"A specter is haunting Europe - the specter of communism"
("Manifesto of the Communist Party", Karl Marx & Friedrich Engels)

What is communism? The answer to this question may be hard to find because, taking into consideration the image it is reckoned with by the media, we would be tempted to say that it is that is a rough political regime, characterized by violence and abuses; in other words, a mankind's mistake. Indeed, this is the fierce shape it took, but, in theory, it is an attempt to rebuild society on other bases, such as monopolization of private property, equality among all citizens and abolition of classes. The problem regarding these political circumstances from the 20^th century was the incapacity of its adepts to bring to life the ideology developed by Karl Marx.

Historically speaking, the communism is a political regime which put forward new models of social and political organization and it was born out of the socialist movement. Its emergence has occurred due to the political, social and historical contexts which were to be found in Europe especially during the 19th century. These contexts have been extremely accurate presented by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels in "Manifesto of the Communist Party", oeuvre which represents the foundation for the communist ideology. The authors of the manifesto say that the society based on the relations between bourgeoisie and the proletariat has many drawbacks: "The modern bourgeois society that has sprouted from the ruins of feudal society has not done away with class antagonisms. It has but established new classes, new conditions of oppression, new forms of struggle in place of the old ones...". Due to the facts that Europe was undergoing a rapid process of industrialization, commerce was developing swiftly and colonization was flourishing, the bourgeoisie developed. In contrast, the proletarian had to witness the progress of the leading class on their work. Marx said about a proletarian that he is just an "appendage of the machine". Moreover, this subordination had as a consequence the appearance of the exploitation of the workers through small wages and the fact that they were not working merely to ensure themselves but also for the welfare of the bourgeois.

Because of this, several organizations appeared, asserting the rights of the working class. Among them, the "Communist League", which had the motto "Working men from all countries, unite!". This urge suggests the fact that uniting all the proletarians represented the key for starting a revolution. Additionally, "Manifesto of the Communist Party" established the relation between the bourgeoisie and the oppressed class: "The immediate aim of the Communists is the same as that of all other proletarian parties: formation of the proletariat into a class, overthrow of the bourgeois supremacy, conquest of political power by the proletariat". Nevertheless, the upholders of the overthrow are divised in two sections: utopian socialists and revolutionary communists. The first ones were confident that the change of the society could have been made using peaceful means (Comte de Saint-Simone, Charles Fourier, Robert Owen)- "So they rejected revolutionary action because of its violence and destructiveness. Moreover, precisely because the revolution had, if anything, widened the divisions between rich and poor, they concluded that political action was hopeless as a means of improving the condition of humanity" (Alex Callinicos - "The Revolutionary Ideas of Karl Marx")- and the last ones thought that violence was their last salvation (Gracchus Babeuf, Auguste Blanqui). A quotation which underlines the idea that violence is a necessity is the next one, also extracted from "Manifesto of the Communist Party": "Let the ruling classes tremble at a Communistic revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to win".

Furthermore, we will speak about the traits that, in theory, should characterize a communist society and about the ones which were attributed to it in practice. So, firstly, it is needless to say that they rejected the idea of private property, which was considered the main source of all differences between classes. Thus, equality regarding social and economic aspects of the citizen could have been achieved. Nonetheless, in practice, the abolition of private property meant abuse, because the population's refuse to give up their land determined the use of violence. Secondly, individuality had to be flattened because communism supposed all the citizens were equal and had the same role: to work on the land which had been turned into the state's private property. Although they tried to eliminate exploitation, the result was exactly the opposite because proletarians were turned into a sort of "peasants", who were compelled to serve the interests of the state. Thirdly, the abolition of the classes was the supreme principle of the communists. Once again, force was used and, consequently, they forgot about their basic goals of the Marxist ideology. The communist leaders forbade religious beliefs. Also, they permitted the existence of only one party, eliminating all politic dissents. They gained control over the means of communication...briefly, they transformed the state into a dictatorship and the chief of the state into a tyrant who followed merely his interests instead of the ones of the people.