Consequently, Mao’s two essays can still be regarded as a major development of the philosophical theories of Marxism, Shi contends, a development manifesting its own particular characteristics. The latter judgement is supported by Shi by reference to three major differences between On Practice and On Contradiction and the Soviet texts on philosophy.
First, Mao’s two essays on philosophy were a model of the sinification and actualisation (xianshihua) of Marxism. Mao perceived Marxism as something more than an abstract body of principles, and On Contradiction and On Practice provide plentiful evidence of his attempt to integrate these principles with the concrete realities of the Chinese Revolution. Shi refers to Mao’s marginal notes in A Course on Dialectical Materialism to illustrate this point. Mao wrote, when he read the section on different contradictions requiring different methods for their resolution, “the national contradiction between China and Japan requires for its resolution a united front with the bourgeoisie”; and further on Mao wrote, “In normal times, the contradiction between labour and capital requires a united front of the workers. And in the contradiction between correct practice and incorrect tendency within the party and revolutionary ranks, the method of ideological struggle must be employed to achieve resolution”. Further examples of the kind appear to illustrate the manner in which Mao perceived the practical implications of this abstract principle.
Mao’s philosophical essays also are illustrative of the process of the sinification of Marxism insofar as they integrate Marxist philosophical concepts and ideas and those of traditional Chinese philosophy. In so doing, such traditional concepts and ideas were endowed with a scientific quality. Shi points to Mao’s employment in On Practice of the traditional philosophical category of knowledge and action (zhixingguari) and the way he linked this to knowledge (renshi) and practice. Similarly, in On Contradiction, Mao employed the traditional Chinese saying “things that oppose each other also complement each other” (xiangfan-xiangcheng) to explicate the concept of the identity of contradiction, and the law of the unity of opposites generally.
Second, not only is the philosophical framework employed by Mao in his two essays more tightly argued and complete than the Soviet sources, in terms of content many of his formulations, and much of his analysis and explanations, are clearer, more concise, systematic, and profound than the Soviet texts on philosophy. In making this claim, Shi refers to Mao’s ability in his marginal notes to summarise with great clarity and even more profoundly sections of the Soviet text. This quality was to be reflected in On Practice and On Contradiction, which were able to present concisely and with great lucidity major areas of Marxist philosophy.
