An interesting debate for me. I wouldn’t get too involved but we who have lived in socialist countries (and there are quite a few of us here) can tell you that Hive is something completely different. Socialism has always degenerated into some shit (but that doesn't mean the same won't happen to Hive), but it's true that you still have quite a few people who think that's it ...
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When most people think of socialism, they think about the various forms of authoritarian socialism. In these scenarios, the system tends to devolve from state socialism into state capitalism before falling apart, as what happened to the USSR.
There have been a handful of highly successful regions that used libertarian socialism, though they often met their end via invasions. One such example of this is Revolutionary Catalonia, a fairly large region that sprung up during the Spanish Civil War. During their existence they saw massive improvements to quality of life and literacy rates, however they were destroyed around the start of World War 2 by fascists.
An example of market socialism would be Yugoslavia, and while it was destroyed by an increase in nationalism leading to wars, they were doing better off than other similar regions during the same time period prior to that.
A modern day example of libertarian socialism would be the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria. Despite being under constant threat of Turkish invasion, they've managed to do quite well for the region. They also played a crucial role in the defeat of ISIS.
A lot of the stuff people hear about socialism these days is propaganda from those in power, as any major successful socialist countries would threaten to topple their power. It's why the USA's CIA has repeatedly overthrown democratically elected leaders in smaller countries. They don't want people to contemplate possible alternatives to the current system.
Every system has its downsides, that's why it's important to compare it to other systems in similar countries. You can find plenty of bad things that have happened in any country regardless of its social and economic systems. I see lots of people point to one bad thing in a country and use it to dismiss the entire system.
Also, a common tactic of authoritarians, including fascists, is to call themselves socialist even when they are anything but. The classic example of this is Hitler's National Socialist party, who killed the actual socialists in the party during the Night of the Long Knives. If calling yourself something was enough to actually be that, than North Korea would be democratic and China would be a people's republic.
Authoritarians call themselves something that's popular in order to garner public support, try not to fall for it.
I don't know, I wouldn't take Catalonia for a successful cause ... Spain still takes them for its own, all leaders have been severely punished ... hey, in Europe, people are imprisoned for political crimes because they think differently or want something independence ...
Yugoslavia ... but I'm from exYU, I wouldn't agree that nationalism was the cause of the catastrophe that happened later, Yu was totally credited and the catastrophe happened when the loans had to be repaid ... and then everyone else was to blame ...
Syria? Um ... with the dictator from before, because everything went well until the drought and the endangered Syrian tribes moved to the area controlled by this dictator and the solution was that they later went to Europe, and next to them they had millions of more Pakistanis, Afghanis, Bangladesh and I don't know who else ... they caused total global chaos ... ... you didn't exactly convince me 😎
In a libertarian socialist society, there are no leaders as it functions as either a direct democracy or a liquid democracy. Like I said, they were destroyed by fascists around the start of WW2 (1939) and after that they became part of Spain again.
Also, Yugoslavia was not a libertarian socialist system, that may not have been clear in my post. It was a federal republic, not unlike the USA, Nepal, or Germany. That puts it as being more authoritarian than libertarian, though nowhere close to the degree of the USSR.
While the rise of nationalism in Yugoslavia was in part driven by the economic crisis, things could've gone a different way had there not been a rise in nationalism. A good chunk of the Yugoslav Wars was driven by nationalism.
In 1989, Yugoslavia had an external debt of USD$17B, or about 19.2% of its GNP.
For comparison, today, the USA has an external debt of USD$21.3T, or about 98.8% of its 2019 GNP (roughly ~140% of its 2020 GNP due to the pandemic). Debt isn't the only factor, else the USA would be a wasteland right now.
Syria and the NES are different governances entirely, given the region's ongoing civil war that should've been more clear. The NES has a population of around 2 million and is currently not recognised by any major government. They currently have 23 represented political parties and operate under a federated semi-direct democracy, with a goal of moving as close to direct democracy as possible over time.