Talk:Communist state/Archive 6

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Section 5:2 spelling error

"Marxst" =>> "Marxist" . Thanks for the unbiased page providing viewpoints from first world and second world people. Unfortunately, having a spelling mistake, means that because More information is Better is a great axiom for wikipedia to strive towards, one person (myself) will spend quarter of an hour searching the internet for "Marxst" (haha.) Unless of course that was a purposeful neologism conveying the idea that "there's no I in Marxism" (similar to the euphemism "There's no I in team." In which case, great. Grazi.

Current communist states

Why does this section not include North Korea? The map does include North Korea though. North Korea may not be guided by Marxism-Leninism anymore, but it's still a communist state as far as I know.

Earlier in the article, it clearly states, "Today, the existing communist states in the world are in China, Cuba, Laos, North Korea, and Vietnam."

This sentence in the section, "They are adherents of Marxism–Leninism" -> can be changed to "They are adherents of Marxism–Leninism except North Korea with juche idealogy." 2600:6C44:117F:95BE:0:0:0:10A9 (talk) 10:20, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. The article mentions North Korea multiple times. Actualcpscm (talk) 23:28, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

Country	Local name	Since	Ruling party
People's Republic of China	Chinese: 中华人民共和国 Pinyin: Zhōnghuá Rénmín Gònghéguó	1 October 1949 (1949-10-01)	Chinese Communist Party
Republic of Cuba	Spanish: República de Cuba	1 January 1959 (1959-01-01)	Communist Party of Cuba
Lao People's Democratic Republic	Lao: ສາທາລະນະລັດ ປະຊາທິປະໄຕ ປະຊາຊົນລາວ Lao romanisation: Sathalanalat Paxathipatai Paxaxon Lao	2 December 1975 (1975-12-02)	Lao People's Revolutionary Party
Socialist Republic of Vietnam	Vietnamese: Cộng hòa xã hội chủ nghĩa Việt Nam	2 September 1945 (North Vietnam) 30 April 1975 (South Vietnam) 2 July 1976 (unified)	Communist Party of Vietnam

I'm referring to this table in the "Current communist states" section. Why North Korea is not included? 2600:6C44:117F:95BE:B8E3:6E37:8761:4A85 (talk) 06:14, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

 Done Please ensure that edit requests are clear and specific :) Actualcpscm (talk) 16:02, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

If we're going by the actual definition, no "communist states" exist or have ever existed. The list should be removed from this article, as it's also a poorer WP:REDUNDANTFORK of List of socialist states#Current socialist states where North Korea is properly categorized. -Vipz (talk) 06:57, 29 November 2022 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 13 January 2023

Add North Korea to the table titled "Overview of current communist states" in the section Current communist states.

The preceding text says:

The following countries are one-party states in which the institutions of the ruling communist party and the state have become intertwined. They are adherents of Marxism–Leninism or its derivatives, such as Juche.

The accompanying map also includes North Korea.

However, North Korea is missing from the table itself. 2601:547:B05:3D9B:F157:B7D:A12B:D1EA (talk) 21:49, 13 January 2023 (UTC)

 Not done: Not done for two reasons. First and foremost, that table is a template. That means that although it's INCLUDED in this page, it's not constructed here. If you want to discuss the content of the template, head over to Template_talk:History_of_Communist_Nations. Secondly, at the aforementioned template page, the current consensus seems to be to leave North Korea in its current location on the table. PianoDan (talk) 22:41, 13 January 2023 (UTC)

Oops - I realize you weren't talking about the template, but about the table later in the article. In that case, I would say you need to develop a consensus here on the talk page before any edit to the main page would be made. PianoDan (talk) 22:44, 13 January 2023 (UTC)

North Korea

By almost any reasonable definition, North Korea is not a Communist country. This was explained in Template talk:History of Communist Nations. If there is no opposition to this, I will update this article to make it consistent with the template. --Antondimak (talk) 08:42, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

I should note that the situation is not the same as before. I wasn't aware that since last year North Korea has started reinserting Communist terminology into its ruling party documents. I don't think this is enough to qualify if as a self-proclaimed Communist state, as there is no proclaimed goal of Communism in the constitution anymore, but I think it's an important caveat to note. --Antondimak (talk) 11:07, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Juche replaced Communism in the constitution however this was only a change of words, there wasn't any drastic change in government policy. Juche is also a derivative of Marxist-Leninism; a unique expression of it. Just like how Socialism with Chinese characteristics is also a derivative of Marxist-Leninism, but Juche is much closer to Marxist-Leninism than Chinese Socialism, & yet China is still considered Communist, & only because China still calls itself a Communist country. North Korea is still Communist even if they go by a different name. We shouldn't say that China is Communist but not say the same about North Korea. TheFriendlyFas2 (talk) 00:01, 2 January 2023 (UTC)

When it comes to policy North Korea was far from Communist long before the change to Juche. Almost the only reason we call China Communist is because it calls itself that. In North Korea's case we don't have that either.

I agree China isn't really Communist, it's non-Socialist society that calls itself Socialist, with the government claiming it intends to reach Communism. That's almost the closest we have however, as by using the basic definition, essentially no country is or ever was Communist. And just because China doesn't have a particularly strong claim to the name, it doesn't mean North Korea should be called that as well. In that case we may as well call Saudi Arabia, another contemporary absolute monarchy, Communist. --Antondimak (talk) 12:36, 2 January 2023 (UTC)

@Antondimak: That logic would entail the removal of every country in that list. So why did you selectively remove North Korea, specifically? 2601:547:B05:1E9C:49D6:994F:BEBC:3070 (talk) 06:21, 13 January 2023 (UTC)

I see no way in which it would. The other countries officially proclaim Socialism or Communism somewhere, as a reality or a goal. There is almost zero reason to add North Korea specifically. Do we add formerly Communist countries? In that case we should also add Lithuania. Do we add "dictatorships"? In that case we should add Saudi Arabia. --Antondimak (talk) 11:34, 13 January 2023 (UTC)

@Antondimak: It says "The following countries are one-party states in which the institutions of the ruling communist party and the state have become intertwined. They are adherents of Marxism–Leninism or its derivatives, such as Juche." Also, the Constitution of North Korea does officially proclaim Socialism and Communism. 2601:547:B05:3D9B:F157:B7D:A12B:D1EA (talk) 21:21, 13 January 2023 (UTC)

This is a remnant from an older version of the article. The claim of Juche being a "derivative" of Marxism-Leninism is pretty weak, pretty much only made to justify North Korea's inclusion. It would make a similar amount of sense to consider Russia's current system a derivative of Marxism-Leninism. The constitution of North Korea has no mention of Communism, either as a goal or a current description of the country. That's the whole point. You can see it in the article you linked. --Antondimak (talk) 23:34, 13 January 2023 (UTC)

@Antondimak: Where do the constitutions of Laos and Vietnam state Communism "as a goal or current description of the country"? 2601:547:501:8F90:B408:E8D3:C338:80EC (talk) 01:42, 14 January 2023 (UTC)

The rules of the Workers' Party of Korea explicitly include a goal to building a communist society since 2021, though, and that the most important part. Additionally, the WPK has never officially turned against Marxism-Leninism; its party rules still state that it upholds the "revolutionary principles of Marxism–Leninism" (though this may be referencing to its historical status as another user has noted before). North Korean state media and Kim Jong-un himself also have started to make regular references to communism. Also, mentioning communism in the constitution is not strictly necessary to be considered a communist state; the East German constitution from 1949 had no references to either communism or Marxism-Leninism whatsoever, yet East Germany was still considered to be a communist state. The 1954 constitution of the People's Republic of China also didn't have references to communism or Marxism-Leninism. The current constitutions of Cuba and Vietnam don't have direct references calling the state Marxist-Leninist (and only indirect references calling their parties such) or having communism as a goal either. The Account 2 (talk) 09:46, 14 January 2023 (UTC)

I did mention that on a previous comment. The decision on the template to which this article is now conforming was taken before Kim Jong-Un's decision to return some older language into the Party documents. Apart from becoming an xenophobic militaristic ultra-nationalist regime, North Korea had also removed all mentions of Communism from its constitution and Party documents. Kim Jong-Un has restored mentions to the Party documents, but I don't think that's comparable to Vietnam or China, where the parties are and have always have been explicitly Communist, partly in their constitutions as well. It is however worth some discussion and that's why I mentioned it. --Antondimak (talk) 17:16, 14 January 2023 (UTC)

Maybe we can have a note that says many scholars dispute that WPK's claims of being communist and instead categorize it as adhering to an ethnic nationalist regime, similar to how it is in the main WPK page? That can be a reasonable compromise. We can also include to the note that WPK is not a traditional Marxist-Leninist system, and adheres to its own homegrown ideology. Another solution could be to change "communist states" to "Marxist-Leninist states", which would unambiguously mean that North Korea shouldn't be added, as the WPK has indeed formally abandoned Marxism-Leninism and has not attempted to reintroduce it (it is also better in the way that it's more precise; communist state sounds too vague). The Account 2 (talk) 20:11, 14 January 2023 (UTC)

I think the latter would be better, but it would still have problems. The whole idea of a "Communist state" was always fuzzy and is now pretty outdated. It essentially has nothing to do with actual policy, but with Cold War alignments, and now with symbolic remnants of those. However the term does exist and it is what the article is about, and almost the only way it can be made to work is if we use the countries' official self-identifications. The problem there is that very rarely have countries which are generally called Communist officially identified as such, using terms such as "Socialist society" or "advancing towards Communism", or being governed by a party with the same official goals.

In this sense North Korea stopped being Communist as it dropped the pretense and officially elevated tradition, the army, and the ruling family as the main pillars of society and the state, only partially reversing it on the party level in 2021. Leaving it more open and making the section about Marxist-Leninist states would probably be better. --Antondimak (talk) 23:11, 14 January 2023 (UTC)

@Antondimak: Can you answer the question regarding Laos and Vietnam? Where do their constitutions state Communism "as a goal or current description of the country"? We need consistent criteria. 2601:547:501:8F90:8D4B:84E9:7971:1077 (talk) 19:26, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

They don't seem to currently do it directly. They have the Communist Party as the national authority and the party itself has that goal. The definition using Marxism-Leninism at least seems somewhat more robust as a criterion. --Antondimak (talk) 09:47, 17 January 2023 (UTC)

Why is North Korea not listed?

The current version of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_state#Current_communist_states states: "The following countries are one-party states in which the institutions of the ruling communist party and the state have become intertwined. They are adherents of Marxism–Leninism or its derivatives, such as Juche." But North Korea isn't listed. 2601:547:B05:1E9C:49D6:994F:BEBC:3070 (talk) 06:19, 13 January 2023 (UTC)

It isn't communist 149.20.252.132 (talk) 15:01, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

@149.20.252.132: That would mean that China, a comparatively more liberal country, isn't communist either. 2601:547:500:2090:1C83:C902:E6DA:1F96 (talk) 01:34, 2 April 2023 (UTC)

Reorganisation

I have restructured this article to clarify specifically the unitary state power of the legislatures and how a ruling communist party monopolises state power. I think the best way to improve the article is to merge the "Ruling party" section with the legislature since the ruling party has to legitimate power without a majority in the legislature. A section should also be written about how the ruling party, through its control of the legislatures, organises election that re-produces a majority in it. I have also changed the heading "Political system" to "The state system of unitary state power" since, in communist systems state system also encompasses the economic system.

I would think a good structure would be:

1. The state system of unitary state power
   1. Legislatures as the highest organ of state power
      1. Unitary state power principle
      2. Communist party control of the legislature
      3. Representativity and functions
   2. Government as the highest administrative agency of state power
      1. Clarify that the government are utterly subservient to the legislatures (and through the legislature, the Party)
   3. Judicial organs
      1. clarify that these organs are utterly subservient to the legislatures (and through the legislature, the Party)
   4. Military
      1. OK sections, but fails to mention that the legislature elects the leading state authority of the armed forces.
   5. Head of state and supervisory institutions
      1. Missing.

Does anyone disagree? Does someone want to help improve this article? --TheUzbek (talk) 08:58, 12 July 2023 (UTC)