Actually, I think it is of historical interest only that Lenin changed his
mind in changed circumstnces in 1918. The question is, does supporting the
big bourgeoisie promote the cause in our circumstances? Neither Chris nor
Charles have given any reason to think so. --jks
> >"For the good of the cause, the proletariat will always support not only
> >the vacillating petty bourgeoisie but even the big bourgeoisie"
> >
> >- according to another self-styled communist - one who proposed a change
> >in the name of their party from Social Democratic to Communist, in 1917.
> >
> >He made the remark in the same year. And led a successful revolution.
> >
> >Chris Burford
>
>The only problem is that Lenin openly repudiated this formulation not long
>after it was written. In a report to the Central Committee of the Bolshevik
>Party, he explained the change in his thinking:
>
>"Comrades, the traitorous Kautsky uses our words against us and questions
>why we repudiate the big bourgeoisie in 1918, when previously we announced
>our willingness to extend a hand for the 'good of the cause.' It is not
>surprising that when the vacillators who have mistaken the forward path of
>the masses for a sack of potatoes fallen between two stools when the
>suppression of the counter-revolution dictates a ruthless but cleansing
>stroke of the sword. We understand that the dialectical turn of the clock
>will always strike midnight when the wheat is being gathered. Hence we
>denounce the narrow-mindedness, timidity and book-keeper mentality of the
>Prubylzytelnayo Vgdenayaists [Kautsky's supporters]. They forget the main
>lessons in the struggle against Bogdanov, who also came close to infecting
>the party with the liberal-bourgeois infection of empirico-symbolism
>purchased at the price of a wholesale chicken in a country market is not
>necessarily the same thing as an organic bond with merciless destruction of
>opportunism." (Lenin, Collected Works, Vol 18, p 315)
>
>
>Louis Proyect
>Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org/
>
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