DEDICATED TO TODAY'S MENSHEVIKS AND OPPORTUNISTS

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DEDICATED TO TODAY'S MENSHEVIKS AND OPPORTUNISTS

Abstracts from lectures by Stalin “ON THE FOUNDATIONS OF LENINISM"(Works, vol.6)

"... By whom and where has it been proven that the parliamentary form of struggle is the main form of struggle of the proletariat? Does not the history of the revolutionary movement show that the parliamentary struggle is only a school and help to organize the outside-parliamentary struggle of the proletariat, that the main issues of the labour movement under capitalism are solved by force, by the direct struggle of the proletarian masses, their general strike, their revolt? "
"The dictatorship of the proletariat can not arise as a result of the peaceful development of bourgeois society and bourgeois democracy - it can only arise as a result of breaking the bourgeois state machine, the bourgeois army, the bourgeois bureaucracy, bourgeois politics."
“The deadly sin of the II International was not that it overestimated the importance of these forms (parliamentary forms of struggle - editor.), considering them almost the only forms, but when the period came for open revolutionary struggles and the question of outside-parliamentary forms of struggle became primary, the parties of the II International turned away from these new challenges and did not adopt them."
"For the reformist, the reform is everything - revolutionary work is not so important, it’s for conversation, a diversion. Therefore, the reform in the reformist tactics in the conditions of bourgeois rule inevitably becomes an instrument of strengthening that authority and into an instrument of contraction of the revolution. For the revolutionary though, on the contrary, the main thing is revolutionary work, and not reform – for him, reforms are a by-product of revolution. Therefore, the reform with revolutionary tactics in the conditions of bourgeois rule, of course, becomes an instrument of break-up of this power and an instrument for strengthening the revolution, a base for further development of the revolutionary movement.
The revolutionary accepts a reform in order to use it as an aid in combining legal and illegal work, in order to use it as a cover for illegal work for the revolutionary preparation of the masses for the overthrow of the bourgeoisie.
This is the essence of revolutionary use of reforms and agreements in the conditions of imperialism.
The reformist, on the contrary, will accept reforms in order to renounce all illegal work and to undermine the work of preparing the masses for revolution under the cover (bestowed) of reform. This is the essence of reformist tactics."
"Defending the II International against attacks, Kautsky says that the parties of the II International are an instrument of peace rather than war and that is why they were not able to do anything serious in the war, in the period of revolutionary actions by the proletariat. That is quite true. But what does this mean? This means that the parties of the II International were unfit for the revolutionary struggle of the proletariat, that they are not militant parties of the proletariat leading the workers to power, but an election machine adapted for parliamentary elections and the parliamentary struggle. Actually, this explains the fact that during the dominance of opportunists in the II International, the main political organization of the proletariat was not a party, but a parliamentary faction.”
"To think that new tasks can be performed by the forces of the old social-democratic parties brought up in the peaceful environment of parliamentarism – means to condemn oneself to hopeless despair and inevitable defeat."
"The party must stand in front of the working class, it must see further than the working class, it must lead the proletariat, and not drag along behind in the wake of spontaneity.”
"The working class without a revolutionary party – is an army without a headquarters. The Party is the headquarters of the proletariat.”

(Comment….this is something the communists in Britain needs study and to act on.