Capitalism Vs Communism Essay, Research Paper
Capitalism is an economic system characterized by private or corporate ownership of capital goods, by investments that are determined by private decision, and by prices, production, and the distribution of goods that are determined mainly by competition in a free market.
Communism is a theory advocating elimination of private property, a system in which goods are owned in common and are available to all as needed, a final stage of society in Marxist theory in which the state has withered away and economic goods are distributed equitably
In a free market society, business rules the land. Either you have money or you do not. There is no government to take care of you and no sympathy for those less fortunate. Karl Marx saw this as a weakness rather than strength. He developed a theory of communism, where the people rule and everything is equally shared. Russia took to this theory and enveloped it, as it’s own way of life. Were Communism and Lenin just in the right place at the right time? Why did Russia and its people take to such a way of life? What made it so appealing to them and, to soon, the rest of what would soon become the Soviet Union?
The people of Russia were looking for something new, a change from the dictatorship czarist government where they had no say in what happened to laws etc. They showed that they wanted change with first the Revolution of 1905, which was unsuccessful in overthrowing the government but led the way to a constitutional monarchy. Furthermore, it paved the way to the more publicized, more popular and much more successful Revolution of 1917, which triggered the Russian civil war. Russia was in a period of depression, since entering the war they suffered huge losses, not only by the loss of millions of lives, but also the government had lost most of the support it had from the lower class. Most people that had migrated to the cities in search of work during the war-factories boom, Russia’s currency had lost its value to the point where people were burning it for a source of heat rather than a source of buying power. Thousands of people were rioting to be fed by their government that had failed to assure them during the war that everything would be all right.
The people of Russia were sick of the czar and its family getting richer, while they were just getting poorer and poorer. While the rest of the world was on its way threw the industrial revolution; most of Russia (approximately 95%) were still suburban farmers! In my opinion, communism and more specifically Lenin were just in the right place at the right time. Russia was just looking for someone to tell them what they wanted to hear, “everyone will be equal, from the leader of the country to the lowest peasant” and ” The czar will not be getting richer while the people of its continue to suffer.” Ross Perot with the idea of socialism could have held a revolution in Russia at that time; it could have been nearly anyone with any idea that could have done what Lenin did.
Communism was supported mainly by the working class, the upper class and those who where rich that did not suffer great losses financially were greatly opposed to communism and its ideals. This was because they did not want to be lowered to the level of the poorer classes. This would most likely happen because the basic principals behind communism is that everyone is equal, everything is owned by the people but controlled by the state; and that nobody is different (which would prove to be one of the greater flaws that would lead to the downfall of the Communist/Soviet regime). For these reasons, this also why Communism worked for such a long time. The majority of the population, which asked for a revolution, and the overthrow of the government, there cries where heard and taken advantage of by Lenin, who saw that he could overthrow the Dictatorship of the Czar and take control of the country. Russia’s people were sick of being told what to do, and that the only reason they were there was to serve the Czar. But now there were led to believe that they had a say and that they were in control of their futures and that they were there to serve each other, through the state, to better their own lives instead of the leader of their own country.
In 1922 the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was created after the end of the Russian civil war. It was lead by Joseph Stalin and originally had four countries including Russia under his power, by 1940 fifteen other countries had joined what had come to be known as the Soviet Union. Russia and the other countries that had joined the Soviet Union under a communist government had all “elected” to have this type of government for the same reasons. They had suffered huge losses during the First World War, the Russian Revolution of 1917 and W.W.II. The original communists hoped to have a classless society where there was no rich or poor, and this was what was so appealing to the people of Russia and what had become the Soviet Union.
The people of Russia and the Soviet Union had suffered greatly during the first world war, the Russian Revolution of 1917 and W.W.II.