First Published: September 1976.
Transcription, Editing and Markup: Paul Saba
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This polemic is part of the paper on party building which the Revolutionary Communist League (M-L-M) will bring out, first summarized in our political organ, Unity and Struggle (October 1976), and later, complete, in pamphlet form.
Although the main danger to the Communist Movement remains Right Opportunism and Revisionism, and in the Anti-Revisionist Communist Movement in the United States, specifically in the form of the October League, in its swift move toward consolidated revisionism; we think it is necessary at this time to put straight some of the bizarre distortions of the Dangerous Duo, PRRWO (Dogmatist-Leader) and RWL (Empiricist-Follower) and their supra-“left” sabotage of the Anti-Revisionist Communist Movement. However it must be said that because of the emphatic, forceful but too many times hysterical way that these misguided comrades have raised the Question of party building, that genuine Marxist-Leninists, in the battle against these incorrect lines, have reached higher levels of theoretical clarity. The struggle for the correct line develops against what is incorrect.
RCL (M-L-M) Sept. 1976
* * *
Puerto Rican Revolutionary Workers’ Organization-Revolutionary Workers League (PRRWO-RWL) in their typical lopsided method say, “Party Building is the Central and Only Task” (Palante, Vol. 6, No 7, p 1, and repeatedly in other places) and by this reveal the essential onesided and exaggerated trend of their thought. In general we united with Resistencia in summing up and objecting to PRRWO-RWL’s “onlys”, which they summed up as, “They have a ’left’ opportunist line characterized by their ’onlys’: only party building, only propaganda (rejecting agitation), only line struggle (discarding all other forms of class struggle) only political line (ideology and organization are not important for them), only the advanced (it is incorrect to pay any attention to the intermediate or attempt to raise the general level of consciousness of the masses according to them), only theory (all practice is economism according to them.) Only the proletariat, p 1 Vol. 6, No 7 (denying the existence of allies of the proletariat like poor farmers, lower sectors of the petty-bourgeoisie, etc.” Although we agree with these characterizations, we think Resistencia should have given specific references to when and where specifically PRRWO-RWL have made these “onlys”, and given specific refutation of them. We also understand that in most cases their practice gives clearer evidence of these tendencies than their words, because they tend to give lipservice to some concepts but completely liquidate them in practice, or so distort the meaning of other concepts that they have no semblance to that practice in real life. Or else they will so distort what they claim to be somebody else’s “erroneous” practice but in reality they will be merely putting forth their own misunderstanding of what that concept is in the first place.
PRRWO-RWL say, “Party building is the central and only task”. But we have three strategic tasks to make socialist revolution, smash capitalism and bring the dictatorship of the proletariat and socialism. They are: A. Vanguard Party B. United Front C. Armed Struggle. And while we have no party, and since the tragic degeneration of the “CP”USA to revisionism, party building has been the central task of Marxist-Leninists and advanced forces, but the building of the party itself is involved with the two other tasks. They are not totally separated and isolated, they are related to each other in a dialectical way and each one can only exist because of the others, separately they have no meaning. The party is basic and key, that is understood. But by saying “Party Building is the Central and only Task”, PRRWO-RWL really mean stay away from the mass movement, have nothing to do with the spontaneous struggles of the masses, just come to our narrow little forums stacked with all our cadre and “advanced” (really PRRWO-RWL “hidden cadre”) and we will argue about party building in the abstract. We will polemicize about theory in the abstract, about propaganda incorrectly academically and in the abstract. We will never deal with either the major issues that effect the working class and the masses, that would be too topical and bowing to spontaneity. “Only Party Building” or “Central and Only Task” is different from Central Task among a number of other tasks and related to a number of other tasks. But their line has it that there are no tasks in this period in relation to the united front or armed struggle. But trade union work, any work in the mass movement, giving conscious character to the spontaneous uprisings of the masses, is partially party building, propaganda and agitation aimed at the advanced, but partially united front, giving leadership to the entire movement in which are the intermediate and the backward, the petty bourgeois and masses of working people, giving leadership to all, but in this period aiming at the advanced. What we are doing specifically and as the central or leading task is trying to build the party, but that is not an isolated quasi mystical task. The very fact that we must become schooled in legal and illegal work, develop open and closed cadres is related right now to the fact that socialism will come through armed struggle. The party we are building is a party of armed struggle. The essence of its ideology, political line and organization are created to wage armed struggle, and this character this capacity is developed with its construction not afterwards.
Yet the way “central and only task” is formulated it becomes the one sided hallmark of the decomposing “wing”, as Lenin said, “Rectilinearity and one-sidedness, woodeness and petrification, subjectivism and subjective blindness–voila, the epistemological roots of idealism...” (CW, Vol 3#, P 363 “On The Question of Dialectics”), “Idealism is one sided, exaggerated,..development (inflation, distention) of one of the features, aspects, facets of knowledge into an absolute, divorced from matter, from nature, apotheosised”(ibid).
Party building is itself a process in this period of Uniting Marxist-Leninists and Winning the advanced to Communism. How do you win the advanced elements of the labor movement, without some direct relationship to it? For instance PRRWO-RWL say Propaganda only, but do not understand what propaganda is. To them propaganda is only written and mainly distributed in newspapers and journals, and otherwise it is put forward only in narrow forums. They say in Vol. 6, No 7, P 3: “The mensheviks have frantically called out ’Stop the propaganda agitation should be the chief form’. But we have stood firm and responded. We must do more and better propaganda.” 1st the problem is that PRRWO-RWL [and in this the classic, Dogmatist-Leader, Empiricist-Follower that Mao mentioned in summing up the three “left” lines that plagued the CPC in its early days, is how the PRRWO-RWL dangerous duo breaks down (p 71 “Our Study and the Current Situation: appendix”]. They actively distort all calls for agitation because they oppose agitation, but any call for agitation or any call to work among the masses they call economism or accuse comrades of making “Agitation the chief form”. But they never mention the kind of agitation they favor, and in practice do none. International Working Women’s Day (IWWD) they finally did no agitation but had a narrow forum at Hunter College, a real working class bastion! May Day + Afrikan Liberation Day (ALD) no agitation at all and by ALD they did no propaganda either but just we would suppose, misstudied, purged each other. During the International Working Women’s Day, after one of the RWL comrades claimed they forgot to raise the question of opposition to the superpowers, so that struggle could go down in earnest in the coalition Workers’ Viewpoint Organization (WVO) had put together, and the demarcation be made. Since many of the folks in the coalition, were Trots, “CP”, Lesbians, etc. and that line of demarcation around the opposition to the superpowers sorely needed to be made. But after this process instead of struggling out further lines of demarcation PRRWO-RWL and WVO return to the meeting next week and run down a list of principles and do they call for line struggle? No. Accept them or get out they say! Just like RWL’s practice in ALSC, a mass organization [even though the national principles of unity have established ALSC a mass organization, RWL have their cadre declaring in New York and D.C., for instance, that ALSC is no longer a mass organization in those towns, that they have “adopted the science of MLMTT” (D.C.) “We Unite With The Line Of The Revolutionary Wing On Party Building”, and purge everyone else instantly who question this “left” sectarianism. (See D.C. ALSC leaflet put out by RWL cadre, “Opportunist and Reactionary Nationalist (sic) Combine To Hold Back Development Of A Genuine Communist Party”.)
As for PRRWO-RWL’s bankrupt “left” sectarian line on mass organizations, it can be summed up as, “either accept the backward line of the Duo, become infantile ’leftists’, or leave”! Most leave. RWL, particularly, has been a party to attempts to destroy the African Liberation Support Committee for the last two years, first because of their empiricism (“we got to go build RWL and sink roots deep in the class...in some wholly mechanical and idealist way”) and liquidation of the National Question and belittling of the role of the Liberation struggles against Imperialism, and now with more empiricism, tailing the PRRWO’s “left” dogmatist line.
The Duo attempted to destroy ALSC (and FFM as well) with their “Left” sectarian distortion that instead of fighting for the correct line in mass organizations and anti-imperialist organizations communists must dogmatically impose the line or else purge, physically assault, to try to turn all in the organization into instant RWL/PRRWO cadres and destroy the organization.
Listen to this “superlefts”,
As Communists we believe in socialism but we do not demand as a condition of our participation in and support for workers and students’ struggle adherence to socialism. So long as the given struggle serves the cause of the people against imperialism (even if that be fairly remote) we participate in and support it. (Australian Communist No 52 June, 1972, p. 27). “Message of Communist of Australia (M-L) signed by E.F. Hill, C.L. O’Shea, N.L. Gallagher and E.A. Bull”
The leadership of the Party in the mass organizations must be insured by the organization of communist fractions...Our leadership in the mass organizations must be secured by conviction and winning the confidence of these masses, and not by compulsion and command. (“Material for a Course on Organizational Questions”, pt E. The Party is the Highest form of Class Organization, from the Party Organizer, CPUSA-1932 reference Resolution of the E.C.C.I., Feb. 1924, on Fractions)
This is said, even with a party, so where does some largely pontificated “revolutionary wing” get off imposing lines or shouting “get out” (purging people from mo’s and thereby squelching real line struggle) this raggidy band of “left” hegemones who are so eager to join with R“CP” and “CL” (and even OL) in declaring the party in existence based on subjectivism and idealism that they pop up with a fictitious hegemonistic title for themselves, “the revolutionary wing”, based largely on partial truths and a propensity for selling woof tickets!
In speaking about the relationship of the party to the mass organizations and especially to the trade unions:
The ’left’ opportunist deviations reflect the pseudo-radicalism, of uprooted petty-bourgeois elements which, isolated from the masses, have no understanding of the conditions of an organized mass movement. They demand measures and methods which isolate the Party from the masses (sectarianism). (ibid).
Although throughout the entire period in the struggle for power the right deviation is the main danger.
The difference between the trade unions and the Party is: the trade union is an organization of all workers who recognize their conflict of interests with the boss and the necessity of a common struggle together with their fellow-workers. They fight for the immediate day to day life interests of the workers. The Party is the organization of the most class-conscious and advanced elements of the proletarian class.
And quoting Lenin On The Trade Unions, where he said, “The organization of the wage workers must be brought about on the basis of their mutual economic interests...Membership in the trade unions must not be made dependent on the acceptance of any political or religious principles.” They go on, “The members of the Party are those who accept Communism in all its phases. The trade unions, on the other hand, must accept all workers, regardless of their political outlook, their religion, &c.”... “Therefore the leadership by the Party of the mass organizations of the proletariat, which include the trade unions, is necessary.”
But we have no party, which means that genuine communists must make certain that their presence in the trade unions and mass organizations contributes directly to our central task in this pre-party period, Party Building. And we cannot do that by liquidating these mass organizations by sectarianism and trying to impose by force political lines of certain organizations. At this stage of party building, in the pre-party period, we hold that Political Line is key link, which means that the theoretical form of class struggle, the ideological struggle over the correct political line, that is the application of the theories of M-L-M to the concrete conditions of the U.S.A. in the concrete practice of making proletarian revolution in the U.S.A. must take precedence, and that our chief form of practical activity is propaganda. Communists did not form the ALSC, it was an organization that developed as a result of the spontaneous struggles of the masses of Black people against colonialism in Afrika. In the condition that exists in the world today, with colonialism still existing in Afrika and other places in the world, and the principal contradiction in the world today being the third world versus imperialism, which is the motor of revolution in the world, organizations like the ALSC will spontaneously come into being. As our Australian comrades say, “Traditionally the ruling circles have striven (and still strive) to steer people’s activity into parliamentary or trade union circles. By doing this they seek to impose their own control over movements which are, or potentially may be, directed against them.
The people, however, have increasingly experienced the futility of parliament and the trade unions in solving their problems. Their very purpose is to maintain the existence of capitalism by deception.
(Our emphasis) Because of their experience of the futility of these institutions the people have sought their own solutions in struggle and in their own organizations. The process has steadily developed so that today, on countless issues such as pollution of the environment, destruction of natural resources, preservation of the historic sites, defence of specific liberties, against particular wars and imperialist war in general, for better wages and working conditions, for better social services, better education, peoples organizations have come into being. These organizations arise from struggle and promote struggle. They show boundless initiative. The people have inexhaustible enthusiasm.
All this activity falls in with, is part of, is influenced by, and influences the world-wide trend among the people towards revolution.
A matter of fundamental importance is the subjective factor of Marxism-Leninism. In Australia, the Communist Party of Australia (M-L) has systematically criticized parliamentarism, trade unionism and legalism and systematically worked to expound the theory of the Australian revolution, anti-imperialist peoples’ democratic struggle and socialism. This too has had a profound effect. It has had such a deep effect that it is incalculable. Without this systematic criticism and exposition the movement in Australia would not have developed to the height that it has. Communists are against the theory of spontaneity. Without revolutionary theory there can be no revolutionary movement. But theory without practice is sterile just as practice without theory is blind, (“Many People’s Organizations Emerge In Struggle For Independence, Democratic Rights”, p 50-56, The Australian Communist No 75).
The leadership by the Party of the mass organizations of the proletariat including the trade unions, is necessary. (Or leadership by communists in the absence of the Party, struggling for the correct line, and as part of the polemics that must be waged in the communist movement with the aid of the advanced workers to put together the strategy and tactics maximum and minimum demands, i.e., program, for the coming vanguard communist party. And it is these polemics aimed at producing such a program which will unite the genuine Marxist-Leninists, demarcate them from the sham, and win the advanced to communism. The so-called “Revolutionary Wing” believes that they can just pop up in meetings and say “accept this truth or split”, what this means is that they cannot possibly be aiming such line or tactics at advanced workers, or advanced anybody, since they will end up invariably talking to themselves.
The “Material for a Course...” goes on outlining under the section “B, The difference between the organizational forms and methods of work of the Party and the proletarian mass organizations,”
These tasks, as laid down in the previous section, in connection with the relation to the Party and to the trade unions, hold good also for the other proletarian mass organizations... they embrace the broadest sections of the masses of workers and must have a different, less rigidly disciplined, organizational form than the Party, which requires iron discipline and rigid organization.
In the building and leadership of the trade unions, more democracy must be expressed than in the Party, Our chief weakness consists in the fact that we have far too few non-Party members in the leadership of the trade unions.
In other proletarian mass organizations, such as the labor, sports, tenants, cultural organizations, labor defense, relief, &c, the organizational forms must be still more flexible, since the strata of membership of these organizations have only made the first steps in the direction of the class struggle, and these organizations conduct only partial tasks in the various spheres of proletarian class struggle. Therefore sections of these organizations must be organized in the form of committees or in the form of a federation (Our emphasis) We must guard ourselves against mechanically imposing the rigid centralized organizational form of the Party, with its iron discipline, on the other proletarian mass organizations.
So disdainful of the spontaneous struggles of the people, the mass movement, that they go so far in this one-sided document [D.C. ALSC leaflet] as to say, that the ALSC itself in the past “DID NOT MOVE OUR STRUGGLE FORWARD” because it actually educated and agitated among the masses about colonialism in Africa and got a large and enthusiastic response. The truth is, were it not for the work in that mass action of1 ALSC these very “superlefts” would not even be able to claim M-L-M, since it was ALSC that got many of the RWL (and CAP too!) moving toward M-L-M in the first place!!!
But no real line struggle, so another “only” is, in practice, “only our line, only us, no real line struggle”, just run in and make the proclamation from on top of their proposed hegemony and run out. So in practice the line struggle they want is only through their newspaper and journal, and to a certain extent in limited forums, but never in the practical mass struggle which they disdain. Why should advanced workers respond to such nonsense as being threatened and talked down to? And even in the forums, the Mew York City May Day forum seemed more like a mandatory religious conversion for inmates in Belsen Belsen than a communist forum. They actually refused to let CAP(RCL) ask Questions, but confined the dialogue to accusations and shouts. While their “security” prowled the aisles woofin at people in a style much worse than any cultural nationalist (with the possible exception of the Nation of Islam) ever thought up!
Propaganda and agitation are linked up, Stalin in Volume 1 Works, p 12, says, “In the initial stages, Social-Democracy was unable to spread its activities among the masses of the workers and it therefore, confined its activities to propaganda and agitation circles. The only form of activity it engaged in at that time was to conduct study circles. The object of these circles was to create among the workers themselves a group that would subsequently be able to lead the movement. Therefore, these circles were made up of advanced workers– only chosen workers could attend them.”
First, Stalin says during this period Social Democracy “was unable” to spread its activities among the masses just as we in the anti-revisionist communist movement are largely unable to spread our activities now broadly among the masses. But the study circles were propaganda and agitation circles, and they did penetrate the mass movement where they could, to recruit the advanced workers for the circles. But the spontaneous movement at that time was itself at a low ebb. But Stalin also characterized the period when Socialists had no roots among the working population...“their activities were abstraction, futile”. The Social Democrats were unable to spread their activities because of the complete separateness of the socialist movement and the workingclass movement in the 70’s and 80’s. It was the action of combining those movements which begins as Stalin says, “The Russian Socialists established contact with the masses of workers only at the beginning of the 90’s. They realized that salvation lay only in the working class, and that this class alone would bring about the socialist ideal. Russian Social-Democracy now concentrated all its efforts and attention upon the movement that was going on among the Russian workers at that time, (ibid)
And so, Social Democracy set to work upon this unconscious, spontaneous and unorganized movement. It tried to develop the class consciousness of the workers, tried to unite the isolated and sporadic struggles of individual groups of workers against individual masters to combine them in a common class struggle...it tried to give this struggle an organized character.” (ibid–our ital.) It tried to combine the movement with socialism to give it a planned and conscious character. It certainly didn’t shrink away from that movement crying “don’t bow to spontaneity!” the bowing to spontaneity meant not giving that movement a planned conscious character but just letting it continue to be spontaneous! And that is exactly what PRRWO-RWL (Dogmatist leader-Empiricist-follower) do.
And as for Stalin saying the working class alone would bring the socialist ideal, he meant the working class is the only class that can lead, it is the only class whose objective position in the production process is thoroughly and resolutely opposed to all manifestations of capital. He says elsewhere (ibid p 22), “Only the working class, and the people generally, who in the struggle have nothing to lose but their chains, they, only they, constitute a genuine revolutionary circle”.
But this does not dispute Lenin saying that propaganda and agitation are done among all classes (WITBD p 94), or that finally the dictatorship of the proletariat is an alliance of democratic classes under the leadership and domination of the proletariat. “This power”, (the dictatorship of the proletariat, ed.) “the power of one class can be firmly established and exercised to the full only by means of special form of alliance between the class of proletarians and the labouring masses of the petty-bourgeois classes, primarily the laboring masses of the peasantry.”
This special form of alliance consists in that the guiding force of this alliance is the proletariat. This special form of alliance consists in that the leader of the state, the leader in the system of the dictatorship of the proletariat is one party, the party of the proletariat, the Party of the Communists which does not and cannot share leadership with other parties. (Stalin, On the Opposition, “Concerning Questions of Leninism”, p 24l-2)
Lenin says in a quote Stalin makes in the same volume, “The dictatorship of the Proletariat is a special form of class alliance between the proletariat, the vanguard of the working people, and the numerous non-proletarian strata of working people (the petty bourgeoisie, the small proprietors, the peasantry, the intelligentsia, etc.) or the majority of these; it is an alliance against capital, an alliance aiming at the complete overthrow of capital, at the complete suppression of the resistance of the bourgeoisie and of any attempt on its part at restoration, an alliance aiming at the final establishment and consolidation of socialism. It is a special type of alliance, which is being built up in special circumstances, namely, in the circumstances of fierce civil war; it is an alliance of the firm supporters of socialism with the latter1s wavering allies and sometimes with ’neutrals’ (then instead of an agreement for struggle, the alliance becomes an agreement for neutrality), an alliance between classes which differ economically, politically, socially and ideologically.” (Lenin, Foreword to “Deception of the People with Slogans of Freedom and Equality”, Vol. XXIX, quoted op. cit. p 381 Progress Publishers 1965 ed.). It is a Trot or Social Democrat line to liquidate allies as Stalin in “Foundations of Leninism” pointed out (p 55), Revolutionaries are interested in allies, the clowns of the second international didn’t have to be interested in allies because in the final go down they weren’t interested in making revolution.
But PRRWO-RWL, the Dangerous Duo, because they have an academic understanding of propaganda, and disassociate it with agitation are left with their newspaper which has drawn away from all occurrences in the world except their super “left” diatribes, a great many of which are now aimed inside their own ranks and keeping score on the departing members of the “wing” which has now become a Dangerous Duo. The whole newspaper Palante in the last issues is like public self cultivation and focuses on no issues or topical exposures as Lenin advised (WITBD, p 86). Just a score card of the recent purges, and badmouthing and distortions about everyone else in the anti-revisionist communist movement. There are fewer than a couple gross of communists in the U.S.A. they imply...we know that makes the rulers feel just fine!
But let’s deal with M-L-M for a second and point out their “left” dizziness! Every time they speak of agitation (except for brief obligatory mentions) it is putting it down, and trying to distort other people’s position by claiming they are “building the mass movement”. We don’t have to build the mass movement in order for struggle to be going on, it is spontaneous. We have to give conscious leadership, to the extent which we can in this period, to it. The Duo also use a quote from the Party of Labor of Albania (PLA) incorrectly, but show their lack of real understanding of what the spontaneous working class movement is, and their disdain for the masses. We don’t “build the mass movement”, we try to give it conscious planned character. Not to do that is to bow to spontaneity! In slandering the August Twenty Ninth Movement (ATM) for instance, (Vol. 6, No 7, p 11) implying that by the agitation around the arrest of Gregg Jones, Revolutionary Cause Vol. 1, No 5, headline, “Free Gregg Jones”, which was an example of combining agitation, around the freeing of Gregg Jones, and communist propaganda, explaining the Afro American National Question... .PRRWO-RWL slander ATM by saying ATM’s work in the Gregg Jones committee shows they are “competing for the O.L.’s base, who is competing for the R.U.’s base, who is competing for the CPUSA’s base, and all of you are competing for the position of most loyal lackies of the bourgeoisie”. This because ATM tried to give conscious, planned, communist leadership to a spontaneous struggle that arose in the community. ATM DIDN’T ARREST GREGG JONES SO THEY COULD START THE COMMITTEE, THE STATE ARRESTED HIM AND THE PEOPLE RESPONDED AND ATM TRIED TO LEAD THEM! So the incorrect use of the PLA quote, “The Party accompanied its propaganda and militant agitation, its political and military actions with its work for the organization of the people. It did not begin to work with the creation of mass organizations, because the masses had to be politically prepared beforehand for such organizations” (History PLA, p 106). But the point here is, as our Australian comrades have pointed out, and we have indicated in our polemics elsewhere against the duo for their incorrect position on mass organizations, the people create organizations in their spontaneous struggle and communists must try to give leadership to them – “Many peoples organizations emerge in the struggle for independence, democratic rights” The Australian Communist, #75, p 50-56. That’s why these hegemonistic sectarian dogmatists belittle the ALSC, saying it “contributed nothing to moving our struggle forward” because it wasn’t put together by the “U.S. Bolshevik Party” and why they first tried to liquidate it and now try to destroy it with “left” sectarianism. The people create organizations, mass resistance in their spontaneous opposition to capitalism. And the communists where possible must give these a conscious and planned character. To do otherwise is to turn our backs on our basic responsibility and task as communists, not to do this, is to obstruct party building by separating the communists from the day-to-day struggles of the masses, and risk talking “futile abstractions” while the people are trying to deal with concrete oppression and concrete exploitation in this capitalist death society. “Because of their experience of the futility of these institutions (parliament, trade unions, &c.) the people have sought their own solutions in struggle and in their own organizations...All this activity falls in with, is part of, and influenced by, and influences the worldwide trend among the people towards revolution.”
A matter of fundamental importance is the subjective factor of Marxism-Leninism. In Australia, the Communist Party of Australia (M-L) has systematically criticized parliamentarism, trade unionism and legalism and systematically worked to expound the theory of the Australian revolution, anti-imperialist peoples democratic struggle and socialism. This too has had a profound effect. It has had such a deep effect that it is incalculable. Without this systematic criticism and exposition the movement in Australia would not have developed to the height that it has. Communists are against the theory of spontaneity. Without revolutionary theory there can be no revolutionary movement. But theory without practice is sterile just as practice without theory is blind. (Op cit)
We don’t have to “build the mass movement” for it to exist spontaneously, our task, is to the extent we are able, in the present period, give it planned and conscious communist leadership! Yes some work in that mass movement is unavoidable (except for “left” sectarian closed doorites and hegemones). We know that during this pre-party period, propaganda is the chief form of practical activity but even the spreading of propaganda involves contact with the mass movement. The advanced workers are part of the spontaneous mass movement. Their being that, advanced, has no meaning otherwise. Agitational literature and agitation in the form of demonstrations, &c... are a part of genuine communist work even during this period. In the “Principles of Party Organization” from the 3rd Congress of the CI, 1921 “The Principle forms of Communist Propaganda” are listed as:
(i) individual verbal propaganda
(ii) Participation in the industrial and political labor movement
(iii) Propaganda through the party press and distribution of literature. Every member of a legal or illegal Party is to participate regularly in one or the other of these forms of propaganda. Lenin, WITBD p. 70
The question arises: what should political education consist of? Can it be confined to the propaganda of working class hostility to the autocracy? Of course not. It is not enough to explain to the workers that they are politically oppressed (no more than it was to explain to them that their interests were antagonistic to the interests of the employers). Agitation must be conducted over every concrete example of this oppression”. Agitation, political exposures, topical issues all linked to the Marxist-Leninist explanation of society, its classes their role and the need for socialist revolution and the dictatorship of the proletariat. Not just closed door navel searching self cultivation with a few purges thrown in to make it spicy!
To polemicize against relating to the mass movement, the spontaneous working class movement, is in fact, to bow to spontaneity, i.e., allowing that working class movement to remain without conscious character under the false line that characterized the so called “theory of cadres” that the PLA puts down. The “theory of cadres” was a Trotskyite trend, which “adopted the Trotskyite theory of educating and preserving cadres,” exclusively. “They considered connections and work with the masses as dangerous, for that would endanger the cadres” (History of The Party of Labor of Albania, p 75). By the time the meeting was held which brought the PLA formally into being, “The meeting denounced all the erroneous views alien to Marxist-Leninist ideology which had existed among the ranks of the communist groups. The ’theory of cadres’ was particularly stigmatized as defeatist and opportunist for it isolated the communists from the masses, kept them as a sect trailing behind the masses, and would finally lead to the dissolution of the party.” (ibid, p 88) And this was during the period of Italian fascism in Albania, this line was put out allegedly to keep the cadres safe from fascism. But even during those times, the role of communists was to give conscious leadership to the spontaneous working class movement! Their role broadening as they objectively developed a program and organizational capabilities - at their highest form as the Marxist-Leninist Party!
So that when PRRWO (dogmatist leader)-RWL (Empiricist follower) put out the line that “Party Building is the Central and Only Task”, they mean clearly to pull away from the spontaneous movement altogether, forgetting that the advanced come from that spontaneous working class movement too. There is no third movement between the communist movement and spontaneous working class movement (including the national struggles) where the advanced issue from.
They say “only propaganda” not directly, but by implying again and again that anyone who says agitation is correct during this period as well, is putting forward that agitation is the main form of activity. Well, we do not, we say propaganda is the chief form of activity, but that it is inextricably bound up with agitation. And we refer you to the CI’s definition* of what constitutes propaganda in the first place!
When the dangerous duo say “only the advanced”, which we hold is the secondary aspect of the entity, “Marxist-Leninists Unite Win The Advanced To Communism”, they really say this by inferring only propaganda can reach the advanced, as in the slander of the ATM in Vol. 7, No 6 p 4 “The Revolutionary Wing has been carrying out the chief form of activity, propaganda, aimed at Bolshevik party cadre, at Marxist-Leninists and advanced workers”. Yes, that is who the propaganda and agitation are aimed at, but it will move even more, and the advanced being the leaders of the spontaneous working class movement, when they are drawn into motion draw the other strata into motion as well. Also, whoever mentions agitation or giving leadership to the spontaneous movement, the Duo slander by saying they are aiming propaganda and agitation at backward and intermediate workers, as if the advanced disdain agitation as much as Dogmatist-PRRWO-leader/Empiricist-RWL-follower.
The Duo’s only class struggle is written which they put forward is line struggle, but as we said they have lines on very few issues recently. And when they draw the net in so tight as to say not Marxist-Leninists Unite, but now “Bolsheviks Unite”, (Vol 6., No 7, p 15) meaning only them, they are moving toward absolute solipsism an extreme form of subjective idealism. There is no program being put forward, none of the polemics embrace program, the strategy and tactics, minimum and maximum program, yet they have already drawn the lines of demarcation so clearly they can say “Bolsheviks Unite”, clear subjectivism of dogmatists and empiricists. But as we said their idea of line struggle is like the godfather, offering you a line you can’t refuse, no struggle at all, either accept this (dogma/empiricism) or get out!
The emphasis of Political Line being key link is necessary but again the Dangerous Duo (Dangerous to M-L-M) so confuse and make things one-sided and exaggerated, that it ends up seeming that to hold political line is key link means to exclude all other considerations and tasks. Political line does not drop from the sky, nor is the mere proclaiming of it enough to make the change we seek. This is the implication of the almost mystical chant of political line is key link, which is taken to such exaggeration that recently when the ALSC was readying for a national conference, a reading list was sent out by the national office (controlled by RWL) which listed Marxist-Leninist classics to read, to ready for the forth-coming meeting. But a short time later, apparently at some directive from the duo, another set of directions came forth which, incredibly, suggested dropping the classics and only reading Palante and Bolshevik as preparation, since to put the M-L-M classics on the list was saying that Ideology was key link! And they want to criticize ATM for telling its cadres to study the lead article of their newspaper, Revolutionary Cause “to ensure we have full consolidation of around our line”. Why is this incorrect? Or aren’t the cadres of the Dangerous Duo allowed to read their newspaper and journal to consolidate around the line or is the line put out the same ay it was in the IWWD and ALSC, “either accept this or split”?? And how can the Duo hook up ATM to RU’s line when the madness that issued out of the ALSC substituting Bolshevik and Palante for the M-L-M classics is out RU-ing RU.
Political Line is key link because now that we have affirmed the theory and ideology of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tse Tung Thought, we can only confirm that we have ideological unity through the struggle around the political line. That is, now we must see if our use of M-L-M theories applied to concrete situations based on concrete analysis corresponds to dialectical and historical materialism, the ideology of the proletariat, i.e., the stand, worldview and outlook. It is only around the ideological struggle over political line, the application of the theories of M-L-M to the concrete practice of making proletarian revolution in the U.S.A., that we can gain ideological unity, and hence at another point, organizational unity.
It is this ideological struggle around political line, which unifies Marxist-Leninists and wins the advanced to communism. And this line struggle must be waged in front of, and with the participation of, the advanced. But this is also why Marxist-Leninists Unite is the principal aspect of this entity, because it is the act of Marxist-Leninists uniting through the ideological struggle over political line, that in fact does win the advanced to communism. Even though these two tactical tasks are carried out simultaneously but they are not in equilibrium as the Duo say (Vol 6, No 7, p 13 Palante). This is why Marxist-Leninists Unite is principal, plays the leading role, because this is the lever that sets in motion the second part, win the advanced to communism. That .makes the whole process happen simultaneously. And this can only be accomplished in the struggle over political line, and that is why political line is key link. (Also there is a contradiction between Palante-PRRWO Dogmatist leader saying these are tactical principles, Palante Vol 6, No 7, p 11 and Bolshevik-RWL-Empiricist Follower, calling them “strategic principles” p. 34).
But this does not mean that this is separated from ideology; ideology has almost become a dirty word to the Duo, and this leads to the moronic behavior of the ALSC misdirective. Uniting around the correct political line is an ideological task and an ideological struggle. Just as uniting organizationally will be an ideological task and an ideological struggle. As even the affirmation of the theory of M-L-M and ideology was an ideological task and involved ideological struggle. Plus we have ideological tasks at each stage of party building as well as organizational tasks, and always ideological struggle.
When the Duo say build the party on the ideological plane, this seems a compromise from their earlier position which brooked of no ideological task at all as if political line was unconnected with ideology. But a correct political line is correct because it demonstrates a dialectical materialist view of reality and method for dealing with it as opposed to a bourgeois view, and methodology for dealing with it. “The question of building the Communist Party is in the first place an ideological question.” (E.F. Hill, Australia’s Revolution: On the struggle for a Marxist-Leninist Communist Party p 70 “As has been said, until Party building is put on the ideological plane there can be no real Party building. The great enemies of Party building in Australia were subjectivism, sectarianism and a style of work characterised by repetitions of quotations from Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin without really seeking to master independently the integration of the universal truth of Marxism-Leninism with the actual conditions in Australia. Mao Tsetung in speaking of China (and its principle is applicable in Australia) said: ’Speaking specifically, people engaged in practical work must at all times keep abreast of changing conditions, and this is something for which no Communist Party in any country can depend on others.’ (Mao Tsetung: Selected Works, Vol. III, p 13)” (Ibid, p.#4) “The question is does one proceed arbitrarily from quotations from the classics and ready made schemes or does one proceed from the facts and a knowledge of the general essence of Marxism-Leninism? Proper style of Communist work rejects the former and adopts the latter.” (Ibid, p. #5) “Subjectivism and sectarianism were recognized as errors. But their real character was not understood. Political subjectivism is the rejection of respect for facts, and the substitution for the facts of ideas invented in the name of Marxism-Leninism in the minds of the kind of ’theoretician’ spoken of a moment ago.” (Ibid.)
When they say only theory this is completely confused because political line is the application of M-L-M to concrete conditions, and as Stalin said, “Some people think that it is sufficient to draw up a correct Party line, proclaim it from the housetops, state it in the form of general theses and resolutions, and take a vote and carry unanimously for victory to come of itself, spontaneously, as it were. This, of course is wrong. It is a gross delusion. Only incorrigible bureaucrats and red-tapists can think so. As a matter of fact, these successes and victories did not come spontaneously, but as the result of a fierce struggle for the application of the Party line. (“On Problems of Organizational Leadership”, Stalin, p 5, On Organization, HB Center Calcutta).
And as far as the relations of theory to practice, Mao Tse Tung’s “On Practice” should have squashed the theory only, rationalist line. We know that theoretical class struggle over correct political line is the essence of this stage of party building, in the pre-party period. But even so the line must be proven in practice, the theory must be verified by practice. The line, in and of itself, means little. It must be applied. “Anyone who thinks that rational knowledge need not be derived from perceptual knowledge is an idealist”...“The rational is reliable precisely because it has its source in sense perceptions, otherwise it would be like water without a source, a tree without roots, subjective, self-engendered and unreliable.” (On Practice, p74) ”If the dialectical-materialist movement of knowledge were to stop at rational knowledge, only half the problem would be dealt with. And as far as Marxist philosophy is concerned, only the less important half at that. Marxist philosophy holds that the most important problem does not lie in understanding the laws of the objective world and thus being able to explain it, but in applying knowledge of these laws actively to change the world. From the Marxist viewpoint theory is important, and its importance is fully expressed in Lenin’s statement “Without revolutionary theory there can be no revolutionary movement”. But Marxism emphasizes the importance of theory precisely and only because it can guide action. If we have a correct theory but merely prate about it, pigeonhole it and do not put it into practice, then that theory, however good, is of no significance.” (On Practice, p 76).
The problem of whether theory corresponds to objective reality is not, and cannot be, completely solved in the movement of knowledge from the perceptual to the rational. The only way to solve this problem completely is to redirect rational knowledge to social practice, apply theory to practice and see whether it can achieve the objectives one has in mind.” (On Practice, p 77).
But the weird flip flop is that in running backwardness like substituting Palante and Bolshevik for the M-L-M classics, even though the Duo prate about theory, in fact they are belittling it. So weird is their “understanding” of political line that they think it is something that leaps up without theory and has nothing to do with ideology. But the Duo should dig this, “Ideology politics and organization are at once a unity and division. They serve each other. Ideology on its own is of no importance. Marx said: ’The philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways; the point however is to change it.’ Marxist-Leninist-Mao Tse Tung ideology leads to particular politics, the politics of class struggle, the struggle of class against class... Ideology and politics demand organization to serve them.” (“Party Organization”, Some Articles On Striving For Marxism-Leninism In Australia, p 39-40, The Communist Party of Australia (M-L). And also, “The World Outlook of Communism enables the Communist Party organization to see clearly the social forces, it enables a correct political grasp and the working out of correct political tactics.” (ibid p 40). It is only a correct ideological position that allows a correct political line, and only a correct organizational form which allows these to have full meaning.
We say the Duo says theory only because they demean all practice as tailing the mass movement, bowing to spontaneity, party building from below, Central task is to build the mass movement, winning the broad masses, agitation is the chief form (see, e.g., p 2, Vol. 6, No 7, Palante). They also distort their own practice by saying “Application of this line is revolutionary practice. To put forward we must build the mass movement is sheer poppycock, treachery to the proletariat.” (ibid p 10). But their actual practice is to “apply” the theory in journals, newspapers, and an occasional propaganda piece only. The constant diatribes against any agitational work or against any work in the working class movement generally points out the exclusivity of their practice being the narrowest form of line struggle. i.e., journalistic and in a decreasing number of forums. IWWD, May Day agitation, demonstrations were cancelled. On ALD, NY ALSC {controlled by RWL) did no work at all. Their practice was to do nothing. Not even issuing printed propaganda, or a forum. In D.C. another RWL controlled ALSC distributed about 300 leaflets, leaving the ALD agitation, demonstration and even propaganda to petty bourgeois Pan-Afrikanist All African Peoples’ Revolutionary Party and Howard University neo-academics who were pushing their collaboration with Soviet Social Imperialism in Afrika. Likewise during the recent outburst of Azania against the degenerate South Afrikan colonialists, the Duo did nothing, nor did its ALSC chapters peep! (On ALD, CAP set up information tables on the sidewalks in downtown areas across the country, and not only circulated propaganda, but spoke directly to the passing crowds over loudspeakers. This was preceded all week, by passing out the propaganda at factory gates, and inside the shops and factories. In the Newark area alone, 10,000 pieces of propaganda, each leaflet about 4 pp each, were distributed in this manner, the majority inside the factories and shops and at the factory gates.) Lenin says in “What The Friends of The People Are” p 297-98, CW No 1, “the practical work of propaganda and agitation must always take precedence, because firstly theoretical work only supplies answers to the problems raised by practical work, and, secondly, the Social Democrats, for reasons over which they have no control, are so often compelled to confine themselves to theoretical work that they value highly every moment when practical work is possible.”
Lenin goes on to say, and this is critical and the exact relationship of theory and practice, theoretical work with practical work, “You cannot be an ideological leader without the above mentioned theoretical work, just as you cannot be one without directing this work to meet the needs of the cause, and without spreading the results of this theory among the workers and helping them to organize.”
Such a presentation of the task guards Social Democracy against the defects from which socialist groups so often suffer, namely, dogmatism and sectarianism.”
There can be no dogmatism where the supreme and sole criterion of a doctrine is in its conformity to the actual process of social and economic development” (the theoretical) “there can be no sectarianism where the task is that of promoting the organization of the proletariat, and when therefore the role of the ’intelligentsia’ is to make special leaders from among the ’intelligentsia’ unnecessary.” (the practical) (ibid p 298).
The Dangerous Duo took the last part of this quote, the last paragraph (p 6, Vol. 6, No 6) beginning, “There can be no dogmatism...”, leaving out the entire first part and foot note, which we quote here, trying to make it seem that Lenin was also taking Party Building in a vacuum of isolation like the Duo, and saying the Duo couldn’t be dogmatic and sectarian cause they were building the party. But Lenin states clearly, “theoretical and practical work merge into one aptly described by the veteran German Social Democrat, Liebknecht, as Study, Propaganda, Organization” (ibid p 298) or Studying, Propagandizing, Organizing.
There is no doubt that our theoretical tasks are enormous in this period, and the theoretical form of class struggle and these tasks must predominate here and now, but also these theoretical tasks must go hand in hand with certain practical ones, which are chiefly propaganda, and appropriate agitation.
We cannot even recognize the correct political line except by deepening of our theoretical work, that’s why to make political line key link unconnected with ideology or ideological line is nonsense. “If one is confused theoretically one is not able to distinguish and resist an erroneous line, nor is it possible to consciously implement a correct line.” (Peking Review, No 31, Aug. 1, 1975, “Raise the Ability to Differentiate Between Correct and Wrong Lines”, p 19).
Only when a Communist Party member establishes a dialectical and historical materialist world outlook can he firmly and consciously implement Chairman Mao’s proletarian revolutionary line...If he does not remould his world outlook and lets idealist and metaphysical ideals remain in his mind, he will not be able to recognize sham Marxism and resist erroneous lines.
The dialectical and historical materialist world outlook does not drop from the skies, nor is it innate in the mind. It comes from prolonged and bitter tempering in practical struggle under the guidance of Marxist theory, (our ital) (Peking Review, No 12, Mar. 23, 1973, “Party Building Must Be Closely Linked With Political Line”, p8) That is critical, ideological soundness comes from “practical struggle under the guidance of Marxist theory”. The political line must be applied, otherwise we have no way of seeing if it is in tune with the world outlook of the proletariat, dialectical materialism. It is here we see the unity between the theories of Marxism-Leninism and the practice of the Proletarian Revolution in the U.S.A.
In an article describing cadre training in the Peoples Republic of China, training in the May 7 Cadre School is described, “the primary task of the school is to educate the students in the ideological and political line. To this end, we have organized them to study Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tsetung Thought in the light of class struggle and the two-line struggle in China and in our province today. The students are required to integrate their study of theories with the criticism of revisionism, with the summing up of historical experience and with the remoulding of their own world outlook, so that they can really learn and master Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tsetung Thought by combining theory, with practice. The criterion for judging the standard of a student is not their ability to memorize and quote phrases from books but their ability to distinguish the Marxist line from the revisionist line in actual struggle and to use Marxist stand, viewpoint and method to solve practical problems.” (Peking Review No 21, May 21, 1976, “An Important Way To Train Proletarian Cadres”)
In addition, to the other onsidedness and lopsidedness, the idealist road to clerical obscurantism, the approach to Revolution is the Main Trend, as polemicized against elsewhere also denies that War is a Trend. Bolshevik says that, “the theory of two contending trends is revisionist”, but the trends are contending, it is just that revolution is the main trend but it is not the only trend, that would be metaphysical! (See the complete pamphlet on Party Building or October *76 Unity and Struggle for a more complete polemic around this issue, plus a repudiation of (CAP’s) RCL’s earlier error on this line.) Plus they say that they repudiate the line and their “error was rooted in spontaneity, our seeking external solutions, like the fully developed line of WV”, but this is still what is going on, the new band wagon being PRRWO. As Mao said, “On account of their limited and narrow experience, most of the empiricists lacked independent, clearcut and systematic views on problems of a general nature and therefore they usually played second fiddle in their association with the dogmatists ...” (Mao Tse-Tung “Our Study And The Current Situation, Appendix: Resolution On Certain Questions In The History Of Our Party”, p 71). In analyzing the three “Left” lines in the Chinese Communist Party during the period, the 2 Li Li San “Left” lines and the Wang Ming line, Chairman Mao said these left lines ”reflected the ideology of the Chinese petty-bourgeois democrats”. He said these lines were characterized by ”The petty-bourgeois method of thinking manifests itself basically in subjectivism and one-sidedness in viewing problems that is, it does not proceed from an objective and comprehensive picture of the balance of class forces, but takes subjective wishes, impressions and empty talk for reality, takes a single aspect for all aspects, the part for the whole and the tree for the forest. Petty-bourgeois intellectuals, being detached from the actual process of production, have only book knowledge, lack perceptual knowledge, and so their method of thinking is apt to manifest itself in the dogmatism discussed above. Those petty bourgeois elements associated with production, though they have some perceptual knowledge, suffer from the limitations characteristic of petty production –narrowness, diffuseness, isolation and conservatism– and so their method of thinking is apt to manifest itself in the empiricism discussed above.
...The political tendency of the petty bourgeoisie is apt to manifest itself in vacillation between the Left and the Right because of its mode of life and the resulting subjectivism and one-sidedness of its method of thinking. Many representatives of the petty-bourgeois revolutionaries hope for an immediate victory of the revolution in order to bring about a radical change in their present status; therefore they lack the patience needed for protracted revolutionary endeavour, are fond of “Left” revolutionary phrases and slogans and, in their sentiments and actions, are given to closed-doorism or adventurism.
...But the same petty-bourgeois revolutionaries when placed in a different set of circumstances–or another section of the petty bourgeois revolutionaries–may become pessimistic and despondent and express Rightist sentiments and views, tailing after the bourgeoisie. (ibid p 76-7).
Sectarianism is an expression of subjectivism in organizational relations; if we want to get rid of subjectivism and promote the Marxist-Leninist spirit of seeking truth from facts, we must sweep the remnants of sectarianism out of the Party, and proceed from the principle that the Party’s interests are above personal or sectional interests, so that the Party can attain complete solidarity and unity. (Mao Tsetung, Selected Readings)
In reality, the movement has been characterized by the twists and turns we have gone through on the road towards building the party. In fact, the history of PRRWO and RWL, from their own account, has not been the history of straight line development, the road to revolution is tortuous and full of “submerged” rocks, but “the future is bright.” We view the struggle to build the party as part of the irresistible trend of revolution in the world. “Cast away illusions, prepare for struggle”!
The 81 Communist and Workers Parties who met in Moscow 1960 stated: “Dogmatism and sectarianism in theory and practice can also become the main danger at some stage of development of individual parties, unless combated unrelentingly. They rob revolutionary parties of the ability to develop Marxism-Leninism through scientific analysis and apply it creatively according to the specific conditions; they isolate Communism from the broad masses of the working people, doom them to passive expectation or leftist, adventurist actions in the revolutionary struggle, prevent them from making a timely and correct estimate of the changing situation and of new experience, using all opportunities to bring about the victory of the working class and all democratic forces in the struggle against imperialism, reaction, war danger, and thereby prevent the peoples from achieving victory in their just struggle.”
They also declared: “The further development of the Communist and Working-class movement calls... for continuing a determined struggle on two fronts – against revisionism, which remains the main danger, (our emphasis) and against dogmatism and sectarianism.” (Statement of 81 Communist and Workers Parties, p 15). Right Opportunism “remains the main danger”, and the “CP”SU revisionism in state power are the leaders and main perpetrators of revisionism in the world and their agents, its 5th column in the U.S.A., the “CP”USA, and in the anti-revisionist communist movement in the U.S.A., by the October League.
Recently, PRRWO-RWL in the organ Palante, implied that the Revolutionary Communist League is a “front organization” for the FBI and even slandered our comrade in struggle, Amiri Baraka, the Chairman of the RCL with the following provocation:
Many times they do this by setting up front organizations, like in the first period of Party Building where the US Organization under the leadership of the notorious gangster Ron Karenga, an old croney of the thoroughly bankrupt element Amiri Baraka, serve as a front, where the secret political police could at random provide external provocation measures to get the BPP involved in confrontations with the aim of destroying the BPP by getting Panthers killed, demoralizing its members, sowing confusion and fear, analyzing each step of the way the. tactics or combinations of tactics to use to accelerate the attacks and repression on the Panther Party. (Palante, p 2, Vol 6, No 6).
One of the real mistakes of the 60’s which PRRWO-RWL are glossing over in this passage, is that the Black Liberation Movement did not distinguish correctly between contradictions between ourselves and the enemy and the contradictions among the people. These are resolved two entirely different ways. The bourgeoisie is always at work dividing the ranks of the revolutionary movement. This was true in the 1960’s and it is certainly true today. But what revolutionary communists must do is to critically and properly sum up the lessons of the past experience gained in the crucible of struggle. Whose interest does it serve to gloss over the errors of the Black Panther Party or US Organization in the 60’s? Certainly not the proletariat! We have summed up cultural nationalism and surely if we look the reformism of the Black Panther Party today, we know that the internal contradictions in the BPP produced the present line. But our duty as communists is the prevention of any actions which may undermine the unity of communists and every genuine communist must take on the responsibility of defending this principle of communist relations. (refer to Statement of 81 Communist and Workers Parties, 1960, p 30). Otherwise we are deviating from M-L-M and the interest of the proletariat and objectively aiding the bourgeoisie in its tactics!
The correct method of resolving contradictions between Marxist-Leninists is unity-criticism-unity and this method based on the international experience of the proletariat:
In criticizing “Left” dogmatism, we discarded this old method and adopted a new one, that is, one of starting from the desire for unity, distinguishing between right and wrong through criticism or struggle and arriving at a new unity on a new basis. This was the method used in the rectification movement of 1942. Thus within a few years, by the time the Chinese Communist Party held its Seventh National Congress in 1945, unity was achieved throughout the Party, and as a consequence the great victory of the people’s revolution was won. The essential thing is to start from the desire for unity. For without this desire for unity, the struggle is certain to get out of hand. Wouldn’t this be the same as “ruthless struggle and merciless blows”? And what Party unity would there be left? It was this very experience that led us to the formula: “unity, criticism, unity”. Or, in other words, “learn from past mistakes to avoid future ones and cure the sickness to save the patient...(Mao, Selected Readings, pp 439-40).
This method is the method of the proletariat that comes from summing up experience based on the world outlook of the proletariat, dialectical & historical materialism. But what about the erroneous method employed by the “Revolutionary Wing”, the pretentious re-writing and romanticizing of past mistakes to make some look like they were the heroes and others like they were the villains? And rather than genuine polemics about our different summations of the movement, PRRWO-RWL employ character assassination and intrigue. This is the method of infantile sectarianism and not Marxism-Leninism. These attacks are acts of provocation and political stupidity at its worst! Where is the BPP at now? Did the ideological errors fall from the sky, no, they are based on contradictions internal to the development of the BPP, We communists must take a dialectical approach and not a onesided, subjectivist approach to reality!
This tactic of the Dangerous Duo has been summed up already by Mao Tse Tung, where he points out the class base for this method:
It is the tactic which the exploiting classes and the lumpen-proletariat habitually practice, but for which the proletariat has no use. For the proletariat the sharpest and most effective weapon is a serious and militant scientific attitude. The Communist Party lives by the truth of Marxism-Leninism, by seeking truth from facts, by science, and not by intimidating people. Needless to say, the idea of attaining fame and position for oneself by pretentiousness is even more contemptible... (Mao, On Literature and Art, p 99).
We can conclude only from these attacks that PRRWO-RWL suffer from infantile sectarianism and it is clear that an incorrect line is coming out that is designed to lead to the same confrontations as in the 60’s. But the RCL understands how the state attempts to turn contradictions between Marxist-Leninist groups which are non-antagonistic into antagonistic contradictions. And we will resist this design in a Marxist-Leninist fashion!
The attacks on Comrade Amiri Baraka have been a standard design of the bourgeoisie to sow seeds of mistrust and discord within our ranks and in the ranks of the communist movement. But the incorrect methodology used by the Dangerous Duo further prove they are no “Revolutionary Wing” and with these provocations, they demonstrate the incorrect world-view that is the ideological source of these tactics. What we are getting in these tracts is criminal gossip, character assassination, and the spreading of rumours, but not ideological struggle over political line. And these loose accusations and irresponsible statements which abuse the purpose of propaganda and betray the central task of party building actually reflects ideological and political weaknesses in the Duo. “Marxism holds that world outlook and methodology are identical.” (Study Philosophy, p 37). On the surface, PRRWO-RWL talk about the danger of bourgeois state, but in practice they are opening the very same door to bourgeois terror as we have seen in the 60’s by fabricating an excuse for the police!
Rather than slander (CAP) RCL with garbage about our “connections” with the state, the Duo should begin paying closer attention to just where inside their own organization the mad “left” lines and calls to assault, mount lumpen like verbal and physical attacks, publish information that enables the state to better analyze the holes in their organization, emanate from? Just who is pushing Neo-Cleaverism and legitimatizing frenzied supra “left” closed doorism as Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tsetung Thought, and why?
In summing up the history of the Congress of Afrikan People in the June issue of Unity & Struggle 1976, we outlined the fact that we actually broke with US Organization around that time of the 1970 CAP conference where-CAP was formed in Atlanta, Georgia. We have repudiated these incorrect lines of cultural nationalism and will continue to criticize the cultural nationalism we had held to in the past, and we have published a more extensive self-criticism of these errors. But no one-sided view of the past can substitute for the revolutionary science of M-L-M.
PRRWO and RWL have made concrete contributions to the anti-revisionist Communist movement, but in the present period, despite these contributions, they are in deep error, and principally a menace to themselves. Their recent line mutations Palante Vol. 6 No 8, which we will analyze in future polemics, demonstrate clearly that even they know something is wrong. Perhaps they will find out that Dogmatism and Empiricism, Mechanical Materialism, Idealism, Subjectivism, Onesidedness, Sectarianism, Character Assassination are no substitute for Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tsetung Thought. Mao has said, “three aspects of petty-bourgeois ideology...subjectivism in ideology, the “Left” and Right Deviations in politics and the sectarianism in organization”, these are principally what the Duo manifests. And the only way out is to overcome this petty-bourgeois ideology and transform it into proletarian ideology. But in the struggle against their errors, like the struggle against the Right opportunist views of OL,” the entire anti-revisionist communist movement can only become theoretically and ideologically clearer, and therefore politically and organizationally stronger. The correct line develops in the struggle against what is incorrect.
PEOPLE OF THE WORLD UNITE TO DEFEAT U.S. IMPERIALISM AND SOVIET SOCIAL IMPERIALISM!
MARXIST-LENINISTS UNITE – WIN THE ADVANCED TO COMMUNISM!
BUILD A REVOLUTIONARY MARXIST-LENINIST COMMUNIST PARTY!