Is a communist simply someone who believes that society should be classless?

[Arakir]

Wikipedia defines a classless society as one where no one is born into a social class, and distinctions such as wealth, income, education, culture, or social network only come from individual experience and achievement.

If someone believes that society should be run like this, does that automatically make them a communist?

[Comrade Samuel]

Wikipedia defines a classless society as one where no one is born into a social class, and distinctions such as wealth, income, education, culture, or social network only come from individual experience and achievement.

If someone believes that society should be run like this, does that automatically make them a communist?

If anything that would make somebody a sympathizer but thats using 'communist' in the broadest sense of the word.


To put it bluntly communism would be society based on the idea "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need." Being in favor of such things and being willing to take action to achieve them would probably be a more concise definition but if you really want your question answered in it's entirety I suggest you pay close attention to some of the longer/properly cited responses below this one and be prepared to think about things very abstractly for a while after reading them.

I'm a little late but welcome to the forum!

[slum]

distinctions such as wealth, income, education etc only come from individual experience and achievement

wealth and income are not relevant in a real classless society i shouldn't think, and the 'education' smacks of some bell-curve meritocratic BS

even if this were an acceptable description of a communist society, i think you have to be committed, like comrade samuel said above, to actually bringing that society about.

[Sidagma]

yeah. you can't just pick an ideology like an item from a menu. it is a way of thinking and a goal to strive for.

[Sudsy]

Maybe but being a Marxist for example means more than just that.

[cantwealljustgetalong]

It is one of three tenets: communism is the abolition of state, private (natural and productive) property, and class.
Marxian communism (Marxism) is the overwhelmingly largest current of communism historically, but it is not the only one. Anarchist communism and Christian communism are two other currents.

[Tim Cornelis]

To put it bluntly communism would be society based on the idea "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need." Being in favor of such things and being willing to take action to achieve them would probably be a more concise definition but if you really want your question answered in it's entirety I suggest you pay close attention to some of the longer/properly cited responses below this one and be prepared to think about things very abstractly for a while after reading them.

I'm a little late but welcome to the forum!

Society would still be communist if distribution is not according to needs, but uses labour credits instead. Otherwise, communism would be a mere mode of distribution. Moreover, labour credits and free-access (according to needs) would likely co-exist for very long, so how then would you call this society?

[garrus]

If someone believes that society should be run like this, does that automatically make them a communist?

Well i guess i'd reserve the word "communist" for someone who also fights and speaks for the establishment for such a society as well.

[Comrade #138672]

If someone believes that society should be run like this, does that automatically make them a communist?No, but it's a start.


Society would still be communist if distribution is not according to needs, but uses labour credits instead. Otherwise, communism would be a mere mode of distribution. Moreover, labour credits and free-access (according to needs) would likely co-exist for very long, so how then would you call this society?How about Socialism, the lower stage of Communism?

[dēmistĕfī]

Who are the Communists?


"The Communists are distinguished from the other working-class parties by this only: 1. In the national struggles of the proletarians of the different countries, they point out and bring to the front the common interests of the entire proletariat, independently of all nationality. 2. In the various stages of development which the struggle of the working class against the bourgeoisie has to pass through, they always and everywhere represent the interests of the movement as a whole.

The Communists, therefore, are on the one hand, practically, the most advanced and resolute section of the working-class parties of every country, that section which pushes forward all others; on the other hand, theoretically, they have over the great mass of the proletariat the advantage of clearly understanding the line of march, the conditions, and the ultimate general results of the proletarian movement." – Manifesto of the Communist Party, 1848 Thus, one cannot be considered a communist if they misinterpret the necessary consequences of the proletarian movement as the re-establishment and defence of a mode of production marked by the generalisation of commodity production and the alienation of labour.

Besides, communism isn't an ideology or dogma. Communism is the immanent movement of the proletariat; scientific socialism is the theoretical expression of this movement.


"Communism is for us not a state of affairs which is to be established, an ideal to which reality [will] have to adjust itself. We call communism the real movement which abolishes the present state of things. The conditions of this movement result from the premises now in existence." – The German Ideology, 1846

[Ravachol]

Society would still be communist if distribution is not according to needs, but uses labour credits instead. Otherwise, communism would be a mere mode of distribution. Moreover, labour credits and free-access (according to needs) would likely co-exist for very long, so how then would you call this society?

No, it would not be a mere mode of distribution. The structure distribution takes is a reflection of the underlying social relations and as such an integral part of what makes communism, communism. Labour credits, as a manifestation of the value-form, are diametrically opposed to any notion of communism. Whether or not they will co-exist with a nascent communism (I think this is less likely today than it was at the time of writing the critique of the Gotha program) is irrelevant. As long as the value-form, the commodity and wage-labor exist, society is not communist. Period.



The closing of private banks and of the central bank puts an end to mercantile relations only if production and life are organised in a way no longer mediated by the commodity, and if such a communal production and life gradually come to dominate the totality of social relationships. Money is not the “evil” to be removed from an otherwise “good” production, but the manifestation (today becoming increasingly immaterial) of the commodity character of all aspects of life. It cannot be destroyed by eliminating signs, but only when exchange withers away as a social relationship.


Furthermore, i'd like to refer to this thread (http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=2551573&postcount=23) in the Dutch section.