p While recognising the popular masses as the main driving force of social development, historical materialism does not deny the role of outstanding individuals. Their activity is not counterposed to the activity of the masses or classes, but is considered as being directly linked to the latter, i. e. as part of the popular masses’ overall struggle for progress.

p The emergence of a specific outstanding figure is no more than an incident in the history of any country. In his or her place there could be another outstanding figure. What is not fortuitous is the fact that history produces outstanding individuals. People who make history are of different ability. They act in different conditions and represent different social groups. Thus, they contribute differently to the common historical cause. Outstanding figures are those who have made the weightiest contribution to the development of a people or country or to the overall progress of mankind.

p The demand in outstanding figures is generated by the very logic of mass or class activity. The latter is effective if it is organised and directed in accordance with a movement’s common goals and interests. History has shown that a class cannot win political supremacy unless it produces its own political leaders, its own advanced figures capable of organising and leading a social movement.

p Class leaders head social movements and perform the following general functions: they work out the programme of the movement and the effective means and methods for implementing it, and organise the masses to fight for the programme goals. In our day, tasks of this kind are carried out by political parties led by the most experienced and the most able individuals from the point of view of the given class.

p The history of the fight for socialism has borne out Lenin’s criticism of the pseudo-revolutionary idea that there should be "no authorities”. The proletariat needs "thoughtful, experienced and knowledgeable political leaders".  [228•1  The proletariat needs authority in the sense that young workers need the experience of seasoned fighters against exploitation and oppression, those who have taken part in a number of revolutionary 229 lights and who have learned from revolutionary traditions and their broad political outlook. Lenin saw Marx, his theory and revolutionary experience as such an authority. The twentiethcentury world communist movement has also produced such an authority for the proletarian fighters for socialism - Lenin. Lenin’s historical magnitude is also recognised by non-communist progressives: for all progressive people throughout the world his name is inseparable Irom events and developments that have changed the world in the twentieth century.

p In every country, the revolutionary movement generated outstarding fighters and leaders of the masses: Jose Marti and Fidel Castro in Cuba, Ho Chi Minh in Vietnam, Agostinho Neto in Angola, Lrnst Thaelmann in Germany, Antonio Gramsci and Palmiro Togliatti in Italy, Maurice Thorez in France, and so on.

p Outstanding figures are shaped and produced by certain historical developments, in particular in periods when the old social system is breaking up and a new system is surfacing. At a time when the new has not fully developed but is taking root, colossal effort is needed to reveal the possibilities and ways for achieving it. The talent of a trailblazer is needed to recognise it, to understand it, and to help others see it. Outstanding figures are needed to carry out the multifarious historical task of breaking the fetters of the old, rejecting the 230 moribund, helping the birth of" the new and progressive that answers the interests of the advanced classes, and rallying them for the fight to achieve the triumph of the new.

p Outstanding individuals possess qualities that allow them to promote the work of carrying out the great social tasks of their time. Inasmuch as they are capable of founding a social movement, to see farther than others, and inasmuch as they want to change the existing system, they play an outstanding role in the history of the world.

p From the point of view of historical materialism, the activity of an outstanding figure always expresses the interests of a progressive class. The role played by this figure is determined by his or her class and the place it occupies in the social movement in question. The more progressive the class, the greater the figures this class advances. At the same time, these individuals exert a powerful influence on historical development so long as they work for the interest of their own class, for urgent social goals. From the history of the working class’s fight for socialism we know quite a few names of those who played an important part and enjoyed authority among the masses while they were revolutionary fighters, and lost their influence the moment they left their ranks.

Marxism-Leninism recognises the significant role played by outstanding figures, but rejects any form of hero worship or the cult of individuals. 231 Never will it set oil" an individual against the masses, classes, or parties. Personality cult is foreign to the science of revolution and the practice of existing socialism. When and where these instances do appear, for certain temporary reasons, they harm the revolutionary movement and socialist construction.