Hegelian Dialectic: Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel was a noted German philosopher whose work greatly influenced Karl Marx. During the last century, socialists have used the Hegelian Dialectic to change the thinking of entire cultures. The Hegelian Dialectic offers a thesis, an antithesis, and resolves the argument between the two with a synthesis, which is presented to avoid a crisis. The crisis is often designed for the purpose of getting acceptance of the synthesis.

Example: Americans believe in private property (thesis). The socialists put forth the concept of communal property, which is totally unacceptable to the American people (antithesis). An environmental crisis (either real or designed) emerges, and we lose some of our private property rights to resolve the supposed crisis (synthesis). The battle over property rights brought about by the golden-cheeked warbler is a good example of the Hegelian Dialectic in action. The people losing their property rights fight valiantly, but the rest of us stoically accept this new definition of private property (i.e., property which the government now regulates and which can no longer be used in a manner freely determined by its owner.)

In this example, the socialists have moved Americans away from their belief in private property freely held and freely managed by its owner, towards an acceptance of government-regulated property, or property which is no longer entirely private. Notice that the socialists give up nothing in this scenario