p Throughout his activity as leader and theorist of the international communist movement, as leader and head of the working class and broad masses of the working people in the Soviet Republic, Lenin carried on a consistent and relentless struggle against every brand of revisionism.

p In his brilliant work, Marxism and Revisionism, and in many other writings, Lenin showed the main content of revisionism: its class, petty-bourgeois roots, its social function of conducting the influence of the bourgeoisie in the communist movement, its ideological content, and its two main forms—revisionism on the Right and revisionism on the “Left”.

p Revisionism is an attempt to revise the fundamental propositions of revolutionary theory and practice, which 332 have stood the test of time, either on the plea of giving Marxism-Leninism a “creative” development, or taking a dogmatic stand which is incompatible with the spirit of the theory.

p Lenin wrote: “Bernstein, a one-time orthodox Marxist, gave his name to this trend by coming forward with the most noise and with the most purposeful expression of amendments to Marx, revision of Marx, revisionism.”  [332•1  This line was subsequently given support by the opportunist elements of the other parties of the Second International, and produced reformism, an opportunist trend in the workingclass movement pursuing the policy of the class collaboration with the bourgeoisie, abandonment of the revolutionary struggle, and betrayal of the interests of the toiling classes (see Chapter Seven).

p Exposing the class roots of revisionism, Lenin observed that there were definite social reasons for the emergence of revisionist vacillations. He wrote: “The inevitability of revisionism is determined by its class roots in modern society. ... In every capitalist country, side by side with the proletariat there are always broad strata of the petty bourgeoisie, small proprietors.... It is quite natural that the pettybourgeois world outlook should again and again crop up in the ranks of the broad workers’ parties.”  [332•2  Among the roots of revisionism is also the corrupting influence exerted by the bourgeoisie on the proletariat. “The deviations from Marxism are generated by ’bourgeois counter-revolution’, by ’bourgeois influence over the proletariat’.”  [332•3 

p The social roots of revisionism ultimately determine its bourgeois ideological content, which is normally a rehash of bourgeois theories and an endless succession of diverse borrowings from the ideological and theoretical views of bourgeois scientists. Lenin said that the revisionists followed in the wake of bourgeois science, that in the sphere of philosophy they rehearsed the bourgeois platitudes about materialism and dialectics, and in the sphere of political economy sought to influence the public by “new data on economic development”,  [332•4  ignoring the basic features of the capitalist 333 system. In the scientific sphere they are given to “superficial generalisations based on facts selected one-sidedly and without reference to the system of capitalism as a whole”.  [333•1  In the sphere of scientific communism, they revised the theory of the class struggle. Lenin gave the following general characteristic of revisionist policy: “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.”  [333•2 

p In 1908, Lenin pointed to two forms of revisionism: revisionism on the Right and revisionism on the “Left”. However, the latter “is far from having developed to the same extent as opportunist revisionism; it has not yet become international, has not yet stood the test of a single big practical battle”.  [333•3  Lenin subsequently continued to do a distinction between these two forms of revisionism, these two streams of “petty-bourgeois wavering, which always occurs alongside the proletariat, and which, in one degree or another, always penetrates its midst”.  [333•4  Revisionism on the Right was characterised by Lenin as a “petty-bourgeois reformism, i.e., servility to the bourgeoisie covered by a cloak of sentimental democratic and ’Social’-Democratic phrases and fatuous wishes”, and revisionism on the Left as a “ pettybourgeois revolutionism—menacing, blustering and boastful in words, brainlessness in deeds”.  [333•5 

p Lenin headed not only the theoretical but also practical struggle against every form of revisionism in Russia and in the international working-class movement. The theoretical and political defeat of economism (1895-1902), of Menshevism (1903-1908) and of liquidationism (1908-1914), that is, of the Russian brands of opportunism and revisionism, was the result of the struggle against the Right opportunist and revisionist trends.

p As to the petty-bourgeois revolutionism and political adventurism within the Bolshevik Party, Trotskyism was the most dangerous enemy with which Lenin and the Party had to carry on a hard struggle.

p Trotsky said the success of the revolution in Russia depended on whether or not it would be supported by a simultaneous uprising of the European proletariat. He erected a dogmatic antithesis between Lenin’s conclusion that the proletariat could initially win out in a few countries or even in one individual country, and the views expressed by the founders of the scientific communism. He ignored the diversity of the contradictions under imperialism and the importance of the struggle for democratic demands. He insisted on the adventurist attitude of starting instant revolutionary war, thereby objectively promoting the ends of the imperialists. He repeated the arguments of the Mensheviks, who rejected, as a matter of principle, the possibility of building a socialist society in a backward country, slandered the Party, undermined its unity, ranged the senior men in the Party against its young members, treated military methods of directing the masses as an absolute, ignored the study of mass experience, ignored material incentives combined with ideological education, did not believe in the possibility of an alliance between the working class and the peasantry, and advocated a harmful policy in respect of the peasantry.

p Upon Lenin’s death, Trotsky started ideological subversion in an effort to supplant Leninism with Trotskyism. The Party and its Central Committee, headed by J. V. Stalin, safeguarded Leninism and, in face of tremendous difficulties, ensured the victory of socialism in the Soviet Republic.

p Without the long and energetic struggle of the Party under the leadership of V. I. Lenin and J. V. Stalin, against the Right-wing deviationists and Trotskyites, it would have been impossible to win in the Great October Socialist Revolution, to consolidate this victory, to build socialism and to safeguard it during the Great Patriotic War.

p In the international arena, Lenin headed the struggle against the Right-opportunist revisionism of Bernstein and then of Kautsky. Lenin helped the “Left” Social-Democrats to understand the need for breaking with the revisionists and establishing a new type of Marxist party. Later he was to 335 give a rebuff to Austro-Marxism as represented by Otto Bauer, F. Adler and others who rejected Marxism as an international theory and spread the idea of a “peaceful socialisation of capitalism”.

p Lenin did very much to help the fraternal Communist Parties overcome Right opportunism, Trotskyism and “Left” communism, and his book “Left-wing” Communism— an Infantile Disorder had a great part to play in this matter.

p The whole of this activity of V. I. Lenin’s is still of exceptional importance today. Many tendencies characterising the situation in Russia in the period before the Great October Socialist Revolution (mounting political activity of the working class, growing general-democratic upswing, involvement of ever great masses of people in the revolutionary process, and intensification of the bourgeois fight against Marxism), have now assumed world-wide proportions, and so made the task of overcoming the trends hostile to Marxism one of especial importance.

p Referring to the situation in Russia in 1910, Lenin said that “sections that in many cases are now for the first time beginning to acquaint themselves with Marxism in real earnest...”  [335•1  had risen to consciously participate in public life. “We must again explain the fundamentals of Marxism to these masses; the defence of Marxist theory is again on the order of the day.”  [335•2  “The theory of Marxism, ’the fundamental principles’ of our entire world outlook and of our entire Party programme and tactics, is now in the forefront of all Party life not by mere chance, but because it is inevit- able.”  [335•3 

p It is quite clear that in the present epoch the involvement of ever greater masses of people (peasants and middle sections in the developing countries; workers by hand and by brain in the imperialist countries; broad sections of the young people and intellectuals; nations oppressed by monopoly capital) in the revolutionary process and the carrying of the truth about socialism and Marxism-Leninism to these masses is one of the most important tasks. This task is made considerably more complicated by the fact that anti- 336 communist propaganda daily, hourly, ceaselessly poisons the minds of broad masses of people.

p Lenin wrote: “The bourgeois press is creating far more fallacious ideas on this score than ever before, and is spreading them more widely. Under these circumstances disintegration in the Marxist ranks is particularly dangerous. Therefore, to understand the reasons for the inevitability of this disintegration at the present time and to close their ranks for consistent struggle against this disintegration is, in the most direct and precise meaning of the term, the task of the day for Marxists.”  [336•1 

p In this period of long, stubborn and hard struggle against imperialism, the line of joint anti-imperialist action calls for a further enhancement of the ideological and political role of the Marxist-Leninist parties in the revolutionary process.

There is profound meaning in the conclusions drawn by the International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties concerning the need of loyalty to Marxism-Leninism and proletarian internationalism. In his speech at the meeting, L. I. Brezhnev stressed: “To apply a consistent class line, firmly adhere to principles, be flexible in tactics, consider the concrete conditions from every angle, to undertake bold and at the same time well-conceived actions, to be able to utilise all the diverse means of fighting imperialism—this is what Lenin taught us, and what we learn from Lenin.”  [336•2  The Appeal of the International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties “Centenary of the Birth of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin” said: “Communists regard it as their task firmly to uphold the revolutionary principles of Marxism-Leninism and proletarian internationalism in the struggle against all enemies, steadfastly to make them a living reality, constantly to develop Marxist-Leninist theory and enrich it on the basis of present experience of waging the class struggle and building socialist society. Communists will always be true to the creative spirit of Leninism.”  [336•3