Posted on 06/24/2019 1:58:15 PM PDT by CondoleezzaProtege
At the dawn of the USSR, hopes of the imminent global rule of communism soared high among leftists of the world. But in a few decades, it became clear that the socialistic ideals of Lenin had failed. How did this come to happen?
“It is important to distinguish socialism from communism,” says Elena Malysheva, dean at the Division of Archival Studies at the Institute for History and Archives. “While socialism was the formal type of state administration of the USSR, communism was the ruling ideology. The project of the socialist state was initially utopian and populistic.”
“The Soviet project contained elements of what we now call ‘a social state’: social mobility, civil society institutes, social support, free health services, etc. But, because of the utopian nature of the project, this all couldn’t be implemented in full,” says Elena Malysheva. “Non-separation of powers, self-administration of the people – all this demands high social responsibilities that Soviet society didn’t have.”
“The Party apparatus and the state apparatus had merged on all levels: executive, administrative and communicative level,” Malysheva says. “In case of any crisis in either one of them – the other one would go into decline, too. So, when democracy started to develop in the late 1980s, the Party couldn’t hold the power. Although the Communist ideology in itself had the capacity for survival, the merging with the state apparatus doomed Communism.”
The Chernobyl catastrophe showed that the executive branch was rotten to the core. After Mikhail Gorbachev started social and political reforms, the unstable equilibrium of the Party and the State fell apart. After the introduction of real elections, the peoples of the Soviet republics showed a strong inclination for sovereignty and the opportunity to make their own decisions...
(Excerpt) Read more at rbth.com ...
For a political system to be viable, it has to work even if implemented imperfectly. Socialism flunks this test over and over again.
Russian GDP grew faster the last 75 years under the Czars, than it did during the 75 years of the Soviet Union, when it became reduced to a near one crop economy, massively dependent on oil/gas production.
The drop in oil prices is what put them under, but the long economic withering under State control is what set them up for the fall.
The exceptions, of course, being the elites who would control the destiny of the rest of the world.
Are we talking about the Beatles or the Russian revolution? John Lennon did write "Imagine," which was a very communistic-sounding song.
Or, as P.J. O'Rourke puts it, "socialism is communism sold by the drink."
“Walter Lipmann wrote “Public Opinion,” which was published in 1922. In it he gives an excellent presentation on Lennon and how Lennon violated his own theory. Communism was supposed to be the natural outgrowth of capitalism. If that was so, then Lennon should have been implementing a capitalist system which would then lead to pure communism. Instead, he established a dictatorship. Then, to ensure his version of communism survived as he reimagined it, he had the Mensheviks executed before he died. The Mensheviks wanted the workers to run everything but Lennon decided to run everything from a central bureaucracy.”
Completely incorrect. Things went to hell when Yoko Ono showed up.
Tough room.
I think you meant "Lenin" and not (John) Lennon.
Lennon? John Lennon?
When life gives you Lenins, make Lennonade.
There really is no difference between socialism and communism.
The reality is that Russia has always had authoritarian rule from the Tsars to Lenin to Stalin to Putin. Communism was just another form of tyrannical rule. The party elites controlling the masses.
Bernie Sanders like any other socialist in power, all pigs are equal but some pigs are more equal than others. He spews communism / socialism yet he lives an opulent lifestyle.
Really dude ?!
Is that what you meant to post ?
(could be sarc but not evident)
Milton Friedman on Socialism vs Capitalism
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MQ0-cDKMS5M
The best line is the last, concerning socialism ...”Just tell me where in the world you find these angels who are going to organize society for us?
It failed because Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez wasn’t yet born...
Communism only works at the point of a gun. If more guns are pointing at the communists, than communism doesn’t work.
Buy ammo, buy arms and practice. Have the practiced capability of hitting a dinner plate at 300 yards or better. That range can kill a whole bunch of commie elites in their protected, rabbit hole dachas.
The whole concept of socialism seems to rely on coveting the neighbors goods whether it’s for power or cash. How can it not fail?
Irrelevant.
The existence of bread lines, people standing in line to get bread that nobody has created, showed that the socialist system was rotten to the core. This was long before Chernobyl.
And long before the system collapsed. They had problems providing basic goods for a long time and yet the system went on. What was it that changed in the '80s/'90s that brought communism down?
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