An Introduction to Marxism-Leninism

By John Maryon

For anyone, especially new comrades, wishing to understand the dynamic philosophy of Marxism-Leninism there is in my view no better insight than to study Dialectical and Historical Materialism by J V Stalin.  A concise and clear work, written in 1938, that outlines the essential theory of Marxism-Leninism.  Its founders were Karl Marx and Frederick Engels with further development by Vladimir Lenin as he applied the philosophy to build socialism in the Soviet Union. It is an important philosophy that guides communist parties in their vanguard role and in the building of socialism.  Stalin had the ability to explain complex ideas without simplification or being patronising to his audience. 
Dialectical materialism is a major component of Marxism-Leninism.   It is called dialectical because it studies changes that are interconnected with other things that may also change.  The theory is materialistic because it accepts that physical processes are governed by specific laws. Historical materialism is the extension of the principles of dialectical materialism to the study of social life. It is an application of the principles of dialectical materialism to the phenomena of the study of the life of society, to the study of society and of its history.
Human history reflects a complex struggle for survival. There is a fundamental difference in the way society and natural processes develop. There are no conscious forces in the purely physical world but social development is influenced by thought and the actions of people.  People have the ability to shape their own destinies and forge progressive trends in a society .  Historical materialism is a core component of the philosophy developed by Marx and Engels.   It is only when grasped and understood by the masses can it become a motive force for the development of society.   Scientific communism is also an important part of Marxist theory which studies the laws, forms and methods of the class struggle.  
It is important to understand what is meant by productive forces and production relations and how they relate to each other under both capitalism and socialism.  The productive forces are the means of production including the workers.  Production relations are the relations existing between people in the process of production, exchange and distribution of wealth.  Historical materialism shows that under capitalism contradictions will exist between productive forces and production relations and that they can only be resolved through class struggle. A struggle to break-up the old system of production relations and replace it with new ones to ensure a more fairer distribution of wealth within a more stable framework. 
Marxist-Leninist philosophy challenges that of fatalism which is promoted by those who are afraid of change and want to keep things as they are.  Fatalists believe that what will happen is fated and can make no difference to the outcome.  Marxists maintain that we make our own history by our actions. We have heard people say 'what will be will be' but they are stuck in a rut and will be cut off from human progress. 
The building of socialism is far more than raising production or economic indicators.  It is concerned with the evolution of human thought along with social and cultural progress.  The failure of comrades in the past to recognise this fact has led to serious setbacks. 'You can't change human nature' is a hackneyed old cliche trotted out by the bourgeoisie who don't want change and the unthinking who don't understand it.  In reality things are changing all the time. Change however is not uniform. In some parts of the world women are still regarded as second-rate citizens to be abused and treated with cruelty.  In the Soviet Union Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman to enter space.
A politically planned economy with public ownership and control of major and strategic industry, utilities, transport and financial institutions is a core requirement of Marxism – Leninism.  Public ownership ensures that the value created by workers is used to pay direct and social wages while creating funds for future investment.  Money, the life=blood of capitalism and mechanism for exploitation, will cease to dominate and to control society. Wealthy capitalists would no longer be able to dictate political and economic policy.  Power would be exercised by the Communist Party on behalf of the people which it serves.  This is the system employed by the socialist countries today. 
Proletarian internationalism is one of the basic principles of Marxism Leninism.  It stems from an awareness that the class struggle has a vital international component and stresses the need for effective worldwide solidarity. Proletarian internationalism governs relations between all peoples of the international working class and between communist parties. Lenin wrote. 'There is one, and only one, kind of real internationalism and that is working wholeheartedly for the revolutionary movement and revolutionary struggle in one's own country and supporting in all ways possible every other country without exception'.  
Utopian socialists had a dream of an ideal society. Engels was able to show how socialism could be achieved by turning that utopian vision into a science that led to an understanding of the laws of development of society, of the contradictions of capitalism and the role of the working class in class struggle.  Communists should not just criticise the injustices of capitalist society but to examine and explain the nature of the capitalist mode of production and its laws of development.  Such an approach exposes the raw nature of capitalism that is essentially based upon the theft of surplus value created by workers by an upper class of parasites. 
 

Our place in an amazing universe

by John Maryon

Looking out into space it is possible to see back in time some 13 billion years and study the pattern of cosmic microwave radiation that resulted from the creation of the universe. Light travels at 186,282 miles per second which makes it almost impossible to grasp the vast size of the universe. We can observe the remnants of cataclysmic explosions, see giant red stars near the end of their life and the birth of new stars forming within vast nursery clouds of dust and gas as they collapse under gravity. Large black holes lurk ominously at the centres of billions of galaxies each containing billions of star systems.
    We must also examine events at other extreme of size. The Greek philosopher Democritus believed that what he called atoms were the smallest parts of matter but he was not in a position to vary his idea. With a typical radius of 0.1 nano metres over 5 million could be placed on a pinhead. Democritus would have been reassured by the work of the Russian chemist Demitri Mendeleev who created the Periodic table in1869. The modern table lists118 naturally occurring elements in order of atomic number related to their make up in terms of electrons, protons and neutrons. Hydrogen being the lightest and uranium the heaviest.
    It is now known that the electron is an elementary particle but protons and neutrons are themselves made up of elementary particles known as quarks. The Large Hadron Collider in Geneva has recently identified a particle called Higgs bosen which had been predicted mathematically and was linked to a field that created matter. It is now believed that all forces, waves and matter, including atoms, are the result of the interaction of various forms of wave energy and fields at a sub atomic level. For example magnetic and electrostatic fields combine to produce light.
    Within the apparent chaos of the universe life has evolved on earth and almost certainly in other places as well. The earliest forms on earth were microscopic organisms whose presence were identified by specific carbon molecules found in rocks 3.8 million years old. Life arose from chemical reactions in non living matter consisting of carbon, water and amino acids that formed in the earth's early atmosphere. Sunshine, hot water and carbohydrates provided the energy to drive the process. In a star system there exists a zone of tolerance where the temperature is just right for life to develop. Also some small cold moons in close proximity to much larger bodies could be heated by gravity stresses in their rocky cores.
    But the big question is why did the process start and continue? Isaac Newton believed that all the conditions for life were created by God. In the early 1970s John Conway, a young mathematician at Cambridge, examined the probability of pattern replication using an infinite grid of squares. By imposing a simple set of rules of contact between identified random squares, Conway and his students, were able to demonstrate that eventually complex patters could be automatically repeated. This revolutionary principle of order from apparent chaos applied to the primeval soup could make life inevitable.
    Today life on Earth has evolved to fill every possible niche for its existence. It is estimated that the total number of species exceeds 8.7 million. The one which I wish to examine in more detail is our own.
    First simple life forms consisted of single cells formed from organic molocules. They processed no consciousness and just survived in a fixed environment. As conditions changed those that had mutated were able to flourish. Variety developed and the natural laws of evolution took over. Cells that combined with others were more successful and more complex organisms emerged that were able to sense their environment and react accordingly. This marked the beginning of a conscious existence for life that would now develop intelligence.
    The ability to observe and respond rewarded those creatures that were to exploit their situation and predators also evolved. Life became more advanced and eventually Homo Sapiens became the dominant species.
    Humans are social creatures that even in their early development existed in small family groups with a life style based upon hunter gathering. Those that formed into larger tribal groupings were more successful in meeting danger and facing competition. For a brief period a form of primitive communism existed for their mutual benefit. Ultimately the 'division of labour' with the emergence of specialist skills and crafts led to the creation of wealth and privilege.
    Human development still continues and I believe can be divided into two phases of progress. Barbarian and Socialist. Today both exist simultaneously and human civilization has reached a major turning point. Capitalism and its extreme nationalistic forms represent the final stages of barbarism. Socialism is the beginning of a new progressive social advance that will change society and human relations for ever. The changes take time to mature, develop and must embrace the experiences of individual nations and peoples.
    Marx and Engels examined the social and production relations of capitalist society and outlined the scientific principles for building a new form of society that would be able to create a beautiful new world. One in which true freedom would exist without explotation and class repression. We live in a physical world within which we may shape our own destiny. On this basis of fraternity and respect we can explore and study the universe and reach a deeper understanding of everything.

Ding, ding, all change!

By Ray Jones

“Nothing ever changes!” you must have heard people moan sometime or other, but you will have also heard people complain that something (sometimes everything) was better in the “Old Days”. Both these sayings certainly reflect, to a degree, people’s experiences, coloured by their moods, hopes and fears, but neither is fully accurate.

When asked to consider seriously most people will admit that things do change and that not everything was better when they were kids, but this will probably not stop them repeating these sayings in the future. This is because they often see no obvious pattern to the nature of change and apparent stability.

And this is not surprising because although the truth is that, in contradiction to the first saying, whilst everything does change it does not always do so in a straight-forward, simple, way.

We know that some things do change from our day-to-day experiences, but we know that everything changes and how it changes from close study of the world.

It may seem to us, and we might act as if, the Sun will always shine (when the clouds don’t get in the way!), that humans have always been around and that the capitalist system has always been with us, for example, but research will tell us differently. The Sun is a star that has a life cycle and will eventually die; humans have evolved from non-human life forms and before capitalism there was feudalism.

Change is always happening but not always, of course, at the same speed nor in the same way. The change is often gradual, perhaps so gradual that we might not notice it. A kitchen chair becomes more and more worn with use, slowly more shaky and rickety, and at a certain point it will collapse and become unusable as a chair. It will be only bits of a chair and not a chair as such.

The nature of the change has altered. From a relatively slow alteration to a relatively sudden one (just as you were sitting down to a nice dinner probably!). A ‘leap’ has occurred, from a usable chair to a pile of bits. This is the kind of change we can call ‘destruction’ because no new thing has come out of it.

Of course, not everything that made up the chair has been destroyed, it may be that it can be repaired and that in this case the change can be reversed; at least temporarily. It’s important to note that changes are not {always} in one direction.

The life of a star may also end in destruction, at a point when we say the star no longer exists, but during its life it goes through long periods of slow change followed by leaps when it becomes distinctly different, a different kind of star. Eventually it becomes a White Dwarf and then finally goes dark. And although elements may remain, no new thing has developed. This a rather different type of change than the example of the chair.

Yet another type of change can be seen in human society and in nature, which can be considered more constructive, when the problems and differences in a thing eventually cause its break-down in a leap (or leaps) but at the same time produce a new thing. This new thing is essentially different but keeps the best of the old.

In this way slave societies became feudalism, feudalism became capitalism, and capitalism becomes socialism through long periods of struggles between classes and a series of leaps – revolutions – and not without reversals and zig-zags. Not as a number of totally separate systems, but as systems which build on each other by evolution and revolution as human society develops.

The real and universal nature of change has always been disputed by some. It does not suit those that benefit from the status quo to admit that it will end and they come up with various attacks on ideas of change – from arguing that things don’t change at all, they only {seem} to change, to admitting that whilst things do change they only do so in a circular way so in the end everything comes back to how it was.

Opposing this have been those whose interests have been in change and development – the oppressed classes and those that support them. These forces have reality and truth on their side.

Fundamentally things change because the universe is made up of particles in constant motion – quantum physicists might say “loops”, “strings” or “fields” – but in any case, change and flux is the nature of the universe, how it came into being and how it has developed.

Well, it’s only common sense, isn’t it?

Bishop Berkeley

 By Ray Jones

It’s often claimed during discussion and arguments that something or other is common sense. Sometimes as a last resort when backed into a corner but sometimes in all seriousness as a triumphant coup to end debate.

But what is common sense? A dictionary definition says it’s “Sound and prudent judgement based on a simple perception of the situation or facts” which seems reasonable but leaves much unclear. What is “sound and prudent”? What is “a simple perception”?

Perhaps we can assume that sound and prudent means something like “what most people would think sound and prudent” or “what a wise person would think”. Which when you consider it are not necessarily the same thing at all and anyway, do we know what most people think or which wise person is being referred to? If we do know what most people think (eg: via a poll) or which wise person is referred to does it follow they are right? Majorities are not always right and wise people are sometimes wrong.

The second part of the definition is perhaps even more difficult. Does “a simple perception” mean a perception by someone who is simple (in a good way or a bad way)? or a perception which is not complex or scientific – why should this be better or worse?

Is common sense merely the view of “the man on the Clapham omnibus” (as philosophers use to say in less PC times)? British academic philosophers, often wandering in obscure unrealistic thought, are sometimes reproached by their rivals with the cry that have gone too far from ordinary language, too far from how the  people in the street think. The response may be, “So what?” but it often makes them stop and reconsider.

It is sometimes amazing what philosophers believe the average person thinks or may think. Bishop George Berkeley (1685 - 1753) seems to have genuinely believed that they would easily agree with him that no solid matter existed in the world, only spirits and their ideas and that this did not seriously conflict with their everyday outlook and conduct.

In spite of some philosophers people have generally believed in the material world. But having said that they have very often believed in gods, spirits and ghosts as well.

Many things considered common sense in the past are generally thought just wrong now. For example for centuries it was taken for granted in the West that the Sun and planets circled the Earth and that the Earth was the centre of the universe. Our everyday experiences and perceptions appeared to prove this – and it said so in the Bible.

It was not until there were technological advances and social changes that this belief was undermined, eventually rejected and a replaced by a new common sense.

The idea of a Sun-centred universe in the West came from Copernicus (1473 – 1543) but not published by him until just before his death. He was reluctant to publish because he feared being laughed at and persecuted by the Catholic Church – both fears were realistic. It was not until many years later, when feudalism had decayed still more and science had advanced, that the theory became generally accepted.

The common sense of the day, the one that dominates, comes from the ruling class, the class that controls the means of production and exchange. It is propagated through their control of education, communication and religion and changes as that class changes in the development of society.

But it changes more profoundly when the old society breaks down entirely and a revolution produces a new ruling class. Because in class societies the oppressed classes produce their own common sense which often conflicts with that of the ruling class and after a revolution will replace much of it.

Different ways of making a living, different relationships with the means of production, can produce these different ways of looking at things.

Owners of industry will foist some ideas of common sense on their employees but not all their ideas and not all employees. “A fair day’s work for a fair day’s pay” is a phrase often used by both capitalists and workers but what is meant by “fair” can be quite different because of their different and conflicting stand points. As the old society goes into crisis these conflicts become more serious, they are part and parcel of the leap from one type of society to another – of a social revolution.

Common sense then can be progressive or reactionary or neutral. There is no simple single common sense. As we always have to ask, “Democracy for whom?” we have to ask, “Common sense for whom and in whose interests?”