___ SOCIALISM – THE LESSONS FROM PAST ___

My dear comrades, 

I am here to express my warm revolutionary greetings for you all.

The topic we are to discuss in this gathering is one of the most serious topics challenging our movement. Not only have the revolutionaries of our own country, but of the whole world been facing it since more than last four decades. We all have been feeling its relevance and thinking about it in our limitations.

I want to request you all very humbly that the question is unanswered even now. All of us know the details of the literature written about the history of global revolutionary movement. There are two kinds of literature available discussing this question. Either they defend the achievements of the experiments of socialist society or condemn them.

Those who defend the socialist formations talk about only the achievements. They don’t provide any detail about the causes of serious damage and unbearable deterioration of communist movement globally. They talk only about the effects of the imperialist forces. Of course the imperialist forces were there to try their best to disturb, defame and damaged their enemies. But there were revolutionaries too to try their best in creating, developing, expanding and defending the ideology and practice of the revolutionary camp.

Like any other Marxist-Leninist I am proud of our glorious past. The struggles to create and defend the socialist system fought by the great leaders, heroes and martyrs were our own struggles. The victories of those struggles were ours and the failures also were ours own. As we are proud of their achievements, in the same way we are sorry for their failures. We are to create the second edition of those models and we want them to be perfect. This is why we are here to discuss the lessons of the past socialist structures.

The ideology of Marxism has developed in two line struggle. The life is continuously adding new problems and new facts with ever changing circumstances. Human society is developing continuously by solving its contradictions and raising new contradictions. The principles of revolution can’t be bound in any readymade set framework. They are not dogma. If we try to analyze and solve our new problems by old principles, it would be mechanical and dogmatic approach and we are sure to fail. It is the main cause of the pitiable deterioration of Indian revolutionary movement. We are taught to concretely analyze the concrete conditions and to chalk out the strategy. There are many examples of rejecting the old thoughts and evolve new ones in changed circumstances.

To explore the causes of the setback to socialism, we must try to understand the roles of different forces in different countries in different periods and circumstances. We are must to have a vision of the particular conditions in which theory of Marxism-Leninism was being practiced. We should begin our attempt to probe into different problems to understand their causes from the very beginning. The problems and achievements of socialist system began with the struggle and victory of soviet revolution.

Comrade Lenin is called master persuader. There was the thesis of global revolution and to revolt in a single country was not a popular thought till then. The popular thought was there that the revolution will start in developed Europe. The Russia under czar was a backward country and according to the popular thinking it was not a proper place for starting revolution. But Lenin and his comrades dared to go against these formulations and the history is evidence of success of Lenin’s line.

After February revolution Lenin felt that the old evaluations and old decisions have become irrelevant. He could not agree with the idea of continuing the democratic revolution as decided by the Bolsheviks previously. Lenin found it not to be possible and he decided to begin the socialist revolution as the bourgeoisie, which was in power, was not capable to fulfill the tasks of democratic revolution. The second example can be given of the Brest-Litovsk pact. In this case also Lenin was in favour of the pact because he wanted peace at any cost. But many members of his central committee were opposing it. But he could succeed in convincing them all.

The new economic policy was declared by Lenin and adopted in the most adverse circumstances. Emphasis on increasing quantity of production was bound to tilt thrust from development of the human efficacy by providing a deep understanding of ideology to the cadres and masses towards increase of material production. Being one step backward, it was a form to provide nourishment to the capitalist elements. Stalin also was bound to take the same decision after Second World War. It helped in encouraging the capitalist roaders.

The unprecedented victory in Second World War was one of the most glorious mile-stones in the prestige of socialism. In this ruthless war the best elements of the soviet society had sacrificed their lives. After the victory over fascism, many of the most valuable leaders and cadres of the Soviet society were not available to continue the task of restructuring the system.

The remaining leaders and cadres who came forward to play for restructuring the society were clever enough to save themselves from the alert vigilance of Comrade Stalin. They remained silent till his death and could not be traced out. After his death Khrushchev, the shrewd revisionist came forward with his thesis of ‘peaceful coexistence, peaceful transition and peaceful competition’ and he attacked on Stalin.

This was the critical stage of the communist movement in Soviet Union and in other countries also. The revisionist line was opposed first of all by Enver Halil Hoxha. He was the leader of Albania as the First Secretary of the Party of Labour of Albania from 1944 until his death in 1985. At that time even Comrade Mao could not stand against Khrushchev.

After Lenin's death Stalin as the leader creatively applied and developed Marxism-Leninism. In the struggle to defend the legacy of Leninism against the Trotskyites, Zinovievities and other bourgeois agents he proved himself to be an outstanding Marxist-Leninist fighter. The personality of Stalin did have many important positive aspects. He led the Soviet Union to a number of important advances and victories -- the massive and extremely rapid industrialization of the country, the completion of the socialization of industry, the collectivization of agriculture, triumph of socialism in the Soviet Union and creation of the conditions for the victory of the Soviet Union in the war against Hitler.

Stalin led the construction of a socialist economy, successfully divided the “united front” of the imperialists against the USSR, saved the world from fascism, expanded the socialist camp from a single country to one-thirds of the human race, encouraged and aided the Black Liberation movement in the United States and revolutionary movements all over the world. These acts were unprecedented victories for the proletariat, and also unprecedented defeats for the bourgeoisie. No other leader has achieved so much in terms of real human progress. Stalin was one of the greatest heroes of the global working class movement. Whatever were his limitations, his achievements stand far above any other leader in history. That’s why his name is greatly honoured by the working class of the world and all progressive mankind.

In a society divided into hostile classes the views of these classes regarding history are contradictory. In modern capitalist society, the historical views and analysis that present the interests of the bourgeoisie prevail in popular media, public discourse, and education. Whatever criticisms can be raised of Stalin from whatever sector of the proletarian movement, it cannot be disputed that his achievements in advancement of socialism on world scale are unprecedented. This is the primary reason of Stalin, more than any other revolutionary leader is demonized in the bourgeois press, all other reasons being secondary.

Stalin exaggerated his own role and counterpoised his individual authority to the collective leadership. Marxist-Leninists hold that the people and their parties need forerunners able to represent their interests and stand in the forefront of their struggles. The leaders play a big role in history. But when any leader places himself over and above the Party and the masses, instead of in their midst, he alienates himself from the masses and ceases to have all-round, penetrating insight into the affairs. Stalin also could not avoid making unrealistic and erroneous decisions on certain important issues: he broadened the scope of the suppression of counter-revolution; he lacked the necessary vigilance on the eve of the anti-fascist war; he failed to pay proper attention to the further development of agriculture and the material welfare of peasantry; he gave certain wrong advice to the international communist movement; and he made a wrong decision on the question of Yugoslavia.

Stalin put forward a formula that in different revolutionary periods the main blow should be so directed as to isolate the middle-of-the-road social and political forces of the time. But the main blow of the revolution should be directed at the diehard main enemy to isolate him, whereas with the middle forces, a policy of both uniting with them and struggling against them should be adopted, so that they may be at least neutralized; and as circumstances permit, efforts should be made to shift them from their position of neutrality to one of alliance with us. Otherwise the result of opposing them as a dangerous enemy, instead of isolating the real enemy, is that we isolate ourselves and suffer losses to the advantage of the real enemy.

Some people consider that Stalin was wrong in everything. It is a grave misconception. Stalin was a great Marxist-Leninist, yet at the same time a Marxist-Leninist who committed several gross errors without realizing that they were errors. We should view Stalin from a historical standpoint, make a proper and all round analysis to see where he was right and where he was wrong and draw useful lessons there from. Both the things he did right and wrong were phenomena of the international communist movement and bore the imprint of the times. Taken as a whole the international communist movement is only a little over hundred years old experience in many fields of revolutionary work is still inadequate. Great achievements have been made, but there are still shortcomings and mistakes.

Sitaram Yechury’s opinion about reverses to Socialism is that there were two areas where wrong understanding and consequent errors were committed. 1- Incorrect Estimations of contemporary world realities and about the concept of socialism. 2- Practical problems confronted during the period of socialist construction.

Most of the socialist revolutions took place in relatively backward countries. The socialist countries removed one-third of the world market from capitalism. This did not directly affect capitalism's capacity to further develop the productive forces on the basis of scientific and technological advances. Imperialism achieved the expansion of the capitalist market through neo-colonialism.

The pace and qualitatively higher advances made by socialism in a relatively short span (what took capitalism 300 years was accomplished by socialism in 30!) led to a belief that such advances were irreversible. Lenin’s warning that the vanquished bourgeoisie will hit back with a force a hundred times stronger was not fully taken into account.

The statement of the 1960 conference issued by 81 participating Communist Parties stated: "It is the principal characteristic of our time that the world socialist system is becoming the decisive factor in the development of society… Capitalism impedes more and more the use of the achievements of modern science and technology in the interests of social progress… The time is not far off when socialism's share of world production will be greater than that of capitalism… Capitalism will be defeated in the decisive sphere of human endeavour, the sphere of material production… A new stage has begun in the development of the general crisis of capitalism… the growing instability of the entire world economic system of capitalism… The world capitalist system is going through an intense process of disintegration and decay". Based on such assessments the statement concluded that "Today the restoration of capitalism has been made impossible not only in the Soviet Union, but in the other socialist countries as well." Such an underestimation of the capacities of world capitalism and overestimation of socialism was reflected in the assessment of the world Communist movement.

The inevitability of capitalism's collapse is not an automatic process. Capitalism has to be overthrown. An erroneous estimation of its strength only blunts the need to constantly sharpen and strengthen the revolutionary ideological struggle of the working class and its decisive intervention under the leadership of a party wedded to Marxism-Leninism -- the subjective factor without which no revolutionary transformation is possible.

Dictatorship of the class was replaced by the dictatorship of the vanguard of the class, i.e., the Party and then by the leadership of the Party. The socialist state which represents the entire class and working people got substituted by a small section in the Party. The decisions of the Polit-Bureau became enforceable on all citizens. The Leninist principle of a Party decision being articulated in democratic people's forums and Party's leadership established through a democratic process with maximum people's participation was replaced by diktats. This, naturally, strengthened the sense of alienation amongst the people.

In the process of implementation of democratic centralism, inner-Party democracy, often, became a casualty while centralism became strengthened. This led to the growth of bureaucratism which is the very antithesis of democracy. Tendencies alien to socialism, such as, corruption and nepotism also surfaced. In this process, the vitality of this revolutionary principle is robbed, alienating the Party from the masses and the Party ranks from the leadership.

Instead of correcting these distortions the leadership set about a course of abandoning both the concept of the leading role of the working class, democratic centralism and social ownership of means of production and planning. It finally led to the dismantling of socialism. Under the influence of the "bourgeois god of market economy", the systematic dismantling of the socialist economic foundations took place which contributed to the dismantling of socialism itself. This is precisely what happened in the USSR in revisionist regime.

These distortions and deviations from the revolutionary content of Marxism-Leninism after the 20th Congress of the CPSU along with the unresolved problems in the process of socialist construction led to the havoc. In the process of socialist construction major shortcomings occurred, as socialism was embarking on an unchartered path of human advance. There were no blueprints or any specific formulae. This reality also contributed in a large measure towards these shortcomings. This led to a steady erosion of the class consciousness and vigilance, both amongst the people and the Party rank and file. This facilitated the process of undermining of socialism with minimum resistance. Due to these shortcomings, a situation arose where counter revolutionary forces, both external and internal, acted in concert to dismantle socialism.

These reverses to socialism, therefore, have occurred not because of any inadequacies in the basic postulates of Marxism-Leninism. On the contrary, they have occurred primarily due to departures from the scientific and revolutionary content of Marxism-Leninism; incorrect estimations of the relative strengths of world capitalism and socialism; a dogmatic and mechanical interpretation of the creative science of Marxism; and also due to major shortcomings during the course of socialist construction. Gorbachev and the liquidationist leadership of the CPSU thus emerged as the children of the illegitimate relationship between revisionism and imperialism.

Despite tremendous advances, that too under the most exacting of circumstances and hostile environment due to these main factors and many others the mighty USSR could not consolidate and sustain the socialist order. Nearly same is the story of Mao’s China. There also the revisionist Deng Xiaoping slowly crept out to demolish Socialism and establish the capitalist formations after Mao’s death. Socialism can be sustained and developed only by the growing collective ideological consciousness of the people which cannot be reared without the ideological steadfastness of the ruling Communist Party.

Yet neither it is chalked out how and why the personality of a communist cadre transforms and develops into a giant like Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Fidel, Che and Ho Chi Minh, nor it is formulated how and why a communist degenerates and deteriorates in a revisionist and renegade like Kautsky, Trotsky, Khrushchev, Brezhnev, Gorbachev, Liu Shao Chi, and Deng Xiaoping after being trained and cultivated by the same communist party in the same way for decades and living the most tough life of a fighter dedicated to change the face of world.

Comrade Mao formulated the Cultural Revolution as the preventive precautionary remedy for the restoration of capitalism. But yet it is not formulated and framed what and how should be done for RESTORATION OF SOCIALISM. WE ARE TO GIVE THE SOLUTION OF THIS UNASWERED QUESTION OF OUR OWN WORLD REVOLUTIONARY MOVEMENT.

INQUILAB ZINDABAD !

GIRIJESH 

09450735496 (girijeshkmr@yahoo.co.in)

30.4.15.

(I disagree with some of the quotations, but was bound to place them to take care of different authors of both sides.)

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References:

1. Three documents of Communist league of India (Marxist-Leninist)

A. Let us start from the very beginning

B. Financial neocolonialism and future revolutions

C. Indian revolution and its problems

2. A Review of the Historical Experiences of World Socialism in The 20th Century-- Some thoughts (Paper presented at the International Symposium on World Socialism in the 21st Century) Sponsored jointly by the Institute of Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong thoughts & Chinese Academy of Social Science, October 21-24, 2002, Beijing http://www.cpim.org/…/historical-experiences-world-socialism

3. Strong, A.L., The Stalin Era, 1957 (4M) 

http://roadmaptowealth.net/suspense/the-stalin-era.html

4. http://www.northstarcompass.org/nsc1312/stalin.htm

5. Restoration of capitalism in the USSR – Martin Nicolus 

http://www.marx2mao.com/Other/RCSU75.html

http://marxism.halkcephesi.net/Martin%20Nicolaus/RCSU75.html

6. http://www.soviet-empire.com/ussr/viewtopic.php…

7. The Life and Death of Stalinism

http://lrp-cofi.org/book/contents.html

8. The essential stalin Introduction By Bruce Franklin

http://marxism.halkcephesi.net/…/the%20essential%20Stalin.h…