6. Where Does the Danger Come From That the Proletariat Will Find Its Hands Tied in the Struggle against the Inconsistent Bourgeoisie?

Marxists are absolutely convinced of the bourgeois character of the Russian revolution. What does this mean? It means that the democratic changes in the political system, and the social and economic changes, that have become a necessity for Russia not only do not in themselves imply the undermining of capitalism, the undermining of the rule of the bourgeoisie, but, on the contrary, will for the first time properly clear the ground for a wide and rapid, European and not Asiatic, development of capitalism; they will for the first time make the rule of the bourgeoisie as a class possible. The Socialist-Revolutionaries cannot grasp this idea, because they do not know the ABC of the laws of development of commodity and capitalist production; they do not see that even the complete success of a peasant uprising, even the redistribution of all the land in the interests of the peasantry and in accordance with its wishes (the “black repartition” or something of the kind), will not in the least abolish capitalism, but will, on the contrary, give an impetus to its development and hasten the class disintegration of the peasantry itself. Failure to understand this truth makes the Socialist-Revolutionaries unconscious ideologists of the petty bourgeoisie. Insistence on this truth is of enormous importance for Social-Democracy, not only theoretically but also in practical politics, for from it follows the necessity of the complete class independence of the party of the proletariat in the present “general democratic” movement.

But it by no means follows from this that a democratic revolution (bourgeois in its social and economic content) is not of enormous interest to the proletariat. It by no means follows that the democratic revolution cannot take place both in a form advantageous mainly to the big capitalist, the financial magnate and the “enlightened” landlord, and in a form advantageous to the peasant and the worker.

The new-Iskrists fundamentally misunderstand the meaning and significance of the category “bourgeois revolution”. Their arguments constantly betray the idea that a bourgeois revolution is a revolution that can give only what is advantageous to the bourgeoisie. And yet nothing could be more mistaken than this idea. A bourgeois revolution is a revolution that does not go beyond the bounds of the bourgeois, that is, the capitalist, social and economic system. A bourgeois revolution expresses the needs of the development of capitalism, not only without destroying its foundations but, on the contrary, by broadening and deepening them. This revolution therefore expresses the interests not only of the working class but of the entire bourgeoisie as well. Since the rule of the bourgeoisie over the working class is inevitable under capitalism, it may quite rightly be said that a bourgeois revolution expresses the interests not so much of the proletariat as of the bourgeoisie. But the idea that a bourgeois revolution does not express the interests of the proletariat at all is quite absurd. This absurd idea comes down either to the hoary Narodnik theory that a bourgeois revolution runs counter to the interests of the proletariat, and that we therefore do not need bourgeois political liberty; or it comes down to anarchism, which rejects any participation of the proletariat in bourgeois politics, in a bourgeois revolution, in bourgeois parliamentarism. Theoretically, this idea amounts to forgetting the elementary propositions of Marxism on the inevitability of capitalist development on the basis of commodity production. Marxism teaches that a society based on commodity production, and carrying on exchange with civilised capitalist nations, inevitably takes the road of capitalism itself at a certain stage of its development. Marxism has irrevocably broken with the ravings of the Narodniks and the anarchists that Russia, for instance, could bypass capitalist development, jump out of capitalism or leap over it by some path other than that of the class struggle on the basis and within the limits of this same capitalism.

All these propositions of Marxism have been proved and chewed over in the fullest detail, both in general and specifically in relation to Russia. And from these propositions it follows that the idea of seeking salvation for the working class in anything except the further development of capitalism is reactionary. In countries like Russia the working class suffers not so much from capitalism as from the insufficient development of capitalism. The working class is therefore unconditionally interested in the widest, freest and most rapid development of capitalism. The removal of all the remnants of the past that hamper the wide, free and rapid development of capitalism is unconditionally advantageous to the working class. A bourgeois revolution is precisely a revolution that most decisively sweeps away the remnants of the past, the remnants of serfdom (which include not only the autocracy but the monarchy as well), and most completely guarantees the widest, freest and most rapid development of capitalism.

That is why a bourgeois revolution is in the highest degree advantageous to the proletariat. A bourgeois revolution is absolutely necessary in the interests of the proletariat. The more complete and decisive, the more consistent the bourgeois revolution, the more secure will be the proletariat’s struggle against the bourgeoisie for socialism. Only to people who do not know the ABC of scientific socialism can this conclusion seem new, strange or paradoxical. And from this conclusion it also follows, among other things, that in a certain sense a bourgeois revolution is more advantageous to the proletariat than to the bourgeoisie. This proposition is undoubtedly true in the following sense: it is to the advantage of the bourgeoisie to rely on certain remnants of the past against the proletariat, for instance on the monarchy, the standing army and so on. It is to the advantage of the bourgeoisie that the bourgeois revolution should not sweep away all the remnants of the past too decisively, but should leave some of them; that is, that this revolution should not be fully consistent, should not be carried through to the end, should not be decisive and relentless. Social-Democrats often express this idea somewhat differently, by saying that the bourgeoisie betrays itself, that the bourgeoisie betrays the cause of liberty, that the bourgeoisie is incapable of consistent democracy. It is more advantageous to the bourgeoisie that the necessary changes in the direction of bourgeois democracy should take place more slowly, more gradually, more cautiously, less decisively, by means of reforms and not by means of revolution; that these changes should be as cautious as possible towards the “venerable” institutions of serfdom (such as the monarchy); that these changes should develop as little as possible the revolutionary independent action, initiative and energy of the common people, that is, of the peasantry and especially of the workers, for otherwise it will be all the easier for the workers, as the French say, “to shift the gun from one shoulder to the other”, that is, to turn against the bourgeoisie itself the weapons with which the bourgeois revolution will supply them, the liberty which it will bring, the democratic institutions which will spring up on the ground cleared of serfdom.

The working class, on the contrary, has more to gain if the necessary changes in the direction of bourgeois democracy come about precisely not by the road of reform but by the road of revolution, for the road of reform is the road of delays, of procrastination, of the painfully slow decomposition of the putrid parts of the national organism. It is the proletariat and the peasantry that suffer first and foremost, and most of all, from their putrefaction. The revolutionary road is the road of a quick operation, the least painful for the proletariat, the road of the direct removal of the putrid parts, the road of the least concession and caution towards the monarchy and the disgusting, vile, rotten institutions that go with it and poison the air with their decay.

That is why our bourgeois-liberal press bewails the possibility of the revolutionary road not merely out of regard for the censor, not merely for fear of the authorities; why it fears revolution, frightens the tsar with revolution, takes pains to avoid revolution, and grovels and fawns for the sake of paltry reforms as the basis of the reformist road. This standpoint is shared not only by Russkiye Vedomosti, Syn Otechestva, Nasha Zhizn and Nashi Dni, but by the illegal, free Osvobozhdenie as well. The very position of the bourgeoisie as a class in capitalist society inevitably gives rise to its inconsistency in the democratic revolution. The very position of the proletariat as a class compels it to be consistently democratic. The bourgeoisie looks backward, fearing democratic progress, which threatens to strengthen the proletariat. The proletariat has nothing to lose but its chains, and with the help of democracy it has the whole world to win. That is why the more consistent the bourgeois revolution is in its democratic changes, the less it confines itself to what is advantageous exclusively to the bourgeoisie. The more consistent the bourgeois revolution, the more it secures the gains of the proletariat and the peasantry in the democratic revolution.

Marxism teaches the proletarian not to keep aloof from the bourgeois revolution, not to be indifferent to it, not to leave the leadership of it to the bourgeoisie, but, on the contrary, to take the most energetic part in it, to fight most resolutely for consistent proletarian democracy, for carrying the revolution through to the end. We cannot jump out of the bourgeois-democratic boundaries of the Russian revolution, but we can vastly extend these boundaries, and within these boundaries we can and must fight for the interests of the proletariat, for its immediate needs and for the conditions that will prepare its forces for the coming complete victory. There is bourgeois democracy and bourgeois democracy. The monarchist Zemstvo man who favours an upper chamber, who “asks” for universal suffrage while secretly, on the quiet, striking a bargain with tsarism for a truncated constitution, is a bourgeois democrat. And the peasant who takes up arms against the landlords and the officials and, with a “naive republicanism”, proposes “to send the tsar packing”, is also a bourgeois democrat. There are bourgeois-democratic regimes like the one in Germany and like the one in England, like the one in Austria and like those in America or Switzerland. He would be a fine Marxist indeed who in a period of democratic revolution failed to see this difference between degrees of democracy and between the different characters of its various forms, and confined himself to “clever” remarks to the effect that, after all, this is “a bourgeois revolution”, the fruit of “a bourgeois revolution”.

And it is just such clever people, giving themselves airs on account of their short-sightedness, that our new-Iskrists are. They confine themselves to arguments about the bourgeois character of the revolution precisely where and when one must be able to draw a distinction between republican-revolutionary and monarchist-liberal bourgeois democracy, to say nothing of the difference between inconsistent bourgeois democracy and consistent proletarian democracy. They content themselves, as if they really had become like “the man in a case”, with melancholy talk about the “process of mutual struggle of opposing classes”, when the point is to give democratic leadership in the present revolution, to emphasise advanced democratic slogans as distinct from the treacherous slogans of Mr Struve and Co., to state plainly and sharply the immediate tasks of the really revolutionary struggle of the proletariat and the peasantry as distinct from the liberal haggling of the landlords and the manufacturers. That, gentlemen, is now the crux of the matter, and you have missed it: whether our revolution will end in a real, grandiose victory or merely in a wretched deal; whether it will go as far as the revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and the peasantry, or will “peter out” in a liberal constitution of the Shipov kind!

It may seem at first sight that in raising this question we are straying entirely from our subject. But that may seem so only at first sight. In actual fact it is precisely in this question that the root lies of the difference of principle which has already fully emerged between the Social-Democratic tactics of the Third Congress of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party and the tactics laid down at the conference of the new-Iskrists. The latter have already taken not two but three steps backward, reviving the errors of “Economism” in deciding questions of tactics that are incomparably more complex, more important and more vital for the workers’ party at a moment of revolution. That is why we must dwell on the analysis of this question with all the attention it deserves.

The part of the new-Iskrist resolution that we have quoted contains a reference to the danger of Social-Democracy tying its own hands in the struggle against the inconsistent policy of the bourgeoisie, of its being dissolved in bourgeois democracy. The thought of this danger runs like a red thread through all the specifically new-Iskrist literature; this thought is the real crux of the whole position of principle in our Party split (ever since the elements of squabbling in this split receded entirely into the background before the elements of a turn towards “Economism”). And we admit without any equivocation that this danger really exists, that just now, at the height of the Russian revolution, it has become especially serious. On all of us, the theoreticians or — as I would rather say of myself — the publicists of Social-Democracy, there falls the urgent and extremely responsible task of examining from which side this danger actually threatens. For the source of our disagreement lies not in a dispute about whether such a danger exists, but in a dispute about whether it is created by the so-called tailism of the “Minority” or by the so-called revolutionism of the “Majority”.

To remove misinterpretations and misunderstandings, let us note first of all that the danger of which we are speaking lies not in the subjective but in the objective aspect of the matter, not in the formal position that Social-Democracy will take in the struggle, but in the material outcome of the entire present revolutionary struggle. The question is not whether this or that Social-Democratic group will want to dissolve in bourgeois democracy, or whether they will be aware that they are dissolving; there is no question of that. We do not suspect any Social-Democrat of such a wish, and it is not a matter of wishes at all. Nor is the question whether this or that Social-Democratic group will retain its formal independence, its separateness, its independence of bourgeois democracy throughout the course of the revolution. They may not only proclaim this “independence” but even retain it formally, and nevertheless things may turn out in such a way that their hands are tied in the struggle against the inconsistency of the bourgeoisie. The final political result of the revolution may prove to be that, in spite of the formal “independence”, in spite of the complete organisational, party separateness of Social-Democracy, it will in fact not be independent, will not be able to put the stamp of its proletarian independence on the course of events, will prove so weak that, on the whole and in the end, in the final analysis, its “dissolution” in bourgeois democracy will nonetheless be a historical fact.

That is what the real danger consists in. And now let us see from which side it threatens: from the deviation of Social-Democracy to the right, as represented by the new Iskra, as we believe, or from its deviation to the left, as represented by the “Majority”, Vperyod and so on, as the new-Iskrists believe.

The answer to this question, as we have pointed out, is determined by the objective combination of the action of the various social forces. The character of these forces has been determined theoretically by the Marxist analysis of Russian reality, and it is now being determined practically by the open action of groups and classes in the course of the revolution. And the whole theoretical analysis made by the Marxists long before the present period, as well as all the practical observation of the development of revolutionary events, shows us that, from the standpoint of objective conditions, there are two possible courses and outcomes of the revolution in Russia. The transformation of Russia’s economic and political system in a bourgeois-democratic direction is inevitable and inescapable. No power on earth can prevent such a transformation. But the combined action of the existing forces that are effecting this transformation may yield one of two results, one of two forms of this transformation. Either 1) the matter will end in a “decisive victory of the revolution over tsarism”, or 2) the forces will be inadequate for a decisive victory, and the matter will end in a deal between tsarism and the most “inconsistent” and most “self-seeking” elements of the bourgeoisie. All the infinite variety of details and combinations, which no one is in a position to foresee, comes down, on the whole, precisely to the one or the other of these two outcomes.

Let us now consider these outcomes, first, from the standpoint of their social significance, and secondly, from the standpoint of the position of Social-Democracy (its “dissolution” or the “tying of its hands”) in the one outcome and in the other.

What is a “decisive victory of the revolution over tsarism”? We have already seen that in using this expression the new-Iskrists do not understand even its immediate political significance. Still less do they appear to understand the class content of this concept. Surely we Marxists must on no account allow ourselves to be deluded by words such as “revolution” or “the great Russian revolution”, as many revolutionary democrats (Gapon, for instance) are deluded by them now. We must be perfectly clear in our minds as to what real social forces are opposed to “tsarism” (which is a real force, perfectly intelligible to everyone) and are capable of gaining a “decisive victory” over it. Such a force cannot be the big bourgeoisie, the landlords, the manufacturers, the “society” that follows the Osvobozhdenie people. We see that they do not even want a decisive victory. We know that, owing to their class position, they are incapable of waging a decisive struggle against tsarism: private property, capital and land are too heavy a ball and chain on their legs for them to go into a decisive struggle. They need tsarism, with its police, bureaucratic and military forces, against the proletariat and the peasantry far too much for them to be able to strive for its destruction. No, the only force capable of gaining a “decisive victory over tsarism” is the people, that is, the proletariat and the peasantry, if we take the main, big forces and distribute the rural and urban petty bourgeoisie (also part of “the people”) between the two. “The decisive victory of the revolution over tsarism” is the revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and the peasantry. Our new-Iskrists cannot escape from this conclusion, which Vperyod pointed out long ago. There is no one else who is capable of gaining a decisive victory over tsarism.

And such a victory will be precisely a dictatorship, that is, it must inevitably rest on military force, on the arming of the masses, on an uprising, and not on institutions of one kind or another created in a “legal” or “peaceful” way. It can only be a dictatorship, for the realisation of the changes urgently and absolutely needed by the proletariat and the peasantry will call forth the desperate resistance of the landlords, of the big bourgeoisie and of tsarism. Without a dictatorship it is impossible to break down that resistance and to repel counter-revolutionary attempts. But of course it will be a democratic, not a socialist dictatorship. It will be unable (without a series of intermediate stages of revolutionary development) to affect the foundations of capitalism. At best it may bring about a radical redistribution of landed property in favour of the peasantry, establish consistent and full democracy, up to and including the republic, root out all the Asiatic features of bondage not only from village life but from factory life as well, lay the foundation for a thorough improvement in the conditions of the workers and for a rise in their standard of living, and — last but not least — carry the revolutionary conflagration into Europe. Such a victory will by no means as yet transform our bourgeois revolution into a socialist revolution; the democratic revolution will not directly overstep the bounds of bourgeois social and economic relationships; nevertheless, the significance of such a victory for the future development both of Russia and of the whole world will be immense. Nothing will raise the revolutionary energy of the world proletariat so much, nothing will shorten so greatly the path leading to its complete victory, as this decisive victory of the revolution that has begun in Russia.

How probable such a victory is, is another question. We are not in the least inclined to be unreasonably optimistic on that score; we do not for a moment forget the immense difficulty of this task; but since we are going into battle we must desire victory and be able to point out the right road to it. Tendencies capable of leading to this victory undoubtedly exist. True, our Social-Democratic influence on the mass of the proletariat is as yet very, very inadequate; the revolutionary influence on the mass of the peasantry is quite insignificant; the dispersion, the lack of development and the ignorance of the proletariat, and especially of the peasantry, are still terribly great. But revolution quickly unites and quickly enlightens. Every step in its development rouses the masses and with irresistible force draws them precisely to the side of the revolutionary programme, as the only programme that consistently and integrally expresses their real and vital interests.

A law of mechanics says that action is equal to reaction. In history too the destructive force of a revolution depends in no small measure on how strong and protracted the suppression of the striving for liberty has been, and how deep the contradiction is between the antediluvian “superstructure” and the living forces of the present epoch. The international political situation, too, is in many respects shaping up in the most advantageous way for the Russian revolution. The uprising of the workers and peasants has already begun; it is fragmentary, spontaneous and weak, but it unquestionably and undoubtedly proves the existence of forces capable of waging a decisive struggle and marching towards a decisive victory.

If these forces prove inadequate, tsarism will have time to conclude a deal, which is already being prepared at both ends, by the Messrs Bulygin and the Messrs Struve. Then the matter will end in a truncated constitution, or even — at the very worst — in a parody of one. That too will be a “bourgeois revolution”, but a miscarriage, a premature birth, a bastard. Social-Democracy entertains no illusions; it knows the treacherous nature of the bourgeoisie; it will not lose heart or abandon its persistent, patient, steady work of giving the proletariat a class education, even in the drabbest everyday days of bourgeois-constitutional, “Shipovian” prosperity. Such an outcome would be more or less similar to the outcome of almost all the democratic revolutions in Europe in the course of the nineteenth century, and our Party’s development would then follow a difficult, hard, long, but familiar and well-trodden path.

The question now arises: in which of these two possible outcomes will Social-Democracy find its hands actually tied against the inconsistent and self-seeking bourgeoisie, find itself actually “dissolved”, or almost so, in bourgeois democracy?

It is enough to put this question clearly to answer it without a moment’s hesitation.

If the bourgeoisie succeeds in frustrating the Russian revolution by a deal with tsarism, then Social-Democracy will find its hands actually tied against the inconsistent bourgeoisie; then Social-Democracy will find itself “dissolved” in bourgeois democracy, in the sense that the proletariat will not succeed in putting its clear stamp on the revolution, will not succeed in settling accounts with tsarism in the proletarian or, as Marx once said, “in the plebeian” manner.

If the decisive victory of the revolution is achieved, then we shall settle accounts with tsarism in the Jacobin or, if you like, in the plebeian way. “The whole French terrorism,” wrote Marx in the famous Neue Rheinische Zeitung in 1848, “was nothing but a plebeian manner of settling accounts with the enemies of the bourgeoisie, with absolutism, feudalism and philistinism” (see Marx’ Nachlass, Mehring’s edition, vol. III, p. 211). Have those people who frighten the Social-Democratic workers of Russia with the bogey of “Jacobinism” in the period of the democratic revolution ever thought about the significance of these words of Marx?

The Girondists of contemporary Russian Social-Democracy, the new-Iskrists, do not merge with the Osvobozhdenie people, but in actual fact, by reason of the nature of their slogans, they trail in their wake. And the Osvobozhdenie people, that is, the representatives of the liberal bourgeoisie, wish to settle accounts with the autocracy gently, in the manner of reformers — yieldingly, without offending the aristocracy, the nobility, the court — cautiously, without breaking anything — kindly and politely, like gentlemen, putting on white gloves (like the ones Mr Petrunkevich put on, taken from the hands of a bashi-bazouk, at the reception of “representatives of the people” (?) by Nicholas the Bloody; see Proletary, No. 5).

The Jacobins of contemporary Social-Democracy — the Bolsheviks, the Vperyod people, the supporters of the Congress or the Proletary people, I really do not know what to call them — wish by their slogans to raise the revolutionary and republican petty bourgeoisie, and especially the peasantry, to the level of the consistent democracy of the proletariat, which retains its complete class individuality. They want the people, that is, the proletariat and the peasantry, to settle accounts with the monarchy and the aristocracy “in the plebeian way”, ruthlessly destroying the enemies of liberty, crushing their resistance by force, making no concessions whatever to the accursed heritage of serfdom, of Asiatic barbarism, of the degradation of man.

This does not mean, of course, that we necessarily want to imitate the Jacobins of 1793, to adopt their views, their programme, their slogans, their methods of action. Nothing of the kind. Our programme is not an old one but a new one: the minimum programme of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party. We have a new slogan: the revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and the peasantry. If we live to see the real victory of the revolution, we shall also have new methods of action, in keeping with the character and aims of the working-class party that is striving for a complete socialist revolution. By our comparison we merely want to explain that the representatives of the advanced class of the twentieth century, the proletariat, that is, the Social-Democrats, are divided into the same two wings (the opportunist and the revolutionary) into which the representatives of the advanced class of the eighteenth century, the bourgeoisie, were divided, that is, the Girondists and the Jacobins.

Only in the event of a complete victory of the democratic revolution will the proletariat have its hands free in the struggle against the inconsistent bourgeoisie; only in that event will it not become “dissolved” in bourgeois democracy, but will leave its proletarian, or rather proletarian-peasant, imprint on the whole revolution.

In a word: in order not to find itself with its hands tied in the struggle against the inconsistent bourgeois democracy, the proletariat must be class-conscious and strong enough to raise the peasantry to revolutionary consciousness, to direct its assault, and thereby to carry out consistent proletarian democracy independently.

That is how matters stand with the question, so unsatisfactorily answered by the new-Iskrists, of the danger of finding our hands tied in the struggle against the inconsistent bourgeoisie. The bourgeoisie will always be inconsistent. Nothing could be more naive and futile than attempts to lay down conditions or points which, if fulfilled, would allow us to regard bourgeois democracy as a sincere friend of the people. Only the proletariat can be a consistent fighter for democracy. It can become a victorious fighter for democracy only on condition that the mass of the peasantry joins its revolutionary struggle. If the proletariat is not strong enough for this, the bourgeoisie will be at the head of the democratic revolution and will give it an inconsistent and self-seeking character. Nothing but a revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and the peasantry can prevent this.

Thus we arrive at the indubitable conclusion that it is precisely the new-Iskrist tactics which, in their objective significance, play into the hands of bourgeois democracy. The preaching of organisational diffuseness that goes as far as plebiscites, the principle of agreement and the separation of Party literature from the Party; the belittling of the tasks of the armed uprising; the confusing of the popular political slogans of the revolutionary proletariat with those of the monarchist bourgeoisie; the distortion of the conditions for a “decisive victory of the revolution over tsarism” — all this taken together produces precisely that policy of tailism at a revolutionary moment which bewilders the proletariat, disorganises it, confuses its understanding and belittles the tactics of Social-Democracy, instead of pointing out the only road to victory and rallying all the revolutionary and republican elements of the people to the proletariat’s slogan.

To confirm this conclusion, at which we have arrived on the basis of an analysis of the resolution, let us approach the same question from other angles. Let us see, first, how the new-Iskrist tactics are illustrated by a simple-minded and outspoken Menshevik in the Georgian Sotsial-Demokrat. Let us see, secondly, who is in fact making use of the slogans of the new Iskra in the present political situation.