It's literally not possible for one economic system to simultaneously "take over" the entire planet, so if a socialist or communist revolution ever took place there would absolutely be a first single country or group of countries to "go socialist." The USSR and its allies were, at the time of their existence and the height of their influence, recognized as being fundamentally communist in nature by communist scholars. Whatever deviations from that ideal caused them to fail are no greater in magnitude (or relevance) than the deviations current nation-states have from capitalism that libertarians use to No-True-Scottsman actually-existing-capitalism.If communism 2.0 is a better system and wouldn't fail for the same reasons that the USSR did, then talk about those differences. When talking about communism 1.0 (and the many, many socialists/communists living today who basically have not deviated from the mindsets of the revolutionaries of the past), drop the special pleading and take the L.
claudiawerner|6 years ago
I'm familiar with that scholarship, and no, they weren't. The main reason being is that the USSR never claimed to be communist. The USSR based its ideology on Marx and Lenin, and Lenin invented this distinction, that "socialism" is a stage preceding communism, and communism is a stateless society (etc. etc. as Marx described it). The USSR claimed to be a union of socialist soviets. They used "socialist" in this sense.
By Communist party-affiliated scholars, there was some disagreement as to whether the USSR really was socialist. By academics in universities, there was more doubt cast on that.