06.11.2008: Climate Protection Program of the MLPD

1. Immediate measures are necessary

Dear reader,

Time is running out for our environment and our climate – although humankind has never before

had such well-developed possibilities for living in harmony with nature at a high technological and

cultural level.

The greed for profit of a small group of international supermonopolies, which dominate the world

economy and world politics, boycotts the safeguarding of the existential foundations of humanity.

They earn billions in profits with wasting energy. They prefer to wage wars for energy reserves than

to research into renewable energies and the saving of energy in the interest of humankind. Success

has been and is possible through courageous citizens’ protests and the active resistance of the

masses of people. In this way, the construction of single nuclear power stations, coal-fired power

stations, waste incineration plants and the incineration of Australian toxic waste in Germany could

be prevented. However, in order to stop the already beginning transformation into a climate

catastrophe an internationally coordinated environmental movement with the working class as

the solid core has to be developed. It must comprise millions of people worldwide. The MLPD

supports the building of an international front of resistance for saving the environment from

the greed for profit! Immediate measures are urgently necessary – at the expense of the profits

of the monopolies! Everyone can contribute to this – you are also needed!

In order to make comprehensive use of science and technology in the service of the people and to

achieve the stabile unity of man and nature once again, the productive forces must be freed from the

fetters of the capitalist mode of production and be fully developed in socialism. A socialist society

will develop a planned and conscious treatment of natural resources. Because it’s basic principle is

to fulfill the needs of the people and the following generations.

I would like to cooperate with you for this aim!

Your Günther Bittel, M.D.

2. The climate catastrophe threatens

humanity!

„Responding appropriately to climate change“ is one of the standard expressions in the publicity

campaigns of the energy and automotive corporations and of the government in Berlin. They can no

longer deny the destructive development of the earth’s climate. While they are actually the ones

who are responsible!

The main cause is the release of vast amounts of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide through the

combustion of coal, mineral oil and natural gas and the clearing of forests. The phenomena of a

chronic environmental crisis, that means of an accelerated phase of the destruction of the soil,

water, air, flora and fauna affecting all basic conditions of human life, had already become evident

at the beginning of the 1980s. Meanwhile a qualitative transformation to a global climate and

environmental catastrophe has begun and continues at an accelerated pace. The destruction of the

natural metabolism has reached such an extent that it is losing its equilibrium, which can destroy the

foundations of all of human existence and production.

Neither playing down the situation by calling it “climate change” to which you might be able to

adapt, nor panic and a “doomsday mood” are helpful. We rely on active resistance to push through

immediate effective measures.

The living activity of plants has trapped carbon dioxide from the atmosphere in the form of coal,

mineral oil, and natural gas in the underground rock over hundreds of millions of years. Because of

the massively increased burning of these “fossil energy sources” by capitalist production, this

carbon dioxide is being released again and is covering the globe like a greenhouse roof. This leads

to the greenhouse effect which is bringing the world's climate out of balance.

Not sunspots nor cosmic radiation, but the pollution of the air with greenhouse gases has caused the

increase of the carbon dioxide content in the atmosphere from 280 ppm in 1870 to 381 ppm in

2006. This has already brought the world's climate out of balance. After the global warming of 1.2°

C in the last 50 years we will experience a rapid additional rise in temperature of 1 to 2° C.

With the already expected rise of the sea level, metropolises like Shanghai, Mumbai or Miami and

vast coastal regions as in Bangladesh will sink in the floods.

Glaciers and polar ice are melting at an accelerated pace, which will further increase the warming

because this leads to the reduced reflection of sunlight into the universe and will release gigantic

amounts of methane and carbon dioxide which until now have been trapped in the earth. The supply

with drinking water for more than two billion people, which is being supplied by the glaciers and

rivers in the mountains, is acutely endangered. The worldwide extinction of about 30 percent of all

species has set in. The clearing and drying up of the tropical forests is advancing. All of these

factors are intensifying each other with catastrophic consequences.

It is not too late yet!

The implementation of a drastic

reduction in the emission of greenhouse gases of 70 to 90

percent until 2030 is necessary to prevent a climate catastrophe.

This can only be achieved through worldwide active mass resistance at the expense of the

profits of the monopolies!

3. The main polluters and profiteers of the

climate catastrophe are the international

supermonopolies

In the international competitive struggle, environmental technology is developing to become a “big

competitive hit” for the German monopolies. That is the sole purpose of their research and

development. The focus of their profits is the increase in the combustion of fossil resources, nuclear

energy and waste incineration. On the international level a fierce battle has already begun among

the corporations and governments over the mineral resources that will become accessible with the

thawing of the Arctic and the Siberian perma-ice.

The Federal Association of German Industry stated in a study that Bangladesh probably must be

given up because of flooding. This means the loss of lives or displacement for millions of people!

However, in return for this, new sources of raw materials would become accessible in Siberia and

Canada. What cold-blooded and inhumane logic!

Their big advertisements for climate protection cannot undo the fact that the four energy

monopolies in Germany alone (RWE, Vattenfall, E.on and EnBW) are planning the construction of

about 40 new big coal-fired and gas-fired power stations within the next 15 years. They cynically

propagate these, as well as nuclear power plants, as being a contribution to climate protection.

However, a green label does not necessarily mean a green content. The international monopolies are

responsible for more than 70 percent of the emissions of greenhouse gases worldwide. The ten

biggest international mineral oil monopolies alone reaped maximum profits of more than 180

billion dollars in 2007. With these profits a far-reaching conversion to renewable energies within

one decade could be paid for!

Active resistance has achieved first success: The German energy monopolies are complaining

that they cannot push through the construction of about 40 percent of the big power plants

they are planning due to active resistance. To implement an immediate and general halt of the

construction of new big fossil power plants, a nationwide interconnection of resistance must

be developed. In close unity with the working-class movement, this includes the struggle for

substitute jobs for the miners and the employees in the energy sector. On the international

level, a far-reaching ban on the combustion of fossil energy sources (mineral oil, natural gas

and coal) step by step is necessary – but not at the expense of the workers, but in unity with

the struggle for their jobs!

Oil monopolies like BP and Shell are presenting themselves as pioneers of renewable energies.

Actually, less than one percent of their turnover and investments are linked to renewable energies.

In the 1980s an immense release of CFC1 that had destroyed the protective ozone layer could be

stopped to a large extent by an international militant environmental movement. In the view of the

monopolies, this should not happen again with the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide. They do

everything they can to prevent their profitable business from being ruined. Shell, BP, Exxon, Ford,

Texaco, General Motors, DaimlerChrysler, Amoco, etc. founded the “Global Climate Alliance”2 in

1989 in order to present themselves as advocates of environmental protection at the World Climate

Conferences since 1992, while at the same time preventing the binding reduction of harmful

emissions of greenhouse gases.

Instead, worldwide trade with “pollution allowances” was agreed upon, which has been deceivingly

explained to the world public as “measures for climate protection”. With these “pollution

allowances” the monopolies get the legal right to further release carbon dioxide into the air at the

expense of other parts of society.

And so the RWE Company was given these rights by the German state as a present, while it charged

the consumers for it with price increases, and so making extra profits of 1.8 billion euros in 2005

alone!

The trade with pollution allowances is a perverted instrument of the competition among the

imperialists, pushing the developing countries even deeper into neocolonial dependence. The

soaring prices for energy, raw materials and agricultural products are deepening the neocolonial

dependence of exactly those countries from which the imperialists are robbing all these raw

materials and mercilessly destroying their environment. And so the struggle for independent control

over the resources and wealth of a country also becomes a key issue in the struggle against

imperialism and neocolonialism.

1

2

. CFC were used e.g. as cooling agents.

a cynical name for concealing the real purpose.

4. The „climate protection policy“ of the

Federal Government is eco-fraud!

The Merkel government and Environmental Minister Gabriel like to present themselves as

international forerunners of climate protection. Their “climate protection program”, however,

proves to be imperialism dressed up as ecological protection, an uncompromising instrument in the

struggle against other imperialist rivals for intensifying neocolonial exploitation and oppression.

The promotion of monopoly profits, the striving for domination over raw materials and other

countries are of primary importance! Never before have so many new coal-fired power stations and

waste incineration plants been planned or constructed as under this government. Just like the

extension of the operating lifetimes of nuclear power stations and the promotion of their export, this

is demagogically claimed to be “climate protection”. Instead of taking immediate effective

measures, the monopolies are being protected, the masses of people are forced to pay the bill and

environmentally destructive technologies like “biofuel” are being promoted. The “climate

protection program” of the government actually follows the guidelines of the Federal Association of

German Industry: Germany is supposed to play a leading role worldwide in the production and sale

of “environmental” technology, while at the same time increasing the profits from the combustion

of fossil fuels, waste incineration and nuclear power and the further plundering of raw materials.

According to the Merkel government, the emission of carbon dioxide (CO2) shall be reduced by 30

to 40 percent until 2020. However, a “reduction” of 20 percent has already been achieved by taking

1990, with the collapse of the devastated economy of the GDR, as the year of reference.

All measures like eco-taxes, environmental stickers for cars or energy passes for houses have in

common that the impression is given that decisive action is being taken, while in reality only the

masses of people are expected to pay. The monopolies as the main cause are being left out. Instead

of broadly extending the public transportation system, the privatization of the environmentally

compatible railway system is being promoted. This leads to soaring prices for the population,

dismantling of unprofitable railway lines and soaring profits for investors.

The majority of people are very willing to contribute to the protection of the natural

resources, to separate waste, to care for nature and animals! If the environment is to be saved

from the greed for profit, this must be combined with active resistance. In opposition to the

hypocrisy of the federal government, immediate measures at the expense of the profits have to

be pushed through in struggle. The ban on the underground storage of carbon dioxide and on

the ecologically harmful “biofuel” is necessary. No privatization of the railway and the

railway network! Expansion of local and national public transport, free use of local public

transport!

5. Lessons from the betrayal of the Greens

Since the beginning of the 1970s, the environmental movement has contributed to the development

of a widespread ecological consciousness. Many activists of the Greens also played an important

role in this. Starting as tigers, the Greens have now become bedside rugs. They were lured by

parliamentary seats, positions in government and business. Their attempt to reconcile themselves

with capitalism and to place ecological and social constraints on it by conforming has failed.

The betrayal of the militant environmental movement through the leadership of the Greens has

caused many honest environmental activists to become disappointed and resign. The newly

developing environmental movement can only be consolidated and broadened if it draws

fundamental conclusions from this betrayal.

On the basis of bourgeois parliamentarism, careerism and anticommunism a successful

international environmental movement is not possible! On the contrary: On this basis it

cannot even develop or it will be destroyed.

“Think globally – act globally” must be the motto of today. The MLPD is committed to

developing an international front of resistance to save the environment from the greed for

profit. Its trademark must be democratic principles, financial independence,

“Ueberparteilichkeit” (a status above party lines) and openness regarding world outlook.

The development of the Greens was a very slow process of the subordination to the ruling powers.

Starting as petty-bourgeois protest movement, it is now a bourgeois monopoly party which has

become interesting not only for the SPD (Social Democratic Party of Germany), but also for the

CDU (Christian Democratic Union) as a provider of parliamentary majorities.

The much acclaimed “grassroots democracy” turned out to be a farce. While the rank and file led

intensive discussions, party strategists like Joschka Fischer or Jürgen Trittin had already made the

decisions for a long time and systematically abandoned and betrayed the goals of the party.

In his function as the “Green” Minister of the Environment, Jürgen Trittin made waste incineration

the rule for the treatment of waste not only in Germany, but also on the European-wide level. It was

completely in the sense of the energy monopolies when the party council of the Greens decided in

September 2008 that old coal-fired power stations should continue to operate and that new ones

could be constructed if the carbon dioxide emissions were treated by equipping the power stations

with the technology for capturing and storing the greenhouse gases. It is a procedure with which

especially the RWE Company wants to reap maximum profits in future. However, it is similarly

unsafe and dangerous for the future of humanity as is the storage of nuclear waste. The Green

Environmental Senator Anja Hajduk in Hamburg, however, is not even obliged to abide by these

decisions. She authorized the construction of the coal-fired power station Moorburg “for legal

reasons” – even though the rank and file of the Greens had conducted an active election campaign

against “coal from Beust”.

The subordination to the “factual constraints” of capital and the attempt to urge the SPD to become

an “ecological” and “social” policy had to result in the Greens themselves becoming a monopoly

party.

Large parts of the leadership of the Greens expressed real hostility towards the working class and its

world outlook, Marxism-Leninism: anticommunist reservations, hostility towards the workers,

masses and organizations, individualism, rejection of binding principles, limitation of the activities

to projects and issues to those in your backyard were all transported into the environmental

movement. In a process of cooperation on a democratic basis, on a basis of equality and openness

regarding world outlook, these subtly working characteristics can be overcome and trust and

confidence can be developed. This is indispensable for the hard, selfless common struggle against

the highly organized international finance capital to push through effective measures for the

protection of the environment.

6. Struggle for the realization of regenerative

power generation and the immediate shutdown

of all nuclear power plants!

It is possible and necessary to increase the percentage of renewable energy in electricity production

to 100 percent until 2020, if the complete potential is used consistently. The claim that it is

technically impossible or would be much too expensive is a fairy tale of the energy companies and

their ideologists.

Alone from the profits of the ten biggest oil monopolies in the year 2007 of 180 billion US-dollars,

450 000 wind power plants producing 600 kilowatts could be installed. Arithmetically they could

produce twice the demand in electricity of Germany (2007). With the profits of the international

energy monopolies within ten years, the entire worldwide demand in electricity could be shifted to

renewable energy. Whereas the energy monopolies get 21 -23 cents/kwh from the consumer, the

small wind power plant suppliers get only 9 cents/kwh. Solar thermal power can be produced and

transported for 5 cents/kwh. This shows that regenerative energy is available at low costs, but not

the monopoly prices of the energy monopolies.

Different techniques of storage ranging from pump storage stations to accumulator systems and to

the production of hydrogen allow a stable supply of electricity independent of the seasons or the

sun’s position. Intensive further research on renewable energy and possibilities of storage is

necessary, as well as the transition to a cheap high-voltage direct-current power grid, by which the

transportation of electricity over thousands of kilometers with almost no loss would be possible.

Solar energy is available in abundance worldwide. Every day it delivers more than 10,000 times of

the worldwide consumption of energy on earth. The possibilities of its use were never as matured as

they are today. It is cheap and it creates jobs. Applied for the benefit of humankind, it could offer a

good basis of life for more than 6.5 billion people in harmony with the protection of nature. Not the

lacking technical capacities are the main obstacle. It is especially the imperialist power politics and

the urge for nuclear weapons of annihilation, which presently force the leading imperialists and the

international monopolies to play the card of the nuclear industry and to sell this as a "CO2-free

alternative" and "indispensible climate protection" - a deadly fraud: Even during "normal operation"

nuclear power plants increase the radioactive contamination of the population. Until today it is not

possible to store radioactive waste in a "secure" way. Much more energy is needed to construct

nuclear power plants, to mine, transport and enrich the uranium and for the necessary storage of

radioactive waste than these ever produce. With the extension of the running times of the old

reactors, an enduring chain of "cases of disruption" in nuclear power plants occurred and the danger

of a new "biggest possible accident" like in Chernobyl is increasing!

Immediate shutdown of all nuclear power plants! Comprehensive introduction of a 100

percent regenerative power generation – within about 15 years at the expense of those who

ran it till then!

7. Ban on waste incineration – for a change to

closed-loop economy!

Substances and matter cannot be annihilated, but can only be transformed. The metabolic process in

nature is organized in cycles „without waste”. Human productive activity must also be organized

according to this principle: Instead of the overexploitation of resources and raw material, instead of

piling up gigantic mountains of waste or waste incineration, all substances must be recycled

completely. Comprehensive closed-loop economy is therefore the order of the day!

An increase of waste incineration is being promoted in Germany in spite of popular resistance. 73

waste incineration plants are in operation in the year 2007 and dozens more are being planned.

Supported by the Federal Government, German waste monopolies like Remondis and E.on want to

expand the business with waste incineration and waste transport to become a worldwide business.

With constantly new tricks, like changing the name to “surrogate fuel plants” and with lies about the

allegedly so tiny emissions with high incineration temperatures, they try to break resistance. Waste

incineration annihilates valuable raw materials. The energy yield is extremely small. In the interest

of present and future generations raw materials must be preserved. Progressive recycling

technologies, like cryogenic (cold) recycling and the biological-mechanical treatment of waste,

make it possible to take decisive steps for recycling plastic, electronic scrap and bio-waste and, with

that, to close the cycle of substances. They are being suppressed in order to guarantee maximum

profits for the waste monopolies.

Alone the introduction of this method of recycling on a broad scale could create more than 100,000

new jobs in Germany.

Gigantic mountains of waste, as for instance in Naples in early 2008, and the international extension

of waste incineration lead to a drastic increase of cancer and allergies.

The struggle for an international ban on waste incineration and dumping has to be connected

with the struggle for a comprehensive introduction of recycling processes like cryogenic

recycling.

People must go beyond local protests against waste incineration and take up the common

struggle for a change to closed-loop economy and renewable energies. This can become the

common concern and binding link of the new environmental movement and could create

hundreds of thousands of jobs.

The 'ueberparteilich'

(above party lines) “Citizens’ Movement for Cryogenic Recycling and

Closed-Loop Economy”, for instance, is struggling for this. The movement arose from the

joint forces of militant miners, citizens' initiatives against waste incineration and critical

scientists. (www.total-recycling.org)

8. Struggle worldwide for the protection of the

environment and for jobs – working-class and

environmental movement united

The necessary worldwide resistance to rescue the planet from the climate and environmental

catastrophe can only be won in a determined and hard struggle with blockades, mass

demonstrations and strikes. As the carriers of the most advanced production procedures and of

industrial large-scale production, the workers not only have the knowledge and an interest in

environmentally compatible production and healthy work sites. Worldwide they are also often at the

very forefront in environmental struggles with their level of organization, their experience in

struggle and their determination, and they are taking on a leading role.

For decades, future technologies have been delayed at the cost of large numbers of jobs and

damage to our health. The struggle for the protection of the environment through new

technologies of closed-loop economy and the struggle for jobs belong together. The workingclass

and trade-union movement can and must become the solid backbone of the

environmental movement.

If the struggle of the workforces, especially those in the big international enterprises, is

combined with the active resistance of the masses and the international environmental

movement, then a stronger force can be posed against the greed for profit of the monopolies.

This will push through the necessary immediate measures for saving the environment

worldwide.

9. The protection of the climate, the

environment and of health – an inseparable

unity

Health problems have increased tremendously, most of all because of traffic chaos, fine dust, toxic

substances in food and housing material, as well as electric smog. The increase of cancer, allergies

and illnesses of the nervous system are the result. The destruction of human health as a result of the

destruction of our environment and habitats is becoming more and more apparent. Physical and

psychological illnesses, deformities and mortalities on a mass scale are the consequence! Scarcity of

drinking water, hunger and spreading epidemics in connection with the beginning transition to a

global climate catastrophe are increasingly threatening all spheres of life worldwide.

Fine dusts and ultra-fine dusts have increased considerably along with the increase of combustion

processes in traffic, energy and production. Through the lung, they invade the blood circulation and

the brain and transport toxic substances on their surfaces. According to official information, every

year in the European Union 100,000 people die as a result. The changes of the climate and the mild

winters favor the reproduction of pathogenic germs, as for instance malaria. The strain on health

from new pathogenic germs is increasing. Permissible limits for the exposure dose from the

radiation of mobile phones and mobile communication are much too high and, in the long run, have

detrimental effects on the health of children and young people. The increase of environmentally

caused problems of health intensifies the double burden of women and families. Stress on the job

and the care for children and sick people become a test of endurance. The struggle for the protection

of the environment and healthy living conditions are important issues of the militant women's

movement. The achievement of thorough preventative medicine and medical care free of charge are

common goals of women and environmentalists.

Twelve billion people could be supplied with food in harmony with nature, if not monopoly profit

were the criterion. The social protest movement, the movements of the environmentalists, the

women and the working-class are united by the interest to struggle against hunger and for healthy

and affordable food.

Comprehensive alternatives for a life in good health, without giving up justified needs, are already

maturing. A struggle is necessary for state and municipal programs for energy economization,

reconstruction of old houses, solar and low-energy housing, financed by a tax on the profits of the

monopolies.

Today women, adolescents, unionists, farmers, tenants, environmental activists, alternative

municipal politicians, people from diverse movements are already active.

We are challenged to transform the knowledge about the connection of the manifold

environmental and day-to-day questions into an organized power of the common and

interconnected mass resistance.

10. Proposal for a Crash Program

The international united front for saving the environment must have its firm basis in the workforces

of the big corporate factories. These will take a leading role, making use of their knowledge, their

level of organization, their international connections and their power. Unity in diversity,

connections with different social, anti-imperialist and militant movements are important trump

cards of this movement. The MLPD proposes:

1.

Immediate measures to lower the emission of greenhouse gases

•

For a crash program to introduce a 100 percent usage of regenerative energies at the expense

of monopoly profits!

•

Drastic reduction of the emission of greenhouse gases by 70 to 90 percent until 2030!

•

Stop the construction of new big fossil-fuel power plants!

•

Ban the combustion of fossil energy carriers step by step!

•

Ban on carbon trade!

•

Ban the storage of CO2 and the production of agrarian fuels from intensive agriculture!

•

Ban waste incineration – for new recycling procedures like cryogenic recycling and

integrated methanation and composting!

•

Immediate shutdown of all nuclear power plants worldwide!

•

For an immediate transition to closed-loop economy!

2.

Protection of the environment in factories and neighborhoods

•

Struggle for sustainable production methods that are compatible with the environment and

health! Production of products that can be completely recycled!

•

Creation of new jobs for the protection of the environment and for closed-loop economy at

the expense of profits!

•

Immediate introduction of cars with zero emissions and new pollutant-free energy carriers

like hydrogen and the construction of the necessary public power supply nets!

•

Expansion of local and national public transport. Introduction of the free use of local public

transport! No privatization of the railway network and the railroads!

•

For municipal energy-saving, housing reconstruction and low-energy housing programs!

•

Drastic lowering of the limits for permissible radiation of the cellular phone network!

•

Thorough preventative medicine and medical care free of charge!

3.

International demands

•

Stop the deforestation of the tropical rain forest regions like in the Amazons!

•

Worldwide and complete ban on carcinogenic CFCs and drastic limits on the use of CHCs,

only in closed circles, so that the ozone layer can recuperate completely!

•

No devastation of the North Arctic Ocean, that will soon be free, through the exploitation of

the raw materials by the imperialist big powers! Proclamation of the entire Arctic Ocean as

an international protected area!

•

For international solidarity and the common struggle against international finance capital!

Strict punishment of the capitalist environmental criminals!

•

Solidarity with the liberation struggle of the peoples for social and national liberation!

•

Save the environment from the greed for profit of the international monopolies!

11. Socialism – living in the constructive unity

of man and nature

From the very beginning socialists were committed and far-sighted environmental protectionists.

More than 100 years ago Karl Marx already stated: “Even a whole society, a nation, or even all

simultaneously existing societies taken together, are not the owners of the globe. They are only its

possessors, its usufructuaries, and, like boni patres familias, they must hand it down to succeeding

generations in an improved condition.”

(Marx/Engels, Capital, Vol. III, IV. in Collected Works pp.759-767)

The former socialist countries, especially the People’s Republic of China under Mao Tsetung, were

a model for environmental protection taking the given knowledge at that time into account.

Today in capitalism all prerequisites for a worldwide sustainable mode of economy have matured:

•

The most modern technology of closed-loop economy and scientific knowledge like bionics,

which combine the magnificent diversity of the “technical principles” of nature, from the

spider web to the transfer of information by proteins, with modern production;

•

The possibility of a worldwide coordinated production process, integrated material and

transportation circulation without emissions or rubbish and without wasting raw materials

and capacities;

•

A highly qualified, internationally interconnected working class;

•

A pronounced environmental consciousness in the population.

Whether they are made use of or not is a question of power.

Karl Marx already warned about the dangers which are connected to the growth of capitalist

production: “Capitalist production, therefore, develops technology, and the combining together of

various processes into a social whole, only by sapping the original sources of all wealth – the soil

and the labourer.” (Marx/Engels, Capital, Vol. I, 15 in Collected Works, p. 245).

Socialist building in China emphasized the unity of man and nature, “to develop its economy, build

up modern industry and agriculture, achieve its complete economic independence and improve the

environment step by step.” 3 Extensive protective areas were built with trees between industrial

plants and residential areas. The workers achieved changes in production in order to avoid exhaust

and toxic waste. They built pipelines from one factory to another in order to make use of production

substances which could not be used in their factory to send it to a neighboring factory. “There is no

such thing as waste, there is only unused material; there is nothing that cannot be made use of.” 4

Professor Dr. K. William Kapp made the following evaluation of environmental protection in Mao

Tsetung’s China: „In socialist construction the principle of the comprehensive use of waste is

regarded as a necessity. On the one hand, it helps and especially protects the social and physical

3

4

environment and so the health of the people, which is more important than the preservation of

material values. On the other hand, this principle offers the opportunity to abolish the traditional

division of labor and specialization. To put it short: it is, at the same time, environmental protection,

increase of production, decentralization of industry and the improvement of public health in the

cities and in the countryside.”5

These were revolutionary transformations which were destroyed again with the restoration of

capitalism in China. Today China is one of the world’s largest polluters, in opposition to which a

large number of the 90,000 demonstrations, struggles and uprisings of the Chinese people are taking

place every year.

The MLPD is convinced today that it is not too late to rescue our planet because human beings have

the ability to consciously alter nature, to recognize and make use of its laws and that humankind

does not want to perish in capitalist barbarism. Capitalism is historically outdated. Since its

founding in 1982, the MLPD has been fighting for saving the environment from the greed for profit

in its practical and theoretical work.

With the trade of “pollution allowances” at the international stock markets, even the air and

its pollution has become a commodity. Capitalist private ownership of the means of

production is the actual cause of the environmental problem and is a fetter for its solution. A

developed closed-loop economy and the conscious and careful treatment as a general societal

principle are possible if the fetters for the development of the productive forces, of science and

research which lie in the greed for profit are broken. That requires the abolition of

exploitation, oppression and the dictatorship of the international supermonopolies in genuine

socialism – the creation of the united socialist states of the world.

Statement of the Chinese speaker at the Stockholm Conference, „Peking Review“, 27 June 1972.

Hua Ching-yuan, „In Multipurpose Utilization for Materials, it is necessary to promote what is beneficial and eliminate,

what is harmful“, Peking Domestic Service, 6 September 1971

Holger Strohm, „Umweltschutz in der VR China“ (Environmental Protection in the People’s Republic of China), p. 80,

Verlag Association, Hamburg, 1978