I want more a discussion on theory on why Communism has failed horribly in nearly every attempt to institute it in the world. There are only a few Communist nations in the world. Cuba (Which is hardly staying alive) and China. I want to know you fine Citizens view on why The Soviet example of Communism failed so miserably.
>>99
No, not rly. That stupid ascii shit just irritates me.
End thread. From this point on only trolls and trollees will reply:
communist is give great explain about how to rule the nation or organisation (for little)..
but in the communist there were a selfish emotion that destroy the chain betwen them.. Oh well that's why communist is fail.. but the real comunist is good..
the result as not as a book says right!!
The ideas of communism if I understood enough of it boils down to everyone is equal. Sameness does not work in a society where one of the biggest things that people crave is power. Others want to keep their power its a basic human goal. Communist would work in a perfect society but the sad truth is neither we nor the system or even the world we inhabit is perfect making communism absolutly worthless.
China has become extremely capitalistic. Health care and other social services have become privatized or requiring bribes to be paid. Also, many factory owners are profiteering off of workers working under unsafe conditions and extremely long hours.
As a member of the Revolutionary Communist Youth Brigade and a supporter of the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA, I have a lot of thoughts about why the first wave of communist countries were defeated:
For one thing, I only consider the short-lived Paris Commune of 1871, the USSR under Lenin & Stalin, and China under Mao to have been the only genuinely socialist nations that have every existed; the rest were/are state-capitalist: socialist in name, but more or less just highly-centralized capitalism (the main difference between a capitalist economy and a socialist economy is that, in a capitalist economy, profit is what drives society, and in a socialist economy it is what best serves the people and brings society closer to a classless society).
The main reasons that the first revolutions were defeated were because of a few things:
1)Imperialist encirclement: There was a great deal of pressure from the outside capitalist powers that exerted a great amount of pressure that caused enormous strain militarily and economically on the socialist states, and in turn strengthened the support base of many revisionist (phony-communists) trends within the ruling Communist parties.
2)The weight of tradition: these societies were an extremely new thing; no one had ever done such a thing before! People were still figuring out how to genuinely direct this society, and at times the weaknesses and errors of the revolutionaries allowed the phony communists in the government to seize initiative. That's why there is a need for a constant revolutionizing of society in culture and in politics for a country to keep on the socialist road.
3)The nature of history: History moves in wave-like and spiral-like motions. Sometimes there a setbacks and crises in the march of history, and in fact during the transition from feudalism to modern capitalism, capitalism actually failed a few times itself! Take a look at the French Revolution: the French Republic was a very progressive thing that was overturned when Napoleon betrayed the Revolution and restored the monarchy. However, eventually, after a few more failed revolutions, the French nation was solidified as a capitalist republic in 1848. In a sense, in the BIG PICTURE of things (I'm saying this as a History major- I like to look at the big picture)... socialism hasn't ended, it's just getting started!
There were indeed serious errors that were made in the early USSR and early China that we must never repeat, and we must investigate on why they were wrong, but at the same time we must proudly uphold the good things of these past projects as powerful achievements of the international working class: the class that will free all of humanity. And indeed, there are still Communist revolutions happening in Nepal, India, the Philippines, and to smaller extents Peru and Turkey. And it is people like Bob Avakian, the Chairman of the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA, that are bringing forward a new synthesis of Communism that sums up the good things and bad things of the past, as well as showing how communist revolution is still a very valid and possible thing in the U.S. and across the world.
For more info, check out:
Revolution newspaper: http://revcom.us/
Bob Avakian Online: http://bobavakian.net/
This Is Communism: http://www.thisiscommunism.org/
Marxists Internet Archive: http://www.marxists.org/
meh. I think if we talk about this, we have to make an important distinction between two very different things that have the same label.
There is communism definition 1, a sort of utopian agrarian anarchism that Marx talked about. Basically his idea seems to have been that one day in the far future, when society matured enough, was wealthy enough, was advanced enough, people would stop being such money-grubbing bastards and share with one another. The people have to choose it of their own free will. It can't be imposed from outside and it can't be imposed by force.
And there is communism definition 2. During the 20th Century it was fashionable for brutal, murderous totalitarian states to use Marxist rhetoric in their propaganda and claim to be "Marxist" or "socialist" or "communist." These societies were universally thugocracies straight out of the Dark Ages: peasants ruled by brigands, and when you look past the propaganda, were just the sort of brutal, unjust, unequal societies that Marx railed against.
Communism definition 1 has never been tried. Being a cynical and evil-minded old bastard, I suspect that human nature makes it utterly impossible on any scale larger than a single farming village, and won't work there either unless everybody there believes and works hard to benefit his neighbors. In other words, there has to be no dissent, because when the only guy in town who can fix tractors starts to resent the fact that he gets the same exact same bread ration as the lazy drunks and 'tards who are only good for pick and shovel work and only do that much when they know they're being watched, well--if he doesn't keep his mouth shut and keep on working, you're hosed and your agrarian utopia goes straight back to the Iron Age in a hell of a hurry.
Civic-spiritedness only goes so far. Even chimpanzees are able to sense the inherent unfairness. In recent experiments, it has been demonstrated that when you teach one chimp to do a trick and give him a banana, and then you get him to do the trick and give him a banana and let him see you give a banana to another chimp who hasn't done anything but sit there scratching his ass, the first chimp will go BERSERK. Communism definition 1 requires everyone to be dedicated to the idea and to hard work, or else it runs right smack into our old primate instincts: "that lazy bastard contributes less than I do, so FUCK him! Why should I bust my balls to feed both of us?"
In any event, communism definition 2 has caused people pretty much everywhere on Earth outside of Berkeley and perhaps North Korea to instantly associate the term with mass murder, torture, and secret police. This has pretty much ruined the respectability of the idea among just about everybody except neurotic self-hating upper-class white kids (from time to time one hears the claim that these beliefs are especially fashionable among Jewish kids, but I really don't know) who want to get back at Daddy for not buying them a pony for their ninth birthday, and maybe some of the more thoroughly brainwashed illiterate peasants who are forced to live in some of the more backward and benighted portions of the Third World.
My recommendation to those who have an interest in the definition-1 flavor is to change the name. Call it "communitarianism" or something like that, because otherwise people will instantly think of Pol Pot before you've been able to say five words. And if you're going to try it, keep us posted. I wish you well, even if I think human nature makes it unlikely that the definition-1 flavor can ever work for groups larger than a family.
I've always thought that the best answer was somewhere in the middle. Capitalism is good at bringing new ideas to market, but sucks at things like providing for the poor in any society. Communism 1 doesn't leave the poor behind, but it kills all incentive for innovation. Why invent a better mousetrap -- it won't make your life any better? But somewhere in the middle, about where Sweden is on the Left/Right economic scale, you get the best of both worlds. Inventing a new product does net you wealth, yet the safety net is big enough that poor folks don't need to worry about affording health care, food and shelter.
Of course there are trade offs. Sweden isn't a superpower, it doesn't get to throw its weight around and get its way in international meetings. The standard of living is less than that of the middle-class USA. But you do get a nice standard of living.
>>111, you say that the standard of living in Sweden is lower than it is in the US, at least for the middle class?
I'm intrigued by this. Leftists in the US traditionally hold up Sweden as a model and claim that the standard of living is higher there than in the US, not lower.
May I ask what your source is for that information? Thanks.