Editing Marxism–Leninism (section)

=== Historiography ===
Historiography of [[Marxist–Leninist state]]s is polarised. According to [[John Earl Haynes]] and [[Harvey Klehr]], historiography is characterised by a split between traditionalists and revisionists.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Haynes |first1=John Earl |author1-link=John Earl Haynes |last2=Klehr |first2=Harvey |author2-link=Harvey Klehr |date=2003 |chapter=Revising History |title=In Denial: Historians, Communism and Espionage |location=San Francisco |publisher=Encounter |pages=11–57 |isbn=1-893554-72-4}}</ref> "Traditionalists", who characterise themselves as objective reporters of an alleged [[totalitarian]] nature of [[communism]] and Marxist–Leninist states, are criticised by their opponents as being [[anti-communist]], even ''[[Fascist (epithet)|fascist]]'', in their eagerness on continuing to focus on the issues of the [[Cold War]]. Alternative characterisations for traditionalists include "anti-communist", "conservative", "Draperite" (after [[Theodore Draper]]), "orthodox", and "right-wing"; Norman Markowitz, a prominent "revisionist", referred to them as "reactionaries", "right-wing romantics", "romantics", and "triumphalist" who belong to the "[[HUAC]] school of [[CPUSA]] scholarship".<ref>{{cite book |last1=Haynes |first1=John Earl |author1-link=John Earl Haynes |last2=Klehr |first2=Harvey |author2-link=Harvey Klehr |date=2003 |chapter=Revising History |title=In Denial: Historians, Communism and Espionage |location=San Francisco |publisher=Encounter |pages=43 |isbn=1-893554-72-4}}</ref> According to Haynes and Klehr, "revisionists" are more numerous and dominate academic institutions and learned journals. A suggested alternative formulation is "new historians of American communism", but that has not caught on because these historians describe themselves as unbiased and scholarly and contrast their work to the work of anti-communist traditionalists whom they would term biased and unscholarly.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Haynes |first1=John Earl |author-link1=John Earl Haynes |last2=Klehr |first2=Harvey |author-link2=Harvey Klehr |date=2003 |chapter=Revising History |title=In Denial: Historians, Communism and Espionage |location=San Francisco |publisher=Encounter |pages=43–44 |isbn=1-893554-72-4}}</ref> Academic [[Sovietology]] after [[World War II]] and during the Cold War was dominated by the "totalitarian model" of the Soviet Union,<ref>{{cite book |first1=Sarah |last1=Davies |author1-link=Sarah Davies (historian) |first2=James |last2=Harris |title=Stalin: A New History |chapter=Joseph Stalin: Power and Ideas |date=8 September 2005 |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |isbn=978-1-139-44663-1 |page=3 |quote=Academic Sovietology, a child of the early Cold War, was dominated by the 'totalitarian model' of Soviet politics. Until the 1960s it was almost impossible to advance any other interpretation, in the USA at least.}}</ref> stressing the absolute nature of Stalin's power.<ref>{{cite book |first1=Sarah |last1=Davies |author1-link=Sarah Davies (historian) |first2=James |last2=Harris |title=Stalin: A New History |chapter=Joseph Stalin: Power and Ideas |date=8 September 2005 |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |isbn=978-1-139-44663-1 |pages=3–4 |quote=In 1953, Carl Friedrich characterised totalitarian systems in terms of five points: an official ideology, control of weapons and of media, use of terror, and a single mass party, 'usually under a single leader'. There was of course an assumption that the leader was critical to the workings of totalitarianism: at the apex of a monolithic, centralised, and hierarchical system, it was he who issued the orders which were fulfilled unquestioningly by his subordinates.}}</ref> The "revisionist school" beginning in the 1960s focused on relatively autonomous institutions which might influence policy at the higher level.<ref name="DaviesHarris2005">{{cite book |first1=Sarah |last1=Davies |author1-link=Sarah Davies (historian) |first2=James |last2=Harris |title=Stalin: A New History |chapter=Joseph Stalin: Power and Ideas |date=8 September 2005 |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |isbn=978-1-139-44663-1 |pages=4–5 |quote=Tucker's work stressed the absolute nature of Stalin's power, an assumption which was increasingly challenged by later revisionist historians. In his ''Origins of the Great Purges'', Arch Getty argued that the Soviet political system was chaotic, that institutions often escaped the control of the centre, and that Stalin’s leadership consisted to a considerable extent in responding, on an ad hoc basis, to political crises as they arose. Getty's work was influenced by political science of the 1960s onwards, which, in a critique of the totalitarian model, began to consider the possibility that relatively autonomous bureaucratic institutions might have had some influence on policy-making at the highest level.}}</ref> Matt Lenoe described the "revisionist school" as representing those who "insisted that the old image of the Soviet Union as a totalitarian state bent on world domination was oversimplified or just plain wrong. They tended to be interested in social history and to argue that the Communist Party leadership had had to adjust to social forces."<ref name="Lenoe2002">{{cite journal |last1=Lenoe |first1=Matt |title=Did Stalin Kill Kirov and Does It Matter? |journal=The Journal of Modern History |volume=74 |issue=2 |year=2002 |pages=352–380 |issn=0022-2801 |doi=10.1086/343411 |s2cid=142829949}}</ref> These "revisionist school" historians challenged the "totalitarian model", as outlined by political scientist [[Carl Joachim Friedrich]], which stated that the Soviet Union and other Marxist–Leninist states were totalitarian systems, with the personality cult, and almost unlimited powers of the "great leader", such as Stalin.{{r|DaviesHarris2005}}<ref name="Fitzpatrick">{{cite journal |first1=Sheila |last1=Fitzpatrick |author-link1=Sheila Fitzpatrick |title=Revisionism in Soviet History |journal=History and Theory |volume=46 |issue=4 |year=2007 |pages=77–91 |issn=1468-2303 |doi=10.1111/j.1468-2303.2007.00429.x |quote=... the Western scholars who in the 1990s and 2000s were most active in scouring the new archives for data on Soviet repression were revisionists (always 'archive rats') such as Arch Getty and Lynne Viola.}}</ref> It was considered to be outdated by the 1980s and for the post-Stalinist era.<ref name="Zimmerman 1980">{{cite journal |last=Zimmerman |first=William |date=September 1980 |title=Review: How the Soviet Union is Governed |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |journal=[[Slavic Review]] |volume=39 |issue=3 |pages=482–486 |doi=10.2307/2497167 |jstor=2497167 |quote=In the intervening quarter-century, the Soviet Union has changed substantially. Our knowledge of the Soviet Union has changed as well. We all know that the traditional paradigm no longer satisfies, despite several efforts, primarily in the early 1960s (the directed society, totalitarianism without terror, the mobilization system) to articulate an acceptable variant. We have come to realize that models which were, in effect, offshoots of totalitarian models do not provide good approximations of post-Stalinist reality. |postscript=. Quote at p. 482}}</ref>

[[File:Stéphane Courtois (cropped).jpg|thumb|[[Stéphane Courtois]], one of the authors of ''[[The Black Book of Communism]]'']]
Some academics, such as [[Stéphane Courtois]] (''[[The Black Book of Communism]]''), [[Steven Rosefielde]] (''[[Red Holocaust (2009 book)|Red Holocaust]]''), and [[Rudolph Rummel]] (''[[Death by Government]]''), wrote of mass, excess deaths under Marxist–Leninist regimes. These authors defined the political repression by communists as a "[[Communist democide]]", "Communist genocide", "Red Holocaust", or followed the "victims of Communism" narrative. Some of them compared Communism to [[Nazism]] and described deaths under Marxist–Leninist regimes (civil wars, deportations, famines, repressions, and wars) as being a direct consequence of Marxism–Leninism. Some of these works, in particular ''The Black Book of Communism'' and its 93 or 100 millions figure, are cited by [[Political groups of the European Parliament|political groups]] and [[Members of the European Parliament]].{{r|Ghodsee 2014}}<ref>{{cite book |last=Neumayer |first=Laure |author-link=Laure Neumayer |year=2018 |title=The Criminalisation of Communism in the European Political Space after the Cold War |location=London |publisher=[[Routledge]] |isbn=978-1-351-14174-1}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Neumayer |first=Laure |author-link=Laure Neumayer |date=November 2018 |title=Advocating for the Cause of the 'Victims of Communism' in the European Political Space: Memory Entrepreneurs in Interstitial Fields |journal=[[Nationalities Papers]] |volume=45 |number=6 |pages=992–1012 |doi=10.1080/00905992.2017.1364230 |s2cid=158275798 |doi-access=free}}</ref> Without denying the tragedy of the events, other scholars criticise the interpretation that sees communism as the main culprit as presenting a biased or exaggerated anti-communist narrative. Several academics propose a more nuanced analysis of Marxist–Leninist rule, stating that anti-communist narratives have exaggerated the extent of political repression and censorship in Marxist–Leninist states and drawn comparisons with what they see as atrocities that were perpetrated by [[capitalist countries]], particularly during the Cold War. These academics include [[Mark Aarons]],<ref>{{cite book |last=Aarons |first=Mark |author-link=Mark Aarons |date=2007 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dg0hWswKgTIC&pg=PA69 |chapter=Justice Betrayed: Post-1945 Responses to Genocide |editor1-last=Blumenthal |editor1-first=David A. |editor2-last=McCormack |editor2-first=Timothy L. H. |url=http://www.brill.com/legacy-nuremberg-civilising-influence-or-institutionalised-vengeance |title=The Legacy of Nuremberg: Civilising Influence or Institutionalised Vengeance? (International Humanitarian Law) |publisher=[[Martinus Nijhoff Publishers]] |pages=[https://books.google.com/books?id=dg0hWswKgTIC&pg=PA71 71], [https://books.google.com/books?id=dg0hWswKgTIC&pg=PA81 80–81] |isbn=978-90-04-15691-3 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170525090909/https://brill.com/legacy-nuremberg-civilising-influence-or-institutionalised-vengeance |archive-date=25 May 2017 |url-status=dead |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref> [[Noam Chomsky]],<ref>{{cite web|last=Chomsky |first=Noam |author-link=Noam Chomsky |title=Counting the Bodies |work=Spectrezine |access-date=18 September 2016 |url=http://spectrezine.org/global/chomsky.htm |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160921084037/http://www.spectrezine.org/global/chomsky.htm |archive-date=21 September 2016}}</ref> [[Jodi Dean]],<ref>{{cite book |last=Dean |first=Jodi |author-link=Jodi Dean |date=2012 |title=The Communist Horizon |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kBghOq42S3YC&pg=PA6 |publisher=Verso |pages=6–7 |isbn=978-1-84467-954-6 |access-date=3 December 2020 |archive-date=17 October 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211017084656/https://books.google.com/books?id=kBghOq42S3YC&pg=PA6 |url-status=live |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref> [[Kristen Ghodsee]],<ref name="Ghodsee 2014">{{cite journal |last=Ghodsee |first=Kristen |author-link=Kristen Ghodsee |date=Fall 2014 |url=https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/kristenghodsee/files/history_of_the_present_galleys.pdf |title=A Tale of 'Two Totalitarianisms': The Crisis of Capitalism and the Historical Memory of Communism |journal=History of the Present: A Journal of Critical History |volume=4 |number=2 |pages=115–142 |doi=10.5406/historypresent.4.2.0115 |jstor=10.5406/historypresent.4.2.0115 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211031180121/https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/kristenghodsee/files/history_of_the_present_galleys.pdf |archive-date=31 October 2021 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="Ghodsee & Sehon 2018">{{cite magazine|last1=Ghodsee |first1=Kristen R. |author-link1=Kristen Ghodsee |last2=Sehon |first2=Scott |author-link2=Scott Sehon |editor-last=Dresser |editor-first=Sam |date=22 March 2018 |url=https://aeon.co/essays/the-merits-of-taking-an-anti-anti-communism-stance |title=The merits of taking an anti-anti-communism stance |magazine=[[Aeon (digital magazine)|Aeon]] |access-date=11 February 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211008113511/https://aeon.co/essays/the-merits-of-taking-an-anti-anti-communism-stance |archive-date=8 October 2021 |url-status=live}}</ref> [[Seumas Milne]],{{r|Milne 2002}}{{r|Milne 2006}} and [[Michael Parenti]].{{sfn|Parenti|1997}} Ghodsee, [[Nathan J. Robinson]],<ref>{{cite news |last=Robinson |first=Nathan J. |author-link=Nathan J. Robinson |date=25 October 2017 |url=https://www.currentaffairs.org/news/2017/10/how-to-be-a-socialist-without-being-an-apologist-for-the-atrocities-of-communist-regimes |title=How To Be A Socialist Without Being An Apologist For The Atrocities Of Communist Regimes |work=[[Current Affairs (magazine)|Current Affairs]] |access-date=13 August 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211020044217/https://www.currentaffairs.org/2017/10/how-to-be-a-socialist-without-being-an-apologist-for-the-atrocities-of-communist-regimes |archive-date=20 October 2021 |url-status=live}}</ref> and [[Scott Sehon]] wrote about the merits of taking an [[anti anti-communist]] position that does not deny the atrocities but make a distinction between [[anti-authoritarian]] communist and other socialist currents, both of which have been victims of repression.{{r|Ghodsee & Sehon 2018}}<ref>{{cite news |last=Klein |first=Ezra |author-link=Ezra Klein |date=7 January 2020 |url=https://www.vox.com/podcasts/2020/1/7/21055676/nathan-robinson-ezra-klein-socialism-bernie-sanders |title=Nathan Robinson's case for socialism |website=[[Vox (website)|Vox]] |access-date=13 August 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210813101444/https://www.vox.com/podcasts/2020/1/7/21055676/nathan-robinson-ezra-klein-socialism-bernie-sanders |archive-date=13 August 2021 |url-status=live}}</ref>