# What has replaced communism

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-has-replaced-communism/683739>\
**Category:** Great Debates\
**Created:** [March 15, 2014, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-has-replaced-communism/683739 "2014-03-15T02:00:40Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 5

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**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\
**Post date:** [March 18, 2014, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-has-replaced-communism/683739/81 "2014-03-18T17:25:48Z")

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> [@Frank\_Merton](#):
>
> It is in a sense totalitarian state, but then so too are the democracies; they just pretend they are not.

One characteristic of a totalitarian state is that all organized elements of [civil society](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_society) are either suppressed or made into state instruments. That has not happened in the democracies.

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**Author:** ![scabpicker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scabpicker/32/8268_2.png) [@scabpicker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scabpicker)\
**Post date:** [March 18, 2014, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-has-replaced-communism/683739/82 "2014-03-18T17:31:55Z")

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> [@BrainGlutton](#):
>
> Mexico during the decades of PRI hegemony was never totalitarian. I guess it depends on the nature of the one party and whether it **wants** totalitarianism or not.

True, even though I am not fond of the PRI, they never devolved into totalitarianism.

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**Author:** ![Steken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e274bd/32.png) [@Steken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steken)\
**Post date:** [March 18, 2014, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-has-replaced-communism/683739/83 "2014-03-18T18:38:19Z")

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> [@John\_Mace](#):
>
> In American English, those two terms are pretty much synonymous. Ghetto can mean an ethnically enclosed urban area, but I can also just mean “slum”.

I didn’t know that, thank you.

To me, ghetto = “drab part of town primarily populated by working class minorities.”

Slum = “cardboard shanty town, shitty brown water, garbage everywhere.”

Sorry about the hijack.

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**Author:** ![ralfy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ralfy/32/600_2.png) [@ralfy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralfy)\
**Post date:** [August 24, 2014, 5:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-has-replaced-communism/683739/84 "2014-08-24T05:52:15Z")

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Global capitalism dependent heavily on risky financial speculation has followed, but that too will fall apart.

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