Rosa Luxemburg's Critique of Lenin's Ultra Centralistic Party Concept and of the Bolshevik Revolution

Abstract

After Rosa Luxemburg's manuscript from 1918 on the Russian Revolution was published in the very early days of 1922 there were—and have continued to be—many discussions on the differences between Luxemburg and Lenin. Luxemburg had a very different position on the character of a socialist proletarian movement and on the role of its leaders in comparison to Lenin and also in contrast to the bureaucrats of the old Social Democratic Party of Germany. A socialist organization should always place its emphasis on the proletarian masses. The kind of socialism and the route to achieve it should be decided by the proletariat rather than the leadership, whose only purpose is to provide a wide framework of socialist issues and drive forward short-, middle- and long-term goals. From these basic democratic ideas Luxemburg criticizes Lenin's Ultra Centralistic Party Concept (see Luxemburg's ‘Organizational Questions of Russian Social Democracy’ (1904) and her ‘Credo: On the State of Russian Social Democracy’ (1911)) and the practice of the Bolshevik revolution (see Luxemburg's manuscript ‘The Russian Revolution’ (September/October 1918)). This article will present new research findings based on recently discovered archival materials. It will address the following issues: the attitude of the other Spartacus leaders to the Bolsheviks’ revolutionary tactics; Luxemburg's possible change of view after the German November Revolution of 1918; and whether she showed hostility to the Bolsheviks or critical solidarity with the Russian comrades.