> The crucial difference everyone overlooks is that an ideological dictatorship like communism is more sticky than a run-of-the-mill non-ideological dictatorship like those of SK and Taiwan.
There’s very little evidence that Leninism and its derivatives are any stickier than any other authoritarian system, and essentially all authoritarianism (and most non-authoritarian systems of government, too) appeals to some ideology for its justification (often local nationalism), so your attempt to divide the world of dictatorships into ideological and non-ideological dictatorships is flawed from the start.
> All of communist ideology is an elaborate justification and sophisticated plan for getting and keeping absolute and unrestricted power.
It’s…not. In fact, the part of Leninism that serves that purpose (vanguardism) is its key departure from Marxism, and notionally an adaptation of Marxist Communism to bypass the need for capitalist development as a prerequisite to the socialist stage.
After the USSR collapsed, the CCP intensely studied why, looking for ways to avoid the same fate, and succeeded. That's one non-trivial bit of evidence.
And I don't consider nationalism an ideology, since it's never as philosophically developed as say communism or US liberal democracy. It's just a useful, easy, naturally occurring fallback for dictators looking for way to rally their population against the "other".
And you can argue till the cows come home about what Leninsim, Marxism, and Maoism are supposed to be, but what they actually become in reality is clear. Totalitarian.
There’s very little evidence that Leninism and its derivatives are any stickier than any other authoritarian system, and essentially all authoritarianism (and most non-authoritarian systems of government, too) appeals to some ideology for its justification (often local nationalism), so your attempt to divide the world of dictatorships into ideological and non-ideological dictatorships is flawed from the start.
> All of communist ideology is an elaborate justification and sophisticated plan for getting and keeping absolute and unrestricted power.
It’s…not. In fact, the part of Leninism that serves that purpose (vanguardism) is its key departure from Marxism, and notionally an adaptation of Marxist Communism to bypass the need for capitalist development as a prerequisite to the socialist stage.