Lenin on the National Question

The conclusion to Trotsky’s chapter on ‘the problem of nationalities’ - from Volume Three of his ‘History of the Russian Revolution’, written in 1930 - shows just how highly he valued Lenin’s approach to the National Question, not just for the Russian Revolution but for the international revolution as a whole: “Whatever may be the further destiny of the Soviet Union … the national policy of Lenin will find its place among the eternal treasures of mankind” [Volume Three, Chapter Two ¹⁶].

Trotsky also explains why having a correct policy on this issue was of particular importance to the Bolsheviks: “Russia was formed not as a national state, but as a state made up of nationalities. This corresponded to its belated character. On a foundation of extensive agriculture and home industry, commercial capital developed not deeply, not by transforming production, but broadly, by increasing the radius of its operation. ... To the seventy million Great Russians … there were gradually added about ninety million ‘outlanders’ … sharply divided into two groups: the western peoples excelling Russia in their culture, and the eastern standing on a lower level. The vast numbers of these nationalities deprived of rights, and the sharpness of their deprivation, gave to the national problem in Russia a gigantic explosive force” [Volume Three, Chapter Two ¹⁶].

He adds that this amalgam of nationalities meant that a bourgeois revolution in Russia, instead of forging national unity as in countries like Italy and Germany, would tend to pull the different nationalities apart: “Lenin early learned the inevitability of this development of centrifugal national movements in Russia, and for many years stubbornly fought … for that famous paragraph 9 of the old party programme which formulated the right of nations to self-determination – that is, to complete separation as states.  Only in this way could the Russian proletariat gradually win the confidence of the oppressed nationalities” [Volume Three, Chapter Two ¹⁶].

However, and as an important corollary to Lenin’s approach, Trotsky adds: “but that was only one side of the matter.  Within the framework of the party, and of the workers’ organisations in general, Bolshevism insisted upon a rigid centralism, implacably warring against every taint of nationalism which might set the workers one against each other or disunite them.  Thus it flatly rejected the national-federation principle of building a party. A revolutionary organisation is not the prototype of the future state, but merely the instrument for its creation.  Thus a centralised organisation can guarantee the success of a revolutionary struggle – even where the task is to destroy the centralised oppression of nationalities” [Volume Three, Chapter Two ¹⁶].

Trotsky explains that with their policy of supporting the right of nationalities to form separate nation states if that was their desire, “the Bolsheviks were accused of aspiring towards the dismemberment of Russia, but [their] bold revolutionary formulation of the national problem won for the Bolshevik party the indestructible confidence of the … oppressed peoples of czarist Russia” [Volume Three, Chapter Two ¹⁶].

In short, what Lenin understood was that any attempt to impose a centralised workers’ state over the heads of the oppressed nationalities would drive them into the hands of reactionary bourgeois nationalists and away from the socialist revolution. On the other hand, the best way to convince them to unite together in a voluntary socialist federation was to inscribe the right to self-determination on the banner of Bolshevism.

Permanent Revolution

Unfortunately, before Lenin’s arrival from exile in April, the Bolshevik leaders adopted as confused a position on the national question as they did on other issues. In March, Stalin tried to equate the extent of national oppression with the strength of the feudal aristocracy. By implication, Stalin was effectively – and erroneously – arguing that the bourgeois politicians given power after the February Revolution were going to guarantee freedom to the oppressed nationalities!

But, just as it had demonstrated in all other aspects of its policies, the February regime’s dependence on the capitalists, not least foreign capital, ensured it continued to hold on to the old sources of power and wealth that had given the Great Russian bourgeoisie its dominance in the first place.

As Trotsky, drawing on his theory of permanent revolution, explains: “In the national sphere also, the uprooting of mediaeval remnants falls to the lot of the proletariat.  In order to achieve liberation and a cultural lift, the oppressed nationalities were compelled to link their fate with that of the working class. And for this they had to free themselves from the leadership of their own bourgeois and petty bourgeois parties – they had to make a long spurt forward, that is, on the road of historic development” [Volume Three, Chapter Two ¹⁶].

Trotsky adds: “Whereas in the nineteenth century the fundamental problem of wars and revolutions was still to guarantee a national market to the productive forces, the problem of our century is to free the productive forces from the national boundaries which have become iron fetters upon them. In the broad historic sense the national revolutions of the East are only stages of the world revolution of the proletariat, just as the national movements of Russia became stepping stones to Soviet [rule].” [Volume Three, Chapter Two ¹⁶].

“This appraisal … does not by any means imply, however, that the bourgeoisie of the colonial and semi-colonial nations have a revolutionary mission. On the contrary, this bourgeoisie of backward countries … grows up as an agentry of foreign capital and, notwithstanding its envious hatred of foreign capital … will in every decisive situation turn up in the same camp with it” [Volume Three, Chapter Two ¹⁶].

Unfortunately, Stalin’s failure to grasp this analysis was to lead to the bloody defeat of the Chinese revolution of 1925-7 where he backed the bourgeois Kuomintang, right up to their massacre of the Shanghai proletariat in April 1927.

The overthrow of the Tsar did not, therefore, lead the way to the national revolution of the oppressed nationalities. Instead, the government dismissed any suggestion that individual nations might be allowed to separate as being the work of the Austro-German enemy.

Some of the most outrageous laws against individual nationalities, notably the Jews, were annulled, establishing a formal equality for all citizens, regardless of nationality. But the Ukrainians and Finns didn’t want ‘equality’, they wanted independence. Legal ‘equality’ also meant little to the peoples of Central Asia held down by economic backwardness.

The language of the possessing classes remained the Russian state language. The oppressed nationalities knew that the same national rule would dominate any future Constituent Assembly. They knew their own cultural development, their own schools, their own courts and officials would still be denied them.

Finland

Finland became the first thorn in the flesh of the February regime. The rural population had looked to the workers from the outset and gave the Finnish social-democrats a clear majority of seats in elections to their parliament or ‘Seim’. With 103 seats out of 200, in June they declared the Seim a sovereign power and appealed to their ‘comrade party of Russia’ for support. But the Compromisers sent Cheidze to try and dissuade the Finnish socialists. Without success, the ‘socialist’ ministers in Petrograd announced they would dissolve the government in Helsingfors by force. So much for ‘democracy’ !

A regional congress of soviets held early in September offered military assistance to defend the Finnish government. But the Finnish compromisers, in turn, were not prepared to turn to insurrection to defend their positions. Instead, new elections were called which, under the threat of dissolution, gave a majority to the bourgeois parties who had been prepared to support such an overthrow.

But, as the revolutionary flood grew higher in Petrograd, it was the bourgeoisie themselves that decided separation from Russian ‘anarchy’ might be the safest course of action. On October 23rd, just before the revolution, Kerensky granted the independence of Finland ‘in principle’, except for military and foreign policy.

After the October Revolution, on 31 December 1917, in line with Lenin’s principled position, the new Soviet government recognised Finland’s independence.

Ukraine

The second, but much bigger thorn, was the Ukraine. In June, their parliament or ‘Rada’ had also declared for effective independence. The Kadets denounced the Ukrainian leaders as German agents. The Compromisers tried to compromise. But, after the July days, they veered to the right and went back on their word. The Russian bourgeoisie could get by with the loss of Finland, but not the loss of Ukraine’s grain, coal and ores.

But the Ukrainian leaders, although having a very similar political outlook to Kerensky and Co., felt confident enough to resist the threats from their ‘brothers’ in Petrograd. The relative economic backwardness of the Ukraine provided their petty bourgeois leaders with a greater stability. The workers’ movement was less developed and the Bolsheviks still lacking in both numbers and skilled cadres. The bourgeoisie and its officials, lawyers and journalists were largely Russian and seen as ‘foreigners’, particularly by the Ukrainian speakers living outside the Russified cities.

Trotsky summarises the situation as follows: “Although hostilely disposed to the Russian Compromisers, along the line of … national aspiration, these borderland Compromisers belonged to the same fundamental type … [and] tried like their Great Russian namesakes to confine the revolution within the framework of the bourgeois regime. But the extreme weakness of the native bourgeois here compelled the Mensheviks and Social Revolutionaries, instead of entering a coalition, to take the state power into their own hands.  [They] also had the great advantage of being able to appear before the army and country as opponents of the coalitional Provisional Government. All this was sufficient, if not to create different destinies for the Russian Compromisers and those of the borderlands, at least to give a different tempo to their rise and fall” [Volume Three, Chapter Two ¹⁶].

Trotsky also comments that as the October Revolution was taking place, an all-Ukrainian soldier congress was meeting. It resolved to oppose the transfer of power to the Ukrainian Soviet but nevertheless voted to prevent troops being sent to put down the Petrograd insurrection. “This equivocation which perfectly characterises the petty bourgeois stage of the national  struggle, facilitated that revolution of the proletariat which intended to put an end to all equivocations” [Volume Three, Chapter Two ¹⁶].

Later, in 1922, following the Civil War, Ukraine became one of the founding republics of the Soviet Union, bearing out Lenin’s sensitive approach to the National Question. However, following the Stalinist degeneration of the Soviet Union, Ukrainian cultural and language rights were again rolled back and the imposition of ‘forced collectivisation’ led to widespread famine. Trotsky’s Left Opposition gained a strong base of support in Ukraine, before being crushed by Stalinist purges.

The city and the villages

The resentment shown by the poor rural population towards the privileged city-folk, speaking a different language to theirs, was an important factor in Georgia and the Baltic states, as well as in the Ukraine: “This difference in nationality between the cities and the villages was painfully felt also in the soviets … predominantly city organisations. Under the leadership of the compromise parties the soviets would frequently ignore the national interests of the basic population. Under a false banner of internationalism the soviets would frequently wage a struggle against the defensive nationalism of the Ukrainians or Muslims, supplying a screen for the oppressive Russifying movement of the cities. A little time after, under the rule of the Bolsheviks, the soviets of these borderlands began to speak the language of the villages” [Volume Three, Chapter Two ¹⁶].

The peoples of the most economically backward areas like Central Asia had neither a national bourgeoisie nor a national proletariat to look to for leadership. The best of the young left intelligentsia nevertheless started to find their way towards the Bolsheviks. Only in some of the poorest areas, largely Muslim, did leadership fall into the hands of the clergy or feudal gentry. In these areas, the national struggle was often not so much about achieving self-administration but simply about having their own teachers, or even alphabet. The colonising landlords and wealthy Russian peasants who held the best land furiously defended ‘the unity of Russia’ against the demands for separatism from the downtrodden Asiatic peoples.

Trotsky explains how,  along with the privileged upper layers of the local population, the exploiters tried to head off the movement by assuring the masses that a future Constituent Assembly would settle the issue: “This became the slogan of conservatism, of reaction, of special interest and privilege all over the country. To appeal to the Constituent Assembly meant to postpone and gain time. Postponement meant: assemble your forces and strangle the revolution” [Volume Three, Chapter Two ¹⁶].

From February to October

The national antagonisms created both opportunities and difficulties for the October revolution. They could be used by the opponents of Bolshevism as a way to turn the masses away from soviet rule, as, for example, was the case in Georgia. But, particularly when the national issues coincided with class issues – such as in White Russia (now Belarus) and the Baltic States (Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia) - these antagonisms could create favourable conditions for Bolshevism as well.

The Lettish (Latvian) population had long resented the largely German bourgeoisie of the cities like Riga. So, at the outbreak of war, many Lettish farm-workers and peasants volunteered for the front and became some of the best sharp-shooters in the army. Trotsky writes that “as early as May .... they had already come out for a Soviet government” [Volume Three, Chapter Two ¹⁶].

More generally, Trotsky notes that “in a famous article, ‘The Crisis Is Ripe,’ written toward the end of September, [Lenin] insistently pointed out that the National curia [voting blocs] of the Democratic Conference ‘had stood second in the matter of radicalism yielding only to the Trade Unions, and standing higher than the Soviet curia in its percentage of votes against the Coalition (40 out of 55).’ This meant that the oppressed peoples were no longer hoping for any benefit from the Great Russian bourgeoisie. They were more and more trying to get their rights by independent action and … revolutionary seizures [Volume Three, Chapter Two ¹⁶].