Modern Catholicism is slandered by many for some of its reactionary adherents, but many of these slanders are completely false or undeserved. Despite those people’s arguments, Catholicism is much more left-wing than we give it credit for — at least economically — with differing Catholic ideologies setting themselves apart from ones currently in use. One of the ideologies I want to cover is Distributism, a 19th century ideology strongly rooted in Catholic social teaching.
What is Distributism?
Distributism is an ideology and an economic theory that wants the means of production to be ‘spread as widely as possible’, not through collective ownership like in socialism, but instead by every worker holding a stake in their company so the means of production are not accumulated by megacorporations. It was developed by Catholic thinkers in opposition to both capitalism’s terrible conditions in the 19th century, and the violent revolutionary socialism that was often anti-theist. For example, Pope Leo XIII wrote Rerum Novarum, a letter distributed to all bishops to address the terrible conditions the working classes were in due to mass exploitation in capitalism. This inspired corporatism and distributism. Some of these distributists, like Dorothy Day, were influenced by left-wing economic theories like the mutualism of Pierre-Joseph Proudhon.
Contrary to socialism, distributism is pro-private property. Distributists believe that not all property should be distributed, only property that produces wealth. G.K. Chesterton, a distributist writer, wrote that “Property is merely the art of the democracy. It means that every man should have something that he can shape in his own image, as he is shaped in the image of heaven. But because he is not God, but only a graven image of God, his self-expression must deal with limits; properly with limits that are strict and even small.” Some distributists don’t just want to distribute the means of production, they want to redistribute wealth, subsidize small businesses, and tax excessive property ownership. They advocate for a guild system, yes, like a medieval-type guild system, and favor mutual banking institutions.
On the social teaching, they advocate for what you would expect in Catholicism: the traditional family unit, the state propping up family ownership, and banning abortion.
Could it be implemented?
In theory, yes, but many distributists (Belloc, for example) thought that their ideology wouldn’t carry on. Distributism is very hard to implement and would most likely be harder to sustain in large nations. The thing with distributism is the ideology wasn’t yet tried in any nation, so it would be difficult to imagine if it could be implemented and what it would look like. Some countries have distributist parties, such as Australia, Romania, and the UK, but they often receive little support and struggle to keep their seats.
According to the British conservative politician Duff Cooper, “He [Belloc] was sitting in the club the next morning over a glass of beer when an enthusiastic young man was shown in who wanted the hono[u]r of a word with him. The young man explained that he was a fervent supporter of the principle of distributism, the political theory for which Chesterton and Belloc were supposed to stand and which advocated the small ownership of the national wealth. Belloc said he was glad to be assured of the young man’s support, and added that so far as he could see there was only one difficulty in the way of his policy being adopted.
“What is that?” eagerly asked the young man, anxious to learn.
“It is,” answered Belloc, “like trying to force the water at Niagara to go up instead of coming down.” The young man went away sorrowful.”
The Rose Outlook 
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