Separate truth from false socialism

How do you define socialism, especially when it's about a "socialist," Bernie Sanders, one of the most popular candidates for the post of president of the United States? Or the next Prime Minister of Spain a "socialist"?

To start with, real socialism means that the government, representing all the people, owns all the land. Land can not be bought or sold, but only used.

When you build a house, plant an orchard or a wheat field, you create value with your work and the roof on your head or the fruit of the fields belongs to you. But not the earth itself.

How can you own something that you have not created? You built your house so you could sell it, but not the land on which it rests. Without a house, the land itself can not be sold.

The ownership of the land is something foreign to socialism and any society that allows it is not socialist, quite simply. All the earth belongs to all peoples, not to any individual.

There are many other questions to define what real socialism is or not, including the amount of means of production that the government must possess before people lose control of their society.

How is society "democratic" in the true sense of the word? What is the difference between the social strata, the better off and the less affluent?

Another indicator of socialism, a question that gives a kind of false impression of Bernie Sanders, is the free universal education and health care.

National service? Yes, all young adults from a socialist country must begin their life course after the end of their schooling, which was funded by the people, serving the people. By doing their national service, whether it be teachers, doctors, mechanics or soldiers.

Contributing directly to the improvement of society, for the common good, is the first duty of everyone in a socialist country. Simply put, you do not put your life and your family first, you put your community, your collective unity and your protection first.

I lived in Eritrea, a socialist country (although we are not officially one), for 13 years. I see every day the advantages and disadvantages of a society struggling to create a new socialist way of life.

As the President says, we want a rich Eritrea without wealthy Eritreans. This is the culmination of socialism and what some would say would begin to move to the next phase of human development, what Karl Marx calls "communism," in which the "common" people work together for the common "good". One could say that socialism is "of each according to his abilities, of each according to his work" becoming "of each according to his abilities, of each according to his needs" in the last great progress of human progress.

The Eritreans who fought for their independence during the war 30 have lived, perhaps for the first time in history. Everyone shared the same sharing, you did your job, whether it was trenching or logistics at the back for what you needed to survive, your daily bread (boj-boj). Your needs for survival, food, water, shelter, medicine and education were provided by the popular national liberation movement and the money played no role in this most ancient form of modern 'communism'. The planet will need such efforts and sacrifices in the future.

Real socialism will be necessary for the survival of the human species, as the imminent climatic catastrophe will bring about apocalyptic droughts all over the world and unknown famines in the history of mankind. Food security will be the first priority and only socialism bringing together the efforts of all peoples will make it a reality.

Here in Eritrea, the country's socialist leaders have focused on food security as an essential element of national security and have put in place a mbadive policy of water conservation and irrigation since independence.

In our whole country, it is essential not to let rivers run all year round, but we will not survive as a society, because scientists predict droughts, droughts of five or even ten years, that will affect the planet in the years to come. These droughts are caused by climate change caused by humans. The industrialized West is primarily responsible for the damage already done to the environment.

When the main industry of a country is agriculture, as here in Eritrea, and the rains are inadequate, the whole society is paralyzed. Yet those
The climate criminals of the West who are at the origin of this catastrophe blame us and the leaders we support in Eritrea for our poverty, fueled by the crisis they have provoked, the drought.

Recently, with the outbreak of peace in the Horn of Africa, our neighbors sent their leaders here to Eritrea
dams and irrigation projects and all that can and must be done to prepare for the climatic apocalypse caused by the drought and the global famine that will accompany it.

With regard to water conservation and food security, the progress made by Eritrea show the way forward for the rest of Africa. Socialism in action is not empty rhetoric, preparing to meet the needs of the population in the coming years of drought and famine.

In this respect, a genuine socialist society is at the forefront in East Africa. Eritrea is increasingly recognized as a model in many areas, be it triggering peace in favor of food security and self-sufficiency.

The goal is to turn the horn of hunger and war into a horn of peace and abundance. Or at least enough to survive. You know, "Enough, is it full" as the saying goes?

A rich Eritrea without rich Eritreans, I may not see it in my lifetime, but we headed no matter the climate disasters and roadblocks created by the West. This is what is called real socialism and which was paid for the blood and hard work of the Eritrean people, and not for the false type of socialism that Bernie Sanders or the Spanish Prime Minister claims to have been claims.

Thomas C. Mountain is a historian and educator who has been living in Eritrea since 2006.
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