@Frankenstein Black: Since when is North Korea anything close to communism? It's a pure totalitarian dictatorship. Nobody works for the common good, everyone just works to further Kim Jong Il. It's about as much of a communism as Iraq was under Saddam. I'm not even positive they even use the term communism for themselves(I should probably know that... took a whole course on NK, but just can't remember what they refer to themselves as, since it doesn't really matter anyway).
well the chinese refer to themselves as communists and they are the most furiously capitalist country on the planet, 13 hour workdays and no workers rights
i think north korea calls itself a "democratic republic" which is as close to the truth as the chinese being communists
@Verythrax: OK, that's actually pretty much the exact opposite of the truth. The Chinese claim to be communist but are actually pretty much a complete capitalism. I can't even remember what the North Koreans claim to be at this point but in reality they have next to no economy, it's pretty much just work to make Kim Jong Il more powerful. Perhaps you're mistaking communism with totalitarianism? Communism is an economic structure which has yet to have any large scale implementation(regardless of what certain countries claim).
...and having looked it up North Korea has a Socialist command economy(per wikipedia... not perfect but good enough for this). So neither one is communist. China is a capitalism that claims to be communist, North Korea is a socialism.
Considering that communism needs that the propriety of the means of production, yes they both are communists. The fact that they can buy things now, and they live or not in a totalitarian state is unimportant - but it's an AMAZING coincidence that all communist countries in history are or where dictatorships.
@Verythrax: Not really sure what you mean by that, since it looks like you had a few typos. Regardless, almost everything in China(including businesses and the means of production) is privately owned and what remains is property of the state(note: in this case that does NOT make it the property of the people at large). Everything(again, including the means of production) in North Korea is property of the central party. Nothing is the property of the people at large. Communism dictates that the means of production must be owned equally by all the people living in the Communist state. You appear mistaking socialism for communism, since it's Socialism where the central government owns all the property. In fact, Communism is pretty much impossible without a pure democracy, without any central government, since it requires that the full means of production be under the ownership of the people at large.
According to marxist theory, in order to get from socialism to communism, you must first have a central government own everything, and then... well, it somehow becomes communism. Unfortunately, Marx never got around to how that is actually suppose to happen. It can be summed up as follows:
Thank you AP European History! From what I remember about communism, in the Russian form at least, it works like this. 1 People are naturally good. 2 Capitalist society makes them bad. 3 People need to be cut off from capitalism. 4 They need a strong government to make these choices for them because they won't do it themselves. 5 After a while, people will have become 'better' and wont need this government anymore. 6 The government fades away, and people live in a happy communist world with no governments or countries, where everybody is happy to do the job they are good at and get paid the same as everyone else. The end.
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Cool the city inabited by the party members get the goodies and the rest die from starvation. Good.
Hey, hey, hey! It's communism. Everyone is "equal" ;^/...
@Frankenstein Black: Since when is North Korea anything close to communism? It's a pure totalitarian dictatorship. Nobody works for the common good, everyone just works to further Kim Jong Il. It's about as much of a communism as Iraq was under Saddam. I'm not even positive they even use the term communism for themselves(I should probably know that... took a whole course on NK, but just can't remember what they refer to themselves as, since it doesn't really matter anyway).
well the chinese refer to themselves as communists and they are the most furiously capitalist country on the planet, 13 hour workdays and no workers rights
i think north korea calls itself a "democratic republic" which is as close to the truth as the chinese being communists
North Korea and China are communist countries, despite which rethoric is used, sorry.
but some are more equal than others....
They're not communist, they're fascist. If they do have aspects of communism then this isn't relevant to their totalitarianism.
@Verythrax: OK, that's actually pretty much the exact opposite of the truth. The Chinese claim to be communist but are actually pretty much a complete capitalism. I can't even remember what the North Koreans claim to be at this point but in reality they have next to no economy, it's pretty much just work to make Kim Jong Il more powerful. Perhaps you're mistaking communism with totalitarianism? Communism is an economic structure which has yet to have any large scale implementation(regardless of what certain countries claim).
* China isn't, North Korea is.
Juche is the philosophy that the North Koreans follow. It's like a warped, not-really-like-it-at-all form of communism.
Mark:
and it is about as functional as communism will ever get.
The end result is the same.
...and having looked it up North Korea has a Socialist command economy(per wikipedia... not perfect but good enough for this). So neither one is communist. China is a capitalism that claims to be communist, North Korea is a socialism.
Considering that communism needs that the propriety of the means of production, yes they both are communists. The fact that they can buy things now, and they live or not in a totalitarian state is unimportant - but it's an AMAZING coincidence that all communist countries in history are or where dictatorships.
@Verythrax: Not really sure what you mean by that, since it looks like you had a few typos. Regardless, almost everything in China(including businesses and the means of production) is privately owned and what remains is property of the state(note: in this case that does NOT make it the property of the people at large). Everything(again, including the means of production) in North Korea is property of the central party. Nothing is the property of the people at large. Communism dictates that the means of production must be owned equally by all the people living in the Communist state. You appear mistaking socialism for communism, since it's Socialism where the central government owns all the property. In fact, Communism is pretty much impossible without a pure democracy, without any central government, since it requires that the full means of production be under the ownership of the people at large.
According to marxist theory, in order to get from socialism to communism, you must first have a central government own everything, and then... well, it somehow becomes communism. Unfortunately, Marx never got around to how that is actually suppose to happen. It can be summed up as follows:
Step one: Socialism
Step two: ???
Step three: Communism!!!
...which probably explains why we have never seen true communism in action.
That, and people are not ants.
Wait... I thought stage 1 was collect underpants.
The CIA World Factbook says that North Korea is a "Communist state one-man dictatorship".
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/kn.html
Thank you AP European History!
From what I remember about communism, in the Russian form at least, it works like this.
1 People are naturally good.
2 Capitalist society makes them bad.
3 People need to be cut off from capitalism.
4 They need a strong government to make these choices for them because they won't do it themselves.
5 After a while, people will have become 'better' and wont need this government anymore.
6 The government fades away, and people live in a happy communist world with no governments or countries, where everybody is happy to do the job they are good at and get paid the same as everyone else.
The end.