But individual Marxists don’t need to conform to the party line. And do the party lines explicitly call out China as socialist, or is that your interpretation from other tenants? Could you link a section?
“Individual Marxists” is a bit of an error. Marxism is a social theory, and posits that in order to truly know something you must put it to practice. The opinion of a Marxist that does not organize is generally inferior to one who does, because organizing informs truths about application of theory to practice. Either way, here is FRSO celebrating the PRC as a quick example.
The vast majority of Marxists globally see the PRC as Socialist.
That sounds like you’re taking about the vast majority of individual Marxists, not the majority of Marxist parties. If you meant that, I would recommend rephrasing to say
The vast majority of Marxist parties globally see the PRC as Socialist.
I can’t speak for every party adhering to this perfectly, but Marxist-Leninists are Democratic Centralists, ie diversity of discussion, Unity in Action. In most cases, the Party Lines are decided either through direct democracy or through elected Cadre discussing it openly and the party adopting it as such. The concept of an unaccountable leadership is antithetical to Marxism-Leninism, ergo it is reasonable to assume that party members side with the party line, otherwise they wouldn’t be a part of the org.
The article you linked as a demonstration of the party line looks like it was only one person’s editorial, Mick Kelly. Could you link something that was democracy decided?
Here’s the Party Program. At this point, though, you appear to be trying to find semantical holes, rather than acknowledging that official statements by the party are agreed upon by the party.
To me it’s fascinating seeing people in the US try to act like ‘democracy’ is their highest value when the US and liberal manifestations of ‘democracy’ are often manifestly antidemocratic. I can see a line of argument from an anarchist angle about the lack of total consensus and tyranny of the majority, but in practice some of the most oppressed groups in China are going to be newly wealthy businesses owners who are unable to translate their wealth into political power -something which would be ultimately antidemocratic, but normal under liberal ‘democracy’.
But individual Marxists don’t need to conform to the party line. And do the party lines explicitly call out China as socialist, or is that your interpretation from other tenants? Could you link a section?
“Individual Marxists” is a bit of an error. Marxism is a social theory, and posits that in order to truly know something you must put it to practice. The opinion of a Marxist that does not organize is generally inferior to one who does, because organizing informs truths about application of theory to practice. Either way, here is FRSO celebrating the PRC as a quick example.
That sounds like you’re taking about the vast majority of individual Marxists, not the majority of Marxist parties. If you meant that, I would recommend rephrasing to say
Parties are made up of people, so yes, the vast majority of individual Marxists hold that opinion, indicated by party lines. This is semantics.
Are the party lines decided democratically? The. I’d agree with you.
I can’t speak for every party adhering to this perfectly, but Marxist-Leninists are Democratic Centralists, ie diversity of discussion, Unity in Action. In most cases, the Party Lines are decided either through direct democracy or through elected Cadre discussing it openly and the party adopting it as such. The concept of an unaccountable leadership is antithetical to Marxism-Leninism, ergo it is reasonable to assume that party members side with the party line, otherwise they wouldn’t be a part of the org.
The article you linked as a demonstration of the party line looks like it was only one person’s editorial, Mick Kelly. Could you link something that was democracy decided?
Here’s the Party Program. At this point, though, you appear to be trying to find semantical holes, rather than acknowledging that official statements by the party are agreed upon by the party.
To me it’s fascinating seeing people in the US try to act like ‘democracy’ is their highest value when the US and liberal manifestations of ‘democracy’ are often manifestly antidemocratic. I can see a line of argument from an anarchist angle about the lack of total consensus and tyranny of the majority, but in practice some of the most oppressed groups in China are going to be newly wealthy businesses owners who are unable to translate their wealth into political power -something which would be ultimately antidemocratic, but normal under liberal ‘democracy’.