Whats the difference between fascism, socialism, and communism?

Answer 1

Let's start with Socialism, because Fascism and Communism use Socialism in different ways, it's important to understand Socialism first.

The ideology of Socialism started as an advocation to structure social/economic systems by the example of Jesus Christ. The idea being to share resource and provide services in order to eliminate poverty and raise everyone up from the inability to support themselves.

This relatively leftist ideology evolved into the Socialist system of economic thought, which disregards the ideological roots of Socialism for a systemic approach. Economic Socialism is the use of governmental services to provide for the people. Socialism can vary from extreme control of resources (i.e. a Statist economy) to a relatively small use of governmental services to provide for the people (like what most of the Western world, including the United States, uses for social services).

Economic Socialism is neither leftist nor right wing, which political spectrum it adheres to depends on the rest of the traits of the system it is used in.

Communism is the ideological belief that economic and social systems are evolving from exploitative systems to systems that require lesser exploitation to function. Early economic systems started using slave labor, and eventually as workers became more educated on their state demanded more rights and a larger share of the cut from their production. As economic systems live out their usefulness, they're essentially negated and replaced by more progressive systems.

Communists believe that economic systems will eventually evolve (along with human society) until a state of Communism is reached. A Communist state has no stratification. (i.e. No class system, no race/gender/ethnic discrimination, etc...) All economic exploitation is negated and the true value of one's work is passed on to the worker.

Communism is an extraordinarily nuanced topic. Unlike Fascism (which has the opposite problem, wherein we tend to avoid labeling Fascist groups as fascist), many of the countries we call Communist were not Communist and never were Communist. (And what's more, they never claimed to be Communist). For instance, we commonly refer to the Soviet Union as a Communist country. This is just "accepted" by people as if it were a fact. But ask yourself this: if the objective of Communism is to negate stratification, how do you reconcile the state of affairs in the Soviet Union with Communism?

You can't. The Soviets didn't even make the claim, in fact. While they had a single-party system and the party in that system was the Communist party, they never claimed to actually have achieved a state of Marxian Socialism. Every single "Communist" country is the same story.

The USSR was a Statist economy. By definition, statism can never be Communist. The whole focus of Communism is freeing the worker from the bonds of exploitation. A statist economy does the exact opposite. The Soviet workers were practically slaves.

There are four different kinds of systems that people refer to as Communist: Marxism, Leninism, Stalinism, and Maoism. The only one of these systems that actually could be considered Communism is Marxism.

Marxism is where the roots of modern day Communist belief lie. Leninism, Stalinism, and Maoism all claim Marxism as their root.

Marxism is what I described above, focused around Karl Marx' study of economic and social systems which produced Das Kapital and Marx' other writings, including The Communist Manifesto.

Marxism is highly misunderstood. People confuse Marxist traits with Leninist/Stalinist/Maoist traits all of the time. Marxism is focused solely on the "means of production".. factories, farms, etc... the resources which workers use to produce. Marx believed that the means of production should be publicly owned by the state (which in Marxian terms is the people, not the government) because private ownership promoted exploitation.

Keep in mind, Karl Marx' time is the time of Charles Dickens, with children working 14 hour days, chained to factory machines, and essentially living the lives of slaves, and growing up and being treated essentially the same. Karl Marx referred to them as "wage slaves" since their bonds were economic (although, in some cases, physical as well).

Marx advocated that the worker was the true producer, and the capitalist exploited the fruit of the worker for profit. Marx defined our first quantifiable class system, which initially had 2 classes: The proletariat (the workers, or the lower class) and the Bourgeoisie (the capitalists, the upper class). Marx viewed these two groups as always at odds. The Bourgeoisie lived off of the proletariat like parasites.

The proletariat, being the VAST majority of the population, had the power to stop the system of oppression through organization. Without the proletariat, the bourgeoisie could not exist. All the proletariat had to do was refuse to be exploited.

Marx argued that, like all other economic systems, Capitalism would eventually fail and be replaced. He suggested that leftist Socialist Democracy was the next step.

Unfortunately, many nefarious people (like Stalin, for instance) latched onto populist Marxian movements for exploitative reasons... essentially short-circuiting them and turning them into totalitarian systems.

The fruits of the labor of Marxists are felt even today, though. You can thank late 19th and early 20th century Marxists and Union workers for the eight hour work day (there was no limit before), the five day work week (it used to be seven), minimum wage, and laws against workplace exploitation of many forms including age exploitation.

Marxists, through their intense devotion to negating stratification, lead the civil rights movement and the movement for womens' suffrage.

Edit:(( Two misconceptions (wide misconceptions) displayed already in this thread:

- Communism dictates a person's life from birth to death.
Not so. That's totalitarianism, which is incompatible with Communism.

- All businesses are owned by the state in Communims.
This is, essentially, true... but with an addendum. The "state" in Communism is defined as the people, not the government. The misunderstanding is in that people assume that the "state" always means the "government".))


Fascism is defined by Benito Mussolini as the exact opposite of a Marxian Socialism. Fascism is a system of exploitation that relies on totalitarian rule and Nationalism. Fascism uses Socialism in the right-wing method, to create a statist economy where business and government interests are merged.

In the words of Mussolini, Fascism is more appropriately called Corporatism, since the purpose of Fascism is to forward the interests of the leaders of the Fascist movement, who own both the government and the major business institutions.

Fascism relies on a zealous nationalism and militarism to control the population, and fascists traditionally tried to attack those who dissented through ridicule and calling them treasonous... often resulting in violent purges. The fascist relies on propaganda and control of the language to perpetuate their power. They also demand the supremacy of a leader who they protect at all costs.

Fascism is both a system and an ideology. Fascists can be a problem in society even if that society is not a fascist system.

Fascism fell from favor after World War II, when the Fascist system in Italy fell and after the fall of Hitler's somewhat Fascist government.

Neo-conservativism is a modern adaptation of Fascism adopted by the modern Republican party's leadership.

Answer 2

these are market distinctions, not government ideologies. Communism is a command market place, the central authority decides what goods are produced and who they are distributed to. Money is an oxymoron in communism, money has no value because there is not a free market place to buy things. This was a problem for western companies that went into the USSR under glasnost. A Russian ruble had no monetary exchange value, so profits had to be extracted primarily as vodka or other trade goods to get out of Russia. In the USA, communism is the method employed in the military-industrial complex. Government lets contracts to specified vendors and is the sole purchaser of their entire product. Socialism is a regulated market place. Every successful economy has been a blend of socialism and capitalism (free market place). An example of pure socialism in the USA is Fox News. television is a totally regulated industry by the FCC. Fascism is where the means of production is owned by the government. all industry is nationalized. Examples in the USA are few but water supply, waste disposal, electric supply in some local communities are government operated. There is nothing inherently right or left with these market distinctions, that is why you are confused.

Answer 3

Fascism is a totalitarian state where one group suppresses, often by force(militarily and economically) another. An example of this would be the Nazis treatment of the Jews, Christians and all others who didn't fit the Aryan format.

Socialism is the government control of all economic production within a state (by state, I mean, nation or other governing group of people). Government organizations produce laws controlling production, wages, profit margins, prices, etc.

Communism is the political for of socialism where the government controls all aspects of human existence from birth to death. They control the education system and media (thereby controlling what people believe). They control the police and where people live. They control who lives and when people can be done away with.

All three have similar traits but are different as well.

Answer 4

Fascism is the type of government where the federal branch of the government has all the power. A good example of fascism would be Nazi Germany.
Communism is not a form of government, as many people seem to believe. It's an economic system in which everything is shared.
In socialism, all social programs are provided for the citizens. In socialistic countries such as Germany, medical care is provided for all German citizens.

And I managed to answer this as objectively as possible.

Answer 5

Fascism is extreme-right, Communism is extreme-left and Socialism and Democracy fills the space in between.

Answer 6

Fascism is a merging of government and private businees intersts.

Communism and socialism have no privatr businesses, everything being owned by the state.

Answer 7

fascism = Republican

socialism = Democratic

communism = Libertarian

Answer 8

Between you, me, and the wall? I think they're all identical. Except that fascists appear to have a thing for snappy black uniforms. ( Shhh!! )

Answer 9

The spelling, all three want to control our lives

Answer 10

all the same