Chinese Town Rejects Refroms For 1960s Communism

[RedStarOverChina]

Interesting video.

http://cosmos.bcst.yahoo.com/up/player/popup/?rn=3906861&cl=5983073&ch=4226714&src=news

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

Very interesting. Some comrades have actually been talking about this recently. I'm going to have to look further into this.

[SouthernBelle82]

I tried to watch but the video feed sucked for me. Is it anywhere else online?

[Dros]

That is really awesome. Just goes to show what the Proletariat actually thinks about Maoism.

[R_P_A_S]

hollyshit. thats fucking cool. i wanna go visit that place.
that Mao Clock is tight! lol.

nice video though. i would love to see more of this.

[Enragé]

"as common people, we have only one thing to do, listen to the party leadership"
yeh, and that party leadership has decided to implement those fucking market reforms.

In any case, aside from the whole Mao-worship and lack of democracy (it should be the party leadership listening to the common people, not the other way around for fuck sake), its nice to see some resistance to the market-reforms, and to see a village implementing common ownership (to some extent, i.e common ownership implies that the people collectively decide about what happens to what they own, and NOT the fucking party leadership) or at least make sure everyone has enough to go around, that everyone benefits equally from what they collectively do (:

[jake williams]

"as common people, we have only one thing to do, listen to the party leadership"
yeh, and that party leadership has decided to implement those fucking market reforms.

In any case, aside from the whole Mao-worship and lack of democracy (it should be the party leadership listening to the common people, not the other way around for fuck sake), its nice to see some resistance to the market-reforms, and to see a village implementing common ownership (to some extent, i.e common ownership implies that the people collectively decide about what happens to what they own, and NOT the fucking party leadership) or at least make sure everyone has enough to go around, that everyone benefits equally from what they collectively do (:
Yeah, while a certain ambient awesomeness and faint hope to this news can't be denied, this was my general impression.

[Dros]

"as common people, we have only one thing to do, listen to the party leadership"

That is the exact opposite of Mao's message. The whole ideology of cultural revolution is that the masses need to rise up against the party and check the party when it is in opposition to the interests of the proletariat. While Maoists recognize that capitalism as a system contributes to the ideological backwardness of the proletariat (The ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas), they have developed a methodology to deal with the contradiction between the need to transform the proletarians themselves and the need to have proletarians self rule (the DoP). This is the function of the Mass Line.

[Prairie Fire]

Good to see, good to see, except that a ot of the more erroneous notions of Maoism persist, especially a lot of Deng Xioping era bullshit that has distorted the perceptions of Mao.

I think that in modern China, this could be seen as a positive development, but in some ways they are like the zapatistas in Mexico, in that they are not expanding outwards. Trying to contain a haven of communism, surrounded by a country of capitalism, well...

Also, it isn't quite Maoism, is it is? No political economy, rather procing commodities for export. See, they exist because they are very little threat to the CPC. They can have their Mao statues, and protraits of the four classics, but they are tied to a market economy and dependent on manufacturing goods for export, while simultaneously not opposing oppurtunist control of the party itself. Their grasp of the goals and workings of Marxism-Leninism seems low, even by the local party leader.

Meh. I'd still go, see what ther eis to see.

[RedStarOverChina]

This is obviously NOT communism, as the extraction of workers' surplus value is still taking place in government-owned factories.

But it does question whether modern Chinese capitalism is actually benefiting Chinese urban working-class population. It's very difficult to assess, if you ask me.

People are generally very sick of all the price hikes, expensive health care, the so-called "real estate boom" and corruption that many would prefer to go back to a "purer, simpler time".

[RedStarOverChina]

http://www.thestandard.com.hk/stdn/std/Weekend/GA22Jp11.html

Here's a good article.

[Xiao Banfa]

Not all visitors are believers. Consider the look on the faces of a group of college students as their guide explains how her village succeeded in wiping out all private possessions.


This is the kind of bullshit I can't stand- blurring the distinction between socialist abolition of private property and abolition of personal property!

It's ridiculous. I find it unlikely that villagers in Nanjie have abolished personal ownership of pots and pats, televisions and radios.

If they have, it sounds like some kind of Pol Pot lunacy and not socialism.

[Dros]

This is obviously NOT communism, as the extraction of workers' surplus value is still taking place in government-owned factories.

Of course it's not Communism comrade. I don't think anyone suggests it is. But it sounds like it could be socialism (but of course do to vastly insufficient information I can't be sure.)

[Enragé]

This is obviously NOT communism, as the extraction of workers' surplus value is still taking place in government-owned factories.

exactly :)
This line of reasoning should be followed more.

[Sleeping Dog]

Socialism or Communism? You theoretical cats are mist ta fying me!

[jake williams]

Socialism or Communism? You theoretical cats are mist ta fying me!
I hope I don't get clubbed to death for my Marxian theory inadequacies, but to oversimplify a bit... socialism is two sort of, related traditions, one considered a transitional stage to communism by Marx. A government of some sort organizes society in such a way that it can transition to communism. The other tradition is one that comes out of a European feudal/partly clerical tradition. A lot of the conventionally regarded "socialist" values.

Communism is totally different. In this society there is no private ownership of the means of production, everyone "works" "for" "free", etc.

[Sleeping Dog]

I hope I don't get clubbed to death for my Marxian theory inadequacies, but to oversimplify a bit... socialism is two sort of, related traditions, one considered a transitional stage to communism by Marx. A government of some sort organizes society in such a way that it can transition to communism. The other tradition is one that comes out of a European feudal/partly clerical tradition. A lot of the conventionally regarded "socialist" values.

Communism is totally different. In this society there is no private ownership of the means of production, everyone "works" "for" "free", etc.Gollee, maybe you can link me to Marx. My understanding was: Socialism, the economic system, Communism, the political system

[Red October]

Gollee, maybe you can link me to Marx. My understanding was: Socialism, the economic system, Communism, the political system

Communism=stateless, classless society.

[Sleeping Dog]

Communism=stateless, classless society.No link?

[Red October]

Read Marx.

[jake williams]

Gollee, maybe you can link me to Marx. My understanding was: Socialism, the economic system, Communism, the political system
They're both a bit of both. And of course, one of the most basic parts of Marx's analysis was that politics is economics.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

The points of interest for us should be the collectivized economy and distribution system of course.

A comrade of mine in China recently has this to say about Nanjie: "It's more of an experiment than anything else."

I'm talking to some others now, as well as doing some more research.

[Dros]

Gollee, maybe you can link me to Marx. My understanding was: Socialism, the economic system, Communism, the political system

Your "understaning" was mistaken.:D

Communism and socialism are modes of production and political structure. That is they describe ways of organizing societies both economically and politically. The Communist Manifesto would be a good place to start.

http://marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/index.htm

[RNK]

I wonder how long this will last before the "PLA" invades. There's no way the oppurtunist government would allow this to go on; especially if it shows signs of popularity among the masses in other parts of China.

The best we can do is publicize this, do everything we can to get the word out, so that this down is not simply swept under the rug.

[RedStarOverChina]

I wonder how long this will last before the "PLA" invades. There's no way the oppurtunist government would allow this to go on; especially if it shows signs of popularity among the masses in other parts of China.

The best we can do is publicize this, do everything we can to get the word out, so that this down is not simply swept under the rug.
LOL the central government knows very well of this experiment and isn't bothered by it one bit. Nanjie follows the statist, export-oriented model of capitalism much like the rest of China, except that the profits are being shared. It saves the government a lot of trouble (such as social unrests) while providing the revenue. The population of Nanjie is as loyal to the CCP as they could get.

To summarize, from the CCP's perspective, it's a model village.

[Sleeping Dog]

Your "understaning" was mistaken.:D

Communism and socialism are modes of production and political structure. That is they describe ways of organizing societies both economically and politically. The Communist Manifesto would be a good place to start.

http://marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/index.htm Thank you for the link I'll review it more in depth tom marrow. It's been quite a while since I've open any of my older "political theory" books (admittedly I recall more of dialectical materialism than this specific terminology). Maybe a new thread might be more appropriate. :)

[Sleeping Dog]

drosera99,

In honest discussion of what Marxist conceived determinate of the constitution terms Socialism and Communism, I would first like to state that bring to mind The Communist Manifesto prior to mention of Capital, Vol III. (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1894-c3/index.htm) particularly Chapter 20. Historical Facts about Merchant's Capital (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1894-c3/ch20.htm) is at best an ill informed occurrence and at worse a "Libertarian like" endeavor to dissemble via massive minutiae.
The extent to which products enter trade and go through the merchants' hands depends on the mode of production, and reaches its maximum in the ultimate development of capitalist production, where the product is produced solely as a commodity, and not as a direct means of subsistence. On the other hand, on the basis of every mode of production, trade facilitates the production of surplus-products destined for exchange, in order to increase the enjoyments, or the wealth, of the producers (here meant are the owners of the products). Hence, commerce imparts to production a character directed more and more towards
exchange-value.
The metamorphosis of commodities, their movement, consists 1) materially, of the exchange of different commodities for one another, and 2) formally, of the conversion of commodities into money by sale, and of money into commodities by purchase. And the function of merchant's capital resolves itself into these very acts of buying and selling commodities. It therefore merely promotes the exchange of commodities; yet this exchange is not to be conceived at the outset as a bare exchange of commodities between direct producers. Under slavery, feudalism and vassalage (so far as primitive communities are concerned) it is the slave-owner, the feudal lord, the tribute-collecting state, who are the owners, hence sellers, of the products. The merchant buys and sells for many. Purchases and sales are concentrated in his hands and consequently are no longer bound to the direct requirements of the buyer (as merchant).I believe that Marx was much smarter than to make an assertion that in the earliest stages of society people went into factories, work to produce things they would not normally consume, and be 'rewarded' at the end of the week with pieces of colored paper or decorated discs which would be exchanged for the food, clothing, etc.
The first primitive means of communicating "my favors for a piece of your meat" are rudimentary politics. What further sophistications for exchange form economic systems and those that communicate and consequently regulate form the political specialty of government.

The Communist Manifesto (http://marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch03.htm), which you implied, indicated that Marx did not view political as different than economic speaks of continuing sophistication of economics "Reactionary Socialism" to Petty-Bourgeois Socialism. Never separates Socialism from Communism. The two are inseparable systems. Shucks I'm an anarchist and I give Marx more credit.

After "reviewing the situation" you may like to inform me via private message of any future pertinent threads.