Category: Communism

Introduction

A Communist is a party that propels the use of social principles of communism enhanced by a communist state of governance. Karl Marx and Angels advanced this form of party in the mid 19th century. According to Leninism, a communist party is a party which belongs to the working class who may be ruling and non-ruling elite in the society¹.

The Chinese Communist Party is the world’s largest and strongest party with approximately 78 million members drawn from the party and non-party members. A survey of the Chinese political parties reveals that the Chinese Communist Party accounts for 5.6% of the total population of China according to 2009 country survey.

The Russian Communist party was recorded as the most powerful party , but today it has collapsed with China taking over the lead. 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.

Discussion

To understand reasons that led to the collapse of the CP in Soviet Union, we examine how these parties arose in respective countries. While the Soviet Union did not experience uprisings, China had a historical series of mass peasantry revolutions.

In October 1949, the party became officially powerful to found a country led by single-party system. The revolution cause driven by the masses gave the CP the power to protest against the perceived oppression’ to give defense, economic resources, employment, and education to the peasant majority.

Until today, the successes of the communist party in China have been attributed to the overwhelming revolt waged by the peasants³.

The Soviet Union has no history of unity among its ethnic minorities as well as the inefficient units that formed the Soviet blocs. The differences in languages spoken among the blocs, varied history for every Soviet state continued to spur ethnic and cultural division.

This led to lack of feasible means that would have unified the innately different subsets that formed the union. According to the founding father of communism, Karl Marx, communism cannot thrive without forming requisite mass revolution of the international proletariat.

Impending lack of unity among the revolutionary proletariat, the Soviet Union came into power without an effective and robust support of the masses to sustain its presence and power. Pursuant to the need for an economically strong party and country, China’s CP remains a distinguished large communist party in the world today⁴.

Thus, one of the greatest differences between the two countries is the extent and scope of emphasis put on the economic reform compared to political liberation. In essence, although political liberation was a necessary condition for the growth of the party, it was not a sufficient condition for creating a powerfully sustainable communist party⁵.

While numerous factors have contributed to the collapse of Communism in the Soviet Union, one eminent cause remains critical to its failure during the 1980’s. This cause creates the fundamental difference between the Soviet case and the survival of the Chinese communist party.

The introduction of liberalist ideologies by Mikhail Gorbachev led to a political compromise between the people’s loyalty to the party and the government.

This led subsequent loss of confidence and trust in the ideologies of communism due to failure of the communist government to provide people with promises that led to the revolution⁶.

The Chinese communist government did not emphasize the need to control the entire populace, but rather generate and control economic resources. The economic reform agenda introduced by the government left the Chinese population more satisfyed.

Because the communist party forms its foundation on the powerful elite forming the lead the working class of a society, it generates and wields its power through a mass of resources from its powerful members.

Studies show that although the party has continued to face resistance from the opposing figures, its highly skilled members that form the party’s elite have continued to devise strategies that maintain its power.

In the case of China, the CCP has obtained its strength from the peasant and armed forces⁷. The emergence of the peasantry revolts that cropped up after the defeat of the second revolution in the southern provinces of China marks the beginning of the Chinese communist party’s strength.

Several factors have contributed to the victory and subsequent success of the Chinese communist party. Firstly, this was made possible because of the Chinese communist party’s excessive involvement in the practices of organizing and training of the peasant majority to form a united front capable of sustaining a continuous war without fail.

High economic resources endowment of the working class enabled the party to sustain the desperateness of the backward peasantry that rallied behind the elitist party forming the communist party⁸.

The ability of the party to demonstrate a strong following was facilitated by the innate backwardness of the peasants coupled with geographic vastness of the country and lack of proper communication networks. Although these factors may be viewed as the insignificant, their contributions has had an enormous impact on the success of the party for many years, especially during the most challenging moments of its life.

For instance, the strong division between the elites and the peasantry facilitated by the intellectual and geographical location, and resource accumulation stimulated the peasants to wage war in respect of their perceived inadequacies⁹.

The observable incompetence of the bourgeois government that existed during this period necessitated the growth and sustenance of the war driven by the peasants on behalf of the working class.

In addition, the utter despair and the sorry state of the peasants found reasons for their war, which stimulated further energy for the war. A large and poor peasant population has characterized China during the revolutions with few, but powerful elitist population that controlled the country’s economy¹⁰.

The tactical sense of the Chinese communist party leadership that oscillated between opportunism and adventurism managed to exist for many years under the province of the strong resistance of the government.

Although the party lost its power against the ruling government, it continued criticism of the government’s policies served to provide an impetus for subsequent revolts through a mass of peasants and army revolutions¹¹.

It continued pressure on the government giving it another bargaining tool to agitate for change in the economic, political, and social systems that underpinned the country’s leadership¹².

Therefore, lack of a strong Democratic Party caused the peasant majority and armies gathered their support for the Chinese Communist Party. This scenario gave the Chinese communist party a formidable ground to front its political capital.

Numerous sources suggest that the power of the Chinese communist party has declined over the past two decades, especially after the advent of the Deng reforms and the subsequent collapse of the joint (collective) farming system.

Many believe that these factors have contributed to the party’s disintegration across the country. Some surveys noted that the rural membership of the Chinese communist party branches had seen 60% disbandment as at the beginning of 1993¹³.

However, the support for the party has remained intact in the urban cities, accounting for its continuous existence. The declining power of the party has generated an impetus to rejuvenate its power by attempting to search for the new direction for its future¹⁴.

The party called eminent scholars and experts from foreign countries to offer their opinions on the way forward for the party. This strategy has been developed out of frustration and worries created by the continuing rise in levels of unemployment, rural poverty, widespread corruption within the party and its government that continue to threaten its sustainable power in the future.

The overall country’s perception about the communist party as an honorable umbrella party has served to stimulate the ever-increasing membership across the country. Studies show that, in the past decade, over one million people joined the party every year.

The party’s leadership has invested enormous resources capable of recruiting the masses, especially the educated young populations that has the power to forge its communist ideologies to the rest of the population. This strategic move to target the educated masses and the working class spurred its growth and strength throughout its historical life¹⁵.

The party has thrived on a number of factors including stirring up nationalist perceptions and feeling among the people while promoting the people-driven defense ideologies. The party’s growth has been attributed to the widespread divide in China between the poor and the rich holding unto the economic and political power.

In addition, the communist party in China has continued to benefit from its strategic membership drawn from the brightest entrepreneurs and elitist groups that held profitable positions in the country’s leading corporations and private ventures.

These proletariats have been made to develop positive perceptions about the Chinese communist party, which has continued to moving them away from mainstream politics and criticism of the Chinese communist party policies.

Similarly, the government has continued to using its state machinery and resources to incorporate the majority from the rural areas left behind in the politics of the communist party.

According to John Pomfret, over the years the communist party has sustained itself as a strong party with excess power by providing the Chinese population with stakes in maintaining the status quo and appealing to the masses. The rural populations have continuously been integrated into the TVE system as well as termination of the taxes.

Therefore, the government under the leadership of the CCP creates a friendlier atmosphere that cushions its people from adverse economic distress arising out of economic downtimes¹⁶. Therefore, the people of China have used these facets to continue submitting to the social principles of the communist party to yield a powerful unity to date.

According to Timothy’s theory of the state effect, he argues that the communist party attempts to position itself as the fundamental reformer of the society¹⁷. Apparently, this society stood separated from the party during its revolution against the tenets of the ruling class.

This juxtaposed state of the party among the people and society has generated a misconceived image to the public, making it a loyalist party with the largest membership.

Conclusion

The communist party in China and the Soviet Union, both had similarities and differences that account for their success and failure respectively. Studies documented that both scenarios posses a series of similarities that illustrate why they survived at one time, the death of the party in the USSR, and the continued wielding of power by the Chinese Communist Party¹⁸.

Many scholars have argued that both parties have experienced the demise of their power due to their inability to formulate strategies that appealed to the changing times.

Many scholars have argued that both parties have experienced the demise of their powers due to their inability to formulate strategies that appealed to the changing times.

In case of the Soviet Union, much of its failure has been attributed to the lack of the appropriate links between the Soviet based states and the leadership that promoted the western democracies at the expense of communist ideologies.

One critical difference that distinguishes the Soviet CP and the Chinese CP are that China did not have immoral communist leader, Mao Tse-tung as opposed to the Soviet Union. In addition, the Chinese communist party during its trying moments prioritized its leadership agenda by putting economic reforms ahead of the political issues that it faced¹⁹.

This phenomenal move under the clever guidance of Deng Xiaoping has continued to receive accolades. This step has enabled Chinese communist party to stay longer in China compared to the Soviet Union.

Bibliography

Amacker, Christopher. “Why did Communism survive in China but not in the USSR?” Web.

Barnett, Thomas, “Deng Xiaoping,” Esquire, 4 (2008): 146.

Johnson, Chalmers A. Peasant Nationalism and Communist Power: The Emergence of Revolutionary China 1937-1945. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1962.

Chan, Bary Watson, eds. Sources of Chinese Tradition. New York: Kegan Paul International, 1960.

Courtois, Stephanie. The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1999.

Grigor, Ronald Suny. The Empire Strikes Out: Imperial Russia, “National” Identity, and Theories of Empire,” A State of Nations: Empire and Nation-Making in the Age of Lenin and Stalin. New York: Oxford University Press, 2001.

Lawrance, Alan. China under communism. New York: Routledge, 1998, 134.

Pei, Minxin. “From Reform to Revolution: The Demise of Communism in China and the Soviet Union”.Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1994, 11.

Shambaugh, David. China’s Communist Party: Atrophy and Adaptation, University of California: University of California Press, 2009, 256.

Zhang, Wei-Wei. Ideology and Economic Reform under Deng Xiaoping. New York: Kegan Paul International, 1996.

Footnotes

¹ Minxin Pei, “From Reform to Revolution: The Demise of Communism in China and the Soviet Union” (Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1994), 11).

² Stephanie Courtois, The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression (Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1999), 39.

³ Christopher Amacker, “Why did Communism survive in China but not in the USSR?”

⁴ Christopher Amacker, “Why did Communism survive in China but not in the USSR?”

⁵ Stephanie Courtois, The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression (Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1999), 39

⁶ Christopher Amacker, “Why did Communism survive in China but not in the USSR?”

⁷ Ronald Grigor Suny, The Empire Strikes Out: Imperial Russia, “National” Identity, and Theories of Empire, A State of Nations: Empire and Nation-Making in the Age of Lenin and Stalin, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001)

⁸ Ronald Grigor Suny and Terry Martin, ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001), 323.

⁹ Thomas, Barnett, “Deng Xiaoping,” Esquire no. 4 (2008): 146.

¹⁰ David Shambaugh, China’s Communist Party: Atrophy and Adaptation, (University of California: University of California Press, 2009), 256.

¹¹ Wei-Wei Zhang, Ideology and Economic Reform under Deng Xiaoping (New York: Kegan Paul International, 1996), 2.

¹² Amacker, Christopher on November 17, Why did Communism survive in China but not in the USSR? (2010).

¹³ Alan Lawrance, China under communism. (New York: Routledge, 1998), 134

¹⁴ Wei-Wei Zhang, Ideology and Economic Reform under Deng Xiaoping (New York: Kegan Paul International, 1996), 2.

¹⁵ Chalmers A. Johnson, Peasant Nationalism and Communist Power: The Emergence of Revolutionary China 1937-1945 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1962), 3.

¹⁶ Chan, Watson Bary ed., Sources of Chinese Tradition (New York, Kegan Paul International, 1960), 871.

¹⁷ Stephanie Courtois, The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression (Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1999), 39.

¹⁸ Pei Minxin, “From Reform to Revolution: The Demise of Communism in China and the Soviet Union” (Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1994), 11.

¹⁹ Christopher Amacker, Why did Communism survive in China but not in the USSR?

Abstract

This research paper considers the development of the Communist Party of Russia (CPRF) over the last two decades. It begins by providing a historical context surrounding the formation of the party in 1993. The paper notes how the CPRF emerged as the successor to the Communist Part of the Soviet Union. A review of the first years of the party and its success at the electoral system is given.

The paper traces the party support over the years and notes that the party made some ideological changes in order to adapt to the new political system. The paper notes that the economy has played a significant role in Communist politics with Communist candidates exploiting the poor economic state of the country to make electoral gains. However, this tact will be unsustainable as Russia’s economy grows.

It reveals that in spite of the party’s poor performance in the previous elections, it is still the most organized party in Russia and the most vocal opposition party. The paper concludes by stating that the Communist party will continue to be a key player in Russian politics at least for the next decade.

Outline

• Introduction

The Communist Party which ruled Russia for much of the 20th century experienced a collapse in the late 1980s following the end of the Cold war. However, the party has been demonstrating growth since the 1990s due to its ability to adapt itself therefore remaining relevant in the Russian political scene.

• 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.

• Reemergence of the Communist Party

A number of factors are to be credited with the re-emergence of the communist Party in post-Soviet Russia. The factors are: the suffering of Russians in the early post-Soviet era, the forging of alliances among various communist contendors, and the inherited institutional legacy from the Soviet era Communist Party.

• Party Support

The CPRF has exhibited support from different quotas in its 2 decade existence. The older generation made up the support base in the parties early years. Citizens with nationalistic sentiments also support the party. Currently, support for the party is based upon ideological values by the members.

• Ideology

The post Soviet-Era communist party evolved from a Marxism-Leninism ideology to a West European form of social democracy. The party styles itself as a party of patriots dedicated to defending Russian statehood.

• Future of the Communist Party

The CPRF has experienced a decrease in influence, a situation accentuated by the sizable losses in votes and parliamentary seats in the 2003 elections. However, the party is still the second-largest electoral party. The good organization of the Communit party is its strong point and it continues to be the main challenger to government policies.

• Discussion and Conclusion

The importance of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation has changed over the years and it has lost many voters over. However, it will remain to be a significant participant in Russian politics.

Introduction

The collapse of the Soviet Union and the subsequent end of Communist rule in much of Eastern Europe was arguably the most significant political event of the late 20th century. This event led to Russia being transformed from a communist one-party state into a multiparty democracy.

The once dominant Communist Party of Russia suffered a massive dismemberment and went on to be banned from participation in post-Soviet political life (Flikke 275). While most people would have expected this to be the end the Communist Party, it experienced some revival during the 1990s.

The party was able to return to politics thanks to the efforts of dedicated professionals who created a nationalist version of the party. The party has been able to adapt itself to a changed political environment and make a strong showing in the State Duma elections over the decades. This paper will set out to offer a detailed review of the Communist Party in Russia.

Brief Historical Overview

The powerful Communist Party of the Soviet Union began its decline following the appointment of Mikhail Gorbachev as the first secretary of the party. He was charged with the task of reforming the party and the reform programs he proposed led to a division of the party. While some members demanded for greater reforms, others resisted these changes, which were perceived to weaken the party.

The final blow occurred in March 1990 when the constitutional Act that guaranteed the party’s political monopoly was repealed. Hard-line party leaders and some military officials tried to launch a coup in August hoping to stop this transformation process.

This August Coup failed and in the backlash against the plotters, the Russian President Boris Yeltsin outlawed the party and confiscated its property (Borrero 119). The post-Soviet Russia therefore emerged as a country free of the Communist Party.

Reemergence of the Communist Party

The communist Party reemerged from its illegal status in post-Soviet Russia as the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF). Under the leadership of Gennadi Zyuganov, this party styled itself as a reformed party that would end the suffering that ordinary Russians were experiencing in the post-Soviet period. Zyuganov’s party declared itself the successor to the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU).

However, this was not the only party to issue such a declaration and Pasynkova documents that a number of communist parties emerged and declared themselves as successors of the CPSU (240). Zyuganov was concerned about this disunity and his party welcomed membership from the multiple successor communist parties in Russia.

Unity among the various communist contenders in these early stages was critical to the success of the CPRF. Zyuganov therefore introduced the dual chairmanship model of political organization that softened internal tensions among the communist contenders and preserved a unity that was based on the rejection of a common enemy (Flikke 278).

The party adopted an “us” against “them” political rhetoric with the party presenting itself as patriots and defenders of a sovereign Russia while the government was presented as enemies of the Russian Empire.

The CPRF quickly took on the role of the opposition and even went on to dub itself the “Russian resistance”. Many people who were opposed to the new government aligned themselves with this opposition force therefore strengthening the power of the party.

The party inherited an institutional legacy following the collapse of the ruling communist party and it was able to consider itself a “successor party”. Pasynkova notes that these new communist party inherited much of the leadership and membership resources of the former ruling party (238).

The public was therefore able to recognize CPRF as the legitimate heir of the communist party. Even so, this new Communist party took great care to avoid being directly associated with the old Communist of the Soviet era since the old party had been blamed for the hardships suffered by many Russians.

In 1994, the government attempted to woo the CPRF leadership to work together with it. These attempts were met with opposition by the CPRF, which protested against the government’s attempt to swaddle it.

In its first participation in the multiparty system, the CPRF gained 12 % of the votes and 45 seats in the State Duma (lower house of the Federal Assembly). This modest victory showed that the communist party still had a following in Russia.

The electoral success of the CPRF in the 1993 Duma Election reinforced its position as the favored successor of the CPSU. The 1995 elections remain to be the most successful for the Communist party. These parliamentary elections held in December 1995 saw the CPRF gain 157 seats in the State Duma and garner 22% of the votes.

Since the Communist party controlled over a third of the seats in the Duma, it was able to influence the president in 1996 to change his pro-Western foreign policy to a Pragmatic Neo-Eurasianist one (Szaszdi 12).

Party Support

In its early years, the party membership overwhelmingly consisted of the older generation. Tsipko states that the pensioners in Russia had suffered the most damage from the new system which had seen them lose the social guarantees that the former social system had assured them of (85).

This segment of the public wanted a return of a communist form of government that would return social guarantees and security to the country. The economically disadvantaged members of the society also voted for the communist party which was critical of the new economic order proposed by the government.

Backes and Moreau illustrate that in this period, the standard of living and especially the amount of income correlated with voting for CPRF (457).

The party is also favored by the segment of the population that wises to see the country restored to its place as a world power. The CPRF holds strong anti-Western sentiments and it views the US as a major adversary of the country. The anti-Western stance taken by the Communist party can be seen by the statement of the party’s Leader Zyuganov who claimed, “The US harbors the aim of weakening and dominating Russia” (Szaszdi 12).

Support for the Communist Party in Russia today is not an outcome of social alienation. Instead, most of the support is based upon ideological values of the members who believe that the socialism Nation envisioned by the party is the best for the country. The communist party’s base is made up of engineers, technicians, clerical works and teachers.

Backes and Moreau note that 33% of the people in this group are the older population aged 60 and above while the remaining portion is 45 years and older (459). Following the steady decline of the party’s membership, the CPRF has changed its approach and is not targeting younger voters.

Backes and Moreau note that CPRF’s efforts at recruiting young voters have been unsuccessful since this group prefers the radical leftist organizations such as the Avant-Garde and the National Bolshevik Party (459). Nevertheless, the CPRF has managed to strengthen its position in recent years with its increased nationalist positions.

Ideology

Pasynkova asserts that the success of the Communist party in the post-communist era of Russia can be attributed to the transformations that the party has made in its organizational and ideological principles (237).

While still ascribing to the Marxism-Leninism ideology, the party has evolved significantly from the old Communist Party of the Soviet Union. The party has adopted a West European form of social democracy which supports private equity while at the same time promoting socialism in the country.

The party has been able to mold itself a popular identity as a party of patriots who are dedicated to defending Russian statehood through opposition to the president and the traitorous government (Flikke 274).

True to its ideals, the Communist Party has managed to resist government control and it is the most independent party in a Russia where the president has greater political power than the legislative branches.

Flikke notes that even with the less than a 200,000, the CPRF is the only party in Russia worth of the title “mass party” (274). The CPRF endeavored to perpetuate most of the communist values that the Russians had grown accustomed to.

The party makes use of the ideological propaganda and popular mobilization to gather up its support base especially in times of election. The party also encourages individual dedication to its cause the individual members are the major means through which party values and ideals are spread to the general population.

The CPRF has set itself apart as an anti-reformist and anti-system party calling for a new constitution and a change to the existing political regime. Pasynkova points to the contradictory messages of the party, which declares that it accepts the democratic values and the constitutional rule of law in Russia (242).

However, the CPRF exhibits some major differences from the old communist party of Russia. The party strongly rejects “careerism” which was a core component of old communism. Careerism led to members blindly following the party rule in the hope of moving up the party hierarchy because of their dedication and apparatchik mentality (Flikke 278).

The Communist Party of Russia falls under the programme type of party. A programme party is one which “prefers candidates defending their ideological principles resulting in the highest degree of ideological coherence of their members” (Pasynkova 241).

The CPRF has ideological unity and strong devotion of its members. As a communist party, the CPRF is ideologically opposed to democracy as advanced by the capitalistic West. However, the party has not maintained a rigid ideological stand and it has been able to adapt itself to the new political system.

The party has therefore resisted some democratic reforms while at the same time adapting them successfully in order to act as a democratic party in the post-communist Russian political environment.

Future of the Communist Party

The CPRF’s influence has steadily decreased under Putin’s rule. However, the party has managed to remain in action unlike the small Communist party, which have been completely marginalized due to institutional changes such as the abolishment of the governor elections and the increasing role of the United Russia party (Backes and Moreau 458).

The decline in support for the communist party was made evident in the 2003 parliamentary elections where the party performed dismally. Many observers saw this poor performance as a beginning of the long awaited decline of the party.

Clark documents that in this election, the party suffered sizable losses in votes and parliamentary seats by the party obtaining 51 seats; a figure that was 62 seats lower than the previous elections in 1999 (15).

Amazingly, the party was still able to maintain its status as the country’s second-largest electoral party. Even so, questions began to be raised concerning the future of the party which had been facing declining support over the years.

In its early years, the CPRF heavily criticized the government’s economic program and the communist vote depended very heavily on the state of the economy. Russia’s economic growth and development over the last decade have therefore decreased support for the communist party.

The party chairman Zyuganov promoted the idea that the market based economy was faulty and that it should be abandoned by Russia and a move towards communism encouraged. Since 1999, the Russian economy has performed better and voter support for the CPRF has receded significantly during this period.

Clark asserts that if the claim that improvements in the performance of the economy threaten the electoral position enjoyed by the CPRF is true, then the party should consider a different approach to ensure future voter support (24). If the party fails to do this, it might loss its prominence and become an insignificant player in Russia’s political arena.

In spite of all these bleak prospects for the party, it is still one of the best organized in the Russian political sphere.

Johari points out that while Russia is a multi-party system with a dozen parties taking part in the presidential and parliamentary elections, most parties are known by the name of their supreme leaders underscoring the fact that they are not formed on the basis of some clear-out programme but on the personality of a leader (411).

Ethridge and Howard proceed to articulate that the problem with Russia is that it lacks a competitive party system because of the many parties in place which make it difficult for any party to achieve a workable majority in the national Parliament (385).

The Communist Party of Russia is the only party with an ideology of its own. The more than 20 parties and blocks operating in Russia are disorganized and indiscipline. Fluid parties and electoral coalitions characterize the Russian political scene.

Johari asserts that parties and blocs frequently splinter, join with others, and rename themselves which makes it hard for the public to hold politicians the parties accountable or even know whom to vote for or against (411). The communist party is also the only party that challenges the government on its policies.

Ethridge and Howard note that since the last election in 2007, the only opposition to the president has come from the Communist Party (385). This party is in fact the only one that speaks out against the government’s authoritarian behavior.

The party has made significant gains since 2003; acquiring 57 and 92 seats in the 2007 and 2011 parliamentary elections respectively. More significantly, the party’s support in all electoral districts has exhibited a steady increase.

The Russian democratic system is not yet mature and the major parties will play a significant role in the country’s future. Oversloot and Verheul assert that at the moment, Russia is not yet a true multi-party system and major parties are needed to overhaul the system.

The communist party will therefore play a significant role in Russian electoral politics as one of the more mature and well-organized parties in the country.

Discussion and Conclusion

While the days when the communist Party of Russia was the state are gone, the party still has a major influence as the leading opposition party in Russia. The CPRF was able to keep the identity of the old soviet era party in order to maintain the support inherited from the CPSU and later on change its identity in order to acquire members from a wider spectrum of the Russian population.

The party has managed to shape the political environment in Russia and it is today the most significant opposition force. Owing to the significant electoral success achieved by the CPRF in the post-Soviet period, the party was able to prove its status as a formidable force in Russian politics that had been able to properly adapt to the new political realities.

Even in the face of failure in the 2003 parliamentary elections, the CPRF still remained one of the leading political parties in Russia. The Communist Party has managed to garner wider appeal across regional and socioeconomic boundaries. This is a significant achievement in a Russia where strong parties are non-existent as the party is centered on a single individual and in many cases, has regional limitations.

The paper set out to provide a detailed discussion of the extraordinary revival of the Communist Party in post-Soviet Russia. It has highlighted the revival of the Communist Party following its banishment in 1991. The paper has documented how the party used the tools of state patriotism and broad opposition to gain popularity against the Yeltsin regime.

It has then discussed the political fortunes of the party in the last decade in order to highlight the weakening of the party as it has lost voters. While the possibility of the Communist Party taking power in Russia is currently doubtful, the Communist Party of the Russian Federation will continue to be a significant participant in the Russian political arena.

Works Cited

Backes, Uwe, and P. Moreau. Communist and Post-Communist Parties in Europe. Moscow: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2008. Print.

Borrero, Mauricio. Russia. New Jersy: Infobase Publishing, 2009. Print.

Clark, William. “Communist Devolution: The Electoral Decline of the KPRF. The predominance of nationalistic sentiments has resulted in a shift in the party’s ideological stand. Problems of Post-Communism. 53.1 (2006): 15–25. Web.

Ethridge, Marcus, and H. Howard. Politics in a Changing World: A Comparative Introduction to Political Science. NY: Cengage Learning, 2009. Print.

Flikke, Geir. “Patriotic Left-Centrism: The zigzags of the Communist party of the Russian Federation.” Europe-Asia Studies. 51.2 (1999): 275-298. Web.

Johari, Carl. New Comparative Government. Venice: Lotus Press, 2006. Print.

Pasynkova, Veronika. “The Communist Party in Contemporary Russia: Problems of Transformation.” Perspectives on European Politics and Society. 6.2 (2005): 237-247. Web.

Oversloot, Hans and Verheul Ruben. “Managing Democracy: Political Parties and the State in Russia.” Journal of Communist Studies and Transition Politics. 22.3 (2006): 383–405. Web.

Szaszdi, Lajos. Russian Civil-Military Relations And The Origins Of The Second Chechen War. NY: University Press of America, 2008.

Tsipko, Alexander. “Why Gennady Zyuganov ‘s Communist Party Finished First.” Demokratizatsiya. 4.2 (1996): 185-200. Print.

Introduction

This paper will explore whether the structure of international security fundamentally changed as a direct result of 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 security at the time and the various methods in which the collapse of communism affected such factors.

This paper will also seek to explore the present day security environment and how it differs from the one seen prior to the collapse of communism.

How Did Communism Collapse?

Focusing on the issue of industrial innovation and entrepreneurship, the subsequent decline of the economies of the U.S.S.R and China from the 1950s to the 1980s can primarily be attributed to the fact that in order for any economy to thrive it is necessary for certain factors to be in place: there must be a variety of small, medium and large enterprises, there must be competition between different producers and finally entrepreneurship and innovation must be encouraged in order to facilitate positive changes within a given industry.

What must be understood is that the proliferation of small, medium and large enterprises results in more jobs being present for people within particular communities (Bergesen 1992). This results in more people having money to buy goods or utilize services and this in turn ramps up demand which necessitates further expansion thus providing more jobs and more money for people.

This current climate is also improved with the presence of entrepreneurship and innovation which facilitates new means of doing business which further improves the economic climate resulting in economic prosperity within a given country. All of these factors are what was lacking in the case of China and the Soviet Union since in effect their centralized means of production killed off the possibility of innovation, entrepreneurship and the development of more high paying jobs within their respective countries.

This created severe stagnation within their economies which led to a subsequent decline in their industrial potential. The end result was an unsustainable system that inevitably could not sustain itself given its inherent limitations. This was in stark contrast to the case of the U.S. wherein through capitalism the production of goods and services has become more efficient and thus cheaper, which resulted in more jobs available for people that wanted them (Hollander 1992).

Such a system encouraged innovation and entrepreneurship which further helped local economies and at the same time it helps to ensure that the economy of the U.S. continued to be productive due to its profit based orientation.

It was only when China modified its communist policies to encourage the creation of businesses, the introduction of foreign investments, private ownership and a variety of other changes that made its current economic system a hybrid of communism and capitalism that it was able to become the second largest economy at the present.

Understanding the Impact of Communism on the International Security Infrastructure

In order to understand how the presence of communism dictated the structure of the international security framework at the time, it is important to first examine the concept of foreign policy creation, ideologies, and national interests and how such factors influenced the security environment prior to the collapse of communism by early 1990s.

Through this particular method of examination it can be expected that the importance of communism as a bulwark for policy decisions at the time will be revealed and how its absence resulted in a drastically different international security environment in terms of changes that occurred in the ideological and national interests of the U.S. who was the main opponent of communism.

Foreign policy is often defined as a set of strategies that have been chosen by the state in the interest of self-preservation through the implementation of national interest strategies within the greater whole of the international community. In a way it can be considered a set of rules by which a state limits itself to when interacting with other states.

As such, in order to understand what motivates a country to perform a certain action, on the international stage so to speak, it is important to take note of its foreign policy directives and how it relates to events as they occur. For example, in the case of the U.S. its foreign policy objectives during the Cold War period was to prevent the expansion of the USSR into Eastern Europe, prevent the spread of the communist ideology and promote the spread of democracy as the de facto “best/ideal” method of governing a country (Buzan 1984).

In this particular instance it can be seen that the development of America’s foreign policy goals were inherently connected to the concept of national interest due to the underlying threat of a potential Soviet invasion. It must be noted though that America’s foreign policy objectives at this time were also inherently dictated from an ideological standpoint.

Michael Hunt in his book, “Ideology and U.S. Foreign Policy”, explains that from an ideological standpoint the relatively hostile relationship between the U.S. and the Soviet Union was a direct result of the U.S seeing the Soviet Union and the concept of communism as a threat to the idea of America’s “destiny” to guide the world due to the success of its great experiment (referring to the creation of a multicultural society) and the tenets of democracy which it bases itself on.

From this particular perspective it can be seen that communism acted as a focal point from which the U.S. and its allies based their international security decisions on (Fonte 2003). The reason behind this, as explained earlier, was due to an inherent divergence in ideologies which created an international security environment where two competing ideologies sought dominance on the basis of proving which one was right.

Both saw the other as a threat to their national interests and as a result took steps in order to prevent the encroachment of external actors within their spheres of influence (Fiammenghi 2011). This can be seen in the strategies implemented by the U.S. during the Cold War period wherein it utilized foreign aid as a method of implementing its security agenda as well as the formation of various strategic alliances such as NATO so as to contain the U.S.S.R and the spread of communism. (DiPaolo 2005)

The U.S.S.R on the other hand also formulated its own strategic alliances with countries such as China, North Korea, several Eastern European countries and began significant arms buildup which was reciprocated by the U.S. As it can be seen, one aspect of the international security environment at the time was that the militaristic actions of one state that represented a particular ideology were in turn reciprocated by the other creating a system which was quite similar to “The Great Game” (1813 – 1907), a term used to describe the strategic rivalry and jostling for regional supremacy between nations (at the time it was between Britain and Russia), and was thought to have gone into subsequent decline as a direct result of trends in globalization and regional cooperation.

It is based on this that the prevalent attitude at the time was one where it was assumed that in order to for the state to survive (which is of course one of the cornerstones of national interest) it was necessary to reciprocate the actions of its rivals so as to create a balance within the international system to prevent the possibility of one ideology overwhelming the other.

This particular way of thinking was particularly apparent in the case of the U.S. and, as described by Howorth & Menon (2009), constituted the main bulk of its national interest strategy since it viewed the spread of communism as a distinct threat to the safety and security of its borders (Howorth & Menon 2009).

National Interests

The concept of national interest is often defined as a country’s inherent goals in relation to the pursuit of particular economic, military or cultural objectives. This is reflected in various foreign policy mandates in relation to the creation of trade unions, military alliances and other means of achieving mandated state goals (Morgan 2004).

What must be understood is that based on the theory of realism in international relations the pursuit of national interests is one of the primary goals of the state and thus helps to shape its foreign policy in order to achieve certain ends. This is not to imply that national interests are the primary reason behind the shaping of foreign policy but rather create the need behind the policy in the first place.

For example, if a country finds that it is surrounded by hostile states its national interest would be the preservation of the state from outside incursion which would impact its foreign policy in dealing with those particular states. This was seen in the case of the U.S.S.R and the U.S. during the Cold War period wherein its foreign policy objectives were influenced by its encirclement by pro-U.S. allies within NATO.

On the other end of the spectrum the foreign policy objectives of the U.S. were also influenced by the prevailing national interests at the time which was the preservation of the “American way of life” which was being threatened by the concept of communism as well as the significant buildup of nuclear arms by the U.S.S.R.

It is based on this that it can be seen that the national interest strategies of both countries in effect created an international security infrastructure of mutual distrust, fear, and apprehension which would create a dynamic wherein each would try to counteract the other within the international stage (Minogue & Shtromas 1993). One way in which this was accomplished was through the spread of various ideologies which were used to great effect in promoting the agendas of either actor at the time.

Impact of changing ideologies on the Structure of International Security

Ideologies in general refer to a proposed set of ideas that are created by a group within society with the main goal of soliciting social change, adherence to a new set of ideals or even a new way of thinking (i.e. white man’s burden, the concept of German racial superiority during World War 2 etc.).

As such it can also refer to the way in which a person portrays themselves in an argument, in a sense that it is a method in which persuaders present an “image” to people that they are attempting to persuade. What must be understood though is that ideologies are in fact “artifice”, meaning that it is created, manufactured, made, constructed etc. It can be considered a type of surface image which may in fact have an entirely fictitious relationship to what is actually true.

The 3 Categories of Influence

It must be noted though that national interests are just one of 3 categories of influence which dictate the creation of foreign policy objectives for states. The following is an elaboration on the 3 categories of influence and are to be utilized in understanding the distinct changes in the structure of international security that occurred as a direct result of the collapse of communism.

The 3 categories of influence are as follows:

1.) Global Influence

2.) National Interests (sometimes referred to as local interests)

3.) Individuals/ Personalities of decision makers

Global influences take the form of various events that drive the interactions between states. These can entail the resulting influence of global economic markets on local economies, wars, natural disasters, trade agreements and a variety of other factors which occur on an international level. What must be understood is that foreign policy objectives are not static but are considered to be a dynamic response to a combination of global events in relation to a country’s national interest.

For example, the U.S. at the present is no longer pursuing a foreign policy strategy of isolation against communism, similarly Russia, as a transitional state, no longer possesses a foreign policy that is distinctly hostile against the U.S. but is focusing more on expanding its influence in the region not through military expansion but through resource allocation and distribution as seen in its use of petrol politics (the denial of resources particularly oil or gas in order to gain political or economic concessions) in its relationship with various countries in Eastern Europe who are dependent on Russian exports of natural gas (Nikitin & Petrovsky 2009).

As it can be seen through these examples foreign policies change over time not only through inherent national interests but as a direct result of global influences which change national interests. In fact it can even be stated that global influences play a distinct role in changing national interests (as seen in the case of the U.S. and international terrorism) which further shows how national interests cannot be considered the only means of directly influencing foreign policy decisions and objectives (INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS 2005).

From an international security perspective it can be seen that through the dynamic changes in American and Russian foreign policy this has in effect changed the overall structure of international security since the two primary actors which were behind the abrasive and often times hostile environment during the Cold War period have in effect altered their national interests due to the absence of ideological, economic and militaristic conflict (Buzan 2003).

Russia has embraced globalization and has become a powerhouse in terms of industrial production and energy supply in the form of its natural gas deposits. In turn the U.S. is no longer actively trying to undermine Russia and has even established numerous trade partnerships with the state.

These changes in the international dynamic have altered the national interests of either state to the point that neither looks at the other as a direct enemy, but rather views the other in context of “just another” competing state within the international arena (Delahunty & Yoo 2009).

This has resulted in a gradual arms reduction over the years, the implementation of programs related to nuclear disarmament and a surge in the global influence of the U.S. The international security environment is no longer composed of two competing spheres of influence backed by nuclear arms and strategic resources but has now changed to a point that there are numerous spheres of influence which have been created through the regional integration of interests (seen in the case of the E.U., A.S.E.A.N and the African Alliance) with the U.S. at the forefront and often considered as the most powerful international actor within international relations at the present (Kowalewski & Rybinski 2011).

Individuals/ Personalities of decision makers

The last categories of influence in creating foreign policy are individuals and their inherent personalities from which the concept of ideology comes into play. What must be understood is that individuals who are the decision makers of the state (i.e. presidents, prime ministers, congress, senate etc.) have access to and are inherent facilitators of the policy making process that creates foreign policy.

They take into account national interests and global influences and formulate foreign policy as a direct response to these two influences (Hoogensen 2005). What must be understood is that similar to the case of national interests being influenced by global events, decision makers are also influenced by various ideologies which dictate how they formulate foreign policy decisions in relation to national interests and global influences.

This occurs as a direct result of a prevailing social idea or concept which influences how that particular society thinks which in turn influences decision makers who must conform to the prevailing ideologies within that society (Weinrod 1993).

People are inherently influenced by particular ideologies (as mentioned in earlier sections) which not only results in certain situations which negatively impact national interests but result in detrimental actions for the state which does not comply with the view of states as rational actors (as seen in the realist theory of international relations and the rational model of foreign policy creation) due to the apparently irrational nature of the foreign policy created by individual actors or groups (Šedivý, J. 2004).

This was seen in the case of the U.S. wherein the various types of propaganda against communism created a type of irrational exuberance which actually led to the Cold War lasting more than it should have.

This in turn created a security environment wherein the leaders of both factions were not predisposed towards implementing some form of peaceful reconciliation of differences (which would have logically been the best path and is often utilized at the present) but rather due to the influences of their respective ideologies and the adverse portrayal of the other within their societies this created a predilection towards indifference regarding a peaceful settlement of disputes and instead resulted in heightened observance with the possibility of nuclear war on the horizon.

One of the most well known examples of an influential ideology affecting state decisions is the concept of the white man’s burden wherein various western countries were under the belief that they had the “responsibility” to educate the “lesser” races due to their “inherent” superiority.

Michael Hunt in his book, “Ideology and U.S. Foreign Policy” even goes on to state that the concept of the white man’s burden and the resulting white racism of the American elite that followed was actually one of the principles that had motivated American foreign policy since the beginning.

In a way, it can be said that ideologies can affect how national interests are formulated resulting in distinct changes to a state’s foreign policy

(Kramer 2003). For example, the ideology of creating a strong German nation and gaining back its lost pride after World War 1 that was advocated by Hitler during his rise to power resulted in distinct changes to Germany’s national interest. This distinctly resulted in foreign policy initiatives that were distinctly expansionary, focused on the elimination of the Jewish people and were generally hostile to the states that Germany had invaded.

Other examples of ideologies affecting foreign policy can be seen in the case of the U.S. itself wherein ideologies related to the supremacy of the American system, the supposed divinely ordained destiny of the U.S. as well as aspects related to the distribution of the tenets of democracy resulted in the U.S. changing from its stance of isolationism (period before the start of World War 1) towards global interference in the affairs of other states (period after World War 2).

Structure of International Security at the Present – The War on Terror

One of the most recent examples of the use of ideologies in influencing foreign policy was the 2001 declaration of “the war on terror”. The ideology created at this point in time was one which focused on ensuring the safety of the U.S. through the elimination of global terrorist threats.

What must be understood is that based on the documentary “The Power of Nightmares” by Allen Curtis it is explained that the threat of radical Islamism as well as the portrayal of Al Qaeda as globally spanning organized force was in fact a myth created by various politicians in several global governments. Its purpose was to help unite and inspire people under the power of a perceived threat so as to find justification for the development of several foreign policy objectives.

The most recent actions of the movement based on their ideology helped to change the America’s foreign policy initiatives to such an extent that it resulted in the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq based on reports created by the Neo-conservatives which indicated Osama Bin Laden was hidden in an extensive cave complex (which was proven to be false and inaccurate) and that there were weapons of mass destruction hidden in Iraq (also proven to be false and inaccurate).

As it can be seen ideologies are used to directly influence public perception which in turn affects national interests resulting in distinct changes to foreign policy. At the present this has manifested itself as a completely different international security environment as compared to what existed prior to the collapse of communism.

Structure of International Security at the Present – Development of Economic Alliances

Going back to the example of China, it can be seen that during the latter half of the 1900s China underwent extensive internal changes as a direct result of new policies involving economic reform, innovation and the encouragement of foreign direct investments.

During this particular transition period in China’s history its national interests underwent a drastic change from previously extolling the evils of the global economic system that was created by democratic states to openly embracing it resulting in the development of new economic reform programs, trade agreements and the encouragement of local entrepreneurship.

The impact this had on its foreign policy created a 180 degree turnabout in the way it interacted with other states, particularly the U.S. China increasingly entered into various trade agreements, sided with the U.S on varying issues and increasingly integrated various aspects of its own economy into U.S. markets.

China’s national interest at this particular period of time was to establish itself as global power by remaking itself into an economic powerhouse in which it was arguably very successful as evidenced by its current ranking as the world’s second largest economy.

It is based on this particular example that it can be seen that national interests do play a distinctive role in influencing the foreign policy of transitional states since it acts as a type of springboard from which foreign policy goals and objectives are created and implemented as evidenced by China’s behavior at the time towards creating an increasing amount of connections in terms of trade and assistance between it and the U.S.

Conclusion

Based on the various facts and arguments presented in this paper it can be concluded that the structure of international security has fundamentally changed with differing ideologies, national interests and entirely new methods of interstate interaction dominating the current international landscape.

There are no longer two spheres of ideologies and interests but rather the international environment is now composed of several spheres of influence which have developed as a direct result of growing interconnectivity and the need to better integrate economic, political and military partnerships. Not only that, the focus of the global international security agenda at the present is no longer a fight against communism but rather one which focuses on combating terrorism.

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White, S. 2001. Communism and Its Collapse. New York: Routledge. 452 p.

People from different places in the world live according to standards, which the society dictates. Human beings start practicing the societal decrees at significantly tender ages. Consequently, people develop behaviors that are congruent with the traditional practices evident in a distinct society. Individuals and societies may become curious thus seeking to decipher how to shift from such traditional practices.

Karl Marx in his book “the communist manifesto” presents a situation that explains the origin of the first world countries. Through this, he explains how established ideologies can be changed. An example is how proletarians contributed to the conversion of societies that practiced slavery, oppression and violence in the societies by enhancing good governance and thriving economy.

In diverse areas in the world, societies follow a certain social arrangement. Dissimilar social classes, which garnered respect from their minors existed (Marx and Engels 22). However, he argues that with time, the issue of the social ranks was replaced by trade and industrialization. He affirms that proletarians resulted to more sensible groups or classes with fewer cases of slavery.

The invention of America gave new routes for development. The availability of markets of India, American colonization and other colonies in the region resulted to effective trade. The growth of commodity exchange resulted to development of many states and countries. This affected how people conducted themselves and their social lifestyles changed as a result.

Rousseau in his book “the social contract” has zeal in understanding how to achieve freedom in a civil society. While trying to understand what freedom refers to, he compares it with the physical freedom that human beings enjoy that has no constraints on their behavior.

However, he argues that for us to enter in to this social contract, we must put restrictions on the way we behave so that it becomes possible to co-exist peacefully in the society.

Therefore, we force ourselves to change our perception on some ideas and behaviors instilled since childhood. We sacrifice our physical freedom with civil freedom that makes us rational human beings. The civil freedom also helps develop morality therefore, doing away with some old behaviors and ideas.

Karl Marx explains how transition from communism to socialism could change our behaviors and practices. In his writing, he explains how these two terms differ from each other. In a society where communism typifies governance, citizens are not entitled to possession of property. The community owns all resources and the government, advocates for equal access to services for all its citizens.

Karl argues that the change of this government from being a communist to a capitalist would mean that laws of the land changes. The change in the country’s governance would imply that the ideas and behaviors that people hold to must also change (Marx and Engels 22).

Sigmund Freud derives his discussion on adoption of religion, arts and science as a methodology of solving the most challenging concerns in our lives. He argues that religion helps significantly in solving issues that seem intricate thus require external help.

Concurrently, religion plays a part when creating awareness amongst people on what they should embrace in order to live peacefully. However, the teachings of these religions help in changing peoples’ behavior and ideas in relation to some issues.

In summary, it is evident that the way of governing any state and other external factors influence the citizens’ behaviors and their way of reasoning. This becomes imminent by examining how Karl Marx explains the transition from communism to socialism. The importance of religion and civil freedom in relation to our behaviors becomes manifest.

Work Cited

Marx, Karl & Engels, Frederick. The communist manifesto. Tendington: Echo library, 2009. Print.

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 the war in Afghanistan. Communism as an ideology was by extent borrowed from the Marxist philosophy.

Communism by large and far is both a political and economic doctrine that advocated for public ownership and control of major facets of production, thus becoming a form of socialism.

This way of thinking came about as a means to counter the American ideology of capitalism, which was seen to entail cut throat competition that further empowered the policy of having private property. To help us grasp the idea of Afghan communism, it is critical to have an understanding of her history.

0ver the years, Afghanistan was under a monarch rule. Mohammed Zahir Shar was the king until July 17^th, 1973 when he was ousted by his brother in-law and cousin, general Daoud Khan who brought an end to the monarch rule and led to the formation of the republic of Afghanistan. In 1979, a group of leftist led by Nur Mohammed Taraki, Kamal Barbrak and Amin Hafizullar organized a coup d’état.

After the former government was withdrawn, Taraki became the new president while the post of the prime minister was given to Hafizullah. As for Kamal, he sought exile in Moscow. Taraki went to Moscow to meet Leonid Brezhnev, the president. Brezhnev advised him to do away with his Prime Minister Hafizulla, but among his security details a guard who was Hafizulla agent and reported the matter to Amin Hafizulla.

Nur Mohammed summoned Amin who agreed to the summons on the pre-condition that his safety was to be guaranteed by the Soviet government through its ambassador. The Soviet embassy agreed to provide Amin with security. Having been forewarned, Amin used the palace guards to take Tariki hostage and assumed leadership of the country. Tariki died shortly of undisclosed illness.

Under Amin’s rule the soviet wanted to put their troops in Afghanistan in anticipation of the American invasion of Iran much to Amin’s willingness. Eventually, the soviet invaded Afghanistan through paratroopers and killed Amin. These led to the occupation of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union. The death of Amin paved way for Babrak Karmal to take over the leadership mantle as the head of Afghanistan’s government.

The government led by Babrak suffered a series of splits which prompted the Soviets to seek Babrak’s replacement with Mohammed Najibullah who was by then the head of the PDPA. Babrak took a conceited role in engaging the Soviets. He eventually succeeded in taking power from Babrak Karmal. The civil war within Afghanistan was felt beyond the boundaries of Afghanistan.

The civil war prompted peace talks in Geneva. As a solution for the continued conflict, the Geneva talks came up with a 9 moth timeline that would see the withdrawal of troops from the troubled Pakistan. These led to the creation of a neutral state of Afghanistan and allowed for Afghan refugees to come back to their country. The agreement between the faction groups was to be guaranteed by the Soviet Union and the United States.

By 15^th February 1989, the last of Soviet troops had withdrawn as stipulated by the agreement schedule. However, the withdrawal did not bring either lasting peace or lessen the resentment from most Afghans and so Afghanistan plunged from one civil war to another.

From the analyzed history, it is important to mention that through the invasion of Afghanistan it led to speedy adoption of communism through assimilation or imposition. The effect was tremendous and far- reaching as it led to a ten year civil war between the soviet troops and the Afghan guerillas or the Mujahedeen.

The war escalated to a holy war (jihad) and served as a rallying force for many Muslims who were drawn from across the Muslim world to fight on the side of the guerillas. Reports based on the 9/11 commission reveals that most schools, mosques and some boarding houses were used for the purpose of recruiting youths for the jihad across the world including the United States.

The ultimate result of Afghan communism, as identified by Bradsher, (2001) was the rise of more violent movements that were first aided by Britain, America and the republic of Saudi Arabia, but down the line, the friendship between these nations deteriorated and the situation graduated to terrorism. The ideology leveled by the soviet to the Afghan people lost a sense of direction when the Soviet Union collapsed.

However, this did not mean the end of radical socialism, but in effect; it brought in a new wave of communism from the wide known economic point of view to a more political idealism that was now headed by the KGB. The Soviet Union had failed in its quest to spread their ideology which had also impacted on their economy negatively.

Communism had to change its face and this was brought to play by Yuri Andropov who took over the reigns of the KGB in 1967. This branch of the Russian security service was transformed to become an independent, fully fledged unit within the Soviet State.

Yuri Andropov also championed the financing activities for various uprisings in Europe, the Middle East and in Africa. These uprisings were initially started as student uprisings especially in northern Europe and in the Middle East. Yuri used a different approach; that of business, especially in oil which was meant to cut of the west especially America that depended on oil products imported from the oil rich gulf-region.

He was also pro-active in the formation of a group of young Muslim fundamentalist from the various Islamic countries who resided in America as either students or workers. Some of this recruits assisted to form the Muslim brotherhood movement.

What remains as the most controversial point in Afghan communism is the fact that the rise of Islamism militias lies squarely on both the infiltration by either the KGB or the CIA, with both parties rooting for their interest within Afghanistan and Pakistan. This is supported by the reports of personalities such as Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, a sympathizer and also a pro-active associate of the communist regime in Kabul.

The most shocking analysis about Gulbuddin Hekmatyar is how he ended up becoming an operative of the Pakistan ISI and even getting both financial and weapons from America in aid of the Taliban in the 1980s, despite being known for his support for the terrorist and his affiliation to militias in Iran. Others have suggested that this could only have been possible through the infiltration of the CIA by KGB.

Others have argued that the CIA lacked the intelligence to have foreseen the consequence of their involvement with these individuals who mostly tried to use the resources’ of the United States to expound on their agenda.

However, it is important to mention that not all socialist ideologists have contributed to this radical wave of violence; rather, it is the extremist side that has led to the formation on internal self-grown terrorists who are affiliated to these extremists.

To enhance this knowledge, it is critical to look at how the Taliban came to be. Taliban was established by Mullah Omar who was joined in 1984 by Osama bin Laden in Pakistan and took part in the 1987 battle. In autumn, of 1989 Bin Laden’s mentor, Massud, was assassinated and he took the reigns of al-Qaayd.

Osama sent most of the fighters at home and abandoned his base in the frontier town of Peshawar in the pretext that Saudi Arabia had issued a decree for his death.

By 1991, still the communists’ regime controlled and governed Kabul and when matters started to take shape in the Soviet Central Asia, Bin Laden changed his focus and apparent interests in destabilizing the Russian ideology and control to targeting pro-American governments’ supporters in Africa, and Europe.

Bin Laden only returned to Afghanistan through the invitation of Hikmatyar in 1996 to join him and also as a refugee, but to his shock, most of his allies had shifted together with the communist generals to Mullah Omar’s camp.

He also followed suit. All through the post-Soviet era, Russia misled the Afghan government of Burhanuddin Rabbani (1992-2001), of loyal support whereas most of its former commanders paid tribute to Hikmatyar.

Reference

Bradsher, H., S. (2001). Afghan Communism and Soviet Intervention. New Edition. New York: Oxford University Press, 2001.

Most people primarily imagine communism as some kind of utopian economical and social system, and only after this – an ideology. Actually communism is primarily an ideology, and only afterwards an economic system. In other words, the preachers of communism in their battle for people’s souls have created a streamlined doctrine that gives answers to all questions that have been fascinating mankind back from the depths of unrecorded time, such as the origin of the universe and life on earth, basic laws of nature, principles of societal development, and so on. The economic communist system, logically (from the communist point of view) derives from the basic philosophical ideas of communist ideology.

In the modern world has rejected communism as a brutal, irrational and inhumane form of governmental rule. After the fall of the Soviet Union, the former republics that formed this largest in the world country have regained their independence and abandoned their old principles of the proletarian regime. The word proletarian originates from the Latin word “proles”, which means offspring. It was initially used to identify the lower class of people, who had no material wealth, besides their sons. Later on Karl Marx – one of the founders of the communist theory had used it to identify the working class of people who he believed were a firm ground for economic, social, and governmental well being and prosperity. The modern world has not left us with many communist strongholds at the current time.

One of the few countries that are still practicing this regime is Cuba. During the cold war which lasted for over 50 years, the geographic location of this country was advantageous to the communist side, and was effectively transformed into a constant threat for the western democracy. Cuba was founded by Spanish explorers and the main part of its population has Hispanic roots. If we were to say that the only attribute remaining from the Hispanic culture is the language, then we would not be saying anything. The Cuban nation profoundly retains its Hispanic heritage, based on the traditions of Roman Catholic Church, and it is unlikely to remain communist for much longer. The communist doctrine officially advocates atheism. This makes the Cubans creates an ideological barrier between the Cubans and other Hispanic nations, however how much longer this state is going to last is unknown.

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 stress the advantages of liberal democratic government with freedom of religions.

The founder of the modern communism Karl Marx considered that in order to build an ideal communist society, two conditions should be met. The first condition includes a complete elimination of any type of opposition, existing governments, religions, and economic/social systems. After this, Karl Marx wrote: “then, I will arise from this devastation as a creator”. The second condition involves the creation of a human being of a new type. Marx imagined the citizens of a communist society as some type of Pavlovian robots, whose minds could be guided in the desired direction using conditioned signals, given by the government. He though of a human race that did not rely on the free will, moral, and conscience.

Communism and the above conditions are not a novelty. During the course of the last 4000 years exactly the same plans were proposed to the humanity. Starting from the Biblical Nimrod, who created a prototype of communist society; Plato, who developed and slickened the earlier propositions; Saint-Simon who developed those propositions in detail; Karl Marx appeared in the 19^th century and managed to gather the disembodied thoughts of the previous philosophers in one integral teaching.

Being an ideology that offered final answers to all questions that were taking up human minds from the beginning of time, communism laid a claim to be the one and only right ideology, which did not limit itself by any moral restraining factors. This way, the preachers of communism considered that it was morally correct to physically eliminate all otherwise-minded. In other words, communism according to its nature does not sustain any ideological concurrence.

If we understand the aforementioned, it is easy to comprehend why any religion is to be eliminated, when the communist party rises to power. It is also easy to understand the naivety of people who say: “It’s strange, why the communists shut down all churches and killed all ministers in Russia. The churches did not do any harm to the communist party”. The same could be said about Cuba, China, and North Korea, which are currently practicing this type of government regime. The ideology of these countries cannot stand the church with its divine theory of the world’s creation and origin of life on earth. Therefore according to communist theory such preacher of false and harmful ideas, as the church must be eliminated, as it prevents the creation of the new human type – the “Marxist human”. In Cuba’s case the Proletarian Marxist-Leninist ideology has collided with the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church. From what we have discussed in this paper, it is hard to imagine how these two ideologies could coexist, especially in the environment like Cuba. Undoubtedly communism and Christianity are not able to coexist because of their complementary negation.

From the point of view of Christianity, the “Marxist human” is a great riddle, as his behavior appears to us irrational, and therefore is full of surprises. In reality the mentality of a Marxist human appears to be at an aboriginal state, being formed on the basis of primitive understanding of nature’s laws. The Marxist human lives according to the laws of the jungle, where all is sacrificed for self-preservation. From this point of view, the mentality of such human being stops being mysterious, and his actions can be predicted with mathematical preciseness. He considers himself to be one of the earthly animals, who was gifted with great intellect according to happy coincidence, and does not appear to lay claims on anything more. He denies the existence and immortality of the soul. He does not believe in the creation of man by God and explains his arrival to this world and current existence as coincidental set of certain material facts. The Marxist Human does not comply with any moral laws, and solves all problems directly and plainly. Considering his self-preservation as the basic factor that determines his behavior he thinks that self-preservation also designates the behavior of all the people that surround him. Since 1917 the western block has been outraged at how the Soviet Union had infringed international agreements in almost 100% of the cases. This outrage is as reasonable, as being outraged by watching a tiger that is killing a deer and eating him. Just like the tiger, the Marxist human being acts according to plain laws of self-preservation. From the tiger’s point of view and from the point of view of the Marxist human, such actions are quite natural. In other words the Marxist human sincerely believes that all that serves to his self-preservation is “good”. He has completely freed himself from moral and honor, which were the limiters of mankind according to Christian and panhuman considerations.

Observing the modern Cuba, with its Hispanic Roman-Catholic traditions it is clear that its modern society will not stand such a disgrace of human principles and standards. Its communist theory that claims the superiority of human beings over the material world, in a sense covers a feeling of own defectiveness. A Marxist man considers himself an incidental occurrence in this world that does not have any final purpose, and constantly attempts to subdue this world and this universe. From the communist point of view the universe is entropy – meaning that it is chaos. From the very beginning communism strived towards subduing not mankind, but the whole universe, attempting to establish order in chaotic (from its point of view) material. The communist theory considers this to be its duty, as the Marxist man is the only intelligent creature in the universe (as there is no God!). Furthermore, the Marxist human thinks that he is the possessor of the absolute truth, and must take the responsibility of organizing the future of the world – a communistic world. He is completely sure in his righteousness, claiming that he should in the end become the ruler and god, on earth, and then in the universe.

This way, the destructive activity of communism in the whole world, its ruthless battle with any religions, elimination of otherwise-minded, and other incomprehensible as it appears actions of communist dictators are the logical result of their thinking process. Moreover, from the Marxist human’s point of view, the actions of those dictators are based on the only scientific theory of social structuring.

In other words, the Christian culture, in our case – the Roman Catholic Church on Cuba in the eyes of a Marxist human is an object of hate and is subject to erasure. A German anti-Christian philosopher, Ludwig Feuerbach, many ideas of whom were used by Karl Marx, wrote: “The turning point of human history will be the moment, when human beings shall acknowledge that the only God for a man is man himself”. When Karl Marx was asked a question, what is the aim of his life, he replied: “We must fight religion – this is the basic truth of materialism, and consequently, Marxism”. It is interesting to note that having rejected God, Holy Scripture, Catholic moral, immortality, and the preciousness of human life and soul, the Marxists have claimed themselves as gods.

Marx and Engels have arrived at conclusion that the task of remodeling the world according should be carried out by communist dictators, as they were the only ones keeping the keys from scientific structuring of the world. Considering this, they have indicated that it will be an uneasy assignment that will require physical elimination of all opposers. These cruel measures are necessary for the communist administration to get rid of all social and economical inequalities at one fling, and afterwards build an ideal society that would allow the humanity to live according to “scientific’ laws in happiness and harmony. The possibility of killing millions of objectors did perplex neither Marx nor Engels, nor their followers. Lenin as the first Marxist dictator of the first Marxist state imagined the proletarian dictature this way: “organization for systematic violence of one class over another, one part of the population over another”. The victims of proletarian dictatorship were measured in millions and the proletarian dictators have considered them as victims of war for the perspective future of all mankind.

According to the ideology of Marx and Engels which dominates in Cuba, the solution to all problems consists in destruction. The moral problems of the society are solved through cancelling the moral; the problems concerning religion – by eliminating the religion and implementing atheism; problems of marriage and family – through destroying marriage and family; issues of private property – by eliminating the right of private property; the issue of equal work salary – through eliminating salary; the issues of competition in work and distribution – by cancelling work and distribution. They basically offer to solve all problems faced by the modern society by eliminating this society. It is certain, that such principles do not have a place in the modern dictator free world of liberal politics and rights of free religion. It appears that communism can originate from the ashes of the society known to us. Such government rule exists only for one purpose – total destruction and elimination. Only after such universal destruction the communists will hope that they will be able to give freedom, equality, and rights to their followers.

Cuba had a puppet like government that completely subjected to the instructions of the Soviet Union during the cold war, as they had common points of interest. Now there is no more cold war and if Cuba will remain communist, it shall have gloomy and indefinite future. Before the coming of the promised “heaven on earth”, the Marxist leaders require the population to undergo bloody fire of revolutionary terror, repression and physical elimination of existing and non existing opposers, seizure of property, dictature of proletariat, cancellation of all human rights, constant surveillance of citizens, total military obligation, and an economic policy that gives just about enough not to die of hunger.

In order to reach its goals the communist Cuban government practices inhumane methods of tortures and concentration camps which cannot be accepted in the modern world. Cuban nation has a strong moral base of Catholic traditions that appear to be much more potent than the current unstable communist government state. It is clear that with the death of the current Cuban dictator the society will realize its need for basic human freedoms. In this case this country has high chances of peaceful democratic revolution.

Works Cited

1. Frank, Marc. Cuba Looks to the Year 2000. New York: International Publishers, 1993.
2. Jennings, Glen. “Karl Marx.” Melbourne Journal of Politics (1999): 161+.
3. Koont, Sinan. “Cuba: An Island against All Odds.” Monthly Review. 1994: 1+.
4. Peterson, G. Paul. “Karl Marx and His Vision of Salvation: The Natural Law and Private Property.” Review of Social Economy 52.3 (1994): 377+.
5. Riemer, Neal. Karl Marx and Prophetic Politics. New York: Praeger Publishers, 1987.
6. Smith, Tony. Thinking like a Communist: State and Legitimacy in the Soviet Union, China, and Cuba. New York: W. W. Norton, 1987.

Effect on political system of governance

It ended dictatorship which was introduced by Lenin and later backed by his successor Stalin. They ensured full control of the Soviet Union and its resources and anyone against the communist rule was executed. 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. The power of the president was devolved to the elect legislatures.

The centre of power towards realization of the economic reforms, led to a political crisis in 1993. The parliament opposed the current constitution under the Yeltsin government. It was dissolved and new elections as well as a referendum ordered. A new constitution was later approved in December the same year which necessitated radical privatization.

The public had more influence on the political and military institutions. The troops present in Afghanistan were withdrawn and a treaty to control arms signed with the US presidents Ronald Reegan and George Bush. The reformist team lead by Yelstin introduced “shock therapy” which lowered the total spending on military. This was diverted in re-building the economy.

The judicial system was public-friendly, during the communist rule one had no opportunity to defend himself in the court. Once arrested, either harassment or execution followed, without any defiance of defense of one self. This changed the entire system and one allowed to fled his/her innocence before a court of law.

Effect on Russian Economy after the fall

Through Private ownership of land which allowed free-market, people were able to own land. This entitled control of it and one could even spare a portion of it and sell it. Others even practiced farming which ensured plenty supply of food products as opposed to the communist rule were government mostly set up industries to manufacture goods such as machinery rather than consumer goods. This increased food production enhancing agriculture growth.

Less government interaction on ownership of enterprises and joint stock companies: Leadership was decentralized and the shareholders were granted the full control to manage the activities of their ventures. Despite the citizens inexperienced skill to control the firms (since they believed in state-owned ones), they had freedom of control. They were not limited to a particular company (as before) but free to open one of their choices.

In 1998 Russia was not spared by the world recession which affected prices of commodities especially of raw materials. It depended on its oil reserves as the chief export. This made the country not to benefit its lion share through foreign trade hence a crisis in its finances.

The instability during transition of the two governments made entrepreneurs and corrupt leaders to grab government properties. Due to their greed as well as lack of subsidies to the industries, led to closure of some, which increased imports compared to the exports.

Social effects

The rates of poverty were noted to increase during the economic collapse in the mid-1990s. Emphasis made on both macroeconomic data and individual incomes and expenditure by World Bank indicated that population under poverty had increased from 1.5% in the late Soviet era, to approximately between 39% and 49% by mid-1993. Also according to figures released by the government the Per capita incomes fell by another 15% by 1998.

A policy known as “Glasnost” was introduced which facilitated the presentation and discussion of social problems affecting the public. Each had a chance to view out individual issues affecting his or her life and able to fight for their rights as well as national identity. This ensured an easy understanding of how to curb the problems to upgrade the living standards.

The education environment introduced during the communist rule was tense and basically aimed at providing awareness on how to obey the communist party. After terminating the studies each student was endowed a particular compulsory job which determined the career line to participate in. One had no option but to oblige to it, hence a graduate had no control of his or her future. It was for the government to decide. Hence its fall ensured that each individual was to decide the future alone.

Religious and ethnic animosity emerged and immediately the rule broke-up, the Russians were torn into religion and ethnic divides. They planned turf wars amongst themselves and even former rulers and also participated in crime.

It led to unemployment of the citizens. As a result of liberation, banks faced inflation since the revenue collection was unavailable (tax was evaded by many). This entailed a lot of currency printing to meet the debts incurred. The subsidies to the state farms and industries were scrapped causing their shutdown. The government was also unable to meet the payment of all its workers.

Bibliography

Alexander, Robert J. A Documentary Analysis of the Movement. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1991.

Anders Aslund, The Impoverished Superpower: Perestroika and the Soviet Military Burden (San Francisco: Institute for Contemporary Studies, 1990), p. 49.

Branko Milanovic, Income, Inequality, and Poverty During the Transformation from Planned to Market Economy (Washington DC: The World Bank, 1998), pp.186- 90.

Bull, Martin J., and Paul Heywood, West European Communist Parties after the Revolutions of 1989. London: Macmillan, 1994.p 40-45.

Carey Hunt, R. N. The Theory and Practice of Communism. Rev. ed. London: Penguin, 1963.

Donald, Moira, and Tim Rees, Reinterpreting Revolution in Twentieth Century Europe. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2001.p 197-9.

Marx, Karl, and Friedrich Engels. The Communist Manifesto. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999.p 217-8.

Pekka Sutela, “Insider Privatization in Russia: Speculations on Systemic Changes,” Europe-Asia Studies 46:3 (1994), p. 420-21.

Sheila M. Puffer, The Russian Management Revolution: Preparing Managers for the Market Economy (Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 1992).p 59-75.

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. It is an economy whose policies are believed to be equitable, socially serviceable, and often aims at attaining the potential of human beings.

In comparison to capitalism where the capitalist solely owns the means of production, socialist production is guarded and controlled by the state and the working population.¹ It is believed to be a bridge between capitalism and communism. In this model, the allocation of resources is largely determined by the market forces. Therefore, it retains the main features of a capitalist economy.

The main policy of socialist economy is that production is limited by individual’s capability while supply is depicted by the needs of the people. Some states like China adopted the socialist market economy and way of governance such as wealth distribution to the poor and acceptable minimum wages.

Issues related to the economy were centrally planned. This economy works through application of the policy of production quotas whereby the clearing of goods is done by a centralized authority. The prices of all essential goods and services in this economy are controlled by the state hence there are no cases of price inflations for the goods regardless of the changes in production factors (Marcos and Eswar, 2010).

This paper focuses on the socialist market economy in China which was first suggested by Deng Xiaoping during his leadership. It was successfully introduced in China after several reforms took place. This economy has been a significant supplement to the centrally planned economy of China, leading to high growth rate of China’s economy. The major components of this economy are both the privately owned and the central owned businesses.

Historical background

Since 1930, the concern over market socialism was embraced in China, whereby the economy was to be comprised of assets owned by the community. However, it was an imitation of supply and demand price adjustment. The plan to adopt the socialist market economy began to take fast pace in 1978. This was introduced by Deng Xiaoping. He targeted introducing a socialist market economy which was purely Chinese.

It was successfully launched in China in 1970. Initially, China depended on agriculture and this was the first sector to be reformed. Private businesses and foreign investments were also encouraged. These changes led to enormous improvement of the Chinese economy, characterized by a privatized state sector, liberated trade and pricing, and an overall wellbeing of the state up to 1990.

The Japanese economy started to deteriorate at the time when that of China was just picking up due to bubble of prices of assets in 1980. The economy had been growing for the previous 20 years. As the Japanese economy stagnated, that of China was growing with double digits on an annual basis. For instance, while the growth rate for Japan was at 1.1% while that of China was ranging at 10.7% in the last quarter of the year 2009. China has been an example to many countries in relation to economic growth.

Growth of the Chinese economy

When Deng came to power in China, the state was still under communism and relatively poor in terms of resource allocation. During the time of Deng’s leadership, reforms in the economy were introduced in China. The market economy of Chinese began growing since 1978 when it adopted radical reforms based on socialist mode of economy.

Since the introduction of the reforms, China’s Gross Domestic Product increased as the authorities adopted an ideal view of many issues in the state, hence introducing capitalist ideas. The government prioritized issues like the social and political stability, the welfare of consumers and the public as a whole. The foreign trade was another area of target which was believed to contribute a vast deal in the growth of the economy.

As the introduced reforms were adopted, the economy of China grew at an exceptionally high rate such that it even surprised the architects behind the reforms. In 1980, the Chinese GDP was 188 billion dollars, which was below that of Japan by 20%. Due to the rapid growth, by the end of 2009, it was nearly equal to that of Japan with a very slight difference. The economy grew at a rapid pace of approximately 9.5%, and at the same time, the inflation increased to 20%.

The rapid growth of the Chinese market economy led to the fall of the poverty level in China by 80%. The China’s economy was a surprise to many because of the fact that it matched with those of advanced states in a remarkably short time and also the fact that they were using the socialist market economy model which was unique and not matching the ones used by advanced states (Wang, 2004).

China recorded an average economic growth of 10% per year in the period between the year 1990 and 2004, which was the highest ever know growth rate in the world. In 2010, China’s total trade was over 2.97 trillion dollars making it the second largest trading nation following United States.

The country experienced many setbacks in the process of its growth. For instance, changing the government sector and making the banking system modern was still a serious problem. Most of the businesses owned by the states were not efficient, and they registered loss most of the times.

Due to these setbacks, in 1997 during the national communist party congress the government publicized its intention to sell all the state owned businesses. With these challenges the government still managed to find ways and improved the economy making it be the world’s second largest. Predictions are that if economy’s growth continues like that by 2030, China will have the largest economy in the world.²

Government involvement in China

Before 1978, the government was entirely responsible in planning and managing the state’s economy. It controlled everything, but when the economic reforms were introduced in 1978, government roles were distributed to all stakeholders. Though government involvement was reduced, according past records, the success of the Chinese economy was mainly facilitated by its government involvement in entrepreneurship.³

The leaders had set clear goals on China’s economy and all the plans were executed as planned without failure. They were capable and highly committed to developing China and did not entertain any nonsense in their plans. They ruled by example and had many other traits which leaders in developing countries do not exhibit.

The Chinese leaders had the needs of their people as the first priority when introducing the economic reforms in the state. The government put many policies in place which helped in raising the economy of China in a period of thirty years to a world superpower.

In the period between 1978 and 1993, the government put various policies in place. Firstly, governance was changed from centralized to decentralized system. This policy empowered the local government by ensuring that they benefited more by paying low taxes and getting higher revenue shares.

The local government had more authority over the local economy and it ensured equal distribution of government resources. Secondly the government encouraged and supported the expansion of non state businesses rather than making the state owned businesses private. These businesses became the vehicles to the growth of China’s economy, raising their contribution to the national industrial output from 9% in 1978 to 36% in 1993.⁴

The dual-track approach was another government key policy the government of China used to raise the market economy. This policy was the opposite of the single fixed price system which was used before 1978 by the centralized government. This policy saw the prices of essential commodities like petroleum, and steel controlled by the government, while that of other ordinary commodities were determined by the market condition.

Lastly, the government introduced a system known as “the particular contracting system” which was aimed at expanding the enterprise autonomy. The government set policies which played a crucial role in raising China’s economy though it faced some setbacks. Critiques do criticize the government of China, but regardless of these, credit is given to the same government for the success of its economy.

Effects of China’s market growth economy

Politics

The rise of China’s economy has led to basic changes both in the global and China’s political systems. China’s partners are benefiting at the same time with China and will still benefit more in the future.⁵ The other superpowers will have to adjust to the fact making China to have moved from a lower position to a top position becoming one of the most powerful states. One of the basic adjustments will be on the political life of China.

Other powerful states will want to control the political life of China for its development has a significant impact on the international market, capital and investments. Having transformed from a small economy to massive economy China has a role like other states with massive economies of controlling the international political systems. The Chinese political system is different from that of the other states with large economies, and for it to fit in this group and control the other international political systems, it has to reform.

The states with large economies have a role of controlling other countries’ economies worldwide. This role has seen China adhere to the international norms which have been put in place, and also has joined significant institutions. These actions enable China to play an active role in international diplomacy. As a superpower, China is a role model to many developing countries and therefore, it has to have a perfect which can be copied by others who learn from it.

Some examples of political changes brought about by the economic growth of China include: first we have the recent changes in the legal system of China, introduction of the great democracy between parties, and the introduction of elections at the village level. Considering the changes in the legal system, which were posted in the white paper issued in 2008.

It explained the progress made by introducing modern legal systems. Despite the changes in the legal system, the law is still dictated by politics in China, and political parties still interfere with sensitive cases.

The second reform in improving inter party democracy has been a success in improving the democratic character. Three policies have successfully been implemented in the party, first retirement age limit for the party leaders has been put in place, limits on the term of leadership have also been set and lastly the party has opened its rank to include capitalists. Though these reforms have been successful in parties, there is still no balance in the leadership which is blamed on corruption in the government (Lardy, 2004).

The other reform in politics due to the economic growth in China is that of introducing elections at the village level. Village elections were made a law in 1998, but still many of the local authorities keep on frustrating the implementation processes. The village elections were introduced to reduce corruption and deal with the increasing local disposition among the local parties.

Though the elections have been able to reduce corruption, local democracy has not been promoted. As a result of this, the village elections have been criticized by many. The economic growth of China has continued to have an enormous effect on the political system of China leading to many reforms being put in place.

Middle class

The current and the predicted effects of China’s economy on the middle class are not easy to determine due to the transparency issues surrounding China’s economic growth. Using data from the national bureau of statistics of China, approximated effects can be drawn.⁶ In China, the group termed as the middle class is the one that earns an annual income between 25,001 and 100,000 R M B. The population in the middle class is approximated to be 39% while that of the poor to be 50%.

Changes in China’s economy have led to increased people’s number in the middle class as the poor keep reducing. Predictions show that the population of the middle class level will keep expanding up to approximately 79% of the total population in the year 2020. Though this prediction contradicts one done in 2003, which stated that the middle class level will rise at a rate of 1% per year, rising from 19% to 40% by 2020 they all prove that the middle class population has increased and will keep increasing due to the economic growth of the state.

Social economy

The growth of the market economy of China has also had a sizeable impact of the social economy of China. Considering the education system of the state, it has been transformed significantly. The enrollment in both high schools and colleges has been increasing at an extremely high rate. Statistics shows that, the total colleges as well as universities’ enrollment in 1998, to be 3.4 million, but after a period of four years, it increased by 165%.

The number of skilled worker in China is extremely high too, and it is still rising.⁷ The trained personnel are more productive that the untrained and because most of China’s population is trained the production is remarkably high and efficient (Huang 2003). The economic growth in China has encouraged its population to seek education for there is competition for skilled personnel in the available job vacancies.

In China, there are township villages, which were established to serve the rural areas. These towns grew with the growth of the economy and they transformed approximately 120 million of people from depending on agriculture. These people started working in these towns which were highly efficient and exposed to the international market.

The managers of these towns were highly efficient and transparent which was the key to their development. Development of the township villages led to urbanization which was at 18% in 1978, and by 2002, it reached 39%.⁸ The urbanization in China was increasing at a precise high rate and at the same time industrialization was growing.

Relationship with the United States

China and United States started trade relations in the year 1972. United States invested in many areas in China such as hotels, factories, and oil. In 1992, the trade between the two states was approximated to be 33 billion dollars, which increased up to 285.3 billion dollars by 2010.⁹

Many United States citizens have capital investments in China and vice versa. Though the two have depended on each other’s economy, their dependency is not equal. The unbalanced nature of trade between the two states has complicated the relationship between them. This tightens the relationship between the two economies making them more independent. The United Nation economy depends largely on imports from China at a remarkably low cost, and has also benefited from financial help to support its budget and account deficits.¹⁰

China depends on United States export market largely and keeps on depending on the United States stock market for its increasing foreign stock exchange. With time, United States has become less depended on China and at the same time China is trying to detach its self from United States market, but it faces challenges.¹¹. For instance Chinese exports to United States were at $100 billion in 2000 and by 2009 it had risen to $296 billion, and the imports increased from $16 billion to $70 billion over the same period.¹²

Effects on Businesses in China

The economy of China has been favorable to all businesses in China. The changing social, economic, cultural, and political environment in China is easily recognized, and it supports the entrepreneurial environment. The environment in China can be assed as one with opportunities by business people who are efficient in business.

It may be termed as a burden with low cost and high risk by people who are not efficient in entrepreneurship. Individuals with high efficiency tend to believe in their actions and always visualize positive outcomes. Such people tend to venture in business because that attitude is the best in the business field.

The leadership in China is largely efficient and it is attributed to the success of China both politically and economically. This attitude in the leaders has contributed to the whole population being encouraged to venture in business. Business in China has continuously grown at a extremely high rate, and a sizeable population is involved in small and large enterprises.¹³

Local businesses have advanced for local demand for goods and services has increased with the growth of the economy. Due to the growth of China’s economy, it is rising to be one of the largest economies in the world. This has made China to be a target for many countries to invest in and also to import or export goods. This has resulted into improving businesses in China where most of the local traders are able to do business both locally and internationally.¹⁴

Is this political tactic helping China?

The Chinese political system has been of substantial help to the growing economy of the country. The political system has set policies which have contributed to the growth of the economy. The political policies are enforced by the political leaders who are for the country, and its success comes before any of their personal interests. The qualities endowed in political leadership have helped in the growth of Chinese economy a vast deal.

Good management is basic if any developments are to take place and the political managers have proved to be excellent managers. The political reforms like the introduction of the village elections have successfully reduced corruption in China though it has not fully cleared all the cases. It has been a notable achievement to China which has increased the confidence of their investors. Again the political tactics have ensured stability and peace in China which still encourages foreign investors hence boosting the economy in China.¹⁵

The future of China with socialis market economy

The future of China is predicted to be a bright one with the socialist market economy. It is predicted to be a place which will be truly safe to invest, economically rich with well equipped labor, a reliable as well as a stable society and government. These factors are expected to attract more foreign investors in China.

The economy will record a particularly high growth rate in the future. It is predicted that in the next ten years, China’s economy will still grow at an approximate rate of 10% , and the GDP will add up to 38 trillion.¹⁶ Though the level of the GDP is still low in China, it will grow at a slow rate, and it will have to be boosted to raise the living standards in China. When the living standards of Chinese population is raised, the difference between the income earned by the rich and the poor will be decreased.¹⁷

In the future, customer satisfaction in China will lead to increase in local demand for goods and services which will keep the economy growing. Increased demand will result into more production of goods and services hence raising and sustaining the growth of the economy.¹⁸

In China, the population is high and a big percentage is comprised of trained personnel which provide cheap labor to the state. The education system in China has been growing rapidly, and it is predicted to have same rate growth in the future. With the education system advancing and a sizeable part of Chinese population acquiring a higher level of education China is predicted to have a particularly bright future.

The urbanization in China is taking place at a extremely high rate and is predicted to keep rising in the future. China had an agricultural based economy in the past, and it has been transforming to from rural agriculture society to urban industrialized society.

It is predicted that the infrastructure in China will be improved in the future leading to a big number of the rural population moving to the urban centers.¹⁹ This will increase the local consumption of the goods produced hence raising the economy higher. With all these changes, there will be better opportunities of investment and production in China.

Will there be capitalism?

Socialist market has been officially described as one that will eliminate capitalism but researchers show that capitalism is still there in this economy. ²⁰It is believed to bring capitalism back where the working class population is disempowered and therefore, inequality is increased in the society.²¹ It also provides favorable grounds for development of a capitalist class. Classical Marxists say that the socialist economy is controversial, and the Chinese economy is more of a capitalist than the socialist for it has many components of capitalism.²²

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Shirk, Susan. How China Opened Its Door: The Political Success of the PRC’s Foreign Trade and Investment Reforms, Washington D.C: The Brookings Institution. 1994.

Suliman, Mohamed Osman. China’s Transition to a Socialist Market Economy. WestPort, CT: Greenwood Publishing, 1998.

Sung, Yun-Wang. The China-Hong Kong Connection: The Key to China’s Open -Door, Dirham: Duke university, 1999.

Wang, Zhengyi. “Conceptualizing Economic Security and Governance: China confronts globalization”, The Pacific Review 17, no.4 (2004): 523-545.

Footnotes

¹ Doak Barnett, Cadres, Bureaucracy, and Political Power in Communist China, (New York: Columbia University Press. 1997), 65.

² Cheing Fu X and Viven manyam Balasubra, “The Township and Village enterprise in China”. Journal of Development Studies 39, no. 4 (2003): 18.

³ Yasheng Huang, Selling China: Foreign Direct Investment during the Reform Era, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 94.

⁴ Barry Naughton, The Chinese Economy: Transitions and Growth Policy, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 106.

⁵ Auty Richard, Economic Development and Industrial Policy: Korea, Brazil, Mexico, India and China, (London: Mansell Publishing Limited, 1994), 90.

⁶Mohamed Osman Suliman, China’s Transition to a Socialist Market Economy. (WestPort, CT: Greenwood Publishing, 1998), 180.

⁷Thomas Moore, China in the World Market: Chinese Industry and International Sources of Reform in the Post-Mao Era, (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 29.

⁸Chun Lin, The Transformation of Chinese Socialism, (Durham and London: Duke University, 2006), 46.

⁹ Edward Chen and Kwan Chen, Asia’s Borderless Economy, (St. Leonards: Allen and Unwin, 1997), 64.

¹⁰Susan Shirk, How China Opened Its Door: The Political Success of the PRC’s Foreign Trade and Investment Reforms, (Washington D.C: The Brookings Institution. 1994), 106.

¹¹ David Blasko, The Chinese Army Today. (New York: Routledge, 2006), 92.

¹²Chamon Marcos and Prasad Eswar, “Why Are Saving Rates of Urban Households in China Rising?” American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics 2, no. 1(2010): 88.

¹³ David Bachman, Bureaucracy, Economy, and Leadership in China: The Institutional Origins of the Great Leap Forward. (New York: Cambridge University Press. 1991), 80.

¹⁴Nicholas Lardy, China’s Unfinished Economic Revolution, (Washington DC: Brooking institution, 2004), 53.

¹⁵ Che, Jiahua and Yingyi Qian.”Insecure Property Rights and Government Ownership of Firms” Quarterly Journal of Economics 113, no. 2(1998): 480.

¹⁶ Hehui Jin and Qian Yingyi, “Public versus Private Ownership of Firms: Evidence from Kurth, James. “The Political Consequences of the Product Cycle: Industry History and Political Outcomes”, International Organization 33, no. 1(1999): 28.

¹⁷Tony, Saich. Governance and Politics of China, (New York: Palgrav, 2001), 76.

¹⁸Yun-Wang Sung, The China-Hong Kong Connection: The Key to China’s Open –Door. ( Dirham: Duke university, 1999), 78.

¹⁹ Jiahua Che and Qian Yingyi, “Insecure Property Rights and Government Ownership of Firms” Quarterly Journal of Economics 113, no. 2(1998), 470.

²⁰ Ibid.471

²¹ Doak Barnett, Cadres, Bureaucracy, and Political Power in Communist China, (New York: Columbia University Press. 1997), 87.

²² Zhengyi Wang, “Conceptualizing Economic Security and Governance: China confronts globalization”, The Pacific Review 17, no.4 (2004): 540.

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 the authorities of the country. Their rejection and disapproval of the socialistic regime led to the ignorance and misunderstanding of two, for the first sight, seemingly equal concepts. The two political philosophies, namely socialism, and communism are more often than not being totally confused by people. But it is necessary to understand that the aspects upon which they rest are quite different. These philosophies seek to achieve different goals, and the tasks, with the help of which they do it, are also different. While socialism is a claimed inevitable stage or step to reach communism, communism is the last instance; the best political regime that might have been on Earth might be on Earth and might be functioning on Earth in the future, considered in the theory of Marx and Engels. It can be compared with nothing, except perhaps with a “political nirvana” – the state, which enables one to get free from all the previous oppressing systems, starting with slavery and finishing with socialism and including it. When communism is set as a functioning regime, there is nothing left to make up, as communism claims to be the Earth Paradise. Thus, it is obvious that socialism and communism are two different matters, which were to perform different functions and to achieve different goals, even though somehow related.

The interrelation of these two political philosophies seems very natural as one result from another. Namely, communism follows capitalism. To better understand the relation of these systems, it is necessary to refer to Hegel’s thesis – anti-thesis – synthesis logic. According to his philosophical views, he followed a new straight logic, including dialectics or, in other words, development. Much of his philosophical studies relate to the history of humanity. Thus, according to his statement, The antiquity is a thesis, while the Middle Ages are anti-thesis, consequently, the New Time is synthesis, where the thesis is a statement, anti-thesis – its denial, and synthesis is an identity. Both Capitalism and Communism are not related either to thesis or anti-thesis. Consequently, they are to represent synthesis, so going by the definition, they should be related. Being guided by their denial of everything related to thesis (Antiquity) or anti-thesis (The Middle Ages), socialism and communism sought some new logic, new values for people. From this point, 98 material values appeared. In this cause, socialism and communism are related and very similar.

It needs a better understanding of why the grounds for the creation and putting socialism into functioning appeared. Of course, no one in the world would put it into functioning without having faith in the further development of this political regime. Socialism, as a regime, was set up as an inevitable step to reach communism. Socialism encompasses several main arguments. First, it is believed that public ownership, as opposed to private ownership, is a more suitable enterprise. Secondly, the concept of egalitarianism has been embraced as it calls for the redistribution of resources from the rich through taxation to the less fortunate members of society (Bealey and Johnson, 1999). Besides, there are other main concepts of socialism, that is, the abolition of religion and the reduction of the role of family within the society. Socialistic authorities believed in evolution in each and every sphere of life.

Socialism is believed to be put into operation only with the help of revolution, which is to overthrow the former regime and to set the dictatorship of the proletariat (the main and basically the only class of people found within the countries with the socialistic regime). Moreover, socialism as a regime is to be set all over the world. The proponents of socialism insist that a revolution against the capitalist system is possible without necessarily compromising the character of the state. For them, capitalism is not a dictatorship vehicle but rather an opportunity for any given social class to abuse power. They insist that instead of wasting resources or trying to create social mechanisms to transform the society, socialism can be instituted by merely embracing democratic forms of capitalist systems. As Einstein put it, socialism can only be attained when the balance between social issues and politics is attained. When power is centralized, bureaucracy receives a life of its own and becomes powerful, so much so that democracy becomes an illusion and human rights are easily abused. First, the socialist distribution principle advocated for social equity and hard work; the more you work, the higher you reward. And its motto goes as follows: from everyone according to his ability, to everyone, according to his deed. (Marx, 7) It aimed at ensuring that all the members of a society would benefit from industrialization. Still, as it is seen from the Manifesto, socialism does not promise the total equality of people, as everyone gets a wage, according to the work he is doing. This is the greatest appeal for socialism because not only is it practical but also very applicable. Socialism saw the emergence of a more productive and happy workforce which was in charge of its own fate because it outnumbered the administrators. Ideally, there is a sense of liberty as everyone was involved in one way or the other in the decision-making processes. As Karl Marx put it, “democracy is the way to socialism.” Socialism discouraged wastage of resources because production was strictly for whoever needs a given good. Hayek (1990) challenges the effectiveness of socialism as a system. He states that socialism is based on scientific findings, which are based on scientific errors. Further, when implemented as an economic system, socialism would fail at running a large economy.

Socialism is an economic and social school of thought that advocates for the public, as opposed to private ownership of property and even natural resources. Socialism for collective and deliberate action as a way of social control and separates communism from capitalism as it advocates for the absolute nationalization of the factors of production in any given society (Bealey, 1999). Though, even the definition of the word “socialism” is so vast that the countries, which chose to follow doctrines of this philosophy were under completely different regimes. Taking into consideration the former USSR and SFRY, the first did not admit the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia to follow socialism at all.

On the other hand, communism is an economic and political philosophy that is also known as “Marxism” or the “Revolutionary Proletarian Socialism” or “higher socialism.” Higher Socialism means the best political regime. Due to the social and political problems associated with capitalist systems, it was intended that a classless and free society would emerge if the bourgeoisie were dethroned. Communism calls for the disbandment of the state. Communists believe that capitalism assisted the society in moving away from feudalistic ways because it resulted in such a fierce and cutthroat environment where a man-eat man was rampant. It is for this reason that communists advocate for the centralization of resources so that a stateless and classless society is created (Bealey, 1999). While socialism is a transitional period to a dream, communism is a dream to be achieved.

The proponents of communism rest the power to transform the society on the working class. They believe that once the working class overturns capitalist power, they must as a social class usher in a classless society. They also believe that appropriate machinery must be laid down so that there is a guarantee that the capitalist is completely powerless to counter revolt. Communist Manifesto document was first published in February of 1848 by Karl Marx, and it aimed to highlight the disparity between social classes, and it was hoped that once the targeted audiences had had access to it, there would be mass riots (All about Philosophy, 2008). Furthermore, this document attempted to lure the masses with the hope of a model government, one that would do away with the upper class and eventually grant the lower classes from the iron fist of upper-class tyrants (All about Philosophy, 2008). There were ten critical communism points discussed in the Communist Manifesto concerned issues of heavy progressive income tax, corporate farms and regional planning, the abolition of private property, and the creation of the central bank. It also addressed government issues such as labor control, communication, transport, and factories ownership, and finally, the governmental control of education.

Edouard Bernstein (1850-1932) has been one of the most vocal critics of the Communist Manifesto because of the estimation of the time it would take for a classless and politically correct society to evolve. Even Friedrich Engels, who was co-author in the Manifesto with Karl Marx, has criticized this timeline theory. Beinstrien further states that with the increase of wealth, the capitalist population increased while the middle class remained unchanged in their actions. In the Marx-Engels reader of 1978, Marx and Engel illustrate that the struggle against the oppressive bourgeoisie rule put the middle class at danger of extinction.

Communism creates a society that all are offered the same access to resources, and it is unlikely that one will lack because resources are allocated according to needs. Unfortunately, the allocation of resources according to the need level breeds a society that is dependant and highly dysfunctional. In fact, communism can only make sense in a society that has self-actualized as these individuals are better placed to assist those genuinely needy cases. Once communism is embraced within a given society, it so often happens that the system becomes totalitarian. It is known that a totalitarian society is an oppressed society. Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences recipient of 1974, Friedrich Hayek agrees with this notion in his book, “The road to Seldom.” He states that when resource allocation within an economy is reduced to a group and is centralized, the result is oppression and tyranny. This is illustrated in countries that have practiced communism in the past, such as Russia and Nazi Germany. Oppressed people are a dangerous and volatile group who, at the first opportunity, will revolt and try to overthrow the reigning leadership. Due to the conservative nature of communism, the decision-making process on the working of the economy is confined to delegated individuals. This means that the subjects within a communist regime are likely subjects of atrocity.

Inferring, it needs to be mentioned that both socialism and communism emerged as systems aimed at eliminating oppressive capitalist regimes. They are similar in terms of the production systems, which call for centralized planning for the factors of production. Moreover, these two political theories are similar in terms of their synthetic character. Thus, being artificially created, they could not function as working political regimes. After the collapse of the country, the largest in the world, the authorities of which tried to live these two political theories out, people tend to sharply criticize these two notions and even confuse them. However, these matters are quite different in their nature. Consequently, they rest on different aspects and seek to perform different functions. While socialism is an inevitable step to go forth to communism from capitalism, it has a need in a revolution which is to overthrow the existing government and is to lead to the dictatorship of the proletariat; communism is a final step in the political development, a claimed final instance in the sense of politics, which enables political theorists to stop inventing further regimes as it is a believed Paradise, materialized on Earth. Communism rests on a strong foundation of socialism and thus does not seek any revolutionary movements; it means that socialism prepares the society to communism through humiliating the class of rich, arrogant, and fortunate (Hayek, 1999), reduces the influence of the family as an institution (diminishes the ties between spouses, children and parents), abolishes religion for a good cause (the theory of evolution is the focal point in the theory of socialism as the society, living under socialism is to evolve with the regime, performed in the country). And communism does not need these radical changes as the grounds for it are implied to have been prepared during socialism. While socialism is a direct result of capitalism, communism is so-called socialism at a higher level. These political philosophies, though directly related to each other in terms of the strict succession, they are to be executed, are still to function at a different time, are to perform completely different goals. Thus, it is clear that these two notions rest on principally different aspects.

Works Cited

All about Philosophy. “Communism”. (2008). Web.

Bealey Frank. “The Blackwell Dictionary of Political Science: A User’s Guide to its terms”. London: Blackwell Publishing, 1999.

Einstein Albert. “Why Socialism?” (1949). 2008. Web.

Hayek Friedrich. “Road to Serfdom”. London: Routeledge, 1944.

Hayek Friedrich. “The Fatal Conceit: The errors of Socialism”. London; Routeledge, 1990.

History Guide. “Karl Marx, 1818-1883”. (2008). Web.

Marx Karl and Engels Friedrich. “The Communist Manifesto”. London: Penguin Classics, 2002.

Marx Karl and Engels Friedrich. “The Marx-Engels Reader”. New York: W. W. Norton, 1978.

Strauss Leo and Cropsey. “History of Political Philosophy”. Chicago: University of Chicago, 1963.

Introduction

During the twentieth century, Communism was prospering in many countries of the world, particularly in the USSR and in Eastern Asia. The influence of Communism on the rest of the countries was significant. Although the ideology itself is not bad, the attempts of people to successfully implement it in the twentieth century in most countries failed. Therefore, although currently there are several socialist states in the world, Communism has almost completely lost its influence among people (Ngo and Mujtaba 2).

Communism in China

The Communist Party of China was established in 1921. In 1927, it was under Mao Zedong’s control. After World War II, the civil war between the communists and the nationalists continued in China. In 1949, Mao Zedong had mobilized millions of peasants in the north achieved victory over the nationalists who then fled to Taiwan and established the Republic of China while Mao Zedong’s China became the People’s Republic of China (Snow 248).

After coming to power in 1949, Mao began reforming the country by introducing his interpretation of the Soviet Five-Year Plan. The plan proved to be successful in increasing overall productivity, particularly in steel production. Mao also followed the example of the Soviet principles of development through the heavy industry with surpluses obtained from the work of peasants. In the 1950s, Mao separated from traditional Marxism-Leninism and introduced Maoism, the Chinese version of Communism (Snow 255).

At the end of the 1950s, the relationships between China and the Soviet Union were spoiled due to Mao’s indignation at the Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev’s De-Stalinization campaign and his position as a peacemaker between capitalists and communists. Thus, the Maoists maintaining a strong communist position proclaimed the Cultural Revolution and implemented the so-called Great Leap Forward which was developed to help make China a heavily industrialized country. However, partially due to the Soviet Union’s termination of support to China, the Great Leap Forward became the Great Leap Backward resulting in the rapid decrease in agricultural production due to the unreasonably high quotas and the increase of corruption at the local level. As a result of this policy, approximately thirty million peasants died from starvation (Snow 259).

Thus, having been deprived of the Soviet Union’s military support, Mao decided to build his military. Despite the successful reforms, Mao was not satisfied, as he felt that China was deviating from the pure communist path. In 1966, he began the Cultural Revolution aiming to purge China of all the traces of Western culture and to eliminate the increasing elite class. As a result of this revolution, the curriculum of universities was mostly focused on Communist Studies, intellectuals and professors were dispatched to collective farms to receive “cultural retraining”, dissidents were captured and killed (Snow 267). Thus, Mao’s Cultural Revolution was another disaster for the nation.

In 1976, after Mao’s death, Deng Xiaoping changed the economic and educational policies of Mao. He implemented many features peculiar to free-market capitalism and thereby made China one of the fastest-growing economies in those times. Besides, Deng introduced the “Four Modernizations” that comprise industry, agriculture, military, and science and technology. In general, Deng is considered a Chinese leader who opened China to the outside world and conducted a successful industrialization policy (Snow 273).

Nowadays, although China remains an authoritarian republic, it has become less preserved and deviated from the path of pure Communism. However, certain communist features such as censorship remained in effect (Snow 279).

Communism in Laos

Communism in Laos appeared with the overthrowing of the King of Laos thereby eliminating monarchy in the country and proclaiming the People’s Democratic Republic of Laos in 1975. Surprisingly, the new government, Pathet Lao, instead of executing their former king, Savang Vatthana and Prime Minister Souvanna, sent them to the re-education camps and, consequently, made them the special advisers to the Politburo. Remarkably, the first actions of Pathet Lao were not to develop a new society and economy but to eliminate the insipid culture and behavior. Hairstyles and clothes, singing and dancing, and family and food traditions became the focus of the new government’s investigation (Baird 746).

Approximately 40,000 rebels who did not manage to flee the country were sent to the re-education camps to live in harsh conditions in Laotian jungles. Interestingly, the government named these camps Samanaya, a word that originated from the Western world “seminar”. Scholars who were averse to being re-educated were involved in slave labor and subjected to continual political propaganda for anywhere from several months to fifteen years. The purpose of these camps was to break the spirit of the old regime members and imbue them with fear towards the new regime. However, the existence of the re-education camps system was not long (Baird 746). The camps began to lose their power and influence in 1978, and by 1986, all the prisoners were released.

Thus, Laos’ experiment to adopt Communism failed. During the ten years of Pathet Lao governance, the country was far from making any economic reforms. The people in the country were still living in poverty, and the ideology of Communism did not manage to convince enough people to support the Party (Baird 747).

Nowadays, although Laos is still governed by people who were educated by such communist countries as the Soviet Union, China, and Vietnam, any changes in the direction of Communism are unlikely. Currently, the government of Laos is inspired by its neighbors and their success and is also determined to implement the Western government model (Baird 748).

Communism in Vietnam

The Vietnamese Communist Party was founded by a Vietnamese revolutionary leader Ho Chi Minh in 1930. After World War II, France wanted to restore control over Vietnam, while Vietnam was already an independent communist state. Thus, the result of this contradiction was the Vietnam War. At the beginning of the war, Vietnam was divided into North Vietnam with the capital in Hanoi supported by the Soviet Union, China, and other communist states and South Vietnam with the capital in Saigon supported by France and the USA (Hearden 54). At first, the French wanted to reclaim its former colonies, but after their defeat in the Battle of Dien Bien Phu in 1954, they realized that they would not be able to restore the control over Vietnam, and this war received negative feedback in their homeland. Thus, at the Geneva Conference, France signed a ceasefire agreement with North Vietnam and granted them, Laos, and Cambodia independence (Hearden 57).

In their turn, the USA continued the Vietnam War, as they considered North Vietnam a communist threat and did not want them to spread. Eventually, after the persistently growing indignation among the population in the USA concerning America’s participation in the Vietnam War, the U.S. government decided to terminate its support to South Vietnam and left the country in 1975. Thus, being deprived of the USA’s support, South Vietnam lost the war, and in 1976 the reunification of North and South Vietnam took place. The country was officially renamed the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, with its capital in Hanoi, and adopted a Stalinist dictatorship of the proletariat system. Those who belonged to the South Vietnamese government were dispatched to re-education camps, which, were hard labor prison camps (Hearden 62).

In the first years of the post-war period, the Vietnamese Communist Party initiated the collectivization of agriculture and the development of the heavy industry. All farms, factories, and private properties in the country became state-controlled. The production of food was collectivized, and fishermen and farmers had to sell their products to the government at significantly low prices, otherwise, they could not purchase fishing equipment and farming supplies. As a result of such sharp changes in the country, the problem of severe food shortage arose, and the areas that had before been rich in rice were threatened with famine (Hearden 65).

The censorship in Vietnam was strict and controlled every aspect of the Vietnamese people’s lives. Most pre-1976 works in literature, art, music, and cinematography were banned. Negative comments towards the government, the Party, Uncle Ho, or Communism might result in the harassment by the police, expulsion from work or school, or even incarceration. However, Communism did not manage to eliminate the black market and corruption. As a result of these strict living conditions, nearly 3 million Vietnamese secretly escaped the country by fleeing to the neighboring countries such as Malaysia, Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, Hong Kong, and even Australia (Hearden 74).

During the 1980s, every year, Vietnam received approximately $3 billion in military and economic aid from the Soviet Union and traded mostly with the USSR and other communist states. Although nowadays, Vietnam is still committed to Socialism, after the complete dissolution of the USSR in 1991, the influence of Communism throughout the country considerably decreased (Hearden 76).

Khmer Rouge Rule of Cambodia

The Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK), or more widely known as the Khmer Rouge, gained control over Cambodia in 1975. In several days after seizing power, the Khmer Rouge compelled two million Cambodians from Phnom Penh and other cities to go to the countryside and perform agricultural work. They established their 1976 “Four-Year Plan” which presupposed that Cambodians had to produce nearly three tons of rice per hectare (Greene 580). They also implemented their radical communist policy based on Maoism and Marxism-Leninism.

They abolished private property, free markets, foreign culture, religious practices, and even their own traditional Khmer culture. Leisure activities were considerably limited and consisted of only Communism-based entertainments. All people in the country including the CPK leaders had to wear their revolutionary clothes, black costumes. It was forbidden for people to gather in groups and speak with each other, as they could be accused of conspiracy against the CPK. People were not allowed to demonstrate affection, as according to Khmer Rouge’s philosophy, “pure” Cambodians had to respect and obey only Angkar Padevat, that is to be “mothers and fathers” for everyone (Greene 583).

The Khmer Rouge stated that only “pure” Cambodians had the right to build their society. Those whom they considered as “non-pure”, they accused of being traitors and sent them to prisons, where they were tortured, interrogated, and executed. The whole country was a large detention center where many intellectuals, soldiers, minority people, and ordinary commoners died every day. Overall, almost 3 million people died in the Khmer Rouge’s genocide and repressions (Greene 584).

At the end of 1977, conflicts broke between the Khmer Rouge and Vietnam. In 1979, Vietnamese troops managed to capture Phnom Penh, and the Khmer Rouge leaders escaped to Thailand and then to China. Thus, Vietnam destroyed the Khmer Regime in Cambodia and helped create a new government which was called the People’s Republic of Kampuchea. In 1999, the Khmer Rouge movement after spending twenty years in exile ceased to exist. Nowadays, Cambodia is a constitutional monarchy that was restored in the country in 1993 (Greene 587).

Communism in the Philippines

The Communist movement in the Philippines appeared in 1930 when the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) was created. After World War II, a group of Filipino insurgents known as the Hukbalahap (the Huks) who continued fighting against Japanese formed an offensive opposition against the government of the Philippines. In 1947, the Communist Party of Philippines decided to support the rebellion and involve more peasants in it. In 1948, Elpidio Quirino, the president of the Philippines, started negotiations with Taruc that were unsuccessful (Parlade 17).

However, in 1953, the Huk rebellion was suppressed. Thus, in 1954, the Communist Party was again outlawed by the Philippino government. Eventually, in 1968, Amado Guerrero (the real name was Jose Maria Sison) established a new Communist Party of the Philippines and the New People’s Army (NPA). The CPP fought against the official government of the Philippines during the time of the dictatorship of the Marcos. In 1972, the CPP was defeated, and Sison was exiled. In the same year, after the Filipino government declared Martial Law, the number of people who wanted to join the CPP and the NPA considerably decreased (Parlade 22).

Since the mid-1970s, no more attempts on the side of the CPP to overthrow the Filipino government have been made. Thus, the Philippines being on the edge of the Communist revolution have never experienced the Communist regime. Nowadays, the Philippines are a republic and use the constitution that they introduced in 1987 (Parlade 25).

Comparison of Communist Asian Countries

Although Communism was adopted by many Asian countries, it was differently implemented in each country. In China and Vietnam, for instance, Communism had a great influence. In China, it reached its peak in the period of Mao Zedong who even created his own branch of Communism called Maoism, whereas, in Vietnam, the best time for Communism was after the reunification of North and South Vietnam. In Laos, Communist regime existed only for ten years and was less strict despite the re-education system. In Cambodia, the implementation of Communism under the rule of the Khmer Rouge, had the most severe consequences resulted in the deaths of almost three million people. In several other countries including the Philippines, Communism failed to be implemented (Derous 1739).

Currently, although in general, the idea of “pure” Communism became a utopia, some people still believe in its realization, and as long as they believe, the idea will not cease to exist. Certainly, there is a possibility that “pure” Communism will ever be implemented, but, now, considering the present state of the world’s affairs, it is unlikely to be realized.

Conclusion

Nowadays, although there are still several countries that have a socialist government structure, their methods and policies are less strict, in comparison with those that were at the outset of Communism. Additionally, now, after numerous attempts to implement “pure” Communism, people became more skeptical about it and realized that even if it is not a utopia, currently, it is not practicable.

Works Cited

Baird, Ian G. “1975: Rescaling Our Understanding of the Fortieth Anniversary of the Establishment of the Lao People’s Democratic Republic.” Geopolitics, vol. 20, no. 4, 2015, pp. 745-748.

Derous, Marjolein. “Why Communism Did Not Collapse. Understanding Regime Resilience in Asia and Europe.” Taylor & Francis, vol. 66, no. 10, 2014, pp. 1738-1739.

Greene, Roberta R. “Resilience and Healing Among Cambodian Survivors of the Khmer Rouge Regime.” Journal of Evidence-Informed Social Work, vol. 12, no. 6, 2015, pp. 579-587.

Hearden, Patrick J. Tragedy of Vietnam. Routledge, 2016.

Ngo, T. P., and Bahaudin Mujtaba. “The Influence of Communism on Ethical Decision Making.” Journal of Knowledge Management, Economics and Information Technology, vol. 1, no. 1, 2014, pp. 1-16.

Parlade Jr., LTC Antonio G. An Analysis of the Communist Insurgency in the Philippines. Pickle Partners Publishing, 2015.

Snow, Edgar. Red Star over China: The Classic Account of the Birth of Chinese Communism. Atlantic Books, 2017.