The Socialism of Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow

State socialism—once upon a time called (the only) “really existing socialism”—was undoubtedly a process that shaped the history of humankind during the twentieth century. Its flaws concerning freedoms and rights were early and widely acknowledged. Nevertheless, its military, economic, and technological achievements in the URSS seemed to ensure its future, which—for many people among which some of its critics—could include some kind of liberalization. It was possible to think that the combination of the expansion of productive forces with improvements of social relations would end by shaping state socialism as a stronger and more desirable system than capitalism, thus confirming in the long run Marxist prediction and moreover the hopes of a better future awakened in so many people by socialist proposals. Possible socialism was perhaps not a contradiction in itself, as so many had believed before 1917.