East European communist parties

East European communist parties were political organizations in countries like Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Romania, and Bulgaria that adhered to Marxist-Leninist ideology. After World War II, with Soviet support, these parties often led or dominated socialist governments, implementing planned economies and single-party rule. Their goal was to establish socialist societies based on state ownership of production and equality, contrasting with Western democracies. Many of these parties lost influences after the fall of communism in the late 1980s and early 1990s, transitioning towards social democratic or other political orientations.