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Research in Political EconomyEmerald Book Chapter: Lenin's Economics: A Marxian Critique

Seongjin Jeong

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To cite this document: Seongjin Jeong, (2011),"Lenin's Economics: A Marxian Critique", Paul Zarembka, Radhika Desai, in (ed.)

Revitalizing Marxist Theory for Today's Capitalism (Research in Political Economy, Volume 27), Emerald Group Publishing Limited,

pp. 223 - 254

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LENINS ECONOMICS: A MARXIAN

CRITIQUE$

Seongjin Jeong

ABSTRACT

This chapter attempts an evaluation of Lenins economic thoughts from a

Marxian standpoint. This chapter argues that Lenins reading of Marxs

Capital in Development of Capitalism in Russia (1899) was biased

toward Ricardian or logico-historicist interpretation of value, dispropor-

tionality theory of crisis as well as economic determinism, characteristic

of the Second International Marxism. While admitting that Lenin

overcame economic determinism and reformist politics of the Second

International Marxism in his Imperialism (1917), this chapter shows

that some essential elements, such as thesis of progressiveness of

capitalism, stagiest or typologist conceptions of capitalism, still persisted

within and afterImperialism. Moreover, this chapter argues that Lenins

Imperialism cannot be considered as a successful concretization of three

latter parts of Marxs plan of critique of political economy in Grundrisse

(1857), that is, State (Part 4), Foreign Trade (Part 5), and World

Market Crisis (Part 6). This chapter also argues that the ambivalence of

Lenins economic thoughts and incomplete break with the Second

International Marxism unexpectedly led to Stalinist thesis of state

$This chapter is a revised version ofJeong (2004).

Revitalizing Marxist Theory for Todays Capitalism

Research in Political Economy, Volume 27, 223254

Copyright r 2011 by Emerald Group Publishing LimitedAll rights of reproduction in any form reserved

ISSN: 0161-7230/doi:10.1108/S0161-7230(2011)0000027010

223

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monopoly capitalism, market socialist ideas, and reformist conception ofvarieties of capitalisms.

This chapter discusses Lenins contribution to the development of Marxist

economics, focusing on the evolution of his economic thoughts on Russian

capitalism, imperialism and socialism. This chapter highlights and demon-

strates the discontinuity and unevenness in the evolution of Lenins economic

thoughts, especially by comparing two representative economics works by

Lenin, The Development of Capitalism in Russia (Lenin, 1899a) (henceforthDCR) and Imperialism (Lenin, 1916). This chapter argues that DCRs

interpretation of MarxsCapitalcontains Ricardian or logico-historicist bias,

and finds Lenins contribution to the development of Marxian critique of

political economy in Imperialism and not in DCR. This chapter locates

Imperialisms break with mechanical materialism and economic determinism

of the Second International Marxism shared by DCR. This chapter also

interprets that the evolution of Lenins economic thoughts from DCR to

Imperialism, including theories of two paths, military-feudal imperial-

ism, and capitalist state, and so on, is the process of self-criticism ofDCR,pressured by the intensification of class struggle in Russia.

Contrary to Nove (1979), Warren (1980), and Desai (2002), who highly

esteem economic works of young Lenin, especially DCR, while discounting

Imperialism as a retreat from it,1 this chapter argues that Imperialism

significantly advances Marxian critique of political economy with its break

with the Second International Marxism. As some commentators noted, re-

reading Hegels Logic was crucial in Lenins break with the Second

International Marxism and return to classical Marxism.2 Also, after the

break, the quintessence of Lenins thoughts, represented by April Thesis(1917) and State and Revolution(1917), was crystallized in the midst of

revolutionary madness, asZ izek (2002) indicated.3

However, this chapter argues that Lenins break with the Second

International Marxism was not complete, and that some of its elements

persisted in Imperialism and even resurfaced during the period of New

Economic Policy (NEP) when the revolutionary utopian madness

receded. Finally, this chapter argues that remnants of the Second

International Marxism in Lenins economic thoughts have been used to

justify Stalinist stagism or social-reformist typology of capitalism, such asopposition between Anglo-American capitalism vs. Rhein capitalism in

the Korean progressives.4

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THE DEVELOPMENT OF CAPITALISMIN RUSSIA (1899)

Lenins DCR is a major work synthesizing young Lenins study on Marxs

Capital and his empirical research on contemporary Russian agrarian

history. After DCR, Lenin did not write a comparable economics work in

terms of length, depth and system untilImperialism. DCRis widely regarded

as one of the most important contributions to the development of Marxist

economics, especially in its model application of MarxsCapitalin empirical

analysis.5

Lenins purpose in DCR was to demonstrate the actuality of capitalist

development in Russia against Narodniks. Lenin wrote DCR largely to

contest Narodnik claims that capitalism could not develop in Russia. Lenin

proved the possibility of capitalist development in Russia through his theory

of market and evidenced the actuality through a painstaking plumbing of

Zemstvo statistics on peasant differentiation. In DCR, Lenin constructed a

model of three peasant classes rich, middle and poor peasants with the

eventual polarization of middle peasants into rich and poor peasants. For

Lenin differentiation of the peasantryy

was intrinsic and central to thedevelopment of capitalism and the class dynamics of its law of motion

theorized, with unique power, by Marx (Bernstein, 2009, p. 61).

However, DCR contains more than a few theoretical, empirical and

political problems that have seldom been discussed in the existing literature.

I think the difficulty ofDCRstems from the fact that it was based on Lenins

theory of market, originally formulated in his On the So-called Market

Question (1893). Even though Lenins theory of market was conceived

to provide a theoretical solution to the problem of market creation during

the transition from the pre-capitalist economy to the capitalist marketeconomy,DCR tried to apply it in explaining the actual development of the

Russian capitalism. As Howard and King indicated, Lenins mistakes were

more serious than those of Plekhanov since he identified capitalist

development with the development of the market (Howard & King,

1989: 178).

DCRviews the relation between the capitalist and pre-capitalist relations

as antagonistic rather than interdependent. The remaining pre-capitalist

social relations in post-emancipation Russia, especially the labor-service

system and Tsar, were regarded to be hindrances to capitalist developmentand were fated to go as the capitalist development took place. DCR regards

Tsar as the representative of the landlords based on the labor-service system,

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anti-democratic politically and anti-capitalist economically. DCR tends toview the Russian capitalism as essentially homogeneous with the Western

capitalism, different from the latter only in the developmental level. DCR

also tends to view the capitalist development from the standpoint of a

closed system, that is, capitalism in one country, and explains the

specificity of the society mainly in terms of the extent that the capitalist

development expelled the pre-capitalist relations.

DCR assumed that the main contradiction of the post-emancipation

Russia lay between the social forces that pursued progress of political

democracy and capitalism (bourgeoisiepeasantsproletariat) and theforces that hindered them (Tsar landlords) based on the labor-service

system (Ota, 1989). Lenins revolutionary strategies during the period of

DCR were basically to eliminate these hindrances to the capitalist

development. However, the landlord system in post-emancipation Russia

was intimately linked to the capitalist reproduction structure. Also, Tsar

promoted, rather than prevented, the capitalist development in Russia.

Lenin assumed that the democratic political institutions would develop

while the pre-capitalist relations would disappear with the capitalist

development. Lenin could not understand the specificity of the Russiancapitalism articulated with the despotic state and landlords.

Apart from the above methodological problems,DCRcontains the following

limitations. DCR tells little about what existed in Russian country before

emancipation. From DCR, it is difficult to grasp what new development occurred

after emancipation. DCR also analyzes little about the structure and dynamics of

themir, Russian village communities, after the Emancipation in 1861. As White

states, from reading Lenins book one would never guess that most Russian

peasants continued to live in village communities (White, 2001, p. 43). Lenin

regarded the differentiation of peasants as the prima facie evidence of thecapitalist development, and argued that he evidenced it in Russia. However,

according to recent historical studies, many Russian village communities still

showed vitality without differentiating themselves into antagonistic classes

during the 1917 revolution, about 20 years afterDCRwas written. As Bernstein

indicated, Whether Lenin got the trend of peasant differentiation right from the

zemstvo statistics he drew on was, of course, contested by his Narodnik

opponents and by Chayanov y as well as questioned by later scholars (e.g.,

and different positions, BanajiyKingston-MannyLehmanny) (Bernstein,

2009, p. 59). For example, as much as 43 percent of the total arable land wasunder the control of village communities in 1892 (Zarembka, 2003, p. 285).

Howard and King also noted that both Lenins theoretical perspective and his

reconstruction of empirical data incorrectly specified at least part of the observed

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inequalities in the village. The peasantry was more homogeneous than herealized (Howard & King, 1989, p. 179).

Moreover, the problematique of DCR is excessively domestic, and is

limited to a single-country perspective. DCR exclusively focuses on the

domestic economic development, paying no attention to the issue of foreign

capitals. As White indicated, in the whole lengthy work only two sentences

refer to foreign capital (White, 2001, p. 43). As a result, DCR ignores one

of the main resources of the Russian capitalist development. It also means

thatDCR underestimated the development of modern machinery industries,

for they are mostly built on foreign capital. In contrast to Lenin who tendedto overplay the development of the agrarian capitalism based on the peasant

differentiation while underestimating the industrial capitalism in urban

factories, Tugan-Baranovsky, whose theoretical position Lenin largely

shared with, explained the capitalist development mainly in terms of the

factory, industry and the state role in his Russian Factory in the Nineteenth

Century(1898).6 Even Vasily Vorontsov, a Naronik economist, emphasized

the crucial role of foreign capital and the state in the capitalist development

in Russia in his The Destiny of Capitalism in Russia (1882). Trotskys

explanation of the capitalist development in Russia in terms of uneven andcombined development in hisResults and Prospects (1905) is not so thick in

its empirics as DCR but is more pertinent in its methodology than

DCR. Trotsky emphasized the role of the state as well as the uneven and

combined characteristics of the capitalist development in Russia. Trotsky

argued that the state-led industrialization was characteristic of the

development of capitalism in Russia. Trotsky wrote that capitalism

seemed to be an offspring of the state (Trotsky, 1905, p. 41) in Russia.

While Lenin studied the development of capitalism in Russia from a closed

single-country perspective and focused on peasant differentiation andagrarian capitalism, Trotsky viewed the Russian capitalism from an

internationalist perspective, emphasizing the roles of foreign capital and

state as well as urban industrial capitalism. Trotsky especially focused on

the concentration of the working class in urban areas and the combination

of weak domestic bourgeoisie, Tsar and foreign capitals in his pamphlet,

1905 (Trotsky, 1909, pp. 2023).

DCR also shows no understanding of the crucial roles played by the

Russian despotic power in the capitalist development since the Emancipa-

tion of 1861. The market theoretic forced Lenin to regard capitalism asdiametrically opposed to pre-capitalist relations, and led him to predict the

disappearance of pre-capitalist relations with the development of capitalism

in DCR.

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Before the 1905 revolution, Lenins agrarian program was limited to therestoration of cut-off lands from the landlords.7 Lenins attack on the

landlord class was not offensive but defensive. In The Agarian Programme

of Russian Social Democracy, published in 1902, Lenin advocated for the

restitution of cut-off lands, arguing that they functioned as bases to sustain

the serfdom labor.8 The reason why Lenin limited his attack on the landlord

class only to the cut-off lands was because he thought that the rest of the

lands except the cut-off lands were farmed in a bourgeois, not a feudal,

method. According to Lenin, the target of the coming revolution should be

the elimination of the hindrances to the capitalist development. So, theattack on the bourgeoisie, including capitalist landlords, must be avoided.

Also, the conventional wisdom that Lenins DCR is the Marxist factual

critique of non-Marxist Narodnik analysis of the Russian economy should

be questioned. Indeed, unlike early Lenin, late Marx studied the Russian

village communities very seriously. Late Marx did not view the peasant

differentiation as the central index of the capitalist development. As is

shown in The Third Draft of the Letter to Vera Zasulich (Marx, 1881b),

late Marx was sympathetic with the Naroniks who projected a direct

transition to socialism based on the village communities.

LENINS PROBLEMATIC READING OF MARXS

CAPITAL IN DEVELOPMENT OF CAPITALISM

IN RUSSIA

Many Marxists regard Lenins DCRas an epochal achievement not only in

the area of Marxist historiography but also in Marxist economics.Especially, the theory of market and the law of uneven development of

the Department I are alleged to successfully resolve the contemporary

Marxist debates on the reproduction and crisis of capitalism. However, this

paper disagrees with this assessment. Apart from the aphorism-style remark

that a definite condition of consumption is one of the elements of

proportionality (Lenin, 1899b, pp. 5859),9 it is hard to find in DCR any

original contribution to the development of Marxs theory of reproduction

and crisis. There is no ground for Stalinist economists10 to present Lenins

remarks above as a creative dialectical resolution of the opposition betweenthe underconsumptionism of Narodniks and the disproportionality of

Legal Marxists. Indeed, Lenins remark that a definite condition of

consumption is one of the elements of proportionality seems to confuse the

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theory of reproduction with the theory of accumulation in Marx, for Marxthought the contradiction between production and consumption was not

just one department of the whole of capitalist development, as

Lenin(1897, p. 168)argued but believed it to be an intrinsic feature of the

capitalist production as a whole.

When Lenin reduced the issue of crisis due to the realization problem to

the issue of disproportionality and substituted the theory of reproduction

scheme for the theory of crisis, he misunderstood Marxian system of critique

of political economy. As a result, Lenin accepted Otto Bauers critique of

Rosa Luxemburg and rejected her main theme inAccumulation of Capital.11

Also, Lenins scheme of expanded reproduction with the rising organic

composition of capital, constructed for critiquing Rosa Luxemburg, gives

the wrong impression that the technical change can proceed harmoniously

in the capitalist economy.

Moreover, the alleged difference in the theory of realization between

Lenin and other Legal Marxists, such as Tugan-Baranovsky, Bulgakov,

Struve, and so on, is not so significant (Zarembka, 2000, p. 204).12 As

Rosdolsky indicated, (i)t is evident that Lenins postulate, according to

which the relation of production and consumption is to be subsumed underthe concept of proportionality, brings him uncomfortably close to

Bulgakovs and Tugans disproportionality theory of crises(Rosdolsky,

1977, p. 479).

Compared to Marxs Capital Volume 2, Lenin underplays the

significance of Capital Volume 3, especially Part 3 on the tendency of

the rate of profit to fall.13 Lenin only partially understood Marxs concept

of capital accumulation, in that it absolutized the aspect of productive

forces while minimizing the aspects of class and relations of production

(Zarembka, 2000, p. 185).14

Even in 1915, Lenin still tended to conceivecapital accumulation as an expansion of production rather than as an

expansion of class relations.15

Indeed, Lenin retreated to the Ricardian economics of production

when he asserted that expansion of capitalist production creates its own

market and that the demand for consumer goods is a derived demand, Lenin

is clearly highlighting the capitalist as organizer of production a` la Ricardo

(Zarembka, 2003, pp. 288289). While Marx did not attempt any systematic

critic of Sismondi in his Theories of Surplus Value, Lenin regarded and

denounced Sismondi as the originator of Narodnik economics. Indeed,Lenin devoted a treatise of over 100 pages, A Characterization of

Economic Romanticism (1897), to criticize petit bourgeois economist

Sismondi. In contrast, Lenin hardly criticized Ricardo.

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Lenin equated market or the commodity production in general withcapitalism and saw the rise of capitalism in the development of market

relation in his On the So-Called Market Question (1893). Moreover, Lenin

underplays the question of coercion in market creation, while highlighting

the possible role of technical change (Zarembka, 2003, p. 284). When

Lenin believed that the pre-capitalist economy could naturally transform

itself into capitalism through the operation of market forces, he echoed

Adam Smith rather than Marx who had emphasized the necessity of extra-

economic coercion during the process of primitive accumulation of capital.

Indeed, Lenin paid little attention to the coercion and forces accompaniedby the creation of the commodity production, and argued that (t)he

dimensions of the market are inseparably connected with the degree of

specialization of social labory this specialization, by its very nature is as

infinite as technical developments (Lenin, 1893, p. 100).

Moreover, Lenin provided the orthodox ground to the logico-historicist

understanding of Marxs Capitalcommonly shared by the Second Interna-

tional Marxism and Stalinism. It is obvious that Lenin tended to the logico-

historicist understanding of Marxs Capital. For example, Lenin argued as

follows: An investigation into the relations of production in a given,historically defined society, in their inception, development, and decline

such is the content of Marxs economic doctrine (Lenin, 1914b, p. 59).

The logico-historicism reduces Marxs law of value to law of exchange

that has functioned since the ancient times, which historically transformed

into the law of production prices with the rise of the capitalism. The logico-

historicism was originally formulated by Hilferding to resolve the so-called

internal contradiction between Marxs Capital Volume 1 and Volume 3

(transformation problem) by delimiting the historical spans of the law of

value and law of production prices to the simple commodity production andcapitalism respectively. However, the logico-historicism paradoxically led to

negate the crucial thesis of Marx, i.e., the actuality of the law of value in

capitalism, despite the intent to defend Marxs theory. Indeed, the logico-

historicism gave rise to Stalins economics, which schematically differentiate

the law of value, the law of surplus value, and the law of monopoly profits

and mechanically matches their spans of operation to the successive stages

of capitalist development, i.e., simple commodity production, competitive

capitalism, and monopoly capitalism.16 The logico-historicism culminates in

Stalins assertion that the law of value operates even in the socialisteconomy, for it is alleged to be not specific to capitalism. In short, the

logico-historicism serves to justify the existence of the commodity

production and law of value in Communist regimes in the name of Marx.

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Lenin also had difficulty in recognizing the significances of the categoriesof value-form or commodity fetishism. In this respect, Lenin belonged to the

most Marxist or Neo-Ricardian economists who could not understand the

organic unity of the quantitative and qualitative aspect of value. Like

Bernstein, Kautsky, Hilferding, or Luxemburg, Lenin did not view the

categories of value-form and commodity fetishism as central to the Marxian

theory of value.

Considering above evidences, it would not be an exaggeration to argue

that Lenins text [DCR], contrary to casual remarks that it represents an

application of the theory of MarxsCapitalto Russian conditions, is in facta radically unorthodox work which abandons many of the supposed central

ideas of Marxism.y Lenin does not use value categories in his account of

the development of capitalist relations in Russia (Hussain & Tribe, 1982,

pp. 202203).

It is true that Lenin secured the methodological basis to overcome the

logico-historicist and Neo-Ricardian economism during 19141915, as is

evidenced in his Philosophical Notebooks. Indeed, unlike the theory of

reflection of Materialism and Empirico Criticism, Philosophical Notebooks

underlines the discrepancy between the essence and phenomenal form,17

which shows that Lenin began to recognize the significance of the categories

of value-form and commodity fetishism. Unfortunately, the occurrence of

the Russian revolution in 1917 deprived from Lenin the time to draw the full

implications of the insight and self-criticize his previous logico-historicist

and Neo-Ricardian approach to Marxian critique of political economy.

FROM TWO PATHS TO MILITARY-FEUDALIMPERIALISM AND BOURGEOIS STATE

Two Paths: 19051914

Lenin viewed the relation between the capitalist and pre-capitalist relations as

confrontational rather than codependent inDCR. Because of this, Lenin was

not able to grasp the explosiveness of peasant struggles against landlords

before the 1905 revolution. Indeed, Lenins program of restoration of cut-off

lands could not catch up the actual development of peasants uprisings duringthe 1905 revolution. After witnessing that peasants took over not only the

cut-off lands but also landed property in toto during the revolution, Lenin

came to advocate confiscation of all landed property instead of restoring just

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the cut-off lands. During the first Russian revolution of 19051907, Leninrecognized the persistence of the landlord system despite the development of

capitalism. He also came to realize that the main subject of the capitalist

development was the Tsar, whom he had regarded only as a representative of

landlord classes. Using these insights, Lenin gave a higher assessment of the

peasants revolutionary capacity, while discounting that of the bourgeoisie in

his Two Tactics (1905). Now Lenin came to envisage the power for proletariat

and peasants from the standpoint of a class confrontation between

Tsar landlordbourgeoisie vs. proletariatpeasants, instead of the

previous one between Tsar landlord vs. proletariatpeasantsbourgeoisie, (Ota, 1989). Lenins new thinking came to be concretized as

the theory of Two Paths in his The Agrarian Programme of Social-

Democracy in the First Russian Revolution 19051907(Lenin, 1907).18

Lenins theory of Two Paths is a concrete analysis of the Russian social

structure as a whole, not a hypothetical simulation like his theory of

market. Lenin viewed the articulation of the landlords and Tsar with the

capitalist development in Russia as a Prussian path for bourgeois agrarian

evolution, while characterizing the conflicting peasants development as an

American path for bourgeois agrarian evolution (Lenin, 1907, pp. 238242). Lenin assumed that the Two Paths competed in the industry as well as

agriculture. He also thought that the essential confrontation in the

contemporary Russian society was between the Prussian path promoted

by Tsar landlordbourgeoisie and American path pursued by

proletariatpeasants (Ota, 1989). Now the Tsar regime and landlords

were regarded as economically progressive despite their anti-democratic

attitudes, for they were the promoters of capitalist development. In other

words, the main struggle was now viewed to reside between the two paths, and

not between promoters for progress and its antagonists.Between the Two Paths, Lenin supported the American path as an

alternative to the Prussian path that Russia had followed, viewing the

former far more progressive solution for the agrarian question than the

latter.19 Between the Two Paths, Lenin sided with the American path

and argued for the overthrow of the Prussian path. For Lenin, the

American path was, in every respect, preferable; and he hoped for a variant of

it in the pre-Revolution Russia in which, he argued, capitalism was

developing in the countryside (Byres, 1996, p. 30). To achieve this, Lenin

advocated land nationalization instead of restoration of cut-off lands.Lenin viewed land nationalization and abolition of landlord system as

preconditions for the American path. Lenin regarded land nationalization

as a bourgeois agrarian program, which facilitated the capitalist development

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by abolishing absolute rent.20

For Lenin, land nationalization program wasnever the maximum socialist program, but compatible with the first-stage

revolution, the anti-feudal democratic revolution. In this respect, Lenins

theory of the Two Paths still corresponded to and supported the two-stage

revolutionary strategy.

However, the theory of Two Paths contains following weaknesses. It

exaggerates the contrast between two paths, while underplaying their

similarities.21 Lenin sometimes idealizes the American path as the free

economy of the free farmer working on free land free from all medieval fetters,

from serfdom and feudalism (Lenin, 1908a, p. 140), neglecting that it wassecured by the bloody expropriation of native Indians. Indeed, the existence of

the slavery in the American South shows that the American path was

inseparable from the Prussian path (Byres, 1996). Also, as Chang (2002)

indicated, the main promoter of capitalist development in the American

path was the American developmental state as well. In other words, Two

Paths, or capitalism from below and capitalism from above were his-

torically intermingled rather than diametrically counterposed. As a result, like

DCR, the theory of Two Paths could not conceptualize the specificity of the

Russian capitalist development, especially its specific reproduction structure,including the Tsar and the landownership as its essential components. The

theory of Two Paths failed to overcome the limitation of DCR, which

regarded the existence of anti-democratic regime as an underdevelopment of

capitalism. In the theory of Two Paths, Lenin assumed that capitalism

developed hand in hand with democracy. Lenin could not imagine that the

despotic regime could promote the capitalist industrialization in late deve-

lopers. Therefore, the theory of Two Paths conceived the task for political

democracy as relevant only for the early period of capitalist development.

The theory of Two Paths also had difficulty in explaining the rise ofmilitant labor movements, for it tried to find the background of the

explosion of peasant struggles in the underdevelopment of capitalism in

Russia. In this respect, the theory of Two Paths conflicts with the thesis of

revolutionary democratic dictatorship by proletariat and peasants

advocated by Lenin in the 1905 revolution.

Military-Feudal Imperialism: 19141917

After WWI began, Lenin argued that the military-feudal imperialism co-

existed with capitalist (bourgeois) imperialism in Russia. Lenin now came

to view the post-Emancipation Russia not as a pre-capitalist society but

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capitalism where two roads to imperialism competed with each other. It was abig change from the theory of Two Paths, which considered the peasant

movements as progressive forces for American path against the Prussian

path for capitalism that was intermingled with the Tsar and landowners.

Now, Tsarism and the landlord system were no longer viewed as obstacles to

the capitalist development but as an essential part of capitalism which had

already advanced to the stage of imperialism. Lenin also began to characterize

peasant movements against the Tsarism and landlords as bourgeois. Lenin

found main characteristics of post-WWI Russia in the coexistence of

military-feudal imperialism with capitalist (bourgeois) imperialism. Forexample, Lenin wrote in The Collapse of the Second International as

follows: In Russia, as is common knowledge, capitalist imperialism is weaker

than military-feudal imperialism is (Lenin, 1915a, p. 228).

Lenins new thesis of military-feudal imperialism admitted that the

development of capitalism in Russia advanced to as far as capitalist

imperialism, monopoly capitalism, or state-monopoly capitalism, while

still containing substantial pre-modern backwardness compared to Western

imperialisms. In other words, Lenins thesis of military-feudal imperial-

ism overrode his previous thesis that viewed contemporary Russia basicallyas a pre-capitalist society.

Unlike DCR, the Tsar and big landowners were no longer viewed as

hindrances to the capitalist development. Now, they were seen as coexisting

with capitalist imperialism, rather than obstructing and being crowded out

by capitalist development. Unlike the thesis of Two Paths that had dif-

ficulty in explaining the rising militant labor movements for it perceived the

contemporary Russia as basically a pre-capitalist society, Lenins new thesis

of military-feudal imperialism succeeded to find grounds for confluence of

revolutionary peasant movements and labor movements in the coexistenceof two kinds of imperialisms: the old military-feudal imperialism with the

new capitalist imperialism or bourgeois imperialism.22

However, the frame of Two Paths still persisted in the thesis of

military-feudal imperialism, for its strategic implication was to liberate

bourgeois Russia from military-feudal imperialism.23 Moreover, the

thesis of military-feudal imperialism still described the Tsar and big

landowners as feudal, like DCR.

Bourgeois State: After 1917 Revolution

After 1917, Lenin dated the starting point of modern Russia back to the

Emancipation Reform of 1861 and characterized the post-Emancipation

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Russian state explicitly as a bourgeois state. We know that prior to 1861it was the feudal landowners who were the power that governed Russia. We

know that since then, generally speaking, the power that governed was the

bourgeoisie, those from the wealthy (Lenin, 1919, p. 393). Lenins new

thesis of Bourgeois State was exactly opposite his previous position that

viewed the post-Emancipation Russia as pre-modern. Now, Tsarism was

considered a type of bourgeois political power on par with the provisional

government: the economic substance of capitalist exploitation is in no wise

affected by the substitution of republican-democratic forms of government

for monarchist forms, and that, consequently, the reverse is also true onlythe form of the struggle for the inviolability and sanctity of capitalist profits

need be changed in order to uphold them under a democratic republic as

effectively as under an absolute monarchy (Lenin, 1917b, p. 329). In other

words, Lenin now came to regard Tsarism as an essential part of capitalism

which required the landlord system for its reproduction. Now for Lenin, the

backwardness of Russia presented specificity of Russian modernity rather

than the evidence that Russia was in a pre-capitalist stage. In this respect,

Lenins following remark was a far cry from DCR, or thesis of Two

Paths, or military-feudal imperialism: It is clear that the bourgeoisie inRussia have become very closely tied up with the landowners.y private

landownership in Russia cannot be abolished, and this without compensa-

tion, except by carrying through a gigantic economic revolution, by bringing

the banks under popular control, by nationalizing the syndicates and

adopting the most ruthless revolutionary measures against capital (Lenin,

1917a, pp. 197198, emphasis by Lenin). Lenin even considered both the

feudal landowners before the February revolution and capitalist land-

owners after it as belonging to the same social class. Lenin reconceptua-

lized the Tsarism as the hub of the Russian capitalist reproduction. Russiandespotic state was no longer reduced to the agents of landowners but viewed

to have some relative autonomy. In other words, Lenin now viewed the Tsar

as a promoter of capitalist development in Russia. Lenin even argued that

the Russian capitalism had already advanced to the stage of state-

monopoly capitalism even under Tsarism in hisThe Impending Catastrophe

and How to Combat It: That capitalism in Russia has also become

monopoly capitalism is sufficiently attested by the examples of Produgol,

the Prodmet, the Sugar Syndicate, etc. This Sugar Syndicate is an object-

lesson in the way monopoly capitalism develops into state-monopolycapitalism (Lenin, 1917b, p. 361).

Lenin now viewed the landlord system in Russia being so deeply

integrated with the capitalist reproduction that it rendered the abolition of

landed property impossible without adopting the most ruthless

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revolutionary measures against capital. This understanding was not onlyincompatible with his thesis of Two Paths, which assumed that the

abolition of landed property would facilitate the capitalist development, but

also was different from the thesis of military-feudal imperialism, which

advocated the liberation of bourgeois Russia from military-feudal

imperialism (Ota, 1989). After the February revolution of 1917, Lenin

came to think that the abolishment of the landowner system itself would

amount to a crushing blow against capitalism.

Lenins conception of the post-Emancipation Russian society evolved from

DCR, Two Paths, military-feudal imperialism to bourgeois state. Earlyemphasis on the progressiveness of capitalism and the incompatibility of

capitalismwith pre-capitalist relations was gradually displaced by the recognition

of the articulation of capitalism with pre-capitalist relations and the reactionary

character of developed capitalism. The evolution of Lenins conception of

Russian capitalism was pressured by intensification of class struggles. Consider-

ing that the thesis of Two Paths or military-feudal imperialism are far from

Lenins final thoughts, but transitory and conjunctural projections eventually

suppressed by Lenin himself after the 1917 revolution, it is not warranted to

overplay it likeHoward and King (1989).24

BREAK WITH THE SECOND INTERNATIONAL

MARXISM

As the Second International turned to the position of national defencism

with the outbreak of WWI in 1914, Lenin declared the bankruptcy of the

Second International and advocated the building of a new International atthe Zimmerwald in 1915. Lenin asserted that the SPD leaders betrayal and

opportunism caused the bankruptcy. Against Kautsky who argued for the

ceasefire and pacifism, Lenin argued that the war should be exploited as a

chance for revolutionary take-off, for it was part of class struggles. Lenin

argued that the socialists should argue for the defeat of their own country

and transform the war into a civil war with a view to the socialist revolution.

Lenin also argued that the people of warring imperialist countries should

direct their gun to their own ruling class rather than to the people of other

warring imperialist countries. For Lenin, the defeat of the tsarist monarchyand its army y would be the lesser evil by far (Lenin, 1914a, p. 18), and

the touchstone to differentiate the real socialists is whether or not they

support revolutionary defeatism.

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Lenin belonged to the Second International Marxism before 1914. Leninrespected Kautsky as an orthodox Marxist before he attacked him as a

renegade. Before 1914, there was no essential difference between Lenin

and Kautsky. Indeed, Lenin drew from Kautsky the main theme ofWhat Is

to Be Done(1902) that the socialist consciousness cannot be attained by the

workers themselves and should be introduced from the outside. Lenin

shared Kautskys left-of-centre position and regarded himself as a pupil of

Plekhanov, a Russian Kautsky. Lenins early work, What the Friends of

the People Are and How They Fight the Social-Democrats (1894) clearly

shows the influences of Plekhanov. Before 1914, Lenin seldom took sidewith the left of German SPD, like Rosa Luxemburg. For example, in 1908

Lenin argued as follows: Kautsky was right when he said of Herve s idea:

The idea of a military strike sprang from good motives, it is noble and full

of heroism, but it is heroic folly (Lenin, 1908b, p. 196). Regarding this,

Harding also commented that he (Lenin) occupied a comparatively

moderate left-of-centre position that differed little from the stance of his

mentor Karl Kautsky (Harding, 1996, p. 72).25 The fact that Lenin was

greatly surprised when he heard that the German SPD voted for the war

debt in 4 August 1914 revealed how deeply Lenin had been incorporated inthe problematique of the Second International Marxism.

Before 1914, Lenin thought that bourgeois revolution and full develop-

ment of capitalism were the first tasks that the Russian left had to

accomplish. He also differed from the Menshevik and other Second

International Marxists not about the two-stage revolutionary strategy,

which he accepted, but about which class would lead the coming bourgeois

revolution. Lenin even argued that seeking salvage for the Russian working

class through a route other than capitalist development would be

reactionary, for the coming Russian revolution would be a bourgeoisrevolution. It is obvious that Lenin in this period was affected by the

mechanical materialist or economic determinist ideas that the object

determines the subject and the economy determines the consciousness, the

heart of the Second International Marxism (Lo wy, 1982).

However, around 19141915 after the outbreak of WWI, a big

transformation, a sort of an epistemological break took place in Lenins

thoughts. Of course, the impact of WWI, especially experiencing betrayal of

the Second International was behind this break. As Harding noted,

Unambiguously, it was the war that led Lenin to Leninism (Harding,1996: 78). After he disowned the bankrupt Second International Marxism,

which he had embraced before 1914, Lenin began the project of finding new

methodological basis by rereading Hegels Logic. Appropriating Hegels

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Logic was instrumental for Lenin to break with pre-dialectical mechanicalmaterialism of the Second International Marxism, including its thesis that

the material objective conditions of Russia was not ripe enough for

accomplishing the socialist revolution. As Lo wy (1982) noted, Lenins

rediscovery of Hegels dialectic during 191415 was a crucial moment when

he received Trotskys strategy of permanent revolution, which he had

hitherto tried to refute, and led to hisApril Thesis, All Power to Soviets in

1917.26 Pressures from class struggles after the 1905 revolution were also

important for Lenins break. However, Lenins break was not complete;

some elements of the Second International Marxism were still present inLenins thoughts even after the break in 19141915.

CONTRIBUTIONS AND LIMITATIONS OF

IMPERIALISM

Imperialism is the most important economics work of Lenin after DCR. It

has provided the fundamental basis of the main stream Marxist analysis ofmodern capitalism since the 20th century. Lenin argued in Imperialism that

capitalism, which was established in England after the Industrial Revolu-

tion, had moved to a new stage of development around late 19th or early

20th century. Lenin characterized this new stage of the capitalist

development as imperialism and summarized its place in history as

monopoly capitalism, parasitic or decaying capitalism, and capitalism

in transition, or moribund capitalism (Lenin, 1916, pp. 298304).

I think the rational kernel of Lenins Imperialism resides in the theori-

zation of the intensification of the economic competition between nationalcapitals and geo-political competition between nation states consequent

upon the uneven development of capitalism, that is, Lenin-Bukharin

synthesis according to Callinicos (2009),27 as well as the emergence of the

revolutionary conjunctures at the weakest link on a global scale. Lenin

wrote Imperialism to debunk the opportunistic and chauvinistic essence of

the Second International Marxism, especially Karl Kautskys ultra-

imperialism and demonstrate the necessity of inter-imperialist war and

the strategy of revolutionary defeatism. In this regard, what Lenin

enumerated as basic features of imperialism, that is, (1) monopoly; (2)finance capital; (3) export of capital; (4) international monopolistic capital;

(5) territorial division of the world among the biggest capitalist powers

should be understood as a dialectical totality (Lenin, 1916, p. 266). What

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Lenin emphasized in Imperialism and Buharin elaborated more in hisImperialism and World Economy (1915) is the necessity of economic

competition between many capitals to intensify beyond national frontier

and culminate in the geo-political competition on a global scale. Con-

sidering Lenins basic motive and the main theme of Imperialism, it is not

warranted to reduce or truncate it as a stagiest theory of monopoly

capitalism or a radical economics of monopoly, as has been done in the

main stream Marxist analysis of modern capitalism, especially Stalinist

economics.

In the evolution of Lenins thoughts, Imperialism overcomes thelimitations of the method ofDCRthat reduces the specificity of each social

formation to the level of the capitalist development. In Imperialism, Lenin

characterized the capitalist world system as a hierarchical structure

composed of powers that economically and politically oppress other nations

and the oppressed colonial and dependent countries. Lenin also tried to

explain the coalescence of a highly developed capitalism and the political and

social retrogressiveness in terms of the transformation of free competition

into monopoly inImperialism. This was a far cry fromDCR that viewed the

capitalist development as historical progress. One ofImperialisms theses thatthe transition from free competition to monopoly facilitates the transforma-

tion of political system from democracy to reactionary regimes seems to

overcome the economic determinism ofDCR, which tries to relate the lack of

democracy with underdevelopment of capitalism.

In Imperialism, Lenin accomplished many important contributions to

the development of Marxian critique of political economy, including the

theorization of the hierarchical structure of uneven development in the

capitalist world system, emphasizing the reactionary aspects of advanced

capitalism, and overcoming the economic determinism. For these reasons,one cannot argue that Lenins Imperialism contributed nothing creative to

the development of Marxist economics.28

However, it is also true that Lenins Imperialismcontains nontrivial flaws.

These flaws are closely related with the problematique of the Second

International Marxism that still remained in Imperialism even after Lenin

broke with it. Indeed, main concepts of Hilferdings Finance Capital(1910),

such as stock company, development of cartel and trust, socialization of

production, and so on, compose the same central concepts of Lenins

Imperialism. Above all, Lenins Imperialism adopted and systemizedHilferdings monopoly stage thesis.29 Indeed, Lenin himself provided the

ground for truncated reduction of Imperialism to the monopoly stagiest

economics by later Stalinist economists, when he asserted that (i)f it

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were necessary to give the briefest possible definition of imperialism weshould have to say that imperialism is the monopoly stage of capitalism

(Lenin, 1916, p. 266). Moreover, Lenin heavily drew from an English

reformist work, J. A. HobsonsImperialism: A Study(1902). They show that

Second International Marxism persisted in Lenin even after the break of

19141915.

However, it should be noted that it is hard to derive the stageist theory of

monopoly from Marxs plan of the critique of political economy. Unlike

Lenin, Marx understood monopoly or imperialism as the specific intensified

form of competition rather than the limitation of competition.30

The stageisttheory of monopoly capitalism does not fit with the development of

capitalism after 20th century, characterized by the intensification of com-

petition on a global scale. Hilferdings concept of financial capital, which

plays a central role in Lenins Imperialism and prioritized and generalized

the experiences of the contemporary German capitalism, especially the

coalescence of the industrial capital and bank capital, cannot easily explain

todays financial globalization, characterized by separation of the industrial

capital from bank capital.

Lenin followed Hilferdings absolutization of the 19th centuryscapitalism, which allegedly materializes the normal functioning of the law

of motion of capitalism (Ota, 1989). As Lenin failed to theorize the relation

between monopoly and super-profit or wage in terms of Marxian value

theory, his theory of labor aristocracy as well as his critique of reformism

contains substantial theoretical difficulties. Indeed, depending on J. A.

Hobsons Imperialism: A Study (1902), Lenin regarded the rise of oppor-

tunism or reformism in the labor movement as a result of sell-out of the part

of the working class by the super-profit of monopoly capital.31 Moreover,

Lenins Imperialism tended to underplay the dynamic potential ofcapitalism, even its apocalyptic prospect. However, the actual capitalism

witnessed so far not stagnation but an ever-growing of productive forces.

While Lenins Imperialism contains triple contradictory connections,

that is, Hobson-Lenin connection, Hilferding-Lenin connection and

Bukharin-Lenin connection, only the last one, immune from the Second

International Marxism, suggests the right path for Marxian theorization

of imperialism. Moreover, Bukharin-Lenin connection in Imperialism

still suffers from the failure of benefiting from Rosa Luxemburgs The

Accumulation of Capital(1913).32

That is the reason why this chapter does notconsider Lenins Imperialism as a successful concretization of three latter

parts of Marxs plan of critique of political economy in Grundrisse (1857), that

is, State (Part 4), Foreign Trade (Part 5), and World Market Crisis (Part 6).

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However, Warren went too far when he argued that the general thrust ofhis (Lenins) argument that monopoly capitalism was parasitic, decadent,

and stagnant compared with competitive capitalism was bound to give the

impression that the relationship between imperialist countries and colonies

and semi-colonies was one of simple robbery (booty) rather than a

dynamic process of two-sided capitalist development, the typical combina-

tion of exploitation and expansion of the productive forces (Warren, 1980,

p. 82). Or, Lenins essay reversed Marxist doctrine on the progressive

character of imperialist expansion and, by an irresistible ideological process,

erased from Marxism any trace of the view that capitalism could henceforthrepresent an instrument of social or economic advance, even in pre-capitalist

societies (Warren, 1980, p. 47). After Lenin, Imperialism came increas-

ingly to be regarded as the major obstacle to industrialization in the Third

World. Capitalism was thus declared to be devoid of positive social

functions anywhere. These conclusions were implicit in Lenins Imperialism,

but they were not to be fully and explicitly drawn until the 1928 Congress of

the Communist International (Warren, 1980, p. 83). Desai also repeated

Warrens theme when he asserted that (a)lthough it is powerfully written,

Imperialism detracts from Marxian economic rigour. Indeed, Leninsdebates with the Narodniks show a much greater level of rigour than his

Imperialism.y I want to contrast the very positive way in which Lenin

treats capitalism both before the war, in his debates with the Narodniks,

and his days as a practical policymaker after the Revolution with his very

negative and dark view of capitalism in Imperialism (Desai, 2002,

pp. 134, 136).

Above all, Warren and Desai were excessively biased when they assumed

that Marx admitted the progressiveness of imperialism. In fact, Marx also

grasped bloody process of imperialist expansion when he mentioned theprogressive aspect of capitalist expansion. As is well known, late Marx

tended to view the capitalist expansion in terms of exploitation rather than

developmentalism. For example, Marx wrote to Nikolai Danielson, dated

1881, as follows: What the English take from them annually in the form of

rent, dividends for railways useless to the Hindus; pensions for military and

civil servicemen, for Afghanistan and other wars, etc., etc. what they take

from them without any equivalent and quite apart from what they

appropriate to themselves annually within India y it amounts to more

than the total sum of income of the 60 millions of agricultural and industriallabourers of India! (Marx, 1881a, p. 63, emphasis by Marx). Marx also

wrote in same year in his The Third Draft of the Letter to Vera Zasulich

(1881) as follows: With respect to India, suppression of communal land

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ownership was nothing but an act of English vandalism which drove theindigenous population backward rather than forward (Marx, 1881b, p.

365). Late Marx conceived the effects of the Western modernity on non-

Western worlds from the angle of vandalism rather than moderniza-

tion. Admitting that early Marx assumed the effects of capitalism on its

peripheries largely as progressive, late Marx certainly viewed them as

retrogressive. In this respect, Lenins Imperialism, which developed the

thesis of retrogressiveness of imperialism, could be situated in the con-

tinuation of late Marxs thoughts.

LATE LENIN: RETREAT TO ECONOMISM?

Lenins thoughts after War Communism and the period of NEP showed a

retreat from the revolutionary madness that had exploded in 1917. This

retreat persisted until the period of final struggles at his death bed.

Indeed, Lenin not only retained the undemocratic measures, which had been

forced by the emergency situation of War Communism, but also tried to

justify extension of the market after the transition to NEP in terms ofmarket socialist theoretics.

Late Lenins thoughts were quite different from those in State and

Revolution of 1917, where everything was transparent.33 State and

Revolution stated that the common people should always be able to access

and exercise state power. Above all, State and Revolutionviewed procedural

democracy as an essential component of socialism, and asserted that

government officials should be paid the average workers wage and be

elected and recalled at any time.34 However, principles of democracy,

central to State and Revolution, rapidly receded with the War Communismand NEP. On the contrary, the mechanical materialism or the economic

determinism, that is, main characteristics of the Second International

Marxism, began to revive again.35 Indeed, some of the symptoms appeared

right after the October revolution, before the transition to War Commun-

ism. For example, Lenin equated the soviet with the dictatorship of

proletariat in his The Immediate Tasks of the Soviet Government, written in

April 1918, Soviet power is nothing but an organizational form of the

dictatorship of the proletariat (Lenin, 1918, p. 265), which is absent in

State and Revolution. Indeed, after 1920 Lenin no longer talked about thecommune state or soviet democracy, and insisted on the building of the

dictatorship of the proletariat. Lenin argued that (h)enceforth, less politics

will be the best politics (Lenin, 1920b, p. 514), and hoped that very happy

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time when politics will recede into the background, when politics will bediscussed less often and at shorter length, and engineers and agronomists

will do most of the talking(Lenin, 1920b, pp. 513514). At the 10th Party

Congress of 1921, Lenin declared that I think the Party Congress will have

to draw the conclusion that the oppositions time has run out and that the

lids on it. We want no more oppositions! (Lenin, 1921a, p. 200).

Lenin tried to introduce Taylorism in the Russian economy after the

October revolution.36 Lenin supported the one-man management as well as

the discipline and hierarchical control in the labor processes. Lenin

infamously argued for electrification as the basis of Communism afterthe Civil War of 1920.37 After 1921, Lenin began to regard the Partys main

task as economic and administrative rather than political. For example, the

recreation of the working class, which had disintegrated during the Civil

War,38 was set as the most important task of the Party rather than its self-

emancipation, and NEP was introduced to achieve this task. Lenin

emphasized that NEP would be executed in earnest and for a long time

at the 10th All-Russia Conference of the Party in May 1921 (Lenin, 1921b,

p. 436). During the period of NEP Lenin tended to assume that socialism

can be realized not by the abolition of but through the market relations.Lenins new concept of socialism was to be formulated as the thesis of

market socialism afterwards. When Lenin argued that the development of

market relations could cure the bureaucratism in Russia in his The Tax in

Kind (1921), it resonated with todays neoliberal eulogy of market.39 It is

unfortunate that the economic determinism and the thesis of progressiveness

of capitalism, intrinsic to the Second International Marxism and shared by

early LeninsDCR, but suppressed during the period ofImperialism, seemed

to revive in late Lenins thoughts. For late Lenins concept of socialism,

concretized in NEP, not only contradict with Marxian socialism but alsowith Lenins own vision crystallized in his State and Revolution.

CONCLUDING REMARKS

Lenins contributions to the development of Marxian critique of political

economy could be assessed in terms of the relation with the Second

International Marxism. Lenin could contribute to the development of

Marxian critique of political economy only by breaking with the SecondInternational Marxism. Likewise, a large part of the difference between

Lenins economics and Marxian critique of political economy stems from

the incompleteness of Lenins break with the Second International Marxism.

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Consequently, there were significant remnants of the Second InternationalMarxism in Lenins economics even after Lenin declared the bankruptcy of

the Second International in 1914. Lenin had believed the progressiveness of

capitalism and tried to explain the social structure of Russia from the

standpoint of economic determinism, the main traits of the Second

International Marxism, in his DCR, before renouncing it, though

incompletely, in his Imperialism. Generally speaking, except Imperialism,

Lenin contributed little to the development of Marxian critique of political

economy. Indeed, the essential problematique of the Second International

Marxism had not only dominated the economic thoughts of young Leninbut remained in mature Lenin, including his Imperialism, and even revived

in late Lenin, especially in his market socialist justification of NEP.

In retrospect, Korean progressives have tended to idolize Lenin, rather

than critically developing the rational kernel of Lenins thoughts, that is,

the endeavor to break with the Second International Marxism. Korean

progressives have also tended to identify some elements of the Second

International Marxism as the essence of Lenins economic thoughts. Indeed,

Korean progressives have tended to incorporate DCR without criticism,

especially the theories of Two Paths, as well as reducing Imperialism tothe stagist theory of monopoly capitalism. Absolutizing the theories of

Two Paths has led to serious theoretical and political problems for the

Korean progressives. Lenins theories of peasant differentiation and Two

Paths had a crucial influence on the Korean historiography by way of

Japanese historian Otsuka Hisao. Otsuka famously schematized two paths

of capitalist development as the paths of revolutionary or normal way

of capitalist development by petty producers and conservative or

crippled way of capitalist development promoted by landlords and

merchants, based on Lenins theories of market and peasant differentiationin DCR (Otsuka, 1973). During 1960s and 1970s in Korea, one of the

popular theories for the Korean progressives was the theory of national

economy, which sought to characterize the Korean capitalism as

comprador bureaucratic or crippled, drawing on the Stalinist economic

history, including Otsukas theory. It was unfortunate that the Korean

progressives could not recognize the fact that Lenins theory of peasant

differentiation as well as Otsukas theory of transition to capitalism, which

was drawn from the former, are nothing but the theory of capitalism in one

country that tend to abolutize the path of petty-producers that is, therise of capitalism based on the economic process of primitive accumulation

of capital (differentiation of petty-producers by the working of law of value)

as the classical ideal-types of capitalist development, while downplaying

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the violent nature of the rise of historical capitalism and the extra-economicprocess of the primitive accumulation of capital, or accumulation by

dispossession (Harvey, 2003). Moreover, Lenins theory of Two Paths

not only provided the historic-theoretical justification for the path of

nationalist capitalism (path for petty-producers or American Path) and

Stalinist two-stage strategies of revolution but also idealized the path for the

classical development of capitalism, eventually succumbing to the ideology

of progressiveness of capitalism. Since the collapse of the Communist

regimes, Lenins theory of Two Paths has functioned to provide a left fac-

ade to the reformists, who after surrendering to the ideology of TINAtend to contrast the type of Rhein capitalism (good capitalism) to the

type of Anglo-American capitalism (bad capitalism) and support the

former. If Lenins theory of Two Paths had served to justify Stalinist two-

stage strategies of revolution in the past, it has currently been incorporated

to Keynesian reformist dichotomy of good capitalism and bad

capitalism.

Considering the limitations and internal inconsistencies of Lenins

thoughts, idolizing Lenins thoughts would be harmful to the project of

rekindling the tradition of the classical Marxism. In fact, the economicthoughts of young Lenin represent mechanical applications of the Sec-

ond International Marxism, opposite to Marxian critique of political

economy. However, it will be equally foolish to discard Lenins Marxism in

toto. Indeed, the essence of Lenins Marxism does not lie in his economic

theories but in the conjunctural or strategic analysis of the age of

war and revolution, represented by works like Imperialism, April Thesis,

and State and Revolution, after he broke with the Second International

Marxism.40

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Author is thankful for valuable comments and suggestions by Radhika

Desai, Paul Zarembka and anonymous referees.

NOTES

1. For example, Alec Nove argued that as an economic theorist, Lenincontributed little after 1899. It cannot be said that his book on imperialism wasparticularly originaly (Nove, 1979, p. 80).

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2. LeninsPhilosophical Notebooks, written in 19141915, was a crucial moment inthe break. For discussions about the epistemological break between Materialismand Empirico-CriticismandPhilosophical Notebooks, refer to Lo wy (1982),Anderson(1995, 2007), andKouvelakis (2007). However, it should be noted that there are alsosome continuing themes in other areas of Lenins thoughts and politics, especiallyaround the party building. Refer to Rees (1998)andLih (2007).

3. Zizek argued that, (w)hat we should stick to is the madness (in the strictKierkegaardian sense) of the Leninist utopia and, if anything, Stalinism stands fora return to the realistic common sense. y Nowhere is this greatness more evidentthan in Lenins writings which cover the time span from February 1917, when thefirst revolution abolished tsarism and installed a democratic regime, to the second

revolution in October. (Z

izek, 2002, pp. 56, emphasis by Zizek).4. For this chapter,Ota (1989),Howard and King (1989),Zarembka (2000, 2003)

provide important references. However this chapter differs from above references infollowing points: Ota (1989) did not make it clear that the break with the SecondInternational Marxism was behind the leap from DCR to Imperialism;Howard andKing (1989)is biased to Ricardian economics;Zarembka (2000, 2003)does not giveany credit to Lenin in developing Marxian critique of political economy.

5. Althusser famously argued the existence of so-called epistemological breakbetween early Marx and mature Marx. However, he did not admit such break inLenin. Indeed, Althusser highly appreciated the significance of early works of Lenin,especially DCR: LeninsThe Development of Capitalism in Russia (1899: Lenin was

twenty-nine years old). The only work of scientific sociology in the world, which allsociologists should study with care.y This work summarizes the essentials of thenumerous studies that Lenin devoted to the basic theses ofCapitalVolume Two intexts of a gripping clarity and rigour, between 1894 and 1899, in his critique of thePopulist and romantic economists.y French specialists in agrarian questionshave every interest in reading this very actual text closely, and learning from it howofficial statistics should be handled (Althusser, 2001, p. 69). Harding alsoevaluatedDCR highly: The Development of Capitalism in Russiaremains the fullest,best documented and best-argued examination of the crucial period of the evolutionof capitalism out of feudalism in the literature of Marxism (Harding, 1977, p. 107).

6. For more discussion of Tugan-Baranovskys view on the Russian capitalism,

refer toHoward and King (1989, pp. 173176).7. According to the Emancipation Reform of 1861 in Russia, large parts of

common land were passed to the major land-owners as otrezki (cut-off lands),making many forests, roads and rivers only accessible for a fee.

8. We maintainy that the demand for the restitution of cut-off lands is themaximum that we can at present advance in our agrarian programme.ybecauseytypical cut-off lands retard the development of capitalism, and their restitution willstimulate this development (Lenin, 1902: 116, 131). In 1903, Lenin still confined hisagrarian programme to the restitution of cut-off lands: The whole essence of ouragrarian programme is that the rural proletariat must fight together with the richpeasantry for the abolition of the remnants of serfdom, for the cut-off lands. yBecausetogether with the rich peasantrythe proletariatwill be unableto go, andmustnotgo, beyond the abolition of serfdom, beyond restitution of the cut-off lands, etc.(Lenin, 1903, p. 442, emphasis by Lenin).

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9. While criticizing Tugan-Baranovsky, Lenin argued as follows: The consumerpower of society and the proportional relation of the various branches ofproduction these are not conditions that are isolated, independent of, andunconnected with, each other. On the contrary, a definite condition of consumptionis one of the elements of proportionality (Lenin, 1899b, pp. 5859).

10. By Stalinist economists, I mean the economists who regard the officialtextbooks on political economy published in Communist regimes, which arefundamentally modeled on Stalins Economic Problems of Socialism in the U.S.S.R.(1952), as the most orthodox development of Marxian economics.

11. According to Rosdolsky, the reason why Lenin exaggerated the importance ofPart 3 of Volume 2 of Capital was because Marxs Theories of Surplus Value or

Grundrissewere not available when he wroteDCR (Rosdolsky, 1977, p. 482). Whenthe young Lenin wrote his treatise on the realization problem neither Marxs Theoriesnor theGrundrissewere known to him: he could have only a less than adequate insightinto the methodologically very complex structure of Marxs economic work. Leninrather exaggerated the theoretical validity and relevance of the analysis in Part 3 ofVolume 2 ofCapital, and tended to regard it as Marxs last word on the theory ofrealization.y the schemes of reproduction and the analysis of Volume 2 can in noway, on their own, offer the complete explanation of the realization problem, but canonly do this in connection with Marxs theory of crisis and breakdown. And it seems tous that the great deficiency in Lenins theory of realization is that he overlooked thisfundamental fact (Rosdolsky, 1977, pp. 482483).

12. Lenin argued in Once More on the Theory of Realization (1899) as follows:Struves statement that the Russian agricultural peasantry, by the differentiationwithin it, creates a market for our capitalism is perfectly correct (Lenin, 1899c, p. 90).

13. Henryk Grossmann seemed to recognize the problems of Lenins under-standing of Marxs Capital, when he argued that Lenin was right in saying thathighly developed capitalism is characterized by an inherent tendency to stagnationand decay. But Lenin linked this tendency to the growth of monopolies. That thereis such a connection is indisputable, but a mere statement is not enough. y Thegrowth of monopoly is a means of enhancing profitability by raising prices and, inthis sense, it is only a surface appearance whose inner structure is insufficientvalorisation linked to capital accumulation (Grossmann, 1929, p. 122).

14. Marx sometimes commented positively on Sismondi, who admitted the possibilityof overproduction crisis against Ricardo: Sismondi is profoundly conscious of thecontradictions in capitalist productiony He is perfectly aware of the fundamentalcontradictions: on the one hand, unrestricted development of the productive forces andincrease of wealth which, at the same time, consists of commodities and must be turnedinto cash; on the other hand, the system is based on the fact that the mass of producers isrestricted to the necessaries. Hence, according to Sismondi, crises are not accidental, asRicardo maintains, but essential outbreaks occurring on a large scale and at definiteperiods of the immanent contradictions (Marx, 1971, pp. 5556).

15. In 1897, Lenin wrote as follows when he criticized Sismondi: Accumulation isindeed the excess of production over revenue (articles of consumption). To expandproduction (to accumulate in the categorical meaning of the term) it is first of allnecessary to produce means of productiony (Lenin, 1897, p. 155). In 1914, Leninstill argued as follows: New and important in the highest degree is Marxs analysis

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of theaccumulation of capital, i.e., the transformation of a part of surplus value intocapital, and its use, not for satisfying the personal needs or whims of the capitalist,but for new production(Lenin, 1914b, p. 63, emphasis by Lenin).

16. InEconomic Problems of Socialism in the U.S.S.R. (1952), which provided thefoundation for all the subsequent official textbooks on political economy in theCommunist regimes, Stalin argued as follows: It is sometimes asked whether the lawof value exists and operates in our country, under the socialist system. Yes, it doesexist and does operate.y Is the law of value the basic economic law of capitalism?No. The law of value is primarily a law of commodity production. It existed beforecapitalism, and, like commodity production, will continue to exist after theoverthrow of capitalism, as it does, for instance, in our country,y It is said that

the law of the average rate of profit is the basic economic law of modern capitalism.That is not true.y It is not the average profit, but the maximum profit that modernmonopoly capitalism demands,y the law of surplus value is too general a law;it does not cover the problem of the highest rate of profit, the securing of whichis a condition for the development of monopoly capitalism (Stalin, 1952, pp. 458,473474).

17. Lenin famously wrote as follows in his Philosophical Notebooks: It isimpossible completely to understand Marxs Capital, and especially its first chapter,without having thoroughly studied and understood the whole of Hegels Logic.Consequently, half a century later none of the Marxists understood Marx (Lenin,1915c, p. 180, emphasis by Lenin). Above remarks should be read as Lenins self-

criticism, confessing that his understanding of Marxs Capital in DCR withoutreading Hegels Logic has serious defects. Therefore, Lenin himself is included inthe Marxists who could not understand Marx cited in above remarks, contrary tothe assertion ofAlthusser (2001, p. 73). After a thorough study of Hegels Logic,Lenin came to understand the significance of theories of value-form and commodityfetishism of Chapter 1 of Marxs Capital, Volume 1. For example, refer to followingremarks of Lenin, which argues that the phenomenon form is never insignificant orunrealistic, emphasizing the relation between the essence and the phenomenon form:i.e., the unessential, seeming, superficial, vanishes more often, does not hold sotightly, does not sit so firmly as Essence. Etwa: the movement of a river thefoam above and the deep currents below. But even the foam is an expression of

essence! (Lenin, 1915c, p. 130, emphasis by Lenin).18. Lenin succinctly summarized the essence of the theory of Two Paths in the

Preface for the 2nd Edition of DCR, written in 1907: With the present economicbasis of the Russian Revolution, two main lines of its development and outcome areobjectively possible: Either the old landlord economy, bound as it is by thousands ofthreads to serfdom, is retained and turns slowly into purely capitalist, Junkereconomy. The basis of the final transition from labor-service to capitalism is theinternal metamorphosis of feudalist landlord economy. The entire agrarian system ofthe state becomes capitalist, and for a long time retains feudal features. Or the oldlandlord economy is broken up by revolution, which destroys all the relics ofserfdom, and large landownership in the first place. The basis of the final transitionfrom labor-service to capitalism is the free development of small peasant farming,which has received a tremendous impetus as a result of the expropriation of thelandlords estates in the interests of the peasantry. The entire agrarian system

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becomes capitalist, for the more completely the vestiges serfdom destroyed the morerapidly does the differentiation of the peasantry proceed (Lenin, 1899a, pp. 3233).

19. It is paradoxical that the most of todays progressives embrace Rheincapitalism, that is, the present form of Prussian path against the Anglo-American capitalism.

20. Thus, the question of the nationalization of the land in capitalist society fallsinto two essentially distinct parts: the question of differential rent, and that ofabsolute rent. Nationalisation changes the owner of the former, and undermines thevery existence of the latter. Hence, on the one hand, nationalization is a partialreform within the limits of capitalism (a change of owners of a part of surplus value),and on the other hand, it abolishes the monopoly which hinders the development of

capitalism as a whole.y

The free, wide, and rapid development of capitalism,complete freedom for the class struggle,y that is what nationalization of the landimplies under the capitalist system of production (Lenin, 1906, pp. 181, 183).

21. Howard and King also indicated this problem in Lenin: while it is sensible tosee Stolypin and Lenin as competitors, there was also an element of shared interest.To achieve his own objectives, Lenin required that Stolypin achieve his on asignificant scale, so that the ties of the obshchina were thoroughly broken and thepeasant bourgeoisie more securely established. Lenins Marxism, therefore, requiredthe partial success of the Prussian path (Howard & King, 1989, p. 215).

22. Incidentally, Lenins concept of military-feudal imperialism with hisconcept of X imperialism in Notebooks on Imperialism (1916) seems to suggest a

clue for a Marxian theorization of the sub-imperialist phenomena in some of newlyindustrializing countries, such as Brazil, South Africa, Korea, etc.

23. The proletariat are fighting, and will fight valiantly, to win power, for arepublic, for the confiscation of the land, i.e., to win over the peasantry, make fulluseof their revolutionary powers, and get the non-proletarian masses of the people totake part in liberatingbourgeoisRussia frommilitary -feudalimperialism (tsarism)(Lenin, 1915b, p. 420, emphasis by Lenin).

24. Howard and King argued as follows: Lenins theorising between 1905 and1914 did represent a genuine advance in Russian Marxism y In this period Leninprovided a political economy intimately connected with the revolutionary problem, aquality which had hitherto been absent from social democracy in RussiayBy

providing a new perspective which distinguished between different types of capitalism,Lenin closed this gap. He linked the forms of capitalist development with varieties ofbourgeois-democratic revolution, and correctly charged Plekhanov with having onlyan abstract conception of the Russian revolution. (Howard & King, 1989, p. 211)

25. Lenin also gave a following big praise to Kautskys The Agrarian Question(1899): Kautskys book is the most important event in present-day economicliterature since the third volume of Capital. Until now Marxism has lacked asystematic study of capitalism in agriculture. Kautsky has filled this gapy (Lenin,1899d: 94). Indeed, as Service noted, After Engelss death in 1895, Ulyanov[Lenin]s hero in the German Social-Democratic Party was the theorist KarlKautsky (Service, 2000, p. 123).

26. Harding located the birth of authentic Lenin withApril Thesis in 1917: Theperiod from April to October 1917 was, clearly, of critical importance in thedevelopment of Leninism.y To pretend that the demarcating features of Leninism

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as a distinctive ideology and mental map of the contemporary world werearticulated and well known before April 1917, is to fly in the face of all theevidence. It was only then that Leninism emerged as a rounded, more or lesscoherent, and more or less comprehensive ideology of the modern world(Harding, 1996, pp. 106, 268).

27. For recent elaboration of this point that is, the importance of dialectics ofeconomic competition between many capitals and geo-political competitionbetween many nation states in theorizing Marxian concept of imperialism refertoCallinicos (2009) andDesai (2009).

28. For example Tony Cliff argued as follows: in terms of the actual descriptionof modern capitalism Lenin is not original at all, and borrows practically everything

from Bukharin (Cliff, 1979, p. 61).29. While Lenin criticized Hilferdings concept of finance capital and opportu-nistic politics, he nevertheless acknowledged his indebtedness to Hilferdings FinanceCapitalin Imperialism: In spite of the mistake the author [Hilferding] makes on thetheory of money, and in spite of a certain inclination on his part to reconcileMarxism with opportunism, this work [Finance Capital] gives a very valuabletheoretical analysis of the latest phase of capitalist development, as the subtitleruns.y throughout the whole of his work [Finance Capital], and particularly in thetwo chapters preceding the one from which this definition is taken, Hilferdingstresses the part played by capitalist monopolies.y Finance capital does not wantliberty, it wants domination, as Hilferding very truly says.y Hilferding rightly

notes the connection between imperialism and the intensification of nationaloppression (Lenin, 1916, pp. 195, 226, 262, 297, emphasis by Lenin). It is alsointeresting to note that Hilferding also shared Lenin and Tugan-Baranovskis thesisof disproportionality in his Finance Capital.

30. Marx used the concept of monopoly to indicate the monopoly of the means ofproduction by the capitalist class or the specific form of competition. HilferdingsFinance Capitalwas the first attempt to define the monopoly capital as the fraction ofcapital, characterized by the combination of the industrial capital and bank capital.Later, it was appropriated by Lenins Imperialism, and succeeded to Stalinist theoryof state monopoly capitalism after being supplemented by neoclassical economicsconcept of monopoly power. However, according to Marx, monopoly profit cannot

be the predominant characteristic of the capitalist mode of production.y

whilemonopoly pertains, according to Maxs theoretical system, to the category ofindividual capital denoting an enterprise which on account of its peculiar positionin the capitalist production process earns higher-than-average profit freecompetition relates exclusively to the category of social capital and is the pre-eminent condition for integration of all individual capitals into social capital(Milios & Sotiropoulos, 2009, pp. 119120).

31. Cliff rightly criticized Lenins thesis of labor aristocracy, when he argued thateconomic roots of reformism is capitalist prosperity resulted from permanentwar economy, and its solidity, its spread throughout the working class, frustratinglargely isolating all revolutionary minorities, make it abundantly clear that theeconomic and social roots of reformism are not in an infinitesimal minority of theproletariat and the working masses as Lenin argues (Cliff, 1957, p. 178).

32. Indeed, in Imperialism, Lenin never mentioned or quoted Rosa Luxemburg.

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