Does Utopian Socialists offer an Attractive Political Reform?
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Utopia is a term invented by Sir Thomas More in 1515. However, he traces the root two Greek words outopia and eutopia which means a place does not exist and a fantasy, invention. It is widely accepted that Plato was to first to picture a utopian order. In his masterpiece, “Republic”, he formed the principles of ideal commonsense and his utopia (Hertzler, 1922:7). After the classical age, Sir Thomas More assumed to be the first of the utopian writers in early modern period. As a humanist, he gave the world in his “Utopia” a vision of a perfect communistic commonwealth (the history of utopian thought). Utopias influence on contemporary and rival scholars is so deep that it has given its name to whole class of literature. Following the appearance of Mores Utopia, there was a lack of Utopian literature for nearly a century (Hertzler, 1922:7). This period ended with the works of Francis Bacon, Campanelle and Harrington. These early modern utopians, being the children of Renaissance, filled with a love of knowledge and high respect for the newly truths of science. Thus, they believed that the common attainment of knowledge means the largest participation of all members of society in its joys and benefits. After the period of early Utopians, continuation of a sprit of French Revolution and initial signs of industrial revolution resulted in the emergence of a new group of Utopians called Socialist Utopians (Hertzler, 1922: 181). The word “Socialism” seems to have been first used by one of the leading Utopian Socialists, St Simon. In politics utopia is a desire that never come true neither now nor afterwards, a wish that is not based on social forces (material conditions and production) and is not supported by the growth and development of political, class forces. This paper discusses the validity of this claim, tries to present and evaluate the political reforms, if any, offered by Socialist Utopians.
In order to assess the degree of appeal for the political reforms offered by the Utopian Socialists, their ideals should be examined from both structural and programmatic point of view. Programmatic point of view helps us to clarify the basis of political reforms of the Utopian Socialists whereas the structural point of view forms the theoretical basis of these practical actions and reform plans.
The period in which the early socialists were formulating their theories covers the development of industrialism which was causing the dislocation to the situation of existing social groups. Furthermore, in this period, a new working class, proletariats, was being created (Goodwin and Taylor, 1982:123). As a result of this process, the social values associated with the past lost much of their relevance and new norms were requested. Thus, the ides of the Utopian Socialists can be seen as a response to these requests.
The response of most Utopian Socialists like Owen, Saint Simon, Fourier and Cabet was the vision of social harmony. Although, this vision is also shared by classical and early modern utopians, the introduction of Newtonian view of the universe as an orderly and integrated order enabled the Utopian Socialist to draw analogies between the social order and Newtons Laws of universe. Harmony implied a view of social relations where members of society live together without conflict and with common interests. Thus, Utopian Socialists presented the future society as a large, happy family. Concept of harmony was broadened to association, community and co-operation by the Utopian Socialists (Goodwin and Taylor, 1982:125). In the early nineteenth century, there was a common voiced by workers for being granted the right to associate for different social and economic purposes. Association promised a range of benefits like better working conditions through the right of bargaining. It was argued that if the labors stopped competing with one another and replaced the competition by the association, there would be a greater security for employment with higher wages. Another important concept of the Socialist Utopians is community. This concept grew out of sense of common living and common identity shared by persons living in diverse locations. The idea of community drives Utopian Socialists and their supporters building up experimental communities like the Owens New Lanark. The third important idea of the Utopian Socialists is Co-operation. Socialist Utopians, specifically Owen and Fourier, believed that Co-operation could offer an alternative mode of organization for the production by aiming to distribute the any resulting income among the producers constituting the Co-operation. The basic motivation for this is claim was to decrease the profit margin of the employers. In another point of view, Co-operation in favors the workers for acquiring their wealth collectively. In short, Utopian Socialists shared the vision of a new community of producers bound together through brotherhood. They opposed to the characteristic feature of their era, greedy individualism. They had equipped well with moralistic overtones and in this sense, they were very dogmatic.
In the following, this paper will try to form the arguments explaining why their political actions and reforms do not provide a promising vision. These arguments can be classified into two groups. The first group consisting of the arguments claiming that Utopian Socialists did not provide a political reform to the society because there was no common concept of political reform claimed by Utopian Socialism. Each Utopian Socialists provided different sets of actions for the realization of the Utopian Socialist ideas and these actions were in conflict with each other. Second group of the arguments claim that Utopian Socialists were just the dreamers. Their ideals were impossible to realize and their actions were impossible to realize by the society.
Although Utopian Socialists agreed on the importance of association, community and co-operation, they did not agree on the steps, constituting their political reform, required to make these qualities operational. They wrote in response to same problems but they proposed different practical recommendations. Thus, diverse practical recommendations