MIM NOTES 195	October 1, 1999

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Maoist Platform within the Revolutionary Young Communist League 
RYCL(b)

1. Ideology and Method.

1.1 We are Marxists. We believe that the heritage of classical 
Marxism, in all its fundamental features, adequately reflects the 
social processes taking place in today's world. The oblivion into 
which Marxism has fallen in the Russian public consciousness today 
is the result of quite specific historical events and this very 
oblivion can be adequately described within the framework of the 
categorical apparatus of Marxism itself. A correct approach to 
social phenomena is impossible without applying the method of 
historical materialism, the dialectic of the basis and the 
superstructure, the theory of proletarian revolution, proletarian 
internationalism.

1.2 The legitimate transformation and generalization of the 
Marxism of Marx and Engels was Marxism-Leninism which explained 
the transition of the capitalist nations to the stage of 
imperialism. In our times the legitimate transformation and 
generalization of the Marxism of Lenin and Stalin is Marxism-
Leninism-Maoism with its analysis of the superstructure as the 
factor which ultimately decides the success or failure of the 
construction of socialism:

The representatives of the bourgeoisie that have crept into the 
Party, the Government, the Army, and into the different spheres of 
culture are a group of counterrevolutionary revisionists. At the 
first opportunity they are ready to seize power and turn the 
dictatorship of the proletariat into a dictatorship of the 
bourgeoisie.

Mao Zedong.

2. Problems of History. 

2.1 We believe that socialism, the dictatorship of the proletariat 
and peasantry is a necessary step towards a communist world -- a 
world without inequality or dictatorship. We consider the USSR 
under V. I. Lenin and J. V. Stalin (1917-1953) and China under Mao 
Zedong (1949-1976) models in this regard.

2.2 As Maoists, we believe that the class struggle between the 
bourgeoisie and the proletariat continues to be waged in modified 
forms under socialism and the arena of this struggle becomes the 
Communist Party leading the socialist construction. The death of 
Stalin in 1953 and of Mao in 1976 are those historical landmarks 
after which the victory of the bourgeois elements inside the CPSU 
and the CCP was becoming more and more evident. In the end this 
led to the rise of typical state capitalism in both countries and 
to their degeneration into social-imperialist regimes.

2.3 From the above follows the unconditionally reactionary 
character of the slogan of the restoration of the USSR. The 
nations residing in its former territory may, after each of them 
has carried out a successful socialist revolution, decide to form 
a certain kind of an interstate union, but we are not in a 
position now to predict either the day of its formation, or the 
nature of this union, or the concrete forms it will take.

3. Contemporary World.

3.1 The world today appears to us divided into three groups of 
countries: (1) countries of the Metropolis (the U$A, the Western 
European states, Japan, etc.); (2) semi-imperialist countries, 
comprising most of the states of the former Soviet Bloc (including 
Russia, the Ukraine, Byelorussia), as well as some other countries 
(e. g. Argentina); (3) countries of the Third World, exploited by 
the former two groups of nations.

3.2 The revolutionary role of the proletariat in each of the above 
groups of countries is different.

3.2.1 In the countries of the Metropolis the working class is 
bought off with the superprofits gained from the exploitation of 
the countries of the Second and Third Worlds and cannot, at the 
present stage, be considered a revolutionary force. The national 
contradiction is to be considered the principal one in the given 
group of countries, while the principal revolutionary forces there 
are the sectors of the working class not belonging to the 
historically dominant national groups (Gastarbeiter) and the 
revolutionary intelligentsia.

3.2.2 In the semi-imperialist countries the proletariat as a whole 
potentially remains the main motive force of socialist revolution, 
while the principal contradiction at this stage remains the class 
one. However, due to the socio-economic position of these 
countries (half-metropolis and half-colonies), as well to certain 
peculiarities of their history, the proletariat here is infected 
with nationalist and chauvinist ideology, harbors reformist 
illusions. It is deeply divided and at the current stage is unable 
to form a united and disciplined "detachment" in the struggle 
against the bourgeoisie. The main ally of the proletariat in its 
struggle against the bourgeoisie here is the revolutionary 
intelligentsia.

3.2.3 In the Third World countries (comprising, among others, many 
peripheral republics of the former USSR) the struggle of the 
proletariat for its own rights is inseparable from the struggle of 
these nations for their national self-determination. Here the 
natural allies of the proletariat are the majority of the 
peasantry and the progressive strata of the national bourgeoisie 
(in the semi-imperialist countries the national bourgeoisie is, as 
a rule, reactionary). The goal of the proletariat's struggle here 
in many cases is not a socialist, but a bourgeois-democratic 
revolution, and the main method of this struggle, the strategy of 
the People's War.

4. Strategy and Tactics. 

4.1 We believe that correct tactics flow from correct strategies, 
which flow from a correct ideological and political line. We 
believe that the fight against imperialism, capitalism and 
patriarchy goes hand in hand with the fight against revisionism, 
chauvinism, and opportunism.

4.2 Our goal is carrying out a socialist revolution and going on 
to build communism a society excluding any form of oppression of 
one social group by another: class oppression, national 
oppression, gender oppression.

4.3 The motive force of this revolution is the working class, 
while its conductor is an avant-garde disciplined revolutionary 
Communist Party, a Party with a system of democratic centralism. 
The later system includes organization, leadership, discipline and 
hierarchy.

4.4 We believe that the ruling bourgeoisie will never give up its 
power without a fight. Putting an end to the bourgeois 
dictatorship is only possible by building public opinion to seize 
power through armed struggle. We believe, however, that at the 
present stage any armed insurrection on the territory of Russia 
will be inevitably crushed as it will not have mass support of the 
potentially revolutionary strata of the population.

4.5 The building on the territory of Russia of an avant-garde 
disciplined revolutionary Communist party guided by the theory of 
Marxism-Leninism-Maoism is hindered by objective historical 
conditions resulting from the long years of rule of revisionist 
Khrushchevite-Brezhnevite social-imperialism.

4.5.1 The main consequence of this rule for the post-Soviet 
Russian proletariat is the fact that it has lost not only its 
traditions of mass revolutionary struggle, but even the elementary 
skills of self-organizing, its readiness to defend its rights, its 
libertarian values and aspirations towards self-government. The 
working class of contemporary Russia is divided, passive, 
indifferent towards politics. Overcoming this situation will take 
a long time.

4.5.2 The inability of the contemporary Russian "Communist 
movement" to develop a correct ideological and political line is 
the direct consequence of its being theoretically, 
organizationally, and on the level of cadres deeply rooted in the 
revisionist CPSU of the Khrushchevite-Brezhnevite period. The 
worst part of the CPSU legacy in the Russian "Communist movement" 
are such ugly phenomena, as chauvinism, xenophobia, anti-
democratism. These are impossible to overcome without a 
renaissance of the revolutionary traditions of the working class.

4.6 We believe our principal tactical task to be agitation and 
propaganda of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism among the broad masses of 
the proletariat and the intelligentsia, primarily targeting young 
workers and students as those least affected by the spirit of 
Khrushchevite-Brezhnevite revisionism. This work is inextricably 
linked with the simultaneous propaganda of the main postulates of 
classical Marxism, no longer taken for granted by many people 
considering themselves "Communist".

It is should also be noted that modern Marxism-Leninism-Maoism is 
inconceivable without seriously tackling the problems of national 
liberation (unconditional recognition of the right of nations to 
self-determination under the bourgeois system); bourgeois 
democracy (demands for the maximum possible rights and liberties, 
declared, but in most cases not observed, by the capitalist 
state); the environment (the predatory attitude towards nature by 
any modern state can only be stopped by the victory of the 
socialist revolution) ; sexism and patriarchy (struggle for the 
rights of wimmin and gays/lesbians); the repressive apparatus of 
the bourgeois state (unconditional anti-militarism, no support 
whatsoever for the bourgeois army).

Long live the great proletarian red banner of the ideas of Mao 
Zedong!

Workers and oppressed nations of all countries, unite!

--August 22, 1999 Kirov, Russia

Dmitry GUEVARIN, member of the Central Control Commission
Irina KOSTIKOVA, member of the Central Committee
Denis SELIVERSTOV, member of the Central Control Commission
Oleg TORBASOV, Secretary for Ideology of the Central Committee
Dar ZHUTAYEV, member of the Central Committee
Translated from the Russian:
Dar Zhutayev, 1999.