Thread: Communism: Do Russians think the USSR was communist?

Originally Posted by Hanna

Can socialism and communism help the developing world?

Communism is utopia. It could only be achieved in small, closed societies. Communism relies on people to be truly altruistic, with compassion, super humane in a sense. And this can only be achieved if a society would have no economical or cultural problems whatsoever, internal or external. People should be willing to do "greater good" for the whole society and not for themselves but this can only be done if all the people in such society are more or less equal in all terms, so the uniqueness of an individual has to be removed completely, which is practically impossible.

Originally Posted by hddscan

Communism is utopia. It could only be achieved in small, closed societies. Communism relies on people to be truly altruistic, with compassion, super humane in a sense. And this can only be achieved if a society would have no economical or cultural problems whatsoever, internal or external. People should be willing to do "greater good" for the whole society and not for themselves but this can only be done if all the people in such society are more or less equal in all terms, so the uniqueness of an individual has to be removed completely, which is practically impossible.

I agree that communism is better suited for smaller groups. People need to be really committed and there needs to be discipline. In a way, you could say that monasteries run a sort of "communism". Everyone lives in the same way, they share almost everything and it's "to everyone according to their needs". They are held together by strong religious conviction. Also, they can simply ask people to leave, who don't follow the rules. A country can't really do that..

The problem with doing it in a large country, is a lot of people never wanted socialism to begin with. They will be negative. Others are just uninterested, lazy or out to exploit the system. Countries like the USA will be out to sabotage the socialistic state as much as possible. And as the years pass, people forget the hardships before socialism and they start taking everything for granted -- worrying a lot more about their "rights" than their obligations.

One of the reasons social democracy worked in Sweden was because it was a completely homogenous country, and there was a real high work ethic among regular people, thanks to Lutheranism. (Neither is true anymore though....)

In actual communism, just triple all the challenges. I agree that it's just not compatible with human nature at present.
But note: The world in Star Trek is communist. If there was a colony on Mars, they'd be living "communism" by necessity, even if they wouldn't call it by that name.

Originally Posted by hddscan

I don't see it as a negative thing. But obviously different people may have different opinions.

No I don't see it as something negative either. But it seems like it's a closed chapter now - gone and not coming back. Or if it's coming back, it will be different and called something else.

The image of socialism was totally ruined in the 1990s. As a "brand", it's almost dead.
Or does anyone see communism or socialism making a real comeback in our lifetimes? I don't...

When I say "socialism" I think of - no private means of production, job and housing for everyone... etc, etc.
Have you got a different view on what it is?

Also: I think all countries that implemented socialism put their own "deviating" touches on it, so there really is no text-book example of "plain" or "pure" socialism.

Originally Posted by Hanna

When I say "socialism" I think of - no private means of production, job and housing for everyone... etc, etc.
Have you got a different view on what it is?

I don't think socialism could be applicable in black and white terms to any country.
But there are some examples of socialism in many countries. Government sponsored pensions, government sponsored medical care, government sponsored education, government sponsored unemployment benefits are the most common modern examples of socialism that could be applicable to many countries.
Government sponsored housing is less common but still exist.
Government-controlled production exists in many countries but at a different degree. And government-controlled service I would say exists in any country with a government.
The more "government-controlled" things a country has the more socialistic it is.
But the "heavyweight" of it all is production of course, which supports my previous claim that economy matters the most for a country.
However based on that Saudi Arabia is a socialistic country, because its oil production is controlled by the government. And when you say "Countries like the USA will be out to sabotage the socialistic state as much as possible" it makes me wonder: was it actually the socialism the US was after or was it something else during the Cold War? I know the answer of course

Originally Posted by hddscan

was it actually the socialism the US was after or was it something else during the Cold War? I know the answer of course

Regarding the USA: I can't follow the reasoning of a violent madman....
But please tell me your theory of why they did it!

To be serious: We know that they used every trick in the book, from blockades, to invasions & propaganda campaigns to destroy socialism. And I believed that the US egged the USSR on, into a spending war on nuclear weapons on purpose, since they knew they had deeper coffers.

Secondly: In 1989 it looked like Russians were prepared to ditch everything they built up, for Coca Cola, rock'n'roll and a pair of Levi's... If the US achieved this consciously, it was pure psy-ops genius warfare. The US turned the population into a Trojan horse and destroyed their biggest enemy from within.... And during the 1990s, the US could feast on the corpse.... But now they are angry, because the party is over... So Russia is again an enemy.

Same with other, smaller countries that have been declared "enemies" of the US, simply because they use a socialist system within their own borders. Countries that now feel forced to spend half their GDP on the military, just to defend themselves, while becoming increasingly paranoid..

Obviously the motivation for the USA can always be traced back to money, but what's your theory?

Originally Posted by Hanna

But please tell me your theory of why they did it!

Money of course.
The US always wanted to be a world's leader on public and world's ruler in reality. Normally an empire would try and conquer actual land to rule it, but after the WW2 the US realized that it can't conquer lands without consequences, so it decided to be an economical ruler of the world.
The US created the Bretton Woods system, which included the IMF and the World Bank and proclaimed American dollar as a currency as equal as gold, which was basically the end of "gold standard" and the beginning of dollar domination. It was a brilliant move at the time. Many countries ratified it but the USSR did not, it also did not join the IMF. That's how the Cold War started.
In a couple of years the US proposed Marshall Plan, which tied the Western Europe to the US with big money and made it dependable on the US for many years.
The world became bipolar: on one side it was the US, UK, Australia, India and Western Europe, on the other it was the USSR, Eastern Europe, South America, China and Africa. Middle East was divided between the sides.
After the USSR collapsed the world stopped being bipolar and the US became dominant country of the world. At the moment the US could do whatever it wants and nobody could do anything about it, it ignores the UN and nobody could do anything, it bombs sovereign nations and nobody puts any sanctions on it, it dictates what over countries could or could not do based on its own interests and so far there is very little resistance. So it finally became a world ruler.
Russia still tries to create a multipolar world, so it is a threat to the US world power and makes it the US enemy.
China started not to do as it told and thus there are consequences: Hong Kong rivals, suddenly Chinese markets drop and now the US sends a warship to the South China Sea to show who's the boss.