Roland Boer's Blog, page 45

Sanders and Corbyn: A Leninist Analysis

Given that the North Atlantic Left is situated well ‘before October’ (unlike China), its various branches have struggled to get across a convincing account of current ills. Thus far, it has been the Right that has managed to do so very well. Think of the UKIP, the French National Front, the Danish People’s Party, and Geert Wilders in the Netherlands.

So what is it about Bernie Sanders and Jeremy Corbyn that seems to have changed the situation somewhat?

Before proceeding, let me get a couple o...

Time to study Xi Jinping

How is this for a timely intervention: last year I was asked to write a piece on the socialist imagination. So I decided to write ‘Xi Jinping’s China: Keeping the Socialist Imagination Alive’. It is based on a careful analysis of ‘The Governance of China’, containing his main writings up to 2014. More is on the way, into which I plan to delve. But now we find calls from the leaders of the CPC itself to study Xi Jinping’s speeches and texts. For example, Liu Yunshan has urged:

Chief officials...

Xi Jinping at the Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation 2017

It’s all happening in Beijing this week, with the major Belt and Road Forum drawing representatives from 130 countries – and the expected levels of security. If there was any doubt about Chinese global leadership, then it is probably time to lay such doubt to rest. Apart from all the usual commentary, what fascinates me is that this massive project – some call it the project of the century and some the most ambitious project in human history – is being spearheaded by nothing less than the Com...

What would today’s equivalent be of the Anti-Japanese University?

In the 1930s and 1940s, there was the wonderful Anti-Japanese University in China, known as Kangda. It’s full name was the Zhongguo Renmin Kangrì Junshì Zhengzhi Daxue (Anti-Japanese Military and Political University). It later merged with the PLA’s university, but it set me wondering: what would an equivalent be today? I suggest the following as possibilities:

The Anti-USA University The Anti-EU University

Fu Ying: China’s position on DPRK-USA tensions

There is now an extraordinarily insightful paper by Fu Ying on the DPRK-USA tensions. She was the head of the Chinese delegation involved in bringing together the USA and the DPRK a decade or more ago and she is now chairperson of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the National People’s Congress. Fu Ying is the most experienced Chinese foreign relations expert, with a deep understanding of North Korean concerns. Her recent detailed assessment can be found here.

She shows consistently how direct...

Life of an absolute monarch

Looks like it is the year of the state. I have written two articles, one on the nature of the socialist state, and another on the transition between bourgeois and socialist states. Currently, I am completing an article on the absolutist ‘Christian state’, which was the (Prussian) context in which Marx and Engels began their early work. I am taken with Marx’s argument that the secular, bourgeois state is the full (dialectical) realisation of the absolutist Christian state.

Meanwhile, a snippet...

The quality of ground troops

Way back in 1945, Stalin was told of the first nuclear test in the USA. He was sceptical. Why? You may have all the firepower in the world, he pointed out, but it is the quality of ground troops that makes all the difference. Stalin’s insights are still very relevant. The USA loves firing missiles and dropping bombs – more bombs were dropped in North Korea in the early 1950s than in the whole of the second world war. But as soon as ground troops go in, they are clearly inferior. The recent hi...

A DPRK (North Korean) view on the current situation

Might it possibly be the case that we will begin to hear more of the DPRK’s view? Perhaps it is the recklessness of that rogue state known as the USA, perhaps it is the destabilising drive from South Korea’s conservative government, perhaps it is a newly belligerent Japan – all of these may be forcing a few people to ask: what is the DPRK’s position?

A hint may be found in an extraordinary interview on the BBC, of all places. In response to some rather aggressive questions, the Vice-Foreign M...

A North Korean Perspective on Reunification

Since the DPRK (North Korea) is in the corporate news, and full of the usual misrepresentation, I thought I would reprise a section of an article I wrote a couple of years ago on Korean reunification – from the perspective of the north.

Reunification been a consistent policy of the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea since its earliest days. But on what terms? A northern takeover of the south? Not at all. The policy is that reunification would be undertaken without outside interference, peac...

Time to leave your electronic devices at home if you have to visit the USA

With increasing news that US border bureaucrats are asking travellers to hand over electronic devices and provide access (passwords etc.), so they can check your social media, email and so on, it is time either to give the USA a miss (there are better places to visit) or to leave all devices at home. A simple ‘dumb’ or ‘burner’ phone, with a couple of numbers on it may be all that you want to bring with you. Then again, you may be denied entry with these as well, since they may be a signal yo...