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p By L. M. MINAYEV

p Lenin substantiated the principles of proletarian party policy in a deep, scientific and comprehensive way. He worked out the strategy and tactics of the revolutionary party that were required to meet the new conditions of the age of imperialism.

p Analysing the historical situation of the early 20th century Lenin came to a conclusion of great historic importance, namely, that the new age of imperialism represented the eve of the proletarian revolution. It called for direct struggle to prepare for the socialist revolution and carry it through. Hence Marxist workers’ parties were faced with new tasks differing from those of the previous historical period (1871-1900), when a slow gathering of forces had taken place in the working class.

p The leaders of the Second International failed to see, let alone understand, these great new tasks facing the working class. At this turning point in history most of the Second International’s leaders began to renounce the workers’ goal of socialism, and to lean towards opportunism and revisionism. Opportunists imposed on the working-class movement the “tactics” of passivity, replacing revolutionary policies by the policy of begging for petty concessions from the bourgeoisie. The significance of strikes was belittled and arguments were presented to prove "the harm" done by, and indeed the “impossibility” of, general political strikes. Discussion of armed uprising was dropped altogether.

p The revisionists adopted the line of giving up revolutionary means of struggle. "There will be no more revolutions—only an endless era of peaceful development lies ahead. .. .” "The naive romanticism of the barricades of the Kjth century is already a thing of the irrevocable past”—that is what Eduard Bernstein, the 349 apostle of revisionism, and his followers used to say. In 1899, Lenin assessed the activities of the representatives of the revisionist trend as follows: "Not by a single step have they advanced the science which Marx and Engels enjoined us to develop; they have not taught the proletariat any new methods of struggle; they have only retreated, borrowing fragments of backward theories and preaching to the proletariat, not the theory of struggle, but the theory of concession—concession to the most vicious enemies of the proletariat, the governments and bourgeois parties. . . ."  [349•1 

p The principal sin of the Second International was, as Lenin pointed out, to give verbal recognition to the idea of revolution and to use this as a cover for opportunism, reformism and nationalism. The decisions of the congresses of the Second International and those of Social-Democratic congresses contained extremely general, abstract phraseology which in fact disguised reformist practice. The crucial issues of the strategy and tactics of the international movement were raised more and more seldom, and their discussion became more and more cursory.

p The Social-Democratic congresses were usually full of reservations and double talk and gave no clear and direct answers to the most pressing questions of the movement. Recall only Kautsky’s notorious "rubber resolution" on the French pseudo- socialist Millerand’s joining the bourgeois government. This resolution in fact legalised in advance similar acts of betrayal.

p In his article "Marxism and Revisionism”, written in 1908, Lenin showed that opportunism meant breaking completely away from the scientific foundations of the proletarian movement, abandoning its revolutionary aims and betraying its militant spirit. "To determine its conduct from case to case, to adapt itself to the events of the day and to the chopping and changing of petty politics, to forget the primary interests of the proletariat and the basic features of the whole capitalist system, of all capitalist evolution, to sacrifice these primary interests for the real or assumed advantages of the moment—such is the policy of revision- ism."  [349•2 

p A cynical attitude towards theory took root among philistine and bourgeoisified leaders of the parties of the Second International, in particular in the German Social-Democratic Party—they had no need for revolutionary theory; all they needed, and even then only for the time being, was Marxist phraseology, so that 350 they might with its help conceal from the masses their degeneration. Systematic hypocrisy and an ever widening gap between word and deed became their hallmarks.

p Lenin firmly opposed this hypocrisy and surrender of the opportunists. He hit hard at international revisionism, showing it up for what it is—a trend which tries to lead the working-class movement into the dead end of narrow trade-unionism and bourgeois-liberal reformism.

p Lenin gave all his attention to elaborating the general principles of the tactics of the labour movement, i.e., the principles governing the application by the Party of the tactical devices to achieve its strategic goals. He stressed the duty of the revolutionary party to conduct a scientific policy. "The direct task of science, according to Marx, is to provide a true slogan of struggle, that is, to be able to present this struggle objectively as the product of a definite system of production relations, to be able to understand the necessity of this struggle, its content, course and conditions of development."  [350•1 

p Correct tactics are based on an objective analysis of reality. This involves "an objective consideration of the sum total of the relations between absolutely all the classes in a given society, and consequently a consideration of the objective stage of development reached by that society and of the relations between it and other societies".  [350•2  It is only by examining the specific features of the current epoch, and in this way getting a clear understanding of its main content and general line of advance, that one can analyse successfully the problems of the revolutionary movement. Another essential, though secondary, point is "that account be taken of the specific features distinguishing that country from others in the same historical epoch".  [350•3 

p Lenin also saw that the common nature of the laws of historical development for all mankind determined the international character of the tactics of the proletarian movement. Lenin did a tremendous amount of work to expose and fulminate bourgeois and petty-bourgeois nationalism, and to defend proletarian internationalism as an unshakable principle. A master of revolutionary dialectics, he showed the relation between the international and national aspects of the working-class tactics: "by going through the same preparatory schooling for the victory over the bourgeoisie 351 everywhere, the labour movement of each country develops and advances each in its own way. . . . The unity of the international tactics of the communist working-class movement in all countries demands, not the elimination of variety or the suppression of national distinctions .. . but the application of the fundamental principles of communism . . . which will correctly modify these principles in certain particulars, correctly adapt and apply them to national and national-state distinctions."  [351•1 

p If the concrete analysis of concrete circumstances constitutes the essence and living soul of Marxism in general, this must be all the more true of Party policy and tactics. It must be based on facts—on the actual state of the political, economic, national, cultural, domestic and other conditions of life and struggle of the working class and of the whole of society. Lenin analysed the many and various requirements of the concrete historical approach to working out Party tactics. He called on the Communists of all nations to concentrate all their efforts and all their attention on finding the forms of transition or approach to the proletarian revolution in their own country.

p Of particular importance is Lenin’s further development of the Marxist tenet that correct tactics call for a variety of forms and means of struggle. "Marxism differs from all primitive forms of socialism by not binding the movement to any one particular form of struggle."  [351•2  Historical progress is dialectical in character. Social life develops in contradictions, and includes both slow evolution and rapid leaps forward. This also applies, of course, to the conditions and the course of the proletarian class struggle. For this reason "the forms of the struggle may and do constantly change in accordance with varying, relatively specific and temporary causes".  [351•3 

p In full accordance with the principles of dialectical materialism, Lenin pointed out that the past experience of the labour movement—in combination with that of the current struggle of the revolutionary classes—provided the basis on which correct tactics can be worked out. Marxism docs not invent new forms of struggle or concoct doctrinaire formulas. It teaches the Party to study closely the mass struggle going on, and to realise that life is forever generating new, hitherto unknown, methods of defence and attack in the class struggle, increasing the variety 352 and range of available tactics as the movement advances, as the class consciousness of the people grows, as the economic and political crises of capitalist society sharpen and as domestic and international conditions change. Hence, the elaboration of tactical theory merges with the practical application of this theory by the Party. Theoretical work that follows from the generalised experience of the mass movement meets the needs of the practical struggle, while practice verifies the correctness of such theory. The Communist and Workers’ Parties, loyal to the spirit of Marxism-Leninism, enrich their strategy and tactics with new ideas corresponding to new conditions of reality; they find original solutions to the new problems raised by changing conditions.

p Correct tactical methods are determined not by abstract dogmas “(the principle of absolute revolutionarism" beloved by sectarians, or "the principle of the non-recognition of violence" espoused by the opportunists) but by what is required to ensure the success of the proletariat at a given stage of its struggle, bearing in mind its supreme interests and final aims. "This means only that decisions made with regard to tactics must be verified as often as possible in the light of new political events. Such verification is necessary from the standpoint of both theory and practice: from the standpoint of theory in order to ascertain in fact whether the decisions taken have been correct, and what amendments to these decisions subsequent political events make necessary; from the standpoint of practice, in order to learn how to use the decisions as a proper guide, to learn to consider them as directives for immediate practical application."  [352•1 

p In working out the tactics of the proletarian party Lenin particularly stressed that Marxist tactics are mass tactics, intended to increase the class consciousness, resolution and revolutionariness of the masses and their ability to struggle through to the end and win. When defending this mass principle on which the tactics of the communist movement are based, Lenin had to fight on two fronts: against sectarian adventurism, and against Right opportunist “tailism”, or the worship of the spontaneous element in the labour movement.

p At the heart of sectarianism is lack of confidence in the people, resulting in the striving to decide everything for the people and without the people, finally developing into contempt for the people and their vital needs and demands.

p (Opportunist “tailism”, or dragging behind the movement, is 353 also hostile to the Marxist tactics of the proletarian party centred around the conscious actions of the working masses. In his struggle against Russian and international opportunism, Lenin counterposed to tailism and the worship of spontaneity the revolutionary Marxist dictum "be with the masses”. The Party is with the masses if it can reveal, by means of scientific analysis, the direction of the struggle, if it "is the first to foresee the approach of a revolutionary period, and already begins to rouse the people and to sound the tocsin, while the philistines are still wrapt in the slavish slumber of loyal subjects”, if it is, therefore, the first to take the path of direct revolutionary struggle and to seek to exhaust all the possibilities and all chances of victory and the last "to leave the path of direct revolutionary struggle . . . when all possibilities have been exhausted, when there is not a shadow of hope for a shorter way, when the basis for an appeal to prepare for mass strikes, an uprising, etc., is obviously disap- pearing".  [353•1 

p While attaching great importance to the theoretical substantiation of tactics, Lenin stressed at the same time that theory cannot and does not furnish ready-made prescriptions for every day-to-= day turn of events. He wrote in his "Letters on Tactics" (April 1917) that political theory, "like all theories, at best only outlines the main and the general, only comes tiear to embracing life in all its complexity".  [353•2  He stressed time and again that the application of Party policy was both a science and an art.

p The art of tactics demands politicians capable of making quick and correct decisions in complex political situations—a gift which a political leader must possess over and above the knowledge and experience he must have anyway. Since "politics is a science and an art,” wrote Lenin, "that does not fall from the skies or come gratis, and if it wants to overcome the bourgeoisie, the proletariat must train its own proletarian ’class politicians’, of a kind in no way inferior to bourgeois politicians."  [353•3  Thus training political leaders is one of the basic tasks of the proletarian party.

p In order to master the art of revolutionary tactics the working-= class leaders should be able to consider, weigh up and decide in the coolest and most dispassionate manner at what stage, under what circumstances and in what sphere of action they should act in a revolutionary way and at what stage, under what 354 circumstances and in what sphere they should temporarily take up the struggle for reforms. The political struggle may require, and most often does require, making compromises with non-proletarian elements. Communists only reject compromises that are detrimental to the interests of the proletariat. But there are compromises that are not only useful but necessary and inevitable for the revolutionary struggle.

By developing Marx’s and Engels’s teachings on the methods of the proletarian struggle and by employing the experience of the Russian and international labour movement, Lenin created a comprehensive theory of the strategy and tactics of the international communist movement. This theory has become an integral part of Marxist-Leninist science and an invincible weapon in the hands of the Communists of all countries.

p The work of the Communist International, led by Lenin, was a great example of the practical application of this theory of the strategy and tactics of the international communist movement.

p Lenin, the great trail-blazer of revolution, outlined the principles of the first programme of the Communist International, and defined exactly the general line of the world communist movement, its organisation and tactics.

p For the general line and strategic course of this international union of the Communist Parties, of primary importance was Lenin’s conclusion concerning the nature of the new era of world history, the era ushered in by the Great October Socialist Revolution, "the era of the rule of a new class, a class which is oppressed in every capitalist country, but which everywhere is marching forward towards a new life, towards victory over the bourgeoisie, towards the dictatorship of the proletariat, towards the emancipation of mankind from the yoke of capital and from imperialist wars".  [354•1 

p Lenin destroyed the petty-bourgeois fairy-tale of Right opportunists that the period of transition from capitalism to socialism would be “peaceful” and “legal” in character. Kautsky, Vandervelde and other traitors to the labour movement ignored or evaded what is most important in the question of transition from capitalism to socialism, namely the fact that the transitional stage 355 is one of "revolution, which means overthrowing the bourgeoisie and breaking up, smashing their state machine".  [355•1 

p Lenin emphasised that the essence of the differences between Communists and Social-Democrats lies in their different attitudes to the dictatorship of the proletariat. The cheap talk of Right opportunists about "pure democracy" and their fear of revolutionary violence applied by the oppressed class to its oppressors are tantamount to apostasy, to defection to the bourgeoisie, since the proletarian revolution is unthinkable without the violent break-up of the bourgeois state machine and its replacement by the revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat. Therefore the policy statement adopted by the First Congress of the Comintern centred around the slogan of the dictatorship of the proletariat, and Lenin’s report to the Congress on bourgeois democracy and proletarian dictatorship became the most important document of the new international organisation of the proletarian parties.

p During the First World War Lenin had to struggle relentlessly against the basic prejudice of Social-Democracy that a socialist revolution must be “pure”, a revolution carried through with the forces of the proletariat alone. In 1916 Lenin wrote with irony about such ideas: "So one army lines up in one place and says: ’we are for socialism’, and another, somewhere else, and says, ’we are for imperialism’, and that will be a social revolution!"  [355•2  Trotskyism was also of a piece with this poor, narrow understanding of revolution as something separated from real life, from the objective reality of the world revolutionary process. The proletariat struggling alone against the bourgeoisie, the latter being supported by all non-proletarian classes and strata of society— that was what the world revolution looked like to the eyes of Trotskyists and "Left Communists" of the Bukharin type.

p Quite a different picture of the future world revolution was presented to revolutionaries by Lenin. The proletariat attracts to its side the working peasantry and all the exploited and oppressed of town and country, anil also establishes alliances with the enslaved peoples of the colonies and semi-colonies, leaving the bourgeoisie in ever greater isolation, until the forces of revolution decisively outweigh the forces of the old world. The socialist revolution "cannot be anything other than an outburst of mass struggle on the part of all and sundry oppressed and discontented elements".  [355•3 

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p By giving up the struggle for the socialist revolution the reformists of the Second International muddled and confused (apart from everything else) the question of the allies of the working class in the revolution. As a result, it was the Bolshevik Party, led by Lenin, which was destined to solve this question. Lenin showed the overriding importance of forming an alliance between the working class and the peasantry and all oppressed and exploited people in order to overthrow capital. He pointed out that "the proletariat cannot achieve victory if it does not win the majority of the population to its side".  [356•1  He developed the theory and tactics for creating such an invincible social force—an alliance of proletariat and peasantry, and the First Congress of the Comintern, upon accepting Lenin’s ideas, announced the fraternal alliance between the working class and all semi-proletarian elements and the rural poor. The "Platform of the Communist International" adopted by the Congress declared that the task of the proletariat was "to wrench the poor petty-bourgeois masses of the countryside from under the influence of the kulaks and rural bourgeoisie, and to organise and attract them as allies in communist construction”. This document emphasised that the victorious proletariat would not expropriate small property- owners. Such owners would gradually be involved "in the sphere of socialist organisation by example and practice that will show the advantages of the new system".  [356•2 

p The Second Congress of the Comintern considered and approved Lenin’s theses on the agrarian question, providing a scientific foundation for communist tactics in relation to the various strata of the peasantry, giving a new form to these tactics to meet the conditions of the new era and taking into account the experience of the proletarian revolutions in Russia and in Hungary. Lenin’s main idea was to turn the proletariat into the vanguard force of all exploited, working people and to draw the rural proletariat, semi-proletarians and small peasants into the struggle against capital. The working peasants can find salvation only by allying themselves with city workers for the purpose of throwing off the yoke of the landowners and the bourgeoisie. On the other hand, the working class cannot fulfil its historic mission without extending the class struggle to the countryside and winning the working peasantry over to its side.

357

p Lenin’s propositions were developed in detail in the Draft Agrarian Programme, adopted by the Fourth Congress ( November-December 1922), and in the decisions of the enlarged plenum of the Executive Committee of the Comintern (June 1923) in connection with the slogan of "the workers’ and peasants’ government”, put forward at that time. Both documents gave effect to Lenin’s idea of strengthening the alliance between the working class and the peasantry and of ensuring the leading role of the working class in this alliance by the most active and continuous support for the demands of the working peasants protesting against capitalist exploitation.

p Lenin’s strategy and tactics and the experience of preparing and carrying through the October Socialist Revolution became known to the international working class and the Communist Parties with the establishment of the Communist International. The slogan "Closer to the Masses" advanced by the Comintern implied the sum total of all working people, all those exploited by capital.

p Lenin attached the utmost importance to enriching the practical experience of non-proletarian masses. These masses, he said, come to decisions on their political position and their place in the struggle between the working class and big capital in no other way than on the basis of their own experience, by comparing and contrasting what these main classes of capitalist society have to offer them, how they approach them, to what degree they are reliable, sincere and friendly allies and leaders, how successful the political headquarters of the different classes are accomplishing their tasks, and what balance of forces is between these classes.

p The position of the working class as the most advanced and the only consistent fighter for popular freedom and genuine democracy imposes upon it great obligations. It is its duty first and foremost to respond to every political protest and render every support to that protest.  [357•1  Lenin fought persistently against the sectarian line of breaking the working class away from its allies and even of opposing the workers to middle sections of society. He struggled with the ultra-Lefts of his time, who “ forgot" that the democratic slogans of the workers’ party were not advanced solely for the workers. "No, these slogans arc issued for the whole of the labouring population, for the entire people."  [357•2 

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p By developing the political consciousness and political responsibility of the workers, the Party draws their attention to all the forms and aspects of bourgeois oppression, calls upon them to protect all the oppressed and discriminated groups of the people, and exposes every arbitrary outrage committed by bourgeois dictatorship in the spheres of economy, politics, culture, science, education, and in the sphere of morality and family life.

p "The working class draws into revolutionary action the masses of the working and exploited people. . ., teaches them revolutionary struggle, trains them, not merely by words, but by deeds, by the example of mass revolutionary action, combining political and economic demands."  [358•1 

p One of Lenin’s great services to science and revolution was his definition of the place and role of the oppressed nations’ liberation movement in the world revolutionary process.

p At Comintern meetings Lenin stressed with particular force the difference between the position of an oppressing nation and that of an oppressed one. The Communist International adopted Lenin’s call to struggle for the right to self-determination to the point of secession, for the complete independence of the colonies, and recommended the Communist Parties that they should establish a close contact with workers’ organisations in the colonies and render active and direct assistance to the liberation movements in the colonies and dependent countries.

p Lenin was the first to present the world revolutionary process as the "revolt of the proletariat against the bourgeoisie of its own country + revolt of the nations in the colonies and dependent countries”,  [358•2  i.e., as the civil war of the working people of the advanced countries against their capitalist exploiters in combination with national wars against international imperialism. The world socialist revolution "will not be solely, or chiefly, a struggle of the revolutionary proletarians in each country against their bourgeoisie—no, it will be a struggle of all the imperialist-= oppressed colonies and countries, of all dependent countries, against international imperialism".  [358•3  That is why Lenin approved the following wording of the international motto of Communists: "Workers of all countries and oppressed nations, unite!"

p Lenin emphasised that the proletariat of the advanced 359 countries—the vanguard of the world revolution and the guarantor of victory over the old world of exploitation, class and national inequality, and imperialist wars—would not be able to achieve this victory unless it was allied to the millions representing the majority of mankind, unless it received the help of the working people of all the oppressed colonial nations, above all the peoples of the Last. On the other hand, the anti-imperialist national liberation movements of the peoples of the East could not advance to a successful conclusion except through alliance with the international revolutionary proletariat and in direct connection with the revolutionary struggle of the Soviet Republic against international imperialism.  [359•1  Closely linked to this was Lenin’s brilliant thesis, put forward at the Second Congress of the Comintern, concerning the possibility of backward countries taking a non-capitalist path of development within the framework of a fraternal alliance with the victorious proletariat of the advanced countries, who could assist and support them.

p The Second International was an association of European Social-Democratic parties. Its leaders did not trouble to concern themselves with the working class and democratic forces of Asia, Africa, Latin America, nor with the building of workers’ organisations in those continents. By way of contrast, the Third, Communist International was from its very inception an international association of the working class of all continents and of all nations. It was to Lenin’s great credit that even before the Comintern was formed he said that proletarian revolutionaries considered it their duty to establish close links with the Mongolians, Persians, Indians and Egyptians, and that they would do all their best to render those peoples selfless assistance in culture, in using machinery, to lighten their labour, and enable them to move to democracy and socialism.

p Lenin’s “Left-Wing” Communlsm—an Infantile Disorder and his reports and speeches at Comintern sessions elaborate and develop the principal points of Marxist-Leninist theory on the Communist Party and its leading role in the struggle for the dictatorship of the proletariat and in the building of socialism. Victory over capitalism, he wrote in his "Theses on the Main Tasks of the Second Congress of the Comintern”, requires a correct relationship between the leading Communist Party, the revolutionary class (the proletariat) and all other exploited people. Lenin pointed out that mastery of Marxism, keen class 360 consciousness, dedication to the cause of the revolution, strict centralisation and iron discipline in the struggle for socialism were all indispensable to a Communist Party, a party of a new type. "Without a party of iron that has been tempered in the struggle, a party enjoying the confidence of all honest people in the class in question, a party capable of watching and influencing the mood of the masses, such a struggle cannot be waged successfully."  [360•1  The first condition for the foundation of Communist Parties, wrote Lenin, was to ensure them freedom from the opportunism and treachery of the bankrupt leaders of the Second International.

p The Second Congress of the Comintern (July-August 1920) adopted "The Terms of Admission into the Communist International" (the “21 Terms”), an important document, written by Lenin, that guaranteed the decisive severance of the communist movement from both opportunism and Centrism which disguised its opportunism by verbally accepting the need for revolution. The "21 Terms" protected the Communist Parties that were in the process of formation from being overcrowded with unstable, uncertain groups and people not entirely free of opportunistic ideas, for whom communism was only a temporary attraction, something then in fashion.

p The "21 Terms" arc not only a declaration of the break with opportunism but also a condensed statement of the basic principles made extremely powerful by their brevity and clarity. They represent the essential foundations for the building of revolutionary parties: adherence to the principle of democratic centralism and iron discipline, together with respect for and confidence in the high authority of the Party centre on the part of all Party members. They interpret concretely and unambiguously the internationalist duty of every Party wishing to belong to the Comintern: the duty to render each other selfless support in the struggle against the forces of counter-revolution, to support not by word but by deed all liberation movements in the colonies, and to demand the withdrawal of the imperialists of their own country from these colonies, etc.  [360•2  They are also a practical programme of action both for work among the people and inside the Party: the active spreading of the idea of the dictatorship of the proletariat among the workers, soldiers and peasants, and the development of all possible links with the people through 361 systematic and persistent communist work inside the trade unions, the co-operatives and other mass organisations—and, when necessary, the combining of legal and illegal work by setting up a parallel illegal apparatus everywhere, for the revolutionary situation, developing into civil war in some countries, often required this.

p Lenin’s idea was to deepen and extend the Party’s bonds with the people and to establish its role as leader. We read in one of his speeches at the Second Congress of the Comintern: "If the minority (in a Party—Ed.) is unable to lead the masses and establish close links with them, then it is not a party, and is worthless in general. . . ."  [361•1  In working out and applying revolutionary tactics Lenin had to fight on two fronts: against Right opportunism and “Left” opportunism, both of which were introduced into the communist movement by people coming from the petty bourgeoisie and by groups of ultra revolutionary-minded workers and Party functionaries. The Leftism and sectarianism of the latter was a kind of reaction to the reformism of the old Social-Democracy and to the servility of its leaders to the bourgeoisie. Though Right opportunism was the chief danger, it was necessary to fight uncompromisingly against “Left” opportunism, too, because it threatened to lead the young Communist Parties into a sectarian blind-alley, raising a barrier to the consolidation of their links with the people and so deprive them of all possibility of fulfilling their mission as the leading and directing force of the working class and all other working people in the fight for socialism.

p The “Left” failed to understand the need to provide a scientific Marxist basis to revolutionary policy, for strategy and tactics to be based on an objective understanding of the life of society. Their dangerous veering from the Marxist dialectics showed itself in the way they were carried away by "purely revolutionary" tactics that missed the point of favourably combining both the objective conditions and the subjective factor required for the victory of socialist revolution. They relied on the preparedness for battle of the vanguard alone. In this connection, in his book “Left-Wing” Commnnism—an Infantile Disorder and in a number of articles and speeches made at Comintern congresses, Lenin developed the theory of the revolutionary situation and conditions needed for the success of the revolution.

p The “Left” trend became especially dangerous in 1920 when 362 the rate of advance of the world proletarian revolution slowed down. The "theory of attack" advanced by some of the Leftists imposed on the communist movement in the capitalist countries "the tactics" of unprepared armed action, without regard for either the real situation or the mood of the people. This amounted to nothing less than an attempt to push the Communist Parties onto the disastrous path of adventurism and complete separation from the people. This meant giving up ordinary everyday work among the people in order to win them to the side of the Party. The Leftists opposed all compromises, all participation in parliamentary action and in the activities of the trade unions that were under the reformists’ influence.

p Lenin’s book “Left-Wing” Communism—an Infantile Disorder, published in June 1920, dealt a severe blow to these sectarian views and redirected many misguided comrades back onto the right road. But the struggle against the Leftists did not end there; it was, rather, only just beginning. From early 1921 the assault by the followers of "the theory of attack" on the Comintern intensified, increasing the harm their actions were doing to many Communist Parties.

p In his talks with Communists before the Third Comintern Congress (held in June-July 1921) Lenin stressed that it was time to finish with “Left” illusions about the victory of the revolution depending entirely on the will of the Party and on the extent and intensity of its work. As Clara Zetkin recalled in her memoirs, Lenin said that the coming Congress should take a decision on tactics which must be linked to its appraisal of the world economic situation. "We must assess the world economic and political situation soberly, quite soberly, if we wish to take up the struggle against the bourgeoisie and to triumph."  [362•1  And Lenin emphasised at the Third Congress itself that the slackening of the revolutionary wave that had begun required even greater attention to questions of tactics, a more thorough and careful approach to the problems of winning the majority of the working class over to the side of Communists. "In Europe, where almost all the proletarians are organised, we must win the majority of the working class,” Lenin said in his speech on July :, 1921, "and anyone who fails to understand this is lost to the communist movement; he will never learn anything if he has failed to learn that much during the three years of the great revolution".  [362•2 

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p The Third Congress, in its theses on tactics, declared that the most pressing task of the moment was that of winning the majority of the working class, of "directly participating in the struggle of ific labouring masses, and oj conducting tins struggle on a communist hasis, and of erecting, during the struggle, great revolutionary Communist mass parties...."  [363•1  Not the "incessant offensive”, not adventures, but the gathering of strength and the correct choosing of the right moment for action, including armed uprising—that is what had to become the basis of tactics. In a letter to German Communists Lenin wrote: "More careful, more thorough preparation for fresh and more decisive battles, both defensive and offensive—that is the fundamental and principal thing in the decisions of the Third Congress."  [363•2 

p Lenin had to wage a hard struggle against the Leftist “ Maximalist" attitude of very many Communists—including some of the then leading personalities of the Third International—towards the everyday demands of the working class and its allies and towards the minimum programmes of fraternal parties. Their failure to realise the importance of fighting for immediate economic demands, and the connection between this fight and the final goal of the proletariat, was one of the most dangerous manifestations of the "infantile disorder" of Leftism in the communist movement against which Lenin spoke so vehemently.

p In the conditions of the sharpest revolutionary crisis that hit Europe after the October Revolution and the end of the First World War, a number of countries were faced with the immediate prospect of establishing the dictatorship of the proletariat. Many leaders in the Communist Parties whose views formed under the influence of this most acute revolutionary situation came to the wrong conclusion that under any conditions, and in any country, the struggle for the partial improvement of the workers’ position only led away from the basic issue of the seizure of power, and that it therefore represented reformist degeneration, or even betrayal.

p What was Lenin’s attitude on this question? In his article "Karl Marx" he wrote: "The Communist Manifesto advanced a fundamental Marxist principle on the tactics of the political struggle: ’The Communists fight for the attainment of the immediate aims, for the enforcement of the momentary interests of 364 the working class; but in the movement of the present, they also represent and take care of the future of that movement.’ ”  [364•1  Lenin repeatedly pointed out that the connection between the struggle for democracy, for the immediate demands of the working people, and the struggle for socialism, could not be broken. In his comments on Zinovicv’s article on Maximalism Lenin demonstrated once again the dialectical relationship between minimum and maximum programmes. A minimum programme does not go beyond the bounds of capitalism, and is compatible with it in principle—none of its individual demands, nor all its demands taken together, can result in the transition to socialism. But, on the other hand, "it is most probable in practice that out of any serious struggle for the ma]or minimum programme demands there will flare up a struggle for socialism and that we, at any rate, are working in that direction".  [364•2 

p While analysing the roots of sectarian Maximalism, Lenin revealed, among other things, the fact that not all leaders and activists of the young Communist Parties managed to draw the lessons of the previous stage of the international labour movement, the one connected with the Second International.

p In his article "The Third International and Its Place in History" Lenin observed that the Communist International discarded the opportunist, social-chauvinist, bourgeois and petty-bourgeois dross of the Second International and at the same time gathered the fruits of the work of that organisation which had only marked the period of preparation of the soil for the broad, mass spread of the labour movement.  [364•3  In a number of other works written in the years 1914-23 Lenin demonstrated that the bearers of the “Left” trend failed to grasp the dialectical nature of the class struggle, misinterpreting the great turn in the international working-class movement as a simple rejection of old forms of struggle, when in fact it was rather a matter of retaining and developing certain old forms which had now been filled with a new content. They became so absorbed in the struggle against the treachery of the opportunists that they did not notice that the historical results of the pre-1914 period were lasting achievements of the proletariat: mass workers’ organisations—trade unions, co-= operatives and other organisations, with their varied knowledge 365 and traditions, having millions of working people attached to them and possessing experience of working within the framework of bourgeois legality, bourgeois parliamentarism, etc. Not everyone realised that it was essential to put to use these achievements and make them serve the interests of the revolution. Handing over to the opportunists such vital means of organisation meant giving them a controlling influence.

p Lenin tirelessly insisted in the Comintern on putting the question of partial demands correctly. This was no easy job, since not a few comrades had caught the Leftist disease. One of the leaders of the Comintern at that time—Zinoviev—having begun by advancing the radically wrong, in fact reformist, proposition in his 1916 article (the one criticised by Lenin) that minimum programme demands "in toto lead to a transition to a new, in principle different, social set-up”, now rushed to the “Left” extreme of totally rejecting a minimum programme. Bukharin also systematically opposed partial demands, refusing to accept anything less than a “planetary” revolution.

p But thanks, largely, to Lenin’s efforts, the Leftist trend was checked. The Third Congress declared, in the spirit of Lenin, that the proletariat could not put oft the struggle for its immediate everyday needs until it was itself the ruling class. The Communist Parties, the Congress theses went on, did not advance a minimum programme of the kind that Social-Democratic parties put forward, designed only to strengthen the shaky edifice of capitalism. They proposed instead struggle for concrete proletarian demands as a means of better organising the working class and as stages on the road to the dictatorship of the proletariat. As the struggle for concrete demands becomes wider and deeper and gains momentum, the Communist Parties must also broaden their slogans. The Congress directly pointed out that "every objection to such partial demands, every accusation of reformism in connection with these partial struggles, is an outcome of the same incapacity to grasp the live issues of revolutionary action which manifested itself in the opposition of some communist groups to participation in trade union activities and parliamentary action".  [365•1 

p While taking part in working out suggestions for the programme of the Communist International at its Fourth Congress, Lenin introduced the following clause: "...The Comintern denounces with equal vigour both the attempts to represent the 366 partial demands in the programme as opportunism and any attempts to slur over the main revolutionary task with partial demands."  [366•1 

p Lenin’s experience of struggle for workers’ unity and his tactics in this struggle are of the greatest importance for the world working-class movement. Lenin, an irreconcilable fighter against Right opportunism, reformism and revisionism, and against Leftist adventurism, sectarianism and dogmatism, taught Communists to value working-class unity highly and to go to all lengths to restore the lost unity for the benefit of the revolutionary cause. "Such a unity is infinitely precious and infinitely important to the working class. Disunited, the workers arc nothing. United, they are everything".  [366•2 

p By participating in the current work of the Comintern, Lenin helped the young Communist Parties to find their way in the struggle to restore the working-class unity destroyed by the bourgeoisie and its agents in the ranks of the proletariat. He explained the absolute necessity of winning the majority of the working class to the side of the socialist revolution, and helped to find the means of making contact with working people who followed Social-Democracy, and the right forms for achieving united action and establishing a united workers’ front.

p Lenin saw that the struggle for working-class unity would be tremendously difficult. He in no way underestimated the existing state of affairs. More than anybody else he understood the intensely contradictory character of social development. He realised that the working class was not made of saints guaranteed from any mistakes or failings. The proletariat is a class of capitalist society, not separated by a blank wall from other classes and not immune from the influence of philistine or even imperialist ideology. Capitalist anarchy leads to competition among the workers, disuniting their ranks and fostering and sustaining in them shop and trade narrow-mindedness. Imperialism bribes the upper layers of the working class with the superprofits obtained from colonial exploitation and from trade on the world market.

p Lenin showed that there existed two tendencies in the political and economic activities of the working class under capitalism: the tendency to settle down fairly comfortably, which was feasible only for a small upper stratum of the proletariat, and the 367 tendency to lead the whole mass of working and exploited people towards the revolutionary overthrow of capital in general.  [367•1  The opportunism of Social-Democracy promoted the former, reformist tendency in working-class politics. Reformism in the labour movement, or Right-wing Social-Democracy, is inevitably produced by capitalism and supported by it. But it does not follow from this that Communists can confine themselves to cursing opportunists, directing their main blows against Social- Democracy, or that they can make a sport of the struggle against Ccntrtsm. They must proceed from the fact that all workers, including those who follow Social-Democrats, and even those who support openly reactionary parties, have, objectively, the same set of common basic interests.

p Communists, Lenin stressed, must have a clear-cut idea of what a united workers’ front is needed for. "The aim and point of united front tactics consists in drawing into the struggle against capital wider and wider sections of the workers."  [367•2  United front tactics do not mean top-level collusions or backstage intrigues with Social-Democrats and bourgeois-democratic parties for the sole purpose of achieving some sort of momentary success. United front tactics mean the making of agreements and alliances which encourage the participation of the broadest masses in the movement and demonstrate to them the possibility of the joint practical action of Communists, Social-Democrats and unorganised workers in the struggle against capital. Let them be quite limited and partial actions at first but they will nonetheless be joint actions of the working people. At first the masses will strive to secure the satisfaction of their most immediate needs, and after that they will go on to fight together for deeper changes and for socialist revolution. The depth and range of such joint actions are bound to grow as the meaning and importance of the final goals of the communist struggle become clearer to the people.

p While working for united fronts the Communist Parties must retain their organisational independence and their complete freedom to express their opinions and to criticise reformist leaders.

p The theses on the united workers’ front elaborated by the Presidium of the Executive Committee of the Comintern in December 1921, with Lenin’s active participation, referred to the 368 experience of the Bolsheviks prior to 1917, when they had repeatedly made agreements with the Mensheviks, "not only because of the ups and downs in the factional struggle but also under the direct pressure of the broad strata of the workers who were waking up to active political life and, in fact, demanded to be given a chance to check by their own experience whether the path of Menshevism radically departed from the path of revolution".  [368•1 

p Lenin gave a great deal of thought to the need of a flexible tactical line in relation to the Social-Democrats. The tactical plan which Lenin suggested to the Comintern representatives going to attend the Berlin Conference of the II, the II 1/2 and the III  Internationals (held early in April 1922) is still instructive. Every small detail of this plan retains its significance. Lenin suggested that the basic tactics of the Comintern delegation should be to put forward only such points that directly concerned practical joint mass action and came within the range of what was admitted to be indisputable in the press of all three Internationals, i.e., Communists were to go to the conference guided only by the need to achieve united action by the working people. He said: "This unity could be achieved at once, even though radical political disagreements are in evidence."  [368•2 

p Lenin advised the Communists to suggest to their opposite numbers at the conference that highly controversial matters should be pushed into the background in order to achieve unity on the most pressing practical matters close to the workers’ interests—such was the wish and the will of all class-conscious workers.

p And after this conference Lenin recommended that criticism of the policies of the II and II 1/2 Internationals should assume "a character more explanatory and should be attended with great patience and attention to detail".  [368•3 

p Lenin’s instructions on the question of communist co-operation with Social-Democracy are of tremendous importance in present-= day conditions: to explain to the workers the irreconcilable contradictions between the slogans adopted at the Berlin Conference by the representatives of the II and II 1/2 Internationals (the struggle against capital, the 8-hour working day, the defence of 369 Soviet Russia, help to the hungry) and the actual reformist policies of Right Social-Democrats and Centrists.

p These instructions of Lenin’s provide a basis for the present tactics of Communists in relation to Social-Democracy and reformist trade unions.

p The Communist International founded by Lenin not only revived, strengthened and multiplied the ties between the workers of all countries that had been undermined by imperialism and the traitors of the II International, but provided the vanguard of the world working-class movement with scientific strategy and tactics for the era of the general crisis of capitalism and the division of the world into two social systems. Under the leadership of the Comintern, with Lenin playing an active part, Communist Parties took shape, grew up and reached ideological maturity on all continents.

The Seventh Congress of the Comintern (held in 1935) was an important landmark in the history of the world communist movement. It assessed and enlarged upon the ideas of Lenin expressed in Two Tactics of Social-Democracy in the Democratic Revolution, “Left-Wing” Communism—an Infantile Disorder and many other works—the ideas of proletarian hegemony within broad class alliances advocating social progress, and his thoughts on the variety of the means of overthrowing bourgeois rule, and on the possibility of there being various transitional forms and intermediary stages leading up to the socialist revolution. The anti-fascist popular fronts of the i93os were a creative application, in new historical conditions, of Lenin’s teachings on the alliance of the working class with non-proletarian working people in the struggle against the main enemy—big capital. During the Second World War the Leninist idea of proletarian hegemony was realised on a national, scale (for in each country that fell victim to aggression the working class was the nucleus and leader of the Resistance movement) and on an international scale (for the first state of the dictatorship of the proletariat was the main force that secured the defeat of naxism, the enemy of all humanity).

p The half-century’s history of the international communist movement has confirmed the correctness of Lenin’s ideas on strategy and tactics, and the universal applicability and readability of the aims and tasks which he advanced. The influence of Leninism on the progress of the working-class movement and on the 370 entire world revolutionary process lias been steadily widening and deepening.

p The emergence and development of the world socialist system, "the inspiring influence of socialism on the entire world have created the prerequisites for accelerating historical progress and opened up new prospects for the advance and triumph of socialism throughout the world”, declared the 1969 Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties. By taking stock of these prospects, the communist movement, which had become an extremely powerful and influential political force, began to look for new ways of organising and uniting working people, new forms of the struggle for socialism and communism. Life also demanded from the communist movement a creative development of theory to accord with the changing conditions.

p The increasing complexity of the class struggle and the tasks of building a new society has raised the importance of theoretical work and of summarising revolutionary experience. The scientific elaboration of strategic and tactical problems is required, as Lenin said, "in order not to lose our way in these idgzags, these sharp turns in history, in order to retain the general perspective, to be able to see the scarlet thread that joins up the entire development of capitalism and the entire road to socialism".  [370•1 

p Communists, by basing themselves on Marxist-Leninist theory and by studying the experience of the world revolutionary movement, have been able to answer the new questions raised by a changing reality.

p CPSU congresses, the congresses of other fraternal Parties, and the international meetings of 1957, 1960 and 1969 worked out the concept of the modern world revolutionary process. The task of defending and developing Lenin’s strategy of the unity, joint action and mutual help of the three torrents of the world revolution—the peoples of the socialist countries, the working-class revolutionary movement in the capitalist countries and the national liberation movement—is of especial importance today. The attempts of Maoists and “Left” opportunists to oppose the national liberation movement to the socialist world and to the working class of industrially advanced countries lead to the weakening of the united front of all anti-imperialist forces and damage the interests of socialism, the international working class and the national liberation struggle by helping imperialism. The 371 CPSU and all true Marxists-Leninists resolutely repulse the intrigues of the enemies of proletarian internationalism.

p The communist movement has defined the role of the world socialist system as the leading force and bulwark of the anti-= imperialist movement. As the struggle between the two world systems develops, ever greater importance attaches to the use of the potentialities of the socialist system, the consolidation of the might of the socialist countries and to the broad, all-round co-= ordination of their effort. The movement of the Communist Parties and people of the socialist countries for higher labour productivity, for economic progress and the introduction of better economic and political forms of social organisation makes up the main content of the struggle between socialism and capitalism on a global scale.

p With the consolidation of the world socialist system and the parallel deepening of the general crisis of capitalism many of the problems of the strategy and tactics of the working-class and national liberation movements are assuming new forms. This is due to a certain shift of the centre of gravity of imperialism’s strategy in the world arena. As L. I. Brezhnev said at the 1969 International Meeting: "The policies of imperialism are being increasingly determined by the class objectives of its general struggle against world socialism, the national liberation revolutions and the working-class movement."

p In the capitalist countries the Marxist-Leninist Parties arc confronted with a situation in which imperialism looks for new opportunities to prolong its existence and adapt itself to the struggle between two systems. Relying on Lenin’s theory of strategy and tactics, these Parties discover new, effective forms of struggle for socialism and new tactics which mostly contribute to the formation and strengthening of a political army of revolution. In appraising theoretically new forms of struggle, the communist movement creatively elaborates such problems as drawing closer together democratic and socialist tasks in the revolutionary struggle of our era and the appropriate combination of peaceful and non-peaceful forms of revolution.

p Under present-day conditions, the work of the Communist and Workers’ Parties in extending the alliances of the working class with the working peasantry, with technical personnel and other intellectuals, with white-collar workers and other urban strata of the population, is acquiring greater importance.

p For the most part these classes and social groups arc concerned with peace, democracy and social progress, with curbing 372 monopoly rule and with social control over production. Their joint action creates favourable preconditions for uniting all the democratic currents into a political alliance capable of putting an end to the omnipotence of monopoly capital, barring the path to reaction, removing the threat of fascism and averting a new world war.

p At the same time, Marxists-Leninists arc aware of the fact that the policy of broad alliances, the tactics of strengthening the unity of workers’ and democratic forces, cannot be sacrificed to preserve blocs and coalitions "at any cost”. It docs not mean cither giving up principled struggle against reformism ancl petty-= bourgeois narrow-mindedness and defending Marxist-Leninist principles and the vanguard role of the Communist Party. The political alliance of democratic currents will be able to fulfil its tasks provided the working class becomes its leading and mobilising force, provided it relies on the mass movement and carries out a decisive struggle against monopoly capital, for democratic demands, which, according to the 1969 International Meeting, "once won, would weaken the positions of imperialism as a whole and shake the very foundations of its rule".

p Communist strategy and tactics in the former colonial and semi-colonial world proceed from the prospect, revealed by Lenin, of a national liberation revolution growing into a revolution, which would reconstruct a country on socialist lines, since the consistent implementation of anti-imperialist and general democratic tasks transcends society beyond the framework of the exploiting system. In Asia and Africa today—in countries where agrarian reform is of prime importance, the anti-imperialist and anti-feudal tasks in the national liberation revolution are closely linked and the peasantry constitutes the vast majority of the population—the central issue of the revolutionary process is the stand taken by the peasantry. Leninism has armed the Communists in these areas of the world with a conclusion that a united national front can be founded only on the alliance between the working class and the peasantry, an alliance which is called upon to become the main force in the struggle for national independence, deep-going democratic changes and social progress.

p The development of Asian and African colonial countries has confirmed Lenin’s forecast that the anti-colonial movement is bound to acquire anti-capitalist content, that the socialist orientation will thread its way confidently among all difficulties and 373 trials. Lenin’s statement to the effect that the problem of the worker-peasant alliance in the ex-colonies largely bears an international character has been borne out in practice. According to the Main Document of the 1969 International Meeting, "it is of paramount importance for the prospects of the anti-imperialist struggle to strengthen the alliance between the socialist system and the forces of the working-class and national liberation movements”.

p As was the case in Lenin’s time, life constantly demands that the international communist movement protects the purity of Marxism-Leninism from the intrigues of the bearers of bourgeois ideology and the Right and “Left” opportunists who join hands with them. As a matter of fact, the struggle on two fronts has never ceased: that against Social-Democratic and Right- revisionist reformism and conciliation with the bourgeoisie, on the one hand, and, on the other, against those pseudo-revolutionary phrase-= mongers who are incapable of endurance, organisation, and discipline, and who show instability by wavering between adventurism and apathy and sometimes surrendering completely to the bourgeoisie.

p In the field of strategy and tactics the Rights ignore the role of the revolutionary vanguard and the subjective factor in general. They venerate one particular form of social development, namely, the evolutionary form. They reject revolutionary violence directed against exploiters. All varieties of Right opportunists rely on ordinary reforms to accelerate the supposedly automatic and spontaneous development of capitalism into socialism or some other system without exploitation. Of course, the bourgeoisie highly values the efforts of these direct or indirect assistants of its rule.

p “Left” opportunists oppose peaceful paths of revolution to non-peaceful paths of revolution and reduce revolution ancl the social changes that follow it to armed uprising.

p Leftism today does not present itself only in the old form of “conventional” sectarianism which advances simplified, stereo-= typed and obsolete formulas and methods for solving new conflicts. Modern sectarian groupings demand the complete abandonment of bourgeois-democratic institutions and legal possibilities of work. Unrestrained by modesty, the ideologists of the "new Left" in the West—Herbert Marcuse, Paul Sweeze & Co.—call their nihilistic theories "the philosophy of universal revolutionary renewal”. This obsolete anarchistic junk is advertised as the "last word in revolutionary science".

374

p Both Right and “Left” opportunism reflect non-proletarian, petty-bourgeois and bourgeois influences, and fear of the so-called omnipotence of the bourgeois system. The progress of the working-= class movement and the other torrents of the world liberation struggle inevitably leaves high and dry such defective theories that arc devoid of all scientific basis and arc contrary to the interests of revolution.

Relying on Lenin’s science of strategy and tactics, the Communist and Workers’ Parties in the capitalist countries find new and effective means of struggle for socialism. They strive to discover such tactical forms which contribute most to the creation and strengthening of the political army of the revolution.