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Academy Resources Glossary of Philosophical Terms Timeline of Philosophy A Timeline of American Philosophy Diagram: Development of Philosophic Thought Diagram: Divisions of Philosophy The Philosophy Resource Center The Religion Resource Center Books about Philosophy in The Radical Academy Bookstore Books about Religion in The Radical Academy Bookstore Click Here for New & Used College Textbooks at Discount Prices Click Here for College Education Information & Study Resources Shop Amazon Stores in the Radical Academy Bookstore Magazine Outlet Music Store Classical Music Store Video Store DVD Store Computer Store Camera & Photo Store Computer/Video Games Software Store Musical Instruments Outlet Store Cellular Phones Toys & Games Tools & Hardware Automotive Store Outdoor Living Consumer Electronics Home & Garden Kitchen & Housewares Baby Superstore Apparel & Accessories Gourmet Food Grocery Store Sporting Goods Jewelry & Watches Health & Personal Care Beauty Store		Mortimer Adler: On Communism and Socialism   To the entry under Capitalism and Socialism, I add here some comments on the seventy-year experiment with communism in the Soviet Union. Though Lenin and Leon Trotsky, apostles of Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, aimed at the socialist ideal in 1917, the communist experiment defeated their attempt to produce a truly democratic and socialist society. Until Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin appeared on the scene in the 1980s, the Communist Party did not realize that neither democracy nor socialism could be accomplished by abolishing the private ownership of capital and by preventing a free-market economy. Lenin had said, of course, that the dictatorship of the proletariat under the despotic regime of the party was the penultimate stage of the revolution. It was necessary while the Soviet Union was surrounded by their capitalist enemies. The ultimate stage of the revolution lay in the future, when the state had withered away. Lenin's The State and Revolution is very clear on this point, but wrong in its predictions. Many individuals in the United States think that communism and socialism are identical. In fact, they are antithetical. (opposite/diametrically opposed) Tyranny & Despotism Index Enrich Your Life With a Philosophy Book... Enrich Your Life With a Philosophy Magazine... Academy Showcase Specials The Human Condition Main Index Philosophy Resource Center Main Page
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