Arguments for Socialism

by Paul Cockshott, David Zachariah

This book is made up of a collection of pieces written by the two of us over the period since the fall of the Berlin wall and the crisis of the European socialist movement brought on in its wake. They record an attempt to argue through the theoretical challenges this period has posed:
- Why did both Leninist communism and social democracy come to crisis?
- What were the economic weaknesses of both and what economic policy should a future socialist movement adopt to overcome these?
- How can the struggle for popular democracy be integrated into the goals of a new movement?

Genres: Politics, Economics, Theory, Nonfiction

226 pages, Paperback

First published December 31, 2011

About the author

Paul Cockshott was a computer scientist at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland.

Reviews

[Jason P · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed this collection of essays. I think many of their arguments are very strong and I'd like to see them more popular among the left. I especially like how they provide a degree of scientific rigor which is lost in most of the contemporary left. The section on Venezuela is very interesting, but unfortunately it was written before the economic disaster. It however does seem to suggest alternatives that Chavez and Maduro could have pursued to avoid disaster, but they of course did not.