Communism, fascism and anarchism

Political Science · Ideologies and political concepts. The idea in plain words, the rules to remember, the mistake to avoid and a worked example, written and checked by Mega Lecture.

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The idea

Marxism-Leninism is Marx's theory as developed by Lenin. Lenin added a disciplined vanguard party to lead the workers, and an account of imperialism as the highest stage of capitalism. After revolution comes the dictatorship of the proletariat; the classless, stateless society lies beyond it.

Fascism exalts the nation and the state above the individual, under one leader and one party. It rejects both liberal democracy and communism. Nazism shared these features and placed a doctrine of racial hierarchy at its centre.

Anarchism holds that the state is unnecessary and harmful, and that society can be organised by free co-operation. Anarchists want the state abolished at once, with no transitional workers' state.

Rules to remember

Lenin: 'What Is to Be Done?' (1902), the vanguard party; 'Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism' (written 1916, published 1917); 'The State and Revolution' (written 1917).
The Bolsheviks under Lenin took power in Russia in October 1917 (old-style calendar; November in the modern calendar).
Mussolini: founded Italian Fascism; came to power after the March on Rome, October 1922; 'everything within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state'.
Hitler: leader of the Nazi party; 'Mein Kampf'; became Chancellor of Germany in January 1933.
Proudhon: 'What Is Property?' (1840), 'Property is theft!'; first to call himself an anarchist.
Bakunin: Russian anarchist; opposed Marx in the First International and was expelled in 1872.
Marxists and anarchists share the goal of a stateless society but differ on the road to it.

Common mistake

Do not treat fascism and communism as the same because both built one-party states. Communism is internationalist and aims at a classless society; fascism is nationalist and keeps classes, uniting them under the state.

Worked example

Two revolutionaries agree that capitalism must be overthrown. One says the workers must first capture the state and use it; the other says any state, even a workers' state, will become a new tyranny. Name the two positions and a thinker for each.

Using state power after the revolution is the dictatorship of the proletariat, a Marxist (and later Leninist) idea.
Rejecting every state, including a transitional one, is the anarchist position.
This was the dispute between Marx and Bakunin in the First International.

Answer: The first is Marxist (Marx, Lenin); the second is anarchist (Bakunin).

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