Page 187 - SELECTED WORKS OF LIU SHAOQI Volume I

ON INNER-PARTY STRUGGLE 183
This explains the necessity of inner-Party struggle.
Much has been said by Lenin and Stalin in their works with
regard to the necessity of inner-Party struggle and as to why liberalism
and conciliationism in the Party are no good. But you can read those
works yourselves, so I will not say more on this subject. The prob-
lem I want to talk about now is how to conduct inner-Party struggle.
This is a new problem for us and it is entirely necessary for everyone
of us to buckle down and begin studying it now. I do not propose
to speak on the problem comprehensively at this time, but I will merely
present my own views, based on my personal observations regarding
the experience of the Chinese Communist Party. I invite all comrades
to discuss whether or not these views are correct.

Ⅱ . THE SPECIAL CONDITIONS UNDER WHICH THE
CHINESE COMMUNIST PARTY WAS FOUNDED
AND THE DEVIATIONS THAT HAVE ARISEN IN ITS
INNER-PARTY STRUGGLE

Comrades!
What did Marx and Engels do for the world proletariat?
Marx and Engels provided the proletariat with a comprehensive
ideological and theoretical system. In addition, they also built an
independent organization for the proletariat, led its mass struggles
and created the First International. 126 In the early period after its
establishment, the Second International came under Engels’ guidance
127
and influence. Marx and Engels educated the working class and gave
it guidance on how to get organized and wage struggles.
During the period of the Second International (the period before
the First World War), the social-democratic parties in various coun-
tries engaged in widespread organizational activities among the work-
ers and launched extensive campaigns to organize the working class,
which were enormously successful. Since this was a period of capi-
talism’s “peaceful” development and the working-class organizations
were formed in such a period, the distinction between the Party and
the trade unions was not yet very clear. After the death of Engels,
the Second International, led by Kautsky and company, adopted an
inexcusable line of conciliation towards opportunism within the par-
ties of the Second International, with the result that opportunism