What Is To Be Done? Understanding Communist Strategy
Oct 23, 2023
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Breht O’Shea and Alyson, hosts of Upstream, discuss the relevance of Vladimir Lenin's 'What Is To Be Done?' and its applications in modern leftist movements. They explore the importance of disciplined organization, the limitations of spontaneous movements, the need for a revolutionary political movement, and the significance of building discipline and revolutionary theory for establishing a vanguard party.
Marxists aim to seize existing infrastructure instead of building an alternative society from scratch.
Vanguardism recognizes the need for a revolutionary party to address a broader scope of issues beyond economic reform.
Marxist-Leninist approach highlights the importance of a revolutionary struggle to secure real reforms.
Spontaneous movements lack structure, unity, and a clear set of demands without a vanguard party.
Deep dives
Solidarity Economy and Utopian Socialism
The concept of the solidarity economy can be seen as similar to utopian socialist movements, which focus on building an alternative society from the ground up. However, Marxism emphasizes that capitalism has already created the conditions for socialism by socializing labor and production. Instead of starting from scratch, Marxists aim to liberate these conditions from the constraints of private ownership through a revolutionary struggle and the seizure of existing infrastructure.
Vanguardism and Economism
The Marxist approach, often associated with vanguardism, acknowledges the importance of economic struggle but insists that it cannot spontaneously lead to revolutionary consciousness. Economism, on the other hand, places too much emphasis on economic reforms and trade union struggles, ignoring the need for political and theoretical struggle. Vanguardism recognizes the need for a revolutionary party to navigate and address a wide range of issues beyond the narrow scope of economic reform.
Competition and Opposition
The scientific socialist perspective does not dismiss the importance of economic struggle or alternative models like worker cooperatives. However, it argues that these efforts alone cannot bring about a revolutionary rupture with capitalism. Capitalism has already created social forces and dynamics that can be utilized for socialism. Both the scientific and utopian perspectives can coexist in practice, but Marxism insists on the revolutionary struggle with the goal of seizing state power and transforming existing infrastructure.
Importance of Marxist-Leninist approach over anarchism
The Marxist-Leninist approach has historically been more successful than anarchist attempts to remake society and transcend capitalism. It emphasizes the need for a revolutionary class struggle to secure real reforms, as opposed to relying solely on spontaneous protests or movements like Occupy or the George Floyd uprisings. The Marxist-Leninist approach argues that reforms within the capitalist system are always subject to dismantling by the ruling class, making a revolutionary struggle necessary to prevent the clawback of reforms. It also highlights the importance of political independence to avoid co-option by bourgeois elements and stresses that the Vanguard Party serves as a unifying force for various progressive classes, subordinating them to proletarian interests.
Limitations of spontaneity and the importance of the Vanguard Party
Spontaneous protests and movements, like Occupy and the George Floyd uprisings, often lack clear demands, long-term political strategies, and theoretical coherence. Without a Vanguard Party to provide political content and guidance, these movements risk being co-opted by opportunistic or bourgeois forces. The Vanguard Party bridges the gap between intellectuals and the proletariat, allowing for the subordination of other class interests to proletarian struggle. It enables the intellectuals to be held accountable to the proletariat and provides theoretical training to workers, elevating them to the level of intellectuals in order to build a revolutionary movement. The party operates through democratic centralism, allowing for robust debates and voting on the correct line, promoting discipline and solidarity within the organization.
Solidarity economy and the need for a revolutionary political movement
The solidarity economy, such as worker co-ops and other initiatives, are important for prefiguring a different world and exercising collective muscles. However, they are not inherently revolutionary on their own and can be co-opted or compromised under the influence of capitalist systems. The need for a revolutionary political movement, combined with the practice of solidarity economy initiatives, becomes essential for transformative change. The Vanguard Party provides the political guidance and theoretical coherence necessary to unite various struggles under the banner of proletarian revolution. Without such a party, the bourgeoisie and spontaneous movements alone cannot lead to revolutionary transformations.
The Importance of Organization and Direction
The podcast explores the limitations of spontaneous movements and emphasizes the need for organization and direction. It discusses how spontaneous movements, such as the Occupy movement and the Black Lives Matter movement, lack structure, unity, and a clear set of demands. Without a centralized and disciplined national organization, these movements are unable to channel their revolutionary energy effectively or achieve meaningful systemic change. The absence of a vanguard party, which can provide leadership and strategic direction, leads to opportunism, infighting, and the hijacking of movements by individuals seeking personal gain. The podcast highlights the importance of having a national party with mass support to cohere and lead revolutionary energy towards significant material gains.
The Necessity of a Vanguard Party
The podcast delves into the concept of a vanguard party as a crucial element for revolutionary success. Drawing from historical examples like the Bolsheviks in Russia, the podcast underscores Lenin's argument that a vanguard party should already be established before a revolutionary rupture occurs. It explains that a vanguard party is a centralized, disciplined, and hierarchical national organization, representing the movement at a broader level. The party's leadership is not imposed, but emerges from the mutual respect, experience, and credibility gained through active involvement in struggles. The podcast emphasizes that a vanguard party provides the necessary structure, focus, and direction to effectively employ revolutionary energy and overcome the limitations of spontaneous uprisings. While acknowledging the absence of a vanguard party in the present U.S. context, the podcast encourages Marxists to prioritize building such an organization to truly advance Marxist politics.
What Is To Be Done? This is the question so profoundly posed by the Russian Revolutionary and Bolshevik leader, Vladimir Lenin, in his landmark text of the same name. Although it was written well over a century ago, this text, the questions it asked, and the paths forward that it provided, are just as relevant today as they were a hundred years ago. And just as urgent.
What roles do spontaneity and disciplined organization have in leftist movements? Can we focus simply on economic reform, or do our actions need a larger political framework to structure, guide, and propel them?
Why does it feel like even though so many of us are motivated to work towards structural change, that things continue to get worse? Why does it seem like potential revolutionary struggles in the West always seem to stall and fail to move from a singular moment to a protracted movement?
These are old and familiar questions — a lot of ink has been spilled and speeches made exploring them — and in this Conversation, we’ve brought on two guests who've not only thought about these questions in depth, but who have some pretty compelling answers that draw from revolutionary theory and practice in both their personal lives and from the deep well of wisdom bequeathed by theorists Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Mao.
Breht O’Shea is the host of the podcast Revolutionary Left Radio and a co-host of Guerrilla History. He’s been on the show multiple times so you may already be familiar with his voice. Alyson Escalate, who has also been on the show, is the co-host, along with Breht, of Red Menace, a podcast that explains and analyzes revolutionary theory and then applies its lessons to our contemporary conditions.
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