V. I.

Lenin

Issue No. 13 of Narodnaya Duma [1] published an endlessly long resolution on mass workers’
organisations and a labour congress; the resolution is a draft for the
forthcoming congress, compiled by a group of publicists and Mensheviks
engaged in practical activities. The names of the publicists are not
mentioned, and in this it differs from other Menshevik resolutions (on the
State Duma and the “tactical platform”). And so it is not known whether
this lapse is accidental or whether it indicates a different grouping of
the Mensheviks on the given question. We recall that such a fervent
Menshevik and champion of the labour congress as El stated that “only part
of the Mensheviks have a more or less sympathetic attitude to the labour
congress” (p. 82 of the collection The All-Russian Labour Congress. For the Current Congress of the R.S.D.L.P. ).

Butlet us go over to the contents of the resolution. It falls into two
parts—A and B. In the preamble to the first part there are endless
platitudes on the benefit of the organisation and uniting of the mass of the
workers. “For the sake of importance”, as

Bazarov [2] said, organisation is convert ed into self-organisation . It is true that this word does not actually
express anything or contain any definite idea, but it is nevertheless a
favourite with the champions of the labour congress! There is no need to
explain that this “self-organisation” is only an intellectualist device
to cover up the dearth of real organisational ideas—it would never have
entered the head of a worker to invent “self-organisation”....

Thepreamble criticises Social-Democracy for the “dominant and
determining role played in it by the intelligentsia as compared to its proletarian elements”. An interesting criticism. We
shall not, for the time being, analyse its real socio-historical
significance—that would lead to too great digression from the present
subject. We merely ask—comrades “publicists and Mensheviks engaged
in practical activities”, why not begin with yourselves? Why does not the
physician heal himself? That which you call “the dominant and determining
role of the intelligentsia” is apparent in every sentence of your
resolution! Why should not your “intelligentsia” begin by
withdrawing and allowing the “proletarian elements” to draft the
resolution? What guarantee is there that in the “self-organisations”
projected by you, by the “publicists and Mensheviks engaged in
practical activities”, the phenomenon will not be repeated?

Larin,El and many other champions of the labour congress, give Social-Democracy
a “dressing-down” for forcing resolutions through . And to drive such criticism home, the publicists
“force through” long new, boring and cloying periods on
“self-organisation”.... What a picture!

Theresolution notes the “ideological and political influence” of the Russian Social-Democratic Party (i.e., the R.S.D.L.P.,
or has a broader term been deliberately used to include Prokopovich, Kuskova,
Posse and others?) on the advanced strata of the proletariat, and speaks of the
desirability of “uniting the forces” of Russian
Social-Democracy “with the politically conscious elements of the proletariat ” (A, Point 6).

Tryfor once to think over the words you use to compile your phrases,
comrades! Can there be a “politically conscious” proletarian who is
not a Social-Democrat ? If there cannot be, then your words boil down to
empty tautology, to turgid and pretentious trivialities. Then you should speak
of extending the R.S.D.L.P. to include real Social-Democrats who have not yet
joined its ranks.

Ifthere can be, then you are calling the proletarian Socialist-Revolutionary a
politically conscious proletarian. It would be ridiculous to deny his
“ political consciousness”! And so what follows is that, under
cover of grandiloquent words about the “self-organisation” and
“independence” of a class party, you are actually preaching the disorganisation of the proletariat by inducting
non-proletarian ideologists, by confusing real independence (Social-Democracy) with non-independence,
with dependence on bourgeois ideology and bourgeois politics
(Socialist-Revolutionaries).

Youwere making for one destination, but reached an other.... [3]

Thisis just like the old intellectual Economists of the 18951901 period, who
foisted on the workers their narrowness, their uncertainty, their cowardice,
their scurrying about under the flag of “self-organisation”, the
“pure working- class” movement, etc.! [4]

Theconclusion drawn by Part A: “The congress recognises the Russian
Social-Democracy’s most important current task to be work done hand in
hand with the advanced elements of the working-class masses [which means
also hand in hand with worker Socialist-Revolutionaries and
not against them?] for the consolidation of the latter in an
independent organisation, no matter how politically modest the character it
bears, or may be compelled to bear, by force of circumstances of time and
place.”

Whatis there in this that is definite, concrete, or goes beyond the bounds of
intellectualist plaints . What is it all about? Nobody knows.

Letus take consumers’ societies. They undoubtedly express
consolidation of the workers. Their character is politically modest enough. Are they “ independent ” organisations?
That depends on the point of view. To the Social-Democrats, workers’
associations are really independent when they are imbued with the
Social-Democratic spirit, and not only imbued with the “spirit”, but are also tactically and politically connected with
Social-Democracy—-either by entering the Social-Democratic Party or by
affiliation to it.

Onthe contrary, the syndicalists, the Bez Zaglaviya group, [5]

Posse’s [6] supporters, the Socialist-Revolutionaries, the
“non-party [ bourgeois ] Progressists”, call only those workers’
associations independent that do not enter the
Social-Democratic Party and are not affiliated to it, are not
linked up with Social-Democracy, arid with Social-Democracy alone, in their
actual politics, in their tactics.

Thisdifference in the two points of view has not been invented by us. It is
generally recognised that these two points of view exist, that they are mutually
exclusive , and that they are in conflict everywhere and on every occasion when workers are for
any reason “associated”. They are irreconcilable points of view,
because, to the Social-Democrat, “non-partisanship” (in tactics and
in politics in general) is only a screen and is, therefore, a particularly
harmful way of subordinating the workers to bourgeois ideology
and bourgeois politics.

Theoutcome: In its conclusion the resolution said absolutely nothing on the
essence of the matter. At best its conclusion is hollow phrase-mongering. At
worst, it is harmful phrase-mongering, misleading to the proletariat, over
shadowing the ABC of Social-Democratic truth, opening wide the door to
any declassed bourgeois, such as those who have for a long time been doing
considerable damage to the Social-Democratic working-class movement in
all European countries.

Howshould the resolution be corrected?

Theempty phrases should be discarded. It should be said simply that
Social-Democracy must support the organisation of various workers’ associations,
for example, consumers’ societies, with due and constant regard for every
workers’ association serving as a centre precisely of Social-Democratic
propaganda, agitation and organisation.

Thatwould, indeed, be a “politically modest” but business-like and Social-Democratic resolution. And you,
gentlemen, you intellectualist warriors against the “dominant and determining role of
the intelligentsia”, you have put forward not the proletarian cause, but
intellectualist phrase mongering.

Weshall deal with the second part (B) of the resolution next time

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Notes:
[1]
Narodnaya Duma ( People’s Duma )—a Menshevik daily newspaper published in St. Petersburg in March and April 1907 in place of
Russkaya Zhizn , which had been suppressed by the authorities.
Twenty-one issues appeared.

[2]
Bazarov —one of the chief characters in Turgenev’s Fathers and Sons .

[3]
Lenin is quoting Sophia in Griboyedov’s comedy Wit Works Woe .

[4]
Economism —an opportunist trend in Russian
Social-Democracy at the turn of the century; it was a variation of
international opportunism. The newspaper Rabochaya Mysl ( Workers’ Thought ), 1897-1902, and the journal Rabocheye Dyelo
( Workers’ Cause ), 1899-1902 were Economist publications. The programme of the Economists, whom
Lenin called “Russian Bernsteinians”, was contained in the
Credo written by E. D. Kuskova in 1899.

The Economists limited the tasks of the working class to the economic struggle
for higher wages, better working conditions, etc., asserting that the political
struggle was the business of the liberal bourgeoisie. They denied the leading
role of the party of the working class, considering that the party should merely
be the observer of the spontaneous process of the movement and the registrar of
events. In their deference to spontaneity in the working-class movement, the
Economists belittled the significance of revolutionary theory and
class-consciousness, asserted that socialist ideology could arise out of the
spontaneous movement, denied the need for a Marxist party to instil
socialist consciousness in the working-class movement, and thereby cleared the
way for bourgeois ideology. The Economists opposed the need to create a
centralised working-class party; as a trend, Economism threatened to divert the
workers from the class revolutionary path and make them a political appendage of
the bourgeoisie.

Leninvery thoroughly criticised the views of the Economists in a number of articles—“A Protest by Russian Social-Democrats” (which he
wrote while in exile in Siberia in 1899; it was directed against the
Credo and was signed by seventeen exiled Social-Democrats); “A Retrograde Trend in Russian Social-Democracy”; “Apropos of the Profession de foi” (see present edition,
Vol. 4); “A Talk with Defenders of Economism” (see present edition,
Vol. 5).

Lenin put the finishing touches to his ideological rout of Economism in his book
What Is To Be Done? (see present edition, Vol. 5). Lenin’s newspaper
Iskra played an important part in the struggle against the Economists.

[5]
Bes Zaglaviya ( Without a Title ) group —a semi-Cadet, semi-Menshevik group of Russian bourgeois intellectuals
(S. N. Prokopovich, E. D. Kuskova, V. Y. Bogucharsky, V. V. Portugalov,
V. V. Khizhnyakov, and others),
that took shape when the Russian revolution of 1905-07 began to
decline. The group took its name from a political weekly, Bez Zaglaviya , published in St. Petersburg from January to May 1906 with
Prokopovich as its editor. The same people later were grouped around the
Left-Cadet newspaper Tovarishch . Hiding behind a formal non-party
screen, the Bez Zaglaviya group propagated the ideas of liberalism and
opportunism; they support ed revisionism in Russian and international
Social-Democracy.

[6]
Posse, V. A. —a bourgeois journalist and public man who, in 1906 and 1907, proposed the establishment of workers’
co-operatives in Russia independent of the Social-Democratic Party.