China: Long Live the Popular Uprising in Hong Kong!

 

After protestors storm the parliament: general strike against the extradition bill and the Lam Administration!

 

Statement of the Revolutionary Communist International Tendency (RCIT), 03 July 2019, www.thecommunists.net

 

 

 

1.             The mass protests in Hong Kong have reached a new stage. A huge demonstration on 1 July of at least half a million people resulted in many young activists storming and briefly occupying the city’s parliament. Pictures of myriads of young demonstrators dressed in black with head protection, ramming the parliament gates, circulated around the world. Parliament will remain closed for at least two weeks due to the serious damage.

 

2.             Unsurprisingly, China’s Stalinist-capitalist regime is outraged and vociferously denounced the popular protests as “mob violence”. (Global Times: “Say no to mob violence and reclaim order in HK society”, 2.7.2019). The ruling class is worried because the violent protests are not the work of a handful of isolated “extremists”. An article in the South China Morning Post, a daily paper owned by China’s richest capitalist Jack Ma, compares the present movement with the Occupy protests five years ago. It arrived at the conclusion: “While most participants during the Occupy protests had emphasised “love and peace” in their demands for universal suffrage, the threshold for confrontation and violence seemed to have been lowered, five years on. From the crowds present and interviews with protesters, a much larger proportion of Hongkongers appeared to be no longer opposed to violence as a means to an end compared to five years ago.” (SCMP: The difference between Occupy and extradition protests: more Hongkongers now believe the use of violence is justified, 2.7.2019) Attempts by Lam Cheuk-ting, Roy Kwong Chun-yu and Leung Yiu-chung, leading politicians of the Democratic Party – the most important bourgeois opposition party in Hong Kong opposing the extradition bill – to calm down the demonstrators failed. They were cursed and quickly pushed aside.

 

3.             These developments reflect a new stage in the radicalization of the popular mass movement against the extradition bill and the Lam Administration. The movement, or at least a significant part of it, openly refuses the conciliatory tactics of the bourgeois opposition and is willing to defend their rights by any means necessary. We are aware that the movement has ideological and organizational weaknesses (e.g. Hong Kong centeredness, illusions in the West, lack of mass organizing structures). But this is hardly surprising given its spontaneous character and its lack of political depth.

 

4.             The Revolutionary Communist International Tendency (RCIT) sends its warmest greetings to the courageous young men and women who successfully fought against the police and pushed the reactionary Administration Carrie Lam close to collapse! We reaffirm that the popular struggle against both the extradition law and the Carrie Lam government is an essential democratic and progressive struggle against the attempted repression of the Stalinist-capitalist dictatorship in Beijing.

 

5.             In our opinion, it is urgent that the vanguard workers and youth in Hong Kong organize on a clear action platform in order to advance the movement. For this we think that it is important to transform the protests into an indefinite general strike to kill the extradition law and to bring down the Lam Administration. Furthermore, it is crucial that they organize mass democratic assemblies in the workplaces, neighborhoods, and universities to discuss the demands and tactics of their struggle and to elect delegates for a coordinating body of the entire movement.

 

6.             In addition, the RCIT considers it important to counter the chauvinist propaganda of Beijing which denounces the protesters as “enemies of the Chinese people”. The protest movement should state their support for the democratic rights of all workers, poor peasants, and oppressed nations in the whole of China. Likewise, the vanguard workers and youth must warn the masses to have no illusions in “democratic” Western powers. Finally, it is necessary to consolidate their rupture with the Democratic Party and to build an independent Workers Party.

 

7.             The democratic struggle in Hong Kong is currently one of the most important class struggles around the world. It is one of the most important cities in the largest country in the world which has now become an imperialist Great Power and the main challenger of the U.S. In contrast to the Stalinists and Castro-Chavistas, socialists must stand in solidarity with the popular uprising in Hong Kong. The RCIT calls on activists to join us in building a revolutionary party both in China and globally based on an international and socialist perspective!

 

* Kill the extradition bill! Defeat the Administration of Carrie Lam!

 

* Down with the Pseudo-“Communist“ Capitalist Dictatorship in Beijing!

 

* For a Workers and Poor Peasants Republic in China! For a Socialist Federation in East Asia as a first step to a socialist world!

 

 

 

International Bureau of the RCIT

 

 

 

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The RCIT has published a number of booklets, statements, and articles on China that can be accessed on our website at https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/asia/ as well as at https://www.thecommunists.net/theory/china-russia-as-imperialist-powers/.

 

In particular we refer to:

 

RCIT: China: Mass Protests against Reactionary “Extradition Law” in Hong Kong. For an indefinite general strike to kill the bill and to bring down the Administration of Carrie Lam! 18 June 2019, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/asia/china-mass-protests-against-reactionary-extradition-law-in-hong-kong/

 

RCIT: China: Down with the Pseudo-“Communist“ Capitalist Dictatorship! No to any imperialist Great Power – U.S., China, Japan, Russia or the European Union! For a Workers and Poor Peasants Republic! https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/asia/call-to-revolutionary-activists-in-china/

 

Michael Pröbsting: China: Defend the Muslim Uyghurs against Oppression! 18.10.2018, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/asia/china-defend-the-muslim-uyghurs-against-oppression/

 

RCIT: Hong Kong/China: Long Live the Anti-Government Protests! For a General Strike against Police Repression and for Democratic Rights! Down with the Reactionary CCP Dictatorship! 2.10.2014, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/asia/hong-kong-protests/

 

Michael Pröbsting: Anti-Imperialism in the Age of Great Power Rivalry. The Factors behind the Accelerating Rivalry between the U.S., China, Russia, EU and Japan. A Critique of the Left’s Analysis and an Outline of the Marxist Perspective, RCIT Books, January 2019, https://www.thecommunists.net/theory/anti-imperialism-in-the-age-of-great-power-rivalry/

 

Michael Pröbsting: China‘s transformation into an imperialist power. A study of the economic, political and military aspects of China as a Great Power, in: Revolutionary Communism No. 4, http://www.thecommunists.net/theory/why-china-is-imperialist/