RE Socialism below; communism is a form of socialism.

Socialism is an economic system in which the means of production are commonly owned and controlled cooperatively. Therefore Romania WAS a socialist country under single-party rule. Also therefore Norway and Sweden, being free market economies, are not socialists, they just have a slightly larger welfare state.

As for Communism not being socialism, people who were under said governance consider themselves both communism and socialism, both words were pretty much used interchangeably. - Source for this, my Hungarian gf, a well used phrase used to be that under socialism they hired 10 people to do one mans job (badly).

Additionally, there are 3 generations of people in most ex european countries. 1) those raised under the socialism, who expect to have a job in which they do nothing and get paid; 2) those brought up under the initial changeover - ie corruption, bribery, knowing people and such. and 3rd, those raised under more recent Capitalism.

Posted By: phrankin, Oct 20, 17:52:04