Authority and Inequality under Capitalism and Socialism: U. S. A., U. S. S. R., and China

9780198285403

019828540X

In any modern state, the systems of authority and inequality can largely be traced to two main sources: the set of political and social institutions, buttressed by cultural beliefs, that prevailed prior to industrialization, and the form of authority and social inequality that industrialization itself promotes. In this stimulating and suggestive survey, a renowned scholar uses a historical approach to describe and analyze the principal similarities and differences in the systems of authority and inequality in three powerful nations--the United States, the Soviet Union, and China--and explores prospects for a free and rational society in the foreseeable future. Moore concludes that the tyranny of socialism with its omnipresent bureaucracies, and the shortcomings of liberal capitalism with its widespread unemployment, have created a partial moral vacuum that is being filled by religious fundamentalism, chauvinism, and even terrorism.