Enver Hoxha in Agreement with Robert Steigerwald

In 1978, the year Hoxha launched his smear-campaign by publishing his book Imperialism and the Revolution, Robert Steigerwald wrote an "unfinished manuscript", titled 'What Methods Did Mao Tsetung Use? – On Maoist Anti-Sovietism'. Both writings are directed against Mao Tsetung and Mao Tsetung Thought, and the similarity is obvious. This we shall demonstrate by juxtaposing essential passages from both writings.

Hoxha on Mao Tsetung Thought:

"'Mao Tsetung Thought' is a 'theory' devoid of the features of Marxism-Leninism."(120)

"When one talks of 'Mao Tsetung Thought', it is difficult to discern a single clear line in it, since, as we said at the beginning, it is an amalgam of ideologies, of anarchism, Trotskyism, modern revisionism à la Tito, à la Khrushchev, à la 'Eurocommunist', and down to the use of some Marxist phrases. In all this amalgam the old ideas of Confucius, Mencius, and the other Chinese philosophers, who have directly influenced the formation of the ideas of Mao Tsetung, his cultural and theoretical development, also occupy an honoured place."(121)

Steigerwald on Mao Tsetung Thought:

"Mao Tsetung's theoretical point of view was never proletarian, although he borrowed quite a bit from the terminology of Marxism-Leninism….(122)

The sources of Mao Tsetung's ideas are miscellaneous. Concerning the class aspect, various currents come together: feudal Chinese, bourgeois 'Western' and petty-bourgeois anarchist sources. It has not been sufficiently investigated how far the modern disciples of Kant have influenced Mao Tsetung. His teacher of philosophy and later father-in-law Yang Ch'ang-chi was a pupil of Friedrich Paulsen, a German disciple of Kant in Münster. It is a proven fact that Mao studied Paulsen's 'System of Ethics'. Certain traits of Mao's philosophy are, at any rate, set up in this spirit."(123)

Hoxha on Mao and the role of the proletariat:

"Mao Tsetung also preached the thesis on the hegemonic role of the peasantry in the revolution as the road of the world revolution.…
According to the Chinese views, the proletariat is a second-rate social force…."(124)

Steigerwald on Mao and the role of the proletariat:

"While Mao Tsetung analysed the situation of the peasants extensively, we find no traces of a comparable analysis of the Chinese working class by him.
The non-proletarian character of Mao Tsetung's ideology and policy repeatedly led to severe disputes with him in the history of the Party which did not even cease after his usurpation of power in the Party."(125)

Hoxha on Mao and dialectics:

"In dealing with contradictions, he [Mao] does not proceed from the Marxist theses, but from those of ancient Chinese philosophers, sees the opposites in a mechanical way, as external phenomena, and imagines the transformation of the opposites as a simple change of places between them.…
[He] negates the internal contradictions inherent in things and phenomena and treats development as simple repetition, as a chain of unchangeable states in which the same opposites and the same relationship between them are observed."(126)

Steigerwald on Mao and dialectics:

"When studying Mao's explanations of such general statements, one realizes that he is far behind not only the Marxist-Leninist solution but also Hegel's solution of the problem of contradictions. It is evident what damage has been caused by his narrow-minded adherence to the elementary dialectics of feudal Chinese philosophers, which were great in their time but backward under today's conditions. Mao's theory of contradictions comes down to a theory of complementary definitions transforming into each other in a simple circular way."(127)

Within this booklet we have to confine ourselves to these few examples. Our purpose was to demonstrate how far these two theoretical views coincide. It is obvious how they harmonize with each other in their revisionist evaluation and condemnation of Mao Tsetung and Mao Tsetung Thought. What is the reason for this? It is the same petty-bourgeois mentality prevailing both in Hoxha and Steigerwald. Their petty-bourgeois attacks on the great Marxist-Leninist Mao Tsetung and Mao Tsetung Thought damage the international communist and labour movement and promote world-wide liquidationism.

In the 'History of the Party of Labour of Albania', published in 1971, the PLA's leadership was still entitled to write about its own international role:

"The PLA has fulfilled a great international duty in taking up a consequent, principle-based struggle against imperialism and modern revisionism. In this struggle the party aimed to protect the socialist camp and the international communist movement from the imperialist and revisionist attempts to liquidate them, and to preserve and confirm this unity. After the Khrushchevite revisionists had split the socialist camp, the party attempted to restore unity on a revolutionary basis without revisionists and traitors and on the basis of a forceful struggle against them."(128)

The historical role of the PLA was turned into its very opposite when the PLA slandered Mao Tsetung as an anti-Marxist and revisionist and Mao Tsetung Thought as an anti-Marxist teaching and as chauvinism. Today Enver Hoxha argues in line with the West German revisionist Robert Steigerwald.