Form of patriotism promoted by some fringe Marxist?Leninist movements
Socialist patriotism
is a form of
patriotism
promoted by
Marxist?Leninist
movements.
[1]
Socialist
patriotism promotes people living within Marxist?Leninist countries to adopt a "boundless love for the socialist homeland, a commitment to the revolutionary transformation of society [and] the cause of
communism
".
[2]
Marxist?Leninists claim that socialist patriotism is not connected with
nationalism
, as Marxists and Marxist?Leninists denounce nationalism as a
bourgeois
ideology developed under
capitalism
that sets workers against each other.
[3]
Socialist patriotism is commonly advocated directly alongside
proletarian internationalism
, with communist parties regarding the two concepts as compatible with each other.
[4]
The concept has been attributed by
Soviet
writers
[
who?
]
to
Karl Marx
and
Vladimir Lenin
.
[1]
Lenin separated patriotism into what he defined as
proletarian
, socialist patriotism from
bourgeois nationalism
.
[5]
Lenin promoted the right of all nations to
self-determination
and the right to unity of all workers within nations; however, he also condemned
chauvinism
and claimed there were both justified and unjustified feelings of national pride.
[6]
Lenin believed that nations subjected to imperial rule had the right to seek
national liberation
from imperial rule.
[7]
Countries' variants
[
edit
]
Soviet Union
[
edit
]
Initially, the
Soviet Russia
and early
Soviet Union
adopted the idea of
proletarian internationalism
instead of
nationalism
on which patriotism is based. However, after the
inability of socialist revolutions
to abolish capitalism and national boundaries,
Joseph Stalin
promoted socialist patriotism following the theory of "
socialism in one country
".
Socialist patriotism would supposedly serve both national interest and international socialist interest.
[8]
While promoting socialist patriotism for the Soviet Union as a whole, Stalin repressed nationalist sentiments in fifteen republics of the Soviet Union.
[9]
However, according to some academics, Soviet patriotism had Russian nationalist overtones in practice.
[10]
China
[
edit
]
The
Chinese Communist Party
and the government of
China
advocate socialist patriotism.
[11]
[12]
The Chinese Communist Party describes the policy of socialist patriotism as the following: "Socialist patriotism has three levels. At the first level, individuals should subordinate their personal interests to the interests of the state. At the second level, individuals should subordinate their personal destiny to the destiny of our socialist system. At the third level, individuals should subordinate their personal future to the future of our communist cause."
[11]
The PRC portrays the government as the embodiment of the will of the Chinese people.
[11]
Mao Zedong
spoke of a Chinese nation, but specified that the Chinese are a civic-based nation of multiple ethnic groups, and explicitly condemned Han
ethnocentrism
, which Mao called
Han chauvinism
and claimed had become widespread in China.
[13]
The
constitution of China
states that China is a multi-ethnic society and that the state is opposed to national chauvinism and specifies Han chauvinism in particular.
[14]
Can a Communist, who is an internationalist, at the same time be a patriot? We hold that he not only can be but also must be. The specific content of patriotism is determined by historical conditions. There is the "patriotism" of the Japanese aggressors and of Hitler, and there is our patriotism. Communists must resolutely oppose the "patriotism" of the Japanese aggressors and of Hitler. The Communists of Japan and Germany are defeatists with regard to the wars being waged by their countries. To bring about the defeat of the Japanese aggressors and of Hitler by every possible means is in the interests of the Japanese and the German people, and the more complete the defeat the better. For the wars launched by the Japanese aggressors and Hitler are harming the people at home as well as the people of the world.
China's case, however, is different, because she is the victim of aggression. Chinese Communists must therefore combine patriotism with internationalism. We are at once internationalists and patriots, and our slogan is, "Fight to defend the motherland against the aggressors." For us defeatism is a crime and to strive for victory in the War of Resistance is an inescapable duty. For only by fighting in defense of the motherland can we defeat the aggressors and achieve national liberation. And only by achieving national liberation will it be possible for the proletariat and other working people to achieve their own emancipation. The victory of China and the defeat of the invading imperialists will help the people of other countries. Thus in wars of national liberation patriotism is applied internationalism.
?
Mao Zedong,
The Role of the Chinese Communist Party in the National War
, October 1938.
East Germany
[
edit
]
The
Socialist Unity Party of Germany
officially had socialist patriotism within its party statutes.
[15]
The SED expanded on this by emphasizing a "socialist
national consciousness
" involving a "love for the GDR and pride in the achievements of
socialism
.
[16]
However the GDR said that socialist patriotism was compatible with
proletarian internationalism
and stated that it should not be confused with
nationalism
that it associated with
chauvinism
and
xenophobia
.
[16]
Ethiopia
[
edit
]
The
Derg
and the
People's Democratic Republic of Ethiopia
under
Mengistu Haile Mariam
advocated socialist patriotism.
[17]
[18]
The Derg declared that "socialist patriotism" meant "true love for one's motherland...[and]...free[dom] from all forms of
chauvinism
and
racialism
".
[18]
North Korea
[
edit
]
Kim Il Sung
promoted socialist patriotism while he condemned nationalism in considered that it destroyed fraternal relations between people because of its exclusivism.
[19]
In
North Korea
, socialist patriotism has been described as an ideology meant to serve its own people, be faithful to their working class, and to be loyal to their own (communist) party.
[19]
Patriotism is not an empty concept. Education in patriotism cannot be conducted simply by erecting the slogan, "Let us arm ourselves with the spirit of socialist patriotism!" Educating people in the spirit of patriotism must begin with fostering the idea of caring for every tree planted on the road side, for the chairs and desks in the school... There is no doubt that a person who has formed the habit of cherishing common property from childhood will grow up to be a valuable patriot.
[20]
?
Kim Il Sung
Vietnam
[
edit
]
The
Communist Party of Vietnam
and the government of
Vietnam
advocate "socialist patriotism" of the
Vietnamese people
.
[21]
Vietnamese Communist leader
Ho Chi Minh
emphasized the role of socialist patriotism to Vietnamese communism, and emphasized the importance of patriotism, saying: "In the beginning it was patriotism and not communism which impelled me to believe in
Lenin
and the
Third International
."
[22]
After the collapse of the Indochinese Communist Party in 1941, the Vietnamese Communist movement since the 1940s fused the policies of proletarian internationalism and Vietnamese patriotism together.
[23]
Vietnamese Communist Party leader Ho Chi Minh was responsible for the incorporation of Vietnamese patriotism into the Party, he had been born into a family with strong anticolonial political views towards
French rule in Vietnam
.
[23]
The incorporation of Vietnamese patriotism into the Communist Party's policy fit in with the longstanding Vietnamese struggle against French colonial rule.
[24]
Although Ho opposed French colonial rule in Vietnam, he harboured no dislike of France as a whole, stating that French colonial rule was "cruel and inhumane" but that the French people at home were good people.
[24]
He had studied in France as a youth where he became an adherent to Marxism?Leninism, and he personally admired the French Revolutionary motto of "liberty, equality, fraternity".
[24]
He witnessed the
Treaty of Versailles
that applied the principles of
Woodrow Wilson
's
Fourteen Points
that advocated national
self-determination
, resulting in the end of imperial rule over many peoples in Europe.
[25]
He was inspired by the Wilsonian concept of national self-determination
[25]
Yugoslavia
[
edit
]
The
Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
endorsed socialist patriotism,
[26]
promoting the concept of "
brotherhood and unity
", where the Yugoslav nations would overcome their cultural and linguistic differences through promoting fraternal relations between the nations.
Cuba
[
edit
]
There is an element of socialist patriotism combined with left-wing nationalism within the
Communist Party of Cuba
in
Cuba
.
[27]
[28]
See also
[
edit
]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
a
b
Robert A. Jones.
The Soviet concept of "limited sovereignty" from Lenin to Gorbachev: the Brezhnev Doctrine
. MacMillan, 1990. Pp. 133.
- ^
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Russia's new politics: the management of a postcommunist society
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- ^
Stephen White.
Understanding Russian Politics
. Cambridge, England, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2011. Pp. 220.
- ^
William B. Simons, Stephen White.
The Party statutes of the Communist world
. BRILL, 1984. Advocacy of socialist patriotism alongside proletarian internationalism shown on Pp. 180 (Czechoslovakia), Pp. 123 (Cuba), Pp. 192 (German Democratic Republic).
- ^
The Current digest of the Soviet press, Volume 39, Issues 1-26
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- ^
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- ^
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.
Why Marx Was Right
. Yale University Press, 2011. p. 217.
- ^
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- ^
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- ^
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(2001).
Encyclopedia of Nationalism, Volume II
. Academic Press.
ISBN
0-12-227230-7
.
- ^
a
b
c
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(2004).
A Nation-State by Construction: Dynamics of Modern Chinese Nationalism
.
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. p. 28.
ISBN
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.
- ^
Jan-Ingvar Lofstedt. Chinese educational policy: changes and contradictions, 1949-79. Almqvist & Wiksell International, 1980. Pp. 25.
- ^
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- ^
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Autonomy and Ethnicity: Negotiating Competing Claims in Multi-Ethnic States
(1 ed.).
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. p. 77.
doi
:
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.
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- ^
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- ^
a
b
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- ^
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Revolutionary Ethiopia: from empire to people's republic
. Indiana University Press, 1988. Pp. 212.
- ^
a
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a
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- ^
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. Mahwah, New Jersey, USA: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc., 2006. Pp. 186.
- ^
Mark Moyar. Triumph forsaken: the Vietnam war, 1954-1965. New York, New York, USA: Cambridge University Press, 2006. Pp. 437.
- ^
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Ho Chi Minh and the struggle for an independent Vietnam
. Merlin Press, 1972.
- ^
a
b
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. Ithaca, New York, USA:
Cornell University Press
, 1982. Pp. 58
- ^
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b
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Vietnamese Communism, 1925-1945
. Ithaca, New York, USA: Cornell University Press, 1982. p. 59
- ^
a
b
Kim Khanh Hu?nh.
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. Ithaca, New York, USA: Cornell University Press, 1982. p. 60
- ^
Teresa Rakowska-Harmstone
. Communism in Eastern Europe. Indiana University Press, 1984. Manchester, England, UK: Manchester University Press ND, 1984. p. 267.
- ^
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.
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.
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:
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.
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.
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.
- ^
Benjamin, Jules R. (1975-02-01).
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.
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.
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.
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