By developer Trotskyism and Stalinism – explained
For most workers, the hammer and sickle has one universal meaning, it is the symbol of Communists, and by extension, it is a sign that whoever carries it is a friend of the worker, or at least someone who is concerned with the wellbeing of the worker. Whether the hammer and Sickle is oriented one way or another, whether or not the organization in question calls itself Marxist Leninist, or just Marxist, or whether there is a ‘4’ draw in the center of it, matters less to the worker who has not had any political education.
It is a common question that comes the way of any Trotskyist, the question of why we are separate from the other Communists, when at least in ‘appearance’ there seems to be no difference. The truth is, there is a difference, one that goes deep and rooted in a history of struggle against the bureaucratic corruption that plagued the Soviet Union, and maintaining a principled communist stands against all manner of opportunism. Understanding this history and explaining it is essential for the education of cadre, and for workers, who must be able to tell friend from foe.
At a basic level, all Communists believe in establishing a Communist society. The first step towards this, is a revolution that overthrows the political system that sustains capitalism. The parliament, or dictatorship, or senate, or whatever system the bourgeoisie chooses to rule by, must be replaced by the democratic ‘dictatorship’ of the working class and its allies. This was achieved in 1917 in Russia, but could not be sustained for a variety of reasons. Today, we see many ‘Communists’ who not only refuse to talk about revolution, but actively work against it, more often than not, these type of ‘Communists’ are Stalinists.
It is equally important that we settle the myths that have been peddled as truth by propagandists and liars who have slandered Trotsky and Trotskyists. These attacks have been motivated with the sole intention of isolating and breaking the will of the Trotskyist movement, and by extension robbing the working class, peasantry and youth of leadership that can deliver a socialist revolution.
In this article, we try to explain the ideas of Trotskyism and Stalinism in a simplified summarized way so it may be widely understood.
Who was Trotsky ?
To understand Trotskyism, one must understand who Trotsky was and what he did.
Leon Trotsky was a thinker and a revolutionary who lived in the Russian Empire in the early 20th century. He formulated the ideas of Permanent revolution, and Degenerated workers states. The idea of the Permanent revolution states, that in the epoch of imperialism, the bourgeoisie is no longer capable of leading revolutionary processes, so it falls on the shoulders of the working class to fulfill the tasks of the Democratic revolution. Writing on the failed Russian revolution of 1905, he concluded, that the working class in alliance with the peasantry of Russia, will carry out the Democratic revolution in passing, as part of the Socialist revolution.
At the time, this was a new idea and niche idea. Trotsky saw firsthand how the bourgeoisie of Russia failed to push through a democratic revolution in Czarist Russia. He could reconcile what had been written in the Communist Manifesto in 1848, that the bourgeoisie was no longer a revolutionary class, with the reality that was present in Russia in 1905. In time, this would prove true not just for Russia, but for almost every country. In India, we saw the Congress party trying to settle for a Dominion Rule, suspending the non-cooperation movement, and compromising with the British Empire, always standing opposed to any revolutionary programme.
Trotsky went beyond charting a path for Socialist revolution, and wrote of the problems of the Soviet Union, and the future Socialist state. Trotsky was the first to espouse the idea, that the bureaucracy of the Soviet Union could devour it from within, and that the Soviet Union might collapse back to capitalism. His theory would be proven true in 1991, when the bureaucrats of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union laid the ground for the liquidation of the USSR.
Trotsky’s legacy went beyond simply theorizing, he was the lead organizer of the Petrograd (now St Petersburg) soviet during the Russian revolution. His joining Lenin and the Bolsheviks helped the latter win the revolution in Russia, in 1917. After the revolution, Trotsky was the main organizer behind building up the Red Army, a force he built from scratch, mobilizing workers and peasants in war against the British armed White Army. Under Trotsky’s military leadership, the nascent Soviet Union fought off 21 invading armies, led by the British Empire, Japan, France and the USA. Without Trotsky, the Soviet Union may well have fallen to this imperialist invasion and the course of the world would have been changed for the worse.
Despite his heroic achievements, he could not stop the Soviet Union from degenerating. Six years of brutal civil war, imperialist invasion, and economic isolation, resulted in the country falling to bureaucracy. From this corrupt bureaucracy emerged the cult of Stalin. After the rise of Stalin, the persecution of Trotsky began. He was repeatedly forced into exile, eventually being forced to go seek shelter in Mexico.
In spite of these difficulties, Trotsky never ceased to fight for the revolutionary movement. While in exile, he built the international Left Opposition to fight the bureaucracy in the Soviet Union, and its compromises with imperialism. From here, emerged the Fourth International, a new international revolutionary international committed to fighting for a Socialist revolution. It was in the midst of this struggle, that Trotsky was assassinated by Stalin’s spy in his home in Mexico.
What is Trotskyism ?
It goes without saying, that Trotskyism is an ideology for Socialist revolution. A Trotskyist is committed to the revolutionary overthrow of capitalism, not for reforming the system. In this, there is agreement with all those who also wish for the revolutionary overthrow of capitalism, where we differ with other Socialists and Communists is in the path towards this end.
To say it simply, Trotskyism is the political ideology based on the thoughts and writings of Leon Trotsky. However, Trotskyism goes beyond merely the writings of Trotsky. The ideas of Marx, Lenin and Engels also form a core foundation of Trotskyist ideas.
Trotskyists recognize that the success of the Russian revolution owed as much to Lenin’s theories of Imperialism, party organization, and his patient party building work, as much as it did to Trotsky’s theories and military organization. The ideas of Marx and Engels form a core part of Trotskyism.
The basic principles of Trotskyism can be enumerated as follows:
1) Internationalism: Socialism is an internationalist idea. Those who believe in Socialism see humanity first, the interests of the working class and class struggle come first. Revolutionaries professing to be Communist can only ever be honest to themselves, if they believe in Socialism as an international idea. Socialism itself can only succeed if it is a global system with equal Socialist countries cooperating with each other. It is not possible if one country is somehow privileged over the other, or if there is an inequality in relations within one country.
The idea of building a world party is not an original Trotskyist idea. Marx and Engels built the First international in the second half of the 19th century. When the First International collapsed because of the failure of Anarchism, Engels built the Second International. When the parties of the Second International betrayed the working class and supported their own imperialist countries in the First World War instead of trying to stop it, Lenin built the Third International. When Stalin abolished the Third International to appease Britain and the USA, Trotsky built the Fourth International.
Stalin’s line of “Socialism in One country” led to them first making a peace agreement with Nazi Germany, then prioritizing the alliance with the British Empire. The Soviet Union and their aligned Communist Party in India betrayed the independence struggle in the midst of World War 2. Trotsky and the Fourth International kept to the principle of internationalism, and supported India’s independence struggle, even as World War 2 raged on. While the Fourth International’s party in India, the BLPI, fought against the British, the Communist Party reported on their activities to the British CID.
2) Permanent Revolution: The cornerstone of Trotskyist thinking is the Theory of Permanent Revolution. In 1848, Marx had declared in the Communist Manifesto, that bourgeoisie had lost its revolutionary potential. The failure of the German revolution of 1848 confirmed this point. Trotsky saw the same failure being repeated in Russia in 1905, and reached the same conclusion and went further. He analyzed the role of the working class and peasantry in Russia during the revolution, and concluded that the working class must fight for their own revolution, a socialist revolution. However, Russia was a backward country ruled by an absolutist monarchy, the democratic revolution to abolish absolutist monarchy, feudal aristocracy, and land reforms, needed to happen. Historically, these were tasks of the bourgeoisie, but in Russia, they proved to be failures.
Trotsky concluded, that even backward Czarist Russia could undergo a Socialist revolution, but one in which the Democratic revolution will be resolved by the working class. However, the revolution of the working class was a Socialist revolution. Thus, the Democratic revolution would become transition to the Socialist revolution and become permanent. Contrary to what some people say, it does not mean the revolution will go on “forever”. The theory of Permanent Revolution was confirmed in the Russian revolution of 1917.
3) Democratic Centralism: The principle of Democratic Centralism was forged through the experience of the Russian Social Democratic party under Lenin’s leadership. His leadership and organizational tactics helped them survive under severe Czarist repression, and fight for leadership of the working class. The basic idea of Democratic Centralism is democratic decision making, and centralized action.
The Socialist revolution in essence is democratic, it is the democratic will of the working class smashing against the Capitalist state. A revolutionary party must reflect this revolution, so party democracy is essential. Thus, democratic decision making is non-negotiable. At the same time, without unity in action, the value of the democratic decision making is lost. The party becomes paralyzed, and will eventually fall prey to repression. Democratic centralism balances these two needs, and is a central pillar of Trotskyist party organization.
4) Transitional Demands: In 1940, Trotsky wrote the Transitional Programme. The programme detailed the path of action for world revolution in the context of the time. Though it was written in 1940, many of the ideas enshrined in it still holds relevance, particularly the idea of transitional demands, and the central conclusion, that the decisive struggle in our time is the struggle for revolutionary leadership. We have witnessed this particularly in the last 25 years, where revolutionary uprisings fail primarily for lack of revolutionary leadership.
The transitional programme and its method, is aimed at raising the consciousness of the working class and peasant masses, by fighting for transitional demands. These go beyond minimum demands, and aim at being a bridge between present prevailing level of class consciousness and socialist consciousness.
5) United front not popular front: A key tactic of Trotskyist parties follows from the tradition of Bolsheviks in the Russian revolution, the tactic of the United Front. The central principle of the United Front is ‘March separately but strike together’. This stands in contrast to Stalinist strategies of Popular Fronts, where the party must blend into a larger alliance that blurs class lines. The United Front is rooted in the interests of the working class, while the Popular Front is a denial of class struggle.
Following the strategy of Popular Fronts, the Chinese Communist Party united with the Kuomintang. In 1925, the Chinese workers of Shanghai erupted in revolution, and formed the Shanghai Commune. China was a divided country at this time, where several factions fought against one another for the control of the country, the Kuomintang emerged as the strongest of these factions, led by a reactionary right wing leader Chiang Kai Shek. Despite open hostility to the ideas of Socialism and to the working class, the Soviet Union directed the CCP to align with the KMT as they were a representative of the ‘Progressive National Bourgeoisie’. The result was that the CCP had no preparation, when the KMT massacred their cadres in Shanghai, leading to thousands of deaths.
China would see several decades of warfare, and a corrupt KMT rule which left the country unprepared for the Japanese invasion. Trotsky had opposed the Popular Front at the time, but he was defeated politically.
6) Political revolution: Trotsky led the fight against the measures that pushed the Soviet Union further and further away from the revolutionary line, and undermined the democracy of the workers, achieved through the Russian revolution. Despite everything Stalin and the troika did, they could not and did not destroy the non-capitalist foundations of the Soviet system. The land was still owned publicly, most of the economy was still in the hands of the state, workers still had important rights like 8 hour day and job security. The solution to Stalinist dictatorship was not the restoration of capitalism, but the restoration of Soviet democracy. This required a political revolution.
In analyzing the character of the Stalinist regime, Trotsky also laid out its direction and the solution to the threat they posed. The Stalinist regime had to be overthrown by the working class in alliance with oppressed sections of the peasantry for a political revolution, replacing the bureaucracy of the corrupted Communist party, with the democratic decision making on the basis of Soviets. Should this not happen, and the Stalinist regime is able to stabilize itself, it will eventually lead to dissolution, and the restoration of capitalism. Trotsky’s analysis would prove to be frighteningly true, when the very Stalinist bureaucrats who were raised worshipping Stalin, destroyed the Soviet Union under Gorbachev and Yeltsin in 1991.
Who are the Stalinists ?
Simply put, the followers of Stalin’s ideas are what we call Stalinist, though they claim themselves to be the true followers of Communism and Marxism. The truth of this is revealed in their political positions and actions throughout history and into the present. The present Communist Parties and organizations trace their origins to the first Communist parties formed in the early 20th century under the leadership of the Third Communist International.
These parties often call themselves as Communist Parties with the suffix of ‘Marxist’ or simply stating their host country. The Third International was founded by Lenin in response to the failure of the Second International to stop the First World War, this new organization would be based on the principles which helped the Communists of Russia win the Russian revolution. Internationalism was a key part of these principles, as was Democratic Centralism.
After the Russian revolution there was a wave of Socialist revolutions throughout Europe, culminating in the German revolution of 1918. These revolutions ended the First World War, they put a final stop to the blood lust of the imperialist regimes hell bent on fighting to the last man. However, only the Russian revolution succeeded in expropriating capitalism, and surviving against armies of reactionaries and imperialists. The pressures on the early Soviet Union sapped out its strength, exhausting its revolutionary potential.
From the pressures imposed by imperialism, emerged the Soviet bureaucracy. The democratic system of Soviets was undermined by imperialist invasion, the famine situation that emerged from this necessitated compromising with capitalism under the New Economic Policy, these conditions led to the emergence of an undemocratic bureaucracy. The party, once the pillar of revolutionary principles, faced a crisis of cadres. The new party that was born from this struggle was a corrupted organization. The Third International began to fail, beginning in China in 1925, and then in Spain in 1931.
The Indian communist party grew under the condition of a corrupted Third International, led by a revolutionary party that was losing its principles. The central figure that embodied this transformation was Joseph Stalin.
Joseph Stalin became the General Secretary of the Communist Party from 1922. After the death of Lenin, Stalin in alliance with the troika of Zinoviev, Kamenev and Bukharin consolidated his position turning the General Secretary into the strongest position in the party, and the country. The ideas of Zinoviev, Bukharin and Kamenev became mainstream.
The Russian revolution was won under the banner of World revolution, but under Stalin this was forsaken for Socialism in One country. The power of Soviets, the democratic organization of workers and peasants, was abolished in favour of the state and its bureaucracy. The myth of the Progressive National Bourgeois was concocted, whereas the Communists won their revolution by rebuking the ability of the bourgeoisie. Democratic Centralism in the party was slowly eroded and what emerged was a new kind of dictatorial structure best descried as bureaucratic centralism. The troika’s policy was implemented in China and India throughout the 1920s and 1930s.
In China, the CCP was led to an outright massacre at the hands of Chiang Kai Shek’s KMT, and in India the young Communist Party faced liquidation when it tried to work with the Congress Party under the Workers and Peasants party. Stalinism was thus born with disasters. In the realm of economic policy, Stalinism led the Soviet Union from one disaster to another. First, it favored market driven agriculture which made food prices unaffordable for the urban workers, only to turn around and move in the opposite direction when the problem became too acute, leading to forced collectivization and requisitioning harvest. The end result was a brutal famine.
Stalin’s rule was finally consolidated when he instituted the Great Terror of 1936, and the new Soviet Constitution. His old allies of the Troika were all killed, along with all of the original party leadership of the Soviet Communist Party. Trotsky was the last of the major leaders of the Russian revolution alive, and he was forced into exile.
The various Communist Parties around the world did not know of the developments within the Soviet Union or within the Soviet party. They only had access to heavily censored and manipulated sources from Russia which painted a false picture of reality. Meanwhile the Left Opposition led by Trotsky remained in a state of disarray or disorganization owing to heavy repression and Trotsky’s exile. The Communist parities at this time grew under the influence of Stalin and followed the party line from Moscow, whether or not it was right.
The parties of this time would help defend Stalinism in their countries, and around the world, becoming a fifth column for the Soviet Communist Party against Trotsky and his movement, who were in fact the last of the true Leninists in the world, the last remnants of the original revolutionary leadership who had not succumbed to corruption. Myths were created to slander Trotsky and those who followed him that Trotsky was spying for the British, or that Trotsky was working with Nazis, or that Trotsky was undermining the Soviet Union. These myths are baseless, without evidence or with references so flimsy that defies any serious consideration. Yet the followers of Stalin, and the Stalinist parties still repeat these lies with full confidence.
By the time the truth of Stalin’s counter revolution became clear, the parties which emerged under his shadow were too far gone. The various Communist Parties built by the Third International became corrupted, bureaucratized organizations, which acted more like the geo-political tool of the Soviet Union rather than parties of the working class. We could see this clearly when the Indian Communist Party, which had always been steadfastly opposed to British rule, suddenly turned around and supported it in the Second World War, the reason? Because the Soviet Union needed to fight Germany, Indian independence be damned!
While the Communist Party of India were spying on revolutionaries for the British CID, Trotsky and the Fourth International supported Indian independence. The party of the Fourth International were at the frontlines of struggle, when the naval uprising shook British rule to its core.
What is Stalinism?
From the above, it should be clear where Stalinism came from, and who were the Stalinists. The ideology we call Stalinism has no link with Marxism or Leninism, in fact it is a refutation of Marx and Lenin. It was born as a result of the pressures of imperialism, formed by opportunists who abandoned revolution in favour of compromise. The parties that held up this ideology under the banner of ‘Communism’ are what we call the Stalinist parties, the various parties which emerged under the leadership of the Third International and became corrupted under the negative influence of Stalin.
It is important to understand their true ideology, not simply by what they profess, but what they do. Stalinist parties claim to be following the path of Marx and Lenin, but the reality tells a different story. The politics of Stalinism can be narrowed down to the following principles:
1) Socialism in One Country: Following the defeat of the German revolution and the Hungarian revolution, the Russian revolution found itself isolated. This isolation grew with the failure of the Chinese revolution. The leaders of the Communist Party rationalized this situation under the banner of “Socialism in One Country”. It was believed by Stalin and the Troika, that Socialism could somehow be achieved within the confines of the Soviet Union, under the intense pressures of world imperialism and reactionary forces that surround it.
We know now that Socialism did not in fact triumph in the Soviet Union, it tried to transition to Socialism, but collapsed under the pressure from world imperialism. A key reason for this was the betrayals under Stalin’s leadership. He abolished the Third International, and guided the various Communist parties around the world to align with the foreign policy of the Soviet Union, or their own national bourgeoisie. At the local level, this led to confused opportunist policies, or outright betrayals. Most Communist parties faced liquidation, or splits.
Today, the policy still stands in the programme of most Communist Parties, especially those in the mainstream of bourgeois politics. Stalinists and Stalinist parties will always put national interests above the interest of the working class. If faced with a question of choosing between the two, they would always choose their nation.
2) Popular Frontism: The popular front is perhaps the most dangerous of Stalinist approaches. In a united front, there is independence of organization. The class interest are placed at the forefront. This is not so in a popular front. A popular front diminishes class struggle in favour of a classless popular front, pitting the bourgeoisie and working class in the same room. A popular front leads to liquidation, the weakening of the Communist Party and in turn a weakening of the working class. Popular frontism in essence is sacrificing class independence for the sake of a vague national unity.
No matter in what form or how the popular front has been constructed, always leads to disaster for the working class and its allies.
3) Bureaucratic Centralism: Lenin and the Bolsheviks had to centralize authority and reorganize the Communist Party to face the existential threat that came from the White Army and the Imperialist invasion. This was designed as a temporary measure, once the war was ended normal democratic functioning would be restored. However, this was not to be.
Under Stalin, the party structure became authoritarian and bureaucratized. In time, this model was peddled as the correct Leninist line, replicating the Soviet system in all the Communist Parties across the world. Of course, no Communist Party ever claims they are undemocratic, but for anyone who has experienced a Stalinist party, they can see the reality clearly.
Power is concentrated in an inner circle of the politburo which is detached from the cadres, decisions don’t flow from below but come from the top, often forced on the party and its cadres regardless of material conditions or principles. This is a rot that began with Stalin and the Soviet Union, the result of imperialist invasion. In time the centralization of leadership becomes so bad that the leaders create their own personality cults.
4) Stagism: One of the main theoretical tools in the arsenal of Stalinism is the theory of Stages. The theory of stages states, that for socialist revolution to happen, capitalist development needs to reach a certain level. In Nepal, this was used to justify pro-capitalist policies by their ruling Maoist government. In India we often hear about India not being ready for revolution precisely on this point. Yet, Russia’s revolution disproved this point.
The Stalinist parties hold on to this theory to use as a cudgel to beat down any argument for pushing forward the agenda of Socialist revolution. Stagism is the basis to justify an alliance with the bourgeoisie, it is the basis on which the Stalinists justify popular frontism, and it is the basis on which the Stalinists justify pro-capitalist policies when coming to power, whether in Soviet foreign policy, or the economic policy in China, or in the hopeless policy of compromising with Capitalism in Nepal and India.
Why do we oppose Stalinism?
Our opposition to Stalinism has nothing to do with the personality of Stalin, nor does our support for Trotsky have to do with his person. The individual is not relevant to this debate, what is of primary relevance is the ideas they espouse. We oppose the ideas of Stalin that shapes the politics of Stalinism, we support the ideas of Trotsky that shapes the politics of Trotskyist parties.
History has shown that the ideas of Stalinism lead the working class to defeat and disaster, while the ideas of Lenin and Trotsky led them to victory in Russia 1917, and forms the core of a principled revolutionary party.
Even in victory, Stalinism leads to undermining the power of the working class. This immediate victory eventually leads to a more crushing defeat, as we have seen in the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Warsaw Pact countries, and China’s surrender to imperialism beginning with Mao’s meeting with Nixon.
The Stalinist parties have convinced the world that they are the true heirs of Lenin and Marx, and that their failed politics of compromising with capitalism is the true path to Communism. At least 90 years of insistent propaganda from the Soviet Union and large Stalinist parties like the Indian and Russian Communist parties have perverted the ideas of Marxism and Leninism. Today, if anyone confuses Communism with dictatorship, corruption, hypocrisy, and sees them as failure, it is precisely because of the legacy of Stalinism.
Trotskyists oppose Stalin, because it must be opposed for the sake of the working class. The history of the last 90 years have shown, that any progress won by the working class, either came on the backs of actions by Trotskyists, or were won by deviating away from the Stalinist programme or were achieved despite Stalinism. Whenever Stalinism takes root, we get disasters like China in 1925-27 , or India during the Quit India movement in 1942.
The victory of the Chinese Communists in the civil war is a perfect example of a victory won by rejecting Stalinist ideas. Mao initially wanted a block of four classes, aligning the peasant and workers of the Communist Party with the bourgeois reactionaries of Chiang Kai Shek’s KMT. This was a fantasy of ‘national unity’ which barely lasted a year before the bourgeoisie turned its guns towards the workers and peasants of China. Ultimately, Mao and the Chinese Communist Party had to fight a brutal four year war to win the revolution. Throughout this period, Stalin kept relations with the KMT, even as his ‘fellow communists’ were fighting him.
Today, Stalinism is seen when the Indian Communist party prioritizes electoral alliances with the Congress party and INDIA bloc, instead of building their own independent forces. Or in the Russian Communist Party, which steadfastly supports Putin’s imperialistic war instead of opposing it in solidarity with Ukrainian workers. Decades have passed, but Stalinism hasn’t changed its programme or character, and the results are the same, disaster for the working class and their allies!
The opposition to Stalinism, isn’t just an ideological question, it is an essential task for Trotskyists, who want to strengthen the working class, and build towards Socialist revolution. In this, we make no difference between Maoism and Stalinism.
Is Maoism and Stalinism the same ?
Stalinists have benefitted from hijacking the ‘Communist’ name. As explained, most parties with the ‘Communist’ name emerged from the Third International and developed under the corrupting influence of Stalin. They fed off the toxicity of defeats that faced the revolution in Germany and Hungary, and the isolation of the Soviet Union. The defeat faced by the Communist Party in China in 1925 was the result of Stalinist ideology emerging, perhaps the first moment we witness Stalinism in action.
The crushing defeat faced by the Chinese Communist Party severed its link with the urban industrial working class, and forced it into the countryside, where it had to rely on the scattered, largely disorganized peasantry, spread among several pockets of territory the party controlled. The fight for survival against the vicious reactionary violence of the Kuomintang forced the party to adapt.
The result of these pressures, was a party that became authoritarian, and centralized around the leadership of Mao Tse Tung. What we call Maoism today, was born from these defeats, but did not exist as an independent thought, outside of the ideological framework of Stalinism, until after the Chinese revolution. Mao never questioned the correctness of Stalin’s leadership, nor the wrong policies undertaken by the International under his leadership, nor was there any re-evaluation of the politics that led to the disaster in 1925.
On the contrary, one of the first campaigns that Mao began, was the destruction of Trotskyist leadership, under the so-called Anti-Bolshevik campaign. The campaign helped consolidate Mao’s hold over the party, which would only grow the longer the war with the KMT continued. The long march resulted in the deaths of whatever remained of the old party, leaving Mao to remodel the Communist Party of China along Stalinist lines.
Mao never deviated from the Stalinist political ideology, except when it was forced on him. Till the very end, he entertained the idea of making an alliance with the KMT, and even toyed with the idea of forming a government with the KMT, the very party that had massacred his comrades. It was Chiang Kai Shek’s stubbornness that made the bloc of four classes an impossibility, forcing Mao to seize power through war.
It wasn’t until after Stalin’s death that Mao truly broke from the leadership of the Soviet Union. Maoism as an independent and distinct political force was born at this point, primarily in response to Krushchev’s fake ‘Destalinization’. Maoism distinguished itself from the prevailing political direction of the Soviet Union by claiming to adhere to the correct orthodox line espoused by Stalin. Anti-revisionism therefore became a key part of Maoism, and the basis of the so-called Cultural Revolution.
Aside from these two features, there is no functional difference between Maoism and Stalinism. There is agreement on the main questions of programme, both believe in Socialism in one country against internationalism, both believe in a dictatorial system of bureaucratic centralism, and both strains believe in aligning with imagined progressive sections of the bourgeoisie, regardless of how inept such bourgeoisie might be.
There have been only two instances of Maoists wielding political power, one in China since 1949, and once in Nepal since 2006. In China, Maoists are sponsoring billionaires like Jack Ma while most Chinese workers have to toil 12 hour work days for 6 days a week, just to afford a basic home. In Nepal, the Maoists threw out any socialist agenda to the dustbin, and favored reconciliation with bourgeois parties, eventually becoming as corrupt as the people they overthrew. Now the Maoists of Nepal have themselves been overthrown.
Reform or revolution?
Ultimately, the core difference between Trotskyists and Stalinists come down to their attitude towards capitalism. Trotskyists follow the line of Lenin and the Bolsheviks, hence why we also call ourselves Bolshevik-Leninists. They do not believe that capitalism can be reformed out of existence, permanent social change doesn’t happen through incremental reforms which leads to one outcome. Capitalism will always preserve the system of exploitation which ensures inequality, both within the country and across the world between countries.
Stalinists may talk about revolution, but for them it is nothing but a ‘distant dream’. In practice, Stalinists always stand opposed to any revolutionary alternative, and always push reformist policies. The politics of the Nepali Maoists reflects this perfectly. It may happen that some reforms do bring about lasting benefits to people, these are always the result of intense class struggle, won despite the leadership of the Stalinists rather than because of it.
The Stalinists of India who always hail the benefits of land reforms in Kerala and West Bengal, don’t mention about their role in the peasant struggle in Telengana, where they actively disarmed the peasantry who were engaged in a revolutionary struggle against the Nizam.
Trotskyists, are not opposed to such reforms, but believe that such reforms are but stepping stones towards the revolutionary seizure of power and the transformation of society, they are not ends in themselves. Reforms that stabilize capitalism only open the way for future repression and capitalist reaction. The only way forward is revolutionary struggle against the capitalist state. In fact, if we look at the last 150 years of history, reforms could only become possible because of successful revolutionary struggle.
The impact of the Russian revolution can be seen outside of Russia, where several governments began welfare reforms. Victories like the 8 hour day, vote for women, and independence for colonies would not have been possible without the Russian revolution weakening and frightening the capitalists of the world. We speak of the high living standards of Western Europe, the same countries which were infamous for leaving their working class in despicable squalor while ruling over massive globe spanning empires. It was only the fear of revolution that made them concede to the working class, striving to grant them a decent living standard, a proper wage, healthcare service and housing. Decades later, these very governments are attacking and rolling back the welfare state, now that there is no longer the fear of revolution or the Soviet Union. This would not have been possible without the connivance of Stalinists.
Typically Stalinist parties orient themselves towards the working class, not to lead them to a revolution, but to harness their energy. The actual objective is gaining power for the bureaucracy, and to pacify the working class and oppressed classes, this serves the interests of capitalism. The more integrated with mainstream bourgeois politics a Stalinist party becomes, the more corrupt they become. The further they are from the mainstream, the further away they are from this corruption. However, as long as they keep to the Stalinist ideology and the Stalinist method of organization, they will always end in degeneration.
Stalinists fight for reform when they face a revolutionary crisis, but when there is no crisis or struggle from the masses, the Stalinists give up on struggle altogether. It is only when faced with the question of survival that Stalinists are forced to push for socialist revolution, and they make every effort to make sure that they exercise control over such a revolutionary process, subjecting the working class to the party’s dictatorship. Trotskyists empower the working class, Stalinists oppress it.
Beneath the slogans of the Stalinists and their ‘fights’ for reform, lay a face of deception and lies. Stalinist policies and actions have ground the revolutionary socialist movement into the dust. With the abject failure of Stalinism worldwide – sometimes becoming an open ally of the capitalist ruling class, sometimes just melting away into irrelevance – it is the turn of revolutionary socialists to grind bureaucrats, reformists and opportunists into the dust, and raise the banner of the revolutionary working class high and proud once more!