scholarly journals Introduction

2012 ◽  
pp. 7-16
Author(s):  
Luca Di Blasi ◽  
Manuele Gragnolati ◽  
Christoph F.E. Holzhey
Keyword(s):  
Communist Party ◽  
The Past

Pier Paolo Pasolini’s own phrase ‘the scandal of self-contradiction’ (‘lo scandalo del contraddirmi’) from ‘Le ceneri di Gramsci’ (1957) encapsulates one of his most salient characteristics. Deeply influenced by a religious childhood, he became an atheist without loosing a powerful sense of the sacred; he was a Marxist expelled by the Italian Communist Party, a revolutionist with a great admiration for the past, a deeply anti-bourgeois bourgeois.

scholarly journals Beijing's Policies for Managing Han and Ethnic-Minority Chinese Communities Abroad

2012 ◽  
Vol 41 (4) ◽  
pp. 183-221 ◽  
Author(s):  
James To
Keyword(s):  
Interest Groups ◽  
Ethnic Minority ◽  
Communist Party ◽  
Chinese Communist Party ◽  
Cooperative Groups ◽  
National Interests ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
The Past ◽  
Vast Network ◽  
Powerful Interest

The overseas Chinese (OC) form a vast network of powerful interest groups and important political actors capable of shaping the future of China from abroad by transmitting values back to their ancestral homeland (Tu 1991). While the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) welcomes and actively seeks to foster relations with the OC in order to advance China's national interests, some cohorts may be hostile to the regime. In accordance with their distinct demographic and ethnic profiles, the CCP's qiaowu ([Formula: see text], OC affairs) infrastructure serves to entice, co-opt, or isolate various OC groupings. This article summarises the policies for managing different subsets of OC over the past three decades, and argues that through qiaowu, the CCP has successfully unified cooperative groups for China's benefit, while preventing discordant ones from eroding its grip on power.

scholarly journals Are the communists dying out in Russia?☆

2002 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
pp. 39-50 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. Roderick Kiewiet ◽  
Mikhail G. Myagkov
Keyword(s):  
Communist Party ◽  
Opportunity To Learn ◽  
The Elderly ◽  
Retirement Age ◽  
The Past ◽  
Russian Economy ◽  
Per Se

Many predicted that the strength of the Communist Party in Russia would wane as the elderly pensioners who disproportionately supported the party died off. Contrary to this prediction, the findings of our analysis indicate that voters who reached retirement age during the past decade were even more supportive of the communists than the cohort of pensioners who preceded them. We believe this occurred because it was workers approaching retirement, not pensioners per se, who were disproportionately injured by the transition to a more market-oriented economy. Like pensioners they lost savings, but in many cases they also lost their jobs. They also had little opportunity to learn the new skills that the Russian economy increasingly calls for. There is as yet no indication that the communists have begun to die out.

scholarly journals The Role of the Media in Shaping and Propagating May Day Rituals

2021 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 377-423
Author(s):  
Slađana Josipović Batorek ◽  
Valentina Kezić
Keyword(s):  
Communist Party ◽  
Religious Tradition ◽  
Political Messages ◽  
The Past ◽  
Cult Of Personality ◽  
May Day ◽  
The Media ◽  
The Government ◽  
Political Rituals

The Communist Party of Yugoslavia’s (CPY) rise to power in 1945 was followed by a period of fundamental socio-political changes that encompassed all aspects of life. In order to establish a complete political and ideological authority, the government attempted to suppress all elements which, in their view, were not aligned with the doctrine of the Communist Party. As a result, everything that was perceived as remnants of the old socio-political order was marginalised, such as religion, tradition and customs. Moreover, reinterpretation of the past also took place, as well as creation of new rituals and Tito’s cult of personality. Accordingly, a completely new calendar of official, state holidays was established, deprived of any national or religious tradition. One of those holidays was May Day, which was celebrated for two days and whose purpose, like most other holidays of that period, was to create uniqueness of feelings and actions in society, focusing on the working class, socialism, CPY, Yugoslavia and Josip Broz Tito. Besides, celebrations of major anniversaries and holidays, including May Day, presented an opportunity for transmission of ideological and political messages, most often articulated through numerous slogans which clearly defined the direction in which the society should move. The media played a key role in this process. Therefore, the central part of the paper consists of the analysis of newspaper articles from Glas Slavonije in order to understand its role in the implementation of those new political rituals and social values.

Writing Władysław Gomułka’s Life: Historiography of Władysław Gomułka’s Biographies

2021 ◽  
pp. 088832542110187
Author(s):  
Anna Müller
Keyword(s):  
Communist Party ◽  
Prime Minister ◽  
Multiple Roles ◽  
The Past ◽  
Deputy Prime Minister ◽  
Historical Figure ◽  
The Future ◽  
Potential Benefits ◽  
Council Of State ◽  
Contemporary Approach

This article looks at a select number of biographies of Władysław Gomułka—an important postwar Polish politician, who because of his long presence in politics is often perceived as the de facto Polish postwar leader. He served in multiple roles: parliamentary deputy, deputy prime minister, minister, member of the Council of State, and the First Secretary of the communist party. I argue that for historians who take up the task of writing his biography, Gomułka is more than a historical figure, and that writing about him allows them to ponder the question of agency and historical contingencies, as well as the meaning of the past for the present. Not surprisingly, Gomułka’s biography serves as a form of a meta-commentary on contemporary approach to the Communist history and its place in Polish history. The existing biographies contain reflections, even if indirectly, on the nature of Communism in Poland, not as elements of the past but as aspects of the present that loom over the future. By the same token, the lack of interest in Gomułka at certain important historical junctures, or a rather selective interest, indicates not as much a lack of interest in an important politician, but rather a certain skewed interest in Communism—not just its shortcomings, but also its potential benefits. The silence gives a certain perception of Communism as something pushed to the margins.

Writing about the Past, an Act of Resistance

2019 ◽  
pp. 21-42
Keyword(s):  
Communist Party ◽  
Chinese Communist Party ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Official Publication ◽  
Xi Jinping ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Past ◽  
On Line ◽  
Historical Truth ◽  
Historical Accounts

Since taking power in 1949, the Chinese Communist Party has consistently tried to enforce a monopoly on the writing and interpretation of history. However, since 1998 individual initiatives have increased in the field of memory. Confronting official amnesia, victims of Maoist movements have decided to write their versions of history before it is too late. This chapter presents a typology of these endeavours. Annals of the Yellow Emperor (Yanhuang chunqiu), an official publication, enjoyed some freedom to publish dissenting historical accounts but was suppressed in 2016. With the rise of the internet, unofficial journals appeared that were often dedicated to a specific period: Tie Liu’s Small traces of the Past (Wangshi weihen) published accounts of victims of the Anti-Rightist movement for almost a decade before the editor was arrested; Wu Di’s Remembrance (Jiyi) founded by former Red Guards and rusticated youth circulates on line. The third type is the samizdat: targets of repression during Mao’s reign recount their experience in books that are published at their own expense and circulated privately. Most of these “entrepreneurs of memory” are convinced that restoring historical truth is a pre-requisite to China’s democratization. Since Xi Jinping came to power, they have suffered repression.

Mao, Tibet, and the Korean War

2006 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 15-33 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael M. Sheng
Keyword(s):  
Communist Party ◽  
Chinese Communist Party ◽  
Korean War ◽  
Mao Zedong ◽  
Chinese Leader ◽  
People's Republic Of China ◽  
Republic Of China ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Korean War ◽  
The Chinese Communist Party

In October 1950 the Chinese leader Mao Zedong embarked on a two-front war. He sent troops to Korea and invaded Tibet at a time when the People's Republic of China was burdened with many domestic problems. The logic behind Mao's risky policy has baffled historians ever since. By drawing on newly available Chinese and Western documents and memoirs, this article explains what happened in October 1950 and why Mao acted as he did. The release of key documents such as telegrams between Mao and his subordinates enables scholars to understand Chinese policymaking vis-à-vis Tibet much more fully than in the past. The article shows that Mao skillfully used the conflicts for his own purposes and consolidated his hold over the Chinese Communist Party.

To Utopia and Back: A Cycle in the History of the Chinese Communist Party

1981 ◽  
Vol 87 ◽  
pp. 407-439 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stuart R. Schram
Keyword(s):  
Communist Party ◽  
Chinese Communist Party ◽  
The Past ◽  
Look Back ◽  
The Future ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Chinese Communist Party ◽  
Sixtieth Anniversary

On 1 July 1981 the Chinese Communist Party celebrated the sixtieth anniversary of its foundation. To mark this occasion, the Party itself issued a statement summing up the experience of recent decades. It seems an appropriate time for outsiders as well to look back over the history of the past 60 years, in the hope of grasping long-term tendencies which may continue to influence events in the future.

Peasant and Land Reform in Indonesian Communism

1963 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-67 ◽  
Author(s):  
Justus M. van der Kroef
Keyword(s):  
Communist Party ◽  
Land Reform ◽  
Agricultural Productivity ◽  
Central Committee ◽  
Active Participation ◽  
Committee Chairman ◽  
National Front ◽  
Agrarian Question ◽  
The Past ◽  
Communist Movement

“A national front without the active participation of the peasants is like a bale of jute without contents, empty and light, and hence easily blown away toy the wind”. These words of Dipa Nusantara Aidit, Central Committee Chairman of the Indonesian Communist Party (Partai Komunis Indonesia – PKI), on the occasion of the party's “National Peasants' Conference” in April, 1959, may serve as an index to the theoretical and tactical importance assigned to the Indonesian peasant's role by the Indonesian Communist movement. Increasingly in the past few years the peasant and the “agrarian question”, i.e. “feudalism”, “landlordism”, debtor bondage and the problem of increasing agricultural productivity, have begun to figure prominently in the PKI program and the “essence of the Indonesian Revolution” is now described by the party as the “agrarian revolution”.

A Maoist Line for India

1968 ◽  
Vol 33 ◽  
pp. 3-16 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bhabani Sen Gupta
Keyword(s):  
Communist Party ◽  
Indian People ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Future ◽  
History Of ◽  
Weekly Journal ◽  
General Secretary

For a key to the Chinese stance on India, one might begin by quoting the first message Mao Tse-tung sent to that country after taking over as Chairman of the People's Republic. Ironically, it went to B. T. Ranadive, who was then the anti-Maoist General Secretary of the Indian Communist Party (CPI), and who is now the doubtfully Maoist editor of the weekly journal of the supposedly pro-Chinese or Marxist Communists (CPI[M]). “The Indian people is one of the great Asian peoples with a long history and a vast population,” said Mao, in reply to a message of greetings from Ranadive; “her fate in the past and her path to the future are similar to those of China in many points.” When India became free, like China after liberation, Mao went on to add, “that day will end the imperialist reactionary era in the history of mankind.”

Echange/Exchange

1975 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 146-147 ◽  
Author(s):  
Irving Abella ◽  
Terence Morley
Keyword(s):  
Political Science ◽  
Communist Party ◽  
Graduate Student ◽  
Canadian Journal ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
The Past ◽  
International Unions ◽  
Queen's University ◽  
New Democratic Party

I was disturbed, and I understand my distress was shared by many others, to see the pages of such a respected scholarly periodical as the Canadian Journal of Political Science being so badly misused by a political bureaucrat for partisan purposes. I refer to the review of my book Nationalism, Communism, and Canadian Labour by Terence Morley, a longtime functionary of the New Democratic party, and now a graduate student at Queen's University.Because I was critical of some of the activities of the CCF in the 1940s, made some kind remarks about the Communist party, and questioned some of the policies of international unions, Morley labels my book a “Waffle-inspired tract.” What utter nonsense! I am not a member nor even a supporter of the Waffle, as should be readily apparent to any intelligent reader of the book. Indeed, if Morley had done any reading over the past year since the book appeared he would have noted that in their reviews and speeches, Waffle leaders were critical of the book's implications – and rightly so given their ideology. But, quite clearly, to the Terence Morleys of Canada, to be even mildly critical of the ccf, immediately marks one as an enemy – as a member of the “Waffle” – just as critics in past years were denounced as “Communists.”Although he is clearly unaware of the fact, I am, and have been for as long as I remember, a supporter of Mr Morley's own party.

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