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What's the difference between Socialism, Marxism and
Communism?What is the difference between socialism, Leninism,
communism and Marxism?
How do you explain to a 12 year old the difference
between Capitalism and Socialism and that Marxism
is stupid?
Can it be said that Marxism, Communism and
Socialism in general were a response to the dirty side
of Capitalism?
How does communism differ from socialism?
What are the differences between Communism and
Socialism? Please answer in simple language rather
going with typical political theories.
What is the difference between communism and
Utopia?
What are Communism, Marxism, Socialism, Leninism
and Stalinism? What are the similarities and
difference between them? Please explain in simpl...
What's the difference between Leninism and Marxism-
Leninism?
What is the basic difference between Maoism and
Marxism?
What is the difference between Maoism and
communism?
More Related Questions
Marxism Socialism Communism Society Comparisons Economics Polit ics
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82 Answers
Originally Answered: What are the differences between communism and socialism?
In classic Marxist theory, Communism is the final stage of the evolution of human
socioeconomic relations. In the Marxist model, the feudal state is overthrown by the rise of
the bourgeoisie, ushering in the capitalist epoch. Capitalism is then overthrown by the rise
of the proletariat, which ushers in not communism, but the Socialist state. Each previous
step is the necessary precondition for the next.
The socialist state is thus the pre-condition for communism, and its function is to alter the
state of human material conditions in such a way that communism can function. The
socialist state then "withers away," leading to the end of political power in any centralized
form – including nation states, as communism as envisioned by Marx is to be an
international system. Equa ll y important is the disappearance of social class distinctions,
which goes hand in ha nd with the end of political pow er:
When in the course of development, class distinctions have disappeared, and all
production has been concentrated in the hands of a vast association of the w hole
nation, the public power will lose its political charac ter. Political power, properly so
called, is merely the organized power of one class for oppressing another.
These conditions all hav e to be met bef ore the communist society can develop. In the most
reductionist sense, socialism presupposes a strong centralized state, while communism
follows once the state is no longer necessary. Marx summarized communism in this way:
"an association in which the free development of each is the condition for the free
development of all."
Both quotes are from The Manifesto of the Communist Party. Three short works from
which one can get a very basic understanding of Ma rx's political a nd economic theories
are Wage, Labor, and Capital,The Manifesto of the Communist Party , and The
Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonapa rte. Another interesting historical work is Leon
Trotsky 's The Revolution Betrayed (1937 ISBN 0-929087-48-8), in which the author
outlines why the Soviet Union was destained to fail, largely within the context of classical
Marxist theory.
Updated Dec 11, 2012 • View Upvotes
Robert Palermo, Kellogg Institute PhD Fellow at the Notre Dame
46.4k Views • Upvoted by Marc Bodnick, Former Stanford PhD student in Politics
Robert is a Most Viewed Writer in Marxism.
Originally Answered: What is the key difference between socialism and communism?
Countries which were termed communist never in fact were communist, they were socialist
countries where the goal was a chieving communism. Cuba, PRC, DPRK, USSR, Warsaw
pact countries, all of these countries practise(d) socialism, with the intent of achieving
communism by Dialectical materialism . The idea here is that cap italism is the thesis,
socialism is the antithesis (or opposite), and communism is the synthesis (or result of
having gone through the two). The State ideology was definitely communist; they practiced
socialism in order to obtain communism eventually.
Socialism is workers' ownership of the means of production, central planning of the
economy and the absence of markets, and enforced equality; in practice this has invariably turned into the nightmare of single-party totalitarian dictatorship, resulting in warfare,
conquest, famine, poverty, genocide, corruption, absence of the most basic human rights
especially freedom of speech, and intense propaganda and revisionism. What people call
today socialism is more properly termed social democracy, something completely different.
Communism is essentially anarchy, where the state doesn't exist anymore, social classes
Joseph Guindi, thermodynamics engineer; aerospace, buildings & sustainable
energy
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don't exist anymore, nor is there any money (socialist countries all have money). The very
existence of communism is entirely theoretical and mostly pseudoscientific, more akin to
an unobtainable utopia. Communism has never existed, there is no evidence that it is even
possible (or desirable), and every attempt at having it, through socialism, resulted in
complete disaster.
Updated Aug 29, 2015 • View Upvotes
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The terms have been so bastardized that there's really little value in a dictionary definition.
If somebody uses those words, you just need to ask them what they mean by it. Insisting
on historical definitions of them ends up just turning into an argument over semantics.
The terms have been muddled since their coinage anyway. If there's one which should
have a definite meaning, it's Marxism, as that would be "the theories of Karl Marx". Marx
tried to define "communism" and "socialism" in The Communist Manifesto. In his
definition, "communism" is the end state of having key means of production owned in
common (communally) without class, while "socialism" is an intermediate transition state
where a social revolution ( that is, of the workers, the vast majority of society) is required to
get to communism.
Accepting M arx's definitions and the economic a nd social consequences he believed would
arise from them makes you a Marxist, and whether you're a socialist or a communist
depends on where you are in history.
Other self-described socialists and communists define the terms differently; both terms
predated Marx and he has no particular claim to defining them aside from popularity.
They are all loosely-defined theories in which private property (i.e. capital) is no longer the
defining force of economics. Beyond that it's all kind of up for grabs.
Other people who a ren't self-described socialists, communists, or Marxists define the terms
their own ways, generally as "anybody who doesn't want what I want". The chips fall where
they may from there. I find that a particularly useless form of language, and such people
tend to be similarly useless in other areas of thinking (including economics), but if you
insist on communicating with them, you'll just have to infer their usage of terminology. No
dictionary will provide much help.
Updated Sep 10, 2012 • View Upvotes • Answer requested by Vishal Thapa and Soo Kim
Joshua Engel
33.8k Views • Upvoted by John Burgess, More than 50 years dealing with 'Inside the Beltway',
Marc Bodnick, Former Stanford PhD student in Politics
Joshua has 30+ answers in Society.
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Noam Chomsky (linguist, author) explains that USSR was not a socialist country and
explains what socialism really means:
Written Sep 10, 2012 • View Upvotes
Artem Boytsov, Founder & CEO of Trullo App, co-author of Google Trends
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Prateek Mahajan, Software Developer at Amazon
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Originally Answered: What is the basic difference between socialism and communism?
Both the terms are often used interchangeably as the difference between the terms cease to
exist in today's scenario.
However, if u go deep, you are likely to find a subtle difference:
Socialism is an economic system in which means of production are state controlled.
However communism is broader in sense, it means a social, political and economic
movement to establish a boundary-less, stateless, moneyless and classless system in
which all p roperties and means of production a re controlled by c ommunity (community
itself refers to people).
Thus it can be said that communism is a super set of socialism. That's why countries like
China, Vietnam, Laos, Cuba etc. call themselves socialist countries but not communist ones
for they believe that they are still on the path of achieving a communist system by using
socialist methodology.
Western powers ( Capitalist or Anti-Communist) hardly d ifferentiate between the terms
because both socialism as well as communism oppose cap italism and p rivate ownership.
Written May 6, 2013 • View Upvotes
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Originally Answered: What is the difference between communism and socialism?
If in Engla nd, for instance, or the United States, the working class were to gain a
majority in Parliament or Congress, they could, by lawful means, rid themselves of
such laws and institutions as impeded their development, though they could only do
insofar as society had reached a sufficiently mature development. However, the
"peaceful" movement might be transformed into a "forcible" one by resistance on the
part of those interested in restoring the former state of af fairs; if ( as in the American
Civil War and French Revolution) they are put down by force, it is as rebels against
"lawful" force.
—Karl Marx, 1878
The Paris Commune (French Revolution) of 1789 to 1795 was in some sense the first
socialist regime, though, because it turned so bloody, socialists are reluctant to claim it.
Following came a number of experiments in Communitarianism around the world, but
mostly in France. Some of these communities branded themselves socialist; others were atpains to draw a distinction.
Marx and Engels published The Communist Manifesto in 1848 and blasted all such
communities as naïve experiments in Utopian socialism as opposed to his scientific
socialism that would result from Marxism . That pretty much put an end to
communitarianism as having any pretension to real socialism, which is appropriate given
that communitarian arrangements are equally legitimate in republican governments
employing free enterprise.
Marx's scheme was socioeconomic. Communism was the economic engine that would
bring about a socialist society. Significantly, it is not a governing scheme. Marx felt that
state power existed in all cases to the detriment of the working class and so sought a
Dictatorship of the proletariat as the simplistic governing arrangement.
The parlors of Europe were abuzz with d iscussions of implementing socialism. But Marx 's
distrust of government didn't provide much way to force the issue. Besides, he said it
would come about automatically, a simple matter of communism superseding ca pitalism
as workers threw off exploitation.
It was not until after the publication of Das Kapital , Volume I in 1867 that the first true
efforts to implement the economics of communism took place. Marx himself labeled the
short-lived Paris Commune of 1871 a true dictatorship of the proletariat.
At the same time, with Ma rx's help, Social democracy became the first effort to achieve
socialism, a blend of the ideas of Marx and Engels and also Ferdinand Lassalle . The
Social Democratic Workers' Party of Germany would be an effort to achieve socialism
peacefully, which Marx admitted in 1872 would sometimes be possible, rather than via
revolution as he had previously seen as necessary.
Lassalle had no trouble employing the levers of state power to implement reforms. This
eventually alienated Marx who lambasted the use of state power in his Critique of the
Gotha Program of 1875. He felt that use of state power would produce a dictatorship of
the bourgeoisie (Liberal democracy ).
Charles Tips, Serious student of economics
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