Socialism and Communism

Our society has many misconceptions about these two economic philosophies. There are those who, as we call communists, continue to leap over China. There are even socialists and communists who make similar sounds. Here, I will explain these two ideologies in general.

Let's start with the definition first.

Socialism is an economic, political and social philosophy that encompasses economic and social systems that characterize social ownership of product production and self-management by corporate employees.

Communism, on the other hand, is a philosophy of social, political and economic ideology whose aim is to establish a communist society which is a socio-economic structure based on the idea of joint ownership of the means of production; without money and social class. 

Definition in laymen term:

- Socialism is where everyone working to contribute to one body that others can adopt. Examples like taxes; all taxable to the government and the government to use tax money for healthcare and the police system to benefit the public.

- Communism is a system in which the government has all kinds of industries and frees the people to work for the government. So there is no business competition because the government owns all industries to the extent that money does not exist. Workers are given emoluments equivalent to their work.

Isn't it similar to these two?

In short, communism is socialism but socialism is not communism. You can, however, say that communism is an extreme form of socialism.

So far there is not a single true communism country in the world.

Countries like China and North Korea claim to be communists but in terms of the definition above, they are not true communists and they still practice the use of money and social class.

From here, maybe we can see what socialism and communism have in common.

What is perhaps clear is that these two ideologies are fighting for the right to eliminate workers' exploitation and to reduce or eliminate the economic class system in society.

There are actually many types of communism and socialism that are practised in countries according to their respective interests. There are Stalinism, Leninism, Maoism, Trotskyism and others that are just variations of Marxism. I won't explain in details what these are to keep this thread introductory only.

Karl Marx was an economist and philosopher who was one of the leading thinkers of communism through the writing of the book The Communist Manifesto.