Opportunism, a component of the ideological and political trend which appears in the working-class movement at specific periods under the influence of bourgeois ideology, and which tries to subordinate the working class to the interests of capital. Opportunism directs the working class towards collaboration with the bourgeoisie, to conciliation with capitalism, and the rejection of socialism, and serves as a weapon of imperialism in its struggle against Marxism-Leninism, the world communist movement, and real socialism. It came into being in the second half of the 19th century. In the epoch of the general crisis of capitalism the ideology of opportunism is represented by two main currents: social reformism of right socialist parties and revisionism in the world communist movement (see Reformism; Revisionism). Social-reformist economic concepts (“ democratic socialism”, "mixed economy”, "market socialism”, etc.) and corresponding policies are being evolved today by leaders and theoreticians of Social- Democratic parties, which came together in 1951 to form the Socialist International. Contemporary opportunism continues and deepens the theory and practice of the right-wing leaders of the Second International ( Bernstein, Kautsky, Hilferding, Adler, Bauer and others). Whereas social-democratic theoreticians once recognised Marxism, albeit only formally, as they further slid to the right after World War II they openly proclaimed their break with Marxism. Bourgeois theories of "transformation of capitalism" are, first of all, the ideological and theoretical source of modern opportunism. As to its effect on the revolutionary working-class movement, opportunism may be right or “left”, with one not infrequently turning into the other. Right-wing opportunism—reformist theories replacing one another, and the conciliatory politics and tactics (Bernsteinism, Kautskyism, modern social-reformism and right revisionism)—is directed at the actual defence of the bourgeois system and statemonopoly capitalism. It rejects, in the interest of reform and for the sake of temporary and partial advantages, revolutionary action and the radical 258 transfermation of society on socialist and communist principles. Opportunism within the communist parties means a degeneration into liquidationist positions, and the adoption of Social-Democratic platforms. Opportunism rejects the leading role of the Marxist-Leninist party and leads to capitulation before anti-socialist forces. “Left” opportunism (Trotskyism) uses ultra- revolutionary phrase to cover itself, pushing the people into adventurist actions, and the Communist Party onto the road of sectarianism. This paralyses its ability to unite people for the anti-imperialist struggle, to successfully guide the building of socialism, discredits communism, and thus facilitates the spread of anticommunism. The "New Left"—neo-Trotskyite and other groups in the radical movement among intellectuals which was especially active in the 1960s is a “left” opportunist trend. These trends criticise state- monopoly capitalism from anarchist and anarcho-syndicalist positions, attack real socialism and the strategy and tactics of the world communist movement from the “left”, and at the same time attempt to use Marx’s theoretical heritage. The economic conceptions of opportunism are part of unscientific, vulgar bourgeois political economy (see Political Economy, Vulgar Bourgeois) "Opportunism in the upper ranks of the working-class movement is bourgeois socialism, not proletarian socialism. It has been shown in practice that working-class activists who follow the opportunist trend are better defenders of the bourgeoisie than the bourgeois themselves. Without their leadership of the workers, the bourgeoisie could not remain in power" (V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol.31, p. 231). The principal ideological and theoretical link in the social and economic doctrines of modern opportunism, social-reformism and revisionism is the concept of the "third road”, which is supposedly different from both capitalism and from scientific, Marxist-Leninist, real socialism (“democratic socialism”, “new” national "models of socialism”, the concept of “ Eurocommunism”). Misinterpreting socio-economic processes that are occurring in state- monopoly capitalism (further capitalist socialisation of production on a national and international scale, imperialist economic integration, partial ousting of individual private capitalist ownership by collective ownership in the form of jointstock, corporation and state capitalism, changes in the structure of the working class, the separation of managerial functions from the ownership of capital, the social gains of the working class in the industrially developed countries, etc.), opportunists have picked up bourgeois theories of "capital democratisation”, "diffusion of property”, "social partnership”, "managerial revolution”, “planned” capitalism, "the state of universal wellfare”, “deproletarianisation”, and "new middle class”, and now claim that capitalism will disappear of itself, without revolution, without power being seized by the working class, without the socialisation of the means of production, which, they say, is being transformed into democratic socialism. Proceeding from these positions, the right leaders of the Socialist International oppose real socialism, which they say is totalitarian, and contrast it to the "free world" as they call the bourgeois states. Anti-communism and the struggle against Marxism-Leninism is the main feature of modern opportunism. Economic opportunism, just as bourgeois political economy nourishing it, is gripped by an ever-deepening crisis. Socialist and SocialDemocratic parties belonging to the Socialist International have often been elected to govern in Austria, Britain, the Netherlands, the FRG, Denmark, Norway and Israel; however, the capitalist mode of production and the system of capitalist exploitation have not been touched in any of them. As regards revisionist attempts to realise in economic practice any version of "market socialism”, they have led (as the example of Czechoslovakia in 1968- 1969 showed) to the undermining of the socialist system. “Left” opportunist conceptions are equally incompatible with scientific socialism. In practice they do great harm to the economy. In struggling against social-reformist and revisionist opportunism, Communists try to consolidate 259 their ranks, as well as the unity of the working class in the struggle for peace, democracy, socialism and communism.