It's the main criterion. If the system doesn't last, then it's shit regardless of what it is. The main purpose of the government (and any organization, for that matter) is to exist for as long as possible, everything else comes second. I wonder what other criteria do you have in mind?
They weren't socialist bc they took a step past socialism and into communism directly. They abolished money, replaced army with armed militia, achieved direct democracy, abolished institution of family, replaced farmers with agrarian proletariat, achieved 100% public housing. USSR is a capitalist shithole compared to Democratic Kampuchea.
Dunno. Dropping friends due to politics seems totally cringe. Civilized people should have the option of "let's not talk about politics" instead of breaking up relationships.
Considering I don't know any democracy that laster longer than 200-300 years and there are a lot of monarchies that lasted for many hundreds or even thousands of years.
Soviet Union bureaucracy was not the proletariat, they didn't use the mop to produce commodities, so they didn't have proletarian class consciousness. Whatever interests they had, it was not working class interests. Lenin, Trotsky and Sverdlov were one nobleman and two petty bourgeoisie.
It's the main criterion. If the system doesn't last, then it's shit regardless of what it is. The main purpose of the government (and any organization, for that matter) is to exist for as long as possible, everything else comes second. I wonder what other criteria do you have in mind?