In this issue of the Australian Marxist Review there is an analysis on a number of topics for consideration of our readers.
Dr Graham Holton is currently a member of the editorial board of Tensoes Mundiais: Revista do Observatorio das Nacionalidades (Brazilian Journal on World Tensions). Graham has a B Sc Applied Geology in Engineering Geology RMIT, a BA Honours with distinction in History La Trobe University, and a PhD Latin America Institute La Trobe University.
Having taught at La Trobe University, Melbourne University, and the University of Queensland, Graham has published numerous articles including a chapter in Latin American Popular Culture: An Introduction edited by W H Beezeley and L A Curcio-Nagy.
His article in Anthropology Forum journal has had a big impact on condemning the racist views of Thor Heyerdahl. He has presented numerous papers at conferences around Australia.
In his article for the AMR Graham cuts through the controversy surrounding Bruce Pascoe’s contribution on the discussion of Indigenous heritage in Australia. Graham turns the spotlight on the loudest critiques from the right against Pascoe’s work, Dark Emu, examining their qualification to criticise.
Graham’s analysis, while recognising the easily identifiable embellishments, exaggerations, and misquotes that Pascoe makes, discusses why this does not diminish the value of Pascoe’s contribution to the dialogue.
Dr Roland Boer is a Professor of Marxist philosophy in the School of Marxism at Dalian University of Technology in China. Earlier, he taught at Renmin University of China and in a number of universities in Australia. He has also been a visiting professor in the Academy of Marxism in Beijing (within CASS). Among numerous works on Marxism and philosophy, he has published the five-volume work, The Criticism of Heaven and Earth (Leiden: Brill, 2007–2014). In 2014, it was awarded the Isaac and Tamara Deutscher Memorial Prize. He has recently published a monograph entitled Socialism with Chinese Characteristics – A Guide for Foreigners (Singapore: Springer, 2021), and will soon have published with Renmin University Press a work entitled Friedrich Engels and the Foundations of Socialist Governance.
Roland is fluent in Mandarin giving him insights that may remain elusive to many. In his contribution he looks at the distinctive feature of the leadership of the Communist Party of China (CPC) in China’s socialist democratic system. Roland draws primarily on Chinese Marxist sources to examine CPC leadership based on the founding of the New China, and governing China today.
An article cowritten by two younger Party Comrades. Christian Goopy is the current Secretary of the Sydney District Committee and Secretary of the Maritime branch and has been a member of the Communist Party of Australia since 2018. He is a delegate of the United Workers Union at his workplace at a warehouse in Rosebery. He is completing undergraduate degrees in a Bachelor of Science in Biology and a Bachelor of Creative Intelligence and Innovation at the University of Technology Sydney and has been active in various social movements since 2014.
Dan Hanford has been a delegate for the TWU, Construction & Maritime Union, and an organiser for the plumbers’ union across Sydney and Canberra. For 20 years his activist focus has been bridging community and industrial disputes. Dan has been a member of the Maritime branch of the CPA since 2015 and joined while living at the gates of a 5-month lockout. Within the CPA he has served a term as district president in Sydney and is currently treasurer of the maritime branch. Currently Dan is a working wharfie in Port Botany and serves on the safety committee.
The comrades have joined the Party at a time of growth and have established themselves within their workplaces and amongst workers in their workplaces and beyond. Their insights of the struggle and ways forward for a Party on the move draws on examples from the past history of the communist movement in Australia, the history of the Parties of China and US to examine what is needed for the CPA to grow, as they write to gain “our position as the vanguard of the working class we need to learn from our past historical experience in solving the problems of being a small Marxist-Leninist organization within a contested working-class space” today.
The Editorial Board hopes that readers find the articles in this issue interesting and valuable to their discussions and work.
David Matters (Convenor)
Anna Pha
Elizabeth Hulm