#HANS AND FRANZ BORDERLANDS HOW TO#

Organization - Year Founded - Peak Membership Table 1: Main Marxist Organizations in the Czarist Empire (1890 to 1914)

Typical in this respect is British socialist Alan Woods’ claim that, “without a clear and principled stand on the national question they could never have led the working class to the conquest of power.” Each of these interpretations simplifies a much more complicated reality and in the process overlook the periphery’s Marxists. Socialists, both Trotskyist and Stalinist, have similarly dismissed the borderland Marxists, as a serious analysis of their perspectives would disrupt the axiom that the Bolsheviks were consistent and pioneering supporters of national liberation. As this interpretation reflected the assumption that Marxism inherently disregards national oppression, the impact and influence of the borderland SDs was conveniently left out. For decades, if Western historians mentioned the borderlands, it was usually to portray them as victims of Bolshevik domination. Yet the national SDs have been neglected by both academic and socialist historiography. In fact, the Mensheviks and Bolsheviks combined only represented about 22% of Marxists in imperial Russia. As ethnic Russians made up at most 42% of the population, it should come as no surprise that the majority of social democrats (SDs) belonged to the national (non-Russian) parties. Our understanding of the revolutionary movement in Russia remains distorted by the historiographic marginalization of the socialist parties of the empire’s dominated nationalities.

#HANS AND FRANZ BORDERLANDS HOW TO#

Given that activists today continue to look to the Russian revolution for lessons on how to successfully challenge capitalism, engaging with this history has important implications for contemporary political practice.

Lenin and his comrades lagged behind the non-Russian Marxists on this crucial issue well into the Civil War-and this political weakness helps explain the Bolshevik failure to build roots among dominated peoples.Ĭonsequently, the Bolsheviks were either too numerically weak and/or indifferent to national aspirations to successfully lead socialist revolutions in the borderlands, facilitating the isolation of the Russian workers’ government and the subsequent rise of Stalinism. I argue that an effective strategy of anti-colonial Marxism was first put forward by the borderland socialists, not the Bolsheviks. The following paper analyzes the socialist debates on the national question up through 1914. ( Eric Blanc is an activist and historian based in Oakland, California.) A view from the Czarist empire’s borderlands obliges us to rethink many long-held assumptions about the revolutions of 19, as well as the development of Marxist approaches to national liberation, peasant struggle, permanent revolution, and the emancipation of women.

Jahrbuch für Forschung zur Geschichte der Arbeiterbewegung ( German)īy Eric Blanc.

Europe solidaire sans frontières ( French).

Hans and franz borderlands