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

Originally Posted by hddscan

the socialism always goes for equalizing living conditions among different social groups of a society(for example - Sweden). Capitalism cares less about it(for example - USA)
But in general what matters most is economy, the better the economy the more people care about something beside food and shelter - Maslow pyramid is in action.
Could it be possible that USSR would have remained socialistic and have high life standards - yes, it would have(in some other time), Sweden is an example. Could have USSR be better economically if it would have been capitalistic, yes, it would have, the US is an example.
It's the matter of perspective.
I would say the more developed the country is(economically and culturally) - the more socialistic it would become. USSR was destined to fail because it was too young to be socialistic.

As for democracy - it does not exist, the same way as communism couldn't exist.

Interesting comments. I agree with most of what you say.
But as a Swedish person I don't believe that my country is socialist, and neither to most Swedish people, apart from right wing people who want to whinge about things they don't like.

I don't think it can be called "socialist" because there has always been private ownership of a large part of the industry. I admit that there was a period during the 1960s — 1985 when there was a lot of socialist "paraphernalia/language and ideology. The state owned all utilities companies and there were virtually no private alternatives in healthcare, education etc. A lot of people believed that the eventual victory of communism was inevitable.

But socialism was never fully in charge of the country, and in the 1990s, the state sold off their companies and introduced market pricing on most things.

I just don't agree with it being labelled "socialist" either by you or by Chemist12. Today, it's absolutely like any other Western European country.

But I think the USSR is very fascinating as a project, an experience etc. I would like to understand what was good and bad about it, what exactly made it voluntarily dissolve itself and fail. Can socialism and communism help the developing world?

The challenge about it is that everything relating to the USSR is hidden behind strong feelings of people who experienced it, layers of propaganda and illusion coming from every angle of historical documentation.

Originally Posted by Hanna

I just don't agree with it being labelled "socialist" either by you or by Chemist12.

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

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 Chemist12

Hi everyone,
I was wondering if most Russians think that the USSR was in anyway communist? Many people in the west think of the USSR as communist when in fact it was obviously socialist.
So, are Russians taught about socialism and communism? Do they know the difference?

Please define communism first. What I found is that the "West" has its own definition of communism, which has nothing to do with reality.

I forgot a BIG reason why Sweden is not and never has been "socialist".

No five year plans or anything like that. Because it was never a centrally planned economy and the government had to be re-elected every 3 years. There was always a risk that they would not get re-elected. So, making a 5 year plan was impossible.

They made some "special" plans for stuff like housing and healthcare and set them up in a way that no future government could change it.

But it was not a Plan that governed everything, like the ones that the real socialist countries had.

I think Marx said something to the extent that a socialist economy must be planned by the representatives of the people, outside of the reach of manipulation by capitalists. This never happened in Sweden, instead there was a symbiosis between the capital and the state.

I just don't agree with it being labelled "socialist" either by you or by Chemist12

I am using the definitions of the early communists. People do disagree on what socialism means, however I go with the definitions that people who have made a career out of studying the subject use.

For example, Richard Wolff says: "socialism is the criticism of capitalism". Basically, any change from pure capitalism, becomes socialism. This is consistent with all the Communist literature I have read on the subject. I am aware that some say that Social democrats split from the socialists, but I think it would be more accurate to say that social democrats split from democratic socialists. As stated earlier, democratic socialism is only one type of socialism. The way socialism was described by the early communists basically included everything except pure capitalism and pure communism (which is why feudalism is a type of socialism).

You may not like the title, but it becomes impossible to talk about socialism if you don't acknowledge that a country that meets the definition of socialism is socialist. It is like saying socialism is x, y, and z. Country A has x, y, and z. However country A it is not socialist. It would become confusing.

I guess you can choose to redefine it (no idea why you would want to), but when talking about socialism in terms of communist/socialist literature, we need to describe those countries that fit the defintion of socialist as socialist.

Please define communism first. What I found is that the "West" has its own definition of communism, which has nothing to do with reality.

I did eventually describe socialism in this thread by quote the Principles of Communism. I explained in the opening post why I was not defining communism. The question is about what Russians think communism is. It doesn't require me to tell them what it is. This is what I said in my opening post:

I haven't described socialism and communism here, because I want to hear what people (Russians specifically) think it is first.

Finally, please have a short book that people can read. It is called the Principles of Communism. It was published in 1847, before the USSR even existed. Pay attention to how it describes socialism:

https://www.marxists.org/archive/mar...1/prin-com.htm

I choose this book to link here because it is a very short read.

This site has a lot of old communist literature. So if you want to know what Communism is, it would be a good idea to go and see what the early communist wrote about it.

@Chemist12 - I have read that book in the distant past and am familiar with the content. IMO, there is no way Engels would have described modern France, Germany or UK as socialist.

If you are set on using the early socialists; the one you want is the main Bernstein book (not sure of English title) on social democracy. It has relevance to modern Europe and the way countries are run. If Bernstein was alive, I think he'd agree up to a point, although he'd label most of contemporary social democratic parties as sellouts.

I'm not able to say any more on this, because I simply can't relate to your premise that Western Europe is socialist.

@HDDscan: Yes agree, but the US wasn't so bad when it first started (well, slavery and homicide of indians apart....) My view is that it took the wrong turn after WW2 and it has been downhill ever since. Exacerbated as you said, by the end of the USSR.

Originally Posted by Chemist12

So, are Russians taught about socialism and communism? Do they know the difference?

Alright, I'm not by all means an expert on the topic, but I do remember something from those days of yore. In essence, we've been taught that:

1. The bourgeois system of the private ownership rights to the means of production is temporary, it is going to rot, and will inevitably be replaced with the Communism whereas the means of production will be collectively owned and operated. There would be no way a person could exploit (=employ) another person. Only the Communist State will be the sole employer for everyone.

2. The Communism will thus inevitably occur world-wide as a result of the technological and humanitarian advancement of the entire humanity.

3. The workers do not have to wait until the Communism would occur naturally and suffer in the meantime. In order to reduce the suffering of the mankind, the Communism could be expedited by means of the Socialist Revolution.

4. Since those who presently own the means of production would not obviously give up their rights easily, they would have to be prosecuted by the Communist State. Since those who owned the means of production comprise negligible amount of the society, the suffering of the entire society is thus minimized and is therefore an act of the humanism. Thus, the unfortunate and temporary usage of the Red Terror is fully legitimate and should be supported by the society as a whole.

5. However the society is far better now once the overall suffering is much less than before, the Communism would still not be reachable until the technological advancement would create the proper means of production to facilitate the provision of the goods and services (=the "needs') required by each individual in the society. Hence, the newly established state would have to be Industrialized first. The suffering caused by the changes are only temporary and should as such be fully accepted by the society.

6. This would therefore facilitate the establishment of the Socialist State called the USSR. So, yes, USSR was officially a socialist country and not a communist country.

7. Unfortunately, the rest of the world is still bourgeois and the owners of the means of production in the rest of the world would obviously strive to destroy the Socialist State fearing that the Socialist Revolution would also occur in their countries. They would inevitably want to destroy the newly established Socialist State. As a result, the Socialist State has to: (a) maintain strong army, (b) maintain lots of secret services in order to identify spies, undercover agents of influence, provocateurs, and terrorists, (c) destabilize the oppressive regimes in the bourgeois countries to expedite the Socialist Revolutions in them in order to reduce suffering in those bourgeois countries.

8. With the advent of the technological improvements, the Socialism in the USSR was renamed into the Developed Socialism (=Развитой Социализм), which roughly meant the state is getting closer to the Communism because they could offer the citizens more goods and services than before.

9. The story ended in 1991.

Hope it helps..