Lenin's “Own Words”(Part Five: Theories of the State, Nation and War)

15. The Theory of the State

What is the Essence of the State?

“If we abstract ourselves from the so-called religious teachings, subtleties, philosophical arguments and the various opinions advanced by bourgeois scholars, if we abstract ourselves from these and try to get at the real essence of the matter, we shall find that the state really does amount to such an apparatus of rule separated out from human society. When there appears such a special group of men who are occupied with ruling and nothing else, and who in order to rule need a special apparatus of coercion and of subjugating the will of others by force -- prisons, special detachments of men, armies, etc. -- then there appears the state.” (“The State,” Marx, Engels, Marxism, Foreign Languages Publishing House, p. 7)

What is the essence -- not this or that particular quality -- of the state that we are aware of in everyday life and told to “resolutely defend”? Lenin responds that this is a special apparatus of coercion that arises from the need to rule and govern a class-divided society. This general essence of the state has remained unchanged through the system of slavery and serfdom right up to the system of capitalism. The division of society into classes means that, on the one hand, there is a group of people who govern and exploit others, while on the other hand there are those who are governed and exploited. In order to compel others to work and continuously appropriate their surplus labor, it is necessary to have some sort of coercive apparatus -- and thus the state is formed.

The ruling class, however, does not necessarily present the state as an ruling-class apparatus, but rather presents it as a community or as an organ that preserves the common interests of both the rulers and the ruled. Even today there are theories that speak of the neutrality of the state. The basis for the appearance of such fantasies is that the ruling class finds that such views serve a certain social function in terms of maintaining and expanding their own interests. In a period of crisis, however, it becomes starkly apparent that the state is an apparatus of force and that it is an illusion to speak of it as a community.

These days there has been a spate of criticism of Lenin’s theory of the state, as seen in the case of the theories of the Structural Reformists. One scholar has proposed that the present-day state has a dual structure. According to this view, in addition to the “state as superstructure” (Lenin’s state as apparatus of force), there is a “state as substructure,” and this state as “economic base” will also exist under socialism since it is a “non-political state.” If one negates the class nature of the state as economic base, the rest is easy. The only thing necessary would be to place this “state as substructure” under democratic control, which would then invariably lead to the appearance of socialism. The general characteristic of all such views of the state is an extreme illusion regarding the “public nature” of what is in fact an organ of the ruling class.

Criticism of the Democratic State

“You say your state is free, whereas in reality, as long as there is private property, your state, even if it is a democratic republic, is nothing but a machine used by the capitalists to suppress the workers, and the freer the state, the more clearly is this expressed. Examples of this are Switzerland in Europe and the United States in the Americas. Nowhere does capital rule so cynically and ruthlessly, and nowhere is this so clearly apparent, as in these countries, although they are democratic republics, no matter how finely they are painted and not withstanding all the talk about labour democracy and the equality of all citizens... and nowhere is this suppression of the working-class movement accompanied by such ruthless severity as in Switzerland and America, and nowhere does the influence of capital in parliament manifest itself as powerfully as in these countries. The power of capital is everything, the stock exchange is everything, while parliament and elections are marionettes, puppets.” (“The State,” Foreign Languages Press, p. 23)

In a democratic state -- present-day Japan being one of its forms -- the rule of capital is single-handed and appears clearly and “purely,” since the state is no longer a coalition that includes feudalistic power. For this reason, the democratic republic, in one aspect, is historically progressive and more advantageous than the old feudal absolutist state in terms of the advancing of the proletariat’s class struggles. On the other hand, however, this is the direct, “ironclad” rule of capital. Whereas in the past, in the case of the English state for example, the proletariat was able to obtain some advantage for itself when the state was an organ of both the landowners and the bourgeoisie and there was a struggle between the two classes (such as when the landowning class, in retaliation against the bourgeoisie for the repeal of the Corn Laws, supported legislation to protect the working conditions of the proletariat). In a democratic republican state, however, the power of capital is almighty and the parliament and elections are nothing but its marionettes. The bourgeoisie carries out its state activities outside of the parliament and behind the scenes through the state apparatus.

For this reason, no illusions can be held toward the democratic republican state and the parliamentarian system. It is a terrible fantasy to say that there is diversity within the parliament or that parliament can become a “tool of the people.” The issue revolves rather around the smashing of the state apparatus of the bourgeoisie.

It is worth noting that Lenin exposes the democratic republic of Switzerland, in addition to that of United States. The JCP has held up Switzerland as the example of a “neutral state,” calling it a model for workers in Japan to aim for, but in fact the Switzerland is a state of the despotic rule of capital, a bourgeois state that must be clearly rejected by the proletariat.

Bourgeois and Proletarian States

“The [bourgeois state] cannot be superseded by the proletarian state through the process of ‘withering away,’ but as a general rule, only through a violent revolution.” (State and Revolution, International Publishers, p. 21)

Here Lenin is criticizing the Second International opportunists and reformists who one-dimensionally distorted Marx’s theory of the state so that the “withering away” of the state came to mean that the bourgeois state would gradually and smoothly wither away without a revolution. Although the expression “wither away” was originally meant to refer to a proletarian state, the opportunists emphasized that the state would “wither away,” in opposition to the anarchists who advocated the “abolition” of the state. In other words, whereas the anarchists called for the immediate abolition of the state, and the state in general, the opportunists called for the state in general to whither away.

Of course, both sides were incorrect and this resulted in vacillation within and damage to the proletarian movement. Since the anarchists negated the state in general, they consequently rejected the task of organizing a proletarian state in place of the bourgeois state. The result of the anarchists’ rejection of the proletarian state was their reluctant tailing after semi-bourgeois popular front governments (e.g. the experience of in 1936). The opportunists, for their part, by claiming that the state in general (and therefore the bourgeois state also) would wither away without a revolution, confused the meaning of revolution and in the end justified and prettified the bourgeois state.

Lenin criticized the one-dimensionality of both sides, clearly stating that the bourgeois state must be “abolished” by means of proletarian revolution, and that only the proletarian state, or the “semi-state,” would be able to wither away.

On Proletarian Democracy

“Proletarian democracy, of which Soviet government is one of the forms, has brought a development and expansion of democracy hitherto unprecedented in the world.” (“The Proletarian Revolution and the Renegade Kautsky” Foreign Languages Press, p. 25)

In this passage, Lenin clarifies the difference between bourgeois democracy and proletarian democracy, and discusses the class content of democracy. Kautsky and others juxtaposed the dictatorship of the Bolshevik government with democracy in general, criticizing the former, while Lenin countered that the Soviet government was a higher form of democracy, proletarian democracy. He said that as long as democracy was the state, it would be the rule of one class against another, and in this sense a “dictatorship.” Even a democratic republic does not change the fact that it is a “dictatorship of the bourgeoisie.” Kautsky attempted to conceal this reality by introducing the issue of democracy in general or “pure democracy.” Proletarian democracy, for its part, is rule against the bourgeoisie and in this sense a “dictatorship,” but since this is in fact a state of the masses, it is a hundred or a thousand times more democratic than a bourgeois state.

Of course, the theory of proletarian democracy discussed here is the abstract concept and should not be confused with the actual state under Stalin. In Russia during the era of Stalin, it was the case that not only proletarian democracy, but even formal democracy (i.e. bourgeois democracy), was lacking (and this remains the case).

Criticism of the "Democratic Coalition Government"

“That is why it always happens, under all sorts of ‘coalition’ Cabinets that include ‘socialists,’ that these socialists, even when individuals among them are perfectly honest, in reality turn out to be either a useless ornament of or a screen for the bourgeois government, a sort of lightning conductor to divert the people’s indignation from the government, a tool for the government to deceive the people. This was the case with Louis Blanc in 1848, and dozens of times in Britain and France, when socialists participated in Cabinets. This is also the case with the Chernovs and Tseretelis in 1917. So it has been and so it will be as long as the bourgeois system exists and as long as the old bourgeois, bureaucratic state apparatus remains intact.” (“One of the Fundamental Questions of the Revolution,” Collected Works, Vol. 25 p. 373)

Unlike today’s pseudo-communists, Lenin emphasized that socialists (and “communists”) participating in democratic coalition governments are tools of the ruling class and serve as a veil. The reason for this is that such governments do not lift a finger to change the old state apparatus. Today, the actual work of the government is carried out by an enormous army of bureaucrats, and a reshuffling of ministers or even a change in governments has little real significance. Since none of the democratic coalition governments that have included socialists or “communists” abolished this state structure or this bureaucratic army, they were unable to carry out proletarian policies and ultimately met with inevitable failure.

Since Lenin wrote these words, opportunism -- that is, opportunism in the sense of participating in and entering bourgeois states and trying to move them in some sort of “socialist direction” instead of striving to smash the bourgeois state apparatus and establish a proletarian government -- has provided us with a wealth of experience concerning coalition governments. Democratic coalition governments emerged in many Europe countries following the First World War, and even the best of them demonstrated their impotence in terms of being a proletarian revolutionary power (the Sachsen-Thueringen government in Germany, or to a certain extent the Bela Kun government in Hungary), while the worst of the social-democratic coalition governments made every effort to strangle the proletarian revolution (the German Scheidemann, Noske government).

And there are innumerable cases where a democratic coalition government has acted as a lightening rod to deflect the anger of the proletarian masses. The 1918 coalition government in Austria composed of the Austrian Social Democratic Party and the Christian Social Party (a bourgeois liberal party), the 1923 coalition government in England made up of the Labor Party and Liberal Party, the 1924 Kuomintang-CCP coalition government in China, as well as the democratic collation government in Germany prior to the victory of the Nazis -- these are all essentially identical examples.

Before and after the Second World War, the main advocates of democratic coalition governments were the Stalinists, who had changed tactics, abandoning their theory of “social fascism” --according to which social democrats and fascists are identical in terms of being the agents of the bourgeoisie -- in favor of the theory of the popular front. There were democratic coalition governments in France, both in 1935 and after the war, in Spain in 1936, and in Italy following the war, and in each case these were as a popular front governments. In France and Italy after the Second World War, Stalinist “communists” (who are in fact Millerandists) entered bourgeois cabinets, but this was just like Chernov who “worked as a Minister” in 1917, in the sense that they were unable to do anything for the masses and surrendered openly to the bourgeois government.

In Japan after the Second World War, a coalition government composed of the Socialist Party and Democratic Party was formed (the Katayama government), but the complete impotence and lack of direction of this government was exposed. The innumerable examples of this sort of experience demonstrate the correctness of the Marxist-Leninist theory of the state, which emphasizes the fact that a popular front government that seeks to organize a government on the basis of the bourgeois state structure, rather than smashing this old state structure, will be unable to wage the struggle for socialism.

Criticism of the "Free People's State"

“The ‘free people’s state’ was a program demand and a catchword among the German Social-Democrats in the seventies. This catchword is devoid of all political content except that it describes the concept of democracy in a pompous philistine fashion. Insofar as it hinted in a legally permissible manner at a democratic republic, Engels was prepared to ‘justify’ its use ‘for a time’ from an agitational point of view. But it was an opportunistic catchword, for it amounted to something more than prettifying bourgeois democracy, it was also a failure to understand the socialist criticism of the state in general.” (State and Revolution, pp. 19-20)

“A free people’s state” became a fashionable slogan within the German Social-Democratic Party near the end of the 19th century. Lenin said that this slogan was nothing but a petty-bourgeois exaggeration of the concept of democracy.” Engels, for his part, considered this an empty expression. The reason for this evaluation was the fact that ultimately this slogan was a one-dimensional abstraction of bourgeois democracy and amounted to its prettification. We must point out that this fantasy of a “people’s state” is not a question of ancient history. The JCP, for instance, today is calling for a new democratic revolution, a people’s democratic revolution, against monopoly capital in Japan. We can understand why Mao Tse Tung would propose such a slogan, even if it is incorrect from the perspective of Marxism, since in the case of this was an ideological reflection of the agrarian revolution. In the case of Japan, however, which has already reached the point of being a highly-developed capitalist state and realized a democratic republic, this slogan is unacceptable, even from a temporary, agitational standpoint. If this were to be brought about it would probably amount to a popular front government. Such governments, however, which arise during a period of crisis for bourgeois rule, play the objective role of allowing the bourgeoisie to ride out the crisis by temporarily taking over the reins of government from the bourgeoisie. There would be no reason why the slogan of the “people’s state,” which was rejected in the time of Marx, could be viewed as being correct today.

Centralized Authority and Regional Autonomy

“The philistine opportunism of that ‘trend’ lies in the fact that people forget the narrow limits of so-called ‘municipal socialism’ (in reality, municipal capitalism, as the English Social-Democrats properly point out in their controversies with the Fabians). They forget that so long as the bourgeoisie rules as a class it cannot allow any encroachment, even from the ‘municipal’ point of view, upon the real foundations of its rule; that if the bourgeoisie allows, tolerates, ‘municipal socialism,’ it is because the latter does not touch the foundations of its rule, does not interfere with the important sources of its wealth, but extends only to the narrow sphere of local-expenditure, which the bourgeoisie itself allows the ‘population’ to manage. It does not need more than a slight acquaintance with “municipal socialism” in the West to know that any attempt on the part of socialist municipalities to go a little beyond the boundaries of their normal, i.e., minor, petty activities, which give no substantial relief to the workers, any attempt to meddle with capital, is invariably vetoed in the most emphatic manner by the central authorities of the bourgeois state.” (“The Agrarian Program of Social-Democracy in the First Russian Revolution,” Collected Works Vol. 13, p. 360)

The established “leftwing” parties in Japan told workers that if they elected “progressive prefectural governors” and “progressive city mayors” and created “bright regional governments,” this “democratic camp” would be able to truly act in the interests of residents. However, even if a number of “progressive” mayors were to emerge, what they would be able to accomplish, as Lenin points out, would be extremely limited. Monopoly capital and the LDP have a grasp on the central power of the state apparatus. And in terms of the regional governments, they are in fact about 80 percent dependent on the central government.

A policy for the workers that would actually threaten the basis of monopoly capital’s interests, not only in words but in deeds, would be obstructed, prevented and rejected by the central government. Workers must recognize the narrow limits of regional governments, and think of the fundamental issues, including the bourgeoisie as a class and its rule, the overall economic system of capitalism, and the overall state apparatus. It is necessary to defeat the excessive fantasies held towards local governments by the established “leftwing” political parties in Japan, who, like the “municipalisers” in Lenin’s day, “seek to divert public attention away from the fundamental questions of the economic system as a whole, and of the state structure as a whole, to minor questions of local self-government.” (Lenin, Ibid. p. 359) The bourgeoisie itself tries to make it appear its small expenditures in the realm of local self-governments is for the sake of the “needs of the residents” and that in this realm all there is class harmony between the “democratic” political parties. In this area of local-government the JCP is able to propose “urgent demands” (?) -- for example the construction of a pedestrian bridge -- that even the LDP would agree to. But this only shows that the JCP has become a petty-bourgeois party that is totally taken in by the notion of “social harmony.”

To know the degree to which “municipal socialism” or “municipal communism” (i.e. municipal capitalism) is a reactionary illusion, one need only look at the policies carried out by Tokyo governor Minobe who sold himself as a friend of the workers, (See part 6, chapter 18 on united fronts)

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