At a Maryland Street Festival, Socialism Means Something Different to Everyone Asked

At the annual street festival in Takoma Park, Maryland, a city long known as a liberal stronghold, attendees offered sharply different definitions of socialism when asked to explain what the word actually means to them.

“The fact is that there’s no…one answer,” said Nina Gilden Seavey, a documentary filmmaker and self-described historian, when pressed for a definition.

Other festival-goers described socialism in terms of public services. Jenny Sniderman said she considered “public libraries, the police department, the fire department, all our public services, utilities” to be part of what makes up socialism. Jaw Blake described it as programs that are funded collectively and then made available to everyone rather than reserved for a select group.

The disagreement comes as a September Gallup poll found that 43% of Americans now hold a positive image of socialism, the highest share recorded since Gallup began tracking the question in 2010. That survey, however, did not define socialism for respondents or ask whether they would support adopting it as a system in the United States.

Support Thins When Private Property Enters the Picture

When asked directly whether they personally would be willing to surrender private property to government or collective control, several festival-goers expressed hesitation.

“Do I want to give up my private property? Of course I don’t want to give up my private property,” Sniderman said. “Are they going to reimburse me fairly? That would be helpful in making my choice.”

Blake was similarly cautious. “I don’t know that I would necessarily love it,” he said, “but I mean, if it was something that was beneficial, I’d at least consider it.” He added, “Nobody wants what they have to be taken away from them. But there is something to be said about…you can set up things so that they’re available for everybody.”

Seavey raised doubts about government management of assets altogether. “I think the government is not the greatest steward…of assets,” she said. “It’s not to say that capitalism is somehow without flaw, but the fact is that there is an idealism that can come from thinking, ‘Oh, if we had some more centrality, if…there was some kind of uber organization in charge of reallocation.'”

Socialism or Democratic Socialism?

Seavey argued that the growing left-wing movement in American politics should not be labeled socialism at all. “This is not socialism. This is democratic socialism. It’s different. There’s socialism, there’s communism, there are all kinds of ‘isms.’ Democratic socialism is essentially what we have a growing movement in this country,” she said. “Socialism is where there is a massive redistribution of wealth. We are not having redistribution of wealth in this country.”

That characterization sits uneasily alongside the platform of the Democratic Socialists of America, the country’s largest socialist organization, which explicitly calls for redistributing wealth from corporations and wealthy individuals to workers and lower-income Americans, along with public stakes in major corporations and essential industries in place of private ownership.

The confusion at the festival mirrors findings from a 2018 survey in which Americans were asked to define socialism in their own words. Only 17% described it in terms of government ownership or control of businesses or production. Another 23% linked it to equality, 10% pointed to social benefits and services, and nearly a quarter gave no answer at all.

Seavey placed much of the blame for the confusion on political rhetoric itself. “Let’s think about it differently and let’s take away these ridiculous stigmas that have to do with these crazy labels that we have allowed the right wing to foment onto the rest of America,” she said.

The exchange underscores a central tension as self-described socialist candidates gain ground within the Democratic Party ahead of the midterms: favorable polling on the word “socialism” does not resolve whether voters are endorsing specific policies like government ownership of industry, or simply responding to promises about affordability and equality.