In a recent post, I mentioned above six or seven books that delve into the nature of terror and its relationship to revolution. I maintained that terror and revolution couldn't be separated, and indeed that terror and modern Russian history couldn't be disentangled. I would be remiss if I didn't say something about Maximilien Robespierre in this context. Robespierre, of course, was the both the chief architect and loudest champion of revolutionary violence. His influence on generations of revolutionaries and would-be revolutionaries is impossible to overestimate. You can hear shades of Robespierre in Marx, but more especially in Lenin and Trotsky and Mao. Slavoj Zizek's book on the subject, a collection of Robespierre's most representative speeches, is an excellent introduction to Robespierre. Virtue and Terror gives Robespierre a chance to speak for himself, without the rancor and condemnation modern historians so often attach to his name. The unmediated Robespierre is shockingly prescient about the nature of power. Like Machiavelli, Robespierre seems to have an excellent grasp on politics: he knows how and why the Committee of Public Safety's Reign of Terror is functioning, and he seems to know also how vulnerable that power is to both internal and external enemies. One appreciates Robespierre's articulateness. In the midst of chaos, Robespierre the Incorruptible is able to translate Enlightenment philosophy into a clear governmental program. One also appreciates Robespierre's boldness: here is a man who seems to have honestly assessed the costs of revolution. If one wants to overthrow centuries of despotism, one should be prepared to overthrow God, king, aristocracy, and even peace. Trotsky, in his 1920 defense of revolutionary violence, Terrorism and Communism, echoes Robespierre's brave logic. Revolutionary terror is, ironically, the shortest way to peace. Irresolution in the midst of civil war means a longer civil war, not a shorter one. Of course, the consequences of Robespierre's ethics have been influential, and their impact on subsequent revolutionary movements far-reaching.
Below are are a few quotations drawn from Robespierre, as presented by Slavoj Zizek. In a subsequent post, Soviet Roulette will look at Leon Trotsky's Terrorism and Communism. The similarities between Robespiere and Trotsky demonstrate a clear line of thinking between the two great revolutionaries.
"The theory of revolutionary government is as new as the revolution which brought it into being. It should not be sought in the books of the political writers, who did not foresee that revolution, nor in the laws of tyrants who, satisfied with abusing their power, are not much concerned with its legitimacy.."
"The function of government is to direct the moral and physical forces of the nation towards the goal of its appointing."
"The goal of constitutional government is to preserve the Republic; that of revolutionary government is to found it."
"Revolution is the war of liberty against its enemies: the constitution is the system of liberty victorious and at peace."
"Revolutionary government needs extraordinary activity, precisely because it is at war. It is subject to less uniform and less rigorous rules, because the circumstances in which it exists are stormy and shifting, and above all because it is continual forced to deploy new resources rapidly, to confront new and pressing dangers."
"Revolutionary government owes good citizens full national protection; to enemies of the people it owes nothing but death."
"Temples to the gods are not meant to provide sanctuary for the sacrilegious who come to profane them; not is the constitution supposed to protect the plots of tyrants who seek to destroy it."
"Above all we must be careful not to kill patriotism by trying to cure it. Patriotism is ardent by its nature. Who can love the homeland coldly?"
"The foundation of the French Republic is not a game for children."
"All the vices are fighting for them: the Republic only has virtues on its side."
"And with what rapidity the seeds of division they throw among us could develop, if we do not hasten to stifle them!"
"And for some time, the foreign courts have been vomiting over France all the cunning scoundrels they have in their pay."
"Yesterday they were murdering the defenders of liberty; today they are attending their funerals, and demanding divine honours for them..."
"So that France, once illustrious among enslaved countries, eclipsing the glory of all the free peoples that have existed, may become the model for all nations, the terror of oppressors, the consolation of the oppressed, the ornament of the universe; and that in sealing our work with our blood, we may at least glimpse the shining dawn of universal felicity."
"In the French Revolution's system, that which is immoral is impolitic, that which is corrupting is counter-revolutionary."
"Perhaps the most dangerous reef we have to avoid is not the fervour of excessive zeal, but rather the lassitude of well-being".
Showing posts with label Slavoj Zizek. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Slavoj Zizek. Show all posts
Friday, March 7, 2014
Thursday, December 12, 2013
The Return of Lenin
Studying the Russian Revolution has rarely led me to examine current debates among the "New Leftists." Those debates have ordinarily struck me as either esoteric (even by the lax standards of this unread blog) or morally abtuse (after all, both Stalinism and the collapse of planned economies can't be lightly dismissed). Reading Lenin Reloaded: Toward a Politics of Truth convinces me that this has been a mistake on my part for two reasons: first, by embracing many of Bolshevism's core values, the New Leftists help contemporary historians to get a better feel for the now ostensibly discredited values of the Revolution; and second, the New Leftists continue to say highly original and remarkably productive things about the Revolution and its main architects. Right or wrong, today's generation of Marxists give one a lot to consider about the Revolution. Indeed, if the essays in Lenin Reloaded are any guide, their current debates about Marx, Lenin, and Trotsky are anything but sterile. Of course, some modern Marxists are more thoughtful than others, but certainly Lenin Reloaded employs more than a few of best of them, including Zizek and Eagelton.
The book's essayists advance diverse arguments about the legacy of Lenin and, by extension, the Revolution. But perhaps the overriding argument is this: Lenin was too great a thinker, and too important a thinker to too many other serious thinkers, to be discarded altogether. The authors' other claim about Lenin, that he can't really be blamed for the excesses of either the Revolution or, more especially, its statist legacy, aren't really convincing. In fact, whatever the reason, the authors don't spend much time refuting the notion that Lenin can in any way be blamed for Stalinism.
What makes Lenin a great thinker, worthy of continued study? Most of the essayists remind us that Lenin got a lot right. He was rightly a serious critic of Tsarism, anti-semitism, colonialism, nationalism, and globalized warfare, to say nothing about his critique of capitalism. Most also note that Lenin had a tremendous talent for operationalizing theory, or indeed for theorizing operations. What they mean, is that Lenin adjusted theory according to experience, and used theory to open up a space in which actual and substantive change finally became possible.
The whole point of the New Leftism of course is that Lenin, or at least his immediate interpreters, didn't get everything right. But reviewing this rich collection of essays, all of which analyze mistakes in the light of what they take to be a very valid project, sheds an immense amount of light on the whole subject of revolution. If we take it to be no more than a bloody pathway to the gulag, we miss something vital about the aspirations of millions of people who then, as now, are searching for something better than the everyday barbarism we so often accept as our inescapable reality. Do we have to be perpetually at war in the Middle East? Is it necessary for Africa to be impoverished? Is radical income disparity in the United States and a racialized prison system unavoidable? Lenin the quintessential revolutionary might have argued otherwise. More than that, he might have tried to do something about the sad situation.
Alain Badiou, "One Divides Itself Into Two."
"Extreme violence is, therefore, the reciprocal correlative of extreme enthusiasm, since what is at stake is indeed, to talk like Nietzsche, the transvaluation of all values."
"The century is lived as the century of victories, after the millennium of attempts and failures."
"For a revolutionary, the world is an ancient world full of corruption and treachery. One has constantly to start again with purification, with disclosing the real under its veils."
"What is new? This is the obsession of the century."
"The new man is either restored or his is produced."
"...the new man..resists all categorization and characterization. In particular he resists the family, private property, and the nation-state."
"Marx..stresses that the universal singularity of the proletariat is to resist categorization, to have no characteristics, and, in particular, in the strongest sense, to have no particular nationality."
Citing Gide: "To all families, I hate you!"
Alex Callinicos, "Leninism in the Twenty-First Century? Lenin, Weber, and the Politics of Responsibility."
Citing Lenin: "There are no miracles in nature or in history, but every abrupt turn in history, and this applies to every revolution, presents such a wealth of content, unfolds such unexpected and specific combinations of forms of struggle and alignments of forces and contestants, that to the lay mind there is much that much appear miraculous."
"History, as Hegel argues in his dialectic of master and slave, is a struggle to the death: the institutionalized violence of class society can only be removed through revolutionary violence."
Terry Eagelton, "Lenin in the Postmodern Age."
"Yet both literature and revolution are of course art forms.."
"Anyone can revolt, but not everyone can carry through a successful revolution."
Fredric Jameson, "Lenin and Revisionism."
"Lenin does not know he is dead."
"...it is for one thing allegorically improper for a collective movement to be represented by a single named human individual."
Francois Furet, "Leaps, Leaps, Leaps."
Citing Furet: "The idea of another society has become almost impossible to conceive of, and no one in the world today is offering any advice on the subject."
"Be ready for the improbable, for the unexpected, for what happens."
The book's essayists advance diverse arguments about the legacy of Lenin and, by extension, the Revolution. But perhaps the overriding argument is this: Lenin was too great a thinker, and too important a thinker to too many other serious thinkers, to be discarded altogether. The authors' other claim about Lenin, that he can't really be blamed for the excesses of either the Revolution or, more especially, its statist legacy, aren't really convincing. In fact, whatever the reason, the authors don't spend much time refuting the notion that Lenin can in any way be blamed for Stalinism.
What makes Lenin a great thinker, worthy of continued study? Most of the essayists remind us that Lenin got a lot right. He was rightly a serious critic of Tsarism, anti-semitism, colonialism, nationalism, and globalized warfare, to say nothing about his critique of capitalism. Most also note that Lenin had a tremendous talent for operationalizing theory, or indeed for theorizing operations. What they mean, is that Lenin adjusted theory according to experience, and used theory to open up a space in which actual and substantive change finally became possible.
The whole point of the New Leftism of course is that Lenin, or at least his immediate interpreters, didn't get everything right. But reviewing this rich collection of essays, all of which analyze mistakes in the light of what they take to be a very valid project, sheds an immense amount of light on the whole subject of revolution. If we take it to be no more than a bloody pathway to the gulag, we miss something vital about the aspirations of millions of people who then, as now, are searching for something better than the everyday barbarism we so often accept as our inescapable reality. Do we have to be perpetually at war in the Middle East? Is it necessary for Africa to be impoverished? Is radical income disparity in the United States and a racialized prison system unavoidable? Lenin the quintessential revolutionary might have argued otherwise. More than that, he might have tried to do something about the sad situation.
Alain Badiou, "One Divides Itself Into Two."
"Extreme violence is, therefore, the reciprocal correlative of extreme enthusiasm, since what is at stake is indeed, to talk like Nietzsche, the transvaluation of all values."
"The century is lived as the century of victories, after the millennium of attempts and failures."
"For a revolutionary, the world is an ancient world full of corruption and treachery. One has constantly to start again with purification, with disclosing the real under its veils."
"What is new? This is the obsession of the century."
"The new man is either restored or his is produced."
"...the new man..resists all categorization and characterization. In particular he resists the family, private property, and the nation-state."
"Marx..stresses that the universal singularity of the proletariat is to resist categorization, to have no characteristics, and, in particular, in the strongest sense, to have no particular nationality."
Citing Gide: "To all families, I hate you!"
Alex Callinicos, "Leninism in the Twenty-First Century? Lenin, Weber, and the Politics of Responsibility."
Citing Lenin: "There are no miracles in nature or in history, but every abrupt turn in history, and this applies to every revolution, presents such a wealth of content, unfolds such unexpected and specific combinations of forms of struggle and alignments of forces and contestants, that to the lay mind there is much that much appear miraculous."
"History, as Hegel argues in his dialectic of master and slave, is a struggle to the death: the institutionalized violence of class society can only be removed through revolutionary violence."
Terry Eagelton, "Lenin in the Postmodern Age."
"Yet both literature and revolution are of course art forms.."
"Anyone can revolt, but not everyone can carry through a successful revolution."
Fredric Jameson, "Lenin and Revisionism."
"Lenin does not know he is dead."
"...it is for one thing allegorically improper for a collective movement to be represented by a single named human individual."
Francois Furet, "Leaps, Leaps, Leaps."
Citing Furet: "The idea of another society has become almost impossible to conceive of, and no one in the world today is offering any advice on the subject."
"Be ready for the improbable, for the unexpected, for what happens."
Wednesday, December 11, 2013
Sylvain Lazarus on Revolution
"...revolution is the unheard-of experience that the end of the state is possible. It is unheard-of because the state itself asserts its inalienable perpetuity..."
It's difficult to digest Sylvain Lazarus' short but theoretically sophisticated essay, "Lenin and the Party, 1902 to November 1917," in Lenin Reloaded: Toward a Politics of Truth. However, Zylvain Lazarus' brilliant little essay makes me think that I put far too little emphasis on analysis and far too much emphasis on description. What does Lazarus have to say about the October Revolution? I think Lazarus' main point is this: that the truly revolutionary moment is over almost as soon as it begins. The point is best illustrated by Lenin himself. Who was Lenin? There are many versions of Lenin, even in terms of his political philosophy. The principle versions of Lenin are these: first, there is the Lenin who modified Marxism in an anticipation of radical freedom from bourgeois social control; second, there is the Lenin who consolidated power by wedding the newly formed socialist state to the communist party; and third, there was the Lenin who was incorporated into the Stalinist philosophical project, namely Marxist-Leninism.
The point here is that there is, at least, a before and after in any revolutionary moment. Is it fair to analyze Lenin as a political thinker, or revolutionary politics in general, from the vantage point of 1918, 1924, or even 1938? Perhaps not, or at least not entirely. Lazarus reminds us that in the nineteenth century the very notion of politics implied revolution. No where was this more true than in Russia. To be political, was to be opposed to the Russian status quo, to the monarchy, to the state in general. This Lenin's thinking prior to November, 1917, is truly revolutionary in the sense that it pushes us to be free, free of colonialism, class oppression, and tyranny in general. But after the Bolshevik takeover, Lenin's thinking means something else entirely. Although the Bolshevik Revolution invented new forms of state activity, including the soviets and the Communist Party, in power the Revolution was no longer, well, revolutionary. In other words, before taking power, Leninism represented something brand new, something perhaps inherently better than world war and colonial exploitation; but in power, Leninism became another expression of state activity, not quite as bad as the Marxist-Leninist variety, but certainly not revolutionary as we should really understand the term.
To sum up, as a category of analysis, revolution is something more than what the "revolutionaries" made of it. It's that rare break in the continuity of the state, a promise of freedom that can't really be reduced to the actual events that unfold in its name.
It's difficult to digest Sylvain Lazarus' short but theoretically sophisticated essay, "Lenin and the Party, 1902 to November 1917," in Lenin Reloaded: Toward a Politics of Truth. However, Zylvain Lazarus' brilliant little essay makes me think that I put far too little emphasis on analysis and far too much emphasis on description. What does Lazarus have to say about the October Revolution? I think Lazarus' main point is this: that the truly revolutionary moment is over almost as soon as it begins. The point is best illustrated by Lenin himself. Who was Lenin? There are many versions of Lenin, even in terms of his political philosophy. The principle versions of Lenin are these: first, there is the Lenin who modified Marxism in an anticipation of radical freedom from bourgeois social control; second, there is the Lenin who consolidated power by wedding the newly formed socialist state to the communist party; and third, there was the Lenin who was incorporated into the Stalinist philosophical project, namely Marxist-Leninism.
The point here is that there is, at least, a before and after in any revolutionary moment. Is it fair to analyze Lenin as a political thinker, or revolutionary politics in general, from the vantage point of 1918, 1924, or even 1938? Perhaps not, or at least not entirely. Lazarus reminds us that in the nineteenth century the very notion of politics implied revolution. No where was this more true than in Russia. To be political, was to be opposed to the Russian status quo, to the monarchy, to the state in general. This Lenin's thinking prior to November, 1917, is truly revolutionary in the sense that it pushes us to be free, free of colonialism, class oppression, and tyranny in general. But after the Bolshevik takeover, Lenin's thinking means something else entirely. Although the Bolshevik Revolution invented new forms of state activity, including the soviets and the Communist Party, in power the Revolution was no longer, well, revolutionary. In other words, before taking power, Leninism represented something brand new, something perhaps inherently better than world war and colonial exploitation; but in power, Leninism became another expression of state activity, not quite as bad as the Marxist-Leninist variety, but certainly not revolutionary as we should really understand the term.
To sum up, as a category of analysis, revolution is something more than what the "revolutionaries" made of it. It's that rare break in the continuity of the state, a promise of freedom that can't really be reduced to the actual events that unfold in its name.
Friday, December 14, 2012
Lenin Revisited
"Lenin" is not the nostalgic name for an old dogmatic certainty; quite the contrary, the Lenin who is to be retrieved is the Lenin whose fundamental experience was that of being thrown into a catastrophic new constellation in which the old co-ordinates proved useless, and who was thus compelled to reinvent Marxism" Slavoj Zizek
"...in revolutionary times the limits of what is possible expand a thousandfold." Lenin.
"Do the masses of the Russian workers possess sufficient class-consciousness, fortitude, and heroism to perform "miracles of proletarian organization" after they have performed miracles of daring, initiative, and self-sacrifice in the direct revolutionary struggle." Lenin.
"..you performed miracles of proletarian heroism yesterday in overthrowing the tsarist monarchy." Lenin.
"I would call this raving had not decades of political struggle taught me to regard honesty in opponents as a rare exception." Lenin
"Let us not forget that the issue of power is the fundamental issue at stake in every revolution." Lenin
Dostoevsky once wrote in his Diary of a Writer: "Try to pose for yourself this task: not to think of a polar bear--and you will see that the cursed thing will come to mind every minute." I think the opposite is also true: try to think of the Revolution and everything but the Revolution will come to mind. This is my excuse for straying so frequently, and so far, from the ostensible subject of this blog. But today let me reflect on the fountainhead of the Russian revolutionary project, V.I. Lenin. What kind of man was Lenin? Like most great men and women of the past, one could spend a lifetime reading his biographies and never get a fixed image of the man. Was he good or evil? Was he exceptionally gifted or a product of his times? Did he predict events better than other people? Was he capable of shaping events or merely react to them? Was he better or worse than his Bolshevik peers? How responsible was he for Stalinism?
Fortunately, Lenin has left us a treasure trove of writing so we can at least return to primary sources to get a sense of how he thought about revolution before it had become monumentalized, or at least a sense of what he wanted other people to think he thought about it. In fact, Lenin left us so much writing that it's hard to know where to begin. But why not begin, as Slavoj Zizek begins in Revolution at the Gates: Selected Writings from 1917, on the very eve of the first revolution of 1917, the February Revolution? What was Lenin saying then, before he had become the chief spokesperson of a new government, and a political institution? What did he say before he had any clue what would ultimately become of Russian socialism?
When one reads Zizek's selection of writings one is struck by the moral dichotomy of Lenin. For clearly the framework of Marxism had allowed him to understand Russia's participation in the First World War with some degree of historical detachment. Lenin's belief that the global conflagration was the inevitable consequence of bourgeois imperialism may not have been, strictly speaking, correct. However, Lenin's Marxist perspective did allow him to see that the great conflict wasn't helping ordinary Russians, and not even Russian control of the Black Sea Straits--one secret goal of the war--would change that simple fact. Lenin's refusal to choose sides in the First World War speaks to the central paradox of his approach to morality. Lenin got the First World War right because he believed that moral decisions could only be decided with reference to long historical processes, especially as these related to the rise of the proletarian class. This big perspective had its advantages. One sees quite clearly that Lenin's support for peace and radical land reform were, historically speaking, correct. On the other hand, we know that Lenin's detachment from ordinary politics led to authoritarian policies and devastatingly cruel decisions.
Lenin's writings also reveal his remarkable ability to demonstrate certainty about the future in the midst of political chaos. Revolutionary Russia was a chaotic place, but Lenin's uncertainty only applied to tactics, which he was willing to change as circumstances changed. On the big questions, Lenin didn't waver. He knew Tsarism was bankrupt, that the Provisional Government was scarcely any better, and that even fellow socialists were unable to grasp the real historical logic of Marxism. Lenin's writings are highly polemical. In each letter or broadside the Bolshevik leader mocks his opponents unceasingly. Lenin's opinion of anything that smacks of bourgeois influence is brutal.
It's interesting to compare Lenin's antipathy for bourgeois with the antipathy French revolutionaries expressed toward their political and even perceived social opponents. In the Price of Liberty, historian Donald Sutherland spends a great deal of time discussing conspiracy theories among French revolutionaries. In that great upheaval, revolutionaries turned to violence at multiple stages in order to solve political problems. They did so for several reasons apparently. First, revolutionaries believed that the ancien regime, and specifically the king, had always used arbitrary power to solve problems. If the king had been able to use violence to solve problems, why shouldn't the sovereign people do the same? After all, the people had a hundred times more political legitimacy than a king. Second, revolutionaries, believing that their political settlement was invisible insofar as it had been established by the whole nation, could only conceive of defeat as a consequence of perfidy from within. With this mindset, the French radicals attacked their enemies viciously, even condoning mob violence. If perceived enemies perished without a trial, so be it. The forms of justice were less important than the results.
Lenin's unflinching attacks against not only bourgeois politicians, but against those socialist politicians who could be seen as collaborating with the bourgeois ones, is redolent of the spirit of 1789, or at least 1792. This shouldn't surprise us. We know that Lenin, like Marx and all students of revolution, studied the French Revolution. And if one studies the French Revolution, and accepts it as something that did more good for humanity than harm, it's hard to totally disavow violence. The French Revolution had various phases, but violence underpinned most of these phases. The king was killed, the queen was killed, aristocrats were murdered, peasant counterrevolution was suppressed, armies were defeated, and suspected agents of counterrevolution were guillotined. Lenin, like most revolutionary thinkers, must have thought long and hard about the violence inherent in revolution well before 1917. In fact, both the Provisional Revolution and the Bolshevik Revolution were surprisingly bloodless. With relatively few causalities, Lenin in power might well have wondered if he gotten revolution right. A true revolution needs enemies it would seem.
At any rate, Lenin's writings reveal a man who believes that revolution is a social phenomenon which is inherently just, and which, paradoxically, remains both open-ended and predictable. True revolutionaries know that revolution follows certain historical patterns first outlined by Karl Marx. True revolutionaries side without reservation on the side of revolution, and true revolution is always radical, violent, and anti- accommodationist.
"...in revolutionary times the limits of what is possible expand a thousandfold." Lenin.
"Do the masses of the Russian workers possess sufficient class-consciousness, fortitude, and heroism to perform "miracles of proletarian organization" after they have performed miracles of daring, initiative, and self-sacrifice in the direct revolutionary struggle." Lenin.
"..you performed miracles of proletarian heroism yesterday in overthrowing the tsarist monarchy." Lenin.
"I would call this raving had not decades of political struggle taught me to regard honesty in opponents as a rare exception." Lenin
"Let us not forget that the issue of power is the fundamental issue at stake in every revolution." Lenin
Dostoevsky once wrote in his Diary of a Writer: "Try to pose for yourself this task: not to think of a polar bear--and you will see that the cursed thing will come to mind every minute." I think the opposite is also true: try to think of the Revolution and everything but the Revolution will come to mind. This is my excuse for straying so frequently, and so far, from the ostensible subject of this blog. But today let me reflect on the fountainhead of the Russian revolutionary project, V.I. Lenin. What kind of man was Lenin? Like most great men and women of the past, one could spend a lifetime reading his biographies and never get a fixed image of the man. Was he good or evil? Was he exceptionally gifted or a product of his times? Did he predict events better than other people? Was he capable of shaping events or merely react to them? Was he better or worse than his Bolshevik peers? How responsible was he for Stalinism?
Fortunately, Lenin has left us a treasure trove of writing so we can at least return to primary sources to get a sense of how he thought about revolution before it had become monumentalized, or at least a sense of what he wanted other people to think he thought about it. In fact, Lenin left us so much writing that it's hard to know where to begin. But why not begin, as Slavoj Zizek begins in Revolution at the Gates: Selected Writings from 1917, on the very eve of the first revolution of 1917, the February Revolution? What was Lenin saying then, before he had become the chief spokesperson of a new government, and a political institution? What did he say before he had any clue what would ultimately become of Russian socialism?
When one reads Zizek's selection of writings one is struck by the moral dichotomy of Lenin. For clearly the framework of Marxism had allowed him to understand Russia's participation in the First World War with some degree of historical detachment. Lenin's belief that the global conflagration was the inevitable consequence of bourgeois imperialism may not have been, strictly speaking, correct. However, Lenin's Marxist perspective did allow him to see that the great conflict wasn't helping ordinary Russians, and not even Russian control of the Black Sea Straits--one secret goal of the war--would change that simple fact. Lenin's refusal to choose sides in the First World War speaks to the central paradox of his approach to morality. Lenin got the First World War right because he believed that moral decisions could only be decided with reference to long historical processes, especially as these related to the rise of the proletarian class. This big perspective had its advantages. One sees quite clearly that Lenin's support for peace and radical land reform were, historically speaking, correct. On the other hand, we know that Lenin's detachment from ordinary politics led to authoritarian policies and devastatingly cruel decisions.
Lenin's writings also reveal his remarkable ability to demonstrate certainty about the future in the midst of political chaos. Revolutionary Russia was a chaotic place, but Lenin's uncertainty only applied to tactics, which he was willing to change as circumstances changed. On the big questions, Lenin didn't waver. He knew Tsarism was bankrupt, that the Provisional Government was scarcely any better, and that even fellow socialists were unable to grasp the real historical logic of Marxism. Lenin's writings are highly polemical. In each letter or broadside the Bolshevik leader mocks his opponents unceasingly. Lenin's opinion of anything that smacks of bourgeois influence is brutal.
It's interesting to compare Lenin's antipathy for bourgeois with the antipathy French revolutionaries expressed toward their political and even perceived social opponents. In the Price of Liberty, historian Donald Sutherland spends a great deal of time discussing conspiracy theories among French revolutionaries. In that great upheaval, revolutionaries turned to violence at multiple stages in order to solve political problems. They did so for several reasons apparently. First, revolutionaries believed that the ancien regime, and specifically the king, had always used arbitrary power to solve problems. If the king had been able to use violence to solve problems, why shouldn't the sovereign people do the same? After all, the people had a hundred times more political legitimacy than a king. Second, revolutionaries, believing that their political settlement was invisible insofar as it had been established by the whole nation, could only conceive of defeat as a consequence of perfidy from within. With this mindset, the French radicals attacked their enemies viciously, even condoning mob violence. If perceived enemies perished without a trial, so be it. The forms of justice were less important than the results.
Lenin's unflinching attacks against not only bourgeois politicians, but against those socialist politicians who could be seen as collaborating with the bourgeois ones, is redolent of the spirit of 1789, or at least 1792. This shouldn't surprise us. We know that Lenin, like Marx and all students of revolution, studied the French Revolution. And if one studies the French Revolution, and accepts it as something that did more good for humanity than harm, it's hard to totally disavow violence. The French Revolution had various phases, but violence underpinned most of these phases. The king was killed, the queen was killed, aristocrats were murdered, peasant counterrevolution was suppressed, armies were defeated, and suspected agents of counterrevolution were guillotined. Lenin, like most revolutionary thinkers, must have thought long and hard about the violence inherent in revolution well before 1917. In fact, both the Provisional Revolution and the Bolshevik Revolution were surprisingly bloodless. With relatively few causalities, Lenin in power might well have wondered if he gotten revolution right. A true revolution needs enemies it would seem.
At any rate, Lenin's writings reveal a man who believes that revolution is a social phenomenon which is inherently just, and which, paradoxically, remains both open-ended and predictable. True revolutionaries know that revolution follows certain historical patterns first outlined by Karl Marx. True revolutionaries side without reservation on the side of revolution, and true revolution is always radical, violent, and anti- accommodationist.
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