Most publicly avowed communist countries actually adopted State Socialism. And in practice, these systems of state-owned industry ended up under consolidated control of oligarchic regimes. Some communistic critics of these Marxist–Leninists regimes even called them State Capitalist. It is not uncommon to refer to "Communism" and mean some form of despotic, top-down state control of industry.

Given that revised definition of "Communism," a greatly consolidated, monopolistic Capitalism, with increased favoritism by the state for leading firms, does start to seem similar in some interesting ways.