socialism is when there's a black person in my video game
communism is when there's a trans person
Any American born during the time of the Soviet Union has permanent brain poisoning regarding socialism and communism due to the massive amount of propaganda.
socialism is when the government does stuff, and it's more socialism the more stuff it does
and if it does a real lot of stuff, it's communism
Socialism is when the government does stuff.
Communism is when no food.
As others have stated - communism is the end goal, socialism is how we get there.
What this also means, of course, is that there are many different types of socialist countries and socialist projects and socialist ideologies.
Socialism describes one specific path though. What all approaches have in common is socializing of the means of production, abolition of private property and dictatorship of the proletariat, the last one meaning the exclusion of former economical and political elites from power.
The alternative to socialism is anarchism, where the end goal of communism, that is a stateless, classless society without hierarchies, is present in the means.
Communism: the end goal. The big lebowski. Socialism: the process to reach communism.
Socialism is when the government does stuff, and when the government does a whole lot of stuff, that's communism.
Socialism is to be understood by multiple definitions, which can be summed up in common parliance as:
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The entirety of leftist ideologies encompassing everything from anarchism to syndicalism, Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, democratic socialism and social democracy (with caveats).
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The abolition of private property of the means of production
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The transitional state between reactionary economic models (capitalism, feudalism, etc) and communism. Socialism in this context is an ongoing process which can take decades or centuries to build up.
Communism has but one definition: a stateless, moneyless, classless society. No state is communist or anarchist as there can be no concept of a state under communism, which means anyone claiming X country is communist has fundamentally misunderstood the principles of both socialism and communism from the outset. "Communist" countries do not claim to be such, but do have the intent to build towards communism via socialist principles.
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Socialism and communism can mean two things, either it is political ideologies or economic systems.
- As economic systems socialism is the dictatorship of the proletariat, a transitional state where the state still exists but is being run by the working class. The socialist society will eventually develop into a communist society where the state has withered away as have class distinctions, money and wage labour.
- As political ideologies, communism is describing those who wants to achieve a communist society and think the way to do it is through the transitional socialist society, whereas socialism is a much broader term describing those who promotes the interests and liberation of the working class. It encompasses communists, anarchists, democratic socialists and even, if you're being very generous, social democrats.
Socialism: dictatorship of the proletariat
Communism: no more DotP because there's no more classes, state has withered away as there are no longer any external or internal capitalist challenges
As I understand it socialism typically refers to a transitory state and the concept of the dictatorship of the proletariat. Communism is the end goal of both anarchists and socialists: A classless stateless society that can only be achieved through international revolutionary cooperation.
Utopian Socialism predates Scientific Socialism and is less a concrete idea and more of a misc category. It’s generally categorized as socialistic systems, state acting on behalf of the working etc etc, but without the historical materialistic perspective that Scientific Socialism provides. Utopians might believe that the ruling class can be convinced to give up their power voluntary. They may also believe that Communism is unfeasible or not desirable.
There is a lot of overlap between utopian socialism and modern radlibs and "left" social democrats.
Communism is from the German Ideology of 1846 (german version)
Communism is for us not a state of affairs which is to be established, an ideal to which reality [will] have to adjust itself. We call communism the real movement which abolishes the present state of things. The conditions of this movement result from the premises now in existence.
Der Kommunismus ist für uns nicht ein Zustand, der hergestellt werden soll, ein Ideal, wonach die Wirklichkeit sich zu richten haben [wird]. Wir nennen Kommunismus die wirkliche Bewegung, welche den jetzigen Zustand aufhebt. Die Bedingungen dieser Bewegung ergeben sich aus der jetzt bestehenden Voraussetzung.
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However Communism is our ideal. We are communists, cause communism is the best mode of societal living, in which love between humans can be most perfect fulfilled(*) and at the same time the human labour in producing goods of nature can be organized most productive. Therefore we have do propaganda everywhere and any times and in any deeds, so communism can be exemplified and be an experiment everywhere. As soon as the conditions enable it to be. Besides that we trust in freedom which is tool and aim of every human progress(**)
Der Kommunismus ist aber unser Ideal. Wir sind Kommunisten, weil der Kommunismus uns die beste Form gesellschaftlichen Zusammenlebens zu sein scheint, in der sich die Liebe zwischen den Menschen am vollständigsten verwirklichen kann und gleichzeitig die menschliche Anstrengung in der Erringung der Güter der Natur am produktivsten gestaltet werden kann. Und daher müssen wir ihn propagieren und ihn überall und in allen Tätigkeitsbereichen als Vorbild und Experiment praktizieren, sobald die Umstünde es uns erlauben. Im übrigen müssen wir Vertrauen in die Freiheit setzen, die stets Zweck und Mittel jedes menschlichen Fortschritts bleibt.
*: Therefore women in the GDR had more orgasms than in the capitalist west
**: Compare to Marx, Capital 3, Chapter 48:
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In fact, the realm of freedom actually begins only where labour which is determined by necessity and mundane considerations ceases thus in the very nature of things it lies beyond the sphere of actual material production. Just as the savage must wrestle with Nature to satisfy his wants, to maintain and reproduce life, so must civilised man, and he must do so in all social formations and under all possible modes of production. With his development this realm of physical necessity expands as a result of his wants; but, at the same time, the forces of production which satisfy these wants also increase. Freedom in this field can only consist in socialised man, the associated producers, rationally regulating their interchange with Nature, bringing it under their common control, instead of being ruled by it as by the blind forces of Nature; and achieving this with the least expenditure of energy and under conditions most favourable to, and worthy of, their human nature But it nonetheless still remains a realm of necessity. Beyond it begins that development of human energy which is an end in itself, the true realm of freedom, which, however, can blossom forth only with this realm of necessity as its basis The shortening of the working-day is its basic prerequisite.
Elaborations only, thought it might be nice to have cursory overviews about communism is.
You basically claim: I know no theory, yet say stuff that is compatible with it :curious-marx:
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Again, like to Marx times, communists as proletarian revolutionary and socialism as bourgeois-reformist movement clash. And the new communism is not just a reprint of the lessons of radical social democracy. From the world's crisis he won new insights, which far surpass those of the old tenets. The difference of those lessons we are about to examine.
Wieder, wie zu Marx' Zeiten, stehen sich der Kommunismus als proletarisch-revolutionäre und der Sozialismus als bürgerlich-reformerische Richtung gegenüber. Und der neue Kommunismus ist nicht einfach eine Neuauflage der Lehre der radikalen Sozialdemokratie. Aus der Weltkrise hat er neue Einsichten gewonnen, die ihn weit über jene alte Lehre hinausheben. Den Unterschied dieser Lehren wollen wir jetzt betrachten.
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The industrial workers and poor peasants (from now on proletariat), are the two forces of the proletarian revolution. For them specifically the Communism is an existential necessity: it means live and freedom, the continuation of private property on the other hand means an immediate danger for the labourers and peasants; to be ground down and lose everything but meager physical existence.
Workers and peasants are the irreducible element, the continuity of revolutionary enthusiasm; they are the iron will, which is not satisfied with any compromise, relentless till their goals are achieved in full, without being demoralized with temporary missteps or failures, without any illusion about easy successes.
They are the backbone of the revolution, the iron battalions of the forward marching proletariat, which through their momentum will surpass barriers or siege them with their mass of bodies, till in patient work, with incredible sacrifices it is gnawed away.
Communism is their civilization, the system of historic conditions in which they gain a personality, a dignity, a culture, for it they become creative minds of progress and beauty.
Every revolutionary work contains the chance of success, if it is in accordance with the workers' and peasants' necessities of life, the demands of their culture. That this is absolutely essential the leaders of proletarian and socialists movement ought to grasp. They also ought to conceive how urgent the problem is to give those invincible forces of revolution a form which matches their most commonly spread psychology.
German quote
Die Industriearbeiter und die armen Bauern sind die beiden Energien der proletarischen Revolution. Für sie besonders ist der Kommunismus eine existentielle Notwendigkeit: er bedeutet Leben und Freiheit, die Beibehaltung des Privateigentums dagegen bedeutet die unmittelbare Gefahr für Arbeiter und Bauern, zerrieben zu werden und bis auf das körperliche Leben alles zu verlieren. Arbeiter und Bauern sind das irreduzible Element, die Kontinuität des revolutionären Enthusiasmus; sie sind der eiserne Wille, keine Kompromisse anzunehmen, unerbittlich bis zur vollen Verwirklichung der Ziele weiterzugehen, ohne sich durch teilweise und vorübergehende Mißerfolge demoralisieren zu lassen, ohne sich allzu viele Illusionen über leichte Erfolge zu machen.
Sie sind das Rückgrat der Revolution, die eisernen Bataillone des voranrückenden Proletariats, die durch ihren Schwung die Hindernisse überwinden, oder sie mit ihrer Menschenflut belagern, sie mit geduldiger Arbeit, mit unermüdlichem Opfer zerbröseln und zernagen. Der Kommunismus ist ihre Zivilisation, ist das System historischer Bedingungen, unter denen sie eine Persönlichkeit, eine Würde, eine Kultur erwerben, für ihn werden sie schöpferischer Geist des Fortschritts und der Schönheit.
Jede revolutionäre Arbeit trägt die Wahrscheinlichkeit des Gelingens in sich, wenn sie den Lebensnotwendigkeiten der Arbeiter und Bauern, den Erfordernissen ihrer Kultur entspricht. Daß dies unumgänglich ist, sollten die Führer der proletarischen und sozialistischen Bewegung begreifen. Und sie sollten begreifen, wie drängend das Problem ist, diesen unbezwingbaren Kräften der Revolution eine Form zu geben, die ihrer nun weitverbreiteten Psychologie entspricht.
Communism to me is essentially post-scarcity socialism. A stateless, classless, moneyless society.
Historically, socialism was the petit bourg radicals, and communism was the workers' own movement. Maybe still relevant, maybe not.
