CCC 2425** The Church has rejected the totalitarian and atheistic ideologies associated in modem times with “communism” or “socialism.” She has likewise refused to accept, in the practice of “capitalism,” individualism and the absolute primacy of the law of the marketplace over human labor.** Regulating the economy solely by centralized planning perverts the basis of social bonds; regulating it solely by the law of the marketplace fails social justice, for “there are many human needs which cannot be satisfied by the market.” Reasonable regulation of the marketplace and economic initiatives, in keeping with a just hierarchy of values and a view to the common good, is to be commended.
No one has a response to this?
I’ll have a crack…
You have underlined and emboldened two sentences.
The first sentence states, rather categorically, that the Church rejects the totalitarian and atheistic ideologies associated in modern times with “communism” and “socialism”.
In that sentence the Church is pointing out that atheism is a part of socialism and communism. She must reject atheism, so therefore, she must reject communism and socilaism. However, the Church also says she rejects the totalitarianism associated with both socialism and communism and which is also associated with atheism. Considering how socialism is intermediate between capitalism and communism, and the latter is, by definition, totalitarian, then the Church must also rightly reject socialism.
I don’t think anyone here has yet attempted a definition of socialism. There just isn’t one single definition, but it describes the varying degrees to which the ownership of the means of production are owned by a government. According to the marxists and leninists, it is the intermediate stage between capitalism and communism. In laymans terms, socilaism gives more economic and social power to authority and that is what the Church is making a stand against.
The second sentence emboldened and underlined states that, within capitalism, the Church has refused to accept individualism and the absolute primacy of the law of the marketplace over human labor. I take it “refuses to accept” is equivalent to “rejected”.
I find it rather contradictory that the Church rejects the rule of the marketplace over labor, yet is against the control by government of the other factors of production. If it is OK for government to interfere in the market place for setting a value on labor, then why is it not OK for governments to interfere with the markets for the other factors of production?
At the same time the Church rejects the primacy of “individualism” in the marketplace. This, I think, is the key to making sense of what the Church is saying. If anyone has read david Ricardo’s theories of economics, they would also probably know that his theories underpinned Karl Marx’s theories. Ricardo theorised that the market place would ultimately drive down wages and Marx capitalised on that observation. Of course, Ricardo’s theory was tempered by other observations regarding value and comparitaive advantage. The main point to be made is, if the creed of “individualism” was not such a strong one in western society, then it wouldn’t really matter what the market place did to the fluctuations of wages. Families and communities would step into the breach to support those whose wages had taken a hit.
Regulation of the marketplace for labor in a capitalist economy actually reinforces, artificially, the notion of “individulaism”.
I have support from the pope and Reinhard Marx. Of course, there are other options, but I find it most compatible with Catholicism and some of my views others might not have. After all, I am biased towards Germany.