I’ve read the Communist Manifesto and found myself agreeing with the ideas presented. However, I’m left wondering: what’s the real point of studying Marxism-Leninism more deeply? It feels like the principles are clear, and it’s unlikely that a deeper understanding of them will lead to significant change.
It seems to me that content creators, like those from podcasts like Deprogram, have a more direct influence on people’s perspectives today. So, I’m curious, why should we invest time in studying these ideologies when there are more immediate ways to engage with and affect the world? What benefits can understanding Marxism-Leninism actually provide in today’s context?
It’s pretty important to read what revolutionary leaders have written about their strategies and their methods of organizing because some of them succeeded, while we haven’t (except the 2 Chinese posters on this site I guess, but I don’t think they were around in 1949). You can learn about the problems they identified with the organizations they had: opportunism, infiltration, dogmatism, tailism, liberalism, ultraleftism, etc. If you join an org today you’ll see all the same things, it’s pretty much a 100% guarantee. So figuring out how to navigate those things productively and build power, instead of just constantly hoping for your enemies to make mistakes and for people to spontaneously organize into socialism, is your best shot at building something positive.
A lot of theory has to do with broad questions of history and political economy that might not seem to be as practically minded as texts such as On Guerilla Warfare or What is to be Done, but those pieces of theory are also important for informing a revolutionary movement’s overall strategy and figuring out how to define a correct political line. Generally, it’s a good idea to decide on a solid foundation of how a movement sees its place in history and what its goals are; if you avoid backtracking from those goals for the sake of gaining more popularity (i.e. opportunism) and remain steadfast in that correct political line, your organization will be solid and will outlast others, so the masses will join you. That’s been the pattern with the most successful ML revolutionary organizations. Not to mention that fully understanding the nature of the system you’re trying to overthrow is helpful for various reasons; you don’t want to end up reinforcing the system by failing to understand some of its characteristics (e.g. anti-identitarian socialists who reject anti-racism who, if they were successful, would end up reinforcing class society across racial lines) or fail to identify cracks in its armor (e.g. understanding the mechanisms behind the boom and bust cycle allows a revolutionary labor movement to strike when it will hurt capitalists the most).