Communism Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! == History == {{main|History of communism}} === Early communism === {{further|Pre-Marxist communism|Primitive communism|Religious communism|Scientific socialism|Utopian socialism}} According to [[Richard Pipes]],<ref name="Pipes">{{cite book |author-link=Richard Pipes |last=Pipes |first=Richard |date=2001 |title=Communism: A History |isbn=978-0-8129-6864-4 |pages=3–5 |publisher=[[Random House Publishing]]}}</ref> the idea of a [[Classless society|classless]], [[egalitarian]] society first emerged in [[Ancient Greece]]. Since the 20th century, [[Ancient Rome]] has been examined in this context, as well as thinkers such as [[Aristotle]], [[Cicero]], [[Demosthenes]], [[Plato]], and [[Tacitus]]. Plato, in particular, has been considered as a possible communist or socialist theorist,<ref>{{cite book |last=Bostaph |first=Samuel |year=1994 |chapter=Communism, Sparta, and Plato |editor-last=Reisman |editor-first=David A. |title=Economic Thought and Political Theory |edition=hardcover |series=Recent Economic Thought Series |volume=37 |location=Dordrecht |publisher=[[Springer Science+Business Media|Springer]] |pages=1–36 |doi=10.1007/978-94-011-1380-9_1 |isbn=9780792394334}}</ref> or as the first author to give communism a serious consideration.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Franklin |first=A. Mildred |date=9 January 1950 |title=Communism and Dictatorship in Ancient Greece and Rome |journal=The Classical Weekly |location=Baltimore, Maryland |publisher=[[Johns Hopkins University Press]] |volume=43 |issue=6 |pages=83–89 |doi=10.2307/4342653 |jstor=4342653}}</ref> The 5th-century [[Mazdak]] movement in [[Persia]] (modern-day Iran) has been described as ''communistic'' for challenging the enormous privileges of the [[noble class]]es and the [[clergy]], criticizing the institution of [[private property]], and striving to create an egalitarian society.<ref>{{cite book |author-link=Ehsan Yarshater |last=Yarshater |first=Ehsan |date=1983 |chapter-url=https://www.the-derafsh-kaviyani.com/english/mazdak.pdf |chapter=Mazdakism (The Seleucid, Parthian and Sasanian Period) |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080611075040/http://www.derafsh-kaviyani.com/english/mazdak.html |archive-date=11 June 2008 |access-date=10 June 2020 |title=[[The Cambridge History of Iran]] |volume=3 |location=Cambridge |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |pages=991–1024 (1019)}}</ref><ref name="Ermak 2019">{{cite book |title=Communism: The Great Misunderstanding |last=Ermak |first=Gennady |year=2019 |publisher=Amazon Digital Services LLC - Kdp |isbn=978-1-7979-5738-8}}</ref> At one time or another, various small communist communities existed, generally under the inspiration of [[religious text]].{{sfn|Lansford|2007|pp=24–25}} In the medieval [[Christian Church]], some [[monastic]] communities and [[religious order]]s shared their land and their other property. Sects deemed heretical such as the [[Waldensians]] preached an early form of [[Christian communism]].<ref name="Busky 2002 p. 33">{{cite book |last=Busky |first=D.F. |title=Communism in History and Theory: From Utopian socialism to the fall of the Soviet Union |publisher=[[Greenwood Publishing Group|Praeger]] |series=[[ABC-CLIO]] ebook |issue=v. 3 |year=2002 |isbn=978-0-275-97748-1 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=O-bi65fwN7kC&pg=PA33 |access-date=18 April 2023 |page=33 |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref><ref name="Boer 2019 p. 12">{{cite book |last=Boer |first=Roland |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=L8KODwAAQBAJ&pg=PA12 |title=Red Theology: On the Christian Communist Tradition |publisher=[[Brill Publishers|Brill]] |year=2019 |isbn=978-90-04-39477-3 |series=Studies in Critical Research on Religion |page=12 |author-link=Roland Boer |access-date=18 April 2023}}</ref> As summarized by historians Janzen Rod and Max Stanton, the [[Hutterites]] believed in strict adherence to biblical principles, church discipline, and practised a form of communism. In their words, the Hutterites "established in their communities a rigorous system of Ordnungen, which were codes of rules and regulations that governed all aspects of life and ensured a unified perspective. As an economic system, communism was attractive to many of the peasants who supported social revolution in sixteenth century central Europe."<ref>{{cite book |last1=Janzen |first1=Rod |last2=Stanton |first2=Max |title=The Hutterites in North America |date=18 July 2010 |edition=illustrated |location=Baltimore |publisher=[[Johns Hopkins University Press]] |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lgUbHUXmrvYC&pg=PA17 |page=17 |isbn=9780801899256 |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref> This link was highlighted in one of [[Karl Marx]]'s early writings; Marx stated that "[a]s Christ is the intermediary unto whom man unburdens all his divinity, all his religious bonds, so the state is the mediator unto which he transfers all his Godlessness, all his human liberty."<ref>{{cite book |title=Jesus in History, Legend, Scripture, and Tradition: A World Encyclopedia: A World Encyclopedia |last1=Houlden |first1=Leslie |last2=Minard |first2=Antone |publisher=[[ABC-CLIO]] |year=2015 |isbn=9781610698047 |location=Santa Barbara |page=357}}</ref> [[Thomas Müntzer]] led a large [[Anabaptist]] communist movement during the [[German Peasants' War]], which [[Friedrich Engels]] analyzed in his 1850 work ''[[The Peasant War in Germany]]''. The [[Marxist]] communist ethos that aims for unity reflects the [[Christian universalist]] teaching that humankind is one and that there is only one god who does not discriminate among people.<ref>{{cite book |last=Halfin |first=Igal |year=2000 |title=From Darkness to Light: Class, Consciousness, and Salvation in Revolutionary Russia |location=Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania |publisher=[[University of Pittsburgh Press]] |page=46 |isbn=0822957043}}</ref> [[File:Hans Holbein, the Younger - Sir Thomas More - Google Art Project.jpg|thumb|left|upright|[[Thomas More]], whose ''[[Utopia (More book)|Utopia]]'' portrayed a society based on common ownership of property]] Communist thought has also been traced back to the works of the 16th-century English writer [[Thomas More]].<ref>{{cite journal |last=Surtz |first=Edward L. |date=June 1949 |title=Thomas More and Communism |journal=PMLA |location=Cambridge |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |volume=64 |issue=3 |pages=549–564 |doi=10.2307/459753 |jstor=459753 |s2cid=163924226}}</ref> In his 1516 [[treatise]] titled ''[[Utopia (More book)|Utopia]]'', More portrayed a society based on [[common ownership]] of property, whose rulers administered it through the application of [[reason]] and [[virtue]].<ref>{{cite magazine |last=Nandanwad |first=Nikita |date=13 December 2020 |url=https://retrospectjournal.com/2020/12/13/communism-virtue-and-the-ideal-commonwealth-in-thomas-mores-utopia/ |title=Communism, virtue and the ideal commonwealth in Thomas More's Utopia |magazine=Retrospect Journal |location=Edinburgh |publisher=[[University of Edinburgh]] |access-date=18 August 2021}}</ref> Marxist communist theoretician [[Karl Kautsky]], who popularized Marxist communism in Western Europe more than any other thinker apart from Engels, published ''Thomas More and His Utopia'', a work about More, whose ideas could be regarded as "the foregleam of Modern Socialism" according to Kautsky. During the [[October Revolution]] in Russia, [[Vladimir Lenin]] suggested that a monument be dedicated to More, alongside other important Western thinkers.<ref name="Papke 2016">{{cite journal |last=Papke |first=David |year=2016 |url=https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1006&context=utopia500 |title=The Communisitic Inclinations of Sir Thomas More |journal=Utopia500 |issue=7 |access-date=18 August 2021 |via=Scholarly Commons}}</ref> In the 17th century, communist thought surfaced again in England, where a [[Puritan]] religious group known as the [[Diggers]] advocated the abolition of private ownership of land. In his 1895 ''Cromwell and Communism'',{{sfn|Bernstein|1895}} [[Eduard Bernstein]] stated that several groups during the [[English Civil War]] (especially the Diggers) espoused clear communistic, [[agrarianist]] ideals and that [[Oliver Cromwell]]'s attitude towards these groups was at best ambivalent and often hostile.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Elmen |first=Paul |date=September 1954 |title=The Theological Basis of Digger Communism |journal=Church History |location=Cambridge |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |volume=23 |issue=3 |pages=207–218 |doi=10.2307/3161310 |jstor=3161310 |s2cid=161700029}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Juretic |first=George |date=April–June 1974 |title=Digger no Millenarian: The Revolutionizing of Gerrard Winstanley |journal=[[Journal of the History of Ideas]] |location=Philadelfia, Pennsylvania |publisher=[[University of Pennsylvania Press]] |volume=36 |issue=2 |pages=263–280 |doi=10.2307/2708927 |jstor=2708927}}</ref> Criticism of the idea of private property continued into the [[Age of Enlightenment]] of the 18th century through such thinkers as [[Gabriel Bonnot de Mably]], [[Jean Meslier]], [[Étienne-Gabriel Morelly]], and [[Jean-Jacques Rousseau]] in France.<ref>{{cite book |last=Hammerton |first=J. A. |title=Illustrated Encyclopaedia of World History Volume Eight |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=S4h68smTPGYC&pg=PA4979 |publisher=Mittal Publications |pages=4979 |id=GGKEY:96Y16ZBCJ04}}</ref> During the upheaval of the [[French Revolution]], communism emerged as a political doctrine under the auspices of [[François-Noël Babeuf]], [[Nicolas Restif de la Bretonne]], and [[Sylvain Maréchal]], all of whom can be considered the progenitors of modern communism, according to [[James H. Billington]].<ref name="Billington">{{cite book |last=Billington |first=James H. |year=2011 |title=Fire in the Minds of Men: Origins of the Revolutionary Faith |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=saTynFUNPD8C |publisher=[[Transaction Publishers]] |page=71 |isbn=978-1-4128-1401-0 |access-date=18 August 2021 |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref> In the early 19th century, various social reformers founded communities based on common ownership. Unlike many previous communist communities, they replaced the religious emphasis with a rational and philanthropic basis.<ref name="britannica">{{Cite encyclopedia |title=Communism |date=2006 |encyclopedia=Encyclopædia Britannica |via=Encyclopædia Britannica Online}}</ref> Notable among them were [[Robert Owen]], who founded [[New Harmony, Indiana]], in 1825, and [[Charles Fourier]], whose followers organized other settlements in the United States, such as [[Brook Farm]] in 1841.{{r|Ball & Dagger 2019}} In its modern form, communism grew out of the [[History of socialism|socialist movement]] in 19th-century Europe. As the [[Industrial Revolution]] advanced, socialist critics blamed capitalism for the misery of the [[proletariat]]—a new class of urban factory workers who labored under often-hazardous conditions. Foremost among these critics were Marx and his associate Engels. In 1848, Marx and Engels offered a new definition of communism and popularized the term in their famous pamphlet ''[[The Communist Manifesto]]''.{{r|Ball & Dagger 2019}} === Revolutionary wave of 1917–1923 === {{further|Revolutions of 1917–1923}} {{multiple image | align = right | total_width = 300 | image1 = Lenin in 1920 (cropped).jpg | caption1 = [[Vladimir Lenin]], founder of the [[Soviet Union]] and the leader of the [[Bolshevik party]] | image2 = Bundesarchiv Bild 183-R15068, Leo Dawidowitsch Trotzki.jpg | caption2 = [[Leon Trotsky]], founder of the [[Red Army]] and a key figure in the [[October Revolution]] }} In 1917, the [[October Revolution]] in Russia set the conditions for the rise to state power of [[Vladimir Lenin]]'s [[Bolsheviks]], which was the first time any avowedly communist party reached that position. The revolution transferred power to the [[All-Russian Congress of Soviets]] in which the Bolsheviks had a majority.<ref>{{cite book |author1-link=Jerry F. Hough |last1=Hough |first1=Jerry F. |author2-link=Merle Fainsod |last2=Fainsod |first2=Merle |date=1979 |orig-date=1953 |title=How the Soviet Union is Governed |location=Cambridge and London |publisher=[[Harvard University Press]] |page=81 |isbn=9780674410305}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Dowlah |first1=Alex F. |last2=Elliott |first2=John E. |date=1997 |title=The Life and Times of Soviet Socialism |publisher=[[Greenwood Publishing Group|Praeger]] |page=18 |isbn=9780275956295}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |author-link=David R. Marples |last=Marples |first=David R. |date=2010 |title=Russia in the Twentieth Century: The Quest for Stability |publisher=[[Routledge]] |page=38 |isbn=9781408228227}}</ref> The event generated a great deal of practical and theoretical debate within the Marxist movement, as Marx stated that socialism and communism would be built upon foundations laid by the most advanced capitalist development; however, the [[Russian Empire]] was one of the poorest countries in Europe with an enormous, largely illiterate peasantry, and a minority of industrial workers. Marx warned against attempts "to transform my historical sketch of the genesis of capitalism in Western Europe into a historico-philosophy theory of the {{lang|fr|arche générale}} imposed by fate upon every people, whatever the historic circumstances in which it finds itself",<ref>{{cite journal |last=Wittfogel |first=Karl A. |date=July 1960 |title=The Marxist View of Russian Society and Revolution |journal=[[World Politics]] |location=Cambridge |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |volume=12 |issue=4 |pages=487–508 |doi=10.2307/2009334 |jstor=2009334 |s2cid=155515389 |quote=Quote at p. 493.}}</ref> and stated that Russia might be able to skip the stage of bourgeois rule through the ''[[Obshchina]]''.<ref>{{cite journal |author-link=Marc Edelman |last=Edelman |first=Marc |date=December 1984 |url=https://go.gale.com/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA3537723&sid=googleScholar&v=2.1&it=r&linkaccess=abs&issn=00270520&p=AONE&sw=w&userGroupName=anon%7E484b4f63 |title=Late Marx and the Russian Road: Marx and the 'Peripheries of Capitalism' |journal=[[Monthly Review]] |volume=36 |pages=1–55 |access-date=1 August 2021 |via=Gale}}</ref>{{refn|While the [[Bolsheviks]] rested on hope of success of the 1917–1923 wave of proletarian revolutions in Western Europe before resulting in the [[socialism in one country]] policy after their failure, Marx's view on the ''mir'' was shared not by self-professed Russian Marxists, who were mechanistic [[Determinism|determinists]], but by the [[Narodniks]]<ref>{{cite book |last=Faulkner |first=Neil |year=2017 |url=https://library.oapen.org/bitstream/handle/20.500.12657/45628/625271.pdf |title=A People's History of the Russian Revolution |edition=hardback |location=London |publisher=[[Pluto Press]] |pages=34, 177 |isbn=9780745399041 |access-date=18 August 2021 |via=OAPEN}}</ref> and the [[Socialist Revolutionary Party]],<ref>{{cite book |last=White |first=Elizabeth |year=2010 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lA_JBQAAQBAJ |title=The Socialist Alternative to Bolshevik Russia: The Socialist Revolutionary Party, 1921–39 |edition=1st hardback |location=London |publisher=[[Routledge]] |page= |isbn=9780415435840 |access-date=18 August 2021 |via=[[Google Books]] |quote=''Narodniki'' had opposed the often mechanistic determinism of Russian Marxism with the belief that non-economic factors such as the human will act as the motor of history. The SRs believed that the creative work of ordinary people through unions and cooperatives and the local government organs of a democratic state could bring about social transformation. ... They, along with free soviets, the cooperatives and the ''mir'' could have formed the popular basis for a devolved and democratic rule across the Russian state.}}</ref> one of the successors to the Narodniks, alongside the [[Popular Socialists (Russia)|Popular Socialists]] and the [[Trudoviks]].<ref>{{cite encyclopedia |url=https://www.marxists.org/glossary/orgs/n/a.htm |title=Narodniks |encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of Marxism |publisher=[[Marxists Internet Archive]] |access-date=18 August 2021}}</ref>|group=note}} The moderate [[Mensheviks]] (minority) opposed Lenin's Bolsheviks (majority) plan for [[socialist revolution]] before the [[Capitalist mode of production (Marxist theory)|capitalist mode of production]] was more fully developed. The Bolsheviks' successful rise to power was based upon the slogans such as "Peace, Bread, and Land", which tapped into the massive public desire for an end to Russian involvement in [[World War I]], the peasants' demand for [[land reform]], and popular support for the [[Soviet (council)|soviets]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Holmes |first=Leslie |title=Communism: a very short introduction |date=2009 |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |isbn=978-0-19-157088-9 |location=Oxford, UK |pages=18 |oclc=500808890}}</ref> 50,000 workers had passed a resolution in favour of Bolshevik demand for transfer of power to the [[soviets]]<ref>{{cite book |last1=Head |first1=Michael |title=Evgeny Pashukanis: A Critical Reappraisal |date=12 September 2007 |publisher=[[Routledge]] |isbn=978-1-135-30787-5 |pages=1–288 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PYGNAgAAQBAJ&dq=october+revolution+50+000+workers&pg=PT83 |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Shukman |first1=Harold |title=The Blackwell Encyclopedia of the Russian Revolution |date=5 December 1994 |publisher=John Wiley & Sons |isbn=978-0-631-19525-2 |page=21 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ScabEAAAQBAJ&dq=october+revolution+50+000+workers&pg=PA21 |language=en}}</ref> Lenin's government also instituted a number of progressive measures such as [[Universal access to education|universal education]], [[universal healthcare|healthcare]] and [[Women in Russia|equal rights for women]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Adams |first1=Katherine H. |last2=Keene |first2=Michael L. |title=After the Vote Was Won: The Later Achievements of Fifteen Suffragists |date=10 January 2014 |publisher=McFarland |isbn=978-0-7864-5647-5 |page=109 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oyaxYvSG6gAC&dq=lenin+universal+literacy+after+the+vote+was+won&pg=PA109 |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Ugri͡umov |first1=Aleksandr Leontʹevich |title=Lenin's Plan for Building Socialism in the USSR, 1917–1925 |date=1976 |publisher=Novosti Press Agency Publishing House |page=48 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gXknAQAAMAAJ&q=lenin+universal+literacy |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Service |first1=Robert |title=Lenin: A Political Life: Volume 1: The Strengths of Contradiction |date=24 June 1985 |publisher=Springer |isbn=978-1-349-05591-3 |page=98 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ntiuCwAAQBAJ&q=universal+education&pg=PA98 |language=en}}</ref> By November 1917, the [[Russian Provisional Government]] had been widely discredited by its failure to withdraw from World War I, implement land reform, or convene the [[Russian Constituent Assembly]] to draft a constitution, leaving the soviets in ''[[de facto]]'' control of the country. The Bolsheviks moved to hand power to the [[Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies]] in the October Revolution; after a few weeks of deliberation, the [[Left Socialist-Revolutionaries]] formed a [[coalition government]] with the Bolsheviks from November 1917 to July 1918, while the right-wing faction of the [[Socialist Revolutionary Party]] boycotted the soviets and denounced the October Revolution as an illegal [[coup]]. In the [[1917 Russian Constituent Assembly election]], socialist parties totaled well over 70% of the vote. The Bolsheviks were clear winners in the urban centres, and took around two-thirds of the votes of soldiers on the Western Front, obtaining 23.3% of the vote; the Socialist Revolutionaries finished first on the strength of support from the country's rural peasantry, who were for the most part [[Single-issue politics|single issue voters]], that issue being land reform, obtaining 37.6%, while the Ukrainian Socialist Bloc finished a distant third at 12.7%, and the Mensheviks obtained a disappointing fourth place at 3.0%.<ref name="Dando 1966">{{cite journal |last=Dando |first=William A. |date=June 1966 |title=A Map of the Election to the Russian Constituent Assembly of 1917 |journal=[[Slavic Review]] |volume=25 |issue=2 |pages=314–319 |doi=10.2307/2492782 |issn=0037-6779 |jstor=2492782 |s2cid=156132823}}</ref> Most of the Socialist Revolutionary Party's seats went to the right-wing faction. Citing outdated voter-rolls, which did not acknowledge the party split, and the assembly's conflicts with the Congress of Soviets, the Bolshevik–Left Socialist-Revolutionaries government moved to dissolve the Constituent Assembly in January 1918. The Draft Decree on the Dissolution of the Constituent Assembly was issued by the [[Central Executive Committee of the Soviet Union]], a committee dominated by Lenin, who had previously supported a [[multi-party system]] of free elections. After the Bolshevik defeat, Lenin started referring to the assembly as a "deceptive form of bourgeois-democratic parliamentarianism."{{r|Dando 1966}} Some argued this was the beginning of the development of [[vanguardism]] as an hierarchical party–elite that controls society,<ref>{{cite book |last=White |first=Elizabeth |year=2010 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=tFMuCgAAQBAJ |title=The Socialist Alternative to Bolshevik Russia: The Socialist Revolutionary Party, 1921–39 |edition=1st hardback |location=London |publisher=[[Routledge]] |isbn=9780415435840 |access-date=18 August 2021 |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref> which resulted in a split between [[anarchism and Marxism]], and [[Leninist]] communism assuming the dominant position for most of the 20th century, excluding rival socialist currents.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Franks |first=Benjamin |date=May 2012 |title=Between Anarchism and Marxism: The Beginnings and Ends of the Schism |journal=[[Journal of Political Ideologies]] |volume=17 |issue=2 |pages=202–227 |doi=10.1080/13569317.2012.676867 |s2cid=145419232 |issn=1356-9317}}</ref> Other communists and Marxists, especially [[social democrats]] who favored the development of [[liberal democracy]] as a prerequisite to [[socialism]], were critical of the Bolsheviks from the beginning due to Russia being seen as too backward for a [[socialist revolution]].{{r|Steele 1992, pp. 44–45}} [[Council communism]] and [[left communism]], inspired by the [[German Revolution of 1918–1919]] and the wide [[proletarian revolution]]ary wave, arose in response to developments in Russia and are critical of self-declared constitutionally [[socialist state]]s. Some left-wing parties, such as the [[Socialist Party of Great Britain]], boasted of having called the Bolsheviks, and by extension those [[Communist state]]s which either followed or were inspired by the Soviet Bolshevik model of development, establishing [[state capitalism]] in late 1917, as would be described during the 20th century by several academics, economists, and other scholars,{{r|Chomsky, Howard, Fitzgibbons}} or a [[command economy]].<ref name="The Soviet Union Has an Administered, Not a Planned, Economy, 1985">{{cite journal |last=Wilhelm |first=John Howard |year=1985 |title=The Soviet Union Has an Administered, Not a Planned, Economy |journal=[[Europe-Asia Studies|Soviet Studies]] |volume=37 |issue=1 |pages=118–30 |doi=10.1080/09668138508411571}}</ref><ref name="Gregory 2004">{{cite book |last=Gregory |first=Paul Roderick |author-link=Paul Roderick Gregory |url=https://www.hoover.org/press-releases/political-economy-stalinism |title=The Political Economy of Stalinism |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |year=2004 |isbn=978-0-511-61585-6 |location=Cambridge |doi=10.1017/CBO9780511615856 |quote='Although Stalin was the system's prime architect, the system was managed by thousands of 'Stalins' in a nested dictatorship,' Gregory writes. 'This study pinpoints the reasons for the failure of the system—poor planning, unreliable supplies, the preferential treatment of indigenous enterprises, the lack of knowledge of planners, etc.—but also focuses on the basic principal agent conflict between planners and producers, which created a sixty-year reform stalemate.' |postscript=. Quote is from Hoover Institution's press release about the book |access-date=12 August 2021 |via=[[Hoover Institution]]}}</ref><ref name="Ellman 2007">{{cite book |last=Ellman |first=Michael |author-link=Michael Ellman |title=Transition and Beyond: Essays in Honour of Mario Nuti |publisher=[[Palgrave Macmillan]] |year=2007 |isbn=978-0-230-54697-4 |editor1-last=Estrin |editor1-first=Saul |location=London |page=22 |chapter=The Rise and Fall of Socialist Planning |quote=In the USSR in the late 1980s the system was normally referred to as the 'administrative-command' economy. What was fundamental to this system was not the plan but the role of administrative hierarchies at all levels of decision making; the absence of control over decision making by the population ... . |editor2-last=Kołodko |editor2-first=Grzegorz W. |editor2-link=Grzegorz Kołodko |editor3-last=Uvalić |editor3-first=Milica}}</ref> Before the Soviet path of development became known as ''socialism'', in reference to the [[two-stage theory]], communists made no major distinction between the [[socialist mode of production]] and communism;{{r|Hudis et al. 2018}} it is consistent with, and helped to inform, early concepts of socialism in which the [[law of value]] no longer directs economic activity. Monetary relations in the form of [[Exchange value|exchange-value]], [[Profit (economics)|profit]], [[interest]], and [[Wage labour|wage labor]] would not operate and apply to Marxist socialism.{{r|Bockman 2011, p. 20}} While [[Joseph Stalin]] stated that the law of value would still apply to socialism and that the Soviet Union was ''socialist'' under this new definition, which was followed by other Communist leaders, many other communists maintain the original definition and state that Communist states never established socialism in this sense. Lenin described his policies as state capitalism but saw them as necessary for the development of socialism, which left-wing critics say was never established, while some [[Marxist–Leninists]] state that it was established only during the [[Stalin era]] and [[Mao era]], and then became capitalist states ruled by ''[[Revisionism (Marxism)|revisionists]]''; others state that Maoist China was always state capitalist, and uphold [[People's Socialist Republic of Albania]] as the only [[socialist state]] after the Soviet Union under Stalin,<ref name="Bland 1995">{{cite journal |last=Bland |first=Bill |date=1995 |orig-date=1980 |url=https://revolutionarydemocracy.org/archive/BlandRestoration.pdf |title=The Restoration of Capitalism in the Soviet Union |journal=Revolutionary Democracy Journal |access-date=16 February 2020}}</ref><ref name="Bland 1997">{{cite book |last=Bland |first=Bill |date=1997 |url=http://ml-review.ca/aml/China/historymaotable.html |title=Class Struggles in China |edition=revised |location=London |access-date=16 February 2020}}</ref> who first stated to have achieved ''socialism'' with the [[1936 Constitution of the Soviet Union]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Smith |first=S. A. |year=2014 |title=The Oxford Handbook of the History of Communism |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |page=126 |isbn=9780191667527 |quote=The 1936 Constitution described the Soviet Union for the first time as a 'socialist society', rhetorically fulfilling the aim of building socialism in one country, as Stalin had promised.}}</ref> === Communist states === ==== Soviet Union ==== {{further|Communist state|Soviet Union}} [[War communism]] was the first system adopted by the Bolsheviks during the [[Russian Civil War]] as a result of the many challenges.{{r|Peters 1998}} Despite ''communism'' in the name, it had nothing to do with communism, with strict discipline for workers, [[strike action]]s forbidden, obligatory labor duty, and military-style control, and has been described as simple [[authoritarian]] control by the Bolsheviks to maintain power and control in the Soviet regions, rather than any coherent political [[ideology]].<ref>{{cite journal |last=Himmer |first=Robert |year=1994 |title=The Transition from War Communism to the New Economic Policy: An Analysis of Stalin's Views |journal=[[The Russian Review]] |volume=53 |issue=4 |pages=515–529 |doi=10.2307/130963 |jstor=130963}}</ref> The Soviet Union was established in 1922. Before the [[Ban on factions in the Communist Party of the Soviet Union|broad ban]] in 1921, there were several factions in the Communist party, more prominently among them the [[Left Opposition]], the [[Right Opposition]], and the [[Workers' Opposition]], which debated on the path of development to follow. The Left and Workers' oppositions were more critical of the state-capitalist development and the Workers' in particular was critical of [[bureaucratization]] and development from above, while the Right Opposition was more supporting of state-capitalist development and advocated the [[New Economic Policy]].<ref name="Peters 1998">{{cite journal |last=Peters |first=John E. |year=1998 |title=Book Reviews: The Life and Times of Soviet Socialism |journal=[[Journal of Economic Issues]] |volume=32 |issue=4 |pages=1203–1206 |doi=10.1080/00213624.1998.11506129}}</ref> Following Lenin's [[democratic centralism]], the Leninist parties were organized on a hierarchical basis, with active cells of members as the broad base. They were made up only of elite [[Cadre (politics)|cadres]] approved by higher members of the party as being reliable and completely subject to [[party discipline]].<ref name="World War II 2001">{{cite book |first=Norman |last=Davies |author-link=Norman Davies |chapter=Communism |title=The Oxford Companion to World War II |editor1-first=I. C. B. |editor1-last=Dear |editor2-first=M. R. D. |editor2-last=Foot |editor2-link=M. R. D. Foot |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |date=2001}}</ref> [[Trotskyism]] overtook the left communists as the main dissident communist current, while more [[libertarian communism]]s, dating back to the [[libertarian Marxist]] current of council communism, remained important dissident communisms outside the Soviet Union. Following Lenin's [[democratic centralism]], the Leninist parties were organized on a hierarchical basis, with active cells of members as the broad base. They were made up only of elite cadres approved by higher members of the party as being reliable and completely subject to [[party discipline]]. The [[Great Purge]] of 1936–1938 was [[Joseph Stalin]]'s attempt to destroy any possible opposition within the [[Communist Party of the Soviet Union]]. In the [[Moscow trials]], many old Bolsheviks who had played prominent roles during the [[Russian Revolution]] or in Lenin's Soviet government afterwards, including [[Lev Kamenev]], [[Grigory Zinoviev]], [[Alexei Rykov]], and [[Nikolai Bukharin]], were accused, pleaded guilty of conspiracy against the Soviet Union, and were executed.<ref>{{cite book |last=Sedov |first=Lev |date=1980 |url=http://www.marxists.org/history/etol/writers/sedov/works/red/index.htm |title=The Red Book on the Moscow Trial: Documents |location=New York |publisher=New Park Publications |isbn=0-86151-015-1 |via=[[Marxists Internet Archive]]}}</ref>{{r|World War II 2001}} The devastation of [[World War II]] resulted in a massive recovery program involving the rebuilding of industrial plants, housing, and transportation as well as the demobilization and migration of millions of soldiers and civilians. In the midst of this turmoil during the winter of 1946–1947, the Soviet Union experienced the worst natural famine in the 20th century.<ref name="Gorlizki">{{Cite book |last=Gorlizki |first=Yoram |title=Cold peace: Stalin and the Soviet ruling circle, 1945-1953 |date=2004 |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |others=O. V. Khlevni︠u︡k |isbn=978-0-19-534735-7 |location=Oxford |oclc=57589785}}</ref> There was no serious opposition to Stalin as the secret police continued to send possible suspects to the [[gulag]]. Relations with the United States and Britain went from friendly to hostile, as they denounced Stalin's political controls over eastern Europe and his [[Berlin Blockade]]. By 1947, the [[Cold War]] had begun. Stalin himself believed that capitalism was a hollow shell and would crumble under increased non-military pressure exerted through proxies in countries like Italy. He greatly underestimated the economic strength of the West and instead of triumph saw the West build up alliances that were designed to permanently stop or contain Soviet expansion. In early 1950, Stalin gave the go-ahead for [[North Korea]]'s invasion of [[South Korea]], expecting a short war. He was stunned when the Americans entered and defeated the North Koreans, putting them almost on the Soviet border. Stalin supported [[China]]'s entry into the [[Korean War]], which drove the Americans back to the prewar boundaries, but which escalated tensions. The United States decided to mobilize its economy for a long contest with the Soviets, built the [[hydrogen bomb]], and strengthened the [[NATO]] alliance that covered [[Western Europe]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Gaddis |first=John Lewis |title=The Cold War: A New History |date=2006 |publisher=[[Penguin Books]] |author-link=John Lewis Gaddis}}</ref> According to Gorlizki and Khlevniuk, Stalin's consistent and overriding goal after 1945 was to consolidate the nation's superpower status and in the face of his growing physical decrepitude, to maintain his own hold on total power. Stalin created a leadership system that reflected historic czarist styles of paternalism and repression yet was also quite modern. At the top, personal loyalty to Stalin counted for everything. Stalin also created powerful committees, elevated younger specialists, and began major institutional innovations. In the teeth of persecution, Stalin's deputies cultivated informal norms and mutual understandings which provided the foundations for collective rule after his death.{{r|Gorlizki}} For most Westerners and [[anti-communist]] Russians, Stalin is viewed overwhelmingly negatively as a [[mass murder]]er; for significant numbers of Russians and Georgians, he is regarded as a great statesman and state-builder.<ref>{{Cite book |last=McDermott |first=Kevin |date=2006 |title=Stalin: Revolutionary in an Era of War |location=Basingstoke and New York |publisher=[[Palgrave Macmillan]] |page=1 |isbn=978-0-333-71122-4}}</ref> ==== China ==== After the [[Chinese Civil War]], [[Mao Zedong]] and the [[Chinese Communist Party]] came to power in 1949 as the [[Nationalist government]] headed by the [[Kuomintang]] fled to the island of Taiwan. In 1950–1953, China engaged in a large-scale, undeclared war with the United States, South Korea, and United Nations forces in the [[Korean War]]. While the war ended in a military stalemate, it gave Mao the opportunity to identify and purge elements in China that seemed supportive of capitalism. At first, there was close cooperation with Stalin, who sent in technical experts to aid the industrialization process along the line of the Soviet model of the 1930s.{{sfn|Brown|2009|pp=179–193}} After Stalin's death in 1953, relations with Moscow soured—Mao thought Stalin's successors had betrayed the Communist ideal. Mao charged that Soviet leader [[Nikita Khrushchev]] was the leader of a "revisionist clique" which had turned against Marxism and Leninism and was now setting the stage for the restoration of capitalism.<ref>{{cite book |last=Gittings |first=John |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=259WHxBah2wC&pg=PA40 |title=The Changing Face of China: From Mao to Market |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |year=2006 |isbn=9780191622373 |page=40 |author-link=John Gittings}}</ref> The two nations were at sword's point by 1960. Both began forging alliances with communist supporters around the globe, thereby splitting the worldwide movement into two hostile camps.<ref>{{cite book |last=Luthi |first=Lorenz M. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dl4TRDxqexMC&pg=PA94 |title=The Sino-Soviet Split: Cold War in the Communist World |publisher=[[Princeton University Press]] |year=2010 |isbn=978-1400837625}}</ref> Rejecting the Soviet model of rapid urbanization, Mao Zedong and his top aide [[Deng Xiaoping]] launched the [[Great Leap Forward]] in 1957–1961 with the goal of industrializing China overnight, using the peasant villages as the base rather than large cities.{{sfn|Brown|2009|pp=316–332}} Private ownership of land ended and the peasants worked in large collective farms that were now ordered to start up heavy industry operations, such as steel mills. Plants were built in remote locations, due to the lack of technical experts, managers, transportation, or needed facilities. Industrialization failed, and the main result was a sharp unexpected decline in agricultural output, which led to mass famine and millions of deaths. The years of the Great Leap Forward in fact saw economic regression, with 1958 through 1961 being the only years between 1953 and 1983 in which China's economy saw negative growth. Political economist [[Dwight H. Perkins (economist)|Dwight Perkins]] argues: "Enormous amounts of investment produced only modest increases in production or none at all. ... In short, the Great Leap was a very expensive disaster."<ref>{{cite book |last=Perkins |first=Dwight Heald |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cVywAAAAIAAJ |title=China's economic policy and performance during the Cultural Revolution and its aftermath |publisher=[[Harvard Institute for International Development]] |year=1984 |page=12 |author-link=Dwight H. Perkins (economist)}}</ref> Put in charge of rescuing the economy, Deng adopted pragmatic policies that the idealistic Mao disliked. For a while, Mao was in the shadows but returned to center stage and purged Deng and his allies in the [[Cultural Revolution]] (1966–1976).<ref>{{cite book |last=Vogel |first=Ezra F.|title=[[Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China]] |publisher=[[Harvard University Press]] |year=2011 |pages=[https://books.google.com/books?id=3IaR-FxlA6AC&pg=PA40 40]–[https://books.google.com/books?id=3IaR-FxlA6AC&pg=PA42 42] |author-link=Ezra Vogel}}</ref> The [[Cultural Revolution]] was an upheaval that targeted intellectuals and party leaders from 1966 through 1976. Mao's goal was to purify communism by removing pro-capitalists and traditionalists by imposing [[Maoist]] orthodoxy within the [[Chinese Communist Party]]. The movement paralyzed China politically and weakened the country economically, culturally, and intellectually for years. Millions of people were accused, humiliated, stripped of power, and either imprisoned, killed, or most often, sent to work as farm laborers. Mao insisted that those he labelled [[Revisionism (Marxism)|revisionists]] be removed through violent [[class struggle]]. The two most prominent militants were Marshall [[Lin Biao]] of the army and Mao's wife [[Jiang Qing]]. China's youth responded to Mao's appeal by forming [[Red Guard]] groups around the country. The movement spread into the military, urban workers, and the Communist party leadership itself. It resulted in widespread factional struggles in all walks of life. In the top leadership, it led to a mass purge of senior officials who were accused of taking a "[[capitalist road]]", most notably [[Liu Shaoqi]] and [[Deng Xiaoping]]. During the same period, Mao's [[personality cult]] grew to immense proportions. After Mao's death in 1976, the survivors were rehabilitated and many returned to power.{{sfn|Brown|2009}}{{page needed|date=June 2022}} Mao's government was responsible for vast numbers of deaths with estimates ranging from 40 to 80 million victims through starvation, persecution, [[Laogai|prison labour]], and mass executions.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Johnson |first=Ian |author-link=Ian Johnson (writer) |date=5 February 2018 |title=Who Killed More: Hitler, Stalin, or Mao? |url=https://www.nybooks.com/daily/2018/02/05/who-killed-more-hitler-stalin-or-mao/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180205193203/https://www.nybooks.com/daily/2018/02/05/who-killed-more-hitler-stalin-or-mao/ |archive-date=5 February 2018 |access-date=18 July 2020 |website=The New York Review of Books}}</ref><ref name=":6">{{cite book |last=Fenby |first=Jonathan |url=https://archive.org/details/modernchinafallr00fenb/page/351/mode/2up |title=Modern China: The Fall and Rise of a Great Power, 1850 to the Present |publisher=[[Penguin Group]] |year=2008 |isbn=978-0061661167 |pages=351 |author-link=Jonathan Fenby}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Schram |first=Stuart |author-link=Stuart R. Schram |date=March 2007 |title=Mao: The Unknown Story |journal=[[The China Quarterly]] |issue=189 |pages=205 |doi=10.1017/s030574100600107x |s2cid=154814055}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Evangelista |first=Matthew A. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9IAfLDzySd4C&q=80+million |title=Peace Studies: Critical Concepts in Political Science |publisher=[[Taylor & Francis]] |year=2005 |isbn=978-0415339230 |pages=96 |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref> Mao has also been praised for transforming China from a [[semi-colony]] to a leading world power, with greatly advanced literacy, women's rights, basic healthcare, primary education, and life expectancy.<ref name="Bottelier">{{Cite book |last=Bottelier |first=Pieter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YMhUDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA131 |title=Economic Policy Making In China (1949–2016): The Role of Economists |publisher=[[Routledge]] |year=2018 |isbn=978-1351393812 |pages=131 |quote=We should remember, however, that Mao also did wonderful things for China; apart from reuniting the country, he restored a sense of natural pride, greatly improved women's rights, basic healthcare and primary education, ended opium abuse, simplified Chinese characters, developed pinyin and promoted its use for teaching purposes. |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Pantsov |first1=Alexander V. |url= |title=Mao: The Real Story |last2=Levine |first2=Steven I. |date=2013 |publisher=[[Simon & Schuster]] |isbn=978-1451654486 |location= |page=574}}</ref><ref name="Galtung">{{cite book |last1=Galtung |first1=Marte Kjær |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qqqDBQAAQBAJ&pg=PA189 |title=49 Myths about China |last2=Stenslie |first2=Stig |date=2014 |publisher=[[Rowman & Littlefield]] |isbn=978-1442236226 |page=189}}</ref><ref name="PopulationStudies2015">{{cite journal |last1=Babiarz |first1=Kimberly Singer |last2=Eggleston |first2=Karen |display-authors=etal. |date=2015 |title=An exploration of China's mortality decline under Mao: A provincial analysis, 1950–80 |journal=[[Population Studies (journal)|Population Studies]] |volume=69 |issue=1 |pages=39–56 |doi=10.1080/00324728.2014.972432 |pmc=4331212 |pmid=25495509 |quote=China's growth in life expectancy at birth from 35–40 years in 1949 to 65.5 years in 1980 is among the most rapid sustained increases in documented global history.}}</ref> === Cold War === {{further|Cold War|Eastern Bloc}} [[File:Communist_Block.svg|thumb|300x300px|States that had communist governments in red, states that the [[Soviet Union]] believed at one point to be [[moving toward socialism]] in orange, and [[List of socialist states#Countries with constitutional references to socialism|states with constitutional references to socialism]] in yellow]] Its leading role in World War II saw the emergence of the [[industrialized Soviet Union]] as a [[superpower]].<ref name="Program_CPSS">{{cite web |url=http://aleksandr-kommari.narod.ru/kpss_programma_1961.htm |script-title=ru:Программа коммунистической партии советского Союза |title=Programma kommunisticheskoy partii sovetskogo Soyuza |language=ru |trans-title=Program of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union |date=1961 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221011120447/http://aleksandr-kommari.narod.ru/kpss_programma_1961.htm |archive-date=11 October 2022}}</ref><ref name="Nossal">{{cite conference |first=Kim Richard |last=Nossal |title=Lonely Superpower or Unapologetic Hyperpower? Analyzing American Power in the post–Cold War Era |url=http://post.queensu.ca/~nossalk/papers/hyperpower.htm |conference=Biennial meeting, South African Political Studies Association, 29 June-2 July 1999 |access-date=28 February 2007 |archive-date=7 August 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120807084022/http://post.queensu.ca/~nossalk/papers/hyperpower.htm |url-status=dead}}</ref> Marxist–Leninist governments modeled on the Soviet Union took power with Soviet assistance in [[People's Republic of Bulgaria|Bulgaria]], [[Czechoslovak Socialist Republic|Czechoslovakia]], [[East Germany]], [[Polish People's Republic|Poland]], Hungary, and [[Socialist Republic of Romania|Romania]]. A Marxist–Leninist government was also created under [[Josip Broz Tito]] in [[Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia|Yugoslavia]]; Tito's independent policies led to the [[Tito–Stalin split]] and expulsion of Yugoslavia from the [[Cominform]] in 1948, and [[Titoism]] was branded ''[[deviationist]]''. [[People's Socialist Republic of Albania|Albania]] also became an independent Marxist–Leninist state following the [[Albanian–Soviet split]] in 1960,{{r|Bland 1995}}{{r|Bland 1997}} resulting from an ideological fallout between [[Enver Hoxha]], a Stalinist, and the Soviet government of [[Nikita Khrushchev]], who enacted a period of [[de-Stalinization]] and re-approached diplomatic relations with Yugoslavia in 1976.<ref>{{cite book |url=http://searchworks.stanford.edu/view/1880822 |title=Kushtetuta e Republikës Popullore Socialiste të Shqipërisë: [miratuar nga Kuvendi Popullor më 28. 12. 1976]. SearchWorks (SULAIR) |trans-title=Constitution of the Socialist People's Republic of Albania: [approved by the People's Assembly on 28. 12. 1976]. SearchWorks (SULAIR) |language=sq |access-date=3 June 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120322181503/http://searchworks.stanford.edu/view/1880822 |archive-date=22 March 2012 |publisher=8 Nëntori |date=4 January 1977}}</ref> The Communist Party of China, led by Mao Zedong, established the [[People's Republic of China]], which would follow its own ideological path of development following the [[Sino-Soviet split]].<ref>{{cite book |title=Chambers Dictionary of World History |editor-first1=Bruce |editor-last1=Lenman |editor-first2=Trevor |editor-last2=Anderson |editor-first3=Hilary |editor-last3=Marsden |publisher=[[Chambers (publisher)|Chambers]] |location=Edinburgh |year=2000 |page=769 |isbn=9780550100948}}</ref> Communism was seen as a rival of and a threat to Western capitalism for most of the 20th century.<ref name="Georgakas1992">{{cite encyclopedia |author-link=Dan Georgakas |last=Georgakas |first=Dan |date=1992 |chapter=The Hollywood Blacklist |encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of the American Left |edition=paperback |location=Champaign, Illinois |publisher=[[University of Illinois Press]] |isbn=9780252062506}}</ref> In Western Europe, communist parties were part of several post-war governments, and even when the Cold War forced many of those countries to remove them from government, such as in Italy, they remained part of the [[liberal-democratic]] process.<ref name="Kindersley"/><ref>{{cite encyclopedia |last=Lazar |first=Marc |author-link=Marc Lazar |encyclopedia=[[International Encyclopedia of Political Science]] |title=Communism |pages=310–314 (312) |editor1-last=Badie |editor1-first=Bertrand |editor1-link=Bertrand Badie |editor2-first=Dirk |editor2-last=Berg-Schlosser |editor2-link=Dirk Berg-Schlosser |editor3-first=Leonardo |editor3-last=Morlino |editor3-link=Leonardo Morlino |volume=2 |date=2011 |publisher=[[SAGE Publications]] |doi=10.4135/9781412994163 |isbn=9781412959636}}</ref> There were also many developments in libertarian Marxism, especially during the 1960s with the [[New Left]].<ref>{{harvp|Wright|1960}}; {{harvp|Geary|2009|p=1}}; {{harvp|Kaufman|2003}}; {{harvp|Gitlin|2001|pp=3–26}}; {{harvp|Farred|2000|pp=627–648}}</ref> By the 1960s and 1970s, many Western communist parties had criticized many of the actions of communist states, distanced from them, and developed a [[democratic road to socialism]], which became known as [[Eurocommunism]].<ref name="Kindersley">{{cite book |editor-first=Richard |editor-last=Kindersley |title=In Search of Eurocommunism |publisher=[[Macmillan Press]] |date=1981 |isbn=978-1-349-16581-0 |url=https://www.palgrave.com/gp/book/9781349165810}}</ref> This development was criticized by more orthodox supporters of the Soviet Union as amounting to [[social democracy]].<ref>{{cite journal |last=Deutscher |first=Tamara |date=January–February 1983 |url=http://newleftreview.org/I/137/tamara-deutscher-e-h-carr-a-personal-memoir |title=E. H. Carr—A Personal Memoir |journal=[[New Left Review]] |volume=I |issue=137 |pages=78–86 |access-date=13 August 2021}}</ref> Since 1957, [[Communism in Kerala|communists have been frequently voted into power]] in the [[India|Indian]] state of [[Kerala]].<ref>{{Cite news |last1=Jaffe |first1=Greg |last2=Doshi |first2=Vidhi |date=1 June 2018 |title=One of the few places where a communist can still dream |language=en-US |newspaper=[[The Washington Post]] |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/the-place-where-communists-can-still-dream/2017/10/26/55747cbe-9c98-11e7-b2a7-bc70b6f98089_story.html |access-date=10 August 2023 |issn=0190-8286}}</ref> In 1959, [[Cuban Revolution|Cuban communist revolutionaries]] overthrew Cuba's previous government under the dictator [[Fulgencio Batista]]. The leader of the Cuban Revolution, [[Fidel Castro]], ruled Cuba from 1959 until 2008.<ref>{{Cite web |date=15 May 2023 |title=Cuban Revolution |url=https://www.britannica.com/event/Cuban-Revolution |access-date=15 June 2023 |website=Encyclopædia Britannica |language=en}}</ref> === Dissolution of the Soviet Union === {{further|Dissolution of the Soviet Union}} With the fall of the [[Warsaw Pact]] after the [[Revolutions of 1989]], which led to the fall of most of the former [[Eastern Bloc]], the Soviet Union was dissolved on 26 December 1991. It was a result of the declaration number 142-Н of the [[Soviet of the Republics]] of the [[Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union]].<ref>{{cite news |last=Alimzhanov |first=Anuarbek |date=1991 |url=http://vedomosti.sssr.su/1991/52/#1561#1082 |title=Deklaratsiya Soveta Respublik Verkhovnogo Soveta SSSR v svyazi s sozdaniyem Sodruzhestva Nezavisimykh Gosudarstv |script-title=ru:Декларация Совета Республик Верховного Совета СССР в связи с созданием Содружества Независимых Государств |language=ru |trans-title=Declaration of the Council of the Republics of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR in connection with the creation of the Commonwealth of Independent States |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151220173637/http://vedomosti.sssr.su/1991/52/#1561 |archive-date=20 December 2015 |work=[[Vedomosti]] |volume=52}}. [[wikisource:ru:Декларация Совета Республик ВС СССР от December 26, 1991 № 142-Н|Declaration № 142-Н]] {{in lang|ru}} of the Soviet of the Republics of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union, formally establishing the dissolution of the Soviet Union as a state and subject of international law.</ref> The declaration acknowledged the independence of the former [[Soviet republics]] and created the [[Commonwealth of Independent States]], although five of the signatories ratified it much later or did not do it at all. On the previous day, Soviet president [[Mikhail Gorbachev]] (the eighth and final [[leader of the Soviet Union]]) resigned, declared his office extinct, and handed over its powers, including control of the [[Cheget]], to Russian president [[Boris Yeltsin]]. That evening at 7:32, the [[Soviet flag]] was lowered from the [[Kremlin]] for the last time and replaced with the pre-revolutionary [[Russian flag]]. Previously, from August to December 1991, all the individual republics, including Russia itself, had seceded from the union. The week before the union's formal dissolution, eleven republics signed the [[Alma-Ata Protocol]], formally establishing the [[Commonwealth of Independent States]], and declared that the Soviet Union had ceased to exist.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1991/12/22/world/end-soviet-union-text-declaration-mutual-recognition-equal-basis.html |title=The End of the Soviet Union; Text of Declaration: 'Mutual Recognition' and 'an Equal Basis' |work=[[The New York Times]] |date=22 December 1991 |access-date=30 March 2013}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/learning/general/onthisday/big/1225.html |title=Gorbachev, Last Soviet Leader, Resigns; U.S. Recognizes Republics' Independence |work=[[The New York Times]] |date=26 December 1991 |access-date=27 April 2015}}</ref> === Post-Soviet communism === {{see also|List of socialist parties with national parliamentary representation}}[[File:Communist flag at night at Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, year 2024.jpg|thumb|Communist flag at night at Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, year 2024]] [[File:Communist Party of Vietnam Poster in Hanoi.jpg|thumb|A poster of the [[Communist Party of Vietnam]] in Hanoi]] As of 2023, states controlled by Marxist–Leninist parties under a single-party system include the People's Republic of China, the [[Republic of Cuba]], the [[Lao People's Democratic Republic]], and the [[Socialist Republic of Vietnam]].{{refn|group=note|name=NKorea}} Communist parties, or their descendant parties, remain politically important in several other countries. With the [[dissolution of the Soviet Union]] and the [[Fall of Communism]], there was a split between those hardline Communists, sometimes referred to in the media as ''[[neo-Stalinist]]s'', who remained committed to orthodox [[Marxism–Leninism]], and those, such as [[The Left (Germany)|The Left]] in Germany, who work within the liberal-democratic process for a democratic road to socialism;<ref>{{cite book |last=Sargent |first=Lyman Tower |year=2008 |title=Contemporary Political Ideologies: A Comparative Analysis |url=https://archive.org/details/contemporarypoli00sarg_989 |url-access=limited |edition=14th |publisher=[[Wadsworth Publishing]] |page=[https://archive.org/details/contemporarypoli00sarg_989/page/n135 117] |isbn=9780495569398 |quote=Because many communists now call themselves democratic socialists, it is sometimes difficult to know what a political label really means. As a result, social democratic has become a common new label for democratic socialist political parties.}}</ref> other ruling Communist parties became closer to [[democratic socialist]] and [[social-democratic]] parties.<ref>{{cite book |last=Lamb |first=Peter |year=2015 |title=Historical Dictionary of Socialism |edition=3rd |publisher=[[Rowman & Littlefield]] |page=415 |isbn=9781442258266 |quote=In the 1990s, following the collapse of the communist regimes in Eastern Europe and the breakup of the Soviet Union, social democracy was adopted by some of the old communist parties. Hence, parties such as the Czech Social Democratic Party, the Bulgarian Social Democrats, the Estonian Social Democratic Party, and the Romanian Social Democratic Party, among others, achieved varying degrees of electoral success. Similar processes took place in Africa as the old communist parties were transformed into social democratic ones, even though they retained their traditional titles ... .}}</ref> Outside Communist states, reformed Communist parties have led or been part of left-leaning government or regional coalitions, including in the former Eastern Bloc. In Nepal, Communists ([[CPN UML]] and [[Nepal Communist Party]]) were part of the [[1st Nepalese Constituent Assembly]], which abolished the monarchy in 2008 and turned the country into a federal liberal-democratic republic, and have democratically shared power with other communists, Marxist–Leninists, and [[Maoists]] ([[CPN Maoist]]), social democrats ([[Nepali Congress]]), and others as part of their [[People's Multiparty Democracy]].<ref>{{cite news |url=http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11057207&fsrc=nwl |title=Nepal's election The Maoists triumph |newspaper=[[The Economist]] |date=17 April 2008 |access-date=18 October 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090214103506/http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11057207&fsrc=nwl |archive-date=14 February 2009 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Bhattarai |first=Kamal Dev |date=21 February 2018 |url=https://thediplomat.com/2018/02/the-rebirth-of-the-nepal-communist-party/ |title=The (Re)Birth of the Nepal Communist Party |work=[[The Diplomat]] |access-date=29 November 2020}}</ref> The [[Communist Party of the Russian Federation]] has some supporters, but is reformist rather than revolutionary, aiming to lessen the inequalities of Russia's market economy.<ref name="Ball & Dagger 2019" /> [[Chinese economic reforms]] were started in 1978 under the leadership of [[Deng Xiaoping]], and since then China has managed to bring down the poverty rate from 53% in the Mao era to just 8% in 2001.<ref>{{cite web |last=Ravallion |first=Martin |author-link=Martin Ravallion |date=2005 |url=http://econ.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/EXTDEC/EXTRESEARCH/0%2C%2CcontentMDK%3A20634060~pagePK%3A64165401~piPK%3A64165026~theSitePK%3A469382%2C00.html |title=Fighting Poverty: Findings and Lessons from China's Success |publisher=[[World Bank]] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180301071146/http://econ.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/EXTDEC/EXTRESEARCH/0%2C%2CcontentMDK%3A20634060~pagePK%3A64165401~piPK%3A64165026~theSitePK%3A469382%2C00.html |archive-date=1 March 2018 |access-date=10 August 2006}}</ref> After losing Soviet subsidies and support, Vietnam and Cuba have attracted more foreign investment to their countries, with their economies becoming more market-oriented.<ref name="Ball & Dagger 2019" /> North Korea, the last Communist country that still practices Soviet-style Communism, is both repressive and isolationist.<ref name="Ball & Dagger 2019" /> Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. 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