Anti-communism is opposition to communism. Organized anti-communism developed in reaction to the rise of communism, especially after the 1917 October Revolution in Russia. It reached global dimensions during the Cold War, when America and the Soviet Union engaged in an intense rivalry. Most modern anti-communists reject the concept of historical materialism, which is a central idea in Marxism. Anti-communists reject the Marxist belief that capitalism will be followed by socialism and communism, just as feudalism was followed by capitalism. Anti-communists question the validity of the Marxist claim that the socialist state will "wither away" when it becomes unnecessary in a true communist society. Anti-communists also accuse communists of having caused several famines that occurred in 20th-century communist states, such as the Russian Famine of 1921 and the much more severe famine in China during the Great Leap Forward. Some anti-communists refer to both communism and fascism as totalitarianism, seeing similarity between the actions of communist and fascist governments. Opponents argue that communist parties that have come to power have tended to be rigidly intolerant of political opposition. Communist governments have also been accused of creating a new ruling class (a Nomenklatura), with powers and privileges greater than those previously enjoyed by the upper classes in the non-communist regimes.

Read full article on Wikipedia · CC-BY-SA