What is Communism?
Communism |ˈkämyəˌnizəm| (often Communism) noun: A political theory derived from Karl Marx, advocating class war and leading to a society in which all property is publicly OWNED , and each person works and is paid according to their abilities and needs. ORIGIN mid 19th century: from French communisme, from commun (common). See also Marxism.
 Communism is the "granddaddy of all" evil in the economic sense. Under this system all of the capital is owned and controlled by the State.
Communism is REALLY defined as a government that OWNS ALL the capital. Although by strict modern [broken] definition, we are told that the PEOPLE control the capital in communist nations - but just open your eyes to Russia and communist China - do the PEOPLE REALLY OWN the capital? Read the Manifesto to find the REAL answer. Often in China the government forcibly kicks senior citizens out of their OWN homes.
Some communist countries will even dictate what YOUR job will be. Even if a Russian citizen wants to be an artist, he might still be ordered to work on a boring assembly line putting the same screw into the same part for the rest of his life; the Russian government has their own artists to produce artwork for them, so there is no reason for them allow the people the freedom to create artworks with the possibility of becoming a professional artist in the field of their choice. It's called a theory because it didn't work. Just ask his holyness the Dalai Lama; red China exiled him from Tibet decades ago.
The most familiar form of communism is that established by the Bolsheviks after the Russian Revolution of 1917, and it has generally been understood in terms of the system practiced by the former USSR and its allies in eastern Europe, in China since 1949, and in some developing countries such as Cuba, Vietnam, and North Korea. Communism embraced a revolutionary ideology (in THEORY) in which the state would wither away after the overthrow of the capitalist system. In practice, however, the state grew to control all aspects of communist society. Communism in eastern Europe collapsed in the late 1980s and early 1990s against a background of failure to meet people's economic expectations, a shift to more democracy in political life, and increasing nationalism such as that which led to the breakup of the USSR.
Karl Marx & Marxism
Marxism |ˈmärkˌsizəm| noun: Marxist. Marxian. The political and economic THEORIES of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, later developed by their followers to form the basis for the THEORY and practice of communism. Central to Marxist THEORY is an explanation of social change in terms of economic factors, according to which the means of production (THE CAPITAL; isn't it just greedy capitalism?) provide the economic base, which influences or determines the political and ideological superstructure. Marx and Engels predicted the revolutionary overthrow of capitalism by the proletariat and the eventual attainment of a classless communist society.
Karl Heinrich Marx (May 5, 1818 – March 14, 1883) was a German philosopher, political economist, historian, political theorist, sociologist, and communist revolutionary, whose ideas played a significant role in the development of modern communism and socialism. Marx summarized his approach in the first line of chapter one of The Communist Manifesto, published in 1848: "The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles." Marx argued that capitalism, like previous socioeconomic systems, would inevitably produce internal tensions which would lead to its destruction. Just as capitalism replaced feudalism, he believed socialism would, in its turn, replace capitalism, and lead to a stateless, classless society called pure communism. This would emerge after a transitional period called the "dictatorship of the proletariat": a period sometimes referred to as the "workers state" or "workers' democracy". In section one of The Communist Manifesto Marx describes feudalism, capitalism, and the role internal social contradictions play in the historical process.
The Communist Manifesto, which contains the basic program for all Communist and Socialists, explicitly preaches the destruction and abolition of private property. Karl Marx understood the power of controlling capital as have all Communists who have ever looked and still look to Marx as their leader. State-controlled capitalism (Communism) always results in high prices and low quality, because the lack of competition offers no incentive to improve. |
