Embracing Socialism

Recent history has not been kind to the ideas of “socialism” and “tradition.” The collapse of communism in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union— “the only existing socialism” according to some friends and foes alike—seems to make socialism an obvious candidate for the dustbin of history. The rhetoric of conservative troglodytes—as at last year’s Republican Convention— illustrates Max Horkheimer’s remark, “Precisely the fact t...