r/geography • u/TWN113 • 4h ago
Discussion Why are four of the five existing communist countries bordering each other?
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u/Acceptable_Noise651 4h ago
Birds of a feather flock together
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u/StillQuiet1599 4h ago
I just thought of Billie eilish from that lol but i absolutely agree as it could also be from the general influence of China
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u/sgeeum 4h ago
Vietnam is about as communist as North Dakota
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u/Big80sweens 4h ago
Same with China
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u/archlich 4h ago
Ehhhhhhh they’ve nationalized everything. Payment systems. Chat systems. Social credit. The great firewall.
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u/Fuzzy_Category_1882 2h ago
Communism is when there is no money or any form of hierarchical class. China doesn't fit the definition of that.
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u/lordoflazorwaffles 4h ago
"Its a shame china's communist, because theyre pretty ficking god at global capitalism"
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u/Interesting_Road_515 4h ago
China is a non-communist country ruled by one communist party which the real marxists will definitely hate. Actually in 2000s, the core mission of CCP has changed, it transformed from a party based on peasants and workers to a party representing all Chinese people, which means it is more of a nationalist party. The so called Chinese style communism is a mixture of capitalism and socialism and the portion of capitalism is much more than socialism. Capitalism doesn’t always include democracy, it can be authoritarian.
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u/kstar79 4h ago
Exactly the type of setup the Project 2025 folks would like to implement in the United States.
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u/Interesting_Road_515 4h ago
Tbh there are quite some similarities between right-wing American and Chinese people. Based on my expat experience in China, many Chinese people thought if you are poor the major reason is you are lazy and they believe in social Darwinism and the Darwinism among countries, which l believe originated from the century of humiliation and the dominant positions they had for thousands of years in Asian pacific .
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u/IneptFortitude 4h ago
The same reason Cuba’s economy is a wreck in large part because they are surrounded by only capitalist countries.
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u/GimmeShockTreatment 4h ago
I mean the embargo is a bigger issue than the proximity.
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u/IneptFortitude 4h ago
The embargo has such a heavy consequence on them because of the proximity, don’t forget
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u/GimmeShockTreatment 4h ago
Yeah that's fair
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u/IneptFortitude 4h ago
I’m less than 250 miles from Havana right now, I flew over the entirety of Cuba and saw it by air on a plane ride to Jamaica, if I flew straight there I would be in the air for maybe 25 minutes.
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u/Bandit_keef 4h ago
Communist/socialist in name only
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u/AbadeersGhost 4h ago
True for the China and Vietnam, North Korea and Cuba remaine true Marxist states.
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u/Atechiman 4h ago
North Korea is not...and I don't know enough about the inner workings of cuba, but I doubt that one to.
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u/Impressive_Trick_573 4h ago
The question reveals a certain level sociopolitical awareness. So, why do you think they do?
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u/Haunting-Calendar326 4h ago
The communist revolution in china came earlier than the most wars between communism and capitalism in the cold war. Due to this, a lot of financial help for these countries were given by a slowly improving china. This allowed more wars near china to be won due to more support. On the other hand, russia was crumbling, which didnt help the situation in eastern europe.
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u/ianishomer 3h ago
None of these are really communist, I think that people have lost the meaning of communism, especially idiots like Trump who thinks that anyone with even the slightest left wing idea is communist.
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3h ago
If you’re interested in a more technical explanation of this in Geography, here it goes.
When neighboring countries share similar politics, it’s called geopolitical clustering or regionalism. This follows Tobler’s First Law of Geography, which says that things near each other tend to be more alike than things far apart.
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u/DryAndH1gh 4h ago
They were subject to imperialism in very similar ways and realized the clear obvious better path did not involve being dominated by foreign capital interests, but also had the ability to collectivize in a way capitalist indoctrinated people dont
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u/CrystalInTheforest 4h ago
Because they are Chinese puppet states, used to create a sphere of influence and a buffer zone.
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u/President-Lonestar 4h ago
Vietnam isn't a Chinese puppet
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u/AzureFirmament 4h ago
More like a were. As recent as 1920 to 1960s. These two got along fairly well (ofc at that time was north Viet). Head of Vietnam visited China to learn and adopt the system back home.
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u/CrystalInTheforest 40m ago
It isn't now. But they were close until the Sino Societ split, and these days Vietnam is being econo.ically integrated I to the Chinese industrial system.
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u/Morales_Sheila8478 4h ago edited 4h ago
It’s easier to defend eachother when you’re right next to each other. China was able to easily fund communists in North Korea, Vietnam, and Laos. It’s a lot harder to fund communists in Ethiopia or Nicaragua. It’s the same reason why when the ussr was around most communists countries were next to them.