Mao, that most complex and important of revolutionaries, having become -- on the "left" over here I mean -- the general equivalent of Stalin and Hitler, it behooves us to work against this same travestying of history. I am not imputing anything to anyone on the basis of this tiny thread, but the larger point here is that, even today, 20 yrs into the Great Reversal, the question of "what is left" need necessarily stand or fall on the question of Mao and the Maoist era. This involves some homework. (A range of people have noted this -- e.g. Arif Dirlik, Liu Kang, Xudong Zhang, Robert Weil, the fine novelist Wang Meng (a social dem), and of course the right and the native informants like Liu Xiaobo and Wei Jingsheng.) On this point, see _Critical Perspectives on MZ's Thought_ edited by Dirlik, Healy, Knight (97). For the question of what the left is (primarily vis a vis intellectuals), references would include Kalpana Mishra, _PostMaoism to PostMarxism_, and Bill Brugger's _Chinese Marxism in the Post-Mao Era_ ('90). Liu Kang has several essays and a new book due out soon. In addition to the recent New Left Review issue from the summer, there was a good collection in Social Text (perhaps surprisingly) from the year before, and _boundary2_ has published some interesting pieces/issues on contemporary China for the past few years now. From the theory-intensive to the a-theoretical: Maurice Meisner's histories are quite useful, see The Deng Xiaopeng Era esp, and the final chapters of the earlier Era's of Mao and Deng. There is a whole industry of liberal (a rather virulent, poorly theorized kind) takes on post-Mao China's politics and "reforms"-- look for names like UNger, Nathan, Friedman, Barme, MacFarquhar. As for WTO specifically, Bruce Cumings has a few unfortunate comments (pro-wto, almost pro-Dengist) in his recent book Parallax Visions (better chapters on Japan and of course on the Koreas and US policy). Lisa Rofel and Gail Hershatter (esp.) are two feminists and socialists who have done important books on, in part, the legacies of the Maoist era and the state of the state.
I'll try and dig up some more specific references-- big issue is in fact an old one-- identifying who or what are the actually existing or potential forces for progressive social change. *Big surprise*: the liberals want to bank on the nascent bourgeoisie, though occasionally smacked in the face with the reality that these folks are either dependent on or happy with a Dengist CP. I myself think that merely banking your hopes on the urban "proletariat" might make sense in a (former?) city-state like Hong Kong, but much less so in China proper, which is still %70+ rural or village-township, and which has in the past decade or so become even more regionally stratified. Hence the importance of Mao. Added to which, I am not sure to what extent and which specific Marxian concepts and narratives of development apply to what is often called post-socialist China. There is so much work to be done, and we know so little.
Best, Dan
On Sun, 19 Dec 1999, Dennis Shih Hua Lai wrote:
>
> My initial impression is that this website isn't
too much different from the official brand of Maoism but it can be that the
maintainer is trying to avoid the censorship if the website
is located within China's domain.
If one want really want to dig out what their position is one
probably have to be an insider or read much more extensively. Steve writes: I would say it contains both and definitely a real alternative to the embrace of liberal ideology that tends to characterize most media material and literature in China. I'm quite certain the website maintainer is in the US at the moment. You can find articles that make clear and coherent criticisms of the dominant Dengist and Maoist positions. There are also articles that clearly stick to an official Maoist critique of Dengism. The main purpose of the webpage is to offer Chinese access to a left critique of the ideology of markets that Chinese, especially intellectuals, are inundated in the official media day in and day out. I think in the next day or two I'll put out a translation of a 5 page critique of the mainstream Maoist position on the fate of China's SOE workers.
Steve ------------------------------------------------------ Daniel F. Vukovich Dept. of English; The Unit for Criticism University of Illinois Urbana, IL ------------------------------------------------------