One Inherent Contradition of Socialism

"But what socialists seriously contemplate the equal division of existing capital resources among the people of the world? They all regard the captial as belonging not to humanity but to the nation - though even within nation few would dare to advocate that the richer regions should be deprived of some of "their" capital equipment in order to help the poorer regions. What socialists proclaim as a duty toward the fellow-members of the existing states they are not prepared to grant to the foreigner..."

"One of the inherent contradictions of the collectivist philosophy is that, while basing itself on the humanistic morals which individualism has developed, it is practicable only within a relatively small group. That socialism so long as it remains theoretical is internationalist, while as soon as it is put into practice, whether in Russia or in Germany, it becomes violently nationalistic, is one of the reasons why "liberal socialism" as most people in the Western world imagine it is purely theoretical, while the practice of socialism everywhere if totalitarian. Collectivism has no room for the wide humanitrianism of liberalism but only for the narrow particularism of of the totalitarian."

- pp. 155-156 The Road to Serfdom by F.A. Hayek