On account of the great variety of meaning in which the term socialism is used it is not easy precisely to define its relation to democracy. Whether socialism is to be regulated as the extension of democracy to economic life or not depends upon the sense which the two terms are employed.
Those who take equality to be the central and most vital constituent part of the democratic faith and define socialism as a comprehensive movement aiming at the creation of social condition in which there will be a m0fl just and equitable distribution of wealt- and all individuals will find equal opportunities to utilize and enjoy the native faculties would whole hearted! endorses the view that socialism is our application of the democratic principle of equality to economic life.
But if class war is regarded as key note of socialism resulting in the dictatorship of the Poletrait, it is evident it cannot have much to do wit: democracy. There are also persons who identifying socialism with an attempt to regiment life accuse it of being destructive of individual liberty arc therefore of being anti-democratic.
The capitalists in Great Britain, America France and other so called democratic countries did not discover anything remotely resembling democracy in communist Russia. Such view may however be regarded as one sided understanding socialism as an indictment of capitalism in which those who own and control the material means of production are in a position not only to exploit the landless and propertyless wage earner but also to yield immense political power in the state and as movement for the replacement, of the present capitalistic order by new social order in which there will be the maximum of justice and equality in the economic and political spheres.
ADVERTISEMENTS:
One can answer the given question in the affirmative. Liberty, equality and fraternity constitute the democratic faith. In so far as socialism aims at ultimately abolishing the present most unequal and
Another argument may be advanced to show that socialism may justly be regained as an extension of the people. It is a form of government in which ultimate power resides in the masses.
Experience of the working of democratic constitution in capitalistic states like England and America shows that in world to today political power tends to fall into the hands of those who yield economic power.
It was therefore realised that so long as land and capital continue to be owned privately by a few individuals there shall be no real freedom for the masses and therefore no true democracy. The only way to have genuine democracy in the political sphere is to have economic equality is one of the fundamentals of socialism is an application of the democratic principle to economic life.