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164-577: Edward Gierek ( Polish pronunciation: [ˈɛdvart ˈɡʲɛrɛk] ; 6 January 1913 – 29 July 2001) was a Polish communist politician who served as the de facto leader of the Polish People's Republic between 1970 and 1980. Gierek replaced Władysław Gomułka as the First Secretary of the ruling Polish United Workers' Party (PZPR). Gierek came from a coal mining family and grew up in France from

328-626: A semi-colony to a leading world power, with greatly advanced literacy, women's rights, basic healthcare, primary education, and life expectancy. Its leading role in World War II saw the emergence of the industrialized Soviet Union as a superpower . Marxist–Leninist governments modeled on the Soviet Union took power with Soviet assistance in Bulgaria , Czechoslovakia , East Germany , Poland , Hungary, and Romania . A Marxist–Leninist government

492-459: A social revolution . The two classes are the proletariat , who make up the majority of the population within society and must sell their labor power to survive, and the bourgeoisie , a small minority that derives profit from employing the working class through private ownership of the means of production. According to this analysis, a communist revolution would put the working class in power, and in turn establish common ownership of property,

656-500: A communist party, the rejection of private property and capitalism, state control of economic activity and mass media , restrictions on freedom of religion , and suppression of opposition and dissent. With the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, several previously Communist governments repudiated or abolished Communist rule altogether. Afterwards, only a small number of nominally Communist governments remained, such as China , Cuba , Laos , North Korea , and Vietnam . With

820-468: A distinct stage between capitalism and communism. This intermediate stage was a concept introduced by Vladimir Lenin as a means to defend the Bolshevik seizure of power against traditional Marxist criticism that Russia's productive forces were not sufficiently developed for socialist revolution . A distinction between communist and socialist as descriptors of political ideologies arose in 1918 after

984-520: A form of communism. In their words, the Hutterites "established in their communities a rigorous system of Ordnungen, which were codes of rules and regulations that governed all aspects of life and ensured a unified perspective. As an economic system, communism was attractive to many of the peasants who supported social revolution in sixteenth century central Europe." This link was highlighted in one of Karl Marx 's early writings; Marx stated that "[a]s Christ

1148-526: A general positive attitude. Others emphasize that the improvements were only made possible by the unwise and unsustainable policies based on huge foreign loans, which led directly to the economic crises of the 1970s and 1980s. Judged by hindsight, the total sum of over 24 billion borrowed (in 1970s dollars) was not well-spent. Upon becoming the first secretary in December 1970, Gierek promised himself that under his watch people would not be shot on streets. In 1976

1312-455: A greater emphasis on certain aspects of classical Marxism while rejecting or modifying other aspects. Many schools of thought have sought to combine Marxian concepts and non-Marxian concepts, which has then led to contradictory conclusions. There is a movement toward the recognition that historical materialism and dialectical materialism remain the fundamental aspects of all Marxist schools of thought . Marxism–Leninism and its offshoots are

1476-545: A hierarchical basis, with active cells of members as the broad base. They were made up only of elite cadres approved by higher members of the party as being reliable and completely subject to party discipline . The Great Purge of 1936–1938 was Joseph Stalin 's attempt to destroy any possible opposition within the Communist Party of the Soviet Union . In the Moscow trials , many old Bolsheviks who had played prominent roles during

1640-623: A hostile anti-socialist foreign inspired conspiracy that took advantage of worker discontent in Poznań enterprises. In July Gierek became a member of the PZPR Politburo, but lasted in that position only until October, when Władysław Gomułka replaced Ochab as first secretary . Nikita Khrushchev criticized Gomułka for not retaining Gierek in the Politburo; he remained a Central Committee secretary responsible for economic affairs, however. He would return to

1804-527: A matter of debate, but the distinction rests largely on the communists' adherence to the revolutionary socialism of Karl Marx." In the United States, communism is widely used as a pejorative term as part of a Red Scare , much like socialism , and mainly in reference to authoritarian socialism and Communist states . The emergence of the Soviet Union as the world's first nominally Communist state led to

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1968-535: A mining accident in a pit at the age of four. His mother remarried and emigrated to northern France, where he lived from the age of 10 and worked in a coal mine from the age of 13. Gierek joined the French Communist Party in 1931 and in 1934 was deported to Poland for organizing a strike. After completing compulsory military service in Stryi in southeastern Poland (1934–1936), Gierek married Stanisława Jędrusik, but

2132-730: A part of Poland's daily reality until July 1989. In the aftermath of the June 1976 protests, a major opposition group, the Workers' Defence Committee (KOR), commenced its activities in September to help the persecuted worker protest participants. Other opposition organizations were also established in 1977–79, but historically the KOR proved to be of particular importance. In 1979, Poland's ruling communists reluctantly allowed Pope John Paul II to make his first papal visit to Poland (2–10 June), despite Soviet advice to

2296-425: A particular type of communism. One of the first uses of the word in its modern sense is in a letter sent by Victor d'Hupay to Nicolas Restif de la Bretonne around 1785, in which d'Hupay describes himself as an auteur communiste ("communist author"). In 1793, Restif first used communisme to describe a social order based on egalitarianism and the common ownership of property. Restif would go on to use

2460-525: A possible communist or socialist theorist, or as the first author to give communism a serious consideration. The 5th-century Mazdak movement in Persia (modern-day Iran) has been described as communistic for challenging the enormous privileges of the noble classes and the clergy , criticizing the institution of private property , and striving to create an egalitarian society. At one time or another, various small communist communities existed, generally under

2624-521: A post-capitalist society – positive humanism, socialism, Communism, realm of free individuality, free association of producers, etc. He used these terms completely interchangeably. The notion that 'socialism' and 'Communism' are distinct historical stages is alien to his work and only entered the lexicon of Marxism after his death." According to the Encyclopædia Britannica , "Exactly how communism differs from socialism has long been

2788-599: A prerequisite to socialism , were critical of the Bolsheviks from the beginning due to Russia being seen as too backward for a socialist revolution . Council communism and left communism , inspired by the German Revolution of 1918–1919 and the wide proletarian revolutionary wave, arose in response to developments in Russia and are critical of self-declared constitutionally socialist states . Some left-wing parties, such as

2952-521: A process begun in 1968 under Gomułka. Many thousands of party activists, including important elder leaders with background in the prewar Communist Party of Poland , were removed from positions of responsibility and replaced with people whose careers formed after World War II. Much of the overhaul was accomplished during and after the VI Congress of the PZPR, convened in December 1971. The resulting governing class

3116-564: A short time, Ukrainians and local Poles conducted a pogrom in the Jews of the settlement, killing about 300 people. Between then and August, 1943, the Germans, with the assistance of the Ukrainian police, are said to have murdered most of the town's 11,000 Jews in a nearby forest or rounded them up to be sent to Belzec extermination camp . Of a pre-war population of 11,000, only a few Jews survived. During

3280-458: A socialist principle of " to each according to his contribution ". Socialism has been described as a philosophy seeking distributive justice, and communism as a subset of socialism that prefers economic equality as its form of distributive justice. In 19th century Europe, the use of the terms communism and socialism eventually accorded with the cultural attitude of adherents and opponents towards religion . In European Christendom , communism

3444-546: A socialist state that is in the process of constructing communism. Terms used by Communist states include national-democratic , people's democratic , socialist-oriented , and workers and peasants' states. According to Richard Pipes , the idea of a classless , egalitarian society first emerged in ancient Greece . Since the 20th century, ancient Rome has been examined in this context, as well as thinkers such as Aristotle , Cicero , Demosthenes , Plato , and Tacitus . Plato, in particular, has been considered as

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3608-692: A work about More, whose ideas could be regarded as "the foregleam of Modern Socialism" according to Kautsky. During the October Revolution in Russia, Vladimir Lenin suggested that a monument be dedicated to More, alongside other important Western thinkers. In the 17th century, communist thought surfaced again in England, where a Puritan religious group known as the Diggers advocated the abolition of private ownership of land. In his 1895 Cromwell and Communism , Eduard Bernstein stated that several groups during

3772-673: A young age, becoming active in the French communist movement and the Polish community in France . Gierek was deported to the Second Polish Republic for his communist advocacy in 1934 but moved to Belgium and was active in the Belgian Resistance during World War II . Gierek returned to Poland in 1948 and attended in the founding of the PZPR as a representative of Silesia , being appointed to

3936-455: Is a sociopolitical , philosophical , and economic ideology within the socialist movement , whose goal is the creation of a communist society , a socioeconomic order centered around common ownership of the means of production , distribution, and exchange that allocates products to everyone in the society based on need. A communist society would entail the absence of private property and social classes , and ultimately money and

4100-466: Is a non- idealist attempt at the understanding of material history and society, whereby communism is the expression of a real movement, with parameters that are derived from actual life. According to Marxist theory, class conflict arises in capitalist societies due to contradictions between the material interests of the oppressed and exploited proletariat  – a class of wage laborers employed to produce goods and services – and

4264-480: Is that of educating voters in what are deemed their true interests rather than in response to the expression of interest by voters themselves. When they have gained control of the state, Leninist communists' main task was preventing other political parties from deceiving the proletariat, such as by running their own independent candidates. This vanguardist approach comes from their commitments to democratic centralism in which communists can only be cadres, i.e. members of

4428-530: Is the intermediary unto whom man unburdens all his divinity, all his religious bonds, so the state is the mediator unto which he transfers all his Godlessness, all his human liberty." Thomas Müntzer led a large Anabaptist communist movement during the German Peasants' War , which Friedrich Engels analyzed in his 1850 work The Peasant War in Germany . The Marxist communist ethos that aims for unity reflects

4592-602: Is very old and means "stream". Its etymology stems from the Indo-European root *sreu. The area was inhabited by the White Croats and it has been established that name Horvat (Croat) is likewise of Iranian (Sarmatian) origin. In different times the name was written differently, and in various old documents we can find such names: Stryg, Stry, Stryj, Stryjn, Stryjia, Strig, Strigenses, Stryi, Strey, Striig, Strya, Sthryensis, Sthrya, Stryei, and Stri. The inhabitants take pride in

4756-650: Is viewed overwhelmingly negatively as a mass murderer ; for significant numbers of Russians and Georgians, he is regarded as a great statesman and state-builder. After the Chinese Civil War , Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist Party came to power in 1949 as the Nationalist government headed by the Kuomintang fled to the island of Taiwan. In 1950–1953, China engaged in a large-scale, undeclared war with

4920-516: The Sejm in February 1976. Organized opposition circles developed gradually and reached 3000–4000 members by the end of the decade. Because of the deteriorating economic situation, at the end of 1975 the authorities announced that the 1971 freeze in food prices would have to be lifted. Prime Minister Jaroszewicz forced the price rises, in combination with financial compensation favoring upper income brackets;

5084-596: The 1917 Russian Constituent Assembly election , socialist parties totaled well over 70% of the vote. The Bolsheviks were clear winners in the urban centres, and took around two-thirds of the votes of soldiers on the Western Front, obtaining 23.3% of the vote; the Socialist Revolutionaries finished first on the strength of support from the country's rural peasantry, who were for the most part single issue voters , that issue being land reform, obtaining 37.6%, while

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5248-482: The 1936 Constitution of the Soviet Union . War communism was the first system adopted by the Bolsheviks during the Russian Civil War as a result of the many challenges. Despite communism in the name, it had nothing to do with communism, with strict discipline for workers, strike actions forbidden, obligatory labor duty, and military-style control, and has been described as simple authoritarian control by

5412-568: The 1968 Polish political crisis . Soon after the student rally on 8 March in Warsaw, on 14 March in Katowice he led a mass gathering of 100,000 party members from the entire province. He was the first Politburo member to speak publicly on the issue of the protests then taking place and later claimed that his motivation was to demonstrate support for Gomułka's rule, threatened by Mieczysław Moczar 's intra-party conspiring. Gierek used strong language to condemn

5576-479: The 1973 oil crisis , and by 1976 price increases became necessary. The June 1976 protests were forcibly suppressed, but the planned price increases were canceled. The greatest accumulation of foreign debt occurred in the late 1970s, as the regime struggled to counter the effects of the crisis. The period of Gierek's rule is notable for the rise of organized opposition in Poland. Changes in the constitution , proposed by

5740-644: The Cheget , to Russian president Boris Yeltsin . That evening at 7:32, the Soviet flag was lowered from the Kremlin for the last time and replaced with the pre-revolutionary Russian flag . Previously, from August to December 1991, all the individual republics, including Russia itself, had seceded from the union. The week before the union's formal dissolution, eleven republics signed the Alma-Ata Protocol , formally establishing

5904-723: The Christian universalist teaching that humankind is one and that there is only one god who does not discriminate among people. Communist thought has also been traced back to the works of the 16th-century English writer Thomas More . In his 1516 treatise titled Utopia , More portrayed a society based on common ownership of property, whose rulers administered it through the application of reason and virtue . Marxist communist theoretician Karl Kautsky , who popularized Marxist communism in Western Europe more than any other thinker apart from Engels, published Thomas More and His Utopia ,

6068-545: The Cold War had begun. Stalin himself believed that capitalism was a hollow shell and would crumble under increased non-military pressure exerted through proxies in countries like Italy. He greatly underestimated the economic strength of the West and instead of triumph saw the West build up alliances that were designed to permanently stop or contain Soviet expansion. In early 1950, Stalin gave

6232-658: The Cold War the town was home to Stryy Air Base . Stryi was the first city in Ukraine to display the Ukrainian flag , when it was hoisted at the Stryi city hall on 14 March 1990, before the December 1991 implosion of the Soviet Union . On 9 April 2009, the Lviv Oblast council decided to remove a Soviet -era statue to the Red Army soldier that was installed by the local Communist regime in

6396-804: The Commonwealth of Independent States , and declared that the Soviet Union had ceased to exist. As of 2023, states controlled by Communist parties under a single-party system include the People's Republic of China, the Republic of Cuba , the Democratic People's Republic of Korea , the Lao People's Democratic Republic , and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam . Communist parties, or their descendant parties, remain politically important in several other countries. With

6560-600: The English Civil War (especially the Diggers) espoused clear communistic, agrarianist ideals and that Oliver Cromwell 's attitude towards these groups was at best ambivalent and often hostile. Criticism of the idea of private property continued into the Age of Enlightenment of the 18th century through such thinkers as Gabriel Bonnot de Mably , Jean Meslier , Étienne-Gabriel Morelly , and Jean-Jacques Rousseau in France. During

6724-512: The Russian Revolution or in Lenin's Soviet government afterwards, including Lev Kamenev , Grigory Zinoviev , Alexei Rykov , and Nikolai Bukharin , were accused, pleaded guilty of conspiracy against the Soviet Union, and were executed. The devastation of World War II resulted in a massive recovery program involving the rebuilding of industrial plants, housing, and transportation as well as

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6888-596: The Russian Social Democratic Labour Party renamed itself as the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , which resulted in the adjective Communist being used to refer to socialists who supported the politics and theories of Bolshevism, Leninism , and later in the 1920s those of Marxism–Leninism . In spite of this common usage, Communist parties also continued to describe themselves as socialists dedicated to socialism. According to The Oxford Handbook of Karl Marx , "Marx used many terms to refer to

7052-594: The Ruthenian Voivodeship , which from the conquest in the 14th century until 1772 was a part of Poland. The city was governed by the local magistrate headed by a burgomaster . Following the Partitions of Poland the territory and all Galicia fell to the Austrian Empire . Its geographical location had a positive influence on its development and growth. The city became a flourishing trade center being located on

7216-688: The Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies in the October Revolution; after a few weeks of deliberation, the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries formed a coalition government with the Bolsheviks from November 1917 to July 1918, while the right-wing faction of the Socialist Revolutionary Party boycotted the soviets and denounced the October Revolution as an illegal coup . In

7380-699: The Sejm in 1952, the Central Committee of the PZPR under Bolesław Bierut in 1956, and the Politburo of the PZPR in 1959. Gierek was known for his openness and public speaking, emerging as one of the most respected and progressive politicians in the Poland whilst becoming a strong opponent to Gomułka. Gierek became First Secretary when Gomułka was removed from office after the 1970 Polish protests were violently suppressed on his authority. Gierek's first years were marked by improvements in living and working conditions with

7544-580: The Socialist Party of Great Britain , boasted of having called the Bolsheviks, and by extension those Communist states which either followed or were inspired by the Soviet Bolshevik model of development, establishing state capitalism in late 1917, as would be described during the 20th century by several academics, economists, and other scholars, or a command economy . Before the Soviet path of development became known as socialism , in reference to

7708-511: The Soviet Union with the Russian Revolution of 1917, and then in portions of Eastern Europe, Asia, and a few other regions after World War II . As one of the many types of socialism , communism became the dominant political tendency, along with social democracy , within the international socialist movement by the early 1920s. During most of the 20th century, around one-third of the world's population lived under Communist governments. These governments were characterized by one-party rule by

7872-556: The Soviet economic model , several scholars posit that in practice the model functioned as a form of state capitalism . Public memory of 20th-century Communist states has been described as a battleground between anti anti-communism and anti-communism . Many authors have written about mass killings under communist regimes and mortality rates , such as excess mortality in the Soviet Union under Joseph Stalin , which remain controversial, polarized, and debated topics in academia, historiography, and politics when discussing communism and

8036-592: The Ukrainian SSR . (see: Polish September Campaign ). In interbellum Poland, it was the capital of the Stryj County (area 2,081 square kilometres (803 sq mi), pop. 152,600) of the Stanisławów Voivodeship . According to the Polish census of 1931 , its population consisted of 35.6% Jews, 34.5% Poles, 28% Ukrainians and 1.6% Germans. In July 1941, the Germans invaded all Galicia, including Stryi. In

8200-427: The bourgeoisie  – the ruling class that owns the means of production and extracts its wealth through appropriation of the surplus product produced by the proletariat in the form of profit . This class struggle that is commonly expressed as the revolt of a society's productive forces against its relations of production , results in a period of short-term crises as the bourgeoisie struggle to manage

8364-400: The common ownership of the means of production, therefore abolishing the bourgeoisie, ultimately abolishing the proletariat itself and ushering the world into communism as a new mode of production . In between capitalism and communism, there is the dictatorship of the proletariat ; it is the defeat of the bourgeois state but not yet of the capitalist mode of production, and at the same time

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8528-648: The dissolution of the Soviet Union and the Fall of Communism , there was a split between those hardline Communists, sometimes referred to in the media as neo-Stalinists , who remained committed to orthodox Marxism–Leninism , and those, such as The Left in Germany, who work within the liberal-democratic process for a democratic road to socialism; other ruling Communist parties became closer to democratic socialist and social-democratic parties. Outside Communist states, reformed Communist parties have led or been part of left-leaning government or regional coalitions, including in

8692-539: The materialist conception of history which holds that the key characteristic of economic systems through history has been the mode of production and that the change between modes of production has been triggered by class struggle. According to this analysis, the Industrial Revolution ushered the world into the new capitalist mode of production . Before capitalism, certain working classes had ownership of instruments used in production; however, because machinery

8856-445: The means of production , earning profit via the surplus value generated by the proletariat, who have no ownership of the means of production and therefore no option but to sell its labor to the bourgeoisie. According to the materialist conception of history, it is through the furtherance of its own material interests that the rising bourgeoisie within feudalism captured power and abolished, of all relations of private property, only

9020-401: The productive forces ) is the primary agent of change in the structure of society and of human social relations and that social systems and their relations (e.g. feudalism , capitalism , and so on) become contradictory and inefficient as the productive forces develop, which results in some form of social revolution arising in response to the mounting contradictions. This revolutionary change is

9184-431: The state (or nation state ). Communists often seek a voluntary state of self-governance but disagree on the means to this end. This reflects a distinction between a more libertarian socialist approach of communization , revolutionary spontaneity , and workers' self-management , and a more authoritarian vanguardist or communist party -driven approach through the development of a socialist state , followed by

9348-435: The two-stage theory , communists made no major distinction between the socialist mode of production and communism; it is consistent with, and helped to inform, early concepts of socialism in which the law of value no longer directs economic activity. Monetary relations in the form of exchange-value , profit , interest , and wage labor would not operate and apply to Marxist socialism. While Joseph Stalin stated that

9512-488: The withering away of the state . As one of the main ideologies on the political spectrum , communist parties and movements have been described as radical left or far-left. Variants of communism have been developed throughout history, including anarchist communism , Marxist schools of thought , and religious communism , among others. Communism encompasses a variety of schools of thought, which broadly include Marxism , Leninism , and libertarian communism, as well as

9676-465: The (at that time emerging) middle class. Terms like management, initiative, personality, or the individualistic maxim "get educated, work hard and get ahead in life", combined with orderliness, replaced class consciousness and the socialist egalitarian concept, as workers were losing their symbolic status, to be eventually separated into a marginalized stratum. Communist Communism (from Latin communis , 'common, universal')

9840-416: The 1970s, and for a time Gierek was hailed as a miracle worker. Poles, to an unprecedented degree, were able to purchase desired consumer items such as compact cars, travel to the West rather freely, and even a solution to the intractable housing supply problem seemed to be on the horizon. Decades later many remembered the period as the most prosperous in their lives. The economy, however, began to falter during

10004-601: The 20th century. In Western Europe, communist parties were part of several post-war governments, and even when the Cold War forced many of those countries to remove them from government, such as in Italy, they remained part of the liberal-democratic process. There were also many developments in libertarian Marxism, especially during the 1960s with the New Left . By the 1960s and 1970s, many Western communist parties had criticized many of

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10168-455: The Bolsheviks to maintain power and control in the Soviet regions, rather than any coherent political ideology . The Soviet Union was established in 1922. Before the broad ban in 1921, there were several factions in the Communist party, more prominently among them the Left Opposition , the Right Opposition , and the Workers' Opposition , which debated on the path of development to follow. The Left and Workers' oppositions were more critical of

10332-422: The Communist ideal. Mao charged that Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev was the leader of a "revisionist clique" which had turned against Marxism and Leninism and was now setting the stage for the restoration of capitalism. The two nations were at sword's point by 1960. Both began forging alliances with communist supporters around the globe, thereby splitting the worldwide movement into two hostile camps. Rejecting

10496-429: The Constituent Assembly in January 1918. The Draft Decree on the Dissolution of the Constituent Assembly was issued by the Central Executive Committee of the Soviet Union , a committee dominated by Lenin, who had previously supported a multi-party system of free elections. After the Bolshevik defeat, Lenin started referring to the assembly as a "deceptive form of bourgeois-democratic parliamentarianism." Some argued this

10660-454: The Cossack Hetmanate army was reinforced by Hungarian regiments of Prince Rákóczi of Transylvania . After the partition of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1772 the city became a part of the Austrian Empire (see: Partitions of Poland ). During the revolutionary times in the Empire a Ruthenian Council was created in the city in 1848. During 1872-1875 the city was connected to the Austro-Hungarian railroad network. Its first train station

10824-409: The Fourierists in France were considered respectable socialists, while working-class movements that "proclaimed the necessity of total social change" denoted themselves communists . This latter branch of socialism produced the communist work of Étienne Cabet in France and Wilhelm Weitling in Germany. While liberal democrats looked to the Revolutions of 1848 as a democratic revolution , which in

10988-416: The Great Leap was a very expensive disaster." Put in charge of rescuing the economy, Deng adopted pragmatic policies that the idealistic Mao disliked. For a while, Mao was in the shadows but returned to center stage and purged Deng and his allies in the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976). The Cultural Revolution was an upheaval that targeted intellectuals and party leaders from 1966 through 1976. Mao's goal

11152-439: The October Revolution which involved the assault on Petrograd occurred largely without any human casualties . By November 1917, the Russian Provisional Government had been widely discredited by its failure to withdraw from World War I, implement land reform, or convene the Russian Constituent Assembly to draft a constitution, leaving the soviets in de facto control of the country. The Bolsheviks moved to hand power to

11316-418: The PPR- PPS unification congress, which resulted in the establishment of the Polish United Workers' Party (PZPR). In 1949, he was designated for and attended a two-year higher party course in Warsaw , where he was judged to be poorly qualified for intellectual endeavors but highly motivated for party work. In 1951 Roman Zambrowski sent Gierek to a striking coal mine, charging him with restoring order. Gierek

11480-407: The PZPR, General Wojciech Jaruzelski , introduced martial law in Poland on 13 December 1981. Gierek was interned for a year from December 1981. Unlike the (also-interned) opposition activists, the internment status brought Gierek no social respect. He ended his political career as the era's main pariah . Edward Gierek died in July 2001 of the miner's lung illness in a hospital in Cieszyn , near

11644-408: The Politburo in March 1959, at the III Congress of the PZPR. In March 1957, in addition to his Central Committee duties, Gierek became the first secretary of the Katowice Voivodeship PZPR organization, and he kept this job until 1970. He created a personal power base in the Katowice region and became the nationally recognized leader of the young technocrat faction of the party. On the one hand Gierek

11808-643: The Russian Federation has some supporters, but is reformist rather than revolutionary, aiming to lessen the inequalities of Russia's market economy. Chinese economic reforms were started in 1978 under the leadership of Deng Xiaoping , and since then China has managed to bring down the poverty rate from 53% in the Mao era to just 8% in 2001. After losing Soviet subsidies and support, Vietnam and Cuba have attracted more foreign investment to their countries, with their economies becoming more market-oriented. North Korea,

11972-431: The Soviet Union . The declaration acknowledged the independence of the former Soviet republics and created the Commonwealth of Independent States , although five of the signatories ratified it much later or did not do it at all. On the previous day, Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev (the eighth and final leader of the Soviet Union ) resigned, declared his office extinct, and handed over its powers, including control of

12136-524: The Soviet government of Nikita Khrushchev , who enacted a period of de-Stalinization and re-approached diplomatic relations with Yugoslavia in 1976. The Communist Party of China, led by Mao Zedong, established the People's Republic of China , which would follow its own ideological path of development following the Sino-Soviet split . Communism was seen as a rival of and a threat to Western capitalism for most of

12300-516: The Soviet model of rapid urbanization, Mao Zedong and his top aide Deng Xiaoping launched the Great Leap Forward in 1957–1961 with the goal of industrializing China overnight, using the peasant villages as the base rather than large cities. Private ownership of land ended and the peasants worked in large collective farms that were now ordered to start up heavy industry operations, such as steel mills. Plants were built in remote locations, due to

12464-546: The Soviets, built the hydrogen bomb , and strengthened the NATO alliance that covered Western Europe . According to Gorlizki and Khlevniuk, Stalin's consistent and overriding goal after 1945 was to consolidate the nation's superpower status and in the face of his growing physical decrepitude, to maintain his own hold on total power. Stalin created a leadership system that reflected historic czarist styles of paternalism and repression yet

12628-745: The Ukrainian Socialist Bloc finished a distant third at 12.7%, and the Mensheviks obtained a disappointing fourth place at 3.0%. Most of the Socialist Revolutionary Party's seats went to the right-wing faction. Citing outdated voter-rolls, which did not acknowledge the party split, and the assembly's conflicts with the Congress of Soviets, the Bolshevik–Left Socialist-Revolutionaries government moved to dissolve

12792-618: The United States, South Korea, and United Nations forces in the Korean War . While the war ended in a military stalemate, it gave Mao the opportunity to identify and purge elements in China that seemed supportive of capitalism. At first, there was close cooperation with Stalin, who sent in technical experts to aid the industrialization process along the line of the Soviet model of the 1930s. After Stalin's death in 1953, relations with Moscow soured – Mao thought Stalin's successors had betrayed

12956-449: The United States. Gierek also was trusted by Leonid Brezhnev , which meant that he was able to pursue his policies ( globalization of Poland's economy) without much Soviet interference. He had readily granted the Soviets concessions that his predecessor Gomułka would consider contrary to the Polish national interest. The Standard of living increased markedly in Poland in the first half of

13120-479: The abolition of capitalism. For Leninist communism, such goals, including short-term proletarian interests to improve their political and material conditions, can only be achieved through vanguardism , an elitist form of socialism from above that relies on theoretical analysis to identify proletarian interests rather than consulting the proletarians themselves, as is advocated by libertarian communists. When they engage in elections, Leninist communists' main task

13284-495: The actions of communist states, distanced from them, and developed a democratic road to socialism , which became known as Eurocommunism . This development was criticized by more orthodox supporters of the Soviet Union as amounting to social democracy . Since 1957, communists have been frequently voted into power in the Indian state of Kerala . In 1959, Cuban communist revolutionaries overthrew Cuba's previous government under

13448-514: The army and Mao's wife Jiang Qing . China's youth responded to Mao's appeal by forming Red Guard groups around the country. The movement spread into the military, urban workers, and the Communist party leadership itself. It resulted in widespread factional struggles in all walks of life. In the top leadership, it led to a mass purge of senior officials who were accused of taking a " capitalist road ", most notably Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping . During

13612-404: The authorities and opposition activists. Since the riots that brought down Gomułka were caused primarily by economic difficulties, Gierek promised economic reform and instituted a program to modernize industry and increase the availability of consumer goods. His "reform" was based primarily on large scale foreign borrowing, not accompanied by major systemic restructuring. The need for deeper reform

13776-532: The books became bestsellers. Polish society is divided in its assessment of Gierek. His government is fondly remembered by some for the improved living standards the Poles enjoyed in the 1970s under his rule. Uniquely among the PZPR leaders, the Polish public has shown signs of Gierek nostalgia, discernible especially after the former first secretary's death. When Polled 45% of Poles assessed Giereks legacy as largely positive, while only 22% judged him negatively, which shows

13940-404: The city of Stryi and move it to a museum of the Soviet totalitarianism, saying that the statue carries no historical or cultural value to the city. Until 18 July 2020, Stryi was incorporated as a city of oblast significance and served as the administrative center of Stryi Raion even though it did not belong to the raion. In July 2020, as part of the administrative reform of Ukraine, which reduced

14104-475: The community"; this semantic constitution has led to numerous usages of the word in its evolution. Prior to becoming associated with its more modern conception of an economic and political organization, it was initially used to designate various social situations. After 1848, communism came to be primarily associated with Marxism , most specifically embodied in The Communist Manifesto , which proposed

14268-491: The construction of blocks of flats , growing industrialization , as well as the loosening of state censorship and openness to new Western ideas which turned Poland into the most liberal country of the Eastern Bloc . Gierek opened the first fully-operational highway in Poland from Warsaw to Katowice in 1976. Gierek's policies were funded by large foreign loans and Poland continued to submerge into economic decline by

14432-544: The contrary. Gierek, who had previously met Pope Paul VI at the Vatican , talked with the Pope on the occasion of his visit. Although Gierek, distressed by the 1976 price increase policy failure, was persuaded by his colleagues not to resign, divisions within his team intensified. One faction, led by Edward Babiuch and Piotr Jaroszewicz, wanted him to remain at the helm, while another, led by Stanisław Kania and Wojciech Jaruzelski ,

14596-452: The country's, and his own, predicament. High foreign debts, food shortages, and an outmoded industrial base were among the factors that forced a new round of economic reforms. Once again, in the summer of 1980 price increases set off protests across the country, especially in the Gdańsk and Szczecin shipyards . Unlike on previous occasions, the regime decided not to resort to force to suppress

14760-552: The demobilization and migration of millions of soldiers and civilians. In the midst of this turmoil during the winter of 1946–1947, the Soviet Union experienced the worst natural famine in the 20th century. There was no serious opposition to Stalin as the secret police continued to send possible suspects to the gulag . Relations with the United States and Britain went from friendly to hostile, as they denounced Stalin's political controls over eastern Europe and his Berlin Blockade . By 1947,

14924-681: The dictator Fulgencio Batista . The leader of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro , ruled Cuba from 1959 until 2008. With the fall of the Warsaw Pact after the Revolutions of 1989 , which led to the fall of most of the former Eastern Bloc , the Soviet Union was dissolved on 26 December 1991. It was a result of the declaration number 142-Н of the Soviet of the Republics of the Supreme Soviet of

15088-492: The end of the 1970s. Gierek's government was unable to pay its creditors and the country was so heavily indebted that rationing was introduced due to shortages . Gierek was removed from power after the Gdańsk Agreement between the state and workers of the emerging Solidarity movement, which was seen as a move to renounce communism by the PZPR's leadership who replaced him as First Secretary with Stanisław Kania . Gierek

15252-490: The exception of North Korea, all of these states have started allowing more economic competition while maintaining one-party rule. The decline of communism in the late 20th century has been attributed to the inherent inefficiencies of communist economies and the general trend of communist governments towards authoritarianism and bureaucracy . While the emergence of the Soviet Union as the world's first nominally Communist state led to communism's widespread association with

15416-454: The eyes of his sponsors in Moscow. When the 1970 Polish protests were violently suppressed, Gierek replaced Gomułka as the first secretary of the party and had thus become the most powerful politician in Poland. In late January 1971, he put his new authority on the line and traveled to Szczecin and Gdańsk , to bargain personally with the striking workers. Consumer price increases that triggered

15580-464: The fact that the city has managed to keep its original name over time. Stryi was mentioned for the first time in 1385 (see: Red Ruthenia ). Its territory was annexed to Poland following their invasion and conquest of Galicia . In 1387 the Polish king Jogaila gave the city as the present to his pro-Tsarist brother Švitrigaila . In 1431 it was given the Magdeburg Rights , and it was located in

15744-452: The feudal privilege, thereby taking the feudal ruling class out of existence. This was another key element behind the consolidation of capitalism as the new mode of production, the final expression of class and property relations that has led to a massive expansion of production. It is only in capitalism that private property in itself can be abolished. Similarly, the proletariat would capture political power, abolish bourgeois property through

15908-477: The former Eastern Bloc. In Nepal, Communists ( CPN UML and Nepal Communist Party ) were part of the 1st Nepalese Constituent Assembly , which abolished the monarchy in 2008 and turned the country into a federal liberal-democratic republic, and have democratically shared power with other communists, Marxist–Leninists, and Maoists ( CPN Maoist ), social democrats ( Nepali Congress ), and others as part of their People's Multiparty Democracy . The Communist Party of

16072-523: The go-ahead for North Korea 's invasion of South Korea , expecting a short war. He was stunned when the Americans entered and defeated the North Koreans, putting them almost on the Soviet border. Stalin supported China 's entry into the Korean War , which drove the Americans back to the prewar boundaries, but which escalated tensions. The United States decided to mobilize its economy for a long contest with

16236-502: The historic circumstances in which it finds itself", and stated that Russia might be able to skip the stage of bourgeois rule through the Obshchina . The moderate Mensheviks (minority) opposed Lenin's Bolsheviks (majority) plan for socialist revolution before the capitalist mode of production was more fully developed. The Bolsheviks' successful rise to power was based upon the slogans such as "Peace, Bread, and Land", which tapped into

16400-418: The idea to group together different countries, such as Afghanistan and Hungary , has no adequate explanation. While the term Communist state is used by Western historians, political scientists, and news media to refer to countries ruled by Communist parties, these socialist states themselves did not describe themselves as communist or claim to have achieved communism; they referred to themselves as being

16564-534: The inspiration of religious text . In the medieval Christian Church , some monastic communities and religious orders shared their land and their other property. Sects deemed heretical such as the Waldensians preached an early form of Christian communism . As summarized by historians Janzen Rod and Max Stanton, the Hutterites believed in strict adherence to biblical principles, church discipline, and practised

16728-442: The intensifying alienation of labor experienced by the proletariat, albeit with varying degrees of class consciousness . In periods of deep crisis, the resistance of the oppressed can culminate in a proletarian revolution which, if victorious, leads to the establishment of the socialist mode of production based on social ownership of the means of production, " To each according to his contribution ", and production for use . As

16892-622: The lack of technical experts, managers, transportation, or needed facilities. Industrialization failed, and the main result was a sharp unexpected decline in agricultural output, which led to mass famine and millions of deaths. The years of the Great Leap Forward in fact saw economic regression, with 1958 through 1961 being the only years between 1953 and 1983 in which China's economy saw negative growth. Political economist Dwight Perkins argues: "Enormous amounts of investment produced only modest increases in production or none at all. ... In short,

17056-660: The last Communist country that still practices Soviet-style Communism, is both repressive and isolationist. Communist political thought and theory are diverse but share several core elements. The dominant forms of communism are based on Marxism or Leninism but non-Marxist versions of communism also exist, such as anarcho-communism and Christian communism , which remain partly influenced by Marxist theories, such as libertarian Marxism and humanist Marxism in particular. Common elements include being theoretical rather than ideological, identifying political parties not by ideology but by class and economic interest, and identifying with

17220-430: The law of value would still apply to socialism and that the Soviet Union was socialist under this new definition, which was followed by other Communist leaders, many other communists maintain the original definition and state that Communist states never established socialism in this sense. Lenin described his policies as state capitalism but saw them as necessary for the development of socialism, which left-wing critics say

17384-590: The legacy of Communist states. Communism derives from the French word communisme , a combination of the Latin word communis (which literally means common ) and the suffix isme (an act, practice, or process of doing something). Semantically, communis can be translated to "of or for the community", while isme is a suffix that indicates the abstraction into a state, condition, action, or doctrine . Communism may be interpreted as "the state of being of or for

17548-446: The long run ensured liberty, equality, and fraternity , Marxists denounced 1848 as a betrayal of working-class ideals by a bourgeoisie indifferent to the legitimate demands of the proletariat . By 1888, Marxists employed the term socialism in place of communism , which had come to be considered an old-fashioned synonym for the former. It was not until 1917, with the October Revolution , that socialism came to be used to refer to

17712-570: The major trade route between Halych and Lviv (Lemberg) and especially during the 15th to 16th centuries. It was destroyed during one of the Tatar raids in 1523. The city was later rebuilt and included a castle for defence purposes which later in the 18th century was dismantled by the Austrian authorities. In 1634 the city was destroyed once again by another Tatar raid. During the Khmelnytsky Uprising

17876-484: The massive public desire for an end to Russian involvement in World War I , the peasants' demand for land reform , and popular support for the soviets . 50,000 workers had passed a resolution in favour of Bolshevik demand for transfer of power to the soviets Lenin's government also instituted a number of progressive measures such as universal education , healthcare and equal rights for women . The initial stage of

18040-451: The maxim that a government should be strong and rule unshakably...Gierek's party nickname was “Tshombe,” and Silesia was the “Polish Katanga.” There he operated almost as a sovereign prince, a talented organizer with a real gift for finding efficient and loyal henchmen. All professions were represented in his court: engineers, economists, professors, writers, party apparatchiks and security agents". Gierek may have tried to make his move during

18204-408: The misery of the proletariat  – a new class of urban factory workers who labored under often-hazardous conditions. Foremost among these critics were Marx and his associate Engels. In 1848, Marx and Engels offered a new definition of communism and popularized the term in their famous pamphlet The Communist Manifesto . In 1917, the October Revolution in Russia set the conditions for

18368-522: The most advanced capitalist development; however, the Russian Empire was one of the poorest countries in Europe with an enormous, largely illiterate peasantry, and a minority of industrial workers. Marx warned against attempts "to transform my historical sketch of the genesis of capitalism in Western Europe into a historico-philosophy theory of the arche générale imposed by fate upon every people, whatever

18532-477: The most well-known of these and have been a driving force in international relations during most of the 20th century. Classical Marxism is the economic, philosophical, and sociological theories expounded by Marx and Engels as contrasted with later developments in Marxism, especially Leninism and Marxism–Leninism. Orthodox Marxism is the body of Marxist thought that emerged after the death of Marx and which became

18696-464: The official philosophy of the socialist movement as represented in the Second International until World War I in 1914. Orthodox Marxism aims to simplify, codify, and systematize Marxist method and theory by clarifying the perceived ambiguities and contradictions of classical Marxism. The philosophy of orthodox Marxism includes the understanding that material development (advances in technology in

18860-531: The only element which places into the realm of possibility moving on from this mode of production. This dictatorship , based on the Paris Commune 's model, is to be the most democratic state where the whole of the public authority is elected and recallable under the basis of universal suffrage . Stryi The city takes its name from that of the river Stryi , a tributary of the Dniester . The river's name

19024-474: The paramount political facts were being determined by the deteriorating economic situation and the resultant labor unrest. In July Gierek went to the Crimea , his usual vacation spot. For the last time he talked there with his friend Brezhnev. He responded to Brezhnev's gloomy assessment of the situation in Poland (including the out-of-control indebtedness) with his own upbeat predictions, possibly not fully cognizant of

19188-409: The party and condemn the "trouble makers". Ordered by Brezhnev not to attempt any further manipulations with prices, Gierek and his government undertook other measures to rescue the market destabilized in the summer of 1976. In August, sugar "merchandise coupons" were introduced to ration the product. The politics of "dynamic development" was over, as evidenced by such ration cards , which would remain

19352-464: The party as being reliable and completely subject to party discipline . Trotskyism overtook the left communists as the main dissident communist current, while more libertarian communisms , dating back to the libertarian Marxist current of council communism, remained important dissident communisms outside the Soviet Union. Following Lenin's democratic centralism , the Leninist parties were organized on

19516-401: The party who are full-time professional revolutionaries, as was conceived by Vladimir Lenin . Marxism is a method of socioeconomic analysis that uses a materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism , to understand social class relations and social conflict and a dialectical perspective to view social transformation . It originates from

19680-481: The party's first secretary, Gierek became a secretary of the Central Committee, even though he publicly expressed doubts about his own qualifications. On 28 June 1956 he was sent to Poznań , where a workers' protest was taking place. Afterward, delegated by the Politburo , he headed the commission charged with investigating the causes and course of the Poznań events. They presented their report on 7 July, blaming

19844-495: The peak of Zwinin (992 metres above sea level ), a few kilometres south of Stryi in which some 33,000 Imperial Russian soldiers perished. On 1 November 1918, an armed uprising took place in the town, after which it became a part of the short-lived West Ukrainian People's Republic . Stryi was again annexed by Poland in May 1919 during another invasion. In 1939, following the Soviet Union 's invasion of eastern Poland, Stryi became part of

20008-644: The policy ultimately was adopted despite strong objections voiced by the Soviet leadership. The increase, supported by Gierek, was announced by Jaroszewicz in the Sejm on 24 June 1976. Strikes broke out the following day, with particularly serious disturbances, brutally pacified by the police, taking place in Radom , at Warsaw's Ursus Factory and in Płock . On 26 June, Gierek engaged in the traditional party crisis-confronting mode of operation, ordering mass public gatherings in Polish cities to demonstrate people's supposed support for

20172-411: The political and later also money elites with the middle class at the expense of the working class , he said "the general idea of the relationship of forces in our society has remained the same from the 1970s, and the period of mass solidarity was an exception" ("mass solidarity" being the years 1980–81). Since the time of Gierek, Polish society has been hegemonized by cultural perceptions and norms of

20336-402: The political ideologies grouped around those. All of these different ideologies generally share the analysis that the current order of society stems from capitalism , its economic system , and mode of production , that in this system there are two major social classes, that the relationship between these two classes is exploitative, and that this situation can only ultimately be resolved through

20500-550: The primary element in the transformation of society towards a communist mode of production . Communism in its modern form grew out of the socialist movement in 18th-century France , in the aftermath of the French Revolution . Criticism of the idea of private property in the Age of Enlightenment of the 18th century through such thinkers as Gabriel Bonnot de Mably , Jean Meslier , Étienne-Gabriel Morelly , Henri de Saint-Simon and Jean-Jacques Rousseau in France. During

20664-482: The production of Fiat 126 in Poland and the erection of Warszawa Centralna railway station , the most modern European station at the time of its completion. Numerous aphorisms and sayings were popularized under his term, in particular the ones referring to the food shortages were later promoted by Ronald Reagan . Edward Gierek was born in Porąbka, now part of Sosnowiec , into a coal mining family. He lost his father to

20828-468: The productive forces continued to advance, the communist society , i.e. a classless, stateless, humane society based on common ownership , follows the maxim " From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs ." While it originates from the works of Marx and Engels, Marxism has developed into many different branches and schools of thought, with the result that there is now no single definitive Marxist theory. Different Marxian schools place

20992-440: The proletariat. According to communists, the proletariat can avoid mass unemployment only if capitalism is overthrown; in the short run, state-oriented communists favor state ownership of the commanding heights of the economy as a means to defend the proletariat from capitalist pressure. Some communists are distinguished by other Marxists in seeing peasants and smallholders of property as possible allies in their goal of shortening

21156-497: The purported "enemies of People's Poland " who were "disturbing the peaceful Silesian water". He showered them with propaganda epithets and alluded to their bones being crushed if they persevered in their attempts to turn the "nation" away from its "chosen course." Gierek was supposedly embarrassed when participants of the party conference in Warsaw on 19 March shouted his name along with that of Gomułka, as an expression of support. The 1968 events strengthened Gierek's position, also in

21320-524: The recent revolt were rescinded. Among Gierek's popular moves was the decision to rebuild the Royal Castle in Warsaw , destroyed during World War II and not included in the post-war restoration of the city's Old Town . State controlled media stressed his foreign upbringing and his fluency in the French language. The arrival of the Gierek team meant the final generational replacement of the ruling communist elite,

21484-515: The regime's long-standing practice of on-and-off confrontation with the Polish Catholic Church , and opted for cooperation. The policy resulted in a privileged position of the Church and its leaders for the duration of the communist rule in Poland. The Church markedly expanded its physical infrastructure and also became a crucial political third force, often involved in mediating conflict between

21648-512: The regime, caused considerable controversy at the turn of 1975 and 1976. The intended amendments included formalizing the "socialist character of the state", the leading role of the PZPR and the Polish-Soviet alliance. The widely opposed alterations resulted in numerous protest letters and other actions, but were supported at the VII Congress of the PZPR in December 1975 and largely implemented by

21812-440: The religious emphasis with a rational and philanthropic basis. Notable among them were Robert Owen , who founded New Harmony, Indiana , in 1825, and Charles Fourier , whose followers organized other settlements in the United States, such as Brook Farm in 1841. In its modern form, communism grew out of the socialist movement in 19th-century Europe. As the Industrial Revolution advanced, socialist critics blamed capitalism for

21976-547: The rise to state power of Vladimir Lenin 's Bolsheviks , which was the first time any avowedly communist party reached that position. The revolution transferred power to the All-Russian Congress of Soviets in which the Bolsheviks had a majority. The event generated a great deal of practical and theoretical debate within the Marxist movement, as Marx stated that socialism and communism would be built upon foundations laid by

22140-404: The same period, Mao's personality cult grew to immense proportions. After Mao's death in 1976, the survivors were rehabilitated and many returned to power. Mao's government was responsible for vast numbers of deaths with estimates ranging from 40 to 80 million victims through starvation, persecution, prison labour , and mass executions. Mao has also been praised for transforming China from

22304-464: The security forces did intervene in strikes, but only after giving up their firearms. In 1980, they did not use force at all. According to sociologist and left-wing politician Maciej Gdula, the social and cultural transformation that took place in Poland in the 1970s was even more fundamental than the one which occurred in the 1990s, following the political transition . Regarding the politics of alliance of

22468-574: The situation in the country and removed them from the Central Committee. The extraordinary IX Congress of the PZPR, in an unprecedented move, voted in July 1981 to expel Gierek and his close associates from the party, as the delegates considered them responsible for the Solidarity-related crisis in Poland, and the First Secretary Kania was unable to prevent their action. The next first secretary of

22632-416: The southern mountain resort of Ustroń where he spent his last years. From the perspective of time his rule was now seen in a more positive light and over ten thousand people attended his funeral. With his lifelong wife, Stanisława née Jędrusik, Gierek had two sons, one of whom is MEP Adam Gierek . In 1990, two books, based on extended interviews with Gierek by Janusz Rolicki, were published in Poland;

22796-641: The state-capitalist development and the Workers' in particular was critical of bureaucratization and development from above, while the Right Opposition was more supporting of state-capitalist development and advocated the New Economic Policy . Following Lenin's democratic centralism , the Leninist parties were organized on a hierarchical basis, with active cells of members as the broad base. They were made up only of elite cadres approved by higher members of

22960-621: The strikes. In the Gdańsk Agreement and other accords reached with Polish workers, Gierek was forced to concede their right to strike, and the Solidarity labor union was born. Shortly thereafter, in early September 1980, he was replaced by the Central Committee's VI Plenum as party first secretary by Stanisław Kania and removed from power. A popular and trusted leader in the early 1970s, Gierek left surrounded by infamy and ridicule, deserted by most of his collaborators. The VII Plenum in December 1980 held Gierek and Jaroszewicz personally liable for

23124-512: The term communism fell out of use during this period. An early distinction between communism and socialism was that the latter aimed to only socialize production , whereas the former aimed to socialize both production and consumption (in the form of common access to final goods ). This distinction can be observed in Marx's communism, where the distribution of products is based on the principle of " to each according to his needs ", in contrast to

23288-595: The term frequently in his writing and was the first to describe communism as a form of government . John Goodwyn Barmby is credited with the first use of communism in English, around 1840. Since the 1840s, the term communism has usually been distinguished from socialism . The modern definition and usage of the term socialism was settled by the 1860s, becoming predominant over alternative terms such as associationism ( Fourierism ), mutualism , or co-operative , which had previously been used as synonyms. Meanwhile,

23452-607: The term's widespread association with Marxism–Leninism and the Soviet-type economic planning model. In his essay "Judging Nazism and Communism", Martin Malia defines a "generic Communism" category as any Communist political party movement led by intellectuals ; this umbrella term allows grouping together such different regimes as radical Soviet industrialism and the Khmer Rouge 's anti-urbanism. According to Alexander Dallin ,

23616-499: The upheaval of the French Revolution , communism emerged as a political doctrine under the auspices of François-Noël Babeuf , Nicolas Restif de la Bretonne , and Sylvain Maréchal , all of whom can be considered the progenitors of modern communism, according to James H. Billington . In the early 19th century, various social reformers founded communities based on common ownership. Unlike many previous communist communities, they replaced

23780-428: The upheaval of the French Revolution , communism emerged as a political doctrine under the auspices of François-Noël Babeuf , Nicolas Restif de la Bretonne , and Sylvain Maréchal , all of whom can be considered the progenitors of modern communism, according to James H. Billington . In the 20th century, several ostensibly Communist governments espousing Marxism–Leninism and its variants came into power, first in

23944-416: The vehicle for fundamental society-wide changes and ultimately leads to the emergence of new economic systems . As a term, orthodox Marxism represents the methods of historical materialism and of dialectical materialism, and not the normative aspects inherent to classical Marxism, without implying dogmatic adherence to the results of Marx's investigations. At the root of Marxism is historical materialism,

24108-472: The works of 19th-century German philosophers Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels . As Marxism has developed over time into various branches and schools of thought , no single, definitive Marxist theory exists. Marxism considers itself to be the embodiment of scientific socialism but does not model an ideal society based on the design of intellectuals , whereby communism is seen as a state of affairs to be established based on any intelligent design; rather, it

24272-726: Was a co-founder of the Belgian branch of the Polish Workers' Party (PPR) and a chairman of the National Council of Poles in Belgium. Gierek, who in 1948 was 35 and had spent 22 years abroad, was directed by the PPR authorities to return to Poland, which he did with his wife and their two sons. Working in the Katowice district PPR organization, in December 1948, as a Sosnowiec delegate he participated in

24436-402: Was a likely successor to Gomułka. The Warsaw University law professor Mieczysław Maneli who knew Gierek from 1960 onward wrote about him in 1971: "Edward Gierek is an old‐fashioned Communist, but without fanaticism or zealousness. His Marxism is encumbered by few dogmas. It is almost pragmatic. He believes profoundly in the leading role that history conferred upon Communist parties and lives by

24600-486: Was able to resolve the situation using persuasion and the use of force was avoided. He was a member of the Sejm , Polish parliament, from 1952. During the II Congress of the PZPR (March 1954), he was elected a member of the party's Central Committee . As chief of the Central Committee's Heavy Industry Division, he worked directly under First Secretary Bolesław Bierut in Warsaw. In March 1956, when Edward Ochab became

24764-618: Was also created under Josip Broz Tito in Yugoslavia ; Tito's independent policies led to the Tito–Stalin split and expulsion of Yugoslavia from the Cominform in 1948, and Titoism was branded deviationist . Albania also became an independent Marxist–Leninist state following the Albanian–Soviet split in 1960, resulting from an ideological fallout between Enver Hoxha , a Stalinist, and

24928-427: Was also quite modern. At the top, personal loyalty to Stalin counted for everything. Stalin also created powerful committees, elevated younger specialists, and began major institutional innovations. In the teeth of persecution, Stalin's deputies cultivated informal norms and mutual understandings which provided the foundations for collective rule after his death. For most Westerners and anti-communist Russians, Stalin

25092-523: Was believed to be the atheist way of life. In Protestant England , communism was too phonetically similar to the Roman Catholic communion rite , hence English atheists denoted themselves socialists. Friedrich Engels stated that in 1848, at the time when The Communist Manifesto was first published, socialism was respectable on the continent, while communism was not; the Owenites in England and

25256-434: Was built in 1875. Around this time industrialisation began. Among the most influentual citizens of the city were Doctor Yevhen Olesnytsky , Father Oleksa Bobykevych , and Father O.Nyzhankivsky . In 1886 a large fire burnt almost the entire city to the ground. From October 1914 to May 1915 Stryi was occupied by the Russian Empire . In 1915 a bloody World War I battle took place in the nearby Carpathian Mountains , around

25420-411: Was expelled from the PZPR and arrested briefly in 1981 during martial law in Poland , living the remainder of his life in retirement until his death in 2001. Gierek is fondly remembered for his patriotism and modernization policies despite dragging Poland into financial and economic decline; over 1.8 million flats were constructed to house the growing population, and he is also responsible for initiating

25584-430: Was less interested in preserving his leadership. In May 1980, after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the subsequent Western boycott of the Soviet Union, Gierek arranged a meeting between Valéry Giscard d'Estaing and Leonid Brezhnev in Warsaw. As was the case with Władysław Gomułka a decade earlier, a foreign policy success created an illusion that the Polish party leader was secure in his statesman aura, while

25748-415: Was much more efficient, this property became worthless and the mass majority of workers could only survive by selling their labor to make use of someone else's machinery, and making someone else profit. Accordingly, capitalism divided the world between two major classes, namely that of the proletariat and the bourgeoisie . These classes are directly antagonistic as the latter possesses private ownership of

25912-468: Was never established, while some Marxist–Leninists state that it was established only during the Stalin era and Mao era , and then became capitalist states ruled by revisionists ; others state that Maoist China was always state capitalist, and uphold People's Socialist Republic of Albania as the only socialist state after the Soviet Union under Stalin, who first stated to have achieved socialism with

26076-572: Was obscured by the investment boom the country was enjoying in the first half of the 1970s. The first secretary's good relations with Western leaders, especially France's Valéry Giscard d'Estaing and West Germany 's Helmut Schmidt , were a catalyst for his receiving foreign aid and loans. Gierek is widely credited with opening Poland to political and economic influence from the Western Bloc. He himself extensively traveled abroad and received important foreign guests in Poland, including three presidents of

26240-477: Was one of the youngest in Europe. The role of the administration was expanded at the expense of the party, according to the maxim "the party leads, the government governs". Throughout the 1970s, the most highly visible member of the top leadership after Gierek was Prime Minister Piotr Jaroszewicz . From May 1971, Gierek's rival party politician Mieczysław Moczar was increasingly marginalized. According to historian Krzysztof Pomian , early in his term Gierek abandoned

26404-412: Was regarded as a pragmatic, non-ideological and economic progress-oriented manager, on the other he was known for his servile attitude toward the Soviet leaders, for whom he was a source of information concerning the PZPR and its personalities. Both the industrial supremacy of Gierek's well-run Upper Silesia territory and the special relationship with the Soviets he cultivated made many believe that Gierek

26568-407: Was the beginning of the development of vanguardism as an hierarchical party–elite that controls society, which resulted in a split between anarchism and Marxism , and Leninist communism assuming the dominant position for most of the 20th century, excluding rival socialist currents. Other communists and Marxists, especially social democrats who favored the development of liberal democracy as

26732-607: Was to purify communism by removing pro-capitalists and traditionalists by imposing Maoist orthodoxy within the Chinese Communist Party . The movement paralyzed China politically and weakened the country economically, culturally, and intellectually for years. Millions of people were accused, humiliated, stripped of power, and either imprisoned, killed, or most often, sent to work as farm laborers. Mao insisted that those he labelled revisionists be removed through violent class struggle . The two most prominent militants were Marshall Lin Biao of

26896-480: Was unable to find employment. The Giereks went to Belgium, where Edward worked in the coal mines of Waterschei , contracting pneumoconiosis (black lung disease) in the process. In 1939 Gierek joined the Communist Party of Belgium . During the German occupation , he participated in communist anti- Nazi Belgian resistance activities . After the war Gierek remained politically active among the Polish immigrant community. He

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