communist

/ˈkɑmjunɪst/

/ˈkɑmjənəst/

Other forms: communists

Communism is a political doctrine that is an extreme form of Socialism, and anyone belonging to this particular political party is called a communist. A handful of countries call themselves communist, including China, Cuba, and North Korea — though many communists would disagree.

We can find the roots of the word communist in the Latin communis, meaning "common" or "shared." These meanings certainly apply to the ideal version of Communism, which means that everyone is equal, and no one has more than anyone else. It was first used in English as both a noun and an adjective in 1841, taken from the French communiste. In the mid-20th Century, division between the U.S. and its allies and those that were Communist formed what became the “Cold War.”

Definitions of communist

1. adjective

   relating to or marked by communism
   “communist governments”

   synonyms: communistic
2. noun

   a socialist who advocates communism
   synonyms: commie

   examples:

   Mao Tsetung

   Chinese communist leader (1893-1976)

   John Reed

   United States journalist who reported on the October Revolution from Petrograd in 1917; founded the Communist Labor Party in America in 1919; is buried in the Kremlin in Moscow (1887-1920)

   Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili

   Russian leader who succeeded Lenin as head of the Communist Party and created a totalitarian state by purging all opposition (1879-1953)

   Chou En-lai

   Chinese revolutionary and communist leader (1898-1976)

   types:

   apparatchik

   a communist who was a member of the administrative system of a communist party

   Bolshevik, Bolshevist

   a Russian member of the left-wing majority group that followed Lenin and eventually became the Russian communist party

   Comrade

   a fellow member of the Communist Party

   revisionist

   a Communist who tries to rewrite Marxism to justify a retreat from the revolutionary position

   type of:

   socialist

   a political advocate of socialism