Re: DOUG: marxism & (under)development or "what's imperialism got to do with it?

[Rubyg580@xxxxxxx]

In a message dated 96-04-10 Doug writes:

>I'm not talking just about Peru, much less about AO himself; I think it's
>time for some serious reflection on what has happened in China, the home of
>Maoism. Why does the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party now say "to
>get rich is glorious"? Why are stocks trading once again in Shanghai?
>
If you would read some actual history and not just make your ignorant
assumptions, you might have a clue.  If you'd read some of what Mao actually
said about the struggle in the 60s and 70s in China, maybe you'd see the
answer to your question.

The leadership in China now says "to get rich is glorious" because that is
what those leaders have been saying since the 70s.  Mao called them
"capitalist roaders" and led theChinese people to defeat them thru the
upheaval of the cultural revolution and the struggle in the mid 70s against
the "right deviationist wind."

The masses of workers and peasants in China (and many supporters of
Revolutionary China thruout the world) actually studied the documents
produced by these capitalist roaders.  The Revolutionaries called them
"poisonous weeds".  They are reproduced in a book titled "The Case of the
Gang of Four" by Chi Hsin, Cosmos Books Ltd, Hong Kong, 1977 as well as other
sources from that era.

These things are not a "degeneration" of socialism, or due to "mistakes"by
Mao.  They are the results of the OVERTHROW of socialism by Deng Xiaoping and
his cronies after Mao died.

Mao himself said, during the struggle against the "right deviationist wind"
in the mid-70s,
that the bourgeoisie was right in the top levels of the Communist Party, and
that the question of who would win out, the bourgeoisie or the proletariat is
not a settled question thruoughout the whole period of socialism--that is,
all the way until Communism--all the way until class distinctions have been
completely done away with on a world scale, and governments can wither away.

>Marx's argument about the development of socialism out of advanced
>capitalism is logical and well known. I want to hear how he was wrong on
>this issue.

Marx lived before the development of imperialism.  That gave a "shot in the
arm" to the capitalist system in the advanced countries, allowing them to
bribe a large section of the workers in those countries, and to allow a
relatively high and comfortable standard of living for not just the petty
bourgeoisie, but also a section of the workers.  This divides the working
class in the imperialist countries.  Lenin goes into this in "Imperialism the
Highest Stage of Capitalism." I also refer you to Adolfo's post of March 25,
1996, titled "Re: Reply to Gina...AND THE QUESTION OF PROLETARIAN REVOLUTION"

The fact is, there has as yet never been a revolution in an advanced
capitalist country.  The closest to it was Russia in 1917, but even though
Russia was an imperialist country at the time, it was a very backward one.
 There has never been a proletarian revolution in a country without a very
substantial peasant class.  So it looks like, in spite of how some on this
list insist that "ONLY" the workers can make a proletarian revolution, and
forget about the peasants, etc. etc., History itself has only given us
revolutions, led by proletarian parties, in countries where the workers had
to mainly ally with the peasants.

You can whine all you want about how things in history have worked
out--including the fact that so far proletarian socialism has only lasted a
few decades in each of the countries where it has been built.  But the
proletariat is still a young class in history.  Its experience in leading
revolutions is still developing, and is increasing with each attempt.

We cannot wish away the conditions set before us by the real world; we can
only struggle to understand them and work within them in order to serve the
people and the cause of proletarian revolution.  (Or, we can choose to pout
that WE are not the focus of revolutionary possibilities at the present
moment, and go on and on about how those who have actually LED revolutions in
"backward" countries must have fucked up, since they didn't follow OUR vision
of "socialism", and since the proletarian dictatorships that were established
in those countries have been overthrown--along with  the ridiculous corolary
that we better not let the same thing happen in Peru.)

Cry as you will about getting back to Marx's original thesis about revolution
first in the advanced capitalist countries, and considering Maoism a failure
because socialism and proletarian leadership no longer have power in China or
in Russia, still, where is the attempt--let alone the success--of a
proletarian revolution so far in an advanced imperialist country?  What are
you doing to bring one about?  Personally, I think our task is to learn all
we can from the proletarian leadership and the actual revolutions that exist
and have existed, and quit whining about how they don't fit our desires and
expectations.

We need to do a thorough class analysis of the countries we live in, and
study the experience and the political line of Marx, Lenin, Mao, and <even>
those nasty upstarts in the PCP who have the nerve to be leading a revolution
that Marx in his day could not have fully envisioned.

Sorry to depart from my usually more measured tone, but it rrreeeaaalllly
pisses me off when these comfortable "leftists" in these imperialist
countries start lecturing to those who have shed their blood for the cause of
the future of all of humanity, about how THEY need to learn from US "cooler
heads".  It is WE who need to learn from THEM!  It is their suffering that is
the source of our relative comfort.

How utterly arrogant for our "Dr. Science" (I know more than you do) leftists
to wag their fingers and their tongues, clucking disapproval because of the
ëxcessive violence"of  the revolutionaries (this from folks sitting in the
wonderful country that gave the world Hiroshema, Nagasaki, My Lai, Bohpal,
Panama '89, the Gulf War, etc. etc. etc.)  These imperialist countries we
live in are the source of the most horrendous violence the world has ever
seen.  We should be applauding the revolutionary violence of the oppressed;
welcoming it with open arms and open hearts--because only thru this
revolutionary violence will the situation be eventually brought about where
violence among people can be forever banished from the face of the earth!

For the world proletarian revolution!
Gina / Detroit


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