One Flower Doesn’t Mean It’s Summer

How Ramiz Alia Destroyed The Dictatorship of the Proletariat in Albania

Editor’s Introduction

I don’t like lengthy introductions so I will only briefly tell you what this document is and then I’ll get out of your way so you can read it. This document was essentially written by Qemal Cicollari, the current leader of the Communist Party of Albania, as, of all things, a series of twenty or thirty facebook posts between 5 March and 28 June, 2023. Facebook is not an effective archival medium. Recognising the historical importance of these posts, I saved them to my tumblr drafts, and with significant help from Google Translate, I began translating them from the original Albanian on 28 May. Further editing work was significantly delayed by my personal circumstances, and so it is only now in October that I publish the finished document.

Machine translation does not result in natural language. With my own (rather modest) knowledge of the Albanian language and my (rather less modest) understanding of Marxism-Leninism and the ideology of the PLA, I cleaned up the translation substantially. This also entailed massive edits for the sake of length. The original document had points that meandered and went nowhere, and frequent, lengthy repetition of ideas that had been covered months earlier. Evidently, Cicollari has written a book in which these matters are discussed. I am sure it is more detailed and stylistically more elegant. But to my knowledge, this book has not been translated into English, and I was unable to find even an Albanian copy while living in Albania. Therefore, to my knowledge, this is the only document written in English discussing the fall of the PSRA with any credibility. My earlier post on this blog arguing that the rot came from within the Sigurimi has become outdated thanks to this extensive first-hand testimony.

Another length edit I made to this document was the removal of frequently-repeated appellations such as “small socialist Albania, led by the Party of Labour of Albania with the great Enver Hoxha at the head” and “chief revisionist Ramiz Alia and his revisionist gang at the head of the Party of Labour of Albania and the “socialist” Albanian state.” The reason I have done this is not because of any hand-wringing about “personality cults”. I actually believe these phrases have an important social purpose. But they are lengthy and awkward in English. This is not a convention that the English language has, and so the frequent repetition of such lengthy phrases negatively impacts readability. I have kept only a few instances of these phrases, and generally simplified them to “Enver”, “the PLA”, “Albania”, “the PSRA”, etc, even though it can be noted that, yada yada, these things were not all done by Enver himself but by the Party overall and various historical actors and events, the PSR is a name that wasn’t adopted until 1976, etc. But life goes on.

This work contains reference to many ideas developed by Stalin and elaborated on in books like Economic Problems in the USSR. These might not at once be recognised by a reader not familiar with Stalin’s work, but I wanted to note briefly that these theses did not originate with the Albanian party but were only further developed by them. They are Stalinist theses at their core. In particular, the foundation of the discussion of the continuing class conflict within the society and the Party during the period of socialist construction is Stalin’s. It also may help some to note here that what I have translated as “the socialist principle of self-reliance” is usually, if not always, translated in Albanian sources as “reliance on one’s own forces” and in Trotskyist and other anti-communist sources as “Socialism In One Country”. These are all one thing, by different names.

Being that this was originally a series of facebook posts, there were a number of comments corroborating Cicollari’s words, and testifying to having seen personally the events of which he wrote. This is generally in keeping with the overall tone of Albanian facebook communities consisting of mostly Albanian men over 45, of which I am a member of several: the majority have substantiated and insightful comments about socialist development and undeniable criticisms of the obviously unacceptable state of affairs in today’s poverty-stricken, de-industrialised, de-populated Albania, and on the other, the occasional guy who comes in to weakly proclaim unsubstantiated, editorialised slogans and thought-terminating cliches like “Enver Hoxha ruled with an iron fist and we lived in terror”, etc, in the typical fascist manner.

The title under which I am publishing this comes from a reply by one Ramadan Ndreka in support of Cicollari’s words below. I reproduce the comment here.

I enjoyed reading this, and liked it a lot. All this analysis leads us to a conclusion.

1. One flower does not mean it’s summer. Enver Hoxha did not have knowledgeable and loyal people around him.

2. The base of the party had a low ideological level and was without morals. I said this to Ramiz Alia on 26 February 1992 in front of a hundred people at a meeting.

It is not the case that revisionism was born in us. The massive part of people who lived in agricultural cooperatives did not agree with that way of life. The party organisations and its members had raised the banner “We know, and you do as we say”. Agronomists and people with 8 year agricultural education who occupied leading positions did exemplary work.

They isolated Enver Hoxha, they did not tell him the reality. His theses were correct.

The content of the actual posts begins here.

Socialism in Albania was Destroyed by Revisionism

As it is known, socialism no longer exists in Albania.

At the end of 1990, “political pluralism” and “market economy” were officially declared in Albania. This date also marks the reversal of socialism in Albania and the restoration of capitalism.

Why was socialism overturned in Albania?

Who uprooted socialism in Albania?

How was socialism overturned in Albania?

You can answer these questions correctly only on the basis of a Marxist — Leninist analysis and assessment.

As it is known from history, after the victory of the Antifascist National Liberation War on November 29, 1944 under the leadership of the Communist Party of Albania, with Enver Hoxha at the head, the dictatorship of the proletariat was established in Albania for over half a century.

After the death of Enver Hoxha on April 11, 1985, Ramiz Alia became the head of the Labor Party of Albania and the Socialist Albanian state. He declared that he would faithfully follow “Enver’s path”, i.e. that the process of building socialism and communism would continue. But, as time later showed, Ramiz Alia and the top leadership of the Party of Labour of Albania were revisionist traitors to Marxist-Leninist science, socialism, and Enver Hoxha.

The reforms undertaken by Ramiz Alia in the framework of the “democratization” of the country’s life shared the same liberal spirit of Mikail Gorbacov’s “Perestroika” and “Glasnost”, and created the conditions and prepared the ground for the birth of revisionism and the restoration of capitalism in Albania.

The overthrow of socialism in Albania, as history showed, was not carried out with an armed bourgeois counter-revolution, with guns, tanks, rockets and atomic bombs from imperialist forces from abroad, but it was carried out “peacefully” with a bourgeois counter-revolution by the former Labor Party of Albania headed by the chief revisionist, Chairman Ramiz Alia. This bourgeois — revisionist “peaceful” counter-revolution was not done suddenly and immediately, but it developed gradually, disguised with “Marxist”, “Enverist”, “socialist” rhetoric, it included the superstructure and economic basis of socialism, from 1985 to the end of 1990.

So, the process of overthrowing of socialism in Albania and the restoration of capitalism with a “socialist” mask began de facto after the death of Enver Hoxha in 1985, and was crowned “de jure” in late 1990 with the official proclaimation of “political pluralism” and “market economy”, i.e. classical capitalism .

To better understand the essence of this issue, that is, the overthrow of socialism in Albania, I think to address very briefly and in a very general way the world history of the war between socialism and capitalism.

The birth of the new socialist system in Russia after the victory of the Great Socialist Revolution of October in 1917 led by the Bolshevik Communist Party with the Great Lenin at the head, antagonistic contradictions were born between the new socialist order and the old capitalist order.

On the basis of this great antagonistic contradiction, the great class war for life or death began between socialism and capitalism, which oppose each other irreconcilably.

History tells us that capitalism has used two methods to overthrow socialism.

First, the method of armed bourgeois counter-revolution to overthrow socialism, including the armed intervention of 14 imperialist states and the internal reaction against Soviet Russia. Another example is the fascist military aggression of Nazi imperialist Germany and its allies in 1941 against the Soviet Union led by Stalin the Great, as well as as the wars of American imperialism in the early 50s — against Democratic Korea, etc.

This was not successful. History tells us that the imperialist bourgeoisie could not overthrow socialism with the force of weapons.

Second, the “peaceful” revisionist path to overthrow socialism from above and restore capitalism, as happened in Yugoslavia after World War II when Titoist revisionists took power, as happened in the former Soviet Union in the mid-50s following Stalin’s death with Khruschev and his revisionist clique, as happened in former socialist countries of Eastern Europe when Khruschevite revisionists came to power in these places, as happened in China when revisionists took power, etc.

History tells us very clearly that socialism was overturned with revisionism, that is, with “peaceful” bourgeois revisionism.

So, socialism in Albania and in the world was overturned with the birth and spread of modern revisionism in former communist parties of former socialist countries and their degeneration into revisionist parties.

Ramiz Alia’s revisionism was capitulation to the pressures of imperialism, social imperialism, and modern revisionism on socialist Albania.

Historical experience had proven that one of the main causes of the birth and spread of modern revisionism in the former Soviet Union and other socialist countries is that they were capitulating to the ideological, political, economic, cultural, and military pressures of imperialism. This happened in Albania as in many other countries.

Regarding this issue, Enver Hoxha emphasized:

“Modern revisionism is not a matter of chance, it did not suddenly emerge like Athena from the head of Zeus. It was born as a result of the fierce class struggle that takes place between socialism, which has a future ahead of it, and the imperialist bourgeoisie, which is waiting for death. It is the embodiment of the capitulation in this war by the aristocratic and undecided segment of the representatives of the working class, as a result of the strong and continuous pressure exerted by imperialism”.
(Enver Hoxha. Works, vol. 23, page 470)

In order to close Albania to the development of modern revisionism, the Party of Labour of Albania led by Enver the Great took all measures, in all areas of life, to avoid this great danger. The Party of Labour of Albania and Enver Hoxha paid a lot of attention to the correct understanding of the imperialist-revisionist siege and the deadly dangers it presents for the fate of socialism, and fought against the development of its consequences.

Enver Hoxha, in order to successfully cope with the great and continuous blackmail of imperialism against the small socialist Albania, took comprehensive measures for the continuous revolutionization of the Party of Labor of Albania, the state of the dictatorship of the proletariat and the whole life of the country. Enver Hoxha considered the struggle against the pressure of the imperialist and revisionist encirclement as an expression of the class struggle between socialism and capitalism in the international arena.

Enver Hoxha, for coping with the pressure of imperialism on socialist Albania, attached great importance to the fight against liberalism. He constantly emphasized that this imperialist encirclement was not imaginary but real and active, and it could only be faced by developing a systematic and merciless class war against liberal concepts and attitudes. Marxist-Leninist science teaches us that liberalism is a system of bourgeois and revisionist views, it is a manifestation of ideological and political opportunism, which essentially denies the class struggle in the name of abstract “humanism”, giving up the consequent class struggle against external and internal enemies, against the stains of the old bourgeois society, such as acceptance of “peaceful coexistence” with enemy ideology, etc.

Albania’s entry into the path of socialism was not easy. Socialist Albania was a small country of 1 million inhabitants, which inherited from the old feudal-bourgeois system a very serious economic, social and cultural backwardness. Albania was the most backward country not only in the Balkans, but also in Europe. Albania started the path of socialism almost without developed industry and with a small working class without much political experience. About 80% of the population were peasants, 90% of the population were illiterate, etc., etc.

As history shows, the small socialist Albania, apart from these very great internal difficulties, had to face from the beginning the great pressure of the British and American imperialists, who organized and led the Albanian reaction for the overthrow of popular power of the socialist order, militarily supported monarcho-fascist Greece that attacked socialist Albania in August 1949, etc.

Albania also faced the pressure of the Yugoslav Titoite revisionists, who wanted to overthrow socialism and turn Albania into the 7th Republic of Yugoslavia.

Albania also faced the great pressure of revisionists and Khrushchevite social imperialists. Having unmasked them at the meeting of the communist parties in Moscow in 1960, it would also have to expel the Russian war fleet from the port of Vlora, exit from the Warsaw Treaty, etc. The Kruschevites demanded the overthrow of socialism in Albania and its transformation into a colony of Soviet social imperialism.

Albania successfully faced the pressure of Mao Zedong’s revisionist China, which also demanded the overthrow of socialism in Albania. The raging war of English and American imperialism for the violent overthrow of socialism in Albania is confirmed by the statement of former British Prime Minister Tony Blair in 2006, who plainly stated that, “for the overthrow of the communist government of Enver Hoxha, the American CIA and the English Intelligence Service worked together, but … they failed”.

Although under the great and continuous pressure of the imperialist-revisionist siege, Albania marked great historical achievements in all fields of life, protecting at all costs the freedom and independence of the homeland and socialism. Small socialist Albania under the leadership of the Marxist-Leninist Albanian Labor Party with the great Enver at the head, during a very short historical time of only 40 years, transformed from a backward agricultural country into an industrial-agricultural country.

This great era of socialism in the small Albania led by Enver the Great is a great example of how to cope with the pressure of imperialism, social imperialism and revisionism of all colors against socialist construction. Under Enver Hoxha, Albania had repeatedly barred the path for revisionism to restore capitalism.

After the death of Enver Hoxha on April 11, 1985, capitalist and revisionist countries, led by American imperialism and Soviet social imperialism, increased pressure on socialist Albania.

How did the PLA respond?

In such historical circumstances, Ramiz Alia began to panic and waver before the great pressure of imperialism and revisionism, gradually taking opportunistic and revisionist positions. Thus, Ramiz Alia betrayed Marxist-Leninist science, socialism and Enver Hoxha, guided by the negative historical experience of Khrushchev revisionists, Titoists, etc. Chief revisionist Ramiz Alia and his revisionist gang at the head of the Labor Party of Albania and the Albanian state designed and implemented a revisionist platform, at the core of which was the “revision”, “correction” and denial of the fundamental principles of Marxist-Leninist science and the teachings of Enver Hoxha.

This revisionist platform, disguised with “socialist” and “Enverist” phraseology, followed a liberal and opportunistic foreign policy against the pressure of imperialism and social imperialism. This liberal and revisionist foreign policy led very quickly to “opening the doors”, or rather “tearing the doors”, to the capitalist and revisionist world in complete betrayal of the Marxist-Leninist policy of Enver Hoxha.

Ramiz Alia tried to argue that Albania had found itself in “new historical conditions” and his new policies were for “the protection and further development of socialism” etc. Ramiz Alia occasionally issued the deceptive slogan “we are neither East nor West” . The essence of this liberal and revisionist policy of Ramiz Alia towards the pressures of imperialism and revisionism was the denial of the class war between socialism and capitalism in the international arena. The essence of this liberal and revisionist policy proved itself gradually and silently.

Ramiz Alia was terrified that his great betrayal would be revealed in the eyes of the honest communists and the people, and to put their revolutionary vigilance to sleep, he followed a strategy in implementation under very sophisticated and disguised politics. Ramiz Alia very carefully took the irreversible steps of the “peaceful” bourgeois-revisionist counter-revolution, constantly avoiding, the reactions and objections of the communist and revolutionary elements. The bureaucratic, liberal and revisionist apparatchiks of the PLA and the state of Ramiz Alia at first labeled and denigrated the communist and revolutionary elements who opposed this liberal and opportunistic policy of capitulation as “ignorant”, “mediocre,” “conservatives,” etc., then they tried to deceive and corrupt them. When these communists and revolutionaries did not retreat from their principled, Marxist-Leninist views and positions, they were subjected to political pressure, they were denigrated and discriminated against in the Party and society, they were accused of “anti-communist” and “anti-socialist” activities, a part of them they were expelled from the Party, and some were even criminally punished. This very sophisticated revisionist policy deceived a considerable amount of the working class, and this stunted any revolutionary movement that opposed the revisionist betrayal.

As a result of this liberal and revisionist policy, the pressure of imperialism, especially American and European imperialism, on Albania increased even more. In order to better recognize and understand the capitulatory nature of the betrayal, I will present some undeniable facts that prove this.

Ramiz Alia, betraying of the Marxist-Leninist foreign policy of Enver Hoxha, began a process of concrete concessions and continuous withdrawal before the pressures of the politics of imperialism and social imperialism. On October 2, 1987, diplomatic relations were established between Albania and West Germany, sealed by the “friendly” conversation, as expressed by the local and foreign media, of the “communist” leader Ramiz Alia with the bourgeois German foreign minister Gensher. The revisionist Ramiz Alia, as time would show later, betrayed Enver Hoxha’s instructions and orders regarding this issue, thus betraying the interests of socialist Albania and submitting to the enslaving interests of German imperialism.

Ramiz Alia accepted loans and credits, on Albania’s behalf, from the capitalist and revisionist countries and their economic monopolies. This was in complete betrayal of the Marxist-Leninist line of the PLA and Enver Hoxha, and in flagrant violation of the Constitution of the People’s Socialist Republic of Albania, which did not allow borrowing loans from the capitalist countries and the economic monopolies of these countries, due to the exploitative and enslaving conditions that they sought to impose on socialist Albania.

Capitalist and revisionist states, and their economic monopolies, as time showed, did not give loans and credits to Albania to “build” and “save” socialism as Ramiz Alia claimed, but to ensure a higher rate of profit from the export of their capital and for the degeneration and transformation of the Albanian socialist economy into a capitalist economy, with the final goal of overthrowing socialism as soon as possible and restoring capitalism in Albania.

In February 1988, the Albanian delegation headed by Foreign Minister Reiz Malile participated for the first time in the meeting of foreign ministers of the bourgeois states of the Balkans in Belgrade, Yugoslavia. To the question of journalists and political commentators about this new policy of Albania, Reiz Malile answered: “We are not the ones who changed, others changed”. But history would show very clearly that those who had changed were not the bourgeois and revisionist states at all, as the revisionist diplomat Reiz Malile hypocritically claimed, but the foreign policy of Albania had changed radically under Ramiz Alia.

In April 1990, the revisionist Ramiz Alia officially declared Albania’s interest in the creation of the “European Security System” in cooperation with the community of bourgeois and revisionist European states, and that “in the light of new approaches with the changes that have taken place” “it is put on the agenda the problem of establishing relations with the United States of America and the Soviet Union”. This statement of the chief revisionist and arch-traitor Ramiz Alia was the crowning of his revisionist policy.

Thus, in implementation of this revisionist policy, capitulating before the blackmail pressure of American imperialism, diplomatic relations were established between Albania and the United States of America in March 1991. This revisionist policy of Ramiz Alia would quickly turn Albania into a colony of American imperialism. In February 1991, diplomatic relations were established between Albania and the former Soviet Union.

In May 1990, UN Secretary General Perez De Cuellar arrived in Tirana for an official visit. On May 10, 1990, before this missionary of imperialism arrived, in preparation to receive this bourgeois UN official, and in accordance with his demands, the People’s Assembly of Albania approved a law which allowed Albanian citizens to leave the country freely, as well as the right to live wherever they wanted, starting from July.

Upon his arrival in Albania, the bourgeois and anti-communist politician Perez De Cuellar made visits, walked around, made statements as he wanted about what he wanted for “Comrade” Ramiz’s “socialist” Albania. At the end of the visit, Perez De Cuellar, dressed in the costume of the Secretary General of the UN, stated emphatically that, “without the dismantling of the system of violence”, “without the radical improvement of the situation of respect for human rights”, “socialist” Albania could not hope to participate widely in the international organizations of the capitalist “free world”.

“Comrade” Ramiz and his revisionist gang at the head of the Albanian Labor Party and the Albanian state carried out point by point all the “orders” of this missionary of imperialism. Thus, in compliance with the orders of Euro-American imperialism, the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia and his revisionist gang continuously and persistently accelerated the measures for the further liberalization of Albania. The prison sentence for escape attempt was removed. The right to receive a passport was granted free of charge.

On July 1, 1990, the law on the free exit of people from the country entered into force, but as a result of this law, in the first days of July, about 6 thousand young people entered foreign embassies. On July 31, 1990, the criminal code was revised once again to no longer consider crossing the border as treason against the homeland.

In July 1990, at the plenum of the PLA Central Committee, changes were made in the cadres of the Government Party, removing the representatives of Enver’s “old guard” and replacing them with loyal “new leaders” who were liberal and opportunistic friends of Ramiz.

This capitulatory, revisionist policy of Ramiz Alia led to the loss of freedom and true independence of the country, the overthrow of socialism, and the restoration of capitalism in Albania, and its transformation into a colony of Euro-American imperialism.

This negative historical experience proved in practice the Marxist-Leninist thesis that, as long as the capitalist encirclement exists, the risk of restoration of capitalism in socialist countries also exists.

The positive historical experience of socialism showed very clearly that socialist countries that struggle and successfully cope with the pressure and influence of the imperialist-revisionist encirclement, such as the Soviet Union led by Lenin and Stalin, Albania led by Enver Hoxha, etc., avoid fully the danger of the birth of revisionism, the degeneration and overthrow of socialism, and the restoration of capitalism.

The negative historical experience of the overthrow of socialism showed very clearly that socialist countries that do not successfully withstand the pressure and influence of the imperialist-revisionist encirclement inevitably see the birth of revisionism, the degeneration of socialism, and the restoration of capitalism.

This was the first objective cause of the birth of revisionism in Albania.

The second main objective cause of the birth of revisionism in Albania was the remaining influence of bourgeois and petty bourgeois culture, even during socialist construction.

The Albanian Labor Party had to face the anti-socialist criminal activity of internal enemies after the liberation of Albania from fascism and the triumph of the People’s Revolution, on November 29, 1944. As history showed, the overturned feudal-bourgeois class, the remnants of fascism, the Ballist-Zogists who ran about inside and outside the country, etc., enraged and terrified by the loss of political and economic power, fought with tenfold power to regain their “lost paradise” by any means necessary. Their goal was to overthrow the popular power of the workers and peasants and the socialist system to restore their old oppressive and exploitative bourgeois power.

The internal feudal-bourgeois reaction, with strong supported from the external reaction, especially the American and British imperialists, organized and led armed reactionary uprisings to overthrow the people’s power and the socialist system, for instance with a military attack on Koplik, which was defeated within a few hours by the People’s Army, the State Security and the armed people.

The internal reaction organized in gangs of saboteurs and criminals led by intelligence agencies such as the American CIA and the English MIT, the Greek ASFALIA and the Yugoslav UDB, etc., carried out terrorist activities, mercilessly killing hundreds and hundreds of communists and activists of peoples’ power, without sparing even women and children, murdering for instance Bardhok Biba, the regional secretary of the Communist Party of Albania in the district of Mirdita, the Four Heroines of Mirdita, etc., etc.

Representatives of the reactionary bourgeoisie and feudal lords, directed by the intelligence agencies of American and English imperialism were continuously organized into illegal hostile organizations such as the “monarchist” group, “social democratic” group, “Christian Democratic” group, etc., which carried out acts of terrorism, espionage and sabotage against the country’s economy, etc. The Labor Party of Albania and Enver Hoxha had to face, in addition to the old enemies, the remnants of the feudal-bourgeois reaction, also the pressure of new enemies, the degenerate elements of socialism in the ranks of the people, in the ranks of the Labor Party of Albania and in the socialist dictatorship of the proletariat.

History tells us that the state of the dictatorship of the proletariat, for almost half a century, discovered and punished by law the old and new enemies, who fought to overthrow the people’s power, socialism, at all costs. The Labor Party of Albania and Enver Hoxha discovered, unmasked and politically condemned the hidden enemies of the Party and the socialist state, such as Sejfulla Malshov, Koçi Xoxe, Tuk Jakov, Liri Belshov, Abdyl Kllez, Beqir Balluku and the polyagent Mehmet Shehu, Kadri Hazbiu and company. The Party of Labour of Albania and the state of the dictatorship of the proletariat with Enver Hoxha at the head, in steel unity with the people, destroyed all the plans and hostile activity of the internal reaction for nearly half a century.

The Labor Party of Albania, led by the great Enver, considered the struggle against the great pressure of the internal enemies of socialism and the constant pressure of the stains of the influence of the old bourgeois and petty bourgeois world, as an expression of the class struggle in socialism.

The class struggle in socialism is a consequence of the existence of classes. In socialism, the class struggle does not disappear, because in this era there is still a broad real objective basis for its development. The experience of the class war in socialist construction in Albania once again proved the Marxist-Leninist thesis that this war takes place objectively: even after the disappearance of the exploiting classes, the former members of these classes live, and are the main carriers and spreaders of bourgeois ideology. The influences of the bourgeois and petty bourgeois ideology on the life and consciousness of the people of the socialist society are thus still preserved, and so the feelings of the people continue to be nourished with bourgeois tendencies.

This phenomenon also happened in socialist Albania, where the Party of Labor of Albania waged a great systematic and continuous war against the stains of the influences of the old bourgeois and petty bourgeois world in the life and conscience of the people of the socialist society.

There is also great pressure from the imperialist-revisionist encirclement, as there was in the Soviet Union during the time of Lenin and Stalin.

Marxist-Leninist science teaches us that the class struggle in socialism is an objective phenomenon, it is an objective law, it is the main driving force of socialist society. The class war in socialism — Marxist-Leninist science teaches us — is a war between two paths of development, between the socialist path and the capitalist path, which develops harshly and continuously and continues for a long time until communism. So, the class struggle in socialism is an inevitable objective phenomenon.

“Waves sometimes rise and fall, are sometimes agitated and sometimes soft, but never cease.” (Enver Hoxha. Reports in the Congress of 5 of the Labor Party of Albania, page 125)

The struggle against the influence of the old bourgeois and petty bourgeois world on the life and consciousness of the people of the socialist society is an expression of the class war, and was necessary for the construction and protection of socialism from the birth of revisionism in Albania.

Chief revisionist Ramiz Alia designed and implemented a revisionist political platform, under the guise of “democratizing the life of the Party and the country”. This revisionist platform of Ramiz Alia, as time showed, denied of the basic principles of Marxist-Leninist science. This revisionist platform denied the class struggle in socialism, that is, it denied the class struggle against the internal enemies of socialism, against the the influences of the old bourgeois and micro-bourgeois world in the lives and consciousness of the people of the socialist society.

In the implementation of this revisionist platform, measures were taken to design and implement a liberal state policy. Liberalism in this aspect, as an ideological and political enemy of the dictatorship of the proletariat, began to gradually rot and degenerate it into a bourgeois-revisionist state.

Thus, in 1987, the “socialist” state of Ramiz Alia, in the framework of its liberal and revisionist policy, quietly released from prisons and places of exile the enemies of the homeland and socialism, a bunch of traitors, spies, opportunists, revisionists, Trotskyists, etc., just as Khrushchev had done before in the Soviet Union, after Stalin’s death.

Marxist-Leninist science teaches us that one of the main functions of the state of the dictatorship of the proletariat is to mercilessly suppress the resistance of the internal and external enemies of socialism.

Ramiz Alia’s state systematically and silently gave up the fight against the internal enemies of socialism. Also, this liberal and revisionist policy of Ramiz Alia was felt, more and more, in the systematic and silent renunciation of the consequent class struggle against the remnants of the influences of the old bourgeois and petit bourgeois world in the life and consciousness of to the people of the socialist society. Thus, continuously and silently, bourgeois and petit bourgeois liberal concepts and attitudes began to come alive, like worms, in people’s lives and consciousness.

The process of bourgeois-revisionist degeneration of the socialist society in all areas of life began to appear on a large scale and was continuously deepened in the political, ideological, economic, cultural, and military fields.

These sworn enemies of socialism felt that the “gentle” time of Ramiz Alia differed radically from the “wild” time of Enver. The dangerous illusion of “reconciliation” with the class enemy was gradually being created in the Party and the people, because according to this liberal and revisionist policy the enemies of socialism had “changed”, were “softened” had become “friends” of socialism!

This liberal and revisionist policy gradually led to the reduction of the revolutionary vigilance of the Party, the working class and the working masses, the people, towards the enemies of the class struggle and socialism.

These enemies of socialism complained and raised their voices about the “injustices” that had been done to them and the “rights” that had been “denied” to them during Enver’s time. In the framework of these “corrections” of the “mistakes” of Enver’s policy, the state began an effort to send the children of the enemies of the homeland and socialism to higher education. This accelerates the process of bourgeois-revisionist degeneration of the Party and the state.

But time would later show very clearly that the educated descendants of the enemies of socialism would be the main inspirers and the most active participants of the bourgeois counter-revolution, which led to the overthrow of socialism and the restoration of capitalism in Albania. This contingent has filled the ranks of the anti-communist bourgeois “leftist” parties, they are the leaders and main ideologues of these bourgeois parties and the most zealous and furious anti-communists.

Of course, the internal enemies of socialism, in cooperation and coordination with the external imperialist and revisionist enemies, were silently supporting Ramiz Alia’s revisionist course in various forms, but they were still not at all satisfied with the results of this revisionist policy.

The internal and external enemies of socialism in Albania aimed and demanded more, they, as time showed, increased the pressure, in every way that time and circumstances allowed, against the Labor Party of Albania and the revisionist state of Ramiz Alia, with the aim of finally abandoning the “communist” and “socialist” masks and officially declaring capitalism in Albania.

This historical fact in Albania, as before in the former Soviet Union and other former socialist countries, proved in practice the Marxist-Leninist thesis that hiding the contrast between antagonistic classes, renouncing the consequent class struggle in socialism, preaching “reconciliation” or “cooperation “ between antagonistic classes, constitutes the essence of any kind of opportunism and revisionism. This is where the platform was sourced for bourgeois-revisionist policy of Ramiz Alia towards the internal enemies of the working class and socialism.

Renunciation of the class struggle in socialism, renunciation of the class struggle against the internal class enemies in socialism, inevitably leads to the birth and spread of revisionism, to the degeneration and overthrow of socialism, and to the restoration of capitalism.

The main internal subjective cause of the overthrow of socialism in Albania was the betrayal and bourgeois degeneration of Marxist-Leninist science and the teachings of Enver Hoxha.

The PLA with the great Enver at the head fought with determination and the greatest coherence for the preservation and continuous strengthening of the leading role of the Party as a decisive factor of the revolution.

The Labor Party of Albania, when it was a conscious and organized vanguard of the working class, had always been guided by revolutionary and scientific Marxist-Leninist theory. The Party drafted and consistently implemented a revolutionary program, consistently applied Leninist principles and norms in its inner life, drafted and implemented a revolutionary strategy and tactics, accepted revolutionary elements in its ranks, preserved and strengthened the proletarian character of The Party, especially its leading bodies, constantly strengthened the Marxist-Leninist ideological and organizational unity of its ranks, continuously strengthened the education and Marxist-Leninist tempering of the communists and cadres, strengthened and perfected the organization of the Party and the vanguard role of the communists, established proletarian discipline, expanded democracy in its internal life, did not allow the existence of factions in the Party, unmasked and ruthlessly excluded the factionist, opportunist and revisionist elements from its ranks, consistently developed class struggle in the Party, continuously strengthened its ties with the working class and the working masses, educated the spirit of proletarian internationalism in the ranks of the Party, etc.

The PLA gave great importance to the continuous revolutionization of its internal life by strengthening democracy in the Party, developing and strengthening revolutionary criticism and self-criticism. This made possible the discovery of flaws and weaknesses in the work of communists and cadres, fought the manifestations of liberalism, bureaucratism, formalism, conformism, etc., and created the premises and conditions for the continuous improvement of the Party’s situation. The strengthening of the leadership role of the PLA became possible, because it attached special importance to the systematic and merciless war against flaws and weaknesses, against the manifestations of liberalism and bureaucratism, in its revolutionary life and activity.

Regarding this matter, Enver Hoxha emphasized:

“But we, at all times and places, must not allow the Party to be disarmed, for it to get drunk from success, to become sluggish, for dust, routine and bureaucracy to suffocate it.”

(Main documents of PLA, vol. 5, page 122).

Strengthening the leadership role of PLA was possible, because, among other reasons, it attached special importance to its continuous revolutionization. Accountability of communists and cadres in front of the masses, communist cadres going into production, the example of communists at the front of the war and working where the front was the most difficult, etc., were some of the main demands of the PLA.

Otherwise, — emphasized Enver Hoxha, — we became “commanders”, we became “aristocrats”. The PLA attached great importance to strengthening its ties with the working class and the working masses, strengthening the unity of the Party and the people, and implementing the line of measures in the work of the Party. It fought any tendency to rise to commanding positions over the working masses, to become masters over the masses, as had happened with the revisionist parties in the former Soviet Union and in other revisionist countries.

Also, the Albanian Labor Party and Enver Hoxha developed a consistent, systematic and continuous war against bureaucratism in the Party.

In order to successfully fight against the risk of bureaucratic distortions in the Party, the PLA took comprehensive and constant measures such as the continuous improvement of the proletarian composition of the Party, the strengthening of democracy in the Party, the strengthening of the role of basic organizations, the deepening of the line of measures in the work of the Party, increasing the quality of new admissions to the Party, increasing the seniority of the candidates for the Party, establishing fair cadre-mass relations, encouraging criticism and revolutionary self-criticism within the Party, systematically holding communist cadres accountable before working measures for the implementation of directives and tasks assigned by the Party, etc. The Party of Labour of Albania and Enver Hoxha have conceived and treated the fight against the manifestations of liberalism and bureaucratism as a manifestation of the class struggle in the Party. This war will continue until communism, for as long as there are classes.

Preserving and continuously strengthening the leading role of the Labor Party of Albania showed very clearly that this was a decisive factor not only for the construction and protection of socialism, but closed the path to bourgeois-revisionist degeneration. This was a great Marxist-Leninist revolutionary experience for the future.

As we have emphasized above, the fundamental cause of the birth of modern revisionism in the Labor Party of Albania was the betrayal of the Marxist-Leninist science of the teachings of Enver Hoxha by the Labor Party of Albania led by the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia.

How did this tragedy happen?

At the end of Enver Hoxha’s life, some flaws and weaknesses were noticed in the life and activity of the PLA.

A certain formality, a bureaucratic routine was felt, due to the action of bureaucratic, liberal elements and enemies disguised in the apparatuses and leadership of the Party.

Marxist-Leninist science teaches us that even in socialism, although bureaucracy disappears as a system, bureaucratism remains and is revived again if it was not fought consistently and systematically in the Party. An unfortunate consequence of the great successes achieved in the construction of socialism was the very gradual development of complacency and arrogance in the party, which eventually thickened into non-proletarian tendencies such as formalism, indifferentism, liberalism, bureaucratism, careerism, servility, conformism, charlatanism, hypocrisy, etc. began to take root and be cultivated among some communists in the Party apparatus. These party members, but not communists, began to see being in the party in a petty bourgeois manner, with the aim of making an undeserved career, or to benefit for themselves and their families, etc.

These bureaucrats in the Party, when given the opportunity, pretended to be “infallible”, “all-powerful”, etc., contrary to the Party’s line and Enver’s teachings.

The great Enver, as history showed, never allowed the manifestations of bureaucratism to grow. He fought, in a systematic and continuous manner, every manifestation of bureaucratism in the Party, not allowing its revisionist degeneration. He always instructed the Party that the fight against bureaucratism was not carried out with campaigns, but in a systematic and continuous manner, until communism.

At the end of Enver Hoxha’s life, these bureaucratic elements, as time showed later, taking advantage of Enver Hoxha’s advanced age and poor health, hid the real situation from him, especially the flaws and mistakes in the Party and in the country. In such conditions, a certain formalism, indifference, and political apathy were observed in the work of the Party, especially on its ideological basis, thinking wrongly, that “the leadership knows and solves everything”, that, “this matter is solved, Enver said everything”, even though Enver, in fact, did not know and had not said anything about this or that issue that was being trumpeted.

The bureaucratic and liberal apparatchiks, the masked opportunistic and revisionist elements and the hidden enemies in the Party apparatus and in its leadership such as Ramiz Alia and his friends, as time showed later, reported to Enver that “everything is in order” etc.

So, as history would show later, the bureaucratic and liberal apparatchiks and other enemies disguised in the Party apparatus and its leadership did not inform Enver Hoxha correctly, they illustrated the situation and tried to hide the reality, and bureaucratically deformed and sabotaged his righteous directives when given the opportunity. But the bureaucratic elements, liberals, and disguised enemies in the Party, apart from this, tried to impose on the mass of the Party and the people, the wrong opinion that, “we should not disturb Enver”, for the flaws and mistakes that were happening, that “these flaws and mistakes will be fixed by the Party” etc. Of course, we are fully convinced that if Enver had recognized the reality of this situation in the Party, hidden by its enemies, he, as a great Marxist-Leninist, would take immediate and comprehensive measures to improve the situation in the Party. He would unmask and show the deserved place to the enemies of the Party and he would lead the Party in a new stage of its revolutionization and the entire life of the country, as he had done before.

This is exactly what the enemies hidden in the bosom and head of the Party and the state were afraid of. That’s why, as history showed later, they fought with all the most refined forms and methods to “surround” and block Enver Hoxha, praising Enver with words and undermining and sabotaging his correct Marxist-Leninist directives. These counter-revolutionaries acted as two-faced people, on the one hand, praising socialism and Enver’s Party, and on the other hand, undermining and sabotaging the Marxist-Leninist line of the Party and Enver Hoxha’s Marxist-Leninist teachings and the issues of socialism.

However, it should be emphasized that these elements could not change the general Marxist-Leninist line of the PLA for the construction and protection of socialism while Enver the Great was alive. But, also, we must point out that, after the death of Enver Hoxha, these bureaucratic elements would later serve as a counter-revolutionary social layer for the overthrow of socialism and the restoration of capitalism in Albania.

How did the PLA degenerate into a bourgeois-revisionist party?

This betrayal and revisionist tragedy of the Labor Party of Albania happened very gradually from 1985 to the end of 1990. Due to the growth of liberalism, Marxist-Leninist education of the cadres and members of the Party was undermined, forgotten and denied; the danger of the pressure and influence of the bourgeois ideology was undervalued, forgotten, and denied; democratic centralism and proletarian discipline were undervalued, forgotten, and denied; liberal, factional, opportunist and revisionist elements were overlooked and allowed, rather than unmasked and excluded from the ranks of the Party, etc., etc.

This process of bourgeois-revisionist liberal degeneration of the PLA was carried out under the misleading slogan “everything is developing normally, according to the principles and Marxist-Leninist norms of the Party” and “according to Enver’s teachings” etc. Thus, the Labor Party of Albania, step by step and over time, lost its revolutionary spirit and energy, lost its proletarian class character and gradually and silently turned into a bourgeois-revisionist party. So, the main cause of the bourgeois-revisionist degeneration of the Labor Party of Albania was liberalism.

The conditions were created for an even greater encouragement and revival of bureaucratism in the Party.

Marxist-Leninist science teaches us that bureaucratism is a way of thinking and directing contrary to the vital interests of the working class and the working masses, which if not fought systematically and with the greatest consistency by the party of the working class, inevitably leads to its bourgeois-revisionist degeneration.

The proletarian composition of the Party was undermined, opening the way widely to the Party’s admission of excess elements from the stratum of the intelligentsia, etc.; proletarian democracy in the party was undervalued and forgotten, replaced by bureaucratic discipline; the role of the Party’s basic organizations was undervalued and “forgotten”; the line of measures in the work of the Party was undervalued and “forgotten”; the accountability of communist cadres for their work to the working masses, the people, etc., etc. was underestimated and “forgotten”.

In such conditions, in the life and activity of the Communists, the Party’s basic organs and organizations, the revolutionary energy was being paralyzed and the process of their political indifference and apathy towards the revisionist line of the senior leadership of the PLA under the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia was deepening.

So, it is a historical fact that a degenerate bourgeois-revisionist layer was formed from the cadres of liberal and bureaucratic, opportunistic and revisionist “apparatchiks” in the ranks of the former Labor Party of Albania, which became the social base which supported Ramiz Alia and his revisionist group at the head of the PLA, and their aim of bourgeois-revisionist degeneration of the PLA and the overthrow of socialism and the restoration of capitalism in Albania.

The revisionist mafioso Ramiz Alia did not dare to attack the Marxist-Leninist line of the PLA led by Enver the Great from the beginning, he did not dare to attack the figure and the great revolutionary work of Enver Hoxha, because he knew very well that Enver the Great enjoyed an absolute authority, respect and gratitude in the Party and among the people. The mafia revisionist Ramiz Alia first chose the path of indirectly hitting Enver “behind the back”, by “accepting” and “protecting” Enver with words and violating in practice his Marxist-Leninist works and teachings in the service of the people and socialism and communism.

This revisionist tactic of Ramiz Alia against Enver Hoxha was, in essence, a tactic distinct from the historical experience of the notorious revisionist Khrushchev against Stalin. But later, after the establishment of “political pluralism” and the official declaration of capitalism in Albania, the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia would tear off the mask of the “communist” and reveal his true face as the sworn enemy of Enver and of communism. He would openly attack the great and enlightened figure of Enver Hoxha, speaking and writing about Enver Hoxha’s political “mistakes”, even about his “personality cult”, in interviews and conversations in bourgeois newspapers and televisions and in his books.

Ramiz Alia, speculating and abusing the position of the main leader of the PLA and supported by his liberal, opportunistic and revisionist followers in its leadership, incited and exploited the liberal, bureaucratic, petit bourgeois tendencies and careerist ambitions of the members of Political Bureau of the Central Committee. He divided them, pitted these “communist leaders” against each other for power and privileges. For this diabolical “divide and rule” tactic of Ramiz Alia, we bring as an illustration the fact of changes, substitutions, “resignations” and frequent and unexpected dismissals from the leadership positions of the Political Bureau. Alia played cat and mouse with them, used them for revisionist and counter-revolutionary goals and, when they no longer wanted to be mocked, ignored them, denigrated them, abandoned them and threw them in the trash, like squeezed lemons.

These mediocre, liberal and opportunist members of the Political Bureau and the Central Committee, with the aim of not losing their power and privileges, did not raise their voice, did not oppose the liberal, opportunist and revisionist line of Ramiz Alia, but slowly and quietly began to agree and implement his revisionist course. This “working aristocracy” under the leadership of the PLA, bourgeois in the way of life and thinking and under the leadership of Ramiz Alia, comfortable and cozy in Blloku, consumed and swallowed their privileges, disconnected from the troubles and problems of the people, gradually degenerating into a revisionist gang.

It is an undeniable fact that the Political Bureau and the Central Committee of the PLA approved step by step the anti-socialist and revisionist “ideas” and “projects” that Ramiz Alia embodied in his “democratic” reforms.

It is an undeniable fact that the Central Committee of the Labor Party of Albania, led by the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia, on December 11, 1990, almost unanimously, with the exception of Rita Markos, Manush Mufti and others, decided the official announcement of “political pluralism” and capitalism in Albania.

Why did this happen? This undeniable fact happened because the Political Bureau and Central Committee of the PLA, led by Ramiz Alia, had degenerated into revisionism.

It is an undeniable fact that the Political Bureau and the Central Committee of the PLA implemented until the end the revisionist approach of Ramiz Alia.

It is an undeniable fact that the members of the Political Bureau and the Central Committee did not publicly denounce and condemn the revisionist line of Ramiz Alia, even when the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia came out openly against the Marxist-Leninist science, the socialism of Enver Hoxha, officially declaring “political pluralism” and the restoration of capitalism in Albania.

It is an undeniable fact that no member of the Political Bureau and the Central Committee of the Labor Party of Albania led by Ramiz Alia joined the Communist Party of Albania when it was founded on September 11, 1991.

Why did this happen? This happened because the members of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee had degenerated into opportunists and revisionists.

The revisionist degeneration of the Political Bureau and the Central Committee of the Labor Party of Albania was also influenced by several objective and subjective factors.

One of the main factors of the bourgeois-revisionist degeneration of the members of the Political Bureau and Central Committee of the PLA was their low Marxist-Leninist theoretical level. This was one of the main reasons why these “communist leaders” capitulated before the pressure of the bourgeois and revisionist ideology and gradually degenerated into liberals, opportunists and revisionists, thus opening the way for the revisionist degeneration of the PLA and the overthrow of socialism and the restoration of capitalism in Albania.

Another factor that influenced the revisionist bourgeois degeneration of the members of the Political Bureau and the Central Committee of the PLA was the fact that a significant part of them were now of petit bourgeois class origin and other social strata.

Of course, the proletarian class origin of the members of the Marxist-Leninist party is one of the main conditions for its existence and revolutionary activity. It is known that many members of the Political Bureau and the Central Committee of the PLA were accepted and militating in the Party since the time of the Anti-Fascist National Liberation War and their class origin was from the lower and middle bourgeoisie and the intelligentsia. This fact would have a negative impact, despite their great contributions in the service of the Party and the people when it was led by the great Enver. In the new conditions, when the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia came to head the PLA and the state and his revisionist platform was being implemented, this began to trigger their revisionist degeneration.

Ramiz Alia violated every organizational norm in the Party.

Some of the closest secret collaborators of Ramiz Alia, such as Xhelil Gjoni, Sabri Godo, Etc., have said in various conversations and interviews in the media that they created a secret, illegal “Central Committee”, with “red guards” who elaborated and implemented his bourgeois-revisionist platform. This was an illegal, anti-communist, Trotskyist activity.

In the Party committees in the districts, the process of their bourgeois-revisionist degeneration took place, gradually and silently. Any Marxist-Leninist cadre of these committees, who expressed doubts and dissatisfaction with the revisionist platform of Ramiz Alia, was at first advised, attention was drawn to his “mistakes”, attempts were made to corrupt him, etc., and later, when this cadre did not “correct” these views, was reduced in responsibility or denigrated, in one form or another, and dismissed from office as “incompetent”, “conservative”, “dogmatic”, or “retired prematurely”, etc.

In implementation of the Ramizist revisionist platform, quick measures were taken for the “renewal” of the leadership of the Party in the districts, that is, for the cleansing and change of the leadership of the Party committees. Thus, the purge of the Party committees in the districts, especially their executive secretariats, from “old”, “conservative”, “non-renewable”, “dogmatic”, “incompetent” etc. cadres, i.e. Marxist-Leninists, started bring in their opposite elements with liberal, bureaucratic, opportunistic and revisionist tendencies and attitudes, loyal to Ramiz Alia.

The committees of the Party of Labor of Albania led by the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia were purged, in one form or another, of Marxist-Leninist cadres. The Party committees in the districts degenerated into revisionist committees.

I am presenting some undeniable facts of the bourgeois-revisionist degeneration of the committees of the Labor Party of Albania led by the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia.

It is an undeniable fact that these committees of the Labor Party of Albania implemented and did not oppose the liberal bourgeois-revisionist political line of Ramiz Alia.

It is an undeniable fact that these party committees did not denounce and condemn the revisionist betrayal of the senior leadership of the PLA led by the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia, even when it openly and officially betrayed Marxism-Leninism, the socialism of Enver Hoxha, proclaiming “political pluralism” and the restoration of capitalism in Albania.

It is an undeniable fact that these committees of the Labor Party of Albania did not join the Communist Party of Albania when it was created on September 11, 1991, even after the transformation of the Labor Party of Albania into a bourgeois social-democratic party without even a “communist” mask, which publicly announced an open bourgeois program and changed its old name to the new name Socialist Party of Albania.

So, the committees of the Party of Labor of Albania led by the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia gradually degenerated into revisionist committees. Chief revisionist Ramiz Alia took systematic and comprehensive measures for the revisionist degeneration of the basic organizations of the Labor Party of Albania, at its foundation.

As a consequence of liberalism, the Marxist-Leninist ideological and organizational principles and norms of the Party were “forgotten” and violated, in a systematic and silent manner, in the life and activity of its basic organizations. The stinking bourgeois-revisionist liberal spirit was making many of the leaders and members of the Party’s basic organizations seriously ill. In such conditions, among the leaders and members of the Party’s basic organizations, bourgeois and petit bourgeois feelings and tendencies were born and developed rapidly, they were in the party and tried to use it for personal benefits for themselves and their families, etc.

The stinking spirit of Bourgeois-revisionist liberalism was gradually poisoning, depraving and paralyzing the life and revolutionary activity of the Party’s basic organizations. The basic organizations of the Party were degenerating, gradually and silently, into bourgeois-revisionist organizations.

Pursuant to the liberal, bourgeois-revisionist platform, and deepening the consolidation of the revisionist process in the PLA, Ramiz Alia threw the “new” idea of so-called “open” meetings in the Party’s basic organizations.

This “new” idea of Ramiz Alia, disguised under the pretext of “implementing the line of the masses”, “strengthening democracy in the Party”, “the fight against bureaucratism”, basically denied the principles and ideological and organizational norms of the Marxist — Leninists in the life and activity of the Party’s basic organizations, with the aim of their revisionist degeneration, as time showed later. Many people began to participate in these meetings, regardless of their ideological and political convictions, even declassified anti-communist and anti-socialist elements began to participate in government. Thus, anti-communist and anti-socialist anti-revolutionary elements could freely enter, amd in the framework of “free debate”, “pluralism of opinions”, with their anti-communist, bourgeois and micro-bourgeois, opportunist and revisionist background, “helped” and “held the communists accountable” for for the sake of “protecting” and “strengthening” the Party and the issue of socialism and communism in Albania!!! O tempos, o mores!

With the exercise of “open” meetings, the basic organizations of the Party gradually began to lose their proletarian class character and leading role in society. They turned into front organizations, so to speak, in which elements from all classes and layers of society could participate and exercise their political will, despite the fact that they did not have Marxist-Leninist convictions. Those healthy Marxist-Leninist elements loyal to Enver in the Party organizations, who did not agree with the opportunistic and revisionist line of Ramiz Alia and who began to speak openly against it at the beginning, were advised to be silent, to “shut up”, to give up this attitude, to “correct themselves”, they tried to corrupt them, etc., later they labeled them as “mediocre”, “conservative” people, “dogmatic”, etc.

When these staunch communists did not retreat from their Marxist-Leninist principled views and positions, then the liberal and bureaucratic leaders of the Party’s basic organizations used the path of open pressure against them, threatening them with punitive measures in the Party and criminal prosecution by state bodies.

Many of these Marxist-Leninist communists of the Party’s basic organizations, in one form or another, were attacked, denigrated, reduced in responsibility, and some of them were even expelled from the Party as “anti-party” elements, etc., but also were prosecuted by state bodies as “anti-communist” and “anti-socialist” elements.

Thus, the basic organizations of the PLA were gradually being purged of Marxist-Leninist elements.

Ramiz Ali’s “new” idea for “open” meetings in the Party was neither new nor original. This “new” idea of Ramiz Ali on “open” meetings in the Party denied, in essence, the Marxist-Leninist thesis that the Marxist-Leninist party is a party of the working class that is guided by Marxist-Leninist science. This “new” idea of Ramiz Alia was a new variant of the old Khrushchev revisionist thesis on the so-called “Party of the entire people”. Also, this “new” idea of Ramiz Aliq, in fact, “legitimized”, in one form or another, the existence of factions of different “lines” in the Party, the coexistence of enemy ideologies.

This idea of Ramiz Ali was a new variant of the old thesis of the revisionist Mao Zedong in the Communist Party of China, expressed in his famous slogan “let 100 flowers bloom”, “let 100 schools compete”.

This “new” idea of Ramiz Ali on the “open” meetings in the Party organizations expressed, in essence, in one form or another, “ideological and political pluralism” in Party.

This idea of Ramiz Ali was a new variant of the old thesis of the old revisionists and the new revisionists, such as the Eurocommunists, etc., and it was even a variant of the ideology of liberal bourgeois parties that accept in their programs the existence of factions and conflicting opinions.

This “new” idea of Ramiz Ali denied the class struggle within the Party, etc. So, Ramiz Ali’s idea for open meetings was, in fact, a thoroughly revisionist idea.

I am presenting some undeniable facts of the bourgeois-revisionist degeneration of the basic organizations of the Labor Party of Albania directed by Ramiz Alia.

It is an undeniable fact that the basic organizations of the Party followed the revisionist line of Ramiz Ali and his revisionist gang until the end.

It is an undeniable fact that the basic organizations of the Labor Party of Albania did not oppose and condemn the revisionist course of the high leadership of the PLA led by Ramiz Alia, even when he came out openly against the Marxist-Leninist science, the socialism of Enver Hoxha and officially announced “political pluralism” and the restoration of capitalism in Albania.

It is an undeniable fact that no basic organization of the Labor Party of Albania joined the Communist Party of Albania when it was created on September 11, 1991, after the transformation of the Labor Party of Albania into a bourgeois Party without even a “communist” mask, which publicly announced an open bourgeois program and changed its old name to the new name Socialist Party of Albania.

So, the organizations of the Labor Party of Albania led by the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia degenerated, gradually and silently, into revisionist organizations.

After the official announcement of the overthrow of socialism and the restoration of capitalism in Albania at the end of 1990, Ramiz Alia and his revisionist gang at the head of the PLA thought that the ground had been prepared and the moment had come to launch an open attack against Marxist-Leninist science, socialism, the general Marxist-Leninist line of the PLA led by Enver the Great, and the major historical figure of Enver Hoxha.

The 10th Congress of the Labor Party of Albania was held from June 10 to 13, 1991 in Tirana.

The report and other main documents of the Congress were prepared by the revisionist group led by Ramiz Alia. The report of the Congress was presented by Xhelil Gjoni, Secretary of the Central Committee of PLA. In this Report, a bunch of “theories” and revisionist and bourgeois theses were presented against revolutionary and scientific Marxist-Leninist theory and the practice of scientific socialism, against the general Marxist-Leninist line of the PLA led by Enver the Great. This major figure of Marxism-Leninism, this great leader of the PLA and the Albanian people, was openly attacked.

To understand the bourgeois-revisionist line of the 10th Congress of the Labor Party of Albania led by the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia, I am briefly presenting some of these bourgeois and revisionist theses of the Report of the 10th Congress of the PLA.

Political pluralism, which brought to the Albanian scene parties and political forces with ideas and programs contrary to that of our party, was called a “reality” and an “objective necessity”. This “new” thesis presented in the report of the 10th Congress of the PLA is, in essence, an old bourgeois and revisionist “theory”.

Political pluralism as “objective reality and necessity” is an old “theory” of the liberal bourgeoisie, it is the very basis of bourgeois “democracy” in the capitalist system. “Political pluralism”, too, is an old revisionist thesis preached, from the old opportunists and revisionists to the newer Eurocommunist revisionists.

“A quick analysis of the processes that took place in the Soviet Union and in other countries of Eastern Europe, testified to the failure of the model, which became the mercy of the Marxist ideal of to socialism”, Alia claimed, because it “paved the way for a bureaucratic, centralized, administrative-commanding policy”.

This “new” thesis of the report of the 10th Congress of the PLA on the “failure of the Marxist model of socialism” was, in essence, a new variant of the old thesis of the bourgeois ideologues on the “failure” of socialism, on the “failure” of Marxism-Leninism or the “bureaucratic, centralized, administrative-commanding, statist politics” etc., of socialist countries, which were guided by revolutionary and scientific Marxist-Leninist doctrine, as in the former Soviet Union during the time of Lenin and Stalin and in Albania during the time of Enver Hoxha etc.

Also, this “new” thesis of the Congress report was, in essence, a new variant of the old thesis of the modern Khrushchev revisionists, Titoists, Eurocommunists, etc., who attacked and denied the Marxist-Leninist theory and the practice of applied scientific socialism, which was successful in the Soviet Union led by Stalin the Great and in Albania led by Enver the Great.

“The ideologization of all aspects of life” was also decried at this revisionist congress.

This “new” thesis of the Congress report, in essence, was a new variant of the old and “new” bourgeois and revisionist “theories” of the so-called “de-ideologizing” of society, of the “depoliticization” of the state, the state’s supposed representation of “all classes”, etc. This “new” bourgeois and revisionist thesis of the 10th Congress of the Labor Party of Albania led by the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia basically denied the thesis of the great Lenin, who said: in the matter of ideological education of the people there can be either proletarian ideology or bourgeois ideology, there is no middle way.

The congress has claimed that socialist self-reliance had been “absolutized”, which “led to economic isolation from the world, which did not harm the world, but Albania.”

This thesis of the 10th Congress of the PLA led by the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia was a falsification of history, a slander, of the Ramizist revisionist gang, because the PLA of Enver the Great consistently applied the great Marxist-Leninist principle of self-reliance as a necessary condition for the victory of the revolution and the construction and protection of socialism in small Albania, under the great imperialist-revisionist blockade, for nearly half a century.

Also, this thesis of the 10th Congress was a falsification of history and a slander, because, as history shows us, the small socialist Albania led by the great Enver had close internationalist fraternal relations with socialist countries such as the former Soviet Union of the time of the great Stalin, China, etc., which provided great material and financial aid to Albania. In addition, socialist Albania had diplomatic and commercial relations with nearly 100 capitalist countries.

This “new” thesis of the Report of the 10th Congress of the ALP was, in essence, a new variant of the old “theory” of the Soviet revisionists on the “shifting into positions of narrow nationalism”, of “autarchic development”. This “new” thesis of the 10th Congress was, in essence, a new variant of the old thesis of the “self-isolation” of socialist Albania preached by the imperialist bourgeoisie, especially American imperialism.

This bourgeois and revisionist thesis preached at the 10th Congress of the PLA denied the principle of Marxist-Leninist self-reliance.

This principle originated from the Marxist-Leninist thesis that the internal factor is determining and decisive both in the victory of the revolution and in the construction of socialism, while the external factor is auxiliary and that this factor exerts its influence not directly, but through the internal factor.

It is an undeniable historical fact that the small socialist Albania, led by the Party of Labor of Albania with the great Enver at the head, by consistently applying the great Marxist-Leninist principle of self-reliance, managed to successfully secure freedom and independence of the homeland and the construction of socialism, and successfully faced the siege of the great imperialist-revisionist blockade, for nearly half a century.

This thesis of the 10th PLA Congress, led by the chief revisionist and chief traitor Ramiz Alia, fully corresponded with the accusations and sermons of the great demagogic propaganda of the international imperialist bourgeoisie, especially of the two superpowers of the time, American imperialism and Soviet social imperialism, which accused socialist Albania, led by Enver the Great, that it allegedly followed the policy of “closure”, “self-isolation”, etc.

This unbridled demagogic bourgeois and revisionist propaganda, especially from American imperialism and Soviet social imperialism, was intended to put pressure on the socialist Albania to “open up”, that is, capitulate to the pressure of imperialism and submit to its rule, overthrow socialism at all costs and restore capitalism in Albania, as happened in reality, which led to the transformation of Albania into a colony of Euro-American imperialism.

Time fully proved the correctness of the principled and far-sighted Marxist-Leninist policy self-reliance as an objective necessity, as a necessary condition for the victory of revolution and the construction of socialism in Albania.

In the 10th Congress of the Labor Party of Albania led by the chief revisionist and chief traitor Ramiz Alia, the historical figure of Enver Hoxha was openly attacked.

Ramiz Alia, as his friends claim in their writings and books, wrote with his own hand the part of “evaluations” for Enver Hoxha and, as he wrote it, it was all inserted without changes in the Report of the 10th Congress of the PLA. This “evaluation” of the great Enver in the Congress by the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia was a general and superficial, subjective, metaphysical, eclectic analysis, which by pointing out the “mistakes” of “comrade” Enver, basically, aimed to falsify, denigrate and deny the historical figure of Enver Hoxha as a symbol of socialism and communism in Albania, to instigate the debate in Congress about the “mistakes” of Enver Hoxha, in order to make a political trial of Enver Hoxha in Congress.

The first to attack Enver Hoxha in Congress was Dritëro Agolli, a well-known writer, who openly attacked the great Enver in his discussion in Congress. The ordinary delegates of the Congress, unlike its leadership, reacted strongly to Dritëro Agolli’s discussion. Thus, the political trial against Enver Hoxha in the 10th Congress of ALP, planned by the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia and his revisionist gang, failed.

The 10th Congress of PLA made the decision to change its symbol, the previous symbol with a hammer and sickle was removed and a new symbol with a red rose was placed in its place. The 10th Congress decided to change the previous name of the Labor Party of Albania, replacing it with the new name Socialist Party of Albania. De jure, the party sanctioned the denial of Marxist-Leninist science and the general Marxist-Leninist line of the PLA for the transformation of the PLA from a revisionist party in a bourgeois social democratic party with the new name, Socialist Party of Albania.

Thus, the 10th Congress of the Labor Party of Albania led by the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia and his revisionist gang set modern revisionism in power in Albania and finalised the transition to positions of open anti-communism.

It is an undeniable fact that the membership of the Labor Party of Albania did not oppose and condemn the bourgeois-revisionist Platform of the 10th Congress.

It is an undeniable fact that the membership of the Labor Party of Albania passed almost “en bloc” to the bourgeois Social Democratic Party with the new name Socialist Party of Albania.

Why did this happen? This happened because the Labor Party of Albania had degenerated into a revisionist party. So, the betrayal of Marxist-Leninist science and the bourgeois-revisionist degeneration of the former Labor Party of Albania led by the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia and his revisionist gang was the main subjective internal cause which led to the birth of revisionism and the overthrow of socialism and the restoration of capitalism in Albania.

The working class, as the hegemonic and leading class in socialism, in the conditions when its party, the Albanian Labor Party led by the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia and his gang, was betraying Marxist-Leninist science, socialism and Enver Hoxha. They did not oppose, did not rise against this revisionist betrayal.

This happened for objective and subjective, internal and external reasons. Some of these reasons were:

The influence of the activity of the internal enemies of socialism and the traces of bourgeois and revisionist ideology in society.

The pressure of imperialism and social imperialism from outside.

The revisionist betrayal of the Party of Labor of Albania led by Ramiz Alia disguised in “Marxist” clothes and “Enverist loyalty”.

This took the working class and the working masses by surprise. The low Marxist-Leninist ideological and political level of the working class and the working masses led to the reduction of revolutionary vigilance and the paralysis of their revolutionary combat readiness against the revisionist betrayal.

The Dictatorship of the Proletariat in Albania also suffered bourgeois-revisionist degeneration.

The Labor Party of Albania, led by Enver Hoxha, fought consistently and systematically for the continuous strengthening and improvement of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat.

We should not allow, emphasized Enver Hoxha, that the cadres make the law over the masses, because this is how the dictatorship of the proletariat degenerates, revisionism is born and spreads, as happened with the leading cadres, the “apparatchiks” in the former revisionist Soviet Union. The bourgeois-revisionist counter-revolution in the former Soviet Union, he emphasized, was carried out by the cadres, the “apparatchiks” of the Soviet party and state.

The Labor Party of Albania, with the great Enver at the head, in order to cut off the bureaucratism and bourgeois-revisionist degeneration of the cadres, took a series of comprehensive measures, from one side, increasing the level of education Marxist-Leninist and revolutionary tempering of cadres in the schools of the working class, and on the other hand, a series of economic and social measures were implemented to put the cadres in such material and social conditions, with the aim of not creating strata privileged at the expense of the working class and the working masses, so that the cadres think, work and live like revolutionaries, so that they do not degenerate and consider themselves lords over the masses, but are always servants of the people.

For this purpose, the PLA and the socialist state in their systematic fight against the danger of bureaucratism, in addition to increasing the Marxist-Leninist ideological level of the cadres, took comprehensive measures to systematically hold to account the cadres before the masses, narrowing the difference in the average salary between the cadres and the working class and the working masses, the performance of the productive work of cadres in the bosom of the working class and the working masses, the circulation of cadres from the base to the center and from top to bottom, the continuous reduction of the organs and redundant links of the state apparatus, the voluntary departure of cadres directly in the field of production, etc., etc.

The PLA and Enver Hoxha considered it a matter of decisive importance in the fight against bureaucratism to directly involve the masses in the governance of the country, strengthening the hegemonic role of the working class in the direction of the country, perfecting the control of the masses from below, especially the workers’ control from below.

The participation in measures such as the design and implementation of economic plans was a necessity. A special role in the direct involvement of the masses in the governance of the country would be played by mass organizations such as the organization of professional unions of workers, the organization of the Front, the organization of youth, the organization of women etc., as a very important part of the system of the dictatorship of the proletariat.

Any underestimation of the role of mass organizations, emphasized Enver Hoxha, leads to the passivity and consequent de-politicization of the working class and the working masses, which constituted a great danger for the bourgeois-revisionist degeneration of the dictatorship of the proletariat.

The PLA, with the great Enver at the head, attached a very great and special importance to the preservation and strengthening of the economic and social basis of the dictatorship of the proletariat. For this purpose, the economic base, which was the common social ownership of the means of production, and the social base, which was the alliance of the working class with the cooperative peasantry under the leadership of the working class and its party, the Albanian Labor Party, were systematically strengthened.

In implementation of this revolutionary policy of PLA, a series of measures were taken for strengthening and continuous improvement of socialist relations in production in all directions, such as the field of property relations, exchange, distribution, etc. Continuous measures were taken to preserve, expand and strengthen the common social property, the gradual narrowing of the cooperative yard, the narrowing of the essential differences between the city and the village, the narrowing of the essential differences between administrative and physical work, etc.

The PLA elaborated a great and original experience related to the strengthening of the dictatorship of the proletariat in the military field. The defense of socialist Albania was based on the internal factor and not on international conjunctures, because its self-reliance originates from the Marxist-Leninist revolutionary and scientific doctrine, which states that the decisive factor in the revolution and the construction and protection of socialism is the internal factor, while the external factor is auxiliary.

For this purpose, the defense of socialist Albania was based on the arming, organization and military preparation of the entire people. The army and the people in socialist Albania were one and indivisible. In this great issue, the PLA was guided by the teachings of the great Lenin, who said: in socialism “every citizen is a soldier and every soldier is a citizen”.

The Labor Party of Albania with the great Enver at the head systematically and continuously took a series of revolutionary measures against the manifestations of liberalism and bureaucratism in the army, with the aim of avoiding the bourgeois-revisionist counter-revolutionary degeneration of the army.

For this purpose, these revolutionary measures led to the strengthening of the leadership of the Party in the army, the strengthening of ideological and political work in the army, the establishment of fair socialist relations between soldiers and cadres, subordinates and superiors, the establishment of a conscious military discipline, not allowing of the creation of military castes with putschist tendencies, the establishment of Party committees in the army, the establishment of commissars in military departments, the regulation and narrowing of salary differences of cadres, the removal of military ranks, etc.

The PLA and Enver Hoxha devoted special importance, with the aim of protecting the socialist homeland and preserving and strengthening the dictatorship of the proletariat, to the elaboration of the implementation of the Military Art of the People’s War, which would make it possible to face a bigger enemy, which was more powerful militarily, and achieve victory over it.

The PLA and Enver the Great taught the communists, the working class and the working masses that the fight against bureaucracy was not a matter of campaigns, but it would be a long, difficult and complicated process of war, which would continue throughout the existence of the dictatorship of the proletariat. All these revolutionary measures of the PLA and Enver Hoxha led to the systematic and unprecedented strengthening of the dictatorship of the proletariat and closed the paths to its bourgeois-revisionist degeneration.

Ramiz Alia and his revisionist gang implemented a bourgeois-revisionist liberal policy for the bourgeois-revisionist degeneration of mass organizations. This bourgeois-revisionist liberal policy, in essence, denied the basic principles of Marxist-Leninist science on the role of mass organizations in the system of the dictatorship of the proletariat.

As a consequence of this bourgeois-revisionist liberal policy, the Union of Professional Organizations of Albania, the Organization of the Democratic Front of Albania, the Union of Labor Youth of Albania, the Organization of the Union of Women of Albania, etc., began, gradually and silently, to degenerate, to lose revolutionary energies, initiative and revolutionary will. They began to lose, their role in the governance of the country, becoming more and more indifferent and apathetic in its political life.

Why was this happening?

Mass organizations in the system of the dictatorship of the proletariat play their revolutionary role only under the leadership of the Marxist-Leninist party. They are transmission belts to bring the revolutionary politics of the class party to the working Marxist-Leninist masses.

This phenomenon was happening, because these mass organizations were no longer led by a Marxist-Leninist party like the PLA of Enver’s day, but they were led by the revisionist PLA led by Ramiz Alia. These mass organizations, implementing bourgeois-revisionist liberal politics, over time degenerated, lost their revolutionary character, gradually transforming into bourgeois-revisionist mass organizations.

It is an undeniable fact that these mass organizations implemented until the end the bourgeois-revisionist liberal policy of Ramiz Alia and his revisionist gang at the head of the PLA and the state.

It is an undeniable fact that these mass organizations did not oppose the revisionist betrayal of Ramiz Ali and his gang at the head of the ALP and the state, even when these revisionists openly betrayed Marxist-Leninist science, the socialism of Enver Hoxha.

Later, Alia treated these mass organizations as independent organizations, just as old and new revisionists had preached before him.

It is no coincidence that Ramiz Alia, later, in the framework of the preparations of the premises and conditions for the announcement of “political pluralism”, announced in 1990 the “independence” of these organizations of the masses, treating them as “independent” electoral political subjects, as early as 1986, just as the revisionist Mikhail Gorbachev had done before in the former Soviet Union

So, the bourgeois-revisionist degeneration of mass organizations led to the bourgeois-revisionist degeneration of the system of the dictatorship of the proletariat in Albania.

So, the bourgeois-revisionist degeneration of the dictatorship of the proletariat in Albania was a main cause for the birth of revisionism and the overthrow of socialism in Albania.

Another reason was the denial of the class war in socialism by the former Party of Labour of Albania and the state led by the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia.

Marxist-Leninist science teaches us, and the experience of the class struggle in socialism showed us very clearly, that the class struggle in socialism develops objectively and is inevitable.

[The following section retreads information above that the class conflict continues to exist under socialism, that Alia freed collaborationist and traitorous prisoners, that this extends to all areas of life, etc. Although this is correct, and the emphasis on it appropriate, it is only retreading information already given above, and so it has been removed here.

One paragraph is in my opinion entirely necessary to keep, because it has not been mentioned before:]

It is an undeniable fact that, during the rule of the regime of Ramiz Ali at the head of the Party of Labor of Albania and the state, no hostile group was discovered in the Party and the state, although the war of internal and external class enemies against socialism and Enver Hoxha developed rapidly.

Reliance on one’s own forces in the revolution and in the construction and defense of socialism is a general principle.

Enver’s Albania did not see this principle of socialist self-reliance conditioned by the pressure and influence of this imperialist-revisionist siege and blockade, but as a great Marxist-Leninist principle that enables the successful development of the socialist revolution and building and protecting socialism.

In relation to this matter, the PLA also took into account the negative historical experience, which had shown that any deviation from the principle of relying on one’s own forces, any revision of it, had led to the undermining of the victories of the revolution and socialism, to the restoration of capitalism in the former socialist countries.

The Labor Party of Albania, with Enver Hoxha at the head, taught the communists and the working masses that relying on one’s own forces was a necessity, as long as socialism and communism had not triumphed on a world scale, as long as there was a risk of returning to capitalism through revisionism, as long as there is a risk of imperialist-revisionist military aggression and attempts by the internal enemy to overthrow the dictatorship of the proletariat.

Regarding this issue, Enver Hoxha emphasized:

“Our party has defended the point of view that self-reliance is not a temporary and conjunctural policy, but an objective necessity for every country, big or small, advanced or backward, a principle applicable both in the liberation wars and in the proletarian revolution, as well as in the construction of socialism and the defense of the homeland”.

(Enver Hoxha, Report to Congress 7th of the APS, page 84)

This principled position of the Labor Party of Albania and the Socialist People’s Republic of Albania led by Enver the Great was expressed very clearly and sanctioned by law in the provisions of the Constitution of the Socialist People’s Republic of Albania. Article 14 of it stated:

“In the construction of socialism, the People’s Socialist Republic of Albania mainly relies on its own forces”

The constitution affirmed that in the territory of socialist Albania, the establishment of bases and foreign military forces was not allowed, the granting of concessions or the creation of foreign economic and financial institutions or joint monopolies with bourgeois and revisionist capitalist states, and the taking of loans from them, were not allowed.

The PLA unmasked and rejected with great consistency and determination the bourgeois and revisionist “theories” of American imperialism and Soviet social imperialism, which labeled the principle of self-reliance as “autarchic development”, “shifting into positions of narrow nationalism”, “closing in the national shell”, etc. Regarding this issue, Enver Hoxha emphasized:

“Working for the construction of socialism according to the principle of self-reliance, our Party has never thought of creating an autarkic economy, closed in on itself. At the same time, fighting against any feeling of inferiority and humility before foreigners has not denied the usefulness of progressive world thought, the achievements of science and technology of other countries”.

(Enver Hoxha, Report on the 7th Congress of the Labor Party of Albania, page 85)

Of course, these viewpoints, “theories” and attitudes of the imperialists and revisionists, as history has shown, were aimed at exploiting and robbing the wealth of other countries, destroying their freedom and independence, undermining, sabotaging and stifling the revolution, subverting socialism and restore capitalism in socialist countries as it actually happened in the former Soviet Union, Albania, etc.

Socialist Albania fought and resisted with great determination and rare heroism for the construction of the defense of socialism, for the defense of the freedom and independence of the homeland, because it applied the principle of self-reliance.

Ramiz drafted and implemented a bourgeois-revisionist liberal policy, based on the principle of relying on one’s own forces. This bourgeois-revisionist liberal policy denied the Marxist-Leninist principle of self-reliance.

Ramiz Alia tried to argue for this bourgeois-revisionist liberal policy with the “need to save socialism” under the “new historical conditions in which Albania found itself”, that there was “no other way to build and save socialism”, etc. So, basically, this bourgeois-revisionist liberal policy of Ramiz Alia was “building and protecting socialism” with the help of capitalist and revisionist countries!!!

Thus, the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia and his revisionist gang at the head of the Labor Party of Albania and the state systematically and silently took all the measures to “build socialism” in Albania with the aid and loans of capitalist and revisionist countries. Marxist-Leninist science teaches us that socialism and capitalism are two opposite economic-social systems that oppose each other. But the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia betrayed Marxist-Leninist science.

As is known, the “socialist” state led by Ramiz Alia, in flagrant violation of the Constitution of the People’s Socialist Republic of Albania, which did not allow the taking of loans and credits from the capitalist and revisionist states and the economic monopolies of these countries due to exploitative and enslaving conditions that they wanted to impose on socialist Albania, opened the way for borrowing and loans from capitalist and revisionist states, opened the way for capitalist exploitation and imperialist dependence, under the pretext of “building socialism” in Albania.

Enver’s path of self-reliance was called “wrong” and denied. In a mafia way, Ramiz Alia allowed the signing of a series of agreements with private monopolistic companies of some Western capitalist countries on the basis of compensation. The implementation of these agreements with the monopolistic companies of the western capitalist countries opened the “de facto” the way and would “legitimate” even “de jure” the capitalist exploitation of the workers and employees of “socialist Albania” by the western capitalist masters of these monopolistic companies, just as they exploited their workers in their capitalist countries.

This revisionist policy of Ramiz Alia, disguised under the pretext of “building and saving socialism” with imperialist loans and credits, actually paved the way for the export of foreign capital from capitalist countries to the economy of “socialist Albania”.

What does capital export mean? Regarding this issue, the father of scientific communism, Karl Marx, emphasized:

“The export of capital does not happen because it absolutely cannot be used within the country. It happens because abroad it can be deployed at a higher rate of profit.”

(Karl Marx: Capital, volume three, book 1, Tirana 1974, page 338)

So, the purpose of exporting capital from capitalist states, or private monopolistic companies, to “socialist Albania” was to ensure a higher rate of profit than in their countries.

The negative experience of receiving loans and credits from imperialist states and their private monopolistic companies or imperialist international financial institutions such as the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, the EBRD, etc. from revisionist countries such as the former Soviet Union, Titoist Yugoslavia, and the revisionist countries of Eastern Europe, etc. had showed very clearly that their economy was drowned by unpaid debts and was going bankrupt.

Capitalists, private and state monopolistic companies, capitalist and imperialist states did not give loans and credits to build socialism, but with the aim, on the one hand, to ensure a higher rate of profit, and on the other hand, for the degeneration and transformation of socialist economy to capitalist economy, the overthrow of socialism and the restoration of capitalism. Time fully proved this.

The capitalist states orchestrated by American imperialism, as time showed, on the one hand, used, in addition to great pressure, or the “stick” policy, against the “socialist” state led by the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia to “open up”, to “democratize” “etc., on the other hand, they used the “carrot” policy, promising aid and credit, of course after meeting their imperialist conditions.

But, as history showed, the goal of imperialism and revisionism was the degeneration and overthrow of socialism and the restoration of capitalism in Albania. Chief revisionist Ramiz Alia and his revisionist gang at the head of the Labor Party of Albania and the state, as history has shown, did not aim to “build and save socialism” with loans and credits from capitalist countries, but the overthrow of socialism and the restoration of capitalism in Albania.

As a consequence of Ramiz Alia’s bourgeois-revisionist liberal policy regarding this issue, in the bodies of the Party, the state and in society, a pessimistic, defeatist and capitulating black spirit was emerging and spreading, gradually and silently, that “socialism could not be built by relied on its own forces, but with loans and credits from capitalist countries, etc.

In such circumstances, the opportunistic and revisionist spirit was born and spread in the Party, state and society, which would lead to the capitulation toimperialism and the restoration of capitalism in Albania.

After the official declaration of capitalism in Albania at the end of 1990, capitalist Albania became a country totally dependent on the imperialist powers, a colony of Euro-American imperialism.

So, the negative historical experience of denying the Marxist-Leninist principle of relying on one’s own forces in the revolution and in the construction and defense of socialism, showed very clearly that this inevitably leads to the undermining, sabotaging and stifling of the revolution, the birth of modern revisionism, and the overthrow of socialism and the restoration of capitalism.

Enver fought with determination and the greatest coherence to preserve and develop the socialist relations in production, taking systematic and comprehensive measures to avoid their bourgeois-revisionist degeneration.

Marxist-Leninist science teaches us that the preservation and continuous development of socialist relations in production is a necessary condition for these relations not to degenerate into bourgeois-revisionist relations.

Enver took systematic and comprehensive measures for the continuous preservation and improvement of socialist relations in production, in every aspect of their direction, in accordance with the conditions in which socialist Albania was located.

Enver oriented and took comprehensive measures for the continuous improvement of socialist relations in production in the field of property, exchange, distribution, organization and direction of work and production.

In the field of socialist property, the PLA took systematic and comprehensive measures for the preservation and continuous development of the socialist character of the socialist social property on the means of production.

During the construction of socialism in Albania, the main way to preserve and strengthen the socialist property was: the increase and expansion of the socialist social property, its protection from damage, abusers and thieves, and its communal administration.

Socialist property in Albania was preserved and developed in 2 forms.

First: in the form of socialist state property, property of the people, the highest level.

Secondly: in the form of socialist cooperative property, group property, the lower level.

The PSRA took systematic and comprehensive measures to maintain and continuously develop socialist exchange relations.

In this direction, bearing in mind that exchange relations serve as a connecting link between production and consumption, measures were taken as fair as possible between them, with the aim of promoting consistent and harmonized production within and between branches of the socialist economy.

The PLA and the socialist state constantly fought against any localist and departmental tendency that hindered the deepening of the mutual exchange of activity within the socialist economy. At the foundation of the improvement of socialist exchange relations was the improvement of economic ties between the working class and the cooperative peasantry, as two friendly classes, as a basis for strengthening the alliance of the working class in power with the cooperative peasantry, as the highest principle of the dictatorship of the proletariat.

The PLA and the socialist state, through the price policy, the collection system, credit, etc., continuously maintained and strengthened cooperation and mutual assistance between the working class and the cooperative peasantry, taking measures to cut off any distortion and tendency that could lead to undervaluing and ignoring this class alliance, which was based on common interests, and which was vital to the fate of socialism.

The PLA in Enver’s time took systematic and comprehensive measures for the preservation and continuous development of socialist relations in the field of organization, direction of work and socialist production.

In order to achieve this objective, the PLA and the socialist state took measures for the rigorous implementation of the great Marxist-Leninist principle of centralized management of the socialist economy according to a unique state plan and at the same time the continuous strengthening of socialist democracy in the management of the economy by widely attracting the creative thought and the spirit of initiative of the working masses.

In implementing this great Marxist-Leninist principle, the PLA and the socialist state took systematic measures to establish fair relations between centralism and democracy, avoiding any opposition between them that creates ground for bourgeois and liberal treatments of centralism in the economy and creates the risk for the bourgeois-revisionist degeneration of the socialist economy.

The PLA took systematic and comprehensive measures for the preservation and continuous development of socialist relations of distribution.

In order to achieve this major objective, the PLA and the socialist state consistently adhered to the great socialist principle that the remuneration in socialism is necessarily done according to the quantity and quality of the work performed and also in accordance with the general average level of living of the people.

The Albanian Labor Party and Enver Hoxha saw the violation of the principle of income distribution according to the quantity and quality of work as a great evil, which endangered the fate of socialism. The classics of Marxist-Leninist science have emphasized that in socialism it is preserved “bourgeois right” without the bourgeoisie.

Regarding this issue, the great Lenin emphasized:

“In the first stage of the communist society (which they usually call socialism) “bourgeois right” is not removed completely, but only partially, only to the extent that the economic revolution has taken place, that is, only as far as the means of production are concerned”

(Lenin, works, volume 25, page 554)

But socialism, said Enver Hoxha, has all the possibilities to limit “bourgeois right”, taking systematic measures based on the objective and subjective conditions that are created by the progress of socialism. Narrowing the differences in the remuneration of work — he stressed — is of vital importance for the issue of the construction and continuous development of socialism.

Regarding this issue, Enver the Great emphasized:

“Fat salaries” arouse the desire to create bigger profits, regular and irregular, they create the desire ……. to become bourgeois, masquerading under the communist banner, with the Party’s card in its pocket”.

(Enver Hoxha, Reports and speeches 1974–1975, page 144).

The Labor Party of Albania and the socialist state took systematic measures for the fair implementation of the socialist principle of income distribution according to work, not allowing either microbourgeois egalitarianism or large disproportions in the distribution of income between cadres and workers and peasants, walking the path of gradually narrowing the differences in rewards between administrative work and physical labour, with the aim of not allowing the creation of any privileged and bourgeois stratum, as happened in the former Soviet Union, Yugoslavia, China and in the other former socialist countries.

The PLA in Enver’s time attached great and special importance to the systematic and continuous narrowing of the essential differences between the city and the countryside, between administrative and physical work, combining the mental work of cadres, subordinates of the intelligentsia with their participation in productive work, learning in school with productive work, but also the direct participation of the working masses, of workers and cooperatives, in the management of the economy, the development of the technical-scientific revolution, and the governance of the country.

Ramiz Alia tried to mask a bourgeois-revisionist liberal policy under the pretext of “correcting” errors which had been previously observed in the field of socialist relations in production in the last years of Enver Hoxha’s life.

Ramiz Alia took systematic and comprehensive measures for the revisionist degeneration of the socialist economic base, that is, of the socialist relations in production.

The PLA of Ramiz Alia denied the basic principles of Marxist-Leninist science on socialist relations in production.

Claiming “democratic” reform in the economic field, Ramiz and his gang drafted and implemented a bourgeois-revisionist liberal policy, which and denied the principles of Marxist-Leninist science regarding socialist relations in production.

These subjectivist and voluntarist limitations and mistakes in the field of socialist relations in production had showed:

• that greater care had been needed in the policy of industrial development, reducing some rates of development of the production of means of production (group A) and increasing some rates of development of the production of consumer goods (group B);
• that, the process of merging field agricultural cooperatives with mountain cooperatives and the creation of united cooperatives had been premature;
• that the liquidation of individual plots of state agricultural farms and cooperative yards had been premature;
• that the herding of the cattle of the peasants in the cooperative yard had been premature;
• that some measures applied in the field of labor distribution and remuneration, such as remuneration for the work performed in industry and in some rare cases also in agriculture, not according to the individual realization of production but on a group basis, with the exception of remuneration according to job categories and qualifications, had been a premature measure.

These subjectivist and voluntarist limitations and errors in the field of socialist relations in production had led to unforeseen and unwanted economic, but also political consequences.

It should be emphasized that despite these limitations and mistakes, which had been observed in the socialist relations in production, they had essentially been and remained socialist relations, because they were based on socialist social property over the means of production, because there was a proletarian state and the dictatorship of the proletariat, and therefore these subjective and voluntarist errors did not lead to the degeneration of socialist relations, did not lead to antagonistic contradictions between socialist relations in production and productive forces, did not harm the multidimensional political unity between the Party and the people.

It is an undeniable fact that these subjectivist and voluntarist limitations and mistakes did not lead to the bourgeois degeneration of socialist relations in production while Enver Hoxha was alive. It is necessary to discover the causes of these limitations and errors.

Based on a Marxist-Leninist analysis and assessment, these limitations and subjective and voluntarist errors appeared for objective and subjective reasons such as:

• the process of building socialism is wide and varied, complicated and difficult, and takes place in conditions which are not always favorable.
• The building of socialism in Albania was walking on untrodden paths.
• The hostile activity of the internal enemies of the working class against socialism was ongoing.
• The great pressure of external imperialist and revisionist enemies against socialism were ongoing.
• The hostile anti-socialist activity of enemies disguised in the leadership and apparatuses of the Party and the socialist state was ongoing.
• The sabotaging activity of bureaucratic and liberal elements in the apparatuses of the Party and the socialist state was ongoing.
• The negative activity of incompetent elements in the apparatuses of the Party and the socialist state was ongoing.

There are still voices that say that these limitations and mistakes in the work of the Party of the socialist state should not have happened etc. Claiming that all flaws and mistakes in the work of the Party and the socialist state could be avoided is not dialectical or scientific. The great Lenin himself said that it is impossible to claim that there can be no mistakes in the work of the Party, but correcting mistakes as soon as possible and not repeating them is a sign of the seriousness of the Marxist-Leninist Party towards the masses of the working class. Albania’s party under Enver had always been serious.

But it should be pointed out that these subjective and voluntarist limitations and errors were exploited later, after the death of Enver Hoxha, by the enemies of socialism, open and disguised, internal and external, with the aim of overthrowing socialism and restoring capitalism in Albania.

Thus, at the beginning of the 80s, at the end of Enver Hoxha’s life, a certain slowdown in the pace of economic development began to appear, which was also felt in people’s daily lives. Supplying the population with livestock products such as milk, meat, cheese, eggs, etc., became particularly problematic, as a result of the premature herding of the livestock in the cooperative farmyard villagers.

In such circumstances, the necessary and urgent need had arisen, that these limitations and errors should be corrected and overcome as soon as possible, with the aim of avoiding the negative economic and social consequences and to pave the way for the development and further improvement of socialist relations in production and consequently the uninterrupted development of the socialist economy.

Enver the Great, old and burdened by poor health, contended also with the hostile activity of the enemies disguised in the leadership of the Party apparatus and of the state, of the sabotaging activity of the bureaucratic and liberal elements and the negative activity of the incompetent elements, who, in one form or another, tried to hide the real state of the economy from him.

Despite this, he directed that comprehensive and rapid measures be taken for the elimination of flaws and subjective and voluntarist errors in the work of the Party and socialist state apparatuses, to solve the economic problems as soon as possible and meet the needs of the people with the missing products as quickly as possible.

But, as time would show later, the enemies disguised in the leadership of the Party and state apparatus sabotaged these very important instructions and orders of Enver Hoxha. Time would show later, that the hidden enemies in the leadership of the State Party, such as Ramiz Alia and his friends, were looking forward to the death of the great Enver, with the aim of overthrowing socialism and restoring capitalism in Albania.

So, after the death of Enver Hoxha, the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia and his revisionist gang at the head of the Labor Party of Albania and the state tried to mask the bourgeois-revisionist liberal policy under the pretext of “correcting” the mistakes of the past.

The revisionist mobster Ramiz Alia, regarding this matter, followed a diabolical tactic.

In the beginning, even though the need to correct the mistakes in the economic field had become urgent, especially in the agriculture and livestock sector, where there were marked restrictions and lack of livestock products such as milk, meat, cheese, eggs, etc., and the rationing of their distribution with tokens, Ramiz Alia, instead of taking quick and effective measures to solve these problems on the Marxist-Leninist path, he, in fact, chose the path of sabotage and revisionist treason.

At first, Ramiz Alia opposed and sabotaged the voices of the people’s demands and the opinions and proposals of the base for the return to the villagers of the herd cattle of the cooperative yard, with the aim of solving the problem of restrictions and shortages of livestock products in the market as soon as possible, under various pretexts such as “we cannot take steps backwards in the development of socialism”, that “these issues were also seen and dealt with by Enver”, etc.

With this diabolical anti-socialist and revisionist tactic, chief revisionist Ramiz Alia intended to strike far and in several directions. He, as time showed, on the one hand, intended and sought to make the economic situation in the country even more difficult and consequently to increase the dissatisfaction of the people towards the socialist system, to cast shadows of doubt and indirectly hit Enver’s image in the eyes of the people, etc. and, on the other hand, to create the conditions to pave the way for the implementation of his bourgeois-revisionist liberal platform without hesitation or obstacles.

When the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia and his gang at the head of the Labor Party of Albania and the state thought that the conditions had been created and the moment had come to implement the liberal bourgeois revisionist platform, ala Gorbachev, in the economic field, they started the “democratic” reform for its implementation in practice.

These reforms took place in the period from 1986 to the end of 1990, divided into 2 phases.

The first phase took place from 1986–1989. The second phase took place from 1989–1990.

The first phase related to overcoming the main difficulties in the economy. The issue would be raised and discussed in the plenum of the Central Committee of the PLA as early as December 1985 and in March 1986, as well as in the 9th Congress of the PLA in November 1986.

The most important cause of the bad state of the economy was decided to be the undervaluation of material incentives, which encouraged the increase of labor productivity and therefore of social production.

Ramiz Alia threw the slogan of turning to “economic logic”. As early as 1987, the Council of Ministers made the decision “on stimulating production growth through salaries”, “on the fairest use of additional material incentives and special funds “, “On the criteria of the financial and economic evaluation of the activity of enterprises”.

All these measures expressed the content of the so-called “new economic mechanism”, which would be trumpeted later.

Direction was given in the village “to return the cattle to the villagers”, to increase the cooperative yard, and to leave the village market free. Measures were taken to “downsize” large state agricultural enterprises and large agricultural cooperatives, “priority” was given to the light food industry.

All these orientations and measures, as time showed later, were sabotaged by Alia’s gang, with the aim of worsening the economic situation even more, and to encourage the dissatisfaction of the people towards the socialist system.

Thus, instead of returning to the peasants the previously herded cattle of the cooperative yard, they “returned” to them the banal experiment of “herds of bees” with goats and lambs, which actually aggravated the economic situation in this sector even more, but also the dissatisfaction of the peasants towards these “democratic” reforms. Likewise, the issue of reducing large agricultural cooperatives and large state agricultural enterprises, etc., was sabotaged. The deterioration of the economic situation and the increase of dissatisfaction among the people would serve as carte blanche to implement quickly and without obstacles his revisionist platform, with the aim of bourgeois degeneration of socialist relations in production, that is, the bourgeois-revisionist degeneration of the economic basis of socialism in Albania.

In the first phase, during the years 1986–1989, “democratic” bourgeois-revisionist reforms were implemented in the economy, both in the field of industry and agriculture.

In industry:

• measures were taken to encourage materialistic selfishness among workers through the so-called “self-financing of the enterprise” and “participation of workers in profit”
• “decentralized production planning” was practiced;
• measures were taken for the privatization of handicrafts, trade and services, etc.

In agriculture:

• in 1989, the “new system of payment at work” was introduced in state agricultural enterprises and agricultural cooperatives, the salary of their managers and specialists was determined depending on the final production result;
• the decision was taken and “supplementary allowance per working day for all production above the plan up to 50%” was set.
• agricultural cooperatives were allowed “to market the products produced on the plan”, with the exception of cereals and industrial crops.

All of these were anti-socialist reforms. These “democratic” reforms of Ramiz Alia, in their essence, denied the basic principles of Marxist-Leninist science and the objective economic laws of socialism.

Typical and essential in terms of the degeneration into bourgeois relations in production was the idea and practice of “self-financing of the enterprise” and “participation of workers in profit”.

According to Ramiz Alia’s idea of the practice of “self-financing enterprise”, this “socialist” self-financing enterprise was free to determine the volume and structure of production, to sell and buy products and means of production on the market, according to supply and demand. These enterprises “self-financing” appeared, thus, independently in the domestic market.

Thus, the “self-financing enterprise” was free to produce that commodity that benefited it and as much as it benefited them, regardless of the general state plan and society’s demand for its goods.

These “self-financing enterprises”, in essence, denied the socialist principle of the centralised planning of the economy.

These “self-financing enterprises”, producing and operating in the market separately and independently of each other, promotes competition between them and general anarchy in social production, which are objective economic laws typical of the capitalist economy, etc.

The main goal of this socialist “self-financing enterprise” was profit, just like the capitalist enterprise. The “participation of the workers in the profit” is nonsense, it is absurd, it is simply demagoguery to deceive the proletarian workers. Workers in Ramiz Alia’s “socialist” self-financing enterprise, governed by objective capitalist economic laws, were actually rewarded with a wage that expressed the value of their labor power, while profit, in the form of high wages , bonuses, allowances, etc., went into the pockets of the management staff, functionaries, technocrats, etc. of the “self-financing enterprise”, or the new Albanian bourgeois class that was being created even with communist cards in their pockets, oppressing and exploiting the working class.

The “self-financing enterprise”, in fact, was not run by the workers, but by the new Albanian bourgeoisie, because the working class was no longer in power because the Labor Party of Albania was no longer its party, it had degenerated into a revisionist party, and the socialist state had degenerated into a bourgeois-revisionist state.

So with these “democratic” reforms of “self-financing” in the economy of Ramiz Alia and his revisionist gang at the head of the PLA and state, socialist relations in production degenerated into bourgeois relations in production. Socialist social property turned into monopolistic state property.

On the basis of these bourgeois economic relations in the economy Albania’s “socialists” led by “comrade” Ramiz Alia began to operate objective bourgeois economic laws such as maximum profit, general anarchy in production, competition, periodic economic crises, etc.

On the basis of these capitalist economic relations of the “socialist” economy of the revisionist regime of Ramiz Alia, the new Albanian bourgeois class was born and was developing, gradually and silently, with a “socialist” mask and a communist card in its pocket.

The idea and practice of “self-financing” of the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia was actually neither new nor original, it was, in essence, the same practice as the “self-administering socialism” of the Yugoslav Titoites, which had unmasked by Enver the Great in his 1978 book on the subject.

The second phase of Ramiz Alia’s “democratic” revisionist reforms in the country’s economy, which were similar to those that took place after the counter-revolutionary events that took place in 1989 in the former revisionist Soviet Union of Gorbachev and other revisionist countries of Eastern Europe, led to the further deepening of the economic, political and social crisis in Albania.

The “democratic” revisionist reforms of Ramiz Alia, as we have discussed before, degenerated the socialist relations in production in all their aspects, such as in the field of property, exchange, distribution, organization and direction of production.

The establishment of bourgeois relations in production with a “socialist” mask, as time showed, paved the way for the restoration of capitalism with a “socialist” mask in Albania.

This undeniable fact has been accepted by the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia himself, who claims that these reforms he undertook: “to a certain extent, preceded the transition from the centralized and concentrated economy in the hands of the state, to the market economy”, that is, to capitalism.

This statement of Ramiz Alia does not need more comments.

The establishment of capitalism, with or without its “socialist” mask, led to a very deep economic, political and social crisis. Thus, as a result of the birth, deepening and exacerbation of the economic crisis in Albania, the economic situation worsened even more.

Many production enterprises greatly reduced production activity and others went bankrupt and closed. The revisionist rulers and governors of Ramiz Alia tried to justify this very difficult economic situation of the industry with the pretext of the “lack of raw materials” in mineral-rich, mountainous Albania.

This was the anti-worker and anti-national scenario of the chief revisionist Ramiz Alia at the head of the PLA and the state, aiming at the gradual destruction of the industry and with it the working class.

Alia was very afraid of the working class and its revolutionary movement, so he did what was possible for its perversion, division and destruction.

In the market, restrictions and shortages for goods were increasing rapidly, especially for agricultural and livestock products.

The level of material and cultural well-being of the people was falling rapidly and at the same time their dissatisfaction with the “socialist” regime of Ramiz Ali grew.

The international imperialist bourgeoisie, especially the American and European imperialism, preached more and more that the cause of this economic crisis was the “failure” of the “socialist” economy, it was the “failure” of Marxism.

Unfortunately, a large mass of people, due to the “socialist” mask of the regime of Ramiz Alia, had the illusion that the economic, political and social crisis was a crisis of the “socialist” system.

This illusion of people about socialism was being fed, with all forms and means, by the furious anti-communist propaganda.

The low level of Marxist-Leninist ideology and the influence of the pressure of imperialism on people, was one of the reasons why this large mass of people, heterogeneous from a social class point of view, remained indifferent, or did not oppose or support, in a form a in another, the “peaceful” bourgeois-revisionist counter-revolution led by Ramiz Alia, which led to the overthrow of socialism and the restoration of capitalism in Albania.

So, the very serious economic crisis at the time of Ramiz Ali had its source in the restoration of capitalist realations.

The war against revisionism is necessary for the victory of the revolution and socialism.

As we have explained above, the fundamental cause of the overthrow of socialism in Albania and in the world was the coming to power of modern revisionism.

Revisionism is a form of opportunism, it is a reflection of bourgeois ideology in theory and practice and aims to preserve or restore capitalism. Today’s revisionism is the direct successor and continuation of the old revisionism, its goal is the preservation and restoration of capitalism.

Revisionism has been and remains a tool used and used by the bourgeoisie to undermine, sabotage, and divide the communist and labour movement from within, with the aim of preserving the old oppressive and exploitative capitalist system and overthrowing the new socialist and communist system and restoring capitalism.

Regarding this issue, the great Lenin emphasizes:

“Opportunism is our main enemy. Opportunism in the upper echelon of the labor movement is not proletarian, but bourgeois socialism. Practically, it has been proven that the militants within the movement who are part of the opportunist current are better defenders of the bourgeoisie than the bourgeoisie itself. If the workers were not led by these people, the bourgeoisie would not be able to stand.”

(Lenin Works, vol. 31 page 354)

Lenin repeatedly emphasized that without first winning over opportunism and revisionism, one cannot win over the bourgeoisie and imperialism. So, the fight against opportunism and revisionism, as Marxist-Leninist science teaches us and as history fully proved, is a necessity not only for the overthrow of the old oppressive and exploitative capitalist system and the victory of the new socialist and communist system without oppression and exploitation of man by man, but also to close the paths in the future for the birth and spread of revisionism in the communist and labor movement and the overthrow of socialism and the restoration of capitalism.

The struggle between Marxist-Leninist science and opportunism and revisionism, as the history of this struggle shows us, has been and remains the law of the development of Marxist-Leninist science itself and of the revolutionary movement of the proletariat.

Why does this phenomenon happen?

The key to understanding the essence of this phenomenon is provided by the Marxist-Leninist science and revolutionary philosophy itself. It teaches us that the dialectical law of the war of opposites operates in every phenomenon of nature and society. In the conditions of the division of society into antagonistic classes, such as today’s capitalist society, in the struggle for life and death between them, between the working class and the bourgeoisie, the dialectical law of the struggle of opposites finds its full expression even in the inevitable struggle between the revolutionary and scientific ideology of the proletariat — Marxism — Leninism, on the one hand, and the bourgeois and revisionist ideology, on the other.

Regarding this issue, the great Lenin emphasized:

“It is not surprising if the doctrine of Marx, which serves directly for the education and organization of the advanced class of today’s society, which shows the duties of this class and proves that today’s order will inevitably be replaced — due to economic development — by a new order. it is not surprising that this doctrine should have to fight her way through life at every step”

(Lenin, Works vol. 15, page 19)

In order to understand and argue the dialectic and the vital and invincible force of Marxist-Leninist science against opportunism and revisionism, I am presenting very briefly and in very general lines the history of the development of Marxism-Leninism and the communist and labor movement in all its stages.

The first stage of the development of Marxism:

This stage started from the 1840s. The peculiarity of the struggle at this stage of the development of Marxism is that this struggle took place within the labor movement itself between Marxism and the theories and doctrines that were openly opposed to him, such as the various currents of pre-Marxist “socialism”, Proudhonism, Lasalism, Bakunism, etc., which at that time constituted the main form of influence of the bourgeoisie on the labor movement.

The development of the revolutionary movement in this period, especially the revolutions of 1848–1851 and especially the Paris Commune in 1871, gave a crushing blow to all these opponents of Marxism, proved in practice the rightness of the revolutionary and scientific theory of Marxism and affirmed it it indisputably as the only revolutionary and scientific ideology, which expresses and protects the vital interests of the working class.

The second stage of the development of Marxism:

This stage begins especially after the death of Engels, it is characterized by the birth of revisionism in the labor movement and by the consequent struggle of the great Lenin and his comrades against revisionism. This war that began in 1890 is known in history as the first great controversy between Marxism-Leninism and revisionism.

Lenin and his Marxist-Leninist comrades mercilessly fought Narodniks, “legal Marxists”, economists, Mensheviks, liquidators, empiricritics, social chauvinists, Kautskyites, anarcho-syndicalists and “leftists”.

The great Lenin consistently protected the basic principles of Marxism from distortions and revisionist revisions and further developed and raised the Marxist doctrine to a higher level, in accordance with the new historical conditions and experience of the age of imperialism.

The great Stalin said, “Leninism is Marxism of the era of imperialism”.

As a result of this relentless struggle of Lenin and his Marxist-Leninist comrades, the opportunism and revisionism of the Second International was ideologically unmasked and destroyed. The revolutionary and scientific Marxist-Leninist theory was fully proven in practice in the fire of the great class struggles of the stage of imperialism, reaping another great historical victory over opportunism and revisionism, it took deep roots in the ranks of the working class and the working masses and peoples oppressed by the bourgeoisie and imperialism.

This victory of Marxism-Leninism was crowned with the triumph of the great October Socialist Revolution in 1917 and the creation of the Third Communist International, fully proving in practice the correctness of the Marxist-Leninist revolutionary and scientific theory.

The third stage of the war between Marxism-Leninism and revisionism began after the October Revolution and especially after the death of Lenin, which is known in history as the second great controversy between them. This great battle between the Marxist-Leninists and the revisionists took place in the former Soviet Union and in the Comintern under the leadership of the great Stalin, which was fought against the right and “left” revisionist currents, such as Trotskyism, Bukharinism, etc., which tried to to falsify revise Leninism, to hinder the construction of socialism in the Soviet Union, to divert the Third International and the entire international communist and revolutionary movement from the right Marxist-Leninist path.

The peculiarity of this war lay in the fact that it is a war between Marxism-Leninism and revisionism for the problems of the socialist order and the construction of socialism, but it also affected the problems of the development of the communist and revolutionary movement on a world scale and in specific countries.

The great Stalin defended the basic principles of Marxist-Leninist science, the purity of Leninism from revisionist distortions, but further enriched the revolutionary and scientific Marxist-Leninist theory. The successful construction of socialism in the Soviet Union, the historic victory of the Soviet Union over fascism, and the victory of popular revolutions in a number of European and Asian countries, fully proved in practice the correctness of the Marxist-Leninist revolutionary and scientific theory.

The fourth stage of the development of Marxism began after the Second World War, especially after the death of Stalin, which is known in history as the third great controversy between Marxism-Leninism and revisionism.

This stage includes the struggle of the great Enver Hoxha and his Marxist-Leninist comrades against all currents and groups of modern revisionism, which continues today.

The great Enver consistently defended the basic principles of Marxist-Leninist science, but also developed them further.

Today, the Communist Party of Albania is part of the great Marxist-Leninist camp against the revisionist camp. The feature of this stage of the struggle between Marxist-Leninists and revisionists, nowadays, is the protection of the basic principles of Marxist-Leninist science from “revisions”, “corrections”, and revisionist “additions”.

The failure of modern Yugoslav, Soviet, Chinese, Eurocommunist revisionism, etc., fully proves in practice the correctness of the Marxist-Leninist revolutionary and scientific theory. The growth and development of the communist and revolutionary movement of the proletariat and the oppressed peoples of the world, the creation of new Marxist-Leninist parties, the strengthening of the fight against revisionism, in our days, is proving in practice, more and more, the rightness of the revolutionary theory and Marxist-Leninist science.

There is no doubt that the ongoing struggle between Marxist-Leninist science and revisionism in our time, despite its twists and turns, will inevitably lead to the complete and final victory of Marxism-Leninism as the only revolutionary theory which represents and expresses the vital interests of the working class, the vanguard and most revolutionary class known to history and to which the future belongs, which will inevitably lead, in the end, to the final defeat of reactionary and anti-scientific revisionist ideology, that is, the bourgeois ideology with “Marxist” and “communist” mask, in the overthrow by proletarian revolution of the old oppressive and exploitative capitalist system and the victory of the new socialist and communist system without oppression and exploitation of man by man.

Socialism and Communism will eventually triumph over capitalism.

In our time, in the era of imperialism and the proletarian revolution, the question of the victory of socialism and communism is the most fundamental question, it is a problem laid out for solution.

In today’s conditions, after the overthrow of the socialist socioeconomic order all over the world with “peaceful” bourgeois-revisionist counter-revolution, that is, with revisionist betrayal, the ideological class war between Marxist-Leninists, on the one hand, and the bourgeoisie and revisionists, on the other other, has taken on vast and complicated dimensions, as never before.

The imperialist bourgeoisie, speculating a lot with the overthrow of socialism in the former Soviet Union, Yugoslavia, the former socialist countries of Eastern Europe, China, Albania, etc., have launched a furious crusade against Marxist-Leninist science and communism. In our time, just like before, bourgeois ideologues loudly preach and trumpet different viewpoints and “theories” that allegedly Marxism-Leninism “failed”, that allegedly Marxism “died”, that allegedly socialism “failed”, because supposedly communism “died”, etc.

Also, today, just like before, the various revisionist currents are on the same anti-communist ideological common front with the bourgeoisie when they preach “new” views and “theories” on the “obsolescence” and “surpassing” of Marxist-Leninist science, which, in essence, are the same as the bourgeois “theories” that preach the “failure” of Marxist-Leninist science.

So, basically, bourgeois and revisionist ideology are one, they are reactionary and anti-scientific ideology against the revolutionary and scientific Marxist-Leninist ideology of the proletariat. In today’s historical conditions of the rule of capitalism and a great and ferocious anti-communist crusade, we Marxist-Leninists, guided at every step of our revolutionary activity by Marxist-Leninist science, have a very clear main objective trend of the development of society in today’s era towards socialism and communism. We Marxist-Leninists, guided by the revolutionary and scientific Marxist-Leninist philosophy, are aware that the overthrow of socialism and the restoration of capitalism in the former socialist countries was a zigzag of the revolution, it is a temporary withdrawal of it.

Marxist-Leninist science has analyzed and evaluated the social phenomenon of regression, of turning back, from socialism to capitalism, as a temporary and partial phenomenon in the process of the unstoppable development of society. The classics of Marxist-Leninist science Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin and Enver Hoxha have said that the world revolutionary process has not developed and cannot develop only in a straight line and forward, regularly and without obstacles, and sometimes without making big leaps back. Regarding this issue, the great Lenin emphasized:

“History progresses with zigzags and detours” (1)

“it is not dialectical, it is not scientific, and it is not theoretically correct to imagine world history as a process that moves forward in an orderly manner and without obstacles, without ever making great leaps back.” (2)

(1-Lenin, works, vol. 27, page 173. 2 — Lenin, works, vol. 22, page 377–378).

The history of the development of society has fully proved in practice the great principle of Marxist-Leninist science that the replacement of an old, lower economic-social system by a new, higher economic-social system, through revolution, is an objective historical process that is not only inevitable, but also not carried out immediately , it spans an entire historical era.

Dialectical materialism, the “soul of Marxism”, has revealed the deepest objective and subjective causes not only of the victory of the revolution and social progress, but also of counter-revolution, turning back, social regression.

The Marxist-Leninist dialectic teaches us that the transition from a new, higher economic-social system to an old, lower economic-social system is another expression of the multifaceted character of the social development process. The history of society’s life proves to us very clearly with undeniable historical facts that the process of society’s development has not always gone forward, upward, but there have also been cases of going back, of falling down, of society’s development.

In order to argue with undeniable historical facts the phenomenon of social regression, I present very briefly and in very general terms the history of social regression, of going back, from a new, higher economic-social system to an older, lower economic-social system.

At the time of the slave-owning economic-social system, the barbarians with their exterminating floods caused colossal damage and destruction, but they could not turn back the wheel of history. In the end, the new feudal order finally won out over the old slave-owning order.

Bourgeois revolutions overthrew the old feudal order in a number of countries and established the new capitalist order. The most typical example is France, where the great bourgeois Revolution of 1789 took place, which led to the overthrow of feudalism and the establishment of capitalism in France. But, as history tells us, the feudal counter-revolution developed and won in capitalist France, which led to the establishment of the Bourbon feudal monarchy and the restoration of feudalism in France in 1815. This going back, this social regression, from capitalism to feudalism in France and in a number of other countries, including Albania after the failure of the bourgeois revolution of June 1924, shows very clearly that the consolidation of the capitalist order did not happen immediately, but it constituted an entire historical era.

The history of society shows us very clearly, with undeniable facts, the victories and defeats of successive bourgeois revolutions until the final victory of the capitalist order over the feudal order.

Feudal counter-revolutions extended the life of the feudal system, but they could not finally turn back the wheel of history. Ultimately, the new capitalist system eventually won out over the old feudal system.

The proletarian revolutions overthrew capitalism and established socialism in some countries of the world such as the former Soviet Union, Albania and a number of Eastern European countries, etc., but as we know, the “peaceful” bourgeois-revisionist counter-revolutions directed from above by the revisionist parties in power in these countries led back from socialism to capitalism.

This return from socialism to capitalism is not fatal. As we said above, social regression, the turning back, from a new, higher economic-social system to an old, lower economic-social system, has not only happened in the socialist order, but has also happened in previous historical orders such as the feudal and capitalist order.

But — as Marxist-Leninist science teaches us — and as the history of the development of human society has fully proven, the wheel of history has not stopped, despite the temporary and partial setbacks that have occurred. The era of proletarian revolutions has just begun. The victory of the new socialist order over the old capitalist order, with the help of the proletarian revolution, is a historical necessity, it is an objective law, derived from the objective development of society, despite the backwardness, social regression, temporary and partial. This is what Marxist-Leninist science teaches us.

“Peaceful” bourgeois-revisionist counter-revolutions prolong the life of the old capitalist system, but they cannot decisively save it.

Bourgeois-revisionist counter-revolutions cannot stop the wheel of society’s development from the old capitalist order to the new socialist and communist order. Ultimately, the new communist system will ultimately triumph over the old capitalist system. In our time, in the era of imperialism and proletarian revolution, even though the waves of counter-revolution are still great, we Marxist-Leninists see the future with revolutionary optimism.

Where our revolutionary optimism originates from is our Marxist-Leninist science, which shows us, as an infallible compass, the path of the class struggle for life and death and the victory of the proletariat and the popular masses and the peoples against the bourgeoisie and imperialism, even under these turbulent conditions and very difficult circumstances in the turbulent sea of class war full of suffering.

The great Lenin defined our era as the era of imperialism and proletarian revolution.

The great Lenin, scientifically analyzing the main trends of the development of capitalism in its last stage (imperialism), determined the historical place of imperialism.

From the scientific analysis he made of imperialism as a whole and the historical place it occupies, Lenin came to the conclusion that imperialism is the era of great class struggles, it is the era of proletarian revolutions, it is the era of the victory of socialism on a world scale.

Today, in the era of imperialism and the proletarian revolution, the objective conditions for the proletarian revolution have matured, but the subjective factors of the proletarian revolution are still not at the appropriate level, which hinders its realization.

In our time, the struggle of the proletariat against the oppression and exploitation of the bourgeoisie, despite the great and various obstacles as a result of the reactionary and terrorist anti-communist, anti-popular and anti-democratic policy of the bourgeois state as well as the great demagogic anti-communist propaganda of the ruling bourgeois class and treason of opportunists and revisionists, has received a great development in all capitalist countries such as the USA, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Russia, Japan, China, Brazil, etc.

In front of us Marxist-Leninists is the immediate task of raising awareness and organizing the working class for revolution to carry out its historical mission, which is the overthrow of the old oppressive and exploitative capitalist system and the victory and construction of the system of new socialism and communism without oppression and exploitation of man by man.

The proletariat is naturally prone to revolution more than any other class, because, among other things, it is the class that does not own the means of production, and in order not to die of hunger, it is forced to submit to the oppression of capitalist exploitation. In such economic and social conditions, the slave proletariat naturally possesses the revolutionary potential to make and lead the proletarian revolution with its Marxist-Leninist party at the head, because, thus, the proletarians in the revolution have nothing to lose but their shackles.

Regarding this issue, the founders of scientific communism Karl Marx and Friederich Engels in their famous work The “Manifesto of the Communist Party” say:

“Let the ruling classes tremble before the Communist Revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose in it but their shackles. They have the whole world to gain.”

(Karl Marks and Friederich Engels, book, Manifesto of the Communist Party, page 68)

In our time, the National Liberation Movement of oppressed peoples for national liberation against the imperialist yoke in Asia, Africa, the Middle East, Latin America, and Europe has taken a big leap. The National Liberation War of the Afghan and Iraqi peoples against the invasion of American imperialism was crowned with the victory of these peoples.

Today’s successful development of national liberation movements against the imperialist yoke, as an integral part of the world revolution, creates the premises and helps to prepare the conditions for the proletarian revolution not only in the former colonial countries and dependent on the imperialist powers, but also in the imperialist countries themselves.

In today’s conditions, in front of the Marxist-Leninist parties lies the historical and immediate task of the consequent principled struggle for the merciless unmasking of the bourgeois and revisionist ideology, which aims to undermine and sabotage the proletarian revolution and the victory of socialism and communism.

Today, in the conditions when capitalism has been gripped by a serious and general crisis of its base and superstructure, before the Marxist-Leninist parties lies the immediate task of unmasking the views of the new bourgeois “theories” on the alternatives of the “new society” “, “democratic society”, etc., after the fiasco suffered by the previous bourgeois “theories” of the “consumer”, “industrial”, “post-industrial” society, etc.

Today, along with the unmasking of the bourgeois “theories”, it is the immediate task of the Marxist-Leninist parties to unmask the views of the revisionist “theories” on the so-called new “models” of “socialisms” such as the “self-administering socialism” of the Yugoslav Titoite revisionists, the “developed socialism” of the Soviet revisionists, the “socialism with Chinese characteristics” of the Chinese revisionists, the “democratic pluralistic socialism” of the Eurocommunist revisionists. As history showed us, all these revisionist “models of socialism” completely failed in theory and practice, because these “models of socialism” had nothing in common with the scientific socialism conceived by Marx and Engels and implemented and developed in practice by Lenin, Stalin, and Enver Hoxha.

So, all these revisionist “models of socialism”, as history has shown, were really nothing but “models” of capitalism disguised with a “socialist” and “communist” mask. The historical experience of the successful construction of socialism in the former Soviet Union led by Lenin and Stalin and in Albania led by Enver, proved in an excellent and final way the Marxist-Leninist revolutionary and scientific theory, showed the absolute truth that true socialism is one and only one, it is socialism that is achieved and realized only according to the general laws of the revolutionary and scientific Marxist-Leninist theory elaborated and developed by Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin and Enver Hoxha.

But, the bourgeois and revisionist ideologues do not throw down their weapons, they are trying with all their might to invent new “theories” that aim to “disprove” and present universal laws of Marxist-Leninist science as “obsolete” and “outdated”, in order to pervert and alienate the working class and the working masses from the revolutionary struggle for the overthrow of the old oppressive and exploitative capitalist system and the victory of the new socialist and communist system.

This fully proves that the bourgeoisie and revisionism are sworn enemies to Marxist-Leninist science, the proletarian revolution, the dictatorship of the proletariat, and socialism and communism.

Nowadays, the ideological struggle between the revolutionary and scientific Marxist-Leninist ideology and the reactionary and anti-scientific bourgeois and revisionist ideology has intensified like never before. The feature of the ideological war, nowadays, between the revolutionary and scientific Marxist-Leninist ideology and the reactionary and anti-scientific bourgeois and revisionist ideology is that the bourgeois ideology and the revisionist ideology have united in a single anti-communist front.

This happens because in the era of imperialism, we have reaction in all areas of life, including the ideological area, where the revisionist ideology is so intertwined with the bourgeois ideology in their basic anti-communist views that they have almost fused together, and as a result have united in a single anti-communist front.

This happens, after all, because the bourgeois ideology and the revisionist ideology, in essence, are one, they are bourgeois ideology, regardless of the fact that the revisionist ideology is disguised with “Marxist” and “communist” masks.

The enemies of Marxist-Leninist science, the bourgeoisie and the opportunists and revisionists, have united in a common anti-communist front, in order to protect and perpetuate capitalism at all costs, using bourgeois state criminal violence against communists and revolutionaries, but at the same using time demagoguery to make ideological diversion to undermine and sabotage the revolutionary communist and labor movement.

This anti-communist front, nowadays, consists of bourgeois, social democratic, revisionist and “leftist” ideology.

Regarding this issue, Enver the Great emphasized:

“Characteristic of today’s ideological diversion of the bourgeoisie and revisionism against socialism is the unification in a single front of the basic counter-revolutionary currents, from the genuine bourgeois ideology of an openly anti-communist character to the old traditional opportunism, from the modern revisionists to to today’s so-called leftist currents”

(Enver Hoxha. Reports and speeches 1972–1973, page 306)

The experience of the ideological struggle between the revolutionary and scientific Marxist-Leninist ideology and the reactionary and anti-scientific bourgeois and revisionist ideology, nowadays, is showing us very clearly, every day more and more, that Marxist-Leninist science is exposing and rejecting, always and more, the viewpoints of the old and “new” bourgeois and revisionist “theories”, that new Marxist-Leninist parties are being created, that the communist and revolutionary movement of the proletariat is getting stronger every day, that it is developing the national liberation movement of the oppressed peoples against the imperialist yoke.

In our time, the Marxist-Leninist parties are fighting for the unmasking of the viewpoints of the bourgeois and revisionist “theories”, they are fighting with consistency and revolutionary courage at the head of the proletariat and the working masses in their class struggle against capitalist oppression and exploitation, with the aim the overthrow by violent proletarian revolution of the old oppressive and exploitative capitalist system and the victory and construction of the new socialist and communist system without oppression and exploitation of man by man.

Marxist-Leninists are aware that the class struggle of the proletariat against the bourgeoisie and revisionism is a long, comprehensive and complicated struggle that will go through different stages. This war of the proletariat against the bourgeoisie, as before, will not be easy, it, as the great Lenin teaches us, will not pass on a wide and paved road, but will have to walk through narrow and dangerous paths on the edges of abysses and steep paths full of difficulties and obstacles.

The proletariat will have to prepare for tough battles against the bourgeoisie with attacks and successes, but also with retreats, partial and temporary, with great pains and sacrifices, but these great pains and sacrifices of the proletariat and the working masses are worth doing, in order to save once and for all from their centuries-long superhuman pains and sacrifices under the slavery of day labor of the old oppressive and exploitative capitalist system.

This revolutionary war of the proletariat and the working masses under the leadership of the Marxist-Leninist party will mobilize and liberate their revolutionary and creative energies, will teach and train them in their class struggle for the protection of their vital interests, will make them aware of their historical role for the revolutionary transformation of society by overthrowing the old oppressive and exploitative capitalist system and building the new socialist and communist system.

The Communist Party of Albania, led by Marxist-Leninist science, will face with revolutionary optimism all the challenges of the time, it will lead the working class and the working masses in the barricades of the class war for the overthrow of the old oppressive and exploitative capitalist system in Albania with side of the proletarian revolution and the victory of the new socialist and communist system without oppression and exploitation of man by man.

The new socialist and communist system is the future of the world, it will inevitably and finally win over the old oppressive and exploitative capitalist system by means of the proletarian revolution led by Marxist-Leninist science according to the teachings of Marx, Engels, Lenin , Stalin and Enver Hoxha.