-Roman Kröger, 09 February 2026
When we look around at the decaying Capitalist society we see many things: Rising unemployment, crime, homelessness, inflation and poverty, a coming economic crisis and tens of thousands of New Zealanders leaving for a better life elsewhere. The economy is in ruins, and yet the largest corporations are recording record profits. Producers are producing far more commodities than the human population needs, and yet there are still people with nothing.
We see our society crumble around us as governments, whether they be National or Labour, fail to address the key issues of our country. This is not because such governments are incompetent or dumb, though that may seem. It’s because the 6 major parties in this country do not exist to solve the before mentioned, inflation, unemployment, and poverty. Rather, they exist to maintain Capitalism by means of coercion, division, and subjection of the working class. And this is where the Communists step in, to advocate for the needs of the working class, to install a system which will rid the world of such unemployment, crime, and poverty.
The Success of a planned economy
But how can I be so confident in myself, that Socialism will deliver the results I say it will? Well because we have seen such things in the past among countries that overthrew capitalism. A planned economy in the USSR and eastern Europe, in a matter of a few decades, took semi-feudal, impoverished, and illiterate countries, and transported them into the modern era. Eliminating poverty, unemployment, inflation, homelessness, significantly reducing crime and dramatically improving healthcare, education, and housing. This is completely unimaginable in Capitalist society today.
The political systems of countries like the Soviet Union and East Germany were not a workers’ democracy, but under a planned economy everyone had a house, a job, food, electricity, access to free university, and quality healthcare. Such things could even be achieved under the constant threats of war, sabotage, sanctions, from outside powers such as the U.S. and Nazi Germany.
A planned economy in which private property is abolished involves all industries and enterprises working together for a common goal. This is a lot more efficient than multiple businesses competing against each other for the individual profits of a few capitalists. That is the key to the success of the Soviet Union. And remember the USSR, for most of its life, was a degenerated workers state, not even socialist. And yet their system was leagues above the Capitalist system in terms of improving living standards for the working class.
If the workers democratically owned and controlled their respective workplaces, one in which human need was the motive for production rather than profit, such a system would have been even more advanced than the USSR.
Issues with the Soviet Model
Of course, the Soviet Union and countries like it had major failings. Inefficiencies, censorship, a lack of political democracy, but none of these are inherent issues of Socialism. For one, all of these can occur under Capitalist countries too. But more importantly, communists know that there are much better solutions than going back to capitalism. We can use the most advanced computer systems to solve inefficiencies which the USSR didn’t have.
So if the Soviet Union was so great then why did it fall? Well the answer lies in the betrayal of its rulers. As the economy developed and became more and more complicated, this led to more and more layers of bureaucracy which eventually choked the economy. The solution was to get rid of bureaucracy as a special layer and let workers run society democratically. Gorbachev took power after the last two leaders had died in their first year in office. Instead of opening up the economy to the workers, Gorbachev opened up the economy to capitalism. To keep their privileges the top bureaucrats preferred to destroy the planned economy, and some of them became Oligarchs in the new capitalist Russia. Gorbachev undemocratically dissolved the union despite 77.5% of the people wishing to keep it. A similar thing happened in East Germany where 86% of the population wished to keep their system and move forward to socialism. And still today large chunks of Eastern Europeans, even after decades of Capitalist brainwashing, say that they prefer the old ‘Socialist’ system.
No Compromise
“Well you know this all sounds well and good, but Communism and Socialism, a bit too extreme. Why can’t we just have a kind of mix of both Capitalism and Socialism, maybe a kind of Social Democracy” you might ask. But social democracy could never do the things Socialism promises to do. Any promises it does fulfil are temporary, and depends on what the capitalists can tolerate, which is not much these days. Because social democracy will never take on capitalism, it could never implement a planned economy. The main motive for production would still be profit rather than human need, and you still wouldn’t have any democratic control over your workplace. At the end of the day, what Social Democracy is is a compromise. A compromise to your rights, a compromise to your control, a compromise to your living standards, and a compromise to your material well-being. Social Democracy exists only to prevent a Communist revolution, it tries to keep the workers happy enough to not rebel, but never happy enough to thrive. The policies which the workers fought so hard for, are rolled back by politicians funded by large, profit driven corporations.
When I say all of this to people when the subject comes up they often say “well we should have Socialism but not Communism, because Socialism sounds good enough as it is and Communism is just too far”. However, as the Capitalist class is eliminated from earth, the coming generations will grow up under Socialism. The need for a society with a currency and state becomes unnecessary as human nature switches from one formed in Bourgeois ideology to one formed in Marxist ideology. With a planned economy powering humanity forward there is no need to fight each other for crumbs. In this environment a state and a currency will be of no need eventually. Human nature will become less greedy, less selfish, and less narcissistic, and thus the need for forces to regulate these instincts will disappear. Socialism will automatically develop into communism.
Even after overthrowing capitalism it is possible to have Capitalist restoration or revisionism from within. In the USSR there was revisionism, and then there was Capitalist restoration. And that revisionism and Capitalist restoration happened within state organs. To stop such a thing from happening there must be complete democracy for the working class majority to run their state. But the only real guarantee will be when capitalism is overthrown on a world scale.
The Place of the Communists
Right now in New Zealand, there is no revolutionary party strong enough to carry out a Socialist revolution. All of the current major parties in NZ are paid off by the corporate elites to support compromises and oppression towards Communism and Democracy. And the Communists cannot hope to take power only through parliaments, we would be facing an uphill battle that would inevitably result in failure. Big business would still use the Capitalist state and armed forces against us should we win only on the ballots. What New Zealand needs, for the construction of revolution, is a revolutionary party, that will win through the seizing of government and enterprise by and for the working class. A Capitalist party would never support Socialism. A reformist, exclusively parliamentary Socialist party like the DSA in America or Your Party in the UK, could never hope to achieve Socialism. Only a highly organised, skilled, and competent Revolutionary party can hope to build Socialism across the world. And our reward for doing so will be a society, based on human need, rational planning, and workers’ democratic ownership over enterprise.