Avant!

Editor’s Note: We have discussed in our previous work, ‘In the Midst of ICE: Against Protesting & the Allure of Nothing’, the tepid nature of protest work. Specifically in its structure and how the protest confines the real movement to an isolated event, we understand these events ultimately to be reactionary spaces. Derived from the real movement to abolish classes and the real movement alone, they are the brainchild of activists and intellectuals competing for ideological hegemony. In this piece, we will peel back further some of these errors specifically with the popular language protests these days typically take. This popular language is nothing more than a popular mediation which seeks to mask the true nature of capitalist life, and we will analyze them both in their content in the format of a “sloganeering” encyclopedia.

Protests often have the intended consequence of assailing an attendee’s senses. There’s the monotonous droning of, an often all too small, megaphone haphazardly clung to the belt of a scrawny organizer. Faintly one can make out the lull of a kettle bell or drum struck just ever-so-slightly off beat that it induces a sensory nightmare. Party organizations and NGOs dissect what momentum has grown to insert their own rhetoric, complete with heady speeches and a lengthy pamphlet which you will throw in the trash shortly after the scene has disbanded. All of these and more bless a gracious viewer who sifts through rubbish, hoping to find something worthwhile; this is a barren and hostile environment, littered with plastic and debris. 

However, nothing at a protest is more mind numbing and intellectually jarring than the abysmal sloganeering which cloaks the mechanisms which define life. And like a broken record, these chants are repeated ad nauseum until they are burned into memory, satirical soundbites which loop in the brain well after the event has died. Furthermore, nearly all of the Parties involved in this spectacle seem to have no stake in revolutionary action or activity, thus to fuel their revolutionary itch they “muster up their courage” to stand on the side of a street or intersection and hurl their chants like spells at any passerby that is unfortunate enough to be in their vicinity. 

Now, whether we have issues with these ideological vagrants of the Left propping themselves up on a busy intersection is not the purpose of this article (See the aforementioned piece for more). Today, we draw our issue in the specific content of these slogans and chants and what their language reveals about their aims and methods. Tactics aside, it is the content itself that seeks a departure from class struggle into something else altogether. Organizers will draw in the masses off the energy of the real movement, and leave them with nothing but a moral set of values. This itself is violence, violence waged against the working masses in the hopes of nullifying them before they take the chance to resist. Before the worker can reassemble life they are confronted by these values, which please them by offering an alternative reality where the clinical life remains holy. Thus these values must be dissected and taken apart, semantic or otherwise. Let us examine a few grotesque examples:

“Protesting is not a Crime! Justice for the [group of arrested activists]!”

At first glance you may say: “What’s wrong with this? All I hear is calls for justice against an unjust state.”, and that is precisely where we draw our issue. Moralistic claims such as these are alien to Communism, as was demonstrated heavily in Marx’s work Poverty of Philosophy. The statement above acts functionally identical to that of Proudhon’s claim that “Property is theft”, in that it is objectively incorrect in its analysis of the present situation. Let us examine this slogan piecemeal before looking at it in its totality. 

1. “Protesting is not a Crime!”

An utterly false statement on its face. While in America there exists minimal protections for the “right” to protest and assemble, the State consistently throws off its sheepskin of “civil rights” to gnaw its true fangs. Many of the tactics taken by protestors across the U.S. are indeed illegal under U.S. law. It is illegal to block highways. It is illegal to impede traffic. It is illegal to even use amplified sound in some areas! Nearly every stage of a protest is full of many micro-actions that are often very much illegal, and this is by design! The Bourgeois State wants you, the hopeful proletariat, to believe that it can use the very mechanism of state power to reform the system by limiting the spontaneous power of action in the streets and workplace. We can see that this call is not only factually incorrect, but in its core messaging it seeks to integrate itself into the system! By claiming that they are not acting illegally they believe that they are granted some special privilege to continue their acts. It is a foolish and childish mistake.

2. Justice for the [group of arrested activists]!”

Calls for “Justice” are utterly meaningless and devoid of Communist sympathies because whose “Justice” are we seeking out? One may say: “We are seeking justice for our bereaved comrades who were valiantly assaulted in the class struggle.” Very well, but who is to deliver this “Justice”? Is this holy “Justice” to be rained down on the aggrieving pigs by the Communists themselves? Of course the answer to that is “No”, so then, again, who is to deliver this “Justice” we seek? We see that the only entity that could possibly right this wrong is not the Proletarian class at large, but rather the Capitalist State itself! What logic is this? The State has already dispensed its justice! You ask me what “Justice” looks like and I’ll show you. Justice looks like an army of pigs descending upon the streets, cracking their batons at anyone they see. Justice looks like the bullet that every pig fires at an unarmed black teen. Justice is the blood that runs down the streets and into the gutters after every vicious attack upon those of our class. You see, this is the justice you cling to so rapidly. The State will never right this wrong, because by all legal definitions no wrong has been committed!

3. “Protesting is not a Crime! Justice for the [group of arrested activists]!”

Now we see the true nature of this slogan. It is not a harmless cry of anger, but is the carefully articulated response designed by the State to mediate and pacify the Proletariat once again. This is not to say those that call for justice are class enemies, but that they are both mistaken and misguided in their approach for retribution. Justice will not come from the halls of the courts, but from the barrel of the rifle, as it rings out the last shot in our final battle. It is to say that we must cease with these calls that show our adherence to liberalism and the State. We must throw off the veil of mediation and dawn the cloak of insurrection. Embrace the illegalism they cast upon us! In this matter the State is correct! What we do is illegal precisely because we have no wish, want, or desire to exist under the State or its so-called justice anymore!

Let’s sort through another common slogan found in recent protests:

“Hands off Iran! [Or any country our State is currently aggressive towards]”

Again, at first glance this phrase may seem innocuous, or even positive. What could possibly be the issue with being anti-war? Well, is this phrase necessarily anti-war? We would answer this question in the negative. Even if the slogan was reformatted to say “No war with Iran!” we  would still find issues with it. Under its current makeup, the slogan does little to show genuine internationalist sympathies with the proletariat of Iran, all it does is show allegiance to a foreign state rather than the United States. No state is worthy of defense or support. The correct position to hold in this matter is to agitate against both the American and Iranian states, as no state is innocent under the Capitalist Imperialist system. All states are the aggressors and the international proletariat are their victims.

After reading this, you may believe that our argument here is purely a semantic one. That our goal here is to create a “Pure Communism”, but that is not the case. We merely seek to truthfully represent the tenets of Communism as it exists as a real movement to abolish what exists. As it stands, these linguistic deviations serve little to do but act as lip service for the State and Capitalism. They take moments of unrest and convert them into ideas easily rehabilitated by liberalism, and thus by nurturing sects of the bourgeoisie. This is not simply a matter of semantics, but of rhetoric. When a proletarian that is burgeoning in class consciousness and sympathetic to Communism is approached with these slogans and liberal ideas their revolutionary potential is effectively neutered. That is why we must be precise and cautious with our language, and show genuine discipline in these moments where conditions are deteriorating. It has real and tangible results on our practice. 

Unfortunately in environments predicated on a spoken or unspoken Democratic Centralism, there is either little debate on rhetoric, or it is actively discouraged. To question leading ideas is mischaracterized as idealist itself, a bitter irony considering the role of the activists’ mediatory ideas in building these movements. When we criticize ideas and especially these ideas, we are not-necessarily-criticizing those that struggle for them; We are certainly not criticizing the rank-and-file. We are criticizing the bourgeoisie, and the idealists with their head in the clouds of righteousness. They claim not to want to draw out debate on immaterial issues, but when they so graciously welcome bourgeois ideas into the movement, these ideas materialize in the most violent of ways. To criticize before, during, or after a critical moment is imperative.

The following section includes a small encyclopedic analysis of some of the most present language in movements with Communist presence today. We provide alternative slogans not because we are master sloganeers, but rather to hint at a more revolutionary direction that language can be taken. As it stands, movement language either hinges on humanity and the rights of man, concessional rhetoric, lawfulness, and other diversions which stifle a clear understanding of each issue. What we hope to incite is not a laundry list of our own slogans, but to encourage Communists to critically examine the slogans they struggle under and for.

ALTERNATIVE SLOGANS AND THEIR REASONING

Original Slogan:

“Protesting is not a Crime! Justice for the [group of arrested activists]!”

Amended Slogan:

“Abolish the Courts! Tear down the Prisons!”

Stated above. Legality is morality and morality is legality, i.e. the supremacy of liberalism.

Original Slogan:

“Hands off Iran!”

Amended Slogan: 

“No War but Class War!”

The proletariat have no nation or incentive to defend their State rulers. States and the Capitalist class trap workers inside their nations and keep them held hostage. When we, as Communists, choose sides between Capitalists we grant legitimacy to their cause, whether that be tacit or explicit. By cheerleading for one imperialist power over another we effectively mediate the class conflict that is happening abroad in the minds of the domestic proletariat. The most recent wave of escalations between the United States and Iran have done little, except exacerbate the suffering of the Iranian proletariat, but to justify, and solidify, the existence of the Iranian State and ruling class. Our goal is to always escalate the class struggle to its highest level, the international revolution. We must thoroughly reject any war, but the class war.

Original Slogan: 

“Fight for 15!”

Amended Slogan:

“Abolish Wages!”

Many Communists create an arbitrary distinction between the supposed “immediate” struggle and “end goals”. While well meaning in their attempts to alleviate the suffering of those around us they misunderstand what the Communist tactic is. Class struggle is not a moralistic claim, or a simple tactic to be used and then abandoned when needed. Class struggle is the driver of history, to deny the role of the real struggle in the current movement is to deny Communism altogether. 

Not to mention that wages are the tools of the Capitalist class. Serfdom, and the peasantry, was eradicated by the creation of the wage labor system. By attaching our aims to the tools and framework of the Capitalist mode of production we do nothing but assert and affirm our class position instead of denying it.

Original Slogan: 

“No Human is Illegal”

Amended Slogan:
“No Borders, No Nations!”

As we have discussed in our previous article, In the Midst of ICE: Against Protesting & the Allure of Nothing, we discussed the issue of inserting ourselves in the intra-class fighting of the bourgeoisie. Our support for those proletarians that are shouldered with the “undocumented” label must lie concretely in their dignity as humans and our assault must be against the very bourgeois legal system itself. Our criticisms of the legalistic and moralistic rhetoric found in the first section of this article stand here as well. To read further on this specific issue we recommend reading our article, In the Midst of ICE: Against Protesting & the Allure of Nothing, in its totality.

Original Slogan:
“Housing is a Human Right!”

Amended Slogan:
“Communal Housing for All!”

Human rights trace their existence to the beginning of bourgeois philosophy. To speak of rights presupposes the question of who/what will enforce and protect that right, and that responsibility falls upon the State. As we have demonstrated and said (as well as can be found in numerous other Communist works) many times now, the State is the vessel of class society. As long as the State remains, so does class. As long as class exists, so do the miserable and alienated lives of the proletariat remain. We must also look at what type of housing we are demanding. Well it is certainly true that any housing is better than no housing, the revolutionary viewpoint necessitates that we must end the current housing system, of large swaths of single family homes, that breeds alienation and replace it with communal housing. 

Original Slogan:

“Freeze the Rent!”

Amended Slogan:

“Cancel all Rents!“

A similar argument to those of increasing wages, calling for a mere freezing of rents represents a temporary halt in the progression of the deteriorating quality of life the proletariat faces. It is not necessary to repeat the same line of argumentation twice; however, it is important to note that the primary call of campaigns surrounding access to housing and rents should be centered on the decommodification of housing and the ability to live. 

Original Slogan:

“It’s Time to Get Organized” (As seen with National PSL)

This slogan doesn’t require amending, simply the end of its use for it grossly misunderstands social organization. To put it mildly, at points of crisis we seek the dissolution of every tangible class form, of the social relationship of labor, and so on. This means that there is no “time to get organized” as much as there are more and less tangible moments to strike at capital. 

Yet at every social inflection point there is a Marxist group shouting at the masses to “Get Organized!”, which is usually a feeble attempt to draw away a few unsuspecting recruits into an activist and/or book club adjacent environment. They do this as inherent opportunists: What they really mean is to get organized with us and our programming, which is the only real program and the only really revolutionary program that can transform social relations. As if the proletariat needs to be pampered with source material for a movement to become “real”. 

All we see here is a bleak departure from any notion of action or movement. “Getting Organized” just means to hyper fetishize structure and growing memberships, neither of which correlate with the overthrow of capitalism nor provide the platform for capital’s death. When a struggle is to be won or lost, and a group’s rallying cry is one of sublime organization, we see an ambitious SPD with a kernel of their capacity.

Original Slogan:

“Keep the Promise” (As seen with United Auto Workers)

Amended Slogan:

“We Demand Nothing But the World”

The bourgeoisie do not make concessions, they make concessions as fit which are ultimately subject to a falling rate of profit. The righteousness of capitalists is a cheap appeal, albeit one that is well ingrained in union circles.

Original Slogan:

“March for Humanity” (As seen with National PSL)

Amended Slogan:

“March for Workers’ Liberation”

A march for humanity could be led by absolutely anyone from PSL to the Democratic and Republican Parties. Furthermore, if class is the distinction on which these claims of human rights are made, then it is class against class that we will abolish such notions. 

Original Slogan:

“No Money for Massacres” (As seen with National DSA)

(Money for the State, just not this one specific tragedy)

Amended Slogan: 

“Abolish the State, Abolish Capitalism”

Only an ingrained ideologue could look at a history of State-sanctioned genocides over the entirety of its existence, isolate it to one time period and as one variable to be contained, and contrast it to other forms of public expenditure.

There is frankly one correct way to approach the question of “money for massacres”, and it is not in the maintenance of a parasitic capitalist life form.

Original Slogan:

“Abolish ICE” (As seen everywhere)

Amended Slogan:

“Abolish the State, Abolish Capitalism”

The American State has overseen some of the most calculating genocides, atrocities, and wars in human history, much of which it has dealt with on its own soil. This regime has consolidated itself like no other Empire in history, and it has done so for centuries without the existence of ICE. Thus when critiquing its use of force, why do we isolate ICE as a historical phenomenon? It is an inflection point undoubtedly, but it is the product of an incredibly cyclical spiral of nativist campaigns, deportation efforts, and maintaining hegemonic capital. ICE is a norm, a product of an entire ethos and employment of life. And in the context of our contributors, we have seen first hand how this derailment aids liberal entryist mystique. Any hope of struggle is ceased, because this slogan substitutes an existential threat for a medication that is easy to stomach.

Original Slogan:

“Unions Uniting so Families Keep Thriving” (As seen with Teamsters)

Amended Slogan:

“Abolish Labor For a Liberated Life”

One of the greatest achievements of the union bureaucracy in this country is that they have managed to still convince masses of people that they are guiding an upward trend. The unions are not only subject to little criticism, but in fact they are subject to no public criticism even when they undergo the underwriting of contemporary history. Families have not thrived this century! But we are to believe them insofar that when we sign their cards, they will lead us to this new imagination. 

The unions fear an employment of life that is not predicated on wage labor, so they paint over the cracks left by capitalist education, media, and superstructure. 

Original Slogan:

“Defend Pilsen: Stop the TIF Expansion” (As seen with Residents Against TIF Expansion)

Amended Slogan:

“Liberate Pilsen: Fight Capital”

Gentrification is a perfect microcosm for those defense movements that go so wrong. This is precisely because the term and understanding of gentrification itself is bourgeois! Just as we attack the use of life under wage labor, we attack the use of land under State, finance, and so on. But in the case of labor we are not satisfied with a return to higher real wages or a step towards workplace parity. No, we seek the evolution of our collective life to something greater, more liberating. The same must be said for gentrification then in that we must resist staking a claim on gentrification, as if what? The petit-bourgeoisie are the base of support we seek to build our platform on? As if poverty, caste, and segregation are anymore desirable? 

We must resist this tendency.

Original Slogan:

“It is Right to Rebel/Resist” (As seen with Maoists, FRSO, SDS)

Amended Slogan:

“Abolish Rights, Abolish Classes”

As we have previously stated, ad nauseum, rights are inextricably tied to the bourgeois system. Since we have discussed this at length we see no reason to relitigate the issue at large, however we will still discuss the peculiarities of this phrase. No State has allowed this “Right to Rebel” in practical terms. Philosophers and Leaders have opined and made gestures towards this “right”, such as Locke and Jefferson to even Lenin, but in practice this right has never materialized. In America, the “right of succession” was shot down with the Civil War and rebellions were quashed in Indian Country. Out of all the  rights that “exist:”, this one is the most insane. 

Original Slogan:

“No Justice, No Peace!”

Amended Slogan:

“We Seek Neither Justice or Peace: Only Liberation”

Justice is a fluid and slanted judgement. It holds no truth to its claims, and as such there should be a staunch rejection of empty promises. What is justice can only be defined by the justice system, and thus we observe this slogan as another which leaves a sour taste in our mouths. 

Peace is likewise a virtue so exalted as it is hollow. We cannot come to define peace as anything other than passivity, and as such we view peace as reactionary. Any peace we seek can only come in the abolition of classes, i.e. not under capitalism nor its justice system. Yet even then this supposed peace can only come at the end of the bitter struggle that will undoubtedly leave bloodshed and destruction around the world. Thus, we seek no justice, and no peace.

Original Slogan:

“Arrest Killer Cops!”

Amended Slogan:

“Abolish Police & the State”

Arresting killer cops implies the supremacy of  the justice system. As we discuss above, this is empty and reactionary. Furthermore, this slogan also implies the existence of good cops within the State system, therefore relying on a juxtaposition of morality within the State itself.

As much as one may enjoy a moral witch-hunt of such capacity, we simply don’t share in this hilarity. The bourgeoisie can purge its forces’ ranks every 4 years, and we would still be left in crisis.

There are no good nor bad police officers, and there is no divine nor inspired justice. Abolition-the absence of any being at all-is thus what we are left with.

Original Slogan:

“Protect Academic Freedom”

Amended Slogan:

“Return Education to Life!”

When not institutionalized or severed from life, education as an action can be incredibly valuable. That is, we are proponents of education as a process of engaging with life itself, and through those interactions forming comprehensive knowledge. Or rather, when learning ceases to be reduced to education. 

We are not proponents of the State’s monopoly on this process, its institutionalization, and reduction to beautifying labor power. As such there is a need to return education to its intentional use: Learning and life.

Original Slogan:

“#ShutDownNation, Boycott Israel, Defund Israel, Stop Supplying Weapons to Israel, etc.” (As seen with the BDS Movement)

Amended Slogan:

“To Free Palestine, Free the Working Class”

The various economic attempts to punish Israel (as discussed in our first piece, “The Student Psyche in Political Crisis”) are entirely hapless. Throwing one’s weight behind such a movement is not viable due to the appeals toward both the petit-bourgeoisie, the bourgeoisie proper, and so on. Any one of the “popular” slogans listed are slogans utilized by the bourgeoisie to protect itself from criticism or examination during this movement. The truth is that should Palestine be liberated, it can only come with the liberation of the international working class. Thus we seek not economic reallocation but a war on economics itself.

Editor’s Note: This is an article that acts a preliminary attack on the most reactionary element of the Current Communist Movement: the abandonment of Internationalism. Rather than being a deep dive into the issues, it serves as an introduction of sorts for an on-going series on Internationalism and the Mythology of Anti-Imperialism.

– L.V.

“Hegel remarks somewhere that all great world-historic facts and personages appear, so to speak, twice. He forgot to add: the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce.”

• 18th Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte, K. Marx.

One does not have to go searching very hard before they encounter anti-Marxist and anti-Communist positions, that much is certain. Cultural hegemony of the bourgeoisie is everywhere and nearly everyone has some kernel of liberalism wedged deep in their core. While we expect our class enemies to launch libelous campaigns against our doctrine, and for unconscious and under-educated workers to follow along, we don’t expect it from our “comrades”. An overwhelming number of self identified “Communists”, especially those who claim the title of “Marxist-Leninist”, parrot outright anti-Marxist, anti-Leninist, and quite frankly, anti-Communist positions. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the current trend of “Multipolarity”.

First, before we can begin our discussions about multipolarity, we must look to the past. In the latter half of the 19th Century the Socialist movement was at its peak. Still fresh off the ideas of the late Marx and Engels, around Europe the phenomena of “Social Democracy” began to spread. In its first inception, Social Democracy was a genuinely revolutionary position, and this revolutionary fervor allowed for the burgeoning Social Democratic parties to court the favor of the growing Proletariat. No party, in this regard, was held in such high esteem as the German Social Democratic Party, or SPD (Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands) for short. The SPD spent its time building revolutionary bases and workers clubs all while functioning as an illegal party. By the first decade of the 20th Century the SPD was the largest socialist party in Western Europe and looked to be the harbingers of a potential proletarian revolution.

However, this Social Democratic revolution would not happen, at least not in Germany and not by the SPD. Important to note is that the SPD held onto a firmly internationalist foreign policy, a policy that attracted many workers, both German and foreign. This internationalism would not last for very long however. With the advent of the first World War, the SPD unilaterally chose to vote in favor of war credits, that is to fund the current war raging across the European Continent.

As the European powers geared for war and set themselves up amongst their allies, there was a break in the worldwide socialist movement, the Second International. The then currently existing Social Democratic parties had split amongst themselves on whether to support the war on the side of their respective countries, or to reject the war and turn it into class war. Lenin sums up the internationalist perspective best:

“In short, the Manifesto defines all these as conflicts emanating from “capitalist imperialism”. Thus, the Manifesto very clearly recognises the predatory, imperialist, reactionary, slave-driving character of the present war, i.e., a character which makes the idea of defending the fatherland theoretical nonsense and a practical absurdity. The big sharks are fighting each other to gobble up other peoples’ “fatherlands”. The Manifesto draws the inevitable conclusions from undisputed historical facts: the war “cannot be justified on the slightest pretext of its being in the interest of the people”; it is being prepared “for the sake of the capitalists’ profits and the ambitions of dynasties”. It would be a “crime” for the workers to “shoot each other down”. That is what the Manifesto says.”

• Opportunism and the Collapse of the Second International, V. Lenin.

Lenin was among the first to call out this opportunist and revisionist trend, correctly identifying those who supported the war as “Social Chauvinists”, or those who are “socialists in word, chauvinist in deeds” and would gladly help their country enslave another. This rising chauvinism abandoned the class struggle for the national struggle and replaced class warfare with class collaboration. It was in this break during the Second International that authentic Marxism could be developed, away from the rotting corpse that was Social Democracy. 

While not serving as a conclusive history, the narrative above shows us one of the first, major flaws: National Chauvinism. The American Communist movement is no stranger to national chauvinism, as evidenced by the Browderite takeover of the Communist Party, (Or frankly looking at any moment in American history) but while the national chauvinism towards the American state has significantly declined, a re-branded form has cropped up.

Polarity refers to how power and influence is distributed amongst the international community, with power either being unipolar or multipolar. Unipolarity is where there is a single ruling power, or a hegemon, of the world. Multipolarity is the inverse, where power is split up amongst several actors. Multipolarists state that the United States, backed by the E.U. and NATO, constitute the world hegemon and the world is currently a unipolar world. To fight this they say that the solution would be for the U.S. to be dethroned, or to at least have equal competition. A further understanding of multipolarity can only be complete with an understanding of “campism”.

Campism is the notion that the world can be split up into competing “camps”, with the first camp being the U.S. and its allies and the second camp being those that wish to tear down American hegemony, such as Russia, Iran, and China. Campists posit that in order to lay siege against American Imperialism, the “First Camp”, we Communists must support the second camp. Without much thought this idea should be readily dismissed as an outright anti-Communist revision. 

While this idea can be waved aside as asinine by any genuine Marxist, some of the largest “Marxist-Leninist” parties in the U.S. seem to buy into drivel, such as the Party for Socialism and Liberation and the Freedom Road Socialist Organization. These groups, along with many others, give support to any actor as long as they portray their actions as “Anti American”. That is how these groups can end up supporting anti-Communist regimes, such as: Assad’s Syria, Gaddafi’s Libya, and Putin’s Russia. Sometimes this campism shows itself as support for the “Actually Existing Socialist” state China as well, but unlike Putin and Assad at least China claims to be socialist. This crude form of geopolitics lends the Communist movement to embarrassment as they support regimes that either: would gladly kill us, or historically have killed Communists (such as Gaddafi and Khomeini). Multipolarists can only envision the world under the current bourgeois order, and seek to replace the existing Imperialists with a new coat of paint. Such that, multipolarity is simply a cover for inter-imperialist conflict, however, instead of a blind national chauvinism for one’s own country, it has been flipped where the revisionists uncritically support the enemy of one’s country. 

This idea also bears a striking resemblance to the anti-Marxist theory of Three Worlds spouted by Mao. Three Worlds Theory is the notion that the world is divided into 3 hemispheres of influence: the 1st world being the United States, Europe, and their allies, the 2nd world being the Soviet Union and their allies, and the 3rd world being the globally oppressed nations. It is assumed that China would be the global vanguard to pick up the pieces of the Communist movement and lead the oppressed victory. Three Worlds Theory is an utterly chauvinist viewpoint that places undue importance on the Chinese, allowing them to fulfill their own imperialist ambitions, all while denying the class struggle for the national struggle. Hoxha builds upon this idea in his Imperialism and the Revolution:

“The Chinese leadership takes no account of the fact that in the “third world” there are oppressed and oppressors, the proletariat and the enslaved, poverty-stricken and destitute peasantry, on the one hand, and the capitalists and landowners, who exploit and fleece the people, on the other.

To fail to point out this class situation in the so-called “third world”, to fail to point out the antagonisms which exist, means to revise Marxism-Leninism and defend capitalism. In the countries of the so-called “third world”, in general, the capitalist bourgeoisie is in power. This bourgeoisie exploits the country, exploits and oppresses the poor people in its own class interests, to make the largest possible profits for itself and to keep the people in perpetual slavery and misery.

In many countries of the “third world”, the governments in power are bourgeois, capitalist governments, of course, with differing political nuances. They are governments of the class hostile to the proletariat, the oppressed and poor peasantry, hostile to the revolution and liberation wars.

The bourgeoisie, which has state power in these countries, is protecting precisely that capitalist society which the proletariat in alliance with the poor strata of town and countryside, seeks to overthrow. It constitutes that upper class which, proceeding from its own narrow interests, is ready, at any moment, at any turn of events, to sell the wealth of the land and the underground assets of the country, the freedom, independence and sovereignty of the homeland, to foreign capitalism. This class, wherever it is in power, is opposed to the struggle and aspirations of the proletariat and its allies, the oppressed classes and strata.

Many of the states which the Chinese leadership includes in the “third world” are not opposed to American imperialism and Soviet social-imperialism. To call such states “the main motive force of the revolution and the struggle against imperialism”, as Mao Tsetung advocates, is a glaring mistake that stands out like the Himalayas. There are other pseudo-Marxists, too, but they at least know how to hide and disguise themselves behind their bourgeois theories.“

Furthermore, the Chinese falsifiers completely disregard the proletariat of the 1st and 2nd worlds, who are allies in our cause of International Revolution. 

While it is wholly true that “during a reactionary war a revolutionary class cannot but desire the defeat of its government”, it is also true that we must turn the inter-imperialist conflict that currently exists into class conflict and proletarian revolution. The matter stands that Lenin, and all of the revolutionaries during the early 20th Century, lived during an age of so-called “multipolarity”, and all it led to was World War and the slaughter of proletarians en masse. This is not to say that we should support a unipolar world, it is in fact the exact opposite. Communists should support a “nonpolar” world, or a world where there is no power divided amongst the international community, but is held collectively by the international proletariat.

Multipolarity and Campism are not new phenomena by any means, as previously said some of these ideas are strikingly similar to the anti-Marxist strain of “Maoist Third-Worldism”, but this most recent inception has a shocking origin. 

Aleksandr Dugin is Russian Philosopher, commonly cited as “Putin’s Brain”. Dugin himself was an active anti-Soviet dissident in the 80s, and was one of the leading figures of the National Bolshevik Party in the 90s. Dugin subscribes to an ideology called “Neo-Eurasianism”

“Eurasianism, in its broadest meaning, is a basic geopolitical term which seeks to understand the entire world from the historical and geographical point of view, excluding the Western sector of world civilization. It also attempts an understanding of the world from the military-strategic point of view, specifically in terms of those countries that do not approve of the expansionist policies of the United States and their NATO partners. In terms of culture, it desires the preservation and development of organic national, ethnic and religious traditions; and from the social point of view, it embraces all the various forms of economic life and efforts toward the “socially just society.”

• Eurasian Mission – An Introduction to Neo-Eurasianism,               A. Dugin.

Dugin’s Neo-Eurasianism is most certainly a variant of fascist ideology, even though he purports it to be the “Fourth Way” (Against Liberalism, Communism, and Fascism). Dugin repeatedly defends the stance of multipolarism: 

“The Eurasianists consequently defend the principle of multipolarity, standing against the project of unipolar globalism that is being imposed by the Atlanticists.”

• Eurasian Mission – An Introduction to Neo-Eurasianism,               A. Dugin.

Multipolarity is so central to Dugin’s theses because it gives Russia the clearance to imperialize places such as Africa and the Middle East, all in an effort to combat “the West”. These ideas have a slim overlap with the Leninist conception of Imperialism, but it fails to hit the mark. Since the revisionists either fail to understand Lenin, or wholly reject his ideas, they readily cling to the crypto-fascist ideology of Eurasianism as a part of the revolutionary struggle, either tacitly or openly.

Groups in America have already adopted these positions. FRSO has adopted the false line of “Actually Existing Socialism” in their fervent support of the “Communist” Party of China. PSL works with RT (formerly Russia Today) together with Sputnik to produce online video content, as well as pushes for a multipolar world, specifically in places such as Africa where they support military juntas all in the name of “anti imperialism”. Perhaps the most brazen is the American “Communist” Party, who outright platforms Dugin and upholds him as a modern Marx.

Aligning with neo-fascist ideology, whether willing or not, presents no viable alternative for the working class. Historically, we already know what the outcome of multipolarity will be and that is World War. Wherever there exists competition amongst imperialists it will turn violent, if not catastrophic. 

The contemporary Communist movement is in an unfavorable position. Everywhere there are revisionists, opportunists, and falsifiers that seek to entrench themselves in our cause to defang the class struggle. While there are many rank and file members of these revisionists organizations that have unknowingly fallen prey to this line of thinking, they still parrot multipolarity and campism as an effective strategy for the liberation of the international proletariat, and it there that we must launch an ideological struggle against these tendencies. 

It may cause some concern that openly attacking these tendencies could cause friction in the already neutered Communist movement in America, but this is the most opportune time to do so. The American Communist movement is in a premature stage of development. As the conditions of Capitalism worsen and the contradictions heighten, more and more workers will be radicalized towards Marxism. We, as authentic Communists, must stand firm in our ideological commitment for the liberation of the International Proletariat and struggle against any and all forms that seek to derail the movement. During the First World War, Lenin could have sat back and not attacked the degenerated Social Democratic parties of the Second International in the interest of “not splitting the movement”, but he and the Bolsheviks chose to stand firm. It is in the same vein of thought that we must also stand firm and struggle, not to splinter the movement, but to foster its development free from all revisions. We cannot sit idly by as we watch so-called Communists repeat the same mistakes of our predecessors. We must struggle for an authentic Communist future!