The Inevitable Failure of Communism in 20th Century

At the end of World War II, half of the globe was red. By the end of last century, I guess nobody will believe in Communism anymore. As China becomes more and more capitalist since then, its economy has paid back. Growing up in China, I blame the impracticality of Communism for all kinds of mistakes happened in 20^th century, including the Great Famine (1960-62), the Great Leap Forward (1963-66), the Cultural Revolution (1966-76), and things happened in 1989 (Personally I do fell uncomfortable naming this incident). As I get older, I saw the failure of Communism as a misunderstanding of Marxism. In USSR, it is the Leninism and the Stalinism, and in China, it is the Maoism, that distorts Marxism. Even if all of them correctly understand Marx, and tries to follow his instructions, the failure is still inevitable, as Marx would say.

The reasoning is simple. The world has not met two premises that Marx emphasizes in “The Germany Ideology”:

First, there are too many “lures” in the world. Marx believes that the “intolerable” power “must necessarily have rendered the great mass of humanity ‘propertyless’ (p161).” This “propertyless” makes each country become dependent to each other, and achieve world-historical so that this form of world could last forever (p162). However, in the last century, not all countries are communist. Therefore, western countries were not only a dependence for the Communist states. Instead, they show too much non-political elements, as I called “lures” to the Communist states. Wealth, education, fame etc. play a large enough role to acknowledge the property and to negate the “propertyless.” Therefore, the first premise Marx stresses does not exist.

Second, the phase of global development has not achieved to the extent that Marx thinks it may fit Communism. Marx denies the possibility of achieving Communism “because without [productive forces] want is merely made general, and with destitution the struggle for necessities and all the old filthy business would necessarily be reproduced.” Back in the 20^th century, none of the Communist state was well-off enough to claim that they are ready for Communism. But this premise paradoxically explains the call for the Great Leap Forward in the early 60s, for the Chinese government was trying to increase its productivity to achieve the premise that Marx posts in his paper.

P.S. A brief introduction of the Great Leap Forward: The Great Leap Forward is basically a period that China, by giving up everything else, focused on the production of iron and steel, for they are the symbol of industrialization and production. There was a very famous slogan at that time: surpassing Britain and catching up with America. (Paradoxically, China regards Britain and America as the most industrialized countries instead of the USSR at that time.)