. A vanguard organization is something which is permanent. A vanguard party has to be constructed, has to be built through a long process. |
A vanguard organization becomes a vanguard party when a significant minority of the real class, of the really existing workers, poor peasants, revolutionary youth, revolutionary women, revolutionary oppressed nationalities, recognizes it as their vanguard party, i.e., follows it in action. |
After all, the history of the 20th century is the history of social revolutions. |
And if the mass of the people do not accept your choice of priorities, no power on earth, even the biggest terror of Stalin, can force them to do the one key thing that you need to build socialism: have a constructive, creative, and convinced participation in the production process. |
And you cannot have a socialist revolution commandeered from the top, ordered around by some omniscient leader or group of leaders. |
But that is going to change because the working class has become a majority in society in practically all the important countries of the world. |
Coming out of all these basic conceptual distinctions we can conclude the necessity of a vanguard formation nearly immediately. |
Factions are a sign of illness in a party. |
Furthermore, there is absolutely no contradiction between the separate organizations of revolutionary vanguard militants and their participation in the mass organizations of the working class. |
I do not believe in self-proclaimed parties. |
If the workers do not fight for higher wages, if they do not fight for a shorter workday, if they do not fight for, let us say it in a provocative way, day-to-day economic issues, they become demoralized slaves. |
If the workers would be at the highest point of militancy and consciousness all the time, you would not need a vanguard organization. |
In a healthy party you have no factions; a healthy party from the point of view of both the political line and the internal party regime. |
In the light of these principles, it is clear that no socialist or communist society exists anywhere in the world today. |
Marxism is always open, always critical, always self-critical. |