What is Maoism (and what should we think of it)?

[SocialismBeta]

I have read much socialist literature but not much on Maoism and Mao in particular. If anyone has any insights or opinions to share, I would appreciate it.

Many (though certainly not all) outside commenters would gladly state, with little nuance, that Maoism is the result of socialism, that Mao killed millions of people in his so-called "Great Leap Forward", and thus Socialism is responsible for millions of deaths. "QED capitalism is better than socialism!"

I feel there are far more practical things to be learned than that.

In particular, what was Mao about and from what lineage of socialist thought did he emerge? Where and why did theory fail, and result in tragedy? How did Maoist China transform into the modern capitalist society it is today? Can socialists take anything from Maoism, besides as what NOT to do?

As far as I am aware (and correct me if I am wrong) Mao championed a view of socialist progression as the third world masses against the west, and also adopted the Stalin-eske philosophy if "socialism in one nation".

Mao himself was also (as dictators are prone to be) a madman. But the eccentricities of Mao's character, while an interesting case study, don't seem directly relevant to making an analysis of Maoism per se.

Anyway, I would appreciate any thoughts on the matter. I will continue with my own research as well... I believe Marxists.org has a section for Mao?

Thanks.

[Flavius]

In my opinion, the Great Leap Forward resulted in a fallacy because of Mao's false perceptions of how economy works. He was a good soldier, but also a complete moron when it came to actually governing a country. (As is the case with so many others. Sometimes the best revolutionary is not the best head of government.)

Also, the Hundred Flowers Campaign was one of the most disgusting things ever. Mao's idea too.

So in my opinion, while there was a certain progress in China during the years of the regime, it had its shameful flaws, and most of these flaws are a consequence of Mao's person, and his personal views and ways.

However, this is just my opinion, and I didn't look into Maoism much, so there is a fair chance that I'm wrong.

[Gunsmas]

China progressed and the working class and peasants saw their living standards increase dramatically from 1949-1955 (Not just as a result of recovery from civil war, but due to the land redistribution).

After that though everything started to go very very wrong. Mao had delusions on how quickly he could overtake the UK/USA. To put some perspective into this, China finally overtook the UK in GDP in 2004. When Mao died, China had a smaller economy than Argentina...

[SocialismBeta]

Thanks for reply's.

No, I did not mean to dismiss the role of Mao himself in the downfall of Chinese socialism (as well as further contributing to the bad perception of socialism in the west). Rather I wanted to know how closely Mao's horrors are tied to "Maoism" as a philosophy or if it does at all.

I will be going to work soon so I can't now... but I did, in fact, find a Maoism section on Marxists.org. I will read up in there a little and see where it takes me.

Thanks and I appreciate any further comments.

[Observational Change]

In my opinion, the Great Leap Forward resulted in a fallacy because of Mao's false perceptions of how economy works. He was a good soldier, but also a complete moron when it came to actually governing a country. (As is the case with so many others. Sometimes the best revolutionary is not the best head of government.)

Also, the Hundred Flowers Campaign was one of the most disgusting things ever. Mao's idea too.

So in my opinion, while there was a certain progress in China during the years of the regime, it had its shameful flaws, and most of these flaws are a consequence of Mao's person, and his personal views and ways.

However, this is just my opinion, and I didn't look into Maoism much, so there is a fair chance that I'm wrong.

I always thought the major problem with the Great Leap Forward was the lack of ecological knowledge in the era. Whatever the great leap forward may have accomplished socio-economically it failed in ecological and hence human catastrophe. The Sparrows campaign led to a rise in grasshoppers which ate the crops and starved the people. People did not starve of failed planning in any kind of socio-economic sense but failed ecological planning. But this happened before Rachel Carson's Silent Spring. This could've happened elsewhere and did: the American Dust Bowl for instance.

[John Nada]

I have read much socialist literature but not much on Maoism and Mao in particular. If anyone has any insights or opinions to share, I would appreciate it.Not a Maoist, but okay.
Many (though certainly not all) outside commenters would gladly state, with little nuance, that Maoism is the result of socialism, that Mao killed millions of people in his so-called "Great Leap Forward", and thus Socialism is responsible for millions of deaths. "QED capitalism is better than socialism!" https://monthlyreview.org/commentary/did-mao-really-kill-millions-in-the-great-leap-forward/ Anti-communist will always try to find or make up something. While there likely was a pretty bad famine, China regularly had famines for centuries before the Great Leap Forward. It was one of the most backwards countries on the planet before the revolution, IIRC average life expectancy was under 40! Yet AFAIK China has had no famines after that one.

Famines and people just starving due to poverty are regular occurrences under regular capitalism, yet few of those same anti-communists blame capitalism. Hell, the PRC wasn't even under socialist construction yet, but still state-capitalist att, according to Mao. If anything, the problem was due to capitalism.
I feel there are far more practical things to be learned than that.Yeah. I think there stuff to be learned from even those we might disagree with. If anyone wants to try constructing socialism better next time, why not learn from the mistakes of previous attempts?
In particular, what was Mao about and from what lineage of socialist thought did he emerge? Where and why did theory fail, and result in tragedy? How did Maoist China transform into the modern capitalist society it is today? Can socialists take anything from Maoism, besides as what NOT to do?Mao, the left-wing and center of the CCP were Marxist-Leninists, like most of the global Communist movement at the time. Much of Mao's theories were elaborations on earlier one's of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin(though critically). Technically, it wasn't called Maoism in his lifetime, but Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong-Thought. Marxism-Leninism-Maoism really only emerged after Mao's death, outside of China, in the late-80's-early-90's http://www.bannedthought.net/International/RIM/AWTW/1995-20/ll_mlm_20_eng.htm . However, in the PRC it's not Maoism, but "Deng Xiaoping theory" that guides things. Mao's more of a nationalist symbol to them now.

On what a socialist can take from Maoism, the theory of people's war, on how to set up dual power, fight a more powerful capitalist foe, grow and launch a revolution. This is very influential, even outside of Maoism. Also Mao's theory on how the superstructure can affect the base, not just the base shaping the superstructure as is often claimed in classical Marxism.

As to the failure of the Chinese Revolution, that's tied to the PRC turning into an imperialist-capitalist country. After Mao's death, a rival named Deng Xiaoping seized power. He represented the right-wing faction, the "capitalist roaders". He attacked and imprisoned the left-wing factions of the CCP. The rightists that took over in a coup after Mao's death effective abandoned Marxism and attacked anything that happened before Deng(a lot of that "Mao personally killed everyone in China!" shit was promoted by Deng), but give Deng credit for anything positive afterwards. A lot of the training and infrastructure during the Mao era didn't have an immediate payoff from a capitalist perspective(still decent economic growth though), but a lot of the growth attributed to the "free market reforms" was due to programs previously implemented during the Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution.
As far as I am aware (and correct me if I am wrong) Mao championed a view of socialist progression as the third world masses against the west, and also adopted the Stalin-eske philosophy if "socialism in one nation".It couldn't be "socialism in one nation". It spread to several nations after WWII, and China alone is a multinational state.:)

That third-world vs. first-world was Lin Biao's theory. He was later accused of plotting a coup against Mao and died in a plane crash fleeing to the USSR after it failed. Afterwards he was denounced in the "Criticizes Lin, Criticizes Confucius" campaign.
Mao himself was also (as dictators are prone to be) a madman. But the eccentricities of Mao's character, while an interesting case study, don't seem directly relevant to making an analysis of Maoism per se.

Anyway, I would appreciate any thoughts on the matter. I will continue with my own research as well... I believe Marxists.org has a section for Mao?

Thanks.Marxists.org has a Mao section (https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/index.htm) that's pretty comprehensive. There's also www.Marx2Mao.com and www.Bannedthought.net .

[Brandon's Impotent Rage]

I'll repeat what I've said about Mao in the past:

As a guerilla leader and soldier, Mao was one of the true greats. He was charismatic, intelligent, and very personable, and his organizational skills during the war were fantastic. It's easy to see why so many people were willing to follow him.

But when it came to actually running the country, he was shit. He was incompetent to an almost criminal level. The Great Leap Forward itself is a great example of Mao's talent at being able to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Under Zhou Enlai, China had begun to rebuild and prosper. Many of the farmers had begun taking part in collectivization experiments (with government backing) to great success. If these experiments had been allowed to grow and spread naturally, who knows what wonders they could have accomplished?

So what did Mao do? He decided that this could be the framework for the entire country. The result was the Great Leap Forward, and all the disasters that followed.

To call Mao a 'mass murderer' is foolishness. But Mao WAS a shit manager, and in that respect he deserves all of the criticisms he gets.

[Comrade Jacob]

The amount of bullshit in this thread is only equalled by a bunch of Reagan-humpers. You should feel embarrassed.

[Gunsmas]

My main issue with Maoist China is the racial-based nationalism that Mao seemed to adhere to. I do not claim to be an expert, but I've read his earlier works.

Today The system is moulded around a "Brave noble peaceful Chinese people vs THOSE FOREIGNERS". I understand that China was humiliated at the hands of foreigners again and again, especially by my country (The UK) but I still dislike the Us Chinese vs Them foreigners rhetoric.

[Hatshepsut]

Where and why did theory fail, and result in tragedy?

One place where theory and reality diverged was in the thousands of backyard "steel furnaces" set up in China. What little metal they managed to produce was of such poor quality as to be unusable. Unfortunately, you can't make steel at home in an illiterate countryside. Bessemer showed how to do it back in 1820 but the knee-jerk against anything Western kept any such ideas well away from Asia. It's likely Mao rejected the foreign assistance implicit in raising a steel industry before any proposals had come forth. But it cost him.

Qui Jin believes the demise of Lin Biao was for reasons of personality; he was a potential rival to Mao, who in turn by 1971 was no longer concerned with Communist Party principles but seeking to maintain his own privileges within a system that had essentially duplicated China's Forbidden City of Ming times. I won't comment on this view or its correctness; it comes from a bourgeois perspective yet that doesn't automatically render an opinion inaccurate or wrong - For Marx, rightness is a thing which depends on the history, not on the messenger. Qui's take is of interest primarily because it is early, therefore less filtered by retrospective or subsequent orthodoxy. One may peruse it here.

http://ww2.odu.edu/ao/instadv/quest/LinBiao.html

I suspect the crash itself was accidental, although that's only my estimate based on the fact that staging transportation crashes by sabotage as a means of concealing intent to assassinate is usually too difficult to be worth it, nor even feasible in most cases. If you're going to kill someone, you may as well just do it as the world will find out anyway, sooner or later.

There is a theory behind every branch of communist political philosophy. But what such "isms" are really about can be determined from their fruits: What did the leaders who espoused them actually do? As experience from Mao himself to Peru's Shining Path suggests, Maoism is heavily infected by the personality cult, depending on this quasi-religious phenomenon for viability.

[Gunsmas]

One place where theory and reality diverged was in the thousands of backyard "steel furnaces" set up in China. What little metal they managed to produce was of such poor quality as to be unusable. Unfortunately, you can't make steel at home in an illiterate countryside. Bessemer showed how to do it back in 1820 but the knee-jerk against anything Western kept any such ideas well away from Asia. It's likely Mao rejected the foreign assistance implicit in raising a steel industry before any proposals had come forth. But it cost him.

Qui Jin believes the demise of Lin Biao was for reasons of personality; he was a potential rival to Mao, who in turn by 1971 was no longer concerned with Communist Party principles but seeking to maintain his own privileges within a system that had essentially duplicated China's Forbidden City of Ming times. I won't comment on this view or its correctness; it comes from a bourgeois perspective yet that doesn't automatically render an opinion inaccurate or wrong - For Marx, rightness is a thing which depends on the history, not on the messenger. Qui's take is of interest primarily because it is early, therefore less filtered by retrospective or subsequent orthodoxy. One may peruse it here.


I suspect the crash itself was accidental, although that's only my estimate based on the fact that staging transportation crashes staged by sabotage as a means of concealing intent to assassinate is usually too difficult to be worth it, or even feasible in most cases. If you're going to kill someone, you may as well just do it as the world will find out anyway, sooner or later.

Rumours are he was in contact with the Republic of China, but both governments have denied it.

[John Nada]

My main issue with Maoist China is the racial-based nationalism that Mao seemed to adhere to. I do not claim to be an expert, but I've read his earlier works.

I can speak Mandarin Chinese myself and the rhetoric is even worse today. The system is moulded around a "Brave noble peaceful Chinese people vs THOSE FOREIGNERS". I understand that China was humiliated at the hands of foreigners again and again, especially by my country (The UK) but I still dislike the Us Chinese vs Them foreigners rhetoric.Earlier the Chinese Red Army was fighting for national liberation, so it was more understandable(nationalism of the oppressed vs. the oppressor, as Lenin said). Mao noticed this and criticized Han chauvinism, saying it was reactionary bourgeois ideas that still permeated the culture. https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-5/mswv5_25.htm

However, Mao later said the CCP was more like a united front between Communists and Nationalists. https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-9/mswv9_32.htm The Nationalist faction is the one that took over after Mao died, and moved against the leftist faction, including throwing Mao's wife Jiang Qing in prison for life. While they didn't total shit on his legacy, he's held up more as a nationalist hero who liberated China and modernized the country but made "ultra-leftist" mistakes, rather than a Marxist. Orthodox Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong-Thought isn't the dominate ideology anymore.
One place where theory and reality diverged was in the thousands of backyard "steel furnaces" set up in China. What little metal they managed to produce was of such poor quality as to be unusable. Unfortunately, you can't make steel at home in an illiterate countryside. Bessemer showed how to do it back in 1820 but the knee-jerk against anything Western kept any such ideas well away from Asia. It's likely Mao rejected the foreign assistance implicit in raising a steel industry before any proposals had come forth. But it cost him.The USSR cut off all aid to the PRC right before the Great Leap Forward. Just up and left projects uncompleted and even tore up the blueprints. The PRC had to remake a lot of it from scratch.

The impression I get about the point of the backyard furnaces is that it wasn't about making high-grade steel. Rather, it was a work program to make pig iron and teach peasants to engaging in social labor like the proletariat, as opposed to individualist, isolated labor of the peasantry. It was to develop productive relations between workers, rather than productive forces of advance smelting and metallurgy.

[Hatshepsut]

The USSR...even tore up the blueprints.

How much aid did China ever get from the USSR? The latter had to prioritize economic assistance to the Warsaw Pact countries in connection with the face-off versus the West in Europe. It also had to shoulder the support of the Vietnamese Communists which China wouldn’t help due to nationalistic differences. With respect to the bourgeois outside world, a façade of unity held for some time:


“The people's revolution in China dealt a crushing blow at the positions of imperialism in Asia and contributed in great measure to the balance of the world forces changing in favor of socialism.”
-Declaration of the 81 Working Peoples’ Parties, 1960

I stand corrected as far as pig iron, not steel, being the product of backyard furnaces—the iron was to be refined into steel. Wasteful in ignoring Bessemer’s one-step blast furnace technique, which was logistically accessible to China without foreign aid, the project didn’t work too well in any case, not even at teaching peasants how to cooperate at new tasks, if the CC forum document you have kindly cited above is any indication:


“There are three kinds of people: landlords who have escaped demarcation, the nascent bourgeoisie, and the rotten...The status of most of them is that they come from laboring people, and are not clean in their political, economic, ideological and organizational stands. They connive with landlords, rich peasants, counter-revolutionaries and bad elements...”

Khrushchev in the Sino-Soviet split however also operated from nationalistic principles, with unstated motives I believe were the border disputes and fear of China’s impending acquisition of nuclear weapons. Your reference to blueprints is a perfect example of this Soviet leader’s shoe-banging vindictiveness. The split was simply a disaster for international communism, with all involved parties deserving of blame for creating it.

[SocialismBeta]

Thanks for the replays, there is a lot to chew on here. :lol: For now I do not have much to say in response, except:


There is a theory behind every branch of communist political philosophy. But what such "isms" are really about can be determined from their fruits: What did the leaders who espoused them actually do? As experience from Mao himself to Peru's Shining Path suggests, Maoism is heavily infected by the personality cult, depending on this quasi-religious phenomenon for viability.

To me this is one of the bigger problems which seem to have plagued far-left movements... The very idea of a personality cult, in fact, seems to go against the very idea of radical democracy and workers self-empowerment.

Not that capitalist societies have ever been immune to the personality cult.

It may rather be a symptom of hierarchical state power taking full control. After all, of people can put a face to "big brother", or if the emperor and appeal to the emotions of the masses, then all the better for the regime.

...But I don't mean to move away from Mao.