Lenin rediscovered : : what is to be done? in context / / by Lars T. Lih.

• Superior document: Historical materialism book series ; Volume 9
• VerfasserIn: Lih, Lars T.,
• Place / Publishing House: Leiden ;, Boston : : BRILL,, [2006]; ©2006
• Year of Publication: 2006
• Language: English; Russian
• Series: Historical materialism book series ; Volume 9.
• Physical Description: 1 online resource.

Lenin's What is to Be Done? (1902) has long been seen as the founding document of a 'party of a new type'. For some, it provided a model of 'vanguard party' that was the essence of Bolshevism, for others it manifested Lenin's élitist and manipulatory attitude towards the workers. This substantial new commentary, based on contemporary Russian- and German-language sources, provides hitherto unavailable contextual information that undermines these views and shows how Lenin's argument rests squarely on an optimistic confidence in the workers' revolutionary inclinations and on his admiration of German Social Democracy in particular. Lenin's outlook cannot be understood, Lih claims here, outside the context of international Social Democracy, the disputes within Russian Social Democracy and the institutions of the revolutionary underground. The new translation focuses attention on hard-to-translate key terms. This study raises new and unsettling questions about the legacy of Marx, Bolshevism as a historical force, and the course of Soviet history, but, most of all, it will revolutionise the conventional interpretations of Lenin.

Table of Contents

Preliminary Material -- Introduction -- The Merger of Socialism and the Worker Movement -- A Russian Erfurtian -- The Iskra Period -- Russian Foes of Erfurtianism -- A Feud Within Russian Erfurtianism -- The Purposive Worker and the Spread of Awareness -- Lenin's Erfurtian Drama -- The Organisational Question: Lenin and the Underground -- After the Second Congress -- Conclusion -- Annotations Part One: Section Analysis -- Annotations Part Two: Scandalous Passages -- Note on the Translation -- What Is to Be Done? / N. Lenin -- Foreword -- Dogmatism and 'Freedom of Criticism' -- The Stikhiinost of the Masses and the Purposiveness of Social Democracy -- Tred-iunionist Politics and Social-Democratic Politics -- The Artisanal Limitations of the Economists and the Organisation of Revolutionaries -- The 'Plan' for an All-Russian Political Newspaper -- Conclusion -- Bibliography -- Index.