Lenin on the nature of the State (Part-II)

Reviewing Lenin’s lecture delivered at the Sverdlov University July 11, 1919

If we dig out the dialectical materialism of Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, they have talked about the historical evolution of human society and generally the 'state'. According to Marx, it was the embryonic stage that gave birth to the private property and with the birth of the private property, the class division or the class conflict began within society. This is how; the millions of years of human history emulated with the emergence of slavery that continued for millions of years and finally faced the revolt from the slaves and diffused into feudalism. Likewise, with the emergence Feudalism, a new class war emerged between the feudal owners and the peasants. The Age of Feudalism also continued for millions of years and finally gave birth to 'Capitalism '.

The whole structure of the State was developed around the community itself,  in which discipline and ordering of the work were maintained through customs and traditions. In this regard, history shows that the state is the product of special apparatus, which emerged through systematic coercion of the masses, especially by giving birth to class division within society — the division into classes and groups. In we touch the discourse of class struggle, the whole history of mankind is nothing but the history of class struggle between the slave and slave-owners, between  the Feudal lords and peasants and between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat.

For Lenin, it was the division of society into classes that gave birth to the fundamental fact of the history. This development has been parallel to every culture, civilization and society around the globe — even modern civilized European society went through these stages. For instance, Slavery remained a supreme fundamental fact in the European history for nearly two thousand years then Feudalism followed and reigned over Europe for thousand years to come. Likewise, if we distinctively spot out the Russian history, the serfdom reigned for hundreds of years, which had dominated all the aspects of the Russian society. Moreover, the Serfdom in Russia reigned longest of all [the so-called Appanage System] in which the Serfs were totally dependent upon the landowners for everything ranges from food, shelter and clothing.

Similarly, if we compare the history of western Europe and Russia in a single domain, then the history of slavery in Russia was worst than the history of slavery in western Europe. It is because; in Russian History the peasants and landowners were dialectically entwined by the apparatus of  State. [1] It was only in 1861, when Feudalism took over in Russia and suddenly diffused into capitalism in the following decades. likewise, with the ascension of capitalism in Russia, the Feudal lords swiftly became the Capitalist or industrialist or the industrial owners. Basically, it was the dawn of Feudalism in Russia in the 1860s and the ascension of Capitalism with the dawn of 20 ^thcentury that instigated revolutionary attempts of 1905 and 1917. Likewise, the rapid shift or the conversion of socio-political system from one form to another increased the number of Proletarians (Proletariats) and soon, they became the majority. With rapid conversion of masses into the proletarian majority, the class war became more vivid that finally led to the Russian Revolution of 1917 — Vladimir Lenin, in his famous book ' State and Revolution ' called it a ' Proletarian Revolution. In addition, if we put this into the perspective of various nations, there are thousands of nations, which went through similar episode of the historical changes. Basically, it was the emergence the new proletarian class that brought major socio-political changes in the history of various states and civilizations. In the meantime, people, who rose above the society came to be known as  rulers or the Statesmen while people, which remained below the society came to be known as peasants or labor  Class or Proletarians. [2]

Class, war, revolution and the state

Similarly, If we dig out the writings of Karl Marx, he developed his theory of socialism or communism based on the ' Basis ' and ' Superstructure ' phenomenon. The categories of Basis and superstructure are important because they analyze in concrete terms the importance of modes of production on all other aspects of the life, including the spiritual aspect of the historical process. [3]In contrast, for Marx, the role of the modes of production is central in determining the socio-political and spiritual process of living society. In this regard, whenever, we talk about the modes of production, it refers to two sides of production — the productive forces and its relation to production. Both sides play a key role in determining the idea of social ans state apparatus. Likewise, when we talk about the state; it is nothing but the reflection of the society in every context — if social relationships are determined by the modes of production then it also determines the nature of the state. When it comes to state and society then we must have some understanding about the socio-economic formations, which determines the life of social organisms. In the meantime, it is the existence of the productive forces that determines the modes of production , hence determines the nature of state and society. For instance, the nature of productive forces within the State of capitalism gives birth to different modes of production known as over-production, while the nature of the productive forces within the State of Socialism gives birth to different mode of production known as Collectivism — what Karl Marx says in his famous Critique of Gotha Program ' from each according to his ability, to each according to his need '. Basically, Karl Marx's this principle refers to free access and distribution of goods, capital and services — the equal distribution of all existing resources. [4]

In contrast, the whole discourse of the state has been the product of historical development and the socialist view of state only came to the spotlight only in the late eighteenth century, especially after the writings of Karl Marx and Frederick Engels. According to Christian theology, the State was evil because the nature of man is evil. Likewise, in the rational domain of enlightenment, the concept of the state is unnatural and hence evil. Various political philosophers such as Hegel, Marx, and Proudhon declared government as evil and hence called for the 'annihilation of the quackery of government'. Among the latter, the Hegelian theoretical terminologies had dominated the German intellectual scene in the nineteenth century, Hegel believed that “as long as the state existed, whatever the form of the government, there would always be the rulers and serfs — perhaps, this opposition will continue until and unless, state, which is the product of polarity, annihilates itself dialectically and give space to a unified social life, which is the actual condition of the community ” . Moreover, in the context of social theory, state is the product of the superstructure; the superstructure is nothing but the antagonistic formations, with all its ideas and ideological relations and institutions, is the result and an instrument of the struggle between the classes. In this regard, for Marx, state is an instrument of the ruling class to rule, and the exploit the ordinary masses for the protection of their interests.

In his earliest critique against the estate owners of the Rhineland, Karl Marx defined the structure of the state in a hyperbolic way; Marx said; “ The ears, eyes, hands and legs by which the interest of the forest owners listens, watches, judges, defends, seizes and runs”—Thus, the modern state only exists for the sake of the private property. Moreover, the state is a kind of organization, which the bourgeoisie necessarily adopt both for the internal and external purposes to guarantee the security of their private wealth, property and interests. In discourse, it is the existence of the private property, which gives birth to the class antagonisms and thus, finally foments and cause the proletarian revolution. With the victory of the proletarians over the bourgeoisie, every means of production comes under the collective ownership, and society becomes classless with no concept of state as raison d'être.

If we read the landmark work of Karl Marx ' The Communist Manifesto ', he openly called for the dictatorship of the proletariat's and the proletariat uprising against the bourgeoisie Capitalism . Likewise, in his famous lecture ' War and Revolution ' which Lenin delivered on May 14, 1917, he discussed 'War' and 'Revolution' as a separate discourse — he questioned the character of war surrounding class; he elaborated what classes are waging war and what are the historical and historic-economic conditions that causes War. In Marxian and scientific socialist discourse, the ideologues often discuss about the techniques and methods to assess the war around different paradigms such as, what is the war being waged for, and what classes staged and directed it. In this regard, the Marxist ideologues become well qualified opponents of the war. For Marxists and socialists, their aim is to achieve the socialist system of society by exterminating the class divisions and by annihilating the state. Likewise, the scientific socialists are totally against the bourgeoisie conflicts and imperialist wars — because of this reason,  Bolsheviks condemned the First Great War by declaring it imperialist war for the new territorial divisions of the globe. [5] Whenever it comes to War and Revolutions,we often figure out the European history because it is entwined with wars and wars. Moreover, there are wars and wars. It is the historical conditions, which gives birth to wars, and it is class antagonisms within society, which give rise to war to achieve some ends. What famous German philosopher and historian of the war Carl Von Clausewitz once said; ' War is a continuation of policy by other means '. Basically, it was Clausewitz, who had Philosophized the concept of war by reviewing the history of wars and by drawing lessons from it. Moreover, there was a time when men in the street's conception of war was being considered apart from the policies of the governments and classes. But thanks to Clausewitz, who had carefully analyzed the philosophy and historical epochs of the war surrounding the socio-political discourse. He divulged the tyrannical face of the state by divulging its war-centric statecraft policy — which resembles the policy of state and the policy of a certain class [ Bourgeoisie] within the state, which pursue it to secure their interest. What V.I Lenin once said; “ War is terrible but terribly profitable". This happened during the revolution in France, when the pro-Monarchist nations across the European continent supported the French Monarchy against the revolutionaries. Even the bourgeoisie Journalists had waged propaganda against the revolutionaries because of their philistine prejudice and ignorance of the backward masses, who are unaware about the economic and historical connections between each war and the prior policies of the government.

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[1] The appanage system emerged during the diffusion of Kievan Russ into centralized Russian State — the Russian historians call this' Appanage Era' that refers to the period between the collapse of Kievan Russ and the emergence of Centralized Russian State.

[2] The concept of the state as necessarily evil originated from man's fallen nature rooted in the Christian traditions. Because, what we have seen during the Middle Ages, there was a power balance between the ecclesiastical authority and the political power in which the ecclesiastical authority was enjoying a supreme power. Moreover, it was the reformation that has subordinated the authority of the church to the state and in this way the modern state came into being. Even Thomas More in his famous book 'Utopia' traces the evil of the government rooted in the institution of private property. For Thomas More, who was Utopian Communist saw the genesis of state in the institution of private property — basically, it is the private property that gave birth to the state. 

[3] Kovalson, V. Kelle and M.Historical Materialism: An outline of the Marxist theory of Society. Moscow: Progress Publisher, 1973.

[4] There are various types of Justice, distributive, retributive, and compensatory which is directly linked with the nature of the state. Likewise, there various theories of Just Distribution—these theories emerged with two major questions: Is it shape, color, race, creed, religion, and sexual orientation? Are differences in character, ability, need, effort, or productivity relevant? With the help these question, the theories about the distribution of social benefits and burdens emerged. The theories includes Egalitarianism; which stresses that for just distribution each member of the society should completely get equal shares of the burden and benefit—There is no relevance differences among the members of society; Socialism; which stresses on ensuring the distribution based on needs and abilities —burdens and benefits should be distributed based on needs and abilities of the individuals; Protestant work Ethic; which stresses on the distribution based on contribution , which sometimes also referred as 'puritan work ethic' — the protestant work ethics confers that each member of the society should be rewarded in proportion to his / her contribution — the main premise of the Protestant work Ethics is that ' Working hard is good to get big rewards';  Libertarianism; which stresses on distribution based on Freedom, it also opines that the just distribution is always the result of free exchange — in contrast, the libertarian ethics opines that the distribution of benefits and burdens is always the result of free choices of the member of the society. On the contrary, the whole discourse of Libertarianism revolves around the notion of Negative Rights, Positive Rights and Contractualism. Whereas the Negative Rights refers to observance of the right without interference from the outside — the freedom from within eg Right to property, freedom of conscience, and freedoms of Press, while the Positive Rights, refers to the observance of Right with a service to the holder. For instance, the right to healthcare is one of the examples of positive right. Lastly, Contractualism, it is based on the some ethical position, which opines that one has no positive moral obligations to anyone else other than those one freely accepts.

[5] In his famous book 'The origin of the family, private property, and the state',Federick Engels summed up his analysis in this way: “The state is, therefore, by no means a power forced on society from without; just as little is it 'the reality of the ethical idea', 'the image and reality of reason', as Hegel maintains. Rather, it is a product of society at a certain stage of development; it is the admission that this society has become entangled in an insoluble contradiction with itself, that it has split into irreconcilable antagonisms which it is powerless to dispel. But in order that these antagonisms, these classes with conflicting economic interests, might not consume themselves and society in fruitless struggle, it became necessary to have a power, seemingly standing above society, that would alleviate the conflict and keep it within the bounds of ' order '; and this power,

Engels, Friedrich. The Origin of the family, Private Property, and the state. London: Penguin Classics, 1972.