The actual material conditions that underpinned the revolutions in China, Russia, and other socialist experiments couldn’t be more different than our situation. China was a country that had a brutally and bloodily repressed peasant revolution before Mao rose to power and, in many ways, allowed that peasant revolution in China. Though I’m not an expert in Chinese history, def have some books here I gotta crack open.
The Russian revolution too, had an extremely weak bourgeois class, a despotic royal family, and like 70 years of hardcore Marxists building the workers movement. Lenin was still exiled when the workers soviets seized power in February, with the Bolshevik revolution taking place in October. We haven’t had our Bloody Sunday, yet, that scares the peaceful worker movement so much that they have no choice but to face facts, organize for power, and overthrow the monarchy.
No, the ruling classes can afford to be like detached from reality like this, they can call themselves Leninists and maybe even read and somewhat understand some of his work (or surround themselves with ppl that do.) But they’ll never understand these movements
The actual material conditions that underpinned the revolutions in China, Russia, and other socialist experiments couldn’t be more different than our situation. China was a country that had a brutally and bloodily repressed peasant revolution before Mao rose to power and, in many ways, allowed that peasant revolution in China. Though I’m not an expert in Chinese history, def have some books here I gotta crack open.
Eh, it’s a bit more complicated than that. Really the material conditions in China were a result of the dissolution of the Qing dynasty under the control of the Manchu people. You can really trace it’s origins back from the Taiping Rebellion, the subsequent Boxer rebellion, the occupation of the western powers, and finally the invasion and occupation of the Japanese. Its material reality was more a result of ethnic conflict between the generally perceived as outsider Manchu, and the repressed Han, who saw themselves as the historic rulers of China. Coupled with the perception by the Han that the Manchu were collaborating with occupying forces.
Mao and the initial leadership of the revolution weren’t exactly what you would think of as peasants, rather they were born to the peasant class. He was actually the son of one of the wealthiest farming families in his region, he was just Han in a time where really only Manchu were elevated into the ruling class.
Oh, I didn’t mean to imply you did. I was just trying to explain a common misconception between the western and eastern understanding of what the peasant class was. In the Qing dynasty a peasant was far from the lowest rung of society, and relatively had a lot of potential for upward mobility.
By eastern standards mao was in the peasant class, but you could still be a relatively wealthy land owner and be part of the peasant class.
In the Qing dynasty there were 5 distinct classes and the order of them is pretty different from Western traditions.
The first class is occupied by the emperor and his immediate family.
The second class was for high government bureaucrats.
The third were agriculturalists, landlords, farmers and peasants.
The fourth was reserved for artisans and merchants.
Lastly the final class and lowest in society was for criminals, slaves, prostitutes, entertainers, low government employees, and the military.
The actual material conditions that underpinned the revolutions in China, Russia, and other socialist experiments couldn’t be more different than our situation. China was a country that had a brutally and bloodily repressed peasant revolution before Mao rose to power and, in many ways, allowed that peasant revolution in China. Though I’m not an expert in Chinese history, def have some books here I gotta crack open.
The Russian revolution too, had an extremely weak bourgeois class, a despotic royal family, and like 70 years of hardcore Marxists building the workers movement. Lenin was still exiled when the workers soviets seized power in February, with the Bolshevik revolution taking place in October. We haven’t had our Bloody Sunday, yet, that scares the peaceful worker movement so much that they have no choice but to face facts, organize for power, and overthrow the monarchy.
No, the ruling classes can afford to be like detached from reality like this, they can call themselves Leninists and maybe even read and somewhat understand some of his work (or surround themselves with ppl that do.) But they’ll never understand these movements
Eh, it’s a bit more complicated than that. Really the material conditions in China were a result of the dissolution of the Qing dynasty under the control of the Manchu people. You can really trace it’s origins back from the Taiping Rebellion, the subsequent Boxer rebellion, the occupation of the western powers, and finally the invasion and occupation of the Japanese. Its material reality was more a result of ethnic conflict between the generally perceived as outsider Manchu, and the repressed Han, who saw themselves as the historic rulers of China. Coupled with the perception by the Han that the Manchu were collaborating with occupying forces.
Mao and the initial leadership of the revolution weren’t exactly what you would think of as peasants, rather they were born to the peasant class. He was actually the son of one of the wealthiest farming families in his region, he was just Han in a time where really only Manchu were elevated into the ruling class.
I didn’t say Mao was a peasant, I said that he facilitated a peasant revolution. But I appreciate the history lesson
Oh, I didn’t mean to imply you did. I was just trying to explain a common misconception between the western and eastern understanding of what the peasant class was. In the Qing dynasty a peasant was far from the lowest rung of society, and relatively had a lot of potential for upward mobility.
By eastern standards mao was in the peasant class, but you could still be a relatively wealthy land owner and be part of the peasant class.
In the Qing dynasty there were 5 distinct classes and the order of them is pretty different from Western traditions.
The first class is occupied by the emperor and his immediate family.
The second class was for high government bureaucrats.
The third were agriculturalists, landlords, farmers and peasants.
The fourth was reserved for artisans and merchants.
Lastly the final class and lowest in society was for criminals, slaves, prostitutes, entertainers, low government employees, and the military.