In contrast, the Menshevik faction, which initially includedLeon Trotsky, emphasized that the party should not neglect the importance of mass populations in realizing acommunist revolution. In the course of the revolution, the Bolshevik party which became theCommunist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) assumed government power in Russia after theOctober Revolution in 1917. With the creation of theCommunist International (Comintern) in 1919, the concept of communist party leadership was adopted by many revolutionary parties, worldwide. In an effort to standardize the international communist movement ideologically and maintain central control of the member parties, the Comintern required that its members use the term "communist party" in their names.
Under the leadership of the CPSU, the interpretations oforthodox Marxism were applied to Russia and led to the emergence ofLeninist andMarxist–Leninist political parties throughout the world. After the death of Lenin, the Comintern's official interpretation of Leninism was the bookFoundations of Leninism (1924) byJoseph Stalin.
As the membership of a communist party was to be limited to activecadres in Lenin's theory, there was a need for networks of separate organizations to mobilize mass support for the party. Typically, communist parties built up variousfront organizations whose membership was often open to non-communists. In many countries, the single most important front organization of the communist parties was itsyouth wing. During the time of theCommunist International, the youth leagues were explicit communist organizations, using the name 'Young Communist League'. Later the youth league concept was broadened in many countries, and names like 'Democratic Youth League' were adopted.
Sometrade unions and students', women's, peasants', and cultural organizations have been connected to communist parties. Traditionally, these mass organizations were often politically subordinated to the political leadership of the party. After the fall of communist party regimes in the 1990s, mass organizations sometimes outlived their communist party founders.
Historically, in countries where communist parties were struggling to attain state power, the formation of wartime alliances with non-communist parties and wartime groups was enacted (such as theNational Liberation Front of Albania). Upon attaining state power these Fronts were often transformed into nominal (and usually electoral) "National" or "Fatherland" Fronts in which non-communist parties and organizations were given token representation (a practice known asBlockpartei), the most popular examples of these being theNational Front of East Germany (as a historical example) and theNorth Korean Reunification Front (as a modern-day example). Other times the formation of such Fronts was undertaken without the participation of other parties, such as theSocialist Alliance of Working People of Yugoslavia and theNational Front of Afghanistan, though the purpose was the same: to promote the communist party line to generally non-communist audiences and to mobilize them to carry out tasks within the country under the aegis of the Front.[citation needed]
Recent scholarship has developed the comparative political study of global communist parties by examining similarities and differences across historical geographies. In particular, the rise of revolutionary parties, their spread internationally, the appearance of charismatic revolutionary leaders and their ultimate demise during the decline and fall of communist parties worldwide have all been the subject of investigation.[1]
A uniform naming scheme for communist parties was adopted by the Communist International. All parties were required to use the name 'Communist Party of (name of the country)', resulting in separate communist parties in some countries operating using (largely) homonymous party names (e.g.in India). Today, there are a few cases where the original sections of the Communist International have retained those names. But throughout the twentieth century, many parties changed their names. For example, following their ascension to power, the Bolshevik Party changed their name to the All-Russian Communist Party.[citation needed] Causes for these shifts in naming were either moves to avoidstate repression or as measures to generate greater acceptance by local populations.
The naming conventions of communist parties became more diverse as the international communist movement was fragmented due to theSino-Soviet split in the 1960s. Those who sided with China and Albania in their criticism of the Soviet leadership, often added words like 'Revolutionary' or 'Marxist–Leninist' to distinguish themselves from the pro-Soviet parties.
In 1985, approximately 38 percent of the world's population lived under "communist" governments (1.67billion out of 4.4billion). The CPSU's International Department officially recognized 95 ruling and nonruling communist parties. Overall, if one includes the 107 parties with significant memberships, there were approximately 82 million communist party members worldwide.[2] Given its worldwide representation, the communist party may be counted as the principal challenger to the influence ofliberal-democratic,catch-all parties in the twentieth century.[3]
Although the historical importance of communist parties is widely accepted, their activities and functions have been interpreted in different ways. One approach, sometimes known as thetotalitarian school of communist studies, has implicitly treated all communist parties as the same types of organizations. Scholars such asZbigniew Brzezinski andFrancois Furet have relied upon conceptions of the party emphasizingcentralized control, a top-down hierarchical structure,ideological rigidity, and strictparty discipline.[7] In contrast, other studies have emphasized the differences among communist parties. Multi-party studies, such as those byRobert C. Tucker and A. James McAdams, have emphasized the differences in both these parties' organizational structure and their use of Marxist and Leninist ideas to justify their policies.[8]
Another important question is why communist parties were able to rule for as long as they did. Some scholars have depicted these parties as fatally flawed from their inception and argue they only remained in power because their leaders were willing to use their monopoly of power and thestate monopoly to crush all forms ofopposition.[9] In contrast, other studies have emphasized these parties' ability to adapt their policies to changing times and circumstances.[10]
^McAdams, A. James. Vanguard of the Revolution: The Global Idea of the Communist Party. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2017.
^These calculations are based on parties for which sufficient data is available. SeeStarr, Richard (March–April 1986). "Checklist of Communist Parties in 1985".Problems of Communism. Vol. 35. pp. 62–66., and the V-Dem (Varieties of Democracy) Dataset athttps://v-dem.net/en/data/[permanent dead link].
^McAdams, A. James (2017).Vanguard of the Revolution: The Global Idea of the Communist Party. Princeton, N.J.:Princeton University Press. pp. 3–4.
^See Carl Joachim Friedrich and Zbigniew K. Brzezinski,Totalitarian Dictatorship and Autocracy (Cambridge, MA:Harvard University Press, 1965); François Furet, et.al.,The Passing of an Illusion: The Idea of Communism in the Twentieth Century (Chicago:University of Chicago Press, 1999); Martin Malia,The Soviet Tragedy: A History of Socialism in Russia, 1917–1991 (New York: Free Press, 1995).
^Franz Borkenau,World Communism (Ann Arbor, MI:University of Michigan Press, 1962); Robert C. Tucker,The Marxian Revolutionary Idea (New York:W. W. Norton & Company), 1969; McAdams,Vanguard of the Revolution;
^Zbigniew Brzezinski,The Grand Failure: The Birth and Death of Communism in the Twentieth Century (New York:Charles Scribner's Sons, 1989); Martin Malia,The Soviet Tragedy; and Andrzej Walicki,Marxism and the Leap to the Kingdom of Freedom: The Rise and Fall of the Communist Utopia (Palo Alto, CA:Stanford University Press, 1997).
^See George Breslauer,Five Images of the Soviet Future: A Critical Review and Synthesis (Berkeley, CA: Center for International Studies, 1978); Stephen F. Cohen,Rethinking the Soviet Experience (New York:Oxford University Press, 1986; and Martin K. Dimitrov, ed.,Why Communism Did Not Collapse: Understanding Authoritarian Regime Resilience in Asia and Europe (New York:Cambridge University Press, 2013)
