- Statue showing the average soviet man and woman wielding a hammer and sickle
The cover of a famous documentary by Michael Moore "Capitalism: A Love Story"
Socialism mounted to power in Russia after forcing the Tsarist regime into abdication. Russia was lagging behind all industrial powers of Europe in production of goods. Socialism seemed as the perfect discipline which could eradicate the humongous gap between Russia’s potential and actual production. Socialism in theory is a political discipline in which all resources in a society are shared equally and all members of that society are equal and work together to achieve a set goal. The creators of basic ideas of socialism, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, had presumed that if this system would be put into practice it would perfect society. If implied without alteration socialism aimed to improve living standards, abolish differences in social status to perfect society in the long run.
During the years when the Socialist Party had established the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, equality was regarded as perfection. The equality of all members of society men women, as well as different nations within the USSR borders was regarded as an essential factor to Soviet success. Social issues could be resolved this way leading to political stability and economic growth, which was mainly the reason for such advertisement and provision of equality. The Soviet advertisement or propaganda was so powerful that all members of this communist society believed that equality was the perfect social status which had been achieved in the USSR.
One may consider Socialism and Capitalism as complete opposites. Despite that there have been points in History when these systems have been extremely similar in practice; the theories are opposite. The extreme contrast can be seen in the inequality which the Capitalist system causes. The socialist system can be seen as all socialist men and women of different nations as equal workers with equal rations. On the other hand the capitalist photo shows a man hiding a sack of money and disguising himself as a patriot by waving a small American flag. This shows the corruptibility and inequality which the capitalist system has led to in some cases. This is exactly what most of the general Soviet population believed.
Thus leading back into the idea of perfection one can see that during the reign of Vladimir Lenin perfection in the Soviet republics, for example Azerbaijan was seen as equality. While today capitalism is considered as the perfect system because of its victory over communism, and the fact that it has adapted through years of tough mending to be the most sophisticated social system. Although one would like to conclude by saying that it is average human behavior to ruin perfect equality, and systems which restrict such behavior lead to failure. Thus a perfect social structure where all members of society are equal is impossible to achieve.
English As Pie 