In this short clip, the Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Žižek explains a distinction that puzzles many people: why he calls himself a communist but not a socialist. Žižek, one of the most widely discussed left-wing thinkers of recent decades, argues that socialism, as it is usually understood today, has become a form of managed capitalism, a system that softens inequality without challenging the underlying order. Communism, in his view, means something more radical: a break with that order altogether, and a rethinking of how society, property and power are organised.
The video captures Žižek at his most provocative, using jokes, paradoxes and references to history and popular culture to make a serious philosophical point. He is not defending the communist regimes of the twentieth century, and he is often sharply critical of them. His argument is that the word communism still names a real alternative, a horizon beyond the present system, while socialism has become too comfortable with the world as it is.
For viewers, the clip is a useful introduction to Žižek’s thinking, and to a wider debate on the left about what words such as socialism and communism actually mean today, and whether either can still describe a future worth wanting.