Marxism vs Leninism vs Trotskyism

[NGGuerrette]

I recently deemed myself a leftist, however, the ideas of Marxism and Leninism and Trotskyism all interplay in my search for Communist philosophy. What is the difference between these three ideologies? Help would be appreciated! Thank you

[RedKobra]

You'll find a lot of disagreement on what each of those terms actually means but a basic overview would be:

Marxism: The combining of Historical Materialism and political economy. A Marxist, in the broadest possible sense accepts the Historical Materialist view. That view being that human social and political evolution is as a result of changes in the mode of production, that the developement of the mode of production outgrows the people in who's interest the means of production work leading to a new revolutionary class emerging that defeats the old ruling elite and takes the means of production for themselves and that this continues with one class always exploiting another until finally the mass of the exploited (the proletariat) revolts and takes over the means of production and uses them to provide for the needs of all, which brings about an end to class, to the state and to exploitation.

Leninism: Simply the strategies developed by Lenin to help bring about the above. Key components of Leninism are the ideas of The Party, The Vanguard, The possibility of revolution in non-developed states, the semi-revolutionary character of the peasant class, Democratic Centralism and many more. Lenin's views on the Party were that the revolutionary masses needed a political body that could guide and orientate its struggle. Lenin disapproved of Anarchistic methods of organisation, he believed in strong leadership and strategy. In regard to the Vanguard, very similar to his view the The Party he believed that not all workers were politically conscious and as such there needed to be, at the head of the revolution a body of advanced revolutionaries who understood Marxism and the nature of the state they were facing. Again, Lenin was a strong believer in leadership, focus and guiding the revolution rather than letting it dissipate into many smaller battles that could be easily defeated. Lenin also occasionally departed from orthodoxy in that he didn't believe that just because in Russia the Proletariat were not in the majority that they weren't the most revolutionary class. He believed that despite most of Russia still being semi-feudal that there could be a working class revolution and that there could be a transition to socialism. Which brings us onto the peasants. Lenin rejected the idea of the working class allying with the bourgeoisie, which is what his adversaries wanted. He wanted the Proletariat to ally with the peasants because in his mind the peasant demand for freedom from the landlords was closer to the demands of the workers (Class ownership of the means of production) rather than the Bourgeois Capitalists who would ultimately continue to exploit the workers. His abiding lesson on Party structure was that of Democratic Centralism, which means that there must be vociferous debate on issues but that once the majority has spoken through a vote then everyone is bound to unite behind that objective.

I'm not a Trotskyist at all, in fact I am quite critical of Trotsky & his beliefs so it would probably be better if I let a Trotskyist expound on that offshoot. Suffice to say though there are many Communists who utterly rejected Trotsky and Trotskyism.

[tuwix]

I recently deemed myself a leftist, however, the ideas of Marxism and Leninism and Trotskyism all interplay in my search for Communist philosophy. What is the difference between these three ideologies? Help would be appreciated! Thank you

Marxism is an ideology created Karl Marx end Frederic Engels describing a critical view on capitalism and postulating a massive change (revolution) to transform a capitalism into another phase of human development socialism/communism.


Leninism ideology created by Vladimir Ilych Ulyanov called Lenin inspired by texts of Marx and Engels but even in theory being completely different thing. Put in practice gave for example censorship and secret political police. Marx an Engels strongly disagreed all of those things. The most important discrepancy between Marxism and Leninism is that Marxism postulate in the first phase common ownership of the means of production for workers and Leninism have created an ownership of state which was property of its elite.


Trotskyism was Leninist critique of Stalinism. It was based on mainly Leninist basis criticizing Josif Dzugashvili called Stalin and Stalinism.

[Blake's Baby]

Trotskyism is a form of Leninism (officially, Trotskyism is 'Bolshevik-Leninism'). The other main Leninist current is 'Marxist-Leninism' (AKA Stalinism). Both claim to be 'the true' Leninist current and that the other is a perversion/revision/betrayal.