Encyclopedia of Anti-Revisionism On-Line

Resolutions and Speeches
1st Congress
Puerto Rican Revolutionary Workers Organization (Young Lords Party)


I Wor Kuen
Speech Presented by Gordon Chang

An ideology is the way in which we view reality, the world around us. It is from our basic ideology that our strategy and structure is derived and thus it is with the hope of furthering the unity of this Congress that we present this ideology. Without a clear stand we will have no consistent direction and will easily get confused, having no way to get to the root of the problems confronting us.

Correct ideology does not come from a flash of lightning, nor from just a study of books alone, and nor does correct ideology emerge full blown from the brains of one or even several persons. Correct revolutionary ideology is based upon the understanding derived from social practice and the study of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tse Tung Thought.

Our ideology will develop and change as we go through more practice and study. This is a natural development and a good development, for our ideology will only be proven right or wrong through practice.

Prologue

Working with objective reality and grasping the stages of the development of the revolution to achieve greater and greater unity guided by communist principles is the only correct approach to the American revolution.

We are revolutionary Asians dedicated to building a communist society is the U.S. The first question is what is the justification for saying that we are revolutionary and Asian? Since communist ideology is based upon class, not racial contradictions, are we not doing something which actually conflicts with our overall goal? (a communist society without class and racial divisions?) Are we abandoning basic principles of Marxism-Leninism?

The road to revolution is the consolidation of the power of the masses, building towards the destruction of the bourgeois state, the seizure of state power and the construction of socialism by the means of the dictatorship of the proletariat. But a unified revolutionary movement led by the working class requires more than just talking about or wishing for working class unity; revolutionaries must deal with the complexity of its formation process and the key role which racism plays in the process. The role of racism, in particular, is one of the most unique characteristics of U.S. capitalism at this time and without an understanding of its roots and implications, the American revolution cannot progress in a correct direction.

The past several years have witnessed a significant upsurge in the revolutionary forces of the U.S., such as in the women’s, student, anti-war and prison movements, and especially among non-white peoples. The present stage in the American revolution calls for unity among the Black, Brown and Asian peoples in the U.S. We as communists are responding to that call. But we must go deeper into our analysis of U.S. society to better answer the above questions and points.

Overview of the Development of the U.S.

The expansionist and aggressive nature of’ the U.S. has been clear from its very beginning. This is a unique aspect.

The creation of the country that later became known as the U.S.A. occurred during the worldwide rise of capitalism. American capitalism was an extension of British capitalism but with certain unique features which became the basis of the rapid development of capitalist forces in this country.

America contained extremely productive agricultural areas and raw materials. The 1776 bourgeois anti-colonial revolution freed American capitalist forces from remnant mother country feudal relations and the colonial yokes of the British capitalist class. The success of this revolution meant that from its very beginning, the U.S.A. had few of the feudal remnant fetters which characterized both Japanese and European capitalism. Coupled with the almost limitless geographical, agricultural and natural resources of the continent, the physical basis of a powerful capitalist economy was set.

The most significant factor, however, in the development of American capitalism was the enslavement of millions of Africans to realize the tremendous agricultural potential of the American south. The very basis of the early American economy was the extremely powerful and profitable system of the Southern agricultural empire based on slavery. Slavery provided tremendous amounts of capital which became the foundation, of the industrialization of the U.S.A. The rapid development of U.S. capitalism could not have taken place without the use of slavery.

Slavery therefore guaranteed the lack of working class unity. On the one hand, from the very beginning there was a bourgeois republic for much of the white population; on the other hand, slavery existed for millions of Blacks. Slavery and “democracy” mutually coexisted and were mutually interdependent. Liberal democracy existed for the white population because it was based on slavery of the Black population. This was the basis of American racism.

The abolition of legal slavery only freed Black people to become the lowest of the wage slaves. Slavery ended only when it no longer was profitable. The freeing of Black people, however, created a tremendous free labor pool for the use of the bourgeoisie. American capitalism not only fostered but perpetuated the divisions which developed during the period of formal slavery between Black and white.

The importation of millions of other colored people (Asian and Brown people), the genocide of the Native Americans, and the colonizing of other nations (Hawaii, Puerto Rico, the Philippines, etc.) further permitted American capitalists and their tools, the government and reactionary trade unions to press to create further divisions among the working people.

Non-white immigrants, coining from societies devastated by colonialism which also perpetuated feudalism, came to America as near slaves or indentured servants. They too became the lowest of the wage slaves of American capitalism.

An overall working class unity never developed, although there were some moments. At every crucial juncture, opportunist leaders of the American working class movement chose to ally themselves with the developing capitalist class, joining with them to continue the division of the working class at home (Chinese discriminatory labor laws, unions, etc.) and to follow them on their worldwide schemes of expansion (the Spanish-American War, WW I). Opportunism was to characterize the American working class movement because of the tremendous ability of American capitalism to expand and bring back tangible benefits for the American working class, especially the white sector.

American capitalism rapidly expanded up into the 1950’s when the weakness of the international capitalist order and the strength of the revolutionary forces of the world forced the U.S. to become the chief imperialist power of the world. Its task was to rule the world to protect international capitalism. But just at the height of its expansion and power, the internal contradictions of U.S. capitalist society sharpened. The U.S. leap to become number one imperialist power signaled the end of American expansion and the beginning of the period when domestic and non-white people began to sharpen their demands for justice and equality and working people of all colors were forced to more and more unite as social and economic conditions deteriorated due to the increasing number of problems of U.S. capitalism and its increasing inability to maneuver out of those problems.

Racism which has divided the American people is therefore the primary reason why there has never been an effective domestic challenge to American capitalism. All past revolutionary movements in the U.S. have failed to grasp the key role of racism, thus dooming the movement to failure.

Neo-colonialism and Racism – the Two Weak Spots of the U.S. Today

Countries want independence, nations want liberation, and the people want revolution. This slogan put forward by China accurately summarizes the irresistible trend of history in the world today. It is a brief statement of the foundation for China’s correct international Anti-imperialist United Front Strategy.

The international Anti-imperialist United Front Strategy is the culmination of the worldwide trend against U.S. imperialism led by the people of the Third World.

Following the Second World War, in order to protect the severely weakened international capitalist order and to expand her own economic and political control, the U.S. became the leading imperialist power of history and assumed responsibility for the counter-revolutionary movements around the world. Neo-colonialism was the product of U.S. imperialism.

The result was the development of a contradiction between the people of the world and the United States. This contradiction has become the major U.S. problem today, also having profound effects internally upon its domestic rule and economic stability. The present and daily strengthening international anti-imperialist united front is shaking the entire U.S. capitalist order down to its foundations and has been and will continue to be a major factor in the development of the domestic revolutionary movement.

Simultaneously, the domestic contradiction between the American ruling class and non-white peoples sharpened and exploded. Internally, neo-colonialism had become its weak point; domestically, racism had become its weak point.

From its very beginning, the response of non-white people to racial has been a political struggle: their fight for equality and justice directly challenges the American capitalist crier. The struggle of non-white people in this country has been the sharpest Struggle during the past two decades and continues to be the most explosive force in American society, demanding the end of the present capitalist order and the construction of a just, truly democratic and equal society.

History of Chinese in America

The Chinese people are a part of the history of non-white people in the U.S. And in tracing the history of the Chinese people in America, it is one specific example of our overall analysis.

The present Chinese population in America of between 400,000 and 500,000 is mainly centered in the urban areas of the West and East Coasts, with the largest concentrations in San Francisco and New York.

Chinese in the United States are the direct result of imperialism and colonialism in Asia. Not including the immigration of a small number of intellectuals in the 19th century and intellectuals and reactionary businessmen in the 1950’s, the great majority of Chinese in this country come from poor peasant and worker backgrounds from the Canton Region of China.

Waves of Chinese came to the U.S. in the 1800’s because of the needs for cheap labor of U.S. infant industry and commerce. Therefore, many hundreds of thousands of Chinese were brought to the U.S., usually as indentured labor – little more than slaves. The mid and late 19th Century was the time of the first big influx.

China at that time was being carved up by a score of imperialist powers and millions of Chinese lived in deteriorating conditions. The destruction caused by imperialism in China and the needs of capitalism in the United States were the pre-conditions of Chinese coming to the U.S.

The descendents of the Chinese who did survive and stay in the U.S. are now largely integrated into the American working and petty bourgeoisie classes, maintaining, however, close ties with the Chinese community. Racism within the capitalist system has prevented full integration into American society.

The second main period of Chinese coming to the U.S. began in the late 1950’s extending up into the present. The rapidly deteriorating conditions of Hong Kong and Taiwan are the main conditions for this wave. The great majority of these immigrants are purely Chinese speaking and live almost exclusively within the Chinese communities.

Overall Analysis of Chinese Communities

Asians in this country, like the vast majority in this country, are working people. They are here because imperialism in one way or another disrupted their traditional way of life at home. With limited -understanding of what capitalism has done to the world, they try to salvage their individual lives for a richer material world, Petty bourgeois fantasy heavily infests much of their thinking. But this thinking is not rigid. When they are here confronting the constant exploitation of capitalism, especially with the addition of racism, they are in one way or another exposed to clear working class, race, or national contradictions. These contradictions are all creations of the capitalist class. To heighten the consciousness of these contradictions under the working class outlook becomes the task of revolutionaries.

To clarify the terminology, we offer the following definitions:

laboring masses: people who engage in laboring for a living; those who must sell their labor. Their work, however, is not in production, or is in production work which is not socialized by the capitalist (e.g., waiters, secretaries, clerks, small-scale seamstresses).
working class: production workers socialized by the capitalists; the antithesis of the capitalist class.
proletariat: advanced elements of the working class, conscious of their power and position in society.

Class Analysis of Chinatown

Chinatowns in the U.S. are distinct entities where we have begun our work for base building. It is a primary task to understand the class composition of such communities. In general, the majority of the people belong to the laboring masses.

Comprador Class: They are the big reactionaries, enemies of the people. They are either controlling Chinatown for their own political and economic interests or they are the lackeys of the U.S. ruling forces and carry out the interests and wishes of U.S. capitalism.

National Bourgeoisie: These are businessmen who want to maintain the status quo of Chinatown but wish to expand their own power by crushing the smaller businesses. Because of racism, however, they identify with being Chinese, whether they are pro-China or pro-Taiwan. Their basic interest is the same as that of the American bourgeoisie, although they understand the limit of their growth is confined to Chinatown.

Petty Bourgeoisie: These are small shop owners who work hard to cling on to their own bit of property. They would like to become bigger, but the objective conditions are quite hopeless for them and more and more of them will fall and become part of the laboring masses. They make up the appearance of Chinatown.

Laboring Masses: These are the majority of the Chinese people. They must sell their labor in long hours of work under extremely oppressive conditions. Most of them have petty bourgeois aspirations. They are not sure of their future, are unorganized and not conscious of the power of discipline.

Working Class: Limited by racism in American society, they are not large in number like the laboring masses. They are basically American-born and much like the general working class. This class is increasing, however.

Lumpen Proletariat: Symptoms of the society. Having no chance to obtain their petty bourgeois aspirations, they are none the less addicted to the power of the higher-ups. Most of them are disgusted with working and become the running dogs of the reactionaries. They become dope pushers, pimps and criminals. They have general anti-disciplinary, anti-authoritarian problems and are hard to organize. They are to be sharply distinguished from the young unemployed who are a part of the laboring masses.

The U.S. Economy and the First Revolutionary Skirmish

The developing economic crisis in the U.S. will on the one hand polarize he consciousness of the working class and will on the other hand hit all the oppressed colored people the hardest. Thus, the growing workers movement will still be characterized by the sharp struggle of non-white people in all aspects of social life: economic and political. It is in this sense that the non-white people become the vanguard of the workers movement.

The U.S. economic crisis has exposed the bankruptcy of her domestic economic system. We have already seen how this is developing. Witness the constantly rising cost of living and Nixon’s “New Economic Policy”. The capitalists will even more scurry around looking for ways to prop up their system of exploitation and we should expect the bourgeoisie to use every liberal and fascist trick to maintain their system.

The overall effect of this American economic disintegration will be the further deepening of the revolutionary movement, particularly among the working masses. The workers movement today is the direct product of the economic crisis.

The economic crisis, however, as every economic crisis in the past, will hit non-white people the hardest. Unemployment will grow and living conditions will fall still further. And precisely because of the deep racism of this country, non-white peoples will suffer the most. Due to the high consciousness among non-white people today, economic attack on the non-white masses will not be tolerated. The result will be that the sharpening economic struggle will be dominated by colored peoples. The bourgeoisie in turn will attempt to channel economic discontent into racial discontent, again trying to pit white against non-white.

The Universality and Particularity of the Contradiction in the U.S.

The contradiction in the capitalist system between the social character of production and the private ownership of the means of production common to all countries where capitalism exists and develops; as far as capitalism is concerned, this constitutes the universality of contradiction...

Since the particular is united with the universal and since the universality as well as the particularity of contradiction is inherent in everything, universality residing in particularity, we should, when studying an object, try to discover both particularity and universality and also their interconnection within the object itself... Mao Tse Tung, On Contradiction

It is universally true that the principal contradiction within all capitalist countries is the contradiction between the bourgeoisie and the working class, and we should strive to understand how this contradiction affects American society. We should also recognize that understanding the universality of this contradiction means understanding what is unique about American capitalism.

The working class versus the capitalist class is the principal contradiction in Japan, England, France and the United States. Our task is to understand the particularity, the unique qualities of American capitalism, or else we will miss the essence of U.S. capitalism which differentiates it from German capitalism (for instance. Without understanding the special characteristics of the class struggle in the U.S. we will became dogmatic and see the strategy which Marx laid out in the 19th century capitalist Germany or the strategy put forward by Lenin in imperialist Russia as directly applicable to the U.S.

The principal contradiction in U.S. society is that between the bourgeoisie and the working class, but the particularity of the contradiction is racism. Without grasping and solving this aspect there can be no solution of the wider class contradiction.

First Stage of the Revolution: Expectations

The road to revolution will be a protracted one and solving the race question is not the final or end solution to the problems of U.S. society (i.e., solving class contradictions). But it is a part of and a step towards the final solution. In this present stage, the revolutionary movement must solve the race question (i.e., disunity within the various colored peoples, disunity between different colored peoples, and disunity between colored peoples and white people). Without solving the race question, it will be extremely difficult if not impossible to solve the class question, because the American working class must be united to defeat the bourgeoisie. As races become more united against imperialism, the fundamental contradiction between working class and bourgeoisie will intensify.

We should recognize that the solution of the race problem is what the revolutionary process must accomplish. We must fight for the survival of non-white peoples while carrying out education on the class contradiction, and ensure that the American people will not fight a race war for the bourgeoisie. Dealing with a bad thing, disunity among non-white and white people, can be made into a good thing by revolutionaries. It can be made into unity and trust among the races in order to prevent racial clash. This is a stage for us to seize the initiative (when racism is the particularity) and build revolutionary unity among Asians and other races as the necessary step to the building of a multi-national revolutionary communist party.

It is also important to appreciate that failing to build this unity may result in fascism, if the ruling class gets the upper hand, or great setbacks for the revolution if the revisionists gain way.

The Importance of a Party

The revolution will develop in stages and we must grasp each stage and act accordingly. Revolution as with all other processes is constantly developing and changing. To understand revolution dialectical1y is to understand where the present level of revolution came from and where it should go. There are some who only see the end product of the revolutionary process and want to jump to it, seeing no intermediate steps. For example, there are some who want to jump to the stage of armed struggle, not understanding that many stages must be gone through before that time. Engaging in armed struggle at this stage as being the primary activity is being out of touch with the reality of the masses of people. This incorrect view comes from being subjective, that is, one-sided, proceeding from book knowledge or personal whim rather than objective conditions. Another example: there are sons people who see the American revolution as being based just on “working class unity,” but they proceed on a political line which does not see how to concretely build that unity, except by talking about it. Yes, class war and armed struggle are inevitable stages of the revolution, but only to engage in them at this time is not seeing all the intermediary steps to build to those decisive stages.

Revolution is like the growth of a plant. We are in a seedling stage, inspired by the blossoms of the future. But the plant, as with the revolution, must go through much struggle, much change, before it can reach the stage of blossoming. There must be a stage of growth, maturity, of new growth, of buds. The flower cannot burst forward from a seedling, nor can armed struggle or the building of a multi-national party develop spontaneously from the desire of a handful of people.

We affirm the primary task of all revolutionaries today is to participate in that ideological struggle that will form the theoretical basis of a genuine Marxist-Leninist-Mao Tse Tung Thought Communist Party, U.S.A. All our practical day to day mass work must be seen within this context. Because without a future communist party which is capable of correctly leading all the various aspects of the revolutionary movement, mass work will flounder and we cannot achieve our ultimate goal of socialism and communism. The writing of this ideology is one contribution we hope to make to this ideological struggle.

So concretely what should we do to build towards a multi-national Communist Party? We should, beginning with this Congress, set up concrete mechanisms for discussion, struggle and mutual consultation.

We must learn from the mistakes of our practice and see the lessons as important contributions to our present understanding. There are two errors we should avoid. Both these forms are examples of organizational chauvinism and prevent the development of a comprehensive perspective and analysis of American society.

The first error is for organizations to try to take over or undermine each other. We meet as fraternal and comrade organizations here, and this unity must also take place in our practice.

The second error is to raise our own backwardness or primitiveness to. a virtue and refuse to see the necessity to struggle for greater unity and to develop a national overview of the revolution.

We should remember foremost that the people and the people alone are the motive force of history. As Marxist-Leninists, we must have concrete understanding of mass struggle as the motivating force of the revolution. We will win because the people are on our side. To fight for them for the liberation of the working class, we must rely on the masses, learn from the masses, and lead them with communist ideology. Our enemy is well-organized and armed to the teeth. We must out-organize them, for the people – arm them and defend them. To defend them, we must ultimately smash the capitalists, destroy their bastion, the state, and uphold the dictatorship of the proletariat.

Revolution is the main trend in the world today! All reactionaries and their running dogs are paper tigers!

Comrades, march on, march forward for a new world!