Lenin: Responding to Catastrophe, Forging Revolution

by Paul le Blanc

“A welcome gift ... Highlighting Lenin’s flexibility and cultivation of collective leadership, Le Blanc brings out the practical activism and revolutionary patience crucial to organizing the oppressed on a rapidly over-heating planet” Jodi Dean, author of Comrade “Crackling with intellectual life” Lars T. Lih, author of Lenin Rediscovered “A wonderful sketch of Lenin’s life and times ... Perhaps the best introduction available in English” Michael D. Yates, author of Can the Working Class Change the World? Vladimir Lenin lies in a tomb in Moscow’s Red Square. History has not been kind to this Russian leader, his teachings reviled by modern mainstream politics. But in today’s capitalist society, riven by class inequality and imperialist wars, perhaps it is worth returning to this communist icon’s demand for “Peace, Land and Bread”, and his radical understanding of democracy. Lenin was wrestling with the question of “what is to be done?” when facing the catastrophes of his own time. Against the odds, the Bolshevik party succeeded in rejecting both the corrupt and decaying Romanov dynasty, as well as the capitalist economic system which had started to take root in Russia. To understand how this happened, and what we can learn from him today, Paul Le Blanc takes us through Lenin’s dynamic revolutionary thought, how he worked as part of a larger collective and how he centered the labor movement in Russia and beyond, uncovering a powerful form of democracy that could transform our activism today. Paul Le Blanc is an activist and acclaimed American historian teaching at La Roche University, Pennsylvania. He is the author of many books.

Genres: History, Biography, Russia, Lenin, Politics

245 pages, Paperback

Published September 20, 2023

About the author

Paul Le Blanc is an American historian at La Roche University in Pittsburgh as well as labor and socialist activist who has written or edited more than 30 books on topics such as Leon Trotsky and Rosa Luxemburg.

Reviews

[Donald]

This book is a good short summary of Lenin's political life for people relatively new to radical politics. Le Blanc draws on a variety of people to construct his Lenin, from Victor Serge and other contemporaries to more recent scholarship like Lars Lih. The result is to show Lenin in action, fighting good battles and making mistakes, advancing and retreating. Le Blanc traces Lenin's relationship with revolutionary democracy and its retreat which gives helpful context while giving as a sense of the enormous stakes involved. I prefer this sort of Lenin, a good leader but part of a cast of characters in a broad worker's movement.

[Toby Crime · Rating 5 out of 5]

Having been in a group of comrades reading through and taking seriously various works of Lenin in the last few years, I was really happy to see this come out as a companion to my primary reading. As a short book covering pre-post revolutionary Russia, it's necessarily a brief overview of many parts of these histories, but all of it feels concise and coherent. The real strength is placing Lenin as a person within each context, as pre-war social democrat, as ascendant party theorist in exile, as described facto leading Bolshevik within the Soviet government.

In tone, this book is basically split into two, pre and post October revolution (probably not a shocking structure). The first part gives a hopeful picture of Lenin as a caring, if sometimes overbearing, committed revolutionary working with his comrades to organise through the repression of Tsarist Russia. It is here that the his commitments to genuine democratic and strategic experimentation based on specific historical conditions are made clear. These serve him well throughout his life, however his commitment to these principles set the stage for the tragedy given in the second half.

While not entirely pessimistic about the gains of the early Soviet government, Le Blanc keeps focus on his subjects unwavering commitment to the fact that Russia's revolutionary success was premised on others in Europe following. The lack of an equivalent communist uprising elsewhere connects to the brutal realities of what is needed to sustain Soviet power. Rather than stumbling into a secret police, war communism, or bureaucratisation, we get snapshots of the reluctance and existential angst involved by many in the lead up to these developments.

With the Cheka, we are given accounts of some of its early agents displaying their horror at the perceived need for the terror to protect the project from destruction. On the looming threat of bureaucratic hegemony, the reality in laid out that Lenin and other early Bolsheviks were not only aware of its worrying development, but actively organising to find ways to prevent it. It's hard in a book of this scale to understand in depth how this development and these struggles took place, but you get the sense of the intense difficulties in these times. While it may not be convenient for cold war narratives, it suggests that the various invasions and revanchist aggression of the white army was near enough to an outright success, insofar as it forced the Soviet government to structure itself primarily around the power politics of geopolitical survival.

I would recommend this as a companion to studying Lenin's writings. Together you gain a good sense of how such an often perversely memorialised political figure, can actually provide real practical advice for the struggles confronting us in our moment and to come.

[James Renaghan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Unravels and remedies distortions of Lenin and the Bolsheviks without blind adulation.

[David Hayter · Rating 5 out of 5]

Easily the best currently available primer on Lenin and even to the Russian Revolution in general.

Le Blanc has a deep understanding of Lenin's writings and thought - having been immersed in them for over 50 years. He easily dispels the myriad myths about Lenin and Bolshevism. His passion for leftwing politics and activism shine, but he does not fall prey to mindless adulation of Vladimir Ilyich. Le Blanc gives us a great overview of how Lenin responds to catastrophes around him in hopes that we might take inspiration for our own catastrophes.

My two favorite things about this book:
1) Le Blanc pays respect to newer works like Suny's Stalin but more importantly to younger scholars like Eric Blanc. One need only to look at other contemporary histories of the Revolution that still cite ridiculous outdated books like Ulam's Stalin to sense the difference here. Inertia does not prevail, Le Blanc understands the dialectic!

2) As a primer, it successfully plants seeds for a novice to launch in many different directions. For the Revolution itself one could go to Miéville, Reed, Bryant, and ultimately to Chamberlain, Sukhanov and the maestro Trotsky. For theoretical matters one should go immediately to Tariq Ali's The Dilemmas of Lenin, Lars Lih's Lenin, Le Blanc's own larger classic work Lenin & The Revolutionary Party and Tamás Krausz's Reconstructing Lenin. For the wider era one might consult EH Carr's classics, Stephen A. Smith, Rex Wade, Le Blanc again in October Song, and so forth.

I was privileged enough to receive this in manuscript form last year and provide some comments to the author - a few of which made it into the final version which I bought myself.

[Alek · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked this. So far I'd say it's the best introduction I've read of lenin that has taken new stock of him. Lots of other authors like Harding, Lih, and id bet LeBlanc himself, have done the legwork elsewhere in denser books.

As a DSA member i have a lot of opinions on application of this stuff and am aware that PSL people for whatever reason also like this book, so I wish leblanc talked more about the faction ban and other things that I think are clear specific faults in leninism which seem to be persisting into our century

[Adam DuBard · Rating 4 out of 5]

As someone who identifies as left-leaning, I enjoyed this book. I didn't know too much about Lenin or the 1917 Russian Revolution going in, and found this book to be a pretty good introduction. Le Blanc doesn't shy away from the criticisms of Lenin, as well as his role in some of the excesses of the Red Terror, and addresses many remarks against him head on. The book is a bit dense at times, although Le Blanc helpfully breaks down the chapters into numerous smaller subchapters, which helps break up the material and provides a good amount of stopping points. My main critique is that Le Blanc hints at the beginning of the book that he will work to tie Lenin's experiences and expertise to the challenges we face in global politics today, but he doesn't do too much of that until the last chapter of the book. Overall I found this a great introduction to Lenin the man and revolutionary, and it really only whet my appetite when it comes to the Russian Revolution. I will certainly be reading more on that subject, and Le Blanc helpfully includes some recommendations for further reading.

[Brandon · Rating 3 out of 5]

A succinct and concise biography of Lenin’s life and explanation of his thoughts in their context. Albeit a Trotskyist work, the final chapter includes tidbits which stir the reader into reconsideration of their present activism. I would suggest this to readers familiar with Marx yet unfamiliar with Lenin, as a helpful stepping-stone.

[Seamus · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thoughtful, detailed, and full of historical context. As a bonus, it's also well-written! A good book I highly recommend!

[Kimia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good and well-written supplementary text.

[Ewoudt · Rating 4 out of 5]

LeBlanc already wrote a lot on Lenin and his contemporaries, but with this relatively short book aimed at new activists manages to put a convincing case for his relevance. This makes it a great introduction. There is a lot of attention for debates on the radical left, both outside and inside the bolshevik party. Showing that Lenin made mistakes, but was always open to adjust positions based on experience. In the effort to stress certain parts of Lenin's politics, it seems that too much is left out when it comes to the precise character of the catastrophe the bolsheviks faced and the kind of policies they proposed and implemented.