No Communist Governments?

[Everyday Anarchy]

I often here communists say that there has never been a communist government. If this is true, than what were the governments of the USSR, Cuba, and China? I always presumed they were communist. But after learning more, I know they aren't/weren't communist.

This raises the question... what type of government were they then?


EDIT:
Google and Reference.com both say that the USSR, Cuba, and China were all communist countries. Who's right? I'm getting confused.

[Jimmie Higgins]

People could mean a number of different things when they say "ther are no communist governmentes":

1. Technically there can be no such thing as a government in a communist society because communism is a society without class differences and a state (since, in marx's view governments are the tools that keep class systems together).

- So if you believe that the USSR was on the right track, then you might call it a socialist state.

2. Many Anarchists and Trotskyists might calim that the USSR was at best "deformed worker states" or "state capitalist" and were not socialist because workers wen't in power and not communist because there was a government and class divisions and so on.

I don't think any of these countries represents socialism; I think if you compare accounts of the paris commune or the early days of the Russian Revolution to life in the USSR or China or whatever, you can see the difference.

[Jimmie Higgins]

What the history books commonly call "communism" is simply countries with nationalized economies. What history books commonly call socialism is capitalist countries with lots of social "safty-nets". I think it's important for radicals (not of these nationalist/reformist tradditions) to make it clear that what we mean by communism is a stateless, classless society and what we mean by socialism is a state where the working class is the ruling class.

[enigma2517]

Depending on who you talk to, you will hear state capitalist or simply "socialist".

Economically, their position is debatable.

Politically, they were all pretty authoritarian.

[CrazyModerate]

I think its safe to say they were proud to call themselves communists, and they did as much. But actions speak louder than works, and vast infrindgements on fundamental freedoms such as the freedom of speech made these countries authoritarian.

[danny android]

The USSR and China both I would concider to be some kind of authoritarian despotisms. I do not know enouf about cuba's government to give a real opionion about it. The USSR and China were both not communist because they failed to eleminate the class structure. Sure they might have gotten rid of the free markets system, but they replaced the old bourgiuasie with a new form of a toltalirarian aristocracy.

[Morpheus]

I think its safe to say they were proud to call themselves communists, and they did as much

No they didn't. They claimed to be in a transitional state between capitalism and communism they called "the dictatorship of the proletariat" or "socialism." That's why it's called "The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics[/b]" and not "The Union of Soviet Communist Republics." IMO, they were really state monopoly capitalist societies and a similar result is the inevitable product of any attempt to implement a "dictatorship of the proletariat." We should go straight to communism instead.

[enigma2517]

Comrade, even though I myself as a libertarian share your concerns about a vanguardist/authoritarian method of revoultion, I advise you to read about up about dictatorship of the proletariat.

It implies proletarian class rule over the bourgeosie. Obviously this must happen, or else it wouldn't really be a revolution would it.

Right now society consists of two distinct social groups/classes. We as communists advocate the majority rule over the minority until that minority is disapated enough that it stops becoming a recognizable class in the first place.

Seizure of factories and dissolving parliments could be two examples of DOTP. While it can be attempted through statist means, it does not have to be.