Date: 1909-08-30
Source: ru:PSS/v47

Source: PSS vol 47

The school on Capri is, in essence, a school deliberately concealed from the Party.

No form of oversight, no “ideological guidance” whatsoever can possibly be exerted over the Capri school—neither by the Central Committee, to which you are now appealing, nor by the editorial board of Proletariy, to which you turned just yesterday. To speak here of “control” or “ideological leadership” is nothing more than empty rhetoric. No one would ever entertain the absurd notion of dispatching Party “inspectors” to Capri to oversee the school; and under even the most trivial of circumstances, it is utterly impossible to send genuinely Party-affiliated lecturers to Capri. If the local Russian organizations were unaware of this fact, then the very architects of the school knew it all too well—and that is precisely why they established the school on Capri: to cloak its factional character, to hide the school from the Party’s purview.

Take the non-factional Russian Social Democrats who have distinguished themselves through their deep engagement with the workers’ movement abroad: Parvus and Rosa Luxemburg (Germany), Sh. Rappoport (France), Rotstein (England). Consider non-factional Social Democratic writers like Ryazanov—you will see at once (unless you choose to close your eyes so as not to see) that while they might, with considerable effort on the part of the Party, manage to deliver lectures in Paris in most cases, they would be utterly unable to make the journey to Capri. The very funds that the school’s organizers expended on sending students and lecturers to the most remote foreign outpost—Capri—would have been more than sufficient to arrange readings for at least some of these same lecturers right here in Paris.

Furthermore, consider the emerging groupings within the Social Democratic movement—groupings whose study is of paramount importance for Russian comrades (the struggle between Party loyalists and liquidators within the Bund; the conflict between the Bolshevik wing of Latvian Social Democrats and the Mensheviks; the R.S.D.* versus the left-wing P.P.S.**; the split within Menshevism, Plekhanov’s outspoken opposition

* – P.S.D. – Polish Social Democracy. Ed.

** – P.P.S. – Polish Socialist Party. Ed.

to the “Diary,” which exposed Potresov’s and the official Mensheviks’ liquidationist tendencies; the attempts to forge a “revolutionary Menshevism,” and so forth). On Capri, it is impossible to gain a proper understanding of these party‑critical phenomena. In Paris, by contrast, there exists every opportunity to learn about the state of affairs firsthand—not merely secondhand.

Finally, take a look at the curriculum of the Capri school. Of its four sections, one—Section III—is titled “The Philosophy of Proletarian Struggle.” Within international Social Democracy, there exist dozens, even hundreds—if not thousands—of propaganda course programs of precisely this kind. Yet nowhere will you find a “Philosophy of Proletarian Struggle.” There is Marx and Engels’ philosophical materialism, but nowhere is there a “Philosophy of Proletarian Struggle.” And none of the European Social Democrats would understand what such a thing could possibly mean. Only those familiar with the works of philosophers like Stanisław (A. Wolski), Bogdanov, Lunacharsky, and Bazárov could truly grasp it. Before one can even begin to teach a “Philosophy of Proletarian Struggle,” one must first invent such a philosophy—a philosophy that, the further it strays from proletarian worldviews, the more frequently it invokes the term “proletarian” in its very name. It is precisely this particular group of members of the new faction who have long since devoted themselves—and continue to devote themselves—to the task of fashioning this peculiar philosophy.

To conclude: if you, comrades, persist in your refusal to come to Paris (while at the same time professing your desire to listen to my lectures), then in doing so you will ultimately prove that the narrow, clique‑oriented politics of the new God‑building, “revivalist” faction has infected not only the lecturers but also certain students of the Capri school.

With socialist greetings, N. Lenin

on the island of Capri (Italy)

in the journal

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Sent from Bombon (France)

First published in 1926

Proletarian Revolution, No. 2

Printed from manuscript