{"id":740,"date":"2019-09-18T14:49:00","date_gmt":"2019-09-18T12:49:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/marxistworkersparty.org.za\/?page_id=740"},"modified":"2019-09-18T15:03:37","modified_gmt":"2019-09-18T13:03:37","slug":"chapter-five","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/?page_id=740","title":{"rendered":"Chapter Five"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Colonial Revolution<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

More than two-thirds of the world’s population live in\ncountries which were formerly colonies or semi-colonies of the imperialist\npowers. Here, over the past three to four decades, there has been permanent instability\nand a process of enormous upheavals, wars, revolutions and coups in one country\nafter another.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The turbulence of the so-called ‘Third World’ has been\nwithout parallel in history. Millions of anonymous heroes, of peasants and\nworkers, have sacrificed their lives in the struggle against colonial rule, and\nagainst the exploitation and oppression by the landlord and capitalist classes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A century ago, Marx explained that only the lack of national\nconsciousness among the scattered and downtrodden peasant masses allowed the\nimperialists to conquer and dominate Asia and Africa. Once they rose up, it was\npractically impossible to hold a whole nation in chains.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The development of capitalism in the colonial world\npenetrated the pre-capitalist economies, broadened the horizons of the people,\nand united them in struggles of resistance against the colonial oppressor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Already by the turn of the century, movements of national\nliberation were under way particularly in Asia. At the end of the First World\nWar, waves of revolutionary struggle in the colonies intersected with the\noutbreak of the proletarian revolution in the West.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Underlying the idea of the ‘permanent revolution’ is the\nfact that, in the epoch of monopoly capitalism and imperialism, the progressive\nrole of the bourgeoisie has been exhausted on a world scale. The combined and\nuneven development of capitalism meant that, above all in the colonies and\nsemi-colonies, the bourgeoisie was feeble and emaciated from the start, and\ncould maintain its position only with the buttress of imperialism and the\nsupport of reactionary pre-capitalist classes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The fear and hostility of the colonial bourgeoisie towards\nthe movement of the masses was already evident after the First World War.\nRecognition of this was a basic element in the approach of Bolshevism towards\nthe colonial revolution. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Lenin put it at the Second Congress of the Communist\nInternational in 1920: “A certain understanding has emerged between the\nbourgeoisie of the exploiting countries and that of the colonies, so that very\noften, even perhaps in most cases, the bourgeoisie of the oppressed countries,\nalthough they also support national movements, nevertheless fight against all\nrevolutionary movements and revolutionary classes with a certain degree of\nagreement with the imperialist bourgeoisie, that is to say together with\nit.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The essentially reformist standpoint of the colonial\nbourgeoisie and its middle-class appendages thus came into increasing conflict\nwith the revolutionary aspirations and revolutionary movement of the peasants\nand workers. It was for this reason that the Comintern used the term\n“national-revolutionary” movements to describe the struggles of the\noppressed masses of the colonial world, in preference to the term\n“bourgeois-democratic”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Russian Revolution had been the first decisive victory\nin the process of the world revolution. With the proletarian revolution\nbeginning to spread to the industrialised countries of the West, it was clear\nthat the colonial revolution would be inseparably linked with it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the Second Congress of the Comintern, the Indian delegate\nRoy stated in his theses (which were adopted) that “the masses of people\nin the oppressed non-European countries have, as a result of the centralisation\nof world capitalism, been indissolubly bound up with the proletarian movement\nin Europe.” <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Task<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The most important and necessary task in the colonial\ncountries was “the creation of Communist organisations of peasants and\nworkers in order to lead them to the revolution and the setting up of the\nSoviet Republic. In this way the masses of the people in the backward countries\nwill be brought to communism not by capitalist development but by the\ndevelopment of class consciousness under the leadership of the proletariat of\nthe advanced countries.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was with the same idea that Lenin raised the possibility\nof Africa advancing directly from tribalism to communism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But this perspective was cut across by the defeats of the\nproletarian revolution in the industrialised capitalist countries, and by the\ndegeneration of the Russian Revolution which followed. Thus the world revolution\nwas interrupted and delayed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With the degeneration of the Communist International\u2014with\nthe rise of Stalinism and the crushing of the forces of Marxism\u2014tragic\nconsequences followed for the colonial peoples also. The young and weak proletariat\nin the under-developed countries was denied an historic opportunity to rise as\nthe organised and class-conscious force capable of leading the emerging nations\nin the struggle against colonial domination, landlordism, and capitalist\nexploitation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We have already shown how, in China in the late 1920s, the\nComintern under Stalinist control insisted that the Chinese Communist Party\nsubordinate itself to the bourgeois-nationalist Kuomintang. Stalin’s policy of\n‘socialism in one country’ meant a policy of so-called \u2018socialism\u2019 for the\nSoviet Union alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stalinism preserved the label of \u2018Marxism-Leninism\u2019, while\nfalsifying and corrupting all the essential ideas of these great teachers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whereas Lenin had employed terms such as\n‘national-democratic’ and ‘national-revolutionary’ in order to distinguish<\/strong> the aims of the workers and\npeasants from those of the colonial bourgeoisie, Stalinism now employed such\nterms to describe what ‘all classes’ of the oppressed nations supposedly had in\ncommon! Packed into the baggage of the ‘two-stage’ theory (see Chapters 2 and\n10), they have been used to argue that the liberation struggles in the colonial\nworld should not attempt to pass beyond a so-called ‘national-democratic\nstage’.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to this theory, the colonial peoples have to carry\nout the national and democratic tasks of the revolution without overthrowing\ncapitalism. The working class must not assert its own class interests or lead a\nstruggle against the bourgeoisie, for fear of jeopardising the supposed unity\nof all the colonial classes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is the opposite of the conclusion drawn by the\nBolsheviks in the Russian Revolution and applied by them to the colonial world\u2014that, precisely for the national-democratic\ntasks to be completed, the working class must lead a struggle of the oppressed\nagainst the bourgeoisie and establish its own state power.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Stalinist position of separate revolutionary \u2018stages\u2019\u2014essentially\nno different from that of the Mensheviks in Russia\u2014has had the effect of\ndisarming and paralysing the working class in the colonial revolution. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yet the theories of Stalinism could in no way alter the\nreality of the devastating effects of capitalism on the life of the colonial\npeoples. Nor could they compensate for the feebleness and bankruptcy of the\ncolonial bourgeoisie. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Explosive<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The explosive heaping\nup of unsolved economic, social and political problems in the under-developed\nworld has led to the carrying through of the permanent revolution in a series\nof countries\u2014but in a distorted and caricatured form which Trotsky himself\ncould not have foreseen.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the course of the struggle against imperialism in a\nnumber of countries since the Second World War, capitalism has been overthrown,\nthe landlords and capitalists expropriated, state ownership of the main means\nof production introduced, and the basis of a planned economy laid\u2014without the proletariat leading the\nrevolution, and even without this fundamental change forming any part of the\nprogramme of the leadership of the masses.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

That was something considered entirely impossible by all the\ngreat teachers of Marxism in the past, and can only be explained on the basis\nof the changed relationship of forces in world history which emerged during and\nafter the Second World War.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

The Chinese Revolution<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The Chinese Revolution of 1944-9 was the greatest and most\nprogressive event in history after the Russian Revolution, freeing nearly a\nquarter of the population of the earth from the nightmare grip of landlordism\nand capitalism. The tremendous advantage this has brought for the Chinese\npeople in the decades since has already been outlined in Chapter 1.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The defeat of the Chinese working class in the revolution of\n1925-27 gave a breathing space to the Chinese bourgeoisie. But in the course of\nthe following two decades the bourgeoisie revealed its complete incapacity to\ntake society forward. This was proved by its failure to solve the problem of\nlandlordism, give land to the peasants and free them from debt; by its\nincapacity to unify the country; by its inability to defend the nation against\nthe attacks of imperialism, both military (in the case of Japan) and economic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the Russian Revolution, as we have shown, the inability\nof the bourgeoisie to carry out the tasks of the bourgeois-democratic\nrevolution had meant that these tasks fell to the proletariat. Under the\nleadership of the Bolsheviks the Russian workers established their own state,\nbroke Russia free from the grip of imperialism, established the right of\nnations to self-determination, nationalised the land of the landlords and\norganised its redistribution to the poor peasants through the peasant soviets.\nAt the same time the workers’ state proceeded to the tasks of eliminating\ncapitalism and began to lay foundations for a transition to socialism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In China, however, a different process took place. After the\ncrushing defeat of the 1920s the proletariat was deserted by the leadership of\nthe Communist Party which had been responsible for its defeat, and it remained\npassive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mao Tse Tung and other remnants of the Stalinised CP\nleadership, abandoning the proletariat, turned instead to the countryside and\nfor two decades organised and led peasant war against the landlords and against\nimperialism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Employing the ideas of Stalinism (as distinct from Marxism),\nMao advanced a perspective for an historical stage in China which would\nsupposedly stand between the ‘dictatorship of the bourgeoisie’ and the\n‘dictatorship of the proletariat’. Described as a ‘new democracy’, this was\nintended to combine elements of state ownership of the larger enterprises with\nthe encouragement of private enterprise by the Chinese capitalist class.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stripped of its obscuring phrases, this was essentially a\nprogramme for an extended period of national capitalism in China.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mao specifically contrasted his conception for China with\nthe economic and social changes which had been established in Russia. Nevertheless, on achieving power in 1949,\nMao and the Chinese Red Army carried through the overthrow of capitalism and\nestablished a regime on the same economic and social foundations as Stalin’s\nregime in Russia.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is not the ‘Thoughts’ in the heads of leaders, nor\nwhether they call themselves ‘communists’, that determines the outcome of a\nrevolution. The decisive question is the\nclass forces active in the struggle and<\/strong>\u2014in the case where the proletariat\nconfronts the bourgeoisie\u2014the conscious\norganisation of the workers<\/strong> on a programme for taking power and\noverthrowing capitalism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was inconceivable to any of the great Marxists in the\npast that a peasant movement, without the leadership of the working class,\ncould result in the overthrow of capitalism. A year before his assassination in\n1940, Trotsky wrote the following passage, which was entirely consistent with\nthe thinking of Marx, Engels and Lenin before him:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The peasantry is dispersed over the surface of an enormous country whose key junctions are the cities. The peasantry itself is incapable of even formulating its own interests inasmuch as in each district these appear differently. The economic link between the provinces is created by the market and the railways, but both the market and the railways are in the hands of the cities. In seeking to tear itself away from the restrictions of the village and to generalise its own interests, the peasantry inescapably falls into political dependence upon the city. Finally, the peasantry is heterogeneous in its social relations as well: the kulak stratum (rich peasants) naturally seeks to swing it to an alliance with the urban bourgeoisie while the lower strata of the village pull to the side of the urban workers. Under these conditions the peasantry as such is completely incapable of conquering power.<\/p>

True enough, in ancient China, revolutions placed the peasantry in power or, more precisely, placed the military leaders of peasant uprisings in power. This led each time to a redivision of the land and the establishment of a new \u2018peasant\u2019 dynasty, whereupon history would begin from the beginning; with a new concentration of land, a new aristocracy, a new system of usury, and a new uprising. So long as the revolution preserves its purely peasant character society is incapable of emerging from these hopeless and vicious circles.<\/p>Three Conceptions of the Russian Revolution<\/em><\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Peasant war<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

If the guerrilla commander Mao himself had no conception of\nthe peasant war in China leading to the elimination of capitalism, even less\nwould Stalin contemplate it. In fact, even while Mao was achieving military victory\nover the bourgeois forces of Chiang Kai-Shek, Stalin wanted him to form a\ncoalition government with the latter!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What was decisive in\ndetermining the outcome of the Chinese Revolution was the changed balance of\nforces nationally and internationally at the end of the Second World War.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Japanese imperialism had been crushingly defeated, and the\nWestern imperialist powers were also incapable of intervening in China because\nof the wave of revolutionary ferment which was sweeping through the working\nclass of the industrialised world. At the same time, at the rear of the Chinese\nRevolution, there was the powerful deformed workers’ state of Stalinist Russia,\nimmensely strengthened as a result of the War.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Chinese Red Army defeated the forces of Chiang Kai-Shek\nby distributing land to the peasants and thereby winning over the peasant\nsoldiers on whom Chiang relied. Massive US aid to Chiang could not halt this\nprocess. The Chinese bourgeoisie, economically weak and utterly discredited by\nits collaboration with imperialism, was left without any basis of support in\nsociety.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Practically speaking, there was no possibility of reviving\nthe emaciated capitalist class or developing the economy on a capitalist basis.\nInstead, the leaders of the Chinese Red Army had before them the model of the\nmighty achievements of the planned economy in Stalinist Russia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Leaning on the support of the peasants and workers, they\nmoved to expropriate the bourgeoisie as effortlessly as squashing a flea.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Nationalised<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In fact, capitalists even applied for their factories to be\nnationalised, pleading merely to be retained as managers of state enterprises!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On taking power, the Red Army commanders had moved to\nprevent any form of worker democracy emerging. Where workers took independent\naction, it was met with the execution of the leading participants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From the outset, the regime was bonapartist<\/strong> in character\u2014resting on the peasant masses while\nraising itself above society, balancing and manoeuvring between the classes,\nand crushing all opposition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Its social character was identical to that of the Stalinist\nregime in Russia\u2014proletarian bonapartist<\/strong>,\nbecause, in the last analysis, it based itself on the elimination of private\nownership, and on an economy characterised by state ownership of the means of\nproduction and planning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is the productive basis of a workers’ state<\/strong> and therefore, solely from the historical point of\nview and the tendency of development, it is a workers’ state which arose in\nChina.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But unlike in Russia, where the proletariat had initially\ntaken power and then lost control of the state to the bureaucracy, the Chinese\nworkers’ state has been deformed from\nthe outset<\/strong>. At no time was there the creation of the elements of a healthy\nworkers’ state on the lines of 1917-1923 in Russia, i.e., soviets, independent\ntrade unions, workers’ democracy, freedom of discussion at all levels of\nsociety, etc.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This was the inevitable consequence of a revolution based on\nthe peasantry and led by the middle class.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not for nothing does Marxism explain that the socialist\nrevolution and the building of socialism is the task of the working class. This\nis because the specific role in production of the working class gives it a\nspecific capacity and consciousness possessed by no other class.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is the working class alone, organised by the organisation\nof industry, which has the social position and can develop the collective\nconsciousness to create a planned economy and democratic workers’ state,\nwithout bureaucracy or privileged strata. Only on the basis of workers’\ndemocracy can the way to genuine socialism be opened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Often even more than the working class, the peasantry\nsuffers the most horrendous oppression under capitalism, and struggles fiercely\nagainst the landlords and the state. Why then cannot the peasantry carry\nthrough a revolution which leads to socialism in the same way as the working\nclass? Why has the emergence of privileged bureaucratic rule been the\ninevitable consequence of social revolutions which have been based on the\npeasantry?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The peasantry, individualised in production, scattered in\nthe countryside, isolated from the centres of industry, cannot act collectively as a democratic organising force in production<\/strong>.\nExperiencing problems on a local scale, peasants tend to be sceptical of\nnational planning. Even the advantages of collectivisation do not generally\noccur naturally to them, but have to be demonstrated by others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In practice, therefore, the peasantry tend to follow the\nclass or stratum which commands power in the towns. In the Russian Revolution the working class<\/strong> led the peasants and\nestablished initially a democratic workers’ state. In China, however, power in\nthe towns passed into the hands of the middle-class leaders of the guerilla\narmy who, resting on the peasantry, could reconstruct the state machine on the\nbasis of their armed organisation. These were the original roots of\nbureaucratisation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But, underlying the social and political roots of\nbureaucratisation are the economic roots. As was shown in Russia after 1923,\neven a healthy workers’ state, particularly in a backward country, will\ndegenerate unless the revolution spreads to other, more advanced countries.\nUnder conditions of generalised poverty and shortages, privileged elites will\nalways arise and graft themselves onto the backs of the masses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lacking the internationalism of the Bolsheviks, the horizons\nof the leadership of the Chinese Revolution were restricted to China alone;\nthis was reinforced by the national state-machine erected above the classes by\nthe guerilla army. Isolated and under-developed, China after the revolution\nprovided fertile ground for the consolidation of privilege.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As in the case of Stalinist Russia, the power of the planned\neconomy to develop the productive forces and lift the peasants and workers out\nof the swamp of famine and destitution, has given a basis of stability to the\nChinese bureaucracy for more than three decades. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Major power<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The rise of China as a major power that could no longer be\ntreated like dirt by the imperialists, has raised the national pride of the\nmasses in their country. This in turn reinforced their support for the regime,\nand especially for the supreme leader, the bonapartist arbiter\u2014Mao.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To reinforce the grip of the regime, especially over the\npeasants, the figure of Mao was elevated (like Stalin) by the cult of\npersonality into a virtual godhead, invested with all the supposed supernatural\nattributes and ‘infallibility’ of the Chinese emperors of old.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While progressive compared with capitalism, a proletarian\nbonapartist regime involves constantly accumulating contradictions between the\nnew ruling caste and the masses, and between different layers of the\nbureaucracy itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Like Stalinist Russia, the Chinese bureaucracy has\ncentralised all power, in this case in Peking. Consequently there is a\ndomination of the Han over all the many national minorities in China, and thus\nnational oppression. In this respect too, there is an exact parallel with\nRussia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There have been striking repetitions of the processes in\nRussia under Stalin. Repeated and sweeping purges of Party and state (although\nnot so bloody); trials of leaders for ‘preparing a return to capitalism and\nfeudalism’; policies of ultra-slow development followed by ‘great leaps\nforward’, denunciations of particular sections of the bureaucracy, and lower\ntiers of officials made scapegoats for the mistakes and arbitrary rule of the\nbureaucracy as a whole.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the first period after the Revolution, the generalised\npoverty, the backwardness of agriculture and of industry, and the smallness of\nthe economic surplus generated in production, meant that there was little scope\nfor state officials, army officers, etc. to enrich themselves grossly above the\nstandards of the masses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Especially in the lower layers of the bureaucracy as it\ncrystallised, there remained a genuine idealism carried over from the\nrevolution, and a commitment to self-sacrifice and hard work in developing the\nnational economy and raising the conditions of the people. This contributed to\nthe enormous popularity of the regime. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

‘Maoism’<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In other countries many young people, CP members and others,\ndisappointed by the obvious corruption and decay of the Stalinist bureaucracy\nin the USSR, came to look hopefully to Chinese Stalinism (or ‘Maoism’) as the\nforce of ‘genuine’ socialism in the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Without a fundamental Marxist analysis of the process of the\nrevolution in China and the social forces involved, they accepted the claims of\nthe bureaucracy at face value. The influence of Maoism was at its height internationally\nin the period after the split between the Chinese and Russian bureaucracies,\nwhen Peking postured as the great champion of the colonial struggles against\nimperialism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Chinese Revolution demonstrated that, in the present\nepoch, given the extreme weakness of the bourgeoisie in an under-developed\ncountry and the inability of imperialism to intervene or prop it up, capitalism\ncan be overthrown without the working class leading the mass movement, and\nwithout the workers establishing their own control of the state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the inevitable consequence of this is bureaucratic\ndeformation and the hardening of a totalitarian, privileged ruling caste. That also inevitably means that a further\nrevolution\u2014a political revolution\u2014is needed to establish workers’ democracy and\nallow the transition to socialism to be carried through.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The limited, national aims of Chinese Stalinism were\nindicated in Mao’s attempts at first to isolate China from the world economy\nand, like Stalin before him, pursue a policy of so-called ‘socialism in one\ncountry’. But, as in the case of the USSR, in order to sustain the development\nof industry, the bureaucracy has been compelled to turn to the world market.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Over the decades, intense struggles have been fought out\nwithin the bureaucracy, between its different wings and layers, over questions\nof economic and foreign policy\u2014over the allocation of the surplus between heavy\nindustry and the raising of living standards; over participation in the world\nmarket versus autarky; over rival claims to increased privileges and power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The most tumultuous of these struggles provided the\nbackground to the ‘Cultural Revolution’ unleashed by Mao in the 1960s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This was not intended, as many imagine, to destroy\nbureaucracy itself; it was to curb the premature enrichment and self-elevation\nof the bureaucrats which was creating potentially explosive conflicts with the\nworker and peasant masses, and stifling economic development. When the masses\nthreatened to turn the Cultural Revolution into a generalised attack on control\nby the bureaucracy itself, Mao turned to crush this with the use of the army.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The defeat of the ‘Gang of Four’ since Mao’s death and the\npredominance of the more ‘pragmatic’ wing of the bureaucracy does not represent\na turn away from \u2018socialism\u2019 towards capitalism. It is tied up with the inevitable\nneed of the planned economy to engage in the world market.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Typical of China’s contracts with the West is the one signed\nin September 1981 to buy combine harvester building technology from John Deere\n& Co. of the USA. The deal included the training of Chinese technicians,\nadministrative personnel and workers. In return, John Deere is required to buy\na large number of the combines produced in China with this technology!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But as in the case of the Soviet Union, bureaucratic rule in\nChina cannot avoid accumulating more and more contradictions, the more\ndeveloped and sophisticated the planned economy becomes. Bureaucracy has begun\nto clog the pores of the productive system. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1980, while China claimed an industrial growth rate of\n8%, some $32 billion worth of equipment and millions of urban workers were left\nin enforced idleness as a result of mismanagement. In the same year, it was\nreported, 20 million tons of the wrong sort of steel were made and so wasted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1981, there was a sudden cut-back of investment plans by\n40%. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Corruption<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Without workers’ democracy, the inevitable corruption of\nofficials and bureaucratic abuses eventually reach staggering proportions. In a\nsupposedly ‘socialist’ country, the regime finds it necessary to retain the\ndeath penalty for economic crimes<\/strong>\u2014and\nin March 1982 the Peking People’s Daily<\/em>\ncalled for it to be used more often because “the shocking incidence of\neconomic crimes has reached such proportions”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From time to time, in an attempt to curb bureaucratic\nexcesses, the regime announces new purges or attacks on corruption, and even\nopens the safety valve briefly to allow some ‘criticism’ and ‘democratic\nexpression’ by the masses\u2014but then swiftly moves again to clamp down ruthlessly\non all opposition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Recently, it was disclosed that 7 million out of the 19\nmillion CP members who joined in the last ten years of Mao’s rule were to be\npurged! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

New upheavals, turns and zig-zags are inevitable in the\nperiod ahead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nevertheless the crisis of the bureaucracy in China is not\nas far advanced as that in Russia and Eastern Europe. This is because of the\nrelatively lower level of the productive forces, of industry and technology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If it were a question of China alone, the bureaucracy could\nstill have a fairly extended period of rule ahead of it before being faced with\nthe inevitable political revolution. But in the present revolutionary period on\na world scale, either the socialist revolution in the West or the political\nrevolution in the other Stalinist states would cut across it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When the working class takes power in the main industrial\ncentres of the world, the bureaucracy in China would be faced immediately with\na movement for its overthrow and replacement by workers’ democracy. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Retreat of Imperialism<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

After the Second World War imperialism was faced with a\ngeneral crisis of colonial rule, and a sequence of struggles and revolutions of\nwhich the Chinese Revolution was the most earth-shaking. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

These struggles against colonial domination had been\nanticipated\u2014under very different conditions\u2014by the spread of national revolt\nthroughout South and Central America, as well as Mexico, against the rotting\npower of Spanish and Portuguese colonialism in the early 19th century. National\nindependence was won in area after area, though on the basis of terrible\neconomic backwardness. The bourgeois republics that emerged were weak and\nunstable from the start, and in due course were pulled into the orbit of rising\nUS imperialism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, after World War II, similar processes occurred in Asia\nand Africa, but in a changed world context. Internationally, the once mighty\nEuropean colonial powers had been completely eclipsed by US imperialism. At\nhome, all the imperialist powers were faced with the mighty pressures of\norganised labour, radicalised by the war. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Moreover, the Chinese Revolution, despite its deformation,\nshifted the balance of forces internationally against imperialism, and provided\na tremendous spur to liberation struggles throughout Asia and Africa. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Already in 1938, Trotsky had observed that the\n\u2018pacification\u2019 of the colonial revolts had become more expensive for\nimperialism than the fruits of the exploitation of the colonies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By 1945, in the case of India, the British ruling class drew\nthe conclusion from the revolt of the Indian people of the necessity to arrive\nat some sort of compromise with the Indian bourgeoisie and landlords. Even\nafter that, however, British imperialism fought a series of wars in its\ncolonies (Malaysia, Kenya, Cyprus, etc) before fully accepting the need for\nretreat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

French and Dutch imperialism had to learn the same lesson\nafter the squandering of much blood and treasure in Indonesia, Indo-China,\nAlgeria, etc. The Portuguese ruling class took much longer to learn it, for\nreasons we will explain in Chapter 7.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus in the decades after the Second World War national\nindependence was achieved by virtually all the former colonies of Asia and\nAfrica. Increasingly it became the policy of imperialism to hand over power\nwithout a struggle to the local capitalists and landlords, precisely to avoid\nthe development of mass struggles that would ultimately force them to retreat\nunder far less favourable conditions for themselves. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Intolerable Burdens of Capitalism<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The standpoint of Marxism has always been one of\nunconditional support for the struggles of the peoples of the colonial world\nagainst imperialism. This is so even where bourgeois-nationalist parties and\nleaders are at the head of a movement. All the more vigorously do we support\nthose revolutions which break the stranglehold of capitalism and open the way\nto ending the horrors of famine, illiteracy and disease.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time, from the standpoint of the working class,\nMarxists are duty-bound to explain the distortions and contradictions which\nfollow when the working class is unable to lead the movement and establish its\nown democratic regime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The unbearable sufferings of the working people of the\nunder-developed countries have meant that they could not and cannot wait for the\nworking class of the industrialised world to carry through the revolution.\nLenin already recognised that, if the workers of the advanced countries did not\ntake the lead in solving the problems of the world on the basis of a clear\nclass programme for an international socialist revolution, then the toilers of\nthe colonial world would see no real alternative but to seek a solution to\ntheir problems along national lines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But if the process of the permanent revolution has been\ndistorted in the pre- and post-War period as a result of the weakness of the\nforces of Marxism internationally, it has also been driven on relentlessly by\nthe accumulated burdens inflicted on the under-developed countries in the epoch\nof monopoly capitalism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The unprecedented upswing of capitalism in the advanced\ncountries after the Second World War was partially based on intensified\nexploitation of the under-developed countries by the imperialist powers. While living standards in the advanced\ncapitalist countries rose steadily, there was an absolute decline, with few\nexceptions, in the standards of the masses in the colonial and former colonial\ncountries.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Significant industrial development did take place, as a\nby-product of the boom in the advanced capitalist world, but it has been mainly\nconcentrated in only a few countries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In order to develop mining, manufacturing and agriculture,\nthe under-developed countries have been forced to rely heavily on imports of\nmachinery, vehicles, equipment for railways and communications, etc. As these\ncountries have become more and more integrated into the world economy, and\nopened to the penetration of the world market, inevitably production for subsistence\nhas more and more given way to production for the market.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But instead of an all-round development of agriculture and\nindustry, these countries have been from the outset under the domination of the\ngiant multinational corporations, with an overwhelming monopoly of large-scale\nproduction and modern techniques.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Most have continued to serve in their colonial role of\nexporting agricultural and mineral raw materials to the advanced industrial\ncountries, and providing markets for the products of Western capitalism.\nColonial rule created cheap labour; competitive export production requires\ncheap labour; cheap labour limits the internal market; a small internal market\nreinforces the emphasis on export production; the multinationals take advantage\nof cheap labour… and so on, in a vicious cycle. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Partial, uneven and lop-sided development of the ex-colonial\ncountries has been the result. Total unemployment in these countries is\nestimated at between 300 and 600 million.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Welded into the chain of world capitalism, agriculture in\nthe under-developed countries has shifted more and more away from the\nproduction of essential foods for the population, and more and more towards\nsingle-crop agriculture intended for export.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus in the mid-1970s, sugar accounted for nine-tenths of\nthe exports of Mauritius, and coffee and yarn for three-fifths those of Egypt;\ncoffee made up half the exports of Columbia, and 84% of Burundi’s; and so on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a result, today, the poorest countries have to spend nearly a third of their export earnings on\nimporting food<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In most of the under-developed countries the land question\nhas remained unresolved. Most agricultural land has remained in the hands of\nreactionary landowning classes. The peasant masses, at the mercy of the\ncapitalist market, unable to compete with large-scale modern agriculture and\nincreasingly dependent on capitalist industry and bankers for implements and\nfertilisers, have been trampled deeper into poverty and debt. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Industry<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In industry, the emphasis has been on mining and the\nelementary processing of raw materials destined for the manufacturing\nindustries of the industrialised world. Generally only the simplest of consumer\ngoods can be manufactured locally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Through their control of the world market, the imperialist\nmonopolies have combined to impose a collective exploitation on the poorer\ncountries. The terms of trade are systematically weighted in favour of\nindustrial goods, and against agricultural products and raw materials. While\nthe prices of manufactured products have risen astronomically, the world market\nprices of food and most minerals have either been held down or, in some cases,\nactually depressed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus to the ‘normal’ exploitation of capitalism is added the\nsuper-exploitation of imperialism. The former colonial countries are forced to\nexchange products of more labour for products of less labour, as Marx put it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Between 1870 and 1950 the quantity of imports that a \u2018Third\nWorld\u2019 country could purchase with a given quantity of exports rose by 50%. But\nby 1970 the quantity that could be bought was 11% below the 1950 level. The\n1973 oil price rise altered the North-South balance, but for the developing\ncountries without oil, they could purchase by 1975 21% less than in 1950. For\nthe very poorest countries it was 32% less.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1974, for example, a given quantity of tea produced in\nSri Lanka could only buy half the imports that it could buy in 1954.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(The oil price rise has produced, for a period, benefits for\nthe oil producers; but even at its height it did not compensate fully for the\nrise in the price of industrial goods since 1950. Today, as a result of the\nrecession of 1980-82, the slump in the demand for oil has forced the\nOrganisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) to lower prices and cut\nproduction, and threatens already to eliminate the gains secured by the oil\nproducers’ cartel.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Per head of population, the purchasing power of the exports\nof the under-developed countries has declined from $25 in the late 1960s to\nonly $16 by the end of the 1970s<\/strong>\u2014a\nclear pointer to the general fall in the living standards of the masses which\nhas taken place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Prices of agricultural raw materials have been in decline\nsince the end of the Second World War. UNCTAD (the UN Conference on Trade and\nDevelopment) has reported that, by the end of 1980, real prices for non-oil\ncommodities exported by the ‘developing’ countries were the lowest for thirty\nyears.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Added to this is the fact that these countries have received\na declining share of the retail price when their export commodities are sold in\nthe advanced capitalist countries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For example, in the case of tea exported to Britain, the\nexporting countries received 61% of the price in 1955-1960 and only 48% of the\nprice in 1973. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the case of coal exported to West Germany, the\ncorresponding decline was from 14% to 8%. In the case of coffee exported to\nFrance, the decline was from 38% to 33%. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Monopoly control<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is the result of monopoly control of world production\nand distribution. Five companies account for 75% of the world, tea market. Six\ncompanies control 50% of manganese ore capacity. Three companies control 60% of\nbanana imports. Six companies control 76% of the world’s alumina production.\nFifteen companies control 85%-90% of world trade in cotton\u2014and so on in every\ncase.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Simultaneously monopolies push up the prices of the\nindustrial goods and other manufactured commodities sold to the ‘Third World’.\nFor instance, the developing countries are said to be paying out an extra $500\nmillion a year because of a cartel governing the supply of heavy electrical\nequipment, which raises prices by about 30%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The whole web of domination and exploitation at the hands of\nthe imperialist monopolies is strengthened by the dependence of the poor\ncountries on international \u2018aid\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Well over half of foreign aid has been tied to the condition\nthat it must be used to purchase goods from the donor countries. So, for\nexample, of every $1 ‘given’ by the United States, 70 cents is directly spent\nin the USA. In fact the US State Department reported three years ago that, for\nevery dollar paid by the government to the World Bank for aid, the poor countries\nwere spending two dollars in the American economy!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By 1979 the USA was spending 38% less in real terms on\ndirect aid than it had in 1962. America spends more on potted plants and\nflowers than on aid. At the same time this aid has been concentrated on a few\nfavoured recipients\u2014some 40% to Israel and Egypt alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The real value of\ntotal Western aid to the ‘Third World’ has been static or declining in recent\nyears. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Gap<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The whole of the post war period has seen the gap between\nthe developed and the under-developed capitalist countries widening massively.\nIn 1960 the industrialised capitalist countries produced 26 times more per head\nof population than the under-developed countries; by 1979 the figure had\nincreased to 44 times.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1950 the countries of the colonial and ex-colonial world\nhad one-third of world trade; in 1964 they had one-quarter; in 1977 they had\none-fifth. Their proportion of world trade in manufactured goods is a mere\n10%\u2014and almost half of this comes from Brazil, South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong\nand Singapore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The increasing dependence of the poor countries, and the\nwidening disparity between the price of their imports and exports, has meant an\nunstoppable decline into debt. This is expected to reach a total of $450\nbillion by the end of 1982.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This year aid to the poor countries will finance only about\n40% of their current account deficits (i.e. the amount by which their export\nearnings fall below the cost of their imports). The balance has to be covered\nby increased borrowing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But already two out of every three dollars borrowed by the\ndeveloping countries goes to servicing existing debt! Interest rates are now\ntwo to three times higher than in the 1970s, and every 1% increase in interest\nrates costs roughly $3 billion more a year in debt servicing by the ‘Third\nWorld’. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time, because of the crisis of world capitalism,\nthere is a downward squeeze on exports to the industrialised countries. Every\n1% reduction in the economic growth rate of the latter countries reduces the\nexport earnings of the ‘Third World’ countries by $2 billion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus the poor countries have to borrow vastly more every\nyear to pay for imports and to finance their increased debt. By 1990, they are\nexpected to have only 15% or less of their total borrowing available for the\npurchase of imports. This vicious circle is like being forced to drink one’s own\nblood in order to stay alive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the partial and one-sided development of these\ncountries produces in many cases statistics of rising ‘per capita’ income, in\nreality this is swamped by the increase in impoverishment, landlessness and\nhunger among the mass of the population. Income is precisely not<\/strong> distributed ‘per capita’, (i.e.\ndivided equally over the population as a whole), but is grossly weighted in\nfavour of a narrow stratum of exploiters, while the millions of dispossessed\nare cast into the slums without jobs, homes, or a future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is the general background of the unbearable situation\nwhich has driven country after country of the under-developed world on the road\nof revolution. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Bourgeois Bonapartism or Proletarian Bonapartism<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Thus the retreat of the old imperialist powers from direct\ncolonial rule has not ended the nightmare of the colonial peoples; it has been\nfollowed instead by intensified exploitation of the masses of the\nunder-developed world through neo-colonial domination. Not only have\nnewly-independent states remained the prisoners of imperialism and the world\nmarket; in many cases political power has been exercised by capitalist regimes\nthat are little more than appendages of the imperialist ruling classes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In nearly every country the state apparatus was constructed\nduring the colonial period, and handed over intact to the new rulers. To this\nday, the military chiefs and top civil servants in many ‘Third World’ countries\nhave received, or continue to receive, their training at the academies of British,\nUS or French imperialism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The inability of capitalism to undertake the all-round\ndevelopment of these countries, and the pathetic weakness of their national\nbourgeoisies, has resulted in endless instability and the lurching from one\ncrisis to another in virtually all the former colonial countries which have remained\non a capitalist basis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With their limited industries absolutely dependent on cheap\nlabour in order to survive, with the urban and rural masses sinking ever deeper\ninto poverty, with the mushrooming of slums and unemployment at unbearable\nlevels, it has been impossible for the ruling classes in these countries to\nconsolidate or sustain their rule through regimes of bourgeois democracy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not only have the former colonial countries suffered\ncrippling economic disabilities; the territories and states which they\ninherited from imperialism have seldom formed a coherent national entity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

National diversity, of course, is not peculiar to the \u2018Third\nWorld\u2019; it is present in many of the advanced capitalist countries also. Yet\nnational integration and unity could be achieved at least partly in Europe on\nthe basis of the development of capitalism. But with the onset of prolonged\neconomic decline and worsening social conditions, even in Western Europe old\ndivisions have been prised open and new national struggles set in motion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Latin America, Asia and Africa, on the other hand,\ngenerations of economic impasse have had their counterpart in the uninterrupted\nseething of national tensions and divisions, resulting in explosions, instability\nand even civil war. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The splitting of the Indian sub-continent, first through the\nseparation of Pakistan from India, and then through the secession struggle of\nBangladesh (formerly East Pakistan) is a major example. In Africa, the\narbitrary Balkanisation imposed by imperialism has left not a single country\nwithout acute or latent tensions, welling to the surface in wounding conflicts\nof which the best known has been the civil war in Nigeria during the 1960s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the under-developed countries generally, with the\nprogressive role of capitalism exhausted, the bourgeoisie has been incapable of\nuniting the nation. The result has been that the sense of national unity\naroused in the course of the struggles against colonial oppression has tended\nto give way to social disintegration and political chaos.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this social and political dead-end, the only force of\ncohesion in country after country, even temporarily, has been the army.\nRepeatedly the generals and colonels have stepped in to take command of the state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But neither can these regimes even begin to solve the\nproblems of the nation on the basis of capitalism. As a result they have been\nextremely fragile. Coups have been followed by counter-coups, or else a\ntemporary return to unstable governments of a ‘bourgeois-democratic’ or\nparliamentary type. Elsewhere the regime has taken the form of a one-party\nstate under the supreme arbitration of a ‘popular’ leader (usually the\nmiddle-class leader of the independence struggle).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus regimes of bourgeois\nbonapartism<\/strong>\u2014understood by Marxism as reflecting crisis\u2014have become the norm\nin the capitalist countries of the ‘Third World’. The bonapartist state\napparatus becomes partly elevated above the classes, balancing between the conflicting\npressures of imperialism, the local capitalists, the middle class, the\npeasants, the workers and the lumpen-proletariat. Nevertheless, in the last\nanalysis, the bourgeois bonapartist state ruthlessly maintains the domination\nof capitalism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course there are differences between regimes in different\ncountries and regions. In Latin America, for example, the bourgeoisie has\nundergone a relatively greater development, enabling them to consolidate a\nstate apparatus more firmly and ensuring them a degree of influence even over\nbestial military dictatorships.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Africa, in comparison, the top-heavy post-colonial states\nmore readily rise beyond control of an almost non-existent indigenous\nbourgeoisie. In conditions of extreme poverty, national fragmentation and\nsocial decay, the masses may for a time lie prostrate under the most horrible\ncaricatures of bourgeois bonapartism\u2014as was the case in Uganda under Amin and\nthe Central African ‘Empire’ under Bokassa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Overthrow<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In contrast to the countries under bourgeois bonapartist\ndictatorships in the under-developed world, there are an increasing number of\ncountries where the crisis of society has led to the overthrow of capitalism\nand the establishment of proletarian\nbonapartist regimes<\/strong> resting on state ownership. This has tended to occur\nwhere capitalism has been least developed and hence the bourgeoisie at its\nweakest; where the proletariat has been correspondingly weak and there has been\nlittle or no independent organisation of the working class.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since the Chinese Revolution, the most outstanding of these\nrevolutions internationally have been those in Cuba and Vietnam. The struggle\nof the Vietnamese people stood out for a whole period to the masses in the\nunder-developed world\u2014and to sections of the workers and youth in the advanced\ncapitalist countries\u2014as a beacon of resistance to the monster of US\nimperialism. Likewise, the defence of the Cuban revolution against the might of\nUS imperialism which menaces it has correctly been regarded as a vital task.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In unconditionally supporting the struggles of the Cuban and\nVietnamese people and defending the gains that have flowed from their\nrevolutions, Marxism does not, however, hide from the task of explaining also\ntheir limits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Cuban revolution clearly illustrates these fundamental\nprocesses of the colonial revolution. Here, as in China and Vietnam, the new\nregime resulted from the victory of a peasant-based guerilla war. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

The Cuban Revolution<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

It is important to understand that Castro had no intention\nof carrying through the overthrow of capitalism in Cuba. His inspiration was\nthe tradition of radical bourgeois democracy and the principles outlined in the\nAmerican Declaration of Independence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A document of his 26th July Movement produced in 1956 during\nthe war against the Batista dictatorship expressly proclaimed a programme of\nnational capitalism and the utopian idea of bringing labour and capital into\nharmony with each other. Although more than half the Cuban population was\nurban, there was no attempt to mobilise the working class.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Cuban Communist Party played no significant role in the\nstruggle, which was won by Castro’s guerilla army, although there was a general\nstrike by the proletariat at the culmination of the war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the time of the revolution, Cuba was effectively a colony\nof US imperialism. American monopolies owned a 90% share in the telephone and\nelectrical system; about 50% in public services; and 40% in raw sugar. Most of\nCuba’s sugar\u2014the single main crop on which the entire economy relied\u2014was\nexported to the US under a fixed yearly quota and set prices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yet, six months before taking power Castro assured\njournalists that he had no plans to nationalise foreign interests. His first government\nwas dominated by professors, bankers and judges, indicating the lack of\nunderstanding by the leadership of the direction the revolution would have to\ntake.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But immediately this government came under enormous pressure\nfrom the peasants and workers for land reforms, higher wages, etc. Castro\ninitially went to Nixon (then US Vice-President) for aid, and condemned the CP\nfor agitating for wage increases.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nevertheless, under the pressure of the masses, he had to\nmove to institute reforms. This struck at the interests of the American\nmonopolies which, with the aid of the US government, tried to pressurise and blackmail\nCuba into submission.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was the bloody-minded policies of American imperialism in\ncutting off purchases of Cuban sugar that drove Castro towards the Soviet\nUnion, and to a policy of nationalising the American-owned telephone and\nelectric companies, oil refinery and sugar mills.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This process having been begun, the Cuban government was\nobliged to carry it through. There was no viable social basis in the country on\nwhich capitalism could rest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was from these circumstances that Castro emerged as a\n‘Marxist-Leninist\u2019, took the CP leaders into the government and, leaning on the\nsupport of the masses who were armed against the danger of US intervention,\nproceeded to construct a state essentially no different from that of Stalinist\nRussia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The progressive nature of the planned economy was once again\nrevealed in Cuba.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Agricultural production was rapidly increased by using\npreviously unused land, once the grip of landlordism was broken. In the first five\nyears of the revolution, industrial production increased by 50%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite extreme under-development, Cuba is the only country\nin Latin America where children do not die of hunger. By 1975 Cuba had achieved\nthe lowest infant mortality rate in Latin America (lower even than parts of the\nUS). Life expectancy is about ten years longer than, for example, Brazil or\nChile.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In tackling unemployment, in the provision of health\nservices and welfare, in overcoming illiteracy, the achievements of the Cuban revolution\nhave been tremendous.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, as Castro and the Cuban leadership have openly\nadmitted, enormous problems for the Cuban people have begun to heap up. These\nare the result of the narrow base of the economy (80% of its exports being\nsugar), and the confinement of the revolution within a small island. Castro himself\nsaid in 1959 that if all Cuba’s sugar was sold to the West at market prices, it\nwouldn’t even have paid its fuel bill. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Subsidies<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In fact Cuba receives large subsidies from the Soviet Union,\nmainly through the purchase of sugar at about double the world market price.\nBut the weakness of the economy is shown by the fact that these subsidies\nconstitute between 20% and 50% of the annual value of all Cuban production.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This sums up the impasse of the economies of the\nunder-developed countries, even where capitalism is overthrown, unless a solution\nis found in the international revolution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Cuba, as in China,\nthe peasant-based guerilla war inevitably resulted, not in a regime of workers’\ndemocracy, but in a form of bonapartism increasingly bureaucratic and\nrepressive in character. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although resting on enormous popular support, from the\noutset Castro and a few close associates ruled from the top, and centralised\nabsolute power through the apparatus of the Communist Party, which was taken\nover and restructured under Castroite control. The bonapartist nature of the\nstate was shown all along in the mass rallies addressed by Castro, where the\nworkers have been called on to shout “Si” or “No” to the\nslogans of the leaders, but not to discuss or decide on issues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was sixteen years after the revolution before the\nCastroite CP even held its first Congress. It was also only in the mid-1970s,\nwhen the regime was faced with problems of what it described as “passive\nresistance” from the workers, that it moved to draft a constitution\nproviding for the election of ‘municipal assemblies’.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These form the lowest tier in a carefully constructed\npyramid of government which continues to ensure Castro’s own control, through\nthe apparatus of the CP, of all important offices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A National Assembly, itself under the control of the\nbureaucracy, was formed for the first time in 1977. This was described as\nending “the provisional period of revolutionary government”\u2014a period\nof eighteen years!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Without workers’ democracy, the Cuban regime has\nconsolidated itself as a permanent bureaucracy. Inevitably, despite its\nrelatively progressive role, it enters more and more into contradiction with\nthe needs and interests of the masses. This prepares the basis in the long run\nfor the overthrow of the bureaucracy once there is a spread of the proletarian\nrevolution through the Americas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The transition to socialism in Cuba cannot be carried\nthrough except in the context of a Socialist Federation of all Latin America\nand the Caribbean, which itself would prepare the downfall of capitalism in its\nheartland of North America. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Transformation of Economy and State<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

In the stormy decades since the Second World War, profound\nchanges have taken place in the consciousness of the working people of the under-developed\nworld. Among the youth, the workers, and even large sections of the peasantry\nthere is now an overwhelming desire for a revolutionary transformation of\nsociety on socialist lines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the one hand this is the product of the unrelieved\nburdens and impoverishment suffered under capitalism and imperialist\ndomination. On the other hand it is the result of the heightened understanding\nand awareness brought about through the experience of struggle, through the\neffects of partial industrialisation and the growth of the proletariat, through\nthe broader vision resulting from improvements in literacy, the education of\nthe youth, and the advances of radio and telecommunications.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even the most systematic bourgeois propaganda cannot conceal\nfrom the masses the material advances gained by their brothers and sisters in\nChina, Cuba, the Soviet Union, and the other states where capitalism has been\noverthrown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As we have pointed out, workers in the advanced capitalist\ncountries who have won for themselves bourgeois-democratic rights together with\nimprovements in standards of living (at least in the past), are repelled by the\ntotalitarian nature of the Stalinist regimes. In the ex-colonial and\nneo-colonial world, however, under the heel of capitalist dictatorships and\nsuffering nightmare conditions, millions of workers and peasants look to the Soviet\nUnion, China, etc., as examples of the triumph of ‘socialism’ over economic\nbackwardness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Such is the hatred of imperialism among the mass of the\nworld’s population, and such the incapacity of capitalism to take the\nunder-developed countries forward in this epoch, that even bourgeois dictators\nin the Third World countries are obliged to posture as \u2018socialists\u2019 in front of\ntheir people. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Anyone who looks to superficial labels, or to the claims of\nleaders about themselves, in the hope of finding there an indication of the\nreal nature of the regime, will be faced with a hopeless morass of\ncontradictions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Right-wing<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even the right-wing Janata government in India described\nitself as ‘socialist’. The bourgeois-bonapartist President of Sri Lanka,\nJayawardena, came to power on the promise of “going beyond\nMarxism”\u2014and proceeded to attack all the social welfare reforms and\npolitical freedoms gained by the Sri Lankan workers and peasants in decades of\nstruggle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bourguiba’s right-wing ruling party in Tunisia proclaims\nitself ‘socialist’. Numeiri’s party is called the \u2018Sudanese Socialist Union\u2019.\nRecently Senghor of Senegal formed the imperialist-inspired ‘Inter-African Socialist\nOrganisation’.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1980 the Egyptian President Sadat, the darling of US\nimperialism, changed the description of the state in the constitution from\n“democratic socialist” to … “socialist democratic”!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Buddhist socialism\u2019, ‘Arab socialism’, ‘African socialism’\u2014the\nlist and variety of labels is potentially unlimited. But none of them provides any scientific indication as to whether or\nnot there has been a break with capitalism, and a qualitative transformation of\nsociety, the economy and the state.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the state can raise itself above society and gain a\ndegree of relative autonomy, in the last analysis it depends either on private\nproperty and a market-based economy, or on a system of state ownership and\neconomic planning. The state is either bourgeois<\/strong>\nor proletarian<\/strong> in its essential\ncharacter\u2014and it is no use to try to dodge this question, as the Stalinists do,\nby describing the state in the under-developed world as ‘national-democratic’.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In practice it seems that states are described as \u2018national-democratic\u2019\u2014regardless\nof their economic basis or the character of their regimes\u2014according to the test\nof whether they are diplomatically friendly to Moscow or Peking!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From the standpoint of Marxism, the first test of the class\nnature of a state is whether production for private profit predominates in the\nsociety or has been decisively broken.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In itself, the amount of nationalisation which has taken\nplace is not a sufficient criterion. On the one hand, even in a healthy\nworkers’ state elements of capitalist enterprise would remain, but subordinated\nto the state-run economy. On the other hand, particularly in less developed\ncountries with relatively few industries concentrated in the hands of a few\ncompanies, under the pressure of crisis a big percentage of the economy can be\nnationalised\u2014but without the domination of the capitalist market being broken.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even in Portugal, during the revolution of 1974, 70% of\nindustry was nationalised\u2014but because there was not a complete transformation\nof the state, the capitalist class was able to regain its hold, and Portugal\nhas so far remained within the framework of capitalism. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Transformation<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The transformation from a bourgeois state to a proletarian\nstate, even one deformed along the lines of proletarian bonapartism, occurs\nonly where the power of the bourgeoisie is decisively smashed, where all\nelements of capitalist control over the state are systematically dismantled,\nand where the grip of imperialism is broken. Ordinarily this cannot be\naccomplished without the mobilisation and arming of the worker and peasant\nmasses against the danger of bourgeois counter-revolution. This qualitative\nchange, in turn, would ordinarily mean that a civil war would have to be fought\nto reverse the changes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Such has been the weakness and bankruptcy of the capitalist\nclass in the under-developed world that social revolutions have not been\nconfined to countries such as China and Cuba, where the old state apparatus was\ndefeated and demolished as the result of a peasant-based guerilla war. In Vietnam,\nin Mozambique, in Angola and other countries the revolution has clearly taken\nthat course. But in Syria, Burma and Ethiopia, for example, the intense\nrevolutionary pressures in society found an outlet through other channels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Burma, after the withdrawal of British imperialism, the\nstate completely broke down in the midst of endemic civil war. Seeing no way\nforward on the basis of capitalism, a\nsection of the officer caste of the army <\/strong>moved from the top to expropriate\nthe bourgeoisie and organise a deformed workers’ state in the name of \u2018Buddhist\nsocialism\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This was because of the complete incapacity of the\nbourgeoisie to solve the problems of the country, and it was easier because\nmost of the capital in Burma was foreign, in the main British, Indian and\nChinese. Thus, leaning on the support of the small working class and the\npeasantry, the transformation was carried through by a section of the existing\nstate apparatus, with the example in front of them of their powerful neighbour,\nChina.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Syria a similar process took place. The Baath Socialist\nParty had the majority support of the officer caste. Indeed the coup was led by\nthe Baath members of the latter. Leaning on the support of the workers and\npeasants, they snuffed out the weak and ineffective bankers, industrialists,\nmerchants and landlords.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The attempt at counter-revolution to restore capitalism was\nbrushed aside by the arming of the workers and 100 000 peasants who flooded\ninto the cities. Imperialism was too weak to intervene because it would have\nunleashed an enormous wave of resistance throughout the Middle East and\nbecause, with the practically bloodless destruction of the power of the\nbourgeoisie, they had no social force on which to rely in Syria.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A similar process took place in Ethiopia, which we shall\ndeal with in the next chapter. In all these cases, the old state machine was\nsmashed as an instrument of the bourgeoisie, and reconstituted from above as a\ndeformed workers’ state\u2014bonapartist and totalitarian in character. In each case\nthe development of the economy has gone forward on the basis of nationalisation\nof the main means of production, state ownership and planning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This caricatured version of the permanent revolution again\ncan be traced to the lag of the revolution in the advanced countries, the\npathetic weakness of the bourgeoisie, the cul-de-sac of these societies, the impossibility\nof advancing on a capitalist basis, and not least the weakness of Marxist\nforces in the world and the inability of the proletariat to take the leading\nrole nationally and internationally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the poor countries in the impasse of capitalism, the\nintellectual elite, the middle class and the junior officers in the army are\nthemselves faced with a dismal future, surrounded by unemployment and\nstarvation, and oppressed by a rotting bourgeois, landlord and merchant class\nonly interested in salting their wealth abroad and incapable of advancing the\ncountry on modern lines. Looking for some way out, these middle layers see\n\u2018socialism\u2019 in China and Russia where their own equivalents form a privileged\nelite. In addition they have seen these countries being modernised at a rapid\npace, with the ruling caste enjoying a stability and popularity unknown by the\nbourgeois-bonapartist rulers in the ex-colonial world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Consequently, in their own interests, they can move to seize\npower and overthrow the bourgeoisie with the participation and support of the\nmasses\u2014provided they see no danger that the working class will threaten them\nwith struggles beyond their control. Having used the workers and peasants as a\nbattering ram, they invariably turn to suppress whatever elements of workers’\ndemocracy may have been created in the process, and organise the state\nbureaucratically on the familiar Stalinist lines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is for all these reasons that the overthrow of capitalism\nin the under-developed world has taken place where capitalism has been weakest\nand where the independent movement of the working class has been either very\nweak or completely absent. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Formidable<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In those countries of the Third World where capitalism has\nundergone a certain development, where there has been a significant degree of\nindustrialisation, where there is a tradition of working-class struggle, where\nthe bourgeoisie has gained a certain basis of support in the middle class, and\nwhere the state apparatus has become consolidated as an instrument of bourgeois\nrule, it is a far more formidable task to carry through the overthrow of\ncapitalism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here, as in the more advanced capitalist countries, the\nprogramme and leadership of the mass movement becomes decisive. It is also in\nthese countries that the unscientific, bankrupt programme of Stalinism is\nrevealed for what it is.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Indonesia in the early 1960s, worsening economic\nconditions impelled large masses of workers and peasants into action. The\nradical bourgeois leader, Sukarno, balancing between the masses and the\nright-wing Moslem leaders, was forced into carrying out measures of reform that\nalarmed the capitalist class. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not satisfied with piecemeal reforms, however, workers and\npeasants turned more and more to the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) to show\nthem a revolutionary way forward. By 1965, with majority support for the PKI in\nthe main centres of the country, conditions were ripe for mass insurrection to sweep\naside the capitalist state. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aware of this danger, the forces of reaction, were preparing\nfor serious struggle. The PKI leadership, on the other hand, was timid and\ndivided. At the urging of Peking, it preferred to try and shore up the\nincreasingly ineffectual government of Sukarno, sooner than face the\nresponsibilities of power. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

After the opportunity had been lost, a half-hearted coup was\nattempted from the left, without any mobilisation of the masses for strikes or\ninsurrection. Failing miserably, this turned the tide in favour of the\ncounter-revolution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Right-wing military leaders seized the opportunity to carry\nthrough a coup. At least 300 000\u2014and possibly as many as a million\u2014Communist\nand non-Communist workers and peasants were slaughtered in the capitalist\nvengeance that followed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Likewise in the Chilean revolution of 1973, reformist\npolicies of the Communist and Socialist leaders along the lines of the Popular\nFront of Spain in the 1930s, held the working class back from power. In the\ncounter-revolution that followed, the military dictatorship of Pinochet,\nemploying fascist methods, imprisoned and tortured or slaughtered every trade union\nactivist and militant student or peasant they could lay their hands on. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Paralysed<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many bourgeois or petty-bourgeois nationalist leaders in the\ncolonial and ex-colonial world, under the pressure of the masses, have also\ncarried out far-reaching reforms on a capitalist basis. But failing to break\ndecisively with capitalism, their programmes have been paralysed and reversed\nunder the pressure of imperialism and the impasse of the productive system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus, for example, the regime of Nkrumah in Ghana, stopping\nshort of a revolutionary transformation of society, was overthrown and replaced\nby a right-wing military government. The radical programme of nationalisation\nand reforms under Nasser in Egypt was completely reversed by his successor,\nSadat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Sri Lanka the reformist “Popular Front” government\n(including the CP) presided over falls in the living standards of the masses\ninevitable on the basis of capitalism. This led to its downfall, and a swing to\nthe right. The present Bonapartist regime of Jayawardena is held back from\nbloody counter-revolution only by the organised strength and militant\ntraditions of the Sri Lankan working class. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Effects of World Crisis<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

If the working people of the under-developed countries have\nendured nightmare conditions in the decade of the great post-war boom period of\nworld capitalism, then with the new international crisis of capitalism they\nface a living hell.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The world market stagnates, and ‘Third World’ countries’\nexports are growing at only one-fifth the rate which U.N. economists estimate\nwould be required for their economies to progress.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The oil import bill of these countries is expected to rise\nnearly 600% in the course of the decade, while the prices of imported industrial\ngoods continue to rocket.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time, the prices of the primary products\nexported by these countries stagnates or falls. The overall prices of food,\ntropical beverages, vegetable oils and seeds, agricultural raw materials,\nminerals, ores and metals exported by the ‘developing countries’ are exported\nto be absolutely lower in 1982 than two years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While their debt burden increases, and their need for further\nborrowing grows, it has become more and more difficult for the poor countries\nto raise the necessary loans. In 1979-1980, for example, the quantity of dollar\ncredits raised by the non-oil developing countries on international markets\nfell by 25%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hence the turn to the International Monetary Fund for\ncredits. But the price of IMF ‘assistance’ is invariably a set of ruthless\nconditions, requiring slashing attacks on the living standards especially of\nthe already poverty-stricken urban population.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus an IMF deal with Morocco in May 1981 required immediate\nprice rises of sugar (39%), cooking oil (28%), milk (14%), butter (76%), and\nflour (40%). The effect was devastating on the two million shanty dwellers of\nCasablanca, and led to a general strike, an uprising, a massacre by government\nforces and mass arrests.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now the Reagan administration in the US insists that the IMF\nmust tighten its lending policies still further! The crisis of capitalism in\nthe under-developed world is starkly shown in the case of Latin America. There\nthe average inflation rate is running at 60% (while in the Third World\ncountries as a whole it is 40%). In 1981 overall economic growth in the region\nwas only 1,2%. Average income declined absolutely, while the region’s foreign\ndebt reached four times the level of 1977.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Argentina, GNP dropped 6% and industrial output shrank\n15%. At the same time the inflation rate was running at 120%! A tractor\nindustry with a capacity of 30 000 tractors produced only 280 in the first four\nmonths of 1981.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nothing could more graphically illustrate the crisis than\nthe case of Brazil. This country, with a population of 120 million, has long been\nheld up as a brilliant example of capitalist ‘success’ in the under-developed\nworld.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Indeed, there has been a massive growth of industry, but as\nthe bourgeois Economist<\/em> (17\/5\/80)\nadmitted, the vast majority of Brazilians “got next to nothing at\nall” out of it. In fact the poor became poorer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Simultaneously, through the 1970s, there was a big increase\nin worker organisation, strike action and mass protest. Strike assemblies of up\nto 60 000 workers at a time took place. The unions began to build underground networks\nfor organising strikes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Under the pressure of the masses, the Brazilian capitalist\nregime attempted to maintain a high rate of economic growth during the world\nrecession of the mid-1970s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the decade growth rates as high as 10% and 15% were\nachieved. This was financed by huge foreign borrowing, with the result that\ntotal foreign debt reached $65 billion by the end of 1981. This amounts to a\nconsiderably higher proportion of annual production than is the case even in\nPoland!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To finance this borrowing, Brazilian capitalism has been\nobliged to drive after a rate of growth of exports of 20-30% a year\u2014which it\nwill be impossible to sustain in the climate of world recession and the\nstagnating world market. As the Economist<\/em>\nwarned in 1980, “the international banking system should start girding its\nloins for the possibility that it may never again see some of the money which\nit splashed out to Brazil”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the domestic economy, on the basis of capitalism, the\nprice of rapid growth and mounting debts has been an inflation rate running as\nhigh as 120%. At the same time, unemployment jumped from 10% to more than 25%\nof the existing labour force by the end of the 1970s. Just to keep unemployment\nsteady, it is estimated that the economy would have to sustain a growth rate of\n7% per year. But in the crisis year of 1981, the growth rate was no higher than\n0-2% (some economists estimate that there was a 3% absolute fall in Gross National\nProduct). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Outbreaks<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Against this background there have been repeated outbreaks\nof mass struggle, strikes by metal workers, the creation of a workers’ party,\nand rioting by students and young unemployed in the poor North-eastern region,\nleading to the worst clashes with troops in 50 years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also in the other ‘jewels’ of capitalist development in the\nex-colonial world\u2014Hong Kong, South Korea, Singapore and Taiwan\u2014flaws and cracks\nhave begun to be exposed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These have all been small enclaves of rapid industrialization,\non the basis of big investment and cheap labour, in every case heavily\ndependent on the export of the goods they produce. All are now faced by a\nsqueeze on their exports to the major industrialized powers, as the world\nmarket stagnates and pressures towards protectionism increase.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the recent mass uprising in South Korea showed, even\nthese countries will be unable in the period ahead to escape the turbulence,\ncoups and revolutions which will more than ever become the picture of the\nex-colonial world. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

The International Implications<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Reagan’s bellicose outbursts and paroxysms in foreign policy\nare an expression of the anxieties of American imperialism at the dangers of\nnew outbreaks of revolution in the former colonial world. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The situation facing imperialism internationally is summed\nup by the editors of the Economist<\/em>,\nwho lamented in their new year edition of 1980 that two-thirds of the world’s\n159 heads of government would go to bed that night understandably upset that\nthey might be overthrown or murdered in a coup by breakfast the following\nmorning!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There was an element of cunning in the former President\nCarter’s ‘human rights’ stance in foreign policy, which was designed to dress\nimperialism up in the sheep’s clothing of pretended democracy. This enabled the\nUS administration both to exert cautionary pressures on the bourgeois\nbonapartist dictatorships of the Third World, while maintaining a posture of\ndistance from their worst ‘excesses’. At the same time, underhand support could\ncontinue to sustain right-wing regimes in power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But this policy\u2014like every policy of imperialism\ntoday\u2014proved completely unable to slow the advance of revolutionary movements.\nCarter himself soon passed over to a policy of preparing a “rapid\ndeployment force” for the purpose of military intervention in the\nunder-developed world. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now with the right-wing Reagan administration, there is\nsnarling and foaming at the mouth, while military forces for foreign\nintervention are being massively strengthened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is breath-taking hypocrisy for Reagan and Haig to piously\ncondemn the military dictatorship in Poland, while whole-heartedly endorsing\nthe capitalist dictatorships of Pakistan, Turkey, etc., with their ruthless suppression\nof all democratic expression and their horrific torture and murder of\nopponents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the decline of US imperialism is irreversible, this\npreviously supreme world power cannot tamely accept the consequences of such\nweakening. It is impossible for the US ruling class to pursue a strictly\n‘rational’ foreign policy, because every policy of imperialism is bankrupt.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus convulsions and the launching of military interventions\nis inherent in the situation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But at the same time, US imperialism is held back from such\nsteps by the realisation that they too are doomed to failure. The ruling class,\nand the Pentagon officials especially, still smart from the humiliating defeat\nsuffered in Vietnam.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now the domestic crisis of US capitalism interlinks with the\ncrisis and upheaval of world capitalism. There is a growing appreciation in the\nworking class and the middle class in the USA that attacks on jobs and living\nstandards at home are linked to Reagan’s costly and aggressive foreign policy.\nThus even the threat of military intervention in El Salvador has already\nprovoked major demonstrations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Moreover, the strategists of imperialism recognise the\ndangers of becoming bogged down in counter-revolutionary war. In Vietnam the US\narmy virtually disintegrated, morally and physically, under the pressure of the\nprotracted and unwinnable war and the obviously criminal character of the\nintervention.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The US forces in Vietnam collapsed to an even greater extent\nthan the Tsar’s army in Russia in 1917. Alcoholism and drug-taking became\nwidespread. This disintegration was one of the major factors in inducing the US\nruling class to withdraw.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today the US army is overwhelmingly comprised of\nworking-class and unemployed youth, mainly drawn from the most deprived and\noppressed sections of the population.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1979, over 60% of the recruits came from the 11% of\nAmerican adults who do not have a high-school diploma. The relatively\nbetter-educated section of the army are the blacks, most of whom are there only\nbecause of the high levels of unemployment which they face in civilian society.\n29% of the US army is now black\u2014while only 12% of the US population as a whole\nis black.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is enormously difficult for the commanders to maintain\nmorale in this army. The army’s own official estimate is that 20% of its\nsoldiers are now on one or other kind of drug.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are therefore extreme dangers for US imperialism in\nbecoming bogged down in extended war in the under-developed world, as would\nobviously be the case with an intervention in any of the countries with\nsizeable populations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Explosions<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even the situation in Central America, with the whole region\nin the spreading turmoil of guerilla warfare, military coups, etc., faces the\nUS Administration with an unsolvable dilemma. While US military intervention\ncould not be completely ruled out, at the same time it would only succeed in\nprovoking further explosions there, in other countries, and ultimately in the\nUS itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course, the fact that Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala,\netc., are located virtually in the jaws of the USA has provided stiffening for\nright-wing juntas, and has faced the peasants and workers with the necessity of\nimmense sacrifices in the struggle against landlord and capitalist oppression.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a number of countries of the under-developed world, a\nfear on the part of radical petty-bourgeois leaders of provoking US imperialist\nintervention may temporarily hold them back from moving towards the overthrow\nof capitalism. But the accumulated, unbearable stresses and tensions in these\ncountries will lead to repeated explosions in the coming period, and compel new\ndevelopments towards the setting up of proletarian bonapartist regimes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Contrary to capitalist propaganda, it has not been the\npolicy of either the Soviet or Chinese bureaucracies to encourage the overthrow\nof capitalism in the under-developed world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Stalinist states have given material and political\nsupport to wars of national liberation from colonial oppression\u2014but have tried\nto encourage the leadership of these movements to remain within the framework\nof capitalism. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This flows from their entire policy of ‘detente’ with\nimperialism. While competing with the capitalist powers for influence\ninternationally, they struggle with might and main to preserve a balance and\nprevent political conflicts from endangering their trade and other links with\nthe major Western states. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Accept<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Stalinists have been forced to accept social revolution,\nwhere that has been the inevitable outcome of the victory of the national\nliberation war\u2014as was the case in Vietnam. Also, naturally, once a proletarian\nbonapartist regime becomes established as an accomplished fact, it is in the\ninterests of the Stalinists to try to form close relations with the new\nbureaucracy and provide aid in order to consolidate their own position in\ninternational diplomacy and politics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But many are the examples where the Soviet and Chinese\nbureaucracies have exerted pressure to prevent the revolutionary overthrow of\ncapitalism in circumstances where this would disturb their own delicate balance\nwith imperialism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus Moscow exerted pressure on Nasser, when he was pursuing\nhis radical policies of nationalisation in Egypt, in order to prevent him from\ngoing over the brink and so decisively changing the whole balance of forces in\nthe Middle East. Similar pressure was exerted on Manley’s reformist PNP\ngovernment in Jamaica in order to keep it within the framework of capitalism. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although Moscow has tried to restrain the victorious\nSandinista government in Nicaragua from moving towards proletarian bonapartism,\nthe pressures towards this development are now becoming intense given the\ngeneral ferment of revolution in Central America and aggressive provocation by\nUS imperialism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Afghanistan, for decades the Soviet bureaucracy gave\nsupport to the monarchy!\u2014but then accepted the consequences of the Afghan\nrevolution as an accomplished fact.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is a fable that the Soviet Union exported revolution to\nAfghanistan. In reality the bureaucracy moved only to shore up the proletarian\nbonapartist regime on its border, when this was threatened with overthrow by\ncounter-revolutionary forces which would have led to a government in all\nprobability hostile to the Soviet Union.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile, as is now notorious, the Chinese bureaucracy has\ngiven support to the dictatorship in Pakistan, maintained relations with\nPinochet in Chile, and supported Unita in Angola, etc.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The foreign policies\nof Stalinism are dictated by the national self-interest of the respective\nbureaucracies, by considerations of great power politics, and not at all by the\npurpose of promoting international revolution.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nothing could better illustrate this than Moscow’s policy\ntowards Iran.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For years, during the bestial dictatorship of the Shah, the\nKremlin’s policy was simply to try to draw the Iranian regime into friendly\nrelations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not long before the Shah’s overthrow by the Iranian workers\nand peasants, the ‘Communist’ Brezhnev sent him the following telegram:\n“Your Majesty Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, Light of the Aryans, King of Kings of\nIran: On the occasion of a day of national rejoicing for the Iranian nation\u2014the\nbirthday of your majesty\u2014please accept the sincere greetings of the Executive\nCommittee of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, and my own as well.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The greeting on the same occasion from the ‘Communist’\nleadership of China was scarcely less grovelling.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While, in the period before the Iranian revolution, the\nIranian Communist Party (Tudeh Party) confined itself to passive opposition to\nthe Shah and played no role of any significance in the revolution itself, it\nsubsequently swung over on the instructions of Moscow to a position of\nuncritical support for the Ayatollah Khomeini and the Islamic fanatics who have\nled the Iranian revolution into a blind alley. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Links<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Clearly, in those ex-colonial countries where capitalism has\nbeen overthrown, the proletarian bonapartist regimes which emerged have had no\nchoice but to link their economies as far as possible with the other deformed\nworkers’ states, and seek shelter against imperialism by linking up\ndiplomatically with one or other of the great Stalinist powers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nevertheless they remain interlinked with the world market,\nand dependent in critical respects on the economies of the imperialist powers.\nMoreover, with the developing crisis in Russia, Eastern Europe (and China), it\nbecomes less and less possible for the developed Stalinist countries to support\nindustrialisation in their under-developed allies with massive injections of\naid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Only about 12% of aid to the less developed countries now\ncomes from Eastern Europe, Russia and China. The Stalinist states’ share of\nlong-term finance to the \u2018developing countries\u2019, which was 10% in 1971, fell\nbelow 2% in 1977. At the same time only about 5% of the ‘developing countries’\nexports are sold to the centrally planned economies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this sense Cuba has been an exception, because of its\nstrategic importance. To allow Cuba to fall once again under the domination of\nUS imperialism would mean a major setback for the Soviet Union in all its international\nrelations, and affect the balance of forces world-wide.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We have explained how, especially in the poorer and weaker\ncountries of the under-developed world, the overthrow of capitalism has taken\nplace without the proletariat playing the leading role. But in every case these\nrevolutions have been nationally limited, and therefore, while able to take\nsociety forward for a period, inevitably become entangled in the contradictions\nresulting from bonapartism and the limitations of the nation-state. Ultimately, there is no way out for the\npeoples of the ex-colonial world in revolutions confined on national lines.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus the programme of Marxism in the colonial revolution has\nalways been to organise the working class to unite the nation, fighting for the\ndemands of the peasants and oppressed middle class, to overthrow capitalism,\nreconstruct society, and break down the national barriers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the key countries of the ‘Third World’, the countries\nwhere because of the size of their population, and the degree of development of\nindustry, the repercussions of revolution would be continental in their\nsweep\u2014in all these countries revolution is impossible without the working class\nplaying the decisive role.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In India, in Brazil, in Argentina, in Nigeria (and of course\nin South Africa) the working class is the key to the future. These are among\nthe decisive countries of capitalism in the ex-colonial world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For a whole historical period, with the delay of the\nproletarian revolution in the West and the weakness of the forces of Marxism world-wide,\nthe colonial revolution has been forced to take a ‘detour’, and appears to\nfollow a course distinct from the movement of the international working class.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But now history has turned full circle once again, on to a\nhigher plane. We are in the epoch not only of the colonial revolution, but now\nagain of the social revolution in the West, and of the political revolution in\nthe East.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All three sectors of the world intersect with each other.\nThe policy of Marxism is to work to link the progress of the colonial revolution\nconsciously to the struggles of workers of the industrialised West for the\nover-throw of capitalism in these areas. Just one revolution in an important\nindustrialised country could change the situation throughout the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time, the umbilical link of the under-developed\nworld to the advanced centres of capitalism, means that the colonial revolution\nalso has repercussions there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Marx and Lenin saw the ultimate significance of the colonial\nrevolution in the blows it struck against capitalism in the West. Marx had even\nbelieved that the Chinese revolution would bring the bourgeoisie in Britain and\nin Europe tumbling from power. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Certainly, today, the fate of imperialism and the West is\nlinked with the movements that are taking place in the ex-colonial areas. The\ndevelopment of the colonial revolution in Latin America, Asia or Africa on a\nmassive basis, extending through entire regions or continents, would strike\nenormous blows against and undermine capitalism in the West.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These revolutions will prepare the way for the organisation of regional Socialist United States in Europe, North America, Latin America, Africa and Asia, and the linking of the whole world into a democratic socialist federation of states.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Continue to Chapter Six<\/a><\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Colonial Revolution More than two-thirds of the world’s population live in countries which were formerly colonies or semi-colonies of the imperialist powers. Here, over […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":709,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-740","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"acf":[],"_hostinger_reach_plugin_has_subscription_block":false,"_hostinger_reach_plugin_is_elementor":false,"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/740","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=740"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/740\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":746,"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/740\/revisions\/746"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/709"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marxistworkersparty.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=740"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}