Self-reliance

[Ismail]

One of the most "controversial" of the policies of Enver Hoxha was his firm commitment to the principle of self-reliance, a principle embodied in the Constitution of the PSR Albania in 1976, which states in Article 26 that: "The development of the economy and the whole construction of socialism in the People's Socialist Republic of Albania is based mainly on self-reliance, as well as on the internationalist aid of other socialist countries. The granting of concessions to, and the creation of foreign economic and financial companies and other institutions or ones formed jointly with bourgeois and revisionist capitalist monopolies and states, as well as obtaining credits from them, are prohibited in the People's Socialist Republic of Albania."

Hoxha noted the revisionist policies of Yugoslavia, the USSR, Romania, the DPRK, Hungary, the GDR, etc. which accrued massive debts as a result of their anti-socialist economic policies. Hoxha also developed these views as a result of the Soviet policy of dictating Albania's economic course under Khrushchev, wherein the industrial basis of the economy was to be undermined in favor of cash crops. One source has noted that:

"Barring the success of world revolution, Hoxha was determined to go it alone. On the other hand, the notion that Albania wanted to completely isolate itself is false. What Hoxha sought was relations with others on his own terms... the main trend of Albanian foreign policy remained the dual adversary doctrine, which held that both the United States and the Soviet Union were evil superpowers; thus Hoxha condemned relations with either of them."
(Richard Frucht (ed). Eastern Europe: An Introduction to the People, Lands and Culture Vol. 3. Denver, CO: ABC-CLIO, Inc. 2005. p. 707.)

Here are three quotes which I've typed out and which summarize Hoxha's views on self-reliance both internally and on the international plain.

"The complete construction of socialist society is closely connected with the understanding and implementation of the principle of self-reliance in every step and every field of life. This great Marxist-Leninist principle of profound revolutionary content is not only a law for the construction of socialism but also, in the present conditions, an urgent necessity for our country to cope successfully with enemy blockades and encirclement...

Our Party has always defended the view that self-reliance is not a temporary policy imposed by circumstances, but an objective necessity for every country, big or small, developed or underdeveloped, a principle applying both in liberation wars and the proletarian revolution, and in the construction of socialism and the defence of the homeland. The implementation of this principle bars all paths to the inflow of bank credits from bourgeois and revisionist states, by means of which the imperialists and the social-imperialists enslave countries and nations...

The bourgeois-revisionist propaganda endeavors to spread and cultivate among the peoples, especially in the developing countries, the sense of bowing and submission to the big imperialist powers. The Soviet revisionists, in particular, distort the revolutionary essence of the principle of self-reliance, labelling it as 'slipping into positions of narrow nationalism', as 'departure from the position of proletarian internationalism', as 'rejecting mutual aid among socialist countries'. With these anti-Marxist theses they seek to justify their policy of imperialist expansion and their practices of capitalist exploitation of other countries...

While working for the construction of socialism according to the principle of self-reliance, our Party has never dreamed of creating an autarkic economy, isolated within itself. At the same time, while combating any feeling of inferiority and worshipping everything foreign, it has not negated the value of progressive world thinking, of the achievements of science and technology in other countries. It has always prized the revolutionary experience of all peoples, everything that serves the cause of the emancipation and progress of mankind.

Far from excluding reciprocal collaboration and aid among the revolutionary and socialist forces, self-reliance presupposes it. The aid which the victorious revolution gives the countries and peoples fighting for national and social liberation, the mutual aid among countries building socialism, is an internationalist duty. It is devoid of any sort of selfish interest and inspired by the lofty interests of Marxism-Leninism. This aid is to the advantage not only of the country which receives it but also of the country which gives it, because the triumph of socialism in any country serves the triumph of revolution in the other countries, too, its triumph over capitalism and revisionism...

Understanding of the principle of self-reliance is complete when every collective and individual fulfils and overfulfils the tasks with which they have been charged without asking the state and the society for supplementary means...

The principle of self-reliance is correctly understood when it is implemented in every field of social activity... when people work and live everywhere as in a state of siege."
(Enver Hoxha. Report Submitted to the 7th Congress of the Party of Labour of Albania. Tirana: 8 Nëntori Publishing House. 1977. pp. 70-73.)

"The capitalists and revisionists measure isolation with trade. We have traded and continue to trade with all countries, with the exception of the United States of America, the Soviet Union, Spain, Israel, and some other states ruled by fascists and racists. But trade is of mutual advantage. The capitalists need our goods, just as we need some of theirs. If anybody thinks that Albania will die if some state, for evil aims, refuses to sell us these goods, he is grossly mistaken. The revisionist Soviet Union established a savage blockade against us, but Albania is living and can live a thousand years without trading with the Soviet revisionists and in spite of their blockade."
(Ibid. p. 198.)

"Let us take, for example, the question of the economic construction of the country, the development of the socialist economy relying on one's own forces. This principle is correct. Every independent, sovereign socialist state must mobilize the entire people, and define its economic policy correctly, must take all measures for the proper and most rational exploitation of all the wealth of the country, and administer this wealth thriftily, must increase it in the interest of its own people and must not allow it to be plundered by others. This is a main, basic orientation for every socialist country, while aid from abroad, aid from other socialist countries, is supplementary.

The credits two socialist countries accord each other have quite a different character. These credits constitutc disinterested internationalist aid. Internationalist aid never engenders capitalism. never impoverishes the masses of the people, on the contrary, it helps develop industry and agriculture, serves their harmonization, leads to the improvement of the well-being of the working masses, to the strengthening of socialism.

In the first place, the economically developed socialist states ought to assist the other socialist countries. This does not mean that a socialist country should not develop relations also with the other non-socialist countries. But these must be economic relations on the bases of mutual interest and must not in any way make the economy of a socialist, or any other non-socialist country, dependent on the more powerful countries. If these relations among states are based on the exploitation of small, economically weak states by big and powerful states, then such 'aid' must be rejected, for it is enslaving."
(Enver Hoxha. Imperialism and the Revolution. Tirana: 8 Nëntori Publishing House. 1979. pp. 94-96.)

"Frequently in the foreign press there are opinionated people who, proceeding from fixed ideas, due to ignorance of the reality, or deliberate ill-will, interpret our policy of self-reliance as an orientation that leads to 'isolation' or 'autarky,' to technological backwardness, to 'separation from the world,' etc., accusations which are levelled at Albania in profusion.

In a meeting I had with him in the autumn of 1983, referring to this enemy propaganda, Comrade Enver put forward a series of arguments to refute it:

'It is clear,' he said, 'that to ensure everything necessary for the economy and the people's consumption for the present and the future with our internal forces, with the local production alone, is impossible. This has never been and is not our policy. Application of the principle of self-reliance does not imply this. Therefore the accusations of 'isolation and autarky' which enemies level at us are unfounded and false.' ...

'Of course,' Comrade Enver went on, 'in the conditions when the hostile bourgeois-revisionist world is trying to step up its influence in our economy through trade, also, we must try to reduce imports to the maximum by increasing production of new articles at home... Today, in terms of value, only about 15 per cent of the raw materials, machinery and equipment are imported. We must proceed in this way regarding other articles, too.'"
(Ramiz Alia. Our Enver. Tirana: 8 Nëntori Publishing House. 1988. pp. 349-351.)

Under such an outlook there is little room in justifying austerity measures, unlike in Yugoslavia and Romania where adherence to "international norms" and economic agreements with the IMF were used as justifications. Under this policy, James S. O'Donnell noted:

"The most obvious demonstration of the success of this policy is seen in the fact that Albania had little, if any foreign debt. This fact is astounding for any country but it is especially so for an East European country which traditionally has very high foreign debt. The Central Intelligence Agency's publication, The World Factbook, showed that in 1983, Albania imported goods worth $280 million but exported goods worth $290 million, which produced a trade surplus of $ 10 million. The 1984 state budget showed expenditures of $1.28 billion and revenues of $1.29 billion. 'Self-reliance' was a limited success within the parameters of the Albanian historical experience."
(James S. O'Donnell. A Coming of Age: Albania under Enver Hoxha. New York: Columbia University Press. 1999. p. 88.)

O'Donnell described the 1980's Albanian economy as one which was "was basically self-sufficient, though in need of an influx of modern technology." (p. 65.)

And instead of austerity measures, the reverse happened. Thus as the Communist Party of Ireland (Marxist-Leninist) noted in 1982:

"On June 5, the day before the opening of the 9th Congress of the Albanian Trade Unions, the Council of Ministers of the People's Socialist Republic of Albania announced reductions in the price of various mass commodity goods and of many public services. The prices of certain items, including meat, clothing, shoes, televisions, radios, washing machines, bicycles, prams, kitchen utensils, watches, etc., were reduced by amounts ranging from 7-35%, whilst the price of various public services fell by 8-15½%. There is no inflation in Socialist Albania. The only changes in prices which have taken place since liberation in 1944 are reductions in prices. This is in stark contrast to the serious and ever-growing burden on the people caused by the continually soaring prices in the capitalist and revisionist countries."
(Red Patriot. Vol. 6, No. 3/4. Aug. 1st 1982. p. 11.)

Under the conditions, despite the fact that hindsight has shown Albania could not do very well under self-reliance for an extended period, it was a consistently revolutionary policy in contrast with the Yugoslav, Soviet, Chinese and other revisionist "theories" on international affairs, trade, etc., for at this same time Albania supported Marxist-Leninist parties abroad and constantly opposed that which would weaken the international communist movement, from Soviet "peaceful coexistence" to the Maoist "Three Worlds Theory" to Eurocommunism.

Is there any disagreement on this matter, even from the perspective of the Soviet, Chinese, Yugoslav, etc. approaches being somehow "better" in this regard?

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Going it alone, to the detriment of the general population to enact their will upon the organs of power of the state, seems pig-headed and extreme to me.

You simply cannot have Socialism in one country, as self-reliance ultimately leads to a vicious cycle of self-unreliance. It is ridiculous to think that a small country as Albania could really prosper under self-reliant autarky.

[Vyacheslav Brolotov]

Damn it. Thread so tempting . . . have to do homework . . . I'll come back tomorrow.

But, nevertheless, Enver Hoxha had good reason to maintain a "autarky." If the Albanian vanguard allowed strong economic ties with non-socialist nations to form, Albania would have become the next Yugoslavia: a sad excuse for a socialist nation. Also, Hoxha need to prevent Albania from becoming what Khruschev called the "orchard of socialism." The Soviet Union and the other Eastern Bloc nations were trying to make Albania into this place for agricultural development that would benefit all the other Warsaw Pact nations . . . except Albania. Albania needed to industralize and Enver Hoxha did not want to hear Khruschev's bullshit. After Khruschev left power, Enver still needed to keep Albania away from the grasp of the Warsaw Pact and the Soviet Union, particularly after the invasion of the CSSR. Hoxha did not want Albania to become the revisionist colony of the Soviet Union.

And Albania was not really an autarky. Albania had strong economical relationships with China until around the early-to-mid seventies.

Need to go back to doing homework.

[Vyacheslav Brolotov]

Going it alone, to the detriment of the general population to enact their will upon the organs of power of the state, seems pig-headed and extreme to me.

You simply cannot have Socialism in one country, as self-reliance ultimately leads to a vicious cycle of self-unreliance. It is ridiculous to think that a small country as Albania could really prosper under self-reliant autarky.

1. Da Fok

2. That's your opinion, not the truth.

3. Albania did prosper while still holding on to real Marxism-Leninism. For its size, history, resources, and socialism, I would say it was the most rapidly and successful industralized socialist nation in Eastern Europe.

4. What would you suggest Albania have done? Open up to trade with non-socialist nations or nations that wanted to stop its industrialization? Do you think capitalism would have worked better or are you just having your wet dream about not having a vanguard?

[Ismail]

Going it alone, to the detriment of the general population to enact their will upon the organs of power of the state, seems pig-headed and extreme to me.The goal was to educate the population to understand the basis of self-reliance. For all the talk about how "isolated" Albania was, many Albanians had easy access to Italian and Yugoslav TV. From this and other sources many were able to develop fondness and bloated expectations of Western glory similar to what other East European states' populations had.


You simply cannot have Socialism in one country, as self-reliance ultimately leads to a vicious cycle of self-unreliance. It is ridiculous to think that a small country as Albania could really prosper under self-reliant autarky.Albania did and continues to have a pretty varied amount of minerals and agricultural resources for a country as small as it was. Albania also had some of the highest growth rates in the world throughout the 1960's and 70's.

[Drosophila]

Going it alone, to the detriment of the general population to enact their will upon the organs of power of the state, seems pig-headed and extreme to me.

You simply cannot have Socialism in one country, as self-reliance ultimately leads to a vicious cycle of self-unreliance. It is ridiculous to think that a small country as Albania could really prosper under self-reliant autarky.

Did you even read the post or did you just look at the title and come up with that assumption?

[Vyacheslav Brolotov]

I actually just read the title and I still came up with better info than that guy.

[GoddessCleoLover]

The notion that autarky worked for awhile in Albania before its ultimate demise reminds me of the story of the person who jumped from the 20th story of a building and as he was falling shouted out that everything was fine so far.:D

[Ismail]

The notion that autarky worked for awhile in Albania before its ultimate demise reminds me of the story of the person who jumped from the 20th story of a building and as he was falling shouted out that everything was fine so far.:DAgain, the alternative was to capitulate to American imperialism (via continuing to follow China's foreign policy line) or Soviet social-imperialism.

[Vyacheslav Brolotov]

Plus, Albania did have some trade relationships with Western Europe.

[GoddessCleoLover]

Would agree with you that larger, regional events overwhelmed anything that Albanian national leaders , whether Enver Hoxha or Ramiz Alia, could do. Events were beyond their control. Perhaps this is the ultimate vindication of the impossibility of constructing socialism in any one country. Any individual nation, and certainly a small nation like Albania as opposed to the vast Soviet Union) is subject to greater, international forces. Perhaps this is why Karl Marx sought to place events within an international context.

[Ismail]

On a semi-related note, Thomas Sankara was also big on self-reliance (though not to the extent of Hoxha.) Burkina Faso and Albania apparently had moderately good foreign relations between each other and some pro-Albanian elements in the former backed the Sankara government and served in its institutions.* When Hoxha died Sankara wrote a telegram expressing his condolences.

* On the other hand, some pro-Albanian elements did not participate and apparently regarded Sankara as a reactionary.

[CommunityBeliever]

Hoxha did not want Albania to become the revisionist colony of the Soviet Union.

What did the working class want?


Albania had strong economical relationships with China until around the early-to-mid seventies.

The problem is that Hoxha propagated dogmatic and revisionist ideas in Imperialism and the Revolution in order to demonize the people's republic of China and the great proletarian cultural revolution.


Maoist "Three Worlds Theory"

We had a long discussion on this, to no avail. There are right Maoists who agree with the Three World's Theory, the meeting with Nixon, the relations with Pinochet, etc. On the other hand, there are left Maoists (such as me) who believe that global people's war and cultural revolution are the best strategy to achieving communism and these ideas were effectively implemented in China until the 1970s.

Just as it is important to distinguish between ultraleft Marxists and Marxist-Leninists it is important to distinguish between various classes of Maoism. If you called SIOC a Marxist theory you will receive objections from much of this site just as you will receive an objection from me if you describe TWT as Maoist. These issues can be confusing, as such, rather then identifying with any doctrine it is probably best to be non-doctrinaire scientific communist.

Mao was a flawed individual who succumbed to sickness. As the 1970s went on comrade Mao had increasingly less say in foreign policy decisions as a result of health problems and by 1974 he couldn't even speak. As such, the rightward turn in foreign policy and the rehabilitation of capitalist roaders such as Deng Xiaoping that occurred in the 1970s should be understood in the context of Mao's sickness.


Albania also had some of the highest growth rates in the world throughout the 1960's and 70's.

Even capitalists recognise that the highest growth rates ever were in the people's republic of China. After the GLF the Chinese GDP was $68.371 billion and by 2011 it was $7.30 trillion. That is over a 100 fold economic increase in a few decades. Before the CCP controlled China it was an economically backwards country and by 2016 it will become the world's largest economy.

[Drosophila]

Even capitalists recognise that the highest growth rates ever were in the people's republic of China. After the GLF the Chinese GDP was $68.371 billion and by 2011 it was $7.30 trillion. That is over a 100 fold economic increase in a few decades. Before the CCP controlled China it was an economically backwards country and by 2016 it will become the world's largest economy.

So Mao is to blame for the current state of China?

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Well, as long as they had access to Italian TV. Freedom and democratic participation right there.:rolleyes:

[CommieTroll]

So Mao is to blame for the current state of China?

To an extent you could say that, a good example is Mao and Nixon building relations between the PRC and the USA but I'd say the current state of China rests on the shoulders of Deng Xiaoping.

[Drosophila]

To an extent you could say that, a good example is Mao and Nixon building relations between the PRC and the USA but I'd say the current state of China rests on the shoulders of Deng Xiaoping.

It was more of a rhetorical question. CommunityBeliever was making it seem like Mao's actions contributed to China's current status, and that it was a good thing.

[Ismail]

Well, as long as they had access to Italian TV. Freedom and democratic participation right there.:rolleyes:Actually the authorities failed to curb access to Italian and Yugoslav TV. That was a negative phenomena the government was trying to stamp out. In the early 70's the mass organizations for the youth and writers had various purges (mostly non-violent) over this issue.

"Our social opinion quite rightly strongly condemned such degenerate 'importations' as long hair, extravagant dress, screaming jungle music, coarse language, shameless behaviour and so on. If the influences and manifestations of the bourgeois-revisionist way of life are not nipped in the bud, they open the way to the corruption and degeneration of people which are so dangerous to the cause of socialism."
(Enver Hoxha. Selected Works Vol. IV. Tirana: 8 Nëntori Publishing House. 1982. p. 836.)

"In the capitalist and revisionist countries, the number of hippies is increasing, narcotics, degenerate music and striptease are spreading far and wide, all kinds of theories to degenerate the people and youth are being propagated everywhere."
(Enver Hoxha. For the Further Revolutionization of the Party and the Whole Life of the Country. Tirana: 8 Nëntori Publishing House. 1974. p. 232.)

"The chief function of literature and art, according to Alia, is to provide young people with the necessary immunity against the poisons of bourgeois and revisionist ideologies. Foreign literary and artistic theories, based on abstract humanism, classless objectivity, and attachment to pure form, were to be shunned as a real threat to the country's creative endeavour. Special care had to be taken in the selection of western and Soviet books for translation. Alia criticized Albanian radio and theatre orchestras for paying more attention to foreign pop and light music than to national folk music; he said a better balance should be struck between the two genres. Films imported from the west and the Soviet bloc should also be closely scrutinized as they were all steeped in an alien morality. Albanian writers and artists should look inwards and concentrate on the life and work of the 'heroes of our time', i.e. the country's industrial workers, farmers and members of the intelligentsia."
(Anton Logoreci. The Albanians: Europe's Forgotten Survivors. London: Victor Gollancz Ltd. 1977. p. 160.)

"These practices
[listening to foreign radio and TV] are not specifically forbidden by law, though they are severely discouraged as acts liable to expose one to pernicious imperialist (western) or revisionist (Soviet and Yugoslav) influences. That people are nevertheless prepared to risk such contamination was shown by an official campaign launched in 1973 against external broadcasts that could either be watched or heard in the country. Television viewers living in a northern district near the border with Yugoslavia were ordered to remove from their sets aerials capable of receiving programmes from the Yugoslav television service at Skopje. Efforts were also made to curtail the reception of Italian television programmes in other parts of Albania."
(Ibid. p. 178.)

[Grenzer]

Was there any kind of Albanian movie scene going on in Hoxha's Albania? I'm a real sucker for propaganda films, and I have seen some Soviet ones. I've heard the DDR had some excellent movie, but I've never been able to find where I could download them.

[Ismail]

Was there any kind of Albanian movie scene going on in Hoxha's Albania? I'm a real sucker for propaganda films, and I have seen some Soviet ones. I've heard the DDR had some excellent movie, but I've never been able to find where I could download them.You can find some Albanian movies made during the 1960's-80's here (no subtitles though): http://enver-hoxha.net/content/content_shqip/video_film_dhe_teater.htm

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Actually the authorities failed to curb access to Italian and Yugoslav TV. That was a negative phenomena the government was trying to stamp out. In the early 70's the mass organizations for the youth and writers had various purges (mostly non-violent) over this issue.

"Our social opinion quite rightly strongly condemned such degenerate 'importations' as long hair, extravagant dress, screaming jungle music, coarse language, shameless behaviour and so on. If the influences and manifestations of the bourgeois-revisionist way of life are not nipped in the bud, they open the way to the corruption and degeneration of people which are so dangerous to the cause of socialism."
(Enver Hoxha. Selected Works Vol. IV. Tirana: 8 Nëntori Publishing House. 1982. p. 836.)

"In the capitalist and revisionist countries, the number of hippies is increasing, narcotics, degenerate music and striptease are spreading far and wide, all kinds of theories to degenerate the people and youth are being propagated everywhere."
(Enver Hoxha. For the Further Revolutionization of the Party and the Whole Life of the Country. Tirana: 8 Nëntori Publishing House. 1974. p. 232.)

"The chief function of literature and art, according to Alia, is to provide young people with the necessary immunity against the poisons of bourgeois and revisionist ideologies. Foreign literary and artistic theories, based on abstract humanism, classless objectivity, and attachment to pure form, were to be shunned as a real threat to the country's creative endeavour. Special care had to be taken in the selection of western and Soviet books for translation. Alia criticized Albanian radio and theatre orchestras for paying more attention to foreign pop and light music than to national folk music; he said a better balance should be struck between the two genres. Films imported from the west and the Soviet bloc should also be closely scrutinized as they were all steeped in an alien morality. Albanian writers and artists should look inwards and concentrate on the life and work of the 'heroes of our time', i.e. the country's industrial workers, farmers and members of the intelligentsia."
(Anton Logoreci. The Albanians: Europe's Forgotten Survivors. London: Victor Gollancz Ltd. 1977. p. 160.)

"These practices
[listening to foreign radio and TV] are not specifically forbidden by law, though they are severely discouraged as acts liable to expose one to pernicious imperialist (western) or revisionist (Soviet and Yugoslav) influences. That people are nevertheless prepared to risk such contamination was shown by an official campaign launched in 1973 against external broadcasts that could either be watched or heard in the country. Television viewers living in a northern district near the border with Yugoslavia were ordered to remove from their sets aerials capable of receiving programmes from the Yugoslav television service at Skopje. Efforts were also made to curtail the reception of Italian television programmes in other parts of Albania."
(Ibid. p. 178.)

So if you have long hear, listen to 'jungle music' (whatever that is), take drugs, perform/receive a striptease, sympathise with humanistic art forms or listen to any western radio/TV, then you are somehow against Socialism?

Yet if you purport 'national folk music' then you're somehow for Socialism?

I guess Richard Wagner could teach me, you and everyone on this site something about Socialism then, eh? :rolleyes:

I can't believe you really take every word of you master dear Enva so seriously. Some of what he says, indeed some of what you are quoting here, is absolute crap! Only the most agile ideological gymnast could really take the quotes you've posted seriously!

[Ismail]

You're the one who acted as if the government was promoting Italian TV, and that I somehow was arguing this proves Albanian socialism.

Also Wagner was condemned as a reactionary and his music not allowed in Albania, IIRC. The point of allowing national traditions was to promote all that was good within these traditions and to denounce all that was backwards and reactionary. There were plenty of poets and such who were popular among the bourgeoisie in 1920's-30's Albania and who are praised by the modern Albanian government, but who were denounced and their works prohibited in the 1940's-80's.

There was, of course, various foreign authors and plays, etc. allowed. Jack London was one, as was Mayakovsky.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Stop ducking the point.

Address what Hoxha said, and you quoted, and I cited, re: long hair, 'jungle music', striptease etc.

I don't want you to explain to me Hoxha's thinking in parrot fashion, I want you to tell me whether you think these ideas were right or wrong.

[Roach]

So if you have long hear, listen to 'jungle music' (whatever that is), take drugs, perform/receive a striptease, sympathise with humanistic art forms or listen to any western radio/TV, then you are somehow against Socialism?

It is pretty foolish and un-marxist to consider those things as simple isolated occurences, you know pretty well that those were the 60s and 70s and those activities were normally associated with the petty-bourgeios pacifist-idealistic hippie movement, it is clear as hell that even today some Marxist-Leninists organisations consider drugs to overall being innapropriate to a politicaly active life.

[teflon_john]

it's true, i don't want to do shit for the revolution when i'm geeked up off that kush.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

It is pretty foolish and un-marxist to consider those things as simple isolated occurences, you know pretty well that those were the 60s and 70s and those activities were normally associated with the petty-bourgeios pacifist-idealistic hippie movement, it is clear as hell that even today some Marxist-Leninists organisations consider drugs to overall being innapropriate to a politicaly active life.

Fine.

But then Ismail shouldn't bring up specific examples as isolated occurrences. If he does, then I have every right to call him out on using such isolated examples; I was only responding to him, not bringing them up in the first place.

[Per Levy]

"Our social opinion quite rightly strongly condemned such degenerate 'importations' as long hair, extravagant dress, screaming jungle music, coarse language, shameless behaviour and so on. If the influences and manifestations of the bourgeois-revisionist way of life are not nipped in the bud, they open the way to the corruption and degeneration of people which are so dangerous to the cause of socialism."
(Enver Hoxha. Selected Works Vol. IV. Tirana: 8 Nëntori Publishing House. 1982. p. 836.)

if i wasnt thinking before that hoxha was a fucking reactionary then i would know it now. long hair is degenerate(ergo im a degenerate), what does he mean as "jungle music" anyway? tbh these views are pretty close to any views very conservative people had to that time(and still have today).

edit: Jungle Music - A racial slur, used primarily in the 1950s and 1960s, to describe African-American influenced music as "noise" and "primitive".

[seventeethdecember2016]

Well I know how I'm going to spend part of my Thursday-reading this. :D

[Per Levy]

Well I know how I'm going to spend part of my Thursday-reading this. :D

dont you have to learn for tests or something?

[Ned Kelly]

He don't need no school he got the school of revleft..yikes

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

"Globalization," that is the economic integration of the entire world, was actually one the historic benefits of the development of capitalism. While capital pursues its own aims, the creation of a global economy can only benefit us when it comes time to move beyond the nation-state and initiate efficient production to meet human ends on a world scale.

"Self-reliance" is a reactionary pipe dream. In the case of Albania it was a case of necessity transformed into principle -- a common phenomenon in a lot of the "socialist states" of the 20th century.

[bricolage]

Unless Hoxha could see into the future of UK dance music, I'm guessing 'jungle music' was just a racial slur. Still though...
lMPhr20XPTo

[Die Neue Zeit]

So Mao is to blame for the current state of China?

Yes, because the Great Leap Backward could have been dumped in favour of more Soviet-style economic development (maybe not so much the kolkhozization as opposed to lost opportunities for sovkhozization). Hua Guofeng came too late to the scene.

[Ismail]

And now more amusing Hoxha quotes.

"Why should we turn our country into an inn with doors flung open to pigs and sows, to people with pants on or no pants at all, to the hirsute, long-haired hippies to supplant with their wild orgies the graceful dances of the Albanian people?"
(Enver Hoxha, quoted in Miranda Vickers & James Pettifer. Albania: From Anarchy to a Balkan Identity. New York, NY: New York University Press. 2000. p. 119.)

"In Europe and throughout the world there are innumerable philosophers and writers who have made a myth of the superiority of men over women. For them man is strong, warlike, courageous, and hence wiser, therefore, predestined to dominate, to lead, whereas woman, for her part, is weak, defenceless and timid by nature, therefore, she must be dominated and led. Bourgeois theoreticians like Nietzsche and Freud likewise uphold the theory that the male is active while the female is passive. This reactionary, anti-scientific theory must lead, as it did, to nazism in politics and to sadism in sexology."
(Enver Hoxha. Selected Works Vol. IV. Tirana: 8 Nëntori Publishing House. 1982. pp. 267-268.)

"At the conference of the 'non-aligned' held in Algiers, the Soviets are preparing to operate through Fidel Castro, whom they are supplying with at least a million and a half dollars a day. In recent months, the bearded Castro attacked both China and Albania, but without mentioning them by name. According to him, the Soviet Union is a genuine socialist country and part of the 'third world'. This gramaphone of the Soviets will put forward these theses in Algeria, too.

'The Soviets, members of the third world!!!' Why not! Chou En-lai has also proclaimed this thesis about China. Then, hurry up, who will be first to get into this 'third world'! But who is left to get into the 'second world'? Who takes part in the first? They can also create a fourth and a fifth so that no one knows where his place is! The purpose is how they can best disguise themselves."
(Enver Hoxha. Reflections on China Vol. II. Tirana: 8 Nëntori Publishing House. 1979. p. 74.)

[seventeethdecember2016]

dont you have to learn for tests or something?
That was today, which I did well on. :D

[gorillafuck]

jungle music means black people. he is saying that hippies scream and shout like people who play "jungle music". that's the albanian communist equivalent of calling someone what americans used to call "nigger lovers".

[Ostrinski]

"Why should we turn our country into an inn with doors flung open to pigs and sows, to people with pants on or no pants at all, to the hirsute, long-haired hippies to supplant with their wild orgies the graceful dances of the Albanian people?"
(Enver Hoxha, quoted in Miranda Vickers & James Pettifer. Albania: From Anarchy to a Balkan Identity. New York, NY: New York University Press. 2000. p. 119.)Anyone who tries to shave my hair or tell me I can't partake in a wild orgy is getting a bullet in the head

So Ismail is this you advocating social conservatism and racism

[Ismail]

So Ismail is this you advocating social conservatism and racismNo.

I don't think one can call Hoxha a social conservative when he said stuff like, "The entire party and country should hurl into the fire and break the neck of anyone who dared trample underfoot the sacred edit of the party on the defence of women's rights." (A. Logoreci, The Albanians: Europe's Forgotten Survivors, p. 158)

Or banning religion.

Or words like these: "Engels says that marriage based on love is moral, and only where love lasts is there marriage... Frequently, if not always, love is stigmatized as something amoral 'which leads women to prostitution and men to degeneracy'. These are erroneous concepts. If there is one thing which has nothing at all to do with prostitution, it is genuine love. There is no love in prostitution. Fortunately our country has not been afflicted with the terrible plague of prostitution, the slightest tendency towards which we must fight and which might appear as a result of a wrong anti-Marxist-Leninist approach to the question of love and marriage, of our failure to fight, both in practice and in theory, against bourgeois and idealist views and practices on this matter. Our country has known marriages through violence, the enslavement and torture of women under the polygamous laws of the Sheriat, it has known the laws of Catholicism, of the Vatican, which not only enslaved and degraded women, but also savagely tortured them spiritually... we would be wrong to think that we have put everything in order on these problems and that we need no longer worry about them, or to leave it to time to correct them. Work must be done to use the time well to create socialist customs and the appropriate public opinion for the present and future generations... Marriage is an act, a social fact, and should not be considered as a philosophical concept." (Selected Works Vol. IV, pp. 276-277.)

His attacks on "jungle music" and hippies obviously demonstrate his dislike of bourgeois culture in the West in general. It isn't like he woke up one day and said "Gee, George Wallace is totally cool, I wish all those damn liberal pacifist hippies would get run over by tanks and American negroes have their voting rights revoked."

[gorillafuck]

His attacks on "jungle music" and hippies obviously demonstrate his dislike of bourgeois culture in the West in general. It isn't like he woke up one day and said "Gee, George Wallace is totally cool, I wish all those damn liberal pacifist hippies would get run over by tanks."except you really can't use "jungle music" as a cultural criticism without having it be racist...

especially when referring to a subculture who's music grew out of traditionally black music...

[Ostrinski]

How exactly are long hair, "jungle" music, and drugs bourgeois? I must be bourgeois as hell. Man if I lived a few decades earlier I would have helped Hoxha lighten up.

[Ismail]

How exactly are long hair, "jungle" music, and drugs bourgeois? I must be bourgeois as hell. Man if I lived a few decades earlier I would have helped Hoxha lighten up.Well long hair and "jungle music" were associated with the West.

Just before that quote, Hoxha had said the following:

"But in recent years, when a heavy blow has been dealt to the old religious, feudal, patriarchal and conservative concepts and prejudices, the struggle against the present influences of bourgeois and revisionist ideology and their manifestation in our life has been somewhat neglected and underestimated. Liberal concepts and attitudes appeared, giving rise to certain harmful phenomena among certain people and especially among some of the youth. Those influences in literature and art, about which we spoke, cannot be viewed apart from certain alien manifestations which have been observed in the tastes, conduct and unseemly behaviour of a few young people. These, and the continuous pressure from abroad, are the fundamental causes of the spread of certain vulgar, alien tastes in music and art, the adoption of extravagant and ugly fashions, and unpleasant behaviour contrary to socialist ethics and the positive traditions of our people." (Selected Works Vol. IV, p. 836)

And right after the "jungle music" quote, "The all-round spiritual development and the moral image of our new man cannot be conceived without the formation of sound ideo-aesthetic tastes about what is beautiful in art, in nature, in work and in life. The problem of tastes is not a purely personal matter for individuals, which allegedly cannot even be discussed. Despite the presence of the individual element in them, tastes always have a social character, being formed under the direct influence of social and economic relations, ideology and culture and social psychology. Hence, it is clear that they have a class character. Therefore, in essence, our tastes are the complete opposite of bourgeois-revisionist tastes. Our communist taste is imbued with the revolutionary ideal, with proletarian simplicity, with noble sentiments and pure moral virtues." (p. 837)

So yeah, a bit of context so it doesn't just sound like Uncle Hoxha woke up one day particularly cranky.

As for drugs, which most socialists 50-100 years ago had a dim view of, Bill Bland once noted that Hoxha said, "Our young people have no need of drugs to escape from reality." I rather doubt drug-users will be treated as criminals in any modern socialist society, just like I doubt homosexuals will be either.

[Ostrinski]

These, and the continuous pressure from abroad, are the fundamental causes of the spread of certain vulgar, alien tastes in music and art, the adoption of extravagant and ugly fashions, and unpleasant behaviour contrary to socialist ethics and the positive traditions of our people." (Selected Works Vol. IV, p. 836)rofl :laugh:

[Grenzer]

I think it would be a grave mistake to treat cultural trends(music, clothing, hairstyles, etc) as being inseperable from the dominant ideology which produced them(in this case, liberal utopianism). Many of us enjoy literature, music, and other forms of culture that were produced by bourgeois entertainers, thinkers; but I don't think this has a tangible impact on our ideology in most cases. Wouldn't that kind of be like "Cultural Marxism" in reverse? I think Wagner is a good example, personally I like his music; but I don't think that the music on it's own is related to Wagner's ideology, which was undoubtably anti-semitic and reactionary. It's kind of reminiscent of the case in Israel actually.. Wagner is unofficially banned and I recall a debacle in which Jewish pianist and conductor Daniel Barenboim wanted to play Wagner in Israel.

On one hand, it's easy to see how Hoxha could have become concerned by the wave of bourgeois idealism that the "Hippy" movement seemed to represent, though I will echo others like Stammer and Tickle in saying that banning such things is a bit was a bit hasty. With the benefit of hindsight, we can see that clearly it's ridiculous on some level. It's a bit similar to the case of homosexuality in Russia. Homosexuality may have been honestly interpreted as a form of bourgeois culture, so it's banning may have been done with the right intent(if that's genuinely what the advocates of banning it though, which I suspect may not entirely be the case); but it was reactionary in effect imo. We should criticize them for mistakes like this.

Besides, when the communist utopia has been achieved I don't imagine that I'll want to give up liquor and other.. things, and I'll wager most of the other people would feel the same. If music, clothing, and TV are inherently corruptive in terms of advancing bourgeois ideology, then we're all bourgeois as fuck.

[Ismail]

For some odd reason Albanian law expressively permitted "unnatural sexual relations (i.e. sodomy)" between a man and a woman, and between women, but explicitly criminalized male-male homosexuality. Apparently lesbians (which 99% of Albanians had no concept of) were seen as a reaction to male patriarchy whereas male homosexuality was seen as helping to enforce it, so a policy of "positive discrimination" was in force.

In the GDR by contrast homosexual acts were apparently decriminalized in the late 60's or early 70's (although you couldn't be openly gay or get married or anything) and by 1989 there was a state-run gay disco bar thing in East Berlin.

Just another example of how material conditions (patriarchal Albania with tribal relations in the north vis-à-vis modernized East Germany) shape consciousness.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Ismail has resorted to explaining Hoxha's explicit racism and implied homophobia, rather than actually stating it was wrong.

Because, you know, Hoxha can never be wrong and Ismail loves to think he's some sort of player in the political game, as evidenced by his 'report' during the great Revleft purge:lol::rolleyes:

[Ismail]

and Ismail loves to think he's some sort of player in the political game, as evidenced by his 'report' during the great Revleft purgeThat's completely irrelevant to the thread.

Obviously I think Hoxha (and Stalin, and Lenin, and Engels, and Marx, and basically every other socialist at the time) was wrong on the subject of homosexuality. I don't consider it a big mark against them, since the recognition of homosexuality as normal and not the result of "external sources" (feudalism, capitalism, rape) wasn't really accepted up until the 1970's, and even then only in the West.

I don't think the term "jungle music" was used by Hoxha in a racist context. Considering he wasn't American and never went to America, and never had any cultural contact with Americans except briefly during the war, it was probably just used to refer to popular Western songs in general. For what it's worth he had a rather positive view of Nkrumah and Sankara and had a cordial interview with W.E.B. DuBois' wife in 1965 or so. He also denounced racism on various occasions, explicitly noting state-sanctioned racism in the USA.

[bricolage]

I don't think the term "jungle music" was used by Hoxha in a racist context. Considering he wasn't American and never went to America, and never had any cultural contact with Americans except briefly during the war, it was probably just used to refer to Western songs in general during the 1960's and 70's.
why would you use jungle to refer to the western unless you were specifically referring to black music from the west? it doesn't make sense otherwise. jungle as a negative term is only ever associated with black people, ie. jungle bunnies.

[Ismail]

why would you use jungle to refer to the western unless you were specifically referring to black music from the west? it doesn't make sense otherwise. jungle as a negative term is only ever associated with black people, ie. jungle bunnies.The term is probably being used in a "this is decadent bourgeois stuff" sense rather than "these negroes can't make good music" sense. There are works where Hoxha praises the struggle of the African people against imperialism and neo-colonialism. In the aforementioned interview with DuBois' wife (which was held on November 27, 1964), Hoxha stated that, "We have sympathy for all peoples, especially the peoples of Africa, which had the same fate as our people.... the social conditions of our country, when we started the Anti-fascist National Liberation War, were more or less similar to what you said for Ghana." (Vepra Vol. 28, pp. 165-166.) In the same interview he says that he is very happy to hear of the progress being made in Ghana at that time in-re women's rights, and that the Albanian ambassador there informs Hoxha and Co. regularly on Ghanaian affairs.

[bricolage]

The term is probably being used in a "this is decadent bourgeois stuff" sense rather than "these negroes can't make good music" sense.
but jungle has never otherwise been used in that context. it seems you're making a big assumption here.

the other stuff you mentioned isn't really relevant.

[Ismail]

but jungle has never otherwise been used in that context. it seems you're making a big assumption here.

the other stuff you mentioned isn't really relevant.I'd say it's relevant since there's no evidence of Hoxha being a racist except for a term he used once in a speech about how bourgeois and revisionist culture is bad. It seems odd that Hoxha would knowingly write down "muzikës së xhunglës" as a racist term.

[bricolage]

I'd say it's relevant since there's no evidence of Hoxha being a racist except for a term he used once in a speech about how bourgeois and revisionist culture is bad. It seems odd that Hoxha would knowingly write down "muzikës së xhunglës" as a racist term.
I didn't say he was a racist, I said he was using racist terminology.
'ideas of the ruling class...' etc.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

I don't consider it a big mark against them, since the recognition of homosexuality as normal and not the result of "external sources" (feudalism, capitalism, rape) wasn't really accepted up until the 1970's, and even then only in the West.

You've already been proven wrong on this several times. Sad to see you keep repeating it.

The October Revolution abolished laws against same-sex sexual relations long before the founding of Hoxha's regime, which means the "sign of the times" rhetoric is absolute horse shit.

"[Soviet legislation] declares the absolute non-interference of the state and society into sexual matters, so long as nobody is injured and no one’s interests are encroached upon. Concerning homosexuality, sodomy, and various other forms of sexual gratification, which are set down in European legislation as offences against morality--Soviet legislation treats these exactly as so-called 'natural' intercourse. All forms of sexual intercourse are private matters." - Dr. Grigorii Batkis (director Moscow Institute of Social Hygiene), The Sexual Revolution in Russia, 1923. [Emphasis in original]

Of course this was later reversed under Uncle Joe. Social forces shaped social policy. The reintroduction of reactionary social policies came along with real, underlying changes. It's no coincidence that abortion, homosexuality and prostitution were criminalized as the bureaucracy firmly secured its grip on power.

[Ismail]

You've already been proven wrong on this several times. Sad to see you keep repeating it.

The October Revolution abolished laws against same-sex sexual relations long before the founding of Hoxha's regime, which means the "sign of the times" rhetoric is absolute horse shit.Yet homosexuality in the 1920's was still seen as a mental illness. Trotsky never once mentioned the recriminalization of homosexuality, although he did have quite a few words against restrictions on abortion. Lenin, too, never spoke on the subject of homosexuality. In the mid-20's homosexuality in Central Asia was attacked for having a perceived patriarchal basis. Abortion was called an "evil" in the original decree legalizing its practice, the decree itself existing on the basis that women would no longer need to harm themselves via makeshift abortions in an act seen as unavoidable at that time for many women.

I've already noted that "sodomy" between a man and a woman was explicitly permitted in Albanian law as well, as were "unnatural" sexual relations between women. Considering that Hoxha has been called the "quintessential Stalinist," perhaps you'd like to explain how this meshes in with your "evil bureaucracy" claims? Albania in the whole of its modern history had no gay rights movement whatsoever until the 1990's, so in this respect one can argue that permitting those two things was even ballsier than what the Bolsheviks did.

Perhaps you can tell me why the GDR (presumably led by a similar sort of "bureaucracy") decriminalized homosexuality. Germany having a much more notable gay rights movement (which significantly influenced the early socialist movement as well) than Tsarist-era Russia can't possibly have contributed to this, right?

Believe it or not homophobia in these contexts can be explained for reasons other than "the Stalinist bureaucracy hated gay people." Not to mention that you seem to be confusing "you won't be imprisoned for having gay sex" with homosexuals actually enjoying equal rights.


I didn't say he was a racist, I said he was using racist terminology.Fair enough.

[l'Enfermé]

The Revolutionary Bolsheviks were displaced by the reactionary-conservative bureaucracy, which Stalin headed, and they reversed the policies of the Bolsheviks and Lenin and implemented their own conservative cultural policies, thus you have re-criminalized homosexuality etc, etc. It's pretty simple.

[Ismail]

Then by your own admission that should mean that Albania, the GDR, etc. were totally progressive on the issue of homosexuality. After all, just because something is decriminalized doesn't mean it's accepted socially nor does it signify equality.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

Yet homosexuality in the 1920's was still seen as a mental illness.

Nope. Post-revolution it was considered a private matter that shouldn't involve the state in the legal realm, and a normal feature of human sexuality in the scientific realm.

Most scientists in Russia and others in the socialist movement in Europe held that homosexuality was normal. Emma Goldman was publicly arguing for equal rights for homosexuals in the United States years before the October Revolution even occurred. Long before that, August Bebel was the first politician anywhere in the world to publicly argue for equality for homosexuals way back in 1898 (http://www.marxists.org/archive/bebel/1898/01/13.htm).

Then there were the prominent people involved in scientific study who weren't socialists like Freud who also held that it was totally normal.

It wasn't until 1934 that same-sex relations were outlawed in the USSR... a year after the NAZI's did the same in Germany, destroying the Institute of Sex Research in Berlin -- probably the most advanced scientific body studying human sexuality at the time, which of course found that homosexuality, transgenderism, etc. was totally normal -- in the process.

[gorillafuck]

The term is probably being used in a "this is decadent bourgeois stuff" sensehow could that mean that?

[Ismail]

Nope. Post-revolution it was considered [...] a normal feature of human sexuality in the scientific realm.Do you have any proof of this? It has been noted that the Bolsheviks early on had no consistent policy on homosexuality (Homosexual Desire in Revolutionary Russia, p. 309.)


Most scientists in Russia and others in the socialist movement in Europe held that homosexuality was normal.Any source for this besides one single thing you've just quoted and keep on quoting? Again decriminalization does not equal "people thought homosexuality was a-okay" anymore than the striking down of anti-"sodomy" laws in the USA indicated that gay people were finally accepted as normal persons deserving of equal rights.


Emma Goldman was publicly arguing for equal rights for homosexuals in the United States years before the October Revolution even occurred. Long before that, August Bebel was the first politician anywhere in the world to publicly argue for equality for homosexuals way back in 1898 (http://www.marxists.org/archive/bebel/1898/01/13.htm).And neither were Russian. I already mentioned that gay rights in Germany was significantly more advanced and connected to the socialist movement than in Tsarist-era Russia. Even right-wing German Social-Democrats like Bernstein stood up for homosexuals.


It wasn't until 1934 that same-sex relations were outlawed in the USSR... a year after the NAZI's did the same in Germany,Yes, Stalin decided "damn, Hitler is beating me in being evil and reactionary. I better best him in this field, too." :rolleyes:

Of course many socialists in the 30's and 40's accused homosexuality and fascism of being connected. That makes said socialists quite wrong on this point, of course.


how could that mean that?Because the Albanians denounced rock music as well? Because jazz (American and Soviet) was denounced? Because basically anything not opera (and traditional folk music, of course) tended to be looked upon with, at least, suspicion?

In his 1967 speech to the Fourth Congress of the Democratic Front Hoxha said, "The indignation and armed revolt of the colored people in the United States of America have burst forth with unprecedented vehemence in the lair of the imperialists itself." (Vepra Vol. 36, p. 386.) Again, it seems quite unlikely that Hoxha used the word "jungle music" with any racist intentions in mind.