Marxism–Leninism

**Marxism–Leninism** is a political philosophy or worldview founded on ideas of Marxism and Leninism, and seeks to establish socialist states and develop them further. Marxist–Leninists espouse a wide array of views depending on their understanding of Marxism and Leninism, but generally they support the idea of a vanguard party, one-party state, state-dominance over the economy, internationalism, opposition to bourgeois democracy, and opposition to capitalism. It remains the official ideology of the ruling parties of China, Cuba, Laos, and Vietnam, and was the official ideology of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) and the other ruling parties making up the Eastern Bloc.

Marxism–Leninism first became a distinct philosophical movement in the Soviet Union during the 1920s, when Joseph Stalin and his supporters gained control of the Russian Communist Party. It rejected the notions, common among Marxists at the time, of world revolution as a prerequisite for building socialism in Russia (in favor of the concept of Socialism in One Country), and of a gradual transition from capitalism to socialism (signified by the introduction of the First Five-Year Plan). The internationalism of Marxism–Leninism was expressed in supporting revolutions in foreign countries (e.g., initially through the Communist International or through the concept of "socialist-leaning countries" of late Soviet Union).

The goal of Marxism–Leninism is the development of a state into a socialist republic through the leadership of a revolutionary vanguard, the part of the working class who come to class consciousness as a result of the dialectic of class struggle. The socialist state, representing a "dictatorship of the proletariat" (as opposed to that of the bourgeoisie) is governed by the party of the revolutionary vanguard through the process of democratic centralism, which Vladimir Lenin described as "diversity in discussion, unity in action." It seeks the development of socialism into the full realization of communism, a classless social system with common ownership of the means of production and with full social equality of all members of society.

Marxism–Leninism as a philosophy and a political movement has been widely criticised, due to its relations with Stalinism, the Soviet Union, state repression in Marxist–Leninist run states and classical Marxism. Trotskyists claim that Marxism–Leninism led to the establishment of a degenerated workers' state. Others, such as philosopher Eric Voegelin, claim that Marxism–Leninism is in its core (as in the ideas of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels) inherently oppressive; claiming that the "Marxian vision dictated the Stalinist outcome not because the communist utopia was inevitable but because it was impossible". Criticism like this has itself been criticised for "philosophical determinism"—i.e., that the negative events in the movement's history were predetermined by their convictions. Historian Robert Vincent Daniels argues that Marxism was used to "justify Stalinism, but it was no longer allowed to serve either as a policy directive or an explanation of reality" during Stalin's rule.

In complete contrast, E. Van Ree argues that Stalin continued to be in "general agreement" with the classical works of Marxism until his death.