demarcations-journal.org Issue No. 2, Summer-Fall 2012 K.J.A.: Polemical Reflections on Bernard D’Mello's Essay ‘What Is Table of Contents — Issue 2 Maoism?’ – ''Scientifically Comprehending, Firmly Upholding And Click here to download complete pdf Going Beyond Maoism for a New Stage of Communism'' version — html version coming soon A wide-ranging response to Bernard D'Mello's article "What Is Maoism?" that K.J.A.: Polemical Reflections on Bernard appeared in Economic and Political Weekly from India. D'Mello's articulates D’Mello’s Essay ‘What Is Maoism?’ – and concentrates a major line in the world today: an eclectic package of the "Scientifically Comprehending, Firmly mirror-opposite trends, principally in the form of reconfiguring communism as Upholding And Going Beyond Maoism for a bourgeois democracy. New Stage of Communism" Bob Avakian: "The Cultural Revolution in China...Art and Culture... Bob Avakian: "The Cultural Revolution Dissent and Ferment...and Carrying Forward the Revolution Toward in China...Art and Culture...Dissent and Communism" Ferment...and Carrying Forward the A provocative historical and conceptual overview of what "the Cultural Revolution Toward Communism" Revolution was seeking to address, and was addressing," while also Raymond Lotta: "Vilifying Communism identifying certain problems in conception and approach. The interview is a and Accommodating Imperialism, The kind of laboratory of the new synthesis: providing scientific understanding Sham and Shame of Slavoj Žižek’s 'Honest and appreciation of the Cultural Revolution, the high point of the first stage Pessimism'" of communist revolution, and indicating ways in which the next stage of Revolutionary Communist Party, USA: communist revolution can go further and do better. Reply to "The Current Debate on the Socialist System" Raymond Lotta: "Vilifying Communism and Accommodating Imperialism, The Sham and Shame of Slavoj Žižek's 'Honest Letter to the Editors and Reply Pessimism'" Raymond Lotta's sharp polemic against Slavoj Žižek's "fusillade of distortion Issue 1, Summer-Fall 2009 of the historical experience of revolution and socialism in the 20th century, accompanied by an egregiously uninformed and unprincipled attack on Bob Raymond Lotta, Nayi Duniya, and K. J. A.: Avakian's new synthesis of communism." Slavoj Žižek is an influential public Alain Badiou's "Politics of Emancipation": intellectual who is perceived and presented as one of the most radical theorists A Communism Locked Within the Confines of the Bourgeois World on communism itself. Lotta begins and ends his piece with a challenge to Žižek (Also available in PDF) to publicly debate these issues. On Developments in Nepal and the Stakes Revolutionary Communist Party, USA: Reply to "The Current Debate on for the Communist Movement: Letters to the Socialist System" the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) An answer from the RCP, USA to an article entitled “The Current Debate on from the Revolutionary Communist Party, the Socialist State System” by Ajith of the Communist Party of India (Marxist- USA, 2005-2008 (With a Reply from the Leninist) [Naxalbari]. This response, written in 2006 but appearing publicly for CPN(M), 2006) the first time, addresses some critical issues of epistemology and political theory Bob Avakian, Chairman of the that demarcate the new synthesis of communism from other lines within the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA: broader international communist movement. "Crises in Physics," Crises in Philosophy and Politics Letter to the Editors and Reply Exchange over the article ''Alain Badiou's 'Politics of Emancipation': To send a comment, please email A Communism Locked Within the Confines of the Bourgeois World'' in [email protected] Demarcations no 1. Editorial Since the inaugural issue of Demarcations, the world has witnessed renewed upsurge, with mass social movements in Egypt and elsewhere capturing the imagination of and stirring defiance among broad sections of people who find the present order intolerable. This fresh wind of resistance and revolt has also been felt in the rebellions in London, in the Occupy and other youth and protest movements, while revolutionary struggles and resistance continue in various parts of the Third World. Puncturing people's belief in, as Marx put it, "the permanent necessity of existing conditions", this renewal of upsurge has also brought fundamental questions to the fore: Of revolution – what is it? Of leadership – is it needed, and of what type? Of the state (and its armies and police) – should it be confronted, and can it be confronted? And what it means for the masses to make history. Most of all, the decisive question getting posed is what social change and what future are desirable and possible – and what constitutes freedom and emancipation. Some of these crucial questions, posed by the Egypt upsurge and the Occupy movements, were addressed in the polemic against the political philosophy of Alain Badiou that appeared in the first issue ofDemarcations : "Alain Badiou's 'Politics of Emancipation': A Communism Locked Within the Confines of the Bourgeois World.'' That polemic takes on new relevance in light of recent developments in the world, and we encourage readers to (re)engage with and respond to it. We also call readers' attention to Bob Avakian's statements on the Egypt uprising [revcom.us/avakian/Egypt/Egypt2011-en.html] and the Occupy movements [revcom.us/a/250/avakian_on_the_occupy_movement-en.html]. What is achingly missing in these new crucibles of struggle is a vision of a radically different society, and how to get there – which focuses up the question of communist leadership. The fact is, a viable and liberatory alternative to this world of horrors – and the kind of leadership needed to bring a new world into being – is concentrated in Bob Avakian's new synthesis of communism. This new synthesis needs to be much more widely known, engaged, and taken up. • • • Why Demarcations? Why Now? Demarcations: A Journal of Communist Theory and Polemic seeks to set forth, defend, and further advance the theoretical framework for the beginning of a new stage of communist revolution in the contemporary world. This journal will promote the perspectives of the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA. Without revolutionary theory, there can be no revolutionary movement. Without drawing sharp dividing lines between communism as a living, critical, and developing science serving the emancipation of humanity, on the one hand, and other perspectives, paths, and programs that cannot lead to emancipation, on the other—whether openly reformist or claiming the mantle or moniker of "communism"—without making such demarcations, it will not be possible to achieve the requisite understanding and clarity to radically change the world. Demarcations will contribute to achieving that clarity. In the wrangling spirit of Marxism, Demarcations will also delve into questions and challenges posed by major changes in the world today. The last quarter-century has seen intensified globalization, growing urbanization and shantytown-ization in the Third World, the rise of religious fundamentalism, shifting alignments in the world imperialist system, and the acceleration of environmental degradation. Demarcations will examine such changes, the discourses that have grown up in connection with them, and the ideological, political, and strategic implications of such developments for communist revolution. Demarcations will also undertake theoretical explorations of issues of art, science, and culture. Demarcations makes its appearance at a particular historical juncture in the communist project, one best characterized as the "end of a stage, the beginning of a new stage." The first wave of socialist revolutions and societies began with the short-lived Paris Commune of 1871, the first attempt to overthrow and replace bourgeois rule. It took a leap with the October Revolution in Russia in 1917, and went further and took yet another leap with the Chinese revolution of 1949, in particular the Cultural Revolution of 1966-1976. This first wave came to an end in 1976 with the overthrow of proletarian power and restoration of capitalist rule in China. This first wave of socialist societies in the Soviet Union (1917-1956) and China (1949-1976) constituted an unprecedented and inspiring breakthrough in liberation for humanity. At the same time, and not surprisingly, this first wave was secondarily marked by shortcomings and mistakes; and while not the cause of capitalist restoration in the Soviet Union and China, these shortcomings did nonetheless play a role in the defeats of these revolutions. With the end of this first stage, communists have been confronted with the objective responsibility of scientifically summing up the lessons and legacy of these revolutions and the rich experience of exercising state power towards the transition to communism, in order to forge the theoretical framework for going forward. Bob Avakian, Chairman of the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA, has risen to that challenge and in the process qualitatively advanced communist theory. He has developed a theoretical framework for the new stage of communist revolutions, a new synthesis. This new synthesis is not a pasting-together of the "best of the previous experience" and the criticisms of these experiences. Rather, as Communism: The Beginning of A New Stage, A Manifesto from the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA, puts it, the new synthesis "builds on all that has gone before,