Question

Attempt Importance of Communist Party

Answer 1

A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the social and economic goals of communism through both revolutionary means and state policy. A communist party is the vanguard party of the working class (proletariat), whether ruling or non-ruling.  As a ruling party, the communist party exercises power in the name of the dictatorship of the proletariat. The idea of communist party dictatorship was heavily influenced by Vladimir Lenin's writings during the first two decades of  the twentieth century when Russian social democracy divided into Bolshevik (meaning "of the majority") and Menshevik (meaning "of the minority") factions. Lenin, the leader of the Bolsheviks, argued that a revolutionary party should be a small vanguard party with a centralized political command and a strict cadre policy emphasizing subservience to the party’s decisions. In contrast, the Menshevik faction, including members like Trotsky, argued that the party should not neglect the important role to be played by the masses in a communist revolution. The Bolshevik party, which eventually became the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), took power in Russia after the October Revolution in 1917. With the creation of the Communist International (Comintern) in 1919, the concept of communist party leadership was adopted by many revolutionary parties worldwide. In an effort to standardize this movement and maintain centralized control over its affiliated parties, the Comintern required its members to call themselves communist. They were subsequently known as Leninist or, later, Marxist-Leninist parties.  The doctrine of Leninism was standardized and popularized by Joseph Stalin in 1924 in the party handbook, Foundations of Leninism.