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Social murder (German : sozialer Mord) is a concept used to describe an unnatural death that is believed to occur due to social, political, or economic oppression, instead of direct violence. Originally coined in 1845 by German philosopher Friedrich Engels, it has since been used by left-wing politicians, journalists and activists to describe deaths they attribute to larger social forces.
The term "social murder" was first introduced by Friedrich Engels in his 1845 work The Condition of the Working-Class in England with regard to the English city of Manchester in the Victorian era. Engels used the term after describing how societal conditions such as poverty, poor housing, and dangerous working conditions have resulted in avoidable excess mortality among the working class. He also argued that those conditions were the results of inherent exploitation and pursuit of profit under the capitalist system. In his opinion, at fault was "the class which at present holds social and political control" (i.e. the bourgeoisie), who placed hundreds of proletarians in a position where they inevitably met an early and unnatural death. According to Engels, this type of death was in a different category to murder and manslaughter committed by individuals against one another, as social murder explicitly was committed by the political and social elite against the poorest in society. [1]
When one individual inflicts bodily injury upon another such that death results, we call the deed manslaughter; when the assailant knew in advance that the injury would be fatal, we call his deed murder. But when society places hundreds of proletarians in such a position that they inevitably meet a too early and an unnatural death, one which is quite as much a death by violence as that by the sword or bullet; when it deprives thousands of the necessaries of life, places them under conditions in which they cannot live – forces them, through the strong arm of the law, to remain in such conditions until that death ensues which is the inevitable consequence – knows that these thousands of victims must perish, and yet permits these conditions to remain, its deed is murder just as surely as the deed of the single individual; disguised, malicious murder, murder against which none can defend himself, which does not seem what it is, because no man sees the murderer, because the death of the victim seems a natural one, since the offence is more one of omission than of commission. But murder it remains. [1]
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In the 21st century, the term social murder reemerged in response to growing social and health inequalities seen around the world. [2] For example, British Politician John McDonnell used the term to describe Conservative economic policy as well as events such as the 2017 Grenfell Tower fire. [3] [4] [5] York University professor Dennis Raphael used it to describe Conservative public policy in Ontario, Canada. [6]
Canadian economists Robert Chernomas and Ian Hudson of the University of Manitoba used the term to refer to conservative economics in their book Social Murder: And Other Shortcomings of Conservative Economics released in 2007.
An article published in Critical Social Policy in 2018, sociologist Chris Grover of Lancaster University writes that social security austerity in Great Britain, which imposes hardships on the mental and physical well-being of working class people, has resulted in "social murder" with increases in suicides, deaths from malnutrition and people dying on the streets. [7] [8] In 2021, the BMJ executive editor Kamran Abbasi used the term to describe governmental policy which he proposed had failed to control the COVID-19 pandemic. [9]
Author and journalist Chris Hedges claims "ruling elites" are the "architects of social murder" by accelerating ecological collapse and climate change:
What is taking place is not neglect. It is not ineptitude. It is not policy failure. It is murder. It is murder because it is premeditated. It is murder because a conscious choice was made by the global ruling classes to extinguish life rather than protect it. It is murder because profit, despite the hard statistics, the growing climate disruptions and the scientific modeling, is deemed more important than human life and human survival. [10]
In the United Kingdom, consistent cuts of healthcare and public services spending, together with a push towards privatized jobs with poor conditions, are argued to be the same kind of consequences that Engels saw in the 1840s. [11]
During the 2024 Spanish floods, the World Socialist Web Site criticized the Spanish governments' actions, describing them as social murder. [12]
After the December 2024 killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, an opinion piece by New York Intelligencer argued that the company's policies and practices related to denying coverage for essential medical treatments fall under the concept of social murder, also noting that it could have potentially contributed as a motive for the attack. As they put it in their piece, "UnitedHealthcare does not pull a trigger and shoot its victims in the street. Instead, they suffer and may die of cancer, or of heart disease, or of some other treatable condition". [13]
Karl Marx was a German-born philosopher, political theorist, economist, historian, sociologist, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. His best-known works are the 1848 pamphlet The Communist Manifesto and his three-volume Das Kapital (1867–1894); the latter employs his critical approach of historical materialism in an analysis of capitalism, in the culmination of his intellectual endeavours. Marx's ideas and their subsequent development, collectively known as Marxism, have had enormous influence on modern intellectual, economic and political history.
Friedrich Engels was a German philosopher, political theorist, historian, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. He was also a businessman and Karl Marx's lifelong friend and closest collaborator, serving as a leading authority on Marxism.
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State Socialism was a set of social programs implemented in the German Empire that were initiated by Otto von Bismarck in 1883 as remedial measures to appease the working class and detract support for socialism and the Social Democratic Party of Germany following earlier attempts to achieve the same objective through Bismarck's Anti-Socialist Laws. As a term, it was coined by Bismarck's liberal opposition to these social welfare policies, but it was later accepted by Bismarck. This did not prevent the Social Democrats from becoming the biggest party in the Reichstag by 1912. According to historian Jonathan Steinberg, "[a]ll told, Bismarck's system was a massive success—except in one respect. His goal to keep the Social Democratic Party out of power utterly failed. The vote for the Social Democratic Party went up and by 1912 they were the biggest party in the Reichstag".
Marxism is a political philosophy and method of socioeconomic analysis. It uses a dialectical and materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to analyse class relations, social conflict, and social transformation. Marxism originates with the works of 19th-century German philosophers Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Marxism has developed over time into various branches and schools of thought, and as a result, there is no single, definitive "Marxist theory". Marxism has had a profound effect in shaping the modern world, with various left-wing and far-left political movements taking inspiration from it in varying local contexts.
Economic progressivism or fiscalprogressivism is a political and economic philosophy incorporating the socioeconomic principles of social democrats and political progressives. These views are often rooted in the concept of social justice and have the goal of improving the human condition through government regulation, social protections and the maintenance of public goods. It is not to be confused with the more general idea of progress in relation to economic growth.
Criticism of capitalism typically ranges from expressing disagreement with particular aspects or outcomes of capitalism to rejecting the principles of the capitalist system in its entirety. Criticism comes from various political and philosophical approaches, including anarchist, socialist, Marxist, religious, and nationalist viewpoints. Some believe that capitalism can only be overcome through revolution while others believe that structural change can come slowly through political reforms. Some critics believe there are merits in capitalism and wish to balance it with some form of social control, typically through government regulation.
The social determinants of health (SDOH) are the economic and social conditions that influence individual and group differences in health status. They are the health promoting factors found in one's living and working conditions, rather than individual risk factors that influence the risk or vulnerability for a disease or injury. The distribution of social determinants is often shaped by public policies that reflect prevailing political ideologies of the area.
Communism is a sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology within the socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a socioeconomic order centered around common ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange that allocates products to everyone in society based on need. A communist society would entail the absence of private property and social classes, and ultimately money and the state.
The National Health Service (NHS) is the umbrella term for the publicly funded healthcare systems of the United Kingdom, comprising the NHS in England, NHS Scotland and NHS Wales. Health and Social Care in Northern Ireland was created separately and is often locally referred to as "the NHS". The original three systems were established in 1948 as part of major social reforms following the Second World War. The founding principles were that services should be comprehensive, universal and free at the point of delivery. Each service provides a comprehensive range of health services, provided without charge for residents of the United Kingdom apart from dental treatment and optical care. In England, NHS patients have to pay prescription charges; some, such as those aged over 60, or those on certain state benefits, are exempt.
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The United Kingdom government austerity programme was a fiscal policy that was adopted for a period in the early 21st century following the era of the Great Recession. Coalition and Conservative governments in office from 2010 to 2019 used the term, and it was applied again by many observers to describe Conservative Party policies from 2021 to 2024, during the cost of living crisis. With the exception of the short-lived Truss ministry, the governments in power over the second period did not formally re-adopt the term. The two austerity periods are separated by increased spending during the COVID-19 pandemic. The first period was one of the most extensive deficit reduction programmes seen in any advanced economy since the Second World War, with emphasis placed on shrinking the state, rather than consolidating fiscally as was more common elsewhere in Europe.
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