The main points of the `Resolution on Some Ideological Issues’ adopted at the CPI(M) Central Committee Meeting, January 17-20, 2012 at Kolkata for consideration of the 20th Congress being held in Kozhikode, April 4-9, 2012 are reproduced below for information and discussion:
This Resolution has been prepared and adopted by the Central Committee under the direction of the CPI(M) 19th Congress (Coimbatore, 2008). The 18th Congress (New Delhi, 2005) had decided that there was a need for the Party to scientifically assess the current developments taking place under imperialist globalization and its impact on India. This is important to meet the ideological challenges that these developments are posing for the advance of the revolutionary struggle for people’s democracy and socialism in India.
Accordingly, this Resolution places the CPI(M)’s analysis and understanding of the present world situation under imperialist globalization and concludes: “Thus, imperialism’s quest for global hegemony is the fountainhead that continues to deny humanity its complete emancipation, liberation and progress.”
Further, the Resolution underlines that “Under these circumstances, particularly when fast moving developments continue to take ¬place, it is imperative that we strengthen our revolutionary resolve through a scientific Marxist-Leninist analysis of the ideological issues and challenges thrown up by these developments, with the singular aim of strengthening the class struggles for human liberation.”
Analysing the working of imperialism in this era of globalization, the Resolution notes that during the last two decades of the end of the Cold War, when the international correlation of forces moved in favour of imperialism following the dismantling of the USSR and the socialist countries in Eastern Europe, imperialism unleashed an all-round offensive – political, economic, military, cultural and ideological – to strengthen its global hegemony.
The emergence of international finance capital following unprecedented huge levels of capital accumulation unleashed a new re-ordering of the world economic order. This is to further facilitate profit maximization – the raison d’tre of capitalism. By virtually drawing all the countries of the world into its vortex, imperialist globalization under the dictates of international finance capital pressurizes all countries to remove all restrictions for the flow of this capital in its pursuit of profit maximization. The consequent package of economic reforms include financial liberalization, the prising open of the markets of independent countries through trade liberalization, the privatization of State-owned assets, the conversion of public utilities (electricity, water, sanitation, civic amenities etc) and services (education, health etc) into areas of profit generation. Neo-liberalism is the ideological and theoretical construct that defines such reforms.
Such a process of gigantic accumulation under the leadership of international finance capital is generating deep crisis imposing unprecedented burdens on the vast majority of world’s population. In the efforts to resolve one crisis, the seeds of a more intense crisis are being sown. The global financial meltdown caused by the sub-prime credit crisis was sought to be overcome through humongous bailout packages to resurrect those very financial giants who caused the crisis in the first place. This resulted in converting corporate bankruptcies into sovereign bankruptcies. This, in turn, is being sought to be solved through the reduction in government expenditures by imposing `austerity measures’ and drastically reducing social sector expenditures that are mounting further economic onslaughts on the people. This, in turn, is leading to a further contraction of the purchasing power in the hands of the people, sowing the seeds of a deeper crisis of double-dip global recession that is, today, looming large.
These developments confirm the Marxist prognosis that the true and complete liberation of humanity from such exploitation can come only with the establishment of socialism. Rising Protests
The Resolution notes that the protests against such predatory capitalist exploitation are on the rise globally. “This is sharply expressed in today’s world situation particularly in Latin America. Such rising struggles are also growing in other parts of the world as seen in the Occupy Wall Street movement and notably in Europe against the imperialist neo-liberal globalization onslaughts on the livelihood of the people, that have sharply intensified in the current global capitalist crisis and recession. These rising struggles against the erosion of the livelihood standards of the working class and other exploited sections of the people constitute the foundations for consolidating and advancing revolutionary struggles in the future.”
Assessing the developments of the rising number of the Left, progressive anti-neo-liberal democratically elected governments in Latin America, the Resolution notes: “Left-wing coalitions, including Communist parties, that have emerged in these countries are providing an alternative to imperialist globalization and neo-liberalism within capitalism.”
The Resolution notes the firm anti-imperialist footing on which the current governments in Venezuela, Bolivia and Ecuador stand. These countries, along with socialist Cuba, had taken the leadership in forming a confederation of the countries in the South American continent, as an alternative to strengthen the struggles against US imperialism’s efforts to impose neo-liberal policies and intensify exploitation in the continent. The Resolution, thus, notes: “These popular forces today constitute an important element in strengthening the worldwide struggle against imperialist globalization. They are also an important element in uniting the anti-war, anti-imperialist, anti-military aggression and interventions movements with the movements against globalization. It is this unity that needs to be built into a powerful global anti-imperialist movement which will have the potential for a future revolutionary transformation.”
Reforms in Socialist Countries
The Resolution examines the process of reforms initiated by the socialist countries. The People’s Republic of China had initiated such reforms since 1978 while Vietnam and Cuba had embarked on a similar course in the 1990s followed later by North Korea.
The Resolution sums up its analysis and evaluation of the reform process in China by stating: “During these three decades of reforms China has made tremendous strides in the development of productive forces and economic growth. A consistent 10 per cent plus growth rate on the average over a period of three decades is unprecedented in the entire history of capitalism for any country. However, this very process has clearly brought to the fore adverse changes in production relations and therefore in social relations in China today. How successfully these contradictions are dealt with and how they are resolved will determine the future course in China.”
While defining the outline of the CPI(M)’s understanding of what socialism in Indian conditions mean (Para 8.3), the Resolution deals with the current anti-Marxist reactionary ideological challenges that need to be frontally confronted to advance the Indian people’s struggle for liberation by establishing socialism.
Indian Conditions: Certain Concrete Issues
The Resolution states that : “In Indian conditions, our task to strengthen our revolutionary advance …. requires the unleashing of powerful mass and popular struggles to sharpen the class struggle in our society in the concrete conditions in which we exist.”
In order to achieve this, the Resolution details the CPI(M)’s programmatic understanding of combining parliamentary and extra parliamentary forms of struggle, “…work in the parliamentary forums is to be utilised to strengthen the mass movements. Parliamentary work should be combined with extra-parliamentary activities and struggles to develop a powerful movement to build an alternative to the existing bourgeois-landlord order”, while warning against guarding from deviations that either neglect extra parliamentary struggles or negate the role of parliamentary struggles.
Unity of Working Class and Forging Worker-Peasant Alliance
The Resolution analyses the concrete conditions in which the CPI(M) must strengthen the unity of the working class and moves towards building an effective worker-peasant alliance.
Caste Based Political Mobilisation
The Resolution also analyses concretely the challenges posed by identity politics and the activities of foreign-funded NGOs, particularly the challenges posed by identity politics based on political mobilization of caste. The Resolution underlines: “The CPI(M) stand is based on the recognition that there is both class exploitation and social oppression in society. Given the socio-economic formation in our country, class exploitation both capitalist and semi-feudal exists along with various forms of social oppression based on caste, race and gender. The ruling classes extract surplus through class exploitation and for the maintenance of their hegemony they utilise the various forms of social oppression. Hence the struggle against both forms of exploitation and oppression should be conducted simultaneously.”
Communalism
The Resolution notes : “It is in this context that the struggle against communalism and all other expressions of religious fundamentalism will have to be seen. Apart from disrupting and weakening the secular democratic foundations of modern India (like the RSS vision of a rabidly intolerant fascistic ‘Hindu Rashtra’), the foundations that largely facilitate the exercise of democratic rights which is an important pre-condition for the advance of our class mobilization, these forces directly disrupt the unity of the working class and the exploited sections by rousing communal passions exploiting the religious appeal amongst our people. Hence, without a firm struggle to defeat communalism, the revolutionary advance in our country will not be possible.”
Gender, Regional and Ethnic Identities The Resolution also underlines the need to strengthen the “struggle against gender inequality and oppression in all its manifestations”. Further, the Resolution deals with the new challenges that are being mounted through mobilizations based on numerous regional and ethnic identities, while championing the struggles against “genuine oppression and discrimination” on these grounds. Conclusion
It is on the basis of confronting and overcoming such concrete challenges, the CPI(M) reiterates its resolve to “carry forward its revolutionary tasks and mobilise all the exploited sections of the Indian people in order to change the current correlation of class forces amongst our people and mount the revolutionary offensive for the establishment of people’s democracy and, on its foundations, socialism – the only basis for human liberation and emancipation”. (Courtsey: Ganashakti)
