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Malayan Peoples' Anti-Japanese Army

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175-625: The Malayan Peoples' Anti-Japanese Army ( MPAJA ) was a communist guerrilla army that resisted the Japanese occupation of Malaya from 1941 to 1945 in World War II . Composed mainly of ethnic Chinese guerrilla fighters, the MPAJA was the largest anti-Japanese resistance group in Malaya . Founded during the Japanese invasion of Malaya , the MPAJA was conceived as a part of a combined effort by

350-643: A semi-colony to a leading world power, with greatly advanced literacy, women's rights, basic healthcare, primary education, and life expectancy. Its leading role in World War II saw the emergence of the industrialized Soviet Union as a superpower . Marxist–Leninist governments modeled on the Soviet Union took power with Soviet assistance in Bulgaria , Czechoslovakia , East Germany , Poland , Hungary, and Romania . A Marxist–Leninist government

525-459: A social revolution . The two classes are the proletariat , who make up the majority of the population within society and must sell their labor power to survive, and the bourgeoisie , a small minority that derives profit from employing the working class through private ownership of the means of production. According to this analysis, a communist revolution would put the working class in power, and in turn establish common ownership of property,

700-500: A communist party, the rejection of private property and capitalism, state control of economic activity and mass media , restrictions on freedom of religion , and suppression of opposition and dissent. With the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, several previously Communist governments repudiated or abolished Communist rule altogether. Afterwards, only a small number of nominally Communist governments remained, such as China , Cuba , Laos , North Korea , and Vietnam . With

875-473: A distinct stage between capitalism and communism. This intermediate stage was a concept introduced by Vladimir Lenin as a means to defend the Bolshevik seizure of power against traditional Marxist criticism that Russia's productive forces were not sufficiently developed for socialist revolution . A distinction between communist and socialist as descriptors of political ideologies arose in 1918 after

1050-526: A form of communism. In their words, the Hutterites "established in their communities a rigorous system of Ordnungen, which were codes of rules and regulations that governed all aspects of life and ensured a unified perspective. As an economic system, communism was attractive to many of the peasants who supported social revolution in sixteenth century central Europe." This link was highlighted in one of Karl Marx 's early writings; Marx stated that "[a]s Christ

1225-541: A full meeting which included the MCP's Central Executive Committee, state party officials, and a group leaders of the MPAJA at the Batu Caves , about ten miles from Kuala Lumpur. The party meeting was then held in a small village near the caves. At daybreak of 1 September 1942, Japanese forces surrounded and attacked the village where the MCP and MPAJA leaders were resting. Caught by surprise, the ambush ended with 92 members of

1400-455: A greater emphasis on certain aspects of classical Marxism while rejecting or modifying other aspects. Many schools of thought have sought to combine Marxian concepts and non-Marxian concepts, which has then led to contradictory conclusions. There is a movement toward the recognition that historical materialism and dialectical materialism remain the fundamental aspects of all Marxist schools of thought . Marxism–Leninism and its offshoots are

1575-556: A hierarchical basis, with active cells of members as the broad base. They were made up only of elite cadres approved by higher members of the party as being reliable and completely subject to party discipline . The Great Purge of 1936–1938 was Joseph Stalin 's attempt to destroy any possible opposition within the Communist Party of the Soviet Union . In the Moscow trials , many old Bolsheviks who had played prominent roles during

1750-453: A look-out for Japanese soldiers. The objectives of such activities was to demonstrate the strength of the group and instill public confidence. Personal accounts by British army officers who lived side by side with MPAJA guerrillas during the war revealed MPAJA cadres as "disciplined people" who had "great seriousness of purpose". The MCP/MPAJA leader, Chin Peng , was also labelled as a man "with

1925-540: A matter of debate, but the distinction rests largely on the communists' adherence to the revolutionary socialism of Karl Marx." In the United States, communism is widely used as a pejorative term as part of a Red Scare , much like socialism , and mainly in reference to authoritarian socialism and Communist states . The emergence of the Soviet Union as the world's first nominally Communist state led to

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2100-474: A minor irritant and certainly no strategic threat to the Japanese". On the other hand, Tie and Zhong felt that "if the atomic bomb had not put an abrupt end to the 'war and peace' problems, the anti-Japanese force could have achieved even more". Communist Communism (from Latin communis , 'common, universal') is a sociopolitical , philosophical , and economic ideology within

2275-425: A particular type of communism. One of the first uses of the word in its modern sense is in a letter sent by Victor d'Hupay to Nicolas Restif de la Bretonne around 1785, in which d'Hupay describes himself as an auteur communiste ("communist author"). In 1793, Restif first used communisme to describe a social order based on egalitarianism and the common ownership of property. Restif would go on to use

2450-529: A possible communist or socialist theorist, or as the first author to give communism a serious consideration. The 5th-century Mazdak movement in Persia (modern-day Iran) has been described as communistic for challenging the enormous privileges of the noble classes and the clergy , criticizing the institution of private property , and striving to create an egalitarian society. At one time or another, various small communist communities existed, generally under

2625-531: A post-capitalist society – positive humanism, socialism, Communism, realm of free individuality, free association of producers, etc. He used these terms completely interchangeably. The notion that 'socialism' and 'Communism' are distinct historical stages is alien to his work and only entered the lexicon of Marxism after his death." According to the Encyclopædia Britannica , "Exactly how communism differs from socialism has long been

2800-617: A prerequisite to socialism , were critical of the Bolsheviks from the beginning due to Russia being seen as too backward for a socialist revolution . Council communism and left communism , inspired by the German Revolution of 1918–1919 and the wide proletarian revolutionary wave, arose in response to developments in Russia and are critical of self-declared constitutionally socialist states . Some left-wing parties, such as

2975-618: A raid on one of the old MPAJA encampments. Members of this settlement opened fire at the British soldiers on sight, and the skirmish ended with one Chinese man dead. Nevertheless, after the formal demobilisation of the MPAJA, associations for demobilised personnel, known as the Malayan Peoples Anti-Japanese Ex-Service Comrades Association, were established in areas where regiments had operated. The president and vice-president of

3150-531: A reputation for fair dealing". Also, the MPAJA in Perak was said to enjoy good relations with the aborigines, or Orang Asli , who "held a party for MPAJA forces" on New Year's Eve. While the MPAJA was officially a multi-racial organisation, membership was made up predominantly by Chinese. Mandarin was the lingua franca of the MPAJA, although concessions to the Malay, Tamil, and English languages were made in some of

3325-458: A socialist principle of " to each according to his contribution ". Socialism has been described as a philosophy seeking distributive justice, and communism as a subset of socialism that prefers economic equality as its form of distributive justice. In 19th century Europe, the use of the terms communism and socialism eventually accorded with the cultural attitude of adherents and opponents towards religion . In European Christendom , communism

3500-546: A socialist state that is in the process of constructing communism. Terms used by Communist states include national-democratic , people's democratic , socialist-oriented , and workers and peasants' states. According to Richard Pipes , the idea of a classless , egalitarian society first emerged in ancient Greece . Since the 20th century, ancient Rome has been examined in this context, as well as thinkers such as Aristotle , Cicero , Demosthenes , Plato , and Tacitus . Plato, in particular, has been considered as

3675-478: A town in East Java province, Indonesia . He strongly rejected proposals to attempt to negotiate with the Japanese and regarded such attempts as characteristic of a hanjian (a Chinese term for race traitor ). He also attempted to dissuade Wang Jingwei from such activities. He exercised considerable effort against the governor of Fujian Province, Chen Yi , for perceived maladministration. In 1943, while he

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3850-416: A voluntary state of self-governance but disagree on the means to this end. This reflects a distinction between a more libertarian socialist approach of communization , revolutionary spontaneity , and workers' self-management , and a more authoritarian vanguardist or communist party -driven approach through the development of a socialist state , followed by the withering away of the state . As one of

4025-710: A work about More, whose ideas could be regarded as "the foregleam of Modern Socialism" according to Kautsky. During the October Revolution in Russia, Vladimir Lenin suggested that a monument be dedicated to More, alongside other important Western thinkers. In the 17th century, communist thought surfaced again in England, where a Puritan religious group known as the Diggers advocated the abolition of private ownership of land. In his 1895 Cromwell and Communism , Eduard Bernstein stated that several groups during

4200-537: A year of the fall of Malaya it was obvious [to the MCP]… that the return of the British was inevitable" and that the "MCP was ready to contend with its former colonial rulers." Although "clashes between the MPAJA and the Japanese Occupation Army occurred, these never threatened the overall Japanese control of the peninsula" as the "MPAJA was conserving its resources for the real war against colonialism once

4375-466: Is a non- idealist attempt at the understanding of material history and society, whereby communism is the expression of a real movement, with parameters that are derived from actual life. According to Marxist theory, class conflict arises in capitalist societies due to contradictions between the material interests of the oppressed and exploited proletariat  – a class of wage laborers employed to produce goods and services – and

4550-480: Is that of educating voters in what are deemed their true interests rather than in response to the expression of interest by voters themselves. When they have gained control of the state, Leninist communists' main task was preventing other political parties from deceiving the proletariat, such as by running their own independent candidates. This vanguardist approach comes from their commitments to democratic centralism in which communists can only be cadres, i.e. members of

4725-542: Is the intermediary unto whom man unburdens all his divinity, all his religious bonds, so the state is the mediator unto which he transfers all his Godlessness, all his human liberty." Thomas Müntzer led a large Anabaptist communist movement during the German Peasants' War , which Friedrich Engels analyzed in his 1850 work The Peasant War in Germany . The Marxist communist ethos that aims for unity reflects

4900-680: Is viewed overwhelmingly negatively as a mass murderer ; for significant numbers of Russians and Georgians, he is regarded as a great statesman and state-builder. After the Chinese Civil War , Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist Party came to power in 1949 as the Nationalist government headed by the Kuomintang fled to the island of Taiwan. In 1950–1953, China engaged in a large-scale, undeclared war with

5075-614: The 1917 Russian Constituent Assembly election , socialist parties totaled well over 70% of the vote. The Bolsheviks were clear winners in the urban centres, and took around two-thirds of the votes of soldiers on the Western Front, obtaining 23.3% of the vote; the Socialist Revolutionaries finished first on the strength of support from the country's rural peasantry, who were for the most part single issue voters , that issue being land reform, obtaining 37.6%, while

5250-490: The 1936 Constitution of the Soviet Union . War communism was the first system adopted by the Bolsheviks during the Russian Civil War as a result of the many challenges. Despite communism in the name, it had nothing to do with communism, with strict discipline for workers, strike actions forbidden, obligatory labor duty, and military-style control, and has been described as simple authoritarian control by

5425-665: The Cheget , to Russian president Boris Yeltsin . That evening at 7:32, the Soviet flag was lowered from the Kremlin for the last time and replaced with the pre-revolutionary Russian flag . Previously, from August to December 1991, all the individual republics, including Russia itself, had seceded from the union. The week before the union's formal dissolution, eleven republics signed the Alma-Ata Protocol , formally establishing

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5600-612: The Chinese Civil War divided Singapore's Chinese community into Communist and Kuomintang sympathisers. Tan Kah Kee has consistently demonstrated a keen interest in business, philanthropy, and education, with a dedicated commitment to uplifting ASEAN and his homeland, particularly in Jimei and Xiamen. He refrains from aligning with any political party but advocates for the principles of diligence and achieving commendable outcomes. The venerable individual does not concern himself with affiliations or factions and disapproves of malpractices within

5775-735: The Christian universalist teaching that humankind is one and that there is only one god who does not discriminate among people. Communist thought has also been traced back to the works of the 16th-century English writer Thomas More . In his 1516 treatise titled Utopia , More portrayed a society based on common ownership of property, whose rulers administered it through the application of reason and virtue . Marxist communist theoretician Karl Kautsky , who popularized Marxist communism in Western Europe more than any other thinker apart from Engels, published Thomas More and His Utopia ,

5950-558: The Cold War had begun. Stalin himself believed that capitalism was a hollow shell and would crumble under increased non-military pressure exerted through proxies in countries like Italy. He greatly underestimated the economic strength of the West and instead of triumph saw the West build up alliances that were designed to permanently stop or contain Soviet expansion. In early 1950, Stalin gave

6125-841: The Commonwealth of Independent States , and declared that the Soviet Union had ceased to exist. As of 2023, states controlled by Communist parties under a single-party system include the People's Republic of China, the Republic of Cuba , the Democratic People's Republic of Korea , the Lao People's Democratic Republic , and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam . Communist parties, or their descendant parties, remain politically important in several other countries. With

6300-669: The English Civil War (especially the Diggers) espoused clear communistic, agrarianist ideals and that Oliver Cromwell 's attitude towards these groups was at best ambivalent and often hostile. Criticism of the idea of private property continued into the Age of Enlightenment of the 18th century through such thinkers as Gabriel Bonnot de Mably , Jean Meslier , Étienne-Gabriel Morelly , and Jean-Jacques Rousseau in France. During

6475-634: The Kuomintang 's Northern Expedition (1926–28), and the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–45). Apart from donating most of his assets and earnings to aid China in those major events, Tan set up funds in Southeast Asia and Hong Kong and contributed to the establishment of several schools in Southeast Asia and China's Fujian Province , including Xiamen University . Tan Kah Kee was born in Xiamen , Fujian Province , in 1874 during

6650-530: The Malayan Communist Party (MCP) and the British colonial government , alongside various smaller groups to resist the Japanese occupation. Although the MPAJA and the MCP were officially different organisations, many saw the MPAJA as a de facto armed wing of the MCP due to its leadership being staffed by mostly ethnic Chinese communists. Many of the ex-guerrillas of the MPAJA would later form

6825-874: The Malayan National Liberation Army (MNLA) and resist a return to pre-war the normality of British rule of Malaya during the Malayan Emergency (1948–1960). Anti-Japanese feelings among the Chinese community in Malaya first began in 1931, with the Japanese invasion and annexation of Manchuria . This escalation in Japanese imperial expansion occurred alongside the Great Depression, during which thousands of Malayan workers were left unemployed. The country's large workforce of Chinese and Indian immigrants that had previously fueled

7000-444: The Nationalist government of the Republic of China took over in 1937. In 1920, Tan arranged a marriage between his daughter, Tan Ai Leh, and Lee Kong Chian , his protégé and a businessman. Tan was one of the prominent overseas Chinese to provide financial support to China during the Second Sino-Japanese War . He organised many relief funds under his name, one of which alone managed to raise ten million Straits dollars in 1937. He

7175-537: The Qing dynasty of China. In 1890, at the age of 16, he travelled to Singapore in the Straits Settlements to help his father, who owned a rice trading business. In 1903, after his father's business collapsed, Tan started his own company and built a business empire from rubber plantations , manufacturing, sawmills, canneries, real estate, import and export brokerage, ocean transport and rice trading. As he

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7350-524: The Russian Revolution or in Lenin's Soviet government afterwards, including Lev Kamenev , Grigory Zinoviev , Alexei Rykov , and Nikolai Bukharin , were accused, pleaded guilty of conspiracy against the Soviet Union, and were executed. The devastation of World War II resulted in a massive recovery program involving the rebuilding of industrial plants, housing, and transportation as well as

7525-611: The Russian Social Democratic Labour Party renamed itself as the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , which resulted in the adjective Communist being used to refer to socialists who supported the politics and theories of Bolshevism, Leninism , and later in the 1920s those of Marxism–Leninism . In spite of this common usage, Communist parties also continued to describe themselves as socialists dedicated to socialism. According to The Oxford Handbook of Karl Marx , "Marx used many terms to refer to

7700-731: The Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies in the October Revolution; after a few weeks of deliberation, the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries formed a coalition government with the Bolsheviks from November 1917 to July 1918, while the right-wing faction of the Socialist Revolutionary Party boycotted the soviets and denounced the October Revolution as an illegal coup . In

7875-595: The Socialist Party of Great Britain , boasted of having called the Bolsheviks, and by extension those Communist states which either followed or were inspired by the Soviet Bolshevik model of development, establishing state capitalism in late 1917, as would be described during the 20th century by several academics, economists, and other scholars, or a command economy . Before the Soviet path of development became known as socialism , in reference to

8050-511: The Soviet Union with the Russian Revolution of 1917, and then in portions of Eastern Europe, Asia, and a few other regions after World War II . As one of the many types of socialism , communism became the dominant political tendency, along with social democracy , within the international socialist movement by the early 1920s. During most of the 20th century, around one-third of the world's population lived under Communist governments. These governments were characterized by one-party rule by

8225-556: The Soviet economic model , several scholars posit that in practice the model functioned as a form of state capitalism . Public memory of 20th-century Communist states has been described as a battleground between anti anti-communism and anti-communism . Many authors have written about mass killings under communist regimes and mortality rates , such as excess mortality in the Soviet Union under Joseph Stalin , which remain controversial, polarized, and debated topics in academia, historiography, and politics when discussing communism and

8400-881: The Tan Kah Kee Foundation , which offers postgraduate scholarships; the Tan Kah Kee MRT station along the Downtown MRT line in Singapore, next to the current site of Hwa Chong Institution . The schools in the Anglo-Chinese School family have houses named after Tan. Chongfu School 's Main Hall is named after him. Tan Kah Kee Hall at the University of California, Berkeley , is also named after him. The asteroid 2963 Chen Jiageng

8575-427: The bourgeoisie  – the ruling class that owns the means of production and extracts its wealth through appropriation of the surplus product produced by the proletariat in the form of profit . This class struggle that is commonly expressed as the revolt of a society's productive forces against its relations of production , results in a period of short-term crises as the bourgeoisie struggle to manage

8750-400: The common ownership of the means of production, therefore abolishing the bourgeoisie, ultimately abolishing the proletariat itself and ushering the world into communism as a new mode of production . In between capitalism and communism, there is the dictatorship of the proletariat ; it is the defeat of the bourgeois state but not yet of the capitalist mode of production, and at the same time

8925-652: The dissolution of the Soviet Union and the Fall of Communism , there was a split between those hardline Communists, sometimes referred to in the media as neo-Stalinists , who remained committed to orthodox Marxism–Leninism , and those, such as The Left in Germany, who work within the liberal-democratic process for a democratic road to socialism; other ruling Communist parties became closer to democratic socialist and social-democratic parties. Outside Communist states, reformed Communist parties have led or been part of left-leaning government or regional coalitions, including in

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9100-548: The materialist conception of history which holds that the key characteristic of economic systems through history has been the mode of production and that the change between modes of production has been triggered by class struggle. According to this analysis, the Industrial Revolution ushered the world into the new capitalist mode of production . Before capitalism, certain working classes had ownership of instruments used in production; however, because machinery

9275-445: The means of production , earning profit via the surplus value generated by the proletariat, who have no ownership of the means of production and therefore no option but to sell its labor to the bourgeoisie. According to the materialist conception of history, it is through the furtherance of its own material interests that the rising bourgeoisie within feudalism captured power and abolished, of all relations of private property, only

9450-401: The productive forces ) is the primary agent of change in the structure of society and of human social relations and that social systems and their relations (e.g. feudalism , capitalism , and so on) become contradictory and inefficient as the productive forces develop, which results in some form of social revolution arising in response to the mounting contradictions. This revolutionary change is

9625-443: The socialist movement , whose goal is the creation of a communist society , a socioeconomic order centered around common ownership of the means of production , distribution, and exchange that allocates products to everyone in the society based on need. A communist society would entail the absence of private property and social classes , and ultimately money and the state (or nation state ). Communists often seek

9800-435: The two-stage theory , communists made no major distinction between the socialist mode of production and communism; it is consistent with, and helped to inform, early concepts of socialism in which the law of value no longer directs economic activity. Monetary relations in the form of exchange-value , profit , interest , and wage labor would not operate and apply to Marxist socialism. While Joseph Stalin stated that

9975-615: The 20th century. In Western Europe, communist parties were part of several post-war governments, and even when the Cold War forced many of those countries to remove them from government, such as in Italy, they remained part of the liberal-democratic process. There were also many developments in libertarian Marxism, especially during the 1960s with the New Left . By the 1960s and 1970s, many Western communist parties had criticized many of

10150-696: The Bolsheviks to maintain power and control in the Soviet regions, rather than any coherent political ideology . The Soviet Union was established in 1922. Before the broad ban in 1921, there were several factions in the Communist party, more prominently among them the Left Opposition , the Right Opposition , and the Workers' Opposition , which debated on the path of development to follow. The Left and Workers' oppositions were more critical of

10325-410: The British. As the British faced further military setbacks with the sinking of its battleships Prince of Wales and Repulse , the British finally accepted the MCP's offer of assistance on 18 December 1941. A secret meeting was held in Singapore between British officers and two MCP representatives, one of whom was Lai Teck , the MCP's secretary general. The agreement between the MCP and the British

10500-598: The CCP and the Soviet Union, the MCP had to alter its stance towards the British as the Soviets and CCP became wartime allies with them. Secondly, the MCP viewed the imminent Japanese invasion of Malaya as a greater threat than the British. Therefore, an offer of mutual co-operation against a potential Japanese aggression was first made in July 1941 to the British. However, the offer was rejected as British officials felt that recognising

10675-480: The Chinese Communist Party. Tan died in 1961 in Beijing and was given a state funeral by the Chinese government. In Singapore, the Tan Kah Kee Scholarship Fund , which later became known as the Tan Kah Kee Foundation , was established in memory of this philanthropy. Tan's sons were: Tan's daughters were: Many of his children maintained close relationship with or even married other prominent Chinese figures in Singapore. For example, Tan Ai Leh, his eldest daughter,

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10850-422: The Communist ideal. Mao charged that Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev was the leader of a "revisionist clique" which had turned against Marxism and Leninism and was now setting the stage for the restoration of capitalism. The two nations were at sword's point by 1960. Both began forging alliances with communist supporters around the globe, thereby splitting the worldwide movement into two hostile camps. Rejecting

11025-429: The Constituent Assembly in January 1918. The Draft Decree on the Dissolution of the Constituent Assembly was issued by the Central Executive Committee of the Soviet Union , a committee dominated by Lenin, who had previously supported a multi-party system of free elections. After the Bolshevik defeat, Lenin started referring to the assembly as a "deceptive form of bourgeois-democratic parliamentarianism." Some argued this

11200-474: The Force 136 officers. The MPAJA agreed to accept the British Army's orders while the war with Japan lasted in return for arms, money, training, and supplies. It was also agreed that at the end of the war, all weapons supplied by Force 136 would be handed back to British authorities, and all MPAJA fighters would disarm and return to civilian life. However, Force 136 was unable to keep several pre-planned rendezvous with its submarines, and had lost its wireless sets;

11375-409: The Fourierists in France were considered respectable socialists, while working-class movements that "proclaimed the necessity of total social change" denoted themselves communists . This latter branch of socialism produced the communist work of Étienne Cabet in France and Wilhelm Weitling in Germany. While liberal democrats looked to the Revolutions of 1848 as a democratic revolution , which in

11550-416: The Great Leap was a very expensive disaster." Put in charge of rescuing the economy, Deng adopted pragmatic policies that the idealistic Mao disliked. For a while, Mao was in the shadows but returned to center stage and purged Deng and his allies in the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976). The Cultural Revolution was an upheaval that targeted intellectuals and party leaders from 1966 through 1976. Mao's goal

11725-472: The Japanese regime. Many of the "collaborators" were ethnic Malays, many of whom the Japanese employed as policemen. Although the MCP and MPAJA consistently espoused non-racial policies, the fact that their members came predominantly from the Chinese community caused their reprisals against Malays who had collaborated to be a source of racial tension. As a result, interracial clashes involving the Chinese-dominated MPAJA and Malay settlers were frequent. For example,

11900-404: The Japanese regime. Therefore, members of the MPAJU were not necessarily Chinese or communists. The MPAJA recruited manpower by organising volunteer units called the Ho Pi Tui (Reserves) in villages, towns and districts. These volunteers were not required to leave their local areas unless they were called up. After a 2-month course in the jungle, they were sent back to their villages and left under

12075-399: The Japanese were evicted." Therefore, the authors suggest that the MPAJA's main enemy was all along the British, and its main purpose was to wrestle independence from the British rather than to resist the Japanese. Cheah Boon Kheng's Red Star Over Malaya also echos Ban and Yap's argument. Cheah acknowledges that the MPAJA was under control of the MCP, with the "Central Military Committee of

12250-506: The Jimei Schools (now Jimei University ) in Xiamen. Tan was also a member of the Anglo-Chinese College Council and had pledged S$ 100,000 to the proposed Anglo Chinese School College in 1919. However, when the proposal was turned down by the Government, he agreed to channel the $ 30,000 he had given to the Anglo-Chinese School fund for physics and chemistry. This helped to complete the Secondary School at Cairnhill in 1928. In 1921, he set up Xiamen University and financially supported it until

12425-548: The Kuomintang. In 1947 Tan founded the Chiyu Banking Corporation in Hong Kong , an intended to be a sustainable business with profits to be devoted to education in Xiamen and the rest of Fujian province in China. After the Communist victory in China and the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949, Tan tried to return to Singapore in 1950 but was denied entry by the British colonial authorities concerned about communist influence in Singapore and Malaya. He then moved permanently to China and served in numerous positions in

12600-765: The MCP Secretary-General and MPAJA leader Lai Teck was a double agent working for the British Special Branch . Subsequently, he became triple-agent working for the Japanese after his arrest by the Kempeitai in early March 1942. There were many different accounts of how Lai Teck was caught by the Kempeitai and his subsequent agreement to collaborate with the Japanese. In his book Red Star Over Malaya, Cheah Boon Keng describes Lai Teck's arrest as such: In August 1942 Lai Teck arranged for

12775-499: The MCP acted as supreme command of the MPAJA." Cheah also agrees that the MCP harboured hidden motives while agreeing to co-operate with the British against the Japanese by holding on to its "secret strategy of ‘Establish the Malayan Democratic Republic'", "ready to take advantage of the opportunity to expel the British from Malaya as soon as practicable". On the other hand, historian Lee Ting Hui argues against

12950-560: The MCP also brought together various anti-Japanese groups, organisations such as the KMT and the Chinese Chamber of Commerce, under a broad front called the "Overseas Chinese Anti-Japanese Mobilisation Federation" (OCAJMF) with Tan Kah Kee as the leader of its "Mobilisation Council". The OCAJMF became a platform to recruit Chinese volunteer soldiers to form an independent force, which would be later known as Dalforce . The MCP contributed

13125-528: The MCP during its open conflict with the BMA in 1948 . Between 1942 and 1945, the MPAJA had a total of 8 independent regiments as follows: All eight independent regiments took orders from the Central Military Committee of the MCP. Therefore, the MPAJA was de facto controlled by the Communist leadership. Each MPAJA regiment comprised five or six patrols, and the average regimental strength

13300-539: The MCP to withhold its hostilities against the British and seek co-operation instead. First of all, war between the Soviet Union and Germany had made the Soviets join the Allies against the Axis powers which included Japan. Additionally, the Kuomintang (KMT) and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) had formed a united front against the Japanese invasion in mainland China . As a communist organisation closely associated with

13475-440: The MCP would give them an unnecessary boost in legitimising its nationalist agenda Nevertheless, the eventual Japanese invasion of Malaya on 8 December 1941 presented the MCP another opportunity to seek co-operation with the British. After the Japanese forces made rapid gains against the British defences in Malaya, the MCP came out publicly to support the British war effort, encouraging Malayan Chinese to pledge their assistance to

13650-434: The MPAJA "claimed it had eliminated 5,500 Japanese soldiers and about 2,500 'traitors' while admitting that they had lost some 1,000 men". On the other hand, the Japanese released their "own figures of 600 killed or wounded and 2,000 casualties from their volunteer forces". They also claimed to have "killed some 2,900 members of the MPAJA". However, Ban and Yap feel that the Japanese might have "under-reported their casualties as

13825-535: The MPAJA because of their resentment towards the Japanese army's brutal treatment of civilians. When not engaged in guerrilla activities, a typical life in an MPAJA camp consisted of military drilling, political education, cooking, collection of food supplies, and cultural affairs. The soldiers organised gatherings and invited residents, particularly the young, to participate in singing and drama events. Whenever these activities were going on, guards armed with machine-guns would be stationed at main exits of villages to keep

14000-521: The MPAJA deliberately kept "open and secret field units", whereby "portions of the MPAJA field units were carefully kept out of sight, husbanded as reserves for a future conflict." One example was the comparison between the "open" 5th Independent Regiment based in Perak which was the strongest and most active in Malaya, and the "secret" 6th Regiment in Pahang which was as well-equipped but "had a less aggressive stance". In fact, according to Ban and Yap, "within

14175-528: The MPAJA had always been depicted as a band of ragged bandits who could pose no threat to the Imperial Army". Also, they noted that towards the end of the war the "guerrillas were matching the Japanese blow for blow" and "Japanese records admitted that they suffered some 506 casualties in one of the attacks while 550 guerrillas were killed". Cooper mentions similar casualty figures of both MPAJA and Japanese accounts in his book Decade of Change: Malaya and

14350-422: The MPAJA to go on the defensive. Hanrahan describes the early months of the MPAJA as " an all-out struggle for bare survival. Most of the Chinese guerillas were ill-prepared, both mentally and physically, to live in the jungle, and the toll from disease, desertions, enemy attacks and insanity increased by the day ". At the end of 18 months, an estimated one-third of the entire guerrilla force perished. Nevertheless,

14525-561: The MPAJA was not allowed to conduct further extrajudicial punishment on collaborators without permission from the British authorities. The MPAJA was formally dissolved on 1 December 1945. A gratuity sum of $ 350 was paid to each disbanded member of the MPAJA, with the option for him to enter civilian employment or to join the police, volunteer forces or the Malay Regiment. 5,497 weapons were handed in by 6,800 guerrillas in demobilisation ceremonial parades held at MPAJA headquarters around

14700-500: The MPAJA was officially a separate organisation from the MCP, it was claimed that "from the start the Malayan Communist Party sought to exert an authoritarian and direct control…with Liu Yao as Chairman to oversee the activities and direction of the MPAJA". The Central Military Commission, which was "reorganized to take full control of the MPAJA", was headed by MCP leaders "Lai Teck, Liu Yao and Chin Peng". Furthermore,

14875-408: The MPAJA's contribution to the war, here are some assessments given by historians: Cheah, in his assessment of the military results of the MPAJA insurgency, says that "British accounts have reported that the guerrillas carried out a number of military engagements against Japanese installations. The MPAJA's own account claims its guerrillas undertook 340 individual operations against the Japanese during

15050-510: The MPAJA. Meanwhile, the MPAJA were able to gain sympathy and widespread support among the Chinese communities in Malaya, who supplied them with food, supplies, intelligence and also fresh recruits. The main link and support organisation which backed the MPAJA was the Malayan People's Anti-Japanese Union (MPAJU). The MPAJU pursued an open policy of recruiting people regardless of race, class, and political belief as long as they were against

15225-670: The Malays in Sungai Manik in Perak , fought with the MPAJA and local Chinese settlers after the MPAJA attempted to take over Sungai Manik and other neighbouring towns. Fighting continued until the arrival of the British army in September. The British Military Administration (BMA) formally took over control of Malaya on 12 September 1945. The British army saw the MPAJA guerrillas as hindrance to their tasks of establishing law and order in

15400-605: The October Revolution which involved the assault on Petrograd occurred largely without any human casualties . By November 1917, the Russian Provisional Government had been widely discredited by its failure to withdraw from World War I, implement land reform, or convene the Russian Constituent Assembly to draft a constitution, leaving the soviets in de facto control of the country. The Bolsheviks moved to hand power to

15575-654: The Russian Federation has some supporters, but is reformist rather than revolutionary, aiming to lessen the inequalities of Russia's market economy. Chinese economic reforms were started in 1978 under the leadership of Deng Xiaoping , and since then China has managed to bring down the poverty rate from 53% in the Mao era to just 8% in 2001. After losing Soviet subsidies and support, Vietnam and Cuba have attracted more foreign investment to their countries, with their economies becoming more market-oriented. North Korea,

15750-431: The Soviet Union . The declaration acknowledged the independence of the former Soviet republics and created the Commonwealth of Independent States , although five of the signatories ratified it much later or did not do it at all. On the previous day, Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev (the eighth and final leader of the Soviet Union ) resigned, declared his office extinct, and handed over its powers, including control of

15925-534: The Soviet government of Nikita Khrushchev , who enacted a period of de-Stalinization and re-approached diplomatic relations with Yugoslavia in 1976. The Communist Party of China, led by Mao Zedong, established the People's Republic of China , which would follow its own ideological path of development following the Sino-Soviet split . Communism was seen as a rival of and a threat to Western capitalism for most of

16100-524: The Soviet model of rapid urbanization, Mao Zedong and his top aide Deng Xiaoping launched the Great Leap Forward in 1957–1961 with the goal of industrializing China overnight, using the peasant villages as the base rather than large cities. Private ownership of land ended and the peasants worked in large collective farms that were now ordered to start up heavy industry operations, such as steel mills. Plants were built in remote locations, due to

16275-500: The Soviets, built the hydrogen bomb , and strengthened the NATO alliance that covered Western Europe . According to Gorlizki and Khlevniuk, Stalin's consistent and overriding goal after 1945 was to consolidate the nation's superpower status and in the face of his growing physical decrepitude, to maintain his own hold on total power. Stalin created a leadership system that reflected historic czarist styles of paternalism and repression yet

16450-540: The Special Operations Executive organisation called Force 136 , landed on the Perak coast on 24 May 1943 from a Dutch submarine. Other groups followed, including Lim Bo Seng , a prominent Straits-born Chinese businessman and KMT supporter who volunteered to join the Force 136 Malayan Unit. On 1 January 1944, MPAJA leaders arrived at the Force 136 camp at Bukit Bidor and entered into discussions with

16625-584: The Straits Settlements 1936–1945 , but nevertheless suggests that the “value of the MPAJA to the Allied cause is debatable” and describes their strategy as “tantalizing [the Japanese], invariably disappearing into the depths of the jungle whenever the Japanese tried to engage them” because they were “little or no match against the Japanese”. He goes even further to add that the MPAJA's contribution “is no more than

16800-778: The Ukrainian Socialist Bloc finished a distant third at 12.7%, and the Mensheviks obtained a disappointing fourth place at 3.0%. Most of the Socialist Revolutionary Party's seats went to the right-wing faction. Citing outdated voter-rolls, which did not acknowledge the party split, and the assembly's conflicts with the Congress of Soviets, the Bolshevik–Left Socialist-Revolutionaries government moved to dissolve

16975-628: The United States, South Korea, and United Nations forces in the Korean War . While the war ended in a military stalemate, it gave Mao the opportunity to identify and purge elements in China that seemed supportive of capitalism. At first, there was close cooperation with Stalin, who sent in technical experts to aid the industrialization process along the line of the Soviet model of the 1930s. After Stalin's death in 1953, relations with Moscow soured – Mao thought Stalin's successors had betrayed

17150-479: The abolition of capitalism. For Leninist communism, such goals, including short-term proletarian interests to improve their political and material conditions, can only be achieved through vanguardism , an elitist form of socialism from above that relies on theoretical analysis to identify proletarian interests rather than consulting the proletarians themselves, as is advocated by libertarian communists. When they engage in elections, Leninist communists' main task

17325-499: The actions of communist states, distanced from them, and developed a democratic road to socialism , which became known as Eurocommunism . This development was criticized by more orthodox supporters of the Soviet Union as amounting to social democracy . Since 1957, communists have been frequently voted into power in the Indian state of Kerala . In 1959, Cuban communist revolutionaries overthrew Cuba's previous government under

17500-462: The army and Mao's wife Jiang Qing . China's youth responded to Mao's appeal by forming Red Guard groups around the country. The movement spread into the military, urban workers, and the Communist party leadership itself. It resulted in widespread factional struggles in all walks of life. In the top leadership, it led to a mass purge of senior officials who were accused of taking a " capitalist road ", most notably Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping . During

17675-531: The associations were the same men who commanded the MPAJA regiments in their respective areas. In other words, the leadership structure of these veteran clubs mirrored that of the former MPAJA. Although there was no direct evidence that all leaders of these associations were communists, representatives of these veteran clubs participated in meetings with communist-sponsored groups that passed political resolutions. Cheah Boon Keng argues that these ex-guerrilla associations would later become well-organised military arms for

17850-485: The community"; this semantic constitution has led to numerous usages of the word in its evolution. Prior to becoming associated with its more modern conception of an economic and political organization, it was initially used to designate various social situations. After 1848, communism came to be primarily associated with Marxism , most specifically embodied in The Communist Manifesto , which proposed

18025-480: The control of village elders or other trusted community representatives to provide self-defense in the villages. By the end of 1944, the MPAJA had increased their membership to over 7,000 soldiers. After the fall of Singapore , the MPAJA had lost contact with the British command in Southeast Asia. The British attempted to reestablish communications by landing army agents in Malaya by submarine. The first party, consisting of Colonel John Davis and five Chinese agents from

18200-506: The country and were anxious to demobilise the MPAJA as soon as possible. Fearing that the MPAJA might challenge British authority, the British army ordered all MPAJA units to concentrate in certain centres and to come under its overall command. Force 136 officers would continue to be liaison officers with the MPAJA. The BMA also declared the MPAJA no longer operational after 12 September, although they were allowed to remain armed until negotiations were finalised for their disarmament. Additionally,

18375-456: The country. However, it was believed that the MPAJA did not proceed to disarm with full compliance. British authorities discovered that most of the surrendered arms were old-type weapons and suspected that the MPAJA hid the newer weapons in the jungles. One particular incident reinforced this suspicion when the British army stumbled upon an armed Chinese settlement that had its own governing body, military drilling facilities and flag while conducting

18550-557: The demobilization and migration of millions of soldiers and civilians. In the midst of this turmoil during the winter of 1946–1947, the Soviet Union experienced the worst natural famine in the 20th century. There was no serious opposition to Stalin as the secret police continued to send possible suspects to the gulag . Relations with the United States and Britain went from friendly to hostile, as they denounced Stalin's political controls over eastern Europe and his Berlin Blockade . By 1947,

18725-713: The dictator Fulgencio Batista . The leader of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro , ruled Cuba from 1959 until 2008. With the fall of the Warsaw Pact after the Revolutions of 1989 , which led to the fall of most of the former Eastern Bloc , the Soviet Union was dissolved on 26 December 1991. It was a result of the declaration number 142-Н of the Soviet of the Republics of the Supreme Soviet of

18900-539: The end of the Japanese Occupation of Malaya. In Ban and Yap's book Rehearsal for War: The Underground War against the Japanese , both authors argued that "while the MCP cooperated with the British against the more immediate threat from the Japanese, it never detracted from its aim of seizing power" and that its ultimate aim "right from the formation of the party in April 1930… is a communist Malaya". Although

19075-455: The end of the war in August 1945 was characterised as one of both "consolidation" and continued growth. With the Japanese surrender on 15 August 1945, an "interregnum" followed which marked a period of lawlessness and unrest before the delayed arrival of the British forces. During this time, the MPAJA focused its efforts on seizing control of territory across Malaya and punishing "collaborators" of

19250-454: The estate kirani ". The total strength of the MPAJA at the time of demobilisation was said to be between 6,000 and 7,000 soldiers. The true objectives of the MPAJA remains a debatable issue. While officially the MPAJA was an organisation formed to resist the Japanese invasion, the true motives behind its formation has often been touted by historians as an elaborate ploy by MCP to create an armed force that would resist British imperialism after

19425-490: The exception of North Korea, all of these states have started allowing more economic competition while maintaining one-party rule. The decline of communism in the late 20th century has been attributed to the inherent inefficiencies of communist economies and the general trend of communist governments towards authoritarianism and bureaucracy . While the emergence of the Soviet Union as the world's first nominally Communist state led to communism's widespread association with

19600-452: The feudal privilege, thereby taking the feudal ruling class out of existence. This was another key element behind the consolidation of capitalism as the new mode of production, the final expression of class and property relations that has led to a massive expansion of production. It is only in capitalism that private property in itself can be abolished. Similarly, the proletariat would capture political power, abolish bourgeois property through

19775-597: The first few months of fighting, but the surviving ones went on to form the core leadership of the MPAJA and train new recruits. In March 1942, after liaising with the Central Committee of the MCP, these graduates of the 101 STS would officially form the First Independent Force of the MPAJA. The MCP decided to go underground as British defences collapsed quickly in the face of the Japanese army's onslaught. A policy of armed resistance throughout

19950-477: The former Eastern Bloc. In Nepal, Communists ( CPN UML and Nepal Communist Party ) were part of the 1st Nepalese Constituent Assembly , which abolished the monarchy in 2008 and turned the country into a federal liberal-democratic republic, and have democratically shared power with other communists, Marxist–Leninists, and Maoists ( CPN Maoist ), social democrats ( Nepali Congress ), and others as part of their People's Multiparty Democracy . The Communist Party of

20125-535: The go-ahead for North Korea 's invasion of South Korea , expecting a short war. He was stunned when the Americans entered and defeated the North Koreans, putting them almost on the Soviet border. Stalin supported China 's entry into the Korean War , which drove the Americans back to the prewar boundaries, but which escalated tensions. The United States decided to mobilize its economy for a long contest with

20300-402: The harsh and brutal treatment of the Chinese by the Japanese occupation forces drove many Chinese to the relative safety of the jungle. The desire for revenge against the Japanese inspired many young Chinese to enlist with the MPAJA guerrillas, thus ensuring a steady supply of recruits to maintain the resistance effort despite suffering from heavy losses. Unbeknownst to the leadership of the MCP,

20475-507: The historic circumstances in which it finds itself", and stated that Russia might be able to skip the stage of bourgeois rule through the Obshchina . The moderate Mensheviks (minority) opposed Lenin's Bolsheviks (majority) plan for socialist revolution before the capitalist mode of production was more fully developed. The Bolsheviks' successful rise to power was based upon the slogans such as "Peace, Bread, and Land", which tapped into

20650-418: The idea to group together different countries, such as Afghanistan and Hungary , has no adequate explanation. While the term Communist state is used by Western historians, political scientists, and news media to refer to countries ruled by Communist parties, these socialist states themselves did not describe themselves as communist or claim to have achieved communism; they referred to themselves as being

20825-546: The inspiration of religious text . In the medieval Christian Church , some monastic communities and religious orders shared their land and their other property. Sects deemed heretical such as the Waldensians preached an early form of Christian communism . As summarized by historians Janzen Rod and Max Stanton, the Hutterites believed in strict adherence to biblical principles, church discipline, and practised

21000-442: The intensifying alienation of labor experienced by the proletariat, albeit with varying degrees of class consciousness . In periods of deep crisis, the resistance of the oppressed can culminate in a proletarian revolution which, if victorious, leads to the establishment of the socialist mode of production based on social ownership of the means of production, " To each according to his contribution ", and production for use . As

21175-630: The lack of technical experts, managers, transportation, or needed facilities. Industrialization failed, and the main result was a sharp unexpected decline in agricultural output, which led to mass famine and millions of deaths. The years of the Great Leap Forward in fact saw economic regression, with 1958 through 1961 being the only years between 1953 and 1983 in which China's economy saw negative growth. Political economist Dwight Perkins argues: "Enormous amounts of investment produced only modest increases in production or none at all. ... In short,

21350-660: The last Communist country that still practices Soviet-style Communism, is both repressive and isolationist. Communist political thought and theory are diverse but share several core elements. The dominant forms of communism are based on Marxism or Leninism but non-Marxist versions of communism also exist, such as anarcho-communism and Christian communism , which remain partly influenced by Marxist theories, such as libertarian Marxism and humanist Marxism in particular. Common elements include being theoretical rather than ideological, identifying political parties not by ideology but by class and economic interest, and identifying with

21525-430: The law of value would still apply to socialism and that the Soviet Union was socialist under this new definition, which was followed by other Communist leaders, many other communists maintain the original definition and state that Communist states never established socialism in this sense. Lenin described his policies as state capitalism but saw them as necessary for the development of socialism, which left-wing critics say

21700-607: The legacy of Communist states. Communism derives from the French word communisme , a combination of the Latin -rooted word communis (which literally means common ) and the suffix isme ( an act, practice, or process of doing something ) . Semantically, communis can be translated to "of or for the community", while isme is a suffix that indicates the abstraction into a state, condition, action, or doctrine . Communism may be interpreted as "the state of being of or for

21875-446: The long run ensured liberty, equality, and fraternity , Marxists denounced 1848 as a betrayal of working-class ideals by a bourgeoisie indifferent to the legitimate demands of the proletariat . By 1888, Marxists employed the term socialism in place of communism , which had come to be considered an old-fashioned synonym for the former. It was not until 1917, with the October Revolution , that socialism came to be used to refer to

22050-442: The main ideologies on the political spectrum , communist parties and movements have been described as radical left or far-left. Variants of communism have been developed throughout history, including anarchist communism , Marxist schools of thought , and religious communism , among others. Communism encompasses a variety of schools of thought, which broadly include Marxism , Leninism , and libertarian communism, as well as

22225-489: The massive public desire for an end to Russian involvement in World War I , the peasants' demand for land reform , and popular support for the soviets . 50,000 workers had passed a resolution in favour of Bolshevik demand for transfer of power to the soviets Lenin's government also instituted a number of progressive measures such as universal education , healthcare and equal rights for women . The initial stage of

22400-408: The misery of the proletariat  – a new class of urban factory workers who labored under often-hazardous conditions. Foremost among these critics were Marx and his associate Engels. In 1848, Marx and Engels offered a new definition of communism and popularized the term in their famous pamphlet The Communist Manifesto . In 1917, the October Revolution in Russia set the conditions for

22575-533: The most advanced capitalist development; however, the Russian Empire was one of the poorest countries in Europe with an enormous, largely illiterate peasantry, and a minority of industrial workers. Marx warned against attempts "to transform my historical sketch of the genesis of capitalism in Western Europe into a historico-philosophy theory of the arche générale imposed by fate upon every people, whatever

22750-422: The most soldiers to Dalforce, although it had also received volunteers from the KMT and other independent organisations. Dalforce was disbanded upon Singapore's surrender to the Japanese on 14 February 1942. The 101 Special Training School may be regarded as the birthplace of the MPAJA. A total of 165 party members were selected by the MCP to participate in the training, which began on 21 December 1941. The training

22925-482: The most well-known of these and have been a driving force in international relations during most of the 20th century. Classical Marxism is the economic, philosophical, and sociological theories expounded by Marx and Engels as contrasted with later developments in Marxism, especially Leninism and Marxism–Leninism. Orthodox Marxism is the body of Marxist thought that emerged after the death of Marx and which became

23100-504: The occupation was declared by all top-ranking MCP members at a final meeting in Singapore in February 1942. This decision proved beneficial to the MCP's political and military advancement, as they were the only political organisation prepared to commit itself to a policy of active anti-Japanese insurgency. After the fall of Singapore resistance forces were cut off from external assistance. The lack of proper equipment and training had forced

23275-506: The occupation, of which 230 were considered "major" efforts – "major" meaning involving an entire regiment." The MPAJA claimed to have eliminated 5,500 Japanese troops while losing 1,000 themselves. The Japanese claimed that their losses (killed and wounded) were 600 of their own troops and 2000 local police, and that the MPAJA losses were 2,900. Cheah believes that the Japanese report is probably more reliable, although only approximate. Ban and Yap agree with Cheah in his figures, mentioning that

23450-473: The official philosophy of the socialist movement as represented in the Second International until World War I in 1914. Orthodox Marxism aims to simplify, codify, and systematize Marxist method and theory by clarifying the perceived ambiguities and contradictions of classical Marxism. The philosophy of orthodox Marxism includes the understanding that material development (advances in technology in

23625-524: The only element which places into the realm of possibility moving on from this mode of production. This dictatorship , based on the Paris Commune 's model, is to be the most democratic state where the whole of the public authority is elected and recallable under the basis of universal suffrage . Tan Kah Kee Tan Kah Kee ( Chinese : 陳嘉庚 ; Pe̍h-ōe-jī : Tân Ka-kiⁿ ; also spelled as Chen Jiageng ; 21 October 1874 – 12 August 1961)

23800-469: The party as being reliable and completely subject to party discipline . Trotskyism overtook the left communists as the main dissident communist current, while more libertarian communisms , dating back to the libertarian Marxist current of council communism, remained important dissident communisms outside the Soviet Union. Following Lenin's democratic centralism , the Leninist parties were organized on

23975-401: The party who are full-time professional revolutionaries, as was conceived by Vladimir Lenin . Marxism is a method of socioeconomic analysis that uses a materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism , to understand social class relations and social conflict and a dialectical perspective to view social transformation . It originates from

24150-570: The policies of the M.C.P. and other Malayan revolutionary organizations grew increasingly anti-Japanese, fueled by further escalations in Japanese imperial expansion. Anti-Japanese sentiments among the Malayan populace reached new heights when Japan declared war on China in 1937, which increased the membership and political influence of the M.C.P. While being anti-Japanese, the MCP was also involved in its local struggle against British Imperialism in Malaya. However, political developments in 1941 prompted

24325-402: The political ideologies grouped around those. All of these different ideologies generally share the analysis that the current order of society stems from capitalism , its economic system , and mode of production , that in this system there are two major social classes, that the relationship between these two classes is exploitative, and that this situation can only ultimately be resolved through

24500-419: The popular notion that the MCP had planned to use the MPAJA to invoke an armed struggle against the British. In his book The Open United Front: The Communist Struggle in Singapore he asserts that the MCP "was pursuing the objective of a new democratic revolution" and had "preferred to operate in the open and in conformity with the law". The MCP had adopted Mao Tze Dong 's strategy of a "peaceful struggle", which

24675-558: The primary element in the transformation of society towards a communist mode of production . Communism in its modern form grew out of the socialist movement in 18th-century France , in the aftermath of the French Revolution . Criticism of the idea of private property in the Age of Enlightenment of the 18th century through such thinkers as Gabriel Bonnot de Mably , Jean Meslier , Étienne-Gabriel Morelly , Henri de Saint-Simon and Jean-Jacques Rousseau in France. During

24850-468: The productive forces continued to advance, the communist society , i.e. a classless, stateless, humane society based on common ownership , follows the maxim " From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs ." While it originates from the works of Marx and Engels, Marxism has developed into many different branches and schools of thought, with the result that there is now no single definitive Marxist theory. Different Marxian schools place

25025-440: The proletariat. According to communists, the proletariat can avoid mass unemployment only if capitalism is overthrown; in the short run, state-oriented communists favor state ownership of the commanding heights of the economy as a means to defend the proletariat from capitalist pressure. Some communists are distinguished by other Marxists in seeing peasants and smallholders of property as possible allies in their goal of shortening

25200-588: The propaganda news-sheets published by the MPAJA's propaganda bureau. Nevertheless, there were token numbers of Malay and Indians among their ranks. In Lim Pui Huen's book, War and Memory in Malaysia and Singapore , an Indian war survivor Ramasamy recalled that "in the plantations, news of guerilla activities were often a great joy to the [Indian] laborers", and that the Indian MPAJA leaders like "Perumal and Muniandy were looked upon… as heroes because they punish

25375-440: The religious emphasis with a rational and philanthropic basis. Notable among them were Robert Owen , who founded New Harmony, Indiana , in 1825, and Charles Fourier , whose followers organized other settlements in the United States, such as Brook Farm in 1841. In its modern form, communism grew out of the socialist movement in 19th-century Europe. As the Industrial Revolution advanced, socialist critics blamed capitalism for

25550-415: The resistance dead. Among those who were killed, 29 were top-ranking party officials which included 4 MPAJA "Political Commissars". The Batu Caves Massacre had effectively wiped out the entire pre-war leadership of the MCP and influential members of the MPAJA. The untimely deaths in the MCP and MPAJA hierarchy provided an opportunity for a new breed of leaders to emerge. Among this new generation of leaders

25725-410: The result was that Allied command did not hear of the agreement until 1 February 1945, and it was only during the last months of the war that the British were able to supply the MPAJA by air. Between December 1944 and August 1945, the number of air drops totalled more than 1000, with 510 men and £1.5 million worth of equipment and supplies parachuted into Malaya. For the MPAJA, the period from 1944 until

25900-561: The rise to state power of Vladimir Lenin 's Bolsheviks , which was the first time any avowedly communist party reached that position. The revolution transferred power to the All-Russian Congress of Soviets in which the Bolsheviks had a majority. The event generated a great deal of practical and theoretical debate within the Marxist movement, as Marx stated that socialism and communism would be built upon foundations laid by

26075-407: The rubber industry's regional boom suddenly found themselves out of work. The Chinese Communist Party leveraged these economic conditions to help spread their revolutionary ideology in the country. Driven by political, racial, and class solidarity, young Chinese immigrants joined the growing Malayan Communist Party (M.C.P.) in greater numbers than most other demographic groups . Throughout the 1930s,

26250-404: The same period, Mao's personality cult grew to immense proportions. After Mao's death in 1976, the survivors were rehabilitated and many returned to power. Mao's government was responsible for vast numbers of deaths with estimates ranging from 40 to 80 million victims through starvation, persecution, prison labour , and mass executions. Mao has also been praised for transforming China from

26425-663: The state-capitalist development and the Workers' in particular was critical of bureaucratization and development from above, while the Right Opposition was more supporting of state-capitalist development and advocated the New Economic Policy . Following Lenin's democratic centralism , the Leninist parties were organized on a hierarchical basis, with active cells of members as the broad base. They were made up only of elite cadres approved by higher members of

26600-516: The term communism fell out of use during this period. An early distinction between communism and socialism was that the latter aimed to only socialize production , whereas the former aimed to socialize both production and consumption (in the form of common access to final goods ). This distinction can be observed in Marx's communism, where the distribution of products is based on the principle of " to each according to his needs ", in contrast to

26775-600: The term frequently in his writing and was the first to describe communism as a form of government . John Goodwyn Barmby is credited with the first use of communism in English, around 1840. Since the 1840s, the term communism has usually been distinguished from socialism . The modern definition and usage of the term socialism was settled by the 1860s, becoming predominant over alternative terms such as associationism ( Fourierism ), mutualism , or co-operative , which had previously been used as synonyms. Meanwhile,

26950-623: The term's widespread association with Marxism–Leninism and the Soviet-type economic planning model. In his essay "Judging Nazism and Communism", Martin Malia defines a "generic Communism" category as any Communist political party movement led by intellectuals ; this umbrella term allows grouping together such different regimes as radical Soviet industrialism and the Khmer Rouge 's anti-urbanism. According to Alexander Dallin ,

27125-504: The upheaval of the French Revolution , communism emerged as a political doctrine under the auspices of François-Noël Babeuf , Nicolas Restif de la Bretonne , and Sylvain Maréchal , all of whom can be considered the progenitors of modern communism, according to James H. Billington . In the early 19th century, various social reformers founded communities based on common ownership. Unlike many previous communist communities, they replaced

27300-428: The upheaval of the French Revolution , communism emerged as a political doctrine under the auspices of François-Noël Babeuf , Nicolas Restif de la Bretonne , and Sylvain Maréchal , all of whom can be considered the progenitors of modern communism, according to James H. Billington . In the 20th century, several ostensibly Communist governments espousing Marxism–Leninism and its variants came into power, first in

27475-416: The vehicle for fundamental society-wide changes and ultimately leads to the emergence of new economic systems . As a term, orthodox Marxism represents the methods of historical materialism and of dialectical materialism, and not the normative aspects inherent to classical Marxism, without implying dogmatic adherence to the results of Marx's investigations. At the root of Marxism is historical materialism,

27650-472: The works of 19th-century German philosophers Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels . As Marxism has developed over time into various branches and schools of thought , no single, definitive Marxist theory exists. Marxism considers itself to be the embodiment of scientific socialism but does not model an ideal society based on the design of intellectuals , whereby communism is seen as a state of affairs to be established based on any intelligent design; rather, it

27825-470: Was Chin Peng , who would eventually become leader of the MCP and one of the key figures in the post-war conflict with the British government of Malaya . Another individual would be Liao Wei-chung, also known as Colonel Itu, who commanded the MPAJA 5th Independent Regiment from 1943 till the end of the war. By late 1943 many of the veteran Japanese soldiers were replaced by fresh units which were less successful in executing counter-insurgency operations against

28000-532: Was a Chinese businessman, investor, and philanthropist active in Singapore and the Chinese cities of Hong Kong , Shanghai , Xiamen , and Guangzhou . A prominent figure in the overseas Chinese community in Singapore and wider Southeast Asia during the 20th century, he was responsible for gathering much support from the community to aid China in major events such as the Xinhai Revolution (1911),

28175-739: Was also a participant in the Legislative Yuan of the Nationalist government in Chongqing . After the Japanese invaded and occupied Malaya and Singapore in 1942, they deemed these contributors "undesirable" and conducted systematic extermination of anti-Japanese elements in Singapore through the Sook Ching Massacre . Tan survived because he escaped from Singapore before it fell to the Japanese, and went into hiding in Malang ,

28350-629: Was also created under Josip Broz Tito in Yugoslavia ; Tito's independent policies led to the Tito–Stalin split and expulsion of Yugoslavia from the Cominform in 1948, and Titoism was branded deviationist . Albania also became an independent Marxist–Leninist state following the Albanian–Soviet split in 1960, resulting from an ideological fallout between Enver Hoxha , a Stalinist, and

28525-427: Was also quite modern. At the top, personal loyalty to Stalin counted for everything. Stalin also created powerful committees, elevated younger specialists, and began major institutional innovations. In the teeth of persecution, Stalin's deputies cultivated informal norms and mutual understandings which provided the foundations for collective rule after his death. For most Westerners and anti-communist Russians, Stalin

28700-535: Was believed to be the atheist way of life. In Protestant England , communism was too phonetically similar to the Roman Catholic communion rite , hence English atheists denoted themselves socialists. Friedrich Engels stated that in 1848, at the time when The Communist Manifesto was first published, socialism was respectable on the continent, while communism was not; the Owenites in England and

28875-556: Was between 400 and 500 members. The 5th Regiment was considered the strongest under the leadership of Chin Peng, then-Perak State Secretary of the MCP, and Colonel Itu (aka Liao Wei Chung). There was no class distinction in the MPAJA. Each member addressed each other simply as "comrade", including the Chairman of the Central Military Committee. Although the MPAJA was directly controlled by the MCP leadership, many members were not communists, contrary to popular belief. Many had signed up for

29050-692: Was in Java , Tan began writing his memoirs, The Memoirs of an Overseas Chinese of the Southern Ocean ( 南僑回憶錄 ; 南侨回忆录 ; Nánqiáo Huíyìlù ), which later became an important document of the history of the overseas Chinese in Southeast Asia. Tan was the de facto leader of the Chinese community in Singapore, serving as chairman of the Chinese Chamber of Commerce and helping to organise the Hokkien clan association . However, he lost this role when

29225-400: Was married to Lee Kong Chian ; Tan Lay Ho was married to Lim Chong Kuo, the eldest son of respected merchant Lim Nee Soon . In recognition of Tan's contributions to education and society throughout his lifetime, there are places and establishments in China and Southeast Asia named after Tan or built to commemorate him, including: the Tan Kah Kee Memorial Museum in Tan's hometown in Jimei ;

29400-415: Was much more efficient, this property became worthless and the mass majority of workers could only survive by selling their labor to make use of someone else's machinery, and making someone else profit. Accordingly, capitalism divided the world between two major classes, namely that of the proletariat and the bourgeoisie . These classes are directly antagonistic as the latter possesses private ownership of

29575-420: Was never established, while some Marxist–Leninists state that it was established only during the Stalin era and Mao era , and then became capitalist states ruled by revisionists ; others state that Maoist China was always state capitalist, and uphold People's Socialist Republic of Albania as the only socialist state after the Soviet Union under Stalin, who first stated to have achieved socialism with

29750-528: Was proficient in Hokkien , he achieved much success doing business in Singapore because Hokkien was the common language of overseas Chinese in Singapore throughout most of the 19th and 20th centuries. His business was at its prime from 1912 to 1914 when he was known as the " Henry Ford of the Malayan community ". Tan had a leading role among the 110 founders of Tao Nan School in Singapore. In 1919, he set up The Chinese High School (now Hwa Chong Institution ) in Singapore. Earlier, in 1918, he established

29925-417: Was rushed, with individual courses lasting only ten days and a total of 7 classes. Receiving only basic training and poorly-equipped, these graduated recruits would be sent across the peninsula to operate as independent squads. The first batch of 15 recruits was sent near Kuala Lumpur , where they had some success in disrupting Japanese communication lines in northern Selangor . However, many were killed within

30100-418: Was that the MCP would recruit, and the British would provide training to resistance groups. Also, the trained resistance fighters would be used as the British Military Command saw fit. The recruits were to undergo training in sabotage and guerrilla warfare at the 101 Special Training School (STS) in Singapore, operated by the Malayan wing of the London-based Special Operations Executive (SOE). On 19 December 1941,

30275-407: Was the beginning of the development of vanguardism as an hierarchical party–elite that controls society, which resulted in a split between anarchism and Marxism , and Leninist communism assuming the dominant position for most of the 20th century, excluding rival socialist currents. Other communists and Marxists, especially social democrats who favored the development of liberal democracy as

30450-560: Was to purify communism by removing pro-capitalists and traditionalists by imposing Maoist orthodoxy within the Chinese Communist Party . The movement paralyzed China politically and weakened the country economically, culturally, and intellectually for years. Millions of people were accused, humiliated, stripped of power, and either imprisoned, killed, or most often, sent to work as farm laborers. Mao insisted that those he labelled revisionists be removed through violent class struggle . The two most prominent militants were Marshall Lin Biao of

30625-499: Was to take over the countryside and get "workers, peasants and others" to conduct "strikes, acts of sabotage, demonstrations, etc." Following Mao's doctrine, the MPAJA would "forge alliance with its secondary enemy against the primary enemy" in which secondary enemy referred to the British and the primary enemy was the Japanese. Therefore, during the war, the "MCP's only target was the Japanese". Casualty figures provided by both MPAJA and Japanese sources differed greatly: With regards to

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