Can Communism Work? - Page 2

Solutionone · #11 (**permalink**) 08-23-2008, 10:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheChief

The real question is would you want it to work?

Well, It's something i've always been interested in, I've seen it host the 2008 olympics with minor problems, save a couple sports related inconsistencies(ages). I just think it's interesting that a country can hold so much nationalism that it remains afloat with such a flawed idea of Government.

Diuretic · #12 (**permalink**) 08-23-2008, 10:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Soupnazi

It is worse and always does succeed . Communism is by definition a dictator with death grip and such dictatorships have been successful since man began forming governments.The USSR , Libya , Cuba , CHina ,North Korea etc are all typical communist nations as Marx himself envisioned and preached.They are the natural outcome of what his twisted and sick philosophy and vision will always lead to.

Of course every person soft on Marx's writings who reads this will claim Hunnh Unnh thats not what Marx meant but YES HE DID which is why it always ends up a brutal bloody dictatorship. Yes I know he babbled about ultimate, true , communism being the withering away of the state and all but that was just window dressing. He stated and meant a violent coup a bloody war and uprising to seize the means of production and to seize the government as well resulting in the " DIctatorship of the Proletariate" Presumably this is a NICE dictatorship or something which allows you to ignore that a dictator is a dictator . Any wonder that the USSR alone slaughtered more innocent people in death camps and with applied famine than the third reich? As did china under mao? This is what dictators DO. Of course communism atrocities are excused because it is for the people or the workers or whoever.

Karl Marx captured the imagination of many people while writing his drug induced vision of utopia but read it with an objective and judgmental mind and see it for what it truly is ,a recipe for slavery genocide and tyranny.

What a load of tosh. It was Lenin who wrote about the secret party and it was Lenin who insisted on the dictatorship of the party. Lenin effectively set about setting up the Soviet Union as a one-party and one person dictatorship after the break with the Mensheviks. And it was Trotsky who argued that it wasn't possible to have a single communist state and that the revolution had to continue around the world.

Marx wrote an analysis of societies and predicted that humankind would move through various stages of development and that as each stage of economic development failed and was superseded by more advanced stages that so societies would move from failed capitalism to socialism to communism and that the forces driving that development were inexorable.

Of course communism can work, just like any other economic system. The question is, will it be the last when it appears?

rodog · #13 (**permalink**) 08-23-2008, 10:21 PM

A claim is that all communist countries fail however besides China and Cuba the only communist countries I can think of were all part of the Soviet bloc. The Soviet Union didn't collapse due to a communist system. They rivaled the might and economic power of the United States for nearly half a century. They collapsed due to them overextending themselves in Afghanistan.

Furthermore in the case of Cuba that country has been boycotted by the United States and most of it's allies for decades, furthermore most South American countries suffer from extreme poverty so I don't see how it could be singled out.

I think communism could "work" in the since that a developed communist country could exist. Don't think I would want to live in one though.

Solutionone · #14 (**permalink**) 08-23-2008, 10:26 PM

New question:
Is the sense of egalitarianism more widespread in Current and past Communist states than in the United States today?

Diuretic · #15 (**permalink**) 08-23-2008, 10:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Solutionone

Question for this
How(if) did Fidel Castro remain "omniscient and omnipotent"?

One activity that i loved in high school, was in my teambuilding/leadership segment for Political science, was when we got to alternate group problem solving techniques, such as a consensus model, a dictatorship(communist for this question), a majority rules scenario. I just thought that was awesome, really makes you think when you're small group gets more work done as a dictatorship under your control =)

Castro followed the blueprint of any dictator. Make sure any legislative assembly is under tight party control. The best way to achieve this is to have the party control the legislature. The party must also control all other organs of the state - the judiciary, the military and the police. There must be set up an internal security apparatus that has eyes and ears working to detect any internal threat to control.

This is the pattern of dictators through centuries. I would suggest that these are no different from the absolute monarchies of history.

Diuretic · #16 (**permalink**) 08-23-2008, 10:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Solutionone

New question:
Is the sense of egalitarianism more widespread in Current and past Communist states than in the United States today?

I didn't see much egalitarianism in Czechoslovakia when I was there in 1982. It was much better in Hungary and in the then Yugoslavia as I travelled around. So I suppose it depends on cultural as well as political factors. I never visited the Soviet Union so I can't speak for it. Cuba, yes, much more egalitarian than the Soviet bloc countries I visited. But then I visited Cuba well after the reunciation of Leninism and the modernisation of the constitution.

I don't see the US as having any egalitarian principles at all.

Solutionone · #17 (**permalink**) 08-23-2008, 10:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Diuretic

Castro followed the blueprint of any dictator. Make sure any legislative assembly is under tight party control. The best way to achieve this is to have the party control the legislature. The party must also control all other organs of the state - the judiciary, the military and the police. There must be set up an internal security apparatus that has eyes and ears working to detect any internal threat to control.

This is the pattern of dictators through centuries. I would suggest that these are no different from the absolute monarchies of history.

So the recipe for success in communism is 100% paranoia? What about eliminating unrest?

Solutionone · #18 (**permalink**) 08-23-2008, 10:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Diuretic

I didn't see much egalitarianism in Czechoslovakia when I was there in 1982. It was much better in Hungary and in the then Yugoslavia as I travelled around. So I suppose it depends on cultural as well as political factors. I never visited the Soviet Union so I can't speak for it. Cuba, yes, much more egalitarian than the Soviet bloc countries I visited. But then I visited Cuba well after the reunciation of Leninism and the modernisation of the constitution.

I don't see the US as having any egalitarian principles at all.

Haha, the US could learn something in that regard I guess. My grandfather lived in Cuba from 1923 to around 1950(his cousin even dated Fidel Castro himself, he tells me), he's always said that he felt, that before Fidel took over that there was a strong "Do it yourself" attitude, and that changed when Fidel took power. I think Cuba has managed itself well over the years simply based on the fact that they adhere so well to the concept of egalitarianism and Lassez-Faire(with a few trade rules of course, coughembargocough). What sayeth you?

Diuretic · #19 (**permalink**) 08-23-2008, 10:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Solutionone

So the recipe for success in communism is 100% paranoia? What about eliminating unrest?

As I tried to point out, where there is a dictatorship - and it doesn't have to be communist, that's just an economic theory - the dictatorship has to protect iself and to do so it has to activate its control over the state apparatus. In a true communist society there is no state apparatus separate from the collection of individuals in the society, that was what Marx and Engels wrote. Lenin was the theorist who argued for the dictatorship of the party ("One Step Forwards, Two Steps Back" and "What Is To Be Done?").

In the pure communist state as envisaged by Marx and Engels there is no social unrest because the causes of social unrest don't exist any longer.

Raharu Haruha · #20 (**permalink**) 08-23-2008, 10:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Solutionone

This is of course assuming it doesn't go to a dictator death-grip like most of them.

Is communism a reasonable concept?
Is it better/worse than democracy?
Why?

Discuss.

Note: China/Cuba

Communism can work. However, the main problem with communism is that it does not encourage technological advances in as many areas and it is hardly as efficient as the free market.

Think about the phone industry. For years it was owned by a monopoly. However, now it's not owned by a monopoly, and phone calls are higher quality, clearer, can take place anywhere, and you can go online. All of which cost the tax payers nothing. This is why communism fails, because given enough time they will be surpassed technologically, and even if they simply copy the designs, there's still a delay. One of the reasons China is having so much success is because they don't follow our patient laws.

The other reason is that it encourages monopolies. Government owned monopolies ensure tax revenues. If anyone were to try and compete, they could simply roll their army in there and kill them. Monopolies are just no efficient. They jack up prices because they can, and the people suffer.

Also, I don't think China is really succeeding. They're getting several successes, but look at their people. They do have several brilliant scientists and businessmen, but the billion plus are all stupid and poor.

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