Revolution and Democracy: Inherently Connected
By: Martin Barakov
Tags: History, Democracy, Politics, Revolution, Government

Revolution and Democracy: Inherently Connected

The two concepts are directly intertwined, not separate from each other, as some might argue.

In mainstream political discourse, the concept of a political revolution that overthrows a government — namely a pro-Western one — tends to be associated with the creation of a very scary image. For instance, the themes of terrorism, military dictatorship, unnecessary blood being shed, and the destruction of existing so-called “democracy” comes to mind.

Photo by Clay Banks on Unsplash

People may point to countries like France, where the creation of a liberal republic turned into the infamous Reign of Terror, despite the fact that the French Revolution itself was a bourgeois revolution. They may also point to coup d’etats that have occurred throughout various countries and then incorrectly frame them as popular uprisings or justified rebellions against ‘authoritarian’ leadership. In many cases, fervent anti-communists will also point to the October Revolution in 1917 as one that produced the infamous notion of a government “ruling with an iron fist”, among other similar concepts that echo orthodox ‘totalitarian’ ideas.

These analyses are wrong and directly tie into modern bourgeois understandings of both revolutions (in the present-day) and what is perceived (by the bourgeoisie) to be democracy. Social democrats, or more accurately, social imperialists, will argue that political revolutions lead to unstable moments in a country’s life and that this is one of the main reasons as to why we should not be striving for the most pure form of agitation with regards to the liberation of the working class. Additionally, they believe in the infantile notion that the internal contradictions of capitalism and the accumulation of capital itself can be minimized through bourgeois structures.

The concept mentioned above is best summarized as reformism, that is, the material and ideological understanding of already existing political structures as ones that can be absolved of their inherent problems, regardless of other social and economic conditions plaguing a specific territory or set of territories.

Bourgeois or Proletarian Democracy?

A traditional understanding of democracy tends to effectively boil down to whether or not a given country has so-called “free multi-party elections”, term limits, and other concepts that are derived from Western idealist political philosophers such as John Locke. Simultaneously, if a country does not adhere to these conditions, they will be described as holding the characteristics of theoretical foundations developed by other Western political ideologues such as Thomas Hobbes or Niccolò Machiavelli.

For the bourgeois liberal, an insult commonly used against a ruling governmental body that does not adhere to their understanding(s) of civil society is to call the aforementioned body ‘tyrannical’ and that the people are in need of “freedom”. However, the people that are being referred to in this context instead call the ‘freedom’ in question “missiles” and “funded sectarian violence”.

Democracy is not dependent on the quantity of political parties present, as is the case in countries such as the United States. If a country has 10 political parties holding power via so-called “representatives”, does that mean that they are inherently more democratic than a country with 7? Of course not.

The bourgeois ideologues who developed such abhorrent and nonsensical conceptions are some of the main driving forces and factors behind legitimizing imperialism and the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie. The United States is often viewed as the bastion of democracy, the land of the free, and other idealist veils surrounding their imperialist and colonial foundations and structures.

In 2014, professors Martin Gilens and Benjamin I. Page from Princeton University and Northwestern University — respectively — came to the conclusion that the United States is not a democracy — or a constitutional republic, if you prefer — but instead a country that resembles an oligarchic mess of a corporate state. The following is an excerpt from their results surrounding the report originally developed by them:

“…economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence.”

Is this the characteristic of a democratic society? No one in their right mind would consider it so, but that will not halt the progression of bourgeois democracy continuing its undeserved legitimacy in the present-day.

Proletarian democracy is built on the foundation of the domination of the working class over the rule of the bourgeoisie, that is, the formation of a societal fabric built on socialist economic principles and similar conceptions. According to Vladimir Lenin in The Social Structure of State Power, the Prospects and Liquidationism, the following is mentioned with regards to understanding the function of the state:

“The social structure of society and of state power is characterized by changes, and unless these changes are understood not a single step can be taken in any sphere of social activity. The understanding of these changes determines the prospects for the future, by which we mean, of course, not idle guessing about things unknown, but the basic trends of economic and political development — those trends, the resultant of which determines the immediate future of the country, those trends which determine the tasks, direction and character of the activity of every intelligent public man.”

As proletarians, as members of the working class, we must understand how the world around us is shaped, whether it is shaped by our own actions and existence, or not. This is the difference between a state controlled by the bourgeois or the proletariat. The state as a political entity only stays so long as it is necessary and so long as there is a struggle to be had between classes. This is the epitome of class struggle, the fight between contrasting interests, the fight between capital and labour.

Democracy or Revolution?

As mentioned earlier, there is a tendency among the bourgeois scholars and journalistic intelligentsia to exclaim that the two notions of revolution and democracy are antithetical to each other, that is, that they are incompatible. If anything, the act of revolution is the most democratic conception that can exist at any given moment. This is due to the nature of what a revolution actually entails and what it seeks to accomplish.

It should go without saying that existing revolutionary momentum is arguably the most grand shift within political life because it is the complete overhaul of all existing political structures of the relic state, that is, the state of ruins and of old.

As Richard Kosolapov puts it in Socialism: Questions of Theory, “Revolution — if, of course, it is not a palace revolution or reshuffle in a capitalist governmental orchestra — is always a qualitative change in the mode of life of the mass of the people.” Furthermore, Kosolapov states the following with regards to what should be constituted as a revolution in the first place:

“It is a revolution only if vast masses of previously passive people join in vigorous political activity. Revolution is always a break-up of the previous social connections that have become too narrow for contemporary social practice. It replaces them with new ones through the direct involvement of the masses. For a time, the country becomes a turbulent general meeting, a national forum seeking to resolve society’s vital problems and to chart the country’s future.” “In other words, revolution is a period of direct democratic development full of content and varied in form of expression. As a rule, it raises economic, social and political problems that cannot be settled by other than revolutionary means, and therefore settles them radically and conclusively.”

The segment above details the extreme importance of understanding revolutionary activity as nothing more than the complete emancipation of the masses, the working class, the proletariat, in regards to social, economic, and political affairs.

A final point — particularly detailing the supposedly inherent ‘bloody’ nature of revolution — is laughable, if not completely detrimental to the progress of socialist construction throughout any piece of land around the world. The October Revolution in 1917 did not have a single death, yet the proclamation of the Soviet Republic was achieved.

The evacuation and arresting of the Provisional Government and its members ensued, and it was not until the counter-revolutionaries began to fight back against the declaration of the new republic that blood was to be seen and spilled. As such, the blame rests with the incompetence of the Provisional Republic as well as the forces that were instrumental in fighting against the development and creation of a new country, one rooted in the support and control of the proletariat and the revolutionary elements of the peasantry.

All in all, revolutionary activity cannot be — as is stated by propagandists and imperialist ‘thinkers’ — anti-democratic. The notion that revolutions are required by mere virtue of their existence to be hostile to democracy is to be ahistorical to the highest degree, especially when taking into account the role of the mobilization of the proletarians. A revolution is the most democratic concept that could potentially exist, so long as it is not one of the so-called ‘revolutions’ as mentioned earlier.