V. I. LENIN TWO TACTICS OF SOCIAL- DEMOCRACY IN THE DEMOCRATIC  REVOLUTION  FOREIGN LANGUAGES PRESS PEKING 1965 First Edition 1965

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NOTES



^[1] Two Tactics of Social-Democracy in the Democratic Revolution was written by Lenin in Geneva, in June-July 1905. The book was published in late July 1905, in Geneva, by the Central Committee of the R.S.D.L.P. It was twice reprinted in Russia in the same year, once by the Central Committee of the R.S.D.L.P., and the second time by the Moscow Committee of the Party, this time in 10,000 copies.
The book was secretly distributed throughout the country -- in St. Petersburg, Moscow, Kazan, Tiflis, Baku and other cities. During arrests and searches the police in many cases found as many as ten or more copies of it. On February 19, 1907 it was banned by the St. Petersburg Press Department, and on Decembet 22 of the same year the St. Petersburg Court issued an injunction for its destruction.
In 1907 Lenin had Two Tactics published in the miscellany Twelve Years, supplementing the book with new notes. The material prepared by Lenin for this book, his plans, synopsis and other notes, were published in Lenin Miscellany, Russ. ed., Vol. V, pp. 315-20, and Vol. XVI, pp. 151-56.
The Leninist theory of revolution and the tactical propositions which Lenin developed in his historic book Two Tactics of Social-Democracy in the Democratic Revolution were consistently upheld and developed by Stalin in such works as: "Armed Insurrection and Our Tactics," "The Provisional Revolutionary Government and Social-Democracy" (1905), "Two Clashes," "The Present Situation and the Unity Congress of the Workers' Party" (1906), "Preface to the Georgian Edition of K. Kautsky's Pamphlet The Driving Forces and Prospects of the Russian Revolution" (February 1907).

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As for the historical importance of Lenin's book Two Tactics see the History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Bolsheviks) Short Course, Eng. ed., Moscow, l950, pp. 75-93.    [p.1]

^[2] Proletary (The Proletarian) -- an illegal Bolshevik weekly, the organ of the Central Committee of the R.S.D.L.P. It was founded in accordance with a resolution of the Third Congress of the Party. Lenin was appointed editor of the Proletary by a decision of a plenary meeting of the Party's Central Committee, on April 27 (May 10), 1905.
Proletary was published in Geneva from May 14 (27) to November (25), 1905, a total of 26 issues being brought out. Those who took a regular part in the work of the editorial board were V. V. Vorovsky, A. V. Lunacharsky, and M. S. Olminsky. Proletary continued the line of the old, Leninist Iskra and maintained full continuity with the Bolshevik newspaper Vperyod. In all, Lenin wrote over 50 articles and commentaries for Proletary, his articles being reprinted in local Bolshevik periodicals, and also published in the form of leaflets. Publication of Proletary was discontinued in November 1905, shortly after Lenin's departure for Russia. The last two issues (Nos. 25 and 26) were edited by V. V. Vorovsky.    [p.1]

^[3] V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, 4th Russ. ed., Vol. IX, p. 127.    [p.1]

^[4] The mutiny broke out on June 14 (27), 1905.    [p.1]

^[5] Osvobozhdeniye (Emancipation) -- a fortnightly journal of the Russian bourgeois liberals published abroad in 1902-05 under the editorship of P. B. Struve. In January 1904, it became the organ of the liberal-monarchist Osvobozbdeniye League.
Later the Osvobozhdeniye group formed the nucleus of the Constitutional-Democratic Party (the Cadets).    [p.4]

^[6] Economism -- an opportunist trend that arose in the Russian Social Democratic movement at the end of the 1890s. The Economists (Akimov, Martynov, and others) asserted that the task of the working class was to wage the economic struggle against the employers; the political struggle against the autocracy, however, was the business of the liberal bourgeoisie, whom the working class must support. The tenets of the Economists were "a desertion of Marxism, a denial of the necessity for an independent political party of the working class, an attempt to convert the working class into a political appendage of the bourgeoisie" (History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Bolsheviks), Short Course, Eng. ed., Moscow, 1950, p. 27). Economism was subjected to withering criticism by Lenin in his work What Is To Be Done? and by

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Stalin in his works: "Briefly About the Disagreements in the Party," and "A Reply to Social-Demokrat."    [p.4]

^[7] This refers to the new, Menshevik Iskra. Following the Second Congress of the R.S.D.L.P., the Mensheviks gained control of the Iskra with the aid of Plekhanov, and in November 1903, beginning with No. 52, Iskra became the organ of the Mensheviks. It continued publication until October 1905.    [p.4]

^[8] The Bulygin Commission -- created by a decree of the tsar in February 1905 and headed by the Minister of the Interior, A. G. Bulygin. The commission drafted a bill for the institution of a State Duma with advisory powers, and the regulations on the Duma elections. The bill and the regulations were made public together with the tsar's manifesto of August 6 (19), 1905. The Bolsheviks proclaimed an active boycott of the Bulygin Duma. The government's attempt to convene the Duma failed and it was swept away by the force of the revolution. On the boycott of the Bulygin Duma, see V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, 4th Russ. ed., Vol. IX, pp. 156-64.    [p.7]

^[9] The Constitutional-Democratic Party (Cadets) was the principal bourgeois party in Russia, the party of the liberal-monarchist bourgeoisie. It was founded in October 1905. Under the cloak of pseudo-democratism and calling themselves the party of "people's freedom," the Cadets tried to win the peasantry to their side. They strove to preserve tsarism in the form of a constitutional monarchy. Subsequently, the Cadets became the party of the imperialist bourgeoisie. After the victory of the October Socialist Revolution, the Cadets organized counter-revolutionary conspiracies and revolts against the Soviet Republic.    [p.7]

^[10] See V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, 4th Russ. ed., Vol. VIII, pp. 452-60, 477-90.    [p.8]

^[11] Millerandism -- an opportunist trend named after the French socialist-reformist Alexander Millerand, who in 1899 entered the reactionary bourgeois government of France, and collaborated with General Gaston Galliffet, butcher of the Paris Commune. p. 18    [p.18]

^[12] On January 9, 1905, by order of the tsar, the troops fired at a peaceful demonstration of St. Petersburg workers who were marching towards the Winter Palace to present a petition to the tsar about their needs. This massacre touched off a wave of mass political strikes and demonstrations all over Russia. The events of January 9 marked the beginning of the first Russian revolution of 1905-07.    [p.22]

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^[13] Die Neue Rbeinische Zeitung was published in Cologne from June 1, 1848 until May 19, 1849. It was directed by Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Marx being editor-in-chief. Following the appearance of No. 301, the paper ceased publication because of persecution by the reactionaries. Regarding this newspaper see Engels's article "Marx and the Neue Rheinische Zeitung (1848-1849)" (Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Selected Works, Eng. ed., Moscow, 1951, Vol. II, pp. 297-305).    [p.23]

^[14] Sotsial-Demokrat (The Social-Democrat) -- a Menshevik Georgian language newspaper published in Tiflis between April and November 1905.
The article "The Zemsky Sobor and Our Tactics" was written by N. Jordania, leader of the Caucasian Mensheviks. It was criticized in detail by Lenin in Chapter Seven of Two Tactics of Social-Democracy in the Democratic Revolution (see pp. 59-64 of this book).    [p.26]

^[15] A constitution " à la Sbipov " -- Lenin here refers to the "constitutional" platform of D. N. Shipov, one of the leaders of the Zemstvo liberal movement of the 1890s and 1900s. The platform provided for the preservation of the tsarist autocracy slightly restricted by a "constitution" to be "granted by the tsar."    [p.28]

^[16] From the perspective of eternity.    [p.34]

^[17] The remote past.    [p.34]

^[18] Russkaya Starina (The Russian Antiquary) -- a monthly journal of history published in St. Petersburg from 1870 to 1918.    [p.35]

^[19] See Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Selected Works, Eng. ed. Moscow, 1951, Vol. II, p. 367.    [p.36]

^[20] The Zemstvo -- local government bodies in pre-revolutionary Russia. They dealt with purely local affairs concerning the rural population (laying roads, building hospitals, etc.). The predominant role in the Zemstvo was played by the landlords.    [p.47]

^[22] The man in the mufller -- chief character in Chekhov's story of the same title, a man typifying the narrow-minded philistine who abhors all innovations or initiative.    [p.48]

^[23] Lenin is referring to the book Aus dem literarischen Nachlass von Karl Marx Friedrich Engels und Ferdinand Lassalle, Herausgegeben von Franz Mehring Band III, Stuttgart, 1902, S. 211 (Posthumous Works of Karl Marx Frederick Engels, Ferdinand Lassalle edited by Franz Mehring, Vol. III, Stuttgart, 1902, p. 211). See Karl Marx, "The Bourgeoisie and the Counter-revolution" (Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Selected Works, Eng. ed., Moscow, 1951, Vol. I, p. 63).    [p.55]

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^[23] Lenin here refers to his article " 'Revolutionaries' in White Gloves," published in Proletary No. 5, 1905 (Collected Works, 4th Russ. ed., Vol. VIII, pp. 491-95).    [p.56]

^[24] Vporyodovtsi, Syezdovtsi, Proletartsi -- different appellations for the Bolsheviks arising from the fact that they published the newspaper Vperyod, that they convened the Third Congress of the Party, and from the name of the newspaper Proletary.    [p.55]

^[25] This refers to the resolution tabled by Starover (pseudonym of the Menshevik A. N. Potresov) on the attitude towards the liberals, which was adopted at the Second Congress of the R.S.D.L.P., and was criticized by Lenin in the article "Working-class and Bourgeois Democracy" (Collected Works, 4th Russ. ed., Vol. VIII, pp. 54-63).    [p.57]

^[26] The expression "parliamentary cretinism" was applied by Lenin to those opportunists who considered the parliamentarian system all-powerful, and parliamentarian activities the only or the principal form of political struggle.    [p.62]

^[27] This refers to the differences of opinion revealed during the discussion of the draft agrarian programme at the Breslau Congress of the German Social-Democratic Party, 1895.    [p.64]

^[28] Rabocheye Dyelo (The Workers' Cause) -- a journal of the Economists published irregularly in Geneva from 1899 to 1902 as the organ of the Union of Russian Social-Democrats Abroad. For a criticism of the Rahocheye Dyelo group, see Lenin's What Is To Be Done? (Selected Works, Eng. ed., Moscow, 1950, Vol. I, Part 1, pp. 203-409).    [p.71]

^[29] This refers to Nadezhdin's press attack on the plan of the Leninist Iskra (Nadezhdin was the pseudonym of Y. 0. Zelensky). Lenin criticized this attack as far back as 1902 in his What Is To Be Done?    [p.71]

^[30] Bernsteinism -- an anti-Marxist trend in international Social-Democracy. It arose towards the close of the 19th century and took its name from the German Social-Democrat Eduard Bernstein, who tried to revise the revolurionary teachings of Marx on the lines of bourgeois liberalism. In Russia this trend was represented by the "Legal Marxists," the Economists, the Bundists, and the Mensheviks.    [p.78]

^[31] This refers to Lenin's articles entitled "Social-Democracy and the Provisional Revolutionary Government" and "The Revolutionary Democratic Dictatorship of the Proletariat and the Peasantry," which were published in Nos. 13 and 14 of the Bolshevik newspaper Vperyod (Collected Works, 4th Russ. ed., Vol. VIII, pp. 247-74).    [p.81]

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^[32] Lenin has in view the programmc published in 1874 by the London group of Blanquists, former members of the Paris Commune. See Frederick Engels, "Emigré Literature. II. The Programme of the Blanquist Emigr&eacutes from the Commune" (Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Collected Works, Ger. ed., 1935, Vol. XV, pp. 224-30).
The Blanquists were adherents of the French revolutionary Louis Auguste Blanqui (1805-81). The classics of Marxism-Leninism, while regarding Blanqui as an outstanding revolutionary and adherent of socialism, criticized him for his sectarianism and conspiratorial methods of activity.
"Blanquism," wrote Lenin, "is a theory that repudiates the class struggle. Blanquism expects that mankind will be emancipated from wage slavery, not by the class struggle of the proletariat, but through a conspiracy hatched by a small minority of intellectuals" (see V. I. Lenin, "The Congress Summed Up", Collected Works, 4th Russ. ed., Vol. X, p. 360).    [p.84]

^[33] The Erfurt Programme of German Social-Democracy was adopted in October 1891 at a congress held in Erfurt. For a criticism of this programme, see Frederick Engels, "Criticism of the Draft Social-Democratic Programme of 1891" (Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Collected Works, Russ. ed., 1936, Vol. XVI, pp. 101-16), and Lenin's The State and Revolution.    [p.91]

^[34] In July 1905 Lenin wrote this note to Chapter Ten of Two Tactics of Social-Democracy in the Democratic Revolution. The note did not go into the first edition of the book, and first appeared in 1926, in Lenin Miscellany, Russ. ed., Vol. V.    [p.92]

^[35] See Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Selected Correspondence, Moscow, 1953, pp. 551-55.    [p.92]

^[36] Lenin here refers to his article "Social-Democracy and the Provisional Revolutionary Government," published in Vperyod, No. 14, 1901 (Collected Works, 4th Russ. ed., Vol. VIII, pp. 247-63).    [p.92]

^[37] Lenin has in view his article "On the Provisional Revolutionary Government" (Collected Works, 4th Russ. ed., Vol. VIII, pp. 427-47), and also the article by Frederick Engels, "The Bakunists at Work. Notes on the Insurrection in Spain in the Summer of 1873," in which the Bakuninist resolution referred to by Lenin is criticized (see Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Collected Works, Russ. ed., 1935, Vol. XV, pp. 105-24).    [p.101]

^[38] Credo was the name by which became known the manifesto issued in 1899 by a group of Economists including S. N. Prokopovich and E. D. Kuskova who later became Constitutional-Democrats. This manifesto was a most striking expression of the opportunism of Russian Economism. Lenin wrote a trenchant protest denouncing the Economists' views ("A Protest of Russian Social-Democrats," Collected Works, 4th Russ. ed., Vol. IV, pp. 149-63). [Transcriber's Note: V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, 4th Eng. ed., Vol. 4, pp. 167-82. -- DJR]    [p.103]

^[39] Rabochaya Mysl (Workers' Thought) -- organ of the Economists, published in 1897-1902. Lenin aiticized the views of this newspaper as a Russian variety of international opportunism in a number of his works, particularly in his articles in Iskra and in his book What Is To Be Done?    [p.104]

^[40] This refers to Marx's words in his "A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Law" (Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Collected Works, Ger. ed., Berlin, 1956, Vol. I, p.385).    [p.104]

^[41] L'Humanité -- a daily paper founded in 1904 by Jean Jaur&egraves as the organ of the French Socialist Party. Soon after the split in the Socialist Party at the Tours Congress (December 1920) and the formation of the Communist Party of France, the paper became the organ of the latter. It is still published in Paris at present as the official organ of the C.P.F.    [p.106]

^[42] Varlin, Louis-Eug&egravene (1839-71) -- French worker and prominent member of the First International, member of the Central Committee of the National Guard and of the Paris Commune of 1871.    [p.118]

^[43] This refers to the "Rules of Organization" adopted at the Geneva Menshevik Conference in 1905. The "Rules" were also criticized by Lenin in the article "A Third Step Back" (Collected Works, 4th Russ. ed., Vol. VIII, pp. 509-18) and in "Preface to the Pamphlet Workers on the Split in the Party" (ibid., Vol. IX, pp. 141-46).    [p.120]

^[44] See Karl Marx, "The Class Struggles in France, 1848 to 1850" (Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Selected Works, Moscow, 1951, Vol. I, p. 198).    [p.124]

^[45] The Hirsch-Duncker trade unions -- founded in 1868 in Germany by two bourgeois liberals -- Hirsch and Duncker who, like the bourgeois economist Brentano, preached "harmony of class interests," distracted the workers from the revolutionary class struggle against the bourgeoisie, and limited the role of the trade unions to the bounds of mutual-aid societies and educational clubs.    [p.132]

^[46] Engels's article "The Bakunists at Work. Notes on the Insurrection in Spain in the Summer of 1873" was translated into Russian under

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Lenin's editorship and was published in 1905 in Geneva by the Central Committee of the R.S.D.L.P. in the form of a pamphlet. A second edition came out in 1906 in St. Petersburg.
The Address of The Central Committee to the Communist League (March 1850) was published in Russian in 1906 in the supplement to Marx's pamphlet Revelations About the Trial of the Communists at Cologne, which was brought out by the Molot Publishers in St. Petersburg (see Karl Marx and Prederick Engels, Selected Works, Eng. ed., Moscow, 1951, Vol. I, pp. 98-108).    [p.136]

^[47] V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, 4th Russ. ed., Vol. V, pp. 19-65.    [p.139]

^[48] From the beginning of this paragraph to ". . . at the tail of Osvobozhdeniye-ism?" on p. 144 was omitted in the first edition of this book. This passage was first published in Pravda, No. 112, April 22, 1940.    [p.142]

^[49] Karl Marx and Prederick Engels, Selected Works, Eng. ed., Moscow, 1951, Vol. I, pp. 429-94.    [p.142]

^[50] Moskovskiye Vyedomosti (Moscow Recorder) -- a newspaper founded in 1756. From the 1860s it expressed the views of the most reactionary monarchist sections of the landlords and the clergy. In 1905 it became a leading organ of the Black Hundreds, and was banned following the October Revolution of 1917.    [p.143]

^[51] Mehring, Franz (1846-1919) -- a prominent member of the Left-wing of German Social-Democracy, historian and publicist. He was one of the founders of the revolutionary Spartacus League, and later joined the Communist Party of Germany.    [p.146]

^[52] See Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Collected Works, Ger. ed., Berlin, 1959, Vol. V, p. 402.    [p.147]

^[53] Ibid., p. 40.    [p.148]

^[54] Ibid., p. 41.    [p.149]

^[55] Ibid., p. 14.    [p.149]

^[56] Ibid., pp. 64-65.    [p.150]

^[57] Ibid., pp. 382-83.    [p.152]

^[58] The organ of the Cologne Workers' League was originally called Zeitung des Arbeiter-Vereins zu K&oumlln, with the subtitle Freiheit, B&uumlnderlichkeit, Arbeit (Freedom, Brotherhood, Labour). Its editors, Joseph Moll and Karl Schapper, were members of the Communist League. Forty issues came out between April and October 1848, and another 23 between

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October 1848 and June 1849, during which period the subtitle became the paper's title.    [p.154]

^[59] Revelations About the Trial of the Communists at Cologne, Z&uumlrich, 1885.    [p.156]

^[60] The Communist League -- the first international organization of the revolutionary proletariat founded in London in the summer of 1847 at a congress of delegates from revolutionary proletarian organizations. The League was organized and guided by Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, who on instructions from the League, wrote its programme -- the Manifesto of the Communist Party. The League existed until l852. Later its foremost members played a leading part in the First International. See Frederick Engels's article "On the History of the Communist League" (Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Selected Works, Eng. ed., Moscow, 1951, Vol. II, pp. 306-23).    [p.156]

^[61] Tovarishch (The Comrade) -- a daily newspaper published in St. Petersburg from March 1906 till January 1908. Though formally not the organ of any particular party, it was in fact the mouthpiece of the Left Constitutional-Democrats. Mensheviks also contributed to the paper.    [p.157]

^[62] See Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Selected Works, Eng. ed., Moscow, 1951, Vol. II, pp. 318-19.    [p.158]

^[63] Khlestakov -- the leading character in Gogol's comedy The Inspector-General, an arrant boaster and liar.    [p.158]