How does the need for emancipatory politics translate into different forms of expression and organization? How can the tangential dynamics of these different forms successfuly align under an overarching moniker, while still maintaining their locality, specificity and urgency? Does the potential of an inclusive communist project need to be reached by overcoming notions such as Marxism, Leninism, Maoism and the like?
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If we choose to look at the specific temporal context of <country> between 1972 and 1986, we arrive at an energetic socio-political environment confronted with pervasive forms of oppression. Faced with the contents of the documents of <archive> published during the aforementioned period, the need for undergoing a process of skimming at first and immersion closely after has resulted in a series of questions, curiosities and conceptual sparks.
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The following text is an attempt at compiling a series of contrasting socio-political tendencies into a communist narrative, which is latent within most of the <archive>'s material, but fractured in its many forms. These calls for unionizing, redistribution of wealth, and workers’ emancipation – amongst other recurring motifs – are extracted as snippets from distinct documents and stitched together into one piece. Thus, the method of assemblage becomes a helpful framework in mapping the diversity of communist aspirations and of the voices that propagate them. According to <philosopher>, an assemblage "is a multiplicity which is made up of heterogeneous terms and which establishes liaisons, relations between them, across ages, sexes and reigns – different natures. Thus the assemblage’s only unity is that of a co-functioning: it is a symbiosis, a ‘sympathy’. It is never filiations which are important, but alliances, alloys; these are not successions, lines of descent, but contagions, epidemics, the wind."
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The quoted paragraphs which this text consists of are not static, but rather, are made to speak to eachother and can be interchanged to break the current order. In no particular order, for now, the story goes like this:
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"The term communism may refer to the comprehensive Marxist-Leninist theory of the industrial proletariat or to a future social formation coming after the national democratic and socialist stages of the <nation> revolution.
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[…]
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The <politicalparty> itself consistently declares that it is pursuing a national democratic revolution and not yet a socialist revolution– under the present circumstances of the <country>. Communism is something possible only as a result of a long process of socialist revolution and construction and the defeat of modern imperialism on a world scale.
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[…]
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Should the <politicalparty> be legalized? Should there be a ceasefire between the <insurgentgroup1> and the <insurgentgroup2>? Should there be a coalition government which includes the revolutionary forces like the <politicalparty>, <insurgentgroup1> and the <revolutionaryorganization>?"
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"<Oppressivepolitician> continues to have a tight grip on the <insurgentgroup2>. <Oppressivepolitician> continues to keep the courts and the sham parliament within the bounds of <possessivepronoun> dictatorial rule. <Oppressivepolitician> is frantically militarizing local officials and expanding the paramilitary forces. <oppressivepolitician>'s fake legislature is about to rig up an electoral code to <oppressivepolitician>'s complete satisfaction. The <governmentbody> is prepared to fix the results of the forthcoming elections."
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"<Oppressivepolitician> on the Air. “My countrymen, we have carefully evaluated concocted information and have definitely established that Communists are behind the attack on the <event>, although I stood to benefit the most from the bombing. We are therefore suspending the <recourseinlaw>, ordering the raid of the campuses and the arrest of everyone in media, the academe, labor and other organizations who do not believe me, and hence are Commies. Consider this a dress rehearsal for <oppressivegovernmentruling>.”
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"The overall human cost of the regime’s economic strategy is staggeringly painful for [the] majority of the people. Inflation, devaluation and wage repression have caused real family incomes to plummet nationwide.
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[…]
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The rising poverty levels were confirmed by the high-powered <internationalbody> “<aidprogram>” that visited the <country> in <year> and by <newsarticle> in <year> . Both reports, however, bluntly ignored the root cause of widespread poverty because to delve into these would be to expose the massive failure of the <internationalbody>-<internationalbody> experiment in the <country>."
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"<Colonizer> Imperialist domination over the <country>, then, is not only limited to controlling the economic and political affairs of the country. It has likewise, made itself felt in our culture specifically thru religious manipulation. Thus as true <religiousdenominations> we have a very vital role to play in exposing and opposing the anti-people work of such pseudo-religious fronts of <colonizer> Imperialism and <acronym>’s. For it is by looking beyond our personal “salvation” that we realize the <religiousscripture> of total, collective and historical liberation. In these days of alarming developments, let us heed God’s call to actively participate in people’s struggle towards a truly <religiousdenomination> society that is free, democratic, and sovereign."
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"<Clericalfigure>, <clericalposition> of <capitalcity>, denied yesterday, allegations that the local <religiousbody> has been infiltrated by radical elements “bent on overthrowing the present regime.”Maintaining that there can be no such group as “<religiousdenomination> leftists,” the <capitalcity><clericalfigure> said the specter of the <religiousdenomination> left has been raised by the government whenever news of major victories against subversive elements isreleased.
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<Clericalfigure> reiterated that, to <clericalfigure>, the term “<religiousdenomination> Left” is a contradiction in terms. “How can a person who has vowed to follow <god>… be accused of embracing communism when communism is precisely the negation of <god>?"
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"It is wrong to insist that communism or a certain religious belief is the main political issue. The few who do so only objectively help the dictatorship. They wittingly and unwittingly join the <colonizer> imperialists and the <oppressivepolitician> regime in obscuring the real issue confronting the <nation> people today. And that issue of urgent necessity to the people at present is the struggle for national liberation and democracy against the <colonizer>-<oppressivepolitician> dictatorship."
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"… the <nation> revolution can and must break new ground in pursuit of this socialist revolution vision. Storming heaven’s gate may merely abort the future."
Max Lehmann
5 years ago