# Rough Drafts and Outline for a Brochure on the Dictatorship of the Proletariat[39]
Source: PSS, Volume 39

1. (Some Aspects of the Question of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat)

The Question of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat

The Transition from Class Society to a Non-Class, Classless Society.

The three principal social groups—classes: the exploited, the exploiters, and the middle strata; the workers, the capitalists, and the petty bourgeoisie.

How are we to achieve this transition? Is it a matter of “the majority” drawn from across the various classes?

Is it not class struggle, but rather the question of the majority?

The continuation of class struggle in a different form: the ruling class—those who are exploited; the proletariat, not the exploited as such.

The middle strata, wavering, led by others.

The capitalists—those who exploit—are suppressed; their resistance is crushed.

The dictatorship of the proletariat as a new form of class struggle, a transitional stage in the movement from capitalism to socialism. Two fundamental questions arise—and further questions emerge:

α) The majority of the proletariat within the population: this is a prerequisite; that is, the dictatorship of the proletariat is permissible only when the proletariat constitutes the majority of the population.

β) The forms of class struggle in this particular stage. Are they the old forms, or new forms? What, precisely, is novel about them?

* Regarding point α. Ed.

** In the English style? Ed.

2. Some Theoretical Aspects of the Question of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat

The dictatorship of the proletariat as the leadership of the working masses—and of society as a whole—by the proletariat.

Two primary tasks—and, correspondingly, two new forms—of class struggle under the dictatorship of the proletariat:

(1) The suppression of the resistance of the exploiters (and of any resurgence, any return to capitalism and to capitalist traditions).

(2) Systematic, guiding intervention—also a form of struggle, but of a special kind, one that overcomes, albeit in a very different way, a distinct form of resistance, and entails a fundamentally different mode of overcoming.

The dictatorship of the proletariat is the transformation of the proletariat into the ruling class. The rule of a single class excludes freedom and equality.

NB:

* Uncritical. Ed.

** Truly petty-bourgeois. Ed.

*** In an abstract form. Ed.

But the revolutionary proletariat needs—and now, more than ever, urgently requires—a concrete definition of its tasks of transition, of the gradual steps from the old to the new.

Real steps toward “freedom and equality,” that is, toward the abolition of classes—though, to be sure, this is nothing more than a phrase, a mere slogan![40]

In one way, along a single line, it is both possible and necessary to abolish the class—or classes—of exploiters.

They can be “overthrown.”

But one cannot “overthrow” classes that are not exploitative, or only indirectly exploitative: the bourgeois intelligentsia; the petty bourgeoisie, which, qua owner of the means of production,[41] is, in potential, an exploiter—and in practice, only partially so.[42]

3. Themes Concerning the Dictatorship of the Proletariat

1. The dictatorship of the proletariat is the continuation of class struggle—in a new form.

2. The state is merely an instrument in this struggle.

3. The form of this instrument cannot remain the same. In particular, formal equality cannot serve as the form of struggle for material equality, against actual inequality.

4. Two principal lines—or forms, or types—of class struggle under the dictatorship of the proletariat:

5. A) The suppression of the exploiters. This is a war more relentless than any other.

6. B) The “neutralization” of the middle elements, of the petty bourgeoisie, of the peasantry. Neutralization is achieved through persuasion, example, education by experience, the suppression of deviations through force, and the like.

7. C) The subjugation of those hostile to positive work (“specialists”).

8. [ + D) The cultivation of a new discipline. ]

9. Dictatorship versus democracy. Dictatorship is, in general, the negation of democracy. The dictatorship of the oppressed class is the negation of democracy for the oppressor class, while simultaneously extending democracy to the oppressed.

10. Democracy, concretely, =

11. α) Equality of all citizens before the law. — There can be no equality with the exploiter once he has been overthrown.

12. β) Political freedom for all citizens. — There can be no political freedom for the exploiters.

13. γ) Decision-making by majority vote of all citizens. — Not so: except for the exploiters, and despite the wavering.

14. Voting as the essence of peaceful or pure democracy. In reality, however, voting is mediated by money in bourgeois democracy. In class struggle, in civil war, during the liberation from capital, during the overthrow of capital.

15. Under capitalism, one class wages class struggle against capital. The same holds true when this struggle continues in the form of the dictatorship of the proletariat. The petty bourgeoisie exists “insofar as” (cf. the Communist Manifesto).

16. Voting as a form of decision-making—that is, as a formal expression of will while preserving the capitalist determinants (the motivations) of that will—is bourgeois democracy. Class struggle and civil war against the exploiters—this is proletarian democracy. Through its own struggle, through revolutionary struggle, the proletariat dismantles capitalist relations of property; ergo, it also dismantles the capitalist determinants—and the motivations—of will and decision-making for those who waver.

17. Voting as a means of decision-making: all are equal, “without counting” money, capital, private property. Class struggle and civil war: first destroy the yoke of money, of capital, of private property; then vote—not for the exploiters. As the former progresses, so too does the latter. With each success in the former, the latter advances as well.

18. Voting as a means of decision-making could, in principle, be fully realized only in a society entirely free of class antagonisms (ergo, already in a non-class society), provided there is no resistance from the exploiters. — This is a utopia of reformism.

19. Democracy under the dictatorship of the proletariat: congresses, assemblies, local self-government, decision-making by the will of the working people, religion, women, oppressed nations: “Heaven and earth.” Teaching the working people to do without capitalists—this is democracy under the dictatorship of the proletariat.

20. The deception of the working people through formal equality while the yoke, the shackles, and the slavery of capitalism are preserved—this is bourgeois democracy.

21. The dictatorship of the proletariat is the process by which one class—the proletariat—educates all working people, while simultaneously assuming leadership. To lead means to govern. The ruling class is the proletariat alone. Domination inherently excludes freedom and equality.

22. The peasantry, as laboring masses, is an ally; as owners and speculators, it is an enemy. “To the extent that…” This is not a matter of voting but of the unfolding of the revolution, the course of civil war, its lessons, and its ultimate outcome.

23. The proletariat does not exist in the abstract; it emerges in the 20th century, following the imperialist war. A split with the upper echelons is inevitable. To bypass the concrete in favor of abstraction is nothing more than deception. (Dialectics versus eclecticism.)

24. Engels’s writings on England in 1852. 1852–1892. Compare this with 1914–1919. The dictatorship of the proletariat signifies the overthrow of its opportunist leaders, the transition from a working-class aristocracy to the broad masses—a “struggle for influence.” This struggle is never without division.

25. The Soviets represent proletarian democracy—and thus the dictatorship of the proletariat. Workers and peasants are enshrined in the Soviet Constitution. “The equality of labor-based democracy.” Article 23 of the Constitution: “The dictatorship of a single party.”

26. The resistance of the exploiters begins long before their overthrow and intensifies as the revolutionary process advances. The conflict may either escalate on two fronts or devolve into evasion of confrontation (as Kautsky argued).

27. There was a time—roughly from 1871 to 1914—when it was necessary to develop backward societies through universal suffrage, without resorting to revolution (though strikes and other forms of protest were nonetheless essential). But the time has come for revolutions—beginning in 1917—when the very course of the proletarian revolution is shaped by the civil war waged by the proletariat itself.

28. The developed proletariat and the “modern barbarians”[43]. The experience of revolution: to inspire and to guide. The revolutionary proletariat must earn the trust and respect of the working masses.

29. The wavering and the weary versus the proletariat.

30. Imperialism represents the hardening of capitalism, its decay, and the imposition of military rule over backward nations. (Compare Hobson’s work with my own “Imperialism.”)

31. The transformation of imperialist war into civil war. Marx wrote in 1870: “Revolution will teach the masses how to wield arms.” Compare this with Kautsky’s analysis during 1914–1918.

32. “The majority”? Fifty-one percent (αα) of the proletariat may be fewer than twenty percent (ββ) of the proletariat—if αα is heavily infected by imperialist tendencies and if it faces fierce resistance from the petty bourgeoisie.

33. “A single reactionary mass.”

NB Engels, 1875. Reflections on the Commune and on the general dictatorship of the proletariat.

Four main sections (A, B, C, D); ABC constitutes the overarching framework; D is “the Russian section.”

D. The Dictatorship of the Proletariat and the Soviet Constitution (25.

§ 9. Dictatorship versus Democracy (“Pure Democracy”).

General[44]

10. (α) Equality (11).

11. (β) Political freedom (12)

12. (γ) And freedom in general.

13. (δ) Decision-making by majority vote (13).

14. Its conditions: equality

15. Good faith

16. Deception

17. Bureaucracy.

18. The dictatorship of the bourgeoisie[45].

19. Resolution through struggle, in its most acute forms (16).

20. The majority and power (32).

21. The successes of democratic principles (19).

V. I. Lenin’s manuscript, “Plan for a Brochure on the Dictatorship of the Proletariat”—written in September–October 1919.

4. NB: Plan for a Brochure on the Dictatorship of the Proletariat

Written in September–October 1919.

First published in 1925 in Volume III of the Lenin Collection.

Printed according to the original manuscripts.