> On Nov 30, 2025, at 18:52, Marv Gandall via groups.io > <[email protected]> wrote: > > Lenin was present at the 10th Congress in 1921 and, in fact, presided over > it. It was he who recommended the ban on factions (part 4, pt. 6): > https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1921/10thcong/index.htm
The 10th Congress coincided with the Kronstadt Rebellion and resulted in a ban on factions and a move to more centralism, as Marv explained. Two months later, however, Lenin collaborated on guidelines for party organization, https://www.marxists.org/history/international/comintern/3rd-congress/riddell-translations/Communist-Party-organization.htm, for the Third Congress of the Communist International: The "Theses on the Organisational Structure of the Communist Parties and the Methods and Content of their Work" used the term "proletarian democracy" and never mentioned centralism without "democratic" put in front of it. About a year earlier, the Second International Congress of the Communist International published the Theses that David mentioned. It uses "iron proletarian centralism" and no reference to "proletarian democracy" (https://www.marxists.org/history/international/comintern/2nd-congress/ch03a.htm). It offered a hierarchical vision of democratic centralism: "The Communist Party must be built up on the basis of democratic centralism. The chief principle of democratic centralism is the election of the higher party cells by the lower, the unconditional and indispensable binding authority of all of the instructions of the higher bodies for the lower and the existence of a strong party centre whose authority is generally recognised for all leading party comrades in the period from one party conference to another." As others have pointed out, democratic centralism does not originate with Lenin. It is a natural way for people to organize ourselves when we need to (1) come to an agreement as peers before taking action and (2) committing to joint action and not to undermine it. By 1920, the Comintern imposed a hierarchy of "indispensable and binding authority" upon democratic centralism seemingly without providing any democratic guarantees against arbitrary authority, such as when someone in Moscow decides who the head of a national party is going to be. Mark -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Groups.io Links: You receive all messages sent to this group. View/Reply Online (#39564): https://groups.io/g/marxmail/message/39564 Mute This Topic: https://groups.io/mt/116549413/21656 -=-=- POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. #4 Do not exceed five posts a day. -=-=- Group Owner: [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://groups.io/g/marxmail/leave/13617172/21656/1316126222/xyzzy [[email protected]] -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
