I have been interested in the Juche Idea lately and read some texts. From what i can tell, one of the main components of the Juche idea is that the man is master, the maker of history and master of his destiny. This sentence by its own sounds quite un-materialist as it implicates that material conditions do not shape the man but vise-versa. BUT, what i think they mean is that, using dialectic-materialism, we can predict societal changes that will evolve in the future…similar to how we know that socialism will sometime ovetake capitalism as the anti-thesis (the proletariat) will assert dominance over the current (syn)thesis as it had happened similarly to former societal structures. Knowing how the wheel of history spins now has given us the ability to predict it and therefore the power to take our destiny into our own hands and shape history after our desire.
Is that what Juche is about? I havent touched much of actual theory on that matter but im interested to know if i have interpreted it right…if not, i would be more than happy to be educated on the Idea and how exactly the man is supposedly the shaper of history according to Juche.
I remember that there is a quote from Engels where he says that while the material conditions do have influence on humans, humans can and do influence the material conditions of the world.
If any comrade can find this quote and link it on a reply to my comment I would be grateful.
It is true that we can change our environments and therefore our material conditions but these man-made changes are again caused by material conditions leading to people changing their environments. That’s how history is and always has been, a cycle of material conditions influencing people to change their surroundings whose material conditions will cause other people to change their surroundings and so on…the question is what was the initiator of this cycle, was the man who made the first change leading to a change of material conditions or the material conditions which led the man to do the first change? I would say its the second as we, from my atheistic point of view, are results of nature, of millions of years of evolution. We did not always possess the ability to change our world how we want it, those who were born adjusted to their environments would survive, those who were not, would die…we, for a long time, had no say over our survival or nature but due to a chain of environmental changes, we started to develop bigger brains and the ability to analyze and use our environments to our advantage. First the material conditions allowing us to to gain the ability to change our material conditions came. We now are not anymore slaves of nature, of selective survival of those who are adjusted, we are now developed enough to help those in need, those who would not survive…we (mostly) have surpassed these harsh realities making us masters of our destiny, not letting us be dictated by forces we can harness. We have the power to save this planet or destroy it how it currently is under global capitalism. Primitivism, Conservatism, any form of regression is not and cannot be the answer without it undermining our social and/or technical achievements made.
i apologize for my outburst, this is not materialist, it is idealist and any good marxist should restrain himself from utopian idealist thought.
Knowing how the wheel of history spins now has given us the ability to predict it and therefore the power to take our destiny into our own hands and shape history after our desire.
I’m not an expert and still in the process of learning about this, but I would say your understanding of it here more or less lines up with my understanding from what I have read so far.
As I understand, Juche dismisses the idealist world outlook as groundless and also rejects mechanical materialism, and holds that the dialectical materialist view is the scientific view of the world. However, it is considered that merely holding a dialectical materialist view does not automatically cause people to start using it as a tool to change the world to humanity’s benefit, which is the question that the Juche idea is mainly concerned with: defining and promoting humanity’s role in changing the world, and increasing peoples’ consciousness of this role. As I understand it, Juche promotes the concept that humans (as a collective whole) not only can but should center themselves in changing the world to benefit them, within the real scientific limits of the world, i.e. with the knowledge of the laws of nature and society which operate independent of human’s will. This is seen as a necessary attitude in humanity’s emancipation from oppression, as simply having a dialectical materialist view does not necessarily cause people to start acting on humanity’s behalf even if it does give them an accurate scientific view of reality’s motion.
Texts about Juche seem to primarily focus on asserting that it is correct for humans to center their own needs in how they shape the world, and also focus on discussing humanity’s historical pursuit for independence and methods of preserving that independence when it is achieved through progressive revolutions, with the primary focus now being the struggle to end imperialism and capitalism and to defend and evolve socialism, in order to remove exploitation from society and continue on humanity’s path to pursuing independence from all restrictions, both natural and social, overcoming them with a methodical and scientific understanding combined with an attitude of intentionally centering human needs and desires in the way humanity consciously shapes the world.
If someone sees something wrong with my understanding, please let me know. I am still in the process of learning about this.
From my own limited understanding, you have captured much of its essence wonderfully.
