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[RedKing]

When I was talking about collapse, I was thinking more of the Communists in Turkey, in India, in Nepal itself...there's just a never-ending fractalization of splinter factions and subfactions and sub-subfactions. It's the Judean People's Front sketch from Life of Brian writ large.

When it's held (as in Cuba, as in North Korea, as it did in China for a long while) it's been because of the force of personality of a single autocratic leader. Without a central strongman, peaceful Communism seems doomed to death by factionalization. Just my opinion, of course.


And as I said re: China, they're Communist in name only these days, and certainly not Maoist. If Mao came back from the dead today....well, besides being a hopping vampire, he'd also probably be labeled an enemy of the state and be squashed like a bug. When the government is trying to move 80% of the population into urban centers by 2050, and allowing massive swathes of land to be privately purchased (often with government support in fending off popular backlash)....yeah, Maoism is dead and buried in the Middle Kingdom.

[Servant Corps]

In all seriousness though, this is not the dire crisis that some (who are apparently stuck in the 1960's) would like to make it out.

That's likely true, but it always bugged me why some people said that the Cold War ended* when, well, you still have communist movements. The real reason I'm concerned though is the fact that the Nepali Maoists are considered a terrorist organization according to the US, and so the Nepali Maoists are technically providing a black eye to this "War on Terrorism" (since they're the most successful of groups, having a chance at gaining political power there).

As for every other person stuck in the 1960's (other than those who posted in this thread of course), I'm guessing that's due to conspiracy theories over Chinese and Indian "schemes" to gain control over Nepali affairs. Which stems back to the war between China and India over Kashmir, the war that India lost, turning China and India into geopolitical rivals (while still being geopolitical friends: BRIC and all).

*The implied subtext being "The Cold War ended, and capitalism won".

[ChairmanPoo]

The Nepali Maoists are actually at odds with Chinese Maoists. They don't regard them as communist enough. Not that they are very revolutionary themselves, though. It likely boils down at not being wanted to be hijacked by them.

[RedKing]

Remaining erstwhile "Communist countries" (as stated above, I do not believe China qualifies as they abandoned the economic side of Communism beginning in 1979):

Cuba
North Korea
Nepal

Total GDP: $100.6 billion ($5.8 trillion if you insist on adding China)



Remaining capitalist countries:

Most of the rest of the world, although we'll just consider the EU, USA and Japan for sake of argument:

Total GDP: $35.9 trillion


I think we can soundly say that capitalism won, and also safely say that Nepalese Maoists running the democratic bureaucracy of one the poorest countries in the world (172nd out of 194 on a GDP per-capita scale) in a landlocked nook of the Himalayas does not constitute a threat to....well, anyone. Probably not even to the Nepalese themselves.

As to their 'terrorist' status, it's shared with a number of other groups which hardly constitute a significant threat these days, such as the PKK, the Continuity IRA, the Real IRA, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, Shining Path, and Aum Shinrikyo.

Let's think about that for a second. The Tamil Tigers are destroyed. The Shining Path mostly collapsed after 1992, and has been on a downward spiral ever since. Aum Shinrikyo had *one* year in which it was a bonafide terrorist organization (1995). It has done absolute zilch since then.

Being on the State Dept list isn't much of a threat indicator. Used to be, it automatically dropped groups every two years unless there was a good reason to keep a group on there. Thanks to the War on Turr, they changed to it "you can petition to be taken off after four years, otherwise a group stays on there forever".

[Servant Corps]

Eh, I take issue with your list of "communist" countries. According to Wikipedia, here are a list of CURRENT communist countries:

Ruling parties

In the following countries, the Communist parties either lead the ruling coalition or hold monopoly on state power.

    * People's Republic of China – Communist Party of China leads the United Front
    * Cyprus – Progressive Party of Working People – leads the ruling coalition
    * Cuba – Communist Party of Cuba
    * Laos – Lao People's Revolutionary Party
    * Nepal – Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist) and Communist Party of Nepal (United) lead the governing coalition. Janamorcha Nepal, and the Communist Party of Nepal (Unity Centre-Masal), are also part of the coalition.
    * North Korea – Korean Workers' Party – leads the Democratic Front for the Reunification of the Fatherland
    * Vietnam – Communist Party of Vietnam – leads the Vietnamese Fatherland Front

Communist parties as part of other ruling coalition
    * Belarus – Communist Party of Belarus – participates in the ruling coalition
    * Bolivia – Communist Party of Bolivia – participates in the ruling coalition
    * Brazil – Communist Party of Brazil – participates in the ruling coalition
    * South Africa – South African Communist Party – participates in the ruling coalition
    * Sri Lanka – Communist Party of Sri Lanka – participates in the ruling coalition
    * Syria – Syrian Communist Party (Bakdash), Syrian Communist Party (Faisal) – participates in the ruling coalition
    * Uruguay – Communist Party of Uruguay – participates in the ruling coalition
    * Venezuela – Communist Party of Venezuela participates in the ruling coalition
    * Ukraine – Communist Party of Ukraine participates of ruling coalition

So...a total of 16 countries have at least communists taking part in at least partially running a country. I sure that GDP wise, they wouldn't really outnumber "remaining capitalist countries", but I don't think it's good to measure GDP-wise and instead look solely at how many States align themselves to capitalism/communism. Because there is still a sizable minority that are communist, I'd say that capitalism is not winning, or at least not winning completely. Communism is still alive, and at least in democratic countries like Brazil, it still retains at least sort of electoral appeal.

and also safely say that Nepalese Maoists running the democratic bureaucracy of one the poorest countries in the world (172nd out of 194 on a GDP per-capita scale) in a landlocked nook of the Himalayas does not constitute a threat to....well, anyone. Probably not even to the Nepalese themselves.

I don't think communism per-se really pose a threat (except an ideological one to capitalism), but I still feel it is interesting nevertheless to note, especially because Nepal borders India, which is suffering from its own Maoist insurgency (granted the Indian Maoists hate the Nepali Maoists). And if there is a "Great Game" going on between India and China over Nepal (I don't know if that is true, but the Indian newspapers and the Maoists are claiming that there is such a "Great Game" going on, with the Indians ranting about Chinese involvement and the Maoists screaming about Indian interference in domestic affairs), then I'd think it'd be interesting to note at least.

As to their 'terrorist' status, it's shared with a number of other groups which hardly constitute a significant threat these days, such as the PKK, the Continuity IRA, the Real IRA, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, Shining Path, and Aum Shinrikyo.

None of those terrorist groups also have a political wing that participates in a ruling coalition. (Okay, the Tamils once controlled Northern Sri Lanka, but not anymore.)