6. The National Question

The national question must be considered under two main departments: a. general statement of the question; b. the movement of the oppressed peoples to secure liberation, and the relationship of that movement to the proletarian revolution.

During the last twenty years, the national question has undergone important modifications. Alike in its scope and in its character, it is very different now from what it was in the palmy days of the Second International.

At that time, when people spoke of the problem of nationality they were thinking, wholly or mainly, of a circumscribed series of questions concerning the “civilised” nations of the western world. The Irish, the Hungarians, the Poles, the Finns, the Serbs—these and a few other European peoples which did not enjoy a full right of self-determination, were of interest to the Second International. The Asiatics and the Africans who, to the number of tens or even hundreds of millions, were subject to the most outrageous forms of oppression, were for the most part beyond the horizon of vision. Whites and blacks, “civilised” and “uncivilised”, belonged to different categories. The activities of the Second International in this field were limited to occasional insipid resolutions wherein the fundamentals of the position of colonial and dependent peoples were carefully glossed over. To-day, however, duplicity and half-heartedness as concerns the national question have become obsolete. Leninism has disclosed the glaring inconsistency of the old outlook. Making no distinction between whites and blacks, between Europeans and Asiatics, between the “civilised? and the “uncivilised “slaves of imperialism, Leninists link up the national question with the colonial question. Thereby the national question has been broadened out, so that it is no longer the private concern of any one nation, but is a general and international concern. It is now seen to be the worldwide problem of the deliverance of the inhabitants of colonial and dependent countries from the yoke of imperialism.

In former days, the right of self-determination was usually narrowed down to the right of “home rule”. Some of the leaders of the Second International were actually content to restrict the right of self-determination to what was called the right to have “cultural autonomy”, this meaning that an oppressed nation was to be entitled to have its own cultural institutions, but in political matters was to be subject to the dominion of the oppressing nation. Thus interpreted, the notion of self-determination, instead of being a weapon for use in the struggle against annexation, became a justification for annexation! This confusion of terms has now been dispelled. According to Leninism, self-determination must be understood in a much wider sense, as meaning that the inhabitants of colonies and dependencies have the right of complete severance, the right to independent national existence. The Leninist interpretation makes it impossible to justify annexations on the ground that self-determination means nothing more than “home rule”. Thereupon “the right of self-determination” ceases to be a mere formula for humbugging the masses (as it undoubtedly was in the hands of the jingo socialists during the imperialist war); it becomes a touchstone for the detection of imperialist leanings and chauvinist machinations, and a means for the political enlightenment of the masses in the spirit of internationalism.

In former days, the question of oppressed nationalities was usually looked upon as legal and nothing more. A solemn proclamation of the “equality of national rights”, countless assertions as to the “equality of the nations”, served the turn of the parties affiliated to the Second International, and helped to veil the fact that under imperialist conditions (in which a minority of nations lives by exploiting the majority) the term “equality of the nations” is a mockery of the oppressed peoples. This bourgeois-legalist conception of the national question is now discredited. Leninism has brought the question down from the altitudes of high-flown declarations to mother earth; has shown that talk about the “equality of the nations” is false and empty declamation unless it is backed up by deeds, unless the proletarian parties give direct support to the oppressed nationalities in their struggle for freedom. Thus the problem of the oppressed nationalities has become the problem of how much genuine and effective help can be given them in their struggle against imperialism, their fight for real national independence, for existence as separate political entities.

Reformists regarded the national question as a problem standing by itself, unrelated to the general problem of the power of capital, that of the oppression exercised by imperialism, that of the proletarian revolution. They tacitly assumed that the European proletariat could win the victory without forming direct ties with the movement for national liberation in the colonies, that the national-colonial question would “solve itself”, apart from the proletarian revolution, apart from the fight against imperialism. This antirevolutionary outlook is now discredited. The imperialist war and the Russian revolution have confirmed the Leninist view that the national problem can only be solved in the arena of the proletarian revolution, and when it is linked up with that revolution; that for the revolution in the western world the path to victory lies by way of a revolutionary alliance with the struggle of the colonial and dependent nationalities to throw off the yoke of imperialism. The national question is part of the general question of the proletarian revolution, part of the question of the dictatorship of the proletariat.

The problem must be stated thus: Are the revolutionary possibilities of the revolutionary movement for the liberation of oppressed countries already exhausted; if they are not exhausted, is there any chance of turning these possibilities to account on behalf of the proletarian revolution, is there any chance of transforming the colonial and dependent lands from reserves of force for the bourgeoisie into reserves of force for the proletariat; can the colonial and dependent nationalities become the allies of the revolutionary proletariat?

The Leninist answer to these questions is that the nationalist movements for the freeing of oppressed countries from the imperialist yoke certainly contain unexhausted revolutionary possibilities; that these possibilities can be utilised for the overthrow of our common enemy, for the destruction of imperialism. The mechanism of imperialist development, that of the imperialist war, and that of the Russian revolution, have fully confirmed the conclusions of Leninism in this respect.

From these considerations it follows that the proletariat must decisively and actively support the nationalist movements for the liberation of the oppressed and dependent peoples.

Of course this does not mean that the proletariat ought to support any and every nationalist movement, at all times and in all places, no matter what the concrete conditions may be. The proletariat should support nationalist movements which tend to weaken and subvert imperialism, not those which tend to strengthen and maintain it. In certain oppressed countries, nationalist movements may run counter to the general interests of the proletarian movement. Obviously, there can be no question of our helping such movements as these. The problem of national rights does not stand alone; it is part of the general problem of the proletarian revolution, is subordinate thereto, and can only be considered by the proletariat from that angle. In the forties of the last century, Marx supported the Polish nationalist movement and the Hungarian nationalist movement, while he opposed the Czech nationalist movement and the Yugoslav nationalist movement. Why this difference? The reason was that in those days the Czechs and the Southern Slavs were “reactionary peoples”, were “outposts of Russian absolutism”, whereas the Poles and the Hungarians were “revolutionary peoples”, fighting against absolutism. At that epoch, to support the Czech nationalist movement and the Yugoslav nationalist movement would have been to give indirect support to tsarism, which was then the most dangerous enemy of the revolutionary movement in Europe.

Lenin writes:

The various demands of democracy, and among others the right of self-determination, have no absolute value, but are parts of the worldwide democratic (nowadays, socialist) movement. In concrete instances, the interests of the part may conflict with the interests of the whole. If that is so, we must repudiate the part. (Works, Russian edition, vol. xix., pp. 199-200.)

These words apply to the various nationalist movements, Contemplated, not from the outlook of formal, abstract right, but realistically, and with an eye to the interests of the revolutionary movement as a whole, a nationalist movement may be reactionary. In like manner, though most of the nationalist movements undoubtedly have a revolutionary character, this is no less relative and specific than is the reactionary character of certain others. Under the imperialist yoke, a nationalist movement may have a revolutionary trend even though it does not embody any proletarian elements, even though its program is neither revolutionary nor republican, and even though the movement lacks a democratic foundation. Objectively considered, the struggle of the amir of Afghanistan to secure the independence of his country is a revolutionary struggle, despite the fact that the amir and his adherents are monarchists and not republicans; for the movement on behalf of the independence of Afghanistan tends to weaken, disintegrate, and undermine imperialism. On the other hand, during the imperialist war, the activities of such doughty democrats, “socialists”, “revolutionaries”, and republicans as Kerensky and Tseretelli, Renaudel and Scheidemann, Chernoff and Dan, Henderson and Clynes, were reactionary in trend, for the upshot of their doings was to mask the workings of imperialism, to promote an imperialist victory. By parity of reasoning, we see that the fight of Egyptian business men and bourgeois intellectuals on behalf of the independence of Egypt is, objectively considered, revolutionary, although the leaders of the Egyptian nationalist movement are bourgeois by birth and occupation, and although they are antisocialists. On the other hand, the determination of the British labour government to maintain the dependence of Egypt is a reactionary determination, although the members of this government are proletarian by birth and calling, and although they declare themselves socialists. I need merely allude in passing to the nationalist movement in much larger colonial and dependent countries, such as Hindostan and China, whose every step towards national liberation is revolutionary, even if it infringes the canons of formal democracy—for every such step on the part of one of these countries inflicts a smashing blow on imperialism.

Lenin was right when he said that the nationalist movements of oppressed countries must be considered, not from the outlook of formal democracy, but from the outlook upon their actual results in the general struggle against imperialism; when he said that they must be regarded, “not in isolation, but as parts of the world process”.

In order to solve the national problem, Leninism sets out from the following propositions:

1. The world is divided into two camps: the camp of the civilised nations, which comprise no more than a small minority, though they control financial capital and exploit the overwhelming majority of the inhabitants of the globe; and the camp of the oppressed and exploited peoples in colonial and dependent lands, far more numerous than their exploiters.

2. Colonial and dependent countries, oppressed and exploited by financial capital, form the main field from which imperialism draws its reserve forces.

3. Only by means of a revolutionary struggle against imperialism can the peoples of dependent and colonial lands hope to free themselves from oppression and exploitation.

4. The chief colonial and dependent countries have already entered into the movement for national liberation, and this cannot fail to bring about a crisis in world capitalism.

5. The proletarian movement in advanced countries and the nationalist movement for the liberation of the peoples of colonial and dependent lands being both revolutionary movements, or two different aspects of the same great revolutionary movement, it will be to their interest to unite, to form a united front against the common enemy—imperialism.

6. The victory of the working class in advanced countries and the liberation of oppressed nationalities from the imperialist yoke can only be effected by the formation and consolidation of a united revolutionary front.

7. The formation of this united revolutionary front is impossible unless the proletariat of the oppressor nations gives direct and effective support to the endeavours of the oppressed nations to free themselves from the yoke of imperialism; and the proletariat of an oppressor nation must do this regardless of the fact that the imperialism of “its own country” functions as oppressor, remembering that (as Marx said) “a people which oppresses another people cannot itself be free”.

8. This support involves the defence, the effective realisation, of the principle that the oppressed nationalities are entitled to break away from the oppressor nationalities, and to form themselves into independent political entities.

9. Only through the effective realisation of this principle will it be possible for the nations to combine and to collaborate in a unified worldwide economic system, which is essential as the material foundation for the victory of socialism.

10. This union must be voluntary, must be based on mutual confidence and on brotherly relationships among the peoples.

There are, therefore, two distinct trends in the nationalist movements. First of all, there is the trend towards political emancipation from imperialist fetters and towards the formation of independent national States, a trend determined by the reaction against imperialist oppression and colonial exploitation. Secondly, there is the trend towards the economic union of the nations, a trend determined by the formation of a world market and the organisation of a worldwide economy.

Compare this statement with what Lenin wrote:

In the course of the development of capitalism, two historical trends are manifest in the national question. First of all, we see an awakening of national life and of nationalist movements, a struggle against all forms of national oppression, the creation of national States. Secondly, we see the formation and the strengthening of all sorts of ties between the nations; the breaking down of the barriers that separate them; the establishment of international unity in capitalism, in economic and political life, in the field of science, etc. Both these trends are universal laws of capitalism. The former is dominant in the early days of capitalism. The latter is characteristic of capitalist maturity, of the days when the transition of capitalist society into socialist society is at hand. (Works, Russian edition, vol. xix., p. 46.)

For imperialism, these two trends represent irreconcilable contradictions. Imperialism cannot exist without the exploitation of the colonies, without combining them by force into a “unified whole”. It can only bring the nations together by annexations, by a policy of grab. Otherwise, imperialism is unthinkable.

For communism, on the other hand, the trends are but two aspects of one great movement, or two phases of a single process —the emancipation of the peoples which are under the imperialist yoke. Communists are well aware that the drawing together of the nations into a worldwide economic system can only be achieved upon a foundation of mutual confidence and voluntary agreement; and they know that the path along which the peoples will enter into a voluntary union must lead in the first instance by way of the severance of the colonies from the “unified whole” into which they have been forcibly aggregated by the imperialists— by way of the interim transformation of the colonies into independent political entities.

Hence the need for a stubborn, incessant, effective struggle against the jingoism of the so-called socialists in the ruling nations (Britain, France, the United States, Italy, Japan, etc.), who, in each country, are unwilling to put up a genuine fight against “their own” imperialist government, or to support attempts of the exploited and oppressed in “their own” colonies to throw off the imperialist yoke and to establish independent States.

Without such a struggle, it is impossible to educate the working class of the ruling nations in the spirit of true internationalism, to bring the workers of the oppressor nations into close touch with the labouring masses of the colonies and dependencies, to diffuse the mentality of the proletarian revolution. The Russian revolution would not have been victorious, Kolchak and Denikin would not have been defeated, unless the Russian proletariat had had the sympathy and support of the oppressed peoples throughout the area which was formerly the Russian empire. But to secure their sympathy and support, the Russian proletariat had, first of all, to break the chains that had been imposed on these peoples by Russian imperialism, to free them from the tsarist yoke. Otherwise it would have been impossible to consolidate the Soviet power, to inculcate true internationalism, to create that remarkable organisation for the collaboration of the peoples which is known as the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics and is the forerunner of the coming union of the nations to form a worldwide economy.

Hence the need for a struggle against the narrowness, the particularism, of those socialists in oppressed lands who cannot see beyond the boundaries of the parish in which they were born, and therefore fail to perceive the intimate connexion between the movement for the liberation of their own country and the proletarian movement in the country by which it is ruled.

Without such a struggle, the proletariat of the oppressed nationality cannot pursue an independent policy, cannot be solidarised with the proletariat of the ruling country for the struggle against the common enemy, for the overthrow of imperialism; without such a struggle, internationalism is impossible.

Only by such a struggle can we educate the labouring masses both of the dominant and of the oppressed nations in the spirit of revolutionary internationalism.

Let us read what Lenin has to say about the twofold task awaiting the communists, who must diffuse among the workers this spirit of internationalism—an educational task:

Can this education be one and the same in the great nations which oppress, and in the small nations which are oppressed; in the nations which annex, and in the nations which are annexed?

Obviously not! They are marching towards the same goal; towards equal rights, a close approximation of all the nations, ultimate fusion. But they must reach that goal by different roads, just as when we draw a line from the side of a page towards the middle we must move the point of the pencil towards the right from the left-hand margin and towards the left from the right-hand margin. If a socialist who belongs to a great, oppressing, annexing nation, an advocate of the fusion of the peoples, forgets (were it but for a moment) that “his” Nicholas II., “his” William II., “his” George V., or “his” Poincaré, is likewise a fusionist (by way of annexation)—Nicholas II. in favour of “fusion” with Galicia; William II. in favour of “fusion” with Belgium; and so on—then this socialist will be an absurd doctrinaire in the field of theory, and an understrapper to imperialism in the field of practice.

The centre of gravity of the internationalist education of the workers in oppressing countries must take the form of insisting upon the right of oppressed countries to secede and set up for themselves. Short of this, there is no internationalism. We can and should regard as an imperialist and a scoundrel every socialist in an oppressing country who fails to carry on propaganda of this kind. The right to secede is axiomatic, even though, before the coming of socialism, there may not be more than one case in a thousand where the right can be enforced.

On the other hand, the socialist of a small and oppressed nation must mainly stress the second part of our general formula— the “voluntary union” of the nations. Without doing violence to his obligations as an internationalist, he may (according to circumstances) either advocate the political independence of his nation, or favour its inclusion in some neighbouring State. In all cases, however, he should fight particularism, exclusiveness, a narrow conception of nationalism; should insist upon the importance of wider issues; should favour the subordination of special interests to general interests.

Persons who have not troubled to fathom these questions are apt to think it “contradictory “that the socialists of oppressing nations should make the “right of secession” their watchword, whereas the socialists of oppressed nations raise the slogan of the “right of fusion’. Brief reflection will, however, show that there is no other road towards internationalism and the coalescence of the nations than the one pointed out in our thesis. (Works, Russian edition, vol. xix., pp. 203-205.)