Learning from the mistakes of the past,paving the way towards the future

 The most severe problem that the Western Communist movement has ever faced,is concerned with its right-wing opportunistic deviation in the Cold-War era,rendering it unable to make the popular masses seek the overthrow of the capitalist system.Despite the amount of anti-communist propaganda or even purges and killings utilized by Bourgeois governments,we could see that even during the Cold-War there was a lot of potential from mass movements even in the western world (May 68 unrest,Greek Polytechnic uprising of 1973,Carnation Revolution in Portugal),that definately did not lead to a Socialist Revolution but still seem as a lucid dream for many communists in modern Europe given the horrible state of the European communist movement and working class movements.

 I deem as important to not idolize the unrest and mass movemements that existed in Western Europe back then,but try and analyse why they never led to targeting the system as a whole instead of just aiming to overthrow a military junta or a governement (which on its own requires a lot of courage and determination,especially when faced against a military regime and seems definately unfathomable to modern era communists ).It is important for modern day communists to understand and learn from how the Communist parties of the era made severe mistakes or succumbed to reformism and right-wing opportunism that prevented them from concentrating the necessary working-class forces on the most important branches of capitalist production,and from aiming towards a socialist revolution,but instead believing that winning the elections could lead to a democratic path towards socialism.Ofcourse the mistakes of the Cold-War era can also be attributed to Soviet Communists and the revisionist policy of the CPSU,that even influenced communist parties that were not ideologically overtaken by eurocommunism or other social-democratic tendencies (i.e. Greek communist party and Eastern bloc Communist parties).

  The fall of the USSR was definately a tragedy for the international communist movement and for the peoples of the Soviet Union,but also an indicator that something was going wrong on the application of Scientific Communism and Marxism-Leninism,from former socialist countries and communist parties around the world. The blow on working class and communist movements from the counter-revolution of the late 80's was huge and its effects are pretty much obvious today,with most communist and working class parties,having a membership of less than a 1000 members if they have not been completely outlawed,by bourgeois governments.Such a situation could probably be comparable with the first years of the Inter-war period when counter-revolution defeated many revolutions in Europe but with the grand exception that a working-class state,the USSR existed back then.

   The horrible condition of the modern-day communist movement probably prevents a lot of working-class or other people from the popular masses that are disapointed with the "system" (while being unable to identify it) to see socialism as an alternative solution,and thus viewing capitalism as the only way to go,with only small changes and achievements to be obtained.It should be our goal to reach these people and make them join our cause,but in order for this to be done it of outmost importance to reconstitute Marxism-Leninism in the Communist parties.Reconstituting the revolutionary ideology of Marxism-Leninism means learing from the past mistakes of its applications,which can start from rejecting participation in Bourgeois governements or believing that winning a national election could lead to a popular alternative or a peaceful road toward Socialism.Comprehending the role of social democracy in the political scene is another step and thus not supporting or showing tolerance towards reformist or social-democratic politicians (i.e. Bernie Sanders,AOC) is of outmost importance,but on the contrary we must make obvious to the working masses that despite their rhetoric,their political programme serves capitalist growth,for example with a transition to a Green economy.As far as social democracy is concerned we must also learn from its role in making most modern trade unions a tool for the capitalist class,and we should definately not cooperate with them ,but instead by specialising the problem of the workers participating in each union ,try and lead the Unions by working into them ,to an Anti-Capitalist orientation,seperating our line from government-sponsored social democratic syndicalism.It should also be mentioned that is important to emphasise towards leading an anti-capitalist alliance of different opressed popular masses ,such as workers ,self-employed,farmers etc instead of focusing into an alliance with other leftist political parties,or "left unity",which only leads to weaking our revolutionary programme and the concentration of working class forces in important branches.All those lines would make communist parties as distinct ideological and political beacons that could be recognised by the popular masses as carriers of revolutionary ideology and lead them away from modern-day capitalist traps such as reformism.  

  As Communists we must also provide a vision for the future Socialist society ,that would persuade the working masses to fight against capitalism as a system and not only target a specific bourgeois politician or government.The Soviet Union despite its late-mistakes should be our primary field of study as far as the construction of  a socialist society is concerned,especially due to the fact that the vast majorities of its achievements in a lot of fields such as Living Conditions, Labour, Education, Healthcare,Culture are pretty much unattained by workers in modern era and thus opening a discussion with a casual worker or reaching a larger audience will be facilitated.For such we must also target lies around its history and combat anti-communism Ofcourse studying the socialist construction in the Soviet Union also means pointing out its mistakes (market-oriented reforms)and most importantly the roots of them.This study should in no instance idolize the past but serve as a means towards preventing past mistakes from reoccuring in the future.

   To conclude,despite the fact that the international communist movement is probably in its worst position since the foundation of scientific socialism,there is a chance to learn from the past mistakes that rendered communist parties unable to turn the mass movements of the time towards an anti-capitalist direction and make communist parties a beacon that would concentrate working-class people seeking solution to their problems.That can only be done by reconstituting Marxism-Leninism.