The Class Struggle, the Proletariat, and the Developing Nations

Abstract

The concepts of class struggle and the leadership of the proletariat figure high among the tenets of Marxist-Leninist ideology and strategy that Soviet theoreticians deem applicable to the developing areas of the world. “A new contingent of the world proletariat — young working class movement of the newly free, independent and colonial countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America — has entered the world arena,” asserted the 1961 Program of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. It is this newly emerging proletariat that hopefully is expected to convert the nationaldemocratic revolutions of Asia, Africa, and Latin America into genuine socialist revolutions of the Marxist-Leninist variety. Hence, the advancement of the working class and the promotion of class struggle have become major concerns of Soviet strategy and tactics in the Third World.