Second part

The five main contributions of Maoism to communist thought

giovedì 18 ottobre 2007.
 

  1. The long lasting revolutionary popular war
  2. The new democracy revolutions
  3. The class’ struggle in the socialist society
  4. The mass line
  5. The struggle between the two lines in the communist party

Download the article

I shall give an introduction, paraphrasing what Stalin says talking about Leninism (1) : the exposition of Mao’s contributions to communist thought is not the exposition of Mao’s conception of the world. Mao’s conception of the world and Maoism are not the same, for extent. Mao Tse-tung is a Marxist-Leninist and Marxism-Leninism is the basis of his conception of the world. Therefore, the exposition of Maoism is not the exposition of the whole Mao’s conception of the world. It is the exposition of what is new and particular in Mao’s work, what Mao brought to the common treasure of Marxism-Leninism and that is tied to his name. This is a discriminating factor between us and all those “Maoists” who present Maoism as a conception apart, absolutely new and independent from Marxism-Leninism, as a break with the old communist movement (2) .

In this article I will limit myself to the exposition of five Mao’s contributions to the communist thought. They clarify some of the principal political problems that necessarily all the communists must face. They are necessary for the balance of the old communist movement and of the first wave of the proletarian revolution. The new communist parties must be and will be Marxist-Leninist-Maoist referring to these contributions (3) . The readers who want to have a wider knowledge of Maoism, can find shown elsewhere other Mao’s contributions (4) .


  1. The long lasting revolutionary popular war
  2. The new democracy revolutions
  3. The class’ struggle in the socialist society
  4. The mass line
  5. The struggle between the two lines in the communist party
Download the article

First part
The Maoism as the third higher stage of communist thought, after Marxism and Leninism
The new communist parties must be Marxist-Leninist-Maoist, and not only Marxist-Leninist

NOTES

1. Stalin, Principles of Leninism, (1924), Introduction.

2. Such “Maoists” are a race appeared above all in the Seventies, and not yet extinct. On the wave of the enthusiasm for socialism that during those years pervaded many strata and classes, many people converged there. There were communists enthusiastic but a little ingenuous. There were also people (particularly coming from the catholic world and from university) without any connection with the old communist movement and even real active and anti-Soviet opponents of that movement. They were members of socialist groups as that of Quaderni Rossi [ Red Exercise Books, n.d.t.], intellectuals and students grown up within Right circles like for example “Student Youth” and “Young Workers” (founded by the priest Don Giussani). I point out this discrimination because amidst those who oppose themselves to Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, there were and will be some people that did not and will note face the arguments here exposed. Those people (in good or in bad faith) resort to the polemic expedient to refer to those “Maoists”, rising up against “the attempt of Maoists to deny or revise the Marxism-Leninism”. I put the readers on his guard against these expedients.

3. Probably the argumentations in this article will not completely resolve all the doubts of some readers. It is understandable. After all the value of a conception verifies itself testing it, and applying it. It is easy to oppose to the argumentation here exposed the objection that “nevertheless Mao’s followers did not succeed in preventing the revisionists’ advent even in the Chinese Communist Party”. In fact some people ought to give an answer to this objection (for example those of Rossoperaio [Rossoperaio is an Italian Maoist group, now Proletari Comunisti, n.d.t.]) if they would seriously be interested in the theory. They are those who proclaim that the Maoism is the third higher stage of communist thought and at the same time assert that colonial and semi colonial countries can play the role of center of the proletarian revolution. Therefore, they refuse the truth that the Chinese Popular Republic was not able to be the center of the world revolution, in spite of Maoism.

I invite the readers “to do the test of practice” and so answer to the following questions. 1. Why in a certain phase has the modern revisionism taken the direction of almost all the communist parties created by the Communist International corroding them till the transformation in their contrary (in promoters of the pacific and gradual restoration of capitalism) and destroying them? 2. Which were the limits of the left wing of these communist parties, owing to which it was not able to prevent the success of the modern revisionism? 3. Which are the main teachings that they draw out from the experience of the first wave of the proletarian revolution, that we must esteem as treasures for the reconstruction of the communist parties and in the preparation, promotion and direction of the second wave of the proletarian revolution?

Everybody who wants to have a vanguard role in the reconstruction of the communist party must answer to these three questions. Who tries to do it will find in the Maoism the guide to reach fecund answers. So he will verify that Maoism is the third higher stage of communist thought.

4. For a wider survey of the Mao’s contributions to the communist thought see the following three sources:

- The article For Marxism-Leninism-Maoism. For Maoism, in Rapporti Sociali, n. 9/10, pages 7 onwards (September 1991). There are illustrated 10 contributions of Mao related to the following themes: the analysis of the classes in which the society is divided, the developing revolutionary situation, the theory of knowledge and the style of work of the party, the leading methods of the party in the revolutionary war, the attitude towards the enemy, the people as a field of forces not hostile to the revolution, the socialist society, the modern revisionism in the socialist countries, the modern revisionism in the imperialist countries, the dialectical materialism.

- The pamphlet On Maoism, Third Stage of the Communist Thought, Editions Rapporti Sociali (1993) There are illustrated in detail 5 contributions (the theory of the revolutionary process as theory of the contradiction as motive-power of the process, the class struggle in the socialist society, the developing revolutionary situation, the united front of the classes and of the revolutionary peoples, the mass line as principal method of work and direction of the communist party). There are indicated 17 other contributions and precisely: 2 in the field of philosophy (theory of the contradiction and theory of the knowledge), 3 in the field of political economy (bureaucratic capitalism, semi colonial and semi feudal countries, political economy of socialism), and 12 in the field of socialism (class analysis in the bourgeois society, developing revolutionary situation, united front of the revolutionary classes under the direction of the working class, distinction between the contradiction among us and the enemy and contradictions within the people [antagonistic and not antagonistic contradictions], the long lasting popular revolutionary war as universal form of the proletarian revolution, the military theory of the proletariat, the struggle between two lines as law of development of the communist party, the mass line as principal method of direction of the communist party, the theory of the class struggle in socialism and the class analysis [where bourgeoisie is in the socialist countries; the three aspects of the production relations, the second aspect and the State), the sources of modern revisionism, the cultural proletarian revolution).

- The Mao Tse-tung’s Works, Rapporti Sociali Editions, (1991-1994). 25 volumes, available also on CD and on the web site http://lavoce-npci.samizdat.net.