Chapter 21

I thought this chapter was interesting because it totally contradicted my preconceived notions about communism. Prior to understanding the roots of communism, I thought of it as a very rigid society centered around solely giving power and authority to the people at the very top. My only real knowledge of communism was based on China’s communist policies and that too was largely based on the One Child Policy China had adopted years ago as a means of population control. 


I was surprised to learn that communism is actually rooted in Marx’s ideas designed around distributing power more equally. In fact, Strayer describes Marx communism as “a final stage of historical development when social equality and collective living would be most fully developed, largely without private property” (930). Interestingly, communism seems to almost be a polar opposite from the fascism that had been trendy in the early 1900s. It minimized nationalism and focused on bringing equality to everyone, especially to the working class. In fact, these ideas are reminiscent of the proletariat ideas we studied during the French Revolution, when the working class wanted more rights and more equality. 

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