V. I.

Lenin

The Agrarian Programme of Social-Democracy in the First Russian Revolution, 1905-1907

2. What is the Struggle About?

Ten million peasant households own 73,000,000 dessiatins of
land, whereas 28,000 noble and upstart landlords own 62,000,000
dessiatins. Such is the main background of the arena on which the peasants’
struggle for the land is developing. On such a main background amazing
technical backwardness, the neglected state of agriculture, an oppressed
and downtrodden state of the mass of peasantry and an endless variety of
forms of feudal, corvée exploitation are inevitable. Not to wander
too far afield we must confine ourselves to mentioning briefly these
commonly known facts, which have been described at great length in the
extensive literature on peasant agriculture. The size of the landholdings
outlined by us in no way corresponds to the scale of farming. In the purely
Russian gubernias large-scale capitalist farming definitely drops into the
background. Small-scale farming preponderates on large latifundia,
comprising various forms of tenant farming based on servitude and bondage,
labour service (corvée) farming, “winter hiring”, [4] bondage for cattle trespassing on the landlords’ pastures, bondage for the
cut-off lands, and so on without end. The mass of the peasants, crushed by
feudal exploitation, are being ruined and some of them let their allotments
to “thrifty” farmers. The small minority of well-to-do peasants
develops into a peasant bourgeoisie, rents land for capitalist farming and
exploits hundreds of thousands of farm-hands and day-labourers.

Bearing in mind all these facts, which have been fully established by
Russian economic science, we must distinguish, in regard to the present
struggle of the peasants for the land, four basic groups of
landholdings:

(1) a mass of peasant farms crushed by the feudal latifundia and directly interested in the expropriation of these latifundia, an expropriation from
which they stand to gain directly snore than anyone else; (2) a small minority of middle peasants already possessing an approximately
average amount of land, sufficient to conduct farming in a tolerable way; (3) a small minority of well-to-do peasants who are becoming transformed
into a peasant bourgeoisie and who are connect ed by a number of
intermediate stages with farming con ducted on capitalist lines, and (4) feudal latifundia far exceeding in dimensions the capitalist farms of
the present period in Russia and deriving their revenues chiefly from the
exploitation of the peasants by means of bondage and the labour rent
system.

Of course, the available data on landed property enable us to distinguish these
basic groups only very approximately and sketchily. Nevertheless, we are
obliged to distinguish them if we are to present a complete picture of the
struggle for land in the Russian revolution. And we can safely say in advance
that partial corrections of the figures, partial shifting of the boundary line
between one group and another, cannot substantially alter the general
picture. It is not. partial corrections that are important; what is important is
that a clear contrast be made between small landownership, which is striving
for more land, and the feudal latifundia, which monopolise an enormous amount of
land. The chief falsity of both the government’s (Stolypin’s) and the
liberals’ (the Cadets’) economics lies in the fact that they conceal, or
obscure, this clear contrast.

Let us assume the following sizes of landholdings for the four groups
mentioned:

(1) up to 15 dessiatins; (2) 15 to 20 dessiatins; (3) 20 to 500 dessiatins, and (4) over 500 dessiatins per holding. Of course, in order to present a
complete picture of the struggle for land, we must, in each of these
groups, combine the peasants’ allotments with the private holdings. In our
source of information the latter category is divided into groups: up to 10
dessiatins, and from 10 to 20 dessiatins, so that a group up to 15
dessiatins can be singled out only approximately. Any inaccuracy that may
arise from this approximate calculation and from the round figures that we
give, will be quite negligible (as the reader will soon see) and will not affect the conclusions to be drawn.

Here is a table showing the present distribution of land among these groups
in European Russia:

| Group | Number of holdings (millions) | Total area of land (million dessiatins) | Average dess. per holding |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| (a) Ruined peasantry, crushed by feudal exploitation | 10.5 | 75.0 | 7.0 |
| (b) Middle peasantry | 1.0 | 15.0 | 15.0 |
| (c) Peasant bourgeoisie and capitalist landownership | 1.5 | 70.0 | 46.7 |
| (d) Feudal latifundia | 0.03 | 70.0 | 2,333.0 |
| Total | 13.03 | 230.0 | 17.6 |
| Not classified according to holdings | – | 50 | – |
| Grand total [1] | 13.03 | 280.0 | 21.4 |

Such are the relations which give rise to the peasants’ struggle for
land. Such is the starting-point of the peasants’ struggle (7-15
dessiatins per household plus renting on terms of bondage, etc.) against
the very big landlords (2,333 dessiatins per estate). What is the objective
tendency, the ultimate point of this struggle? Obviously, it is
the abolition of large feudalist estates and the transfer of the land (according to certain principles) to the peasants. This objective tendency
inevitably arises from the predominance of small-scale cultivation , which is held in bondage by the feudal latifundia. To
depict this tendency in the same graphic way in which we depicted the
starting-point of the struggle, i. e., the present state of affairs, we
must take the best conceivable eventuality, i. e., we must assume
that all the feudalist latifundia, as well as all land not classified
according to holdings, have passed into the hands of the ruined
peasantry. It is this best eventuality which all the participants
in the present agrarian struggle envisage more or less distinctly: the
government talks about “allotting” land to the “needy”, the liberal official (or Cadet) talks a-bout
supplementary allotments to those who have little land, the peasant
Trudovik talks about increasing holdings to the “subsistence”
or “labour” “norm”, and the Social Democrat, differing on the
question of the form of land tenure, generally accepts the proposal of the
Narodniks about allotting land to the poorest peasants. (In the Second
Duma, 47th sitting, May 26, 1907, Tsereteli accepted the figure of the
value of the 57,000,000 dessiatins of land to be alienated as given by the
Narodnik Karavayev, namely, 6,500,000,000 rubles, of which the poorest
peasants having up to 5 dessiatins account for 2,500,000,000 rubles. See
Stenographic Record, p. 1221.) In short, however much the landlords, the
officials, the bourgeoisie, the peasantry, and the proletariat may differ
in their view of the aims and terms of the reform, they all outline the
same tendency, namely, the transfer of the large landed estates to the most
needy peasants. With the fundamental differences of opinion among the
classes concerning the extent and terms of such a transfer we shall deal
separately elsewhere. At present we shall supplement our outline of the
starting-point of the struggle with a similar outline of its possible
ultimate point. We have already shown what the situation is
now . We shall show what it may be then . Let us assume
that 30,000 landlords will retain 100 dessiatins each, i. e., a total of
3,000,000 dessiatins, while the remaining 67,000,000 dessiatins and
50,000,000 dessiatins of unclassified land will be transferred to
10,500,000 poor households. We shall then get the following:

| | Now | Then |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Num- ber of hold- ings (mill) | Total area of land (mill. dess.) | Average dess. per hold- ing. | Num- ber of hold- ings (mill) | Total area of land (mill. dess.) | Average dess. per hold- ing. |
| (a) Small ruined peasants | 10.5 | 75 | 7.0 | — | — | — |
| (b) Middle peasants | 1.0 | 15 | 15.0 | 11.5 | 207 | 18.0 |
| (c) Wealthy peasants and bourgeoisie | 1.5 | 70 | 46.7 | 1.53 | 73 | 47.7 |
| (d) Feudal landlords | 0.03 | 70 | 2,333.0 | — | — | — |
| Total | 13.03 | 230 | 17.6 | 13.03 | 280 | 21.4 |
| Unclassified land | — | 50 | — | — | — | — |
| Grand total | 13.03 | 280 | 21.4 | — | — | — |

Such is the economic basis of the struggle for land in the Russian
revolution. Such is the starting-point of this struggle and its tendency, i.e.,
its ultimate point, its result in the best eventuality (from the standpoint of
those engaged in the struggle).

Before proceeding to examine this economic basis and its ideological (and
ideological-political) cloak, let us dwell on possible misunderstandings and
objections as well.

First, it may be said that my picture presupposes the division of the
land, whereas I have not yet examined the question of municipalisation,
division, nationalisation, or socialisation.

That would be a misunderstanding. My picture leaves out altogether the
terms of landownership; it does not deal at all with the terms
of the transfer of the land to the peasants (whether in ownership or in one or
another form of tenure). I have taken only the transfer of the land in general to the small peasants and there can be no doubt whatever that this
is the trend of our agrarian struggle. The small peasants are fighting, fighting
to have the land transferred to themselves . Small (bourgeois)
cultivation is fighting large-scale (feudal)

landownership. [2]

At best, the revolution can have no other result than the one I
have drawn.

Secondly, it may be said that I had no right to assume that all the
confiscated lands (or expropriated lands, for I have not yet said anything
about the terms of expropriation) will be transferred to the peasants with
little land. It may be said that owing to economic necessity the lands
must be transferred to the wealthier peasants. But such an
objection would be a misunderstanding. To demonstrate the bourgeois
character of the revolution, I must take the best eventuality from
the standpoint of the Narodniks, I must assume the achievement of
the aim set themselves by those who are fighting. I must take an aspect
that most closely approaches the so-called

General Redistribution [5] and not the further consequences of the agrarian revolution. If the masses
win the struggle, they will take the fruits of the victory for
themselves. To whom these fruits will ultimately go is another matter.

Thirdly, it may be said that I have assumed an unusually favourable result for
the poor peasantry (that the whole of the poor peasantry will be transformed
into middle peas ants with holdings up to 18 dessiatins per household)
by overestimating the extent of the unoccupied land area. It may ho
said that I should have discounted forests , which, it is said, cannot
be allotted to the peasants. Such objections may, and even inevitably will, be
raised by the economists in the government and Cadet camp, but they will be
wrong. First, one must be a bureaucrat who all his life grovels to the
semi-feudal landlord to imagine that the peasants will not be able to manage
forest land properly and derive an income from it for themselves and
not for the landlords. The standpoint of the police official and of the Russian
liberal is: how to provide the muzhik with an allotment? The standpoint of the
class-conscious worker is: how to free the muzhik from feudal landlordism? How
to break up the feudal latifundia? Secondly I have left out the whole
of the northern region (the Arkhangelsk, Vologda, and Olonets gubernias), as
well as parts of the Vyatka and Perm gubernias, i.e., areas in which it is
difficult to imagine that the agricultural exploitation of land covered by
forests is likely in the near future. Thirdly, a special calculation of the
forest areas would greatly complicate the matter without much altering the
results. For instance, Mr. Kaufman, who is a Cadet, and, consequently, is very cautious
when dealing with landlord estates, calculates that land with over 25 per
cent of forest might go to cover the shortage of land, and he thus obtains
an area of 101,700,000 dessiatins for 44 gubernias. For 47 gubernias I have
estimated a land area of approximately 101,000,000 dessiatins, i. e.,
67,000,000 out of the 70,000,000 dessiatins of the feudal latifundia, and
34,000,000 dessiatins owned by the state and by various
institutions. Assuming that all landed estates of over 100 dessiatins are
to be expropriated, these lands will be increased by another nine or ten
million

dessiatins. [3]

---
Notes:
[1]
As already mentioned, this table is. given in round figures. Here are
the exact figures: allotment land: (a) 10,100,000 holdings and 72,900,000
dessiatins; (b)874,000 holdings and 15,000,000 dessiatins. Private landed
property up to 10 dessiatins, 410,000 holdings and 1,600,000 dessiatins;
10-20 dessiatins, 106,000 holdings and 1,600,000 dessiatins, Sum total a+b
of both categories of land: 11,500,000 holdings and 91,200,000
dessiatins. For group (c) the exact. figures are 1,500,000 holdings and
69,500,000 dessiatins. For group (d): 27,833 holdings and 61,990,000
dessiatins of land. To the latter are added, as already mentioned,
5,100,000 dessiatins of crown lands and 3,600,000 dessiatins owned by the
very large industrial and commercial associations. The exact figure of land
not classified according to holdings was given above as 48,500,000
dessiatins. From this the reader may see that all our approximate
calculations and round figures involve quite negligible numerical changes
and cannot affect our conclusions in the least. — Lenin

[2]
What I have put. in brackets is either ignored or denied by the
petty-bourgeois ideology of the Narodniks. I shall deal with this later on.
— Lenin

[3]
The alienation limit of 500 dessiatins. which I have taken in the text,
is purely hypothetical. If this limit, is taken as 100 dessiatins, which is
also purely hypothetical, the picture of the change will he as follows:

| Now | Then |
| --- | --- |
| | Households (millions) | Total area of land (million dessiatins) | | Households (millions) | Total area of land (million dessiatins) | Dess. per household |
| (a) | 10.5 | 75 | (a) | — | — | |
| (b) | 1.0 | 15 | (b) | 11.5 | 217 | 18.8 |
| (c) | 1.4 | 50 | (c) | 1.53 | 63 | 41.1 |
| (d) | 0.13 | 90 | (d) | — | — | — |
| | 13.03 | 230 + 50 | | 13.03 | 280 | 21.4 |

The main conclusions about the character and essence of the change are
identical in either case. — Lenin

[4]
Winter hiring —the system practised by the landlords and
kulaks of hiring peasants for summer work in the winter, when the peasants
were badly in need of money and compelled to accept enslaving terms.

[5]
General Redistribution —a slogan expressing the peasants’
urge towards a general redistribution of the land and the abolition of
landlordism.