Introduction

This volume continues the exploration begun in Secularist, Religious and Scientistic Socialism: Red Faith I of how socialist ideologies have related to religious and secular belief systems. Through a series of historical and typological case studies, Humanist Socialism and the Religion of Socialism : Red Faith II traces how different thinkers have understood socialism as a humanist and as a new type of religion, “the Religion of Socialism”. Each chapter examines socialist, sceptical, and scholarly perspectives, while the final section evaluates previous research to ask: how should the relationship between socialism and faith be conceptualised, and who among the scholars has been right – if anyone?