Global Learning
  • Home
  • Defenders of Cuban Socialism
    • UN Charter
    • Declaration of Human Rights
    • Bandung
    • New International Economic Order
    • Non-Aligned Movement
  • Substack editorial column
  • New Cold War articles
  • Friends of Socialist China articles
  • Global Research articles
  • Counterpunch articles
  • Cuba and the world-system
    • Table of Contents and chapter summaries
    • About the author
    • Endorsements
    • Obtaining your copy
  • Blog ¨The View from the South¨
    • Blog Index
    • Posts in reverse chronological order
  • The Voice of Third World Leaders
    • Asia >
      • Ho Chi Minh
      • Xi Jinping, President of China
    • Africa >
      • Kwame Nkrumah
      • Julius Nyerere
    • Latin America >
      • Fidel Castro
      • Hugo Chávez
      • Raúl Castro >
        • 55th anniversary speech, January 1, 1914
        • Opening Speech, CELAC
        • Address at G-77, June 15, 2014
        • Address to National Assembly, July 5, 2014
        • Address to National Assembly, December 20, 2014
        • Speech on Venezuela at ALBA, 3-17-2015
        • Declaration of December 18, 2015 on USA-Cuba relations
        • Speech at ALBA, March 5, 2018
      • Miguel Díaz-Canel >
        • UN address, September 26, 2018
        • 100th annivesary, CP of China
      • Evo Morales >
        • About Evo Morales
        • Address to G-77 plus China, January 8, 2014
        • Address to UN General Assembly, September 24, 2014
      • Rafael Correa >
        • About Rafael Correa
        • Speech at CELAC 1/29/2015
        • Speech at Summit of the Americas 2015
      • Nicolás Maduro
      • Cristina Fernández
      • Cuban Ministry of Foreign Relations >
        • Statement at re-opening of Cuban Embassy in USA, June 20, 2015
        • The visit of Barack Obama to Cuba
        • Declaration on parliamentary coup in Brazil, August 31, 2016
        • Declaration of the Revolutionary Government of Cuba on Venezuela, April 13, 2019
      • ALBA >
        • Declaration of ALBA Political Council, May 21, 2019
        • Declaration on Venezuela, March 17, 2015
        • Declaration on Venezuela, April 10, 2017
      • Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) >
        • Havana Declaration 2014
        • Declaration on Venezuela, March 26
    • Martin Luther King, Jr.
    • International >
      • Peoples’ Summit 2015
      • The Group of 77 >
        • Declaration on a New World Order 2014
        • Declaration on Venezuela 3/26/2015
      • BRICS
      • Non-Aligned Movement
  • Readings
    • Charles McKelvey, Cuba in Global Context
    • Piero Gleijeses, Cuba and Africa
    • Charles McKelvey, Chávez and the Revolution in Venezuela
    • Charles McKelvey, The unfinished agenda of race in USA
    • Charles McKelvey, Marxist-Leninist-Fidelist-Chavist Revolutionary
  • Recommended Books
  • Contact

Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Recommended books on Amazon.com; click on image of book to connect

The revolutionary party of the vanguard

1/25/2014

0 Comments

 
     In calling the proletariat to the vanguard of the revolution, the formulators of classical Marxism were using the term “vanguard” in a broad sense.  But they also used the term in a more strict sense, as composed of persons who possess exceptional leadership qualities, who lead, exhort, and educate the workers during the revolutionary process.

     The vanguard in this more strict sense was expressed by Trotsky when he wrote:  “The proletariat can become imbued with the confidence necessary for a governmental overthrow only if . . . it feels above it a farsighted, firm, and confident leadership.  This brings us to the last premise—by no means the last in importance—of the conquest of power: the revolutionary party as a tightly welded and tempered vanguard of the class” (Trotsky 2008:745-46).

     The taking of power occurs as a single historic event, such as the insurrection of October 25 and the assumption of power by the Congress of Soviets on October 26.  But the revolution is a continuing process, involving the development of the revolutionary project and the protection of the revolution against counterrevolutionary attacks, which assume a variety of forms.  In Trotsky’s conception, the revolutionary party, as the vanguard of the revolutionary class, has an important role to play in this on-going revolutionary process: formulating a clear direction that can provide the basis for unity and that can give the revolutionary class confidence that it can overcome all challenges and obstacles.

     The revolutionary party seeks to formulate its own political, intellectual, and moral perspective that is different from and opposed to bourgeois assumptions and opinions and is based on the thoughts and desires of the revolutionary class.  “Lenin taught the party to create its own social opinion, resting upon the thoughts and feelings of the rising class.  Thus by a process of selection and education, and in continual struggle, the Bolshevik Party created not only a political but a moral medium of its own, independent of bourgeois social opinion and implacably opposed to it” (Trotsky 2008:739).

    The Bolshevik Party of Lenin and Trotsky functioned as a revolutionary vanguard party from the end of April 1917 until it was undermined by bureaucratization and by a petty bourgeois counterrevolution, the signs of which were evident by 1924, according to the Ted Grant (1997).  There are other important examples of revolutionary parties that defined direction, unified the people, and inspired hope and confidence: the Chinese Communist Party under Mao Zedong, the Vietnam Workers’ Party under the leadership of Ho Chi Minh; and the Cuban Communist Party under the leadership of Fidel Castro.  These cases represent the most enduring and significant revolutions of the twentieth century, indicating the importance of the development of a revolutionary party that functions as a vanguard in the strict sense. 

       In my experiences in Cuba, I have found that there is a clear difference between the vanguard and the people, not with respect to privileges or material conditions, but in relation to understanding.  The members of the vanguard, which consists of perhaps 25% of the population, have an informed global and historical understanding of national and international dynamics, and they are committed to revolutionary values.  Most are members of the Party, but not all are; many have developed leadership qualities through the assuming of leadership roles in the various mass organizations of workers, farmers, students, women, and neighborhoods at the national, provincial, and local levels.  The vanguard has been formed through fifty-four years of revolution, and its formation is a significant achievement of the revolution. 

     The majority of people, on the other hand, tend to think much more concretely, concerned with issues such as the price of food or the quality of public transportation.  They have less of a grasp of national and international issues, although there is a general orientation of support for and appreciation of the revolution and its leaders.

      In light of this distinction between the vanguard and the people, it makes sense to speak of the necessity in the revolutionary process for a vanguard party that explains to the people, reminding them of fundamental facts and values, and that plays a leadership role in the revolutionary process.  The vanguard cannot lead, of course, without the support of the people, so the vanguard must be part of the people and must understand their concerns and needs, as the Cuban revolutionary leadership understands.

       Revolutionary processes lift up charismatic leaders, and there is an intimate relation between the charismatic leader and the vanguard.  The vanguard is formed by the charismatic leader, and as it develops, it seeks to become the institutionalization of charismatic authority, so that when the charismatic leader is no longer present, the vanguard is able to lead with legitimate authority, basing its decisions on the teachings of the charismatic leader. 

       As we reflect on the possibilities for popular revolution in the countries of the North, one of the issues that we must address is the question of how to form a vanguard, a sector of the people that has an informed understanding of fundamental historical and social facts and a commitment to universal human values; a vanguard that would be able to educate the people concerning the concrete steps that must be taken to advance toward a more just, democratic, and sustainable world; a vanguard that earns the respect of the people through its example and through its capacity to respectfully explain understandings that are alternatives to the ideological distortions that the people have internalized.  As I have indicated in previous posts, an important dimension of this process is encounter with the revolutionary movements formed by the Third World, which offer critical analyses of the world-system from below.


References

Grant, Ted.  1997.  Rusia—De la revolución a la contrarrevolución: Un análisis marxista.  Prólogo de Alan Woods.  Traducción de Jordi Martorell.  Madrid: Fundación Federico Engels.  [Originally published in English as: RUSSIA—From Revolution to Counterrevolution].

Trotsky, Leon.  2008.  History of the Russian Revolution.  Translated by Max Eastman.  Chicago: Haymarket Books.


Key words: Third World, revolution, colonialism, neocolonialism, imperialism, democracy, national liberation, sovereignty, self-determination, socialism, Marxism, Leninism, Cuba, Latin America, world-system, world-economy, development, underdevelopment, colonial, neocolonial, blog Third World perspective, Russian Revolution, Lenin, Trotsky, vanguard
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Author: Charles McKelvey

    Retired professor, writer,  and Marxist-Leninist-Fidelist-Chavist revolutionary

    Categories

    All
    American Revolution
    Blog Index
    Bolivia
    Charismatic Leaders
    China
    Critique Of The Left
    Cuban History
    Cuba Today
    Ecuador
    Environment
    French Revolution
    Gay Rights
    Haitian Revolution
    Knowledge
    Latin American History
    Latin American Right
    Latin American Unity
    Marx
    Marxism-Leninism
    Mexican Revolution
    Miscellaneous
    Neocolonialism
    Neoliberalism
    Nicaragua
    North-South Cooperation
    Presidential Elections 2016
    Press
    Public Debate In USA
    Race
    Religion And Revolution
    Revolution
    Russian Revolution
    South-South Cooperation
    Third World
    Trump
    US Ascent
    US Imperialism
    Vanguard
    Venezuela
    Vietnam
    Wallerstein
    Women And Revolution
    World History
    World-System
    World-System Crisis

    Archives

    August 2019
    July 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    December 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    January 2013

    RSS Feed

    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture

More Ads


website by Sierra Creation