There's a thread here titled "Fascism: What exactly is it and how do you recognize it?". Fascism resists clear defintion. So too, socialism. Or Captialism for that matter. I mean the US isn't really capitalist. The owning class would not allow it. The state in large part protects the ownership classes from the unfettered forces of the markets and/or their own hubris, greed and stupidity. State capitalism? Yeah that's not socialism and I agree with Ruder that large scale worker ownership of the means of production and distribution has never really existed/been allowed to exist.
In a socialist society, workers' councils at the school, hospital, warehouse, and factory level would be essential to give workers a say in the day-to-day running of their workplaces. Each workplace council would also send elected delegates to coordinate decision-making on an industry-wide and economy-wide basis.
Because these delegates would be drawn directly from and accountable to the base, because they would be paid the same as the rest of the workers in that workplace and known by their co-workers, and because they would be recallable if they failed to exercise the will of those who elected them, such councils would give workers the ability to have a real and deciding say in every aspect of society.
I would argue that one essential
aspect of a socialist society would be to provide a not for profit pool of risk to provide medical insurance for all citizens. There is no reason to believe that this could not be done in a way that would be democratic and within the rubric Ruder suggests, as long as we're dreaming. There are many varieties of socialism.
Why have you settled on Ruder's definition which excludes state socialism?
"Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity." - Martin Luther King Jr.
