A CritiQue of Maotse-Tung's Theoretical Concept - @LBiz - en - 1972 - CMTTC290

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<•> INTRODUCTION
5
TOC Chapter One
Card
THE SUBSTANCE OF MAOIST PHILOSOPHY
Text
HTML 15 1. Ideological Origins
PS
PDF 27 2. The Meaning of Marxist Terminology in Mao’s Writings
T* 33 3. On the Real Meaning of Maoist Dialectics

19*
### 49 4. Subjective Idealism Instead of the Materialist View of History
Chapter Two
GREAT-HAN CHAUVINISM AND HECEMONISM

PRESENTED AS PROLETARIAN INTERNATIONALISM
1. The Sources of Great-Han Chauvinism and Hegemonism in the

62 Views of Mao and His Followers
2. Great-Han Chauvinism and Hegemonism in the Guise of

72 Proletarian Internationalism
Chapter Three
ANTITHESIS OF THE MARXIST AND THE MAOIST VIEW

OF PROLETARIAN REVOLUTION, WAR AND PEACE
1. Is Chinese Experience Alone a Basis for Producing Laws for the

90 Whole World?
95 2. On the Two Ways of Socialist Revolution
3. Peaceful Coexistence of the Two Systems and the Revolutionary

101 Movement in Individual Countries
106 4. “World Revolution” and World Thermonuclear War
Chapter Four
THE ATTITUDE OF MARXISM AND OF MAOISM TO THE

STATE AND PROLETARIAN LEGALITY
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/index.html[2012-12-18 2:25:29]
115 1. When an “Antitoxin” Becomes a Toxin
2. The “State and Revolution” Problem in the Light of Events in

120 China
129 3. On the Question of Mao’s Personality Cult
4. Political Arbitrariness Instead of Socialist Democracy and

138 Legality
5. Ideological Justification of the Regime of Political Arbitrariness

145 in Mao’s Works
152 6. On the True Essence of the “Cultural Revolution”
Chapter Five
THE MAOIST CONCEPTION OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF

THE SOCIAL STRUCTURE AND THE CLASS STRUGGLE
165 1. Development of Social Relations in China from 1949 to 1957
173 2. Line of “Leaping Over” Objective Laws
176 3. Curtailment of the Vanguard Role of the Working Class
184 4. Artificial Aggravation of Class Struggle
193 5. Class Struggle Without the Struggle Against the Bourgeoisie
195 6. Class Struggle: Pretext for Repression
201 7. Concerning Mao’s Attitude to the Working Class
Chapter Six
RELATION OF POLITICS AND ECONOMICS IN THE

THEORY AND PRACTICE OF MAOISM
206 1. Role of Economics in Social Development Minimised
212 2. Mao’s View of Socialist Economic Development
223 3. The “Great Leap Forward”: Collapse and Consequences
236 4. Zigzags in Peking’s Economic Policy
242 5. Some Aspects of China’s Foreign Policy
Chapter Seven
“GREAT PROLETARIAN CULTURAL REVOLUTION”, OR
DRIVE AGAINST WORLD CULTURE
249 [introduction.]
251 1. The Cultural Revolution and the Cultural Legacy
262 2. Socialist Culture and Its “Critics”
269 3. The “Cultural Revolution” in China and the Intelligentsia
277 4. The Maoist Cultural Policy After the “Cultural Revolution”
282 CONCLUSION
***

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INTRODUCTION 5
<•>
The present epoch is justly known as the epoch of transition from capitalism to p
TOC
socialism, and the historical experience of the past few decades provides irrefutable
Card evidence of this. As a result of the joint struggle of the socialist states, the working
class in the capitalist countries, the newlyfree and the oppressed peoples, there is a
Text further weakening of imperialist positions in the political, economic, military and
HTML ideological spheres. The Main Document of the 1969 International Meeting of
PS Communist and Workers’ Parties says that “socialism, which has triumphed on one-
PDF third of the globe, has scored new successes in the world-wide struggle for the
hearts and minds of the people". [ 5•1
T*
19* However, international imperialism has been counterattacking in an effort to change p
the overall balance of forces in its favour. In these conditions, there is need for even
### greater cohesion of all the anti-imperialist forces, above all, the Communist and
Workers’ Parties, the most progressive sections of modern society. “The policy of
joint anti-imperialist action demands that the ideological and political role of the
Marxist-Leninist Parties in the world revolutionary process should be
enhanced". [ 5•2
This task can only be fulfilled through implacable struggle against bourgeois p 6
ideology, against Right and “Left” opportunism, against revisionism, dogmatism and
Leftsectarian adventurism.
One of the pressing tasks before Marxism-Leninism today is to criticise the p

theoretical conceptions of Mao Tse-tung and his group. The Report of the CPSU
Central Committee to the Party’s 24th Congress stressed that the Chinese leaders
“have put forward an ideological-political platform of their own which is
incompatible with Leninism on the key questions of international life and the world
communist movement and have demanded that we should abandon the line of the
20th Congress and the Programme of the CPSU". [ 6•1
A new front of ideological struggle has been opened in connection with the anti- p
Marxist, anti-socialist, chauvinistic and anti-Soviet line pursued by the present
Chinese leadership. This line was officially formalised by the 9th Congress of the
CPC in April 1969. The theoretical basis of this line is the “thought of Mao Tse-
tung”, or Maoism, which is an ideological trend hostile to Marxism. Maoism is
deeply alien to internationalism and to the idea of the proletarian solidarity of
nations; Great-Power chauvinism has become one of its main features.
The history of 20th century revolutions shows that Marxism is latent with vast p
attractive power not only for the working class, but also for other social groups, in
particular, the peasantry, the urban petty bourgeoisie and the intelligentsia. Apart
from the Marxists, the communist and working-class movement is joined by men
with various incorrect notions about the ways of restructuring society, among them
revolutionary democrats, anarchists, bourgeois nationalists, etc. Some of them, once
tempered in the flames of revolutionary struggle in the ranks of the Party, become
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/0-Introduction[2012-12-18 2:25:47]
Marxists, others fail to stand the test and break with the communist movement, while
still others remain in the ranks of the Party, but never ultimately shed their old
petty-bourgeois or bourgeois convictions.
This is of particular importance in any examination of the make-up of Communist p

and Workers’ Parties in developing, peasant countries. Petty-bourgeois ideology 7
necessarily has a negative effect on these Parties, because their ranks are formed
mainly from the non-proletarian sections of society. This was a fact to which
Comintern documents at one time strongly drew attention. In these conditions, the
role of the leading nucleus of the Communist Party is considerably enhanced, for it
has the duty to rally, on a common Marxist platform, all the members of the Party,
regardless of their social origin, past activity and former views, and to prevent views
hostile to Marxism from gaining the upper hand in the Party. When for various
reasons leadership in a Communist Party falls into the hands of anti-Marxists, this
creates the danger of the Party’s degeneration and its conversion into a non-socialist,
non-revolutionary organisation.
Let us emphasise that from the outset the CPC brought together not only Marxists, p
but also non-Marxists, many of whom joined the Party mainly for tactical reasons.
One of them was Mao Tse-tung.
Chinese Marxists-Leninists were aware of Mao Tse-tung’s erroneous political line, p

and of the anti-Marxist essence of his views, and saw the artificial build-up of the
myth of Mao Tse-tung as an outstanding theorist and infallible leader of the Chinese
revolution. As best they could they resisted Mao’s attempts to impose his own,
specific line on the Party, to “sinify” Marxism, and to supplant Marxist-Leninist
ideas with the “thought of Mao Tse-tung”. It was their persistent resistance to Mao’s
political line that made the 8th Congress of the CPC in 1956 expunge from the Party
Rules the provision, imposed on the Party at the 7th Congress in May 1945,
according to which the Party was “to be guided in all its activity" by the “thought of
Mao Tse-tung”, and laid down in the Rules that “in all its activity the Communist
Party of China shall be guided by Marxism-Leninism”.
Mao Tse-tung did not accept this ideological defeat at the 8th Congress of the p
CPC, and launched on a fresh round of struggle against the Marxists-Leninists and
internationalists in the period of the so-called “great proletarian cultural revolution"
in China, one of whose purposes, it will be recalled, was massive terrorism in order
to impose Mao’s views on the whole Party and the Chinese people, as the “most
correct" and the “greatest” ideas.
The failure of the “Three Red Banners" line and the foreign-policy defeats were a p 8
blow at the myth of Mao’s being a Marxist-Leninist and an infallible theorist of the
Chinese revolution. In this context, a special role was played by the “cultural
revolution" which laid bare the real antiMarxist petty-bourgeois nature of the
Maoists’ views and political line, and provided fresh evidence that Mao and his
followers pursued aims which were a far cry from scientific socialism, democracy
and peace. What is more, it showed once again that the Maoists confronted the
international revolutionary movement as a bourgeois-nationalistic trend seeking to
occupy a commanding position in the world revolutionary process so as to impose
Mao’s anti-socialist views on the Communists and revolutionary democrats, to
subordinate the revolutionary movement to their influence and to make it serve
interests incompatible with Marxism-Leninism and proletarian internationalism.
The appearance of Maoism in China as a specific pettybourgeois, nationalistic trend p
is connected not only with the name of Mao Tse-tung, but also with definite
objective conditions.
Because the Chinese proletariat emerged on the historical scene at a relatively late p
date, and because it was weak as a class, socialist concepts in China for a long time
had the character of a social utopia coloured in the hues of traditional Chinese
notions about the perfect society with its purely peasant ideals of social justice.
From the outset, the Communist Party of China had to work in a country where the p
peasantry made up 90 per cent of the population. The social make-up of the CPC
was largely peasant and petty-bourgeois. That is why petty-bourgeois ideology of
every shade was frequently reflected in the minds of CPC members. That was
inevitable. As Mao himself admitted, men who came to the CPC from the ranks of
the petty bourgeoisie were “often liberals, reformists, anarchists, Blanquists, etc.”,
who pretended to be MarxistsLeninists. [ 8•1 Let us bear in mind that Mao himself
comes from the petty bourgeoisie.
The survival of semi-feudal relations of production in China helped to conserve p

among various sections of the Chinese people Great-Power nationalistic attitudes,
which the country’s ruling elite had been implanting for many centuries, attitudes 9
which at the turn of the century were sharpened to the extreme and assumed the
urge of restoring China to her old grandeur. The ideology of Great-Han chauvinism
had infected not only the conservative feudal, bureaucratic forces, but also China’s
petty-bourgeois democrats, who dreamed of seeing their country as the centre of the
world and reigning supreme in the international arena. It was indeed Great-Han
chauvinism, combined with pettybourgeois revolutionism, that created the atmosphere
in which Mao’s ideology developed.
Mao’s views were shaped in the conditions of the Chinese people’s revolutionary p
struggle against imperialism and feudalism, in an atmosphere of growing popularity
of MarxismLeninism in China, following the victory of the Great October Socialist
Revolution and the internationalist assistance which the Soviet Union was rendering
the Chinese people in their liberation struggle. It was quite natural therefore for Mao
Tse-tung at one time also to turn to MarxismLeninism as a banner which rallied all
the progressive forces of China. He sought to exploit the vast authority of Marxist-
Leninist ideas for his own selfish ends. He clothed his petty-bourgeois, unscientific
conceptions and views in Marxist-Leninist form, because the reputation of being a
Marxist-Leninist opened up before him the possibility of taking over the leading
position within the CPC.
Marxism-Leninism never became for Mao a world outlook which he understood, p

assimilated and accepted. He regarded Marxism-Leninism as a “foreign teaching”, of
which only some “general truths" could be applied in China. Mao’s approach to
Marxism-Leninism was pragmatic, for he borrowed from it only that which met and
served his purposes. Because before the Chinese people’s victory in 1949 Mao’s
schemes were objectively in the main identical with the tasks of the Chinese
bourgeois-democratic revolution, he made use in that period of that part of Marxism-
Leninism which could be placed at the service of these tasks.
Mao’s views never took shape as a full-fledged, systematic world outlook, or a p

more or less coherent theory. They are a conglomerate of diverse ideas borrowed,
depending on the need of the moment, from the most diverse sources, ranging from
the conversations of Confucius to the writings of Kropotkin. That is why they are 10
eclectic, fragmentary and superficial. The appearance of the Little Red Book in China
was not at all accidental: it was a reflection of the mosaic nature of Mao’s views.
Mao’s views and political line reveal elements which are akin to Narodism,
anarchism, Blanquism, Trotskyism and other petty-bourgeois ideological trends. This
is due not only to the concrete historical situation in which Mao’s views were
shaped, the conditions which in the past generated in Europe ideas of “Left”
revolutionism, but also to the influence, direct and indirect, exerted on Mao by the
tenets of Bakunin, Trotsky and petty-bourgeois theorists of similar stripe. However, it
would be wrong to identify Mao’s views with any of these ideological trends.
Because Maoism is chiefly a Chinese phenomenon, it has deep socio-economic,
historical, ideological and epistemological roots in Chinese soil, especially in view of
the fact that Mao’s political acts and views have far from always been in the nature
of “Left” revolutionism, constituting in many instances a Rightopportunist and
nationalistic line covered up with Leftist catchwords.
In claiming the “thought of Mao Tse-tung" to be the summit of modern Marxist- p

Leninist thinking, Chinese propaganda seeks to create the impression that Mao has
formulated new ideas on all the basic problems of Marxist-Leninist theory. In actual
fact, Mao has sought to exploit MarxismLeninism and to use its authority as
camouflage, falsifying and distorting the essence of this great revolutionary teaching.
The failure of the attempts to apply the “thought of Mao Tse-tung" in practice p
shows best of all that this “thought” is subjectivist and unscientific. These failures,
more than anything else, show that Maoism, whatever the mantle it dons, cannot
serve the interests of a modern society building socialism. The objective laws of
social development have overthrown, and will always continue to overthrow, similar
“thought” and the political schemes it is used to justify or cover up. For all the
efforts of the present Chinese leaders to maintain their ideological domination,
Maoism is bound sooner or later to suffer a complete collapse. However, this will
occur the earlier the sooner the working people of China realise the true nature of
the “thought of Mao Tse-tung”. The “cultural revolution" shows that the
disillusionment in this “thought” had spread in China to such an extent that it took a 11
massive campaign of terrorism and intimidation to maintain the “thought of Mao
Tse-tung" in a dominant position.
Mao’s followers have been trying in various ways to make the Chinese people p
believe that his “thought” allegedly has a “miraculous power" and that it is the
“embodiment of truth”. It is well known, however, that to establish the objectivity of
a truth it has never been necessary to use force, abuse, idolatry and destruction of
the most conscious and high-minded sections of society. Only obscurantism and
barbarism were established in that manner. The light of truth has no need for the
flames of bonfires lit to burn up books.
This question naturally arises: if Mao’s views are unscientific, vulgar and schematic, p
is it at all proper to make any serious effort to expose them and to carry on a
consistent ideological struggle against them? There is only one answer: it is not only
proper, but necessary. It is necessary because the Maoists are seeking to present them
as the highest achievement of Marxism-Leninism of the modern epoch. On the
strength of their views, they have been pursuing a special, nationalistic line,
discrediting the ideals of socialism and communism. Petty-bourgeois revolutionism,
which permeates these views, exerts an influence on the petty-bourgeois section in
China herself and elsewhere, especially in the developing countries.
It should also be borne in mind that Mao’s views add up to an ideology of the p
personality cult in its ugliest form, and that they are marked by demagogy and an
appeal to the basest instincts. The Maoists have used this demagogy to confuse the
most backward section of the Chinese working class and the peasantry and to
corrupt the young.
Finally, Mao’s views and political line have made it possible for anti-communism p
considerably to step up its activity. Imperialist propaganda has been making wide use
of the “thought of Mao Tse-tung" to fight the forces of socialism, democracy and
peace. It has used, for its own ends, the fact that a part of progressive opinion
abroad is inclined to regard Mao’s “misconceptions” and “mistakes” as being the
price of transplanting the Marxist doctrine to Chinese soil. The Marxists are known
resolutely to be opposed to any mechanical application of general truths and the
imposition of abstract schemes without consideration of the specific conditions in 12
each country. Back in 1919, Lenin required the Communists of the East to “translate
the true communist doctrine, which was intended for the Communists of the more
advanced countries, into the language of every people...". [ 12•1 However, this
translation of Marxism into the idiom of each nation, including the Chinese, should
not amount to a departure from or betrayal of the general principles of Marxism, or
to a substitution of petty-bourgeois ideology for Marxism.
To expose the anti-Marxist essence of Maoist theoretical conceptions there is need, p

first, to clarify their origins; second, to compare them with the principles of
MarxismLeninism; third, to show the political orientation of Maoist postulates; and
fourth, to examine these postulates in the context of the Maoists’ practical activity.
In analysing the “thought of Mao Tse-tung" there is need to start above all from the p
Marxist doctrine of the state and revolution. There is need to obtain a comprehensive
and profound understanding of what Lenin said about the tremendous complexity of
the socialist revolution in a pettybourgeois country. The events in China make it
necessary to consider a number of other problems as well, such as the class struggle
and social relations in the transition period, the “cultural revolution" and the attitude
to the cultural heritage, the correlation between the international and national aspects
of the anti-imperialist liberation struggle, and finally, the problem of war and peace
in the presence of mass destruction weapons, etc.
This work is an attempt to give a scientific analysis, a Marxist assessment of the p

“thought of Mao Tse-tung”. The authors have naturally not set themselves the task
of considering every aspect of this “thought”, let alone providing exhaustive and
definitive answers to all the questions arising in the course of this consideration.
The authors have constantly turned to an analysis of the Maoists’ political practices p
and have sought to show the true meaning of Mao’s various propositions in the light
of the facts provided by the Maoists’ practical activity; they have tried to expose the
unscientific, petty-bourgeois, Great-Power essence of Maoism, and the depth of 13
Mao’s political, moral and theoretical degradation.
This monograph has been prepared by the Institute of Philosophy and the Institute p
of the Far East of the USSR Academy of Sciences.
The Introduction was written by V. G. Georgiyev, Cand. Sc. (Philos.), and V. A.

Krivtsov, Cand. Sc. (Philos.); Chapter One by V. G. Georgiyev; Chapter Two by V.
A. Krivtsov (Section 1), V. G. Georgiyev and V. A. Krivtsov (Section 2); Chapter
Three by Y. G. Plimak, Cand. Sc. (Hist.), and Y. F. Karyakin (Sections 1, 2, 3), V.
G. Georgiyev and Y. G. Plimak (Section 4); Chapter Four by Y. G. Plimak (Sections
1 and 2), V. G. Georgiyev, K. I. Ivanov, Y. G. Plimak, and V. Y. Sidikhmenov,
Cand. Sc. (Econ.) (Section 3), G. S. Ostroumov, Cand. Sc. (Law) (Sections 4 and 5),
V. G. Georgiyev and G. S. Ostroumov (Section 6); Chapter Five by V. N.
Semyonov, Dr. Sc. (Philos.), and V. Y. Sidikhmenov; Chapter Six by A. S. Frish,
Cand. Sc. (Philos.); Chapter Seven by Y. A. Bailer, Dr. Sc. (Philos.), and the
Conclusion by V. G. Georgiyev and V. Y. Sidikhmenov.
14
***

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Notes
[ 5•1] International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties, Moscow 1969,

Documents, Prague 1969, p 12.
[ 5•2] Ibid., p. 38.
[ 6•1] 24th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, Documents,
Moscow, 1971, p. 15.
[ 8•1] Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works, Vol. 4, London, 1956, p. 212.
[ 12•1 ] V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 30, p. 162.
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Chapter One 15
<•>
THE SUBSTANCE OF MAOIST PHILOSOPHY

TOC 1. Ideological Origins

Card
The whole “wealth” of Maoist philosophy is contained in these publications: 1. The p
pamphlet, Dialectical Materialism, written in Yenan at the end of the 1930s on the
Text
basis of a series of lectures given at a Party school. A small part of this book was
HTML
subsequently rewritten and published in the form of two articles, “On Practice" and
PS
PDF
“On Contradictions" in the Selected Works in the 1950s; 2. The article, “On the
Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People”, published in 1957; 3. The
T* article, “Whence Does a Man Acquire Correct Ideas?" (1963); 4. The articles, “On
19* New Democracy" and “On the Democratic Dictatorship of the People”; 5. Editorial
articles in the newspaper Jenmin jihpao and the journal Hungchih (1963–
### 1965) [ 15•1 ; 6. Statements on philosophical questions at various conferences and
in connection with philosophical discussions. [ 15•2
An analysis of all these philosophical articles and statements inevitably suggests the p
conclusion that Mao’s theoretical scope is extremely circumscribed. The sources of
Maoist philosophy are, first, the traditional Chinese (feudal) philosophy; and second,
various bourgeois and pettybourgeois theories, both Chinese and European.
Marxist philosophy is known to be a critical revolutionary generalisation of the p 16

whole of earlier philosophic thought. German classical philosophy, above all the
writings of Hegel and Feuerbach, was an immediate theoretical source of Marxist
philosophy. Among the important gains of world philosophic thought were Hegel’s
dialectical method and his coherent system of dialectical laws and categories, and
Feuerbach’s materialist thesis that nature and man are the only objective realities, and
his statement that practice is the criterion of truth. These show that by the time Marx
and Engels began their theoretical activity European philosophy had attained a
sufficiently high level of development. If we take a look at the Chinese philosophy
of the same period we shall find that it presents a different picture.
For a number of historical reasons, above all the long period dominated by the p
feudal mode of production ( expressed in the sphere of spiritual life in the deadening
domination of neo-Confucian scholasticism), theoretical thinking in China by the
mid-19th century markedly lagged behind theoretical thinking in other countries. At
the dawn of world civilisation, Chinese philosophy had provided instances of
profound (for the time of course) penetration into the substance of human nature and
relations between men, of interesting dialectical conceptions covering a fairly wide
range of problems of being, and in the early period of mankind’s history Chinese
philosophy developed parallel to philosophy in other countries and may perhaps have
even been in advance of the latter on some points, which is why Confucius, Mo
Tzu, Lao Tzu, Hsiin Tzu, Chuang Tzu, Yang Chu and Wang Chung all have a niche
in history alongside Heraclitus, Democritus, Plato and Aristotle. However, in the
Middle Ages, and especially in the period of modern history, there was a
fundamental change in the situation.
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/1.1-Ideological.Origins[2012-12-18 2:26:57]
Of course, even in these periods we find some original Chinese philosophers, among p
them the free thinker Fan Chen (5th century) and Han Yui (8-9th centuries), the
materialists Chang Tsai (12th century), Wang Fu-chih (17th century), and Tai Chen
(18th century), the objective idealist Chu Hsi (12th century), the intuitive idealist
Wang Yang-ming (16–17th centuries), and the interesting social philosopher Huang
Tsung-hsi (17th century). However, these features are characteristic of the overall
tendency in the development of Chinese philosophy: first, a somewhat narrow range 17
of problems, with a prevailing interest in ethical values, which are considered mainly
in the light of the relationship between man’s duty and obligations to (feudal)
society, and the subordination of personal freedom to the authority of the state; and
second, a descriptive, sketchy and naive approach in explaining the phenomena of
the external world, an approach deeply rooted in the ancient period.
Through the whole of the history of Chinese philosophy runs the idea of there p
being opposite principles in nature and society which are interconnected and pass
into each other. However, no Chinese philosopher ever gave a clearcut formulation of
the interconnection of the opposites of the objective world as a general ontological
law. Their conception of opposites was extremely metaphysical. Indeed, these
opposites appeared to be discrete in time and space. The transition from one opposite
to another was not an internal process of transition and connection of opposites but
their mere outward displacement, or changing of places. Moreover, development was
seen to be cyclical. That was the view taken of the problem of opposites not only by
Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu, but also by Chang Tsai, Chu Hsi, Wei Yuan and Cheng
Kuan-ying (19th century), among others.
Here, for instance, is what Chu Hsi wrote: “East-West, top-bottom, winter-summer, p
day-night, birth-death: all these are opposites and constitute pairs. All natural
phenomena are necessarily paired." [ 17•1 Wei Yuan, who lived six centuries later,
wrote in a similar vein: “Heat reaching a limit gives way not to heat but to cold.
Cold reaching a limit, gives way not to cold but to heat. Something excessively bent
straightens out with greater force. Latent energy is revealed with greater force. . . .
Decline and growth are indissoluble, happiness and misfortune have a common
root." [ 17•2
The same philosopher also said this: “There are no isolated things in the Universe; p
everything must have a pair, that is, there can be no two high things, two big things,
two costly things, there can be no two forces similar in magnitude. A struggle for
primacy always takes place in everything that is paired. Why? It is simply because in 18
paired things one must be cardinal and the other subordinate, because only then does
the pair not break up into separate things." [ 18•1
Both Chu Hsi and Wei Yuan confined themselves to stating the fact that opposites p
exist in nature and alternate with each other, but one will look in vain for an
explanation in their writings of the cause and content of the process of alternation,
or of any consideration, in particular, of the problem of the identity of opposites.
That is why they were unable to explain the transformation of things into their
opposites.
In the middle and even at the end of the 19th century, Chinese philosophers p
frequently retold what had been said and written not only by their immediate
predecessors, but also by philosophers who had lived 2,000 years before them. They
continued to reiterate their ideas, relying on the traditional categories of Yin, Yang,
Tao, Tai Chi, etc. In 1893, Cheng Kuan-ying, an ideologist of the emergent Chinese
bourgeoisie, published a book entitled Bold Talk in the Age of Florescence (Sheng-
shi wei-yan), proposing a number of political reforms for the purpose of China’s
technical and economic modernisation. [ 18•2 In his philosophical substantiation of
the book—“Tap-Chi”—he wrote: “It is said in Yi Ching, in the section ’Hsi Tzu
Chuan’ [ 18•3 : ’That which has no form is called Tao; that which has form is
called Chi.’ Tao sprang from non-existence; initially (it) produced primary matter
(Chi) which thickened and became Tai Chi. Subsequently there occurred the division
of Tai Chi into Yin and Yang." [ 18•4
“The heavens were arranged around the earth, and the earth occupied its place in p
the midst of the heavens; Yin included within itself Yang, and Yang included within 19
itself Yin. That is why it is said that ’the interaction of Yin and Yang is Tao’.
Hence: ’Two produced three, and three—all things.’ Things and their names, primary
matter and its laws existing in the world are embraced (by Tao). Because odd and
even numbers exist, so, just as the multiplication of even and odd numbers produces
a diversity of different numbers, the interaction of Yin and Yang in the aggregate
produces the diversity of all things. Consequently, things emerge from primary
matter, or in other words, concrete objects appear from Tao." [ 19•1
This primitive, naively dialectical scheme, which is based on ancient treatises (the p
author backs up his conception with references to the corresponding ideas of Lao Tzu
and Confucius), was formulated in 1893 when the law of the conservation and
transformation of energy, the cellular theory and Darwin’s theory of evolution were
already known in other countries. [ 19•2
Without in any sense denying the importance of this view of cosmological problems p
for the establishment of the materialist world outlook, let us note that it is an
obvious oversimplification. With rare exceptions, the whole of Chinese philosophy
from the 17th to the 19th century was weak on ontological and epistemological
problems. As a result, by the turn of the century Chinese philosophy markedly
lagged behind the philosophy of other countries in the range and scope of its
problems and the depth of their solution. [ 19•3
Philosophical development is known to be directly connected with the development p 20

of the natural sciences, and there is no doubt at all that the gains of philosophy in
the period of modern history were largely determined by the great advances in
medicine, astronomy, biology, physiology, mathematics, mechanics, etc. Meanwhile,
the natural sciences in China from the 17th to the 19th century were embryonic, a
fact which necessarily had an effect on the development of Chinese philosophy in
the period under consideration.
Neo-Confucianism, the official feudal ideology of China, was the main retarding p
factor in Chinese philosophy. Confucius was a great thinker who had considered a
number of important problems, including man’s social predestination, the causal
nexus of his acts, the criteria for human acts, the relationship between various social
groups, etc.
On the whole, however, the teaching of Confucius faced the past, an earlier period p
he called the “golden age" in the history of China. Confucius justified and upheld
conservative views and outdated traditions. He insisted that the traditions established
by the ancients, the wise rulers of the earlier periods, embodied the “behests of
heaven”, and that these traditions, designated in the aggregate as Li ( ceremony,
“etiquette”), were sacrosanct.
One of the central categories of the Confucian teaching is Jen, which means “love p
of mankind”, “humaneness”, but it would be wrong to identify this concept with the
concept of compassion, love and respect for men. Jen was a category with a clearly
class tenor and a strictly defined sphere of application. “Humaneness” was proper
only to noble men, the elite of society. “A noble man can be inhumane, but a
commoner cannot be humane." [ 20•1 Since Li was a concrete embodiment of the
Jen category, the requirement laid down by Confucius and his disciples, notably
Meng Tzu, to follow Jen meant nothing more than the requirement unconditionally to
observe the social graduation of men. The ideal of Confucius and his followers was
that the father must be a father, the son a son, the emperor an emperor, the official 21
an official. Everyone must occupy the station assigned to him by the heavens.
Society, structured in accordance with this order, must consist of two categories of
men: those who work with the “heart”, that is, with their reason, and govern, and
those whom the heavens assign to work by hand and feed those who govern.
An important principle of the social order advocated by Confucianism is the p

requirement of unconditional subordination to one’s seniors, whether by age or
station in life. In this context, Confucius and his followers laid great emphasis on the
concept Hsiao, which meant “filial esteem”. They believed that “those who honour
their parents and respect their elders rarely fail to submit to their superiors". [ 21•1
Consequently, Confucianism sought to use tribal, patriarchal traditions to educate men
in a spirit of blind submission to the ruling elite. Confucius himself repeatedly said
as much. He held that the common people had no business discoursing on the affairs
of government, and had to “be made to follow, but should not be allowed to be
enlightened". [ 21•2 Unquestioning obedience and submissiveness to the power of
the ruler (the son of heaven), the law that “everyone should know his place"—those
are the fundamental principles of Confucian philosophy.
Although these ideas did have a negative influence on the development of Chinese p
theoretical thinking, their influence was at first limited, because Taoism and
Buddhism existed as teachings on a par with Confucianism. However, in the llth and
12th centuries, mainly through the efforts of Chu Hsi, the teaching of neo-
Confucianism was established as a blend of the ethical teaching of Confucius and the
tenets of Taoism and Buddhism.
Neo-Confucianism became the official ideology of Chinese society. It secured a p

monopoly control over the people’s spiritual life, requiring strict observance of the
accepted forms of thinking and behaviour. Neo-Confucianism was a system of
strictly defined canons and rigid rules, each of which was obligatory and had to be
observed without fail. It was learned by rote, like dogma, in all the schools. Each
pupil and student had to memorise numerous sayings by Confucius and his followers 22
as interpreted by Chu Hsi, without usually understanding what they meant. A
mechanical knowledge of these sayings entitled a scholar to become an official.
The memorising of Confucian dogmas from generation to generation was cultivated p

by the feudal elite and became a national tradition. Such methods of upbringing and
education made every Chinese, in a sense, a Confucian. This did not mean, of
course, that everyone was versed in all the Confucian dicta, but only that everyone
accepted the Confucian prescriptions as something natural, as something to be taken
for granted, as ancestral tradition.
In order to foster among the people a spirit of loyalty to the traditional ideology of p
neo-Confucianism every effort was made to cultivate the notion that the Chinese
people’s spiritual and cultural values were exclusive. This not only generated an
attitude of conformism with respect to China’s conservative traditions, but also
helped to form the ideology of Sinocentrism, an essential element of which was

contempt for all things non-Chinese, including non-Chinese sciences and philosophy.
The sway of neo-Confucian scholasticism necessarily left its mark on Chinese p

philosophy. Scholars were required to produce no more than commentaries on the
writings of the Confucian fathers in the orthodox spirit; ideas contradicting neo-
Confucianism were reviled. This naturally prevented Chinese thinkers from
considering the pressing problems of China’s social and spiritual development. Even
progressive philosophers and socio-political thinkers were forced to fall back on the
authority of Confucius to defend their ideas. Thus, at the end of the 19th century,
bourgeois reformers (among them Kang Yu-wei and Liang Chi-chao) used some
Confucian philosophical tenets to spread the idea of constitutional monarchy. [ 22•1
Chinese society first got a knowledge of the culture and philosophy of other p 23
countries in the second half of the 19th century. [ 23•1 Because the vehicle of this
process was the intelligentsia, mainly its feudal section, it naturally assumed a
definite character. A study was made mainly of the technical achievements in world
science, some political and social institutions, and some ideas of the bourgeois
philosophy of other countries, notably, positivism, but not, of course, Marxism. It
should be borne in mind that Chinese society first got a knowledge of the
accomplishments of world civilisation just as China was being colonised and that
these ideas were brought in by agents of the imperialist powers, which naturally
wanted a pro-imperialist ideology to be established in China.
The sway of traditionalism in philosophy and the embryonic state of the natural p
sciences resulted in a situation in which the borrowing of some elements of Western
culture among the Chinese philosophers at the end of the 19th century produced a
synthesis of traditional and European scientific concepts. Thus, Kang Yu-wei
identified electricity with the spiritual principle called “Jen”, which according to
Confucianism was inherent in all things and phenomena. Among those who translated
the writings of European thinkers was Yan Fu, a Right-wing bourgeois reformer. His
translations contain commentaries in which he sought to show the similarity of
various Western socio-philosophical conceptions with the traditional socio-political
ideas of Chinese antiquity and the Middle Ages, mostly with Confucianism.
Consequently, the conclusion is well warranted that modern Chinese philosophy had p
not on the whole risen above the level of its medieval predecessor. The formation of
modern philosophy, which began at the end of the 19th century, in the sense of its
alignment in level with the latest achievements in theoretical knowledge, naturally 24
enough could not all at once yield any tangible results, especially considering that it
proceeded, as we have said, under the sway of neo-Confucianism. The Chinese
philosophy of the 17th-19th centuries was essentially a curious modification of the
original form of materialism and naive dialectics. That was the theoretical foundation
on which Maoist philosophy grew. Like all men of his generation, Mao Tse-tung
received the traditional education, which consisted in the main in a Talmudic
drumming into men’s heads of Confucian tenets and other ancient texts. [ 24•1
Another source of Maoist philosophy is the Utopian, egalitarian ideas, running right p
through the history of the Chinese thought, which in the 19th century were most
fully expressed in the policy statements of the Taipings—dispossessed Chinese
peasants—and the writings of Kang Yu-wei. The Taiping ideal was a just society
practising the following principles: “The land would be tilled in common, meals
would be taken together, clothes would be used jointly, and money spent collectively.
Equality would be observed everywhere, and everyone would be provided with food
and clothing." [ 24•2
Kang Yu-wei’s social utopia implied social ownership and the principle of popular p
rule and self-government. He believed such a society could be set up through the
gradual elimination of the family and private property relations within it. Men and
women would enter into free marital relations, and their children would be entirely in
the public care. Kang Yu-wei believed that this would eliminate the family, with the
result that no property, with the exception of ornaments and various knick-knacks,
would be handed down, so that upon the death of their owners the land, factories
and shops would pass into public use. Kang Yu-wei believed that this would result
in universal equality. Actually, however, this amounted to no more than an anarchist
rejection of the family. [ 24•3
We find that Hung Hsiu-chuan, the founder of the Taiping peasant movement, and p 25
Kang Yu-wei, who expressed the interests of the bourgeoisie, had the same idea of a
return to a “golden age”, and the establishment of an ideal and just society, called
“Tatung”. [ 25•1
Characteristically, Mao’s writings contain almost no mention of the development of p

the natural sciences and their latest discoveries. This is due not only to Mao’s
specifically traditional education, which did not provide for any serious study of the
fundamentals of modern science, but also to Mao’s own lack of interest in the
natural sciences. [ 25•2 Here are some of the “references” to the natural sciences
that will be found in Mao’s Little Red Book. 1. “The history of mankind is one of
the continuous development from the realm of necessity to the realm of freedom.
This process is neverending. In any society in which classes exist class struggle will
never end. In classless society the struggle between the new and the old and
between truth and falsehood will never end. In the course of the struggle for
production and scientific experiment, mankind makes constant progress and nature
undergoes constant change; they never remain on the same level. Therefore, man has
constantly to sum up experience and go on discovering, inventing, creating and
advancing. Ideas of stagnation, pessimism, inertia and complacency are all wrong.
They are wrong because they agree neither with the historical facts of social
development over the past million years, nor with the historical facts of nature so far
(history of celestial bodies, the earth life, and other natural phenomena)." [ 25•3 2.
“Natural science is one of man’s weapons in his fight for freedom. For the purpose
of attaining freedom in society, man must use social science to understand and
change society and carry out social revolution. For the purpose of attaining freedom 26
in the world of nature, man must use natural science to understand, conquer and
change nature and thus attain freedom from nature." [ 26•1
Both these statements are a recapitulation of Engels’ idea about the relation between p
freedom and necessity, while the references to natural science are extremely vague
and abstract. What is more, these references are used by Mao to substantiate a
“truth” which has been known since the days of Heraclitus, who said: “All is flux,
nothing is stationary.” However, an editorial article in Hungchih in 1969 claimed that
these statements of Mao’s were the “ theoretical generalisation of the history of
nature”.
Lenin said that “there is nothing resembling ‘ sectarianism’ in Marxism, in the sense p
of its being a hidebound, petrified doctrine, a doctrine which arose away from the
high road of the development of world civilisation". [ 26•2 By contrast, Maoist
philosophy was developed mainly on a narrow, Chinese national basis, out of touch
with the best achievements of philosophical thought in the rest of the world.
Mao read a number of works by foreign writers, among which he was most p
influenced by Herbert Spencer’s Principles of Sociology, Thomas Henry Huxley’s
Evolution and Ethics, John Stuart Mill’s On Liberty, Adam Smith’s Inquiry into the
Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations and Montesquieu’s L’Esprit des Lois.
Mao did not take much interest in the natural science and politico-economic
problems these writers dealt with. He was attracted in their writings by their socio-
political conception which in the early 20th century swayed men in various sections
of Chinese society, the conception of social-Darwinism, which in China was seen
above all as an explanation, “in the light of advanced science”, of the causes and
laws of a struggle for existence between nations and races.
At the start of his revolutionary activity, Mao took a keen interest in anarchist ideas
(above all those of Bakunin and Kropotkin), whose influence he has in fact never
been able to overcome.
***

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normal
Notes
[ 15•1 ] According to the Hungweiping press, all these articles were written with
Mao’s direct participation.
[ 15•2 ] These statements were reported in the Chinese press, mainly the
Hungweiping press, which also gave the content of the statements and sometimes the
verbatim text.
[ 17•1 ] Yui Tung, Principal Problems of Chinese Philosophy, Peking, 1958, p. 139
(in Chinese).
[ 17•2 ] Selected Writings of Progressive Chinese Thinkers of the Period of Modern

History, Moscow, 1961, pp. 45–46 (in Russian).
[ 18•1 ] Selected Writings..., p. 48.
[ 18•2 ] Edgar Snow tells us that Mao read this book in his youth and was highly
impressed (Red Star Over China, London, 1968, p. 134).
[ 18•3 ] Yi Ching (Book of Changes) is one of the most ancient Chinese treatises,
dating back to the 8th–7th centuries B.C. “Hsi Tzu Chuan”, an appendix to Yi
Ching, sets out the philosophical interpretation of the main text of the book; written
in about the 5th-3rd centuries B.C.
[ 18•4 ] Tai Chi (Great Limit), signifying the initial stage and the cause behind the
origination and development of all things and phenomena, first occurs in Yi Ching.
Yin and Yang, the two opposite principles in nature whose struggle, according to the
ancient Chinese, led to the origination and development of all things.
[ 19•1 ] Selected Writings. .., pp. 98–99.
[ 19•2 ] Another prominent reformer, Kang Yu-wei, bases his explanation of the
origin of the world on the concepts of Yuan Chi and Chi, which occur in the
writings of Confucius.
[ 19•3 ] In this connection it is strange, to say the least, to find the Chinese professor
Chu Chien-chi asserting that Chinese (Confucian) philosophy has had an effect on
the development of world philosophy and ultimately of Marxism as well. In an
article in a Chinese philosophical journal he wrote: “Marxism, dialectical materialism,
is essentially connected with the European philosophy of the 18th century, and the
European philosophy of the 18th century is essentially connected with Chinese
philosophy. This means that as it penetrated Europe, Chinese philosophy exerted, on
the one hand, a direct influence on French materialist philosophy, and on the other, a
direct influence on the dialectics of German idealism. These materialism and
dialectics were precisely the important source on which Marx and Engels drew in
shaping their dialectical materialism. If these historical facts are true, we shall find it
easy in the future to understand the connection between Marxism and Chinese
philosophy, we shall cease to be unacquainted, as we once used to be, with
dialectical materialism, and in general we shall find it much easier to apprehend
Marxist philosophy.” (Chieh-hsueh yan-chiu No. 4, 1957, p. 57).
[ 20•1 ] Lunyui, Ch. “Hsian wen”, 6.
[ 21•1 ] Ibid., Ch. “Hsiuer”, 2.
[ 21•2 ] Ibid., Ch. “Tai-po”, 9.
[ 22•1 ] It is not surprising that the cult of Confucius was once again enshrined and
renovated in China under the Kuomintang reactionary clique, when it was
underpinned by pseudo-Sun Yat-senism, the official doctrine of Kuomintang reaction,
on the one hand, and reactionary bourgeois ideas from the West, on the other. This
was the basis for Chen Li-fu’s “ philosophy of life" and Chiang Kai-shek’s
“philosophy of action”, both designed to vindicate the dictatorship of the Kuomintang
clique. This “phi– losophy” used the cult of Confucius as a black banner to cover up
the massacre of hundreds of thousands of patriots and the pursuit of chauvinistic
policies. The ideologists of the Kuomintang clique declared his teaching to be the
“ideological basis" for mankind’s progress and prosperity, and predicted that the
peoples of the whole world would in one way or another ultimately travel the way
indicated by Confucius.
[ 23•1 ] Up to then there was a limited knowledge of world culture and philosophy.
[ 24•1 ] Mao Tse-tung studied at a primary school in his native village of Shaoshan,
at a school in the district centre of Hsiangtan, and at a secondary school and a
teachers’ training college of the provincial town of Changsha.
[ 24•2 ] Selected Writings..., p. 69.
[ 24•3 ] According to Liang Chi-chao, an associate of Kang Yu-wei’s in the reform

movement, the latter’s social utopia boiled down to an “elimination of the family”.
[ 25•1 ] The writings of both contain an extract from Chapter “Liyun” of the ancient
Confucian treatise, Lichi, describing the Tatung society. Let us note, by the way, that
the organisation and activity of the Chinese communes from 1958 to 1960 was
highly reminiscent of the socio-economic experiments of the Taiping and Kang Yu-
wei’s social utopia.
[ 25•2 ] Recalling his school years, Mao said: “For one thing, I was opposed to the
required courses in natural science. I wanted to specialise in social sciences. Natural
sciences did not especially interest me, and I did not study them, so I got poor
marks in most of these courses" (Edgar Snow, 0p. cit., p. 145).
[ 25•3 ] Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, Peking, I960, pp. 203–04.
[ 26•1 ] Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, pp. 204–05.
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2. The Meaning of Marxist Terminology 27
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in Mao’s Writings

TOC
At the 9th Congress of the CPC it was declared that for 50 years (that is, from p
Card
1919) Mao had been combining the universal truth of Marxism-Leninism with the
practice of the Chinese revolution. In the light of the historical facts, this assertion is
Text quite groundless. In his earliest works, Mao was already elaborating non-Marxist
HTML ideas: in his first work, “An Essay on Physical Education" (1917), the 24-year-old
PS Mao declared the physical health of the nation to be a means of China’s national
PDF resurgence. In his second work, an article entitled “The Great Alliance of the People"
(1919), he said nothing about the working class as the vanguard and leader of the
T* revolution, and made no mention of the proletarian dictatorship. In 1926, as one of
19*
the leaders of the CPC, Mao wrote an article, “Analysis of the Classes in Chinese
### Society”, [ 27•1 which gave a petty-bourgeois view of China’s social structure.
That is not at all surprising. Mao’s traditional education naturally excluded the study p
of Marxist theory. As he set out to educate himself, Mao was unable to gain a
correct idea of Marxism, because he obtained his information about it mainly from
the writings of various petty-bourgeois socialists.
Moreover, Mao was able to obtain an idea about Marxism only in translation, p
because he knew no foreign languages and was unable to read the writings of the
Marxist-Leninist classics in the original. What is more, by the early 1940s, and in
fact even as late as 1949, a very insignificant part of these works had been
translated into Chinese. [ 27•2
His main source for the study of Marxism were popular writings, mainly textbooks p
by Soviet philosophers, which were made available to the CPC’s active members
through the translations of Ai Szu-chi and others.
Although these Soviet philosophical textbooks did consider some of the important p 28
theoretical problems directly connected with the practice of socialist construction,
specifically the problem of contradictions in exploitative and socialist societies, their
authors’ main purpose was to provide a popular aid on Marxist philosophy for a
mass readership.
In the Soviet Union, these writings were of great importance in the struggle against p
the mechanistic and idealistic distortions of Marxism, and in educating Party
members, government functionaries and scientists in the spirit of Marxist philosophy.
In China, the Soviet textbooks on philosophy helped the Communists to obtain a
knowledge of Marxism and raise the theoretical level of CPC cadres.
Mao thus had ample opportunity to acquire a correct understanding of the p

fundamentals of Marxist philosophy, but the content of his philosophical writings
shows that he failed to master the whole body of knowledge in the philosophy of
Marxism-Leninism contained in the Soviet textbooks.
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/1.2-Marxist.Terminology.in.Maos.Writings[2012-12-18 2:27:06]
As has been said, Mao’s first philosophical work was the pamphlet, Dialectical p
Materialism, which he wrote in Yenan on the basis of a series of lectures he gave at
a Party school. The contents of the pamphlet give an idea of the problems he dealt
with.
Chapter I. Idealism and Materialism. p
1) The war between two armies in philosophy. p
2) The difference between idealism and materialism. p
3) The source of the rise and development of idealism. p
4) The source of the rise and development of materialism. p
Chapter II. Dialectical Materialism. p
1) Dialectical materialism—a revolutionary weapon of the proletariat. p
2) The attitude of dialectical materialism to the legacy of the old philosophy. p
3) The unity of world view and methodology in dialectical materialism. p
4) The problem of the subject of materialist dialectics (what does materialist p

dialectics serve to study?).
5) On matter. p
6) On motion (on development). p
7) On space and time. p
8) On consciousness. p
9) On reflection. p
10) On truth. p 29
11) On practice (on the connection between cognition and practice, theory and p
reality, knowledge and action).
Chapter III. Materialist Dialectics. p
1) The law of the unity of opposites. p
a) Two views of development. p
b) The formal-logical law of identity and the dialectical law of contradiction. p
c) The universality of contradiction. p
d) The specific nature of contradiction. p
e) The principal contradiction and the principal aspect of contradiction. p
f) Identity and struggle of opposites. p
g) The place of antagonism in the line of contradictions. p
The pamphlet was published at Talien sometime between 1945 and 1949. Earlier, in p
1940, the journal Minchu carried its first chapter, entitled “Dialectical Materialism”.
Our detailed study of the text of the Dialectical Materialism pamphlet shows that it p
was written on the basis of two Soviet works: the textbook Dialectical Materialism
(written under the direction of Academician M. Mitin), which was published in
Moscow in 1933, and the article “Dialectical Materialism”, in Volume 22 of the first
edition of the Bolshaya Sovietskaya Entsiklopedia.
Mao’s pamphlet is essentially a digest of these two works. Now and again, he p
simply “borrows” various propositions from Soviet writings and slightly modifies
them. This applies especially to philosophical problems which were either not dealt
with in traditional Chinese philosophy at all, or were treated on a low theoretical
level, because their treatment required both a grounding in natural science and
information about the world-wide historico-philosophical process. This applies to the
problems of the material nature of the world, matter and the forms of its existence,
notably space and time, consciousness, and the relationship between objective,
relative and absolute truth.
But even while recapitulating in his Dialectical Materialism pamphlet the correct p
propositions taken from the abovementioned works, Mao oversimplifies and
vulgarises them. Here are a few examples.
1. Characterising the class essence of the two main philosophical trends, the authors p
of the Soviet textbook Dialectical Materialism quite rightly remarked on the 30
possibility of idealist theories reflecting the social needs of the epoch. They said: “In
its historical development, idealism was the ideology of the exploiting classes and as
a rule had a reactionary part to play. Materialism, whose development was an
expression of the world outlook of the revolutionary classes, had to make its way in
the class society in ceaseless struggle against idealism, the philosophy of reaction. Of
course, no obligatory historical pattern can be established in this sphere. There are
instances when immature social classes expressed their new revolutionary demands
in the language of idealism (German idealism in the early 19th century, the theories
of natural law, and, in part, Utopian socialism). On the other hand, the militant
French materialism of the 18th century was the ideology of the revolutionary French
bourgeoisie. The materialism of the 17th century, Engels said, had an aristocratic
origin." [ 30•1
Mao Tse-tung borrowed only the first two ideas: “In the process of its historical p
development, idealism was the form of consciousness of the exploiting classes and
had a reactionary role to play. By contrast, materialism is the world outlook of the
revolutionary classes. It originates and develops in class society in ceaseless struggle
against idealism, the reactionary philosophy.” The result is a primitive and vulgarised
scheme of the history of philosophical thought which rules out the possibility of
recognising the achievements of the idealists in developing theoretical thinking.
2. According to Mao, the basic social cause behind the origination of idealism is the p
antithesis between mental and physical labour. He says: “...Initially, idealism emerges
as the product of the superstition and ignorance of a savage primitive man. But with
the development of production the gap between physical and mental labour comes to
be the main condition promoting the formation of idealism as a philosophical trend.
The social division of labour is the result of the development of the productive
forces of society; it subsequently results in the separation of men among whom

mental labour becomes the main speciality. But so long as the productive forces
remained weak, the gap between the two forms of labour was not yet complete. Only 31
after classes and private property appear and exploitation becomes the basis for the
existence of the ruling class, does a great change occur: mental labour becomes the
privilege ol the ruling class, and physical labour, the lot of the oppressed classes.
The ruling class begins to take a distorted view of its relations with the oppressed
classes, claiming that it is not the working people who provide the means of
subsistence for the members of the ruling class but that, on the contrary, it is the
members of the ruling class who provide the means of subsistence for the working
people. That is why they have contempt for physical labour, and that is the way
idealistic views appear. The elimination of the distinctions between physical and
mental labour is one of the conditions for eliminating idealistic philosophy." [ 31•1
Mao wrongly identifies the causes producing the illusion that ideology develops p
independently, and the social roots of idealism. Actually, the division into mental and
physical labour does deform men and establishes definite social functions for some
of them, but it also gives an impetus to the development of society’s productive
forces, science and the arts. Evidence of this comes from the history of the first
society with antagonistic classes. Engels wrote: “It was slavery that first made
possible the division of labour between agriculture and industry on a larger scale,
and thereby also Hellenism, the flowering of the ancient world. Without slavery, no
Greek state, no Greek art and science...." [ 31•2 As for the social roots of idealism,
they lie in the division of society into classes and in the urge of the exploiting
classes to maintain and consolidate their domination.
Let us add that when writing his pamphlet, Mao himself had a very modest opinion p
of it. He wrote: “This lecture course of mine cannot likewise be considered a good
one, because I myself have just started to study dialectics and am unable to write a
good book." [ 31•3
When preparing his Selected Works for the press in the late 1940s and early 1950s, p
Mao included in them only a part of his Dialectical Materialism pamphlet, namely,
the last section of Chapter II, as an article, “On Practice”, and Chapter III (with the 32
exception of Section 2, “The formallogical law of identity and the dialectical law of
contradiction”) as an article “On Contradiction". [ 32•1 These articles also contain a
number of borrowings from the above-mentioned textbook, Dialectical Materialism,
and the article “ Dialectical Materialism" in the Bolshaya Soinetskaya Entsiklopcdia.
Does the fact of Mao’s borrowing and use of various propositions from popular p
Soviet works give ground to regard him as a rank-and-file Marxist philosopher, let
alone an “outstanding Marxist-Leninist"? Is it right to say that Marxist terminology
“mastered” in this way is evidence that Soviet philosophers are to blame for the
emergence of Maoism, as bourgeois propaganda and some scientists in the West
have claimed? The answer to both questions is an emphatic no.
The fact is that the borrowing of Marxist propositions from Soviet writings goes p
hand in hand not only with oversimplification and vulgarisation in interpreting a
number of problems but also with anti-Marxist propositions. This is especially
evident in Mao’s treatment of the principal law of dialectics. In fact, his digest gives
way to downright distortion, to say nothing of the fact that in range and depth Mao’s
pamphlet does not bear any comparison with the works of Soviet philosophers.
The fact that the terminology in Mao’s articles “On Contradiction" and “On p
Practice" is outwardly similar to those in Marxist writings, a fact which is due to

Mao’s borrowing of various propositions from Soviet textbooks, creates the wrong
impression about their real content and true value.
We find a further distortion and vulgarisation of Marxism in Mao’s articles and

statements on philosophy in the 1950s and the 1960s (for instance, in his article “On
the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People”, 1957, and in his
“Directions Concerning the Discussion on ‘Dichotomy of Unity’ ”, 1964). The
Maoists have tried to obscure the real essence of the “thought of Mao Tse-tung" by
playing up his use of Marxist phraseology, his extensive quotations from the writings 33
of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin, and the formal similarity of some Maoist
postulates with Marxist ideas.
***

TEXT SIZE
normal
Notes
[ 27•1 ] A reference to the original version of the article, and not the one which is
included in Mao Tse-tung’s Selected Works (sec Voprosy [ilosofii. No. 6, 1969).
[ 27•2 ] Let us also emphasise that from the 1920s to the 1940s there were no
Chinese translations of the world’s classic philosophers: Bacon, Locke, Diderot,
Holbach, Kant, Hegel, Feuerbach, and so on. In that period, the Chinese public was
only able to read the works of the founders of positivism and pragmatism: Comte,
Spencer, Russell, Dewey and James.
[ 30•1 ] Dialectical and Historical Materialism, Part 1, Moscow, 1933, p. 37 (in

Russian). (Emphasis added—V.G.)
[ 31•1 ] Dialectical Materialism, Talien, p. 5 (in Chinese).
[ 31•2 ] F. Kngcls, Anti-Diihring, Moscow, 1969, p. 210.
[ 31•3 ] Dialectical Materialism, p. 110.
[ 32•1 ] Up until recently it was considered that Mao’s articles “On Practice" and
“On Contradiction" had been written in 1937. The latest works by Soviet scientists
show that they were in fact written in the late 1940s and the c-:»V 1950s (see M.
Altaisky and V. Georgiyev, The Philosophical fiVcrs of Mao Tse-tung. A Critical
Analysis, Moscow, 1971, pp. 19–21).
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3. On the Real Meaning 33
<•>
of Maoist Dialectics

TOC
Maoist propaganda claims that Mao has safeguarded and developed materialist p
Card
dialectics, notably, the law of the unity and struggle of opposites.
Text Actually, Mao has said much on contradictions and the unity and struggle of p
HTML opposites, but his view of the law of the unity and struggle of opposites is radically
PS at variance with the Marxist view of it.
PDF
First of all, while recognising the struggle of opposites, Mao has failed to show the p
T* true essence of this process. Take his speech at a sitting of the Politburo of the CPC
19* Central Committee in Wuchang on December 1, 1958, which the Maoists like to
quote. Here is what he said at the time: “Just as duality is a feature of all things and
### phenomena in the world (this is the essence of the law of the unity of opposites), so
duality is also a feature of imperialism and all reactionaries—they are both real and
paper tigers. History shows that until taking power and for some time after their
takeover, the slaveowners, the feudal landowners and the bourgeoisie were viable,
revolutionary and advanced classes, and were real tigers. In the subsequent period, as
the slaves, the peasantry and the proletariat—the classes which are their opposites—
gradually grew, gained in strength and carried on an ever fiercer struggle against
them, the slaveowners, the feudal landowners and the bourgeoisie underwent a
reverse transformation: they became reactionary, backward classes, they were
transformed into paper tigers and ultimately were or will be overthrown by the
people.”
Leaving aside for the time being Mao’s use of the terms “real” and “paper” tigers p
(which will be dealt with later) one finds that he does not in essence go beyond a
formal recognition of the law of the unity and struggle of opposites, and fails to
show the mechanism of its operation. Indeed, in the process of historical
development, the slaveowners, the feudal lords and the bourgeoisie do cease to be 34
vehicles of social progress and are gradually supplanted by more advanced classes.
But to say this is to say nothing, because a mere statement of the generally known
historical facts does not yet add up to scientific dialectics. The Marxist theorist must
show the dialectics of the process in which one class is supplanted by another,
because a knowledge of the reasons, of the source of motion and the development of
antagonistic societies provides the basis for men’s conscious activity in the
revolutionary transformation of the world.
The mutual admission and mutual exclusion of opposites is determined by their p

dialectical nature. Opposites are in a state of mutual interpenetration. That is why
from the very beginning of their existence the slaveowners, the feudal lords and the
bourgeoisie are burdened with their opposites —the slaves, the peasants and the
proletariat. The unity of these opposites consists in the fact that they mutually imply
and mutually exclude each other. If this unity is to be eliminated there is need to
destroy the basis which produces these opposites, that is, antagonistic society. Such
unities are destroyed in the course of the class struggle and social revolution.
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/1.3-Real.Meaning.of.Maoist.Dialectics[2012-12-18 2:27:13]
Mao frequently quotes Lenin about the unity of opposites being temporary and p
relative and their struggle being absolute. However, he has in fact no correct idea of
the process in which contradictions unfold. Because Mao regards the unity of
opposites as their mere coexistence in one thing or process, he regards their
intertransition, their transformation into each other as no more than a mutual
exchange of places.
Mao fails to understand that Lenin’s formula about the unity of opposites being p
relative and their struggle being absolute means that the contradiction between
opposites inevitably deepens and unfolds. This leads to a resolution of the given
contradiction, its “removal” and the emergence of a new contradiction. In the
process, there is a qualitative change, the emergence of a new phenomenon. For
instance, the proletariat is not transformed into the bourgeoisie and does not change
places with it, as one would assume on the strength of Mao’s reasoning; there is here
a qualitative transformation in the historical role of the bourgeoisie and of the
proletariat as opposite classes of capitalist society: at a definite stage in the unfolding 35
of the contradictions, the bourgeoisie ceases to play a progressive role, and the latter
passes to the proletariat. This determines the bourgeoisie’s inevitable defeat and the
proletariat’s victory, the struggle between them ultimately results in a break of their
intrinsic connections and the elimination of the given unity of opposites, as
capitalism gives way to socialism. “When the proletariat is victorious, it by no means
becomes the absolute side of society, for it is victorious only by abolishing itself and
its opposite. Then the proletariat disappears as well as the opposite which determines
it, private property." [ 35•1
Consequently, according to Mao, as a result of the victory of the socialist revolution p

the proletariat changes places with the bourgeoisie. According to Marx, however, the
victory of the socialist revolution results in the elimination of the bourgeoisie (private
property in Marx’s terminology), and the elimination of the proletariat. Who is right,
Mao or Marx? Of course it is Marx. Indeed, on the one hand, the victory of the
socialist revolution results in the elimination of the bourgeoisie, because the
expropriation of private capitalist property is the decisive condition for the
elimination of this class. Of course, bourgeois ideology continues to exert an
influence, but the bourgeoisie itself ceases to exist as a class. On the other hand, the
victory of the socialist revolution also results in the elimination of the proletariat of
the old bourgeois society, a class deprived of the means and implements of
production, a class exploited by the bourgeoisie. The proletariat, or to be more
precise, the working class of socialist society is a totally new class, directing society,
in which the means and instruments of production belong to all the working people
and where there is no exploitation of man by man. That is why it is wrong to say,
as Mao does, that the victory of the socialist revolution results in the proletariat
changing places with the bourgeoisie.
In contrast to Maoist dialectics, Marxist dialectics clearly shows that under socialism p
neither the bourgeoisie nor the proletariat exist in the old sense, because socialism is
a qualitatively new social phenomenon, with a unity of opposites proper to it alone.
Mao’s approach to the law of the unity and struggle of opposites suggests that p 36
development is not viewed as a negation of the old by the new, but as a simple
repetition of the past, as a circular movement or even as a movement in reverse.
Suffice it to say that Mao’s “dialectics” envisages the destruction of mankind and the
globe: “There are no things in the world which are not born, which do not develop
and die. The monkey was transformed into man, men arose, but ultimately mankind
as a whole is bound to perish. It will be transformed into something different, and at
that time there will be no globe. The globe is ultimately bound to be destroyed.”
The content of the Maoist concept of contradiction itself is a mechanical antithesis p

of external opposites, with Mao using good and bad as the terms to designate these
opposites. There are also other pairs like good and evil, hot and cold, etc. Such
propositions were to some extent meaningful 20 centuries ago, when the idea that
objective being and human thinking were contradictory was being established. But in
the 20th century, with the present level of scientific knowledge, that is hardly
enough. What is more, to declare these propositions today, under the scientific and
technological revolution, as being the summit of scientific dialectics, is to hurl
philosophy into the past, and amounts to insisting on the idea of a geocentric
Universe.
Marxist philosophy is never stationary and constantly develops. But it does not p
develop by returning to ancient philosophical ideas, however true these were in the
past, but by generalising the data provided by the latest scientific advances, and
analysing the development of theoretical thinking itself. Similarly, Marxist dialectics
is not, and cannot be, reduced to a simple mechanical juxtaposition of external and
quite obvious opposites. Scientific dialectics must show the internal contradictions
inherent in things and phenomena, and the real process of development of things and
phenomena consisting of two opposites; in other words, scientific dialectics must
analyse their self-movement.
The Maoist definition of opposites does not give a correct understanding of the p
complex and contradictory processes of development in nature and society. This is
not only because it is meaningless. Mao has been using such opposites to vindicate
his distorted interpretation of social processes and to obscure the failures of his 37
political line. He says that counter-revolutionary insurrections in the socialist
countries are “good” because they help to strengthen the new social system; equally
the death of great numbers of people in social revolutions is good because it brings
on the victory of the people; another world war is good, because it will allegedly
help to eliminate capitalism, and so on. Such “dialectics” have as much in common
with Marxism as alchemy with chemistry.
In general, a purely mechanical combination of selfevident opposites does not p

amount to scientific dialectics. On the contrary, it is vulgarisation and distortion of
dialectics. Moreover, self-evident opposites do not always constitute the two sides of
a unity, whether thing or process. For instance, in some developing countries the
bourgeoisie (commercial, compradore, bureaucratic) can exist without the proletariat;
in socialist society the proletariat can exist without the bourgeoisie; under feudalism
the landowners can exist without tenants, etc.
This also applies to war and peace. Of course, war and peace are two opposite p
concepts: when war starts, peace ends, and vice versa. This does not mean, however,
that war and peace are phenomena which mutually determine each other. Mao takes
the oversimplified, unscientific view of these two phenomena as being outwardly
opposite to each other, and regards them as social opposites expressing the essence
of social development. It may logically follow from this that the self-movement, the
unfolding of the opposite sides of a social organism, inevitably leads to the
alternation of war and peace. However, war and peace are not two sides of a unity,
but distinct forms of political relations between states. War originates not from the
development of a form of relations between states like peace, but from the
intrinsically contradictory nature of capitalist society itself. Mao’s “theoretical
substantiation" of the alternation of war and peace merely shows up the pathetic
nature of his “dialectics”.
We find him considering the law of the unity and struggle of opposites without p
analysing the interconnection between the categories of possibility and reality. It is
quite obvious, however, that the resolution of any contradiction is closely connected
with the transformation of possibility into reality, because the resolution of the
contradiction and the point at which possibility is transformed into reality constitute 38
the two sides of one and the same process of development.
The existence of possibility depends on the intrinsically contradictory nature of p

phenomena. For instance, in the present conditions there is a possibility of another
world war breaking out. However, the existence of such a possibility does not yet
mean that it is bound to develop into reality. Possibility is transformed into reality
only through the struggle of opposites and the victory of one of them. The victory of
one and the defeat of the other depend on the quantitative and qualitative distinctions
of the possibilities which contain within themselves the given opposites. For instance,
whereas in the past the forces of war possessed much greater possibilities for
winning out than the forces of peace, today the situation is fundamentally different.
In our day, the united might of the socialist community, the international working- p
class and the national liberation movement can force the imperialists to abandon war
as a means of settling international disputes. Today, mankind can do away with war
as a form of political relations between states. Thus, war and peace are two different
phenomena in social life. That is why Mao’s assertion that war must follow upon
peace and vice versa, because they alternate, does not show the true essence of these
social phenomena. Moreover, the Maoists’ practical activity in the world arena,
especially in the recent period, shows very well that Mao’s theoretical exercises over
the problem of war and peace are patently political.
One of the fundamental flaws of Maoist “dialectics” is that it is eclectic and p

incoherent, and that its separate elements are not logically connected. This is evident,
in particular, in Mao’s incorrect view of the peculiar operation of the law of the
unity and struggle of opposites under socialism, the substance and historical role of
antagonistic and non-antagonistic contradictions. On the one hand, he says that the
opposites of an antagonistic contradiction are identical, that they penetrate and are
transformed into each other, so that antagonistic opposites develop into non-
antagonistic ones and back again. On the other hand, he regards the struggle of the
opposites of a non-antagonistic contradiction as being the antagonism of two forces
running in opposite directions.
On the strength of such methodological principles, Mao in his article “On the p 39
Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People”, revises the Marxist doctrine
on the different types of social contradictions. He substitutes the concepts of
“contradictions between ourselves and our enemies, and contradictions within the
ranks of the people" for “antagonistic and non-antagonistic contradictions”. This does
not amount to a mere terminological specification or innovation. The point is that the
contradiction between the working class and the peasantry, on the one hand, and the
national bourgeoisie, on the other, is included among the contradictions within the
ranks of the people. Mao writes: “The contradictions between ourselves and our
enemies are antagonistic ones. Within the ranks of the people, contradictions among
the working people are non-antagonistic, while those between the exploiters and the
exploited classes have, apart from their antagonistic aspect, a non-antagonistic
aspect. ... In our country, the contradiction between the working class and the
national bourgeoisie is a contradiction among the people. The class struggle waged
between the two is, by and large, a class struggle within the ranks of the people.
This is because of the dual character of the national bourgeoisie in our
country." [ 39•1
The assertion that the contradictions between the working class and the (big) p
national bourgeoisie in China is nonantagonistic (the reservation that these
contradictions also have an antagonistic aspect is immaterial) is Right– opportunist
and revisionist, although Mao himself claims to be a fighter against “modern
revisionism”. The vital interests of the working class and of the national bourgeoisie
in China are irreconcilable, because the latter, like the bourgeoisie of any other
country, does not want socialism on any terms, and this is backed up by the whole
history of the Chinese People’s Republic. Mao substitutes for the question of class
relations the question of the possibility of political agreements and blocs with the
bourgeoisie which is fundamentally hostile to the working class. The antagonistic
contradiction between the working class and the bourgeoisie can be resolved only
through the elimination of the latter.
But perhaps Mao’s idea that the contradictions between the proletariat and the p 40
national bourgeoisie fall under the head of contradictions within the ranks of the
people is evidence of his creative and unconventional approach to the complex and
diverse phenomena of reality itself, of his urge to involve the broadest sections of
the population of China in building a new society, and, finally, of a creative solution
of the theoretical problems and of a contribution to Marxist philosophy, as Maoist
propaganda has claimed? [ 40•1
Let us recall that it was Lenin who showed the correct and scientific methods for p
resolving the different contradictions after the triumph of the socialist revolution. On
the strength of his dialectical view of contradictions, he required that any possible
internal connections even between antagonisms at a definite stage in the development
of this or that process should be discovered. Being aware that in the period of
transition from capitalism to socialism a fierce class struggle between the proletariat
and the bourgeoisie was inevitable, he believed it possible to use state capitalism,
controlled by proletarian dictatorship, to use the bourgeoisie under the New
Economic Policy to boost and develop the country’s productive forces, provided the
bourgeoisie fully abided by the laws of the state, and provided it was simultaneously
being restricted and displaced. Lenin always said that the contradiction between the
proletariat and the bourgeoisie was an antagonistic one.
Mao’s assertion that the contradictions between the proletariat and the national p
bourgeoisie are contradictions within the ranks of the people clashes with his own
statements at the 2nd Plenary Meeting of the 7th Central Committee in 1949, when
he said that once the proletariat took power in the whole of China the contradiction 41
between the working class and the bourgeoisie would become the main one within
the country. Maoist dialectics has mutually exclusive propositions because it has a
social function. On the whole, Mao has converted philosophy into a handmaid of
politics, in the worst sense of the word. His approach to philosophy is purely
utilitarian, pragmatic. He has use for philosophy only to the extent it can be applied
as an instrument for his ambitious, Great-Power interests.
A utilitarian, pragmatic approach to dialectics means that it is used to justify any p

political action. In that case, dialectics must contain a set of propositions which
could be used for such purposes, regardless of whether or not these square with one
another. That is precisely what we find in Maoist “dialectics”. [ 41•1 Naturally
enough, at every given moment the propositions of Maoist “dialectics” which best
serve the current tactical aims of Mao’s group are brought to the fore.
The social function of Maoist “dialectics” is most clearly revealed in Mao’s p

interpretation of the concept of people. He writes: “On this stage of building
socialism, all classes, strata and social groups which approve, support and work for
the cause of socialist construction belong to the category of the people, while those
social forces and groups which resist the socialist revolution, and arc hostile to and
try to wreck socialist construction, are enemies of the people." [ 41•2 “That is to
say, democracy operates within the ranks of the people, while the working class,
uniting with all those enjoying civil rights, the peasantry in the first place, enforces
dictatorship over the reactionary classes and elements and all those who resist
socialist transformation and oppose socialist construction." [ 41•3 It may appear at
first sight that this is a correct Marxist definition of the concept of people. The
people are all those who stand for socialism and build it; those who hamper the 42
socialist reconstruction of society are classed among the enemies of the people.
However, a closer examination of the Maoist concept of people shows that class
principles are forgotten and that subjectivism takes over.
In defining the concept of people Marxist sociology starts primarily from the p
decisive role of material production in social development, and from the economic
status of various classes, sections and groups within a given system of social
production, because that is exactly what determines the extent to which the various
classes, sections and groups have an objective interest and capacity for tackling the
concrete tasks facing society in progressive social development. The point is,
however, that the Maoist definition of the concept of people lacks the first and basic
criterion by which social classes, sections and groups are included in this concept,
and this leaves room for subjectivism in defining its framework. All a social group,
even an exploiting one (in this case the bourgeoisie), needs to do to be included in
the concept of people is to announce its desire to build socialism and take a formal
part in its construction.
In the period of transition from capitalism to socialism the concept of people may p
include the petty and even the middle urban and rural bourgeoisie, but there is no
ground at all for putting a broad interpretation on the concept by including the big
capitalists as well. However, according to Mao’s view, the people include, and have
included, “all those enjoying civil rights”, which means therefore men like one-time
Vice-President of Kuomintang China, the diehard reactionary Li Tsung-jen, the
economic dictator of Macao Huo Ying, who was a member of the People’s Political
Consultative Council of China, and many other leaders of this stripe.
Mao also takes an anti-Marxist approach to the definition of the proletariat’s class p
enemies. His main criterion here is attitude to the political line of the present
Chinese leadership. According to the Maoist interpretation, “enemy of the people"
ceases to be a sociological characteristic and becomes a political phenomenon, which
may not be—and as developments in China in the last few years indicate, is not in
fact —connected with membership of an exploiting class. On the contrary, a man’s
membership of a class is derived from his political stand. Those who are classified
as “enemies of the people" are not members of exploiting classes, but all those who 43
“resist the socialist revolution, and are hostile to socialist construction (meaning,
refuse to approve the distortion of the principles of socialist construction by the
Maoists) and try to wreck socialist construction (meaning, fight against the Mao
group)”.
This approach makes it possible to declare anyone an enemy if, for instance, he p
happens to express his dissatisfaction or disagreement with the Maoist foreign-policy

line. No account is taken of a man’s social origin or social status, or the motives of
his discontent. All he needs do to be automatically classed with the “enemies of the
people" is to express his disagreement with Mao’s political propositions. It is not
surprising, therefore, that in China internationalist Communists are now being branded
as “enemies of the people”.
Thus, according to Mao’s views, present-day Chinese society is divided into “us” p
and the “enemies”, the former meaning Mao himself and his followers, and the latter
not only, and not so much, the bourgeoisie, as all those who think differently and
disagree with Mao’s theory and practices. On June 23, 1966, the newspaper
Chungkuo chingnien pao wrote: “Those who oppose the thought of Mao Tse-tung
are counter-revolutionaries.” Consequently, all one needs do to be branded as an
“enemy” is to doubt some Maoist proposition or express his own views. That is why
Mao and his followers have been using the “enemy of the people" concept to cover
up any arbitrary treatment of their ideological opponents, even those who have never
belonged to the exploiting classes and have honestly served the Chinese people and
the Chinese revolution.
The anti-Marxist essence of Maoist exercises on the subject of “people” and p

“enemies of the people" has been further laid bare by the practices of the “cultural
revolution”. The Mao group claims that the aim of this “revolution” is to prevent
China’s return to the bourgeois order, and that they are fighting the “enemies of the
people" (the word “enemy” has now been enriched with such synonyms as “scum”,
“bandit”, “scoundrel”, etc.) and against the “agents of the bourgeoisie who have
infiltrated the Party”, “against those who are in power and take the capitalist way”.
Of course, it is quite possible for bourgeois degenerates and even downright agents p
of the class enemy to exist in the Communist Party, and there is need for a resolute 44
struggle against them. However, it is the real and not imaginary enemies that must
be resolutely fought. Meanwhile, the facts show that during the “cultural revolution"
thousands upon thousands of Communists were branded as “enemies of China"
because, according to the Maoists, they were agents of the bourgeoisie, which seeks
to undermine the cause of socialist construction in China. On the other hand, the real
representatives of the bourgeoisie have been spared any criticism.
Mao seeks to back up his subjectivist interpretation of contradictions under p

socialism, an interpretation which has nothing in common with Marxism, by
references to MarxistLeninist philosophy.
As has been said, Mao turned to Marxism in the 1920s because he felt that it was p
the best means of helping to return China to her old grandeur. In the 1930s and
1940s, he used Marxist terminology to assert his leadership in the CPC. Evidence of
this comes from the “Decision on Some Questions of the Party’s History”, which he
himself drew up, and which abounds with reminders of the need to fight dogmatism
and the dogmatists (meaning the internationalist Communists). Mao’s references to
Marxist propositions in the 1950s and 1960s were used to cover up his betrayal of
Marxism-Leninism, of the principles of socialist construction, to prop up his shaken
power in the Party and the country, and to justify the splitting activity in the socialist
community and the international communist, working-class and national liberation
movement.
In the first few years after the people’s revolution in China, when Mao and his p
followers did not yet dare openly to revise the principles of socialist construction
and break with the world socialist system and the international communist
movement, and when they were forced in the world arena to support the Soviet
policy of peaceful coexistence, they still referred to the existence of non-antagonistic
contradictions. Once the Maoists executed their radical turn about in domestic and
foreign policy and laid their claims to hegemony in the world socialist system, and
the international communist, working-class and national liberation movement, they
began to speak mainly of antagonistic contradictions, which they sought to use to
justify the need to draw a “line of demarcation" from the Marxists-Leninists both in 45
China and elsewhere. That was the very purpose of the broad discussion on the law
of the unity and struggle of opposites which was started in China in 1964. To make
their approach appear Marxist, the Maoists used the authority of Lenin, and put their
own gloss on Lenin’s well-known idea of the “dichotomy of unity”.
Marxist dialectics requires a concrete historical approach to social phenomena. It p

cannot serve as an abstract scheme from which answers to all the concrete questions
of practice are spun out in a purely logical manner. Apart from the general features
inherent in the development of social phenomena this dialectics takes into account
the contradictory nature of social phenomena at their specific stage of development.
In addition to the general features the development in each socialist country, in the
socialist community as a whole, in each Communist Party, in the world workingclass
movement as a whole, has its own specific features, with the unity of opposites
having a specific role to play, because the contradictions are non-antagonistic. For
instance, the Communist and Workers’ Parties have to work in different conditions,
and this produces different approaches to practical matters and even differences
between the Parties. However, their common vital interests provide a basis for
overcoming the difficulties and differences between the various contingents of the
world army of Communists. The participants in the international communist forum in
1969 expressed their firm conviction that the differences between the Communist and
Workers’ Parties would be successfully overcome. They declared: “This belief is
based on the fact that the international working class has common long-term
objectives and interests, on the striving of each Party to find a solution to existing
problems which would meet both national and international interests and the
Communists’ revolutionary mission; it is based on the will of Communists for
cohesion on an international scale." [ 45•1
The Maoists apply to all social phenomena, including socialist society, the concrete p
instances in which the “ dichotomy of unity" appears in the form of a division of
society into hostile classes. They say that to deny the existence of social antagonisms 46
in socialist society is, in particular, to deny the struggle of opposites as a source of
development.
However, this approach is fundamentally wrong because it does not accord with the p
propositions of Marxist dialectics and is not warranted by socialist reality itself.
Obviously, the law of the unity and struggle of opposites is universal, which is why p
the struggle of opposites is a source of development even under socialism, but this
struggle of opposites proceeds within the framework of nonantagonistic contradictions
and not social antagonisms. Lenin said that antagonism and contradiction are not the
same thing, that under socialism antagonism disappears but contradictions remain.
The new system has no struggle of antagonistic classes which leads to a substitution
of one socioeconomic formation by another. Socialist society develops on the basis of
a resolution of the contradictions which spring from the nature of socialism,
otherwise it would be impossible to advance. But these contradictions are not
antagonistic.
What kind of contradictions are they? Some of them are class distinctions between p
workers and peasants, essential distinctions between town and country, between
workers by brain and workers by hand, etc., which are inherited from the earlier
formations. After all, according to the founders of Marxism-Leninism, socialism has
just emerged “into the light of day out of the womb of capitalism" and therefore “is
in every respect stamped with the birthmarks of the old society". [ 46•1
Characterising the social gains of socialism, Lenin wrote: “The first phase of
communism ... cannot yet provide justice and equality: differences, and unjust
differences, in wealth will still persist, but the exploitation of man by man will have
become impossible because it will be impossible to seize the means of production—
the factories, machines, land, etc.—and make them private property." [ 46•2
In addition, as socialism develops it produces other contradictions, which are p

different from those inherent in capitalism. Among these are, for instance, the
following: disparity between the rapidly growing material requirements of the
population and the inadequate level of development of production, between the 47
interests of citizens and separate collectives, between the collective and society as a
whole, between science and production, when production either lags behind scientific
achievements, or when science fails to satisfy the needs of production. Among the
contradictions which arise as socialism develops are also a certain unevenness in the
territorial location of industry, the lag of agriculture behind industry, and bureaucratic
practices in some institutions and among some officials.
All these contradictions in socialist society are of a specific, non-antagonistic p

character, but they still continue to be contradictions which determine the advance of
society.
Such is the Marxist view of the question of the specific operation of the law of the p
unity and struggle of opposites under socialism. It is on the basis of this view that
the Communist Parties have been scoring their successes in practical activity.
It would be wrong to assume that the Maoists’ approach to contradictions under p

socialism is due to their theoretical mistakes or misconceptions. This may be so for
rank– andfile Maoists, but for Mao himself it is a deliberate retreat from the ideas of
Marxist philosophy. The thesis concerning the “dichotomy” of socialist society serves
as the theoretical justification for the slander and lies directed against the Soviet
Union. The Maoists have been shouting about the class stratification of Soviet
society, claiming that there are irreconcilable contradictions between the broad masses
of the working people and some kind of privileged section, which has allegedly
usurped power and is appropriating the fruits of the Soviet people’s labour. The
struggle against some anti-social elements, like thieves, embezzlers of socialist
property, hooligans and idlers is also set up as a social antagonism. [ 47•1
Evidence of Mao’s utilitarian approach to dialectics also comes from the fact that p 48
the “dichotomy of .unity" is proclaimed only with respect to some handpicked social
phenomena. The “dichotomy” of the socialist community is declared to be
progressive and inevitable, but the “dichotomy” of China into the CPR and Taiwan,
which is occupied by the Chiang Kai-shek clique, happens to be a “unification of
two in a unity”.
The “dichotomy” of the Communist Party of China is declared to be progressive p

and inevitable. But when it comes to the Chinese bourgeoisie, then this is said to be
“ unification of two in a unity”. The “dichotomy” of the international working-class
movement is declared to be progressive and inevitable. Simultaneously, the principle
of “unification of two in a unity" is proclaimed with respect to the renegades

expelled from the Communist Parties and patent agents of the bourgeoisie.
The nihilistic attitude to the cultural legacy practised in the course of the “cultural p
revolution" offers another example of the use of theory to justify practical political
expedients.
This will be dealt with in detail in Chapter Seven. Let us merely stress at this point p
that the attacks on Chinese and world culture are justified by the Maoists on the plea
that there is need to eradicate the old (feudal and bourgeois) views, traditions,
morals, customs and habits, which hamper the assimilation of Marxist (meaning
Maoist) ideology. But it would be wrong to draw the conclusion on the strength of
this that Mao is opposed to any cultural legacy as such. The destruction of the
Chinese people’s cultural values, carried out on his initiative, is, we believe,
determined by tactical considerations. The “great helmsman" has attacked the cultural
heritage in recent years, first, because this heritage is an obstacle in the way of
duping the millions of Chinese; second, because it is being used by the political and
ideological opponents of Maoism; and third, because in the light of the world’s
cultural and philosophic values the “thought of Mao Tse-tung" stands out in its
mediocrity.
However, it is quite possible that, as conditions change, Mao may well take a stand p
for some elements of the old culture. The thing to bear in mind is his traditional
education, his great love of calligraphy and versification in the old Chinese manner, 49
and his interest in Confucianism and Buddhism. [ 49•1
The Maoists seek to substantiate their political acts with quotations from the
Marxist-Leninist classics: the “Great Leap Forward"—with quotations on the
transformation of an idea into a material force when it takes hold of the masses;
their splitting policies—with quotations on Lenin’s idea concerning the dichotomy of
unity; the lawlessness of the Hungweipings—with references to the Marxist
proposition on the need for resolute struggle against revisionism, etc. The result is a
vulgarisation and gross distortion of Marxist dialectics. Apart from some outward
terminological similarity, Maoist “dialectics” has nothing in common with the Marxist
dialectical method, and when put to the test turns out to be a peculiar modification
of traditional Chinese dialectics as described above.
***

TEXT SIZE
normal
Notes
[ 35•1 ] K. Marx and F. Engels, The Holy Family or Critique of Critical Critique,
Moscow, 1956, p. 52.
[ 39•1 ] Mao Tse-tung, “On the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the
People”. Supplement to People’s China No. 13, July 1, 1957, p. 4 (emphasis added
—V.G.).
[ 40•1 ] The report to the 9th Congress of the CPC said the article “On the Correct
Handling of Contradictions Among the People" was a “great work”. It said that “in
this work . . . Chairman Mao Tse-tung gave an all-round formulation of the doctrine
of contradictions, of classes and class struggle under the dictatorship of the
proletariat, the doctrine o\ the two types of dissimilar contradictions existing within
socialist society —the contradictions between ourselves and our enemies, and
contradictions within the ranks of the people, a great theory on the continuation of
the revolution under proletarian dictatorship. Like a radiant beacon, this great work
has shed light on the way of the socialist revolution and socialist construction in our
country and has at the same time laid the theoretical foundations for the current great
proletarian cultural revolution" (emphasis added—V.G.).
[ 41•1 ] Let us note in this context that the same report at the 9th Congress of the
CPC extolled Mao’s thesis that the contradiction between the proletariat and the
bourgeoisie was the main contradiction in present-day China, as well as the thesis
that this contradiction was among the contradictions within the ranks of the people
(sic!).
[ 41•2 ] Mao Tse-tung, “On the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the
People”, p. 4 (emphasis added—V.G.).
[ 41•3 ] Ibid.
[ 45•1 ] International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties, Moscow, 1969, p.

38.
[ 46•2 ] Ibid., p. 466.
[ 47•1 ] It is a curious fact that in their view of contradictions under socialism the
Maoists are at one with the anti-Communists. Thus, the well-known critic of
Marxism and a rabid West German anti– Communist, G. Wetter, says in his book
Soviet Ideology Today: “How can dialectical development go on under socialism if
the class struggle is no longer there? How can such dialectics continue to exist if the
proletarian revolution is the last revolution, and socialism and communism, the last
social formations?”
[ 49•1 ] In a private conversation in I960, Mao stressed the importance of studying

Buddhist philosophy.
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4. Subjective Idealism Instead 49
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What are the starting principles of Mao’s outlook? Although his works contain p
Card
statements that being is primary and consciousness is secondary, and that objective
reality is the source of sensation, he takes an essentially metaphysical and idealistic
Text view of the whole complex interconnection of matter and consciousness, of the
HTML whole contradictory process of reflection by man’s consciousness of objective things
PS and phenomena.
PDF
Mao quite obviously needed the proposition on the primacy of matter and the p
T* secondary nature of consciousness in order to appear to be a consistent materialist,
19* for it cannot in any way be squared with Mao’s own “original” view of many
philosophical problems reflecting his ideological stand, such as the relationship
###
between the objective laws of social development and men’s conscious activity,
society’s economic basis and its political superstructure, social being and social ideas,
and so on.
Viewed from this angle, Maoism is seen to start from the primacy of the subjective p 50
factor, “subjective activity”, politics, ideas. This is expressed in such postulates as:
the main role in the socialist mode of production belongs to the relations of
production and not to the productive forces; politics and not economics is the
command force in socialist society; moral and not material incentives are the
principal ones in socialist construction.
All these postulates ultimately boil down to the thesis that under socialism men’s p
“subjective activity" has the decisive role to play, which essentially means an urge to
subordinate the objective laws of socialist construction to the subjective activity of
leaders, and to provide a theoretical substantiation for subjectivism, voluntarism and
adventurism in domestic and foreign policy.
A discussion on the relationship between objective laws and subjective activity was p
started in China in 1958 and 1959, and extensive propaganda of the notorious
“theory of subjective activity" was launched at about the same time, with Mao’s role
in developing this theory being extolled in every possible way. Here are two
pertinent statements from a textbook, Dialectical Materialism, published in Peking in
1961: 1. “Carrying on a resolute struggle against all manner of opportunist elements
denying or minimising the role of the subjective activity of the masses, he [Mao
—Ed.] made not only a theoretical but also a great practical contribution to the
development of the theory of subjective activity. He not only gave a precise
scientific definition of subjective activity in the Marxist view, and clearly and
concretely showed that in certain conditions subjective activity plays a decisive role,
but also made a comprehensive and profound study, on the basis of a close unity of
materialism and dialectics, of the existence of dialectical connections between the
subjective and the objective, between subjective activity and objective regularities,
between revolutionary spirit and scientific approach.”
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/1.4-Subjective.Idealism[2012-12-18 2:27:20]
2. “Comrade Mao Tse-tung’s fresh contribution to Marxist philosophy consists not p

only in the fact that, starting from the contradiction between the subjective and the
objective, he gives a clear and positive answer to the question concerning the
definitive role of subjective activity in certain conditions, but also in the fact that
basing himself on the main spheres of social life and the Party’s practical activity, he
gives our Party an even more powerful theoretical instrument for directing the people 51
in the struggle for the grand transformation of the world [emphasis added—V.G.]."
What leaps to the eye in these quotations is the emphasis on Mao’s services to p
Marxism in bringing out the “ definitive, decisive role of subjective activity”.
Marxism does not, of course, deny the importance of the subjective factor in social p
development under socialism. On the contrary, it stresses its growing role with the
successful advance of socialist construction. This is due to the fact that the
Communist Party, relying on the knowledge of the objective laws of social
development, is able to use them in the interest of society as a whole. This makes
men’s activity purposeful and conscious. However, the laws of social development in
socialist society are just as determined materially and are as objective as the laws of
social development in all other socio-economic formations. Their inadequate
consideration—to say nothing of their neglect—of men’s socio-economic activity
inevitably has a negative effect on the development of socialist society.
In contrast to Marxism, the Maoists advocate men’s subjective activity, virtually p

ignoring the dialectic unity of the objective laws of social development and men’s
conscious activity. They call the Marxists mechanicists because, they say, “refusing
to recognise man as the decisive factor in the relations between man and things, they
lay one-sided stress on the fact that man’s actions are determined by the lifeless
schemes of objective laws, and that man can do no more than passively submit to
these laws”. Referring to the fact that under socialism the role of the subjective
factor is immensely increased, the Maoists metaphysically contrast objective laws and
men’s activity, and separate the two.
However, the main thing is that the Maoists do not regard “subjective activity" as p
conscious, purposeful activity of the masses, based on a knowledge of the laws of
social development, but action in realising any subjectivist propositions of the
leaders. That is why the references to Mao’s services in developing the “theory of
subjective activity" mean his apology of men’s activity which is not limited by any
objective laws, that is, essentially an apology of voluntarism and subjectivism. This
is a subjective, idealist standpoint.
One important point needs to be borne in mind in analysing Maoist philosophy. p 52

Very frequently the Maoists resort to the following trick to cover up their departure
from Marxism. They take a correct Marxist proposition but give it their own
interpretation, by variously accentuating one of its aspects, which they happen to
need most at the time, and by taking a part out of the context of the whole and
turning it into an absolute. But to cover up the sleight of hand they make sure to
quote the doctored Marxist proposition in full.
That is exactly what they have done in this instance. In order to cover up their p
revision of the Marxist philosophical postulate concerning the dialectical
interconnection between the objective laws of social development and men’s
conscious activity under socialism, they centre attention on men’s activity while
speaking of the need to give consideration to objective laws.
That is why the Maoists’ distortion of the correct propositions of Marxist

philosophy can be discovered not only in a careful study of their theoretical views
and a thorough analysis and comparison of all the statements on a given question,
but also by establishing when, in which circumstances and on what occasion this or
that theoretical proposition is being accentuated. In particular, Mao’s subjective,
idealist approach to the use of the objective laws of social development becomes
even more obvious when we find that his apology of subjective activity occurred in
the period of the “Great Leap Forward" and the people’s communes.
Maoism also takes an essentially subjective, idealist view of man’s role in material p
production. Take an article which appeared in 1965 in the journal Hsin Chianshe,
organ of the Philosophical and Social Sciences Department of the Academy of
Sciences of China. The authors said: “Although the instruments of labour in
production, the objects of labour, weapons in war, etc., are indeed of great
importance, although they are a considerable factor in production and in war, they
occupy a secondary place in comparison to man. Regardless of the area—production
struggle or class struggle, it is men and not things that are the factor with the
decisive role to play." [ 52•1 The point is, the authors add, that man has an active
and things a passive place. Man “can think, can work, he possesses subjective 53
activity, he can know and change the world, whereas things do not possess such
features. . ." [ 53•1 . “Among all things, the instruments of labour in production and
weapons in war are the most important. . .. However, detached from human activity,
nature cannot supply man with the necessary instruments of labour and weapons. In
detachment from human activity the implements and weapons already created are
turned into rubbish." [ 53•2 Here, as on the question of the relationship between
subjective activity and objective laws, the role of the subjective factor is
hypertrophied.
But perhaps this is a stand for man’s active substance, for his activity? If we recall p
that the abovementioned reasoning appeared just when China’s industrialisation rate
had slowed down after the fiasco of the “Great Leap Forward" and the people’s
communes, in a period when the role of technical devices and technological progress
was being variously played down and ignored, in a period when Mao’s idea of the
atomic bomb being a “paper tiger" was being plugged, it will become obvious that it
has a patently antiMarxist ring. We find a deliberate exaggeration of man’s role in
material production and a playing down of the role of material production itself.
Marxism has always emphasised man’s decisive role in production. One need p
merely recall what Lenin said about the working man being the primary productive
force of all mankind. But Marxism has never separated man from the other
component elements of the productive forces or contrasted him with them. Man is
the chief but not the only component of the productive forces. Any neglect of this
principle, whether deliberate or otherwise, tends to obliterate the fundamental
distinctions between the various modes of production, because every society is
characterised by a definite level in the development of the productive forces.
As man exerts an influence on nature he not only changes it but also changes p
himself. He becomes more adept in the mode of creating the means of labour, but
this depends on the level in the development of the productive forces attained at any 54
given moment. It should be borne in mind that at every given historical epoch man’s
power and potentialities are limited by the existing level in the development of
material production, the means of labour above all. Hardly anyone will deny that the
means of labour are nothing without man. But this does not warrant their reduction
to nothing. Man’s power is expressed precisely in the level to which his means of
production have been developed. The Maoists preach nihilism with respect to science
and technology, and this is reflected in one of their slogans: “Topple the scientific
authorities.” Under the current scientific and technological revolution, with science
being a direct productive force in society, this attitude is bound to lead to stagnation
in scientific research.
There again we find the characteristic feature of Maoism: the narrowly utilitarian p
approach to theory, resulting in a divergence between theory and practice. Mao
himself cannot but be aware of the ever growing role of the natural sciences in
modern society, because the use of their achievements helps man to enhance his
power over nature. Evidence of this comes also from the fact that most of the
research institutions and scientists engaged in the fabrication of nuclear missiles were
spared any criticism during the “cultural revolution”. The blows fell mainly on those
working in the social sciences. Mao apparently needed the bogey of “ pseudo-
science" and “admiration for scientific authorities" in order to defeat his political
opponents. The Maoists have not cast doubt on the importance of the applied natural
sciences, and are hardly likely to do so in the future.
Mao’s exaggeration of man’s role in production is closely connected with his p

erroneous view of the relationship between the productive forces and the relations of
production, between the basis and the superstructure.
The Marxist view of this question was expressed by the founder of the scientific p
philosophy in these words: “In the social production of their existence, men
inevitably enter into definite relations, which are independent of their will, namely,
relations of production appropriate to a given stage in the development of their
material forces of production. The totality of these relations of production constitutes
the economic structure of society, the real foundation, on which arises a legal and
political superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of social 55
consciousness. The mode of production of material life conditions the general process
of social, political and intellectual life. It is not the consciousness of men that
determines their existence, but their social existence that determines their
consciousness. At a certain stage of development, the material productive forces of
society come into conflict with the existing relations of production or—this merely
expresses the same thing in legal terms —with the property relations within the
framework of which they have operated hitherto. From forms of development of the
productive forces these relations turn into their fetters. Then begins an era of social
revolution. . .. Just as one does not judge an individual by what he thinks about
himself, so one cannot judge such a period of transformation by its consciousness,
but, on the contrary, this consciousness must be explained from the contradictions of
material life, from the conflict existing between the social forces of production and
the relations of production." [ 55•1 Lenin said that these words of Marx expressed
the materialist view of history.
By contrast Mao, first, essentially assigns the main role within the productive p
forces/relations of production system to the latter component and, second, holds that
the establishment of new relations of production does not spring from objective
necessity, which is rooted in the process of material production, but from men’s
subjective will. [ 55•2
The Maoists believe it to be possible artificially to “ improve" the relations of p

production regardless of the development of the productive forces, in order to tackle
the tasks of China’s socio-economic development. That was the purpose of the
“Great Leap Forward" and the establishment of the people’s communes. With
socialist construction in China at its initial stage, they issued a call for the earliest
transition to communism. The people’s communes were advertised as the primary
cells of the future communist society. The lamentable results of this “experiment”
are well known.
The artificial “improvement” of the relations of production, which boils down to all p 56
manner of organisational and political restructuring in agriculture and industry, is
designed to sharpen the class struggle, and this has been expressed in the endless
succession of political campaigns and mass movements. Let us recall the movement
against the “three” and “five” evils (1952 and 1953), the struggle against the
“Rightist elements" (1957–1958), the movement for ordering the style of work
(1958), the “give the Party your heart" campaign (1958–1959), the movement for
socialist education in the countryside (1962–1963) and, finally, the “cultural
revolution" (1966–1969).
This anti-Marxist conception is given a logical capstone in the following formula: p

“The thought of Mao Tse-tung is an almighty force.” The newspaper Jenmin jihpao
wrote: “When the thought of Mao Tse-tung spreads across the whole world, when
the revolutionary peoples of the whole world gradually master it, it will be able to
change the spiritual face of the revolutionary peoples of the world and to transform
spiritual force into a great material force. Having mastered the thought of Mao Tse-
tung, the revolutionary peoples of the world will destroy the old world in a
powerful, inexorable attack, completely bury imperialism, modern revisionism and
reaction in all countries, and build on earth an immensely radiant, unprecedentedly
beautiful, great new communist world, a world without oppression and
exploitation." [ 56•1
We find here an unscientific interpretation of the Marxist proposition concerning the p

relative independence of ideology, and a vulgarisation of Marx’s thesis that ideas
become a material force when they take hold of the masses.
Marxists have always attached much importance to the role of ideas in social p
development, believing that ideas can help to accelerate its pace, provided only that
these ideas reflect real life, the relationship between classes, the advance of science
and economic progress. Marxist ideas are viable and invincible and exert an
accelerating effect on the social process because they are scientific and accord with
the laws of social development. That is why they become a material force
transforming the world. The “thought of Mao Tsetung" is deprived of any life-giving
power because it is not based on science, and does not accord with the objective 57
laws of social development, which is why its translation into practice has brought
defeats for China’s domestic and foreign policies.
Maoism revises the Marxist proposition concerning the role of the masses and the p
individual in history: the role of the individual is exaggerated, the cult of heroes is
revived, and the masses are treated as a faceless mob bent to the will of the leaders.
The unscientific and subjectivist view of the role of the individual in history is p
clearly expressed in the build-up of Mao’s personality cult, and in the exaggeration
of his role, with a simultaneous playing down of the role of the people and the
Communist Party in the history of the Chinese revolution. The whole activity of the
CPC at every period of its history is identified with the activity of one man—Mao
Tsetung—“a personality of the highest order”, “a genius”, according to Maoist
propaganda, who is born into the midst of men once in a few centuries, which is
why unquestioning obedience to him is a guarantee of China’s successes. “ Always
think of Chairman Mao, obey Chairman Mao in everything, consistently follow

Chairman Mao, do everything for the sake of Chairman Mao." [ 57•1
We have here something that goes beyond the mere revival or rehearsal of the p
Narodist theory of the “heroes” and the “crowd”. The Narodniks held up more than
one hero, and enshrined the hero as an ideal. In Mao’s case we have one “hero”
who has the capacity, at will, to change or even abolish the laws of social
development.
The official press helps to deify Mao and praise the Maoists who are obedient to p
him. The official press is not interested in the people as such, as the maker of
history, as a participant in the revolutionary transformation of society. In the theory
and practice of Maoism, the people is assigned the role of extra, who walks on the
stage when bidden ta do so and blindly carries out the orders of Mao Tse-tung.
According to the logic of Maoist philosophy, the masses are incapable of taking
conscious and organised action, and can merely submit to and blindly follow the
“hero”. This is substantiated by “Mao’s thought" that the Chinese people is a clean 58
sheet of paper on which there is nothing, but on which one is able to write “the
newest, the most beautiful characters, on which one can produce the newest, the
most beautiful drawings". [ 58•1 This view of the role of the individual and the
masses in history has nothing in common with Marxism. It adds up to a pernicious
cult of the personality of a leader who stands over and above the people. It amounts
to mistrust of the people and abuse of them.
The sway of Mao’s personality cult fosters in the Chinese people a spirit of slavish p
adulation of the leader. Ordinary Chinese are quoted as saying: “Chairman Mao’s
concern is vaster than the heavens and the earth, Chairman Mao is dearer than father
and mother. But for Chairman Mao, I would not have existed." [ 58•2 All of Mao’s
writings are regarded as sacred; therefore “Mao Tse-tung’s works must be studied
every day. If you fail to study the leader’s works for one day, a host of questions
will arise; if you fail to study them for two days, you will begin to slide down; and
it is altogether impossible to live without the leader’s works for three days." [ 58•3
Subjectivism is a feature of Mao’s view of history. The Maoists regard Mao’s p

political and theoretical activity as being the only cause behind social development.
Action by social classes, sections and groups is meaningful only in so far as it
coincides with the leader’s prescriptions. That is why today the Hungweipings are
ordered out into the streets, and tomorrow are sent into the countryside; today all the
Party cadres are persecuted and tomorrow some of them are rehabilitated.
No political leader can regard himself as a Marxist unless he is guided in his p

activity by the tenet that history is made by the masses, by millions of producers,
and that the decisive role in revolutionary transformation belongs to social classes,
unless he is able, or to be more precise, willing to connect in a single whole the
individual and the masses, and to cease theoretically and practically to act on the
principle that history is made by heroes at whim.
Consequently, Mao’s philosophy constitutes a revision of the materialist view of 59

history, and marks a retreat to subjective, including Narodist, sociology, whose
propositions have long since been refuted by Marxism.
***
Summing up some of the results of the examination of Maoist philosophy, we can p

draw the conclusion that Mao and his ideological followers do not take the stand of
dialectical materialism. Their Marxist terminology merely serves to cover up the

eclectic mixture of subjective idealism and some propositions of pre-Marxian
materialism and naive dialectics.
Mao is essentially a traditional Chinese thinker, but one who has to act in the 20th p
century, and who has for that reason adopted as his instrument (naturally, modified)
the elements of modern theoretical thinking which he needs and is able in any way
to sort out.
Let us note that Mao’s apologists, when building up the myth that he is the greatest p
Marxist philosopher of our day and age, deliberately accentuate only those problems
which are dealt with in Mao’s works, thereby creating the impression that these are
at the centre of modern philosophy. The problems Mao fails to “elaborate” or even
to mention are deliberately dropped as philosophical problems, thereby artificially
narrowing down the sphere of philosophical knowledge and impoverishing philosophy
itself as a science. At the same time, the Maoists deliberately ignore the fact that the
solution of the problems Mao considers was given by philosophers before Marx,
while the most general propositions are borrowed from the Marxist-Leninist classics
to help Mao appear as a classic himself. The Maoists’ “works” do not give the
slightest hint that modern Marxist thinking has been elaborating any philosophical
problems.
Here is Mao’s version of the process of cognition: “Often, correct knowledge can p
be arrived at only after many repetitions of the process leading from matter to
consciousness and then back to matter, that is, leading from practice to knowledge
and then back to practice. Such is the Marxist theory of knowledge, the dialectical
materialist theory of knowledge." [ 59•1 The ways, stages and forms of cognition
are known to be an important element of Marxist epistemology, which emphasises 60
the dialectical essence of the process of cognition, makes a detailed study of the
logic of forms and laws of thinking, especially of conceptions, judgements and
deductions, and shows the role of theory and hypotheses in the attainment of the
truth.
Mao confines himself to rehashing the ideas about the two stages of knowledge and p
their sequence, something that has been known since the period of antiquity and
ancient Oriental philosophy. Maoist epistemology altogether fails to show the
dialectical connection between consciousness and matter, to show the role of labour
and other types of human activity in the origination and development of
consciousness. The theory of knowledge of Maoist philosophy is not connected with
the materialist theory of reflection. It fails to analyse the dialectics of objective,
relative and absolute truth, or their contradictory unity and transition into each other,
and has absolutely nothing to say about the logical and historical ascent from the
abstract to the concrete in the comprehension of the substance of things and
phenomena.
Moreover, Mao directly revises the Marxist-Leninist theory of knowledge. First of p

all, he breaks up the process of cognition into independent, discrete processes
alternating with each other. Furthermore, he takes a vulgar, mechanistic view of the
connection between the process of cognition and the process of formulating practical
policy, and confuses the problem of the source of knowledge and the process of
cognition itself, which, let us bear in mind, is based on a definite store of
knowledge. Mao rejects mediated experience; he holds that “theories, directives,
plans, measures" have to be taken through all the stages of knowledge afresh. This
approach of Mao’s is also confirmed by his neglect of the experience of his
predecessors, whose knowledge, he says, is “bookish”. While taking an

oversimplified and vulgar view of the connection between theory and practice, Mao
also has an idealistic concept of “practice” itself, in which the materialist substance
of the Marxist theory of knowledge— “recognition of the external world and its
reflection in the human mind" (Lenin)—altogether disappears. While not denying this
fundamental materialist principle in so many words, Mao considers the objective
external world with all its laws and in all its diversity in absolutely abstract terms, as 61
a “sheet of clean paper" designed for voluntarist “ creative" acts by the “genius”.
Mao regards the Chinese people as just such a sheet of clean paper on which one
can “ produce the newest, the most beautiful drawings”.
Because Mao’s “practice” does not rest on concrete and diverse living reality it p
loses its principal property, that of being the criterion of the truth. Hence, his
pragmatic conclusion that only that is correct which leads to success.
Finally, Mao contrasts sensual and rational knowledge, and theory and practice, and
connects practice only with purely sensual knowledge, with “experience”, thereby
depriving practice of its rational character, and refusing to recognise it as rational
activity in the process of cognition. In the light of this view of the connection
between rational and sensual knowledge, and theory and practice, the whole of social
life—the practice of millions upon millions of working people becomes blind,
unconscious activity, each of these being no more than a “little cog" in a gigantic
machine run by the hand of the “great genius”.
***

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normal
Notes
[ 52•1 ] Hsin Chianshe No. 7, 1965, p. 23.
[ 53•1 ] Ibid.
[ 53•2 ] Ibid., p. 24.
[ 55•1 ] K. Marx, A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy, Moscow,

1970, pp. 20–21.
[ 55•2 ] The Maoists’ reservations, like those examined above, are purely tactical and
are designed to cover up their revision of the materialist view of history.
[ 56•1 ] Jenmin jihpao, June 20, 1966.
[ 57•1 ] China Pictorial No. 7, 1968.
[ 58•1 ] China Pictorial No. 3, 1968.
[ 58•2 ] Ibid., No. 7, 1968.
[ 58•3 ] Ibid.
[ 59•1 ] Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, pp. 208–09.
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Dialectics


CHAUVINISM AND
PROLETARIAN
INTERNATIONALISM

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Chapter Two 62
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GREAT-HAN CHAUVINISM
AND HECEMONISM PRESENTED AS PROLETARIAN
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INTERNATIONALISM
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1. The Sources of Great-Han Chauvinism

Text and Hegemonism in the Views of Mao
HTML and His Followers
PS
PDF
The struggle between reactionary bourgeois chauvinism and proletarian p
T* internationalism is not a new phenomenon. The struggle has been carried on ever
19* since the bourgeoisie and the proletariat emerged in the arena of history, giving rise
to the “two great class camps”, and to the emergence and development in
### irreconcilable struggle of the ideologies of these two camps. The Marxist-Leninist
classics have shown that the victory of proletarian internationalism over reactionary
bourgeois chauvinism depends on a fundamental change in proprietary relations.
Marx wrote: “To be able to unite the peoples must have common interests. For the
interests to be common, the existing relations of property must be destroyed because
the existing property relations provide for the exploitation of some peoples by others.
. .". [ 62•1 In other words, bourgeois chauvinism is inseparable from the system
dominated by capitalist property in the means of production and man’s exploitation
of man, while proletarian internationalism is inherent in the society where private
property in the means of production has been abolished and the very basis of the
exploitation of man by man, and of one people by another has been eliminated.
But bourgeois chauvinism and proletarian internationalism are determined not only p
by socio-economic conditions. They are closely connected with the historical
development of this or that nation, and are deeply rooted in its traditions, social 63
mentality, and ideological and cultural life, apart from many other things. Let us add
that in certain conditions, these circumstances, as events in China have shown, may
acquire great importance. The elimination of the socioeconomic basis of bourgeois
chauvinism and society’s adoption of the ideas of proletarian internationalism do not
immediately lead to an overcoming of chauvinistic attitudes and preconceptions. The
specially important point to stress here is the dependence of chauvinism on the social
mentality of the petty producer and the conservative and stable character of socio-
psychological phenomena in general. The experience of socialist construction in the
USSR and other countries shows that the adoption of the new ideology does not
require as much time as the remaking of the social mentality.
In any country, the elimination of private property in the means of production does p
on the whole create the conditions for gradually doing away with bourgeois
chauvinism and establishing proletarian internationalism. These conditions should
sooner or later lead the people in the country to realise that they have common
interests with the peoples of other countries, that is, to adopt the attitude of
proletarian internationalism. However, experience has shown this process to be a long
and complex one. The development of the socialist countries and the strengthening
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/2.1-Sources.of.Great-Han.Chauvinism.and.Hegemonism[2012-12-18 2:27:26]
of their national independence and sovereignty has gone hand in hand with a
growing national awareness, which is on the whole a positive phenomenon. However,
the growth of national awareness, in the presence of strong nationalistic traditions in
a country, may result in a temporary rise of bourgeois chauvinism. This largely
depends on the social structure of society, and the specific features of its working
class, in particular, its political maturity and integrity, and its capacity to withstand
the influence of the surrounding petty-bourgeois element. Finally, another important
thing is the nature of its leading party, the extent to which it has been tempered and
theoretically prepared, and whether it has close ties with the international working-
class and communist movement, and so on.
Lenin said that even in those parties which called themselves Communist, p
internationalism may only be given lip service, while philistine chauvinism is actually 64
practised. He warned that “the urgency of the struggle against this evil, against the
most deep-rooted petty-bourgeois national prejudices, looms ever larger with the
mounting exigency of the task of converting the dictatorship of the proletariat from a
national dictatorship (i.e., existing in a single country and incapable of determining
world politics) into an international one (i.e., a dictatorship of the proletariat
involving at least several advanced countries, and capable of exercising a decisive
influence upon world politics as a whole)." [ 64•1
It goes without saying that fulfilment by any proletarian party of its international p
duty is inseparable from its national tasks. The point is what these national tasks are.
It is one thing when these are connected with the vital interests of the working
people at home and in other countries. It is something quite different if the national
tasks of the working people of one country are contrasted with the tasks of the
working people of other countries.
The Chinese leadership’s open switch to Great-Han hegemonism and the spread in p
China of bourgeois chauvinism and even of racism have their roots in various
historical, social and ideological factors.
China is a peasant country. Masses of peasants, fostered in the feudal and the p
patriarchal traditions and for centuries oppressed by local and foreign rulers, make up
an absolute majority of the population. Fairly recently, a large part of the Chinese
population consisted of petty artisans, traders and other non-proletarian elements.
That is precisely the social medium which most vigorously breeds diverse
nationalistic views and attitudes, which, in definite circumstances, easily grow into
chauvinism and even racism. At the same time the spread of chauvinistic views in
China is also due to an ideological factor like the country’s long domination by
Confucianism and to such historical factors as China’s special role in the history of
the Far East, foreign rule, first of the Mongols, and then of the Manchus, and in the
last century, of the colonialists from the capitalist countries.
In the history of China, Confucianism was connected with the Great-Han p

chauvinistic and Sinocentric idea of the superiority of the Chinese (or of the “Han”, 65
as they called themselves) over all the other peoples, whom Confucianism regarded
as “savages” whose duty was to pay tribute to the Chinese emperor. The point is that
from ancient times up until the mid-19th century China was the leading country in
the Far East and in a sense a centre of culture and civilisation which exerted a great
influence on the neighbouring peoples. No wonder China was known as the “Middle
Kingdom" (“Chung Kuo”), whose historical documents invariably designated
neighbouring and distant peoples as “ barbarians”. For centuries, this Sinocentrism
was used by the ruling classes of feudal China, and in the first half of the 20th
century by various feudal and compradore groups, notably the Chiang Kai-shek
clique, to implant Great-Han chauvinistic ideas and feelings, to spread xenophobia,
etc.
All of this has undoubtedly left a deep mark on the minds of people from various p
sections of society in China and is expressed even today in Great-Han arrogance
which had been fostered for centuries by the ruling circles of feudal China. They
held all things foreign to be unworthy of attention, because China was the “summit
of world civilisation”. Chinese civilisation was regarded as the highest achievement
of the human spirit which had to be spread across the world. The idea of China’s
superiority over other countries was put on record in the Confucian canons which
commanded great authority in Chinese society. Thus, one finds in the book, Meng
Tzu, the following: “I have heard men use the teachings of our great country in
order to re– educate the barbarians, but never yet have I heard of anyone being re-
educated by the barbarians.” This kind of chauvinistic view of spiritual culture has
left a deep mark on the minds of men in different social sections of modern China,
and undoubtedly created the conditions for the spread of Great-Han attitudes.
The Chinese revolution tackled the tasks not only of the Chinese people’s social p
emancipation, but also of its national liberation, and that was one of its specific
features. Over a period of two and a half centuries the Chinese people had fought
against the Manchu yoke, and once that had been overthrown found itself facing the
need to fight first against the European imperialist powers and then against Japan.
This long and hard struggle for national liberation has sharpened the Chinese 66
people’s national feelings to an extreme, and has intensified the feelings of distaste
for all things foreign. It has helped to put the national question in the foreground of
the Chinese social mentality.
Consequently, for definite historical reasons, nationalism in China has had two p
aspects since it emerged—the progressive and the reactionary. Its progressive aspect
was connected with the Chinese people’s struggle against China’s oppression by the
Manchu aristocracy and the Chinese feudal lords who sided with it, and then with
the struggle against the imperialism of the Great Powers, who sought to turn China
into a colony. It was the nationalism of an oppressed nation and it was aimed at
transforming China into an independent democratic state, and helped to advance the
Chinese bourgeois-democratic revolution. All progressives in Chinese society
brimmed with patriotic feelings and yearned to drive the foreign invaders from their
native soil. These aspirations were strikingly expressed in the revolutionary-
democratic teaching of Sun Yat-sen of whom Lenin said: “Every line of Sun Yat-
sen’s platform breathes a spirit of militant and sincere democracy." [ 66•1 Sun Yat-
sen’s teaching, the progressive trend of nationalism in China, played a great role in
the Chinese people’s national liberation struggle.
The reactionary aspect of Chinese nationalism consisted in the fact that since its p
emergence it has had the features of Great-Han chauvinism and contained the idea of
the Chinese people’s national superiority over the other peoples, and an urge for
racism and hegemonism. The Chinese bourgeoisie’s aspirations to see China great
and dominating the international scene clashed with the country’s oppressed and
semi-colonial status, and this served to sharpen its national pride to an extreme.
The ideologists of the Chinese bourgeoisie held the yellow race to be a special and p
outstanding one, and believed the Han people to have a leading role in it, and to be
destined in good time to establish their hegemony over the whole world. Thus, in a
letter to Liang Chi-chao in October 1907, Kang Yu-wei said that if there was “no
revolt" in China, it would become the “ruler of the world". [ 66•2
This shows that the ideologists of the Chinese bourgeoisie saw their ultimate aim p 67
not in a prosperous and independent China, which would seek to establish equitable
and just relations with other nations, but in raising China over and above the others
and turning her into their ruler. This spirit of disdain for all things non-Chinese, this
certainty of moral superiority over other nations was fostered by the Chinese
bourgeoisie right up to 1949, when Chiang Kai-shek was totally routed.
The victory of the People’s Revolution in 1949 and the early successes of socialist p
construction produced in China, on the one hand, a general patriotic elan, and on the
other, revived Great-Han arrogance and hegemonistic aspirations. For a number of
subjective and objective reasons these feelings increasingly developed into Great-Han
chauvinism. Of course, this process would not have had such a fatal character, and
could have been stopped and cut short, had a united Marxist-Leninist party, capable
of overcoming any anti– popular, anti-socialist ideological and political trend,
properly directed the people’s state. However, the CPC was not such a party and, as
has been stressed above, carried within itself the struggle of two lines: the Marxist-
Leninist and the chauvinist, bourgeois line. Moreover, the Marxist-Leninist,
internationalist line fell victim to the anti-Marxist policy of the Mao group. We
believe this was ultimately due to the fact that most of the members of the CPC
were of peasant origin, while the working-class section made up an insignificant
minority. The working class of China did not succeed in retaining its vanguard role
at the bourgeois-democratic stage of the revolution and in firmly taking the leading
position in the country at its socialist stage. Mao and his followers, far from seeking
to strengthen the vanguard role of the Chinese working class, in fact did everything
to reduce it. China’s working class proved to be unable to withstand the pressure of
Great-Han chauvinistic ideas and feelings, and to put up adequate resistance to Mao
and his followers. As a result, Mao and his followers were given an opportunity to
hit out at the CPC and the working class of China, and to push the country on to
the way of Great-Han chauvinism and hegemonism.
The penetration of Marxism-Leninism into China, the making and development of p

the Communist Party of China and the emergence of proletarian internationalism in 68
the country proceeded in stubborn struggle against chauvinism, which was at the time
opposed to the Comintern’s internationalist line. At the very end of the 1920s and in
the early 1930s, the chauvinistic views within the CPC were expressed in the so-
called Li Li-san line. This put China at the centre of all world developments and
regarded the Chinese revolution as the “main pillar of the world revolution”, that is,
took the Sinocentrist view of the world revolutionary process. To secure a victory for
the revolution in China, Li Lisan and his followers were prepared to sacrifice
everything, including the lives of millions of workers and peasants not only in
China, but also in other countries, because they expected to start a world war in the
interest of the Chinese revolution.
We have recalled Li Li-san’s Sinocentrism and chauvinism at this point because, p

first, at the time his views largely coincided with those of Mao Tse-tung, and
second, “Mao’s thought" on revolution and war today is reminiscent of Li’s views.
This struggle between the internationalists and the chauvinists in the CPC in the p
1930s was carried on, among other things, over the nature of contradictions of the
epoch and the interpretation of internationalism. The chauvinists held that at the time
the focal point of world contradictions did not involve the Soviet Union and the
capitalist system, but China and Japan. Accordingly, they asserted that
internationalism did not consist in helping the Soviet Union to fight the capitalist
system but in helping the CPC to fight Japan and the Kuomintang. That is why Mao
held the Canadian Doctor Bethune, who had come to China to help the Chinese
people fight Japan, to be the model internationalist. There is obviously an
interconnection between this early Sinocentrist conception and the Mao and his
group’s present-day view of the basic contradiction of the epoch and their view of
internationalism.
In the late 1930s and the early 1940s, the ideological struggle between Marxism- p
Leninism and chauvinism in the CPC was also expressed in the form of somewhat
abstract discussion concerning the relation between the specific and the general, the
Chinese and the foreign (just as the struggle between Marxism-Leninism and
chauvinism in China in the 1960s at one time assumed the form of a discussion on 69
the dichotomy of unity), and then gave way to a broad campaign for “correction of
style"—“cheng feng" (just as in the 1960s the discussion on the dichotomy of unity
turned out to be connected with the movement for “socialist education”). It is now
becoming increasingly clear, especially considering the nature of the “socialist
education" campaign that the struggle for “correction of style" started on Mao’s
initiative was essentially a chauvinistic drive against Marxism– Leninism and
internationalism in the guise of the fight with dogmatism and alienation from
Chinese reality. It was closely connected with the establishment of a “Sinified
Marxism”, that is, a substitution of Maoism for Marxism-Leninism.
The ideas which promoted the emergence of a “Sinified Marxism" began to appear p
in China back in the 1920s. Thus, at the time Kuo Mo-jo tried to show that
Confucianism and Marxism had many points in common, and also to prove that
Confucius was superior to Marx. At the time he published an allegory entitled
“Marx’s Visit to the Temple of Confucius" (this article was subsequently included in
a collection of Kuo Mo-jo’s articles, entitled “Laughter in the Underground" which
was issued in a new edition in 1950). It shows Confucius as a noble-minded and
true sage of antiquity and Marx as a “whiskered crab speaking a pidgin language”.
After the talk between the two sages it turns out that Marx had not produced any
new ideas: everything that he had said and written had been expressed by Confucius
long before. Marx is made to say the following: “I had never expected to find such
an esteemed fellow-thinker living in the distant Far East over 2,000 years ago. You
and I hold exactly the same views." [ 69•1
In the early 1940s, the danger of the spread of GreatHan views in China was p
pointed out by the journal Chungkuo wenhwa (organ of the CPC Central Committee),
which was published in Yenan. It said: “All the reactionary views in modern China
have one special tradition, and to give it its name one could perhaps say that it is
ideological seclusion. As the people’s democratic revolution and the culture of
modern China develop, this kind of backlash in ideology appears in different forms,
and in accordance with the different stages in the development of the revolution and 70
the different objective conditions this kind of views in contrasted, in different forms,
with progressive revolutionary views and the revolutionary forces. However,
regardless of the numerous transformations these have undergone, their main content
invariably consists in stressing the ’national features’ and ’specifics of China’, a
denial of the general laws of human history, an assertion that the development of
Chinese society can proceed only on the basis of specific Chinese regularities, that
China can advance only along her own way which runs outside the general laws
governing the development of human history. In China, this ideological tradition of
seclusion ... is a specific feature of reactionary views." [ 70•1
In the late 1930s and the early 1940s, Chinese Trotskyites, like Yeh Ching, p
propounded, under the pretext of “ mastering the specifics of China”, ideas which
essentially amounted to an assertion of the superiority of “the Chinese spirit”, ideas
borrowed from the arsenal of feudal and bourgeois Chinese chauvinism. They
demanded that MarxismLeninism should be Sinified. The journal Shihtai chinshen
wrote: “There is need to modify the form of MarxismLeninism, and to make it a
thing that would be like a new, Chinese thing differing from the original
one." [ 70•2
These views were subjected to criticism in the CPC. The journal Chungkuo wenhwa p
said that those who insisted on the need to Sinify Marxism-Leninism “implied
Sinification to mean a change of its form and by a change of its form a total
rejection of original Marxism". [ 70•3
However, this criticism of those who urged that MarxismLeninism should be p

Sinified did not mean that the CPC succeeded in overcoming the growing tendency
towards chauvinism. The fact is that since the late 1930s, Mao himself was insisting
on “Sinifying Marxism”. As we have already seen, the “correction of style"
movement had a Great-Han character and was used to hit out at Marxism-Leninism
and internationalism within the ranks of the CPC. The 7th Congress of the CPC in
1945 was told that Mao had produced a “Sinified Marxism”. This congress reflected 71
the emergence of Mao’s personality cult and a marked intensification of Sinocentrist
attitudes within the ranks of the Party.
The Soviet Union’s victory over nazi Germany and militarist Japan, the emergence p
of the socialist world system, the formation of the Chinese People’s Republic in
1949 and the establishment by the Soviet Union of friendly relations with her had a
positive influence in fortifying the MarxistLeninist forces within the CPC. This
process was reflected and consolidated in the decisions of the 8th Congress of the
CPC in 1956.
In 1958, Mao once again managed to increase his ideological influence in the CPC p
and to secure the adoption of the adventurist “Three Red Banners" line: the general
line, the “Great Leap Forward" and the people’s communes. Since then there has
been a noticeable increase in the Chinese leaders’ policy of Great-Han chauvinism
and hegemonism.
At the turn of the century, that is, the period in which the minds of the elder p
generation of the Chinese leaders were moulded, ideas of “pan-Asianism”, superiority
of the yellow race, the idea that the peoples of Asia had a common future, the idea
of a pan-Asian Sino-Japanese alliance, etc., appeared in China under the impact of
Japanese theories. It is well known that in some historical conditions nationalism all
too easily assumes the form of racism, the view that some nations are physically or
spiritually superior to others.
Of course, the Chinese leaders are well aware of the illfame of racism, which has p
been used by fascism and nazism. That is why they naturally seek to conceal their
views which reek of racism. However, they are not always successful. There were
already racist, pan-Asian elements in Mao’s idea of the “wind from the East"
prevailing over the “wind from the West”. That is why this idea was duly rejected
by the international communist movement.
The Maoist pan-Asianism and racism is most pronounced in their political line with p
respect to Japan, which they regard as a possible temporary ally in their drive for
domination in Asia and hegemony in the world. In a talk Mao had in the early
1950s with Japanese POW generals and officers, who were being allowed to return
home from China, he said that China intended to take a dominant position in Asia,
and that Japan should not wait too long. He said: “China and Japan must join hands 72
and forget the past.” In 1961, Mao met a Japanese delegation and suggested that
China and Japan had a common future. He said: “We share the same destiny, which
is why we are united. We must enlarge the framework of unity and gather together
in a unity the peoples of the whole of Asia, Africa and Latin America and of the
whole world.” In their talks with Japanese delegations, the Maoists keep stressing
that the Chinese and the Japanese belong to one and the same race, that they have a
common written language and other elements of culture.
This short look into the past shows that the Great-Han chauvinism and hegemonism
in the views and political line of the Chinese leadership is not at all a casual
development, but that both are rooted in China’s socio-economic and ideological
development, and her Confucian traditions and history.
***

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Notes
[ 62•1 ] K. Marx and F. Engels, Werke, Bd. 4, Berlin, S. 416.
[ 66•2 ] Quoted from Y. V. Ghudodeyev, On the Eve of the 1911 Revolution in

China, Moscow, 1966, p. 123 (in Russian).
[ 69•1 ] Tihsia hsioshen, Shanghai, 1950, p. 27.
[ 70•1 ] Chungkuo wenhwa No. 1, 1940.
[ 70•2 ] Ibid.
[ 70•3 ] Ibid,
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and Hegemonism in the Guise of Proletarian
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Card
A typical feature of the Chinese leaders’ theoretical and practical activity is that p
they seek thoroughly to cover up their views and acts with Marxist-Leninist
Text
terminology and to present these as internationalism. In this way they managed for a
HTML
long time to mislead not only the CPC but also some members of the international
PS
communist and working-class movement. This they also managed to do because they
PDF
acted with circumspection, behind a barrage of revolutionary catchwords, calls for
T*
fighting imperialism and so on.
19*
However, with time the waters receded and the stones appeared on the surface, as p
### the saying in China goes, revealing the true Great-Han, chauvinistic and
hegemonistic essence of the views of the Chinese leaders who acted ever more
openly and with growing brazenness.
Maoism’s Great-Han, chauvinistic and hegemonistic character was most fully p

revealed during the “cultural revolution”. Let us recall in this connection that on
August 1, 1966, Mao issued a tatsupao to the Hungweipings in which he said, with
reference to Marx: “The proletariat has not only to emancipate itself but has also to 73
emancipate all mankind. If it is unable to emancipate all mankind the proletariat itself
will be unable to win real emancipation.” Mao gave these words a Great-Han
chauvinistic twist. We know that in China today it is Mao’s followers that are known
as the proletariat (regardless of their class status). That is why Mao’s talk about the
proletariat having to emancipate the whole of mankind means that it is Mao’s
followers that have to emancipate the whole of mankind, and to carry out this
“emancipation” on the strength of the “thought of Mao Tse-tung" and the
establishment of a corresponding order.
That this was precisely the meaning given to Marx’s words about the proletariat’s p
emancipatory mission was shown by the appearance within a few weeks of a
Hungweiping “appeal to our compatriots”, which spoke of their urge resolutely to
hoist “the great red banner of Mao Tsetungism all over the globe”.
The “cultural revolution" in China has intensified all manner of chauvinistic Great- p
Han attitudes, xenophobia and racism, especially among the young who have no
knowledge of Marxism-Leninism and who have been blinded and confused by the
spread of the “thought of Mao Tse-tung”. The idea that China is politically, morally
and ideologically superior over all the other countries, that the “thought of Mao Tse-
tung" is the summit of Marxist-Leninist thinking, that China is the centre of world
revolution, etc., is being drummed into the heads of the Chinese people.
The 9th Congress of the CPC held in April 1969 has a very important place in p
Maoism’s final transformation into a Great-Han chauvinistic and hegemonistic
ideology. It showed that Maoism is not only alien but is deeply hostile to proletarian
internationalism. The material of the 9th Congress, specifically the programme section
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/2.2-Chauvinism.in.the.Guise.of.Internationalism[2012-12-18 2:27:40]
of the Rules it adopted, contains the old call of “emancipating the whole of
mankind" and insists that the present epoch is “the epoch when imperialism is
moving towards its universal collapse, and socialism towards victory all over the
world”. While this is quite right in itself, the point is that the Maoists invest it with
a Great-Han hegemonistic meaning. After all, Mao and his followers do not accept
any other socialism except their own “true” one. That is why this talk of the victory
of socialism all over the world means a victory for “Mao”s thought”, a victory for 74
China.
Since the congress, the Chinese propaganda has made no secret of the Chinese p
leadership’s intentions to remake the whole world according to the Maoist image.
The Chinese press reports that this is to be done through a world war, which is
regarded as an engine of history, and as something that helps to foster and temper
the people. Extreme chauvinism is known always to lead to war. The Great-Han
hegemonism of Mao Tse-tung and his followers appears to be no exception.
Today, there is no international event of any importance to which the Chinese p

leaders have not openly taken a GreatHan chauvinistic approach. Take the unity of
the countries within the socialist community in the fight against imperialism, the
international communist movement, the national liberation struggle, Afro-Asian
solidarity, the movement of the peoples for peace, etc.—to each of these the Chinese
leaders have not taken a class, internationalist approach, but a narrowly nationalistic,
Sinocentric approach, in the light of their chauvinistic and hegemonistic interests.
The Main Document of the International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ p

Parties held in Moscow in the summer of 1969, re-emphasised the decisive role of
the world socialist system in the anti-imperialist struggle, and once again drew
attention to the need for the cohesion of the socialist states. [ 74•1 However, it is
precisely against the world socialist system and the socialist countries’ cohesion that
the Mao group has carried on a fierce fight, directing all their hatred at the Soviet
Union in particular. At the 12th Plenary Meeting of the CPC Central Committee,
held in October 1968, the Maoists called for the establishment of a “broad united
front of peoples" aimed against the USA and the USSR, a demand allegedly justified
by absurd talk of a “deal” between the USSR and the USA.
It is well known, however, that Mao and his followers now and again ascribe their p
own intentions to others for the purpose of camouflage. Every sober-minded observer
will realise that they make mention of the USA merely to present themselves as
“fighters against imperialism”. In actual fact, the Chinese leaders call for the 75
establishment of such a front to fight the Soviet Union. Will anyone believe that
they are in earnest about fighting the USA, the leading power of the capitalist world,
while China’s foreign trade relations are being increasingly re-oriented upon the
major capitalist countries closely allied with the USA, namely, Japan, the FRG and
Britain, among others? However, we are not here interested in this hypocritical
manner of action, but in the fact that the Chinese leaders continue to claim to be
internationalists while betraying proletarian internationalism at every step.
The 9th Congress of the CPC officially adopted the antiSoviet line of the present p
Chinese leaders. Its decisions contain not only statements about “Soviet revisionism"
and a “deal between the Soviet leaders and American imperialism”, but also
assertions that the Soviet Union is a “ social-imperialist country”.
The Chinese leaders’ talk about the need for simultaneously fighting US imperialism p
is no more than a smoke screen. To see the truth of this one needs merely look at
their policy on the Vietnam issue. Their attitude to the US aggression against the
Democratic Republic of Vietnam most fully and obviously reflects their betrayal of
the interests of proletarian internationalism. The USA would never have dared to
launch its aggression had the CPC leadership not pursued its anti-Soviet line and not
attacked the unity of the socialist countries. When escalating their aggression in
Vietnam, the US imperialists undoubtedly reckon with the Great-Han chauvinism of
the Chinese leaders and their stubborn refusal to accept any proposals on concerted
action by China, the USSR and the other socialist countries in helping the
Vietnamese people beat back the US aggression.
The Maoists have not only failed to give the fighting Vietnamese people adequate p
military and economic assistance but have also in every way hampered the other
socialist countries in their efforts to do so. At the same time, they have tried to
capitalise politically on the Vietnamese people’s struggle, and have resorted to
provocative attacks against the Soviet Union’s policy on the Vietnam question.
Specifically, the Chinese leaders have qualified the joint action by the fraternal
Parties in rendering assistance to fighting Vietnam as “chauvinism”, as “treason”, and
“betrayal”, while presenting their own Great-Power, pro-imperialist line as a model 76
of proletarian internationalism.
However, recent facts have exposed the verbal shifts and dodges of the CPC p
leaders. The Chinese press has been writing less and less about the Vietnamese
people’s struggle. What is more, the question was for all practical purposes not dealt
with even at the 9th Congress of the CPC. The report disposes of it in one sentence:
“We ... resolutely support the Vietnamese people in carrying to the end the war of
resistance against American aggression for the salvation of their country.”
In contrast to this nationalism-dictated approach to the Vietnam problem, the p

International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties stressed that it was the
primary aim of joint action by all the Communist and Workers’ Parties and all the
anti-imperialist forces to give all-round support to the heroic Vietnamese people. The
Meeting adopted a special document, “Independence, Freedom and Peace for
Vietnam!”, in which the Communists of the world once again condemned the US
aggression in Vietnam and reaffirmed their complete solidarity with the Vietnamese
people’s just struggle. The document says: “True to the principles of proletarian
internationalism and in the spirit of fraternal solidarity, the international communist
and working-class movement will continue to render the Vietnamese people all the
assistance they require until the final triumph of their just cause." [ 76•1
The international communist and working-class movement is an embodiment of the p

principles of proletarian internationalism, but it is precisely against this movement
that Mao and his followers have been carrying on their stubborn fight. They bear a
great responsibility for their efforts to undermine the international solidarity of the
working class and its parties.
The CPC leaders have carried on extensive splitting activity in the ranks of the p
international communist movement, slandering the tried and true leaders of the
working class, and organising factional groups and whole parties with a Maoist
platform who take orders from Peking. There are schemes in Peking for setting up a 77
bloc of Maoist parties, to fight the Marxist-Leninist parties and the world communist
movement.
The Chinese leadership’s Great-Han chauvinism and hegemonism is based on p

Sinocentrism, which has been duly clothed and thoroughly camouflaged to look like
MarxismLeninism. But once the camouflage is off, its Great-Power chauvinistic and
hegemonistic substance stands out and is clearly seen to have nothing in common
with MarxismLeninism or proletarian internationalism.
Thus, the prospects for political developments in the colonial and semi-colonial p
countries are viewed in the light of Sinocentrism. Back in 1940, Mao said in his
work On New Democracy that in the course of the revolution only the Chinese-type
new democracy could be used as a form of state in the colonial and semi-colonial
countries. While noting its transitional nature, he stressed that this form was
necessary and obligatory. This means that in their political development all colonies
and semi-colonies must pass along China’s way; in other words, all the countries
subsequently included by the Chinese leadership in the “world village" would
necessarily have to follow in the tracks of China’s development. From this it
necessarily and logically followed that China was the leader of the peoples in the
colonial and semicolonial countries.
In 1963, the Sinocentrist idea was essentially made the basis of the “Proposals on p
the General Line of the International Communist Movement" and of other documents
containing an analysis of the present epoch. At the time, the Chinese leaders said
that Asia, Africa and Latin America were the “focal point of various contradictions
of the capitalist world and may be said to be the focal point of all the contradictions
existing in the world. These areas constitute the weakest link in the imperialist chain
and the main centres of revolutionary storms in the modern world". [ 77•1 The
struggle of the peoples of Asia, Africa and Latin America “is of decisive importance
for the cause of the international proletariat as a whole”, [ 77•2 and “without the
support of the revolutionary struggle of the oppressed nations and peoples in the 78
countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America, the proletariat and masses of people in
the capitalist countries of Europe and America cannot realise their aspirations—to be
rid of privation and calamities caused by the oppression of capital and the threat of
imperialist war". [ 78•1
There is no doubt at all about the great importance of the liberatory revolutionary p
struggle of the peoples in the countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America or about
the need for the unity of the progressive forces of the world in the struggle against
imperialism. But the “Proposals on the General Line of the International Communist
Movement" clearly contained an attempt to push the international communist
movement into the background and to contrast it with the national liberation
movement, thereby separating the national liberation movement from the world
socialist system and the international communist movement.
At the 9th Congress of the CPC, the approach to the basic contradictions of the p
present epoch, as given in the “Proposals on the General Line of the International
Communist Movement”, was markedly modified. The report asserted that “in the
modern world there are four major contradictions: the contradiction between the
oppressed nations, on the one hand, and imperialism and social– imperialism, on the
other; the contradiction between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie in the capitalist
and the revisionist countries; the contradiction between the imperialist countries and
the social-imperialist country, [ 78•2 between the imperialist countries themselves;
the contradiction between the socialist countries, on the one hand, and imperialism
and social-imperialism, on the other”.
In this “new scheme" of the basic contradictions of the present epoch the p
contradiction brought to the fore may be formulated as follows: the contradiction
between the working class and the national liberation movement and so-called
social-imperialism, because the latter is mentioned in all the four contradictions.
That is not at all accidental. The Chinese leaders still seek to put China at the p
centre of world developments. All the theoretical exercises described above are
required in order to introduce the idea of China’s leading role in the present-day 79
socio-historical process. That is the purpose behind the accusation of social-
imperialism levelled at the Soviet Union, because this is an attempt to undermine its
prestige as the leading socialist power in the world revolutionary process, and to put
China in its place.
The “people’s war" theory provides more evidence of the Great-Power, chauvinistic p
and hegemonistic attitudes of the present CPC leadership. This theory was first
briefly outlined in an article, “Long Live the Victory in the People’s War!”, written
by Lin Piao, who was a close associate of Mao at the time and Minister of Defence.
The publication of this article was timed for the 20th anniversary of the Chinese
people’s victory in the war against the Japanese invaders (September 1955). This
article was designed to impose on the peoples of Asia, Africa and Latin America the
Chinese model of revolution, to unleash armed conflicts in various parts of the globe,
to secure in the course of these conflicts a weakening of the USA and of the USSR,
and ultimately to establish China’s undivided domination on the globe.
The substance of this model of revolution is expressed in the two words “people’s p
war" by which is meant extensive spread of guerrilla warfare based on strongholds
set up in the villages and the surrounding of the towns by the village. The article
says: “Many countries and peoples in Asia, Africa and Latin America are now being
subjected to aggression and enslavement on a serious scale by the imperialists headed
by the United States and its lackeys. The basic political and economic conditions in
many of these countries have many similarities to those that prevailed in old China.
As in China, the peasant question is extremely important in these regions. The
peasants constitute the main force of the national– democratic revolution directed
against the imperialists and their lackeys. In committing aggression against these
countries, the imperialists usually begin by seizing the big cities and the main lines
of communication, but they are unable to bring the vast countryside completely under
their control. The countryside, and the countryside alone, can provide the broad areas
in which the revolutionaries can manoeuvre freely. The countryside, and the
countryside alone, can provide the revolutionary bases from which the revolutionaries
can go forward to final victory. Precisely for this reason, Comrade Mao Tse-tung’s 80
theory of establishing revolutionary base areas in the rural districts and encircling the
cities from the countryside is attracting more and more attention among the peoples
in these regions.
“Taking the entire globe, if North America and Western Europe can be called ’the p
cities of the world’, then Asia, Africa and Latin America constitute ’the rural areas
of the world’. Since World War II, the proletarian revolutionary movement has for
various reasons been temporarily held back in the North American and West
European capitalist countries, while the people’s revolutionary movement in Asia,
Africa and Latin America has been growing vigorously. In a sense, the contemparary
world revolution also presents a picture of the encirclement of cities by the rural
areas." [ 80•1
In their efforts to invest the “people’s war" theory with international significance the p
Chinese leaders simultaneously seek to minimise the historic experience of the
October Revolution. The article says: “The October Revolution began with armed
uprisings in the cities and then spread to the countryside, while the Chinese
revolution won nation-wide victory through the encirclement of the cities from the
rural areas and the final capture of the cities." [ 80•2 The Peking leaders suggest
that the experience of the proletariat of Russia is inapplicable to the practice of the
revolutionary movement in the countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America, allegedly
being of purely European significance, whereas Chinese experience is of universal
significance and can be used by countries whose population is mainly rural.
Seeking to impose the experience of China’s liberation struggle on other peoples, p

Peking leaders go to the extent of twisting the history of the Chinese revolution.
Contrary to the actual facts, they argue that the Chinese people’s victory over Japan
and then over the Kuomintang was scored exclusively through “reliance on one’s
own strength”. Without in any way minimising the importance of the Chinese
people’s struggle against Japanese imperialism, there is need to emphasise that
Japan’s defeat was predetermined by the Soviet Union’s entry into the war against 81
her. Peking leaders forget such “trifles” as the fact that China’s victory in the
“people’s war" was predetermined by the rout of Japanese imperialism.
At one time, Mao himself admitted: “We are told that ‘Victory is possible even p
without international help’. This is a mistaken idea. In the epoch in which
imperialism exists, it is impossible for a genuine people’s revolution to win victory
in any country without any assistance from international revolutionary forces, and if
this victory is won, it will not be consolidated in the absence of such
assistance." [ 81•1 Similar statements were also made by other Chinese leaders, who
stressed that without the Soviet Union’s assistance China’s victory over Japan would
have taken a long time. However, at present they are trying in every way to isolate
the national liberation movement from the international working-class movement and
its product, the world socialist system, and to impose on this movement their policy
of “reliance on one’s own strength”.
Let us now consider the question of this allegedly universal and world-wide p
character of Chinese military experience. Is it right to say that at present the peoples
of Asia, Africa and Latin America are faced with the need of a “people”s war”, as
the Chinese leaders insist? We do not think so. Lenin wrote: “Marxist dialectics calls
for a concrete analysis of each specific historical situation." [ 81•2 We are
witnessing the collapse of the colonial system of imperialism: not more than 30
million people still live in colonies, as compared with 1,500 million 20 years ago.
The overwhelming majority of the colonies have won independence, some of them
arms in hand. At present, the former colonial and semi-colonial countries are faced
with the task of consolidationg this political independence, winning economic
independence, and making good their economic and cultural lag.
The Document of the International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties p

stresses that “the solution of these problems involves far-reaching socio-economic
changes, the implementation of democratic agrarian reforms in the interests of the
working peasantry and with its participation, the abolition of outdated feudal and
pre-feudal relations, liquidation of oppression by foreign monopolies, radical 82
democratisation of social and political life and the state apparatus, regeneration of
national culture and the development of its progressive traditions, the strengthening
of revolutionary Parties and the founding of such Parties where they do not yet
exist". [ 82•1 These socio-economic transformations cannot, of course, be realised
the military way. Such is the specific historical situation which now obtains in the
countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America.
Puppet regimes exist in a number of these countries. Besides, imperialism, while p
using neo-colonialist methods, simultaneously has no qualms about resorting to direct

armed intervention in the domestic affairs of the newly-free countries. We have
already said that some peoples continue to live under the yoke of colonialism. That
is why nationalcolonial wars in our day and age are possible and are in fact
inevitable, but they are only one of the methods in the fight against imperialism.
At present, political and economic methods of fighting imperialism and its local p
agents are being brought to the fore in the countries of Asia, Africa and Latin
America, and these methods are as or more complex than those of armed struggle.
That is why it is quite wrong today to regard armed struggle as an absolute and to
insist on it as the central task facing the peoples of these continents.
This question arises: what is the purpose of the Chinese leaders’ strong advocacy of p
“people’s war"? There is only one answer: their only purpose is to provoke armed
conflicts in various parts of the globe, to incite civil wars within the liberated
countries, to involve the USA and the USSR in these conflicts and wars, so as to
start a world war while remaining on the sidelines. There are any number of facts to
bear this out. Take the war-mongering policy of the Chinese leaders during the Indo-
Pakistani armed conflicts in 1965 and 1971, their intensified support of the extremist
elements in Indonesia, Burma, Congo, Thailand, Malaysia and elsewhere. Today,
during Israel’s aggression against the Arab countries they keep saying that the Soviet
Union has allegedly betrayed the Arabs. They want to provoke the Soviet Union into 83
direct armed intervention in the Middle East conflict and by getting Israel’s
imperialist friends to take counteraction, to push the world on the brink of nuclear
war.
Analysing the international situation after the Second World War, in 1946, Mao put p
forward his “theory of the intermediary zone”, which allegedly lies between the
Soviet Union and the USA. This “theory” contained the assertion that the principal
contradiction of the epoch was not that between the socialist countries and the
capitalist world (in this instance represented by the USA), but between the USA and
the “intermediate zone”. As time went on, the chauvinistic element in this “theory”
was steadily built up, until finally the Soviet Union was ranked with the USA, while
China was brought to the fore as the leader of the “ intermediate zone”.
Of late the Maoist leadership has advanced a doctrine of “the monopoly of two p
superpowers”, according to which two Great Powers—the USSR and the USA—
struggle acutely for the division of the world into spheres of influence and for
establishing sole supremacy.
The doctrine is another proof that Peking goes to all lengths, including the departure p
from its class positions, in order to reach its purposes. When analysing the world
situation and defining foreign policy tasks, the Chinese leaders regard not socio-
economic and political factors but geopolitical factors, geographic position and other
state features as being of paramount importance. Moreover, they derive benefit from
the negation of the objectively existing division of the world into two diametrically
opposed social systems and the genuine nature of the resultant class struggle in the
world arena.
The Maoists disregard the fact that one of the Great Powers is a socialist state and p
the other is an imperialist state. The latter actively supports Israeli aggression in the
Middle East, whereas the former acts as a reliable friend and bulwark of Arab states
in their struggle for the elimination of the aftermath of Israeli aggression. The latter
has occupied Taiwan, a Chinese island, and has a treaty of alliance with Chiang
Kai-shek, is resorting to aggressive actions in Indochina in the direct vicinity of

China’s borders, and is provoking against the Korean People’s Democratic Republic.
The former is supplying the Vietnamese people with weapons, ammunition and other 84
materiel and resources, and is rendering the peoples of Indochina political and
diplomatic support, is actively counteracting the provocations against the fraternal
Korean People’s Democratic Republic, is strongly decrying the occupation of Taiwan
by the USA, and is consistently exposing all attempts aimed at creating a situation
of “two Chinas’.
In an attempt to fit all the diverse and complex world developments into an p
artificially concocted scheme the Maoists regard these developments through a prism
of the conception of “the monopoly of two superpowers”. According to their logic, to
eliminate backwardness or to achieve further progress the peoples have no need at all
to fight for their national or social liberation, for the solution of their economic and
political tasks. As soon as “the middle-sized and small states unite against the two
superpowers”, it was stated in Peking early in June 1971, “the weak states will turn
into strong ones, and the small into big ones.”
But the main purport of this doctrine is to give ideological substance to “the p
exclusive role" played by China as the leader of “the struggle against two
superpowers”. They circulate the following assertions: the People’s Republic of China
is similar to “small and weak" states, shares with them “a special community of
features”, for she is also “subjected to aggression and interference on the part of the
‘superpowers’ ”. Their modesty being exhausted at this point, they make a different
statement: “China towers above the East as a giant.” By this they imply that China
is the biggest and strongest state among those which “oppose the two superpowers”.
This explains why on May 20, 1970, Mao Tse-tung put into circulation the term
“small and weak states”.
An approach to the world in terms of a conglomeration of nations and countries, in p

which “small and weak" states have to seek China’s protection from the “rule of two
superpowers" and a deliberate introduction of confusion into people’s concepts about
the alignment of class forces and the nature of the world struggle only play into the
hands of imperialist politicians and ideologists.
The thesis of “two superpowers" is in unison with the ideas long harboured by the p
reactionary circles in the West. Two years before the appearance of this Chinese
doctrine Strauss, the leader of the revenge-seeking forces in West Germany, 85
published his book The Challenge and the Reply. A Programme for Europe, in which
he reiterates the idea about “the dominance of two Great Powers—the USA and the
USSR"—and urges Europeans (albeit in more modest terms—in European terms
rather than in global ones as Peking does) to create “an autonomous Europe which
would confront both the USA and the USSR" and in which the ERG would, of
course, be the “most important strategically, and the strongest economically”.
The Chinese leaders’ Great-Han chauvinism reveals itself not only in their p
theoretical approach to present-day problems, but mainly in their practical activity in
which they willingly make use for their own interests of various conceptions like
pan-Africanism, pan-Arabism, pan-Asianism, the “young emergent forces”, etc. They
have deliberately inflated racist feelings by plugging the antithesis of East and West.
While paying lip service to Afro-Asian solidarity, Mao and his followers are in fact p
prepared to recognise solidarity only where it meets their own plans, that is,
solidarity on their own ideological-political platform. With the start of the “cultural
revolution" in China, there has been a marked step-up in the efforts to make the
peoples of Asia and Africa recognise Peking’s ideological leadership at any price, “to
carry to the peoples of Africa a clear understanding of the genius of Mao Tse-tung
and the great proletarian cultural revolution”, and to lend “the new African national
organisations the militant spirit of Mao Tse-tung”. But because the peoples of these
countries want to develop relations with each other on the basis of the principles
they formulated together at Bandung in 1955, and to set themselves goals meeting
the national interests, the Chinese leaders have tried to undermine Afro-Asian
solidarity in every possible way. The most glaring instance of this policy is their
torpedoing of the Second Conference of Asian and African Heads of State and
Government that was to have been held at Algiers in 1965.
There is rejection in Peking of any other solidarity between the peoples and p
countries of Asia and Africa except that based on the “thought of Mao Tse-tung”.
Any other kind of solidarity is regarded as being illegitimate and is being branded as 86
resulting from the moves of “modern revisionism”.
Economic diplomacy, designed to play upon the young national states’ desire to p
develop their economy and cooperate with other countries for that purpose, is a
growing element of China’s foreign policy with respect to the developing countries.
Its main task is, of course, to exercise Chinese influence on the countries of Asia
and Africa. The CPC leadership has been trying to use the Afro-Asian Organisation
for Economic Co-operation and Development in its efforts to impose on Asian and
African countries its recipes for economic development, above all, the principle of
“reliance on one’s own strength”, which it takes to mean that the newly-emergent
countries should look to support only from China. Co-operation with China is the
only type of economic, scientific and technical co-operation Peking finds acceptable
for the newly-emergent countries. This means that in the sphere of economic
relations as well the Maoists intend to impose on the Asian and African countries the
domination of China and to set up a kind of closed AfroAsian economic organisation
under Peking’s control. Claiming to be the “best friends" of Asia and Africa and
trying hard to prove their “selflessness”, they readily issue promises of economic,
scientific and technical aid and support in the fight against “imperialism and the old
and new colonialism”. However, the experience of the peoples of Asia and Africa
tells them that Peking’s aid either comes to mere promises (for, as a rule, Peking
honours only a small part of its commitments) or is in the nature of a Trojan horse.
The Chinese leaders seek to impose on the developing countries their own specific p
way of social development. They take little interest in the actual practical problems
of construction in the young national states, such as development of the productive
forces, achievement of genuine economic independence, etc. They are much more
concerned with involving these countries in struggle with each other over territory
(Chinese diplomats assigned to Africa are explicitly set the task of “helping the
African brothers to secure realisation of the new countries’ just territorial claims”),
with starting civil wars wherever possible and spreading chaos and confusion so as
to present all this as a “ revolutionary storm”. When this kind of meddling in the
affairs of the newly-emergent countries sparks off an offensive by domestic reaction 87
or even open intervention by imperialism, the leaders in Peking pretend that none of
this has anything to do with their activity and launch upon obscure discourses about
the “inevitable zigzags and relapses" in the development of world revolution. That
was exactly what happened, for instance, after the failure of the attempted coup in
Indonesia, which was staged not without Peking’s participation.
The Chinese leadership’s Great-Power calculations are chiefly connected with Asia, p
which is regarded as a sphere of immediate Chinese interests and the area of China’s
traditional influence. In the last few years the Chinese leadership have carried out
their major foreign-policy measures in Asia, with the countries in this area taking the
bulk of China’s trade and one-half of her aid to the developing states. In fact, it is
in Asia that one of the characteristic methods of their foreign policy—divide and
rule—is most clearly revealed. There they seek to set at odds everyone they can in
order to pave China’s way to the domination of that part of the world.
To promote their chauvinistic interests the Maoists are prepared to betray the p
national liberation movement of Asian peoples. A glaring example of this was the
Peking support of the repressions fulminated by the Pakistani military regime against
the liberation movement in East Bengal in 1971.
The Chinese leadership’s Great-Han chauvinistic claims to domination in Asia and p

their gross intervention in the affairs of the Asian countries, their expansionist
schemes and attempts to decide territorial issues by force of arms have led to a
situation in which China’s Asian policy is meeting with ever growing difficulties.
The Chinese leaders’ policy with respect to the US aggression in Vietnam is also the
source of grave apprehension and much concern in Asia.
Equally grave apprehensions are aroused by the Maoists’ policy in Africa and Latin p
America, which is reflected in growing mistrust of it in the African and Latin
American countries.
It is the national-territorial issue that has perhaps most forcefully revealed the p
Chinese leaders’ Great-Han chauvinism. The ideologists of the Chinese national 88
bourgeoisie used to spread expansionist ideas with much vigour. From the turn of the
century, books and articles published in China presented the Chinese history as an
expansion of her national boundaries, with vast territories bordering on China and
even whole countries designated as having been “lost” by China. Today, China’s
leaders have Great-Power schemes of re-establishing China within the boundaries of
the last Chin dynasty. Let us note the fact that even in the 1930s and 1940s, when
the CPC was giving a lead in the fight against Japanese imperialism for the
country’s liberation, there were hints of Great-Power notions in some of Mao’s
statements. Thus, in an interview with Edgar Snow in 1936, he declared that after
the people’s revolution had been victorious in China, Outer Mongolia would
automatically become a part of the Chinese Federation, at its own will. [ 88•1
In 1954, the Chinese leaders raised with a Soviet government delegation the p
question of a merger between the Mongolian People’s Republic and the Chinese
People’s Republic totally ignoring the Mongolian people’s “own will”.
Characteristically, that same year a book on China’s modern history published in
Peking showed Mongolia, and also the Korean People’s Democratic Republic, the
Democratic Republic of Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Burma and a part of the territory
of the USSR as lands “lost” by China. The next event which revealed the Chinese
leadership’s chauvinistic, expansionist attitudes on the national-territorial questions
was the Sino-Indian border dispute and the Chinese leaders’ territorial claims on
India, which led to a number of armed clashes along the border.
The Chinese leaders’ expansionism was equally revealed with respect to the Sino- p
Soviet border. Back in 1945, Mao Tse-tung said in the Political Report to the 7th
Congress of the CPC that “the Soviet Union was the first country to renounce
unequal treaties and sign new, equal treaties with China". [ 88•2 From this
statement it followed that relations between the USSR and China were based on
justice and equality, and that there were no outstanding issues, including border
issues between the two countries. However, very soon Mao “discovered” some 89
“outstanding” territorial problems between the USSR and China. Beginning with
1960, the Chinese side systematically staged provocations on the Sino-Soviet border,
making efforts to “assimilate” various parts of Soviet territory. This was followed by
statements in the Chinese press alleging that the treaties defining the Sino-Soviet
border were unequal, [ 89•1 and that these treaties had cost China the loss of her
territories. When meeting a group of Japanese socialists in 1964, Mao already put
forward a whole programme of territorial claims on the Soviet Union, adding that
China was yet to “present her bill" for the vast territory lying in the Baikal-
Kamchatka-Vladivostok triangle. [ 89•2
As a logical sequence of this there came the armed provocations staged in 1969 in p
the area of the Soviet island of Damansky and on other sectors of the Soviet-Chinese
border.
The Chinese leaders’ territorial claims on the Soviet Union demonstrate their
expansionism and once again show up their Great-Han chauvinistic and hegemonistic
aspirations. All of this reveals the true nature of the Chinese leaders’ political line
and shows it to be anti-socialist. Today, their Great-Han chauvinism and
hegemonism is increasingly acquiring a militaristic and political tenor, acting as an
accomplice of the most reactionary forces of world imperialism and the worst enemy
of proletarian internationalism.
***

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normal
Notes
[ 74•1 ] International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties, Moscow, 1969,

pp. 21, 23,

44.
[ 77•1 ] Once Again on Comrade Togliatti’s Differences With Us, Peking, 1963, p. 34
(in Chinese).
[ 77•2 ] Ibid., pp. 47–48.
[ 78•1 ] Once Again on Comrade Togliatti’s Differences With Us, p. 49.
[ 78•2 ] Meaning the USSR.
[ 80•1 ] Lin Piao, “Long Live the Victory of People’s War!”, In Commemoration of
the 20th Anniversary of Victory in the Chinese People’s War of Resistance against
Japan, Peking, 1967, pp. 48–49.
[ 80•2 ] Ibid., p. 42.
[ 81•1 ] Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, Vol. VI, Peking, 1961, p. 416.
28.
[ 88•1 ] See Edgar Snow, Red Star Over China, London, 1968, p. 443.
[ 88•2 ] Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works, Vol. 4, London, 1956, p. 302.
[ 89•1 ] Jcnmin jihpao, March 8, 1963.
[ 89•2 ] Pravda, September 2, 1964.
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Chauvinism and Hegemonism in the
Views of Mao and His Followers

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OF MAOIST PHILOSOPHY THE MARXIST AND THE
MAOIST VIEW OF
PROLETARIAN REVOLUTION,
WAR AND PEACE

Chauvinism.in.the.Guise.of.Internationalism

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ANTITHESIS OF THE MARXIST
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REVOLUTION, WAR AND PEACE
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1. Is Chinese Experience Alone a Basis

Text for Producing Laws for the Whole World?

HTML
PS
A collection of Mao’s statements on various questions, a sort of compendium of p
PDF
Maoist ideology, was issued in Peking in 1966 in the main languages of the world. It
gives a good idea of the level and content of Maoist theoretical postulates, which the
T*
present Chinese leadership seeks to substitute for Marxism-Leninism.
19*
### Let us note that a person who is about to read Mao’s Little Red Book is in for a p
surprise. None of the 26 sections of this “aid”, which is declared to be a summit of
revolutionary Marxism, specially deals with revolution. It does not contain such terms
as “revolutionary situation”, “forms and methods of revolutionary struggle”, “the
theory of bourgeois-democratic revolution growing into a socialist revolution”, and so
on. But there are any number of expressions dealing with war, like “war and peace”,
“people”s war”, “relations between officers and men”, “relations between the army
and the people”, etc.
There is good reason for this lopsided attitude to the problems of revolution. In the p
Little Red Book the rich and living, the many-faceted and profound doctrine of Marx
and Lenin on the proletariat’s revolutionary struggle has been supplanted by a
primitive scheme reducing every form of struggle and Communist Parties’ activity
essentially to revolutionary war.
Here are some of the statements it contains. p
“War is the highest form of struggle for resolving contradictions, when they have p 91
developed to a certain stage, between classes, nations, states, or political groups, and
it has existed ever since the emergence of private property and of classes." [ 91•1
“Every Communist must grasp the truth: ’Political power grows out of the barrel of p
a gun’... .
“The seizure of power by armed force, the settlement of the issue by war is the p
central task and the highest form of revolution. This Marxist-Leninist principle of
revolution holds good universally, for China and for all other countries." [ 91•2
One is struck by the inflexibility and peremptory character of these formulations. If p

they “hold good universally”, one may well ignore the concrete conditions, the time
and place. This simplifies the theory of revolutionary struggle to the limit. At long
last one has got universal means of solving all kinds of problems and resolving any
contradictions: the contradictions “between classes, nations, states, or political
groups”. This means is a revolutionary war. If Mao does now and again advise the
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/3.1-Is.Chinese.Experience.Alone.a.Basis[2012-12-18 2:27:49]
use of other means it is merely to prepare for the selfsame revolutionary war.
How, on what ground, has this distortion of Marxism arisen? Let us look above all p
at the period in the history of the Chinese revolution to which these quotations refer.
They have been taken from Mao’s works entitled “On Protracted War”, “War and
Questions of Strategy”, “Strategic Questions of the Revolutionary War in China”, and
“ Questions of Strategy in the Guerrilla War Against the Japanese Invaders”. All
these works date to the 1930s, and their titles and date explain a great deal.
The 1930s were the height of the civil war, which continued even after the Japanese p
imperialists attacked China. In that period, practice, life itself demanded of the
progressive forces of the Chinese people, the Chinese Communists above all, that
they should organise armed resistance to the invaders, and launch a nation-wide
armed struggle, although judging by these same extracts, Mao was already at that
time now and again giving incorrect theoretical expressions to this necessity, treating 92
as absolutes specific propositions applicable to a given country, to a given period,
and enshrining them as absolute general laws.
However, in these same works of Mao’s we find—and this is especially important— p

some understanding of the specific nature of the Chinese situation. Even at the time,
Mao used to stress the specific features of China’s external and domestic situation
which put the CPC into an absolutely exceptional set of conditions in the struggle.
He wrote: “If one clearly understands this [that China is a semi-colony contended for
by many imperialist powers—Ed.], then, first, one can understand why in China
alone in the world there is such an unusual thing as a prolonged strife within the
ruling classes, why the fight intensifies and expands day by day, and why no unified
political power has ever come into being. Secondly, one can understand how
important the peasant problem is, and consequently why rural uprisings have
developed on such a nation-wide scale as at present. Thirdly, one can understand the
correctness of the slogan about a workers’ and peasants’ democratic political power.
Fourthly, one can understand another unusual thing which corresponds to and arises
out of the unusual thing that in China alone in the world there is a prolonged strife
within the ruling classes, and that is the existence and development of the Red Army
and guerrilla troops, and, together with them, the existence and development of
small Red areas that have grown amid the encirclement of the White political power
(no such unusual thing is found anywhere except in China). Fifthly, one can also
understand that the formation and development of the Red Army, the guerrilla units
and the Red areas are the highest form of the peasant struggle under the leadership
of the proletariat in semi-colonial China, the inevitable outcome of the growth of the
peasant struggle in a semi-colony, and are undoubtedly the most important factors in
accelerating the revolutionary upsurge throughout the country. And sixthly, one can
also understand that the policy of purely mobile guerrilla-like activities cannot
accomplish the task of accelerating the nation-wide revolutionary upsurge, while the
kind of policies adopted by Chu Teh and Mao Tse-tung and by Fang Chih-min are
undoubtedly correct—policies such as establishing base areas; building up political
power according to plan, deepening the agrarian revolution, and expanding the 93
people’s armed forces by developing in due order first the township Red Guards,
then the local Red Army, and then a regular Red Army; and expanding political
power by advancing in a series of waves, etc., etc." [ 93•1
However, with the growing tendency for Peking to establish its hegemony in the p
international liberation movement, these indications of the specific character of the
Chinese situation tended to disappear from the CPC documents. The concrete
national experience was transformed into experience that “holds good universally" in
a phased manner. At first, the experience of armed struggle in China was presented
as a universal means for the national liberation struggle of the peoples in Asia,
Africa and Latin America. In their statements, the Chinese leaders ever more
frequently presented the Chinese revolution as the classic type of revolution for the
oppressed countries, and all the three continents (without consideration of the
differences in the concrete situation in various countries, their different levels of
social development, etc.) as centres of a “ revolutionary situation" standing on the
threshold of civil war.
Very soon even this was felt to be insufficient. When reprinting in 1965 Mao’s p
article, “Questions of Strategy in the Guerrilla War Against the Japanese Invaders”,
the editors of the Hungchih declared the concrete military propositions of that period
to be valid as global strategy. The same purpose was served by Lin Piao’s article
“Long Live the Victory of the People’s War”, which appeared the same year. It not
only declared that the political and economic conditions in China and in the
countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America were identical, it not only advocated for
these countries Mao’s thesis of “setting up revolutionary base areas in the countryside
and encircling the town by the village”. Mao’s idea was used, you might say, also to
characterise the postwar situation in the world, and the attitude of the countries of
Asia, Africa and Latin America to the countries of North America and Western
Europe. The latter were declared to be the “world town”, and Asia, Africa and Latin
America, the “world village”. Encirclement of the town by the village was declared 94
to be the specific feature of “world revolution" at its present stage. [ 94•1
Finally, in Mao’s Little Red Book, published a year later, in 1966, the operation of p
converting Chinese experience into universal experience was completed. There, the
conclusions bearing on a definite situation in China in the 1930s and the 1940s were
already presented as a universal law; various statements, taken out of historical
contents, were presented as the summit of Marxist thinking, as universal truths of the
epoch of the “general collapse of imperialism and the triumph of socialism
throughout the world”.
In 1936, Mao wrote: “War, this monster of mutual slaughter among mankind, will p
be finally eliminated through the progress of human society, and in no distant future
too. But there is only one way of eliminating it, namely, to oppose war by means of
war.... A war ... will form a bridge leading world history into a new era." [ 94•2
That was said a long time ago, in a period when the German, Italian and Japanese p
imperialists were starting the Second World War on the fields of Europe, Africa and
Asia, and the rigidity and peremptory character of the formulation could have been
ascribed to the requirements of the concrete situation, of the concrete historical
epoch. However, this has been reprinted and declared to be the greatest and, what is
more, universal truth in our day. From this it follows (and the Peking propagandists
have said as much) that thermonuclear war may be fought by means of
thermonuclear war itself. From this it follows that thermonuclear war is the bridge
leading to mankind’s radiant future. But if it is a bridge, it is one which is made up
of corpses, and one leading to the burial ground of mankind’s civilisation. Summing
up the practice of the 1930s and the 1940s, Mao declared: “As we are advocates of
the abolition of war, we do not desire war; but war can only be abolished through
war; in order to get rid of the gun we must first grasp it in our hand." [ 94•3 In
order to get rid of thermonuclear arms we must first grasp them in our hand, seems
to be the message of this idea today.
In the 1930s, Mao wrote: “Some people have waxed ironic, calling us advocates of p 95
the ’theory of almightiness of war’.. . . Indeed, we are advocates of the theory of

almightiness of revolutionary war. This is not bad, this is good, this is the Marxist
approach.”
One may well ask this legitimate question: what about thermonuclear war: is it, too, p
almighty, revolutionarycreative and therefore desirable?
Spreading the theory of the almightiness of revolutionary war, Mao assures us that
this is “not bad, this is good, this is the Marxist approach”. No, this is not the
Marxist approach at all. Even revolutionary war cannot be regarded as being the sole
almighty means for establishing socialism. It is inevitable only in definite conditions.
The only almighty means is the active ogranisation of the revolutionary masses, the
proletariat above all, flexibly adapting its tactics and forms of struggle to the
changing and mobile political situation.
***

TEXT SIZE
normal
Notes
[ 91•1 ] Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-time;, p. 58.
[ 91•2 ] Ibid., pp. 61–62.
[ 93•1 ] Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works, Vol. 1, London, 1954, pp. 116–17 (emphasis
added—Y.K. and Y.P.).
[ 94•1 ] Jenmin jihpao, September 3. 1965.
[ 94•2 ] Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works, Vol. 1, p. 179.
[ 94•3 ] Ibid., Vol. 2, p. 273.
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Revolution

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CHAUVINISM AND OF MARXISM AND OF MAOISM
HECEMONISM PRESENTED AS TO THE STATE AND
PROLETARIAN PROLETARIAN LEGALITY
INTERNATIONALISM

Is.Chinese.Experience.Alone.a.Basis

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<•>
Revolution

TOC
The communist movement is constantly faced with opponents on the “Right” and on p
Card
the “Left” who claim to stand for socialist revolution but in fact distort its meaning.
Both tend to regard relative truth as an absolute, and carry it to absurdity. They
Text declare either of the two forms of struggle, which produces the greatest effect only
HTML in definite conditions, to be the only and unquestionably best form of struggle. Thus,
PS the revisionists, with their slogan of “painless progress”, insist that there is only the
PDF one—peaceful—way of transition to socialism, and it is a way which they in fact
reduce to reforms, which do not go to the roots of capitalism; when confronted with
T* armed reaction, they capitulate. On the other hand, the dogmatists, having once and
19*
for all connected revolution with revolutionary war, refused to recognise any other,
### peaceful forms of struggle for power, and push the people into unwarranted sacrifices
and disorganise the revolutionary movement.
Let us note that the anti-Marxist attitude of the CPC leadership on the question of p
ways of socialist revolution did not crystallise all at once. Up until mid-1963, before 96
the CPC leadership finally broke with the decisions of the 1957 and 1960 Meetings
of Communist and Workers’ Parties in Moscow, and merely spoke about a “different
reading" of them, documents issued by the CPC Central Committee contained,
together with one-sided and erroneous formulations, propositions generally accepted
by the Communist Parties about the need to master “every form of struggle”, and to
learn swiftly to switch from one form of struggle to another “in accordance with the
changes in the situation of such struggle”. A CPC Central Committee letter of June
14, 1963, “Proposal Concerning the General Line of the International Communist
Movement”, stressed that “the Communists always prefer to make the transition to
socialism by peaceful means". [ 96•1 But this letter already threw the wrong light
on the attitude taken by the Communist Parties to disagree with Peking. It was said
that there had appeared in their ranks “soothsayers” who pinned their hopes on a
“peaceful transition”, men who “started from historical idealism, obscured the basic
contradictions of capitalist society, rejected the Marxist-Leninist doctrine of the class
struggle and erected their own subjectivist propositions". [ 96•2
Subsequently, an open attempt to revise the basic propositions of the 1957 p

Declaration and the 1960 Statement was made in the well-known editorial articles
published from September 6, 1963 to March 31, 1964. The last of the eight articles
dealt specifically with the question of the so-called peaceful transition. Intending to
talk to the “revisionists” in “much clearer language than before”, its authors left
virtually nothing at all of the statements contained earlier in CPC Central Committee
documents about the diversity of forms of proletarian struggle. The same “violent
revolution is the universal law of proletarian revolution" was proclaimed to be the
only Marxist approach. The article explained: “Marxism openly declares the
inevitability of violent revolution. It says that violent revolution is the midwife
without whom no socialist society is born, that it is the inevitable way of supplanting
the bourgeois dictatorship by the proletarian dictatorship, the universal law of 97
proletarian revolution." [ 97•1
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/3.2-Two.Ways.of.Socialist.Revolution[2012-12-18 2:27:56]
By repeating that the Marxist classics had regarded violence as the midwife of the p
new society, the Chinese leaders try to present themselves as consistent Marxists.
Indeed, Marx and Engels did say that revolutionary violence was the midwife of the
new society, but what they meant was social violence, social revolution, which is far
from always being identical with war. Generally speaking, the substance of socialist,
proletarian revolution consists not only, and not so much, in violence or coercion, as
in the creative construction of the new society (the prevalence of violent forms and
methods of struggle usually marks the early stages of a social revolution). Lenin
wrote: “There is no doubt that without this, without revolutionary violence, the
proletariat could not have triumphed. Nor can there be any doubt that revolutionary
violence was a necessary and legitimate weapon of the revolution only at definite
stages of its development, only under definite and special conditions, and that a far
more profound and permanent feature of this revolution and condition of its victory
was, and remains, the organisation of the proletarian masses, the organisation of the
working people. And it is this organisation of millions of working people that
constitutes the best stimulant for the revolution, its deepest source of
victory." [ 97•2
Furthermore, in the course of a proletarian revolution there does indeed occur p

elimination of the exploiting classes, the “expropriation of the expropriators”, that is,
the application of violence to a handful of oppressors, but the social demise of the
bourgeois class or of the class of landowners is not the same thing as the physical
destruction of persons belonging to these classes. The proletariat gives freedom and
the right to work to those who come from the exploiting classes but who refuse to
resist the socialist transformations and express their desire to co-operate with the
new power.
Finally, revolution is always violence and social coercion (on this point there can be p
no misunderstanding), but it does not always involve the use of armed force. It is
correct, therefore, to speak not of some kind of “peaceful transition" and violent 98
proletarian revolution, and to contrast these two concepts, but of the peaceful and
non-peaceful ways of socialist revolution. The revolution runs a peaceful course
when it does not involve an armed uprising, civil war or the armed export of
counter-revolution; it runs a non-peaceful way whenever any of these elements (or
all three together, as was the case, for instance, during the socialist revolution in
Russia) are present in it.
The author of the Jenmin jihpao article of March 31, 1964, made known the theses p
which the CPC delegation set up in contrast to the CPSU’s attitude at the 1957
Meeting of the Communist and Workers’ Parties. He wrote: “Starting from tactical
considerations, it is useful to express a desire for peaceful transition, but there
should be no excessive accent on the possibility of peaceful transition, it is always
necessary to be ready to give a rebuff to the attacks of counterrevolution, it is
necessary to be prepared for the revolution at the decisive moment of taking power
by the working class to overthrow the bourgeoisie by means of armed force, if it
resorts to armed force to suppress the people’s revolution (which is, as a rule,
inevitable)." [ 98•1
No Communist has ever doubted the need to use arms to beat back the counter- p
revolution when it resorts to “armed force to suppress the people’s revolution”. But
the Communists have never used the recognition of the peaceful as well as the non-
peaceful way of socialist revolution as a kind of tactical ploy or a propaganda slogan
which merely serves to cover up preparations for the almost always “inevitable”
forms of armed struggle. For the Communists, this question of the way the
revolution is to run has always been one of real political tactics and strategy.
Moreover, this question of the peaceful and the non-peaceful ways of revolution has
been and continues to be one of the Communist Parties’ humanistic world outlook.
Let us stress that the question of the real implementation of the ideas of the p
socialist revolution’s peaceful way is a most complex one. The Communist Parties of
a number of advanced capitalist countries seek to its solution through so-called
structural reforms in capitalist society, by making use of the traditional democratic 99
institutions existing in these countries.
It is, in fact, the failure to understand this attitude and the denial of the possibility p
of there being different forms of social coercion, and of the need to use and
combine different forms of political struggle that is the characteristic feature of the
“directive” Jenmin jihpao article examined above, for its purpose is to revise the
agreed documents of the international communist movement and to substitute
onesided dogmatic propositions for the dialectical Marxist– Leninist ones. The article
says, among other things: “The documents of the Meetings, in particular, contain the
assertion that there is a possibility in some capitalist countries of winning state power
without civil war, although they also say that the ruling classes never give up power
of their own accord; they contain the assertion that there is a possibility of winning
a solid majority in parliament and converting parliament into an instrument serving
the working people, although they also point to the need to carry on extensive and
massive extra-parliamentary struggle and to break down the resistance of the
reactionary forces; they do not accentuate the fact that violent revolution is a
universal law, although peaceful transition is mentioned." [ 99•1
The Maoists have essentially distorted the idea of the possibility of peaceful
transition to socialism which the Communist Parties advocate. A peaceful victory for
the socialist revolution is not at all equivalent to denying the use of force in the
struggle, nor does the idea of a peaceful way amount to a mere use of bourgeois
legalism. When, say, the Communists seek to make parliament serve the people and
to fill it with new content, they have in mind not only the battles which are fought
at the polls and not only parliamentary debates, but above all the winning by the
working class of a parliamentary majority through the broadest revolutionary action
of the masses. The revolution develops both “from above" and “from below”.
Massive extra-parliamentary struggle is the rock bottom foundation lor truly
democratic activity by members of parliament and the condition for parliament
progressively playing an ever greater part in the country’s social life.
Emacs-File-stamp: "/home/ysverdlov/leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/20070510/199.tx" 100
“The proletarian party must in no instance base its ideological propositions, its p
revolutionary line and the whole of its work on the assumption that the imperialists
and the reactionaries will agree to peaceful change," [ 100•1 the CPC leaders
warned the Communist Parties which recognise the real possibilities not only of an
armed but also of a peaceful way for the revolution. But recognition by the
Communist Parties of the possibility of peaceful transition to socialism does not at
all imply voluntary abandonment by the exploiting classes of their power, their
property or their privileges. In this sense, no deep-going social revolution is
conceivable without the organisation of massive political action, without the use of
coercive measures with respect to the exploiters, and without the establishment of a
dictatorship of the revolutionary classes. Let us add, too, that there has never been
any “purely” peaceful or non-peaceful revolution in history in any period. In actual
fact there is always a prevalent, predominant tendency which makes its way across
the other tendencies. These may pass into one another in the most diverse
combinations. Which means of struggle is best and in which conditions? Is it
guerrilla warfare? Is it a general political strike? Is it an electoral campaign? Is it an
armed uprising in town or country? How are these different means to be combined
with each other? To obtain the answers to these questions there is need again and
again to look at the aggregation of internal and external factors, which, by the way,
keep constantly changing, or, as Lenin said, there is need for concrete analysis of the
concrete situation.
Today, there are over 100 countries which have still to travel the way to socialism. p
In any of these there may arise and be realised the most diverse tendencies in the
most different “proportions”. The history of each nation has national and international
features, the specific and the general, the former being unique and the latter
occurring everywhere. Coming revolutions will have the great advantage over earlier
revolutions in that they will have the opportunity to take account of all their pluses
and minuses. The Communists believe that the growing variety of forms in the
struggle for socialism is evidence of its viability, and is in a sense an earnest of its
triumph.
The 1969 International Meeting of Communists in Moscow stressed this point once 101
again when it said: “The Communist and Workers’ Parties are conducting their
activity in diverse, specific conditions, requiring an appropriate approach to the
solution of concrete problems. Each Party, guided by the principles of Marxism-
Leninism and in keeping with concrete national conditions, fully independently
elaborates its own policy, determines the directions, forms and methods of struggle,
and, depending on the circumstances, chooses the peaceful or non-peaceful way of
transition to socialism.” [ 101•1
***

TEXT SIZE
normal
Notes
[ 96•1 ] Jenmin jihpao, June 17, 1963.
[ 96•2 ] Ibid.
[ 97•1 ] Jcumin ji//jjai>, March 31, 1964.
[ 97•2 ] V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 20, pp. 89–90.
[ 98•1 ] Jenmin jihpao, March 31, 1964 (emphasis added—Y.K. and Y.P.).
[ 99•1 ] Jenmin jihpao, March 31, 1964.
[ 100•1] Jenmin jihpao, June 17, 19G3.
[ 101•1] International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties, Moscow,

1<HH), p. 37 (emphasis added.—Y.K. and Y.I’.).
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3. Peaceful Coexistence of the Two Systems 101
<•>
and the Revolutionary Movement
TOC in Individual Countries

Card
Today, it is impossible, more so than at any other period, to consider the p
revolutionary movement in individual countries outside the context of international
Text
events and of the world-wide struggle between the two systems. That is why the
HTML
problem of “peaceful coexistence and the class struggle" has become one of the
PS
central ones in the present-day ideological struggle between the Marxists and their
PDF
ideological adversaries.
T*
The line of peaceful coexistence between the two systems, for which the p
19*
Communists stand, is based on the theory of socialist revolution. During the First
### World War, Lenin gave theoretical proof, and historical practice has confirmed this,
that socialist revolution cannot win out simultaneously in all the capitalist countries.
After the revolution wins out initially in one or several countries, the imperialist
camp, with great economic, political and military strength, will be in existence over
a whole historical epoch, which means that two fundamentally different social
systems will exist side by side. The struggle between them is inevitable, but the
forms of this struggle are not hard and fast, but are determined by the arrangement
and balance of forces at every given period; thus, in the early years and decades of
the world’s first and only Soviet socialist republic its peaceful coexistence together 102
with the imperialist states was virtually inconceivable for any considerable length of
time, because the capitalists did not stop trying to destroy it by means of armed
intervention; however, as the strength of the socialist state grew and a whole system
of socialist countries emerged such attempts became in effect quite hopeless;
imperialism was forced to accept the existence of a hostile social system and to
abandon the idea of resorting to war as a means of resolving the contradictions
between the two systems. Coexistence of the two opposite systems over a long
period became historical reality and the struggle between them moved mainly into
political, economic and ideological spheres.
Why can and must there be peaceful coexistence between the two systems, between p
states with opposite social systems, but not between the proletariat and the
bourgeoisie, between the people and the reactionaries of a given capitalist country?
In present-day conditions, peaceful coexistence is a necessity first of all because if
mankind wants to live and develop it has no other alternative, considering the vast
and ever growing force of nuclear and other modern weapons. Peaceful coexistence
is now a possibility above all because the joint strength of the working people of all
the world, the strength of international communism, the strength of the socialist
countries, the strength of the Soviet Union is now no longer inferior to that of the
international bourgeoisie. Relying on its ever growing economic, political and
military might, the proletarian states confront the bourgeois states.
Relations between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie in the capitalist countries are p
quite another matter. There, the proletariat is not equal in any respect, and has no
positions in the economy, politics or ideology which would be equivalent to those of
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/3.3-Peaceful.Coexistence.of.the.Two.Systems[2012-12-18 2:28:02]
the bourgeoisie. There we find a ceaseless struggle between the oppressed and the
oppressors, a struggle between the exploiters and the exploited, a struggle which
rules out “peaceful coexistence”.
However, let us stress once again that the peaceful coexistence of states is merely a p
specific form of class struggle in which the outcome is for one of the systems in the
competition to show its decisive superiority in meeting the basic interests of the
people. This specific form of class struggle exerts a tremendous influence on the
course of the class struggle in the individual countries, and that is something that 103
Maoists fail to understand.
A collection of their programme articles entitled Long Live Leninism (1960) p

contained the assertion that “the peaceful coexistence of different states and people’s
revolutions in different countries are essentially two different things and not one
thing, two concepts and not one concept, questions of two types and not of one....
What the transition will be, whether it will take the form of armed uprising or will
run a peaceful course [ 103•1 —that is a totally different question which is basically
distinct from the question of peaceful coexistence between the socialist and the
capitalist countries. It is an internal question in each country which can be settled
only depending on the balance of class forces in a given country at a given period.
That is a question only the Communists of each country themselves can
decide." [ 103•2
It is not right to identify different types of liberation movement, different forms of p

class struggle—international and internal—all that is elementary Marxism. But is it
right to contrast them absolutely as this is being done in the above and similar
passages? The CPC leaders refuse to see the real interconnection between the class
struggle as it proceeds in the international arena and within each individual country.
Indeed, although there is not always a direct interconnection between relaxation of p

international tensions and the heat of the class battles in the capitalist countries, there
is no doubt at all that any detente markedly facilitates the solution of the social tasks
which have matured there. What is the result of every success scored by the policy
of peaceful coexistence? It is the earliest realisation of the creative plans of the
countries in the socialist system, and a growing influence of socialist ideas on the
working people in the capitalist countries. This policy exposes the essence of
capitalist exploitation, because the bourgeoisie finds it harder to evade the solution of
internal problems by referring to a mythical “external” threat. This policy opens up
the prospects for more effective struggle against militarism, the mainstay of
international and domestic reaction, and ties the hands of those who want to export 104
counter-revolution. That is precisely what the aggressive circles of the imperialist
bourgeoisie fear, and that is why they have been trying so hard to keep any form of
“cold war" simmering in the international arena.
Being unable to refute clear-cut and unequivocal propositions of Lenin’s doctrine of p

peaceful coexistence the CPC leaders usually resort to slander and gross distortions
of the stand taken by their opponents. They assert that peaceful coexistence, which
the Communists stand for, “meets the needs of imperialism and plays into the hands
of the imperialist policy of aggression and war”, “signifies a substitution for the
class struggle of class collaboration on a world scale ... substitution of pacifism and
an abandonment of proletarian internationalism for the proletarian
revolution". [ 104•1 They add: “It is quite wrong to extend peaceful coexistence to
relations between oppressed and oppressor classes, between oppressed and oppressor
nations, to impose the policy of peaceful coexistence pursued by the socialist
countries on the Communist Parties of the capitalist world, or to try to subordinate to

this policy the revolutionary struggle of oppressed peoples and nations." [ 104•2
But the Communists have always insisted that peaceful coexistence only extends to p
the sphere of interstate relations and does not in any sense mean an end to the
struggle of the capitalist-oppressed classes for their social emancipation, an end to
the struggle of oppressed nations for their national liberation, or any relaxation of the
ideological struggle between communism and anti-communism. This was forcefully
re-emphasised by the International Meeting of Communists in 1969 who declared:
“The policy of peaceful coexistence does not contradict the right of any oppressed
people to fight for its liberation by any means it considers necessary—armed or
peaceful. This policy in no way signifies support for reactionary regimes.... This
policy does not imply either the preservation of the socio-political status quo or a
weakening of the ideological struggle." [ 104•3
But an analysis of the CPC leadership’s actual policy suggests that these phrases are p 105
part of the old “tactical considerations" attitude, and amount to no more than sheer
propaganda, like the slogan about the possibility of the revolution running a peaceful
way.
In early March 1959, Mao said in a confidential talk he had with representatives of p
a number of Latin American Communist and Workers’ Parties that “if there is
international tension Communist Parties will grow more quickly, the rate of their
development will be more rapid". [ 105•1 Let us add that the Chinese leaders do
not confine themselves to words alone. They have tried to create conflicts on China’s
borders with other countries, they have opposed the steps taken by the Soviet Union
to eliminate tension in the Caribbean Sea and in the Middle East, and have long
opposed any political settlement of the Vietnam conflict. Just recently, the Chinese
leaders have been spreading wild ideas about a military threat to China on the part
of “social– imperialism" (as the Soviet Union and socialist countries friendly to it are
now being designated in Peking). Here are some of the slogans Radio Peking has
been broadcasting all over the world, which come from the report to the 9th
Congress of the CPC: “We must be fully prepared”, “we must be ready for their
starting a large-scale war”, “we must be ready for their starting a war in the near
future”, “we must be ready for their starting a war with the use of conventional
weapons, and must also be ready for their starting a large-scale nuclear war”. Up to
now, Peking has substituted for the clear-cut propositions of Lenin’s doctrine of
peaceful coexistence sayings which date to the epoch of the Chinese emperors and
mandarins, as for instance, “the state flourishes in difficulties”, “the state is destroyed
unless it is faced with an external threat on the part of an enemy’s state". [ 105•2
For all practical purposes, in international affairs the Chinese leaders have long p
since taken for their guide this simple rule: “the worse—the better”, thereby
objectively taking the attitude of splitting the united anti-imperialist camp and
encouraging imperialism in its foreign-policy gambles.
Naturally, this policy arouses indignation of all progressive public opinion. This 106
being the case, the Maoists have taken up the slogan of peaceful coexistence.
Whereas in the recent past they did not even want to hear about peaceful
coexistence, now they do all they can to prove their adherence to it. But they use
this slogan for chauvinistic purposes. Although professing support for peaceful
coexistence with all countries, they in the first place appeal to imperialist powers due
to the general reorientation of China’s foreign policy. While struggling against the
socialist community and exacerbating their relations with Asian neighbour countries
(Sino-Indian relations are a typical example in this respect), the Maoists are greatly
interested in better relations with imperialist countries. Hence their appeals to the
USA, Britain and other countries that their relations with them should be based on
the principles of peaceful coexistence. Thus the slogan of peaceful coexistence is
used by the Maoists for tactical purposes prompted as they are by their chauvinistic
interests and the desire to mask the anti-socialist nature of their foreign policy.
***

TEXT SIZE
normal
Notes
[ 103•1] The CPC leadership’s documents dating to the early 1960s still nominally
recognised the peaceful way of the socialist revolution together with the non-peaceful
way.
[ 103•2] Long Live Leninism, Peking, 1960, pp. 35, 47 (in Chinese).
[ 104•1] Jenmin jihpao, December 12, 1963.
[ 104•2] Ibid.
[ 104•3] International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties, Moscow, 1969,

p. 31 (emphasis added—Y.K. and Y.P.).
[ 105•1] World Marxist Review, Vol. 7, No. 6, June 1964, p. 56.
[ 105•2] Jenmin jih/xio, January 30, 1965.
< >

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4. “World Revolution” and World 106
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Thermonuclear War

TOC
Let us recall that the concept of world revolutionary process, which is accepted by p
Card
the Communist Parties, establishes the general content of our epoch as an epoch of
transition from capitalism to socialism and also implies recognition of the qualitative
Text diversity of the progressive liberation movements proceeding throughout the world
HTML (proletarian revolutions, bourgeois-democratic revolutions, national liberation
PS revolutions, general democratic struggle in the countries of monopoly capital, anti-
PDF fascist struggle in the countries with fascist and semi-fascist regimes, and other types
of movements). Furthermore, this concept implies recognition not only of definite
T* general laws governing socialist construction in countries where the proletarian
19*
revolution has triumphed but also a diversity of forms of the socialist reconstruction
### that is taking place in these countries, forms which are determined by the economic,
political and cultural levels attained, forms which accord with the historical, national 107
traditions in each country. Finally, the concept of world revolutionary process implies
a definite duration of the renovation movement which is inexorably running in every
part of the globe and which is ultimately to put an end to the epoch of oppression,
violence and war.
In contrast to this realistic concept, which takes account of all the diversity, p
complexity, qualitative distinctions, and definite difficulties in revolutionary processes
and the possibility not only of advances but also of temporary retreats, of zigzag
courses, the Chinese leaders have long been spreading among the people illusory and
essentially mythical notions about the events taking place in the world outside China.
Thus, the deepening crisis of US imperialist policy has been presented in this p
vulgarised and caricatured form: “US imperialism, this arch-enemy of the peoples of
the world, is steadily plunging downwards. Once in office, Nixon took over an
economy bursting at the seams, faced an insoluble economic crisis, and tremendous
resistance from the peoples of the whole world and the masses of people at home,
and found himself in a difficult situation, in which there is complete confusion
among the imperialist countries while the rod of US imperialism has been steadily
losing its force.” It is true that it has at his command “vast quantities of planes and
guns, nuclear bombs and guided missiles”, but the use of these can result in only
one thing: it can cause “an even broader revolution throughout the world”. One
would expect such statements to come from a mediocre propagandist, but these
happen to be theoretical disquisitions from the report at the 9th Congress of the
CPC. To these “ conclusions" were added wild ideas about the whole world soon
becoming a field of application for the selfsame ideas of the “great Mao”. The new
Rules adopted by the 9th Congress, for instance, declare: “Mao Tse-tung thought is
the MarxismLeninism of an epoch in which imperialism is moving to a general
collapse, and socialism to victory all over the world.”
The myth of an almost imminent “general collapse" of imperialism and of p

“revisionism”, and of the triumphant advance of the “world revolution" in every part
of the world was undoubtedly of some propaganda importance at home, being
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/3.4-World.Thermonuclear.War-[2012-12-18 2:28:10]
designed to leave the Chinese people with the impression that the difficulties faced 108
by the Chinese People’s Republic do not in any sense spring from the leadership’s
fatal policies but from the incompleteness of international revolutionary processes and
that these difficulties will be overcome only after the revolution triumphs in the
international arena, and that this will be done overnight, in one great leap. Let us
note that these attempts to make success in socialist construction in China directly
dependent on successes of the “world revolution”, the attempts to prove that the
internal problems of the Chinese revolution cannot be solved without a solution of
international problems, without a “world-wide” defeat for imperialism, were first
made precisely towards the end of the 1950s, following the failure of the “Great
Leap Forward" which was to have “introduced” communism in China within a matter
of three or five years. [ 108•1
However, it would be wrong to reduce the “world revolution" slogan only to an p

urge on the part of the Chinese leaders to evade responsibility for their failures in
domestic policy and to put the blame for the delay in China’s socialist construction
on other Communist Parties. The facts show that from the end of the 1950s, the
Chinese leadership did indeed try to replace the policy of peaceful coexistence with a
policy of “cold” (and not only “cold”) war, attempting to push the socialist camp
into a military overnight solution of contradictions between the two systems. And the
greatest danger is that the future victory of socialism over imperialism was even then
connected with the prospect of a world thermonuclear war.
At the 1957 Moscow Meeting, Mao argued that a world thermonuclear war could be p
a real way for socialism’s future victory over imperialism. He reasoned: “Is it
possible to estimate the number of human victims a future war could cause? Yes, it
is, it will perhaps be one-third of the 2,700 million population of the whole world,
that is, only 900 million people—-I argued over the issue with Nehru. In this respect
he is more pessimistic than I am. I told him that if one-half of mankind were
destroyed, there would still remain the other half, but then imperialism would be
completely wiped out and only socialism would remain all over the world, and that
within half a century or a full century the population will once again increase even 109
more than by half as much again.”
When spokesmen for relatively small nations expressed legitimate fears over such p
prognostications, because their nations could be totally wiped out in a thermonuclear
war, Chinese officials assuaged their fears by saying: “In the event of a devastating
war, the small countries would have to subordinate their interests to the common
interests.” Or: “But the other nations would remain, while imperialism would be
destroyed.”
The Soviet Government, expressing the interest and the will of the Soviet people p
and standing up for the interests of the peoples of the other countries, including the
peoples of China, issued a clear and unequivocal statement over such irresponsible
and inhuman “prognostications”. It declared: “But has anyone asked the Chinese
people who are being doomed to death in advance about whether they agree to be
the firewood in the furnace of a nuclear missile war; have they empowered the CPR
leadership to issue their burial certificates in advance?
“Another question also arises. If, according to the Chinese leaders’ forecasts, p
roughly one-half of the population of such a big country as China is destroyed in a
thermonuclear war, how many men will die in countries whose populations do not
run to hundreds of millions but to tens or to simply millions of people? It is, after
all, quite obvious that many countries and peoples would find themselves entirely
within that half of mankind which the Chinese leaders are prepared to scrap from the
human race. Who then has given the Chinese leaders the right to make free with
these people’s destinies or to speak on their behalf?
“Who has given the Chinese leaders the right to denigrate the ultimate goal of the p
international working-class movement—the triumph of labour over capital—by
making assertions that the way to it runs through world thermonuclear war and that it
is worth sacrificing one-half of the globe’s population in order to build a higher
civilisation on the corpses and ruins? This conception has nothing in common with
Marxist-Leninist doctrine. We oppose this bestial conception. We have carried on
and are carrying on a tireless struggle for the triumph of Marxist-Leninist ideas, for
the emancipation of the peoples from all exploitation and oppression, and for the 110
triumph of labour over capital, with the use of methods which are worthy of the
great humanistic ideals of socialism and communism." [ 110•1
On the one hand, their attitude is characterised by an underestimation of the p

monstrously devastating force of thermonuclear (and other) modern weapons, an
underestimation which has its classic expression in the notorious Maoist slogan: “The
atomic bomb is a paper tiger.” In his well-known interview with Edgar Snow, Mao
spoke of modern weapons with extreme scorn. He said that “ Americans also had
said very much about the destructiveness of the atom bomb, and that Khrushchev
had made a big noise about that.. . . Yet recently he had read reports of an
investigation by Americans who had visited the Bikini Islands six years after the
nuclear tests had been conducted there. From 1959 onward research workers had
been on Bikini. When they first entered the island they had had to cut paths through
the undergrowth. They had found mice scampering about and fish swimming in the
stream as usual. The wellwater was potable, plantation foliage was flourishing and
birds were twittering in the trees. Probably there had been two bad years after the
tests, but nature had gone on. In the eyes of nature and the birds, the mice and the
trees the atom bomb was a paper tiger. Possibly man had less stamina than they?
” [ 110•2
On the other hand, the Maoists have underestimated the strength of the united forces p
of peace and socialism standing in the way of thermonuclear war, and have in effect
been spreading the fatalistic idea that another world-wide conflict is inevitable
because the future of war and peace, they insist, is in the hands of the imperialists
alone.
The collection Long Live Leninism insisted that “whether the imperialists ultimately p
start a war does not depend on us, for we are not the chiefs of the imperialists’
general staffs" [ 110•3 A CPC Central Committee’s letter of June 14, 1963, says
that it is an “absolutely vain illusion" to hope to avert wars. When it comes to world
wars, the Maoists use only words like “always” and “inevitably”. To create the
impression that on this question the present Chinese leadership take a Marxist stand, 111
while their opponents pursue a revisionist line, they present quotations from Lenin
without considering the actual epoch in which he made the statement. Imperialism is
latent with war: from this truth, Mao’s followers draw the conclusion that another
world war is inevitable.
In contrast to the CPC leaders, Marxists-Leninists do not believe that the possibility p
of world war is equivalent to an inevitability. Although the nature of imperialism has
not changed, it is no longer able to dictate its will to the peoples of the world,
because the sphere of its activity has been narrowed down and the scale of its
influence has been reduced. Imperialism is the soil for aggressive wars, but to
prevent a third world war from growing on this soil there is need for definite
conditions which may or may not materialise, that is, there is need for a balance of
forces within the individual countries and in the world arena favouring the start of a
war. It is the task of the popular movement for peace and against war to make these
conditions as unfavourable as possible. The Document of the 1969 Meeting of the
Communists of the world declared once again that “a new world war can be averted
by the combined effort of the socialist countries, the international working class, the
national liberation movement, all peace-loving countries, public organisations and
mass movements". [ 111•1
The Chinese leaders like to repeat Marx’s words about ideas becoming a material p
force when they get hold of the masses. Radio Peking often starts its broadcasts by
quoting Mao as saying that the “people, and the people alone, are the motive force
in the making of world history". [ 111•2 “The Chinese people and all the
revolutionary peoples of the world" constituting, according to Chinese propaganda
estimates, over 90 per cent of the population of the globe, are capable of performing
all sorts of miracles, except one—to prevent another world war. Isn’t this a rather
curious line to take for those who insist that the peoples are all-powerful?
Actually, however, in the present epoch the question of a war depends above all on p
the joint efforts of the progressive anti-imperialist, anti-war forces. The truth must be
faced; it is precisely the splitting policy of the Chinese leadership, which weakens 112
the united front in the struggle for peace, that is untying the hands of the “chiefs of
the imperialists’ general staffs”.
It is true that just recently this idea of the inevitability of another world war has p
been expressed in more veiled formulations. The report to the 9th CPC Congress
contains Mao’s “latest” precept on this score: “As for the question of world war,
there are only two possibilities: either war will cause revolution, or revolution will
avert war.” But “ dialectical" juggling with slogans like the one about “either war
causing revolution or revolution averting war”, may confuse only those who have
lost the ability of getting through to the real meaning of deceptively sonorous
phrases, those who have lost their sense of historical reality. The point is that war—
and what the Chinese leaders have in mind is a world thermonuclear war—is capable
rather not of producing “world-wide revolution”, but interrupting for many decades
any continuation of social and even of simple biological life in the most developed
countries of the world. On the other hand, by insisting that “revolution will avert
war”, the CPC leaders deprive the Marxist-Leninist concept of “social revolution" of
its rich and highly diverse content, reduce the revolutionary process to extreme forms
of armed struggle or even to Blanquist armed putsches, thereby scrapping the
importance of general democratic struggle for peace. In either case they betray the
very substance of the MarxistLeninist revolutionary doctrine, whose precepts are the
relentlessly sober approach and realism in assessing the concrete historical conditions
of the class struggle, on the one hand, and on the other, a choice of means and ways
of political action which are most favourable in the light of social progress and the
interests of the working classes.
The reckless and irresponsible arithmetical exercises about the future destruction of p
one-third or one-half of mankind (and who can guarantee that these figures will not
actually increase to nine-tenths or even ten-tenths?), like the falsely optimistic
predictions that after an “anti-imperialist” thermonuclear war the “triumphant people
will very rapidly create on the ruins of destroyed imperialism a civilisation a
thousand times higher than that under the capitalist system, and will build its own,
truly beautiful future”, [ 112•1 have nothing in common with the Marxist doctrine 113
of war and revolution and its application in the conditions of the present epoch.
In 1918 Lenin said that back in the 1880s the leaders of the international proletariat p
“with extreme caution" treated the prospect of socialism growing out of an all-
European war, for they clearly realised that such a war “would also lead to the
brutalisation, degradation and retrogression of the whole of Europe". [ 113•1
Summing up the sanguinary experience of the First World War, Lenin anticipated the
threat that this kind of conflict “might undermine the very foundations of human
society. Because it is the first time in history that the most powerful achievements of
technology have been applied on such a scale, so destructively and with such energy,
for the annihilation of millions of human lives. When all means of production are
being thus devoted to the service of war, we see that the most gloomy prophecies
are being fulfilled, and that more and more countries are falling a prey to
retrogression, starvation and complete decline of all the productive forces". [ 113•2
These words become a hundred times more meaningful under the present military-
technological revolution, which involves a great advance in destructive weapons
fraught with the possibility of catastrophic consequences.
The Communists are convinced that imperialism is bound to be destroyed and that p
the forces of progress will do away with the world of violence, oppression, and
wars, however protracted and hard their struggle may be. But the Communists have
been doing their utmost to have all the nations and all the peoples share the joys of
this victory, and to have this victory secured by mankind at the lowest costs in terms
of sacrifices, so that men are spared the horrors of a world thermonuclear war.
Let us recall, that the aim Marx set himself in his Capital was to discover and p
analyse the laws of social development, whose knowledge could help to reduce and
ease the birth pangs of the new social system. The Peking leaders have taken as
their basis the very opposite proposition: to increase and to sharpen the birth pangs,
without ever giving a thought that this kind of “midwifery” could well transform the
pangs of birth into the agony of death. Incidentally, the “great Mao‘s’ latest precepts
hold in store for the Chinese people not just war, but a war with a lethal outcome. 114
Editorials in Jenmin jihpao, Chiefangchiun pao and Hungchih have been widely
circulating the following statement by Mao Tse-tung: “I favour this slogan: ’fear no
difficulties, fear no death’.” That is the logical capstone to the earlier conclusion that
the “world can be rebuilt only with the aid of a gun”, that war is the “bridge” along
which mankind will move into a future world without wars, etc.
Although in recent times Chinese propagandists have somehow toned down the p
thesis about the inevitability of a new world war and ever more often make
statements to the effect that China favours peaceful coexistence, Peking keeps
opposing the adoption of any practical measures aimed at solving acute problems and
easing tensions. Proof of this is its attitude to the war in Indochina, its policy in the
Middle East and its attempts to provoke a new conflict there. The true designs of
Chinese statesmen are seen in their deep disappointment over the signing of treaties
between the USSR and the FRG and between Poland and the FRG, over the signing
of a quadripartite agreement on West Berlin, and in their desire to prevent the
convocation of a conference on European security. Peking has pleaded against the
treaty on the non-proliferation of nuclear arms, rejected the treaty banning the
placing of mass destruction weapons on the seabed, and declined the Soviet proposal
to hold a conference of the five nuclear powers to consider problems of nuclear
disarmament. At the 26th UN General Assembly the Chinese representatives argued
against the Soviet proposal to convene a world conference on disarmament and
played into the hands of the US delegation. One of the chief designs of Peking today
is to frustrate international detente, to create new hotbeds of war, and to provoke a

missile-nuclear conflict between the USA and the USSR.
Adventurist propositions governing the foreign policy of a great power, which is in p

possession of thermonuclear weapons, are latent with grave consequences.
The real successes in the struggle for the triumph of socialism throughout the world
will largely depend on how successfully and swiftly the world revolutionary
movement is able to overcome these adventurist propositions advocated by the
present CPC leadership, which is pushing mankind towards a world thermonuclear
conflict.
***

TEXT SIZE
normal
Notes
[ 108•1] China Today, Moscow, 1969, p. 31.
[ 110•1] “Soviet Government’s Statement”, Pravda, August 21, 19G3.
[ 110•2] Maoism Through the Eyes of Communists, Moscow, 1970, p. 134.
[ 110•3] Long Live Leninism, p. 23.

p. 31.
[ 111•2] Quotations from Chairman Mao ‘I’sc-luiig, p. IIS.
[ 112•1] Long Live Leninism, p. 23.
[ 113•1] V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 27, p. 422.
[ 113•2] Ibid.
< >

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<•> TITLE: A Critique of Mao Tse-Tung's Theoretical Conceptions.
Editorial Board: F.~V. KONSTANTINOV, M.~I.
EDITORS: SLADKOVSKY~ V.~G. GEORGIYEV, (Editors-in-Chief),
TOC
V.~A. KRIVTSOV, V.~Y. SIDIKHMENOV.
Card TRANSLATOR(S): Translated from the Russian by YURI SDOBNIKOV.
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[BEGIN]
__TITLE__
A Critique
of MaoTse-tung's
Theoretical
Conceptions
__TEXTFILE_BORN__ 2007-05-10T20:28:06-0700
__TRANSMARKUP__ "Y. Sverdlov"
Progress Publishers
Moscow
[1]
Translated from the Russian by YURI SDOBNIKOV
Designed by VLADIMIR DOBER
__MISSING__ Editorial Board:
F. V. KONSTANTINOV, M. I. SLADKOVSKY
 V. G. GEORGIYEV,
 (Editors-in-Chief),
 V. A. KRIVTSOV, V. Y. SIDIKHMENOV
KPMTHKA TEOPETHMECKHX
MAO
Ha UHZAUUCKOM n:tbiKe
__COPYRIGHT__
First printing 1972
 Printed in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/index.txt[2012-12-18 2:29:16]
[2]
CONTENTS
Page
INTRODUCTION................. 5
Chapter One. THE SUBSTANCE OF MAOIST PHILOSOPHY 15
1. Ideological Origins...............
15
2. The Meaning of Marxist Terminology in Mao's Writings

27
3. On the Real Meaning of Maoist Dialectics.......

33
4. Subjective Idealism Instead of the Materialist View of

History....................
49
Chapter Two. GREAT-HAN CHAUVINISM AND

HEGEMONISM PRESENTED AS PROLETARIAN INTERNATIONALISM 62
1. The Sources of Great-Han Chauvinism and Hegemonism
in the Views of Mao and His Followers........62
2. Great-Han Chauvinism and Hegemonism in the Guise of

Proletarian Internationalism............72
Chapter Three. ANTITHESIS OF THE MARXIST AND THE
MAOIST VIEW OF PROLETARIAN REVOLUTION, WAR

AND PEACE...................90
1. Is Chinese Experience Alone a Basis for Producing Laws for
the Whole World?...............

90
2. On the Two Ways of Socialist Revolution.......

95
3. Peaceful Coexistence of the Two Systems and the

Revolutionary Movement in Individual Countries........
101
4. ``World Revolution" and World Thermonuclear War . . .

106
Chapter Four. THE ATTITUDE OF MARXISM AND OF
MAOISM TO THE STATE AND PROLETARIAN LEGALITY 115
1. When an `Àntitoxin'' Becomes a Toxin........115
[3]
2. The ``State and Revolution" Problem in the Light of Events
in China...................
120
3. On the Question of Mao's Personality Cult.......

129
4. Political Arbitrariness Instead of Socialist Democracy and

Legality....................
138
5. Ideological Justification of the Regime of Political

Arbitrariness in Mao's Works...............
145
6. On the True Essence of the ``Cultural Revolution" ....

152
Chapter Five. THE MAOIST CONCEPTION OF THE

DEVELOPMENT OF THE SOCIAL STRUCTURE AND THE CLASS
STRUGGLE...................
165
1. Development of Social Relations in China from 1949 to 1957

165
2. Line of ``Leaping Over" Objective Laws.......

173
3. Curtailment of the Vanguard Role of the Working Class . .

176
4. Artificial Aggravation of Class Struggle........

184
5. Class Struggle Without the Struggle Against the Bourgeoisie

193
6. Class Struggle: Pretext for Repression........

195
7. Concerning Mao's Attitude to the Working Class ....

201
Chapter Six. RELATION OF POLITICS AND ECONOMICS IN
THE THEORY AND PRACTICE OF MAOISM.....
206
1. Role of Economics in Social Development Minimised . . .

206
2. Mao's View of Socialist Economic Development.....

212
3. The ``Great Leap Forward": Collapse and Consequences . .

223
4. Zigzags in Peking's Economic Policy.........

236
5. Some Aspects of China's Foreign Policy.......

242
Chapter Seven. ``GREAT PROLETARIAN CULTURAL

REVOLUTION'', OR DRIVE AGAINST WORLD CULTURE . .
249
1. The Cultural Revolution and the Cultural Legacy . . . .

251
2. Socialist Culture and Its ``Critics''..........

262
3. The ``Cultural Revolution" in China and the Intelligentsia .

269
4. The Maoist Cultural Policy After the ``Cultural Revolution"

277
CONCLUSION...................
282
[4]
__ALPHA_LVL1__
INTRODUCTION
 The present epoch is justly known as the epoch of

transition from capitalism to socialism, and the historical
experience of the past few decades provides irrefutable evidence
of this. As a result of the joint struggle of the socialist states,
the working class in the capitalist countries, the
newlyfree and the oppressed peoples, there is a further weakening
of imperialist positions in the political, economic, military
and ideological spheres. The Main Document of the 1969
International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties
says that ``socialism, which has triumphed on one-third of
the globe, has scored new successes in the world-wide
struggle for the hearts and minds of the people".^^1^^
 However, international imperialism has been
counterattacking in an effort to change the overall balance of forces
in its favour. In these conditions, there is need for even
greater cohesion of all the anti-imperialist forces, above all, the
Communist and Workers' Parties, the most progressive
sections of modern society. ``The policy of joint anti-imperialist
action demands that the ideological and political role of the
Marxist-Leninist Parties in the world revolutionary process
should be enhanced".^^2^^
_-_-_
~^^1^^ International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties, Moscow

1969, Documents, Prague 1969, p 12.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 38.
 This task can only be fulfilled through implacable

struggle against bourgeois ideology, against Right and ``Left''
opportunism, against revisionism, dogmatism and
Leftsectarian adventurism.
 One of the pressing tasks before Marxism-Leninism today

is to criticise the theoretical conceptions of Mao Tse-tung
and his group. The Report of the CPSU Central Committee
to the Party's 24th Congress stressed that the Chinese
leaders ``have put forward an ideological-political platform of
their own which is incompatible with Leninism on the key
questions of international life and the world communist
movement and have demanded that we should abandon the
line of the 20th Congress and the Programme of the CPSU".^^1^^
 A new front of ideological struggle has been opened in

connection with the anti-Marxist, anti-socialist, chauvinistic
and anti-Soviet line pursued by the present Chinese
leadership. This line was officially formalised by the 9th Congress
of the CPC in April 1969. The theoretical basis of this line
is the ``thought of Mao Tse-tung'', or Maoism, which is an
ideological trend hostile to Marxism. Maoism is deeply alien
to internationalism and to the idea of the proletarian
solidarity of nations; Great-Power chauvinism has become one of
its main features.
 The history of 20th century revolutions shows that

Marxism is latent with vast attractive power not only for the
working class, but also for other social groups, in particular,
the peasantry, the urban petty bourgeoisie and the
intelligentsia. Apart from the Marxists, the communist and
working-class movement is joined by men with various incorrect
notions about the ways of restructuring society, among them
revolutionary democrats, anarchists, bourgeois nationalists,
etc. Some of them, once tempered in the flames of
revolutionary struggle in the ranks of the Party, become Marxists,
others fail to stand the test and break with the communist
movement, while still others remain in the ranks of the Party,
but never ultimately shed their old petty-bourgeois or
bourgeois convictions.
 This is of particular importance in any examination of the

make-up of Communist and Workers' Parties in developing,
_-_-_
~^^1^^ 24th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union,

Documents, Moscow, 1971, p. 15.
peasant countries. Petty-bourgeois ideology necessarily has

a negative effect on these Parties, because their ranks are
formed mainly from the non-proletarian sections of society.
This was a fact to which Comintern documents at one time
strongly drew attention. In these conditions, the role of the
leading nucleus of the Communist Party is considerably
enhanced, for it has the duty to rally, on a common Marxist
platform, all the members of the Party, regardless of their
social origin, past activity and former views, and to prevent
views hostile to Marxism from gaining the upper hand in
the Party. When for various reasons leadership in a
Communist Party falls into the hands of anti-Marxists, this creates
the danger of the Party's degeneration and its
conversion into a non-socialist, non-revolutionary organisation.
 Let us emphasise that from the outset the CPC brought
together not only Marxists, but also non-Marxists, many of
whom joined the Party mainly for tactical reasons. One of
them was Mao Tse-tung.
 Chinese Marxists-Leninists were aware of Mao Tse-tung's

erroneous political line, and of the anti-Marxist essence of
his views, and saw the artificial build-up of the myth of Mao
Tse-tung as an outstanding theorist and infallible leader of
the Chinese revolution. As best they could they resisted
Mao's attempts to impose his own, specific line on the Party,
to ``sinify'' Marxism, and to supplant Marxist-Leninist ideas
with the ``thought of Mao Tse-tung''. It was their persistent
resistance to Mao's political line that made the 8th Congress
of the CPC in 1956 expunge from the Party Rules the
provision, imposed on the Party at the 7th Congress in May
1945, according to which the Party was ``to be guided in all
its activity" by the ``thought of Mao Tse-tung'', and laid
down in the Rules that `ìn all its activity the Communist
Party of China shall be guided by Marxism-Leninism''.
 Mao Tse-tung did not accept this ideological defeat at the
8th Congress of the CPC, and launched on a fresh round of
struggle against the Marxists-Leninists and internationalists
in the period of the so-called ``great proletarian cultural
revolution" in China, one of whose purposes, it will be
recalled, was massive terrorism in order to impose Mao's
views on the whole Party and the Chinese people, as the
``most correct" and the ``greatest'' ideas.
 The failure of the ``Three Red Banners" line and the
foreign-policy defeats were a blow at the myth of Mao's

being a Marxist-Leninist and an infallible theorist of the
Chinese revolution. In this context, a special role was played
by the ``cultural revolution" which laid bare the real
antiMarxist petty-bourgeois nature of the Maoists' views and
political line, and provided fresh evidence that Mao and
his followers pursued aims which were a far cry from
scientific socialism, democracy and peace. What is more, it showed
once again that the Maoists confronted the international
revolutionary movement as a bourgeois-nationalistic trend
seeking to occupy a commanding position in the world
revolutionary process so as to impose Mao's anti-socialist views
on the Communists and revolutionary democrats, to
subordinate the revolutionary movement to their influence and to
make it serve interests incompatible with Marxism-Leninism
and proletarian internationalism.
 The appearance of Maoism in China as a specific

pettybourgeois, nationalistic trend is connected not only with the
name of Mao Tse-tung, but also with definite objective
conditions.
 Because the Chinese proletariat emerged on the historical

scene at a relatively late date, and because it was weak as
a class, socialist concepts in China for a long time had the
character of a social utopia coloured in the hues of
traditional Chinese notions about the perfect society with its purely
peasant ideals of social justice.
 From the outset, the Communist Party of China had to

work in a country where the peasantry made up 90 per cent
of the population. The social make-up of the CPC was largely
peasant and petty-bourgeois. That is why petty-bourgeois
ideology of every shade was frequently reflected in
the minds of CPC members. That was inevitable. As Mao
himself admitted, men who came to the CPC from the ranks
of the petty bourgeoisie were `òften liberals, reformists,
anarchists, Blanquists, etc.'', who pretended to be
MarxistsLeninists.^^1^^ Let us bear in mind that Mao himself comes from
the petty bourgeoisie.
 The survival of semi-feudal relations of production in
China helped to conserve among various sections of the
Chinese people Great-Power nationalistic attitudes, which
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works, Vol. 4, London, 1956, p. 212.
the country's ruling elite had been implanting for many

centuries, attitudes which at the turn of the century were
sharpened to the extreme and assumed the urge of restoring
China to her old grandeur. The ideology of Great-Han
chauvinism had infected not only the conservative feudal,
bureaucratic forces, but also China's petty-bourgeois
democrats, who dreamed of seeing their country as the centre of
the world and reigning supreme in the international arena.
It was indeed Great-Han chauvinism, combined with
pettybourgeois revolutionism, that created the atmosphere in
which Mao's ideology developed.
 Mao's views were shaped in the conditions of the Chinese

people's revolutionary struggle against imperialism and
feudalism, in an atmosphere of growing popularity of
MarxismLeninism in China, following the victory of the Great
October Socialist Revolution and the internationalist assistance
which the Soviet Union was rendering the Chinese people
in their liberation struggle. It was quite natural therefore
for Mao Tse-tung at one time also to turn to
MarxismLeninism as a banner which rallied all the progressive forces
of China. He sought to exploit the vast authority of
Marxist-Leninist ideas for his own selfish ends. He clothed
his petty-bourgeois, unscientific conceptions and views in
Marxist-Leninist form, because the reputation of being a
Marxist-Leninist opened up before him the possibility of
taking over the leading position within the CPC.
 Marxism-Leninism never became for Mao a world outlook

which he understood, assimilated and accepted. He regarded
Marxism-Leninism as a ``foreign teaching'', of which only
some ``general truths" could be applied in China. Mao's
approach to Marxism-Leninism was pragmatic, for he
borrowed from it only that which met and served his purposes.
Because before the Chinese people's victory in 1949 Mao's
schemes were objectively in the main identical with the tasks
of the Chinese bourgeois-democratic revolution, he made
use in that period of that part of Marxism-Leninism which
could be placed at the service of these tasks.
 Mao's views never took shape as a full-fledged, systematic

world outlook, or a more or less coherent theory. They are a
conglomerate of diverse ideas borrowed, depending on the
need of the moment, from the most diverse sources, ranging
from the conversations of Confucius to the writings of
9
Kropotkin. That is why they are eclectic, fragmentary and

superficial. The appearance of the Little Red Book in China
was not at all accidental: it was a reflection of the mosaic
nature of Mao's views. Mao's views and political line reveal
elements which are akin to Narodism, anarchism, Blanquism,
Trotskyism and other petty-bourgeois ideological trends. This
is due not only to the concrete historical situation in which
Mao's views were shaped, the conditions which in the past
generated in Europe ideas of ``Left'' revolutionism, but also
to the influence, direct and indirect, exerted on Mao by the
tenets of Bakunin, Trotsky and petty-bourgeois theorists of
similar stripe. However, it would be wrong to identify Mao's
views with any of these ideological trends. Because Maoism is
chiefly a Chinese phenomenon, it has deep socio-economic,
historical, ideological and epistemological roots in Chinese
soil, especially in view of the fact that Mao's political acts
and views have far from always been in the nature of ``Left''
revolutionism, constituting in many instances a
Rightopportunist and nationalistic line covered up with Leftist
catchwords.
 In claiming the ``thought of Mao Tse-tung" to be the

summit of modern Marxist-Leninist thinking, Chinese
propaganda seeks to create the impression that Mao has formulated
new ideas on all the basic problems of Marxist-Leninist
theory. In actual fact, Mao has sought to exploit
MarxismLeninism and to use its authority as camouflage, falsifying
and distorting the essence of this great revolutionary
teaching.
 The failure of the attempts to apply the ``thought of Mao

Tse-tung" in practice shows best of all that this ``thought''
is subjectivist and unscientific. These failures, more than
anything else, show that Maoism, whatever the mantle it
dons, cannot serve the interests of a modern society building
socialism. The objective laws of social development have
overthrown, and will always continue to overthrow, similar
``thought'' and the political schemes it is used to justify or
cover up. For all the efforts of the present Chinese leaders
to maintain their ideological domination, Maoism is bound
sooner or later to suffer a complete collapse. However, this
will occur the earlier the sooner the working people of China
realise the true nature of the ``thought of Mao Tse-tung''.
The ``cultural revolution" shows that the disillusionment in
10
this ``thought'' had spread in China to such an extent that it

took a massive campaign of terrorism and intimidation to
maintain the ``thought of Mao Tse-tung" in a dominant
position.
 Mao's followers have been trying in various ways to make
the Chinese people believe that his ``thought'' allegedly has
a ``miraculous power" and that it is the `èmbodiment of
truth''. It is well known, however, that to establish the
objectivity of a truth it has never been necessary to use force,
abuse, idolatry and destruction of the most conscious and
high-minded sections of society. Only obscurantism and
barbarism were established in that manner. The light of truth
has no need for the flames of bonfires lit to burn up books.
 This question naturally arises: if Mao's views are

unscientific, vulgar and schematic, is it at all proper to make any
serious effort to expose them and to carry on a consistent
ideological struggle against them? There is only one answer: it is
not only proper, but necessary. It is necessary because the
Maoists are seeking to present them as the highest achievement
of Marxism-Leninism of the modern epoch. On the strength
of their views, they have been pursuing a special,
nationalistic line, discrediting the ideals of socialism and
communism. Petty-bourgeois revolutionism, which permeates these
views, exerts an influence on the petty-bourgeois section in
China herself and elsewhere, especially in the developing
countries.
 It should also be borne in mind that Mao's views add up

to an ideology of the personality cult in its ugliest form,
and that they are marked by demagogy and an appeal to
the basest instincts. The Maoists have used this demagogy to
confuse the most backward section of the Chinese working
class and the peasantry and to corrupt the young.
 Finally, Mao's views and political line have made it

possible for anti-communism considerably to step up its activity.
Imperialist propaganda has been making wide use of the
``thought of Mao Tse-tung" to fight the forces of socialism,
democracy and peace. It has used, for its own ends, the fact
that a part of progressive opinion abroad is inclined to regard
Mao's ``misconceptions'' and ``mistakes'' as being the price of
transplanting the Marxist doctrine to Chinese soil. The
Marxists are known resolutely to be opposed to any
mechanical application of general truths and the imposition of
11
abstract schemes without consideration of the specific

conditions in each country. Back in 1919, Lenin required the
Communists of the East to ``translate the true communist
doctrine, which was intended for the Communists of the
more advanced countries, into the language of every
people...".^^1^^ However, this translation of Marxism into the
idiom of each nation, including the Chinese, should not
amount to a departure from or betrayal of the general
principles of Marxism, or to a substitution of petty-bourgeois
ideology for Marxism.
 To expose the anti-Marxist essence of Maoist theoretical

conceptions there is need, first, to clarify their origins;
second, to compare them with the principles of
MarxismLeninism; third, to show the political orientation of Maoist
postulates; and fourth, to examine these postulates in the
context of the Maoists' practical activity.
 In analysing the ``thought of Mao Tse-tung" there is need

to start above all from the Marxist doctrine of the state and
revolution. There is need to obtain a comprehensive and
profound understanding of what Lenin said about the
tremendous complexity of the socialist revolution in a
pettybourgeois country. The events in China make it necessary
to consider a number of other problems as well, such as the
class struggle and social relations in the transition period,
the ``cultural revolution" and the attitude to the cultural
heritage, the correlation between the international and
national aspects of the anti-imperialist liberation struggle, and
finally, the problem of war and peace in the presence of
mass destruction weapons, etc.
 This work is an attempt to give a scientific analysis, a

Marxist assessment of the ``thought of Mao Tse-tung''. The
authors have naturally not set themselves the task of
considering every aspect of this ``thought'', let alone providing
exhaustive and definitive answers to all the questions arising
in the course of this consideration.
 The authors have constantly turned to an analysis of the

Maoists' political practices and have sought to show the
true meaning of Mao's various propositions in the light of
the facts provided by the Maoists' practical activity; they
have tried to expose the unscientific, petty-bourgeois,
_-_-_
~^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 30, p. 162.
12
Great-Power essence of Maoism, and the depth of Mao's political,

moral and theoretical degradation.
 This monograph has been prepared by the Institute of

Philosophy and the Institute of the Far East of the USSR
Academy of Sciences.
 The Introduction was written by V. G. Georgiyev, Cand.

Sc. (Philos.), and V. A. Krivtsov, Cand. Sc. (Philos.); Chapter
One by V. G. Georgiyev; Chapter Two by V. A. Krivtsov
(Section 1), V. G. Georgiyev and V. A. Krivtsov (Section 2);
Chapter Three by Y. G. Plimak, Cand. Sc. (Hist.), and
Y. F. Karyakin (Sections 1, 2, 3), V. G. Georgiyev and
Y. G. Plimak (Section 4); Chapter Four by Y. G. Plimak
(Sections 1 and 2), V. G. Georgiyev, K. I. Ivanov, Y. G.
Plimak, and V. Y. Sidikhmenov, Cand. Sc. (Econ.) (Section 3),
G. S. Ostroumov, Cand. Sc. (Law) (Sections 4 and 5),
V. G. Georgiyev and G. S. Ostroumov (Section 6); Chapter
Five by V. N. Semyonov, Dr. Sc. (Philos.), and V. Y.
Sidikhmenov; Chapter Six by A. S. Frish, Cand. Sc. (Philos.);
Chapter Seven by Y. A. Bailer, Dr. Sc. (Philos.), and the
Conclusion by V. G. Georgiyev and V. Y. Sidikhmenov.
[13]
[14]
__NUMERIC_LVL1__
Chapter One
__ALPHA_LVL1__
THE SUBSTANCE OF MAOIST PHILOSOPHY
__ALPHA_LVL2__
1. Ideological Origins
 The whole ``wealth'' of Maoist philosophy is contained in

these publications: =
1. The pamphlet, Dialectical

Materialism, written in Yenan at the end of the 1930s on the basis of
a series of lectures given at a Party school. A small part of
this book was subsequently rewritten and published in the
form of two articles, `Òn Practice" and `Òn Contradictions"
in the Selected Works in the 1950s; =
2. The article, `Òn the

Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People'',
published in 1957; =
3. The article, ``Whence Does a Man

Acquire Correct Ideas?" (1963); =
4. The articles, `Òn New

Democracy" and `Òn the Democratic Dictatorship of the
People''; =
5. Editorial articles in the newspaper Jenmin jihpao

and the journal Hungchih (1963--1965)^^1^^; =
6. Statements on
philosophical questions at various conferences and in
connection with philosophical discussions.^^2^^
 An analysis of all these philosophical articles and
statements inevitably suggests the conclusion that Mao's
theoretical scope is extremely circumscribed. The sources of
Maoist philosophy are, first, the traditional Chinese (feudal)
philosophy; and second, various bourgeois and
pettybourgeois theories, both Chinese and European.
_-_-_
~^^1^^ According to the Hungweiping press, all these articles were written
with Mao's direct participation.
~^^2^^ These statements were reported in the Chinese press, mainly the
Hungweiping press, which also gave the content of the statements and
sometimes the verbatim text.
15
 Marxist philosophy is known to be a critical revolutionary

generalisation of the whole of earlier philosophic thought.
German classical philosophy, above all the writings of Hegel
and Feuerbach, was an immediate theoretical source of
Marxist philosophy. Among the important gains of world
philosophic thought were Hegel's dialectical method and his
coherent system of dialectical laws and categories, and
Feuerbach's materialist thesis that nature and man are the only
objective realities, and his statement that practice is the
criterion of truth. These show that by the time Marx and
Engels began their theoretical activity European philosophy
had attained a sufficiently high level of development. If we
take a look at the Chinese philosophy of the same period
we shall find that it presents a different picture.
 For a number of historical reasons, above all the long

period dominated by the feudal mode of production (
expressed in the sphere of spiritual life in the deadening
domination of neo-Confucian scholasticism), theoretical thinking
in China by the mid-19th century markedly lagged behind
theoretical thinking in other countries. At the dawn of world
civilisation, Chinese philosophy had provided instances of
profound (for the time of course) penetration into the
substance of human nature and relations between men, of
interesting dialectical conceptions covering a fairly wide range
of problems of being, and in the early period of mankind's
history Chinese philosophy developed parallel to philosophy
in other countries and may perhaps have even been in
advance of the latter on some points, which is why
Confucius, Mo Tzu, Lao Tzu, Hsiin Tzu, Chuang Tzu, Yang Chu
and Wang Chung all have a niche in history alongside
Heraclitus, Democritus, Plato and Aristotle. However, in the
Middle Ages, and especially in the period of modern history,
there was a fundamental change in the situation.
 Of course, even in these periods we find some original
Chinese philosophers, among them the free thinker Fan Chen
(5th century) and Han Yui (8-9th centuries), the
materialists Chang Tsai (12th century), Wang Fu-chih (17th century),
and Tai Chen (18th century), the objective idealist Chu Hsi
(12th century), the intuitive idealist Wang Yang-ming
(16--17th centuries), and the interesting social philosopher
Huang Tsung-hsi (17th century). However, these features
are characteristic of the overall tendency in the
16
development of Chinese philosophy: first, a somewhat narrow range

of problems, with a prevailing interest in ethical values,
which are considered mainly in the light of the relationship
between man's duty and obligations to (feudal) society, and
the subordination of personal freedom to the authority of
the state; and second, a descriptive, sketchy and naive
approach in explaining the phenomena of the external world,
an approach deeply rooted in the ancient period.
 Through the whole of the history of Chinese philosophy

runs the idea of there being opposite principles in nature
and society which are interconnected and pass into each
other. However, no Chinese philosopher ever gave a
clearcut formulation of the interconnection of the opposites of
the objective world as a general ontological law. Their
conception of opposites was extremely metaphysical. Indeed,
these opposites appeared to be discrete in time and space.
The transition from one opposite to another was not an
internal process of transition and connection of opposites but
their mere outward displacement, or changing of places.
Moreover, development was seen to be cyclical. That was
the view taken of the problem of opposites not only by Lao
Tzu and Chuang Tzu, but also by Chang Tsai, Chu Hsi, Wei
Yuan and Cheng Kuan-ying (19th century), among others.
 Here, for instance, is what Chu Hsi wrote: `Èast-West,

top-bottom, winter-summer, day-night, birth-death: all these
are opposites and constitute pairs. All natural phenomena
are necessarily paired."^^1^^ Wei Yuan, who lived six centuries
later, wrote in a similar vein: ``Heat reaching a limit gives
way not to heat but to cold. Cold reaching a limit, gives
way not to cold but to heat. Something excessively bent
straightens out with greater force. Latent energy is revealed
with greater force. . . . Decline and growth are indissoluble,
happiness and misfortune have a common root."^^2^^
 The same philosopher also said this: ``There are no

isolated things in the Universe; everything must have a pair,
that is, there can be no two high things, two big things, two
costly things, there can be no two forces similar in
magnitude. A struggle for primacy always takes place in
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Yui Tung, Principal Problems of Chinese Philosophy, Peking, 1958,
p. 139 (in Chinese).
~^^2^^ Selected Writings of Progressive Chinese Thinkers of the Period of

Modern History, Moscow, 1961, pp. 45--46 (in Russian).
__PRINTERS_P_17_COMMENT__
2---1362
17
everything that is paired. Why? It is simply because in paired

things one must be cardinal and the other subordinate,
because only then does the pair not break up into separate
things."^^1^^
 Both Chu Hsi and Wei Yuan confined themselves to

stating the fact that opposites exist in nature and alternate with
each other, but one will look in vain for an explanation in
their writings of the cause and content of the process of
alternation, or of any consideration, in particular, of the
problem of the identity of opposites. That is why they were
unable to explain the transformation of things into their
opposites.
 In the middle and even at the end of the 19th century,
Chinese philosophers frequently retold what had been said
and written not only by their immediate predecessors, but
also by philosophers who had lived 2,000 years before them.
They continued to reiterate their ideas, relying on the
traditional categories of Yin, Yang, Tao, Tai Chi, etc. In 1893,
Cheng Kuan-ying, an ideologist of the emergent Chinese
bourgeoisie, published a book entitled Bold Talk in the Age
of Florescence (Sheng-shi wei-yan), proposing a number of
political reforms for the purpose of China's technical and
economic modernisation.^^2^^ In his philosophical substantiation
of the book---``Tap-Chi''---he wrote: `Ìt is said in Yi Ching,
in the section 'Hsi Tzu Chuan'^^3^^: 'That which has no form is
called Tao; that which has form is called Chi.' Tao sprang
from non-existence; initially (it) produced primary matter
(Chi) which thickened and became Tai Chi. Subsequently
there occurred the division of Tai Chi into Yin and Yang."^^4^^
 ``The heavens were arranged around the earth, and the
earth occupied its place in the midst of the heavens; Yin
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Selected Writings..., p. 48.
~^^2^^ Edgar Snow tells us that Mao read this book in his youth and was
highly impressed (Red Star Over China, London, 1968, p. 134).
~^^3^^ Yi Ching (Book of Changes) is one of the most ancient Chinese
treatises, dating back to the 8th--7th centuries B.C. ``Hsi Tzu Chuan'', an
appendix to Yi Ching, sets out the philosophical interpretation of the
main text of the book; written in about the 5th-3rd centuries B.C.
~^^4^^ Tai Chi (Great Limit), signifying the initial stage and the cause
behind the origination and development of all things and phenomena,
first occurs in Yi Ching. Yin and Yang, the two opposite principles in
nature whose struggle, according to the ancient Chinese, led to the
origination and development of all things.
18
included within itself Yang, and Yang included within itself

Yin. That is why it is said that 'the interaction of Yin and
Yang is Tao'. Hence: 'Two produced three, and three---all
things.' Things and their names, primary matter and its laws
existing in the world are embraced (by Tao). Because odd
and even numbers exist, so, just as the multiplication of even
and odd numbers produces a diversity of different numbers,
the interaction of Yin and Yang in the aggregate produces
the diversity of all things. Consequently, things emerge from
primary matter, or in other words, concrete objects appear
from Tao."^^1^^
 This primitive, naively dialectical scheme, which is based

on ancient treatises (the author backs up his conception with
references to the corresponding ideas of Lao Tzu and
Confucius), was formulated in 1893 when the law of the
conservation and transformation of energy, the cellular theory and
Darwin's theory of evolution were already known in other
countries.^^2^^
 Without in any sense denying the importance of this view

of cosmological problems for the establishment of the
materialist world outlook, let us note that it is an obvious
oversimplification. With rare exceptions, the whole of Chinese
philosophy from the 17th to the 19th century was weak on
ontological and epistemological problems. As a result, by the
turn of the century Chinese philosophy markedly lagged
behind the philosophy of other countries in the range and
scope of its problems and the depth of their solution.^^3^^
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Selected Writings. .., pp. 98--99.
~^^2^^ Another prominent reformer, Kang Yu-wei, bases his explanation of

the origin of the world on the concepts of Yuan Chi and Chi, which occur
in the writings of Confucius.
 ^^3^^ In this connection it is strange, to say the least, to find the Chinese
professor Chu Chien-chi asserting that Chinese (Confucian) philosophy
has had an effect on the development of world philosophy and ultimately
of Marxism as well. In an article in a Chinese philosophical journal he
wrote: ``Marxism, dialectical materialism, is essentially connected with
the European philosophy of the 18th century, and the European
philosophy of the 18th century is essentially connected with Chinese
philosophy. This means that as it penetrated Europe, Chinese philosophy
exerted, on the one hand, a direct influence on French materialist
philosophy, and on the other, a direct influence on the dialectics of
German idealism. These materialism and dialectics were precisely the
important source on which Marx and Engels drew in shaping their
dialectical materialism. If these historical facts are true, we shall find
__NOTE__ Footnote cont. on page 20.
19
 Philosophical development is known to be directly

connected with the development of the natural sciences, and
there is no doubt at all that the gains of philosophy in the
period of modern history were largely determined by the
great advances in medicine, astronomy, biology, physiology,
mathematics, mechanics, etc. Meanwhile, the natural sciences
in China from the 17th to the 19th century were embryonic,
a fact which necessarily had an effect on the development
of Chinese philosophy in the period under consideration.
 Neo-Confucianism, the official feudal ideology of China,

was the main retarding factor in Chinese philosophy.
Confucius was a great thinker who had considered a number of
important problems, including man's social predestination,
the causal nexus of his acts, the criteria for human acts, the
relationship between various social groups, etc.
 On the whole, however, the teaching of Confucius faced

the past, an earlier period he called the ``golden age" in the
history of China. Confucius justified and upheld
conservative views and outdated traditions. He insisted that the
traditions established by the ancients, the wise rulers of the
earlier periods, embodied the ``behests of heaven'', and that
these traditions, designated in the aggregate as Li (
ceremony, `ètiquette''), were sacrosanct.
 One of the central categories of the Confucian teaching

is Jen, which means ``love of mankind'', ``humaneness'', but
it would be wrong to identify this concept with the concept
of compassion, love and respect for men. Jen was a category
with a clearly class tenor and a strictly defined sphere of
application. ``Humaneness'' was proper only to noble men,
the elite of society. `À noble man can be inhumane, but a
commoner cannot be humane."^^1^^ Since Li was a concrete
embodiment of the Jen category, the requirement laid down by
Confucius and his disciples, notably Meng Tzu, to follow
Jen meant nothing more than the requirement
unconditionally to observe the social graduation of men. The ideal
of Confucius and his followers was that the father must be
_-_-_
__NOTE__ Footnote cont. from page 19.
it easy in the future to understand the connection between Marxism

and Chinese philosophy, we shall cease to be unacquainted, as we once
used to be, with dialectical materialism, and in general we shall find
it much easier to apprehend Marxist philosophy.'' (Chieh-hsueh yan-chiu
No. 4, 1957, p. 57).
~^^1^^ Lunyui, Ch. ``Hsian wen'', 6.
20
a father, the son a son, the emperor an emperor, the official

an official. Everyone must occupy the station assigned to him
by the heavens. Society, structured in accordance with this
order, must consist of two categories of men: those who
work with the ``heart'', that is, with their reason, and govern,
and those whom the heavens assign to work by hand and
feed those who govern.
 An important principle of the social order advocated by

Confucianism is the requirement of unconditional
subordination to one's seniors, whether by age or station in life. In
this context, Confucius and his followers laid great emphasis
on the concept Hsiao, which meant ``filial esteem''. They
believed that ``those who honour their parents and respect
their elders rarely fail to submit to their superiors".^^1^^
Consequently, Confucianism sought to use tribal, patriarchal
traditions to educate men in a spirit of blind submission to the
ruling elite. Confucius himself repeatedly said as much. He
held that the common people had no business discoursing on
the affairs of government, and had to ``be made to follow,
but should not be allowed to be enlightened".^^2^^
Unquestioning obedience and submissiveness to the power of the ruler
(the son of heaven), the law that `èveryone should know his
place"---those are the fundamental principles of Confucian
philosophy.
 Although these ideas did have a negative influence on the

development of Chinese theoretical thinking, their influence
was at first limited, because Taoism and Buddhism existed
as teachings on a par with Confucianism. However, in the
llth and 12th centuries, mainly through the efforts of Chu
Hsi, the teaching of neo-Confucianism was established as
a blend of the ethical teaching of Confucius and the tenets
of Taoism and Buddhism.
 Neo-Confucianism became the official ideology of

Chinese society. It secured a monopoly control over the people's
spiritual life, requiring strict observance of the accepted
forms of thinking and behaviour. Neo-Confucianism was a
system of strictly defined canons and rigid rules, each of
which was obligatory and had to be observed without fail.
It was learned by rote, like dogma, in all the schools. Each
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Ibid., Ch. ``Hsiuer'', 2.
~^^2^^ Ibid., Ch. ``Tai-po'', 9.
21
pupil and student had to memorise numerous sayings by

Confucius and his followers as interpreted by Chu Hsi,
without usually understanding what they meant. A mechanical
knowledge of these sayings entitled a scholar to become an
official.
 The memorising of Confucian dogmas from generation

to generation was cultivated by the feudal elite and became
a national tradition. Such methods of upbringing and
education made every Chinese, in a sense, a Confucian. This did
not mean, of course, that everyone was versed in all the
Confucian dicta, but only that everyone accepted the
Confucian prescriptions as something natural, as something to be
taken for granted, as ancestral tradition.
 In order to foster among the people a spirit of loyalty to

the traditional ideology of neo-Confucianism every effort
was made to cultivate the notion that the Chinese people's
spiritual and cultural values were exclusive. This not only
generated an attitude of conformism with respect to China's
conservative traditions, but also helped to form the ideology
of Sinocentrism, an essential element of which was
contempt for all things non-Chinese, including non-Chinese
sciences and philosophy.
 The sway of neo-Confucian scholasticism necessarily left

its mark on Chinese philosophy. Scholars were required to
produce no more than commentaries on the writings of the
Confucian fathers in the orthodox spirit; ideas contradicting
neo-Confucianism were reviled. This naturally prevented
Chinese thinkers from considering the pressing problems of
China's social and spiritual development. Even progressive
philosophers and socio-political thinkers were forced to fall
back on the authority of Confucius to defend their ideas.
Thus, at the end of the 19th century, bourgeois reformers
(among them Kang Yu-wei and Liang Chi-chao) used some
Confucian philosophical tenets to spread the idea of
constitutional monarchy.^^1^^
_-_-_
~^^1^^ It is not surprising that the cult of Confucius was once again
enshrined and renovated in China under the Kuomintang reactionary clique,
when it was underpinned by pseudo-Sun Yat-senism, the official doctrine
of Kuomintang reaction, on the one hand, and reactionary bourgeois ideas
from the West, on the other. This was the basis for Chen Li-fu's ``
philosophy of life" and Chiang Kai-shek's ``philosophy of action'', both
designed to vindicate the dictatorship of the Kuomintang clique. This ``phi--
22
 Chinese society first got a knowledge of the culture and

philosophy of other countries in the second half of the 19th
century.^^1^^ Because the vehicle of this process was the
intelligentsia, mainly its feudal section, it naturally assumed a
definite character. A study was made mainly of the technical
achievements in world science, some political and social
institutions, and some ideas of the bourgeois philosophy of other
countries, notably, positivism, but not, of course, Marxism.
It should be borne in mind that Chinese society first got a
knowledge of the accomplishments of world civilisation just
as China was being colonised and that these ideas were
brought in by agents of the imperialist powers, which
naturally wanted a pro-imperialist ideology to be established in
China.
 The sway of traditionalism in philosophy and the

embryonic state of the natural sciences resulted in a situation
in which the borrowing of some elements of Western
culture among the Chinese philosophers at the end of the 19th
century produced a synthesis of traditional and European
scientific concepts. Thus, Kang Yu-wei identified electricity
with the spiritual principle called ``Jen'', which according to
Confucianism was inherent in all things and phenomena.
Among those who translated the writings of European
thinkers was Yan Fu, a Right-wing bourgeois reformer. His
translations contain commentaries in which he sought to
show the similarity of various Western socio-philosophical
conceptions with the traditional socio-political ideas of
Chinese antiquity and the Middle Ages, mostly with
Confucianism.
 Consequently, the conclusion is well warranted that

modern Chinese philosophy had not on the whole risen above
the level of its medieval predecessor. The formation of
modern philosophy, which began at the end of the 19th
century, in the sense of its alignment in level with the latest
_-_-_
losophy'' used the cult of Confucius as a black banner to cover up the

massacre of hundreds of thousands of patriots and the pursuit of
chauvinistic policies. The ideologists of the Kuomintang clique declared his
teaching to be the `ìdeological basis" for mankind's progress and
prosperity, and predicted that the peoples of the whole world would in
one way or another ultimately travel the way indicated by Confucius. 
 ~^^1^^ Up to then there was a limited knowledge of world culture and
philosophy.
23
achievements in theoretical knowledge, naturally enough

could not all at once yield any tangible results, especially
considering that it proceeded, as we have said, under the
sway of neo-Confucianism. The Chinese philosophy of the
17th-19th centuries was essentially a curious modification
of the original form of materialism and naive dialectics.
That was the theoretical foundation on which Maoist
philosophy grew. Like all men of his generation, Mao Tse-tung
received the traditional education, which consisted in the
main in a Talmudic drumming into men's heads of
Confucian tenets and other ancient texts.^^1^^
 Another source of Maoist philosophy is the Utopian,

egalitarian ideas, running right through the history of the Chinese
thought, which in the 19th century were most fully expressed
in the policy statements of the Taipings---dispossessed
Chinese peasants---and the writings of Kang Yu-wei. The
Taiping ideal was a just society practising the following
principles: ``The land would be tilled in common, meals would be
taken together, clothes would be used jointly, and money
spent collectively. Equality would be observed everywhere,
and everyone would be provided with food and clothing."^^2^^
 Kang Yu-wei's social utopia implied social ownership and

the principle of popular rule and self-government. He
believed such a society could be set up through the gradual
elimination of the family and private property relations
within it. Men and women would enter into free marital
relations, and their children would be entirely in the public
care. Kang Yu-wei believed that this would eliminate the
family, with the result that no property, with the exception
of ornaments and various knick-knacks, would be handed
down, so that upon the death of their owners the land,
factories and shops would pass into public use. Kang Yu-wei
believed that this would result in universal equality.
Actually, however, this amounted to no more than an anarchist
rejection of the family.^^3^^
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Mao Tse-tung studied at a primary school in his native village of

Shaoshan, at a school in the district centre of Hsiangtan, and at a
secondary school and a teachers' training college of the provincial town
of Changsha.
~^^2^^ Selected Writings..., p. 69.
~^^3^^ According to Liang Chi-chao, an associate of Kang Yu-wei's in

the reform movement, the latter's social utopia boiled down to an
`èlimination of the family''.
24
 We find that Hung Hsiu-chuan, the founder of the

Taiping peasant movement, and Kang Yu-wei, who expressed the
interests of the bourgeoisie, had the same idea of a return
to a ``golden age'', and the establishment of an ideal and
just society, called ``Tatung''.^^1^^
 Characteristically, Mao's writings contain almost no

mention of the development of the natural sciences and their
latest discoveries. This is due not only to Mao's specifically
traditional education, which did not provide for any serious
study of the fundamentals of modern science, but also to
Mao's own lack of interest in the natural sciences.^^2^^ Here are
some of the ``references'' to the natural sciences that will be
found in Mao's Little Red Book. =
1. ``The history of
mankind is one of the continuous development from the realm
of necessity to the realm of freedom. This process is
neverending. In any society in which classes exist class struggle
will never end. In classless society the struggle between the
new and the old and between truth and falsehood will never
end. In the course of the struggle for production and scientific
experiment, mankind makes constant progress and nature
undergoes constant change; they never remain on the same level.
Therefore, man has constantly to sum up experience and go
on discovering, inventing, creating and advancing. Ideas of
stagnation, pessimism, inertia and complacency are all
wrong. They are wrong because they agree neither with the
historical facts of social development over the past million
years, nor with the historical facts of nature so far (history
of celestial bodies, the earth life, and other natural
phenomena)."^^3^^ =
2. ``Natural science is one of man's weapons in

his fight for freedom. For the purpose of attaining
freedom in society, man must use social science to
understand and change society and carry out social
_-_-_
~^^1^^ The writings of both contain an extract from Chapter ``Liyun'' of

the ancient Confucian treatise, Lichi, describing the Tatung society. Let
us note, by the way, that the organisation and activity of the Chinese
communes from 1958 to 1960 was highly reminiscent of the socio-economic
experiments of the Taiping and Kang Yu-wei's social utopia.
~^^2^^ Recalling his school years, Mao said: ``For one thing, I was opposed
to the required courses in natural science. I wanted to specialise in social
sciences. Natural sciences did not especially interest me, and I did not
study them, so I got poor marks in most of these courses" (Edgar Snow,
0p. cit., p. 145).
~^^3^^ Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, Peking, I960, pp. 203--04.
25
revolution. For the purpose of attaining freedom in the world

of nature, man must use natural science to understand,
conquer and change nature and thus attain freedom from
nature."^^1^^
 Both these statements are a recapitulation of Engels' idea

about the relation between freedom and necessity, while the
references to natural science are extremely vague and
abstract. What is more, these references are used by Mao
to substantiate a ``truth'' which has been known since the
days of Heraclitus, who said: `Àll is flux, nothing is
stationary.'' However, an editorial article in Hungchih in 1969
claimed that these statements of Mao's were the ``
theoretical generalisation of the history of nature''.
 Lenin said that ``there is nothing resembling `

sectarianism' in Marxism, in the sense of its being a hidebound,
petrified doctrine, a doctrine which arose away from the
high road of the development of world civilisation".^^2^^ By
contrast, Maoist philosophy was developed mainly on a
narrow, Chinese national basis, out of touch with the best
achievements of philosophical thought in the rest of the
world.
 Mao read a number of works by foreign writers, among

which he was most influenced by Herbert Spencer's Principles
of Sociology, Thomas Henry Huxley's Evolution and Ethics,
John Stuart Mill's On Liberty, Adam Smith's Inquiry into
the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations and
Montesquieu's L'Esprit des Lois. Mao did not take much interest
in the natural science and politico-economic problems these
writers dealt with. He was attracted in their writings by
their socio-political conception which in the early 20th
century swayed men in various sections of Chinese society,
the conception of social-Darwinism, which in China was seen
above all as an explanation, `ìn the light of advanced
science'', of the causes and laws of a struggle for existence
between nations and races.
 At the start of his revolutionary activity, Mao took a keen

interest in anarchist ideas (above all those of Bakunin and
Kropotkin), whose influence he has in fact never been able to
overcome.
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, pp. 204--05.
26
__ALPHA_LVL2__
2. The Meaning of Marxist Terminology
 in Mao's Writings
 At the 9th Congress of the CPC it was declared that for
50 years (that is, from 1919) Mao had been combining the
universal truth of Marxism-Leninism with the practice of the
Chinese revolution. In the light of the historical facts, this
assertion is quite groundless. In his earliest works, Mao was
already elaborating non-Marxist ideas: in his first work, `Àn
Essay on Physical Education" (1917), the 24-year-old Mao
declared the physical health of the nation to be a means of
China's national resurgence. In his second work, an article
entitled ``The Great Alliance of the People" (1919), he said
nothing about the working class as the vanguard and leader
of the revolution, and made no mention of the proletarian
dictatorship. In 1926, as one of the leaders of the CPC, Mao
wrote an article, `Ànalysis of the Classes in Chinese
Society'',^^1^^ which gave a petty-bourgeois view of China's social
structure.
 That is not at all surprising. Mao's traditional education

naturally excluded the study of Marxist theory. As he set
out to educate himself, Mao was unable to gain a correct
idea of Marxism, because he obtained his information about
it mainly from the writings of various petty-bourgeois
socialists.
 Moreover, Mao was able to obtain an idea about Marxism

only in translation, because he knew no foreign languages
and was unable to read the writings of the Marxist-Leninist
classics in the original. What is more, by the early 1940s,
and in fact even as late as 1949, a very insignificant part
of these works had been translated into Chinese.^^2^^
 His main source for the study of Marxism were popular
writings, mainly textbooks by Soviet philosophers, which
were made available to the CPC's active members through
the translations of Ai Szu-chi and others.
_-_-_
~^^1^^ A reference to the original version of the article, and not the one
which is included in Mao Tse-tung's Selected Works (sec Voprosy
[ilosofii. No. 6, 1969).
~^^2^^ Let us also emphasise that from the 1920s to the 1940s there were
no Chinese translations of the world's classic philosophers: Bacon, Locke,
Diderot, Holbach, Kant, Hegel, Feuerbach, and so on. In that period,
the Chinese public was only able to read the works of the founders of
positivism and pragmatism: Comte, Spencer, Russell, Dewey and James.
27
 Although these Soviet philosophical textbooks did consider

some of the important theoretical problems directly connected
with the practice of socialist construction, specifically the
problem of contradictions in exploitative and socialist
societies, their authors' main purpose was to provide a popular
aid on Marxist philosophy for a mass readership.
 In the Soviet Union, these writings were of great

importance in the struggle against the mechanistic and idealistic
distortions of Marxism, and in educating Party members,
government functionaries and scientists in the spirit of
Marxist philosophy. In China, the Soviet textbooks on philosophy
helped the Communists to obtain a knowledge of Marxism
and raise the theoretical level of CPC cadres.
 Mao thus had ample opportunity to acquire a correct

understanding of the fundamentals of Marxist philosophy,
but the content of his philosophical writings shows that he
failed to master the whole body of knowledge in the
philosophy of Marxism-Leninism contained in the Soviet textbooks.
 As has been said, Mao's first philosophical work was the
pamphlet, Dialectical Materialism, which he wrote in Yenan
on the basis of a series of lectures he gave at a Party school.
The contents of the pamphlet give an idea of the problems
he dealt with.
 Chapter I. Idealism and Materialism.
 1) The war between two armies in philosophy.
 2) The difference between idealism and materialism.
 3) The source of the rise and development of idealism.
 4) The source of the rise and development of materialism.


 Chapter II. Dialectical Materialism.
 1) Dialectical materialism---a revolutionary weapon of the

proletariat.
 2) The attitude of dialectical materialism to the legacy of

the old philosophy.
 3) The unity of world view and methodology in dialectical
materialism.
 4) The problem of the subject of materialist dialectics

(what does materialist dialectics serve to study?).
 5) On matter.
 6) On motion (on development).
 7) On space and time.
 8) On consciousness.
 9) On reflection.
28
 10) On truth.
 11) On practice (on the connection between cognition and

practice, theory and reality, knowledge and action).
 Chapter III. Materialist Dialectics.


 1) The law of the unity of opposites.
 a) Two views of development.
 b) The formal-logical law of identity and the dialectical

law of contradiction.
 c) The universality of contradiction.
 d) The specific nature of contradiction.
 e) The principal contradiction and the principal aspect

of contradiction.
 f) Identity and struggle of opposites.
 g) The place of antagonism in the line of contradictions.


 The pamphlet was published at Talien sometime between

1945 and 1949. Earlier, in 1940, the journal Minchu carried
its first chapter, entitled ``Dialectical Materialism''.
 Our detailed study of the text of the Dialectical

Materialism pamphlet shows that it was written on the basis of two
Soviet works: the textbook Dialectical Materialism (written
under the direction of Academician M. Mitin), which was
published in Moscow in 1933, and the article ``Dialectical
Materialism'', in Volume 22 of the first edition of the 
Bolshaya Sovietskaya Entsiklopedia.
 Mao's pamphlet is essentially a digest of these two works.

Now and again, he simply ``borrows'' various propositions
from Soviet writings and slightly modifies them. This applies
especially to philosophical problems which were either not
dealt with in traditional Chinese philosophy at all, or were
treated on a low theoretical level, because their treatment
required both a grounding in natural science and
information about the world-wide historico-philosophical process.
This applies to the problems of the material nature of the
world, matter and the forms of its existence, notably space
and time, consciousness, and the relationship between
objective, relative and absolute truth.
 But even while recapitulating in his Dialectical

Materialism pamphlet the correct propositions taken from the
abovementioned works, Mao oversimplifies and vulgarises them.
Here are a few examples.
 1. Characterising the class essence of the two main

philosophical trends, the authors of the Soviet textbook 
29
Dialectical Materialism quite rightly remarked on the possibility

of idealist theories reflecting the social needs of the epoch.
They said: `Ìn its historical development, idealism was the
ideology of the exploiting classes and as a rule had a
reactionary part to play. Materialism, whose development was an
expression of the world outlook of the revolutionary classes,
had to make its way in the class society in ceaseless struggle
against idealism, the philosophy of reaction. Of course, no
obligatory historical pattern can be established in this
sphere. There are instances when immature social classes
expressed their new revolutionary demands in the language
of idealism (German idealism in the early 19th century, the
theories of natural law, and, in part, Utopian socialism). On
the other hand, the militant French materialism of the 18th
century was the ideology of the revolutionary French
bourgeoisie. The materialism of the 17th century, Engels said,
had an aristocratic origin."^^1^^
 Mao Tse-tung borrowed only the first two ideas: `Ìn the
process of its historical development, idealism was the form
of consciousness of the exploiting classes and had a
reactionary role to play. By contrast, materialism is the world outlook
of the revolutionary classes. It originates and develops in
class society in ceaseless struggle against idealism, the
reactionary philosophy.'' The result is a primitive and vulgarised
scheme of the history of philosophical thought which rules
out the possibility of recognising the achievements of the
idealists in developing theoretical thinking.
 2. According to Mao, the basic social cause behind the

origination of idealism is the antithesis between mental and
physical labour. He says: ``...Initially, idealism emerges as
the product of the superstition and ignorance of a savage
primitive man. But with the development of production the
gap between physical and mental labour comes to be the
main condition promoting the formation of idealism as a
philosophical trend. The social division of labour is the result
of the development of the productive forces of society; it
subsequently results in the separation of men among whom
mental labour becomes the main speciality. But so long as
the productive forces remained weak, the gap between the
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Dialectical and Historical Materialism, Part 1, Moscow, 1933, p. 37

(in Russian). (Emphasis added---V.G.)
30
two forms of labour was not yet complete. Only after classes
and private property appear and exploitation becomes the
basis for the existence of the ruling class, does a great
change occur: mental labour becomes the privilege ol the
ruling class, and physical labour, the lot of the oppressed
classes. The ruling class begins to take a distorted view of
its relations with the oppressed classes, claiming that it is
not the working people who provide the means of subsistence
for the members of the ruling class but that, on the contrary,
it is the members of the ruling class who provide the means
of subsistence for the working people. That is why they have
contempt for physical labour, and that is the way idealistic
views appear. The elimination of the distinctions between
physical and mental labour is one of the conditions for
eliminating idealistic philosophy."^^1^^
 Mao wrongly identifies the causes producing the illusion

that ideology develops independently, and the social roots
of idealism. Actually, the division into mental and physical
labour does deform men and establishes definite social
functions for some of them, but it also gives an impetus to the
development of society's productive forces, science and the
arts. Evidence of this comes from the history of the first
society with antagonistic classes. Engels wrote: `Ìt was
slavery that first made possible the division of labour between
agriculture and industry on a larger scale, and thereby also
Hellenism, the flowering of the ancient world. Without
slavery, no Greek state, no Greek art and science...."^^2^^ As
for the social roots of idealism, they lie in the division of
society into classes and in the urge of the exploiting classes
to maintain and consolidate their domination.
 Let us add that when writing his pamphlet, Mao himself
had a very modest opinion of it. He wrote: ``This lecture
course of mine cannot likewise be considered a good one,
because I myself have just started to study dialectics and am
unable to write a good book."^^3^^
 When preparing his Selected Works for the press in the
late 1940s and early 1950s, Mao included in them only a
part of his Dialectical Materialism pamphlet, namely, the
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Dialectical Materialism, Talien, p. 5 (in Chinese).
~^^2^^ F. Kngcls, Anti-Diihring, Moscow, 1969, p. 210.


~^^3^^ Dialectical Materialism, p. 110.
31
last section of Chapter II, as an article, `Òn Practice'', and

Chapter III (with the exception of Section 2, ``The
formallogical law of identity and the dialectical law of
contradiction'') as an article `Òn Contradiction".^^1^^ These articles also
contain a number of borrowings from the above-mentioned
textbook, Dialectical Materialism, and the article ``
Dialectical Materialism" in the Bolshaya Soinetskaya Entsiklopcdia.
 Does the fact of Mao's borrowing and use of various

propositions from popular Soviet works give ground to regard
him as a rank-and-file Marxist philosopher, let alone an
`òutstanding Marxist-Leninist"? Is it right to say that
Marxist terminology ``mastered'' in this way is evidence that
Soviet philosophers are to blame for the emergence of
Maoism, as bourgeois propaganda and some scientists in the
West have claimed? The answer to both questions is an
emphatic no.
 The fact is that the borrowing of Marxist propositions

from Soviet writings goes hand in hand not only with
oversimplification and vulgarisation in interpreting a number of
problems but also with anti-Marxist propositions. This is
especially evident in Mao's treatment of the principal law
of dialectics. In fact, his digest gives way to downright
distortion, to say nothing of the fact that in range and depth
Mao's pamphlet does not bear any comparison with the works
of Soviet philosophers.
 The fact that the terminology in Mao's articles `Òn

Contradiction" and `Òn Practice" is outwardly similar to those
in Marxist writings, a fact which is due to Mao's borrowing
of various propositions from Soviet textbooks, creates the
wrong impression about their real content and true value.
 We find a further distortion and vulgarisation of
Marxism in Mao's articles and statements on philosophy in the
1950s and the 1960s (for instance, in his article `Òn the
Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People'',
1957, and in his ``Directions Concerning the Discussion on
`Dichotomy of Unity'~'', 1964). The Maoists have tried to
obscure the real essence of the ``thought of Mao Tse-tung" by
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Up until recently it was considered that Mao's articles `Òn Practice"
and `Òn Contradiction" had been written in 1937. The latest works
by Soviet scientists show that they were in fact written in the late 1940s
and the c-:»V 1950s (see M. Altaisky and V. Georgiyev, The Philosophical
fiVcrs of Mao Tse-tung. A Critical Analysis, Moscow, 1971, pp. 19--21).
32
playing up his use of Marxist phraseology, his extensive

quotations from the writings of Marx, Engels, Lenin and
Stalin, and the formal similarity of some Maoist postulates
with Marxist ideas.
__ALPHA_LVL2__
3. On the Real Meaning
 of Maoist Dialectics
 Maoist propaganda claims that Mao has safeguarded and

developed materialist dialectics, notably, the law of the
unity and struggle of opposites.
 Actually, Mao has said much on contradictions and the

unity and struggle of opposites, but his view of the law of
the unity and struggle of opposites is radically at variance
with the Marxist view of it.
 First of all, while recognising the struggle of opposites,

Mao has failed to show the true essence of this process. Take
his speech at a sitting of the Politburo of the CPC Central
Committee in Wuchang on December 1, 1958, which the
Maoists like to quote. Here is what he said at the time:
``Just as duality is a feature of all things and phenomena in
the world (this is the essence of the law of the unity of
opposites), so duality is also a feature of imperialism and all
reactionaries---they are both real and paper tigers. History shows
that until taking power and for some time after their
takeover, the slaveowners, the feudal landowners and the
bourgeoisie were viable, revolutionary and advanced classes, and
were real tigers. In the subsequent period, as the slaves, the
peasantry and the proletariat---the classes which are their
opposites---gradually grew, gained in strength and carried
on an ever fiercer struggle against them, the slaveowners, the
feudal landowners and the bourgeoisie underwent a reverse
transformation: they became reactionary, backward classes,
they were transformed into paper tigers and ultimately were
or will be overthrown by the people.''
 Leaving aside for the time being Mao's use of the terms
``real'' and ``paper'' tigers (which will be dealt with later)
one finds that he does not in essence go beyond a formal
recognition of the law of the unity and struggle of opposites,
and fails to show the mechanism of its operation. Indeed,
in the process of historical development, the slaveowners,
3---1362
33
the feudal lords and the bourgeoisie do cease to be vehicles

of social progress and are gradually supplanted by more
advanced classes. But to say this is to say nothing, because
a mere statement of the generally known historical facts
does not yet add up to scientific dialectics. The Marxist
theorist must show the dialectics of the process in which
one class is supplanted by another, because a knowledge
of the reasons, of the source of motion and the development
of antagonistic societies provides the basis for men's conscious
activity in the revolutionary transformation of the world.
 The mutual admission and mutual exclusion of opposites

is determined by their dialectical nature. Opposites are in a
state of mutual interpenetration. That is why from the very
beginning of their existence the slaveowners, the feudal
lords and the bourgeoisie are burdened with their opposites
---the slaves, the peasants and the proletariat. The unity of
these opposites consists in the fact that they mutually imply
and mutually exclude each other. If this unity is to be
eliminated there is need to destroy the basis which produces these
opposites, that is, antagonistic society. Such unities are
destroyed in the course of the class struggle and social
revolution.
 Mao frequently quotes Lenin about the unity of opposites

being temporary and relative and their struggle being
absolute. However, he has in fact no correct idea of the process
in which contradictions unfold. Because Mao regards the
unity of opposites as their mere coexistence in one thing
or process, he regards their intertransition, their
transformation into each other as no more than a mutual exchange
of places.
 Mao fails to understand that Lenin's formula about the

unity of opposites being relative and their struggle being
absolute means that the contradiction between opposites
inevitably deepens and unfolds. This leads to a resolution
of the given contradiction, its ``removal'' and the emergence
of a new contradiction. In the process, there is a
qualitative change, the emergence of a new phenomenon. For
instance, the proletariat is not transformed into the
bourgeoisie and does not change places with it, as one would
assume on the strength of Mao's reasoning; there is here
a qualitative transformation in the historical role of the
bourgeoisie and of the proletariat as opposite classes of
34
capitalist society: at a definite stage in the unfolding of the

contradictions, the bourgeoisie ceases to play a progressive
role, and the latter passes to the proletariat. This determines
the bourgeoisie's inevitable defeat and the proletariat's
victory, the struggle between them ultimately results in a break
of their intrinsic connections and the elimination of the
given unity of opposites, as capitalism gives way to socialism.
``When the proletariat is victorious, it by no means becomes
the absolute side of society, for it is victorious only by
abolishing itself and its opposite. Then the proletariat disappears
as well as the opposite which determines it, private
property."^^1^^
 Consequently, according to Mao, as a result of the victory

of the socialist revolution the proletariat changes places with
the bourgeoisie. According to Marx, however, the victory of
the socialist revolution results in the elimination of the
bourgeoisie (private property in Marx's terminology), and
the elimination of the proletariat. Who is right, Mao or
Marx? Of course it is Marx. Indeed, on the one hand, the
victory of the socialist revolution results in the elimination
of the bourgeoisie, because the expropriation of private
capitalist property is the decisive condition for the
elimination of this class. Of course, bourgeois ideology continues to
exert an influence, but the bourgeoisie itself ceases to exist
as a class. On the other hand, the victory of the socialist
revolution also results in the elimination of the proletariat
of the old bourgeois society, a class deprived of the means
and implements of production, a class exploited by the
bourgeoisie. The proletariat, or to be more precise, the working
class of socialist society is a totally new class, directing
society, in which the means and instruments of production
belong to all the working people and where there is no
exploitation of man by man. That is why it is wrong to say, as
Mao does, that the victory of the socialist revolution results
in the proletariat changing places with the bourgeoisie.
 In contrast to Maoist dialectics, Marxist dialectics clearly

shows that under socialism neither the bourgeoisie nor the
proletariat exist in the old sense, because socialism is a
qualitatively new social phenomenon, with a unity of
opposites proper to it alone.
_-_-_
~^^1^^ K. Marx and F. Engels, The Holy Family or Critique of Critical
Critique, Moscow, 1956, p. 52.
35
 Mao's approach to the law of the unity and struggle of

opposites suggests that development is not viewed as a
negation of the old by the new, but as a simple repetition
of the past, as a circular movement or even as a movement
in reverse. Suffice it to say that Mao's ``dialectics'' envisages
the destruction of mankind and the globe: ``There are no
things in the world which are not born, which do not
develop and die. The monkey was transformed into man, men
arose, but ultimately mankind as a whole is bound to perish.
It will be transformed into something different, and at that
time there will be no globe. The globe is ultimately bound
to be destroyed.''
 The content of the Maoist concept of contradiction itself

is a mechanical antithesis of external opposites, with Mao
using good and bad as the terms to designate these opposites.
There are also other pairs like good and evil, hot and cold,
etc. Such propositions were to some extent meaningful 20
centuries ago, when the idea that objective being and human
thinking were contradictory was being established. But in
the 20th century, with the present level of scientific
knowledge, that is hardly enough. What is more, to declare these
propositions today, under the scientific and technological
revolution, as being the summit of scientific dialectics, is to hurl
philosophy into the past, and amounts to insisting on the
idea of a geocentric Universe.
 Marxist philosophy is never stationary and constantly

develops. But it does not develop by returning to ancient
philosophical ideas, however true these were in the past, but
by generalising the data provided by the latest scientific
advances, and analysing the development of theoretical
thinking itself. Similarly, Marxist dialectics is not, and
cannot be, reduced to a simple mechanical juxtaposition of
external and quite obvious opposites. Scientific dialectics must
show the internal contradictions inherent in things and
phenomena, and the real process of development of things and
phenomena consisting of two opposites; in other words,
scientific dialectics must analyse their self-movement.
 The Maoist definition of opposites does not give a correct

understanding of the complex and contradictory processes
of development in nature and society. This is not only
because it is meaningless. Mao has been using such opposites
to vindicate his distorted interpretation of social processes
36
and to obscure the failures of his political line. He says that
counter-revolutionary insurrections in the socialist countries
are ``good'' because they help to strengthen the new social
system; equally the death of great numbers of people in
social revolutions is good because it brings on the victory of
the people; another world war is good, because it will
allegedly help to eliminate capitalism, and so on. Such ``dialectics''
have as much in common with Marxism as alchemy with
chemistry.
 In general, a purely mechanical combination of

selfevident opposites does not amount to scientific dialectics. On
the contrary, it is vulgarisation and distortion of dialectics.
Moreover, self-evident opposites do not always constitute the
two sides of a unity, whether thing or process. For instance,
in some developing countries the bourgeoisie (commercial,
compradore, bureaucratic) can exist without the proletariat;
in socialist society the proletariat can exist without the
bourgeoisie; under feudalism the landowners can exist without
tenants, etc.
 This also applies to war and peace. Of course, war and
peace are two opposite concepts: when war starts, peace
ends, and vice versa. This does not mean, however, that war
and peace are phenomena which mutually determine each
other. Mao takes the oversimplified, unscientific view of these
two phenomena as being outwardly opposite to each other,
and regards them as social opposites expressing the essence
of social development. It may logically follow from this
that the self-movement, the unfolding of the opposite sides
of a social organism, inevitably leads to the alternation of
war and peace. However, war and peace are not two sides
of a unity, but distinct forms of political relations between
states. War originates not from the development of a form
of relations between states like peace, but from the
intrinsically contradictory nature of capitalist society itself. Mao's
``theoretical substantiation" of the alternation of war and
peace merely shows up the pathetic nature of his ``dialectics''.
 We find him considering the law of the unity and struggle
of opposites without analysing the interconnection between
the categories of possibility and reality. It is quite obvious,
however, that the resolution of any contradiction is closely
connected with the transformation of possibility into reality,
because the resolution of the contradiction and the point at
37
which possibility is transformed into reality constitute the

two sides of one and the same process of development.
 The existence of possibility depends on the intrinsically

contradictory nature of phenomena. For instance, in the
present conditions there is a possibility of another world
war breaking out. However, the existence of such a
possibility does not yet mean that it is bound to develop into reality.
Possibility is transformed into reality only through the
struggle of opposites and the victory of one of them. The
victory of one and the defeat of the other depend on the
quantitative and qualitative distinctions of the possibilities
which contain within themselves the given opposites. For
instance, whereas in the past the forces of war possessed
much greater possibilities for winning out than the forces of
peace, today the situation is fundamentally different.
 In our day, the united might of the socialist community,

the international working-class and the national liberation
movement can force the imperialists to abandon war as a
means of settling international disputes. Today, mankind can
do away with war as a form of political relations between
states. Thus, war and peace are two different phenomena in
social life. That is why Mao's assertion that war must follow
upon peace and vice versa, because they alternate, does not
show the true essence of these social phenomena. Moreover,
the Maoists' practical activity in the world arena, especially
in the recent period, shows very well that Mao's theoretical
exercises over the problem of war and peace are patently
political.
 One of the fundamental flaws of Maoist ``dialectics'' is

that it is eclectic and incoherent, and that its separate
elements are not logically connected. This is evident, in
particular, in Mao's incorrect view of the peculiar operation of
the law of the unity and struggle of opposites under
socialism, the substance and historical role of antagonistic and
non-antagonistic contradictions. On the one hand, he says
that the opposites of an antagonistic contradiction are
identical, that they penetrate and are transformed into each other,
so that antagonistic opposites develop into non-antagonistic
ones and back again. On the other hand, he regards the
struggle of the opposites of a non-antagonistic contradiction
as being the antagonism of two forces running in opposite
directions.
38
 On the strength of such methodological principles, Mao

in his article `Òn the Correct Handling of Contradictions
Among the People'', revises the Marxist doctrine on the
different types of social contradictions. He substitutes the
concepts of ``contradictions between ourselves and our
enemies, and contradictions within the ranks of the people"
for `àntagonistic and non-antagonistic contradictions''. This
does not amount to a mere terminological specification
or innovation. The point is that the contradiction between
the working class and the peasantry, on the one hand, and
the national bourgeoisie, on the other, is included among the
contradictions within the ranks of the people. Mao writes:
``The contradictions between ourselves and our enemies are
antagonistic ones. Within the ranks of the people,
contradictions among the working people are non-antagonistic,
while those between the exploiters and the exploited classes
have, apart from their antagonistic aspect, a non-antagonistic
aspect. ... In our country, the contradiction between the
working class and the national bourgeoisie is a contradiction
among the people. The class struggle waged between the two
is, by and large, a class struggle within the ranks of the
people. This is because of the dual character of the national
bourgeoisie in our country."^^1^^
 The assertion that the contradictions between the working

class and the (big) national bourgeoisie in China is
nonantagonistic (the reservation that these contradictions also
have an antagonistic aspect is immaterial) is Right--
opportunist and revisionist, although Mao himself claims to be a
fighter against ``modern revisionism''. The vital interests of
the working class and of the national bourgeoisie in China
are irreconcilable, because the latter, like the bourgeoisie of
any other country, does not want socialism on any terms,
and this is backed up by the whole history of the Chinese
People's Republic. Mao substitutes for the question of class
relations the question of the possibility of political agreements
and blocs with the bourgeoisie which is fundamentally hostile
to the working class. The antagonistic contradiction between
the working class and the bourgeoisie can be resolved only
through the elimination of the latter.
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Mao Tse-tung, `Òn the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among

the People''. Supplement to People's China No. 13, July 1, 1957, p. 4
(emphasis added---V.G.).
39
 But perhaps Mao's idea that the contradictions between

the proletariat and the national bourgeoisie fall under the
head of contradictions within the ranks of the people is
evidence of his creative and unconventional approach to the
complex and diverse phenomena of reality itself, of his urge
to involve the broadest sections of the population of China
in building a new society, and, finally, of a creative solution
of the theoretical problems and of a contribution to Marxist
philosophy, as Maoist propaganda has claimed?^^1^^
 Let us recall that it was Lenin who showed the correct
and scientific methods for resolving the different
contradictions after the triumph of the socialist revolution. On the
strength of his dialectical view of contradictions, he required
that any possible internal connections even between
antagonisms at a definite stage in the development of this or that
process should be discovered. Being aware that in the period
of transition from capitalism to socialism a fierce class
struggle between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie was
inevitable, he believed it possible to use state capitalism,
controlled by proletarian dictatorship, to use the bourgeoisie
under the New Economic Policy to boost and develop the
country's productive forces, provided the bourgeoisie fully
abided by the laws of the state, and provided it was
simultaneously being restricted and displaced. Lenin always said
that the contradiction between the proletariat and the
bourgeoisie was an antagonistic one.
 Mao's assertion that the contradictions between the

proletariat and the national bourgeoisie are contradictions
within the ranks of the people clashes with his own statements
at the 2nd Plenary Meeting of the 7th Central Committee
in 1949, when he said that once the proletariat took power
_-_-_
~^^1^^ The report to the 9th Congress of the CPC said the article `Òn the
Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People" was a ``great
work''. It said that `ìn this work . . . Chairman Mao Tse-tung gave an
all-round formulation of the doctrine of contradictions, of classes and
class struggle under the dictatorship of the proletariat, the doctrine o\
the two types of dissimilar contradictions existing within socialist society
---the contradictions between ourselves and our enemies, and
contradictions within the ranks of the people, a great theory on the continuation
of the revolution under proletarian dictatorship. Like a radiant beacon,
this great work has shed light on the way of the socialist revolution and
socialist construction in our country and has at the same time laid the
theoretical foundations for the current great proletarian cultural
revolution" (emphasis added---V.G.).
40
in the whole of China the contradiction between the working

class and the bourgeoisie would become the main one within
the country. Maoist dialectics has mutually exclusive
propositions because it has a social function. On the whole,
Mao has converted philosophy into a handmaid of politics,
in the worst sense of the word. His approach to philosophy
is purely utilitarian, pragmatic. He has use for philosophy
only to the extent it can be applied as an instrument for his
ambitious, Great-Power interests.
 A utilitarian, pragmatic approach to dialectics means that

it is used to justify any political action. In that case,
dialectics must contain a set of propositions which could be used
for such purposes, regardless of whether or not these square
with one another. That is precisely what we find in Maoist
``dialectics''.^^1^^ Naturally enough, at every given moment the
propositions of Maoist ``dialectics'' which best serve the
current tactical aims of Mao's group are brought to the
fore.
 The social function of Maoist ``dialectics'' is most clearly
revealed in Mao's interpretation of the concept of people.
He writes: `Òn this stage of building socialism, all classes,
strata and social groups which approve, support and work
for the cause of socialist construction belong to the category
of the people, while those social forces and groups which
resist the socialist revolution, and arc hostile to and try to
wreck socialist construction, are enemies of the people."^^2^^
``That is to say, democracy operates within the ranks of the
people, while the working class, uniting with all those
enjoying civil rights, the peasantry in the first place, enforces
dictatorship over the reactionary classes and elements and
all those who resist socialist transformation and oppose
socialist construction."^^3^^ It may appear at first sight that this
is a correct Marxist definition of the concept of people. The
people are all those who stand for socialism and build it;
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Let us note in this context that the same report at the 9th Congress
of the CPC extolled Mao's thesis that the contradiction between the
proletariat and the bourgeoisie was the main contradiction in present-day
China, as well as the thesis that this contradiction was among the
contradictions within the ranks of the people (sic!).
~^^2^^ Mao Tse-tung, `Òn the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among

the People'', p. 4 (emphasis added---V.G.).
~^^3^^ Ibid.
41
those who hamper the socialist reconstruction of society are

classed among the enemies of the people. However, a closer
examination of the Maoist concept of people shows that class
principles are forgotten and that subjectivism takes over.
 In defining the concept of people Marxist sociology starts

primarily from the decisive role of material production in
social development, and from the economic status of various
classes, sections and groups within a given system of social
production, because that is exactly what determines the
extent to which the various classes, sections and groups
have an objective interest and capacity for tackling the
concrete tasks facing society in progressive social
development. The point is, however, that the Maoist definition of the
concept of people lacks the first and basic criterion by which
social classes, sections and groups are included in this
concept, and this leaves room for subjectivism in defining its
framework. All a social group, even an exploiting one (in
this case the bourgeoisie), needs to do to be included in the
concept of people is to announce its desire to build socialism
and take a formal part in its construction.
 In the period of transition from capitalism to socialism
the concept of people may include the petty and even the
middle urban and rural bourgeoisie, but there is no ground
at all for putting a broad interpretation on the concept
by including the big capitalists as well. However, according
to Mao's view, the people include, and have included, `àll
those enjoying civil rights'', which means therefore men like
one-time Vice-President of Kuomintang China, the diehard
reactionary Li Tsung-jen, the economic dictator of Macao
Huo Ying, who was a member of the People's Political
Consultative Council of China, and many other leaders of
this stripe.
 Mao also takes an anti-Marxist approach to the definition

of the proletariat's class enemies. His main criterion here is
attitude to the political line of the present Chinese
leadership. According to the Maoist interpretation, `ènemy of the
people" ceases to be a sociological characteristic and becomes
a political phenomenon, which may not be---and as
developments in China in the last few years indicate, is not in fact
---connected with membership of an exploiting class. On the
contrary, a man's membership of a class is derived from his
political stand. Those who are classified as `ènemies of the
42
people" are not members of exploiting classes, but all those

who ``resist the socialist revolution, and are hostile to
socialist construction (meaning, refuse to approve the distortion of
the principles of socialist construction by the Maoists) and
try to wreck socialist construction (meaning, fight against the
Mao group)''.
 This approach makes it possible to declare anyone an

enemy if, for instance, he happens to express his
dissatisfaction or disagreement with the Maoist foreign-policy line. No
account is taken of a man's social origin or social status, or
the motives of his discontent. All he needs do to be
automatically classed with the `ènemies of the people" is to express
his disagreement with Mao's political propositions. It is not
surprising, therefore, that in China internationalist
Communists are now being branded as `ènemies of the people''.
 Thus, according to Mao's views, present-day Chinese

society is divided into `ùs'' and the `ènemies'', the former
meaning Mao himself and his followers, and the latter not
only, and not so much, the bourgeoisie, as all those who
think differently and disagree with Mao's theory and
practices. On June 23, 1966, the newspaper Chungkuo chingnien
pao wrote: ``Those who oppose the thought of Mao Tse-tung
are counter-revolutionaries.'' Consequently, all one needs do
to be branded as an `ènemy'' is to doubt some Maoist
proposition or express his own views. That is why Mao and his
followers have been using the `ènemy of the people" concept
to cover up any arbitrary treatment of their ideological
opponents, even those who have never belonged to the
exploiting classes and have honestly served the Chinese people and
the Chinese revolution.
 The anti-Marxist essence of Maoist exercises on the

subject of ``people'' and `ènemies of the people" has been
further laid bare by the practices of the ``cultural revolution''.
The Mao group claims that the aim of this ``revolution'' is
to prevent China's return to the bourgeois order, and that
they are fighting the `ènemies of the people" (the word
`ènemy'' has now been enriched with such synonyms as
``scum'', ``bandit'', ``scoundrel'', etc.) and against the `àgents
of the bourgeoisie who have infiltrated the Party'', `àgainst
those who are in power and take the capitalist way''.
 Of course, it is quite possible for bourgeois degenerates

and even downright agents of the class enemy to exist in the
43
Communist Party, and there is need for a resolute struggle

against them. However, it is the real and not imaginary
enemies that must be resolutely fought. Meanwhile, the facts
show that during the ``cultural revolution" thousands upon
thousands of Communists were branded as `ènemies of
China" because, according to the Maoists, they were agents
of the bourgeoisie, which seeks to undermine the cause of
socialist construction in China. On the other hand, the real
representatives of the bourgeoisie have been spared any
criticism.
 Mao seeks to back up his subjectivist interpretation of

contradictions under socialism, an interpretation which has
nothing in common with Marxism, by references to
MarxistLeninist philosophy.
 As has been said, Mao turned to Marxism in the 1920s

because he felt that it was the best means of helping to
return China to her old grandeur. In the 1930s and 1940s,
he used Marxist terminology to assert his leadership in the
CPC. Evidence of this comes from the ``Decision on Some
Questions of the Party's History'', which he himself drew
up, and which abounds with reminders of the need to fight
dogmatism and the dogmatists (meaning the internationalist
Communists). Mao's references to Marxist propositions in
the 1950s and 1960s were used to cover up his betrayal of
Marxism-Leninism, of the principles of socialist construction,
to prop up his shaken power in the Party and the country,
and to justify the splitting activity in the socialist
community and the international communist, working-class and
national liberation movement.
 In the first few years after the people's revolution in
China, when Mao and his followers did not yet dare openly
to revise the principles of socialist construction and break
with the world socialist system and the international
communist movement, and when they were forced in the world
arena to support the Soviet policy of peaceful coexistence,
they still referred to the existence of non-antagonistic
contradictions. Once the Maoists executed their radical turn
about in domestic and foreign policy and laid their claims
to hegemony in the world socialist system, and the
international communist, working-class and national liberation
movement, they began to speak mainly of antagonistic
contradictions, which they sought to use to justify the need to
44
draw a ``line of demarcation" from the Marxists-Leninists

both in China and elsewhere. That was the very purpose of
the broad discussion on the law of the unity and struggle of
opposites which was started in China in 1964. To make their
approach appear Marxist, the Maoists used the authority
of Lenin, and put their own gloss on Lenin's well-known
idea of the ``dichotomy of unity''.
 Marxist dialectics requires a concrete historical approach

to social phenomena. It cannot serve as an abstract scheme
from which answers to all the concrete questions of practice
are spun out in a purely logical manner. Apart from the
general features inherent in the development of social
phenomena this dialectics takes into account the contradictory
nature of social phenomena at their specific stage of
development. In addition to the general features the
development in each socialist country, in the socialist community as
a whole, in each Communist Party, in the world
workingclass movement as a whole, has its own specific features, with
the unity of opposites having a specific role to play, because
the contradictions are non-antagonistic. For instance, the
Communist and Workers' Parties have to work in different
conditions, and this produces different approaches to
practical matters and even differences between the Parties.
However, their common vital interests provide a basis for
overcoming the difficulties and differences between the various
contingents of the world army of Communists. The
participants in the international communist forum in 1969 expressed
their firm conviction that the differences between the
Communist and Workers' Parties would be successfully
overcome. They declared: ``This belief is based on the fact that
the international working class has common long-term
objectives and interests, on the striving of each Party to find
a solution to existing problems which would meet both
national and international interests and the Communists'
revolutionary mission; it is based on the will of Communists
for cohesion on an international scale."^^1^^
 The Maoists apply to all social phenomena, including
socialist society, the concrete instances in which the ``
dichotomy of unity" appears in the form of a division of society
_-_-_
~^^1^^ International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties, Moscow,

1969, p. 38.
45
into hostile classes. They say that to deny the existence of

social antagonisms in socialist society is, in particular, to
deny the struggle of opposites as a source of development.
 However, this approach is fundamentally wrong because

it does not accord with the propositions of Marxist dialectics
and is not warranted by socialist reality itself.
 Obviously, the law of the unity and struggle of opposites

is universal, which is why the struggle of opposites is a
source of development even under socialism, but this struggle
of opposites proceeds within the framework of
nonantagonistic contradictions and not social antagonisms. Lenin
said that antagonism and contradiction are not the same
thing, that under socialism antagonism disappears but
contradictions remain. The new system has no struggle of
antagonistic classes which leads to a substitution of one
socioeconomic formation by another. Socialist society develops on
the basis of a resolution of the contradictions which spring
from the nature of socialism, otherwise it would be
impossible to advance. But these contradictions are not
antagonistic.
 What kind of contradictions are they? Some of them are

class distinctions between workers and peasants, essential
distinctions between town and country, between workers by
brain and workers by hand, etc., which are inherited from
the earlier formations. After all, according to the founders
of Marxism-Leninism, socialism has just emerged `ìnto the
light of day out of the womb of capitalism" and therefore
`ìs in every respect stamped with the birthmarks of the old
society".^^1^^ Characterising the social gains of socialism, Lenin
wrote: ``The first phase of communism ... cannot yet provide
justice and equality: differences, and unjust differences, in
wealth will still persist, but the exploitation of man by man
will have become impossible because it will be impossible
to seize the means of production---the factories, machines,
land, etc.---and make them private property."^^2^^
 In addition, as socialism develops it produces other

contradictions, which are different from those inherent in
capitalism. Among these are, for instance, the following: disparity
between the rapidly growing material requirements of the
_-_-_
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 466.
46
population and the inadequate level of development of

production, between the interests of citizens and separate
collectives, between the collective and society as a whole,
between science and production, when production either lags
behind scientific achievements, or when science fails to
satisfy the needs of production. Among the contradictions
which arise as socialism develops are also a certain
unevenness in the territorial location of industry, the lag of
agriculture behind industry, and bureaucratic practices in some
institutions and among some officials.
 All these contradictions in socialist society are of a

specific, non-antagonistic character, but they still continue to be
contradictions which determine the advance of society.
 Such is the Marxist view of the question of the specific

operation of the law of the unity and struggle of opposites
under socialism. It is on the basis of this view that the
Communist Parties have been scoring their successes in practical
activity.
 It would be wrong to assume that the Maoists' approach to

contradictions under socialism is due to their theoretical
mistakes or misconceptions. This may be so for rank--
andfile Maoists, but for Mao himself it is a deliberate retreat
from the ideas of Marxist philosophy. The thesis concerning
the ``dichotomy'' of socialist society serves as the theoretical
justification for the slander and lies directed against the
Soviet Union. The Maoists have been shouting about the
class stratification of Soviet society, claiming that there are
irreconcilable contradictions between the broad masses of
the working people and some kind of privileged section,
which has allegedly usurped power and is appropriating
the fruits of the Soviet people's labour. The struggle against
some anti-social elements, like thieves, embezzlers of
socialist property, hooligans and idlers is also set up as a social
antagonism.^^1^^
_-_-_
~^^1^^ It is a curious fact that in their view of contradictions under

socialism the Maoists are at one with the anti-Communists. Thus, the
well-known critic of Marxism and a rabid West German anti--
Communist, G. Wetter, says in his book Soviet Ideology Today: ``How can
dialectical development go on under socialism if the class struggle is no
longer there? How can such dialectics continue to exist if the proletarian
revolution is the last revolution, and socialism and communism, the last
social formations?''
47
 Evidence of Mao's utilitarian approach to dialectics also

comes from the fact that the ``dichotomy of .unity" is
proclaimed only with respect to some handpicked social
phenomena. The ``dichotomy'' of the socialist community is
declared to be progressive and inevitable, but the ``dichotomy''
of China into the CPR and Taiwan, which is occupied by
the Chiang Kai-shek clique, happens to be a `ùnification of
two in a unity''.
 The ``dichotomy'' of the Communist Party of China is

declared to be progressive and inevitable. But when it comes
to the Chinese bourgeoisie, then this is said to be ``
unification of two in a unity''. The ``dichotomy'' of the
international working-class movement is declared to be progressive
and inevitable. Simultaneously, the principle of `ùnification
of two in a unity" is proclaimed with respect to the renegades
expelled from the Communist Parties and patent agents
of the bourgeoisie.
 The nihilistic attitude to the cultural legacy practised in

the course of the ``cultural revolution" offers another
example of the use of theory to justify practical political
expedients.
 This will be dealt with in detail in Chapter Seven. Let us

merely stress at this point that the attacks on Chinese and
world culture are justified by the Maoists on the plea that
there is need to eradicate the old (feudal and bourgeois)
views, traditions, morals, customs and habits, which hamper
the assimilation of Marxist (meaning Maoist) ideology. But
it would be wrong to draw the conclusion on the strength
of this that Mao is opposed to any cultural legacy as such.
The destruction of the Chinese people's cultural values,
carried out on his initiative, is, we believe, determined by
tactical considerations. The ``great helmsman" has attacked the
cultural heritage in recent years, first, because this heritage
is an obstacle in the way of duping the millions of Chinese;
second, because it is being used by the political and
ideological opponents of Maoism; and third, because in the light of
the world's cultural and philosophic values the ``thought of
Mao Tse-tung" stands out in its mediocrity.
 However, it is quite possible that, as conditions change,

Mao may well take a stand for some elements of the old
culture. The thing to bear in mind is his traditional
education, his great love of calligraphy and versification in the
48
old Chinese manner, and his interest in Confucianism and
Buddhism.^^1^^
 The Maoists seek to substantiate their political acts with

quotations from the Marxist-Leninist classics: the ``Great
Leap Forward"---with quotations on the transformation of
an idea into a material force when it takes hold of the masses;
their splitting policies---with quotations on Lenin's idea
concerning the dichotomy of unity; the lawlessness of the
Hungweipings---with references to the Marxist proposition
on the need for resolute struggle against revisionism, etc.
The result is a vulgarisation and gross distortion of Marxist
dialectics. Apart from some outward terminological
similarity, Maoist ``dialectics'' has nothing in common with the
Marxist dialectical method, and when put to the test turns
out to be a peculiar modification of traditional Chinese
dialectics as described above.
__ALPHA_LVL2__
4. Subjective Idealism Instead
 of the Materialist View of History
 What are the starting principles of Mao's outlook?

Although his works contain statements that being is primary
and consciousness is secondary, and that objective reality is
the source of sensation, he takes an essentially metaphysical
and idealistic view of the whole complex interconnection of
matter and consciousness, of the whole contradictory process
of reflection by man's consciousness of objective things and
phenomena.
 Mao quite obviously needed the proposition on the

primacy of matter and the secondary nature of consciousness
in order to appear to be a consistent materialist, for it cannot
in any way be squared with Mao's own `òriginal'' view of
many philosophical problems reflecting his ideological stand,
such as the relationship between the objective laws of social
development and men's conscious activity, society's economic
basis and its political superstructure, social being and social
ideas, and so on.
 Viewed from this angle, Maoism is seen to start from the
_-_-_
~^^1^^ In a private conversation in I960, Mao stressed the importance of

studying Buddhist philosophy.
4---1362
49
primacy of the subjective factor, ``subjective activity'',
politics, ideas. This is expressed in such postulates as: the main
role in the socialist mode of production belongs to the
relations of production and not to the productive forces; politics
and not economics is the command force in socialist society;
moral and not material incentives are the principal ones in
socialist construction.
 All these postulates ultimately boil down to the thesis

that under socialism men's ``subjective activity" has the
decisive role to play, which essentially means an urge to
subordinate the objective laws of socialist construction to
the subjective activity of leaders, and to provide a
theoretical substantiation for subjectivism, voluntarism and
adventurism in domestic and foreign policy.
 A discussion on the relationship between objective laws

and subjective activity was started in China in 1958 and
1959, and extensive propaganda of the notorious ``theory of
subjective activity" was launched at about the same time,
with Mao's role in developing this theory being extolled
in every possible way. Here are two pertinent statements
from a textbook, Dialectical Materialism, published in
Peking in 1961: =
1. ``Carrying on a resolute struggle against all

manner of opportunist elements denying or minimising the
role of the subjective activity of the masses, he [Mao---Ed.]
made not only a theoretical but also a great practical
contribution to the development of the theory of subjective
activity. He not only gave a precise scientific definition of
subjective activity in the Marxist view, and clearly and
concretely showed that in certain conditions subjective activity
plays a decisive role, but also made a comprehensive and
profound study, on the basis of a close unity of materialism
and dialectics, of the existence of dialectical connections
between the subjective and the objective, between subjective
activity and objective regularities, between revolutionary
spirit and scientific approach.''
 2. ``Comrade Mao Tse-tung's fresh contribution to Marxist

philosophy consists not only in the fact that, starting from
the contradiction between the subjective and the objective,
he gives a clear and positive answer to the question
concerning the definitive role of subjective activity in certain
conditions, but also in the fact that basing himself on the main
spheres of social life and the Party's practical activity, he
50
gives our Party an even more powerful theoretical instrument

for directing the people in the struggle for the grand
transformation of the world [emphasis added---V.G.]."
 What leaps to the eye in these quotations is the emphasis
on Mao's services to Marxism in bringing out the ``
definitive, decisive role of subjective activity''.
 Marxism does not, of course, deny the importance of the

subjective factor in social development under socialism. On
the contrary, it stresses its growing role with the successful
advance of socialist construction. This is due to the fact that
the Communist Party, relying on the knowledge of the
objective laws of social development, is able to use them in the
interest of society as a whole. This makes men's activity
purposeful and conscious. However, the laws of social
development in socialist society are just as determined
materially and are as objective as the laws of social development
in all other socio-economic formations. Their inadequate
consideration---to say nothing of their neglect---of men's
socio-economic activity inevitably has a negative effect on the
development of socialist society.
 In contrast to Marxism, the Maoists advocate men's

subjective activity, virtually ignoring the dialectic unity of the
objective laws of social development and men's conscious
activity. They call the Marxists mechanicists because, they
say, ``refusing to recognise man as the decisive factor in the
relations between man and things, they lay one-sided stress
on the fact that man's actions are determined by the lifeless
schemes of objective laws, and that man can do no more
than passively submit to these laws''. Referring to the fact
that under socialism the role of the subjective factor is
immensely increased, the Maoists metaphysically contrast
objective laws and men's activity, and separate the
two.
 However, the main thing is that the Maoists do not regard
``subjective activity" as conscious, purposeful activity of the
masses, based on a knowledge of the laws of social
development, but action in realising any subjectivist propositions of
the leaders. That is why the references to Mao's services in
developing the ``theory of subjective activity" mean his
apology of men's activity which is not limited by any objective
laws, that is, essentially an apology of voluntarism and
subjectivism. This is a subjective, idealist standpoint.
4*
51
 One important point needs to be borne in mind in

analysing Maoist philosophy. Very frequently the Maoists resort to
the following trick to cover up their departure from Marxism.
They take a correct Marxist proposition but give it their own
interpretation, by variously accentuating one of its aspects,
which they happen to need most at the time, and by taking
a part out of the context of the whole and turning it into an
absolute. But to cover up the sleight of hand they make sure
to quote the doctored Marxist proposition in full.
 That is exactly what they have done in this instance. In

order to cover up their revision of the Marxist
philosophical postulate concerning the dialectical interconnection
between the objective laws of social development and men's
conscious activity under socialism, they centre attention on
men's activity while speaking of the need to give
consideration to objective laws.
 That is why the Maoists' distortion of the correct

propositions of Marxist philosophy can be discovered not only in a
careful study of their theoretical views and a thorough
analysis and comparison of all the statements on a given
question, but also by establishing when, in which circumstances
and on what occasion this or that theoretical proposition is
being accentuated. In particular, Mao's subjective, idealist
approach to the use of the objective laws of social
development becomes even more obvious when we find that his
apology of subjective activity occurred in the period of the
``Great Leap Forward" and the people's communes.
 Maoism also takes an essentially subjective, idealist view

of man's role in material production. Take an article which
appeared in 1965 in the journal Hsin Chianshe, organ of
the Philosophical and Social Sciences Department of the
Academy of Sciences of China. The authors said: `Àlthough
the instruments of labour in production, the objects of labour,
weapons in war, etc., are indeed of great importance,
although they are a considerable factor in production and
in war, they occupy a secondary place in comparison to man.
Regardless of the area---production struggle or class
struggle, it is men and not things that are the factor with the
decisive role to play."^^1^^ The point is, the authors add, that man
has an active and things a passive place. Man ``can think,
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Hsin Chianshe No. 7, 1965, p. 23.
52
can work, he possesses subjective activity, he can know and

change the world, whereas things do not possess such
features. . ."^^1^^. `Àmong all things, the instruments of labour in
production and weapons in war are the most important. . ..
However, detached from human activity, nature cannot
supply man with the necessary instruments of labour and
weapons. In detachment from human activity the implements
and weapons already created are turned into rubbish."^^2^^
Here, as on the question of the relationship between
subjective activity and objective laws, the role of the subjective
factor is hypertrophied.
 But perhaps this is a stand for man's active substance, for
his activity? If we recall that the abovementioned
reasoning appeared just when China's industrialisation rate had
slowed down after the fiasco of the ``Great Leap Forward"
and the people's communes, in a period when the role of
technical devices and technological progress was being
variously played down and ignored, in a period when Mao's
idea of the atomic bomb being a ``paper tiger" was being
plugged, it will become obvious that it has a patently
antiMarxist ring. We find a deliberate exaggeration of man's
role in material production and a playing down of the role
of material production itself.
 Marxism has always emphasised man's decisive role in

production. One need merely recall what Lenin said about
the working man being the primary productive force of all
mankind. But Marxism has never separated man from the
other component elements of the productive forces or
contrasted him with them. Man is the chief but not the only
component of the productive forces. Any neglect of this
principle, whether deliberate or otherwise, tends to
obliterate the fundamental distinctions between the various modes
of production, because every society is characterised
by a definite level in the development of the productive
forces.
 As man exerts an influence on nature he not only changes

it but also changes himself. He becomes more adept in
the mode of creating the means of labour, but this depends
on the level in the development of the productive forces
_-_-_
 ^^1^^ Ibid.
 ^^2^^ Ibid., p. 24.
53
attained at any given moment. It should be borne in mind

that at every given historical epoch man's power and
potentialities are limited by the existing level in the development
of material production, the means of labour above all.
Hardly anyone will deny that the means of labour are nothing
without man. But this does not warrant their reduction to
nothing. Man's power is expressed precisely in the level to
which his means of production have been developed. The
Maoists preach nihilism with respect to science and
technology, and this is reflected in one of their slogans: ``Topple
the scientific authorities.'' Under the current scientific and
technological revolution, with science being a direct
productive force in society, this attitude is bound to lead to
stagnation in scientific research.
 There again we find the characteristic feature of Maoism:

the narrowly utilitarian approach to theory, resulting in a
divergence between theory and practice. Mao himself
cannot but be aware of the ever growing role of the natural
sciences in modern society, because the use of their
achievements helps man to enhance his power over nature. Evidence
of this comes also from the fact that most of the research
institutions and scientists engaged in the fabrication of nuclear
missiles were spared any criticism during the ``cultural
revolution''. The blows fell mainly on those working in the
social sciences. Mao apparently needed the bogey of ``
pseudo-science" and `àdmiration for scientific authorities" in order
to defeat his political opponents. The Maoists have not cast
doubt on the importance of the applied natural sciences, and
are hardly likely to do so in the future.
 Mao's exaggeration of man's role in production is closely

connected with his erroneous view of the relationship
between the productive forces and the relations of production,
between the basis and the superstructure.
 The Marxist view of this question was expressed by the

founder of the scientific philosophy in these words: `Ìn the
social production of their existence, men inevitably enter
into definite relations, which are independent of their will,
namely, relations of production appropriate to a given stage
in the development of their material forces of production.
The totality of these relations of production constitutes the
economic structure of society, the real foundation, on which
arises a legal and political superstructure and to which
54
correspond definite forms of social consciousness. The mode of

production of material life conditions the general process of
social, political and intellectual life. It is not the
consciousness of men that determines their existence, but their social
existence that determines their consciousness. At a certain
stage of development, the material productive forces of
society come into conflict with the existing relations of
production or---this merely expresses the same thing in legal terms
---with the property relations within the framework of which
they have operated hitherto. From forms of development of
the productive forces these relations turn into their fetters.
Then begins an era of social revolution. . .. Just as one does
not judge an individual by what he thinks about himself,
so one cannot judge such a period of transformation by
its consciousness, but, on the contrary, this consciousness
must be explained from the contradictions of material life,
from the conflict existing between the social forces of
production and the relations of production."^^1^^ Lenin said that
these words of Marx expressed the materialist view of
history.
 By contrast Mao, first, essentially assigns the main role

within the productive forces/relations of production system to
the latter component and, second, holds that the
establishment of new relations of production does not spring from
objective necessity, which is rooted in the process of material
production, but from men's subjective will.^^2^^
 The Maoists believe it to be possible artificially to ``

improve" the relations of production regardless of the
development of the productive forces, in order to tackle the tasks of
China's socio-economic development. That was the purpose
of the ``Great Leap Forward" and the establishment of the
people's communes. With socialist construction in China at
its initial stage, they issued a call for the earliest
transition to communism. The people's communes were advertised
as the primary cells of the future communist society. The
lamentable results of this `èxperiment'' are well known.
 The artificial `ìmprovement'' of the relations of
_-_-_
~^^1^^ K. Marx, A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy,

Moscow, 1970, pp. 20--21.
~^^2^^ The Maoists' reservations, like those examined above, are purely
tactical and are designed to cover up their revision of the materialist view
of history.
55
production, which boils down to all manner of organisational and

political restructuring in agriculture and industry, is designed
to sharpen the class struggle, and this has been expressed
in the endless succession of political campaigns and mass
movements. Let us recall the movement against the ``three''
and ``five'' evils (1952 and 1953), the struggle against the
``Rightist elements" (1957--1958), the movement for ordering
the style of work (1958), the ``give the Party your heart"
campaign (1958--1959), the movement for socialist education
in the countryside (1962--1963) and, finally, the ``cultural
revolution" (1966--1969).
 This anti-Marxist conception is given a logical capstone

in the following formula: ``The thought of Mao Tse-tung
is an almighty force.'' The newspaper Jenmin jihpao wrote:
``When the thought of Mao Tse-tung spreads across the
whole world, when the revolutionary peoples of the whole
world gradually master it, it will be able to change the
spiritual face of the revolutionary peoples of the world and
to transform spiritual force into a great material force.
Having mastered the thought of Mao Tse-tung, the revolutionary
peoples of the world will destroy the old world in a
powerful, inexorable attack, completely bury imperialism, modern
revisionism and reaction in all countries, and build on earth
an immensely radiant, unprecedentedly beautiful, great new
communist world, a world without oppression and
exploitation."^^1^^
 We find here an unscientific interpretation of the

Marxist proposition concerning the relative independence of
ideology, and a vulgarisation of Marx's thesis that ideas become
a material force when they take hold of the masses.
 Marxists have always attached much importance to the

role of ideas in social development, believing that ideas can
help to accelerate its pace, provided only that these ideas
reflect real life, the relationship between classes, the advance
of science and economic progress. Marxist ideas are viable
and invincible and exert an accelerating effect on the social
process because they are scientific and accord with the laws
of social development. That is why they become a material
force transforming the world. The ``thought of Mao
Tsetung" is deprived of any life-giving power because it is not
_-_-_
 ^^1^^ Jenmin jihpao, June 20, 1966.
56
based on science, and does not accord with the objective laws
of social development, which is why its translation into
practice has brought defeats for China's domestic and foreign
policies.
 Maoism revises the Marxist proposition concerning the

role of the masses and the individual in history: the role of
the individual is exaggerated, the cult of heroes is revived,
and the masses are treated as a faceless mob bent to the will
of the leaders.
 The unscientific and subjectivist view of the role of the

individual in history is clearly expressed in the build-up of
Mao's personality cult, and in the exaggeration of his role,
with a simultaneous playing down of the role of the people
and the Communist Party in the history of the Chinese
revolution. The whole activity of the CPC at every period of its
history is identified with the activity of one man---Mao
Tsetung---`à personality of the highest order'', `à genius'',
according to Maoist propaganda, who is born into the midst of
men once in a few centuries, which is why unquestioning
obedience to him is a guarantee of China's successes. ``
Always think of Chairman Mao, obey Chairman Mao in
everything, consistently follow Chairman Mao, do everything for
the sake of Chairman Mao."^^1^^
 We have here something that goes beyond the mere
revival or rehearsal of the Narodist theory of the ``heroes'' and
the ``crowd''. The Narodniks held up more than one hero,
and enshrined the hero as an ideal. In Mao's case we have
one ``hero'' who has the capacity, at will, to change or even
abolish the laws of social development.
 The official press helps to deify Mao and praise the
Maoists who are obedient to him. The official press is not
interested in the people as such, as the maker of history, as a
participant in the revolutionary transformation of society. In
the theory and practice of Maoism, the people is assigned
the role of extra, who walks on the stage when bidden ta do
so and blindly carries out the orders of Mao Tse-tung.
According to the logic of Maoist philosophy, the masses are
incapable of taking conscious and organised action, and can
merely submit to and blindly follow the ``hero''. This is
substantiated by ``Mao's thought" that the Chinese people is a
_-_-_
 ^^1^^ China Pictorial No. 7, 1968.
57
clean sheet of paper on which there is nothing, but on which

one is able to write ``the newest, the most beautiful
characters, on which one can produce the newest, the most
beautiful drawings".^^1^^ This view of the role of the individual and
the masses in history has nothing in common with Marxism.
It adds up to a pernicious cult of the personality of a leader
who stands over and above the people. It amounts to mistrust
of the people and abuse of them.
 The sway of Mao's personality cult fosters in the Chinese

people a spirit of slavish adulation of the leader. Ordinary
Chinese are quoted as saying: ``Chairman Mao's concern is
vaster than the heavens and the earth, Chairman Mao is
dearer than father and mother. But for Chairman Mao, I
would not have existed."^^2^^ All of Mao's writings are regarded
as sacred; therefore ``Mao Tse-tung's works must be studied
every day. If you fail to study the leader's works for one
day, a host of questions will arise; if you fail to study them
for two days, you will begin to slide down; and it is
altogether impossible to live without the leader's works for
three days."^^3^^
 Subjectivism is a feature of Mao's view of history. The

Maoists regard Mao's political and theoretical activity as
being the only cause behind social development. Action by
social classes, sections and groups is meaningful only in so
far as it coincides with the leader's prescriptions. That is why
today the Hungweipings are ordered out into the streets, and
tomorrow are sent into the countryside; today all the Party
cadres are persecuted and tomorrow some of them are
rehabilitated.
 No political leader can regard himself as a Marxist unless

he is guided in his activity by the tenet that history is made
by the masses, by millions of producers, and that the decisive
role in revolutionary transformation belongs to social classes,
unless he is able, or to be more precise, willing to
connect in a single whole the individual and the masses, and to
cease theoretically and practically to act on the principle that
history is made by heroes at whim.
 Consequently, Mao's philosophy constitutes a revision of
_-_-_
~^^1^^ China Pictorial No. 3, 1968.
~^^2^^ Ibid., No. 7, 1968.
~^^3^^ Ibid.
58
the materialist view of history, and marks a retreat to

subjective, including Narodist, sociology, whose propositions
have long since been refuted by Marxism.
__*_*_*__
 Summing up some of the results of the examination of

Maoist philosophy, we can draw the conclusion that Mao
and his ideological followers do not take the stand of
dialectical materialism. Their Marxist terminology merely serves
to cover up the eclectic mixture of subjective idealism and
some propositions of pre-Marxian materialism and naive
dialectics.
 Mao is essentially a traditional Chinese thinker, but one

who has to act in the 20th century, and who has for that
reason adopted as his instrument (naturally, modified) the
elements of modern theoretical thinking which he needs and
is able in any way to sort out.
 Let us note that Mao's apologists, when building up the

myth that he is the greatest Marxist philosopher of our day
and age, deliberately accentuate only those problems which
are dealt with in Mao's works, thereby creating the
impression that these are at the centre of modern philosophy. The
problems Mao fails to `èlaborate'' or even to mention are
deliberately dropped as philosophical problems, thereby
artificially narrowing down the sphere of philosophical
knowledge and impoverishing philosophy itself as a science. At
the same time, the Maoists deliberately ignore the fact that
the solution of the problems Mao considers was given by
philosophers before Marx, while the most general
propositions are borrowed from the Marxist-Leninist classics to
help Mao appear as a classic himself. The Maoists' ``works''
do not give the slightest hint that modern Marxist thinking
has been elaborating any philosophical problems.
 Here is Mao's version of the process of cognition: `Òften,

correct knowledge can be arrived at only after many
repetitions of the process leading from matter to consciousness
and then back to matter, that is, leading from practice to
knowledge and then back to practice. Such is the Marxist
theory of knowledge, the dialectical materialist theory of
knowledge."^^1^^ The ways, stages and forms of cognition are
_-_-_
 ^^1^^ Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, pp. 208--09.
59
known to be an important element of Marxist epistemology,

which emphasises the dialectical essence of the process of
cognition, makes a detailed study of the logic of forms and
laws of thinking, especially of conceptions, judgements and
deductions, and shows the role of theory and hypotheses in
the attainment of the truth.
 Mao confines himself to rehashing the ideas about the two
stages of knowledge and their sequence, something that has
been known since the period of antiquity and ancient
Oriental philosophy. Maoist epistemology altogether fails to show
the dialectical connection between consciousness and matter,
to show the role of labour and other types of human
activity in the origination and development of consciousness.
The theory of knowledge of Maoist philosophy is not
connected with the materialist theory of reflection. It fails to
analyse the dialectics of objective, relative and absolute
truth, or their contradictory unity and transition into each
other, and has absolutely nothing to say about the logical
and historical ascent from the abstract to the concrete in the
comprehension of the substance of things and phenomena.
 Moreover, Mao directly revises the Marxist-Leninist theory

of knowledge. First of all, he breaks up the process of
cognition into independent, discrete processes alternating with
each other. Furthermore, he takes a vulgar, mechanistic view
of the connection between the process of cognition and the
process of formulating practical policy, and confuses the
problem of the source of knowledge and the process of
cognition itself, which, let us bear in mind, is based on a
definite store of knowledge. Mao rejects mediated experience;
he holds that ``theories, directives, plans, measures" have
to be taken through all the stages of knowledge afresh. This
approach of Mao's is also confirmed by his neglect of the
experience of his predecessors, whose knowledge, he says, is
``bookish''. While taking an oversimplified and vulgar view
of the connection between theory and practice, Mao also
has an idealistic concept of ``practice'' itself, in which the
materialist substance of the Marxist theory of knowledge---
``recognition of the external world and its reflection in the
human mind" (Lenin)---altogether disappears. While not
denying this fundamental materialist principle in so many
words, Mao considers the objective external world with all
its laws and in all its diversity in absolutely abstract terms,
60
as a ``sheet of clean paper" designed for voluntarist ``

creative" acts by the ``genius''. Mao regards the Chinese people
as just such a sheet of clean paper on which one can ``
produce the newest, the most beautiful drawings''.
 Because Mao's ``practice'' does not rest on concrete and

diverse living reality it loses its principal property, that of
being the criterion of the truth. Hence, his pragmatic
conclusion that only that is correct which leads to success.
 Finally, Mao contrasts sensual and rational knowledge,

and theory and practice, and connects practice only with
purely sensual knowledge, with `èxperience'', thereby
depriving practice of its rational character, and refusing to
recognise it as rational activity in the process of cognition.
In the light of this view of the connection between rational
and sensual knowledge, and theory and practice, the whole
of social life---the practice of millions upon millions of
working people becomes blind, unconscious activity, each of these
being no more than a ``little cog" in a gigantic machine run
by the hand of the ``great genius''.
[61]
__NUMERIC_LVL1__
Chapter Two
__ALPHA_LVL1__
GREAT-HAN CHAUVINISM
 AND HECEMONISM PRESENTED AS PROLETARIAN
 INTERNATIONALISM
__ALPHA_LVL2__
1. The Sources of Great-Han Chauvinism
 and Hegemonism in the Views of Mao
 and His Followers
 The struggle between reactionary bourgeois chauvinism

and proletarian internationalism is not a new phenomenon.
The struggle has been carried on ever since the bourgeoisie
and the proletariat emerged in the arena of history, giving
rise to the ``two great class camps'', and to the emergence
and development in irreconcilable struggle of the ideologies
of these two camps. The Marxist-Leninist classics have
shown that the victory of proletarian internationalism over
reactionary bourgeois chauvinism depends on a fundamental
change in proprietary relations. Marx wrote: ``To be able
to unite the peoples must have common interests. For the
interests to be common, the existing relations of property
must be destroyed because the existing property relations
provide for the exploitation of some peoples by others. . .".^^1^^
In other words, bourgeois chauvinism is inseparable from
the system dominated by capitalist property in the means
of production and man's exploitation of man, while
proletarian internationalism is inherent in the society where
private property in the means of production has been abolished
and the very basis of the exploitation of man by man, and
of one people by another has been eliminated.
 But bourgeois chauvinism and proletarian

internationalism are determined not only by socio-economic conditions.
They are closely connected with the historical development
_-_-_
~^^1^^ K. Marx and F. Engels, Werke, Bd. 4, Berlin, S. 416.
62
of this or that nation, and are deeply rooted in its traditions,

social mentality, and ideological and cultural life, apart
from many other things. Let us add that in certain
conditions, these circumstances, as events in China have shown,
may acquire great importance. The elimination of the
socioeconomic basis of bourgeois chauvinism and society's
adoption of the ideas of proletarian internationalism do not
immediately lead to an overcoming of chauvinistic attitudes
and preconceptions. The specially important point to stress
here is the dependence of chauvinism on the social mentality
of the petty producer and the conservative and stable
character of socio-psychological phenomena in general. The
experience of socialist construction in the USSR and other
countries shows that the adoption of the new ideology does
not require as much time as the remaking of the social
mentality.
 In any country, the elimination of private property in

the means of production does on the whole create the
conditions for gradually doing away with bourgeois chauvinism
and establishing proletarian internationalism. These
conditions should sooner or later lead the people in the country
to realise that they have common interests with the peoples
of other countries, that is, to adopt the attitude of
proletarian internationalism. However, experience has shown this
process to be a long and complex one. The development of
the socialist countries and the strengthening of their national
independence and sovereignty has gone hand in hand with
a growing national awareness, which is on the whole a
positive phenomenon. However, the growth of national
awareness, in the presence of strong nationalistic traditions in a
country, may result in a temporary rise of bourgeois
chauvinism. This largely depends on the social structure of society,
and the specific features of its working class, in particular,
its political maturity and integrity, and its capacity to
withstand the influence of the surrounding petty-bourgeois
element. Finally, another important thing is the nature of its
leading party, the extent to which it has been tempered and
theoretically prepared, and whether it has close ties with the
international working-class and communist movement, and
so on.
 Lenin said that even in those parties which called

themselves Communist, internationalism may only be given lip
63
service, while philistine chauvinism is actually practised. He

warned that ``the urgency of the struggle against this evil,
against the most deep-rooted petty-bourgeois national
prejudices, looms ever larger with the mounting exigency of the
task of converting the dictatorship of the proletariat from a
national dictatorship (i.e., existing in a single country and
incapable of determining world politics) into an
international one (i.e., a dictatorship of the proletariat involving at
least several advanced countries, and capable of exercising a
decisive influence upon world politics as a whole)."^^1^^
 It goes without saying that fulfilment by any proletarian

party of its international duty is inseparable from its
national tasks. The point is what these national tasks are. It is
one thing when these are connected with the vital interests
of the working people at home and in other countries. It is
something quite different if the national tasks of the working
people of one country are contrasted with the tasks of the
working people of other countries.
 The Chinese leadership's open switch to Great-Han

hegemonism and the spread in China of bourgeois chauvinism
and even of racism have their roots in various historical,
social and ideological factors.
 China is a peasant country. Masses of peasants, fostered

in the feudal and the patriarchal traditions and for
centuries oppressed by local and foreign rulers, make up an
absolute majority of the population. Fairly recently, a large part
of the Chinese population consisted of petty artisans, traders
and other non-proletarian elements. That is precisely the
social medium which most vigorously breeds diverse
nationalistic views and attitudes, which, in definite circumstances,
easily grow into chauvinism and even racism. At the same
time the spread of chauvinistic views in China is also due
to an ideological factor like the country's long
domination by Confucianism and to such historical factors as
China's special role in the history of the Far East, foreign
rule, first of the Mongols, and then of the Manchus, and in
the last century, of the colonialists from the capitalist
countries.
 In the history of China, Confucianism was connected with

the Great-Han chauvinistic and Sinocentric idea of the
_-_-_
64
superiority of the Chinese (or of the ``Han'', as they called

themselves) over all the other peoples, whom Confucianism
regarded as ``savages'' whose duty was to pay tribute to the
Chinese emperor. The point is that from ancient times up
until the mid-19th century China was the leading country
in the Far East and in a sense a centre of culture and
civilisation which exerted a great influence on the neighbouring
peoples. No wonder China was known as the ``Middle
Kingdom" (``Chung Kuo''), whose historical documents
invariably designated neighbouring and distant peoples as ``
barbarians''. For centuries, this Sinocentrism was used by the
ruling classes of feudal China, and in the first half of the
20th century by various feudal and compradore groups,
notably the Chiang Kai-shek clique, to implant Great-Han
chauvinistic ideas and feelings, to spread xenophobia, etc.
 All of this has undoubtedly left a deep mark on the minds
of people from various sections of society in China and is
expressed even today in Great-Han arrogance which had
been fostered for centuries by the ruling circles of feudal
China. They held all things foreign to be unworthy of
attention, because China was the ``summit of world civilisation''.
Chinese civilisation was regarded as the highest
achievement of the human spirit which had to be spread across the
world. The idea of China's superiority over other countries
was put on record in the Confucian canons which
commanded great authority in Chinese society. Thus, one finds
in the book, Meng Tzu, the following: `Ì have heard men
use the teachings of our great country in order to re--
educate the barbarians, but never yet have I heard of anyone
being re-educated by the barbarians.'' This kind of
chauvinistic view of spiritual culture has left a deep mark on the
minds of men in different social sections of modern China,
and undoubtedly created the conditions for the spread of
Great-Han attitudes.
 The Chinese revolution tackled the tasks not only of the
Chinese people's social emancipation, but also of its
national liberation, and that was one of its specific features. Over
a period of two and a half centuries the Chinese people had
fought against the Manchu yoke, and once that had been
overthrown found itself facing the need to fight first against
the European imperialist powers and then against Japan.
This long and hard struggle for national liberation has
5---1362
65
sharpened the Chinese people's national feelings to an extreme,

and has intensified the feelings of distaste for all things
foreign. It has helped to put the national question in the
foreground of the Chinese social mentality.
 Consequently, for definite historical reasons, nationalism

in China has had two aspects since it emerged---the
progressive and the reactionary. Its progressive aspect was connected
with the Chinese people's struggle against China's oppression
by the Manchu aristocracy and the Chinese feudal lords who
sided with it, and then with the struggle against the
imperialism of the Great Powers, who sought to turn China into
a colony. It was the nationalism of an oppressed nation and
it was aimed at transforming China into an independent
democratic state, and helped to advance the Chinese
bourgeois-democratic revolution. All progressives in Chinese
society brimmed with patriotic feelings and yearned to drive
the foreign invaders from their native soil. These aspirations
were strikingly expressed in the revolutionary-democratic
teaching of Sun Yat-sen of whom Lenin said: `Èvery line
of Sun Yat-sen's platform breathes a spirit of militant and
sincere democracy."^^1^^ Sun Yat-sen's teaching, the
progressive trend of nationalism in China, played a great role in
the Chinese people's national liberation struggle.
 The reactionary aspect of Chinese nationalism consisted

in the fact that since its emergence it has had the features
of Great-Han chauvinism and contained the idea of the
Chinese people's national superiority over the other peoples,
and an urge for racism and hegemonism. The Chinese
bourgeoisie's aspirations to see China great and dominating the
international scene clashed with the country's oppressed and
semi-colonial status, and this served to sharpen its national
pride to an extreme.
 The ideologists of the Chinese bourgeoisie held the

yellow race to be a special and outstanding one, and believed
the Han people to have a leading role in it, and to be
destined in good time to establish their hegemony over the
whole world. Thus, in a letter to Liang Chi-chao in October
1907, Kang Yu-wei said that if there was ``no revolt" in
China, it would become the ``ruler of the world".^^2^^
_-_-_
~^^2^^ Quoted from Y. V. Ghudodeyev, On the Eve of the 1911 Revolution
in China, Moscow, 1966, p. 123 (in Russian).
66
 This shows that the ideologists of the Chinese bourgeoisie

saw their ultimate aim not in a prosperous and independent
China, which would seek to establish equitable and just
relations with other nations, but in raising China over and
above the others and turning her into their ruler. This spirit
of disdain for all things non-Chinese, this certainty of moral
superiority over other nations was fostered by the Chinese
bourgeoisie right up to 1949, when Chiang Kai-shek was
totally routed.
 The victory of the People's Revolution in 1949 and the

early successes of socialist construction produced in China,
on the one hand, a general patriotic elan, and on the other,
revived Great-Han arrogance and hegemonistic aspirations.
For a number of subjective and objective reasons these
feelings increasingly developed into Great-Han chauvinism. Of
course, this process would not have had such a fatal
character, and could have been stopped and cut short, had a united
Marxist-Leninist party, capable of overcoming any anti--
popular, anti-socialist ideological and political trend, properly
directed the people's state. However, the CPC was not such
a party and, as has been stressed above, carried within itself
the struggle of two lines: the Marxist-Leninist and the
chauvinist, bourgeois line. Moreover, the Marxist-Leninist,
internationalist line fell victim to the anti-Marxist policy of
the Mao group. We believe this was ultimately due to the
fact that most of the members of the CPC were of peasant
origin, while the working-class section made up an
insignificant minority. The working class of China did not succeed
in retaining its vanguard role at the bourgeois-democratic
stage of the revolution and in firmly taking the leading
position in the country at its socialist stage. Mao and his
followers, far from seeking to strengthen the vanguard role of
the Chinese working class, in fact did everything to reduce
it. China's working class proved to be unable to withstand
the pressure of Great-Han chauvinistic ideas and feelings,
and to put up adequate resistance to Mao and his followers.
As a result, Mao and his followers were given an opportunity
to hit out at the CPC and the working class of China, and
to push the country on to the way of Great-Han chauvinism
and hegemonism.
 The penetration of Marxism-Leninism into China, the

making and development of the Communist Party of China
67
and the emergence of proletarian internationalism in the

country proceeded in stubborn struggle against chauvinism,
which was at the time opposed to the Comintern's
internationalist line. At the very end of the 1920s and in the early
1930s, the chauvinistic views within the CPC were expressed
in the so-called Li Li-san line. This put China at the centre
of all world developments and regarded the Chinese
revolution as the ``main pillar of the world revolution'', that is,
took the Sinocentrist view of the world revolutionary
process. To secure a victory for the revolution in China, Li
Lisan and his followers were prepared to sacrifice everything,
including the lives of millions of workers and peasants not
only in China, but also in other countries, because they
expected to start a world war in the interest of the Chinese
revolution.
 We have recalled Li Li-san's Sinocentrism and chauvinism

at this point because, first, at the time his views largely
coincided with those of Mao Tse-tung, and second, ``Mao's
thought" on revolution and war today is reminiscent of Li's
views.
 This struggle between the internationalists and the

chauvinists in the CPC in the 1930s was carried on, among other
things, over the nature of contradictions of the epoch and
the interpretation of internationalism. The chauvinists held
that at the time the focal point of world contradictions did
not involve the Soviet Union and the capitalist system, but
China and Japan. Accordingly, they asserted that
internationalism did not consist in helping the Soviet Union to fight
the capitalist system but in helping the CPC to fight Japan
and the Kuomintang. That is why Mao held the Canadian
Doctor Bethune, who had come to China to help the Chinese
people fight Japan, to be the model internationalist. There
is obviously an interconnection between this early Sinocentrist
conception and the Mao and his group's present-day view of
the basic contradiction of the epoch and their view of
internationalism.
 In the late 1930s and the early 1940s, the ideological
struggle between Marxism-Leninism and chauvinism in the
CPC was also expressed in the form of somewhat abstract
discussion concerning the relation between the specific and
the general, the Chinese and the foreign (just as the struggle
between Marxism-Leninism and chauvinism in China in the
68
1960s at one time assumed the form of a discussion on the
dichotomy of unity), and then gave way to a broad campaign
for ``correction of style"---``cheng feng" (just as in the 1960s
the discussion on the dichotomy of unity turned out to be
connected with the movement for ``socialist education''). It
is now becoming increasingly clear, especially considering
the nature of the ``socialist education" campaign that the
struggle for ``correction of style" started on Mao's initiative
was essentially a chauvinistic drive against Marxism--
Leninism and internationalism in the guise of the fight with
dogmatism and alienation from Chinese reality. It was closely
connected with the establishment of a ``Sinified Marxism'',
that is, a substitution of Maoism for Marxism-Leninism.
 The ideas which promoted the emergence of a ``Sinified

Marxism" began to appear in China back in the 1920s. Thus,
at the time Kuo Mo-jo tried to show that Confucianism and
Marxism had many points in common, and also to prove
that Confucius was superior to Marx. At the time he
published an allegory entitled ``Marx's Visit to the Temple
of Confucius" (this article was subsequently included in a
collection of Kuo Mo-jo's articles, entitled ``Laughter in the
Underground" which was issued in a new edition in 1950).
It shows Confucius as a noble-minded and true sage of
antiquity and Marx as a ``whiskered crab speaking a pidgin
language''. After the talk between the two sages it turns out
that Marx had not produced any new ideas: everything that
he had said and written had been expressed by Confucius
long before. Marx is made to say the following: `Ì had never
expected to find such an esteemed fellow-thinker living in
the distant Far East over 2,000 years ago. You and I hold
exactly the same views."^^1^^
 In the early 1940s, the danger of the spread of

GreatHan views in China was pointed out by the journal 
Chungkuo wenhwa (organ of the CPC Central Committee), which
was published in Yenan. It said: `Àll the reactionary views
in modern China have one special tradition, and to give it
its name one could perhaps say that it is ideological
seclusion. As the people's democratic revolution and the culture
of modern China develop, this kind of backlash in ideology
appears in different forms, and in accordance with the
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Tihsia hsioshen, Shanghai, 1950, p. 27.
69
different stages in the development of the revolution and the

different objective conditions this kind of views in contrasted,
in different forms, with progressive revolutionary views and
the revolutionary forces. However, regardless of the
numerous transformations these have undergone, their main
content invariably consists in stressing the 'national features'
and 'specifics of China', a denial of the general laws of
human history, an assertion that the development of Chinese
society can proceed only on the basis of specific Chinese
regularities, that China can advance only along her own
way which runs outside the general laws governing the
development of human history. In China, this ideological
tradition of seclusion ... is a specific feature of reactionary
views."^^1^^
 In the late 1930s and the early 1940s, Chinese

Trotskyites, like Yeh Ching, propounded, under the pretext of ``
mastering the specifics of China'', ideas which essentially
amounted to an assertion of the superiority of ``the Chinese
spirit'', ideas borrowed from the arsenal of feudal and
bourgeois Chinese chauvinism. They demanded that
MarxismLeninism should be Sinified. The journal Shihtai chinshen
wrote: ``There is need to modify the form of
MarxismLeninism, and to make it a thing that would be like a new,
Chinese thing differing from the original one."^^2^^
 These views were subjected to criticism in the CPC. The

journal Chungkuo wenhwa said that those who insisted on
the need to Sinify Marxism-Leninism `ìmplied Sinification
to mean a change of its form and by a change of its form a
total rejection of original Marxism".^^3^^
 However, this criticism of those who urged that

MarxismLeninism should be Sinified did not mean that the CPC
succeeded in overcoming the growing tendency towards
chauvinism. The fact is that since the late 1930s, Mao himself was
insisting on ``Sinifying Marxism''. As we have already seen,
the ``correction of style" movement had a Great-Han
character and was used to hit out at Marxism-Leninism and
internationalism within the ranks of the CPC. The 7th
Congress of the CPC in 1945 was told that Mao had produced
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Chungkuo wenhwa No. 1, 1940.
~^^2^^ Ibid.
~^^3^^ Ibid,
70
a ``Sinified Marxism''. This congress reflected the emergence

of Mao's personality cult and a marked intensification of
Sinocentrist attitudes within the ranks of the Party.
 The Soviet Union's victory over nazi Germany and

militarist Japan, the emergence of the socialist world system, the
formation of the Chinese People's Republic in 1949 and the
establishment by the Soviet Union of friendly relations
with her had a positive influence in fortifying the
MarxistLeninist forces within the CPC. This process was reflected
and consolidated in the decisions of the 8th Congress of
the CPC in 1956.
 In 1958, Mao once again managed to increase his

ideological influence in the CPC and to secure the adoption of the
adventurist ``Three Red Banners" line: the general line, the
``Great Leap Forward" and the people's communes. Since
then there has been a noticeable increase in the Chinese
leaders' policy of Great-Han chauvinism and hegemonism.
 At the turn of the century, that is, the period in which
the minds of the elder generation of the Chinese leaders were
moulded, ideas of ``pan-Asianism'', superiority of the yellow
race, the idea that the peoples of Asia had a common future,
the idea of a pan-Asian Sino-Japanese alliance, etc.,
appeared in China under the impact of Japanese theories. It is
well known that in some historical conditions nationalism
all too easily assumes the form of racism, the view that
some nations are physically or spiritually superior to others.
 Of course, the Chinese leaders are well aware of the

illfame of racism, which has been used by fascism and nazism.
That is why they naturally seek to conceal their views which
reek of racism. However, they are not always successful.
There were already racist, pan-Asian elements in Mao's idea
of the ``wind from the East" prevailing over the ``wind from
the West''. That is why this idea was duly rejected by the
international communist movement.
 The Maoist pan-Asianism and racism is most pronounced

in their political line with respect to Japan, which they
regard as a possible temporary ally in their drive for
domination in Asia and hegemony in the world. In a talk Mao
had in the early 1950s with Japanese POW generals and
officers, who were being allowed to return home from China,
he said that China intended to take a dominant position in
Asia, and that Japan should not wait too long. He said:
71
``China and Japan must join hands and forget the past.'' In
1961, Mao met a Japanese delegation and suggested that
China and Japan had a common future. He said: ``We share
the same destiny, which is why we are united. We must
enlarge the framework of unity and gather together in a
unity the peoples of the whole of Asia, Africa and Latin
America and of the whole world.'' In their talks with
Japanese delegations, the Maoists keep stressing that the Chinese
and the Japanese belong to one and the same race, that
they have a common written language and other elements
of culture.
 This short look into the past shows that the Great-Han
chauvinism and hegemonism in the views and political line
of the Chinese leadership is not at all a casual development,
but that both are rooted in China's socio-economic and
ideological development, and her Confucian traditions and
history.
__ALPHA_LVL2__
2. Great-Han Chauvinism
 and Hegemonism in the Guise of Proletarian
 Internationalism
 A typical feature of the Chinese leaders' theoretical and

practical activity is that they seek thoroughly to cover up
their views and acts with Marxist-Leninist terminology and
to present these as internationalism. In this way they
managed for a long time to mislead not only the CPC but
also some members of the international communist and
working-class movement. This they also managed to do because
they acted with circumspection, behind a barrage of
revolutionary catchwords, calls for fighting imperialism and so on.
 However, with time the waters receded and the stones
appeared on the surface, as the saying in China goes,
revealing the true Great-Han, chauvinistic and hegemonistic
essence of the views of the Chinese leaders who acted ever
more openly and with growing brazenness.
 Maoism's Great-Han, chauvinistic and hegemonistic

character was most fully revealed during the ``cultural
revolution''. Let us recall in this connection that on August 1, 1966,
Mao issued a tatsupao to the Hungweipings in which he
said, with reference to Marx: ``The proletariat has not only
72
to emancipate itself but has also to emancipate all mankind.

If it is unable to emancipate all mankind the proletariat
itself will be unable to win real emancipation.'' Mao gave
these words a Great-Han chauvinistic twist. We know that
in China today it is Mao's followers that are known as the
proletariat (regardless of their class status). That is why
Mao's talk about the proletariat having to emancipate
the whole of mankind means that it is Mao's followers that
have to emancipate the whole of mankind, and to carry
out this `èmancipation'' on the strength of the ``thought of
Mao Tse-tung" and the establishment of a corresponding
order.
 That this was precisely the meaning given to Marx's

words about the proletariat's emancipatory mission was
shown by the appearance within a few weeks of a
Hungweiping `àppeal to our compatriots'', which spoke of their
urge resolutely to hoist ``the great red banner of Mao
Tsetungism all over the globe''.
 The ``cultural revolution" in China has intensified all

manner of chauvinistic Great-Han attitudes, xenophobia and
racism, especially among the young who have no knowledge
of Marxism-Leninism and who have been blinded and
confused by the spread of the ``thought of Mao Tse-tung''. The
idea that China is politically, morally and ideologically
superior over all the other countries, that the ``thought of Mao
Tse-tung" is the summit of Marxist-Leninist thinking, that
China is the centre of world revolution, etc., is being
drummed into the heads of the Chinese people.
 The 9th Congress of the CPC held in April 1969 has a
very important place in Maoism's final transformation into
a Great-Han chauvinistic and hegemonistic ideology. It
showed that Maoism is not only alien but is deeply hostile
to proletarian internationalism. The material of the 9th
Congress, specifically the programme section of the Rules it
adopted, contains the old call of `èmancipating the whole of
mankind" and insists that the present epoch is ``the epoch
when imperialism is moving towards its universal collapse,
and socialism towards victory all over the world''. While
this is quite right in itself, the point is that the Maoists invest
it with a Great-Han hegemonistic meaning. After all, Mao
and his followers do not accept any other socialism except
their own ``true'' one. That is why this talk of the victory
73
of socialism all over the world means a victory for ``Mao''s

thought'', a victory for China.
 Since the congress, the Chinese propaganda has made no

secret of the Chinese leadership's intentions to remake the
whole world according to the Maoist image. The Chinese
press reports that this is to be done through a world war,
which is regarded as an engine of history, and as something
that helps to foster and temper the people. Extreme
chauvinism is known always to lead to war. The Great-Han
hegemonism of Mao Tse-tung and his followers appears to
be no exception.
 Today, there is no international event of any importance

to which the Chinese leaders have not openly taken a
GreatHan chauvinistic approach. Take the unity of the countries
within the socialist community in the fight against
imperialism, the international communist movement, the national
liberation struggle, Afro-Asian solidarity, the movement of
the peoples for peace, etc.---to each of these the Chinese
leaders have not taken a class, internationalist approach, but
a narrowly nationalistic, Sinocentric approach, in the light
of their chauvinistic and hegemonistic interests.
 The Main Document of the International Meeting of

Communist and Workers' Parties held in Moscow in the
summer of 1969, re-emphasised the decisive role of the world
socialist system in the anti-imperialist struggle, and once
again drew attention to the need for the cohesion of the
socialist states.^^1^^ However, it is precisely against the world
socialist system and the socialist countries' cohesion that the
Mao group has carried on a fierce fight, directing all their
hatred at the Soviet Union in particular. At the 12th
Plenary Meeting of the CPC Central Committee, held in
October 1968, the Maoists called for the establishment of a ``broad
united front of peoples" aimed against the USA and the
USSR, a demand allegedly justified by absurd talk of a
``deal'' between the USSR and the USA.
 It is well known, however, that Mao and his followers

now and again ascribe their own intentions to others for the
purpose of camouflage. Every sober-minded observer will
realise that they make mention of the USA merely to present
themselves as ``fighters against imperialism''. In actual fact,
_-_-_

1969, pp. 21, 23,
74
the Chinese leaders call for the establishment of such a front

to fight the Soviet Union. Will anyone believe that they are
in earnest about fighting the USA, the leading power of the
capitalist world, while China's foreign trade relations are
being increasingly re-oriented upon the major capitalist
countries closely allied with the USA, namely, Japan, the
FRG and Britain, among others? However, we are not here
interested in this hypocritical manner of action, but in the
fact that the Chinese leaders continue to claim to be
internationalists while betraying proletarian internationalism at
every step.
 The 9th Congress of the CPC officially adopted the

antiSoviet line of the present Chinese leaders. Its decisions
contain not only statements about ``Soviet revisionism" and a
``deal between the Soviet leaders and American imperialism'',
but also assertions that the Soviet Union is a ``
social-imperialist country''.
 The Chinese leaders' talk about the need for

simultaneously fighting US imperialism is no more than a smoke
screen. To see the truth of this one needs merely look at
their policy on the Vietnam issue. Their attitude to the US
aggression against the Democratic Republic of Vietnam most
fully and obviously reflects their betrayal of the interests of
proletarian internationalism. The USA would never have
dared to launch its aggression had the CPC leadership not
pursued its anti-Soviet line and not attacked the unity of the
socialist countries. When escalating their aggression in
Vietnam, the US imperialists undoubtedly reckon with the
Great-Han chauvinism of the Chinese leaders and their
stubborn refusal to accept any proposals on concerted action by
China, the USSR and the other socialist countries in
helping the Vietnamese people beat back the US aggression.
 The Maoists have not only failed to give the fighting
Vietnamese people adequate military and economic assistance but
have also in every way hampered the other socialist
countries in their efforts to do so. At the same time, they have
tried to capitalise politically on the Vietnamese people's
struggle, and have resorted to provocative attacks against
the Soviet Union's policy on the Vietnam question.
Specifically, the Chinese leaders have qualified the joint action by
the fraternal Parties in rendering assistance to fighting
Vietnam as ``chauvinism'', as ``treason'', and ``betrayal'', while
75
presenting their own Great-Power, pro-imperialist line as a

model of proletarian internationalism.
 However, recent facts have exposed the verbal shifts and
dodges of the CPC leaders. The Chinese press has been
writing less and less about the Vietnamese people's struggle.
What is more, the question was for all practical purposes
not dealt with even at the 9th Congress of the CPC. The
report disposes of it in one sentence: ``We ... resolutely
support the Vietnamese people in carrying to the end the
war of resistance against American aggression for the
salvation of their country.''
 In contrast to this nationalism-dictated approach to the

Vietnam problem, the International Meeting of Communist
and Workers' Parties stressed that it was the primary aim
of joint action by all the Communist and Workers' Parties
and all the anti-imperialist forces to give all-round support
to the heroic Vietnamese people. The Meeting adopted a
special document, `Ìndependence, Freedom and Peace for
Vietnam!'', in which the Communists of the world once
again condemned the US aggression in Vietnam and
reaffirmed their complete solidarity with the Vietnamese people's
just struggle. The document says: ``True to the principles of
proletarian internationalism and in the spirit of fraternal
solidarity, the international communist and working-class
movement will continue to render the Vietnamese people all
the assistance they require until the final triumph of their
just cause."^^1^^
 The international communist and working-class movement
is an embodiment of the principles of proletarian
internationalism, but it is precisely against this movement that Mao
and his followers have been carrying on their stubborn fight.
They bear a great responsibility for their efforts to
undermine the international solidarity of the working class and its
parties.
 The CPC leaders have carried on extensive splitting

activity in the ranks of the international communist movement,
slandering the tried and true leaders of the working class,
and organising factional groups and whole parties with a
Maoist platform who take orders from Peking. There are
_-_-_

1969, p. 44.
76
schemes in Peking for setting up a bloc of Maoist parties,

to fight the Marxist-Leninist parties and the world
communist movement.
 The Chinese leadership's Great-Han chauvinism and

hegemonism is based on Sinocentrism, which has been duly
clothed and thoroughly camouflaged to look like
MarxismLeninism. But once the camouflage is off, its Great-Power
chauvinistic and hegemonistic substance stands out and is
clearly seen to have nothing in common with
MarxismLeninism or proletarian internationalism.
 Thus, the prospects for political developments in the

colonial and semi-colonial countries are viewed in the light
of Sinocentrism. Back in 1940, Mao said in his work On
New Democracy that in the course of the revolution only the
Chinese-type new democracy could be used as a form of state
in the colonial and semi-colonial countries. While noting its
transitional nature, he stressed that this form was necessary
and obligatory. This means that in their political
development all colonies and semi-colonies must pass along China's
way; in other words, all the countries subsequently included
by the Chinese leadership in the ``world village" would
necessarily have to follow in the tracks of China's
development. From this it necessarily and logically followed that
China was the leader of the peoples in the colonial and
semicolonial countries.
 In 1963, the Sinocentrist idea was essentially made the

basis of the ``Proposals on the General Line of the
International Communist Movement" and of other documents
containing an analysis of the present epoch. At the time, the
Chinese leaders said that Asia, Africa and Latin America
were the ``focal point of various contradictions of the
capitalist world and may be said to be the focal point of all the
contradictions existing in the world. These areas constitute
the weakest link in the imperialist chain and the main
centres of revolutionary storms in the modern world".^^1^^ The
struggle of the peoples of Asia, Africa and Latin America
`ìs of decisive importance for the cause of the international
proletariat as a whole'',^^2^^ and ``without the support of the
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Once Again on Comrade Togliatti's Differences With Us, Peking,

1963, p. 34 (in Chinese).

~^^2^^ Ibid., pp. 47--48.
77
revolutionary struggle of the oppressed nations and peoples

in the countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America, the
proletariat and masses of people in the capitalist countries of
Europe and America cannot realise their aspirations---to be
rid of privation and calamities caused by the oppression of
capital and the threat of imperialist war".^^1^^
 There is no doubt at all about the great importance of

the liberatory revolutionary struggle of the peoples in the
countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America or about the
need for the unity of the progressive forces of the world in
the struggle against imperialism. But the ``Proposals on the
General Line of the International Communist Movement"
clearly contained an attempt to push the international
communist movement into the background and to contrast it
with the national liberation movement, thereby separating
the national liberation movement from the world socialist
system and the international communist movement.
 At the 9th Congress of the CPC, the approach to the

basic contradictions of the present epoch, as given in the
``Proposals on the General Line of the International
Communist Movement'', was markedly modified. The report
asserted that `ìn the modern world there are four major
contradictions: the contradiction between the oppressed
nations, on the one hand, and imperialism and social--
imperialism, on the other; the contradiction between the
proletariat and the bourgeoisie in the capitalist and the
revisionist countries; the contradiction between the imperialist
countries and the social-imperialist country,^^2^^ between the
imperialist countries themselves; the contradiction between
the socialist countries, on the one hand, and imperialism and
social-imperialism, on the other''.
 In this ``new scheme" of the basic contradictions of the
present epoch the contradiction brought to the fore may be
formulated as follows: the contradiction between the
working class and the national liberation movement and so-called
social-imperialism, because the latter is mentioned in all the
four contradictions.
 That is not at all accidental. The Chinese leaders still

seek to put China at the centre of world developments. All
the theoretical exercises described above are required in
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Once Again on Comrade Togliatti's Differences With Us, p. 49.
~^^2^^ Meaning the USSR.
78
order to introduce the idea of China's leading role in the

present-day socio-historical process. That is the purpose
behind the accusation of social-imperialism levelled at the
Soviet Union, because this is an attempt to undermine its
prestige as the leading socialist power in the world
revolutionary process, and to put China in its place.
 The ``people's war" theory provides more evidence of the

Great-Power, chauvinistic and hegemonistic attitudes of the
present CPC leadership. This theory was first briefly
outlined in an article, ``Long Live the Victory in the People's
War!'', written by Lin Piao, who was a close associate of
Mao at the time and Minister of Defence. The publication
of this article was timed for the 20th anniversary of
the Chinese people's victory in the war against the
Japanese invaders (September 1955). This article was
designed to impose on the peoples of Asia, Africa and Latin
America the Chinese model of revolution, to unleash armed
conflicts in various parts of the globe, to secure in the course
of these conflicts a weakening of the USA and of the USSR,
and ultimately to establish China's undivided domination on
the globe.
 The substance of this model of revolution is expressed in

the two words ``people's war" by which is meant extensive
spread of guerrilla warfare based on strongholds set up in
the villages and the surrounding of the towns by the village.
The article says: ``Many countries and peoples in Asia,
Africa and Latin America are now being subjected to aggression
and enslavement on a serious scale by the imperialists headed
by the United States and its lackeys. The basic political and
economic conditions in many of these countries have many
similarities to those that prevailed in old China. As in China,
the peasant question is extremely important in these regions.
The peasants constitute the main force of the national--
democratic revolution directed against the imperialists and their
lackeys. In committing aggression against these countries,
the imperialists usually begin by seizing the big cities and
the main lines of communication, but they are unable to
bring the vast countryside completely under their control.
The countryside, and the countryside alone, can provide the
broad areas in which the revolutionaries can manoeuvre
freely. The countryside, and the countryside alone, can
provide the revolutionary bases from which the revolutionaries
79
can go forward to final victory. Precisely for this reason,

Comrade Mao Tse-tung's theory of establishing
revolutionary base areas in the rural districts and encircling the cities
from the countryside is attracting more and more attention
among the peoples in these regions.
 ``Taking the entire globe, if North America and Western

Europe can be called 'the cities of the world', then Asia,
Africa and Latin America constitute 'the rural areas of the
world'. Since World War II, the proletarian revolutionary
movement has for various reasons been temporarily held
back in the North American and West European capitalist
countries, while the people's revolutionary movement in
Asia, Africa and Latin America has been growing vigorously.
In a sense, the contemparary world revolution also presents
a picture of the encirclement of cities by the rural areas."^^1^^
 In their efforts to invest the ``people's war" theory with

international significance the Chinese leaders simultaneously
seek to minimise the historic experience of the October
Revolution. The article says: ``The October Revolution began
with armed uprisings in the cities and then spread to the
countryside, while the Chinese revolution won nation-wide
victory through the encirclement of the cities from the rural
areas and the final capture of the cities."^^2^^ The Peking leaders
suggest that the experience of the proletariat of Russia is
inapplicable to the practice of the revolutionary movement in
the countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America, allegedly
being of purely European significance, whereas Chinese
experience is of universal significance and can be used by
countries whose population is mainly rural.
 Seeking to impose the experience of China's liberation

struggle on other peoples, Peking leaders go to the extent of
twisting the history of the Chinese revolution. Contrary to
the actual facts, they argue that the Chinese people's victory
over Japan and then over the Kuomintang was scored
exclusively through ``reliance on one's own strength''. Without
in any way minimising the importance of the Chinese
people's struggle against Japanese imperialism, there is need to
emphasise that Japan's defeat was predetermined by the
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Lin Piao, ``Long Live the Victory of People's War!'', In
Commemoration of the 20th Anniversary of Victory in the Chinese People's War
of Resistance against Japan, Peking, 1967, pp. 48--49.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 42.
80
Soviet Union's entry into the war against her. Peking leaders
forget such ``trifles'' as the fact that China's victory in the
``people's war" was predetermined by the rout of Japanese
imperialism.
 At one time, Mao himself admitted: ``We are told that
`Victory is possible even without international help'. This is
a mistaken idea. In the epoch in which imperialism exists,
it is impossible for a genuine people's revolution to win
victory in any country without any assistance from
international revolutionary forces, and if this victory is won, it
will not be consolidated in the absence of such assistance."^^1^^
Similar statements were also made by other Chinese leaders,
who stressed that without the Soviet Union's assistance
China's victory over Japan would have taken a long time.
However, at present they are trying in every way to isolate
the national liberation movement from the international
working-class movement and its product, the world socialist
system, and to impose on this movement their policy of
``reliance on one's own strength''.
 Let us now consider the question of this allegedly

universal and world-wide character of Chinese military experience.
Is it right to say that at present the peoples of Asia, Africa
and Latin America are faced with the need of a ``people''s
war'', as the Chinese leaders insist? We do not think so.
Lenin wrote: ``Marxist dialectics calls for a concrete analysis
of each specific historical situation."^^2^^ We are witnessing the
collapse of the colonial system of imperialism: not more
than 30 million people still live in colonies, as compared
with 1,500 million 20 years ago. The overwhelming majority
of the colonies have won independence, some of them arms
in hand. At present, the former colonial and semi-colonial
countries are faced with the task of consolidationg this
political independence, winning economic independence, and
making good their economic and cultural lag.
 The Document of the International Meeting of

Communist and Workers' Parties stresses that ``the solution of these
problems involves far-reaching socio-economic changes, the
implementation of democratic agrarian reforms in the
interests of the working peasantry and with its participation, the
abolition of outdated feudal and pre-feudal relations,
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, Vol. VI, Peking, 1961, p. 416.

6---1362
81
liquidation of oppression by foreign monopolies, radical

democratisation of social and political life and the state apparatus,
regeneration of national culture and the development of its
progressive traditions, the strengthening of revolutionary
Parties and the founding of such Parties where they do not
yet exist".^^1^^ These socio-economic transformations cannot, of
course, be realised the military way. Such is the specific
historical situation which now obtains in the countries of Asia,
Africa and Latin America.
 Puppet regimes exist in a number of these countries.

Besides, imperialism, while using neo-colonialist methods,
simultaneously has no qualms about resorting to direct armed
intervention in the domestic affairs of the newly-free
countries. We have already said that some peoples continue to
live under the yoke of colonialism. That is why
nationalcolonial wars in our day and age are possible and are in fact
inevitable, but they are only one of the methods in the fight
against imperialism.
 At present, political and economic methods of fighting

imperialism and its local agents are being brought to the
fore in the countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America, and
these methods are as or more complex than those of armed
struggle. That is why it is quite wrong today to regard
armed struggle as an absolute and to insist on it as the
central task facing the peoples of these continents.
 This question arises: what is the purpose of the Chinese

leaders' strong advocacy of ``people's war"? There is only
one answer: their only purpose is to provoke armed conflicts
in various parts of the globe, to incite civil wars within the
liberated countries, to involve the USA and the USSR in
these conflicts and wars, so as to start a world war while
remaining on the sidelines. There are any number of facts
to bear this out. Take the war-mongering policy of the
Chinese leaders during the Indo-Pakistani armed conflicts
in 1965 and 1971, their intensified support of the extremist
elements in Indonesia, Burma, Congo, Thailand, Malaysia
and elsewhere. Today, during Israel's aggression against the
Arab countries they keep saying that the Soviet Union has
allegedly betrayed the Arabs. They want to provoke the
_-_-_
~^^1^^ International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties,

Moscow, 1969, p. 28.
82
Soviet Union into direct armed intervention in the Middle

East conflict and by getting Israel's imperialist friends to take
counteraction, to push the world on the brink of nuclear war.
 Analysing the international situation after the Second

World War, in 1946, Mao put forward his ``theory of the
intermediary zone'', which allegedly lies between the Soviet
Union and the USA. This ``theory'' contained the assertion
that the principal contradiction of the epoch was not that
between the socialist countries and the capitalist world (in
this instance represented by the USA), but between the USA
and the `ìntermediate zone''. As time went on, the
chauvinistic element in this ``theory'' was steadily built up, until
finally the Soviet Union was ranked with the USA, while
China was brought to the fore as the leader of the ``
intermediate zone''.
 Of late the Maoist leadership has advanced a doctrine

of ``the monopoly of two superpowers'', according to which
two Great Powers---the USSR and the USA---struggle
acutely for the division of the world into spheres of
influence and for establishing sole supremacy.
 The doctrine is another proof that Peking goes to all

lengths, including the departure from its class positions, in
order to reach its purposes. When analysing the world
situation and defining foreign policy tasks, the Chinese leaders
regard not socio-economic and political factors but
geopolitical factors, geographic position and other state features
as being of paramount importance. Moreover, they derive
benefit from the negation of the objectively existing division
of the world into two diametrically opposed social systems
and the genuine nature of the resultant class struggle in
the world arena.
 The Maoists disregard the fact that one of the Great
Powers is a socialist state and the other is an imperialist
state. The latter actively supports Israeli aggression in the
Middle East, whereas the former acts as a reliable friend
and bulwark of Arab states in their struggle for the
elimination of the aftermath of Israeli aggression. The latter
has occupied Taiwan, a Chinese island, and has a treaty
of alliance with Chiang Kai-shek, is resorting to aggressive
actions in Indochina in the direct vicinity of China's
borders, and is provoking against the Korean People's
Democratic Republic. The former is supplying the Vietnamese
6*
83
people with weapons, ammunition and other materiel and

resources, and is rendering the peoples of Indochina
political and diplomatic support, is actively counteracting the
provocations against the fraternal Korean People's
Democratic Republic, is strongly decrying the occupation of
Taiwan by the USA, and is consistently exposing all
attempts aimed at creating a situation of ``two Chinas'.
 In an attempt to fit all the diverse and complex world

developments into an artificially concocted scheme the
Maoists regard these developments through a prism of the
conception of ``the monopoly of two superpowers''.
According to their logic, to eliminate backwardness or to achieve
further progress the peoples have no need at all to fight
for their national or social liberation, for the solution of
their economic and political tasks. As soon as ``the
middle-sized and small states unite against the two superpowers'',
it was stated in Peking early in June 1971, ``the weak states
will turn into strong ones, and the small into big ones.''
 But the main purport of this doctrine is to give

ideological substance to ``the exclusive role" played by China as
the leader of ``the struggle against two superpowers''. They
circulate the following assertions: the People's Republic of
China is similar to ``small and weak" states, shares with
them `à special community of features'', for she is also
``subjected to aggression and interference on the part of
the `superpowers' ''. Their modesty being exhausted at this
point, they make a different statement: ``China towers above
the East as a giant.'' By this they imply that China is the
biggest and strongest state among those which `òppose the
two superpowers''. This explains why on May 20, 1970,
Mao Tse-tung put into circulation the term ``small and
weak states''.
 An approach to the world in terms of a conglomeration

of nations and countries, in which ``small and weak" states
have to seek China's protection from the ``rule of two
superpowers" and a deliberate introduction of confusion
into people's concepts about the alignment of class forces
and the nature of the world struggle only play into the
hands of imperialist politicians and ideologists.
 The thesis of ``two superpowers" is in unison with the

ideas long harboured by the reactionary circles in the West.
Two years before the appearance of this Chinese doctrine
84
Strauss, the leader of the revenge-seeking forces in West
Germany, published his book The Challenge and the Reply.
A Programme for Europe, in which he reiterates the idea
about ``the dominance of two Great Powers---the USA and
the USSR"---and urges Europeans (albeit in more modest
terms---in European terms rather than in global ones as
Peking does) to create `àn autonomous Europe which would
confront both the USA and the USSR" and in which the
ERG would, of course, be the ``most important strategically,
and the strongest economically''.
 The Chinese leaders' Great-Han chauvinism reveals itself

not only in their theoretical approach to present-day
problems, but mainly in their practical activity in which they
willingly make use for their own interests of various
conceptions like pan-Africanism, pan-Arabism, pan-Asianism,
the ``young emergent forces'', etc. They have deliberately
inflated racist feelings by plugging the antithesis of East
and West.
 While paying lip service to Afro-Asian solidarity, Mao

and his followers are in fact prepared to recognise solidarity
only where it meets their own plans, that is, solidarity on
their own ideological-political platform. With the start of
the ``cultural revolution" in China, there has been a marked
step-up in the efforts to make the peoples of Asia and Africa
recognise Peking's ideological leadership at any price, ``to
carry to the peoples of Africa a clear understanding of the
genius of Mao Tse-tung and the great proletarian cultural
revolution'', and to lend ``the new African national
organisations the militant spirit of Mao Tse-tung''. But because
the peoples of these countries want to develop relations with
each other on the basis of the principles they formulated
together at Bandung in 1955, and to set themselves goals
meeting the national interests, the Chinese leaders have
tried to undermine Afro-Asian solidarity in every possible
way. The most glaring instance of this policy is their
torpedoing of the Second Conference of Asian and African
Heads of State and Government that was to have been held
at Algiers in 1965.
 There is rejection in Peking of any other solidarity

between the peoples and countries of Asia and Africa except
that based on the ``thought of Mao Tse-tung''. Any other
kind of solidarity is regarded as being illegitimate and is
85
being branded as resulting from the moves of ``modern

revisionism''.
 Economic diplomacy, designed to play upon the young

national states' desire to develop their economy and
cooperate with other countries for that purpose, is a growing
element of China's foreign policy with respect to the
developing countries. Its main task is, of course, to exercise
Chinese influence on the countries of Asia and Africa. The
CPC leadership has been trying to use the Afro-Asian
Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development in
its efforts to impose on Asian and African countries its
recipes for economic development, above all, the principle
of ``reliance on one's own strength'', which it takes to mean
that the newly-emergent countries should look to support
only from China. Co-operation with China is the only type
of economic, scientific and technical co-operation Peking
finds acceptable for the newly-emergent countries. This
means that in the sphere of economic relations as well the
Maoists intend to impose on the Asian and African countries
the domination of China and to set up a kind of closed
AfroAsian economic organisation under Peking's control.
Claiming to be the ``best friends" of Asia and Africa and trying
hard to prove their ``selflessness'', they readily issue
promises of economic, scientific and technical aid and support
in the fight against `ìmperialism and the old and new
colonialism''. However, the experience of the peoples of Asia
and Africa tells them that Peking's aid either comes to mere
promises (for, as a rule, Peking honours only a small part
of its commitments) or is in the nature of a Trojan horse.
 The Chinese leaders seek to impose on the developing

countries their own specific way of social development. They
take little interest in the actual practical problems of
construction in the young national states, such as development
of the productive forces, achievement of genuine economic
independence, etc. They are much more concerned with
involving these countries in struggle with each other over
territory (Chinese diplomats assigned to Africa are
explicitly set the task of ``helping the African brothers to secure
realisation of the new countries' just territorial claims''),
with starting civil wars wherever possible and spreading
chaos and confusion so as to present all this as a ``
revolutionary storm''. When this kind of meddling in the affairs
86
of the newly-emergent countries sparks off an offensive by

domestic reaction or even open intervention by imperialism,
the leaders in Peking pretend that none of this has anything
to do with their activity and launch upon obscure discourses
about the `ìnevitable zigzags and relapses" in the
development of world revolution. That was exactly what happened,
for instance, after the failure of the attempted coup in
Indonesia, which was staged not without Peking's
participation.
 The Chinese leadership's Great-Power calculations are

chiefly connected with Asia, which is regarded as a sphere
of immediate Chinese interests and the area of China's
traditional influence. In the last few years the Chinese
leadership have carried out their major foreign-policy
measures in Asia, with the countries in this area taking the
bulk of China's trade and one-half of her aid to the
developing states. In fact, it is in Asia that one of the
characteristic methods of their foreign policy---divide and rule---is most
clearly revealed. There they seek to set at odds everyone
they can in order to pave China's way to the domination of
that part of the world.
 To promote their chauvinistic interests the Maoists are

prepared to betray the national liberation movement of
Asian peoples. A glaring example of this was the Peking
support of the repressions fulminated by the Pakistani
military regime against the liberation movement in East Bengal
in 1971.
 The Chinese leadership's Great-Han chauvinistic claims

to domination in Asia and their gross intervention in the
affairs of the Asian countries, their expansionist schemes
and attempts to decide territorial issues by force of arms
have led to a situation in which China's Asian policy
is meeting with ever growing difficulties. The Chinese
leaders' policy with respect to the US aggression in Vietnam
is also the source of grave apprehension and much concern
in Asia.
 Equally grave apprehensions are aroused by the Maoists'

policy in Africa and Latin America, which is reflected in
growing mistrust of it in the African and Latin American
countries.
 It is the national-territorial issue that has perhaps most

forcefully revealed the Chinese leaders' Great-Han
87
chauvinism. The ideologists of the Chinese national bourgeoisie used

to spread expansionist ideas with much vigour. From the
turn of the century, books and articles published in China
presented the Chinese history as an expansion of her national
boundaries, with vast territories bordering on China and
even whole countries designated as having been ``lost'' by
China. Today, China's leaders have Great-Power schemes
of re-establishing China within the boundaries of the last
Chin dynasty. Let us note the fact that even in the 1930s
and 1940s, when the CPC was giving a lead in the fight
against Japanese imperialism for the country's liberation,
there were hints of Great-Power notions in some of Mao's
statements. Thus, in an interview with Edgar Snow in 1936,
he declared that after the people's revolution had been
victorious in China, Outer Mongolia would automatically
become a part of the Chinese Federation, at its own will.^^1^^
 In 1954, the Chinese leaders raised with a Soviet
government delegation the question of a merger between the
Mongolian People's Republic and the Chinese People's Republic
totally ignoring the Mongolian people's `òwn will''.
Characteristically, that same year a book on China's modern
history published in Peking showed Mongolia, and also the
Korean People's Democratic Republic, the Democratic
Republic of Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Burma and a part of the
territory of the USSR as lands ``lost'' by China. The next
event which revealed the Chinese leadership's chauvinistic,
expansionist attitudes on the national-territorial questions
was the Sino-Indian border dispute and the Chinese leaders'
territorial claims on India, which led to a number of armed
clashes along the border.
 The Chinese leaders' expansionism was equally revealed

with respect to the Sino-Soviet border. Back in 1945, Mao
Tse-tung said in the Political Report to the 7th Congress
of the CPC that ``the Soviet Union was the first country to
renounce unequal treaties and sign new, equal treaties with
China".^^2^^ From this statement it followed that relations
between the USSR and China were based on justice and
equality, and that there were no outstanding issues,
including border issues between the two countries. However, very
_-_-_
~^^1^^ See Edgar Snow, Red Star Over China, London, 1968, p. 443.
88
soon Mao ``discovered'' some `òutstanding'' territorial

problems between the USSR and China. Beginning with 1960,
the Chinese side systematically staged provocations on the
Sino-Soviet border, making efforts to `àssimilate'' various
parts of Soviet territory. This was followed by statements
in the Chinese press alleging that the treaties defining the
Sino-Soviet border were unequal,^^1^^ and that these treaties
had cost China the loss of her territories. When meeting a
group of Japanese socialists in 1964, Mao already put
forward a whole programme of territorial claims on the Soviet
Union, adding that China was yet to ``present her bill" for
the vast territory lying in the Baikal-Kamchatka-Vladivostok
triangle.^^2^^
 As a logical sequence of this there came the armed

provocations staged in 1969 in the area of the Soviet island
of Damansky and on other sectors of the Soviet-Chinese
border.
 The Chinese leaders' territorial claims on the Soviet Union

demonstrate their expansionism and once again show up
their Great-Han chauvinistic and hegemonistic aspirations.
All of this reveals the true nature of the Chinese leaders'
political line and shows it to be anti-socialist. Today, their
Great-Han chauvinism and hegemonism is increasingly
acquiring a militaristic and political tenor, acting as an
accomplice of the most reactionary forces of world
imperialism and the worst enemy of proletarian internationalism.
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Jcnmin jihpao, March 8, 1963.
~^^2^^ Pravda, September 2, 1964.
[89]
__NUMERIC_LVL1__
Chapter Three
__ALPHA_LVL1__
ANTITHESIS OF THE MARXIST
 AND THE MAOIST VIEW OF PROLETARIAN
 REVOLUTION, WAR AND PEACE
__ALPHA_LVL2__
1. Is Chinese Experience Alone a Basis
 for Producing Laws for the Whole World?
 A collection of Mao's statements on various questions, a

sort of compendium of Maoist ideology, was issued in Peking
in 1966 in the main languages of the world. It gives a good
idea of the level and content of Maoist theoretical postulates,
which the present Chinese leadership seeks to substitute for
Marxism-Leninism.
 Let us note that a person who is about to read Mao's

Little Red Book is in for a surprise. None of the 26 sections
of this `àid'', which is declared to be a summit of
revolutionary Marxism, specially deals with revolution. It does
not contain such terms as ``revolutionary situation'', ``forms
and methods of revolutionary struggle'', ``the theory of
bourgeois-democratic revolution growing into a socialist
revolution'', and so on. But there are any number of expressions
dealing with war, like ``war and peace'', ``people''s war'',
``relations between officers and men'', ``relations between the
army and the people'', etc.
 There is good reason for this lopsided attitude to the

problems of revolution. In the Little Red Book the rich and
living, the many-faceted and profound doctrine of Marx
and Lenin on the proletariat's revolutionary struggle has
been supplanted by a primitive scheme reducing every form
of struggle and Communist Parties' activity essentially to
revolutionary war.
 Here are some of the statements it contains.
90
 ``War is the highest form of struggle for resolving

contradictions, when they have developed to a certain stage,
between classes, nations, states, or political groups, and it
has existed ever since the emergence of private property and
of classes."^^1^^
 `Èvery Communist must grasp the truth: 'Political power

grows out of the barrel of a gun'... .
 ``The seizure of power by armed force, the settlement of

the issue by war is the central task and the highest form
of revolution. This Marxist-Leninist principle of revolution
holds good universally, for China and for all other
countries."^^2^^
 One is struck by the inflexibility and peremptory character

of these formulations. If they ``hold good universally'', one
may well ignore the concrete conditions, the time and place.
This simplifies the theory of revolutionary struggle to the
limit. At long last one has got universal means of solving
all kinds of problems and resolving any contradictions: the
contradictions ``between classes, nations, states, or political
groups''. This means is a revolutionary war. If Mao does
now and again advise the use of other means it is merely
to prepare for the selfsame revolutionary war.
 How, on what ground, has this distortion of Marxism

arisen? Let us look above all at the period in the history
of the Chinese revolution to which these quotations refer.
They have been taken from Mao's works entitled `Òn
Protracted War'', ``War and Questions of Strategy'', ``Strategic
Questions of the Revolutionary War in China'', and ``
Questions of Strategy in the Guerrilla War Against the Japanese
Invaders''. All these works date to the 1930s, and their titles
and date explain a great deal.
 The 1930s were the height of the civil war, which
continued even after the Japanese imperialists attacked China.
In that period, practice, life itself demanded of the
progressive forces of the Chinese people, the Chinese
Communists above all, that they should organise armed resistance
to the invaders, and launch a nation-wide armed struggle,
although judging by these same extracts, Mao was already
at that time now and again giving incorrect theoretical
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-time;, p. 58.
~^^2^^ Ibid., pp. 61--62.
91
expressions to this necessity, treating as absolutes specific

propositions applicable to a given country, to a given period,
and enshrining them as absolute general laws.
 However, in these same works of Mao's we find---and this

is especially important---some understanding of the specific
nature of the Chinese situation. Even at the time, Mao used
to stress the specific features of China's external and
domestic situation which put the CPC into an absolutely
exceptional set of conditions in the struggle. He wrote: `Ìf one
clearly understands this [that China is a semi-colony
contended for by many imperialist powers---Ed.], then, first, one
can understand why in China alone in the world there is
such an unusual thing as a prolonged strife within the
ruling classes, why the fight intensifies and expands day by
day, and why no unified political power has ever come into
being. Secondly, one can understand how important the
peasant problem is, and consequently why rural uprisings
have developed on such a nation-wide scale as at present.
Thirdly, one can understand the correctness of the slogan
about a workers' and peasants' democratic political power.
Fourthly, one can understand another unusual thing which
corresponds to and arises out of the unusual thing that in
China alone in the world there is a prolonged strife within
the ruling classes, and that is the existence and development
of the Red Army and guerrilla troops, and, together with
them, the existence and development of small Red areas that
have grown amid the encirclement of the White political
power (no such unusual thing is found anywhere except in
China). Fifthly, one can also understand that the formation
and development of the Red Army, the guerrilla units and
the Red areas are the highest form of the peasant struggle
under the leadership of the proletariat in semi-colonial
China, the inevitable outcome of the growth of the peasant
struggle in a semi-colony, and are undoubtedly the most
important factors in accelerating the revolutionary upsurge
throughout the country. And sixthly, one can also understand
that the policy of purely mobile guerrilla-like activities
cannot accomplish the task of accelerating the nation-wide
revolutionary upsurge, while the kind of policies adopted
by Chu Teh and Mao Tse-tung and by Fang Chih-min are
undoubtedly correct---policies such as establishing base areas;
building up political power according to plan, deepening
92
the agrarian revolution, and expanding the people's armed

forces by developing in due order first the township Red
Guards, then the local Red Army, and then a regular Red
Army; and expanding political power by advancing in a
series of waves, etc., etc."^^1^^
 However, with the growing tendency for Peking to

establish its hegemony in the international liberation
movement, these indications of the specific character of the
Chinese situation tended to disappear from the CPC
documents. The concrete national experience was transformed
into experience that ``holds good universally" in a phased
manner. At first, the experience of armed struggle in China
was presented as a universal means for the national
liberation struggle of the peoples in Asia, Africa and Latin
America. In their statements, the Chinese leaders ever more
frequently presented the Chinese revolution as the classic
type of revolution for the oppressed countries, and all the
three continents (without consideration of the differences in
the concrete situation in various countries, their different
levels of social development, etc.) as centres of a ``
revolutionary situation" standing on the threshold of civil war.
 Very soon even this was felt to be insufficient. When

reprinting in 1965 Mao's article, ``Questions of Strategy in
the Guerrilla War Against the Japanese Invaders'', the
editors of the Hungchih declared the concrete military
propositions of that period to be valid as global strategy. The
same purpose was served by Lin Piao's article ``Long Live
the Victory of the People's War'', which appeared the same
year. It not only declared that the political and economic
conditions in China and in the countries of Asia, Africa and
Latin America were identical, it not only advocated for
these countries Mao's thesis of ``setting up revolutionary base
areas in the countryside and encircling the town by the
village''. Mao's idea was used, you might say, also to
characterise the postwar situation in the world, and the attitude
of the countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America to the
countries of North America and Western Europe. The latter
were declared to be the ``world town'', and Asia, Africa and
Latin America, the ``world village''. Encirclement of the
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works, Vol. 1, London, 1954, pp. 116--17
(emphasis added---Y.K. and Y.P.).
93
town by the village was declared to be the specific feature

of ``world revolution" at its present stage.^^1^^
 Finally, in Mao's Little Red Book, published a year later,

in 1966, the operation of converting Chinese experience into
universal experience was completed. There, the conclusions
bearing on a definite situation in China in the 1930s and
the 1940s were already presented as a universal law;
various statements, taken out of historical contents, were
presented as the summit of Marxist thinking, as universal
truths of the epoch of the ``general collapse of imperialism
and the triumph of socialism throughout the world''.
 In 1936, Mao wrote: ``War, this monster of mutual

slaughter among mankind, will be finally eliminated through
the progress of human society, and in no distant future too.
But there is only one way of eliminating it, namely, to
oppose war by means of war.... A war ... will form a bridge
leading world history into a new era."^^2^^
 That was said a long time ago, in a period when the
German, Italian and Japanese imperialists were starting the
Second World War on the fields of Europe, Africa and Asia,
and the rigidity and peremptory character of the formulation
could have been ascribed to the requirements of the concrete
situation, of the concrete historical epoch. However, this has
been reprinted and declared to be the greatest and, what is
more, universal truth in our day. From this it follows (and
the Peking propagandists have said as much) that
thermonuclear war may be fought by means of thermonuclear war
itself. From this it follows that thermonuclear war is the
bridge leading to mankind's radiant future. But if it is a
bridge, it is one which is made up of corpses, and one
leading to the burial ground of mankind's civilisation. Summing
up the practice of the 1930s and the 1940s, Mao declared:
`Às we are advocates of the abolition of war, we do not
desire war; but war can only be abolished through war; in
order to get rid of the gun we must first grasp it in our
hand."^^3^^ In order to get rid of thermonuclear arms we must
first grasp them in our hand, seems to be the message of this
idea today.
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Jenmin jihpao, September 3. 1965.
~^^2^^ Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works, Vol. 1, p. 179.


~^^3^^ Ibid., Vol. 2, p. 273.
94
 In the 1930s, Mao wrote: ``Some people have waxed

ironic, calling us advocates of the 'theory of almightiness of
war'.. . . Indeed, we are advocates of the theory of
almightiness of revolutionary war. This is not bad, this is good,
this is the Marxist approach.''
 One may well ask this legitimate question: what about
thermonuclear war: is it, too, almighty,
revolutionarycreative and therefore desirable?
 Spreading the theory of the almightiness of revolutionary
war, Mao assures us that this is ``not bad, this is good, this
is the Marxist approach''. No, this is not the Marxist
approach at all. Even revolutionary war cannot be regarded
as being the sole almighty means for establishing socialism.
It is inevitable only in definite conditions. The only almighty
means is the active ogranisation of the revolutionary masses,
the proletariat above all, flexibly adapting its tactics and
forms of struggle to the changing and mobile political
situation.
__ALPHA_LVL2__
2. On the Two Ways of Socialist
 Revolution
 The communist movement is constantly faced with

opponents on the ``Right'' and on the ``Left'' who claim to stand
for socialist revolution but in fact distort its meaning. Both
tend to regard relative truth as an absolute, and carry it to
absurdity. They declare either of the two forms of struggle,
which produces the greatest effect only in definite conditions,
to be the only and unquestionably best form of struggle.
Thus, the revisionists, with their slogan of ``painless
progress'', insist that there is only the one---peaceful---way of
transition to socialism, and it is a way which they in fact
reduce to reforms, which do not go to the roots of
capitalism; when confronted with armed reaction, they capitulate.
On the other hand, the dogmatists, having once and for all
connected revolution with revolutionary war, refused to
recognise any other, peaceful forms of struggle for power,
and push the people into unwarranted sacrifices and
disorganise the revolutionary movement.
 Let us note that the anti-Marxist attitude of the CPC

leadership on the question of ways of socialist revolution
95
did not crystallise all at once. Up until mid-1963, before the

CPC leadership finally broke with the decisions of the 1957
and 1960 Meetings of Communist and Workers' Parties in
Moscow, and merely spoke about a ``different reading" of
them, documents issued by the CPC Central Committee
contained, together with one-sided and erroneous formulations,
propositions generally accepted by the Communist Parties
about the need to master `èvery form of struggle'', and to
learn swiftly to switch from one form of struggle to another
`ìn accordance with the changes in the situation of such
struggle''. A CPC Central Committee letter of June 14, 1963,
``Proposal Concerning the General Line of the International
Communist Movement'', stressed that ``the Communists
always prefer to make the transition to socialism by
peaceful means".^^1^^ But this letter already threw the wrong light
on the attitude taken by the Communist Parties to
disagree with Peking. It was said that there had appeared
in their ranks ``soothsayers'' who pinned their hopes on
a ``peaceful transition'', men who ``started from
historical idealism, obscured the basic contradictions of capitalist
society, rejected the Marxist-Leninist doctrine of the
class struggle and erected their own subjectivist
propositions".^^2^^
 Subsequently, an open attempt to revise the basic

propositions of the 1957 Declaration and the 1960 Statement
was made in the well-known editorial articles published from
September 6, 1963 to March 31, 1964. The last of the eight
articles dealt specifically with the question of the so-called
peaceful transition. Intending to talk to the ``revisionists'' in
``much clearer language than before'', its authors left
virtually nothing at all of the statements contained earlier in
CPC Central Committee documents about the diversity of
forms of proletarian struggle. The same ``violent revolution
is the universal law of proletarian revolution" was proclaimed
to be the only Marxist approach. The article explained:
``Marxism openly declares the inevitability of violent
revolution. It says that violent revolution is the midwife without
whom no socialist society is born, that it is the inevitable
way of supplanting the bourgeois dictatorship by the
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Jenmin jihpao, June 17, 1963.
~^^2^^ Ibid.
96
proletarian dictatorship, the universal law of proletarian

revolution."^^1^^
 By repeating that the Marxist classics had regarded

violence as the midwife of the new society, the Chinese leaders
try to present themselves as consistent Marxists. Indeed,
Marx and Engels did say that revolutionary violence was
the midwife of the new society, but what they meant was
social violence, social revolution, which is far from always
being identical with war. Generally speaking, the substance
of socialist, proletarian revolution consists not only, and not
so much, in violence or coercion, as in the creative
construction of the new society (the prevalence of violent forms and
methods of struggle usually marks the early stages of a
social revolution). Lenin wrote: ``There is no doubt that
without this, without revolutionary violence, the proletariat
could not have triumphed. Nor can there be any doubt that
revolutionary violence was a necessary and legitimate
weapon of the revolution only at definite stages of its
development, only under definite and special conditions, and
that a far more profound and permanent feature of this
revolution and condition of its victory was, and remains, the
organisation of the proletarian masses, the organisation of
the working people. And it is this organisation of millions
of working people that constitutes the best stimulant for the
revolution, its deepest source of victory."^^2^^
 Furthermore, in the course of a proletarian revolution

there does indeed occur elimination of the exploiting classes,
the `èxpropriation of the expropriators'', that is, the
application of violence to a handful of oppressors, but the social
demise of the bourgeois class or of the class of landowners
is not the same thing as the physical destruction of persons
belonging to these classes. The proletariat gives freedom
and the right to work to those who come from the
exploiting classes but who refuse to resist the socialist
transformations and express their desire to co-operate with the new
power.
 Finally, revolution is always violence and social coercion

(on this point there can be no misunderstanding), but it does
not always involve the use of armed force. It is correct,
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Jcumin ji//jjai>, March 31, 1964.
 ^^2^^ V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 20, pp. 89--90.
97
therefore, to speak not of some kind of ``peaceful transition"

and violent proletarian revolution, and to contrast these
two concepts, but of the peaceful and non-peaceful ways of
socialist revolution. The revolution runs a peaceful course
when it does not involve an armed uprising, civil war or the
armed export of counter-revolution; it runs a non-peaceful
way whenever any of these elements (or all three together,
as was the case, for instance, during the socialist revolution
in Russia) are present in it.
 The author of the Jenmin jihpao article of March 31, 1964,
made known the theses which the CPC delegation set up in
contrast to the CPSU's attitude at the 1957 Meeting of the
Communist and Workers' Parties. He wrote: ``Starting from
tactical considerations, it is useful to express a desire for
peaceful transition, but there should be no excessive accent
on the possibility of peaceful transition, it is always
necessary to be ready to give a rebuff to the attacks of
counterrevolution, it is necessary to be prepared for the revolution
at the decisive moment of taking power by the working
class to overthrow the bourgeoisie by means of armed force,
if it resorts to armed force to suppress the people's
revolution (which is, as a rule, inevitable)."^^1^^
 No Communist has ever doubted the need to use arms to
beat back the counter-revolution when it resorts to `àrmed
force to suppress the people's revolution''. But the
Communists have never used the recognition of the peaceful as well
as the non-peaceful way of socialist revolution as a kind of
tactical ploy or a propaganda slogan which merely serves
to cover up preparations for the almost always `ìnevitable''
forms of armed struggle. For the Communists, this question
of the way the revolution is to run has always been one of
real political tactics and strategy. Moreover, this question
of the peaceful and the non-peaceful ways of revolution
has been and continues to be one of the Communist Parties'
humanistic world outlook.
 Let us stress that the question of the real implementation

of the ideas of the socialist revolution's peaceful way is a
most complex one. The Communist Parties of a number
of advanced capitalist countries seek to its solution through
so-called structural reforms in capitalist society, by making
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Jenmin jihpao, March 31, 1964 (emphasis added---Y.K. and Y.P.).
98
use of the traditional democratic institutions existing in

these countries.
 It is, in fact, the failure to understand this attitude and

the denial of the possibility of there being different forms
of social coercion, and of the need to use and combine
different forms of political struggle that is the characteristic
feature of the ``directive'' Jenmin jihpao article examined
above, for its purpose is to revise the agreed documents of
the international communist movement and to substitute
onesided dogmatic propositions for the dialectical Marxist--
Leninist ones. The article says, among other things: ``The
documents of the Meetings, in particular, contain the assertion
that there is a possibility in some capitalist countries of
winning state power without civil war, although they also say
that the ruling classes never give up power of their own
accord; they contain the assertion that there is a possibility
of winning a solid majority in parliament and converting
parliament into an instrument serving the working people,
although they also point to the need to carry on extensive
and massive extra-parliamentary struggle and to break down
the resistance of the reactionary forces; they do not
accentuate the fact that violent revolution is a universal law,
although peaceful transition is mentioned."^^1^^
 The Maoists have essentially distorted the idea of the

possibility of peaceful transition to socialism which the
Communist Parties advocate. A peaceful victory for the
socialist revolution is not at all equivalent to denying the
use of force in the struggle, nor does the idea of a peaceful
way amount to a mere use of bourgeois legalism. When,
say, the Communists seek to make parliament serve the
people and to fill it with new content, they have in mind
not only the battles which are fought at the polls and not
only parliamentary debates, but above all the winning by
the working class of a parliamentary majority through the
broadest revolutionary action of the masses. The revolution
develops both ``from above" and ``from below''. Massive
extra-parliamentary struggle is the rock bottom foundation
lor truly democratic activity by members of parliament and
the condition for parliament progressively playing an ever
greater part in the country's social life.
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Jenmin jihpao, March 31, 1964.
99
 ``The proletarian party must in no instance base its

ideological propositions, its revolutionary line and the whole
of its work on the assumption that the imperialists and the
reactionaries will agree to peaceful change,"^^1^^ the CPC
leaders warned the Communist Parties which recognise the
real possibilities not only of an armed but also of a peaceful
way for the revolution. But recognition by the Communist
Parties of the possibility of peaceful transition to socialism
does not at all imply voluntary abandonment by the
exploiting classes of their power, their property or their privileges.
In this sense, no deep-going social revolution is conceivable
without the organisation of massive political action, without
the use of coercive measures with respect to the exploiters,
and without the establishment of a dictatorship of the
revolutionary classes. Let us add, too, that there has never been
any ``purely'' peaceful or non-peaceful revolution in history
in any period. In actual fact there is always a prevalent,
predominant tendency which makes its way across the other
tendencies. These may pass into one another in the most
diverse combinations. Which means of struggle is best and
in which conditions? Is it guerrilla warfare? Is it a general
political strike? Is it an electoral campaign? Is it an armed
uprising in town or country? How are these different means
to be combined with each other? To obtain the answers to
these questions there is need again and again to look at the
aggregation of internal and external factors, which, by the
way, keep constantly changing, or, as Lenin said, there is
need for concrete analysis of the concrete situation.
 Today, there are over 100 countries which have still to
travel the way to socialism. In any of these there may arise
and be realised the most diverse tendencies in the most
different ``proportions''. The history of each nation has national
and international features, the specific and the general, the
former being unique and the latter occurring everywhere.
Coming revolutions will have the great advantage over
earlier revolutions in that they will have the opportunity to
take account of all their pluses and minuses. The Communists
believe that the growing variety of forms in the struggle
for socialism is evidence of its viability, and is in a sense
an earnest of its triumph.
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Jenmin jihpao, June 17, 19G3.
100
 The 1969 International Meeting of Communists in

Moscow stressed this point once again when it said: ``The
Communist and Workers' Parties are conducting their activity
in diverse, specific conditions, requiring an appropriate
approach to the solution of concrete problems. Each Party,
guided by the principles of Marxism-Leninism and in
keeping with concrete national conditions, fully independently
elaborates its own policy, determines the directions, forms
and methods of struggle, and, depending on the
circumstances, chooses the peaceful or non-peaceful way of transition
to socialism.''^^1^^
__ALPHA_LVL2__
3. Peaceful Coexistence of the Two Systems
 and the Revolutionary Movement
 in Individual Countries
 Today, it is impossible, more so than at any other period,

to consider the revolutionary movement in individual
countries outside the context of international events and of the
world-wide struggle between the two systems. That is why
the problem of ``peaceful coexistence and the class struggle"
has become one of the central ones in the present-day
ideological struggle between the Marxists and their ideological
adversaries.
 The line of peaceful coexistence between the two systems,
for which the Communists stand, is based on the theory of
socialist revolution. During the First World War, Lenin
gave theoretical proof, and historical practice has confirmed
this, that socialist revolution cannot win out simultaneously
in all the capitalist countries. After the revolution wins out
initially in one or several countries, the imperialist camp,
with great economic, political and military strength, will be
in existence over a whole historical epoch, which means that
two fundamentally different social systems will exist side by
side. The struggle between them is inevitable, but the forms
of this struggle are not hard and fast, but are determined by
the arrangement and balance of forces at every given period;
thus, in the early years and decades of the world's first and
_-_-_

1<HH), p. 37 (emphasis added.---Y.K. and Y.I'.).
101
only Soviet socialist republic its peaceful coexistence together

with the imperialist states was virtually inconceivable for
any considerable length of time, because the capitalists did
not stop trying to destroy it by means of armed
intervention; however, as the strength of the socialist state grew and
a whole system of socialist countries emerged such attempts
became in effect quite hopeless; imperialism was forced to
accept the existence of a hostile social system and to abandon
the idea of resorting to war as a means of resolving the
contradictions between the two systems. Coexistence of the two
opposite systems over a long period became historical reality
and the struggle between them moved mainly into political,
economic and ideological spheres.
 Why can and must there be peaceful coexistence between

the two systems, between states with opposite social systems,
but not between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie, between
the people and the reactionaries of a given capitalist
country? In present-day conditions, peaceful coexistence is a
necessity first of all because if mankind wants to live and
develop it has no other alternative, considering the vast and
ever growing force of nuclear and other modern weapons.
Peaceful coexistence is now a possibility above all because
the joint strength of the working people of all the world, the
strength of international communism, the strength of the
socialist countries, the strength of the Soviet Union is now no
longer inferior to that of the international bourgeoisie.
Relying on its ever growing economic, political and military
might, the proletarian states confront the bourgeois states.
 Relations between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie in

the capitalist countries are quite another matter. There, the
proletariat is not equal in any respect, and has no positions
in the economy, politics or ideology which would be
equivalent to those of the bourgeoisie. There we find a ceaseless
struggle between the oppressed and the oppressors, a
struggle between the exploiters and the exploited, a struggle which
rules out ``peaceful coexistence''.
 However, let us stress once again that the peaceful

coexistence of states is merely a specific form of class struggle in
which the outcome is for one of the systems in the
competition to show its decisive superiority in meeting the basic
interests of the people. This specific form of class struggle
exerts a tremendous influence on the course of the class
102
struggle in the individual countries, and that is something that

Maoists fail to understand.
 A collection of their programme articles entitled Long Live

Leninism (1960) contained the assertion that ``the peaceful
coexistence of different states and people's revolutions in
different countries are essentially two different things and not
one thing, two concepts and not one concept, questions of
two types and not of one.... What the transition will be,
whether it will take the form of armed uprising or will run a
peaceful course^^1^^---that is a totally different question which
is basically distinct from the question of peaceful coexistence
between the socialist and the capitalist countries. It is an
internal question in each country which can be settled only
depending on the balance of class forces in a given country
at a given period. That is a question only the Communists
of each country themselves can decide."^^2^^
 It is not right to identify different types of liberation

movement, different forms of class struggle---international and
internal---all that is elementary Marxism. But is it right to
contrast them absolutely as this is being done in the above
and similar passages? The CPC leaders refuse to see the real
interconnection between the class struggle as it proceeds in
the international arena and within each individual country.
 Indeed, although there is not always a direct

interconnection between relaxation of international tensions and the
heat of the class battles in the capitalist countries, there is
no doubt at all that any detente markedly facilitates the
solution of the social tasks which have matured there. What is
the result of every success scored by the policy of peaceful
coexistence? It is the earliest realisation of the creative plans
of the countries in the socialist system, and a growing
influence of socialist ideas on the working people in the
capitalist countries. This policy exposes the essence of capitalist
exploitation, because the bourgeoisie finds it harder to evade
the solution of internal problems by referring to a mythical
`èxternal'' threat. This policy opens up the prospects for
more effective struggle against militarism, the mainstay of
international and domestic reaction, and ties the hands of
_-_-_
 ^^1^^ The CPC leadership's documents dating to the early 1960s still
nominally recognised the peaceful way of the socialist revolution together
with the non-peaceful way.
~^^2^^
Long Live Leninism, Peking, 1960, pp. 35, 47 (in Chinese).
103
those who want to export counter-revolution. That is

precisely what the aggressive circles of the imperialist
bourgeoisie fear, and that is why they have been trying so hard to
keep any form of ``cold war" simmering in the international
arena.
 Being unable to refute clear-cut and unequivocal

propositions of Lenin's doctrine of peaceful coexistence the CPC
leaders usually resort to slander and gross distortions of the
stand taken by their opponents. They assert that peaceful
coexistence, which the Communists stand for, ``meets the
needs of imperialism and plays into the hands of the
imperialist policy of aggression and war'', ``signifies a substitution
for the class struggle of class collaboration on a world
scale ... substitution of pacifism and an abandonment of
proletarian internationalism for the proletarian revolution".^^1^^
They add: `Ìt is quite wrong to extend peaceful coexistence
to relations between oppressed and oppressor classes,
between oppressed and oppressor nations, to impose the policy
of peaceful coexistence pursued by the socialist countries on
the Communist Parties of the capitalist world, or to try to
subordinate to this policy the revolutionary struggle of
oppressed peoples and nations."^^2^^
 But the Communists have always insisted that peaceful

coexistence only extends to the sphere of interstate relations
and does not in any sense mean an end to the struggle of
the capitalist-oppressed classes for their social emancipation,
an end to the struggle of oppressed nations for their
national liberation, or any relaxation of the ideological struggle
between communism and anti-communism. This was
forcefully re-emphasised by the International Meeting of
Communists in 1969 who declared: ``The policy of peaceful
coexistence does not contradict the right of any oppressed
people to fight for its liberation by any means it considers
necessary---armed or peaceful. This policy in no way signifies
support for reactionary regimes.... This policy does not
imply either the preservation of the socio-political status quo
or a weakening of the ideological struggle."^^3^^
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Jenmin jihpao, December 12, 1963.
~^^2^^ Ibid.

1969, p. 31 (emphasis added---Y.K. and Y.P.).
104
 But an analysis of the CPC leadership's actual

policy suggests that these phrases are part of the old
``tactical considerations" attitude, and amount to no more
than sheer propaganda, like the slogan about the possibility
of the revolution running a peaceful way.
 In early March 1959, Mao said in a confidential talk he

had with representatives of a number of Latin American
Communist and Workers' Parties that `ìf there is
international tension Communist Parties will grow more quickly,
the rate of their development will be more rapid".^^1^^ Let us
add that the Chinese leaders do not confine themselves to
words alone. They have tried to create conflicts on China's
borders with other countries, they have opposed the steps
taken by the Soviet Union to eliminate tension in the
Caribbean Sea and in the Middle East, and have long opposed
any political settlement of the Vietnam conflict. Just
recently, the Chinese leaders have been spreading wild ideas about
a military threat to China on the part of ``social--
imperialism" (as the Soviet Union and socialist countries friendly to
it are now being designated in Peking). Here are some of
the slogans Radio Peking has been broadcasting all over the
world, which come from the report to the 9th
Congress of the CPC: ``We must be fully prepared'', ``we
must be ready for their starting a large-scale war'', ``we
must be ready for their starting a war in the near future'',
``we must be ready for their starting a war with the use of
conventional weapons, and must also be ready for their
starting a large-scale nuclear war''. Up to now, Peking has
substituted for the clear-cut propositions of Lenin's doctrine of
peaceful coexistence sayings which date to the epoch of the
Chinese emperors and mandarins, as for instance, ``the state
flourishes in difficulties'', ``the state is destroyed unless it is
faced with an external threat on the part of an enemy's
state".^^2^^
 For all practical purposes, in international affairs the

Chinese leaders have long since taken for their guide this
simple rule: ``the worse---the better'', thereby objectively
taking the attitude of splitting the united anti-imperialist
camp and encouraging imperialism in its foreign-policy
gambles.
_-_-_
 ^^1^^ World Marxist Review, Vol. 7, No. 6, June 1964, p. 56.

~^^2^^ Jenmin jih/xio, January 30, 1965.
105
 Naturally, this policy arouses indignation of all progressive

public opinion. This being the case, the Maoists have taken
up the slogan of peaceful coexistence. Whereas in the recent
past they did not even want to hear about peaceful
coexistence, now they do all they can to prove their adherence
to it. But they use this slogan for chauvinistic purposes.
Although professing support for peaceful coexistence with
all countries, they in the first place appeal to imperialist
powers due to the general reorientation of China's foreign
policy. While struggling against the socialist community and
exacerbating their relations with Asian neighbour countries
(Sino-Indian relations are a typical example in this respect),
the Maoists are greatly interested in better relations with
imperialist countries. Hence their appeals to the USA, Britain
and other countries that their relations with them should
be based on the principles of peaceful coexistence. Thus the
slogan of peaceful coexistence is used by the Maoists for
tactical purposes prompted as they are by their chauvinistic
interests and the desire to mask the anti-socialist nature of
their foreign policy.
__ALPHA_LVL2__
4. ``World Revolution'' and World
 Thermonuclear War
 Let us recall that the concept of world revolutionary

process, which is accepted by the Communist Parties, establishes
the general content of our epoch as an epoch of transition
from capitalism to socialism and also implies recognition of
the qualitative diversity of the progressive liberation
movements proceeding throughout the world (proletarian
revolutions, bourgeois-democratic revolutions, national liberation
revolutions, general democratic struggle in the countries of
monopoly capital, anti-fascist struggle in the countries with
fascist and semi-fascist regimes, and other types of
movements). Furthermore, this concept implies recognition not
only of definite general laws governing socialist construction
in countries where the proletarian revolution has triumphed
but also a diversity of forms of the socialist reconstruction
that is taking place in these countries, forms which are
determined by the economic, political and cultural levels
106
attained, forms which accord with the historical, national
traditions in each country. Finally, the concept of world
revolutionary process implies a definite duration of the
renovation movement which is inexorably running in every part of
the globe and which is ultimately to put an end to the epoch
of oppression, violence and war.
 In contrast to this realistic concept, which takes account of

all the diversity, complexity, qualitative distinctions, and
definite difficulties in revolutionary processes and the
possibility not only of advances but also of temporary retreats,
of zigzag courses, the Chinese leaders have long been
spreading among the people illusory and essentially mythical
notions about the events taking place in the world outside
China.
 Thus, the deepening crisis of US imperialist policy has

been presented in this vulgarised and caricatured form: `ÙS
imperialism, this arch-enemy of the peoples of the world,
is steadily plunging downwards. Once in office, Nixon took
over an economy bursting at the seams, faced an insoluble
economic crisis, and tremendous resistance from the peoples
of the whole world and the masses of people at home, and
found himself in a difficult situation, in which there is
complete confusion among the imperialist countries while the rod
of US imperialism has been steadily losing its force.'' It is
true that it has at his command ``vast quantities of planes
and guns, nuclear bombs and guided missiles'', but the use
of these can result in only one thing: it can cause `àn even
broader revolution throughout the world''. One would
expect such statements to come from a mediocre propagandist,
but these happen to be theoretical disquisitions from the
report at the 9th Congress of the CPC. To these ``
conclusions" were added wild ideas about the whole world soon
becoming a field of application for the selfsame ideas of the
``great Mao''. The new Rules adopted by the 9th Congress,
for instance, declare: ``Mao Tse-tung thought is the
MarxismLeninism of an epoch in which imperialism is moving to a
general collapse, and socialism to victory all over the world.''
 The myth of an almost imminent ``general collapse" of

imperialism and of ``revisionism'', and of the triumphant
advance of the ``world revolution" in every part of the world
was undoubtedly of some propaganda importance at home,
being designed to leave the Chinese people with the
107
impression that the difficulties faced by the Chinese People's

Republic do not in any sense spring from the leadership's fatal
policies but from the incompleteness of international
revolutionary processes and that these difficulties will be
overcome only after the revolution triumphs in the international
arena, and that this will be done overnight, in one great
leap. Let us note that these attempts to make success in
socialist construction in China directly dependent on successes
of the ``world revolution'', the attempts to prove that the
internal problems of the Chinese revolution cannot be solved
without a solution of international problems, without a
``world-wide'' defeat for imperialism, were first made
precisely towards the end of the 1950s, following the failure of
the ``Great Leap Forward" which was to have `ìntroduced''
communism in China within a matter of three or five years.^^1^^
 However, it would be wrong to reduce the ``world

revolution" slogan only to an urge on the part of the Chinese
leaders to evade responsibility for their failures in domestic
policy and to put the blame for the delay in China's
socialist construction on other Communist Parties. The facts
show that from the end of the 1950s, the Chinese
leadership did indeed try to replace the policy of peaceful
coexistence with a policy of ``cold'' (and not only ``cold'')
war, attempting to push the socialist camp into a military
overnight solution of contradictions between the two systems.
And the greatest danger is that the future victory of
socialism over imperialism was even then connected with the
prospect of a world thermonuclear war.
 At the 1957 Moscow Meeting, Mao argued that a world

thermonuclear war could be a real way for socialism's future
victory over imperialism. He reasoned: `Ìs it possible to
estimate the number of human victims a future war could
cause? Yes, it is, it will perhaps be one-third of the 2,700
million population of the whole world, that is, only 900
million people----I argued over the issue with Nehru. In this
respect he is more pessimistic than I am. I told him that if
one-half of mankind were destroyed, there would still
remain the other half, but then imperialism would be
completely wiped out and only socialism would remain all over
the world, and that within half a century or a full century
_-_-_
~^^1^^ China Today, Moscow, 1969, p. 31.
108
the population will once again increase even more than by

half as much again.''
 When spokesmen for relatively small nations expressed

legitimate fears over such prognostications, because their
nations could be totally wiped out in a thermonuclear war,
Chinese officials assuaged their fears by saying: `Ìn the
event of a devastating war, the small countries would have
to subordinate their interests to the common interests.'' Or:
``But the other nations would remain, while imperialism
would be destroyed.''
 The Soviet Government, expressing the interest and the
will of the Soviet people and standing up for the interests
of the peoples of the other countries, including the peoples
of China, issued a clear and unequivocal statement over such
irresponsible and inhuman ``prognostications''. It declared:
``But has anyone asked the Chinese people who are being
doomed to death in advance about whether they agree to be
the firewood in the furnace of a nuclear missile war; have
they empowered the CPR leadership to issue their burial
certificates in advance?
 `Ànother question also arises. If, according to the Chinese

leaders' forecasts, roughly one-half of the population of such
a big country as China is destroyed in a thermonuclear war,
how many men will die in countries whose populations do
not run to hundreds of millions but to tens or to simply
millions of people? It is, after all, quite obvious that many
countries and peoples would find themselves entirely within that
half of mankind which the Chinese leaders are prepared to
scrap from the human race. Who then has given the Chinese
leaders the right to make free with these people's destinies
or to speak on their behalf?
 ``Who has given the Chinese leaders the right to denigrate
the ultimate goal of the international working-class
movement---the triumph of labour over capital---by making
assertions that the way to it runs through world thermonuclear
war and that it is worth sacrificing one-half of the globe's
population in order to build a higher civilisation on the
corpses and ruins? This conception has nothing in common
with Marxist-Leninist doctrine. We oppose this bestial
conception. We have carried on and are carrying on a tireless
struggle for the triumph of Marxist-Leninist ideas, for the
emancipation of the peoples from all exploitation and
109
oppression, and for the triumph of labour over capital, with

the use of methods which are worthy of the great humanistic
ideals of socialism and communism."^^1^^
 On the one hand, their attitude is characterised by an

underestimation of the monstrously devastating force of
thermonuclear (and other) modern weapons, an
underestimation which has its classic expression in the notorious
Maoist slogan: ``The atomic bomb is a paper tiger.'' In his
well-known interview with Edgar Snow, Mao spoke of
modern weapons with extreme scorn. He said that ``
Americans also had said very much about the destructiveness of
the atom bomb, and that Khrushchev had made a big noise
about that.. . . Yet recently he had read reports of an
investigation by Americans who had visited the Bikini Islands
six years after the nuclear tests had been conducted there.
From 1959 onward research workers had been on Bikini.
When they first entered the island they had had to cut paths
through the undergrowth. They had found mice scampering
about and fish swimming in the stream as usual. The
wellwater was potable, plantation foliage was flourishing and
birds were twittering in the trees. Probably there had been
two bad years after the tests, but nature had gone on. In
the eyes of nature and the birds, the mice and the trees the
atom bomb was a paper tiger. Possibly man had less stamina
than they?''^^2^^
 On the other hand, the Maoists have underestimated the

strength of the united forces of peace and socialism standing
in the way of thermonuclear war, and have in effect been
spreading the fatalistic idea that another world-wide
conflict is inevitable because the future of war and peace, they
insist, is in the hands of the imperialists alone.
 The collection Long Live Leninism insisted that ``whether

the imperialists ultimately start a war does not depend on
us, for we are not the chiefs of the imperialists' general
staffs"^^3^^ A CPC Central Committee's letter of June 14, 1963,
says that it is an `àbsolutely vain illusion" to hope to avert
wars. When it comes to world wars, the Maoists use only
words like `àlways'' and `ìnevitably''. To create the
impression that on this question the present Chinese leadership take
_-_-_
~^^1^^ ``Soviet Government's Statement'', Pravda, August 21, 19G3.
~^^2^^ Maoism Through the Eyes of Communists, Moscow, 1970, p. 134.


~^^3^^ Long Live Leninism, p. 23.
110
a Marxist stand, while their opponents pursue a revisionist

line, they present quotations from Lenin without considering
the actual epoch in which he made the statement.
Imperialism is latent with war: from this truth, Mao's followers draw
the conclusion that another world war is inevitable.
 In contrast to the CPC leaders, Marxists-Leninists do not

believe that the possibility of world war is equivalent to an
inevitability. Although the nature of imperialism has not
changed, it is no longer able to dictate its will to the
peoples of the world, because the sphere of its activity has been
narrowed down and the scale of its influence has been
reduced. Imperialism is the soil for aggressive wars, but to
prevent a third world war from growing on this soil there
is need for definite conditions which may or may not
materialise, that is, there is need for a balance of forces within
the individual countries and in the world arena favouring
the start of a war. It is the task of the popular movement
for peace and against war to make these conditions as
unfavourable as possible. The Document of the 1969 Meeting
of the Communists of the world declared once again that
`à new world war can be averted by the combined effort
of the socialist countries, the international working class, the
national liberation movement, all peace-loving countries,
public organisations and mass movements".^^1^^
 The Chinese leaders like to repeat Marx's words about

ideas becoming a material force when they get hold of the
masses. Radio Peking often starts its broadcasts by quoting
Mao as saying that the ``people, and the people alone, are
the motive force in the making of world history".^^2^^ ``The
Chinese people and all the revolutionary peoples of the
world" constituting, according to Chinese propaganda
estimates, over 90 per cent of the population of the globe, are
capable of performing all sorts of miracles, except one---to
prevent another world war. Isn't this a rather curious line
to take for those who insist that the peoples are all-powerful?
 Actually, however, in the present epoch the question of a

war depends above all on the joint efforts of the
progressive anti-imperialist, anti-war forces. The truth must be
faced; it is precisely the splitting policy of the Chinese
_-_-_

1069, p. 31.
~^^2^^ Quotations from Chairman Mao Ì'sc-luiig, p. IIS.
111
leadership, which weakens the united front in the struggle for

peace, that is untying the hands of the ``chiefs of the
imperialists' general staffs''.
 It is true that just recently this idea of the inevitability

of another world war has been expressed in more veiled
formulations. The report to the 9th CPC Congress contains
Mao's ``latest'' precept on this score: `Às for the question of
world war, there are only two possibilities: either war will
cause revolution, or revolution will avert war.'' But ``
dialectical" juggling with slogans like the one about `èither war
causing revolution or revolution averting war'', may confuse
only those who have lost the ability of getting through to
the real meaning of deceptively sonorous phrases, those who
have lost their sense of historical reality. The point is that
war---and what the Chinese leaders have in mind is a world
thermonuclear war---is capable rather not of producing
``world-wide revolution'', but interrupting for many decades
any continuation of social and even of simple biological life
in the most developed countries of the world. On the other
hand, by insisting that ``revolution will avert war'', the CPC
leaders deprive the Marxist-Leninist concept of ``social
revolution" of its rich and highly diverse content, reduce the
revolutionary process to extreme forms of armed struggle
or even to Blanquist armed putsches, thereby scrapping the
importance of general democratic struggle for peace. In
either case they betray the very substance of the
MarxistLeninist revolutionary doctrine, whose precepts are the
relentlessly sober approach and realism in assessing the
concrete historical conditions of the class struggle, on the one
hand, and on the other, a choice of means and ways of
political action which are most favourable in the light of social
progress and the interests of the working classes.
 The reckless and irresponsible arithmetical exercises about

the future destruction of one-third or one-half of mankind
(and who can guarantee that these figures will not actually
increase to nine-tenths or even ten-tenths?), like the falsely
optimistic predictions that after an `ànti-imperialist''
thermonuclear war the ``triumphant people will very rapidly
create on the ruins of destroyed imperialism a civilisation a
thousand times higher than that under the capitalist system,
and will build its own, truly beautiful future'',^^1^^ have nothing
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Long Live Leninism, p. 23.
112
in common with the Marxist doctrine of war and revolution

and its application in the conditions of the present epoch.
 In 1918 Lenin said that back in the 1880s the leaders of
the international proletariat ``with extreme caution" treated
the prospect of socialism growing out of an all-European
war, for they clearly realised that such a war ``would also
lead to the brutalisation, degradation and retrogression of
the whole of Europe".^^1^^ Summing up the sanguinary
experience of the First World War, Lenin anticipated the threat
that this kind of conflict ``might undermine the very
foundations of human society. Because it is the first time in
history that the most powerful achievements of technology
have been applied on such a scale, so destructively and with
such energy, for the annihilation of millions of human lives.
When all means of production are being thus devoted to the
service of war, we see that the most gloomy prophecies are
being fulfilled, and that more and more countries are falling
a prey to retrogression, starvation and complete decline of all
the productive forces".^^2^^ These words become a hundred times
more meaningful under the present military-technological
revolution, which involves a great advance in destructive
weapons fraught with the possibility of catastrophic consequences.
 The Communists are convinced that imperialism is bound
to be destroyed and that the forces of progress will do away
with the world of violence, oppression, and wars, however
protracted and hard their struggle may be. But the
Communists have been doing their utmost to have all the nations
and all the peoples share the joys of this victory, and to have
this victory secured by mankind at the lowest costs in terms
of sacrifices, so that men are spared the horrors of a world
thermonuclear war.
 Let us recall, that the aim Marx set himself in his Capital
was to discover and analyse the laws of social development,
whose knowledge could help to reduce and ease the birth
pangs of the new social system. The Peking leaders have
taken as their basis the very opposite proposition: to increase
and to sharpen the birth pangs, without ever giving a thought
that this kind of ``midwifery'' could well transform the pangs
of birth into the agony of death. Incidentally, the ``great
Mao`s' latest precepts hold in store for the Chinese people
_-_-_
~^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 27, p. 422.


~^^2^^ Ibid.
8---1362
113
not just war, but a war with a lethal outcome. Editorials in

Jenmin jihpao, Chiefangchiun pao and Hungchih have been
widely circulating the following statement by Mao Tse-tung:
`Ì favour this slogan: 'fear no difficulties, fear no death'.''
That is the logical capstone to the earlier conclusion that the
``world can be rebuilt only with the aid of a gun'', that war
is the ``bridge'' along which mankind will move into a future
world without wars, etc.
 Although in recent times Chinese propagandists have

somehow toned down the thesis about the inevitability of a
new world war and ever more often make statements to the
effect that China favours peaceful coexistence, Peking keeps
opposing the adoption of any practical measures aimed at
solving acute problems and easing tensions. Proof of this
is its attitude to the war in Indochina, its policy in the Middle
East and its attempts to provoke a new conflict there. The
true designs of Chinese statesmen are seen in their deep
disappointment over the signing of treaties between the USSR
and the FRG and between Poland and the FRG, over the
signing of a quadripartite agreement on West Berlin, and
in their desire to prevent the convocation of a conference
on European security. Peking has pleaded against the treaty
on the non-proliferation of nuclear arms, rejected the treaty
banning the placing of mass destruction weapons on the
seabed, and declined the Soviet proposal to hold a conference
of the five nuclear powers to consider problems of nuclear
disarmament. At the 26th UN General Assembly the Chinese
representatives argued against the Soviet proposal to
convene a world conference on disarmament and played into
the hands of the US delegation. One of the chief designs of
Peking today is to frustrate international detente, to create
new hotbeds of war, and to provoke a missile-nuclear conflict
between the USA and the USSR.
 Adventurist propositions governing the foreign policy of a

great power, which is in possession of thermonuclear
weapons, are latent with grave consequences.
 The real successes in the struggle for the triumph of

socialism throughout the world will largely depend on how
successfully and swiftly the world revolutionary movement
is able to overcome these adventurist propositions advocated
by the present CPC leadership, which is pushing mankind
towards a world thermonuclear conflict.
[114]
__NUMERIC_LVL1__
Chapter Four
__ALPHA_LVL1__
THE ATTITUDE OF MARXISM AND OF MAOISM
 TO THE STATE AND PROLETARIAN LEGALITY
__ALPHA_LVL2__
1. When an `Àntitoxin'' Becomes a Toxin
 The grave danger of Maoism consists in its efforts to

discredit the principles of socialism, and horribly to distort,
twist and deform the ideals for which millions of men on
the globe have been fighting.
 The Maoists refuse to consider this elementary truth: the

means of transformation cannot be neutral with respect to
the aim of transformation, the way this or that country has
to carry out the mature social revolution, for this inevitably
leaves its mark on the nature of the new system that is being
established. In other words, the Maoists fail to realise the
simple fact that even a victorious civil war creates vast
additional difficulties for further creative construction. Mao's
Little Red Book says: ``Revolutionary war is an antitoxin
which not only eliminates the enemy's poison but also purges
us of our own filth. Every just, revolutionary war is endowed
with tremendous power and can transform many things or
clear the way for their transformation ... and people and
everything else ... will be transformed during and after the
war."^^1^^
 Superficially this sounds like the ideas Marx and Lenin
expressed about the use of revolutionary coercion being
inevitable and necessary, and about revolutionary coercive
action by the masses being creative. But having declared
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, p. 61.
115
revolutionary war to be a cure-all, Mao altogether forgets

about dialectics, about the fact that any phenomenon may
develop into its opposite, that the antitoxin may well become
(as the dividing line is obliterated and the use of violent
methods is overdone) a potent toxin, a preparation that kills
instead of curing.
 In contrast to reformism of any stripe, Marxism

recognises revolutionary coercion to be inevitable and necessary for
social transformations. In the society divided into
antagonistic classes, the rising, progressive classes cannot avoid
using force to break up the obsolete social relations and to
overthrow the exploiting classes which are connected with that
system and refuse to give up their interests and privileges of
their own accord. This is a truth Marxism had derived from
summing up past experience. Let us recall what Plekhanov
once said: ``The fewer the chances a given social class
or section has of maintaining its domination the more inclined
it is to terroristic measures."^^1^^ Resistance by the outgoing
classes inevitably makes the revolutionary classes resort to
violent retaliatory measures and armed struggle.
 But in contrast to all manner of Blanquist, anarchist and

Trotskyite petty-bourgeois theories, Marxism does not confine
itself to saying that revolutionary coercion is progressive and
justified. On many occasions the founders of Marxism
warned the proletariat that the use of violent means was
limited and forced, and emphasised the dangers arising from
the use of extreme means of struggle.
 Marxism requires that a distinction should be drawn

between the forms of violence and requires---and this is
extremely important---that the leaders of the proletariat should
keep violence down to a minimum at every stage of the
struggle, and use more moderate forms of coercion whenever
possible. It requires them to display skill in switching at the
right time from means of violence and coercion to means of
education and persuasion.
 On the strength of historical experience, the Marxists
regard the forms of violent action by proletarian parties
above all as being dependent on the resistance put up by the
overthrown classes and the ability of the masses to impose
_-_-_
~^^1^^ G. V. Plekhanov, Works, Vol. IV, Moscow-Petrograd, 1923, p. 63

(in Russian).
116
their own methods and modes of struggle on the enemy. At

the same time, as Marx and Lenin both pointed out, the
level of the moral and intellectual development of the
working class itself and its parties and leaders, and other
circumstances, like the legacy of war, have a great part to play
in the choice of more humane or sterner forms of revolution.^^1^^
Marx saw the political organisation of the Paris Commune
type as being an organised means of proletarian action and
specifically observed that `ìt affords the rational medium in
which that class struggle can run through its different phases
in the most rational and humane way."^^2^^
 The experience of the Paris Commune in 1871 and of the

October Socialist Revolution in 1917 showed that
proletarian revolutions were initially almost totally bloodless
revolutions, and that only support of the counter-revolutionary
forces by interventionists (Prussians in 1871, and the Entente
and the Germans in 1918--1920) enabled the overthrown
classes to start sanguinary civil wars both in France and in
Russia. The proletariat used more moderate means of
coercion after the Second World War as bourgeois-democratic
revolutions developed into socialist ones in the countries of
Eastern Europe.
 Consequently, to the extent that it depends on the

proletarian revolutionary parties they have always preferred not
to carry things to the extremes. They are aware of the simple
truth, one that history has tested over and over again in
numerous civil wars, that armed struggle and civil war are
connected with vast losses and sufferings for the masses, with
the destruction of the productive forces, with the death of
the best revolutionary men, that they are connected---and
this is of much importance for the prospects of the
revolution---with the inevitable militarisation of the country, and
the emergence of traditions and habits which may
subsequently become a serious obstacle to transition to peaceful
construction.
 During the Civil War in Russia, Lenin repeatedly warned

of the danger of the excessive enlargement of the sphere in
_-_-_
~^^1^^ K. Marx, Capital, Vol. 1, 1971, p. 9; V. I. Lenin, Collected Works,
Vol. 27, p. 268.
 ^^2^^ K. Marx and F. Engels, OH the Paris Commune, Moscow, 1971,
p. 156.
117
which military methods were being applied, and said that

it was intolerable to use military orders in organising the
working masses. He wrote: ``This is a field in which
revolutionary violence and dictatorship can be applied only by
way of abuse and I make bold to warn you against such
abuse. Revolutionary violence and dictatorship are excellent
things when applied in the right way and against the right
people. But they cannot be applied in the field of
organisation."^^1^^
 It is true that during the Civil War in Russia herself,

the country's militarisation and some militarisation of
organised government became inevitable. The ``war
communism" of the Civil War period is known to have included the
surplus food appropriation system, and the use of the Red
Army units not only in military operations but also on the
labour front, with some sections of production being
militarised. Lenin specifically and repeatedly stressed that ``war
communism" was a forced expedient caused by the Civil
War and the country's extreme ruin, and that it had not
been and could not be a permanent policy. After the Civil
War, the Party combated attempts to continue the
emergency measures longer than was necessary.
 In China this historical experience of the October

Revolution has been discarded. In their day-to-day political
practices, the Maoists are guided by the idea that socialism should
be built in the first place by means of violence and the use
of armed force.
 The healthy forces in the CPC, believing that it is

impossible for China today to abandon the military methods of
the earlier period all at once, were nevertheless fully aware
of their interim nature and of their applicability only within
a definite historical period and within the framework of
strictly established spheres of Party and government activity.
By contrast, Mao's followers put all their trust into these
methods in tackling any questions, and the forms and
methods of work produced during the civil war were carried
over to the whole of the transition period.
 The Maoists have carried out a ``militarisation'' both of

town and country, spreading army rules to the Party
organisations, the enterprises, the schools and the kindergartens.
_-_-_
118
Relations are modelled after the army in the people's

communes, the factories and plants; military orders are used to
decide all questions relating to the development of
production and a new system of wages has been introduced based
on this principle: ``Work for the highest level in production,
and maintain a low level in life''; orders, coercion and
violence have become popular as a means of `èducational
work" with the intelligentsia. This tendency, already fairly
pronounced back in the 1950s, was carried to an extreme
during the ``cultural revolution''; the violent voluntaristic
measures coming from the ``top'' were backed up by
stagemanaged pressure from ``below'' on the part of politically
immature masses of young people who had been drugged
by pseudo-Marxist catchwords; subsequently, the anarchist
masses escaping from under control were kept in check by
the use of army units.
 With the barrack-room as their ideal, the leaders of the

``cultural revolution" have no need for normally
functioning democratic organs or socialist legality. No wonder then
that in the course of the ``cultural revolution" central or local
organs of power were disbanded, trade unions and young
communist organisations were broken up and a massive purge
of Party bodies carried out. The society the Maoists
are trying to build up has no need either for the conscious,
intelligent and well-educated man, capable of thinking for
himself; no wonder the architects of the ``cultural
revolution" have set themselves the task of converting the conscious
citizen of socialist society into ``Chairman Mao's stainless
screw''. This kind of society has no need for popular
participation in elaborating socialist forms, for there everything
has been provided for in advance and established by the
precepts of the `òmniscient great helmsman''. The people
are being induced to believe that to reach communism all
one need do is obediently fulfil Mao's teachings, that only
one thing is necessary, namely, that the people should become
`àn army without uniform''.
 ``What a fine specimen of barrack-room communism!'',

Marx and Engels once wrote about the well-known article
of the Bakuninists entitled ``The Main Principles of the
Future Social System'', which proposed that men should
produce for society as much as possible and consume as little
us possible, that men's activity should all be regulated,
119
including the use of dining rooms and bedrooms, and that all
the functions of administration should be vested in a
committee of conspirators, without any control or responsibility
to anyone. ``This article shows that if mere mortals are being
punished, as for a crime, for the very idea of a future
organisation of society, that is because the leaders have already
ordered everything beforehand."^^1^^ We wonder what Marx
and Engels would have said about the principles of
presentday Maoist policy, whose aim is to translate into life these
monstrous principles of a reactionary utopia.
__ALPHA_LVL2__
2. The ``State and Revolution'' Problem
 in the Light of Events in China
 The events taking place in China have made Marxists all
over the world return to the problem of ``the state and
revolution'', which is central to the doctrine of Marx and Lenin.
 Let us recall that Marx in the 19th century and Lenin
on the eve of the 1917 Revolution believed that it was
unnecessary to establish in the course of the revolution a
professional apparatus of coercion and pointed to the need for
the army, carrying on a war against the bourgeoisie and the
landowners, to be merged with the mass of the population,
with the people, to the need of officials being elected by the
people, to the need for full democracy in organising
production and distribution.
 These ideas of the founders of Marxism rested on the

experience of history, on the experience of the first proletarian
state, the Paris Commune. The Commune, having done away
with the police, having armed the population, and having
transferred the whole executive and legislative power, all
the levers of management of production into the hands of
functionaries elected by the Communards or the workers of
the enterprises, transformed the functions of administration
into truly popular ones, and wrested them from the hands
of a specially trained ruling caste isolated from the people.
The whole of social life, all social relations became
transparent, open and crystal-clear. Marx wrote: ``[Gone is] the
delusion as if administration and political governing were
_-_-_
~^^1^^ K. Marx/F. Engels, Werke, Bd. 18, Berlin, S. 424.
120
mysteries, transcendent functions only to be trusted to the

hands of a trained caste---state parasites, richly paid
sycophants and sinecurists, in the higher posts, absorbing the
intelligence of the masses and turning them against
themselves in the lower places of the hierarchy. Doing away with
the state hierarchy altogether and replacing the haughteous
masters of the people by its always removable servants, a
mock responsibility by a real responsibility, as they act
continuously under public supervision."^^1^^
 However, this highly valuable practical experience of

state construction under the Paris Commune was highly
short-lived, this city-state lasted for only a few months and
its boundaries did not extend beyond the city of Paris. What
is more, the outcome of the civil war between Paris and
Versailles showed that in the conditions of civil war it was
precisely the various fundamentally new features of the
Commune, which promised to give the new society tremendous
advantages in the long-term historical prospects, that proved
to be a tremendous practical shortcoming: the Commune
went down, in particular, because it was unable to carry out
a ruthless centralisation in the sphere of military affairs,
administration and management of production. The Paris
Commune on the whole failed to solve the problem of the
balance between democracy and centralisation, and its
shortlived experience had to be put to the test over and over
again.
 The October Revolution, having repeated in its initial

stages the experience of its predecessor, subsequently
introduced substantial additions. In order to withstand the flames
of the Civil War, which proved to be a ``natural state of
transition" of the proletarian revolution in one country, the
Soviet power had to resort to a sharp intensification of
centralism in every sphere of social life.
 In the very first year of the revolution, counter--

revolutionary resistance forced the Soviet power, which at first
relied on the people who were armed to a man, to set up
special agencies and apparatuses of class suppression---the
Red Army and the All-Russia Extraordinary Commission.
Their edge was now directed against the overthrown
_-_-_
~^^1^^ K. Marx and F. Engels, On the Paris Commune, Moscow, 1971,
p. 154.
121
oppressors. This class orientation was guaranteed above all by

the make-up of the leadership of the Red Army and the
AllRussia Extraordinary Commission, which had recruited from
the ranks of the Party its best fighters who had passed the test
of revolutionary battle. However, the existence of special
apparatuses of coercion was to some extent latent with
dangerous tendencies and in the event of any relaxation of Party
control over these agencies or in the event of any violation
of the Leninist principles of democratic centralism within
the Party, opened up the possibility for their abuse. It was
essentially about these difficulties of the revolutionary
process, the difficulties of the transition period in a country
which had gone through the epoch of civil war that a
warning was sounded for the Communists of all countries by the
decisions of the 20th Congress of the CPSU, which pointed
to the connection between some aspects of the personality
cult and the temporary and inevitable limitations on
democracy in the course of the revolutionary process. The CPSU
Central Committee resolution `Òn Overcoming the
Personality Cult and Its Consequences" said: ``This complicated
international and internal situation required an iron
discipline, tireless vigilance, and the strictest centralisation of
leadership, and this necessarily had a negative effect on the
development of some democratic forms. In the course of
fierce struggle against the whole world of imperialism our
country had to make some limitations of democracy, which
were justified by the logic of our people's struggle for
socialism in conditions of the capitalist encirclement. But even
at the time, these limitations were already regarded by the
Party and the people as being temporary, and as being
subject to elimination as the Soviet state was consolidated and
the forces of democracy and socialism throughout the world
developed."^^1^^
 The Chinese leaders, carrying out their transformations of

the transition period in more favourable international
conditions, had every possibility of taking account of the
experience of socialist construction in the USSR.
 The CPC leaders tried to do this directly after the 20th
Congress of the CPSU, as will be seen from the decisions
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Questions of Ideological Work, Moscow, 19G1, pp. 83--84 (in

Russian).
122
of the 8th Congress of the CPC. Speaking on behalf of the

Central Committee in a report on changes of the Party's
Rules, the former CPC General Secretary Teng Hsiao-ping
gave a high assessment to the 20th Congress of the CPSU
and condemned the personality cult. He said: `Àn important
achievement of the 20th Congress of the Communist Party
of the Soviet Union lies in the fact that it showed us what
serious consequences can follow from the deification of the
individual. Our Party has always held that no political
parties and no individuals are free from flaws and mistakes in
their activities, and this has now been written into the
General Programme of the draft constitution of our Party. For
the same reason, our Party abhors the deification of the
individual."^^1^^ Today the documents of the 8th Congress,
adopted collectively and in approval of the line of the 20th
Congress of the CPSU, have been discarded by Mao and his
associates. The ``great Mao's'' formulas have been substituted
for the Marxist doctrine of the state and revolution. The
precepts of the founders of Marxism and the whole of
historical experience gained by the world communist
movement has been forgotten.
 Mao's Little Red Book said: `Èvery Communist must

grasp the truth: political power grows out of the barrel of
a gun."^^2^^ There is some truth in this, but not the whole truth.
In the course of the proletarian revolution the gun does not
merely produce power, but military-revolutionary power. In
the flames of the civil war, which the overthrown exploiting
classes impose on the classes rising up against the exploiters,
the revolutionary forces have to resort mainly to violence
and coercion, when everything is decided by orders ``from
above'', by military orders. Following its victory over the
armed counter-revolution, the proletarian revolution (
especially a proletarian revolution winning out in a backward,
petty-bourgeois country) faces long years of struggle against
sabotage, dislocation and the ignorance and inertness of
millions of people. In this period, it is inevitable that the
old agencies and some of the old methods of struggle are
maintained. But it would be a bad mistake to see violent
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Eighth National Congress of the Communist Party of China,

Documents, Vol. I, Peking, 1956, p. 200.
~^^2^^ Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, p. 61.
123
military methods alone as providing the key to a solution of

all the problems and tasks of the transition period.
 The Party directing the transformative socialist process

must modify its methods of struggle as the situation changes,
and this means above all its own organisation and the
organisation of the whole government machine. Thus, in the
early years of the Soviet Republic, the Civil War conditions
did little to help develop the principles of inner-Party
democracy at every level of the Party organism. On the whole,
both the form of organisation and the methods of work were
necessarily determined by the concrete historical situation
and the task of organising resistance against the
interventionists and the whiteguards. The Resolution of the 10th
Congress of the RCP(B) said: `Àccordingly, the Party's
organisational form was inevitably to be in that period a
militarisation of the Party organisation. Just as the form of
proletarian dictatorship assumed the nature of
militaryproletarian dictatorship, so the form of Party organisation has
assumed---and from the standpoint of revolutionary
purpose, inevitably had to assume in such conditions---a
corresponding character. This was on the whole expressed in an
extreme organisational centralism and a fold-up of the
collective organs of Party organisation."^^1^^
 With the end of the Civil War and the entry upon the
period of peaceful construction there necessarily appeared
some contradictions between the Party's forms of
organisation and methods of work on the one hand, and on the other,
the tasks of educating the broadest masses of Party members
in a spirit of initiative and active solution of all the questions
of Party life. These contradictions were already brought out
by the 10th Congress of the RCP(B), whose Resolution also
outlined ways of doing away with them.
 After the Civil War, the forms of organisation of the

socialist state were bound to be modified in various ways: ``the
military-proletarian dictatorship" gradually lost its features
of a militarised and extremely centralised apparatus. The
transition period is simultaneously a period in which the
remnants of the hostile classes are being eliminated, in which
their resistance is overcome, and a period in which millions
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Tenth Congress of the RCP(B). Verbatim Report, Moscow, 1963,

p. 560 (in Russian).
124
of working people develop and are involved in the cause of

socialism, a period in which the new proletarian democracy,
the new socialist legality is established and consolidated, a
period in which the state machine, adapted to the Civil War
conditions, is improved and restructured. Without all this, it
is impossible for the socialist revolution to advance.
 Let us stress that centralised power which is built up in

the process of revolutionary struggle is simultaneously a
system of definite human relations, of definite dependence of
men on each other. Leading workers, habituated in the Civil
War epoch to issue orders and appoint performers, may
continue in the same manner, even after the situation has changed
and when there is need not only of unquestioning
execution of orders but also freedom of discussion, not only
oneman authority but also collegiality, not only continuity, but
also change and renewal of leadership.
 There is a possibility here of different variants of

development. The contradictions which inevitably arise in the
course of socialist construction may be painlessly and openly
resolved through an improvement of the system of
democratic centralism, but these contradictions may also be resolved
behind closed doors, within a tight little group of leaders,
so that the Party is faced with the faits accomplis. That is
when situations may arise, as they have in China, when the
Party loses control of its Central Committee, and the Central
Committee loses control of the Politburo, the highest leading
group.
 The consequences of this are well known: the line of

gradual advance towards socialism was substituted by an
adventurist attempt extremely to accelerate the pace of
socioeconomic change, producing the idea of a ``Great Leap
Forward'', which was to carry the country straight into
communism, while the old level-headed warnings about the
country taking `ònly the first few steps along a 10,000-mile
way" gave way to boastful and irresponsible promises, like
``three years of persistent labour effort---10,000 years of
happy life''. When the inevitable collapse soon followed, the
CPC leaders hastened to put the blame for these failures on
the designs of `ènemies'' at home and ``revisionists'' abroad.
Leninist norms of inner-Party life were trampled, open and
principled polemics and self-criticism were supplanted with
intrigue, designed to do away with those who opposed the
125
adventurist line. Educational work within the Party and in

the masses was increasingly supplanted by violence, while
the ideology of proletarian socialism was ousted by
primitive forms of socialism, egalitarian, barrack-room socialism,
with Mao's personality cult assuming monstrous forms. The
preaching of chauvinism went hand in hand with a fanning
of hostility for the USSR and attempts to impose a
hegemonistic line on the world revolutionary movement. Finally, in
the period of the ``cultural revolution" Mao and his
followers came to look for support to the politically most
immature masses of young people and increasingly to the
army. It is not the Party, not the working people's grass
roots organisations, but the army that has been raised
over and above the other sections of the political
superstructure.
 This practice was provided with ideological backing in the

report to the 9th Congress of the CPC, which, as the current
practice is, referred to Mao's authority when it said: ``The
People's Liberation Army is the mainstay of the dictatorship
of the proletariat. Chairman Mao Tse-tung has repeatedly
said that from the Marxist standpoint the army is the main
component part of the state."^^1^^
 Indeed, the people's army is a reliable bulwark of the

proletarian dictatorship, which ensures defence of the
socialist countries against imperialist aggression, but to declare
it to be the ``main component part" of the socialist state and
an instrument of ``support of industry, agriculture and broad
masses of the Left" and to impose on it the functions of
``military control" over the country's life and of ``
military-political education" of the whole people is to convert the
socialist state system into a military-bureaucratic state system.
 The army's interference in the inner-Party struggle and

the country's social and economic life is more than an
additional minor detail in the ``helmsman's" biography or
another feature of the overall picture of the revolution. A
political coup has been staged in the country, with real political
power taken over by the army; the country's life is being
rapidly militarised, and the real gains and cadres of the
people's revolution in China have been destroyed under the
guise of the ``cultural revolution''. All of this is subordinated
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Hsinhua Press Release, April 27, 1969.
126
to a single goal, that of helping Mao and his followers retain

power.
 The dangerous tendencies of the people's democratic power

being transformed into a military-bureaucratic dictatorship
first became evident at the early stages of the ``cultural
revolution''; the subsequent course of events led to the
consolidation of these dangerous tendencies in the whole of the
country's internal political life.
 Analysing the processes going on in China, the Marxists

must naturally not discount some objective circumstances
which have helped to inflate the centralising elements at
the expense of the democratic elements, and to militarise
the whole of governmental and social life. The whole of
China's modern history is marked by strong tendencies
towards local separatism, with the provincial governors
concentrating vast political, economic and military power in
their hands. After the 1911 revolution, China was, for all
practical purposes, split up into a number of areas, each a
state within a state, and each headed by a definite
militaristic group. The establishment in 1927 of the central
Kuomintang government with Chiang Kai-shek at its head, could
not result in the establishment of centralised power. Seeking
to put down the revolutionary movement, Chiang Kai-shek
struck an alliance with the local militarists, who agreed to
support him provided they retained great powers in running
the provinces, within whose limits they operated.
 Japan's occupation of the north-eastern provinces in 1931

and the subsequent aggression against the rest of China not
only disrupted the ties between the various parts of the
country, but also removed a sizable part of it from the
Kuomintang government's control. On a vast territory in
northwest China, the Communists succeeded in setting up their
own organs of power, organising the army, etc.
Consequently, in the early 1940s China was not a united state.
 It was quite natural therefore that after the victory of the
people's revolution there was intensified centralisation in the
country, and at the first stage of socialist construction some
methods characteristic of the period of the armed struggle
against the Kuomintang were retained.
 Let us also note that before the people's democratic

revolution China was a country virtually without democratic
government institutions; the feudal traditions had an impact
127
not only on the policy of the ruling class. At the end of the
1920s, Mao wrote the following about the legacy of the
past: ``The evil practice of arbitrary dictation in feudal
times, deeply rooted in the minds of the masses and even of
the Party members in general, cannot be swept away at once;
when anything comes up, people seek the easy way out and
do not like the elaborate democratic system.''^^1^^
 During the civil war which was fought for decades the
democratic centralism system within the Party and the mass
organisations could not be fully developed. Add to this
the inadequate Marxist training of the leading Party cadres
and the obvious oversimplification of the scientific
socialism theory down to primitive levels in the theoretical
writings of Mao Tse-tung, who headed the CPC Central
Committee.
 But although a number of objective circumstances in China

hampered the development of the new, proletarian
democracy, there was nothing fatally inevitable about the
people's democratic state degenerating into a
militarybureaucratic dictatorship. The CPC leadership, taking a
critical view of its own activity and learning from the
international experience accumulated by other revolutionary
parties could well have put a stop to the development of the
undesirable and dangerous tendencies. Observance of
innerParty democracy, and the Leninist principles and rules of
Party life could well have become a most important
guarantee of successes in building up a socialist state. Lenin
wrote: ``More confidence in the independent judgement of
the whole body of Party workers!... The whole Party must
constantly, steadily and systematically train suitable persons
for the central bodies, must see clearly, as in the palm of
its hand, all the activities of every candidate for these high
posts, must come to know even their personal
characteristics, their strong and weak points, their victories and '
defeats'. . .. Light, more light!"^^2^^ This was said at a time when
the Bolshevik Party had to work in the underground.
But what Lenin said has even more relevance to ruling
parties.
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works, Vol. 1, p. 92.
~^^2^^ V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 7, pp. 116, 117, 118.
128
__ALPHA_LVL2__
3. On the Question of Mao's
 Personality Cult
 One of the expressions of the violation of Leninist

principles and rules of inner-Party life in China is Mao's
personality cult, which has assumed such ugly and
hypertrophied forms that it has virtually become impossible to make
mention of the personality cult problem, let alone examine
it. But this very fact makes a look at the CPC documents
dealing specially with personality cult problems so much
more important and instructive. These documents date back
to the period when Mao's glorification and deification in
China had not yet reached the proportions of a national
craze, a period when the CPC leadership still tried to analyse
the problem theoretically.
 We have in mind above all the article `Òn the Historical
Experience of the Proletarian Dictatorship" which was
written just after the 20th Congress of the CPSU, when
fundamental decisions in the Communist Party of China were still
being taken collectively and, as the editors of Jenmin jihpao
said at the time, this article was written `òn the basis of a
discussion of the given question at an enlarged meeting of
the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Communist
Party of China".^^1^^ This fact seems to explain why there is
some depth in this document, which is the best evidence
today of the CPC leadership's betrayal of its own
principles and concrete assessments.
 Chinese documents in the early 1960s declared the

decisions of the 20th Congress of the CPSU on the personality
cult to be `à betrayal of Marxism'', ``revisionism'', ``
treason'', etc. The Chinese leaders said: ``The so-called fight
against the personality cult, started by the CPSU leadership
was taken over by them in a relay from Bakunin, Kautsky,
Trotsky and Tito, who had used the slogan to fight against
the leaders of the proletariat and to undermine the
proletariat's revolutionary movement."^^2^^
 Let us now recall what the same paper had said about
the same decisions seven years earlier. It had written: ``This
_-_-_
~^^1^^ On the Historical Experience of the Proletarian Dictatorship,

Moscow, 1956, p. 2.
~^^2^^ Jenmin jihpao, September 13, 1963.
9---1362
129
bold self-criticism, carried out by the Communist Party of

the Soviet Union and aimed at exposing the mistakes it had
made, testifies that its inner life is highly principled and that
Marxism-Leninism has great viability."^^1^^
 But apart from recalling these general principled

assessments by the CPC leadership of the decisions of the 20th
CPSU Congress the important thing to bear in mind is that
the article `Òn the Historical Experience of the Proletarian
Dictatorship" contained attempts to consider the personality
cult in its historical development, in a unity of its
subjective and objective aspects. The article linked up its
emergence with the ideology of the past, with the immaturity of
millions of people in a petty-bourgeois country which had
carried out a proletarian revolution, and where old
traditions had much potency. The article went on: ``The
personality cult is a rotten legacy which has come down from
mankind's long history. The personality cult has a basis not
only among the exploiter classes but also among the small
producers___After the establishment of the proletarian
dictatorship, despite the fact that the exploiting classes were
eliminated, the petty-producer economy supplanted by the
collective economy, and a socialist society built, some of the
rotten ideological survivals remaining from the old society
and laden with poison can still long remain in the minds of
men. 'The force of habit in millions and tens of millions is
a most formidable force' (V. I. Lenin, Collected Works,
Vol. 31, p. 44). The personality cult is also in a sense an
expression of the force of habit of millions and tens of millions
of people."^^2^^
 It was also stressed that there were various difficulties in

building up the state machinery in a socialist country which
had gone through a period of civil war, difficulties which
in turn helped to produce the personality cult: `Ìn order to
defeat a strong enemy the proletarian dictatorship requires
a high degree of centralised power. This highly centralised
power must go hand in hand with a high level of democracy.
When the accent is one-sidedly on centralisation, a great
many errors may arise."^^3^^
_-_-_
~^^1^^ On the Historical Experience of the Proletarian Dictatorship,
p. 3.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 10.
~^^3^^ Ibid., p. 6.
130
 The emergence and development of the personality cult

was connected with the fact that after the victory over the
class enemy, bureaucratic practices tended to remain
tenacious, and that the practice of the Chinese revolution itself
offered an example. The article said: `Àfter the victory of
the revolution, when the working class and the Communist
Party became a class and a party in power, leading workers
of our Party and state are subjected in many respects to the
influence of bureaucracy, thereby facing a great danger:
abusing their official position in government agencies, they
may well engage in arbitrary practices, lose their touch with
the masses, abandon the collective leadership, govern by fiat
and undermine democratic principles in the Party and in
the state. That is why if we do not want to find ourselves
in such a bog, we must devote the closest attention to
maintaining the 'line of the masses' in our method of leadership,
and never in any case allowing the slightest negligence. For
this we must formulate a definite system of work,
ensuring the implementation of the 'line of the masses' and of
collective leadership, so as to avoid the appearance of
upstarts and individual `heroes' out of touch with the masses,
reducing subjectivism and one-sidedness in our work which
are at variance with objective reality".^^1^^
 An attempt was also made in the article to establish the

connection between the initial and the culminating stage of
the process being examined, when the emergence of the
personality cult was to some extent promoted not only by the
difficulties but also by the successes of socialist construction
achieved through the effort of the masses and hundreds of
thousands of Communists. The article elaborated on the
well-known idea expressed in the documents of the 20th
Congress of the CPSU to the effect that ``the personality
cult emerged and developed against the background of the
greatest historical gains by Marxism-Leninism, and the
tremendous successes scored by the Soviet people and the
Communist Party in socialist construction".^^2^^
 It would of course be wrong to require an editorial

article, and especially one written shortly after the events in
question, to contain an exhaustive analysis of the causes of a
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Ibid., pp. 13--14.
~^^2^^ On the Question of the Personality Cult, pp. 4-5.
131
complex and contradictory phenomenon like the

personality cult. But it cannot be denied that it did contain some
important outlines making it possible to take a historical
approach to the analysis of the experience of the proletarian
dictatorship and a consideration of its lessons and mistakes.
A general assessment of the 1956 article today shows that
it concentrated attention on Lenin's idea about the
difficulties of the transition period. That was the key to an
understanding of the events taking place in one's own country, the
key which the CPC leadership subsequently lost. This
departure from the method of Leninism and of historical
materialism went hand in hand with its slanderous statements
to the effect that the 20th and the 22nd Congresses of the
CPSU had revised Lenin's propositions.
 The events of the past few years give ground to say that
the article `Òn the Historical Experience of the Proletarian
Dictatorship" contained an indirect critique of Mao's
personality cult and had been written without his consent, even
if not against his will. It had apparently been prepared by
the internationalist section of the CPC leadership at the time,
which under the influence of the 20th Congress of the CPSU
could not help but realise the full extent of the danger for
China's future presented by Mao's personality cult.
 Under pressure from the section Mao and his followers
had to accept the criticism of the personality cult at the 8th
Congress and the deletion from the CPC Rules of the
statement, which had been written into the Rules at the 7th
Congress, that Mao's ideas were the Party's leading ideology.
It was under pressure from this section that the 8th Congress
tried to remove the shortcomings in the structure and the
system of the Party apparatus which made it possible for
various negative features to appear among Party leaders,
notably Mao himself. We have in mind the requirements that
Party congresses are to be held regularly, that the Rules
should contain a provision on annual sessions of Congresses
for the purpose of controlling the Central Committee's
activity, that the Central Committee and its Politburo should
be enlarged, that all Party members, including its leaders,
should strictly abide by the Party Rules and so on.
 Let us note this fact. In the period under consideration,

Mao himself and his closest associates did not oppose, not
openly at any rate, the criticism of the ideology and practice
132
of the personality cult, and at one time this may even have
created the impression that Mao accepted this criticism. At
any rate, towards the end of February 1957, Mao delivered a
speech at the Supreme State Conference, which was then
published in the form of an article and entitled: `Òn the
Correct Handling of the Contradictions Among the People''.
Mao spoke fairly frankly about the difficulties of socialist
construction, agreed that contradictions existed in the
country, criticised bureaucratic practices in the Party and
government apparatus, and urged broad discussions in science,
literature and the art (the so-called Hundred Flowers line).^^1^^
He wished to create the impression that he was not speaking
as the leader of a state and of a Party but as the father of
a big family. That is why he did not in essence condemn
those who had taken part in the strikes and the disorders
which had occurred in China in 1956, but merely rebuked
them, and blamed everything on the bureaucratic practices
of the local leaders.
 Mao's speech evoked a stormy response inside and

outside the Party. Rank-and-file Party members and the masses
of working people saw his speech as a call for the
establishment of Leninist standards in the Party and the state
and in every sphere of social and political life. A broad
discussion was started of Mao's article and in the course of it
demands were put forward for measures in China essentially
similar to those which were being put through in the Soviet
Union in pursuance of the decisions of the 20th Congress
of the CPSU. Statements by ordinary Chinese citizens
contained criticism of Mao's personality cult and its negative
consequences.
 Here is an example. Lin Hsi-ling, a girl-student of the

People's University, delivered a speech at Peking University
on May 27, 1957. She said: ``Chairman Mao's valuable
quality is that he has dialectical ideas and knows how to
discover and correct mistakes, to generalise experience and to
learn from it. But that is not to say that he has not made
any mistakes. In China there is also a personality cult....
The Chairman wrote several poems and sent them to the
_-_-_
~^^1^^ We do not consider here the mistaken propositions his speech

contained because this has no direct bearing on the question being dealt with
and also because these were analysed in Chapter One.
133
journal Shikan, where some people began to evaluate them,

declaring that the Chairman is not only a great politician
but also a great poet. I think that when the Chairman heard
of this he could not help being angry, because these are nasty
words. Some people say that the Chairman is a good
calligrapher, but I don't think so [emphasis added---V. Y., K. I.,
Y.P.and V.Y.}."^^1^^
 Statements by many scientists, lecturers, students and

workers dealt with a broad range of questions relating to breaches
of the principles of socialist legality, the existence of a
bureaucratic regime in the Party, the discrepancy between
wages and the principles of remuneration for labour under
socialism, lack of democratic principles in the work of
colleges and research institutions, etc.
 The discussion of Mao's article, in the course of which

shortcomings in various sections of China's social
mechanism were criticised, was used by counter-revolutionary
elements, especially by members of the bourgeois parties and
also by their allies within the CPC and outside it, as an
opportunity for attacking the CPC, the Soviet Union and
socialism in general. They were justly condemned as ``Rightist
elements'', but the Maoists put a broad interpretation on this
concept, and included among them those who were mistaken
or were vacillating, and even those who favoured the
establishment of Leninist standards in Party and state life
not only in words but also in deeds. Without any reason
at all they were lumped together with avowed enemies of
socialism like Chang Po-chun, Lung Yun and Fei
Hsiaotung.
 The attacks on Mao's opponents which followed in 1957

and 1958 under the pretext of a drive against the ``Rightist
elements" showed very well the falsehood and essentially
provocative character of the Maoists' condemnation of the
personality cult, and gave evidence that Mao and his
entourage in fact had no intention of giving up the ideology
and practices of the personality cult.
 It is well known that for the USSR the personality cult
was a temporary phenomenon, and that the CPSU found the
strength to put an end to that state of affairs. The Theses of
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Let us note that in the autumn of 1957 Lin Hsi-ling was declared
to be a ``Right-wing element" and was ordered to work as a charwoman.
134
the CPSU Central Committee, Fiftieth Anniversary of the

Great October Socialist Revolution, which summed up the
experience of socialist construction in the USSR over half
a century, said: ``Life proved that the Party's political course
was correct. It showed its ability to give theoretical
generalisation to the experience of the masses, to put forward
correct political slogans, and to lay bare and correct
mistakes. In pursuing its course towards the further development
of socialist democracy, the 20th Party Congress resolutely
condemned Stalin's personality cult which was expressed in
the glorification of the role of one man, something that is
alien to the spirit of Marxism-Leninism, in departures from
the Leninist principles of collective leadership, and in
unwarranted reprisals and other violations of socialist legality
which inflicted harm on our society. These distortions, for
all their gravity, did not alter the nature of socialist society,
nor did they shake the pillars of socialism.
 ``The Party and the people had an abiding faith in the
cause of communism and worked with enthusiasm to
implement the Leninist ideals, overcoming difficulties,
temporary setbacks and mistakes."^^1^^ Where the Party finds the
strength and means to give an objective assessment of
negative tendencies, where these tendencies are resolutely cut
short, there they cannot develop into a threat to the
construction of socialism and communism.
 In contrast to the line of the CPSU and the fraternal

Parties of other socialist countries oriented upon a broad
development of socialist democracy, Mao's personality cult is
being implanted in China in increasing proportions. This is
evident in the fact that all the power in the Party and the
state is virtually concentrated in the hands of one man, that
his instructions, and his alone, are the ultimate truth, that
there is no freedom of opinion either within the Party or the
state, and that the ideological and political opponents of the
``great helmsman" and people who merely doubt or are
mistaken are classed as `ènemies of the people'', that there
is a political reign of terror in the country which is being
carried out in Mao's name and that Marxism-Leninism is being
supplanted by Maoism. The report to the 9th Congress of
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Fiftieth Anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution,

Theses of the CPSU Central Committee, Moscow, 1967, p. 24.
135
the CPC asserted: `Àll the achievements of the Communist

Party of China are the result of Chairman Mao Tse-tung's
sage leadership, are a victory of the thought of Mao
Tsetung. Over the last half-century, Chairman Mao Tse-tung,
directing the great struggle of the multinational people of
China to complete the new-democratic revolution, in the
course of directing the great struggle---the socialist
revolution and socialist construction in our country---in the course
of the great struggle of the modern international communist
movement against imperialism, against modern revisionism
and reaction in various countries, combining the universal
truth of Marxism-Leninism with the concrete practice of
the revolution, inherited, upheld and developed
MarxismLeninism in the sphere of politics, military science,
economics, culture, philosophy and so on, and raised it to a
totally new stage.''
 This kind of assessment of Mao's contribution to Marxist

theory goes hand in hand with ignoring or direct denial of
the merits of all the other leading members of the CPC, past
and present, and of the leaders of the international communist
and working-class movement. For that purpose, the history
of the CPC before Mao's advent to power in 1935 is being
revised and is being presented as a succession of mistakes
and miscalculations. There is a deliberate confusion between
the Right opportunists (Chen Tu-hsiu), the ``Left''
opportunists (Li Li-san) and true internationalists (Chui Chu-po). The
paper Jenmin jihpao wrote: `Òur Party has gone through
struggle with the Right or the Left-deviationist erroneous
line of Chen Tu-hsiu, Chui Chu-po, Li Li-san, and Wang
Ming, and especially through long and repeated struggle
with the bourgeois reactionary line represented by Liu
Shaochi."^^1^^ This assertion was repeated in the report to the 9th
Congress of the CPC: ``The history of the Communist Party
of China is a history of struggle of the Marxist-Leninist
line, of Chairman Mao Tse-tung's struggle against Right
and `Left'-opportunist lines in the Party.. .. Our Party has
matured, grown up and gained in stature in struggle
between two lines, especially in struggle which led to the rout
of three traitors' cliques: the cliques of Chen Tu-hsiu, Wang
_-_-_
~^^1^^
Jenmin jihpao, November 25, 1968.
136
Ming and Liu Shao-chi, which have done the Party a great
harm.
 On instructions from the Mao group a ``movement for the

study of the history of the struggle between the two lines
within the Party" was started in China, with the obvious
purpose of defaming all of Mao's opponents, while
presenting him as the great leader of the CPC who never makes
any mistakes. In this context, one should note the publication
in the Chinese press, on November 25, 1968, of Mao's report
at the 2nd Plenary Meeting of the Seventh Central
Committee of the CPC on March 5, 1949. The re-issue of this
20-year-old report and the highest praise heaped on it at
the 9th Congress of the CPC pursued the following purposes:
to present Mao's fight against those who differed with
him within the Party as a struggle of long duration between
two lines: the ``revolutionary proletarian line'', meaning
Mao's own line, and the ``counter-revolutionary, revisionist
line'', meaning that of his opponents.^^1^^
 The report, and the Party Rules adopted at the 9th
Congress of the CPC were designed to put an official legal seal
on the ideology of Mao's personality cult. All the events set
out in the report centre on Mao's own personality; the whole
history of the struggle within the CPC during the
antiJapanese war and after the formation of the CPR is
described as Mao's personal struggle against Liu Shao-chi, as
the struggle of the ``proletarian revolutionary line of
Chairman Mao Tse-tung" against the ``revisionist line of Liu
Shaochi''. It is alleged that ``the line of Mao Tse-tung" scored
victories at every stage while the line of Liu Shao-chi
suffered defeat. The report made no mention of any Party
documents or decisions of Party congresses and conferences.
The development of the Chinese revolution is presented
in the light of naked subjectivism: out in front was Mao
Tse-tung, who saw all and anticipated everything,
while the Party and the people followed blindly in his
footsteps.
 There is no other instance in the history of the world

revolutionary movement of a living leader's name being
entered into the Party Rules.
_-_-_
~^^1^^
Jenmin jihpao, November 25, 196S.
137
 Let us stress that Mao's personality cult has been erected
on the socio-spiritual foundation which had been cemented
for long centuries by feudal Confucian tradition. Confucius
magnified the cult of Wen Wang (12th century B.C.), the
first legendary king of the Chou dynasty (12th-3rd centuries
B.C.) and spread his own teaching on the strength of his
authority and on tradition. Subsequently, the cult of
Confucius himself was built up step by step, until he came to be
compared with the ``heavens'' which lit up the whole world
with its radiant light. By the 2nd century B.C., Confucius
was enshrined as a deity and his cult was given a
theological substantiation in the teaching of Tung Chung-shu.
 Confucianism had the aim of suppressing vibrant thinking

among men and transforming them into fanatics who did the
will of the ruling feudal elite. Confucius insisted that the
life of men down here, on earth, depended entirely on sage
rulers. He compared them to the wind, and their subjects to
the grass which bent in the wind. Where rulers rule wisely,
the people ``will toil without grumbling".^^1^^
 Virtually the same ideas are being preached in China

today, the only difference being that Maoism does not make
any references to the ``will'' of the ancestors, while the rest
is essentially identical with Confucian dogmas. The point
is that Maoism has no need either of ``celestial will" or of
any ancestors---``sage rulers of antiquity"---because Mao
himself has long since been converted by his admirers into a
``living god'', and, as Maoist propaganda insists, is an
embodiment of mankind's wisdom.
__ALPHA_LVL2__
4. Political Arbitrariness Instead
 of Socialist Democracy and Legality
 The theoretical apology of the personality cult in

practice takes the form of a drive against the Chinese people's
democratic gains.
 Lenin used to say that the fullest and most consistent
democracy is the most important distinctive mark of the new,
proletarian, socialist state, as compared with the state in the
``proper sense of the word'', which he saw as a ``special
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Lun Yii, Ch. ``Yaoyueh'', 2.
138
machine for the suppression of one class by another, and, what

is more, of the majority by the minority".^^1^^ Lenin wrote:
``Democracy, introduced as fully and consistently as is at
all conceivable, is transformed from bourgeois into
proletarian democracy; from the state (=a special force for the
suppression of a particular class) into something which is no
longer the state proper."^^2^^
 Proletarian, socialist democracy is closely connected with

the implementation of the rules of socialist law, with
socialist legality, which serve as the constitutional expression
of the general interests of the working people.
Characterising socialist democracy and its class character, Lenin pointed
to the broad range of rights enjoyed by citizens in socialist
society, including election and recall of functionaries of the
state apparatus, control by the masses of their work, and
alternative participation by citizens in the conduct of
affairs of state. Lenin never regarded socialist democracy as
arbitrary rule by a faceless crowd, which ignored democratic
institutions and civil rights. Nor had he ever contrasted direct
action by the masses and the activity of representative
institutions of the proletarian state. He wrote: ``We cannot
imagine democracy, even proletarian democracy, without
representative institutions."^^3^^ According to Lenin, the
representative institutions of the socialist state carry out
legislation and organise its translation into life.
 It is a duty of every citizen and of every person in office,
without exception, to observe socialist legality. The whole
activity of the Communists should set an example of
observance of socialist laws. With Lenin's participation, the
8th Congress of the Party in 1919 adopted a resolution
which said that ``the Party must carry out its decisions
through the Soviet organs, within the framework of the
Soviet Constitution".^^4^^ The leader of the working people stressed
the need consistently and steadily to consolidate
legality. In 1921, he said: ``The closer we approach conditions
of unshakable and lasting power and the more trade
_-_-_
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 419.
~^^3^^ Ibid., p. 424.
~^^4^^ The CPSU in Resolutions and Decisions of Congresses, Conferences

mid CC Plenary Meetings, Part I, Moscow, 1953, p. 446 (in Russian).
139
develops, the more imperative it is to put forward the firm

slogan of greater revolutionary legality."^^1^^
 Lenin held respect for socialist laws to be one of the

most important marks of civilised behaviour. He wrote
that legality and civilised behaviour are indissoluble, and
attached vast importance to the use of legality in raising the
standards of behaviour among broad masses of people.^^2^^
Lenin's principles of socialist democracy and legality and
Lenin's experience in the struggle to implement them are
the legacy of all true revolutionaries, of all the advanced
culture of modern society. Socialist democracy and legality
serve, according to the Marxist-Leninist doctrine, as
guarantees against subjectivism and arbitrary acts, and help to
bring out and realise the people's true will, to establish
respect for human dignity, and the most consistent observance
of the basic rules of any community living.^^3^^
 The Main Document of the International Meeting of

Communist and Workers' Parties held in Moscow in June
1969 stressed that ``the forces of socialism are strengthened
and unity of will and action of the people is promoted by
the steadily increasing political activity of the working
people, by the greater activity of their social organisations,
extension of the rights of the individual, irreconcilable
struggle against manifestations of bureaucracy and by the
allround development of socialist democracy".^^4^^ Neglect or
distortion of these ideas in the practice of socialist construction
breeds subjectivism, builds up political mistakes and may
develop into highly dangerous political arbitrariness, gravely
jeopardising the socialist gains of the working people.
 The tragic consequences of the policy pursued by Mao and

his supporters are closely connected with the downright
neglect of the key Marxist-Leninist ideas on socialist
democracy and legality. Mao and his entourage contemptuously
try to present their own unprecedented arbitrariness as being
the theory and practice of ``massive democracy under the
proletarian dictatorship'', as being the use and development
of the experience of the Paris Commune, as being an ``
_-_-_
~^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol, 33, p. 176.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 366.
~^^3^^ Ibid., Vol. 25, p. 474.

W69, p. 22.
140
epochal and brilliant development of Marxism-Leninism" and

as its entry upon a totally new stage, that of the ``thought of
Mao Tse-tung''.
 The rampant political arbitrariness of Mao and his

supporters, which reached a peak during the ``cultural
revolution'', has a fairly long and complex history behind it. It
cannot be correctly understood without consideration, as has
been said, of the fact that in the late 1940s and early 1950s
there was in China an objective need to establish a strictly
centralised political power capable of exercising control over
the country's vast territory, which had just been liberated in
the course of the civil war from Chiang Kai-shek's rule. The
new power had to fight against the counter-revolution, the
resistance of the exploiting classes, the vacillation of the petty
bourgeoisie, and the criminal acts of the declasse elements.
 These problems were all tackled mainly through

administrative repressions and outright armed suppression, both
of which were used on a fairly large scale. The massive use
of repression was accompanied by a number of mistakes and
abuses, and now and again developed into brutal violence.
However, political coercion, aimed at expropriating the
landowners and compradores and safeguarding the gains of the
revolution, had a progressive significance and yielded a
tangible political effect. Let us stress that this coercion was
being carried out simultaneously with extensive economic
and cultural construction, in which the USSR and other
socialist countries gave great assistance. Meanwhile, as
practice has shown, some political leaders in China, who had
mastered mainly violent, military and paramilitary methods
of tackling various problems, came to believe that violence,
administration by fiat, military orders, hand in hand with
massive campaigns were the most effective and reliable
means of solving any political, economic and other problems.
 At the 8th Congress of the CPC in September 1956, some

delegates expressed concern over these attitudes. In its
resolution, the Congress, having remarked on the successes of
socialist construction in China, declared: `Ìt is a matter of
urgency and of great importance, now that we have entered
the period of socialist construction, to further extend the scope
of democracy in our country, and to combat bureaucracy."^^1^^
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Eighth National Congress of the Communist Party of China, p. 126.
141
The Congress outlined a number of concrete measures to

develop socialist democracy in China and condemned the views
of those who were trying artificially to sharpen the class
struggle in the country. The Congress also noted that the
provisional laws adopted in the initial period after
liberation and direct action by the masses as a mode of combating
reaction, had already played their part. The CPC Central
Committee's report said that together with the changing tasks
in the struggle `à corresponding change in the methods of
struggle will consequently have to follow, and a complete
legal system becomes an absolute necessity".^^1^^ Tung Pi-wu, a
founding member of the CPC, made some trenchant
criticism of the state of legality in the country and advanced
important proposals for strengthening it. He said: ``The
problem today is that we still lack several urgently-needed,
fairly complete basic statutes such as a criminal code, a civil
code, rules of court procedure, a labour law, a law governing
the utilisation of land and the like. At the same time,
because of the changes that have taken place in our political
and economic situation, a number of our laws should have
been revised or framed anew."^^2^^ He added: `Ìt would have
to be regarded as a serious problem, if we allowed our legal
system to remain incomplete or unduly deferred its
completion."^^3^^
 At the Congress much was also said about the fact that
``while carrying out our work in a number of localities and
departments, we have often discovered violations of the law
and encroachments upon the people's democratic rights".^^4^^ It
was further said that there had been arrests without
observance of the established legal procedure, that the defendants'
exercise of the rights of defence and appeal had been
restricted and that those arrested were brutally treated.^^5^^ The
material of the Congress contains an analysis of the
historical and social reasons for these negative developments in the
life of the country. It said: ``Before our Party, as the leading
force of the people, seized state power throughout the
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Eighth National Congress of the Communist Party of China, p. 82.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 87.
~^^3^^ Ibid., p. 57.
~^^4^^ Ibid., p. 89.
~^^5^^ Ibid., p. 145.
142
country, we were an outlawed party with no legal means of

waging the struggle and all revolutionary work had to be carried
on by outwitting the legal system of the old regime; after
we seized state power throughout the country, we did a
thorough job of destroying the old state apparatus and the
old legal system. For this reason there was a deep-seated
hatred for the old legal system among our Party membership
and the revolutionary masses, and it is very natural that this
hatred for the old legal system should have caused a lack of
respect for all legal systems in general."^^1^^ And: ``The petty
bourgeoisie make up the preponderant majority of all the
classes existing in our society. People from the petty
bourgeoisie also form the biggest part of our Party
membership. ... It may be said that all forms of disregard for the
legal system are, in essence, manifestations of the anarchist
thinking of the petty bourgeoisie."^^2^^
 One important and alarming conclusion that rang out at

the 8th Congress of the CPC was this: `Àpart from the fact
that the causes of disregard and non-observance of the legal
system are deeply embedded in our history and in our
society, we have today a vast number of new and inexperienced
cadres, and the propaganda and education work that has
been done in this connection among them is by no means
adequate."^^3^^
 Some speakers at the Congress stressed the danger of

subjectivism and adventurism. The Congress announced a line
to strengthen and develop socialist democracy and legality
in China. There is reason to assert that a number of political
leaders took a highly serious view of this line, which was a
novel one for China in every respect, and sought to
implement it in political and legal practices. Meanwhile, as has
been noted above, Mao himself, being forced to accept the
line proclaimed by the 8th Congress, had no intention of
putting it into practice. Already in the summer of 1957 a
fresh tide of repressions was generated. Among the victims,
alongside the elements truly hostile to the revolution, were a
large mass of people who were sincerely responding to Mao's
``Hundred Flowers" call, which implied freedom of criticism
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Ibid., pp. 91--92.
~^^2^^ Ibid., pp. 92--93.
~^^3^^ Ibid., p. 93.
143
and expression within the framework of the law. They were

labelled (sometimes literally) with the ``Right element"
tag. These ``Right elements" were placed on a par with
war criminals, Chiang Kai-shek's agents and
counterrevolutionaries. Being declared a ``Right element" meant
dismissal from work, expulsion from school, and other
repressions.
 The campaign against the ``Right elements" was no

exception. Subsequent practice showed that Mao and his followers
had decided to put down criticism of their acts by every
possible means. Far from abandoning the extensive use of
violence in the new conditions, they in fact applied it against
all their opponents, stifling criticism, and hoping that reliance
on violence, combined with generation of `ènthusiasm''
among the masses, would help them to solve the most
complex problems.
 In August 1957, the State Council of the CPR adopted a

decision on labour education, under which virtually any
citizen of the CPR, without trial or the sanction of the
prosecutor, simply under a decision by an administrative
agency, could be transported for labour education, which for all
practical purposes meant exile or the concentration camp for
an indefinite period. An announcement broadly circulated at
the end of 1957 revealed that a number of responsible
workers^t the Ministry of Control of the CPR, the Supreme
People's Court and the Supreme People's Procurator's Office
had been dismissed from their office and qualified as ``Right
elements who had infiltrated into the Party''. They were
accused of a Right-wing deviation for having stood up for
the independent powers of the organs of state control, the
procurator's office and the court. This was followed by a
corresponding purge in the agencies of state control, the
courts and the procurator's office.
 The proposals on the adoption of the new criminal, civil

and procedural codes, which speakers at the 8th Congress of
the CPC said were extremely necessary, were soon branded
as `ùndermining the democratic dictatorship of the people".^^1^^
Some of the drafted codes are being applied in secret,
without publication, and the practice of intimidating criminal
punishments, like execution by shooting deferred for two
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Chengfa yanchiu No. 3, 1958, pp. 28--29. 
144
years, deprivation of liberty for an indefinite period, and so

on, is being continued.
 The wider use of violent methods in implementing policy,

and neglect of legality have gone hand in hand with
political and economic adventurism, Maoist plans for ``Great Leaps
Forward'', ``communisation'' and world hegemonism.
Characteristically, the National People's Congress, the highest
organ of state power, was ignored when such extremely
important measures for the people as the ``Great Leap
Forward" and the introduction of the people's communes, were
being prepared. Implementation of this line was
accompanied with an intensification of criminal and other repressions.
Mobile teams, consisting of security men, and functionaries
of the courts and the procurator's office, were formed to
speed up the infliction of mass repressions. Here and there,
the execution of death sentences was carried out in the
presence of vast crowds. The labour of prisoners was being
widely used in all the provinces. Fierce attacks were launched
in the political and juridical press against assertions that the
main functions of the state in China had now become the
function of economic organisation and cultural education,
and that there was no longer any need to intensify the
function of suppression at home. ``The fundamental reason for
the existence of our law consists in the existence of the class
struggle in the period of transition from capitalism to
communism, and since contradictions exist between our enemies
and ourselves the main role of law always consists in
exercising a dictatorship over the enemies, and in resolving the
contradictions between us and the enemies; it is not the main
role of law to resolve the contradictions within the people."^^1^^
Consequently, the primary function of law as an instrument
of repression and retribution was being emphasised in every
way.
__ALPHA_LVL2__
5. Ideological Justification of the Regime
 of Political Arbitrariness in Mao's Works
 The events taking place in China's political life in the

1950s and 1960s were evidently connected with a number
of objective circumstances but in no small measure depended
_-_-_
~^^1^^
Chcngfa yanclriu No. 6, 1958, p. 40.
10---1362
145
also on the subjective propositions of Mao and his followers,

and on Mao's theoretical conceptions of the role of violence
in a socialist revolution.
 For one thing, an analysis of Mao's political ideas shows

that he had been moving from the use of some Marxist
propositions concerning the break-up of the old, exploiting state
power towards a distortion of the Marxist-Leninist ideas of
power, democracy and legality in the period of socialist
construction.
 As has already been stressed, Mao's political views took

shape on the relatively narrow basis of Chinese practice
during the protracted civil wars and in isolation from the diverse
experience of the international working class. That is why
his view of politics is inseparable from the notion of war.
He insists that ``politics is war without bloodshed while war
is politics with bloodshed".^^1^^
 Mao's idea of power corresponded to some concrete

circumstances of the struggle against the semi-feudal and
semicolonial system in China. In effect, he even borrowed some
of his notions of power and the method of exercising it, as
he himself has repeatedly admitted, from the practices of
Chiang Kai-shek, which everyone knows amounted to
antidemocratic, militaristic terrorism. Mao stressed: ``The
revolutionary dictatorship and the counter-revolutionary
dictatorship are opposite in character, but the former appeared in
the course of learning from the latter. This learning is highly
important.''
 Very early on Mao observed, with approval and some

envy, how well Chiang Kai-shek had mastered the old
precepts of Chinese militarists, like their saying that `ìf you
have an army, you have power'', and ``war decides
everything''. Mao turned these notions into absolutes and
identified them with Marxism; as has been noted above, he holds
that ``from the standpoint of the Marxist doctrine of the state
the army is the most important part of the apparatus of state
power''. Another `àbsolute truth"---``power grows out of the
barrel of a gun"---has also been enshrined as a Marxist
proposition. Both these propositions as the ``cultural revolution"
made absolutely clear, are also being applied by Mao to
power in a socialist state. Mao regards the strengthening and
_-_-_
~^^1^^
Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, p. 59.
146
consolidation of the people's state above all as the

strengthening of his position in the army and in the punitive
organs.
 As a rule Mao seeks to obscure the difference between

democratic and socialist methods in exercising political
power. His works reveal a confusion of such concepts as the type
and form of state. This is not at all accidental. Mao has
clearly ignored the legal forms of state power and regards
legality not as a necessary and generally binding method of
exercising such power, but merely as one of the possible
means of suppressing and removing all real, possible and
even imaginary adversaries. The role Mao assigns to law,
legality and democratic state institutions shows that he does
not believe they merit any serious development and
consolidation.
 The pseudo-revolutionary content of Mao's ideas of

socialist democracy and legality has gradually developed into
a subjectivist and pragmatic system. In accordance with this
system of views, rules of law are not binding on the person
or group of persons exercising supreme political power. It
provides for the suppression of any, including imaginary,
political opponents, and the possibility of regarding the
people as a ``clean sheet of paper" on which `ìt is possible to
write the newest, the most beautiful characters, and to create
the newest, the most beautiful drawings.''
 The theoretical basis for this system of views rests on

postulates about ``two types of dissimilar contradictions and
two dissimilar methods of their resolution''. Another
postulate is the distinction between ``the contradictions between
us and our enemies" and ``contradictions among the people''.
There is no doubt at all over the proposition that different
types of contradictions have to be resolved in different ways,
but the point is that Mao simultaneously introduces a highly
ilexible definition for the concept of `ènemies''. As was said
in Chapter One, his concept of `ènemy'' has no definite class
meaning and is so interpreted that it will fit anyone whom
Mao and his followers find unsuitable.
 Each of these two types of contradictions, says Mao, may

develop into its opposite. The fundamental principle for
resolving dissimilar contradictions, according to Mao, is: ``
ferocity towards the enemies and gentleness with one's own
people.'' Those who find themselves in the category of
10*
147
`ènemies'', are deemed not to have any rights and are

subject to suppression. The ``thought of Mao Tse-tung" does
not provide for any constitutional, democratic, legal norms
or guarantees for the power of the people and the rights of
citizens. This needs to be specially emphasised because the
CPR has no criminal, civil or labour codes, nor developed
procedural legislation, while the powers of the bodies
applying coercion administratively are exceptionally broad.
These circumstances help to understand the true meaning
of Mao's statements about ``the democratic method, that is,
persuasion, and not coercion" being used `àmong the
people''. The role of law `àmong the people" is reduced by Mao
to the operation of `àdministrative orders issued for the
purpose of maintaining public order''.
 In China, Mao's greatest ``contribution'' to the theory and

practice of socialist democracy is declared to be a complex
of methods characterised as the ``line of the masses'', or
rather, as the ``mass line''. In Mao's views this consists in
conditioning the population in the course of which some of
its sections are converted, by means of deception and
intimidation, into mobs acting as the tools and accomplices in
the political gambles and repressions carried out by Mao's
supporters.
 Practice has shown that in the guise of this ``mass line'',
Mao's associates have been making ever wider use of the
``foul traditions" of the feudal epoch to promote their own
ends. Mao proceeds from the assumption that the `èxtremes''
of the ``mass line" may play a revolutionising role, and has
advanced as a general principle the idea that `ìn order to
straighten something out one must bend it to an extreme,
without bending it to an extreme one cannot straighten it
out''.
 In the last few years, one of the main methods used by
the Maoists has been to stage ``deafening'', ``thunderous''
mass campaigns which ``shake heaven and earth'', which
generate unhealthy passions and instincts and violate
elementary social rules, and the legitimate interests and rights of
citizens. This is connected with another method of pursuing
political aims, namely, provocative calls for broad
expression of diverse opinions and criticisms, which are followed
by mass repressions.
 Characteristic in this respect are Mao's speech at an All--
148
China Conference on Propaganda Work of the CPC in

March 1957 and the subsequent events. At the time he said
that the method to be used in directing the state was that of
`àllowing freedom" and not that of ``suppression'' and that
it was not right ``to club to death" those who express
mistaken opinions. Within a few months a broad and massive
campaign of represssion was launched not only against the
real opponents of socialism but also everyone who had dared
to express, within the framework of the law, critical
judgements and proposals aimed at improving government and
social affairs in the country.
 The anti-democratic substance of Mao's political views has

reached a peak in the last few years, and has been
formulated as follows: `Àlways, everywhere and in all things to
obey Mao Tse-tung, Mao Tse-tung's precepts are the
supreme law.'' This sets as a binding rule on everyone the
autocratic leader's infallible will. Mao and his followers are now
trying to substitute for the principles of socialist democracy
and legality the routine, autarchic principle of rule
characteristic of oriental despotic regimes in the early ages, of
absolutist regimes in the Middle Ages and ultra-dictatorial
regimes today. In this context, there has been a highly
characteristic ``massive campaign" against the principles of
democratic centralism with the pretext provided by Liu
Shaochi's pamphlet On the Communist's Work on Himself.
 Under the pretext of criticising Liu's pamphlet, Mao and

his followers attacked the principle that the minority must
submit to the majority, the principle that decisions by higher
organs are binding on lower organs, and declared these to be
effective and democratic only when they serve to promote
the ``thought of Mao Tse-tung". Jenmin jihpao wrote in June
1967: ``We must fulfil the instructions of Comrade Mao
Tsetung regardless of whether we have or have not yet
understood them. We must establish Mao Tse-tung's absolute
authority___This constitutes our highest discipline."^^1^^
 A fatal effect has been exerted on the development of

legal science by the eclectic ideology of autocracy, political
arbitrariness, lawlessness and anti-democracy, which are
now and again covered up with a vulgarised Marxist--
Leninist terminology and demagogic catch-phrases about serving
_-_-_
~^^1^^
Jenmin jihpao, June 16, 1967.
149
the masses. Academic lawyers have concentrated mainly on
seeking out and exposing pseudo-bourgeois ideas in each
other's writings, lectures and speeches. For all practical
purposes, the publication of books on the science of law has been
abandoned in China.
 Under the pretext of fighting bourgeois juridical

constructions, progressive, democratic legal principles and
institutions are being discarded on the ground that similar legal
formulations are to be found in bourgeois legal writings or
in operative bourgeois law. Thus, Chinese legal publications
have branded as bourgeois---and consequently unacceptable
---the idea that in the trial of cases judges must be
independent and free from extraneous influence; the idea that judges
should try the cases before them according to their inner
judicial convictions based on a consideration of all the
circumstances in the case is also considered to be an expression
of bourgeois subjectivism; the idea that criminal proceedings
may be started only for acts which are qualified in law as
being criminal is likewise discarded; also discarded as a
bourgeois principle is the idea that a man is deemed to be
innocent until proved guilty in the manner established by
law, etc.
 In late 1964 and early 1965, another broad campaign,

conceived by Mao, was launched across the country. This
was an all-embracing system of repressive measures which
came to be designated as the ``campaign of socialist
education''. Judging by the political and legal press, this campaign
equals or even exceeds in scope such massive movements as
the agrarian reform, the eradication of the counter--
revolution and the fight against the ``three evils" and against the
``five evils''. It was regarded as a universal means of
eradicating the seeds of ``revisionism'', and ``bourgeoisification'' in
every section of the population. Simultaneously, orders were
issued on behalf of Mao Tse-tung that the ``massive line" in
dictatorship over the enemies was to be intensified.
 To implement this and to carry out the ``campaign of

socialist education" teams, consisting of Party workers,
security men, workers of the court, the procurator's office, officers
and soldiers and students, were sent to every village,
enterprise and organisation in the cities by the superior Party
committee. The teams made a detailed study of the situation
on the spot. The propagandists, mainly students, making use
150
of visual agitation, gongs and drums, popularised the

``thought of Mao Tse-tung" on the class struggle. Other
members of the teams sought out among the masses the `ènemies
of socialism ... seeking to take the capitalist way''. In
accordance with a directive from the centre, roughly 5 per cent
of the total population of every locality was to be classed
under that head. The teams worked for days, sometimes
months, holding ceaseless mass meetings, at which every
citizen, every worker had to come out with denunciatory
criticism and self-criticism aimed against the ``restoration of
capitalism" and at exposing the enemy 5 per cent in his midst.

 Workers of politico-legal organs, who were compelled to

take an active part in the campaign, were given the
following instructions: `Àll the purely juridical precautions and
superfluous ceremonies, which bind the masses and do not
correspond to the revolutionary struggle, must be discarded
without the slightest regret. It should be clearly understood
that all the necessary normative regulations and procedural
rules are designed to help to fight the enemies and not to
fetter ourselves. We must apply the revolutionary
standpoint of the class struggle, and not take a metaphysical view
of various legal statuses."^^1^^
 Quite clearly the repressions carried out in the guise of

``socialist education" were designed not so much to punish
criminals as to intimidate everyone. This is shown, in
particular, by the establishment of an `ìndicator of the
revolutionisation of the work of the court'', which was to `ènsure
and stimulate the three great revolutionary movements: the
class struggle, the production struggle, and scientific
experimentation''.
 To remove all doubts in the minds of the workers of

political and legal organs about implementing the ``mass line"
they were bound to fight against their own ego, which was
identified with `ìndividualism''. There was good reason why
the following view was expressed in the press in 1966: ``
Individualism means the presence in the consciousness of one's
own ego, and the concept of ègo' is a great enemy of the
concept of àpplication' [of Chairman Mao's ideas---G.O.}.
When you face a big enemy, you must defeat him."^^2^^ In 1965
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Chengfa yanchiu No. 1, 1965.
~^^2^^ Ibid., No. 1, 1966.
151
there had already been some complaints that not all the
political and juridical workers had their militant spirit ``
truly aroused''. In 1966, there was open talk about a category of
political and juridical workers who merely ``pretended'' to
obey Chairman Mao. The Maoists demanded that the
workers of the court, the procurator's office and security service
should act in accordance with the formula established for
military men: `Ì shall do exactly what Chairman Mao says.''
This was quite clearly said in an academic law journal.^^1^^
 The sternest measures were taken in respect to those who
failed to display a marked enthusiasm in carrying out the
repressions. In the roughly 18 months just before the ``
cultural revolution" attained its peak there had been an almost
total replacement of the leading workers in the Supreme
People's Court, the Supreme People's Procurator's Office,
and their branches in Tibet, and also of workers of the
courts and procurator's offices in Peking, Shanghai and all
the provinces.
__ALPHA_LVL2__
6. On the True Essence
 of the ``Cultural Revolution''
 Let us bear in mind that the strict centralisation of the

political machinery, an objective necessity in the early
years following the formation of the CPR, gradually
developed the features of a hierarchical autocracy, that is, a form
of administration under which all the real power on a given
territory was in the hands of an individual responsible
virtually to the individual on the rung above him.
 The fact is that the political power at the centre was quite
deliberate in allowing the localities relatively broad freedom
in choosing the means of attaining the aims set by the centre.
That is why the Ministry of Control was eliminated, and
why the principle of ``direct subordination" of the organs of
the procurator's office and general procuratorial supervision
were whittled down. That is why the principle that judges
are independent was not established, and why the principle
that ``the courts are independent'', provided for by the
Constitution, was not put into practice. For the same reason, the
_-_-_
~^^1^^
See Chengfa yanchiu No. 1, 1966.
152
sessions of the national people's congresses at the centre and

in the localities were essentially formalistic affairs and the
law governing the recall of deputies was never adopted.
 For a long time, this state of affairs suited the followers
of Mao as far as their plans were concerned. Mao's absolute
power, which was not checked in any way, and the
subordination to his will of the whole machinery of political power,
unconnected with democratic institutions or responsibility
before the people and its representatives, led to a succession
of the grossest political mistakes, like the ``Great Leap
Forward'', the establishment of the people's communes, the
worsening of relations with the socialist countries and the drive
for world hegemony.
 The 1959--1962 crisis was so grave that it made many of

the local leaders give more consideration to the real
possibilities and requirements than to the Maoists' ideological and
political propositions. During the period in which the
mistakes of the ``Great Leap Forward" and the communisation
were being corrected, from 1962 to 1965, the local organs
became relatively independent of the central Maoist
leadership. This was also largely promoted by the instructions
which came from the centre, from the individuals and
organisations charged with the task of righting the grave
situation. This widened the gap between the Maoist leadership
and the real economic and political processes. The
machinery of political power was gradually slipping out of the
Chinese leaders' hands. The mainly passive, but stubborn,
even if largely unrealised, resistance to the Maoists'
ideological and political aims on the part of broad masses of the
working people and many grass-roots functionaries was put
down and possibly for a time partly overcome with the aid
of politico-juridical organs in the course of the ``socialist
education campaign''.
 However, it was not eradicated while the covert

nonacceptance of the extreme adventurism by the functionaries
in the middle and higher governing echelons of the
machinery of political power remained. The difficulty of
overcoming this situation was compounded by the fact, as the
Chinese press makes clear, that in these echelons there were
no open, public statements against Mao Tse-tung. The local
Party and government functionaries, including the
functionaries of political and juridical organs, could not and would
153
not come out against their leaders, who had been elected in
accordance with the CPR Constitution and the CPC Rules,
acting on behalf of the CPC Central Committee and
wielding exceptionally great real power. That is why Mao
Tsetung, having fortified his positions in the army but
apparently not being quite able to rely on it and wishing to give his
acts a massive character, went on to set up new organisations
consisting of men who were personally loyal to him and who
were not directly subordinate to the existing Party and
government bodies. Their purpose was to fight those who
could be classed as overt, covert or potential anti-Maoists,
and to influence the mass of neutral, doubting and
vacillating men. Such organisations were in fact set up from among
the Hungweipings and the Tsaofans. Mao's political style
was revealed in the way the ``cultural revolution" was
prepared and carried out.
 However, this time it was an attempt to saddle the

country with a regime of personal power, and the aims and
methods of the ``cultural revolution" gave ground to qualify
it as such an attempt. For one thing, from the very outset of
this ``revolution'' it was quite clear that those who were
carrying it out constituted a minority in the Party and in the
country, a fact the official Maoist press could not conceal
and had to explain in some way. An article in Jenmin jihpao
said that the ``Leftists were the iron club, the golden club of
the proletarian dictatorship".^^1^^ The press admitted that the
``Leftists'' who were the ``core and mainstay of the
movement" were ``not numerous''. They were set the
straightforward task of ``winning over, rallying together and
educating the majority".^^2^^ However, the Maoists did not expect the
Leftists to be able to do this within the framework of the
existing legal order, and therefore provided in the
resolution of the CPC Central Committee, which they put through
on August 8, 1966, for unprecedented measures, releasing the
``revolutionary students" from criminal or administrative
punishment for any crimes and offences against law and
order which they might commit in the course of the ``
revolution''. This resolution, while stating that it was ``
inadmissible to use methods of suppression against the minority"
_-_-_
~^^2^^ Ibid.
154
(and the minority consisted of ``Leftists''), also said: `Ìn the

course of the movement, apart from murderers, incendiaries,
poisoners, saboteurs, stealers of state secrets and other
counter-revolutionaries, concerning whose crimes real evidence
is available and who have to be punished in accordance with
the law, questions about students of higher schools, special,
secondary and primary schools should not as a rule be
brought up."^^1^^ It is not surprising, therefore, that there were
widespread abuses, slanders, arrests, beatings, inflictions of
bodily injuries and other gross forms of violence against the
victims of the ``cultural revolution'', and that these now and
again developed into lynchings, killings and massive clashes
involving much bloodshed. These facts were admitted in the
Maoist press. Nor could it have been otherwise, because the
resolution on the ``cultural revolution" said: ``There is no
need to fear disorder. Chairman Mao teaches us that the
revolution cannot be carried out with such refinement, with
such delicacy, with such decorum and stability."^^2^^
 Although the Maoists did put in a reservation that the

blows should be dealt at those ``who go along the capitalist
way'', with rare exceptions all the responsible functionaries
in the centre and in the localities were in fact subjected to
repression and intimidation in one way or another. The
reason was quite understandable: Mao was no longer sure
that a majority of them would support his line without
question. Hence the slogan of the ``cultural revolution": ``Let''s
break the dog's head of anyone who opposes the thought of
Mao Tse-tung.''
 The situation that has taken shape as a result of the ``

cultural revolution" is so complex because neither the
Constitution nor any of the other CPR laws have been revoked in
any formal proceedings by competent state organs. That is
largely the reason why events in China have assumed such a
confused and contradictory character and why they have
been verging into political, economic and administrative
chaos.
 In many places, the wild frenzy of the Hungweipings and

the Tsaofans came up against resistance on the part of local
_-_-_
~^^1^^ CPC Central Committee's Resolution on the Great Proletarian

Cultural Revolution, § 7, Jenmin jihpao, August 9. 1966.
~^^2^^ Ibid.
155
Party organisations and government bodies, supported by

the factory workers. Now and again local political and
legal bodies put a check on the ``rebels'' in accordance with
the laws of the CPR. Whereupon Mao's followers issued
calls for a ``take-over of power'', `òverthrow of the
bourgeois dictatorship" and ``break up of the old state machine''.
The methods used in the ``cultural revolution" show that its
organisers intended not only to defeat their opponents, who
held Party and government office in accordance with the
CPC Rules and the Constitution of the CPR, but also to
create a totally different machinery of political power, which
would make the apparatus of power and the broad masses of
the population absolutely subservient in their activity to the
implementation of Mao's political line.
 Having failed to obtain support from broad masses of

workers, peasants and intellectuals, the Maoists began to
move in the army units. From January 1967, they began to
``take over power" in the provinces and the cities with the
help of the army. The ``take-over of power" consisted in the
storming and sacking of premises of central departments and
also of local Party and government agencies, in beatings,
tortures and murders of many functionaries of these organs,
some of whom were driven to suicide. Among the victims
were even ministers of the CPR, and deputies of assemblies
of people's representatives, including the National People's
Congress. The latter was unable to hold any of its regular
sessions beginning from 1966. The Standing Committee of
the National People's Congress and the Chairman of the
CPR and his deputies were unable to exercise their functions.
The most important directives were issued by agencies not
empowered to do so by the Constitution; orders to the armed
forces of which the Chairman of the CPR is the
constitutional chief, were issued on behalf of Mao Tse-tung, who has
no legal grounds for such acts.^^1^^
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Recent reports from China say that the Maoists intend to hold
elections for the fourth National People's Congress, a decision clearly
dictated by tactical and short-term considerations. The Maoists want
the military-bureaucratic dictatorship regime to function normally by
making it ``respectable'' and to try to re-establish some of the organs of
state administration which had been in existence before the start of
the ``cultural revolution''. They are also impelled to do so by
foreignpolicy considerations : first, they would like to appear in the eyes of
world opinion as supporters of legality and law and order, and second,
156
 Having broken up the organs of administration established

in accordance with the CPR Constitution, the Maoists set
up ``revolutionary committees" consisting of military men,
representatives of ``mass revolutionary organisations" and
the CPC functionaries who had ``stood the test of true
loyalty to Chairman Mao's line''. The establishment of these ``
revolutionary committees" ran up against great difficulties in
view of resistance on the part of various social groups of
Chinese society, and was finally completed only by
September 1968. These committees simultaneously held all the state
and Party power.
 The new, unconstitutional organs of power have managed

to maintain themselves mainly by resorting to violence. An
editorial in Pravda on May 18, 1970, gave this assessment
of the Maoists' system of power: ``The organs of power in
China are structured on the militaristic model, inherited from
the Chiang Kai-shek clique. Power is concentrated in the
hands of the military, who are Mao's henchmen, and who
boss the so-called revolutionary committees. The
commanders of military districts, armies and garrisons are uncontrolled
masters of the provinces. They head 'revolutionary
committees' and direct the òrdering' of the Party organisations.
Army units are quartered at enterprises, establishments and
schools. At the factories, the shops and teams have been
organised into companies and squads. The same militaristic
system is being introduced in the government establishments
and institutions of learning. The army controls the economy
and culture."^^1^^
_-_-_
to facilitate the attainment of political and cultural ties with foreign

countries, the capitalist countries above all. This is naturally hampered
by the absence of a parliament (the National People's Congress) and a
Chairman of the CPR.
 The Maoists' intention to hold elections for the fourth National
People's Congress also shows that it was pure demagogy on the part
of the Maoists to back up the activity of the Hungweiping and Tsaofan
outfits, and to declare their break-up of the constitutional organs of
power to amount to the `ùtilisation and development of the experience
of the Paris Commune''. When the Maoists were faced with the need to
eliminate their political and ideological opponents, they held forth
about the need to ``break up the old state machine''; now that the
Maoists have achieved their aims they are prepared to use the `òld
state machine'', against which they had earlier directed the wrath and
hatred of millions of men.
~^^1^^ See ``Pseudo-Revolutionaries Unmasked" (editorial article

published in Pravda on May 18, 1970), Moscow, 1970, pp. 6-7 (in Russian).
157
 The Maoists' unconstitutional activity is also clearly

evident from the fact that they have everywhere abolished the
organs of the court, the procurator's offices and the public
security offices, and have set up in their place ``joint
committees for eradicating counter-revolutionaries''. These
committees have to overcome strong resistance, because the
number of those who are dissatisfied with the new authorities is
exceptionally large and may be expected considerably to
grow in the future.
 The incompetence of the new organs of power and the

absence of any sort of positive programme created such a
dangerous situation in the country that Mao's followers were
forced to establish military control everywhere and to make
the utmost use of the army to organise production.
 Tremendous difficulties and fresh acute contradictions

arise from the efforts to re-establish elementary law and
order, which are being made for the purpose of cutting short
the excesses of the ``revolution''. During the exposure of
``bourgeois dictatorship of the counter-revolutionary
revisionists" in the second half of 1966, millions of victims of the
``socialist education campaign" began to demand
rehabilitation. In this connection, according to some organs of the
Hungweiping press, there was evidence of a tendency on the
part of the victims to revenge themselves upon the members
of the teams who had carried out the `èducation''. The
Maoists have had repeatedly to reaffirm, on Mao's authority, that
the repressions carried out in the course of that campaign
had been ``correct''. The committees of poor peasants and
lower sections of the middle peasants, which had been formed
and reformed in the course of the ``campaign'' and which
had the task of controlling the state of affairs in the
countryside, proved to be powerless. It was not they or the organs
of the communes and production teams, which had existed
earlier, that directed the agricultural operations from 1967
to 1969, but ``combat groups" and ``front commands" which
relied on army personnel.
 In the course of the ``cultural revolution" the numbers of

persons accused by the Maoists of counter-revolutionary
activity prior to 1966 were swelled by a mass of so-called
counter-revolutionary revisionists from the Party and state
apparatus. Finally, there appeared a totally new and
possibly the most dangerous section of the suppressed and
158
discontented, consisting of arrested or dispersed members of the

``rebel'' organisations which had been set up to carry out the
``cultural revolution'', but which had gone much farther than
the Maoists had expected. Evidence of serious discontent
with the ultimate results among those who had ``pioneered
the revolution" comes from the insistent calls for unity and
cohesion of the ranks of the Hungweipings, the Tsaofans
and other ``rebels,'' calls for combating anarchism,
ultrademocratism and nihilism in their midst, and the dispatch of
many of them into the countryside, amounting to exile.
 Crime is reported to spread in the country; there is

growing discontent among the relatives of repressed persons, who
are frequently treated as disloyal citizens. Many facts show
that there is also discontent and indignation over the Chinese
leadership's policy even in the army itself, which has been
openly proclaimed the ``most important and the most
reliable mainstay''. Even in provinces and cities like Kweichow
and Shanghai, where the ``greatest victories for Mao
Tsetung's thought" have been repeatedly announced, there have
been massive and sanguinary clashes on various occasions,
involving the army, between the proponents and the
opponents of the ``cultural revolution''. Sizable sections of the
population, who have had their fill of the ``revolution'', seek
to fence themselves off from it and are not taking anything
like an active part in it.
 In their attempts to consolidate their power, Mao's

followers have unhinged the country's political machinery and
plunged it into a grave crisis. The attempts on the part of
some Chinese leaders to stop the `èxcesses'' and to
disassociate themselves from such excesses, to re-install some
harassed individuals in their responsible posts, and to take
reprisals against the ``rebel organisations" and ``rebels'' who
had exceeded the limits set out by the sponsors of the
``revolution'', are being made from purely tactical
considerations.
 The facts show that Mao's followers are trying to present
their political arbitrariness as a universal law governing the
development of socialist society. In order to establish a
system of military-bureaucratic dictatorship in the country, they
seek to make the system appear ultra-revolutionary, and
declare any struggle against it as stemming from the eternal
machinations of the ``counter-revolutionary revisionists'',
159
``restorers of capitalism" and suchlike enemies of ``Mao

Tsetung's thought''.
 The Maoists insist that following one round of exposures

of `ènemies'' within the Party, the government and the
army, there inevitably appear new enemies within them. The
struggle against these enemies, Mao and his followers insist,
will require ``decades and even centuries".^^1^^ At the height of
the ``cultural revolution" Mao warned: ``No one must
assume that everything will be well if the great cultural
revolution is carried out one-two or three-four times.'' On
another occasion Mao said that the ``cultural revolution is
bound to be carried out many times".^^2^^ Consequently, the
Maoists are trying to establish political arbitrariness as a
law.
 The Communist Party is the highest form of socio-political

organisation in socialist society, which exercises political
and ideological leadership of socialist construction, and acts
as the organising nucleus of the whole social system, and as
the collective mind of all the working people. As Lenin put
it, the Communist Party alone is capable of ``being the
teacher, the guide, the leader of all the working and
exploited people in organising their social life without the
bourgeoisie and against the bourgeoisie."^^3^^
 Recognition of the Communist Party's leading role in

socialist society is the touchstone of membership of the
Marxist-Leninist camp.
 Mao and his followers pay lip-service to the Communist

Party's leading role, but their practical activity testifies to
the contrary. Mao does not regard the Party as the leading
and directing force of society but as an instrument of the
regime of personal power, as the most important means for
carrying out his adventurist and chauvinistic policy. Mao
found unsuitable a Communist Party which based its activity
on the principles of Marxism-Leninism and proletarian
internationalism. That is why one of the basic tasks of the
``cultural revolution" was to change the composition and
_-_-_
~^^1^^ See ``Minutes of a Conference on Questions of Work in the Sphere

of Literature and the Arts in the Army, Called by Comrade Tsian
Chin on the Assignment of Comrade Lin Piao'', Hsinnua Press Release,
May 28, 1967.
160
ideological-political face of the Communist Party of China

and also its functions within the system of society's political
superstructure. The Maoists undertook a veritable offensive
against the Communist Party of China: all the elective
leading organs of the CPC from top to bottom were broken up,
the Party's organisational structure, earlier established on
the principle of democratic centralism, was destroyed as a
whole, and a heavy blow was dealt at all the healthy forces
within the Party. A large group of prominent Party and
state leaders, military commanders, veterans of the Chinese
revolution and a broad section of the Party intelligentsia
and Communists were removed from political activity and
subjected to a purge, repression and denigration. They were
all those whom Mao and his followers saw as overt or
potential opponents of their own line; there was a sharp
reduction in the Party of the share of politically conscious
representatives of the working class and the Party intelligentsia.
For all practical purposes, the CPC's Eighth Central
Committee was eliminated: over two-thirds of its membership
was branded as belonging to the ``black band''. It is true that
now and again the Maoists pretended that they were acting
on behalf of the Central Committee, but this they did in
order to throw a cloak of legality on their unlawful actions.
 Convincing evidence of this came from the 12th Plenary

Meeting of the CPC Central Committee held in October
1968. It was called an enlarged Plenary Meeting. Because,
as we have said, most CC members had been subjected to
repression, a great number of military men and ``
revolutionary youths" were invited to attend the Plenary Meeting to
create the impression of representation and also to exert
pressure on the CC members who were still `àt large" (
naturally with the exception of Mao's followers).
 Naturally the CC Plenary Meeting made up in

such fashion rubberstamped the decisions drafted
beforehand by the CPC leadership on the victory of the ``great
proletarian cultural revolution'', and expelled from the
Party and removed from all his posts in the Party and the state
(once again in violation of the prerogatives of state organs)
Liu Shao-chi, Chairman of the CPR, and adopted a decision
to call the 9th Congress of the CPC. The sponsors of this
congress expected it to provide a legal basis for the regime
of Mao's personal power.
11---1362
161
 The 9th Congress of the CPC called in April 1969,

demonstrated the grossest violations of inner-Party
democracy: 1,512 delegates to this congress were not elected by Party
branches but were handpicked from among Mao's loyal
supporters. Most of the members of the Central Committee,
elected at the 8th Congress of the CPC, were not among the
delegates. Speakers in the debate on the report were not
given and their speeches were not published.
 The 9th CPC Congress has not stabilised the Maoist
sociopolitical system. The second half of 1971 saw a new political
crisis in China, in the course of which a group of top army
and Party leaders disappeared from public life. A great
deal of attention has been given to the disappearance of
Lin Piao, who was earlier proclaimed ``the most reliable
associate and continuator of Mao's cause" and his official
``successor''. Until recently the Chinese press invariably
emphasised that the army fulfilling Mao's instructions was
under the ``direct command of Lin Piao''. Today one can
no longer see Lin Piao's portraits in Peking. Moreover,
publications in any way associated with him have been withdrawn
from sale. All over the country there was a long wave of
Party meetings at which reports were made about Lin Piao's
``blunders'', about his raising his hand against Mao himself.
Together with Lin Piao there disappeared some other
members of the Political Bureau of the CC CPC and army
leaders including the Chief of the General Staff Huang
Yung-sheng, his deputies Wu Fa-Hsien and Li Tso-peng.^^1^^
 It is still difficult to give a definite answer to the question

as to what reasons underlay the crisis in the Chinese
leadership in September 1971. One thing is clear---the September
developments are but a mirror of the general crisis of the
Maoist ``special'' political course, proof of a complicated
and tense situation in China, caused by the consequences of
the ``cultural revolution" and by the anti-Leninist internal
and external policies imposed by Mao Tse-tung on the 9th
CPC Congress.
 It is common knowledge that at the 9th CPC Congress
_-_-_
~^^1^^ As before, the Army, in whose command such `ùnexpected''
changes were made, continues to play the role of the chief support
and instrument of the regime created as a result of ``the fierce struggle
for power'', as the ``cultural revolution" is now described by its organisers.
162
the Mao group adopted the course of external and internal

policies wholly subordinated to the assertion of Peking's
hegemonistic positions in the international arena. With this
end in view the Maoists are turning China into a ``barrack'',
into a ``single military camp'', and are orienting her economy
and socio-political life on ``the preparation for war''. While
doing this, they emphasise in every way that China faces a
military threat ``from the North''.
 However, it is obvious that it has been much easier for

the Maoist leadership to proclaim a ``special course" than
to implement it in practice. Both the internal and external
policies of Mao run counter to the objective requirements of
China's advance along the road of socialism, of her
strengthening friendship and internationalist ties with the
Soviet Union and other socialist countries, with all the
revolutionary forces of today. The Chinese leadership seems
to be rent by deep disagreements on major problems of
internal and external policies.
 The sponsors of the ``cultural revolution" failed to remove

from the consciousness of Chinese Communists, workers,
peasants, intellectuals and servicemen the ideas of socialism
and proletarian internationalism, the ideas for which the
Chinese people had fought for many long years and which
had been duly reflected in the decisions of the 8th CPC
Congress. It is not accidental that Mao and his adherents
say that ``not only one, but even three or four cultural
revolutions would not suffice to educate the people" in a
spirit they like.
 The very fact that the Maoists have tried to settle their
political, social and economic problems through methods of
compulsion, through the Army, has undoubtedly deepened
the crisis of the entire Maoist socio-political system. The
Maoist policy, inimical to Marxism-Leninism and proletarian
internationalism, has caused serious contradictions in the
country and plunged it into a protracted political crisis.
__*_*_*__
 Thus, one of the essential features of Maoist ideology is

its apology of violence, and its stake on the army and the
punitive agencies as the main means for implementing
Maoist policy. All of this is fundamentally at variance with
Marxism, which sets strict legal limits to the use of methods
163
of suppression. Mao has deliberately discarded the

constructive function of the proletarian dictatorship and has ``
forgotten" about the fact that it is closely connected with
socialist democracy, that it is in itself the highest type of
democracy, because it represents the interests of the
overwhelming majority of citizens, instead of a handful of
individuals.
 Maoist ideology is an ideology of political adventurism,

demagogy, violence and mass terrorism. It is naturally
inconceivable without the personality cult. Mao's followers
have used it to usurp power in the Party and in the state in
the course of the ``cultural revolution''. However, the
experience of world history suggests that power obtained in
this way is tenuous and is bound to collapse.
[164]
__NUMERIC_LVL1__
Chapter Five
__ALPHA_LVL1__
THE MAOIST CONCEPTION
 OF THE DEVELOPMENT
 OF THE SOCIAL STRUCTURE
 AND THE CLASS STRUGGLE
__ALPHA_LVL2__
1. Development of Social Relations
 in China from 1949 to 1957
 An analysis of the views and practical policy on classes,

the class struggle and class relations pursued by the Chinese
leaders leaves no doubt that they have distorted the key
principles formulated by Marxism-Leninism on the
establishment of new social relations in the period of transition
from capitalism to socialism.
 The socialist countries' experience, summed up in the

documents of the International Meetings of Communist and
Workers' Parties in 1957, 1960 and 1969, fully confirmed
the proposition of the Marxist-Leninist theory that the
processes of socialist revolution and socialist construction are
based on a number of key laws which apply to all countries
taking the socialist path. These laws are manifest
everywhere in the presence of a great diversity of
historicallyrooted national specifics and traditions which must be taken
into account.
 Among these general laws are: leadership of the working

people by the working class, with the Marxist-Leninist party
as its core, in carrying through the proletarian revolution in
one form or another and the establishment of the proletarian
dictatorship in one form or another; the alliance of the
working class with the bulk of the peasantry and other
sections of the working people; the elimination of capitalist
property and the establishment of socialist property in the
principal means of production; the gradual socialist
165
transformation of agriculture, the balanced development of the

national economy aimed at building socialism and
communism and raising the working people's living standards; the
implementation of socialist changes in the sphere of ideology
and culture and the creation of a numerous intelligentsia
loyal to the working class, the working people and the
socialist cause; the elimination of national oppression and the
establishment of equality and fraternal friendship among
nations; the defence of socialist gains against the
encroachments of external and internal enemies; and proletarian
internationalism, which means solidarity between the
working class of a given country and the working class of other
countries.
 While favouring strict account in socialist construction of

the concrete historical conditions and national features, the
participants in the International Meeting of Communist and
Workers' Parties in 1969 stressed the need to follow the
general laws. These are the general laws of the socialist
revolution and socialist construction bearing on the development
of classes and class relations:
 1. Exercise by the working class of leadership of the mass

of working people in the proletarian revolution, and, once
the proletarian dictatorship is established, of its leading role
in society. Reliance of the working class on its alliance with
the bulk of the peasantry and other sections of the working
people.
 2. Elimination of exploiting classes resulting from the

abolition of private property in the means of production.
 3. Socialist re-education of the peasantry and the

intelligentsia; creation of a numerous intelligentsia loyal to the
cause of socialism.
 These laws governing the development of the social

structure and class relations necessarily apply to any
country taking the socialist path.
 These are of especial importance for China, considering

the level of her socio-economic development at the end of
1949, when under the leadership of the Communist Party
the Chinese people took power into their own hands. In that
period, China was an agrarian small-peasant, economically,
socially and culturally backward country. Her transition to
socialism did not take place on the level of developed
capitalism but of a feudal-capitalist social system in which the
166
exploiters were landowners and a bureaucratic and national

bourgeoisie.
 In 1949, the bulk of China's population (over 80 per cent)

consisted of peasants. The principal antagonistic
contradictions of Chinese society were those between the landowners
and the peasants. The absentee landowners rented out their
lands to the landless and land-hungry peasants, collecting
an exorbitant feudal rent which came to over one-half the
peasant's crop. In the Chinese countryside, the development
of capitalist relations was shackled by feudalism, which is
why the rich peasants (kulaks) were very weak
economically and as a rule used pre-capitalist forms of exploiting
peasants: they rented most of their land to farmhands and
middle peasants and engaged in usury. The landowners and
the kulaks, who made up less than 10 per cent of the rural
population, owned 70--80 per cent of the farmland. The
other 90 per cent of the rural population---farmhands and
poor and middle peasants---had only 20--30 per cent of the
land.^^1^^
 This was the reason for broad action by the Chinese
peasants against the existing social regime. The existence of a
peasant anti-feudal movement was a positive fact for the
revolutionary struggle of the working class, because the bulk
of the peasantry is an ally of the proletariat. However, the
petty-bourgeois character of the peasants constituting a
majority of the population produced various difficulties for
the working-class party in the transition period.
 These difficulties were compounded by the fact that when

the people's revolution in China won out, industrial workers
constituted roughly 0.5 per cent of the total population.^^2^^
Industrial and office workers numbered only 8 million, or
1.5 per cent of the population (together with their families
the figure came to about 5-6 per cent). This naturally created
the highly acute problem of the numerical growth of the
working class, of its vanguard role in town and country and
in all the branches of the national economy. Another equally
acute problem was the remoulding of the social character
_-_-_
 ^^1^^ The Fundamental Provisions of the Land Law of China, Harbin,
1948, p. 3 (in Chinese).
~^^2^^ World Economics and International Relations No. 6, 1967, p. 31

(in Russian).
167
of the peasantry, so as to make it take the socialist path of

development, and the formation of a numerous socialist
intelligentsia.
 In the first 7-8 years of the transition period (1949--1957)

the Communist Party of China took account of the
experience of the development of classes and class relations in the
other socialist countries and relied on the general laws of
socialist construction, taking these as a basis for its policy
in developing the social structure. In that period, the
formulation of the CPC's political line was greatly influenced by
men among the Party leadership who had a clear
understanding of the tremendous difficulties the Chinese people
had to overcome to ensure a transition to socialism, and fully
and finally to establish the socialist mode of
production. China's economic and cultural backwardness, the 2nd
Plenary Meeting of the 7th CPC Central Committee
(March 1949) said in its decisions, require a more or less
prolonged period for creating the economic and cultural
prerequisites necessary for ensuring the full victory of
socialism.
 Following the establishment of the CPR, the government's

first act was to expropriate the property of the imperialists
and the compradore bourgeoisie. The state nationalised
almost all the railways, the bulk of the enterprises in the heavy
industry, and also some of the key branches of the light
industry, and this helped to create a socialist sector in the
country.
 Following the expropriation of the property of the

bureaucratic bourgeoisie from 1950 to 1952, an agrarian reform
was carried out in China designed to eliminate feudal
relations of production and the class of landowners, and to hand
over, without redemption, the land confiscated from the
landowners to the landless and land-hungry peasants. The
47 million hectares of land confiscated from the landowners
went to 300 million landless and land-hungry peasants.
Feudal property in land gave way to individual peasant
property in land. Once the land reform was completed, the
following social groups took shape within the Chinese
peasantry: the poor peasants, the middle peasants, who consisted
of the lower middle peasants (the poor middle peasants), the
higher middle peasants (the rich middle peasants), and also
the kulaks. In economic status, the poor middle peasants
168
were close to the poor peasants and together with the latter
made up 60--70 per cent of the rural population.^^1^^
 The land reform which eliminated the landed estates
helped considerably to enlarge the domestic market, and
in these conditions capitalist industry and trade began
rapidly to develop.
 The state used the capitalist economy for the purpose of
rehabilitating the national economy, which had been ruined
by the foreign intervention and the civil war. However, the
national bourgeoisie put up stiff resistance to the measures
the people's government took to improve the state of the
country's economy. For one thing, it sought to corrupt and
weaken the government apparatus from inside by means of
graft. Accordingly, in late 1951 and early 1952, the CPC
launched two campaigns: first one against the ``three evils"
(stealing, waste and bureaucratic practice) and then against
the ``five evils" (graft, tax evasion, stealing of government
funds, careless fulfilment of government orders and stealing
of secret economic information in government agencies).^^2^^
 These campaigns helped to limit and cut short the

bourgeoisie's economic and political subversion against the
people's power and to purge the government and Party
apparatus of persons who were making concessions to the
bourgeoisie or were its direct agents.
 In 1952, once the rehabilitation of the national economy,

ruined by the civil war and the foreign intervention, had
in the main been completed, the CPC Central Committee
worked out the Party's general line for the transition period,
which set these tasks before the Chinese people: gradually
to carry out the country's socialist industrialisation and
socialist change in agriculture, the handicrafts industry and
in capitalist industry and trade. These tasks were to be
fulfilled in roughly three five-year periods, that is, about
15 years, from 1953 to 1967, by which time China was
expected to become a ``great socialist state".^^3^^
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Chinchi yanchiu No. 5, 1956, p. 88,
~^^2^^ Essays on the History of China in the Recent Period, Moscow
1959, p. 511 (in Russian).
~^^3^^ See Fighting to Mobilise all the Forces to Transform Our Country
into a Great Socialist State. Theses for the Study and Propaganda of
the Party's General Line in the Transition Period, Moscow, 1953 (in
Russian).
169
 In connection with the announcement of the Party's

general line for the transition period, the CPC Central
Committee approved a set of special theses for its study and
propaganda, which said that if socialism was to score a full
victory in China in the transition period the following had
to be done: the relations of production were to be
simultaneously modified with the development of productive forces;
a powerful socialist industry had above all to be set up as a
basis for transforming the individual peasant farms, that
is, non-socialist sectors into a socialist sector; socialist
industry had to be converted into the leading and guiding
force of the whole national economy.
 In accordance with the CPC's general line, important

socio-economic changes were started in the country from
1953. The whole peasantry (including the kulaks) was
involved in agricultural producers' co-operatives. The
individual property of the peasants and the handicraftsmen
was transformed into collective property. All private
industrial and commercial enterprises were transformed into
state-private enterprises. The capitalists were deprived of
the means of production and were allowed an interest of
5 per cent per annum on their erstwhile capital and also
higher salaries for their work as government employees.
 The 8th Congress of the CPC, held in September 1956,

declared that the following socio-class changes had by then
taken place in China as a result of the implementation of
the Party's general line.
 1. The exploitation of man by man, together with its

roots, was in the main eliminated; the class contradictions
between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie were resolved
in favour of socialism, thereby deciding the issue of ``who
beats whom" in the struggle between socialism and
capitalism.
 2. Class contradictions ceased to be the principal

contradictions of Chinese society, giving way to contradictions
``between the advanced socialist system and the backward
social productive forces'', thereby centring the Chinese
people's attention on the task of developing material
production.^^1^^
_-_-_
~^^1^^ See V. Sidikhmenov, ``The Maoists' Revision of the CPC's General

Line'', Kommunist No. 3, 1969.
170
 However, the social changes carried out in the country

did not yet mean the complete establishment of socialist
relations of production, which were still highly immature
and imperfect, and rested on an extremely backward
material and technical basis. The country was just making a
start on all-round industrialisation. Chinese society was yet
to effect its full and final transition to socialism, a
transition that had to be consolidated through the further
development of society's productive forces, and of the whole of
the national economy.
 The working class still constituted a clear minority and

was concentrated mainly in the cities. The very small
percentage of workers who came from working-class families
were mainly skilled cadres. The national bourgeoisie still
maintained some economic and ideological influence. A
sizable section of the handicraftsmen were yet to be drawn
into co-operatives. There was an acute shortage of
intellectuals, and the new, socialist intelligentsia was virtually
just taking shape. These objective difficulties were
compounded by a number of subjective mistakes made in the
course of socialist change through Mao's fault.
 Let us emphasise that in 1955 and 1956, the Maoists and
their opponents were already seriously divided over the
methods and pace of socialist construction. Mao and his
followers were trying to impose on the country a totally
unrealistic pace of socialist change and were pushing the
peasants into a stepped up transformation of their individual
property, without providing any solid material and
technical basis for such a change-over. Mao's opponents urged
that socialist changes should be carried out within the
periods set by the Party's general line, and insisted that any
changes in the social character of the peasantry should be
tied in with changes in their economic life and their
mentality.
 However, Mao managed to saddle the Party with his

adventurist line which was expressed chiefly in the hasty
completion of agricultural co-operation, without the
necessary economic measures: instead of the 15--18 years initially
envisaged, the co-operatives were nominally set up within
just over 2 years. The balanced development of economic,
social and spiritual processes was disrupted and the need
for proportional social development discarded. There was
171
discontent among a section of the peasantry with this

stepped up pace in agricultural co-operation and the rapid
transition from lower-type to higher-type co-operatives, and
this naturally did not help to strengthen the social basis of
the people's power.
 In contrast to Mao, the CPG leaders who held correct

views on various aspects of socialist construction, believed
that the Party should concentrate the people's efforts on
laying a modern material and technical foundation for the
new relations of production. The report of the CPC Central
Committee to the 8th Congress of the CPC (September
1956) said: ``Now, however, the period of storm and stress
is past, new relations of production have been set up, and
the aim of our struggle is changed into one of safeguarding
the successful development of the productive forces of
society."^^1^^
 The decisions of the 8th Congress of the CPC mapped

out a real and concrete programme for transforming China
into an advanced socialist power. On the social plane, its
implementation was to result in a considerable growth of
the working class, improvement of its professional training,
and its ideological and political levels, thereby reaffirming
and consolidating its leading position in Chinese society. In
the period of transition from capitalism to socialism, the
introduction of science and technology into agriculture was
bound to have changed the face of the Chinese countryside,
favourably affecting the tradition-bound thinking and
mentality of the Chinese peasants, and converting them into
real allies of the proletariat in the struggle for China's
social transformation. The development of science and
culture, the cultural revolution, was to have helped to
create a numerous intelligentsia closely allied with the
people.
 However, because of the voluntarist line of social

development, imposed by Mao on the Party and the country,
the changes in the classes and class relations, which naturally
occur in the transition period, and which followed from
the decisions of the 8th Congress of the CPC, were not
carried out.
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Eighth National Congress of the Communist Party of China

Peking, 1956, p. 82.
172
__ALPHA_LVL2__
2. Line of ``Leaping Over''
 Objective Laws
 In mid-1958, the Maoists announced that the transition

period in China had been fully completed, that socialism
had been built, and that an immediate start could be made
on building communist relations. The adventurist idea was
put forward that China could move rapidly towards
communism by executing a ``Great Leap Forward''. Chinese
society did not in actual fact have the necessary material,
social and cultural prerequisites even for developed
socialism, but the Maoists argued that it could attain
communism merely by carrying out this ``Great Leap Forward''.
 The fact that Mao and his followers suggested the ``Great
Leap Forward" idea showed that they had lost the ability
of making a realistic assessment of the situation, of starting
from the actual level of development at which Chinese
society then found itself. This undoubtedly sprang from the
hegemonistic aspirations of Mao and his followers. In order
to rise to leadership in the world's revolutionary movement,
it was necessary to ``surpass'' the Soviet Union, and the
`àccelerate the transition to communism" slogan was issued
to achieve this aim. This subjectivist and anti-Marxist slogan
was seized upon and ``theoretically'' analysed by the Chinese
press. The journal Hsin chianshe wrote: ``Not long ago many
believed that for a fairly long subsequent period changes
in the relations of production in our country would take
place within the framework of socialism, i.e., that this would
be a completion of the socialist revolution on the economic
front, with all the main forces being thrown into the
implementation of the technological and cultural revolution.''
The journal declared this quite correct view to be wrong,
and suggested the following as the right approach: `Ùnder
the leadership of the CPC Central Committee and Comrade
Mao Tse-tung, simultaneously with the full completion of
the socialist revolution, with the productive forces growing
at an exceptionally fast rate, we have already created the
conditions for gradual transition to communism."^^1^^ Thus,
the completion of transition to socialism and the all-round
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Hsin chianshe No. 11, 1958.
173
development of socialism were declared to be a stage that

was over.
 An idea which runs right through the numerous

publications in the Chinese press from 1958 to 1960 is that China
is on the threshold of transition to communism. In their
efforts to provide a theoretical grounding for such transition,
Chinese theorists fell back on the well-known statement of
Marx's that between capitalist and communist society there
lies a period of revolutionary transformation of the former
into the latter, with a corresponding political transition
period. From this they drew the conclusion that socialist
society could not be regarded as an independent stage of
social development, because it allegedly had a transitional
character. The Maoists started to include socialism, the first
phase of the communist formation, into the transition period.
All of this was to help them remove from the order of the
day the task of completing socialist construction in China,
and orient the Chinese people upon immediate transition to
communist society. Jenmin jihpao wrote: `Àfter all, socialism
is not our supreme ideal. Communist society is our supreme
ideal. . .. We are building socialism to move on to
communist society and not for the purpose of consolidating the
making of socialist society, and regarding it as a historical
period of stability and absence of change, or of quantitative
but not qualitative change."^^1^^
 Indeed, communist society, its highest phase, is the ideal

of the working class, but to attain it there is need to build
full-fledged socialism, a whole phase of the communist
formation, and to make it function and progress successfully.
However, it is impossible to find in any of Mao's statements
a full-scale programme for completing the construction and
further development of socialism, dealing with the
improvement of its material and technical basis, and the rapid
development of the productive forces corresponding to
socialist relations of production.
 The Maoists have come to regard the strengthening and

further improvement of the foundations of the socialist
social system as no more than the treading of water, and
as unwillingness to go on from socialism to communism. One
journal, criticising the advocates of ``frozen socialism'',
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Jenmin jihpao, April 24, 1960.
174
wrote: ``The demand that socialist relations of production

and also collective property and the distribution according
to labour should be rigidly fixed at one point expresses the
standpoint of those who want to conserve socialist society.
Such views are erroneous."^^1^^
 Consequently, before the ``Great Leap Forward'', the

Maoists regarded the transition period as one of transition
from capitalism to socialism, while following the
announcement of the ``Great Leap Forward" in 1958 their views
underwent a fundamental, totally unfounded change: on
the one hand, they ceased to draw any line of distinction
between the transition period and socialism proper, and
on the other, enlarged the framework of the transition
period to include the construction of full-scale communist
society. In other words, they discarded socialism as a
lawgoverned socio-economic state of society on the way to
communism.
 The ``Three Red Banners" (the general line, the ``Great
Leap Forward'', and the people's communes), the line Mao
put forward in 1958, far from accelerating the socio-class
development of Chinese society, in fact slowed it down,
because it ran into contradiction with the tendencies of social
development objectively required by socialism. This was
expressed in the following.
 First, there was a slow-down in the quantitative and
especially qualitative growth of the working class which
usually goes hand in hand with a country's industrialisation,
because the accent was on the establishment of primitive,
handicraft enterprises.
 Second, the implanting of people's communes in the

countryside in effect diverted the peasantry from the natural
socialist path of development onto a path of artificial
egalitarianism and a barrack-room social system.
 Third, the accelerated transition to communism resulted

in a neglect of the need for a relatively long period in
which state-private enterprises are transformed into socialist
enterprises, and the members of the bourgeoisie are moulded
into working people of socialist society.
 The outcome of all this was that the transition to

communism was actually slowed down and a brake was put
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Chinchi yanchiu No. 5, 1960.
175
on the socialist transformation of classes and their relations

in the country. The greatest harm was thereby inflicted on
the development of the already small working class.
__ALPHA_LVL2__
3. Curtailment of the Vanguard Role
 of the Working Class
 On many occasions, Lenin analysed in detail the

arrangement of class forces in China, drawing important
conclusions about the difficulties and the main problems facing the
revolutionary movement in that country. In April 1913,
commenting on the intricate problems faced by Sun Yat-sen, he
wrote: ``What is this party's weakness? It lies in the fact
that it has not yet been able sufficiently to involve broad
masses of the Chinese people in the revolution. The
proletariat in China is still very weak---there is therefore no
leading class capable of waging a resolute and conscious
struggle to carry the democratic revolution to its end. The
peasantry, lacking a leader in the person of the proletariat,
is terribly downtrodden, passive, ignorant and indifferent
to politics-----How little of the really broad popular mass
has yet been drawn into active support of the Chinese
Republic. But without such massive support, without an
organised and steadfast leading class, the Republic cannot
be stable."^^1^^
 Lenin's indication of the need to promote the growth of
the working class, to enhance its vanguard, conscious and
organising role in every sphere of social development to
bring about the success of the revolution in China was
grossly neglected.
 Mao never understood the fundamental Marxist-Leninist

proposition about the hegemony of the proletariat in the
bourgeois-democratic and socialist revolution, and he has
always essentially relied on the petty-bourgeois elements,
which he regarded as the leader both in the bourgeois--
democratic and the socialist revolution. That was his line when he
set out on his political career, and that is still his line today.
 The 3rd Congress of the CPC was held in Canton from
June 10 to 19, 1923, and it was attended by Mao. What was
_-_-_
176
his stand on this crucial question of the revolution at that

time? He supported the capitulationist line of Chen Tu-hsiu,
who denied the hegemony of the proletariat in the
bourgeois-democratic revolution and who put his stake on the
national bourgeoisie, the urban petty bourgeoisie and the
peasantry. Three weeks later, Mao had an article in the
CPC General Committee's journal Hsiangtao, entitled ``The
Coup in Peking and the Merchants'', dealing with the role
of the merchants in the Chinese revolution. He wrote:
``China''s present political problem is none other than the
problem of the national revolution. The Chinese people's
historical mission lies ... in using this force of the people
to overthrow militarism and the foreign imperialists. This
revolution is a task of the whole people and all those who
constitute the people---merchants, workers, peasants, students,
teachers---everyone must undertake a part of the
revolutionary work. However, in virtue of historical necessity and
the tendencies of the present-day situation, it is the
merchants that have to take upon themselves the more vital
and important part of this work for the sake of the national
revolution rather than the rest of the people."^^1^^
 We find, therefore, that Mao did not regard the workers
or the peasants, but the merchants, that is, the petty--
bourgeois and bourgeois elements as constituting the most
important component part of the Chinese people, and assigned
to them a decisive role in the Chinese revolution. He wrote:
``The time has now come to unite the whole people for the
purpose of starting a revolutionary movement, which makes
it all the more important to prevent any split among the
merchants. .. . The broader the unity of the merchants and
the greater their influence, the more powerful the force
leading the whole people and the more swiftly the
revolution will achieve success."^^2^^
 A reading of Mao's earlier writings shows that he believed

the definition of classes was not based on socio-economic
relations between men, which are of different types, but on
their property status, regardless of the actual form of
relations of production (feudal, capitalist, etc.). Ignoring the
historical approach, he classified all men into five categories:
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Hsiangtao No. 31--32, July 11, 1923, p. 233.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 234.
12---1362
177
big bourgeoisie, middle bourgeoisie, petty bourgeoisie,

semiproletariat, and proletariat. This was an extremely confused
and unscientific approach to the definition of classes, and
it stood out in the boldest relief in an article he wrote in
1926, entitled `Ànalysis of the Classes of Chinese Society".^^1^^
There, he grouped into a single class different social groups
representing different types of relations of production. Thus,
big feudal landowners, militarists and senior officials, senior
civil servants, officials of banks and industrial and
commercial enterprises, and the upper layers of the
intelligentsia, like prominent lawyers, teachers and lecturers of
institutions of higher learning, and also a section of the
students, were lumped alongside the compradores together
with the big bourgeoisie. Apart from the owners of various
enterprises, the middle bourgeoisie also included small
landowners, together with employees of banks, industrial and
commercial enterprises, a section of the teachers and
students of institutions of higher learning, small-time
lawyers, etc.
 Consequently, the big and middle bourgeoisie included

all the rich, propertied or well-off sections of the
population in general. By including the landowners into the class
of Chinese bourgeoisie, Mao ignored the domination of
semifeudal relations in the country and took the edge off the
agrarian revolution in China.
 The article also contained a muddled and equivocal

definition of the petty bourgeoisie. Mao wrote: ``To the
petty bourgeoisie belongs the toiling peasantry, the small
traders, the owners of handicraft enterprises, and the small
intelligentsia---petty officials and employees, pupils of
secondary schools and teachers of secondary and primary
schools, small-time lawyers, etc."^^2^^ The petty bourgeoisie
is divided into three groups depending on the size of income.
In the first group we find men who have ``surpluses of rice
and money'', in the second those whose `ànnual income
allows them barely to make ends meet'', and in the third, men
``whose living conditions grow worse from year to year".^^3^^
 Apart from the industrial workers, miners, railwaymen,

seamen, dock-workers, the proletariat also includes all the
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Chungkuo nungmin No. 2, 1926.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 3.
~^^3^^ Ibid.
178
propertyless, poor and deprived sections of the population

in general, like the city coolies, farm labourers in the
countryside, and also the lumpen proletariat, which meant
bandits, mercenaries, beggars, robbers and prostitutes. Mao
wrote: ``This category of people is able to carry on a heroic
struggle. Under skilful leadership, they can become a
revolutionary force."^^1^^
 Mao characterised the role of the industrial proletariat

as follows: ``Despite its small numerical strength the
industrial proletariat is the main force of the national--
revolutionary movement."^^2^^ However, he explained the proletariat's
revolutionary activity by the fact that `ìts economic
condition is low. Having been deprived of the instruments of
production, it was left with its bare hands, without any hope
of enrichment''. The implication here is that the workers
were guided in the revolution not by their class
consciousness, but by an urge for enrichment. Consequently, Mao
defined classes not by men's place in social production, but
by their proprietary condition, the size of their income, that
is, relations of distribution.
 Mao derived men's attitude to the revolution, and the

extent of the revolutionary activity of various social groups
from the place these men had within the system of social
distribution. This made the lowest sections of society the
most revolutionary forces, instead of those who were
connected with progressive, large-scale modern production; it
turned out that the poorer a people, the better, because
``poverty impelled men to revolution''. Because the peasantry
was the poorest section of China's population it followed
that the peasantry was to play the leading role in the Chinese
revolution. It is this anti-Marxist attitude to the question of
classes---with the accent on the peasantry---that determined
the adventurist line of action in the political sphere.
 No Marxist-Leninist has denied the important role of the

peasantry in the revolutionary movement, especially in
countries like China. While stressing the leading role of
the working class in the Chinese revolution, Lenin did not
in any sense minimise the great importance of the peasantry
in social progress. He wrote: ``By drawing ever broader
masses of the Chinese peasantry into the movement and into
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Chungkuo nungmin No. 2, 1926, p.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 10.
12*
179
politics, Sun Yat-sen's party is becoming (to the extent

to which this process is taking place) a great factor of
progress in Asia and of mankind's progress. Whatever defeats
it may suffer from political rogues, adventurers and
dictators, who rely on the country's reactionary forces, this
party's efforts will not have been in vain."^^1^^ Lenin believed
that Sun Yat-sen's democratic programme was a militant
one, because it took account of the interests of the peasantry.
 Let us recall that after the Great October Socialist

Revolution, Lenin attached much importance to the liberation
struggle of the peasant masses, whom he regarded as the
natural and principal allies of the proletariat in
nationalcolonial revolutions. Accordingly, the Communist
International repeatedly stressed the great role of the peasantry
in the backward countries of the East. Thus, the ``General
Theses on the Eastern Question" of the 4th Congress of the
Comintern in 1922 stressed that the ``revolutionary
movement in the backward countries of the East cannot win any
success unless it is based on action by broad masses of
peasants".^^2^^
 The theses on the revolutionary movement in the colonial

and semi-colonial countries adopted by the 6th Congress of
the Comintern in 1928 said that ``the peasantry, together
with the proletariat and as its ally, is a motive force of the
revolution".^^3^^ The Comintern Executive's Directives to the
3rd Congress of the CPC in May 1923 drew the Chinese
Communists' attention to the fact that `ìt is the peasant
question that is the central question of the whole policy"^^4^^
The resolution of the 6th enlarged Plenary Meeting of the
Comintern Executive in March 1926 observed that ``the
peasant question is the principal question of the Chinese
national liberation movement".^^5^^ A letter from the Comintern
Executive to the CPC Central Committee in December 1929
stressed that ``peasant war is a distinctive feature of the
national crisis and the revolutionary upswing in China''.^^6^^
_-_-_
~^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 41, pp. 282--83.
~^^2^^ The Strategy and Tactics of the Comintern in the

NationalColonial Revolution as Exemplified by China, Moscow, 1934, p. 47 (in
Russian).
~^^3^^ Ibid., p. 72.
~^^4^^ Ibid., p. 114.
~^^5^^ Ibid., p. 125.
~^^6^^ Ibid., p. 255.
180
 We find all these documents stressing that in countries like

China the peasant question is the central and principal
question; that the peasantry is an ally of the proletariat; that
peasant war is a distinctive feature of the national crisis
and the revolutionary upswing. All of this is undoubtedly
true, but we do not find any of these documents saying that
the peasantry is the vanguard force of the revolution in
China or in any of the economically backward countries of
the East in general.
 Let us recall that the 2nd Congress of the Comintern

stressed the idea of the hegemony of the proletariat in the
national liberation revolutions in the East, an idea which
was further elaborated in the ``General Theses on the
Eastern Question'', adopted by the 4th Congress of the
Comintern. While recognising the great role of the peasantry
in the East, notably in China, the Comintern pointed to the
need to subordinate the peasant question to the strategic
goal of the proletariat. By emphasising the decisive role of
the petty bourgeoisie, the peasantry, in the revolution, Mao
ignores the idea of the proletariat's hegemony, thereby
breaking with the revolutionary line of the whole
international communist movement.
 As early as 1923, attention to the fact that Mao tended

to underestimate the role of the working class in China was
drawn by the representative of the Comintern Executive in
China. His memo to the Comintern Executive on June 20,
1923, concerning the 3rd Congress of the CPC, said that ``the
Hunan delegate, now Party Secretary, Mao Tse-tung,
declared that it was now still impossible to set up either
a national or a mass Communist Party''. In his ``Report on
an Investigation of the Peasant Movement in Hunan'',
published in March 1927, Mao expressed in general terms
the view that the peasantry was the decisive and only force
of the revolutionary movement in China.^^1^^ He went into this
matter at greater length in his work ``trategic Problems
of China's Revolutionary War'',^^2^^ summing up the experience
of Party work from 1927 to 1936. Once again, Mao advanced
as the theoretical basis of the Chinese revolution, the
proposition that the peasantry had the decisive role to play, and
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Mao Tsc-tung, Sclcfled Works, Vol. 1, pp. 23--24,


~^^2^^ Ibid., pp. 175--88.
181
reiterated this formula: the peasantry---the strategic

mainstay; war---the principal tactical means of the Chinese
revolution. In his work, ``The Chinese Revolution and the
Communist Party of China" at the end of 1939, Mao
declared that the peasantry was the ``main force in the
Chinese revolution'', that the revolution had its mainstay
in the countryside, and that the revolution was first to
triumph in the rural districts and then in the towns.^^1^^
 In his work `Òn New Democracy" (January 1940) Mao

drew the general conclusion that ``the Chinese revolution
is virtually the peasants' revolution, and the resistance to
Japan now going on is virtually the peasants' resistance to
Japan. New-democratic politics is virtually the granting of
power to the peasants.. . . And all that goes into the
resistance to Japan and our own livelihood is virtually provided
by the peasants. ... So the peasant problem has become the
main problem of the Chinese revolution, and the strength
of the peasants constitutes the principal force of the Chinese
revolution".^^2^^
 Back in 1931, Wang Ming, who was elected to the CPC
leadership and subsequently also to the leadership of the
Comintern Executive, and his followers pursued the
Comintern line and tried to resist Mao's line, by stressing the
importance of relying on the proletariat. They emphasised
that even in the specific conditions in which the revolution
developed in China it was not right to ignore the historical
role of the working class, to forget about its historical
mission in the revolution and to bring the peasantry into the
foreground. For all the specific features of the Chinese
revolution, for all the importance of the agrarian and
peasant question in China, it was not right to ignore the
strategic line of the Party which saw the proletariat as the
guiding and leading force of the revolution. Wang Ming
and his followers said Mao's line was an expression of the
``specifically peasant revolutionary attitude'', of ``peasant
capitalism" and the ``kulak line''.
 Mao started a drive against Wang Ming and accused him
of taking a ``Left-deviationist'' line in the CPC leadership.
By resorting to demagogy and juggling catchwords about
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works, Vol. 4, pp. 171--218.


~^^2^^ Ibid., Vol. 3, p. 138.
182
the need to fight subjectivism and improve and correct the

style of work in the CPC, Mao got the 7th Plenary Meeting
of the CPC Central Committee to adopt the ``Resolution on
Questions in History of the Party"^^1^^ expressing Mao's view and
criticising those who advocated the ``Left-deviationist'' line
above all for having resisted the line of the peasant
revolution and subordination of work in the towns to work in the
countryside.
 These unscientific, opportunistic views of Mao's, which had

taken shape long ago, were most forcefully expressed after
1960 in his openly Right-opportunist line of depriving the
working class of its vanguard role in Chinese society. In
1939 and 1940, Mao put forward the slogan that ``the rural
districts are the mainstay of the revolution" and that ``the
peasantry is the main force of the Chinese revolution'',
whereas after 1960 he proclaimed the so-called general line
of national-economic development: `Àgriculture is the basis
of the national economy, industry is its leading force.'' Mao
was unable altogether to drop all mention of industry, where
the working class is engaged, but he did declare agriculture
to be the basis of life in society. In a sense this realised the
idea he had expressed in his article `Òn New Democracy"
in 1940, that `òur own livelihood is virtually provided by
the peasants".^^2^^
 This sharp turn-about from the ``Great Leap Forward"

in industry to reliance on agriculture cannot be construed
otherwise than as a petty-bourgeois Right-opportunist
response to the failure of the Leftist policy of instant
construction of socialism and communism. Here we constantly
find a toing and froing between ``Left'' opportunism and
Right opportunism, for such is the ``logic'' of all those who
abandon Marxism: the overdoing of the Leftist line and its
failure impel them to retreat to the Right, and then once
again to fall back on Leftist gambles.
 Mao's line of slowing down the country's

industrialisation has inevitably caused a slow-down in the development
of the working class and a reduction of its leading, vanguard
role in the country. As a result, there has been a marked
slow-down in the quantitative and qualitative growth of the
_-_-_
~^^2^^ Ibid., pp. 137--38.
183
working class in China. From 1949 to 1957, the number of

industrial and office workers increased 3-fold (from 8
million to 24.5 million), an increase of 16.5 million; from 1957
to 1964, it increased by only about 10 million (from 24.5
million to 34--35 million). From 1949 to 1957, the number of
industrial workers alone increased from 3 million to 9
million, and from 1957 to 1965, the number of industrial
workers increased by only 2 million (a growth of only
onethird in a similar period), reaching 11 million (with China's
population in 1965 at 735 million).
 Consequently, the share of the working class in the

socioclass structure of present-day Chinese society is still very
small.
__ALPHA_LVL2__
4. Artificial Aggravation
 of Class Struggle
 Having taken the attitude of subjectivism and refusing to

consider the real, objective processes of social development,
Mao and his followers pushed the country into serious
economic difficulties which had a grave effect on the life of
hundreds of millions of people. By the end of 1960, Mao's
idea of rapidly building communism in China was already
a shambles. Industrial output had been halved and
agriculture was in decline. The economic difficulties were
compounded by heavy natural calamities which hit the country
in 1959 and 1960. Millions of people died in the ensuing
famine. The economic difficulties arising from the
experiments in the period of the ``Great Leap Forward" reduced
living standards among almost every section of the Chinese
population, and this, for its part, naturally caused extensive
and strong discontent throughout the country over the
CPC's domestic policy, evidence of which came from the
numerous disorders in many parts of China from 1958 to
1960.^^1^^
_-_-_
~^^1^^ For example, on November 18, 1958, 40 men, armed with rifles,
shotguns and knives, staged a peculiar demonstration in the village
of Taiping, Wuhsing district, Jukin region, Szechwan province. They
marched through the village bearing red hexagonal banners with
this inscription: ``Down with Chairman Mao Tse-tung''. The participants
in this demonstration chanted slogans like: ``We are starving'', ``We
184
 However, the fatal consequences of the Left-adventurist

line for China did not induce Mao and his followers to take
the path followed by other socialist countries. What is more,
Mao's followers gradually lost faith in the possibility of
building socialism in China within the foreseeable future.
In 1958, during the ``Great Leap Forward'', the Chinese
press asserted that for the Chinese people communism was
a matter of the immediate future, whereas following the
failure of the ``Great Leap Forward" socialist construction
was regarded as a remote and totally dim prospect. An
editorial article carried by Jenmin jihpao and Hungchih on
June 14, 1964, said: `Ìt is impossible to achieve the final
triumph of socialism within the lifetime of one or two
generations. It can be fully achieved in five-ten generations
or even after a much longer period of time."^^1^^ In accordance
with this theoretical conclusion, the Maoists took the line of
curtailing socialist construction in the country in the early
1960s.
 Simultaneously, they began artificially to put heat into

the political situation in the country. The line Mao has been
conducting since 1960--1961 is aimed not at strengthening
and developing in Chinese society relations of co-operation,
and of alliance between the various labouring classes and
groups of Chinese society, not at completing the class
struggle against the remnants of the national bourgeoisie
and other exploiting classes. It is geared to diametrically
opposite aims: artificial fanning of social contradictions, the
ranging and incitement of classes and social groups against
each other: peasants against workers, workers and peasants
against the intelligentsia, students and schoolchildren against
Party and government cadres, etc.
_-_-_
cast iron in the mountain, and never see our wives and children''. Here
is another example: on April 18, 1959, seven districts of Hsinhua
region, Chinghai province, inhabited by people of four nationalities---
Sala, Tibetan, Uighur and Chinese---were the scene of a large-scale
uprising; the insurgents besieged the regional centre, Hsinhua, for three
days. Almost 4,000 other people rallied to their side and they occupied
a large part of the regional territory. On April 25, the Chinese troops
managed to put down the uprising. The insurgents lost over 400 men
killed, while nearly 2,500 men were taken prisoner. Similar action
occurred in other parts of the country.
~^^1^^ The Chinese press said this article had been written by Mao
himself.
185
 Mao's theoretical propositions on class relations in China

have further evolved. Whereas in 1958 and 1959 his accent
was on the possibility of rapidly overcoming all the
contradictions and antagonisms between classes and even on the
possibility of their peaceful resolution, the accent was now
switched to an apology of the class struggle. In their
domestic policy, the Maoists laid their main stress not on
the development of production or improvement of the new
relations of production, not on raising the people's living
standards, but on ferreting out more and more class enemies.
The Chinese press broadly circulated this postulate
formulated by Mao: ``The class struggle, the production struggle
and scientific experimentation are the three great
revolutionary movements in the construction of a socialist power.''
Let us note that the class struggle is ranked first and is
seen as a ``lever of these three great revolutionary
movements''. ``The class struggle is the substance of all questions.''
``From start to finish, the epoch of socialism is an epoch of
class struggle."^^1^^
 The idea that the class struggle is to continue until

communist society has been built was first officially formulated
in a communique issued by the 10th Plenary Meeting of
the CPC Central Committee in September 1962, which said:
``The 10th Plenary Meeting of the 8th Central Committee
declares that throughout the whole historical period of the
proletarian revolution and the proletarian dictatorship,
throughout the whole historical period of transition from
capitalism to communism (this period covers decades and
an even longer period of time) a class struggle takes place
between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie, a struggle
between the socialist and the capitalist ways."^^2^^ The 10th
Plenary Meeting of the CPC Central Committee proclaimed
a line of sharpening the class struggle within the country,
and one journal explained this as follows: ``During the
period of socialism, classes and the class struggle not only
continue to exist but the difficulties and complexities are
far greater than those of earlier periods, and do not bear
comparison with any other revolutionary period."^^3^^
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Jcntnin jifipao, November 29, 1963.
~^^2^^ Hsinhua Press Release, September 28, 1902.
~^^3^^ Shichicn, November 1, 19G4.
186
 In a speech at this plenary meeting, Mao issued a call on

the whole Party and the whole people ``never to forget
about classes and the class struggle."^^1^^ Later he said:
``Throughout the whole stage of socialism, the class struggle
between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie in the political,
economic, ideological and cultural-educational spheres
cannot cease. This is a long and intricate struggle; it runs
a zigzag path and is repeated again and again. Like the
wave, this struggle rises and falls; now it diminishes
somewhat, now it is sharply aggravated. This struggle determines
the future of socialism. On this protracted struggle depends
the way socialist society takes: towards communism or
towards a restoration of capitalism."^^2^^
 Let us stress that this presentation of the class struggle in

the form of a wave that rises and falls, regardless of the
concrete political, economic and social changes in a society
building socialism smacks of anarchism and demagogy, for
it reduces the class struggle to the level of a tantrum thrown
by the elemental forces of nature, while the possibility of
making conscious use of the laws of social development
discovered by Marx and Lenin is rejected. The Communist
Parties, having mastered these laws, are in a position to say
when the class struggle will become sharper and when it
will subside.
 It was declared at the 9th Congress of the CPC that Mao's
thesis concerning the existence of the class struggle within
the socialist society enriched Marxism and was a contribution
to Marxist theory. The report said: ``Chairman Mao
Tsetung especially emphasised that . . . 'the class struggle
between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie, the class struggle
between the various political forces, the class struggle
between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie in the sphere of
ideology remains protracted, develops in zigzags and now
and again even assumes a highly bitter character'.
Consequently, it was Chairman Mao Tse-tung who for the first
time in the theory and practice of the international
revolutionary movement gave a clear-cut statement of the doctrine
that following the completion in the main of the socialist
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Chicfangchiun pan, April 18, 1967.
~^^2^^ Editorial article published in Jcnmin ji/ipao and Iluiigchih
.June 14, 1964.
187
transformation of the property in the means of production

classes and the class struggle still exist, and that the
proletariat must continue to carry on the revolution.''
 The assertion about Mao's ``development'' of the theory

of class struggle as applied to socialist society is at variance
with the generally known historical facts. No Marxist has
ever said that the class struggle disappears of itself once
the expropriators are expropriated. For a long time, the
overthrown exploiting classes continue to have a sense of
rabid hatred for the new social system and jump at any
opportunity to restore their old domination. This was
repeatedly pointed out by Lenin, who required that the Communists
should be vigilant in face of the machinations by the class
enemy. The experience of socialist construction in the Soviet
Union and the other socialist countries, including China
herself, has borne out the truth of what Lenin said. This
was most visually demonstrated by such recent events as
the counter-revolutionary putsch in Hungary in 1956 and
the counter-revolutionary action in Czechoslovakia in 1968.
It was said at the International Meeting of Communist and
Workers' Parties in 1969 that ``the enemies of socialism are
keeping up their attempts to undermine the foundations of
the socialist state power, thwart the socialist transformation
of society and restore their own rule".^^1^^
 Mao has never taken the historical approach to the

analysis of social phenomena. He has refused to make any
distinction between the initial stage of socialist construction
and the stage of mature and developed socialism, between
the laws of the period of transition from capitalism to
socialism and the laws of socialist society. He has identified
the class contradictions between antagonistic classes and
class contradictions and relations between friendly
nonantagonistic classes in socialist society. That is why he has
essentially proposed similar methods for resolving these
contradictions. Finally, Mao has refused to consider the fact
that in the course of socialist construction the bitterness of
the class struggle is moderated, and that gradually the edge
of the class struggle is increasingly directed outwardly,
because the remnants of the exploiting classes are left with
_-_-_
 ^^1^^ International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties, Moscow

1969), p. 22.
188
less and less opportunities for restoring their erstwhile
domination without direct armed support on the part of
imperialism.
 According to Mao, it turns out that the economic

domination, political rule and ideological pressure of the
bourgeoisie remain not only in the period of transition from
capitalism to socialism but also in full-scale socialist society.
This question then suggests itself: what kind of full-fledged
and mature socialist society is that?
 Mao says that the elimination of the bourgeoisie, the

landowners and other exploiters, as social classes, depends
only on the overcoming of the bourgeois-feudal ideology
among the citizens of the socialist society. The Maoists argue
roughly on these lines: since bourgeois ideology exists, the
bourgeoisie exists as well, and consequently there is need
for the class struggle.
 Here are some extracts from the Chinese press. ``Some
people believe that once the socialist transformations are
in the main completed, the capitalist economy, as the basis
of the bourgeoisie, is in the main already eliminated, the
bourgeoisie no longer holds the means of production and
consequently already ceases to exist.'' ``By destroying the
reactionary state machine men can eliminate it, but
reactionary political views and ideology cannot be destroyed,
these can be eliminated only as a result of re-education over
a protracted period of time. That is why, although the
crucial thing in eliminating a class is to deprive that class
of its economic basis and the main conditions for its
economic existence, this does not in any sense mean its
immediate destruction. So long as the members of this class
have not been re-educated, so long as the ideological and
political influence of this class remains, it cannot be said
to have been finally eliminated."^^1^^ Here is another extract:
``The solution of the question of property in the means of
production is undoubtedly the first step which is of decisive
importance in the elimination of classes, but it would be
wrong to reduce the task of eliminating classes to this
proposition alone. It would be wrong to assume that once the
question of property is settled, there follows an instant
disappearance of classes and the historical task of eliminating
classes is fulfilled. Even after the exploiting classes have
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Chungkuo chingnien Nos. 20, 21, 1962.
189
been overthrown in economic terms they continue to exist

as classes. Their political views, ideology, world outlook and
all kinds of activity exist and operate as the marks of their
class. This is an important objective source for the
protracted existence of classes, class contradictions and the class
struggle in the transition period."^^1^^ And again: `Ìt is
inconceivable that once the means of production are transferred,
the exploiting classes are at once transformed into working
people, and that in the sphere of ideology bourgeois world
outlooks are likewise instantly transformed into proletarian
outlooks. Following the establishment of the socialist system
of property the struggle between the two ways continues
to exist, the class struggle continues to be the main motive
force behind the development of production."^^2^^
 These texts contain some correct propositions, borrowed

from Marxist theory, and there is nothing wrong with them.
What we have in mind is, for instance, that ``by destroying
the reactionary state machine men can eliminate it, but
reactionary political views and ideology cannot be destroyed,
these can be eliminated only as a result of re-education over
a protracted period of time''. And again: `Ìt is inconceivable
that once the means of production are transferred, the
exploiting classes are at once transformed into working
people, and that in the sphere of ideology bourgeois world
outlooks are likewise instantly transformed into proletarian
outlooks''.
 But these correct Marxist propositions are being used to

substantiate an incorrect, anti-Marxist thesis about
ideological re-education, instead of the expropriation of the
property of the exploiting classes being the crucial
condition for their elimination. The fact that a capitalist has been
deprived of his private property, that he no longer receives
surplus value, that he is made by his labour to earn the
means of subsistence---all that turns out to be less than the
basic condition for eliminating the capitalists as
representatives of the exploiting classes. In other words, in defining
the social structure and class relations in Chinese society,
Mao and his followers do not start from objective criteria
but mainly from subjective criteria relating to the sphere of
ideology and politics.
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Hsin chianshe No. 11, 1967.
~^^2^^ Chien hsien No. 12, 1964.
190
 Real revolutionaries have never discounted subjective

criteria in analysing the class structure of socialist society,
especially in the initial period of its construction. They have
been fully aware that the expropriation of the expropriators,
while signifying their elimination in social and class terms,
and marking an end of their economic domination and
political power, does not at all signify the total disappearance
of bourgeois ideology. The proposition that social
consciousness tends to lag behind social being is a Marxist axiom.
That is why the revolutionary parties directing socialist
construction are in no doubt about the fact that the struggle
against the influence exerted by bourgeois ideology requires
a considerable period of time, especially in view of the
steady pressure exerted on the socialist countries by
imperialist propaganda. However, none of these facts nullifies
the fundamental Marxist-Leninist proposition that the
expropriation of private capitalist property is the crucial
condition for the elimination of the exploiting classes. This
proposition holds true whatever the conditions of the class
struggle.
 Let us stress that Mao also takes a distorted view of the
struggle against bourgeois ideology itself: he refers to the
class struggle any discussion and any debate on political
and ideological problems, and ranks among the class enemies
Party functionaries who express differing views.
 But Mao has gone beyond distortions of the Marxist

theory of classes and the class struggle, and has been
stubbornly putting them into practice. He has used these
mainly artificially to build up an atmosphere of bitter class
struggle in the country and then used this atmosphere to
establish police control over the behaviour of every section
of the Chinese population. Under the pretext of ``socialist
re-education" the Maoists have carried out intensified purges
in the cities among Party functionaries, government officials
and the intelligentsia in trapping and suppressing those who
do not accept their policy.
 One of the refined measures used in ``re-educating'' such

people, especially among the cadres and intellectuals, is to
transport them to the countryside for ``tempering'' and ``
reeducation in labour''. The Maoists have made wide use of
this method to put down the discontented whom it is
impossible to charge with any criminal offence. Jenmin
191
jihpao and other newspapers have described this ``tempering

through labour" in the countryside as the ``most important
and radical measure" for the socialist system, which helps
to overcome bureaucratic practices and to avert revisionism.
The papers have been calling for resolute implementation
of Mao's instructions, concerning the ``tempering through
labour" as one of the ways of ``preventing the restoration of
capitalism''. Refusal by functionaries to fulfil the directives
concerning the ``tempering through labour" and to leave for
the countryside is qualified as bourgeois degeneration.
 The policy pursued by Mao and his followers in the

countryside is also aimed at building up clashes between
social classes.
 During the completion of the co-operative drive

(1956--1957) Chinese peasants were divided into the class
sections of the poor, the middle peasants and the kulaks
chiefly in accordance with the means of production they had
in their possession. The distinction between the well-off
middle peasants and the kulaks consisted in the fact that the
earnings from exploitation obtained by the well-off middle
peasant were not in excess of 25 per cent of his whole
family's total annual income, whereas for the kulak family
it was in excess of 25 per cent of the total annual income.
Through the establishment of co-operatives, the main means
of production held by the peasants (including the kulaks)
were socialised. The landowners (the petty landowners,
because the big landowners had been suppressed during the
agrarian reform) had also been admitted into the
cooperatives on definite terms.
 Of course, the end of the co-operative campaign did not

mean the instant disappearance of class distinctions in the
Chinese countryside, but the main source of class
differentiation among the peasants---private property in the means
of production---was no longer there. Now, with the class
struggle being artificially sharpened, Mao and his followers
have once again fallen back on the idea of the class
distinction among the peasants based not on their relation to
property but on their relation to the ``thought of Mao
Tsetung''. Mao's supporters rank among the hostile classes in
the countryside not only the former landowners and kulaks,
but virtually all well-off middle peasants.
 The Maoists' artificial aggravation of the class struggle
192
in the Chinese countryside and their reliance on the poor

and the economically weak middle peasants is due to the
following reasons: the establishment of the people's
communes led to a break-up of collective farms which had not
yet been firmly established. The peasantry, especially its
middle section, discontented with the existing state of affairs,
has been seeking to improve its living conditions. In
accordance with Mao's conceptions, the urge on the part of
the Chinese peasants to improve their living conditions (by
various means, including the sale in the open market of the
farm produce they grow by their own labours) is branded by
the official press as ``spontaneous capitalistic tendencies''.
Mao's class line in the countryside is designed above all to
distract the peasantry's attention from its vital interests, to
switch its efforts to the struggle against the ``class enemies'',
thereby damping down peasant discontent by means of an
artificial state of tension.
__ALPHA_LVL2__
5. Class Struggle Without the Struggle
 Against the Bourgeoisie
 If the main class contradiction in China in the period of

transition from capitalism to socialism, according to Mao,
continues to be the contradiction between the proletariat
and the bourgeoisie, one would think that the revolutionary
forces should concentrate their efforts on the struggle against
the Chinese bourgeoisie. In practice this is far from being
so. The Chinese press carries no reports about a class struggle
against the bourgeois elements, no calls on the people to
intensify the struggle against them, nor reports about
subversive activity by the national bourgeoisie.
 In 1956, following the wholesale conversion of all private

enterprises into state-private enterprises, the state assessed
the share of private capital at these enterprises as being
worth 2,200 million yuan. Every year the former owners of
the enterprises converted into state-private enterprises are
paid 5 per cent on their invested capital. This means they
receive 110--120 million yuan a year. Initially, the payment
of interest, started in 1956, was expected to go on until the
end of the second five-year period, that is, up to 1962, by
when the state should have paid out almost 35 per cent of
13---1362
193
the value of the private capital, that is, 770 million yuan.^^1^^
However, the payment of interest has continued to this very
day, and there is no indication when it will be stopped.
 Another important form in buying out private capital in

China, apart from the fixed interest, is the very high
salaries paid to working capitalists. Thus, average salaries
to former capitalists working in foreign trade establishments
in Shanghai came to 223 yuan, as compared with the average
of 50--60 yuan for industrial wages. A capitalist who is
director of the Shenhsin textile mill No. 9 in Shanghai was
paid 400 yuan a month, while the director of the same
factory representing the state was paid 160 yuan. Some
Shanghai capitalists have salaries running to more than
1,000 yuan a month. If the buying out payments already
received by the capitalists are added to the amount by
which the capitalists' salaries exceed those of government
officials of equal rank (let us note that it is the high salary
and not the fixed interest that is the capitalists' chief source
of income) the total may be safely regarded as fully
covering the value of the means of production bought up from the
Chinese bourgeoisie.
 Despite the fact that the buying out of the means of
production from the bourgeoisie under the proletarian
dictatorship does not amount to a transaction of sale (a fact
the Chinese theorists did not deny in their articles either),
the Chinese leadership, while claiming to be extra ``
revolutionary" and urging a step-up of the class struggle, continue
to pay the bourgeoisie ``smart money" 20 years since the
establishment of the people's power.
 The following fact shows the Maoists' attitude to the

bourgeoisie.
 Liu Nieh-yi is a capitalist who lives in Shanghai. His

father had owned many enterprises, which in 1956 were
estimated to be worth 90 million yuan. Following the father's
death, the estate was shared out equally among his 10 sons.
Liu Nieh-yi's share came to a number of match factories.
Every year, he receives from the state 5 per cent interest on
his capital, which comes to 450,000 yuan. Liu is chairman of
_-_-_
~^^1^^ See Theses of the All-China Trade Union Federation on the Policy
of Redemption by the State of the Share of Private Capital at
StatePrivate Enterprises, Peking, 1957 (in Chinese).
194
the Shanghai industrialists' and merchants' federation, and

as director of one of his former factories receives a monthly
salary of 250 yuan. His nine brothers cannot complain either.
They too receive 450,000 yuan a year each and a
higherthan-average salary. One of them, for instance, is director
of a cement plant and has a salary of 690 yuan.
 Liu Nieh-yi will tell you straight away that in China the
``dictatorship of the proletariat is not aimed against the
Chinese bourgeoisie'', and that he already regards himself
as a common working cadre. Consequently, the loud talk
about the class struggle and greater class vigilance has not
prevented Mao and his entourage from forgetting it when
dealing with the Chinese bourgeoisie.
 At the 9th Congress of the CPC much was said about
fighting the class enemies and purging the ``class ranks'',
but the question of the national bourgeoisie, the last exploiter
class of Chinese society, was not even considered. Mao's
attitude to the national bourgeoisie can hardly be squared
with the Maoists' revolutionary catchwords and is in fact
marked by compromise, Right-opportunist flirtation and
concessions, an urge to neutralise it and even to win it over
to the Maoists' side in their fight against the Chinese people's
socialist gains. Consequently, their Leftist words go hand
in hand with their Right-opportunist deeds.
__ALPHA_LVL2__
6. Class Struggle:
 Pretext for Repression
 Mao said the ``cultural revolution" was `àbsolutely

necessary and highly timely in consolidating the proletarian
dictatorship, preventing the restoration of capitalism and
building socialism''. In their efforts to prove that the
``cultural revolution" was a ``natural development" and ``
accorded with Marxist doctrine" the Maoists cited the
founders of Marxism-Leninism.
 In order to justify his assertions concerning the danger of

a restoration of capitalism in full-scale socialist society, Mao
referred to the following words of Lenin's: ``The transition
from capitalism to communism takes an entire historical
epoch. Until this epoch is over, the exploiters inevitably
cherish the hope of restoration, and this hope turns into
13*
195
attempts at restoration."^^1^^ Mao thinks these words of Lenin's

back up his idea that because the danger of restoration
continues to exist right up to the construction of full-scale
communist society the implication is that even in full-scale
socialist society there must be a bitter class struggle. Mao
ignores Lenin's remark to the effect that socialism is in fact
communism, but only its first, or lower, phase. Lenin
regarded the transition to communism as transition to its first
stage---socialism. Here is what Lenin said about this in his
work The State and Revolution: ``What is usually called
socialism was termed by Marx the `first', or lower, phase of
communist society. Insofar as the means of production
become common property, the word `communism' is also
applicable here, providing we do not forget that this is not
complete communism."^^2^^
 When Lenin said that the exploiters still have hopes
of restoration he had in mind the period of transition from
capitalism to socialism, in which the issue of ``who beats
whom" is decided. Mao tries to extend this period, and to
include in it the whole of socialist society, when the issue
of ``who beats whom" has already been decided. The Chinese
leaders have been driving home the idea that the restoration
of capitalism in the socialist countries is inevitable. They
have slanderously declared that this process is already taking
place in the Soviet Union and in a number of other socialist
countries in Eastern Europe. Accordingly, they ``
recommend" that the peoples of these countries, including the
Soviet people, should stage ``cultural revolutions" like the
Chinese one.
 In China's case the possibility of a capitalist restoration

there cannot be denied because the country is still going
through the transition period proper. To this very day, we
find in Chinese society the national bourgeoisie and
numerous remnants of old exploiting classes, who have visions of
restoring the old social order. Nor can it be denied that their
hopes of doing so have materially increased after socialist
_-_-_
~^^1^^ This quotation from Lenin's ``The Proletarian Revolution and the
Renegade Kautsky" (Collected Works, Vol. 28, p. 254) was given in
an editorial article carried by Jenmin jihpao and Hungchih on June
14, 1964, and once again used in the report to the 9th Congress of the
CPC.
196
ideas were discredited among some social sections of the

Chinese people by the Maoist leadership's subjectivist
policies.
 The ``great proletarian cultural revolution" in China is

in no sense directed against the national bourgeoisie and the
remnants of the other exploiting classes. None of those who
have been `èxposed'' as being opponents of the ``thought of
Mao Tse-tung" were capitalists or received unearned
incomes. The Chinese press has admitted as much. Hungchih
said in No.~8 for 1966: ``The great proletarian cultural
revolution in our country is aimed against a handful of
scoundrels who have used the signboard of communism to peddle
their anti-communist wares. It is aimed against the handful
of anti-Party, anti-socialist and counter-revolutionary
bourgeois intellectuals.''
 The ``Resolution of the CPC Central Committee on the

Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution" (adopted on August
8, 1966) said: ``Because the cultural revolution is a
revolution it inevitably meets with resistance. The source of this
resistance lies mainly among those vested with power who
have infiltrated into the Party and are going the capitalist
way.'' It added: ``The present movement is centred on the
struggle against those vested with power who are within the
ranks of the Party and who are going the capitalist way."^^1^^
 Who are these men who are ``vested with power ... and
are going the capitalist way"? It turns out that the advocates
of the counter-revolutionary line and restoration of
capitalism in China and of struggle against the Party and socialism
are Party cadres. The result is a pretty weird picture: it is
not the bourgeois elements, but Party cadres who have
visions of restoring capitalism in China.
 Mao's shameless speculation on the threat of a capitalist

restoration in China and the demagogic nature of his
assertions about a ``life-and-death struggle between bourgeois
restoration and proletarian counter-restoration"^^2^^ ultimately
lays bare the true reasons behind the notorious ``great
proletarian cultural revolution''. We believe the reasons to be
these.
_-_-_
~^^1^^ China Pictorial No. 9, 1966, pp. 6-7. At the 9th Congress of the CPG
a new term---``capwayist''---was coined to designate those who are in
power and are going the capitalist way.
~^^2^^ Hungchih No. 8, 1966.
197
 The Maoists' adventurist experiments in stepping up

China's entry into communism by means of the ``Three Red
Banners" line proved to be a fiasco. These experiments
inflicted great damage on the Chinese economy, and it is still
trying to make good these losses. In industrial and
agricultural production China remains essentially on the 1957--1959
level. A large part of the national income goes into military
needs, above all the fabrication of nuclear weapons.
Despite some stabilisation of the economic and political situation
following the failure of the ``Great Leap Forward'', Mao's
erroneous domestic and foreign policy line has, for all
practical purposes, driven the country into a dead end. It was
announced that 1966 marked the start of the third
fiveyear period, but no target figures for the five-year plan have
yet been published. It would be wrong to assume that the
gross errors made by Mao and his followers, including
the ``Great Leap Forward'', have already become a
part of history and have been forgotten by the Chinese
people.
 Many Party functionaries and government officials

knew who was really to blame for China's plight. The
Maoists could not be unaware of the fact that their domestic
and foreign-policy failures had markedly undermined the
influence of the ``thought of Mao Tse-tung" at home and
abroad. So, in order to retain power, Mao and his followers
started the ``cultural revolution''. Under the pretext of
fighting the threat of a capitalist restoration they attacked
the Party cadres and the patriotic elements who condemned
Mao's adventurist propositions in the sphere of economic
policy and demanded a return to the socialist methods of
economic development; those who demanded an end to
Mao's personality cult, which had frozen the life and
creativity of the Party; those who insisted on restoring
friendly relations and co-operation between China and the
Soviet Union; those who urged the use of scientific, technical
and cultural achievements in foreign countries; and those
who demanded that the intelligentsia should be given more
freedom of initiative and allowed to pursue its own creative
quest. These demands by internationalist-minded Chinese
Marxists, and other men who simply take the common-sense
view of things are depicted by Chinese propaganda as an
attempt to ``restore capitalism'', and as amounting to a
198
``struggle against the Party and socialism" and a ``

counterrevolutionary line''.
 These Maoists' assertions amount to no more than a bogey

used to intimidate and terrify the Chinese people, a trick
used to justify the Maoists' political reprisals and to
discredit their opponents.^^1^^ Despite these zigzags in China's
political and economic life, brought about by the Maoists'
line, there are considerable numbers of people in China
who support socialism. Quite naturally, in the absence of
any information concerning the true causes of the difficulties
now facing China and the men who were instrumental in
producing them, the speculation over the ``restoration of
capitalism" slogan suits the book of Mao and his followers,
because it allows them to retain some of their political
and ideological influence.
 During the ``cultural revolution" thousands of Party

functionaries in charge of ideological and cultural matters,
workers in culture, the sciences and the arts in all provinces
and cities were removed from their posts and subjected to
abuse, humiliation and political harassment. The most
prominent leaders of the Communist Party of China fell victim
to Mao's ambitious and treacherous policy, among them
Liu Shao-chi and Teng Hsiao-ping, members of the
Standing Committee of the Politburo of the CPC Central
Committee, Peng Chen, member of the Politburo of the CPC
Central Committee, Lu Ting-yi, alternate member of the
Politburo of the CPC Central Committee and head of the
CPC Central Committee's propaganda department, Lo
Juiching, Chief of the General Staff of the People's Liberation
Army, and many others.
 The pragmatic nature of the ``restoration of capitalism"

slogan, designed to meet the narrow group interests of the
_-_-_
 ^^1^^ Thus, for instance, Chou Yang, one-time chief of the propaganda
department of the CPC Central Committee, was declared to be a
``counter-revolutionary revisionist element" on the ground that he had
declared the following: ``The general line, the 'Great Leap Forward'
and the people's communes met with great difficulties.'' He also said:
`Ùltimately, it will be possible to say whether we arc right or wrong
within 50 or 100 years.'' Chinese propaganda regards this as a slander
of Mao Tse-tung because, as Jenmin jihpao wrote, ``the Party's general
line---straining to the utmost, seeking to advance in building socialism
on the principle of `more, faster, better, at less cost', is a great work
of the thought of Mao Tse-tung" (Jenmin jihpao, August 7, 1966).
199
Maoists, stands out quite clearly in an analysis of the charges

brought against Liu Shao-chi. The report to the 9th
Congress of the CPC calls Liu a ``provocateur'', `à
strikebreaker'', and a ``running dog of imperialism''. He is alleged
to have ``concocted the political line of restoring capitalism"
in China and of ``transforming China into a colony of
imperialism and revisionism'', working to condition public
opinion for an `òverthrow of the proletarian dictatorship''.
The really surprising thing, however, is that the report
contains no concrete facts to back up these charges. The report
does not contain either an outline of Liu's programme or
information about his contacts with the bourgeoisie. Some of
the facts concerning ``Liu Shao-chi's black line'', which the
report gives, relate mainly to the period before 1949, and
merely show that Liu did not share some of Mao's tactical
propositions. The point is that the Maoists were incapable
of producing any facts to confirm the absurd assertion that
Liu was seeking to restore capitalism, because no such facts
are available. The fact is that, beginning from the
mid1950s, Liu (like other sober-minded Party leaders)
increasingly differed with Mao and his followers on the various
aspects of the content and pace of China's socio-political
and economic development.
 Evidence of this comes from the ``charges'' levelled against

Liu Shao-chi by the Hungweiping press. Liu was attacked
with special ferocity for having urged in the 1950s that a
study should be made of the experience of socialist
construction in the Soviet Union, and for having `àctively preached
the idea of learning from the Soviet Union'', ``campaigned
for Sino-Soviet friendship" and ``given a high assessment
of Soviet assistance to China''. The Hungweiping press also
accused Liu of having entertained the possibility of joining
with the Soviet Union in fighting US imperialism.
 One Hungweiping handbill gave this assessment of Liu

Shao-chi's report at the 8th Congress of the CPC: `Ìn his
report at the 8th Congress of the CPC in 1956, under the
pretext of opposing the personality cult, he came out against
Chairman Mao Tse-tung and used the banner of fighting
against dogmatism as a pretext for attacking Mao Tse-tung.''
Another handbill accused Liu of ``revising'' the Party Rules,
as adopted by the 7th Congress of the CPC. This ``revision''
amounted to the following. The Party Rules adopted at the
200
7th Congress of the CPC, said that the blend of

MarxismLeninism with the practice of the Chinese revolution, as
embodied in the ``thought of Mao Tse-tung'', was the
guiding light of all its work, while the Party Rules adopted
by the 8th Congress of the CPC said that every Party
member had the duty strenuously to study Marxism-Leninism,
but said nothing about studying the ``thought of Mao
Tsetung''. The handbill asserted that Liu was ``mainly
responsible for modifying the Party Rules at the 8th Congress of
the CPC''. Similar charges were levelled at Teng
Hsiaoping, former General Secretary of the CPC.^^1^^
 The nature of the charges brought against Liu once again
testifies to the fact that Mao has deliberately distorted the
Marxist-Leninist doctrine of classes and the class struggle,
that he has identified the clash of opinion within the Party
and the class struggle, and that he has ranked all the
Communists who disagree with his adventurist propositions
among the class enemies and supporters of the ``bourgeois
headquarters''. That is why the report to the 9th Congress
says the struggle between Mao and Liu is not an
innerParty struggle over the ways of building socialism in China,
but a class struggle between the proletariat and the
bourgeoisie. The facts also show that Mao has suppressed many
of his former associates precisely because they have come
out against his pseudo-revolutionary conceptions and lines
on classes and class relations.
__ALPHA_LVL2__
7. Concerning Mao's Attitude
 to the Working Class
 In Section 3 of this Chapter we already dealt with

the fact that in the 1920s and 1930s Mao had, for all practical
_-_-_
~^^1^^ The Hungweiping press wrote the following about Teng: `Àt the
8th Congress of the CPC, back in 1956, his report on changes in the
Party Rules in every way glorified the 20th Congress of the CPSU, and
opposed the so-called personality cult.'' Naturally enough, considering
the unprecedented proportions to which Mao's personality cult has
now been blown up in China, such a statement is regarded as
counterrevolutionary, and is amounting to action against the ``thought of
Mao Tse-tung''. Like Liu, Teng was accused of spreading the ``fading
out of the class struggle" theory, and insisting that as socialist
transformations were being completed, the class struggle in China was
bound to ease off.
201
purposes, ignored the leading role of the working class in

the Chinese revolution. In fact, he has maintained a similar
stand since then. However, in an effort to put a Marxist
gloss on his views and theoretically to back up his right to
leadership in the CPC, he has `ìnjected'' into his works
(including those written earlier, in the 1920s) statements
about the leading role of the working class in Chinese
society. That is why his works contained much favourable
mention about the Chinese working class. He said: ``The
entire history of revolution proves that without the
leadership of the working class revolution fails and that with the
leadership of the working class revolution triumphs. In the
epoch of imperialism, in no country can any other class lead
any genuine revolution to victory."^^1^^ This was uttered more
than 20 years ago, on June 30, 1949, in an article entitled `Òn
the People's Democratic Dictatorship''. Mao has expressed
similar ideas since then.
 Thus, for instance, in August 1968 he declared: `Òur

country has a population of 700 million. The working class
is the leading class. There is need fully to develop the leading
role of the working class in the great proletarian cultural
revolution and in all other matters."^^2^^ One of Mao's ``latest
precepts" was quoted in the report to the 9th Congress of
the CPC, which said: ``The proletariat is the greatest class
in the history of mankind. Ideologically, politically and in
terms of strength it is the mightiest revolutionary class.''
The CPC Rules contain this statement: ``The Communist
Party of China is the political party of the proletariat.''
 However, all these statements, paying lip-service to the

leading role of the working class, are purely declarative,
because in practice they are not backed up by any
politicoorganisational or ideological measures.
 Although the ``cultural revolution" has been designated as

``proletarian'' and is allegedly being pursued in the interests
of the proletariat, the Chinese workers have in fact been
prevented from taking part in it (the presence of young
workers in some Tsaofan units makes no difference to the
overall situation). What is more, at one stage of the ``cultural
revolution'', the edge of the struggle was turned directly
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, Vol. IV, Peking, 1961, p. 421.
202
against the workers, namely, the campaign against ``

counter-revolutionary economism''. The workers' legitimate demands
for better living conditions were declared to be an
expression of `ègoism'', `èconomism'', ``bourgeois ideology'', ``
revisionism'', etc. Jenmin jihpao declared: ``This kind of
economism amounts to using every means of corruption to indulge
the demands of the small groups of backward masses, to
erode the revolutionary will of the masses, and to divert the
political struggle of the masses to the false path of
economism, so as to make the masses stop reckoning with the
interests of the state and the collective, the long-term interests,
and to pursue nothing but their personal and short-term
interests. The aim of economism is to stifle the great
proletarian cultural revolution and to undermine the dictatorship
of the proletariat and the socialist system."^^1^^
 Maoism holds that the leading role of the working class
can be ensured only if it unconditionally fulfils Mao's
instructions. Hungchih explains this as follows: `Ìn order to
safeguard the leadership of the working class, the first thing
that needs to be done is to ensure the fulfilment of every
instruction of Chairman Mao, the great leader of the
working class."^^2^^ Ultimately, the leading role of the working class
is reduced to the leading role of the ``thought of Mao
Tse-tung''. Kwangming jihpao wrote: ``The working class
must direct everything. This means that Mao Tse-tung's
thought must direct everything."^^3^^ Consequently, while
lip-service is being paid to the leading role of the working
class, steps are in fact taken to disperse the vanguard
of the working class, the Communist Party, to eliminate
the organisation of the working class, the trade unions,
and to attack the vital rights of the Chinese workers
under the pretext of fighting ``counter-revolutionary
economism''.
 It is not surprising, therefore, that on the whole the

working class of China has taken a hostile attitude to the ``cultural
revolution''. There have been disturbances and strikes at
many factories and enterprises. In order to put these down
and simultaneously to restart production operations,
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Jenmin jihpao, January 12, 1967.
~^^3^^ Kwangming jihpao, July 26, 1969.
203
disorganised by the ``cultural revolution'', the Maoists fell back

on the help of the army.
 Mao's verbal flirtation with the working class, which has
been recently intensified, and which has been expressed, in
particular, in his latest precepts, is due not only to his efforts
to make his ideas and actions appear to be scientific, but also
to purely utilitarian considerations. The Maoists cannot help
but realise that the development of large-scale (arms)
industry inevitably leads to a growth in the numerical strength
and influence of the working class. They realise that unless
this fact is taken into account, they may find themselves
facing large-scale political disturbances in the future.
__*_*_*__
 Thus, Chinese society has been plunged by the Maoists

into a state of bitter struggle. The relations of friendship,
co-operation and mutual assistance between groups of
working people, which socialism naturally produces, have been
disrupted, and supplanted by hostility, eavesdropping,
suspicion and treachery; the military-bureaucratic dictatorship,
established by Mao Tse-tung, hits out at all the social groups
of working people.
 The ``class line" openly pursued by Mao Tse-tung, as

expressed in the so-called great proletarian cultural
revolution, has in fact made impossible in China the tendency
towards an obliteration of social distinctions between groups
of working people, a tendency inevitable under socialism for
objective reasons, on the basis of an all-round improvement
of their cultural-educational, professional, intellectual,
ideological and political level. A normal development of the
working class, the peasantry and the intelligentsia has been
grossly disrupted. The Chinese people's intelligentsia, an
active creator of the people's spiritual values, has been
subjected to massive massacres and all manner of reprisals.
 The social structure of modern China has been

substantially deformed. It has not functioned or developed normally
as a socialist structure. The mutually determined
development of the socialist working class, the socialist peasantry
and the socialist intelligentsia has not taken place in Chinese
society because virtually every one of these social groups
of working people has been deformed and deprived of the
possibility of normal development.
204
 A characteristic feature of socialism is that as it develops

groups of working people engage in something like a mutual
exchange of the most advanced features. Each group of
working people seeks to borrow from the other groups their
most progressive features, and this brings them closer
together on a higher level. From the working class the peasants,
the intellectuals and the office workers borrow the features
which are characteristic of it as the economically and
politically most advanced force, features of high ideological
consciousness, awareness and organisation. For their part,
the workers and peasants seek to rise to the general
educational, cultural and intellectual level of the intelligentsia.
The peasantry itself has many fine features, and these
inevitably blend with the best features of other working people.
This process is especially intensified when many people from
peasant families move into the ranks of the working class
and the intelligentsia. In China, this natural process has
been disrupted.
 The touchstone of one's attitude to Marxism-Leninism is

known to be the attitude to classes, the class struggle, and
to the dictatorship and leading role of the proletariat. Those
are the very issues on which the unscientific, adventurist,
subjectivist and idealistic conceptions and lines of the
Maoists are being most clearly revealed.
 The actions of the Chinese leadership have seriously

prejudiced the interest of the people and the cause of socialism in
China.
[205]
__NUMERIC_LVL1__
Chapter Six
__ALPHA_LVL1__
RELATION OF POLITICS AND ECONOMICS
 IN THE THEORY AND PRACTICE OF MAOISM
__ALPHA_LVL2__
1. Role of Economics in Social Development
 Minimised
 A correct understanding of the relation between politics

and economics is the most important criterion of the scientific
nature of a social theory and the social practice resting on
it. The starting point of the Marxist-Leninist theory of social
development and the materialist view of history consists in
recognition of the definitive role of production in this process,
and recognition of the fact that changes in the social
superstructure, specifically the political life of society, are based
on changes in the mode of production which are determined
by the development of the productive forces. This is the
fundamental distinction between Marxism-Leninism, the
theory of the revolutionary working class, and the social
theories put forward by the reactionary ideologists not only
of the big but also of the petty bourgeoisie.
 The twofold nature of the condition and mentality of the

petty-bourgeois masses, the peasant masses above all, is
expressed in the existence of opposite ideological traditions:
the progressive tradition of revolutionary democracy, which
real revolutionaries regard with profound respect, and
reactionary traditions against which real revolutionaries carry
on an implacable struggle, and this means specifically the
traditions of pseudo-revolutionary adventurism and
anarchism.
 Anarchists, like the followers of Bakunin, denied the need

for a mass proletarian party, for the proletariat's hegemony
206
in the socialist revolution and for its dictatorship, and

regarded the revolution as a spontaneous rebellion by
pettybourgeois masses and declasse elements. Following Marx
and Engels, Lenin resolutely condemned Bakunin's views,
characterised them as the outlook of a petty-bourgeois
despairing of his salvation, and consistently opposed any
manifestations of anarchist theory and tactics in the
revolutionary movement. In his work ``Left-Wing'' Communism
---an Infantile Disorder and several others, Lenin exposed
the reactionary essence of anarchist conceptions and showed
them to be incompatible with Marxist theory and the
strategy and tactics of the communist movement.
 The ideologists of the proletariat regarded anarchism as

an essentially counter-revolutionary trend which brought
division into the liberation movement of the masses, and
which hampered the strengthening of the unity of the
revolutionary forces, and development of the alliance between
the working class and the non-proletarian exploited masses,
the toiling peasantry in the first place. By contrast, Marx,
Engels and Lenin regarded revolutionary democracy as a
trend expressing the truly revolutionary aspirations of the
non-proletarian masses which helped to raise the awareness
of these masses to the level of proletarian ideology. In their
ideological development, Marx and Engels themselves
travelled from revolutionary democracy to scientific
communism.
 Marxism was a continuation of the revolutionary--

democratic tradition which, in particular, was expressed in the
understanding of the dependence of politics on economics.
In contrast to this, anarchism saw politics as constituting the
main force behind the historical process, and relied not on
objective economic prerequisites for revolution and the mass
movements they generated, but on arbitrary sparking off of
putsches by handfuls of politicians, declasse elements, and
so on. The anarchists concentrated on the destructive side of
the revolution and lost sight of its creative side.
 We have to deal with these matters because Mao's

ideological and theoretical platform, which is at the basis of his
group's current political line, is a departure not only from
proletarian ideology, from Marxism-Leninism, but also from
all the progressive traditions of the revolutionary peasantry.
 Maoism gives expression not to petty-bourgeois ideology
207
as a whole, but to the reactionary tradition of this ideology,

specifically, the anarchist tradition, elements of whose
ideological content Mao and his group have used to speculate on
the ideological and political immaturity of sizable sections
of the population resulting from the country's economic
backwardness.
 The anarchist tendencies in Mao's views were expressed

variously and in differing forms at the succeeding stages
of his ideological evolution. It is true that during the civil
war---the struggle against the Kuomintang regime---Mao
paid lip-service to the danger of such expressions of
anarchism within the Party branches and the Red Army of China
as ``the militaristic mentality" which is connected with
mistrust of the strength of the masses, putschism,
clannishness, the ``freebooters'' spirit'', demands for egalitarian
distribution, etc. In that period, he made a show of attacking
the very elements of anarchist mentality and tactics which
he himself now makes a point of openly and stubbornly
implanting.^^1^^
 However, even then anarchist tendencies had a definite

effect on Mao's own views, being expressed in a one-sided
enthusiasm for political means of class struggle and an
underestimation of its economic content and tasks.^^2^^
 The analysis of economic phenomena is known to have

played a most important part in the writings of the founders
of Marxism-Leninism. Scientific political economy, an
important component part of Marx's doctrine, was formulated
in his fundamental writings, the greatest of which is his
immortal Capital. In the creative development of Marxism,
Lenin gave much attention to an analysis of economic
processes and specifically dealt with them in such of his works
as The Development of Capitalism in Russia and 
Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism, and a great number
of articles.
 A departure from this tradition, which is characteristic of
genuine social science, is to be found in Mao's writings.
_-_-_
~^^1^^ See Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works, Vol. 1, London, 1954, pp. 105--16.
~^^2^^ Let us bear in mind that anarchist ideas were popular in China at
the time when Mao's world outlook took shape. In the first and second
decades of the century, a large section of the Chinese intelligentsia went
through a period of enthusiasm for anarchism.
208
which betray an obvious neglect for questions of economic

theory.
 This could to some extent be explained by the fact that

for many years Mao had to work in an atmosphere of armed
struggle, which required primary attention to matters of
military strategy and tactics, and which tended to push
questions arising in the development of production into the
background. That is why Mao regarded economic problems
not from the standpoint of the prospects of socialist change,
but merely as current economic questions directly
subordinate to the political tasks of the civil war. Because Mao was
not sufficiently mature in theoretical terms, he tended to turn
this approach into an absolute: he developed the notion that
politics had the decisive role to play in social life. The thesis
he formulated---``politics is the soul, the command force"---
clearly expresses his view of the relationship between
economics and politics, a view which is incompatible with
Marxism-Leninism.
 Characterising the Communist Party's scientific approach

in formulating its policy, Lenin wrote: ``We value
communism only when it is based on economic facts ... 'we always
took our stand first and foremost on an exact economic
analysis'."^^1^^ Another of Lenin's references to the question
stresses the definitive role of economics and characterises
the meaning of the attitude of those who ignore it. In 1918,
he said: `Èconomic interests and the economic position of
the classes which rule our state lie at the root of both our
home and foreign policy. These propositions which constitute
the basis of the Marxist world outlook and have been
confirmed for us Russian revolutionaries by the great experience
of both Russian revolutions, must not be forgotten even for
a moment if we are to avoid losing ourselves in the thickets,
the labyrinth of diplomatic tricks, a labyrinth which at times
is artificially created and made more intricate by people,
classes, parties and groups who like to fish in muddy waters,
or who are compelled to do so."^^2^^
 It is precisely the basis of the Marxist world outlook, which
Lenin brought out, that Mao distorts because, when
considering the relationship between economics and politics, he
_-_-_
~^^2^^ Ibid., Vol. 27, pp. 365--66.
14---1362
209
substitutes a mechanistic for a dialectical approach and

essentially presents politics as a force which is independent of
economics.
 Economics and politics are organically connected with

each other. Revealing this interconnection, Lenin wrote that
``politics is a concentrated expression of economics'',^^1^^ and
that is precisely why ``politics must take precedence over
economics".^^2^^ In his article `Ònce Again on the Trade
Unions" Lenin showed that it was not right to separate the
``political approach" from the `èconomic approach" and to
try mechanically to combine them as principles isolated from
each other. The political approach to questions of economic
construction from the standpoint of the working class
requires that the interests of the current economic advantage
should not blot out the vital economic interests of the working
people, and that the primary economic tasks of the working
class---the tasks of building and developing the socialist
economy---should be regarded as the fundamental ones.
 Politics takes precedence over economics simply because

the question of whether the working class is to retain its
economic domination is decided in the political sphere, in
the sphere of the class struggle. It is precisely on the
successful solution of the political task of consolidating the alliance
of the working class and the toiling peasantry that the
implementation of socialist change in the economy depends. Let
us note that it is not any type of politics that takes
precedence over economics, but only correct politics, which give
genuine expression to the economic interests of the working
class and indicate the scientifically-grounded ways for
realising these interests, relying on a consideration of the
requirements of objective economic laws. Lenin stressed: ``Without
a correct political approach to the matter the given class will
be unable to stay on top, and, consequently, will be
incapable of solving its production problems either,"^^3^^ adding that
for the working class which has taken power into its own
hands, for its Party and for the state of the proletarian
dictatorship the most important content of politics henceforth
amounts to a fulfilment of this ``production problem":
_-_-_
~^^2^^ Ibid.
~^^3^^ Ibid., p. 84.
210
organisation of economic construction on scientific principles,

unification of the efforts of all the working people and
direction of their activity in building and developing the
socialist economy.
 Neglect of the dialectical interconnection between

economics and politics and inability to analyse economic processes
and to apply such analysis in formulating policies were
increasingly revealed in Mao's writings as the specific
conditions of the civil war receded and China entered a period
of peaceful construction, when economic questions assumed
central importance.
 Initially, Mao did not try blatantly to contrast his specific
approach to these questions with the economic line
formulated by the collective thinking of the Communist Party of
China, which relied on the Soviet Union's experience. The
correctness of this policy, expressed in the CPC's general
line and approved, following nation-wide discussion, by the
National People's Congress in September 1954, was borne
out by the successes in fulfilling the first five-year plan of
China's economic development (1953--1957).
 This plan provided for the establishment of a primary base

of socialist industry and the socialist transformation of
agriculture, concentration of the main forces on building 694
large industrial enterprises, among which the main ones were
156 enterprises and shops that were being built with the
Soviet Union's assistance. The plan targets for capital
construction were overfulfilled by 10 per cent. The targets for
gross industrial output were overfulfilled by 15 per cent,
and the targets for the staple cereal and industrial crops
were slightly overfulfilled.
 However, Mao saw these successes not as an argument in

favour of the general line adopted by the Party, but as a
pretext for its revision. From 1955 on, Mao, spurred by his
hegemonistic aspirations and claims to personal leadership
of the world revolutionary movement, has been insisting on
supplanting the general line by the new line designed to put
China ahead of all the socialist countries in one great spurt.
While trying to impose on the Party his adventurist line, he
also tries to give it some theoretical backing, and all of Mao's
``creativity'' in economic theory comes to these attempts in
the form of separate statements, thrown here and there in
his various articles and speeches. It is futile to seek in these
14*
211
statements any hint of a scientific analysis of economic

processes. Still, they reveal most clearly a definite conception
of economic development, and because it is embodied in the
Chinese leaders' economic policy, it is worthwhile to consider
its content.
__ALPHA_LVL2__
2. Mao's View of Socialist Economic
 Development
 Let us recall that Mao's followers have declared him to be

the ``greatest Marxist-Leninist of our day''. The extent to
which Mao is actually out of touch with Marxism-Leninism
will be clearly seen from his views concerning the substance
and development of the socialist mode of production.
Marxist-Leninist theory regards the mode of production as
a dialectical unity of its two sides: the productive forces and
the relations of production. These two sides cannot be
detached from each other, because in reality they are
organically connected and develop in accordance with the objective
law of their mutual concordance. That is also the law
governing the development of the socialist mode of
production; conscious consideration of the requirements of this law
means the balanced maintenance of the concordance of the
productive forces and the relations of production, and their
simultaneous improvement. Once the working class takes
over political power, it can and must use it for the balanced
establishment and development of socialist relations of
production on the basis of the development of the productive
forces. To try to establish new relations of production
without relying on a development of the productive forces is
to establish these relations of production only in formal
terms, without the substratum on which alone they can be
consolidated and developed.
 The triumph of socialism in the USSR was secured because

Lenin and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union were
guided by the proposition of simultaneously improving the
productive forces and the relations of production, and
consciously working to maintain them in harmonious balance.
The Party Programme, adopted by the 8th Congress of the
RCP(B), said that the `àll-round boosting of the country's
productive forces" should be the main line which determined
212
the whole economic policy of the Soviet power.^^1^^ Lenin felt
that it was necessary to supplement the full-scale plan for
social change, above all change in the sphere of relations of
production, as set out in the Party Programme, with a
concrete plan for developing the country's productive forces,
above all its material and technical basis, the plan known
as the GOELRO, which was elaborated on Lenin's initiative.
 Lenin resolutely opposed any attempt to identify the

development of the productive forces with the quantitative growth
of production which went forward without any reliance on
technological progress. He saw the rise of the productive
forces as implying an improvement of technology and the
technical organisation of production, going hand in hand
with a development of the working people themselves
through a change in the content of their work and the
supplanting of manual operations by mechanised operations
arising from steady technical improvements, through higher
living standards and a raising of their general educational
and professional levels.
 Lenin said that the way to establish social property

throughout the national economy lay through socialist
industrialisation, the building of a large-scale machine industry
capable of supplying all the branches of the economy with
modern means of production and establishing a technical
basis for a developed agriculture. He wrote: ``Without
highly developed large-scale industry, socialism is
impossible anywhere; still less is it possible in a peasant country."^^2^^
 These precepts of Lenin's have been the CPSU's guideline

in the whole of its economic policy. It rejected the
opportunist suggestions to delay the establishment of a heavy
industry, and to lay stress on the boosting of output in the
light and handicraft industries, which had a backward
technical basis. The CPSU also discarded the Trotskyite
suggestions for developing production by putting pressure on
the workers and peasants and lowering their living
standards. In line with Lenin's precepts, the CPSU based its
economic policy on the need to ensure the technical
improvement of production together with the creation of
_-_-_
~^^1^^ The CPSU in Resolutions and Decisions of Congresses, Conferences,

and CC Plenary Meetings, Part I, p. 421.
213
conditions promoting a steady rise in the material welfare and

cultural and technical levels of the working people, the chief
productive force.
 Mao's conception has nothing in common with the

MarxistLeninist doctrine of the substance and development of the
socialist mode of production, which has been tested and
confirmed by the practice of socialist construction in the USSR
and the other socialist countries.
 Whereas Marxist-Leninist theory regards the mode of

production as a dialectical unity of the productive forces
and the relations of production, Mao's conception has these
two aspects of the mode of production mechanistically
detached from each other. He assumes that it is possible to
establish socialist relations of production and even to
transform them into communist ones without reliance on a
corresponding development of the productive forces. In Mao's
view it is not the establishment of the necessary material
conditions, not the development of society's material and
technical basis and change in the content of labour that provides the
groundwork for the development of socialist relations of
production, but decrees, instructions from the political leader,
and political instruments which make the masses obediently
bend to his orders.
 Mao's neglect of the improvement of society's material

and technical basis is ever more clearly revealed in his
statements as he formulates his new economic line. In a report
dealing with co-operatives in agriculture in 1955, he said:
``We are now carrying out a revolution not only in the social
system, the change from private to public ownership, but
also in technology, the change from handicraft to
largescale modern machine production. . .. We must on no
account regard industry and agriculture, socialist
industrialisation and the socialist transformation of agriculture as two
separate and isolated things, and on no account must we
emphasise the one and play down the other."^^1^^ This appears
not only to insist on a simultaneous development of the
productive forces and the relations of production, as stated in
the CPC's general line in that period, but also to emphasise
the need for this proposition, the need for the technical
improvement of production (agriculture in particular) as a
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-lung, pp. 26--27.
214
condition for switching it to socialist lines. But recognition

of the need to abide by the requirements of the law of
concordance amounted to no more than demagogy, for what
Mao said in the above-mentioned speech clashed with the
main content of the report from which the words are taken: in
the report Mao urged a step-up in the collectivisation of
agriculture, without ensuring the real possibilities for its
technical equipment.
 Let us recall that the CPC Central Committee's general line
provided for a gradual implementation of socialist change
in the country over a period of roughly 15 years. In 1956,
Mao proposed that this period of transition to socialism
should be reduced to one-third. He told the Supreme State
Conference: ``Since the summer of last year, socialist change,
that is, a socialist revolution, has been started on an
exceptionally large scale. Within another three years or so the
socialist revolution will in the main be completed on the
scale of the whole country."^^1^^
 The idea of instantly establishing socialist relations of

production throughout the national economy without
providing the necessary technical basis clearly clashed with the
principle of developing the relations of production on the
basis of an improvement of the productive forces. While in
1955 Mao still pretended that he had considerations for this
principle, when he declared that the ``revolution in the social
system" should be implemented together with the ``
revolution in technology'',^^2^^ in 1956 he openly discarded this
principle. This was expressed in his distorted view of the
operation of the law of concordance of the productive forces and
the relations of production in the period of socialist
construction. In 1956 Mao declared: ``Socialist revolution aims
at liberating the productive forces. The change-over from
individual to socialist, collective ownership in agriculture
and handicrafts and from capitalist to socialist ownership in
private industry and commerce is bound to bring about a
tremendous liberation of the productive forces. Thus the
social conditions are being created for a tremendous
expansion of industrial and agricultural production."^^3^^
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Quoted from Pravda, January 27, 1956.
~^^2^^ See Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-lung, p. 27.
 ^^3^^ Ibid., p. 26 (emphasis added---A.F.).
215
 There is good reason why the idea of developing the

productive forces has been supplanted by the idea of their
``liberation''. The substance of Mao's new line in effect
consisted in putting off the development of the productive forces
and the technical equipment of agriculture for an indefinite
period, merely gaining the advantages to be had from a
simple co-operation of the peasants' unmechanised labour.
On this basis, which did not allow the productive forces to
go beyond the framework of a very limited level, Mao
expected not only to establish socialist relations of
production in an immature form, but also to develop them to a
high state of maturity, and to convert the forms of
organisation in production into communist ones. Mao was not put
out by the lack of the necessary material and technical
basis: he decided that the political power of the state was
a factor which could serve as a substitute.
 Thus, the new line oriented the CPC's economic policy
away from a consideration of the objective requirements
of the law of concordance of the productive forces and the
relations of production and upon a deliberate neglect of
these requirements: it did not induce a balanced resolution
of the contradictions between the productive forces and the
relations of production, but an artificial sharpening of these
contradictions. It will be easily seen that the idea which,
let us recall, Mao put forward in that period, namely, that
under socialism contradictions are resolved through their
artificial sharpening, served not only as a ``substantiation''
for the sharpening of the class struggle within socialist
society, but also as justification for the new line in the CPC
leadership's economic policy. In fact, Mao took a cynical
attitude on the question of contradictions under socialism:
guided by the principle ``the worse the better'', he declared
massive poverty and backwardness to be a favourable factor
in socialist construction. He said: `Àpart from their other
characteristics, the outstanding thing about China's 600
million people is that they are 'poor and blank'. This may
seem a bad thing, but in reality it is a good thing. Poverty
gives rise to the desire for change, the desire for action and
the desire for revolution."^^1^^

 Above we already dealt with Mao's voluntarism and his
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, p. 36.
216
off-hand attitude to the people, expressed, in particular, in

his well-known statement in which he compares the people
with a ``clean sheet of paper" on which, ``the newest, the
most beautiful characters" can be written, and ``the newest,
the most beautiful drawings can be created''. This patent
voluntarism, this scorn for the working people, the chief
productive force, were most clearly revealed in the economic
sphere. Mao's statement quoted above suggests a haughty
confidence on his part that the impoverished and backward
mass of people can be made to do anything, that it can be
turned into a pliant tool of the adventurist politician
imagining himself to be a demi-god capable of changing the social
system at will.
 The ``sheet of paper" on which Mao intended to write
``the newest, the most beautiful characters" in the
expectation of setting up communism in some miraculous fashion
was indeed a ``clean'' one in the sense that the objective
conditions for such a project were lacking. The peasantry,
constituting 80 per cent of China's population, was engaged
in subsistence and semi-subsistence farming. It lacked even
the primitive implements which require the application of
arduous manual labour, while in many places the peasants
had to pull their ploughs and carts themselves because they
were short of draught animals and mechanical means of
traction. In industry, the bulk of the workers were engaged
in handicraft production or at small and medium-size
enterprises with extremely backward techniques and machinery
and with the prevalence of manual labour. These workers
had a productivity which came to no more than 10 per cent
of that at the very small number of large enterprises
equipped with machinery.
 In these conditions, there was an especially acute need to

concentrate efforts on developing the large-scale machine
industry as the only basis for the technical equipment of
production and the substitution of mechanised for manual
operations, so as to enhance productivity. But Mao thought
on different lines. He assumed that economic problems could
be tackled without technical improvements in production, if
the entire working population were involved, while the
working people's poverty and backwardness would make it
possible to get the most out of them through longer hours
and lower living standards, to make up for the low labour
217
productivity. Instead of setting the goal of technical

development and higher living, cultural and technical standards
for the people, Mao put forward the idea of boosting
production and increasing accumulation at the expense of the
working people.
 That is precisely what was done in 1958. Enterprises were

switched to a 10--12-hour working day with two holidays
a month, and in the countryside more intensive use of
manpower was made through the peasantry being saddled with
the duty, in addition to farming, of also doing industrial
work by extending rural handicraft production. The level of
consumption among the rural population was sharply pressed
down while the closed 3rd Plenary Meeting of the CPC
Central Committee in 1957 formulated a special policy of
``low and rational wages" in order to press down living
standards among industrial and office workers. The
substance of this policy was expressed by Minister of Labour
Liu Tze-chiu, when he said: `Àt the present time, the basic
policy in the sphere of labour and wages in our country is
aimed at having five men consume the food of three."^^1^^ The
urge for higher wages and better living conditions was
declared by Mao to be an expression of `ùnhealthy style" and
of the bourgeois mentality. He proclaimed this slogan:
``Poverty is good.''
 The substance of the new economic line proposed by Mao

and his entourage boiled down to the following: to accept
the technical backwardness of production based on manual
labour, to involve all the manpower reserves in this backward
production by setting up labour armies and a great many
handicraft industries, to put millions of men and women in
conditions of hard labour, setting the goal not of boosting
productivity, which is impossible without technological
progress, but of wearing down men's physical strength and
pressing down their living standards to the utmost. This
was a programme for the barbarous use of the available
productive forces, which ruled out any possibility of their
development. Nothing but a destruction of the productive
forces could result from this programme.
 While holding forth about the ``liberation'' of the

productive forces, Mao put this in the context of triumphant
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Kunjcn jihpao, March 1, 1957.
218
socialist relations of production and socialist property. The terms

``socialist property" and ``social property" constantly occur
in his speeches. However, behind the Marxist terminology
there is nothing but a distortion of these concepts of
MarxistLeninist science.
 Marxism-Leninism regards socialist relations of

production not as the result of a formal socialisation of the means
of production, decreed by some political body, but as a
true realisation of relations involving the social ownership
of the means of production and signifying that the various
branches and the numerous units of the national economy
are no longer fragmented economically, but have been
brought together and are ruled by a single plan. Real
establishment of social property means development of
comradely co-operation and mutual assistance in the relations
involving exchange of labour activity and a system of
incentives for this activity which provides for a blend of
personal interests, group interests and the interests of society as
a whole. According to Marxism-Leninism, socialist
democracy alone allows the development of all these aspects of
socialist relations of production and their growth into
communist forms of socio-economic organisation of social
production.
 It will be easily seen that the political instruments which
Mao has decided to use have nothing in common with
socialist democracy, and the socio-economic system which
he has been stubbornly trying to implant with these
instruments has nothing in common with socialist relations of
production.
 Mao's idea about the political instruments to be used to

establish the new relations of production is expressed in his
call to ``militarise organisation, take combat action and carry
on a collective way of life'', as formulated in the CPC
Central Committee's resolution of August 29, 1958. Among
the means used by Mao and his followers to implant the
``collective way of life" are decrees establishing the form of
organisation the people are to adopt, backed up by
ideological brainwashing, and the introduction of these forms
through administrative and military pressure on the masses.
The so-called collective way of life itself, which is being
established in this manner, is a system of extra-economic
coercion of the working people, who have been switched to
219
near barrack-room conditions, and who have to play the

part of faceless little screws doing the will of their senior.
The people's communes, which Mao declared to be the best
organisational form for transition to communism, have
always been instruments of extra-economic coercion designed
to make the masses put up with any privation and give
up the fruits of their labour to the state without a
murmur.
 As Mao saw them, the communes were economic

organisations essentially embodying not social but group property.
This means that Mao's views of the ideal economic
organisation of society did not originate in Marxism but in
anarchisttype conceptions and ideas going all the way back to
Proudhon. Instead of realising the need to set up an
integrated national economy with developed economic ties,
and rational specialisation and co-operation of its units,
Mao set for China the ideal of a semi-subsistence economy
claiming that economic cells isolated from each other
constituted a communist system. For one thing, each of these cells
had to look to its own supplies, and not expect to co-operate
with other cells, and for another, it was forced to make
deductions into a state's accumulations fund, without
expecting any help from the latter.
 In the last few years, these conceptions have been

expressed in Mao's principle of ``relying on one's own
strength'', which in application to China's internal economic
development boils down to the requirement of self-supply
by economic cells and complexes. The practices at the
Tacheng oil fields and of the Tachai production brigade were
declared to be setting a model in the application of this
principle. About 80,000 families, constituting the population
of Tacheng---an oil-bearing area in north-east China, live in
villages and hamlets situated in such a way as to enable the
men to work on the oil fields and the women on the farms.
The ``spirit of Tacheng" which the Chinese press has extolled
over a period of several years, amounts to a low rate of
consumption and wretched living conditions in barrack-rooms
and mud-huts, self-supply of foodstuffs and ``voluntary''
renunciation of assistance from the state. The same thing
applies to the ``spirit of Tachai'', with the sole difference
that this is not a large industrial enterprise, but a small
farm consisting of 83 households. The Tachai brigade is
220
credited not only with having provided their own supplies

of seed, feed, fertilisers and building materials, but also with
having refused to use paper and ink, so as to refrain from
acquiring anything for their office from outside. The Tachai
brigade practises the following principle: the greater part of
the crop goes to the state and the rest is used for the needs
of the farm and food for the peasants. One of their slogans
is ``three never ask" (never ask the state for grain, money
or materials).
 The principle of ``relying on one's own strength" is the

``substantiation'' of the thesis that the isolation of the areas,
the communes and production collectives is not a defect of
China's economy, but a great boon. At the same time, the
Maoists have used this principle to justify their line of
isolating China economically from the other socialist countries, a
line which is in conflict with the objective need for
international division of labour within the world socialist system
and is aimed at undermining the economic unity of the
socialist countries.
 Substitution of group for social property and of relations

of economic isolation for relations of co-operation and
mutual assistance necessarily had an effect on Mao's views
of the mechanism of the national economy and the economic
laws governing its operation and development. Mao regards
commodity-money relations as something that is alien to
socialism, that is only outwardly connected with socialist
relations of production and that exists alongside these
relations. One would think that this view implies recognition of
the need for strict centralisation of the national economy and
comprehensive planning. But Mao has in fact also denied
the need to regulate the national economy on the basis of
the objective law of balanced and proportional
development.
 In a speech before the Supreme State Conference in 1957
he said that grain was the only item that needed to be
planned centrally, because the production of other industrial
and agricultural items has to be determined by ``local social
organisations or by the masses themselves''. There is nothing
paradoxical about this conclusion, because once the isolation
of the economic units is idealised it logically follows that
there is no need for centralising social production and
carrying it on under a single plan. What is paradoxical is this:
221
Mao has failed to see that the separation of the economic

units inevitably results in the anarchy of production and
spontaneous operation of the law of value, and that
consideration of the objective requirements of this law is a
necessary condition for the balanced development of a
socialist economy. In fact, he appears to regard socialist
production as being a realm of spontaneous movement, in
which there are no objective regulators.
 According to Mao, the law of `ùndulating'' development

is the only ``law'' that governs socialist production. He says
that social production spontaneously fluctuates between a
``state of equilibrium" and a ``state of disequilibrium'', with
alternating ebbs and flows, ups and downs. It is impossible,
he says, to do anything about this and make economic
development steady; the only thing that can be done is for
the subjective factors to exert an influence on the economy
so as to whip up the spontaneous rise and limit the
spontaneous fall, when the time comes. Those are the only
limits, according to Mao, in which the planning and conscious
regulation of the development of socialist production is
possible.
 Personal incentives are not among the means to be used

in putting up the rises and tempering the falls. The
working people have to be induced to do better by means of
ideological influence and administrative pressure, with the
products of labour so distributed as to ensure maximum
accumulation, while keeping personal consumption' down to a
minimum, which the principle of levelling should help the
working people to accept.
 Thus, in his view of socialist relations of production and

their development, Mao is as far from Marxism-Leninism as
he is in his view of the substance and importance of the
productive forces in the socialist mode of production, and
of the need for their improvement. Mao's conception is an
eclectic mixture, in which distorted concepts of
MarxistLeninist science are interwoven with concepts and notions
borrowed from anarchist-type theories whose roots go back
to Proudhon, together with the mechanistic ``theory of
equilibrium" which the Right opportunists once advocated, and
other similar ideas.
[222]
__ALPHA_LVL2__
3. The ``Great Leap Forward'': Collapse
 and Consequences
 Mao began to put through his economic conception by

breaking up the `òld framework" of the first five-year plan.
He did so in the hope of whipping up the advance which
was evident in the early years of the five-year period.
Accordingly, the 1956 plan targets for capital construction and
industrial production were sharply increased. In 1956
outlays on capital investments went up by 62 per cent, and
the pace at which the peasant farms were collectivised was
sharply increased. Whereas only 14 per cent of peasant
farms in China were united in co-operatives in 1955, by the
end of 1956, the co-operative sector already covered over
90 per cent of the peasant farms. Within a few months, the
bulk of agricultural production and the handicraft industry
was co-operated, while private industrial and commercial
enterprises were converted into mixed state-private
enterprises.
 However, there was no reason to regard the state-private

enterprises, which were essentially a part of the
statecapitalist sector, as a form of social socialist property in the
means of production. As for the co-operative sector, which
was hurriedly set up almost throughout the whole of
agricultural and handicraft production, if socialist relations of
production were to develop and to be solidly established in
it, there was need to provide a corresponding material basis
for the collective forms of economic operation, without
which they could not be stable. It was impossible to do this
while keeping the level of mechanisation of agricultural
labour extremely low and without creating the conditions
for ensuring the technical equipment of agriculture.
 Mao was apparently hoping that the favourable weather

in 1955 would continue in the following few years, thereby
ensuring good crops and helping to win the peasants over
with more or less adequate incomes from the collective
farms. However, his expectations were not realised. The last
years of the five-year period---1956 and 1957---were marked
by heavy crop failures. Far from increasing, the incomes of
a sizable section of the peasantry were in fact reduced after
they joined co-operatives. The situation in the social sector
of the co-operatives became more complicated.
223
 The attempt to step up industrial output likewise came

to nothing: capital investments, scattered over an excessive
number of construction projects, were largely frozen and
shortages of the necessary raw and other materials
developed. Serious disproportions appeared in the national
economy. There were interruptions in the supply of consumer
goods and food to the cities. This caused discontent and
strikes were staged by workers and students in some parts of
the country.
 Thus, the experiment which, it later turned out, was a

peculiar dress rehearsal for the ``Great Leap Forward"
proved to be a fiasco. In the circumstances, it would have
been wise to resume consistent fulfilment of the general line
set out in 1953 and to correct the situation in agriculture by
resorting to the economic instruments inherent in socialist
production, enhancing the material incentives for peasants in
developing the social sector of economy and by increasing
state assistance to the co-operatives.
 While the possibilities were limited, they were still there:
in the five-year period the growth rates of gross industrial
output averaged 12.8 per cent (as compared with
the planned 9.9 per cent). By continuing to give priority
development to large-scale industry while making rational
use of handicraft production to turn out simple farm
implements and consumer goods, carrying out repairs and
providing everyday services for the population, China could have
built up her industrial strength at a relatively rapid pace,
and allocated more and more money and machinery to
agriculture. That was exactly what the 8th Congress of the CPC
suggested for the second five-year plan (1958--1962). It said:
``The value of industrial output . .. will be about double the
planned figure for 1957 and that of agricultural output will
increase by about 35 per cent."^^1^^
 However, Mao's hegemonistic aspirations induced him to

ignore the realistic targets set by the congress and, despite
the lessons of the unfortunate experiment in 1956, to advance
a full-scale programme for even hastier economic
development. This programme was approved by the 3rd Plenary
Meeting of the CPC Central Committee in September 1957,
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Eighth National Congress of the Communist Party of China,

p. 233.
224
and adopted by the 2nd session of the 8th Congress of the

CPC in May 1958 as the Party's new general line. That year
saw the start on the practical implementation of Mao's new
line, the ``Three Red Banners" line, that is, the new general
line, the people's communes and the ``Great Leap Forward''.
 This policy did not win unanimous support in the Party,
and was opposed by those who favoured a realistic economic
policy. Mao and his followers resorted to harsh measures
in fighting their opponents. In 1955, Mao already levelled
the charge of ``cowardice'' against those who did not accept
the idea of stepped up co-operation in agriculture, while the
realisation of the new line started with a political campaign
aimed at routing those who opposed it. In the course of a
discussion on ``bourgeois law and distribution'', those who
stood up for the principle of remuneration according to
labour were declared to be advocates of ``bourgeois
corruption'', while the principle of levelling was strongly boosted;
the population was invited to reconcile itself with the
hardships that were allegedly inevitable because the country had
to remain in a state of full alert; the armed border conflict
with India was used to screw up nationalistic `ènthusiasm''.
 In this political atmosphere a start was made on setting

up the people's communes, which Mao hoped would help
carry the Chinese people into instant communism bypassing
the socialist stage. Each commune was set up through an
amalgamation of all the co-operatives of one or several
districts and covered a territory with a population ranging
from 25,000 to 100,000. Mao's followers believed that the
substitution of tens of thousands of communes for over
700,000 co-operatives would allow them to manage and
deploy labour power and the means of production `ìn a
unified way to ensure that they are used still more rationally
and effectively...".^^1^^
 The local organs of power were merged with the commune
boards and were empowered to dispose of the peasants'
property, labour and the products of their labour. Rigid
administrative control was established over each working
man's labour and leisure. The peasants' house-and-garden
plots, which in 1957 had on the average provided families
with 27 per cent of their incomes, were confiscated.
_-_-_
~^^1^^ World Marxist Review, Vol. 2, No. 3, 1959, p. 80.

15---1362
225
 This led to a reduction in rural living standards. Work

on the fields or in the handicraft enterprises, which were a
part of the communes' social sector, yielded very little
income for their members, first, because farms remained on
a low level of development and second, because communes'
governing bodies were put under an obligation to increase
accumulations to the utmost. In 1958, the accumulation of
the state and the people's communes came to 30 per cent of
net agricultural output, that is, an increase of roughly 100
per cent over the average for 1953--1957. This was achieved
by reducing the share of the product which went into
personal consumption and which was in the main distributed
in the communes on the levelling principle.
 The barrack-room atmosphere in the communes and the

administrative control could not compensate for the peasants'
loss of personal material incentive in developing agriculture.
Moreover, a large part of the manpower was withdrawn
from agricultural production, because tens of millions of
peasants were switched to industrial and building operations
through the ``labour armies'', which were set up at the same
time as the communes, and worked under contracts
concluded between the communes and industrial enterprises.
Stripped of manpower in this way, agricultural production
went into decline. While the crops were saved by the good
weather in 1958, the crop failures in 1959 and 1960 showed
that agriculture was in a very bad state and that the country
was faced with massive famine. The acute shortage of
foodstuffs, increasingly felt with the rapid population growth,
forced the CPR government to fall back on grain purchases
abroad.^^1^^
 Mao had expected that the ``Great Leap Forward" would
help to boost agriculture, which had been switched to the
commune system, and bring about unprecedented growth in
production on the basis of a special type of ``
industrialisation''. The idea behind this `ìndustrialisation'' was that the
line of the priority development of large-scale machine
industry, effected in the first five-year period, was supplanted
_-_-_
~^^1^^ According to foreign observers, China made annual purchases of

foreign grain reaching 6 million tons, so as to keep the rate of food
consumption at the level of 1,900-2,000 calories per man a day (that
is, below the minimum average of 2,300 calories).
226
by the ``walking on two legs" line, with equal emphasis on

large-scale industry and on handicraft production. In actual
fact, it was the latter that became the main source of
industrial products. In order to enlarge it, 7.5 million small
and medium-size enterprises were set up during the ``Great
Leap Forward" period (1958--1960). These were technically
weak enterprises using the simplest equipment operated by
tens of millions of peasants and urban dwellers lacking
industrial skills and knowledge.
 This incredibly inflated handicraft and artisan

production was urged not to confine itself to turning out consumer
goods, carrying out repairs, etc., but also to take over, on
a large scale, the functions of heavy industry, like the
mining of coal, the casting of metal and the making of machinery
and mechanisms for every branch of the national economy.
Under the 1958 plan (which the Maoists soon declared to be
``conservative'', without sufficient orientation on the
production of the means of production), the handicraft industry was
to produce over 1 million tons of standard pig-iron, 200,000
tons of steel, 18,000 metal-cutting machine tools, over 21,000
electrical machines, and 8,300 motors of different kinds.^^1^^
 Mao's followers promised the Chinese people that the

establishment within a short period of an extensive network
of small and medium-size enterprises covering every part
of China would `ìnevitably result in: =
1) quickening the pace

of the nation's industrialisation; =
2) quickening the pace of

mechanisation of agriculture...".^^2^^ The rate of acceleration,
allegedly guaranteed by the growth of handicraft
production, was fantastic. In the five years from 1958 to 1962,
industrial output was to go up 6.5-fold.
 It very soon turned out that these calculations were

groundless. The extremely low standard of equipment at the
newly-established handicraft enterprises, the switch of many
old enterprises of this kind to the manufacture of
unaccustomed products, which deprived the workers of the
possibility of using their old labour skills and which obliterated
the distinction between them and the unskilled newcomers,
_-_-_
~^^1^^ See Hsiao Chiun, Boost Metallurgy and Machine-Building, Peking,

1958, pp. 13--14 (in Chinese).
~^^2^^ Second Session of the Eighth National Congress of the

Communist Party of China, Peking, 1958, p. 50.
15*
227
the disruption of the production, supply and marketing

activity of the handicraft industry and of the management
of its enterprises due to the hasty conversion of co-operatives
into enterprises of local state industry and people's
communes---all this had disastrous consequences. There was a
sharp drop in the output of consumer goods, while the means
of production, to the making of which most handicraft
enterprises had switched, turned out to be unfit for use. This
meant the waste of vast financial and material resources
and the labour of tens of millions of men. Only in the
handicraft metallurgical industry, which produced
substandard pig-iron and steel, the CPR suffered losses in
excess of 4,000 million yuan. The overwhelming majority of
the handicraft enterprises set up in the ``Great Leap
Forward" period had to be closed down because they were
patently unprofitable and turned out low-quality goods.
Only a small part of them were later remodelled.
 The ``handicraft industrialisation" also hit agriculture, first,

because it siphoned off large numbers of workers (from 25
to 50 per cent of the working population in rural localities),
and second, because it prevented the development of
irrigation. In the first five-year period, the state had allocated
resources for the construction of large-scale irrigation
installations, but in 1958 irrigation construction, an extremely
vital element in China's agriculture, was switched to
handicraft operations. There, too, the line was to set up
small installations which the peasants were to erect through
their own efforts and pay for out of local budgets. On
February 1, 1958, Jenmin jihpao reported that 100 million
people were taking part in a mass irrigation movement.
According to the Chinese press, in 1958 the irrigated area
increased by 32 million hectares (as against an annual
average increase of 1.5 million hectares from 1950 to 1955),
and towards the end of that year covered 62 per cent of all
farmland.^^1^^
 However, in 1963, Jenmin jihpao reported that only

onethird of all the farmland was being irrigated, with a large
part of the irrigation system functioning badly or not at all.^^2^^
This means that the irrigation installations thrown up hastily
_-_-_
~^^1^^ See The Great Decade, Peking, 1960 (in Chinese).
~^^2^^ See Jenmin jihpao, November 30, 1963.
228
and in large numbers during the ``Great Leap Forward"

period, turned out to be useless, like the handicraft
enterprises run in at the time.
 Thus, vast damage was inflicted on the national economy

by the adventurist ``Three Red Banners" line. It was
disrupted. The people's communes turned out to be an
impediment to the development of production, so that the
``Great Leap Forward" hurled it back instead of advancing
it. The increase in the output of coal, pig-iron and steel in
1959 and 1960 turned out to be fictitious, because a large
part of the products made by the handicraft industry was
unfit for use. The years 1961--1962 were marked by a direct
drop of production in the various lines of basic industrial
products by something like 20 to 50 per cent. Instead of
accelerating the development of the productive forces, the
new line noticeably slowed down the country's pace of
industrialisation, hit its agriculture and worsened the
material conditions and working capacity of the workers
and peasants, the country's chief productive force.
 The grave condition in which the economy found itself

forced Mao into a partial retreat from the programme of
the new economic line. In 1959, at the height of the ``Great
Leap Forward'', the 8th Plenary Meeting of the CPC Central
Committee was forced to scale down the plan targets for
the current year (from 525 million to 275 million tons for
grain and from 18 million to 12 million tons for steel). The
Plenary Meeting proposed that the production brigades in
the communes (about the size of the old co-operatives) should
be given more freedom to operate on their own, and that
remuneration by labour should be restored. The decisions
of the 9th Plenary Meeting in January 1961 and the 10th
Plenary Meeting in September 1962 were even more drastic:
they laid down the line, declared to be temporary, of
``regulation, strengthening, replenishment and enhancement,
with emphasis on regulation".^^1^^
 This line provided above all for an abandonment of the

priority development of industry and concentration of efforts
on boosting agriculture. Handicraft blast furnaces and many
other similar-type small enterprises were dismantled, and
_-_-_
~^^1^^ See ``The Third Session of the National People's Congress'', Pravda,
April 18, 1962.
229
construction of such enterprises stopped. The enterprises

which continued to function were set the task of mainly
servicing agriculture and turning out consumer goods.
 The decline in production during the ``Great Leap

Forward" created a grave financial situation; budget
revenues fell short of the need to make large-scale purchases
of industrial equipment abroad in addition to redeeming
debts under old loans, and buying foreign grain and mineral
fertilisers. The lack of funds was compounded by the
consequences of the Great-Power chauvinistic attitude taken by
the Maoist leadership of the CPC: it decided sharply to
worsen economic ties with the USSR and other socialist
countries, and deprive China of the possibility of using the
extensive assistance which it had been receiving from these
countries before; at the same time, the CPC leadership
saddled the country with the intolerable burden of
fabricating nuclear weapons, a goal that was dictated by
hegemonistic considerations. All of this resulted in a sharp
reduction of capital investments in large-scale industry (with
the exception of the arms industries).
 The cut-back in appropriations for industry made it

possible somewhat to increase investments in agriculture. At
the same time, Mao and his entourage had to agree to some
restoration of the principle of material incentive for working
people and a return from levelling to distribution in
accordance with labour, and some invigoration of
commoditymoney relations. The communes were split up (their number
increased from 24,000 in 1958 to 73,000 in 1965). They
retained the functions of local organs of power through which
the state continued to determine production plans and the
volume of farm procurements, rates of food consumption by
peasants, etc. But the role of principal production unit in the
countryside now went to the small production brigades,
economic cells similar in size to the productive co-operatives
of the first five-year period (they usually consisted of 20--40
peasant households). The house-and-garden plots were
returned to the peasants and they were permitted to
sell the produce from their personal plots on the village
markets.
 These measures helped to bring about a relative

stabilisation of China's economy. They were a forced concession on
the part of the Chinese leadership to the Party members
230
and economic personnel whom life had convinced of the

need to pursue a realistic economic policy. Their efforts
were aimed at restoring the economy, disrupted during the
``Great Leap Forward" period, and by improving industrial
management to prepare the conditions for returning the
economy to planned development. A conference of the State
Economic Commission in 1965 discussed a set of instructions,
formulated by Liu Shao-chi, concerning the economic
measures to be taken to improve management in industry.
Articles appearing >in the Chinese press in 1964 and 1965
dealt with the need for industrial co-ordination both within
the individual industries and between industries, and the
need to develop specialisation and co-operation under a
single state plan.
 This tendency was clearly expressed during the discussion

of production targets for 1965 by the State Conference on
Industry and Transport. Among other things, its resolution
said: `Ìt is necessary to get rid of prejudices and not of
science. There is need to act in accordance with objective
reality and not on the basis of subjective desires.
Production must be boosted, wherever it is possible, instead of
blindly trying to do so where it is not possible. The boosting
of production must be based on growing labour productivity,
better management of production, the use of advanced
techniques, the achievement and surpassing of international
standards and improvement of co-operation between
enterprises."^^1^^
 However, Mao did not like this line, to say nothing of
the growing influence of those members of the Party who
backed it up. The Maoists built up their positions through
the armymen who were appointed to the political
departments set up to keep an eye on the Party branches of
economic bodies. In the press they attacked articles calling
for a common sense approach to economics and urged the
``destruction of boundaries" and fresh ``leaps forward''. This
was their preparation for. the fierce offensive which they
launched in 1966 against the advocates of realistic economic
policies under the banner of the ``great proletarian cultural
revolution''.
_-_-_
~^^1^^
Jenmin jihpao, February 25, 1965.
231
 This time, the political campaign against those who were,
wittingly or unwittingly, encroaching on the Maoists'
dictatorship, assumed unprecedented proportions. Those
who dared point at the unfortunate lessons of the past and
try to introduce rational methods into economic
management were branded as class enemies, and revisionist
accomplices of imperialism. The Maoists began by
denigrating the Party, government and economic cadres who
disagreed or were suspected of disagreeing with Mao's line,
and then went on to dismiss them from office and execute
many of them. Speculating on the political immaturity of
young people and implanting in their midst a spirit of
mindless adulation of Mao Tse-tung, his henchmen organised
Hungweiping and Tsaofan detachments, which they used to
break up Party and other social organisations.
 This political campaign was carried on in an atmosphere

of growing chauvinistic intoxication and war hysteria, and
it gave Mao and his followers a free hand in preparing for
the next ``leap forward'', which was announced by the llth
Plenary Meeting of the CPC Central Committee in August
1966. Preparations were started for a fresh offensive on the
living standards of the working people. From the end of
1966, it began to assume ever greater proportions, being
advanced under the slogans of fighting against `èconomism''
and the principle of material incentive which was declared
to be ``bourgeois''.
 The exploitation of the peasant masses was again

intensified. Production brigades were put under an obligation
to increase their deliveries to the state and to reduce the
rates of personal consumption fixed for their members. In
1966, average food consumption among peasants (much
lower than that for urban dwellers) came to roughly 200
kilograms per man a year for grain (including sweet potatoes
and potatoes, in terms of grain) as compared with 229
kilograms in 1957, and 900 grams per man a year for
vegetable oil, as compared with 1.25 kilograms in 1957.
Over the next few years, the level of consumption for these
and other foodstuffs in the countryside was further reduced.
The personal consumption funds in the production brigades
were reduced and were in the main---70--80 per cent---
distributed on the levelling principle, under so-called
guaranteed norms. Many peasants in fact found themselves
232
incapable of purchasing even these famine rations because

of their extremely low incomes which were roughly half
the average incomes in industry.
 The condition of the urban working people also sharply

deteriorated. Housing and all construction for service
industries fell into a state of complete stagnation, and in
many parts of China it was officially wound up. The policy
of ``low and rational wages" was fully implemented; in 1966
and 1967, the bonus system of wages, which had been
partially restored at the enterprises in 1960, was once again
abolished, so that nominal wages among workers, engineers
and technicians were reduced on the average by about
10--15 per cent. Real wages dropped even lower because of
the growing prices of rice and other foodstuffs. The number
of items being rationed was greatly increased (in 1968,
ration cards were introduced even for laundry soap). A
campaign was started that year to switch schools and
public health establishments from the state budgets to
maintenance by enterprises, city blocks and communes, all of
which fell as an additional burden on the shoulders of the
people.
 This time they put up more active resistance to the

offensive against their living standards than they had done
in 1958--1960. Industrial and office workers staged
massive strikes in response to the reduction of their living
standards.
 In many parts of the country, the peasants broke into

foodstores, shared out the social funds. Numerous reports
in the provincial newspapers testify to the massiveness of
this action. Among the urgent tasks formulated by the
``revolutionary organisations" of central agricultural and
forestry establishments, this special point was made: `Ìt shall
not be permitted in any circumstances to share out seeds,
feed, social accumulation funds, communal funds.. . . The
seeds, feed, reserve grain, resources from social
accumulation funds, from communal funds, and from production funds
already shared out must be returned."^^1^^ In the countryside
there was sabotage of agricultural operations, and this forced
the Maoists to send regular army units into the rural
localities.
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Jenmin jihpao, February 12, 1967.
233
 Mao and his followers did not shrink from using armed
force to suppress the massive protest, with the army being
used as the main force to ensure implementation of their
domestic policy. Following the ``revolutionising'' of
enterprises and offices, and the establishment of the
political department system, designed to exercise political control
over the behaviour of industrial and office workers, the
functions of such control were transferred directly to the
army. By intensifying the barrack-room regime, sending
demobilised soldiers to the enterprises, and using the
armycontrolled Hungweipings and Tsaofans to put down the
discontented working people, the Maoists expected to
prevent social production from being disrupted. However,
these expectations were not justified. The ``cultural
revolution" led to rampant anarchy, clashes between hostile groups
at enterprises, distraction of working men from their jobs
for participation in various political acts, and relaxation of
management in production. All of this necessarily had an
effect on the state of China's national economy. While the
Maoists did manage to safeguard the arms and to some
extent the chemical and the oil industry from the effects of
the ``cultural revolution'', it did have a devastating effect on
the other industries, including metallurgy and engineering.
In 1969, steel output was down to 12 million tons from 13
million in 1966; coal extraction was down respectively from
245 million to 210 million tons. The coal shortage had an
effect on electric power generation: 60,000 million kwh
was generated in 1969 as compared with 70,000 million in
1966. In Wuhan, Kunming, Tsinan, Chungking and other
cities electric power supplies to enterprises and homes were
repeatedly interrupted. In early 1968, the level of production
in Peking and many other industrial centres was only 40--50
per cent of the 1966 level.
 The normal operation of industrial enterprises was

further disrupted by snags in transport. The transfer of
Hungweipings and other ``representatives of the
revolutionary masses" from one part of the country to another
(from the autumn of 1966 to February 1967, the railways
carried over 20 million such unpaying customers), the
disturbances and other armed clashes, the strikes---all this
upset the railway timetable and kept some consignments
of freight lie for months waiting delivery to the place of
234
their destination. China's seaports operated with great

interruption.
 The disruption of transport had an effect not only on

industry but also on agriculture, because a large part of the
chemical fertilisers was not delivered for use in good time.
This factor was added to the disruption of agriculture,
which was bred by the ``cultural revolution'', the sabotage,
and so on. The use of the army on the farms helped to
prevent grain production from dropping sharply, and to
maintain it on about the 1965 and 1966 level, but there was
a drop in per capita output, which worsened the already
poor state of food supplies.
 The damage inflicted by the ``cultural revolution" on

China's national economy will be seen from the following
data characterising the changes in the principal indicators
for the 1957--1969 period.
Unit 1957
1959
1965
1966
1968*
1969*
'000
National income
mln
yuan
83.7
150.9
125.0
137.0
125.0
131.0
Gross industrial out--
put
``
70.4
163.0
122.0
135.0
120.0
130.0
Gross agricultural
output
``
53.7
60.0
55.0
55.0
55.0
60.0
Total investments
from budget
``
13.8
26.7
13.5
13.0
8.0
____
Investments in in--
dustry
i>
7.2
20.2
6.5
6.5
4.0
___ .
Military expendi--
ture (direct)
»»
5.5
5.8
12.5
13.0
17.0
18--19
 * Preliminary estimate.
 These data show that the gradual edging up to the 1959
level, as expressed in the 1965--1966 indicators, was
interrupted by the ``cultural revolution'', which went hand in
hand with abandonment of the ``line of regulation" and a
return to Mao's economic line. This line had brought about a
sharp decline in China's economy during the ``Great Leap
235
Forward" period, and in 1967 and 1968 led to a fresh

decline, thus showing itself to be completely untenable.
 In a speech in August 1967 Mao was forced to admit that

``we have had to pay a very high price for the present
cultural revolution''. Alarmed by the economic losses, the
Maoist leadership started in late 1967 to put through
measures intended to clamp down on the Hungweipings and
the Tsaofans, and to intensify the army's control in the
economic bodies and at the enterprises. The functions of
economic organisation, once performed by the now-routed
Party and government apparatus, were transferred to the
``revolutionary committees" in' which army representatives
play the leading role, and which, the Maoists hope, will help
them to make good the economic consequences of the
``cultural revolution''.
 In a speech before the Peking revolutionary committee in

September 1967, Chou En-lai dealt with the matter of
economic losses caused by the ``cultural revolution" and
gave this promise: `Ìf the revolution succeeds, we shall make
up for everything in six months.'' Much more time has
passed since then, but the ``making up" has not quite
succeeded. With the army's help, the Maoists have stopped
the decline in production, but military methods cannot help
to solve the strident task of economic development. The rate
of economic development has been heavily affected by the
actual suspension of capital construction caused by the
``cultural revolution'', and by the debilitation of the
management and technical services at the enterprises because of
the massive reduction in the number of specialists and the
increase in the military outlays, which hamper the
development of power engineering, transport and other industries
producing bottlenecks in China's national economy and
acting as a drag on its development.
__ALPHA_LVL2__
4. Zigzags in Peking's Economic Policy
 The 9th CPC Congress has not changed the Maoist
economic policy which had shattered China's economy and
retarded its development for a long time. It did not work out
any practical recommendations, but only reiterated provisions
236
that would serve as a ``theoretical groundwork" for Mao's

policy. The CC report to the Congress mentioned the
oftrepeated thesis that politics are a commanding force, that
production may be stimulated by a ``revolution in the
superstructure" and by a criticism of the ``revisionist line" and
once again according to tradition in Maoist propaganda
Lenin's words that politics have a priority over economics
were interpreted as a justification of arbitrariness in politics.
The congress once again approved the formula: `Àgriculture
is the basis of the national economy while industry is its
leading force.'' This formula is contrary to Lenin's idea that
developing industry is the basis of the transformation of the
national economy along socialist lines. The congress
reiterated that Mao's group would henceforward carry on the policy
of ``support on one's own strength'', a policy which
consolidates the disunity of economic cells and places them in a
position of state tributaries compelled to complement state
accumulations with their own means without claiming any
material assistance from the state.
 The years that have passed since the 9th CPC Congress
testify to the continued crisis of the Maoists' economic policy,
which fact serves as a direct reflection of the existing
discrepancy between their theoretical conceptions and the objective
requirements of China's economic growth.
 It is quite obvious that the establishment of a semblance

of `òrder'' by tightening up the military-bureaucratic regime
has not helped to improve China's economy. The country's
militarisation has not helped and cannot help invigorate
production activity among the working people, contrary to
the Maoists' expectations. Nor can this be achieved by the
system of labour services, under which millions of peasants
have to do temporary, arduous and poorly paid work in
industry, while hundreds of thousands of intellectuals are
transported into the countryside to work on the farms. Nor
can the economy be improved by the measures designed to
make the millions of Chinese in the semi-subsistence and
separated economic units boost production with their bare
hands on the basis of manual, unskilled labour, ``stimulated''
not by any moral or material incentives geared to the results
of their work, but by political demagogy, orders from
supervisers and threats of reprisal. Nor will the economy be
improved by the waste for military purposes of money which
237
is being squeezed out from the people through a lowering

of their living standards.
 In 1971, according to Chinese official statistics, China

produced 21 million tons of steel and gathered 245 million
tons of grain. However, already in the early 1960s, the
Republic's production capacities had made it possible to
put out as much as 22 million tons of steel. The results
achieved in the production of grain were below those of
1958, although the country's population had risen
considerably since then. This is evidence of the fact that the Chinese
economy up till now has not been able to overcome the big
economic difficulties brought about by the adventurist policy
of the ``Great Leap Forward'', the ``people's communes" and
later of the ``cultural revolution''.
 Recent facts testify to certain zigzags in Peking's economic

policy: in a way it reappraises the theoretical ``values'' of
the ``cultural revolution''. A part of Chinese leading
personnel, especially those who are employed in concrete sectors
of economic construction are realising more and more that
voluntarist attempts to force up the rate of economic growth
through the utmost strain of the workers' effort, to rely not
on objective economic laws and real possibilities but only on
Mao's ideas cannot bring about the expected results. This, it
seems to us, explains the now observable in China return to
some rational methods of economic management which had
justified themselves during the first five-year-plan periods,
to the application of economic levers of influencing
production. And though the Peking propagandists continue to insist
on the ``revolutionising'' of management in enterprises and
on ``fighting the revisionist venom of Liu Shao-chi'', one can
see in fact the use of forms and methods of economic
management which had been subjected to criticism and abolished
by the ``cultural revolution''.
 The striving to put an end to the chaos and anarchy in

industrial management is seen in the attempts to restore the
principles of planning in industry and the centralised
guidance of enterprises.
 Reality itself forced the Government to resume the work

of industrial ministries and the State Planning Committee
which had been paralysed during the ``cultural revolution''.
After a long time it convened a national conference on
problems of planning and some sectoral conferences on the
238
same subject. Chinese papers, while mentioning the fact that

the ``cultural revolution" was so to say `à great stimulus" to
the Chinese economy, fulminated against those ``hostile
elements" who, `ùnder the influence of anarchism and
ultraLeft views'', negate the need for economic planning. The
mass media have buried in oblivion the ``theories'' of the
sponsors of the ``cultural revolution" according to which
planning ``fetters mass initiative" and centralisation means
a ``departmental dictatorship'', which ``the revisionists and
reactionaries" had tried to implant in the country.
 Peking propagandists are bent on expanding the campaign

to improve the economic performance of factories and mills
based on the application of such categories as cost
accounting, prime cost, profit, payment according to the work done,
and planning. The journal Hungchih stresses the need for
`à maximum utilisation of manpower and equipment, a
maximum improvement of labour organisation, better
management and higher labour productivity''. As this journal
writes, ``cost accounting in the national economy is an
important method of managing socialist enterprises''.
 Reports from China show that there is a greater tendency

towards the restoration of the principle of distribution
according to labour contributed, although during the ``cultural
revolution" the principle of material incentives in general was
declared to be `à sugar-coated shell'', `à black revisionist
commodity'', `à dagger driven into the back of the
revolution''. As was mentioned before, the ``cultural revolution"
abolished the system of material incentives for good labour,
the latter comprising 25 to 35 per cent of the workers' total
earnings. This ``reform'' was played down by Peking
propagandists as an essential ``guarantee'' against ``bourgeois
regeneration" to which workers of some socialist countries
are allegedly subject. But economic construction has made
the Chinese renounce egalitarian dogmas and retain the
principles of remuneration for the labour done.
 According to the Chinese press, there is no clear-cut

criterion by which to distinguish the universally recognised
principle ``to each according to labour contributed" from ``
revisionism" and ``bourgeois economism''. Yet despite all this,
the management of many Chinese enterprises is renouncing
wage equalisation and is introducing a system of
differentiated payment for the labour done in order to stimulate
239
production. An example is provided by the Shanghai

Engineering Works, a large enterprise employing over 6,000
workers. Their wages are two or two and a half times
higher than those received by apprentices. The wages are
fixed here not only with due account for the ``devotion'' of
a worker to ``Mao''s thought'', as the sponsors of the ``
cultural revolution" insisted, but also for the record of labour
service and professional skill. The same situation obtains
at many other enterprises and in some agricultural communes.
As the provincial newspaper Hunan jihpao points out,
``Members of communes who produce more output must
receive greater income''.
 Economic experience prompts the most sober managers to

come to the conclusion that slogans and quotations cannot
replace concrete economic and technical knowledge, that
it is impossible to run the national economy without
experienced, knowledgeable personnel. In recent times the
Chinese have intensified the campaign for ``strengthening
the guidance of production'', for the gradual return into
the sphere of production of those qualified administrative
and especially technical personnel who had been defamed
and repressed during the ``cultural revolution''. After
completely reversing its policy in this field the Chinese press is
now reporting about ``the valuable experience" of making
use of the old cadres who are now employed in managerial
work. Jenmin jihpao says that ``the old cadres must play
today the role of the backbone in the management of
enterprises" and subjects to criticism the management of those
factories who ``make insufficient effort to promote their role
as technical specialists and managers''.
 According to the Chinese press, the cadres promoted
during the ``cultural revolution" cannot cope with the tasks
they have been assigned because they do not know the
elements of economics and often apply methods that do not
correspond to realities. On the other hand, the `òld cadres'',
that is specialists accused during the ``cultural revolution"
of revisionism, `èconomism'' and other ``mortal sins'', sent
for ``re-education'' purposes to rural localities or placed as
manual workers in labour-consuming sectors of production,
but now returned to their former posts, behave passively,
shirk the solution of concrete problems out of fear of entering
into conflict with those who watch over their political
240
``trustworthiness''. All this, naturally, exacerbates the moral

atmosphere at enterprises and creates additional tensions in
the economy as a whole.
 Complex and contradictory, at times even diametrically

opposite phenomena and processes occurring in China, the
absence of consensus in the Peking leadership concerning the
ways and means of the country's development are bound
to retard the progress of the Chinese economy.
 The congress did not work out any practical

recommendations, but merely reiterated the propositions designed to serve
as a ``theoretical foundation" for Mao's line. It once again
repeated the thesis that politics was the command force, that
production should be stimulated through ``revolution in the
sphere of the superstructure'', and criticism of the ``
revisionist line'', and once again---in accordance with the
tradition established in Maoist propaganda---what Lenin
said about politics taking precedence over economics, this
being interpreted as justification for arbitrary political acts.
Once again this formula was proclaimed: `Àgriculture is
the basis of the national economy, and industry is its leading
force,'' a formula which is fundamentally at variance with
the Leninist idea of industrial development as the basis of
the socialist transformation of the national economy. This
provided further evidence that Mao's entourage is still
intent on pursuing the line of ``relying on one's own
strength'', a line which tends to perpetuate the fragmentation
of economic units and which puts them in the position of
tributaries of the state whose duty is to provide resources
for its accumulation, without claiming any material
assistance on its part.
 The 9th Congress did nothing to change the policy which
has unhinged China's national economy and which has
retarded her economic development for a long time. The only
way to clear the obstacles to this development is resolutely to
reject the Maoists' anti-popular policy, the line which runs
counter to the requirements of the objective laws of
socialism. So long as this line is being pursued it provides
ground for the ``tactics of despair" and for preparation of
adventurist ``leaps forward'', which do not bring the Chinese
people anything except greater extra-economic coercion
and political deprivation, nothing except fresh burdens and
privations.
10---1362
241
__ALPHA_LVL2__
5. Some Aspects of China's Foreign
 Policy
 The line of intensifying the barrack-room regime, the

country's militarisation, which is due to Mao's urge to
maintain the system of extra-economic coercion, is one of
the basic elements which determine the character of the
specific foreign-policy line imposed on China by the
Maoists, a line which is just as alien to Marxist-Leninist
principles as is their domestic-policy line. Historical
experience shows that war communism is justified as a system
for organising production and distribution in a country
without a high economic potential forced to carry on a
drawn-out war against the counter-revolutionary forces of
the overthrown bourgeoisie, and the interventionists. But it
is unfit for peacetime construction. The Maoists have sought
to use the methods of war communism even in peacetime,
thereby distorting them, killing their communist content,
and converting them into a means of militarising the country
and creating an ideological climate which gives the
population a sense of impending danger of war. For many years,
the creation of such a climate, the build-up of an atmosphere
of war hysteria in China, was being done with the help of
the idea that another world war was fatally inevitable and
that it was impossible for the world socialist revolution to
develop without a direct armed clash between its forces and
those of international imperialism. In recent years, the same
purposes have been served by the war hysteria built up over
the ``threat from the north'', that is, from the Soviet Union,
which the Maoists have invented.
 Since the late 1950s, statements by Mao and his followers
on such key questions as the content of the present epoch,
the balance between the contending forces, the place of the
various revolutionary streams within the single world
revolutionary process, have ever more clearly revealed the
denial of the need of economic prerequisites for socialist
revolution and of the role of the socialist system as the
economic mainstay for unfolding the world socialist
revolution.
 In his speech at the 1957 Moscow Meeting of fraternal
parties, and in his articles `Òn the Historical Experience of
242
the Proletarian Dictatorship" and `Ònce More on the

Historical Experience of the Proletarian Dictatorship" Mao still
expressed the view that war was the only means of achieving
revolution together with recognition of the decisive role of the
socialist system in the development of the world revolutionary
process. However, in the course of the polemics which Mao
started by coming out against the CPSU's stand and the
principles written into the 1957 Declaration and the 1960
Statement, he arrived at the denial of the decisive role of the
socialist system in the world revolutionary process, and came
to contrapose the national liberation movement and the forces
of socialism.
 Mao's followers ignore the fact that the character of the
national liberation movement is determined by its economic
content, that the outcome of the national-democratic
revolution depends on the kind of economic tasks it sets out to
tackle: tasks expressing the interests of the bourgeoisie,
which seeks to direct the country's development after
national independence along the capitalist way, or tasks
expressing the interests of the proletariat which seeks to
carry on the revolution beyond the bourgeois-democratic
stage and to fill it with socialist content.
 National-democratic revolutions in countries without

internal economic prerequisites for the triumph of socialism
would inevitably be confined to a solution of
bourgeoisdemocratic tasks unless the working people in these
countries were able to rely on the support of the world
socialist system and the assistance and experience of the
socialist countries. The Maoists' denial that the socialist
system is the decisive factor of the world revolutionary
process has been expressed in the CPR's foreign economic
policy, which took a sharp turn after 1960. By breaking
their economic ties with the Soviet Union and other socialist
states, ties which under the first five-year plan had
determined the successes of economic construction in China, the
Maoists pushed the country into autarchy, into isolated
development of the national economy, which in fact
developed into a policy of orientation upon the international
capitalist market and extension of economic ties with the
capitalist countries.
 The cancellation, on the CPR's initiative, of the agreements

concluded with the socialist countries resulted in a sharp
243
drop in China's trade with this group of countries. In 1968,

it was down by more than 66 per cent as compared with
1959, when it was at its peak. In that period, China's trade
with the capitalist countries increased by 120 per cent. In
1968 and 1969, the share of non-socialist countries in China's
foreign trade went up to 75 per cent (with the capitalist
countries' share coming to roughly 50 per cent of total
trade), while the share of the socialist countries was down
to less than 25 per cent of China's foreign trade.
 The Maoists have used the ``relying on one's own

strength" thesis to back up their break of economic ties with
the socialist countries, a thesis they believe to mean, for the
state, a refusal to participate in the international division of
labour, complete self-sufficiency of the national economy in
every type of product needed, regardless of whether the home
production of this or that item is warranted in terms of
economic efficiency.
 Their references to the ``relying on one's own strength"

principle are untenable theoretically and also hypocritical,
like their declarations of implacability with respect to
imperialism. This is well illustrated by the CPR's ever
more pronounced orientation on the system of the
international capitalist division of labour. The Maoists have been
extending direct trade ties with the advanced capitalist
countries (Japan and the FRG in the first place), relying less
and less on intermediaries (Hong Kong, etc.) which had
helped them to cover up these ties and ever more actively
supplementing them with scientific and technical co--
operation, invitation of foreign specialists, conclusion of credit
agreements, etc. Mao and his followers have also been
openly seeking to establish economic ties with the United
States.
 In an effort to justify the turn-about in foreign economic

policy which they had foisted on the country, the Maoists
tried to blame the Soviet Union and the other socialist
countries for the ``Great Leap Forward" fiasco, and spread
slanderous inventions about co-operation with these countries
having hampered China's economic development, about their
economic assistance to China having been insignificant and
ineffective, etc.
 These inventions are patently absurd. The scale of the

economic assistance the socialist countries gave China will be
244
seen from the fact that the Soviet Union alone helped China
to build and modernise enterprises ensuring the production
of 8.7 million tons of pig-iron, 25--30 per cent of the country's
electric power generation, 80 per cent of its lorry and tractor
output, etc. The Soviet Union supplied China with complete
sets of plant for 90 projects out of 211 going up in China
under the first five-year plan. It should be borne in mind
that these deliveries were so arranged as to accelerate the
development in China of the leading branches of the heavy
industry and to help her create the necessary basis for
technological progress. In 1957, China's industry already
supplied 50 per cent of the equipment for the industrial
projects going up with the Soviet Union's assistance. The
vast economic, financial and technical assistance from the
Soviet Union and the other socialist countries helped China
to establish within a short period a developed iron and
steel industry, heavy and precision engineering, an
automobile and tractor industry, an aircraft industry, a
powergenerating equipment industry, a radio engineering
industry and an atomic industry.
 Co-operation with the socialist countries helped China

rapidly to build up the basis of her economic independence.
Just now, her orientation to the international capitalist
market is producing the opposite results, because the
imperialist countries see no point in letting China have large
quantities of the producer goods she needs to develop her
economy.
 The turn-about in her foreign economic policy is a source

of large losses for China, because, on the one hand, it has
reduced her export potential and has forced her to sell at
reduced prices the products the capitalist countries want
(agricultural raw materials and some minerals, non-ferrous
metals above all); on the other hand, China now has to pay
high prices for the goods she has to buy from these countries.
Add to this the losses arising from the need to pay high
interest rates for the capitalist countries' credits, and the high
price of the various types of scientific and technical
assistance, which the socialist countries had made available to
China virtually free of charge.
 The fact that the Maoists have decided to reorientate the
country's external economic ties, despite the vast losses this
has inflicted on China, is sufficiently clear evidence that
245
this step of theirs was not in any sense motivated by concern

for national economic development. It was motivated by
political considerations springing from the Chinese
leadership's hegemonistic propositions and the hope of promoting
their self-seeking aims by making use of the contradictions
between capitalism and socialism. Unscrupulous politicasting
is the substance of the line being pursued by Mao and his
followers at home and in relations with other countries.
That is the essence of the ill-famed principle of ``politics is
the command force'', a principle which they have adopted
for their banner, and which serves to vindicate their policy
expressive of Great-Power interests, instead of the vital
economic interests of the working people. Their policy
has no socialist economic content and in all its forms cuts
across the objective requirements of socialist construction
in China and the development of the world socialist
revolution.
 History has shown that Lenin was quite right when he
kept stressing that the outcome of the world socialist
revolution crucially depends on the economic successes in
countries where the working class has taken over. Lenin insisted
that the economic front was the fundamental one for the
first proletarian dictatorship, the young Soviet Republic, and
added that unless victory was scored on this front, unless a
powerful socialist economy was built up, ``nothing will follow
from our successes, from our victories in overthrowing the
exploiters, and from our military rebuff to international
imperialism, and a return to the old system will be
inevitable".^^1^^
 Lenin showed the dialectical interconnection between

economics and politics, and proved that the development of
the socialist economy is not only the basic condition for a
full and final victory of socialism in Soviet Russia, but also
a necessary condition for the political victory of the
working class advancing at the head of great masses of exploited
people in their liberation struggle, victory over the
bourgeoisie on a world scale. He wrote: ``We are now exercising
our main influence on the international revolution through
our economic policy. The struggle in this field has now
_-_-_
246
become global. Once we solve this problem, we shall have

certainly and finally won on an international scale."^^1^^
 The last half-century of world history has shown very

well that the national liberation movement has become a
mighty force in a world divided into two camps---the
socialist and the imperialist---a world in which the first
socialist power, relying on the mighty economic potential
it had built up, routed the most reactionary forces of
imperialism, with socialism established as a world system,
bringing together a number of countries and scoring more
and more victories in the economic competition with
capitalism.
 With China for its example, history has also presented an
unfortunate lesson showing that neglect of objective
requirements in economic development, bearing on the
``deepest foundations of the existence of hundreds of
millions of people'',^^2^^ as Lenin put it, tends to revenge itself
by turning politics into baseless adventurism.
 In 1948, Mao wrote: ``Policy is the starting-point of all

the practical actions of a revolutionary party and
manifests itself in the process and end-result of that party's
actions.
 ``What we call experience is the process and the end-result

of carrying out a policy. Only through the practice of the
people, that is, through experience, can we verify whether
a policy is correct or wrong and determine to what extent it
is correct or wrong."^^3^^ In this formulation Mao seems to
``have forgotten" that the social practice of the masses does
not amount to a mere implementation of a policy but that
it is the basis on which it is alone possible to work out a
correct policy, that it is not policy that serves as the starting
point, because it cannot be correct if it is a flight of fancy,
but that the starting point is scientific analysis of the social
practice of the masses, of the concrete conditions in which
this takes place, a scientific generalisation of historical
experience. The Chinese people have to pay a stiff price
for Mao's ``forgetfulness''. The enshrinement of a subjectivist,
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Ibid., Vol. 32, p. 437.
~^^2^^ Ibid., Vol. 27, p. 409.
~^^3^^ Selected Works of Mao Tse-lung, Vol. IV, Peking, 1961, p. 204.
247
adventurist policy, not in any way anchored economically,

has led to disastrous failures in the CPR's economic
development, and has sent Mao and his followers hastily
abandoning their illusions about the possibility of establishing
communism in China before this is done in other countries,
and panically embracing the idea that no country can
reach communism even after centuries of development. This
has impelled them to take anti-socialist action, which has
resulted in their growing isolation in the international
liberation movement.
[248]
__NUMERIC_LVL1__
Chapter Seven
__ALPHA_LVL1__
``GREAT PROLETARIAN CULTURAL
 REVOLUTION'', OR DRIVE AGAINST
 WORLD CULTURE
__ALPHA_LVL2__
[introduction.]
 Marx's aphorism about ``revolutions being locomotives of

history" applies equally to society's material and spiritual
life.
 Socialist revolution is not only a fundamental and

qualitative transformation of the whole system of political
and economic relations existing under capitalism, but also
a deep-going transformation of society's spiritual life. That
is what Lenin called the cultural revolution.
 What did the founders of Marxism-Leninism mean by

this concept? Marx wrote that communism is ``the complete
return of man to himself as a social (i.e., human) being---a
return becoming conscious, and accomplished within the
entire wealth of previous development".^^1^^ It is hard to
exaggerate the importance of this idea of Marx, because it
gives the very gist of the cultural revolution, which is to
eliminate the alienated forms of human activity. Marx gives
the main characteristic of the process of communist
construction: mankind's conscious activity, and sets out with
exceptional clarity the attitude of the socialist revolution to the
culture of the past, ``within the entire wealth of previous
development''.
 Communism is a society consisting of men freely creating

their own social relations. This kind of system can be
_-_-_
~^^1^^ K. Marx, Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, Moscow,

1959, p. 102.
249
produced only as a result of conscious and purposeful activity

by millions of working people based on the knowledge and
creative use of the objective laws of social development.
This implies above all the need to put the great store of
culture created by mankind within the reach of the masses.
At the same time, while formulating his plan for the cultural
revolution in the USSR Lenin kept stressing that it was not
so much a process of enlightenment as creative activity aimed
at the transformation of things. Every step in assimilating
the spiritual treasures created by mankind, he said, is
connected with the tackling of this or that task in socialist
construction. That is the basis on which, he insisted, culture
will become an inner need for each member of society.
 Indeed, the full man is formed in the course of creative

construction of the new world, which provides every
individual with an opportunity for developing his creative
potential, abilities and talents, and that is the main purpose
of the cultural revolution. Under communism, the free and
harmonious development of every individual will become
the condition of the free and harmonious development of
society, and of unlimited growth of the people's creative
powers. Consequently, the cultural revolution the people
start by building socialism has for its highest aim the
allround development of man's spiritual creative powers, the
elimination of the alienated forms of human activity which
are characteristic of all antagonistic socio-economic
formations, and the conversion of every individual into a conscious
maker of history.
 Are there any common points between the

MarxistLeninist view of the cultural revolution and the ``cultural
revolution" in China?
 Marxism-Leninism starts from the assumption that no

cultural revolution is possible unless men master the store
of knowledge and assimilate the material and spiritual
values accumulated by mankind before their day, but Mao
and his followers started their ``great proletarian cultural
revolution" in China by proclaiming that the culture of past
centuries was alien and hostile to the proletariat, and set the
Hungweipings loose in a rampage against the cherished
values of world civilisation.
 Marxism-Leninism starts from the assumption that the

cultural revolution, permeating every aspect of social life,
250
helps to overcome the division of society into makers and

consumers of culture, opening the floodgates to mass
initiative and social activity, whereas Mao and his followers
have been implanting the personality cult, which means
turning masses of people into mobs whose duty is blindly to
act on the orders of the ``leader''.
 What is there in common between genuine cultural

activity of masses of working people and the ``
revolutionism" of the Hungweipings and the Tsaofans, who supplant
the assimilation of culture by parroting quotations from
Mao's articles? The line of the ``great proletarian cultural
revolution'', announced by the CPC leadership in late 1965
and early 1966 and subsequently given the official
imprimatur by the decisions of the llth Plenary Meeting of
the CPC Central Committee in 1966, is a patent ``Leftist''
revision of the Marxist-Leninist doctrine of culture and the
cultural revolution. This revision, which affects literally all
the basic propositions of the Marxist-Leninist theory on the
cultural revolution, was given perhaps the most explicit
expression in the CPC leadership's attitude to such basic
problems of the cultural revolution as 1) the cultural legacy
of the past; 2) the culture of modern bourgeois society; and
3) the intelligentsia.
__ALPHA_LVL2__
1. The Cultural Revolution
 and the Cultural Legacy
 The problem of continuity has always been a vital one

for human progress. In the most general terms, the dialectics
of social development reveals a contradictory unity of two
interconnected elements. On the one hand, each new
generation never starts from scratch, but assimilates the cultural
(material and spiritual) values which had been accumulated
by earlier generations. By extracting from cultural values of
the past the concentrated creative energy of human thought
and work which they contain, men are enabled to turn it into
their own gain. On the other hand, the material and spiritual
values of past epochs become for those who assimilate them
no more than ``the raw material for new production" (Marx),
for the creation of fresh values and, consequently, for fresh
spurts into the future.
251
 That is why the culture of each new formation necessarily

finds itself in continuity with the whole aggregate of earlier
relations of spiritual production, distribution, exchange and
consumption. The objective basis for this continuity is
provided by the development of material production, because
ultimately changes in spiritual production are determined
by the changes taking place in the sphere of social being. But
while being determined by production and reproduction of
actual life, spiritual culture always depends in its
development both on the relations which have arisen earlier in
spiritual production itself and on the existing results of
mankind's earlier spiritual activity, which are found in the
form of a definite complex of cultural values.
 In the recent period, the attitude of communism to the

cultural legacy of the past is a question that has acquired
special practical, political and theoretical urgency in
connection with a number of additional circumstances. New
theoretical and political aspects of continuity have appeared
with the spread of socialism beyond the boundaries of one
country, the establishment of the world socialist community,
and the collapse of the colonial system of imperialism. There
have arisen the problem of the attitude on the part of the
culture of some socialist countries to the cultural experience
gained by other socialist countries and the problem of the
relationship between the culture of socialist society and the
culture of bourgeois society under peaceful coexistence
between opposite social systems and the mounting ideological
struggle.
 The greater the number of countries taking the way of
socialist change, the faster is the cultural and historical
progress of society, the greater the urgency of the question
of the attitude to adopt to the cultural legacy of earlier
generations, of what precisely needs to be taken from the
treasure-house of world culture, of how the socialist nations
and the nations taking the non-capitalist way can use not
only the cultural values created in past historical epochs but
also the cultural achievements in present-day capitalist
society.
 The steady and unprecedented growth in the flow of

information, which mankind is accumulating in the course
of the headlong scientific and technological revolution,
objectively gives greater importance to the question of
252
assimilating the cultural legacy. At the same time, there are

also subjective reasons for probing more deeply into the
problem of continuity in the development of culture in
socialist society. Let us consider only two of these: a) the
attempts by present-day Right and ``Left'' revisionists to
revise the basic Marxist principles bearing on the cultural
legacy; b) the fresh barrage of charges coming from the
anti-Communists that the Marxists-Leninists are taking a
nihilistic attitude to the culture of earlier epochs (let us
note that the revival of anti-communist activity along this
line is largely connected precisely with the Maoists'
antiLeninist attitude to the cultural legacy).
 A vast store of practical experience in cultural

construction, experience which is of international importance, has
been gained in the USSR and the People's Democracies in
the decades of their socialist construction. One of the most
important lessons the Communist Parties have drawn from
an analysis of their activity in realising Lenin's plan of the
cultural revolution is that it would have been unfeasible but
for the Marxist-Leninist struggle on two fronts: both against
the attempts to adopt the whole of the old culture, without
discrimination, and against the attempts to reject the whole
of it out of hand.
 Lenin repeatedly stressed that there can be no

extraclass ideology, and consequently no extra-class culture, in
bourgeois society, which is rended by class antagonisms. He
criticised the ``mindless philosophers" who denied the party
spirit of philosophy, and branded those whom he called the
``learned salesmen of the capitalist class'', insisting on the
partisanship of literature and art. Lenin said that the
proletariat could not afford to adopt indiscriminately the whole
of the old culture, adding that this would be tantamount to
forgetting the class criteria in assessing the cultural legacy.
These ideas of Lenin's are of immediate relevance to our
own day in fighting present-day revisionism, which calls for
an end to ideology in culture, and a ``peaceful synthesis" of
socialist and bourgeois cultures (Henri Lefebvre, Ernst
Fischer, and others). However, while fighting the 
Rightopportunist attitudes to the cultural legacy,
MarxistsLeninists have always attacked the ``Left"--opportunist
anarchist attitude to the cultural legacy.
 There is nothing in common between the cultural
253
revolution and the nihilistic attitude to the achievements of world

culture, the primitive rejection of the cultural legacy of
one's own nation and of that of other nations.
 In his writings and numerous speeches, Lenin showed

the sheer nonsense of the ultra-Leftist arguments about a
bourgeois science ``hostile to the proletariat in class terms'',
about `àll of bourgeois art, a product of the exploitative
system, being alien to the proletariat''. Lenin maintained that
socialist culture could not arise `òut of nothing'', that it did
not ``spring from out of nowhere'', and that the way for its
emergence had been paved by centuries of social
development. From this he drew the conclusion that ``we must take
the entire culture that capitalism left behind and build
socialism with it".^^1^^ He also wrote: ``Socialism cannot be
built unless we utilise the heritage of capitalist culture."^^2^^
 These ideas of Lenin's are of special importance for a

principled assessment of the ideological ``platform'' and
nihilistic practices in the so-called great proletarian cultural
revolution in China.
 The ideologists of the ``cultural revolution" in China say

that the proletariat must put an end to all the `òld culture"
as being a ``feudal'' and ``bourgeois'' culture. The tone of the
ideological campaign was set on April 13, 1966, by an
editorial in Chief angchiun pao, the mouthpiece of the People's
Liberation Army, entitled ``Hold High the Great Red Banner
of Mao Tse-Tung's Thought, Actively Participate in the
Great Socialist Cultural Revolution''. It was reprinted by
all the national papers and also in the journal Hungchih.
It provided a ``theoretical basis" for these nihilistic calls:
``The socialist revolution goes hand in hand with destruction
and construction. There can be no complete construction
without complete destruction." This slogan became the
central one in the drive against culture. Thus, a Hsinhua
press release on June 11, 1966, said that the ``proletarian
revolution demands the final destruction of the old bourgeois
and feudal culture, which is rotten through and through, and
the creation of a totally new, socialist culture'', and called
for `à struggle for the extensive liquidation of the old
culture''.
_-_-_
 ^^1^^ V I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 29, p. 70.
 ^^2^^ Ibid., p. 156.
254
 How did the leaders of the ``cultural revolution" in China

come to adopt these monstrous ideas which are not only
alien to Marxism-Leninism, but clash with the views of
Marx, Engels and Lenin? It is impossible to answer this
question without bringing out all the connections which exist
between some of Mao's theoretical views and the practices
of the ``great proletarian cultural revolution''.
 Even before the revolution won out in China, Mao

insisted, in some of his speeches, notably those at a
conference on literature and art in Yenan in May 1942, that
`ònly dark forces which endanger the masses of the people
must be exposed ... this is the basic task of all revolutionary
artists and writers".^^1^^ He stressed that the revolution had
need only of works extolling the bright side of the proletariat
and ``depicting the dark side" of the bourgeoisie.^^2^^ Hence the
conclusion: ``Life, reflected in the works of literature and
art, can and must appear to be loftier, brighter, more
concentrated, more typical and more ideal . .. than commonplace
reality."^^3^^
 In defining in this utilitarian manner the content of

socialist art, the tasks it faced and the Party's line with
respect to art, Mao went on to a similarly blunt definition of
form for works of literature and art. He stressed that workers
and peasants needed the kind of art that ``can be readily
accepted by them".^^4^^ This essentially primitive and idealistic
approach to fundamental aesthetic problems, being again
nothing but vulgarisation and revision of the basic principles
of Marxist-Leninist aesthetics, was given practical
expression in the CPC leadership's political line as the ``theoretical
basis" of the ``great cultural revolution''. A direct outcome
of this theoretical injunction, in particular, was the attitude
to the whole of the Chinese people's artistic legacy, which
was declared to be anti-popular and characteristic of the
exploiting elite, and so allegedly alien to the revolution in
form and content.
 Mao asserted that in pre-revolutionary China the whole

of culture had consisted of two parts: Chinese semi-feudal
_-_-_
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 89.
~^^3^^ The Great Socialist Cultural Revolution in China, Part I, Peking,

p. 15 (in Chinese).
255
culture, on the one hand, and the culture brought in from

outside, `ìmperialist'' culture, on the other.^^1^^ He wrote that
for this reason, the Chinese people had had a feeling of
hatred for the traditional ``culture of the mandarins'',
and for the `ìmperialist culture'', which it had regarded as
a ``foreign body''. `Àll these are rotten and should be
completely destroyed."^^2^^ From this necessarily followed the need
to eliminate the whole of the old culture as being an ``
exploitative" culture. That is precisely what the leaders of the
``great proletarian cultural revolution" suggested: ``We must
vigorously eradicate the old ideology, the old culture, the
old customs and the old mores of all the exploiting classes."^^3^^
 Chou En-lai, Chen Yi and Lin Piao gave an unambiguous

explanation of how these nihilistic propositions should be
applied to culture. On June 17, 1966, Chou En-lai declared
that the traditional Chinese culture, created over the past
several thousand years, ``poisoned the minds of men'', and
on June 21, 1966, Chen Yi told a meeting that ``culture [the
whole of culture!---E. B.] and traditional customs poison the
minds of people, which is why they need to be completely
(sic!) rejected and their influence destroyed".^^4^^ On August 31,
1966, addressing a meeting of ``revolutionary'' students and
teachers, Lin Piao urged them on Mao's behalf to ``wipe out
the old culture''.
 The Chinese leaders declared that the works of the

outstanding masters of culture in the past did not contain
anything but ``the exploitative substance" and ordered a drive
both against national and world culture. The first blow was
dealt at the Chinese classics, among them Li Po, Tu Fu, Tao
Yuan-ming, Kwang Han-ching and Pu Sung-ling. Here is
how Kwangming jihpao assessed the classical novel, Dream
in the Red Chamber, by the 18th-century writer Tsao
Hsiueh-ching: ``To be quite frank, Tsao Hsiueh-ching
considers beautiful what from our present standpoint has long
since become outdated. ... There is a thick layer of
_-_-_
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 143. Let us note, by the way, that these statements by the
``great helmsman" can hardly be squared with his own bent for imagery
and quotations from the Chinese classics.
~^^3^^ Carry the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution to the End,
Peking, 1966, p. 33 (in Chinese).
~^^4^^ L'Humanit\'e, September 26, 1966.
256
exploitative, class varnish on the methods of combating feudal

morality used by Chia Pao-yui and Lin Tai-yui [the
leading characters of the novel---E.B.], on their ideals of life,
the essence of their love, etc.''
 For some time now Chinese periodicals and literary

journals have said nothing good about such classical works
of traditional art as the Peking, Shaohsin, Kunming and
other national operas. The CPC leaders have accused many
present-day playwrights and composers of being ``too
enthusiastic about ancient art'', and have urged a complete
repudiation of classic opera, declaring that `ìf Peking opera
does not fade away in 40 years, it is bound to fade away
within 60".^^1^^ That being the Maoists' attitude to their own
traditional Chinese culture, is it surprising that they have
anathematised the classical cultural legacy of other nations?
 Virtually all the world's classics in literature and the arts
have been attacked. Thus, official Chinese critics have
actually consigned all of Shakespeare's works to the scrapheap,
declaring them to be a part `òf the ideology of the
exploiting classes, and antagonistic to the ideology of the proletariat,
which is why if they are allowed to spread unhampered,
without being subjected to harsh criticism, they could have
an extremely bad effect on the modern reader.... Seen in
the light of the present day, Shakespeare's plays turn out to
be contrary to socialist collectivism at root,'' says 
Kwangming jihpao.
 The same paper says about Balzac: ``He extolled a

reactionary theory of humanism.'' About Stendhal the paper
says: `Ìn building the beautiful life we must not be inspired
by the works of Stendhal.. .. He and we are essentially men
going different ways.... We cannot but separate ourselves
from him ideologically.'' Chinese periodicals have classed
among the ``poisonous weeds" works like Dante's Divina
Commedia, Goethe's Die Leiden des jungen Werthers, the
works of Rablais, Hugo and Maupassant.
 It is said quite in earnest in China that the works of

Mozart, Beethoven, Schumann, Schubert, Chopin, Glinka
and Chaikovsky allegedly ``reflect nothing but the suffering
and romanticism of the lone intellectual".^^2^^ According to
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Jenmin jihpao, August 1, 1966.
~^^2^^ Wenhui pao, January 9, 1963.
17---1362
257
Kwangming jihpao, Bizet's ``Carmen'' is nothing but an ``

auction of goods like the bourgeois emancipation of the
individual, the cult of sex and of individualism".^^1^^ Consider the
same paper's view of the classical ballet, which, it says,
``spreads the reconciliation of classes and the bourgeois
theory of humanism, and corrupts youth".^^2^^ Here is what
Hungchih said in February 1970 about the new production
of ``Swan Lake" at the Bolshoi Theatre: `Àn evil genius
leaps about the stage, suppressing everything. Indeed, devils
have become the protagonists! . .. We have here a truly
sinister picture of the restoration of capitalism on the stage!''
 Attacks have been made on all the Russian classics,

including Pushkin, Lermontov, Gogol, Lev Tolstoi and Chekhov.
Chinese critics say that stories and novels by Pushkin,
Lermontov, Turgenev and Goncharov do nothing but ``relish
the corrupt way of life of landowners and aristocrats''. They
found a ``revisionist outlook" in Tolstoi's Resurrection and
Anna Karenina, and Turgenev's A Sportsman's Sketches.
The weekly Wenyi pao accused the prominent Chinese
writer, Shao Chuan-lin, of ``political degradation" and
charged that he was ``kowtowing to the West'', because
he had translated into Chinese Dostoyevsky's novel The
Insulted and Humiliated.^^3^^ Another prominent Chinese
writer, Ouyang Shan, has also been abused for ``worshipping
Chekhov''. Some Chinese newspapers carried pasquinades
against the famous Russian 19th-century revolutionary
democrats Belinsky, Dobrolyubov and Chernyshevsky and
called them ``bourgeois literary critics''.
 In their efforts to provide some ``theoretical basis" for

their nihilistic treatment of the classics, Chinese literary
critics have put forward the ridiculous idea that recognition
of continuity between socialist literature and the literature
and art of critical realism amounts to `à denial of the
innovative character of socialist literature and art''. In an
effort to convince their readers that this view, which so
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Kwangming jihpao, June 29, 1966.
~^^2^^ Ibid., August 8, 1966.
~^^3^^ It is a curious fact that up until 1965 the Chinese press still
treated Dostoyevsky's works with respect. However, official Chinese
propaganda has now discerned in his writings elements which are
``harmful to the existing system" and accordingly branded his
translator, Shao Chuan-lin, as an `àccomplice of modern revisionism''.
258
patently clashes with Lenin's, is in line with the principles

of Marxism-Leninism, Chinese ``theorists'' have gone to the
extent of falsifying the views of Maxim Gorky, the founder
of socialist realism. `Àccording to Gorky critical realism is
the realism of bourgeois idlers."^^1^^ This is the grossest
possible distortion of Gorky's view, which can be allowed only
when the reader is unable to consult the original. Everyone
knows that Gorky always showed the greatest respect for
the writers of critical realism and called them the ``prodigal
sons" of their class, thereby stressing the idea that by
overcoming their class sympathies and antipathies these men
rose above them and to a large extent expressed the
feelings of the working people.
 The official Chinese press has also given equal

assessments of the scientific legacy, and while these have been less
concrete, they have been sufficiently definite. It has denied
the objective content of science, declaring all scientific
achievements of past epochs to be `àlien in class terms" to
the proletariat and the revolution. Thus, in an article
entitled ``Refuting the Slogan Àll Are Equal in Face of the
Truth'~" one paper wrote: ``Can àll be equal' in face of the
truth? We say: No! Truth has a class substance."^^2^^
 Another paper carried a letter signed by seven students

of the Chinese People's University addressed to the Central
Committee and Chairman Mao demanding ``resolute, swift
and final destruction of the whole old system of education,
and the heaviest fire aimed against the gentlemen styled as
bourgeois àuthorities'~".^^3^^ This letter, which was hailed by
students and teachers in many other Chinese colleges,
ridiculed the old system of education ``with its emphasis on
so-called systematic knowledge" and insisted that ``the
longer the students study, the hazier their thinking''. The letter
proposed the abolition of ``the old bourgeois titles and
degrees'', ``the bourgeois system of enrolment and training of
post-graduates'', etc. The editors said the letter set `à model
of courage and daring''.
 The CPC leadership got the Central Committee and the
State Council to issue a directive abolishing entrance
examinations at higher schools, and declared the teacher's
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Jenmin jihpao, October 28, 1958.
~^^2^^ Kwangming jihpao, June 13, 1966.
~^^3^^ Jenmin jihpao, July 12, 1966.
17*
259
concern for high academic progress among students to be a

``bourgeois revisionist black line''. It urged that the old
study aids (published before 1966) should be ``buried'' and a
new curriculum implemented, under which primary schools
should ``study quotations from the works of Chairman Mao
and three of his articles'', secondary schools, a collection
of selected works by Mao and other articles of his, and
institutions of higher learning---the Selected Works of Mao
Tse-tung.
 The theoretical propositions of the ideologists of the

``cultural revolution'', which have been building up another
``Great Wall" between China's culture and foreign culture,
are extremely harmful, and are clearly at variance with the
whole ideology and revolutionary practice of Marxism--
Leninism and, let us add, with the decisions of the 8th Congress
of the CPC, whose resolution on the Central Committee's
political report said: ``There is need to inherit and
comprehend everything that is useful in our country's past culture
and the culture of foreign countries; in addition, there is
need to use the achievements of modern science and culture
to sort out all the best elements in our country's cultural
legacy and to make efforts to create a new, socialist national
culture.''
__NOTE__ Missing footnote with source for above quotation.
 In contrast to the primitive Leftist talk about the spiritual

culture of the past epochs being unacceptable for the
triumphant proletarian revolution, Marxism-Leninism takes a
strictly scientific and truly class approach to the cultural
legacy, implying above all a concrete historical analysis of
the cultural values of the past epochs. Because at definite
stages of social development, namely, in the initial stages
of the existence of this or that antagonistic formation, the
relations of production proper to it have a progressive role
to play, the class which is in charge of these relations of
production, the ruling class, acts as a progressive force in
the cultural and historical process. For this reason, the
culture of every ruling class is not always, and never entirely,
reactionary. The history of exploitative societies shows that
many ideas put forward by the men who represent the ruling
class in the sphere of culture can contain objective truth,
correctly reflect the objective requirements of social progress
and be of lasting importance.
 Every ideology has a class character, reflecting the world
260
in terms of definite class positions, but the whole point is

how correctly it reflects reality at a given historical moment.
Lenin repeatedly warned of the serious danger of
vulgarisation whenever, for instance, the terms ``bourgeois'', ``
bourgeois ideology'', ``bourgeois literature'', etc., are used outside
a historical context. He wrote: ``This word [bourgeois---E.B.)
is often understood very incorrectly, narrowly and
unhistorically, it being associated (without distinction of historical
period) with a selfish defence of the interests of a minority."^^1^^
 Everyone knows that bourgeois writers, critics, and so on,

who fought against the reactionary and religious ideology
of feudalism, made a big contribution to the treasure-store of
world culture, and that the proletariat inherits and
continues all that is best in the sphere of culture under
capitalism.
 In class society, spiritual culture has a class character.

That is an axiom of Marxism-Leninism. But what does
that mean? It means above all that spiritual culture in a
class society always has a definite class ideological content.
It also means that spiritual culture in class society has
corresponding social functions and a practical class orientation.
But it should also be borne in mind that not all the
components of spiritual culture have a class character. Science,
for instance, is a most important component of culture.
Lenin relentlessly branded his ideological adversaries as
``learned salesmen of the capitalist class'', but added: ``For
instance, you will not make the slightest progress in the
investigation of new economic phenomena without making
use of the works of these salesmen."^^2^^ This is even truer of
the natural and technical sciences, which do contain some
elements of the class philosophical outlook, but cannot be
reduced to these because they always rest on facts, which
they generalise, and are in addition inconceivable without
the methods of research proper to this or that science.
 Lenin warned that ``not a single one" of the bourgeois

scientists who are capable of making very valuable
contributions in the special fields of chemistry, history or physics ``can
be trusted one iota'', when it comes to theoretical and
philosophical generalisations.^^3^^ At the same time, he urged to take
_-_-_
~^^2^^ Ibid., Vol. 14, p. 342.
~^^3^^ Ibid., p. 342.
261
and use in the interests of socialism the discoveries made by

these men and to separate the objective content of science (to
be inherited and advanced) from reactionary class philosophy
(to be cut off and discarded).
 In this context, let us recall, for instance, Lenin's attitude

to Taylor's system, which, he said, combined the refined
brutality of bourgeois exploitation and a number of
outstanding scientific achievements in analysing physical
movements in the labour process, elimination of incorrect and
superfluous movements, development of the most expedient
methods, and introduction of the best systems of accounting
and control. Assessing the , role of Taylor's system in
the scientific organisation of labour, Lenin wrote: ``The
Soviet Republic must at all costs adopt all that is
valuable in the achievements of science and technology in this
field."^^1^^
 Nor can socialism afford to take a nihilistic attitude to

the achievements of art in earlier epochs. The emergence
of humanistic art, for instance, is connected with the rise of
bourgeois relations, but it does not follow that humanism is
an exclusively ``bourgeois'' ideology, because from the
outset it was an expression of protest against the inhumanity
of bourgeois relations as well. The art of socialist society
inherits and critically remoulds these humanistic ideas,
develops on the basis of progressive artistic and aesthetic views
and creative realistic traditions, adopting the techniques
and artistic methods, and what is especially important,
inherits the works of art themselves which are unique in their
aesthetic value as specimens and monuments of the culture
of past ages.
 This leads us up to yet another highly important question,

that of the attitude of the cultural revolution to the culture
of present-day bourgeois society.
__ALPHA_LVL2__
2. Socialist Culture and Its ``Critics''
 Capitalism as a socio-economic formation, with its

culture, is in a sense something that is already on the
way out, while socialism, with its culture, represents
_-_-_
262
the future of mankind, a higher and qualitatively new stage
of development. However, in this period the two cultures
exist side by side, and so necessarily influence each other.
That is why the relationship between socialist culture and
the culture of modern bourgeois society can and must be seen
as yet another essential aspect of the problem of continuity,
which might be called the ``horizontal'' aspect (in contrast
to the ``vertical'', historical aspect).
 It would be quite wrong to take the retrospective view

of this relationship not only in theoretical but also in
practical terms, because once the element of continuity is excluded
from this relationship we should have to deny the need for
making critical use of the progressive elements in the culture
of modern bourgeois society. The present is always a point
at which the future is in contact with the past, and so has
to take over from it all that is valuable.
 It is quite obvious that in view of the implacable class

struggle which is going on in the world arena there can be
no `ìntegration'' of ideology, as the Right-wing revisionists
have advocated. Socialist ideology and bourgeois ideology
are antipodes and do not meet. Leonid Brezhnev said in his
speech at the International Meeting of Communist and
Workers' Parties: ``Peaceful coexistence does not extend
to the struggle of ideologies---this must be stressed most
categorically."^^1^^ Likewise there can be no ``convergence''
between the two cultures, socialist culture and bourgeois
culture.
 However, it would be wrong to reduce the problem of the

dialectical interaction of the two cultures to a struggle of
ideologies. Far from excluding, the struggle of ideologies
implies the need to make the utmost use `òf the achievements
of the engineering and culture created by large-scale
capitalism".^^2^^ This applies not only to capitalism as it existed
before the 1920s, but fully applies also to modern capitalism
and its culture.
 The ideologists of the ``cultural revolution" in China,

while urging a struggle against the whole of the `òld
culture'', as a ``feudal'' and ``bourgeois'' culture, have also
_-_-_

1969, p. 170.
263
issued the slogan of fighting present-day foreign culture,

which they regard either as `ìmperialist'' or ``revisionist''.
They declare: ``We must not only stamp out but also destroy
a corrupt culture like the imperialist and the modern
revisionist culture."^^1^^ It is now hard to find a West European
or American writer or scientist whom the Chinese
periodicals have not anathematised, and this includes James
Aldridge, Ernest Hemingway, Lion Feuchtwanger, Frederic
Joliot-Curie and John Bernal.
 The ``theorists'' of the ``great proletarian cultural

revolution" identify the concept of ``the culture of bourgeois
society" and ``bourgeois culture'', whereas it is necessary to
draw a distinction within each national culture between
the culture of the ruling class and the culture of the oppressed
classes, the more or less developed elements of democratic
and socialist culture.
 It is an incontestable fact that in highly developed

capitalist countries a proletarian literature has already long
since emerged and is successfully developing, a new
literature that has attained great ideological and artistic heights.
Among those who have helped to create it are outstanding
playwrights and producers, a host of remarkable musicians
and artists, who have sided with communism.
 Besides, many prominent workers in culture in the

capitalist world today now find themselves at the crossroad. They
have rejected the policy which leads to another world war,
and begin to realise that this policy springs from a definite
social order. In their creative work, these men and women---
sometimes hesitantly and inconclusively---express their
people's urge for peace and social progress. Some of them
have still a long way to go before accepting communism.
But whatever the differences of their views and nature of
their activity they all represent the democratic stream in
the spiritual life of modern bourgeois society. That is why
they should not be classed among the ``servitors'' of the
bourgeoisie. Some of these numerous democratic leaders may
subsequently turn to the Right, as Jules Romains once did
in the past, and John Steinbeck in our own day, but many
of them will continue on the hard and dangerous way of
struggle. Let us recall that Anatole France joined the
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Hsinhua News Agency Release, July 11, 1966.
264
Communist Party, Romain Rolland actively co-operated with the

Communists, and Pablo Picasso sided with communism.
 In their fight against ``bourgeois culture'', the Chinese

leaders discard the Marxist-Leninist criterion of the
dialectical, concrete historical assessment of cultural values; they
have clearly revised from the ``Left'' Lenin's proposition of
the two cultures within each national culture of bourgeois
society; they have rejected out of hand the culture of
bourgeois society as a whole, including its democratic elements,
and also the elements of socialist culture, taking shape within
the entrails of capitalist society; they have classed the new
culture of the socialist countries as ``bourgeois'' culture.
 Take the pamphlet entitled Some Questions Bearing on

the Literature of Modern Soviet Revisionism, which was
published in Peking in the summer of 1966. The contributors
to the pamphlet, which was put out for distribution at the
so-called extraordinary conference of Asian and African
writers (July 1966), attacked the article ``The Art of the
Heroic Epoch'',^^1^^ which said that the general line in the
development of literature in the 20th century consists in
assimilating and enriching the traditions of critical and
socialist realism---the traditions of Maxim Gorky, Martin
Andersen Nexo, Romain Rolland, Theodore Dreiser,
Thomas and Heinrich Mann, Pablo Neruda, Bertolt Brecht,
Mikhail Sholokhov, Leon Kruczkowski, Henri Barbusse,
Vladimir Mayakovsky, Vitezslav Nezval, Mihail Sadoveanu
and Johannes Becher. The two men who wrote the article
entitled `Èxtracts from the Statements of Sholokhov, a
Renegade Author'', Hsiang Hung and Wei Ning, said: ``The
present-day Soviet revisionists, with the help of their '
general line of development of literature in the 20th century',
which represents a mixture of revolutionary, non--
revolutionary and counter-revolutionary writers, and which makes no
distinction between friends and enemies... have in fact
tried to prevent the development of a truly socialist,
revolutionary literature of the 20th century."^^2^^
 The best writings of proletarian authors in the USA,

Britain and Italy have been labeled in China as ``revisionist''.
_-_-_
~^^1^^ See Kommunist No. 10, 1964.
~^^2^^ Some Questions Bearing on the Literature of Modern Soviet

Revisionism, Peking, 1966, p. 82 (in Chinese).
265
This is in fact a distortion of the propositions proclaimed

by the 8th Congress of the CPC to `ìnherit and comprehend
all that is useful in the culture of China and of foreign
countries''.
 Another fundamental error made by the vulgarisers of

Marxism, who reject the whole of present-day foreign
culture as an `ìmperialist culture'', consists in their
identification of the concepts of ``culture'' and of `ìdeology''.
These two concepts are in no sense identical, but we find
them identified in Mao's article `Òn New Democracy"
which said that `à given culture is the ideological reflection
of the politics and economy of a given society".^^1^^ Actually,
however, while ideology makes up the content of spiritual
culture in class society, and for that reason determines and
directs the development of every form of spiritual
production, it is in no sense a concept that is identical with the
concept of ``spiritual culture''.
 When V. Pletnyov, Chairman of the Central Committee

of the Proletcult,^^2^^ wrote in an article, `Òn the Ideological
Front'', which appeared in Pravda in 1922, that ``questions
of ideology are broader than questions of culture'', Lenin
made a note in the margin of this word ``broader''. A little
later, Pravda carried an article by Y. Yakovlev, entitled
`Òn Proletarian Culture and Proletcult'', which had been
written on the strength of Lenin's notes and which, in
addition, had been read and edited by Lenin himself.^^3^^
Concerning the statement that `ìdeology is broader than
culture'', the article said: ``This is a patent absurdity, because
culture, which brings together a number of social phenomena
(ranging from morality and law to science, art and
philosophy) is, of course, a more general concept than social
ideology."^^4^^ Consequently, `ìdeology'' is not broader but
narrower than ``culture''.
 On the strength of Lenin's ideas, the 20th Congress of
_-_-_
~^^2^^ Reference is to the Proletarian Culture Organisation, whose

members rejected the cultural legacy of the past and tried to create a special
``proletarian culture''. It flourished in 1919 and in the twenties went into
decline, and in 1932 ceased to exist.---Ed.
~^^3^^ Questions of Culture under Proletarian Dictatorship,

MoscowLeningrad, 1925, p. 3 (in Russian).
~^^4^^ Ibid., p. 22.
266
the CPSU made a scathing criticism of the vulgar theories

which held that the general tendency for capitalism to
stagnate allegedly rules out any progress in the sphere of
culture in the imperialist epoch. Those who close their eyes
to the achievements of culture abroad wittingly or
unwittingly help to slow down the development of culture in the
socialist society. Lenin believed that the epoch-making task
facing the proletariat after the take-over was ``turning the
sum total of the very rich, historically inevitable and
necessary for us store of culture and knowledge and technique
accumulated by capitalism from an instrument of capitalism
into an instrument of socialism".^^1^^
 The Chinese leaders have not only rejected everything

that is progressive in the culture of modern bourgeois society,
including the elements of democratic and socialist culture,
which are taking shape within it, but have also urged
repudiation of the achievements in the culture of the socialist
countries.
 Mao's followers have accused Soviet cultural personalities

of ``revisionism'' and ``bourgeois degeneration'', and this
applies above all to those who attack militarism and urge
efforts to prevent a disastrous nuclear war, among them
Sholokhov, Simonov, Tvardovsky and Ehrenburg.
 The Maoists declare that the `ìdeology of survival"

permeates such works as Sholokhov's ``The Fate of a Man'',^^2^^
and Simonov's The Living and the Dead and Days and
Nights. They say that the Soviet writers Aitmatov,
Miezelaitis and Rozhdestvensky are ``revisionists'' who constitute
a ``special detachment of US imperialism and help to
undermine the revolutionary wars of Asian and African peoples''.
An article by Hsieh Shui-fu denigrates all Soviet writers
who have written works about the Great Patriotic War,
declaring that ``they have taken the path of betrayal of the
revolutionary traditions of Soviet literature ... and are
vehicles of ideas asserting no more than the need to save
one's life and unwillingness to carry on the revolution,
vehicles of ideas asserting the happiness of the individual
_-_-_
~^^2^^ An article about Sholokhov's story, ``The Fate of a Man'', by

Chi Hsueh-tung and Cheng Tse-ping, said: ``The story is a black
banner of modern revisionism in literature and art" (see Jenmin jihpao,
May 13, 1966).
267
and indifference to the country's prosperity. These works

can only paralyse and undermine the militant will of the
peoples fighting in defence of peace and against imperialism,
and in practice play the part of accomplices of imperialism
in preparing another war".^^1^^
 The best Soviet films---Clear Skies, Ballad of a Soldier,

On the Seven Winds, Ivan's Childhood, The Cranes Are
Flying, Nine Days of One Year, among others---have ``
merited" similar assessments in the Chinese press. The film critic
Fang Liang says: ``Some revisionists .. . have deliberately
distorted the true face of war by producing a number of
reactionary films ... these films extol pacifism,
capitulationism, and preach the philosophy of survival."^^2^^ Among the
``revisionist films" the Chinese film critics have managed to
include Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, Don Quixote, The Idiot,
Eugene Onegin, The Captain's Daughter, Queen of Spades
and Resurrection.
 There has been particular indignation in China over the

struggle for peaceful coexistence, against another world war,
and the consequent policy of cultural contacts with the
capitalist countries, which the Soviet people has pursued under
the leadership of the Communist Party, and in which workers
of Soviet culture quite naturally take an active part. The
Maoists condemn the cultural exchanges between the USSR
and the USA, and the publication of the works of foreign
writers in the Soviet Union on the plea that this allegedly
helps the `ìnfiltration'' of bourgeois ideology.
 The attacks on Soviet literature and art and on

outstanding cultural personalities are an aspect of the broad
antiSoviet propaganda campaign which has been carried on by
its sponsors for a long time behind the cover of the ``
cultural revolution''. By now the whole world has realised that
this campaign has far-reaching political aims. There is no
doubt at all that one of these aims is to deify Mao, to stamp
out creative thinking, and to try to eliminate all opposition
to the adventurist and chauvinistic policy which is being
pursued for the purpose of realising the hegemonistic plans
now being fostered by the CPC leadership.
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Hsieh Shui-fu, `Ùnder the Cover of Party Approach'', Wenhsueh

pinglung No. 5, 1965; see also Kuang Chiun's article, ``The Mouthpiece
of the Revisionist Grouping'', Chiefangchiun pao, July 9, 1966.
~^^2^^ Wenyi pao No. 5, 1965.
268
__ALPHA_LVL2__
3. The ``Cultural Revolution''
 in China and the Intelligentsia
 The experience of the USSR and other socialist countries

shows that in the period of socialist and communist
construction the role of the intelligentsia in society acquires special
importance. This is due not only to the scientific and
technological revolution which is taking place in all the
advanced countries, but also to the fact that in contrast to
antagonistic class formations socialism does not arise or
develop spontaneously but on the basis of a conscious
application of the objective laws of social development which
men have comprehended. In these conditions, the activity
of those who engage in brainwork turns out to be the most
important factor without which it is impossible for society
to function normally.
 One of the main specific features in the emergence of a

socialist intelligentsia is that it is shaped mainly after the
triumph of the socialist revolution. Whereas the bourgeoisie
was in a position to build up a numerous intelligentsia long
before it had taken over, and as new productive forces
emerged, the proletariat has very few intellectuals on its
side before the triumph of the socialist revolution, and these
are in the first place professional revolutionaries.
 Following the overthrow of the bourgeoisie and the

establishment of proletarian dictatorship it is faced with
gigantic tasks in creating the new, socialist society. Quite
naturally, the small group of proletarian intellectuals who
sided with the people before or just after the revolution,
cannot cope with these tasks in full. That is why one of
the most important tasks of the cultural revolution is to
build up a new, socialist intelligentsia. However, this cannot
be done in a short time. That is why there arises the task
of making use of bourgeois specialists. In the early Soviet
years, Lenin taught the Party how to go on fighting the
counter-revolutionary elements, while creating an atmosphere
of comradely co-operation for honest specialists who were
loyal to the Soviet state, how to carry on painstaking and
systematic efforts to involve them in the work of the Soviet
power, being prepared to pay them high salaries and make
bolder use of their knowledge and experience, learn from
them how to manage the economy, while educating them
269
ideologically. Lenin wrote: ``We cannot build it [Soviet

power---Ed.] if we do not utilise such a heritage of capitalist
culture as the intellectuals."^^1^^
 But it was also impossible to build the new society without
fostering intellectuals who came from the ranks of the people.
This was a much more intricate and difficult task than the
winning over of bourgeois specialists for the revolution. It
required above all the raising of the people's general cultural
standard so as to enable socialist intellectuals ultimately to
rise from its ranks.
 It goes without saying that the fulfilment of these tasks

proves to be the more difficult the more backward,
economically and culturally, is a country taking the way of socialist
revolution.
 In the early years of the people's power in China a great

deal was done to overcome the people's age-old
backwardness: illiteracy was reduced, the working people's cultural
standards raised and national intellectuals trained. As the
revolution in China entered its seventh year, there were
already 3,840,000 specialists working in the national
economy, with about 100,000 of them trained to the highest
standards.^^2^^ In a report at a conference on the question of
the intelligentsia, called by the CPC Central Committee on
January 14, 1956, Chou En-lai said that the intelligentsia
was a ``great force in socialist construction" in five principal
spheres: scientific research, education, engineering, public
health, culture and art. Invaluable assistance was given to
the Chinese People's Republic by other socialist countries,
the Soviet Union above all. Thousands of Soviet specialists
helped the Chinese people to implement the plans of
national economic development, while many thousands of
Chinese young men and women studied at Soviet institutions
of higher learning and were trained to become high-skilled
specialists.
 However, later, in violation of the decisions adopted by

the 8th Congress of the CPC, and in contravention of the
Party's general line, Mao and his followers acted in such
a manner that Soviet specialists were recalled from China
_-_-_
~^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol 28, p. 215.
~^^2^^ Chou En-lai, On the Question of the Intelligentsia, Peking, 1956,
pp. 14--15 (in Chinese).
270
and Chinese students left the USSR. At the same time, a

campaign was mounted in China against ``Soviet revisionism"
and its `àgents'' in the midst of the Chinese intelligentsia.
In the course of this campaign, a succession of draconian
measures was aimed against workers in Chinese culture (
numerically still very small), as a prelude to the ``great
cultural revolution" in China.
 In 1945, Mao declared that intellectuals should be

`èsteemed as valuable assets of the nation and society".^^1^^ In
1948, he said: `Ìt is entirely right that we should value
intellectuals, for without revolutionary intellectuals the
revolution cannot succeed."^^2^^ From 1964 to 1966, that is,
just before the decisions were taken by the llth Plenary
Meeting of the CPC Central Committee marking the start
of the ``great proletarian cultural revolution'', the present
CPC leadership scrapped the old line and mounted a
succession of attacks against the intelligentsia, primarily against
workers in the art and the humanities, that is, against the
overwhelming majority of intellectuals. As a rule, the
intellectuals in the scientific and technological fields,
constituting a small minority of the workers by brain, were spared
any attack, and the Hungweipings were even officially
forbidden to touch them in any way. This must have been
motivated chiefly by the Maoists' militaristic policy and was,
for a very good reason, connected in the relevant instructions
for the ``great cultural revolution" with China's nuclear
blasts.
 It is true that before the full-scale offensive against the

intelligentsia was started in late 1964, there had been attacks
from 1951 to 1964, like the criticism of the film entitled The
Life of Wu Hsun, the campaign over the analysis of the
classical novel, Dream in the Red Chamber, the fight against
Hu Feng and his ``counter-revolutionary clique'', the fight
in 1957 against the ``bourgeois Rightists'', and so on. But
in scale and effect, the drive from 1964 to 1966 surpassed
all these attacks and ``critical campaigns" taken together.
 In the course of this unprecedented drive against the

intellectuals in China, there was another ``reappraisal of
values": all the traditions of revolutionary Chinese culture
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works, Vol. 4, pp. 299--300.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 32.
271
of the 1920s and 1930s were overthrown, the very traditions

which had been considered the ``pride of China's national
literature and art''.
 Among the victims of the fierce ``discussion'' that followed

was the film In February, in Early Spring, a screen
adaptation by the well-known producer Hsieh Teh-li of a novel
by Jou Shih (Chao Ping-fu), a Communist writer shot in
1931; and the works of Yin Fu, Hu Yeh-pin, Li Wei-hsien
and Feng Keng, who had been shot together with Jou Shih
by the Kuomintang, and who, according to Lu Hsun, ``had
written with their own blood the first page of Chinese
proletarian literature''. The Maoist critics also attacked the
writings of Mao Tun (in connection with the screening of his
story, ``Lin''s Shop'') and the writings of all the authors who
had been grouped round Lu Hsun in the 1930s. The final
blast against ``the so-called literature and art of the 1930s"
came from an editorial article in Chiefangchiun pao on
April 18, 1966, which was subsequently reprinted by all
the newspapers and Hungchih. It called for an end ``to the
blind faith in the so-called literature and art of the 1930s'',
which were characterised as an `ànti-Party, anti-socialist
black line opposing the thought of Mao Tse-tung".^^1^^
 In 1965 and 1966, the Chinese press was virtually swamped
with a flood of ``denunciatory'' articles against leading
Chinese intellectuals, chiefly historians, philosophers,
economists, workers of cultural and ideological
establishments, and against all those who used their own heads and
had ``directly or indirectly expressed doubt about the
correctness of Mao's line. It is highly indicative that the hardest
blows were dealt above all at the members of the older
generation, active Party members like the playwright Tien
Han, Deputy Chairman of the All-China Association of
Literary and Art Circles, the script writer Hsia Yen, Deputy
Minister of Culture Lin Mo-han, Prorector of the Higher
Party School under the CPC Central Committee Yang
Hsiang-chen, and others. Mao Tun, the world-famed writer,
was removed from the post of Minister of Culture, which he
had held since 1949.
 But there was ``logic'' in this madness, for those who had
gone through the great school of revolutionary activity were
_-_-_
272
most consistent in adhering to Marxism-Leninism and

internationalism. All of them were variously accused of being
politically unreliable and subjected to different repressions,
like humiliating ``criticism'', dismissal from their posts, and
deportation to remote rural areas.
 Jenmin jihpao admitted that in 18 months of 1965 and

1966, 160,000 intellectuals were sent to the countryside for
``physical re-education''. Subsequently, at the height of the
``cultural revolution'', at least 400,000 more ``hostile
elements" and members of their families went the same way.
Of course, not all of them were intellectuals, but they were
engaged in creative work. As a result, the overwhelming
majority of the best members of China's intelligentsia were
for all practical purposes subjected to repression.
 The 1964--1966 campaign against the intelligentsia, a sort

of prelude for the ``great proletarian cultural revolution'',
like the ``cultural revolution" itself, announced at the llth
Plenary Meeting of the CPC Central Committee, cannot be
understood unless they are viewed in the context of the
Maoist domestic economic policy and foreign policy.
 In their efforts to cover up the collapse of the ``Great

Leap Forward" policy, the failure of the people's communes
and the economic difficulties which sprang from the
adventurist domestic policy, together with foreign-policy fiascos,
the present CPC leaders used the ``cultural revolution" as
a cover for their massacre of Party cadres and intellectuals
who took a critical view of Mao's line. The ``struggle against
modern revisionism" in Chinese literature in the course of
the ``proletarian cultural revolution" was in fact a political
fight against the leading workers in Chinese culture, the
Party's internationalist cadres, the most revolutionary
sections of China's youth, and all the forward-looking Chinese
who urged loyalty to the ideas of Marxism-Leninism.
 The decisions of the llth Plenary Meeting of the CPC

Central Committee and the practice of the ``cultural
revolution" showed the world that Mao and his entourage had
abandoned Marxism-Leninism and the socialist camp. There
was good reason why the anti-Soviet campaign flared up
afresh following that plenary meeting. The Chinese leaders
did their utmost to worsen relations between the Soviet
Union and China, a sinister scheme which was to be
implemented behind the smokescreen of the ``cultural revolution''.
18---1362
273
 In 1964, the journal of the CPSU Central Committee,

Kommunist, gave an assessment of the nihilistic policy of
the CPC leadership on cultural values. An editorial article
in the journal said: `Ìt is now very hard even to imagine
the vast damage the Chinese people will suffer in the sphere
of culture from this policy of national isolation, the urge to
separate oneself from the cultural life of the world, especially
of the socialist countries."^^1^^
 Three years later, with the blessings of the ``great

helmsman'', the Hungweipings were let loose on their rampage,
destroying the ``demons and monsters of the old ruling
classes'', the Greek, Roman and Chinese treasures at the
Peking Museum and the Central Academy of Arts, the
Pushkin monument in Shanghai, and the bookshops and art
shops with their ``feudal'' and ``revisionist'' works by the
masters of world culture. Today, most journals and
newspapers in China are not being published, virtually no
scientific and art books are being printed, because all the paper
goes into the publication of Mao's Little Red Book and
eulogies of the great leader. Feature films have not been
shown in the country for over five years. Cinema-goers may
see only newsreels about government receptions, parades,
festivities and sports events.
 No sign of life comes from the modern drama, or the

dialogue drama, as it is known in China. For several years
now, the ``revolutionised'' Peking Musical Theatre has been
running the same plays which had been prepared ``with the
personal participation of Chiang Chang, and which glorify
her husband's ``radiant thought''. The ballet is regarded as
a ``counter-revolutionary'' art, but two ballet pieces---``The
Red Women's Company" and the ``Grey-Haired Girl"---are
still on: they have been ``revolutionised'' through the
introduction of a chorus which keeps singing songs about Mao
Tse-tung.
 At Peking University, the students keep learning Mao's

statements by rote. Following the ``re-organisation'' of the
education system, all the departments at the Peking
Technical Institute of Forestry have been abolished and all the
teachers and students organised in ``companies''. In a country
_-_-_
~^^1^^ `Àgainst Dogmatism and Vulgarisation in Literature and Art'',

Kummunist No. 9, 1964, p. 14.
274
where hundreds of millions of people are still unable to

read or write all the schools have been closed down.
Academic centres, research institutions and laboratories have been
declared a ``battlefield''. There, ``bourgeois reactionary
authorities'', scientists who do not accept the ``thought of Mao
Tse-tung'', are being ``winkled out of the dark corners''.
Professor Lu Ping, Rector of Peking University, who dared
to teach the students ``some kind of chemical formulas"
instead of the ``thought of Mao Tse-tung" was killed, while
Professor Hua Loo-keng, Director of the Institute of
Mathematics of the Academy of Sciences, was subjected to
repressions, and so on.
 Everything is being done to fence off the Chinese people

not only from world civilisation and from the advanced
experience of the socialist community, but also from China's
own cultural heritage. Thus, Chen Po-ta, the former head
of the group for ``cultural revolution" affairs under the
CPC Central Committee, declared that `ìt is better for old
books to be read by only a small number of men, and only
for the purpose of subjecting such literature to criticism
and supplying the fertiliser for producing correct ideas in
the heads of the new generation of Chinese''. This ``sage''
statement links up with Mao's own sentiment that ``the more
books you read, the stupider you become. There is no point
at all in much learning.''
 Of the 13,000 book titles issued over the last 50 years by
the Chunghua Publishers only 500 titles have been permitted
to remain. The rest are being barbarously destroyed,
including classical philosophic, literary and historical works. In
the recent period, some 500,000 old editions of books have
been destroyed only by the central and the southern branches
of the Hsinhua shutien Publishers. Family libraries that had
been handed down from generation to generation have been
destroyed in the flames.
 In recent years, no work of fiction has been published in

the country and libraries and museums have been closed.
At the same time, the plan for the publication of Mao's
Selected Works, his Little Red Book, and collections of his
poems, was fulfilled `àhead of schedule'', reprinting 3,000
million copies. ``This is a brilliant achievement,'' said
Hsinhua News Agency. ``This is an unprecedented triumph
for the cultural revolution.'' There was a time when on New
18*
275
Year's Day Hsinhua reported the overfulfilment of national

economic plans and successes in education and public health,
and this was a source of joy for all the friends of the Chinese
people. Ever since Mao's ``special line" was adopted and
the ``cultural revolution" started in China, Hsinhua makes
no mention at all of five-year plans and does not publish
any concrete data on their fulfilment.
 The ``cultural revolution" showed that Mao's followers

regard the intelligentsia and all workers by brain in general
as a force hostile to the Chinese people, a force which could
easily take the way of ``revisionism'' and ``bourgeois
degeneration''. It turns out that there is only one way to
prevent this, and that is to make these men do manual
labour, because it is the embodiment of everything that is
truly popular and revolutionary. Manual labour is the one
and only cure-all for the ``degeneration'' of the Chinese
intelligentsia. The ``theoretical'' arguments for this were set
out by Mao as follows: `Ìn order to determine what this
or that member of the intelligentsia is---a revolutionary, a
non-revolutionary or a counter-revolutionary---there is only
one decisive criterion: one needs to know whether he is
willing to coalesce with the workers' and peasants' masses
and whether he does in fact coalesce with them."^^1^^
 The practical implication here is that the intellectual must

be made to do manual labour on a par with the worker and
the peasant. According to Mao's view, the intellectual's task
is to sink to the cultural level of the peasants and to adopt
their way of life, instead of passing on his knowledge to
the working people and helping them to raise their cultural
and political standards. Here is, for instance, how Hsinhua
News Agency presented the ``sobering up" of one Chinese
intellectual. He had come from a poor family, but after being
long out of touch with manual labour, the callosities on his
palms became thinner and his feelings for the poor and
lower middle peasants shallower. Having now arrived with
his whole family permanently to live and work in a
production brigade, he took off the uniform of the cadre worker
and put on peasant garb. He wore the straw shoes he had
woven himself, and began to work with the peasants. He
said thoughtfully: ``The thicker the callosities on your palms,
_-_-_
~^^1^^ Hsinhua Press Release, November 5, 1968.
276
the deeper your feelings for the poor and lower middle
peasants, and the more strength you have in fighting against
revisionism and for its prevention."^^1^^
 The Maoists insist that manual labour can help ``change
the ideology and feelings of the intelligentsia and
revolutionise their consciousness".^^2^^ The Chinese press quoted, for
instance, these assertions by the cadre workers who went
to the rural areas to engage in manual labour: ``This time
we have really made a beginning in revolutionising our
consciousness by leaving our families, schools and offices
and entering the homes of the poor and lower middle
peasants."^^3^^
 Just after the ``cultural revolution" a campaign was

started in China to dispatch young people who could read
and write to the countryside to make them ``merge with
the poor and lower middle peasants''. In this context,
Jenmin jihpao wrote: ``The boundless expanses of the
villages are universities for the remoulding of literate
young people."^^4^^ The Chinese press has repeatedly stressed
that literate young people are sent to the countryside to
accept a new education from the poor and lower middle
peasants, because ``when out of touch with manual labour
one may be infected with revisionist ideology".^^5^^
__ALPHA_LVL2__
4. The Maoist Cultural Policy After
 the ``Cultural Revolution''
 New phenomena are now observable in China against the

general background of her cultural development.
 Peking booksellers propose to readers a number of books

on China's history, published during the early years of the
People's Republic, chief of them being China s Ancient
History by Fan Wen-Ian and Ten Critical Articles by Kuo
Mo-jo. The journal Wen-wu has seen the day of light, its
first issue summing up the results of archaeological research
in recent years. Bookstores have on display the book Notes
_-_-_
~^^1^^
Hsinhua Press Release, October 31, 1968.

~^^2^^
Kwangming jihpao, January 17, 1969.

~^^3^^
Hsinhua Press Release, October 31, 1968.

~^^4^^ Jenmin jihpao, January 17, 1969.
~^^5^^
Hsinhua Press Release, January 5, 1969.
277
on the Stone, a variant of the popular classical novel, Hung

Lou Meng (Dream of the Red Chamber), which was published
in 1958 but until recently was banned as a ``black'', ``feudal''
and `ànti-popular'' work of art. The journal Hungchih now
urges the publishing houses ``to select some classical literary
works, both Chinese and foreign, and to plan their
publication''. This is the first-ever (since the ``cultural revolution'')
public appeal to the up-till-now-banned classical literature.
 Late in 1971, Kuo Mo-jo published his new book Li Po
and Tu Fu, devoted to the two well-known poets of Chinese
medieval times. Some popular science books and stories have
made their appearance. Even fiction is now being advertised,
the forthcoming publication of some of works of art has been
announced in the press. The higher educational
establishments have resumed their functioning. All this shows that
there is some revival of activity on the cultural front of
China today.
 The reasons of this phenomenon must be sought in the

internal and external political factors. The Maoist idea of
bringing up ``men-cogs'' has in effect flopped. The specimens
of Maoist ``culture'' did not bring about the desired results.
The rank-and-file person has remained indifferent to these
specimens, for he was reared up in other traditions. In
particular, the Chinese people have been fond of the ancient
theatre from time immemorial. The national theatre was
used to acquaint the illiterate masses with the heroes of
national history, with ancient legends, with concepts of good
and evil. Thousands of theatrical troupes staged performances
in villages all over China. The art of professional actor was
bequeathed, as a rule, from father to son, from generation
to generation. All family members and apprentices used to
participate in theatrical performances. Although their acting
was within the strict framework of national traditions, they
played their parts in a masterly fashion. The ``cultural
revolution" has put an end to popular art in China and the most
ardent and single-hearted spectator in the world has been
deprived of his theatre.
 The poor set of ``model performances" could not,

naturally, satisfy the needs of the exacting Chinese spectator.
Neither could he be content with Maoist imitations in other
fields of literature and art. All this could not but trouble the
Peking leaders, since their policy has considerably restricted
278
the possibility of brainwashing the masses. Hence the need

for definite changes in the sphere of culture.
 In addition to this, there are reasons of an external

political nature. The Maoist leadership have been trying to
present themselves as the mouthpiece of the `òppressed part
of humanity" and to pass off China's social development as
an example to other nations of the world. But it was no
longer possible to lay these claims and simultaneously deprive
themselves of the possibility of propping them up by
achievements in the sphere of culture. The most far-sighted
politicians in Peking seem to have realised that the destruction of
cultural values and the suppression of the creativity of
intellectuals during the ``cultural revolution" have done the
Maoists an ill turn, once they tried to influence public opinion in
other countries. Even the newly-free nations have already
produced real masterprieces with a deep social content. So
in the eyes of their people the ``specimens'' of Maoist culture
look like effete and awkward imitations.
 The present changes in the sphere of culture are being

camouflaged with public glorification of ``victories'' scored
by the same cultural policy which Peking has to renounce
because of its patent failure. For instance, the Chinese
periodical press has announced that Hao Jan's novel The Sun
Shines Bright is to be reprinted. Its three volumes were first
published long before the ``cultural revolution''. Although it
describes the Chinese village in terms of ``Mao''s thought'',
until recently it was banned from circulation among readers.
Now the author is writing another novel on this topic and
the press mentions this fact as though the country had never
been the venue of the Hungweipings' violence, and for six
years Hao Jan had been writing in peace.
 In its issue of January 8, 1972, Jenmin jihpao reports

about the visit paid by its correspondent to Peking
University and the talk he had with some of its professors. One
may learn astonishing things from this article, e.g., that the
``cultural revolution" allegedly promoted the progress of
science and education in China, while it is common
knowledge that the Chinese higher educational establishments did
not function during this ``revolution''. This testifies to the
strong effort of the Maoist leadership to reject the
accusation of striking a heavy blow at Chinese culture.
 The Maoists are applying the policy of bringing a certain
279
part of cultural workers and social scientists back to active

service only to those persons who have never been in
opposition to the present Chinese leadership. One can observe
startling developments in this context. The same issue of
Jenmin jihpao (January 8, 1972) carried an interview given
by Prof. Fen Yu-lan, a well-known bourgeois philosopher
who created in the 1920s the reactionary system of
NeoConfucianism. This professor, whose books have been more
than once translated in the USA, is praising in this interview
``Mao's thought" and the ``cultural revolution''. He speaks
and writes in the press on behalf of the Chinese philisophers,
whereas such Chinese Marxists as Hou Wai-lu, Sung
Tingkuo, Jen Chi-yu, Pan Tzu-nien and others are deprived of
such an opportunity.^^1^^
 The Maoists are not going to cease adapting the works of
literature and art to their anti-socialist policy. This is proved
in particular by the latest book written by Kuo Mo-jo. Up
till now there are no objectively verified data concerning the
place of birth of Li Po, though Chinese scholars conducted
their research for many centuries. Yet in defiance of
historical truth Kuo Mo-jo begins his book with the phrase: ``Li
Po was born in Central Asia.'' What purpose lies behind
the assertion that Li Po's homeland is the region of Lake
Balkhash and what reasons are there to distort the
universally known facts? The answer is: to substantiate the right of
the Maoist leadership to lay claim to Soviet Central Asia.
 The foregoing warrants the conclusion that it is difficult

to overestimate the damage inflicted by the ideology and
practice of the ``cultural revolution" on the world communist
movement.
 These are only some of the truly tragic results of what is
now known in China as the ``great proletarian cultural
revolution''. It is hard to exaggerate the harm that has been
done to the world communist movement by the ideology and
practices of the ``cultural revolution" in China. By
_-_-_
~^^1^^ This circumstance is, no doubt, dictated by foreign-policy

considerations. Since China is drawing nearer to the Western imperialist
powers, the Maoists need to show that they favour the bourgeois
intelligentsia and that the ``cultural revolution" has not affected them.
It is not without interest to note that Fen Yu-lan was among the few
Chinese intellectuals who were present at the reception given in honour
of President Nixon during his sojourn in Peking in February 1972.
280
distorting Marxism-Leninism, and trampling on the experience of

socialist cultural revolutions in other countries, the Chinese
leaders throw a freakish light on the noble ideals of socialism
and undermine the prestige of the world revolutionary
movement.
 The Communists can show the working people of the

world what the genuine cultural revolution is and the true
attitude of the socialist revolution to culture and the cultural
heritage by exposing the Chinese leadership's anti-Marxist,
anti-Leninist line in the sphere of culture. The example of
the Soviet Union and of the peoples of other socialist
countries advancing along the Leninist path has provided
the world with convincing proof that socialism brings
mankind a new culture, but that the culture of the new
world emerges as the legitimate successor to all the best
works of society in pre-socialist formations, instead of
arising somewhere off the highway of world civilisation.
 It is impossible to go on to communism without using

the cultural legacy stored up by mankind over the centuries.
Assimilation of this legacy---not by select individuals, but
by everyone---is a necessary condition for producing an
abundant spiritual culture, and constitutes a most
important prerequisite for the development of the full man.
There can be no cultural revolution without such creative
assimilation and utmost development by the people of the
cultural attainments of past epochs and of the present-day
bourgeois society, and without the Leninist attitude to the
intelligentsia. The true purpose of the cultural revolution
is to create the culture of communism which, as the
Programme of the CPSU says, by `àbsorbing and developing
all the best that has been created by world culture, will
be a new, higher stage in the cultural progress of mankind".^^1^^
_-_-_
~^^1^^ The Road to Communism, Moscow, 1961, p. 576.
19---1362
[281]
__ALPHA_LVL1__
CONCLUSION
 We have considered some aspects of Maoism and have
tried to show how it looks in theory and practice. Summing
up what has been said one could define it as a specific
pseudo-revolutionary, chauvinistic trend in the world
revolutionary movement.
 As we have tried to show, Maoism consists of conceptions

and notions characteristic of non-proletarian social groups
in Chinese society: the petty-bourgeois intelligentsia, the
petty-bourgeois urban sections, and the poor sections of the
peasantry. These conceptions and notions are largely
determined by the status of their vehicles in the country's
sociohistorical structure and by their cultural and ideological
traditions. They contain ideas borrowed from non-socialist
thinking abroad. In addition, Maoism also contains a whole
range of nominally Marxist propositions which, however,
lose their real meaning because they are incorrectly
understood or applied.
 It would be wrong to say that Maoism stems directly from

non-Marxist ideological trends. It emerged in definite
historical conditions and has its own specific features.
However, Maoism is akin to other pseudo-revolutionary
ideological trends, because those spring from similar-type
socio-economic structures.
282
 Thus, for instance, the Maoists, like the Trotskyites, have
no faith in the strength of the working class and its capacity
to give a lead to the peasantry along the socialist path,
although this is expressed in different ways. Trotsky saw
the peasantry as a petty-bourgeois mass hostile to socialism,
a mass which in Soviet Russia was, sooner or later, to clash
with the working class, because the latter was allegedly
incapable of establishing a strong alliance with the peasantry.
By contrast, Mao believes the peasantry to be the most
consistently revolutionary and constructive force, capable of
giving China a lead along the way to socialism and
communism. However, this discrepancy is more outward,
because ultimately the Trotskyites and the Maoists equally
ignore the historical mission of the working class and
minimise its leading role in society.
 The Trotskyites and the Maoists have also much in

common in the methods they advocate for socialist
construction, for these are based on subjectivism and voluntarism
and lack of any scientific understanding of the laws
governing the development of the socialist economy.
 The Trotskyites sought to introduce militarised forms and

methods of organising production, and held that such
production was to be based on forced labour. They also insisted
on the retention of the civil-war methods of strictly
regulating distribution of the aggregate social product, with the
maintenance of low levels of consumption. Trotsky insisted
on a levelling of the working people's consumption together
with the principle of shock-work, that is, utmost
mobilisation of efforts by workers and peasants in production. This
was categorically rejected by Lenin, who wrote: `Ìt is all
wrong. Shock-work is preference, but it is nothing without
consumption... . Preference in shock-work implies preference
in consumption as well."^^1^^
 The Maoists have reproduced Trotskyite ideas, and looked

to forced labour, the establishment of labour armies, and
the use of military methods in the national economy.
 The method of administration by fiat, of orders and the

use of force was expressed in Trotsky's thesis about ``
tightening the screws" and ``shaking out the trade unions'', a
_-_-_
283
method the Trotskyites wanted to be turned into the basis

of the Party's domestic policy in its relations with the
working people. The Chinese leaders have reproduced this
method on an extended scale.
 Disbandment of trade unions, abolition of

democratic principles in life, ``revolutionisation'' of industrial
enterprises with the aid of military units, and uninterrupted
purge campaigns---these are only some of the methods
the Maoists have used. Trotsky tried artificially to
accelerate the world revolution by means of a world war. Mao
has pursued the same aim, but by means of a ``people's
war''.
 There is also much in common between Maoism and

anarchism. Let us recall that anarchism was the fullest
expression of petty-bourgeois revolutionism at the dawn of
the proletarian movement, when the proletariat's struggle
was still embryonic and was still dominated by the forms
which occur at the initial stages of the proletarian
movement. Lenin said: `Ànarchism is a product of despair. The
psychology of the unsettled intellectual or the vagabond
and not of the proletarian."^^1^^
 Among the characteristic features of anarchism is the

demand for instant revolution and blind faith in the
miraculous power of activity. Its view of the revolution above all
as an act of universal destruction goes hand in hand with
fairly hazy ideas about constructive activity after the
revolution. This makes anarchism akin to Maoism, which sees the
revolution and the post-revolutionary period as consisting of
nothing but destruction.
 What the Maoists and the Blanquists have in common is

that both start from the assumption that a bold revolutionary
sally by conspirators (armed uprising, rebel action) can
provide the impetus, the spark that will ignite the
conflagration---a massive uprising for the triumph of social revolution.
Lenin said these Blanquist tactics were a ``Blanquist
gamble" and ``~a game of taking over power''. Both Blanquism
and Maoism are characterised by conspiratorial tactics based
on action only by the top leadership, without any
consideration of objective conditions.
 There is also a great deal that is common to the Maoists
_-_-_
284
and the Narodniks. The assumption that the peasantry is

imbued with ``socialist instincts'', that the village commune
is an embryo of socialism, and that peasant riots will save
mankind from capitalism and exploitation---all these
Narodnik political propositions have been re-issued in a new
version by the Maoists, who have visions of building
communism first in the countryside, and who consider the
peasantry to be the greatest constructive force. The Maoists
regard the urge on the part of the poor section of the Chinese
peasants to have egalitarian distribution as signifying a high
level of communist awareness.
 Maoism also reveals some Bonapartist features, like its

reliance on the militarists and its tacking between
classes and social groups. The Maoists have borrowed a great
deal from Confucius and his followers. Confucius believed
that man's moral improvement was the best means of doing
away with social injustice in society. This Confucian dogma
was adopted by Mao, who holds that if the Chinese studied
his articles---``Serve the People'', `Ìn Memory of N. Bethune"
and ``Yui Kung Has Moved the Mountains"---all their vital
problems would be solved. Like Confucius, Mao has visions
of a ``society of justice" which is to be set up by educating
the Chinese people in a spirit of asceticism and privation,
instead of tackling economic problems.
 We believe these are the characteristic features of Maoism:
 First, eclecticism. This is natural because, as we have

said, Maoism consists of different, sometimes mutually
exclusive, concepts and propositions.
 Second, primitivism and oversimplification, verging on
distortion of various propositions of scientific theory.
 Third, a demagogically utilitarian and pragmatic approach

to theoretical propositions. Maoism regards philosophy as
a narrowly utilitarian instrument to be used for the
achievement of definite aims, instead of a methodological basis for
working out correct strategy and tactics, policy and
slogans.
 When considering the eclecticism, primitivism and

utilitarianism of Maoism the following points should be borne
in mind. Maoism exists on two ``levels'': one is for the broad
masses, and the other for a narrower group of persons, for
the military-bureaucratic elite; there are two ``truths'': one
is for general consumption, for the Party rank-and-file, the
285
masses of workers and peasants, and the other, for Mao's

entourage. The second ``truth'' is a fairly coherent system
of views concerning the functioning and structure of
social power, the principles of economic policy, and the
rules governing relations in society and the Party, and
so on.
 Fourth, Great-Han chauvinism. Many Maoist propositions

are of a clearly chauvinistic tenor and are designed to back
up the universal importance of Chinese experience and, in
consequence, China's messianic role in the world
revolutionary process and in the whole of world history, and to
justify the political practices of the present Chinese
leadership. Theoretically, their chauvinism is substantiated, the
Maoists argue, by the shift of the centre of the world
revolutionary movement to China. One newspaper declared:
``China is the centre of world revolution. In the past, the
centre of history lay entirely in the West, but now it has
shifted to China. China has become not only the political
and economic centre, but also the cultural centre. It is unique
in the whole world. In future the centre of science
and technology will also shift to China. . . . People's China,
armed with the thought of Mao Tse-tung, will inevitably
become the political, economic, cultural, scientific and
technological centre."^^1^^
 Brezhnev's speech at the International Meeting of

Communist and Workers' Parties in Moscow in June 1969,
specifically drew attention to the connection between the
hegemonism of the present Chinese leadership and its
Great-Power aspirations.
 Great-Han chauvinism is indissolubly connected with

anti-Sovietism. It is expressed above all in the fierce
attacks on Lenin's Party, which, according to the Mao group,
stands in the way of their hegemonistic aspirations. Here
is how the Maoists' logic runs: in order to impose their
doctrines on the international revolutionary movement and
to subordinate all countries and peoples to their political
and ideological diktat, there is need to ``crush'' the CPSU.
For that purpose, the most incredible, slanderous inventions
have been circulated about the `àggressiveness of the USSR"
and a ``Soviet-American deal''.
_-_-_
~^^1^^
Hungse haiyuan, January 24, 1968.
286
 Brezhnev's report on the occasion of the centenary of the

birth of Lenin said: ``The enemies of socialism are the only
ones who benefit by the virulent anti-Soviet campaign that
has been conducted in China during the past few years.
Lately it has been carried on under the screen of an alleged
threat from the Soviet Union. By their actions against
the country of Lenin and against the world communist
movement the initiators of this campaign expose
themselves before the masses as apostates of the revolutionary
cause of Lenin."^^1^^
__*_*_*__
 The emergence of an ideological trend like Maoism

inevitably poses the question of the future of Marxism in
oncebackward countries, including China. The ideologists of the
bourgeoisie have recently been drumming in the idea that
Marxist theory is inapplicable to countries with a
precapitalist social structure, and have referred to the
experience of the Chinese revolution, the activity of Mao
and his followers, and the conceptual formalisation of
Maoism.
 We believe these assertions to be groundless. The spread

of Marxist-Leninist ideas across the world is naturally
promoted by the growth of the world revolutionary process,
as it involves many millions of working people in
oncebackward countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America. It
would, of course, be wrong to assume that the process runs
smoothly and painlessly. The experience of the past few
decades shows that the spread of Marxism in breadth has
far from always been accompanied by a correct
understanding and application of its principles. Lenin wrote: `Òne of
the most profound causes that periodically give rise to
differences over tactics is the very growth of the labour
movement. If this movement is not measured by the criterion
of some fantastic ideal, but is regarded as the practical
movement of ordinary people, it will be clear that the
enlistment of larger and larger numbers of new `recruits',
the attraction of new sections of the working people must
inevitably be accompanied by waverings in the sphere of
_-_-_
~^^1^^ L. I. Brezhnev, Lenin's Cause Lives On and Triumphs, Moscow,

1970, p. 64.
287
theory and tactics, by repetitions of old mistakes, by a

temporary reversion to antiquated views and antiquated
methods, and so forth. The labour movement of every
country periodically spends a varying amount of energy,
attention and time on the `training' of recruits."^^1^^
 This warning of Lenin's is of special importance for the

working-class movement in the developing countries. It is
common knowledge that the social structure of these
countries is marked by a slight class differentiation, the
prevalence of peasants among the population, and a weak
working class (or no working class to speak of in some
countries). All of this, quite naturally, confronts Marxists
in these countries with much more difficult tasks than
those that have ever faced Marxists in the developed capitalist
countries.
 China is a striking example of the extreme backwardness,

illiteracy and ignorance of millions of people in the past.
But there are different kinds of backwardness. Russia, too,
was once very backward, but both this backwardness and
the need for change had already been recognised among
the leading sections of the intelligentsia as early as the end
of the 18th century. Russia had a rich and historically
rooted revolutionary tradition of social thinking and social
action. In China, such a tradition began to take shape only
in the 20th century. The country did not have any serious
chance of `èxperiencing'' the various theories of
revolutionary thought, before it found itself faced with the need of
expressing its attitude to full-fledged socialist trends,
notably, Marxism.
 This brings up the fundamental methodological question

about applying general Marxist propositions to concrete
(national) conditions, specifically in backward countries
which include China. It would be wrong to deny the need to
consider national specifics as Marxism is joined with the
revolutionary movement in this or that country. Marxism is
not `àpplied'' to some abstract social organism, but to a
definite socio-historical soil. Marxism is not joined with
a working-class movement in general, but with the
political movement of the working class and the other
exploited sections in the given country. Marxism is not
_-_-_
288
adopted by abstract men, but real individuals with

definite and fairly stable conceptions, traditions and habits
which have been shaped under the influence of their social
milieu.
 Lenin was fully aware of this and of the great difficulties
facing Marxists in the backward countries. He required that
they should display skill in tackling the complex problems
of reality, and taking account of national specifics in
applying Marxism in the conditions of backward countries.
 Consequently, the spread and assimilation of Marxist

ideas in socio-economically backward countries cannot be
quite identical, at any rate not at the initial stage, to similar
processes taking place in the advanced countries.
 All of this has a direct bearing on China. Marxism

can be successfully adapted to China's conditions only if
the men directing this process take account of the
socioeconomic conditions, of China's historical past, of the
level of scientific development and scientific thinking,
including philosophy, and of the Chinese national
traditions.
 However, the transfer of Marxism to national, in this

instance Chinese, soil should not be accompanied with
departures from its cardinal principles. Marxists resolutely
oppose any stereotyped application of general truths and the
imposition of abstract schemes without considering the
specifics of each country. However, consideration of national
specifics cannot and must not be accompanied with
departures from the general principles of Marxism, with direct
betrayal of these principles and a substitution of a hostile
ideology for Marxism. At this point, exceptional importance
attaches to the subjective moment, meaning who directs the
process of joining Marxism with the revolutionary
movement of the exploited masses in each country. Because since
the 1930s this process in China was headed mainly by
inconsistent Marxists or anti-Marxists (Mao and his followers)
this has resulted in the emergence of an ideological trend
like Maoism, which is hostile to Marxism.
 Marxists insist on the creative development of the theory

of scientific socialism. ``Communists regard it as their task
firmly to uphold the revolutionary principles of
MarxismLeninism and proletarian internationalism in the struggle
against all enemies, steadfastly to make them a living
289
reality, constantly to develop Marxist-Leninist theory and

enrich it on the basis of present experience of waging the
class struggle and building socialist society."^^1^^
 The Maoists have distorted the idea of the creative

approach to the development of Marxism-Leninism. Referring
to the specifics of the Chinese revolution, Mao has tried to
create a methodology of his own, which is different from
Marxist-Leninist methodology, clothing it in ``Chinese''
national form. He wrote: ``Marxism can be translated into
life only through a national form. There is no abstract
Marxism, there is only concrete Marxism. Concrete Marxism
is Marxism that is embodied in national form, that is,
Marxism which is applied in concrete struggle, in the
concrete conditions of Chinese reality, and not Marxism which
is applied abstractly. If the Communists, who constitute a
part of the great nation, who are an organic part of this
nation, treat Marxism outside the context of China's
specifics, that will be abstract, empty Marxism."^^2^^
 Indeed, Marxism needs to be applied in the light of the

concrete situation in any country, including China. But Mao
is wrong in saying that there is only ``concrete Marxism''.
This is a denial of the international character of Marxism,
and its ``quartering'' at the various ``national premises''.
 It is also wrong in itself to contrast `àbstract'' and ``

concrete" Marxism, because Marxism is a coherent doctrine of
the international working class.
 Creative application of Marxism in accordance with each

country's conditions does not amount to its ``
nationalisation'', which is why it is wrong to speak of a ``Russified'',
``Germanised'' or ``Sinified'' Marxism. But Mao believes the
application of Marxism in the concrete conditions of Chinese
reality is a ``Sinification'' of Marxism, which in effect
amounts to a distortion and vulgarisation of Marxism and
its supplanting by the ``thought of Mao Tse-tung''.
 The emergence of Maoism, and its subsequent

establishment as the official doctrine of the CPC, has never been
inevitable. The experience of revolution and socialist
construction in countries neighbouring on China, the history of the
_-_-_
 ^^1^^ International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties, Moscow,

1969, p. 41.
~^^2^^ Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works, Harbin, 1946, p. 928 (in Chinese).
290
revolutionary movement in China herself, and finally, the
practice of the first ten years of the people's power in China
show that Marxist-Leninist ideas are universally meaningful,
both for countries in the West and for countries in the
East.
 There is no doubt at all that the fundamental stand taken

by the CPSU and the other fraternal Parties on the
antiLeninist and anti-socialist propositions of the present
Chinese leadership, and the well-argumented scientific
critique of its theoretical conceptions will help to enhance
the influence of Marxist ideology among the Chinese
people.
[291]
__ALPHA_LVL0__
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Chapter Four 115
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THE ATTITUDE OF MARXISM AND OF MAOISM
TO THE STATE AND PROLETARIAN LEGALITY
TOC
Card 1. When an “Antitoxin” Becomes a Toxin

Text The grave danger of Maoism consists in its efforts to discredit the principles of p
HTML socialism, and horribly to distort, twist and deform the ideals for which millions of
PS men on the globe have been fighting.
PDF
The Maoists refuse to consider this elementary truth: the means of transformation p
T* cannot be neutral with respect to the aim of transformation, the way this or that
19* country has to carry out the mature social revolution, for this inevitably leaves its
mark on the nature of the new system that is being established. In other words, the
### Maoists fail to realise the simple fact that even a victorious civil war creates vast
additional difficulties for further creative construction. Mao’s Little Red Book says:
“Revolutionary war is an antitoxin which not only eliminates the enemy’s poison but
also purges us of our own filth. Every just, revolutionary war is endowed with
tremendous power and can transform many things or clear the way for their
transformation ... and people and everything else ... will be transformed during and
after the war." [ 115•1
Superficially this sounds like the ideas Marx and Lenin expressed about the use of p
revolutionary coercion being inevitable and necessary, and about revolutionary
coercive action by the masses being creative. But having declared revolutionary war 116
to be a cure-all, Mao altogether forgets about dialectics, about the fact that any
phenomenon may develop into its opposite, that the antitoxin may well become (as
the dividing line is obliterated and the use of violent methods is overdone) a potent
toxin, a preparation that kills instead of curing.
In contrast to reformism of any stripe, Marxism recognises revolutionary coercion to p

be inevitable and necessary for social transformations. In the society divided into
antagonistic classes, the rising, progressive classes cannot avoid using force to break
up the obsolete social relations and to overthrow the exploiting classes which are
connected with that system and refuse to give up their interests and privileges of
their own accord. This is a truth Marxism had derived from summing up past
experience. Let us recall what Plekhanov once said: “The fewer the chances a given
social class or section has of maintaining its domination the more inclined it is to
terroristic measures." [ 116•1 Resistance by the outgoing classes inevitably makes
the revolutionary classes resort to violent retaliatory measures and armed struggle.
But in contrast to all manner of Blanquist, anarchist and Trotskyite petty-bourgeois p

theories, Marxism does not confine itself to saying that revolutionary coercion is
progressive and justified. On many occasions the founders of Marxism warned the
proletariat that the use of violent means was limited and forced, and emphasised the
dangers arising from the use of extreme means of struggle.
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/4.1-When.an.Antitoxin.Becomes.a.Toxin[2012-12-18 2:30:10]
Marxism requires that a distinction should be drawn between the forms of violence
and requires—and this is extremely important—that the leaders of the proletariat
should keep violence down to a minimum at every stage of the struggle, and use
more moderate forms of coercion whenever possible. It requires them to display skill
in switching at the right time from means of violence and coercion to means of
education and persuasion.
On the strength of historical experience, the Marxists regard the forms of violent p
action by proletarian parties above all as being dependent on the resistance put up by
the overthrown classes and the ability of the masses to impose their own methods 117
and modes of struggle on the enemy. At the same time, as Marx and Lenin both
pointed out, the level of the moral and intellectual development of the working class
itself and its parties and leaders, and other circumstances, like the legacy of war,
have a great part to play in the choice of more humane or sterner forms of
revolution. [ 117•1 Marx saw the political organisation of the Paris Commune type
as being an organised means of proletarian action and specifically observed that “it
affords the rational medium in which that class struggle can run through its different
phases in the most rational and humane way." [ 117•2
The experience of the Paris Commune in 1871 and of the October Socialist p
Revolution in 1917 showed that proletarian revolutions were initially almost totally
bloodless revolutions, and that only support of the counter-revolutionary forces by
interventionists (Prussians in 1871, and the Entente and the Germans in 1918–1920)
enabled the overthrown classes to start sanguinary civil wars both in France and in
Russia. The proletariat used more moderate means of coercion after the Second
World War as bourgeois-democratic revolutions developed into socialist ones in the
countries of Eastern Europe.
Consequently, to the extent that it depends on the proletarian revolutionary parties p

they have always preferred not to carry things to the extremes. They are aware of
the simple truth, one that history has tested over and over again in numerous civil
wars, that armed struggle and civil war are connected with vast losses and sufferings
for the masses, with the destruction of the productive forces, with the death of the
best revolutionary men, that they are connected—and this is of much importance for
the prospects of the revolution—with the inevitable militarisation of the country, and
the emergence of traditions and habits which may subsequently become a serious
obstacle to transition to peaceful construction.
During the Civil War in Russia, Lenin repeatedly warned of the danger of the p
excessive enlargement of the sphere in which military methods were being applied, 118
and said that it was intolerable to use military orders in organising the working
masses. He wrote: “This is a field in which revolutionary violence and dictatorship
can be applied only by way of abuse and I make bold to warn you against such
abuse. Revolutionary violence and dictatorship are excellent things when applied in
the right way and against the right people. But they cannot be applied in the field of
organisation." [ 118•1
It is true that during the Civil War in Russia herself, the country’s militarisation and p
some militarisation of organised government became inevitable. The “war
communism" of the Civil War period is known to have included the surplus food
appropriation system, and the use of the Red Army units not only in military
operations but also on the labour front, with some sections of production being
militarised. Lenin specifically and repeatedly stressed that “war communism" was a
forced expedient caused by the Civil War and the country’s extreme ruin, and that it
had not been and could not be a permanent policy. After the Civil War, the Party
combated attempts to continue the emergency measures longer than was necessary.
In China this historical experience of the October Revolution has been discarded. In p
their day-to-day political practices, the Maoists are guided by the idea that socialism
should be built in the first place by means of violence and the use of armed force.
The healthy forces in the CPC, believing that it is impossible for China today to p
abandon the military methods of the earlier period all at once, were nevertheless
fully aware of their interim nature and of their applicability only within a definite
historical period and within the framework of strictly established spheres of Party
and government activity. By contrast, Mao’s followers put all their trust into these
methods in tackling any questions, and the forms and methods of work produced
during the civil war were carried over to the whole of the transition period.
The Maoists have carried out a “militarisation” both of town and country, spreading p
army rules to the Party organisations, the enterprises, the schools and the
kindergartens. Relations are modelled after the army in the people’s communes, the 119
factories and plants; military orders are used to decide all questions relating to the
development of production and a new system of wages has been introduced based on
this principle: “Work for the highest level in production, and maintain a low level in
life”; orders, coercion and violence have become popular as a means of “educational
work" with the intelligentsia. This tendency, already fairly pronounced back in the
1950s, was carried to an extreme during the “cultural revolution”; the violent
voluntaristic measures coming from the “top” were backed up by stagemanaged
pressure from “below” on the part of politically immature masses of young people
who had been drugged by pseudo-Marxist catchwords; subsequently, the anarchist
masses escaping from under control were kept in check by the use of army units.
With the barrack-room as their ideal, the leaders of the “cultural revolution" have p
no need for normally functioning democratic organs or socialist legality. No wonder
then that in the course of the “cultural revolution" central or local organs of power
were disbanded, trade unions and young communist organisations were broken up
and a massive purge of Party bodies carried out. The society the Maoists are trying
to build up has no need either for the conscious, intelligent and well-educated man,
capable of thinking for himself; no wonder the architects of the “cultural revolution"
have set themselves the task of converting the conscious citizen of socialist society
into “Chairman Mao’s stainless screw”. This kind of society has no need for popular
participation in elaborating socialist forms, for there everything has been provided for
in advance and established by the precepts of the “omniscient great helmsman”. The
people are being induced to believe that to reach communism all one need do is
obediently fulfil Mao’s teachings, that only one thing is necessary, namely, that the
people should become “an army without uniform”.
“What a fine specimen of barrack-room communism!”, Marx and Engels once wrote
about the well-known article of the Bakuninists entitled “The Main Principles of the
Future Social System”, which proposed that men should produce for society as much
as possible and consume as little us possible, that men’s activity should all be
regulated, including the use of dining rooms and bedrooms, and that all the functions 120
of administration should be vested in a committee of conspirators, without any
control or responsibility to anyone. “This article shows that if mere mortals are being
punished, as for a crime, for the very idea of a future organisation of society, that is
because the leaders have already ordered everything beforehand." [ 120•1 We
wonder what Marx and Engels would have said about the principles of presentday
Maoist policy, whose aim is to translate into life these monstrous principles of a
reactionary utopia.
***

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Notes
[ 115•1] Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, p. 61.
[ 116•1] G. V. Plekhanov, Works, Vol. IV, Moscow-Petrograd, 1923, p. 63 (in

Russian).
[ 117•1] K. Marx, Capital, Vol. 1, 1971, p. 9; V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 27,
p. 268.
[ 117•2] K. Marx and F. Engels, OH the Paris Commune, Moscow, 1971, p. 156.
[ 120•1] K. Marx/F. Engels, Werke, Bd. 18, Berlin, S. 424.
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Problem in the Light of Events in
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THE MARXIST AND THE CONCEPTION OF THE
MAOIST VIEW OF DEVELOPMENT OF THE SOCIAL
PROLETARIAN REVOLUTION, STRUCTURE AND THE CLASS
WAR AND PEACE STRUGGLE

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2. The “State and Revolution” Problem 120
<•>
in the Light of Events in China

TOC
The events taking place in China have made Marxists all over the world return to p
Card
the problem of “the state and revolution”, which is central to the doctrine of Marx
and Lenin.
Text
HTML Let us recall that Marx in the 19th century and Lenin on the eve of the 1917 p
PS Revolution believed that it was unnecessary to establish in the course of the
PDF revolution a professional apparatus of coercion and pointed to the need for the army,
carrying on a war against the bourgeoisie and the landowners, to be merged with the
T* mass of the population, with the people, to the need of officials being elected by the
19* people, to the need for full democracy in organising production and distribution.
### These ideas of the founders of Marxism rested on the experience of history, on the p
experience of the first proletarian state, the Paris Commune. The Commune, having
done away with the police, having armed the population, and having transferred the
whole executive and legislative power, all the levers of management of production
into the hands of functionaries elected by the Communards or the workers of the
enterprises, transformed the functions of administration into truly popular ones, and
wrested them from the hands of a specially trained ruling caste isolated from the
people. The whole of social life, all social relations became transparent, open and
crystal-clear. Marx wrote: “[Gone is] the delusion as if administration and political
governing were mysteries, transcendent functions only to be trusted to the hands of a 121
trained caste—state parasites, richly paid sycophants and sinecurists, in the higher
posts, absorbing the intelligence of the masses and turning them against themselves
in the lower places of the hierarchy. Doing away with the state hierarchy altogether
and replacing the haughteous masters of the people by its always removable servants,
a mock responsibility by a real responsibility, as they act continuously under public
supervision." [ 121•1
However, this highly valuable practical experience of state construction under the p
Paris Commune was highly short-lived, this city-state lasted for only a few months
and its boundaries did not extend beyond the city of Paris. What is more, the
outcome of the civil war between Paris and Versailles showed that in the conditions
of civil war it was precisely the various fundamentally new features of the
Commune, which promised to give the new society tremendous advantages in the
long-term historical prospects, that proved to be a tremendous practical shortcoming:
the Commune went down, in particular, because it was unable to carry out a ruthless
centralisation in the sphere of military affairs, administration and management of
production. The Paris Commune on the whole failed to solve the problem of the
balance between democracy and centralisation, and its shortlived experience had to
be put to the test over and over again.
The October Revolution, having repeated in its initial stages the experience of its p
predecessor, subsequently introduced substantial additions. In order to withstand the
flames of the Civil War, which proved to be a “natural state of transition" of the
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/4.2-The.State.and.Revolution.Problem[2012-12-18 2:30:16]
proletarian revolution in one country, the Soviet power had to resort to a sharp
intensification of centralism in every sphere of social life.
In the very first year of the revolution, counter– revolutionary resistance forced the p
Soviet power, which at first relied on the people who were armed to a man, to set
up special agencies and apparatuses of class suppression—the Red Army and the
All-Russia Extraordinary Commission. Their edge was now directed against the
overthrown oppressors. This class orientation was guaranteed above all by the make- 122
up of the leadership of the Red Army and the AllRussia Extraordinary Commission,
which had recruited from the ranks of the Party its best fighters who had passed the
test of revolutionary battle. However, the existence of special apparatuses of coercion
was to some extent latent with dangerous tendencies and in the event of any
relaxation of Party control over these agencies or in the event of any violation of the
Leninist principles of democratic centralism within the Party, opened up the
possibility for their abuse. It was essentially about these difficulties of the
revolutionary process, the difficulties of the transition period in a country which had
gone through the epoch of civil war that a warning was sounded for the Communists
of all countries by the decisions of the 20th Congress of the CPSU, which pointed to
the connection between some aspects of the personality cult and the temporary and
inevitable limitations on democracy in the course of the revolutionary process. The
CPSU Central Committee resolution “On Overcoming the Personality Cult and Its
Consequences" said: “This complicated international and internal situation required an
iron discipline, tireless vigilance, and the strictest centralisation of leadership, and
this necessarily had a negative effect on the development of some democratic forms.
In the course of fierce struggle against the whole world of imperialism our country
had to make some limitations of democracy, which were justified by the logic of our
people’s struggle for socialism in conditions of the capitalist encirclement. But even
at the time, these limitations were already regarded by the Party and the people as
being temporary, and as being subject to elimination as the Soviet state was
consolidated and the forces of democracy and socialism throughout the world
developed." [ 122•1
The Chinese leaders, carrying out their transformations of the transition period in p
more favourable international conditions, had every possibility of taking account of
the experience of socialist construction in the USSR.
The CPC leaders tried to do this directly after the 20th Congress of the CPSU, as p
will be seen from the decisions of the 8th Congress of the CPC. Speaking on behalf 123
of the Central Committee in a report on changes of the Party’s Rules, the former
CPC General Secretary Teng Hsiao-ping gave a high assessment to the 20th
Congress of the CPSU and condemned the personality cult. He said: “An important
achievement of the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union lies
in the fact that it showed us what serious consequences can follow from the
deification of the individual. Our Party has always held that no political parties and
no individuals are free from flaws and mistakes in their activities, and this has now
been written into the General Programme of the draft constitution of our Party. For
the same reason, our Party abhors the deification of the individual." [ 123•1 Today
the documents of the 8th Congress, adopted collectively and in approval of the line
of the 20th Congress of the CPSU, have been discarded by Mao and his associates.
The “great Mao’s” formulas have been substituted for the Marxist doctrine of the
state and revolution. The precepts of the founders of Marxism and the whole of
historical experience gained by the world communist movement has been forgotten.
Mao’s Little Red Book said: “Every Communist must grasp the truth: political p
power grows out of the barrel of a gun." [ 123•2 There is some truth in this, but
not the whole truth. In the course of the proletarian revolution the gun does not
merely produce power, but military-revolutionary power. In the flames of the civil
war, which the overthrown exploiting classes impose on the classes rising up against
the exploiters, the revolutionary forces have to resort mainly to violence and
coercion, when everything is decided by orders “from above”, by military orders.
Following its victory over the armed counter-revolution, the proletarian revolution (
especially a proletarian revolution winning out in a backward, petty-bourgeois
country) faces long years of struggle against sabotage, dislocation and the ignorance
and inertness of millions of people. In this period, it is inevitable that the old
agencies and some of the old methods of struggle are maintained. But it would be a
bad mistake to see violent military methods alone as providing the key to a solution 124
of all the problems and tasks of the transition period.
The Party directing the transformative socialist process must modify its methods of p
struggle as the situation changes, and this means above all its own organisation and
the organisation of the whole government machine. Thus, in the early years of the
Soviet Republic, the Civil War conditions did little to help develop the principles of
inner-Party democracy at every level of the Party organism. On the whole, both the
form of organisation and the methods of work were necessarily determined by the
concrete historical situation and the task of organising resistance against the
interventionists and the whiteguards. The Resolution of the 10th Congress of the
RCP(B) said: “Accordingly, the Party’s organisational form was inevitably to be in
that period a militarisation of the Party organisation. Just as the form of proletarian
dictatorship assumed the nature of militaryproletarian dictatorship, so the form of
Party organisation has assumed—and from the standpoint of revolutionary purpose,
inevitably had to assume in such conditions—a corresponding character. This was on
the whole expressed in an extreme organisational centralism and a fold-up of the
collective organs of Party organisation." [ 124•1
With the end of the Civil War and the entry upon the period of peaceful p
construction there necessarily appeared some contradictions between the Party’s forms
of organisation and methods of work on the one hand, and on the other, the tasks of
educating the broadest masses of Party members in a spirit of initiative and active
solution of all the questions of Party life. These contradictions were already brought
out by the 10th Congress of the RCP(B), whose Resolution also outlined ways of
doing away with them.
After the Civil War, the forms of organisation of the socialist state were bound to p
be modified in various ways: “the military-proletarian dictatorship" gradually lost its
features of a militarised and extremely centralised apparatus. The transition period is
simultaneously a period in which the remnants of the hostile classes are being
eliminated, in which their resistance is overcome, and a period in which millions of 125
working people develop and are involved in the cause of socialism, a period in
which the new proletarian democracy, the new socialist legality is established and
consolidated, a period in which the state machine, adapted to the Civil War
conditions, is improved and restructured. Without all this, it is impossible for the
socialist revolution to advance.
Let us stress that centralised power which is built up in the process of revolutionary p
struggle is simultaneously a system of definite human relations, of definite
dependence of men on each other. Leading workers, habituated in the Civil War
epoch to issue orders and appoint performers, may continue in the same manner,
even after the situation has changed and when there is need not only of
unquestioning execution of orders but also freedom of discussion, not only oneman
authority but also collegiality, not only continuity, but also change and renewal of
leadership.
There is a possibility here of different variants of development. The contradictions p

which inevitably arise in the course of socialist construction may be painlessly and
openly resolved through an improvement of the system of democratic centralism, but
these contradictions may also be resolved behind closed doors, within a tight little
group of leaders, so that the Party is faced with the faits accomplis. That is when
situations may arise, as they have in China, when the Party loses control of its
Central Committee, and the Central Committee loses control of the Politburo, the
highest leading group.
The consequences of this are well known: the line of gradual advance towards p
socialism was substituted by an adventurist attempt extremely to accelerate the pace
of socioeconomic change, producing the idea of a “Great Leap Forward”, which was
to carry the country straight into communism, while the old level-headed warnings
about the country taking “only the first few steps along a 10,000-mile way" gave
way to boastful and irresponsible promises, like “three years of persistent labour
effort—10,000 years of happy life”. When the inevitable collapse soon followed, the
CPC leaders hastened to put the blame for these failures on the designs of “enemies”
at home and “revisionists” abroad. Leninist norms of inner-Party life were trampled,
open and principled polemics and self-criticism were supplanted with intrigue,
designed to do away with those who opposed the adventurist line. Educational work 126
within the Party and in the masses was increasingly supplanted by violence, while
the ideology of proletarian socialism was ousted by primitive forms of socialism,
egalitarian, barrack-room socialism, with Mao’s personality cult assuming monstrous
forms. The preaching of chauvinism went hand in hand with a fanning of hostility
for the USSR and attempts to impose a hegemonistic line on the world revolutionary
movement. Finally, in the period of the “cultural revolution" Mao and his followers
came to look for support to the politically most immature masses of young people
and increasingly to the army. It is not the Party, not the working people’s grass roots
organisations, but the army that has been raised over and above the other sections of
the political superstructure.
This practice was provided with ideological backing in the report to the 9th p
Congress of the CPC, which, as the current practice is, referred to Mao’s authority
when it said: “The People’s Liberation Army is the mainstay of the dictatorship of
the proletariat. Chairman Mao Tse-tung has repeatedly said that from the Marxist
standpoint the army is the main component part of the state." [ 126•1
Indeed, the people’s army is a reliable bulwark of the proletarian dictatorship, which p
ensures defence of the socialist countries against imperialist aggression, but to declare
it to be the “main component part" of the socialist state and an instrument of
“support of industry, agriculture and broad masses of the Left" and to impose on it
the functions of “military control" over the country’s life and of “ military-political
education" of the whole people is to convert the socialist state system into a
military-bureaucratic state system.
The army’s interference in the inner-Party struggle and the country’s social and p
economic life is more than an additional minor detail in the “helmsman’s" biography
or another feature of the overall picture of the revolution. A political coup has been
staged in the country, with real political power taken over by the army; the country’s
life is being rapidly militarised, and the real gains and cadres of the people’s
revolution in China have been destroyed under the guise of the “cultural revolution”.
All of this is subordinated to a single goal, that of helping Mao and his followers 127
retain power.
The dangerous tendencies of the people’s democratic power being transformed into a p
military-bureaucratic dictatorship first became evident at the early stages of the
“cultural revolution”; the subsequent course of events led to the consolidation of
these dangerous tendencies in the whole of the country’s internal political life.
Analysing the processes going on in China, the Marxists must naturally not discount p
some objective circumstances which have helped to inflate the centralising elements
at the expense of the democratic elements, and to militarise the whole of
governmental and social life. The whole of China’s modern history is marked by
strong tendencies towards local separatism, with the provincial governors
concentrating vast political, economic and military power in their hands. After the
1911 revolution, China was, for all practical purposes, split up into a number of
areas, each a state within a state, and each headed by a definite militaristic group.
The establishment in 1927 of the central Kuomintang government with Chiang Kai-
shek at its head, could not result in the establishment of centralised power. Seeking
to put down the revolutionary movement, Chiang Kai-shek struck an alliance with
the local militarists, who agreed to support him provided they retained great powers
in running the provinces, within whose limits they operated.
Japan’s occupation of the north-eastern provinces in 1931 and the subsequent p

aggression against the rest of China not only disrupted the ties between the various
parts of the country, but also removed a sizable part of it from the Kuomintang
government’s control. On a vast territory in northwest China, the Communists
succeeded in setting up their own organs of power, organising the army, etc.
Consequently, in the early 1940s China was not a united state.
It was quite natural therefore that after the victory of the people’s revolution there p
was intensified centralisation in the country, and at the first stage of socialist
construction some methods characteristic of the period of the armed struggle against
the Kuomintang were retained.
Let us also note that before the people’s democratic revolution China was a country p
virtually without democratic government institutions; the feudal traditions had an
impact not only on the policy of the ruling class. At the end of the 1920s, Mao 128
wrote the following about the legacy of the past: “The evil practice of arbitrary
dictation in feudal times, deeply rooted in the minds of the masses and even of the
Party members in general, cannot be swept away at once; when anything comes up,
people seek the easy way out and do not like the elaborate democratic
system.” [ 128•1
During the civil war which was fought for decades the democratic centralism system p
within the Party and the mass organisations could not be fully developed. Add to
this the inadequate Marxist training of the leading Party cadres and the obvious
oversimplification of the scientific socialism theory down to primitive levels in the
theoretical writings of Mao Tse-tung, who headed the CPC Central Committee.
But although a number of objective circumstances in China hampered the

development of the new, proletarian democracy, there was nothing fatally inevitable
about the people’s democratic state degenerating into a militarybureaucratic
dictatorship. The CPC leadership, taking a critical view of its own activity and
learning from the international experience accumulated by other revolutionary parties

could well have put a stop to the development of the undesirable and dangerous
tendencies. Observance of innerParty democracy, and the Leninist principles and
rules of Party life could well have become a most important guarantee of successes
in building up a socialist state. Lenin wrote: “More confidence in the independent
judgement of the whole body of Party workers!... The whole Party must constantly,
steadily and systematically train suitable persons for the central bodies, must see
clearly, as in the palm of its hand, all the activities of every candidate for these high
posts, must come to know even their personal characteristics, their strong and weak
points, their victories and ’ defeats’. . .. Light, more light!" [ 128•2 This was said
at a time when the Bolshevik Party had to work in the underground. But what Lenin
said has even more relevance to ruling parties.
***

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normal
Notes
[ 121•1] K. Marx and F. Engels, On the Paris Commune, Moscow, 1971, p. 154.
[ 122•1] Questions of Ideological Work, Moscow, 19G1, pp. 83–84 (in Russian).
[ 123•1] Eighth National Congress of the Communist Party of China, Documents,

Vol. I, Peking, 1956, p. 200.
[ 124•1] Tenth Congress of the RCP(B). Verbatim Report, Moscow, 1963, p. 560 (in
Russian).
[ 126•1] Hsinhua Press Release, April 27, 1969.
[ 128•1] Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works, Vol. 1, p. 92.
[ 128•2] V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 7, pp. 116, 117, 118.
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3. On the Question of Mao’s 129
<•>
Personality Cult

TOC
One of the expressions of the violation of Leninist principles and rules of inner- p
Card
Party life in China is Mao’s personality cult, which has assumed such ugly and
hypertrophied forms that it has virtually become impossible to make mention of the
Text personality cult problem, let alone examine it. But this very fact makes a look at the
HTML CPC documents dealing specially with personality cult problems so much more
PS important and instructive. These documents date back to the period when Mao’s
PDF glorification and deification in China had not yet reached the proportions of a
national craze, a period when the CPC leadership still tried to analyse the problem
T* theoretically.
19*
We have in mind above all the article “On the Historical Experience of the p
###
Proletarian Dictatorship" which was written just after the 20th Congress of the
CPSU, when fundamental decisions in the Communist Party of China were still
being taken collectively and, as the editors of Jenmin jihpao said at the time, this
article was written “on the basis of a discussion of the given question at an enlarged
meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of
China". [ 129•1 This fact seems to explain why there is some depth in this
document, which is the best evidence today of the CPC leadership’s betrayal of its
own principles and concrete assessments.
Chinese documents in the early 1960s declared the decisions of the 20th Congress p
of the CPSU on the personality cult to be “a betrayal of Marxism”, “revisionism”, “
treason”, etc. The Chinese leaders said: “The so-called fight against the personality
cult, started by the CPSU leadership was taken over by them in a relay from
Bakunin, Kautsky, Trotsky and Tito, who had used the slogan to fight against the
leaders of the proletariat and to undermine the proletariat’s revolutionary
movement." [ 129•2
Let us now recall what the same paper had said about the same decisions seven p
years earlier. It had written: “This bold self-criticism, carried out by the Communist 130
Party of the Soviet Union and aimed at exposing the mistakes it had made, testifies
that its inner life is highly principled and that Marxism-Leninism has great
viability." [ 130•1
But apart from recalling these general principled assessments by the CPC leadership p
of the decisions of the 20th CPSU Congress the important thing to bear in mind is
that the article “On the Historical Experience of the Proletarian Dictatorship"
contained attempts to consider the personality cult in its historical development, in a
unity of its subjective and objective aspects. The article linked up its emergence with
the ideology of the past, with the immaturity of millions of people in a petty-
bourgeois country which had carried out a proletarian revolution, and where old
traditions had much potency. The article went on: “The personality cult is a rotten
legacy which has come down from mankind’s long history. The personality cult has
a basis not only among the exploiter classes but also among the small
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/4.3-Maos.Personality.Cult[2012-12-18 2:30:28]
producers___After the establishment of the proletarian dictatorship, despite the fact

that the exploiting classes were eliminated, the petty-producer economy supplanted by
the collective economy, and a socialist society built, some of the rotten ideological
survivals remaining from the old society and laden with poison can still long remain
in the minds of men. ’The force of habit in millions and tens of millions is a most
formidable force’ (V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 31, p. 44). The personality cult
is also in a sense an expression of the force of habit of millions and tens of millions
of people." [ 130•2
It was also stressed that there were various difficulties in building up the state p
machinery in a socialist country which had gone through a period of civil war,
difficulties which in turn helped to produce the personality cult: “In order to defeat a
strong enemy the proletarian dictatorship requires a high degree of centralised power.
This highly centralised power must go hand in hand with a high level of democracy.
When the accent is one-sidedly on centralisation, a great many errors may
arise." [ 130•3
The emergence and development of the personality cult was connected with the fact p 131
that after the victory over the class enemy, bureaucratic practices tended to remain
tenacious, and that the practice of the Chinese revolution itself offered an example.
The article said: “After the victory of the revolution, when the working class and the
Communist Party became a class and a party in power, leading workers of our Party
and state are subjected in many respects to the influence of bureaucracy, thereby
facing a great danger: abusing their official position in government agencies, they
may well engage in arbitrary practices, lose their touch with the masses, abandon the
collective leadership, govern by fiat and undermine democratic principles in the Party
and in the state. That is why if we do not want to find ourselves in such a bog, we
must devote the closest attention to maintaining the ’line of the masses’ in our
method of leadership, and never in any case allowing the slightest negligence. For
this we must formulate a definite system of work, ensuring the implementation of
the ’line of the masses’ and of collective leadership, so as to avoid the appearance
of upstarts and individual ‘heroes’ out of touch with the masses, reducing
subjectivism and one-sidedness in our work which are at variance with objective
reality". [ 131•1
An attempt was also made in the article to establish the connection between the p
initial and the culminating stage of the process being examined, when the emergence
of the personality cult was to some extent promoted not only by the difficulties but
also by the successes of socialist construction achieved through the effort of the
masses and hundreds of thousands of Communists. The article elaborated on the
well-known idea expressed in the documents of the 20th Congress of the CPSU to
the effect that “the personality cult emerged and developed against the background of
the greatest historical gains by Marxism-Leninism, and the tremendous successes
scored by the Soviet people and the Communist Party in socialist
construction". [ 131•2
It would of course be wrong to require an editorial article, and especially one p

written shortly after the events in question, to contain an exhaustive analysis of the
causes of a complex and contradictory phenomenon like the personality cult. But it 132
cannot be denied that it did contain some important outlines making it possible to
take a historical approach to the analysis of the experience of the proletarian
dictatorship and a consideration of its lessons and mistakes. A general assessment of
the 1956 article today shows that it concentrated attention on Lenin’s idea about the
difficulties of the transition period. That was the key to an understanding of the
events taking place in one’s own country, the key which the CPC leadership
subsequently lost. This departure from the method of Leninism and of historical
materialism went hand in hand with its slanderous statements to the effect that the
20th and the 22nd Congresses of the CPSU had revised Lenin’s propositions.
The events of the past few years give ground to say that the article “On the p
Historical Experience of the Proletarian Dictatorship" contained an indirect critique of
Mao’s personality cult and had been written without his consent, even if not against
his will. It had apparently been prepared by the internationalist section of the CPC
leadership at the time, which under the influence of the 20th Congress of the CPSU
could not help but realise the full extent of the danger for China’s future presented
by Mao’s personality cult.
Under pressure from the section Mao and his followers had to accept the criticism p
of the personality cult at the 8th Congress and the deletion from the CPC Rules of
the statement, which had been written into the Rules at the 7th Congress, that Mao’s
ideas were the Party’s leading ideology. It was under pressure from this section that
the 8th Congress tried to remove the shortcomings in the structure and the system of
the Party apparatus which made it possible for various negative features to appear
among Party leaders, notably Mao himself. We have in mind the requirements that
Party congresses are to be held regularly, that the Rules should contain a provision
on annual sessions of Congresses for the purpose of controlling the Central
Committee’s activity, that the Central Committee and its Politburo should be
enlarged, that all Party members, including its leaders, should strictly abide by the
Party Rules and so on.
Let us note this fact. In the period under consideration, Mao himself and his closest p
associates did not oppose, not openly at any rate, the criticism of the ideology and
practice of the personality cult, and at one time this may even have created the 133
impression that Mao accepted this criticism. At any rate, towards the end of February
1957, Mao delivered a speech at the Supreme State Conference, which was then
published in the form of an article and entitled: “On the Correct Handling of the
Contradictions Among the People”. Mao spoke fairly frankly about the difficulties of
socialist construction, agreed that contradictions existed in the country, criticised
bureaucratic practices in the Party and government apparatus, and urged broad
discussions in science, literature and the art (the so-called Hundred Flowers
line). [ 133•1 He wished to create the impression that he was not speaking as the
leader of a state and of a Party but as the father of a big family. That is why he
did not in essence condemn those who had taken part in the strikes and the disorders
which had occurred in China in 1956, but merely rebuked them, and blamed
everything on the bureaucratic practices of the local leaders.
Mao’s speech evoked a stormy response inside and outside the Party. Rank-and-file p
Party members and the masses of working people saw his speech as a call for the
establishment of Leninist standards in the Party and the state and in every sphere of
social and political life. A broad discussion was started of Mao’s article and in the
course of it demands were put forward for measures in China essentially similar to
those which were being put through in the Soviet Union in pursuance of the
decisions of the 20th Congress of the CPSU. Statements by ordinary Chinese citizens
contained criticism of Mao’s personality cult and its negative consequences.
Here is an example. Lin Hsi-ling, a girl-student of the People’s University, p

delivered a speech at Peking University on May 27, 1957. She said: “Chairman
Mao’s valuable quality is that he has dialectical ideas and knows how to discover
and correct mistakes, to generalise experience and to learn from it. But that is not to
say that he has not made any mistakes. In China there is also a personality cult....
The Chairman wrote several poems and sent them to the journal Shikan, where some 134
people began to evaluate them, declaring that the Chairman is not only a great
politician but also a great poet. I think that when the Chairman heard of this he
could not help being angry, because these are nasty words. Some people say that the
Chairman is a good calligrapher, but I don’t think so [emphasis added—V. Y., K. I.,
Y.P.and V.Y.}." [ 134•1
Statements by many scientists, lecturers, students and workers dealt with a broad p
range of questions relating to breaches of the principles of socialist legality, the
existence of a bureaucratic regime in the Party, the discrepancy between wages and
the principles of remuneration for labour under socialism, lack of democratic
principles in the work of colleges and research institutions, etc.
The discussion of Mao’s article, in the course of which shortcomings in various p

sections of China’s social mechanism were criticised, was used by counter-
revolutionary elements, especially by members of the bourgeois parties and also by
their allies within the CPC and outside it, as an opportunity for attacking the CPC,
the Soviet Union and socialism in general. They were justly condemned as “Rightist
elements”, but the Maoists put a broad interpretation on this concept, and included
among them those who were mistaken or were vacillating, and even those who
favoured the establishment of Leninist standards in Party and state life not only in
words but also in deeds. Without any reason at all they were lumped together with
avowed enemies of socialism like Chang Po-chun, Lung Yun and Fei Hsiaotung.
The attacks on Mao’s opponents which followed in 1957 and 1958 under the pretext p
of a drive against the “Rightist elements" showed very well the falsehood and
essentially provocative character of the Maoists’ condemnation of the personality cult,
and gave evidence that Mao and his entourage in fact had no intention of giving up
the ideology and practices of the personality cult.
It is well known that for the USSR the personality cult was a temporary p
phenomenon, and that the CPSU found the strength to put an end to that state of
affairs. The Theses of the CPSU Central Committee, Fiftieth Anniversary of the 135
Great October Socialist Revolution, which summed up the experience of socialist
construction in the USSR over half a century, said: “Life proved that the Party’s
political course was correct. It showed its ability to give theoretical generalisation to
the experience of the masses, to put forward correct political slogans, and to lay bare
and correct mistakes. In pursuing its course towards the further development of
socialist democracy, the 20th Party Congress resolutely condemned Stalin’s
personality cult which was expressed in the glorification of the role of one man,
something that is alien to the spirit of Marxism-Leninism, in departures from the
Leninist principles of collective leadership, and in unwarranted reprisals and other
violations of socialist legality which inflicted harm on our society. These distortions,
for all their gravity, did not alter the nature of socialist society, nor did they shake
the pillars of socialism.
“The Party and the people had an abiding faith in the cause of communism and p
worked with enthusiasm to implement the Leninist ideals, overcoming difficulties,
temporary setbacks and mistakes." [ 135•1 Where the Party finds the strength and
means to give an objective assessment of negative tendencies, where these tendencies
are resolutely cut short, there they cannot develop into a threat to the construction of
socialism and communism.
In contrast to the line of the CPSU and the fraternal Parties of other socialist p
countries oriented upon a broad development of socialist democracy, Mao’s
personality cult is being implanted in China in increasing proportions. This is evident
in the fact that all the power in the Party and the state is virtually concentrated in
the hands of one man, that his instructions, and his alone, are the ultimate truth, that
there is no freedom of opinion either within the Party or the state, and that the
ideological and political opponents of the “great helmsman" and people who merely
doubt or are mistaken are classed as “enemies of the people”, that there is a political
reign of terror in the country which is being carried out in Mao’s name and that
Marxism-Leninism is being supplanted by Maoism. The report to the 9th Congress of
the CPC asserted: “All the achievements of the Communist Party of China are the 136
result of Chairman Mao Tse-tung’s sage leadership, are a victory of the thought of
Mao Tsetung. Over the last half-century, Chairman Mao Tse-tung, directing the great
struggle of the multinational people of China to complete the new-democratic
revolution, in the course of directing the great struggle—the socialist revolution and
socialist construction in our country—in the course of the great struggle of the
modern international communist movement against imperialism, against modern
revisionism and reaction in various countries, combining the universal truth of
Marxism-Leninism with the concrete practice of the revolution, inherited, upheld and
developed MarxismLeninism in the sphere of politics, military science, economics,
culture, philosophy and so on, and raised it to a totally new stage.”
This kind of assessment of Mao’s contribution to Marxist theory goes hand in hand p
with ignoring or direct denial of the merits of all the other leading members of the
CPC, past and present, and of the leaders of the international communist and
working-class movement. For that purpose, the history of the CPC before Mao’s
advent to power in 1935 is being revised and is being presented as a succession of
mistakes and miscalculations. There is a deliberate confusion between the Right
opportunists (Chen Tu-hsiu), the “Left” opportunists (Li Li-san) and true
internationalists (Chui Chu-po). The paper Jenmin jihpao wrote: “Our Party has gone
through struggle with the Right or the Left-deviationist erroneous line of Chen Tu-
hsiu, Chui Chu-po, Li Li-san, and Wang Ming, and especially through long and
repeated struggle with the bourgeois reactionary line represented by Liu
Shaochi." [ 136•1 This assertion was repeated in the report to the 9th Congress of
the CPC: “The history of the Communist Party of China is a history of struggle of
the Marxist-Leninist line, of Chairman Mao Tse-tung’s struggle against Right and
‘Left’-opportunist lines in the Party.. .. Our Party has matured, grown up and gained
in stature in struggle between two lines, especially in struggle which led to the rout
of three traitors’ cliques: the cliques of Chen Tu-hsiu, Wang Ming and Liu Shao-chi, 137
which have done the Party a great harm.
On instructions from the Mao group a “movement for the study of the history of p
the struggle between the two lines within the Party" was started in China, with the
obvious purpose of defaming all of Mao’s opponents, while presenting him as the
great leader of the CPC who never makes any mistakes. In this context, one should
note the publication in the Chinese press, on November 25, 1968, of Mao’s report at
the 2nd Plenary Meeting of the Seventh Central Committee of the CPC on March 5,
1949. The re-issue of this 20-year-old report and the highest praise heaped on it at
the 9th Congress of the CPC pursued the following purposes: to present Mao’s fight
against those who differed with him within the Party as a struggle of long duration
between two lines: the “revolutionary proletarian line”, meaning Mao’s own line, and
the “counter-revolutionary, revisionist line”, meaning that of his opponents. [ 137•1
The report, and the Party Rules adopted at the 9th Congress of the CPC were p
designed to put an official legal seal on the ideology of Mao’s personality cult. All
the events set out in the report centre on Mao’s own personality; the whole history
of the struggle within the CPC during the antiJapanese war and after the formation
of the CPR is described as Mao’s personal struggle against Liu Shao-chi, as the
struggle of the “proletarian revolutionary line of Chairman Mao Tse-tung" against the
“revisionist line of Liu Shaochi”. It is alleged that “the line of Mao Tse-tung" scored
victories at every stage while the line of Liu Shao-chi suffered defeat. The report
made no mention of any Party documents or decisions of Party congresses and
conferences. The development of the Chinese revolution is presented in the light of
naked subjectivism: out in front was Mao Tse-tung, who saw all and anticipated
everything, while the Party and the people followed blindly in his footsteps.
There is no other instance in the history of the world revolutionary movement of a p

living leader’s name being entered into the Party Rules.
Let us stress that Mao’s personality cult has been erected on the socio-spiritual p 138
foundation which had been cemented for long centuries by feudal Confucian
tradition. Confucius magnified the cult of Wen Wang (12th century B.C.), the first
legendary king of the Chou dynasty (12th-3rd centuries B.C.) and spread his own
teaching on the strength of his authority and on tradition. Subsequently, the cult of
Confucius himself was built up step by step, until he came to be compared with the
“heavens” which lit up the whole world with its radiant light. By the 2nd century
B.C., Confucius was enshrined as a deity and his cult was given a theological
substantiation in the teaching of Tung Chung-shu.
Confucianism had the aim of suppressing vibrant thinking among men and p
transforming them into fanatics who did the will of the ruling feudal elite. Confucius
insisted that the life of men down here, on earth, depended entirely on sage rulers.
He compared them to the wind, and their subjects to the grass which bent in the
wind. Where rulers rule wisely, the people “will toil without grumbling". [ 138•1
Virtually the same ideas are being preached in China today, the only difference
being that Maoism does not make any references to the “will” of the ancestors,
while the rest is essentially identical with Confucian dogmas. The point is that
Maoism has no need either of “celestial will" or of any ancestors—“sage rulers of
antiquity"—because Mao himself has long since been converted by his admirers into
a “living god”, and, as Maoist propaganda insists, is an embodiment of mankind’s
wisdom.
***

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normal
Notes
[ 129•1] On the Historical Experience of the Proletarian Dictatorship, Moscow,

1956, p. 2.
[ 129•2] Jenmin jihpao, September 13, 1963.
[ 130•1] On the Historical Experience of the Proletarian Dictatorship, p. 3.
[ 130•2] Ibid., p. 10.
[ 130•3] Ibid., p. 6.
[ 131•1] Ibid., pp. 13–14.
[ 131•2] On the Question of the Personality Cult, pp. 4-5.
[ 133•1] We do not consider here the mistaken propositions his speech contained
because this has no direct bearing on the question being dealt with and also because
these were analysed in Chapter One.
[ 134•1] Let us note that in the autumn of 1957 Lin Hsi-ling was declared to be a
“Right-wing element" and was ordered to work as a charwoman.
[ 135•1] Fiftieth Anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution, Theses of

the CPSU Central Committee, Moscow, 1967, p. 24.
[ 136•1] Jenmin jihpao, November 25, 1968.
[ 137•1] Jenmin jihpao, November 25, 196S.
[ 138•1] Lun Yii, Ch. “Yaoyueh”, 2.
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4. Political Arbitrariness Instead 138
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of Socialist Democracy and Legality

TOC
The theoretical apology of the personality cult in practice takes the form of a drive p
Card
against the Chinese people’s democratic gains.
Text Lenin used to say that the fullest and most consistent democracy is the most p
HTML important distinctive mark of the new, proletarian, socialist state, as compared with
PS the state in the “proper sense of the word”, which he saw as a “special machine for 139
PDF the suppression of one class by another, and, what is more, of the majority by the
minority". [ 139•1 Lenin wrote: “Democracy, introduced as fully and consistently as
T* is at all conceivable, is transformed from bourgeois into proletarian democracy; from
19* the state (=a special force for the suppression of a particular class) into something
which is no longer the state proper." [ 139•2
###
Proletarian, socialist democracy is closely connected with the implementation of the p
rules of socialist law, with socialist legality, which serve as the constitutional
expression of the general interests of the working people. Characterising socialist
democracy and its class character, Lenin pointed to the broad range of rights enjoyed
by citizens in socialist society, including election and recall of functionaries of the
state apparatus, control by the masses of their work, and alternative participation by
citizens in the conduct of affairs of state. Lenin never regarded socialist democracy
as arbitrary rule by a faceless crowd, which ignored democratic institutions and civil
rights. Nor had he ever contrasted direct action by the masses and the activity of
representative institutions of the proletarian state. He wrote: “We cannot imagine
democracy, even proletarian democracy, without representative institutions." [ 139•3
According to Lenin, the representative institutions of the socialist state carry out
legislation and organise its translation into life.
It is a duty of every citizen and of every person in office, without exception, to p

observe socialist legality. The whole activity of the Communists should set an
example of observance of socialist laws. With Lenin’s participation, the 8th Congress
of the Party in 1919 adopted a resolution which said that “the Party must carry out
its decisions through the Soviet organs, within the framework of the Soviet
Constitution". [ 139•4 The leader of the working people stressed the need
consistently and steadily to consolidate legality. In 1921, he said: “The closer we
approach conditions of unshakable and lasting power and the more trade develops, 140
the more imperative it is to put forward the firm slogan of greater revolutionary
legality." [ 140•1
Lenin held respect for socialist laws to be one of the most important marks of p
civilised behaviour. He wrote that legality and civilised behaviour are indissoluble,
and attached vast importance to the use of legality in raising the standards of
behaviour among broad masses of people. [ 140•2 Lenin’s principles of socialist
democracy and legality and Lenin’s experience in the struggle to implement them are
the legacy of all true revolutionaries, of all the advanced culture of modern society.
Socialist democracy and legality serve, according to the Marxist-Leninist doctrine, as
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/4.4-Political.Arbitrariness[2012-12-18 2:30:37]
guarantees against subjectivism and arbitrary acts, and help to bring out and realise
the people’s true will, to establish respect for human dignity, and the most consistent
observance of the basic rules of any community living. [ 140•3
The Main Document of the International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ p

Parties held in Moscow in June 1969 stressed that “the forces of socialism are
strengthened and unity of will and action of the people is promoted by the steadily
increasing political activity of the working people, by the greater activity of their
social organisations, extension of the rights of the individual, irreconcilable struggle
against manifestations of bureaucracy and by the allround development of socialist
democracy". [ 140•4 Neglect or distortion of these ideas in the practice of socialist
construction breeds subjectivism, builds up political mistakes and may develop into
highly dangerous political arbitrariness, gravely jeopardising the socialist gains of the
working people.
The tragic consequences of the policy pursued by Mao and his supporters are p
closely connected with the downright neglect of the key Marxist-Leninist ideas on
socialist democracy and legality. Mao and his entourage contemptuously try to
present their own unprecedented arbitrariness as being the theory and practice of
“massive democracy under the proletarian dictatorship”, as being the use and
development of the experience of the Paris Commune, as being an “ epochal and 141
brilliant development of Marxism-Leninism" and as its entry upon a totally new
stage, that of the “thought of Mao Tse-tung”.
The rampant political arbitrariness of Mao and his supporters, which reached a peak p
during the “cultural revolution”, has a fairly long and complex history behind it. It
cannot be correctly understood without consideration, as has been said, of the fact
that in the late 1940s and early 1950s there was in China an objective need to
establish a strictly centralised political power capable of exercising control over the
country’s vast territory, which had just been liberated in the course of the civil war
from Chiang Kai-shek’s rule. The new power had to fight against the counter-
revolution, the resistance of the exploiting classes, the vacillation of the petty
bourgeoisie, and the criminal acts of the declasse elements.
These problems were all tackled mainly through administrative repressions and p
outright armed suppression, both of which were used on a fairly large scale. The
massive use of repression was accompanied by a number of mistakes and abuses,
and now and again developed into brutal violence. However, political coercion,
aimed at expropriating the landowners and compradores and safeguarding the gains
of the revolution, had a progressive significance and yielded a tangible political
effect. Let us stress that this coercion was being carried out simultaneously with
extensive economic and cultural construction, in which the USSR and other socialist
countries gave great assistance. Meanwhile, as practice has shown, some political
leaders in China, who had mastered mainly violent, military and paramilitary
methods of tackling various problems, came to believe that violence, administration
by fiat, military orders, hand in hand with massive campaigns were the most
effective and reliable means of solving any political, economic and other problems.
At the 8th Congress of the CPC in September 1956, some delegates expressed p
concern over these attitudes. In its resolution, the Congress, having remarked on the
successes of socialist construction in China, declared: “It is a matter of urgency and
of great importance, now that we have entered the period of socialist construction, to
further extend the scope of democracy in our country, and to combat
bureaucracy." [ 141•1 The Congress outlined a number of concrete measures to 142
develop socialist democracy in China and condemned the views of those who were
trying artificially to sharpen the class struggle in the country. The Congress also
noted that the provisional laws adopted in the initial period after liberation and direct
action by the masses as a mode of combating reaction, had already played their part.
The CPC Central Committee’s report said that together with the changing tasks in
the struggle “a corresponding change in the methods of struggle will consequently
have to follow, and a complete legal system becomes an absolute
necessity". [ 142•1 Tung Pi-wu, a founding member of the CPC, made some
trenchant criticism of the state of legality in the country and advanced important
proposals for strengthening it. He said: “The problem today is that we still lack
several urgently-needed, fairly complete basic statutes such as a criminal code, a
civil code, rules of court procedure, a labour law, a law governing the utilisation of
land and the like. At the same time, because of the changes that have taken place in
our political and economic situation, a number of our laws should have been revised
or framed anew." [ 142•2 He added: “It would have to be regarded as a serious
problem, if we allowed our legal system to remain incomplete or unduly deferred its
completion." [ 142•3
At the Congress much was also said about the fact that “while carrying out our p
work in a number of localities and departments, we have often discovered violations
of the law and encroachments upon the people’s democratic rights". [ 142•4 It was
further said that there had been arrests without observance of the established legal
procedure, that the defendants’ exercise of the rights of defence and appeal had been
restricted and that those arrested were brutally treated. [ 142•5 The material of the
Congress contains an analysis of the historical and social reasons for these negative
developments in the life of the country. It said: “Before our Party, as the leading
force of the people, seized state power throughout the country, we were an outlawed 143
party with no legal means of waging the struggle and all revolutionary work had to
be carried on by outwitting the legal system of the old regime; after we seized state
power throughout the country, we did a thorough job of destroying the old state
apparatus and the old legal system. For this reason there was a deep-seated hatred
for the old legal system among our Party membership and the revolutionary masses,
and it is very natural that this hatred for the old legal system should have caused a
lack of respect for all legal systems in general." [ 143•1 And: “The petty
bourgeoisie make up the preponderant majority of all the classes existing in our
society. People from the petty bourgeoisie also form the biggest part of our Party
membership. ... It may be said that all forms of disregard for the legal system are, in
essence, manifestations of the anarchist thinking of the petty bourgeoisie." [ 143•2
One important and alarming conclusion that rang out at the 8th Congress of the p
CPC was this: “Apart from the fact that the causes of disregard and non-observance
of the legal system are deeply embedded in our history and in our society, we have
today a vast number of new and inexperienced cadres, and the propaganda and
education work that has been done in this connection among them is by no means
adequate." [ 143•3
Some speakers at the Congress stressed the danger of subjectivism and adventurism. p
The Congress announced a line to strengthen and develop socialist democracy and
legality in China. There is reason to assert that a number of political leaders took a
highly serious view of this line, which was a novel one for China in every respect,
and sought to implement it in political and legal practices. Meanwhile, as has been
noted above, Mao himself, being forced to accept the line proclaimed by the 8th
Congress, had no intention of putting it into practice. Already in the summer of 1957
a fresh tide of repressions was generated. Among the victims, alongside the elements
truly hostile to the revolution, were a large mass of people who were sincerely
responding to Mao’s “Hundred Flowers" call, which implied freedom of criticism
and expression within the framework of the law. They were labelled (sometimes 144
literally) with the “Right element" tag. These “Right elements" were placed on a par
with war criminals, Chiang Kai-shek’s agents and counterrevolutionaries. Being
declared a “Right element" meant dismissal from work, expulsion from school, and
other repressions.
The campaign against the “Right elements" was no exception. Subsequent practice p
showed that Mao and his followers had decided to put down criticism of their acts
by every possible means. Far from abandoning the extensive use of violence in the
new conditions, they in fact applied it against all their opponents, stifling criticism,
and hoping that reliance on violence, combined with generation of “enthusiasm”
among the masses, would help them to solve the most complex problems.
In August 1957, the State Council of the CPR adopted a decision on labour p
education, under which virtually any citizen of the CPR, without trial or the sanction
of the prosecutor, simply under a decision by an administrative agency, could be
transported for labour education, which for all practical purposes meant exile or the
concentration camp for an indefinite period. An announcement broadly circulated at
the end of 1957 revealed that a number of responsible workers^t the Ministry of
Control of the CPR, the Supreme People’s Court and the Supreme People’s
Procurator’s Office had been dismissed from their office and qualified as “Right
elements who had infiltrated into the Party”. They were accused of a Right-wing
deviation for having stood up for the independent powers of the organs of state
control, the procurator’s office and the court. This was followed by a corresponding
purge in the agencies of state control, the courts and the procurator’s office.
The proposals on the adoption of the new criminal, civil and procedural codes, p
which speakers at the 8th Congress of the CPC said were extremely necessary, were
soon branded as “undermining the democratic dictatorship of the people". [ 144•1
Some of the drafted codes are being applied in secret, without publication, and the
practice of intimidating criminal punishments, like execution by shooting deferred for
two years, deprivation of liberty for an indefinite period, and so on, is being 145
continued.
The wider use of violent methods in implementing policy, and neglect of legality
have gone hand in hand with political and economic adventurism, Maoist plans for
“Great Leaps Forward”, “communisation” and world hegemonism. Characteristically,
the National People’s Congress, the highest organ of state power, was ignored when
such extremely important measures for the people as the “Great Leap Forward" and
the introduction of the people’s communes, were being prepared. Implementation of
this line was accompanied with an intensification of criminal and other repressions.
Mobile teams, consisting of security men, and functionaries of the courts and the
procurator’s office, were formed to speed up the infliction of mass repressions. Here
and there, the execution of death sentences was carried out in the presence of vast
crowds. The labour of prisoners was being widely used in all the provinces. Fierce
attacks were launched in the political and juridical press against assertions that the
main functions of the state in China had now become the function of economic
organisation and cultural education, and that there was no longer any need to
intensify the function of suppression at home. “The fundamental reason for the
existence of our law consists in the existence of the class struggle in the period of
transition from capitalism to communism, and since contradictions exist between our
enemies and ourselves the main role of law always consists in exercising a
dictatorship over the enemies, and in resolving the contradictions between us and the
enemies; it is not the main role of law to resolve the contradictions within the
people." [ 145•1 Consequently, the primary function of law as an instrument of
repression and retribution was being emphasised in every way.
***

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Notes
[ 139•2] Ibid., p. 419.
[ 139•3] Ibid., p. 424.
[ 139•4] The CPSU in Resolutions and Decisions of Congresses, Conferences mid

CC Plenary Meetings, Part I, Moscow, 1953, p. 446 (in Russian).
[ 140•1] V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol, 33, p. 176.
[ 140•2] Ibid., p. 366.
[ 140•3] Ibid., Vol. 25, p. 474.
[ 140•4] International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties, Moscow, W69,

p. 22.
[ 141•1] Eighth National Congress of the Communist Party of China, p. 126.
[ 142•2] Ibid., p. 87.
[ 142•3] Ibid., p. 57.
[ 142•4] Ibid., p. 89.
[ 142•5] Ibid., p. 145.
[ 143•1] Ibid., pp. 91–92.
[ 143•2] Ibid., pp. 92–93.
[ 143•3] Ibid., p. 93.
[ 144•1] Chengfa yanchiu No. 3, 1958, pp. 28–29.
[ 145•1] Chcngfa yanclriu No. 6, 1958, p. 40.
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of Political Arbitrariness in Mao’s Works

TOC
The events taking place in China’s political life in the 1950s and 1960s were p
Card
evidently connected with a number of objective circumstances but in no small
measure depended also on the subjective propositions of Mao and his followers, and 146
Text on Mao’s theoretical conceptions of the role of violence in a socialist revolution.
HTML
PS For one thing, an analysis of Mao’s political ideas shows that he had been moving p
PDF from the use of some Marxist propositions concerning the break-up of the old,
exploiting state power towards a distortion of the Marxist-Leninist ideas of power,
T* democracy and legality in the period of socialist construction.
19*
As has already been stressed, Mao’s political views took shape on the relatively p
### narrow basis of Chinese practice during the protracted civil wars and in isolation
from the diverse experience of the international working class. That is why his view
of politics is inseparable from the notion of war. He insists that “politics is war
without bloodshed while war is politics with bloodshed". [ 146•1
Mao’s idea of power corresponded to some concrete circumstances of the struggle p

against the semi-feudal and semicolonial system in China. In effect, he even
borrowed some of his notions of power and the method of exercising it, as he
himself has repeatedly admitted, from the practices of Chiang Kai-shek, which
everyone knows amounted to antidemocratic, militaristic terrorism. Mao stressed:
“The revolutionary dictatorship and the counter-revolutionary dictatorship are opposite
in character, but the former appeared in the course of learning from the latter. This
learning is highly important.”
Very early on Mao observed, with approval and some envy, how well Chiang Kai- p
shek had mastered the old precepts of Chinese militarists, like their saying that “if
you have an army, you have power”, and “war decides everything”. Mao turned
these notions into absolutes and identified them with Marxism; as has been noted
above, he holds that “from the standpoint of the Marxist doctrine of the state the
army is the most important part of the apparatus of state power”. Another “absolute
truth"—“power grows out of the barrel of a gun"—has also been enshrined as a
Marxist proposition. Both these propositions as the “cultural revolution" made
absolutely clear, are also being applied by Mao to power in a socialist state. Mao
regards the strengthening and consolidation of the people’s state above all as the 147
strengthening of his position in the army and in the punitive organs.
As a rule Mao seeks to obscure the difference between democratic and socialist p
methods in exercising political power. His works reveal a confusion of such concepts
as the type and form of state. This is not at all accidental. Mao has clearly ignored
the legal forms of state power and regards legality not as a necessary and generally
binding method of exercising such power, but merely as one of the possible means
of suppressing and removing all real, possible and even imaginary adversaries. The
role Mao assigns to law, legality and democratic state institutions shows that he does
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not believe they merit any serious development and consolidation.
The pseudo-revolutionary content of Mao’s ideas of socialist democracy and legality p

has gradually developed into a subjectivist and pragmatic system. In accordance with
this system of views, rules of law are not binding on the person or group of persons
exercising supreme political power. It provides for the suppression of any, including
imaginary, political opponents, and the possibility of regarding the people as a “clean
sheet of paper" on which “it is possible to write the newest, the most beautiful
characters, and to create the newest, the most beautiful drawings.”
The theoretical basis for this system of views rests on postulates about “two types p
of dissimilar contradictions and two dissimilar methods of their resolution”. Another
postulate is the distinction between “the contradictions between us and our enemies"
and “contradictions among the people”. There is no doubt at all over the proposition
that different types of contradictions have to be resolved in different ways, but the
point is that Mao simultaneously introduces a highly ilexible definition for the
concept of “enemies”. As was said in Chapter One, his concept of “enemy” has no
definite class meaning and is so interpreted that it will fit anyone whom Mao and
his followers find unsuitable.
Each of these two types of contradictions, says Mao, may develop into its opposite. p
The fundamental principle for resolving dissimilar contradictions, according to Mao,
is: “ ferocity towards the enemies and gentleness with one’s own people.” Those
who find themselves in the category of “enemies”, are deemed not to have any 148
rights and are subject to suppression. The “thought of Mao Tse-tung" does not
provide for any constitutional, democratic, legal norms or guarantees for the power
of the people and the rights of citizens. This needs to be specially emphasised
because the CPR has no criminal, civil or labour codes, nor developed procedural
legislation, while the powers of the bodies applying coercion administratively are
exceptionally broad. These circumstances help to understand the true meaning of
Mao’s statements about “the democratic method, that is, persuasion, and not
coercion" being used “among the people”. The role of law “among the people" is
reduced by Mao to the operation of “administrative orders issued for the purpose of
maintaining public order”.
In China, Mao’s greatest “contribution” to the theory and practice of socialist p

democracy is declared to be a complex of methods characterised as the “line of the
masses”, or rather, as the “mass line”. In Mao’s views this consists in conditioning
the population in the course of which some of its sections are converted, by means
of deception and intimidation, into mobs acting as the tools and accomplices in the
political gambles and repressions carried out by Mao’s supporters.
Practice has shown that in the guise of this “mass line”, Mao’s associates have been p
making ever wider use of the “foul traditions" of the feudal epoch to promote their
own ends. Mao proceeds from the assumption that the “extremes” of the “mass line"
may play a revolutionising role, and has advanced as a general principle the idea that
“in order to straighten something out one must bend it to an extreme, without
bending it to an extreme one cannot straighten it out”.
In the last few years, one of the main methods used by the Maoists has been to p
stage “deafening”, “thunderous” mass campaigns which “shake heaven and earth”,
which generate unhealthy passions and instincts and violate elementary social rules,
and the legitimate interests and rights of citizens. This is connected with another
method of pursuing political aims, namely, provocative calls for broad expression of
diverse opinions and criticisms, which are followed by mass repressions.
Characteristic in this respect are Mao’s speech at an All– China Conference on p 149
Propaganda Work of the CPC in March 1957 and the subsequent events. At the time
he said that the method to be used in directing the state was that of “allowing
freedom" and not that of “suppression” and that it was not right “to club to death"
those who express mistaken opinions. Within a few months a broad and massive
campaign of represssion was launched not only against the real opponents of
socialism but also everyone who had dared to express, within the framework of the
law, critical judgements and proposals aimed at improving government and social
affairs in the country.
The anti-democratic substance of Mao’s political views has reached a peak in the p
last few years, and has been formulated as follows: “Always, everywhere and in all
things to obey Mao Tse-tung, Mao Tse-tung’s precepts are the supreme law.” This
sets as a binding rule on everyone the autocratic leader’s infallible will. Mao and his
followers are now trying to substitute for the principles of socialist democracy and
legality the routine, autarchic principle of rule characteristic of oriental despotic
regimes in the early ages, of absolutist regimes in the Middle Ages and ultra-
dictatorial regimes today. In this context, there has been a highly characteristic
“massive campaign" against the principles of democratic centralism with the pretext
provided by Liu Shaochi’s pamphlet On the Communist’s Work on Himself.
Under the pretext of criticising Liu’s pamphlet, Mao and his followers attacked the p
principle that the minority must submit to the majority, the principle that decisions
by higher organs are binding on lower organs, and declared these to be effective and
democratic only when they serve to promote the “thought of Mao Tse-tung". Jenmin
jihpao wrote in June 1967: “We must fulfil the instructions of Comrade Mao
Tsetung regardless of whether we have or have not yet understood them. We must
establish Mao Tse-tung’s absolute authority___This constitutes our highest
discipline." [ 149•1
A fatal effect has been exerted on the development of legal science by the eclectic p
ideology of autocracy, political arbitrariness, lawlessness and anti-democracy, which
are now and again covered up with a vulgarised Marxist– Leninist terminology and
demagogic catch-phrases about serving the masses. Academic lawyers have 150
concentrated mainly on seeking out and exposing pseudo-bourgeois ideas in each
other’s writings, lectures and speeches. For all practical purposes, the publication of
books on the science of law has been abandoned in China.
Under the pretext of fighting bourgeois juridical constructions, progressive, p

democratic legal principles and institutions are being discarded on the ground that
similar legal formulations are to be found in bourgeois legal writings or in operative
bourgeois law. Thus, Chinese legal publications have branded as bourgeois—and
consequently unacceptable —the idea that in the trial of cases judges must be
independent and free from extraneous influence; the idea that judges should try the
cases before them according to their inner judicial convictions based on a
consideration of all the circumstances in the case is also considered to be an
expression of bourgeois subjectivism; the idea that criminal proceedings may be
started only for acts which are qualified in law as being criminal is likewise
discarded; also discarded as a bourgeois principle is the idea that a man is deemed to
be innocent until proved guilty in the manner established by law, etc.
In late 1964 and early 1965, another broad campaign, conceived by Mao, was p
launched across the country. This was an all-embracing system of repressive

measures which came to be designated as the “campaign of socialist education”.
Judging by the political and legal press, this campaign equals or even exceeds in
scope such massive movements as the agrarian reform, the eradication of the
counter– revolution and the fight against the “three evils" and against the “five
evils”. It was regarded as a universal means of eradicating the seeds of
“revisionism”, and “bourgeoisification” in every section of the population.
Simultaneously, orders were issued on behalf of Mao Tse-tung that the “massive
line" in dictatorship over the enemies was to be intensified.
To implement this and to carry out the “campaign of socialist education" teams, p
consisting of Party workers, security men, workers of the court, the procurator’s
office, officers and soldiers and students, were sent to every village, enterprise and
organisation in the cities by the superior Party committee. The teams made a detailed
study of the situation on the spot. The propagandists, mainly students, making use of 151
visual agitation, gongs and drums, popularised the “thought of Mao Tse-tung" on the
class struggle. Other members of the teams sought out among the masses the
“enemies of socialism ... seeking to take the capitalist way”. In accordance with a
directive from the centre, roughly 5 per cent of the total population of every locality
was to be classed under that head. The teams worked for days, sometimes months,
holding ceaseless mass meetings, at which every citizen, every worker had to come
out with denunciatory criticism and self-criticism aimed against the “restoration of
capitalism" and at exposing the enemy 5 per cent in his midst.
Workers of politico-legal organs, who were compelled to take an active part in the p
campaign, were given the following instructions: “All the purely juridical precautions
and superfluous ceremonies, which bind the masses and do not correspond to the
revolutionary struggle, must be discarded without the slightest regret. It should be
clearly understood that all the necessary normative regulations and procedural rules
are designed to help to fight the enemies and not to fetter ourselves. We must apply
the revolutionary standpoint of the class struggle, and not take a metaphysical view
of various legal statuses." [ 151•1
Quite clearly the repressions carried out in the guise of “socialist education" were p
designed not so much to punish criminals as to intimidate everyone. This is shown,
in particular, by the establishment of an “indicator of the revolutionisation of the
work of the court”, which was to “ensure and stimulate the three great revolutionary
movements: the class struggle, the production struggle, and scientific
experimentation”.
To remove all doubts in the minds of the workers of political and legal organs p
about implementing the “mass line" they were bound to fight against their own ego,
which was identified with “individualism”. There was good reason why the following
view was expressed in the press in 1966: “ Individualism means the presence in the
consciousness of one’s own ego, and the concept of ‘ego’ is a great enemy of the
concept of ‘application’ [of Chairman Mao’s ideas—G.O.}. When you face a big
enemy, you must defeat him." [ 151•2 In 1965 there had already been some 152
complaints that not all the political and juridical workers had their militant spirit “
truly aroused”. In 1966, there was open talk about a category of political and
juridical workers who merely “pretended” to obey Chairman Mao. The Maoists
demanded that the workers of the court, the procurator’s office and security service
should act in accordance with the formula established for military men: “I shall do
exactly what Chairman Mao says.” This was quite clearly said in an academic law
journal. [ 152•1
The sternest measures were taken in respect to those who failed to display a marked
enthusiasm in carrying out the repressions. In the roughly 18 months just before the
“ cultural revolution" attained its peak there had been an almost total replacement of
the leading workers in the Supreme People’s Court, the Supreme People’s
Procurator’s Office, and their branches in Tibet, and also of workers of the courts
and procurator’s offices in Peking, Shanghai and all the provinces.
***

TEXT SIZE
normal
Notes
[ 149•1] Jenmin jihpao, June 16, 1967.
[ 151•1] Chengfa yanchiu No. 1, 1965.
[ 151•2] Ibid., No. 1, 1966.
[ 152•1] See Chengfa yanchiu No. 1, 1966.
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6. On the True Essence 152
<•>
of the “Cultural Revolution”

TOC
Let us bear in mind that the strict centralisation of the political machinery, an p
Card
objective necessity in the early years following the formation of the CPR, gradually
developed the features of a hierarchical autocracy, that is, a form of administration
Text under which all the real power on a given territory was in the hands of an individual
HTML responsible virtually to the individual on the rung above him.
PS
PDF The fact is that the political power at the centre was quite deliberate in allowing the p
localities relatively broad freedom in choosing the means of attaining the aims set by
T* the centre. That is why the Ministry of Control was eliminated, and why the
19* principle of “direct subordination" of the organs of the procurator’s office and
general procuratorial supervision were whittled down. That is why the principle that
###
judges are independent was not established, and why the principle that “the courts
are independent”, provided for by the Constitution, was not put into practice. For the
same reason, the sessions of the national people’s congresses at the centre and in the 153
localities were essentially formalistic affairs and the law governing the recall of
deputies was never adopted.
For a long time, this state of affairs suited the followers of Mao as far as their p
plans were concerned. Mao’s absolute power, which was not checked in any way,
and the subordination to his will of the whole machinery of political power,
unconnected with democratic institutions or responsibility before the people and its
representatives, led to a succession of the grossest political mistakes, like the “Great
Leap Forward”, the establishment of the people’s communes, the worsening of
relations with the socialist countries and the drive for world hegemony.
The 1959–1962 crisis was so grave that it made many of the local leaders give p
more consideration to the real possibilities and requirements than to the Maoists’
ideological and political propositions. During the period in which the mistakes of the
“Great Leap Forward" and the communisation were being corrected, from 1962 to
1965, the local organs became relatively independent of the central Maoist leadership.
This was also largely promoted by the instructions which came from the centre, from
the individuals and organisations charged with the task of righting the grave
situation. This widened the gap between the Maoist leadership and the real economic
and political processes. The machinery of political power was gradually slipping out
of the Chinese leaders’ hands. The mainly passive, but stubborn, even if largely
unrealised, resistance to the Maoists’ ideological and political aims on the part of
broad masses of the working people and many grass-roots functionaries was put
down and possibly for a time partly overcome with the aid of politico-juridical
organs in the course of the “socialist education campaign”.
However, it was not eradicated while the covert nonacceptance of the extreme p
adventurism by the functionaries in the middle and higher governing echelons of the
machinery of political power remained. The difficulty of overcoming this situation
was compounded by the fact, as the Chinese press makes clear, that in these echelons
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/4.6-True.Essence.of.the.Cultural.Revolution[2012-12-18 2:30:56]
there were no open, public statements against Mao Tse-tung. The local Party and
government functionaries, including the functionaries of political and juridical organs,
could not and would not come out against their leaders, who had been elected in 154
accordance with the CPR Constitution and the CPC Rules, acting on behalf of the
CPC Central Committee and wielding exceptionally great real power. That is why
Mao Tsetung, having fortified his positions in the army but apparently not being
quite able to rely on it and wishing to give his acts a massive character, went on to
set up new organisations consisting of men who were personally loyal to him and
who were not directly subordinate to the existing Party and government bodies. Their
purpose was to fight those who could be classed as overt, covert or potential anti-
Maoists, and to influence the mass of neutral, doubting and vacillating men. Such
organisations were in fact set up from among the Hungweipings and the Tsaofans.
Mao’s political style was revealed in the way the “cultural revolution" was prepared
and carried out.
However, this time it was an attempt to saddle the country with a regime of p
personal power, and the aims and methods of the “cultural revolution" gave ground
to qualify it as such an attempt. For one thing, from the very outset of this
“revolution” it was quite clear that those who were carrying it out constituted a
minority in the Party and in the country, a fact the official Maoist press could not
conceal and had to explain in some way. An article in Jenmin jihpao said that the
“Leftists were the iron club, the golden club of the proletarian dictatorship". [ 154•1
The press admitted that the “Leftists” who were the “core and mainstay of the
movement" were “not numerous”. They were set the straightforward task of “winning
over, rallying together and educating the majority". [ 154•2 However, the Maoists
did not expect the Leftists to be able to do this within the framework of the existing
legal order, and therefore provided in the resolution of the CPC Central Committee,
which they put through on August 8, 1966, for unprecedented measures, releasing the
“revolutionary students" from criminal or administrative punishment for any crimes
and offences against law and order which they might commit in the course of the “
revolution”. This resolution, while stating that it was “ inadmissible to use methods
of suppression against the minority" (and the minority consisted of “Leftists”), also 155
said: “In the course of the movement, apart from murderers, incendiaries, poisoners,
saboteurs, stealers of state secrets and other counter-revolutionaries, concerning whose
crimes real evidence is available and who have to be punished in accordance with
the law, questions about students of higher schools, special, secondary and primary
schools should not as a rule be brought up." [ 155•1 It is not surprising, therefore,
that there were widespread abuses, slanders, arrests, beatings, inflictions of bodily
injuries and other gross forms of violence against the victims of the “cultural
revolution”, and that these now and again developed into lynchings, killings and
massive clashes involving much bloodshed. These facts were admitted in the Maoist
press. Nor could it have been otherwise, because the resolution on the “cultural
revolution" said: “There is no need to fear disorder. Chairman Mao teaches us that
the revolution cannot be carried out with such refinement, with such delicacy, with
such decorum and stability." [ 155•2
Although the Maoists did put in a reservation that the blows should be dealt at p
those “who go along the capitalist way”, with rare exceptions all the responsible
functionaries in the centre and in the localities were in fact subjected to repression
and intimidation in one way or another. The reason was quite understandable: Mao
was no longer sure that a majority of them would support his line without question.
Hence the slogan of the “cultural revolution": “Let”s break the dog’s head of anyone
who opposes the thought of Mao Tse-tung.”
The situation that has taken shape as a result of the “ cultural revolution" is so p
complex because neither the Constitution nor any of the other CPR laws have been
revoked in any formal proceedings by competent state organs. That is largely the
reason why events in China have assumed such a confused and contradictory
character and why they have been verging into political, economic and administrative
chaos.
In many places, the wild frenzy of the Hungweipings and the Tsaofans came up p
against resistance on the part of local Party organisations and government bodies, 156
supported by the factory workers. Now and again local political and legal bodies put
a check on the “rebels” in accordance with the laws of the CPR. Whereupon Mao’s
followers issued calls for a “take-over of power”, “overthrow of the bourgeois
dictatorship" and “break up of the old state machine”. The methods used in the
“cultural revolution" show that its organisers intended not only to defeat their
opponents, who held Party and government office in accordance with the CPC Rules
and the Constitution of the CPR, but also to create a totally different machinery of
political power, which would make the apparatus of power and the broad masses of
the population absolutely subservient in their activity to the implementation of Mao’s
political line.
Having failed to obtain support from broad masses of workers, peasants and p
intellectuals, the Maoists began to move in the army units. From January 1967, they
began to “take over power" in the provinces and the cities with the help of the
army. The “take-over of power" consisted in the storming and sacking of premises of
central departments and also of local Party and government agencies, in beatings,
tortures and murders of many functionaries of these organs, some of whom were
driven to suicide. Among the victims were even ministers of the CPR, and deputies
of assemblies of people’s representatives, including the National People’s Congress.
The latter was unable to hold any of its regular sessions beginning from 1966. The
Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress and the Chairman of the
CPR and his deputies were unable to exercise their functions. The most important
directives were issued by agencies not empowered to do so by the Constitution;
orders to the armed forces of which the Chairman of the CPR is the constitutional
chief, were issued on behalf of Mao Tse-tung, who has no legal grounds for such
acts. [ 156•1
Having broken up the organs of administration established in accordance with the p 157
CPR Constitution, the Maoists set up “revolutionary committees" consisting of
military men, representatives of “mass revolutionary organisations" and the CPC
functionaries who had “stood the test of true loyalty to Chairman Mao’s line”. The
establishment of these “ revolutionary committees" ran up against great difficulties in
view of resistance on the part of various social groups of Chinese society, and was
finally completed only by September 1968. These committees simultaneously held all
the state and Party power.
The new, unconstitutional organs of power have managed to maintain themselves p

mainly by resorting to violence. An editorial in Pravda on May 18, 1970, gave this
assessment of the Maoists’ system of power: “The organs of power in China are
structured on the militaristic model, inherited from the Chiang Kai-shek clique.
Power is concentrated in the hands of the military, who are Mao’s henchmen, and
who boss the so-called revolutionary committees. The commanders of military
districts, armies and garrisons are uncontrolled masters of the provinces. They head
’revolutionary committees’ and direct the ‘ordering’ of the Party organisations. Army
units are quartered at enterprises, establishments and schools. At the factories, the
shops and teams have been organised into companies and squads. The same
militaristic system is being introduced in the government establishments and
institutions of learning. The army controls the economy and culture." [ 157•1
The Maoists’ unconstitutional activity is also clearly evident from the fact that they p 158
have everywhere abolished the organs of the court, the procurator’s offices and the
public security offices, and have set up in their place “joint committees for
eradicating counter-revolutionaries”. These committees have to overcome strong
resistance, because the number of those who are dissatisfied with the new authorities
is exceptionally large and may be expected considerably to grow in the future.
The incompetence of the new organs of power and the absence of any sort of p
positive programme created such a dangerous situation in the country that Mao’s
followers were forced to establish military control everywhere and to make the
utmost use of the army to organise production.
Tremendous difficulties and fresh acute contradictions arise from the efforts to re- p
establish elementary law and order, which are being made for the purpose of cutting
short the excesses of the “revolution”. During the exposure of “bourgeois dictatorship
of the counter-revolutionary revisionists" in the second half of 1966, millions of
victims of the “socialist education campaign" began to demand rehabilitation. In this
connection, according to some organs of the Hungweiping press, there was evidence
of a tendency on the part of the victims to revenge themselves upon the members of
the teams who had carried out the “education”. The Maoists have had repeatedly to
reaffirm, on Mao’s authority, that the repressions carried out in the course of that
campaign had been “correct”. The committees of poor peasants and lower sections of
the middle peasants, which had been formed and reformed in the course of the
“campaign” and which had the task of controlling the state of affairs in the
countryside, proved to be powerless. It was not they or the organs of the communes
and production teams, which had existed earlier, that directed the agricultural
operations from 1967 to 1969, but “combat groups" and “front commands" which
relied on army personnel.
In the course of the “cultural revolution" the numbers of persons accused by the p
Maoists of counter-revolutionary activity prior to 1966 were swelled by a mass of
so-called counter-revolutionary revisionists from the Party and state apparatus.
Finally, there appeared a totally new and possibly the most dangerous section of the
suppressed and discontented, consisting of arrested or dispersed members of the 159
“rebel” organisations which had been set up to carry out the “cultural revolution”,
but which had gone much farther than the Maoists had expected. Evidence of serious
discontent with the ultimate results among those who had “pioneered the revolution"
comes from the insistent calls for unity and cohesion of the ranks of the
Hungweipings, the Tsaofans and other “rebels,” calls for combating anarchism,
ultrademocratism and nihilism in their midst, and the dispatch of many of them into
the countryside, amounting to exile.
Crime is reported to spread in the country; there is growing discontent among the p
relatives of repressed persons, who are frequently treated as disloyal citizens. Many
facts show that there is also discontent and indignation over the Chinese leadership’s
policy even in the army itself, which has been openly proclaimed the “most
important and the most reliable mainstay”. Even in provinces and cities like
Kweichow and Shanghai, where the “greatest victories for Mao Tsetung’s thought"
have been repeatedly announced, there have been massive and sanguinary clashes on
various occasions, involving the army, between the proponents and the opponents of
the “cultural revolution”. Sizable sections of the population, who have had their fill
of the “revolution”, seek to fence themselves off from it and are not taking anything
like an active part in it.
In their attempts to consolidate their power, Mao’s followers have unhinged the p
country’s political machinery and plunged it into a grave crisis. The attempts on the
part of some Chinese leaders to stop the “excesses” and to disassociate themselves
from such excesses, to re-install some harassed individuals in their responsible posts,
and to take reprisals against the “rebel organisations" and “rebels” who had exceeded
the limits set out by the sponsors of the “revolution”, are being made from purely
tactical considerations.
The facts show that Mao’s followers are trying to present their political arbitrariness p
as a universal law governing the development of socialist society. In order to
establish a system of military-bureaucratic dictatorship in the country, they seek to
make the system appear ultra-revolutionary, and declare any struggle against it as
stemming from the eternal machinations of the “counter-revolutionary revisionists”,
“restorers of capitalism" and suchlike enemies of “Mao Tsetung’s thought”. 160
The Maoists insist that following one round of exposures of “enemies” within the p
Party, the government and the army, there inevitably appear new enemies within
them. The struggle against these enemies, Mao and his followers insist, will require
“decades and even centuries". [ 160•1 At the height of the “cultural revolution"
Mao warned: “No one must assume that everything will be well if the great cultural
revolution is carried out one-two or three-four times.” On another occasion Mao said
that the “cultural revolution is bound to be carried out many times". [ 160•2
Consequently, the Maoists are trying to establish political arbitrariness as a law.
The Communist Party is the highest form of socio-political organisation in socialist p

society, which exercises political and ideological leadership of socialist construction,
and acts as the organising nucleus of the whole social system, and as the collective
mind of all the working people. As Lenin put it, the Communist Party alone is
capable of “being the teacher, the guide, the leader of all the working and exploited
people in organising their social life without the bourgeoisie and against the
bourgeoisie." [ 160•3
Recognition of the Communist Party’s leading role in socialist society is the p

touchstone of membership of the Marxist-Leninist camp.
Mao and his followers pay lip-service to the Communist Party’s leading role, but p
their practical activity testifies to the contrary. Mao does not regard the Party as the
leading and directing force of society but as an instrument of the regime of personal
power, as the most important means for carrying out his adventurist and chauvinistic
policy. Mao found unsuitable a Communist Party which based its activity on the
principles of Marxism-Leninism and proletarian internationalism. That is why one of
the basic tasks of the “cultural revolution" was to change the composition and
ideological-political face of the Communist Party of China and also its functions 161
within the system of society’s political superstructure. The Maoists undertook a
veritable offensive against the Communist Party of China: all the elective leading
organs of the CPC from top to bottom were broken up, the Party’s organisational
structure, earlier established on the principle of democratic centralism, was destroyed
as a whole, and a heavy blow was dealt at all the healthy forces within the Party. A
large group of prominent Party and state leaders, military commanders, veterans of
the Chinese revolution and a broad section of the Party intelligentsia and
Communists were removed from political activity and subjected to a purge,

repression and denigration. They were all those whom Mao and his followers saw as
overt or potential opponents of their own line; there was a sharp reduction in the
Party of the share of politically conscious representatives of the working class and
the Party intelligentsia. For all practical purposes, the CPC’s Eighth Central
Committee was eliminated: over two-thirds of its membership was branded as
belonging to the “black band”. It is true that now and again the Maoists pretended
that they were acting on behalf of the Central Committee, but this they did in order
to throw a cloak of legality on their unlawful actions.
Convincing evidence of this came from the 12th Plenary Meeting of the CPC p
Central Committee held in October 1968. It was called an enlarged Plenary Meeting.
Because, as we have said, most CC members had been subjected to repression, a
great number of military men and “ revolutionary youths" were invited to attend the
Plenary Meeting to create the impression of representation and also to exert pressure
on the CC members who were still “at large" ( naturally with the exception of
Mao’s followers).
Naturally the CC Plenary Meeting made up in such fashion rubberstamped the p

decisions drafted beforehand by the CPC leadership on the victory of the “great
proletarian cultural revolution”, and expelled from the Party and removed from all
his posts in the Party and the state (once again in violation of the prerogatives of
state organs) Liu Shao-chi, Chairman of the CPR, and adopted a decision to call the
9th Congress of the CPC. The sponsors of this congress expected it to provide a
legal basis for the regime of Mao’s personal power.
The 9th Congress of the CPC called in April 1969, demonstrated the grossest p 162
violations of inner-Party democracy: 1,512 delegates to this congress were not
elected by Party branches but were handpicked from among Mao’s loyal supporters.
Most of the members of the Central Committee, elected at the 8th Congress of the
CPC, were not among the delegates. Speakers in the debate on the report were not
given and their speeches were not published.
The 9th CPC Congress has not stabilised the Maoist sociopolitical system. The p
second half of 1971 saw a new political crisis in China, in the course of which a
group of top army and Party leaders disappeared from public life. A great deal of
attention has been given to the disappearance of Lin Piao, who was earlier
proclaimed “the most reliable associate and continuator of Mao’s cause" and his
official “successor”. Until recently the Chinese press invariably emphasised that the
army fulfilling Mao’s instructions was under the “direct command of Lin Piao”.
Today one can no longer see Lin Piao’s portraits in Peking. Moreover, publications
in any way associated with him have been withdrawn from sale. All over the country
there was a long wave of Party meetings at which reports were made about Lin
Piao’s “blunders”, about his raising his hand against Mao himself. Together with Lin
Piao there disappeared some other members of the Political Bureau of the CC CPC
and army leaders including the Chief of the General Staff Huang Yung-sheng, his
deputies Wu Fa-Hsien and Li Tso-peng. [ 162•1
It is still difficult to give a definite answer to the question as to what reasons p

underlay the crisis in the Chinese leadership in September 1971. One thing is clear—
the September developments are but a mirror of the general crisis of the Maoist
“special” political course, proof of a complicated and tense situation in China, caused
by the consequences of the “cultural revolution" and by the anti-Leninist internal and
external policies imposed by Mao Tse-tung on the 9th CPC Congress.
It is common knowledge that at the 9th CPC Congress the Mao group adopted the p 163
course of external and internal policies wholly subordinated to the assertion of
Peking’s hegemonistic positions in the international arena. With this end in view the
Maoists are turning China into a “barrack”, into a “single military camp”, and are
orienting her economy and socio-political life on “the preparation for war”. While
doing this, they emphasise in every way that China faces a military threat “from the
North”.
However, it is obvious that it has been much easier for the Maoist leadership to p
proclaim a “special course" than to implement it in practice. Both the internal and
external policies of Mao run counter to the objective requirements of China’s
advance along the road of socialism, of her strengthening friendship and
internationalist ties with the Soviet Union and other socialist countries, with all the
revolutionary forces of today. The Chinese leadership seems to be rent by deep
disagreements on major problems of internal and external policies.
The sponsors of the “cultural revolution" failed to remove from the consciousness of p
Chinese Communists, workers, peasants, intellectuals and servicemen the ideas of
socialism and proletarian internationalism, the ideas for which the Chinese people
had fought for many long years and which had been duly reflected in the decisions
of the 8th CPC Congress. It is not accidental that Mao and his adherents say that
“not only one, but even three or four cultural revolutions would not suffice to
educate the people" in a spirit they like.
The very fact that the Maoists have tried to settle their political, social and
economic problems through methods of compulsion, through the Army, has
undoubtedly deepened the crisis of the entire Maoist socio-political system. The
Maoist policy, inimical to Marxism-Leninism and proletarian internationalism, has
caused serious contradictions in the country and plunged it into a protracted political
crisis.
***
Thus, one of the essential features of Maoist ideology is its apology of violence, p
and its stake on the army and the punitive agencies as the main means for
implementing Maoist policy. All of this is fundamentally at variance withnormal
Marxism,
which sets strict legal limits to the use of methods of suppression. Mao has 164
deliberately discarded the constructive function of the proletarian dictatorship and has
“ forgotten" about the fact that it is closely connected with socialist democracy, that
it is in itself the highest type of democracy, because it represents the interests of the
overwhelming majority of citizens, instead of a handful of individuals.
Maoist ideology is an ideology of political adventurism, demagogy, violence and

mass terrorism. It is naturally inconceivable without the personality cult. Mao’s
followers have used it to usurp power in the Party and in the state in the course of
the “cultural revolution”. However, the experience of world history suggests that
power obtained in this way is tenuous and is bound to collapse.
***

TEXT SIZE
Notes
[ 154•2] Ibid.
[ 155•1] CPC Central Committee’s Resolution on the Great Proletarian Cultural

Revolution, § 7, Jenmin jihpao, August 9. 1966.
[ 155•2] Ibid.
[ 156•1] Recent reports from China say that the Maoists intend to hold elections for
the fourth National People’s Congress, a decision clearly dictated by tactical and
short-term considerations. The Maoists want the military-bureaucratic dictatorship
regime to function normally by making it “respectable” and to try to re-establish
some of the organs of state administration which had been in existence before the
start of the “cultural revolution”. They are also impelled to do so by foreignpolicy
considerations : first, they would like to appear in the eyes of world opinion as
supporters of legality and law and order, and second, to facilitate the attainment of
political and cultural ties with foreign countries, the capitalist countries above all.
This is naturally hampered by the absence of a parliament (the National People’s
Congress) and a Chairman of the CPR.
The Maoists’ intention to hold elections for the fourth National People’s Congress
also shows that it was pure demagogy on the part of the Maoists to back up the
activity of the Hungweiping and Tsaofan outfits, and to declare their break-up of the
constitutional organs of power to amount to the “utilisation and development of the
experience of the Paris Commune”. When the Maoists were faced with the need to
eliminate their political and ideological opponents, they held forth about the need to
“break up the old state machine”; now that the Maoists have achieved their aims
they are prepared to use the “old state machine”, against which they had earlier
directed the wrath and hatred of millions of men.
[ 157•1] See “Pseudo-Revolutionaries Unmasked" (editorial article published in

Pravda on May 18, 1970), Moscow, 1970, pp. 6-7 (in Russian).
[ 160•1] See “Minutes of a Conference on Questions of Work in the Sphere of

Literature and the Arts in the Army, Called by Comrade Tsian Chin on the
Assignment of Comrade Lin Piao”, Hsinnua Press Release, May 28, 1967.
[ 162•1] As before, the Army, in whose command such “unexpected” changes were
made, continues to play the role of the chief support and instrument of the regime
created as a result of “the fierce struggle for power”, as the “cultural revolution" is
now described by its organisers.
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Chapter Five 165
<•>
THE MAOIST CONCEPTION
OF THE DEVELOPMENT
TOC
OF THE SOCIAL STRUCTURE
Card
AND THE CLASS STRUGGLE

Text 1. Development of Social Relations

HTML in China from 1949 to 1957
PS
PDF
An analysis of the views and practical policy on classes, the class struggle and class p
T* relations pursued by the Chinese leaders leaves no doubt that they have distorted the
19* key principles formulated by Marxism-Leninism on the establishment of new social
relations in the period of transition from capitalism to socialism.
###
The socialist countries’ experience, summed up in the documents of the International p
Meetings of Communist and Workers’ Parties in 1957, 1960 and 1969, fully
confirmed the proposition of the Marxist-Leninist theory that the processes of
socialist revolution and socialist construction are based on a number of key laws
which apply to all countries taking the socialist path. These laws are manifest
everywhere in the presence of a great diversity of historicallyrooted national specifics
and traditions which must be taken into account.
Among these general laws are: leadership of the working people by the working p
class, with the Marxist-Leninist party as its core, in carrying through the proletarian
revolution in one form or another and the establishment of the proletarian
dictatorship in one form or another; the alliance of the working class with the bulk
of the peasantry and other sections of the working people; the elimination of
capitalist property and the establishment of socialist property in the principal means
of production; the gradual socialist transformation of agriculture, the balanced 166
development of the national economy aimed at building socialism and communism
and raising the working people’s living standards; the implementation of socialist
changes in the sphere of ideology and culture and the creation of a numerous
intelligentsia loyal to the working class, the working people and the socialist cause;
the elimination of national oppression and the establishment of equality and fraternal
friendship among nations; the defence of socialist gains against the encroachments of
external and internal enemies; and proletarian internationalism, which means
solidarity between the working class of a given country and the working class of
other countries.
While favouring strict account in socialist construction of the concrete historical p

conditions and national features, the participants in the International Meeting of
Communist and Workers’ Parties in 1969 stressed the need to follow the general
laws. These are the general laws of the socialist revolution and socialist construction
bearing on the development of classes and class relations:
1. Exercise by the working class of leadership of the mass of working people in the p
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/5.1-Social.Relations.in.China.from.1949.to.1957[2012-12-18 2:31:06]
proletarian revolution, and, once the proletarian dictatorship is established, of its

leading role in society. Reliance of the working class on its alliance with the bulk of
the peasantry and other sections of the working people.
2. Elimination of exploiting classes resulting from the abolition of private property p

in the means of production.
3. Socialist re-education of the peasantry and the intelligentsia; creation of a p

numerous intelligentsia loyal to the cause of socialism.
These laws governing the development of the social structure and class relations p
necessarily apply to any country taking the socialist path.
These are of especial importance for China, considering the level of her socio- p
economic development at the end of 1949, when under the leadership of the
Communist Party the Chinese people took power into their own hands. In that period,
China was an agrarian small-peasant, economically, socially and culturally backward
country. Her transition to socialism did not take place on the level of developed
capitalism but of a feudal-capitalist social system in which the exploiters were 167
landowners and a bureaucratic and national bourgeoisie.
In 1949, the bulk of China’s population (over 80 per cent) consisted of peasants. p
The principal antagonistic contradictions of Chinese society were those between the
landowners and the peasants. The absentee landowners rented out their lands to the
landless and land-hungry peasants, collecting an exorbitant feudal rent which came to
over one-half the peasant’s crop. In the Chinese countryside, the development of
capitalist relations was shackled by feudalism, which is why the rich peasants
(kulaks) were very weak economically and as a rule used pre-capitalist forms of
exploiting peasants: they rented most of their land to farmhands and middle peasants
and engaged in usury. The landowners and the kulaks, who made up less than 10 per
cent of the rural population, owned 70–80 per cent of the farmland. The other 90 per
cent of the rural population—farmhands and poor and middle peasants—had only
20–30 per cent of the land. [ 167•1
This was the reason for broad action by the Chinese peasants against the existing p
social regime. The existence of a peasant anti-feudal movement was a positive fact
for the revolutionary struggle of the working class, because the bulk of the peasantry
is an ally of the proletariat. However, the petty-bourgeois character of the peasants
constituting a majority of the population produced various difficulties for the
working-class party in the transition period.
These difficulties were compounded by the fact that when the people’s revolution in p
China won out, industrial workers constituted roughly 0.5 per cent of the total
population. [ 167•2 Industrial and office workers numbered only 8 million, or 1.5
per cent of the population (together with their families the figure came to about 5-6
per cent). This naturally created the highly acute problem of the numerical growth of
the working class, of its vanguard role in town and country and in all the branches
of the national economy. Another equally acute problem was the remoulding of the
social character of the peasantry, so as to make it take the socialist path of 168
development, and the formation of a numerous socialist intelligentsia.
In the first 7-8 years of the transition period (1949–1957) the Communist Party of p
China took account of the experience of the development of classes and class
relations in the other socialist countries and relied on the general laws of socialist
construction, taking these as a basis for its policy in developing the social structure.
In that period, the formulation of the CPC’s political line was greatly influenced by
men among the Party leadership who had a clear understanding of the tremendous
difficulties the Chinese people had to overcome to ensure a transition to socialism,
and fully and finally to establish the socialist mode of production. China’s economic
and cultural backwardness, the 2nd Plenary Meeting of the 7th CPC Central
Committee (March 1949) said in its decisions, require a more or less prolonged
period for creating the economic and cultural prerequisites necessary for ensuring the
full victory of socialism.
Following the establishment of the CPR, the government’s first act was to p
expropriate the property of the imperialists and the compradore bourgeoisie. The state
nationalised almost all the railways, the bulk of the enterprises in the heavy industry,
and also some of the key branches of the light industry, and this helped to create a
socialist sector in the country.
Following the expropriation of the property of the bureaucratic bourgeoisie from p

1950 to 1952, an agrarian reform was carried out in China designed to eliminate
feudal relations of production and the class of landowners, and to hand over, without
redemption, the land confiscated from the landowners to the landless and land-hungry
peasants. The 47 million hectares of land confiscated from the landowners went to
300 million landless and land-hungry peasants. Feudal property in land gave way to
individual peasant property in land. Once the land reform was completed, the
following social groups took shape within the Chinese peasantry: the poor peasants,
the middle peasants, who consisted of the lower middle peasants (the poor middle
peasants), the higher middle peasants (the rich middle peasants), and also the kulaks.
In economic status, the poor middle peasants were close to the poor peasants and 169
together with the latter made up 60–70 per cent of the rural population. [ 169•1
The land reform which eliminated the landed estates helped considerably to enlarge p
the domestic market, and in these conditions capitalist industry and trade began
rapidly to develop.
The state used the capitalist economy for the purpose of rehabilitating the national p
economy, which had been ruined by the foreign intervention and the civil war.
However, the national bourgeoisie put up stiff resistance to the measures the people’s
government took to improve the state of the country’s economy. For one thing, it
sought to corrupt and weaken the government apparatus from inside by means of
graft. Accordingly, in late 1951 and early 1952, the CPC launched two campaigns:
first one against the “three evils" (stealing, waste and bureaucratic practice) and then
against the “five evils" (graft, tax evasion, stealing of government funds, careless
fulfilment of government orders and stealing of secret economic information in
government agencies). [ 169•2
These campaigns helped to limit and cut short the bourgeoisie’s economic and p
political subversion against the people’s power and to purge the government and
Party apparatus of persons who were making concessions to the bourgeoisie or were
its direct agents.
In 1952, once the rehabilitation of the national economy, ruined by the civil war p
and the foreign intervention, had in the main been completed, the CPC Central
Committee worked out the Party’s general line for the transition period, which set
these tasks before the Chinese people: gradually to carry out the country’s socialist
industrialisation and socialist change in agriculture, the handicrafts industry and in
capitalist industry and trade. These tasks were to be fulfilled in roughly three five-
year periods, that is, about 15 years, from 1953 to 1967, by which time China was
expected to become a “great socialist state". [ 169•3
In connection with the announcement of the Party’s general line for the transition p 170
period, the CPC Central Committee approved a set of special theses for its study and
propaganda, which said that if socialism was to score a full victory in China in the
transition period the following had to be done: the relations of production were to be
simultaneously modified with the development of productive forces; a powerful
socialist industry had above all to be set up as a basis for transforming the individual
peasant farms, that is, non-socialist sectors into a socialist sector; socialist industry
had to be converted into the leading and guiding force of the whole national
economy.
In accordance with the CPC’s general line, important socio-economic changes were p
started in the country from 1953. The whole peasantry (including the kulaks) was
involved in agricultural producers’ co-operatives. The individual property of the
peasants and the handicraftsmen was transformed into collective property. All private
industrial and commercial enterprises were transformed into state-private enterprises.
The capitalists were deprived of the means of production and were allowed an
interest of 5 per cent per annum on their erstwhile capital and also higher salaries for
their work as government employees.
The 8th Congress of the CPC, held in September 1956, declared that the following p
socio-class changes had by then taken place in China as a result of the
implementation of the Party’s general line.
1. The exploitation of man by man, together with its roots, was in the main p
eliminated; the class contradictions between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie were
resolved in favour of socialism, thereby deciding the issue of “who beats whom" in
the struggle between socialism and capitalism.
2. Class contradictions ceased to be the principal contradictions of Chinese society, p

giving way to contradictions “between the advanced socialist system and the
backward social productive forces”, thereby centring the Chinese people’s attention
on the task of developing material production. [ 170•1
However, the social changes carried out in the country did not yet mean the p 171
complete establishment of socialist relations of production, which were still highly
immature and imperfect, and rested on an extremely backward material and technical
basis. The country was just making a start on all-round industrialisation. Chinese
society was yet to effect its full and final transition to socialism, a transition that
had to be consolidated through the further development of society’s productive
forces, and of the whole of the national economy.
The working class still constituted a clear minority and was concentrated mainly in p
the cities. The very small percentage of workers who came from working-class
families were mainly skilled cadres. The national bourgeoisie still maintained some
economic and ideological influence. A sizable section of the handicraftsmen were yet
to be drawn into co-operatives. There was an acute shortage of intellectuals, and the
new, socialist intelligentsia was virtually just taking shape. These objective
difficulties were compounded by a number of subjective mistakes made in the course
of socialist change through Mao’s fault.
Let us emphasise that in 1955 and 1956, the Maoists and their opponents were p
already seriously divided over the methods and pace of socialist construction. Mao
and his followers were trying to impose on the country a totally unrealistic pace of
socialist change and were pushing the peasants into a stepped up transformation of
their individual property, without providing any solid material and technical basis for
such a change-over. Mao’s opponents urged that socialist changes should be carried
out within the periods set by the Party’s general line, and insisted that any changes
in the social character of the peasantry should be tied in with changes in their
economic life and their mentality.
However, Mao managed to saddle the Party with his adventurist line which was p
expressed chiefly in the hasty completion of agricultural co-operation, without the
necessary economic measures: instead of the 15–18 years initially envisaged, the co-
operatives were nominally set up within just over 2 years. The balanced development
of economic, social and spiritual processes was disrupted and the need for
proportional social development discarded. There was discontent among a section of 172
the peasantry with this stepped up pace in agricultural co-operation and the rapid
transition from lower-type to higher-type co-operatives, and this naturally did not
help to strengthen the social basis of the people’s power.
In contrast to Mao, the CPG leaders who held correct views on various aspects of p
socialist construction, believed that the Party should concentrate the people’s efforts
on laying a modern material and technical foundation for the new relations of
production. The report of the CPC Central Committee to the 8th Congress of the
CPC (September 1956) said: “Now, however, the period of storm and stress is past,
new relations of production have been set up, and the aim of our struggle is changed
into one of safeguarding the successful development of the productive forces of
society." [ 172•1
The decisions of the 8th Congress of the CPC mapped out a real and concrete p
programme for transforming China into an advanced socialist power. On the social
plane, its implementation was to result in a considerable growth of the working
class, improvement of its professional training, and its ideological and political
levels, thereby reaffirming and consolidating its leading position in Chinese society.
In the period of transition from capitalism to socialism, the introduction of science
and technology into agriculture was bound to have changed the face of the Chinese
countryside, favourably affecting the tradition-bound thinking and mentality of the
Chinese peasants, and converting them into real allies of the proletariat in the
struggle for China’s social transformation. The development of science and culture,
the cultural revolution, was to have helped to create a numerous intelligentsia closely
allied with the people.
However, because of the voluntarist line of social development, imposed by Mao on

the Party and the country, the changes in the classes and class relations, which
naturally occur in the transition period, and which followed from the decisions of the
8th Congress of the CPC, were not carried out.
***

normal
TEXT SIZE
Notes
[ 167•1] The Fundamental Provisions of the Land Law of China, Harbin, 1948, p. 3
(in Chinese).
[ 167•2] World Economics and International Relations No. 6, 1967, p. 31 (in
Russian).
[ 169•1] Chinchi yanchiu No. 5, 1956, p. 88,
[ 169•2] Essays on the History of China in the Recent Period, Moscow 1959, p. 511
(in Russian).
[ 169•3] See Fighting to Mobilise all the Forces to Transform Our Country into a
Great Socialist State. Theses for the Study and Propaganda of the Party’s General
Line in the Transition Period, Moscow, 1953 (in Russian).
[ 170•1] See V. Sidikhmenov, “The Maoists’ Revision of the CPC’s General Line”,
Kommunist No. 3, 1969.
[ 172•1] Eighth National Congress of the Communist Party of China Peking, 1956,
p. 82.
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2. Line of “Leaping Over” 173
<•>
Objective Laws

TOC
In mid-1958, the Maoists announced that the transition period in China had been p
Card
fully completed, that socialism had been built, and that an immediate start could be
made on building communist relations. The adventurist idea was put forward that
Text China could move rapidly towards communism by executing a “Great Leap
HTML Forward”. Chinese society did not in actual fact have the necessary material, social
PS and cultural prerequisites even for developed socialism, but the Maoists argued that it
PDF could attain communism merely by carrying out this “Great Leap Forward”.
T* The fact that Mao and his followers suggested the “Great Leap Forward" idea p
19* showed that they had lost the ability of making a realistic assessment of the
situation, of starting from the actual level of development at which Chinese society
###
then found itself. This undoubtedly sprang from the hegemonistic aspirations of Mao
and his followers. In order to rise to leadership in the world’s revolutionary
movement, it was necessary to “surpass” the Soviet Union, and the “accelerate the
transition to communism" slogan was issued to achieve this aim. This subjectivist and
anti-Marxist slogan was seized upon and “theoretically” analysed by the Chinese
press. The journal Hsin chianshe wrote: “Not long ago many believed that for a
fairly long subsequent period changes in the relations of production in our country
would take place within the framework of socialism, i.e., that this would be a
completion of the socialist revolution on the economic front, with all the main forces
being thrown into the implementation of the technological and cultural revolution.”
The journal declared this quite correct view to be wrong, and suggested the
following as the right approach: “Under the leadership of the CPC Central
Committee and Comrade Mao Tse-tung, simultaneously with the full completion of
the socialist revolution, with the productive forces growing at an exceptionally fast
rate, we have already created the conditions for gradual transition to
communism." [ 173•1 Thus, the completion of transition to socialism and the all-
round development of socialism were declared to be a stage that was over. 174
An idea which runs right through the numerous publications in the Chinese press p
from 1958 to 1960 is that China is on the threshold of transition to communism. In
their efforts to provide a theoretical grounding for such transition, Chinese theorists
fell back on the well-known statement of Marx’s that between capitalist and
communist society there lies a period of revolutionary transformation of the former
into the latter, with a corresponding political transition period. From this they drew
the conclusion that socialist society could not be regarded as an independent stage of
social development, because it allegedly had a transitional character. The Maoists
started to include socialism, the first phase of the communist formation, into the
transition period. All of this was to help them remove from the order of the day the
task of completing socialist construction in China, and orient the Chinese people
upon immediate transition to communist society. Jenmin jihpao wrote: “After all,
socialism is not our supreme ideal. Communist society is our supreme ideal. . .. We
are building socialism to move on to communist society and not for the purpose of
consolidating the making of socialist society, and regarding it as a historical period
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/5.2-Line.of.Leaping.Over.Objective.Laws[2012-12-18 2:31:19]
of stability and absence of change, or of quantitative but not qualitative

change." [ 174•1
Indeed, communist society, its highest phase, is the ideal of the working class, but p
to attain it there is need to build full-fledged socialism, a whole phase of the
communist formation, and to make it function and progress successfully. However, it
is impossible to find in any of Mao’s statements a full-scale programme for
completing the construction and further development of socialism, dealing with the
improvement of its material and technical basis, and the rapid development of the
productive forces corresponding to socialist relations of production.
The Maoists have come to regard the strengthening and further improvement of the p
foundations of the socialist social system as no more than the treading of water, and
as unwillingness to go on from socialism to communism. One journal, criticising the
advocates of “frozen socialism”, wrote: “The demand that socialist relations of 175
production and also collective property and the distribution according to labour
should be rigidly fixed at one point expresses the standpoint of those who want to
conserve socialist society. Such views are erroneous." [ 175•1
Consequently, before the “Great Leap Forward”, the Maoists regarded the transition p
period as one of transition from capitalism to socialism, while following the
announcement of the “Great Leap Forward" in 1958 their views underwent a
fundamental, totally unfounded change: on the one hand, they ceased to draw any
line of distinction between the transition period and socialism proper, and on the
other, enlarged the framework of the transition period to include the construction of
full-scale communist society. In other words, they discarded socialism as a
lawgoverned socio-economic state of society on the way to communism.
The “Three Red Banners" (the general line, the “Great Leap Forward”, and the p
people’s communes), the line Mao put forward in 1958, far from accelerating the
socio-class development of Chinese society, in fact slowed it down, because it ran
into contradiction with the tendencies of social development objectively required by
socialism. This was expressed in the following.
First, there was a slow-down in the quantitative and especially qualitative growth of p
the working class which usually goes hand in hand with a country’s industrialisation,
because the accent was on the establishment of primitive, handicraft enterprises.
Second, the implanting of people’s communes in the countryside in effect diverted p

the peasantry from the natural socialist path of development onto a path of artificial
egalitarianism and a barrack-room social system.
Third, the accelerated transition to communism resulted in a neglect of the need for p
a relatively long period in which state-private enterprises are transformed into
socialist enterprises, and the members of the bourgeoisie are moulded into working
people of socialist society.
The outcome of all this was that the transition to communism was actually slowed
down and a brake was put on the socialist transformation of classes and their 176
relations in the country. The greatest harm was thereby inflicted on the development
of the already small working class.
***

TEXT SIZE
normal
Notes
[ 173•1] Hsin chianshe No. 11, 1958.
[ 174•1] Jenmin jihpao, April 24, 1960.
[ 175•1] Chinchi yanchiu No. 5, 1960.
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3. Curtailment of the Vanguard Role 176
<•>
of the Working Class

TOC
On many occasions, Lenin analysed in detail the arrangement of class forces in p
Card
China, drawing important conclusions about the difficulties and the main problems
facing the revolutionary movement in that country. In April 1913, commenting on the
Text intricate problems faced by Sun Yat-sen, he wrote: “What is this party’s weakness?
HTML It lies in the fact that it has not yet been able sufficiently to involve broad masses of
PS the Chinese people in the revolution. The proletariat in China is still very weak—
PDF there is therefore no leading class capable of waging a resolute and conscious
struggle to carry the democratic revolution to its end. The peasantry, lacking a leader
T* in the person of the proletariat, is terribly downtrodden, passive, ignorant and
19*
indifferent to politics—–How little of the really broad popular mass has yet been
### drawn into active support of the Chinese Republic. But without such massive support,
without an organised and steadfast leading class, the Republic cannot be
stable." [ 176•1
Lenin’s indication of the need to promote the growth of the working class, to p
enhance its vanguard, conscious and organising role in every sphere of social
development to bring about the success of the revolution in China was grossly
neglected.
Mao never understood the fundamental Marxist-Leninist proposition about the p

hegemony of the proletariat in the bourgeois-democratic and socialist revolution, and
he has always essentially relied on the petty-bourgeois elements, which he regarded
as the leader both in the bourgeois– democratic and the socialist revolution. That
was his line when he set out on his political career, and that is still his line today.
The 3rd Congress of the CPC was held in Canton from June 10 to 19, 1923, and it p
was attended by Mao. What was his stand on this crucial question of the revolution 177
at that time? He supported the capitulationist line of Chen Tu-hsiu, who denied the
hegemony of the proletariat in the bourgeois-democratic revolution and who put his
stake on the national bourgeoisie, the urban petty bourgeoisie and the peasantry.
Three weeks later, Mao had an article in the CPC General Committee’s journal
Hsiangtao, entitled “The Coup in Peking and the Merchants”, dealing with the role
of the merchants in the Chinese revolution. He wrote: “China”s present political
problem is none other than the problem of the national revolution. The Chinese
people’s historical mission lies ... in using this force of the people to overthrow
militarism and the foreign imperialists. This revolution is a task of the whole people
and all those who constitute the people—merchants, workers, peasants, students,
teachers—everyone must undertake a part of the revolutionary work. However, in
virtue of historical necessity and the tendencies of the present-day situation, it is the
merchants that have to take upon themselves the more vital and important part of
this work for the sake of the national revolution rather than the rest of the
people." [ 177•1
We find, therefore, that Mao did not regard the workers or the peasants, but the p
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/5.3-Curtailment.of.the.Vanguard.Role[2012-12-18 2:31:33]
merchants, that is, the petty– bourgeois and bourgeois elements as constituting the
most important component part of the Chinese people, and assigned to them a
decisive role in the Chinese revolution. He wrote: “The time has now come to unite
the whole people for the purpose of starting a revolutionary movement, which makes
it all the more important to prevent any split among the merchants. .. . The broader
the unity of the merchants and the greater their influence, the more powerful the
force leading the whole people and the more swiftly the revolution will achieve
success." [ 177•2
A reading of Mao’s earlier writings shows that he believed the definition of classes p
was not based on socio-economic relations between men, which are of different
types, but on their property status, regardless of the actual form of relations of
production (feudal, capitalist, etc.). Ignoring the historical approach, he classified all
men into five categories: big bourgeoisie, middle bourgeoisie, petty bourgeoisie, 178
semiproletariat, and proletariat. This was an extremely confused and unscientific
approach to the definition of classes, and it stood out in the boldest relief in an
article he wrote in 1926, entitled “Analysis of the Classes of Chinese
Society". [ 178•1 There, he grouped into a single class different social groups
representing different types of relations of production. Thus, big feudal landowners,
militarists and senior officials, senior civil servants, officials of banks and industrial
and commercial enterprises, and the upper layers of the intelligentsia, like prominent
lawyers, teachers and lecturers of institutions of higher learning, and also a section
of the students, were lumped alongside the compradores together with the big
bourgeoisie. Apart from the owners of various enterprises, the middle bourgeoisie
also included small landowners, together with employees of banks, industrial and
commercial enterprises, a section of the teachers and students of institutions of
higher learning, small-time lawyers, etc.
Consequently, the big and middle bourgeoisie included all the rich, propertied or p
well-off sections of the population in general. By including the landowners into the
class of Chinese bourgeoisie, Mao ignored the domination of semifeudal relations in
the country and took the edge off the agrarian revolution in China.
The article also contained a muddled and equivocal definition of the petty p
bourgeoisie. Mao wrote: “To the petty bourgeoisie belongs the toiling peasantry, the
small traders, the owners of handicraft enterprises, and the small intelligentsia—petty
officials and employees, pupils of secondary schools and teachers of secondary and
primary schools, small-time lawyers, etc." [ 178•2 The petty bourgeoisie is divided
into three groups depending on the size of income. In the first group we find men
who have “surpluses of rice and money”, in the second those whose “annual income
allows them barely to make ends meet”, and in the third, men “whose living
conditions grow worse from year to year". [ 178•3
Apart from the industrial workers, miners, railwaymen, seamen, dock-workers, the p
proletariat also includes all the propertyless, poor and deprived sections of the 179
population in general, like the city coolies, farm labourers in the countryside, and
also the lumpen proletariat, which meant bandits, mercenaries, beggars, robbers and
prostitutes. Mao wrote: “This category of people is able to carry on a heroic struggle.
Under skilful leadership, they can become a revolutionary force." [ 179•1
Mao characterised the role of the industrial proletariat as follows: “Despite its small p
numerical strength the industrial proletariat is the main force of the national–
revolutionary movement." [ 179•2 However, he explained the proletariat’s
revolutionary activity by the fact that “its economic condition is low. Having been
deprived of the instruments of production, it was left with its bare hands, without
any hope of enrichment”. The implication here is that the workers were guided in
the revolution not by their class consciousness, but by an urge for enrichment.
Consequently, Mao defined classes not by men’s place in social production, but by
their proprietary condition, the size of their income, that is, relations of distribution.
Mao derived men’s attitude to the revolution, and the extent of the revolutionary p
activity of various social groups from the place these men had within the system of
social distribution. This made the lowest sections of society the most revolutionary
forces, instead of those who were connected with progressive, large-scale modern
production; it turned out that the poorer a people, the better, because “poverty
impelled men to revolution”. Because the peasantry was the poorest section of
China’s population it followed that the peasantry was to play the leading role in the
Chinese revolution. It is this anti-Marxist attitude to the question of classes—with the
accent on the peasantry—that determined the adventurist line of action in the political
sphere.
No Marxist-Leninist has denied the important role of the peasantry in the p

revolutionary movement, especially in countries like China. While stressing the
leading role of the working class in the Chinese revolution, Lenin did not in any
sense minimise the great importance of the peasantry in social progress. He wrote:
“By drawing ever broader masses of the Chinese peasantry into the movement and
into politics, Sun Yat-sen’s party is becoming (to the extent to which this process is 180
taking place) a great factor of progress in Asia and of mankind’s progress. Whatever
defeats it may suffer from political rogues, adventurers and dictators, who rely on the
country’s reactionary forces, this party’s efforts will not have been in vain." [ 180•1
Lenin believed that Sun Yat-sen’s democratic programme was a militant one, because
it took account of the interests of the peasantry.
Let us recall that after the Great October Socialist Revolution, Lenin attached much p
importance to the liberation struggle of the peasant masses, whom he regarded as the
natural and principal allies of the proletariat in nationalcolonial revolutions.
Accordingly, the Communist International repeatedly stressed the great role of the
peasantry in the backward countries of the East. Thus, the “General Theses on the
Eastern Question" of the 4th Congress of the Comintern in 1922 stressed that the
“revolutionary movement in the backward countries of the East cannot win any
success unless it is based on action by broad masses of peasants". [ 180•2
The theses on the revolutionary movement in the colonial and semi-colonial p

countries adopted by the 6th Congress of the Comintern in 1928 said that “the
peasantry, together with the proletariat and as its ally, is a motive force of the
revolution". [ 180•3 The Comintern Executive’s Directives to the 3rd Congress of
the CPC in May 1923 drew the Chinese Communists’ attention to the fact that “it is
the peasant question that is the central question of the whole policy" [ 180•4 The
resolution of the 6th enlarged Plenary Meeting of the Comintern Executive in March
1926 observed that “the peasant question is the principal question of the Chinese
national liberation movement". [ 180•5 A letter from the Comintern Executive to
the CPC Central Committee in December 1929 stressed that “peasant war is a
distinctive feature of the national crisis and the revolutionary upswing in
China”. [ 180•6
We find all these documents stressing that in countries like China the peasant p 181
question is the central and principal question; that the peasantry is an ally of the
proletariat; that peasant war is a distinctive feature of the national crisis and the
revolutionary upswing. All of this is undoubtedly true, but we do not find any of
these documents saying that the peasantry is the vanguard force of the revolution in
China or in any of the economically backward countries of the East in general.
Let us recall that the 2nd Congress of the Comintern stressed the idea of the p
hegemony of the proletariat in the national liberation revolutions in the East, an idea
which was further elaborated in the “General Theses on the Eastern Question”,
adopted by the 4th Congress of the Comintern. While recognising the great role of
the peasantry in the East, notably in China, the Comintern pointed to the need to
subordinate the peasant question to the strategic goal of the proletariat. By
emphasising the decisive role of the petty bourgeoisie, the peasantry, in the
revolution, Mao ignores the idea of the proletariat’s hegemony, thereby breaking with
the revolutionary line of the whole international communist movement.
As early as 1923, attention to the fact that Mao tended to underestimate the role of p
the working class in China was drawn by the representative of the Comintern
Executive in China. His memo to the Comintern Executive on June 20, 1923,
concerning the 3rd Congress of the CPC, said that “the Hunan delegate, now Party
Secretary, Mao Tse-tung, declared that it was now still impossible to set up either a
national or a mass Communist Party”. In his “Report on an Investigation of the
Peasant Movement in Hunan”, published in March 1927, Mao expressed in general
terms the view that the peasantry was the decisive and only force of the
revolutionary movement in China. [ 181•1 He went into this matter at greater length
in his work “trategic Problems of China’s Revolutionary War”, [ 181•2 summing up
the experience of Party work from 1927 to 1936. Once again, Mao advanced as the
theoretical basis of the Chinese revolution, the proposition that the peasantry had the
decisive role to play, and reiterated this formula: the peasantry—the strategic 182
mainstay; war—the principal tactical means of the Chinese revolution. In his work,
“The Chinese Revolution and the Communist Party of China" at the end of 1939,
Mao declared that the peasantry was the “main force in the Chinese revolution”, that
the revolution had its mainstay in the countryside, and that the revolution was first to
triumph in the rural districts and then in the towns. [ 182•1
In his work “On New Democracy" (January 1940) Mao drew the general conclusion p
that “the Chinese revolution is virtually the peasants’ revolution, and the resistance to
Japan now going on is virtually the peasants’ resistance to Japan. New-democratic
politics is virtually the granting of power to the peasants.. . . And all that goes into
the resistance to Japan and our own livelihood is virtually provided by the peasants.
... So the peasant problem has become the main problem of the Chinese revolution,
and the strength of the peasants constitutes the principal force of the Chinese
revolution". [ 182•2
Back in 1931, Wang Ming, who was elected to the CPC leadership and p
subsequently also to the leadership of the Comintern Executive, and his followers
pursued the Comintern line and tried to resist Mao’s line, by stressing the importance
of relying on the proletariat. They emphasised that even in the specific conditions in
which the revolution developed in China it was not right to ignore the historical role
of the working class, to forget about its historical mission in the revolution and to
bring the peasantry into the foreground. For all the specific features of the Chinese
revolution, for all the importance of the agrarian and peasant question in China, it
was not right to ignore the strategic line of the Party which saw the proletariat as the
guiding and leading force of the revolution. Wang Ming and his followers said
Mao’s line was an expression of the “specifically peasant revolutionary attitude”, of
“peasant capitalism" and the “kulak line”.
Mao started a drive against Wang Ming and accused him of taking a “Left- p
deviationist” line in the CPC leadership. By resorting to demagogy and juggling
catchwords about the need to fight subjectivism and improve and correct the style of 183
work in the CPC, Mao got the 7th Plenary Meeting of the CPC Central Committee
to adopt the “Resolution on Questions in History of the Party" [ 183•1 expressing
Mao’s view and criticising those who advocated the “Left-deviationist” line above all
for having resisted the line of the peasant revolution and subordination of work in
the towns to work in the countryside.
These unscientific, opportunistic views of Mao’s, which had taken shape long ago, p
were most forcefully expressed after 1960 in his openly Right-opportunist line of
depriving the working class of its vanguard role in Chinese society. In 1939 and
1940, Mao put forward the slogan that “the rural districts are the mainstay of the
revolution" and that “the peasantry is the main force of the Chinese revolution”,
whereas after 1960 he proclaimed the so-called general line of national-economic
development: “Agriculture is the basis of the national economy, industry is its
leading force.” Mao was unable altogether to drop all mention of industry, where the
working class is engaged, but he did declare agriculture to be the basis of life in
society. In a sense this realised the idea he had expressed in his article “On New
Democracy" in 1940, that “our own livelihood is virtually provided by the
peasants". [ 183•2
This sharp turn-about from the “Great Leap Forward" in industry to reliance on p
agriculture cannot be construed otherwise than as a petty-bourgeois Right-opportunist
response to the failure of the Leftist policy of instant construction of socialism and
communism. Here we constantly find a toing and froing between “Left” opportunism
and Right opportunism, for such is the “logic” of all those who abandon Marxism:
the overdoing of the Leftist line and its failure impel them to retreat to the Right,
and then once again to fall back on Leftist gambles.
Mao’s line of slowing down the country’s industrialisation has inevitably caused a p
slow-down in the development of the working class and a reduction of its leading,
vanguard role in the country. As a result, there has been a marked slow-down in the
quantitative and qualitative growth of the working class in China. From 1949 to 184
1957, the number of industrial and office workers increased 3-fold (from 8 million to
24.5 million), an increase of 16.5 million; from 1957 to 1964, it increased by only
about 10 million (from 24.5 million to 34–35 million). From 1949 to 1957, the
number of industrial workers alone increased from 3 million to 9 million, and from
1957 to 1965, the number of industrial workers increased by only 2 million (a
growth of only onethird in a similar period), reaching 11 million (with China’s
population in 1965 at 735 million).
Consequently, the share of the working class in the socioclass structure of present-
day Chinese society is still very small.
***

TEXT SIZE
normal
Notes
[ 177•1] Hsiangtao No. 31–32, July 11, 1923, p. 233.
[ 177•2] Ibid., p. 234.
[ 178•1] Chungkuo nungmin No. 2, 1926.
[ 178•2] Ibid., p. 3.
[ 178•3] Ibid.
[ 179•1] Chungkuo nungmin No. 2, 1926, p.
[ 179•2] Ibid., p. 10.
[ 180•1] V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 41, pp. 282–83.
[ 180•2] The Strategy and Tactics of the Comintern in the NationalColonial

Revolution as Exemplified by China, Moscow, 1934, p. 47 (in Russian).
[ 180•3] Ibid., p. 72.
[ 180•4] Ibid., p. 114.
[ 180•5] Ibid., p. 125.
[ 180•6] Ibid., p. 255.
[ 181•1] Mao Tsc-tung, Sclcfled Works, Vol. 1, pp. 23–24,
[ 181•2] Ibid., pp. 175–88.
[ 182•1] Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works, Vol. 4, pp. 171–218.
[ 182•2] Ibid., Vol. 3, p. 138.
[ 183•2] Ibid., pp. 137–38.
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4. Artificial Aggravation 184
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of Class Struggle

TOC
Having taken the attitude of subjectivism and refusing to consider the real, objective p
Card
processes of social development, Mao and his followers pushed the country into
serious economic difficulties which had a grave effect on the life of hundreds of
Text millions of people. By the end of 1960, Mao’s idea of rapidly building communism
HTML in China was already a shambles. Industrial output had been halved and agriculture
PS was in decline. The economic difficulties were compounded by heavy natural
PDF calamities which hit the country in 1959 and 1960. Millions of people died in the
ensuing famine. The economic difficulties arising from the experiments in the period
T* of the “Great Leap Forward" reduced living standards among almost every section of
19*
the Chinese population, and this, for its part, naturally caused extensive and strong
### discontent throughout the country over the CPC’s domestic policy, evidence of which
came from the numerous disorders in many parts of China from 1958 to
1960. [ 184•1
However, the fatal consequences of the Left-adventurist line for China did not p 185
induce Mao and his followers to take the path followed by other socialist countries.
What is more, Mao’s followers gradually lost faith in the possibility of building
socialism in China within the foreseeable future. In 1958, during the “Great Leap
Forward”, the Chinese press asserted that for the Chinese people communism was a
matter of the immediate future, whereas following the failure of the “Great Leap
Forward" socialist construction was regarded as a remote and totally dim prospect.
An editorial article carried by Jenmin jihpao and Hungchih on June 14, 1964, said:
“It is impossible to achieve the final triumph of socialism within the lifetime of one
or two generations. It can be fully achieved in five-ten generations or even after a
much longer period of time." [ 185•1 In accordance with this theoretical conclusion,
the Maoists took the line of curtailing socialist construction in the country in the
early 1960s.
Simultaneously, they began artificially to put heat into the political situation in the p
country. The line Mao has been conducting since 1960–1961 is aimed not at
strengthening and developing in Chinese society relations of co-operation, and of
alliance between the various labouring classes and groups of Chinese society, not at
completing the class struggle against the remnants of the national bourgeoisie and
other exploiting classes. It is geared to diametrically opposite aims: artificial fanning
of social contradictions, the ranging and incitement of classes and social groups
against each other: peasants against workers, workers and peasants against the
intelligentsia, students and schoolchildren against Party and government cadres, etc.
Mao’s theoretical propositions on class relations in China have further evolved. p 186
Whereas in 1958 and 1959 his accent was on the possibility of rapidly overcoming
all the contradictions and antagonisms between classes and even on the possibility of
their peaceful resolution, the accent was now switched to an apology of the class
struggle. In their domestic policy, the Maoists laid their main stress not on the
development of production or improvement of the new relations of production, not
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/5.4-Artificial.Aggravation.of.Class.Struggle[2012-12-18 2:31:41]
on raising the people’s living standards, but on ferreting out more and more class
enemies. The Chinese press broadly circulated this postulate formulated by Mao:
“The class struggle, the production struggle and scientific experimentation are the
three great revolutionary movements in the construction of a socialist power.” Let us
note that the class struggle is ranked first and is seen as a “lever of these three great
revolutionary movements”. “The class struggle is the substance of all questions.”
“From start to finish, the epoch of socialism is an epoch of class struggle." [ 186•1
The idea that the class struggle is to continue until communist society has been p
built was first officially formulated in a communique issued by the 10th Plenary
Meeting of the CPC Central Committee in September 1962, which said: “The 10th
Plenary Meeting of the 8th Central Committee declares that throughout the whole
historical period of the proletarian revolution and the proletarian dictatorship,
throughout the whole historical period of transition from capitalism to communism
(this period covers decades and an even longer period of time) a class struggle takes
place between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie, a struggle between the socialist
and the capitalist ways." [ 186•2 The 10th Plenary Meeting of the CPC Central
Committee proclaimed a line of sharpening the class struggle within the country, and
one journal explained this as follows: “During the period of socialism, classes and
the class struggle not only continue to exist but the difficulties and complexities are
far greater than those of earlier periods, and do not bear comparison with any other
revolutionary period." [ 186•3
In a speech at this plenary meeting, Mao issued a call on the whole Party and the p 187
whole people “never to forget about classes and the class struggle." [ 187•1 Later
he said: “Throughout the whole stage of socialism, the class struggle between the
proletariat and the bourgeoisie in the political, economic, ideological and cultural-
educational spheres cannot cease. This is a long and intricate struggle; it runs a
zigzag path and is repeated again and again. Like the wave, this struggle rises and
falls; now it diminishes somewhat, now it is sharply aggravated. This struggle
determines the future of socialism. On this protracted struggle depends the way
socialist society takes: towards communism or towards a restoration of
capitalism." [ 187•2
Let us stress that this presentation of the class struggle in the form of a wave that p
rises and falls, regardless of the concrete political, economic and social changes in a
society building socialism smacks of anarchism and demagogy, for it reduces the
class struggle to the level of a tantrum thrown by the elemental forces of nature,
while the possibility of making conscious use of the laws of social development
discovered by Marx and Lenin is rejected. The Communist Parties, having mastered
these laws, are in a position to say when the class struggle will become sharper and
when it will subside.
It was declared at the 9th Congress of the CPC that Mao’s thesis concerning the p
existence of the class struggle within the socialist society enriched Marxism and was
a contribution to Marxist theory. The report said: “Chairman Mao Tsetung especially
emphasised that . . . ’the class struggle between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie,
the class struggle between the various political forces, the class struggle between the
proletariat and the bourgeoisie in the sphere of ideology remains protracted, develops
in zigzags and now and again even assumes a highly bitter character’. Consequently,
it was Chairman Mao Tse-tung who for the first time in the theory and practice of
the international revolutionary movement gave a clear-cut statement of the doctrine
that following the completion in the main of the socialist transformation of the 188
property in the means of production classes and the class struggle still exist, and that
the proletariat must continue to carry on the revolution.”
The assertion about Mao’s “development” of the theory of class struggle as applied p
to socialist society is at variance with the generally known historical facts. No
Marxist has ever said that the class struggle disappears of itself once the
expropriators are expropriated. For a long time, the overthrown exploiting classes
continue to have a sense of rabid hatred for the new social system and jump at any
opportunity to restore their old domination. This was repeatedly pointed out by
Lenin, who required that the Communists should be vigilant in face of the
machinations by the class enemy. The experience of socialist construction in the
Soviet Union and the other socialist countries, including China herself, has borne out
the truth of what Lenin said. This was most visually demonstrated by such recent
events as the counter-revolutionary putsch in Hungary in 1956 and the counter-
revolutionary action in Czechoslovakia in 1968. It was said at the International
Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties in 1969 that “the enemies of socialism
are keeping up their attempts to undermine the foundations of the socialist state
power, thwart the socialist transformation of society and restore their own
rule". [ 188•1
Mao has never taken the historical approach to the analysis of social phenomena. p
He has refused to make any distinction between the initial stage of socialist
construction and the stage of mature and developed socialism, between the laws of
the period of transition from capitalism to socialism and the laws of socialist society.
He has identified the class contradictions between antagonistic classes and class
contradictions and relations between friendly nonantagonistic classes in socialist
society. That is why he has essentially proposed similar methods for resolving these
contradictions. Finally, Mao has refused to consider the fact that in the course of
socialist construction the bitterness of the class struggle is moderated, and that
gradually the edge of the class struggle is increasingly directed outwardly, because
the remnants of the exploiting classes are left with less and less opportunities for 189
restoring their erstwhile domination without direct armed support on the part of
imperialism.
According to Mao, it turns out that the economic domination, political rule and p
ideological pressure of the bourgeoisie remain not only in the period of transition
from capitalism to socialism but also in full-scale socialist society. This question
then suggests itself: what kind of full-fledged and mature socialist society is that?
Mao says that the elimination of the bourgeoisie, the landowners and other p
exploiters, as social classes, depends only on the overcoming of the bourgeois-feudal
ideology among the citizens of the socialist society. The Maoists argue roughly on
these lines: since bourgeois ideology exists, the bourgeoisie exists as well, and
consequently there is need for the class struggle.
Here are some extracts from the Chinese press. “Some people believe that once the p
socialist transformations are in the main completed, the capitalist economy, as the
basis of the bourgeoisie, is in the main already eliminated, the bourgeoisie no longer
holds the means of production and consequently already ceases to exist.” “By
destroying the reactionary state machine men can eliminate it, but reactionary
political views and ideology cannot be destroyed, these can be eliminated only as a
result of re-education over a protracted period of time. That is why, although the
crucial thing in eliminating a class is to deprive that class of its economic basis and
the main conditions for its economic existence, this does not in any sense mean its
immediate destruction. So long as the members of this class have not been re-
educated, so long as the ideological and political influence of this class remains, it
cannot be said to have been finally eliminated." [ 189•1 Here is another extract:
“The solution of the question of property in the means of production is undoubtedly
the first step which is of decisive importance in the elimination of classes, but it
would be wrong to reduce the task of eliminating classes to this proposition alone. It
would be wrong to assume that once the question of property is settled, there follows
an instant disappearance of classes and the historical task of eliminating classes is
fulfilled. Even after the exploiting classes have been overthrown in economic terms 190
they continue to exist as classes. Their political views, ideology, world outlook and
all kinds of activity exist and operate as the marks of their class. This is an
important objective source for the protracted existence of classes, class contradictions
and the class struggle in the transition period." [ 190•1 And again: “It is
inconceivable that once the means of production are transferred, the exploiting classes
are at once transformed into working people, and that in the sphere of ideology
bourgeois world outlooks are likewise instantly transformed into proletarian outlooks.
Following the establishment of the socialist system of property the struggle between
the two ways continues to exist, the class struggle continues to be the main motive
force behind the development of production." [ 190•2
These texts contain some correct propositions, borrowed from Marxist theory, and p
there is nothing wrong with them. What we have in mind is, for instance, that “by
destroying the reactionary state machine men can eliminate it, but reactionary
political views and ideology cannot be destroyed, these can be eliminated only as a
result of re-education over a protracted period of time”. And again: “It is
inconceivable that once the means of production are transferred, the exploiting classes
are at once transformed into working people, and that in the sphere of ideology
bourgeois world outlooks are likewise instantly transformed into proletarian
outlooks”.
But these correct Marxist propositions are being used to substantiate an incorrect, p
anti-Marxist thesis about ideological re-education, instead of the expropriation of the
property of the exploiting classes being the crucial condition for their elimination.
The fact that a capitalist has been deprived of his private property, that he no longer
receives surplus value, that he is made by his labour to earn the means of
subsistence—all that turns out to be less than the basic condition for eliminating the
capitalists as representatives of the exploiting classes. In other words, in defining the
social structure and class relations in Chinese society, Mao and his followers do not
start from objective criteria but mainly from subjective criteria relating to the sphere
of ideology and politics.
Real revolutionaries have never discounted subjective criteria in analysing the class p 191
structure of socialist society, especially in the initial period of its construction. They
have been fully aware that the expropriation of the expropriators, while signifying
their elimination in social and class terms, and marking an end of their economic
domination and political power, does not at all signify the total disappearance of
bourgeois ideology. The proposition that social consciousness tends to lag behind
social being is a Marxist axiom. That is why the revolutionary parties directing
socialist construction are in no doubt about the fact that the struggle against the
influence exerted by bourgeois ideology requires a considerable period of time,
especially in view of the steady pressure exerted on the socialist countries by
imperialist propaganda. However, none of these facts nullifies the fundamental
Marxist-Leninist proposition that the expropriation of private capitalist property is the
crucial condition for the elimination of the exploiting classes. This proposition holds
true whatever the conditions of the class struggle.
Let us stress that Mao also takes a distorted view of the struggle against bourgeois p
ideology itself: he refers to the class struggle any discussion and any debate on
political and ideological problems, and ranks among the class enemies Party
functionaries who express differing views.
But Mao has gone beyond distortions of the Marxist theory of classes and the class p
struggle, and has been stubbornly putting them into practice. He has used these
mainly artificially to build up an atmosphere of bitter class struggle in the country
and then used this atmosphere to establish police control over the behaviour of every
section of the Chinese population. Under the pretext of “socialist re-education" the
Maoists have carried out intensified purges in the cities among Party functionaries,
government officials and the intelligentsia in trapping and suppressing those who do
not accept their policy.
One of the refined measures used in “re-educating” such people, especially among p
the cadres and intellectuals, is to transport them to the countryside for “tempering”
and “ reeducation in labour”. The Maoists have made wide use of this method to put
down the discontented whom it is impossible to charge with any criminal offence.
Jenmin jihpao and other newspapers have described this “tempering through labour" 192
in the countryside as the “most important and radical measure" for the socialist
system, which helps to overcome bureaucratic practices and to avert revisionism. The
papers have been calling for resolute implementation of Mao’s instructions,
concerning the “tempering through labour" as one of the ways of “preventing the
restoration of capitalism”. Refusal by functionaries to fulfil the directives concerning
the “tempering through labour" and to leave for the countryside is qualified as
bourgeois degeneration.
The policy pursued by Mao and his followers in the countryside is also aimed at p
building up clashes between social classes.
During the completion of the co-operative drive (1956–1957) Chinese peasants were p
divided into the class sections of the poor, the middle peasants and the kulaks
chiefly in accordance with the means of production they had in their possession. The
distinction between the well-off middle peasants and the kulaks consisted in the fact
that the earnings from exploitation obtained by the well-off middle peasant were not
in excess of 25 per cent of his whole family’s total annual income, whereas for the
kulak family it was in excess of 25 per cent of the total annual income. Through the
establishment of co-operatives, the main means of production held by the peasants
(including the kulaks) were socialised. The landowners (the petty landowners, because
the big landowners had been suppressed during the agrarian reform) had also been
admitted into the cooperatives on definite terms.
Of course, the end of the co-operative campaign did not mean the instant p
disappearance of class distinctions in the Chinese countryside, but the main source of
class differentiation among the peasants—private property in the means of production
—was no longer there. Now, with the class struggle being artificially sharpened, Mao
and his followers have once again fallen back on the idea of the class distinction
among the peasants based not on their relation to property but on their relation to the
“thought of Mao Tsetung”. Mao’s supporters rank among the hostile classes in the
countryside not only the former landowners and kulaks, but virtually all well-off
middle peasants.
The Maoists’ artificial aggravation of the class struggle in the Chinese countryside 193
and their reliance on the poor and the economically weak middle peasants is due to
the following reasons: the establishment of the people’s communes led to a break-up
of collective farms which had not yet been firmly established. The peasantry,
especially its middle section, discontented with the existing state of affairs, has been
seeking to improve its living conditions. In accordance with Mao’s conceptions, the
urge on the part of the Chinese peasants to improve their living conditions (by
various means, including the sale in the open market of the farm produce they grow
by their own labours) is branded by the official press as “spontaneous capitalistic
tendencies”. Mao’s class line in the countryside is designed above all to distract the
peasantry’s attention from its vital interests, to switch its efforts to the struggle
against the “class enemies”, thereby damping down peasant discontent by means of
an artificial state of tension.
***

TEXT SIZE
normal
Notes
[ 184•1] For example, on November 18, 1958, 40 men, armed with rifles, shotguns
and knives, staged a peculiar demonstration in the village of Taiping, Wuhsing
district, Jukin region, Szechwan province. They marched through the village bearing
red hexagonal banners with this inscription: “Down with Chairman Mao Tse-tung”.
The participants in this demonstration chanted slogans like: “We are starving”, “We
cast iron in the mountain, and never see our wives and children”. Here is another
example: on April 18, 1959, seven districts of Hsinhua region, Chinghai province,
inhabited by people of four nationalities— Sala, Tibetan, Uighur and Chinese—were
the scene of a large-scale uprising; the insurgents besieged the regional centre,
Hsinhua, for three days. Almost 4,000 other people rallied to their side and they
occupied a large part of the regional territory. On April 25, the Chinese troops
managed to put down the uprising. The insurgents lost over 400 men killed, while
nearly 2,500 men were taken prisoner. Similar action occurred in other parts of the
country.
[ 185•1] The Chinese press said this article had been written by Mao himself.
[ 186•1] Jcntnin jifipao, November 29, 1963.
[ 186•2] Hsinhua Press Release, September 28, 1902.
[ 186•3] Shichicn, November 1, 19G4.
[ 187•1] Chicfangchiun pan, April 18, 1967.
[ 187•2] Editorial article published in Jcnmin ji/ipao and Iluiigchih .June 14, 1964.
[ 188•1] International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties, Moscow 1969),

p. 22.
[ 189•1] Chungkuo chingnien Nos. 20, 21, 1962.
[ 190•1] Hsin chianshe No. 11, 1967.
[ 190•2] Chien hsien No. 12, 1964.
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5. Class Struggle Without the Struggle 193
<•>
Against the Bourgeoisie

TOC
If the main class contradiction in China in the period of transition from capitalism p
Card
to socialism, according to Mao, continues to be the contradiction between the
proletariat and the bourgeoisie, one would think that the revolutionary forces should
Text concentrate their efforts on the struggle against the Chinese bourgeoisie. In practice
HTML this is far from being so. The Chinese press carries no reports about a class struggle
PS against the bourgeois elements, no calls on the people to intensify the struggle
PDF against them, nor reports about subversive activity by the national bourgeoisie.
T* In 1956, following the wholesale conversion of all private enterprises into state- p
19* private enterprises, the state assessed the share of private capital at these enterprises
as being worth 2,200 million yuan. Every year the former owners of the enterprises
###
converted into state-private enterprises are paid 5 per cent on their invested capital.
This means they receive 110–120 million yuan a year. Initially, the payment of
interest, started in 1956, was expected to go on until the end of the second five-year
period, that is, up to 1962, by when the state should have paid out almost 35 per
cent of the value of the private capital, that is, 770 million yuan. [ 194•1 However, 194
the payment of interest has continued to this very day, and there is no indication
when it will be stopped.
Another important form in buying out private capital in China, apart from the fixed p
interest, is the very high salaries paid to working capitalists. Thus, average salaries to
former capitalists working in foreign trade establishments in Shanghai came to 223
yuan, as compared with the average of 50–60 yuan for industrial wages. A capitalist
who is director of the Shenhsin textile mill No. 9 in Shanghai was paid 400 yuan a
month, while the director of the same factory representing the state was paid 160
yuan. Some Shanghai capitalists have salaries running to more than 1,000 yuan a
month. If the buying out payments already received by the capitalists are added to
the amount by which the capitalists’ salaries exceed those of government officials of
equal rank (let us note that it is the high salary and not the fixed interest that is the
capitalists’ chief source of income) the total may be safely regarded as fully covering
the value of the means of production bought up from the Chinese bourgeoisie.
Despite the fact that the buying out of the means of production from the bourgeoisie p
under the proletarian dictatorship does not amount to a transaction of sale (a fact the
Chinese theorists did not deny in their articles either), the Chinese leadership, while
claiming to be extra “ revolutionary" and urging a step-up of the class struggle,
continue to pay the bourgeoisie “smart money" 20 years since the establishment of
the people’s power.
The following fact shows the Maoists’ attitude to the bourgeoisie. p
Liu Nieh-yi is a capitalist who lives in Shanghai. His father had owned many p
enterprises, which in 1956 were estimated to be worth 90 million yuan. Following
the father’s death, the estate was shared out equally among his 10 sons. Liu Nieh-
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/5.5-Class.Struggle.Not.Against.Bourgeoisie[2012-12-18 2:31:54]
yi’s share came to a number of match factories. Every year, he receives from the
state 5 per cent interest on his capital, which comes to 450,000 yuan. Liu is
chairman of the Shanghai industrialists’ and merchants’ federation, and as director of 195
one of his former factories receives a monthly salary of 250 yuan. His nine brothers
cannot complain either. They too receive 450,000 yuan a year each and a
higherthan-average salary. One of them, for instance, is director of a cement plant
and has a salary of 690 yuan.
Liu Nieh-yi will tell you straight away that in China the “dictatorship of the p
proletariat is not aimed against the Chinese bourgeoisie”, and that he already regards
himself as a common working cadre. Consequently, the loud talk about the class
struggle and greater class vigilance has not prevented Mao and his entourage from
forgetting it when dealing with the Chinese bourgeoisie.
At the 9th Congress of the CPC much was said about fighting the class enemies
and purging the “class ranks”, but the question of the national bourgeoisie, the last
exploiter class of Chinese society, was not even considered. Mao’s attitude to the
national bourgeoisie can hardly be squared with the Maoists’ revolutionary
catchwords and is in fact marked by compromise, Right-opportunist flirtation and
concessions, an urge to neutralise it and even to win it over to the Maoists’ side in
their fight against the Chinese people’s socialist gains. Consequently, their Leftist
words go hand in hand with their Right-opportunist deeds.
***

TEXT SIZE
normal
Notes
[ 194•1] See Theses of the All-China Trade Union Federation on the Policy of
Redemption by the State of the Share of Private Capital at StatePrivate Enterprises,
Peking, 1957 (in Chinese).
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6. Class Struggle: 195
<•>
Pretext for Repression

TOC
Mao said the “cultural revolution" was “absolutely necessary and highly timely in p
Card
consolidating the proletarian dictatorship, preventing the restoration of capitalism and
building socialism”. In their efforts to prove that the “cultural revolution" was a
Text “natural development" and “ accorded with Marxist doctrine" the Maoists cited the
HTML founders of Marxism-Leninism.
PS
PDF In order to justify his assertions concerning the danger of a restoration of capitalism p
in full-scale socialist society, Mao referred to the following words of Lenin’s: “The
T* transition from capitalism to communism takes an entire historical epoch. Until this
19* epoch is over, the exploiters inevitably cherish the hope of restoration, and this hope
turns into attempts at restoration." [ 196•1 Mao thinks these words of Lenin’s back 196
###
up his idea that because the danger of restoration continues to exist right up to the
construction of full-scale communist society the implication is that even in full-scale
socialist society there must be a bitter class struggle. Mao ignores Lenin’s remark to
the effect that socialism is in fact communism, but only its first, or lower, phase.
Lenin regarded the transition to communism as transition to its first stage—socialism.
Here is what Lenin said about this in his work The State and Revolution: “What is
usually called socialism was termed by Marx the ‘first’, or lower, phase of
communist society. Insofar as the means of production become common property, the
word ‘communism’ is also applicable here, providing we do not forget that this is
not complete communism." [ 196•2
When Lenin said that the exploiters still have hopes of restoration he had in mind p
the period of transition from capitalism to socialism, in which the issue of “who
beats whom" is decided. Mao tries to extend this period, and to include in it the
whole of socialist society, when the issue of “who beats whom" has already been
decided. The Chinese leaders have been driving home the idea that the restoration of
capitalism in the socialist countries is inevitable. They have slanderously declared
that this process is already taking place in the Soviet Union and in a number of
other socialist countries in Eastern Europe. Accordingly, they “ recommend" that the
peoples of these countries, including the Soviet people, should stage “cultural
revolutions" like the Chinese one.
In China’s case the possibility of a capitalist restoration there cannot be denied p

because the country is still going through the transition period proper. To this very
day, we find in Chinese society the national bourgeoisie and numerous remnants of
old exploiting classes, who have visions of restoring the old social order. Nor can it
be denied that their hopes of doing so have materially increased after socialist ideas 197
were discredited among some social sections of the Chinese people by the Maoist
leadership’s subjectivist policies.
The “great proletarian cultural revolution" in China is in no sense directed against p

the national bourgeoisie and the remnants of the other exploiting classes. None of
those who have been “exposed” as being opponents of the “thought of Mao Tse-
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/5.6-Class.Struggle.Pretext.for.Repression[2012-12-18 2:32:01]
tung" were capitalists or received unearned incomes. The Chinese press has admitted
as much. Hungchih said in No. 8 for 1966: “The great proletarian cultural revolution
in our country is aimed against a handful of scoundrels who have used the signboard
of communism to peddle their anti-communist wares. It is aimed against the handful
of anti-Party, anti-socialist and counter-revolutionary bourgeois intellectuals.”
The “Resolution of the CPC Central Committee on the Great Proletarian Cultural p
Revolution" (adopted on August 8, 1966) said: “Because the cultural revolution is a
revolution it inevitably meets with resistance. The source of this resistance lies
mainly among those vested with power who have infiltrated into the Party and are
going the capitalist way.” It added: “The present movement is centred on the struggle
against those vested with power who are within the ranks of the Party and who are
going the capitalist way." [ 197•1
Who are these men who are “vested with power ... and are going the capitalist p
way"? It turns out that the advocates of the counter-revolutionary line and restoration
of capitalism in China and of struggle against the Party and socialism are Party
cadres. The result is a pretty weird picture: it is not the bourgeois elements, but
Party cadres who have visions of restoring capitalism in China.
Mao’s shameless speculation on the threat of a capitalist restoration in China and p

the demagogic nature of his assertions about a “life-and-death struggle between
bourgeois restoration and proletarian counter-restoration" [ 197•2 ultimately lays
bare the true reasons behind the notorious “great proletarian cultural revolution”. We
believe the reasons to be these.
The Maoists’ adventurist experiments in stepping up China’s entry into communism p 198
by means of the “Three Red Banners" line proved to be a fiasco. These experiments
inflicted great damage on the Chinese economy, and it is still trying to make good
these losses. In industrial and agricultural production China remains essentially on the
1957–1959 level. A large part of the national income goes into military needs, above
all the fabrication of nuclear weapons. Despite some stabilisation of the economic
and political situation following the failure of the “Great Leap Forward”, Mao’s
erroneous domestic and foreign policy line has, for all practical purposes, driven the
country into a dead end. It was announced that 1966 marked the start of the third
fiveyear period, but no target figures for the five-year plan have yet been published.
It would be wrong to assume that the gross errors made by Mao and his followers,
including the “Great Leap Forward”, have already become a part of history and have
been forgotten by the Chinese people.
Many Party functionaries and government officials knew who was really to blame p
for China’s plight. The Maoists could not be unaware of the fact that their domestic
and foreign-policy failures had markedly undermined the influence of the “thought of
Mao Tse-tung" at home and abroad. So, in order to retain power, Mao and his
followers started the “cultural revolution”. Under the pretext of fighting the threat of
a capitalist restoration they attacked the Party cadres and the patriotic elements who
condemned Mao’s adventurist propositions in the sphere of economic policy and
demanded a return to the socialist methods of economic development; those who
demanded an end to Mao’s personality cult, which had frozen the life and creativity
of the Party; those who insisted on restoring friendly relations and co-operation
between China and the Soviet Union; those who urged the use of scientific, technical
and cultural achievements in foreign countries; and those who demanded that the
intelligentsia should be given more freedom of initiative and allowed to pursue its
own creative quest. These demands by internationalist-minded Chinese Marxists, and
other men who simply take the common-sense view of things are depicted by
Chinese propaganda as an attempt to “restore capitalism”, and as amounting to a
“struggle against the Party and socialism" and a “ counterrevolutionary line”. 199
These Maoists’ assertions amount to no more than a bogey used to intimidate and p
terrify the Chinese people, a trick used to justify the Maoists’ political reprisals and
to discredit their opponents. [ 199•1 Despite these zigzags in China’s political and
economic life, brought about by the Maoists’ line, there are considerable numbers of
people in China who support socialism. Quite naturally, in the absence of any
information concerning the true causes of the difficulties now facing China and the
men who were instrumental in producing them, the speculation over the “restoration
of capitalism" slogan suits the book of Mao and his followers, because it allows
them to retain some of their political and ideological influence.
During the “cultural revolution" thousands of Party functionaries in charge of p

ideological and cultural matters, workers in culture, the sciences and the arts in all
provinces and cities were removed from their posts and subjected to abuse,
humiliation and political harassment. The most prominent leaders of the Communist
Party of China fell victim to Mao’s ambitious and treacherous policy, among them
Liu Shao-chi and Teng Hsiao-ping, members of the Standing Committee of the
Politburo of the CPC Central Committee, Peng Chen, member of the Politburo of the
CPC Central Committee, Lu Ting-yi, alternate member of the Politburo of the CPC
Central Committee and head of the CPC Central Committee’s propaganda
department, Lo Juiching, Chief of the General Staff of the People’s Liberation Army,
and many others.
The pragmatic nature of the “restoration of capitalism" slogan, designed to meet the p
narrow group interests of the Emacs-File-stamp: 200
"/home/ysverdlov/leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/20070510/290.tx" Maoists, stands
out quite clearly in an analysis of the charges brought against Liu Shao-chi. The
report to the 9th Congress of the CPC calls Liu a “provocateur”, “a strikebreaker”,
and a “running dog of imperialism”. He is alleged to have “concocted the political
line of restoring capitalism" in China and of “transforming China into a colony of
imperialism and revisionism”, working to condition public opinion for an “overthrow
of the proletarian dictatorship”. The really surprising thing, however, is that the
report contains no concrete facts to back up these charges. The report does not
contain either an outline of Liu’s programme or information about his contacts with
the bourgeoisie. Some of the facts concerning “Liu Shao-chi’s black line”, which the
report gives, relate mainly to the period before 1949, and merely show that Liu did
not share some of Mao’s tactical propositions. The point is that the Maoists were
incapable of producing any facts to confirm the absurd assertion that Liu was seeking
to restore capitalism, because no such facts are available. The fact is that, beginning
from the mid1950s, Liu (like other sober-minded Party leaders) increasingly differed
with Mao and his followers on the various aspects of the content and pace of
China’s socio-political and economic development.
Evidence of this comes from the “charges” levelled against Liu Shao-chi by the p
Hungweiping press. Liu was attacked with special ferocity for having urged in the
1950s that a study should be made of the experience of socialist construction in the
Soviet Union, and for having “actively preached the idea of learning from the Soviet
Union”, “campaigned for Sino-Soviet friendship" and “given a high assessment of
Soviet assistance to China”. The Hungweiping press also accused Liu of having
entertained the possibility of joining with the Soviet Union in fighting US
imperialism.
One Hungweiping handbill gave this assessment of Liu Shao-chi’s report at the 8th p
Congress of the CPC: “In his report at the 8th Congress of the CPC in 1956, under
the pretext of opposing the personality cult, he came out against Chairman Mao Tse-
tung and used the banner of fighting against dogmatism as a pretext for attacking
Mao Tse-tung.” Another handbill accused Liu of “revising” the Party Rules, as
adopted by the 7th Congress of the CPC. This “revision” amounted to the following.
The Party Rules adopted at the 7th Congress of the CPC, said that the blend of 201
MarxismLeninism with the practice of the Chinese revolution, as embodied in the
“thought of Mao Tse-tung”, was the guiding light of all its work, while the Party
Rules adopted by the 8th Congress of the CPC said that every Party member had the
duty strenuously to study Marxism-Leninism, but said nothing about studying the
“thought of Mao Tsetung”. The handbill asserted that Liu was “mainly responsible
for modifying the Party Rules at the 8th Congress of the CPC”. Similar charges were
levelled at Teng Hsiaoping, former General Secretary of the CPC. [ 201•1
The nature of the charges brought against Liu once again testifies to the fact that
Mao has deliberately distorted the Marxist-Leninist doctrine of classes and the class
struggle, that he has identified the clash of opinion within the Party and the class
struggle, and that he has ranked all the Communists who disagree with his
adventurist propositions among the class enemies and supporters of the “bourgeois
headquarters”. That is why the report to the 9th Congress says the struggle between
Mao and Liu is not an innerParty struggle over the ways of building socialism in
China, but a class struggle between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie. The facts also
show that Mao has suppressed many of his former associates precisely because they
have come out against his pseudo-revolutionary conceptions and lines on classes and
class relations.
***

normal
TEXT SIZE
Notes
[ 196•1] This quotation from Lenin’s “The Proletarian Revolution and the Renegade
Kautsky" (Collected Works, Vol. 28, p. 254) was given in an editorial article carried
by Jenmin jihpao and Hungchih on June 14, 1964, and once again used in the report
to the 9th Congress of the CPC.
[ 197•1] China Pictorial No. 9, 1966, pp. 6-7. At the 9th Congress of the CPG a
new term—“capwayist”—was coined to designate those who are in power and are
going the capitalist way.
[ 197•2] Hungchih No. 8, 1966.
[ 199•1] Thus, for instance, Chou Yang, one-time chief of the propaganda department
of the CPC Central Committee, was declared to be a “counter-revolutionary
revisionist element" on the ground that he had declared the following: “The general
line, the ’Great Leap Forward’ and the people’s communes met with great
difficulties.” He also said: “Ultimately, it will be possible to say whether we arc
right or wrong within 50 or 100 years.” Chinese propaganda regards this as a slander
of Mao Tse-tung because, as Jenmin jihpao wrote, “the Party’s general line—
straining to the utmost, seeking to advance in building socialism on the principle of
‘more, faster, better, at less cost’, is a great work of the thought of Mao Tse-tung"
(Jenmin jihpao, August 7, 1966).
[ 201•1] The Hungweiping press wrote the following about Teng: “At the 8th
Congress of the CPC, back in 1956, his report on changes in the Party Rules in
every way glorified the 20th Congress of the CPSU, and opposed the so-called
personality cult.” Naturally enough, considering the unprecedented proportions to
which Mao’s personality cult has now been blown up in China, such a statement is
regarded as counterrevolutionary, and is amounting to action against the “thought of
Mao Tse-tung”. Like Liu, Teng was accused of spreading the “fading out of the
class struggle" theory, and insisting that as socialist transformations were being
completed, the class struggle in China was bound to ease off.
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7. Concerning Mao’s Attitude 201
<•>
to the Working Class

TOC
In Section 3 of this Chapter we already dealt with the fact that in the 1920s and p
Card
1930s Mao had, for all practical purposes, ignored the leading role of the working 202
class in the Chinese revolution. In fact, he has maintained a similar stand since then.
Text However, in an effort to put a Marxist gloss on his views and theoretically to back
HTML up his right to leadership in the CPC, he has “injected” into his works (including
PS those written earlier, in the 1920s) statements about the leading role of the working
PDF class in Chinese society. That is why his works contained much favourable mention
about the Chinese working class. He said: “The entire history of revolution proves
T* that without the leadership of the working class revolution fails and that with the
19*
leadership of the working class revolution triumphs. In the epoch of imperialism, in
### no country can any other class lead any genuine revolution to victory." [ 202•1 This
was uttered more than 20 years ago, on June 30, 1949, in an article entitled “On the
People’s Democratic Dictatorship”. Mao has expressed similar ideas since then.
Thus, for instance, in August 1968 he declared: “Our country has a population of p
700 million. The working class is the leading class. There is need fully to develop
the leading role of the working class in the great proletarian cultural revolution and
in all other matters." [ 202•2 One of Mao’s “latest precepts" was quoted in the
report to the 9th Congress of the CPC, which said: “The proletariat is the greatest
class in the history of mankind. Ideologically, politically and in terms of strength it
is the mightiest revolutionary class.” The CPC Rules contain this statement: “The
Communist Party of China is the political party of the proletariat.”
However, all these statements, paying lip-service to the leading role of the working p
class, are purely declarative, because in practice they are not backed up by any
politicoorganisational or ideological measures.
Although the “cultural revolution" has been designated as “proletarian” and is p

allegedly being pursued in the interests of the proletariat, the Chinese workers have
in fact been prevented from taking part in it (the presence of young workers in some
Tsaofan units makes no difference to the overall situation). What is more, at one
stage of the “cultural revolution”, the edge of the struggle was turned directly against 203
the workers, namely, the campaign against “ counter-revolutionary economism”. The
workers’ legitimate demands for better living conditions were declared to be an
expression of “egoism”, “economism”, “bourgeois ideology”, “ revisionism”, etc.
Jenmin jihpao declared: “This kind of economism amounts to using every means of
corruption to indulge the demands of the small groups of backward masses, to erode
the revolutionary will of the masses, and to divert the political struggle of the
masses to the false path of economism, so as to make the masses stop reckoning
with the interests of the state and the collective, the long-term interests, and to
pursue nothing but their personal and short-term interests. The aim of economism is
to stifle the great proletarian cultural revolution and to undermine the dictatorship of
the proletariat and the socialist system." [ 203•1
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/5.7-Maos.Attitude.to.the.Working.Class-[2012-12-18 2:32:07]
Maoism holds that the leading role of the working class can be ensured only if it p
unconditionally fulfils Mao’s instructions. Hungchih explains this as follows: “In
order to safeguard the leadership of the working class, the first thing that needs to be
done is to ensure the fulfilment of every instruction of Chairman Mao, the great
leader of the working class." [ 203•2 Ultimately, the leading role of the working
class is reduced to the leading role of the “thought of Mao Tse-tung”. Kwangming
jihpao wrote: “The working class must direct everything. This means that Mao Tse-
tung’s thought must direct everything." [ 203•3 Consequently, while lip-service is
being paid to the leading role of the working class, steps are in fact taken to
disperse the vanguard of the working class, the Communist Party, to eliminate the
organisation of the working class, the trade unions, and to attack the vital rights of
the Chinese workers under the pretext of fighting “counter-revolutionary economism”.
It is not surprising, therefore, that on the whole the working class of China has p
taken a hostile attitude to the “cultural revolution”. There have been disturbances and
strikes at many factories and enterprises. In order to put these down and
simultaneously to restart production operations, disorganised by the “cultural 204
revolution”, the Maoists fell back on the help of the army.
Mao’s verbal flirtation with the working class, which has been recently intensified,
and which has been expressed, in particular, in his latest precepts, is due not only to
his efforts to make his ideas and actions appear to be scientific, but also to purely
utilitarian considerations. The Maoists cannot help but realise that the development of
large-scale (arms) industry inevitably leads to a growth in the numerical strength and
influence of the working class. They realise that unless this fact is taken into
account, they may find themselves facing large-scale political disturbances in the
future.
***
Thus, Chinese society has been plunged by the Maoists into a state of bitter p
struggle. The relations of friendship, co-operation and mutual assistance between
groups of working people, which socialism naturally produces, have been disrupted,
and supplanted by hostility, eavesdropping, suspicion and treachery; the military-
bureaucratic dictatorship, established by Mao Tse-tung, hits out at all the social
groups of working people.
The “class line" openly pursued by Mao Tse-tung, as expressed in the so-called p
great proletarian cultural revolution, has in fact made impossible in China the
tendency towards an obliteration of social distinctions between groups of working
people, a tendency inevitable under socialism for objective reasons, on the basis of
an all-round improvement of their cultural-educational, professional, intellectual,
ideological and political level. A normal development of the working class, the
peasantry and the intelligentsia has been grossly disrupted. The Chinese people’s
intelligentsia, an active creator of the people’s spiritual values, has been subjected to
massive massacres and all manner of reprisals.
The social structure of modern China has been substantially deformed. It has not p
functioned or developed normally as a socialist structure. The mutually determined
development of the socialist working class, the socialist peasantry and the socialist
intelligentsia has not taken place in Chinese society because virtually every one of
these social groups of working people has been deformed and deprived of the
possibility of normal development.
p 205
A characteristic feature of socialism is that as it develops groups of working people

engage in something like a mutual exchange of the most advanced features. Each
group of working people seeks to borrow from the other groups their most
progressive features, and this brings them closer together on a higher level. From the
working class the peasants, the intellectuals and the office workers borrow the
features which are characteristic of it as the economically and politically most
advanced force, features of high ideological consciousness, awareness and
organisation. For their part, the workers and peasants seek to rise to the general
educational, cultural and intellectual level of the intelligentsia. The peasantry itself
has many fine features, and these inevitably blend with the best features of other
working people. This process is especially intensified when many people from
peasant families move into the ranks of the working class and the intelligentsia. In
China, this natural process has been disrupted.
The touchstone of one’s attitude to Marxism-Leninism is known to be the attitude to p

classes, the class struggle, and to the dictatorship and leading role of the proletariat.
Those are the very issues on which the unscientific, adventurist, subjectivist and
idealistic conceptions and lines of the Maoists are being most clearly revealed.
The actions of the Chinese leadership have seriously prejudiced the interest of the
people and the cause of socialism in China.
***

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Notes
[ 202•1] Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, Vol. IV, Peking, 1961, p. 421.
[ 202•2] Hungchih No. 2, 1968.
[ 203•1] Jenmin jihpao, January 12, 1967.
[ 203•2] Hungchih No. 2, 1968.
[ 203•3] Kwangming jihpao, July 26, 1969.
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Chapter Six 206
<•>
RELATION OF POLITICS AND ECONOMICS
IN THE THEORY AND PRACTICE OF MAOISM
TOC
Card 1. Role of Economics in Social Development

Minimised

Text
HTML A correct understanding of the relation between politics and economics is the most p
PS important criterion of the scientific nature of a social theory and the social practice
PDF resting on it. The starting point of the Marxist-Leninist theory of social development
and the materialist view of history consists in recognition of the definitive role of
T* production in this process, and recognition of the fact that changes in the social
19* superstructure, specifically the political life of society, are based on changes in the
mode of production which are determined by the development of the productive
###
forces. This is the fundamental distinction between Marxism-Leninism, the theory of
the revolutionary working class, and the social theories put forward by the
reactionary ideologists not only of the big but also of the petty bourgeoisie.
The twofold nature of the condition and mentality of the petty-bourgeois masses, the p
peasant masses above all, is expressed in the existence of opposite ideological
traditions: the progressive tradition of revolutionary democracy, which real
revolutionaries regard with profound respect, and reactionary traditions against which
real revolutionaries carry on an implacable struggle, and this means specifically the
traditions of pseudo-revolutionary adventurism and anarchism.
Anarchists, like the followers of Bakunin, denied the need for a mass proletarian p
party, for the proletariat’s hegemony in the socialist revolution and for its 207
dictatorship, and regarded the revolution as a spontaneous rebellion by pettybourgeois
masses and declasse elements. Following Marx and Engels, Lenin resolutely
condemned Bakunin’s views, characterised them as the outlook of a petty-bourgeois
despairing of his salvation, and consistently opposed any manifestations of anarchist
theory and tactics in the revolutionary movement. In his work “Left-Wing”
Communism —an Infantile Disorder and several others, Lenin exposed the
reactionary essence of anarchist conceptions and showed them to be incompatible
with Marxist theory and the strategy and tactics of the communist movement.
The ideologists of the proletariat regarded anarchism as an essentially counter- p

revolutionary trend which brought division into the liberation movement of the
masses, and which hampered the strengthening of the unity of the revolutionary
forces, and development of the alliance between the working class and the non-
proletarian exploited masses, the toiling peasantry in the first place. By contrast,
Marx, Engels and Lenin regarded revolutionary democracy as a trend expressing the
truly revolutionary aspirations of the non-proletarian masses which helped to raise
the awareness of these masses to the level of proletarian ideology. In their
ideological development, Marx and Engels themselves travelled from revolutionary
democracy to scientific communism.
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/6.1-Economics.in.Social.Development.Minimised[2012-12-18 2:32:14]
Marxism was a continuation of the revolutionary– democratic tradition which, in p

particular, was expressed in the understanding of the dependence of politics on
economics. In contrast to this, anarchism saw politics as constituting the main force
behind the historical process, and relied not on objective economic prerequisites for
revolution and the mass movements they generated, but on arbitrary sparking off of
putsches by handfuls of politicians, declasse elements, and so on. The anarchists
concentrated on the destructive side of the revolution and lost sight of its creative
side.
We have to deal with these matters because Mao’s ideological and theoretical p
platform, which is at the basis of his group’s current political line, is a departure not
only from proletarian ideology, from Marxism-Leninism, but also from all the
progressive traditions of the revolutionary peasantry.
Maoism gives expression not to petty-bourgeois ideology as a whole, but to the p 208
reactionary tradition of this ideology, specifically, the anarchist tradition, elements of
whose ideological content Mao and his group have used to speculate on the
ideological and political immaturity of sizable sections of the population resulting
from the country’s economic backwardness.
The anarchist tendencies in Mao’s views were expressed variously and in differing p
forms at the succeeding stages of his ideological evolution. It is true that during the
civil war—the struggle against the Kuomintang regime—Mao paid lip-service to the
danger of such expressions of anarchism within the Party branches and the Red
Army of China as “the militaristic mentality" which is connected with mistrust of the
strength of the masses, putschism, clannishness, the “freebooters” spirit”, demands for
egalitarian distribution, etc. In that period, he made a show of attacking the very
elements of anarchist mentality and tactics which he himself now makes a point of
openly and stubbornly implanting. [ 208•1
However, even then anarchist tendencies had a definite effect on Mao’s own views, p
being expressed in a one-sided enthusiasm for political means of class struggle and
an underestimation of its economic content and tasks. [ 208•2
The analysis of economic phenomena is known to have played a most important p

part in the writings of the founders of Marxism-Leninism. Scientific political
economy, an important component part of Marx’s doctrine, was formulated in his
fundamental writings, the greatest of which is his immortal Capital. In the creative
development of Marxism, Lenin gave much attention to an analysis of economic
processes and specifically dealt with them in such of his works as The Development
of Capitalism in Russia and Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism, and a
great number of articles.
A departure from this tradition, which is characteristic of genuine social science, is p

to be found in Mao’s writings. which betray an obvious neglect for questions of 209
economic theory.
This could to some extent be explained by the fact that for many years Mao had to p
work in an atmosphere of armed struggle, which required primary attention to
matters of military strategy and tactics, and which tended to push questions arising
in the development of production into the background. That is why Mao regarded
economic problems not from the standpoint of the prospects of socialist change, but
merely as current economic questions directly subordinate to the political tasks of the
civil war. Because Mao was not sufficiently mature in theoretical terms, he tended to
turn this approach into an absolute: he developed the notion that politics had the
decisive role to play in social life. The thesis he formulated—“politics is the soul,
the command force"— clearly expresses his view of the relationship between
economics and politics, a view which is incompatible with Marxism-Leninism.
Characterising the Communist Party’s scientific approach in formulating its policy, p

Lenin wrote: “We value communism only when it is based on economic facts ... ’we
always took our stand first and foremost on an exact economic analysis’." [ 209•1
Another of Lenin’s references to the question stresses the definitive role of
economics and characterises the meaning of the attitude of those who ignore it. In
1918, he said: “Economic interests and the economic position of the classes which
rule our state lie at the root of both our home and foreign policy. These propositions
which constitute the basis of the Marxist world outlook and have been confirmed for
us Russian revolutionaries by the great experience of both Russian revolutions, must
not be forgotten even for a moment if we are to avoid losing ourselves in the
thickets, the labyrinth of diplomatic tricks, a labyrinth which at times is artificially
created and made more intricate by people, classes, parties and groups who like to
fish in muddy waters, or who are compelled to do so." [ 209•2
It is precisely the basis of the Marxist world outlook, which Lenin brought out, that p
Mao distorts because, when considering the relationship between economics and
politics, he substitutes a mechanistic for a dialectical approach and essentially 210
presents politics as a force which is independent of economics.
Economics and politics are organically connected with each other. Revealing this p
interconnection, Lenin wrote that “politics is a concentrated expression of
economics”, [ 210•1 and that is precisely why “politics must take precedence over
economics". [ 210•2 In his article “Once Again on the Trade Unions" Lenin showed
that it was not right to separate the “political approach" from the “economic
approach" and to try mechanically to combine them as principles isolated from each
other. The political approach to questions of economic construction from the
standpoint of the working class requires that the interests of the current economic
advantage should not blot out the vital economic interests of the working people, and
that the primary economic tasks of the working class—the tasks of building and
developing the socialist economy—should be regarded as the fundamental ones.
Politics takes precedence over economics simply because the question of whether p
the working class is to retain its economic domination is decided in the political
sphere, in the sphere of the class struggle. It is precisely on the successful solution
of the political task of consolidating the alliance of the working class and the toiling
peasantry that the implementation of socialist change in the economy depends. Let us
note that it is not any type of politics that takes precedence over economics, but only
correct politics, which give genuine expression to the economic interests of the
working class and indicate the scientifically-grounded ways for realising these
interests, relying on a consideration of the requirements of objective economic laws.
Lenin stressed: “Without a correct political approach to the matter the given class
will be unable to stay on top, and, consequently, will be incapable of solving its
production problems either," [ 210•3 adding that for the working class which has
taken power into its own hands, for its Party and for the state of the proletarian
dictatorship the most important content of politics henceforth amounts to a fulfilment
of this “production problem": organisation of economic construction on scientific 211
principles, unification of the efforts of all the working people and direction of their
activity in building and developing the socialist economy.
Neglect of the dialectical interconnection between economics and politics and p

inability to analyse economic processes and to apply such analysis in formulating
policies were increasingly revealed in Mao’s writings as the specific conditions of
the civil war receded and China entered a period of peaceful construction, when
economic questions assumed central importance.
Initially, Mao did not try blatantly to contrast his specific approach to these p
questions with the economic line formulated by the collective thinking of the
Communist Party of China, which relied on the Soviet Union’s experience. The
correctness of this policy, expressed in the CPC’s general line and approved,
following nation-wide discussion, by the National People’s Congress in September
1954, was borne out by the successes in fulfilling the first five-year plan of China’s
economic development (1953–1957).
This plan provided for the establishment of a primary base of socialist industry and p
the socialist transformation of agriculture, concentration of the main forces on
building 694 large industrial enterprises, among which the main ones were 156
enterprises and shops that were being built with the Soviet Union’s assistance. The
plan targets for capital construction were overfulfilled by 10 per cent. The targets for
gross industrial output were overfulfilled by 15 per cent, and the targets for the
staple cereal and industrial crops were slightly overfulfilled.
However, Mao saw these successes not as an argument in favour of the general line
adopted by the Party, but as a pretext for its revision. From 1955 on, Mao, spurred
by his hegemonistic aspirations and claims to personal leadership of the world
revolutionary movement, has been insisting on supplanting the general line by the
new line designed to put China ahead of all the socialist countries in one great spurt.
While trying to impose on the Party his adventurist line, he also tries to give it some
theoretical backing, and all of Mao’s “creativity” in economic theory comes to these
attempts in the form of separate statements, thrown here and there in his various
articles and speeches. It is futile to seek in these statements any hint of a scientific 212
analysis of economic processes. Still, they reveal most clearly a definite conception
of economic development, and because it is embodied in the Chinese leaders’
economic policy, it is worthwhile to consider its content.
***

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Notes
[ 208•1] See Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works, Vol. 1, London, 1954, pp. 105–16.
[ 208•2] Let us bear in mind that anarchist ideas were popular in China at the time
when Mao’s world outlook took shape. In the first and second decades of the
century, a large section of the Chinese intelligentsia went through a period of
enthusiasm for anarchism.
[ 209•2] Ibid., Vol. 27, pp. 365–66.
[ 210•2] Ibid.
[ 210•3] Ibid., p. 84.
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2. Mao’s View of Socialist Economic 212
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Development

TOC
Let us recall that Mao’s followers have declared him to be the “greatest Marxist- p
Card
Leninist of our day”. The extent to which Mao is actually out of touch with
Marxism-Leninism will be clearly seen from his views concerning the substance and
Text development of the socialist mode of production. Marxist-Leninist theory regards the
HTML mode of production as a dialectical unity of its two sides: the productive forces and
PS the relations of production. These two sides cannot be detached from each other,
PDF because in reality they are organically connected and develop in accordance with the
objective law of their mutual concordance. That is also the law governing the
T* development of the socialist mode of production; conscious consideration of the
19*
requirements of this law means the balanced maintenance of the concordance of the
### productive forces and the relations of production, and their simultaneous
improvement. Once the working class takes over political power, it can and must use
it for the balanced establishment and development of socialist relations of production
on the basis of the development of the productive forces. To try to establish new
relations of production without relying on a development of the productive forces is
to establish these relations of production only in formal terms, without the substratum
on which alone they can be consolidated and developed.
The triumph of socialism in the USSR was secured because Lenin and the p
Communist Party of the Soviet Union were guided by the proposition of
simultaneously improving the productive forces and the relations of production, and
consciously working to maintain them in harmonious balance. The Party Programme,
adopted by the 8th Congress of the RCP(B), said that the “all-round boosting of the
country’s productive forces" should be the main line which determined the whole 213
economic policy of the Soviet power. [ 213•1 Lenin felt that it was necessary to
supplement the full-scale plan for social change, above all change in the sphere of
relations of production, as set out in the Party Programme, with a concrete plan for
developing the country’s productive forces, above all its material and technical basis,
the plan known as the GOELRO, which was elaborated on Lenin’s initiative.
Lenin resolutely opposed any attempt to identify the development of the productive p
forces with the quantitative growth of production which went forward without any
reliance on technological progress. He saw the rise of the productive forces as
implying an improvement of technology and the technical organisation of production,
going hand in hand with a development of the working people themselves through a
change in the content of their work and the supplanting of manual operations by
mechanised operations arising from steady technical improvements, through higher
living standards and a raising of their general educational and professional levels.
Lenin said that the way to establish social property throughout the national economy p
lay through socialist industrialisation, the building of a large-scale machine industry
capable of supplying all the branches of the economy with modern means of
production and establishing a technical basis for a developed agriculture. He wrote:
“Without highly developed large-scale industry, socialism is impossible anywhere;
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/6.2-Maos.View.of.Socialist.Economic.Development[2012-12-18 2:32:22]
still less is it possible in a peasant country." [ 213•2
These precepts of Lenin’s have been the CPSU’s guideline in the whole of its p
economic policy. It rejected the opportunist suggestions to delay the establishment of
a heavy industry, and to lay stress on the boosting of output in the light and
handicraft industries, which had a backward technical basis. The CPSU also
discarded the Trotskyite suggestions for developing production by putting pressure on
the workers and peasants and lowering their living standards. In line with Lenin’s
precepts, the CPSU based its economic policy on the need to ensure the technical
improvement of production together with the creation of conditions promoting a 214
steady rise in the material welfare and cultural and technical levels of the working
people, the chief productive force.
Mao’s conception has nothing in common with the MarxistLeninist doctrine of the p
substance and development of the socialist mode of production, which has been
tested and confirmed by the practice of socialist construction in the USSR and the
other socialist countries.
Whereas Marxist-Leninist theory regards the mode of production as a dialectical p

unity of the productive forces and the relations of production, Mao’s conception has
these two aspects of the mode of production mechanistically detached from each
other. He assumes that it is possible to establish socialist relations of production and
even to transform them into communist ones without reliance on a corresponding
development of the productive forces. In Mao’s view it is not the establishment of
the necessary material conditions, not the development of society’s material and
technical basis and change in the content of labour that provides the groundwork for
the development of socialist relations of production, but decrees, instructions from
the political leader, and political instruments which make the masses obediently bend
to his orders.
Mao’s neglect of the improvement of society’s material and technical basis is ever p
more clearly revealed in his statements as he formulates his new economic line. In a
report dealing with co-operatives in agriculture in 1955, he said: “We are now
carrying out a revolution not only in the social system, the change from private to
public ownership, but also in technology, the change from handicraft to largescale
modern machine production. . .. We must on no account regard industry and
agriculture, socialist industrialisation and the socialist transformation of agriculture as
two separate and isolated things, and on no account must we emphasise the one and
play down the other." [ 214•1 This appears not only to insist on a simultaneous
development of the productive forces and the relations of production, as stated in the
CPC’s general line in that period, but also to emphasise the need for this proposition,
the need for the technical improvement of production (agriculture in particular) as a
condition for switching it to socialist lines. But recognition of the need to abide by 215
the requirements of the law of concordance amounted to no more than demagogy, for
what Mao said in the above-mentioned speech clashed with the main content of the
report from which the words are taken: in the report Mao urged a step-up in the
collectivisation of agriculture, without ensuring the real possibilities for its technical
equipment.
Let us recall that the CPC Central Committee’s general line provided for a gradual p
implementation of socialist change in the country over a period of roughly 15 years.
In 1956, Mao proposed that this period of transition to socialism should be reduced
to one-third. He told the Supreme State Conference: “Since the summer of last year,
socialist change, that is, a socialist revolution, has been started on an exceptionally
large scale. Within another three years or so the socialist revolution will in the main
be completed on the scale of the whole country." [ 215•1
The idea of instantly establishing socialist relations of production throughout the p

national economy without providing the necessary technical basis clearly clashed with
the principle of developing the relations of production on the basis of an
improvement of the productive forces. While in 1955 Mao still pretended that he had
considerations for this principle, when he declared that the “revolution in the social
system" should be implemented together with the “ revolution in
technology”, [ 215•2 in 1956 he openly discarded this principle. This was expressed
in his distorted view of the operation of the law of concordance of the productive
forces and the relations of production in the period of socialist construction. In 1956
Mao declared: “Socialist revolution aims at liberating the productive forces. The
change-over from individual to socialist, collective ownership in agriculture and
handicrafts and from capitalist to socialist ownership in private industry and
commerce is bound to bring about a tremendous liberation of the productive forces.
Thus the social conditions are being created for a tremendous expansion of industrial
and agricultural production." [ 215•3
There is good reason why the idea of developing the productive forces has been p 216
supplanted by the idea of their “liberation”. The substance of Mao’s new line in
effect consisted in putting off the development of the productive forces and the
technical equipment of agriculture for an indefinite period, merely gaining the
advantages to be had from a simple co-operation of the peasants’ unmechanised
labour. On this basis, which did not allow the productive forces to go beyond the
framework of a very limited level, Mao expected not only to establish socialist
relations of production in an immature form, but also to develop them to a high
state of maturity, and to convert the forms of organisation in production into
communist ones. Mao was not put out by the lack of the necessary material and
technical basis: he decided that the political power of the state was a factor which
could serve as a substitute.
Thus, the new line oriented the CPC’s economic policy away from a consideration p
of the objective requirements of the law of concordance of the productive forces and
the relations of production and upon a deliberate neglect of these requirements: it did
not induce a balanced resolution of the contradictions between the productive forces
and the relations of production, but an artificial sharpening of these contradictions. It
will be easily seen that the idea which, let us recall, Mao put forward in that period,
namely, that under socialism contradictions are resolved through their artificial
sharpening, served not only as a “substantiation” for the sharpening of the class
struggle within socialist society, but also as justification for the new line in the CPC
leadership’s economic policy. In fact, Mao took a cynical attitude on the question of
contradictions under socialism: guided by the principle “the worse the better”, he
declared massive poverty and backwardness to be a favourable factor in socialist
construction. He said: “Apart from their other characteristics, the outstanding thing
about China’s 600 million people is that they are ’poor and blank’. This may seem a
bad thing, but in reality it is a good thing. Poverty gives rise to the desire for
change, the desire for action and the desire for revolution." [ 216•1
Above we already dealt with Mao’s voluntarism and his off-hand attitude to the p 217
people, expressed, in particular, in his well-known statement in which he compares
the people with a “clean sheet of paper" on which, “the newest, the most beautiful
characters" can be written, and “the newest, the most beautiful drawings can be
created”. This patent voluntarism, this scorn for the working people, the chief
productive force, were most clearly revealed in the economic sphere. Mao’s
statement quoted above suggests a haughty confidence on his part that the
impoverished and backward mass of people can be made to do anything, that it can
be turned into a pliant tool of the adventurist politician imagining himself to be a
demi-god capable of changing the social system at will.
The “sheet of paper" on which Mao intended to write “the newest, the most p
beautiful characters" in the expectation of setting up communism in some miraculous
fashion was indeed a “clean” one in the sense that the objective conditions for such
a project were lacking. The peasantry, constituting 80 per cent of China’s population,
was engaged in subsistence and semi-subsistence farming. It lacked even the
primitive implements which require the application of arduous manual labour, while
in many places the peasants had to pull their ploughs and carts themselves because
they were short of draught animals and mechanical means of traction. In industry, the
bulk of the workers were engaged in handicraft production or at small and medium-
size enterprises with extremely backward techniques and machinery and with the
prevalence of manual labour. These workers had a productivity which came to no
more than 10 per cent of that at the very small number of large enterprises equipped
with machinery.
In these conditions, there was an especially acute need to concentrate efforts on p

developing the large-scale machine industry as the only basis for the technical
equipment of production and the substitution of mechanised for manual operations,
so as to enhance productivity. But Mao thought on different lines. He assumed that
economic problems could be tackled without technical improvements in production, if
the entire working population were involved, while the working people’s poverty and
backwardness would make it possible to get the most out of them through longer
hours and lower living standards, to make up for the low labour productivity. Instead 218
of setting the goal of technical development and higher living, cultural and technical
standards for the people, Mao put forward the idea of boosting production and
increasing accumulation at the expense of the working people.
That is precisely what was done in 1958. Enterprises were switched to a 10–12-hour p
working day with two holidays a month, and in the countryside more intensive use
of manpower was made through the peasantry being saddled with the duty, in
addition to farming, of also doing industrial work by extending rural handicraft
production. The level of consumption among the rural population was sharply pressed
down while the closed 3rd Plenary Meeting of the CPC Central Committee in 1957
formulated a special policy of “low and rational wages" in order to press down
living standards among industrial and office workers. The substance of this policy
was expressed by Minister of Labour Liu Tze-chiu, when he said: “At the present
time, the basic policy in the sphere of labour and wages in our country is aimed at
having five men consume the food of three." [ 218•1 The urge for higher wages
and better living conditions was declared by Mao to be an expression of “unhealthy
style" and of the bourgeois mentality. He proclaimed this slogan: “Poverty is good.”
The substance of the new economic line proposed by Mao and his entourage boiled p
down to the following: to accept the technical backwardness of production based on
manual labour, to involve all the manpower reserves in this backward production by
setting up labour armies and a great many handicraft industries, to put millions of
men and women in conditions of hard labour, setting the goal not of boosting
productivity, which is impossible without technological progress, but of wearing
down men’s physical strength and pressing down their living standards to the utmost.
This was a programme for the barbarous use of the available productive forces,
which ruled out any possibility of their development. Nothing but a destruction of
the productive forces could result from this programme.
While holding forth about the “liberation” of the productive forces, Mao put this in p
the context of triumphant socialist relations of production and socialist property. The 219
terms “socialist property" and “social property" constantly occur in his speeches.
However, behind the Marxist terminology there is nothing but a distortion of these
concepts of MarxistLeninist science.
Marxism-Leninism regards socialist relations of production not as the result of a p

formal socialisation of the means of production, decreed by some political body, but
as a true realisation of relations involving the social ownership of the means of
production and signifying that the various branches and the numerous units of the
national economy are no longer fragmented economically, but have been brought
together and are ruled by a single plan. Real establishment of social property means
development of comradely co-operation and mutual assistance in the relations
involving exchange of labour activity and a system of incentives for this activity
which provides for a blend of personal interests, group interests and the interests of
society as a whole. According to Marxism-Leninism, socialist democracy alone
allows the development of all these aspects of socialist relations of production and
their growth into communist forms of socio-economic organisation of social
production.
It will be easily seen that the political instruments which Mao has decided to use p
have nothing in common with socialist democracy, and the socio-economic system
which he has been stubbornly trying to implant with these instruments has nothing in
common with socialist relations of production.
Mao’s idea about the political instruments to be used to establish the new relations p
of production is expressed in his call to “militarise organisation, take combat action
and carry on a collective way of life”, as formulated in the CPC Central
Committee’s resolution of August 29, 1958. Among the means used by Mao and his
followers to implant the “collective way of life" are decrees establishing the form of
organisation the people are to adopt, backed up by ideological brainwashing, and the
introduction of these forms through administrative and military pressure on the
masses. The so-called collective way of life itself, which is being established in this
manner, is a system of extra-economic coercion of the working people, who have
been switched to near barrack-room conditions, and who have to play the part of 220
faceless little screws doing the will of their senior. The people’s communes, which
Mao declared to be the best organisational form for transition to communism, have
always been instruments of extra-economic coercion designed to make the masses
put up with any privation and give up the fruits of their labour to the state without a
murmur.
As Mao saw them, the communes were economic organisations essentially p

embodying not social but group property. This means that Mao’s views of the ideal
economic organisation of society did not originate in Marxism but in anarchisttype
conceptions and ideas going all the way back to Proudhon. Instead of realising the
need to set up an integrated national economy with developed economic ties, and
rational specialisation and co-operation of its units, Mao set for China the ideal of a
semi-subsistence economy claiming that economic cells isolated from each other
constituted a communist system. For one thing, each of these cells had to look to its
own supplies, and not expect to co-operate with other cells, and for another, it was
forced to make deductions into a state’s accumulations fund, without expecting any
help from the latter.
In the last few years, these conceptions have been expressed in Mao’s principle of p
“relying on one’s own strength”, which in application to China’s internal economic
development boils down to the requirement of self-supply by economic cells and
complexes. The practices at the Tacheng oil fields and of the Tachai production
brigade were declared to be setting a model in the application of this principle.
About 80,000 families, constituting the population of Tacheng—an oil-bearing area in
north-east China, live in villages and hamlets situated in such a way as to enable the
men to work on the oil fields and the women on the farms. The “spirit of Tacheng"
which the Chinese press has extolled over a period of several years, amounts to a
low rate of consumption and wretched living conditions in barrack-rooms and mud-
huts, self-supply of foodstuffs and “voluntary” renunciation of assistance from the
state. The same thing applies to the “spirit of Tachai”, with the sole difference that
this is not a large industrial enterprise, but a small farm consisting of 83 households.
The Tachai brigade is credited not only with having provided their own supplies of 221
seed, feed, fertilisers and building materials, but also with having refused to use
paper and ink, so as to refrain from acquiring anything for their office from outside.
The Tachai brigade practises the following principle: the greater part of the crop goes
to the state and the rest is used for the needs of the farm and food for the peasants.
One of their slogans is “three never ask" (never ask the state for grain, money or
materials).
The principle of “relying on one’s own strength" is the “substantiation” of the thesis p
that the isolation of the areas, the communes and production collectives is not a
defect of China’s economy, but a great boon. At the same time, the Maoists have
used this principle to justify their line of isolating China economically from the other
socialist countries, a line which is in conflict with the objective need for international
division of labour within the world socialist system and is aimed at undermining the
economic unity of the socialist countries.
Substitution of group for social property and of relations of economic isolation for p
relations of co-operation and mutual assistance necessarily had an effect on Mao’s
views of the mechanism of the national economy and the economic laws governing
its operation and development. Mao regards commodity-money relations as
something that is alien to socialism, that is only outwardly connected with socialist
relations of production and that exists alongside these relations. One would think that
this view implies recognition of the need for strict centralisation of the national
economy and comprehensive planning. But Mao has in fact also denied the need to
regulate the national economy on the basis of the objective law of balanced and
proportional development.
In a speech before the Supreme State Conference in 1957 he said that grain was the p
only item that needed to be planned centrally, because the production of other
industrial and agricultural items has to be determined by “local social organisations
or by the masses themselves”. There is nothing paradoxical about this conclusion,
because once the isolation of the economic units is idealised it logically follows that
there is no need for centralising social production and carrying it on under a single
plan. What is paradoxical is this: Mao has failed to see that the separation of the 222
economic units inevitably results in the anarchy of production and spontaneous
operation of the law of value, and that consideration of the objective requirements of
this law is a necessary condition for the balanced development of a socialist
economy. In fact, he appears to regard socialist production as being a realm of
spontaneous movement, in which there are no objective regulators.
According to Mao, the law of “undulating” development is the only “law” that p
governs socialist production. He says that social production spontaneously fluctuates
between a “state of equilibrium" and a “state of disequilibrium”, with alternating
ebbs and flows, ups and downs. It is impossible, he says, to do anything about this
and make economic development steady; the only thing that can be done is for the
subjective factors to exert an influence on the economy so as to whip up the
spontaneous rise and limit the spontaneous fall, when the time comes. Those are the
only limits, according to Mao, in which the planning and conscious regulation of the
development of socialist production is possible.
Personal incentives are not among the means to be used in putting up the rises and p
tempering the falls. The working people have to be induced to do better by means of
ideological influence and administrative pressure, with the products of labour so
distributed as to ensure maximum accumulation, while keeping personal consumption’
down to a minimum, which the principle of levelling should help the working people
to accept.
Thus, in his view of socialist relations of production and their development, Mao is
as far from Marxism-Leninism as he is in his view of the substance and importance
of the productive forces in the socialist mode of production, and of the need for
their improvement. Mao’s conception is an eclectic mixture, in which distorted
concepts of MarxistLeninist science are interwoven with concepts and notions
borrowed from anarchist-type theories whose roots go back to Proudhon, together
with the mechanistic “theory of equilibrium" which the Right opportunists once
advocated, and other similar ideas.
***

normal
TEXT SIZE
Notes
[ 213•1] The CPSU in Resolutions and Decisions of Congresses, Conferences, and

CC Plenary Meetings, Part I, p. 421.
[ 214•1] Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-lung, pp. 26–27.
[ 215•1] Quoted from Pravda, January 27, 1956.
[ 215•2] See Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-lung, p. 27.
[ 215•3] Ibid., p. 26 (emphasis added—A.F.).
[ 218•1] Kunjcn jihpao, March 1, 1957.
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3. The “Great Leap Forward”: Collapse 223
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TOC
Mao began to put through his economic conception by breaking up the “old p
Card
framework" of the first five-year plan. He did so in the hope of whipping up the
advance which was evident in the early years of the five-year period. Accordingly,
Text the 1956 plan targets for capital construction and industrial production were sharply
HTML increased. In 1956 outlays on capital investments went up by 62 per cent, and the
PS pace at which the peasant farms were collectivised was sharply increased. Whereas
PDF only 14 per cent of peasant farms in China were united in co-operatives in 1955, by
the end of 1956, the co-operative sector already covered over 90 per cent of the
T* peasant farms. Within a few months, the bulk of agricultural production and the
19*
handicraft industry was co-operated, while private industrial and commercial
### enterprises were converted into mixed state-private enterprises.
However, there was no reason to regard the state-private enterprises, which were p
essentially a part of the statecapitalist sector, as a form of social socialist property in
the means of production. As for the co-operative sector, which was hurriedly set up
almost throughout the whole of agricultural and handicraft production, if socialist
relations of production were to develop and to be solidly established in it, there was
need to provide a corresponding material basis for the collective forms of economic
operation, without which they could not be stable. It was impossible to do this while
keeping the level of mechanisation of agricultural labour extremely low and without
creating the conditions for ensuring the technical equipment of agriculture.
Mao was apparently hoping that the favourable weather in 1955 would continue in p
the following few years, thereby ensuring good crops and helping to win the peasants
over with more or less adequate incomes from the collective farms. However, his
expectations were not realised. The last years of the five-year period—1956 and 1957
—were marked by heavy crop failures. Far from increasing, the incomes of a sizable
section of the peasantry were in fact reduced after they joined co-operatives. The
situation in the social sector of the co-operatives became more complicated.
The attempt to step up industrial output likewise came to nothing: capital p 224
investments, scattered over an excessive number of construction projects, were
largely frozen and shortages of the necessary raw and other materials developed.
Serious disproportions appeared in the national economy. There were interruptions in
the supply of consumer goods and food to the cities. This caused discontent and
strikes were staged by workers and students in some parts of the country.
Thus, the experiment which, it later turned out, was a peculiar dress rehearsal for p
the “Great Leap Forward" proved to be a fiasco. In the circumstances, it would have
been wise to resume consistent fulfilment of the general line set out in 1953 and to
correct the situation in agriculture by resorting to the economic instruments inherent
in socialist production, enhancing the material incentives for peasants in developing
the social sector of economy and by increasing state assistance to the co-operatives.
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/6.3-The.Great.Leap.Forward[2012-12-18 2:32:43]
While the possibilities were limited, they were still there: in the five-year period the p
growth rates of gross industrial output averaged 12.8 per cent (as compared with the
planned 9.9 per cent). By continuing to give priority development to large-scale
industry while making rational use of handicraft production to turn out simple farm
implements and consumer goods, carrying out repairs and providing everyday
services for the population, China could have built up her industrial strength at a
relatively rapid pace, and allocated more and more money and machinery to
agriculture. That was exactly what the 8th Congress of the CPC suggested for the
second five-year plan (1958–1962). It said: “The value of industrial output . .. will
be about double the planned figure for 1957 and that of agricultural output will
increase by about 35 per cent." [ 224•1
However, Mao’s hegemonistic aspirations induced him to ignore the realistic targets p
set by the congress and, despite the lessons of the unfortunate experiment in 1956, to
advance a full-scale programme for even hastier economic development. This
programme was approved by the 3rd Plenary Meeting of the CPC Central Committee
in September 1957, and adopted by the 2nd session of the 8th Congress of the CPC 225
in May 1958 as the Party’s new general line. That year saw the start on the practical
implementation of Mao’s new line, the “Three Red Banners" line, that is, the new
general line, the people’s communes and the “Great Leap Forward”.
This policy did not win unanimous support in the Party, and was opposed by those p
who favoured a realistic economic policy. Mao and his followers resorted to harsh
measures in fighting their opponents. In 1955, Mao already levelled the charge of
“cowardice” against those who did not accept the idea of stepped up co-operation in
agriculture, while the realisation of the new line started with a political campaign
aimed at routing those who opposed it. In the course of a discussion on “bourgeois
law and distribution”, those who stood up for the principle of remuneration according
to labour were declared to be advocates of “bourgeois corruption”, while the
principle of levelling was strongly boosted; the population was invited to reconcile
itself with the hardships that were allegedly inevitable because the country had to
remain in a state of full alert; the armed border conflict with India was used to
screw up nationalistic “enthusiasm”.
In this political atmosphere a start was made on setting up the people’s communes, p
which Mao hoped would help carry the Chinese people into instant communism
bypassing the socialist stage. Each commune was set up through an amalgamation of
all the co-operatives of one or several districts and covered a territory with a
population ranging from 25,000 to 100,000. Mao’s followers believed that the
substitution of tens of thousands of communes for over 700,000 co-operatives would
allow them to manage and deploy labour power and the means of production “in a
unified way to ensure that they are used still more rationally and
effectively...". [ 225•1
The local organs of power were merged with the commune boards and were p
empowered to dispose of the peasants’ property, labour and the products of their
labour. Rigid administrative control was established over each working man’s labour
and leisure. The peasants’ house-and-garden plots, which in 1957 had on the average
provided families with 27 per cent of their incomes, were confiscated.
This led to a reduction in rural living standards. Work on the fields or in the p 226
handicraft enterprises, which were a part of the communes’ social sector, yielded
very little income for their members, first, because farms remained on a low level of
development and second, because communes’ governing bodies were put under an
obligation to increase accumulations to the utmost. In 1958, the accumulation of the

state and the people’s communes came to 30 per cent of net agricultural output, that
is, an increase of roughly 100 per cent over the average for 1953–1957. This was
achieved by reducing the share of the product which went into personal consumption
and which was in the main distributed in the communes on the levelling principle.
The barrack-room atmosphere in the communes and the administrative control could p
not compensate for the peasants’ loss of personal material incentive in developing
agriculture. Moreover, a large part of the manpower was withdrawn from agricultural
production, because tens of millions of peasants were switched to industrial and
building operations through the “labour armies”, which were set up at the same time
as the communes, and worked under contracts concluded between the communes and
industrial enterprises. Stripped of manpower in this way, agricultural production went
into decline. While the crops were saved by the good weather in 1958, the crop
failures in 1959 and 1960 showed that agriculture was in a very bad state and that
the country was faced with massive famine. The acute shortage of foodstuffs,
increasingly felt with the rapid population growth, forced the CPR government to fall
back on grain purchases abroad. [ 226•1
Mao had expected that the “Great Leap Forward" would help to boost agriculture, p
which had been switched to the commune system, and bring about unprecedented
growth in production on the basis of a special type of “ industrialisation”. The idea
behind this “industrialisation” was that the line of the priority development of large-
scale machine industry, effected in the first five-year period, was supplanted by the 227
“walking on two legs" line, with equal emphasis on large-scale industry and on
handicraft production. In actual fact, it was the latter that became the main source of
industrial products. In order to enlarge it, 7.5 million small and medium-size
enterprises were set up during the “Great Leap Forward" period (1958–1960). These
were technically weak enterprises using the simplest equipment operated by tens of
millions of peasants and urban dwellers lacking industrial skills and knowledge.
This incredibly inflated handicraft and artisan production was urged not to confine p
itself to turning out consumer goods, carrying out repairs, etc., but also to take over,
on a large scale, the functions of heavy industry, like the mining of coal, the casting
of metal and the making of machinery and mechanisms for every branch of the
national economy. Under the 1958 plan (which the Maoists soon declared to be
“conservative”, without sufficient orientation on the production of the means of
production), the handicraft industry was to produce over 1 million tons of standard
pig-iron, 200,000 tons of steel, 18,000 metal-cutting machine tools, over 21,000
electrical machines, and 8,300 motors of different kinds. [ 227•1
Mao’s followers promised the Chinese people that the establishment within a short p
period of an extensive network of small and medium-size enterprises covering every
part of China would “inevitably result in: 1) quickening the pace of the nation’s
industrialisation; 2) quickening the pace of mechanisation of agriculture...". [ 227•2
The rate of acceleration, allegedly guaranteed by the growth of handicraft production,
was fantastic. In the five years from 1958 to 1962, industrial output was to go up
6.5-fold.
It very soon turned out that these calculations were groundless. The extremely low p
standard of equipment at the newly-established handicraft enterprises, the switch of
many old enterprises of this kind to the manufacture of unaccustomed products,
which deprived the workers of the possibility of using their old labour skills and
which obliterated the distinction between them and the unskilled newcomers, the 228
disruption of the production, supply and marketing activity of the handicraft industry
and of the management of its enterprises due to the hasty conversion of co-
operatives into enterprises of local state industry and people’s communes—all this
had disastrous consequences. There was a sharp drop in the output of consumer
goods, while the means of production, to the making of which most handicraft
enterprises had switched, turned out to be unfit for use. This meant the waste of vast
financial and material resources and the labour of tens of millions of men. Only in
the handicraft metallurgical industry, which produced substandard pig-iron and steel,
the CPR suffered losses in excess of 4,000 million yuan. The overwhelming majority
of the handicraft enterprises set up in the “Great Leap Forward" period had to be
closed down because they were patently unprofitable and turned out low-quality
goods. Only a small part of them were later remodelled.
The “handicraft industrialisation" also hit agriculture, first, because it siphoned off p
large numbers of workers (from 25 to 50 per cent of the working population in rural
localities), and second, because it prevented the development of irrigation. In the first
five-year period, the state had allocated resources for the construction of large-scale
irrigation installations, but in 1958 irrigation construction, an extremely vital element
in China’s agriculture, was switched to handicraft operations. There, too, the line was
to set up small installations which the peasants were to erect through their own
efforts and pay for out of local budgets. On February 1, 1958, Jenmin jihpao
reported that 100 million people were taking part in a mass irrigation movement.
According to the Chinese press, in 1958 the irrigated area increased by 32 million
hectares (as against an annual average increase of 1.5 million hectares from 1950 to
1955), and towards the end of that year covered 62 per cent of all
farmland. [ 228•1
However, in 1963, Jenmin jihpao reported that only onethird of all the farmland was p
being irrigated, with a large part of the irrigation system functioning badly or not at
all. [ 228•2 This means that the irrigation installations thrown up hastily and in 229
large numbers during the “Great Leap Forward" period, turned out to be useless, like
the handicraft enterprises run in at the time.
Thus, vast damage was inflicted on the national economy by the adventurist “Three p
Red Banners" line. It was disrupted. The people’s communes turned out to be an
impediment to the development of production, so that the “Great Leap Forward"
hurled it back instead of advancing it. The increase in the output of coal, pig-iron
and steel in 1959 and 1960 turned out to be fictitious, because a large part of the
products made by the handicraft industry was unfit for use. The years 1961–1962
were marked by a direct drop of production in the various lines of basic industrial
products by something like 20 to 50 per cent. Instead of accelerating the
development of the productive forces, the new line noticeably slowed down the
country’s pace of industrialisation, hit its agriculture and worsened the material
conditions and working capacity of the workers and peasants, the country’s chief
productive force.
The grave condition in which the economy found itself forced Mao into a partial p
retreat from the programme of the new economic line. In 1959, at the height of the
“Great Leap Forward”, the 8th Plenary Meeting of the CPC Central Committee was
forced to scale down the plan targets for the current year (from 525 million to 275
million tons for grain and from 18 million to 12 million tons for steel). The Plenary
Meeting proposed that the production brigades in the communes (about the size of
the old co-operatives) should be given more freedom to operate on their own, and
that remuneration by labour should be restored. The decisions of the 9th Plenary
Meeting in January 1961 and the 10th Plenary Meeting in September 1962 were
even more drastic: they laid down the line, declared to be temporary, of “regulation,
strengthening, replenishment and enhancement, with emphasis on
regulation". [ 229•1
This line provided above all for an abandonment of the priority development of p
industry and concentration of efforts on boosting agriculture. Handicraft blast
furnaces and many other similar-type small enterprises were dismantled, and
construction of such enterprises stopped. The enterprises which continued to function 230
were set the task of mainly servicing agriculture and turning out consumer goods.
The decline in production during the “Great Leap Forward" created a grave financial p
situation; budget revenues fell short of the need to make large-scale purchases of
industrial equipment abroad in addition to redeeming debts under old loans, and
buying foreign grain and mineral fertilisers. The lack of funds was compounded by
the consequences of the Great-Power chauvinistic attitude taken by the Maoist
leadership of the CPC: it decided sharply to worsen economic ties with the USSR
and other socialist countries, and deprive China of the possibility of using the
extensive assistance which it had been receiving from these countries before; at the
same time, the CPC leadership saddled the country with the intolerable burden of
fabricating nuclear weapons, a goal that was dictated by hegemonistic considerations.
All of this resulted in a sharp reduction of capital investments in large-scale industry
(with the exception of the arms industries).
The cut-back in appropriations for industry made it possible somewhat to increase p

investments in agriculture. At the same time, Mao and his entourage had to agree to
some restoration of the principle of material incentive for working people and a
return from levelling to distribution in accordance with labour, and some invigoration
of commoditymoney relations. The communes were split up (their number increased
from 24,000 in 1958 to 73,000 in 1965). They retained the functions of local organs
of power through which the state continued to determine production plans and the
volume of farm procurements, rates of food consumption by peasants, etc. But the
role of principal production unit in the countryside now went to the small production
brigades, economic cells similar in size to the productive co-operatives of the first
five-year period (they usually consisted of 20–40 peasant households). The house-
and-garden plots were returned to the peasants and they were permitted to sell the
produce from their personal plots on the village markets.
These measures helped to bring about a relative stabilisation of China’s economy. p

They were a forced concession on the part of the Chinese leadership to the Party
members and economic personnel whom life had convinced of the need to pursue a 231
realistic economic policy. Their efforts were aimed at restoring the economy,
disrupted during the “Great Leap Forward" period, and by improving industrial
management to prepare the conditions for returning the economy to planned
development. A conference of the State Economic Commission in 1965 discussed a
set of instructions, formulated by Liu Shao-chi, concerning the economic measures to
be taken to improve management in industry. Articles appearing >in the Chinese
press in 1964 and 1965 dealt with the need for industrial co-ordination both within
the individual industries and between industries, and the need to develop
specialisation and co-operation under a single state plan.
This tendency was clearly expressed during the discussion of production targets for p
1965 by the State Conference on Industry and Transport. Among other things, its
resolution said: “It is necessary to get rid of prejudices and not of science. There is
need to act in accordance with objective reality and not on the basis of subjective
desires. Production must be boosted, wherever it is possible, instead of blindly trying
to do so where it is not possible. The boosting of production must be based on
growing labour productivity, better management of production, the use of advanced
techniques, the achievement and surpassing of international standards and
improvement of co-operation between enterprises." [ 231•1
However, Mao did not like this line, to say nothing of the growing influence of p
those members of the Party who backed it up. The Maoists built up their positions
through the armymen who were appointed to the political departments set up to keep
an eye on the Party branches of economic bodies. In the press they attacked articles
calling for a common sense approach to economics and urged the “destruction of
boundaries" and fresh “leaps forward”. This was their preparation for. the fierce
offensive which they launched in 1966 against the advocates of realistic economic
policies under the banner of the “great proletarian cultural revolution”.
This time, the political campaign against those who were, wittingly or unwittingly, p 232
encroaching on the Maoists’ dictatorship, assumed unprecedented proportions. Those
who dared point at the unfortunate lessons of the past and try to introduce rational
methods into economic management were branded as class enemies, and revisionist
accomplices of imperialism. The Maoists began by denigrating the Party, government
and economic cadres who disagreed or were suspected of disagreeing with Mao’s
line, and then went on to dismiss them from office and execute many of them.
Speculating on the political immaturity of young people and implanting in their midst
a spirit of mindless adulation of Mao Tse-tung, his henchmen organised
Hungweiping and Tsaofan detachments, which they used to break up Party and other
social organisations.
This political campaign was carried on in an atmosphere of growing chauvinistic p

intoxication and war hysteria, and it gave Mao and his followers a free hand in
preparing for the next “leap forward”, which was announced by the llth Plenary
Meeting of the CPC Central Committee in August 1966. Preparations were started
for a fresh offensive on the living standards of the working people. From the end of
1966, it began to assume ever greater proportions, being advanced under the slogans
of fighting against “economism” and the principle of material incentive which was
declared to be “bourgeois”.
The exploitation of the peasant masses was again intensified. Production brigades p
were put under an obligation to increase their deliveries to the state and to reduce
the rates of personal consumption fixed for their members. In 1966, average food
consumption among peasants (much lower than that for urban dwellers) came to
roughly 200 kilograms per man a year for grain (including sweet potatoes and
potatoes, in terms of grain) as compared with 229 kilograms in 1957, and 900 grams
per man a year for vegetable oil, as compared with 1.25 kilograms in 1957. Over the
next few years, the level of consumption for these and other foodstuffs in the
countryside was further reduced. The personal consumption funds in the production
brigades were reduced and were in the main—70–80 per cent— distributed on the
levelling principle, under so-called guaranteed norms. Many peasants in fact found
themselves incapable of purchasing even these famine rations because of their 233
extremely low incomes which were roughly half the average incomes in industry.
The condition of the urban working people also sharply deteriorated. Housing and p
all construction for service industries fell into a state of complete stagnation, and in
many parts of China it was officially wound up. The policy of “low and rational
wages" was fully implemented; in 1966 and 1967, the bonus system of wages, which
had been partially restored at the enterprises in 1960, was once again abolished, so
that nominal wages among workers, engineers and technicians were reduced on the
average by about 10–15 per cent. Real wages dropped even lower because of the
growing prices of rice and other foodstuffs. The number of items being rationed was
greatly increased (in 1968, ration cards were introduced even for laundry soap). A
campaign was started that year to switch schools and public health establishments
from the state budgets to maintenance by enterprises, city blocks and communes, all
of which fell as an additional burden on the shoulders of the people.
This time they put up more active resistance to the offensive against their living p
standards than they had done in 1958–1960. Industrial and office workers staged
massive strikes in response to the reduction of their living standards.
In many parts of the country, the peasants broke into foodstores, shared out the p
social funds. Numerous reports in the provincial newspapers testify to the
massiveness of this action. Among the urgent tasks formulated by the “revolutionary
organisations" of central agricultural and forestry establishments, this special point
was made: “It shall not be permitted in any circumstances to share out seeds, feed,
social accumulation funds, communal funds.. . . The seeds, feed, reserve grain,
resources from social accumulation funds, from communal funds, and from
production funds already shared out must be returned." [ 233•1 In the countryside
there was sabotage of agricultural operations, and this forced the Maoists to send
regular army units into the rural localities.
Mao and his followers did not shrink from using armed force to suppress the p 234
massive protest, with the army being used as the main force to ensure
implementation of their domestic policy. Following the “revolutionising” of
enterprises and offices, and the establishment of the political department system,
designed to exercise political control over the behaviour of industrial and office
workers, the functions of such control were transferred directly to the army. By
intensifying the barrack-room regime, sending demobilised soldiers to the enterprises,
and using the armycontrolled Hungweipings and Tsaofans to put down the
discontented working people, the Maoists expected to prevent social production from
being disrupted. However, these expectations were not justified. The “cultural
revolution" led to rampant anarchy, clashes between hostile groups at enterprises,
distraction of working men from their jobs for participation in various political acts,
and relaxation of management in production. All of this necessarily had an effect on
the state of China’s national economy. While the Maoists did manage to safeguard
the arms and to some extent the chemical and the oil industry from the effects of
the “cultural revolution”, it did have a devastating effect on the other industries,
including metallurgy and engineering. In 1969, steel output was down to 12 million
tons from 13 million in 1966; coal extraction was down respectively from 245
million to 210 million tons. The coal shortage had an effect on electric power
generation: 60,000 million kwh was generated in 1969 as compared with 70,000
million in 1966. In Wuhan, Kunming, Tsinan, Chungking and other cities electric
power supplies to enterprises and homes were repeatedly interrupted. In early 1968,
the level of production in Peking and many other industrial centres was only 40–50
per cent of the 1966 level.
The normal operation of industrial enterprises was further disrupted by snags in p

transport. The transfer of Hungweipings and other “representatives of the
revolutionary masses" from one part of the country to another (from the autumn of
1966 to February 1967, the railways carried over 20 million such unpaying
customers), the disturbances and other armed clashes, the strikes—all this upset the
railway timetable and kept some consignments of freight lie for months waiting
delivery to the place of their destination. China’s seaports operated with great 235
interruption.
The disruption of transport had an effect not only on industry but also on p
agriculture, because a large part of the chemical fertilisers was not delivered for use
in good time. This factor was added to the disruption of agriculture, which was bred
by the “cultural revolution”, the sabotage, and so on. The use of the army on the
farms helped to prevent grain production from dropping sharply, and to maintain it
on about the 1965 and 1966 level, but there was a drop in per capita output, which
worsened the already poor state of food supplies.
The damage inflicted by the “cultural revolution" on China’s national economy will
be seen from the following data characterising the changes in the principal indicators
for the 1957–1969 period.
Unit 1957 1959 1965 1966 1968* 1969* ’000 National income mln yuan 83.7 150.9
125.0 137.0 125.0 131.0 Gross industrial out– put “ 70.4 163.0 122.0 135.0 120.0
130.0 Gross agricultural output “ 53.7 60.0 55.0 55.0 55.0 60.0 Total investments
from budget “ 13.8 26.7 13.5 13.0 8.0 ____ Investments in in– dustry i> 7.2 20.2 6.5
6.5 4.0 ___ . Military expendi– ture (direct) »» 5.5 5.8 12.5 13.0 17.0 18–19
* Preliminary estimate. p
These data show that the gradual edging up to the 1959 level, as expressed in the p
1965–1966 indicators, was interrupted by the “cultural revolution”, which went hand
in hand with abandonment of the “line of regulation" and a return to Mao’s
economic line. This line had brought about a sharp decline in China’s economy
during the “Great Leap Forward" period, and in 1967 and 1968 led to a fresh 236
decline, thus showing itself to be completely untenable.
In a speech in August 1967 Mao was forced to admit that “we have had to pay a p
very high price for the present cultural revolution”. Alarmed by the economic losses,
the Maoist leadership started in late 1967 to put through measures intended to clamp
down on the Hungweipings and the Tsaofans, and to intensify the army’s control in
the economic bodies and at the enterprises. The functions of economic organisation,
once performed by the now-routed Party and government apparatus, were transferred
to the “revolutionary committees" in’ which army representatives play the leading
role, and which, the Maoists hope, will help them to make good the economic
consequences of the “cultural revolution”.
In a speech before the Peking revolutionary committee in September 1967, Chou

En-lai dealt with the matter of economic losses caused by the “cultural revolution"
and gave this promise: “If the revolution succeeds, we shall make up for everything
in six months.” Much more time has passed since then, but the “making up" has not
quite succeeded. With the army’s help, the Maoists have stopped the decline in
production, but military methods cannot help to solve the strident task of economic
development. The rate of economic development has been heavily affected by the
actual suspension of capital construction caused by the “cultural revolution”, and by
the debilitation of the management and technical services at the enterprises because
of the massive reduction in the number of specialists and the increase in the military
outlays, which hamper the development of power engineering, transport and other
industries producing bottlenecks in China’s national economy and acting as a drag on
its development.
***

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Notes
[ 225•1] World Marxist Review, Vol. 2, No. 3, 1959, p. 80. 15—1362
[ 226•1] According to foreign observers, China made annual purchases of foreign

grain reaching 6 million tons, so as to keep the rate of food consumption at the level
of 1,900-2,000 calories per man a day (that is, below the minimum average of 2,300
calories).
[ 227•1] See Hsiao Chiun, Boost Metallurgy and Machine-Building, Peking, 1958,
pp. 13–14 (in Chinese).
[ 227•2] Second Session of the Eighth National Congress of the Communist Party of
China, Peking, 1958, p. 50.
[ 228•1] See The Great Decade, Peking, 1960 (in Chinese).
[ 228•2] See Jenmin jihpao, November 30, 1963.
[ 229•1] See “The Third Session of the National People’s Congress”, Pravda, April
18, 1962.
[ 231•1] Jenmin jihpao, February 25, 1965.
[ 233•1] Jenmin jihpao, February 12, 1967.
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4. Zigzags in Peking’s Economic Policy 236
<•>
The 9th CPC Congress has not changed the Maoist economic policy which had p
TOC
shattered China’s economy and retarded its development for a long time. It did not
Card work out any practical recommendations, but only reiterated provisions that would 237
serve as a “theoretical groundwork" for Mao’s policy. The CC report to the Congress
Text mentioned the oftrepeated thesis that politics are a commanding force, that production
HTML may be stimulated by a “revolution in the superstructure" and by a criticism of the
PS “revisionist line" and once again according to tradition in Maoist propaganda Lenin’s
PDF words that politics have a priority over economics were interpreted as a justification
of arbitrariness in politics. The congress once again approved the formula:
T* “Agriculture is the basis of the national economy while industry is its leading force.”
19* This formula is contrary to Lenin’s idea that developing industry is the basis of the
transformation of the national economy along socialist lines. The congress reiterated
### that Mao’s group would henceforward carry on the policy of “support on one’s own
strength”, a policy which consolidates the disunity of economic cells and places them
in a position of state tributaries compelled to complement state accumulations with
their own means without claiming any material assistance from the state.
The years that have passed since the 9th CPC Congress testify to the continued p
crisis of the Maoists’ economic policy, which fact serves as a direct reflection of the
existing discrepancy between their theoretical conceptions and the objective
requirements of China’s economic growth.
It is quite obvious that the establishment of a semblance of “order” by tightening up p

the military-bureaucratic regime has not helped to improve China’s economy. The
country’s militarisation has not helped and cannot help invigorate production activity
among the working people, contrary to the Maoists’ expectations. Nor can this be
achieved by the system of labour services, under which millions of peasants have to
do temporary, arduous and poorly paid work in industry, while hundreds of thousands
of intellectuals are transported into the countryside to work on the farms. Nor can the
economy be improved by the measures designed to make the millions of Chinese in
the semi-subsistence and separated economic units boost production with their bare
hands on the basis of manual, unskilled labour, “stimulated” not by any moral or
material incentives geared to the results of their work, but by political demagogy,
orders from supervisers and threats of reprisal. Nor will the economy be improved by
the waste for military purposes of money which is being squeezed out from the 238
people through a lowering of their living standards.
In 1971, according to Chinese official statistics, China produced 21 million tons of p

steel and gathered 245 million tons of grain. However, already in the early 1960s,
the Republic’s production capacities had made it possible to put out as much as 22
million tons of steel. The results achieved in the production of grain were below
those of 1958, although the country’s population had risen considerably since then.
This is evidence of the fact that the Chinese economy up till now has not been able
to overcome the big economic difficulties brought about by the adventurist policy of
the “Great Leap Forward”, the “people’s communes" and later of the “cultural
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/6.4-Zigzags.in.Pekings.Economic.Policy[2012-12-18 2:32:52]
revolution”.
Recent facts testify to certain zigzags in Peking’s economic policy: in a way it p

reappraises the theoretical “values” of the “cultural revolution”. A part of Chinese
leading personnel, especially those who are employed in concrete sectors of
economic construction are realising more and more that voluntarist attempts to force
up the rate of economic growth through the utmost strain of the workers’ effort, to
rely not on objective economic laws and real possibilities but only on Mao’s ideas
cannot bring about the expected results. This, it seems to us, explains the now
observable in China return to some rational methods of economic management which
had justified themselves during the first five-year-plan periods, to the application of
economic levers of influencing production. And though the Peking propagandists
continue to insist on the “revolutionising” of management in enterprises and on
“fighting the revisionist venom of Liu Shao-chi”, one can see in fact the use of
forms and methods of economic management which had been subjected to criticism
and abolished by the “cultural revolution”.
The striving to put an end to the chaos and anarchy in industrial management is p
seen in the attempts to restore the principles of planning in industry and the
centralised guidance of enterprises.
Reality itself forced the Government to resume the work of industrial ministries and p
the State Planning Committee which had been paralysed during the “cultural
revolution”. After a long time it convened a national conference on problems of
planning and some sectoral conferences on the same subject. Chinese papers, while 239
mentioning the fact that the “cultural revolution" was so to say “a great stimulus" to
the Chinese economy, fulminated against those “hostile elements" who, “under the
influence of anarchism and ultraLeft views”, negate the need for economic planning.
The mass media have buried in oblivion the “theories” of the sponsors of the
“cultural revolution" according to which planning “fetters mass initiative" and
centralisation means a “departmental dictatorship”, which “the revisionists and
reactionaries" had tried to implant in the country.
Peking propagandists are bent on expanding the campaign to improve the economic p
performance of factories and mills based on the application of such categories as
cost accounting, prime cost, profit, payment according to the work done, and
planning. The journal Hungchih stresses the need for “a maximum utilisation of
manpower and equipment, a maximum improvement of labour organisation, better
management and higher labour productivity”. As this journal writes, “cost accounting
in the national economy is an important method of managing socialist enterprises”.
Reports from China show that there is a greater tendency towards the restoration of p
the principle of distribution according to labour contributed, although during the
“cultural revolution" the principle of material incentives in general was declared to
be “a sugar-coated shell”, “a black revisionist commodity”, “a dagger driven into the
back of the revolution”. As was mentioned before, the “cultural revolution" abolished
the system of material incentives for good labour, the latter comprising 25 to 35 per
cent of the workers’ total earnings. This “reform” was played down by Peking
propagandists as an essential “guarantee” against “bourgeois regeneration" to which
workers of some socialist countries are allegedly subject. But economic construction
has made the Chinese renounce egalitarian dogmas and retain the principles of
remuneration for the labour done.
According to the Chinese press, there is no clear-cut criterion by which to p
distinguish the universally recognised principle “to each according to labour

contributed" from “ revisionism" and “bourgeois economism”. Yet despite all this,
the management of many Chinese enterprises is renouncing wage equalisation and is
introducing a system of differentiated payment for the labour done in order to
stimulate production. An example is provided by the Shanghai Engineering Works, a 240
large enterprise employing over 6,000 workers. Their wages are two or two and a
half times higher than those received by apprentices. The wages are fixed here not
only with due account for the “devotion” of a worker to “Mao”s thought”, as the
sponsors of the “ cultural revolution" insisted, but also for the record of labour
service and professional skill. The same situation obtains at many other enterprises
and in some agricultural communes. As the provincial newspaper Hunan jihpao
points out, “Members of communes who produce more output must receive greater
income”.
Economic experience prompts the most sober managers to come to the conclusion p
that slogans and quotations cannot replace concrete economic and technical
knowledge, that it is impossible to run the national economy without experienced,
knowledgeable personnel. In recent times the Chinese have intensified the campaign
for “strengthening the guidance of production”, for the gradual return into the sphere
of production of those qualified administrative and especially technical personnel who
had been defamed and repressed during the “cultural revolution”. After completely
reversing its policy in this field the Chinese press is now reporting about “the
valuable experience" of making use of the old cadres who are now employed in
managerial work. Jenmin jihpao says that “the old cadres must play today the role of
the backbone in the management of enterprises" and subjects to criticism the
management of those factories who “make insufficient effort to promote their role as
technical specialists and managers”.
According to the Chinese press, the cadres promoted during the “cultural revolution" p
cannot cope with the tasks they have been assigned because they do not know the
elements of economics and often apply methods that do not correspond to realities.
On the other hand, the “old cadres”, that is specialists accused during the “cultural
revolution" of revisionism, “economism” and other “mortal sins”, sent for “re-
education” purposes to rural localities or placed as manual workers in labour-
consuming sectors of production, but now returned to their former posts, behave
passively, shirk the solution of concrete problems out of fear of entering into conflict
with those who watch over their political “trustworthiness”. All this, naturally, 241
exacerbates the moral atmosphere at enterprises and creates additional tensions in the
economy as a whole.
Complex and contradictory, at times even diametrically opposite phenomena and p

processes occurring in China, the absence of consensus in the Peking leadership
concerning the ways and means of the country’s development are bound to retard the
progress of the Chinese economy.
The congress did not work out any practical recommendations, but merely reiterated p
the propositions designed to serve as a “theoretical foundation" for Mao’s line. It
once again repeated the thesis that politics was the command force, that production
should be stimulated through “revolution in the sphere of the superstructure”, and
criticism of the “ revisionist line”, and once again—in accordance with the tradition
established in Maoist propaganda—what Lenin said about politics taking precedence
over economics, this being interpreted as justification for arbitrary political acts.
Once again this formula was proclaimed: “Agriculture is the basis of the national
economy, and industry is its leading force,” a formula which is fundamentally at
variance with the Leninist idea of industrial development as the basis of the socialist
transformation of the national economy. This provided further evidence that Mao’s
entourage is still intent on pursuing the line of “relying on one’s own strength”, a
line which tends to perpetuate the fragmentation of economic units and which puts
them in the position of tributaries of the state whose duty is to provide resources for
its accumulation, without claiming any material assistance on its part.
The 9th Congress did nothing to change the policy which has unhinged China’s
national economy and which has retarded her economic development for a long time.
The only way to clear the obstacles to this development is resolutely to reject the
Maoists’ anti-popular policy, the line which runs counter to the requirements of the
objective laws of socialism. So long as this line is being pursued it provides ground
for the “tactics of despair" and for preparation of adventurist “leaps forward”, which
do not bring the Chinese people anything except greater extra-economic coercion and
political deprivation, nothing except fresh burdens and privations.
***

TEXT SIZE
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5. Some Aspects of China’s Foreign 242
<•>
Policy

TOC
The line of intensifying the barrack-room regime, the country’s militarisation, which p
Card
is due to Mao’s urge to maintain the system of extra-economic coercion, is one of
the basic elements which determine the character of the specific foreign-policy line
Text imposed on China by the Maoists, a line which is just as alien to Marxist-Leninist
HTML principles as is their domestic-policy line. Historical experience shows that war
PS communism is justified as a system for organising production and distribution in a
PDF country without a high economic potential forced to carry on a drawn-out war
against the counter-revolutionary forces of the overthrown bourgeoisie, and the
T* interventionists. But it is unfit for peacetime construction. The Maoists have sought
19*
to use the methods of war communism even in peacetime, thereby distorting them,
### killing their communist content, and converting them into a means of militarising the
country and creating an ideological climate which gives the population a sense of
impending danger of war. For many years, the creation of such a climate, the build-
up of an atmosphere of war hysteria in China, was being done with the help of the
idea that another world war was fatally inevitable and that it was impossible for the
world socialist revolution to develop without a direct armed clash between its forces
and those of international imperialism. In recent years, the same purposes have been
served by the war hysteria built up over the “threat from the north”, that is, from the
Soviet Union, which the Maoists have invented.
Since the late 1950s, statements by Mao and his followers on such key questions as p
the content of the present epoch, the balance between the contending forces, the
place of the various revolutionary streams within the single world revolutionary
process, have ever more clearly revealed the denial of the need of economic
prerequisites for socialist revolution and of the role of the socialist system as the
economic mainstay for unfolding the world socialist revolution.
In his speech at the 1957 Moscow Meeting of fraternal parties, and in his articles p
“On the Historical Experience of the Proletarian Dictatorship" and “Once More on 243
the Historical Experience of the Proletarian Dictatorship" Mao still expressed the
view that war was the only means of achieving revolution together with recognition
of the decisive role of the socialist system in the development of the world
revolutionary process. However, in the course of the polemics which Mao started by
coming out against the CPSU’s stand and the principles written into the 1957
Declaration and the 1960 Statement, he arrived at the denial of the decisive role of
the socialist system in the world revolutionary process, and came to contrapose the
national liberation movement and the forces of socialism.
Mao’s followers ignore the fact that the character of the national liberation p
movement is determined by its economic content, that the outcome of the national-
democratic revolution depends on the kind of economic tasks it sets out to tackle:
tasks expressing the interests of the bourgeoisie, which seeks to direct the country’s
development after national independence along the capitalist way, or tasks expressing
the interests of the proletariat which seeks to carry on the revolution beyond the
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/6.5-Some.Aspects.of.Chinas.Foreign.Policy[2012-12-18 2:33:02]
bourgeois-democratic stage and to fill it with socialist content.
National-democratic revolutions in countries without internal economic prerequisites p

for the triumph of socialism would inevitably be confined to a solution of
bourgeoisdemocratic tasks unless the working people in these countries were able to
rely on the support of the world socialist system and the assistance and experience of
the socialist countries. The Maoists’ denial that the socialist system is the decisive
factor of the world revolutionary process has been expressed in the CPR’s foreign
economic policy, which took a sharp turn after 1960. By breaking their economic
ties with the Soviet Union and other socialist states, ties which under the first five-
year plan had determined the successes of economic construction in China, the
Maoists pushed the country into autarchy, into isolated development of the national
economy, which in fact developed into a policy of orientation upon the international
capitalist market and extension of economic ties with the capitalist countries.
The cancellation, on the CPR’s initiative, of the agreements concluded with the p
socialist countries resulted in a sharp drop in China’s trade with this group of 244
countries. In 1968, it was down by more than 66 per cent as compared with 1959,
when it was at its peak. In that period, China’s trade with the capitalist countries
increased by 120 per cent. In 1968 and 1969, the share of non-socialist countries in
China’s foreign trade went up to 75 per cent (with the capitalist countries’ share
coming to roughly 50 per cent of total trade), while the share of the socialist
countries was down to less than 25 per cent of China’s foreign trade.
The Maoists have used the “relying on one’s own strength" thesis to back up their p
break of economic ties with the socialist countries, a thesis they believe to mean, for
the state, a refusal to participate in the international division of labour, complete self-
sufficiency of the national economy in every type of product needed, regardless of
whether the home production of this or that item is warranted in terms of economic
efficiency.
Their references to the “relying on one’s own strength" principle are untenable p
theoretically and also hypocritical, like their declarations of implacability with respect
to imperialism. This is well illustrated by the CPR’s ever more pronounced
orientation on the system of the international capitalist division of labour. The
Maoists have been extending direct trade ties with the advanced capitalist countries
(Japan and the FRG in the first place), relying less and less on intermediaries (Hong
Kong, etc.) which had helped them to cover up these ties and ever more actively
supplementing them with scientific and technical co– operation, invitation of foreign
specialists, conclusion of credit agreements, etc. Mao and his followers have also
been openly seeking to establish economic ties with the United States.
In an effort to justify the turn-about in foreign economic policy which they had p
foisted on the country, the Maoists tried to blame the Soviet Union and the other
socialist countries for the “Great Leap Forward" fiasco, and spread slanderous
inventions about co-operation with these countries having hampered China’s
economic development, about their economic assistance to China having been
insignificant and ineffective, etc.
These inventions are patently absurd. The scale of the economic assistance the p
socialist countries gave China will be seen from the fact that the Soviet Union alone 245
helped China to build and modernise enterprises ensuring the production of 8.7
million tons of pig-iron, 25–30 per cent of the country’s electric power generation,
80 per cent of its lorry and tractor output, etc. The Soviet Union supplied China with
complete sets of plant for 90 projects out of 211 going up in China under the first
five-year plan. It should be borne in mind that these deliveries were so arranged as
to accelerate the development in China of the leading branches of the heavy industry
and to help her create the necessary basis for technological progress. In 1957,
China’s industry already supplied 50 per cent of the equipment for the industrial
projects going up with the Soviet Union’s assistance. The vast economic, financial
and technical assistance from the Soviet Union and the other socialist countries
helped China to establish within a short period a developed iron and steel industry,
heavy and precision engineering, an automobile and tractor industry, an aircraft
industry, a powergenerating equipment industry, a radio engineering industry and an
atomic industry.
Co-operation with the socialist countries helped China rapidly to build up the basis p
of her economic independence. Just now, her orientation to the international capitalist
market is producing the opposite results, because the imperialist countries see no
point in letting China have large quantities of the producer goods she needs to
develop her economy.
The turn-about in her foreign economic policy is a source of large losses for China, p
because, on the one hand, it has reduced her export potential and has forced her to
sell at reduced prices the products the capitalist countries want (agricultural raw
materials and some minerals, non-ferrous metals above all); on the other hand, China
now has to pay high prices for the goods she has to buy from these countries. Add
to this the losses arising from the need to pay high interest rates for the capitalist
countries’ credits, and the high price of the various types of scientific and technical
assistance, which the socialist countries had made available to China virtually free of
charge.
The fact that the Maoists have decided to reorientate the country’s external p
economic ties, despite the vast losses this has inflicted on China, is sufficiently clear
evidence that this step of theirs was not in any sense motivated by concern for 246
national economic development. It was motivated by political considerations springing
from the Chinese leadership’s hegemonistic propositions and the hope of promoting
their self-seeking aims by making use of the contradictions between capitalism and
socialism. Unscrupulous politicasting is the substance of the line being pursued by
Mao and his followers at home and in relations with other countries. That is the
essence of the ill-famed principle of “politics is the command force”, a principle
which they have adopted for their banner, and which serves to vindicate their policy
expressive of Great-Power interests, instead of the vital economic interests of the
working people. Their policy has no socialist economic content and in all its forms
cuts across the objective requirements of socialist construction in China and the
development of the world socialist revolution.
History has shown that Lenin was quite right when he kept stressing that the p
outcome of the world socialist revolution crucially depends on the economic
successes in countries where the working class has taken over. Lenin insisted that the
economic front was the fundamental one for the first proletarian dictatorship, the
young Soviet Republic, and added that unless victory was scored on this front, unless
a powerful socialist economy was built up, “nothing will follow from our successes,
from our victories in overthrowing the exploiters, and from our military rebuff to
international imperialism, and a return to the old system will be inevitable". [ 246•1
Lenin showed the dialectical interconnection between economics and politics, and p
proved that the development of the socialist economy is not only the basic condition
for a full and final victory of socialism in Soviet Russia, but also a necessary
condition for the political victory of the working class advancing at the head of great
masses of exploited people in their liberation struggle, victory over the bourgeoisie
on a world scale. He wrote: “We are now exercising our main influence on the
international revolution through our economic policy. The struggle in this field has
now become global. Once we solve this problem, we shall have certainly and finally 247
won on an international scale." [ 247•1
The last half-century of world history has shown very well that the national p
liberation movement has become a mighty force in a world divided into two camps
—the socialist and the imperialist—a world in which the first socialist power, relying
on the mighty economic potential it had built up, routed the most reactionary forces
of imperialism, with socialism established as a world system, bringing together a
number of countries and scoring more and more victories in the economic
competition with capitalism.
With China for its example, history has also presented an unfortunate lesson p
showing that neglect of objective requirements in economic development, bearing on
the “deepest foundations of the existence of hundreds of millions of
people”, [ 247•2 as Lenin put it, tends to revenge itself by turning politics into
baseless adventurism.
In 1948, Mao wrote: “Policy is the starting-point of all the practical actions of a p
revolutionary party and manifests itself in the process and end-result of that party’s
actions.
“What we call experience is the process and the end-result of carrying out a policy.
Only through the practice of the people, that is, through experience, can we verify
whether a policy is correct or wrong and determine to what extent it is correct or
wrong." [ 247•3 In this formulation Mao seems to “have forgotten" that the social
practice of the masses does not amount to a mere implementation of a policy but
that it is the basis on which it is alone possible to work out a correct policy, that it
is not policy that serves as the starting point, because it cannot be correct if it is a
flight of fancy, but that the starting point is scientific analysis of the social practice
of the masses, of the concrete conditions in which this takes place, a scientific
generalisation of historical experience. The Chinese people have to pay a stiff price
for Mao’s “forgetfulness”. The enshrinement of a subjectivist, adventurist policy, not 248
in any way anchored economically, has led to disastrous failures in the CPR’s
economic development, and has sent Mao and his followers hastily abandoning their
illusions about the possibility of establishing communism in China before this is
done in other countries, and panically embracing the idea that no country can reach
communism even after centuries of development. This has impelled them to take
anti-socialist action, which has resulted in their growing isolation in the international
liberation movement.
***

TEXT SIZE
normal
Notes
[ 247•1] Ibid., Vol. 32, p. 437.
[ 247•2] Ibid., Vol. 27, p. 409.
[ 247•3] Selected Works of Mao Tse-lung, Vol. IV, Peking, 1961, p. 204.
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Chapter Seven 249
<•>
“GREAT PROLETARIAN CULTURAL
REVOLUTION”, OR DRIVE AGAINST
TOC
WORLD CULTURE
Card
[introduction.]

Text
HTML Marx’s aphorism about “revolutions being locomotives of history" applies equally to p
PS society’s material and spiritual life.
PDF
Socialist revolution is not only a fundamental and qualitative transformation of the p
T* whole system of political and economic relations existing under capitalism, but also
19* a deep-going transformation of society’s spiritual life. That is what Lenin called the
cultural revolution.
###
What did the founders of Marxism-Leninism mean by this concept? Marx wrote that p
communism is “the complete return of man to himself as a social (i.e., human) being
—a return becoming conscious, and accomplished within the entire wealth of
previous development". [ 249•1 It is hard to exaggerate the importance of this idea
of Marx, because it gives the very gist of the cultural revolution, which is to
eliminate the alienated forms of human activity. Marx gives the main characteristic of
the process of communist construction: mankind’s conscious activity, and sets out
with exceptional clarity the attitude of the socialist revolution to the culture of the
past, “within the entire wealth of previous development”.
Communism is a society consisting of men freely creating their own social relations. p
This kind of system can be produced only as a result of conscious and purposeful 250
activity by millions of working people based on the knowledge and creative use of
the objective laws of social development. This implies above all the need to put the
great store of culture created by mankind within the reach of the masses. At the
same time, while formulating his plan for the cultural revolution in the USSR Lenin
kept stressing that it was not so much a process of enlightenment as creative activity
aimed at the transformation of things. Every step in assimilating the spiritual
treasures created by mankind, he said, is connected with the tackling of this or that
task in socialist construction. That is the basis on which, he insisted, culture will
become an inner need for each member of society.
Indeed, the full man is formed in the course of creative construction of the new p
world, which provides every individual with an opportunity for developing his
creative potential, abilities and talents, and that is the main purpose of the cultural
revolution. Under communism, the free and harmonious development of every
individual will become the condition of the free and harmonious development of
society, and of unlimited growth of the people’s creative powers. Consequently, the
cultural revolution the people start by building socialism has for its highest aim the
allround development of man’s spiritual creative powers, the elimination of the
alienated forms of human activity which are characteristic of all antagonistic socio-
economic formations, and the conversion of every individual into a conscious maker
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of history.
Are there any common points between the MarxistLeninist view of the cultural p
revolution and the “cultural revolution" in China?
Marxism-Leninism starts from the assumption that no cultural revolution is possible p

unless men master the store of knowledge and assimilate the material and spiritual
values accumulated by mankind before their day, but Mao and his followers started
their “great proletarian cultural revolution" in China by proclaiming that the culture
of past centuries was alien and hostile to the proletariat, and set the Hungweipings
loose in a rampage against the cherished values of world civilisation.
Marxism-Leninism starts from the assumption that the cultural revolution, permeating p
every aspect of social life, helps to overcome the division of society into makers and 251
consumers of culture, opening the floodgates to mass initiative and social activity,
whereas Mao and his followers have been implanting the personality cult, which
means turning masses of people into mobs whose duty is blindly to act on the orders
of the “leader”.
What is there in common between genuine cultural activity of masses of working

people and the “ revolutionism" of the Hungweipings and the Tsaofans, who
supplant the assimilation of culture by parroting quotations from Mao’s articles? The
line of the “great proletarian cultural revolution”, announced by the CPC leadership
in late 1965 and early 1966 and subsequently given the official imprimatur by the
decisions of the llth Plenary Meeting of the CPC Central Committee in 1966, is a
patent “Leftist” revision of the Marxist-Leninist doctrine of culture and the cultural
revolution. This revision, which affects literally all the basic propositions of the
Marxist-Leninist theory on the cultural revolution, was given perhaps the most
explicit expression in the CPC leadership’s attitude to such basic problems of the
cultural revolution as 1) the cultural legacy of the past; 2) the culture of modern
bourgeois society; and 3) the intelligentsia.
***

TEXT SIZE
normal
Notes
[ 249•1] K. Marx, Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, Moscow, 1959,

p. 102.
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1. The Cultural Revolution 251
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and the Cultural Legacy

TOC
The problem of continuity has always been a vital one for human progress. In the p
Card
most general terms, the dialectics of social development reveals a contradictory unity
of two interconnected elements. On the one hand, each new generation never starts
Text from scratch, but assimilates the cultural (material and spiritual) values which had
HTML been accumulated by earlier generations. By extracting from cultural values of the
PS past the concentrated creative energy of human thought and work which they contain,
PDF men are enabled to turn it into their own gain. On the other hand, the material and
spiritual values of past epochs become for those who assimilate them no more than
T* “the raw material for new production" (Marx), for the creation of fresh values and,
19*
consequently, for fresh spurts into the future.
###
That is why the culture of each new formation necessarily finds itself in continuity p 252
with the whole aggregate of earlier relations of spiritual production, distribution,
exchange and consumption. The objective basis for this continuity is provided by the
development of material production, because ultimately changes in spiritual
production are determined by the changes taking place in the sphere of social being.
But while being determined by production and reproduction of actual life, spiritual
culture always depends in its development both on the relations which have arisen
earlier in spiritual production itself and on the existing results of mankind’s earlier
spiritual activity, which are found in the form of a definite complex of cultural
values.
In the recent period, the attitude of communism to the cultural legacy of the past is p
a question that has acquired special practical, political and theoretical urgency in
connection with a number of additional circumstances. New theoretical and political
aspects of continuity have appeared with the spread of socialism beyond the
boundaries of one country, the establishment of the world socialist community, and
the collapse of the colonial system of imperialism. There have arisen the problem of
the attitude on the part of the culture of some socialist countries to the cultural
experience gained by other socialist countries and the problem of the relationship
between the culture of socialist society and the culture of bourgeois society under
peaceful coexistence between opposite social systems and the mounting ideological
struggle.
The greater the number of countries taking the way of socialist change, the faster is p
the cultural and historical progress of society, the greater the urgency of the question
of the attitude to adopt to the cultural legacy of earlier generations, of what precisely
needs to be taken from the treasure-house of world culture, of how the socialist
nations and the nations taking the non-capitalist way can use not only the cultural
values created in past historical epochs but also the cultural achievements in present-
day capitalist society.
The steady and unprecedented growth in the flow of information, which mankind is p
accumulating in the course of the headlong scientific and technological revolution,
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objectively gives greater importance to the question of assimilating the cultural 253
legacy. At the same time, there are also subjective reasons for probing more deeply
into the problem of continuity in the development of culture in socialist society. Let
us consider only two of these: a) the attempts by present-day Right and “Left”
revisionists to revise the basic Marxist principles bearing on the cultural legacy; b)
the fresh barrage of charges coming from the anti-Communists that the Marxists-
Leninists are taking a nihilistic attitude to the culture of earlier epochs (let us note
that the revival of anti-communist activity along this line is largely connected
precisely with the Maoists’ antiLeninist attitude to the cultural legacy).
A vast store of practical experience in cultural construction, experience which is of p

international importance, has been gained in the USSR and the People’s Democracies
in the decades of their socialist construction. One of the most important lessons the
Communist Parties have drawn from an analysis of their activity in realising Lenin’s
plan of the cultural revolution is that it would have been unfeasible but for the
Marxist-Leninist struggle on two fronts: both against the attempts to adopt the whole
of the old culture, without discrimination, and against the attempts to reject the
whole of it out of hand.
Lenin repeatedly stressed that there can be no extraclass ideology, and consequently p
no extra-class culture, in bourgeois society, which is rended by class antagonisms.
He criticised the “mindless philosophers" who denied the party spirit of philosophy,
and branded those whom he called the “learned salesmen of the capitalist class”,
insisting on the partisanship of literature and art. Lenin said that the proletariat could
not afford to adopt indiscriminately the whole of the old culture, adding that this
would be tantamount to forgetting the class criteria in assessing the cultural legacy.
These ideas of Lenin’s are of immediate relevance to our own day in fighting
present-day revisionism, which calls for an end to ideology in culture, and a
“peaceful synthesis" of socialist and bourgeois cultures (Henri Lefebvre, Ernst
Fischer, and others). However, while fighting the Rightopportunist attitudes to the
cultural legacy, MarxistsLeninists have always attacked the “Left"–opportunist
anarchist attitude to the cultural legacy.
There is nothing in common between the cultural revolution and the nihilistic p 254
attitude to the achievements of world culture, the primitive rejection of the cultural
legacy of one’s own nation and of that of other nations.
In his writings and numerous speeches, Lenin showed the sheer nonsense of the p
ultra-Leftist arguments about a bourgeois science “hostile to the proletariat in class
terms”, about “all of bourgeois art, a product of the exploitative system, being alien
to the proletariat”. Lenin maintained that socialist culture could not arise “out of
nothing”, that it did not “spring from out of nowhere”, and that the way for its
emergence had been paved by centuries of social development. From this he drew
the conclusion that “we must take the entire culture that capitalism left behind and
build socialism with it". [ 254•1 He also wrote: “Socialism cannot be built unless
we utilise the heritage of capitalist culture." [ 254•2
These ideas of Lenin’s are of special importance for a principled assessment of the p
ideological “platform” and nihilistic practices in the so-called great proletarian
cultural revolution in China.
The ideologists of the “cultural revolution" in China say that the proletariat must put p
an end to all the “old culture" as being a “feudal” and “bourgeois” culture. The tone
of the ideological campaign was set on April 13, 1966, by an editorial in Chief
angchiun pao, the mouthpiece of the People’s Liberation Army, entitled “Hold High
the Great Red Banner of Mao Tse-Tung’s Thought, Actively Participate in the Great
Socialist Cultural Revolution”. It was reprinted by all the national papers and also in
the journal Hungchih. It provided a “theoretical basis" for these nihilistic calls: “The
socialist revolution goes hand in hand with destruction and construction. There can
be no complete construction without complete destruction." This slogan became the
central one in the drive against culture. Thus, a Hsinhua press release on June 11,
1966, said that the “proletarian revolution demands the final destruction of the old
bourgeois and feudal culture, which is rotten through and through, and the creation
of a totally new, socialist culture”, and called for “a struggle for the extensive
liquidation of the old culture”.
How did the leaders of the “cultural revolution" in China come to adopt these p 255
monstrous ideas which are not only alien to Marxism-Leninism, but clash with the
views of Marx, Engels and Lenin? It is impossible to answer this question without
bringing out all the connections which exist between some of Mao’s theoretical
views and the practices of the “great proletarian cultural revolution”.
Even before the revolution won out in China, Mao insisted, in some of his speeches, p
notably those at a conference on literature and art in Yenan in May 1942, that “only
dark forces which endanger the masses of the people must be exposed ... this is the
basic task of all revolutionary artists and writers". [ 255•1 He stressed that the
revolution had need only of works extolling the bright side of the proletariat and
“depicting the dark side" of the bourgeoisie. [ 255•2 Hence the conclusion: “Life,
reflected in the works of literature and art, can and must appear to be loftier,
brighter, more concentrated, more typical and more ideal . .. than commonplace
reality." [ 255•3
In defining in this utilitarian manner the content of socialist art, the tasks it faced p
and the Party’s line with respect to art, Mao went on to a similarly blunt definition
of form for works of literature and art. He stressed that workers and peasants needed
the kind of art that “can be readily accepted by them". [ 255•4 This essentially
primitive and idealistic approach to fundamental aesthetic problems, being again
nothing but vulgarisation and revision of the basic principles of Marxist-Leninist
aesthetics, was given practical expression in the CPC leadership’s political line as the
“theoretical basis" of the “great cultural revolution”. A direct outcome of this
theoretical injunction, in particular, was the attitude to the whole of the Chinese
people’s artistic legacy, which was declared to be anti-popular and characteristic of
the exploiting elite, and so allegedly alien to the revolution in form and content.
Mao asserted that in pre-revolutionary China the whole of culture had consisted of p
two parts: Chinese semi-feudal culture, on the one hand, and the culture brought in 256
from outside, “imperialist” culture, on the other. [ 256•1 He wrote that for this
reason, the Chinese people had had a feeling of hatred for the traditional “culture of
the mandarins”, and for the “imperialist culture”, which it had regarded as a “foreign
body”. “All these are rotten and should be completely destroyed." [ 256•2 From
this necessarily followed the need to eliminate the whole of the old culture as being
an “ exploitative" culture. That is precisely what the leaders of the “great proletarian
cultural revolution" suggested: “We must vigorously eradicate the old ideology, the
old culture, the old customs and the old mores of all the exploiting
classes." [ 256•3
Chou En-lai, Chen Yi and Lin Piao gave an unambiguous explanation of how these p
nihilistic propositions should be applied to culture. On June 17, 1966, Chou En-lai
declared that the traditional Chinese culture, created over the past several thousand
years, “poisoned the minds of men”, and on June 21, 1966, Chen Yi told a meeting
that “culture [the whole of culture!—E. B.] and traditional customs poison the minds
of people, which is why they need to be completely (sic!) rejected and their
influence destroyed". [ 256•4 On August 31, 1966, addressing a meeting of
“revolutionary” students and teachers, Lin Piao urged them on Mao’s behalf to “wipe
out the old culture”.
The Chinese leaders declared that the works of the outstanding masters of culture in p
the past did not contain anything but “the exploitative substance" and ordered a drive
both against national and world culture. The first blow was dealt at the Chinese
classics, among them Li Po, Tu Fu, Tao Yuan-ming, Kwang Han-ching and Pu
Sung-ling. Here is how Kwangming jihpao assessed the classical novel, Dream in the
Red Chamber, by the 18th-century writer Tsao Hsiueh-ching: “To be quite frank,
Tsao Hsiueh-ching considers beautiful what from our present standpoint has long
since become outdated. ... There is a thick layer of exploitative, class varnish on the 257
methods of combating feudal morality used by Chia Pao-yui and Lin Tai-yui [the
leading characters of the novel—E.B.], on their ideals of life, the essence of their
love, etc.”
For some time now Chinese periodicals and literary journals have said nothing good p
about such classical works of traditional art as the Peking, Shaohsin, Kunming and
other national operas. The CPC leaders have accused many present-day playwrights
and composers of being “too enthusiastic about ancient art”, and have urged a
complete repudiation of classic opera, declaring that “if Peking opera does not fade
away in 40 years, it is bound to fade away within 60". [ 257•1 That being the
Maoists’ attitude to their own traditional Chinese culture, is it surprising that they
have anathematised the classical cultural legacy of other nations?
Virtually all the world’s classics in literature and the arts have been attacked. Thus, p
official Chinese critics have actually consigned all of Shakespeare’s works to the
scrapheap, declaring them to be a part “of the ideology of the exploiting classes, and
antagonistic to the ideology of the proletariat, which is why if they are allowed to
spread unhampered, without being subjected to harsh criticism, they could have an
extremely bad effect on the modern reader.... Seen in the light of the present day,
Shakespeare’s plays turn out to be contrary to socialist collectivism at root,” says
Kwangming jihpao.
The same paper says about Balzac: “He extolled a reactionary theory of humanism.” p
About Stendhal the paper says: “In building the beautiful life we must not be
inspired by the works of Stendhal.. .. He and we are essentially men going different
ways.... We cannot but separate ourselves from him ideologically.” Chinese
periodicals have classed among the “poisonous weeds" works like Dante’s Divina
Commedia, Goethe’s Die Leiden des jungen Werthers, the works of Rablais, Hugo
and Maupassant.
It is said quite in earnest in China that the works of Mozart, Beethoven, Schumann, p
Schubert, Chopin, Glinka and Chaikovsky allegedly “reflect nothing but the suffering
and romanticism of the lone intellectual". [ 257•2 According to Kwangming jihpao, 258
Bizet’s “Carmen” is nothing but an “ auction of goods like the bourgeois
emancipation of the individual, the cult of sex and of individualism". [ 258•1
Consider the same paper’s view of the classical ballet, which, it says, “spreads the
reconciliation of classes and the bourgeois theory of humanism, and corrupts
youth". [ 258•2 Here is what Hungchih said in February 1970 about the new
production of “Swan Lake" at the Bolshoi Theatre: “An evil genius leaps about the
stage, suppressing everything. Indeed, devils have become the protagonists! . .. We
have here a truly sinister picture of the restoration of capitalism on the stage!”
Attacks have been made on all the Russian classics, including Pushkin, Lermontov, p
Gogol, Lev Tolstoi and Chekhov. Chinese critics say that stories and novels by
Pushkin, Lermontov, Turgenev and Goncharov do nothing but “relish the corrupt way
of life of landowners and aristocrats”. They found a “revisionist outlook" in Tolstoi’s
Resurrection and Anna Karenina, and Turgenev’s A Sportsman’s Sketches. The
weekly Wenyi pao accused the prominent Chinese writer, Shao Chuan-lin, of
“political degradation" and charged that he was “kowtowing to the West”, because he
had translated into Chinese Dostoyevsky’s novel The Insulted and
Humiliated. [ 258•3 Another prominent Chinese writer, Ouyang Shan, has also been
abused for “worshipping Chekhov”. Some Chinese newspapers carried pasquinades
against the famous Russian 19th-century revolutionary democrats Belinsky,
Dobrolyubov and Chernyshevsky and called them “bourgeois literary critics”.
In their efforts to provide some “theoretical basis" for their nihilistic treatment of p
the classics, Chinese literary critics have put forward the ridiculous idea that
recognition of continuity between socialist literature and the literature and art of
critical realism amounts to “a denial of the innovative character of socialist literature
and art”. In an effort to convince their readers that this view, which so patently 259
clashes with Lenin’s, is in line with the principles of Marxism-Leninism, Chinese
“theorists” have gone to the extent of falsifying the views of Maxim Gorky, the
founder of socialist realism. “According to Gorky critical realism is the realism of
bourgeois idlers." [ 259•1 This is the grossest possible distortion of Gorky’s view,
which can be allowed only when the reader is unable to consult the original.
Everyone knows that Gorky always showed the greatest respect for the writers of
critical realism and called them the “prodigal sons" of their class, thereby stressing
the idea that by overcoming their class sympathies and antipathies these men rose
above them and to a large extent expressed the feelings of the working people.
The official Chinese press has also given equal assessments of the scientific legacy, p
and while these have been less concrete, they have been sufficiently definite. It has
denied the objective content of science, declaring all scientific achievements of past
epochs to be “alien in class terms" to the proletariat and the revolution. Thus, in an
article entitled “Refuting the Slogan ‘All Are Equal in Face of the Truth’ " one
paper wrote: “Can ‘all be equal’ in face of the truth? We say: No! Truth has a class
substance." [ 259•2
Another paper carried a letter signed by seven students of the Chinese People’s p
University addressed to the Central Committee and Chairman Mao demanding
“resolute, swift and final destruction of the whole old system of education, and the
heaviest fire aimed against the gentlemen styled as bourgeois
‘authorities’ ". [ 259•3 This letter, which was hailed by students and teachers in
many other Chinese colleges, ridiculed the old system of education “with its
emphasis on so-called systematic knowledge" and insisted that “the longer the
students study, the hazier their thinking”. The letter proposed the abolition of “the
old bourgeois titles and degrees”, “the bourgeois system of enrolment and training of
post-graduates”, etc. The editors said the letter set “a model of courage and daring”.
The CPC leadership got the Central Committee and the State Council to issue a p
directive abolishing entrance examinations at higher schools, and declared the
teacher’s concern for high academic progress among students to be a “bourgeois 260
revisionist black line”. It urged that the old study aids (published before 1966) should
be “buried” and a new curriculum implemented, under which primary schools should
“study quotations from the works of Chairman Mao and three of his articles”,
secondary schools, a collection of selected works by Mao and other articles of his,
and institutions of higher learning—the Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung.
The theoretical propositions of the ideologists of the “cultural revolution”, which p

have been building up another “Great Wall" between China’s culture and foreign
culture, are extremely harmful, and are clearly at variance with the whole ideology
and revolutionary practice of Marxism– Leninism and, let us add, with the decisions
of the 8th Congress of the CPC, whose resolution on the Central Committee’s
political report said: “There is need to inherit and comprehend everything that is
useful in our country’s past culture and the culture of foreign countries; in addition,
there is need to use the achievements of modern science and culture to sort out all
the best elements in our country’s cultural legacy and to make efforts to create a
new, socialist national culture.”
In contrast to the primitive Leftist talk about the spiritual culture of the past epochs p
being unacceptable for the triumphant proletarian revolution, Marxism-Leninism takes
a strictly scientific and truly class approach to the cultural legacy, implying above all
a concrete historical analysis of the cultural values of the past epochs. Because at
definite stages of social development, namely, in the initial stages of the existence of
this or that antagonistic formation, the relations of production proper to it have a
progressive role to play, the class which is in charge of these relations of production,
the ruling class, acts as a progressive force in the cultural and historical process. For
this reason, the culture of every ruling class is not always, and never entirely,
reactionary. The history of exploitative societies shows that many ideas put forward
by the men who represent the ruling class in the sphere of culture can contain
objective truth, correctly reflect the objective requirements of social progress and be
of lasting importance.
Every ideology has a class character, reflecting the world in terms of definite class p 261
positions, but the whole point is how correctly it reflects reality at a given historical
moment. Lenin repeatedly warned of the serious danger of vulgarisation whenever,
for instance, the terms “bourgeois”, “ bourgeois ideology”, “bourgeois literature”,
etc., are used outside a historical context. He wrote: “This word [bourgeois—E.B.) is
often understood very incorrectly, narrowly and unhistorically, it being associated
(without distinction of historical period) with a selfish defence of the interests of a
minority." [ 261•1
Everyone knows that bourgeois writers, critics, and so on, who fought against the p
reactionary and religious ideology of feudalism, made a big contribution to the
treasure-store of world culture, and that the proletariat inherits and continues all that
is best in the sphere of culture under capitalism.
In class society, spiritual culture has a class character. That is an axiom of p

Marxism-Leninism. But what does that mean? It means above all that spiritual
culture in a class society always has a definite class ideological content. It also
means that spiritual culture in class society has corresponding social functions and a
practical class orientation. But it should also be borne in mind that not all the
components of spiritual culture have a class character. Science, for instance, is a
most important component of culture. Lenin relentlessly branded his ideological
adversaries as “learned salesmen of the capitalist class”, but added: “For instance,
you will not make the slightest progress in the investigation of new economic
phenomena without making use of the works of these salesmen." [ 261•2 This is
even truer of the natural and technical sciences, which do contain some elements of
the class philosophical outlook, but cannot be reduced to these because they always
rest on facts, which they generalise, and are in addition inconceivable without the
methods of research proper to this or that science.
Lenin warned that “not a single one" of the bourgeois scientists who are capable of p
making very valuable contributions in the special fields of chemistry, history or
physics “can be trusted one iota”, when it comes to theoretical and philosophical
generalisations. [ 261•3 At the same time, he urged to take and use in the interests 262
of socialism the discoveries made by these men and to separate the objective content
of science (to be inherited and advanced) from reactionary class philosophy (to be
cut off and discarded).
In this context, let us recall, for instance, Lenin’s attitude to Taylor’s system, which, p
he said, combined the refined brutality of bourgeois exploitation and a number of
outstanding scientific achievements in analysing physical movements in the labour
process, elimination of incorrect and superfluous movements, development of the
most expedient methods, and introduction of the best systems of accounting and
control. Assessing the , role of Taylor’s system in the scientific organisation of
labour, Lenin wrote: “The Soviet Republic must at all costs adopt all that is valuable
in the achievements of science and technology in this field." [ 262•1
Nor can socialism afford to take a nihilistic attitude to the achievements of art in p
earlier epochs. The emergence of humanistic art, for instance, is connected with the
rise of bourgeois relations, but it does not follow that humanism is an exclusively
“bourgeois” ideology, because from the outset it was an expression of protest against
the inhumanity of bourgeois relations as well. The art of socialist society inherits and
critically remoulds these humanistic ideas, develops on the basis of progressive
artistic and aesthetic views and creative realistic traditions, adopting the techniques
and artistic methods, and what is especially important, inherits the works of art
themselves which are unique in their aesthetic value as specimens and monuments of
the culture of past ages.
This leads us up to yet another highly important question, that of the attitude of the
cultural revolution to the culture of present-day bourgeois society.
***

TEXT SIZE
normal
Notes
[ 254•1] V I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 29, p. 70.
[ 254•2] Ibid., p. 156.
[ 255•1] Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works, Vol. 4, London, 1956, p. 87.
[ 255•2] Ibid., p. 89.
[ 255•3] The Great Socialist Cultural Revolution in China, Part I, Peking, p. 15 (in
Chinese).
[ 256•2] Ibid., p. 143. Let us note, by the way, that these statements by the “great
helmsman" can hardly be squared with his own bent for imagery and quotations
from the Chinese classics.
[ 256•3] Carry the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution to the End, Peking, 1966,
p. 33 (in Chinese).
[ 256•4] L’Humanité, September 26, 1966.
[ 257•1] Jenmin jihpao, August 1, 1966.
[ 257•2] Wenhui pao, January 9, 1963.
[ 258•1] Kwangming jihpao, June 29, 1966.
[ 258•2] Ibid., August 8, 1966.
[ 258•3] It is a curious fact that up until 1965 the Chinese press still treated
Dostoyevsky’s works with respect. However, official Chinese propaganda has now
discerned in his writings elements which are “harmful to the existing system" and
accordingly branded his translator, Shao Chuan-lin, as an “accomplice of modern
revisionism”.
[ 259•1] Jenmin jihpao, October 28, 1958.
[ 259•2] Kwangming jihpao, June 13, 1966.
[ 259•3] Jenmin jihpao, July 12, 1966.
[ 261•2] Ibid., Vol. 14, p. 342.
[ 261•3] Ibid., p. 342.
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2. Socialist Culture and Its “Critics” 262
<•>
Capitalism as a socio-economic formation, with its culture, is in a sense something p

TOC
that is already on the way out, while socialism, with its culture, represents the future 263
Card of mankind, a higher and qualitatively new stage of development. However, in this
period the two cultures exist side by side, and so necessarily influence each other.
Text That is why the relationship between socialist culture and the culture of modern
HTML bourgeois society can and must be seen as yet another essential aspect of the
PS problem of continuity, which might be called the “horizontal” aspect (in contrast to
PDF the “vertical”, historical aspect).
T* It would be quite wrong to take the retrospective view of this relationship not only p
19* in theoretical but also in practical terms, because once the element of continuity is
excluded from this relationship we should have to deny the need for making critical
### use of the progressive elements in the culture of modern bourgeois society. The
present is always a point at which the future is in contact with the past, and so has
to take over from it all that is valuable.
It is quite obvious that in view of the implacable class struggle which is going on p
in the world arena there can be no “integration” of ideology, as the Right-wing
revisionists have advocated. Socialist ideology and bourgeois ideology are antipodes
and do not meet. Leonid Brezhnev said in his speech at the International Meeting of
Communist and Workers’ Parties: “Peaceful coexistence does not extend to the
struggle of ideologies—this must be stressed most categorically." [ 263•1 Likewise
there can be no “convergence” between the two cultures, socialist culture and
bourgeois culture.
However, it would be wrong to reduce the problem of the dialectical interaction of p

the two cultures to a struggle of ideologies. Far from excluding, the struggle of
ideologies implies the need to make the utmost use “of the achievements of the
engineering and culture created by large-scale capitalism". [ 263•2 This applies not
only to capitalism as it existed before the 1920s, but fully applies also to modern
capitalism and its culture.
The ideologists of the “cultural revolution" in China, while urging a struggle against p
the whole of the “old culture”, as a “feudal” and “bourgeois” culture, have also
issued the slogan of fighting present-day foreign culture, which they regard either as 264
“imperialist” or “revisionist”. They declare: “We must not only stamp out but also
destroy a corrupt culture like the imperialist and the modern revisionist
culture." [ 264•1 It is now hard to find a West European or American writer or
scientist whom the Chinese periodicals have not anathematised, and this includes
James Aldridge, Ernest Hemingway, Lion Feuchtwanger, Frederic Joliot-Curie and
John Bernal.
The “theorists” of the “great proletarian cultural revolution" identify the concept of p
“the culture of bourgeois society" and “bourgeois culture”, whereas it is necessary to
draw a distinction within each national culture between the culture of the ruling class
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/7.2-Socialist.Culture.and.Its.Critics[2012-12-18 2:33:28]
and the culture of the oppressed classes, the more or less developed elements of
democratic and socialist culture.
It is an incontestable fact that in highly developed capitalist countries a proletarian p

literature has already long since emerged and is successfully developing, a new
literature that has attained great ideological and artistic heights. Among those who
have helped to create it are outstanding playwrights and producers, a host of
remarkable musicians and artists, who have sided with communism.
Besides, many prominent workers in culture in the capitalist world today now find p
themselves at the crossroad. They have rejected the policy which leads to another
world war, and begin to realise that this policy springs from a definite social order.
In their creative work, these men and women— sometimes hesitantly and
inconclusively—express their people’s urge for peace and social progress. Some of
them have still a long way to go before accepting communism. But whatever the
differences of their views and nature of their activity they all represent the
democratic stream in the spiritual life of modern bourgeois society. That is why they
should not be classed among the “servitors” of the bourgeoisie. Some of these
numerous democratic leaders may subsequently turn to the Right, as Jules Romains
once did in the past, and John Steinbeck in our own day, but many of them will
continue on the hard and dangerous way of struggle. Let us recall that Anatole
France joined the Communist Party, Romain Rolland actively co-operated with the 265
Communists, and Pablo Picasso sided with communism.
In their fight against “bourgeois culture”, the Chinese leaders discard the Marxist- p
Leninist criterion of the dialectical, concrete historical assessment of cultural values;
they have clearly revised from the “Left” Lenin’s proposition of the two cultures
within each national culture of bourgeois society; they have rejected out of hand the
culture of bourgeois society as a whole, including its democratic elements, and also
the elements of socialist culture, taking shape within the entrails of capitalist society;
they have classed the new culture of the socialist countries as “bourgeois” culture.
Take the pamphlet entitled Some Questions Bearing on the Literature of Modern p
Soviet Revisionism, which was published in Peking in the summer of 1966. The
contributors to the pamphlet, which was put out for distribution at the so-called
extraordinary conference of Asian and African writers (July 1966), attacked the
article “The Art of the Heroic Epoch”, [ 265•1 which said that the general line in
the development of literature in the 20th century consists in assimilating and
enriching the traditions of critical and socialist realism—the traditions of Maxim
Gorky, Martin Andersen Nexo, Romain Rolland, Theodore Dreiser, Thomas and
Heinrich Mann, Pablo Neruda, Bertolt Brecht, Mikhail Sholokhov, Leon
Kruczkowski, Henri Barbusse, Vladimir Mayakovsky, Vitezslav Nezval, Mihail
Sadoveanu and Johannes Becher. The two men who wrote the article entitled
“Extracts from the Statements of Sholokhov, a Renegade Author”, Hsiang Hung and
Wei Ning, said: “The present-day Soviet revisionists, with the help of their ’ general
line of development of literature in the 20th century’, which represents a mixture of
revolutionary, non– revolutionary and counter-revolutionary writers, and which makes
no distinction between friends and enemies... have in fact tried to prevent the
development of a truly socialist, revolutionary literature of the 20th
century." [ 265•2
The best writings of proletarian authors in the USA, Britain and Italy have been p
labeled in China as “revisionist”. This is in fact a distortion of the propositions 266
proclaimed by the 8th Congress of the CPC to “inherit and comprehend all that is
useful in the culture of China and of foreign countries”.
Another fundamental error made by the vulgarisers of Marxism, who reject the p
whole of present-day foreign culture as an “imperialist culture”, consists in their
identification of the concepts of “culture” and of “ideology”. These two concepts are
in no sense identical, but we find them identified in Mao’s article “On New
Democracy" which said that “a given culture is the ideological reflection of the
politics and economy of a given society". [ 266•1 Actually, however, while
ideology makes up the content of spiritual culture in class society, and for that
reason determines and directs the development of every form of spiritual production,
it is in no sense a concept that is identical with the concept of “spiritual culture”.
When V. Pletnyov, Chairman of the Central Committee of the Proletcult, [ 266•2 p

wrote in an article, “On the Ideological Front”, which appeared in Pravda in 1922,
that “questions of ideology are broader than questions of culture”, Lenin made a note
in the margin of this word “broader”. A little later, Pravda carried an article by Y.
Yakovlev, entitled “On Proletarian Culture and Proletcult”, which had been written
on the strength of Lenin’s notes and which, in addition, had been read and edited by
Lenin himself. [ 266•3 Concerning the statement that “ideology is broader than
culture”, the article said: “This is a patent absurdity, because culture, which brings
together a number of social phenomena (ranging from morality and law to science,
art and philosophy) is, of course, a more general concept than social
ideology." [ 266•4 Consequently, “ideology” is not broader but narrower than
“culture”.
On the strength of Lenin’s ideas, the 20th Congress of the CPSU made a scathing p 267
criticism of the vulgar theories which held that the general tendency for capitalism to
stagnate allegedly rules out any progress in the sphere of culture in the imperialist
epoch. Those who close their eyes to the achievements of culture abroad wittingly or
unwittingly help to slow down the development of culture in the socialist society.
Lenin believed that the epoch-making task facing the proletariat after the take-over
was “turning the sum total of the very rich, historically inevitable and necessary for
us store of culture and knowledge and technique accumulated by capitalism from an
instrument of capitalism into an instrument of socialism". [ 267•1
The Chinese leaders have not only rejected everything that is progressive in the p
culture of modern bourgeois society, including the elements of democratic and
socialist culture, which are taking shape within it, but have also urged repudiation of
the achievements in the culture of the socialist countries.
Mao’s followers have accused Soviet cultural personalities of “revisionism” and p

“bourgeois degeneration”, and this applies above all to those who attack militarism
and urge efforts to prevent a disastrous nuclear war, among them Sholokhov,
Simonov, Tvardovsky and Ehrenburg.
The Maoists declare that the “ideology of survival" permeates such works as p
Sholokhov’s “The Fate of a Man”, [ 267•2 and Simonov’s The Living and the Dead
and Days and Nights. They say that the Soviet writers Aitmatov, Miezelaitis and
Rozhdestvensky are “revisionists” who constitute a “special detachment of US
imperialism and help to undermine the revolutionary wars of Asian and African
peoples”. An article by Hsieh Shui-fu denigrates all Soviet writers who have written
works about the Great Patriotic War, declaring that “they have taken the path of
betrayal of the revolutionary traditions of Soviet literature ... and are vehicles of
ideas asserting no more than the need to save one’s life and unwillingness to carry
on the revolution, vehicles of ideas asserting the happiness of the individual and 268
indifference to the country’s prosperity. These works can only paralyse and
undermine the militant will of the peoples fighting in defence of peace and against
imperialism, and in practice play the part of accomplices of imperialism in preparing
another war". [ 268•1
The best Soviet films—Clear Skies, Ballad of a Soldier, On the Seven Winds, Ivan’s p
Childhood, The Cranes Are Flying, Nine Days of One Year, among others—have “
merited" similar assessments in the Chinese press. The film critic Fang Liang says:
“Some revisionists .. . have deliberately distorted the true face of war by producing a
number of reactionary films ... these films extol pacifism, capitulationism, and preach
the philosophy of survival." [ 268•2 Among the “revisionist films" the Chinese film
critics have managed to include Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, Don Quixote, The Idiot,
Eugene Onegin, The Captain’s Daughter, Queen of Spades and Resurrection.
There has been particular indignation in China over the struggle for peaceful p
coexistence, against another world war, and the consequent policy of cultural contacts
with the capitalist countries, which the Soviet people has pursued under the
leadership of the Communist Party, and in which workers of Soviet culture quite
naturally take an active part. The Maoists condemn the cultural exchanges between
the USSR and the USA, and the publication of the works of foreign writers in the
Soviet Union on the plea that this allegedly helps the “infiltration” of bourgeois
ideology.
The attacks on Soviet literature and art and on outstanding cultural personalities are
an aspect of the broad antiSoviet propaganda campaign which has been carried on by
its sponsors for a long time behind the cover of the “ cultural revolution”. By now
the whole world has realised that this campaign has far-reaching political aims.
There is no doubt at all that one of these aims is to deify Mao, to stamp out creative
thinking, and to try to eliminate all opposition to the adventurist and chauvinistic
policy which is being pursued for the purpose of realising the hegemonistic plans
now being fostered by the CPC leadership.
***

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normal
Notes

p. 170.
[ 264•1] Hsinhua News Agency Release, July 11, 1966.
[ 265•1] See Kommunist No. 10, 1964.
[ 265•2] Some Questions Bearing on the Literature of Modern Soviet Revisionism,

Peking, 1966, p. 82 (in Chinese).
[ 266•2] Reference is to the Proletarian Culture Organisation, whose members

rejected the cultural legacy of the past and tried to create a special “proletarian
culture”. It flourished in 1919 and in the twenties went into decline, and in 1932
ceased to exist.—Ed.
[ 266•3] Questions of Culture under Proletarian Dictatorship, MoscowLeningrad,

1925, p. 3 (in Russian).
[ 266•4] Ibid., p. 22.
[ 267•2] An article about Sholokhov’s story, “The Fate of a Man”, by Chi Hsueh-
tung and Cheng Tse-ping, said: “The story is a black banner of modern revisionism
in literature and art" (see Jenmin jihpao, May 13, 1966).
[ 268•1] Hsieh Shui-fu, “Under the Cover of Party Approach”, Wenhsueh pinglung
No. 5, 1965; see also Kuang Chiun’s article, “The Mouthpiece of the Revisionist
Grouping”, Chiefangchiun pao, July 9, 1966.
[ 268•2] Wenyi pao No. 5, 1965.
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3. The “Cultural Revolution” 269
<•>
in China and the Intelligentsia

TOC
The experience of the USSR and other socialist countries shows that in the period p
Card
of socialist and communist construction the role of the intelligentsia in society
acquires special importance. This is due not only to the scientific and technological
Text revolution which is taking place in all the advanced countries, but also to the fact
HTML that in contrast to antagonistic class formations socialism does not arise or develop
PS spontaneously but on the basis of a conscious application of the objective laws of
PDF social development which men have comprehended. In these conditions, the activity
of those who engage in brainwork turns out to be the most important factor without
T* which it is impossible for society to function normally.
19*
One of the main specific features in the emergence of a socialist intelligentsia is p
###
that it is shaped mainly after the triumph of the socialist revolution. Whereas the
bourgeoisie was in a position to build up a numerous intelligentsia long before it had
taken over, and as new productive forces emerged, the proletariat has very few
intellectuals on its side before the triumph of the socialist revolution, and these are in
the first place professional revolutionaries.
Following the overthrow of the bourgeoisie and the establishment of proletarian p

dictatorship it is faced with gigantic tasks in creating the new, socialist society. Quite
naturally, the small group of proletarian intellectuals who sided with the people
before or just after the revolution, cannot cope with these tasks in full. That is why
one of the most important tasks of the cultural revolution is to build up a new,
socialist intelligentsia. However, this cannot be done in a short time. That is why
there arises the task of making use of bourgeois specialists. In the early Soviet years,
Lenin taught the Party how to go on fighting the counter-revolutionary elements,
while creating an atmosphere of comradely co-operation for honest specialists who
were loyal to the Soviet state, how to carry on painstaking and systematic efforts to
involve them in the work of the Soviet power, being prepared to pay them high
salaries and make bolder use of their knowledge and experience, learn from them
how to manage the economy, while educating them ideologically. Lenin wrote: “We 270
cannot build it [Soviet power—Ed.] if we do not utilise such a heritage of capitalist
culture as the intellectuals." [ 270•1
But it was also impossible to build the new society without fostering intellectuals p
who came from the ranks of the people. This was a much more intricate and
difficult task than the winning over of bourgeois specialists for the revolution. It
required above all the raising of the people’s general cultural standard so as to
enable socialist intellectuals ultimately to rise from its ranks.
It goes without saying that the fulfilment of these tasks proves to be the more p
difficult the more backward, economically and culturally, is a country taking the way
of socialist revolution.
In the early years of the people’s power in China a great deal was done to p
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/7.3-The.Cultural.Revolution.and.the.Intelligentsia[2012-12-18 2:33:36]
overcome the people’s age-old backwardness: illiteracy was reduced, the working
people’s cultural standards raised and national intellectuals trained. As the revolution
in China entered its seventh year, there were already 3,840,000 specialists working in
the national economy, with about 100,000 of them trained to the highest
standards. [ 270•2 In a report at a conference on the question of the intelligentsia,
called by the CPC Central Committee on January 14, 1956, Chou En-lai said that the
intelligentsia was a “great force in socialist construction" in five principal spheres:
scientific research, education, engineering, public health, culture and art. Invaluable
assistance was given to the Chinese People’s Republic by other socialist countries,
the Soviet Union above all. Thousands of Soviet specialists helped the Chinese
people to implement the plans of national economic development, while many
thousands of Chinese young men and women studied at Soviet institutions of higher
learning and were trained to become high-skilled specialists.
However, later, in violation of the decisions adopted by the 8th Congress of the p
CPC, and in contravention of the Party’s general line, Mao and his followers acted
in such a manner that Soviet specialists were recalled from China and Chinese 271
students left the USSR. At the same time, a campaign was mounted in China against
“Soviet revisionism" and its “agents” in the midst of the Chinese intelligentsia. In
the course of this campaign, a succession of draconian measures was aimed against
workers in Chinese culture ( numerically still very small), as a prelude to the “great
cultural revolution" in China.
In 1945, Mao declared that intellectuals should be “esteemed as valuable assets of p

the nation and society". [ 271•1 In 1948, he said: “It is entirely right that we should
value intellectuals, for without revolutionary intellectuals the revolution cannot
succeed." [ 271•2 From 1964 to 1966, that is, just before the decisions were taken
by the llth Plenary Meeting of the CPC Central Committee marking the start of the
“great proletarian cultural revolution”, the present CPC leadership scrapped the old
line and mounted a succession of attacks against the intelligentsia, primarily against
workers in the art and the humanities, that is, against the overwhelming majority of
intellectuals. As a rule, the intellectuals in the scientific and technological fields,
constituting a small minority of the workers by brain, were spared any attack, and
the Hungweipings were even officially forbidden to touch them in any way. This
must have been motivated chiefly by the Maoists’ militaristic policy and was, for a
very good reason, connected in the relevant instructions for the “great cultural
revolution" with China’s nuclear blasts.
It is true that before the full-scale offensive against the intelligentsia was started in p
late 1964, there had been attacks from 1951 to 1964, like the criticism of the film
entitled The Life of Wu Hsun, the campaign over the analysis of the classical novel,
Dream in the Red Chamber, the fight against Hu Feng and his “counter-
revolutionary clique”, the fight in 1957 against the “bourgeois Rightists”, and so on.
But in scale and effect, the drive from 1964 to 1966 surpassed all these attacks and
“critical campaigns" taken together.
In the course of this unprecedented drive against the intellectuals in China, there p
was another “reappraisal of values": all the traditions of revolutionary Chinese culture
of the 1920s and 1930s were overthrown, the very traditions which had been 272
considered the “pride of China’s national literature and art”.
Among the victims of the fierce “discussion” that followed was the film In p
February, in Early Spring, a screen adaptation by the well-known producer Hsieh
Teh-li of a novel by Jou Shih (Chao Ping-fu), a Communist writer shot in 1931; and
the works of Yin Fu, Hu Yeh-pin, Li Wei-hsien and Feng Keng, who had been shot
together with Jou Shih by the Kuomintang, and who, according to Lu Hsun, “had
written with their own blood the first page of Chinese proletarian literature”. The
Maoist critics also attacked the writings of Mao Tun (in connection with the
screening of his story, “Lin”s Shop”) and the writings of all the authors who had
been grouped round Lu Hsun in the 1930s. The final blast against “the so-called
literature and art of the 1930s" came from an editorial article in Chiefangchiun pao
on April 18, 1966, which was subsequently reprinted by all the newspapers and
Hungchih. It called for an end “to the blind faith in the so-called literature and art
of the 1930s”, which were characterised as an “anti-Party, anti-socialist black line
opposing the thought of Mao Tse-tung". [ 272•1
In 1965 and 1966, the Chinese press was virtually swamped with a flood of p
“denunciatory” articles against leading Chinese intellectuals, chiefly historians,
philosophers, economists, workers of cultural and ideological establishments, and
against all those who used their own heads and had “directly or indirectly expressed
doubt about the correctness of Mao’s line. It is highly indicative that the hardest
blows were dealt above all at the members of the older generation, active Party
members like the playwright Tien Han, Deputy Chairman of the All-China
Association of Literary and Art Circles, the script writer Hsia Yen, Deputy Minister
of Culture Lin Mo-han, Prorector of the Higher Party School under the CPC Central
Committee Yang Hsiang-chen, and others. Mao Tun, the world-famed writer, was
removed from the post of Minister of Culture, which he had held since 1949.
But there was “logic” in this madness, for those who had gone through the great p
school of revolutionary activity were most consistent in adhering to Marxism- 273
Leninism and internationalism. All of them were variously accused of being
politically unreliable and subjected to different repressions, like humiliating
“criticism”, dismissal from their posts, and deportation to remote rural areas.
Jenmin jihpao admitted that in 18 months of 1965 and 1966, 160,000 intellectuals p
were sent to the countryside for “physical re-education”. Subsequently, at the height
of the “cultural revolution”, at least 400,000 more “hostile elements" and members of
their families went the same way. Of course, not all of them were intellectuals, but
they were engaged in creative work. As a result, the overwhelming majority of the
best members of China’s intelligentsia were for all practical purposes subjected to
repression.
The 1964–1966 campaign against the intelligentsia, a sort of prelude for the “great p
proletarian cultural revolution”, like the “cultural revolution" itself, announced at the
llth Plenary Meeting of the CPC Central Committee, cannot be understood unless
they are viewed in the context of the Maoist domestic economic policy and foreign
policy.
In their efforts to cover up the collapse of the “Great Leap Forward" policy, the p
failure of the people’s communes and the economic difficulties which sprang from
the adventurist domestic policy, together with foreign-policy fiascos, the present CPC
leaders used the “cultural revolution" as a cover for their massacre of Party cadres
and intellectuals who took a critical view of Mao’s line. The “struggle against
modern revisionism" in Chinese literature in the course of the “proletarian cultural
revolution" was in fact a political fight against the leading workers in Chinese
culture, the Party’s internationalist cadres, the most revolutionary sections of China’s
youth, and all the forward-looking Chinese who urged loyalty to the ideas of
Marxism-Leninism.
The decisions of the llth Plenary Meeting of the CPC Central Committee and the p
practice of the “cultural revolution" showed the world that Mao and his entourage
had abandoned Marxism-Leninism and the socialist camp. There was good reason
why the anti-Soviet campaign flared up afresh following that plenary meeting. The
Chinese leaders did their utmost to worsen relations between the Soviet Union and
China, a sinister scheme which was to be implemented behind the smokescreen of
the “cultural revolution”.
In 1964, the journal of the CPSU Central Committee, Kommunist, gave an p 274
assessment of the nihilistic policy of the CPC leadership on cultural values. An
editorial article in the journal said: “It is now very hard even to imagine the vast
damage the Chinese people will suffer in the sphere of culture from this policy of
national isolation, the urge to separate oneself from the cultural life of the world,
especially of the socialist countries." [ 274•1
Three years later, with the blessings of the “great helmsman”, the Hungweipings p
were let loose on their rampage, destroying the “demons and monsters of the old
ruling classes”, the Greek, Roman and Chinese treasures at the Peking Museum and
the Central Academy of Arts, the Pushkin monument in Shanghai, and the bookshops
and art shops with their “feudal” and “revisionist” works by the masters of world
culture. Today, most journals and newspapers in China are not being published,
virtually no scientific and art books are being printed, because all the paper goes into
the publication of Mao’s Little Red Book and eulogies of the great leader. Feature
films have not been shown in the country for over five years. Cinema-goers may see
only newsreels about government receptions, parades, festivities and sports events.
No sign of life comes from the modern drama, or the dialogue drama, as it is p
known in China. For several years now, the “revolutionised” Peking Musical Theatre
has been running the same plays which had been prepared “with the personal
participation of Chiang Chang, and which glorify her husband’s “radiant thought”.
The ballet is regarded as a “counter-revolutionary” art, but two ballet pieces—“The
Red Women’s Company" and the “Grey-Haired Girl"—are still on: they have been
“revolutionised” through the introduction of a chorus which keeps singing songs
about Mao Tse-tung.
At Peking University, the students keep learning Mao’s statements by rote. p

Following the “re-organisation” of the education system, all the departments at the
Peking Technical Institute of Forestry have been abolished and all the teachers and
students organised in “companies”. In a country where hundreds of millions of 275
people are still unable to read or write all the schools have been closed down.
Academic centres, research institutions and laboratories have been declared a
“battlefield”. There, “bourgeois reactionary authorities”, scientists who do not accept
the “thought of Mao Tse-tung”, are being “winkled out of the dark corners”.
Professor Lu Ping, Rector of Peking University, who dared to teach the students
“some kind of chemical formulas" instead of the “thought of Mao Tse-tung" was
killed, while Professor Hua Loo-keng, Director of the Institute of Mathematics of the
Academy of Sciences, was subjected to repressions, and so on.
Everything is being done to fence off the Chinese people not only from world p
civilisation and from the advanced experience of the socialist community, but also
from China’s own cultural heritage. Thus, Chen Po-ta, the former head of the group
for “cultural revolution" affairs under the CPC Central Committee, declared that “it is
better for old books to be read by only a small number of men, and only for the
purpose of subjecting such literature to criticism and supplying the fertiliser for
producing correct ideas in the heads of the new generation of Chinese”. This “sage”
statement links up with Mao’s own sentiment that “the more books you read, the
stupider you become. There is no point at all in much learning.”
Of the 13,000 book titles issued over the last 50 years by the Chunghua Publishers p
only 500 titles have been permitted to remain. The rest are being barbarously
destroyed, including classical philosophic, literary and historical works. In the recent
period, some 500,000 old editions of books have been destroyed only by the central
and the southern branches of the Hsinhua shutien Publishers. Family libraries that
had been handed down from generation to generation have been destroyed in the
flames.
In recent years, no work of fiction has been published in the country and libraries p
and museums have been closed. At the same time, the plan for the publication of
Mao’s Selected Works, his Little Red Book, and collections of his poems, was
fulfilled “ahead of schedule”, reprinting 3,000 million copies. “This is a brilliant
achievement,” said Hsinhua News Agency. “This is an unprecedented triumph for the
cultural revolution.” There was a time when on New Year’s Day Hsinhua reported 276
the overfulfilment of national economic plans and successes in education and public
health, and this was a source of joy for all the friends of the Chinese people. Ever
since Mao’s “special line" was adopted and the “cultural revolution" started in China,
Hsinhua makes no mention at all of five-year plans and does not publish any
concrete data on their fulfilment.
The “cultural revolution" showed that Mao’s followers regard the intelligentsia and p
all workers by brain in general as a force hostile to the Chinese people, a force
which could easily take the way of “revisionism” and “bourgeois degeneration”. It
turns out that there is only one way to prevent this, and that is to make these men
do manual labour, because it is the embodiment of everything that is truly popular
and revolutionary. Manual labour is the one and only cure-all for the “degeneration”
of the Chinese intelligentsia. The “theoretical” arguments for this were set out by
Mao as follows: “In order to determine what this or that member of the intelligentsia
is—a revolutionary, a non-revolutionary or a counter-revolutionary—there is only
one decisive criterion: one needs to know whether he is willing to coalesce with the
workers’ and peasants’ masses and whether he does in fact coalesce with
them." [ 276•1
The practical implication here is that the intellectual must be made to do manual p
labour on a par with the worker and the peasant. According to Mao’s view, the
intellectual’s task is to sink to the cultural level of the peasants and to adopt their
way of life, instead of passing on his knowledge to the working people and helping
them to raise their cultural and political standards. Here is, for instance, how
Hsinhua News Agency presented the “sobering up" of one Chinese intellectual. He
had come from a poor family, but after being long out of touch with manual labour,
the callosities on his palms became thinner and his feelings for the poor and lower
middle peasants shallower. Having now arrived with his whole family permanently to
live and work in a production brigade, he took off the uniform of the cadre worker
and put on peasant garb. He wore the straw shoes he had woven himself, and began
to work with the peasants. He said thoughtfully: “The thicker the callosities on your
palms, the deeper your feelings for the poor and lower middle peasants, and the 277
more strength you have in fighting against revisionism and for its
prevention." [ 277•1
The Maoists insist that manual labour can help “change the ideology and feelings of p
the intelligentsia and revolutionise their consciousness". [ 277•2 The Chinese press
quoted, for instance, these assertions by the cadre workers who went to the rural
areas to engage in manual labour: “This time we have really made a beginning in
revolutionising our consciousness by leaving our families, schools and offices and
entering the homes of the poor and lower middle peasants." [ 277•3
Just after the “cultural revolution" a campaign was started in China to dispatch
young people who could read and write to the countryside to make them “merge
with the poor and lower middle peasants”. In this context, Jenmin jihpao wrote:
“The boundless expanses of the villages are universities for the remoulding of literate
young people." [ 277•4 The Chinese press has repeatedly stressed that literate young
people are sent to the countryside to accept a new education from the poor and
lower middle peasants, because “when out of touch with manual labour one may be
infected with revisionist ideology". [ 277•5
***

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normal
Notes
[ 270•1] V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol 28, p. 215.
[ 270•2] Chou En-lai, On the Question of the Intelligentsia, Peking, 1956, pp. 14–15
(in Chinese).
[ 271•1] Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works, Vol. 4, pp. 299–300.
[ 271•2] Ibid., p. 32.
[ 272•1] Hungchih No. 6, 1966.
[ 274•1] “Against Dogmatism and Vulgarisation in Literature and Art”, Kummunist

No. 9, 1964, p. 14.
[ 276•1] Hsinhua Press Release, November 5, 1968.
[ 277•1] Hsinhua Press Release, October 31, 1968.
[ 277•2] Kwangming jihpao, January 17, 1969.
[ 277•3] Hsinhua Press Release, October 31, 1968.
[ 277•4] Jenmin jihpao, January 17, 1969.
[ 277•5] Hsinhua Press Release, January 5, 1969.
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New phenomena are now observable in China against the general background of her p
Card
cultural development.
Text Peking booksellers propose to readers a number of books on China’s history, p

HTML published during the early years of the People’s Republic, chief of them being China
PS s Ancient History by Fan Wen-Ian and Ten Critical Articles by Kuo Mo-jo. The
PDF journal Wen-wu has seen the day of light, its first issue summing up the results of
archaeological research in recent years. Bookstores have on display the book Notes
T* on the Stone, a variant of the popular classical novel, Hung Lou Meng (Dream of the 278
19* Red Chamber), which was published in 1958 but until recently was banned as a
“black”, “feudal” and “anti-popular” work of art. The journal Hungchih now urges
###
the publishing houses “to select some classical literary works, both Chinese and
foreign, and to plan their publication”. This is the first-ever (since the “cultural
revolution”) public appeal to the up-till-now-banned classical literature.
Late in 1971, Kuo Mo-jo published his new book Li Po and Tu Fu, devoted to the p
two well-known poets of Chinese medieval times. Some popular science books and
stories have made their appearance. Even fiction is now being advertised, the
forthcoming publication of some of works of art has been announced in the press.
The higher educational establishments have resumed their functioning. All this shows
that there is some revival of activity on the cultural front of China today.
The reasons of this phenomenon must be sought in the internal and external p
political factors. The Maoist idea of bringing up “men-cogs” has in effect flopped.
The specimens of Maoist “culture” did not bring about the desired results. The rank-
and-file person has remained indifferent to these specimens, for he was reared up in
other traditions. In particular, the Chinese people have been fond of the ancient
theatre from time immemorial. The national theatre was used to acquaint the illiterate
masses with the heroes of national history, with ancient legends, with concepts of
good and evil. Thousands of theatrical troupes staged performances in villages all
over China. The art of professional actor was bequeathed, as a rule, from father to
son, from generation to generation. All family members and apprentices used to
participate in theatrical performances. Although their acting was within the strict
framework of national traditions, they played their parts in a masterly fashion. The
“cultural revolution" has put an end to popular art in China and the most ardent and
single-hearted spectator in the world has been deprived of his theatre.
The poor set of “model performances" could not, naturally, satisfy the needs of the p
exacting Chinese spectator. Neither could he be content with Maoist imitations in
other fields of literature and art. All this could not but trouble the Peking leaders,
since their policy has considerably restricted the possibility of brainwashing the 279
masses. Hence the need for definite changes in the sphere of culture.
In addition to this, there are reasons of an external political nature. The Maoist p
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/7.4-Cultural.Policy.After.the.Cultural.Revolution[2012-12-18 2:33:44]
leadership have been trying to present themselves as the mouthpiece of the

“oppressed part of humanity" and to pass off China’s social development as an
example to other nations of the world. But it was no longer possible to lay these
claims and simultaneously deprive themselves of the possibility of propping them up
by achievements in the sphere of culture. The most far-sighted politicians in Peking
seem to have realised that the destruction of cultural values and the suppression of
the creativity of intellectuals during the “cultural revolution" have done the Maoists
an ill turn, once they tried to influence public opinion in other countries. Even the
newly-free nations have already produced real masterprieces with a deep social
content. So in the eyes of their people the “specimens” of Maoist culture look like
effete and awkward imitations.
The present changes in the sphere of culture are being camouflaged with public p
glorification of “victories” scored by the same cultural policy which Peking has to
renounce because of its patent failure. For instance, the Chinese periodical press has
announced that Hao Jan’s novel The Sun Shines Bright is to be reprinted. Its three
volumes were first published long before the “cultural revolution”. Although it
describes the Chinese village in terms of “Mao”s thought”, until recently it was
banned from circulation among readers. Now the author is writing another novel on
this topic and the press mentions this fact as though the country had never been the
venue of the Hungweipings’ violence, and for six years Hao Jan had been writing in
peace.
In its issue of January 8, 1972, Jenmin jihpao reports about the visit paid by its p
correspondent to Peking University and the talk he had with some of its professors.
One may learn astonishing things from this article, e.g., that the “cultural revolution"
allegedly promoted the progress of science and education in China, while it is
common knowledge that the Chinese higher educational establishments did not
function during this “revolution”. This testifies to the strong effort of the Maoist
leadership to reject the accusation of striking a heavy blow at Chinese culture.
The Maoists are applying the policy of bringing a certain part of cultural workers p 280
and social scientists back to active service only to those persons who have never
been in opposition to the present Chinese leadership. One can observe startling
developments in this context. The same issue of Jenmin jihpao (January 8, 1972)
carried an interview given by Prof. Fen Yu-lan, a well-known bourgeois philosopher
who created in the 1920s the reactionary system of NeoConfucianism. This professor,
whose books have been more than once translated in the USA, is praising in this
interview “Mao’s thought" and the “cultural revolution”. He speaks and writes in the
press on behalf of the Chinese philisophers, whereas such Chinese Marxists as Hou
Wai-lu, Sung Tingkuo, Jen Chi-yu, Pan Tzu-nien and others are deprived of such an
opportunity. [ 280•1
The Maoists are not going to cease adapting the works of literature and art to their p
anti-socialist policy. This is proved in particular by the latest book written by Kuo
Mo-jo. Up till now there are no objectively verified data concerning the place of
birth of Li Po, though Chinese scholars conducted their research for many centuries.
Yet in defiance of historical truth Kuo Mo-jo begins his book with the phrase: “Li
Po was born in Central Asia.” What purpose lies behind the assertion that Li Po’s
homeland is the region of Lake Balkhash and what reasons are there to distort the
universally known facts? The answer is: to substantiate the right of the Maoist
leadership to lay claim to Soviet Central Asia.
The foregoing warrants the conclusion that it is difficult to overestimate the damage p
inflicted by the ideology and practice of the “cultural revolution" on the world
communist movement.
These are only some of the truly tragic results of what is now known in China as p
the “great proletarian cultural revolution”. It is hard to exaggerate the harm that has
been done to the world communist movement by the ideology and practices of the
“cultural revolution" in China. By distorting Marxism-Leninism, and trampling on the 281
experience of socialist cultural revolutions in other countries, the Chinese leaders
throw a freakish light on the noble ideals of socialism and undermine the prestige of
the world revolutionary movement.
The Communists can show the working people of the world what the genuine p
cultural revolution is and the true attitude of the socialist revolution to culture and
the cultural heritage by exposing the Chinese leadership’s anti-Marxist, anti-Leninist
line in the sphere of culture. The example of the Soviet Union and of the peoples of
other socialist countries advancing along the Leninist path has provided the world
with convincing proof that socialism brings mankind a new culture, but that the
culture of the new world emerges as the legitimate successor to all the best works of
society in pre-socialist formations, instead of arising somewhere off the highway of
world civilisation.
It is impossible to go on to communism without using the cultural legacy stored up

by mankind over the centuries. Assimilation of this legacy—not by select individuals,
but by everyone—is a necessary condition for producing an abundant spiritual
culture, and constitutes a most important prerequisite for the development of the full
man. There can be no cultural revolution without such creative assimilation and
utmost development by the people of the cultural attainments of past epochs and of
the present-day bourgeois society, and without the Leninist attitude to the
intelligentsia. The true purpose of the cultural revolution is to create the culture of
communism which, as the Programme of the CPSU says, by “absorbing and
developing all the best that has been created by world culture, will be a new, higher
stage in the cultural progress of mankind". [ 281•1
***

TEXT SIZE
normal
Notes
[ 280•1] This circumstance is, no doubt, dictated by foreign-policy considerations.

Since China is drawing nearer to the Western imperialist powers, the Maoists need to
show that they favour the bourgeois intelligentsia and that the “cultural revolution"
has not affected them. It is not without interest to note that Fen Yu-lan was among
the few Chinese intellectuals who were present at the reception given in honour of
President Nixon during his sojourn in Peking in February 1972.
[ 281•1] The Road to Communism, Moscow, 1961, p. 576.
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CONCLUSION 282
<•>
We have considered some aspects of Maoism and have tried to show how it looks p
TOC
in theory and practice. Summing up what has been said one could define it as a
Card specific pseudo-revolutionary, chauvinistic trend in the world revolutionary
movement.
Text
HTML As we have tried to show, Maoism consists of conceptions and notions p
PS characteristic of non-proletarian social groups in Chinese society: the petty-bourgeois
PDF intelligentsia, the petty-bourgeois urban sections, and the poor sections of the
peasantry. These conceptions and notions are largely determined by the status of
T* their vehicles in the country’s sociohistorical structure and by their cultural and
19* ideological traditions. They contain ideas borrowed from non-socialist thinking
abroad. In addition, Maoism also contains a whole range of nominally Marxist
### propositions which, however, lose their real meaning because they are incorrectly
understood or applied.
It would be wrong to say that Maoism stems directly from non-Marxist ideological p
trends. It emerged in definite historical conditions and has its own specific features.
However, Maoism is akin to other pseudo-revolutionary ideological trends, because
those spring from similar-type socio-economic structures.
Thus, for instance, the Maoists, like the Trotskyites, have no faith in the strength of p 283
the working class and its capacity to give a lead to the peasantry along the socialist
path, although this is expressed in different ways. Trotsky saw the peasantry as a
petty-bourgeois mass hostile to socialism, a mass which in Soviet Russia was, sooner
or later, to clash with the working class, because the latter was allegedly incapable
of establishing a strong alliance with the peasantry. By contrast, Mao believes the
peasantry to be the most consistently revolutionary and constructive force, capable of
giving China a lead along the way to socialism and communism. However, this
discrepancy is more outward, because ultimately the Trotskyites and the Maoists
equally ignore the historical mission of the working class and minimise its leading
role in society.
The Trotskyites and the Maoists have also much in common in the methods they p
advocate for socialist construction, for these are based on subjectivism and
voluntarism and lack of any scientific understanding of the laws governing the
development of the socialist economy.
The Trotskyites sought to introduce militarised forms and methods of organising p

production, and held that such production was to be based on forced labour. They
also insisted on the retention of the civil-war methods of strictly regulating
distribution of the aggregate social product, with the maintenance of low levels of
consumption. Trotsky insisted on a levelling of the working people’s consumption
together with the principle of shock-work, that is, utmost mobilisation of efforts by
workers and peasants in production. This was categorically rejected by Lenin, who
wrote: “It is all wrong. Shock-work is preference, but it is nothing without
http://www.leninist.biz/en/1972/CMTTC290/8-Conclusion[2012-12-18 2:33:54]
consumption... . Preference in shock-work implies preference in consumption as

well." [ 283•1
The Maoists have reproduced Trotskyite ideas, and looked to forced labour, the p
establishment of labour armies, and the use of military methods in the national
economy.
The method of administration by fiat, of orders and the use of force was expressed p
in Trotsky’s thesis about “ tightening the screws" and “shaking out the trade unions”,
a method the Trotskyites wanted to be turned into the basis of the Party’s domestic 284
policy in its relations with the working people. The Chinese leaders have reproduced
this method on an extended scale.
Disbandment of trade unions, abolition of democratic principles in life, p

“revolutionisation” of industrial enterprises with the aid of military units, and
uninterrupted purge campaigns—these are only some of the methods the Maoists
have used. Trotsky tried artificially to accelerate the world revolution by means of a
world war. Mao has pursued the same aim, but by means of a “people’s war”.
There is also much in common between Maoism and anarchism. Let us recall that p
anarchism was the fullest expression of petty-bourgeois revolutionism at the dawn of
the proletarian movement, when the proletariat’s struggle was still embryonic and
was still dominated by the forms which occur at the initial stages of the proletarian
movement. Lenin said: “Anarchism is a product of despair. The psychology of the
unsettled intellectual or the vagabond and not of the proletarian." [ 284•1
Among the characteristic features of anarchism is the demand for instant revolution p
and blind faith in the miraculous power of activity. Its view of the revolution above
all as an act of universal destruction goes hand in hand with fairly hazy ideas about
constructive activity after the revolution. This makes anarchism akin to Maoism,
which sees the revolution and the post-revolutionary period as consisting of nothing
but destruction.
What the Maoists and the Blanquists have in common is that both start from the p
assumption that a bold revolutionary sally by conspirators (armed uprising, rebel
action) can provide the impetus, the spark that will ignite the conflagration—a
massive uprising for the triumph of social revolution. Lenin said these Blanquist
tactics were a “Blanquist gamble" and “ a game of taking over power”. Both
Blanquism and Maoism are characterised by conspiratorial tactics based on action
only by the top leadership, without any consideration of objective conditions.
There is also a great deal that is common to the Maoists and the Narodniks. The p 285
assumption that the peasantry is imbued with “socialist instincts”, that the village
commune is an embryo of socialism, and that peasant riots will save mankind from
capitalism and exploitation—all these Narodnik political propositions have been re-
issued in a new version by the Maoists, who have visions of building communism
first in the countryside, and who consider the peasantry to be the greatest
constructive force. The Maoists regard the urge on the part of the poor section of the
Chinese peasants to have egalitarian distribution as signifying a high level of
communist awareness.
Maoism also reveals some Bonapartist features, like its reliance on the militarists p
and its tacking between classes and social groups. The Maoists have borrowed a
great deal from Confucius and his followers. Confucius believed that man’s moral
improvement was the best means of doing away with social injustice in society. This
Confucian dogma was adopted by Mao, who holds that if the Chinese studied his
articles—“Serve the People”, “In Memory of N. Bethune" and “Yui Kung Has
Moved the Mountains"—all their vital problems would be solved. Like Confucius,
Mao has visions of a “society of justice" which is to be set up by educating the
Chinese people in a spirit of asceticism and privation, instead of tackling economic
problems.
We believe these are the characteristic features of Maoism: p
First, eclecticism. This is natural because, as we have said, Maoism consists of p

different, sometimes mutually exclusive, concepts and propositions.
Second, primitivism and oversimplification, verging on distortion of various p

propositions of scientific theory.
Third, a demagogically utilitarian and pragmatic approach to theoretical propositions. p

Maoism regards philosophy as a narrowly utilitarian instrument to be used for the
achievement of definite aims, instead of a methodological basis for working out
correct strategy and tactics, policy and slogans.
When considering the eclecticism, primitivism and utilitarianism of Maoism the p

following points should be borne in mind. Maoism exists on two “levels”: one is for
the broad masses, and the other for a narrower group of persons, for the military-
bureaucratic elite; there are two “truths”: one is for general consumption, for the
Party rank-and-file, the masses of workers and peasants, and the other, for Mao’s 286
entourage. The second “truth” is a fairly coherent system of views concerning the
functioning and structure of social power, the principles of economic policy, and the
rules governing relations in society and the Party, and so on.
Fourth, Great-Han chauvinism. Many Maoist propositions are of a clearly p

chauvinistic tenor and are designed to back up the universal importance of Chinese
experience and, in consequence, China’s messianic role in the world revolutionary
process and in the whole of world history, and to justify the political practices of the
present Chinese leadership. Theoretically, their chauvinism is substantiated, the
Maoists argue, by the shift of the centre of the world revolutionary movement to
China. One newspaper declared: “China is the centre of world revolution. In the past,
the centre of history lay entirely in the West, but now it has shifted to China. China
has become not only the political and economic centre, but also the cultural centre.
It is unique in the whole world. In future the centre of science and technology will
also shift to China. . . . People’s China, armed with the thought of Mao Tse-tung,
will inevitably become the political, economic, cultural, scientific and technological
centre." [ 286•1
Brezhnev’s speech at the International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties p

in Moscow in June 1969, specifically drew attention to the connection between the
hegemonism of the present Chinese leadership and its Great-Power aspirations.
Great-Han chauvinism is indissolubly connected with anti-Sovietism. It is expressed p

above all in the fierce attacks on Lenin’s Party, which, according to the Mao group,
stands in the way of their hegemonistic aspirations. Here is how the Maoists’ logic
runs: in order to impose their doctrines on the international revolutionary movement
and to subordinate all countries and peoples to their political and ideological diktat,
there is need to “crush” the CPSU. For that purpose, the most incredible, slanderous
inventions have been circulated about the “aggressiveness of the USSR" and a
“Soviet-American deal”.
Brezhnev’s report on the occasion of the centenary of the birth of Lenin said: “The 287
enemies of socialism are the only ones who benefit by the virulent anti-Soviet
campaign that has been conducted in China during the past few years. Lately it has
been carried on under the screen of an alleged threat from the Soviet Union. By
their actions against the country of Lenin and against the world communist
movement the initiators of this campaign expose themselves before the masses as
apostates of the revolutionary cause of Lenin." [ 287•1
***
The emergence of an ideological trend like Maoism inevitably poses the question of p
the future of Marxism in oncebackward countries, including China. The ideologists of
the bourgeoisie have recently been drumming in the idea that Marxist theory is
inapplicable to countries with a precapitalist social structure, and have referred to the
experience of the Chinese revolution, the activity of Mao and his followers, and the
conceptual formalisation of Maoism.
We believe these assertions to be groundless. The spread of Marxist-Leninist ideas p

across the world is naturally promoted by the growth of the world revolutionary
process, as it involves many millions of working people in oncebackward countries
in Asia, Africa and Latin America. It would, of course, be wrong to assume that the
process runs smoothly and painlessly. The experience of the past few decades shows
that the spread of Marxism in breadth has far from always been accompanied by a
correct understanding and application of its principles. Lenin wrote: “One of the
most profound causes that periodically give rise to differences over tactics is the very
growth of the labour movement. If this movement is not measured by the criterion of
some fantastic ideal, but is regarded as the practical movement of ordinary people, it
will be clear that the enlistment of larger and larger numbers of new ‘recruits’, the
attraction of new sections of the working people must inevitably be accompanied by
waverings in the sphere of theory and tactics, by repetitions of old mistakes, by a 288
temporary reversion to antiquated views and antiquated methods, and so forth. The
labour movement of every country periodically spends a varying amount of energy,
attention and time on the ‘training’ of recruits." [ 288•1
This warning of Lenin’s is of special importance for the working-class movement in p

the developing countries. It is common knowledge that the social structure of these
countries is marked by a slight class differentiation, the prevalence of peasants
among the population, and a weak working class (or no working class to speak of in
some countries). All of this, quite naturally, confronts Marxists in these countries
with much more difficult tasks than those that have ever faced Marxists in the
developed capitalist countries.
China is a striking example of the extreme backwardness, illiteracy and ignorance of p

millions of people in the past. But there are different kinds of backwardness. Russia,
too, was once very backward, but both this backwardness and the need for change
had already been recognised among the leading sections of the intelligentsia as early
as the end of the 18th century. Russia had a rich and historically rooted
revolutionary tradition of social thinking and social action. In China, such a tradition
began to take shape only in the 20th century. The country did not have any serious
chance of “experiencing” the various theories of revolutionary thought, before it
found itself faced with the need of expressing its attitude to full-fledged socialist
trends, notably, Marxism.
This brings up the fundamental methodological question about applying general p

Marxist propositions to concrete (national) conditions, specifically in backward
countries which include China. It would be wrong to deny the need to consider
national specifics as Marxism is joined with the revolutionary movement in this or
that country. Marxism is not “applied” to some abstract social organism, but to a
definite socio-historical soil. Marxism is not joined with a working-class movement
in general, but with the political movement of the working class and the other
exploited sections in the given country. Marxism is not adopted by abstract men, but 289
real individuals with definite and fairly stable conceptions, traditions and habits
which have been shaped under the influence of their social milieu.
Lenin was fully aware of this and of the great difficulties facing Marxists in the p
backward countries. He required that they should display skill in tackling the
complex problems of reality, and taking account of national specifics in applying
Marxism in the conditions of backward countries.
Consequently, the spread and assimilation of Marxist ideas in socio-economically p

backward countries cannot be quite identical, at any rate not at the initial stage, to
similar processes taking place in the advanced countries.
All of this has a direct bearing on China. Marxism can be successfully adapted to p
China’s conditions only if the men directing this process take account of the
socioeconomic conditions, of China’s historical past, of the level of scientific
development and scientific thinking, including philosophy, and of the Chinese
national traditions.
However, the transfer of Marxism to national, in this instance Chinese, soil should p
not be accompanied with departures from its cardinal principles. Marxists resolutely
oppose any stereotyped application of general truths and the imposition of abstract
schemes without considering the specifics of each country. However, consideration of
national specifics cannot and must not be accompanied with departures from the
general principles of Marxism, with direct betrayal of these principles and a
substitution of a hostile ideology for Marxism. At this point, exceptional importance
attaches to the subjective moment, meaning who directs the process of joining
Marxism with the revolutionary movement of the exploited masses in each country.
Because since the 1930s this process in China was headed mainly by inconsistent
Marxists or anti-Marxists (Mao and his followers) this has resulted in the emergence
of an ideological trend like Maoism, which is hostile to Marxism.
Marxists insist on the creative development of the theory of scientific socialism. p

“Communists regard it as their task firmly to uphold the revolutionary principles of
MarxismLeninism and proletarian internationalism in the struggle against all enemies,
steadfastly to make them a living reality, constantly to develop Marxist-Leninist 290
theory and enrich it on the basis of present experience of waging the class struggle
and building socialist society." [ 290•1
The Maoists have distorted the idea of the creative approach to the development of p
Marxism-Leninism. Referring to the specifics of the Chinese revolution, Mao has
tried to create a methodology of his own, which is different from Marxist-Leninist
methodology, clothing it in “Chinese” national form. He wrote: “Marxism can be
translated into life only through a national form. There is no abstract Marxism, there
is only concrete Marxism. Concrete Marxism is Marxism that is embodied in national
form, that is, Marxism which is applied in concrete struggle, in the concrete
conditions of Chinese reality, and not Marxism which is applied abstractly. If the
Communists, who constitute a part of the great nation, who are an organic part of
this nation, treat Marxism outside the context of China’s specifics, that will be
abstract, empty Marxism." [ 290•2
Indeed, Marxism needs to be applied in the light of the concrete situation in any p
country, including China. But Mao is wrong in saying that there is only “concrete
Marxism”. This is a denial of the international character of Marxism, and its
“quartering” at the various “national premises”.
It is also wrong in itself to contrast “abstract” and “ concrete" Marxism, because p

Marxism is a coherent doctrine of the international working class.
Creative application of Marxism in accordance with each country’s conditions does p

not amount to its “ nationalisation”, which is why it is wrong to speak of a
“Russified”, “Germanised” or “Sinified” Marxism. But Mao believes the application
of Marxism in the concrete conditions of Chinese reality is a “Sinification” of
Marxism, which in effect amounts to a distortion and vulgarisation of Marxism and
its supplanting by the “thought of Mao Tse-tung”.
The emergence of Maoism, and its subsequent establishment as the official doctrine p
of the CPC, has never been inevitable. The experience of revolution and socialist
construction in countries neighbouring on China, the history of the revolutionary 291
movement in China herself, and finally, the practice of the first ten years of the
people’s power in China show that Marxist-Leninist ideas are universally meaningful,
both for countries in the West and for countries in the East.
There is no doubt at all that the fundamental stand taken by the CPSU and the other
fraternal Parties on the antiLeninist and anti-socialist propositions of the present
Chinese leadership, and the well-argumented scientific critique of its theoretical
conceptions will help to enhance the influence of Marxist ideology among the
Chinese people.
***

TEXT SIZE
normal
Notes
[ 286•1] Hungse haiyuan, January 24, 1968.
[ 287•1] L. I. Brezhnev, Lenin’s Cause Lives On and Triumphs, Moscow, 1970, p.

64.
[ 290•1] International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties, Moscow, 1969, p.

41.
[ 290•2] Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works, Harbin, 1946, p. 928 (in Chinese).
< >

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PROLETARIAN CULTURAL
REVOLUTION'', OR DRIVE
AGAINST WORLD CULTURE

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A Abc of Dialectical and Historical Materialism

A Abc of Dialectical and Historical Materialism
Contents
A Abc of Planning: Fundamentals of the theory and methodology of economic planning, An
A About Andrei Tarkovsky
Index A About Lenin: Lenin in Soviet Literature
Card A Account to the Party and the People:, An
A Across the Soviet Union: Impressions of the USSR
Formats: A Activeness and Self-Education
Text A Actors Without Makeup
PS A Advocates of Colonialism
PDF A Aesthetics and Poetics
A Aesthetics, Art, Life: A collection of articles
A Aesthetics: A Textbook
Other
A Afghanistan Weighs Heavy on My Heart: The reminiscences of soldiers who fought in Afghanistan
Titles:
T*
A Afghanistan, the Revolution Continues
A Afghanistan: Between the past and future
Years: A Afghanistan: Past and present
19* A Africa Today: Progress, difficulties, perspectives
A Africa: Politics Economy Ideology
A Africa: Progress, problems, prospects:
### A African Communists Speak: Articles and documents from "The African Communist"
MAP A African Countries’ Foreign Policy.
A After 14,000 Wars
A Against Dogmatism and Sectarianism in the Working-Class Movement
A Against Liquidationism
A Against Right-Wing and Left-Wing Opportunism, Against Trotskyism
A Against Trotskyism: The struggle of Lenin and the CPSU against Trotskyism
A Against U.S. Aggression for National Salvation
A Against the Threat of Another World War
A Age-Group and Pedagogical Psychology
A Aggressive Broadcasting, Evidence Facts Documents: Psychological Warfare
A Agony of a Dictatorship: Nicaraguan Chronicle, The
A Agostinho Neto
A Agrarian India Betwen the World Wars
A Agrarian Reforms and Hired Labour in Africa
A Agrarian Relations in the USSR
A Agricultural Co-operatives: Their role in the development of socialist agriculture in the Soviet Union
A Agriculture in the U.S.S.R
A Aim of A Lifetime:, The
A Albert Einstein’s Philosophical Views and the Theory of Relativity
A Albert Einstein: Creator and rebel
A Alexei Tolstoy Collected Works In Six Volumes:
A All About The Telescope
A Along the Path Blazed in Helsinki
A Alternatives to Positivism.
A Always a Journalist
A Ambient Conflicts: Chapters from the history of relations between countries with different social system
A American Age of Reason: Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, The
A American Literary Criticism: An anthology
A American Model on the Scales of History, The
A American Utopia, The
A American Youth Today
A Americans: As seen by a Soviet writer, The
A Anarchism and Anarcho-Syndicalism
A Anatomy of Lies [Amnesty International], The
A Anatomy of the Middle East Conflict
A Ancient Civilisations of East and West
A Andromeda: A Space Age Tale
A Anglo-Bulgarian Relations During the Second World War
A Anthology of Soviet Short Stories: In Two Volumes: Volume One.
A Anthology of Soviet Short Stories: In Two Volumes: Volume Two.
http://www.leninist.biz/en/TAZ[2012-12-18 2:34:25]
A Anthony Eden
A Anti-Communism Today
A Anti- Communism, the Main Line of Zionism
A Anti-Hitler Coalition:, The
A Antitank Warfare
A Anton Chekhov and His Times
A Anton Makarenko: His life and his work in education
A Arab Struggle For Economic Independence
A Arduous Beginning, The
A Are Our Moscow Reporters Giving Us the Facts About the USSR?
A Aristotle
A Armed Forces of the Soviet Union, The
A Arms Trade: A new level of danger, The
A Arms and Dollars: Roots of U.S. foreign policy
A Army and Social Progress, The
A Army and the Revolutionary Transformation of Society, The
A Art Festivals, USSR
A Art and Social Life
A Art and Society: Collection of articles
A Artistic Creativity, Reality and Man.
A Artistic Truth and Dialectics of Creative Work
A As Military Adviser in China
A As the People Willed: A documented account of how the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was founded (1917–1922)
A Ascent: Careers in the USSR, The
A Asian Dilemma: A Soviet view and Myrdal’s concept
A Asian Dilemma: The essence of social progress in the transitional period
A Astronomy for Entertainment
A At the Bidding of the Heart:
A At the Centr\ve of Political Storms: The memoirs of a Soviet diplomat
A At the Turning Points of History: Some lessons of the struggle against revisionism within the Marxist-Leninist movement
A Atlantis
A Atomic Nucleus
A Authoritarianism and Democracy
A Avengers:
A Awakening to Life: Forming behaviour and the mind in deaf-blind children
A Azerbaijanian Poetry, Classic Modern, Traditional:
B Badges and Trophies in Soviet Sports
B Basic Economic Law of Modern Capitalism, The
B Basic Principles of Dialectical and Historical Materialism, The
B Basic Principles of Operational Art and Tactics: A Soviet view, The
B Basic Principles of the Organisation of Soviet Agriculture, The
B Basic Problems of the Marxist-Leninst Theory: Symposium of Lectures
B Basics of Marxist-Leninist Theory
B Battle for the Caucasus
B Battle of Ideas in the Modern World., The
B Battle of Kursk, The
B Before the Nazi Invasion: Soviet Diplomacy in September 1939–June 1941
B Beginning: Lenin’s Childhood and Youth, The
B Behind the Facade of the Masonic Temple:
B Behind the Scenes of Third Reich Diplomacy.
B Benefactors of Peace
B Big Business and the Economic Cycle:
B Big Changes in the USSR: Leafing through the Soviet Journal Kommunist
B Biosphere and Politics, The
B Birth of Nations, The
B Birth of a Genius: The Development of the Personality and World Outlook of Karl Marx
B Black Book and Schwambrania:, The
B Blacks in United States History
B Bolshevik Party’s Struggle Against Trotskyism (1903–February 1917), The
B Bolshevik Party’s Struggle Against Trotskyism in the Post-October Period., The
B Bolshevik-led Socialist Revolution, March–October 1917, The
B Bolsheviks and the Armed Forces in Three Revolutions:, The
B Book About Artists
B Book About Bringing Up Children, A
B Book About Russia: In the union of equals:, A
B Books in the Service of Peace, Humanism, and Progress
B Books in the USSR
B Boris Kustodiev: The Artist and His Work
B Boris Pasternak: Selected writings and letters.
B Bourgeois Economic Thought 1930s–1970s
B Bourgeois Nations and Socialist Nations
B Breadwinners, The
B Brief Course of Dialectical Materialism: Popular outline, A
B British Foreign Policy During World War II 1939–1945
B Broad-Casting Pirates or Abuse of the Microphone:
B Builder of Socialism and Figher Against Fascism, The
B Bureaucracy in India
B Bureaucracy, Triumph and Crisis: New thinking
B Bureaucrats in Power–Ecological Collapse
B By: ANNA LOUISE STRONG
B By: JASON W. SMITH
C Camp of Socialism and the Camp of Capitalism, The
C Can Man Change the Climate?
C Can Socialists & Communists Co-Operate?
C Canada–USA: Problems and contradictions in North American economic integration
C Capital Accumulation and Economic Growth in Developing Africa
C Capitalism and the Ecological Crisis
C Capitalism at the End of the Century
C Capitalism, Socialism and Scientific and Technical Revolution
C Capitalism, the Technological Revolution, and the Working Class
C Capitalist Economy
C Case for Perestroika: Articles from the monthly Kommunist , The
C Categories and Laws of the Political Economy of Communism
C Caught in the Act
C Causality and the Relation of States in Physics
C Cause of My Life., The
C Caution: Zionism!:
C Cecil Rhodes and His Time
C Central Asia and Kazakhstan Before and After the October Revolution
C Central Asia and Kazakstan[d] Before and After the October Revolution: Reply to falsifiers of history
C Central Asia in Modern Times:
C Central V.I. Lenin Museum
C Centralised Planning of the Economy
C Ch’ing Empire and the Russian State in the 17th Century, The
C Challenges of Our Time: Disarmament and social progress, The
C Champions of Peace
C Changing Face of the Earth:, The
C Chapters from the History of Russo-Chinese Relations 17th–19th Centuries
C Child Development and Education
C Child, Adults, Peers: Patterns of communication
C Children and Sport in the USSR
C Children and Sport in the USSR
C Chile, Corvalan, Struggle.
C Chile: CIA Big Business
C China Theatre in World War II: 1939–1945., The
C China and Her Neighbours from Ancient Times to the Middle Ages:
C Choice Facing Europe, The
C Choice for Children, A
C Christ–Myth or Reality?
C Christian Ecumenism
C Christianity and Marxism
C Cia Target: The USSR
C Cia in Asia: Covert operations against India and Afghanistan., The
C Cia in Latin America, The
C Cia in the Dock., The
C Citizenship of the USSR: A legal study.
C City Invincible
C City of the Yellow Devil: Pamphlets, articles and letters about America, The
C Civil Codes of the Soviet Republics., The
C Civil Law and the Protection of Personal Rights in the USSR
C Civil War in Russia: Its causes and significance, The
C Civil War in the United States, The
C Civilisation and Global Problems
C Civilisation and the Historical Process
C Civilisation, Science, Philosophy:
C Civilisation, science, philosophy : theme of the 17th World Congress of Philosophy
C Classes and Nations
C Classes and the Class Struggle in the USSR, 1920s–1930s
C Classic Soviet Plays
C Classical Islamic Philosophy
C Cmea Countries and Developing States: Economic cooperation
C Cmea Today: From economic co-operation to economic integration
C Cmea and Third Countries: Legal aspects of co-operation

C Cmea and the Strategy of Acceleration
C Cmea: International Significance of Socialist Integration
C Co-operative Movement in Asia and Africa:, The
C Collapse of the Russian Empire 1917, The
C Comet in the Night: The story of Alexander Ulyanov’s heroic life and tragic death as told by his contemporaries
C Coming World Order, The
C Comintern and the East: A critique of the critique, The
C Comintern and the East: The struggle for the Leninist strategy and tactics in national liberation movements, The
C Comintern and the East: strategy and tactics in national liberation movements, The
C Communism IN THE UNITED STATES— A BIBLIOGRAPHY
C Communism and Cultural Heritage
C Communism and Freedom
C Communism as a Social Formation
C Communism: Questions and Answers: 1
C Communism: Questions and Answers: 7
C Communism: Questions and answers: 4
C Communist :: 1938 (VOL. XVII), The
C Communist Morality
C Communist Party (Cuba): (Collection of documents)
C Communist Party in Socialist Society: A critique of bourgeois concepts , The
C Communist Response to the Challenge of Our Time, The
C Communists and the Youth: Study of revolutionary education
C Comprehensive Programme for the Further Extension and Improvement of Co-Operation and the Development of Socialist Economic Integration by the CMEA Member Countries
C Comprehensive Science of Man: Studies and solutions, A
C Comrade Stalin—the Continuer of Lenin’s Great Work
C Concept of Common Heritage of Mankind: From new thinking to new practice.
C Concepts of Regional Development
C Concise Psychological Dictionary, A
C Confrontation or Compromise?: The meaning of worker participation in the management of capitalist enterprises
C Conjugation of Russian Verbs
C Conservation of Nature
C Conservatism in U.S. Ideology and Politics
C Consolidation of the Socialist Countries Unity
C Conspiracy Against Delgado: A History of One Operation by the CIA and the PIDE
C Conspiracy Against the Tsar: A Portrait of the Decembrists
C Constitution of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
C Constitutional Law and Political Institutions.
C Contemporary Anti-Communism: Policy and ideology.
C Contemporary Bourgeois Legal Thought: A Marxist evaluation of the basic concepts
C Contemporary Capitalism and the Middle Classes
C Contemporary Capitalism: New developments and contradictions
C Contemporary International Law: Collection of articles.
C Contemporary Political Science in the USA and Western Europe
C Contemporary Revolutionary Process: Theoretical Essays, The
C Contemporary Trotskyism: Its anti-revolutionary nature
C Contemporary World History 1917–1945, A
C Contemporary World Situation and Validity of Marxism
C Contradictions of Agrarian Integration in the Common Market
C Correction of the Convicted: Law, theory, practice
C Correspondence Between the Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR and the Presidents of the USA and the Prime Ministers of Great Britain During the Great Patriotic War of 1941–1945:
VOLUME 1:
C Correspondence Between the Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR and the Presidents of the USA and the Prime Ministers of Great Britain During the Great Patriotic War of 1941–1945:
VOLUME 2:
C Cpsu and the Soviet State in Developed Socialist Society, The
C Cpsu in the Struggle for Unity of All Revolutionary and Peace Forces, The
C Cpsu’s Nationalities Policy: Truth and lies, The
C Cpsu: Ideological, political and organisational principles., The
C Cpsu: Party of Proletarian Internationalism
C Cpsu: Topical Aspects of History and Policy, The
C Criminalistics
C Crisis of Capitalism and the Conditions of the Working People., The
C Crisis of World Capitalism
C Critique of Anti-Marxist Theories
C Critique of Mao Tse-Tung’s Theoretical Conceptions., A
C Critique of Masarykism, A
C Cultural Changes in Developing Countries
C Cultural Exchange: 10 years after Helsinki
C Cultural Life of the Soviet Worker: A Sociological Study, The
C Culture and Perestroika
C Culture for the Millions
C Current Problems of Contemporary Capitalism

D Danger: NATO
D De Gaulle: His Life and Work
D Death Can Wait
D Decisions of the Central Committee, C.P.S.U.(B.) on Literature and Art (1946-1948)
D Dedication: Stories about Soviet men and women
D Definition (Logico-Methodological Problems)
D Demography in the Mirror of History
D Denis Diderot
D Destiny of Capitalism in the Orient
D Destiny of the World: The socialist shape of things to come, The
D Destruction of Reason, The
D Destructive POLICY [Policy of Chinese leadership], A
D Destructive Policy, A
D Detente and Anti-communism
D Detente and the World Today: 26th CPSU Congress:
D Developed Socialism: Theory and practice
D Developed Socialist Society: Basic features and place in history.
D Developing Countries from the Standpoint of Marxist Political Economy
D Developing Countries’ Social Structure, The
D Developing Nations At the Turn of Millennium.
D Development by J.V. Stalin of the Marxist-Leninist Theory of the National Question, The
D Development of Revolutionary Theory by the CPSU.
D Development of Rights and Freedoms in the Soviet State, The
D Development of Soviet Law and Jurisprudence:, The
D Development of the Monist View of History., The
D Dialectical Logic: Essays on its history and theory
D Dialectical Materialism and the History of Philosophy
D Dialectical Materialism.
D Dialectical Materialism: Popular lectures
D Dialectics in Modern Physics
D Dialectics of the Abstract and the Concrete in Marx’s Capital, The
D Dialogue For Peace
D Dialogue of Cultures or Cultural Expansion?
D Dictionary for Believers and Nonbelievers., A
D Dictionary of Ethics., A
D Dictionary of International Law, A
D Dictionary of Philosophy (1967)
D Dictionary of Philosophy (1984)
D Dictionary of Political Economy., A
D Dictionary of Scientific Communism., A
D Difficult Mission: War Memoirs: Soviet Admiral in Great Britain during the Second World War.
D Dilemma of Balanced Regional Development in India
D Diplomacy of Aggression: Berlin–Rome–Tokyo Axis, its rise and fall.
D Diplomatic Battles Before World War II
D Disarmament and the Economy
D Disarmament: the Command of the Times
D Discovering the Soviet Union
D Discovery of the Century
D Distribution of the Productive Forces: General schemes, theory and practice
D Dmitry Shostakovich: About himself and his times
D Do The Russians Want War?
D Documents and Materials Relating to the Eve of the Second World War:
D Documents and Resolutions: the 26th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, Moscow, February 23–March 3, 1981
D Domination in 2,545 Endgame Studies.
D Dramas of the Revolution.
D Drawings by Soviet Children
D Dynamic Stability: The Soviet economy today
D Dynamic Twentieth Century, The
E Early Centuries of Russian History
E Early Russian Architecture
E Early Stories
E East After the Collapse of the Colonial System, The
E Eastern Societies: Revolution, Power, Progress:
E Echoes of the A-Blast
E Ecology and Development
E Ecology: Political Institutions and Legislation: environmental law in the USSR
E Economic “Theories” of Maoism., The
E Economic Aspects of Capitalist Integration
E Economic Aspects of Social Security in the USSR, The
E Economic Cycle: Postwar Development, The
E Economic Development and Perspective Planning

E Economic Geography of the Ocean
E Economic Geography of the Socialist Countries of Europe:
E Economic Geography of the World
E Economic Geography of the World
E Economic Geography: Theory and methods
E Economic Growth and the Market in the Developing Countries
E Economic History: The Age of Imperialism (1870–1917), An
E Economic Inequality of Nations
E Economic Integration: Two approaches
E Economic Law
E Economic Neocolonialism: Problems of South-East Asian Countries’ Struggle for Economic Independence
E Economic Policy During the Construction of Socialism in the USSR
E Economic Substantiation of the Theory of Socialism, The
E Economic System of Socialism, The
E Economic Theories and Reality
E Economic Zone: An International Legal Aspect, The
E Economics, Politics, the Class Struggle, International Relations
E Economies of Rich and Poor Countries, The
E Economies of the Countries of Latin America
E Economy of the Soviet Union Today: Socialism Today, The
E Education in the U.S.S.R.
E Education of the Soviet Soldier: Party-political work in the Soviet armed forces.
E Einstein and the Philosophical Problems of 20th-Century Physics
E Einstein
E Elements of Political Knowledge.
E Elitist Revolution or Revolution of the Masses?
E Elyuchin
E Emotions, Myths and Theories.
E End of Ideology Theory: Illusions and reality:, The
E End of the Third Reich., The
E Engels: A short biography
E English Revolution of the 17th Century through Portraits of Its Leading Figures, The
E Enigma of Capital: A Marxist viewpoint., The
E Environment: International Aspects
E Envoy of the Stars: Academician Victor Ambartsumyan
E Epoch of the Collapse of Capitalism and the Development of Socialism
E Era of Man or Robot?
E Ernesto Che Guevara
E Essays in Contemporary History, 1917–1945
E Essays in Contemporary History, 1946–1990
E Essays in Political Economy: Imperialism and the developing countries
E Essays in Political Economy: Socialism and the socialist orientation
E Essays on Linguistics: Language systems and structures
E Estonia, One of the United Family.
E Eternal Man: Reflections, dialogues, portraits
E Ethics of Science: Issues and controversies, The
E Ethics.
E Ethiopia: Population, resources, economy
E Ethnic Problems of the Tropical Africa: Can they be solved?
E Ethnocultural Development of African Countries
E Ethnocultural Processes and National Problems in the Modern World.
E Ethnogenesis and the Biosphere
E Europe 1939:
E Europe and Detente
E Europe and the Communists
E European Security and Co-Operation:
E European Security: Social aspects
E Evgeny Vakhtangov
E Exercises in Russian syntax with explanatory notes: [no date [ca. 1960]].
E Experience of Industrial Management in the Soviet Union, The
E Experience of the CPSU: Its World Significance.
E Export of Counter-Revolution: Past and present, The
F Face to Face With America: The story of N.S. Khrushchov’s [Khrushchev’s] visit to U.S.A., September 15–27, 1959
F Facts About the USSR
F Failure of Three Missions: British diplomacy and intelligence in the efforts to overthrow Soviet government in Central Asia and Transcaucasia...
F Fate of Man, The
F Faust versus Mephistopheles?
F Felix Dzerzhinsky: A biography.
F Female Labour Under Socialism: The Socio-Economic Aspects
F Feudal Society and Its Culture
F Few Salient Points or Things That Agitate Us: A collection of articles, A

F Fifty Fighting Years: The Communist Party of South Africa, 1921–1971
F Fifty Soviet Poets
F Fifty Years of a New Era:
F Fighters for National Liberation: Political profiles
F Fighting Red Tape in the USSR
F Figures for Fun:
F Film Trilogy About Lenin, A
F Final Reckoning, Nuremburg Diaries, The
F Finale: A Retrospective Review of Imperialist Japan’s Defeat in 1945
F Finance and Credit in the USSR
F First Breath of Freedom, The
F First Congress of the Communist Party of Cuba:
F First Days of the October [sic. ABEBOOKS], The
F First Man in Space:
F Firsthand News
F Five Years’ Progress in Agricultural Production and the Tasks for the Future: Report
F Following Lenin’s Course: Speeches and articles
F Following the Course of All-round Perfection of Socialism
F For All Time and All Men [Karl Marx]
F For Man’s Happiness: The forum of Soviet Communists
F For a Nuclear-Free World
F For a Restructuring of International Economic Relations: 20th anniversary of UNCTAD
F Foreign Comrades in the October Revolution: Reminiscences
F Formation of the Socialist Economic System
F Foundations of Marxist Aesthetics
F Founding Fathers of the United States: Historical portraits
F Fourth Congress of the Lao People’s Revolutionary Party:, The
F Fraternal Family of Nations:, A
F Frederick Engels: A Biography
F Frederick Engels: His Life and Work
F Freedom and the Artist
F Freedom of Conscience in the USSR
F From Anti-Imperialism to Anti-Socialism: The evolution of Peking’s foreign policy
F From Childhood to Centenarian
F From Geneva to Reykjavik
F From Helsinki to Belgrade:
F From Keynes to Neoclassical Synthesis:
F From Literacy Classes to Higher Education
F From Madrid to Vienna: Follow-up report of the Soviet Committee for European Security and Cooperation on the Helsinki Final Act
F From Revisionism to Betrayal: A criticism of Ota Sik’s economic views
F From Socialism to Communism
F From Tsarist General to Red Army Commander
F From Wooden Plough to Atomic Power: The Story of Soviet Industrialisation.
F From the History of Soviet-Chinese Relations in the 1950’s: Concerning the discussion of Mao Zedong’s role
F From the Missionary Days to Reagan: US China Policy
F Fundamental Law of the U.S.S.R., The
F Fundamental Problems of Marxism
F Fundamentals of Corrective Labour Legislation of the USSR and the Union Republics: Statute on remand in custody
F Fundamentals of Criminalistics
F Fundamentals of Dialectical Materialism
F Fundamentals of Dialectics
F Fundamentals of Ergonomics
F Fundamentals of Legislation of the USSR and the Union Republics
F Fundamentals of Marxism-Leninism • Manual
F Fundamentals of Marxism-Leninism • Manual
F Fundamentals of Marxist-Leninist Philosophy (1974), The
F Fundamentals of Marxist-Leninist Philosophy (1982), The
F Fundamentals of Marxist-Leninist Theory and Tactics of Revolutionary Parties
F Fundamentals of Philosophy
F Fundamentals of Political Economy (1980)
F Fundamentals of Political Economy (1983), The
F Fundamentals of Political Economy: Popular course
F Fundamentals of Political Science: Textbook for primary political education.
F Fundamentals of Scientific Communism
F Fundamentals of Scientific Management of Socialist Economy
F Fundamentals of Scientific Socialism
F Fundamentals of Soviet State Law
F Fundamentals of Sports Training
F Fundamentals of the Socialist Theory of the State and Law
F Future of Society:, The
F Future of the USSR’s Economic Regions, The

F Futurology Fiasco: A Critical Study of non-Marxist Concepts of How Society Develops
G General Chernyakhovsky
G General Council of The First International 1864–1866: The London conference 1865 minutes
G General Crisis of Capitalism
G General Theory of Law: Social and philosophical problems, The
G Generalisation and Cognition
G Genesis of the Soviet Federative State (1917–1925)
G Genocide
G Geographical Prognostication: Problems and prospects
G Geography and Ecology: A collection of articles, 1971–1981
G Geography of the Soviet Union: Physical background, population, economy
G Georgi Dimitrov Selected Works (Volume 1):
G Georgi Dimitrov Selected Works (Volume 2):
G Georgi Dimitrov Selected Works (Volume 3)
G Georgi Dimitrov: An eminent theoretician and revolutionary
G Georgi Plekhanov Selected Philosophical Works (Volume I):
G Georgi Plekhanov Selected Philosophical Works (Volume II):
G Georgi Plekhanov Selected Philosophical Works (Volume III):
G Georgi Plekhanov Selected Philosophical Works (Volume IV):
G Georgi Plekhanov Selected Philosophical Works (Volume V):
G German Imperialism: Its past and present
G Germany:
G Glance at Historical Materialism, A
G Global engineering.
G Global Ecology
G Global Problems and the Future of Mankind
G Global Problems of Our Age
G Global Problems of Our Age
G Glory Eternal: Defence of Odessa 1941
G Going Beyond the Square: Notes by an economist
G Gorky Collected Works in Ten Volumes:
G Gorky and His Contemporaries:
G Government Regulation of the Private Sector in the USSR
G Great Baikal Amur Railway, The
G Great Construction Works of Communism and the Remaking of Nature
G Great Heritage: The classical literature of Old Rus, The
G Great March of Liberation, The
G Great Mission of Literature and Art, The
G Great October Revolution and World Social Progress, The
G Great October Revolution and the Intelligentsia:, The
G Great October Revolution and the Working Class, National Liberation and General Democratic Movements, The
G Great October Socialist Revolution, The
G Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union, 1941–1945:
G Grounds for Optimism
G Growing Up Human
G Growing Up in the Soviet Union from the Cradle to Coming of Age
G Guarantee of Peace
H Hague Congress of the First International, September 2–7, 1872:, The
H Handbook of Philosophy, A
H Hands Up! Or Public Enemy No. 1
H Hans Kohn Analyses the Russian Mind
H Hashar
H Hatredmongers: Anti-Soviet activity of the Lithuanian Clerical EmigrÃ©s
H Health Protection in the USSR.
H Heartbeat of Reform: Soviet jurists and political scientists discuss the progress of Perestroika:, The
H Henry Thoreau
H Henry Winston: Profile of a U.S. communist
H Higher Education and Computerisation
H Highlights of a Fighting History: 60 Years of the Communist Party, USA
H Historical Experience of the CPSU in Carrying Out Lenin’s Co-operative Plan
H Historical Knowledge: A Systems-Epistemological Approach.
H Historical Materialism ( by Cornforth )
H Historical Materialism (1969)
H Historical Materialism: An outline of Marxist theory of society.
H Historical Materialism: Basic problems.
H Historical Materialism: Theory, methodology, problems.
H Historical Science in Socialist Countries:
H Historical Science in the USSR: New research:
H History OF THE COMMUNIST PARTY OF THE SOVIET UNION / BOLSHEVIKS / SHORT COURSE
H History OF THE FIRST INTERNATIONAL
H History Versus Anti-History: A critique of the bourgeois falsification of the postwar history of the CPSU.
H History and Politics: American historiography on Soviet society
H History in the Making: Memoirs of World War II Diplomacy
H History of Afganistan
H History of Ancient Philosophy: Greece and Rome
H History of Classical Sociology, A
H History of India (2 v.), A
H History of Old Russian Literature, A
H History of Psychology, A
H History of Realism, A
H History of Religion
H History of Science: Soviet research, The
H History of Soviet Foreign Policy 1945–1970
H History of the Ancient World.
H History of the Middle Ages
H History of the October Revolution
H History of the Three Internationals
H History of the USA Since World War I
H History of the USSR in three parts: PART I:
H History of the USSR in three parts: PART II:
H History of the USSR in three parts: PART III:
H History of the USSR: An outline of socialist construction
H History of the USSR: Elementary course
H History of the USSR: The era of socialism
H Ho Chi Minh Selected Writings, 1920–1969:
H Ho Chi Minh.
H Honour Eternal: Second World War Memorials
H How Many Will the Earth Feed?
H How Socialism Began: Russia Under Lenin’s Leadership 1917–1923
H How Soviet Economy Won Technical Independence
H How Wars End: Eye-witness accounts of the fall of Berlin
H How the National Question Was Solved in Soviet Central Asia
H How the Revolution Was Won:
H How the Soviet Economy Is Run:
H How to Study Historical Materialism
H How to Study the Theory of Scientific Communism:
H Human Relations Doctrine: Ideological weapon of the monopolies.
H Human Rights and Freedoms in the USSR
H Human Rights and International Relations
H Human Rights, What We Argue About
H Human Rights: Continuing the discussion
H Humanism of Art., The
H Humanism, Atheism: Principles and Practice
H Humanism: Its Philosophical, Ethical and Sociological Aspects.
I I Hereby Apply for an Apartment
I I Saw the New World Born: John Reed
I Icon Painting: State Museum of Palekh Art.
I Ideals and Spiritual Values of Socialist Society, The
I Ideological Struggle Today
I Ideological Struggle and Literature:, The
I Ideology and Social Progress
I Ideology and Tactics of Anti-Communism: Myths and Reality, The
I Illusion of Equal Rights: Legal Inequality in the Capitalist World, An
I Image of India: The Study of Ancient Indian Civilisation in the USSR, The
I Immortality: Verse By Soviet Poets Who Laid Down Their Lives in the Great Patriotic War of 1941–1945
I Imperial China: Foreign-policy conceptions and methods
I Imperialism and the Developing Countries
I Improvement of Soviet Economic Planning
I In Disregard of the Law
I In Pursuit of Social Justice
I In Search of Harmony
I In Search of Holy Mother Russia
I In Southern Africa
I In the Forecasters’ Maze
I In the Grip of Terror
I In the Name of Life: Reflections of a Soviet Surgeon
I In the Name of Peace
I In the World of Music
I India: Independence and oil
I India: Social and Economic Development (18th–20th Century)
I India: Spotlight on Population
I Indian Economy, The

I Indian Philosophy in Modern Times
I Individual and Society, The
I Individual and the Microenvironment, The
I Individual in Socialist Society, The
I Industrial Revolution in the East, The
I Industrialisation of Developing Countries
I Industrialisation of India
I Inflation Under Capitalism Today
I Information Abused: Critical essays
I Insane Squandering: The Social and Economic Consequences of the Arms Race
I Integration of Science., The
I Intensifying Production: Acceleration factors
I Inter-American Relations from Bolivar to the Present
I Interaction of Sciences in the Study of the Earth, The
I International Covenants on Human Rights and Soviet Legislation
I International Humanitarian Law
I International Law of the Sea, The
I International Law: A textbook
I International Law
I International MEETING OF COMMUNIST AND WORKERS’ PARTIES – MOSCOW 1969
I International Monetary Law
I International Monopolies and Developing Countries
I International Solidarity with the Spanish Republic 1936–1939:
I International Space Law.
I International Terrorism and the CIA: Documents, Eyewitness Reports, Facts
I International Trade and the Improvement of the Standard of Living in the West
I International Working-Class Movement, Volume 1: The Origins of the Proletariat and Its Evolution as a Revolutionary Class, The
I International Working-Class Movement, Volume 2: The Working-Class Movement in the Period of Transition to Imperialism (1871–1904), The
I International Working-Class Movement, Volume 3: Revolutionary battles of the early 20th Century, The
I International Working-Class Movement, Volume 4: The Socialist Revolution in Russia and the International Working Class (1917–1923), The
I International Working-Class Movement, Volume 5: The Builder of Socialism and Fighter Against Fascism, The
I International Working-Class Movement, Volume 6: The Working-Class Movement in the Developed Capitalist Countries After the Second World War (1945–1979), The
I International Working-Class and Communist Movement: Historical Record (1830s to mid-1940s)
I Interpreting America: Russian and Soviet Studies of the History of American Thought
I Introduction to Physics
I Invitation to a Dialogue
I Islam and Muslims in the Land of the Soviets
J Jawaharlal Nehru and His Political Views
J Jawaharlal Nehru
J Joint Jubilee Meeting of the CPSU Central Committee, Supreme Soviet of the USSR and the Supreme Soviet of the Russian Federation, Moscow November 3, 1967
J Jonestown Carnage: A CIA crime, The
K Kampuchea: From Tragedy to Rebirth
K Karl Marx and Modern Philosophy: Collection of Articles
K Karl Marx and Our Time: Articles and speeches
K Karl Marx and Our Time: The struggle for peace and social progress
K Karl Marx’s Great Discovery: The dual-nature-of-labour doctrine:
K Karl Marx: A Biography
K Karl Marx: Short biography.
K Keynesianism Today:
K Klement Gottwald Selected Writings 1944–1949
K Komsomol: Questions and Answers, The
K Konstantin Stanislavsky, 1863–1963: Man and Actor:
K Kwame Nkrumah
L Labour Protection at Soviet Industrial Enterprises
L Labour in the USSR: Problems and solutions
L Land of Soviets, The
L Landmarks in History: The Marxist Doctrine of Socio-Economic Formations
L Landmarks of Marxist Socio-Economic Foundations
L Last Nuclear Explosion: Forty years of struggle against nuclear tests, The
L Last of the Romans and European Culture, The
L Law and Force in the International System
L Law and Legal Culture in Soviet Society
L Law, Morality and Man:
L Law, Progress, and Peace: A journalist’s observations on the influence of Soviet law on the progressive development of international law
L Leap Through the Centuries, A
L Leftist Terrorism: Are the Leftist Terrorists Really Left?
L Legal Regulation of Soviet Foreign Economic Relations, The
L Legislation in the USSR
L Legislative Acts of the USSR: Book 3
L Lenin About the Press
L Lenin COLLECTED WORKS (International), V.I.

L Lenin Collected Works
L Lenin In Our Life.
L Lenin In Profile: World writers and artists on Lenin
L Lenin On Participation of the People in Government
L Lenin Prize Winners: Soviet stars theatre, music, art
L Lenin Selected Works
L Lenin Talks to America.
L Lenin Through the Eyes of Lunacharsky
L Lenin Through the Eyes of the World:
L Lenin and Books
L Lenin and Gorky: Letters, reminiscences, articles.
L Lenin and Library Organisation.
L Lenin and Modern Natural Science.
L Lenin and National Liberation in the East
L Lenin and Problems of Literature.
L Lenin and USSR Foreign Politics
L Lenin and the Bourgeois Press
L Lenin and the Leagues of Struggle
L Lenin and the Soviet Peace Policy: Articles and Speeches 1944–80.
L Lenin and the World Revolutionary Process
L Lenin in London: Memorial places
L Lenin in Soviet Literature; A Remarkable Year, etc.
L Lenin in Soviet Poetry
L Lenin on Labour Under Socialism: The Great Legacy of Marxism-Leninism
L Lenin on Language
L Lenin on religion, V.I.
L Lenin on the Intelligentsia
L Lenin on the Unity of the International Communist Movement
L Lenin’s "What the ‘Friends of the People’ Are and How They Fight the Social-Democrats"
L Lenin’s “Materialism and Empirio-Criticism”
L Lenin’s “The Proletarian Revolution and the Renegade Kautsky”
L Lenin’s Behests and the Making of Soviet Latvia
L Lenin’s Comrades-In-Arms:
L Lenin’s Doctrine of National Liberation Revolutions and Modern World
L Lenin’s Geneva Addresses
L Lenin’s Ideas and Modern International Relations
L Lenin’s Plan of Building Socialism in the USSR
L Lenin’s Political Testament
L Lenin’s Teaching on the World Economy and Its Relevance to Our Times
L Lenin’s Theory of Non-capitalist Development and the Experience of Mongolia:
L Lenin’s Theory of Revolution
L Lenin: A Biography
L Lenin: A Short Biography., V.I.
L Lenin: Comrade and man
L Lenin: Great and Human
L Lenin: His life and work: Documents and photographs, V.I.
L Lenin: Revolution and the World Today
L Lenin: The Founder of the Soviet Armed Forces
L Lenin: The Great Theoretician.
L Lenin: The Revolutionary.
L Lenin: The Story of His Life, V. I.
L Lenin: Youth and The Future
L Lenin: a Biography
L Leningrad Does Not Surrender
L Leninism and Contemporary Problems of the Transition from Capitalism to Socialism.
L Leninism and Modern China’s Problems
L Leninism and Revolution: Reply to Critics
L Leninism and Today’s Problems of the Transition to Socialism
L Leninism and the Agrarian Peasant Question in Two Volumes: Volume One:
L Leninism and the Agrarian Peasant Question in Two Volumes: Volume Two:
L Leninism and the Battle of Ideas.
L Leninism and the National Question
L Leninism and the Revolutionary Process
L Leninism and the World Revolutionary Working-Class Movement (1971):
L Leninism and the World Revolutionary Working-Class Movement (1976):
L Leninism: The Banner of Liberation and Progress of Nations
L Leninist Standards of Party Life.
L Leninist Theory of Reflection and the Present Day, The
L Leninist Theory of Revolution and Social Psychology
L Leninist Theory of Socialist Revolution and the Contemporary World.
L Let Us Live in Peace and Friendship

L Let the Blood of Man Not Flow
L Let the Living Remember: Soviet War Poetry
L Letters From the Dead:
L Lev Vygotsky.
L Liberation Mission of the Soviet Armed Forces in the Second World War
L Liberation of Europe, The
L Liberation
L Lie of a Soviet War Threat, The
L Life and Activities of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin: A lofty example of serving mankind, The
L Life and Death of Martin Luther King, The
L Life and Work of Walt Whitman: A Soviet view
L Life of Lenin
L Life, Art and America: Narratives and stories, articles
L Life, We’re All in It Together
L Lifelong Cause, A
L Literature and the New Thinking
L Living Ocean, The
L Living and Effective Teaching of Marxism-Leninism:, The
L Logic Made Simple: A dictionary
L Logic
L Lomonosov’s Philosophy
L Long Road: Sino-Russian economic contacts from ancient times to 1917, The
L Looking Into the Future
M Macro-Economic Models
M Mad Love
M Made in USSR
M Mahitahi = Work Together: Some peoples of the Soviet Union
M Main Trends in Philosophy: A theoretical analysis of the history of philosophy., The
M Major Ethnosocial Trends in the USSR
M Making of the Marxist Philosophy from Idealism and Revolutionary Democracy to Dialectical Materialism and Scientific Communism, The
M Man After Work: Social problems of daily life and leisure time.
M Man At Work: The Scientific and Technological Revolution, the Soviet Working Class and Intelligentsia
M Man and His Stages of Life
M Man and Man’s World: the categories of “man” and “world” in the system of scientific world outlooks
M Man and Nature: The ecological crisis and social progress
M Man and Sea Warfare
M Man and Society
M Man and the Scientific and Technological Revolution
M Man as the Object of Education: An Essay in Pedagogical Anthropology (Selected extracts)
M Man at the Limit: Eye-witness reports
M Man’s Dreams are Coming True.
M Man’s Potential: Sketches
M Man’s Road to Progress: Talks on political topics
M Man, Science and Society
M Man, Science, Humanism: A New Synthesis
M Man, Society and the Environment:
M Man: His Behaviour and Social Relations
M Management of Socialist Production
M Mankind and the Year 2000: Current problems
M Manoeuvre in Modern Land Wafare
M Manpower Resources and Population Under Socialism
M Manzhou Rule in China
M Mao Tse-Tung: A political portrait
M Mao Tse-Tung: An ideological and psychological portrait
M Mao’s Betrayal
M Maoism As It Really Is:
M Maoism Through the Eyes of Communists
M Maoism Unmasked: Collection of Soviet Press Articles
M Maoism and Its Policy of Splitting the National Liberation Movement
M Maoism and Mao’s Heirs
M Maoism: The Curse of China
M Market of Socialist Economic Integration: Selected conference papers, The
M Marshal of the Soviet Union G. Zhukov (Volume 2):
M Marx & Engles Collected Works
M Marx • Engels • Marxism [Lenin]
M Marx Engels On Religion
M Marx and Engels Through the Eyes of Their Contemporaries
M Marx’s “Critique of the Gotha Programme”
M Marx’s Theory of Commodity and Surplus-Value: Formalised exposition
M Marxism and the Renegade Garaudy
M Marxism-Leninism on Proletarian Internationalism

M Marxism-Leninism on War and Army
M Marxism-Leninism on War and Peace
M Marxism-Leninism on the Non-Capitalist Way
M Marxism-Leninism: A Flourishing Science
M Marxism-Leninism: The International teaching of the working class
M Marxist Conception of Law, The
M Marxist Philosophy at the Leninist Stage
M Marxist Philosophy: A Popular Outline.
M Marxist Philosophy
M Marxist-Leninist Aesthetics and Life:
M Marxist- Leninist Aesthetics and the Arts
M Marxist-Leninist Philosophy (1978)
M Marxist-Leninist Philosophy (1980)
M Marxist- Leninist Philosophy: Diagrams, tables, illustrations for students of Marxist-Leninist theory.
M Marxist- Leninist Teaching of Socialism and the World Today, The
M Marxist-Leninist Theory of Society:, The
M Mass Information in the Service of Peace and Progress
M Mass Media in the USSR
M Mass Organisations in the U.S.S.R.
M Materialism and the Dialectical Method ( by Cornforth 1971)
M Materialismus Militans: Reply to Mr. Bogdanov
M Maxim Gorky Letters
M Maxim Litvinov
M May Day Traditions
M Meaning and Conceptual Systems.
M Meaning of Life, The
M Mechanisation of Soviet Agriculture: The economic effect, The
M Meeting of European Communist and Workers’ Parties for Peace and Disarmament, Paris, 28–29 April, 1980
M Meeting of Representatives of the Parties and Movements participating in the celebration of the 70th anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution
M Meeting the Challenge: Soviet youth in the Great Patriotic War 1941–1945
M Meetings with Sholokhov
M Memoirs of Wartime Minister of Navy
M Men at War
M Methodology of History
M Methodology of Law
M Middle East: Oil and Policy, The
M Mikhail Bulgakov and His Times: Memoirs, Letters
M Milestones of Soviet Foreign Policy 1917–1967.
M Militant Solidarity, Fraternal Assistance:
M Militarism and Science
M Militarism in Peking’s Policies
M Military-Industrial Complex of the USA, The
M Millionaires and Managers
M Miracle of the Age
M Moby Dick, or the Whale
M Modern History of China., The
M Modern History of the Arab Countries
M Modern History, 1640–1870
M Modern State and Politics, The
M Modern Theories of International Economic Relations
M Moiseyev’s Dance Company
M Monetary Crisis Of Capitalism: Origin, Development
M Monism and Pluralism in Ideology and in Politics (Abridged).
M Monopoly Press: Or, How American journalism found itself in the vicious circle of the “crisis of credibility”, The
M Morality and Politics: Critical essays on contemporary views about the relationship between morality and politics in bourgeois sociology
M Moscow Diary, A
M Moscow Soviet, The
M Moscow, Stalingrad, 1941–1942: Recollections, stories, reports.
M Multilateral Economic Co-Operation of Socialist States:, The
M Music Education in the Modern World:
M Musical Journey Through the Soviet Union, A
M My Day and Age: selected poems
M Mysteries of the Deeps [i.E. Deep]:
M Mystery of Pearl Harbor: Facts and Theories, The
M Myth About Soviet Threat: cui bono?
M Myth, Philosophy, Avant-Gardism:
N N. Lobachevsky and His Contribution to Science
N Namibia, A Struggle for Independence:
N National Economic Planning
N National Folk Sports in the USSR
N National Languages in the USSR: Problems and Solutions

N National Liberation Movement in West Africa
N National Liberation Revolutions Today: Part I:
N National Liberation Revolutions Today: Part II
N National Liberation: Essays on Theory and Practice
N National Sovereignty and the Soviet State
N Nationalities Question: Lenin’s Approach:, The
N Nations and Internationalism
N Nations and Social Progress
N Nato: A Bleak Picture
N Nato: Threat to World Peace
N Nature Reserves in the USSR
N Nature of Science: An epistemological analysis., The
N Nearest Neighbour is 170 KM Away: A journey into the Soviet Union, The
N Neo-Colonialism on the Warpath
N Neo-Freudians In Search of “Truth”.
N Neocolonialism and Africa in the 1970s
N Neocolonialism: Methods and manoeuvres.
N Nep, a Modern View
N Never Say Die
N New Approach to Economic Integration, A
N New Constitution of the USSR, The
N New Information Order or Psychological Warfare?, A
N New International Economic Order
N New Life Begun: Prose, poetry and essays of the 1920s–1930s, A
N New Realities and the Struggle of Ideas
N New Scramble for Africa, The
N New Soviet Legislation on Marriage and the Family
N Newly Free Countries in the Seventies, The
N Nihilism Today.
N Nikolai Miklouho-Maclay: Traveller, scientist and humanist
N Nikolai Vavilov: The Great Sower:
N Nine Modern Soviet Plays
N Nineteenth Century American Short Stories
N Non-Capitalist Development: An Historical Outline
N Non-aligned Movement, The
N Noncapitalist Way: Soviet Experience and the Liberated Countries, The
N Normalization of World Trade and the Monetary Problem
N North Russian Architecture
N Not For War We Raise Our Sons: A collection of letters to the Soviet Peace Fund and the Soviet Women’s Committee
N Notes on Indian History (664–1858)
N Nuclear Disarmament
N Nuclear Engineering Before and After Chernobyl:
N Nuclear Space Age: The Soviet viewpoint, The
N Nuclear Strategy and Common Sense
N Nuclear WAR: THE MEDICAL AND BIOLOGICAL CONSEQUENCES
N Nuremberg Epilogue, The
O Ocean and Its Resources
O October Revolution and Africa, The
O October Revolution and the Arts:, The
O October Revolution and the Working-Class, National Liberal, and General Democratic Movements, The
O October Storm and After:, The
O October Storm and After:, The
O Of Human Values: Soviet literature today
O Old, the New, the Eternal: Reflections on art, The
O On Communist Education
O On Education: Selected articles and speeches
O On Historical Materialism • A Collection [Marx-Engels-Lenin]
O On Just and Unjust Wars
O On Labour-Oriented Education and Instruction
O On Literature and Art
O On Proletarian Internationalism
O On Relations Between Socialist and Developing Countries
O On The Art and Craft of Writing
O On The Principle Of Mutual Advantage:
O On a Military Mission to Great Britain and the USA
O On the “Manifesto of the Communisty Party” of Marx and Engels
O On the Communist Programme
O On the Edge of an Abyss: From Truman to Reagan, the doctrines and realitites of the Nuclear Age
O On the Eve of World War II: A foreign policy study
O On the Intelligentsia
O On the International Working-Class and Communist Movement

O On the Paris Commune
O On the Path of Cultural Progress: Culture of the socialist world
O On the Side of a Just Cause: Soviet assistance to the heroic Vietnamese people
O On the Soviet State Apparatus
O On the Threshold of the Twenty-First Century: The technological revolution and literature
O On the Track of Discovery. [Series 1] [n.d. [1960’s]]:
O On the Unity of the International Communist Movement
O On the Upgrade: Living standards in the Soviet Union
O On the Way to Knowledge: Man, the Earth, outer space, acceleration
O One Is Not Born a Personality.
O One True Luxury: Research into communication pattern of Soviet schoolchildren, The
O One Way Ticket to Democracy:
O Optimal Functioning System for a Socialist Economy
O Orbits of the Global Economy, The
O Organisation and Management: A sociological analysis of Western theories
O Organisation of Domestic Trade in the USSR
O Organisation of Industry and Construction in the USSR
O Organisation of Statistics in the U.S.S.R.
O Organisation of Statistics in the USSR
O Organization of African Unity: 25 years of struggle
O Organizations: Communist Party, USA
O Origin and Principles of Scientific Socialism
O Origin of Man, The
O Origin of the Human Race., The
O Origins of the Proletariat and Its Evolution as a Revolutionary Class, The
O Our Course: Peace and Socialism
O Our Course: Peace and Socialism
O Our Lives, Our Dreams: Soviet women speak:
O Our Rights: Political and economic guarantees:
O Outer Space: Politics and law
O Outline History of Africa, An
O Outline History of the Communist International (1971)
O Outline History of the Soviet Working Class
O Outline Political History of the Americas
O Outline Theory of Population, An
O Outline of Soviet Labour Law, An
O Overseas Chinese Bourgeoisie: A Peking tool in southeast Asia.
O Overseas Expansion of Capital:, The
P Pacific Community: An Outlook, The
P Palekh: Village of Artists
P Palestine Problem: Aggression, resistance, ways of settlement, The
P Palestine Question: Document adopted by the United Nations and other international organisations and conferences, The
P Panorama of the Soviet Union
P Part Played By Labour in the Transition from Ape to Man, The
P Passing Age: The ideology and culture of the late bourgeois epoch, The
P Path of Valour., The
P Path to Peace: A view from Moscow, The
P Patrice Lumumba: Fighter for Africa’s freedom
P Peace Prospects From Three Worlds
P Peace Strategy in the Nuclear Age
P Peace and Disarmament. Academic Studies. 1980
P Peace and Disarmament: Academic Studies, special issue 1987:
P Peace and Disarmament
P Peaceful Coexistence: Contemporary international law of peaceful coexistence
P Peking Reaches Out: A Study of Chinese Expansionism
P People’s Army, The
P People’s Control in Socialist Society
P People’s Democracy, A New Form of Political Organization of Society
P People’s Theater: From the Box Office to the Stage
P Peoples of the North and Their Road to Socialism, The
P Perestroika In Action:
P Perestroika: The Crunch is Now
P Permanent Blush of Shame: A Trip to the East and West, A
P Personal Property in the USSR
P Personal Subsidiary Farming Under Socialism
P Petty-Bourgeois Revolutionism (Anarchism, Trotskyism and Maoism)
P Phenomenon of the Soviet Cinema
P Philosophical Conception of Man:, The
P Philosophical Concepts in Natural Science.

P Philosophical Foundations of Scientific Socialism
P Philosophical Problems of Elementary Particle Physics
P Philosophical Traditions Today.
P Philosophical Views of Mao Tse-Tung: A Critical Analysis, The
P Philosophy and Scientific Cognition
P Philosophy and Social Theory: An Introduction to Historical Materialism
P Philosophy and Sociology.
P Philosophy and the Ecological Problems of Civilisation
P Philosophy and the World-Views of Modern Sciences
P Philosophy in the USSR: Problems of dialectical materialism.
P Philosophy of Dialectical Materialism., The
P Philosophy of Optimism: Current problems
P Philosophy of Revolt: Criticism of left radical ideology., The
P Philosophy of Survival, The
P Philososphy in the USSR: Problems of historical materialism
P Physics of Interstellar Space: A popular-science outline
P Pioneers of Space
P Plain-Spoken Facts, The
P Planet of Reason: A Sociological Study of Man-Nature Relationship, The
P Planning a Socialist Economy
P Planning in Developing Countries: Theory and methodology
P Planning in the USSR: Problems of theory and organisation
P Planning of Manpower in the Soviet Union
P Plato
P Please Accept my Donation: Collection of Letters to the Soviet Peace Fund
P Pluto’s Chain: Explorations of the Kamchatka-Kuril volcanic belt
P Polar Diaries
P Policy Keeping the World on Edge, A
P Policy of Peaceful Coexistence in Action, The
P Policy of Provocation and Expansion: A collection of documents and articles, published in the Soviet press, dealing with China’s policy of annexation and its territorial claims to other countries, A
P Policy of the Soviet Union in the Arab World:, The
P Politcal Economy (1983)
P Political Consciousness in the U.S.A.: Traditions and evolutions.
P Political Economy (1989)
P Political Economy of Capitalism (1974), The
P Political Economy of Capitalism (1985)
P Political Economy of Revolution:, The
P Political Economy of Socialism (1967)
P Political Economy of Socialism (1985)
P Political Economy: A Condensed Course
P Political Economy: A beginner’s course
P Political Economy: A study aid
P Political Economy: Capitalism
P Political Economy: Socialism.
P Political Map of the World, The
P Political Reality and Political Consciousness.
P Political Systems, Development Trends: Theme of the 11th World Congress of political sciences
P Political Terms: A short guide
P Political Terrorism: An Indictment of Imperialism.
P Political Thought of Ancient Greece
P Political Work in the Soviet Army
P Politico-Economic Problems of Capitalism.
P Population Biology: Progress and problems of studies on natural populations
P Population and Socio-Economic Development
P Population of the USSR: A socio-economic survey, The
P Population, Economics, and Politics: The socio-economic development of the European members of the CMEA
P Populism: Its past, present and future.
P Present-Day China: Socio-economic problems, collected articles.
P Present- Day Ethnic Processes in the USSR
P Present- Day Problems in Asia and Africa: Theory - Politics - Personalities
P Present- day Non-Marxist Political Economy:
P Press Is a Great Force, The
P Prevent War, Safeguard Peace. [ca. 1962]
P Prevention of War: Doctrines, concepts, prospects
P Principles of Criminology, The
P Principles of Philosophy, The
P Principles of the Theory of Historical Process in Philosophy.
P Priorities of Soviet Foreign Policy Today, The
P Privileged Generation: Children in the Soviet Union, The

P Problem of the Ideal: The nature of mind and its relationship to the brain and social medium, The
P Problems of Africa Today
P Problems of Common Security
P Problems of Contemporary Aesthetics: A collection of articles
P Problems of Leninism
P Problems of Modern Aesthetics:
P Problems of Socialist Theory
P Problems of Soviet School Education
P Problems of War and Peace: A critical analysis of bourgeois theories.
P Problems of the Communist Movement: Some Questions of Theory and Method.
P Problems of the Development of Mind.
P Problems of the History of Philosophy.
P Proceedings of the First Congress of the Yemeni Socialist Party:
P Profession of the Stage-Director, The
P Profiles in Labour: Essays about heroes of socialist labour
P Programme of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union:, The
P Protestant Ethic and the “Spirit” of Capitalism and Other Writings, The
P Psychiatry
P Psychological Research in USSR: Volume 1
P Psychological War, The
P Psychology (1989)
P Psychology As You May Like It
P Psychology in the Soviet Union: A Historical Outline.
P Psychology of Experiencing: An analysis of how critical situations are dealt with, The
P Psychology of Learning: Theories of learning and programmed instruction, The
P Psychology of Management of Labour Collectives, The
P Psychology of Phantasy:, The
P Psychology of Thinking, The
P Public Education in Soviet Azerbaijan: Appraisal of an achievement
P Public Education in the U.S.S.R.
P Public Enterprises in Developing Countries: Legal status
P Public Sector in Developing Countries:, The
P Publishing in the Soviet Union
P Pulse of Time, The
Q Questions of the Methodology of History:
R R&D in Social Reproduction.
R Races and Peoples: Contemporary ethnic and racial problems.
R Races of Mankind, The
R Racism: An ideological weapon of imperialism.
R Rational Utilization of Natural Resources and the Protection of the Environment, The
R Re-reading Dostoyevsky
R Reader on Social Sciences (ABC #1), A
R Reader on the History of the USSR (1917–1937)., A
R Real Socialism and Ideological Struggle
R Real Truth: Profiles of Soviet Jews, The
R Recent History of the Labor Movement in the United States 1918–1939
R Recreational Geography in the USSR
R Red Carnation., The
R Red Star and Green Crescent
R Reflections on Security in the Nuclear Age: A Dialogue Between Generals East and West
R Relativity and Man
R Religion and Social Conflicts in the U.S.A.
R Religion in the World Today
R Remarkable Year: The Blue Notebook: Retracing Lenin’s Steps., A
R Reminiscences of a Kremlin Commandant. [no date, ca. 1965.]
R Rendezvous in Space: Soyuz Apollo
R Renovation of Traditions: (traditions and innovations of Socialist realism in Ukrainian prose)
R Report of the Central Committee of the CPSU to the XXVI Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and the Immediate Tasks of the Party in Home and Foreign Policy
R Report to the Nineteenth Party Congress on the Work of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.)
R Requirements of Developed Socialist Society
R Responsiblity for War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity:
R Resumption and Development of International Economic Relations, The
R Retracing Lenin’s Steps
R Revolution in Laos: Practice and Prospects
R Revolutionaries of India in Soviet Russia: Mainspring of the Communist movement in the East
R Revolutionary Battles of the Early 20th Century
R Revolutionary COMMUNIST PARTY, USA
R Revolutionary Democracy and Communists in the East
R Revolutionary Democracy in Africa

R Revolutionary Movement of Our Time and Nationalism., The
R Revolutionary Process in the East:, The
R Revolutionary Vanguard:, The
R Riddle of the Origin of Consciousness., The
R Riddle of the Self, The
R Riddles of Three Oceans, The
R Right of the Accused to Defence in the USSR, The
R Right-Wing Revisionism Today
R Rights Accruing From Loss of Health
R Rights of Soviet Citizens: Collected normative acts
R Rights of the Individual in Socialist Society, The
R Rise and Fall of the Gunbatsu: A Study in Military History, The
R Rise and Growth of the Non-Aligned Movement, The
R Rise of Socialist Economy: The experience of the USSR, other socialist, and socialist-oriented developing countries, The
R Road to Communism:, The
R Road to Great Victory: Soviet Diplomacy 1941–1945
R Road to Nirvana, The
R Road to Stable Peace in Asia, The
R Road to Victory: The Struggle For National Independence, Unity, Peace and Socialism in Vietnam, The
R Role of Advanced Ideas in Development of Society
R Role of Socialist Consciousness in the Development of Soviet Society, The
R Role of the State in Socio-Economic Reforms in Developing Countries, The
R Role of the State in the Socialist Transformation of the Economy of the U.S.S.R., The
R Rules of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
R Russia and Her People: Recollections in Tranquillity
R Russia and the West: 19th Century
R Russian Discovery of America, A
R Russian History in Tales
R Russian Museum: A Guide, The
R Russian Orthodox Church (1982), The
R Russian Orthodox Church 10th to 20th Centuries, The
R Russian Revolution: The Comic Book Version, The
R Russian Revolution: What actually happened?, The
R Russian Revolutionary Tradition, The
R Russian Thinkers: Essays on Socio–Economic Thought in the 18th and 19th Centuries
R Russians Abroad
S Sacred Lyre: Essays on the life and work of Alexander Pushkin
S Safeguard of Peace: Soviet armed forces:, A
S Salyut Project, The
S Saturn Is Almost Invisible
S Scandinavian Social Democracy Today
S School of Classical Dance
S Science AT THE CROSS ROADS
S Science Fiction and Adventure Stories by Soviet Writers
S Science Fiction: English and American Short Stories
S Science In Its Youth: Pre-Marxian political economy, A
S Science Policy: Problems and trends
S Science Serves the Nation:
S Science and Morality
S Science and Philosophy
S Science and Society.
S Science and Soviet People’s Education
S Science and Technology, Humanism and Progress:
S Science in the USSR:
S Science, Technology and the Economy
S Scientific Communism (1986)
S Scientific Communism (A Popular Outline)
S Scientific Communism and Its Falsification by the Renegades
S Scientific Communism: A textbook
S Scientific Intelligentsia in the USSR: (structure and dynamics of personnel), The
S Scientific Management of Society (1971), The
S Scientific Management of Society
S Scientific and Technical Progress and Socialist Society
S Scientific and Technical Progress in the USA:
S Scientific and Technical Revolution: Economic aspects
S Scientific and Technological Progress and Social Advance
S Scientific and Technological Revolution and the Revolution in Education, The
S Scientific and Technological Revolution: Its impact on management and education, The
S Scientific and Technological Revolution: Its role in today’s world, The
S Scientific and Technological Revolution: Social Effects and Prospects, The
S Scientific-Technological Revolution and the Contradictions of Capitalism., The

S Sdi: Key to security or disaster
S Search in Pedagogics: Discussions of the 1920’s and Early 1930s, A
S Second International, 1889–1914: The History and heritage, The
S Second Session of the Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R.:
S Second World War: A Politico-Military Survey, The
S Secret War Against Cuba
S Secret War Against Soviet Russia, The
S Secret Weapon in Africa
S Secrets from Whitehall and Downing Street
S Secrets of the Second World War.
S Seeking Rational Solutions: Discussions old and new
S Selected Pedagogical Works
S Selected Philosophical Works
S Selected Speeches and Articles
S Selected Works in Geography
S Selected Writings: Linguistics, poetics
S Selections from Shaw: A fearless champion of truth.
S Selections from Shaw: A fearless champion of truth
S Semantic Philosophy of Art
S Sentinels of Peace
S Sergei Prokofiev: Materials, Articles, Interviews
S Serving the People.
S Seven Days in May
S Seven Essays on Life and Literature
S Shakespeare in the Soviet Union: A collection of articles.
S Sholokhov: A critical appreciation
S Short Course on Political Economy, A
S Short Economic History of the USSR, A
S Short History of Geographical Science in the Soviet Union, A
S Short History of Soviet Society, A
S Short History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union., A
S Short History of the National-Liberation Movement in East Africa, A
S Short History of the USSR (1987), A
S Short History of the USSR: A popular outline, A
S Short History of the USSR: Part I., A
S Short History of the USSR: Part II., A
S Short History of the World in Two Volumes, A
S Short History of the World in Two Volumes, A
S Siberia, 60 Degrees East of Greenwich: Oil and people
S Siberia: Achievements, Problems, Solutions
S Siberia: Epic of the Century
S Silent Death (Chemical weapons/warfare), The
S Simon Bolivar
S Sino-Soviet Relations 1945-1973:
S Sketches of the Soviet Union
S Social Democracy and Southern Africa, 1960s–1980s
S Social Informaton and the Regulation of Social Development
S Social Insurance in the U.S.S.R.
S Social Organisations in the Soviet Union: Political and legal organisational aspects
S Social Partnership or Class Struggle?: Theory, Legislation & Practice
S Social Problems of Man’s Environment: Where We Live and Work
S Social Programme of the Ninth Five-Year Plan
S Social Psychology and History
S Social Psychology and Propaganda
S Social Psychology
S Social Science
S Social Sciences: Information system., The
S Social Security in the USSR
S Social Structure of Soviet Society, The
S Social and Economic Geography: An essay in conceptual terminological systematisation
S Social and State Structure of the U.S.S.R., The
S Socialism As a Social System
S Socialism Theory and Practice:
S Socialism and Capitalism: Score and Prospects
S Socialism and Communism: Selected passages, 1956–63
S Socialism and Communism
S Socialism and Culture: A collection of articles
S Socialism and Democracy: A Reply to opportunists
S Socialism and Energy Resources
S Socialism and Humanism
S Socialism and Law: Law in society

S Socialism and Optimism
S Socialism and State Administration
S Socialism and Wealth
S Socialism and the Individual
S Socialism and the Newly Independent Nations
S Socialism and the Rational Needs of the Individual
S Socialism and the State
S Socialism in the USSR: How it was built
S Socialism’s Historic Mission and the World Today
S Socialism: A new theoretical vision
S Socialism: Crisis or renewal?
S Socialism: Foreign Policy in Theory and Practice
S Socialism: Its Role in History.
S Socialism: One-party and multi-party system
S Socialism: Questions of Theory
S Socialist Community at a New Stage, The
S Socialist Community: A new type of relations among nations, The
S Socialist Countries’ Economy in the 1970s, The
S Socialist Countries: Important Changes, The
S Socialist Culture and Man
S Socialist Democracy: Aspects of theory
S Socialist Humanism, Culture, Personality:
S Socialist Ideal and Real Socialism, The
S Socialist Ideology
S Socialist Integration
S Socialist International, The
S Socialist Internationalism (1978)
S Socialist Internationalism: Theory and practice of international relations of a new type
S Socialist Life Style and the Family
S Socialist Literatures, Problems of Development
S Socialist Long-Term Economic Planning.
S Socialist Management: The Leninist concept.
S Socialist Nationalisation of Industry.
S Socialist Organisation of Labour
S Socialist Policy of Peace: Theory and practice
S Socialist Realism and the Modern Literary Process
S Socialist Realism in Literature and Art:
S Socialist Revolution [MarxEngels], The
S Socialist Revolution and Its Defense, The
S Socialist Revolution in Russia and the Intelligentsia, The
S Socialist Revolution in Russia and the International Working Class (1917–1923), The
S Socialist Self-Government
S Socialist Society In the Present Stage: Proceedings of a section meeting
S Socialist Society: Its social justice
S Socialist Society: Scientific principles of development
S Socialist Way of Development in Agriculture, The
S Socialist Way of Life: Problems and perspectives
S Socialist World System, The
S Socialist- Oriented State: Instrument of Revolutionary Change, A
S Society and Economic Relations
S Society and Individual: Give and take
S Society and Nature: Socio-ecological problems
S Society and Youth
S Society and the Environment: A Soviet view
S Society of the Future
S Sociological Theory and Social Practice:
S Sociology of Culture, The
S Sociology of Revolution: A Marxist view
S Sociology: Problems of theory and method.
S Soldier’s Duty, A
S Soldier’s Memoirs:, A
S Solving the National Question in the USSR
S Some Aspects of Party-Political Work in the Soviet Armed Forces
S Some Basic Rights of Soviet Citizens
S Some Questions Concerning the Struggle of Counter-Revolutionary Trotskyism Against Revolutionary Leninism
S South Africa Against Africa, 1966–1986
S Southeast Asia: History, economy, policy.
S Southern Africa: Apartheid, Colonialism, Aggression.
S Soviet Agriculture
S Soviet Ambassador Reports Back, The
S Soviet Armed Forces Yesterday and Today, The

S Soviet Army, The
S Soviet Banker’s Notes, A
S Soviet Circus: A Collection of articles, The
S Soviet Collective Farm (a sociological study), The
S Soviet Communist Forum: (World response to the 25th CPSU congress)
S Soviet Constitution and the Myths of Sovietologists, The
S Soviet Constitution: A dictionary, The
S Soviet Court, The
S Soviet Democracy and Bourgeois Sovietology
S Soviet Democracy in the Period of Developed Socialism
S Soviet Economic Reform: Progress and problems.
S Soviet Economy Forges Ahead: Ninth five-year plan 1971–1975.
S Soviet Economy: Results and prospects
S Soviet Employee’s Rights in Law
S Soviet Family Budgets
S Soviet Finance: Principles, Operation
S Soviet Financial System
S Soviet Fine Arts
S Soviet Foreign Policy Volume I:
S Soviet Foreign Policy Volume II:
S Soviet Foreign Policy: A brief review 1955–65.
S Soviet Foreign Policy: Objectives and principles
S Soviet Foreign Trade: Today and tomorrow
S Soviet Form of Popular Government, The
S Soviet Frontiers of Tomorrow
S Soviet General Staff at War 1941–1945: Book 1, The
S Soviet General Staff at War 1941–1945: Book 2, The
S Soviet Geographical Explorations and Discoveries
S Soviet Geography Today: Aspects of theory
S Soviet Geography Today: Physical Geography
S Soviet Historical Science: New research
S Soviet Industry
S Soviet Land Legislation.
S Soviet Legislation on Children’s Rights.
S Soviet Legislation on Women’s Rights:
S Soviet Literature–Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow
S Soviet Literature: Problems and People
S Soviet Lithuania on the Road to Prosperity
S Soviet Man: The making of a socialist type of personality
S Soviet Nationalities and Policy and Bourgeois Historians: The formation of the Soviet multinational state (1917–1922) in contemporary American historiography
S Soviet Navy in War and Peace, The
S Soviet North: In the Land of the Midnight Sun; the Arctic; News from High Latitudes
S Soviet North: Present Development and Prospects, The
S Soviet Officers
S Soviet Parliament: A reference book, The
S Soviet Peace Efforts on the Eve of World War II
S Soviet Peace Efforts on the Eve of World War II
S Soviet Peace Policy, 1917–1939
S Soviet Peasantry: An outline history (1917–1970), The
S Soviet People as I Knew Them
S Soviet People: A new historical community, The
S Soviet Planned Economy, The
S Soviet Policy for Asian Peace and Security
S Soviet Political System Under Developed Socialism, The
S Soviet Political System: Perceptions and perspectives
S Soviet Psychology
S Soviet Reality in the Seventies
S Soviet Rock: 25 Years in the Underground + 5 Years of Freedom
S Soviet Russia Opts for Peace
S Soviet Russian Literature 1917–1977: Poetry and Prose - Selected Reading
S Soviet Russian Stories of the 1960s and 1970s
S Soviet Scene 1987: A collection of press articles and interviews
S Soviet School of Courage and Warcraft, The
S Soviet Science and Technique in the Service of Building Communism in the U.S.S.R.
S Soviet Socialist Democracy
S Soviet Society: Philosophy of Development
S Soviet Stars in the World of Music
S Soviet State and Law., The
S Soviet State as a Subject of Civil Law, The
S Soviet State, The
S Soviet Trade Unions: A collection of background materials, The

S Soviet Trade Unions: Yesterday Today Tomorrow
S Soviet Ukraine
S Soviet Union 50 Years Statistical Returns
S Soviet Union Today, The
S Soviet Union and Africa, The
S Soviet Union and European Security, The
S Soviet Union and International Economic Cooperation, The
S Soviet Union and the Manchurian Revolutionary Base (1945–1949), The
S Soviet Union as Americans See It 1917–1977, The
S Soviet Union: Political and Economic Reference Book.
S Soviet Volunteers in China 1925–1945
S Soviet Way of Life, The
S Soviet Women (Some aspects of the status of women in the USSR)
S Soviet Women: A portrait.
S Soviet Worker, The
S Soviet Writers Look At America
S Soviet Youth and Socialism.
S Soviet Youth: A socio-political outline.
S Soviet–U.S. Relations, 1933–1942
S Soviets of People’s Deputies: Democracy and administration
S Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies on the Eve of the October Revolution, March–October 1917
S Soweto: Life and Struggles of a South African Township
S Space Age, The
S Space Flights Serve Life on Earth
S Specialisation and Co-Operation of the Socialist Economies
S Sport and Society
S Stanislavsky
S State Law of the Socialist Countries: Socialism Today, The
S State Monopoly Capitalism and Labour Law
S State Monopoly Incomes Policy: Conception and Practice (In the Context of Great Britain)
S State Property in the USSR: Legal aspects
S State Structure of the USSR
S State and Communism, The
S State and Nations in the USSR, The
S State of Israel: A Historical, Economic and Political Study , The
S State, Democracy and Legality in the USSR: Lenin’s ideas today, The
S State-Monopoly Capitalism and the Labour Theory of Value.
S Steeled in the Storm: Essays on the history of the Komsomol
S Steep Steps: A Journalist’s Notes, The
S Stories About Lenin and the Revolution
S Stories About the Party of Communists Under Whose Leadership the Peoples of Russia Overthrew...
S Straight from the Heart: The writer and the time series
S Strategy of Economic Development in the USSR, The
S Strategy of Transnational Corporations, The
S Stride Across a Thousand Years:, A
S Strong in Spirit, The
S Struggle for Socialism in the World
S Studies in Psychology: The collective and the individual.
S Study of Soviet Foreign Policy, A
S Subject, Object, Cognition.
S Submarines in Arctic Waters
S Sukhomlinsky on Education, V.
S Surrealism
S System of Physical Education in the USSR, The
S Systems Theory: Philosophical and Methodological Problems
C Cp of China :: THE POLEMIC ON THE GENERAL LINE OF THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNIST MOVEMENT
T Tales of the Ancient World:
T Talking About the Future: Can We Develop Without Disaster
T Talking About the Future: Is Mankind Heading for a Raw Materials Crisis?
T Talks on Soviet Democracy.
T Teacher’s Experience: Stanislav Shatsky: A collection, A
T Teaching of Political Economy: A critique of non-Marxian theories, The
T Teaching: Calling and skills.
T Teaching
T Technological Neo-colonialism
T Tehran, Yalta and Potsdam Conferences., The
T Television In the West and Its Doctrines.
T Ten Years of the Ethiopian Revolution
T Territorial Industrial Complexes: Optimisation models and general aspects
T Territorial Organisation of Soviet Economy, The
T Terrorism and International Law

T That Curious World of Nature: Geography for entertainment
T The LAND OF SOCIALISM TODAY TOMORROW
T The POLICY OF NON-ALIGNMENT
T Theatre, Music, Art (1967–1970)
T Their Point of View: Young Americans in the USSR
T Theoretical Aspects of Linguistics
T Theoretical Physics
T Theories of Surplus Value:
T Theory and Practice of Proletarian Internationalism, The
T Theory and Tactics of the International Communist Movement
T Theory of Earth’s Origin: Four lectures
T Theory of Growth of a Socialist Economy, The
T Theory of Knowledge ( by Cornforth ), The
T Theory of Population: Essays in Marxist research., The
T Theory of the State and Law
T There Shall be Retribution: Nazi war criminals and their protectors
T They Came to Stay: North Americans in the USSR
T They Found Their Voice: Stories from Soviet Nationalities with No Written Language Before the 1917 October Revolution
T They Knew Lenin: Reminiscenses of Foreign Contemporaries
T They Sealed Their Own Doom
T Third Soviet Generation
T Third World War? Threats, real, and imaginary, A
T Third World: Problems and Prospects, current stage of the national-liberation struggle, The
T Thirty Years of Victory
T This Amazing Amazing Amazing But Knowable Universe
T This NATION AND SOCIALISM ARE ONE
T This Nation and Socialism Are One
T This Whole Human Rights Business
T This is My Native Land: A Soviet journalists travels
T Three Centuries of Russian Poetry
T Three Leaders: Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi
T Three Men in a Boat to Say Nothing of the Dog
T Through the Russian Revolution
T Time For a New Way of Thinking
T Time to Speak Out, The
T To Be an Individual–Is It the Lot of Only a Chosen Few?
T To Children I Give My Heart
T Tomorrow Will Be Too Late: Dialogue on the threshold of the third millennium
T Topsy-Turvy Planet, or, Paramon’s Incredible Tale of Travel and Adventure, A
T Towards Freedom and Progress: The triumph of Soviet power in Central Asia
T Towards Social Homogeneity
T Towards Technologies of the Future
T Towns for People
T Tracing Martin Bormann
T Trade Among Capitalist Countries
T Trade Unions in Socialist Society
T Trade Unions, Disarmament, Conversion
T Trade and Coexistence
T Transition from Capitalism to Socialism, The
T Transnational Corporations And Militarism
T Travel to Distant Worlds
T Travels to New Guinea: Diaries Letters Documents.
T Tretyakov Art Gallery: A Guide
T Triumph of Lenin’s Ideas: Proceedings of Plenary Session
T Triumph of the Leninist Ideas of Proletarian Internationalism:
T Truth About Afghanistan:, The
T Truth About Cultural Exchange: 10 Years After Helsinki, The
T Turning-Point of World War II:, The
T Twentieth Century Capitalism
T Two Directions of Socio-economic Development in Africa
T Two Hundred Days of Fire: Accounts by participants and witnesses of the battle of Stalingrad
T Two Worlds–Two Monetary Systems
U U.S. Budget and Economic Policy.
U U.S. Labour Unions Today: Basic problems and trends.
U U.S. Military Doctrine, The
U U.S. Monopolies and Developing Countries
U U.S. Negroes in Battle: From Little Rock to Watts
U U.S. Neocolonialism in Africa
U U.S. Policies in the Indian Ocean
U U.S. Policy in Latin America: Postwar to present.
U U.S. Two-Party System: Past and present:, The

U U.S. War Machine and Politics, The
U Ultras in the USA., The
U Ulyanov Family, The
U Unbreakable Union of Soviet Republics, The
U Undaunted Heroes: A Vietnam diary, The
U Undeclared War: Imperialism vs. Afghanistan:, The
U Union of Soviet Writers: Aims, Organisation, Activities, The
U United Soviet People, The
U Unity, Solidarity, Internationalism: International Communist Unity:
U Universe and Civilisation, The
U Universe, The
U Us Monopolies and Developing Countries
U Usa and Western Europe: Economic Relations After World War II, The
U Usa versus Western Europe: New Trends
U Usa, Western Europe, Japan: a triangle of rivalry, The
U Usa: Anatomy of the Arms Race
U Usa: Imperialists and Anti-Imperialists: The great foreign policy debate at the turn of the Century
U Usa: Militarism and the Economy
U Ussr - USA - Sports Encounters
U Ussr Builds for the Future, The
U Ussr Economy in 1976–1980, The
U Ussr Proposes Disarmament (1920s–1980s), The
U Ussr State Industry During the Transition Period
U Ussr Tenth Five-Year Plan Building Projects
U Ussr Through Indian Eyes
U Ussr and Countries of Africa
U Ussr and Developing Countries: Economic Cooperation, The
U Ussr and International Copyright Protection, The
U Ussr and International Economic Relations:, The
U Ussr in World Politics., The
U Ussr–FRG Relations: A new stage
U Ussr–USA Trade Unions Compared
U Ussr’s Activities in the UN for Peace, Security and Co-Operation, 1945–1985, The
U Ussr, Reorganisation and Renewal
U Ussr, the USA, and the People’s Revolution in China, The
U Ussr: A Dictatorship or a Democracy?, The
U Ussr: A Short History., The
U Ussr: A Time of Change: Scholars, Writers and Artists Speak
U Ussr: A genuine united nations, The
U Ussr: A guide for businessmen
U Ussr: Education, Science and Culture., The
U Ussr: For Peace Against Aggression:
U Ussr: Geography of the eleventh five-year plan period
U Ussr: Public Health and Social Security., The
U Ussr: Questions and Answers
U Ussr: Sixty Years of the Union: 1922–1982
U Ussr: Youth of the Eighties
V Vietnam Story, The
V Village Children: A Soviet experience
V Vladimir Favorsky
V Vladimir Ilyich Lenin: A biography
V Vladimir Ilyich Lenin: Life and works
V Vladimir Ilyich Lenin: Pages from his life with reminiscences of his associates
V Vladimir Ilyich Lenin
V Vladimir Mayakovsky: Innovator
V Vladimir Vysotsky: Hamlet with a guitar
W Wanted...
W War Is Their Business: The U.S. Military-Industrial Complex:
W War of Ideas in Contemporary International Relations:, The
W War’s Unwomanly Face
W Wars and Population
W Washington Crusaders On the March
W Washington Silhouettes: A political round-up
W Washington Versus Havana
W Way Society Develops, The
W We Are From Friendship University [nd (mid 1960s)]
W We Choose Peace
W Weaponry in Space: The dilemma of security
W Welfare the Basic Task: Five Year Plan, 1971–1975
W West Berlin: In memory of those Soviet officers and men who fell in the battle to liberate Berlin
W West Berlin: Yesterday and Today

W West European Integration: Its policies and international relations
W Western Aid: Myth and Reality
W Western Europe Today: Economics, politics, the class struggle, international relations
W What Are Classes and the Class Struggle? (ABC #14)
W What Are They After in Peking?
W What Are Trade Unions? (ABC #21)
W What If Everything You Thought You Knew About AIDS Was Wrong?
W What Is Capitalism? (ABC #8)
W What Is Communism? (ABC #10)
W What Is Democratic Centralism?
W What Is Democratic Socialism?
W What Is Dialectical Materialism? (ABC #6)
W What Is Good and What is Bad
W What Is Historical Materialism? (ABC #7)
W What Is Labour? (ABC #11)
W What Is Marxism-Leninism? (ABC #2)
W What Is Personality? (ABC #23)
W What Is Philosophy? (ABC #4)
W What Is Political Economy? (ABC #3)
W What Is Property? (ABC #13)
W What Is Revolution? (ABC #17)
W What Is Scientific Communism? (ABC #5)
W What Is Socialism? (ABC #9)
W What Is Surplus Value? (ABC #12)
W What Is The Party? (ABC #15)
W What Is The Scientific and Technological Revolution? (ABC #22)
W What Is The State? (ABC #16)
W What Is The Transition Period? (ABC #18)
W What Is The Working People’s Power? (ABC #19)
W What Is The World Socialist System? (ABC #20)
W What Is What? (ABC #24)
W What Maoism is Really Like
W What Real Socialism Means to the People:
W What’s What in World Politics: A reference book
W Where All Roads Into Space Begin:
W Where Are Trotskyites Leading the Youth?
W Where Human Rights Are Real.
W Where It’s Coldest
W Where the Old Are Young: Long life in the Soviet Caucasus
W White Book:, The
W White House and the Black Continent, The
W Whither and With Whom? Essays from the ideological front
W Who’s Who in the Soviet Cinema: Seventy Different Portraits
W Why We Returned to the Soviet Union: Testimonies from Russian emigrÃ©s
W Wilfred Grenfell: His life and work
W Will We Survive?
W Winning for Peace: The great victory–its world impact
W Winston Churchill
W Witness to War:
W Women Today
W Women in Science
W Women in the USSR: On the UN Decade for Women
W Women of a New World
W Words of Friends: Greetings extended to the XXVIth Congress of the CPSU, The
W Work and Love
W Workers in Society: Polemical essays
W Workers’ Control Over Production: Past and present.
W Working Class Movement in the Period of Transition to Imperialism (1871–1904), The
W Working Class and Social Progress:, The
W Working Class and its Allies, The
W Working Class and the Contemporary World:, The
W Working Class and the Trade Unions in the USSR:, The
W Working Class in Socialist Society:, The
W Working Class—The Leading Force of the World Revolutionary Process:, The
W Working-Class Movement in the Developmed Capitalist Countries After the Second World War (1945–1979), The
W Working-Class Struggle for Peace and Social Progress:, The
W Working-Class and National-Liberation Movements:
W World Capitalist Economy: Structural changes:, The
W World Communist Movement: An outline of strategy and tactics, The
W World Energy Problem, The
W World MARXIST REVIEW

W World Market Today, The
W World Revolutionary Movement of the Working Class
W World Revolutionary Process, The
W World Socialist Movement & Anti-Communism., The
W World Socialist System and Anti-Communism, The
W World Socialist System:, The
W World War II: Myths and the Realities.
W World War II: The Decisive Battles of the Soviet Army
W World Without Arms?, A
W World of Man In the World of Nature, The
W Wormwood [Hitler-era anti-semitism & postwar Zionism]
W Writer’s Creative Individuality and the Development of Literature, The
Y Yakov Sverdlov
Y Year 2000: End of the human race?, The
Y Year of Victory
Y Yellow Devil: Gold and capitalism., The
Y Young Communist International and Its Origins, The
Y Young Teens Blaze Paths to Peace: The story of the first global children’s festival for peace, friendship co-operation
Y Young in the Revolution:, The
Y Your First Move: Chess for beginners.
Y Youth and Politics
Y Youth and the Party: Documents
Z Zionism Stands Accused
Z Zionism: Enemy of peace and social progress

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A CritiQue of Maotse-Tung's Theoretical Concept - @LBiz - en - 1972 - CMTTC290

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<<< A CritiQue of Maotse-Tung’S Theoretical @AT LENINIST

T* 33 3. On the Real Meaning of Maoist Dialectics

### 49 4. Subjective Idealism Instead of the Materialist View of History

GREAT-HAN CHAUVINISM AND HECEMONISM

1. The Sources of Great-Han Chauvinism and Hegemonism in the

2. Great-Han Chauvinism and Hegemonism in the Guise of

ANTITHESIS OF THE MARXIST AND THE MAOIST VIEW

1. Is Chinese Experience Alone a Basis for Producing Laws for the

95 2. On the Two Ways of Socialist Revolution

3. Peaceful Coexistence of the Two Systems and the Revolutionary

106 4. “World Revolution” and World Thermonuclear War

THE ATTITUDE OF MARXISM AND OF MAOISM TO THE

115 1. When an “Antitoxin” Becomes a Toxin

2. The “State and Revolution” Problem in the Light of Events in

129 3. On the Question of Mao’s Personality Cult

4. Political Arbitrariness Instead of Socialist Democracy and

5. Ideological Justification of the Regime of Political Arbitrariness

152 6. On the True Essence of the “Cultural Revolution”

THE MAOIST CONCEPTION OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF

165 1. Development of Social Relations in China from 1949 to 1957

173 2. Line of “Leaping Over” Objective Laws

176 3. Curtailment of the Vanguard Role of the Working Class

184 4. Artificial Aggravation of Class Struggle

193 5. Class Struggle Without the Struggle Against the Bourgeoisie

195 6. Class Struggle: Pretext for Repression

201 7. Concerning Mao’s Attitude to the Working Class

RELATION OF POLITICS AND ECONOMICS IN THE

206 1. Role of Economics in Social Development Minimised

212 2. Mao’s View of Socialist Economic Development

223 3. The “Great Leap Forward”: Collapse and Consequences

236 4. Zigzags in Peking’s Economic Policy

242 5. Some Aspects of China’s Foreign Policy

“GREAT PROLETARIAN CULTURAL REVOLUTION”, OR

DRIVE AGAINST WORLD CULTURE

251 1. The Cultural Revolution and the Cultural Legacy

262 2. Socialist Culture and Its “Critics”

269 3. The “Cultural Revolution” in China and the Intelligentsia

277 4. The Maoist Cultural Policy After the “Cultural Revolution”

Lenin Obras Completas, Akal Editor (Mexico).

<<< A CritiQuE oF MaotSE-TunG'S THEorEticaL @AT LENINIST

One of the pressing tasks before Marxism-Leninism today is to criticise the p

This is of particular importance in any examination of the make-up of Communist p

Chinese Marxists-Leninists were aware of Mao Tse-tung’s erroneous political line, p

The appearance of Maoism in China as a specific pettybourgeois, nationalistic trend p

The survival of semi-feudal relations of production in China helped to conserve p

Marxism-Leninism never became for Mao a world outlook which he understood, p

Mao’s views never took shape as a full-fledged, systematic world outlook, or a p

In claiming the “thought of Mao Tse-tung" to be the summit of modern Marxist- p

To expose the anti-Marxist essence of Maoist theoretical conceptions there is need, p

This work is an attempt to give a scientific analysis, a Marxist assessment of the p

The Introduction was written by V. G. Georgiyev, Cand. Sc. (Philos.), and V. A.

[ 5•1] International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties, Moscow 1969,

[ 5•2] Ibid., p. 38.

[ 8•1] Mao Tse-tung, Selected Works, Vol. 4, London, 1956, p. 212.

[ 12•1 ] V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 30, p. 162.

<<< Chapter One -- THE SUBSTANCE >>>

<<< A CRitiQue of Maotse-TunG'S TheoRetical @AT LENINIST

TOC 1. Ideological Origins

Marxist philosophy is known to be a critical revolutionary generalisation of the p 16

Philosophical development is known to be directly connected with the development p 20

An important principle of the social order advocated by Confucianism is the p

Neo-Confucianism became the official ideology of Chinese society. It secured a p