Upon first examining Enver Hoxha’s new book, Imperialism and the Revolution, one is tempted to dismiss it as a petty and shallow hatchet job and refer the reader to the works of Mao Tsetung, which make clear that most of the charges hurled at Mao are simply the worst type of blatant misquotations, distortions and downright lies, and also refer the reader to the many Soviet criticisms of Mao which, while sharing the same method and most of the same arguments as Hoxha, at least have the virtue of a more systematic and well-rounded presentation of the revisionist line.
However, the current situation in the international communist movement makes such a course impossible to follow, no matter how tempting. The capture of revolutionary China by the capitalist-roaders led by Hua and Teng has led to the capitulation of some erstwhile Marxist-Leninists and the demoralization of many more. The eyes of the international movement have focused on Hoxha and the Party of Labor of Albania in the hopes that amidst the turmoil and confusion in the ranks of communists the PLA would continue to play a leading role in the fight against revisionism. Indeed, Albania’s initial response to the coup in China, riddled though it was with eclecticism and contradictory theses, gave cause for such hope.
But Hoxha and the leadership of the PLA chose a different course–lending the prestige of the PLA (a prestige that, ironically, was gained in large degree because Hoxha had united with Mao and the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution at a time when it was under attack from revisionists everywhere) to those who would retreat from the advances forged in the battle against modern revisionism in the past two decades and erect a revisionist political and ideological line based upon sanctifying and raising to the extreme, errors of revolutionaries since the mid-1930s. And all this is done in the name of the “purity” of Marxism-Leninism.
Of course this is not the first time in history that revisionism has posed itself as “orthodox” Marxism and tried to paint the genuine revolutionary communists with the brush of “deviationism,” or even fanaticism. Karl Kautsky was the orthodox Marxist of his day in his battle against Leninism. And, likewise, Trotsky posed as the “proletarian” and “pure’ Marxist as he did his best to undermine and wreck the world’s first socialist state.
For, contrary to the outlook which permeates the writings of Enver Hoxha, the world does not advance in a smooth, direct line. And what is true of the world itself is equally true of Marxism-Leninism, which is, after all, a science based upon understanding the contradictions in nature and society and a tool for advancing society in accordance with the laws of motion of these contradictions–a science which is, and can only be, continually enriched and deepened in the course of revolutionary practice.
Enver Hoxha makes numerous indictments of Mao Tsetung, arguments that we will attempt to address one by one, but what comes through most clearly is Hoxha’s complete inability to understand the living science of dialectics, a bewilderment he was willing to keep to himself as long as revolutionary China was continuing to advance and battling enemies that Hoxha recognized as foes also, but a bewilderment turned to antagonism that he now seeks to pawn off on the whole of the international communist movement since the forward advance in China has been temporarily reversed.
In fact, one of the very few relatively accurate characterizations of Mao’s line given by Hoxha is when he says, “he [Mao] regards [revolution] as an endless process which is repeated periodically throughout the whole period of the existence of mankind on earth, as a process which goes from defeat to victory, from victory to defeat, and so on endlessly.”[1] Of course, in this passage, Hoxha is trying to imply that Mao sees no advance in human society but merely the cyclical repetition of things. But what comes through much more clearly (since this vulgarization of Mao doesn’t wash for anyone who has studied any of his writings) is Hoxha’s own view of revolution as an unfortunate if occasionally necessary disruption that history imposes on society at rare instances, and a disruption that will cease for all time as soon as the working class (or condescending saviors having its interests at heart) can seize power from the old exploiters and begin its “uninterrupted advance” along wide and straight Nevsky Prospect to some goal which bears much in common with the religious vision of the Kingdom of God on earth, where all conflict, struggle and discord will be replaced by the realm of perfect harmony and stability.
Hoxha wants to attack Marxism-Leninism, Mao Tsetung Thought and at the same time distinguish himself from modern revisionism. The result is his embracing not only of a basic revisionist outlook but a wholesale adoption of many time-worn revisionist theses–all thinly covered by a dogmatist veneer. Hence the label dogmato-revisionist.
Imperialism and the Revolution covers many topics, and to deal with all of the errors and distortions of Marxism contained in it would require a book much longer than Hoxha’s. The present article deals almost exclusively with Part II, section III: “’Mao Tsetung Thought’–An Anti-Marxist Theory,” and even here, not every aspect of Hoxha’s distortions, errors and slander is gone into–although even so, what’s written here is of sufficient length and detail to give more than a taste (in fact more than a bellyful) of Hoxha’s counter-revolutionary line![1a]
[1] Enver Hoxha, Imperialism and the Revolution (published as an issue of “Proletarian Internationalism,” Chicago, 1979), p. 113. I use this edition of Hoxha’s book because the price corresponds more closely to its political value.
[1a] Hoxha tries, like the current revisionist rulers of China, to pin Mao with the reactionary “three worlds” strategy. The RCP has dealt with this question in the article, “Three Worlds’ Strategy: Apology for Capitulation,” in Revolution, November 1978. Nor does this current article address Hoxha’s portrayal of the current world situation or the increasing convergence between Hoxha’s views and the machinations of the Soviet social-imperialists.