Lesson 5: The Acolytes: Yugoslavia and China
1991: Soviet rule ends with Gorbachev
-Revolution dies at old age at 74: Utopian promise for better life for all turned into cruel illusion
-Marxist vision of a classless society failed
Communism:
-did the opposite of creating prosperity and equity
-It caused the largest death toll in human history
-the fall of the Soviet Union was due to flagrant injustice, unimaginable atrocities, catastrophic economic collapse
-Communist ideologies still had life because of the Soviet Union’s use of propaganda
-it expanded to other countries with the help of Soviet funding and training
Nikita Khrushchev, First Secretary of the Communist Party 1953-1964
-Youth buy in: you didn’t have to think or work very hard
Yugoslavia:
- A country that no longer exists tried and failed the same patterns of the Soviet Union
-in the early 90’s there was a brutal civil war
-end of WWII under the hand of Stalin as the country adopted the Stalinist economy
Communist party leader in Yugoslavia:
-Josip Broz Tito President of the Central Committee of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia 1939-1980
-between west and Soviet Union by diminishing the government control over the people
-mid 60’s he allowed people to leave and send money back to the country
-he built what was called the system of Socialism called workers self management
The plan:
-rather than central planning we are going to have workers through Democratic means who will decide how these factories will be run
-caught the attention of west intellectuals who said this is the better Socialism
-after his death Yugoslavia collapses
-devalues currency in attempt to save the federation
-reason why on paper Yugoslavia looked economically good
- but it was because they were given loans from the world bank
-international monetary fund, but after Tito’s death the money halted and the countries wanted the loans to be paid back
-late 80’s worst cases of hyper-inflation on record that led to the total collapse of Yugoslavia’s economy and entered into a horrific civil war
-central and eastern Europe dominated by USSR pushed spread of Communism across the globe
China:
-Marxist Leninist and Stalinist = Mao
-Soviet Union influence in the rise of Mt. Sandong in China
-traditional Chinese beliefs crumbling part of the early 1st decade of the 20th century
-China turns to Marxism and then to Communism
-popular because it gave freedom to the peasants so they thought which was the vast majority of the Chinese population
-living off the land was harsh so promised life would get better
-indigenous Marxist beliefs popular with the elites
-Soviet Union trained the elites on China
-Marxist and technical education spread
Mao Zedong (chairman of the Communist Party of China 1943-1976):
-4 decades of civil war allowed the reign of Communism to infiltrate
-upheaval after WWII
-two main groups: the Nationalists and the Communists
-Soviets set up a military academy in China (Wampo military academy-early 1920’s)
-People's Liberation Army came from that academy
-relationship between Mao and Soviet Union
-Mao was on the Soviet payroll
-Soviet Union subsidized the community party
-Mao had his own interpretation of communism but soviet style also influenced
-Chinese communism has Marxism at its core, but more play with with imagination over science
**example: reliance of imagination and willfulness is the idea that if you plant crops deeper they will grow taller and stronger so they will have more food but reality is you must plan them in a certain way and certain time of year for them to work/grow at all
-fanciful measure played out with severe brutality
-this transformed whole segments of society
-Chinese revolution dealt with Marxism
-China was starting at the bottom of poverty
-no railroads and not a nation
-chaos of warlords killing each other
-influenced by how Russia became a nation that it end up crumbling
-China tried to do the same thing with even worse results
-Mao painted the revolution as an insurrection
-he painted the revolution as an act of violence
- he painted the revolution as one class overthrowing another
- his result was that it was necessary to create terror in every rural area
***Mao brought macro-economic policy, abolition of private party, confiscation, which drew on soviet tradition
-very Xenophobic purge of the early 1950’s, similar to the anti-foreign elements of the great terror in Russia
***China built denunciation boxes made bright red to point to denounce someone for being a foreign sympathizers-agents of the American Imperialists-or class enemy
-1.2 million suspected-3 million sent to re-education camps, encouraged to denounce neighbors and family members
***death quotas in percentages-not a raw number to be killed but a percentage of people
-round up and kill a percentage of people in certain targeted areas
The Great Leap Forward:
-Mao then campaigned the great leap forward “walk on two legs at once” meaning both industrialize and mass collectivize agriculture
-redistribution of resources equally let half people die so the other half can eat as there is not enough to eat for all people
-per million units of cubic soil moved equals how many people will die
-Mao willing to accept that price
-tried the great leap but what broke out was bones (the plan didn’t work in China)
-1988 Communist government admitted 20 million people starved to death but more like 40 million in a span of 3-4 years 1958-1962
-greatest killer of his own people in world history was Mao
-Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution 1966-1976
-went after anyone who was education and held the Chinese economy from developing at all
-1976 Mao died
Deng Ziaoping leader of the Communist party 1972-1980:
-he had been briefly denounced by Mao part of the proletarian cultural revolution(1966)
-spoke out about capitalism, but was reeducated and rehabilitated
-while Moa still alive in 1974, he was part of the central committee of the Communist party
-he was known as a bit of a maverick that leaked out to other countries so worked to his advantage
-he took it upon himself to emerge as the leader of the Communist party
-he did not move away from communism of China but thought that China could learn from the west and Japan and United States
-how to make the production more effectively, economic growth
***1979-present day-China benefits from access to the United States markets, technologies, and patents, and ability to copy reverse engineerists, seal patents and intellectual property from the US
-1980’s economic experiments led to destitution
-aim was never to liberalize China politically but wanted to catch up to the west
-led to one child policy and late term abortions
-Chinese people trying to keep up with the Chinese government regulations of only having one child
-Tiananmen square April 15-June 4 1989 uprising protests
-liberation army crushed the people
-used as an example that revolution will not be allowed in China and Communism will continue to rule
-brutal oppressive regime of freedom and of human rights
-ordinary life in China is not freedom
-1990s-2000s market reforms in China did bring prosperity
-rigid totalitarian political structure can be a successful marketing economy
-Chinese society today is a corrupt oligarchy oppressive machine that allows just enough economic productivity which has raised the monetary status of many Chinese
***Communist party still has forced labor camps-slave labor camps-elements of re-education camps like the Uyghur Muslims
-perfected the art of social surveillance of the population but of also mass oppression and exploitation of poorly slave labor to help build the economy
-officially they call themselves a Communist and Marxist country, but in a new style or a Chinese manner
-not really Communist without the classless society
-modified version that they have been able to make it work
China Success:
-foreign technology transfer
-industrial espionage
-opportunistic trade deals
-leveraging every asset they have to maintain party control
-party dominance over the Chinese economy
-party dominance with the global economy
XI JinPing General secretary of the Chinese Communist Party 2002-present
-head of state, leader of the president of the people's republic of China
-he runs both parties and the state
-goal for reunification of the mainland Taiwan
-primary foreign policy goal of the people's republic of China
-broader domestic goals maintain control over economic growth
-destroy the parties who challenge their power like the Uyghurs
-socialist hybrid economy,
***Marxist writings are becoming more popularity in the United states
-What is the Socialist appeal in the US?
Union Communiste Libertaire:
-in 1991, the Libertarian Communist Workers’ Union was founded
-2002, a split of the Anarchist Federation into two factions
-in 2002, its successor built an alternative Coordination of Anarchist Groups with an Alternative Libertaire
Purpose:
-self-organized that aims to lead feminist, anti-racist, pro-LGBTQ+, and ecologist struggles
-10-15 years fake large economy to deprive people of basic freedoms, imaginativeness, live well, etc.
-Socialists keep trying to bring it back in a better way but it never works