Albanian communist...

[commieboy]

A few weeks ago i met a kid in my school who was also wearing a CCCP shirt...so after talking about socialism and history he told me about a Leader in Albainia (His native country) who was the closest to a commie leader as ever, he got rid of foreign imports and exports...he said he did good things for the country...but as a persone was a piece of shit...What's this leaders' name?
'
I want to learn more about him

[Saint-Just]

Enver Hoxha

[Cassius Clay]

Hoxha was his name.

Enver was recently voted in one of them millenium poles the greatest Albanian in history. Although I think he came second in another pole to the guy that won independence back in the day.

Albania acheived many great things under Socialism, noteably they were the first and only country to abolish taxes in 1968, tunred a nation where no one could read into having a 98% literacy rate. The Albanian Communists also exposed revisionism, whether it came in the Titoite, Maoist or Khruchevite form.

[the SovieT]

Hoxha, Enver

(b. Oct. 16, 1908, Gjirokastër, Albania - d. April 11, 1985, Tiranë, Albania)

Albania's first Communist head of government, a capacity in which he served for four decades. He is perhaps best remebered for his polemics with the post-Stalin leadership of the USSR and with Maoist China.

Hoxha was a school teacher at the French lycée in Korcë until the Italian invasion of Albania in 1939, whereupon he was dismissed for refusing to join the newly-formed Albanian Fascist Party. Hoxha then opened a tobacco shop in Tiranë, which, in time, became the center for a communist cell. After the German invasion of Albania in 1941, Hoxha and other militants formed the Albanian Communist Party, which was later renamed the Party of Labor of Albania (PLA). Hoxha was named secretary of the party's Central Committee and political commissar for the Army of National Liberation, which fought against the German army and fascist and feudal Albanian forces. From 1944 until 1954 he was Albania's prime minister, and later held other posts in the government, but as secretary of the PLA's Central Committee, effectivel controlled the government until his death.

Following liberation from the Italian and German occupations, Albania's society and economy were revolutionized. The feudal relations which had remained from Ottoman rule were swept away and agriculture was collectivized, enabling Albania to eventually attain near-self sufficiency in food. Simultaneously, industry, which had previously been almost nonexistent, grew to contribute more than 50% of the gross national product by the 1980s. Electricity was brought to every rural district, epidemicdiseases were controlled, and illiteracy was made a thing of the past.

These gains, however, were accompanied by brutal Stalinist tactics. The PLA government imprisoned, executed, or exiled thousands of landowners, rural clan leaders, Muslim and Christian clerics, peasants who resisted collectivization, and party officials. Hoxha's social and economic policies, whicheven prohibited private ownership of automobiles, exercised a brake on Albania's development and meant that in some areas collective agriculture was not even mechanized. Despite gains in food production and industrialization, by the 1980s Albania was widely regarded as having the lowest standard of living Europe, but Hoxha's isolationist policies left a populace so out of touch with the outside world that many thought that Albania was the most prosperous country in Europe.

In 1948 Hoxha broke relations with Yugoslavia and drew closer to the Soviet Union, and to Joseph Stalin, for whom he held a life-long admiration. Indeed, after Stalin's death and Nikita Krushchev's "secret speech" denouncing him, Hoxha and the PLA broke with the Soviet Union and formed a bloc with the Communist Party of China in denouncing the post-Stalin USSR as "revisionist" and "social-imperialist" . (See, for example, his speech at the Meeting of 81 Communist Parties in Moscow in 1960, "Reject the Revisionist Theses of the XX Congress of the CPSU and the Anti-Marxist Stand of Krushchev's Group! Uphold Marxism-Leninism!".)

However, Hoxha's relations with the Maoists were not entirely smooth. For one thing they had differing notions of "protracted people's war." Mao and his followers world-wide insisted that in peasant countries urban insurrection must occur in the last stages of the revolutionary war, which until then would have the countryside as its theater of operations. Hoxha insisted, on the other hand, that the cities ought not to be left until last but that actions must be carried out simultaneously in city and countryside. As revolutionary movements gathered momentum in Latin America, Africa, and Asia, continents with large rural populations, these issues were at the center of intense debates between "Hoxhaists" and Maoists.

Relations grew further strained as the cult of personality around Mao grew, China drew closer to the United States and other capitalist countries, and as China's stature and influence increased internationally. Eventually, Hoxha broke with that country in 1978 after the death of Mao Zedong and China's rapprochement with the West. In that year he published Imperialism and the Revolution, in which he declared that Mao Zedong was not a Marxist-Leninist and that there were no Marxist-Leninists in China. From then on, Hoxha's Albania turned in on itself as Hoxha, having alienated every ally and workers' government, declared that Albania not only would become a model socialist republic on its own, but that it was the only socialist country left in the world.

Hoxha retired from active politics in 1981, but not without carrying out a final purge in which the several leading party members and government officials were executed. The reins of government were handed to Hoxha's protegé, Ramiz Alia, who suceeded him upon his death in 1985.

[Saint-Just]

Originally posted by Cassius [email protected] 4 2003, 11:16 AM
Albania acheived many great things under Socialism, noteably they were the first and only country to abolish taxes in 1968, tunred a nation where no one could read into having a 98% literacy rate. The Albanian Communists also exposed revisionism, whether it came in the Titoite, Maoist or Khruchevite form.
The DPRK abolished taxes too, in 1975.

[Comrade Ceausescu]

but as a persone was a piece of shit..
thats not true.hoxha was a good guy.

[Ian]

Anyone care to tell us the correct pronunciation? I've heard it said Hodja or thereabouts...

[Saint-Just]

Yes, that way is right Ian Rocks.

[ComradeRobertRiley]

I was in Albania two months ago, they have cheap food :rolleyes:

[Sovietski Soyuz]

I have taken a particular interest in Hoxha lately, and I think he was one of the best socialist leaders to come out of any Warsaw Pact country. Amazing man, who did amazing things.

[Ian]

Sounds like he is worth reading up on, anyone know a good source of online texts by Hoxha? Marxists.org doesn't have too many.

[Cassius Clay]

Marx to Mao have alot of his stuff on it.

Try reading his speech in 1961 in Moscow.

[Anarchist Freedom]

i have a friend from albania 8 D sweet huh ? well yah he is cool



:che:

[Comrade Ceausescu]

is he a communist?

[UnionofSovietSocialistRepublics]

i remember that simpsons with that albanian communist, 'the sparrow' - in that one where barts goes to france on an exchange programme.

[Ian]

http://www.lewzworld.com/simpsons/adilhox.jpg

This is Adil Hoxha, the Spy, I just found the picture.

I can't really remember it, but it looks like it is funny.

[ComradeRobertRiley]

Enver Hoxha (1908-1985) - prime minister of Albania

The first communist chief of state of Albania. As that country's ruler for 40 years after World War II, he forced its transformation from a semifeudal relic of the Ottoman Empire into an industrialized economy with the most tightly controlled society in Europe. In 1930 he went on a state scholarship to the University of Montpellier, France, and then from 1934 to 1936 he was a secretary at the Albanian consulate general in Brussels and studied law at the university there. Returning to Albania in 1936, he became a teacher at his old school in KorcÔ. In 1939, when Italy invaded Albania, Hoxha was dismissed from his teaching post for refusing to join the newly formed Albanian Fascist Party, and he opened a retail tobacco store at Tiran‘, which became headquarters for a communist cell. After Germany invaded Yugoslavia in 1941, Yugoslav communists helped Hoxha found the Albanian Communist Party (afterward called the Party of Labour). Hoxha became first secretary of the party's Central Committee and political commissar of the communist-dominated Army of National Liberation. He was prime minister of Albania from its liberation in 1944 until 1954, simultaneously holding the ministry of foreign affairs from 1946 to 1953. As first secretary of the Party of Labour's Central Committee, he retained effective control of the government until his death. Albania's economy was revolutionized under Hoxha's long rule. Farmland was confiscated from wealthy landowners and gathered into collective farms that eventually enabled Albania to become almost completely self-sufficient in food crops. Industry, which had previously been almost nonexistent, received huge amounts of investment, so that by the 1980s it had grown to contribute more than half of the gross national product. Electricity was brought to every rural district, epidemics of disease were stamped out, and illiteracy became a thing of the past. In order to enforce his radical program, however, Hoxha resorted to brutal Stalinist tactics. His government imprisoned, executed, or exiled thousands of landowners, rural clan leaders, Muslim and Christian clerics, peasants who resisted collectivization, and disloyal party officials. Private property was confiscated by the state; all churches, mosques, and other religious institutions were closed; and all cultural and intellectual endeavours were put at the service of socialism and the state. As ardent a nationalist as he was a communist, Hoxha excoriated any communist state that threatened his power or the sovereignty of Albania. In 1948 he broke relations with Yugoslavia and formed an alliance with the Soviet Union. After the death of the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, for whom Hoxha held a lifelong admiration, his relations with Nikita Khrushchev deteriorated until Hoxha broke with him completely in 1961. He then forged close ties with China, breaking with that country in turn in 1978 after the death of Mao Zedong and China's rapprochement with the West. From then on, Hoxha spurned all the world's major powers, declaring that Albania would become a model socialist republic on its own. In order to ensure the succession of a younger generation of leaders, Hoxha in 1981 ordered the execution of several leading party and government officials. Thereafter he withdrew into semiretirement, turning over most state functions to Ramiz Alia, who succeeded him upon his death.


Sounds like a great guy to have in charge

[Kez]

Good analysis Rob....*shakes head*

In anycase, i think a number of points are raised during discussion

I think it clearly shows the stupidity of the Cliffite's State Capitalism "theory" in which they say that stalinism was as bad as capitalism....and that the Soviet collapse was a horizontal move...*shakes head once more*

[Cassius Clay]

Kamo.

Can I ask what the hell 'Cliffe's State Capitalism' has to do with anything?

Anyway on the article above. Sorry but wwhile the west was saying Albania had a million priosners (that's a third of the population) they infact had 800. Albania's economy was better than Yugolsavia and some of the E other Eastern Bloc countries.

Hoxha should not be criticised for being 'hostile' to the rest of the so called 'Socialist nations'. Yugoslavia was about as Socialist as Britain, and the USSR was allready entering Capitalism aswell as being a Empire which thought it had the right to intervene in other nations affairs. They even threatened to invade Albania in 1960.

[ComradeRobertRiley]

Well from what i know it sounds like Hoxha was a great man who did wonders for the country, not its a mess because of capitalism but back then it sounds super. Stalinism or not its irrelevent, stupid manes/titles, its not the words but the action that counts, so Hoxha is THE man! :)

[Soviet power supreme]

What about those bunkers he built in Albania?Over 600000 bunkers.

[ComradeRobertRiley]

i fail to see your point SPS, are you anti-bunkers?

Communist countries need defence against possible invading capitalism

[Soviet power supreme]

But did they need that much.Albania's population was only couple millions.

And I think that those money could have spent to buy better weapons or something.

[ComradeRobertRiley]

maybe they bought the weopans as well as the bunkers?


population = 3.5 million