The second form of socialism you mentioned isnt socialism, because socialisms is pretty clearly defined and giving money to corporations isnt any part of it. Regulating the financial sector neither is one, because socialism wants to extinguish the financial sector.RuthlessCray wrote:
I don't see Socialism and Corporatism as being opposing forces. There's just different flavors of Socialism. There's socialism for the poor( Take from the rich/middle class and give to the poor), and government run institutions (public school system, socialized medicine etc), and then there's socialism for the rich (govt bailouts of corporations, politicians pandering to the military industrial complex, regulations on the financial sector that crush competition and build up the big corporations, central banking).
It seems like you label pretty much anything socialism that involves regulations and/or statism. Now from an anarchist perspective this might seem true, but i would heavily disagree. There are many systems and ideologies that are statist and regulatory that are vigorously opposed to socialism. Fascism and Corporatism for example.
Socialism teaches that the world is dividedinto classes and that the lower classes need to break their chains. That is one of the most elemental teachings of socialism, not its statism. Its not defined by that. There is Anarchist socialism, democratic socialism, christian socialism etc. Socialism doesnt require statism. Its one possible part of it.
Now fascism teaches survival of the fittest, aristocracy, rule of the rich over the poor. This can coexist very well with capitalism and corporatism, unlike socialism which rules out these things.
Thats why the Chicago boys (Milton Friedman etc.) chose Fascist Chile back in the days for experimenting with their ideology. Because a fascist, corporatist environment is the most fertile soil for their ideas. No regulations for them, no human rights or workers rights that might mess with big capital etc.
Didnt Ronald Reagan deregulate the financial sector in the US leading into skyrocketing debt? And didnt everyone else after him follow suit? Correct me if i am wrong.RuthlessCray wrote: In the US, we have a mixture of both. Either way, it is a statist paradigm..Call it socialism, fascism, corporatism, Left Wing or Right wing, it is still Statist based.
BTW, Neo cons have never been libertarian. Neo cons have always been arch enemies. Their major influence was originally Leo Strauss, and most of them came from the Left, as communists and socialists. They were basically statists leftists that went to the Right during the Vietnam war and cold war. They were all for government control of everything except unlike the Left during that era, the Neo Cons were Pro war.
I really doubt that Neocons were former socialists, because Neocons tend to be heavily christian, something that doesnt mix with being socialist.
From what i remember Strauss coined liberal thought (not as in leftist) and neocons were libertarians capitalists and believed in democracy.
The term Neocon was invented by a socialist to refer to non-socialists, social democrats who were leaning slightly to the right.
Maybe i got it confused, but most of these guys who were labeled neocons in the last 20 years were all for tax cuts, deregulation of the financial sector and so on. Maybe you could call them corporatists then.
Like i said, from a perspective from outside the US, the US has little to no regulation, compared. Over here people dont see the state as a threat. They see it as the best way to organize a society, because it was the state that developed our countries it guaranteed safety compared to the times when there was no state here.RuthlessCray wrote: The US doesn't have a deregulated capitalist system. It has the opposite. (Central banking, hundreds of regulatory agencies overseeing the financial sector, complex tax codes, etc etc)
Those were times of constant strife and kill or be killed mentality.