The Digital United Front (1/3)
Forging Unity in the People's War of Information
(This work is the first essay in a series of three, on the digitalization of Mao’s magic weapons: The United Front, the People’s Army, and the Party)
Regardless of how you feel about Mao, nearly everyone is able to accept that his words and his work have had an enduring power footprint on the world.
With respect to the United Front, he said:
If in any process there are a number of contradictions, one of them must be the principal contradiction playing the leading and decisive role, while the rest occupy a secondary and subordinate position. Therefore, in studying any complex process in which there are two or more contradictions, we must devote every effort to finding its principal contradiction. Once this principal contradiction is grasped, all problems can be readily solved. —On Contradiction
We begin with the understanding that the United Front is simply a broader force than the People’s Army itself; usually they are a response to an immediate threat or task, and they are therefore based upon that task. They are composed of a front- and rear-guard all working in unison against a common enemy, and we can see how identifying that common enemy, or principal contradiction, becomes paramount. This is true of the Digital United Front, too; in the age of information, there are simply more and more ways to be exploited. This changes the material balance of contradictions and may modify what the principal contradiction actually is, or rather, how it behaves.
Nonetheless, the Digital United Front is still a strategic alliance to isolate the primary enemy and unite all possible forces (based on some form of response to a necessity, primarily founded on shared material conditions — not an ideological unity). This can include any conventional or contemporary military forces, home fronts and logistics, organizations like trade unions, and even entirely digital entities like online newsletters, hacking groups, and so on.
The Digital Age makes the United Front more complex but also more crucial: in the increasing use of AI non-intelligence we find greater fragmentation of information, targeted propaganda, surveillance, and the exposition of the broader global nature of imperialist capital.
This work will explain why Mao’s principles of the United Front must be adapted and applied to the contemporary information landscape to build an effective alliance against global imperialism.
Redefining the Enemy in the Digital Sphere
Here the work is straightforward: the primary enemy to the broader movement is global imperialism, in both its digital and physical apparatus. In this we find the true ‘principal contradiction’, and it is indeed founded in class contradiction.
However, a United Front is developed in response to stimuli more specific than the broader ruling class (depending on the present stage in the People’s War).
An example of a force to be united against is Meta, and other platforms like it. Foucault said:
A body is docile that can be subjected, used, transformed and improved.
These massive collections of what we are well-aware of to be monitored surveillance systems are also serving a second interest to the state — they keep you deadlocked-in to your shit-brick of a cell phone, for as many hours of the day as you can possibly get away with.
In practice it is in the formal rejection of these platforms that we find an approach weldable with revolution. We must recognize the inherent contradictions within the consenting and unfruitful use of things like Instagram, Facebook, and even ChatGPT; the environmental impact alone is enough, but it comes along with the repression of the Global South for computational hardware and its resource extraction, mass exploitation of laborers for training LLMs and other monstrous models, all not to mention the researched numbing effects on the revolutionary mind put forth by this media. It has to stop. It’s literally not stable enough to continue.
The capitalist system requires a docile and disciplined workforce that can be subjected to the demands of production, exploited for its labor power, and “improved” in terms of efficiency and obedience. Surveillance (as a component of disciplinary power) helps to create and maintain these docile bodies, making them amenable to the rhythms and demands of capitalist production.
Some of the most significant forces at play are the Big Tech monopolies, being instruments of capital control and ideological dissemination. In their collaboration we see the sophisticated nature of modern imperialist propaganda and disinformation campaigns.
Identifying Potential Allies and Contradictions
As should all current Marxists, we attempt to make the transition from traditional classes to diverse social movements, such as the anti-war, environmental, racial justice, and queer rights movements. I find it simply encapsulated in the phrase “working and oppressed people” as the defenders and defended of Marxist thought.
A common critique of Marx’s value-theory of labor is that it is ill-defined in the objective-subjective sense when it comes to digital labor. Where is the material gain of software?
We contend that, through both the massive extraction of resources to build computational hardware and the numerous efficiencies, new techniques, and adaptations that result from successful software modifications, there exists a digital proletariat that produces real material/economic surplus from purely digital labor.
It then goes without saying that, under our current late-imperialist framework, the so-called digital proletariat is indeed heavily exploited. Along with it is the class structure of those marginalized by algorithmic capitalism, including the disabled, queer, poor, and those of color.
Mao’s concept of identifying the ‘principal contradiction’ (beyond class contradiction, if not including it) is crucial for effective United Front work. In the digital sphere, where information flows rapidly and alliances shift, this means strategically discerning the core conflict from the myriad of tangential debates and secondary issues.
The principal contradiction is the fundamental, decisive struggle that shapes the overall context and without whose resolution, other issues cannot be effectively addressed. It’s the axis around which all other conflicts resolve.
Specifically in the digital front, we contend that there are (at least) four potential principal non-class contradictions: against algorithmic bias and discrimination; combating state-sponsored disinformation; pervasive digital surveillance; and the environmental impact of digital infrastructure.
If a movement’s core struggle is against how algorithms perpetuate and amplify societal inequalities (in hiring, policing, credit scores), then the principal contradiction might be the opacity and unaccountability of tech giants and their data practices, versus the promise of ‘objective’ digital systems.
There is evidence found for this in hiring algorithms, which systematically are found to discriminate against women or certain racial groups; the same can be said of facial recognition software, healthcare algorithms, and loan applications/credit scores.
If technology is supposedly objective, then it shouldn’t serve to reproduce and deepen existing social inequalities, which are fundamentally rooted in the capitalist system. The “digital” becomes another mechanism for capital to rationalize and intensify discrimination, presenting it as an inevitable outcome of data, rather than a social construct.
In a context where state actors are actively spreading false narratives to suppress dissent or manipulate public opinion, the principal contradiction is the state’s control over information and its mechanisms for spreading disinformation versus the pursuit of collective understanding and action.
Here we find evidence of this contradiction in foreign influence campaigns (especially online), domestic online propaganda, and “fake news” laws and censorship (which is sometimes itself framed to combat disinformation).
This contradiction reveals the struggle for ideological hegemony in the digital age. The ruling class, often operating through the state, seeks to control the narrative and shape consciousness to maintain its power and prevent collective organization.
Disinformation isn’t just about misleading; it’s about atomizing the working class, sowing division, and preventing the development of a unified, revolutionary understanding of societal problems.
If the primary issue is the state’s all-encompassing surveillance of the proletariat, we find the corresponding contradiction to be one of pervasive digital surveillance versus the right to privacy and autonomy.
This contradiction is evidenced by data collection by corporations, government surveillance, ‘smart’ devices (which constantly collect data about users’ lives), and even workplace monitoring, which is an aspect of the alienation of labor under capitalism.
Here we find that the increasing subjugation of the individual to the demands of capital and the state is facilitated by digital technology. Privacy and autonomy (bourgeois ideals) become increasingly unattainable as every aspect of human life is digitized and converted into data, a new form of capital to be accumulated and controlled. For the proletariat, this surveillance isn’t just about privacy; it’s about the ability of capital to optimize exploitation, predict and suppress dissent, and ultimately exert greater control over the labor-power and consciousness of individuals.
The last movement is that of environmentalism, with their digital contradiction being the environmental impact of such infrastructure versus the ‘dematerialized’ illusion of the digital age.
Data centers are the prime illustration of physical demands of objects such as the ‘cloud’. They use enormous amounts of energy, water, space (in electronic waste due to obsolescence), and rare earth minerals.
This contradiction shatters the illusion of the digital world as a clean, dematerialized space. It exposes the hidden material basis of the digital economy and how it directly contributes to the ecological crisis driven by capitalist production. The incessant demand for new devices, faster networks, and more data storage, fueled by capitalist competition and planned obsolescence, intensifies the extraction of natural resources and the generation of waste. There are finite limits to this planet.
Secondary contradictions are important issues, but they are subordinate to the principal one. They may be related, but their resolution depends on or is amplified by addressing the primary conflict. Engaging with them before or instead of the principal contradiction can dilute effort, fragment alliances, and distract from the main objective.
In a digital context, this can include internal debates, tangential issues, divisive topics, and ephemeral trends — simply fleeting controversies that, while generating traffic, do not contribute to long-term strategic goals.
Specifically this could pertain to debates over specific hashtag usage, criticism of an allied organization’s internal structure or minor missteps, focusing on individual ‘bad actors’ rather than the system enabling them, or even arguments over niche ideological interpretations (yeah, my bad).
There is great challenge to be found in identifying genuine allies versus opportunists or agents and provocateurs in decentralized networks. The key is to accept that they will always exist, and over time and application of theory, you will learn how to discern them much more easily.
Principles and Tactics for a Digital United Front
In understanding of Mao’s Mass Line, we find a great importance, especially in the Digital Age, to listening, synthesizing, and disseminating information found through the dialectic process.
There are numerous methods for the party to gather intelligence and sentiment from online masses, but there should be a good balance between the opposing forces of online visibility (and therefore targetability) and effective presence/density (and therefore the amount of work that can actually get done). Disciplined approaches must be employed: find party members with experience in digital security, and leave them to monitor digital spaces like newsletters, accounts, and calls to action. They must answer to a centralized structure that consistently views reports on the security and breadth of the party’s online presence. Files must be managed with a professional level of said security.
There are also countless tools and algorithms available for online feedback loops and collective decision-making. While not strictly necessary, this is a powerful tactic for the broader digital united front in ensuring rapid unity and dissemination of decided/voted information.
There is a great strength in adapting revolutionary messaging for diverse online audiences without diluting principles. One can employ a way to speak, as one of my comrades recently mentioned, with ‘quiet, honest discipline’; in this straightforward style you will quickly find the revolutionary tone.
In strategic alliance-building in networked spaces, we find that the party should leverage social media and encrypted platforms for cross-movement coordination.
There should be bridges built between online activism and offline direct action. A careful distinction must be made in terms of security culture when inviting an individual found in a social media space to an encrypted space.
As a party, when forming the broader digital united front, there is a deep art of principled negotiation and maintaining organizational independence within allied collectives.
In addition, in order to engage in information warfare and counter ideological subversion, the party should develop rapid response mechanisms for debunking disinformation. There should be a cultivation of digital literacy among not just the party, but the masses. Included also is the role of ‘counter-hegemonic’ media: independent news sites, podcasts, and Substack channels as tools for ideological struggle.
Mobilizing the United Front for the Global Vanguard
The first aspect of a broader mobilization campaign is a time of opportunity met with careful preparation. The party itself must have principled stances in international solidarity with not just the digitally interconnected world, but the entire global working and oppressed people. This must include supporting anti-imperialist struggles in the Global South; that can look like information sharing and advocacy, but as proven by Thunberg, it can look like a lot more, too.
There must be careful, dialectical application of revolutionary tactics to overcome digital divides and linguistic barriers in international organizing. With today’s technology, this is often relatively straightforward, but inexplicably still often-ignored.
Through such unity will come the capability to coordinate actions against shared imperialist targets, through boycotts, digital disruptions, direct action, and even overt violence and class struggle.
Regardless, there are challenges when relying on a digital apparatus, either in defense or offense: these include censorship, and even internet shutdowns. There must be attempts made to ensure reliable, secure, and resilient communication channels for international comrades.
On any discussion of the broader United Front, there should be talk of the home front; digitally, there ought to be a diaspora of communities in supporting struggles for their home countries. This provides the Global Vanguard with a stretched, globalized base for their operations, which is superior to previous hyperlocality.
Unity as Strength in the Age of Information Warfare
It must be reiterated that the United Front is not merely a tactic, but a fundamental principle of revolutionary power. It is the buffer between the fight and the people. It is the support of all logistical chains not internalized to the People’s Army.
The party has the indispensable role in leading and guiding the United Front, ensuring its revolutionary direction. The ultimate aim is forging a collective force capable of challenging and dismantling global imperialist hegemony.
It can and must be done.