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3mon
I understand that there was still much good about the Soviet/Eastern Bloc system and shortages and all didn't always happen and revisionism would eventually cause all sorts of issues. However, I'm looking for a detailed answer (feel free to send links too) to what actually caused the infamous economic struggles that many people faced (which apparently isn't just completely bourgeois propaganda) in the Soviet Union and other Warsaw Pact nations (particularly in their later years). ... read full post
cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/40108657 ... read full post
This is something that's always confused me, but I've put it off since it's always "later." But Marx and such talks about how a communist society wouldn't have alienation or a division of labor ["In a higher phase of communist society, after the enslaving subordination of the individual to the division of labor, and therewith also the antithesis between mental and physical labor, has vanished; after labor has become not only a means of life but life's prime want; after the productive forces have also increased with the all-around development of the individual, and all the springs of co-operative wealth flow more abundantly – only then can the narrow horizon of bourgeois right be crossed in its entirety and society inscribe on its banners: From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs!"- Marx, Critique of the Gotha Programme] . But like...how? He's using the division of labor the same way I am right? [That being, multiple people make individual parts of a thing and therefore have better throughput but no one has a concrete connection to the thing they're making?] But I don't understand how you necessarily get rid of that. Maybe this is basic but this confuses me ... read full post
I've had the displeasure of happening upon some ultra-leftists talking about Gramsci and they blamed him for eurocommunism [without a source, of course]. But I'm a little confused on how he even got associated with it. I can only think of his writings one war of position vs war of maneuver, but even that feels like a very big stretch. And otherwise I feel like Gramsci, with his revolution against Capital and all, would be the exact opposite of Eurocommunism. ... read full post
hello hello, hoping this is the right community to post something like this in! ... read full post
Has anyone read this book? If so, would you recommend it for the purpose of helping "normies" dispel their anti-Soviet misconceptions and myths about WWII? Based on this review the book sounds like it could be interesting and useful as a resource: ... read full post
I was reading about Mao's early guerrilla campaigns in Hunan and such, and the incorrect Li Lisen and Chen Duxiu lines. Despite there being massive losses taken during both the reconcilitory and adventurist periods, Mao never split from the CPC and that seemed to work pretty well. ... read full post
A little while ago I was scrolling through 1dimes Twitter [because i hate myself i guess] and saw a post he retweeted saying something like "Venezuala was better under Hugo Chavez, but Maduro is just a comprador [for the russians and chinese]" or something like that. ... read full post
In the US, the ottomans aren't really talked about that much outside ww1 [and even then, just barely] so I dont really know where to look for histiographic sources on the topic. I don't need like a full analysis in the replies, just any sources relating to the matter would be fine. Thank you in advance.
I know presenting this in a binary like that is not great, but previously I had assumed, given both what I've seem on the grad second hand and the previous answers i had received to other questions, that this space held the same view as the CPC on the cultural revolution, that it was misguided. But my previous question asked here had answers that gave off the impression that the cultural revolution was good and even necessary. ... read full post
What I mean is that I get the general ideological beliefs behind the cultural revolution, but how did so much chaos occur in the first place, backed by both the party and a lot (even if not the majority) of people? ... read full post
Obviously intially places like the GDR and Cuba didnr immediately become bastions of lgtbq rights, but overtime they definitely developed a lot in that respect. I can understand the intial roll back of these rights right after a revolution (like on Cuba), and then gradually reexpanding over time. The idea being that homosexuality is viewed as Bourgeois decadence because the Bourgeois wouldn't be punished (as much) for that behavior, so instead of getting rid of the law they apply it equally across society. Of course this is wrong and eventually the people choose to give more rights to lgbtq people. ... read full post
The work is good and from what I can tell, the points about the discussion on the State (which is the basis for Lenin's thesis in State and Revolution), seem solid. But a lot of the family stuff seems...I don't know. I was never taught that stuff and I really have no anthropological background to begin researching such stuff, and I know Engels wrote it based on the very start of (respectable) anthropology. ... read full post
If so, is it more similar to the previous marxist histiography in France and the USSR in the 1900s or more similar to the more modern works, like the modern Oxford History of the French Revolution (Side note, I haven't read that yet. Can anyone here give a reccomendation on it)?
I asked this question a long, long time ago on reddit, but now I cant find it and also we've all matured and learned a lot since then, so id like to ask the question again. ... read full post
Basically, I was reading Gramsci's work again and reread his thing on caesarism/bonapartism. He places Julius Caesar and Bonaparte the actually competent as progressive caesarist/bonapartist, and then places Napoleon the stupid and...Bismark(?) as regressive caesarist/bonapartists. ... read full post
A very relevant piece given how confused of a state the western left finds itself in at the moment. Lenin's work cuts through the fog of opportunism and brings ideological clarity to the topic of revolutionary agitation and organization. If we want to succeed we must learn the lessons of history and creatively apply them to our own distinct historic conditions.
Chapter 2 article 35: Citizens of the People’s Republic of China shall enjoy freedom of speech, the press, assembly, association, procession and demonstration. ... read full post
A lot of people on here talk about how GDP isn't a good statistic for measuring economic output. And I don't disagree, but it does make me wonder why I've never seen a different form of statistics developed by a socialist country. If there is a better way to measure economic output in terms of socially necessary labor or such then I would think that some economist or ministry would make one after 100 years of existing socialism around the world in some for or another ... read full post
Obviously there are proletarian revolutions, and bourgeois revolutions, but I've never heard of a Feudal revolution.
This is obviously going off of classical histiography of like, Engels's Origin of the Family, so maybe it's changed since then and the feudal-slave society split isnt really a thing.
There's this famous quote from putin that goes something like, "Whoever doesn't miss the soviet union has no heart, whoever wants it back has no brain." ... read full post
Viv Ansanm (Let’s Live Together), a contested, criticized, feared – but above all misunderstood – entity, extends a generous hand to those who, only yesterday, refused even to acknowledge its “political” existence. This proposal is an invitation to dialectics. Not to compromise, but to the co-construction of reality.
(Note:I am specifically referring to China here, but I'm fine with answers pertainubg to other currently existing or formerly existing socialist states) ... read full post