I have a general interest in reading 19th century European history. Yesterday, while checking on my blog-feed, I came across a blog entry by a historical fiction author. While bantering about his novel, he mentioned the Paris Commune and implied that it was a precursor of the communist state. Is that true? Did the rebels/revolutionaries adhere to an ideology, and did they pass any laws to indicate that.
As well, I'd like to read about the subject, from a rather unbiased viewpoint. The author/blogger had referenced "Fall of Paris" by Alistair Horne (and another socialist source) as the source of his info. However, on checking the book I found that it's big and a major part of it discussed the Prussian siege of Paris. I'm more interested in reading about the Commune itself.
Thank you.
P.S. For those wanting to check on the blog-entry mentioned above, check here: http://maxconnelly.blogspot.ro/2014/03/on-writing-next-big-thing-torn-between.html
Marx was very impressed by the Communards, which I think is why they are often identified as pre-communists or proto-communists. But they were not really communists in any meaningful way. This is because they were totally uninterested in what must be the main task of any serious communist - the redistribution of wealth. When the Communards discovered large gold deposits in Paris' banks, there was no question of redistributing them - they were too respectful of private property.
Source: The Bourgeois Century, 1815-1914, by Roger Magraw