African Socialism Re-Examined

Abstract

Socialism has collapsed. The ideology is in utter chaos in eastern Europe. The Soviet Union is in none too happy condition either. Sharp edges of the ideological conflict between the two global systems have been blunted. Disarray was a gradual process which culminated in the events of 1989 in East Europe. Many have argued that there is no room any more for socialist thrust as the system had failed to deliver the goods. The bipolarisation of the world appears to be gradually fading. Meanwhile the market forces demonstrated their world wide application.

President Gorbachev's thought process embodied in the concepts like ‘glasnost’ and ‘perestroika’ unleased a revolutionary wave whose ripples reached far and wide. The declining Socialist surge had in turn led to increasing boost to the ideals like political pluralism. The pertinent point is whether the euphoria generated in the west by the sudden and unexpected turn of events in the eastern block of countries is really suggestive of the collapse of socialist thought and all that went with it. However, this writer believes that all is not over; what has happened is that only a particular variant of socialism has lost its luster. May be socialism in its extreme form has run amuck. It was the failure of its rapid ideological phase, its totalitarian and bureaucratic bungling.

At initial stages of Socialism in Russia and China and Eastern Europe it was a triumphant march. It eliminated feudalism, created more equal society and a basic industrial structure next only to United States. But it encountered situations that Marx and Lenin did not forsee. Any ideology that moves away from its central moorings can be counter-productive.