Arrigo Cervetto's Class Struggles and the Revolutionary Party (1964)
Trotsky's Definition
Trotsky's Strategy
"The conception of revolutionary strategy," Trotsky says, "took root only in the post-war years, and in the beginning undoubtedly under the influence of military terminology. But it did not by any means take root accidentally. Prior to the war we spoke only of the tactics of the proletarian party; this conception conformed adequately enough to the then prevailing trade union, parliamentary methods which did not transcend the limits of the day-to-day demands and tasks.
By the conception of tactics is understood the system of measures that serves a single current task or a single branch of the class struggle. Revolutionary strategy on the contrary embraces a combined system of actions which by their association, consistency, and growth must lead the proletariat to the conquest of power.
The basic principles of revolutionary strategy were naturally formulated since the time when Marxism first put before the revolutionary parties of the proletariat the task of the conquest of power on the basis of the class struggle.
Only the Third International re-established the rights of the revolutionary strategy of communism and completely subordinated the tactical methods to it."
Trotsky's definition of strategy is worth special attention. Although we may consider it theoretically correct, we must ask ourselves if it can embrace the entire concept of strategy or if, on the other hand, it has some serious shortcomings.
Our answer is that Trotsky's definition of the scientific concept of strategy is too narrow. Consequently, it leaves several aspects unclear, which, however, we may find developed in Lenin's thought.
We chose to use the comparison between Trotsky and Lenin as the field in which to study the issue of strategy because this comparison takes place within revolutionary Marxism between its two highest exponents and authors.
It is comparison between two of our masters, and even if we find shortcomings in Trotsky, this does not diminish his theoretical and political stature in any way. We only see the enormous importance that developing a revolutionary strategy took on in the Marxist movement. We only see how this scientific issue - that the imperialist age made urgently important - inevitably had to generate differences and various stages of development among the revolutionary movement's great representatives.
For example, can we say that Lenin's view, even if he uses the political term "tactics" which was conventional at the time, is limited to "tactics" as Trotsky defines it?
Can we say that the "tactic" that Lenin developed is simply a "tactic" and not, instead, genuine strategy? Of course not.
Lenin uses the term "tactics", but in essence, he refers to problems concerning strategy. Theoretically and politically, Lenin develops the strategy while continuing and developing the "main principles in the strategy" set forth by Marxism. First of all, this is obvious in his methodological framework, and, second of all, in all his theoretical and political work.
The Second International abandoned the strategy, reducing it to a "system of measures that serves a single current task or a single branch of the class struggle". This abandonment took place not with the strategy's formal rejection, but with its reduction to an "ultimate goal" or "maximum program" (the seizing of power, socialist society, etc.). Between this "maximum goal" and daily reality, between theory and practice, between scientific abstraction and concrete social relations, more than developing something, the Second International expressed a mediation tool called tactics. This was limited to particular problems and specific aspects of the class struggle. Undoubtedly, this tactical view "conformed adequately enough to the then prevailing trade union, parliamentary methods". But this, in other words, meant that the tactic's theoretical expression was the expression of reformist and opportunist practice. The prevalence of this practice and of the methods that corresponded to it led to the prevalence of the reformist view of tactics. And, if the parliamentary and trade-union reformist practice had favorable conditions during the relatively peaceful historical stage of capitalism's development, this only further worsened the divide between Marxism's revolutionary strategy and opportunist practice; between the science of the classes' struggle, and reformist empiricism.
Marxism's strategic conception solved the problem of translating theory into action. We have already seen how. Thus, for Marxism, there is no separation between a revolutionary strategy that should only be valid and feasible during revolutions - when the proletariat has the possibility to seize power - and a tactic that should be directed towards transient and sector-related problems that social reality brings up daily. Problems that can only be solved empirically, in a reformist manner.
If this were the case, Marxism would not be a science, and reformism, in addition to being historically justified, would be a social necessity. It would be a constant law for every kind of society divided into classes; it would be a need, not only for the ruling class, but also for the ruled one.
In that case, Marxist revolutionary strategy would be truly reduced to a combined system of moral, fanciful, utopian preaching and cursing against practice, against life.
Instead, Marxism is science because it analyzes and struggles to change reality in every particular situation and in every historical period. Marxism is science because it is the only scientific method that faces reality. In this sense, Marxism is the only practical method scientifically possible.
There is no strategy that is only valid for the revolutions and an inevitably reformist practice. There is no division between the science of the revolution and transitory action. There is no separation between strategy and tactics, and seeking one at all costs means making a caricature of Marxism.
On the other hand, the revolutionary strategy is a combined system of actions, as Trotsky says, of class actions coordinated by the party; of actions that face each individual economic and political problem that the class struggle determines; of actions that take root in social reality, in the daily and constant practice of social life.
The essence of the strategy is precisely that of connecting and coordinating all the working class' actions in a strategic long-term framework that analyzes and preordains all the trends and variations thereon that occur in determining the relations of forces between classes.
Each action, each element and factor that develops at a local, national, and international level, influences the creation of economic, social, and political trends that shape, change, and upset the relations of forces between the classes. Therefore, there is no "minimum practice" and "maximum program". Rather, there is an ongoing process of class struggles whose episodes and stages both affect the revolutionary party's strategy, the proletariat's scientific consciousness.
The party develops strategy throughout this process, and, in particular, during the historical stages that we can define as counter-revolutionary. That is, it develops strategy during those stages in which a combined group of factors determines a relation of forces that is unfavorable to the working class' seizing of power. The party scientifically analyzes and describes these factors; it analyzes and describes economic development and the classes' social development; it analyzes and describes the entire movement of social relations; it analyzes and describes the forms in which the development of the socio-economic structure reflects on the development of the political superstructure and the State organization.
Based on this analysis, the party takes concrete action. Through this action on reality, it confirms the validity of its analysis; tests the practicality of its science; accumulates material from its experiment and experience.
Since Marx's Manifesto until now, through its concrete action, the revolutionary party has been able to accumulate enough experience to set the main principles for the revolutionary strategy. Furthermore, it has been able to recognize and theorize a group of objective laws that regulate, given their constant recurrence, the possibility and the ability to coordinate the actions of the classes' struggle in a succession that leads the proletariat to seize power.
Throughout his work Lenin recognizes and theorizes these laws. For Lenin, "tactics" means what Trotsky called "strategy". It certainly does not mean what the Social Democrats in the Second International meant with their "tactics", their "minimalism,"
Lenin continues and develops the principles in the revolutionary strategy established by Marx and Engels. Here also, he testifies to Marxism's continuity or, as Trotsky says, he reestablishes its rights. Faced with the Second International's "tactics", Lenin's is the only truly Marxist "tactics".
He will soon demonstrate this when, while addressing the immediate tasks of the 1905 revolution, he formulates the party's tactics against the Mensheviks and Trotsky himself. The 1905 Leninist "tactics" will mark, even before the imperialist world war and the Third International, the reestablishment of the rights of communism's revolutionary strategy.
Therefore, we can say that the strategy becomes such not only when it is a combined system of actions (otherwise, Marx's 1850 Address, to which Trotsky refers in his 1905 permanent revolution theory, would have limited scientific value), but when coordination becomes possible on a worldwide scale. Strategy, the heart and soul of the party, develops with the party's historical development. Strategy itself is one of the aspects of the science's, of Marxism's circulation. Over the historical course of the proletariat's struggle, we can't distinguish - as Trotsky's definition could lead us to strategy from its infancy, tactics.
When capitalism becomes the predominant system in a group of countries, the proletariat is, in fact, an international class, and its strategy can only be international.
The strategy that Marx set out for the proletariat during the nineteenth-century bourgeois revolutions and the first proletarian revolution of 1871 is an international one, and its fundamental pillars are already complete.
Lenin will be the genius strategy maker, not its creator. He will re-establish the principles of Marxist strategy by applying and developing them during capitalism's imperialist stage, during the stage in which the pace of international factors in the classes' struggle makes strategic coordination possible as well as the existence of a center that coordinates and directs the action.
Imperialism’s crisis opens a revolutionary period and quickly brings the importance of the strategy into focus. The old "tactics" of the Second International - under pressure of the pace of the imperialist crisis and the problems of choice that this crisis brings to the classes - shows in practice that there is no tactics separated from the strategy. It reveals what it really is and has gradually become in capitalism's relatively peaceful stage of development; it shows itself for the reformist tactics of the counter-revolutionary strategy, i.e., one of the tactical variations of the capitalist class' strategy.
But, if imperialism’s First World War opens a revolutionary period, it is the first Russian revolution that begins a new era in the revolutionary strategy after the counter-revolutionary period that followed the Paris Commune's defeat.
Lenin already sees this clearly in What Is to Be Done? According to him, historical development confronts the Russian proletariat with "an immediate task that is more revolutionary than all the immediate tasks that confront the proletariat of any other country. The fulfillment of this task, the destruction of the most powerful bulwark, not only of European but also of Asian reaction, would place the Russian proletariat in the vanguard of the international revolutionary proletariat."
It is true that this was Kautsky's thesis, but Lenin developed it because, among other things, he provided it with the tool to make it a reality - the party.
It is through the Bolshevik party that the Russian proletariat becomes the vanguard of the international revolutionary proletariat, and it is through the Bolshevik party that the center of the revolutionary strategy shifts towards the Russian class struggles.
The solution to these Russian struggles became extremely important for the close interdependence that had been established between the classes' relations of force in Russia and those in Europe. One of the merits of Russian revolutionary Marxists is clearly the fact that they identified this interrelation between the relations of force on a national level and those on an international level; that they clearly recognized this quantitative and qualitative development that had been historically determined in the world. Already in 1905, Lenin and Trotsky reason politically with the scientific criteria of an international strategy. Their divergence will be on other aspects that we will see further on. The important thing is to underline the clear theoretical and political awareness of the interdependence between national and international factors that comprise the strategy and that the analysis must address to draw the party and class' directives for action. Based on this awareness, and from this time forward, the revolutionary strategy not only has solid theoretical bases, but, above all, it has solid practical, political, and organizational ones.
The theory of revolutionary strategy has now become the strategy of the revolutionary theory.
The shared "strategic" consciousness of the proletariat's tasks in the first Russian revolution, does not prevent Lenin and Trotsky from having profound differences regarding the strategy itself.
On the contrary, in our opinion, it is precisely the convergence on the need for strategy that allows for the divergence, for two different strategies. Lenin observes that it is no coincidence that the Mensheviks do not propose a strategy but the fiat reproduction of the Second International's tactics translated into Russian.
In his book on Stalin, Trotsky explains the Menshevik view as follows: "Plekhanov's Marxism focuses its efforts on demonstrating that Russia's and the West's historical paths are, in principle, identical... The Menshevik concept of revolution comes down to this: victory of the Russian bourgeois revolution is inconceivable except under the leadership of the liberal bourgeoisie, and power must be remitted to it. The democratic regime will allow the proletariat to reach its Western brothers quickly, faster than before, on the path of the struggle for socialism."
On the other hand, Trotsky explains Lenin's view thus:
"... the Russian bourgeoisie suffers a delay and is unable to conduct its revolution all the way. The revolution's complete victory, through the "democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and the peasants", will purge the country of medievalism. It will give American paces to Russian capitalism's development; it will strengthen the cities' and countryside's proletariat and will open broad possibilities for the struggle for socialism. On the other hand, the Russian revolution's victory will give the socialist revolution in the West a strong push, and the latter will not only preserve Russia from the dangers of restoration, but it will allow the Russian proletariat to handle seizing power in a relatively short historical time."
And here is how Trotsky expresses his own idea: "The perspective of the permanent revolution can be summarized as follows: the complete victory of the democratic revolution in Russia can only be conceived in the form of the dictatorship of the proletariat supported by the peasantry. The dictatorship of the proletariat, that will infallibly place not only the democratic tasks on the agenda but also the socialist ones, will, at the same time, give the international socialist revolution a strong push."
Trotsky maintains his strategic view by saying that the Bolshevik framework "... was incomplete: it showed the general direction of the struggle correctly, but it did not characterize its stages properly. If the defeat of the Bolshevik perspective does not appear in 1905, it is only because the Russian revolution does not continue to develop. On the contrary, at the beginning of 1917, Lenin is forced to change his perspective in direct conflict with the party's old cadres." It is also possible to trace back to the center of the strategic divergence between Lenin and Trotsky linearly from this opinion: the scientific method of analyzing social relations, a fundamental condition to properly frame a strategy.
The example we cite is extremely important because it shows that it is not enough to reach the Marxist idea of the revolutionary strategy to outline precisely the necessary development in a given situation, society, and country. An analysis is needed - founded on scientific criteria - of that particular situation and society, the movement of its classes, its classes' struggle; and the relationships between its classes in their interdependency with the relationships between the classes in the world.
It is precisely in the scientific criteria of analysis, in the methodology itself, that the divergence between Trotsky's and Lenin's formulations of the strategy becomes clear. In our view, it also becomes just as clear how and why Trotsky's strategic solution is lacking a specific idea of the means that must enact the strategy and without which the strategy remains a purely theoretical exercise - the revolutionary party.
After the October revolution, Trotsky would say that he had been wrong on the party issue and that Lenin was right. Without detracting from the importance of Trotsky's Bolshevik maturity and self-critical ability of the revolutionary militant, we feel that his affirmation actually does little to help solve the problem we raised.
In 1905, were the "dictatorship of the proletariat" and "democratic dictatorship of the workers and peasants" truly two variations on a shared revolutionary strategy and not, instead, the first a theoretical "program" and the second, the only strategy that was valid in practice? This is the problem. In principle, one cannot exclude the fact that a strategic framework may have a series of variations. The Marxist scientific analysis of the classes' struggle, at a given time, can, precisely because of the nature of the phenomena that it analyzes, envisage the hypothesis of a variety of choices in the party's action. It makes a series of attempts, of tests necessary. But this can occur, for example, in the evaluation of short periods in given social processes or courses of class struggle, that is when it is necessary to evaluate the intensity or pace of an economic development, of an economic crisis and their impact on political development, on the political crisis, on the class struggle for a temporary period.
In this kind of evaluation, scientific analysis proceeds based on approximations, and this reflects on the revolutionary party, i.e., the center that changes the analysis into strategy, with a series of tactical differentiations. Brest-Litovsk, the German crisis, the degree of imperialist crisis after the First World War are historical examples of this kind of evaluation. Evaluating all the factors in German capitalism's crisis and their pace of development as quickly as possible and with the urgency of immediately establishing the right strategy for the revolutionary party was a task that objectively entailed various hypotheses of political action. The revolutionary party must have the ability to weigh all the hypotheses in an inner dialectic that is not an abstract "democratic" discussion or an intellectual comparison of opinions. Rather, this must be a process of scientific elaboration that requires incessant research and continual selection of working hypotheses. From this point of view, Leninist "democratic centralism", is not a formula that tends to reconcile two ideological concepts. Instead, it is a principle taken from a tested practice of scientific work within the revolutionary party.
But, if different hypotheses may rest on shared scientific criteria in the analysis that we may call microscopic, two different hypotheses derive from two different methods of scientific research and political elaboration in the macroscopic analysis.
Thus, we have two strategies; we have two different views of the classes' dynamics and their interrelations. It is not a shared strategic perspective at the heart of which there is the analysis of degree and intensity of a given stage of the class struggle. On the contrary, there are two different strategic perspectives at the heart of the divergence.
In this case, there isn't even any shared ground that makes scientific elaboration possible in the corresponding organ, the party. Therefore, there can't be any comparison and selection of hypotheses. In fact, there are two parties.
The history of the Marxist revolutionary movement in Russia shows how this can occur in practice, but at the same time it shows that a correct scientific analysis corresponds to a political action by the party that tends to take it.
Also from a strictly organizational point of view, history showed that the revolutionary party was Lenin's. However, Trotsky's convergence in the Bolshevik party could mean little, since Trotsky could have brought his strategic theory to the Bolshevik organization and have seen his view confirmed. Instead, this did not happen.
Trotsky says that Lenin correctly showed the general direction of the struggle (it is true that at a certain point, Trotsky's and Lenin's perspectives merged), but that he did not characterize its stages properly. Trotsky doesn't say what elaboration process Lenin used to characterize the stages of the proletariat's and other classes' general struggle. And yet, this is the point where we think the issue must be raised.
In a dense series of writings, Lenin analyzes and studies the issue of capitalist development in general and of capitalist development in Russia, in particular. Lenin addresses this problem from a theoretical point of view, and he solves it in the specific analysis of the Russian social reality. The results he reaches are extremely important because, on the one hand, they establish a detailed and scientific methodology of socio-economic analysis, and, on the other, they make it possible to evaluate, based on strict criteria, the classes in Russia and their struggle and relations. How can one speak of "moving forces" of the revolution without a scientific analysis of these forces, of their development, of their specific weight, of their strength and weakness? And then, how can one speak of the same "moving forces" without a scientific analysis of the socio-economic process that expresses, develops, or compresses them?
There is more than just scientific analysis of the moving forces of the Russian revolution at the base of Lenin's strategy; there is a science that makes a given analysis possible; there is a theory of capitalist development that continues the Marxist theory of capitalist development set forth in Capital.
The Leninist theory of capitalist development is not an innovation with respect to Capital. On the other hand, it is a strict and consequent application, a perfectly consistent and fertile development.
In this context, we can't illustrate, not even roughly, the Leninist theory of capitalist development. The complexity and quantity of its aspects prevent us from doing so, and, obviously, an adequate illustration would require an organic and specific study that we will not fail to do because, in our view, this fundamental aspect of Lenin's thought has been overlooked too long. We will say more: a preliminary study incessant research and continual selection of working hypotheses. From this point of view, Leninist "democratic centralism", is not a formula that tends to reconcile two ideological concepts. Instead, it is a principle taken from a tested practice of scientific work within the revolutionary party.
But, if different hypotheses may rest on shared scientific criteria in the analysis that we may call microscopic, two different hypotheses derive from two different methods of scientific research and political elaboration in the macroscopic analysis.
Thus, we have two strategies; we have two different views of the classes' dynamics and their interrelations. It is not a shared strategic perspective at the heart of which there is the analysis of degree and intensity of a given stage of the class struggle. On the contrary, there are two different strategic perspectives at the heart of the divergence.
In this case, there isn't even any shared ground that makes scientific elaboration possible in the corresponding organ, the party. Therefore, there can't be any comparison and selection of hypotheses. In fact, there are two parties.
The history of the Marxist revolutionary movement in Russia shows how this can occur in practice, but at the same time it shows that a correct scientific analysis corresponds to a political action by the party that tends to take it.
Also from a strictly organizational point of view, history showed that the revolutionary party was Lenin's. However, Trotsky's convergence in the Bolshevik party could mean little, since Trotsky could have brought his strategic theory to the Bolshevik organization and have seen his view confirmed. Instead, this did not happen.
Trotsky says that Lenin correctly showed the general direction of the struggle (it is true that, at a certain point, Trotsky's and Lenin's perspectives merged), but that he did not characterize its stages properly. Trotsky doesn't say what elaboration process Lenin used to characterize the stages of the proletariat's and other classes' general struggle. And yet, this is the point where we think the issue must be raised.
In a dense series of writings, Lenin analyzes and studies the issue of capitalist development in general and of capitalist development in Russia, in particular. Lenin addresses this problem from a theoretical point of view, and he solves it in the specific analysis of the Russian social reality. The results he reaches are extremely important because, on the one hand, they establish a detailed and scientific methodology of socio-economic analysis, and, on the other, they make it possible to evaluate, based on strict criteria, the classes in Russia and their struggle and relations. How can one speak of "moving forces" of the revolution without a scientific analysis of these forces, of their development, of their specific weight, of their strength and weakness? And then, how can one peak of the same "moving forces" without a scientific analysis of the socio-economic process that expresses, develops, or compresses them?
There is more than just scientific analysis of the moving forces of the Russian revolution at the base of Lenin's strategy; there is a science that makes a given analysis possible; there is a theory of capitalist development that continues the Marxist theory of capitalist development set forth in Capital.
The Leninist theory of capitalist development is not an innovation with respect to Capital. On the other hand, it is a strict and consequent application, a perfectly consistent and fertile development.
In this context, we can't illustrate, not even roughly, the Leninist theory of capitalist development. The complexity and quantity of its aspects prevent us from doing so, and, obviously, an adequate illustration would require an organic and specific study that we will not fail to do because, in our view, this fundamental aspect of Lenin's thought has been overlooked too long. We will say more: a preliminary study of what we define as the Leninist theory of capitalist development is indispensable to understand many Leninist theses and positions - not to say all of them - that may seem political but which, in reality, rest on a close economic analysis. A long series of political problems solved and framed by Lenin was, in fact, framed and solved with economic analysis, with economic theory. Without knowing exactly how Lenin conceives of capitalism's economic development, not only in Russia, but on a worldwide level, we can't understand his strategic conception.
Ultimately, the Leninist strategy has its solid bases in the scientific conception of capitalism's development. This holds for 1905 as it does for 1917. It holds in general for the revolutionary party, during any historical stage in which it is operating. It is even more valid for the present, since the scientific conception of capitalist development is the first condition for the party strategy and a constant factor for the party's own existence. The party cannot operate if it doesn't have a specific conception of the development of the reality in which it works. In order to have such a conception, it must have specific tools of analysis, it must have a scientific methodology.
Lenin's 1905 strategy was not, therefore, one proletariat's strategy. Rather, it was the proletariat's strategy. If we can't illustrate here all of Lenin's theory on capitalist development which is at the root of his strategy, we can, however, indicate two of its essential aspects. These can contribute to better understand his strategy, on the one hand, and on the other to see the non-scientific nature of Trotsky's. In his analysis of capitalist development in Russia, Lenin manages to classify the proletariat - even statistically. This classification is different from Trotsky's, but it is also different, for example, from Kautsky's traditional one. Lenin's classification of the proletariat in Russia is a classification that stands apart from the conventional one. Lenin analyzes the entire labor-power market, and consequently, also the sale of the labor power that takes place partially, not constantly.
By introducing this criterion of analysis, Lenin follows the entire proletarization process through every stage. This way, he makes a different and higher evaluation of the proletarian population than Trotsky.
We can't explain here how Lenin reached these conclusions. The strategic consequences, though, are obvious once Lenin's analysis has been accepted. The "democratic dictatorship of the workers and peasants" will be the most powerful strategic lever to accelerate the proletarization process and to bring a powerful, aware, organized proletariat out of a democratic-bourgeois revolution. This proletariat will be guided by a strong Marxist party as has never before occurred in the history of other bourgeois revolutions. But, someone who supports Trotsky's strategy could object that if the proletarization process were indeed this intense, more intense than Trotsky himself imagined, wouldn't this be another valid reason to consider the "dictatorship of the proletariat" as mature and possible in the 1905 revolution? Wasn't this additional confirmation of the proletariat's predominant role before the other classes and the objective possibility to provide a socialist solution to the problems that a bourgeois-democratic revolution no longer had the ability or strength to solve?
It is precisely the intense proletarization process, registered by Lenin's analysis, that contradicts Trotsky's framework. If class differentiation in the Russian economy reached such a high level, it means that capitalism develops impetuously and has demonstrated its ability to develop quickly; and, most importantly, it means that it has the objective possibility of developing even faster. By analyzing the final decades of the nineteenth century, Lenin had already demonstrated that the pace of Russian capitalism’s development was faster than that of European capitalisms. Moreover, he had set forth his thesis - now contrabanded as new and socialist - according to which Russian capitalism had every possibility of having a development pace that approached, if it did not exceed, the American pace.
Russia, with its immense internal market development possibilities, can become in Europe what the United States are in America, Lenin thinks. Two paths arise for the future of Russian capitalism: the "German track", the Bismarck solution, or the "democratic assault", the American solution with the peasants who become "farmers" and the semi-proletarian and proletarized peasants who become workers.
Thus, the workers' revolutionary party's strategic choice becomes clear: participate in the "democratic assault", take its leadership, not to provide impossible socialist solutions to economic development, but to push all the capitalist forces to the limit. From this "democratic assault", once the capitalist forces have been installed as the managing class, the proletariat and its party will be incredibly reinforced and able to put the goal of a socialist revolution and the dictatorship of the proletariat on the agenda.
To understand the greatness and suggestiveness of Lenin's strategic view, imagine nineteenth-century American history with the determining presence of a workers' revolutionary party that had based its activity on a Marxist strategy like this!
All this shows how Trotsky's premise was radically different. Already in his 1905 work, and, more than twenty years later, in his History of the Russian Revolution, Trotsky underlined some "particularities" of Russian history that, according to his thought, made the October revolution possible. In our view, their theorization is one of the bases of Trotsky's strategy.
About this part of Trotsky's thought we can express the same regret as we did about Lenin's theory of capitalist development: it has been overlooked too long, and we don't have the chance to illustrate it here. Livio Maitan, who is praised as the best Trotsky scholar in Italy by the bourgeois literature and the Italian Communist Party, doesn't even mention this issue in his introduction to the recent re-printing of the History of the Russian Revolution!
Nonetheless, it is worthwhile for us to pause on one of these "particularity" that Trotsky theorized, i.e., the extreme slowness in Russian capitalist development and the resulting influence of European finance capital on the Russian economy. For Trotsky, these two phenomena are interdependent, and, somehow, complementary. Consequently, from this particularity of the Russian situation derives not only the need, but above all the possibility for the socialist revolution to develop as a near stage in the permanent revolution. During this, the proletariat, while forced to soave the problems that the bourgeoisie leaves unsolved, already raises socialist issues and, in fact, establishes its dictatorship. Starting from the premise of slow capitalist development in Russia, Trotsky would inevitably reach this strategic conclusion.
But, the premise has not been proved while Lenin's strategic conclusions emerge from an in-depth analysis and are demonstrated and verified scientifically.
Comparing Lenin's analysis of capitalist development and Trotsky's theorization of the Russian "particularities" would be worth detailed examination. This would also allow us to consider, from this specific point of view, the relationship between the revolutionary party and the strategy.
For now, it is enough to have established, based on one of the greatest examples in the theoretical and political history of the revolutionary Marxist movement, the indivisible dependency of the strategy on scientific analysis.
Strategy can't be a group of rules taken from a body of theoretical statements on the classes' struggle. Instead, strategy is the result of a scientific analysis of a given stage in the classes' struggle. This is the essence of the revolutionary party because without scientific analysis and the consequent strategy, the party cannot live. Rather, it vegetates as a propagandistic sect.