Permanent Revolution - INDEPENDENT AND LEADING ROLE
INDEPENDENT AND LEADING ROLE
We have noted that the
central thesis of Trotsky’s theory of Permanent Revolution was the proposition that the proletariat would seize power in .the bourgeois
revolution, and then go directly to the introduction of its maximum, socialist programme. This thesis was buttressed by two propositions which require examination. These propositions were derived
from two specific concepts
— that of independent role and that of leading role. The peasantry, according
to Trotsky,
was incapable of either these functions. The notion of leading role enabled
Trotsky to dismiss the idea that the peasants
could play a hegemonic role in the bourgeois-democratic revolution. This, however, was a superfluous argument, since no Russian Social-Democrat ever assumed
otherwise. The importance of the concept “leading role” — for Trotsky’s theory
of Permanent Revolution — is
that it was the key concept which enabled him to characterize the class nature of state power,
by an identification of the class which performed the hegemonic
role in the revolution: The proletariat would lead the victorious revolution against
Tsarism, therefore a worker’s state would be established. This was the same reasoning
employed by Martynov
in his Two Dictatorships to warn against
Social- Democracy
playing the kind of hegemonic role supported by Lenin — because a workers’ state, compelled
to implement its maximum programme, could not hope to survive,
unless the revolution spread to the West, and it was precisely the same reasoning
used by Parvus in
his preface to
Trotsky’s Before the 9th of January, and which
Lenin severely criticized. [81]
The notion
of “Independent role” is less easy to assess in Trotsky’s analytical framework, because it was always
associated with the notion of “leading role”. One of the crucial propositions advanced by Lenin in the formulation of an agrarian
programme for Russian
Social- Democracy, was the idea that the emancipation of the peasants from semi-feudal exploitation had to be the act of the peasants
themselves. In the agrarian
programme adopted
by the R.S.D.L.P. in 1903, [82] in the agrarian
resolution adopted
by the Bolsheviks at their congress in 1905, [83] and in the agrarian programme presented by Lenin to the Unity Congress in 1906,
[84] one of the crucial
demands was for the establishment of revolutionary peasant committees as'the organizational form of the peasant movement. At the Unity congress,
he defended his demand for the formation
of peasant committees by saying:
My draft proposes the formation of peasant
committees as the direct levers of the revolutionary peasant movement, and as the most desirable
form of that movement…
peasant committees mean calling
upon the peasants to set to work immediately and directly
to settle accounts
with the government officials and the landlords in the most drastic
manner. Peasant committees mean calling
upon the people who are being oppressed by the survivals of serfdom and the
police regime to eradicate
these survivals “in a plebeian manner”... [85]
This was premised on the belief that the peasants were quite capable of coming out as a mass democratic force against their class enemy, the semi-feudal landowners. This was not an inevitable or logically derived necessity, but only a possibility arising from: “The class antagonism between the mass of the democratic rural
population and the semi- feudal landlords....” [86]
In
a polemic against the Menshevik
Y. Larin, Lenin made the point that:
The outcome of our revolution will actually
depend most of all on the steadfastness in struggle of the millions of peasants. Our big bourgeoisie is far more afraid
of revolution than of reaction.
The proletariat by itself, is not strong enough to win. The urban poor do not represent
any independent interests, they are not an independent force compared with the proletariat and peasantry. The rural population has the decisive
role not in the sense of leading
the struggle (this is
out of the question), but in the sense of being
able to ensure victory.
[87]
This meant, according to Lenin, that:
...the victorious outcome of the bourgeois
revolution in Russia is possible, only in the form of a revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and the peasantry. [88]
The “peasants”, then, had independent class interests (the elimination
of the remnants of feudal
social relations), and were quite capable
of carrying out a class struggle for the realization of these interests; furthermore, they were capable of forming
mass democratic organisations (peasant committees, political parties) in the course of their mass struggles. None of these things'
were inevitable — they were only possibilities in the practice of the class struggle. The struggles of the peasants, however, could only be decisive
if they were exercised
in alliance with, and under the influence of, the proletariat. The proletariat would exercise
its “leading” role by striving
to draw the peasant
masses onto the path of the democratic revolution against the landlords
and the Tsarist state. It seems to me that Trotsky’s use of the notions of “leading”
and “Independent” role obscured the real problems
of developing a strategy of winning the peasants to the side of the proletariat in the democratic revolution, particularly in his reduction of the problem to one of whether or not the
peasants could form “independent” political parties.
CLASSES AND THE STATE
We have seen that Trotsky deduced the class character
of state power in a victorious democratic revolution from an identification
of the class subject which “leads”
the revolution. This rested on
the following
thesis:
The whole problem
consists in this: who will determine
the content of the government's policy, who will form within it a solid majority? [89]
Implicit in Trotsky’s
theory of Permanent Revolution, particularly in the
notions of “leading” and
“Independent” roles, is a view of the
“representation” of classes and class interests at the level
of the state, through the
mechanism of political parties, rather than
as
“effects” of determinate political class struggles, in which parties, alongside other mass organisations, have a role to play. The peasants,
we are told, are unable
to create an independent political party, therefore, there
can be no democratic alliance between the proletariat and the peasantry, and, consequently, the “...representative body of the nation, convened under the leadership of the proletariat ... will be nothing less than a democratic dress for
the rule
of the proletariat.” [90] In this
theory, the class struggles of the peasants do not “appear”
at the level of the state,
because of the absence
of a peasant party able to articulate the interests
of the peasants.
Lenin, at the Bolshevik congress in 1905, made the point that:
The peasant committees are a flexible institution, suitable both under present
conditions and under, let us say, a provisional revolutionary government, when they would become organs
of the government. [91]
In Lenin’s analysis, the peasants would be represented at the
level of the state precisely because their mass democratic organizations would constitute organs of that state,
regardless of whether
or not a powerful,
independent peasant party was formed.
Lenin believed that the proletariat had a strong ally in the peasantry, against feudal social and political
relations; this ally had its own objective class interests for which it was prepared to engage
in struggle, therefore
those interests could not but be represented at the level of state which would arise from the destruction of Tsarism. The peasants had “real
needs” which gave rise to their struggles; a successful revolution, in order to survive
against the inevitable resistance of the old order, had to recognise these interests, and ensure that they were expressed
in policies benefiting the mass of peasants. It was this which made a dictatorship of workers
and peasants both possible and necessary
in the Russian democratic revolution. The actual
composition of the provisional government — the relation of parties
in that government — could not be determined in advance merely
by designating which classes
were present and then deducing
answers from their
class characteristics — the struggles of those classes, the forms of their struggles
and their outcomes,
would determine the composition of the revolutionary government and the relation
of parties.
From what we have said so far, we can see that there were two levels of
analysis in Lenin’s conception of the bourgeois revolution — the first level referred to the alliance of classes
necessary for a radical
consummation of the bourgeois-democratic revolution; the slogan of the democratic-dictatorship of the proletariat and the peasantry
referred to this level of analysis.
The second level referred
to the composition of the provisional revolutionary government and the relation
of parties to each other. At this level of analysis, it was left open as to the precise composition of the government; a powerful
peasant party might or might not be in a majority
in that government. The important theoretical point is that the second
level of analysis
could not be deduced from the first.
It was a concrete question, which only the practice of the revolution would resolve. According
to Trotsky, a coalition of the proletariat and the peasantry — the first level of analysis in Lenin’s
analytical framework...
...presupposes either that one of the existing bourgeois parties commands influence over the peasantry
or that the peasantry
will have created a powerful
independent party of its own, but we have attempted to show that neither one nor the other is possible. [92]
We can see that there is an analytical difference between Lenin and Trotsky. In Trotsky’s analysis the question
of class alliances is collapsed
into a question of the relation of parties:
As the peasantry
cannot — in the Russian
revolution — be
represented by an independent party — then there can be no alliance as envisaged by Lenin. Lenin, distancing himself
theoretically from Trotsky, maintained that:
A
"coalition" of classes does not
at all presuppose
either the existence of any particular powerful
party, or parties in general. This is only confusing classes with parties. A “coalition” of the specified
classes does not in the least imply either,
that one of the existing bourgeois parties will establish
its sway over the peasantry
or that the peasants
should form a powerful
independent party.... The experience of the Russian revolution shows that “coalition” of the proletariat and the peasantry were formed
scores and hundreds of times,
in the most diverse
forms... [93]
Whereas in Lenin’s strategy there were two levels of
analysis which could not
be reduced to each other, in Trotsky there is a conflation of these two levels.
We can therefore
see that Trotsky’s slogan of the “Dictatorship of the Proletariat
supported by the Peasantry” was derived from a fundamentally different theoretical mode of analysis to the one employed by Lenin. It was this collapsing of levels
of analysis which led Trotsky to reduce the question of the character of state power in a victorious democratic revolution to the question of which class subject would form a homogeneous majority within the provisional government. And it was because
Lenin was careful to demarcate
between these
two levels, that he could say against both Trotsky and
Martov:
It is not true that “the whole question
is, who will determine the government’s
policy, who will constitute a homogeneous
majority in it”.... The question of
the dictatorship of the revolutionary classes ... cannot be reduced
to a question of the “majority” in any particular revolutionary government, or the terms on which the participation of the Social-Democrats in such a government is admissible. [94]
We have noted that Trotsky and the Menshevik
theoreticians fundamentally shared the same theoretical and analytical framework, one that was criticised by Lenin; they derived the same logical conclusions,
from the problematic of the “leading role of
a class
subject”; they both advocated Social-Democratic participation in a provisional revolutionary government solely
on the basis of the dominance
of Social- Democracy in that government; the Mensheviks opposed
such a participation in the Russian democratic revolution, whereas Trotsky
and Parvus supported it. For both Trotsky and the Mensheviks, this participation (as the dominant
political force) constituted the conquest
of political power by the proletariat through its political
representative. The tactical difference (which of course
had strategic implications), arose from the fact that whereas in the Menshevik strategy, it was the bourgeoisie which was constituted as the subject of the revolutionary process, [95] in Trotsky’s strategy, through the notions of “independent” and “leading”
role, it was the proletariat
which was constituted as
the subject of the revolutionary process. If the Mensheviks could be convinced, as Trotsky was, of the inability of the “bourgeoisie” to play a “leading” role in the bourgeois-democratic revolution, then the logic of their theoretical assumptions and mode of reasoning would compel them to accept Trotsky’s
prognosis of the Russian revolution. This is precisely what happened
with substantial sections of the Menshevik faction
at the height
of the revolutionary .storms in 1905, and this included
such influential theoreticians of Menshevism as Martynov, Dan and Chereveanin (though not Martov, Aksel’rod or Plekhanov). According to
Israel Getzler:
Many Mensheviks began to lose faith in a bourgeois revolution. They dismissed
the bourgeoisie either as treacherous and counterrevolutionary or as virtually
non-existent ... [96]
Theodore Dan, himself admitted that “Trotskyite themes” began
to echo
...more and more loudly
in the utterances and articles
of eminent members of the Iskra editorial
board (first and foremost Martynov and the author
of these lines) with the manifest approval of substantial segments of Mensheviks... [97]
That it was possible to reconcile, what on the surface appears as radically opposed theoretical and political
conceptions as those of Trotsky
and the Mensheviks, is easily understood if we recognise
that the decisive
difference between them was not theoretical, but a very specific tactical-political difference — they gave a different answer to the question: which class will act as the “leader” of
the revolutionary process? They gave different answers, initially,
because they had a different estimation of the revolutionary capacity of the bourgeoisie in the Russian democratic revolution. When this difference of political
estimation was resolved, then substantial sections of the Mensheviks made the transition to the strategy of the “Permanent
Revolution”.
Martynov,
in his Two Dictatorships, had argued that if Social- Democracy prepared, timed and conducted a successful armed uprising of the people,
it would have political
power in its hands which it could not retain and consolidate without attempting to put its maximum programme into effect.
[98] This was precisely the same mode of reasoning
used by Trotsky to characterise the Permanent nature of the revolution.
Immediately ... that power is transferred into the hands of a revolutionary government with a socialist majority, the division of our programme
into maximum and minimum
loses all significance ... A proletarian government under
no circumstances can confine
itself within such limits.
[99]
The very fact of the
proletariat’s representatives entering
the government, not as
powerless hostages,
but as the leading force, destroys the border-line between
maximum and minimum
programme; that is to say, it places collectivism on
the order of the day. [100]
The process of transition to socialism
is deduced by Trotsky
from the fact that the working
class holds state power, which is deduced from the fact that the proletariat leads the successful bourgeois-democratic revolution. The transformation of the bourgeois revolution into the socialist revolution — the elimination of the distinction between the minimum and the maximum programme, is the logical
effect of the leading role of a class subject — the proletariat — in the revolutionary process.
SELF-ABNEGA TION?
In a polemical
article against the Bolsheviks and Mensheviks, [101] Trotsky
argued that the consummation of the revolution against Tsarism required the transfer
of power to a “revolutionary public
force”. [102] Lenin
had characterized
this force as the “Revolutionary- Democratic Dictatorship of the Proletariat and the Peasantry”. Trotsky’s critique of this formulation is very interesting. Lenin, he said:
...draws a distinction of principle
between the Socialist
dictatorship of the proletariat and the democratic (that is, bourgeois-democratic) dictatorship of the proletariat and the peasantry. He believes that this logical, purely formal operation
can act as a perfect protection against the contradiction between the low level of productive forces and the hegemony
of the working classes.
[103]
In Trotsky’s mode of reasoning, there exists
a fundamental contradiction that between
the low level of development of the productive forces and the leading role of the proletariat in the revolution. From within this problematic he ascribes
to Lenin a solution to this contradiction
between the “proletariat’s class interests and objective conditions”,
which consists of the “proletariat imposing a political
limitation upon itself’. [104] Trotsky
maintained that Lenin “solved” the
problems arising from
the specified contradiction by the
proletariat’s “self- abnegation”, by a “class asceticism” — the proletariat consciously decides not to go beyond the democratic stage.
Trotsky’s “solution” to this contradiction, in contrast,
is not any “self- limitation”
by the working-class, but rather,
is determined by the logic of the situation, in which the proletariat finds itself as the hegemonic
class holding state power, and which
forces it to go directly
into the implementation of socialist
measures, regardless of objective conditions (the level of economic development, the hostility of the property
owning peasants.) The contradiction between the low level
of the productive forces and the leading (“hegemonic”)
role of the proletariat is displaced
into a political contradiction between the proletariat in power,
which is seeking to socialize
the means of production, and the peasantry. The solution
to this contradiction lies in the international character of the world revolutionary process. Lenin,
said Trotsky “... transfers the objective contradiction into the proletariat’s consciousness and resolves it by means of a class asceticism...” [105] whereas, in fact, the correct
place to transfer this contradiction was the international arena, where, in
the words of the Menshevik resolution “On the
Seizure of Power and
Participation in a Provisional Government”, adopted in 1905, “... conditions for the realization of socialism have already attained
a certain degree of maturity”. [106]
As is apparent, however,
Lenin did not have a strategy of the proletariat in possession of state power imposing
a bourgeois-democratic limitation upon itself. Rather, he believed
that:
Objectively, the historical course of events has now posed before the Russian proletariat precisely
the task of carrying through
the democratic bourgeois revolution {the whole content
of which ...we sum up in the word Republic)', this task confronts the people as a whole,
viz., the entire mass of the petty bourgeoisie and the peasantry;
Without such a revolution the more or less extensive
development of an independent class organisation for the socialist revolution is unthinkable. [107]
The form taken by the bourgeois revolution — landlord-bourgeois or peasant-bourgeois revolution — would determine
the nature, of the terrain upon which the working
class would conduct
its struggle for socialism. The concrete
forms of transition to the socialist revolution, the length of time between the bourgeois
revolution and the socialist
revolution, and therefore
the length
of time in which capitalism would have to expand and develop, could
not be posed in the abstract.
In the period of the first Russian
revolution, all that could be concretely posed was the question
of the form of the bourgeois
revolution[ 108] which would be determined in the practice of the class struggle.
As it was impossible to pre-determine this form, then one
could not specify
the forms of the process
of transition to the socialist
revolution. All that Lenin could say was that once the proletariat had advanced
as far as it could alongside
the petty bourgeoisie against the semi-feudal social system, then it would immediately begin, according to the measure of its strength, to strive
for the socialist revolution.
Next ; THEORIES OF TRANSITION
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