Leftist Reading

This week’s reading is Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism, part 3
by Vladimir Ilyich Lenin

Available online here: https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/imperialism.pdf

[Part 1]

I. Concentration of Production and Monopolies

[Part 2]

II. Banks and Their New Role

[Part 3 – This Week]

III. Finance Capital and the Financial Oligarchy

[Part 4]

IV. Export of Capital

V. Division of the World Among Capitalist Associations

[Part 5]

VI. Division of the World Among the Great Powers

[Part 6]

VII. Imperialism as a Special Stage of Capitalism

[Part 7]

VIII. Parasitism and Decay of Capitalism

[Part 8]

IX. Critique of Imperialism

[Part 9]

X. The Place of Imperialism in History

Figures:

1 – 12:46

This week’s reading is Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism, part 2
by Vladimir Ilyich Lenin

Available online here: https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/imperialism.pdf

[Part 1]

I. Concentration of Production and Monopolies

[Part 2 – This Week]

II. Banks and Their New Role

[Part 3]

III. Finance Capital and the Financial Oligarchy

[Part 4]

IV. Export of Capital

V. Division of the World Among Capitalist Associations

[Part 5]

VI. Division of the World Among the Great Powers

[Part 6]

VII. Imperialism as a Special Stage of Capitalism

[Part 7]

VIII. Parasitism and Decay of Capitalism

[Part 8]

IX. Critique of Imperialism

[Part 9]

X. The Place of Imperialism in History

Figures:

1 – 2:37

This week’s reading is a guest reading by Em (@em_being) from Abnormal Mapping.
They’re reading all of “Oppose Book Worship”
by Mao Tse-tung

Available online here:
https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-6/mswv6_11.htm

[This episode:]

I. NO INVESTIGATION, NO RIGHT TO SPEAK – 1:35

II. TO INVESTIGATE A PROBLEM IS TO SOLVE IT – 2:19

III. OPPOSE BOOK WORSHIP – 4:14

IV. WITHOUT INVESTIGATING THE ACTUAL SITUATION, THERE IS BOUND TO BE AN IDEALIST APPRAISAL OF CLASS FORCES AND AN IDEALIST GUIDANCE IN WORK, RESULTING EITHER IN OPPORTUNISM OR IN PUTSCHISM – 6:02

V. THE AIM OF SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC INVESTIGATION IS TO ARRIVE AT A CORRECT APPRAISAL OF CLASS FORCES AND THEN TO FORMULATE CORRECT TACTICS FOR THE STRUGGLE – 7:04

VI. VICTORY IN CHINA'S REVOLUTIONARY STRUGGLE WILL DEPEND ON THE CHENESE COMRADES' UNDERSTANDING OF CHINESE CONDITIONS – 10:11

VII. THE TECHNIQUE OF INVESTIGATION – 12:52

Footnotes:

1. 3:36
See Confucian Analects, Book III, "Pa Yi": "When Confucius entered the Ancestral Temple he inquired into everything."

2. 6:40
Li Kuei was a hero in the well-known Chinese novel shui Hu Chuan' (Heroes of the Marshes) which describes the peasant war that occurred towards the end of the Northern Sung Dynasty (960-1127). He was simple, outspoken and very loyal to the revolutionary cause of the peasants, but crude and tactless.

3. 7:32
Comrade Mao Tse-tung has always laid great stress on investigation, regarding social investigation as the most important task and the basis for defining policy in the work of leadership. The work of investigation was gradually developed in the Fourth Army of the Red Army on Comrade Mao Tsetung's initiative. He stipulated that social investigation should be a regular part of the work, and the Political Department of the Red Army prepared detailed forms covering such items as the state of the mass struggle, the condition of the reactionaries, the economic life of the people and the amount of land owned by each class in the rural areas. Wherever the Red Army went, it first made itself familiar with the class situation in the locality and then formulated slogans suited to the needs of the masses.

4. 9:57
Here 'the mountains' are the Chingkang mountain area along the borders of Kiangsi and Hunan Provinces; the 'plains’ are those in southern Kiangsi and western Fukien. In January 1929, comrade Mao Tse-tung led the main force of the Fourth Army of the Red Army down from the Chingkang Mountains to southern Kiangsi and western Fukien in order to set up two large revolutionary base areas.

5. 11:50
The "Book of documents" consisted of the resolutions adopted at the Sixth National Congress of the Communist Party of China in July 1928, including the political resolution and the resolutions on the peasant question, the land question, the organization of political power, etc. Early in 1929 the Front Committee of the Fourth Army of the Red Army published these resolutions in book form for distribution to the Party organizations in the Red Army and to the local Party organizations.

This week’s reading is Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism, part 1
by Vladimir Ilyich Lenin

Available online here: https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/imperialism.pdf

[Part 1 – This Week]
I. Concentration of Production and Monopolies – 1:45

[Part 2]
II. Banks and Their New Role

[Part 3]
III. Finance Capital and the Financial Oligarchy

[Part 4]
IV. Export of Capital
V. Division of the World Among Capitalist Associations

[Part 5]
VI. Division of the World Among the Great Powers

[Part 6]
VII. Imperialism as a Special Stage of Capitalism

[Part 7]
VIII. Parasitism and Decay of Capitalism

[Part 8]
IX. Critique of Imperialism

[Part 9]
X. The Place of Imperialism in History

Footnotes:
1. 04:31
Figures taken from Annalen des deutschen Reichs, 1911, Zahn —Lenin
2. 06:15
Statistical Abstract of theUnited States, 1912, p.202 —Lenin
3. 08:46
Finance Capital, Russ. ed., pp. 286-87 —Lenin
4. 10:15
Hans Gideon Heymann, Die gemischten Werke im deutschen Grosseiseugewerbe, Stuttgart, 1904, (S.256, 278). —Lenin
5. 12:21
Hermann Levy, Monopole, Kartelle und Trusts, Jena, 1909, S. 286, 290, —Lenin
6. 16:32
Th. Vogelstein, “Die finanzielle Organisation der kapitalistischen Industrie und die Monopolbildungen” in Grundriss der Sozialökonomik, VI. Abt., Tubingen, 1914. Cf., also by the same author: Organisationsformen der Eisenindustrie und Textilindustrie in England und Amerika, Bd. 1, Lpz., 1910. —Lenin
7. 17:47
Dr. Riesser, Die deutschen Grossbanken und ihre Konzentration im Zusammenhange mit der Entwicklung der Gesamtwirtschaft in Deutschland, 4. Aufl., 1912, S. 149; Robert Liefmann, Kartelle und Trusts und die Weiterbildung der volkswirtschaftlichen Organisation, 2. Aufl., 1910, S. 25. —Lenin
8. 19:31
Dr. Fritz Kestner, Der Organisationszwang. Eine Untersuchung über die Kämpfe zwischen Kartellen und Aussenseitern, Berlin, 1912, S. 11. —Lenin
9. 20:34
R. Liefmann, Beteiligungs-und Finanziertingsgesellschaften. Eine Studie über den modernen Kapitalismus und das Effektenwesen, 1. Aufl., Jena, 1909, S. 212. —Lenin
10. 20:59
Ibid., S. 218. —Lenin
11. 21:08
Dr. S. Tschierschky, Kartell und Trust, Göttingen, 1903, S. 13. —Lenin
12. 21:22
Tr. Vogelstein, Organisationsformen, S. 275. —Lenin
13. 22:38
Report of the Commissioner of Corporations on the Tobacco Industry, Washington, 1909, p. 266, cited according to Dr. Paul Tafel, Die nordamerikanischen Trusts und ihre Wirkungen auf den Fortschritt der Technik, Stuttgart, 1913, S. 48. —Lenin
14. 22:59
Dr. P. Tafel, ibid., S. 49. —Lenin
15. 24:17
Riesser, op. cit., third edition, p. 547 et seq. The newspapers (June 1916) report the formation of a new gigantic trust which combines the chemical industry of Germany.
—Lenin
16. 30:20
Kestner, op.cit., S. 254 —Lenin
17. 32:32
L. Eschwege, “Zement” in Die Bank, 1909, S. 115 et. seq. —Lenin
18. 33:37
Jeidels, Das Verhältnis der deutschen Grossbanken zur Industrie mit besonderer Berüchsichtigung der Eisenindustrie, Leipzig, 1905, S. 271 —Lenin
19. 34:00
Liefmann, Beteiligungs-und Finanzierungsgesellschaften, S, 434. —Lenin
20. 34:45
Ibid, S. 465-66 —Lenin
21. 36:31
Jeidels, op. cit., S. 108. —Lenin

This week’s reading is the final part of “What is Marxism All About?”
by F.I.S.T. - Fight Imperialism, Stand Together

Available online here: https://www.workers.org/books2016/what-is-marxism-all-about-by-fist.pdf

Next week we’ll be starting Vladimir Lenin’s “Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism”

The intro and outro music is Decisions by Eric Matyas
Find it and many more tracks at http://soundimage.org/

Part 1
1. Class Society
2. Capital and Capitalism
3. Exploitation and Surplus Value
4. Private Property
5. Dialectical and Historical Materialism
6. Class Solidarity and Class Struggle
7. Imperialism and Globalization

Part 2
8. Women’s Oppression
9. Racism and Oppressed Nations
10. Lesbian, Bi, Gay, Trans and Queer Oppression
11. Self-Determination
12. Culture
13. How the State Arose
14. The State Today

[Part 3 – This Week]
15. Democracy – 00:54
16. Reformism – 06 :33
17. Labor Bureaucracy – 09:52
18. Fascism – 13:34
19. Revolution – 17:38
20. Socialism – 22:46
21. Socialist Countries – 25:38
22. Communism – 30:54

Episode 4:

This week’s reading is “What is Marxism All About?”
by F.I.S.T. - Fight Imperialism, Stand Together

Available online here: https://www.workers.org/books2016/what-is-marxism-all-about-by-fist.pdf

[Part 1 – This Week]

Class Society – 00:55

Capital and Capitalism – 04:26

Exploitation and Surplus Value – 08:12

Private Property – 12:44

Dialectical and Historical Materialism – 16:47

Class Solidarity and Class Struggle – 20:41

Imperialism and Globalization – 24:31

Part 2

8. Women’s Oppression

9. Racism and Oppressed Nations

10. Lesbian, Bi, Gay, Trans and Queer Oppression

11. Self-Determination

12. Culture

13. How the State Arose

14. The State Today

Part 3

15. Democracy

16. Reformism

17. Labor Bureaucracy

18. Fascism

19. Revolution

20. Socialism

21. Socialist Countries

22. Communism

Episode 3:
This week’s reading is the Communist Manifesto, part 3 of 3
by Friedrich Engels and Karl Marx

Available online here: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/31193

Next week we’ll start reading “What is Marxism All About?”
by FIST, Fight Imperialism Stand Together.

Part 1
Introduction
I Bourgeois and Proletarians

Part 2
II Proletarians and Communists

[Part 3 – This Week]
III Socialist and Communist Literature – 00:43
(i) Reactionary Socialism – 00:48
(a) Feudal Socialism – 00:50
(b) Petty Bourgeois Socalism – 04:14
(c) German or “True” Socialism – 07:16
(ii) Conservative or Bourgeois Socialism – 13:26
(iii) Critical-Utopian Socialism and Communism – 16:17
IV Position of the Communists in Relation to the Various Existing Opposition Parties – 22:44

Footnotes:
1. 01:24
Not the English Restoration 1660-1689, but the French Restoration 1814- 1830.

2. 03:40
This applies chiefly to Germany where the landed aristocracy and squirearchy have large portions of their estates cultivated for their own account by stewards, and are moreover, extensive beet-root sugar manufacturers and distillers of potato spirits. The wealthier British aristocracy are, as yet, rather above that; but they, too, know how to make up for declining rents by lending their names to floaters of more or less shady joint-stock companies.

3. 21:56
Phalansteres were socialist colonies on the plan of Charles Fourier; Icaria was the name given by Cabet to his Utopia and, later on, to his American Communist colony.

4. 23:19
The party then represented in parliament by Ledru-Rollin, in literature by Louis Blanc, in the daily press by the Reforme. The name of Social-Democracy signified, with these its inventors, a section of the Democratic or Republican party more or less tinged with Socialism.

This episode’s reading is part 1 of the Communist Manifesto by Friedrich Engels and Karl Marx

Available online here: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/31193

Intro and outro music is Decisions by Eric Matyas
Available at soundimage.org

Part 1 - This episode:

Introduction – 0:56
I Bourgeois and Proletarians - 2:20

Part 2:
II Proletarians and Communists

Part 3:
III Socialist and Communist Literature
IV Position of the Communists in Relation to the Various Existing Opposition Parties

Footnotes:

1 (2:15)
By bourgeoisie it’s meant the class of modern Capitalists, owners of the means of social production and employers of wage-labor. By proletariat, the class of modern wage-laborers who, having no means of production of their own, are reduced to selling their labor-power in order to live.

2 (2:23)
That is, all written history. In 1847, the pre-history of society, the social organization existing previous to recorded history, was all but unknown. Since then, Haxthausen discovered common ownership of land in Russia, Maurer proved it to be the social foundation from which all Teutonic races started in history, and by and by village communities were found to be, or to have been the primitive form of society everywhere from India to Ireland.

The inner organization of this primitive Communistic society was laid bare, in its typical form, by Morgan's crowning discovery of the true nature of the Gens and its relation to the Tribe. With the dissolution of these primaeval communities society begins to be differentiated into separate and finally antagonistic classes.

3 (2:32)
Guildmaster, that is a full member of a guild, a master within, not a head of a guild.

4 (28:10)
"Commune" was the name taken, in France, by the nascent towns even before they had conquered from their feudal lords and masters, local self-government and political rights as the "Third Estate."
Generally speaking, for the economical development of the bourgeoisie, England is here taken as the typical country; for its political development, France.