What Is To Be Done?

Front matter

WHAT IS TO BE DONE?

Burning Questions of Our Movement

IN THE LITTLE LENIN LIBRARY

Foreword

EDITOR'S FOREWORD

What Is To Be Done? is one of Lenin's outstanding revolutionary writings. It has long been a classic in its field. The first generation of Russian Bolsheviks, which includes many of the present Soviet leaders, have been brought up on this brilliant exposition of the policies and tactics of the revolutionary Socialist movement. Its uniqueness in Russian Marxist literature is due to the way it treats the rôle of the Party in the revolutionary struggle—a subject to which slight attention was paid up to that time. The subtitle, "Burning Questions of Our Movement," which Lenin gave to this brochure, indicates how deeply he felt the need of calling attention to the problem of organisation.

What were these "burning questions" which Lenin, soon after his return from Siberian exile, posed and to which he gave answers, first in articles in the Iskra ("The Urgent Tasks of Our Movement," December, 1900; "Where To Begin," May, 1901) and finally developed in What Is To Be Done?, published in March, 1902?

Ideologically, Marxism had won a decisive victory over Populism which exercised hegemony among advanced Russian society and revolutionary intelligentsia during the seventies and eighties. In his early writings Lenin himself carried on sharp polemics against Populist and other utopian perversions of Socialism, thereby greatly contributing to the Marxist literary campaign designed to check their influence on the nascent revolutionary workers' movement.

The Marxist movement at that time suffered, however, from two basic weaknesses. The first was the tendency prevalent in a section of the movement and characterised as Economism, which maintained that the economic struggles of the workers for the improvement of their immediate working and living conditions should be the chief preoccupation of the labor movement. The struggle against tsarism, the Economists proposed to leave to the liberal bourgeoisie to whom they ascribed a monopoly in that field. Lenin and other revolutionary Socialists could not but consider such a policy as a travesty on Marxism, as a complete break with the nature and aims of the revolutionary labor movement, the very essence of which, they held, was the struggle for power. Lenin goes hammer and tongs after all those who attempt to separate the struggle against the tsarist government from that against the capitalists, and brands the pure and simple trade unionism of the Economists as thoroughly reactionary and inimical to the interests of the workers.

The second weakness which Lenin vigorously attacks in this study is the question of organisation. He raises this problem to the political importance it deserves and makes an impassioned appeal to scrap the existing form of organisation and build a theoretically sound party, revolutionary in purpose and national in scope. Although formally organised into a party a few years before (1898), the Marxist movement consisted of little more than small circles, each carrying on a more or less independent existence and engaging in sporadic and planless activities. This loose aggregation of revolutionists, carrying on their work in primitive, handicraft fashion, and depending on the spontaneity of the masses, could not, according to Lenin, become the organiser and leader of the revolutionary struggles which were rapidly developing and which were involving larger and larger masses of workers. Only a centralised party, working according to a carefully prepared plan, with each member assigned a specific task for which he is to be held accountable, could successfully lead the Russian workingclass in the struggle against capitalist exploitation and tsarist rule.

"If we have a strongly organised party, a single strike may grow into a political demonstration, into a political victory over the government," Lenin wrote sometime before he began to work on What Is To Be Done? Obviously, the party as he conceived it, had to consist of members "who shall devote to the revolution not only their spare evenings, but the whole of their lives."

Written thirty years ago, What Is To Be Done? still retains its freshness because of the revolutionary enthusiasm which permeates its pages and the great lessons it has today for the workers in capitalist countries who would build their revolutionary parties after the pattern fashioned by Lenin during the formative period of the Bolshevik Party.

Alexander Trachtenberg

December, 1931.

Preface

WHAT IS TO BE DONE?

PREFACE

According to the author's original plan, the present pamphlet was intended for the purpose of developing in greater detail the ideas that were expressed in the article he wrote in Iskra, No. 4, May, 1901, entitled "Where to Begin." First of all, we must apologise to the reader for this belated fulfilment of the promise made in that article (and repeated in reply to many private enquiries and letters). One of the reasons for this belatedness was the attempt to combine all the Social-Democratic organisations abroad which was undertaken in June last (1901). Naturally, one wanted to see the results of this attempt, for had it been successful, it would perhaps have been necessary to express Iskra's views on organisation from another point of view. In any case, such success promised to put an end very quickly to the existence of two separate tendencies in Russian Social-Democracy. As the reader knows, the attempt failed, and, as we shall try to show farther on, failure was inevitable after the new turn Rabocheye Dyelo took in its issue No. 10 towards Economism. It was found to be absolutely necessary to commence a determined fight against these diffused, ill-defined, but very persistent tendencies, which may degenerate into many diverse forms. Accordingly, the original plan of the pamphlet was changed and considerably enlarged.

Its main theme was to have been the three questions presented in the article: "Where to Begin," viz., the character and the principal content of our political agitation; our organisational tasks; and the plan for setting up simultaneously in various parts of the country, a militant, All-Russian organisation. These questions have long engaged the mind of the author, and he tried to raise them in the Rabocheye Gazeta at the time one of the unsuccessful attempts was made to revive that paper (cf. Chap. V). But the original plan to confine this pamphlet to these three questions, and to express our views as far as possible in a positive form without, or almost without, entering into polemics, proved quite impracticable for two reasons. One was that Economism proved to be more virile than we supposed (we employ the term Economism in the broad sense as it was explained in Iskra No. 12, December, 1901, in an article entitled "A Conversation with Defenders of Econornism," which represented a synopsis, as it were, of the present pamphlet). It became unquestionably clear that the differences regarding the solution of the three problems mentioned were to be explained to a much greater degree by the fundamental antagonism between the two tendencies in Russian Social-Democracy than by differences over practical questions. The second reason was that the astonishment displayed by the Economists concerning the views we expressed in Iskra revealed quite clearly that we often speak in different tongues, and therefore cannot come to any understanding without going over the whole range of questions ab ovo; that it was necessary to attempt in the simplest possible style, illustrated by numerous and concrete examples, systematically "to clear up" all the fundamental points of difference with all the Economists. I resolved to make this attempt to "clear up" these points, fully realising that it would greatly increase the size of the pamphlet and delay its publication, but I saw no other way of fulfilling the promise I made in the article "Where to Begin." In apologising for the belated publication of the pamphlet I also have to apologise for its numerous literary shortcomings. I had to work under great pressure, and frequently had to interrupt the writing of it for other work.

The three questions mentioned before still represent the main theme of this pamphlet, but I had to start out with the examination of two other, more general questions, viz., Why does an "innocent" and "natural" slogan like "freedom of criticism" represent a fighting watchword for us at the present time? And why can we not agree on even so important a question as the rôle of Social-Democracy in relation to the spontaneous mass movement? Furthermore, the exposition of our views on the character and the content of political agitation developed into an explanation of the difference between trade-union politics and Social-Democratic politics, and the exposition of our views on organisational tasks developed into an explanation of the difference between primitive methods, which satisfy the Economists, and an organisation of revolutionists, which in our opinion is essential. Moreover, I insist mote strongly than ever on the plan for a national political newspaper, the more so because of the weakness of the arguments that were levelled against it, and because the question that I put in the article "Where to Begin" as to how we can set to work simultaneously, all over the country, to establish the organisation we require was never really answered. Finally, in the concluding part of this pamphlet I hope to prove that we did all we could to avoid a rupture with the Economists, but the rupture proved inevitable; that Rabocheye Dyelo acquired special, "historical," if you will, significance not so much because it expressed consistent Economism, but because it fully and strikingly expressed the confusion and vacillation that mark a whole period in the history of Russian Social-Democracy, and that therefore, the polemics with Rabocheye Dyelo, which at first sight may seem excessively detailed, also acquires significance; for we can make no progress until we have completely liquidated this period.

February, 1902.

Chapter I: Dogmatism and "Freedom of Criticism"

I

DOGMATISM AND "FREEDOM OF CRITICISM"

A. What is "Freedom of Criticism"?

"Freedom of criticism," this undoubtedly is the most fashionable slogan at the present time, and the one most frequently employed in the controversies between the Socialists and democrats of all countries. At first sight, nothing would appear to be more strange than the solemn appeals by one of the parties to the dispute for freedom of criticism. Can it be that some of the progressive parties have raised their voices against the constitutional law of the majority of European countries which guarantees freedom to science and scientific investigation? "Something must be wrong here," an onlooker who has not yet fully appreciated the nature of the disagreements among the controversialists will say, when he hears this fashionable slogan repeated at every cross-road. "Evidently this slogan is one of the conventional phrases which, like a nickname, becomes legitimatised by custom," he will conclude.

In fact, it is no secret that two separate tendencies have been formed in international Social-Democracy. The fight between these tendencies now flares up in a bright flame, and now dies down and smoulders under the ashes of imposing "resolutions for an armistice." What this "new" tendency, which adopts a "critical" attitude towards "obsolete doctrinaire" Marxism represents, has been stated with sufficient precision by Bernstein, and demonstrated by Millerand.

Social-Democracy must change from a party of the social revolution into a democratic party of social reforms. Bernstein has surrounded this political demand by a whole battery of symmetrically arranged "new" arguments and reasonings. The possibility of putting Socialism on a scientific basis and of proving that it is necessary and inevitable from the point of view of the materialist conception of history was denied; the fact of increasing poverty, proletarianisation, the growing acuteness of capitalist contradictions, were also denied. The very conception of "ultimate aim" was declared to be unsound, and the idea of the dictatorship of the proletariat was absolutely rejected. It was denied that there is any difference in principle between liberalism and Socialism. The theory of the class struggle was rejected on the grounds that it could not be applied to strictly democratic society, governed according to the will of the majority, etc.

Thus, the demand for a decided change from revolutionary Social-Democracy to bourgeois reformism, was accompanied by a no less decided turn towards bourgeois criticism of all the fundamental ideas of Marxism. As this criticism of Marxism has been going on for a long time now, from the political platform, from university chairs, in numerous pamphlets, and in a number of scientific works, as the younger generation of the educational classes have been systematically trained for decades on this criticism, it is not surprising that the "new, critical" tendency in Social-Democracy should spring up, all complete, like Minerva from the head of Jupiter. This new tendency did not have to grow and develop, it was transferred bodily from bourgeois literature to Socialist literature.

If Bernstein's theoretical criticism and political yearnings are still obscure to any one, the trouble the French have taken to demonstrate the "new method" should remove all ambiguities. In this instance, also, France has justified its old reputation as the country in which "more than anywhere else the historical class struggles were always fought to a finish" [Engels, in his introduction to Marx's Eighteenth Brumaire]. The French Socialists have commenced, not to theorise, but to act. The more developed democratic political conditions in France have permitted them to put Bernstein into practice immediately, with its inevitable consequences. Millerand has provided an excellent example of practical Bernsteinism. It is not surprising that he so zealously defends and praises Bernstein and Volmar! Indeed, if Social-Democracy, in essentials, is merely a reformist party, and must be bold enough to admit this openly, then, not only has a Socialist the right to join a bourgeois cabinet, but he ought always to strive to obtain places in it. If democracy, in essence, means the abolition of class domination, then why should not a Socialist minister charm the whole bourgeois world by orations on class co-operation? Why should he not remain in the cabinet even after the shooting down of workers by gendarmes has exposed, for the hundredth and thousandth time, the real nature of the democratic co-operation of classes? Why should he not personally take part in welcoming the Tsar, for whom the French Socialists now have no other sobriquet than "Hero of the Gallows, Knout and Banishment" (knouteur, pendeur et deportateur)? And the reward for this humiliation and self-degradation of Socialism in the face of the whole world, for the corruption of the Socialist consciousness of the working class—the only thing that can guarantee victory—the reward for this is, imposing plans for niggardly reforms, so niggardly in fact, that much more has been obtained even from bourgeois governments.

He who does not deliberately close his eyes cannot fail to see that the new "critical" tendency in Socialism is nothing more nor less than a new species of opportunism. And if we judge people not by the brilliant uniforms they deck themselves in, not by the imposing appellations they give themselves, but by their actions, and by what they actually advocate, it will be clear that "freedom of criticism" means freedom for an opportunistic tendency in Social-Democracy, the freedom to convert Social-Democracy into a democratic reformist party, the freedom to introduce bourgeois ideas and bourgeois elements into Socialism.

"Freedom" is a grand word, but under the banner of Free Trade the most predatory wars were conducted: under the banner of "free labour," the toilers were robbed. The term "freedom of criticism" contains the same inherent falsehood. Those who are really convinced that they have advanced science, would demand, not freedom for the new views to continue side by side with the old, but the substitution of the old views by the new views. The cry "Long live freedom of criticism," that is heard to-day, too strongly calls to mind the fable of the empty barrel.

We are marching in a compact group along a precipitous and difficult path, firmly holding each other by the hand. We are surrounded on all sides by enemies, and are under their almost constant fire. We have combined voluntarily, especially for the purpose of fighting the enemy and not to retreat into the adjacent marsh, the inhabitants of which, right from the very outset, have reproached us with having separated ourselves into an exclusive group, and with having chosen the path of struggle instead of the path of conciliation. And now several in our crowd begin to cry out: Let us go into this marsh! And when we begin to shame them, they retort: How conservative you are! Are you not ashamed to deny us the right to invite you to take a better road!

Oh yes, gentlemen! You are free, not only to invite us, but to go yourselves wherever you will, even into the marsh. In fact, we think that the marsh is your proper place, and we are prepared to render you every assistance to get there. Only, let go of our hands, don't clutch at us, and don't besmirch the grand word "freedom"; for we too are "free" to go where we please, free, not only to fight against the marsh, but also those who are turning towards the marsh.

B. The New Advocates of "Freedom of Criticism"

Now, this slogan ("Freedom of Criticism") is solemnly advanced in No. 10 of Rabocheye Dyelo, the organ of the League of Russian Social-Democrats Abroad, not as a theoretical postulate, but as a political demand, as a reply to the question: "Is it possible to unite the Social-Democratic organisations operating abroad?"—"In order that unity may be durable, there must be freedom of criticism" [p. 36].

From this statement two very definite conclusions must be drawn:

1. That Rabocheye Dyelo has taken the opportunist tendency in international Social-Democracy under its wing; and 2. That Rabocheye Dyelo demands freedom for opportunism in Russian Social-Democracy. We shall examine these conclusions.

Rabocheye Dyelo is "particularly" displeased with Iskra's and Zarya's "inclination to predict a rupture between the Mountain and the Gironde in international Social-Democracy."

Generally speaking [writes Krichevsky, editor of Rabocheye Dyelo] this talk about the Mountain and the Gironde that is heard in the ranks of Social-Democracy, represents a shallow historical analogy, which looks strange when it comes from the pen of a Marxist. The Mountain and the Gironde did no represent two different temperaments, or intellectual tendencies, as idealist historians may think, but two different classes, or strata—the middle bourgeoisie on the one hand, and the petty bourgeoisie and the proletariat on the other. In the modern Socialist movement, however, there is no conflict of class interests; the Socialist movement in its entirety, all of its diverse forms [B. K.'s italics] including the most pronounced Bernsteinists stand on the basis of the class interests of the proletariat, and of the proletarian class struggle for political and economic emancipation [pp. 32–33].

A bold assertion! B. Krichevsky, have you heard the fact long ago noted, that it is precisely the extensive participation of the "academic" stratum in the Socialist movement in recent years that has secured the rapid spread of Bernsteinism? And what is most important—on what does our author base his opinion that even "the most pronounced Bernsteinists" stand on the basis of the class struggle for the political and economic emancipation of the proletariat? No one knows. This determined defence of the most pronounced Bernsteinists is not supported by any kind of argument whatever. Apparently, the author believes that if he repeats what the pronounced Bernsteinists say about themselves, his assertion requires no proof. But can anything more "shallow" be imagined than an opinion of a whole tendency that is based on nothing more than what the representatives of that tendency say about themselves? Can anything more shallow be imagined than the subsequent "homily" about the two different, and even diametrically opposite, types, or paths, of party development? [Rabocheye Dyelo, pp. 33–35.] The German Social-Democrats, you see, recognise complete freedom of criticism, but the French do not, and it is precisely the latter that present an example of the "harmfulness of intolerance."

To which we reply that the very example B. Krichevsky quotes, illustrates how even those who regard history, literally from the Ilovaisky point-of-view sometimes describe themselves as Marxists. Of course, there is no need whatever, in explaining the unity of the German Socialist Party and the dismembered state of the French Socialist Party, to search for the special features in the history of the respective countries, to compare the conditions of military semi-absolutism in the one country with republican parliamentarism in the other, or to analyse the effects of the Paris Commune and the effects of the anti-Socialist laws in Germany; to compare the economic life and economic development of the two countries, or recall that "the unexampled growth of German Social-Democracy" was accomplished by a strenuous struggle unexampled in the history of Socialism, not only against the theoreticians (Muehlberger, Duehring), the Socialists of the Chair, but also against mistaken tactics (Lassalle), etc., etc. All that is superfluous! The French quarrel among themselves because they are intolerant; the Germans are united because they are good fellows.

And observe, this piece of matchless profundity is intended to "refute" the fact which is a complete answer to the defence of Bernsteinism. The question as to whether the Bernsteinists stand on the basis of the class struggle of the proletariat can be completely and irrevocably answered only by historical experience. Consequently, the example of France is the most important one in this respect, because France is the only country in which the Bernsteinists attempted to stand independently on their own feet with the warm approval of their German colleagues (and partly also of the Russian opportunists). [Cf. Rabocheye Dyelo, Nos. 2–3, pp. 83–84]. The reference to the "intolerance" of the French, apart from its "historical" significance (in the Nozdrev sense), turns out to be merely an attempt to obscure a very unpleasant fact with angry invectives.

But we are not even prepared to make a present of the Germans to B. Krichevsky and to the other numerous champions of "freedom of criticism." The "most pronounced Bernsteinists" are still tolerated in the ranks of the German Party only because they submit to the Hanover resolution which emphatically rejected Bernstein's "amendments," and to the Luebeck resolution, which, notwithstanding the diplomatic terms in which it is couched, contains a direct warning to Bernstein. It is a debatable point from the standpoint of the interests of the German party, as to whether diplomacy was appropriate in this case and whether, in this case, a bad peace is better-than a good quarrel. Opinions may differ in regard to the expediency or not of the methods employed to reject Bernsteinism, but the fact remains that the German party did reject Bernsteinism on two occasions. Therefore, to think that the German example endorses the thesis: "The most pronounced Bernsteinists stand for the proletarian class struggle, for its economic and political emancipation," means to fail absolutely to understand what is going on before one's eyes.

More than that. As we have already observed, Rabocheye Dyelo comes before Russian Social-Democracy, demands "freedom of criticism," and defends Bernsteinism. Apparently, it came to the conclusion that we were unfair to our "critics" and Bernsteinists. To whom were we unfair, when and how? About this not a word. Rabocheye Dyelo does not name a single Russian critic or Bernsteinist! All that is left for us to do is to make one of two possible suppositions: First, that the unfairly treated party is none other than Rabocheye Dyelo itself (and that appears to be confirmed by the fact that in the two articles in No. 10 reference is made only to the insults hurled at the Rabocheye Dyelo by Zarya and Iskra). If that is the case, how is the strange fact to be explained that Rabocheye Dyelo, which always vehemently dissociates itself from Bernsteinism, could not defend itself, without putting in a word on behalf of the "most pronounced Bernsteinists" and of freedom of criticism? The second supposition is, that a third party has been treated unfairly. If the second supposition is correct, why should not this party be named?

We see, therefore, that Rabocheye Dyelo is continuing to play the game of hide and seek that it has played (as we shall prove below) ever since it commenced publication. And note the first practical application of this much-extolled "freedom. of criticism." As a matter of fact, not only has it now been reduced to abstention from all criticism, but also to abstention from expressing independent views altogether. The very Rabocheye Dyelo, which avoids mentioning Russian Bernsteinism as if it were a shameful disease (to use Starover's apt expression) proposes, for the treatment of this disease, to copy word for word the latest German prescription for the treatment of the German variety of the disease! Instead of freedom of criticism—slavish (worse: monkey-like) imitation! The very same social and political content of modern international opportunism reveals itself in a variety of ways according to its national characteristics. In one country the opportunists long ago came out under a separate flag, while in others, they ignore theory, and conduct a Radical-Socialist policy of practical politics. In a third country, several members of the revolutionary party have deserted to the camp of opportunism and strive to achieve their aims not by an open struggle for principles and for new tactics, but by gradual, unobserved, and, if one may so express it, unpunishable corruption of their party. In a fourth country again, similar deserters employ the same methods in the twilight of their political slavishness, and with an extremely original combination of "legal" with "illegal" activity, etc., etc. To talk about freedom of criticism and Bernsteinism as a condition for uniting the Russian Social-Democrats, and not to explain how Russian Bernsteinism has manifested itself, and what fruits it has borne, means to talk for the purpose of saying nothing.

We shall try, if only in a few words, to say what Rabocheye Dyelo did not want to say (or perhaps did not even understand).

C. Criticism in Russia

The peculiar position of Russia in regard to the point we are examining is that right from the very beginning of the spontaneous labour movement on the one hand, and the change of progressive public opinion towards Marxism on the other, a combination was observed of obviously heterogeneous elements under a common flag for the purpose of fighting the common enemy (obsolete social and political views). We refer to the heyday of "legal Marxism." Speaking generally, this was an extremely curious phenomenon, that no one in the eighties, or the beginning of the nineties, would have believed possible. Suddenly, in a country ruled by an autocracy, in which the press is completely shackled, and in a period of intense political reaction in which even the tiniest outgrowth of political discontent and protest was suppressed, a censored literature springs up, advocating the theory of revolutionary Marxism, in a language extremely obscure, but understood by those "interested." The government had accustomed itself to regard only the theory of (revolutionary) Populism as dangerous without observing its internal evolution as is usually the case, and rejoicing at the criticism levelled against it no matter from what side it came. Quite a considerable time elapsed (according to our Russian calculations) before the government realised what had happened and the unwieldly army of censors and gendarmes discovered the new enemy and flung itself upon him. Meanwhile, Marxian hooks were published one after another, Marxian journals and newspapers were published, nearly every one became a Marxist, Marxism was flattered, the Marxists were courted and the book publishers rejoiced at the extraordinary ready sale of Marxian literature. It is quite reasonable to suppose that among the Marxian novices who were carried away by this stream, there was more than one "author who got a swelled head. …"

We can now speak calmly of this period as of an event of the past. It is no secret that the brief appearance of Marxism on the surface of our literature was called forth by the alliance between people of extreme and of extremely moderate views. In point of fact, the latter were bourgeois democrats; and this was the conclusion (so strikingly confirmed by their subsequent "critical" development), that intruded itself on the minds of certain persons even when the "alliance" was still intact.

That being the case, does not the responsibility for the subsequent "confusion" rest mainly upon the revolutionary Social-Democrats who entered into alliance with these future "critics"? This question, together with a reply in the affirmative, is sometimes heard from people with excessively rigid views. But these people are absolutely wrong. Only those who have no reliance in themselves can fear to enter into temporary alliances with unreliable people. Besides, not a single political party could exist without entering into such alliances. The combination with the legal Marxists was in its way the first really political alliance contracted by Russian Social-Democrats. Thanks to this alliance an astonishingly rapid victory was obtained over Populism, and Marxian ideas (even though in a vulgarised form) became very widespread. Moreover, the alliance was not concluded altogether without "conditions." The proof: The burning by the censor, in 1895, of the Marxian symposium, Materials on the Problem of the Economic Development of Russia. If the literary agreement with the legal Marxists can be compared with a political alliance, then that book can be compared with a political treaty.

The rupture, of course, did not occur because the "allies" proved to be bourgeois democrats. On the contrary, the representatives of the latter tendency were the natural and desirable allies of the Social-Democrats in so far as their democratic tasks that were brought to the front by the prevailing situation in Russia were concerned. But an essential condition for such an alliance must be complete liberty for Socialists to reveal to the working class that its interests are diametrically opposed to the interests of the bour However, the Bernsteinist and "critical" tendency to which the majority of the legal Marxists turned, deprived the Socialists of this liberty and corrupted Socialist consciousness by vulgarising Marxism, by preaching the toning down of social antagonism, by declaring the idea of the social revolution and the dictatorship of the proletariat to be absurd, by restricting the labour movement and the class struggle to narrow trade unionism and to a "practical" struggle for petty, gradual reforms. This was tantamount to the bourgeois democrat's denial of Socialism's right to independence, and consequently, of its right to existence; in practice it meant a striving to convert the nascent labour movement into a tail of the liberals.