Di., 24. Dez. um 09:23
Some Principles of Two-Line Struggle
Editorial Board
How does The Worker propose accomplishing ideological unity among the Maoists in the United States? Through the conscious organization of two-line struggle, proceeding from the conception of Maoism itself, developing from this to its practical application. Two-line struggle is the manifestation of class struggle within the revolutionary organization and between the various revolutionary groups each taking up or approximating the denomination of Maoism. This process must be planned and organized and not allowed to fall to individualism or spontaneity.
First, rectifying the dispersal of revolutionaries by consolidating under a single banner of Maoism provides an ideological leap in understanding which is the basic desire and goal of the majority of genuine revolutionaries. Such an ideological leap leads to a leap in work among the revolutionary masses specifically the working class. The correct handling of two-line struggle enables revolutionaries to prevent the emergence of a revisionist line, allowing the movement to confront and overcome new problems. This requires firmness and sagacity when being applied, always guided by three objectives: uniting, differentiating and leading. It is the process which unites revolutionaries, demarcates revolutionaries from revisionists, and forges leadership. The problem of leadership is a key issue in two-line struggle—it determines which line leads the revolutionary movement, to accomplish new successes or suffer setbacks and reversal.
Left and Right lines emerge from contention and do not come about fully formed. Instead of consolidating positions for ruthless attack, comrades must talk over misunderstandings. No one is 100% Marxist, meaning that revolutionaries must proceed from the desire for unity and hold talks in the spirit of helping one another. One divides into two; first evaluate achievements, then shortcomings, agreements, and then disagreements, and analyze everything.
Apply agreements, those identified and those won through discussion. Do not go back on them and fight attempts to sweep them away or elevate disagreements inappropriately. Fight for the Left line in gestation and against the Right deviations from the onset, before it coheres while it is still in development. Rightism begins to emerge without a head, in the form of deviations and incorrect ideas and positions. Cure these to prevent sickness from overcoming the organization and reversing its revolutionary character. Rightism is the main danger, and deviations arise from contradictions among the people.
Chairman Gonzalo taught that: “The good dialectical handling of the two-line struggle has allowed us to avoid the split in the Party, the structuring of opportunist lines, making 90% of the membership advance by applying decapitation and resolving the contradictions between right and left and the divergences on the left as contradictions within the people.”
What is meant by applying decapitation? To cut the head off the emergent Right of course, to prevent it from consolidating into a Right Opportunist Line. This must be done in good time; liberalism here leads to avoiding conflict and struggle, which allows the rightist deviations and positions to fester and grow a headquarters.
By basing themselves in the principles outlined above, carrying out analysis and discussion, revolutionaries can divide the matter into two, understanding the internal contradictions better and “Fight the neglect of the two-line struggle and the reduction to a single right-left contraction in order to appear to enlarge the right and antagonize the struggle by labeling the two-line struggle as ultra.”
One aspect of rightism is that it treats ideological struggle as a form of antagonism, promoting only the minimum concept sometimes in name only, and allowing for each individual to have his or her own privatized ideology. This is to prevent itself from being confronted and to allow itself to grow, to make the Right appear the most rational majority and the Left appear fringe extremists or ideological “purists.”
Chairman Gonzalo instructs not to “lower your guard against the tactics used by the right” and delineates these as follows: “maneuvering, revoking agreements, surprise attacks, intrigues and conspiracies, ganging up, changing targets, absolving yourself of your responsibility, making a dirty fight by lowering it to a personal level and not as a struggle of ideas.” We do not have to look far or hard to find numerous examples of rightist tactics plaguing our movement, the main example being how the right has in so many instances made a dirty fight by lowering it to a personal level and not a struggle of ideas. This is the rationale behind and the basis for all the police work, and the rationale of those who remain in the movement doing the exact same in a less apparent manner, seeking a united front with the Politically Degenerate Right Liquidationists, who all revolutionaries must boycott, against the “ultras” and “Daltonites” they condemn.
In contrast to the tactics of the Right, the Left must follow the instructions of Chairman Gonzalo carefully, safeguarding against their own mistakes and deviations: “we handle the contradictions between the Left and the Right, the divergences in the Left as contradictions within the people, averting the split and making 90% of the militancy advance through the rectification campaign, raising the unity of the Party in function of the armed struggle. Fighting rightism as the main danger.” Concretely the Chairman is talking about a rectification campaign carried out while waging people’s war, under the leadership of the Party; generally, he is talking about Maoist principles which must be creatively applied everywhere.
1) Handle the contradictions between Left and Right and divergences of the Left as contradictions within the people. 2) Avert splits. 3) Rectify our work in class struggle, among the masses. 4) Understand rightism as the main danger.
Two-line struggle is the motor force of organizational development, and provides the foundation of unity necessary to overcome complex situations and disadvantages faced by revolutionary forces. It cannot be neglected nor avoided, it objectively exists regardless if it is handled consciously or spontaneously.
The law of contradiction leaves nothing untouched, including ideological struggle in the internal life of an organization. In 1988 Chairman Gonzalo expressed and defended two-line struggle well. Learn this:
“For the Chairman [Mao Zedong] the Party is a contradiction because if it wasn’t it wouldn’t exist. Everything that exists is contradiction. Well then, what aspects are in that contradiction? The proletarian line and the non-proletarian lines and they are specified according to the moments and cases. The Chairman is then going to generalize. What is the problem? Revisionism. Did he not say this? That is the danger. Revisionism. Principally in the Central Committee. He says it himself. If the Party is not understood as a contradiction the problem will not be grasped. Therefore, how can there be a lack of two-line struggle in the Party? The Party would then not develop. How can there be conciliation? It doesn’t serve. It expresses itself. Just like rightism. Who will it feed? The right.”
“The problem is to change the soul of the people. It is to transform the ideology. That is what the Chairman says. For the rest, from what I know comrades, from the Communist Party of China, it is not in their tradition to kill comrades. It’s not in their tradition. In its tradition of two-line struggle is to destroy, annihilate, and crush entirely and completely the opposing ideas; opportunism. That is the tradition of the Communist Party of China. …Liu Shaoqi was not shot. Liu Shaoqi was swept away, smashed ideologically and politically and then he was expelled for life. In other words, never again was he able to return to the Communist Party of China. That is the tradition that the Communist Party of China has. What there has been, rather, are measures against traitors, informers, this is another thing, comrades, it is another problem. The Chairman has always pointed towards ideological struggle and smashing and sweeping away of the contrary ideas and the contrary line, and after a sufficiently long and thorough development of the struggle, when the person, the individual, the opportunist was irrecoverable, then only He was sanctioned, that is, he was expelled from the Party when he was irrecoverable!”
Thus two-line struggle is taken as an essential part of the ideological remolding of the whole people; it must proceed to shape and transform the revolutionary organization until it is consolidated to a single will, and then repeat. The above offers an apt example of how communists “apply decapitation”, smash completely the opportunist, revisionist, and reactionary line, consolidate unity and expel only the very few individual opportunists who are irrecoverable, but only after the struggle has been developed through a process that is sufficiently long and deep. On the other hand, rightism will at times proclaim that it lacks the “capacity” for such a struggle, and will fall into haphazard labeling, rejection and expulsion without direct criticism or two-line struggle, and it does this to avoid the fight, to attempt to get rid of leftists. This provokes splits and disregards unity; one cannot prove revisionism or that someone is irrecoverable if they go in for this opportunist and bureaucratic method.
Revisionism, like Marxism is not something one is born with; rather, it is learned and developed through a process of social practice. Conduct in politics, in two-line struggle, helps not only to differentiate between Marxism and Revisionism, but is in the process of forming Marxists and revisionists. Deviations can and must be corrected and two-line struggle must be organized to accomplish this. Three principles represent a synthesis of the historical experience of Chairman Mao concerning the two-line struggle of the Communist Party of China: practice Marxism, not revisionism; unite, don’t split; be open and above board, do not intrigue and conspire. These three basic principles constitute the norm with which we can distinguish the correct line from the incorrect line.