Talk:Socialist state/Archive 3

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Archive This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

The arguments against including Fred Bauder's personal theories have been repeatedly and laboriously well-stated by many contributors. I’m just going to lay them all out right now once again for contributors who have belatedly tried to step in and restore his essay.

Tannin, like everyone else who has observed this ongoing row, is correct. If you can produce a balanced text, it can indeed be included in a relevant article. But this is NOT the article. This is, as everyone else who has touched this article (bar Adam, of course) is agreed, explicitly dealing with a political science definition of the political science term 'communist state'. It is not an article on communism, a fact that you alone on wikpedia seem to have great difficulty in grasping but an article exclusively on a system of government, just as the article on federalism is on a system of government, not on the politics within a particular federal system, just as the article on devolution is on devolution, not on the politics of a state with devolved system of government, just as constitutional monarchy is about a system, not a discussion on the politics of monarchies. At this stage the number of people who have read your contribution and view it as unbalanced is growing constantly. And even if it was balanced, people are almost universally agreed that you are putting it in the wrong article. So constant attempts to put irrelevant information (even if balanced, and this is a long long way from balanced) into the wrong article will simply be reverted as often as necessary. At this stage, the only question is which of a long line of people who have criticised your additions will be the first to do the reversion each time you add in irrelevant material. So for your own sake, don't keep wasting your own time and effort trying to put your information into the wrong article that will never be allowed stay there. Rewrite it in a balanced way and put it into an article where it is relevant, whether communism, the history of the USSR, China or wherever. But it is not going here, where it is 100% irrelevant. ÉÍREman 14:17 Apr 27, 2003 (UTC)

"an article exclusively on a system of government"

OH boy. How many times and how many people have to explain it. A system of government deals with two issues: the constitutional structures and how they work. In this case, it involves the concept of government as held within communism and the manner in which in a Cs of government, unlike in liberal democracies party and constitutional structures are embedded in each other. The general characteristics of a political system belong in an article on the political system or on history, not here. Jeez. How come you have such difficulty grasping a fundamental characteristics of this article, when no-one else can? Your information if well written belongs in an article. But simply not this one because it is as irrelevant here as discussing George W. Bush's linguistic dexterity in an article on Federal Republics, or a piece on Prince Charles's sex life in an article on the constitutional concept of constitutional monarchy. Please stop making a fool of yourself here with this battle you are not going to win. ÉÍREman 14:30 Apr 27, 2003 (UTC)


How can ONE PERSON be so utterly incapable of understanding what a political science term is, what belongs in an article on a political science term and what doesn't? How many revertions will be necessary for him to cop on that he is 100% wrong, the stuff is 100% irrelevant and it has 0% of being left in the article? 20 revertions? fifty reversions? ÉÍREman 23:41 Apr 27, 2003 (UTC)

The primary issue here, Mav, is not the appropriateness of Fred's edit (yes, it's a POV rant, but that is a secondary issue), it is his persistent violation of intellectual homesty and courtesy to other contributors by marking major edits minor. Simply, this is unacceptable behaviour.
With that said, your totalitarianism or totalitarian state suggestion is a good one. However, there would need to be some heavy editing done on Fred's POV rant which, while it (quite correctly) lists a series of human rights violations in the Soviet Union, for example, entirely fails to mention the extraordinary economic development that took place there in the years (roughly) 1920 - 1960: the massive improvements in education, or the (very expensive) provision of basic health care to all. These undoubted achievements must stand beside the equally undoubted failures. To mention either one without the other is highly POV.
(I expect Cunc will be along shortly to correct my abuse of the language by using "POV" as an adjective. I plead guilty as charged.) Tannin


This article is simply about a governmental system, no more and no less. It is not among communism and a debate on communism as a political system, which by definition belongs in articles on history, political science, or different articles on definitions, specificially something such a totalitarianism. The name of the article is clear. Communist state, ie the state structure in communist states, and in specific terms how the governmental-party relationship in the process of governance, and how that is a product of the concept of leadership within marxism-lenninism. Details of the politics and history of a system belongs in an article on such issues, not in an article that is not specifically on the topic, but or a narrow segment, namely the definition of a particular governmental issue. ÉÍREman 22:08 Apr 28, 2003 (UTC)

Re Sirub's comments, if one is writing an article on a bicycle, you don't throw into it a discussion on everything to do with transport. You mention other forms of transport in terms of their relationship to bicycles and transport but don't have a lets mention everything approach. You link the article to related articles on cars, buses, pollution, transportation policy etc etc. But the article would be primarily on bicycles. We don't have a 'lets mention absolutely everything approach on a topic. This is a specific topic on a specific political science definition, something taught to billions of students worldwide. Academics do not have a 'Lets discuss everything anyone can think of relating to this topic', they deal with aspects, building blocks which when assembled together provide a broad analysis. We do that through linked articles, not throwing everything into the one pot so that individual elements of information are swamped and lost. ÉÍREman 22:08 Apr 28, 2003 (UTC)


Hold on a moment, Mav. This article was created because people didn't know what the term communist state, a standard term taught to 'political science', 'politics', 'political economy', 'history', 'politics of government', 'world states', 'leadership' and other students worldwide. meant. Now you have a problem with . . . defining a term some people did not seem to understand, to enable them to understand it. And your problem is that, in defining the term, it doesn't include things that aren't part of the term. So in other words, because people do not understand a term, you shouldn't include a definition unless it make it so broad and meaningless that it no longer defines the term it was created to define. Tell me, when you are writing about something in biology, do you write about it or about anything sort of linked, in a kinda way, by anyone to it? And do you take exception to someone writing about a biological fact as a biological because, shudder the thought, it might be based on a biological definition? And no, there is NO DISAGREEMENT WHATSOEVER about what the term 'communist state' means. There is a dispute over the meaning of communism in a political sense, there are issues over political, ideological and other nomenclature, but NONE on the specific term used to define a particular system in which a marxist-lenninist communist party operates in a one-party system which blurs the meaning of state and party to produce a hybrid that is unique to such systems. That is ALL this article is about; a political system with a communist party one party system operating a hybrid governmental model. How communist is a communist party, is it pseudo-communist, psuedo-capitalist, self-proclaimed socialist of the French, Scandanavian, Italian, Portuguese, British, US, Indian, Turkish or South African understanding of the term, is not the issue because the model, as students of politics who have studied the issue know, the term 'communist state' is centred on the governmental structure of the 'state', hence its use in the term, NOT on the nature of 'communist' within that state. Already we have rows because wiki seems to have a 'problem' accepting that it should get terms to do with flaura and fauna. Now there is a problem using a term that, shock, horror, is based in political science. Does wiki have a problem with intellectualism? Does it want everything dumbed down to some sort of meaningless third rate mediocrity that offers nothing of any intellectual depth, anything that might enable them to learn? Maybe we should just abandon any attempt at standards altogether and just fill wiki with more stupid lists about nothing of any importance. ÉÍREman 23:02 Apr 28, 2003 (UTC)

Do you know the damn difference between opinion and proper content for an encyclopedia? We don't need Fred's personal theories (especially from a user who created a misspelled link to politbureau) in an article not even pertaining to those theories. 172

Fred, get it through your dense skull that this isn't an article on the Soviet Union but a government-type. Do you understand, for instance, that atrocities against Native Americans or the role of the US government in the rise of Pol Pot would not belong in an article on "federal republic", the government-type of the US?


Aside from that, only a few sentences of the rant that you want to add would be salvageable in any other article. It's propaganda that ignores the varying conditions of Communist states from East Germany to Vietnam, the varying economic structures from Hungary to North Korea, the varying type of resource allocation from centrally planned economies (CPEs) of the Soviet-type to China's mixed economy, variations in politics from Stalinism to bureaucratic pluralism, and ideological schisms like the ones between China and the USSR since Khrushchev or between Yugoslavia and the USSR. Under Communist governments from 1917 to the present there has not been a single mode of development, a single monolithic ideology and social system in the Communist world due to differences in historical conditions, social systems, development levels, cultural traditions and concepts of values. While Communists have seized power in mostly agrarian countries, initial conditions varied greatly. Keep in mind that a quarter of the world's population lives under Communist states today, down from one-third before 1989. In contrast, you have a highly-oversimplified, elementary grasp of one era, the Stalinist era in Russia, and you confuse that with all other Communist states along with your own unique analysis of the disillusion of the Soviet Union. Your contributions, in short, come nowhere close to scholarly history even if they pertained to the topic of this article. 172

Fred is misleading to the point of being a liar in his charges that JTD, Tannin, and I share a 'pro-Communist revisionist bias'. I actually added valid NPOV contributions on the same issues that he attempted to raise, like the Great Purges, the social consequences of collectivization under Stalin, the stagnation of the centrally planned Soviet economy since the 1970s, the destabilizing effects of the Cultural Revolution, and the aftermath of the Great Leap forward in many other articles. But his charges are so absurd that I'm actually embarrassed to dignify those charges with a response. 172

I would be more supportive of 172's position had he not reverted some of my changes without explanation. Those changes were (with my original edit summaries in italicised brackets):

  • change [[Trotskyist]]s to [[Trotskyism|Trotskyist]]s (reinstating part of Fred Bauder's edit that was incorrectly reverted)
  • intro, (remove "is a term", which is a "refers to" badness)

I'm going to reinstate these edits. In future, 172, when you decide to revert Fred's "vandalism" (sorry, I mean "VANDALISM"), please refrain from catching third parties in the cross-fire. Thank you. Martin

I also note that in your revert you changed "applicability" back to its previous, incorrect, spelling. Martin

I'm very sorry, but this was an oversight on my part. I didn't realize that after Fred restored his bullshit some users made some valid contributions. 172

Thank you for your apology. However, I do have a few further points, I'm afraid.
Firstly, I made my edits before Fred made his most recent edit to this article.
Secondly, I note that the large chunk of "bullshit" was not restored by Fred, but by The Cunctator, with the edit summary (Restoring text of general characteristics of the communist state)
Thirdly, I note that the correction of the link to Trotskyism has been made a large number of times by Fred, and every time it has been reverted by one or another of his opponents.
Fourthly, I note that Roadrunner's grammar corrections have also had the same treatment.
I understand that in edit wars tempers can get a little frayed, and perhaps not as much attention is paid to detail as perhaps it should be. However, I should note that having my edits reverted in this way doesn't do wonders for my temper either.
Finally, the following text, which was partly based on my edits, and partly based on Fred's, was reverted. It looks reasonably accurate and neutral to me, but I might be missing some subtle political science point here, so I offer it up for further examination below. Martin
Anti-Marxist one party states such as Nazi Germany and authoritarian regimes such as 1960s Taiwan do not adhere to Marxism-Leninism and are therefore not communist states. Similarly, the government of the Indian state of Kerala, while Marxist-Leninist, operates in a multiparty framework. Communist states which have existed during the 20th century include the Soviet Union, (and its satellites Poland, East Germany, Hungary, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Romania and Mongolia), The People's Republic of China, Albania, Yugoslavia, Cuba, Viet Nam and North Korea. The Soviet Union, its satellites including Mongolia, and Romania, Albania and Yugoslavia abandoned Communism in the early 1990s. The People's Republic of China has significantly modified its system and now significantly deviates from the general pattern. Cuba and Viet Nam remain communist states, but differ somewhat from the general pattern. North Korea remains a traditional totalitarian communist state.

After reading this article for the first time, I'm thinking to myself "Gee, maybe communist states aren't so bad after all!" But the historical evidence is that every "communist state" has had to maintain its position by large-scale abuse of human rights - it's not just a matter of labelling someone "counterrevolutionary or an enemy of the people", which sounds pretty innocuous, like something a newspaper columnist might write about a politician, but that the labelling is followed up by convictions and imprisonment, forced unemployment, harassment of relatives, etc. The article doesn't need to go into depth, but its cross-refs and waffle words are subtly structured to give the whole thing the flavor of a Marxist apology. It would be more intellectually honest to follow up the theoretical discussion with at least the list of agreed-upon communist states and their dates for the system, plus whether they were considered totalitarian, authoritarian, etc. This isn't the Great Soviet Encyclopedia, we won't be punished for pointing out failures! Stan 23:20 May 7, 2003 (UTC)

It is a fair point, Stan, except this article isn't on communist states or on communism but simply on a system of government in communist systems operating under Marxist-Leninism in which state and party become so utterly entwined that they are inseparable in a way unheard of in pluralist democracies, where the party system produces competing political elites who government through state, not party structures. As it is edited, this article keeps moving away from the definition and into broader discussions of communism that really belongs in other articles, perhaps linked to this one. That was the central problem with Fred's edits; he kept trying to add in more and more about communism and straying away from a simple political science definition of a system of government, even if his content was NPOV, which it wasn't. The problem here was that because people didn't know what communist state meant, this article was created, only to have people them add to it in such a way as to obscure the actual definition and go into a broad critique of communism, replicating here what is in other articles and which is not relevant to the simple political science definition of communist state, the definition of which is why this article was created in the first place. ÉÍREman 23:36 May 7, 2003 (UTC)

Yes, I see that there are more talk page links to this article than real links from articles, ugh - but I'd say that's a fault in other articles. For instance, Laos uses the term "communist state" without linking to the article. Still, as part of being encyclopedic, once you have the abstract definition and general characteristics, there ought be a comprehensive table of real-life examples of states that fit the definition. Otherwise how will the reader be able to find them? Communism mentions a few offhandedly, but it's hardly complete. Perhaps I should take a break from ships and planes and bacteria :-), create the List of communist states. The list might also help direct energy away from the general definition and towards the issues with specific states. Stan 00:42 May 8, 2003 (UTC)

That's a good idea. This page was created because a row over what the term meant on the China page. Fred kept removing it saying no-one knew what it meant. So I started this page so it could be defined as a compromise. Then Fred came here and kept adding in irrelevant POV bits here. We were all so busy dealing with Fred here that for days we could do nothing else (and were all mighty pissed off to be stuck here. I had two pages I kept trying to work on, only to find that Fred had slipped in his stuff again and I'd have to go back. Though in the end, by the time I went back, a queue of people would be forming to do the reversions. Jeez, when someone totted up the number of times his reversions had to be reverted, it was nearly 20!) Now that we have the term defined, it should definitely be linked to all the states that use or used that term. I was so knackered after the experience of the battle here that I ended up going off wiki for a few days to recover!!! ÉÍREman 01:03 May 8, 2003 (UTC)


On Fred Bauder's vandalism:

Why even respond to these charges? No article is there to convey why Communist states "aren't so bad after all". Conversely, no article is there to convey why communist states are "so bad after all." This site has an NPOV policy. Tell these people to go away from this site with their political agendas. I've written content, as I've mentioned, on the Great Purges, the social consequences of collectivization under Stalin, the stagnation of the centrally planned Soviet economy since the 1970s, the destabilizing effects of the Cultural Revolution, and the aftermath of the Great Leap Forward in many other articles. But I didn't add that content to demonstrate why Communist states are so bad after all.

Like all history, the history of Communist states since 1917 onward to today is varied and complex, often since they're presiding over revolutionary social changes. If this site's going to be an illuminating sourcebook then we need to move past writing articles espousing simplistic qualitative political points.

To give contributors an idea how absurd Fred's additions are let me turn his notions upside down just to make a point about being misleading and simplistic. For instance, I'd also reject someone trying to say that one of the characteristics of the Communist state would be the near-elimination of poverty and the doubling of life expectancy, even though these two trends were undoubtedly witnessed in the two largest Communist states, China and the Soviet Union. You could even say that rapid growth without inflation or with low inflation is a characteristic of the Communist state! Stalinist Russia industrialized more rapidly than any country in history with no inflation and China has been sustaining one of the world's highest rates of per capita GDP growth over the past two decades with low inflation. You could even make the argument that Communist states have greatly liberalized many societies, opening the doors for new opportunities for women, liberating workers from feudal or quasi-feudal landlords, revolutionizing society whereby individuals have the opportunity to choose their own professions as opposed to having them determined by family origin, and laying the groundwork for individuals to enjoy more individual freedom than ever before in history. All of these trends have been evident in China, where modern Chinese are now free from their landlords and extended families, unlike in 1949. However, for these trends to be listed as characteristics of the Communist state would be utterly ridiculous. These trends occurred due to a complex range of factors. The unfortunate aspect of history, like statistics, is that a propagandist is free to conflate correlation with causation to suggest whatever damn point that he'd like. Wikipedia, however, demands scholarly history, not propaganda. We do not need to be making such sweeping claims in favor of Communism or against it. That's why historians warn of sweeping generalizations incessantly.

I've written much on the stagnation of the Soviet Union's centrally planned economy, but with evidence and attention to the context of the period. I've pointed out evidence that the Soviet CPE met the goals for extensive growth, but failed when it came to intensive growth. But you cannot extend that narrative to other Communist states automatically. Keep in mind the varying economic structures of Communist states from China's dynamic market economy to the heavily militarized, heavily regimented, and very austere North Korea. As I've said earlier, under Communist governments from 1917 to the present there has not been a single mode of development, a single monolithic ideology and social system in the Communist world. And this is no surprise when different variations of this ideology have been applied from industrialized East Germany to Vietnam, one of the poorest countries in the world, and other countries with huge differences in historical conditions, social systems, development levels, cultural traditions, and geo-political challenges.

BTW, there is no need to counter the statements that I've made. I just made these statements to make a point. I AM NOT ENDORSING THESE VIEWS REGARDING THE CHARACTERISTICS OF THE COMMUNIST STATE. I WROTE SIMPLISTIC COMMENTS FOR THE SAKE OF POINTING OUT WHY WE WANT TO AVOID SWEEPING GENERALIZATIONS.

172

Oh great. Now we have another person (The Cunctator) who doesn't know what a definition is and is trying to add in stuff into the wrong page. How many more reversions are going to have to be made before one or two people get their heads around the fact that this is a political science definition page. It is not about communism. ÉÍREman 04:29 May 8, 2003 (UTC)

Oh great. Now we have another person who doesn't know what a definition is and is trying to add in stuff into the wrong page?

Remember, I argued along with you that this was a political science definition and that no content pertaining to the "characteristics" of a Communist state belonged in the article.

I was just rejecting the presumption on the part of many contributors that while Fred's posting maybe not belong in this particular article, they'd be valid in an article pertaining to Communism or totalitarianism. I just wanted to make the point that his postings were not up to the standards of Wikipedia, though I agree with that many had a strong basis in reality, especially regarding the Stalinist variant of Communism, especially considering North Korea. I do know that in principle that I should post this content elsewhere with maybe just a link to it in the Communist state talk page, but I decided (perhaps wrongly) that I might as well just post it there since it would be in a more frequented location where it would make the point to as many contributors as possible. I figured that if others rejected both the appropriateness of Fred's content in this particular article as well as its content in any article, that the debate would die down.

I agree with you COMPLETELY that this is an article on a political science term that has no need to discuss "characteristics", like in all other sourcebooks and encyclopedias. I would even remove valid content on its "characteristics" if it were posted. In fact, I believe that I had. I just posted those comments on that page due to a tactical decision, not ignorance. I'm surprised that you didn't have faith in me being able to realize that! 172

Opps. The above wasn't about you, 172. It was about The Cunctator who was adding in Fred's old stuff to the article. ÉÍREman 05:21 May 8, 2003 (UTC)

My mistake. Communicating on Wikipedia or anywhere else online is tricky! 172

You know, it might be a losing battle to try to constrain the contents of this article so narrowly. The content of a wiki page can't be controlled singlehandedly; it can only stabilize if all the potential editors agree on the content. There are stable pages, so it is possible, but a title like "communist state" is a lightning rod just like Arab-Israeli conflict. It's not unreasonable for a generically-named article like "communist state" to attract additions that talk about general characteristics - there's nothing in the title that says "this is only a definition, unlike other articles with generic names". If you want an article with just the definition, it would be easier to stabilize under a title like "definition of communist state", and to leave "communist state" as more of an index to topics concerning communist states (about whom there is much to be said, much more than will fit in one article). Stan 05:24 May 8, 2003 (UTC)

I hope in my latest edits I have made some progress toward an article we can all live with. I ask you to not engage in further wholesales deletions of mine or anyone else's factually based material either here or in any other article. Please make edits which add value to the existing article. Fred Bauder 12:56 May 8, 2003 (UTC)

No. They simply try yet another way of adding in stuff that belongs to another article, not this one. How many people have to repeat the fact that this is about political science definition. Are you intellectually incapable of grasping what just about everyone else who has come to this page has grasped? Only stuff that is explicitly to do with a political science definition of what communist state is: a governmental system operating under principles of marxism-leninism in which state and party structures are blurred, allowing people in the former to exercise control that in pluralistic democracies would exclusively be exercised by means of the former. Is that still too hard for you to grasp? Anything that does not focus on that narrow area and which ramples off into irrelevant detail about communISM will be reverted every single time. The stuff you keep trying to add in has nothing to do with communist state and everything to do with the nature of communism, which is a different but related thing, just as federal republic and the United States of America are related topics, constitutional monarchy and the crisis of the Prince of Wales' marriage are related topics. But federal republic is not about the United States of America, constitutional monarchy is not about the Prince of Wales' marriage and communist state is not about communism, it is about a system of government. Specific stuff on communism, like specific stuff of Charles' marriage or on the US belongs in those articles, not the ones simply defining a political science term. Anything that is not to do with political science topic but which is about the analysis of communism will be removed as many times as it takes. So you are wasting your time trying to force your stuff on this article. It is not going to be allowed to stay, even if it takes another 20 revertions or more. Please put it in the correct article, not the wrong one. ÉÍREman 13:29 May 8, 2003 (UTC)

So what better article is there to to talk about the real-life things that go on in communist states? It's extremely unusual to insist that an article cannot include random material that is directly related to the topic. For instance, while Charles' marriage was irrelevant to constitutional monarchy, Edward VIII's marriage was relevant, and I think it would be completely reasonable to mention it and its connection in an article about constitutional monarchy. Given that, what is it about "communist state" that requires it to be treated differently from all other Wikipedia articles? The repeated summary deletion of factual material, with no attempt to mention a specific article where it should go, or to move it to a better place oneself, is starting to look to me more like an attempt to push a POV, not a serious effort to make more and better articles. Stan 20:16 May 8, 2003 (UTC)
Stan, Edward VIII would only be relevant in an article on constitutional monarchy in terms of analysing the constitutional issues raised by abdication. The details of Edward VIII and his marital woes would be covered by a link to Abdication Crisis of 1936. Anyone who tried to turn an article on constitutional monarchy into a discussion of Edward VIII's relationship with Lady Furness, Mrs. Simpson' simultaneous affairs with the King and the Duke of Leinster, or rumours about her sexual techniques and Queen Mary's belief that it was through those techniques that Mrs. Simpson kept a 'hold' on the Prince/King (no pun intended!) would be greeted by a chorus of 'hold on a minute. This is an article on constitutional monarchy. That belongs in pages on King Edward, on Wallis Simpson or British history (maybe even sexual techniques but not in a page describing a constitutional system. If there isn't an article, then Fred should create one, not keep adding it in to the wrong article.

Socialist state

I was reading in a history book about Marxism when I read it, it said "workers are exploted by employer"or somthing like that,and I thought. That doesn't sound like Communism at all Communism is "workers in a worker's state"