Talk:Marxist-Leninist government

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This is a meaningless article that should be done away with and redirected to Communist state. The "Communist state" is an official, formal framwork of government. Other government-types include monarchy, constitutional monarchy, federal republic, republic, confederation, etc..

All forms of government have a theoretical basis for sovereignty. Sovereignty can be vested in the state, monarch, "the people" through their representatives, the whole body of citizens, and so on.

A "Communist state" is a republic officially structured in a certain way. According to the principles of Marxism-Leninism, soveriegnty rests in "the people" through a people's assembly constituted by members of a single Communist Party. In contrast, Chile under Allende, was not a Communist state. Even if a Marxist-Leninist Party dominates the country, it is not a "Communist state" until you have a new constitution set up according to Leninist principles. Some Communist parties operate within the framework of existing government structures. This is a strategic decision on their part depending on the context in which they are operating. If the Communist Party USA, for example, won every local, state, and national election in 2004, the United States would not officially be a "Communist state." It would be the same "federal republic" that it has been since 1789.

Yes, at times this can be meaningless in reality. But in an article on the "Communist state," we are not writing about the histories of all Communist states. The same goes for "monarchy." In the article on "monarchy," we are not writing the histories of all monarchial regimes.

Did they stop teaching all this at the high school level these days? So many readers see an article on government types and want and confuse it with the histories of the Soviet Union and Chile, for crying out loud.

I'll list this article on VFD shortly. 172 23:20, 6 Feb 2004 (UTC)

There's no need to list this on vfd if it is just a merge with Communist state.--Jiang 00:57, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)
VfD wasn't the place for the discussion, it appear, see below. Pete/Pcb21 (talk) 15:58, 9 Feb 2004 (UTC)

A while back, we had another user who knew what a government-type was. I am moving his comments down below:

It has just been taken from there. Communist state is a political science term about the constitutional system. This is about the political system that operates in communISM, not about the constitutional and legal process which is what Communist state is about. This is broader and more orientated to the practical issue of communism that communist state, which is theoretical and definitionary. Just as a discussion on the personal aspect on constitutional monarchy would not be placed on a page about the constitutional nature of CM but on separate related pages associated with individuals, so this should be dealt with, rewritten and allowed to grow independently of a page purely concerned with the legal/consitutional meaning of the political science term. communist state. ÉÍREman 22:50 May 8, 2003 (UTC)


Note the above, and then note that the following discussion occurred on VfD. Nothing got deleted... but further consideration on merging might be contemplated.

  • Marxist-Leninist government. See the talk page.
    • Funny thing; both articles: this and Communist state are almost of the same age; many active authors edited both of them, and nobody noticed that both are basically about the same ?!! Mikkalai
    • Keep. This needs to be hashed out more before anything can be done. Anthony DiPierro 12:20, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)
    • This does not seem to be a request to delete. The discussion should go on its talk page on whether and how to merge.--Jiang 12:48, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)
    • Keep. Shouldn't ever have been listed here. Andrewa 19:39, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Merger with Communist state will require that the sympathetic spin of that article be dealt with. This topic needs to be dealt with in more or less the same way as Nazism is. Fred Bauder 15:40, Feb 9, 2004 (UTC)