Vanguardism

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Vanguardism, in the context of

leading role of the Communist party
, usually enshrined in the constitution, after the seizure of power in the state by Communists.

Foundations

Imperial Russia) required that a close-knit group of individuals pulled from the working class vanguard to safeguard the revolutionary ideology within the particular circumstances presented by the Tsarist régime (Russian Empire) at the time. While Lenin wished for a revolutionary organisation akin to the contemporary Social Democratic Party of Germany, which was open to the people and more democratic in organisation, the Russian autocracy prevented this.[2][3]

Leninists argue that Lenin's ideal vanguard party would have open membership: "The members of the Party are they who accept the principles of the Party program and render the Party all possible support."[4] This party could be completely transparent, at least internally: the "entire political arena is as open to the public view as is a theatre stage to the audience".[5] A party that supposedly implemented democracy to such an extent that "the general control (in the literal sense of the term) exercised over every party man in the politics brings into existence an automatically operating mechanism which produces what in biology is called the "survival of the fittest"". The party would be completely open while educating the proletariat to remove the false consciousness that had been instilled in them.[5]

In its first phase, the vanguard party would exist for two reasons. Firstly, it would protect Marxism from outside corruption from other ideas, as well as advance its plans. Secondly, it would educate the proletariat in Marxism in order to cleanse them of their "false individual consciousness" and instill the revolutionary "class consciousness" in them.

Our task is not to champion the degrading of the revolutionary to the level of an amateur, but to raise the amateurs to the level of revolutionaries.[5]

If the party is successful in their goal, on the eve of revolution, a critical mass of the working class population would be prepared to usher forth the transformation of society. Furthermore, a great number of them, namely their most dedicated members, would belong to the party

professional revolutionaries, and would be elected to leadership positions by the mass party membership. Thus the organisation would quickly include the entire working class.[5]

Political party

A vanguard party is a

ideologies
.

Friedrich Engels and Karl Marx presented the concept of the vanguard party as solely qualified to politically lead the proletariat in revolution; in Chapter II: "Proletarians and Communists" of The Communist Manifesto (1848), they said:

The Communists, therefore, are, on the one hand, practically the most advanced and resolute section of the working-class parties of every country, that section which pushes forward all others; on the other hand, theoretically, they have over the great mass of the proletariat the advantage of clearly understanding the lines of march, the conditions, and the ultimate general results of the proletarian movement. The immediate aim of the Communists is the same as that of all other proletarian parties: Formation of the proletariat into a class, overthrow of the bourgeois supremacy, conquest of political power by the proletariat.

According to Lenin, the purpose of the vanguard party is to establish a

anarcho-syndicalists
. Like Karl Marx, Lenin distinguished between the two aspects of a revolution, the economic campaign (labour strikes for increased wages and work concessions), which featured diffused leadership; and the political campaign (socialist changes to society), which featured the decisive revolutionary leadership of the Bolshevik vanguard party.

Marxism–Leninism

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Main article: Marxism–Leninism

As he surveyed the European milieu in the late 1890s, Lenin found several theoretic problems with the

radicalism
of political vanguard of the working class, who then would attract many workers from the middling ranks of the reformist leaders of the trade unions.

It is often believed that Lenin thought the bearers of class consciousness were the common

Menshevik rivals, Lenin distinguished himself by his hostility towards the bourgeois intelligentsia, and was routinely criticised for placing too much trust in the intellectual ability of the working class to transform society through its own political struggles.[citation needed
]

Like other political organisations that sought to change Imperial Russian society, Lenin's Bolshevik Party resorted to conspiracy, and operated in the political underground. Against Tsarist repression, Lenin argued for the necessity of confining membership to people who were professionally trained to overthrow the Okhrana;[

Revolution of 1905, Lenin proposed that the Bolshevik Party "open its gates" to the unhappiest of the working class, who were rapidly becoming political radicals, in order for the Party to become a mass political party with genuine roots in the working class movement.[citation needed
]

The notion of a 'vanguard', as used by Lenin before 1917, did not necessarily imply single-party rule. Lenin considered the

irreconcilable conflicts between the Bolsheviks and their rivals. At the 10th Congress of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks) in 1921, the Party made the de facto reality de jure by outlawing opposition parties and formalising single-Party rule.[10]

The impetus for having a vanguard party was used by the Bolsheviks to justify their suppression of other parties. Their rationale was that since they were the vanguard of the proletariat, their right to rule could not be legitimately questioned.[citation needed] Hence, opposition parties could not be permitted to exist. From 1936 onward, Communist-inspired state constitutions enshrined the "father your own family and let your families live in a nation with society" rubric by giving the Communist parties formal leadership in society—a provision that was interpreted to either ban other parties altogether or force them to accept the Communists' guaranteed right to rule as a condition of being allowed to exist as an alternative party.

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In the 20th century, the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) continued regarding itself as the institutionalisation of Marxist–Leninist political consciousness in the Soviet Union; therein lay the justification for its political control of Soviet society. Article 6 of the 1977 Soviet Constitution refers to the CPSU as the "leading and guiding force of Soviet society, and the nucleus of its political system, of all state organizations and public organizations". The CPSU, precisely because it was the bearer of Marxist–Leninist ideology, determined the general development of society, directed domestic and foreign policy, and "imparts a planned, systematic, and theoretically substantiated virtuosity" to the struggle of the Soviet people for the victory of communism.

Nonetheless, the politics of the vanguard party, as outlined by Lenin, is disputed among the contemporary communist

movement. Lenin's contemporary in the Bolshevik Party, Leon Trotsky, further developed and established the vanguard party with the creation of the Fourth International. Trotsky, who believed in permanent revolution, proposed that a vanguard party must be an international political party.[citation needed
]

Frankfurt School

For some in the Frankfurt School, the lumpenproletariat (underclass) have the potential to be vanguardists in the revolution. They argue this underclass has the potential to change the status quo because they are excluded from it and survive largely outside of the capitalist system. Marx viewed the lumpenproletariat with suspicion and as a reserve army of labour with a primarily counter-revolutionary character unlike the industrial proletariat, whose role in production led Marx see them as the primary agents of change. For some in the Frankfurt School, the lumpenproletariat existing outside the capitalist production process gives them the unique ability to attack the capitalist system from outside which other revolutionary elements can not.[11]

Other uses

Although Lenin honed the idea in terms of a class leadership forged out of a proletarian vanguard specifically to describe Marxist–Leninist parties,[12] the term is also used for many kinds of movement shaping themselves as initially guided by a small elite. Theodor Herzl, the theorist of Zionism, believed legitimation from the majority would only hinder from the outset his movement and therefore advised that "we cannot all be of one mind; the gestor will therefore simply take the leadership into his hands and march in the van."

Herzl's principle antedated by some years the Leninist idea of Bolshevism as the vanguard of the revolution by characterizing the "Zionist movement as a vanguard of the Jewish people."

Shari'ah), leading to the world becoming the House of Islam. The party members formed an elite group (called arkan) with "affiliates" (mutaffiq) and then "sympathizers" (hamdard) beneath them.[17] Today, the Jamaat-e-Islami has spread wings to other South Asian countries with large Muslim populations, such as Afghanistan, Bangladesh and India. The literature of the Baháʼí Faith also frequently refers to those serving to raise the capacities of communities around the world as the "vanguard" of the Cause of Baha'u'llah[18]

According to Roger Eatwell, some

fascist parties have also operated in ways similar to the concept of a vanguard party.[19]

See also

References

  1. ISBN 9781412959636
    .
  2. ISBN 9781137389961 – via Google Books
    .
  3. ISBN 9781412959636
    .
  4. What is to be Done? – via Marxists Internet Archive
    ., quoting Clause 1 of the Rules of the German Social-Democratic Party.
  5. ^ a b c d Lenin 1901.
  6. ISBN 978-0-14-051274-8 – via Internet Archive
    .
  7. ^ Le Blanc 1990, p. 49.
  8. ^ Serge, Victor (1930). Year One of the Russian Revolution. p. 243 – via Marxists Internet Archive.
  9. ^ Le Blanc 1990, p. 260.
  10. ^ Le Blanc 1990, p. 306.
  11. ISSN 2619-4023
    .
  12. ISBN 9781134493678 – via Google Books
    .
  13. ISBN 978-0-307-77253-4 – via Google Books
    .
  14. ISBN 9780521630122 – via Google Books
    .
  15. ISBN 9781594033711 – via Google Books
    .
  16. ^ Kramer, Martin (June 1996). "Fundamentalist Islam at Large: The Drive for Power". Middle East Quarterly. 3 (2): 37–49.
  17. ^ a b "Jamaat-e-Islami". GlobalSecurity.org.
  18. ^ "Search: vanguard". Bahá'í Reference Library. 2019.
  19. ISBN 978-1-84413-090-0
    .

Bibliography

  • Humanities Press International
    .

Further reading

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