Where Do We Go From Here? (On the Maoist Situation in the US)

   I have observed over the last year and a half to two years that the Maoist movement is growing in the united states and in other first world/imperialist nations (Canada,UK,Italy etc). The ideas of Maoism and the universal correctness of it revolutionary theory are spreading and becoming more popular among the left and the people in general. Even non-Maoist are starting to mimic the mass line and line struggle with-in their organizations. All these things are good news for the Maoist movement in the US. (I will be discussing the situation here in the US as I am not well read enough in the other nations to comment on their situation.)


But where can we go from here? What task do we now face?


   Obviously we can either go up or down from here, forward or backwards. We want to go up/forward obviously. But the question will be "how?" Well as of right now at least I think the answer is easy (even if in practice it will be hard.) Our movement is made up of smaller local groups that are sometimes based on only one or two political or economic issues. And that is fine, I am not here to critique that at this time. I believe that is what is with-in our means as of right now.


   However; the time will come (hopefully soon) when the Maoist movement will have to start organizing on a national level. We cannot spark national revolution or even start national dissent from our local groups. We need some sort of national organization if we are to become relevant. I mean an actual national organization where all Maoist are included regardless of their sub-ideology/beliefs. One where criticism/self-criticism and line struggle are the leading ideas as opposed to ultra-leftism and self sectarianism with-in the Maoist movement.


   The task we face? The task we now face is building that national organization. Getting over our petty historical/minor political differences to unite all the Maoist forces into one cohesive organization who's goal is socialist revolution in the US. Once again this is easily stated but will be hard to achieve in practice. I believe if we Maoist living in the US can unite and create said national organization, I think we can honestly be the largest and most relevant communist group in the nation. Many independent Maoist (regardless of their specific sub-ideology) are forced into joining non-Maoist organizations/parties such as PSL, FRSO etc. Specifically because they have no real Maoist group to participate in on a national level.


   If you are reading this and asking yourself "what about the Progressive Labor Party or the Revolutionary Communist Party?" While these are both national organizations (respectively) we must consider the following; In regards to the Progressive Labor Party (PLP); They have referred to themselves as Maoist before but they can not be the national group I am speaking of because they look down on and regard the cultural revolution as a bad thing. This is too large of a dividing issue for the PLP to be able to unite the Maoist living in the US into a national movement. In regards to the Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP); Anyone who is familiar with the RCP could probably think of ten or more reasons why the RCP would be unable to unite the Maoist movement. The main reason would be (obviously) the semi-worship of Avakianism over Maoism which is alienating to traditional and most new age Maoist. This is not to say I oppose both of these groups because that would be untrue. Both groups have good and bad things about them. I am just pointing out that while both of these groups call themselves Maoist, neither are capable of uniting the Maoist movement in this country. In reality these two parties are not open enough (ideologically nor politically) to allow the independent/unaffiliated Maoist to flock into their respective parties. This is why we must create a new organization as opposed to joining an existing one.                   


   I hope that soon all of the independent Maoist and the smaller Maoist groups can start a dialog to start the process of a national organization building for a true Maoist party based on people's democracy and revolutionary socialism. I for one would be willing to promote, help organize, donate to, discuss, critique etc. Anything that would be needed of me I would be willing to do to achieve this great dream. We as a group either want socialism or we do not. Their is no middle path here. You either want socialism and are willing to struggle for it or else you are a running dog of capitalist imperialism. It is time to cast aside all petty differences to unite into one national organization with the aim of building a party and eventually taking power from the capitalist classes and placing the power into the hands of the proletarian masses. 

The Deadly Virus of Ultra Leftism in the Belly of the Beast.

   Something that is consistent in Mao's writings and speeches is the need to combat ultra left thinking and actions. He describes one aspect of "ultra leftism" as the refusal to work or unite with other groups or individuals that could be united with. He explains that these people split over the most miniscule and petty reasons.


   A communist number one goal is and should always be the victory of the broad working masses. Socialism over capitalism, self-determination and independence over imperialism. An ultra leftist would compromise this goal by refusing to work with other progressive elements on basis of "principle" or sometimes just plain arrogance.


   We in the USA, the largest imperialist nation on earth, a first world nation, have the luxury of ultra leftism. Ultra leftism is (in the USA) a luxury for communist in first world and imperialist nations. We can afford to keep to our small ineffectual, intellectual circles that only allow in a certain ideology and refuses to work with other groups who don't believe the exact same thing that we do. Why should we prepare for revolution when we can stay busy arguing with other people that we could be uniting with to create a revolutionary situation? 


   I don't believe I need to continue to rant on this overall situation because any communist reading this is already aware that ultra leftism, or; the inability to work well with others. Is holding us back and makes it impossible to create the correct situation for revolution. I'm not calling for communist to unite with everyone. That is ultra right-wing communism to go about uniting with others for opportunistic or utopian reasons.


   In a nation where there are sooooo many different groups and a lot of different ideologies are represented it is important to know who you can unite with for revolution and those that you can not. Our goal is proletarian revolution! The democratic dictatorship of the broad working classes over the bourgeoisie and imperialist forces. We can not and will never achieve our goals under the current situation of ultra leftism on one side of the communist movement and ultra rightism on the other.

                             ULTRA LEFTISM IN THE MAOIST MOVEMENT

   We Maoist are ourselves guilty of ultra leftism to the highest degree. We split ourselves over everything from the GLF to the 100 flower movement to the GPCR. We split from those who see the USSR as social imperialist and those who don't. We split from those who support the shinning path and those who don't. We split over which line we support in the Nepal revolution. We would split over anything it seems. We have no functional party to work in as a unit. We are fractured, sectarian and ineffectual. Of course I do not mean all Maoist living in the US, some Maoist here are shinning examples of how to be a good communist. But for the most part we are ultra leftist talking revolution but not willing to step outside our circles and comfort zone to actually achieve a revolutionary situation.


   I myself am guilty of ultra leftism earlier in my political life. I used to never want to work with anyone who wasn't a marxist leninist. But we must see and draw on past lessons. (as maoist) It is important to work with all who can be united with. What is better? One large, unified, comprehensive communist/progressive movement based in and on the broad working masses? Or a small, fractured, schizophrenic movement based on intellectual circles and protest activist?  The answer is easy and was handed to us long ago by Mao himself. The real question is what are we going to do about it?
 


    

Communal Democracy-Great Proletarian Cultural Revolutionist-Feminist-Maoist Chinese Modelist...

"You are not a Maoist, you are a revisionist"


Things are not always black and white. The same goes with peoples ideological line. The acronym MLM can mean many different things to different people.


To some individuals or groups it means ML (which itself is used in many ways such as Hoxhaist or tankie or Stalinist) with some contributions from Mao. Some MLM uphold the Three head theory (Marx Lenin and Mao) and some uphold four (Marx Lenin Stalin and Mao). To some it means staunch anti-revisionism to any Marxist-Leninist revision. To others it means to revision all revolutionary theory to current and local conditions. Some Maoist support younger Mao's ideas and actions and some support older Mao's ideas and actions. Some dogmatically follow all his writing to a tee and some people see his ideas as a starting point and think it is against Maoism itself to be dogmatic. To some people to be a Maoist is to be a state-authoritarian, to others it is complete dictatorship of the proletariat from the bottom up.


I am writing this because I want to explain why I am the kind of Maoist that I am.


The great leap forward (GLF) is usually used as a way to attack Maoist so let me just say that first off the massive numbers of 16-70 million people that were "killed" by Mao has been disproved by many accounts (here is one). Many people did die during the GLF, but it was from starvation and not mass murder and no one set up the GLF so people would starve (there was also drought in some areas and natural disasters in others) . In fact it is impossible to prove how many people starved or that more people starved than in previous years. But the great leap forward was important in the country side because the nation didn't have good irrigation systems and in drought years whole villages would have to fight off starvation (which was a major problem under the old KMT and feudal system). So the CPC called for peasants to help build these huge irrigation systems. The problem was that no one was tasked with turning volunteers away and too many people volunteered and not enough people stayed home and grew food. So I see the GLF as both a success and a failure, if one person died because of the policy then it was one too many. However the GLF brought great harvest after this period and helped put a boot to the throat of mass starvation(many claims supported in link).


Just thought I should clear that up least someone thing Maoist think murdering millions is okay or justifiable.


One of the major reasons I am a Maoist is that I believe communal democracy as enacted in China during the liberation phase up til its dismantling by the soviet wing of the party was the greatest example of proletarian democracy. The old peasants associations and village congresses along with communal farms and kitchens were great corner stones for how a proletarian society should look.


Another reason is that I admire the right and ability of people to criticize the government and their policies and have a chance to steer policy. Under communal democracy and especially during the cultural revolution until 68 the peasants and the working class held control over almost all aspects of their lives. At one point in time during the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (GPCR) the people of Shanghai actually took a vote to change what the colors on the stop lights meant. They voted to make red mean go because red was the color of socialism and thus the color of progress and a movement forward. Some may see this as silly but it illustrates how much power communal democracy gave to the masses. They ended up not changing the light system because it was agreed that it would be confusing to people not from the city and more important things could be discussed.


Since I brought it up I will discuss why I uphold the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (GPCR) as the furthest advance towards communism and why I believe that many cultural revolutions will be necessary to achieve communism.


Many critics of the GPCR on both the right-wing and the reactionary left simply brush off the GPCR as a violent period that was a result of Mao trying to hold onto power. This is simply an incorrect ahistorical view of the cultural revolution. While there was violence used in the GPCR it was purely because of anger that came forth from the masses over right-wing politicians attempts to turn China into a capitalist nation.


One point of the GPCR was to revolutionize the masses and to smash the reactionary ideas and customs of the old Chinese society. It was direct action by the people to destroy all lines that advocated capitalism as the way forward. Violence was unfortunately needed sometimes to unseat politicians, reactionary landlords or bosses. Everyone was subject to the peoples will. Party members were especially targeted if they were seen as capitalist roaders or as reactionaries.


I believe that cultural revolutions would only be needed in backwards nations and bourgeois minded societies. I do think that the GPCR brought many lessons that we can draw from to revolutionize the popular masses and keep radical people's power in charge. It was reported that when Mao was forced to order the red guards to disband that he did so with tears running down his cheeks. Was this because he knew that this symbolized the end of people's power in China? And that it also showed that the government was to take more power over the people as opposed to the people holding power over their government? Meaning that the "revolutionary Committees" were to be reinstated and that the Soviet wing and the capitalist roaders had won? This writer think these are the reasons for his tears that sad day for China. Most of China's politicians speak ill of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution today because as reactionary capitalist roaders and capitalisms running dogs these politicians would have been targeted during the GPCR, and rightly so.


Anti-anti-ideologies- I do not uphold any anti ideologies, I do believe every branch has something to contribute to the movement to some degree. I am not a anti-revisionist, I think revision to MLism is very important and needed to move forward. We live in a different time and under different conditions and in different places than any of these people who have become demigods. To treat people as infallible is in my opinion in itself against a dialects position. Also to not unite with those who can be united with, over silly reasons is considered leftism.


Self criticism- Is the most important trait that is need in any person or group that plans on taking a leadership position. Not only being able to make self criticisms but also learning from and fixing your short comings is so important to me. Ive never heard any group in the States say "we were wrong" or "that wasn't a correct tactic/slogan" etc. Ive never even heard a member of a party or group say "we were wrong/incorrect". Instead we hear excuses or straw arguments on how they were actually correct.  This I believe is brought on by the luxury of these groups being irrelevant in the bigger picture, they can afford to be wrong and ignore it because they are not accountable to anyone and their decisions don't affect any ones life. But these groups need to learn to do self criticisms and learn and grow from their mistakes or else they run the risk of never being taken seriously.

Religion, Should it be Banned Under a Revolutionary Government?

It is a complicated question with a complex answer that varies between many different groups and individuals.


Most communist are atheist or follow the slogan that "Religion is the opium of the masses." But as Maoist we are taught that;


"To link oneself with the masses, one must act in accordance with the needs and wishes of the masses. All work done for the masses must start from their needs and not from the desire of any individual, however well-intentioned. It often happens that objectively the masses need a certain change, but subjectively they are not yet conscious of the need, not yet willing or determined to make the change. In such cases, we should wait patiently. We should not make the change until, through our work, most of the masses have become conscious of the need and are willing and determined to carry it out. Otherwise we shall isolate ourselves from the masses. Unless they are conscious and willing, any kind of work that requires their participation will turn out to be a mere formality and will fail.... There are two principles here: one is the actual needs of the masses rather than what we fancy they need, and the other is the wishes of the masses, who must make up their own minds instead of our making up their minds for them" (1)


The first four sentences of this quote spell out exactly what a communist stance should be towards the banning of religion. Especially in the USA it would be impossible to expect the proletariat to allow a revolutionary government to ban their religion. Religion is important to the proletariat. And to ban it would be to go against the wishes of the masses. It is also important to point out that some nations with strong religious roots have turned to communism our socialism.


It is an error to call for the banning of religion in a nation as a whole. It shows people who espouse this would run the nation as the few ruling over the masses. But I would never suggest that we ban religion as a whole.


But it can also go both ways. As a comrade of mine said "right wing deviations should be banned" I think watched and monitored would be the best at first followed by state criticism and propaganda against right wing deviations of religions. Then when the masses are ready and support it we can close down the right wing deviations of religions. The other side of the coin is that some religions and certain sects of different religions are left wing in nature. They would support a revolutionary government that is centered around empowering the masses over the few. They would support a government that puts needs above profits and material want.


Religion will only be our complete enemy if we constantly attack it and threaten to ban it. Not all sects will oppose a revolutionary state. Some sects should even be reached out to and brought into the communist and socialist circles. Many of sects espouse social justice at their services. Should we alienate these people because of a quote by Marx? NO! It is foolish how communist act towards the religious peoples when we need to be engaging them.



Written by; Dustin Slagle


1, Quotations from chairman Mao, the Mass line. Taken from Marxist.org

My March Forward to Maoism! (updated and revised)

My path towards socialism started when I was 18. I had grown up in a poor family, my parents were working multiple jobs but we were still living in poor housing and unable to ever get ahead financially. Growing up I had always heard that here in the USA the hardest workers were rewarded by their hard work by moving up the "ladder" and thus achieving "the American dream".


Before I even became a teenager I knew the American dream was a lie. My dad never was home except to sleep, then he was off to another job. By the standards of "the American dream" we would have been millionaires, but we weren't and we never got our heads above the water. We never even made it to the "middle class". This helped me come to the realization that capitalism was a system of exploitation and inequality at a very young age.


I became a socialist after a trip I took to the south west. While down there I saw things that I never would have believed existed in the US. I went to lunch lines where I ended up giving all the food I had with me in my back pack to a guy who was living out of his car with his 9 year old child. This touched me deep down in a place I didn't know exited inside myself and I had to help them even if all I could offer was some deer jerky. I cried later that night because there was not more I could do for these people.


I also saw things such a shanty towns and people living in 3rd world like conditions. One thing I couldn't help but notice was that I was the only person that was white in that whole shanty town. People living in the worlds most gluttonous country should not be living in houses made out of gardening sheds and trash metal etc. After talking to some of the residents of this place One person told us he works for dollars a day sometimes his whole family only making 10 to 15 dollars a day. But because they were here "illegally" they couldn't report their conditions. Not to mention that there was a whole family (grandpa, grandma, mom, dad, uncle, aunt, sisters brothers all living in the same "house" (more like makeshift sheds.)



Seeing these kind of injustices on the people living in these conditions to me pointed to something very obvious; that there was a problem with the system and not just specifically the US government. After going on an education binge about politics and different kind of economic systems I realized that there were two problems facing the world; capitalism and imperialism. I then set out to find a system (if there was one) that could correct the problems that the world is facing.


From Independent to democratic Socialist to Marxist


I didn't jump right into revolutionary politics. I was a democrat supporter before I was 18 and at the age of 18 I started reading about socialism but still was in the "communism is bad" camp but at this time I saw socialism and communism and two completely different things. After looking different types of socialism up on the internet I became a democratic socialist. Because that is what MLK declared himself and at this time I was deeply inspired by MLK. I stayed in that camp for around a year and a half. Then I started learning about Che Guevara and reading his diaries which helped me compile a reading list which included Capital volume 1 and the Communist Manifesto and these two readings helped convert me to Marxism.


Once again like most of my advances in theory it was because of CHE's writings and speaches that encouraged to read Lenin's main works. Imperialism; the Higher form of Imperialism, What is to be Done etc. These readings struck me as pure common sense.


This is what lead me to eventually through self education and research become a self proclaimed Marxist. As one could imagine it didn't take me long to tie together imperialism and capitalism as soul mates after reading Lenin's works. I soon would come to call myself and uphold Marxist Leninism as the furthest advance in communist theory.


From M-L to M-L-M



When I first stared on the road to socialism, Maoism was still a bad word to me. The way I understood Maoism was that one person took power and exploited the masses to their benefit. I thought it to be a "capitalist state" idea. I also had the influence of some Trotskyist in my ear telling me that Maoism was only Stalinism. Which now I realize that they only wanted to scare me away from Maoism and for me to join their org. Once again it was the way CHE acted during the Cuban revolution and the rules he made for his army that were so close to that of Mao's rules. After reading about how and why he favored Chinese styled socialism I was inspired to read about Maoism. CHE had been in trouble for speaking out against the USSR socialism in favor of the Chinese (at the time Maoist) form of socialism.


About 2008 I tried to learn whatever I could about Chairman Mao. It was very hard to find anything that wasn't severely anti-Mao in my library and or book stores. So I tried to do some self research and asked people not only about Mao but about Maoism as an idea. Then one of my brothers sent me a link to the little red book. I was captivated by the whole book and was appalled that anyone had ever told me that Mao never contributed to the furtherance of socialism. Well that was just the beginning.


I started reading more and more (On New Democracy, Serve the People, on Correcting Mistaken Ideas in the Party,) then I was sent a link that would change my life forever. It was the most helpful thing I have ever applied to my actions and ideas up til that point. It explained the mass-line and how to apply it to everyday situations. Although this is not the 100% correct way to apply the mass-line, it is a good starting point for any beginner Maoist.

(this is the link I was sent) http://freedomroad.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=705%3Athe-mass-line-what-it-is-and-how-to-use-it&catid=182%3A21st-century-socialism&Itemid=235&lang=en


Ive since been growing my knowledge about my local population and interjecting revolutionary ideas and actions whenever possible. I have had a great success with this tactic. I now understand the class divisions more clearly then I ever did. My work has been more effective than in the past and Maoism inspires me daily to struggle forward.


I now have the strongest faith in the poor proletarian classes to be the ones to carry the masses to the proletarian revolution. I believe in communal democracy, I am now a Maoist!


By:Dustin Slagle

My Views on Maoist Third Worldism.

There are many reasons why I am inspired to write a blog post about Maoist Third Worldism (MTWist). One main reason is the high amount of chauvinism and xenophobia shown by first worldist communist toward the MTW movement. Another few reasons is their theory of what a proletariat is, their ideas of international proletarian revolution, and their attitude towards the present conditions in imperialist countries and finally just the heavy amount of myths that surround this ideology are some reasons why I am writing this blog post.


Let me start by saying as a Marxist it is important to take a scientific approach to all ideas, situations and circumstances. Please keep this in mind while reading this. This post is not meant a promotion nor a condemnation of Maoist Third Worldism (MTW).


One thing I find very interesting about MTW is their idea that not everyone who is part of the working class is a proletariat. While most communist refer to all workers or anyone who sells their labor as a proletarian the MTWist see this as incorrect as did Marx. The proletarian is someone who has nothing to lose but their chains, who has nothing to sell but his labor. The proletarian is also someone who produces value or engages in productive labor. Now this hardly applies to many people in the united states let alone anyone in the first world. As the LLCO correctly point out in one of their blogs "This effect is magnified even more by the relative ease with which First World peoples gain access to large amounts of credit. Significantly, First World workers also receive a share of imperialist super profits extracted from the Third World–just because they are from the First World. Furthermore, First World workers are generally not involved in productive labor as Marx’s model proletarian is. Rather, First World people are employed in non-value-creating positions such as management, merchant capital enterprises, white-collar work, distribution, the service industry, etc. They are often employed in positions that are purely parasitic and drain value. Also, they are often employed in work that may be necessary to realize value, but is not itself value creating."(1)


"global median is about $2.50 a day. There are more people in India earning less than $0.80 a day than people living in the USA." These are staggering numbers that knock me to the floor. It is hard to believe that anyone thinks a revolution will happen in a place where the minimum wage is $5.50 higher then what the average worker in the rest of the world makes. A person making $10,000 a year is in the top 13.3% of the worlds wealthiest people annual income wise. The average American home brings in around $50,000 dollars a year that would put you in the top 1% of the wealthiest people in the world. Now try to imagine you were given only $3,000 dollars to live off of for a whole year, just $3,000 you would still be in the top 15% of wealthiest people on earth annual income wise. The MTWist actually make more sense the more of the ideas I explore.



Their idea of international revolution is easy to follow and makes a lot of sense. They basically follow the ideas of Lin Biao set out in the book "Long Live the Victory of People's War". In the book Lin Biao puts forward that in an international revolution the smaller third world countries would act as the rural areas and that imperialist first world countries would be the cities, and in order to win the international revolution the proletarian army would have to first gain control of the rural country sides (poor, third world countries). After they gained control of the international country sides then the people's army would have to encircle and take over the cities of the world (the first world imperialist nations).



This takes me into one of the myths Ive heard over and over not just about MTWist but Maoist in general. That they are nationalist. I have no clue where this notion came from and I don't care. As a Maoist I can say that not only are we not nationalist but we are the strongest internationalist in the world ideologically. Every Maoist has called for international proletarian revolution. From Mao in China to Fred Hampton in the US we have always called for the start of an international revolution. MTW are no different in fact they are more internationalist than most people claiming to be communist because those who even live in the first world call for the freedom and empowerment of the third world before focusing on their own-selves. That is real internationalism, they call on themselves to uphold the need to lower their living standards so that the people of the world can live more equally. In my opinion that is about as far away from nationalism as possible.



Ive heard so many myths swirling around this ideology that it is hard to chose one to talk about. One time some one said they had heard that MTWist want to "enslave the first world workers" not only is this silly but this is a case of one "socialist" party trying to cause xenophobia towards MTWism. After reading through the LLCO/MSH material I think where the idea of this came from is that the LLCO (correctly) asserts that in order for socialist redistribution to work the workers in the first world imperialist nations would have to lower their standards of living in order for the standards of living in the third world to go up. I agree because we can not pull random nonexistent value from no where. The earth can only produce so much value at a time and in order for everyone on earth to live up to the living standards of the US we would need like 2-3 earths.


Last thing I wanna touch on is what the MTWist mean by "first worldist". A first worldist is someone who thinks that workers in the first world imperialist nations are more advanced than workers in the second and third worlds. Advanced meaning they think the first world workers have more revolutionary potential and that the first world worker is more class conscious. This is mainly just childish chauvinism but where it is dangerous is that it is anti-dialectal. It instills a false sense into the "communist" of the first world that a revolution is not only possible in their country but that if one happens that it will happen in a advanced first world nation. Now lets be clear that with Russia being the one exception (and it is debated rather they were even a first world nation during 1917) there has never been a successful proletarian/communist revolution in a first world country. All great proletarian revolutions took place in third world countries. So it is anti-dialects if a leader of you party/ORG tells you otherwise.


Other times they refer to FWist as people who fight for gains for the first world workers but the MTWist warn that these gains are not free and that the gains won by these struggles come on the backs of third world proletarians. And the MTWist claim that first world worker gain from their nations imperialist exploitation. The counter argument Ive heard to this is that "No imperialist CORP is going to share its profits with the people of their nation" on this issue I am torn. I think we in the first world do slightly benefit from the exploitation of the third world by our government. But I also think that most of the profits stolen from the third world end up in the banks or the big CORP's pockets for the most part.



I think MTWism is something that is a hint of fresh air to a rather stale and old movement. They have a lot to contribute to the movement and I believe their use of Marxism as a science is as good as anybodies. I would encourage my reader to check out their site and read some for themselves before turning their nose up at the Maoist third worldist. You can find the link to the Leading Light Communist Organization at the side of this page I invite you to go and read their material you might like what you see.


By: Dustin Slagle










(1)http://llco.org/archives/4911, FEB, 1, 2010

The Socialist Parties: A Collective Problem

It is no secret that all the socialist parties seems to share one common trait; bureaucracy. As a person who has been a active socialist for some 6 years plus now, and has many friends in the communist movement. One story seems constant to me, the story of un-democratic bureaucracy ruling over the party. Or to put it plainly bureaucratic-centralism. To someone who may not know what this means, it means that instead of the majority choosing how things are run there are a few (leaders) members who make all or most of the decisions and the majority is expected to parrot (follow) the decision. If the bureaucracy has reached a high level than any criticism of the leaders decisions are usually treated as treason or you are simply purged from the party.


Democratic centralism is suppose to be where the majority chose what to do in a certain situation or the majority decide what stance the party will take on certain issues. And the people in the minority are expected to follow and defend the choice. A common slogan is "freedom of discussion, unity of action."

But why and where does this problem come from? I will attempt to answer these questions in this entry. Some people simply write it off as Stalinism, but this not only lacks in-depth analysis but also blindly ignores dialect materialism. The fact is that most all revolutionary (and non-revolutionary)socialist parties suffer from this to one degree or another.


Why did this problem develop?: This is no easy answer. Since democratic centralism started a long time ago it is hard to pin point exactly when it went wrong. So I will go with something that should be fairly obvious. Even Trotskyist use the democratic centralism model in most of their parties but when a party or country degenerates to bureaucratic centralism the trots call that party/country Stalinist. Of course a Trotskyist is never going to pass up a chance to jab at Stalin but in reality it was Lenin's model of democratic centralism that is/was incorrect. This writer personally believes if Lenin was alive today he would say the same thing. One thing communist seem to ignore is that we should always be advancing and moving forward. Of course it was not Lenin's fault it turned into a bureaucracy as I believe he would have called for a different approach if he would have seen what democratic centralism was to become.


In reality democratic centralism naturally leads to bureaucracy. When a party starts there are usually a few members who are more dedicated than others or do more work than other members. This rightfully earns this said person a certain amount of respect among the founding members and new members. So they are elected to a seat of power. The problem is that as time goes on the people who started the group want to make sure things are run the way they want and that they stay in charge. So what ends up happening is that the original members end up with multiple seats or too much power. New members of a party may take years to realize the level of bureaucracy in their party, especially if the party lets its new members vote on the small things giving the member a false sense of inner democracy.

Some parties claim they use democratic centralism yet they just tell their members the party believes this about China or that about China (just an example) and expects the new members to parrot these stances even though the party never held a vote on the issues. Usually a parties "Central Committee" decides on the parties stances on issues, but why does a small group think they should decide what is the best stance for a party? Well since these people are nominated by other party members some people parrot that this is real democracy, but is it? No, this is another fault of democratic centralism today. A small number of older members just ends up running the party and making all the major choices.


The biggest problem that develops after this stage is when a member offers a criticism of the parties theoretical line or stances on a certain issue, they are usually treated as a traitor or are accused of not following democratic centralism. What happens next is that when the party should take his/her criticism seriously and figure out the best way forward theoretically, instead the criticizer is kicked out of the party.

Parties that claim to use dialect materialism should always be open to changing a position on an issue or international situation. If a party/org kicks one of their members out of for criticizing the theoretical line then that party does not follow dialect materialism and should not claim so. A party can expect its members to defend the parties choices but if the party does not include all or most party members in the decision making process then it is not following true democratic centralism. My point being that it is hard to up hold democratic centralism in the first place.

I'm not the kind of person to just write a criticism without offering some kind of alternative or a way to fix the said problem.

So how do we fix this bureaucracy with in democratic centralism? Well dogmatism in a communist might say we need to reform it. But the fact of the matter is we may need to do away with democratic centralism all together. Ive had many discussions with people about democratic centralism and no one has shown me a way to reform democratic centralism that would eliminate the bureaucratic element.

Since it does not seem possible to reform democratic centralism we must resort back to our revolutionary roots and find something new. This brings to mind something that has been tried before but was dismantled by the right wing of the CPC. Communal democracy and a communal run planned economy.

I do not personally believe that there has ever been a better example of true democracy in either a country or a party that represented the masses to the fullest. Plus we know from experiences that democratic centralism run on a national scale quickly turns sour and eventually ends up oppressing people who speak outside of what the party says it is okay to speak out against. Communal socialism would be better because how is some one in LA or DC or NYC suppose to know what we need in Mississippi or Illinois or Colorado etc? Only the people from those areas know exactly what they are producing and what they need. Each area would be more personally in charge of themselves and thus wouldn't feel the constant oppression of the centralized state.

Obviously this writer knows he doesn't have all the answers but I am sick of seeing hundreds of intelligent individuals walking around parroting what their leaders, elders and party tell them to. It is time for the communist to start using dialect materialism correctly again, it is time for a revolution!

Written by: Dustin Slagle

(I plan to expand on this)