Learn Some Political Economy
1. Learn Some Political Economy
The Object of Political Economy 1
The great Chairman Mao teaches us over and over again to learn some political economy. This is not only a requirement for Communist Party members and revolutionary cadres; it is also a requirement for every combatant in the Three Great Revolutionary Struggles. To learn some political economy is very important for understanding Marxism, for penetratingly criticizing revisionism and transforming our world outlook of our own accord, and especially for a deeper appreciation of the Party’s basic line and policies in the whole socialist historical stage.
The youths fighting in the front lines of the countryside and factories are our country’s hope and the successors to the proletarian revolutionary enterprise. To better engage in combat, to grow healthily and more quickly, the youths must learn some political economy.
The Object of Political Economy Is Production Relations
What kind of science is political economy? We must start from its object of study. The object of study for Marxist political economy is production relations. Engels clearly pointed out that “what economics investigates is not things, but the relations among people and ultimately the relations among classes.” 2 How do production relations among people arise? We must start from man’s productive activities.
Chairman Mao said, “Marxists regard man’s production activities as the most basic practical activities which determine all other activities.” 3 But, over a hundred years ago, before Marxism was created, people did not have this scientific understanding. Thinkers of the exploiting class all opposed this viewpoint. They either championed the fallacy that human society developed according to God’s will or peddled the heresy of heroes creating history. These so-called thinkers glossed over the simplest fact, namely, that people must first be able to feed, clothe, and shelter themselves before they can engage in politics, science, fine arts, and religious activities. If people need food, clothing, and shelter, they must engage in productive activities. Therefore, the direct production of material commodities forms the basis of human societal development. Without the productive activities of the laboring class, people cannot survive, and society cannot develop. It was Marx who discovered this law of development in human history.
To produce, people must form certain mutual relationships. Isolated individuals cannot engage in production. Just as Marx pointed out:
“To engage in production, people form certain associations and relationships. Only within these social associations and relationships can there be a relation between them and Nature and can there be production.” 4
These relations formed by people during the production process are called production relations. In class society, these relations are ultimately reflected in class relationships.
Production relations consist of three aspects: (l) the ownership pattern of the means of production; (2) people’s roles in production and their mutual relations; (3) the pattern of product distribution. The ownership pattern refers to who owns the means of production (including means of labor, such as machines, plants, and land, and objects of labor, such as raw materials). In production relations, the most important aspect is the ownership pattern of the means of production. It is the basis of production relations. The ownership pattern of the means of production determines the nature of production relations. Primitive society, slave society, feudal society, capitalist society, and socialist society in human societal development are classified according to the differences in their ownership patterns of the means of production. The ownership pattern determines people’s roles in production and their mutual relations and thus the distribution pattern of products.
To produce, it is necessary not only to have relations among people but also relations between man and Nature. Man must conquer and transform Nature. The power which man uses to conquer and transform Nature is called productive forces. Productive forces are composed of men and materials (namely, means of production). In productive forces, tools of production are the most important. The types of tools used for production reflect the magnitude of man’s power to conquer Nature. But we cannot regard tools of production as the determining factor in productive forces. “The determining factor is man, not materials.” 5 “Of all things in the world, man is the most valuable.” 6 Because tools have to be used by man, created by man, and renovated by man, without man, there would be no tools and no knowhow. Without man, the best “automatic” tools are never really “automatic.”
Production relations and productive forces comprise the two aspects of social production. In overall historical development, productive forces are generally revealed as the major determining factor. Any transformation of production relations is necessarily a result of a certain development in productive forces. Production relations must be compatible with productive forces. When certain production relations become incompatible with the development of productive forces, these production relations must be replaced by some other new production relations which better match the development in productive forces. This is to say, the form of production relations is not determined by man’s subjective will, but by the level of development of productive forces. Production relations must conform to the development of productive forces. This is an objective law which is not subject to change according to people’s will. The emergence, development, and extinction of certain production relations unfold with a corresponding evolution of the contradictions of certain productive forces. Therefore, in the study of production relations, Marxist political economy also studies productive forces.
In the overall development of history, if productive forces are revealed to be the major determining factor, does it mean that production relations are entirely passive compared with productive forces? Definitely not. When production relations are compatible with productive forces, they exert an active impetus to the development of productive forces. When production relations become incompatible with productive forces, they will hinder the development of productive forces. As productive forces cannot be developed without changing production relations, the transformation of production relations plays a major determining role. When old China was under the rule of imperialism, feudalism, and bureaucratic capitalism, the landlord and the comprador represented the most reactionary and backward production relation of China. Productive forces were severely restricted and sabotaged. Before liberation, China did not have any machine building industry or any automobile or airplane manufacturing. The annual output of steel was only several hundred thousand tons outside of Northeast China. Even daily necessities were imported. Cloth was called foreign cloth; umbrellas were called foreign umbrellas. Even a tiny nail was called a foreign nail. Under those circumstances, the overthrow of the rule of imperialism, feudalism, and bureaucratic capitalism, the transformation of comprador-feudal production relations, and the establishment of socialist production relations played an important role in promoting the development of productive forces.
Big development of productive forces often occurs after the transformation of production relations. This is a universal law. Big development of productive forces in capitalist society also occurred after the disintegration of feudal production relations induced by the bourgeois revolution and the rapid development of capitalist production relations. Take England, for example, where big development of productive forces occurred on the basis of the bourgeois revolution in the seventeenth century and the Industrial Revolution of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. The modern industries of France, Germany, the United States, and Japan rapidly developed only after the old superstructure and production relations had been transformed in various ways. On the issue of production relations and productive forces, one of the principal aspects of the long struggle between the Marxists and the Soviet revisionists has always been whether one should insist on taking the dialectical unity viewpoint or should expound the reactionary productivity-first viewpoint. Lin Piao, in league with Ch’en Pota, advocated that the major task after the Ninth Party Congress was to develop production. This is a copy of the revisionist fallacy inserted into the Resolution of the Eighth Party Congress by Liu Shaoch’i and Ch’en Pota which pointed out “the contradiction between the advanced socialist system and the backward social productive forces.” In China, socialist production relations are basically compatible with the development of the productive forces. This opens up a new horizon for the development of the productive forces. But it also has its imperfect aspects. And these imperfections contradict the development of the productive forces. The experience of socialist revolution teaches us that it is always the superior socialist system which promotes the development of the productive forces. It is always after the transformation of those parts of production relations which are incompatible with the development of the productive forces that the development of the productive forces is promoted. Where is “the contradiction between the advanced socialist system and the backward social productive forces”? The criminal intent of Liu Shao-ch’i’s, Lin Piao’s, and other similar swindlers’ advocacy of this fallacy was to vainly attempt to use the productivity-first viewpoint as a weapon to oppose the continuing revolution under the proletarian dictatorship and the basic Party policy laid down by Chairman Mao for the socialist stage. This is their impossible dream.
Production relations must be compatible with productive forces. The development of productive forces necessitates the destruction of old production relations which are not compatible with it and their replacement by new production relations which are compatible with its development. But the process of disintegration of old production relations and the appearance of new production relations cannot be a smooth one. The transformation of old production relations and the establishment and perfection of new production relations are often realized only after revolutionary struggles. Therefore, if one wants to understand how old production relations are transformed and new production relations are established and perfected, it is not enough to explain in terms of the contradictions between production relations and productive forces. The relations between the superstructure and the economic substructure must also be investigated.
The superstructure refers to the national government, army, law, and other political systems and their corresponding ideological forms, such as philosophy, literature, and fine arts. The economic substructure is production relations.
“The sum total of these production relations forms the economic substructure of society, the real basis upon which a legal and political superstructure arises and to which definite social forms of consciousness correspond.” 7
This statement by Marx scientifically explains the relation between the superstructure and the economic substructure.
In the contradiction between the superstructure and the economic substructure, the latter, in general, is the determining force. The economic substructure determines the superstructure. With change in the economic substructure, “the whole immense superstructure is slowly or rapidly transformed.” 8 This is to say, the old economic substructure has disintegrated, and the superstructure built upon this foundation must also disintegrate. But the rate of its disintegration varies. When reactionary state machinery has been transformed, the reactionary classes do not willingly bow out of the historical stage with the disappearance of the old economic substructure. They inevitably engage in prolonged and desperate struggle with the advanced classes in the political, ideological, and cultural spheres. In particular, old ideological forms associated with the overthrown classes remain for a long time.
The superstructure is determined by the economic substructure. Once it is established, it has an immense negative effect on the economic substructure. Stalin pointed out, “The substructure creates its superstructure to serve its own establishment and consolidation and to destroy the old substructure and its superstructure.” 9 This explains why the superstructure always serves its economic substructure. The socialist superstructure serves its socialist economic substructure, and the capitalist superstructure serves its capitalist economic substructure.
In capitalist society, with the intensification of the contradictions between the socialization of production and the private ownership of means of production, there is an urgent need to replace capitalist private ownership with socialist public ownership. But the bourgeoisie controls the reactionary state machinery and uses it to maintain the capitalist economic substructure. If the proletariat does not first smash the capitalist state machinery, it is impossible to destroy the capitalist economic system. The new and old revisionists’ claim that “capitalism can peacefully grow into socialism” is all a pack of lies.
In socialist society, the superstructure and the economic substructure are basically compatible. But due to the existence of the bourgeoisie and its ideological forms, some bureaucratic styles of work in the state organs, and defects in certain parts of the state system, the consolidation, perfection, and development of the socialist economic substructure was hindered or undermined. We must make the socialist superstructure better serve the socialist economic substructure. We must firmly grasp the struggle in the superstructure and carry the socialist revolution in the superstructure to the end.
Political economy touches upon the most practical and immediate interests of various classes and strata. It explains the most acute and intense problems of class struggle. Marxist political economy, like Marxist philosophy, publicly proclaims that it is at the service of proletarian politics. Political economy is a science about class struggle.
Political Economy Is the Theoretical Basis for the Party’s Defining the Basic Line
Marxist political economy was born with the appearance of the modern proletariat and the big productive forces — big industries. Marx participated in the class struggles of his time. He used revolutionary materialist dialectics to analyze the capitalist society. He revealed the secrets of how the capitalists exploited the workers and scientifically demonstrated the contradictions between the socialization of production and capitalist ownership. These contradictions were manifested as acute antagonism between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie. With the daily development of capitalist social contradictions, the proletariat, who acted as the gravediggers of the capitalist system, daily strengthened. ‘The knell of capitalist private property will soon be struck. The expropriators will be expropriated.” 10 From this, the revolutionary and scientific conclusion of the inevitable replacement of the capitalist system by the socialist system and the bourgeois dictatorship by the proletarian dictatorship was arrived at. “This conclusion was arrived at by Marx according to the law of economic motion in modern society.” 11 Thus, Marxist political economy, along with Marxist philosophy and scientific socialism, became the theoretical basis for the proletarian political party to formulate its basic policy. On the theoretical basis of Marxism and under capitalist conditions, the proletarian revolutionary leaders formulated for the proletarian party the basic political line of using revolutionary violence to seize political power. They guided the proletariat to struggle for the complete overthrow of the bourgeoisie and all exploiting classes, the replacement of bourgeois dictatorship by proletarian dictatorship, the triumph of socialism over capitalism, and the realization of communism.
In socialist society, Marxist political economy still provides the theoretical basis for the proletarian party‘s formulation of basic lines. Chairman Mao has penetratingly analyzed the contradictions between socialist production relations and productive forces and between the superstructure and the economic substructure and has demonstrated the long duration and complexity of class struggle and line struggle in the socialist period.
On this theoretical basis, he further formulated the basic line for our Party for the entire socialist stage. This basic line tells us:
“Socialist society covers a considerably long historical period. Throughout this historical period, there are classes, class contradictions, and class struggle, there is the struggle between the socialist road and the capitalist road, there is the danger of capitalist restoration, and there is the threat of subversion and aggression by imperialism and social imperialism. These contradictions can be resolved only by depending on the theory of continued revolution under the dictatorship of the proletariat and on practice under its guidance.” 12
The Party’s basic line guides the Chinese people to persist in continuing revolution under the proletarian dictatorship, to struggle for the consolidation of the proletarian dictatorship, the prevention of capitalist restoration, and the building of socialism, and to struggle for the great ideal of worldwide realization of communism.
The basic task of socialist political economy is to study and illustrate the law of transformation from socialist production relations to communist production relations. Some understanding of political economy helps us to understand the objective law of socialist economic motion and the inevitability of the association, distinction, and development of various production relations. This will increase our understanding of the Party’s basic line and elevate our awareness about implementing it.
It is of fundamental importance to insist on the Party’s basic line. It is simply “to carry out Marxism, not revisionism.” To carry out Marxism, we must first learn Marxism. To oppose revisionism, we must be able to tell what revisionism is. But Marxism consists of philosophy, political economy, and scientific socialism. If we want to understand Marxism, we must seriously study Marxist philosophy and scientific socialism, but we must also seriously study Marxist political economy.
Marxist political economy is in opposition to all bourgeois and revisionist political economy, and it developed from the process of challenging bourgeois and revisionist political economy. Learning Marxist political economy helps to distinguish between Marxism and revisionism, between socialism and capitalism, and between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie. It will also correct tendencies toward deviation and elevate our ideological awareness.
In summary, we must study some political economy if we want to overcome anti-Party, anti-Marxist thinking, better carry through the Party’s basic line for the socialist stage, more penetratingly unfold the criticism of Lin Piao and the rectification of the style of work, and score new and greater victories in the great socialist revolution and socialist enterprise.
Combine Theory with Practice to Learn Political Economy Well
Political economy is a demonstration and application of dialectical materialism and historical materialism. To learn political economy, we must follow the guidance of dialectical materialism and historical materialism.
“The dialectical method attempts to understand every set pattern through its continuous motion and its temporary nature. It does not worship anything, and it is critical and revolutionary in nature.” 13
This proletarian world outlook is in direct opposition to idealism and metaphysics. Only after we fully appreciate dialectical materialism and historical materialism and use them to observe and analyze the law of motion in capitalist society and economy can we understand why capitalism is bound to perish and socialism will triumph. And only when we use them to observe and analyze the law of motion in socialist society and economy can we understand the duration and complexity of class struggle and line struggle in socialist society, and only then can we understand the general tendency of development from socialism to communism and why it cannot be averted by human will. This will strengthen our faith to struggle for the ultimate victory of the communist enterprise with full determination and without fear of sacrifice and difficulties.
To study political economy, we must insist on the revolutionary style of learning, which combines theory with practice. Chairman Mao teaches us:
“We must thoroughly know Marxist theory and be able to apply it. The purpose of thoroughly knowing it lies in applying it.” 14
To combine theory and practice is a question of revolutionary discipline and a question of the nature of the Party. We must combine the study of political economy with the criticism of modern revisionism, with the criticism of the reactionary fallacies peddled by Liu Shaoch’i, Lin Piao, and similar swindlers, with the Three Great Revolutionary Practices of class struggle, production struggle, and scientific experiment, and with the transformation of the world outlook.
“Marxist philosophy considers that the most important question is not being able to explain the world through an understanding of the laws of the objective world, but being able to use this understanding to transform the world.” 15
Is it difficult to learn Marxist political economy? Yes. In the preface to the first edition of Capital. Marx said: “Everything starts out difficult. Every science is this way.” In the concrete analysis of objective phenomena, Marxist political economy penetrates the surface, grasps the essence, and undertakes scientific abstraction. Thus, when we start, we often come across some terms and concepts which are difficult to understand. But Marxist political economy was written for the proletariat and talked about proletarian revolution. If only we seriously study it, we can understand it gradually.
“‘There are no difficult things, only people without sufficient resolve.’ If it is not difficult to start, it is also feasible to do advanced study. All that is needed is the determination and the ability to learn.” 16
Marx once pointed out:
“There is no smooth path in science. Only those who are not afraid of climbing the steep mountain paths can expect to reach the summit of brilliance.” 17
Proletarian revolutionary leaders spent their whole lives establishing and developing Marxist theory. Following their shining examples and diligently reading works by Marx, Lenin, and Chairman Mao, we should struggle to study for the mastery of this Marxist theoretical weapon, for the socialist revolution and the socialist construction enterprise, and for the worldwide realization of communism.
Major Study References
Marx, “Introduction to A Critique of Political Economy.” Engels, Anti Dühring, Part 2, Chapter 1.
Lenin, Karl Marx (“Marx’s Economic Theories”).
Chairman Mao, “On Contradiction,” Section 4.
Chairman Mao, “On the Correct Handling of the Contradictions among the People,” Section 1.
Review Problems
- Why is political economy a science of class struggle?
- Why do we say that Marxist political economy is an important theoretical basis for the Party’s basic line?
- How can one learn political economy well?
17 Footnotes
