[[File:Learning for the Revolution Utterly Comprehending the Mao Zedong Thought (为革命而学，把毛泽东思想真正学到手) (50013742906).jpg|right|thumb|1965 Chinese poster, with text "Learning for the Revolution Utterly Comprehending the Mao Zedong Thought."]]
| name = Mao Zedong Thought<br />{{small|毛泽东思想}}
'''Mao Zedong Thought'''{{Efn|Simplified Chinese: 毛泽东思想, Hanyu Pinyin: ''Máo Zédōng sīxiǎng''}} ('''MZT''') is a tendency developed by [[Mao Zedong]] and the [[Communist Party of China]] more broadly which asserts itself to be an application of [[Marxism–Leninism]] to the national conditions of [[People's Republic of China|China]].
| caption = [[Mao Zedong]], revisionist theorist and namesake of Mao Zedong Thought.
| class = [[Bourgeoisie]], [[Peasantry|large peasantry]]
| position = [[Revisionism|Revisionist]]<br>[[Fascism|Social-fascist]]<br>[[Nationalism|Nationalist]]
|theorists=[[Mao Zedong]]<br>[[Lin Biao]]<br>[[Jiang Qing]]|related=[[Socialism with Chinese Characteristics|Dengism]]<br>[[Maoism]]<br>[[Maoism–Third Worldism|Third worldism]]}}
{{Hatnote|This article is about Mao Zedong Thought, a revisionist tendency that claims to be the application of Marxism–Leninism to China. For the tendency derived from Mao Zedong Thought, see [[Maoism]].}}
'''Mao Zedong Thought'''{{Efn|Simplified Chinese: 毛泽东思想, Hanyu Pinyin: ''Máo Zédōng sīxiǎng''}} ('''MZT''') is a [[Chinese revisionism|Chinese revisionist]] and [[Nationalism|nationalist]] ideology which was developed by the [[Bourgeois revolution|bourgeois revolutionary]] leader [[Mao Zedong]] of the [[Communist Party of China]]. Mao Zedong Thought was formulated during the 1940s and 1950s by Mao, who [[Eclecticism|eclectically]] incorporated traditional Chinese philosophies such as [[Confucianism]], [[Bourgeoisie|bourgeois]] [[liberalism]], nationalism, and fragments of [[Marxism|Marxist]] theory into his doctrine.<ref>Mao Zedong (1964). ''[https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-9/mswv9_27.htm Talk On Questions Of Philosophy]''. Available on the Marxists Internet Archive.
<small>''“To get some experience of class struggle — that’s what I call a university. They argue about which university is better, Peking University or People’s University. For my part I am a graduate of the university of the greenwoods, I learned a bit there. In the past I studied Confucius, and spent six years on the Four Books and the Five Classics. I learned to recite them from memory, but I did not understand them. At that time, I believed deeply in Confucius, and even wrote essays [expounding his ideas]. Later I went to a bourgeois school for seven years. Seven plus six makes thirteen years. I studied all the usual bourgeois stuff — natural science and social science. They also taught some pedagogy. This includes five years of normal school, two years of middle school, and also the time I spent in the library. At that time I believed in Kant’s dualism, especially in his idealism. Originally I was a feudalist and an advocate of bourgeois democracy."''</small></ref>
Mao Zedong Thought, although developed for the Chinese context, held universal characteristics which would be developed into [[Maoism]] with the contributions of [[Abimael Guzmán]] of the [[Communist Party of Peru]] and others.
Following the rise to power of Mao and the formation of the [[People's Republic of China]] in 1949, Mao Zedong Thought was made the official state ideology, with it being regarded by the Chines revisionists as a "creative development" of [[Marxism–Leninism]] to Chinese circumstances in order to justify its deviations from [[Marxism|scientific socialism]]. Mao Zedong Though was employed as the ideological justification for the numerous departures from [[Socialism|socialist]] construction in China, including the disregard for the [[dictatorship of the proletariat]] in favor of development of [[Class collaboration|class collaborationist]] systems such as [[New Democracy]], political purges and insurrectionist incitement of the petite-bourgeoisie as seen with the "[[Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution|Cultural Revolution]]," and [[Social-imperialism|social-imperialist]] efforts in the form of "[[Three Worlds Theory]]."<ref>Mao Zedong (1957). ''[https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-5/mswv5_58.htm On The Correct Handling of Contradictions Among The People]''. Available on the Marxists Internet Archive.
The CPC declared Mao Zedong Thought to be a higher stage of Marxism at the 9th congress of the Communist Party of China:
''<small>“The contradiction between the national bourgeoisie and the working class is one between exploiter and exploited, and is by nature antagonistic. But in the concrete conditions of China, this antagonistic contradiction between the two classes, if properly handled, can be transformed into a non-antagonistic one and be resolved by peaceful methods. However, the contradiction between the working class and the national bourgeoisie will change into a contradiction between ourselves and the enemy if we do not handle it properly and do not follow the policy of uniting with, criticizing and educating the national bourgeoisie, or if the national bourgeoisie does not accept this policy of ours.”</small>''
<blockquote>"Chairman Mao has integrated the universal truth of Marxism-Leninism with the concrete practice of revolution, has inherited, defended and developed Marxism-Leninism in the political, military, economic, cultural, philosophical and other spheres, and has brought Marxism-Leninism to a higher and completely new stage. Mao Tsetung Thought is Marxism-Leninism of the era in which imperialism is heading for total collapse and socialism is advancing to world-wide victory."<ref>[https://www.marxists.org/subject/china/documents/cpc/9th_congress_report.htm| Lin Piao, report to the 9th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (Delivered on April 1 and adopted on April 14, 1969)]</ref> </blockquote>
</ref>
==Contributions==
===People's war===
{{Main|Protracted people's war}}
In contrast to many other Marxist–Leninist formations which sought to emulate the model of revolution done in the [[Russian Empire|Russia]] (i.e. the "October Road") of a long period of mostly legal struggle leading to eventual insurrection in the cities, and then most likely followed by a period of civil war, Mao Zedong developed his own means of [[socialist revolution]] relevant to Chinese peculiarities known as [[protracted people's war]].
Although Mao Zedong Thought and its adherents claimed to [[Anti-revisionism|oppose revisionism]], their actions were merely those of replacing one instance of revisionism with another; the Maoists often collaborated with the [[Soviet revisionism|Soviet revisionists]], including with regard to [[Anti-Stalinism|condemning]] [[Joseph Stalin]], endorsing [[Nikita Khrushchev's]] distortions, etc.<ref>P. F. Yudin ( March 31, 1956). ''[https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/journal-ambassador-p-f-yudin-record-conversation-mao-zedong-31-march-1956 Record of Conversation with Mao Zedong]''. ''Wilson Center Digital Archive''.
With people's war, the Communist Party of China mobilized the peasantry under proletarian leadership to surround the cities from the country side through a protracted armed struggle under which the people's war would go from being on the defensive to the offensive in positional warfare. This strategy led to the victory of the socialist revolution in China in 1949 with the defeat of the [[Guomindang]].
===New Democracy===
''<small>“Further I said that I had wanted to visit him (Mao Zedong) in the very first days following my return to Beijing and to tell about the work of the 20th Congress of the CPSU and, in particular, about Comrade Khrushchev’s speech at the closed session regarding the cult of personality. [...] Mao Zedong said that the members of the CPC delegation who had attended the 20th Congress had told him something about the work of the Congress and had brought one copy of Comrade Khrushchev’s speech regarding the cult of personality. That speech has already been translated into Chinese and he had managed to become acquainted with it.”</small>''
{{Main|New Democracy}}
Mao transcended the traditional understanding of the [[state]] in [[Marxism]] by developing a third type of dictatorship — [[New Democracy]]. New Democracy represents a joint-dictatorship of all anti-[[Feudalism|feudal]] and progressive strata under the leadership of the proletariat to build up the country for an eventual transition to a conventional [[Dictatorship of the proletariat|proletarian dictatorship]]. China would advance from New Democracy to a full socialist revolution by 1975 with the [[Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution]].<ref>[[Library:1975 Constitution of the People's Republic of China|''1975 Constitution of the People's Republic of China'']]</ref>
''<small>“During a conversation about I.V. Stalin’s mistakes Mao Zedong noted that Stalin’s line on the China question, though it had basically been correct, in certain periods he, Stalin, had made serious mistakes. In his speeches in 1926 Stalin had exaggerated the revolutionary capabilities of the Kuomintang, had spoken about the Kuomintang as the main revolutionary force in China. In 1926 Stalin had given the Chinese Communists an instruction about the orientation to the Kuomintang, having viewed it as a united front of the revolutionary forces of China. Stalin said that it is necessary to depend on the Kuomintang, to follow after that party, i.e. he spoke directly about the subordination of the Communist Party of China to the Kuomintang. This was a great mistake which had held back the independent work of the Communist Party of China on the mobilization of the masses and on attracting them to the side of the Communist Party.”</small>''
===Continuation and intensification of class struggle under socialism===
{{Main|Intensification of class struggle under socialism}}
''<small>“Through the Comintern, Mao Zedong continued, Stalin, having become after the death of V.I. Lenin the de facto leader of the Comintern, gave to the CC CPC a great number of incorrect directives. These mistaken and incorrect directives resulted from the fact that Stalin did not take into account the opinion of the CPC. At that time Wang Ming, being a Comintern worker, met frequently with Stalin and tendentiously had informed him about the situation in the CPC. Stalin, evidently, considered Wang Ming the single exponent of the opinion of the CC CPC.”</small>''
Mao was one of the few members of the international communist movement who recognized that [[class struggle]] would not only persist, but aggravate under under socialism and that sustained effort would be needed to eliminate the revived bourgeois class in the socialist society. Mao recognized that this was not what was happening in the [[Soviet Union]], and that China was also in danger of following the capitalist path that [[Nikita Khrushchev]] and his followers had pioneered there.
</ref> The policies and deviations of Mao eventually led to the rise of [[Deng Xiaoping]] in 1976, who used Mao's concepts as the basis for the [[Fascism|fascistic]] doctrine of "[[Socialism with Chinese Characteristics]]," which serves as the ideological basis of the Communist Party of China into the present. Other followers of Mao, particularly those outside of China like [[Abimael Guzmán]], have formalized the inventions of Mao and others into [[Maoism]].
== Further reading ==
* ''[https://theredspectre.com/against-maoism-part-one-the-progenitor-of-maoism-mdash-mao-zedong-thought.html Against Maoism, Part One, The progenitor of Maoism — Mao Zedong Thought]'' (2024), by the Red Spectre
== See also ==
== See also ==
* [[Chinese revisionism]]
* [[Maoism]]
* [[Maoism]]
* [[Communist Party of China]]
* [[Communist Party of China]]
* [[Dengism]]
* [[People's Republic of China (1949–1978)]]
* [[Socialism with Chinese Characteristics]]
* [[People's Republic of China]]
== References ==
== References ==
<references />
<references />
=== Notes ===
=== Notes ===
{{Notelist}}{{stub}}
{{Notelist}}{{stub}}
[[Category:Revisionism]]
[[Category:Communist Party of China]]
[[Category:Communist Party of China]]
[[Category:People's democracies]]
[[Category:Maoism]]
[[Category:Maoism]]
[[Category:Anti-Stalinism]]
[[Category:Mao Zedong]]
[[Category:Mao Zedong]]
[[Category:Nationalism]]
Latest revision as of 18:24, 10 September 2025
1965 Chinese poster, with text "Learning for the Revolution Utterly Comprehending the Mao Zedong Thought."
Mao Zedong Thought, although developed for the Chinese context, held universal characteristics which would be developed into Maoism with the contributions of Abimael Guzmán of the Communist Party of Peru and others.
The CPC declared Mao Zedong Thought to be a higher stage of Marxism at the 9th congress of the Communist Party of China:
"Chairman Mao has integrated the universal truth of Marxism-Leninism with the concrete practice of revolution, has inherited, defended and developed Marxism-Leninism in the political, military, economic, cultural, philosophical and other spheres, and has brought Marxism-Leninism to a higher and completely new stage. Mao Tsetung Thought is Marxism-Leninism of the era in which imperialism is heading for total collapse and socialism is advancing to world-wide victory."[1]
In contrast to many other Marxist–Leninist formations which sought to emulate the model of revolution done in the Russia (i.e. the "October Road") of a long period of mostly legal struggle leading to eventual insurrection in the cities, and then most likely followed by a period of civil war, Mao Zedong developed his own means of socialist revolution relevant to Chinese peculiarities known as protracted people's war.
With people's war, the Communist Party of China mobilized the peasantry under proletarian leadership to surround the cities from the country side through a protracted armed struggle under which the people's war would go from being on the defensive to the offensive in positional warfare. This strategy led to the victory of the socialist revolution in China in 1949 with the defeat of the Guomindang.
Mao transcended the traditional understanding of the state in Marxism by developing a third type of dictatorship — New Democracy. New Democracy represents a joint-dictatorship of all anti-feudal and progressive strata under the leadership of the proletariat to build up the country for an eventual transition to a conventional proletarian dictatorship. China would advance from New Democracy to a full socialist revolution by 1975 with the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution.[2]
Continuation and intensification of class struggle under socialism
Mao was one of the few members of the international communist movement who recognized that class struggle would not only persist, but aggravate under under socialism and that sustained effort would be needed to eliminate the revived bourgeois class in the socialist society. Mao recognized that this was not what was happening in the Soviet Union, and that China was also in danger of following the capitalist path that Nikita Khrushchev and his followers had pioneered there.
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