Reconstructing Lenin: an intellectual biography

I hope that ‘Reconstructing Lenin’ by Tamas Krausz becomes established as a major reference in writing and discussion about Lenin and the Bolsheviks: not simply in academic circles, but (more importantly) among modern-day revolutionary activists. It deserves to become an integral part of the study of Lenin, Bolshevism and the Russian Revolution – a growing and sizeable field of study since the end of the Cold War - due to the author’s excellent political judgement, the wealth of relevant contextual material and the way if illuminates the coherence and continuity in Lenin’s political thought over time (and its relationship to Lenin and his comrades’ political actions).

It is a very substantial book, a work of exceptional scholarship accurately subtitled ‘an intellectual biography’ because the focus is largely on Lenin’s ideas and their development. To call it ‘exhaustively researched’ is an understatement: its ‘Notes’ contain well over 1000 references, drawing on an extraordinarily wide range of sources.

Originally written in Hungarian, the English translation will hopefully influence discussion about its subject in the English-speaking world. This translation, by Balint Bethlenfalvy with Mario Fenyo, is published by US-based left-wing publishers Monthly Review Press.

The author, Tamas Krausz, is a professor of Russian history in Budapest. He is long established as a leading Marxist intellectual in Hungary. The earliest reference to his own writing on Lenin that I spotted in the bibliography was from 1980, so this book has had a long gestation (it is described as ‘four decades in the making’ on the back cover).

The author’s location in a former Eastern Bloc state means he is acutely conscious of the massive and violent distortion done to Lenin’s ideas, reputation and legacy by Stalinism. He is determined to uncover the real Lenin, via close attention to Lenin’s own writings and a sensitive project of re-discovering the intellectual, political and social world that shaped him.

This is not, it should be noted, an introduction to Lenin, the Bolsheviks, or the times in which they lived. A certain amount of familiarity with the field is generally assumed, while much of the language is reasonably specialised. It is nonetheless accessible and readable, and I highly recommend it for anyone wanting to explore the field in some depth.

Although the focus is primarily on Lenin’s intellectual and political development, the opening (and long) chapter is biographical, from Lenin’s family background through his entire life. I thought this was excellent – genuinely insightful even for those of us familiar with Lenin and his life story, rooting the man in his time and place. It includes some fascinating, less well-known, details while recapitulating the essentials, giving a vivid sense of Lenin’s compelling personality as well as tracing the events of his life and how they intersected with wider political and social contexts.

It’s also worth noting here that two extensive appendices complement the main text perfectly. One of them is an extremely thorough series of brief biographical details of scores of socialists, political figures and so on relevant to a biography of Lenin. The other is a detailed time line of events between the revolutionary year of 1917 and Lenin’s death in 1924.Both of these are useful resources.

An innovative and coherent thinker

The book has three particular themes which should be flagged up. Firstly, Krausz is keen to root Lenin firmly in the Marxist tradition while grasping the intellectual contributions that made him innovative. He demonstrates, unanswerably, that Lenin made important contributions to the Marxist tradition – a necessary antidote to those who treat him as a purely pragmatic figure. But these contributions are nonetheless rooted in Marxism – Krausz explicitly rejects any suggestion that Lenin originated a new ism that is separate from Marxism, or one that constitutes a variation on Marxism.

Different chapters examine different important contributions – roughly chronologically, though there is inevitably much overlap. These include Lenin’s work on Russian capitalist development, imperialism, the national question, the state and revolution, and the relationship between struggles for democracy and struggles for socialism. Lenin made original contributions that form a vital part of the inheritance of classical Marxism and help us understand history and both understand and change the world we live in.

Secondly, Krausz makes a powerful case for Lenin’s intellectual and political coherence. This is not to underestimate his tactical or organisational flexibility – these are well documented. But his flexibility in practice was deeply rooted in a coherent and consistent worldview and set of ideas.

This is a vital antidote to the idea that Lenin was an opportunistic politician, twisting and turning to suit immediate practical interests with no intellectual compass. Even after 1917, when he repeatedly faced incredibly difficult obstacles as leader of a besieged and fledgling workers’ state, there was a coherent political worldview shaping his responses (whatever political expediency was, admittedly, required).

This, again, does not mean ignoring how Lenin’s ideas developed and evolved. There is no suggestion that he arrived fully formed, so to speak. Quite the opposite: the development of his ideas is traced in close relationship to the history of the society in which he lived. He is rooted historically by Krausz.

There is also a strong sense of interplay between Lenin’s thinking and that of other Marxists: he was ‘first among equals’, the leading figure in a talented and intellectually vibrant generation of radical socialists. There’s a lively sense of the many debates between Lenin and others, and the significance of these debates. It’s also clear that political experiences – above all the 1905 revolution – influenced the direction of Lenin’s thinking.

So Lenin made important political and theoretical contributions to Marxism which analysed a changing world: a world in which capitalism was spreading globally, while its European and north American core was evolving into a constellation of competing imperialist states, with the nation state increasingly intertwined with the capitalist economy. Capitalist development was uneven, with Russia characterised by a complex mix of new industrial methods and traditional (but evolving) agriculture. Classes were being re-shaped: the industrial working class was growing in many countries, but the peasantry was changing too.

Consequently, the prospects for revolution were changing too – new thinking was needed on the potential role of different classes in the revolutionary process, and on the nature and scope of revolution. Lenin’s analysis evolved over time and through debate with other Marxists, but nonetheless formed a coherent worldview that was consistent with the Marxist tradition.

Ideas into action

The third central theme in Krausz’s account concerns the relationship between ideas and action. Lenin was a revolutionary political leader. He didn’t simply develop analysis of the world; that analysis was, profoundly and throughout his adult life, geared towards changing the world. Krausz notes that Marx’s famous thesis – ‘the philosophers have interpreted the world; the point, however, is to change it’ – has never been more acutely relevant than in the case of Lenin. A single-minded commitment to building an organisation capable of playing a decisive role in historical change dominated Lenin’s life up to 1917.

Krausz carefully traces the relationship between theory and practice, between Lenin’s ideas and the project of social transformation. He provides the big picture here, but also a multitude of specific tactical debates and decisions. He makes an interesting comment, for example, about how all the various factional disputes in the Russian revolutionary movement (over many years) had a strategic or tactical dimension. They were often influenced by theoretical issues, but there was only ever really a serious dispute if there were tactical implications (there were no splits over purely philosophical debates).

Krausz is attentive to the different aspects of debates and to what was going on at key turning points, e.g. the 1905 revolution, the ‘April Theses’ in April 1917, on the eve of insurrection in October 1917, etc. He expresses the theoretical underpinnings without reducing everything to them; concrete tactical disagreements can only be understood with attention to the concrete situation.

Lenin’s practical achievements – incomparable in the history of Marxism – were threefold: he had the leading role in building a revolutionary party in Russia before 1917, he was the principal leader in the ‘second revolution’ of 1917, i.e. that which led to the overthrow of the entire political and social order in October, and he was subsequently the head of government in a fledgling Russian workers’ state for several years (this last one remains a unique role in the history of revolutionary socialism). He was therefore, in turn, party builder, revolutionary leader and statesman.

Krausz is good at illustrating the continuity in Lenin’s personality, political qualities and ideas through all these periods, while also focusing on the distinctiveness of each context. The period of building revolutionary organisation, at varying stages from the 1890s until 1917, was the bulk of Lenin’s political life, and it proves especially fascinating in terms of potential implications for activists today. 

In addition to these central themes, ‘Reconstructing Lenin’ is a goldmine of details – biographical, political and historical. Although Lenin is at the centre throughout, it brings various other political figures of the time (Plekhanov, Kautsky, Luxemburg, Trotsky, Zinoviev, Bogdanov and many more) into focus, showing how they influenced Lenin or how he debated with them. It in some senses serves as a collective biography of the Bolsheviks, a compelling study of a revolutionary organisation that evolved enormously in changing circumstances.

I have just three very small criticisms. Firstly, although Krausz is brutally honest about the enormous problems faced after October 1917 - and indeed the mistakes he believes were made by Lenin and his government during this period - he refers very little to the actual positive achievements of revolutionary Russia (which were considerable). This makes his sketching of the context of Russia in the several years following the October Revolution a little unbalanced.

Secondly, I think he underestimates the possibilities for successful revolution in a number of European countries, especially Germany, during the same period, appearing to be rather mechanical and deterministic about the apparently near-inevitable failure of the European movements. Thirdly, I think he is guilty of somewhat understating Trotsky's achievements and stature as a political leader and thinker - not drastically so, but this is a minor problem of emphasis for me.

These minor points should not distract, however, from the larger achievement. Crucially, the question of how ideas interacted with efforts to change the world is a thread running through the whole book. The issue of what lessons revolutionary socialist activists can learn for today is not my main focus in this short appreciation, but the book provides a solid historical basis for that project.

Note: I recommend Chris Nineham's Counterfire review of the book.

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Unfinished Leninism - an extended review

Paul Le Blanc’s Unfinished Leninism, a collection of 12 essays, most of them previously published on socialist websites or in publications in the last few years, mixes biography, historical summary, polemic and contemporary strategy. It does not merely summarise the life of Lenin, his political ideas and the tradition with which he is identified; it also explains the relevance of the revolutionary leader, and of Leninism, to our own times.

The book aims to persuade readers that Lenin ought to be taken seriously, his ideas applied creatively to new realities. This is an unfashionable task: Lenin has long been written off as at best irrelevant, at worst dangerous, by mainstream politicians and academics. Moreover, he is also regarded as outdated or irrelevant by many on the left and among those who are entering radical or anti-capitalist politics. Marxism in general is no longer automatically a major reference point for radical activists.

The notion of revolutionary organisation in the tradition of Lenin and the Bolsheviks has become particularly marginal for a number of reasons: the small size of the revolutionary left can make it seem insignificant, the sectarian degeneration and impotence of much of it has made it unattractive, and the body of ideas – Marxism – which underpins it is still little understood. Numerous alternative ways of organising have been offered, though all of them have encountered profound difficulties. The case for a renewal of revolutionary organisation may be unfashionable, but in a world of growing inequalities, seemingly intractable crisis and deep social injustice, it is one that deserves serious attention.

A reviled figure

Lenin is an important figure in history as the leader of the Russian Revolution of 1917, a central figure in the international Communist movement that developed in its aftermath, and the first leader of post-revolutionary Russia until his death in 1924. Lenin has been reviled by successive generations of conservative politicians, historians and political commentators precisely because he was a key protagonist in a revolutionary, mass working class challenge to capitalism - to the wealth and power of the ruling class - of huge historic significance, serving as inspiration to workers and oppressed people worldwide. But he has also been a source of contention and disagreement among many who have rejected the status quo of exploitation, inequality and oppression because the Soviet Union became, under Lenin’s successor Stalin, a grotesquely undemocratic, unequal and violent society.

The view that Lenin led inevitably to the horrors of Stalinism became the orthodoxy in the Cold War era. It requires considerable historical analysis to uncover why the fledgling revolutionary state which emerged from 1917 became the opposite of what Russian workers, soldiers and peasants had struggled for. This largely falls outside Le Blanc’s remit in this book, but he directs readers towards such analysis and seeks to rescue Lenin from the crimes committed in his name.

The rise of Stalinism was made possible by the isolation of the revolution: though there were revolutionary upheavals and popular rebellions in several European countries, none of them resulted in the defeat of the old order. Meanwhile, revolutionary Russia was attacked by imperialist armies and, for a time, engulfed in civil war.

Economic hardship and the demands of protecting the new revolutionary state from attack and civil war had a devastating impact on the working class and the scope for any sort of meaningful working-class democracy. The rising bureaucracy became, in this context, more powerful, centralised, and removed from the experiences of ordinary workers.

Since the end of the Cold War, there has been some renewed interest in what the author dubs ‘Lenin studies’, with some fresh thinking unencumbered by the rigid orthodoxies of the Cold War era, yet the dominant interpretation of the upheavals of 1989-91 was that they ‘finished’ Leninism for good. This confirms notions of triumphant free-market capitalism and the elimination of any radical, progressive alternatives. Public perceptions of Lenin in the West are still mainly shaped by anti-Communist propaganda of the Cold War era and the association of Lenin with the subsequent Stalinist era.

Lenin’s Marxism

Lenin is also significant as one of the towering figures of Marxism. Le Blanc stresses Lenin’s continuity from Marx; his deep rootedness in the writings of Marx and Engels. At the same time he summarises Lenin’s special contributions to a rich political and intellectual tradition, one that depends always on being creatively applied to new situations and on interaction with the lives and struggles of working-class people.

Lenin was the author of such influential Marxist texts as What is to be done?, Imperialism, the highest stage of capitalism, State and Revolution and Left Wing Communism, an infantile disorder. Le Blanc argues – persuasively in my view, though some will disagree – that it is justified to talk of ‘Leninism’: a body of ideas and analysis that updated and developed Marx’s own writings, involving the application of Marxism to Russian realities and more generally to an era of capitalist expansion, imperialist competition and war. More positively, Lenin’s era witnessed the growth of mass socialist parties and trade unions, and successive waves of popular struggle, opening up new opportunities for Marxists but also presenting fresh challenges which Marx and Engels had not faced.

Lenin’s contributions included analysis of Russian capitalism’s particular development, an account of the emergence of modern imperialist rivalry in the era of monopoly capitalism, and a nuanced understanding of nationalism and national liberation movements. Le Blanc sketches the contexts which shaped the development of these ideas, including the debates which took place among Marxists. There is a fascinating essay examining the connections and differences between Lenin and Rosa Luxemburg. They are often counter-posed to each other, but Le Blanc demonstrates that any differences between their outlooks were fewer than often supposed, while teasing out the significance of the genuine differences – for example over the national question - that did exist.

Lenin also developed important ideas about socialist strategy: a thorough and innovative understanding of the relationship between movements for democracy and the struggle for socialism. He developed a strategic perspective that linked Russian workers with the rural peasantry, and some original analysis of revolutionary processes. This was informed partly by his own revolutionary experiences in 1905 and 1917 as well as the legacy of earlier breakthroughs like the Paris Commune of 1871, which was the first experience anywhere of working-class people taking control, albeit briefly, of the running of a city.

The period following the Russian Revolution opened up further strategic challenges, which required new thinking. The urgent need to spread the successful revolution and simultaneously learn from the Russian experience, while engaging with distinctive situations in other countries, prompted the launch of the Third International (or Comintern) in 1919 and the developing body of ideas and strategy that went with it.  This included sharp critiques of both European reformist politics and the problems of ultra-leftism, and the emergence of the united-front strategy as a means of advancing working-class aims in non-revolutionary times.

I agree with Le Blanc when he writes that it is peculiar – when considering these contributions - for some contemporary critics to dismiss the idea that there is such a thing as Leninism, or that Lenin’s influence of the development of Marxism was either minor or largely limited to organisational questions. He also adeptly discredits the idea that ‘Leninism’ was an invention of those who followed Lenin and should be rejected on that basis. While it is true that Stalin and others created an ossified and obscenely distorted ‘Leninism’, there is nonetheless a real body of ideas associated with Lenin.

Lenin was shaped by the best of Second International (1889-1914) Marxism, but he also moved beyond some of its limits. Although one of an able generation of Marxists, also including Leon Trotsky and Rosa Luxemburg, and later Antonio Gramsci and Georg Lukács, he did make his own distinctive contributions as part of a collective enterprise. Lenin can be seen as ‘first among equals’ in the development of Marxism during this period, interacting with the ideas of others and the debates among socialists while making significant innovations.

Revolutionary Lenin

In addition to Lenin’s significance as an influential historical figure and giant of Marxism, he is important because his life and work, more than that of anyone else in the history of socialism, is bound up with the whole question of how revolutionaries should organise and act in pursuit of their goals. He can reasonably be regarded as history’s greatest revolutionary leader. But what made that historical role possible? How did Lenin and his comrades actually organise themselves, and what lessons (if any) does this offer us today?

It is the questions of strategy and organisation that most often prompt debate about Lenin, and his legacy, in left-wing circles; this is as true today as it has ever been. Lenin was a pioneer of distinctively revolutionary organisation and the experiences of the Bolsheviks (the faction and later party that he led) from 1903 to 1917, are a particular focus for debate. Le Blanc challenges the oft-expressed idea that Stalinism originated in pre-1917 Bolshevik practices and the myth that Lenin undemocratically dominated the Bolsheviks, which was in fact a democratic, collective organisation in which debate flourished. He skilfully clarifies the genuine meaning of ‘democratic centralism’ for Lenin and his contemporaries.

He also critiques the idea, currently prevalent in some debates, that there was nothing especially distinctive about the Bolsheviks, treating the argument of Lars Lih (among others) that Lenin was essentially a standard Second International Marxist until 1914 with critical sympathy. He recognises the degree of truth in this. Lenin didn’t, prior to 1914, view the Bolsheviks as a new and special type of organisation or as substantially different from some European socialist parties, but he also explains how the Bolsheviks had in fact developed quite differently from the likes of the German Social Democrats, which had become increasingly geared towards parliamentary politics and compromise with capitalism. The outbreak of World War One, and corresponding collapse of most socialist parties into national chauvinism, was a turning point, after which the differences became sharper and the thinking of Lenin and other revolutionaries continued to evolve.

For those who seek to change the world, not merely understand it, wrestling with Lenin’s writings about strategy and organisation – and equally importantly his actions – is indispensable. The revolution he led was the only successful overthrow of capitalist state power in world history and, though it may have been beset by problems from the beginning, and unsuccessful in the longer term, the experiences involved remain a unique school in strategy and tactics for anyone wanting to end the miseries of capitalism and create a better world.

A central preoccupation for the author is the excavation of Lenin and the Bolsheviks’ deep commitment to democracy, the profoundly democratic possibilities inherent in the Russian Revolution and the democratic character of how Lenin and his comrades organised. He refutes several well-worn myths along the way, clearing away the misconceptions to present a view of Lenin as a radical democrat, and his revolutionary socialism as a political project with democracy at its core.

This is acutely relevant to our own times, in which democracy is visibly the loser in its struggle with capitalism, and when struggles for real democracy are integral to struggles against various aspects of the capitalist system. The recovery of Lenin’s radical democracy is especially necessary because of the widespread distortions of Leninism in the name of Leninism; most importantly those associated with the old Communist bloc, but also (as the author notes) the faulty versions of ‘Leninist’ practice that many well-meaning socialists have pursued in the West. These have seen dogmatic and somewhat sectarian groups competing with each other and largely cut off from influence over the broad working-class movement, therefore giving Leninist organisation a bad name.
 
The return of Lenin

The particular context framing this latest volume is twofold, with both social and more specifically literary dimensions. Firstly, there is the wave of insurgencies that have followed the emergence of a severe crisis for capitalism since 2008: Arab revolutions, Occupy, anti-austerity rebellions, the indignados and other manifestations of anti-capitalist revolt. This has, rather paradoxically, not led to a general revival of organised left-wing politics – though there are partial exceptions, such as in Greece, Spain and parts of Latin America –and it certainly has not proved the basis for a renewal of specifically Leninist (or revolutionary socialist) political practice.

However, the idea of revolution is certainly in the air, partly due to the Arab uprisings of 2011 and partly because the erosion and fragmentation of traditional parliamentary politics has fed a volatile situation in which rhetoric about ‘revolution’ (e.g. the public debate prompted by Russell Brand’s new book) is rather more mainstream than a few years ago, however ill-defined it might be.

The traditional revolutionary left, though, has in shrunk, fragmented and in many instances become politically sterile. The reference to the ‘return of a revolutionary doctrine’ in this book’s subtitle may for now be mostly wishful thinking, but the conditions clearly exist for considering that as a live possibility. The political radicalisation and volatility of recent years, the stirrings of debate about what is meant by ‘revolution’, and the small breakthroughs in ‘Lenin studies’, can all, in quite different ways, be seen as providing some basis for hope.

Secondly, there is a somewhat more favourable context for the publication of a new book on Lenin and Leninism, which is a partial revival in worthwhile scholarship on Lenin. Although the leader of the Russian Revolution largely remains a marginal, caricatured and derided figure, in politics, media and academia, there has been a series of books in recent years, generally written from a sympathetic left-wing perspective, that have generated some debate and welcome re-evaluation.

Lars Lih, who wrote the path-breaking 2006 book Lenin Rediscovered, has been foremost in re-assessing Lenin’s ideas, practice and context. Lih’s work in particular keeps cropping up – not without some criticism and disagreement, but with tremendous appreciation – in Le Blanc’s new collection. Canadian historian John Riddell’s on-going labour of love in editing the proceedings of the Comintern, from 1919 until the mid-1920s, is another vital reference point. Le Blanc’s essays involve reviewing some newer biographies and studies, but there are also references to older but still very useful works by the likes of Tony Cliff, Marcel Liebman and Ernest Mandel.

Le Blanc has decades of both study and practical experience to draw on in writing about his subject. His experience is as a revolutionary socialist activist in the US and he is acutely aware that the context in which he has been active is a radically different one from Lenin’s own, so any lessons from Lenin must be thought through in relation to contemporary reality. Unlike many of his peers, Le Blanc has remained a dedicated Marxist, though conscious of the need for an independent, critical and open Marxism which runs counter to the dogmatic orthodoxies which have so often plagued the avowedly Leninist left. He writes of the need for ‘guidelines’ rather than dogma when appreciating Lenin’s legacy.

I had previously read a number of the essays (though they all paid re-reading) and I heard their author deliver the talk at the Dangerous Times 2013 festival which is included here (and previously published on Counterfire). Le Blanc has previously written studies of the Marxist tradition, with a special focus on questions of organisation and strategy, and edited or co-edited selections of writings by Lenin, Trotsky and Luxemburg, all of which I warmly recommend. His concern in all these writings has been to update our understanding of the intellectual contributions of the most influential figures in the tradition and to indicate how they can serve activists in renewing the tradition. Consequently his style is lucid and accessible, blessedly devoid of academic jargon, and there is a rich sense of the wider context of socialist debate in Lenin’s own time.

The format, a selection of essays, written at different times for different audiences, inevitably leads to some repetition, but the author just about gets away with it. The selection animates a series of debates among contemporary writers and activists about aspects of both the historical record and the legacy. There are critiques of a range of recent works on Lenin, including a number of biographies, relevant historical works and the 2007 Lenin Reloaded collection of essays by left-wing intellectuals.

Overall the book succeeds as both an introduction to the life, times, ideas and legacy of Lenin, and as an insightful discussion of important issues for today’s activists. It can be dipped into and read in any order that suits the reader. Several essays could reasonably serve as an introduction to the topic, while others are more pitched at those familiar with certain debates.

When disagreeing with other writers, Le Blanc is admirably fair and does justice to any arguments he is disputing, though he is not afraid to criticise or re-think orthodoxies. The title is inspired in part by a fraternal disagreement with Alex Callinicos, chief theoretician of the British Socialist Workers Party, after he penned an article asking ‘Is Leninism finished?’ Le Blanc agrees with the answer proffered by Callinicos – no it isn’t finished, but is instead still acutely relevant – but points out that ‘finished’ has a dual meaning. It suggests ‘irrelevant’, but it can also mean ‘complete’.

The problem with Callinicos is that he appears to lapse into presenting Leninism as already complete, a doctrine to be passed down the generations rather than as a space for creative renewal. For Le Blanc, Leninism is unfinished in both senses: it is still relevant and it still requires constant updating and applying in light of new experiences. Rather than defensively repeating a doctrine, the advocacy of Leninism ought to be critical and creative.

The future of Leninism

The concluding essay is, appropriately, where Le Blanc is most explicit and forthright about renewing Leninism today and for the future. He rejects the notion that anything resembling a revolutionary party already exists anywhere in the world. We are instead at an earlier stage of development in renewing revolutionary organisation and it is necessary to avoid false or inflated ideas about the organisations we are building.

He convincingly argues that it is (self-) destructive for relatively small organisations to imagine themselves as the definitive Leninist party, when in fact they can at best be something far more modest: a contribution to the re-composition of an authentic revolutionary left. This does not mean treating the building of such organisations lightly; rather, it suggests seriousness of purpose combined with a healthy sense of perspective and openness to different possible realignments.

He reasserts the centrality of participation in actual working-class struggles and the need to relate Marxist ideas to people’s struggles and experiences. The fusion of socialism with the working-class movement is the historic core of the Marxist tradition, as a practical endeavour not merely a scholarly exercise, and it remains essential. But he also notes the difficulties we face when there is not the same kind of mass class-conscious working-class vanguard, with powerful traditions of struggle, ideas and organisation, which existed in roughly the first third of the twentieth century. The process of renewing revolutionary organisation thus goes together with processes of re-building the broader working-class movement and a recognisably left-wing culture.

He calls for a focus on democracy, not only as a topic of practical political struggle, but as something indispensable to how revolutionaries operate. Democracy is necessary in the broader movements we are part of, and inside our own organisations. This dedication to democratic practice is inextricably linked with the development of self-confident cadres who can think independently and engage in political debate. It is connected with the pursuit of a critically engaged open Marxism, willing to question orthodox interpretations and engage thoughtfully with changing realities.

The closing essay also emphasises the need for strategy. The ultimate goal for revolutionaries is the successful overthrow of capitalism and moving towards a democratic socialist future. This vision, the recognition of the potential inherent in current contradictions, and an awareness that current revolts can be the seeds of future social transformation, shapes revolutionaries’ perspectives. Elsewhere in the volume, Le Blanc cites Lukács, who wrote about the ‘actuality of revolution’ in his own short book on Lenin: the potential for revolution serves as a horizon for Marxist activists, and specific tactical decisions are made in the context of that broader worldview.

The ‘three whales of Bolshevism’ – a strategic perspective encompassing an 8-hour working day, land redistribution and a democratic assembly – guided the Bolsheviks between 1912 and 1917, providing a link between day-to-day struggles and the larger vision of socialism. A fresh strategic vision is needed to guide our own efforts today, suggests Le Blanc, and to provide that same bridge to a socialist alternative.

‘Unfinished Leninism’ is a source of ideas about how to build a stronger anti-capitalist left – more coherently organised, wider in its influence, and capable of applying the lessons of history to new challenges – as well as an historical introduction. Hopefully it will reach many of the activists who are searching for effective ways to organise for a future characterised by democracy, equality and human liberation.

This review was originally published on Counterfire.

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Socialism from below: Trotsky's revolutionary life

Leon Trotsky died on 21 August 1940, killed by a Stalinist agent. In 1917 he had been second only to Lenin as a leading figure in the Russian revolutionary movement. In October 1917 he was the main organiser of the insurrection which enabled the Russian working class to overthrow the state.

Trotsky was tremendously talented and had many strengths. He wrote, with outstanding perception, across a wide range of topics; he was a powerful orator, important marxist theoretician and immensely capable political organiser. Trotsky also demonstrated great personal commitment and courage in his continued defiance of Stalin, suffering expulsion from his party, exile from his country and the killings of several of his family before finally being assassinated himself.

He adhered to his revolutionary socialist ideas and principles to the end, despite being personally persecuted and politically marginalised, and dedicated himself to keeping alive the authentic tradition of socialism from below and internationalism. He was helped in this by his gift for brilliant clarity of political analysis, and also his fidelity to the ideas which had guided him and his fellow revolutionaries in more favourable times.

Read the rest of my brief introduction to Trotsky (plus an excellent chapter, on the insurrection of October 1917, from his 'Lessons of October') HERE.

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History captured in a moment

Tomorrow is the 70th anniversary of the murder of Leon Trotsky. In his epic 'History of the Russian Revolution', Trotsky describes a demonstration by 2,500 workers in Petrograd, in February 1917, which was attacked by the Cossacks. This is a superb description of an exciting and important moment in the revolutionary process, and captures something of the nature of revolutionary change:

'Cutting their way with the breasts of their horses, the officers first charged through the crowd. Behind them, filling the whole width of the Prospect, galloped the Cossacks. Decisive moment! But the horsemen, cautiously, in a long ribbon, rode through the corridor just made by the officers.

‘Some of them smiled,’ Kayurov recalls, ‘and one of them gave the workers a good wink.’ This wink was not without meaning. The workers were emboldened with a friendly, not hostile, kind of assurance, and slightly infected the Cossacks with it.

The one who winked found imitators. In spite of renewed efforts from the officers, the Cossacks, without openly breaking discipline, failed to force the crowd to disperse, but flowed through it in streams This was repeated three or four times and brought the two sides even closer together.

Individual Cossacks began to reply to the workers’ questions and even to enter into momentary conversations with them. Of discipline there remained but a thin transparent shell that threatened to break through any second.

The officers hastened to separate their patrol from the workers, and, abandoning the idea of dispersing them, lined the Cossacks out across the street as a barrier to prevent the demonstrators from getting to the centre. But even this did not help: standing stock-still in perfect discipline, the Cossacks did not hinder the workers from ‘diving’ under their horses.

The revolution does not choose its paths: it made its first steps toward victory under the belly a Cossack’s horse.'

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The revolution will be televised

The short Timeline documentary on the Russian Revolution, made for the Islam Channel, is now online (see below). It is written and presented by John Rees, author of 'In Defence of October' and 'The Algebra of Revolution'.

There's also an excellent new theoretical piece on revolution - past, present and future - by Feyzi Ismail at Counterfire. It examines recent events in Thailand (Red Shirts spokesperson pictured) and Nepal against the background of the history of revolutions. Feyzi writes:

'The recent political upheavals in Nepal and Thailand have been historic events in those countries. They have been heroic struggles, and they have started to open up class divisions. Yet they have failed to achieve fundamental change.

The specifics of these cases are different, but both have been characterised by mass movements on the streets, which have created temporary paralysis in society, and both have concentrated on democratic demands.



They join a long list of popular mass movements since 1989 that have caught the imagination of workers and the poor—from Indonesia to South Africa to much of Eastern Europe—but which have not delivered on their promises. None have been able to address the problems of poverty and inequality.

Not only have the aspirations for fundamental social change that precipitated these movements remain unfulfilled, but the movements have often fallen far short of the democracy they have been fighting for. They have been met either with severe repression, or accommodated through partial settlement.'


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Kollontai: a revolutionary view of work, sex, love and just about everything

Counterfire has just published a classic work by Alexandra Kollontai: a remarkably ahead-of-its-time analysis (from 1909) of class, women's oppression and strategies for women's liberation. This version has a bracing introduction by Tansy Hoskins:

'When will someone make a film about the incredible life of Alexandra Kollontai? Born into a rich family, she rebelled with an 'unsuitable' marriage, was radicalised by visits to textile factories, became a political campaigner in the late 1890's and then left her husband and child to study Marxism in Europe.

Returning to Russia she became a leader in the movement of women workers, a role that put a price on her head and forced her into exile in 1908. Whilst in exile, Kollontai continued her political work in England, Denmark, Sweden, Belgium, Switzerland, Italy, America and spent 1914 in Germany and Austria fighting against the impending world war.

Returning to Russia in 1917 Kollontai was elected to the executive committee of the Petrograd Soviet. Whilst in prison she became the only woman elected to the Central Committee of the Bolsheviks and, with the Revolution of October 1917, was appointed by Lenin as People's Commissar for Social Welfare.

Working with other leading female Bolsheviks, like Inessa Amand, Kollontai founded the Zhenotdel (or "Women's Department") in 1919. They introduced contraception, abortion and divorce on demand, and equal rights for both partners in a marriage. They turned into communal duties all the chores that had bound women to the home. Suddenly Russia was decades ahead of every other nation in terms of social welfare...'

Read more HERE. Is it still relevant today? In my view most definitely yes, but judge for yourself.


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What does it mean to be a revolutionary?

I've read a lot of Tony Cliff, but nowhere does he write more succinctly and eloquently than in this passage from his 1960 essay 'Trotsky on substitutionism'. The title may suggest something quite obscure, but that's not the case at all - Cliff is writing about big and important issues for socialist activists. I was going to attempt a synopsis of his ideas, or write a commentary, but there's nothing better than just letting this speak for itself.

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One can visualise three kinds of leadership that for lack of better names we shall call those of the teacher, the foreman and the companion in struggle. The first kind of leadership shown by small sects is “blackboard socialism” (in Britain an extreme example of this sort is the SPGB) in which didactic methods take the place of participation in struggle.

The second kind, with foreman-worker or officer-soldier relations, characterises all bureaucratic reformist and Stalinist parties: the leadership sits in a caucus and decides what they will tell the workers to do, without the workers actively participating. What characterises both these kinds of leadership is the fact that directives go only one way: the leaders conduct a monologue with the masses.

The third kind of leadership is analogous to that between a strike committee and the workers on strike, or a shop steward and his mates. The revolutionary party must conduct a dialogue with the workers outside it. The party, in consequence, should not invent tactics out of thin air, but put as its first duty to learn from the experience of the mass movement and then generalise from it.

The great events of working-class history have shown the correctness of this emphasis beyond all measure of doubt. The workers of Paris in 1871 established a new form of state – a state without a standing army and bureaucracy, where all officials received the average worker’s salary, with the right of recall of all officials, etc., before Marx began to generalise about the nature and structure of a workers’ state.

Again the workers of Petrograd in 1905 established a Soviet independently of the Bolshevik Party, actually in opposition to the local Bolshevik leadership, and in the face of at least suspicion, if not animosity, on the part of Lenin himself. Therefore one cannot but agree with Rosa Luxemburg when she wrote in 1904:

'The main characteristics of the tactics of struggle of Social Democracy are not “invented”, but are the result of a continuous series of great creative acts of elementary class struggle. Here also the unconscious precedes the conscious, the logic of the objective historical process comes before the subjective logic of its bearer.'

The role of Marxists is to generalise the living, evolving experience of the class struggle, to give a conscious expression to the instinctive drive of the working class to reorganise society on a socialist basis.

Because the working class is far from being monolithic, and because the path to socialism is uncharted, wide differences of strategy and tactics can and should exist in the revolutionary party. The alternative is the bureaucratised party or the sect with its “leader”. Here one cannot but regret Trotsky’s sweeping statement that “any serious factional fight in a party is always in the final analysis a reflection of the class struggle”. This verges on a vulgar materialist interpretation of human thought as growing directly out of material conditions!

What class pressures separated Lenin from Luxemburg, or Trotsky from Lenin (1903-17), or what change in class pressures can one see in Plekhanov’s zigzags: with Lenin in 1903, against him in 1903, against him in 1905, with him again (and at last breaking, it is true, with Lenin and with the revolutionary movement and joining the class enemy)? Can the differences in the theory of imperialism between Lenin and Luxemburg be derived from an analysis of their position in class society? Scientific socialism must live and thrive on controversy. And scientists who start off with the same basic assumptions, and then use the same method of analysis, do differ in all fields of research.

In order that the party should be able to conduct a dialogue with the masses, it is necessary not only that the party have confidence in the tremendous abilities of the working class in action, but also that the party understand correctly the situation in the country and the conditions of the working class, materially and morally. Any self-deceit on its part must cut short the dialogue and turn it into a boring monologue.

The party has to be subordinated to the whole. And so the internal regime in the revolutionary party must be subordinated to the relation between the party and the class. The managers of factories can discuss their business in secret and then put before the workers a fait accompli. The revolutionary party that seeks to overthrow capitalism cannot accept the notion of a discussion on policies inside the party without the participation of the mass of the workers – policies which are then brought “unanimously” ready-made to the class.

Since the revolutionary party cannot have interests apart from the class, all the party’s issues of policy are those of the class, and they should therefore be thrashed out in the open, in its presence. The freedom of discussion which exists in the factory meeting, which aims at unity of action after decisions are taken, should apply to the revolutionary party. This means that all discussions on basic issues of policy should be discussed in the light of day: in the open press. Let the mass of the workers take part in the discussion, put pressure on the party, its apparatus and leadership.

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Lenin, Lukacs and the actuality of the revolution

This is the fourth and final part of my series on a few key aspects of Lenin and his legacy. The previous posts are here:

Lenin's 'What is to be done?'
Lenin, democracy and freedom of criticism
Lenin: how to divide and how to combine

It is the Russian Revolution and its achievements that gives Lenin his place in history. But it is also the degradation of the original revolutionary spirit under Stalinism that largely accounts for Lenin's poor reputation, even on the left. Georg Lukacs' short book 'Lenin: a study on the unity of his thought' was written in 1924 and expresses the key ideas that guided Lenin in the years preceding 1917 and in the revolution.

Lukacs makes much of Lenin's concept of the actuality of the revolution - and the working class as the revolutionary class. What does this mean? Firstly, it doesn't mean that revolution is always lurking just around the corner. For the vast majority of the time, in a capitalist society, revolution appears a distant horizon: to most people, most of the time, it is unrealistic. But Lenin and Lukacs both recognised the potential for revolutionary transformation that is latent in society. The contradictions of our world mean there is always potential for outbursts of resistance, often very unexpectedly.

Furthermore, the working class is inherently the revolutionary class because of its social and economic position as producers of wealth and due to being able to act collectively. The working class was small and weak when Marx and Engels published the Communist Manifesto; by 1917, even in a relatively under-developed Russia, it had much greater collective strength. Lukacs wrote that 'the actuality of the revolution means that the bourgeoisie has ceased to be a revolutionary class.'

The era of bourgeois revolutions, which consolidated capitalist power politically, was over. The English and French revolutions of the 1640s and 1789-93 respectively had marked the strengthening of bourgeois rule in developing capitalist societies. But these ruling classes were now the established order - they were in no position to be revolutionary, even in a country like Russia (with its still semi-feudal Tsarist order). Alongside this development is another one: the working class grows. As Lukacs writes: 'Thus the outlines of the situation in which the proletariat, on its own, is called upon to play the leading role become sharper and more concrete'.

Writing about the change between Marx's time and the era of Lenin, Lukacs wrote: 'the actuality of the proletarian revolution is no longer only a world historical horizon arching above the self-liberating working class, but that revolution is already on its agenda.' The contradictions in capitalist society - and in working class consciousness - mean sudden twists and leaps are possible, however superficially stable things may seem. To make the most of new opportunities, revolutionaries require dynamism and flair in giving coherence and leadership (where possible) to the struggles that emerge.

Lenin grasped that the latent revolutionary character of his (and our) times was the framework for determining socialist strategy and tactics. Even modest tactical decisions have to be formulated in that context. He, as Lukacs writes, recognised 'the fundamental problem of our time - the approaching revolution - at the time and place of its first appearance. From then on he understood and explained all events, Russian as well as international, from this perspective - from the perspective of the actuality of the revolution.'

One of Lukacs' intellectual achievements, particularly in History and Class Consciousness, was his theoretical work on the marxist dialectic and its applications. A central element in this work is relating the specific to the whole, analysing every specific situation in relation to the bigger picture. This has, as I've indicated, implications for strategy and tactics, because tactics have to be part of a wider strategy and based on an accurate understanding of social and political conditions. Lenin did this in practice: one of his great strengths was flexibly adapting tactics within a larger strategy, while he was expert in connecting 'what is to be done' to an informed analysis of society. He was extremely adaptable, but once a course had been chosen it was necessary to implement it decisively. This was the essence of leadership - not only personal leadership of the party by Lenin, but leadership of wider struggles and movements by the party.

Lukacs puts it like this: 'Individual actions can only be considered revolutionary or counter-revolutionary when related to the central issue of revolution, which is only to be discovered by an accurate analysis of the socio-historic whole. The actuality of the revolution therefore implies study of each individual daily problem in concrete association with the socio-historic whole, as moments in the liberation of the proletariat'. Looked at in this light, even very minor victories have meaning and worth as part of a revolutionary project - they are 'moments in the liberation of the proletariat'.

A talk on Lukacs' 'Lenin' by John Rees can be viewed HERE. I also suggest looking at THIS.

For an in-depth elaboration of the dialectic - including chapters on Lenin and Lukacs - I strongly recommend The Algebra of Revolution: the dialectic and the classic marxist tradition by John Rees. Volume 1 - Building the Party - of Tony Cliff's Lenin biography is a superb exploration of Lenin's own practice as a revolutionary.

Lenin: how to divide and how to combine

This is Part 3 in a short series on Lenin and the real Leninist tradition.
Part 1: Lenin's 'What is to be done?'
Part 2: Lenin, democracy and freedom of criticism

The 1905 revolution in Russia challenged Tsarism and gave birth to the soviet, or workers' council, which exemplified a new and radical form of direct workers' democracy. Workers in factories directly elected their representatives, who came together to discuss and plan collectively. The revolution was ultimately defeated - and followed by represssion by the Russian state and a period of demoralisation and defeat for workers.

Yet, for a brief period, the Petrograd Soviet offered an alternative democratic vision and challenged for power. The chair of the Petrograd workers' council was a 26-year-old Leon Trotsky, who later led the 1917 Revolution alongside Lenin - 1905 has been described with hindsight as a 'great dress rehearsal' for 1917.

Lenin is frequently viewed as anti-democratic, as presiding in an autocratic manner over his own party. The party in turn treated ordinary workers with contempt - according to this view - and simply acted as a self-appointed revolutionary elite. 1905 gives the lie to that myth in a number of ways.

The unexpected development of such revolutionary democracy was an inspiration to many Marxists, but also generated some uncertainty about how to respond. The creation of workers' councils was not foreseen by Lenin; he learnt a great deal from workers' own initiative. Lenin noted that it was the workers, not merely the revolutionary party, that created this form of democracy.

Lenin rejected juxtaposing the soviet and the party, as if it is necessary to choose between them: 'the decision must certainly be both the Soviet of Workers' Deputies and the Party. The only question - and a highly important one - is how to divide, and how to combine, the tasks of the Soviet and those of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party.' In other words, what are the distinctive tasks of each, and how do they relate to each other?

This question - of the relationship between organised revolutionaries and the wider working class - goes to the heart of Leninism. The authentic tradition of Lenin is utterly different to the caricature. Lenin's view was that a party cannot substitute for mass action by the working class: 'The Soviet of Workers' Deputies came into being through the general strike, in connection with the strike, and for its aims. Who led the strike and brought it to a victorious close? The whole proletariat...'

It would be madness to limit such a body to only those with revolutionary politics, though revolutionaries should play a central role: 'the Soviet of Workers' Deputies, as an organisation representing all occupations, should strive to include... all who want and are able to fight in common for a better life for the whole working people'.

Achieving broad unity in response to the ruling order and its attacks on working people was a fundamental aim. Workers taking action will have extremely diverse ideas, with most expressing a mixture of the radical and the conservative. In this context the Social Democrats (or Marxists), organised in the RSDLP, ought to simultaneously build united action and articulate distinctive socialist strategy and ideas.

Lenin wrote: 'As for us Social-Democrats, we shall do our best, first, to have all our Party organisations represented on all trade unions as fully as possible and, secondly, to use the struggle we are waging jointly with our fellow-proletarians, irrespective of their views, for the tireless, steadfast advocacy of the only consistent, the only proletarian world outlook, Marxism.'

This combination of united action over shared demands and having a distinctive pole of revolutionaries is the core of Leninism. The 1905 experience is a reminder that democracy is at the heart of genuine socialist politics, and that Lenin was a champion of socialism from below not the authoritarian control freak of the anti-Leninist mythology.

Main source: Lenin's 'Our Tasks and the Soviet of Workers' Deputies' (1905)
The final part of this series will summarise some key ideas in Georg Lukacs' book on Lenin.

Futurism and revolutionary art

When I was in London earlier this month I went to Tate Modern for the Futurism exhibition, plus a visit to the Russian revolutionary posters. These exhibitions have a few things in common - magnificent inventiveness, technical mastery and political engagement amongst them. But another common feature is that in both the Futurist art and the revolutionary posters you can see, through changes in the art, how history played itself out in Europe and Russia during the 1910s and 1920s.

Much, though far from all, of the Futurist art of this period is simply amongst my favourite art: I love the style, all jagged edges and distorted perspectives, strange combinations and dazzling use of colour. While there are plenty of mediocre and unoriginal pieces, a fair proportion was highly innovative at the time and still feels incredibly fresh. A lot of it is social and political, but very rarely in crude or propagandist ways.

Tate Modern has grouped the art so that it's easier to follow Futurism's development, and how that interlocked with historical, political changes. The simple version of the story of Futurism is roughly as follows: before 1917 it was artistically revolutionary but not that political, then after 1917 the Russian version became political and left-wing while the Itlaian Futurists went over to Mussolini and glorified war and nation.

While this is over-simplistic, it interested me how Futurism did very obviously develop in different directions. The weakest art, in my view, was the bland, vague wartime Italian work that celebrated Italian nationhood. Art shouldn't be judged on crassly political criteria, but curiously it was indeed the most ideologically conservative strand that proved least artistically interesting.

Some of the best and most inspiring works, conversely, were the most politcally charged, such as the outstanding 'Revolt' by Luigi Russolo above. With fairly non-naturalistic art, there's room for interpretation, but I viewed it as a depiction of mass collective action, creating and striving for new horizons, suffused with hope (and that was before glancing at the title). I enjoyed an exhibition specifically of Russian Futurism in Newcastle a year or two back - and it's the Russian variant that provides much of the best work at Tate Modern. And this exhibition also benefits from some superb art that isn't strictly Futurist, but overlaps in period and style (including some Picasso).

I used the term 'propagandist' above as an insult. This is perhaps lazy, as the revolutionary posters demonstrated how propaganda can rise to the heights of great creativity and artistry. They in fact challenge the very idea of a hierarchy, in which an exhibited artwork is automatically assumed to be superior to a political poster. Some of the posters from the early revolutionary period were stunning and visionary, undoubtedly fuelled by passion for building a better world.

The historical changes were reflected in various ways. For example, in an early poster a woman was depicted as very strong, assured, determined; some years later, in the era of Stalin, and there's a softer-toned, traditionally feminine, unthreatening portrait. The contrast speaks volumes about the counter-revolution against the progressive ideals of 1917. Generally, the iconography becomes blander, the style more naturalistic, and there's a growing focus on showing the individual rather than collective struggles and aspirations.

For those who are interested, the Futurism exhibition is on until 20 September.