Party On!

The formula of the Party-State, as the defining feature of twentieth-century Communism, thus needs to be complicated: there is always a gap between Party and State, corresponding to the gap between the Ego-Ideal (symbolic Law) and the Superego, for the Party remains the half-hidden obscene shadow which redoubles the State structure. There is here no distance, its organization embodying a fundamental distrust of the State organs and mechanisms, as if they need to be continually kept in check. A true twentieth-century-style Communist never fully accepts the State: there always has to be a vigilant agency outside of State control, with the power to intervene in the State's business.

- Slavoj Zizek, "Living in the End Times"