Hoxha and Albania

[Koba1917]

I know very little about Communist Albania because I only recently found out about it. What I'm curious about is why its never talked about in US history classes. From my expierence I heard nothing about it. Is it because it worked very well. Or is it because Albania is a much smaller country than China and the USSR.

[Chimurenga.]

eZ9xNVEyNgM (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZ9xNVEyNgM)

pRlMkgyfqUo (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pRlMkgyfqUo&feature=related)

YhYvDFXE71g (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YhYvDFXE71g)

I think these videos are a good starting point. I'll let the followers and critics of both Hoxha and socialist Albania fill in the other blanks.

[Bright Banana Beard]

Mainly because Albania is a very small country and it was "poor" in a sense that they did not depend on bourgeois economic measurement to be succesful. Albania was just taking care of itself. It would be asking too much for Albania to rank to the top when in reality they were doing fine.
They only went bad in the 80s where they lacked serious discussion on massive mishandling in argiculture activity.

[Nolan]

Because Albania is small.

[Omsk]

Small,and it had much more developed neighbors,+ it tried to cut itself from the rest of the world some time,not to mention that it was a relatively young country.

[Dimentio]

As for Debray.

Apparently, he has recently called De Gaulle a French "Anti-Imperialist" against "American Anti-French Imperialism" and claims that the worker and student uprising which contributed to De Gaulle's fall from power was orchestrated by the CIA...

[Nolan]

As for Debray.

Apparently, he has recently called De Gaulle a French "Anti-Imperialist" against "American Anti-French Imperialism" and claims that the worker and student uprising which contributed to De Gaulle's fall from power was orchestrated by the CIA...

wut

[Ismail]

As others said above, it's a small country that was isolated from the rest of the world, and even before Hoxha it was still a largely "mysterious" country to outside travelers, like Tibet or Mongolia. The US and UK also cut off all ties with Albania in 1946, so basically they pretended Albania didn't exist.

There are plenty of books about Albanian history though.

[Omsk]

Hmh,Ismail,are you from Albania?
The state of Albania is young,but the people were present on the Balkans a long time,so i think you should refer to the history of Albania,as to 'history of the Albanian people'.
Albania,along with other Balkan states was rarely treated well by the imperialist dogs of the so called 'civilised' Europe.

[Ismail]

I'm not Albanian, no. I obviously like reading about its history and such though.

[Jack]

I know very little about Communist Albania because I only recently found out about it. What I'm curious about is why its never talked about in US history classes. From my expierence I heard nothing about it. Is it because it worked very well. Or is it because Albania is a much smaller country than China and the USSR.

Essentially what everyone else has said, I mean, seriously, how many people can name a single Albanian?

[Roach]

I mean, seriously, how many people can name a single Albanian?

Mother Theresa was an Albanian born in what today is Macedonia, but almost anybody knows that.

[psgchisolm]

A off-topic question but how do you even pronounce Hoxha's last name? is it like HoxHAY or HoxHAH please halp meh. I get OCD and can't stop thinking about stuff like this.

[Roach]

A off-topic question but how do you even pronounce Hoxha's last name? is it like HoxHAY or HoxHAH please halp meh. I get OCD and can't stop thinking about stuff like this.


''HodjAH''

[Ismail]

In Albanian xh is j, so Ho-ja.

But yeah, there are some pronunciation differences depending on accents. It's never "HOX-HA" though.

[Omsk]

xh=J
Hodza.
But its easier to say Hodjah.

[Dimentio]

wut

http://www.powells.com/biblio/17-9780860914525-1

http://content-5.powells.com/cover?isbn=9780860914525

”the last West European statesman to take the power of the mind seriously”

”in the sixties, the politicized young looked for their demi-gods abroad: Lenin, Mao, Castro, Ho Chi Minh… How were we supposed to realize that we had a great man in the house, within easy reach?”

”it is well known that people who are squemish about patriotism tend to espouse more powerful nationalisms: our Communists have long cultivated a Soviet nationalism, as our liberals have the American variant.”

"A culture is enormously heavy, compared to a party leadership or a rate of profit. A language, a religion, a memory, are immaterial granite: mess with them at your peril. Could it be that we in the West, for all our self-assurance and snobberies, are rather light-weight in our perception of these active subterranean masses?"


”that sort of collective genetic code known as the spirit of a people, which over time sets into the living individuality called a ”nation”… an elective nation, founded on the law of the soil and voluntary participation in a common project.” - About de Gaulle's project.

[Red_Struggle]

Hoxha was a generally good Marxist whose leadership enabled the Albanians to fight off the Italians and the Germans without outside help. Plus his theoretical and political work shed a great deal of light on the relations between the Albanians, the Soviets (both Stalin and afterwords), and the Chinese.

I guess the reason you never hear about Albania, like the above posters mentioned, is that it is a small country and that it wasn't powerful enough to directly challenge imperialism's interests worldwide, although they did fight off a CIA/MI6 attempt to reestablish Zog at the end of world war 2.

From Albania Defiant:


"The CIA dropped some of its agents here. Flew them in from Italy and dropped them by parachute. But we got them. They had some fine radio equipment. They were going to set up a base here in Albania. At that time my brother was in the Central Committee and said he thought we ought to be ableto have some fun out of the CIA too. Everyone agreed. After all, we'd gotten their radios and their codes and all the rest of it. So we informed the CIA in Rome that the revolt was going fine. All we needed was more weapons. And the CIA flew in bazookas and gelignite and all kinds of weapons. And themore they sent, the more successes we reported back. We let the CIA fly in one consignment of weapons after another, and as soon as they came flying in, we snapped them up.
They were good weapons. And cheap, too. But in the end even the CIA noticed something was amiss. They'd flown in masses of weapons and still nothing was happening in Albania.Then we told them how we'd been putting them on.Transmitted it in their own code. And then we tapped out Ha-ha-ha."

Pretty badass, if I do say so myself. :thumbup1:

There's more here if you want more info on Albania. Just about everything on this page was published internally in Albania and translated, such as "New Albania" which is excellent. http://archive.250x.com/albania.html

[Bright Banana Beard]

I love how they trolled the CIA.

[Geiseric]

All politics besides, I liked that story with the CIA, I got a good laugh out of it. He musta been a good guerrilla leader.

[Red_Struggle]

All politics besides, I liked that story with the CIA, I got a good laugh out of it. He musta been a good guerrilla leader.

They knew how to do it. Marxism-Leninism is your friend :lol:

by the way, if anyone wants more information on Albania, send me a PM or leave a comment. I'd be more than happy to give you a hand.

[Geiseric]

I wouldn't mind learning about Albania, i'm particularly wondering how industrialised and productive their economy was.

[Ismail]

I wouldn't mind learning about Albania, i'm particularly wondering how industrialised and productive their economy was.James S. O'Donnell's book A Coming of Age: Albania Under Enver Hoxha gives a good overview of the economic and social progress of the country from 1944-1985.

In the 1974 book Pickaxe and Rifle (written by William Ash, a British visitor to Albania), the following is noted (p. 139):

Where before the war the majority of workshops employed fewer than 25 workers, by 1965 less than 1% of Albanian workers were employed in such small concerns; from 4½% of the total income then represented by industry the percentage had grown to over 55%; and this growth rate was assured by a steady increase in means of production at a rate of some 65-70% as against a 30-35% rise in consumer goods - which is the form socialist accumulation takes.

The economic base was able to sustain increasingly large units of production like the big oil refineries, mechanised copper, chrome, and iron-nickel mines, the great Stalin and Mao Tsetung textile mills, the Hammer and Sickle knitting mills, huge cement factories and chemical works for the production of fertilisers, the tractor spare parts factory at Tirana and gigantic hydro-power stations like the Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels plants in the north, and Joseph Stalin in the south and the new Vau i Dejes (Deja Ford) station on the Drin River which produces over one billion Kw/H.

The rate of annual increase of industrial production has been over 15%, reaching in 1967 a level 44 times that of 1938, and in under 25 years the national income has grown to more than five times its original size.Meanwhile, here are excerpts of an article by American socialist Scott Nearing (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_Nearing) whose article in Monthly Review ("Approach to Albania") Vol. 20 Issue 1, May 1968 notes the impressions of his trip (pp. 33-39):

Years passed before we could accept the invitation, but early in 1968 we set aside a few weeks to go there on our return from an extended stay in India... We not only got a feel of the cities, countryside, and activities of the citizens, but we established a rapport with some of the cheeriest, sturdiest, most hard-working, and independent people we have ever had the pleasure to meet....

The head waiter in our Albturist hotel was an Albanian who spoke with a strong American accent. "Where did you pick that up?" we asked. "I lived for 20 years in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where I was a waiter," he said. "Times got bad there. I was unemployed. Now I've come back to my homeland where I can still carry on my craft and where I'll have a comfortable and secure old age."

Tirana was badly damaged during the war years of 1939-1945. Today it is a modern city of 180,000; built around a broad central boulevard with the university at one end, a large square with theatre, opera house, and library at the other end, and government buildings and parks in between. Our hotel was situated along this boulevard.

... In older parts of the city new housing and shopping units are being constructed as rapidly as materials and labor power are available. Everywhere we walked or drove in the city we were impressed with the cleanliness, order, neatness. This was true of the people, the pavements and sidewalks, the public buildings, the living quarters. Seldom have we visited a more attractive, more livable city...

Albanian Economy

Albania is a country slightly larger than New Jersey, with a population of two million. In the north, east, and south it is mountainous. Elsewhere there are some wide reaches of bottom land, with hills rolling up to the mountains...

Like all good economists, Albanians are using, improving, and conserving natural resources, of which they have a meager supply. Water is being used for transport, irrigation, and electric power. The country has six strategically placed hydro-electric stations which feed electricity into a nationwide grid. The stations are the work of Albanian engineers. Generators come from the socialist countries of East Europe...

Mineral resources are being explored and developed. Copper mines, recently enlarged, are adding copper-wire to the national exports. Albanian economists warn against the export of any raw material that can be fabricated at home and exported as a finished or semi-finished product.

... We visited collective and state farms in various parts of the country. As a general rule, where a large estate was available or an extensive piece of marsh land was drained, a state farm was established. Agricultural villages organized collective farms. Private family farms, like private family businesses, have virtually disappeared in Albania...

... Science and technology are penetrating the countryside. On every farm there are hometrained economists, agronomists, veterinarians, botanists, biologists.

Transport is being developed and improved. Albania's first railroad, begun in 1948, was laid out by engineers and built largely by volunteer labor. Except for the more remote mountainous regions, good to excellent paved roads connect all populated areas and are used by trucks, busses, passenger cars, and bicycles, all imported. As tractors are placed on collective and state farms, stone-based roads are being built on the farms as a protection against the costs and frustrations of "mud-time." ...

Talking to a skillful chauffeur who maneuvered us over dozens of hairpin turns on the mountain roads, I called his attention to the small amount of motor traffic that we encountered on the well-built roads. "By the way," I asked, "how many motor vehicles do you have on your highways?" His answer was a classic: "Just enough for our needs. When we need more we will import more. We keep a large foreign exchange balance in our favor, and we pay cash."

Building Industry

Foreign exchange balances are looked upon by Albanians as a temporary but necessary part of their industrialization program. They import specialized equipment until they can begin to produce it at home. They pay cash, to avoid "interest slavery." Their goal is socialist, their means maximum self-sufficiency.

Each year's plan calls for imported equipment that will enable the Albanian economy to self-supply essential needs... This spare-parts plant was built by Albanians. The necessary machines came from China and were installed with the help of Chinese engineers. Today the plant is operating at near full capacity. Only two Chinese experts remain on the premises to help guide the work, and they will return soon to their homeland.

... Up to the limit of their available balances, Albania paid for the Chinese equipment in cash. The rest was covered by low-interest loans which will soon be liquidated...

As industrial production expands, a larger part of the needs of the home population can be met by home products, and more finished goods are exported to cover the costs of needed technical facilities.

... The necessaries are already there and priced very low; the conveniences are higher, with the luxuries expensive and as yet largely unavailable.

Consumer goods are supplied mainly through well stocked cooperatives which we visited in cities, towns, and villages. The field of merchandising is part of the public sector.

Economic plans are paying off. All the people we saw in Albania—children, women, and men (in that order) looked well fed, were well dressed and shod against cold, water, and mud... men and women dressed according to Western styles (though no miniskirts or beatnik jeans) and the young people and children seemed especially jaunty and self-possessed.

We saw no slums, no shacks, no physical poverty, no unemployment, no beggars. Albania has a wages system of payment according to work done, with a minimum spread between top and bottom income levels. The Albanians seemed sure of themselves and of their ability to shape their own economic future.

... They plan carefully, avoid speculation and other forms of adventurism. They are building solidly and fundamentally for a better future.