It was Pope Leo XIII, I believe, who declared that no one could at the same time be a Catholic and a true Socialist. A previous poster said that “Socialism” is not a precise term because people use it to mean different things. Yet Pope Leo used the term. What did he mean by that?
In the encyclical “Rerum Novarum”, Leo XIII took up the notion of socialism, along with that of capitalism and compared those to the Church’s own views.
The principal thrust of Leo XIII’s analysis (shared by later popes) is not negative but positive. He recognized that, in some way, all people are in need. That’s just how life is. In meeting those needs, he said, the remedial agent most proximate to the need is the proper one to relieve the need. Therefore, for example, if my child is hungry, I should not rely on the neighbors, the Church, the city or the county or the state or the nation to feed my child if I can feed my child myself. Nor should those more distant entities undertake the task if I can do it, because it encourages me to neglect my duty to my child and encourages both me and my child to become dependant on distant entities to do that which we would be more moral in doing ourselves. That’s called “subsidiarity”.
Socialism, when you cut away all the details and differences, is one thing. It is using the coercive power of the state to redistribute goods contrary to what the marketplace would do. The marketplace insists that if I want something someone else has produced, I must give for it something of reasonably equal value that I have produced for it. Since “swapping” is unhandy, we use money as a “symbol” of the production and trade that.
Socialism would simply be market economics if it did that,but it doesn’t. It insists that what I produce be given to another who has not produced something of reasonably equal value, and that I must give it and not receive value for it. So, it’s an involuntary servitude, to a degree. Since people don’t usually want to do that, they must be forced to do it by the power of the state. Ultimately, the power of the state depends on its power to incarcerate or kill me, because one or the other happens if I resist sufficiently to get it to that point.
That conflicts with the Church’s position in several ways. The most important is that it’s contrary to “subsidiarity”. The capable entity most proximate to the need is not generally the level of government that has the power to incarcerate or kill me, but is far down the scale from that. Nor, under “subsidiarity” does coercion necessarily have to be involved. Take food again. One has to get to at least the state level in the U.S. before reaching an entity with the power to coerce my neighbor to give my child something for nothing under pain of incarceration or death, when I, myself, may be the most proximate entity capable of doing it. But socialism takes it a step further and puts the duty on the highest and most removed entity immediately; the national government.
Furthermore, when my child depends on the national government for his existence, he becomes a creature of the state and the pupil of the state, not of his family, friends, Church, and so on.
The child learns the values of the state, not that of family, friends, Church, etc., and it is destructive to everything in between. If I get used to the idea that the national government will feed my child, I am encouraged to neglect my natural and moral duties to the child, and so on. In doing that, I also become a dependant of the state and subject to its will more than would otherwise be the case.
That is not to say that Pope Leo XIII felt no one should help my child if I cannot. But he did say the next most proximate competent entity should then do it. Neighborhood, Church, city, etc. Only when none of them can do it effectively should the highest entities of government do it.
But, Leo XIII felt, and being very distrustful of resorting to dependency on large entities of any kind, whether government, big business or anything like them, that certain provisions should be made for those in need who cannot help themselves and who cannot be helped by more proximate entities. If, say, disabled people simply cannot be provided for in any other way, then it is the duty of the state to provide decently for them, and if coercion is unavoidable, then it must resort to it in order to protect human dignity. Then, and only then, can the state, in effect, violate voluntary associations (the market) and cause me to give what I produce to someone who does not reciprocate to the economy.
The problems, then, with socialism, is that it is a concept that resorts to high-end coercion right off, in order to meet needs as it sees them regardless of the ability of more proximate entites to do it, sweeps aside voluntarism in principle, and tends to exact agreement with its dicta in other ways because it can, all others being dependant on it. It’s the concept, not the particular small applications, that is the problem.
As applied, socialism tends to provide things routinely that can be provided more proximately, and arrogates to itself, increasingly, the role of doing it. That, to me, and to the Church, is why what is commonly termed “middle class welfare” is wrong. If, say, my parents and I are capable of working to put me through college, even if it takes more effort than it might for someone else, and even if it takes longer, then it is wrong for the government to step in and guarantee a free college education for everyone.
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Isn’t better education for better scorers better than better education for better payers? Some people were able to get the kind of education they’d never get in a capitalist system. Obviously, with a better management than the communist system provides for, the quality of education - at least as far as the tech, presentational means, rooms etc, as far as such things go, would be better. Student loans could be arranged for. And it’s surely not bad if people can spend money on education by choice even if they score poorly. But I’ll insist that the test and entry exam system wasn’t altogether bad.