Tag: lenin

Study Circle 23 of 2019: The Concrete Analysis of the Concrete Situation

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Dear comrades and friends,

DYFI CUC organised the twenty third study circle of this year yesterday. We read the Chapter 4 – Imperialism: World War and Civil War of Lenin: A Study on the Unity of his Thought by Georg Lukacs.

The chapter talks about what Lenin was able to do with the theory of imperialism – not so much groundbreaking economic work, but groundbreaking analysis of what imperialism meant for action. Lenin was the only one at the time who was able to give a guideline for concrete action, in the backdrop of imperialism, because his was a theory of the class forces active under imperialism. As Lukacs says:

For Marxists the concrete analysis of the concrete situation is not the opposite of ‘pure’ theory; on the contrary, it is the culmination of all genuine theory, its consummation, the point where it therefore breaks into practice.

The chapter then talks about two flawed ways of assessing bourgeois and proletarian revolutions: one, to think that if a revolution is a bourgeois revolution, the only task of the proletariat is to support that revolution; two, to assume that all revolutions in an imperialist age will be proletarian revolutions. Both these approaches mechanistically divide bourgeois and proletarian revolutions, and ignore revolutionary elements in both. 

The chapter also briefly talks about what revisionism means in the context of war and civil war. We discussed the nature of the revolution in Nepal. Next week, we will read Chapter 5.

Revolutionary Greetings,

Central Unit Committee,

Democratic Youth Federation of India – Delhi 

Study Circle 22 of 2019 – Lenin, The Revolution and the Party

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Dear comrades and friends,

DYFI CUC organised the twenty second study circle of this year today. We read the first three chapters of Lenin: A Study on the Unity of his Thought by Georg Lukacs.

The text is helpful introduction to the writings of Lenin, as it considers his work as a whole. The first chapter talks about how the actuality of the revolution (the fact that the misery of the proletariat contains a revolutionary element) is distinct from the imminence of the revolution (the idea that revolution is around the corner). When theories are formulated with the actuality of the revolution in mind, as Lenin’s were, individual events are seen as parts of a whole, a journey towards liberation, and not just by themselves.

The second chapter talks about why Lenin considered the proletariat as the leading class of the revolution, even in Russia where it did not constitute the majority of the population. The objective class position of the proletariat, and the fact that it was the growing class while the peasantry was a declining class, provided the basis for this conclusion.

The third chapter explains why a vanguard party of the proletariat is required. It shows how political questions and organisational questions cannot be separated, that is, how organisational forms are determined by, and determine, political conditions. As Lukacs explains:

Both the old idea – held by Kautsky among others – that organization was the precondition of revolutionary action, and that of Rosa Luxemburg that it is a product of the revolutionary mass movement, appear one-sided and undialectical. Because it is the party’s function to prepare the revolution, it is – simultaneously and equally – both producer and product, both precondition and result of the revolutionary mass movement.

We discussed what it meant for the party to stay “only one step” ahead of the masses, particularly for thorny questions such as those of religion, and the difference between a compromise between ruling classes (like landlords and the big bourgeoisie) and true class alliances.

Next week, we will continue reading this book.

Revolutionary Greetings,

Central Unit Committee,

Democratic Youth Federation of India – Delhi

Study Circle 12 of 2019 – Communism cannot be learnt by rote

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Dear comrades and friends,


DYFI CUC organised the twelfth study circle of this year today. We read three short texts to refresh our understanding of Marxism.
We first read Lenin’s The Three Sources and Three Component Parts of Marxism. Lenin talks of Marxism as the successor of German philosophy, English political economy, and French socialism. The three component parts are then philosophical materialism, the labour theory of value, and class struggle. 


To read further on materialism, dialectics, and the accusations levelled against Marxists about being metaphysical, we read the first part of Stalin’s Anarchism or Socialism?. This is a defence of Marxism against Anarchism, and also a simple explanation of how Marx took the dialectical method but not the metaphysical theory from Hegel.


We then moved on to reading Lenin’s The Tasks of the Youth Leagues. Lenin addresses this to the youth of the USSR, tasked, as a generation growing up under socialism, with building communism. Lenin expounds on what communist morality means, how class struggle continues under socialism, and what education under socialism ought to be like. The central point is that communism cannot be taught through its conclusions or slogans; we still need to learn of all accumulated human knowledge and derive communism for ourselves through learning and practice. In other words, communism cannot be learnt by rote.


As usual, do send us your thoughts and suggestions, including suggestions for reading material!


Revolutionary Greetings,

Central Unit Committee,

Democratic Youth Federation of India – Delhi

Study Circle 9 of 2019 – Alliances, democracy, war

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DYFI-CUC organised the ninth study circle of the year today, and we finally finished reading Emile Burns’ What Is Marxism?


We read Chapter 8, A Guide To Action. The chapter emphasises the point that Marxism is not solely an academic discipline, but is meant to provide the knowledge and method to guide action towards a higher stage of production. We discussed about how that transition is not automatically made, and how suffering caused by capitalism does not by itself lead to a revolution.


The chapter discusses the Marxist answers to three questions: Which classes should ally against old systems, and when? When should communists participate in Parliamentary democracy? What kinds of wars are just wars?


The general answer is that it depends on the circumstances and on one question: do the alliances, Parliamentary participation, and war further working class interests? Even if the question is simple, the analysis has to be based on a close, often contentious, examination of circumstances.


We discussed what this means for whether Left parties in India should ally with the Congress. We talked about an essay by PMS Grewal that says that the question of this alliance is dependent on whether the Indian state is fascist or fascism is imminent. He concludes that fascism is not imminent in India, and that’s why the energies of the Left parties are better spent building an independent left movement. However, we also acknowledged that if an alliance is made, it would not necessarily be opportunistic, but likely based on a conclusion that fascism is, in fact, imminent.


We also spoke of technological monopolies and platform capitalism, and how this changes which classes should now ally against imperialism, which itself is fast-changing – big traders, for example, also find themselves threatened now.


On war, we talked about how Lenin, during the first world war, advised the working classes of the warring countries to use the inter-imperialist crisis to overthrow the ruling classes of their respective countries instead of killing fellow workers from other countries. However, during the second world war, Burns explains, the situation warranted the working classes of the allied countries to contribute to the war effort of their own ruling classes, because the fascist advance would be a setback to working class interests and liberation struggles worldwide.


For the next study circle, we voted on what topic to read about. We wanted to read about the Marxist approach to caste, the fundamentals of Marxist economics, the agrarian crisis, and the basics of Marxist philosophy. We decided to read the works of EMS Namboodiripad and BT Ranadive on caste, followed by Marx’s Wage, Labour and Capital.


Revolutionary Greetings,

Central Unit Committee

Democratic Youth Federation of India – Delhi

Study Circle 4 of 2019 – Imperialism

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DYFI-CUC organised the fourth study circle of the year – an emotional one, because we heard Salvador Allende’s last speech before he was killed by a CIA-led military coup. He addresses the women, workers and farmers of Chile and denounces imperialism and foreign capital. In the final seconds of the recording you can hear explosions, and then, silence. Not a happy video to watch, but as Allende said: social processes can be arrested neither by crime nor force. History is ours, and people make history. 


Appropriately, we read the fourth chapter of Emile Burns’s What Is Marxism?: The Imperialist Stage of Capitalism. 


The chapter is about Lenin’s explanation of the development of capitalism since the death of Marx: the imperialist stage is characterised by the export of monopoly finance capital and the dividing up of the world among finance capital groups.


We discussed concentration of economic power in Indian finance capital, the role of bank nationalisation in helping capitalism progress, attempts in Europe to reject austerity and why they failed, and the imperialist aggression against Venezuela.
Speaking of Venezuela, CUC members visited the Venezuelan embassy on Friday to attend a solidarity meeting against US imperialism. If you are in Delhi, we urge you to visit the embassy and sign the solidarity statement.


Next Sunday, we will read Chapter 5: Class Struggles in Modern Times. If you would like to come for the next study circle, please try to read the first four chapters. If you cannot, we will be happy to answer doubts and queries.

Revolutionary Greetings,

Central Unit Committee

Democratic Youth Federation of India, Delhi