A number of months ago I discussed in an article some conceptual weaknesses in the study of Chinese Communism. To illustrate my point, I briefly reviewed the “Maoist” thesis—the claim that Mao Tse-tung, in 1927 and subsequently, violated basic principles of orthodox Marxist-Leninist Communism.

¹New Leader, issue of07 22/27,1959, New YorkGoogle Scholar. I am indebted to theNew Leader for permitting me to reproduce parts of this article here.

² See, for instance,Tang,Peter S. H., “Stalin's Role in the Communist Victory in China,”American Slavic and East European ReviewXIII, No.3 (101954), pp.375–388CrossRefGoogle Scholar;idem,Communist China Today (New York: Frederick A. Praeger,1957), p.74 et seq.Google Scholar;Walker,Richard L.,China Under Communism: The First Five Years (New Haven:Yale University Press,1955), pp.20,153Google Scholar;ibid.,The Continuing Struggle. Communist China and the Free World (New York: Athene Press, Inc.),1958, p.110Google Scholar;Michael,Franz H. andTaylor,George E.,The Far East in the Modern World (New York:Henry Holt & Co.,1956), p.414Google Scholaret seq.;Wittfogel,Karl A., “The Influence of Leninism-Stalinism on China,”Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science (091951), p.28Google Scholaret seq. (hereafter cited as Wittfogel 1951);ibid.,“The Communist Strategy in Asia,” theNew Leader,02 15,1954Google Scholar (hereafter cited asWittfogel,1954)Google Scholar;ibid., “Short History of Chinese Communism,” inHandbook on China, edited by Hellmut Wilhelm under commission from The Human Relations Area Files for the United States Army, Chap. V, A (MS. hereafter cited as Short History);ibid.,Oriental Despotism (New Haven: Yale University Press,1957), p.442Google Scholar (hereafter cited as Wittfogel 1957);ibid.,“Die Bauern,” Chap. 11 ofHandbuch des Welt-Kommunismus (Freiburg/München: Karl Alber—American edition to be published soon by Frederick A. Praeger),1958, p.456et seq.Google Scholar

³Lattimore,Owen,Solution in Asia (Boston:Little, Brown & Co.,1957), p.108Google Scholar;Isaacs,Harold R.,The Tragedy of the Chinese Revolution (London:Seeker & Warburg,1938), p.404Google Scholar (hereafter cited as Isaacs 1938). Isaacs elaborated the Trotskyist view, about which see more below.

⁴Schwartz,Benjamin I.,Chinese Communism and the Rise of Mao (Cambridge:Harvard University Press,1951)Google Scholar, Acknowledgments (hereafter cited as Schwartz 1951).

⁵Brandt,Conrad,Schwartz,Benjamin andFairbank,John K.,A Documentary History of Chinese Communism (Cambridge:Harvard University Press,1952), p.27CrossRefGoogle Scholar (hereafter cited asDocumentary History).

⁶Documentary History, p.27.Google Scholar

⁷Fairbank,John King,The United States and China (Cambridge:Harvard University Press,1948), p.260et seq.Google Scholar

⁸Schwartz,1951:76.Google Scholar

⁹Op. cit. p. 75.

¹⁰Op. cit. p. 77et seq.

¹¹Op. cit. p. 191.

¹²Op. cit. p. 199.

¹³Documentary History, p.77.Google Scholar

¹⁴Op. cit. p. 79.

¹⁵Schwartz,1951, p.76.Google Scholar

¹⁶Op. cit. p. 78. Italics in original.

¹⁷Schwartz,1951, p.118Google Scholar;Documentary History, p.79.Google Scholar

¹⁸ See Short History,passim.

¹⁹Marx,Karl,Der achtzehnte Brumaire des Louis Bonaparte (Stuttgart:J. H. Dietz,1920), p.102.Google Scholar

²⁰Manifesto,Communist,Marx,Karl andEngels,Friedrich,Historisch-Kritische Gesamtausgabe, Werke-Schriften-Briefe (Moscow:Marx-Engels-Lenin Institute,1927et seq.) I, 6, p.535 (hereafter cited as MEGA).Google Scholar

²¹ See,e.g., his letter toEngels, of07 27,1854Google Scholar (MEGAIII, 2, p.47).Google Scholar

²² As the mainnational-revolutionary element he mentioned the Poles. SeeEngels,Friedrich, “IV: Soziales aus Russland (Volksstaat, 1875),” inInternationales aus dem Volksstaat (1871–1875) (Berlin, 1894), p.48.Google Scholar

²³Engels,Frederick,Socialism. Utopian and Scientific, translated byAveling,Edward (New York:International Publishers,1935), p.18.Google Scholar

²⁴MEGAIII, 2, p.131Google Scholaret seq. Marx wrote the italicised words in English in the otherwise German letter.

²⁵ In 1908 Lenin approvingly and at length cited Engels idea that in the three great bourgeois revolutions the peasants had provided the fighting army (Lenin,W. I.,Sämtliche Werke (Wien-Berlin, Moscow-Leningrad), Vol.XII, p.254Google Scholar (hereafter cited as Lenin, SWG). In 1914, he reproduced Marx' 1856 notion about the dependence of a successful German proletarian revolution on a second edition of the peasant war (Lenin,V. I.,Selected Works,12 vols. [New York:International Publishers],1943et seq., Vol. XI, p.40 [hereafter cited as Lenin, SW]).Google Scholar

²⁶Marx,Karl andEngels,Frederick,Selected Works,2 vols. (Moscow:Foreign Languages Publishing House,1951), Vol. II, p.392et seq.Google Scholar

²⁷ See his reference to Engels' “anti-Semite” formula in the discussion of the first agrarian programme of the Russian Social-Democrats in 1902 (Lenin,, SWGV, p.40Google Scholar;cf. p. 125 and IV, 1, p. 115).

²⁸Lenin,, SWGVIII, p.349.Google Scholar

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³⁰Lenin,, SWGVII, p.379.Google Scholar

³¹ SeeLenin,, SWGVIII, pp.516Google Scholaret seq., 559, 657;ibid.,Werke, (Berlin: J. H. Dietz). (Vol.X:111905–061906), 1958. Vol. X, p.76 (hereafter cited as Lenin, Werke).Google Scholar

³²Lenin,, WerkeX, pp.161et seq., 169, 188.Google Scholar

³³Lenin,, SWIII, p.258.Google Scholar

³⁴Lenin,, SWGXII, p.361.Google Scholar

³⁵Lenin,, SWGXX, 1, pp.4,25 andpassim.Google Scholar

³⁶Lenin,, SWGXX, 1, pp.108,117,527Google Scholar; XX, 2, pp. 9, 11et seq., 24et seq., 29et seq.

³⁷Lenin,, SWGXXI, pp.140Google Scholaret seq., 146, 175 andpassim; XXII, p. 20et seq.

³⁸ See below.

³⁹Lenin,, SWGXXV, p.336et seq.Google Scholar

⁴⁰Lenin,V. I.,The National Liberation Movement in the East (Moscow:Foreign Languages Publishing House,1957), p.234 (hereafter cited as Lenin 1957).Google Scholar

⁴¹Lenin,, SWGIV, 2, pp.159et seq., 169et seq., 251, 254, 276.Google Scholar

⁴²Lenin,, SWX, p.240Google Scholaret seq.

⁴³Lenin,, SWX, p.237. Italics mine.Google Scholar

⁴⁴Lenin,, SWX, p.241.Google Scholar

⁴⁵Lenin,, SWX, p.243.Google Scholar

⁴⁶Schwartz,1951, p.192Google Scholar;cf. p. 119et seq.

⁴⁷Schwartz,1951, p.196.Google Scholar

⁴⁸ In this context, obviously: Communist-led thought and activity.

⁴⁹Lenin,, SWX, p.242Google Scholar. Italics mine.

⁵⁰ For the doctrinal problems connected with the Communist use of the term “feudal,” seeWittfogel,1957, p.379et seq.Google Scholar

⁵¹Lenin,, SWX, p.242Google Scholar. Italics mine.

⁵²Lenin,, SWX, p.242Google Scholaret seq.

⁵³Lenin,, SWX, p.240.Google Scholar

⁵⁴Lenin,, SWGXXV, p.691.Google Scholar

⁵⁵Lenin,, SWGXXV, p.692. Italics mine.Google Scholar

⁵⁶Lenin, SWX, p.240.Google Scholar

⁵⁷Lenin,, SWX, p.198.Google Scholar

⁵⁸Lenin,, SWX, pp.239,241–243.Google Scholar

⁵⁹(Pervyi)S'ezd narodov Vostoka, Baku, September 1–8, 1920 (1st Congress of the Peoples of the East, Baku,1920)Google Scholar.Stenographic reports (Petrograd: Communist International Publishers,1920), 2nd ed., p.191.Google Scholar

⁶⁰Ibid. p. 15 (Zinoviev), p. 178 (Bela Kun), p. 186 (Skachko).

⁶¹Ibid. p. 13 (Zinoviev).

⁶²Ibid. pp. 178, 184, 194.

⁶³Ibid. pp. 13, 184.

⁶⁴Ibid. p. 13. Meaning obviously: the Communist Parties of these areas.

⁶⁵Ibid. pp. 195, 198.Cf.Lenin,, SWX, p.242.Google Scholar

⁶⁶Ibid. p. 185.

⁶⁷Ibid. p. 179.

⁶⁸Ibid. p. 178. Italics mine.

⁶⁹Baku Congress reports, p.185.Google Scholar

⁷⁰Degras,Jane,The Communist International 1919–1943. Documents, selected and edited byDegras,Jane, Vol.I:1919–1922 (London:Oxford University Press,1956), p.105.Google Scholar

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⁷²Pipes,Richard,The Formation of the Soviet Union. Communism and Nationalism. 1917–1923 (Cambridge:Harvard University Press,1954), pp.184,238Google Scholaret seq., 232et seq.

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⁷⁶Schwartz,,1951, p.30Google Scholar;Documentary History, p.67.Google Scholar

⁷⁷ Schwartz's remark about Lenin's alleged “speculation” appears to be an afterthought that has not affected the substance of his and his colleagues' argument.

⁷⁸ In November 1926, Bukharin referred to China as a peasant country in Lenin's sense of the term; and he cited Lenin's argument of the three steps of Communist policy in such countries, the organisation of peasant soviets being the second step (International Press Correspondence. English ed. [Vienna/London,1921–1928] 1926, p.1471Google Scholar [hereafter cited asInprecor]).

⁷⁹ Mif, one of the authors of the draft resolution on the Chinese situation, seems to have proposed that the slogan of peasant soviets in the countryside be proclaimed immediately and without waiting for a corresponding development in the industrial centres. Mif's idea was rejected byStalin, in his speech on11 30,1926Google Scholar (Inprecor1926, p.1583).Google Scholar

⁸⁰Stalin,J.,Works,13 vols. (Moscow:Foreign Languages Publishing House1952–1955), Vol. VIII, p.384.Google Scholar

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⁸³Inprecor1930, p.1065Google Scholar. Italics in original. Manuilsky wrote this in an article“On the Threshold of the Fourteenth Year,” published inPravda on11 7,1930.Google Scholar

⁸⁴Inprecor1930, p.439.Google Scholar

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⁸⁷Trotzki,L.,Die Russische Revolution 1905 (Berlin:Vereinigung Internationaler Verlagsanstalten,1923), p.230et seq.Google Scholar

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