Communism

An overview of the political theory

Matthew Yatsayte Economics 10/13/13

Communism, when people say this word they mostly think of the "Soviet Union". Communism may have started in Russia, but that doesn't mean it's only Russian. Communism basically makes everyone equal that creates a society where property is publicly owned, and everyone works for the same days wage. In this system there are no social classes; middle class or rich nor poor, because everyone is equal. In communism the government controls everything for the benefit of the people, and by controlling this means they control pay to make everyone equal. One similar idea to communism is socialism which is the government controls and gives out everything to the people. That is also where the former Soviet Union got their name the "United Soviet Socialist Republic" (USSR). The communist manifesto was the first doctrine about communism written by Karl Marx, and Friedrich Engels in 1848. Originally named "The Manifesto of the Communist Party" this 45 page document of philosophy and sociology was original written in German. This was though of a solution to the "class problem" that capitalism created. Communism didn't really become a government until the 20th century; on October of 1917 the Russian revolution Russia obtained new power which would soon lead to the creation of the United Soviet Socialist Republic or the USSR. After this Communism begun to spread mainly to poor countries, because this was most appealing to the poor because that mean you had a job and money. The growing of communism then led to the Cold War between the free world vs. the iron curtain. The idea of communism is a widely known idea that has been in many countries. The peak of the spread of communism was in the 20th century Russia being the first country to move to communism to Nicaragua being the last communist country to join the communist party. The result of communisms outspread creates a worry with capitalist thinker resulting in the cold war for dominance in countries mostly in Asia. There are only five countries that are currently

communist which are China, Cuba, Laos, North Korea, and Vietnam. Out of all the countries that initially joined communism most have left communism at the start of the 1980s for flaws that led to the fall of some countries. Although communism was looked to as the solution to poverty and keeping the number of poor down, but with communism there are jobs for everyone. It creates a stronger community, and since everyone is equal women are treated the same. When it comes to industry communism falls short, by putting individuals in charge because they lack the motivation productivity slowly decreases. The result of this has made communist countries less productive than capitalist societies. With the productivity level lower than capitalist societies this causes the standards of living to drop lower. Majority of people living in communist countries remain poor since the standards of living lowered. Throughout the years communism has started in countries, and then ended within the same century, and thats where the question comes. What is the problem with communism that makes countries end it so soon? The answer is dictatorship making the people fall under the control of one man. The only way that this would succeed is if people would leave behind their greed. If greed is eliminated from the people then communism would be the utopia that it was hoped to be. In our Economics class we have talked about many things and of those things is greed. Greed plays a big part in communism, because as stated in the previous paragraph greed is a downfall to communism. Other ways we have talked about communism is how its a type of economy a part of the command economy group. It is important to know about because this is

history and like the old quote those who dont know history are doomed to repeat it. Knowing this shows us the downsides to communism so that we know not to do it. During the 19th century when the Red Scare was going around many would say that communism wasnt Christian, and it was Gods plan that democracy would beat communism. When looking into the bible some parts can be said to be communist. Even one of parables that Jesus told was in a way communism. The workers of the vineyard (Matthew 20: 1-16) talks about how the workers in the vineyard all get paid the same days wages, so it wouldnt be an issue in the bible. In Acts 2 as well it talks how everyone can receive heaven even at the last moment although they havent worked as hard as the others. Some people would say that the early Christians lived in a communist like society according to some acts in the bible. For communism to keep running it will need to submit to change, because if it doesnt then it will be ending soon like it did in all the other countries that switch over from communism. Most likely communism could be something of a memory to us that maybe our grand children might not even see communism still being used in countries. From the amount of countries that have dropped communism, it doesnt give much hope that communism will still be here in more than 25 years. The thing that needs to be changed is human nature that wants to be better than others will always be there which makes communism not work. If we could make ourselves rid of that want then communism would last but other than that it wont make it more than 25 years. Even though communism was made for the good of the people, there are ways that it can make things worse for the people as we discussed. It does make for the perfect utopia, but it wont happen as long as people lack the motivation and have the abundance of greed. Although communism sounds okay for the poor, in the long term it more of another struggle with everyone

being equal. Leaving its opponent Capitalism to rise above, and achieve more than the makers of communism thought it would

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+20%3A1-16 https://www.boundless.com/sociology/definition/communism/ http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/viewSubCategory.asp?id=581 http://www.globalmuseumoncommunism.org/map_of_communism

http://www.globalmuseumoncommunism.org/timeline_of_communism

http://www.gotquestions.org/communism-Bible.html http://oneconservativevoice.blogspot.com/2011/06/timeline-of-communistcountries.html?m=1 http://www.slideshare.net/Geckos/the-four-types-of-economic-systems-presentation http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Communist_Manifesto http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/October_Revolution