The East Is Still Red!

I came to China via the "Cultural Revolution." During the late 1960s China was the beacon of the world revolution and Mao's leadership of the Cultural Revolution was awe-inspiring. It led me to study Chinese and to eventually conduct paleoanthropological research that took me to China multiple times throughout the 1980s and 90s.

The death of Mao, the arrest of the "Gang of Four," the rise of Deng Xiaoping and the reform and opening up of the Chinese economy that resulted led to immense changes throughout China and its emergence in the 21st century as one of the world's leading economies. Deng's reformist policies, which followed the "capitalist road" of economic development has been dubbed "market socialism." It is a conscious policy of the CCP to use state capitalism and "scientific" market mechanisms to free the forces of production, in order to modernize and urbanize China. The results so far have been breath taking. The composite wealth of the Chinese nation has grown geometrically at a rate of 10% per annum and all Chinese have benefited, especially the new petite and national bourgeoisie. But with the promotion of capitalist relations of production all the abuses of the capitalist system have reemerged, including bureaucratic graft and corruption, labor abuses of every imaginable sort, abusive exploitation of peasant land rights, feudal customs and superstitious religious beliefs, hedonistic Western cultural values, etc., etc. On the other hand Chinese have much more freedom of expression, much greater personal liberty, and much more individual economic freedom and opportunity. What has been lost is the revolutionary spirit of selflessness, the iron rice bowl of a guaranteed job, subsidized food and housing, free medical care and education, although these benefits were doled out primarily to workers in state owned enterprises and to government employees. Many Chinese have seen great gains in their personal lives over the last 30 years. But many have not and have been left behind by escalating income disparities, massive layoffs in state owned enterprises, a resurgence of exploitative labor relations and conditions, and all sorts of scandals including adulterated and poisoned produce and pharmaceuticals, pollution, etc., etc. What has been lost is associated with the building of socialism, what has been gained has been tarnished by capitalism.

For many years revolutionaries in the West who had supported China under Mao cursed the reforms and the triumph of the "capitalist headquarters" in the CCP. They disparaged all the advances made by China over the last 30 years as a perversion of socialism if not the outright restoration of capitalism and the CCP as an oppressive fascist party. The Left in China seemed to be totally vanquished and without voice.

But two-line struggle never ended within the CCP and recalcitrant Maoists remained and still remain in it. The Internet has however given voice to these forces and a vigorous Maoist critique of Chinese domestic and foreign policy is now widely available and disseminated at sites like maoflag.net and Utopia.

This blog will present these Chinese Marxist-Leninist-Maoist critiques of China and commentary on world events. Included will be political analysis of the world communist movement, reassessment of the history of the communist movement from the fall of the Soviet Union to events in Cuba, as well as poetry and cultural commentary.