What the new revisionism attacked was the view that socialism had as its goal the abolition of the private ownership of the fundamental means of production - in other words, of capitalism itself. This is less starling than it may first appear. The abolition of capitalism, after all, was hardly the only goal of socialism. It was considered a necessary and, for some, even a sufficient precondition for the achievement of other desirable objectives such as social equality, prosperity and happiness - all aims also pursued by many non-socialists. Unlike non-socialists, however, socialists maintained that these desirable goals could not be be reached while large-scale private ownership prevailed. Thus, the establishment of collective ownership in some form or another, such as nationalisation or, less frequently, workers’ control, did not require any further justification: the abolition of private ownership was the precondition for public happiness.