It is our opinion that the Russian revolution creates conditions whereby political power can (and, in case of a victorious revolution, must) pass into the hands of the proletariat before the politicians of the liberal bourgeoisie would have occasion to give their political genius full swing.
Summing up the results of the revolution and counter-revolution in 1848 and 1849, Marx wrote in his correspondences to the New York Tribune: "The working class in Germany is, in its social and political development, as far behind that of England and France as the German bourgeoisie is behind the bourgeoisie of those countries. Like master, like man. The evolution of the conditions of existence for a numerous, strong, concentrated, and intelligent proletariat goes hand in hand with the development of the conditions of existence for a numerous, wealthy, concentrated and powerful middle class. The working class movement itself never is independent, never is of an exclusively proletarian character until all the different factions of the middle class, and particularly its most progressive faction, the large manufacturers, have conquered political power, and remodeled the State according to their wants. It is then that the inevitable conflict between employer and the employed becomes imminent, and cannot be adjourned any longer."[1] This quotation must be familiar to the reader, as it has lately been very much abused by scholastic Marxists. It has been used as an iron-clad argument against the idea of a labor government in Russia. If the Russian capitalistic bourgeoisie is not strong enough to take governmental power into its hands, how is it possible to think of an industrial democracy, i.e., a political supremacy of the proletariat, was the question.
[1] Karl Marx, Germany in 1848. (English edition, pp. 22-23.)
Let us give this objection closer consideration.
Marxism is primarily a method of analysis,—not the analysis of texts, but the analysis of social relations. Applied to Russia, is it true that the weakness of capitalistic liberalism means the weakness of the working class? Is it true, not in the abstract, but in relation to Russia, that an independent proletarian movement is impossible before the bourgeoisie assume political power? It is enough to formulate these questions in order to understand what hopeless logical formalism there is hidden behind the attempt to turn Marx's historically relative remark into a super-historic maxim.
Our industrial development, though marked in times of prosperity by leaps and bounds of an "American" character, is in reality miserably small in comparison with the industry of the United States. Five million persons, forming 16.6 per cent. of the population engaged in economic pursuits, are employed in the industries of Russia; six millions and 22.2 per cent. are the corresponding figures for the United States. To have a clear idea as to the real dimensions of industry in both countries, we must remember that the population of Russia is twice as large as the population of the United States, and that the output of American industries in 1900 amounted to 25 billions of rubles whereas the output of Russian industries for the same year hardly reached 2.5 billions.
There is no doubt that the number of the proletariat, the degree of its concentration, its cultural level, and its political importance depend upon the degree of industrial development in each country.
This dependence, however, is not a direct one. Between the productive forces of a country on one side and the political strength of its social classes on the other, there is at any given moment a current and cross current of various socio-political factors of a national and international character which modify and sometimes completely reverse the political expression of economic relations. The industry of the United States is far more advanced than the industry of Russia, while the political rôle of the Russian workingmen, their influence on the political life of their country, the possibilities of their influence on world politics in the near future, are incomparably greater than those of the American proletariat.
In his recent work on the American workingman, Kautsky arrives at the conclusion that there is no immediate and direct dependence between the political strength of the bourgeoisie and the proletariat of a country on one hand and its industrial development on the other. "Here are two countries," he writes, "diametrically opposed to each other: in one of them, one of the elements of modern industry is developed out of proportion, i.e., out of keeping with the stage of capitalistic development; in the other, another; in America it is the class of capitalists; in Russia, the class of labor. In America there is more ground than elsewhere to speak of the dictatorship of capital, while nowhere has labor gained as much influence as in Russia, and this influence is bound to grow, as Russia has only recently entered the period of modern class struggle." Kautsky then proceeds to state that Germany can, to a certain degree, study her future from the present conditions in Russia, then he continues: "It is strange to think that it is the Russian proletariat which shows us our future as far as, not the organization of capital, but the protest of the working class is concerned. Russia is the most backward of all the great states of the capitalist world. This may seem to be in contradiction with the economic interpretation of history which considers economic strength the basis of political development. This is, however, not true. It contradicts only that kind of economic interpretation of history which is being painted by our opponents and critics who see in it not a method of analysis, but a ready pattern."[2] These lines ought to be recommended to those of our native Marxians who substitute for an independent analysis of social relations a deduction from texts selected for all emergencies of life. No one can compromise Marxism as shamefully as these bureaucrats of Marxism do.
[2] K. Kautsky, The American and the Russian Workingman.