Vladimir Ilyich Lenin

“ Within the country we are passing through a period of slow constructive work and of merciless rigor, of a long and persistent struggle of the proletarian discipline with the threatening petty bourgeois dissoluteness and anarchy. Such, in short, are the distinctive features of the present stage in the Socialist revolution. Such is the link in the historical chain of events which we must now grasp with all our strength to come out with honor, before we pass to the next link—which draws us by its glory, by the glory of the victories of the international proletarian revolution. ”

“ If we are not anarchists, we must admit the necessity of a state; that is, of compulsion, for the transition from capitalism to Socialism. The form of compulsion is determined by the degree of development of the particular revolutionary class, then by such special circumstances as, for instance, the heritage of a long and reactionary war, and then by the forms of resistance of the bourgeoisie and the petty bourgeoisie. There is therefore absolutely no contradiction in principle between the Soviet (Socialist) democracy and the use of dictatorial power of individuals. ”

“ Among the absurd falsehoods which the bourgeois likes to spread about Socialism, is the one that Socialists deny the value of emulation. In reality only Socialism, destroying classes and, hence, the enslavement of the masses, for the first time opens up opportunities for emulation on a mass scale. And only the Soviet organization, passing from the formal democracy of a bourgeois republic to the actual participation in management of the toiling masses, for the first time puts emulation on a broad basis. ”

“ We must prove worthy of this, the most difficult (and the most promising) problem of the Socialist revolution. We must not fail to see that, besides the ability to convince the masses and to win in civil war, our success depends on our ability to organize. This is the most difficult problem. It means the organization of the economic foundations of life for millions of people on a new basis. And it is the most promising problem, for only after its solution shall we be able to say that Russia has become not only a Soviet, but a Socialist republic. ”

“ There is a lack of appreciation of the simple and obvious fact that, if the chief misfortunes of Russia are famine and unemployment, these misfortunes cannot be overcome by any outbursts of enthusiasm, but only by thorough and universal organization and discipline, in order to increase the production of bread for men and fuel for industry, to transport it in time and to distribute it in the right way. That therefore responsibility for the pangs of famine and unemployment falls on everyone who violates the labor discipline in any enterprise and in any business. ”

“ We must size up in full, to the very bottom, the abyss of defeat, partition, enslavement and humiliation into which we have been thrown. The clearer we understand this, the firmer, the more hardened and inflexible will become our will for liberation, our desire to arise anew from enslavement to independence, our firm determination to see at all costs, that Russia shall cease to be poor and weak, that she may become truly powerful and prosperous. ”

“ We must clearly comprehend and firmly remember that Socialism cannot be built on such a social base. Only a class that marches along its road without hesitation, that does not become dejected and does not despair on the most difficult and dangerous crossings, can lead the toiling and exploited masses. We do not need hysterical outbursts. We need the regular march of the iron battalions of the proletariat. ”

“ Secondly, every great revolution, and especially a Socialist revolution, even if there were no external war, is inconceivable without an internal war, with thousands and millions of cases of wavering and of desertion from one side to the other, and with a state of the greatest uncertainty, instability and chaos. And, of course, all elements of decay of the old order, inevitably very numerous and connected largely with the petty bourgeoisie (for the petty bourgeoisie is the first victim of every war and every crisis) cannot fail to "give themselves away" during such a profound transformation. ”

“ If we should add to this the treasonable policy of the servants of the bourgeoisie, the Mensheviks, the Social-Revolutionists of the Right, etc., it will become clear that energetic and persistent efforts must be exerted by the best and most conscious workers and peasants to effect a complete change in the mood of the masses and to turn them to a regular, uninterrupted and disciplined labor. Only such a change accomplished by the masses of proletarians and near-proletarians can complete the victory over the bourgeoisie, and especially over the more persistent and numerous peasant bourgeoisie. ”

“ It will inevitably take some time before the masses begin to feel themselves free after the overthrow of the land owners and the bourgeoisie, and before they comprehend—not from books, but from their own experience through the Soviets—that without thorough state accounting and control of production and distribution the authority of the toilers, and their freedom, cannot last, and a return to the yoke of capitalism is inevitable. ”

“ On the one hand, they declare the Soviet rule simply something absurd and anarchically wild, carefully avoiding all our historical comparisons and theoretical proofs that the Soviets are a higher form of democracy; nay, more, the beginning of a Socialist form of democracy. On the other hand, they demand of us a higher democracy than the bourgeois and argue: individual dictatorship is absolutely incompatible with your Bolshevist (i. e. Socialist, not bourgeois) democratic principles, with the Soviet democratic principles. ”

“ If the proletariat, acting through the Soviets, should successfully establish accounting and control on a national scale, there would be no need for such compromise. Through the Food Departments of the Soviets, through their organs of supply, we would unite the population in one cooperative directed by the proletariat, without the assistance from bourgeois co-operatives, without concessions to the purely bourgeois principle which compels the labor co-operatives to remain side by side with the bourgeois co-operatives instead of wholly subjecting these bourgeois co-operatives, fusing both. ”

“ Russia will become such, provided she frees herself of all dejection and phrase-mongering; provided she strains her every nerve and every muscle; provided she comes to understand that salvation is possible only on the road of the international Socialist revolution, which we have chosen. To move forward along this road, not becoming dejected in case of defeats; to lay, stone after stone, the firm foundation of a Socialist society; to work tirelessly to create discipline and self-discipline ”

“ It is not surprising that at the most difficult points of such a crisis, when everywhere around us the old order is crumbling and falling apart with tumult and crash, and a new order is being born in indescribable torments—it is not surprising that some are becoming bewildered, some become victims of despair, and others, to escape from the bitter reality, are taking cover behind beautiful and enchanting phrases. ”

“ The more firmly we now have to advocate a merciless and firm rule and dictatorship of individuals for definite processes of work during certain periods of purely executive functions, the more diverse should be the forms and means of mass control in order to paralyze every possibility of distorting the Soviet rule, in order repeatedly and tirelessly to remove the wild grass of bureaucratism. ”

“ All middle courses are advanced—in order to deceive the people—by the bourgeois, who are not in a position to tell the truth and admit openly that they need a Kornilov, or—through stupidity—by the petty bourgeois democrats, the Tchernovs, Zeretellis and Martovs, prattling of a united democracy, of the dictatorship of democracy, of a single democratic front and similar nonsense. Those who have not learned even from the course of the Russian revolution of 1917–1918 that middle courses are impossible must be given up as hopeless. ”

“ For the Soviet rule is nothing else than the organized form of the dictatorship of the proletariat, the dictatorship of the advanced class awakening to a new Democracy, to independent participation in the administration of the state, tens and tens of millions of exploited toilers, who through their experience are discovering that the disciplined and class-conscious vanguard of the proletariat is their most reliable leader. ”

“ We are for the "defense of our fatherland, " but the war for the fatherland towards which we are moving is a war for a Socialist fatherland, for Socialism, as a part of the universal army of Socialism. ”

“ In this respect our situation is especially bad and even hopeless—if we should take the word of those who are frightened by the bourgeoisie or who are paid to serve it. These people do not understand that there has never been nor can ever be a revolution in which the adherents of the old regime have not wailed about disorganization, anarchy, etc. It is natural that among the masses who have just overthrown an incredibly barbarous oppression, there is profound and widespread unrest and ferment, that the development of a new basis of labor discipline is a very long process ”

“ The Soviets abolished commercial secrecy and entered on a new road, but have done almost nothing to make use of publicity in the interests of economic emulation. We must systematically endeavor that—along with the merciless suppression of the thoroughly dishonest and insolently slanderous bourgeois press—work shall be carried on to create a press which will not amuse and fool the masses with spicy political trifles, but which will bring to the attention of the masses, and will help them to study seriously, the questions of everyday economics. ”

“ We must study the peculiarities of the highly difficult and new road to Socialism without concealing our mistakes and weaknesses. We must try to overcome our deficiencies in time. To conceal from the masses that attracting bourgeois specialists by extremely high salaries is a defection from the principles of the Commune, would mean that we had lowered ourselves to the level of bourgeois politicians who rule by practicing deception. ”

“ There never was a great revolution in history in which the people have not instinctively felt this and have not displayed a salutary firmness, shooting thieves on the spot. The trouble with the previous revolutions was this—that the revolutionary zeal of the masses, which kept them vigilant and gave them strength to suppress mercilessly the elements of decay, did not last long. ”

“ Without the direction of specialists in different branches of science, such as technical men, the transformation toward Socialism is impossible, for Socialism demands a conscious mass movement toward a comparatively higher productivity of labor on the basis which has been attained by capitalism. Socialism must accomplish this movement forward in its own way, by its own methods—to make it more definite—by Soviet methods. But the specialists are inevitably bourgeois, on account of the whole environment of social life which made them specialists. ”

“ A Socialist state can come into existence only as a net of production and consumption communes, which keep conscientious accounts of their production and consumption, economize labor, at the same time steadily increasing its productivity and thus making it possible to lower the workday to seven, six or even less hours. Anything less than rigorous, universal, thorough accounting and control of grain and of the production of grain, and later also of all other necessary products, will not do. ”

“ We have successfully solved the second problem of the revolution; to awaken and arouse the downtrodden social classes which were oppressed by the exploiters and which only after November 7, 1917, have obtained the freedom to overthrow them and to begin to take stock and to regulate their lives in their own way. The "meeting holding" of the most oppressed and downtrodden, of the least trained toiling masses, their joining the Bolsheviks, their creating Soviet organizations everywhere—this is the second great stage of the revolution. ”

“ In every Socialist revolution—after the proletariat has solved the problem of winning power, and to the extent to which the problem of expropriating the expropriators and of suppressing their resistance is solved—it becomes necessary to turn first of all to the fundamental problem of the creation of a higher social system than capitalism; namely, to raise the productivity of labor, and in connection with this (and for this) , to improve its organization. ”

“ Whoever fails to understand that just such a "halt" in the offensive against capitalism is dictated to us by the objective situation of the present period, does not understand anything in the present situation.
Of course, we can speak only metaphorically of a "halt" in the offensive against capitalism. In an ordinary war it is possible to issue a general order to halt the offensive; it is possible actually to stop the movement forward. ”

“ The outcome of struggle with the bureaucratic distortion of the Soviet organizations is assured by the firm bond between the Soviets and the people (in the sense of the exploited toilers) , by the flexibility and elasticity of this bond. The bourgeois parliaments even in the most democratic 'capitalist republic are never looked upon by the poor as "their" institutions. But the Soviets are for the masses of the workers and peasants, "their own," and not alien institutions. ”

“ It is clear to every thinking person that our work of organizing proletarian accounting and control has not kept pace with the work of the direct "expropriation of the expropriators." If we now turn all our efforts to organizing accounting and control, we shall be able to solve this problem; we shall overcome our shortcomings and win our "campaign" against capitalism. ”