Great Conversation. Personally, aside from the obvious, the Bolsheviks won the revolution, the question of Leninism has always perplexed me on two fronts. Firstly, the conflict between the Bolsheviks and the Mensheviks seems to already foreshadow the problems of organization specifical fratricidal sectarianism that would culminate in the repression of the Kronstad workers rebellion. Centralization of power may be practical if and only class composition demonstrates the level of backwardness characteristic of the Russian experience in the 1900's. The vanguard here is necessary to galvanize the backward elements, and provide technical leadership with the sole purpose of organizing a mass front. The second concern drawing from the context of the first is the economic problem of the division of labor. As a former card carrying member of the IWW my experience with trade unionism has made me critical of the elements of the working class that assume roles of leadership whether by election, delegation, or sortion. When there is a class of workers that are above the regular workers, who sustain their activity on membership dues or the labor of the day to day cadre, tension can arise simply because of the issue of representation. In the pre-Lenin International model the same questions of membership, leadership, and representation are at play, yet the international scope of the organization prevents the problem of "highest levels" while exacerbating the problem of cults of personality, and sectarianism.
To me these issues of division of labor are insurmountable. Democracy is a model of both absolute government and procedure. I once was a co-owner in a worker owned cooperative, the model of democratic centralism was debated ad nauseum until we developed an alternative called consensus deliberation. Under consensus deliberation the entire democratic structure could not proceed with any action without consensus derived from voting procedure, supermajorities, or abstention. In practice meetings over small issues would take hours to resolve with the most typical solution being, abstention of the dissenters and in some cases dissenters would leave the organization frustrated and disillusioned. On the flip side, workers developed personal relationships amongst each other which devolved into fratricidal voting blocs eroding the efficacy of "one person one vote," creating "the highest level" and undermining minority rights. Imperfect as the system of consensus was, the structure was at least functional enough to run the day to day business of the cooperative in a way that included the voices of all the workers. Based on these organizational failures I personally am discouraged by both Leninism and participatory models that centralize decision making power into the hands of a small cadre of representatives. It is my argument that the division of labor necessitates the individuation of priorities against the dubious nature of combined interest. This requires qualitative attunement to the specificity of the condition of the organization. Every individual carries unique skills, idiosyncrasies, varying temperaments, and preconscious investments in class consciousness that require mediation with the quantitative i.e the quantity of work expected, the gross number of workers required to be present for quorum, the concrete objectives of a mass organization i.e the management of socially necessary labor. If I was to propose an alternative it would be collective sortion. All necessary labor should be planned by workers in a democratic forum but implementation should be rotationally delegated to those who are both willing and able to carry out the task. In this inverted leadership model, the highest level becomes the lowest. The organization manages the quantitative necessary labor collectively and leadership is tasked with the qualitative tasks of implementation. Success and failure can be measured and judged collectively and tactical leaders can never reach a higher level than the collective organization. Great discussion Cheers, Ben On Tue, Dec 2, 2025 at 10:40 PM Mark Baugher via groups.io ( http://groups.io ) <mark= [email protected] > wrote: > > Hi Hari, > > > On Nov 29, 2025, at 05:49, hari kumar via groups.io ( http://groups.io ) > <hari6.kumar= [email protected] > wrote: > > > > > > ... > > > > > > > -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Groups.io Links: You receive all messages sent to this group. View/Reply Online (#39582): https://groups.io/g/marxmail/message/39582 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]] -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
