Communism
Introduction
Key Takeaways: Communism
Communism is an ideology that seeks to establish a society free from class distinctions, where all assets and resources are owned by the community, rather than by individual individuals.
The origins of communism date back to 1848 when Karl Marx and his collaborator, Friedrich Engels, coined the term.
A genuine communist society is the antithesis of a capitalist one, which is based on the principles of democracy, creativity, and the pursuit of profit through the production of goods.
The two most famous communist systems were the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China.
While the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 marked the end of communism as we know it, China has made significant changes to its economic structure to incorporate many elements of free-market capitalism.
The history of communism
Although the term communism didn't become popular until the 1800s, communist societies were already described by the Greek philosopher Plato in the fourth century BCE. In the Socratic dialogue, Plato talks about an ideal society where a group of guardians, mostly philosophers and soldiers, take care of the needs of everyone in the community. He argues that if everyone owned their own stuff, it would make them greedy, selfish, and spoiled, so the guardians had to act like a big family that owned all the stuff, plus their spouses and kids.
Religion also gave rise to other early ideas about communism. For example, in the Bible's Book of Acts, it's said that the first Christians practised communism as a way to keep people together and avoid the bad things that come with owning things. In some early monasteries, monks were required to take vows of poverty, which meant they had to share their few possessions with each other and the poor. In a 1516 work called Utopia, an English statesman named Sir Thomas More wrote about a perfect society where money was not a thing, and people shared food, houses and other things.
The origins of contemporary communism can be traced back to the Industrial Revolution in Western Europe at the end of the 18th and beginning of the 19th century. This revolution, which enabled some to become wealthy at the cost of the growing poverty of the working class, led Prussian political scientist Karl Marx to argue that class struggles caused by income inequality will inevitably lead to a society where everyone owns the same means of production so that prosperity can be enjoyed by everyone.
The Communist Manifesto was published in 1848 by Karl Mises and Friedrich Engels. In it, they argued that the conditions of poverty, illness, and shortened life expectancy that plagued the working class of the proletariat could only be solved by the replacement of capitalism with communism. In communism, as Mises and Engels saw it, the main sources of industrial production, such as factories, mills, quarries, and railways, would be owned and operated by the people for the common good.
Following the fall of capitalism, Marx predicted that a full-fledged form of communism would lead to a society without class distinctions or government, where the production of goods and the distribution of goods were based on the idea of “From everyone according to their ability, to every one according to their needs.” Many of his followers, particularly Russian revolutionary Vladimir Lenin, adopted these ideas of a communist society.
During the Second World War, the Soviet Union collaborated with other European Communist and socialist regimes to combat the fascist menace posed by Adolf Hitler's Germany. At the same time, the end of World War II marked the end of the long-standing alliance between the Union and its politically more moderate Warsaw Pact satellite states, thus enabling the Soviet Union to establish communist regimes throughout Eastern Europe.
Following the Russian Revolution of 1917, the Soviet Union was established in 1922 under the leadership of Vladimir Lenin. Lenin's brand of moderate communism was replaced in the 1930s by the communist party of the Soviet Union. Under Joseph Stalin, the Communist Party exercised absolute power over all aspects of Russian society. Although the human cost of Stalin's iron-fisted authoritarian application of communism was incalculable, the Soviet Union rose from a backward nation into a world superpower.
After World War II, the political fallout from the Cold War, combined with the economic burden of maintaining its position as a major military power, started to chip away at the Soviet Union's control over its communist satellite countries in the Eastern Bloc (East Germany, Poland, and Czechoslovakia). By the early 1990s, communism was no longer as powerful a political force around the world as it had been in the past. Today, the only communist states left are China (China), Cuba (Cuba), North Korea (North Korea), Laos (Laos), and Vietnam.
Key Principles
Even though the most well-known communist countries, like the Soviet Union, the People's Republic of China, and the Soviet Union-Yugoslavia, had their own distinct models that changed over time, there are often six defining features of pure communist ideology.
The concept of collective ownership of a means of production: The state owns and operates all forms of production, including factories, agricultural holdings, land, mining operations, transportation, and communication networks.
Private Property Abolition: In accordance with the principle of collective ownership, private ownership of the means of production is forbidden. In a strictly communist state, the individual citizen owns nothing except the essentials of life. Similarly, the operation of privately owned enterprises is forbidden.
Democratic centralism: The official way of organizing and making decisions of Communist parties is called democratic centralism. Basically, it means that political decisions, even though they're made through a supposedly democratic vote, are made binding on everyone in the party - basically all the people. Lenin's idea of democratic centralism means that party members can take part in political debates and express opinions, but once a decision is made, they have to stick to the Communist Party's "line".
Centrally planned economy: A centrally planned economy (also called a command economy) is an economic system where a single central authority (usually the government in communist countries) makes all decisions about the production and distribution of goods and services. A centrally planned economy is distinct from a free-market economy, such as those found in capitalist countries, where supply and demand factors determine the decisions of businesses and consumers.
Eliminate Income Inequality: The idea is that by giving everyone what they need, income inequality and class friction are reduced. Income inequality is reduced by eliminating income, interest income, and profit, and wealth is distributed in a fair and equitable way.
Repression: Political opposition and economic liberty are prohibited or curtailed in accordance with democratic centralism. Other fundamental individual rights and liberties may also be curtailed or curtailed. Communist states, like the former Soviet Union, have traditionally been characterized by the rule of the state in most areas of life. “Good thinking” that adheres to the party line is supported by coercion, often threatening, propaganda produced by the state-owned and controlled media.
Communism vs. Socialism
What is the difference between Communism and Socialism? The terms communism and socialism have been used interchangeably for centuries. Even Karl Marx referred to them interchangeably. According to Marx, socialism was the beginning of communism. Communism, on the other hand, is often confused with socialism. But while communism and socialism share many similarities, they differ significantly in their objectives and how they are accomplished.
The aim of communism is to achieve complete social equality and the abolition of social classes. To achieve this goal, the means of production must be owned by the central government and all aspects of economic production must be controlled by it.
On the other hand, socialism is based on the assumption that social classes will always exist and strives to reduce the number of them. The government's power over means of production in socialism is regulated by the democratic participation of the people. Contrary to popular belief, socialism does not allow the private possession of property. Unlike communism, socialism rewards effort and innovation.
The most popular form of socialism today, social democracy, seeks to equalize wealth distribution and other social reforms by means of democratic processes and usually co-exists with a free market capitalist economy.
Examples
The former Soviet Union, communist China, communist Cuba, and communist North Korea are just a few examples of communist regimes that have been around throughout history.
Soviet Union
The former Soviet Union is still seen as a model of communism at work today. The Soviet Communist Party (1927-1953) was controlled by Joseph Stalin (1953-1953) and his successor, Nikita Kruschev (1953-1964). The party banned all forms of opposition and assumed control of the "commanding heights" of the Soviet economy, which included agriculture, banking and all forms of industrial production, thanks to the communist system's central planning. The Soviet Union's rapid industrialization culminated in the detonation of the first hydrogen bomb in 1953. GDP growth in the Soviet Union from 1950 to 1965 exceeded that of the entire United States. On the whole, however, Soviet economic growth was much slower than that of its capitalist and democratic counterparts.
The Soviet Union's central economic "Five Year Plans" during the Cold War overstated the importance of industrial and military output, resulting in chronic under-production of consumer products. As long queues at under-supply grocery stores became commonplace, weak consumer expenditure contributed to economic decline. The shortages also led to the emergence of black markets, despite their illegality, which was tolerated and even encouraged by venal leaders within the ruling Communist Party. Desperately fed by half a century of shortages, high levels of corruption, and suppression, the people of the Soviet Union called for reforms to the economy, social system, and political party. These reforms, initiated in 1985 by the reformists known as the "Perestroika" and "Glasnost", did not only fail to halt the economic decline but may have hastened the decline of the Soviet Union by loosening the Communist Party's control over the sources of public opposition. The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 precipitated the dissolution of the Soviet Union, resulting in the formation of fifteen separate republics.
Communist China
In 1949, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) took control of the country, making it the second-largest Marxist Leninist state in the world after the Soviet Union. With its violence, poverty, and iron-fisted adherence to the CCP line, Mao's rule in China was reminiscent of Joseph Stalin's in the Soviet Union.
Mao's "Great Leap Forward" plan of 1958 was intended to revolutionize the Chinese economy. By 1962, the rural population was expected to produce an unimaginable amount of steel. Instead of producing usable steel, the Great Chinese Famine killed between 15-45 million people.
In 1966, he and his cronies, the so-called Gang of Four, initiated China's Cultural Revolution. With the aim of purging the country of the "Four Olds," old habits, old ways, and old beliefs, the Cultural Revolution killed at least 400,000 more people before Mao's death in 1976.
Deng Xiaoping, Mao’s son-in-law, implemented a series of far-reaching market reforms that caught the attention of the United States. President Richard Nixon visited China in 1972 and the US began to normalize diplomatic relations with China.
Today, state-owned enterprises (SOEs) still make up a large portion of the economy, but the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) still controls the political system. Freedom of speech is tightly controlled. Political participation is prohibited, except in Hong Kong, where candidates must be approved by the CCP before appearing on the ballot.
Cuba
The Communist Party of Cuba (PLO) was officially established in 1965 and remains Cuba's only political party. In the most recent revised Cuban Constitution of 1992, the PLO was described as the "organized vanguard" of the Cuban people. Communism has left Cuba one of the least free countries in the world. According to the Heritage Foundation, Cuba ranks 175th in terms of economic freedom, one spot higher than Venezuela. Before Castro took power in Cuba, the country was one of the richest in the Western Hemisphere.
In July 2021, angry Cubans marched to demonstrate against the country's one-party communist system and the government's response to the pandemic. The protests were the biggest in decades, and the government responded by killing at least one person, detaining journalists, and blocking access to social media sites used by protesters to communicate. Analysts say that while the protests won't bring much change to Cuba's communist government, they will put pressure on it to accelerate economic and social reforms.
North Korea
Robert Service, a professor of political science at Oxford University, has described North Korea as most closely resembling the communist ideology laid down by Karl Marx in the Communist Manifesto. The country is governed by an internal ideology of communism called Juche. It was first formulated in the early 20th century by Kim Il Sung, the country's founder.
Juche emphasizes self-sufficiency and total isolation from the outside world, which is why North Korea is considered one of the world's most isolated and secretive states. Like Marxism, Juche emphasizes complete control of the economy by the government, which claims to be on the side of the people.
The famine in North Korea in the 1990s was caused by a combination of natural disasters, bad agricultural practices, and poor economic management. It left an estimated 240,000 to 3.5 million North Koreans dead from hunger. Instead of focusing on the obvious needs of the people, the government invested heavily in the military, which is now thought to have developed or acquired nuclear weapons. Nowadays, North Korea is run like a totalitarian state under the leadership of Kim Jong-un, who, like his predecessors, is trained to worship him like a god. The media is tightly controlled by the government. People don't have access to the internet, which means ordinary North Koreans don't have much of a way to communicate with the rest of the world. Any form of political opposition is quickly and severely punished, and human rights violations are common. Kim has introduced some small reforms, but the economy is still tightly controlled by the communist government.
Communism in Action
For all the concerns and conflicts it's caused, real communism, as it was seen by Marx and Lenin, doesn't exist anymore and probably never will.
By 1985, when the Cold War was at its peak, almost a third of the world's population lived under communism. Most of these countries were the Soviet Union and its eastern European satellite republics, but modern historians doubt that any of them were ever really communist at all, since they were so far removed from many of the fundamentals of a true Marxist system. In fact, some argue that the fact that these Cold War governments failed to live up to the true values of communism, combined with their tendency toward authoritarianism, played a major role in the decline of communism at the end of the 20th century.
Today, there are only five countries that officially recognize communism as their form of government: China; North Korea; Laos; Cuba; and Vietnam. These countries can only be classified as communist because they all have central governments that control all aspects of their economic and political systems. However, they have not eliminated elements of capitalism, such as personal wealth, money, and socioeconomic class systems, as is required by genuine communist ideology.
The failure of communism
Under pure communism, citizens are not expected to work for financial gain. In capitalist societies, the drive to produce for profit encourages competition and innovation. However, in communist societies, "ideal" citizens are expected to dedicate themselves solely to social causes, regardless of their personal well-being. As the Chinese Communist Party's First Vice-Chairman Liu Shaoqi famously said in 1984, "At all times and in all matters, a party member should put the Party's interests first and put them second."
The second reason for communism's downfall was its inefficiency. For instance, the overly complicated centralized planning system made it necessary to collect and analyze huge amounts of economic data. Unfortunately, this data was often wrong and manipulated by the party-selected economic planners to make it look like things were going in the right direction. Putting so much power in so few hands only made things more inefficient and corrupt. The corruption, laziness and heavy-handed government supervision also meant there wasn't much incentive for hard-working people to work. The centrally planned economy suffered because of this, and the people were left poor, disappointed, and unhappy with the communist system.
