79

p In examining Maoist philosophy we are forced to consider basic question of all philosophy—the relationship between being and thinking. Marx and Engels, in their study of the history of philosophy, showed that "the great basic question of all philosophy, especially of more recent philosophy, is that concerning the relation of thinking and being".  [79•1  Lenin, commenting on Engels’ development of this idea, wrote: "In his Ludwig Feuerbach, Engels declares that the fundamental philosophical trends are materialism and idealism. Materialism regards nature as primary and spirit as secondary; it places being first and thought second. Idealism holds the contrary view.”  [79•2 

p If we compare Mao Tse-tung’s statements with the statements of the classics of Marxism-Leninism, we might well conclude that Mao simply repeats in his own words various Marxist-Leninist propositions, i.e., that the only difference lies in the manner in which they are expressed. Thus, we can find any number of statements in Mao’s works that appear to adhere to the Marxist interpretation of the basic question of philosophy. Let us examine two such statements: "The source of all knowledge lies in the perception through man’s physical sense organs of the objective world surrounding him... .”  [79•3  "People’s social being determines their ideology."  [79•4 

p In his Dialectical Materialism, which we have already had occasion to mention, Mao Tse-tung repeats, practically word for word, whole passages from Mitin’s Dialectical and Historical Materialism, published in the USSR in 1933. "The whole history of philosophy is the history of the struggle and development of two mutually opposed schools of philosophy, idealism and materialism.”  [79•5  Although Mao goes on to misinterpret the causes of idealism, we nonetheless have this direct admission of the division of philosophy into two 80 camps. He makes an equally open declaration of his support for dialectical materialism. "Wherein lies the main difference between idealism and materialism? It lies in the opposite answer they give to the basic question of philosophy, that of the relationship between spirit and matter ( consciousness and being).

p “Idealism regards spirit (consciousness, concepts, the subject) as the source of all that exists in the world, and matter (nature and society) as secondary and subordinate. Materialism recognises the independent existence of matter as detached from spirit and considers spirit as secondary and subordinate. The opposite answers to this question are the point of departure of the divergence of views on all other questions.”  [80•1 

p Leaving aside Mao’s oversimplification of such a complicated question, it must be said that the answer he gives is ostensibly materialist.

p If we were to judge the above statements at their face value, we should be bound to consider Mao Tse-tung a supporter of dialectical materialism, attribute his errors and false propositions to inconsistency, making allowance for oversimplification on the grounds that it is perhaps inevitable when attempting to present the subject in simple terms that will be comprehensible to all.

p In actual fact, however, this is not the case. Maoist philosophy merely masquerades as dialectical materialism, borrowing Marxist-Leninist terminology for the purpose.

p Mao needed the thesis that matter is primary and spirit secondary, and that the objective world is the source of perception in order to add weight to his claim to be an orthodox Marxist. In fact there is no substance to these empty declarations. Moreover, by framing his own ideas in the law that "people’s social life determines their ideas" and materialising them (every Chinese is having it drummed into him, day in, day out, that Mao Tse-tung’s Thought is the be all and end all, the all-determining factor) Mao, aided and abetted by his followers, is in fact departing from the Marxist answer to the basic question of philosophy. It must be said that Mao’s followers are far more frank in expounding their views than Mao himself.

81

p The text-book Dialectical Materialism, published by the People’s University in 1961, did, it is true, cite Engels’ answer to the basic question of philosophy. However, the authors immediately substituted the question of the relationship beIwcen subject and object, between subjective and objective, for the original question of the relationship between mind and matter. "The basic question of philosophy is by no means a question of pure theory, it is the basic question of cognising and transforming the surrounding world. Essentially, it is the question of the connection between subjective and objective. The process of cognisance of the world consists in the reilection of being in thinking, in the reflection of the objective in the subjective; the process of transforming the world involves the application of thinking to being, in the subjective’s view of the objective.”  [81•1  Further on they write: "The question of what is primary—the subjective or the objective—is the only criterion for differentiation between materialism and idealism; there can be no other criteria.”  [81•2 

p The substitution of object for matter and the replacement of the relationship between mind and matter by the relationship between subjective and objective is designed to mask Mao Tse-tung’s subjective idealism and eclecticism. In this way the authors erase the distinction between idealism and materialism, for Hegel and the Neo-Thomists also accept the existence of objective reality outside, and independent of, the mind. Besides, the concept of object is by no means limited to the sphere of matter. An object may be of a material or an ideal nature.

p This interpretation of the question, no matter how much it is qualified, makes the object dependent on, and conditioned by the subject. The Maoists’ revision of the Marxist interpretation of the basic question of philosophy is the point of departure of their subjective idealism, their doctrinairism in philosophy and petty-bourgeois revolutionarism in politics.

p The Peking leaders extrapolate from this theory that the transformation of the "objective world" is conditional upon 82 the transformation of the "subjective world”, which is a return to pre-Marxian historical idealism. Mao Tse-tung himself is not so explicit on this point, although he applies it in practice, accepting the primacy of the ideological- political factor over material, economic factors.

p Mao Tse-tung divorces Marx’s thesis that theory can become a material force when it takes hold of the masses from its original context and combines it with his own “thought” that "the Chinese people is a clean sheet of paper”, on which "the newest and most beautiful words can be written" and "the newest and most beautiful pictures can be painted".  [82•1 

p In "On Contradiction”, Mao tries to conceal his subjectivism by emphasising "the reaction of spiritual things on material things”. "... We recognise that in the development of history as a whole it is material things that determine spiritual things and social existence that determines social consciousness, at the same time we also recognise and must recognise the reaction of spiritual things and social consciousness on social existence, and the reaction of the superstructure on the economic foundation.”  [82•2 

p Note how the assertion of the primacy of material, social existence is related not to real present-day existence but to history, to the abstract "development of history as a whole”, thereby justifying subjectivism in every-day political practice.

p Indeed, Mao Tse-tung’s next step in justifying his subjectivism was to refer to the thesis that the ideal is frequently the decisive factor of development in concrete reality. It is as a supplement to this thesis that we have the idea of likening the consciousness of the masses to tabula rasa which can be used as the leader sees fit.

p With their voluntarist interpretation of the thesis that "the material can be transformed into the spiritual and the spiritual into the material”, Mao Tse-tung and his supporters are apparently suggesting that any ideas can be imposed upon society. Hence the preposterous lengths that are gone to to try and impose "Mao Tse-tung’s Thought”.

p Discussing Mao’s ideas on the role of the subjective factor, 83 the authors of the text-book Dialectical Materialism adopt a patently subjective-idealist standpoint. Thus, ".. .the transformation of the world involves a double task: the transformation of the objective world and the transformation of the subjective world".  [83•1  We are told that Mao Tse-tung " creatively developed the principle of the transformation of the subjective world... stressed the tremendous importance of the transformation of the subjective world, political education and the use of politics as a decisive force".  [83•2 

p “. . .Before transforming the objective world it is necessary to transform the subjective world, that is, to transform people’s ability to understand the objective world, and transform the relations between the subjective world and the objective world.”  [83•3  Here the authors are breaking up the compound process of the transformation of man and society and putting the cart before the horse. They are suggesting that the transformation of society and the implementation of revolution must begin with the transformation of man, the transformation of his subjective world, a view which stands in complete contradiction to the Marxist-Leninist principles of historical materialism.

p Mao Tse-tung is suggesting that the new man must be created outside the historical conditions in which he lives, and that then this "new man-idea" will transform all social relations and subdue nature according to his own ideal model.

p The subjective side of man’s activity is absolutised and fetishised, made the main, decisive factor, while the objective side of development, the material conditions in which this process takes place are either declared to be "secondary causes"  [83•4  or ignored altogether.

p Maoism thus regards politics, ideas, subjective activity, to be the decisive factor of social development, which means that while paying lip service to dialectical materialism and formally accepting the thesis of the primacy of matter and social being, in practice it treats spiritual things, the ideal, etc., as the primary factor, thereby adopting what is essentially an idealist standpoint. Then, in order to mask this 84 subjective-idealist approach to the second side of the basic question of philosophy, namely the problem of the relationship between our knowledge of the world and the objective world, the Maoists substitute the question of the relationship between subject and object for the question of the relation of mind and matter, and the identity of subjective and objective for the identity of thinking and being. Moreover, their treatment of this identity is mechanistic and vulgar. The Maoists are in fact deducing reality from "Mao Tsetung’s Thought”, attempting to construct reality according to their own abstract patterns. Lenin’s remark that "People repeat slogans, words, war cries, but are afraid to analyse objective reality"  [84•1  fits the Maoists like a glove.

p While on the subject, it would be a pity to overlook two further Maoist “contributions” to the basic question of philosophy.

p As though aware of their vulnerability in trying to present "Mao Tse-tung’s Thought" in materialist garb, the Maoists provide their own “supplement” to the basic question. They hold that in addition to the sides to the basic question mentioned by Engels there is yet another side, the question of the relationship between metaphysics and dialectics. This attempt to supplement the basic question of philosophy was already implicit in Mao’s course of lectures "Dialectical Materialism”. In the text-book we have been discussing, however, it is quite explicit. "The opposition of outlook between materialism and idealism and their differences also comprise the opposition between dialectics and metaphysics.”  [84•2 

p There is nothing wrong with the assertion that philosophical views can be divided into metaphysical and dialectical. But it is absurd to suggest that this division corresponds to the division of philosophy into materialist and idealist schools. History is full of examples of materialists who were metaphysicians and idealists who were dialecticians.

p The Maoists ignore this. "If we approach this question (the question of opposition between metaphysics and dialectics) as the basic question, then rejection of contradictions, refusal to analyse and resolve contradictions, will inevitably lead to our being unable to consistently base ourselves on 85 objective reality, gain a correct understanding of the world and transform it, and to completely, scientifically solve the question of the relationship between thinking and being.”  [85•1 

p This “supplement” enables the Maoists to follow the principle of all political charlatans. Whoever disagrees with Chairman Mao’s “dialectics” is a metaphysician and thus automatically an idealist, and hence a counter-revolutionary, a member of the "black gang”, and it is immediately asked what sort of head he has, a man’s or a dog’s.

p The second Maoist “supplement” to the basic question of philosophy involves the concept of philosophy as a specific form of social consciousness and its role in the general progress of mankind.

p Marxism-Leninism regards philosophy in terms of world view, as a science that reveals the more general laws of development of nature, society and human knowledge. The founders of Marxism stressed the connection between Marxist philosophy and the revolutionary practice of the working class and insisted on the distinction between philosophy and practice, theory and practice, condemning outright the mechanistic practice of deducing practical questions from general philosophical propositions. But this is just what the Maoists do. They try to extract a solution to all practical problems up to and including the curing of the deaf- anddumb from general philosophic principles. The French journalist J. E. Vidal, whom we have already mentioned, wrote that "Maoism is theorising detached from historical reality. This is not Marxism. Mao Tse-tung, with his abstract outlook, gives directions that no longer correspond to historical reality. The Chinese cadres, even the most out-and-out Maoists, at first, when called upon to put the doctrines into practice, and later when they come up against the hard facts of reality, tend to become anti-Maoists, because the doctrine is impracticable—- Maoism... is refuted by practice.... Its existence presupposes constant suppression of the opposition which is produced by its inherent contradiction between theory and practice, utopia and reality.”  [85•2 

p Mao Tse-tung began to identify theory with practice back in the forties. "Our revolutionary practice,” he wrote, "is a 86 science which is known as social or political science, and unless we understand dialectics we shall not be very successful.”  [86•1  Later, Mao tries to "free philosophy and dialectics from mysticism”. "We also hear it said that dialectics are so profound and difficult as to be quite beyond the ordinary person. This is also untrue. Dialectics contain laws of nature, society and thought, so that anybody with some social experience (experience of production or the class struggle) can understand something of dialectics and the more social experience he has the better he will understand dialectics."  [86•2 

p Identifying direct personal experience with theory, in this case dialectics, the Maoists go on to declare that "the basic question of philosophy is at the same time the basic question of practical work”,  [86•3  and even go as far as to say that the basic question is the transformation of the material world.  [86•4 

p The "greatest philosopher" of all time, as Mao is described by the Peking propaganda machine, shows an understanding of the true nature of philosophy at the level of those Philistine views which were scorned by Hegel. Mao not only identifies theory with practice; he even denies theoretical knowledge its true status, reducing it to the level of common-sense assertions.

p The reader is reminded that Hegel, writing in the first half of the nineteenth century, came much closer to a scientific understanding of the true essence of philosophical knowledge than Mao Tse-tung does with his “original” interpretation in the mid-twentieth century. Hegel wrote: "There is a difference between having such feelings and notions defined and permeated by thought and having thoughts about them. The thoughts produced through consideration of these modes of perception are what is meant by reflection, reasoning and the like, and also philosophy."  [86•5  Hegel poked fun at those who are wont to philosophise whenever given the slightest opportunity. "This science is often so scorned that even those who have never had 87 anything to do with it imagine that they understand what philosophy is all about without studying it at all, and that having a normal education and drawing especially on religious feeling they can philosophise and make judgements on philosophy as they please. In the case of other sciences special knowledge is considered necessary to know them and only those who have acquired such a knowledge have the right to judge them. It is also agreed that in order to make a boot it is necessary to have learnt and practised the cobbler’s trade, although every man has a measure for it in his foot, and has hands and thanks to them the necessary natural ability for the job. It is only philosophy that requires no such study, learning and effort. This convenient attitude has found confirmation in recent times in the teaching on direct knowledge, knowledge through observation.”  [87•1 

p Let us now compare the attitudes of Hegel and Mao Tsetung on the matter of the “unintelligibility” of philosophy. Hegel writes: "Philosophy combines views, thoughts, categories, or to be more precise, concepts. Views can generally be regarded as metaphors of thoughts and concepts. But having attitudes, we still do not know their meaning for thought, the thoughts and concepts that underlie them. Conversely, it is not the same to have thoughts and concepts and to know what attitudes, meditations and feelings correspond to them. This, partly, is what gives rise to what is called the unintelligibility of philosophy.”  [87•2  "The most intelligible are thus considered to be the writers, preachers and orators, etc., who expound to their listeners things which the latter already know by heart, which they are used to and which are self-evident.”  [87•3  Hegel’s witty remarks are devastatingly applicable to Lin Piao’s vulgarising statements to the effect that "constant reading of extracts from the works of Chairman Mao, and even better learning them by heart brings immediate, tangible results.” In his foreword to Quotations from Chairman Mao, Lin Piao writes: "Selective study of extracts from the works of Chairman Mao Tsetung in search of the key to the solution of various problems is an excellent method of studying the works of Mao Tsetung, with the aid of which it is easy to obtain immediate, 88 tangible results.”  [88•1  This is simply making a dogma of individual statements by Mao Tse-tung and attributing them with miraculous powers. All you have to do is pray, read aloud a quotation, or better, chant it, and you will obtain "immediate, tangible results”.

p What has this got to do with revolutionary, creative Marxism? And how, indeed, does it differ from religion, from psalm-singing and so on? The worshippers of "the greatest and most vital Marxism of our age" who have not even read what they extol might be reminded of what Engels had to say about Marxism. "Our theory is not a dogma but the exposition of a process of evolution, and that process involves successive phases.”  [88•2  And again: "Our theory is a theory of evolution, not a dogma to be learnt by heart and to be repeated mechanically.”  [88•3 

p Lin Piao’s “idea” of the need to stack quotations from Mao Tse-tung was met with mockery even within China on the part of educated people who had derived their understanding of Marxism-Leninism not from collections of quotations but from studying the classics of Marxism-Leninism and the experience of the revolutionary movement in China and other countries, above all the experience of the October Revolution in Russia. The Rector of Hsian University, Chen Kang, was reported in the Chinese press to have remarked in connection with the campaign for the study of Mao’s philosophy: "If I don’t know how to pole-vault, the fact that I am read a few quotations from the works of Chairman Mao will not make me any more able to do so.” The Maoists regarded this as a denial of the effectiveness of the thoughts of Mao and the thesis that they bring "immediate, tangible results”.

p When Chinese geologists aided by Hungarian specialists found a large oil deposit at Taching, the discovery was hailed as "a great victory of the thoughts of Mao Tse-tung”. Yang Hsien-chen, whom we have already mentioned, declared that it was necessary to respect the principles of materialism, that "unless the specialists and workers had made a careful study of the geological structure of the strata, unless thorough investigations had been made, the Taching 89 oilmen would not have achieved such remarkable success”.

p However, such statements as these, criticising the way the achievements of the Chinese people are being ascribed to the "Thoughts of Mao" were given a very hostile reception by the Maoists, and their authors found themselves excluded from the political and theoretical life of the Chinese People’s Republic.

p As Lenin wrote, "You cannot have a proper understanding of any mistake, let alone a political one, unless you dig down to its theoretical roots among the basic premises of the one who makes it.”  [89•1  This is an essential principle of Marxism-Leninism in the investigation of any philosophical system, of any ideological error.

p The roots of the theoretical errors of Mao Tse-tung are to be sought above all in the absolutisation of the subjective factor and a corresponding depreciation of the role of material, economic factors in the development of society. This is due to the limited nature of the ideological-theoretical, philosophical views underlying Mao’s outlook. Claiming to be the author of a "universal philosophy" of general truths, Mao misinterprets the experience of the class struggle in China. His talk of "production struggle" and scientific experiment can be discounted, since we find no hint in his works of his deductions being even vaguely based on any real facts of the development of the economy and the productive forces, and no mention at all of the development of science and recent scientific discoveries.

p With their poor grasp of economics and their ignorance of the achievements of modern science, it is perhaps only natural that the Maoists should stake all their hopes for the solution of China’s problems on the subjective factor, understood as the "thoughts of Mao”.

p While accepting the thesis that "thinking is the reflection of being" historically, Maoism completely ignores it in practice, on the excuse that "when theory takes hold of the masses it becomes a material force”, and that the political superstructure has a strong reverse influence on being, and the economic basis.

p The Maoists maintain that great disasters overtake the masses as soon as they depart from the designs of Chairman 90 Mao, and that the main source of strength is faith in the "absolute authority of the thoughts of Mao Tse-tung”.

p Maoist philosophy, asserting the decisive role of the subjective factor, has been proclaimed the philosophy of " revolutionary enthusiasm”.

p The Chinese Marxists spoke out against this philosophy of revolutionary enthusiasm. Yang Hsien-chen countered the Maoist thesis of the "identity of thinking and being" and "the transformation of the ideal into the material" with the thesis of the "unity of thinking and being”. A Maoist, one Feng Chi, attacked him for this. "At the time when the enthusiasm of the masses has risen to an unprecedented height, and they have entered heart and soul into the fire of revolutionary struggle, ‘theoreticians’ are waving a book at them and fervently propagating the passive theory of reflection. . . . Yang Hsien-chen, denying the role of subjective activity, stresses so-called ’respect for the principles of materialism’.”  [90•1 

p But Yang Hsien-chen himself maintains that "the premise that matter determines mind is recognition of the active role of mind".  [90•2  In answer to the Maoist attempt to prove the realism and correctness of their adventurist policy by dogmatically quoting excerpts from the classics of MarxismLeninism and to Mao Tse-tung’s statement that "politics is the ruling force" Yang insists that thought, and politics as one of its forms, "should correspond to the demands of reality.”

p Probing the gnoseological roots of Maoist idealism, Yang Hsien-chen writes: "The idea of the unity of thinking and being is dialectical materialism, whereas the idea of the identity of thinking and being is idealism or vulgar materialism.”  [90•3  He goes on to explain: "The unity of thinking and being is the demand that thinking should be a correct reflection of being, that the subjective should accurately reflect the objective; unity here is to be understood as ’ correspondence’.”  [90•4 

p We are bound to agree with Yang Hsien-chen’s criticism of Maoism. As Engels wrote: "To attempt to prove the 91 reality of any product of thought by the identity of thinking and being was indeed one of the most absurd delirious phantasies of Hegel.”  [91•1 

p Yet it is "delirious phantasies" such as this that form the underlying methodological principles of Maoist philosophy, albeit masked in fine phrases about the role of the subjective factor, the "philosophy of revolutionary enthusiasm" and so on.

Thus, absolutisation of the subjective factor and an unflexible one-sided interpretation of the transformation of the spiritual into the material, the practice of making "the thoughts of Mao" a source of development from which practical policy is derived, the deification of Mao Tse-tung and the ascribing of magic powers to him and his statements— such are the gnoseological, theoretical roots of the idealism and eclecticism of Maoism.

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