Stalin's experience of defending Leninism
No. 4/92.IV.2024
Introduction
Despite the fact that the era of Stalin is long over, debates about its significance for Russia and the world do not subside to this day. The streams of lies and dirt that are constantly poured onto the life and views of the Georgian Bolshevik signal, on the one hand, the unfading relevance of his ideas, and therefore the serious danger that they pose for capitalism, on the other hand, the need for his modern followers to mobilize all your will, all your knowledge to protect the good name of the Genius.
A huge number of different historical myths are being created around Stalin, the most dangerous of which is the thesis that Stalin, as a political figure and theorist, opposed Lenin and Marxism. Trying to separate Stalin from Lenin and from Marxism, anti-communists of all sorts stop at nothing. The line of theoretical barriers protecting such a blatant lie is built on several fronts at once, but the dominant directions are right (bourgeois-patriotic) and left (Trotskyist).
Thus, bourgeois patriots see in Stalin a strong statesman and a Russian nationalist who abandoned the idea of world revolution and played the role of a Marxist when it was profitable; an effective patriotic manager who mercilessly dealt with the “fifth column” in the person of supposedly Marxists, Leninists, Trotskyists and globalists (which for “patriots” is often the same thing) and created a “red empire” (on the ruins of the tsarist one); the commander-in-chief, albeit with heavy losses (where would we be without the tales of 27 million dead), but who won the most terrible war in history.
Trotskyists see Stalin as an ignorant but cunning “politician,” a mediocrity who expresses the collective will of the bureaucracy and skillfully uses party mechanisms to seize individual power and to eliminate democracy in the party and the country. For them, Stalin is a strangler of freedom, a national patriot and a totalitarian dictator, ready to physically destroy the “Leninist guard” for the sake of power.
It is worth noting that the circumstances of the history of the class struggle of the last century, including the successful experience of the Stalinist USSR and the unsuccessful experience of Trotskyist r-r-revolutionary activity, force many of Lev Davidovich’s followers to take a half-hearted position: they call for “objective” (in fact, objectivist, that is, anti-communist) analysis of the internal party struggle, trying to reduce the fundamental, scientific and theoretical contradictions of Leninism and Trotskyism to unimportant (and often dictated by personal motives) tactical disagreements that have the nature of interpersonal squabbles; they recognize the mistakes of not only Stalin, but also Trotsky, while striving (following the tenets of Shapinov, forgotten by many [1]) to doubt the relevance and expediency of contrasting two trends in “social democracy” (opportunism-Trotskyism and Marxism-Leninism) - it seems to them , as if the confrontation between Stalinism and Trotskyism is a long-outdated scholastic dispute about dogmas: they say, modern Marxists should be interested in modern politics, that is, protests, trade unions and elections, and not the insignificant and mothball-smelling disagreements of “bygone days.”
However, in one thing, all the mentioned categories of left and right are similar - they are all, in one way or another, trying to defend one of the forms of lies: either Stalin did not support Lenin, or he did it inconsistently and poorly.
The bourgeoisie supports and feeds all anti-Stalinist movements. The reason for this is the zoological fear that the scoundrels experience in relation to the Great Stalin and his achievements. It is obvious that Stalin’s practice of building communism dealt a crushing blow to the entire world system of imperialism and colonialism, that Stalin’s theoretical and practical heritage is not so much the past as the future of humanity. The bourgeoisie, realizing this, clings to all attempts to denigrate Stalin in any way, distort his biography, attribute to him views that the real Joseph Vissarionovich criticized.
Meanwhile, Stalin is a brilliant student of a brilliant teacher, a faithful follower and ally of Lenin, an expert, defender, propagandist of Marxist-Leninist theory, who made a significant contribution to it. All attempts to denigrate Stalin or “objectively comprehend” (in fact, throwing mud at historical falsifications) his contribution to the treasury of Marxism represent a more or less hidden form of anti-communism. The entire history of the Bolshevik Party shows that Stalin supported Vladimir Ilyich in all the most important and difficult situations. Discussion about economism and tailism, about the first point of the party charter and centralism, about tactics during the first Russian revolution, about liquidationism and otzovism, about tactics in the revolutionary process of 1917, about the October armed uprising, about the Brest-Litovsk Peace, about the possibility of a revolution in one, a single country, etc., etc. - everywhere and always (where circumstances allowed) Stalin was next to his mentor and senior comrade, firmly adhering to the only true Leninist line. The authors of “Breakthrough” have repeatedly emphasized the importance of the struggle for historical truth, for the true Stalin [2], however, many novice Marxists, unfortunately, still en masse fall for the bait of unscrupulous interpreters of Stalin’s theory and practice, trusting false libels and cunning manipulations of interested parties anti-Marxist orientation, falling, for example, into the bait of the myth of the “Great Terror”.
Right and left anti-Stalinism united in a single anti-communist impulse, striving in different ways to achieve a common goal - to separate Stalin from Lenin and from Marxism. That is why one of the highest priorities of modern Marxists is to study and propagate Stalin’s experience of defending Leninism.
Part I. From spontaneity to consciousness
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Russia experienced rapid growth of capitalism, which led to an increase in the number of wage workers employed in developing industries. However, the capitalist economy, subject to constant crises, caused discontent among workers. This led to spontaneous resistance on the part of the population, which became increasingly susceptible to revolutionary propaganda.
Naturally, one of the most influential social democratic movements of this time was the so-called economism. Economists believed that the labor movement did not need a scientific theory capable of directing the revolutionary energy of the masses in a creative direction. They preferred to use the labor movement for economic resistance to capital, considering the “economic struggle” a necessary stage for the transition to the political. However, in practice, economism was guided by the Bernsteinian concept of “movement is everything, the goal is nothing,” and Marxist consciousness was replaced by worship of the elements of proletarian resistance.
They gave the political sphere into the hands of the liberal intelligentsia and the liberal bourgeoisie of that time. The role of the Marxists was reduced to helping the proletariat in the struggle for wages and working conditions. Economists, therefore, gave in to liberalism and trailed behind the labor movement [3]. However, real, revolutionary Marxists did not agree with them.
Let us turn to the history of the confrontation between Marxists and economists.
In 1899, a program document by economists called “Credo” [4] was published, which was criticized by Lenin, who was in exile, in the same year [5]. Vladimir Ilyich’s article (after a short period of time) is followed by materials from the new Georgian social democratic newspaper “Brdzola” [6], also directed against economism. In the very first article of the newspaper, published in September 1901 and entitled “From the Editor,” the young Marxist, Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin, defending the Leninist idea of the need to introduce consciousness into the labor movement (with the help of a printed publication), writes:
“...The newspaper, as an organ of the Social Democrats, must lead the labor movement, show it the way, protect it from mistakes . In a word, the primary duty of a newspaper is to stand as close as possible to the working masses, to be able to constantly influence them, to be their conscious and leading center .
<…>
The Georgian Social Democratic newspaper must give a clear answer to all questions related to the labor movement, explain fundamental issues, explain theoretically the role of the working class in the struggle and illuminate with the light of scientific socialism every phenomenon that the worker encounters" (Stalin, "From the Editor") .
After which, in the second and third issues of the same newspaper, two parts of one article were published entitled “The Russian Social Democratic Party and its Immediate Tasks,” in which Stalin continues his attack on economists:
“Instead of leading a spontaneous movement, introducing social democratic ideals into the masses and directing them towards our ultimate goal , this part of the Russian social democrats [economists] turned into a blind instrument of the movement itself; it blindly followed the insufficiently developed part of the workers and limited itself to formulating those needs, those needs that were recognized at that moment by the working masses” (Stalin, “The Russian Social Democratic Party and its Immediate Tasks”).
As can be seen, from the very beginning of his party career, young Stalin acted as an irreconcilable fighter against opportunism, a fighter for Marxism in its true, Leninist understanding.
The next significant event in the confrontation between Marxists and economists is Vladimir Ilyich’s brilliant book “What is to be done? Urgent issues of our movement,” which represents “a terrible projectile fired at the head” of opportunism [7]. It is obvious that the successful exposure of economism did not and could not lead to its virtual disappearance from the political practice of domestic Social Democracy. However, the further hidden rehabilitation of economism was not carried out by them.
The thing is that the results of the second congress [8] did not suit a number of high-ranking party members who were accustomed to being in leadership positions:
“At Lenin’s suggestion, Lenin, Plekhanov and Martov were elected to the editorial board of Iskra [9]. Martov demanded at the congress that all six old editors of Iskra, the majority of whom consisted of Martov’s supporters, be elected to the editorial board of Iskra. The Congress rejected this proposal by a majority. The troika proposed by Lenin was elected. Then Martov declared that he would not join the editorial board of the central body” (Stalin, “A Short Course in the History of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks)”).
After the results of the second congress, which were unpleasant for the Mensheviks [10], they turned out to be opponents of Vladimir Ilyich: they began to actively sabotage the decisions of the congress, violate party discipline, boycott work in the newspaper [11] (although Lenin and Plekhanov actively called on the authors to comply with the decisions of the congress [12] and to journalistic activity in the Central Organ [13]). The current situation contributed to the fact that Plekhanov, who was gradually leaning towards Menshevism, followed the wishes of a group of unprincipled intellectuals [14], who ignored the decisions of the congress, and accused the Bolshevik leader of intransigence [15]:
“At the Second Congress, Plekhanov walked with Lenin. But after the Second Congress, Plekhanov allowed himself to be intimidated by the Mensheviks with the threat of a split. He decided to “make peace” with the Mensheviks at all costs. Plekhanov was drawn to the Mensheviks by the burden of his previous opportunist mistakes. From a conciliator to the Menshevik opportunists, Plekhanov soon became a Menshevik himself. Plekhanov demanded that all the old Menshevik editors rejected by the congress be included in the editorial board of Iskra. Lenin, of course, could not agree with this and left the editorial board of Iskra in order to gain a foothold in the Central Committee of the party and from this position to beat the opportunists. Plekhanov single-handedly, violating the will of the congress, co-opted former Menshevik editors into the Iskra editorial board. From that moment, from Iskra No. 52, the Mensheviks turned it into their organ and began to preach their opportunist views through Iskra” (Stalin, “A Short Course in the History of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks)”).
Completely confused by the testimony, Plekhanov, trying to emerge victorious from an ugly situation, publicly spoke out against Lenin’s book “What is to be done?”: in the 70th and 71st issues of the new Menshevik Iskra (1904) he published the article “The Working Class and the Social Democratic Intelligentsia,” in which made excuses for not immediately speaking out against the “majority” and criticized those of Lenin’s theses, the defender of which he was before the party-organizational disagreements. Thus, Plekhanov, who supported Lenin’s book at the second congress, after a short period of time himself acted as a critic of Vladimir Ilyich, making absurd accusations against him, trying, for example, to contrast him with Marx and Engels:
“According to Lenin, the working class, left to itself, is able to fight only for the conditions for the sale of its power on the basis of capitalist relations of production. According to Marx and Engels, this class must necessarily strive to eliminate these relations, that is, to carry out a socialist revolution.”
AND:
“...The contradiction inherent in capitalism inevitably causes the workers to strive to eliminate capitalist relations of production, and Lenin, who unsuccessfully referred to him [Marx], assures that this contradiction can push the proletariat only into a struggle waged on the basis of these relations” (Plekhanov, “Working Class” and the Social Democratic intelligentsia").
It is easy to notice how close Plekhanov’s opportunist argumentation and “criticism” is to the rhetoric of our modern economists with their blind faith in the revolutionary nature of either the entire proletariat, its industrial detachment, or some arbitrarily appointed “advanced” strata. It is also easy to notice what role individual leaders and theoreticians, their passions and emotions play in the communist movement.
All these unsuccessful attempts to “publish Lenin’s mistakes” led Plekhanov to an open break with him, which resulted in meaningless and sharp attacks towards the Bolshevik leader:
“I never considered Lenin to be any outstanding theoretician and always found that he was organically incapable of dialectical thinking” (Plekhanov, “The Working Class and the Social Democratic Intelligentsia”).
But this turned out to be insufficient. Plekhanov’s justifications went so far that he himself was forced to admit that economists, it turns out, were not so wrong about Lenin and the Bolsheviks:
“... Even before the congress, some comrades who once belonged to the camp of “economists” drew my attention to the practical mistakes and excesses of too “firm Iskra-ists.” Although I myself noticed and noted in letters to the editors of Iskra other of these extremes, the testimony of former “economists” still seemed to me too exaggerated. Now it turns out that they did not exaggerate as much as I thought ” (Plekhanov, “The Working Class and the Social Democratic Intelligentsia”).
In general, Plekhanov’s article is a clear example of Menshevik criticism of Bolshevik “leadership” and “sectarianism.” This experience is to this day adopted by the ideological successors of the “minority line”, repeating the main theses of Plekhanov, which, of course, helps bourgeois ideology to consolidate opportunist principles as guiding principles in the left movement.
It is also worth mentioning the “faithful Leninist” Trotsky and his pamphlet “Our Political Tasks” (1904) [16], published under the editorship of the Menshevik Iskra [16], in which he, with the consent of Plekhanov and other opportunists, criticizes the Bolsheviks, including for their position in economism. That same Trotsky, who subsequently more than once cowardly and deceitfully called himself, after the death of the leader, a follower and comrade-in-arms of Lenin, in one of the most important historical periods, on the eve of the first Russian revolution, disagrees with Vladimir Ilyich on a fundamental strategic issue, simultaneously accusing him of schismatics and incompetence, calling him “the leader of the reactionary wing of the Social Democratic Party.” However, this brochure by Trotsky will be discussed in more detail in another part.
What do we end up with? The Mensheviks are characterized by unscrupulousness, floridness, aggressive opportunistic ignorance and intellectual slackness. Having initially recognized that Lenin was right, but finding themselves in a situation that deprived them of party portfolios and thereby affected their delicate mental organization, they quickly and unprincipledly changed their minds, beginning to defend a new edition of economism, attacking Bolshevism from positions that were destroyed by Bolshevism [17]. Lacking the knowledge, will and conscience to admit the fallacy of their own position, they unsuccessfully tried to hide behind organizational delays, making absurd accusations against Lenin. All these qualities were not just accidentally inherent in the leaders of opportunism and ordinary opportunists, but were a form of adaptation of the party to the objective, spontaneous movement of the proletariat.
It was in such difficult historical and party circumstances that Stalin wrote the works “Letters from Kutais”, “Briefly about party differences” and “Reply to the Social Democrat” [18], devoted to the criticism of economism and tailism in the light of the unprincipled behavior of the Mensheviks and Plekhanov.
Based on the theses formulated by Marx, Engels and Lenin, Stalin says that science should be brought into the labor movement from the outside, by revolutionary Marxist scientists:
“...The labor movement must be united with socialism, practical activity and theoretical thought must merge together and thereby give the spontaneous labor movement a social democratic character...” (Stalin, “Briefly about party differences”).
Since ordinary workers are forced to spend most of their lives on monotonous physical labor, they are not able to reach a scientific worldview on their own; they objectively do not have the opportunity to spend the proper amount of time on self-education in the field of Marxism:
“...The working class, while it remains the working class, cannot become the head of science and develop scientific socialism on its own: it has neither the time nor the means for this” (Stalin, “Briefly about party differences”).
However, this opportunity is available to Marxists, who are therefore obliged to convert their knowledge into propaganda and the development of scientific theory. Marxist theorists, according to Stalin, must, using the diamatic methodology of thinking, learn the laws of social development, which, in turn, opens up the possibility of scientific foresight based on open, stable connections. Therefore, in the process of developing a revolutionary movement, the role of theory is decisive. At the same time, the theorists themselves formulate concepts not “from the head” (although with its obligatory help), but through a correct reflection of objective reality:
“...The theorist of a particular class cannot create an ideal, the elements of which do not exist in life... he can only notice the elements of the future and on this basis theoretically create an ideal , to which this or that class comes practically. The difference is that the theorist is ahead of the class and notices the embryo of the future before it” (Stalin, “Briefly about party differences”).
Marxist theorists, thus, “see to the root,” directing the entire revolutionary movement towards communist creation. They are obviously opposed to the tailists or, as Lenin called them, “defenders of backwardness,” who propose to completely submit to spontaneity, which is the main feature of the labor movement. It was in this that Lenin and Stalin saw a big problem [19], which the Bolsheviks had to solve:
“Does the masses give their leaders a program and justification for the program, or do the leaders give the masses? If the masses themselves and their spontaneous movement give us the theory of socialism, then there is nothing to protect the masses from the harmful influence of revisionism, terrorism, Zubatovism, anarchism: “the spontaneous movement gives birth to socialism out of itself.” If the spontaneous movement does not give birth to the theory of socialism... it means that the latter is born outside the spontaneous movement, from the observation and study of the spontaneous movement by people armed with the knowledge of our time . This means that the theory of socialism is developed “completely independently of the growth of the spontaneous movement,” even in spite of this movement, and then is introduced from the outside into this movement, correcting it in accordance with its content , that is, in accordance with the objective requirements of the class struggle of the proletariat” (Stalin, “Letter from Kutais").
At the same time, Stalin writes, the working class is spontaneously drawn to socialism. But you need to understand that such an attraction, an attraction to justice, does not equal Marxism. In this context, the importance of having competent agitators and propagandists becomes clearer: if a competent Marxist takes up the work of agitation and propaganda, then workers will more willingly and more productively learn the fundamentals of Marxist science, including on the basis of a spontaneous attraction to socialism. Deep scientific truths, disseminated by a knowledgeable person, are more quickly grasped by workers who strive to understand the truth, and not to militantly defend errors.
An obstacle on the path of Marxists is the mass dissemination of bourgeois ideology, the petty-bourgeois consciousness of the proletariat, which naturally arises from the conditions of capitalism and is strengthened and cultivated by propaganda, school, and religion. In addition, bourgeois social science, represented by the corrupt bourgeois intelligentsia, very fruitfully develops the foundations of the bourgeois worldview, filling the “information space” with anti-communist dogmas about the naturalness and justice or inevitability of the system of exploitation. Thus, the working people, deprived of guidance from the Marxists, from the scientific center, are under the influence of all kinds of social science errors, which Stalin, after Lenin, calls bourgeois ideology. At the same time, trade unionism, economism, tailism and other forms of opportunism are identified by Stalin precisely with bourgeois ideology, opposed to the only true Marxist science.
Marxists, says Stalin, need to begin eliminating social science illiteracy among advanced workers, putting scientific knowledge in their heads, which will allow them to expose the propaganda of not only the liberal-bourgeois professors (that is, open enemies), but also various Trotskyists, economists and other latent lackeys of the bourgeoisie. Moreover, Stalin (like Lenin) paid much more attention to the fight against the latter categories of citizens, because he clearly understood: the key point in the fight FOR truth, FOR communism is the fight AGAINST opportunism . Therefore, the Stalinist works mentioned above are imbued with a critical attitude towards specific Mensheviks in particular and towards all Menshevism in general.
It must be emphasized that one of the main accusations brought by the Mensheviks against the Bolsheviks was the accusation of forgetting the “economic form of class struggle.” For example, in the brochure “Briefly about party differences,” Joseph Vissarionovich, for the purpose of critical analysis, cites the following remarkable fragment from an article published in the Georgian Menshevik newspaper “Social Democrat”:
“The fight against “economism” gave rise to the other extreme - the belittling of the economic STRUGGLE , a disdainful attitude towards it and the recognition of the dominant significance of the political struggle.”
It is not surprising that the Mensheviks of Georgia [20] (following their unprincipled teachers from the “center”) accuse the Bolsheviks of “diminishing the economic struggle” and “recognizing the dominant importance of the political struggle.” Trying to hide behind slogans about extremes, the Mensheviks ignored the fact that the “economic struggle” only creates the appearance of a real, dialectically understood struggle.
In fact, the so-called “economic form of class struggle” is not any class struggle (in the scientific sense of the word). Spontaneous economic resistance , which often occurs in the form of strikes and walkouts, in itself is only one of the forms of competition between market subjects, which, in turn, has nothing to do with the dialectically understood struggle. Workers, under the yoke of exploitation, spontaneously organize in order to repel the offender, not realizing that the main offender is impersonal, that he is not a specific manufacturer or banker, but the entire capitalist system as a whole and the entire class of capitalists, that his main agents become explicit and implicit anti-communists: bourgeois intellectuals and opportunists who feed social science ignorance and speculate on it. Workers have the ability to independently unite in the context of resistance to employers, but they are not able to independently unite in the context of a consistent political class struggle, pursuing the goals of qualitative change in society, and not a partial and often imaginary improvement in the standard of living of individual workers. Consequently, those who believe that the Communist Party must meet the daily needs of individual workers by acting as advisers on legal and other matters of strikes and labor relations are mistaken. The task of the communists, says Stalin, is to enlighten progressive-minded citizens, mobilizing them for an inexorable class struggle. And economic resistance, as a form of movement of the proletariat, must be used for the political organization of the class.
The point is that the Bolsheviks found themselves in historical circumstances when workers spontaneously and en masse rose up to “fight” their employers. Therefore, the Bolsheviks had the task of leading these spontaneous uprisings , explaining to the workers the need for political struggle under the leadership of the vanguard in the person of the Communist Party and thereby directing them (the uprisings) in a constructive direction. The Bolsheviks worked with the material that history provided them, so attempts to mechanically transfer their tactics to modern circumstances are doomed to failure.
The idea according to which the proletarian, by his class position alone, is the bearer of the communist worldview is also erroneous. Communism is a scientific Marxist worldview, and its formation requires education and comprehension of truths. The proletarian, despite his socio-economic status, can easily be a supporter of the bourgeoisie:
“The fact is that I can be a proletarian, and not a bourgeois by status, but at the same time not be aware of my position and therefore submit to bourgeois ideology. This is exactly how things stand... with the working class” (Stalin, “Briefly about party differences”).
This rule can also be understood in reverse formulation: a person can be born into a wealthy bourgeois family, but this does not necessarily make him a bourgeois in outlook, but only as a rule. The very idea that a worker is a priori a revolutionary is extremely harmful, because scientific-revolutionary consciousness is a property acquired in the process of upbringing and education; it, unfortunately, is not a quality of a person automatically determined by his position [21]. As practice shows, the proletarian masses, without the influence of Marxists, turn into a crowd of philistines, unable to take a critical look at the scientific constructs of the corrupt intelligentsia.
In this context, Lenin’s idea of distributing Marxist ideas not only to the proletarian masses, but also to other classes and social strata is important:
“...The rumors that it is necessary, in the name of the supposed class point of view, to less emphasize the common dissatisfaction with the government of different sections of the population have a harmful influence. On the contrary, we are proud that Iskra awakens political discontent in all segments of the population , and we only regret that we are not able to do this on an even wider scale” (Lenin, “Conversation with the Defenders of Economism”).
The same idea is defended by Stalin in the earlier and already mentioned article “From the Editor” [22]:
“...Since in today’s conditions in Russia, in addition to the workers, it is also possible for other elements of society to act as fighters “for freedom” and since this freedom is the immediate goal of the fighting workers of Russia, the newspaper is obliged to give room to any revolutionary movement, even if it occurs outside labor movement ... The newspaper should pay special attention to the revolutionary movement that is taking place or will take place among other elements of society . It must explain every social phenomenon and thereby influence everyone fighting for freedom. Therefore, the newspaper is obliged to pay special attention to the political situation in Russia, take into account all the consequences of this situation and raise the question of the need for political struggle as broadly as possible (Stalin, “From the Editor”).
Yes, in many ways it was only about dissatisfaction with the tsarist government, since the Bolsheviks were faced with the task of first implementing a minimum program: a bourgeois-democratic revolution. However, the basis of political agitation against autocracy was the idea that not only workers, but also peasants and capitalists are capable of joining the ranks of freedom fighters, capable of spending their physical and intellectual strength for the benefit of the whole society (under the leadership of the revolutionary working class). Stalin considers it a mistake to link the revolutionary transformation of society with the working class alone; the working class is the hegemonic class, which needs help and support from the entire working people and the progressive intelligentsia. In other words, Marxist consciousness was associated by Lenin and Stalin not so much with a person’s social position, but with his real knowledge and actions: a person from any class of society, with the right attitude, is capable of becoming a Marxist .
It is obvious that in the conditions of the bourgeois-democratic revolution, the autocracy was opposed by the broadest strata of society, including part of the bourgeoisie. Nevertheless, the subsequent practice of the development of the bourgeois revolution into a communist revolution, the practice of the events of 1917, the practice of the post-October transition to the side of the Bolsheviks of many representatives of the “old world” clearly shows the correctness of the theses of Lenin and Stalin about the importance of spreading the scientific worldview to all layers of society [23]. Yes, some peasants, small capitalists, intellectuals and even proletarians rebelled against the dictatorship of the proletariat, but this does not imply the need to artificially, class-wise, limit the scope of Marxist propaganda and agitation.
It is worth noting in passing that it is Marxism that allows one to see one’s social status as an instrument that helps one more or less successfully engage in revolutionary activities. The same Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, being a hereditary nobleman, devoted his entire life to science, denying his own noble privileges with his revolutionary practice. It is difficult for a person new to Marxism to understand Engels, who owned capitalist property, but despite this, went down in history as one of the main enemies of private property, as a person who laid the necessary scientific and theoretical foundation for the future destruction of “private” and replacing it with “general” [24]. Such a reasonable attitude towards one’s own social position is possible thanks to Marxism, which allows one to perceive oneself as an important detail of the global mechanism of communist progress, part of the world process of humanizing humanity. The same requirement - regardless of origin and social status, a person must strive for scientific knowledge of the world - should be extended among the working masses, many of whom think in a bourgeois way, sometimes even perceiving themselves as “rich in the making.”
Among other things, Stalin criticizes the soft-heartedness of the left-wing intelligentsia for its “worker-philism,” that is, an uncritical attitude towards the errors of the proletarians in the field of science, a lack of understanding of the vanguard role of the party in the revolutionary movement. Worker-philes were ready to turn a blind eye to mass ignorance, so long as the workers did not turn away from the Marxists:
“They consider the proletariat to be a capricious young lady who cannot be told the truth, who always needs to be complimented so that she does not run away. No, dear ones! We believe that the proletariat will be more resilient than you think. We believe that he will not be afraid of the truth!” (Stalin, “Briefly about party differences”).
The Bolsheviks, Stalin said, differ from the opportunists in that they are not afraid to tell the workers the truth in the face, do not hide behind florid formulations, demonstrating communist integrity and honesty.
***
So. In the period preceding the Second Congress, Lenin and Stalin rightly accused economists of opportunism and betrayal of the revolution. However, after a short amount of time (following the second congress), the defeated economism acquired unexpected allies in the person of Plekhanovites, who at first supported Lenin’s theses. Frightened by the decisions of the congress and abandoning party discipline, the opportunists tried with all their might to undermine the authority of Vladimir Ilyich in the party. The desire to expose the “majority” at any cost led the “minority” to previously overcome and defeated opportunist positions. Menshevism thereby replaced theorizing with unprincipled political speculation, pursuing the selfish goals of individual unscrupulous leaders.
Thus, the above-mentioned struggle of the Bolsheviks against economism took place in two stages: the first was the struggle against classical economism, the second was the struggle against the unprincipled, and therefore reformed, Mensheviks, who defended the positions of the same economism in a hidden form. In both situations, Stalin in his works appears as a solid Bolshevik, defending Lenin’s thesis about the need to introduce consciousness into the spontaneous labor movement and criticizing the opportunists for illiteracy and double-dealing.
Bronislav
04/13/2024
Notes
1. Shapinov is a left-wing publicist and social and political figure, who postulates in his works “There is no more Stalinism and Trotskyism, there is revolutionary Marxism and reformism” and “Once again that there is no more Trotskyism and Stalinism” the following theses: firstly, “the recognition or condemnation of “Stalinism,” as well as the recognition or condemnation of Trotskyism, should not today serve as an entrance ticket to the revolutionary Marxist organization” and, secondly, “the differences in the left movement, which should lead to organizational disengagement, do not lie in the plane today discussions between the “left opposition” and the “majority” in the Comintern, but can rather be formulated as contradictions between revolutionary Marxism and opportunism.” In other words, trying to hide his anti-Marxist essence with left-wing populism, Shapinov proposed abandoning the opposition between Stalin and Trotsky due to the supposed irrelevance and inappropriateness of such a opposition. A separate article in the magazine was devoted to criticism of Shapinov’s concept .
2. The Great Commonwealth of Lenin and Stalin , What does Stalin mean? , The struggle against Stalin is the struggle against Marxism , On the programmatic material of modern Trotskyists, etc.
3. “...On the one hand, the labor movement was growing, and it needed an advanced leadership detachment, on the other hand, “social democracy” in the person of the “economists,” instead of leading the movement, denied itself and lagged behind the movement.” (Stalin, “Briefly about party differences”).
4. “Credo” (“Credo”) - a manifesto of a group of Russian Social Democrats, written by E.D. Kuskova. in 1899. This document outlined the basic principles of economism: “For a Russian Marxist, there is only one outcome: participation, that is, assistance in the economic struggle of the proletariat and participation in liberal opposition activities.” For more details, see Lenin, “Protest of the Russian Social Democrats.”
5. Lenin, “Protest of Russian Social Democrats” (Collected Works, 4th ed., pp. 149-163).
6. “Brdzola” (“Struggle”) is the first Georgian newspaper of the Tiflis social democracy (Leninist-Iskra group), founded by Stalin and Lado Ketskhoveli. Tiflis is the old name of the city of Tbilisi.
7. “Distribution of “What to do?” led to the fact that a year after its release... by the Second Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Party, only an unpleasant memory remained of the ideological positions of “economism”, and the nickname “economist” began to be perceived by the majority of party workers as an insult. It was a complete ideological defeat of “economism”, a defeat of the ideology of opportunism, tailism, gravity” (Stalin, “A Short Course in the History of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks)”).
8. Lenin described the chronology of events associated with the election of a new editorial board by the congress: “The Tagesordnung was, as already indicated above, according to paragraph 24: the choice of the central institutions of the party. And in my commentary on the Tagesordnung (this comment was known to all sparks long before the congress and to all members of the congress) it was written in the margins: the election of 3 persons in the Central Organ and 3 in the Central Committee. Therefore, there is no doubt that from the depths of the editorial board came the demand to choose the top three, and no one from the editorial office protested it. Even Martov and another leader of the Martovites defended these “two troikas” before a number of delegates even before the congress.”
Then: “The editors left the congress while the issue of selection or approval was discussed. After desperately passionate debates, the congress decided: the old edition is not approved.
Only after this decision did the former members of the editorial board enter the hall. Martov then gets up and refuses to make a choice for himself and for his colleagues, saying all sorts of terrible and pitiful words about the “state of siege in the party” (for unelected ministers?), about “exceptional laws against individuals and groups” (like individuals, on behalf of “Sparks” bringing Ryazanov to her and saying one thing in the commission, another at the congress?).”
As a result: “The elections were given: Plekhanov, Martov, Lenin. Martov again refused. Koltsov (who had 3 votes) also refused. The congress then adopted a resolution instructing two members of the editorial board of the Central Organ to co-opt the third when they find a suitable person.”
9. Explaining the reasons why only three former editors were chosen to join the Iskra editorial board, Lenin wrote: “The old six were so incapacitated that they had never met in full force in three years - this is incredible, but it is a fact. Not a single one of the 45 issues of Iskra was compiled (in the editorial and technical sense of the word) by anyone other than Martov or Lenin. And not once was a major theoretical question raised by anyone other than Plekhanov. Axelrod did not work at all (zero articles in Zarya and 3–4 in all 45 issues of Iskra). Zasulich and Starover limited themselves to cooperation and advice, never doing purely editorial work. Who should be elected to the political leadership, to the center - this was clear as day for every member of the congress, after its month-long work.”
10. As is known, the division into Bolsheviks and Mensheviks occurred precisely at the Second Congress.
11. “Soon after the Second Congress of the RSDLP, the Mensheviks, seeking to seize the leadership of the party, created their own secret anti-party organization. In September 1903, a factional meeting of 17 Mensheviks led by Martov, Potresov and other opposition leaders took place in Geneva, secretly from the majority of the party and its leadership centers. The resolution written by Trotsky and Martov outlined a plan to fight the majority of the party and the party centers chosen by the Second Congress of the RSDLP. The meeting recommended not to stop at any means of struggle in order to expand the influence of the opposition and change the composition of the highest institutions of the party. Members of the opposition were asked to refuse to work under the leadership of the Central Committee, to boycott Iskra, and to seek the restoration of the old editorial staff. At the meeting, a literary group was created from former editors of Iskra, the purpose of which was to unite the Mensheviks and promote the opportunist ideas of the Menshevik opposition” (From the notes to volume 8 of the 5th edition of Lenin’s PSS).
12. “The Central Committee of the Party and the editorial board of the Central Organ consider it their duty to contact you, after a number of unsuccessful attempts at individual personal explanations, with an official message on behalf of the party they represent. Refusal from the editorship and cooperation in Iskra by Comrade. Martov, the refusal of former members of the Iskra editorial board to cooperate, the hostile attitude of several fellow practitioners towards the central institutions of our party creates a completely abnormal relationship between this so-called “opposition” and the entire party. Passive withdrawal from party work, attempts to “boycott” the central institutions of the party (expressed, for example, in the cessation of cooperation in Iskra with No. 46, and in the departure of Comrade Blumenfeld from the printing house), persistent identification of oneself in a conversation with a member of the Central Committee { 24} “group”, contrary to the party charter, sharp attacks on the personnel of the centers approved by the congress, the demand to modify this composition as a condition for ending the boycott - all this behavior cannot be recognized as consistent with party duty. All this behavior borders on a direct violation of discipline and nullifies the resolution adopted by the congress (in the party charter) that the distribution of forces and resources of the party is entrusted to the Central Committee.
<…> Dissatisfaction with the personnel of the centers, whether it stems from personal irritations or from disagreements that seem serious to one or another party member, cannot and should not lead to a disloyal course of action. If the centers, in the opinion of certain persons, make certain mistakes, then it is the duty of all party members to point out these mistakes to all party members and, above all, to point them out to the centers themselves” (“Draft Appeal of the Central Committee and the Editorial Board of the Central Organ to Members of the Opposition” ).
13. “To Comrade Martov from the editors of the Central Organ of Russia. SDLP. Dear comrade! The editors of the Central Organ consider it their duty to officially express their regret regarding your removal from participation in Iskra and Zarya (No. 5 of Zarya is currently being prepared for publication). Despite the repeated invitations to cooperate, which we made immediately after the Second Party Congress, before No. 46 of Iskra, and repeated several times after that, we have not received a single literary work from you. Little of. Even the publication of the second edition of your brochure “The Red Banner” is delayed for many weeks due to the failure to deliver the final manuscript. The editorial board of the Central Organ states that it considers your removal from cooperation to have been caused by nothing on its part. Any personal irritation should, of course, not serve as an obstacle to work in the Central Organ of the Party. If your removal is caused by one or another difference in views between you and us, then we would consider it extremely useful in the interests of the party to present such differences in detail. Moreover. We would consider it extremely desirable that the nature and depth of these disagreements be clarified as soon as possible before the entire party on the pages of the publications we edit. Finally, in the interests of the cause, we once again point out to you that we are currently ready to co-opt you as a member of the editorial board of the Central Organ in order to give you full opportunity to officially declare and defend all your views in the highest party institution" (Lenin, Assembly works, 4th ed., vol. 34, p. 146).
14. Lenin cites the following dialogue that took place between him and Plekhanov: “You know, sometimes there are such scandalous wives,” said Plekhanov, “that they need to give in in order to avoid hysteria and a loud scandal in front of the public. “Perhaps,” I answered, “but we must yield in such a way as to retain the power to prevent an even greater “scandal”” (Lenin, “On the circumstances of leaving the editorial office of Iskra”).
15. Here is what Plekhanov responded to the unprincipled actions of the former editors of Iskra: “...The intransigence of the party centers causes enormous damage to the party... therefore, concessions must be made in a timely manner.”
Or: “Many of us are accustomed to thinking that a Social Democrat must be uncompromising if he does not want to sin with opportunism. But intransigence and intransigence are different, and there is an intransigence that, in its practical consequences, is tantamount to the most undesirable type of compliance. Intransigence towards those who could become our comrades makes us less strong in the fight against opponents who will never be our comrades” (Plekhanov, Collected Works, Vol. 13).
16. Trotsky dedicated his pamphlet to “dear teacher Pavel Borisovich Axelrod,” who was one of the leaders of the Mensheviks.
17. It is worth noting that the above is only a small part of the remarkable events associated with the party life of the RSDLP after the second congress; additional information can be found in the works of Lenin, Stalin, Plekhanov, in issues of Iskra and in other sources chronologically and substantively related to the specified period in the history of the party.
18. The highest assessment of Stalin’s activities are the following words of Vladimir Ilyich: “In the article “Answer to the Social Democrat” we note the excellent formulation of the question of the famous “introduction of consciousness from the outside”” (Lenin, Collected Works, vol. 9, ed. 4., p. . 357).
19. This same most important idea, but in other words, was expressed by Vladimir Ilyich Lenin in his work “Conversation with the Defenders of Economism”: “...“Ideologist” only deserves the name of ideologist when he goes ahead of the spontaneous movement, showing him the way, when he knows how to others to resolve all theoretical, political, tactical and organizational issues that the “material elements” of the movement spontaneously encounter. In order to truly “take into account the material elements of the movement,” one must be critical of them, one must be able to point out the dangers and shortcomings of a spontaneous movement, one must be able to raise spontaneity to consciousness. <...> The mass (spontaneous) movement lacks “ideologists” who are theoretically prepared enough to be insured against any vacillation; it lacks leaders with such a broad political outlook, such revolutionary energy, such organizational talent to create a militant political party on the basis of the new movement "
20. More information about the class struggle in the Caucasus can be found in Beria’s work “On the Question of the History of Bolshevik Organizations in Transcaucasia.”
21. You can, for example, recall the RCWP party, about which Valery Alekseevich Podguzov wrote: “In November 1991, the Russian Communist Workers' Party (RCWP) was created in Russia. Its distinctive feature was the statutory norm, according to which 51% of the members of all senior governing bodies were to be machine workers and collective farmers. The authors of the program and the Charter, especially M.V. Popov, believed that this proportion would cause growing confidence on the part of the proletarians and they would not only join the Central Committee of the RCWP, the Central Control Commission, the Regional Committee, the Regional Committee and the City Committee, but also attract their comrades to the party. The organization of its own serious system of scientific and theoretical education of proletarians who joined the party was not planned. Moreover, over time, the party began to send proletarians to short-term courses at the school of trade unions, or the so-called. “Workers' Academy”, in which the accomplished economist M.V. Popov read lectures to the proletarians. After the first constituent meetings of the RCWP, all management structures complied with these statutory norms. After four years, it became clear that there was no influx of workers into the party, but if a new worker accidentally appeared in the party, he was immediately introduced to some governing body. Four years later, this norm was no longer observed at all due to the fact that a tiny number of proletarians who decided to get involved in politics preferred to join the Communist Party of the Russian Federation. Practice has proven that the working environment, as stated in the “KP Manifesto,” is not capable of producing from its ranks ready-made propagandists and agitators of Marxism with any authority at their own enterprises” (Podguzov, “ Ignorance and Opportunism ”).
22. And Stalin repeats this same position, but in his other address “Citizens!” (1905): “The proletariat, the most revolutionary class of our society, which has bore on its shoulders the entire struggle against the autocracy to this day, and its most determined and selfless opponent to the end, is preparing for an open armed action. And he calls on you, all classes of society , for help and support. Arm yourself, help him arm himself, and prepare for a decisive battle” (Stalin, “Citizens!”).
23. A separate part will be devoted to the question of “the hegemony of the proletariat in the revolution.”
24. As an example of using social status for the benefit of communism: Shesternin S.P., Realization of the inheritance after N.P. Schmit and my meetings with Lenin.
https://prorivists.org/92_stalin-leninism/
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