Maoism is it possible in america

[ashtonh]

Hi i have recently been faced with a thought on how various forms of communism, socialism, and anarchism would work in america. I would like to start with maoism.

[BIXX]

Well none of them will work if we don't break down the idea of America from it's current form (as an independent country) to simply being a descriptor of a landmass.

I assumed you meant America as in the United States, but if you meant it as in "the Americas" the same thing applies, only replace "country" with "continent".

[VivalaCuarta]

Certainly Maoism is possible in America (U.S.). There have been many American Maoists. Most have succeeded in implementing the Mao-Stalinist program of class collaboration and have generally, given enough time, taken it to its logical conclusion. Maoists in the U.S. have been the biggest "Leftist" cheerleaders for NATO and apartheid South Africa.

If by Maoism you mean the establishment of a bureaucratically deformed workers state such as in China in 1949, this is impossible in the U.S. The Maoists were forced to expropriate the bourgeoise in China and build a state based on collectivized property because they failed to carry out their program of class collaboration with the Guomindang, the party of a weak and mortally divided national bourgeoisie. Their peasant-based "peoples war" succeeded because of the Soviet occupation of their base areas. Neither of these conditions obtain in the heart of U.S. imperialism. The conditions here allow Maoists to consistently practice their program of class-collaborationist betrayal of the proletariat.

[Comrade Jacob]

I don't see much of an oppressed peasantry in the states, do you? Although I do think if anything happens in the US all classes (minus the capitalists) will play their role...and then the world!

[Fourth Internationalist]

Certainly Maoism is possible in America (U.S.). There have been many American Maoists. Most have succeeded in implementing the Mao-Stalinist program of class collaboration and have generally, given enough time, taken it to its logical conclusion. Maoists in the U.S. have been the biggest "Leftist" cheerleaders for NATO and apartheid South Africa.

If by Maoism you mean the establishment of a bureaucratically deformed workers state such as in China in 1949, this is impossible in the U.S. The Maoists were forced to expropriate the bourgeoise in China and build a state based on collectivized property because they failed to carry out their program of class collaboration with the Guomindang, the party of a weak and mortally divided national bourgeoisie. Their peasant-based "peoples war" succeeded because of the Soviet occupation of their base areas. Neither of these conditions obtain in the heart of U.S. imperialism. The conditions here allow Maoists to consistently practice their program of class-collaborationist betrayal of the proletariat.

If the Maoists were petty bourgeois, as that is the class nature of the Stalinists, and they betrayed the working class by crushing and killing them, how exactly did they, non-proletarian Maoists, create a proletarian state?

[Lensky]

Hi i have recently been faced with a thought on how various forms of communism, socialism, and anarchism would work in america. I would like to start with maoism.

I don't know about America, but in Canada the PCR-RCP is attempting to apply maoist theory to a first world situation.

[The Feral Underclass]

I don't see much of an oppressed peasantry in the states, do you? Although I do think if anything happens in the US all classes (minus the capitalists) will play their role...and then the world!

Maoism has more to offer than 'OMG peasants.'

[Remus Bleys]

Such as what gun fetishism and peoples war? Peoples war of course, as practiced involved the peasants taking over the cities... america doesn't really. Have the basis for maoism that existed in countries like china or albania, and neither of those two countries didn't really have maoism as is popularly conceptualized either. The ussr is dead so no official funding for the iniative an americas already had its capitalist revolution thank you very much
http://www.international-communist-party.org/English/Texts/65ThChin.htm this is some good reading on the matter

[ashtonh]

All interesting points. Any thoughts on other asian communist rulers.

[Loony Le Fist]

Hi i have recently been faced with a thought on how various forms of communism, socialism, and anarchism would work in america. I would like to start with maoism.

If I understand maoism correctly it won't work in the US. The US has invested heavily in armaments and is well prepared for any attempt at armed agrarian rebellion. In chapter 6 of Art of War, Sun Tzu understands this problem well. You do not attack an enemy where they are strongest, you attack them where they are weakest.



Sun Tzu, Art of War
If the enemy is taking his ease, he can harass him; if well supplied with food, he can starve him out; if quietly encamped, he can force him to move

The food of our enemy is money. We must first withdraw our support of the corporate state by forming our own systems and mass movements. We starve them out, and we must be prepared for retaliation. This doesn't mean that we shouldn't be armed and use it self-defense. It means we should not instigate attacks against our enemies where we know they are stronger.

[ashtonh]

That is truly an interesting point. China was weak so the masses took over. Now weaponry has increased.

[BIXX]

Such as what gun fetishism...

I really am tired of people referring to the belief that guns will assist (and be vital) for the revolution as "gun fetishism". That sounds so immature, and it feels like those people can't think of "OMG GUNZ ARE DANGEROUS".

My thoughts: you can't figure out which type of revolution will work before you decide what kind of society you want to build. While communism will work in the US, or it will work nowhere, everyone seems to ignore that not all communisms are equal. Furthermore, we spend a lot of time trying to take old historical ideologies and make them for in the US or the world today or whatever battleground of revolution we are talkin about, and try to make it fit. Why not build new ideas, and if they resemble old ones that is totally fine. But I think we try to rip things out of their historical context too much. As a materialist, I think that's fucking embarrassing.

Of course y'all know what kind of revolution (if it can necessarily be called that) I'd want to see: insurrections against the state, capitalism, and everything, tending toward the individual. But that comes from me, not because someone told me it would be more successful or whatever. I personally thought it would be better. Maybe there should be more of that amongst the revolutionaries here.

[Remus Bleys]

Of course guns will be used in the Revolution. The armed proletariat, through violent insurrection will establish a totalitarian state to which it will suppress all institutions and things that will seek to prevent the revolution from accomplishing its goal.
I've made that known several times that that is my position. All of this will require force and violence (which may even be terroristic) and what does this rely on - weapons. A gun, as a sophisticated weapon, will of course be used throughout the revolution and I would say that many would learn how to use a gun.
Gun fetishism that I refer to when I am talking about maoism is this "political power grows out of a barrel of a gun." Then I guess that class doesn't count, the party doesn't count, a revolutionary theory doesn't count, to have revolution you just need a militia (there is a poem about Mao where they say that the revolutionary is a "warrior monkey grasping his golden rod" - which is the perfect exemplification of Maoism's cult of personality and weapon fetishism). This is obvious enough as to why it is an absurdity. Taking the quote a little more literal, does this mean that politics didn't exist before guns? Do all politics require out and out force?
This is what I mean when I say maoism is gun fetishism - to think that the gun, which is really just neutral when not being used or harnessed by anyone - is the source of political power is complete absurdity. I am not saying that weapons will not be used, they are tools, but that is all they are - tools. The gun is not a basis of power, the class using the gun is.

[jake williams]

Just to clarify, none of the major Maoist traditions in the US have anything to do with the idea that a socialist revolution in the US is going to primarily involve a people's war by the peasants to liberate the US from imperialism and feudal landlords.

There's basically two things that people are signifying when they identify as US Maoists:

1) They want to build a revolutionary strategy based on the material conditions faced in the US today, which are completely different than those faced in feudal China; they recognize the difference in material conditions, but they take some form of political or theoretical inspiration from Mao. Often people identify as Maoists mainly because they oppose Khrushchev, and see Mao as defending communism against revisionism. One important example of this tradition is the new left black liberation movement which often was interested in building a similar alliance between the black lumpenproletariat and the industrial working class as they saw having been built by the peasantry and proletariat in China.

2) A lot of the tradition of Maoism in the US is some variant of what is usually called "third worldism". There's "strict" third worldism that says the main axis of class struggle is not between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie as such, but between the imperialist bourgeoisie in the "first world" and the workers and peasants in the "third world". The assumption is that workers in the first world have mostly been bought off by the imperialist bourgeoisie, whereas the nascent bourgeoisie in the third world can be a strategic ally of third world workers and peasants.

While not a lot of people will call themselves "third worldists", the basic worldview or related beliefs are shared by a really large part of the left (from people who call themselves "anti-imperialists", and defend nationalist bourgeois states defending themselves against NATO, to people who call themselves "anarchists" and think that organizing most workers in imperialist countries is worthless because only organizing super-exploited workers, especially in the third world, is viable).

[Q]

The OP fits better in /learning. So, moving away from /theory.

[ashtonh]

Ok so basically maoism truly replicated is impossible. Maybe in somewhere else. Personally I follow this theory line marx-engels-lenin-mao-guevara while some of stalins methods were beneficial i cannot agree to be a stalinist for ruling method was to harsh.