REVOLUTION AND EVOLUTION
IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY
JAMES AND GRACE LEE BOGGS
More than thirty years of experience in the labor, radical, and black
movements in the United States are distilled by the authors in these
pages. "We have written this book," they say in their preface. "for
those Americans of our time who have become aware of the need
for profound and drastic changes in this country, who want to do
something to improve human life and are ready to dedicate their
lives to this goal, but who are unable to see a path, a direction for
their dedication; who are convinced that they must do something
of a sustained character to change this country if they are to realize
their own human identity and if this country is ever to get back on
the human road, but who are not sure whether what they are now
doing is helpful or futile, relevant or irrelevant."
"The author of The American Revolution and Racism end Class
Struggle, Alabama-born black writer James Boggs, and New Eng-
land-born Grace Boggs (the daughter of Chinese emigrants) survey
the Russian, Chinese, Portuguese Guinean and Vietnamese revolu-
tions from their Marxist-activist perspectives. Out of their long
experience in American labor and civil rights movements they write
with an objectivity (and a sense of the cultural depths out of which
permanent social change must grow) that lifts their book beyond
mere ideological polemics. Every revolution is unique, in their view,
and none can be taken for a model. The second half of their book v
examines American history in terms of class struggle, taking the ri
long view that the poor and the blacks can liberate themselves 'only
by liberating American society as a whole.' A stimulating book.'-
Publishers' Weekly.
Monthly Review Press
155 West 23rd Street, New YORK, NY 10011
Copyright 1974 by James and Grace Lee Boggs
All Rights Reserved
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Boggs, James.
Revolution and evolution in the twentieth century. 1. Revolution--
History. 2. Negroes--Politics and suffrage. 3. United States--
Civilization -- 1945. 1. Boggs, Grace Lee, joint author. II. Title.
D445.B63 301.6'333 73-90076
ISBN 0-85345-322-5
First Modern Reader Paperback 1975
Manufactured in the United States of America
1098765
CONTENTS
Preface 7
1. Revolution and Evolution 13
2. Revisiting the Russian Revolution 24
3. The Chinese Revolution:
Putting Politics in Command 47
4. The Liberation of Guine·:
Building as We Fight 81
5. People's War in Vietnam 97
6. Dialectics and Revolution 121
7. Rediscovering the American Past 143
8. A Unique Stage in Human Development 168
9. Changing Concepts for Changing Realities 197
10. Correcting Mistaken Ideas About War,
Work, Welfare, Women 223
11. No Promised Land 257
PREFACE
We have written this book for those Americans of our time who have
become aware of the need for profound and drastic change in this
country, who want to do something to improve human life and are
ready to dedicate their lives to this goal, but who are unable to see a
path, a direction for their dedication; who are convinced that they
must do something of a sustained character to change this country if
they are to realize their own human identity and if this country is
ever to get back on the human road, but who are not sure whether
what they are now doing is helpful or futile, relevant or irrelevant.
During the more than thirty years of our participation in the labor,
radical, and black movements in this country, we have made
countless speeches and written countless documents, pamphlets,
leaflets, and articles. We have also written two books on the
contradictions in U.S. society and the state of the movements which
have emerged to resolve these contradictions.
In The American Revolution (New York: Monthly Review Press,
1963), we focussed on the tremendous technological development
which has taken place in this country, the economy of abundance
and the Welfare State which it has made possible, and the
7
8 Preface
transformations which these have brought about in the work force
and in the relations between the races and classes in this country.
Most radicals have never reflected upon this unique development.
Instead of using the dialectical method which was Marx's landmark
contribution to revolutionary thought, they have been chiefly
concerned with proving the correctness of what Marx wrote about
capital and labor in the middle of the nineteenth century at the
beginning of the Industrial Revolution. The aim of The American
Revolution was to create a consciousness of historical development in
the U.S. movement and thus finish up with those so-called Marxists
who will never be able to do the creative thinking necessary to lead a
revolution in the United States, because for them Marx has written
the last word on revolution and the world might as well have been
standing still for the last one hundred years.
Racism and the Class Struggle (New York: Monthly Review Press,
1970), contained a selection of our many articles and speeches from
the 1960s. Our main purpose in these articles and speeches was to
make clear the specific role which exploitation of the black
underclass has played in the rapid development of American
capitalism and hence the strategic political role which blacks can
now play in revolutionizing this country as a whole.
The central theme in these publications has been the fundamental
and dangerous contradiction in our society between economic
overdevelopment and political, or human, underdevelopment. This
political underdevelopment pervades our society. Every American,
black or white, rich or poor or middle class, suffers from it because
over the years everyone has gone his/her merry and not so merry
way, pursuing individual life, liberty and happiness, and evading
political responsibility in the delusion that economic development
will resolve all human questions.
Now the chickens have come home to roost.
When The American Revolution was published in 1963, the idea of
a American Revolution in our generation was so remote that most
people assumed it was a book about the revolution of 1776. Now, on
the eve of the two hundredth anniversary of the Declaration of
Independence, this country has undergone nearly twenty years of
sustained rebellion, the longest such period in our history.
In this period of social upheaval, most Americans have done what
others have done in other countries in similar times. First, they have
9 Preface
tried many different ways to resolve their problems and their
conflicts. Then, having been frustrated in these efforts, most people
have gone back to being apathetic, while a few continue to search for
a new way. These few must now move on to a higher level, a higher
plateau, in order to get a perspective on where they have been and
where they still have to go.
We hope these people will find in this book food for much
thought, and from that thought, the energies for the protracted
struggle necessary to create a new nation out of these United States,
a nation which all Americans, regardless of race, sex, or national
origin, will be proud to call their own.
The ideas in the following pages are the product of collective
struggles and collective discussion continuing over many years. They
are ours only in the sense that we take responsibility for them.
-- James Boggs
-- Grace Lee Boggs
Detroit, Michigan
July 4, 1973
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