Translated by D. Klimenko

It is no secret that almost every person who has become sympathetic towards leftist ideas at some point starts thinking about doing something practical, something that will almost immediately have a revolutionary effect.

It should be explained to such a person that everything they suggest to do, everything they come up with has already been done many times. Leafleting and entryism, direct action activism and unionization, participating in elections and organizing consumer cooperatives, establishing countless parties and organizing educational circles, making YouTube videos and going on hunger strikes, adhering to the theory of small deeds and awaiting for a revolutionary situation, adopting the ideas of the Frankfurt School, «Cheguevarism», «Maoism», «Marighellism» and «Zapatism», and, of course, the protests, pickets, processions, human chains, strikes, petitions, appeals, resolutions, manifestos, associations, divisions, alliances and secret societies. There were even idiots in the Russian left movement who blew up monuments and planted bombs in law enforcement offices. All of this has been done before, and something even relatively successfully exists to this day.

There is nothing with which a newcomer could enrich the practice of the left movement. Everything has already been coined and tried out before you, dear neophytes.

There are quite a few people among the left who are ready to do something, to help somehow. However, all this activity has nothing to do with a communist one.

Usually, a reflection on the deplorable state of the left movement starts with noticing the lack of connection with the masses. This is expressed by an assertion that Marxism and Marxist organizations are unpopular among proletarians.

“You are unpopular, ordinary people do not know about you — that is the main problem”, say people who have just been introduced to the left movement. But it is fundamentally wrong to put the question this way. We do not need to be popular. Popularity is of no help to the cause. Populists and demagogues are known if not to the majority, then to a greater number of people than, for example, all the left non-parliamentary parties put together. So what?

And even if we are not speaking about recognition per se, but about influence on people, the point remains the same. There is no organization that influences our compatriots more than the bourgeoisie. This is an objective fact.

The KPRF (1) is known and influential not because of its ability to win over the masses, but because it historically managed to worm its way into parliament and become a natural political support for the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie from the left. It is impossible to take its place due to the irreversibility of history.

The average person knows and respects those who are in power. At the moment, there is no and cannot be a party connection with the man in the street.

A strong authoritative party is required first, then — the political class organized by it, and only after that the influence of this class on the broad masses. The masses, the millions come into motion spontaneously. The question is whether the means will be found to win them over, to win their confidence so that they appoint communists as their leaders.

In a word, today our problem is neither popularity nor recognition. The average contingent whose recognition the KPRF can boast of is unable to do anything for the communist revolution at the moment.

Quality over quantity.

Those who got interested in the left idea on their own are able to find both the KPRF website and the works of the classics of Marxism-Leninism with no problem. It is also no problem for them to find those who call themselves Marxists, our newspaper included. Some grumble that people, having got caught in all that winding leftist political junk, do not reach our newspaper and Proriv journal. Alas, practice shows that those people lack consistency and persistence, and at the moment they are not suitable for cadre forging. This way we lose extras, for sure, but the real work of turning sympathizers into supporters and supporters into Marxists does not suffer from it.

So, all serious and even semi-serious leftists are definitely aware of both Proriv and our newspaper. Our level of «popularity» is quite objective and reflects the potential of an interested in Marxism audience for turning it into Marxists and revolutionaries. And it is a delicate, individual work.

It is necessary to accept the fact that decisive fights are still a distant prospect. For now, it’s all about preparing the organizational core, that’s why each man is worth their weight in gold, and random popularity is worth nothing.

One man today will educate dozens tomorrow. The day after tomorrow they will build an agent network of hundreds. These hundreds will rally around them tens of thousands who, sooner or later, will lead millions.

Connection with the masses via the Internet solves lots of tedious practical problems that faced the revolutionaries of the past. To reiterate, nowadays, every person interested in communism can easily find our newspaper and start the process of self-education, that is, of growing their political consciousness. Neophytes are often vexed at the fact that such people are few today. While this is true, there are still significantly more of them than there were ten years ago. And tomorrow there will be even more. But in order to offer them ready-made food for thought, it is necessary, among other things, to develop Marxism, persistently conduct propaganda and train propagandists, agitators and organizers.

For example, Valery Alekseevich Podguzov between 1995 and 2002 (2) published several large brochures that essentially became Proriv’s program. Almost every key Marxist category is developed in these brochures. We know that even our readers have not yet fully appreciated that almost everything we write is somewhat a repetition of one man’s groundwork. It was this theoretical foundation that allowed to expand the work of the journal, put forward the theory of scientific centralism, correctly identify the reasons that led to restoration of capitalism in the USSR and decay of the CPSU and resolve some other issues.

Sooner or later we, Prorivists, will give an exact blueprint of communist construction, a popular and complete exposition of diamatics, an up-to-date program of the struggle for working class political power in Russia and the world, that is, we will carve out a projectile of the necessary caliber. And it is only on this theoretical basis that the communist movement can make productive progress towards victory.

We do not insist upon adhering to the theoretical propositions that we have worked out, but we call for an active independent intellectual work. The main point is not to agree with us formally, but to sincerely, selflessly and self-critically seek for objective truth, to come independently to an understanding of our position, to refine and develop it.

Our opponents are after the numbers of formal supporters, they want to gain mass as quickly as possible. Whereas we, as an entrance exam, accept only elaborating on the fundamental Marxist issues in the form of preparing notes, articles and abstracts, which will be presented to the readers after approval.

We are vehemently against doing something just for the sake of doing anything. Everyone has to get serious and make decisions based solely on diamatics. As long as history gives us precious time, we must, thoroughly, methodically and without haste, learn communism, form a strong Marxist organization and establish stable relations with the non-party masses.

Our goals

What are the goals and objectives of our organization? Our organization, so far, is a community of editors of the journal Proriv and the newspaper Prorivist, a community of those who are called Prorivists. Our goal is the establishment of communism throughout the world. Our immediate objective is to prepare Marxist cadres, on the basis of primarily self-directed work, up to the necessary qualitative and quantitative level for the establishment of the Party of Scientific Centralism.

What are the theoretical methods for their implementation, and what is already being done in practice? The only method of thought and action that we recognize is the dialectical method of materialism, or diamatics for short. The application of diamatics to the surrounding objective reality dictates the need for unfolding the theoretical form of the class struggle (a call for prioritizing theoretical work) in the form of freeing Marxism from opportunism and developing it, taking into account the former defeat of communism in Europe. This will serve as a mechanism for forging cadres for a future party of a new type. In practice, a socio-theoretical journal and an online newspaper with a daily supplement are published.

What exactly do we propose to do?

I. Get acquainted with the main works of the classics. Experience shows that the actual learning of Marxism occurs generally as follows. Usually, a person, having been interested in Marxism or communism, within a couple of years quietly gets acquainted with the main classics’ works. It looks like a simple or even relaxed reading of the works of Marx, Engels, Lenin and, less often, Stalin. The composition of articles and books may differ, but it almost never includes Capital as supposedly heavy work. After that, a person usually becomes a supporter of communism and in matters of social science trusts the basic, elementary truths of Marxism. If they are interested in potential political activity and some sort of propaganda practice, then at a certain point they move forward.

The second stage usually begins with the fact that a person turns to one of the classics’ works on a specific issue and is surprised to find that they did not understand anything in it on a previous read which results in a deeper understanding of the topic. Then this situation happens again and again. In this case, we can say that this person begins to understand at a surface level the individual provisions of Marxist science, while still repeating known truths in a complete mechanical and metaphysical manner.

Without practical propaganda work, and preferably in a literary form, further mastering of Marxism seems, generally speaking, extremely unlikely. In addition, propaganda must be based on a careful, now slow and thoughtful study, of primarily Capital, The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State, all the major works of Lenin and most of the works of Stalin from his 13-volume collected works. And constant search for answers on major, minor and smallest issues in the works of the classics as an essential requirement for propaganda practice, with obligatory resolution of an issue at least to a first approximation, will gradually create a stable system of relatively strong basic knowledge which will be already qualitatively different from a standard leftist hodgepodge. At the same time, this develops a good strong habit to consult the classics, the book, so to speak, on every small and subtle issue.

After two dozen of non-sloppy articles, after reaching an actual growth in quality of materials and in quantity of propagandized supporters, provided that a person continues in good faith their self-education, sooner or later there is a jump to the third stage. This already represents mature studying of the classics, when one re-reads a page ten times in order to understand to the smallest detail the thought of Marx, Engels, Lenin or Stalin in all its interrelations with their teaching as a whole. Studying with reference to several or many works of the classics, including Philosophical Notebooks.

Particularly important to study Science of Logic and turn to it whenever a methodological question arises. Hegel is in many ways a mystic, but a knowledgeable materialist will learn how to read through Hegel’s entanglements properly. Reading Hegel is useful not only by accustoming the reader to his very special abstractions and flexible thought movements. Hegel also serves as a kind of idealistic interlocutor, whose judgments allow one not to be blinkered, but to examine the existing layouts of facts, phenomena, processes, forces and other objects of study with a more vigilant eye.

At the fourth stage, we already may talk about a full-fledged scientific research, and not only about an interpretation of Marxism, however competent and even creative it may be, which is characteristic for the development of literary propaganda at the previous stage. At some point, when one writes another article and analyzes a serious and complex issue, using a lot of literature, primarily the works of the classics, they suddenly get closer to solving the issue, an understanding is groped, and, most importantly, this understanding corresponds to reality, facts and all socio-historical practice.

II. Get acquainted with Proriv’s development of Marxism, with the theory of scientific centralism.

III. Outline a plan for practical work. It should include: 1) constant self-education, 2) propaganda, 3) organizational work.

Continuous self-education

Among people who claim to know Marxism, a contest of sorts exists which boils down to compiling lists of literature for studying Marxist theory. The underlying idea is that there are more feasible works of the classics, from which alone one should start studying Marxism.

There is nothing more erroneous than, taking into account current mass literacy, trying to find those Marxist works which would not be difficult for studying, or at least would not be as difficult for studying as, say, the first volume of *Capital*. Marxism is a monolithic system of knowledge, as if cast from a single piece of high-strength Bolshevik steel, therefore each provision in each work of the genius classics requires the utmost exertion of one’s intellectual abilities.

The assimilation of Marxism is the result of great diligence shown in the process of careful studying, correlating the works of the classics of Marxism and studying concrete historical conditions in which certain provisions of Marxist theory and politics were put forward. Fortunately, in the collected works of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin, the substantiations for almost all the theses and principles set forth are expressed with utmost clarity, it is repeatedly pointed out which specific fundamental conclusions of Marxism underlie the worldview as a whole, and which particular conclusions are the result of a historical compromise or a specificity of the situation.

Therefore, no matter what the subjective goals set by those studying Marxism are, the objective task, dictated by the very essence of Marxism, is to learn to look at Marxism dialectically, that is, to see it as a holistic scientific worldview in its development, in its indissoluble unity between all its aspects and concrete historical circumstances.

Marxist science, roughly speaking, was created by the classics and is largely mothballed in their collected works. It must be known and understood as Newton’s laws of motion in their interconnection. And only this knowledge, as it is mastered, gives and increasingly expands one’s ability to work in a Marxist way, if, of course, at the same time they have a highly developed conscience.

Thus, the Prorivist slogan, which is the goal of the communist struggle at this stage in a nutshell, by itself gives a purpose for self-education — becoming a Marxist in order to earn the name of a communist.

What does it mean to be a Marxist and to work in a Marxist way from Proriv’s perspective?

“To be a Marxist means, at the very least: firstly, to master the dialectical method of thinking, i.e. becoming a dialectician; secondly, to apply this method consistently when studying, analyzing and synthesizing the facts of the production of society’s material conditions throughout history, bringing the research to a discovery or, at the very least, a deep understanding of objective economic laws, i.e. becoming a materialist; thirdly, to learn in practice to manage the struggle of the working class, being guided by the requirements of objective economic laws, i.e. becoming a revolutionary-in-practice.

Without mastering dialectical thinking, it is impossible to comprehend the meaning of life in its continuous dynamics, in all the variety of its forms of manifestation and development; it is impossible to influence the ongoing processes in any significant way, since the dialectical method, still misunderstood and underestimated by most people, is the only scientific method that allows to bring human thoughts and actions into full accordance with the objective laws of nature and society development.

At present, in order to become a communist, it is necessary to master not only Marxism, but Leninism as well.

Unlike Marxism, which had three sources of its origin, Leninism has two sources: theoretical and practical. The first one is Marxism itself, and the second one is the experience of both the Narodniks and the three Russian revolutions of the capitalist period, during which the hegemon was the proletariat that managed to independently find a new form of the dictatorship of the proletariat — Soviet power. Leninism is, to quote Stalin, Marxism developed by Lenin in relation to the era of imperialism and proletarian revolutions. Leninism is the first absolutely successful attempt to combine the revolutionary struggle of the proletarian masses with the highest achievements of human thought in the field of social science.

The next significant stage in the development of the communist worldview was Stalinism, which in turn is Marxism-Leninism of the era of the victorious building of communism in one single country, the collapse of the classical colonial slavery of bourgeois democracies and the spread of communism as a world social system.” (3)

“When a Marxist is looking for an answer to a question that has arisen, he must diligently, creatively, with no fear of fatigue work out an answer to it, mobilizing all the theoretical wealth which was created by Marxism as a whole and verified by the social practice of mankind development. That is, an answer to the question posed by history is given not by the mobilization of a dozen quotations drawn from Marxism, and even more so from “Marxism” as Novikov (4) subjectively understands it, but by the ability to draw a modern conclusion on the basis of the existing holistic theory and social practice which, as a rule, in its content gradually goes beyond the framework of an already existing theory and requires from communists no longer a quotation, but a creative theoretical and practical approach to the analysis of new, actual practice.” (5)

Lunacharsky, in our opinion, quite accurately called Marxism the highest level of cognition:

“Marxism is not only a theory of society in its true scientific version, it is the highest level of cognition. Marx and Engels had found the fundamental method of human thinking which coincides with the objective laws of development — the dialectical method. And the bourgeoisie, in overturning and rejecting Marxism, had to reject both its basis — the materialist worldview, and its method — the dialectical method. Instead of fertilizing the natural sciences with the achievements in the field of social science, laying a materialistic foundation under the exact and biological sciences, the bourgeoisie, by hostile suppression of Marxism and slander against it, led to the fact that the natural and biological sciences remained unbound by Marxist methodology, turned out to be insufficiently based on an objective materialistic view.”

What does it mean to be a communist from Proriv’s perspective?

“Firstly, a person who calls himself a Marxsist must, regardless of fatigue, study all that knowledge which made Lenin and Stalin victorious communists. Otherwise, don’t be quick to name yourself a communist which requires, first of all, the mastery of science. At the very least, let your comrades call you a Marxist, if they are sure of it.

Secondly, every person who recognizes themselves as a Marxist must have under their belt opportunists exposed in the theoretical form of the class struggle, as well as scientific, propaganda and agitation works published in one form or another. If this is not the case, learn to defeat or re-educate opportunists, learn to write yourself, and don’t be quick to teach others.

Thirdly, every person who is recognized as a Marxist among his comrades-in-arms must organize, offline or online, the training of candidates for the title of communist. If you can’t do that, then learn to teach, so that eventually you would be turned to as a teacher.

Fourth, every Marxist must be able to work in a team and with a team, to organize people to achieve strategic goals. If you can’t, learn from those who already do it successfully. Do not compete, but selflessly help them, learning in the process.

Fifth, never think about a career, fame, gratitude or material gain. All this makes becoming a Marxist impossible. If all this frippery, born out of stupidity and envy, occupies you, dear reader, evokes more than indifference in you, know that you have nothing to do with Marxism yet, regardless of what you have read and written.

If you will work for communism, artlessly, sparing no effort, overcoming fatigue, you will get what only vain, shallow and greedy people dream of — fame and wide recognition, along with all that comes with them: huge responsibility, hatred, envy, lies, intrigues of outright enemies and competitors who «adore» you.

Today, however, all those call themselves communists who trail behind the proletarian movement and are only capable of assenting to the leaders of the trade union-strike form of resistance to the capitalist dictatorship. The struggle for communism has been sacrificed by the modern left to helpless babble about the need to help the proletariat in its Sisyphean struggle for the ‘Muddy Penny’ (6)” (7).

Strictly speaking, mastering Marxism is impossible without self-education.

Many people who sympathize with communism genuinely wish to understand the surrounding situation and current events. They follow the news, complain about the weakness of the communist movement, criticize capitalism and its specific manifestations. However, being aware of individual events, accusatory agitation and propaganda, and even oratorical skills can only push one’s thoughts in a certain direction. In order to actually objectively understand the essence of the situation, the nature of capitalism and the regime, and the path of the communist struggle, it is necessary to study the theory of Marxism, thoroughly and independently.

Anyone who wishes to understand the socio-political reality must at least study the capitalist system, its entire economic structure, the identity of the opposites of base and superstructure, the connection between economy and ideology, understand the internal contradictions of capitalism and, finally, comprehend the mechanics of those forces that, emerging in its depths, will ultimately destroy it.

As practice shows, successful self-education is absolutely impossible without a certain orientation of thought, an orientation towards the search for truth about a certain initial range of issues. The content of any Marxist work for its successful assimilation must be somehow connected with the thoughts of a person, with their need to expand the pool of knowledge, their life experience. Otherwise, the venture is 99% doomed to failure. However, one should not forget that the modern average level of culture, the quality of public consciousness, has all the right ingredients to form, even spontaneously, the corresponding factors of the identified needs in the life of the majority of physically mature individuals. For this reason, by the way, there can be such a thing as a nine-year-old composer or chess player, but there cannot be a nine-year-old Marxist.

As a rule, this need is formed by a certain set of interests which is inherent to an individual, at first glance, by sheer coincidence. Quantitative and qualitative diversity of this complex of interests acts in the form of a healthy human curiosity and is very helpful for self-education and fruitful development of an individual as a whole. In this case, it remains to raise this healthy curiosity to a scientific level, and an unflagging interest in the search for objective truths is guaranteed.

Less often, the need for self-education comes from a mature and conscious attitude towards life. The concept of consciousness, awareness is not limited to how scientific one’s worldview is, but it also includes how thoughtful and logically consistent one’s views are. This kind of holistic worldview is usually associated with worldly wisdom. It is not necessarily scientific, but it has the potential for scientific education, including Marxist education. At the same time, wise with life experience people tend to preserve their views, to reject the new, while naturally losing the ability for productive practice, both professional and in everyday life. If there is still a desire for developing one’s views, for rethinking one’s position, then the indicated tendency towards self-education is bound to manifest itself.

In addition, if a given topic coincides with one’s interests, it requires less willpower from a person to focus on it. Oftentimes, however, interests, having arisen almost accidentally, present more of a familiar field of knowledge than the subject of particular intellectual concerns. An interest may be helpful only at the initial stage of self-education; later, as the horizon of knowledge expands, as diamatical methodology is being mastered, the power of the mind increases, which allows one to focus on the studied subject for a long period of time. With time, perseverance, thoroughness and diligence gradually become a habit for scientific and theoretical work.

Diamatics will have to complete the process of filling consciousness with concrete absolute truths, spontaneously initiated by mathematics and physics, thus saving mankind, first of all, from mysticism, the so-called trial and error method, and the Russian “somehow” which in the 20th century was pretentiously named “risk theory”. Diamatics, after being liberated by the revolutionary process of building communism, will gradually become the only unquestionable method for the formation of an absolutely adequate individual and social consciousness.

Today, in the specific case of communist self-education we must have an example of just such a formation of consciousness, its fulfillment with positive content and gradual displacement of fallacies in it. It would be appropriate to say that this process enriches life with both satisfaction and pleasure. Here is the conclusion on the topic that Valery Alekseevich Podguzov makes:

“Naturally, the first algorithmic step of any brilliant thinking is the assimilation of the diamatical axiom: matter is primary, consciousness is secondary. But even this truth is absolute only within the limits of the basic question of philosophy. Beyond its borders, living diamatics begins, which is that all human activity in the material world is preceded by a mental act of will, the highest form of which is the consciousness of varying degrees of adequacy. Therefore, depending on the level of development of consciousness, in the same historical context, some individuals experience tragedies, while others prosper. The most developed of them prosper at the level of happiness, and actually brilliant — at the level of pleasure and permanent bliss.

Many of my contemporaries, but not all, will argue that permanent bliss is impossible, especially for everyone, since some acknowledged geniuses ended their days at the stakes of the Inquisition. But this only means that many of my peers are so exhausted by the free market that they no longer fly in their dreams, but run away from tax inspectors, debt collectors and hired killers in them. Moreover, with the modern social system, bliss and enjoyment of life are not available to anyone: neither the Nobel Prize winner, nor the oligarch, nor his wife, nor the Pope. Few people today will understand Marx’s words that happiness is a struggle.

The tragic existence of the majority of the world population over the millennia is largely driven by the fact that the mass public consciousness was being shaped by constant exposure of individuals, at first, to idiotic fairy tales for children, later — to idiotic fairy tales for adults (that were made into the «laws» of God), economic, nationalistic and racial theories and the novels of bourgeois writers.

But, by the mid-20th century, with the strengthening of the USSR and respective collapse of the European world colonial system, the literacy rate in many countries in Asia, Africa and even the United States increased significantly compared to Russia in 1917, when its proletarian masses were perceiving Marxism in the trenches of the First World War only by ear, only in the form of slogans, and only on faith.

Therefore, in modern conditions, the proletarians (especially those of mental labor) have high chances at understanding, should they so desire, the logical constructions of Hegel, even more so Marx, Lenin and Stalin, on their own, without shepherds and prophets. This desire will be increasing the faster, the more the church and the liberal government will be reducing the opportunistic and collaborationist humanities and social sciences faculties. Due to budget cuts and commercialisation in higher education, there are less and less humanities teachers in Russia, despite the pro-government or shallow content of their lectures. As a result, in the not-so-distant future, not only among the proletarians, but among the students as well, Marxist propagandists (should they, indeed, prepare themselves) will have virtually no competitors. With a proper creative attitude towards self-education and propaganda, modern creative Marxists, united in the Party of Scientific Centralism, can establish the only center of scientific social science knowledge with which no theological or official liberal professors, due to their bias, dogmatism, speculation and tailism, will be able to compete.” (8)

Krupskaya, being the largest Marxist theoretician and practitioner of education, wrote that nothing gives such pleasure to a person as the ability to link the new with the old, to encounter a new phenomenon that boldly violates established ideas and uncover its mystery.

There’s nothing more foolish than reading quickly, in the sense of “devouring” books. This kind of “self-education” is a waste of time. In the process of studying fundamental scientific literature, Lenin’s brilliant formula “Better fewer, but better” holds absolute power.

There is a ridiculous disregard for mental work that has long been rooted in the public mind. It is generally recognized that in order to develop a relatively tolerable skill in, say, classical dancing, a person needs years of exhausting daily training. Just to learn how to perform at least one arabesque tolerably in terms of expressiveness and technique, both a strong general choreographic training and thousands of repetitions of the pose itself are necessary. In order to become, say, a decent locksmith, you will have to successfully “wield” a metalworking tool for a couple of years. However, at the same time, such mental work as mastering Marxism is imagined by the vast majority of people as a cakewalk: you read Capital once and voila — you are a Marxist. The same goes for organizing propaganda work: just sit down, write an article about this-and-that, without re-reading, without thinking, without weighing every word, without checking every thought with the classics, and you’re golden. It is not surprising that such frivolity leads to continuous failures and disappointments, including due to high expectations from a single reading of the classics and the first results after releasing propaganda materials.

One should keep in mind that between reading a Marxist work and its understanding, assimilation, lies the process of repeated re-reading and referring to the text, the process of comparison, reflection and study. The brilliant works by Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin are so capacious that even on the twentieth read one still discovers something new, previously unnoticed and unaccounted for. The thing is that the heuristic power of a truly Marxist text lies not only in the theoretical depth of the narrative itself, but also in how certain thoughts and provisions are interconnecting in the reader’s mind due to operating Marxism as a consistent holistic system. In other words, as a person grows as a Marxist, previously read works are re-discovered with a certain new depth and freshness, the course of the author’s thoughts and the objective factors reflected in it become more and more clear.

The most effective ways to internalize the works of the classics are the following. The first, is to think through the author’s reasoning, to think whether it is possible to talk about the subject in some other way. The second, is to retell the provisions of the work to another person, be it for the purposes of exchanging impressions or introducing someone to Marxism. The third and final one, is to process the Marxist position into an independent note or article, that is, to write down what was read and understood, make it into an abstract.

We know how the classics themselves worked with literature: they made extracts, compiled notes, formulated critical remarks. Krupskaya, for example, recommends compiling notebooks with concise, explicit illustrative notes that reflect the theses of the work and what you need and want to remember.

However, to assimilate a work does not always mean to fully master the system of objective truths presented in it. The fact is that personal observations, life experience and in particular the experience of operating the knowledge also play an important role in the development of scientific and theoretical mind. As mentioned above, without using Marxism in practice, including in research work, professional activity and even personal life, it is, as a matter of fact, impossible to fully master it. Therefore, the refined reading of the classics, which is typical of some intellectuals, reading for the sake of reading, reading for the sake of admiring oneself for being a highbrow, has nothing to do with Marxist self-education and the communist movement.

That is why it is extremely important that a person engaged in self-education should try to apply and verify the acquired knowledge through personal observation and work.

The pace of self-education varies within the limits of what’s possible under objective conditions. Today the situation is such that the sedateness of the educational process, the maximum emphasis on quality, not speed, plays a decisive role. The hecticness often preached by the hotheads does only harm today. Today we need bookishness, not a “r-revolutionary” farce.

It is by activating the process of self-education, promoting the spirit of self-teaching and self-education among the Proriv supporters, could be achieved that necessary state which is conducive to solving the most important strategic task: «to complete the creation and mass understanding of a full-fledged theory of building communism on the basis of objective preconditions born by the development of modern productive forces».

However, it does not follow from what has been said that a person cannot take one step within the communist movement until they become a strong Marxist. On the contrary, becoming a Marxist means being of use right now, doing practical work both in the propaganda field and providing the necessary technical assistance. It is only through practical work that theoretical growth can really be achieved.

Conducting propaganda

There are several ways of conducting propaganda. It is best if a person joins the writing team of our newspaper. However, if they are experienced in organizational work, then, naturally, they can independently set up a publication: a theoretical leaflet or a newspaper. The main thing is that propaganda must be strictly scientific and strictly partisan.

Propaganda should also be oral. But it should be based not on imposing opinions on others, but either on their interest, or on the professional, life, scientific credibility of the propagandist.

Organizational work

In organizational work we must mainly focus on strengthening our publications — the journal and newspaper — by searching for and rallying like-minded people, providing financial and other support, especially in spreading our position. It is necessary to gather supporters around a printed organ, and not, as the leftists suggest, around perpetual get-togethers under the guise of collective education. And, clearly, with aiming at creating a cell of scientific centralism organization, and not another leftist hobby club.

If there is a steady circle of like-minded people organized offline, then the propaganda work of the cell can be expanded in a certain way.

What do we think about educational circles? We insist on the principle of self-education and involving the comrades engaged in self-education in printed propaganda right off the bat. We provide methodological assistance to all who wish to study Marxism.

We would recommend to all leftists, who have just become acquainted with Marxism and the organizations that claim to be communist, avoid joining anywhere, especially when feeling a strong desire to do so. Before joining anywhere, it is necessary to acquire such political maturity and master Marxism in such a way as to at least independently form an adequate idea of ​​all existing organizations, theorists, platforms and practical work. In this case, joining the organization will happen not out of a mood, inclination, trend, burning desire to do something and stuff like that, but will be a conscious, deliberate choice.

Why so slow?

First, there are no geniuses of the level of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin among us, but we work on ourselves and educate ourselves to meet the objective requirements of communism.

Secondly, our enemy has grown considerably wiser since the times of the Great October Revolution, and the severity of communist defeat in the USSR has become an important factor hindering the formation of a revolutionary class. And even when we consider the history of Bolshevism, its origin, formation and subsequent victories, it took the first Marxists 20 years to create a party, and then another 14 years to take power, given the devastating world war and the crisis of tsarism. The bourgeoisie learned its lesson from the October.

On the one hand, the bourgeoisie’s control over the material conditions of the masses has blunted the power of old slogans, making it impossible to spread communist ideas through a mere appeal to solve the problems of extreme poverty, poverty, unemployment, and so on. Moreover, nowadays virtually all bourgeois parties are talking about the need to fight against the ills of capitalism and the consequences of exploitation. On the other hand, the role of deep theoretical propaganda, that proves the scientific invincibility, the truth of Marxism-Leninism and the communist future of all mankind in an accessible way, has increased dramatically.

It is not surprising that not only *Proriv* fails to repeat the successes of the Bolsheviks, but others around the world as well. The situation has changed significantly. Something has become easier, especially in technical aspects, but the main thing has become more complicated — we now face a much more competent foe in the oligarchy (corporations), its army of propagandists (scientists, journalists, ideologists), the police state and its leaders. Lenin famously said that in a backward country it is not as difficult to overthrow the power of capital as in a developed one, but it is much more difficult to transition towards building communism. So, now we live in a developed capitalist country, where it is even more difficult to overthrow the power of capital than in England or the USA at the start of the 20th century, but on the other hand, a transition towards building communism can be done in just a few months.

Thirdly, the leftists do not accept scientific centralism, including in the Leninist-Stalinist experience of Bolshevism, and are guided by an opportunistic approach to organizational building, which makes it simply impossible for them to create a viable organization and form a revolutionary working class. They expect that power will fall to them by itself from the hands of the bourgeoisie, while having neither the ability nor any idea how to exercise it. In this respect we are having to act alone, overcoming the resistance of the most inveterate opportunism in the form of leftist love for democratic centralism, or even just democracy.

Consequently, fourthly, there is no uniformity in understanding the theory of Marxism-Leninism among people who consider themselves Marxists. This is primarily due to the fact that left-wing activists and party members read the works of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin skimmingly, do not study party documents, do not think for themselves. Communication experience with leftists shows that the majority of them lack the skills of theoretical work and self-education. As a result, no offense, but some semi-educated people listen to other semi-educated people or misguided opportunist theoreticians. The revolutionary-literary and revolutionary-educational traditions laid down in our country by the Narodniks are largely lost; for the most part, they died away during the Khrushchev-Brezhnev period. Just read what is being produced by left-wing parties — it’s mostly rubbish. Theoretical content is almost nonexistent, only tantrums and flashy slogans. And now in video format. Look at how leftists study Marxism, at all those miserable circles and nightmarish political clubs.

Proriv journal and, following it, our newspaper are trying to revive the Bolshevik traditions of cadre forging, to form a pleiad of strong Marxist propagandists, agitators, and organizers; and are trying to do so on the basis of scientific centralism, that is, on the basis of a uniform understanding of Marxism-Leninism and the highest level of discipline. Naturally, taking into account the negative experience of Bolshevism, when all sorts of Trotskyists and other carrion were infiltrating the party. Unlike other left-wing groups, no difficult situations, such as the transformations of the Russian bourgeois state or the outbreak of war, requiring the highest manifestation of diamatical thinking for their scientific assessment, have led to a loss of unanimity and splits in our ranks.

Therefore, one shouldn’t complain about the speed, being hasty about establishing the Party of Scientific Centralism is of no use. Or to quote Valery Alekseevich: “We must simply keep working and working in our field, and the result will follow.”

Editorial

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1. The Communist Party of the Russian Federation
2. Proriv journal was established in 2002.
3. Podguzov V.A. Communism vs “Communism”. No English translation of the work is available. The Russian version can be found here.
4. One of the members of the RKRP.
5. Podguzov V.A. In Response to the So-Called Revolutionaries. No English translation of the work is available. The Russian version can be found here.
6. The “Muddy Penny” is an expression that is used today when talking about fundraising, another tax on the workers which is posed as being beneficial to them. Originates from the novel Mother by Maxim Gorky. “Back of the factory, almost encircling it with a ring of putrescence, stretched a vast marsh grown over with fir trees and birches. In the summer it was covered with thick yellow and green scum, and swarms of mosquitoes flew from it over the village, spreading fever in their course. The marsh belonged to the factory, and the new manager, wishing to extract profit from it, conceived the plan of draining it and incidentally gathering in a fine harvest of peat. Representing to the workingmen how much this measure would contribute to the sanitation of the locality and the improvement of the general condition of all, the manager gave orders to deduct a kopeck from every ruble of their earnings, in order to cover the expense of draining the marsh. The workingmen rebelled; they especially resented the fact that the office clerks were exempted from paying the new tax.”
7. Podguzov V.A. How Do Supporters, in Words, of SCIENTIFIC Communism Fight Against SCIENTIFIC Centralism?
8. Podguzov V.A. Can One Consider Oneself a Communist Without Fully Mastering the Methodology of Marxism? No English translation of the work is available. The Russian version can be found here.