bakunin's controversy with marx

7/24/2019 Bakunin's Controversy With Marx

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Bakuain s Controversy With Marx

n nalysisof theTensionsW ithinModern Socialism

By DON ALD CLARK HODGES

THE DIFFERENCES between Mao and Khrushchev, the Chinese system of

communes and the Russian system of collectives, the levelling tendency of

the Chinese revolution and the stratifying tendency of Soviet society, are

due in large part to the different stages in the development of socialism

represented by each. Yet they are also evidence of a con tinuing struggle

within the socialist world between the forces of political realism and the

tendency to revolutionary messianism, a struggle which can be traced to

Bakunin's controversy w ith M arx.

During the initial stages of the Russian and Chinese revolutions, revolu-

tionary messianism seemed to many to herald a genuine break with the

class societies of the past. The passion for destruction was at its he igh t,

leading to a genuine levelling of social distinctions and economic privi-

leges. In add ition to socialization of the means of production , the dis-

tinction between wages and salaries was well-nigh abolished. In New

China, the intelligentsia is expected to register voluntarily for physical

labor in State-sponsored projects, with serious repercussions for those who

do not. The campaigns against w hite collarism in China are reminis-

cent of the efforts of the early Soviet regime to establish a common wage

standard for both intellectual and manual workers. It h noteworthy that

the chief critics of individualism and privilege in the communist world

today are the Chinese and not the Russians. W hile Khrushchev has been

willing to make concessions to Tito and to adopt a more liberal policy

toward the West, the Chinese Commimists have been intransigent in

their opposition to Titoism and to any soft-pedalling in the struggle for

communism.

The levelling tendency within socialism, like the belief in the revolution-

ary potential of economically backward countries and the revolutionary role


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260 The merican Journal of conomicsand Sociology

he suspected that Marx, too, had shown a momentary weakness and defec-

tion to Bakuninism, in defending the policies of the Paris Commune dur-

ing the civil war in France . Revolutionary struggles of this kind have

invariably led to a renascence of Bakuninist doctrines within the socialist

movement, while post-revolutionary construction has tended to realism

rather than idealism and, ultimately, to a liberal revision of Marx. The

struggle against right-wing deviations and Marxist revisionism, which has

spread from China to the Soviet sphere, is an indication that China is still

in the throes of her revolution, and that left-wing policies with a Bakunin-

ist slant are what presently distinguish her from the rest of the socialist

world.

During the early days of the Russian revolution the Bolsheviks were

also criticized for their levelling tendencies by the older, better established,

and more conservative Social Democratic leadersh ip. Those were the days

in which syndicalists and leaders of the American I.W .W ., such as Big

Bill Hajrwood, W illiam Z . Foster, and Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, went

over to the Communists. These latter day followers of Bakunin were ready

and willing to join forces with the revolutionary wing of socialism because

of its policy of direct action and its intention of realizing the classless

society during their lifetime. History would seem to repeat itself in the

current slogans of the Chinese Communists and their policy of Com -

munism N ow . Once again, well-intentioned individuals, whose sympa-

thies are with the workers, have gone over to communism in the vain hope

of its issuing in a messianic age.

Lenin openly recognized the doctrinal similarity between Daniel De

Leon's variant of Marxism, which was strongly affected by Bakuninism,

and his own. It is difficult to know w hether M ao also recognizes his kin-

ship w ith Bakunin. Of course, Lenin and Mao subordinated Bakun in's

doctrines to their own variant of Marxism, so that one looks in vain to the

communist world for the type of free labor movement and workers' con-

trol of industry envisaged by Bakunin. Syndicalist opposition to the State,

to the leadership of intellectuals in the labor movement, and to socialism

imposed from above was quickly crushed by both Lenin and Mao. N on e-


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261

theory of historical materialism is that it became the model for all subse-

quent attempts to purify M arxian sociology or to rid it of non-pro le-

tarian modes of thought. Historical materialism was originally designed

as a proletarian sociology, a sociology concerned with problems of special

interest to the proletariat, so that efforts to purify it were motivated

primarily by social and political considerations.

The sociological significance of Bakunin's struggle with Marx on the

issue of apoUtism, or whether the proletariat should participate in politics,

is that it questioned for the first time the Marxian claim to represent the

interests and perspective of the wage earner. M arx had lumped toge ther

in a single class all the employees of capital, so that the term pro leta riat

was almost as amorphous as the bourgeois concept of the peop le. It

was Bakunin's merit to have foreseen the disintegration of the proletariat

into two hostile classes, a decomposition similar to that of th e people (o r

third estate) in to bourgeoisie and proletariat. Yet it remained for Baku-

nin's successors to analyze in detail the Marxian concept of the proletariat

and to question the Marxian belief in a future classless society.

Politically, Bakunin's controversy with Marx was waged over the ques-

tion of apolitism: It is this poin t which mainly divides the Socialists or

revolutionary coUectivists from the authoritarian Com munists, wrote Ba-

kunina statement of their differences which also agrees with Engels'

accoimt of the controversy.^ How ever both B akunin and M arx recog-

nized that their differences were not merely strategical but theoretical

and, despite the similarity of their ultimate goals, that they were divided

by a class issue as well. Thu s Bakunin regarded M arx and his followers

as bourgeo is socialists, a bourgeois socialist being formally defined as a

revolutionary who accepts the principle that political revolution must pre-

cede social and economic revolution.^ The partisans of pro letarian State

dictatorship belong in this category, according to Bakunin. Althou gh the

mortal enemies of capitalism, they would replace it by the dictatorship of

social scientists and wotJd-be bureaucrats. Anticipating M ichels' iro n

law of oligarchy, Bakunin wro te of the political leaders of the pro letaria t:

obeying the iron law, according to which the social position of a given


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ven turer and intrig uer, and his followers as riff raff. * It is note-

worthy that these terms were usually applied by Marx to the unreliable

and declasse elements within the lumpen-proletariat. The latter, consist-

ing of the refuse of all classes, was an altogether unreliable ally of the

proletariat, according to M arx . Moreover, he considered Bakuninism a

variety of sectarian socialism, a sect being defined as a gro up rem ote

from every real activity, from politics, strikes, trade unions, in a word,

from every collective movement. (T he sects were regarded as character-

istic of the infancy rather than of the maturity of the labor movement.)

Th is characterization was obviously unfair to Bakunin. Nonethe less it is

true that Bakunin was a declasse revolutionary, a conspirator and rabble-

rouser, and that he represented the interests of the migrant laborer and

unsettled working class stratum. Indeed, this accounts in large part for

his greater popularity in the less industrialized and Latin-speaking coun-

tries. According to Bakun in: In Italy there prevails the wretchedly poor

proletariat, about which Messrs, Marx and Engels, and following them

the whole German Social Democratic school, speak with such deep disdain.

Surely this is a mistake, since it is in this proletariat, and only in this, not

in the bourgeois rank of the working class, that the whole reason and

strength of the future Social Revolution lie. ^

The first major attempt to revise Marxian sociology was not the revi-

sionism of the rig ht begun by Edw ard Bernstein, but the revisionism of

the left dating from Bakunin's controversy with M arx. Althoug h in the

forefront of their controversy was the question of apolidsm, the answers

to this question revealed a schism within the ranks of the proletariat that

was more than a disagreement over strategy and tactics. The answers to

this question followed from their different conceptions of the proletariat,

which became the basis for their different theories of historical materialism.

T o answer yes with M arx implied that the proletariat could capture

the State with the correct strategy, whereas to answer n o with Bakunin

meant tha t the State could not be seized by the proletariat by any means. As

a matter of fact, both were correct. The issue between M arx and Bakunin

was fundamentally over the question of the meaning of exploitation and


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263

It was Bakunin's lasting contribution to have discovered within Marx's

concept of the proletariat the germs of a new type of exploitation based

not upon material property or capital, but upon intellectual power and

bureaucratic capacity.'^ Bakunin perceived, however vaguely, that M arx 's

goal of proletarian emancipation did not necessarily imply the abolition

of exploitation, and that the victory of the proletariat, in Marx's sense,

would mean something different from the liquidation of classes.

The basis of Bakxinin's criticism was taken in part from Marx himself

from his analysis of exploitation in the first volume of Capital. Bakunin

intuited, without taking the trouble to analyze the reasons for his misgiv-

ings,that the labor theory of value cotild be used to justify the exploitation

of a proletariat of manual wage earners by a salariat of professional and

administrative employees. Consequently, he felt that M arx's concept of

the proletariat had to be revised in order to make it consistent with the

socialist goal of abolishing exploitation. To Bakunin belongs the credit

of being the first to analyze the Marxian concept of the proletariat into its

elements: a proletariat, in the strict sense of a class of wage earners or

manual laborers; and a salariat of white collar employees, who are paid

salaries instead of wages and who manipulate persons and symbols instead

of things.

The Bakuninist controversy has underlined the theoretical confusion

resulting from M arx 's failure to clarify the distinction between a alary

and a vfzsp^

i.e.

remuneration for intellectual and administrative labor as

distin(Ji:om that for manual or drudge labor. M arx's great error was to

argue that the abolition of capital is identical with the abolition of the

wages system. However, under so-called socialism, in which bourgeois

property is either abolished or in process of liquidation, the fundamental

distinction is between a class of wage laborers and a class of salaried

employees.

Possessing neither intellectual nor institutional command over the means

of production, the manual workers, as Bakunin foresaw, are as much at the

mercy of salaried employees under socialism as they once were dependent

upon the accumulated power of capital.^ Justification for wage-salary dif-


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would seem to suppo rt Bakunin's theory rather than Marx's.^o Indeed,

the course of recent history is living testimony of the continued signifi-

cance of Bakunin's contribution to contemporary social and political

analysis.

II

T H E Q U E S T I O N

is the extent to which Marx and Bakunin can be said to

represent faithfully the interests of salary and wage earners. Paradoxi-

cally, the class issue underlined by the Bakuninist controversy originated

in a clash between men both of whom may be regarded as declasse. T he

theore tical differences with in scientific socialism have been the produc t

for the most part of controversies over philosophical, political and eco-

nomic theories that have been generally beyond tiie comprehension of the

class of wage earners. T he theoreticians of scientific socialism have

been intellectuals, not proletarians.

Marx and Bakunin were continually in debt and were not self-support-

ing. It was Engels who kept Marx's household going by supporting it

from the profits of the Manchester spinning firm of which he was a part-

ner. At the same time, H erzen and other Russian emigres, like the P rin-

cess Obolensky, made it possible for Bakunin to devote his entire time and

energies to revolutionary activities. Thus the main protagonists of the

Bakuninist controversy were neither wage earners nor members of the

salariat, but were the proteges respectively of the German bourgeoisie and

Russian nobility.

Karl Kautsky sheds some light upon the origins of Scientific socialism

and the conditions leading up to the Bakuninist controvgrsf'in an article

for the Neue Zeit the theoretical organ of the German Social-Democratic

party.

Socialism and the class struggle [he wrote] arise side by side and not one

out of the other . . . Modern socialist consciousness can arise only on the

basis of profound scientific knowledge . . . The vehicles of science are

not the proletariat but the bourgeois intelligentsia: It was out of the heads

of the members of this stratum that modern socialism originated, and it

was they who communicated it to the more intellectually developed pro-

letarians who, in their turn, introduced it into the proletarian class strug-

gle . . . Thus socialist consciousness is something introduced into the


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Bakunin s Controversy With Marx 265

interests of thewage earners. Kautsky and Lenin,aswell asMarxhim-

self, took for granted that the interests of manual laborers are best

understood

by a

revolutionary vanguard, which

is for, but not of, the

proletariat. On the other hand, Bakunin and his followers have been

skeptical not only of the Marxist claim, but even of their own claim to

represent faithfully

the

interests

of

manual laborers.

In

a

noteworthy passage, Bakunin wro te: Revolutionary Socialists

believe that there is much more of practical reason and intelligence in

the instinctive aspirations

and

real needs

of the

masses

of

people than

in

the profound minds

of all

these learned doctors

and

self-appointed

tutors of humanity, who,having before them the sorry examples of so

many abortive attempts

to

make humanity happy, still intend

to

keep

on

working

in the

same direction.''^^

jt

seems

to

have been Bakunin's

self-

appointed tasktodefend thewage earners againsttheradical intelligentsia,

in

the

suspicion that

the

gift

of

authoritative socialism

was a

Trojan

horse masquerading

the

would-be rule

of a new

bureaucratic class

of

social

scientistsand managerial and political office holders. Indeed, his Polish

follower, Waclaw Machajski,

has

become known

for his

criticism

of

nineteenth century socialism

as the

ideology

of the

underprivileged,

mal-

content, adventurous, declasse, lower middle class salaried employees.^^

A similar thesisis frequently urged todayin theeffort toexplain fascism

or national socialism;

but it has

seldom been applied

to

Marxism.

Cer-

tainly

the

Marxists cannot

be

accused

of

betraying their

own

group,

the

radical intelligentsia. Yet the charge most frequently advanced against

Bakunin

and his

followers

is

that they were anti-intellectual.

Ill

U N L I K E B A K U N I N , MARX seems to have considered himself an excep-

tion

to his own

theory, that

it is not the

consciousness

of men

that

determines their being,

but, on the

contrary, their social being that deter-

mines the ir consciousness. ^* Certainly,he was notskepticalof hisability

to represent faithfully

the

perspective

of the

wage earner without himself

being one.

It is

difficult

to

reconcile Marx's theory with

his

conception

of

the socialist intelligentsia, which is supposedly representativeof the inter-


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thought from being fully representative of the interests of the wage earn-

ers and to learn what in fact was the principal motivation behind his

dedication to socialism. The extent to which Bakunin's thought is repre-

sentative of the wage earners' interests may also be learned in part by an

inquiry into his personal mo tivations. Besides, the contrast in M arx 's and

Bakunin's social origins may be expected to shed light upon their theoreti-

cal differences.

The contrast in family and social background is striking. M arx was a

German Jew by descent, the son of a middle class lawyer who had em-

braced Christianity; Bakunin, a Russian nobleman, born to an estate of

five hundred souls, the third of eleven children. Th ere is an obvious

connection between Marx's social origin and his tremendous need to

asserthimself It has been suggested that in an anti-Semitic environment

the converted Jew suffers doubly: H e is treated as a Jew, without having

the moral support and consolation of knowing that he is one of God's

chosen people. ^^ Indeed, Marx 's violent polemics against his fellow

socialists and his inability to stand opposition, which he interpreted as

either obtuseness or infidelity to the revolutionary cause, suggest that he

needed to compensate for the lack of personal recognition commensurate

with his superior talents. Th is quality does not seem to have been a pa rt

of Bakunin's make-up, who was also supremely talented both as a writer

and an original thinker, but who was generous toward his personal

enemies, quick to recognize their theoretical and practical contributions

to the socialist movement, and without jealousy toward his rivals. Such

differences in character and upbringing are especially significant because

they help to explain the motivation of intellectuals in turning to authori-

tarian and libertarian forms of socialism.

It is noteworthy that Bakunin thought of Marx as vain and morose,

whereas M arx called Bakunin a sentimental idealist. ^* Yet no t M arx

but Bakunin was the apostle of pan-destruction. Unlike M arx, who seems

to have suffered from a brooding sense of personal and social insecurity,^^

Bakunin felt the contempt for social status that makes a man try to com-

pensate for his advantages, not for his disadvantages. Beginning higher

than Marx he could allow himself to sink much lower without an affront


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should have adopted the life of a working-man and, sharing a life of toil

with my brethren, should have participated equally with them in the

organization of the forces of the proletariat. ^^ And elsewhere, he

writes that a man likehimself with a bourgeois or aristocratic origin, can

become a sincere or genuine socialist only wh en he has broken

all ties

binding him to the privileged world and has renounced all its advan-

tages. ^ W ithou t personal bitterness toward any, he could indulge in

that impersonal hatred for persons and symbols of authority which

made him eminently suited to become the Father of Terrorism . Un -

doubtedly his long imprisonment and Siberian exile had much to do with

his apostleship of Satan. But his desire for com pensation was no t

repressed nor did it take a personal form as it did with Marx.

IV

ALTHOUGH THEIR SOCIAL BACKGROUNDS and the clash of personalities

have been of main interest to the biographers of Marx and Bakunin, the

cultural influences upon each are vastly more important for understanding

their theoretical differences. Yet most studies of th e cultural forces

which have shaped their thought are academic in keeping within the

formal boundaries of particular disciplines. Th us Lenin stressed the

impact of German philosophy, French socialism, and English political

economy upon Marx's social philosophy, while the anarcho-syndicalist

Kenafick argues that Bakuninism is distinguished from Marxism by its

particular blend of Proudhonian anarchism and Comtean positivism.^^

The interdisciplinary and specifically cultural interpretations of Marx and

Bakunin are mostly superficial interpretations found in general works on

cultural history. By far the best attemp t to understand M arx as the child

of a particular age is Bar2un's

D arwin, M arx, Wagner. ^^

However, it

falls into the error of underestimating the influence of older traditions,

notably the biblical messianic heritage, upon Marx's thought.

M arx criticized the Utopian socialists for basing their concern for

the interests of the wage earners upon sentimental grounds, viz., the con-

sideration tha t they are the most suffering class. ^^ In his desire to

change the world, his concern was less philanthropic than revolutionary.


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268 The American Journal of Econom ics and Sociology

revolutionary in search of suppo rt from the most revolutionary class.

M arx was before all else a revolutionary, Engels said at M arx's grave,

a revolutionary not only in practice, but in political theory, economics,

history, and philosophy.2* T o the question of a news reporter: W ha t is

your idea of hap piness? he replied: T o struggle.''^^ W hile Bakunin

was an apostle of Satanic rebellion against tyranny, Marx likened himself

to Prometheus.2

Marx's heroic posture, his Faustian defiance and struggle against the

philistinism of the bourgeois world^^ mark him as a typical romantic.

However, his romanticism was balanced by a harsh realism. H e supported

the most revolutionary class only because he believed in an historical

guarantee of victory. M arx sought to ride the wave of the future to

eminence as the intellectual leader and organizer of the new class by

consciously identifying himself with its avant-ga rde. Th ere is no

reason for gainsaying his profound indignation at the exploitation of the

wage earners and his tremendous intellectual labors on their behalf Yet

he considered himself not so much the champion or tutor of the oppressed

as the morta l enemy of capitalism.

Bakunin was also in the depths of his soul a romantic, for whom the

proletariat was the means of universal upheaval.^s However, he differed

from M arx in his belief that the drudge peo ple are the end as well as

the means of world revolution, and in his Slavic conception of the

greater revolutionary role of the moral instincts as compared to Western

scientific intelligence. H e was far from being the theoretical equal of

Marx, although what he lacked in German thoroughness he partly made

up for by the most remarkable insights into human nature and society.

He was astute enough to recognize immediately the significance of Marx's

painstaking work of research that went into the composition of Capital

W ith Capital as his stepping stone he was able to adapt Marxism to the

revolutionary needs of the peasantry as well as the wage earners, and to

underline their opposition to the intelligentsia.

It is a grave mistake to interpret Bakunin's revolutionary theory of di-

rect action and his contempt for rational theory as a token of theoretical


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269

not theory to which Bakunin was opposed, but abstract and involved specu-

lations about man and society. Regarding the accusation tha t Bakunin was

guilty of anti-intellectualism, it is true that he had misgivings that (if

scientific socialism were to become the starting-point for social upheaval)

the revolutionary movement would fall into the hands of scientists and

specialists, who would in turn constitute themselves into a new privileged

class. 2 Altho ugh against intellectuals, whom he feared as the auxiliary

arm of the political bureaucracy and as a privileged class in its own right,

he had no lack of respect for intelligence. His contempt was not for

science but for scientists.

V

As CONTEMPORARIES and eager students of Hegel and every new current

in the intellectual life of the Continent, Marx and Bakunin were subject to

similar cultural influences. Despite their efforts neither succeeded in shak-

ing off entirely their biblical heritage . Indeed , their social philosophies

reveal three distinct and opposing strains of thought: a Jewish, moralistic,

messianic orientation; a liberal, scientific and humanistic one; and a

revolutionary, romantic influence. These competing modes of thought cor-

responded to their several leading roles. Besides cham pioning the under-

do g, their task was to enlighten th e proletariat and to organize the forces

of social revo lution . The ir efforts on behalf of the wage earners testify to

the influence upon them of the Old Testament tradition of moral

righteousness and resistance to oppression. Their task of liberating men

from religious absurdities, political mystification, and the role of unreason

in economics reflected the realism and materialism of the Enlightenment.

Finally, their struggle to abolish capitalism and to introduce a socialist

new orde r by revolutionary means shows the influence of Rom anticism.

Both Marx and Bakunin fought a war on each of these different al-

thoug h related fronts. The abolition of exp loitation , the refutation of

metaphysics, and the liquidation of the bourgeoisie were believed by

each to be merely different sides of a single strugg le to achieve socialism .

But this end was no less ambiguous than the process of achieving it.

Indeed, their respective goals were determined by the relative weight each


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270 The merican Journal of

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Realpolitik also point to a Jacobin influence. Equally Jacobin was his

critique of Utopian socialism as sentimental idealism, his concern for the

proletariat as the most revolutionary rather than as the most suffering

class, and his strategy for acquiring undisputed leadership of the Inter-

national. Th e proletariat was to be the means of revolution rather than

the end, while science was to be the guide . Th us the liberal, scientific

and humanistic orientation in Marx was also given precedence over the

immediate needs of the wage earners.

Like M arx , Bakunin sacrificed theory to practice, and scientific social-

ism to the practical aims of the International. How ever, he had a

much more radical interpretation of the relation of theory to practice than

Marx, in believing that science should also be subordinated to the im-

mediate and everyday struggle of the workers. A t the same time , he

was the sworn enemy of Jacobinism or revolution by decrees. Bakunin's

glorification of the evil instincts, his impatience with revolutionary

ideas, and his apostleship of destruction indicate that he was less depen-

dent than Marx upon theoretical work as a preliminary to revolution, and

that he had greater faith in the revolutionary instincts of the oppressed .

It is true that there is a utilitarian strain in Bakunin's concept of terrorism

which likens it to Jacobinism. How ever, his desire to tu rn the tables ,

to reverse the roles of the exploiters and exploited that the first might

be last and the last might be first is not Jacobin bu t biblical in inspiration.

Like Proudhon, Bakunin was an avowed Satanist, the end of Satanism

being rebellion against heavenly tyranny and its earthly representative, the

State. 2 Precisely because Satan is doomed to everlasting defeat, the end

of Satanism is anarchy and pan-destruction. Of course, Bakunin was

optimistic about the possibility of social revolution, so his Satanism was

compromised by his revolutionary romanticism. The poin t, however, is*

that by means of Satanism he was able to avoid the temptations of

Jacobinism.

In marked contrast to Satanism, the essence of Jacobinism is the political

revolution, not the destruction of the State but the capture of political

power and the foundation thereon of a new social order. Its essence, ac-

cording to Len in, is the transfer of power to the revolutionary oppressed


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271

rejection of a conspiratorial revolution from above show that he was less

of a revolutionary than a rebel and less concerned with the creation of a

new order than with the negation of an old one.

VI

THE DIFFERENT AND COMPETING PERSPECTIVES within the framework of

Marxian sociology help to explain the different interpretations of his-

torical materialism as well as the fundamental differences between the

several socialist movements. Contrary to the apostles of orthodoxy, each

of the major forms of socialism is revisionistic in representing a one-

sided approach to the body of Marxian sociology. T he question of the ir

comparative orthodoxy is an insoluble one precisely because of this one-

sidedness. It is true that M arx assigned different weights or values to

different traditions and combinations of influence, and that Jacobinism

was of foremost im portance in determining the general tenor of his

thought. However, his Jacobinism was balanced by liberal and biblical

tendencies in a way in which Bolshevism is not.

Revolutionary syndicalism, whose roots go back to Marx as well as to

Bakunin, is closest in spirit to the prophetic element in Marxism . It is a

peculiar combination of the Satanic and Promethean, since its major con-

cern for the lot of the exploited and oppressed is buttressed by a fierce

desire for action in the romantic tradition. Of the different sides of

Marxism, it underlines the Jewish moralistic, messianic doctrines, such

as the Marxian theories of surplus value and exploitation, the class war,

the revolutionary role of the proletariat, and the prophecy of an imminent

cataclysm in which the forces of good defeat forever the powers of evil.

The fact that revolutionary syndicalism

is

the principal heir of the First

International, whose leading figures were Marx and Bakunin, is explained

by the revision which Marxism underwent under the influence of

Bakunin.

Social Democracy or democratic socialism

is

the successor to the liberal

tradition of the Enlightenment and differs from revolutionary syndicalism

in giving precedence to the scientific ingredient in Marxism at the ex-


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its leaders. Th e differences between De Leon and K autsky, Kautsky and

Bernstein, Bernstein and Luxemburg were too great to have been toler-

ated by any other tradition of Marxism . It is noteworthy that the recent

statement of principles adopted by the Socialist International at Frank-

furt-on-Main continues to stress this liberal heritage of socialism.^

Bolshevism is professedly Jacobin, according to Lenin's own statement,

so that it gives precedence to revolutionary romanticism and the realistic

elements within Marxism at the expense of both liberal and messianic

tendencies. It underlines those doctrines of Marx which reflect the in-

fluence of romanticism, such as the doctrines of the revolutionary van-

guard, proletarian dictatorship, and the strategy and tactics of the socialist

revolution. Science and scholarship are subordinated to the requirements of

practice, so that even history is rewritten with a regard for practical re-

sults.

O n the other hand , science is the principal guide to revolution so

that it, too, is given precedence over the Jewish, moralistic and messianic

tendencies within Marxism.

Unlike democratic socialism, Bolshevism has proclaimed a war against

heresy both within the Third International and its offshoot, the Trotskyist

Fourth In terna tiona l. The Jacobinism of the Bolsheviks has led to official

terrorism, purges, and the subordination of the demands of the wage

earners to specifically political goals. Democratic socialists have shown

somewhat greater concern for the immediate interests of the wage earners.

On the other hand, they, too, tend to use the proletariat as a lever for their

own political purposes. Indeed, the leadership of bo th Social Democracy

and Bolshevism has been dominated by an intelligentsia of salaried em-

ployees concerned with reforms from above rather than from below. Th us

it might have been expected that they would represent primarily the in-

terests of the salariat rather than those of the proletariat.

VII

B A K U N I N I S M

has been far from rivalling Marxism in the claims of its

successors to orthodoxy . Nonetheless th e same set of perspectives has

been influential in shaping different aspects of this trad ition. From

Bakunin's revision of Marxism three different social movements have


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Revolutionary syndicalism claims to be both Marxian and socialist.

However, the dominant traditions within Marxism, as represented by

both Social Democracy and Bolshevism, have become increasingly recog-

nized as representing the interests primarily of the salaried or new m id-

dle class. The same cannot be said of revolutionary syndicalism o r

trade unionism, which is a movement from below initiated by the wage

earners. The leading principles of revolutionary syndicalism, such as

the supremacy of the trade unions, apolitism, and the general strike, are

not M arxian but Bakunian. Th e intellectual ligh ts of the movement

have especially emphasized the conflict of interests, indeed, the class con-

flict between the two m ain segments of the so-called working class, the

brain and manual workers.

From Bakunin to Machajski, Pelloutier, Sorel, Michels, and, more re-

cently, Camus, revolutionary syndicalists have attacked the dominant forms

of socialism for betraying the interests of the wage earners. Although the

intellectuals of syndicalism have not always been wage earners themselves,

neither have they constituted the leadership of the trade imions. Instead,

they have served trade unionism, for the most part, from the sidelines

without any vested interest in the movement.

Bakunin was also the father of nihilism or the militant variety of

anarchism. W hereas revolutionary syndicalism is obviously inspired by

the Jewish messianic cult of the oppressed, anarchism goes back through

Stirner and Proudhon to Godwin, who was just as obviously a child of the

Enlightenm ent. Indeed , the extreme individualism and libertarianism of

the leading anarchists before Bakunin testify to the prominent place of

liberalism within anarchist thought. Bakunin's federalism and libertarian-

ism, his critique of the socialist W elfare State, his opposition to the

increasing tendency of the modern bureaucratic State to extend the limits

of its authority, point definitely to his inclusion within the anarchist tradi-

tion. Bdcunin's liberal tendencies were saturated by his feelings for the

oppressed, so that they were considerably more radical than the liberal

strains within Marxism.

Yet it is a mistake to conceive of the main issue between Marx and


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274

The Am erican fournal of conomics and Sociology

drawn attention, namely, that between the earlier wreckers and incendiar-

ies,

following in the footsteps of Nechayev, and the later fastidious

assassins, of which Kaliayev is one of the best examples.^ In genera l,

nihilism is a kind of inverted Jacobinism. Certainly, it is not representa-

tive of the perspective of the salariat, but neither is it a mass movement

like trade unionism.

The third movement which fell under Bakunin's influence was Bol-

shevism. Although the Bolsheviks went directly to M arx for their science

of society, their revolutionary strategy and theory of soviet power were

derived for the most part from Bakunin. Contrary to most ofl&cial inter-

pretations of Marxism-Leninism, Lenin was independently influenced by

the Russian Jacobin, Tkachev, from whom he got his ideas of the pro-

letarian elite, professional revolutionaries, and the secret conspiratorial

society. It is noteworthy that Tkachev, a major exponent and interpreter

of Bakunin's ideas, was criticized by Engels for his conception of the revo-

lutionary role of the peasantry^' also a Leninist idea. The influence of

Nechayev's revolutionary Machiavellianism upo n Bolshevism has also

been increasingly recognized by scholars.* Th us between M arx and

Lenin were at least three revolutionary figures of consequence who helped

to mold Lenin's thought.

The Bakuninist controversy still lives in the opposition between mili-

tant anarchism and syndicalism, on one side, and the reigning forms of

socialism on the other. The struggle within the so-called proletariat o r

successor to the bourgeoisie, as Bakunin originally prophesied, becomes

inaeasingly a struggle between brain and manual workers, white collar

and denim , salary and wage earners. Th us the issue between M arx and

Bakunin over the question of apolitism underlines one of the major

social struggles of oiir time, usually but superficially depicted as the rise

to pow er of a new middle class. Yet Bakunin's influence upon trade

unionism has been grossly underrated, while scholars have been devoting

too much energy to investigating his effect upon Bolshevism. It is true

that through Bolshevism Bakuninism has had a determining influence

upo n political events. How ever, Bakunin was closer in spirit to bo th

militant anarchism and trade unionism, which means that his revolu-


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bakunin's controversy with marx

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