Do you think Politzer’s Elementary Principles of Philosophy doesn’t satisfy those roles enough? More than Stalin’s DaHM, I feel that Politzer’s work baby-steps readers into philosophy, in a way western leftists may not be immediately on guard against, and those are my target audience. Not to discredit DaHM, it’s a great work, but I like Politzer’s work more unless the reader is already trying to join an org and is sympathetic to AES. Mao’s On Practice and On Contradiction were put later in the list as the reader presumably begins to have the basics grasped, but needs to actually begin practice, I wanted to push the gas on organization and social practice once the basics were set.

As for why Dialectical Materialism comes after Principles and Blackshirts, I wanted to essentially get the reader up to speed on terms, and then debunk as many anti-communist preconceptions the reader may have going into the list before they start actually learning, as they can form selective biases when reading and inform different outcomes. Having the typical anti-AES slant can result in odd conclusions or selective hearing when reading.

Those were my thoughts on ordering, do you think changing them around would result in better outcomes?