Communist parties in the context of Cadre (politics)

The title of General Secretary or First Secretary is commonly used for the leaders of most communist parties. When a communist party is the ruling party of a communist state the general secretary is typically the country's de facto leader. Except in Vietnam, it is not uncommon for this leader to also assume state-level positions, such as president or premiership, thereby also becoming the de jure leader of the state. The position of general secretary is typically elected by the communist party's central committee (with the Workers' Party of Korea as an exception), and the holder of this title also serves on the communist party's politburo and secretariat.

Socialism has been mentioned in several liberal democratic constitutions. It is referenced either in the form of denunciation (as is the case in the Croatian, Hungarian and Polish constitutions) or in form of construction, namely that the constitution of the state in question proclaim that it seeks to establish a socialist society (Bangladesh, India, Guyana and Portugal being examples). In these cases, the intended meaning of the term socialism can vary widely and sometimes the constitutional references to socialism are left over from a previous period in the country's history.

With the exceptions of Bangladesh, India, Guyana, Portugal, and Sri Lanka, references to socialism were introduced by Marxist–Leninist communist parties (sometimes in collaboration with more moderate socialist parties). In India, it is used in relation to secularism. In Sri Lanka, socialist terms were introduced by the United National Party. Tanzania considers itself to be a socialist state, having previously been a one-party state led by the Party of the Revolution (which has been in power since independence). Croatia, Hungary and Poland have references to socialism in the form of rejection of their own past communist state.

Bolshevization of the Communist International has at least two meanings. First it meant to independently change the way of working of new communist parties, such as the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) in the early 1920s. Secondly was the process from 1924 by which the pluralistic Communist International (Comintern) and its constituent Communist parties were increasingly subject to pressure by the Soviet government in Moscow. With the development within Soviet Communism of Marxism–Leninism under Joseph Stalin, this latter Bolshevization became more clearly Stalinization. The autonomy of national Communist parties was downplayed and the Comintern became a tool of Soviet foreign policy.

There are a number of communist parties active in various countries across the world and a number that used to be active. They differ not only in method, but also in strict ideology and interpretation, although they are generally within the tradition of Marxism–Leninism.

The formation of communist parties in various countries was first initiated by the Russian Bolsheviks within the Communist International. Since then, communist parties have governed numerous countries, whether as ruling parties in one-party states like the Chinese Communist Party or the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, or as ruling parties in multi-party systems, including majority and minority governments as well as leading or being part of several coalitions.

National communism is a term describing various forms in which Marxism–Leninism and socialism has been adopted and/or implemented by leaders in different countries using aspects of nationalism or national identity to form a policy independent from communist internationalism. National communism has been used to describe movements and governments that have sought to form a distinctly unique variant of communism based upon distinct national characteristics and circumstances, rather than following policies set by other socialist states, such as the Soviet Union.

In each independent state, empire, or dependency, the relationship between social class and nation had its own particularities. The Ukrainian communists Vasil Shakhrai, Alexander Shumsky, and Mazlakh, and then the Tatar Sultan Galiyev, considered the interests of the Bolshevik Russian state at odds with those of their countries. Communist parties that have attempted to pursue independent foreign and domestic policies that conflicted with the interests of the Soviet Union have been described as examples of national communism; this form of national communism differs from communist parties/movements that embrace nationalist rhetoric. Examples include Josip Broz Tito and his independent direction that led Yugoslavia away from the Soviet Union, Imre Nagy's anti-Soviet democratic socialism, Alexander Dubček's socialism with a human face, and János Kádár's Goulash Communism.

The 22nd Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Russian: XXII съезд КПСС) was held from 17 to 31 October 1961. In fourteen days of sessions (22 October was a day off), 4,413 delegates, in addition to delegates from 83 foreign Communist parties, listened to Nikita Khrushchev and others review policy issues. At the Congress, the Sino-Soviet split hardened, especially due to Soviet de-Stalinization efforts, and it was the last Congress to be attended by the Chinese Communist Party. The Congress elected the 22nd Central Committee.

Philosophy in the Soviet Union was officially confined to Marxist–Leninist thinking, which theoretically was the basis of objective and ultimate philosophical truth. During the 1920s and 1930s, other tendencies of Russian thought were repressed (many philosophers emigrated, others were expelled). Joseph Stalin enacted a decree in 1931 identifying dialectical materialism with Marxism–Leninism, making it the official philosophy which would be enforced in all communist states and, through the Comintern, in most communist parties. Following the traditional use in the Second International, opponents would be labeled as "revisionists".

From the beginning of Bolshevik regime, the aim of official Soviet philosophy (which was taught as an obligatory subject for every course), was the theoretical justification of communist ideas. For this reason, "Sovietologists", among whom the most famous were Józef Maria Bocheński, professor of philosophy at the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas and Gustav Wetter, have often claimed Soviet philosophy was close to nothing but dogma.