Communist and Postcommunist States in Comparative Perspective

Abstract

So far in this book we have been concerned with politics in the sixteen communist and postcommunist states, and not to any significant extent with politics in the world outside them. As we suggested in the first chapter, however, comparative communism should properly be thought of as a subfield of comparative politics rather than as a substitute for that method of inquiry, and if we are interested in examining the performance of the communist states in relation to that of similar but non-communist states, in other words in the significance of communist rule as such, then it is clearly the comparative approach that we require. When dealing with the communist states we can normally take for granted a good deal in terms of institutional and other similarities, and the group of states to be considered is fairly easily determined. In dealing with a wider range of political systems, however, the choice of units of comparison becomes somewhat more arbitrary. Should we compare the communist (and now postcommunist) states, for instance, with the major capitalist states, which the communist states have pledged themselves to overtake but which are still, by and large, at a more advanced stage of social and economic development?