The USSR was a functioning democracy, moreso than its peer countries. Rather than being entirely decided by Capital, the Soviets extended democratic input to the economic sector. Soviet Democracy by Pat Sloan and This Soviet World by Anna Louise Strong are both good first-hand accounts.
It certainly wasn’t perfect, either, but it was a dramatic improvement on Capitalism. Zhenli has a good article on contextualizing some of the failures of democracy in early Socialism, as well as pointing out how western leftists often let the perfect Socialism in their heads be the enemy of the flawed but really existing Socialism in the real world, that faces real struggles thanks to being a really existing system.
The USSR was a functioning democracy, moreso than its peer countries. Rather than being entirely decided by Capital, the Soviets extended democratic input to the economic sector. Soviet Democracy by Pat Sloan and This Soviet World by Anna Louise Strong are both good first-hand accounts.
It certainly wasn’t perfect, either, but it was a dramatic improvement on Capitalism. Zhenli has a good article on contextualizing some of the failures of democracy in early Socialism, as well as pointing out how western leftists often let the perfect Socialism in their heads be the enemy of the flawed but really existing Socialism in the real world, that faces real struggles thanks to being a really existing system.