The Managerial Revolution: What is Happening in the World

by James Burnham

With the collapse of this argument and these assumptions, the case for the belief that socialism is coming is very slight. Of course, many people would like it to come, and regard socialism as the noblest and best form of society that could be sought as an ideal. But we must not permit our wishes to interfere with a reasoned estimate of the facts. The prediction that socialism is coming could correctly rest only upon a demonstration drawn from contemporary events themselves, upon showing that there are present today in society powerful tendencies, more powerful than any other, toward socialism, that socialism is the most probable outcome of what is happening. And contemporary events show nothing of the kind; they seem to some to do so only because they accept these unjustified assumptions or because they confuse their wishes with reality.