who's left

[ernesto]

Dear comrades;
In 1917 in Russia which would have been further left, Mensheviks or Social Revolutionaries , and why? I realize that Bolsheviks would have been further left than those two groups. Could someone tell me the differences in particulars between all three groups?
Thank you ernesto

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[Orthodox Marxist]

Dear comrades;
In 1917 in Russia which would have been further left, Mensheviks or Social Revolutionaries , and why? I realize that Bolsheviks would have been further left than those two groups. Could someone tell me the differences in particulars between all three groups?
Thank you ernesto


The mensheviks thought that it was best to have a bourgeois (Rich class) democratic revolution in which they could take part in government.

The social revolutionaries were more concerned with the poor being the revolutionary class in Russia not the workers (proletariat). The social revolutionaries were more of a democratic socialist party rather than a revolutionary socialist party which is why I tend to disregard their importance.

Bolshevism was a program of nationalization and usually has many negative connotations associated with it (stalin). There was also a considerable emphasis on a a strongly centralized hierarchy within the party.

[Faceless]

There are some roughly correct points in the last post. To expand on the role of the SR's and the Mensheviks, with individual exceptions, these partys went on to align themselves with the Whites and the Russian bourgeoisie in attempting to crush the Bolshevik revolution. In the final analysis the two parties proved to be totally counter-revolutionary.

The Mensheviks used Marxism as a stale dogma to the extent that the peasantry could play no role in a socialist revolution as far as they were concerned, which was proven untrue by the Bolsheviks who mobilised many peasants to their cause under a distinctly proletarian leadership. This was also their position on the bourgeois revolution, believing simply that feudalism would be followed by possibly centuries of capitalism, only then to be followed by a socialist revolution.

"Libertarian Marxist" misses the mark by quite a way by simply describing Bolshevism as a program of nationalisation. In the time when the elected soviets ruled Russia, Bolshevism was a fluid set of ideas which established not just nationalisation (something not uncommon to capitalist societies) but nationalisation under workers control, and more specifically under the control of the elected Soviets. The negative connotations associated with "Bolshevism" are the result of many years of equating the ruthless seizure of power by Stalin and his effective substitution of the democratic Soviets with the Party elite with the period of democracy which preceded it.

[Revolution 9]

Originally posted by Libertarian [email protected] 2 2006, 06:55 PM
The social revolutionaries were more concerned with the poor being the revolutionary class in Russia not the workers (proletariat).
:o

Please tell me you are kidding me.

The proletarians are, by definition, all who do not own land/capital to make their own money without working for others.

This includes all of the "working class" but also most of the poor who do not have jobs and are landless.

There are also petit (or petty) bourgeoisie (such as small farmers and your local shopkeeper), but they do not pose a threat to Communism, and I believe that we are perfectly capable of assimilating the petit bourgeoisie into the proletarian class when the revolution happens.