communism essay

ENCYCLOPEDIC ENTRY

Communism is a form of government most closely associated with the ideas of Karl Marx, which he outlined in The Communist Manifesto . Communism is based on the goal of eliminating socioeconomic class struggles by creating a classless society in which everyone shares the benefits of labor and the state controls all property and wealth.

Social Studies, Civics, Economics

Soldiers Marching in Beijing

China is one of just five proclaimed communist nations left. There were many more communist countries in 1973 when this photograph of Chinese soldiers was taken.

Photograph by J. Cuinieres/Roger Viollet via Getty Images

Communism is a form of government most frequently associated with the ideas of Karl Marx, a German philosopher who outlined his ideas for a utopian society in The Communist Manifesto , written in 1848. Marx believed that capitalism , with its emphasis on profit and private ownership, led to inequality among citizens. Thus, his goal was to encourage a system that promoted a classless society in which everyone shared the benefits of labor and the state government controlled all property and wealth. No one would strive to rise above others, and people would no longer be motivated by greed. Then, communism would close the gap between rich and poor, end the exploitation of workers, and free the poor from oppression. The basic ideas of communism did not originate with Marx, however. Plato and Aristotle discussed them in ancient times, but Marx developed them into a popular doctrine , which was later propelled into practice. Marx’s ideal society ensured economic equality and fairness. Marx believed that private ownership of property promoted greed, and he blamed capitalism for society’s problems. The problems, he claimed, stemmed from the Industrial  Revolution . The rise of factories, the reliance on machines, and the capability of mass production created conditions that promoted oppression and encouraged the development of a proletariat, or a working class. Simply put, in a capitalist system, the factories fueled the economy, and a wealthy few owned the factories. This created the need for a large number of people to work for the factory owners. In this environment, the wealthy few exploited the laborers, who had to labor in order to live. So, Marx outlined his plan to liberate the proletariat, or to free them of the burden of labor. His idea of utopia was a land where people labored as they were able, and everyone shared the wealth. If the government controlled the economy and the people relinquished their property to the state, no single group of people could rise above another. Marx described this ideal in his Manifesto , but the practice of communism fell far short of the ideal. For a large part of the 20th century, about one-third of the world lived in communist countries—countries ruled by dictatorial leaders who controlled the lives of everyone else. The communist leaders set the wages, they set the prices, and they distributed the wealth. Western capitalist nations fought hard against communism , and eventually, most communist countries collapsed. Marx’s utopia was never achieved, as it required revolution on a global scale, which never came to pass. However, as of 2020, five proclaimed communist countries continue to exist: North Korea, Vietnam, China, Cuba, and Laos.

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The Collapse of Communism

Experts continue to debate one of the most important political questions of the twentieth century—why did Communism collapse so suddenly? These essays suggest that a wide range of forces—political, economic, strategic, religious, add the indispensable role of the principled statesman and the brave dissident—brought about the collapse of communism.

Ten years after the fall of the Berlin Wall and eight years after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, experts continue to debate one of the most important political questions of the twentieth century—why did Communism collapse so suddenly? A comprehensive and often unexpected answer is provided in this unique volume of essays by the world's leading authorities on Communism.

Presidential adviser Zbignew Brzezinski discusses the critical role of policymakers like Ronald Reagan, Mikhail Gorbachev, and John Paul II in the demise of Communism. Richard Pipes and Martin Malia debate the importance of history and ideology. Robert Conquest analyzes the deleterious impact of the Stalin years, and Michael Novak delineates the missing element of faith in Communism. Andrzej Brzeski exposes the fatal flaws of Communist economics; Brian Crozier discusses why there was a cold war. Paul Hollander concludes with a consideration of who in the academy was right—and wrong—about Communism. These insightful essays suggest that a wide range of forces—political, economic, strategic, and religious—along with the indispensable role of the principled statesman and the brave dissident, brought about the collapse of Communism.

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Home — Essay Samples — Government & Politics — Political Systems & Ideologies — Communism

Essays on Communism

Communism essay topics.

Communism is a political and economic ideology that has shaped the course of history and continues to be a topic of debate and discussion in academic circles. Whether you are studying political science, history, economics, or sociology, writing an essay on communism can provide a unique opportunity to explore the complexities of this ideology and its impact on society. In this guide, we will explore some compelling communism essay topics that can help you delve deeper into this fascinating subject.

1. The Rise of Communism: A Historical Analysis

One of the most popular communism essay topics is the exploration of the rise of communism and its impact on the world. You can examine the historical events and factors that led to the emergence of communism in countries such as Russia, China, Cuba, and Vietnam. Discuss the role of key figures such as Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin, Mao Zedong, and Fidel Castro in shaping the ideology and its implementation.

2. The Ideological Foundations of Communism

Another interesting topic for an essay on communism is to delve into the ideological foundations of the ideology. You can explore the core tenets of communism as outlined by Marx and Engels in the Communist Manifesto, and analyze how these ideas have been interpreted and put into practice by different communist regimes around the world. Consider the principles of class struggle, the abolition of private property, and the vision of a classless society.

3. The Soviet Union and the Legacy of Communism

The rise and fall of the Soviet Union is a rich subject for an essay on communism. You can examine the impact of the Bolshevik Revolution, the consolidation of power under Stalin, the Soviet economic model, and the eventual collapse of the USSR. Consider the lasting legacy of communism in Russia and the former Soviet bloc countries, and how it continues to shape political and social dynamics in the region.

4. The Cultural Revolution in China

Another compelling topic for an essay on communism is the Cultural Revolution in China. You can explore the origins of the movement, its impact on Chinese society and politics, and its legacy in contemporary China. Consider the role of Mao Zedong in initiating the Cultural Revolution, the mass mobilization of the Red Guards, and the long-term effects on Chinese culture, education, and economy.

5. Communism and the Cold War

The Cold War is a pivotal period in modern history, and writing an essay on communism can provide insight into this global conflict. You can explore the ideological and geopolitical rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union, the spread of communism in Eastern Europe, and the proxy wars fought in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Consider the lasting impact of the Cold War on international relations and the global balance of power.

6. The Legacy of Communism in Contemporary Society

Finally, you can choose to write an essay on the legacy of communism in contemporary society. You can explore how former communist countries have transitioned to market economies and democratic political systems, and the challenges they continue to face in reconciling their past with the present. Consider the impact of communism on social inequality, political corruption, and cultural identity in post-communist societies.

When choosing a communism essay topic, it's important to consider the specific requirements of your assignment and your own areas of interest. You may also want to consider the availability of primary and secondary sources to support your research. Regardless of the topic you choose, writing an essay on communism provides a valuable opportunity to engage with complex ideas and historical events, and to develop a deeper understanding of this influential ideology.

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How Are Socialism and Communism Different?

By: Sarah Pruitt

Updated: November 4, 2020 | Original: October 22, 2019

Both socialism and communism are essentially economic philosophies advocating public rather than private ownership, especially of the means of production, distribution and exchange of goods (i.e., making money) in a society. Both aim to fix the problems they see as created by a free-market capitalist system, including the exploitation of workers and a widening gulf between rich and poor.

But while socialism and communism share some basic similarities, there are also important differences between them.

Karl Marx and the Origins of Communism

Socialism emerged in response to the extreme economic and social changes caused by the Industrial Revolution , and particularly the struggles of workers. Many workers grew increasingly poor even as factory owners and other industrialists accrued massive wealth.

In the first half of the 19th century, early socialist thinkers like Henri de Saint-Simon, Robert Owen and Charles Fourier presented their own models for reorganizing society along the lines of cooperation and community, rather than the competition inherent in capitalism, where the free market controlled the supply and demand of goods.

Then came Karl Marx , the German political philosopher and economist who would become one of the most influential socialist thinkers in history. With his collaborator Friedrich Engels, Marx published The Communist Manifesto in 1848, which included a chapter criticizing those earlier socialist models as utterly unrealistic “utopian” dreams.

Marx argued that all history was a history of class struggles, and that the working class (or proletariat) would inevitably triumph over the capital class (bourgeoisie) and win control over the means of production, forever erasing all classes.

Communism , sometimes referred to as revolutionary socialism, also originated as a reaction to the Industrial Revolution, and came to be defined by Marx’s theories—taken to their extreme end. In fact, Marxists often refer to socialism as the first, necessary phase on the way from capitalism to communism. Marx and Engels themselves didn’t consistently or clearly differentiate communism from socialism, which helped ensure lasting confusion between the two terms.

Key Differences Between Communism and Socialism

Under communism, there is no such thing as private property. All property is communally owned, and each person receives a portion based on what they need. A strong central government—the state—controls all aspects of economic production, and provides citizens with their basic necessities, including food, housing, medical care and education.

By contrast, under socialism, individuals can still own property. But industrial production, or the chief means of generating wealth, is communally owned and managed by a democratically elected government.

Another key difference in socialism versus communism is the means of achieving them. In communism, a violent revolution in which the workers rise up against the middle and upper classes is seen as an inevitable part of achieving a pure communist state. Socialism is a less rigid, more flexible ideology. Its adherents seek change and reform, but often insist on making these changes through democratic processes within the existing social and political structure, not overthrowing that structure.

In his 1875 writing, Critique of the Gotha Program , Marx summarized the communist philosophy in this way: “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.” By contrast, socialism is based on the idea that people will be compensated based on their level of individual contribution to the economy.

Unlike in communism, a socialist economic system rewards individual effort and innovation. Social democracy, the most common form of modern socialism, focuses on achieving social reforms and redistribution of wealth through democratic processes, and can co-exist alongside a free-market capitalist economy.

Socialism and Communism in Practice

Led by Vladimir Lenin , the Bolsheviks put Marxist theory into practice with the Russian Revolution of 1917, which led to the creation of the world’s first communist government. Communism existed in the Soviet Union until its fall in 1991. 

Today, communism and socialism exist in China, Cuba, North Korea, Laos and Vietnam—although in reality, a purely communist state has never existed. Such countries can be classified as communist because in all of them, the central government controls all aspects of the economic and political system. But none of them have achieved the elimination of personal property, money or class systems that the communist ideology requires.

Likewise, no country in history has achieved a state of pure socialism. Even countries that are considered by some people to be socialist states, like Norway, Sweden and Denmark, have successful capitalist sectors and follow policies that are largely aligned with social democracy. Many European and Latin American countries have adopted socialist programs (such as free college tuition, universal health care and subsidized child care) and even elected socialist leaders, with varying levels of success.

In the United States, socialism has not historically enjoyed as much success as a political movement. Its peak came in 1912, when Socialist Party presidential candidate Eugene V. Debs won 6 percent of the vote. But at the same time, U.S. programs once considered socialist, such as Medicare and Social Security , have been integrated into American life.

What Is Democratic Socialism? 

Democratic socialism, a growing U.S. political movement in recent years, lands somewhere in between social democracy and communism. Like communists, democratic socialists believe workers should control the bulk of the means of production, and not be subjected to the will of the free market and the capitalist classes. But they believe their vision of socialism must be achieved through democratic processes, rather than revolution. 

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The Differences Between Socialism and Communism

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The difference between communism and socialism is not conveniently clear-cut. The two terms are often used interchangeably, but these economic and political theories are not the same. Both communism and socialism arose from protests against the exploitation of the working class during the Industrial Revolution.

While applications of their economic and social policies vary, several modern countries—all ideologically opposed to capitalism —are perceived as either communist or socialist. To understand contemporary political debates, it's important to know the similarities and differences between communism and socialism.

Communism vs. Socialism

In both communism and socialism , people own the factors of economic production. The main difference is that under communism, most property and economic resources are owned and controlled by the state (rather than individual citizens); under socialism, all citizens share equally in economic resources as allocated by a democratically-elected government. This difference and others are outlined in the table below.

Key Similarities

Communism and socialism both grew out of grass-roots opposition to the exploitation of workers by wealthy businesses during the Industrial Revolution . Both assume all goods and services will be produced by government-controlled institutions or collective organizations rather than privately owned businesses. In addition, the central government is mainly responsible for all aspects of economic planning, including matters of supply and demand .

Key Differences

Under communism, the people are compensated or provided for based on their needs. In a pure communist society, the government provides most or all food, clothing, housing, and other necessities based on what it considers to be the needs of the people. Socialism is based on the premise that people will be compensated based on their level of individual contribution to the economy. Effort and innovation are thus rewarded under socialism.

Pure Communism Definition

Pure communism is an economic, political, and social system in which most or all property and resources are collectively owned by a class-free society rather than by individual citizens. According to the theory developed by the German philosopher, economist, and political theorist Karl Marx , pure communism results in a society in which all people are equal, and there is no need for money or the accumulation of individual wealth. There is no private ownership of economic resources, with a central government controlling all facets of production. Economic output is distributed according to the needs of the people. Social friction between white and blue-collar workers and between rural and urban cultures will be eliminated, freeing each person to achieve his or her highest human potential.

Under pure communism, the central government provides the people with all basic necessities, such as food, housing, education, and medical care, thus allowing the people to equally share the benefits of collective labor. Free access to these necessities depends on constant advances in technology contributing to ever-greater production.

Karl Marx and the Origins of Communism

Socialism arose as a response to the struggles of the working class amidst the extreme social and economic changes caused by the Industrial Revolution in Europe and later in the United States. As many workers grew increasingly poor, factory owners and other industrialists accrued massive wealth.

During the first half of the 19th century, early socialist thinkers like Henri de Saint-Simon, Robert Owen, and Charles Fourier proposed ways in which society might be reorganized in a manner embracing cooperation and community, rather than the competitiveness inherent in capitalism , where the free market controlled the supply and demand of goods.

In 1848, the German political philosopher and economist Karl Marx , with his collaborator Friedrich Engels, published The Communist Manifesto , which included a chapter criticizing those earlier socialist models as utterly unrealistic “utopian” dreams.

Marx argued that all history was a history of class struggles and that the working class, or the “proletariat,” would inevitably triumph over the capital class, or the “bourgeoisie,” and win control over the means of production, forever erasing all classes.

“The modern bourgeois society that has sprouted from the ruins of feudal society has not done away with class antagonisms. It has but established new classes, new conditions of oppression, new forms of struggle in place of the old ones,” wrote Marx and Engels.

Often referred to as “revolutionary socialism,” communism also originated as a reaction to the Industrial Revolution and came to be defined by Marx’s theories—taken to their most extreme end. Marxists often refer to socialism as an early necessary phase on the way from capitalism to communism. Marx and Engels themselves didn’t consistently or clearly differentiate communism from socialism, which helped ensure lasting confusion between the two terms.

In 1875, Marx coined the phrase used to summarize communism, “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.”

The Communist Manifesto

The ideology of modern communism began to form during the French Revolution between 1789 and 1802. As previously mentioned, Marx and Engels published their still-influential thesis “ Communist Manifesto ” in 1948. Rather than the Christian overtones of earlier communist philosophies, Marx and Engels suggested that modern communism demanded a materialistic and purely scientific analysis of the past and future of human society. “The history of all hitherto existing society,” they wrote, “is the history of class struggles .”

The Communist Manifesto depicts the French Revolution as the point at which when the “bourgeoisie,” or merchant class took control of France’s economic “means of production” and replaced the feudal power structure, paving the way for capitalism . According to Marx and Engels, the French Revolution replaced the medieval class struggle between the peasant serfs and the nobility with the modern struggle between the bourgeois owners of capital and the working class “proletariat.” 

Pure Socialism Definition

Pure socialism is an economic system under which each individual—through a democratically elected government—is given an equal share of the four factors of economic production: labor, entrepreneurship, capital goods, and natural resources. In essence, socialism is based on the assumption that all people naturally want to cooperate, but are restrained from doing so by the competitive nature of capitalism.

Socialism is an economic system where everyone in society equally owns the factors of production. The ownership is acquired through a democratically elected government. It could also be a cooperative or public corporation in which everyone owns shares. As in a command economy , the socialist government employs centralized planning to allocate resources based on both the needs of individuals and society as a whole. Economic output is distributed according to each individual’s ability and level of contribution.

In 1980, American author and sociologist Gregory Paul paid homage to Marx by coining the phrase commonly used to describe socialism, “From each according to his ability, to each according to his contribution.”

What Is a Social Democracy?

Democratic socialism is an economic, social, and political ideology holding that while both the society and economy should be run democratically, they should be dedicated to meeting the needs of the people as a whole, rather than encouraging individual prosperity as in capitalism. Democratic socialists advocate the transition of society from capitalism to socialism through existing participatory democratic processes, rather than revolution, as characterized by orthodox Marxism. Universally used services such as housing, utilities, mass transit, and health care are distributed by the government, while consumer goods are distributed by a capitalistic free market. 

The latter half of the 20th century saw the emergence of a more moderate version of socialist democracy advocating a mixture of socialist and capitalist control of all means of economic production, supplemented by extensive social welfare programs to help provide the basic needs of the people.

What Is Green Socialism?

A recent outgrowth of the environmental movement and climate change debate, green socialism or “eco-socialism” places its economic emphasis on the maintenance and utilization of natural resources. This is achieved largely through government ownership of the largest, most resource-consuming corporations. The use of “green” resources, such as renewable energy, public transit, and locally sourced food is emphasized or mandated. Economic production focuses on meeting the basic needs of the people, rather than a wasteful excess of unneeded consumer goods. Green socialism often offers a guaranteed minimum livable income to all citizens regardless of their employment status.

Communist Countries

It is difficult to classify countries as being either communist or socialist. Several countries, while ruled by the Communist Party, declare themselves to be socialist states and employ many aspects of socialist economic and social policy. Three countries typically considered communist states—mainly due to their political structure—are Cuba, China, and North Korea.

The Communist Party of China owns and strictly controls all industry, which operates solely to generate profits for the government through its successful and growing export of consumer goods. Health care and primary through higher education are run by the government and provided free of charge to the people. However, housing and property development operate under a highly competitive capitalist system.

The Communist Party of Cuba owns and operates most industries, and most of the people work for the state. Government-controlled health care and primary through higher education are provided free. Housing is either free or heavily subsidized by the government.

North Korea

Ruled by the Communist Party until 1946, North Korea now operates under a “Socialist Constitution of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.” However, the government owns and controls all farmland, workers, and food distribution channels. Today, the government provides universal health and education for all citizens. Private ownership of property is forbidden. Instead, the government grants people the right to government-owned and assigned homes.

Socialist Countries

Once again, most modern countries that identify themselves to be socialist may not strictly follow the economic or social systems associated with pure socialism. Instead, most countries generally considered socialist actually employ the policies of democratic socialism.

Norway, Sweden, and Denmark all employ similar predominantly socialist systems. The democratically chosen governments of all three countries provide free health care, education, and lifetime retirement income. As a result, however, their citizens pay some of the world’s highest taxes. All three countries also have highly successful capitalist sectors. With most of their needs provided by their governments, the people see little need to accumulate wealth. As a result, about 10% of the people hold more than 65% of each nation’s wealth.

Kallie Szczepanski  contributed to this article.

Engels, Frederick. " Principles of Communism .”

Marx, Karl. " The Critique of the Gotha Programme ."

Bukharin, Nikoli. " The ABCs of Communism .”

Pomerleau, Kyle. " How Scandinavian Countries Pay for Their Government Spending ."

Lundberg, Jacob, and Daniel Waldenström. " Wealth Inequality in Sweden: What Can We Learn from Capitalized Income Tax Data? " Institute of Labor Economics.

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What Is Communism?

Understanding communism, the communist manifesto, the soviet union, communist china, the cold war, the bottom line.

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What Is Communism? Definition and History

James Chen, CMT is an expert trader, investment adviser, and global market strategist.

Pete Rathburn is a copy editor and fact-checker with expertise in economics and personal finance and over twenty years of experience in the classroom.

Communism is a political and economic ideology that positions itself in opposition to liberal democracy and capitalism . It advocates instead for a classless system in which the means of production are owned communally and private property is nonexistent or severely curtailed. 

Key Takeaways

• Communism is an economic ideology that advocates for a classless society in which all property and wealth are communally owned instead of being owned by individuals.
• Visions of a society that may be considered communist appeared as long ago as the 4th Century BCE.
• Modern communist ideology began to develop during the French Revolution and its seminal tract, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels' "Communist Manifesto," was published in 1848.
• Communism was pitted against capitalism, which relies on democracy and the production of capital to form a society.
• Prominent examples of communism were the Soviet Union and China. The Soviet Union collapsed in 1991 but China has drastically revised its economy to include some capitalism.

Communism is an umbrella term that encompasses a range of ideologies. The term's modern usage originated with Victor d'Hupay, an 18th-century French aristocrat who advocated living in "communes" in which all property would be shared and "all may benefit from everybody's work."

The idea was hardly new, even at that time. The Bible's Book of Acts describes 1st-Century Christian communities holding property in common according to a system known as  koinonia. This inspired later religious groups such as the 17th-century English "Diggers" to reject private ownership.

Modern communist ideology began to develop during the French Revolution and its seminal tract, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels' "Communist Manifesto," was published in 1848. That pamphlet rejected the Christian tenor of previous communist philosophies, laying out a materialist and scientific analysis of the history and future trajectory of human society. "The history of all hitherto existing society," Marx and Engels wrote, "is the history of class struggles."

The Communist Manifesto presented the French Revolution as a major historical turning point when the "bourgeoisie," the merchant class that was in the process of consolidating control over the "means of production," overturned the feudal power structure and ushered in the modern capitalist era.

That revolution replaced the medieval class struggle that pitted the nobility against the serfs with the modern one pitting the bourgeois owners of capital against the "proletariat," the working class who sell their labor for wages.

Marx, Engels, and their followers advocated for and predicted as historically inevitable a global proletarian revolution in the Communist Manifesto and later works. They stated that it would first usher in an era of socialism , then of communism .

The final stage of human development would mark the end of class struggle and therefore of history in Communist theory. All people would live in social equilibrium without class distinctions, family structures, religion, or property. The state would "wither away," too.

As a popular Marxist slogan puts it, the Communist economy would function "from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs."

Marx and Engels' theories wouldn't be tested in the real world until after their deaths. An uprising in Russia toppled the czar and sparked a civil war in 1917 during World War I that eventually saw a group of radical Marxists led by Vladimir Lenin gain power in 1922. This group was called the Bolsheviks. It founded the Soviet Union on former Imperial Russian territory and attempted to put communist theory into practice.

Lenin had developed the Marxist theory of vanguardism before the Bolshevik Revolution. This theory argued that a close-knit group of politically enlightened elites was necessary to usher in the higher stages of economic and political evolution: socialism and finally communism.

Lenin died shortly after the civil war ended but the "dictatorship of the proletariat" led by his successor Joseph Stalin would pursue brutal ethnic and ideological purges as well as forced agricultural collectivization. Tens of millions died during Stalin's rule from 1922 to 1953 on top of the tens of millions who died as a result of the war with Nazi Germany.

The Soviet state became a powerful one-party institution rather than withering away. It prohibited dissent and occupied the "commanding heights" of the economy. Agriculture, the banking system, and industrial production were subject to quotas and price controls laid out in a series of Five Year Plans.

This system of central planning enabled rapid industrialization and growth in Soviet gross domestic product (GDP) outpaced that of the U.S. from 1950 to 1965. The Soviet economy generally grew at a much slower pace than its capitalist, democratic counterparts, however.

Weak consumer spending was a particular drag on growth. Central planners' emphasis on heavy industry led to chronic underproduction of consumer goods. Long lines at understocked grocery stores were a fixture of Soviet life even during periods of relative prosperity.

The Soviet Union collapsed in 1991 after a push to reform the economic and political system and provide greater room for private enterprise and free expression. These reform pushes were known as perestroika  and  glasnost respectively. They didn't halt the economic decline the Soviet Union suffered in the 1980s and likely hastened the Communist state's end by loosening its grip on sources of dissent.

Mao Zedong's Communist Party gained control of China In 1949 after more than 20 years of war with the Chinese Nationalist Party and Imperial Japan. It formed the world's second major Marxist-Leninist state. Mao allied the country with the Soviet Union but the Soviets' policies of de-Stalinization and "peaceful coexistence" with the capitalist West led to a diplomatic split with China around 1958.

Mao's rule in China resembled Stalin's in its violence, deprivation, and insistence on ideological purity. The Communist Party ordered the rural population to produce enormous quantities of steel during the Great Leap Forward from 1958 to 1962 to jumpstart an industrial revolution in China.

The same period's Great Chinese Famine killed at least 16 million people and perhaps more than 45 million. The Cultural Revolution, an ideological purge that lasted from 1966 until Mao's death in 1976, killed perhaps another 1.6 million people and subjected millions of others to political persecution.

Deng Xiaoping introduced a series of market reforms after Mao's death that remained in effect under his successors. The U.S. began normalizing relations with China when President Nixon visited in 1972 before Mao's death.

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) remains in power, presiding over a largely capitalist system, although state-owned enterprises continue to form a large part of the economy. Freedom of expression is significantly curtailed and meaningful opposition to the reigning Communist Party isn't permitted. It would take a miracle for the CCP to be ousted.

The year marked the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War between that power and the U.S.

The U.S. emerged from World War II as the world's richest and most militarily powerful nation. The country, if not all its people, felt a sense of exceptionalism and historical purpose as a liberal democracy that had just defeated fascist dictatorships in two theaters.

The Soviet Union, its ally in the fight against Germany and the world's only revolutionary Marxist state, did as well. The two powers promptly divided Europe into spheres of political and economic influence: Winston Churchill called this dividing line the "Iron Curtain."

The two superpowers both possessed nuclear weapons after 1949 and they engaged in a long standoff known as the Cold War. The closest the U.S. came to direct military conflict with the Soviet Union was the 1962 Cuban missile crisis.

The U.S. did fight a prolonged war in Vietnam, however, in which its military supported South Vietnamese forces fighting the Chinese- and Soviet-supported North Vietnamese army and South Vietnamese communist guerrillas. The U.S. withdrew from the war and Vietnam was united under communist rule in 1975.

The Cold War ended with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.

Communism failed for several reasons, including a lack of profit incentives among citizens, the failure of central planning, and the impact of power being seized by such a small number of people who then exploited it and gamed the system.

Why Did Communism Fail?

There's been extensive study of the reasons for communism's failure but researchers have pinpointed a couple of common factors that contributed to its demise.

The first is an absence of incentives among citizens to produce for profit. The profit incentive leads to competition and innovation in society but an ideal citizen in a communist society was selflessly devoted to societal causes and rarely thought about their own welfare.

The second reason for communism's failure was the system's inherent inefficiencies, such as centralized planning. This form of planning requires aggregation and synthesis of enormous amounts of data at a granular level. All projects were planned centrally so this form of planning was also complex. Growth data was fudged or error-prone in several cases to make facts fit into planned statistics and create an illusion of progress.

The concentration of power in the hands of a select few also bred inefficiency and provided them with incentives to game the system for their benefit and retain their hold on power. Corruption and laziness became endemic features of this system. Surveillance such as that characterized East German and Soviet societies was common. It also disincentivized industrious and hard-working people. The economy suffered in the end.

What Is an Example of Communism?

An example of communism would be a commune where people live together and share responsibilities and possessions. Many of these communities function well but they tend to be small in scale.

What Countries Are Still Communist?

Communism is the official form of government in China, Cuba, Laos, North Korea, and Vietnam. These countries also abide by some capitalist principles, however. They're largely autocratic and they don't reflect Marx’s definition of the term.

What Is the Difference Between Communism and Socialism?

Both communism and socialism advocate public over private ownership and they champion equality. They seek to give power to the working class. Socialism is viewed as a more moderate ideology, however. Unlike communism, it permits the continued existence of capitalism in some parts of the economy and favors gradual change over revolution.

Communism has been around as a theory since the beginning of humanity but the French Revolution, Karl Marx, and Friedrich Engels turned it into an influential political ideology. 

The idea of a classless society in which all property and wealth are communally owned has been tarnished somewhat since then. It has existed harmoniously in smaller communities but communism has so far failed to be successfully implemented on a larger level. Two major examples are Russia and China where communist leaders ruled with violence and suppression and often gamed the system for their own benefit.

Some say that this proves communism doesn’t work. Others argue that these regimes deviated from communism and therefore shouldn't be considered as examples.

Britannica. " Communism ."

Marx, Karl and Engels, Friedrich. " The Communist Manifesto ." Appleton-Century-Crofts, Inc., 1955, page 9.

Marx, Karl and Engels, Friedrich. " The Communist Manifesto ." Appleton-Century-Crofts, Inc., 1955, page xxviii.

Library of Congress. " Revelations From the Russian Archives ."

History.com. " Joseph Stalin ."

Texas National Security Review. " Assessing Soviet Economic Performance During the Cold War: A Failure of Intelligence? "

U.S. Department of State Office of the Historian. " Fall of Communism in Eastern Europe, 1989 ."

U.S. Department of State Office of the Historian. " The Chinese Revolution of 1949 ."

U.S. Department of State Archive. " Background Notes: China, August 1999 ."

Meng, Xin, Qian, Nancy, and Yared, Pierre. " The Institutional Causes of China's Great Famine, 1959-1961 ." Oxford University Press, January 2015, page 1568.

Harvard University. " For Whom the Bell Tolls: The Political Legacy of China's Cultural Revolution ."

Human Rights Watch. " China Events of 2021 ."

Center for Strategic and International Studies. " Hong Kong in 2022 ."

Library of Congress. " Churchill and the Great Republic ."

U.S. Secretary of State Office of the Historian. " The Collapse of the Soviet Union ."

Marxists.org. " How to Be a Good Communist ."

Britannica. " Which Countries Are Communist? "

History.com. " How Are Socialism and Communism Different? "

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World History Project - 1750 to the Present

Course: world history project - 1750 to the present   >   unit 7.

• READ: The Global Story of the 1930s
• READ: Fascism in Germany
• READ: Fascism in Italy

READ: Communism in the Soviet Union

• READ: Authoritarianism in Japan
• READ: Fascist Histories, Part II - Exercising Authoritarianism
• READ: Appeasement
• The Road to War

First read: preview and skimming for gist

Second read: key ideas and understanding content.

• What big challenges did Lenin and the Bolshevik (communist) leadership face in the first stages of their revolution?
• How does the author characterize the Bolshevik party during the early part of their rule?
• How did Stalin’s rise to power change the way the Bolsheviks ruled?
• What were some consequences for everyday life under the Soviet command economy?
• How were fascism and communism under Stalin similar and different?

Third read: evaluating and corroborating

• Communism under Stalin was certainly different from fascism. But Italian Fascism, as you now know, was different from German fascism. Why do we call Mussolini and Hitler’s approaches fascism, but use the term communism for Stalin’s regime?
• Think about the last time you heard someone called a “communist” or a “fascist”. Do you think the term was used correctly?
• In this unit we see the rise of governments that have certain political characteristics. We call these characteristics fascism, authoritarianism, and totalitarianism. Using these definitions, evaluate which of these terms can appropriately be applied to this government. It may be all, some, or none:
• A totalitarian regime has a highly centralized system of government that requires strict obedience.
• An authoritarian regime focuses on the maintenance of order at the expense of personal freedom.
• A fascist regime is a government that embraces extreme nationalism, violence, and action with the goal of internal cleansing and external expansion.

Communism in the Soviet Union

Introduction, the rise of stalin, communism and fascism.

• Both, of course, exhibited an authoritarian impulse to bring the population into line with the aims of the state.
• Both sought to install a totalitarian system that could do as it pleased.
• Both used violence to achieve political ends.
• Both rejected liberalism.
• The fascist “new man” even had a counterpart in the “new Soviet man”. Each was a mythic symbol of their movement’s values.
• The Soviets embraced left-wing socialist internationalism, while fascists embraced right-wing ethnic nationalism.
• The Soviets, in theory at least, rejected the doctrines of racism and ethnic nationalism, while these doctrines were central to fascism.
• Soviet communism wanted to erase class and gender inequalities, while fascists wanted to affirm social and gender hierarchies that limited women to marriage and motherhood and promoted a violent cult of masculinity for men.
• A premier is a head of a government, like a prime minister.
• Collectivization is the idea that, within a state, nothing can be privately owned because everything is meant to be shared with all members of the state.

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117 Communism Essay Topic Ideas & Examples

🏆 best communism topic ideas & essay examples, 👍 good essay topics on communism, 💡 most interesting communism topics to write about, ❓ questions about communism.

• Similarities and Differences Between Communism and Democratic Socialism This is because, according to the proponents of both ideologies, in Capitalist countries, the majority of ordinary citizens are denied the right to have a fair share in the national wealth.
• Reasons for the Collapse of Communism These economists believed that the problems encountered in society today are due to the unequal distribution of wealth and resources and hence to bring an end to this, the gap between the rich and type […]
• How Does Revolutionary Communism Compare With Democratic Socialism? Revolutionary communism holds it that the capitalism would never let go of their hold on community and political power and as such, only a violent revolution can result in the changes that communism calls for.
• Karl Marx and the “Communist Manifesto” He outlined a framework of the future course of events on which he based prescriptions for a strategy on the part of those who wished to change the nature of society.= The Communist Manifesto was […]
• Communism and Its Worldwide Impact The idea was to redistribute the wealth of the upper class among the poorer cohort of the population in order to achieve this equality, but it was also vital to communism that all manufacturing be […]
• Gorbachev’s Ideas: Communist Society and Economy Lack of support from the commoners and the leaders led to very slight changes in the economy. In conclusion, not all of Gorbachev’s efforts to improve the country’s economy bore much fruits.
• The Communist Party in Russia Brief Historical Overview The collapse of the Soviet Union initiated the decline of the Communist party with the decline reaching an ultimate following the outlawing of the party by Boris Yeltsin.
• Love and Marriage during the Era of Mao in Communist China In the Mao era, the law did not allow polygamous marriage in the Chinese community and through such, the sale of young females within the society ended.
• Different Aspects of Socialism and Communism After the collapse of the largest country in the world, the USSR, covering almost half of the continent, with the regime performing within this country, people tend to analyze the mistakes, which were made by […]
• Capitalism Versus Communism In the case of capitalism this comes in the form of the widening gap between the rich and the poor while in the case of communism this comes in the form of economic stagnation due […]
• The Anti-Communist Movements’ Impact on the US The first was in 1917-1920 and was associated with the fear of revolution in the United States. In the second wave, despite some warming of relations between the USSR and the U.S.in the 1930s, back […]
• Nazism in Germany and Communism in the Soviet Union In particular, it is essential to note that they were characterized by totalitarian thinking as one of the distinguishing features of the first half of the twentieth century and the times of faith in science […]
• McCarthyism and Anti-Communist Campaigns Hence, 1917 was the starting point and impetus for the development of communism and movements against the “Reds,” when the number of strikes in the United States increased against the background of the Russian Revolution.
• Boyer’s The Historical Background of the Communist Manifesto The central argument of Boyer is that Marx wrote this Manifesto during the “hungry”1840s, years when there was a collapse in the economic sector, and communism was well thought of during the coming up of […]
• The U.S. Reforms Against the Spread of Communism Though the U.S.did not manage to protect South Vietnam from communist forces, its spread to the rest of Southeast Asia was blocked, and it is possible to consider this reform effective.
• Successful Anti-Communist Foreign Policies This allowed the U.S.to maintain a capitalist presence in Berlin and convinced Western Europe that the new enemy was the communist U.S.S.R.
• Impact of Communism on the Plot Development First of all, it is necessary to mention that the political theme in the novel is represented as the background of the main theme and the main occasions of the plot.
• Christians in Communism and Capitalism After viewing the video “The Cold War in Context,” the role of Christians in analyzing the war and the concepts of capitalism and communism can be clarified.
• Fully Automated Luxury Communism It is often presented as a more humane alternative to capitalism and the ultimate solution to most problems caused by the system.
• Education in Marxism: The Communist Manifesto Karl Marx is the founder of new doctrine and the author, together with Friedrich Engels, of the Communist Manifesto, one of the most influential documents in the history of humankind.
• World History in The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx Communism is the political and economic teaching which goal is to abolish private property and a profit-based economy and introduce public ownership and communal control of the resources instead.
• End of Communism in Eastern Europe This was followed by the Marxist facts in Europe that de-Stalinized the Soviet Union and led to the easing of the cold war in the 1950’s.
• Destiny of the Post-Communist Countries After the Dissolution of the Soviet Union, the direction of the country’s development changed greatly. The economy of the Soviet Union was not centralized.
• Communism and Totalitarianism: Political Ideologies Comparison As much as this is a good policy for the good of the larger population, it hinders the development of the agriculture sector of the economy that is the backbone of most economies especially in […]
• Historiography of East, West Frameworks on Eastern European Women During Communist Era While discussing women’s roles in the communist era of the Eastern Europe, Peto shows that in the post-communist there developed a feminist side of history, but before which history was grossly dominated by patriarchal views.
• Capitalism and Industrialization in the “Communist Manifesto” by Marx In fact, the Communist Manifesto is clear in indicating that industrialization was a process that led to the overall improvement of society in doing away with the hardships of the majority of the population.
• Communism in the Soviet Union In order to understand the processes which occurred in the Soviet Union and led to its disintegration and collapse, it is necessary to consider the development of the state, form of government, the state regime, […]
• Post-Communist Russian Politics Then throw is the challenge of having to establish a new platform that would aid in the promotion of cordial relationships between on the one hand, the military personnel and on the other hand, the […]
• Communism of Karl Marx and the Soviet Union The seizure of Winter Palace by the Bolsheviks gave birth to the communist movement in 1917, when and died in 1989, with the fall of the Berlin Wall and in 1991, when the Soviet Union […]
• Overview and History of Communism: New Socialist System After 1917 It contributed to the decline of the empires of the European powers while giving a tremendous boost to the influence of the united state of America; it led to the overthrow of Russian tsarism and […]
• Effects of Fall of Communism in Russia The elevation of Mikhail Gorbachev as the successor of Stalin brought about “perestroika” program whose aim was to restructure the political system of the Soviet Union.
• Human Nature in Marx’s “The Communist Manifesto” and Dostoyevsky’s “Notes From Underground“ In such an arrangement, there is a tendency to have the opinion that the development of one individual is a benchmark for the development of another, which eventually leads to laxity among some individuals.
• Karl Marx’s Communist Manifesto Analysis The class-consciousness in the capitalist society like United States, according to Marx was instilled in the minds of feudal and capitalist bourgeoisies and not in the working class proletariat.
• The Result of Western Capitalism Fueling Communism The paper starts with the history of China and elucidates the entry of western capitalism into China in different stages, including the historic opium wars.
• Cuba Remaining Communist: Discussion In order to determine the condition in which the country is in under the communist rule, the peculiarities of the communist ideology should be discussed in order to define its multiple faults and weaknesses and […]
• “The Manifesto of the Communist Party” by Marx & Engels They voiced their discontent with the capitalist mode of production instead of focusing on the possibilities of adapting a political theory that will favor collectivism in a classless society. In the third chapter of the […]
• Communism Versus Organic Solidarity The article presents a brief overview of the meaning of the terms communism and organic solidarity and compares and contrasts them with respect to societal interactions.
• Economy of Capitalism, Communism, Fascism and Socialism Government structure: the structure of the government in the two countries, involves federal governments that are led by the political elites in the countries. The government has the duty of formulating policies that regulate the […]
• “The Communist Manifesto” by Karl Marx and Frederick Engels Since the political views of the leaders were shaped in a different social environment and by the time Marx and Engels were coining The Communist Manifesto, European economy and society had undergone considerable development, there […]
• Communist Manifesto as to Production and Ideology The main difference between feudalism and capitalism lies in the possibility of the non-aristocratic people to become the bourgeoisie through owning the means of production.
• Communism in Asia: Crisis and Opportunities During the twentieth century, Communism was prospering in many countries of the world, particularly in the USSR and in Eastern Asia.
• The Documentary “The Lost World of Communism” Romania was no exception, and the period from the 1960s to the 1980s is known as an epoch of the Ceausescu dictatorship. It reveals the dreadful truth about the power of the Ceausescu family and […]
• History in Marx’s Manifesto of the Communist Party The Manifesto of the Communist Party is a powerful source of information about the most crucial force in history that is the attention to social and personal interests, the peculiarities of the bourgeoisie with its […]
• The Communist Manifesto and Japan in 20th Century The industrialization process in this country was contributed by many individuals and groups due to the communist’s way of governance in the country.
• “The Manifesto of the Communist Party” The authors of this manuscript provided their own explanation of the nature of the society, the gap between classes as its ever-present historical characteristic, and the predicted development and failure of the capitalist way of […]
• US Anti-Communism in “Memories of the Red Decade” The intended audience of the article includes historians and scholars interested in this subject, ideological sympathizers of the author, and the students of History Departments willing to study the inside of Communist moods and movements […]
• Chinese Communist Party and Authoritarian Regime According to Pye, “the turmoil of Cultural Revolution in China and the subsequent crisis of legitimacy…have been central features of traditional Chinese political culture”.
• The Chinese Communist Party The country’s contentious politics contribute to the stabilization of the authoritarian regime, which has eased political transition to the extent that the country has failed to achieve democratization.
• Latin American and Post-Communist Democracies To compare the historical weaknesses of Latin American democracies and the modern vision of the post-communist democracies, it is necessary to determine the criteria according to which it is possible to assess the level of […]
• Communism in Eastern Europe Therefore, when the call of solidarity was made, there were a lot of people ready and willing to be part of the movement. To them, solidarity was a way of fighting against the evils in […]
• China Communist Party & Economics Introduction China is considered to have been one of the largest and most advanced economies in the world during the nineteenth century. The country’s economy stagnated since the 16th century (Liao 191). In totality, China’s economy deteriorated between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. However, there was a brief recovery during 1930s. Economic reforms that ushered […]
• Communism Collapse in the USSR The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was one of the earliest communist societies to embrace the ideologies of communism. The collapse of communism in the USSR began in 1989 after the fall of the Berlin […]
• The Communism History: Red Scare and McCarthyism Facts The quote means that the world was afraid of a new World war to happen; this is why the most powerful states of the planet became very suspicious of each other.”The climate of fear and […]
• Communist Manifesto, Time and Social Issues The primary issue of the manifesto is the vagaries in which the bourgeoisie subject and subjugate the proletariat, all in the struggle for private property.
• Socialist Market Economy and Communism in China A socialist economy is defined as an economy whose main objective is to create equality and ensure that the means of production in the market is owned by the working class of the state. The […]
• The United States Confrontation to Communism By 1962, the Russian premier maintained the same uncertainty on the nuclear potential of the US, who were a prime threat to the Soviet Union.
• The Cultural Revolution in China and the Chinese Communist Party The need to address Mao’s interests in the rivalry with his opponents was disguised in the fight for the preservation of socialism in China through the Cultural Revolution.
• Afghan Communism and Soviet Intervention The purpose of this paper is to get a better perspective and understanding of Afghan communism and the Soviet intervention by critically analyzing the communism ideology and how it aided the Soviet Union to join […]
• Transition from communism to socialism The change in the country’s governance would imply that the ideas and behaviors that people hold to must also change. The importance of religion and civil freedom in relation to our behaviors becomes manifest.
• Did the structure of international security fundamentally change with the collapse of communism? To do so what will be examined are the reasons why communism collapsed, the impact of communism on the international security infrastructure, the way in which national interests and ideologies affected the structure of international […]
• The Reasons behind the Success of the 1949 Communist Revolution in China The emergence of the state of Communist China in 1949 was one of the most significant events of the 20th century and the Communist Revolution which led to its emergence is hailed as one of […]
• How Realistic or Desirable Was Marx’s Idea of Communism? This was to be made possible through nationalization of the means of production and putting them under the control of the workers; the individuals who he viewed to be the major producers of wealth.
• Equality to All? Karl Marx’s “The Communist Manifesto” In many western nations, the classical movement was driven by the quest to transform the economy and the political philosophy. The intention was to meet the needs and aspirations of the colonial powers.
• Communism in the 20th Century China Although the Japanese remained in control of the cities, the people of China started to view the communists as the probable force behind China’s liberation.
• Communism in China and Its Effects Consequently, the stretch of communism in the region resulted into the establishment of the People Republic of China in the fiscal nineteen forty-nine.
• The communist Party in the Soviet Union and China This paper explores some of the factors that may account for the failure of the communist party in Russia, as well as factors contributing to the success of the Communist party in China2.
• Triumph at Kapyong: Canada’s Response to Communist Attacks The book focuses on the Battle of Kapyong, a minor group of hills in the northeastern part of Seoul and Bjarnason as well uses most of his story to explain the incidents which resulted to […]
• Global Culture: Communism Ideologies Relative to Arjun Appadurai’s Argument Appadurai argues that the complexity of global culture is due to economic, political, and social disjunctures that exist in the modern world.
• Socialism and Communism after Marx However; Karl Marx failed in his Marxism theory as a result of the establishment of the middle class. Following Karl Marx’s demise in 1844, Friedrich Engels who was became the narrator of the Marxism theory […]
• Influence of Nationalism and Communism on the Non-Western World In countries like Japan, class mantra was the order of the day in the areas that were controlled by communists, the CCP which was the main political party was against agrarian radicalism and hence abandoned […]
• Marx’s and Engels’s Communist Manifesto The chain of events starting with the overthrow of the monarchy in the French revolution eroded the traditional power base of Europe, leading to the rise of a new class of oppressors among the serfs […]
• Rhetorical Analysis of the Communist Manifesto A famous philologist and linguist Bakhtin described the use of language in its relation to the particular circumstances and he emphasized the process of subject formation: “pre-empts the phenomenological theory of the subject by producing […]
• How Capitalism Beat Communism/Socialism This is exactly the reason why USSR was doomed to collapse in just about every society, the functioning of which is being concerned with the observance of Socialist principles, the prolonged continuation of social, cultural […]
• Communism and Nazism Additionally, the two doctrines Nazism and Communism assert that, it is the economy, which is responsible for all goods and services, and therefore, the public should plan, control and own these goods and services through […]
• Journey into the Whirlwind: A True Story of an Ordinary Communist Woman She is often at the death’s doors, but she manages to stay alive “to spite them” as she is “consumed by the desire to survive the tragedy”. In spite of her lasting imprisonment and all […]
• The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx Marx predicted the persistent demo of commoditization and additional escalating growth of the capitalist bazaar as one day pursuing the bourgeoisie above the facade of the world.
• The Communist Manifesto: the Statement of Germany Revolutionary Group In the description on the manifesto, the argument shows the division of the society along the line of bourgeoisie or the capitalists who engage in the production fields such as milling, mining and other industrial […]
• Why Is the Transition From Communism So Difficult?
• Has Communism Been Good for Cuba?
• Why the Vietnam War Was an Unsuccessful Effort by the United States Against Communism?
• How Did Albania Change From a Communism to Democracy?
• Why Was the USA Unable to Defeat Communism in Asia Between 1965-1973?
• Was Mikhail Gorbachev Responsible for the Fall of Communism in Russia?
• How Did Australia Respond to the Threat of Communism in 1950?
• Was Americas Main Aim to Stop the Spread of Communism in Europe?
• How Did Communism Influence the US Foreign Policy After WWII?
• What Caused the Clash Between Communism and Capitalism During the Cold War?
• How Did Communism Succeeding in China Affect U.S. Foreign Policy?
• What Does Animal Farm Tell Us About George Orwell’s Attitude to Communism Under Stalin?
• How Did Modern Communism Fail?
• What’s Wrong With Communism?
• How Far Was Fear of Communism the Main Reason for the Rise to Power of the Nazi Party?
• What Was Life Like Under War Communism?
• How Did the Anti-communism Cold War Undermine Some U.S. Freedoms?
• When and Why Did Communism Emerge?
• How Did the United States Attempt to Stop the Spread of Communism Post-WWII?
• Who Was the Man Behind Communism?
• How Did the United States Contain Communism in the Cold War?
• Why Did Communism and the Soviet Union Collapse by 1991?
• How Was America Affected by the Fear of Communism Between 1945 and 1960?
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• How Was Cuba and China Lost to Communism?
• Why Does Communism Work for China but Not for Russia?
• How Was Soviet Life During Communism?
• Why Did Karl Marx Think Communism Was the Ideal Political Party?
• What Is Socialism and How Is It Different From Communism?
• Why Is Communism Considered as Evil (Like Fascism and Nazism) In the United States?
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Richard Nixon

The meaning of communism to americans: study paper by richard m. nixon, vice president, united states of america.

The major problem confronting the people of the United States and free peoples everywhere in the last half of the 20th century is the threat to peace and freedom presented by the militant aggressiveness of international communism. A major weakness in this struggle is lack of adequate understanding of the character of the challenge which communism presents.

I am convinced that we are on the right side in this struggle and that we are well ahead now in its major aspects. But if we are to maintain our advantage and assure victory in the struggle, we must develop, not only among the leaders, but among the people of the free world a better understanding of the threat which confronts us.

The question is not one of being for or against communism. The time is long past when any significant number of Americans contend that communism is no particular concern of theirs. Few can still believe that communism is simply a curious and twisted philosophy which happens to appeal to a certain number of zealots but which constitutes no serious threat to the interests or ideals of free society.

The days of indifference are gone. The danger today in our attitude toward communism is of a very different kind. It lies in the fact that we have come to abhor communism so much that we no longer recognize the necessity of understanding it.

We see the obvious dangers. We recognize that we must retain our present military and economic advantage over the Communist bloc, an advantage which deters a hot war and which counters the Communist threat in the cold war. In the fields of rocket technology and space exploration, we have risen to the challenge and we will keep the lead that we have gained. There is no question that the American people generally will support whatever programs our leaders initiate in these fields.

What we must realize is that this struggle probably will not be decided in the military, economic, or scientific areas, important as these are. The battle in which we are engaged is primarily one of ideas. The test is one not so much of arms but of faith.

If we are to win a contest of ideas we must know their ideas as well as our own. Our knowledge must not be superficial. We cannot be content with simply an intuition that communism is wrong. It is not enough to rest our case alone on the assertions, true as they are, that communism denies God, enslaves men, and destroys justice.

We must recognize that the appeal of the Communist idea is not to the masses, as the Communists would have us believe, but more often to an intelligent minority in newly developing countries who are trying to decide which system offers the best and surest road to progress.

We must cut through the exterior to the very heart of the Communist idea. We must come to understand the weaknesses of communism as a system - why after more than 40 years on trial it continues to disappoint so many aspirations, why it has failed in its promise of equality in abundance, why it has produced a whole library of disillusionment and a steady stream of men, women, and children seeking to escape its blight.

But we must also come to understand its strength - why it has so securely entrenched itself in the U.S.S.R., why it has been able to accomplish what it has in the field of education and science, why in some of the problem areas of the world it continues to appeal to leaders aspiring to a better life for their people.

It is to find the answers to these questions that in this statement I want to discuss communism as an idea - its economic philosophy, its philosophy of law and politics, its philosophy of history.

This statement will admittedly not be simple because the subject is complex.

It will not be brief because nothing less than a knowledge in depth of the Communist idea is necessary if we are to deal with it effectively.

In discussing the idea I will not offer programs to meet it. I intend in a later statement to discuss the tactics and vulnerabilities of the Communist conspiracy and how we can best fashion a strategy for victory.

I anticipate that some might understandably ask the question - why such a lengthy discussion of communism when everybody is against it already?

If the free world is to win this struggle, we must have men and women who not only are against communism but who know why they are against it and who know what they are going to do about it. Communism is a false idea, and the answer to a false idea is truth, not ignorance.

One of the fundamentals of the Communist philosophy is a belief that societies pass inevitably through certain stages. Each of these stages is supposed to generate the necessity for its successor. Feudalism contained within its loins the seed of capitalism; capitalism was, in other words, to supplant feudalism. Capitalism, in turn, moves inevitably toward a climax in which it will be supplanted by its appointed successor, communism. All of these things are matters of necessity and there is nothing men can do to change the inflexible sequence which history imposes.

It is a part of this philosophy that, as society moves along its predestined way, each stage of development is dominated by a particular class. Feudalism was dominated by the aristocracy; capitalism by something called the bourgeoisie; communism by the proletariat. During any particular stage of society's development the whole of human life within that society is run and rigged for the benefit of the dominant class; no one else counts for anything and the most he can expect is the leftover scraps. In the end, of course, with the final triumph of communism, classes will disappear - what was formerly the proletariat will expand so that it is the only class, and, since there are no longer any outsiders that it can dominate, there will in effect be no classes at all.

Now this theory of successive stages of development makes it clear that, if we are to understand communism, we must understand the Communist view of capitalism, for, according to Communist theory, capitalism contains within itself the germs of communism. The Communist notion of capitalism is that it is a market economy, an economy of "free trade, free selling and buying," to quote the manifesto again. It follows from this that, since communism inevitably supplants and destroys capitalism, it cannot itself be anything like market economy.

The fundamental belief of the Communist economic philosophy therefore is a negative one; namely, a belief that, whatever the economic system of mature communism may turn out to be, it cannot be a market economy; it cannot - in the words of the Communist Manifesto - be an economy based on "free trade, free selling and buying."

It may be well at this point to digress for the purpose of recalling the curious fact that the literature of communism contains so many praises for the achievements of capitalism. The manifesto contains these words about the market economy of capitalism and its alleged overlords, the bourgeoisie:

It has accomplished wonders far surpassing Egyptian pyramids, Roman aqueducts, and Gothic cathedrals; it has conducted expeditions that put in the shade all former migrations of nations and crusades. * * * The bourgeoisie, during its rule of scarce 100 years (the manifesto speaks from the year 1848), has created more massive and more colossal productive forces than have all preceding generations together. Subjection of Nature's forces to man, machinery, application of chemistry to industry and agriculture, steam navigation, railways, electric telegraphs, clearing of whole continents for cultivation, canalization of rivers, whole populations conjured out of the ground - what earlier century had even a presentiment that such productive forces slumbered in the lap of social labor?

Marx and Engels could afford this praise for capitalism because they supposed it would everywhere be succeeded by communism, a stage of society whose glories would in turn dwarf all the achievements of capitalism. Communism would build on capitalism and bring a new economy that would make the capitalist world look like a poorhouse. Those who constituted the dominant class of capitalism, the bourgeoisie, would have performed their historic mission and would be dismissed from the scene - dismissed without thanks, of course, for after all they only accomplished what was foreordained by the forces of history, forces that were now to throw them into the discard like the husk of a sprouting seed.

One of the most startling gaps in the Communist theory is the lack of any clear notion of how a Communist economy would be organized. In the writings of the great founders of communism there is virtually nothing on this subject. This gap was not an oversight, but was in fact a necessary consequence of the general theory of communism. That theory taught, in effect, that as a society moves inevitably from one level of development to another, there is no way of knowing what the next stage will demand until in fact it has arrived. Communism will supplant and destroy the market economy of capitalism. What will its own economy be like? That we cannot know until we are there and have a chance to see what the world looks like without any institution resembling an economic market. The manifesto, in fact, expresses a deep contempt for "utopian socialists" who propose "an organization of society specially contrived" by them, instead of waiting out the verdict of history and depending on the "spontaneous class organization of the proletariat." The Communist economy would organize itself according to principles that would become apparent only when the arena had been cleared of the market principle.

Operating then, in this vacuum of guidance left behind by their prophets, how did the founders of the Soviet Union proceed to organize their new economy? The answer is that they applied as faithfully as they could the teachings of their masters. Since those teachings were essentially negative, their actions had to have the same quality. They started by attempting to root out from the Russian scene every vestige of the market principle, even discouraging the use of money, which they hoped soon to abolish altogether. The production and distribution of goods were put under central direction, the theory being that the flow of goods would be directed by social need without reference to principles of profit and loss. This experiment began in 1919 and came to an abrupt end in March of 1921. It was a catastrophic failure. It brought with it administrative chaos and an almost inconceivable disorder in economic affairs, culminating in appalling shortages of the most elementary necessities.

Competent scholars estimate its cost in Russian lives at 5 million. The official Russian version of this experiment does not deny that it was an enormous failure. It attributes that failure to inexperience and to a mythical continuation of military operations, which had in fact almost wholly ceased. Meanwhile the Russian economy has been moving steadily toward the market principle.

The flow of labor is controlled by wages, so that the price of labor is itself largely set by market forces. The spread from top to bottom of industrial wages is in many cases wider than it is in this country. Managerial efficiency is promoted by substantial economic incentives in the form of bonuses and even more substantial perquisites of various kinds. Enterprises are run on a profit and loss basis. Indeed, there are all the paraphernalia of an advanced commercial society, with lawyers, accountants, balance sheets, taxes of many kinds, direct and indirect, and finally even the pressures of a creeping inflation.

The allocation of resources in Russia probably now comes about as close to being controlled by the market principle as is possible where the government owns all the instruments of production. Russian economists speak learnedly of following the "Method of Balances."

This impressive phrase stands for a very simple idea. It means that in directing production and establishing prices an effort is made to come out even, so that goods for which there is an insufficient demand will not pile up, while shortages will not develop in other fields where demand exceeds supply. The "Method of Balances" turns out to be something a lot of us learned about in school as the law of supply and demand.

All of this is not to say that the Russian economy has fully realized the market principle. There are two obstacles that block such a development. The first lies in the fact that there is a painful tension between what has to be done to run the economy efficiently and what ought to be happening according to orthodox theory. The result is that the Russian economist has to be able to speak out of both sides of his mouth at the same time. He has to be prepared at all times for sudden shifts of the party line. If today he is condemned as an "unprincipled revisionist" who apes capitalist methods, tomorrow he may be jerked from the scene for having fallen into a "sterile orthodoxy", not realizing that Marxism is a developing and creative science.

The other obstacle to the realization of a free market lies in the simple fact that the government owns the whole of industry. This means, for one thing, that the industrial units are huge, so that all of steel, or all of cosmetics, for example, is under a single direction. This naturally creates the economic condition known as oligopoly and the imperfectly functioning market which attends that condition.

Furthermore, a realization of the market principle would require the managers of the various units of industry to act as if they were doing something they are not, that is, as if they were directing independent enterprises. Understandably there is a considerable reluctance to assume this fictitious role, since the manager's reward for an inconvenient independence may well be a trip to Siberia where he is likely nowadays, they say, to be made chief bookkeeper in a tiny power plant 300 miles from the nearest town. Meanwhile, a constant theme of complaint by Moscow against the managers is that they are too "cousinly" with one another and that they are too addicted to "back scratching." They ought to be acting like capitalist entrepreneurs, but they find this a little difficult when they are all working for the same boss.

One of the most familiar refrains of Communist propaganda is that "capitalism is dying of its internal contradictions." In fact, it would be hard to imagine a system more tortured by internal contradictions than present-day Russia. It constantly has to preach one way and act another. When Russian economists and managers discover that they have to do something that seems to contradict the prophets, they usually don't know which of three justifications - all hazardous - they ought to attempt: (1) to explain their action as a temporary departure from Marxist propriety to be corrected in a more propitious future; (2) to show that what they are doing can be justified by the inherited text if it is read carefully and between the lines; or (3) to invoke the cliché that Marxism is a progressive science that learns by experience - we can't after all, expect Marx, Engels, and Lenin to have foreseen everything.

These inner tensions and perplexities help to explain the startling "shifts in the party line" that characterize all of the Communist countries. It is true that these shifts sometimes reflect the outcome of a subterranean personal power struggle within the party. But we must remember that they also at times result from the struggles of conscientious men trying to fit an inconvenient text to the facts of reality.

The yawning gap in Communist theory, by which it says nothing about how the economy shall be run except that it shall not be by the market principle, will continue to create tensions, probably of mounting intensity, within and among the Communist nations. The most painful compromise that it has so far necessitated occurred when it was decided that trade among the satellite countries should be governed by the prices set on the world market.

This embarrassing concession to necessity recognized, on the one hand, that a price cannot be meaningful unless it is set by something like a market, and, on the other, the inability of the Communist system to develop a reliable pricing system within its own government-managed economy.

The Communist theory has now had a chance to prove itself by an experience extending over two generations in a great nation of huge human and material resources. What can we learn from this experience? We can learn, first of all, that it is impossible to run an advanced economy successfully without resort to some variant of the market principle. In time of war, when costs are largely immaterial and all human efforts converge on a single goal, the market principle can be subordinated. In a primitive society, where men live on the verge of extinction and all must be content with the same meager ration, the market principle largely loses its relevance. But when society's aim is to satisfy divers human wants and to deploy its productive facilities in such a way as to satisfy those wants in accordance with their intensity - their intensity as felt by those who have the wants - there is and can be no substitute for the market principle. This the Russian experience proves abundantly. That experience also raises serious doubt whether the market principle can be realized within an economy wholly owned by the government.

The second great lesson of the Russian experience is of deeper import. It is that communism is utterly wrong about its most basic premise, the premise that underlies everything it has to say about economics, law, philosophy, morality, and religion. Communism starts with the proposition that there are no universal truths or general truths of human nature. According to its teachings there is nothing one human age can say to another about the proper ordering of society or about such subjects as justice, freedom, and equality. Everything depends on the stage of society and the economic class that is in power at a particular time.

In the light of this fundamental belief - or rather, this unbending and all-pervasive disbelief - it is clear why communism had to insist that what was true for capitalism could not be true for communism. Among the truths scheduled to die with capitalism was the notion that economic life could be usefully ordered by a market. If this truth seems still to be alive, orthodox Communist doctrine has to label it as an illusion, a ghost left behind by an age now being surpassed. At the present time this particular capitalist ghost seems to have moved in on the Russian economy and threatens to become a permanent guest at the Communist banquet. Let us hope it will soon be joined by some other ghosts, such as freedom, political equality, religion, and constitutionalism.

This brings me to the Communist view of law and politics. Of the Communist legal and political philosophy, we can almost say that there is none. This lack is, again, not an accident, but is an integral part of the systematic negations which make up the Communist philosophy.

According to Marx and Engels, the whole life of any society is fundamentally determined by the organization of its economy. What men will believe; what gods, if any, they will worship; how they will choose their leaders or let their leaders choose themselves; how they will interpret the world about them - all of these are basically determined by economic interests and relations. In the jargon of communism: religion, morality, philosophy, political science, and law constitute a superstructure which reflects the underlying economic organization of a particular society. It follows that subjects which fall within the superstructure permit of no general truths; for example, what is true for law and political science under capitalism cannot be true under communism.

I have said we can almost assert that there is no Communist philosophy of law and political science. The little there is can be briefly stated. It consists in the assumption that after the revolution there will be a dictatorship (called the dictatorship of the proletariat) and that this dictatorship will for a while find it necessary to utilize some of the familiar political and legal institutions, such as courts. (There is an incredibly tortured literature about just how these institutions are to be utilized and with what modifications.) When, however, mature communism is achieved, law and the state, in the consecrated phrase, "will wither away." There will be no voting, no parliaments, no judges, no policemen, no prisons - no problems. There will simply be factories and fields and a happy populace peacefully reveling in the abundance of their output.

As with economic theory, there was a time in the history of the Soviet regime when an attempt was made to take seriously the absurdities of this Communist theory of law and state. For about a decade during the thirties an influential doctrine was called the commodity exchange theory of law. According to this theory, the fundamental fact about capitalism is that it is built on the economic institution of exchange. In accordance with the doctrine of the superstructure, all political and legal institutions under capitalism must therefore be permeated and shaped by the concept of exchange. Indeed, the theory went further. Even the rules of morality are based on exchange, for is there not a kind of tacit deal implied even in the Golden Rule, "Do unto others, as you would be done by"? Now the realization of communism, which is the negation of capitalism, requires the utter rooting out of any notion of exchange in the Communist economy. But when exchange has disappeared, the political, legal, and moral superstructure that was built on it will also disappear. Therefore, under mature communism there will not only be no capitalistic legal and political institutions, there will be no law whatever, no state, no morality - for all of these in some measure reflect the underlying notion of an exchange or deal among men.

The high priest of this doctrine was Eugene Pashukanis. His reign came to an abrupt end in 1937 as the inconvenience of his teachings began to become apparent. With an irony befitting the career of one who predicted that communism would bring an end to law and legal processes, Pashukanis was quietly taken off and shot without even the semblance of a trial.

As in the case of economics, since Pashukanis' liquidation there has developed in Russian intellectual life a substantial gray market for capitalistic legal and political theories. But where Russian economists seem ashamed of their concessions to the market principle, Russian lawyers openly boast of their legal and political system, claiming for it that it does everything that equivalent bourgeois institutions do, only better. This boast has to be muted somewhat, because it still remains a matter of dogma that under mature communism, law and the state will disappear. This embarrassing aspect of their inherited doctrine the Soviet theorists try to keep as much as possible under the table. They cannot, however, openly renounce it without heresy, and heresy in the Soviet Union, be it remembered, still requires a very active taste for extinction.

One of the leading books on Soviet legal and political theory is edited by a lawyer who is well known in this country, the late Andrei Vyshinsky. In the table-pounding manner he made famous in the U.N., Vyshinsky praises Soviet legal and political institutions to the skies and contrasts their wholesome purity with the putrid vapors emanating from the capitalist countries. He points out, for example, that in Russia the voting age is 18, while in many capitalist countries it is 21.

The capitalists thus disenfranchise millions of young men and women because, says Vyshinsky, it is feared they may not yet have acquired a properly safe bourgeois mentality. As one reads arguments like this spelled out with the greatest solemnity, and learns all about the "safeguards" of the Soviet Constitution, it comes as a curious shock to find it openly declared that in the Soviet Union only one political party can legally exist and that the Soviet Constitution is "the only constitution in the world which frankly declares the directing role of the party in the state."

One wonders what all the fuss about voting qualifications is about if the voters are in the end permitted only to vote for the candidates chosen by the only political party permitted to exist. The plain fact is, of course, that everything in the Soviet Constitution relating to public participation in political decisions is a facade concealing the real instrument of power that lies in the Communist Party. It has been said that hypocrisy is vice's tribute to virtue. The holding of elections in which the electorate is given no choice may similarly be described as an attempt by communism to salve its uneasy conscience. Knowing that it cannot achieve representative democracy, it seems to feel better if it adopts its empty forms.

When one reflects on it, it is an astounding thing that a great and powerful nation in the second half of the 20th century should still leave its destinies to be determined by intraparty intrigue, that it should have developed no political institutions capable of giving to its people a really effective voice in their Government, that it should lack any openly declared and lawful procedure by which the succession of one ruler to another could be determined. Some are inclined to seek an explanation for this condition in Russian history with its bloody and irregular successions of czars. But this is to forget that even in England, the mother of parliaments, there were once in times long gone by some pretty raw doings behind palace walls and some unseemly and even bloody struggles for the throne.

But where other nations have worked gradually toward stable political institutions guaranteeing the integrity of their governments, Russia has remained in a state of arrested development. That state will continue until the Russian leaders have the courage to declare openly that the legal and political philosophy of Marx, Engles, and Lenin is fundamentally mistaken and must be abandoned.

How heavy the burden of the inherited Communist philosophy is becomes clear when the concept of law itself is under discussion. Throughout the ages, among men of all nations and creeds, law has generally been thought of as a curb on arbitrary power. It has been conceived as a way of substituting reason for force in the decision of disputes, thus liberating human energies for the pursuit of aims more worthy of man's destiny than brute survival or the domination of one's fellows. No one has supposed that these ideals have ever been fully realized in any society. Like every human institution, law is capable of being exploited for selfish purposes and of losing its course through a confusion of purposes. But during most of the world's history, men have thought that the questions worthy of discussion were how the institutions of law could be shaped so that they might not be perverted into instruments of power or lose the sense of their high mission through sloth or ignorance.

What is the Communist attitude toward this intellectual enterprise in which so many great thinkers of so many past ages have joined? Communism consigns all of it to the ashcan of history as a fraud and delusion, beneath the contempt of Communist science. How, then, is law defined today in Russia? We have an authoritative answer. It is declared to be "the totality of the rules of conduct expressing the will of the dominant class, designed to promote those relationships that are advantageous and agreeable to the dominant class."

Law in the Soviet Union is not conceived as a check on power, it is openly and proudly an expression of power. In this conception surely, if anywhere, the bankruptcy of communism as a moral philosophy openly declares itself.

It is vitally important to emphasize again that all of the truly imposing absurdities achieved by Communist thought - in whatever field: in economics, in politics, in law, in morality - that all of these trace back to a single common source. That origin lies in a belief that nothing of universal validity can be said of human nature, that there are no principles, values, or moral truths that stand above a particular age or a particular phase in the evolution of society. This profound negation lies at the very heart of the Communist philosophy and gives to it both its motive force and its awesome capacity for destruction.

It is this central negation that makes communism radically inconsistent with the ideal of human freedom. As with other bourgeois virtues, once dismissed contemptuously, Soviet writers have now taken up the line that only under communism can men realize "true freedom." This line may even have a certain persuasiveness for Russians in that individuals tend to prize those freedoms they are familiar with and not to miss those they have never enjoyed. A Russian transplanted suddenly to American soil might well feel for a time "unfree" in the sense that he would be confronted with the burden of making choices that he was unaccustomed to making and that he would regard as onerous. But the problem of freedom goes deeper than the psychological conditioning of any particular individual. It touches the very roots of man's fundamental conception of himself.

The Communist philosophy is basically inconsistent with the ideal of freedom because it denies that there can be any standard of moral truth by which the actions of any given social order may be judged. If the individual says to government, "Thus far may you go, but no farther," he necessarily appeals to some principle of rightness that stands above his particular form of government. It is precisely the possibility of any such standard that communism radically and uncomprisingly denies. Marx and Engels had nothing but sneers for the idea that there are "eternal truths, such as freedom, justice, etc., that are common to all states of society."

They contend that there are no eternal truths. All ideas of right and wrong come from the social system under which one lives. If that system requires tyranny and oppression, then tyranny and oppression must within that system be accepted; there can be no higher court of appeal.

Not only do the premises of Communist philosophy make any coherent theory of freedom impossible, but the actual structure of the Soviet regime is such that no true sense of freedom can ever develop under it. To see why this is so, it is useful to accept the Communist ideology provisionally and reason the matter out purely in terms of what may be called human engineering. Let us concede that a struggle for political power goes on in all countries and let us assume in keeping with Marxist views that this struggle has absolutely nothing to do with right and wrong. Even from this perversely brutal point of view, it is clear why a sense of freedom can never develop under the Soviet regime. In a constitutional democracy the struggle for political power is assigned to a definite arena; it is roped off, so to speak, from the rest of life. In the Soviet Union, on the other hand, there is no clear distinction between politics and economics, or between politics and other human activities. No barriers exist to define what is a political question and what is not. Instead of being ordered and canalized as it is in constitutional democracies, the struggle for political power in Russia pervades, or can at any time pervade, every department of life. For this reason there is no area of human interest - the intellectual, literary, scientific, artistic, or religious - that may not at any time become a battleground of this struggle.

Take, for example, the situation of a Soviet architect. Today without doubt he enjoys a certain security; he is not likely to lie awake fearing the dread knock at the door at midnight. Furthermore, he may now see opening before him in the practice of his profession a degree of artistic freedom that his predecessors did not enjoy. But he can never be sure that he will not wake up tomorrow morning and read in the papers that a new "line" has been laid down for architecture, since his profession, like every other, can at any moment be drawn into the struggle for power. He can never know the security enjoyed by those who live under a system where the struggle for political power is fenced off, as it were, from the other concerns of life. When Soviet "politics" invades a field like architecture, it cannot be said to spread beyond its proper boundaries, for it has none. It is precisely this defect in the Soviet regime that in the long run prevents the realization of the ideal of freedom under communism.

It is only in the constitutional democracies that the human spirit can be permanently free to unfold itself in as many directions as are opened up for it by its creative urge. Only such governments can achieve diversity without disintegration, for only they know the full meaning of "those wise restraints that make men free."

Since the Communist philosophy of history is the central core of its ideology, that philosophy has of necessity permeated every theme I have so far discussed. Briefly stated the Communist philosophy of history is that man does not make history, but is made by it.

Though communism denies to man the capacity to shape his own destiny, it does accord to him a remarkable capacity to foresee in great detail just what the future will impose on him. The literature of communism is full of prophecies, tacit and explicit. Probably no human faith ever claimed so confidently that it knew so much about the future. Certainly none ever ran up a greater number of bad guesses. On a rough estimate the Communist record for mistaken prophecies stands at about 100 percent.

Among the conclusions about the future that were implicit in the Communist philosophy, or were drawn from it by its prophets, we can name the following:

That communism will first establish itself in countries of the most advanced capitalism; That in such countries society will gradually split itself into two classes, with the rich becoming fewer and richer, the laboring masses sinking steadily to a bare level of existence; That under capitalism colonialism will increase as each capitalistic nation seeks more and more outlets for its surplus production; That in capitalist countries labor unions will inevitably take the lead in bringing about the Communist revolution; That as soon as communism is firmly established steps will be taken toward the elimination of the capitalist market and capitalist political and legal institutions; etc.

As with other aspects of communism, this record of bad guesses is no accident. It derives from the basic assumption of Marxism that man has no power to mold his institutions to meet problems as they arise, that he is caught up in a current of history which carries him inevitably toward his predestined goal. A philosophy which embraces this view of man's plight is constitutionally incapable of predicting the steps man will take to shape his own destiny, precisely because it has in advance declared any such steps to be impossible. Communism in this respect is like a man standing on the bank of a rising river and observing what appears to be a log lodged against the opposite shore. Assuming that what he observes is an inert object, he naturally predicts that the log will eventually be carried away by the rising floodwaters. When the log turns out to be a living creature and steps safely out of the water the observer is, of course, profoundly surprised. Communism, it must be confessed, has shown a remarkable capacity to absorb such shocks, for it has survived many of them. In the long run, however, it seems inevitable that the Communist brain will inflict serious damage upon itself by the tortured rationalizations with which it has to explain each successive bad guess.

This brings us to the final issue. Why is it that with all its brutalities and absurdities communism still retains an active appeal for the minds and hearts of many intelligent men and women? For we must never forget that this appeal does exist.

It is true that in the United States and many other countries the fringe of serious thought represented by active Communist belief has become abraded to the point of near extinction. It is also the fact that many people everywhere adhere to groups dominated by Communist leadership who have only the slightest inkling of communism as a system of ideas. Then again we must remember that in the Communist countries themselves there are many intelligent, loyal, and hard-working citizens, thoroughly acquainted with the Communist philosophy, who view that philosophy with a quiet disdain, not unmixed with a certain sardonic pleasure of the sort that goes with witnessing, from a choice seat, a comedy of errors that is unfortunately also a tragedy Finally we must not confuse every "gain of communism" with a gain of adherents to Communist beliefs. In particular, we should not mistake the acceptance of technical and economic aid from Moscow as a conversion to the Communist faith, though the contacts thus established may, of course, open the way for a propagation of that faith.

With all this said, and with surface appearance discounted in every proper way, the tragic fact remains that communism as a faith remains a potent force in the world of ideas today. It is an even more tragic fact that that faith can sometimes appeal not only to opportunists and adventurers, but also to men of dedicated idealism. How does this come about?

To answer this question we have to ask another: What are the ingredients that go to make up a successful fighting faith, a faith that will enlist the devotion and fanaticism of its adherents, that will let loose on the world that unaccommodating creature, "the true believer"?

I think that such a faith must be made up of at least three ingredients.

First, it must lift its adherents above the dread sense of being alone and make them feel themselves members of a brotherhood.

Second, it must make its adherents believe that in working for the objectives of their faith they are moving in step with nature, or with the forces of history, or with the divine will.

Third, it must be a faith that gives to its adherents a sense of being lifted above the concerns that consume the lives of the nonbelieving.

All of these ingredients are furnished in abundance by communism. In the Communist philosophy the first two ingredients are fused into one doubly effective amalgam. To become a Communist is no longer to be alone, but to join in the march of a great, oppressed mass of humanity called the proletariat. This silent, faceless army is being carried inevitably to its goal by the unseen forces of history. There is thus a double identification. History belongs to the proletariat, the proletariat belongs to history. By joining in this great march the Communist not only gains human companions but a sense of responding to the great pull of the universe itself.

Now the picture I have just painted is not one that even the most devout Communist can comfortably carry about with him at all times. Indeed, there are probably few Communists who do not, even in their moments of highest faith, sense some of the fictions and contradictions of the dream to which they are committed. The absurdities of the Communist ideology are, however, by no means immediately apparent to the new convert, who is likely to be intrigued rather by the difficulty of understanding them. The old believer sees no reason to point out these absurdities, partly because he does not wish to undermine the faith of the young, and partly because he has become inured to them, has learned to live with them at peace, and does not want to disturb his own adjustment to them.

One of the key fictions of the Communist edifice of thought is the belief that there is in modern industrial society an identifiable class of people called the proletariat. That such a class would develop was not a bad guess in 1848 and Marx had other economists with him in making this guess. As usual, history perversely took the wrong turn. And as usual, this has caused communism no particular embarrassment, for it continues - with diminished ardor, to be sure - to talk about the proletariat as if it were actually there. But professing to see things that are not there is often a sign of faith and furnishes, in any event, a bond of union among believers.

To many of its American critics, communism has appeared as a kind of nightmare. Like awakened sleepers still recoiling from the shock of their dream, these critics forget that the nightmare is after all shot through and through with absurdities. The result is to lend to the Communist ideology a substance that, in fact, it does not possess. If in moments of doubt the Communist is inclined to feel that his philosophy is made of air and tinsel, he is reassured and brought back into the fold when he recalls that its critics have declared this philosophy to be profoundly and powerfully vicious.

Part of the tarnish that an uncompliant history has visited on the Communist prophecies has in recent years been removed by the achievements of Russian technology. It is now possible to identify communism with the land that has the highest school buildings, the hugest outdoor rallies, the most colossal statues and the space satellites that weigh the most tons. It is not difficult to make all this appear as a kind of belated flowering of the promises communism began holding out more than a hundred years ago. It is easy to make men forget that none of the solid accomplishments of modern Russia came about by methods remotely resembling anything anticipated by Marx, Engels, or Lenin.

In suggesting the ingredients that go to make up a successful fighting faith, I stated that such a faith must be one "that gives to its adherents a sense of being lifted above the concerns that consume the lives of the nonbelieving." I have purposely left this aspect of the Communist faith to the last for it is here that the truly nightmarish quality of that faith manifests itself.

Not that it is any objection to a faith that it enables those sharing it to be indifferent to things that seem important to others. The crucial question is, What is it that men are told not to heed? As to the Communist faith there is no ambiguity on this score. It tells men to forget all the teachings of the ages about government, law, and morality. We are told to cast off the intellectual burden left behind by men like Confucius, Mencius, Plato, Aristotle, St. Thomas, Kant and Bentham. There are no "eternal truths" about society. There is no science of social architecture. Only the simple minded can believe that there are principles guiding the creation of sound legal and political institutions. For the enlightened there is only one rule: Smash the existing "bourgeois" economic and legal order and leave the rest to the "spontaneous class organization of the proletariat."

In diplomatic dealings the Russians display great respect for American military and economic power, but consider us hopelessly naive in matters political. We are still concerned with trifles as they feel themselves long since to have left behind - trifles like: How do you help a people to realize self-government who have had no experience with its necessary forms and restraints? How, following the overthrow of a tyranny, do you suggest steps that will prevent an interim dictatorship from hardening into a second tyranny?

It is not that the Communists have ideas about sound government that differ from ours. According to strict Communist theory there can be no ideas on such a subject. If a gray market for such ideas has gradually developed in Russia it has not yet reached the point of being ready for the export trade. Russia has engineers able to help the underdeveloped countries build roads and dams and there is no reason to question the competence of these engineers. But whoever heard of Russia sending an expert in political institutions to help a new country design an appropriate form of representative self-government? Not only would such a mission stand in ludicrous incongruity with the present situation of the Communist countries in Europe; it would be a repudiation of the basic premises of the whole Communist philosophy.

Even in the economic field, Russia really has nothing to offer the rest of the world but negations. For a long time after the establishment of the Soviet regime it was actively disputed in Russia whether for communism there is any such thing as an economic law.

Communistic ideology has had gradually to bend before the plain fact that such laws exist. But Russia has as yet developed no economic institutions that are more than distorted shadows of their capitalist equivalents. Russia may help a new country to develop electric power. It has nothing to say about the social institutions that will determine how that power will be utilized for the good of the whole people.

This great vacuum that lies in the heart of communism explains not only why its philosophy is in the long run so destructive of everything human, but why in the short run it can be so successful. Consider, for example, what it can offer to the leader of a successful revolution. A cruel dictatorship has been overthrown. It had to be overthrown by force because it permitted no elections or never counted the vote honestly. Following the successful revolt, there must be an interval during which order is kept by something approaching a dictatorship. Sooner or later, if the revolution is not to belie its democratic professions, some movement must be made toward representative self-government. This is a period of great difficulty. There is no mystery about its problems. They fit into an almost classic pattern known from antiquity. The revolutionary leaders must find some accommodation with what is left of the old regime. Sooner or later the firing squad must be retired. Even when this is done vengeful hatreds continue to endanger the successful operation of parliamentary government. Among the revolutionary party, men who were once united in overthrowing plain injustice become divided on the question what constitutes a just new order. Militant zealots, useful in the barricades, are too rough for civil government and must be curbed. If curbed too severely, they may take up arms against the new government. Etc., etc. What can communism offer the revolutionary leader caught in this ancient and familiar quandary? It can, of course, offer him material aid. But it can offer him something more significant and infinitely more dangerous, a clear conscience in taking the easy course. It can tell him to forget about elections and his promises of democracy and freedom. It can support this advice with an imposing library of pseudoscience clothing despotism with the appearance of intellectual respectability.

The internal stability of the present Russian Government lends an additional persuasiveness to this appeal. If Russia can get along without elections, why can't we? Men forget that it is a common characteristic of dictatorships to enjoy internal truces that may extend over decades, only to have the struggle for power renew itself when the problem of a succession arises. This is a pattern written across centuries of man's struggle for forms of government consistent with human dignity. It is said that the struggle for power cannot under modern conditions with modern armies and modern weapons, take the form of a prolonged civil war. That is no doubt true in a developed economy like that of Russia. The shift in power when it comes may involve only a few quick maneuvers within the apparatus of the party, which have their only outward manifestation in purges or banishments that seal the results. But the fact remains that the fate of millions will be determined by processes which take no account of their interests or wishes, in which they are granted no participation, and which they are not even permitted to observe.

It must not be forgotten that modern Russia was for an indefinite period prior to 1953 governed by a tyranny. This is admitted in Russia today. To be sure, the term "tyranny" is not used, because according to the Communist philosophy a term like that betokens a naive and outdated view of the significance of governmental forms. The Soviet term is "the cult of personality." According to the official explanation Stalin and his followers in some mysterious way became infected with a mistaken view of Stalin's proper role. According to ancient wisdom this was because Stalin ruled without the check of constitutional forms and without effective popular participation in his government. In the words of Aristotle, written some 23 centuries ago, "This is why we do not permit a man to rule, but the principle of law, because a man rules in his own interest, and becomes a tyrant."

It is plain that Stalin at some point became a tyrant. According to Aristotle this was because Russia did not base its government on the principle of law. According to the Communist theory some inexplicable slippage of the gears, some accidental countercurrent of history, led Stalin to embrace incorrect notions about himself.

If mankind is to survive at a level of dignity worthy of its great past, we must help the world recapture some sense of the teachings of the great thinkers of former ages. It must come again to see that sound legal and political institutions not only express man's highest ideal of what he may become, but that they are indispensable instruments for enabling him to realize that ideal. It would be comforting to believe that the forces of history are working inevitably toward this realization and that we too are cooperating with the inevitable. We can only hope that this is so. But we can know that the forces of human life, struggling to realize itself on its highest plane, are working with us and that those forces need our help desperately.

Richard Nixon, The Meaning of Communism to Americans: Study Paper by Richard M. Nixon, Vice President, United States of America Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/274060

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Communist Party of the Soviet Union

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• Presidential Library - The 20th congress of the Communist party of the Soviet Union opened
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Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) , the major political party of Russia and the Soviet Union from the Russian Revolution of October 1917 to 1991.

(Read Leon Trotsky’s 1926 Britannica essay on Lenin.)

The Communist Party of the Soviet Union arose from the Bolshevik wing of the Russian Social Democratic Workers’ Party (RSDWP). The Bolsheviks, organized in 1903, were led by Vladimir I. Lenin , and they argued for a tightly disciplined organization of professional revolutionaries who were governed by democratic centralism and were dedicated to achieving the dictatorship of the proletariat . In 1917 they formally broke with the right, or Menshevik, wing of the RSDWP . In 1918, when the Bolsheviks became the ruling party of Russia, they changed their organization’s name to the All-Russian Communist Party; it was renamed the All-Union Communist Party in 1925 after the founding of the U.S.S.R. and finally to the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1952.

The Communist Party arose in opposition to both capitalism and the socialists of the Second International who had supported their capitalist governments during World War I . The name communist was specifically taken to distinguish Lenin’s followers in Russia and abroad from such socialists.

Following their victory in the Russian Civil War (1918–20), the Soviet communists followed a cautious policy of limited capitalism during the New Economic Program until Lenin’s death in 1924. Then the powerful general secretary Joseph Stalin and leaders around him moved to assume the leadership of the party. The Stalin group easily defeated such rival leaders as Leon Trotsky, Grigory Zinoviev, and Lev Kamenev . Then, in the late 1920s, opposition arose from Stalin’s ally Nikolay Bukharin to the policies of rapid industrialization and collectivization. Stalin eliminated Bukharin from the leadership in 1929 and sought to eradicate the last remnants of opposition within the party by launching the Great Purge (1934–38), in which many thousands of his real or assumed opponents were executed as traitors and millions more were imprisoned or sent to forced-labour camps. During Stalin’s years in power the party’s size expanded from about 470,000 members (1924) to several million from the 1930s on. Following victory in World War II , Stalin faced no further challenges within the party, but discontent with his tyranny and arbitrariness smoldered among the party leadership. Following Stalin’s death in 1953, Nikita Khrushchev began a rapid rise and in 1956 repudiated Stalin’s tyrannical excesses in his famous “Secret Speech” at the 20th party congress. The next year he decisively defeated his rivals Vyacheslav Molotov , Georgy Malenkov, and others of the “anti-party group” and became the party’s undisputed leader. Khrushchev ended the practice of bloody purges of the party membership, but his impulsive rule aroused dissatisfaction among the other party leaders, who ousted him in 1964. Leonid Brezhnev succeeded him and was general secretary until his death in 1982, being in turn succeeded by Yury Andropov . After Andropov’s death in 1984, Konstantin Chernenko became party leader, and after Chernenko’s death in 1985 the leadership went to Mikhail Gorbachev , who attempted to liberalize and democratize the party and—more largely—the U.S.S.R.

Internationally the CPSU dominated the Communist International (the Comintern) and its successor, the Cominform , from the 1920s on. But the very spread and success of communist parties worldwide brought challenges to the CPSU’s hegemony , first from the Yugoslavs in 1948 and then from the Chinese in the late 1950s and early ’60s. The CPSU continued to serve as the model for the Soviet-dominated states of eastern Europe, however, until 1989, at which time the communist parties of eastern Europe either disintegrated or transformed themselves into Western-style socialist (or social democratic) parties.

From 1918 through the 1980s the Communist Party of the Soviet Union was a monolithic , monopolistic ruling party that dominated the political, economic, social, and cultural life of the U.S.S.R. The constitution and other legal documents that supposedly ordered and regulated the government of the Soviet Union were in fact subordinate to the policies of the CPSU and its leadership. Constitutionally, the Soviet government and the CPSU were separate bodies, but virtually all high government officials were party members, and it was this system of interlocking dual membership in party and governmental bodies that enabled the CPSU to both make policy and see that it was enforced by the government.

But by 1990, Mikhail Gorbachev’s efforts to restructure the Soviet Union’s economy and democratize its political system had eroded both the CPSU’s unity and its monopolistic hold on power. In 1990 the CPSU voted to surrender its constitutionally guaranteed monopoly of power, thereby permitting opposition parties to flourish legally in the Soviet Union. The holding of free (and in some cases multiparty) elections in various union republics hastened the decline in the party’s membership and enabled defectors from its ranks (such as Boris Yeltsin ) to rise to positions of power in republic governments.

Despite these changes, the party remained the principal obstacle to Gorbachev’s attempts to reform the Soviet economy along free-market lines. A failed coup by communist hard-liners against Gorbachev in August 1991 discredited the CPSU and greatly hastened its decline. In subsequent months the party was stripped of its physical assets; its control of the Soviet government, internal-security agencies, and armed forces was broken; and the party’s activities were suspended. The dissolution of the Soviet Union on December 25, 1991, into a group of sovereign republics headed by democratically elected governments marked the CPSU’s formal demise , though the party’s former members retained much of their control over economic and political decision making in the new republics.

The basic unit of the CPSU was the primary party organization, which was a feature in all factories, government offices, schools, and collective farms and any other body of any importance whatsoever. At the party’s peak size in the early 1980s, there were about 390,000 primary party organizations, and above this lowest level there were district, city, regional, and republic committees. At its height the CPSU had some 19 million members.

Nominally, the supreme body in the CPSU was the party congress, which usually met every five years and was attended by several thousand delegates. The party congress nominally elected the 300 or so members of the Central Committee of the CPSU, which met at least twice a year to perform the work of the party in between congresses . In its turn the Central Committee elected the members of various party committees, two of which, the Politburo and the Secretariat, were the actual centres of ultimate power and authority in the Soviet Union. The Politburo, with about 24 full members, was the supreme policy-making body in the country and exercised power over every aspect of public policy, both domestic and foreign. The Secretariat was responsible for the day-to-day administrative work of the party machine. The membership of these bodies, though nominally determined by the Central Committee, was in fact self-perpetuating and was largely determined by those bodies’ members themselves.

The training ground for future candidates and members of the party was the All-Union Lenin League of Communist Youth , known as the Komsomol . The principal publications of the party were the daily newspaper Pravda and the monthly theoretical journal Kommunist .