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Why did communism fail in the Soviet Union?

Political Theory: Did communism or socialism fail?

  • In primary school I learned that communism failed. The fall of the Berlin Wall, the end of the cold war. It was insinuated that capitolism won over communism but did communism or socialism really fail? Socialism being what is referenced here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism

  • Answer:

    Since you're referencing Wikipedia's definition of Socialism, I thought it would help to quote it here to see what could have possibly failed: Socialism is an http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_system characterised by http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_ownership of the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Means_of_production and co-operative management of the economy,http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism#cite_note-1 and a http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_philosophy advocating such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worker_cooperative enterprises, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_ownership, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_ownership, or citizen ownership of equity.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism#cite_note-2 I think it's fair to say that state ownership of the means of production has been tried at least several times (USSR, China, North Korea, Cuba) and seems to have failed, at least in terms of economic efficiency compared to free market capitalism. Note however, that no other implementations of the socialist idea ("cooperative enterprises, common ownership, citizen ownership of equity") have ever been tried in any significant scale. So it's definitely too early to say that the very idea of communal business ownerships and democratic governance of business by workers (which is the core of Socialism) has failed. Actually, if we ever get to say so it would be a very sad day indeed. It would mean that for some reasons, probably related to human nature, the society just operates best when a very small minority controls production by command, and wide-spread ownership and decision-making by all people is undesirable. In our political thought, we believe firmly that it is not the case, but in our economical thought, we seem to believe this is the only possible state of nature. Also worth noting that if capitalism ever evolves into a system where business ownership will be more or less equally spread across the population, rather than severely concentrated, it will be indistinguishable from Socialism from political and philosophical perspectives, regardless of whether all other attributes of capitalism (such as free markets and financial institutions) are still in place. However, there are all reasons to believe that this is an impossible development without some state intervention since unfettered capitalism tends to promote capital accumulation and extreme inequality. If you think about it though, it's not completely unthinkable to imagine a society where stock ownership is widespread and much more equal than today, strong social safety net exists from slipping into poverty alongside universal healthcare, and banks and financial institutions play the role of accumulated capital required for businesses, still with the ultimate goal for profit, but with much flatter distribution of ownership. That would be Socialism. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_socialism for more details.

Artem Boytsov at Quora Visit the source

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I think it's a big stretch to say that it failed. The welfare state in Europe and the New Deal in America would not have happened if the capitalists and the state were not afraid of communism and other radical movements. So that the fact that we have public education, minumum wage, Medicare, Unions etc. are the direct result of socialist movements. The system we have now is a hybrid system and a very tame form of capitalism (in the first world) compared to what existed until the 30's (just read any accounts factories and slums in American and European cities in the 19th century). Also, the countries that experienced socialism and communism were a lot less developed going into Communism then American and Europe, so its an unfair comparison that people often make to say that America has a higher standard of living than Russia and this must be because of Capitalism vs. Communism.

Murat Keyder

No but it has been modified to to make capitalism look beautiful. What I mean is that a lot of leaders claim to be socialists but when you have a tight grasp of Marxism you'll know that they aren't. The struggle continues until classes in the society exists.

Reena Salvador

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