Communism is one of the most influential political and economic ideologies of the modern world. At its heart, it seeks to create a society where wealth and resources are shared equally, and no one class has power or influence over another. To understand communism, it is first important to understand its history and the main principles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Communism is an economic and political system that is based on the principles of socialism<\/a>, especially the earlier development of\u00a0Marxism<\/a>\u00a0and the ideas of\u00a0Karl Marx<\/a>\u00a0as expressed in the Communist Manifesto. Similar to Marxism, communism is centered on the idea of establishing a society based upon public ownership of the means of production and the removal of any form of social classes.\u00a0 For example, communism generally focuses on the conditions of the working-class, and the wide income gap that existed in laissez-faire capitalist<\/a> societies. Laissez-faire capitalism\u00a0was the dominant economic system in Europe during the 19th century and, in general, was based upon little or no government intervention in the economy.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n At the time, some argued that laissez-faire capitalism was favorable to the wealthy while devastating for the working-class people. Socialism developed as a response to how some felt about laissez-faire capitalism and its apparent failings. As a theory, communism is concerned with correcting this imbalance and creating a society based upon an equitable distribution of the income with no class divisions. As stated previously, communism emerged out of the ideas of Marxism, but distinguished itself from other socialist ideologies when it first emerged in the 20th century.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Historians have identified several principles of communism, including: a classless society, public ownership, and a centrally planned economy. In short, communism seeks to abolish social classes within society. According to communist thought, everyone in society should be equal, without divisions between the rich and poor or the workers and owners. As such, the concept of public ownership was central to the idea of communism. For example, in a communist state the community or the state controls production so that the wealth benefits everyone, not just a few wealthy individuals. This was to be achieved through a centrally planned economy or a command economy. Instead of letting supply and demand determine production (such as in capitalism<\/a>), communism uses a centrally planned economy (command economy<\/a>), where the government decides what to produce and how resources are distributed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The first country in the world to adopt communism was Russia during the events on the Russian Revolution<\/a> in 1917. At the time, Russia was rule by Tsar Nicholas II<\/a>, who, in the opinion of Russian peasants, was failing to meet the needs of the country.\u00a0 Russia was a society that was sharply divided and the poorest Russians struggled to survive day-to-day.\u00a0 Poverty was widespread<\/a>, especially among Russian peasants, who worked for the landowning nobility.\u00a0 This all combined to set the stage for a revolution against the Tsar and his rule over Russia.\u00a0 In 1917, Vladimir Lenin<\/a> led a series of revolts against Tsar Nicholas II.\u00a0 Lenin was the leader of the Bolsheviks<\/a>, who were a communist organization that sought to gain power over Russia.\u00a0 Lenin referred to himself as a Marxist and promoted the idea of establishing Russia as the world\u2019s first communist state.\u00a0 Soon, Tsar Nicholas II and his family were imprisoned and Lenin and the Bolsheviks assumed power over Russia.\u00a0 Russia transformed into the Soviet Union and remained a communist state until the early 1990s.\u00a0 The history of communism in the Soviet Union is important to understand because it displays the connection between communism and the political system of a dictatorship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A dictatorship<\/a> is a political ideology in which the leader holds all the power in a given society and often maintains power through terror and violence against his own citizens.\u00a0 Throughout the 20th century, the Soviet Union was dominated by a series of dictators that used their power to form a communist state while also protecting and centralizing authority in themselves. This is an important distinction because while communism is similar to other forms of socialism in many ways, the inclusion of a dictator separates it politically.\u00a0 For example, in the Communist Manifesto, Karl Marx argued in favor of a classless society based upon public ownership.\u00a0 While communist societies such as the Soviet Union are based on public ownership, the nature of a dictatorship means that they are inherently not classless, since the dictator and the federal government control the central authority of the government.\u00a0 As such, communist countries are often referred to as having a command economy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A command economy<\/a> is one in which the economic decision-making of a country is done by a central authority.\u00a0 For example, the central authority issues command about the basic functions of the economy, including:\u00a0 what goods and services should be produced; how should goods and services be produced; who should receive the goods and services that are produced?\u00a0 Communists argue that a command economy is beneficial to society because it: provides a strong central means of production for easy coordination, allows the government to carry out comprehensive economic planning and avoids the issues associated with capitalism, such as: wide income gap and poor conditions for the poor and working-class.\u00a0 Alternatively, those against the principles of communism argue that a command economy is harmful to society because: large-scale economic planning is difficult, and the government may not necessarily meet the needs of all of its people, the economy is reliant on a single source for decision-making, and freedom of choice for producers and consumers is limited.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Communism in the Soviet Union also played an important role in\u00a0Cold War<\/a>, which occurred between the United States and the Soviet Union from the end of World War II<\/a> in 1945 until about 1990. \u00a0At its heart, the Cold War was an ideological\u00a0divide<\/a> between the two countries since the Soviet Union was based on communism and the United States was based upon capitalism<\/a> and democracy<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While communism emerged in the early 20th century with the Russian Revolution, it still remains in a few areas of the world today, including: Cuba and North Korea.\u00a0 Similar to the Soviet Union, the history of Cuba is that of a dictator who imposed communist principles on the country.\u00a0 Dictator\u00a0Fidel Castro<\/a>\u00a0brought communism to Cuba in 1959 as part of the Cuban Revolution<\/a>.\u00a0 It remains communist today even though Castro recently died.\u00a0 Castro ruled over the country as a dictator but instituted several reforms based on the idea of public ownership, including universal healthcare.\u00a0 For example, Cuba is known for its publicly funded healthcare system that provided Cuba with a low infant mortality rate and an excellent ratio of doctors to patients.\u00a0 With that said, Cuba is also known for a lack of human rights and the imprisonment of political opponents who openly protest against the dictatorship in the country.\u00a0 In general, communism is a political and economic ideology that, while supposed to be about removing class distinctions in society, is operated very differently in practise.\u00a0 Regardless it is a significant ideology that has had a profound effect on the world in the past and still today.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The first country in the world to adopt communism was Russia during the events on the Russian Revolution in 1917. This article details the history, significance and main principles of communism.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":11,"footnotes":""},"categories":[50,31,49,13,21],"tags":[103,62,63,15,104,22],"class_list":["post-3914","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-government","category-cold-war","category-economics","category-russian-revolution","category-world-war-ii","tag-cold-war","tag-economics","tag-government","tag-history","tag-soviet-union","tag-world-war-ii"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3914","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3914"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3914\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10566,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3914\/revisions\/10566"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3914"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3914"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3914"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}MAIN PRINCIPLES OF COMMUNISM<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
COMMUNISM IN RUSSIA (SOVIET UNION)<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
COMMUNISM AND DICTATORSHIP<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
COMMUNISM AND COMMAND ECONOMY<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
COMMUNISM IN THE COLD WAR<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
COMMUNISM TODAY<\/h2>\n\n\n\n