Development of Trotsky's theory of revolution, 1898–1907

DON KARL ROWNEY

Development of Trotsky's Theory of Revolution,1898-1907

As a major figure in the Russian revolutionary movement, LeonTrotsky often dealt with the rhetoric of dialectical and historicalmaterialism. On the other hand. Trotsky's career as an active political leader involved him in protracted and tortuous efforts to justifypolitical practice in the light of generally accepted theory. The question that arises is whether Trotsky's interpretations of theory weregenerated, in a purely opportunistic fashion, to deal with problemsad hoc and as they arose, or whether theory was. in fact. a guide tothe analysis and solution of political problems that Trotsky was forcedto solve.

The Russian Marxist approach to the problem of the role of theoryand the unity of theory and practice is not always polarized betweena voluntarism that effectively denies such a unity except situationally.and a determinism that presumes it to be sine qua non.1 Theoryought to face in two directions: it is both the measure-predictor ofpractice (i.e.• the standard against which the desirability, efficiency,and justice of practical activity can be gauged) and the changing reflection of practice. Thus, theory may be spoken of as a model existing,

1. Arthur P. Mendel, .. Current Soviet Theory of History: New Trendsor Old? .. The American Historical Review, Vol. 72. No . I (February 1966),pp. 65-67. cites several examples of th is among historians anxious. perhaps,to find a compromise between the extremes.

STUDIES IN COMPARATIVE C OMMUNI SM V OL. X, Nos . 1 & 2, SPRING/SUMMER 1977, 18-33

TROTSKY'S THEORY OF REVOLUTION 19

in a dialectical sense, in various .. moments ." In spite of a propensityto view the theory-practice relationship strictly and inflexibly! evenLenin recognized the ambiguity of the relationship. .. The path," hewrote, .. from living observation to abstract thought and from thelatter to practice, that is the dialectical path of the recognition oftruth." 3 Theories and principles, in this sense, are not universalconclusions or even norms to which behavior must conform; theyare the product of an on-going dialogue with the world of action ,the phenomena external to the subject.' Thus , theory is a way ofknowing the world; yet it is a way that is constantly becoming trueras a result of a reflexive interaction between the knower and theworld.

The relation between theory and practice sketched above has beenformally expressed in various ways by theoreticians during the lastsixty years. It is an entirely different matter, however, to ask whethersuch a view was accepted in practice by politicians who might havepreferred either a more deterministic, normative guide to action orwho might have preferred to dispense with theory entirely except inthe most solipsistic sense. Thus the question which this study examinesis whether Trotsky's changing statements on revolutionary strategy,the future of the revolution, the odds for its success-his revolutionarytheory, in short-were mere political rhetoric or whether there isevidence in Trotsky's statements of genuine theory in dialogue withevents.

Trotsky has been described as a flawed, inadequate, or inconsistenttheoretician." To be sure, his writings and speeches from 1898 to 1906reflect small direct interest in Marx and Marxist philosophy. He wasmuch more preoccupied with issues closely related to his time andplace: party organization, revolutionary leadership of the pro-

2. Z. A. Jordan, "The Dialectical Materialism of Lenin," Slavic Review,Vol. 25, No.2 (June 1966), pp, 259-286. Criticizing him as a philosopher ratherthan as the politician he was, Jordan finds Lenin quite a rigid materialist anddeterminist.

3. Quoted in J. M. Bochenski, Soviet Russian Dialectical Materialism(Dordrecht: Reidel, 1963), p. 96, from V. I. Lenin, Filosojskie tetradi (Leningrad, 1933), p, 166.

4. Gustav A. Wetter formulated this notion in highly abstract yet accurateterms: "The cleavage between Idea and reality must not merely be overcome(as with Hegel) in philosophical cognition, it must also be transcended inconcrete, perceptible practice." Dialectical Materialism (New York: Praeger,1958), pp. 257-258.

5. Claude Lefort, Elements d'une critique de la bureaucratie (Geneva: Droz,1971), pp. 22-28. Lefort focuses especially on Trotsky's lack of conceptualconsistency during the struggle for power in the 1920s.

20 STUDIES IN COMPARATIVE COMMUNISM

letariat, competition with Socialist Revolutionaries, economic development of poor, agrarian societies, or survival of a proletarian government in an overwhelmingly peasant society. On the other hand, thisperiod of early development seems to have left Trotsky with a theoretical framework that made it possible for him to avoid dogmatismand yet give conceptual meaning to his political actions. As he suggested in his autobiography, My Life, he came to believe that thedynamic relationship between theory and action, the dialectic, washistorically verified and that history itself was a dynamic, goaloriented process." This framework gave him not only the rhetoricbut also the logic necessary for responding intellectually to practicaldemands of political survival. Thus, Trotsky's theory was less thatof an articulate Marxist philosopher than that of a strategist of socialrevolution. This paper argues that it was a genuine theory because itwas consistent and articulate and because, in spite of its applicabilityto specific political problems in Russia, it was of interest elsewhereespecially in other agrarian, underdeveloped societies. At the sametime, Trotsky's theory was dialectic in the sense that it consciouslytook account of the dynamic relationship of thought , idea, and subject, on the one hand, and engagement, action, praxis, the world, onthe other. It seems evident from Trotsky's writings that he readilyperceived the ambiguity and conflict inherent in theoretically verifiedconclusions and norms and the daily needs of political life. Ratherthan undermine a pristine Marxism that Trotsky never owned, theseconflicts continually reinforced a dialectical view of the world, allowing for yet further theoretical and practical alterations.

The extent to which Trotsky's theoretical constructs and dailytactics were functions of one another may be illustrated by hisresponses to several broad classes of problems. There is a coherentand consistent progression or development of the theory of revolutionin Russia in Trotsky's treatment of these problems, if we judge consistency in a dialectical way. I will summarize this developmentbriefly here and then deal with each stage a little more elaborately.

In the earliest part of his career Trotsky rejected the classicalMarxist notion of the stages of revolution in Russia. The Russianbourgeoisie, he argued, was historically far too weak to create arevolutionary situation. Next, about 1903-1905, he developed hisnotion of the role of the Russian proletariat as the creative sourceof the Russian revolution. In doing this he sought to limit the roleof political parties and to emphasize the role of organizations, which

6. Leon Trotsky, My Life. An Attempt at an Autobiography (New York:Scribner's, 1930), pp. 119-122.


he saw as closer to the proletarian power. This approach is underscored by his political behavior in the same period-his rejection ofthe Leninist (Bolshevik) party and his work in the Revolution of1905 with the St. Petersburg Soviet. Next, in 1906, he reformulatedhis ideas about proletarian power and creativity in the light of the1905 experience. The problem was not whether the workers couldseize power at that stage of the Russian revolution: they had alreadydemonstrated in 1905 that they could do this. The problem waswhether, having seized power, they could hold it. Although 1906 isbest known as the period during which Trotsky formulated the ideaof " permanent revolution," it is important more because it was thenthat he confronted the problem of maintaining the proletarian revolution in a hostile social environment. His answer to this problem, notsurprisingly, was the state. The last period in Trotsky's developmentgoes beyond the scope of this paper. Trotsky in power after 1917created the instruments-or proposed the creation of instruments-ofstate power necessary to realize the positions he formulated earlier.These instruments included the Red Army, the single economicplan, and the reorganization of labor. Thus, in about eight yearsTrotsky developed a theory of revolution which focused, as his earlyreading had taught him to do, on the historical realities such as theweakness of the Russian bourgeoisie and the potential strength, in arevolutionary situation, of the proletariat. The theory underwent successive stages of modification-stages which are linked to Trotsky'sown political experiences. Each time he encountered a major newdeparture in his career, or a major political problem (such as his firstSiberian exile, his work with Iskra, the 1903 Bolshevik-Mensheviksplit, or the Revolution of 1905), there is an attempt to respond, toformulate-and then reformulate-a theory of revolutionary changefor Russia, a largely preindustrial society. Trotsky's interpretation ofthese problems is partly the product of his personal view of Marxism-or, to borrow a phrase from an early source of ideas for Trotsky,"critical communism." In addition, however, his interpretationsreflected the needs of the moment-particularly the all-importantneed of social democratic politicians to survive and to extend theirpower. The immediate needs of the Social Democrats, moreover,were more complex than might first appear to be the case, for, in theirtum, they continually ran afoul of Russia's overwhelmingly agrariantraditions. Throughout Trotsky's political career there are examplesof his viewing Russian society as underdeveloped or as slowly developing. To be sure, his vision continually underwent clarification as he


attempted to express his ideas in different forms and in the contextof changing political challenges. But what is interesting to note isthat his theoretical approach to the problems of Russia's backwardness tends to be guided by the patterns that he encountered in hisearly readings and continued to develop until about 1907.

Early Development: "Critical Communism"

During 1899, while awaiting trial in Odessa prison, Trotsky readwhat was available to him in the prison library, as well as literaturesmuggled in, with the goal either of studying historical materialism,Marxism and its antecedents, or else of learning to criticize otherliterature from the materialist position. His information was garneredfrom many sources: the right-wing" Orthodox Review," pamphletsand books on the phenomenon of freemasonry, and anthropologicaland sociological works. These latter studies included Charles Darwinand the Italian social philosopher Antonio Labriola.' Of Labriola'sworks he wrote:

Although thirty years have gone by since I read his essays, thegeneral trend of his argument is still firmly intrenched in mymemory, together with his continuous refrain, "ideas do notdrop from the sky." After Labriola, all the Russian proponentsof the multiplicity of factors, Lavrov, Mikhailovsky, Kareyev,and others, seemed utterly ineffectual to me....8

The sense of Labriola's essays could not have been wholly newto Trotsky even at this early date. He had already read JuliusLippert, for example, who did not explicitly espouse a monisticview of human development, but who, as a pioneering culturalanthropologist, was interested in showing how human culture had

7. Ibid. and Max Eastman, Leon Trotsky, Portrait of a Youth (London,1920), pp. 128-129.

8. Trotsky, My Life, p. 119. He did not give the names of the essays. Itseems certain, however, that one of them was "Historical Materialism,"published first in Italian, an essay in which the remark, "ideas do not dropfrom heaven," is frequently used. This essay was published together withLabriola's" In Memory of the Communist Manifesto" in 1898 to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of Marx's speech. The two were publishedtogether in a French edition-to which Trotsky refers--within a relativelyshort time. Trotsky also referred to material taken from these essays in hisTerrorism and Communism: A Reply to Karl Kautsky (Ann Arbor : Universityof Michigan Press, 1961), p. 133.


evolved spontaneously from the most primitive levels.9 NicholasChernyshevsky, whom Trotsky also studied, had attempted to placesociology, politics, and aesthetics on an exclusively materialist foundation and thus came quite close to a thoroughly monistic view ofhistory and sociology." When Trotsky approached Labriola's verbosebut lively work, then, he probably knew what he had in his hands andwhat he was looking for. The fact that after thirty years he shouldremember Labriola's remark, " ideas do not drop from the sky," isnot surprising. This formulation was part of the rhetoric of Labriola'stheory-practice dialectic: ideas, theory, are not produced in avacuum, but as a consequence of engagement with the real, materialworld. This said, however, a problem immediately arises. If ideas area product of the material world, what scope is left within this material,self-determining world for the human being as he is known to thephilosopher or artist rather than to the physical scientist-i.e., for anindividual capable of acting freely and creatively? The political implications of this dilemma are obviously manifold. Having sealedthemselves up in a self-creating universe where politics is simply onemore phenomenon of evolution, Marxists have ever after tried to findthe means of regaining control of it and thus of regaining freedom.

Part of Labriola's solution was the attainment of what was calleda "scientific" level of knowledge.'! Such a knowledge led, in itsown turn, to the creation of a sophisticated theory of revolutionarypolitics, a " critical communism." As Labriola wrote :

It is not merely a question of discovering and determining thesocial groundwork, and then of making men appear upon it likeso many marionettes, whose threads are held and moved, nolonger by Providence but by economic categories. These categories have themselves developed and are developing, like aUthe rest-because men change as to the capacity and the art of

9. It was Julius Lippert who wrote:

In the embryonic social organization of primitive times, there wasas yet no true human sovereignty, but a broad perspective isopened up in the realization that such might develop in some wayand unite with the disciplinary power created by cult ideas.

Lippert's The Evolution 0/ Culture (New York: Macmillan, 1931), p, 129;also pp, 603 ff',

10. Nicholas G. Chernyshevsky, "The Aesthetic Relation of Art to Reality:A Dissertation," in Selected Philosophical Essays (Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House, 1953).

11. For Labriola's explanation of this term, see "In Memory of the Communist Manifesto," in Essays on the Materialist Conception 0/ History , trans.by Charles H. Kerr (Chicago: Kerr, 1908), p. 55.


vanquishing, subduing, transforming and utilizing natural conditions; . . . and therefore as individuals depending in variousdegrees upon one another.t-

Historical materialism in its most sophisticated form is thus notmerely abstraction and analysis, nor even merely science, but also anart. 13 Insisting that socialism continues to be the most profoundform of historic necessity, Labriola nevertheless defined what hecalled "critical communism" as the "theory of the proletarianrevolution." "Critical communism dates," he said, "from themoment when the proletarian movement is not merely a result ofsocial conditions, but when it has already strength enough to understand that the conditions can be changed and to discern what meanscan modify them and in what direction." 14 Taken together in its mostrefined dialectical form, scientific socialism amounts to the "discovery of the self-criticism which is in the things themselves." "Thereal criticism of society is society itself," he wrote, "which by theantithetic conditions of the contrasts upon which it rests, engendersfrom itself, within itself, the contradiction and finally triumphs overthis by its passage into a new form." 15

It is impossible to show that Trotsky depended in substantial parton Labriola for his ideas of the dialectic. Each man was no doubtfamiliar with many of the same writers who, in their tum, might becited as sources. At the same time it seems evident that Trotskywas to some extent indebted to Labriola as a young student isindebted to a teacher who has suggested various methods of observation and patterns of interpretation. Indeed, it may well be that thisindebtedness extended to a corollary developed by Labriola, as heshifted between the poles of determinism and voluntarism. Thethought that leadership of the revolution, however much a part ofhistorically necessary social phenomena, might transform dictatorship of the revolutionary proletariat into dictatorship over the proletariat occurred to Labriola as, later, it would keep recurring toTrotsky. For Labriola the point was made moot by the fact that theproletariat "already knows ... that the conquest of political powercannot and should not be made by others in its name." 16

12. Labriola, "Historical Materialism," in Essays, pp. 228-229.13. Ibid.14. Labriola, "In Memory," pp. 24--27.15. Labriola, "Historical Materialism," p. 169 .16. Labriola, "In Memory," p. 59.


Problems of Orthodoxy; The Russian Bourgeoisie and Capitalism

The next stage in the development of Trotsky's theory of revolution emerges in his earliest writings, published during his first Siberianexile. Like other Russian Social Democrats, he was concerned withwhat could be called the rhythm of revolution and the identificationof the pattern of Russia's revolutionary development. Marxian orthodoxy required the development of social, economic, and political rolesfor capitalism and the bourgeoisie. But in Russ ia such developmentseemed to be occurring very slowly, if at all. Lenin dealt with this byarguing, in effect, that appearances were deceiving." Trotsky, in agroup of articles he wrote for the Vostochnoe obozrenie (EasternObserver) 18 while in Siberian exile, was more the historical realist.One of the articles of this group was titled "The Declaration ofRights and the Velvet Book." 1 9 The comparison suggested by twodocuments-one a relic of the revolutionary strength of the Frenchbourgeoisie, the other a symbol of lingering feudal authority inbackward Russia-was of particular significance in a society whereeach of these traditions continued to exist and to intermingle withthe other. The fact of intermingling middle class and aristocratictraditions was a phenomenon that Labriola had emphasized and thatTrotsky himself had recognized before."? This view of historical-asdistinct from theoretical-societies at times enabled Trotsky to transcend a simpler, more artificially categorized economic framework ofthe kind that underlay Lenin's The Development of Capitalism inRussia.

As it seemed to Trotsky, the Russian bourgeoisie, in its sickly,disreputable existence, had developed under conditions quite differentfrom those found in Western Europe. In the West, he thought, thebourgeoisie had prospered until they were powerful enough as a classand as an economic force to mold the social and political patterns thatgradually came to reflect their economic way of life. In Russia, onthe other hand, the bourgeoisie was a semiliterate, timorous minority,insensate to issues of a social nature. The major consequence of this

17. This is the burden of Lenin's The Development of Capitalism inRussia: The Process of Formation of a Home Market for Large-Scale Industry,written between 1896 and 1898 and first published in 1899 (St. Petersburg,Leifert).

18. Published in Irkutsk. His first articles appeared in 1900; cr. Trotsky,Sochineniia (Moscow, 1925-1927), Vol. 20, Kul'tura starogo mira.

19. "Deklaratsiia pray i barkhatnaia kniga."20. This was reflected in an essay-no longer extant-written while he

was in Odessa prison and described in his autobiography.


was that, seeking to preserve a modicum of its economic independence, the bourgeoisie sought protection from a moribund Russianfeudalism, generating a disreputable alliance. 21 Trotsky thus beganto develop a view of Russia in the twentieth century that was different from the orthodox Marxist view and quite distinct from establishedWest European patterns of development; he found the social andeconomic sources of these differences in a candid appraisal of theRussian past." Such an appraisal focused on the historical Russiarather than on the theoretical or mythical Russia that dominated thethinking of many Russian Marxists at the time. Instead of concludingthat Russia was locked into a certain pattern of development, Trotskywas already suggesting that the objective, historical conditions forthis development did not exist in Russia-in short, that no forwardhistorical motion could be expected from the Russian bourgeoisie.Ultimately, as we see below, he concluded that the creative force ofthe revolution in Russia at this stage was not the bourgeoisie, noreven an elite revolutionary leadership such as the Bolsheviks, butthe proletariat.

The Party and the Proletariat, 1903-1905

In 1903 and 1904, during the course of the long and furious debateon the split of Russian Social Democrats into Menshevik and Bolshevik factions. Trotsky made what is often regarded as a major contribution to the literature of Russian Marxism. From this long, densepamphlet, entitled "Our Political Tasks," it is evident that he nomore wished to allow formal party ties to force an alteration of histheory of Russia's social development than he had been to let orthodoxy do this. The dominant theme of this work dealt with the issueof Lenin's abortive attempt to reshape Russian Social Democratsalong the extremely centralized lines of his faction." What may benoted here is that, in Trotsky's view, the real evil that Lenin's doctrinaire approach had done was to prevent the Party's getting on with

21. Trotsky, Sochineniia, 20: 83-86.22. Ibid., p. 80.23. In the course of this critique, he made the famous assertion:

In internal party politics [Lenin's] methods come, as we havealready seen, to this, that the party organization .. substitutes"itself for the party [at large], the central committee substitutesitself for the party organization, and finally .. the dictator substitutes himself for the central committee ..."

Nashi politicheskie zadachi (Geneva, 1904), pp. 54-55.


its proper tasks, its "political tasks." Intellectual fencing and ideological wars, Trotsky wrote, were expected and even proper duringthe earlier years of the Party's history and especially during what hecalled "the Iskra period" (1900-1903). Now, however, the Partyshould be prepared to assume its full adult responsibilities, recognizing that the days of the underground political revolutionary werewaning, and that the hour had come for expression of historical truthin action." Critical tasks of the moment should be the dual ones ofeducating the proletariat and learning from them rather than indulging in vicious and petty quarrels, as Lenin had done, over Partyorganization. Russian social democracy's political tasks, therefore,were the formulation of what, in the dialectic of theory and practice,Trotsky regarded as pertinent, realistic social democratic tactics andof intelligent participation in the thrust of history and its blindmaterial forces." The Party, on the other hand, was turning in onitself with no concern for the outside world. In this, the Party andLenin in particular could be thought of as philosophers, rationalists,generating theory without regard for the need to act. Thus, Trotskywrote ironically:

For better or worse (more, for worse) we are revolutionizing themass, awakening in it protozoan instincts. But, so far as thisbusiness is concerned with the complicated task-to turn these" instincts" into the conscious strivings for political self-definitionof the worker class-we are turning, in the broadest sense, tothe tried and true method of "rationalization" (otdumyvanie)and" substitutionalism." 26

For Trotsky, not the Party but the proletariat, aggressive and selfarticulating, was the central feature of the revolution." Revealing inthis context is a work written immediately preceding the Revolutionof 1905 and published later under the title, "Before the Ninth ofJanuary." 28 This pamphlet was written to restate Trotsky's opposition to Lenin's demands for tight Party organization and aggressive,

24. Ibid., pp. 33-35.25. Ibid., Introduction, PP. x-xi,26. Ibid., p. 54.27. So much so that Lenin condemned this general line of reasoning as

.. semi-anarchistic" See J. L. H. Keep, The Rise of Social Democracy inRussia (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1963), p. 197.

28. "Do deviatogo ianvaria," Sochineniia, 2: Part 1 (Nash a pervaia revoliutsiia), pp. 1-53. The title is obviously anachronistic. The pamphlet waswritten just before the outbreak of revolution, but it was not publisheduntil later in 1905.


individual political leadership. Among other things, however, Trotskytried to give explicit examples of the way in which he believed theworkers might seize the revolutionary initiative and dispense with theparty. As an illustration, he wrote a vivid description of the way hethought a revolution might begin. Allowing his imagination free rein,he wrote of the development of a general strike. The surging mass ofworkers would sweep from factory to factory, swelling as it went,until it finally crashed down upon old Russia with irresistible force."It is evident that a spontaneous explosion of this kind did not preclude the influence of a party of intellectuals, such as the Bolsheviksor Mensheviks, at some level. The implication was clear, nevertheless: the workers might take leadership away from a party that wastoo inflexible to respond to rapidly changing political needs."Trotsky's experiences in the actual Revolution of 1905 did not shakethese convictions, but reinforced them. Thus, attempting to distinguish the leadership role of the St. Petersburg Soviet from that ofthe Party, he wrote:

The Social Democratic organization, narrowly limited to a secretgroup of several hundred in the underground and ideologicallyunited with a few thousand workers in St. Petersburg, had thecapacity to give slogans .... [But] to bind a crowd of hundredsof thousands with a living organizational bond was not within itsstrength because of the singular fact that it had always accomplished the major portion of its work in hiding from the masses,in conspiratorial laboratories."!

What then was the role of the Marxist intellectual or the Marxistpolitical leader in this real revolutionary situation? It was to workwith organizations which he thought were close to the proletariat,responsive to proletarian demands, and which still afforded the opportunity of influencing the proletariat. In 1905, so far as Trotsky wasconcerned, this organization was the St. Petersburg Soviet

... not only because it is the greatest workers' organization thatRussia has seen to date, not only because the Petersburg Soviet

29. Ibid., pp. 50-51.30. The weakness of labor support of the social democratic movement is

evident. See, for example, Allan K. Wildman, "Lenin's Battle with theKustarnichestvo," Slavic Review, Vol. 33, No. 3 (September 1964), pp.479-503, and Richard Pipes, Social Democracy and the St. Petersburg LaborMovement, 1885-1897 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1963).

31. "Rol' soveta v pervoi revoliutsii. Kak voznik sovet rabochikhdeputatov," Sochineniia, 2: Part 2, p, 179. Trotsky's emphasis.

TROTSKY'S THEORY OF REVOLUTION

served as a model for Moscow, Odessa, and a raft of othertowns-but above all because this pure class, proletarian organization appeared as an organization of the revolution, as such.The Soviet was the center of all events ... ."2

29

It may be, of course, that Trotsky was defending here his own rolein the St. Petersburg Soviet. That this was his only objective, however,is most unlikely in view of the subsequent development of his ideasconcerning success of the proletarian revolution.

Economic Backwardness in Dialectical Perspective: 1905-1907

It has already been asserted that Trotsky's experience during theentire revolution reinforced his assumptions concerning the dialecticalarticulation of revolutionary theory and practice. The workers as wellas their revolutionary leaders-himself among them-were learning,were acquiring the necessary training in 1905 to make theory andabstract goals" a practical task for our own day." 33 "In Russianlife," he wrote, "the revolution of 1905 was the dress rehearsal forthe revolution of 1917." 34 While he did not mention Labriola byname in his writings at this time, it is evident that the notion of theoryengaged in a dialectical process, continually modifying and beingmodified by social fact, was still central to Trotsky's perception ofRussia and the future of the revolution.

The Revolution of 1905 was instructive for Trotsky just as heregarded it as instructive for the proletariat and for the party poliotician. But his conclusions concerning the significance of the revolution must be read in the light of two specific, political problems. Thefirst was that, according to the preconceptions of many RussianSocial Democrats, the revolution should have been dominated by themiddle classes and their political parties; theoretically, it should nothave involved overt acts or influential political decisions on the partof the proletariat. At the same time, it was a fact that when the proletariat-the urban workers, the unions, and the working-class parties----'had found the opportunity of assuming a leading role in therevolution, that class had ultimately failed to gain any substantialrevolutionary victories. All this raised not only theoretical problemsbut serious practical issues for politicians now forced to breathe anew spirit into the demoralized proletariat. For Trotsky, the theoreti-

32 Ibid See also "Istoricheskoe znachenie so veta rabochikh deputatov,"Sochineniia, 2: Part 2, pp. 185ff.

33. Trotsky, My Life, p. 167. 34. Ibid., p. 186.


cal adjustments were less drastic than for many other Russian SocialDemocrats. He was accustomed to thinking of Russian problems asunique by comparison with those of the West, and his fundamentalnotion of the articulation of theory with practice allowed for constant dialectical change. In this context, he articulated corollaries tohis theory of the historical development of the revolution. A statementof both is to be found in a well-known essay entitled" The Balanceand the Prospects," prepared for the book" Our Revolution." 35 Forone thing, he suggested that in a future revolution the contradictionof a workers' government ruling a peasant society might be resolvedby an extension of the revolution over a long period of time and frombackward Russia to advanced societies of Western Europe. This, ofcourse, is the essence of "permanent revolution," an idea similar toone suggested by other Social Democrats, for various reasons, atabout the same time." In addition, Trotsky explicitly discussed thepolitical implications, for a proletarian revolution, of Russia's technological, sociological, and economic backwardness." Granting that theprimitive technology of an economically backward country shouldnormally be accompanied by a small, backward proletariat, he dismissed the possibility of a coalition with middle class parties: "Socialdemocracy can never assume power under a double obligation..." 38

To ensure that he had made his point adequately, he went on topoint out that the" self-limiting" workers would be, in fact, the contradiction in terms which others had already begun to support: itwould be a democratically based (i.e., middle class) dictatorship of theproletariat.

It is, therefore, absurd ... to speak of a purely democratic dictatorship. The working class can never secure the democraticcharacter of its dictatorship [i.e., secure social and economicequality] without overstepping the limits of its democratic [i.e.,limited] prograrn.?"

35. Nasha revoliutsiia (81. Petersburg, 1906). The full title of Trotsky'sessay was Itogi i perspektivy: dvizhushchie sily revoliutsii. It was publishedseparately in Moscow, 1919. Translations here are by Moissaye J. Olgin andare from an English edition which appeared in New York in 1918.

36. Among them was Lenin. Keep, Rise of Social Democracy, p. 198.37. The two dimensions-cross-cultural and temporal-are, in Trotsky's

theory, closely related. In this connection, see the intriguing remarks ofMaurice Merleau-Ponty in Les aventures de la dialectique (paris: Gallimard, 1955) about "this idea of a world unfulfilled without praxis, a praxiswhich makes up a part of the definition of the world" (pp. 118-119); seealso pp. 16-17.

38. "Balance and the Prospects," p. 27. 39. Ibid., p. 28.


In addition, he had asserted on numerous occasions in the past thatexpectations of a worker-peasant coalition were, in this sense, largelypipe dreams." Instead, he wrote of "control over" the peasantry.Thus, even though a minority, the workers had to act alone. In " TheBalance and the Prospects" Trotsky tried to formulate his solutiontv this dilemma:

There is no doubt that the number of proletariat, the degree ofits concentration, its cultural level, and its political importancedepend upon the degree of industrial development in eachcountry.

This dependence, however, is not a direct one.... The industryof the United States is far more advanced than the industry ofRussia, while the political role of the Russian workingmen, theirinfluence on the political life of their country, the possibilitiesof their influence on world politics in the near future are incomparably greater than those of the American proletariat. 41

Evidence of the Russian proletariat's superiority was manifested inthe vitality of the soviets, for example." Thus, it followed that theRussian proletariat might emerge victorious in a future revolution.

It is, therefore, not excluded that in a backward country witha lesser degree of capitalistic development the proletariat shouldsooner reach political supremacy than in a highly developedcapitalist state.v'

The problem still remained, however, as to the ability of theworkers' government-the dictatorship of the proletariat as opposed tothe "democracy" of the liberals-to hold power over a long periodof time. In spite of a proletarian victory, the country would remainat a low level of industrial development with technically advancedpatterns of social organization concentrated in a few large urbanareas. The remainder of the country would still be a predominantlytraditional society. How could the revolutionary government successfully substitute for the lack of an economic, a technological and, thus,a social basis for political reforms? Trotsky reiterated his despair ofvoluntary cooperation with the peasants, writing instead of how" con-

40. See, for example, "Gospodin Petr Strove v politike," Sochineniia, 2:Part 1, pp. 333fT., and "Chemu uchat sotsialistov-revoliutsionistov," Sochineniia, 2: Part 1, pp. 22Sf!.

41. .. Balance and the Prospects," pp. 27-28.42. Ibid., pp. 10-11. 43. Ibid., p. 13.


ditions will impel the peasants to uphold the policies of a labordemocracy." 44 Even so, Trotsky understood that while the workerrevolutionary might be acting in the long-run best interests of all, amajority of Russians might be unaware of this, and might, for aperiod of time, lend aid and comfort to the reaction. Although heseems to have recognized this as dangerous in the extreme, Trotskydid not regard it as necessarily disastrous for the revolutionary minority government. In order to save the day, the Russian proletariatwould be called upon to use its remarkable resources to the full andby doing so it would ultimately receive aid from the proletariat in theeconomically advanced countries of Central and Western Europe.There was an additional resource, however, that could also be calledupon-the state. In referring specifically to this means whereby proletarian authority might be sustained, Trotsky articulated a point ofview which, apparently, came out of his 1905 experience and whichnow entered into his theory of revolution in Russia:

The state is not an end in itself. It is, however, the greatest meansfor organizing, disorganizing, and reorganizing social relations.

According to who is directing the machinery of the state, itcan be an instrument of profound transformation, or a means oforganized stagnation.s"

He then proceeded, intermingling references to the power of state andparty as he went, to point out that, in this sense, political strugglesare actually efforts to gain control over the machine of state and itsorganizational abilities. Thus, Trotsky recognized the magnitude ofthe political problem inherent in a minority's seizure of power. At thesame time, he foresaw the potentially hard means available to theproletarian minority to maintain itself in power even in the event thatit had no aid from abroad.

Other students of Trotsky's career have correctly observed that hewas in no meaningful sense a philosopher 46_i.e., someone interestedin the systematic analysis of ideas for their own sake. My study ofhis early writings, supported by his own comments on his earlypolitical career, has nevertheless argued that Trotsky was both atheoretician and a dialectician. Trotsky's ideas about the appropriateness of Marxism for Russia, the roles of the bouregoisie, the proletariat, and the Party, and the role he assigns to the state all took

44. Ibid., p. 22.45. Ibid, p, 12. See also pp. 47-48.46. MerIeau-Ponty, Les aventures, pp. 101fr. See also Lefort, Elements d'une

critique, pp. 22ff.


their characteristic form between 1898 and 1907. This developmentprovided Trotsky not merely with a rhetoric useful for defending hispolitical activities and attacking those of his enemies, but with a conception of proletarian revolution in an underdeveloped country thatwas coherent and consistent in its interpretation of events and servedas a foundation for Trotsky's response to events. Although the truedialectician never ceases to grow and change in his subjective response to the world, still the basic features of Trotsky's theory ofrevolution had been laid down as early as 1906. In a word, he foresawa proletarian revolution that would empower the state to serve as themeans of " organizing and reorganizing" social relations in a societywhere backwardness of those relations would otherwise smother therevolution in its crib. It is on this theoretical foundation that Trotsky'spolitical and economic policies and proposals of 1917 to 1923 werebuilt. 47 The political uses he made of the Red Army, the labor battalions, his proposals for the reorganization of labor, and the singleeconomic plan were all attempts to sustain the revolution with instruments of state power. Given the enigma of Trotsky's personal failureto hold power, it is not surprising that we should find his politicalbehavior hard to understand.v In the end, he was a better theoreticianthan politician, a distinction that is of considerable help in understanding the career of this perpetually fascinating man. He expressedit best himself:

I do not measure the historical process by the yardstick of one'sown personal fate. On the contrary, I appraise my fate objectivelyand live it subjectively, only as it is inextricably bound up withthe course of social development. 49

47. Richard B. Day, Leon Trotsky and the Politics of Economic Isolation(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1973), Chaps. 2-3, pp, 17-65.

48. Lefort, Elements d'une critique, refers to the "contradiction ofTrotsky" and ultimately concludes that Trotsky's failure was really the revolution's failure-or, at least, the Party's failure. "Trotsky's battle against thebureaucracy lacked foundation," he wrote, "because Trotsky was objectivelya craftsman of that bureaucracy" (p. 26). Merleau-Ponty argued that thefailure was more fundamental, lying at the roots of Marxism and the revolution as such. Cf. "La dialectique en action," pp. I24ff. in Les A ventures.

49. Trotsky, My Life, pp. 581-582.

c.c..-2

Documents

Development of Trotsky's theory of revolution, 1898–1907