*This posting was published first in May 2012 under the title of 'America was Great when America was Socialist.'
It was updated on 5 November 2025
Photo credit:NYC-DSA
The Dream and reimagination has started
A Better New York is possible
A Better US is Possible
A Better World is Possible
On the evening of Tuesday, November 4, 2025, New York was described as a "beacon of hope" following the historic mayoral election victory of Zohran Mamdani, the city's first Muslim and youngest mayor in over a century, an immigrant in the city of immigrants. Zohran was elected with more than 50% of the votes in the biggest turnout since the 1960s.
A Historic Moment
Mamdani’s rise marks a new dawn for American socialism
Photo credit via the BBC
In his victory speech, Mamdani emphasized the city's role in the national political landscape, stating, "If anyone can show a nation betrayed by Donald Trump how to defeat him, it is the city that gave rise to him".
Zohran’s decisive victory is the triumph of light over darkness, hope over fear and despair, unity over hate and division, decency, honesty, values-led politics over populism, cronyism, lies, fakery, corruption, oligarchy and authoritarianism, when the 99% triumphed over the 1% money-men and where democratic socialism won over casino capitalism, individualism, selfishness and greed.
All in all, I am delighted and hopeful for a better future, not only for the New Yorkers, but also for the US and the entire world, now that the New Yorkers have nailed the last nail in the coffin of immoral and evil neoliberalism. They now have defeated the brainwashing idea that there is no alternative to neoliberalism. They celebrated the vision that change for the better is possible.
Let us not forget, America was great, when it was socialist. Please see below what I had noted on this matter over 13 years ago.
Please read it. It is a fascinating story of how we have been sold a false story of America, the Americans and their dreams!
America was Great when America was Socialist
‘How Socialists Built America’
Back When America Was Socialist: When America had a Dream- When America had Values
Photo credit: Berkeley Economic Review
'The history of our nation has many rich and vibrant hues—some of them red.'-John Nichols, executive editor of The Nation
To become great again, America must rediscover its original roots of its greatness: American Democratic Socialism, ideas, sentiments and vision.
“A socialist is just someone who is unable to get over his or her astonishment that most people who have lived and died have spent lives of wretched, fruitless, unremitting toil.”--Terry Eagleton, ‘Ideology: An Introduction’
“To me, what socialism means is to guarantee a basic level of dignity. It’s asserting the value of saying that the America we want and the America that we are proud of is one in which all children can access a dignified education. It’s one in which no person is too poor to have the medicines they need to live.”-- Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Vogue, 2018
Members of the Democratic Socialists of America attending the Occupy Wall Street protests in 2011. Photo credit: Via Wikimedia
“[I]t’s hard for me to believe that, thirty years after I came to America as an idealistic teenager, this is where we are headed. In college I read John Stuart Mill’s On Liberty, which contains the thrilling declaration “If all mankind minus one were of one opinion, and only one person of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind. We seem to have gone, in one generation, from the bracing atmosphere of Mill’s On Liberty to the dark, dank atmosphere of Orwell’s 1984. Hate Week! The Ministry of Truth! The Thought Police! All of this—once the hallmark of faraway socialist regimes—is now familiar. It has become our world.”--Dinesh D’Souza, United States of Socialism
American Democratic Socialism’ Has a Proud, Diverse, and Inspiring History
“Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.” —John Steinbeck
But, then, America has always been at its best, most efficient, when guided by socialist principles
Photo credit:American Democratic Socialism’ Has a Proud, Diverse, and Inspiring History
In an article in the Financial Times ('American socialism’s day in the sun') Edward Luce remarks that:
“To most students of US politics, the phrase American socialism is an oxymoron — like clean coal or the Bolivian navy. A century ago, Werner Sombart, a German scholar, asked “Why is there no socialism in America?” It was a question that confounded Marxists. As the most advanced capitalistic society, the US was most ripe for a proletarian revolution, according to their teleology.”
Then, Luce notes that today’s America is different:
“Leftwing politicians are in electoral retreat across most of the western world. The one exception is the United States. At 15 per cent in the Democratic polls, Bernie Sanders, the senator from Vermont, is riding higher than any US socialist since Eugene Debs ran for the White House a century ago.
The fact that Mr Sanders has very little chance of unseating Hillary Clinton is beside the point. His popularity is dragging her leftward. If he flames out, other left-wingers, such as Martin O’Malley, the former governor of Maryland who entered the race at the weekend, are ready to pick up the baton. Elizabeth Warren, the populist Massachusetts senator, will continue to prod Mrs Clinton from outside the field. The more Mrs Clinton adopts their language, the harder it will be for her to reclaim the centre ground next year. Yet she is only following the crowd. A surprisingly large chunk of Democrats are happy to break the US taboo against socialism.”
I very much agree with Luce. For me, America has always had a socialist economy, at its best, most efficient, when guided by socialist principles. Now, it should also try a bit harder and create a more equality, harmony, justice and well-being for more Americans. "American Dream" can only be realised when it serves the common good.
History of the socialist movement in the United States
Back When America Was Socialist
See below for more:
Face it, the US economy is socialist
“Once you accept the fact that some kind of socialism is part of the US economy, we no longer have to suffer silly debates over whether it is or it not partly socialist. It is.”
…“ By this standard, the US is a socialist country, because to some degree or another, the government has always got involved in the economy: the railroads, the Homestead Act, the power grid, the interstate highway system, and the internet. These are products of the government creating markets or meeting demand, and then getting out of the way to allow capitalism to work. Most in the US wouldn't call this socialism, however. They would call it good governance.
That the US has shepherded the economy in one way or another exemplifies its economy's mixed nature. It's mostly capitalist, but partly socialist when the profit-motive is detrimental to human need. The best example is Medicare. The older you are, the less insurable you are. In a free market, in which government coercion is completely absent from the exchange of commodities and securities, the elderly would die sooner. That's how markets work, and that's why Lyndon Johnson didn't want the elderly to be at the mercy of the markets.”…
Read the article: Face it, the US economy is socialist - Al Jazeera English
For further reading see:
Socialism and the Common Good: New Fabian Essays (Paperback) - Taylor & Francis
‘Democratic socialism is ascending in the United States as a consequence of a widespread recognition that global capitalism works only for a minority and is harming the planet’s ecology. This history of American democratic socialism from its beginning to the present day interprets the efforts of American socialists to address and transform multiple intersecting sites of injustice and harm. Comprehensive, deeply researched, and highly original, this book offers a luminous synthesis of secular and religious socialisms, detailing both their intellectual and their organizational histories.’
Read more and buy the book HERE