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    The Rabocheye Dyelo's assertions -- which we have analyzed above -- that the economic struggle is the most widely applicable means of political agitation and that our task now is to lend the economic struggle itself a political character, etc., express a narrow view not only of our political, but also of our organi~ational tasks. The "economic struggle against the employers and the government" does not in the least re quire -- and therefore such a struggle can never give rise to -- an all-Russian centralized organization that will combine, in one general onslaught, all and every manifestation of political opposition, protest and indignation, an organization that will consist of professional revolutionaries and be led by the real political leaders of the whole people. This is but natural. The character of any organization is naturally and inevitably determined by the content of its activity. Consequently, the Rabocheye Dyelo, by the assertions analyzed above, sanctifies and legitimatizes not only the narrowness of political activity, but also the narrowness of organization al work. In this case too, as always, it is an organ whose consciousness yields to spontaneity. And yet the worship of spontaneously developing forms of organization, failure to realize how narrow and primitive is our organizational work, what amateurs we still are in this most important sphere, failure to realize this, I say, is a veritable disorder from which our movement suffers. It is not a disorder that comes with decline, it is, of course, a disorder that comes with growth. But it is precisely at the present time, when the wave of spontaneous indignation, as it were, sweeps over us, leaders and organizers of the movement, that a most ir reconcilable struggle must be waged against all defence of backwardness, against any legitimization of narrowness in this matter, and it is particularly necessary to rouse in all who take part in practical work, in all who are preparing to take up their work, discontent with the amateurishness that prevails among us and an unshakable determination to get rid of it.

    We shall try to answer this question by giving a brief description of the activity of a typical Social-Democratic circle of the period of 1894-1901. We have already noted that the entire student youth of the period was absorbed in Marxism. Of course, these students were not only, or even not so much, absorbed in Marxism as a theory, but as an answer to the question: "What is to be done?"; as a call to take the field against the enemy. And these new warriors marched to battle

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with astonishingly primitive equipment and training. In a vast number of cases, they had almost no equipment and absolutely no training. They marched to war like peasants from the plough, armed only with clubs. A students' circle, having no contacts whatever with the old members of the movement, no contacts with circles in other districts, or even in other parts of the same city (or with other universities), without the various sections of the revolutionary work being in any way organized, having no systematic plan of activity covering any length of time, establishes contacts with the workers and sets to work. The circle gradually expansds its propaganda and agitation; by its activities it wins the sympathies of rather large sections of workers and of a certain section of the educated classes, which provide it with money and from among whom the "committee" recruits new groups of young people. There is a growing fascination about the committee (or League of Struggle), its sphere of activity becomes wider and its activities expand quite spontaneously: the very people who a year or a few months previously had spoken at the gatherings of the students' circle and discussed the question, "Whither?", who established and maintained contacts with the workers, wrote and published leaflets, now establish contacts with other groups of revolutionaries, procure literature, set to work to publish a local newspaper, begin to talk about organizing a demonstration, and finally, commence open hostilities (these open hostilities may, according to circumstances, take the form of the publication of the very first agitational leaflet, or the first issue of a newspaper, or of the organization of the first demonstration). And usually the very first of these actions ends in immediate and wholesale arrests. Immediate and wholesale, precisely because these

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open hostilities were not the result of a systematic and carefully thought-out and gradually prepared plan for a prolonged and stubborn struggle, but simply the result of the spontaneous growth of traditional circle work; because, naturally, the police, in almost every case, knew the principal leaders of the local movement, for they had already "won a reputation" for themselves in their school days, and the police waited only for a convenient moment to make their raid, deliberately allowing the circle sufficient time to develop its work so that they might obtain a palpable corpus delicti, and always permitted several of the persons known to them to remain at liberty in order to act as "breeders" (which, I believe, is the technical term used both by our people and by the gendarmes). One cannot help comparing this kind of warfare with that conducted by a mob of peasants, armed with clubs, against modern troops. And one can only wonder at the virility of the movement which expanded, grew and scored victories in spite of the total lack of training among the fighters. It is true that from the historical point of view, the primitiveness of equipment was not only inevitable at first, but even legitimate as one of the conditions for the wide recruiting of fighters, but as soon as serious war operations commenced (and they commenced in fact with the strikes in the summer of 1896), the defects in our fighting organizations made themselves felt to an ever-increasing degree. Thrown into confusion at first and committing a number of mistakes (for example, its appeal to the public describing the misdeeds of the Socialists, or the deportation of workers from the capital to provincial industrial centres), the government very soon adapted itself to the new conditions of the struggle and managed to deploy its perfectly equipped detachments of

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agents provocateurs, spies and gendarmes. Raids became so frequent, affected such a vast number of people and cleared out the local circles so thoroughly that the masses of the workers literally lost all their leaders, the movement assumed an incredibly sporadic character, and it became utterly impossible to establish continuity and coherence in the work. The terrible dispersion of the local leaders, the accidental character of the circle memberships, the lack of training in and the narrow outlook on theoretical, political, and organizational questions were all the inevitable result of the conditions described above. Things reached such a pass that in several places the workers, because of our lack of stamina and ability to maintain secrecy, began to lose faith in the intelligentsia and to avoid them; the intellectuals, they said, are much too careless and lay themselves open to police raids!

    Anyone who has the slightest knowledge of the movement is aware that all thinking Social-Democrats have at last begun to regard these primitive methods as a disease. And in order that the reader who is not acquainted with the movement may have no grounds for thinking that we are "inventing" a special stage or special disease of the movement, we shall refer once again to the witness we have already quoted. We hope we shall be forgiven for the length of the quotation:

    "While the gradual transition to more extensive practical activity," writes B-v in the Rabocheye Dyelo, No. 6, "a transition which is directly dependent on the general transitional period through which the Russian working-class movement is now passing, is a characteristic feature . . . there is, however, another and not less interesting feature in the general mechanism of the Russian workers' revolution. We refer to the general lack of revolutionary forces fit for action* which is felt not only in St. Petersburg, but throughout the whole of Russia. With the

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    We must now deal with a question that has undoubtedly arisen in the mind of every reader. Can a connection be established between amateurishness, this disorder of growth affecting the whole of the movement, and Economism, which is one of the trends in Russian Social-Democracy? We think that it can. Lack of practical training, lack of ability to carry on organizational work is certainly common to us all, including those who have from the very outset unswervingly stood for revolutionary Marxism. And, of course, were it only lack of practical training, no one could blame the practical workers. But the term "amateurishness" embraces something else: it denotes a narrow scope of revolutionary work generally, failure to understand that a good organization of revolutionaries cannot be built up on the basis of such narrow activity, and lastly -- and most important -- it denotes attempts to justify this narrowness and to elevate it to a special "theory," i.e., bowing in worship to spontaneity on this question too. Once such attempts were observed, it became certain that amateurishness is connected with Economism and that we shall never eliminate this narrowness of our organizational activity until we eliminate Economism generally (i.e., the narrow conception of Marxist theory, of the role of Social-Democracy and of its political tasks). And these attempts were revealed in a twofold direction. Some began to say: the mass of workers themselves have not yet advanced the broad and militant political tasks that the revolutionaries are attempting to "impose" upon them; they must continue, for the time being, to fight for immediate political demands, to conduct "the economic struggle against the employers

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    It is only natural to expect that a Social-Democrat, who conceives the political struggle as being identical with the "economic struggle against the employers and the government," should conceive of an "organization of revolutionaries" as being more or less identical with an "organization of workers." And this, in fact, is what actually happens; so that when we talk about organization, we literally talk in different tongues. I vividly recall, for example, a conversation I once had with a fairly consistent Economist, with whom I had not been previously acquainted. We were discussing the pamphlet Who Will Bring About the Political Revolution? and we were very soon agreed that its principal defect was that it ignored the question of organization. We were beginning to think that we were in complete agreement with each other -- but . . . as the conversation proceeded, it became clear that we were talking of different things. My interlocutor accused the author of ignoring strike funds, mutual aid societies, etc., whereas I had in mind an organization of revolutionaries as an essential factor in "bringing about" the political revolution. As soon as that disagreement became clear, I hardly remember a single question of principle upon which I was in agreement with that Economist! What was the source of our disagreement? It was the fact that on questions of both organization and politics the

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Economists are forever lapsing from Social-Democracy into trade unionism. The political struggle of Social-Democracy is far more extensive and complex than the economic struggle of the workers against the employers and the government. Similarly (and indeed for that reason), the organization of a revolutionary Social-Democratic party must inevitably be of a different kind than the organizations of the workers designed for this struggle. A workers' organization must in the first place be a trade organization; secondly, it must be as broad as possible; and thirdly, it must be as little clandestine as possible (here, and further on, of course, I have only autocratic Russia in mind). On the other hand, the organizations of revolutionaries must consist first, foremost and mainly of people who make revolutionary activity their profession (that is why I speak of organizations of revolutionaries, meaning revolutionary Social-Democrats). In view of this common feature of the members of such an organization, all distinctions as between workers and intellectuals, and certainly distinctions of trade and profession, must be utterly obliterated. Such an organization must of necessity be not too extensive and as secret as possible. Let us examine this threefold distinction.

    In countries where political liberty exists the distinction between a trade union and a political organization is clear enough, as is the distinction between trade unions and Social-Democracy. The relation of the latter to the former will naturally vary in each country according to historical, legal and other conditions -- it may be more or less close, complex, etc. (in our opinion it should be as close and simple as possible); but there can be no question of trade union organizations being identical with the Social-Democratic party

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organizations in free countries. In Russia, however, the yoke of the autocracy appears at first glance to obliterate all distinctions between a Social-Democratic organization and trade unions, because all workers' associations and all circles are prohibited, and because the principal manifestation and weapon of the workers' economic struggle -- the strike -- is regarded as a criminal (and sometimes even as a political!) offence. Conditions in our country, therefore, on the one hand, strongly "impel" the workers engaged in economic struggle to concern themselves with political questions, and, on the other, they "impel" Social-Democrats to confuse trade unionism with Social-Democracy (and our Krichevskys, Martynovs and their like, while diligently discussing the first kind of "impelling," fail to notice the second kind). Indeed, picture to yourselves people who are immersed ninety-nine per cent in "the economic struggle against the employers and the government." Some of them will never, during the whole course of their activity (four to six months) be impelled to think of the need for a more complex organization of revolutionaries; others, perhaps, will come across the fairly widely distributed Bernsteinian literature, from which they will become convinced of the profound importance of the forward march of "the drab everyday struggle." Still others will be carried away, perhaps, by the seductive idea of showing the world a new example of "close and organic contact with the proletarian struggle" -- contact between the trade union and Social-Democratic movements. Such people may argue that the later a country enters into the arena of capitalism and, consequently, of the working-class movement, the more the Socialists in that country may take part in, and support, the trade union movement, and the less reason can

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and should there be for non-Social-Democratic trade unions. Up to this point the argument is quite correct; unfortunately, however, some go beyond that and envisage the complete fusion of Social-Democracy with trade unionism. We shall soon see, from the example of the Rules of the St. Petersburg League of Struggle, what a harmful effect these dreams have upon our plans of organization.

    The workers' organizations for the economic struggle should be trade union organizations. Every Social-Democratic worker should as far as possible assist and actively work in these organizations. That is true. But it is not at all to our interest to demand that only Social-Democrats should be eligible for membership in the "trade" unions: that would only narrow down our influence over the masses. Let every worker who understands the need to unite for the struggle against the employers and the government join the trade unions. The very aim of the trade unions would be unattainable if they failed to unite all who have attained at least this elementary degree of understanding, and if they were not very wide organizations. And the wider these organizations are, the wider our influence over them will be -- an influence due not only to the "spontaneous" development of the economic struggle but also to the direct and conscious effort of the socialist trade union members to influence their comrades. But a broad organization cannot apply the methods of strict secrecy (since the latter demands far greater training than is required for the economic struggle). How is the contradiction between the need for a large membership and the need for strictly secret methods to be reconciled? How are we to make the trade unions as little clandestine as possible? Generally speaking, there can be only two ways to this end:

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in the "Rules for a Trade Union Workers' Organization," of October 1900 (special leaflet printed in St. Petersburg and quoted in the Iskra, No. 1). The fundamental defect of both these sets of rules is that they give a detailed formulation of a broad workers' organization and confuse it with an organization of revolutionaries. Let us take the last-mentioned set of rules, since it is drawn up in greater detail. The body of it consists of fifty-two paragraphs. Twenty-three paragraphs deal with structure, the method of conducting business and the jurisdiction of the "workers' circles," which are to be organized in every factory ("not more than ten persons") and which elect "central (factory) groups." "The central group," says paragraph 2, "observes all that goes on in its factory or workshop and keeps a record of events." "The central group presents to subscribers a monthly financial account" (par. 17), etc. Ten paragraphs are devoted to the "district organization," and nineteen to the highly complex interconnection between the "Committee of the Workers' Organization" and the "Committee of the St. Petersburg League of Struggle" (delegates from each district and from the "executive groups" -- "groups of propagandists, groups for maintaining contact with the provinces and with the organization abroad, groups for managing stores, publications and funds").

    Social-Democracy= "executive groups" in relation to the economic struggle of the workers! It would be difficult to find a more striking illustration of how the Economists' ideas deviate from Social-Democracy to trade unionism, and how alien to them is any idea that a Social-Democrat must concern himself first and foremost with an organization of revolutionaries who are capable of guiding the whole proletarian struggle for emancipation. To talk of "the political emancipation of the working class" and of the struggle against "tsarist

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despotism," and yet to draft rules like this, indicates a complete failure to understand what the real political tasks of Social-Democracy are. Not one of the fifty or so paragraphs reveals the slightest glimmer of understanding that it is necessary to conduct the widest possible political agitation among the masses, an agitation that deals with every aspect of Russian absolutism and with all the features of the various social classes in Russia. Rules like these are of no use even for the achievement of trade union aims, let alone political aims, for that requires organization according to trades, of which no mention is made in the Rules.

    But most characteristic of all, perhaps, is the amazing top-heaviness of the whole "system," which attempts to bind each single factory with the "committee" by a permanent string of uniform and ludicrously petty rules and a three-stage system of election. Hemmed in by the narrow outlook of Economism, the mind is lost in details which positively reek of red tape and bureaucracy. In practice, of course, three-fourths of the clauses are never applied; on the other hand, however, a "conspiratorial" organization of this kind, with its central group in each factory, makes it very easy for the gendarmes to carry out raids on a vast scale. The Polish comrades have already passed through a similar phase in their movement, when everybody was enthusiastic about the extensive organization of workers' benefit funds; but they very quickly abandoned this idea when they saw that such organizations only provided rich harvests for the gendarmes. If we are out for wide workers' organizations, and not for widespread arrests, if we do not want to provide satisfaction to the gendarmes, we must aim to have these organizations remain entirely informal. But will they be able to function in that case? Well, let us see what the functions are: ". . . to observe all that goes on in the

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factory and keep a record of events." (Par. 2 of the Rules.) Do we really require a formal group for this? Could not the purpose be better served by correspondence to the illegal papers and without setting up special groups? ". . . To lead the struggles of the workers for the improvement of their workshop conditions." (Par. 3 of the Rules.) This, too, requires no formal group. Any sensible agitator can establish just what demands the workers want to advance in the course of ordinary conversation and transmit them to a narrow -- not a wide -- organization of revolutionaries to be embodied in a leaflet. ". . . To organize a fund . . . to which subscriptions of two kopeks per ruble should be made" (par. 9) . . . to present to subscribers a monthly financial account (par. 17) . . . to expel members who fail to pay dues (par. 10), and so forth. Why, this is a very paradise for the police; for nothing would be easier than for them to penetrate into the ponderous secrecy of a "central factory fund," confiscate the money and arrest all the best people. Would it not be simpler to issue one-kopek or two-kopek coupons bearing the official stamp of a well-known (very exclusive and very secret) organization, or to make collections without coupons of any kind and to print reports in a certain agreed code in an illegal paper? The object would thereby be attained, but it would be a hundred times more difficult for the gendarmes to pick up clues.

    I could go on analyzing the Rules, but I think that what has been said will suffice. A small, compact core of the most reliable, experienced and hardened workers, with responsible representatives in the principal districts and connected by all the rules of strict secrecy with the organization of revolutionaries, can, with the widest support of the masses and without any formal organization, perform all the functions of

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a trade union organization, and perform them, moreover, in a manner desirable to Social-Democracy. Only in this way can we secure the consolidation and development of a Social-Democratic trade union movement, in spite of all the gendarmes.

    It may be objected that an organization which is so loose that it is not even definitely formed, and which even has no enrolled and registered membership, cannot be called an organization at all. That may very well be. I am not out for names. But this "organization without members" will do everything that is required, and from the very outset guarantee the closest contact between our future trade unions and Socialism. Only an incorrigible utopian would want a broad organization of workers, with elections, reports, universal suffrage, etc., under the autocracy.

    The moral to be drawn from this is a simple one: if we begin with the solid foundation of a strong organization of revolutionaries, we can guarantee the stability of the movement as a whole and carry out the aims of both Social-Democracy and of trade unions proper. If, however, we begin with a broad workers' organization, supposed to be most "accessible" to the masses (but as a matter of fact most accessible to the gendarmes and making the revolutionaries most accessible to the police), we shall achieve neither one nor the other of these aims; we shall not eliminate our amateurishness, and because we remain scattered and our forces are constantly broken up by the police, we shall only make the trade unions of the Zubatov and Ozerov type most accessible to the masses.

    What, properly speaking, should be the functions of an organization of revolutionaries? We shall deal with this in detail. But first let us examine a very typical argument advanced by our terrorist, who (sad fate!) in this matter also is a next-

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door neighbour to the Economist. The Svoboda (No. 1), a journal published for workers, contains an article entitled "Organization," the author of which tries to defend his friends, the Economist workers of Ivanovo-Voznesensk. He writes:

    "It is a bad thing when the crowd is mute and unenlightened, and when the movement does not proceed from the rank and file. For instance, the students of a university town leave for their homes during the summer and other vacations and immediately the workers' movement comes to a standstill. Can a workers' movement which has to be pushed on from outside be a real force? Of course not! . . . It has not yet learned to walk, it is still in leading strings. So it is in everything. The students go off, and everything comes to a standstill. The most capable among the cream are arrested -- the milk turns sour. If the 'committee' is arrested, everything comes to a standstill until a new one can be formed. And one never knows what sort of committee will be set up next -- it may be nothing like the former one. The first preached one thing, the second may preach the very opposite. Continuity between yesterday and tomorrow is broken, the experience of the past does not serve as a guide for the future. And all this is because no deep roots have been struck in the crowd; the work is carried on not by a hundred fools, but by a dozen wise men. A dozen wise men can be wiped out at a snap, but when the organization embraces the crowd everything proceeds from the crowd, and nobody, however he tries, can stop the cause." (P. 63.)

    The facts are described correctly. They provide a fairly good picture of our amateurishness. But the conclusions are worthy of the Rabochaya Mysl both for their stupidity and their lack of political tact. They represent the height of stupidity, because the author confuses the philosophical and social-historical question of the "depth" of the "roots" of the movement with the technical and organizational question of the best method of fighting the gendarmes. They represent the height of political tactlessness, because the author, instead of appealing from bad leaders to good leaders, appeals from

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organization of leaders that maintains continuity; 2) that the wider the masses spontaneously drawn into the struggle, forming the basis of the movement and participating in it, the more urgent the need of such an organization, and the more solid this organization must be (for it is much easier for demagogues to sidetrack the more backward sections of the masses); 3) that such an organization must consist chiefly of people professionally engaged in revolutionary activity; 4) that in an autocratic state, the more we confine the membership of such an organization to people who are professionally engaged in revolutionary activity and who have been professionally trained in the art of combating the political police, the more difficult will it be to wipe out such an organization, and 5) the greater will be the number of people of the working class and of the other classes of society who will be able to join the movement and perform active work in it.

    I invite our Economists, terrorists and "Economists-terrorists"* to confute these propositions. At the moment, I shall deal only with the last two points. The question as to whether it is easier to wipe out "a dozen wise men" or "a hundred fools" reduces itself to the question we have considered above,

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namely, whether it is possible to have a mass organization when the maintenance of strict secrecy is essential. We can never give a mass organization that degree of secrecy without which there can be no question of persistent and continuous struggle against the government. But to concentrate all secret functions in the hands of as small a number of professional revolutionaries as possible does not mean that the latter will "do the thinking for all" and that the crowd will not take an active part in the movement. On the contrary, the crowd will advance from its ranks increasing numbers of professional revolutionaries; for it will know that it is not enough for a few students and for a few workingmen waging the economic struggle, to gather together and form a "committee," but that it takes years to train oneself to be a professional revolutionary; the crowd will "think" not of amateurish methods alone but of such training. The centralization of the secret functions of the organization by no means implies the centralization of all the functions of the movement. The active participation of the widest mass in the illegal press will not diminish because a "dozen" professional revolutionaries centralize the secret functions connected with this work; on the contrary, it will increase tenfold. In this way, and in this way alone, will we ensure that reading of illegal literature, writing for it, and to some extent even distributing it, will almost cease to be secret work, for the police will soon come to realize the folly and futility of setting the whole judicial and administrative machine into motion to intercept every copy of publication that is being broadcast in thousands. This applies not only to the press, but to every function of the movement, even to demonstrations. The active and widespread participation of the masses will not suffer; on the contrary, it will benefit by the fact that a "dozen" experienced

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revolutionaries, trained professionally no less than the police, will centralize all the secret aspects of the work -- drawing up leaflets, working out approximate plans and appointing bodies of leaders for each urban district, for each factory district and for each educational institution, etc. (I know that exception will be taken to my "undemocratic" views, but I shall reply fully to this anything but intelligent objection later on.) The centralization of the most secret functions in an organization of revolutionaries will not diminish, but rather increase the extent and quality of the activity of a large number of other organizations which are intended for a broad public and are therefore as loose and as non-secret as possible, such as workers' trade unions, workers' self-education circles and circles for reading illegal literature, socialist and also democratic circles among all other sections of the population, etc., etc. We must have such circles, trade unions and organizations everywhere in as large a number as possible and with the widest variety of functions; but it would be absurd and dangerous to confuse them with the organization of revolutionaries, to obliterate the border line between them, to dim still more the masses' already incredibly hazy appreciation of the fact that in order to "serve" the mass movement we must have people who will devote themselves exclusively to Social-Democratic activities, and that such people must train themselves patiently and steadfastly to be professional revolutionaries.

    Yes, this appreciation has become incredibly dim. Our chief sin with regard to organization is that by our amateurishness we have lowered the prestige of revolutionaries in Russia. A person who is flabby and shaky in questions of theory, who has a narrow outlook, who pleads the spontaneity of the masses as an excuse for his own sluggishness, who resembles

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    We have already heard from B-v about "the lack of revolutionary forces fit for action which is felt not only in St. Petersburg, but throughout the whole of Russia." Hardly anyone will dispute this fact. But the question is, how is it to be explained? B-v writes:

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    "We shall not go into an explanation of the historical causes of this phenomenon; we shall merely state that a society, demoralized by prolonged political reaction and split by past and present economic changes, advances from its own ranks an extremely small number of persons fit for revolutionary work; that the working class does advance revolutionary workers who to some extent reinforce the ranks of the illegal organizations, but that the number of such revolutionaries is inadequate to meet the requirements of the times. This is all the more so because the worker who spends eleven and a half hours a day in the factory is in such a position that he can perform, mainly, the functions of an agitator; but propaganda and organization, delivery and reproduction of illegal literature, issuing leaflets, etc., are duties which must necessarily fall mainly upon the shoulders of an extremely small force of intellectuals." (Rabocheye Dyelo, No. 6, pp. 38-39.)

    On many points we disagree with B-v, particularly with the words we have emphasized, and which bring out most saliently that, although weary of our amateurishness (as is every practical worker who thinks over the position), B-v cannot find the way out of this intolerable situation, because he is ground down by Economism. The fact of the matter is that society advances very many persons fit for "work," but we are unable to make use of them all. The critical, transitional state of our movement in this respect may be formulated as follows: there are no people -- yet there is a mass of people. There is a mass of people, because the working class and ever more diverse strata of society, year after year, advance from their ranks an increasing number of discontented people who desire to protest, who are ready to render all the assistance they can in the fight against absolutism, the intolerableness of which is not yet recognized by all, but is nevertheless more and more acutely sensed by increasing masses of the people. At the same time we have no people, because we have no leaders, no political leaders, no talented organizers capable of arranging extensive and at the same time uniform and harmonious work that would employ all forces, even the most in-

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imbue not only one's own army with confidence in its strength, but it is important also to convince the enemy and all neutral elements of this strength; friendly neutrality may sometimes decide the issue. If such an organization existed, one built up on a firm theoretical foundation and possessing a Social-Democratic journal, we would have no reason to fear that the movement might be diverted from its path by the numerous "outside" elements that are attracted to it. (On the contrary, it is precisely at the present time, with amateurishness prevalent, that we see many Social-Democrats leaning towards the Credo, and only imagining that they are Social-Democrats.) In a word, specialization necessarily presupposes centralization, and in its turn imperatively calls for it.

    But B-v himself, who has so excellently described the necessity for specialization, underestimates its importance, in our opinion, in the second part of the argument that we have quoted. The number of working-class revolutionaries is inadequate, he says. This is perfectly true, and once again we stress that the "valuable communication of a close observer" fully confirms our view of the causes of the present crisis in Social-Democracy, and, consequently, of the means required for overcoming it. Not only are revolutionaries in general lagging behind the spontaneous awakening of the masses, but even working-class revolutionaries are lagging behind the spontaneous awakening of the working-class masses. And this fact most strikingly confirms, even from the "practical" point of view, not only the absurdity but even the political reactionariness of the "pedagogics" to which we are so often treated when discussing our duties to our workers. This fact proves that our very first and most imperative duty is to help to train working-class revolutionaries who will be

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on the same level in regard to Party activity as the revolutionaries from amongst the intellectuals (we emphasize the words "in regard to Party activity," because although necessary, it is neither so easy nor so imperative to bring the workers up to the level of intellectuals in other respects). Therefore, attention must be devoted principally to raising the workers to the level of revolutionaries; it is not at all our task to descend to the level of the "working masses" as the Economists wish to do, or to the level of the "average worker," as the Svoboda desires to do (which thus ascends to the second grade of Economist "pedagogics"). I am far from denying the necessity for popular literature for the workers, and especially popular (but, of course, not vulgar) literature for the especially backward workers. But what annoys me is this constant confusion of pedagogics with questions of politics and organization. You, gentlemen, who are so much concerned about the "average worker," as a matter of fact, rather insult the workers by your desire to talk down to them when discussing working-class politics and working-class organization. Talk about serious things in a serious manner, leave pedagogics to the pedagogues, and not to politicians, nor to organizers! Are there not advanced people, "average people," and the "mass," among the intelligentsia too? Does not everyone recognize that popular literature is also required for the intelligentsia and is not such literature written? Just imagine someone, in an article on organizing college or high-school students, repeating over and over again, as if he had made a new discovery, that first of all we must have an organization of "average students." The author of such an article would be ridiculed, and rightly so. He would be told: give us your ideas on organization, if you have any, and we ourselves will decide who is "aver-

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waste our strength in a positively shameful manner; we lack the ability to husband that which should be tended and reared with special care. Look at the Germans: they have a hundred times more forces than we have. But they understand perfectly well that the "average" does not too frequently promote really capable agitators, etc., from its ranks. That is why they immediately try to place every capable workingman in such conditions as will enable him to develop and apply his abilities to the utmost: he is made a professional agitator, he is encouraged to widen the held of his activity, to spread it from one factory to the whole of the industry, from one locality to the whole country. He acquires experience and dexterity in his profession, he broadens his outlook and increases his knowledge, he observes at close quarters the prominent political leaders from other localities and of other parties, he strives to rise to their level and combine within himself the knowledge of working-class environment and freshness of socialist convictions with professional skill, without which the proletariat cannot wage a stubborn struggle against its excellently trained enemies. In this way and in this way alone does the mass of workers produce men like Bebel and Auer. But what in a politically free country takes place very largely automatically must in Russia be done deliberately and systematically by our organizations. A worker-agitator who is at all talented and "promising" must not be left to work eleven hours a day in a factory. We must arrange that he be maintained by the Party, that he may go underground in good time, that he change the place of his activity, otherwise he will not enlarge his experience, he will not widen his outlook, and will not be able to hold out for at least a few years in the fight against the gendarmes. As the spontaneous rise of the working-class

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masses becomes wider and deeper, they promote from their ranks not only an increasing number of talented agitators, but also talented organizers, propagandists and "practical workers" in the best sense of the term (of whom there are so few among our intelligentsia who, for the most part, in the Russian manner, are somewhat careless and sluggish in their habits). When we have detachments of specially trained worker-revolutionaries who have gone through extensive preparation (and, of course, revolutionaries "of all arms"), no political police in the world will then be able to contend against them, for these detachments of men absolutely devoted to the revolution will themselves enjoy the absolute confidence of the widest masses of the workers. And we are directly to blame for doing too little to "stimulate" the workers to take this path, common to them and to the "intellectuals," of professional revolutionary training, and that we too frequently drag them back by our silly speeches about what "can be understood" by the masses of the workers, by the "average workers," etc.

    In this, as in other respects, the narrow scope of our organizational work is without a doubt directly due to the fact (although the overwhelming majority of the "Economists" and the novices in practical work do not appreciate it) that we restrict our theories and our political tasks to a narrow field. Worship of spontaneity seems to inspire a fear of taking even one step away from what "can be understood" by the masses, a fear of rising too high above mere subservience to the immediate and direct requirements of the masses. Have no fear, gentlemen! Remember that we stand so low on the plane of organization that the very idea that we could rise too high is absurd!

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    And yet there are many people among us who are so sensitive to the "voice of life" that they fear it more than anything in the world and accuse those who adhere to the views here expounded of Narodnaya Volya-ism, of failing to understand "democracy," etc. We have to deal with these accusations, which, of course, have been echoed by the Rabocheye Dyelo.

    The writer of these lines knows very well that the St. Petersburg Economists even accused the Rabochaya Gazeta of being Narodnaya Volya-ite (which is quite understandable when one compares it with the Rabochaya Mysl ). We were not in the least surprised, therefore, when, soon after the appearance of the Iskra, a comrade informed us that the Social-Democrats in the town of X describe the Iskra as a Narodnaya Volya-ite journal. We, of course, were flattered by this accusation, for what decent Social-Democrat has not been accused by the Economists of being a Narodnaya Volya-ite?

    These acusations are the result of a twofold misunderstanding. First the history of the revolutionary movement is so little known among us that the name "Narodnaya Volya" is used to denote any idea of a militant centraiized organization which declares determined war upon tsarism. But the magnificent organization that the revolutionaries had in the 'seventies, and which should serve us as a model, was not established by the Narodnaya Volya-ites, but by the Zemlya i Volya-ites, who split up into the Cherny Peredel and Narodnaya Volya. Consequently, to regard a militant revolutionary organization as something specifically Narod-

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naya Volya-ite is absurd both historically and logically, because no revolutionary tendency, if it seriously thinks of fighting, can dispense with such an organization. The mistake the Narodnaya Volya-ites committed was not that they strove to enlist in their organization all the discontented, and to direct this organization to decisive battle against the autocracy; on the contrary, that was their great historical merit. Their mistake was that they relied on a theory which in substance was not a revolutionary at all, and they either did not know how, or were unable, inseparably to link up their movement with the class struggle within developing capitalist society. And only a gross failure to understand Marxism (or an "understanding" of it in the spirit of Struve-ism) could prompt the opinion that the rise of a mass, spontaneous working-class movement relieves us of the duty of creating as good an organization of revolution aries as the Zemlya i Volya had, and even an incomparably better one. On the contrary, this movement imposes this duty upon us, because the spontaneous struggle of the proletariat will not become its genuine "class struggle" until this struggle is led by a strong organization of revolutionaries.

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sity is centralized, may too easily rush into a premature attack, may thoughtlessly intensify the movement before the growth of political discontent, the intensity of the ferment and anger of the working class, etc., have made such an attack possible and necessary. To this we reply: speaking abstractly, it cannot be denied, of course, that a militant organization may thoughtlessly commence a battle, which may end in defeat, that might have been avoided under other circumstances. But we cannot confine ourselves to abstract reasoning on such a question, because every battle bears within itself the abstract possibility of defeat, and there is no other way of reducing this possibility than by organized preparation for battle. If, however, we proceed from the concrete conditions at present prevailing in Russia, we must come to the positive conclusion that a strong revolutionary organization is absolutely necessary precisely for the purpose of giving firmness to the movement, and of safeguarding it against the possibility of making premature attacks. It is precisely at the present time, when no such organization exists yet, and when the revolutionary movement is rapidly and spontaneously growing, that we already observe two opposite extremes (which, as is to be expected, "meet"), i.e., absolutely unsound Economism and the preaching of moderation, and equally unsound "excitative terror," which "strives artificially to call forth symptoms of its end in a movement which is developing and becoming strong, but which is as yet nearer to its beginning than to its end." (V. Zasulich, in the Zarya, No. 2-3, p. 353.) And the example of the Rabocheye Dyelo shows that there are already Social-Democrats who give way to both these extremes. This is not surprising because, apart from other reasons, the "economic struggle against the employers and the government" can never satisfy

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revolutionaries, and because opposite extremes will always arise here and there. Only a centralized, militant organization that consistently carries out a Social-Democratic policy, that satisfies, so to speak, all revolutionary instincts and strivings, can safeguard the movement against making thoughtless attacks and prepare attacks that hold out the promise of success.

    A further objection may be raised, viz., that the views on organization here expounded contradict the "principles of democracy." Now while the first-mentioned accusation was specifically Russian in origin, this one is specifically foreign in character. And only an organization abroad (the Union of Russian Social-Democrats) was capable of giving its editorial board instructions like the following:

    "Principles of Organization. In order to secure the successful development and unification of Social-Democracy, broad democratic principles of Party organization must be emphasized, developed and fought for; and this is particularly necessary in view of the antidemocratic tendencies that have become revealed in the ranks of our Party." (Two Congresses, p. 18.)

    We shall see in the next chapter how the Rabocheye Dyelo fights against the Iskra's "antidemocratic tendencies." For the present we shall examine more closely the "principle" that the Economists advance. Everyone will probably agree that "broad democratic principles" presuppose the two following conditions: first, full publicity, and second, election to all offices. It would be absurd to speak about democracy without publicity, that is, a publicity that is not limited to the membership of the organization. We call the German Socialist Party a democratic organization because all it does is done publicly; even its party congresses are held in public. But no one would call democratic an organization that is hidden from every one but its members by a veil of secrecy.

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What is the use, then, of advancing "broad democratic principles" when the fundamental condition for these principles cannot be fulfilled by a secret organization? "Broad principles" turns out to be a resonant but hollow phrase. More, it reveals a total lack of understanding of the urgent tasks in regard to organization. Everyone knows how great is the lack of secrecy among the "broad" masses of our revolutionaries. We have heard the bitter complaints of B-v on this score, and his absolutely just demand for a "strict selection of members." (Rabocheye Dyelo, No. 6, p. 42.) Yet, persons who boast a keen "sense of realities" urge, in a situation like this, not the strictest secrecy and the strictest (and therefore more restricted) selection of members but "broad democratic principles"! This is what we call being absolutely wide of the mark.

    Nor is the situation any better with regard to the second attribute of democracy, namely, the principle of election. In politically free countries, this condition is taken for granted. "Membership of the Party is open to those who accept the principles of the Party program and render the Party all possible support" -- reads clause I of the rules of the German Social-Democratic Party. And as the entire political arena is as open to the public view as is a theatre stage to the audience, this acceptance or non-acceptance, support or opposition, is known to all from the press and public meetings. Everyone knows that a certain political figure began in such and such a way, passed through such and such an evolution, behaved in a trying moment in such and such a way and possesses such and such qualities and, consequently, all party members, knowing all the facts, can elect or refuse to elect this person to a particular party office. The universal

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control (in the literal sense of the term) exercised over every act of a party man in the political field brings into existence an automatically operating mechanism which produces what in biology is called "survival of the fittest." The "natural selection" by full publicity, election and universal control provides the guarantee that, in the last analysis, every political figure will be "in his proper place," will do the work for which he is best fitted by his capacity and abilities, will feel the effects of his mistakes on himself, and will prove before all the world his ability to recognize mistakes and to avoid them.

    Just try to put this picture into the frame of our autocracy! Is it conceivable in Russia for all those "who accept the principles of the Party program and render the Party all possible support" to control every action of the revolutionary working in secret? Is it possible for all the revolutionaries to elect one of their number to any particular office, when, in the very interests of the work, he must conceal his identity from nine out of ten of these "all"? Ponder a little over the real meaning of the high-sounding phrases to which the Rabocheye Dyelo gives utterance, and you will realize that "broad democracy" in Party organization, amidst the gloom of the autocracy and the domination of gendarme selection, is nothing more than a useless and harmful toy. It is a useless toy because, as a matter of fact, no revolutionary organization has ever practised, or could practise, broad democracy, however much it desired to do so. It is a harmful toy because any attempt to practise the "broad democratic principles" will simply facilitate the work of the police in carrying out large-scale raids, it will perpetuate the prevailing amateurishness, divert the thoughts

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of the practical workers from the serious and imperative task of training themselves to become professional revolutionaries to that of drawing up detailed "paper" rules for election systems. Only abroad, where people who have no opportunity of doing real live work gather togethet very often, could this "playing at democracy" develop here and there, especially in various small groups.

    In order to show how implausible is the Rabocheye Dyelo's favourite trick of advancing the plausible "principle" of democracy in revolutionary affairs, we shall again call a witness. This witness, E. Serebryakov, the editor of the London magazine, Nakanunye, has a tender feeling for the Rabocheye Dyelo, and is filled with great hatred for Plekhanov and the "Plekhanovites." In its articles on the split in the Union of Russian Social-Democrats Abroad, the Nakanunye definitely sided with the Rabocheye Dyelo and poured a stream of abuse upon Plekhanov. All the more valuable, therefore, is this witness in the question at issue. In No. 7 of the Nakanunye (July 1899), in an article entitled "The Manifesto of the Self-Emancipation of the Workers Group," E. Serebryakov argues that it was "indecent" to talk about such things as "self-deception, leadership and so-called Areopagus in a serious revolutionary movement" and, among other things, wrote:

    "Myshkin, Rogachov, Zhelyabov, Mikhailov, Perovskaya, Figner and others never regarded themselves as leaders, and no one ever elected or appointed them as such, although as a matter of fact, they were leaders because, in the propaganda period, as well as in the period of the fight against the government, they took the brunt of the work upon themselves, they went into the most dangerous places and their activities were the most fruitful. They became leaders not because they wished it, but because the comrades surrounding them had confidence in their wisdom, their energy and loyalty. To be afraid of some kind of

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Areopagus (if it is not feared, why write about it?) that would arbitrarily govern the movement is far too naïve. Who would obey it?'!

    We ask the reader, in what way does "Areopagus" differ from "antidemocratic tendencies"? And is it not evident that the Rabocheye Dyelo's "plausible" organizational principle is equally naïve and indecent; naïve, because no one would obey "Areopagus," or people with "antidemocratic tendencies," if "the comrades surrounding them had" no "confidence in their wisdom, energy and loyalty"; indecent, because it is a demagogic sally calculated to play on the conceit of some, on the ignorance of others regarding the actual state of our movement, and on the lack of training and ignorance of the history of the revolutionary movement of still others. The only serious organizational principle for the active workers of our movement should be the strictest selection of members and the training of professlonal revolutionaries. Given these qualities, something even more than "democracy" would be guaranteed to us, namely, complete, comradely, mutual confidence among revolutionaries. And this is absolutely essential for us because there can be no question of replacing it by universal democratic control in Russia. And it would be a great mistake to believe that the fact that it is impossible to establish real "democratic" control renders the members of the revolutionary organization beyond control altogether. They have not the time to think about the toy forms of democracy (democracy within a close and compact body of comrades in which complete, mutual confidence prevails), but they have a lively sense of their responsibility, knowing as they do from experience that an organization of real revolutionaries will stop at nothing to rid itself of an undesirable member. Moreover, there is a fairly well-developed public opinion in

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Russian (and international) revolutionary circles which has a long history behind it, and which sternly and ruthlessly punishes every departure from the duties of comradeship (and "democracy," real and not toy democracy, certainly forms a component part of the conception of comradeship). Take all this into consideration and you will realize that all this talk and these resolutions about "antidemocratic tendencies" have the musty smell of that playing at generalship which is indulged in abroad.

    It must be observed also that the other source of this talk, i.e., naïveté, is likewise fostered by the confusion of ideas concerning the meaning of democracy. In Mr. and Mrs. Webb's book on the British trade unions there is an interesting chapter entitled "Primitive Democracy." In it the authors relate how the British workers, in the first period of existence of their unions, thought that it was an indispensable sign of democracy for all the members to do all the work of managing the unions; not only were all questions decided by the vote of all the members, but all the official duties were fulfilled by all the members in turn. A long period of historical experience was required for workers to realize how absurd such a conception of democracy was and to make them understand the necessity for representative institutions, on the one hand, and for full-time officials, on the other. Only after a number of cases of financial bankruptcy of trade unions occurred did the workers realize that the ratio between dues and benefits cannot be decided merely by a democratic vote, but requires also the advice of insurance experts. Take also Kautsky's book on parliamentarism and legislation by the people and you will see that the conclusions drawn by the Marxist theoretician coincide

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with the lessons learned from many years of practical experience by the workers who organized "spontaneously." Kautsky strongly protests against Rittinghausen's primitive conception of democracy; he ridicules those who in the name of democracy demand that "popular newspapers shall be directly edited by the people"; he shows the need for professional journalists, parliamentarians, etc., for the Social-Democratic leadership of the proletarian class struggle; he attacks the "Socialism of anarchists and litterateurs," who in their "striving after effect" extol direct legislation by the whole people, completely failing to understand that this idea can be only relatively applied in modern society.

    Those who have performed practical work in our movement know how widespread is the "primitive" conception of democracy among the masses of the students and workers. It is not surprising that this conception penetrates into rules of organization and into literature. The Economists of the Bernstein persuasion included in their rules the following: "§10. All affairs affecting the interests of the whole of the union organization shall be decided by a majority vote of all its members." The Economists of the terrorist persuasion repeat after them: "The decisions of the committee shall become effective only after they have been circulated among all the circles." (Svoboda, No. 1, p. 67.) Observe that this proposal for a widely applied referendum is advanced in addition to the demand that the whole of the organization be built on an elective basis! We would not, of course, on this account condemn practical workers who have had too few opportunities for studying the theory and practice of real democratic organizations. But when the Rabocheye Dyelo, which lays claim to leadership, confines itself, under such

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    The objections raised against the organization plan outlined here on the grounds that it is undemocratic and conspiratorial are totally unsound. Nevertheless, a question still remains which is frequently put and deserves detailed examination. This is the question about the relations between local work and all-Russian work. Fears are expressed that the formation of a centralized organization may shift the centre of gravity from the former to the latter, damage the movement, weaken our contacts with the masses of the workers and undermine local agitation generally. To these fears we reply that our movement in the past few years has suffered precisely from the fact that the local workers have been too absorbed in local work; that therefore it is absolutely necessary to shift the centre of gravity somewhat to national work and that far from weakening, this would strengthen our ties and the continuity of our local agitation. Take the question of central and local newspapers. I would ask the reader not to forget that we cite the publication of newspapers only as an example, illustrating an immeasurably broader and more varied revolutionary activity in general.

    In the first period of the mass movement (1896-98), an attempt is made by local Party workers to publish an all-Russian paper, the Rabochaya Gazeta. In the next period (1898-1900), the movement makes an enormous stride, but the attention of the leaders is wholly absorbed by local publications. If we count up all the local papers that were

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