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Communism,
term
in political science denoting either a society where all property is held
in common or a political movement whose final aim is the establishment of
such a society.
PRIMITIVE
COMMUNISM
Primitive
communism designates a largely self-sufficient village economy where the
basic tools of production, animals, land, etc., are the property of the
community as a whole. The idea that individual private property is an
impediment to a just society has led many writers to imagine a state of
affairs without private ownership. Thus in the Republic by Plato the
ruling class of guardian-philosophers live in a state of communism so that
they may dedicate themselves to the pursuit of justice. Other classes are
not so restricted. Communal ownership also characterizes the utopian
societies imagined by Thomas More (1516, Utopia) and Tommaso Campanella (Civitas
Solis, 1623; The City of the Sun). Similar depictions became common among
socialist thinkers in the 18th and 19th centuries, for instance Charles
Fourier and William Morris.
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