>

This is an archive of the former website of the Maoist Internationalist Movement, which was run by the now defunct Maoist Internationalist Party - Amerika. The MIM now consists of many independent cells, many of which have their own indendendent organs both online and off. MIM(Prisons) serves these documents as a service to and reference for the anti-imperialist movement worldwide.

> Without being fully comprehensive, it would still be valuable if you

> could spell out some things you regard as positive in the Cultural

> Revolution as well perhaps as anything else important that was negative.

> Chris B, London.

MIM replies: Today it is more clear than ever that Deng Xiaoping

was indeed a capitalist-roader just as the Cultural Revolutionaries said.

Those in the West too lazy or bourgeoisified to study said

it was all rhetoric or power struggle of individuals, precisely

because that is all the individual in the West ever seems to

experience. But now the good thing about the capitalist restoration

in China is that Deng Xiaoping has now proved in practice every

single charge ever made against him in the Cultural Revolution

and more.

Look at all the other theories of existing socialism.

1. Totalitarian theory said these societies could never

change except with force used from outside.

2. Metaphysical "Stalinists" like Hoxha said it was

impossible to go backward in class struggle and once

a society went to socialism there could be no

capitalist restoration.

3. Most Trotskyists said the same thing or allowed for a

case of "bloody counterrevolution" as the Sparts used

to yell at us before recently admitting they were wrong.

It was Mao who predicted who would restore open capitalism

in the Soviet Union, Albania and so on--the bourgeoisie

in the party. Who were Yeltsin, Gorbachev and Ramiz Alia?

They were all high-ranking authorities in the party.

They were not foreign imperialists, old landlords or

old capitalists reclaiming their power. Now that is clear

to anyone who cares about existing socialist societies,

but Mao was the only one to see that and that was what

the Cultural Revolution was about. Mobilize the masses

to knock out the capitalist-roaders, the people with

access to the means of production through the state and party.

That's the good thing about the Cultural Revolution.

We have plenty to say about the real and alleged abuses of

intellectuals and people-on-people violence in our theory

journals. Suffice it to say when the masses seize

unprecedented political freedom, and there is still an

enemy class--the result is not a tea party.

This was a long post, because we hope to establish just

once our position on certain things. Issues of tone, how

we write, how much we write, etc. are bound to come up

again and we can just refer readers back to this post.

Pat for MIM