V. I. Lenin

Ourreaders know, of course, that during the past year our
Party has had to concern itself with the so-called liquidationist trend in
Social-Democracy. The liquidators are those most undaunted opportunists who
have begun to advocate the view that an illegal Social-Democratic Party is
unnecessary in Russia today, that the R.S.D.L.P. is unnecessary. Our
readers are also aware that the Bolsheviks waged and carried through a
struggle against this liquidationist trend, carried it through at least to
such an extent that at the All-Russian Party Conference in December

1908 {2} liquidationism was condemned in the most decisive and irrevocable
manner against the votes of the Mensheviks and part of the

Bundists {3} (the other part of the Bundists came out against
liquidationism).

However,the official organ of the Menshevik faction, Golos Sotsial-Demokrata , {4} not only did not admit that it was
liquidationist but, on the contrary, assumed an unusually “proud and
noble” pose and denied that it was in any way involved in
liquidationism. The facts convicted them. But Golos Sotsial-Demokrata grandly ignored the facts. The recent issue, No. 9,
of Plekhanov’s Dnevnik Sotsial-Demokrata {5} (August 1909) is extremely valuable because in
it one of the leaders of Menshevism completely exposes liquidationism. This
is not the only significance of Dnevnik but it is on this aspect
of the matter that we must dwell first of all.

No. 45of

Proletary {6} published a letter from Mensheviks of Vyborg
District (in St. Petersburg) protesting against the Menshevik
liquidators. This letter is reprinted in Golos No. 14 (May 1909)
and the editors remark:

“The editorial board of Proletary pretends to have seen in the
letter of the Vyborg comrades a step away from the newspaper
Golos Sotsial-Demokrata ....”

Plekhanov’s Dnevnik appears. Its author shows the whole content of liquidationist ideas in the article published in Golos
No. 15, without the slightest reservation on the part of the editors (and
moreover in an article expressing entirely the same views as those of the
editors). Plekhanov quotes in this connection the letter of the Vyborg comrades
and says:

“This letter shows us how the broad workers’ organisations are
at times influenced by people who have deserted our Party on the pretext of
‘new’ work” ( Dnevnik , p. 10). It is just this “pretext” that has always been put forward by Golos !
“Such influence,” Plekhanov continues, “is by no means a
Social-Democratic influence; it is in spirit absolutely hostile to
Social-Democracy” (p. 11).

Andso, Plekhanov quotes the letter of the Vyborg comrades against
No. 15 of Golos Sotsial-Demokrata . We ask the reader: in point of fact, who is it that is “ pretending "? Was Proletary
“pretending” when it accused Golos of liquidationism, or
was “ Golos ” pretending when it denied that it had any
connection with liquidationism.

The literary dishonesty of the editorial board of Golos has
been exposed, and exposed by Plekhanov, who until recently was one of its
members.

Butthis is by no means all.

In Golos No. 15 (June 1909), in an article signed F. Dan , we
find a statement that

Pravda’s {7} reputation for non-factionalism protects it “from
stupid and unscrupulous accusations of liquidationism” (p. 12). One could
not put it more forcefully. It would be difficult to show on one’s
countenance a more lofty, nobler indignation at Golos being
accused of liquidationism.

Plekhanov’s Dnevnik appears. The author shows the whole content of liquidationist ideas in one of the articles of Golos
No. ‘5 and declares to the Mensheviks who share these ideas:

“Why are you offended at the charge of liquidationism when in fact you are very much guilty
of this sin?” (p. 5).

“Comrade S. {8} [the author of the article in Golos No. 15
examined by

Plekhanov] {1} not only can but must be accused of liquidationism, because the plan that he expounds and defends in
his letter is in reality nothing hut a plan for the liquidation of our
Party” ( Dnevnik , p. 6). In his article Comrade S. plainly
expresses his solidarity with “the Caucasian delegation ”,
i.e., with the editorial board of “ Golos ”, which had,
as is known, two mandates out of three in this delegation.

Plekhanovcontinues:

“Onemust make a choice here: either liquidationism or a
fight against it. There is no third way. In saying so I have in mind, of course,
comrades who are guided not by their personal interests but by the interests of
our common cause. For those who are guided by their personal interests, for
those who are thinking only of their revolutionary careers — and there is
indeed such a career!—for them, of course, a third way does exist. Big
and little people of this calibre can, and, even must at the present time,
manoeuvre between the liquidationist and anti-liquidationist trends; under
existing conditions they have to make the strongest possible excuses for not
giving a straight answer to the question whether it is necessary to combat
liquidationism; they have to escape from giving such an answer by means of
‘allegories and empty hypotheses’, for nobody knows yet which trend will get
the upper hand—the liquidationist or anti-liquidationist—and
these sapient diplomatists want at any rate to share in the celebration; they
want at all costs to be on the side of the victors. I repeat, for such people
there is a third way. But Comrade S. will probably agree with me if I say that
they are not genuine people, but only ‘toy manikins’. {9} They are not
worth talking about; they are inborn opportunists; their motto is: ‘as you
please’” ( Dnevnik , pp. 7–8).

Thiscan be called: a gentle hint ... at a serious matter. The fifth and last
act, scene 1. On the stage are the editors of Golos , all except
one. Editor So-and-so, addressing the public with an air of exceptional
nobility: “the accusations of liquidationism levelled at us are not only
stupid but deliberately dishonest ."

Scene 2. The same persons and “he”, the editor of Golos who
has just safely resigned from the editorial board {10} ; he pretends not to notice any of the editors and says,
addressing contributor S., who is at one with the editors: “Either liquidationism, or a fight against it. There is a third way only for
revolutionary careerists, who manoeuvre, who make excuses for not giving a
straight answer, who wait to see who will, get the upper hand. Comrade
S. probably agrees with me that these are not genuine people but toy
manikins. They are not worth talking about: they are inborn opportunists; their
motto is—‘as you please’.”

Timewill show whether “Comrade S.”, the collective Menshevik Comrade S.,
really agrees with Plekhanov or whether he prefers to retain as his leaders
certain toy manikins and inborn opportunists. One thing we can safely say
already: among Menshevik workers , if Plekhanov, Potresov (a “convinced
liquidator” according to, Plekhanov’s comment on p. 19 of Dnevnik ) and
the toy manikins, whose motto is “as you please”, fully lay bare their views
before them, you will certainly not find ten per cent who are in favour
of Potresov and in favour of those who say “as you please”, taken together . You can be sure of that. Plekhanov’s statement is sufficient to
make Menshevik workers turn in disgust from both ’Potresov and those
who say “as you please”. Our task is to see to it that the working-class
Mensheviks, especially those who are not readily influenced by propaganda coming
from the Bolsheviks, become fully acquaint ed with No. 9 of Plekhanov’s
Dnevnik . Our task is to see to it that the working-class Mensheviks now
seriously set about clarifying the ideological basis of the
divergencies between Plekhanov, on the one hand, and Potresov and those who say
“as you please” on the other.

Onthis particularly important question, Plekhanov in Dnevnik No. 9
provides material that is also. extremely valuable, but far, very far, from
adequate. “Hurrah for ’general delimitation’!” exclaims Plekhanov, greeting
the fixing of boundaries between the Bolsheviks and the anarcho-syndicalists (as
Plekhanov calls our otzovists, ultimatumists and god-builders {11} ) and declaring that “we Mensheviks must demarcate ourselves
from the liquidators” ( Dnevnik , p. 18). Of course, we Bolsheviks, who
have already fixed our general boundary , whole-heartedly associate
ourselves with this demand for a general delimitation within the Menshevik
faction. We shall await with impatience this general delimitation. among the
Mensheviks. We shall see where the general boundary among them will lie. We shall see whether it will be a really
general boundary.

Plekhanovdepicts the split within the Menshevik ranks over liquidationism as a
split over an organisational question. At the same time, however, he provides
data which show that ’the matter is far from being confined to a question of
organisation. So far Plekhanov has drawn two boundaries,
neither of which as yet deserves to be called general. The first
boundary definitely divides Plekhanov from Potresov, the second divides him
indefinitely from the “factional diplomatists”, the toy manikins and the
inborn opportunists. Concerning Potresov, Plekhanov says that already in the
autumn of 1907 he “spoke like a convinced liquidator”. But there is more to it
than that. Besides this verbal statement of Potresov ’s on the organisational
question, Plekhanov refers to the well-known collective work of the Mensheviks
The Social Movement in Russia at the Beginning of the Twentieth Century , and says that he, Plekhanov, resigned from the editorial board of
this symposium because Potresov’s article (even after corrections and
redraftings demanded by Plekhanov and carried out through the mediation of Dan
and Martov) was unacceptable to him. “I became fully convinced that Potresov’s
article could not be corrected” (p. 20). “I saw,” he writes in
Dnevnik , “that the liquidationist ideas Potresov expressed in Mannheim
were firmly established in his mind and that he had completely lost the ability
to look at social life, at its present and past, through the eyes of a
revolutionary” (pp. 19–20). “Potresov is no comrade of mine ... he and I do
not go the same way” (p. 20).

Thequestion here is not at all one of present-day organisational problems,
which Potresov did not touch on, and could not touch on, in his article. It is a
question of the fundamental ideas of the Social-Democratic programme and tactics , which are being “liquidated” by the collective
Menshevik “work” issued under the collective Menshevik editor ship of
Martov, Maslov and Potresov .

Inorder to draw a really general boundary here it is not enough to
break with Potresov and make a “gentle” hint at the “as you please”
heroes. For this it is necessary to reveal in detail precisely where,
when, why and how “Potresov lost the ability to look at Social life through the eyes of a
revolutionary”. Liquidationism, says Plekhanov, leads to the “slough of
the most disgraceful opportunism” (p. 12). “Among them (the liquidators)
new wine is converted into a very sour liquid suitable only for preparing
petty-bourgeois vinegar” (p. 12). Liquidationism “facilitates the
penetration of petty-bourgeois tendencies in a proletarian environment”
(p. 14). “I have repeatedly tried to prove to influential Menshevik
comrades that they are making a great mistake in displaying at times their
readiness to go hand-in-hand with gentlemen who to a greater or lesser
extent are redolent of opportunism” (p. 15). “Liquidationism leads
straight to the muddy slough of opportunism and petty-bourgeois aspirations
hostile to Social-Democracy” (p. 16). Compare all these comments of
Plekhanov’s with the recognition of Potresov as a convinced liquidator. It
is quite clear that Potresov is described by Plekhanov (is now recognised
by Plekhanov, it would be more correct to say) as a petty-bourgeois democrat-opportunist . It is quite clear that insofar as Menshevism,
represented by all the influential writers of the faction (except
Plekhanov), participates in this Potresovism (in The Social Movement), to that extent Menshevism is now acknowledged by Plekhanov
to be a petty-bourgeois opportunist trend . Insofar as Menshevism,
as a faction, gives its blessing to Potresov, and screens him, Menshevism
is now acknowledged by Plekhanov to be a petty-bourgeois opportunist faction .

Theconclusion is clear: if Plekhanov remains alone, if he fails to
gather around him the bulk, or at least a considerable section, of the
Mensheviks, if he fails to lay bare before all Menshevik workers the entire
roots and manifestations of this petty-bourgeois opportunism, then our
estimate of Menshevism will prove to be confirmed by the Menshevik who is
the most outstanding as regards theory and who led the Mensheviks farthest
in the tactics of 1906-07.

Timewill show whether the “revolutionary Menshevism” proclaimed by
Plekhanov will be strong enough to wage a struggle against the
whole circle of ideas that have given rise to Potresov and liquidationism.

Inspeaking of the general delimitation among the Bolsheviks

Plekhanov compares the Bolshevik Marxists, Social-Democrats, to Gogol’s

Osip, {12} who picked up all sorts of rubbish, every little bit of string
(including empirio-criticism {13} and god-building), Now the Bolshevik Osip, says
Plekhanov jokingly, has begun “to clear the space around him”, to expel
the anti-Marxists, to throw away the “string” and other rubbish.

Plekhanov’sjoke touches not, on a frivolous question but on a
fundamental and very serious one for Russian Social-Democracy, namely,
which trend within it has been, most to the benefit of rubbish, “string”, i.e., to the benefit of bourgeois-democratic
influences in the proletarian environment. All the “subtleties” of
factional disputes, all the long vicissitudes of the struggle over various
resolutions, slogans, etc.—all this “factionalism” (which is now so
frequently being condemned by empty cries against “factionalism” that
encourage unprincipledness most of all ) turns on this fundamental
and very serious question for Russian Social-Democracy: which trend within
it has been the most subservient to bourgeois-democratic influences (which
are inevitable to some extent at some time during the bourgeois revolution
in Russia, just as they are inevitable in every capitalist country). Every
trend in Social-Democracy inevitably receives the adherence of a greater or
lesser number of not purely proletarian but semi-proletarian and
semi-petty- bourgeois elements; the question is which trend is
less subordinate to them, more rapidly rids itself of them, more
successfully combats them. This is the question ,of the socialist,
proletarian, Marxist Osip in relation to the liberal or anarchist,
petty-bourgeois; anti-Marxist “bit of string”.

Bolshevik Marxism, says Plekhanov, is a “more or less narrow and
crudely conceived Marxism”. The Menshevik variety, apparently, is “more
or less broad and subtle”. Let us look at the results of the revolution,
at the results of six years of the history of the
Social-Democratic movement (1903-09), and what six years they were! The
Bolshevik Osips have already drawn a “general boundary” and “shown the
door” to the Bolshevik petty-bourgeois “bit of string”, which is now
whining that it has been “ousted” and “removed”.

The Menshevik Osip has proved to be a lone figure, who has resigned
both from the official Menshevik editorial board and from the collective
editorial board of the most important Menshevik work, a lone protester
against “petty bourgeois opportunism” and liquidationism, which reign
both in the one and the other editorial board. The
Menshevik Osip has proved to be tied up by the Menshevik “bit of
string”. He did not pick it up; it picked him up. He has not overpowered
it, it has overpowered him.

Tellus, reader, would you prefer to be in the position of the
Bolshevik Osip or the Menshevik Osip? Tell us, does that Marxism in the
history of the workers’ movement prove to be “narrow and crude” that is
more firmly linked with the proletarian organisations and is more
successfully coping with the petty-bourgeois “bit of string"?

---
Notes:
{1}
Interpolations in square brackets (within passages quoted by Lenin)
have been introduced by Lenin, unless otherwise indicated.— Ed .

{2}
The All-Russian (December) Conference of the RS.D.L.P . (Fifth
Conference of the R.S.D.L.P.) was held in Paris on December 21-27, 1908
(January 3-9, 1909). It was attended by 16 delegates with the right to
speak and vote: 5 Bolsheviks, 3 Mensheviks, 5 Polish Social-Democrats and 3
Bundists. The representative of the Central Committee of the R.S.D.L.P. was
Lenin. He delivered a report at the Conference on “The Present Moment and
the Tasks of the Party”, and also spoke on the Social-Democratic group in
the Duma, and on the organisational and other questions. At the Conference
the Bolsheviks waged a struggle against two kinds of opportunism in the
Party: the liquidators and the otzovists. On the proposal of Lenin, the
Conference condemned liquidationism and called on all Party organisations
to combat vigorously attempts to liquidate the Party.

Foran appraisal of the decisions of the Conference, see Lenin’s
articles “On the Road” and “Liquidation of Liquidationism” (see present
edition, Vol. 15, pp. 343–53, 452-60).

{3}
The Bundists —members of the Bund, the shortened title of the
General Jewish Workers’ Union of Lithuania, Poland and Russia, founded in
1897. It united mainly semi-proletarian Jewish artisans in Russia’s western
regions. The Bund pursued an opportunist, Menshevik policy.

{4}
Golos Sotsial-Demokrata ( Voice of the Social-Democrat )—-organ of the Menshevik liquidators abroad; it was
published from February 1908 to December 1911, first in Geneva and later in
Paris.

{5}
Dnevnik Sotsial-Demokrata ( Diary of a Social-Democrat )—a non-periodical organ published by G. V. Plekhanov
in Geneva 4 considerable intervals from March 1905 until April 1912. In all
46 issues appeared. Publication was resumed in 1916 in Petrograd, but only
one issue appeared.

{6}
Proletary ( The Proletarian )—an illegal newspaper formed by the Bolsheviks after the Fourth (Unity) Congress of the Party. It
was published from August 21 (September 3), 1906 to November 28 (December
11), 1909, under Lenin’s editorship. Bearing the title of organ of the
Moscow and St. Petersburg Party Committees and for a time also of the
Moscow District, Perm, Kursk and Kazan Committees Proletary was
actually the Central Bolshevik Organ.

Altogether 50 issues appeared (the first 20 in Vyborg, Finland). From
February 13 (26) to December 1 (14), 1908. Proletary was published
in Geneva, and from January 8 (21) to November 28 (December 11), 1909, in
Paris. It printed over 100 articles and items by Lenin. During the Stolypin
reaction it played an outstanding part in preserving and strengthening the
Bolshevik organisations.

{7}
Pravda (of Vienna)—a Menshevik newspaper, the factional
organ of Trotsky, published in 1908-12 in Vienna. Under cover of
“non-factionalism”, it took up a liquidationist position on all main
issues, and also supported the otzovists and ultimatumists. In 1912,
Trotsky and his Pravda were the organisers of the anti-Party
August bloc.

{8}
S .—Silvestr Djibladze—a Georgian Menshevik liquidator.

{9}
Toy manikins —the name given in a story with this title by
M. Y. Saltykov-Shchedrin to the dolls of whom Izuverov, the skilful workman
who made them, said: “They have no brains, they do nothing, they have no
desires, but instead just an outward appearance.”

{10}
G. V. Plekhanov was a member of the editorial board of the Menshevik
organ Golos Sotsial-Demokrata . The newspaper’s development towards
liquidationism caused Plekhanov to disagree with the other editors. In
December 1908 he virtually ceased to take p art in the newspaper, first of
all giving notice of his resignation from the editorial board of the
five—volume work, The Social Movement in Russia , published by
the liquidators, and later from the editorial board of Golos as
well. Plekhanov ’s formal resignation from the latter occurred on May 13
(26), 1909.

{11}
Otzovists, otzovism (from the Russian word otozvat —recall)—an opportunist trend which arose among a
section of the Bolsheviks after the defeat of the 1905-07 Revolution, The
otzovists demanded the recall of the Social-Democratic deputies from the
Duma and the abandonment of work in legal organisations. In 1908 the
otzovists formed a special group and carried on a struggle against
Lenin. They refused to take part in the Duma, in the trade unions,
co-operatives and other mass legal or semi—legal organisations, and tried
to confine themselves to illegal work. Under cover of “revolutionary”
phraseology, they hindered the extension of the Party’s connections with
wide sections of the working class, pursued a policy that cut the Party off
from the masses, and thereby weakened the Party. Lenin sharply criticised
the otzovists and called them “liquidators of a new type” and
“Mensheviks inside-out”.

Ultimatumists,ultimatumism —a variety of otzovism. The ultimatumists proposed that an ultimatum should be presented to the
Social-Democratic Duma group as a preliminary and, on its non-fulfilment,
that the Social-Democratic deputies should be with drawn from the Duma.

God-builders,god-building —a religious-philosophical trend
hostile to Marxism which arose in the period of the Stolypin reaction among
a section of the Party literary writers who withdrew from Marxism after the
defeat of the 1905–07 Revolution. The “god-builders” (Lunacharsky,
Bazarov and others) advocated the creation of a new, “socialist”
religion, and tried to reconcile Marxism and religion.

Themeeting of the enlarged editorial board- of Proletary in
June 1909 adopted a resolution which sharply condemned otzovism and
ultimatumism, and also god-building. The resolution pointed out that
Marxism had nothing in common with these anti-Marxist trends and it called
on the Bolsheviks to wage a resolute struggle against them.

{12}
Osip —a character in N. V. Gogol’s comedy
Inspector-General .

{13}
Empirio-criticism —a subjective idealist trend in bourgeois philosophy which arose at the end of the last century and is
linked with the names of the German philosopher Avenarius and the Austrian
philosopher Mach. Empirio-criticism denies the objective existence of the
material world and its laws, and regards things as complexes of
sensations. Underlying the philosophical views of the empirio-critics is an
idealist conception of experience, which they interpret as a totality of
human feelings and sensations independent of the external world. In his
work Materialism and Empirio-criticism , Lenin made an annihilating
criticism of empirio-criticism and its Russian followers, Bogdanov,
Bazarov and others (present edition, Vol. 14, pp. 17–361).