Kasama: Yay or Nay?

Here's a footnote from a book review

6 The Maoist Kasama Project, formed in 2007 as a minority split from the faltering RCP, is primarily made up of those who were unhappy with Avakian's "New Theoretical Synthesis" and his increased [!?] dogmatism. Their aim is a "reconception" of revolutionary theory and the role of the revolutionary organization (see footnote 4 for McMillan's description), and in doing so they pretend to be non-dogmatic, saying they are open to listening to people from other political traditions. Their support for the electoralist anti-Indian nationalists (disguised as a struggle against Indian capital) of the Communist Part of Nepal-Maoist should automatically remove them from being considered radical.

http://anarchymag.org/index.php/content/current-issue/39-latest-issue/82-the-beginning-of-the-american-fall

Nay.

I'm utterly mystified as to what the appeal of Maoism is in the West.

As shit as Trotskyism is at least it has some connection to the workers movement and has produced a few decent writers. Maoism gives you pointless cheerleading for the third world nationalist guerilla racket of the month and intellectual cretinism.

The appeal is precisely its lack of connection to lived experience, it's a symptom of alienation

a couple of years ago, there were quite a number of interesting articles, often written in a good journalistic style (e.g. about Ely's experience as an RCP organizer in a coal mine in the bible belt during the 1970ies or about local struggles in the US) but my impression is, that the "crisis" of their Nepalese comrades has hit them and that there are fewer and less interesting articles than e.g. 2-3 years ago ... they are also promoting the KOE which is a member org of SYRIZA (with 3 MPs) and sister party of the (awful) MLPD

Kasama seem politically much the same as their old RCP mother party, but are apparently a faction that split due to not being able to tolerate the crazy cultism/hero-worship of the Chairman Avakian church. They’ve been described as ‘soft-Maoism’. There is the occasional statement by a member that Kasama is not a Maoist project and that some members are apparently not Maoist; though if it weren’t for such rare statements one would think them clearly Maoist and there doesn’t seem to be any expressed critique of Maoism within the group.

They seem more eclectic and a looser alliance than a Party form. So without such narrow ideological limits being imposed they’ve had, eg, recent discussions of communisation articles on their site. But in practice their politics is a familiar leftism; they seem to put most energy into typical pro-maoist stuff like loyal support for Nepali Maoism. Despite slavishly promoting “Prachanda Path” for years as the world’s guiding revolutionary formula, defending their strike ban proposals and general reformism, inventing dubious excuses and falsehoods to defend Nepali party lines etc, Prachanda’s Party is now denounced as “revisionist”, but with no real analysis of how it came to be. Allegiance has now been transferred to the splitter Baidya faction’s new CPN-(M) Party. Kasama recently sent a delegate to the new Party’s first congress, where they shared a platform with delegates from the Chinese and North Korean states, which Kasama-ites strongly defended in response to criticisms such as this;

Some people just never learn – all the opportunism that led Dahal & Bhattarrai’s mother Party into their present situation – eg, the diplomatic games with India etc – is being created in mirror image by the Baidya split-off Party. And, predictably, the Western pro-maoists are already coming out with the same kind of lame excuses for it. Just as they did for the strike bans, wealth accumulation by the Party elite etc of the mother Party (even though the policies they once defended but are now implied to be ‘revisionist’ were present from the beginning of the 2005 Party program).

For Maoists, there was generally previously nothing more explicitly anti-Maoist, revisionist and counter-revolutionary than the Chinese CP for its role in ending what Maoists called ‘socialism’ in China. And during the Nepali guerilla war the Chinese CP denounced Prachanda & co as ‘not real Maoists’ and supplied weapons to the King to use against the guerrilla PLA. Yet in the blink of an eye, for the sake of simple political opportunism (characterised as ‘necessary realpolitik’) against their more pro-India Maoist rivals, all this is forgotten and Baidya’s Party are proclaimed by their devotees as great revolutionaries while getting into bed with the same people they denounced for decades as the “capitalist roaders” who crushed Chinese Maoism – and who helped kill Nepali Maoist PLA troops. Just as they were led by their uncritical devotion into for years loyally defending and excusing the most blatant hypocrisies and reformism of Prachanda’s Party, now they begin the same process with Baidya’s operation. All in the name of ‘necessary realpolitik’ of course. Undoubtedly if it had been Prachanda & co now sucking up to China then the revlefters & kasama-ites would be shouting in chorus; ‘Ah-ha! Yet more proof of their evil revisionism!’ [...]
http://kasamaarchive.org/2013/01/12/kasama-to-cpn-m-new-beginnings-on-the-communist-road/#comments

I think it depends on what exactly you want from them. In terms of politics its the usually Maoist line you can find elsewhere with some added sniping at Avakian and the RCP. But they do have the occasionally interesting historical document and article especially concerning groups associated with Maoism and there fascination with third world conflict means they can be useful in staying up to date in far away conflicts. Just don't let them be your only source of information if you do.

Bumping because it looks like the project folded http://www.kasamaproject.org/

Here's an archive https://kasamaarchive.org/ from the latest articles it looks like they were gearing up to cheer lead the Nepalese Maoists again.

I know the "project" was Maoist but I do remember the site had some interesting historical articles about slave revolts and Black Power, I'm going to add there Red Closet pamphlet to the library because I thinks its important, anyone think anything else on the site is worth saving?

Oh and I'm curious does anyone know what these guys are doing now?

Reddebrek

. . . anyone think anything else on the site is worth saving?

Another "nay."

This offspring of a fucked up cult can randomly be interesting, much like the occasional article in The New York Times or The Economist. Or how a broken clock is correct twice a day.

I still can't forget hearing RCP cadre preaching that homosexuality was "bourgeois decadence." In that sense, Maoists are the Donald Trumps of the Left.

Smoke weed in socialism?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5bahRhwpnM8

[youtube]5bahRhwpnM8[/youtube]

think there were a few other interesting pieces, e.g. https://kasamaarchive.org/2008/08/21/didnt-you-see-that-spirit-descend-shackles-in-the-bible-belt/