Market Socialism on the 12 Axes

Economists Oskar Lange and Abba Lerner proposed market socialism in the 1930s as an answer to claims that socialism could not calculate prices. Yugoslavia under Tito built the best-known real system from the 1950s: workers' councils managed enterprises that competed in markets, and Hungary's New Economic Mechanism of 1968 moved in a similar direction. Later thinkers such as John Roemer and David Schweickart designed models based on worker cooperatives and public banks, and the Mondragon cooperatives in Spain are often cited as a working example. Market socialism differs from state socialism and Leninism by rejecting central planning, and from social democracy by changing who owns firms rather than only taxing and regulating private capital. Compared with mutualism, it accepts a public sector and a democratic state.

• Social Democracy 83%Social democracy accepts a market economy and parliamentary democracy but uses taxes, strong unions, regulation and a broad welfare state to reduce inequality and protect workers.
• Libertarian Socialism 81%Libertarian socialism is a broad family of ideas that combines social ownership of the economy with radical democracy and personal freedom, rejecting both capitalism and authoritarian state socialism.
• Democratic Socialism 80%Democratic socialism aims to replace capitalism with social ownership of the economy, reached and governed through elections, civil liberties and multiparty democracy instead of revolution or one-party rule.
• Social Liberalism 79%Social liberalism holds that individual freedom requires real opportunity, so it pairs a market economy and civil liberties with public education, healthcare and social insurance.