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Political Science Term Paper Human society is a complicated and dynamic environment that changes throughout the course if its development. As these social and economical changes arrive, they usually initiate the formation of new political regimes that are aimed at accommodating those changes. Modern history provides us with numerous examples of such regimes and tendencies, such as liberalism, conservatism, fascism, communism and many others. We are going to investigate what every regime has to offer to the society and how these ideologies are related to each other. In order to be able to compare between these different political systems, we have to have a good understanding of what each one of them actually is, so we are going to take a closer look at some of them. Liberalism is probably one of a few movements that passed the testing with time, although it did evolve to accommodate the realities of the modern society.
Liberal movement originated in the nineteenth century, among the European bourgeois, and this was considered to be a phenomenon at the time. The main postulates of the ideal liberalism, developed and supported by such people as John Locke, Adam Smith, Jean-Jacque Rousseau and Voltaire were reduction in the authority of the church and aristocracy and formation of a democratic society with no radical differences in distribution of wealth. However, the revolutions of 1848 that took place in France showed the hypocritical side of liberalism of those times. By joining the aristocracy in their attempt to suppress the uprising and supporting monarchism, the liberals belied their main idea of a democratic society.
Liberalism today is very different from its original idea, but the foremost conceptions personal liberties, individual choice and economical ambitions still remain unchanged. Another direction in politics worth mentioning is conservatism. Conservatism is defined as a desire to maintain what has been in the face of what will be (Bronner), although it is often viewed as a simple reaction against any type of reforms. Conservatism first emerged as a natural response to the revolutionary tendencies, popular in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Conservatism was quite natural for the aristocracy of the time who did not want to lose their high status and so resisted any change that could result in the loss of their privileges. Francois de Chateaubriand was one of the first people who defined the main ideas of conservatism, such as the conservation of values and tradition from generation to generation.
In the modern world, conservatism often takes such forms as McCarthyism in America during the Cold War, which was a response to the increasing influence of communist countries. A movement which was entirely different from the two described above is socialism. Its main difference and the defining quality was that it was founded by the working class and not by aristocrats or the bourgeoisie. It rose in the eighteenth century, probably provoked by the supporters of liberalism who preached the need for the formation of a democratic society. When liberalism failed to fulfill its promised goals, the socialistic movement started to form. Its goals and ideas were somewhat similar to those of the liberalism, but with a higher accent on equal opportunities.
The fact that socialism was founded by the labor force and not by bourgeoisie explains this difference. The main manifestation of democratic socialism was probably Marxism, although it spawned a large number of other movements, such as communism. Communism was probably one of the largest branches that came out of the social democracy movement. Although associated with Soviet Union and Russian Empire by most people, communism was originally founded in France, and it acquired its name from the Paris Commune.
But it was actually the Russian empire where separate communist movements were brought together and directed to one aim by Lenin. His supporters were called Bolsheviks and their aim was to realize the social democracy in the conditions posed by the Russian empire of that time. One of the big differences between Russia and other countries was that the working class was a minority in Russia and peasants formed the largest class. Lenin also had very radical views on how the social democracy should enter the stage, being a supporter of a theory that the ground for the social revolution should be prepared by the political reform, the views that resulted in the Russian revolution. The orthodox Marxism was perverted by Lenin supporters, resulting in the formation of the Party and the totalitarian state. Fascism if often likened to communism, probably due to the military inclination of both movements.
To some extent, fascism can be considered to be a radical form of conservatism and some values preached by these movements are very similar, for example the opposition to socialistic and liberal movements. The key characteristics of the fascism movements in the modern society were the exercise of absolute power by its leaders, anti-Semitism and the formation of a common idea, which was nothing but a myth. This movement was built on emotion rather than logic and exploited such human trend as the lust for supremacy. Fascism movement became stronger than ever in Germany, during the period that followed the WWI.
The conditions that existed in the country at the time provided a fertile soil for the cultivation of this movement, and, as the result of this, the Nazi movement came to power. Comparing the entire political and social movements can be a very complicated matter, for some of them existed in completely different epochs and formed as the result of different social and economical conditions. Nevertheless, the generalized policies and values advocated by these movements can be contrasted against each other and the similarities can be found. Liberalism and conservatism are probably two movements that are hardest to compare. At the times when liberalism was founded, it was in direct opposition to conservatism. Liberalists demanded for the change in the social environment, for the liberation of working classes from the post-feudal regime, for the cessation of aristocracy as a class.
All these things were of primary value to conservators at the time. However, today, when the society is quite liberal, conservator try to ensure that it stays this way. A good example of this is the emergence of McCarthyism in the post-war period. Liberalism and socialism are two movements, which are quite close. Socialism can even be said to have been initiated by liberals. Both movements praise the value of personal liberties, equality, elimination of extreme classes, such as the elite.
However, certain differences exist between these movements and liberals have been known to betray the values that they preach in the past, during the revolutions of 1848, when liberals helped to suppress the formation of the republique democratique et sociale. The main cause for that was the fear that the supporters of the socialistic movements would demolish the right to private property, something which was an important concept of liberalism but was opposed by socialism. Socialism and communism are often mistaken for one thing by people who are uneducated in the matter. Although communism was essentially based on the same ideology as socialism, it changed quite radically throughout the course of its development. Communism promoted the formation of a totalitarian state, which, in the end, wasnt that different from monarchy. Both communism and socialism advertised the equality of classes, but the idea did not work well with communism.
A good example of that is what happened in the Soviet Union. The Party, which was supposed to play the role of a communist government and direct the distribution of goods, became the elite minority, thus forming something that socialism rejects. Communism has quite a few similarities with fascism. Both movements formed the totalitarian states. Both movements were highly militarized. Communism and fascism were very idealistic, when almost entire nations supported the conceptions.
Both of them always had key figures, which were Lenin and Stalin for the Soviet Union and Adolph Hitler for Germany. A large proportion of the population of the Unites States of America even associated these two movements during the age of Cold War. Although there are many similarities between these two, there are also significant differences. Fascism did not try to average the population to one class, as it was done with communism. Fascism also promoted racism, which was not officially accepted by communists. Conservatism and fascism is another pair which is very hard to compare, for the same reason as in comparison of conservatism and liberalism.
The idea of what has to be conserved changes with time, as the society develops. At the time when fascism became a popular tendency, conservatism supported it for a number of reasons. Firstly, they shared some values, such as the proclamation of the existence of the elite. Secondly, at the time it was the choice between the authoritarian right committed to antidemocratic values and republican regimes with a social democratic mass base (Bronner), which conservatism opposed. If fascism movement became popular today, conservatism would probably stand in opposition to it. Marxism was the idealized version of socialism, something that was good in theory, but would be impossible to build in reality.
Various works of Karl Marx, such as Capital, were taken up as a bible by communists and socialists. Just like the Bible, Marxism has a large number of different tract ations, which lead to the formation of these different branches, i. e. western socialism and communism. The differences between these two are discussed above. Post structuralism / post modernism is a philosophical approach that arose in the last quarter of the twentieth century.
From certain point of view, it can be seen as a logical development of socialism and liberalism, because it uses certain concepts advertised by these movements for its foundation. Post structuralism promotes the obliteration of the elite, but it does not support the idea of the whole society being averaged, as the socialism does. On the contrary, post modernists argue that every group of people who are brought together by shared values, such as various minority groups, should be able to express their own opinion as opposed to having a common representative for all these groups. This should ensure that they wont be ignored by the public. Bibliography Bronner, Stephen Eric. Ideas in Action: Political Tradition in the Twentieth Century.
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