communist or  Socialist?
828722
The basic difference is that Communism is a pure political philosophy where the Government controls all the means of production while Capitalism is on the opposite end of the spectrum, where the people own the means of production.\n\nSocialism is the hybrid of Communism and Capitalism.  Socialism is essentially Capitalism where the government controls certain industries within the country's marketplace.\n\nSome examples:\n\nCapitalist:  United States; Or, more purely, Hong Kong (but not the rest of China).\n\nSocialism:  Germany, Norway\n\nCommunism:  Cuba or China
804095
A Communist is a communist who will misuse the power to continue in power. Once thay come it will be just very difficult to get them removed by democratic means. They believe in partyless democracy. So knowingly, why one should risk his own freedom allured by the sweet coated quinine?
107286
Neither, the closest I can muster is libertarian (socialy liberal, fiscaly conservative).\n\nVote independant, the two party system has failed, stop the corruption.\n\nand to those who say liberals are more like comunists... both liberals and conservatives are closer to comunisim than libertarian. Lest we forget the deffinition of a comunist... a social conservative, fiscal liberal.\n\nIt seems to me most americans now-a-days meet this definition (comunism), and are afraid of freedom.
453106
Capitalism is an other word for greed. Communism is about sharing, neither work very well in its entirety. However some socialism in a mix with capitalism would work if you could get the capitalist to see that it would restore order to a chaotic society.
1148615
Communists are cool because they make every shmuck as miserable as the next schmuck :).  And by the way, communism has never reached the strides Capitalism has in terms of wealth and common good.
1048016
There a big difference but only people who don't understand politics or world events wouldn't understand. \n\nTrue communism calls for the end of classes, no poor or rich. Everyone is equal. In a communist state everyone works to help the state and in a sense they help each other. Unfortunately people are greedy and lazy so communism failed and that why we see the evil states of the Soviet Union and Cuba. \n\nDemocrats don't believe in an unchecked corporate world. They try to place policies to help unprivileged people which often taxes the rich. Now -a- days the Democrats have a hard time deciding in what they believe in... That's why they keep losing the White House.\n\nThinking about it Jesus was the first Communist. He just didn't have a word for it.
1158990
You need to understand the difference between socialism and communism. There are several socialist and quasi-socialist countries that are highly successful in the world today (market socialism).
696310
To the answer above, communism is an economic system. The totalitarian regime in the Soviet Union gives it a negative connotation.
857855
From each according to his ability and to each according to his work--is socialism.\n\nFrom each according to his ability and to each according to his needs-- is Communism.\n\nIn Socialism, there will a dictatorship of the preliterate and the means of the production will be owned by the government run by the representative of the workers. Communism is an ideal state in which there will be absolutely no scope for private ownership. The State, which was there in the Socialistic set up, as a means for controlling the production, will wither away.
663976
ugh, i just answered this to find you removed it, here I go again.\n\nActually the word 'socialist' better describes todays 'democrats'.  People can still have liberal ideals without having them freakishly to the left of reality.\n\nLiberals are basically the ones who think a world wide utopia is possible if they 'live and let live'.  They are unable to mentally comprehend the fact that there are others in this world who do not tolerate views different than theirs.  Liberals, for some reason, are hypocritical in most of their thinking.  For instance, since they don't like George W. Bush, they think that a man who gassed to death over 30 thousand of his countries innocent people should be left in power, and defend the lives of people on death row, who were convicted of the most heinous crimes known to man.  Yet liberals for some reason think it is OK for a mother to kill a child.  \n\nLiberals also say it is wrong to discriminate by race/ religion (as do conservatives), but then the liberals turn around and make laws that give benifits to some, and not all, such as 'affirmative action'.  If that is not hypocrocy, what is?\n\nBasically Socialists, Liberals, Democrats, all stand for the same things.  They want to take businesses away from the ones who built them, and give them to the government to run, and give out free stuff to everyone.  What they fail to realize is that over time, the few who are working to support everyone else, will get tired of doing all the work, and the work will gradually decline, thus leading less to distribute.  Eventually we will be sitting in bread lines, waiting for our government rations, because it doesn't matter how hard you work, you will get the same amount of bread as the lazy democrat in line next to you.
901533
Yes, because the definition of socialism is simply being against capitalism. It doesn't make you communist or anti-American. They also believe in protecting the earth, economy, and rights of the American people. Not really bad folks actually. Why are people attacking the Green Party?
37896
The quick 'n' easy way to remember the difference between Socialism and Communism is: Socialism is "from each according to their ability, to each according to their DEEDS," whereas Communism is "from each according to their ability to each according to their NEEDS." \n\nSocialism is the stage between Capitalism and Communism. It builds upon the previous system (Capitalism) by nationalizing the "means of production" (i.e. corporations, resources, banks, etc.), but not by making everyone equal. In other words, people will be paid wages based on several factors (social need, difficulty, amount of schooling required, etc.), so not everyone will make the same wage -- as is often a misinterpretation of Socialism. \n\nCommunism is the point where the state "withers away." In other words, it's quite a few years in the future. If I had to guess, I'd say at least 10 generations of established Socialism has to occur before people evolve enough to realize that hurting others or the system ends up hurting themselves. \n\nAs Communists we advocate Socialism because it is the next necessary step to get to Communism. In other words, it's not that we've given up on building a house, we just realize there is a need for a sturdy foundation first. \n\nCommunists believe in human evolution. We evolve in accordance to the system we live within. Capitalism has allowed us to evolve out of our feudalistic ways (for the most part), and slavery does not exist in our country anymore (for the most part). But Capitalism, which is driven by the need to always increase profits, founders a "dog eat dog" mentality. This is not a sustainable system, either for humankind or for the environment. \n\nUnder Socialism people will evolve to the point where they care about each other regardless of their location or race or whatever. If we are to survive as a species, we need to evolve. That's one of the many reasons I'm a Communist. \n\nFinally, one misconception people often have about Communism is that we are looking to make everyone poor. On the contrary, we want everyone to enjoy as much as possible the fruits of our vast wealth.
44665
Actually the Nazis had a socialist form of government.  Now I am not about to start comparing anyone to the Nazis and the atrocities they committed during WW2, but if you were going to compare the 2 major parties in the US, most people would say the Republicans are more capitalist and the Democrats are more socialist. Please post another question if you need a definition of socialism and capitalism, I will be glad to help educate you.
338760
Absolutely nothing. Socialism theoritically sounds great. In practice, no one is so altruistic to believe in socialism. In fact socialism has caused severe damage to people than Capitalism. At least in capitalism the best make it somewhere on the top or just above the middle or at least above poverty level. Socialism in the long run creates poverty, no jobs, spoilt education, lopsided views and revolutionary ideas that might lead to terrorist activities. Socialism must be shunned like communalism and terrorism. It has been proved to be a failure and I do not know why there is so much of talk about it. If socialism has to succeed, we need humans like Gods. By the way, have you heard of Dachas?? They were part of a socialistic government and leaders of politburo used it. So much for socialism.
877078
Yes it's only a slight difference... In Asia communism is the chief underlying political movement... In the US, socialism is the primary force guiding the leftist - moving government we have had now for over 12 years.
243212
I consider myself as a Socialist.
972637
There are big government communists / socialists and there are small government communists / socialists.  The big government ones believe a strong central government is needed to coordinate the economic activities of the nation.  The small government ones would put economic control in the hands of citizens of independent communities or in the hands of the employees of independent companies.\n\nThe reason some communists / socialists also call themselves anarchists is because they feel government has been used in the past by the rich to prevent productive capital (raw materials, buildings, machines, tools, etc) from being controlled by employees.  Instead, the wealthy few use the government to make sure that only they have final say over the control of the capital, and the result is that the average person has to do all the work while at the same time, give the largest rewards of their work to the owner of the capital, who often isn't doing anything productive.  Anarchists want to abolish government backing of capitalists, assume democratic control of corporations, and return each company's profits back to their employees (and possibly the local community as well).