Leadership and Lenin (1949)

From the December 1949 issue of the Socialist Standard

The idea of “ Leadership ” developed alongside the growth of private property; it was a reflection of class-divided society, and the leader or leaders always represented property interests. Behind the idea was the theory that a few are born to lead whilst the many are born to serve. Over 2,000 years ago Aristotle, a Greek philosopher, put the idea this way;—

“He who can foresee with his mind is by nature intended to be lord and master, and he who can work with his body is a subject, and by nature a slave."

“And so in one point of view, the art of war is a natural art of acquisition, for it includes hunting, an art which ought to practice against wild beasts, and against men who, though intended by nature to be governed, will not submit, for war of such a kind is naturally just."

In the last century Thomas Carlyle, in his essay on Chartism, put the idea in a more polite form:—

"Surely, of all 'rights of man,' this right of the ignorant man to be guided by the wiser, to be, gently or forcibly, held in the true course by him, is the indisputablist. Nature herself ordains it from the first; Society struggles toward perfection by enforcing and accomplishing it more and more . . . In Rome and Athens, as elsewhere, if we look practically, we shall find that it was not by loud voting and debating of many, but by wise insight and ordering of a few that the work was done. So is it ever, so will it ever be."

As soon as the workers began to combine to try to obtain some amelioration of their conditions their Movement was also cursed with this idea of leadership, and a contemporary of Carlyle, William Lovett —a working man who drafted the six points of the Charter —complained bitterly about it: —

“They were always looking up to leadership of one description or another; were being swayed to and fro in opinion and action by the idol of their choice, and were rent and divided when some popular breath had blown that idol from its pedestal. In fact the masses, in their political organisations, were taught to look up to 'great men' (or to men professing greatness) rather than to great principles."

Despite Lovett’s complaints the leadership idea was firmly entrenched in the radical and social democratic movement, and became one of the pedestals of Bolshevism. Lenin, the most prominent of the early Bolsheviks, had a complete contempt for the workers, looking upon them as just pawns in the struggle for power. In a pamphlet written by him in 1902, entitled “What is to be Done,” he indicated the attitude that governed his actions. The following quotation will make clear what this attitude was: —

“We said that there could not yet be Social-Democratic consciousness among the workers. This consciousness could only be brought to them from without. The history of all countries shows that the working-class, exclusively by its own effort, is able to develop only trade-union consciousness, i.e., it may itself realise the necessity for combining in unions, to fight against the employers and to strive to compel the Government to pass necessary labour legislation, etc.

The theory of Socialism, however, grew out of the philosophic, historical and economic theories that were elaborated by the educated representatives of the propertied classes, the intellectuals. The founders of modem scientific Socialism, Marx and Engels, themselves belonged to the bourgeois intelligentsia." (pages 32-33.)

“The workers can acquire class political consciousness only from without, that is, only outside of the economic struggle, outside of the sphere of relations between workers and employers." (page 76.)

Lenin was arguing against those who contended that only the trade union struggle mattered, but in doing so he showed his hand. It may be pointed out, in passing, that it was largely from the theories of French, German and English working men that Marx and Engels acquired the knowledge that they systematised into scientific Socialism.

Lenin was an opportunist struggling for power and when it suited his policy he glorified the intelligence of the workers (see for instance his arguments in favour of trusting “ the masses ” in “Lessons of the Russian Revolution," page 24) pouring scorn on the alleged intricacies of organisational functions; later on he was just as emphatic in the opposite direction. This whole organisational policy, however, was built upon the idea that only a few possessed the intellectual capacity to direct the masses, and this was his interpretation of the “ Dictatorship of the Proletariat." Let us just give an example of how he wrote when he was appealing for working class support:—

“Capitalist culture has created industry on a large scale in the shape of factories, railways, posts, telephones and so forth, and on this basis the great majority of functions of ‘the old State' have become enormously simplified and reduced, in practice, to very simple operations such as registration, filing and checking. Hence they will be quite within the reach of every literate person, and it will be possible to perform them for the usual 'working- man's wage.’ This circumstance ought, and will, strip them of all their former glamour as 'Government,' and. therefore, privileged service.

The control of all officials, without exception, by the unreserved application of the principle of election and, at any time, recall; and the approximation of their salaries to the 'ordinary pay of the workers'—these are simple and ‘self-evident' democratic measures, which harmonise completely the interests of the workers and the majority of peasants; and, at the same time, serve as a bridge, leading from Capitalism to Socialism." (“The State and Revolution," page 46.)

The above was written just before the Bolsheviks obtained control of State power; after this was accomplished the tune changed. To illustrate this change of tune here are some extracts from “Resolutions and Regulations of the Tenth Congress of the Russian Communist Party (29th March to 4th April, 1920) Published by the Executive Committee of the Communist International. Moscow, 1920." In considering these extracts it must be remembered that Lenin was the dominating figure in both the Russian Communist Party and the Communist International-

“The Congress makes it obligatory to all members of the party mercilessly to fight that particularly obnoxious form of ignorant conceit which deems the working class capable of solving all problems without the assistance in the most responsible cases of specialists of the bourgeois school. The demagogic elements who speculate on this kind of prejudice of the more backward section of our working classes can have no place in the ranks of the party of scientific Socialism.

Registration of individual output or productivity of labour and the granting of corresponding individual premiums must also be carried out in a way suitable to administrative technical staff. Better conditions must be secured for our best administrators and engineers to enable them to make full use of their capacities in the interests of Socialist economy.

A special system of premiums is to be established for those specialists under whose guidance the workers can attain the necessary qualifications to make them capable to accept further independent posts.'* page 16.)

Gone was simplicity, election of officials, equality of wages and the rest of the support-catching slogans. In place of them the iron hand of dictatorship and of the “intellectual minority” was revealed. Many pages of the report were given over to arguments alleging the necessity and advantages of one-man management and responsibility. It is interesting to notice that the penalties to be imposed for failure to fall in line with labour discipline included internment in concentration camps. This shows that forced labour and concentration camps were used to bolster up dictatorship at the beginning of Bolshevik rule.

“The way to fight this labour desertion is to publish a column of desertion fines, the formation of labour detachments of deserters under fine and finally internment in concentration camps.” (page 20.)

The quotations we have given will show that leadership, an attribute of private property society, which has cursed the working class’ movement from its inception, was elevated into a guiding principle by the Bolsheviks, and sedulously followed out up to the present, bringing with it domination and the “flesh pots of Egypt” to the privileged minority whilst the masses suffer penury, hard labour, and the threat of the concentration camps or worse.

(All italics in the quotations arc in the originals.)

Gilmac.

A Hundred Years Since the Charter (1938)

From the May 1938 issue of the Socialist Standard

May, 1838—May, 1938: one hundred years pregnant with profound changes in social and political development. May, 1838, saw working-class discontent and agitation for political enfranchisement reach organised expression in the production of the “Charter" from which the Chartist movement took its name. The Charter was written by William Lovett, an "uneducated" working man who was a leading figure in the London Working Men’s Association, an organisation formed to pursue agitation for Universal Suffrage. The basic demands of the Charter were: (1) Annual Parliaments, (2) Universal Suffrage, (3) Payment of Members, (4) Abolition of Property Qualification, (5) Equal Electoral Districts.

It would be simple enough to declaim on the mistakes of the Chartists, but they were the mistakes resulting from working-class immaturity. In view of the background of the movement the marvel is that it did not make more mistakes, and provide more numerous examples of unintelligent direction. The conditions out of which the Chartist movement grew are familiar to students of history. In the early nineteenth century the industrial revolution, which transformed England from an agricultural to a largely industrial country, had hardly completed itself. The transformation created a property-less working class, which formed the majority of the population. There was intense suffering and misery. Towns had sprung up over-night. Workers were huddled in barrack-like hovels called houses, with little regard for sanitation, light or air. Whole families were brutally exploited by the new propertied class, the factory owners. Hours of labour were from sixteen to twenty a day. Children of an average age of eight years, and some even as low as four or five years, were employed in degrading and revolting conditions in the mines and factories. Many who tried to run away were brought back and chains were riveted on them.

So fiendish and brutal in their lust for profit were the new factory-owning class, and so blind to the social results of their greed, that many of the more farsighted reformers of the older ruling class, the aristocracy, feared a dangerous decline of the working-class population. England seethed in a bitter class-struggle which was crystallised around the struggle for the Charter. Until 1832, the year when the Reform Act was passed, the workers had supported the new industrial capitalist class in its struggle to gain Parliamentary enfranchisement. The Reform Act achieved this, but left the workers without any say in the government of the country. Deserted and left in the air for a few years, the many separate working-class organisations throughout the country which had worked for the franchise soon found themselves welded together in support of Lovett’s Charter. The movement followed a turbulent course for about ten years and then gradually passed out.

The Charter gained considerable support from workers throughout the country. The first petition for the Charter was presented to Parliament in 1839 and was rejected by an overwhelming majority. This failure resulted in increasing support for the “physical force" section of the Chartist movement, as opposed to the “moral force” section. Attempts were made at insurrection. One effort to release a Chartist leader from prison culminated in a riot in which soldiers, firing only one round of ammunition, killed ten and wounded forty Chartists. Several leaders were executed and others transported for life.

After the failure of the first petition the movement lagged and suffered considerably from the internal disputes between its “physical" and “moral" force sections. Subsequently, the “moral force" section broke away and formed the National Charter Association, which aimed at achieving political reform through association with the Liberals. Thenceforth the “physical force" section was in the ascendant and dominant. A second petition was presented to Parliament in 1842 and was again rejected. This was followed by an abortive attempt at a general strike. In 1848, stimulated by the upheaval in France, Chartism again revived, and a third petition was presented on April 10th, this time accompanied by a march on the House of Commons by thousands of Chartists. O’Connor, leader of the “physical force" Chartists, suffered the humiliation of having to order his followers to disperse on the “advice of the police." When the petition was examined it was found that instead of having the six million signatures claimed for it there were only two million, and a great proportion of those were patent forgeries. It was the death blow for Chartism. But though it died it unquestionably left its mark on working-class politics and exerted a tremendous influence on the reform movement of the time, besides influencing the literary world, as is shown by some of the outstanding writers of those days. Though the movement was left bleeding and exhausted, it doubtless assisted the introduction of such reforms as the Child Labour Acts (1842), The Ten-Hour Day (1847) and the abolition of the stamp duty on newspapers in 1836.

The aims for which the Chartists struggled have now been achieved, with the exception of Annual Parliaments; though Universal Suffrage and the Payment of Members are relatively modern innovations, the one being introduced in 1918 and the other in 1911. The lapse of the years between the struggle for the Charter and the achievement of its objects tends to obscure the important part in working-class history played by the Chartists. The desperate nature of their struggle brought the franchise to the workers more quickly than if that struggle had not taken place. The modern working class has inherited the benefits and the accumulated experience of those struggles. The Chartists fought for democratic enfranchisement, the modern working class takes it for granted and must inevitably fight for more. Bitter experience taught the Chartists the importance of Parliament. Some saw in the acquiring of the franchise an end to all their troubles, a few saw deeper, that their poverty was due to capitalist ownership, and glimpsed the Socialist solution. Nevertheless, the democratic struggle which they fought was part of the historic struggle for Socialism, a struggle that had to be made. The ruling class feared them and their aims. It took many decades for the rulers to learn that enfranchisement for the workers did not of necessity threaten the rights of private property. The struggles for the aims of Chartists were carried on in other forms by men who came after, and partial concessions were made to the workers in 1867 and 1884, before complete enfranchisement was granted to all males over 21 in 1918 and to females in 1930. The nineteenth century capitalist took the measure of the Chartists and their successors, bitterly opposing their aims and granting concessions only when to do so diverted them, from adopting more menacing demands; the modern capitalist class has made concessions in the happy assurance of apparent safety. But are they.so safe?

The Parliamentary machine which they control has reached coercive and administrative perfection. It has reached it through centuries of struggle for dominance between the propertied sections. But to-day there is only one dominant propertied class and only one class, the working class, who can challenge its dominance. At the moment there may appear to be nothing serious to disturb the equanimity of the capitalists. But that means little. The modern working class inherits the lessons of history, half-formed ideas of. the goal towards which historic evolution is relentlessly marching shape themselves in the minds of millions of workers. The seeds of generations of propaganda have been sown, and who knows when and how events which neither capitalists nor workers can control will develop rapidly those half-formed ideas into Socialist convictions and bring to maturity the seeds sown in past generations ? Political catastrophes, like those in Nature, appear to occur suddenly, but they are not sudden to those who understand that they are the culmination of the innumerable past factors in historical development. The Chartists played their part, the modern workers play theirs. Between the two much ground has been cleared, preparing the way for the days when events will show clearly to intelligent workers that Socialism is the only logical outcome of the class struggle and the only solution for their poverty and insecurity. 

Harry Waite

Leadership: lessons from the past (1982)

From the April 1982 issue of the Socialist Standard

To appear on a public platform for the Socialist Party is usually enough for some members of the audience to appoint you the leader—in spite of your indignant protests and denials. That a great deal of practical experience helps foster this delusion is indisputable. The teacher in the class-room; the lecturer at college; the captain of a ship, or the conductor of an orchestra. Aren't they leaders? "A single violinist is his own Conductor. An orchestra requires a separate one" (Karl Marx). In most job-processes involving group co-operation a supervisor, foreman or group-leader is required. What about the surgeon in the operating theatre, or the consultants? Aren't they leaders? Even the SPGB has a General Secretary! isn't that leadership? It is even claimed that, in defending the real teachings of Marx against the distortions of Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin and others, the SPGB is elevating Marx to the position of a leader.

What was later to be the Socialist case on leadership was well-known and explicitly set-down by a group of workers in London, on 16 June 1836, when forming The London Working Men's Association. From the outset, the LWMA was thoroughly democratic, eschewing all forms of secrecy at a time when conspiracy and intrigue were commonplace (due to the influence of the French Revolution). It refused to countenance violence or illegal activities of any kind, pinning its faith entirely in the developing consciousness of the workers; and therefore advocating universal suffrage, the Charter (of which its Secretary, William Lovett, was the author), the establishment of free public libraries, and an educational system—but, above all, deliberately renouncing all Leaders. All this is to be found in the book, The Life and Struggles of William Lovett, the LWMA's first secretary. Lovett, who in the 1820s tramped from Cornwall to London seeking work, taught himself cabinet-making while living on a half-penny loaf a day; refused admission to the Cabinet Makers Union, he later became its General Secretary.

There is much quoted in Lovett's autobiography about leadership which socialists would agree with. Let Lovett speak for himself:

We had seen enough of the contentions of leaders and the battles of factions; to convince us, that no sound Public Opinion, and consequently no just Government, could be formed in this country as long as men's attention was constantly directed to the useless warfare of pulling down, and setting up, of one Idol of Party after another (P. 90).

The masses, in their political organisations, were taught to look up to "Great Men" (or to men professing "greatness") rather than to great Principles. We wished therefore to establish a political school of self-instruction among them, in which they should accustom themselves to examine great social and political principles, and by their publicity and free discussion, help to form a sound and healthful public opinion throughout the country (P. 94).

We have not wished, neither do we desire to be, Leaders, as we believe that the principles we advocate have been retarded, injured or betrayed by Leadership, more than by the open hostility of opponents. Leadership too often generates confiding bigotry, or political indifference on the one hand, or selfish ambition, on the other.

The principles WE advocate are those of the peoples' happiness, and for these to be justly established, each man must Know and feel his Rights and Duties. He must be prepared to guard the one; and perform the other with cheerfulness. And if Nature has given to one Man superior faculties, to express or execute the general wish, he only performs his Duty at the Mandate of his bretheren; he is therefore the "Leader" of none, but the equal of ALL (P. 192).

How well these "ordinary" working men, who never graced a school classroom, nor entered the hallowed portals of any great "seat of learning", knew that the "superior faculties" of some were no barrier to the general welfare of all.

Horatio