Socialism: Utopian and Scientific

A distinction between "scientific socialism" and "utopian socialism" was one of the basic ideas of Marxism. According to Karl Marx, utopian socialists were those who aimed at demonstrating that conditions in a socialist society would be incomparably more satisfactory than those of existing social conditions. Utopian socialists attempt to bring about the transition to socialism by convincing people that socialism is in every respect more desirable than the system of private ownership of the means of production. Marx rejected such views as fallacious. He asserted that socialism will not come because people may prefer it; but because, as be had discovered and revealed, historical evolution necessarily and inevitably leads to the establishment of socialism. From this viewpoint, Marxian socialists claim the term "scientific" for themselves, while disparaging the older socialist authors as "utopian" dreamers.

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