The Bolsheviks and the Provisional Government¶
Core Argument¶
Digest: The Bolsheviks and the Provisional Government¶
This chapter dissects the profound disorientation and rightward drift of the Bolshevik leadership in Petrograd immediately following the February Revolution of 1917, contrasting it with the healthier class instinct of the rank-and-file and the clear-sighted line Lenin would later impose. The core argument is that the Bolsheviks’ theoretical baggage—specifically the outdated formula of the ‘democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry’—left them strategically paralysed. Having assumed the coming revolution could only be bourgeois, they had no perspective beyond consolidating a liberal regime. The chapter quotes Olminsky to show this was “an obligatory premise for every member of the party” right up to February 1917, and cites a 7 March Pravda editorial insisting there was “no question… of the downfall of the rule of capital”.
The narrative thrust contrasts the vacillating Central Committee with the factory workers, who from the outset displayed “healthy scepticism” towards the Provisional Government. Early Bolshevik manifestos—demanding a democratic republic, eight-hour day, land seizures, and an end to the war—placed them on a collision course with the ‘progressive camp’. Pravda initially called for the Soviet to “get rid of this Provisional Government… and declare itself to be the provisional revolutionary government”. This radicalism collapsed with the return of exiles from Siberia, particularly Stalin and Kamenev. They steered the party sharply rightwards, towards conciliation with the Mensheviks and critical support for Prince Lvov’s government.
The chapter provides extensive evidence from the March 1917 All-Russian Conference of party workers, held in Lenin’s absence. Stalin’s report advocated support for the government “insofar as it fortifies the steps of the revolution”, a position the author condemns as “opportunistic adaptation”. Stalin publicly distanced himself from the Bureau’s more critical resolution and endorsed the Krasnoyarsk Soviet’s opportunist line, which imagined the Soviets could coexist with the bourgeoisie and oblige it to submit through pressure. In an “incredible intervention”, Stalin argued it was more proper to speak of “the Government supporting us”. The author excoriates this as a flagrant contradiction of Marxism and common sense, noting the same formula later derailed the German Revolution of 1918.
The chapter’s most notable polemic is against the Stalin-Kamenev line of class collaboration and fusion with the Mensheviks. Stalin described the historic differences between Bolshevism and Menshevism as “trivial disagreements” and “a storm in a tea-cup”. The Conference voted to proceed with unity negotiations, electing a committee including Stalin and Kamenev. The author counterposes this to the left-wing interventions of Molotov and Krassikov, the latter being shouted down and deprived of the floor when he raised the question of the dictatorship of the proletariat. The theoretical root of this capitulation is traced to the “confused and contradictory” slogan of ‘democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry’, which Trotsky had long criticised. The chapter draws heavily on the works of Trotsky, Marcel Liebman, and E.H. Carr to substantiate its case, presenting the March Conference as a near-disaster for the revolution, averted only by Lenin’s return.