[kerkeslager]

I don't agree with the poster--I think communism has been tried, sometimes even successfully (i.e. kibbutzim).

However, the examples of communism which capitalists like to point at as failures, such as Stalinism or Maoism, didn't ever actually distribute wealth, instead merely changing the concentration of wealth. This points to a failure to actually achieve communism, rather than a failure of communism to work.

Unfortunately I don't think there are very good explanations of this out there. The best I can find is this[1] but that's pretty dense, assumes a lot of prior economic knowledge, and is (ironically) behind a paywall.

[1] https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/089692050809085...

[alexvoda]

I will read up on what you posted. But to answer GP, I basically agree with what you posted.

From a philosophical pov, the well known regimes (Stalinist USSR, Maoist China, Varsovia pact regimes, DPRK) were dictatorships and they were failed attempts at communism.

From a historical point of view it is fine to call them communist.