Maoism

[Poum_1936]

What has Mao Zedong thought added or improved onto Leninism?

To me it seems like Maoism has actually regressed rather than advanced the ideas of Lenin.

[American_Trotskyist]

It is. It has absolutly nothing to do with Marxism (Leninism too because it is a continuation). It believes in the same Stalinism ideas of two stage theory, only take farther. It says that communism can be built by including the petty bourgeoisie in the revolution. Maoism is also ANTI-proletariat. It is against urbanization and for the peasantry alone. www.newyouth.com and the FAQs about Maoism are an ok summary.

[RedStarOverChina]

American trotskyist, im not a Maoist but even i can tell u definately got everything backwards.

Maoism doesnt oppose proletariats. My grandmother was a child labor when the Liberation army came to liberate the town. Soon she was given an education and served in the medical field and held considerably high positions.

In old China, Peasants are considered to be proletariats because unlike the peasants of Europe, Chinese peasants dont have land(or any other capital other than labor) which makes them serfs which makes them even more revolutionary than the workers, believe it or not. not to mention Peasants were more than 90 % of the population thus cannot afford to be ignored.

Just because Mao is pro-peasants doesnt make him anti worker. By anti urbanization, did u mean industrialization?

around the time of the countrys liberation capitalists are divided into two groups: patriotic capitalists who sympathize the revolution; and the evil industrialists and landlords. the former was protected(for a while) while the latter is crushed.

Maos theory of contradiction is without doubt, a great development of dialectical materialism. It explains the conflict and struggle between all things based on dialectical materialism.

and u havent forgotten about Maos brilliant theory of guerilla war, have u?

So overall i find it hard to dismiss Maoism as bluntly as American_Trotskyist did.
There are room for discussion but it is definately wrong and irrational for a Marxist to bash Maoism so carelessly.

by the way, there is no way one could catagorize the Nepalease Maoists as true Maoists. They broke many fundamental rules to Maoism(or Mao Zedong thoughts) by conducting terrorist acts against the PEOPLE.

[RedStarOverChina]

My nepalease friend believes that the Maoists would have come to power much earlier had they not alienate the population by forcing them to do all sorts of things.

Mao emphasized educating people then mobilize them, other than forcing them to serve the so-called voluntery labor.

[LSD]

Maoism, What did they add to Leninism?

About a billion people.

In terms of ideas, I suppose you could credit Mao with the further erosion of democratic principles within Leninism, but by that time Stalin had already eviscerated what little democracy Lenin had originally included, so really Mao just continued what "Comrade" Stalin had already begun.

Beyond that, I guess you could, as RedStarOverChina did, include Mao's "Agrarian Socialism" which did, I suppose, deviate from classical Marxist-Leninism in several ways, although to be fair Marxist-Leninism had already begun down that road anyways, it's just that China had a lot more peasants.

As for Mao's "brilliant theory of guerilla war"... well.... I'll acknowledge that he was a succeful and innovative general, but he kinda lucked out in that the Nationalists were effectively already beaten and the Japanese occupation had made the people willing to consider alternatives far more freely than under normal circumstances. But either way, I hardly see how one can consider Mao's military record relevent in discussing his ideological contributions to Leninism.


There are room for discussion but it is definately wrong and irrational for a Marxist to bash Maoism so carelessly.

I'd say it's "wrong and irrational" for Leninists to dismiss Mao, not Marxists. Don't forget that there's an important difference between the two.

[RedStarOverChina]

but he kinda lucked out in that the Nationalists were effectively already beaten and the Japanese occupation had made the people willing to consider alternatives far more freely than under normal circumstances.

thats nonsense. Maos guerilla tactics worked just fine way before the Sino japanese war got started. Also the communist troops were also wore-out after WWII.
some the most important contribution of Maoism (to leninism) is its military tactics so i felt the need to bring it up.


I'd say it's "wrong and irrational" for Leninists to dismiss Mao, not Marxists. Don't forget that there's an important difference between the two.

remember the central theme of Marxism?
dialectical materialism.

whether or not Mao is a marxist is still debated. I do not want to make the judgement too early. but in terms of theory, Maos theory of contradiction is a brilliant development of dialectical materialism. So in that sense Mao contributed to marxism overall. so if Marxists discard Maos theory of contradiction, its like slapping ourselves in the face.


u disagree with Leninism, as i do. But know the difference between Lenin and Leninism.

just out of curiosity: do u have any role models or anyone u feel not very objectionable?

[LSD]

thats nonsense. Maos guerilla tactics worked just fine way before the Sino japanese war got started.

No question, but there's no way that they would have been nearly as succeful had the war not happened. IF after 28 the KMT had been able to fully solidify its position, the communists probably wouldn't have had a chance. If Chian Kai-Shek had had the time to build up his army and fight the communists alone, he most likely could have crushed them while Mao was still running the "Jiangxi Soviet".


Also the communist troops were also wore-out after WWII.

Of course they were, but not nearly to the extent of the nationalist ones. Unlike the CCP, the nationalist army had been waging the defensive battles of the war, whereas the CCP, when it helped at all, was largely fighting a guerrila war. This meant that the total bulk of the nationalist armies were not only worn, they were battle-scarred and exhausted. Furthermore most of their supply stations were ruined and their support bases devastated.

Because of Chiang Kai-Shek's long anti-communist movement, most (if not all) of the CCP's heasquarters / main bases were located in rural and hard to reach areas, effectively out of reach of the Japanese. This meant that while the nationalist army stations were being broken, the CCP's were largely intact. This gave the CCP an enormous advantage once the civil war broke out.


some the most important contribution of Maoism (to leninism) is its military tactics so i felt the need to bring it up.

Well, that's sort of my point!

If the biggest contribution you can point to isn't ideological, than I would say its fair to say that Mao didn't really modify the ideology!


whether or not Mao is a marxist is still debated. I do not want to make the judgement too early. but in terms of theory, Maos theory of contradiction is a brilliant development of dialectical materialism. So in that sense Mao contributed to marxism overall. so if Marxists discard Maos theory of contradiction, its like slapping ourselves in the face.

Personally, I reject Dialectics in all forms, so I have no trouble dismissing Mao's "empirical conflict" model.

The fact is that there is absolutely no evidence that Mao's paradigm actually works, and by all indications it is such a politicized theory that it basically describes what the CCP did because it was their theory!

Now I'm a true empiracist, and since so far this theory has not made any accurate predictions ...so I'm going to hold of on believing it for now.

[Severian]

It doesn't have anything to do with Leninism.

It doesn't really have anything to do with ideas, even.

Read the "Little Red Book". Most of those empty platitudes have two sides: on the one hand, on the other hand.

That's so Mao could do whatever was convenient at the moment, to look out for the apparatchik caste he headed, and find some justification for it. His policies constantly changed throughout his political career, in and out of power, often without warning or serious explanation. His "theory" had to be infinitely flexible in order to keep up.

[waltersm]

Mao was an incredible guerilla fighter but definatly not a statesman. His policies were much like Stalinism only I beleive Mao actually had his peoles best intentions at heart, he just sucked at carrying out.

[Poum_1936]

From what little I know Mao was an excellent guerilla fighter. And thats what made him so popular. But he wasnt up to par with revolutionary theory.

It also seems the Maoists have incorperated lots of ideas that Lenin was fighting against. Such as guerralism.

Also, American Trot, do you happen to stop by the YFIS forums. It seems like you stop there... and steal my flag! :P

[TC]

I think Maoism in the proper sense is only Marxism-Leninist politics and ideology with tactics suited to revolution in the 3rd world, such as those used in the Chinese revolution. Maoist concepts like protracted people's war, involving peasent armies liberating the country side outside of teh control of the state, work only in states with comparatively weak governments (as a sort of revolution by civil war, as opposed to the Russian revolution which was more revolution by coup detat).

Cultural revolution, revolutions within a socialist state against reactionary elements in that state, is also counted as a maoist invention, but unlike protracted people's war, i don't think its been done anywhere but China, and it didn't work in China (as the Gang of Four were deposed and the 'capitalist roaders' came to power anyways) soooo....

To say that all of Mao's policies constitute "maoism" is to ignore the historical and poltiical context of his policies, not to mention that his position evolved over the period of his administration. I think you can support Mao as a political leader without claiming to follow him as some sort of 'ideology', because frankly his biggest contributions by far were political and not theoretical.

[RedStarOverChina]

whereas the CCP, when it helped at all, was largely fighting a guerrila war.

that was the plan but things didnt turn out that way.

Against the will of Mao, Gen. Peng Dehuai of the communists waged the Battle of a Hundred Army Groups in which he clearly demonstrated to the Japanese the threat of the communists. Altho Pengs campaign was successful in severely damaging the Japanese army, it exposed to the Japanese the real strength of the communists, which caused the Japanese to focus on fighting the Communists for a long period of time. Because of that the communists experienced disasterous results. Many even worry that the Japanese would allie themselves with the Nationalists against the communists.

Dont forget that the nationalists after WWII were armed by the USA while the CCP received minimum amount of aid from the Soviets until the very end of the war. They were still using the most backward rifles when the nationalists got hold of airplanes and tanks.



If Chian Kai-Shek had had the time to build up his army and fight the communists alone, he most likely could have crushed them while Mao was still running the "Jiangxi Soviet".

If I do remember correctly, Chiang amassed about 2 million troops in total to try to take out Maos Jiangxi Soviet when Maos troops never exceeded 80 thousand. But he failed miserably UNTIL Maos tactics were discarded by Soviet dogmatism within the communist party. Thats the beauty of guerilla warfare developed by Mao.


If the biggest contribution you can point to isn't ideological, than I would say its fair to say that Mao didn't really modify the ideology!

He did modify Marx-Leninism to fit the condition of China as i explain before. I dont know how else to put it.



Personally, I reject Dialectics in all forms, so I have no trouble dismissing Mao's "empirical conflict" model.

How can u be a Marxist if u dont even employ dialectical materialism? Thats the soul of all Marxist thoughts, u know.
Once again i wanna know what exactly is ur political view other than empiricism.





It doesn't have anything to do with Leninism.

of course it does.... its developed upon Marx-Leninism. Thats a well-known fact.


It doesn't really have anything to do with ideas, even.

What????


Read the "Little Red Book". Most of those empty platitudes have two sides: on the one hand, on the other hand.

Who reads the Little Red Book to understand Maoism? Tho some material in there summarize Maos thoughts(and much of it certainly arent empty platitudes...) u can not understand Maos thoughts through a book of his quotes--just like how u cant understand Marxs economic theory just by reading his quotes.


That's so Mao could do whatever was convenient at the moment....... His "theory" had to be infinitely flexible in order to keep up.

Maos idea of contradiction suggests that everything is changing thus creating new conflicts.(which goes back to Marxs dialectical materialism) Of course he was practical but thats the thing with dialectical materialism(its practicality. Many Marxists are forgeting about that.) It makes perfect sense tho i dont think i agree with his way of dealing with those changes.





It also seems the Maoists have incorperated lots of ideas that Lenin was fighting against. Such as guerralism.

could u tell me whats so objectionable about Maos guerillaism? Im sure u have misunderstandings about it....




Mao was an incredible guerilla fighter but definatly not a statesman. His policies were much like Stalinism only I beleive Mao actually had his peoles best intentions at heart, he just sucked at carrying out

yeah thats the conventional marxist view on him except that he was an excellent statement tho not a economist(thats the conventional view).

U will find more andmore conflicting ideas about him as u learn more about him...hes really a contriversial person.




Maoist concepts like protracted people's war, involving peasent armies liberating the country side outside of teh control of the state, work only in states with comparatively weak governments (as a sort of revolution by civil war, as opposed to the Russian revolution which was more revolution by coup detat).

sorry comrade, u got it the other way around. A Maoist revolution aims to overthrow a STRONG centralized government. Russias October revolution succeeded cause the government was weak. The main reason Maoists go rural is that the government forces are too powerful in major cities. That was the case in the Chinese revolution, Cuban revolution and the current Nepalese revolution. So instead of gathering support from the workers in major cities(which would be doom to failure), Marxists(or not) in those cases go to rural areas and gather support from the oppressed peasants.

[TC]

sorry comrade, u got it the other way around. A Maoist revolution aims to overthrow a STRONG centralized government. Russias October revolution succeeded cause the government was weak. The main reason Maoists go rural is that the government forces are too powerful in major cities. That was the case in the Chinese revolution, Cuban revolution and the current Nepalese revolution. So instead of gathering support from the workers in major cities(which would be doom to failure), Marxists(or not) in those cases go to rural areas and gather support from the oppressed peasants.

actually. you're basically right if you want to look at it that way..but i don't think maoist tactics would work in an imperialist state because any concentration of rural guerrillas would just be wiped out. on the other hand urban guerrillas and 'vanguard parties' can operate in imperialist states...i mean i think Iraq right now is a good example of that (iraq being occupied by an imperialist state). What i meant more was in terms of third world states compared to first world states (and countries they're occupying).

[LSD]

Against the will of Mao, Gen. Peng Dehuai of the communists waged the Battle of a Hundred Army Groups in which he clearly demonstrated to the Japanese the threat of the communists. Altho Pengs campaign was successful in severely damaging the Japanese army, it exposed to the Japanese the real strength of the communists, which caused the Japanese to focus on fighting the Communists for a long period of time.

And in response Mao reasserted his control over the party, the CCP pulled out of direct Japanese confrontations and, while the nationalists were still fighting it out, the CCP was able to build up its forces in relative isolation for the remaining six years of the war!


Dont forget that the nationalists after WWII were armed by the USA while the CCP received minimum amount of aid from the Soviets until the very end of the war. They were still using the most backward rifles when the nationalists got hold of airplanes and tanks.

Granted. And, again, I'm not saying that Mao (and many around him) wasn't a very good military leader. I'm just saying he did have a significant amount of luck on his side.

Yes, the nationalists were better supplied, but they also were more worn and exhausted. They also were increasingly unliked by the people and the CCP had been running a subversive propaganda campaign for decades. The CCP was always better at recruitment that the KMT (for obvious reasons <_<) and so, again, while Mao&#39;s leadership probably contributed, I wouldn&#39;t say that he was indispensible from a strategic perspective.


If I do remember correctly, Chiang amassed about 2 million troops in total to try to take out Maos Jiangxi Soviet when Maos troops never exceeded 80 thousand.

...well, before the Hundred Regiments Offensive in 1940, the CCP fighting force was up to 400,000, but I take your point.

Again, Mao had a great deal of advantaged and yes, he used them quite well, I just don&#39;t know if someone else in his place wouldn&#39;t have made the exact same decisions.


How can u be a Marxist if u dont even employ dialectical materialism?

I don&#39;t consider myself a "Marxist".

I consider myself a communist. I take a great deal from Marxism and greatly respect his invaluble contributions... but I think that in terms of Dialects he was severely trapped in Prussian dogmatism.

Do you realy think that if Marx had been born in France, he would have so "naturally" adopted Hellelian thinking?

The fact is that Dialectics has never made an accurate prediction and has never been at all empirically justified&#33; There is, in simple terms, no proof it works. I am veryhesitant to accept a 200 year old theory with absolutely no evidence behind it because an old dead German claimed that it worked. Hegel claimed that a lot of his stuff works, I don&#39;t take his word for it.

Look, I&#39;ve had this argument several times, once drunkenly with CyM at a bar at 2 in the morning... so I doubt we&#39;re going to settle it. If you want to believe in Dialectics fine, but don&#39;t expect that every other communist should as well&#33;

[NovelGentry]

Do you realy think that if Marx had been born in France, he would have so "naturally" adopted Hellelian thinking?

Had he not adopted Hegelian thinking, I don&#39;t think he would have come up with what he did.

I&#39;m not going to support the dialectic as a cyrstal ball, but at the same time is has and continues to be adopted nicely to retrofit both social and material aspects of history. Without the dialectic Marxism would not exist. Does this mean scientific socialism would not exist? No. Without a doubt another means of deriving much of what we learn from Marx could have fallen out of another way of looking at things, and certainly from someone else completely, but it more than likely wouldn&#39;t have been Marx, and we wouldn&#39;t be calling these contributions Marxism today.


The fact is that Dialectics has never made an accurate prediction and has never been at all empirically justified&#33; There is, in simple terms, no proof it works.

Agreed. It is not science, but a pseudo-science, and one that rarely works for proving things, but seems to work very consitently for analyzing things. This is essentially how Marx used it, looking at all previous and historic aspects of man, society, and thus class struggle -- he merely assumed much of the same progress which he fit to the dialectic would continue, and thus the dialectic would fit to the progression towards socialism.

I don&#39;t believe any more than you do that it is a means of prediction, but I believe post-socialism, we will be able to look back at socialism and quite accurately see it&#39;s birth, analyzing it&#39;s full growth with dialectics. Does this mean dialectics is a crystal ball? No... I&#39;m not so sure Marx ever thought it was either.


I am veryhesitant to accept a 200 year old theory with absolutely no evidence behind it because an old dead German claimed that it worked.

I&#39;ll admit I&#39;ve not read all of Marx... but where again did he say it "worked"? He used it and used it well, but I&#39;ve never seen where he ever let it take a crystal ball role.

He applied that way of thinking to the real and material world, and came to conclusions with it. Are these conclusions possible to come to without it? I believe so. I&#39;ve yet to come across any piece of Marx&#39;s work that flat out preaches the dialectical reasoning behind it. It is, however, infused in the work; It is not encompassing of the work itself.

In this sense you&#39;re both right. It&#39;s impossible to consider oneself Marxist without accepting the dialectical reasoning "works," because it DID work for Marx, to come to the conclusions he came to. However, I don&#39;t think you have to accept the dialectic as the only means and only support of those conclusions, nor do I think Marx did, which is extremely evident when comparing his later works to his earlier works.

[LSD]

I&#39;ll admit I&#39;ve not read all of Marx... but where again did he say it "worked"?

I was actually refering to Hegel there.

But I understand how you could get confused in a conversation involving two dead Germans and their theories. :D

Sounds like a Monty Python sketch...


He applied that way of thinking to the real and material world, and came to conclusions with it.

Yes, and a good deal of these predictions were wrong.

It&#39;s perfectly understandable, after all, Marx, as visionary as he was, was a product of his time and was trapped within its preconceptions. He wouldn&#39;t possible predict how things would change in the comming centuries. But if dialectics were really what it&#39;s cracked up to be, it should have been able to&#33;


I don&#39;t believe any more than you do that it is a means of prediction, but I believe post-socialism, we will be able to look back at socialism and quite accurately see it&#39;s birth, analyzing it&#39;s full growth with dialectics.

...maybe. But if so only in the same way that Marxists today "look back" with dialectics. The same way that Marx "looked back" with dialectics, in fact: Re-invent the theory. Modifying the premises and ideas each time so that it fits the observations.

Now, there&#39;s nothing wrong with refining a theory, but if you have to keep reforming and reforming a theory and it still never makes an accurate prediction ...wouldn&#39;t you get a new theory?

I do think that in a communist world we will be able to better analyze human sociological progressions, I just don&#39;t think that dialectics is the way to do it.


In this sense you&#39;re both right. It&#39;s impossible to consider oneself Marxist without accepting the dialectical reasoning "works," because it DID work for Marx, to come to the conclusions he came to.

Well, we can never know what Marx would have written had he lived outside of Hegel&#39;s iron imperial philisophical kingdom, but I think there&#39;s a good chance he would have come up with something similar.

Marx&#39;s biggest influence wasn&#39;t dialectics. It was observation. Marx identified the class struggles inherent to capitalism not because of Hegelian thinking, but because of careful observation of the world around him. Recognizing the class conflict doesn&#39;t take dialectics, it just takes a willingness to look.

Besides, regardless of the history, in the context of today&#39;s communism, it doesn&#39;t matter what theoretical models Marx might have used to come to his ideas. The only question is what works for us. What is useful for us. The simple truth is that dialectics has shown again and again to not be a reliable tool for prediction or analysis.

It may be useful for historiography, but not for politics&#33;


Agreed. It is not science, but a pseudo-science

I think the world has about as much pseudo-science as it can take.

Let&#39;s not make any more.

[NovelGentry]

Yes, and a good deal of these predictions were wrong.

Maybe you&#39;d be so kind as to furnish a list of them.

There are a number of specific things which he took up under the critique of capitalism, such as the idea that over time wages would get lower and lower, to the point that their limitation could only be the necessary rate which could be paid to sustain the life of the working class. Even this is not proven "wrong" and especially if not seen through the reasoning of dialectics, which is not how he came about this conclusion, but rather he seemed to borrow this idea from even earlier economic works.

Much of these things Marx supposedly got wrong (which still have yet to run their course) are very similar specific critiques, and again, founded through the thinking of the time, but not through dialectical reasoning.


It&#39;s perfectly understandable, after all, Marx, as visionary as he was, was a product of his time and was trapped within its preconceptions. He wouldn&#39;t possible predict how things would change in the comming centuries. But if dialectics were really what it&#39;s cracked up to be, it should have been able to&#33;

Well see my point above. Unless there are some drastic difference as to what we agree are the questionable and unproven Marxist theories, the majority of these critiques have little to do with his dialectical reasoning. For the most part his economic work is nearly void of this when compared to his philosophical work such as "The German Ideology." -- Strangely enough, both you and Marx seem to agree that the current thinking in that part of the world at this time was flawed, maybe you have more in common than you think?

The further question, who said they were all they were cracked up to be, depends on who defines the "all." Which Marx, personally, never bothered with or took the time to do. His work is effectively void of preaching about his method, which is not so clean cut as simple dialectics.


...maybe. But if so only in the same way that Marxists today "look back" with dialectics. The same way that Marx "looked back" with dialectics, in fact: Re-invent the theory. Modifying the premises and ideas each time so that it fits the observations.

And we have no reason not to look back with dialectics in mind. They are an amazing tool for analyzing previous points in history. I&#39;ve yet to come across anyone who re-invented it with each passing phase, the most I&#39;ve ever seen from this board with the exception of a few posts (and what I&#39;m assuming is the brunt of this argument) is misunderstanding of it.

Whether or not we can or should even bother to try looking forward with dialectics is another question altogether. Marx did this, but the material and scientific progression towards socialism does not rely on the dialectic, but seems merely to have been discovered by his use of it.

You can throw away the dialectics completely and come to all the same conclusions he did and be equally as wrong without it. This is not a sign that dialectics fails to predict the future any more than it is to say all the other logic used in the work does. Nor am I sure Hegel or Marx ever claimed it did predict the future. While Hegel may have applied it as aptly as possible and said "this is how things work," Marx never even took it that far. Instead, he simply relegated it to the position of a ruler: a way to see and determine the line, but hardly the means by which it is drawn and hardly to what ends it points to.


I do think that in a communist world we will be able to better analyze human sociological progressions, I just don&#39;t think that dialectics is the way to do it.

Why not?


Marx&#39;s biggest influence wasn&#39;t dialectics. It was observation. Marx identified the class struggles inherent to capitalism not because of Hegelian thinking, but because of careful observation of the world around him. Recognizing the class conflict doesn&#39;t take dialectics, it just takes a willingness to look.

I agree, and have made that point quite clear in this post and my previous one. The problem is again that without having applied dialectics would he have seen the initial coils of what he devoted so much more observation to, and thus, would his theory have ever been as complete as it was? I do not believe it would be.

My point was very simply that you can throw out the dialectics and maintain the conclusions of Marxism, but you cannot throw out dialectics and still maintain Marxism itself.


Besides, regardless of the history, in the context of today&#39;s communism, it doesn&#39;t matter what theoretical models Marx might have used to come to his ideas. The only question is what works for us. What is useful for us. The simple truth is that dialectics has shown again and again to not be a reliable tool for prediction or analysis.

It may be useful for historiography, but not for politics&#33;

I&#39;m not sure where dialectics has ever been about prediction other in the minds of those who distort it&#39;s purpose, and who would rather attempt to use it to predict out of necessity to predict and lack of a better tool... Lenin comes to mind. Nor have I ever seen dialectics to have anything to do with "what is useful." It is not about creating a paradigm which one must follow, it is about simple understanding. This is why I will agree wholeheartedly with your comment about prediction, but as far as analysis goes, it has seemed to work mountains better than you have made it out to be.

I&#39;ve read countless of articles that properly use the dialectics to analyze the social progression of man aspects ranging anywhere from racial descrimination, all the way to communal policing, and as I had pointed out just the other day on this board, overcoming sexual gender-bias stereotypes.

As far as dialectical materialism, only in the wizards mind and those who have put faith in it as magic, has it ever failed and I&#39;d challenge you to point out where Marx ever succumbed to this problem.


I think the world has about as much pseudo-science as it can take.

Let&#39;s not make any more.

Unfortunately there are some aspects of life which scientific method does not apply well to, specifically in the realm of social progression. As such, for all intents purposes, pseudo-science will be as good as it gets in the political and sociological sphere.

Are different means of analyzing these aspects available? Maybe. But still none that I am aware of bridge material and apparent immaterial life the way Marx found dialectics could, and for that, it is still a very useful tool.

[YKTMX]

Common error.

Maoism isn&#39;t actually a theory - it is merely Stalinism adopted to China. The Chinese bureaucracy was merely an expansion of the counter-revolution in Russia.

If anyone has ever suffered Mao&#39;s "writings", you&#39;ll see its mostly banal military writings, useless quotations and a keeness to label everything in site "revisionist".

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

you forgot the eastern mysticism ala Confucius

[Poum_1936]

If anyone has ever suffered Mao&#39;s "writings", you&#39;ll see its mostly banal military writings, useless quotations and a keeness to label everything in site "revisionist".

Haahaha

Oh my, so that&#39;s where the Maoists get it from. I cant debate a Maoist without getting labeled reformist or dogmatic Kautskite. :rolleyes:

[redstar2000]

Originally posted by NovelGentry
My point was very simply that you can throw out the dialectics and maintain the conclusions of Marxism, but you cannot throw out dialectics and still maintain Marxism itself.

Oh? I did that.

Marxism Without the Crap (http://redstar2000papers.com/theory.php?subaction=showfull&id=1082912812&archive=&cnshow=headlines&start_from=&ucat=&)

The "Tools" of Marxism (http://redstar2000papers.com/theory.php?subaction=showfull&id=1082947254&archive=&cnshow=headlines&start_from=&ucat=&)

http://www.websmileys.com/sm/cool/123.gif

[OleMarxco]

Heh, Reddy, you seem to have it "pretty easy" in thy discussions...just linkin&#39; to yer "saved discussion files" to back up your lazy-ness to reharse an argument, heh, easy times I see? :che:

[redstar2000]

Originally posted by [email protected] 6 2005, 07:00 AM
Heh, Reddy, you seem to have it "pretty easy" in thy discussions...just linkin&#39; to yer "saved discussion files" to back up your lazy-ness to reharse an argument, heh, easy times I see? :che:
Well, some topics do come up over and over again. :)

http://www.websmileys.com/sm/cool/123.gif

[flyby]

I think someone needs to actually list all the pathbreaking ways Mao developed marxism. This can be (and is) the subject of whole books, so I can&#39;t do it justice. And just by describing the breakthroughs doesn&#39;t mean i have explained or elaborated them (obviously). But I will try to give some links that can help others study and investigate more deeply.

1) He developed (for the first time) a strategic theory for revolutoin in colonial and semi-colonial countries. This approach (called New Democratic REvolution) was a breakthrough in understanding how the anti-feudal and anti-imperialist struggles in semi-colonial countries could be united with the world proletarian revolution in practice -- and could take formerly oppressed countries onto a socialist road (not a neo-colonial road which continued domination and capitalism in new forms).

(perhaps this is obvious, but this theoretical breakthrough accompanied and grew out of a historic practical breakthrough: the socialist revolution in china that liberated a quarter of humanity from imperialism and feudalism&#33;)

2) Mao (through twenty years of revolutionary war, and then the subsequent struggle to defeat the U.S. in Korea, and then defend socialist china) developed the first comprehensive military doctrine in the history of marxism.

The elements of this (peoples war, the dialectics of offense and defense, ways of relying on the people during revolutionary war, issues of maintaining political communist leadership over military affairs) were a major and new leap in the science of marxism.

As part of that he developed the core thesis that "people not weapons are decisive" in the face of U.S. imperialism and its nuclear monopoly (and in opposition to others in the communist movement who argued for capitulation to nuclear threats&#33;)

3) Mao developed a comprehensive and penetrating critique of the approach of Stalin to socialism and economics. (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/works/1961/stalcrit.htm) There is much to say and sum up here -- but it was an important beginning on changing the ways communists understood the relationship between production and continuing revolution under socialism (concentrated in the epigramatic "grasp revolutoin, promote production) It criticized the approach to the peasantry, the relations of heavy and light industry, the theory of balances in planning, but above all, pointed out that people are not things, and the revolution is not guaranteed simply by boosting the level of productoin, and by indicating in sweeping ways how the struggle over society&#39;s future continues politically and ideologically (and how that interpenetrates with economics).

important parts of this are summed up here in one consise article: http://rwor.org/a/v22/1070-79/1073/shangh.htm

4) Mao&#39;s main theoretical accomplishment is his "theory of continuing revolution under the dictatorship of the proletariat." It fell to him to analyse and sum up the restoration of capitalism that was happening in the Soviet Union, to uncover where these powerful restorationist forces were emerging within socialism, and to struggle from many sides to develop new forms of revolutonary struggle to defeat these restorationist forces. (The capitalist roaders in high places within the party and state).

This approach had to break with what had been conventional wisdom among communists (that once the transformation of the ownership system is in the main accomplished that the basis for major antagonistic class struggle and restoration has been eliminated) and also the conventional wisdom of the non-communist left (that conservatism in socialist countries was a product of a classless "bureaucratism" and stratum of bureaucracy.)

And it laid the basis for the great poletarian cultural revolution -- which was the most massive and conscious human struggle in history -- where literally tens of millions of people were deeply involved in struggling through (under complex real-life revolutonary conditions and conflicts) how to defeat capitalist restoration, and how to advance socialism further along the road to communism.

5) Mao also made major developments in philosophy. He fought on many levels to place dialectics at the center of communist philosophy, and waged a lifelong battle to criticize the kinds of mechanical and religious thinking that had become so influential under STalin. In addition, he developed new and pathbreaking insights into dialectics -- concentrated in his great work On Contradiction (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-1/mswv1_17.htm) but also developed quite a bit further in the decades after that initial work was written. Of particular note: Mao explicitly criticized the notion of "negation of the negation" and thought that it should be rejected as a thesis. This was particularly startling since conservative (revisionist) elements within the world communist movement were (at the same time) saying that "the negation of the negation is the communist theory of development" (and were raising this metaphysical hegelian notion to a central place in their non-revolutionary philosophy.)

There is much more to add. And I imagine we can get in it further in this thread.

But I just wanted to jot down these initial descriptions.

Mao developed Marxism to a whole new stage -- and his developments were major in literally every arena of Marxist thought and theory. He summed up phenomena that no other Marxist leader had been able to examine (the first major restoration of capitalism in a socialist country, the wave of colonial revolutons against imperialism, the development of nuclear weapons, and much more) and in the process, he developed new insights and theoretical syntheses that went to the heart of Marxism itself, and sharpened this important theoretical and scientific instrument of revolution.

[SonofRage]

Of course Mao was against the negation of the negation, he was afraid of it because it meant real communism and the end of his reign.



The clearest expression of Marx&#39;s view that Hegel&#39;s categories express not only the logic of capital but also a dialectic of liberation is contained in his use of the negation of the negation. In the 1844 Manuscripts Marx directly appropriated this Hegelian category, writing: Communism is the position of the negation of the negation.&#39; In Capital he returned to it anew in writing, capitalist production process begets, with the inexorability of a natural process, its own negation. This is the negation of the negation. Though it has become fashionable in some quarters to view Hegel&#39;s dialectic as nothing but the expression of the logic of capital, that was neither what Marx concluded from his critique of Hegel nor, I argue, should we in light of the need to ground emancipatory struggles in a philosophy of liberation.

The Death of the Death of Subject (http://www.endpage.com/Archives/Subversive_Texts/Marxist_Humanism/News_and_Letters/The_Death_of_the_Death_of_the_Subject.xhtml)



That is what Mao is blind to-he thinks he can construct two opposite worlds, and as soon as he assures it "100 flowers can bloom," even if he does deny any flower the right to be a second party, which is "bourgeois," thereupon he has assured his poverty-stricken land "unity." Marx, in his "Critique of the Hegelian Dialectic," where he speaks of how many fields of exploration lay hidden in Hegel if only critically understood, points precisely to this spot which Hegel calls "The Noble Type of Consciousness," [A]t another place [Hegel says], "This type of mind is the heroism of service" and, finally "Such a type is the haughty vassal; he is active in the interests of the state-power": "This estrangement, however, takes place in Language, in words alone, and language assumes here its peculiar role.... [I]t is the power of utterance QUA utterance which, just in speaking, performs what has to be performed.... Speech, however, contains this ego in its purity; it alone expresses I, I itself."

It is equivalent, in economic terms, to the Fetishism of Commodities which kept even classical political economy, which had discovered labor as the source of value, its prisoner. Throughout that remarkable first chapter in CAPITAL Marx keeps talking of the perverse relationship under capitalism where dead labor dominates living labor. In Hegel "this entire sphere of perversion" of the spirit in self-estrangement ends with: "This type of spiritual life is the absolute and universal inversion of reality and thought, their entire estrangement the one from the other; it is pure culture. What is found out in this sphere is that neither the concrete realities, state-power and wealth, nor their determinate conceptions, good and bad, nor the consciousness of good and bad (the consciousness that is noble and the consciousness that is base) possess real truth; it is found that all these moments are inverted and transmuted the one into the other, and each is the opposite of itself."

THAT opposite Mao did not grasp, nor could he, since this state he is leader of has its own dialectic of development, irrespective of the noble consciousness of its leader. Just as every single thing has its own dialectic of development, so the various stages of alienation go through their transformations. Or rather vice versa since "the moving and creating principle" (to use Marx&#39;s expression for the principle of negativity) is this very negativity. Neither Khrushchev nor Mao can escape this, but that each has tried a different aspect of it because of the compulsion from the objective movement and the subjective aspirations of their working people denotes the true absolute of our age, the counterrevolution in the very innards of revolution and (and that is the vision) the revolution in the innards of their counterrevolutionary states. Wait till the book [MARXISM AND FREEDOM] appears and we go to battle.

50 years after the revolution - Mao, Hegel, and dialectics in China (http://www.marxists.org/archive/dunayevskaya/works/1957/maos-dialectics.htm)

[flyby]

Originally posted by [email protected] 7 2005, 05:42 PM
Of course Mao was against the negation of the negation, he was afraid of it because it meant real communism and the end of his reign.
hmmm.

I learned long ago that when someone writes "of course" while summing up complex matters, it is rarely true. And (unfortunately) sonofrage (who i respect and have had interesting exchanges with) has increasingly slid into a pretty superficial, kneejerk, and nasty kind of quips when it comes to me (and more importantly when it comes to the revolutionary communist movement and its leaders.)

But despite that, i&#39;d like to dig into what sonofrage is raising.

Why does Mao oppose the negation of the negation?

Well, basically (if you go read what he wrote on it) -- he doesn&#39;t think it exists.

"Negation of the negation" means that what negates a thing has a link to what preceded it.

So that class society negates early classless society, and then communist classless society negates class society. And (supposedly) there are inherently linkages, commonalities, and connections between the earlier communal society and the later communist society.

He doesn&#39;t think that there is an inherent "form of negation" for complex things.

In other words, the problem with the negation of the negation is that it assumes a "typical form of negation" and overestimates the inevitability of how negation happens.

In fact reality, history and human society is more complex and less predetermined than the hegelian philosophical formulation presumes.

And it has important to struggle to remove the remnants of mechanical thinking (including dogmatism, linear assumptions, over estimation of necessary outcomes and inevitability) that have had influence within Marxism. (And this influence was particularly strong in Stalin, but had also existed in aspects of what marx and lenin held to be true.)

in many ways, there has been a mechanical view (within major currents of Marxism) that argued that things are inevitable in a way that is called "teleological" -- in other words, mechanically and absolutely inevitable.

The approach (struggled for by Mao, and now very sharply by Avakian) argues that "the laws of motion" of matter are not rigid binding "laws" in some overarching sense -- but are tendencies, trends, pulls and dynamics within reality. But for all of them there is accident and contingency -- and other outcomes are possible.

There is for example a powerful set of dynamics within capitalism that give rise to communist society and revolution. Is communism "inevitable" in some absolute sense? No. Fuck, a meteor could hit the earth and end human existance (so much for inevitable). Or society could go into a spiral in some way (ecological, nuclear war, other unexpected things) that pushed humanity in some other directon (and left our world in continuing oppressin).

Also, even while there is a powerful dynamic within capitalism bringing forward communsit movement, ideas and struggle -- it is also true that there are a lot of different possibilities: different ways that socialism can be imagined and attempted, different visions of what communism might be and what the road there should be like. And the way we view things, the way we struggle, the choices that human being make, the ideas they develop and hold and promote -- all make a tremendous difference in how things actually unfold. It isn ot all cut and dry, history is not a pre-set rut.

And this sence of the contradiction and contingency in all things, is what Mao was bringing forward, and what Bob Avakian has (among other things) fought explore and deepen.

I would urge anyone interested in these matters to look into a conversation that is excerpted on line: Postinevitablist Marxism -- Principles and the Real World: Vision and Viability (http://rwor.org/a/1266/avakian-martin-post-inevitablist-marxism.htm) between Bob Avakian and the philospohy professor Bill Martin.

Is it surprising that things don&#39;t "turn out" in ways people expect? No. Marxism is a science not a religious prophesy. We can see trend lines, tendencies, dynamics, forces and patters -- but the outcome of things is complex and often unpredictable.

And a key point that both Mao and Avakian are making: the conscious role of humans, what they decide and do, makes a huge difference in what happens. (And this dynamic role of human agency is often disregarded, deminished, dissed and denied by the teleological and mechancial forms of thinking that have cropped up within "Marxism" of various kinds).

As for sonofrage&#39;s specific charge, that mao was against the negation of the negation cuz he did not want to be negated.... well, that is not true, and there is much to show that.

In a nutshell, Mao was clear that everything is negated (that is not the issue here, as sonofrage implies). Mao argued that the party itself will be negated. And even humanity as a species would be transcended. His belief in constant change, in the ceaseless emergence of the new from the old is a core to his philosophy.

What he didn&#39;t believe was the narrow and mechanical assumptions (taken from Hegel) about how the future is determined by the past. The future IS marked by the path, but in ways more open to change, accident and influence than assumed by Hegel (and by marxists who hadn&#39;t broken with this part of hegel).

[Faceless]

Maos theory of contradiction is a brilliant development of dialectical materialism

No one seems to have addressed this yet. In actual fact it is bunk. Mao&#39;s contribution to marxism, the "principle contradiction", does not necessarily exist&#33; It is very much subjective in any case. Such as whether or not I choose to get dressed first in the morning or to go straight down stairs to get some breakfast. Neither of these is the principle contradiction. In the last resort the idea of a "principle contradiction" can be considered to be more akin to utilitarianism than marxism.


In old China, Peasants are considered to be proletariats because unlike the peasants of Europe, Chinese peasants dont have land(or any other capital other than labor) which makes them serfs which makes them even more revolutionary than the workers, believe it or not. not to mention Peasants were more than 90 % of the population thus cannot afford to be ignored.

This does not make the peasant any more a consistently revolutionary force. Unlike the worker, such serfs are more likely to interact with nature than with society to appropriate what they need and as such do not have the democratic structure or the various educational tools that the proletariat-proper have at their disposal. And, no one is suggesting that the peasant should have been ignored but rather the proletariat should not have been made to take a back seat but should have formed the vanguard of the revolution. Mao made clear however the secondary position he had intended the proletariat to play.

Mao was a despot, only proven capable in matters of self-pomotion and of ignorant sophistry in matters of marxism.

[flyby]

faceless writes: "Mao was a despot, only proven capable in matters of self-pomotion and of ignorant sophistry in matters of marxism."

On the contrary, Mao was one of humanity&#39;s greatest liberators -- personally leading the historic anticolonial struggle of China (with a quarter of humanity&#33;) and then leading this huge people on the socialist road, and then waging intense struggle within the International commuist revolution against the restoration of capitalism in the USSR (and the total caputulation of parties alligned with the USSR).

It is hard to imagine anyone studying this history not having their breath taken away by the sweep and power of these events -- the profound changes in hundreds of millions of lives, and the way they gave a new breath of life to socialism (at a time where the Soviet Union was looking grayer and grayer).

But we are talking about contributions to marxism -- and (frankly) Mao&#39;s most important contribution are there -- to the science of marxism. (And these would be of historic importance even if he had not been able to actually lead a major revolution to victory.)

On the point raised about dialectics:

Mao&#39;s contribution to Marxist philospophy are many-sided. Key to it was fighting to have contradiction (unity of opposites) back at the center of dialectics, and then applying this in a living and creative way to many of the related controversies and challenges of understanding and changing the world.

faceless is raising the issue of "principal contradiction" -- which is an important dialectical concept for understanding the dynamics of complex things.


I urge you to read about it, and make up your own mind... here: Mao&#39;s On contradiction (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-1/mswv1_17.htm)

Mao wrote: "At every stage in the development of a process, there is only one principal contradiction which plays the leading role. Hence, if in any process there are a number of contradictions, one of them must be the principal contradiction playing the leading and decisive role, while the rest occupy a secondary and subordinate position. Therefore, in studying any complex process in which there are two or more contradictions, we must devote every effort to finding its principal contradiction. Once this principal contradiction is grasped, all problems can be readily solved. This is the method Marx taught us in his study of capitalist society. Likewise Lenin and Stalin taught us this method when they studied imperialism and the general crisis of capitalism and when they studied the Soviet economy. There are thousands of scholars and men of action who do not understand it, and the result is that, lost in a fog, they are unable to get to the heart of a problem and naturally cannot find a way to resolve its contradictions."

Mao claims rather modestly that this particular concept is not his invention. However it is true that he greatly developed our understanding of this, and (as faceless points out) this is one of Mao&#39;s great contributions to philosophy.

Now, faceless is welcome to believe that "the principal contradiction" does not exist. He is even free to deny dialectics and materialism.

However, i&#39;m afraid I agree with mao, that if we were to discard this valuable scientific insight we would be "lost in a fog, unable to get to the heart of a problem and naturally cannot find a way to resolve its contradictions."

And what a powerful philosophical tool that is: that enables people to identify the HEART of complex processes, what determines overall development, and therefore to understand what is arising, and how it is rising&#33;

[SonofRage]

Originally posted by [email protected] 7 2005, 04:31 PM

On the contrary, Mao was one of humanity&#39;s greatest liberators -- personally leading the historic anticolonial struggle of China (with a quarter of humanity&#33;) and then leading this huge people on the socialist road, and then waging intense struggle within the International commuist revolution against the restoration of capitalism in the USSR (and the total caputulation of parties alligned with the USSR).

You say things like this as if it were indisputable fact. China under Mao was, like the USSR, State Capitalism and nothing more. The working class was not under control, and were still under wage-slavery. I don&#39;t see anything liberating about a party dictatorship.

[NovelGentry]

Oh? I did that.

Calling it Marxism is a fallacy. You did not maintain Marxism, you maintained the conclusions of Marxism, which I said is completely possible to do without the dialectics.

[Lamanov]

Its not about opposing the urban working class in favour of the peasantry... this takes a constructive critique, and the best starting-point would be the soul nature of the Chinese revolution, the social structure and the economical basis of China at the time. The fact that revolution played out in 90% peasant society is a fact that goes against marxism both in practice and theory. If we recognise the &#39;permanenet revolution&#39; theory as proven [for 1, by these revolutions, which i do], then we have to admit that only way these revolutions would have continued in a &#39;marxist&#39; path would be a continued revolution in the developed world [which did not happen, as we all know]. I think its stupid to concider peasantry as a socialist-revolutionary force. Its revolutionary so far as their petty-burgoise land-owning interests lead them, after that, revolution has to make compromises. Ideology of such degression and compromise is maoism, and the result is a bonapartist dictatureship, counterposed to urban proletariat.


>> Maos theory of contradiction is without doubt, a great development of dialectical materialism. It explains the conflict and struggle between all things based on dialectical materialism. <<

Thats sounds like brutal version of darwinism to me. Can you explain it?? [only reason i would like to get an explanation is so i could criticise it...]


>> and u havent forgotten about Maos brilliant theory of guerilla war, have u? <<

Have you forgot about the brilian theory of Karl Marx that guerilla war leads to bonapartism?? Well, you should remind yourself, especially since it has proven itself as correct. [especially in China&#33;]

By the way, lets not forget about the role of stalinist politics in the chinese revolution.


>> It doesn&#39;t have anything to do with Leninism. <<

>> of course it does.... its developed upon Marx-Leninism. Thats a well-known fact. <<

At times - I&#39;d have to say - Lenin had little to do with Leninism, much less marxism. The main reason for this would be the [unmarxist] non-proletarianst envieroment where these revolutions took place. Deviated conditions lead to ideological and practical deviations, and there should be no question about it.


>> How can u be a Marxist if u dont even employ dialectical materialism? Thats the soul of all Marxist thoughts, u know. <<

The METHOD - YEA; the "laws" [especially ones "contributed" by Mao] - no.

[flyby]

Originally posted by SonofRage+May 7 2005, 11:01 PM--> (SonofRage @ May 7 2005, 11:01 PM)
[email protected] 7 2005, 04:31 PM

On the contrary, Mao was one of humanity&#39;s greatest liberators -- personally leading the historic anticolonial struggle of China (with a quarter of humanity&#33;) and then leading this huge people on the socialist road, and then waging intense struggle within the International commuist revolution against the restoration of capitalism in the USSR (and the total caputulation of parties alligned with the USSR).

You say things like this as if it were indisputable fact. China under Mao was, like the USSR, State Capitalism and nothing more. The working class was not under control, and were still under wage-slavery. I don&#39;t see anything liberating about a party dictatorship. [/b]
Well, all i can say, brother, is that you are looking at a sweeping and remarkable historical event with very very narrow blinders.

Liberated china ended the footbinding and sale of women.
In the land reform, the largest transfer of wealth in history happened -- with hundreds of millions of peasants (for the first time, and largely under their own steam) taking the land that they had watered with their sweat and blood.

A century of utter degradation at the hands of foreign imperialists ended. If you have a sense of the opium wars, the boxer rebellion, the carving up of china into foreign concessions and warlord kingdoms -- and if you have a sense of the utter misery that caused.... then you get a glimpse of what liberation brought with it.

Huge public works were possible for the first time -- which meant relief from the massive floods of china&#39;s rivers.

Collective organizaztion made major inroads against diseases like sleeping sickness.

Opium addictin was abolished, and prostitution.

And the first, socialist industry started to emerge.

Now all of this may mean nothing to you. Which is your business.

You may not know about this, or you may not care. That is your business.

But the chinese people loved mao for this, and so did much of humanity. And for good reasons. This was the second great socialist revolution in world history. Rich in experience, in profound movements and victories -- and also extreme difficulties and setbacks.

I don&#39;t think it helps to just "write it off" -- to dismiss it lightly, or to overlook its profound impact on hundrds of millions of people.

I can suggest several powrful books for understanding mao&#39;s revolution: Red Star over China, Fanshen, Wind in the Tower, Morning Deluge, and others.

But I can&#39;t make you read them. And wouldn&#39;t try.

for people who ARE interested there are some wonderful online sources.

here are a few: http://rwor.org/s/china.htm

[SonofRage]

Call me ultra-Left, but how is this socialist? All these things are things that people have gotten in bourgeois revolutions and under capitalism.

What "socialist industry" are you talking about? Nationalization certainly isn&#39;t socialist to me. Is the US Postal Service a "socialist industry?"

I have no doubt that State Capitalism was progressive for China, but don&#39;t glorify and use it as an example of Mao&#39;s greatness. It just sounds like a bourgeois revolution wrapped in a red flag to me.

[Lamanov]

I have no doubt that State Capitalism was progressive for China, but don&#39;t glorify and use it as an example of Mao&#39;s greatness. It just sounds like a bourgeois revolution wrapped in a red flag to me.

Smart. [ :ph34r: the force is strong with this one :P ]
That is the whole point. Thats [almost] what they all were. When there is no strong urban petty-burgoise class to execute the burgoise revolution and to throw down the semi-feudal system, proletariat and peasantry take their role as a primary revolutionary force. And thats it. Roles change but the path stays the same, because, on the other hand, proletariat is not strong enough to lead the revolution by itself, society gets stuck between the burgoise and socialist revolutionary methods. Due to low development [weak indrustry, small urban society, etc.] > 1) revolution can&#39;t take a socialist form > 2) state capitalism takes on the role of classical capitalism.

[flyby]

I agree with important parts of the last two posts.

A large part of humanity still lives under semi-feudal conditions where revolution inherently includes major anti-feudal and anti-imperialist tasks (land distribution, overcoming of feudal ideology, even serfdom, and the defeat of foreign dominators.)

And bourgeois forces trying to take up such things (like Sun Yatsen or similar forces around the world0 have fallen short, because their capitalist road takes them back into the embrace of the imperialists, with all that flows from that.

And so, Mao, by leading a new form of bourgeois democratic revoluton but under the leadership of a communist proletarian line was both able to carry through this anti-feudal and anti-imperialist revolution and do so in a way that led (rather seamlessly and directly and quickly) to new socialist changes in society, the economy and the superstructure.

Because leading revolution in semi-feudal countries is a huge part of the world proletarian revolution today -- Mao&#39;s contribution to marxism in this regard was extremely important.

Today, there have been further changes, -- including a rise of urbanism in previously agricultural countries, tremendous growth of industrial sectors (even in third world countries), much closer economic integration of different countries, capitalist relations widely spreading in some previously semi feudal agricultural areas).

Mao&#39;s New Democratic revolution (in both theory and practice) was a huge leap for Marxism (and part of the reason Marxism is called Marxism-Leninism-Maoism today) -- but at the same time these new conditions and changes call for making new analyses and summations about where things NOW stand, and what that means for the revolutoins in third world countries. (This is something Chairman Avakian has called for and talked about for some time.)

Now on some level, sonofrage is pooh-poohing that.

He argues on one hand that the liberation of China carried out revolutoinary tasks that were not initially and directly socialist (which is true.) However, this does not chagne the fact that 1) these were huge events for humanity on a world scale, or 2) they were not linked in many important ways to the world proletarian revolutoin, or 3) that Mao&#39;s approach did not lay the basis for moving over (after 1949) to socialist revolution.

Then sonofrage argues that it was just all state-capitalism. Well, I don&#39;t agree... and really we could have a whole thread on this. But i urge you to study what conditions were really like in the socialist industry (the legacy of the Taiching Oil fields or the Anshan Steel and Iron works http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/...8/mswv8_49.htm) (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-8/mswv8_49.htm)), I urge you to read "Maoist Economics and the Revolutionary Road to Communism--The Shanghai Textbook." (It is a mind blowing theoretical work out of the Culktural Revolutoin that describes in great detail their approach and experiences in developing socialist relations at many levels in China.) (unfortunately this book is not online itself, though it can be bought online.)

Part of what i&#39;m saying: let&#39;s actually get into this rich and complex and enlightening history, and wrangle over whether it was "just state-capitalism" or whether this was some of our precious, if early and beginning, experience with a whole new liberated way of life.

[Lamanov]

Well, I guess my thesis stands: between so-called socialist countries and socialism stands a second revolution [after state capitalism plays out its historical role (*instead of clasical capitalism), and we can see it has]

[flyby]

In one sense, there ARE two revolutionary processes going on:

In the world today, there is still a major struggle against feudalism in many countries.

And then the world as a whole is gripped by capitalism -- in its current imperialist form.

And the real-world revolutionary struggle in many country often combines elements of both processes -- the burning issues of overthrowing feudalism become a basis for forming a worker-peasant analysis that can then overthrow capitalism. (to put it a little crudely).

And this is the underpinning of Mao&#39;s theory of New Democracy -- which is a road of trasnforming the anti-feudal and anti-imperialist struggle into a path to socialism and communism.

DJ-TK wrote: The fact that revolution played out in 90% peasant society is a fact that goes against marxism both in practice and theory.

This is rather confused.

Why can&#39;t we have revolution in countries that are 90% peasant? Where is that written?

And, in fact, there have been great (even soul-stirring) revolutionary movement emerging in heavily peasant countries (China itself, vietnam, and now Nepal&#33;)

And in a world now dominated by imperialist-capitalism -- why can&#39;t those peasant revolutions be led by a proletarian-communist line, and be part of the the larger world proletarian revolution?

Our Marxism should not be a rigid set of apriori rules (and especially not made of rules that dismiss revolution&#33;)

Marx did think that revolution would break out first where capitalism was strongest -- but 150 years later, we have lots of evidence that his estimation was mistaken. Revolution has broken out where capitalism was the weakest, and in many cases it has been where capitalism intruded harshly and brutally from without -- into colonial and semi-feudal countries.

And there has been a lot of exerpience (much of it led and inspired by Mao) that the anti-colonial struggle is an important component of the world proletarian revolution.

Marx once wrote that he could envision revolution that combined the Paris commune with a "second edition of the German peasant wars."

Just such a worker-peasant alliance (even in countries overwhelingly peasant&#33;) is one of the main currents of socialist revolution in our world today.

[Lamanov]

How about you read everything DJ-TC wrote, than you might understand the essence:

I repeat:
"When there is no strong urban petty-burgoise class to execute the burgoise revolution and to throw down the semi-feudal system, proletariat and peasantry take their role as a primary revolutionary force. And thats it. Roles change but the path stays the same, because, on the other hand, [industrial-urban]* proletariat is not strong enough to lead the revolution by itself, society gets stuck between the burgoise and socialist revolutionary methods. Due to low development [weak indrustry, small urban society, etc.] > 1) revolution can&#39;t take a socialist form > 2) state capitalism takes on the role of classical capitalism."
[*interpolation]
You can start a revolution in China, but you can&#39;t finish it there, not with socialism.

If you want to be a marxist red flags must not confuse you.

[flyby]

Originally posted by DJ&#045;[email protected] 18 2005, 07:49 PM
How about you read everything DJ-TC wrote, than you might understand the essence:

I repeat:
"When there is no strong urban petty-burgoise class to execute the burgoise revolution and to throw down the semi-feudal system, proletariat and peasantry take their role as a primary revolutionary force. And thats it. Roles change but the path stays the same, because, on the other hand, [industrial-urban]* proletariat is not strong enough to lead the revolution by itself, society gets stuck between the burgoise and socialist revolutionary methods. Due to low development [weak indrustry, small urban society, etc.] > 1) revolution can&#39;t take a socialist form > 2) state capitalism takes on the role of classical capitalism."
[*interpolation]
You can start a revolution in China, but you can&#39;t finish it there, not with socialism.

If you want to be a marxist red flags must not confuse you.
Well, of course, I had read what you wrote.

But i think this is an example of a common problem: mechanical thinking leading to pessimism and defeatism.

You say (ahead of time) that socialist revolution can&#39;t succeed in most countries.

And you do this based on what? Based on your assumptions of how things work? based on crudely dismissing the whole history of the Chinese revolution? (Which did, in fact, create socialism in a largely peasant country&#33;&#33;)

Clearly, the process is difficult. And ultimately in china, the proletariat was not able to keep overall state power (losing it in the coup of 1976). But the heroic achievements of the previous two decades certainly carved a path -- and showed that it is possible to make a transition from the anti-feudal "democratic revolution" to a socialist one.

[red_che]

Guys, I just want to impart some of my knowledge on Mao.

I agree with flyby with all what he said. Maoism is a development in Marxism-Leninism. Mao contributed significant developments in Marxism.

First, he developed the earlier teachings of Marx and Lenin on how to advance and win the socialist revolution in a feudal or semi-feudal society. In China (a semi-feudal and semi-colonial society), Mao led and guided the advancement of the "New Democratic Revolution" with a Socialist Perspective under the guidance of Marxism-Leninism. He showed through the experience of China how a Socialist Revoultion be done in a semi-feudal society. He clarified that there are two stages of revolution and that a semi-feudal society cannot advance to socialism until all the relics of feudalism were not yet eliminated. Thus, a need for the democratic stage of the revolution and in order to gain victory, a thorough and concrete social investigation and class analysis must be done in order to know the social system and condition and know the real enemies of the revolution, on the one hand, and the forces and friends on the other hand.

He further clarified that in a semi-feudal society, the first stage of the revolution (the New Democratic Revolution) must be led by the proletariat (through its political party -the Communist Party- as was stated in the Communist Manifesto), and the proletariat must link with its closest and most trusted ally (the peasantry), who are the primary force of the revolution. The revolution must also pull on its side the progressive forces in the petty-bourgeoisie to tilt the balance of forces. The revolutionary movement should recognize the patriotic forces in the local bourgeois class and get it on the side of the revolution. And lastly, the revolutionary forces must exploit the contradictions within the ruling big comprador-bourgeois-landlord class. In this stage, Mao developed the strategy and tactics of protracted war by encircling the cities from the countryside in order to advance wave upon wave the revolution. He also developed the strategy of United Front in order to exploit every situation in a semi-feudal society wherein sharp contradictions arise not only between the ruling class and the exploiters, but also within the ruling class.

From the above, China was able to gain freedom from the yoke of Imperialism, Feudalism and Bureaucrat Capitalism. Mao, when they have gained power, led the establishment and construction of socialism in the Chinese society. He has made great leaps from the economy to the culture. We must put in our mind that China was a very conservative society before their revolution. Mao dealt with that and tirelessly promulgated the Marxian (dialectical materialism) philosophy. From here, he was able to contribute many developments to Marxism (stated already by flyby in his above articles).

Mao also had great contributions with his strong repudiations of the then growing Revisionism in Russia as well as within the CCP. He bravely criticized Kruschev for its (Kruschev and the CPSU) turning into revisionism. He then forwarded the theory of a "Continuing Revolution" where he said that the revolution must not be done only by crushing the economic foundations and political power of the bourgeoisis. It must be carried out also through a cultural revolution to eliminate all bourgeois influences and tendencies which are strong even among Party members and communists. During that time, Mao was the only one who stood up against the mighty USSR who were now turning into the road of capitalism. Mao galantly defended Marxism in the midst of a strong capitalist current in the USSR and the Socialist camp. However, upon his death, the capitalist roaders in the CCP grabbed power and have now turned as Capitalists.

His contributions to the world proletarian movement were such as great as Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin. His ideas are universal in that it can be applied (not literally) in all semi-feudal countries. Mao is a Great Communist.

[flyby]

I think that red-che has dug into this from several sides, and pointedout some importat ways that Mao developed marxism.

On the closing paragraphs i have some thoughts:

"His contributions to the world proletarian movement were such as great as Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin. His ideas are universal in that it can be applied (not literally) in all semi-feudal countries. Mao is a Great Communist."

Actually I think that Mao&#39;s contributions stand on a level that was only previously matched by Marx and Lenin. Stalin, while he tried to continue on a leninist path, did not actually make new breakthroughs in the science of revolution -- and unfortunately actually took a number of things backwards, injecting a lot of mechanical materialism in the movement, going away from proletarian internationalism in a number of ways, etc.

(That is, after all, why Marxism today is Marxism-Leninism-Maoism -- not Marxism-Leninism-Stalinism-Maoism. There is no Stalinism, no special development and leap in marxism identified with Stalin.)

To dig into that further, I&#39;d like to urge you to check out the remarkable work Conquer the World -- the International Proletariat Must and Will (http://rwor.org/bob_avakian/conquerworld/) by Bob Avakian. It was just (finally&#33;) posted online this week, and is a profound examination of the development of Marxism through the varoius stages of its creation (down til today) and the relationship of the work of key leaders like Marx, Lenin, Mao, stalin etc.

And one thing that jumps out is that the work of such leaders was not all, simply, a development and extension of each other -- there were contradictions and differences, there were mistaken judgements, there were initial theories that proved wrong and were then modified later. We need to have a scientific view of the world -- and that INCLUDES a scientific (and self-crticical) view of marxism itself.

Having said that, I certainly agree that Maoism is a new stage of Marxism -- and not just in third world countries.

But that too has to be correctly understood.

First, it doesn&#39;t mean that we can take "what mao did" and apply it like a formula (not even in countries that "look like China" -- such as Peru or Nepal or parts of India.) We don&#39;t want to take particular forms and strategies and act like they are "universal" in THAT sense -- since it would fail, because successful revolution requires a much more scientific and creative approach than such cookie-cutter dogmatism.

And Mao&#39;s breakthroughs in how to make revolution in semi-colonial countries (while historic and important) were not even his most important contribution. What was most important was his method and approach -- and his truly groundbreaking analysis of the restoration of capitalism in the Soviet union (the roots of revisionism in the base, the rise of revisionism to power being a restoration of capitalism, and the approach of "continuing the revolution under the dictatorship of the proletariat" as the way to fight it.)

Having said all this, I want to repeat that i agree with the thrust of what you wrote, red-che. And look forward to learning more about what yhou have uncovered about marxism and politics.

[SonofRage]

Originally posted by [email protected] 25 2005, 02:43 PM

(That is, after all, why Marxism today is Marxism-Leninism-Maoism -- not Marxism-Leninism-Stalinism-Maoism. There is no Stalinism, no special development and leap in marxism identified with Stalin.)

You mean your particular brand of Marxism is Marxism-Leninism-Maoism. I don&#39;t get how you RCP&#39;ers so arrogantly think of your ideas as being the one true Marxism. There&#39;s shades of religion there

[flyby]

Contrary to what you may believe, sonofrage, my point is not to say "my views are good, yours suck." That isn&#39;t my approach, and also it isn&#39;t what i atually think. I think we canand should all learn from each other -- and that marxists and communists have a lot to learn (including from people who are not into communism or marxism at all&#33;)

Let me break down where I&#39;m coming from, and why I say that Marxism of today is Marxism-Leninism-Maoism.

First, i don&#39;t think Marxism is a religion at all, and we shouldn&#39;t treat it that way.

We shouldn&#39;t look at Marx as some kind of prophet who produced "sacred texts."

and we shouldn&#39;t look at our movement as a "tradition."

Whenever someone says to me "I&#39;m out of the trotskyist tradition" or "He came out of the anarchist tradition" i think to myself "this person is lifting a concept and a way of looking at worldviews from the religious sphere."

And it is a way of thinking that is best left in the religious sphere.

So, if we look at marxism as a scientific worldview and method -- it is inevitable and necessary that it should be developed. That some new concepts should emerge (based both on new experience, but also just on new and better thinking).

Some old concepts will be overthrown, criticized or amended.

And especially as the world goes through all kinds of leaps and transformations, it is inevitable that all kinds of new problems and issues will be explored and examined by marxists -- producing new developments for marxism.

So, that is what I am talking about when I say that Marxism today is marxism-leninism-maoism.

If we just went "back to marx" -- we would be shitty marxists. We would be upholding both the good and the bad, the visionary and the primitive. And (frankly) people who uphold "only Marx" (and disregard lenin, mao and new thinkers like Avakian) are not Marxists at all -- they end up being a kind of social democrat (and i&#39;m sure you have met some of them.)

So, i don&#39;t think it is arrogance -- it is a particular view of Marxism and our science.

I understand that you (sonofrage) and others (here on this message board and more generally) may not have the same view (as I do) of what concepts are correct and scientific. And we should wrangle over it.

but let&#39;s not start with an assumption of "relativism" -- i.e. that &#39;its all good" or that all ideas are equally valid.

We should debate many ideas, and consider them respectfully -- but in the final analysis they are not ALL equally valid. Some will prove false, some will prove half true, and some will prove powerful and penetrating truths. And those last ones are the ones we need to be looking for, expounding and sharing&#33;

IN closing, let me just not that there has just been posted on the internet one of the most controversial communist writings of our times, Comquer the World (http://rwor.org/bob_avakian/conquerworld/) which was exactly controversial because it takes that kind of scienfific (critical and self-critical) view of marxism itself (including the great marxists like marx, lenin, mao and so on.)

And in this work, there is a whole discussion of what happens if you simply "stand on Marx" without taking a scientific and dynamic approach -- if you take previous scientific insights as frozen revelation... and cut yourself off from a living and creative process.

Avakian writes (for example): "As stressed before there is Leninism and there is Lenin, and if Lenin didn’t always live up to Leninism, that doesn’t make Leninism any less than what it is." Which is the kind of thing that drove some dogmatics absolutely nuts -- but which is (nonetheless) a rather important kind of approach and stand to have if we are going to get real.

I don&#39;t want to try to go into more detail about this...

but i did want to make those points:

That we have to view Marxism (our worldview and method) as a scientific ideology, and we have to have a scientific approach to Marxism itself -- including by questioning and changing parts of our previous understandings that appear wrong or outdated or partial.

And that is why Marxism became Marxism=Leninism (with new insights about the party, imperialism, forms of revolution, philosophy etc.) and why Marxism-Leninism gave way to Marxism-Leninism-Maoism (with all the developments and leaps involved in Mao&#39;s work, and the whole world process after Lenin&#39;s time.)

Obviously the name of our ideology can&#39;t keep getting longer, without becoming ridiculous. And there are reasons why we maybe shouldn&#39;t so narrowly associate it with a list of names. Perhaps we will one day just call it "communism" or "communist theory."

[RedStarOverChina]

Originally posted by [email protected] 25 2005, 03:43 PM
Contrary to what you may believe, sonofrage, my point is not to say "my views are good, yours suck." That isn&#39;t my approach, and also it isn&#39;t what i atually think. I think we canand should all learn from each other -- and that marxists and communists have a lot to learn (including from people who are not into communism or marxism at all&#33;)

Let me break down where I&#39;m coming from, and why I say that Marxism of today is Marxism-Leninism-Maoism.

First, i don&#39;t think Marxism is a religion at all, and we shouldn&#39;t treat it that way.

We shouldn&#39;t look at Marx as some kind of prophet who produced "sacred texts."

and we shouldn&#39;t look at our movement as a "tradition."

Whenever someone says to me "I&#39;m out of the trotskyist tradition" or "He came out of the anarchist tradition" i think to myself "this person is lifting a concept and a way of looking at worldviews from the religious sphere."

And it is a way of thinking that is best left in the religious sphere.

So, if we look at marxism as a scientific worldview and method -- it is inevitable and necessary that it should be developed. That some new concepts should emerge (based both on new experience, but also just on new and better thinking).

Some old concepts will be overthrown, criticized or amended.

And especially as the world goes through all kinds of leaps and transformations, it is inevitable that all kinds of new problems and issues will be explored and examined by marxists -- producing new developments for marxism.

So, that is what I am talking about when I say that Marxism today is marxism-leninism-maoism.

If we just went "back to marx" -- we would be shitty marxists. We would be upholding both the good and the bad, the visionary and the primitive. And (frankly) people who uphold "only Marx" (and disregard lenin, mao and new thinkers like Avakian) are not Marxists at all -- they end up being a kind of social democrat (and i&#39;m sure you have met some of them.)

So, i don&#39;t think it is arrogance -- it is a particular view of Marxism and our science.

I understand that you (sonofrage) and others (here on this message board and more generally) may not have the same view (as I do) of what concepts are correct and scientific. And we should wrangle over it.

but let&#39;s not start with an assumption of "relativism" -- i.e. that &#39;its all good" or that all ideas are equally valid.

We should debate many ideas, and consider them respectfully -- but in the final analysis they are not ALL equally valid. Some will prove false, some will prove half true, and some will prove powerful and penetrating truths. And those last ones are the ones we need to be looking for, expounding and sharing&#33;

IN closing, let me just not that there has just been posted on the internet one of the most controversial communist writings of our times, Comquer the World (http://rwor.org/bob_avakian/conquerworld/) which was exactly controversial because it takes that kind of scienfific (critical and self-critical) view of marxism itself (including the great marxists like marx, lenin, mao and so on.)

And in this work, there is a whole discussion of what happens if you simply "stand on Marx" without taking a scientific and dynamic approach -- if you take previous scientific insights as frozen revelation... and cut yourself off from a living and creative process.

Avakian writes (for example): "As stressed before there is Leninism and there is Lenin, and if Lenin didn’t always live up to Leninism, that doesn’t make Leninism any less than what it is." Which is the kind of thing that drove some dogmatics absolutely nuts -- but which is (nonetheless) a rather important kind of approach and stand to have if we are going to get real.

I don&#39;t want to try to go into more detail about this...

but i did want to make those points:

That we have to view Marxism (our worldview and method) as a scientific ideology, and we have to have a scientific approach to Marxism itself -- including by questioning and changing parts of our previous understandings that appear wrong or outdated or partial.

And that is why Marxism became Marxism=Leninism (with new insights about the party, imperialism, forms of revolution, philosophy etc.) and why Marxism-Leninism gave way to Marxism-Leninism-Maoism (with all the developments and leaps involved in Mao&#39;s work, and the whole world process after Lenin&#39;s time.)

Obviously the name of our ideology can&#39;t keep getting longer, without becoming ridiculous. And there are reasons why we maybe shouldn&#39;t so narrowly associate it with a list of names. Perhaps we will one day just call it "communism" or "communist theory."
hear, hear.

A little advise tho--dont mention Bob Avakian too many times. Most people in this forum seem to be allergic to that name.

[SonofRage]

Originally posted by [email protected] 25 2005, 04:43 PM

If we just went "back to marx" -- we would be shitty marxists. We would be upholding both the good and the bad, the visionary and the primitive. And (frankly) people who uphold "only Marx" (and disregard lenin, mao and new thinkers like Avakian) are not Marxists at all -- they end up being a kind of social democrat (and i&#39;m sure you have met some of them.)

So, i don&#39;t think it is arrogance -- it is a particular view of Marxism and our science.

You&#39;re missing my point, which is that you don&#39;t have a monopoly on Marxist thought and aren&#39;t the only ones who have advanced Marxist theory since Marx and Engels.

Anton Pannekoek, Antonio Gramsci, Raya Dunayevskaya, Antonio Negri etc. have made significant contributions to Marxism.


:ph34r:

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

A little advise tho--dont mention Bob Avakian too many times. Most people in this forum seem to be allergic to that name.

And for good reason.

[red_che]

Actually I think that Mao&#39;s contributions stand on a level that was only previously matched by Marx and Lenin. Stalin, while he tried to continue on a leninist path, did not actually make new breakthroughs in the science of revolution -- and unfortunately actually took a number of things backwards, injecting a lot of mechanical materialism in the movement, going away from proletarian internationalism in a number of ways, etc.

Well, Stalin may not be as philosophical as Mao was, but, certainly he has done great in advancing Marxism-Leninism.

Ideologically, he defended Marxism-Leninism against the revisionism of Trotsky and others who tried to distort Marxism to favor their own "ideas".

Politically, Comrade Stalin pursued the establishment of Dictatorship of the Proletariat in the Soviet system as against the elitist, pure working class government that the revisionists wanted to establish (which will just serve to isolate the working class - proletariat - from the rest of the society). And defended Socialism against all kinds of Imperialist efforts at destroying Socialism.

Organizationally, Comrade Stalin strengthened party discipline and carried out and implemented Democratic Centralism in the party as opposed to ultra-democracy or extreme leftism of the revisionists.

In other words, Comrade Stalin was tireless in leading the Soviet society in building Socialism. There may have been some mistakes, but I think those mistakes were not very serious as compared to the foolishness the revisionists were trying to impose. And these mistakes are understandable since the Soviets do not have a model socialist society to look into. Even the Chinese Communist Party under Mao had mistakes. The CCP had made several rectification movements then to rectify those errors. Stalin did the same thing. Still, I can say that Stalin is as great as Marx, Engels, Lenin and Mao were in terms of advancing Socialism and the proletarian revolution.

[SonofRage]

Originally posted by [email protected] 27 2005, 02:53 AM

Politically, Comrade Stalin pursued the establishment of Dictatorship of the Proletariat in the Soviet system as against the elitist, pure working class government that the revisionists wanted to establish (which will just serve to isolate the working class - proletariat - from the rest of the society).
Silly workers wanting their own government. What did they think they had there, a workers&#39; state? :D


Such blatant authoritarianism. Stalinism was the worst thing to happen to the communist movement.

[cph_shawarma]

If we just went "back to marx" -- we would be shitty marxists. We would be upholding both the good and the bad, the visionary and the primitive. And (frankly) people who uphold "only Marx" (and disregard lenin, mao and new thinkers like Avakian) are not Marxists at all -- they end up being a kind of social democrat (and i&#39;m sure you have met some of them.)
There are several "marxist" currents that break already at Lenin and still remain revolutionary. The Italian Left is one of these currents that are very interesting, most of all Amadeo Bordiga. People who have come from this current, including Gilles Dauvé (aka Jean Barrot) and Karl Nesic, have a far more accurate view of today&#39;s society and the communist perspectives of modern capitalism, than any Marxist-Leninist or Maoist. All without degenerating to social democracy (which I think Marxism-Leninism and Maoism have, even in its original "revolutionary" character).

[flyby]

Originally posted by [email protected] 25 2005, 09:12 PM
A little advise tho--dont mention Bob Avakian too many times. Most people in this forum seem to be allergic to that name.
RSOC&#33; I appreciate your agreement ("hear, hear&#33;") with the thrust of my remarks.

And i have given some thought to your "little advice." Here is what I think:

First, i understand that it is true that some people (in this forum and elsewhere) "seem to be allergic" to even a mention (&#33;) of our communist leader, Bob Avakian. But so what? Can we communists only say things that no one will oppose?

And i suppose that is even understandable that promoting communism and especially this communist leader will be controversial -- EVEN HERE where most people are some kind of leftist.

After all, many many things that Avakian stands for are VERY challenging. And following where he leads means REALLY taking revolution seriously -- and has many implications for people and their lives.

Some people really don&#39;t think it is possible to make revolution -- and they think you are nuts if you talk about it. Some people also really have started to believe that "the communist project is dead." And some people don&#39;t believe you NEED communist leaders, and even some even think that "the problem" with communism is that it has (and promotes) leaders.

Some people are dedicated to other political trends and other political leaders (like Che or kucinich for example, or sonofrage&#39;s pannekoek etc.)

But really, that is part of the value and purpose of a forum like this:

You put forward your theories and theoreticians, and others will put forward theirs -- and then we all engage. And, hopefully, in a principled and thoughtful way, we need to "compare and contrast" where different lines and people are leading us.

Second, I definitely don&#39;t think "most people in this forum" are hostile to revolutionary communism and Chairman Avakian.

That just isn&#39;t how it appears to me.

I think a few are, and they are often somewhat vocal. And that is fine with me (including sonofrage&#39;s sometimes sputtering exasperation).

But many people have also been supportative and many more have been interested in seeing the kind of deep debate and wrangling that Avakian is fighting for -- people WANT to get into the DEEP issues of our world and they want to hear from people who are SERIOUS about change.

And (frankly) most people on this message board don&#39;t yet know that much about Bob and what he stands for. And most don&#39;t know yet what THEY think about MANY things.

Which is both understandable and part of why we are all here.

We live under a media monopoly where everyone knows who Paris hilton is, and revolutionary thinking rarely gets mass exposure -- and it is OUR JOB to counteract that.

Third, I want to say a little about the importance of fighting to "put our communist convictions before everyone" (as Lenin put it.)

I think we are really in a life-and-death situation. I think the next years, and what WE do, may have a huge impact on the future world humanity lives under.

The reactionaries (here in the U.S.) are acting with tremendous energy, aggressiveness and extremism. IN some ways, they are barely opposed. And yet, at the same time, their actions are shocking people -- and waking millions of people up to political life. A whole generation of youth is looking around. What will they find? Some lame liberalism like Kucinich (that will lead them into a dead end)?

Will they find themselves turned into footsoldiers for a movement that has such "lowered sights" that it doesn&#39;t even discuss a new world, or revolution, or communism -- and has not more lofty goals than getting schoolmarm Hillary to be in charge?

We really have an opening here. ONly we can seize it, and only we can throw it away.

And how do we get people to "give communism a second look"? How do we get a revolutionary vision to be a part of every debate and discussion?

I really think that Bob Avakian (http://bobavakian.net) and the Revolution (http://revcom.us)newspaper are a huge part of how we do that -- because they are working precisely to link the struggles we desperately need to wage TODAY, with the revolutionary communist world we want to create in the future.

I like this message board, I enjoy it. But.... I think there are some things missing here:

For one thing there is not nearly enough urgency.

We need to have a passionate restlessness about us -- because events are moving quickly, and revolutionaries have tremendous responsibilities in such times.

And for another thing, we need to fight (and i mean FIGHT&#33;) to raise the sights of people, to inject a vision of a new liberated world, to counteract all the poisonous arguments of the old order, to make a living creative forward-looking communism movement a powerful part of the political stage and the political life.

To me, communism is not some idle intellectual hobby.
It is not a nostalgia for past victories.
It is not "a good idea that probably will never happen."
It is not something we should "toy with in private" -- while we pretend to be mindless zombies in our high schools and neighborhoods.

To me, revolutionary communism is the very hope of humanity.

And i spent a long time looking for a movement and a leadership that was focused on realizing that hope. I have learned a tremendous amount from Chairman Avakian (http://rwor.org/chair_e.htm) -- enough that I consider myself a student and a follower.

Avakian has trained me (and a whole movement of revolutionaries) in critical thinking -- and in revolutionary sweep. Approaching the present with the future in mind. Looking past the petty, and going for the bigger questions in a lofty way.

He has fought for a firm and materialist faith in the people -- in their ability to take the future into their own hands. He is working intensely to sum up our communist past -- to expose what was bad, to uphold what was right, to move forward and do even better.

And look, when you are trying to do something that controversial and radical -- some folks just won&#39;t like it (at first). Some folks will act "allergic." Some folks may even "dismiss without even investigating." (And you can tell, that some people who are "allergic" really have not even bothered to look into what they are opposing.)

But while some people will complain, i think many many more are going to be stirred. This is what we need&#33; This is what is possible, and happening, in this moment.

This is our responsibility to humanity, to the hopes of people all over the world&#33;

So much of the "left" is puny -- accepting impotence and isolation. It thinks like an already-defeated force -- even while real possibilities and challenges are SHOUTING out to us&#33;

Imagine if we actually succeed in creating this new powerful revolutionary movement, right here in the U.S.&#33; -- not just a few collectives here and there -- but a powerful movement of millions, with deep roots in the ghettos and barrios -- inspired by the sweep and fearless method that Avakian fights for. Imagine what that would mean for humanity&#33;

That is what I&#39;m about. That is why I get up in the morning.
And more important, that is what we really need much more of -- especially right now.

[Lamanov]

Originally posted by [email protected] 27 2005, 06:53 AM
...ultra-democracy or extreme leftism of the revisionists.
:rolleyes: that about sums it up :lol:
"extreme leftism of the revisionists"...
Idiotic stalinists :D

[NovelGentry]

My issue isn&#39;t with Bob Avakian, or even so much of what he says, my issue is with how everything you seem to say on here drives down to him. Some may say I have the very same issue with Marx, but in general, I have far more of my own ideas thrown out and developed on here than I do things that strictly fall back to Marx -- that I generally reserve for Opposing Ideologies and parts of Theory.

How you present yourself is religious, even if you do not think it is. "Our communist leader, Bob Avakian" conjures up slogans like, "Our lord, Jesus Christ." Certainly we all have our heroes and those who inspire us, this site was founded of one of those inspirational leaders, but there is a certain aroma to the words you have that I cannot even perceive from the most devote Leninists who praise his word as total fact.

I&#39;ve not read a lot of Avakian&#39;s work, but something which stops me every day from reading more is the nature in which it is presented by people like yourself. Think about how many people you disuade by your words, as well as how many you may encourage, and choose those words carefully.

[flyby]

shrugs.

well, look:

If you were alive when the Communist Manifesto was written, and the "left" was a swamp of utopians and isolated conspirators.... would you make a big stink about it? You would make a big noise about it&#33; And you would be right&#33;

You may think it is religious to say "we have a leader" -- but this is the most anti-religious leader in history. There is not a hint of slavishness in what he is proposing. And the heart of his whole approach is to GET RID OF the dogmatic and (frankly) religious bullshit that stamps SO FUCKING MUCH of how communists talk and think.

I am letting people know that this is happening.

And i thnk it is kinda paradoxical when you write: "I might check him out, but i don&#39;t like the fact that people are pointing out that it is worth checkig him out." (my paraphrase).

Don&#39;t take it wrong when i say: Look, this stuff is too important to be petty about it. Don&#39;t get hung up in some prejudices. If we want to fucking overthrow imperialism in the heart of the u.S. -- it ain&#39;t that fucking easy&#33;&#33; We better have leaders who are remarkable, who have spent a lifetime figuring that out, and we better check out and evaluate where they are at in figuring that out.

And i&#39;m kinda unapologetic in saying: one of the most positive things about life in the U.S., one of the things that actually makes revolution possible, is that we have a leadership that is on that level. It matters.

Sometimes people say "He may be a really important leader, but it turns me off when you say so." Well if it is the truth, why shouldn&#39;t i say it? If it is important, why shouldn&#39;t i say it?

There is a whole "identity politics" philosophy that says "don&#39;t say shit that offends me." Well I think we should say the truth, whether it upsets or startles or "offends" someone. How can we make the most radical revolution in history without startling, offending and upsetting some people&#33;&#33;??

On an ideological level:

Look: ideas are both individual and collective.

When a kid says "fuck you, I&#39;ll do what i want." That is his/her personal idea. But it is also an idea that (collectively) grips the youth. It is both individual and social. (That is why when Rage against the Machine sings that -- everyone nods and say "that&#39;s exactly right.")

The same is true with political ideas. Every time some person thinks "Dude, we need no state, no one telling us what do do&#33;" this person thinks he is "thinking for himself." And then he shows up at the demo where a few hundred people had the same thought -- and you realize that the personal idea was also a collective, social idea. (And as you know, the anarachists who are so "individualists" are also the only political trend with a strict UNIFORM they all wear.... heheheheh).

So don&#39;t be naive or simplistic. On one level, we all "think for ourselves" -- in the sense that we think with our own brains, and not with someone elses&#33; And on the other level, we all think as part of social trends and movements, and the ideas that "pop" into our brains were not really or basically invented by us.

See what I mean? It is "very American," very individualist, and frankly more than a little immature, to think that the ideas in our heads are some kind of special personal invention. That is an illusion.

So on one level, I express my own ideas. I am pretty energetic about that.... and pretty fluid at expressing my thoughts.

But on an ideological level, are they really "my own ideas"?

They are also social and collective ideas -- and in particularly i have worked to grasp and apply Marxism, and have been particularly deeply influenced by Bob Avakian. And many ideas that are deeply and personally "mine" were developed and elaborated (best and first) by him.

There is nothing wrong with that -- that is true of all political ideas.

I will express my views, as clearly as i can. But i also want to let you know that all of this is being developed (in ways that can&#39;t be captured in some message board post) by BA (http://bobavakian.net)... and you should think about checking that out

(if you aren&#39;t interested, cool. If you are interested, its here (http://rwor.org/chair_e.htm). No body is twisting your arm. There is tons of shit i see on the internet that doesn&#39;t interest me. I don&#39;t stand there telling everyone not to post it&#33; I just don&#39;t click on it and pass onto something that does interest me. If my posts bug you, don&#39;t read them. right?)

If that&#39;s a crime, then i&#39;m a criminal.

[Lamanov]

a question: who the hell is Bob Avakian? :huh:

[NovelGentry]

I&#39;m under the impression you&#39;ve mistaken me for something of an anarchist. Either way, it doesn&#39;t change the fundamental flaw in what you&#39;re saying.

Whether or not you think for yourself is not determined on the issue of whether or not someone else has the same thought, but from where that thought comes from, where it is derived from. If you can do nothing but spew the words and ideology of Bob Avakian, along with stamping his name wherever possible, it is difficult to see you as anything separate. Maybe this is what you want.

Effectively what you are saying is that, "Bob&#39;s idea is to listen to people, to get a mix of ideas, and develop consistently new ideas from them." What you are left with is an uninspiring thought which is inherent in all of us. You take the face of the left and assume it is the creation of Bob. We are all here to listen to people and get a mix of ideas and develop them, we just don&#39;t feel the need to say it in every post.

You create something of a universal dogmatism in this sense, by attributing this single "revolutionary thinking" to Bob alone, as if no one could have thought for an instance about putting away as much dogmatism as possible and just trying to develop the ideas.

What I always found interesting about this, is how keen the RCP is to call itself Marxist-Leninist-Maoist, if indeed they are attempting to wash the dogma.

The fact is, I don&#39;t really get the RCP. I&#39;ve not read much, but what I have read (and listened to) from Bob is generally some of the weakest and most abstracted communist theory I&#39;ve ever heard. To have a constently developing ideology is as flawed as having a completely unwavering ideology. The second will never allow you to overcome any change, you will have no solution to any revelation, no matter how simple or serious. The first will be flawed in precisely the same way, not because you will not budge, but because you&#39;re too fluid.

I&#39;m not sure which side of that flaw Bob represent. From his written and spoken word I&#39;m given the impression it is the first. From his followers I&#39;m given the impression it is the second.

[anomaly]

Originally posted by [email protected] 27 2005, 06:53 AM

Actually I think that Mao&#39;s contributions stand on a level that was only previously matched by Marx and Lenin. Stalin, while he tried to continue on a leninist path, did not actually make new breakthroughs in the science of revolution -- and unfortunately actually took a number of things backwards, injecting a lot of mechanical materialism in the movement, going away from proletarian internationalism in a number of ways, etc.

Well, Stalin may not be as philosophical as Mao was, but, certainly he has done great in advancing Marxism-Leninism.

Ideologically, he defended Marxism-Leninism against the revisionism of Trotsky and others who tried to distort Marxism to favor their own "ideas".

Politically, Comrade Stalin pursued the establishment of Dictatorship of the Proletariat in the Soviet system as against the elitist, pure working class government that the revisionists wanted to establish (which will just serve to isolate the working class - proletariat - from the rest of the society). And defended Socialism against all kinds of Imperialist efforts at destroying Socialism.

Organizationally, Comrade Stalin strengthened party discipline and carried out and implemented Democratic Centralism in the party as opposed to ultra-democracy or extreme leftism of the revisionists.

In other words, Comrade Stalin was tireless in leading the Soviet society in building Socialism. There may have been some mistakes, but I think those mistakes were not very serious as compared to the foolishness the revisionists were trying to impose. And these mistakes are understandable since the Soviets do not have a model socialist society to look into. Even the Chinese Communist Party under Mao had mistakes. The CCP had made several rectification movements then to rectify those errors. Stalin did the same thing. Still, I can say that Stalin is as great as Marx, Engels, Lenin and Mao were in terms of advancing Socialism and the proletarian revolution.
You actually support Stalin? Stalin, the &#39;man of steel&#39;, was just a scared, cold human being who even allied himself with Hitler for a short while&#33; He was ideologically the weakest so-called MArxist to ever walk the planet. Much like Fidel Castro, Stalin really only wanted one thing-power. Lenin was a proponent of democracy, and so was his rightful successor Trotsky. Trotsky&#39;s thinking for himself, and against the imperial &#39;Communist Party&#39; that Stalin so terribly perverted, was why he was forced into exile. Stalin was a murderer, just like Hitler. As a true comrade, sonofrage, points out, Stalin was indeed the worst thing to happen to the communist movement. It&#39;s unbelievable that you support a man like Che Guevaro and at the same time call Stalin a &#39;comrade&#39;. Later in your post you say that Stalin&#39;s mistakes were not very serious when compared to the efforts of revisionists. So the murder of thousands isn&#39;t a big mistake? Quite frankly, it&#39;s people like you, idiotic Stalinists, who give Marxism and the modern anti-capitalist movement a bad name.

[red_che]

Anomaly: You actually support Stalin? Stalin, the &#39;man of steel&#39;, was just a scared, cold human being who even allied himself with Hitler for a short while&#33; He was ideologically the weakest so-called MArxist to ever walk the planet. Much like Fidel Castro, Stalin really only wanted one thing-power. Lenin was a proponent of democracy, and so was his rightful successor Trotsky. Trotsky&#39;s thinking for himself, and against the imperial &#39;Communist Party&#39; that Stalin so terribly perverted, was why he was forced into exile. Stalin was a murderer, just like Hitler. As a true comrade, sonofrage, points out, Stalin was indeed the worst thing to happen to the communist movement. It&#39;s unbelievable that you support a man like Che Guevaro and at the same time call Stalin a &#39;comrade&#39;. Later in your post you say that Stalin&#39;s mistakes were not very serious when compared to the efforts of revisionists. So the murder of thousands isn&#39;t a big mistake? Quite frankly, it&#39;s people like you, idiotic Stalinists, who give Marxism and the modern anti-capitalist movement a bad name.

You are entitled for what you think. But it doesn&#39;t mean you are correct. Let me remind you that Marx and the anarchists belonged together to the 1st Communist International when it was established. But being allied with them at a certain point and time does not make Marx the same as the anarchists. It is how you fought them against their ideas and actions. Stalin may have allied with the Nazis at a certain time, as you have said although I have not read of that kind of thing, in the end, he was the one who fiercelessly fought and defeated the Nazis.

If I support Stalin, it is because I believe that he defended Marxism-Leninism. No matter what kind of malicious attacks people like you may say, who is just following the capitalist propaganda that he masterminded the murder of thousands, I don&#39;t care for as long as I can see that what he did, he did it to defend Socialism against all those who are trying to sabotage it. And being supportive of Che Guevara does not necessarily make one to not support Stalin.

If revisionists like you would keep on insisting that Stalin was the worst thing to happen to the communist movement, I think of exactly the opposite, that you were the worst thing to happen to the communist movement and you were the ones who are stopping the progress of the international proletarian struggle.

[red_che]

Originally posted by DJ&#045;TC+May 27 2005, 07:15 PM--> (DJ&#045;TC &#064; May 27 2005, 07:15 PM)
[email protected] 27 2005, 06:53 AM
...ultra-democracy or extreme leftism of the revisionists.
:rolleyes: that about sums it up :lol:
"extreme leftism of the revisionists"...
Idiotic stalinists :D [/b]
When people can no longer present arguments to defend their points or do not have anymore to say, this is what they usally do, just become rude, arrogant and sarcastic. That shows their level of intelligence, no level at all. :lol:

[anomaly]

Originally posted by [email protected] 28 2005, 05:10 AM

Anomaly: You actually support Stalin? Stalin, the &#39;man of steel&#39;, was just a scared, cold human being who even allied himself with Hitler for a short while&#33; He was ideologically the weakest so-called MArxist to ever walk the planet. Much like Fidel Castro, Stalin really only wanted one thing-power. Lenin was a proponent of democracy, and so was his rightful successor Trotsky. Trotsky&#39;s thinking for himself, and against the imperial &#39;Communist Party&#39; that Stalin so terribly perverted, was why he was forced into exile. Stalin was a murderer, just like Hitler. As a true comrade, sonofrage, points out, Stalin was indeed the worst thing to happen to the communist movement. It&#39;s unbelievable that you support a man like Che Guevaro and at the same time call Stalin a &#39;comrade&#39;. Later in your post you say that Stalin&#39;s mistakes were not very serious when compared to the efforts of revisionists. So the murder of thousands isn&#39;t a big mistake? Quite frankly, it&#39;s people like you, idiotic Stalinists, who give Marxism and the modern anti-capitalist movement a bad name.

You are entitled for what you think. But it doesn&#39;t mean you are correct. Let me remind you that Marx and the anarchists belonged together to the 1st Communist International when it was established. But being allied with them at a certain point and time does not make Marx the same as the anarchists. It is how you fought them against their ideas and actions. Stalin may have allied with the Nazis at a certain time, as you have said although I have not read of that kind of thing, in the end, he was the one who fiercelessly fought and defeated the Nazis.

If I support Stalin, it is because I believe that he defended Marxism-Leninism. No matter what kind of malicious attacks people like you may say, who is just following the capitalist propaganda that he masterminded the murder of thousands, I don&#39;t care for as long as I can see that what he did, he did it to defend Socialism against all those who are trying to sabotage it. And being supportive of Che Guevara does not necessarily make one to not support Stalin.

If revisionists like you would keep on insisting that Stalin was the worst thing to happen to the communist movement, I think of exactly the opposite, that you were the worst thing to happen to the communist movement and you were the ones who are stopping the progress of the international proletarian struggle.
Stalin was a murderer&#33; How anyone can support such a man is beyond me. He perverted Marxism, and nearly destroyed the entire Soviet economy by spending all money generated on his red army. It is obvious that the man wanted only power. And yet you call me a revisionist. You have a distorted view of what the dictatorship of the proletariat actually is. It is the rule of one class, not one man. Stalin obviously failed to recognize this, as do you. To sum it up, you can either be a Stalinist or a socialist, you cannot be both because they are completely different. You must realize that such tyrannical socialism does not empower the working class but opresses them. I want to empower the working class which is why I am a supporter of democracy, or rule of the majority. One cannot run a planned economy by having a vanguard tell the working class what to produce. It simply doesn&#39;t work. Stalin was a moral, economic, and social disaster. I certainly hope that you are the only Stalinist in this, an otherwise respectable, forum.

[Lamanov]

Oh? I have no arguments? Against a stalinist? :D :P :lol:

You better behave nicely kid.

[RedStarOverChina]

Flyby, I find ur thread inspiring but that is only because I already agree with ur message and I dont have a problem with Bob Avakian.

But there are alot of people who aren&#39;t like me, and you have to present your argument cleverly so they don&#39;t think you are brainwashed.

People automatically assume that when you give them the impression u worship a leader like a god(even tho that might not be the case). The sterotypical image of communists worshipping leaders must be avoided.

[anomaly]

Originally posted by DJ&#045;[email protected] 29 2005, 12:33 AM
Oh? I have no arguments? Against a stalinist? :D :P :lol:

You better behave nicely kid.
Don&#39;t let it bother you. The Stalinist is obviously confused. But I do now realize that this forum is not quite what I expected, therefore I must ask: Who here more closely follow or idolize Stalin and Mao and who, like me, more idolize and follow Lenin and Trotsky?

[NovelGentry]

I think Stalin was an idiot and I think Trotsky was senile, how bout I reject the whole of the Bolshevik movement and start over?

[Lamanov]

Originally posted by [email protected] 29 2005, 05:29 PM
I think Stalin was an idiot and I think Trotsky was senile, how bout I reject the whole of the Bolshevik movement and start over?

Healthy thinking.

Allthough I might have accepted some of Trotsky&#39;s theories -- I could never call myself a "trotskyist" symply because of the whole &#39;in-defence-of-Lenin&#39; bull*.
Soon as you enter into each one of these -isms, you loose touch with most important -ism of all ;) , if you know what I mean.

By becoming a dogmat, you fail to be a marxist.
You might accept PR-theory, or Lenin&#39;s contribution with his theory of imperialism, but when you accept the boshevik practice and formulations as a whole you soon lose touch with ...well... reality..

[El_Revolucionario]

Maoism = totalitarian capitalism masquerading as communism

[anomaly]

Originally posted by DJ&#045;TC+May 29 2005, 07:19 PM--> (DJ-TC @ May 29 2005, 07:19 PM)
[email protected] 29 2005, 05:29 PM
I think Stalin was an idiot and I think Trotsky was senile, how bout I reject the whole of the Bolshevik movement and start over?

Healthy thinking.

Allthough I might have accepted some of Trotsky&#39;s theories -- I could never call myself a "trotskyist" symply because of the whole &#39;in-defence-of-Lenin&#39; bull*.
Soon as you enter into each one of these -isms, you loose touch with most important -ism of all ;) , if you know what I mean.

By becoming a dogmat, you fail to be a marxist.
You might accept PR-theory, or Lenin&#39;s contribution with his theory of imperialism, but when you accept the boshevik practice and formulations as a whole you soon lose touch with ...well... reality.. [/b]
Well said, which is why I was careful not to put any &#39;isms&#39; on those names. Basically, I ask who respects Lenin and Trotsky more and who respects Stalin and Mao more? I am encouraged by your responses. For a minute there I was fearing that this was a mostly Stalinist site. I&#39;m glad most of you think the way I do of Stalin and Mao.

[NovelGentry]

I&#39;m glad most of you think the way I do of Stalin and Mao.

While most here may think that way, I have little doubt that I personally think quite differently than you.

[RedStarOverChina]

Me also. Though I am not sure about Stalin.

[anomaly]

Perhaps the two opposing sides will just have to learn to cooperate, in order to effectively combat the capitalists....I may have my personal opinions but I also hope we two opposing sides may be able to see through our differences and to the fact that we really want much the same thing. We must become allies now, seeing that though we oppose each other to a degree, we each greatly oppose a much larger enemy to a much larger degree: the capitalist rulers of this world. After some thought, perhaps this debate over old historical figures is not as beneficial as I originally thought. I hope that now we two sides can agree on such an alliance as has been described here.

[RedStarOverChina]

THAT i agree with you. Leftists seem to enjoy making enemies out of their friends.

[guerillablack]

Not everyone is your friend because you are leftists.

[red_che]

QUOTE (DJ-TC @ May 28 2005, 11:26 AM)
Fuck off red_che. Nobody&#39;s reading your stalinist bullshit
When I want to debate bonapartist reactionaries i just go to OI.

getting pissed-off? :lol: why? that&#39;s not a good sign of your being a marxist(or... are you really a marxist?) :P . marxists are patient and would explain to everyone its points no matter who they are debating with. marxists debate on issues not on personalities. :angry:

[SonofRage]

Originally posted by [email protected] 1 2005, 05:40 AM


getting pissed-off? :lol: why? that&#39;s not a good sign of your being a marxist(or... are you really a marxist?) :P . marxists are patient and would explain to everyone its points no matter who they are debating with. marxists debate on issues not on personalities. :angry:
I&#39;m not a Marxist...but Marxism is not a religion. It&#39;s absurd to ascribe certain moral characteristics to all Marxists.

[flyby]

hmmm.

Well, i think there is a morality that emerges from our goals and vision. (And I also think, somewhat in contrast to red-che&#39;s remarks, that communists do get pissed off -- at the system of course, but also sometimes at the backwardness of the masses and other revolutionaries. But as red-che says, correctly, we need to have a method and style of work that is patient with our brothers and sisters -- that puts an arm around the shoulder, even while we struggle HARD for what is necessary and correct.)

And while our politics should not simply be forged out of a moral outrage, i believe that if you want a new world you need to discuss what kind of morality you stand for -- and you need to raise it in sharp opposition to the fucked up reactionary morality of this society and the christian fascists who rant about their traditional values.

We need to have a morality of internationalism, of loving each other, of opposing oppression, of solidarity. A morality of equality between men and women. A morality that respects the views of other people, and seeks to learn from the insights and experiences of people.

In particular, i learned a lot from this sweeping discussion of Communist Morality vs. Bibical Morality (http://rwor.org/a/1240/bamorality.htm) where it said:

"The basis for communist morality is contained, in a concentrated way, in what Maoists refer to as the "4 Alls." This is drawn from the summary by Marx of what the communist revolution aims for and leads to: the abolition of all class distinctions (or "class distinctions generally"); the abolition of all the relations of production on which these class distinctions rest; the abolition of all the social relations that correspond to these relations of production; and the revolutionizing of all the ideas that result from these social relations. (See "The Class Struggles in France, 1848 to 1850.") This provides the basic principle underlying communist morality and the basic standard for determining what is and what is not in accordance with communist morality: Whatever conforms to and contributes to these "4 Alls" is consistent with communist morality; whatever does not is opposed to, and opposed by, communist morality."

[Sa&#39;d al-Bari]

According to Marxists.org… (http://www.marxists.org/glossary/terms/m/a.htm#maoism)

These are the most distinct components of Maoism:

1) Guerrilla warfare/People’s War: The armed branch of the party must not be distinct from the masses. To conduct a successful revolution the needs and demands of the masses must be the most important issues.

2) New democracy: In backward countries socialism cannot be introduced before the country has gone through a period in which the material conditions are improved. This cannot be done by the bourgeoisie, as its progressive character is long since replaced by a regressive character.

3) Contradictions as the most important feature of society: Society is dominated of a wide range of contradictions. As these are different of nature, they must also be handled in different ways. The most important divide is the divide between contradictions among the masses and contradictions between the masses and their enemies. Also the socialist institutions are plagued with contradictions, and these contradictions must not be suppressed as they were during Stalin.

4) Cultural revolution: Bourgeois ideology is not wiped out by the revolution; the class-struggle continues, and even intensifies, during socialism. Therefore an instant struggle against these ideologies and their social roots must be conducted.

5) Theory of three worlds: During the cold war two imperialist states formed the “first world”; the USA and the Soviet Union. The second world consisted of the other imperialist states in their spheres of influence. The third world consisted of the non-imperialist countries. Both the first and the second world exploit the third world, but the first world is the most aggressive part. The workers in the first and second world are “bought up” by imperialism, preventing socialist revolution. The people of the third world, on the other hand, have not even a short-sighted interest in the prevailing circumstances. Hence revolution is most likely to appear in third world countries, which again will weaken imperialism opening up for revolutions in other countries too.
____________________

Maoism, from my view point seems to be primarily Marxism-Leninism as applied to the conditions Mao was faced with, with emphasis being placed on facets that had not been fully elaborated by previous theoreticians.

For instance, consider the following:

First component: There is not really much distinct here. This conclusion could easily follow logically from the ideas of worker’s militia, and the idea of keeping the party and state apparatuses subordinate to the masses.

Second component: Marx and Lenin argued that Socialism develops out of capitalism, according to and continuing from the conditions created during Capitalism. Therefore, developing the material conditions necessary to create Socialism is only logical, and can be regarded as implicit in Marxist theory.

Third component: Contradictions have long been understood by Marx in a somewhat similar sense. It seems that Mao simply emphasized this point.

Fourth component: Class struggle continuing after the revolution was most definitely understood by Lenin. He argued that the resistance of the bourgeoisie increases tenfold following the bourgeoisie’s removal from power, and argued for the Dictatorship of the Proletariat primarily based the need to expropriate the capitalists.

Fifth component: Whether or not this was newly introduced by Mao is debatable. Previous theoreticians recognized that the stretching of imperialism and resulting contradictions would result in imperialism being broken at the point of the “weakest link in the chain”. It seems quite clear that this is most applicable to the third world. As for workers being “brought up” by imperialism in the first and second worlds, this seems to be basically an application of Gramsci’s theory of Cultural Hegemony. The way he looked this situation seems rather unique, but it not new enough to constitute a radical ideological supplementation.

Thus, Maoism comes off primarily as emphasis on particular points to Marxist-Leninist theory. It is not new development that introduces entirely new aspects to previous theory, so as Leninism definitely added new elements to Marxism to justify the creation of Marxism-Leninism as something new, the same can not be said for Maoism.

[Poum_1936]

4) Cultural revolution: Bourgeois ideology is not wiped out by the revolution; the class-struggle continues, and even intensifies, during socialism. Therefore an instant struggle against these ideologies and their social roots must be conducted.

Flyby, you seem like a well read Maoist. Mao&#39;s cultural revolution, did it intend to create a "proletarian art" prolecult are whatever its called? For instance, getting rid of bourgeois music such as classical. I hear playing violins and such was outlawed during the cultural revolution. Or was this bourgeois nonsense?

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

My major problem with the RCPers -- besides the major theoretical flaws -- is the fact that it seems they can NEVER debate any point without pointing to one of Bob Avakian&#39;s &#39;sweeping and profound&#39; works. Flyby is a perfect representation of this.

But onward they say (to a Maoist revolution based in the non-existant peasantry which will develop an economy already fully developed to make way for socialism in the US)&#33;&#33;

[1949]

Originally posted by [email protected] 2 2005, 02:53 PM
But onward they say (to a Maoist revolution based in the non-existant peasantry which will develop an economy already fully developed to make way for socialism in the US)&#33;&#33;
Do me a favor: if you are going to debate the positions of the RCP--or anyone, for that matter--debate their actual positions. Distorting and falsifying people&#39;s positions is an unprincipled method that does not help us get from where we are to where we are going.

The RCP will be the first ones to admit that there is no peasantry in the U.S. Much of their time has been spent tackling the thorny problem of how, using the science of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, to make revolution in imperialist nations--which is hard to do, since there is very little historical experience with communist movements in imperialist nations that rose above economism, reformism and all sorts of other revisionism.

Militarily, the RCP sees the coming revolution in the U.S. as more similar to the path the Bolsheviks took in Russia than to the path the Maoists took in China. There is an important section of part two of their Draft Programme, under the heading “Revolution Means Waging People’s War,” subheading “One World Revolution—Two Basic Paths,” outlining the basic differences between one-stage revolution through armed insurrection followed by civil war (the path in imperialist nations) and two-stage revolution through protracted people’s war (the path in semi-feudal, semi-colonial nations):

“In the oppressed nations the basic path to power is protracted people’s war, a path forged by Mao Tsetung in leading the Chinese revolution to victory. Mao recognized it was possible in the oppressed nations for the revolutionary forces to take up the task of armed struggle as the main form of struggle from the beginning. Through a protracted period of armed struggle, the revolutionaries could gradually build up their armed forces and establish revolutionary base areas where the masses begin to exercise power. As the balance of forces shifts in favor of the revolutionary forces, and when the revolutionary forces have in large part encircled the cities, then war can be waged to seize the cities, deliver the decisive defeat to the counter-revolutionary forces and liberate the whole country.

“This is possible because generally, in the oppressed nations, the development of the economy, under the domination of imperialism, is highly uneven—with only a few “enclaves” characterized by “advanced technology,” while the general character of the economy is backward, semi-feudal and not well integrated and articulated. The masses of people are in desperate conditions all the time, and in the countryside there are large numbers of brutally exploited peasants who can be the main force in waging and supporting the revolutionary war. And the backward and isolated state of much of the countryside can actually be turned into a strength of the revolution—the basis for relatively self-sufficient base areas serving as the backbone of the protracted people’s war.

“Further, in these oppressed nations generally the central government’s authority and ability to “impose order” does not extend in a uniform and powerful way throughout the country. In addition, the roads, means of communication, etc., are unevenly developed. For these reasons, the ruling classes are not able to quickly concentrate and coordinate massive forces in all parts of the country and crush the people’s war.

“In imperialist countries, the revolutionary road is, of necessity, different. The conditions in the imperialist states are generally ones where the grip of the ruling class on society is centralized in a strong national government and at the same time is powerfully and fairly uniformly extended throughout the country. The level of technology, including means of transportation and communication, is highly developed. Except in situations of serious crisis, the ruling class can concentrate massive armed force in any particular place—or even in a number of places—within a short period of time.

“And, generally, while in these countries there are large numbers of proletarians and others whose daily conditions cry out for a radical change, there are also significant sections of the people, particularly in the middle class, who face such conditions only in times of extreme crisis. In ordinary times in the imperialist countries, the conditions for launching a revolutionary war do not exist.
“In these countries, the launching of the revolutionary war depends on the eruption of a revolutionary crisis in society as a whole, including serious dissension and contention within the ranks of the ruling class over how to rule and “maintain control.” Further, revolutionary war must rely on a revolutionary people—proletarians, and other oppressed people, in a combative mood, busting loose in massive upheaval, where increasing numbers of them are ready to “put it on the line” for a different future. And there must be large sections of middle strata no longer willing to accept the ruling class’ program, and who could potentially be won over as allies to the revolutionary cause.

“Building on all the political organizing and the struggle of the masses that has taken place during the entire period preceding the development of the revolutionary situation, the party can lead the masses to seize on the eruption of such a revolutionary crisis: to forge a revolutionary army and to wage a revolutionary war. This war must take the form of mass armed insurrections—in a number of major cities, at relatively the same time—leading to the establishment of a revolutionary regime in as much of the territory as possible, and then the waging of civil war to finally and completely defeat the old ruling class and its counterrevolutionary forces and consolidate the new revolutionary power over a much greater territory.”

full Draft Programme, and several articles about it, available online here: http://rwor.org/s/programme_e.htm

Why Flyby failed to point this out in a different thread where you made a similar distortion of the RCP’s views, I do not know. Perhaps he/she is simply more confident than I am in the ability of the masses here at RL to see through your dishonesty.

I have more I would like to say on why it is necessary to promote Bob Avakian, as well as some critical remarks on Red_Che’s views on Stalin, but I shall stop here for now. I&#39;ll try to finish later.

[bolshevik butcher]

Do maoists believe that china was actually maoist when mao was in chrage?

[1949]

Yes.

articles on China: http://rwor.org/s/china.htm

[bolshevik butcher]

Mao is hostries biggest killer, 38 million died in the freat leap forward alone.

[RedStarOverChina]

thanx for blowing things out of proportion.

the CIA estimation is 30 million. U know, u should work for them.

[bolshevik butcher]

Originally posted by [email protected] 4 2005, 11:08 PM
thanx for blowing things out of proportion.

the CIA estimation is 30 million. U know, u should work for them.
Was a figure from moscow documents from chinese documnets actually&#33; And i suppsoe if it was 30million it would all be ok? Oh yeh i already am working for them, your all gonna get rounded up soon.

[RedStarOverChina]

Dont rush to turn me in. I was merely pointing out the fact that u are even better than CIA at blowing things out of proportion.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

Originally posted by 1949
Do me a favor: if you are going to debate the positions of the RCP--or anyone, for that matter--debate their actual positions. Distorting and falsifying people&#39;s positions is an unprincipled method that does not help us get from where we are to where we are going.

Do me a favor: Never, EVER compare where the RCP wants to go to where us communists are headed.

The main features of Maoism are: (1)Guerrilla Warfare/People&#39;s War: Obviously not applicable to the conditions of the United States. (2)New Democracy: a period of developing the material conditions to make way for socialism No need to develop the conditions in the US, the US is already an advanced nation, once again obviously doesn&#39;t apply to the conditions of the US (3) Contradictions as the most important feature of society: Nothing but Eastern Mysticism and metaphysics added to the theory of dialectics (4) Cultural revolution: I think we&#39;ve all seen the results of this great historical mistake&#33; If the material conditions TRULY change, so will the culture, with no metaphysics neccessary (5) Theory of three worlds: Says that revolution will happen in the third world first, and that it won&#39;t happen in the Imperialist nations until it does throughout the third world So are we communists to sit around and wait for this, "supporting" these struggles? What&#39;s the line here?

The truth is, the RCP plans for a &#39;people&#39;s war&#39;, not for the proletariat taking power. ie. Revolution over Revolutionary Worker, although this is just one example of many. The RCP isn&#39;t even advanced in comparison with the backwards and reactionary sections of the "left" ie. Claiming Homosexuality was &#39;bourgeois&#39; until recently (After persistant and harsh criticism from the left). Maoism is not Marxism, but rather a complete deviation from the scientific theory of Marx and Engels. Marx spoke of socialism as the &#39;next phase&#39; of society, after capitalism had &#39;burnt out&#39; and the proletariat took control of the means of production in it&#39;s own interest. The plans for a small vanguard of &#39;advanced&#39; communists to take power &#39;in the name of the people&#39; and place it into the hands of Bob Avakian illustrates this completely.

edited for spelling corrections.

[1949]

Originally posted by CompaneroDeLibertad+Jun 5 2005, 05:46 PM--> (CompaneroDeLibertad &#064; Jun 5 2005, 05:46 PM) The main features of Maoism are: (1)Guerrilla Warfare/People&#39;s War: Obviously not applicable to the conditions of the United States. (2)New Democracy: a period of developing the material conditions to make way for socialism No need to develop the conditions in the US, the US is already an advanced nation, once again obviously doesn&#39;t apply to the conditions of the US [/b]
Great job ignoring almost everything I said.


me
The RCP will be the first ones to admit that there is no peasantry in the U.S. Much of their time has been spent tackling the thorny problem of how, using the science of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, to make revolution in imperialist nations--which is hard to do, since there is very little historical experience with communist movements in imperialist nations that rose above economism, reformism and all sorts of other revisionism.

Militarily, the RCP sees the coming revolution in the U.S. as more similar to the path the Bolsheviks took in Russia than to the path the Maoists took in China. There is an important section of part two of their Draft Programme, under the heading “Revolution Means Waging People’s War,” subheading “One World Revolution—Two Basic Paths,” outlining the basic differences between one-stage revolution through armed insurrection followed by civil war (the path in imperialist nations) and two-stage revolution through protracted people’s war (the path in semi-feudal, semi-colonial nations):

“In the oppressed nations the basic path to power is protracted people’s war, a path forged by Mao Tsetung in leading the Chinese revolution to victory. Mao recognized it was possible in the oppressed nations for the revolutionary forces to take up the task of armed struggle as the main form of struggle from the beginning. Through a protracted period of armed struggle, the revolutionaries could gradually build up their armed forces and establish revolutionary base areas where the masses begin to exercise power. As the balance of forces shifts in favor of the revolutionary forces, and when the revolutionary forces have in large part encircled the cities, then war can be waged to seize the cities, deliver the decisive defeat to the counter-revolutionary forces and liberate the whole country.

“This is possible because generally, in the oppressed nations, the development of the economy, under the domination of imperialism, is highly uneven—with only a few “enclaves” characterized by “advanced technology,” while the general character of the economy is backward, semi-feudal and not well integrated and articulated. The masses of people are in desperate conditions all the time, and in the countryside there are large numbers of brutally exploited peasants who can be the main force in waging and supporting the revolutionary war. And the backward and isolated state of much of the countryside can actually be turned into a strength of the revolution—the basis for relatively self-sufficient base areas serving as the backbone of the protracted people’s war.

“Further, in these oppressed nations generally the central government’s authority and ability to “impose order” does not extend in a uniform and powerful way throughout the country. In addition, the roads, means of communication, etc., are unevenly developed. For these reasons, the ruling classes are not able to quickly concentrate and coordinate massive forces in all parts of the country and crush the people’s war.

“In imperialist countries, the revolutionary road is, of necessity, different. The conditions in the imperialist states are generally ones where the grip of the ruling class on society is centralized in a strong national government and at the same time is powerfully and fairly uniformly extended throughout the country. The level of technology, including means of transportation and communication, is highly developed. Except in situations of serious crisis, the ruling class can concentrate massive armed force in any particular place—or even in a number of places—within a short period of time.

“And, generally, while in these countries there are large numbers of proletarians and others whose daily conditions cry out for a radical change, there are also significant sections of the people, particularly in the middle class, who face such conditions only in times of extreme crisis. In ordinary times in the imperialist countries, the conditions for launching a revolutionary war do not exist.
“In these countries, the launching of the revolutionary war depends on the eruption of a revolutionary crisis in society as a whole, including serious dissension and contention within the ranks of the ruling class over how to rule and “maintain control.” Further, revolutionary war must rely on a revolutionary people—proletarians, and other oppressed people, in a combative mood, busting loose in massive upheaval, where increasing numbers of them are ready to “put it on the line” for a different future. And there must be large sections of middle strata no longer willing to accept the ruling class’ program, and who could potentially be won over as allies to the revolutionary cause.

“Building on all the political organizing and the struggle of the masses that has taken place during the entire period preceding the development of the revolutionary situation, the party can lead the masses to seize on the eruption of such a revolutionary crisis: to forge a revolutionary army and to wage a revolutionary war. This war must take the form of mass armed insurrections—in a number of major cities, at relatively the same time—leading to the establishment of a revolutionary regime in as much of the territory as possible, and then the waging of civil war to finally and completely defeat the old ruling class and its counterrevolutionary forces and consolidate the new revolutionary power over a much greater territory.”

full Draft Programme, and several articles about it, available online here: http://rwor.org/s/programme_e.htm

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

I wasn&#39;t ignoring it, I was pointing out the main characteristics of Maoism, to show that they don&#39;t apply to the material conditions in the United States. The RCP is Maoist right?

Basicially the RCP tries to &#39;correct&#39; and &#39;adapt&#39; them to the conditions of the US, but the obviously question is, if none of the pillars of Maoism apply to the US, then why Maoism in the United States???

[redwinter]

We don&#39;t have to adapt anything about what Mao said about revolution in imperialist countries to the conditions in the US, because what he said about imperialist countries is one thing and oppressed countries is another thing.


Why Maoism in the US, and the world in general?

Because Mao took the theories of Marx and Lenin and other communist thinkers and came up with a new, higher synthesis of communist theory. All of the things you mentioned (besides the Three Worlds Theory, which is often incorrectly attributed to Mao but was actually a fabrication by Deng Xiaopeng and other revisionists in the Chinese Communist Party) are indeed important contributions of Mao, but that&#39;s certainly not all of them- not by any stretch&#33; Military theory, including Mao&#39;s theory of protracted people&#39;s war, was one great contribution and a subject that Mao wrote more than maybe any other communist theorist. As far as the Cultural Revolution, I don&#39;t think that that whole period of several years of intense society-wide ideological and political struggle can be encapsulated in a statement like, "I think we&#39;ve all seen the results of this great historical mistake&#33; If the material conditions TRULY change, so will the culture, with no metaphysics neccessary."

This leads to another of Mao&#39;s important contributions - that within the Communist Party itself, during socialism, there exists the tendency for a new bourgeoisie to emerge within the party leadership because of the contradiction between the party and the masses, the leadership and the led. So not only is there the old, expropriated or semi-expropriated bourgeoisie and its backward ideas that we must struggle against (as Lenin and Stalin correctly recognized) but there is also this new bourgeoisie emerging within the party that has to be fought against, which Mao recognized as the reason for capitalist restoration in the USSR as well as the growing power of these capitalist-roaders (aka revisionists) in China itself.


To get back to your original question, this whole theory of combating the bourgeoisie in the party is in itself one big reason why communists in the US cannot ignore or brush aside the contributions of Mao. If we fail to recognize the struggle against revisionism then we will fall into the same errors that ultimately caused the USSR to fall back into the capitalist road.

But this brief, brief summary I&#39;ve given even of this one contribution by Mao barely does it any justice. I really recommend you do some further reading on the subject, by checking out the actual works of Mao himself.

[bolshevik butcher]

Did anyone see unmasking mao? It was an interesting programme.

[1949]

Red Winter took the words out of my mouth to a large extent. Although, to be fair, I wouldn&#39;t say the Three Worlds Theory was entirely a creation of the revisionists. Bob Avakian pointed out in Conquer The World? and other places that sometimes, such as in the polemics against the Soviet revisionists, the CCP had a tendency to make out U.S. imperialism to be the primary enemy of the world&#39;s people--which it was, I grant--but then make an incorrect leap from that basis to encouraging the revolutionaries in the "lesser" imperialist nations (the "second world") to take up the national banner against those particular monopoly capitalists which sold out the "national interest" to the U.S, instead of targetting the entirety of "their own" bourgeoisie. I found this particularly striking in "Is Yugoslavia a Socialist Country?," when the CCP spoke of the Japanese people&#39;s "patriotic struggle" against U.S. occupation. (Of course, ten years later, when Soviet social-imperialism became the biggest external threat to the proletariat in power in China, the CCP inverted their old line and now said the Soviet Union was the primary threat to the world revolution--which we could have an entirely different discussion about.) I also think the way Red Winter phrases his explanation of Mao&#39;s contributions in the field of military strategy might be misinterpreted as saying that protracted people&#39;s war is the strategy for proletarian revolution in the developed nations, which is what I was initally arguing against in this thread. I don&#39;t think this is what he meant, though.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

Bob Avakian has &#39;pointed out&#39; everything hasn&#39;t he?

In truth, the main issue -- which remains unaddressed (or at least it hasn&#39;t been sufficient to resolve the issue) -- is Maoism&#39;s split with actual communist theory&#33;

The Maoists base themselves theoretically off of a rejection of the most basic principal of communism(&#33;), that the working class is the only truly revolutionary class. Maoism, in fact, rejects the KEY role of the working class in favor of a doctrine of a revolution created by the classless &#39;people&#39;(?) -- thus rejecting the essence of the class struggle&#33;

Maoism has a track record of complete failure, even when it wins -- it creates an atmosphere of acceptable exploitation of the workers by petty bourgeois leadership (ala Bob Avakian).

[redwinter]

Originally posted by [email protected] 9 2005, 01:09 AM

Bob Avakian has &#39;pointed out&#39; everything hasn&#39;t he?

In truth, the main issue -- which remains unaddressed (or at least it hasn&#39;t been sufficient to resolve the issue) -- is Maoism&#39;s split with actual communist theory&#33;

The Maoists base themselves theoretically off of a rejection of the most basic principal of communism(&#33;), that the working class is the only truly revolutionary class. Maoism, in fact, rejects the KEY role of the working class in favor of a doctrine of a revolution created by the classless &#39;people&#39;(?) -- thus rejecting the essence of the class struggle&#33;

Maoism has a track record of complete failure, even when it wins -- it creates an atmosphere of acceptable exploitation of the workers by petty bourgeois leadership (ala Bob Avakian).
I think you are misrepresenting the beliefs of Maoists, Companero.

"Our enemies are all those in league with imperialism - the warlords, the bureaucrats, the comprador class, the big Landlord class and the teactionary section of the intelligentsia attached to them. The leading force in our revolution is the industrial proletariat. Our closest friends are the entire semi-proletariat and petty bourgeoisie. As for the vacillating middle bourgeoisie, their right-wing may become our enemy and their left-wing may become our friend - but we must be constantly on our guard and not let them create confusion within our ranks."

--Mao Tse Tung, "Analysis of Classes in Chinese Society" [emphasis added]


Still care to say that Maoists reject the key role of the working class? Shit, why do you think Mao wrote an analysis of classes in Chinese society if he was "in favor of a doctrine of a revolution created by the classless &#39;people&#39;" as you suggest?

"Classes struggle, some classes triumph, others are eliminated. Such is history, such is the history of civilization for thousands of years. To interpret history from this viewpoint is historical materialism; standing in opposition to this viewpoint is historical idealism."
--Mao Tse Tung, "Cast Away Illusions, Prepare for Struggle" [emphasis added]

So, Maoists also reject class struggle, eh? I&#39;m not even going to any obscure writings of Mao to find these quotes. Both are in Chapter 2 of the Little Red Book.

As for your claim that Maoism has a track record of complete failure -- I don&#39;t think so. Among other things, in China Maoists doubled the life expectancy in a few years after the revolution (from the low 30s to the mid 60s), got tens of millions of opium addicts clean, carried out land-to-the-tiller policies and actually allowed people to grow food on available land and not have to give it all to a rapacious landlord while they starved (want even more examples?: http://rwor.org/a/1248/mao_china_setting_r...d_straight.htm) (http://rwor.org/a/1248/mao_china_setting_record_straight.htm)). Maoists worldwide are either carrying out people&#39;s war or preparing for people&#39;s war; in Nepal nearly the entire country is under Maoist control and has already begun to see a few of the benefits of land redistribution and other aspects of new-democracy and socialism. So when Maoists lead the people and the people win, it is a success and a victory worth fighting for. Hardly some kind of "petty bourgeois leadership exploiting the workers" -- both Mao and Bob Avakian have fiercely fought to expose the new bourgeoisie that emerged in the Chinese Communist Party and also within the communist movement as a whole. Maoists fight for all the way revolution and an elimination of all forms of exploitation and oppression.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

"Actions speak louder than words" -- I, like most people, am not impressed by Mao&#39;s rhetoric, in case you missed it, I&#39;m not a Maoist.

Mao was a peasant and Bob Avakian comes from a petty bourgeois background if I&#39;m not mistaken. Traditional class characteristics of &#39;great leader&#39;s&#39;.

According to Marx, emancipating the working class is the work of the WORKING CLASS ITSELF.

ps. The &#39;&#39;beliefs of Maoists&#39;&#39; seems to be the correct terminology for what you all uphold -- seeing as it is just that &#39;belief&#39; and not knowledge based in material reality.

[redwinter]

So you&#39;re "not impressed with Mao&#39;s rhetoric": so what does that have to do with your assertion that "The Maoists base themselves theoretically off of a rejection of the most basic principal of communism(&#33;), that the working class is the only truly revolutionary class," as you wrote, which I showed was incorrect in my previous post?

Yeah, Mao was a peasant and Bob Avakian came from the middle class (as did Marx). Engels was a bourgeois factory owner. Does it make their ideas or leadership any less relevant?

"According to Marx, emancipating the working class is the work of the WORKING CLASS ITSELF."
Indeed, that&#39;s why it hasn&#39;t happened already. Just because we got leaders like Mao and Bob Avakian doesn&#39;t mean that the working class is automatically liberated or something -- their mere existence does not do that. Taking up their theory and putting it into practice is the important thing - the key factor in making revolution and leading the emancipation of humanity from class society. And this will happen when the party of the proletariat, the communist party, leads a broad united front of classes under its leadership to take state power and exercise a dictatorship over the bourgeoisie.

In one sense, in China and Russia, it was the working class emancipating themselves. But they could never have done it without the guiding theories of the revolutionary leadership. And in my opinion, the same is true today with regards to Bob Avakian -- that&#39;s why I think it&#39;s important to be popularizing him, his leadership and his body of work. If the working class never had a Marx to first come up with Marxism, maybe eventually someone else would have come to the same conclusions. But we should value the fact that Marx (a petit bourgeois intellectual) did come along and came up with his theories.

[romanm]

The most important part of being a Maoist in North America is recognizing that there is no significant Amerikkkan nor white proletariat.

[redwinter]

Originally posted by [email protected] 9 2005, 07:14 AM
The most important part of being a Maoist in North America is recognizing that there is no significant Amerikkkan nor white proletariat.
Your statement is kind of confusing, but let&#39;s get into it. So you mean that there are no proletarians in the USA, and no proletarians in the world that has white skin?

On both counts I&#39;d say you&#39;re extremely incorrect. There are a lot of people in the USA with "nothing to lose but their chains," people living from paycheck to paycheck without any money saved up or put into capital or investments. I know that millions of service industry workers and agricultural workers get wages below a living wage (not to say there aren&#39;t millions in other industries). The vast majority of these people living paycheck to paycheck often can barely pay the bills for rent, clothing, food and transportation to their jobs, plus taking care of their kids if they have any - truly what Marx called being paid just enough to sustain the proletarian&#39;s labor and bring up the new generation of proletarians. It&#39;s becoming a privilege to have healthcare in this country with something like 50 million people without it - and these aren&#39;t the rich people without healthcare. So yeah, there is a huge proletariat in the USA numbering millions -certainly "significant" to me. Remember, what is the proletariat? The class that has to sell its labor power to live in exchange for a wage, in contrast to the bourgeoisie which owns the means of production and employs other people for their labor power. If these people I&#39;m referring to in the US stop working, they die. It&#39;s as simple as that.

Now, are any of the proletarians in the world white? This question is almost too ridiculous to consider. Hundreds of millions of white proletarians exist, they are all over the world- in the US, Canada, Latin America, Europe, the ex-USSR, the Middle East, and Australia and New Zealand. For the US I know you can look up the statistics of who is living in the housing projects, who is receiving welfare benefits from the state (the majority are white), and looking at the income distribution by race - plenty of whites make below &#036;10,000 a year. None of these things is a straight up indicator of "oh, there are X number of white or black or asian or hispanic proletarians" but it points to the trend that yeah, there are plenty of white people that do not own capital or have investments and have to work for a boss to live. For other countries, I don&#39;t know where to find this information specifically, but I&#39;m sure the proletarians constitute an even bigger part of the population.

But anyway, your claims of there being no white proletariat or no proletariat in the US have nothing to do with Maoism. For example, Mao himself wrote about the US, "In the final analysis, national struggle is a matter of class struggle. Among the whites in the United States it is only the reactionary ruling circles who oppress the black people. They can in no way represent the workers, farmers, revolutionary intellectuals and other enlightened persons who comprise the overwhelming majority of the white people." This was in the Quotations of Chairman Mao Tse Tung. There have been volumes written about the nature of the US and the nature of the international proletariat - you should check out the Draft Programme of the RCP for more information on both questions of who is the US proletariat and what must be done about national oppression.

[romanm]

I am not interested in getting into a little tit for tat with an RCP-U&#036;A supporter. You may or may not be aware of it, but this debate has happened so many times that it isn&#39;t really worth having again. You can familiarize yourself with the Maoist position by clicking on the link below.

The Maoist criticism of RCP-U&#036;A is widley available on various forums and here. (http://www.etext.org/Politics/MIM/wim/wyl/crypto.html)

For others who are interested in Maoism. I suggest checking out MIM. (http://www.etext.org/Politics/MIM)

Also, we have a new forum that will be opening shortly to discuss various topics from a Maoist perspective. It will be a very good resource for people who wish to learn about Maoism. The site is It&#39;s Right to Rebel&#33; forums. (http://marxleninmao.proboards43.com)

[redwinter]

Romanm: If you&#39;re not interested in debating, then don&#39;t get into the debate. If you can&#39;t handle the heat, you better get out of the kitchen. Don&#39;t just use the discussion as an excuse to make a one-line comment, publicize your websites and then leave the debate.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

Originally posted by [email protected] 9 2005, 05:28 AM
So you&#39;re "not impressed with Mao&#39;s rhetoric": so what does that have to do with your assertion that "The Maoists base themselves theoretically off of a rejection of the most basic principal of communism(&#33;), that the working class is the only truly revolutionary class," as you wrote, which I showed was incorrect in my previous post?

Yeah, Mao was a peasant and Bob Avakian came from the middle class (as did Marx). Engels was a bourgeois factory owner. Does it make their ideas or leadership any less relevant?

"According to Marx, emancipating the working class is the work of the WORKING CLASS ITSELF."
Indeed, that&#39;s why it hasn&#39;t happened already. Just because we got leaders like Mao and Bob Avakian doesn&#39;t mean that the working class is automatically liberated or something -- their mere existence does not do that. Taking up their theory and putting it into practice is the important thing - the key factor in making revolution and leading the emancipation of humanity from class society. And this will happen when the party of the proletariat, the communist party, leads a broad united front of classes under its leadership to take state power and exercise a dictatorship over the bourgeoisie.

In one sense, in China and Russia, it was the working class emancipating themselves. But they could never have done it without the guiding theories of the revolutionary leadership. And in my opinion, the same is true today with regards to Bob Avakian -- that&#39;s why I think it&#39;s important to be popularizing him, his leadership and his body of work. If the working class never had a Marx to first come up with Marxism, maybe eventually someone else would have come to the same conclusions. But we should value the fact that Marx (a petit bourgeois intellectual) did come along and came up with his theories.
You didn&#39;t show it to be incorrect, you showed a quote by Mao, that means nothing in comparisson to what actually happened in China under Mao&#39;s "leadership".

The difference with Marx was that he put forward that at most the petty-bourgeois could serve the proletarian movement until that decisive time (of revolution) when they should expect to be cut from the moevement -- and Marx stayed true to what he said, cutting his ties and becoming &#39;proletarianized&#39;, as well as only SERVING the proletariat as an intellectual in their service.

I think that HJ Miles (of the Communist League) gets into the basis of these questions in this article, which I suggest you take a look at:
On the Lessons of the USSR Experience (http://www.communistleague.org/wr/stories/wr2005q1-ussr.html)

[redwinter]

Originally posted by CompaneroDeLibertad+Jun 11 2005, 12:06 AM--> (CompaneroDeLibertad @ Jun 11 2005, 12:06 AM)
[email protected] 9 2005, 05:28 AM
So you&#39;re "not impressed with Mao&#39;s rhetoric": so what does that have to do with your assertion that "The Maoists base themselves theoretically off of a rejection of the most basic principal of communism(&#33;), that the working class is the only truly revolutionary class," as you wrote, which I showed was incorrect in my previous post?

Yeah, Mao was a peasant and Bob Avakian came from the middle class (as did Marx). Engels was a bourgeois factory owner. Does it make their ideas or leadership any less relevant?

"According to Marx, emancipating the working class is the work of the WORKING CLASS ITSELF."
Indeed, that&#39;s why it hasn&#39;t happened already. Just because we got leaders like Mao and Bob Avakian doesn&#39;t mean that the working class is automatically liberated or something -- their mere existence does not do that. Taking up their theory and putting it into practice is the important thing - the key factor in making revolution and leading the emancipation of humanity from class society. And this will happen when the party of the proletariat, the communist party, leads a broad united front of classes under its leadership to take state power and exercise a dictatorship over the bourgeoisie.

In one sense, in China and Russia, it was the working class emancipating themselves. But they could never have done it without the guiding theories of the revolutionary leadership. And in my opinion, the same is true today with regards to Bob Avakian -- that&#39;s why I think it&#39;s important to be popularizing him, his leadership and his body of work. If the working class never had a Marx to first come up with Marxism, maybe eventually someone else would have come to the same conclusions. But we should value the fact that Marx (a petit bourgeois intellectual) did come along and came up with his theories.

You didn&#39;t show it to be incorrect, you showed a quote by Mao, that means nothing in comparisson to what actually happened in China under Mao&#39;s "leadership".

The difference with Marx was that he put forward that at most the petty-bourgeois could serve the proletarian movement until that decisive time (of revolution) when they should expect to be cut from the moevement -- and Marx stayed true to what he said, cutting his ties and becoming &#39;proletarianized&#39;, as well as only SERVING the proletariat as an intellectual in their service.

I think that HJ Miles (of the Communist League) gets into the basis of these questions in this article, which I suggest you take a look at:
On the Lessons of the USSR Experience (http://www.communistleague.org/wr/stories/wr2005q1-ussr.html) [/b]
To argue your first point semantically, I showed a quote from Mao and this does indeed mean something when you say "Maoists base themselves theoretically off of a rejection of the most basic principal of communism(&#33;), that the working class is the only truly revolutionary class" (emphasis added). I mean, wouldn&#39;t Maoists get their theoretical basis besides from the writings of Mao? So yeah, it does prove you wrong when you say that "Maoist theory is based on a rejection of the idea of the proletariat being the revolutionary class" and I reference something written by Mao which is the opposite of what you said.

Now, as to your point of what actually happened in China during Mao&#39;s lifetime: how was the experience of revolutionary socialist China up until capitalist restoration anything but a reflection of the principal of putting the proletarian line in the lead?



Finally, in times when the class struggle nears the decisive hour, the progress of dissolution going on within the ruling class, in fact within the whole range of old society, assumes such a violent, glaring character, that a small section of the ruling class cuts itself adrift, and joins the revolutionary class, the class that holds the future in its hands. Just as, therefore, at an earlier period, a section of the nobility went over to the bourgeoisie, so now a portion of the bourgeoisie goes over to the proletariat, and in particular, a portion of the bourgeois ideologists, who have raised themselves to the level of comprehending theoretically the historical movement as a whole.
...
The lower middle class, the small manufacturer, the shopkeeper, the artisan, the peasant, all these fight against the bourgeoisie, to save from extinction their existence as fractions of the middle class. They are therefore not revolutionary, but conservative. Nay, more, they are reactionary, for they try to roll back the wheel of history. If, by chance, they are revolutionary, they are only so in view of their impending transfer into the proletariat; they thus defend not their present, but their future interests; they desert their own standpoint to place themselves at that of the proletariat.
Source: Manifesto of the Communist Party, K. Marx & F. Engels


I don&#39;t think that you are correct in saying that Marx put forward that the petit-bourgeois could only serve the communist movement until revolution, and then they would have to be cut off from the movement. Shit, look at the Communist Manifesto: even a section of the ruling class might join the revolutionary movement, if it takes up the revolutionary proletarian line. Petit bourgeois and other middle class forces are only revolutionary if they take up the revolutionary communist/proletarian line and not the class line of their own class: the same for any individual of any class background. Line is the decisive point here, not someone&#39;s individual position in the class structure. You can be a proletarian with a reactionary line but that doesn&#39;t make you a better communist than a bourgeois dude like Engels with a revolutionary communist line who ultimately was much more loyal to the proletariat as a whole in its long term interests than the proletarian with the reactionary line.

Also, I was never aware of Marx "cutting his ties and becoming &#39;proletarianized&#39;" as you claim: around the time of his exile when he wrote the Manifesto, according to the Marxists Internet Archive, "Poverty weighed heavily on Marx and his family; had it not been for Engels’ constant and selfless financial aid, Marx would not only have been unable to complete Capital but would have inevitably have been crushed by hunger and malnutrition." Engels got this money from his family&#39;s ownership of a factory, neither Engels much less Marx got a job in a factory to survive. If I remember correctly, he later on served as a London correspondent for the New York Times and did some work as a journalist. In Otto Ruhle&#39;s biography of Karl Marx:

"Even though Marx failed to solve the problem of earning a livelihood, he was never a man to shrink from hard work. On the contrary, his industry and his powers of work arouse our amazement.
Although he made a poor showing as breadwinner, he was otherwise a happy and successful husband, a tender father, was able on into old age to delight his charming and clever wife, and to retain her affection."

Not that it matters whether Marx was a proletarian or if he was bourgeois anyway, but just to disprove your point about Marx being some pure "working class hero" while everyone you don&#39;t agree with in the communist movement isn&#39;t sufficiently proletarian and thus not allowed to be a communist, or something.

I did check out the essay by HJ Miles, "On the Lessons of the USSR Experience." In it he seems to confuse the concept of classes and class interests as a whole and as a general tendency (on the one hand), and individuals from these classes themselves (on the other hand). This is a huge mistake. Marx and Engels fought against the influence of petit-bourgeois line but this was not because they were exploited proletarians themselves, but because they recognized the fact that the proletariat is the most revolutionary class and that its long term interests are in revolution. And of course the petit bourgeois and big bourgeois lines, as expressed by the ideologues of those class standpoints, are reactionary. But it doesn&#39;t mean that all petit bourgeois people or even big bourgeois individuals necessary have to be reactionary or can&#39;t be sympathetic to or even contribute to the revolutionary communist effort. Certainly we all know that there are proletarians around with reactionary lines, traitors to their class -- reminds me of a joke with which I will end my post:


Khrushchev says to Zhou Enlai, "The difference between the Soviet Union and China is that I rose to power from the peasant class, whereas you came from the privileged Mandarin class."

Zhou replies, "True. But there is this similarity. Each of us is a traitor to his class."

[Saint-Just]

Originally posted by Clenched [email protected] 6 2005, 11:32 AM
Did anyone see unmasking mao? It was an interesting programme.
The ***** on that programme must have had her father murdered by Mao given how much she hated him.

[SonofRage]

Originally posted by Saint&#045;Just+Jun 14 2005, 07:24 AM--> (Saint-Just @ Jun 14 2005, 07:24 AM)
Clenched [email protected] 6 2005, 11:32 AM
Did anyone see unmasking mao? It was an interesting programme.
The ***** on that programme must have had her father murdered by Mao given how much she hated him. [/b]
Why do you feel the need to refer to her as "the ***** on that programme"?

[1949]

CompaneroDeLibertad wrote: “If the material conditions TRULY change, so will the culture, with no metaphysics necessary.”

This is an important question which does not have an easy answer.

There is a tendency MLM calls “mechanical materialism,” which takes Marx and Engels’s statement that material conditions are the ultimately determining factor in the development of society and distort it to say that material conditions are the only determining factor. This is completely at odds with what Marx and Engels actually said.

Engels was very clear on this point in an 1890 letter to Joseph Bloch (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1890/letters/90_09_21.htm): “According to the materialist conception of history, the ultimately determining element in history is the production and reproduction of real life. Other than this neither Marx nor I have ever asserted. Hence if somebody twists this into saying that the economic element is the only determining one, he transforms that proposition into a meaningless, abstract, senseless phrase. The economic situation is the basis, but the various elements of the superstructure — political forms of the class struggle and its results, to wit: constitutions established by the victorious class after a successful battle, etc., juridical forms, and even the reflexes of all these actual struggles in the brains of the participants, political, juristic, philosophical theories, religious views and their further development into systems of dogmas — also exercise their influence upon the course of the historical struggles and in many cases preponderate in determining their form. There is an interaction of all these elements in which, amid all the endless host of accidents (that is, of things and events whose inner interconnection is so remote or so impossible of proof that we can regard it as non-existent, as negligible), the economic movement finally asserts itself as necessary. Otherwise the application of the theory to any period of history would be easier than the solution of a simple equation of the first degree.”

But even if it was true that Marx and Engels actually did propose mechanical materialism, then that wouldn’t change the essential fact that it is objectively incorrect, because it neglects the fact that the superstructure tends to lag behind the base and can in turn cause the base to cease development, at which point it is necessary to first revolutionize the superstructure before you can revolutionize the base--as Mao pointed out in ”On Contradiction” (http://www.marx2mao.com/Mao/OC37.html).

Lenin pointed out a long time ago, in polemicizing against economism in What Is To Be Done? (http://www.marx2mao.com/Lenin/WD02NB.html), that historically speaking, it has been possible only to bring about a revolutionary development in the economics of society only after radical changes in the political institutions of society (and that the vast majority of injustices committed against the masses of people in tsarist Russia were of a political nature). What, after all, is a revolution? It is the overthrow of one form of class dictatorship by another--a radical change in the political institutions, which are an element of the superstructure.

Mao, in A Critique of Soviet Economics (http://www.marx2mao.com/Mao/CSE58.html), expanded upon this point by giving concrete examples from the Chinese revolution, and by pointing out that this was true not just of new democratic and socialist revolutions, but of old democratic revolutions, too. The major revolutionary changes in the productive forces in North America and Western Europe all happened after the bourgeoisie seized political power. So, for instance, it was the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution that liquidated slavery in the South--even though the bourgeoisie had overthrown the southern slavocracy an entire eight months before, with the end of the American Civil War.

This entire orientation of mechanical materialism, if carried out to its logical conclusion, would actually discourage tendencies towards revolution and encourage tendencies towards reformism--because, if the economic base of society determines the development of society in some absolute way, then we shouldn’t go for political power, because a change in political power cannot influence the base. (This mechanical materialism, I should add, is also very similar to what was put forward by Stalin in the thirties, after the triumph of socialist ownership in the Soviet Union was in the main completed and the productive forces were rushing forward, while simultaneously homosexuality and abortion were recriminalized and feudal despots like Ivan the Terrible were making a comeback in popular culture as symbols of national unity and resistance against imperialist invasion.)

And in fact, as Bob Avakian pointed out in footnote #6 of ”Democracy: More Than Ever We can and Must Do Better Than That,” (http://rwor.org/chair_e.htm#democracy) “the “theory of productive forces” (and mechanical materialism generally) is ultimately idealist itself. It metaphysically separates matter from consciousness. It does not grasp the way in which (as Mao put it) matter can be transformed into consciousness and consciousness into matter. Thus, it does not correctly grasp the material foundation of all ideas, nor does it grasp how ideas can be transformed into a tremendous material force.”

[Saint-Just]

Originally posted by SonofRage+Jun 14 2005, 02:59 PM--> (SonofRage @ Jun 14 2005, 02:59 PM)
Originally posted by Saint&#045;[email protected] 14 2005, 07:24 AM

Clenched [email protected] 6 2005, 11:32 AM
Did anyone see unmasking mao? It was an interesting programme.
The ***** on that programme must have had her father murdered by Mao given how much she hated him.
Why do you feel the need to refer to her as "the ***** on that programme"? [/b]
Because I can&#39;t remember her name.

[redwinter]

As a revolutionary communist I have to say that calling anyone a "*****" reinforces the oppression of women, even if the target of the term is a reactionary liar. Let&#39;s call people out for having the wrong line, not the wrong gender.

[1949]

Originally posted by [email protected] 15 2005, 04:34 PM
As a revolutionary communist I have to say that calling anyone a "*****" reinforces the oppression of women, even if the target of the term is a reactionary liar. Let&#39;s call people out for having the wrong line, not the wrong gender.
Agreed.

[Saint-Just]

Originally posted by [email protected] 16 2005, 12:34 AM
As a revolutionary communist I have to say that calling anyone a "*****" reinforces the oppression of women, even if the target of the term is a reactionary liar. Let&#39;s call people out for having the wrong line, not the wrong gender.
Yes, but I am not a Maoist or a revolutionary communist. As such I don&#39;t share your view of women.

I don&#39;t hate that woman because she is a woman though. If you saw that woman speak about Mao you would have been using the same language. She was criticising the sympathy some liberals harbour for Mao and very heavily criticising it. Specifically saying that Mao was a worse man than Hitler, that Mao was responsible for the deaths of hundreds of millions of people. She created an image of him as a power hungry tyrant with deep psychological problems. She appeared to be some kind of neo-classic liberal (neo-conservative as Americans call them).

[Black Dagger]

Yes, but I am not a Maoist or a revolutionary communist. As such I don&#39;t share your view of women.


What &#39;are&#39; you then?

[Saint-Just]

Originally posted by Black [email protected] 16 2005, 03:21 PM

Yes, but I am not a Maoist or a revolutionary communist. As such I don&#39;t share your view of women.


What &#39;are&#39; you then?
I believe in what is virtuous, which is fairly vague, however it would be difficult to place my beliefs on the political spectrum. I judge Mao quite favourably though. Anyway, I think the way in which I used the word ***** might have been misunderstood since it has a number of different connotations. In America it is usually seen as a word gangster rappers and those that subscribe to their culture use to refer to women - I did not mean it in that context.

[Veers]

Iam not a Maoist, i fovor Linen more becouse Mao Kinda Followed Stalin&#39;s Ideas and Stalin was a mad man and meant nothing to Communism. Altthough Mao wa better than any other leader in China to that date.

[Led Zeppelin]

In my opinion Maoism has added nothing to Leninism, instead it has revised it, read this chapter for more information on this subject:

"Mao Tsetung Thought" - An Anti-Marxist Theory (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hoxha/works/imp_rev/imp_ch6.htm)

For those who are too lazy to read that link, here&#39;s a brief summary:

Maoism does not acknowledge the historical importance of Stalin.

Maoism is opposed to the dictatorship of the proletariat.

Maoism preaches cultural revolutions led by students.

[SonofRage]

I&#39;m not even a Maoist, and I know that the above post is a load of crap.

[Led Zeppelin]

and I know that the above post is a load of crap.

Elaborate.

I am not going to take you seriously with that response.

[romanm]

Sonofrage is correct. "Marxist-Leninist" is an extreme dogmatist. You can write a detailed response to him and he&#39;ll simply reply "wrong". You can even gives scholarily sources and he&#39;ll just shrug it all off.

He is stuck in some retrograd Hoxhaitism that was made irrelevant by Maoism a long time ago.

[Led Zeppelin]

If you are going to quote my member name do it correctly.


He is stuck in some retrograd Hoxhaitism that was made irrelevant by Maoism a long time ago.

How was Marxism-Leninism made irrelevant by Maoism? Please post links to some critiques.

[violencia.Proletariat]

i had a question on maoism in order to understand it more, i heard maoists believe there will always be a representative type government, why should there be and isnt this a contradiction to marxism/leninism?

[Led Zeppelin]

i heard maoists believe there will always be a representative type government

Not true.