The author of this article argues why “MLM” (Marxism-Leninism-Maoism) should be used as a term for today’s Marxists, and criticizes “Summary of internal discussions and external criticism” from the Norwegian organization “Revolusjonært Kommunistisk Forbund”(RK).
By Reidar Knutsen.
RK writes in its document “Summary of internal discussions and external criticism“:
… We hope that the platform will thus be able to gain support from revolutionaries who do not consider themselves Maoists.
and later:
The National Assembly adopted the following change to the paragraph in the statutes that defines our political basic view:
The union bases its policy on revolutionary communism. RK is also a Marxist organization, which stands in the Maoist tradition.The paragraph previously read as follows: “The union’s leading ideology is revolutionary communism, i.e. Marxism-Leninism-Maoism”.
This change means that we do not explicitly agree with the formulation “Marxism-Leninism-Maoism”. The new formulation opens up the possibility that different perceptions of Maoism can coexist in the organization, while at the same time establishing “revolutionary communism” as our common fundamental view.
The goal is to make the platform palatable to more people. In line with this, the ideological basis is broadened by removing “MLM” and downplaying Maoism, opening up the possibility that different lines can “coexist in the organization”. There will always be different lines in communist organizations, and this is not a bad thing, but a good thing, as long as the contradictions are resolved by the proletarian line strengthening itself in the struggle against the bourgeois/petty bourgeois. But if the goal is for several lines to “coexist”, then you turn everything upside down. Then the goal is no longer to develop a common correct Maoist line, and use contradictions as a tool for this goal. Instead, different lines have become an independent goal, and consequently the struggle between correct and incorrect lines disappears. Implicitly it is communicated that there is no one correct line, but several. In this way, the Marxist dialectical view of line struggle is replaced, and replaced with an opportunistic line where one seeks unprincipled unity where different lines are accepted without trying to combat the incorrect lines. It is important that one is able to see the very essential nuance difference in viewing contradictions between lines as positive as part of a dialectical process where the correct line strengthens itself in the struggle against the incorrect one. And to see the existence of different lines as an end in itself. In reality, the difference between Marxism and opportunism lies in this nuance.
The summary text does not explain why it is better to make the organization broader. I disagree that making the organization broader, by changing the ideological basis, is an independent point. In this article, I will start by explaining why communists must be uncompromising and sharp on ideology. I will argue why ideological and political clarity is crucial, before finally arguing why “MLM” is the scientifically correct designation of the revolutionary communism of our time.
Communists must be uncompromising on ideology
The opportunist, by his very nature, tends to avoid a definite and final solution of a question; he is always seeking for alternatives; he writhes like an eel between mutually exclusive points of view; he tries to ‘be in agreement’ with all sides, but expresses his disagreements in amendments, doubts, pious and innocent wishes, etc. etc.
V.I. Lenin. (1904) One step forward, two steps back. Retrieved 01 July 2025 from: https://espressostalinist.com/2012/02/14/lenin-on-opportunism/
“Communism” is a term with several meanings:
- It describes a future classless society
- It is used synonymously with the term “scientific socialism”/Marxism
- It is used as a name for the movement that fights for communist society
Marxism claims that practice is the only source of knowledge. Practice is summarized in theory, which provides guidance for new practice, which in turn must be summarized in new theory. Mao put it this way:
Practice, knowledge, again practice, and again knowledge. This form repeats itself in endless cycles, and with each cycle the content of practice and knowledge rises to a higher level. Such is the whole of the dialectical-materialist theory of knowledge, and such is the dialectical-materialist theory of the unity of knowing and doing.
Mao Zedong. 1927 “On Practice”. Retrieved 01 July 2025 from: https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-1/mswv1_16.htm
Mao wrote further:
Idealism and mechanical materialism, opportunism and adventurism, are all characterized by the breach between the subjective and the objective, by the separation of knowledge from practice.
Mao Zedong. 1927 “On Practice”. Retrieved July 1, 2025 from: https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-1/mswv1_16.htm
If knowledge is separated from practice, it means that we have the wrong theory. That is, theory that is not true. It is theory that will point out the wrong direction for our practice. If we go in that direction, we will not reach the goal: the communist society. In other words, it is crucially important that we have a theory that is correct. Everything communists do springs from this scientific basis. Everything is subject to this scientific basis. Nothing trumps it. When we come to the ideological, this is especially important and there is no sharp distinction between communism as science and communism as ideology. Marxism is an ideological science. That is, it is a science that exists for the purpose of being a guide for changing society by abolishing class society and creating communist society. In this sense, Marxism as a science is also Marxism as an ideology.
When RK “opens up for different perceptions of Maoism to coexist in the organization”, the question is whether this is a side effect of scientific development in Marxism (I use “Maoism” and “Marxism” synonymously. In my opinion, “Maoism” is just another term for the Marxism of our time. That is, one cannot be a Marxist today without also being a Maoist). So far, I am unable to see what scientific development has caused this side effect. If that were the case, the summary text should have started by explaining this. It does not happen, instead one starts by describing that this has happened, and later in the document it says:
The new formulation, in short, provides room for an open, thorough and unprejudiced discussion about the content of Maoism, how we should understand concepts such as “science”, “ideology” and “theory”, and the epistemological basis for a scientific socialism.
Instead of a process of scientific and ideological development that has provided greater clarity, one has done the exact opposite: One has rejected the clarities one previously had (and which modern Marxism has provided clarity on), and taken a step back to more ambiguity and opened up for erroneous theories to flourish in the organization. Admittedly, there will always be a need for “open-minded discussion about the content of Maoism”, but when you do not hold yourself to the epistemological basis for scientific socialism that actually exists (and do not mention it at all), this shows that you are taking a step back and not forward. It reveals either a lack of knowledge or that one is in practice removing scientific Marxist principles in order to “expand” the organization, in other words, making concessions to opportunism. Whether proven or not, the result of removing “MLM” and downplaying Maoism (as a substitute for the far more diffuse “revolutionary communism” that even Trotskyists use to label themselves) is that ideological clarity is replaced by ambiguity – this is, in practice, opening the door to opportunism.
Why ideological clarity?
The Communists disdain to conceal their views and aims. They openly declare that their ends can be attained only by the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions.
Marx and Engels, Friedrich. 1848. The Communist Manifesto. Retrieved July 1, 2025 from: https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/download/pdf/Manifesto.pdf
The Communist Party is not a separate party from the working class, but its most advanced and determined part, which understands the laws of social development and can lead the struggle against capitalism. The Communist Manifesto states:
The Communists, therefore, are on the one hand, practically, the most advanced and resolute
Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. 1848. The Communist Manifesto. Retrieved July 1, 2025 from: https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/download/pdf/Manifesto.pdf
section of the working-class parties of every country, that section which pushes forward all
others; on the other hand, theoretically, they have over the great mass of the proletariat the
advantage of clearly understanding the line of march, the conditions, and the ultimate general results of the proletarian movement.
In other words, the Communist Party must function as the leadership of the proletariat. Many proletarians see the problems with capitalist society and want change, but they have vague or erroneous ideas about how society should be changed. It is not that it is obvious and intuitive how to change something as complex as human society. That is precisely why we need scientific studies and collective theoretical efforts by a number of individuals to create insight, explanations, and clarity about what needs to be done.
It is the most important task of the Communist Party to analyze society and create a plan for how capitalism can be overthrown and communism can be introduced, and then to spread this insight and clarity to the proletariat. If the Communist Party is unable to create theoretical and ideological clarity within itself, it cannot spread such clarity to the masses. A party or organization that calls itself communist but has no theoretical and ideological clarity to spread to the masses ends up becoming an opportunistic tail-snapping party that panders to the masses and apes their demands without providing the leadership and clarity required for a communist revolution to actually take place and have a chance of succeeding in its goal.
It is therefore worrying when Revolutionary Communists become more unclear and uncertain about the path to the goal. If such theoretical and ideological degeneration continues, it will not help if the change leads to quantitative growth in the organization. A communist organization that grows by increasing ambiguity will eventually succumb to opportunism and degenerate into a tail-snapping party without the ability to lead any revolution. Organizational growth must never come at the expense of qualitative growth, but on the contrary come in the wake of qualitative growth. Once you open the door ajar to such opportunism, it becomes progressively more difficult to close it, which is why it is very important never to open it. Once you have opened a small crack, it is crucially important to close it as quickly as possible.
Why is “MLM” a scientifically correct name for modern communism?
Finally, Hegel’s law holds not only for compound bodies, but for the chemical elements themselves. We know now that chemical properties of elements are a periodic function of their atomic weight and consequently their quality is determined by the quantity of their atomic weight (or, as we would now say, of their atomic number), and the proof of this has been made in a most striking way. . . . By the help of the—unknown—application of Hegel’s law of the change of quantity into quality, Mendeleyeff has achieved a scientific feat which can well stand comparison with Leverrier’s calculation of the orbit of the still unknown planet Neptune. . . . Perhaps those gentlemen who up till now have treated the transformation of quantity into quality as mysticism and incomprehensible transcendentalism will now explain that it is all perfectly self-evident, trivial, and platitudinous, that it has been long familiar to them and that we have nothing new to teach them. To have put forward for the first time a general law of nature and thought, in its most generally valid form, that will always remain as a historical achievement of the first order, and if these gentlemen for so many years have allowed quantity and quality to turn into each other without knowing what they were doing, they must console themselves with Molière’s Monsieur Jourdain, who had all his life spoken prose unwittingly.
Friedrich Engels. Dialectics of Nature. Retrieved July 1, 2025 from: https://www.marxists.org/archive/bernal/works/1930s/engels.htm.
Marxist philosophy teaches us that quantity turns into quality. This means that over a certain time one can have a gradual quantitative increase in the essence of a thing, but at a certain level, the quantitative increase turns into a qualitative leap, where the essence of the thing changes fundamentally. We find several examples from both the natural sciences and the social sciences of examples where a quantitative development turns into qualitative development:
- Ice melts into water: At a certain temperature, and a certain air pressure, ice melts into water. At the water surface this is approx. 0 degrees Celsius. This means that if we imagine that we have ice that has a temperature of -60 degrees, then this is solid ice. At -50 degrees it is still solid ice, and it is difficult to see any difference, even though the ice may have expanded a little. The same at -40 degrees, -30 degrees, etc. until we get to about 0 degrees, where a fundamental change occurs where the ice changes from solid to liquid form (from ice to water).
- Water turns into steam: From about 0 degrees – about 100 degrees Celsius with air pressure corresponding to sea level, water will turn into steam: The ice in our previous example melted to water at about 0 degrees. If we continue heating it will go from 0+ degrees to 10 degrees, then we will not see any significant difference. The shape is the same, even though the water may expand a little in volume. We see the same thing at 20 degrees, 30 degrees, 40 degrees, etc. until we reach about 100 degrees, where the water turns into a gas (steam).
- Capitalism becomes socialism: From social science/Marxism we know that the class struggle at a certain level of class conflict leads to revolution. Increased class oppression and worsening living conditions for the proletariat under capitalism gradually lead to a little more protests, but capitalism will continue to exist. When the contradiction reaches a certain level, it will trigger a revolution. This is explained a little simplified, as a revolution also presupposes the subjective element – i.e. that there is a communist party that has managed to gain support and functions as the leadership of the proletariat. At the same time, it is the case that sufficient class contradiction over time will create this party, but the time when this happens, and when the party becomes strong enough, depends on subjective (and partly random) elements.
These are three examples where gradual quantitative change at a given point turns into qualitative change, i.e. a qualitative leap. Revolution (as in the last example) is an example of a qualitative leap. Qualitative leaps are found not only in these examples, but everywhere in nature and society. Nor is Marxism itself exempt from the law that development occurs through qualitative leaps. There have actually been three such leaps in Marxism:
- The establishment of scientific socialism (Marxism): The first leap in Marxism was its establishment. Before Marxism, there was a utopian and unscientific socialism, which with limited analysis and visions envisioned how one could have a better society without class oppression. Several times in history, attempts were made to create such socialist societies, and just as many times they failed. After sufficient experience with failed attempts to establish socialism, and experiences from the Paris Commune and other uprisings, combined with analysis of previous revolutions, studies of today’s capitalist society, etc., Marxism was established by Marx and Engels primarily systematizing and theorizing the practical experiences and making a scientific analysis of what had to be done.
- The Russian Revolution: Experience with making socialist revolution was very limited before the revolution in Russia in 1917. In the run-up to the revolution, the Bolsheviks had waged a fierce struggle against opportunism and revisionism in the labor movement, as well as defending and further developing Marxism. Through the Russian Revolution of 1917, the theory was tested in practice and a sea of new experiences were established and systematized in new theory. This led to a tremendous development – a leap – in Marxism, and just as ice turned into water at 0 degrees, Marxism turned into Marxism-Leninism with the Russian Revolution.
- The Chinese Revolution: Just as the Russian Revolution added a sea of new experiences and new theory, the revolution in China added the same. The revolution in China was carried out in a less industrialized country. Mao and other communists in the CCP adapted Marxism to their conditions and created a theory for how a socialist revolution could be carried out here, which largely broke with previous revolutionary theory. The validity of the new theories was proven in practice through the success of the Chinese Revolution. In addition to this, Mao and the Chinese communists criticized a number of errors and shortcomings in the Russian Revolution, which ultimately led to its degeneration. Despite the fact that the revolution ultimately failed in China as well, there is a wealth of theory and experience from it that has partly proven its validity in practice and that has made Marxism-Leninism – just like in the case of water turning into steam – take a leap, where it added significant new theoretical contributions to Marxism, broke with errors and shortcomings in Marxism-Leninism and became something new: Marxism-Leninism-Maoism (MLM).
Marxism is the science of communism. Just like all other sciences, it is not a set of unchanging dogmas, but a science that is in development. Like all other sciences, it is characterized by periods of slow gradual development, and periods of revolutionary leaps. From the natural sciences we have some examples of qualitative leaps:
- Newton and gravity: Newton brought together the laws of motion and gravity in the Principia, which cut across Aristotle’s or medieval views – everything from planetary orbits to falling apples was understood via one universal theory. This was a classic example of a tipping point where new macro-level laws emerged from quantitative measurements (of planetary orbits, acceleration, etc.).
- Theory of Relativity – from Newton to Einstein (1905/1915): Einstein’s special and general relativity represented a fundamental break with Newtonian mechanics when it came to high speed and strong gravitational fields – not just an improvement, but a new way of understanding time, space, and gravity. This is a clear qualitative leap – a new understanding of reality with completely different rules than before.
- Quantum mechanics: Classical mechanics completely failed at the atomic level, and quantum mechanics introduced discrete energy quanta, the wave-particle duality and fundamentally probabilistic laws – in contrast to determinism. For example: “water always boils at 100 degrees Celsius” is a deterministic statement. Marxism is not deterministic, but sees development as consisting of units consisting of mutually exclusive sides. If one side fights the other, the unit changes quality and becomes something new.
In the same way, we have the above-mentioned leap in marxism. Since Marxism is a science, it is bound to correct and improve itself in step with new discoveries and new experiences. It can never remain as an unchanging set of dogmas. At the same time, its development, like all other sciences and developments, will be characterized by long periods of gradual increase, up to sudden qualitative leaps where Marxism can only continue to be Marxism, through making a leap away from the old and up to a new and higher level. That is: Marxism can in such cases only continue to be Marxism through a leap that makes it cease to be like Marxism as it was known until then. – Only by breaking with the old Marxism can it continue (have continuity) with Marxism as a science. Independent of our beliefs and thoughts, Marxism has in reality undergone three such leaps as described above. Those who do not understand that Marxism is a developing science, but cling to an old petrified version of Marxism, relate to Marxism as a set of unchanging dogmas. As a consequence, they do not treat Marxism as a science, but as something that has more in common with religion. In doing so, they break with the whole point of Marxism: with the essence of Marxism, and thus Marxism as such. Only by understanding and acknowledging the development of Marxism, and understanding Marxism scientifically, can one be a Marxist. “Marxism-Leninism-Maoism” (MLM) is a term that is scientifically correct, because it describes Marxism as a science that has undergone three fundamental qualitative transformations. The term is scientifically correct, and distinguishes true Marxism from dogmatic, opportunistic, and revisionist quasi-Marxism. For this reason, it is not only scientifically correct, but also today the framework that (despite confusion spread by some confused organizations and individuals) is best able to distinguish us from the quasi-Marxist trends, and provide the most clarity about our ideological and theoretical basis. By removing the term, RK has created greater ambiguity about its ideological and theoretical basis. I have previously explained why this is wrong, and will not repeat the argument here. The important thing is that the organization takes the problem seriously, realizes the mistake, learns from it and gets the ship on the right course.