V. I. Lenin
PRELIMINARY DRAFT THESES
ON THE NATIONAL AND
THE COLONIAL QUESTIONS
FOR THE SECOND CONGRESS OF
THE COMMUNIST INTERNATIONAL
Published in June, 1920
Published according to the manu-
script and checked against the text
of the proof-sheet, as emended by
V. I. Lenin
>From V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, 4th English
Edition,
Progress Publishers, Moscow, 1966
Vol. 31, pp. 144-51.
Translated from the Russian
Edited by Julius Katzer
Prepared © for the Internet by David J. Romagnolo,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (July 1997)
page 144
PRELIMINARY DRAFT THESES
ON THE NATIONAL AND THE COLONIAL QUESTIONS[51]
FOR THE SECOND CONGRESS OF THE COMMUNIST INTERNATIONAL
In submitting for discussion by the Second
Congress of the Communist International the following
draft theses on the national and the colonial
questions I would request all comrades, especially
those who possess concrete information on any of these
very complex problems, to let me have their opinions,
amendments, addenda and concrete remarks in the most
concise form (no mree than two or three pages ),
particularly on the following points:
Austrian experience;
Polish-Jewish and Ukrainian experience;
Alsace-Lorraine and Belgium;
Ireland;
Danish-German, Italo-French and Italo-Slav relations;
Balkan experience;
Eastern peoples;
The struggle against Pan-Islamism;
Relations in the Caucasus;
The Bashkir and Tatar Republics;
Kirghizia; Turkestan, its experience;
Negroes in America;
Colonies;
China-Korea-Japan.
N. Lenin
June 5, 1920
page 145
1) An abstract or formal posing of the problem of
equality in general and national equality in
particular is in the very nature of bourgeois
democracy. Under the guise of the equality of the
individual in general, bourgeois democracy proclaims
the formal or legal equality of the property-owner and
the proletarian, the exploiter and the exploited,
thereby grossly deceiving the oppressed classes. On
the plea that all men are absolutely equal, the
bourgeoisie is transforming the idea of equality,
which is itself a reflection of relations in commodity
production, into a weapon in its struggle against the
abolition of classes. The real meaning of the demand
for equality consists in its being a demand for the
abolition of classes.
2) In conformity with its fundamental task of
combating bourgeois democracy and exposing its
falseness and hypocrisy, the Communist Party, as the
avowed champion of the proletarian struggle to
overthrow the bourgeois yoke, must base its policy, in
the national question too, not on abstract and formal
principles but, first, on a precise appraisal of the
specific historical situation and, primarily, of
economic conditions; second, on a clear distinction
between the interests of the oppressed classes, of
working and exploited people, and the general concept
of national interests as a whole, which implies the
interests of the ruling class; third, on an equally
clear distinction between the oppressed, dependent and
subject nations and the oppressing, exploiting and
sovereign nations, in order to counter the
bourgeois-democratic lies that play down this colonial
and financial enslavement of the vast majority of the
world's population by an insignificant minority of the
richest and advanced capitalist countries, a feature
characteristic of the era of finance capital and
imperialism.
3) The imperialist war of 1914-18 has very clearly
revealed to all nations and to the oppressed classes
of the whole world the falseness of
bourgeois-democratic phrases, by practically
demonstrating that the Treaty of Versailles of the
celebrated "Western democracies" is an even more
brutal and foul act of violence against weak nations
than was the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk of the German
Junkers and the Kaiser. The League of Nations and the
entire post war policy of the Entente reveal this
truth with even greater
page 146
clarity and distinctness. They are everywhere
intensifying the revolutionary struggle both of the
proletariat in the advanced countries and of the
toiling masses in the colonial and dependent
countries. They are hastening the collapse of the
petty-bourgeois nationalist illusions that nations can
live together in peace and equality under capitalism.
4) From these fundamental premises it follows that
the Communist International's entire policy on the
national and the colonial questions should rest
primarily on a closer union of the proletarians and
the working masses of all nations and countries for a
joint revolutionary struggle to overthrow the
landowners and the bourgeoisie. This union alone will
guarantee victory over capitalism, without which the
abolition of national oppression and inequality is
impossible.
5) The world political situation has now placed
the dictatorship of the proletariat on the order of
the day. World political developments are of necessity
concentrated on a single focus -- the struggle of the
world bourgeoisie against the Soviet Russian Republic,
around which are inevitably grouped, on the one hand,
the Soviet movements of the advanced workers in all
countries, and, on the other, all the national
liberation movements in the colonies and among the
oppressed nationalities, who are learning from bitter
experience that their only salvation lies in the
Soviet system's victory over world imperialism.
6) Consequently, one cannot at present confine
oneself to a bare recognition or proclamation of the
need for closer union between the working people of
the various nations; a policy must be pursued that
will achieve the closest alliance, with Soviet Russia,
of all the national and colonial liberation movements.
The form of this alliance should be determined by the
degree of development of the communist movement in the
proletariat of each country, or of the
bourgeois-democratic liberation movement of the
workers and peasants in backward countries or among
backward nationalities.
7) Federation is a transitional form to the
complete unity of the working people of different
nations. The feasibility of federation has already
been demonstrated in practice both by the relations
between the R.S.F.S.R. and other
page 147
Soviet Republics (the Hungarian, Finnish[52] and
Latvian[53] in the past, and the Azerbaijan and
Ukrainian at present), and by the relations within the
R.S.F.S.R. in respect of nationalities which formerly
enjoyed neither statehood nor autonomy (e.g., the
Bashkir and Tatar autonomous republics in the
R.S.F.S.R., founded in 1919 and 1920 respectively).
8) In this respect, it is the task of the
Communist International to further develop and also to
study and test by experience these new federations,
which are arising on the basis of the Soviet system
and the Soviet movement. In recognising that
federation is a transitional form to complete unity,
it is necessary to strive for ever closer federal
unity, bearing in mind, first, that the Soviet
republics, surrounded as they are by the imperialist
powers of the whole world -- which from the military
standpoint are immeasurably stronger -- cannot
possibly continue to exist without the closest
alliance; second, that a close economic alliance
between the Soviet republics is necessary, otherwise
the productive forces which have been ruined by
imperialism cannot be restored and the well-being of
the working people cannot be ensured; third, that
there is a tendency towards the creation of a single
world economy, regulated by the proletariat of all
nations as an integral whole and according to a common
plan. This tendency has already revealed itself quite
clearly under capitalism and is bound to be further
developed and consummated under socialism.
9) The Communist International's national policy
in the sphere of relations within the state cannot be
restricted to the bare, formal, purely declaratory and
actually non-committal recognition of the equality of
nations to which the bourgeois democrats confine
themselves -- both those who frankly admit being such,
and those who assume the name of socialists (such as
the socialists of the Second International).
In all their propaganda and agitation -- both
within parliament and outside it -- the Communist
parties must consistently expose that constant
violation of the equality of nations and of the
guaranteed rights of national minorities which is to
be seen in all capitalist countries, despite
page 148
their "democratic" constitutions. It is also
necessary, first, constantly to explain that only the
Soviet system is capable of ensuring genuine equality
of-nations, by uniting first the proletarians and then
the whole mass of the working population in the
struggle against the bourgeoisie; and, second, that
all Communist parties should render direct aid to the
revolutionary movements among the dependent and
underprivileged nations (for example, Ireland, the
American Negroes, etc.) and in the colonies.
Without the latter condition, which is
particularly important, the struggle against the
oppression of dependent nations and colonies, as well
as recognition of their right to secede, are but a
false signboard, as is evidenced by the parties of the
Second International.
10) Recognition of internationalism in word, and
its replacement in deed by petty-bourgeois nationalism
and pacifism, in all propaganda, agitation and
practical work, is very common, not only among the
parties of the Second International, but also among
those which have withdrawn from it, and often even
among parties which now call themselves communist. The
urgency of the struggle against this evil, against the
most deep-rooted petty-bourgeois national prejudices,
looms ever larger with the mounting exigency of the
task of converting the dictatorship of the proletariat
from a national dictatorship (i.e., existing in a
single country and incapable of determining world
politics) into an international one (i.e., a
dictatorship of the proletariat involving at least
several advanced countries, and capable of exercising
a decisive influence upon world politics as a whole).
Petty-bourgeois nationalism proclaims as
internationalism the mere recognition of the equality
of nations, and nothing more. Quite apart from the
fact that this recognition is purely verbal,
petty-bourgeois nationalism preserves national
self-interest intact, whereas proletarian
internationalism demands, first, that the interests of
the proletarian struggle in any one country should be
subordinated to the interests of that struggle on a
world-wide scale, and, second, that a nation which is
achieving victory over the bourgeoisie should be able
and willing to make the greatest national sacrifices
for the overthrow of international capital.
page 149
Thus, in countries that are already fully
capitalist and have workers' parties that really act
as the vanguard of the proletariat, the struggle
against opportunist and petty-bourgeois pacifist
distortions of the concept and policy of
internationalism is a primary and cardinal task.
11) With regard to the more backward states and
nations, in which feudal or patriarchal and
patriarchal-peasant relations predominate, it is
particularly important to bear in mind:
first, that all Communist parties must assist the
bourgeois-democratic liberation movement in these
countries, and that the duty of rendering the most
active assistance rests primarily with the workers of
the country the backward nation is colonially or
financially dependent on;
second, the need for a struggle against the clergy
and other influential reactionary and medieval
elements in backward countries;
third, the need to combat Pan-Islamism and similar
trends, which strive to combine the liberation
movement against European and American imperialism
with an attempt to strengthen the positions of the
khans, landowners, mullahs, etc.;[*]
fourth, the need, in backward countries, to give
special support to the peasant movement against the
landowners, against landed proprietorship, and against
all manifestations or survivals of feudalism, and to
strive to lend the peasant movement the most
revolutionary character by establishing the closest
possible alliance between the West European communist
proletariat and the revolutionary peasant movement in
the East, in the colonies, and in the backward
countries generally. It is particularly necessary to
exert every effort to apply the basic principles of
the Soviet system in countries where pre-capitalist
relations predominate -- by setting up "working
people's Soviets", etc.;
fifth, the need for a determined struggle against
attempts to give a communist colouring to
bourgeois-democratic liberation trends in the backward
countries; the Communist International should support
bourgeois-democratic national
* In the proofs Lenin inserted a brace opposite
points 2 and 3 and wrote "2 and 3 to be united". --Ed.
page 150
movements in colonial and backward countries only on
condition that, in these countries, the elements of
future proletarian parties, which will be communist
not only in name, are brought together and trained to
understand their special tasks, i.e., those of the
struggle against the bourgeois-democratic movements
within their own nations. The Communist International
must enter into a temporary alliance with bourgeois
democracy in the colonial and backward countries, but
should not merge with it, and should under all
circumstances uphold the independence of the
proletarian movement even if it is in its most
embryonic form;
sixth, the need constantly to explain and expose
among the broadest working masses of all countries,
and particularly of the backward countries, the
deception systematically practised by the imperialist
powers, which, under the guise of politically
independent states, set up states that are wholly
dependent upon them economically, financially and
militarily. Under present-day international conditions
there is no salvation for dependent and weak nations
except in a union of Soviet republics.
12) The age-old oppression of colonial and weak
nationalities by the imperialist powers has not only
filled the working masses of the oppressed countries
with animosity towards the oppressor nations, but has
also aroused distrust in these nations in general,
even in their proletariat. The despicable betrayal of
socialism by the majority of the official leaders of
this proletariat in 1914-19, when "defence of country"
was used as a social-chauvinist cloak to conceal the
defence of the "right" of their "own" bourgeoisie to
oppress colonies and fleece financially dependent
countries, was certain to enhance this perfectly
legitimate distrust. On the other hand, the more
backward the country, the stronger is the hold of
small-scale agricultural production, patriarchalism
and isolation, which inevitably lend particular
strength and tenacity to the deepest of
petty-bourgeois prejudices, i.e., to national egoism
and national narrow-mindedness. These prejudices are
bound to die out very slowly, for they can disappear
only after imperialism and capitalism have disappeared
in the advanced countries, and after the entire
foundation of the backward countries' economic life
has radically changed.
page 151
It is therefore the duty of the class-conscious
communist proletariat of all countries to regard with
particular caution and attention the survivals of
national sentiments in the countries and among
nationalities which have been oppressed the longest;
it is equally necessary to make certain concessions
with a view to more rapidly overcoming this distrust
and these prejudices. Complete victory over capitalism
cannot be won unless the proletariat and, following
it, the mass of working people in all countries and
nations throughout the world voluntarily strive for
alliance and unity.
NOTES
[51] Notes to "Preliminary Draft Theses on the
National and the Colonial Questions" were received by
Lenin from G. V. Chicherin, N. N. Krestinsky, J. V.
Stalin, M. G. Rafes, Y. A. Preobrazhensky, N. D.
Lapinsky, and I. Nedelkov (N. Shablin), representative
of the Bulgarian Communists, as well as from a number
of leaders in Bashkiria, Kirghizia, and Turkestan.
Along with correct ideas, the notes contained certain
grave errors. Thus, Chicherin gave a wrong
interpretation to Lenin's theses on the necessity of
support for national liberation movements and on
agreements with the national bourgeoisie, without due
regard for Lenin's distinction between the bourgeoisie
and the peasantry. With regard to this Lenin wrote: "I
lay greater stress on the alliance with the peasantry
(which does not quite mean the bourgeoisie)" (Central
Party Archives of the Institute of Marxism-Leninism of
the C.C. C.P.S.U.). Referring to the relations between
the future socialist Europe and the economically
underdeveloped and dependent countries, Preobrazhensky
wrote: ". . . if it proves impossible to reach
economic agreement with the leading national groups,
the latter will inevitably be suppressed by force and
economically important regions will be compelled to
join a union of European Republics." Lenin decisively
objected to this remark: ". . . it goes too far. It
cannot be proved, and it is wrong to say that
suppression by force is "inevitable". That is
radically wrong" (see Voprosy Istorii KPSS [Problems
of the C.P.S.U. History] 1958, No. 2, p. 16).
A grave error was made by Stalin, who did not
agree with Lenin's proposition on the difference
between federal relations among the Soviet republics
based on autonomy, and federal relations among
independent republics. In a letter to Lenin, dated
June 12, 1920, he declared that in reality "there is
no difference between these two types of federal
relations, or else it is so small as to be
negligible". Stalin continued to advocate this later,
when, in 1922, he proposed the "autonomisation" of the
independent Soviet republics. These ideas were
criticised in detail by Lenin in his article "The
Question of Nationalities or 'Autonomisation'", and in
his letter to members of the Political Bureau "On the
Formation of the U.S.S.R" (see present edition, Vol.
36, and Lenin Miscellany XXXVI; pp. 496-98).
[p.144]
[52] As a result of the revolution which commenced
in Finland on January 27, 1918, the bourgeois
government of Svinhufvud was overthrown and the
working class assumed power. On January 29, the
revolutionary government of Finland, the Council of
People's Representatives was formed by Edvard Gylling,
Yrjö Sirola, Otto Kuusinen, A. Taimi and others. The
following were among the most important measures taken
by the workers' government: the law on the transfer to
landless peasants, without indemnification,
page 556
of the land they actually tilled; tax-exemption for
the poorest sections of the population; the
expropriation of enterprises whose owners had fled the
country; the establishment of state control over
private banks (their functions being assumed by the
State Bank).
On March 1, 1918, a treaty between the Finnish
Socialist Workers' Republic and the R.S.F.S.R. was
signed in Petrograd. Based on the principle of
complete equality and respect for the sovereignty of
the two sides, this was the first treaty in world
history to be signed between two socialist countries.
The proletarian revolution, however, was
victorious only in the south of Finland. The
Svinhufvud government concentrated all
counter-revolutionary forces in the north of the
country, and appealed to the German Kaiser's
government for help. As a result of German armed
intervention, the Finnish revolution was put down in
May 1918, after a desperate civil war. White terror
reigned in the country, thousands of revolutionary
workers and peasants were executed or tortured to
death in the prisons. [p.147]
[53] As a result of mass action by the Lettish
proletariat and peasantry against the German invaders
and the counter-revolutionary government of Ulmanis, a
provisional Soviet government was established in
Latvia on December 17, 1918, which issued a Manifesto
on the assumption of state power by the Soviets.
Soviet Russia gave fraternal help to the Lettish
people in their struggle to establish Soviet rule and
strengthen the Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic.
Under the leadership of the Latvian Communist
Party and the Latvian Soviet Government, a Red Army
was formed, the landed estates were confiscated, the
banks and big commercial and industrial enterprises
were nationalised, social insurance and an eight-hour
working day were introduced, and a system of public
catering for working people was organised.
In March 1919, German troops and the whiteguards,
armed and equipped by the U.S. and the Entente
imperialists, attacked Soviet Latvia. In May they
captured Riga, the capital of Soviet Latvia. After
fierce fighting the entire territory of Latvia had
been overrun by the interventionists by the beginning
of 1920. The counter-revolutionary bourgeoisie
established a regime of bloody terror, thousands of
revolutionary workers and peasants being killed or
thrown into prison. [p.147]
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