Socialism has acquired an appeal that few would have imagined a decade ago. Bernie Sanders’s near success as a presidential candidate seemed like a one-off. But now, self-declared socialists are winning elections.
The appeal isn’t surprising. Americans are experiencing anxieties about housing, health care, the economy, and technology. Some feel helpless. Socialists offer a deceptively simple explanation: Powerful corporations and wealthy Americans have rigged the system. And they offer equally simple solutions: Take power from the powerful, take their money, and use government to give people what they want. It’s a hero’s journey worthy of Hollywood.
But the interesting question isn’t why socialism has gained momentum, but what kind of world it assumes: Are prosperity and comfort things government can design from above? Or do they emerge only when people have the freedom to choose and pursue their own ambitions?
Adam Smith warned us about visions of top-down prosperity over 250 years ago. In The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Smith called the would-be planner a “man of system”: someone so confident in his own wisdom and design for society that he forgets that the people he proposes to direct have their own minds and purposes. They respond well to incentives, but not to dictates.
Sadly, today’s progressives fail to see themselves in Smith’s words. Consider Michigan Democratic U.S. Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed, who recently declared himself a capitalist and invoked Adam Smith to explain why. His Smith is chiefly an enemy of monopoly: Concentrated businesses exploit workers and consumers, requiring governments to restrain them.