DECLARATION TO REAFFIRM THE SIGNIFICANCE AND RELEVANCE OF THE ANTI-REVISIONIST STRUGGLE AND THE GPCR
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May 1, 2007
We, the undersigned Marxist-Leninist, Mao Zedong Thought and
Marxist-Leninist-Maoist parties and organizations, hereby issue this
declaration to reaffirm the significance and relevance of the struggle
against modern revisionism starting in 1956 in opposition to the
revisionist content of the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the
Soviet Union (CPSU) in February 1956 leading to the Great Proletarian
Cultural Revolution from 1966 to 1976 and continuing after the
bourgeoisie seized power in China in 1976. We do so after one year of
activities celebrating the 50th anniversary of the anti-revisionist
struggle and renewing our commitment to pursue this struggle.
We honor and pay the highest respect to Comrade Mao Zedong for
leading the Communist Party of China (CPC) and all Marxist-Leninist
parties in the struggle against modern revisionism. He promptly caused
the publication of the editorial of the People's Daily, "On the
Historical Experience of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat" in April
1956 in response to the 20th Congress of the CPSU. In this congress the
Khrushchov revisionist clique repudiated in February 1956 under the
pretext of opposing "personality cult" the fundamentals of
Marxism-Leninism and the great revolutionary achievements of the Party
of Lenin and Stalin in building socialism, fighting fascism and leading
the international communist movement for more than 30 years.
The actions of the Soviet revisionists headed by Khrushchov
laid bare the phenomenon of modern revisionism in opposition to the
proletarian dictatorship and put the Soviet Union on the road of
capitalist restoration. They reorganized the Soviet Party, the state,
the economy and the cultural institutions in order to subvert
Marxism-Leninism and the socialist system.
They opposed the dictatorship of the proletariat and
propagated bourgeois populism with the notions of "party of the whole
people" and "state of the whole people" and bourgeois pacifism with the
notions of "peaceful transition", "peaceful competition" and "peaceful
coexistence". They undertook to undermine the international communist
movement and pushed "peaceful coexistence" as the general line to
oppose proletarian internationalism and to attack the international
communist movement and the national liberation movements.
Revisionism destroyed all the formerly socialist countries. It
transformed these into colonies of social imperialism, deprived the
revolutionary world movement of its revolutionary center, destroyed
revolutionary parties and brought confusion, division and
liquidationism into the international communist and working class
movement. It had a corroding effect on the proletarian class struggle
and the anti-imperialist struggle and led to defeats involving heavy
losses. The process of the international proletarian revolution has
been set back for decades.
There are ideological, political, socio-economic and cultural
causes of modern revisionism. The major causes include deviation from
materialist dialectics, abandonment or waning of the proletarian class
stand and class struggle, worship of outdated or revisionist Soviet
examples and the degeneration of a great number of bureaucrats and
intellectuals due to their petty bourgeois social conditions and ways
of thinking, which are the gateway to modern revisionism as full
bourgeois ideology.
Hankering for personal privileges, nepotism, careerism, abuse
of power, enrichment and other forms of self-interest, those afflicted
with the petty bourgeois mode of thinking gain the upper hand among the
leading functionaries in the party, state, economy and cultural
institutions and give rise to modern revisionism as bourgeois ideology
and as platform for bourgeois policies.
Comrade Mao defended the theory and practice of
Marxism-Leninism against the line of modern revisionism. He denounced
the revisionists for sowing confusion in the international communist
movement and generating disorder and uprisings against the socialist
cause in Yugoslavia, Poland, Hungary and elsewhere in Eastern Europe.
Under the direction of Comrade Mao, the delegation of the CPC
pursued the anti-revisionist line in the Moscow meetings of communist
and workers’ parties in 1957 and 1960. Thereafter, the
Marxist-Leninists led by the CPC launched an international ideological
struggle on a comprehensive range of issues against the modern
revisionists centered in the Soviet party.
Further on, the Marxist-Leninists led by Comrade Mao proceeded
to the criticism and repudiation of the phenomenon of monopoly
bureaucrat capitalism and social imperialism during the long regime of
Brezhnev. Monopoly bureaucrat capitalism masqueraded as socialism while
the bureaucrats and businessmen connived to steal from the state
sector. In international relations, the Soviet revisionists engaged in
socialist phrase-mongering and in the practice of imperialism.
Comrade Mao did not rest content with the critique of modern
revisionism as it had arisen and grown in the Soviet Union and in the
other countries of the Soviet bloc. He examined and analyzed the growth
of modern revisionism in China, arising from both homegrown factors and
external influences. Thus, he united the leading antirevisionist
revolutionaries in the CPC, who rallied forces to launch the Great
Proletarian Cultural Revolution in May 1966 in order to carry out the
theory of continuing revolution under proletarian dictatorship. This is
to combat revisionism, prevent the restoration of capitalism and
consolidate socialism.
The theory and practice of continuing revolution under the
dictatorship of the proletariat through the GPCR constituted a new and
higher stage in the development of Marxism-Leninism. It posed a series
of problems in the building of socialism, for a whole historical epoch
in transition from capitalism to communism, and brought up the basic
principles and methods for solving said problems, involving the
existence of classes and class struggle in socialist society, the
relations of the social base and superstructure, the mass line,
cultural revolution, revolution and production, succession by the
youth, leadership in the factories and communes and the formation of
the organs of political power.
Many of these issues were not understood or could not have
been understood through the decades of socialism in the Soviet Union.
The launching of the GPCR reflected an understanding and summation of
that Soviet experience, and was an unprecedented political mobilization
of the masses against revisionism, this time in the CPC.
Comrade Mao successfully led the Chinese proletariat and
people from victory to victory in the Great Proletarian Cultural
Revolution against tremendous odds and against powerful adversaries.
But soon after his death, the enemies of the Chinese proletariat and
people made a coup and reversed his proletarian revolutionary line in
carrying out socialist revolution and construction. Since then the new
bourgeois rulers in China have launched the most brutal attacks against
the Chinese workers and peasants. While they have continued to claim
the title of the "Communist Party of China", they in fact, are now the
worst oppressors and exploiters and abusers of the Chinese people.
There are manifestations of China's all-round retrogression
and degradation to the status of being a big-comprador neocolonial
adjunct of the US and other imperialist powers. China has completely
tied itself to the policy of imperialist globalization pushed by the US
and other imperialist powers. But China is also trying to become a
relatively autonomous imperialist power, extending its economic
investment and political influence on a world scale in places such as
Africa, Latin America and Asia. It is reminiscent of a generally
backward and poor but imperialist Russia before the Bolshevik
revolution.
The full restoration of capitalism in China and in the former
Soviet bloc countries vindicates the teaching of Comrade Mao that
socialism is lost when the revisionist line prevails within the ruling
communist or workers' party and that eventually the bourgeoisie within
the party and state succeeds in unleashing a coup and overthrowing the
proletariat.
Comrade Mao has bequeathed to us a legacy with which we can
combat and defeat modern revisionism and with which we can revive and
further develop the forces of socialism. We are alert to and oppose the
continuing dangers of revisionism, modern revisionism and other forms
of opportunism.
We reaffirm Comrade Mao's revolutionary theory and practice of continuing revolution under proletarian
dictatorship through the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution.
We condemn the betrayal of socialism and of Comrade Mao's proletarian
revolutionary line by the Liu Shaoqi-Deng Xiaoping clique and the new
Chinese bourgeoisie.
We renew our determination and efforts to carry out the
historic mission of the proletariat, which is to carry out a
new-democratic and socialist revolution and construction. All the evils
that have beset the former revisionist-ruled countries drive us to
uphold Marxism-Leninism-Maoism against modern revisionism and to pursue
the revolutionary cause of socialism.
Upon the temporary success of modern revisionism against
Marxism-Leninism and the dictatorship of the proletariat, monopoly
capitalism headed by US imperialism has been able to launch the worst
attacks against the proletariat and the oppressed peoples, such as
"free market" globalization, racism, repression and wars of aggression.
In response to the escalation of oppression and exploitation, the
proletariat and people are intensifying their resistance through armed
struggle and other forms of resistance.
It is not enough to defend Marxism-Leninism and Maoism in
order to generate a new upswing in the struggle for genuine socialism.
The international Marxist-Leninist and working class movement must draw
the lessons from the defeat of socialism by revisionism and from the
successes of the 50 years of struggle against revisionism.
The building of Marxist-Leninist parties world-wide, the
overcoming of the fragmentation, the strengthening of proletarian
revolutionary parties closely linked to the masses and their
international revolutionary collaboration are the essential
ideological, political and organizational preconditions for the
liberation of humankind.
It is the internationalist duty of Marxist-Leninist-Maoist
parties to unite and to arouse, organize and mobilize the proletariat
and people in their respective countries and in the world at large in
the struggle for national liberation, democracy and socialism against
imperialism, revisionism and reaction. We renew our commitment to
persevere in the revolutionary struggle and strive to win ever greater
victories under the guidance of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism.
Uphold, defend and advance the teachings of Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin and Mao! Reaffirm Marxism-Leninism-Maoism against modern revisionism! Carry forward the revolution against imperialism, revisionism and reaction! Glory to the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution! Long live all Marxist-Leninist-Maoist parties! Long live proletarian internationalism! Long live Marxism-Leninism-Maoism!
SIGNATORIES [In alphabetical order (English) by country]: - Brazil - Communist Party of Brazil (Red Fraction)
- Germany - Marxist-Leninist Party of Germany
- Greece - Communist Party of Greece-ML
- India - Communist Party of India (Maoist)
- Indonesia - Communist League of Indonesia
- Italy - Committee to Support Resistance - for Communism (CARC)
- Moldova - Maoist Anti-Imperialist Circle
- Philippines - Communist Party of the Philippines
- Turkey - Communist Party of Turkey/Marxist-Leninist (TKP/ML)
- United States - Marxism-Leninism-Maoism Revolutionary Study Group
- Uruguay - Communist Party of Uruguay
- (Note: Any signatory may qualify its agreement on any point in this declaration with an annotation.)
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