Marxism Research Network
Unofficial English Translation

Ding Guanghao and Sun Daiyao: A Re-examination of the Theoretical Debate Between Lenin and Kautsky over the October Revolution from the Perspective of Revolutionary Will

Marxism Abroad

I. Introduction

The victory of the October Revolution in 1917 represented a historic leap in the development of human institutional civilization; for the first time, socialism became an institutional reality within a single country. The theory and practice suggesting that a socialist revolution could first occur and succeed in an economically and culturally backward country differed from the developmental sequence envisioned by Marx. This shift was so profound that some later referred to the October Revolution as a "revolution against Karl Marx’s Capital." [1] Within the socialist camp, diametrically opposed theoretical debates emerged, the most representative of which was the dispute between Lenin and Karl Kautsky following the revolution. Kautsky, known as the spokesperson for the "premature birth theory," published a series of pamphlets including The Dictatorship of the Proletariat, The National Assembly and the Soviet, and Terrorism and Communism. In these works, he resolutely denied the theoretical connection between the Russian October Revolution and Marxism, arguing that the revolution was like "a pregnant woman who, in her frantic jumping, shortens the period of her unbearable pregnancy and brings about a premature birth. Such a child, as a rule, is not viable." [2] Lenin responded with articles such as The Proletarian Revolution and the Renegade Kautsky, in which he insisted on integrating the new revolutionary situation with the scientific methodology of Marx and Engels to guide Russian revolutionary practice. He later further summarized, refined, enriched, and developed historical materialism and Marxist revolutionary theory in works like The State and Revolution.

Academic circles both in China and abroad have maintained continuous interest in and research on the theoretical debate between Lenin and Kautsky, with surges of discussion occurring particularly during anniversaries of the October Revolution or commemorations of the deaths of Kautsky and Lenin. Early Western Marxists critiqued the vulgar economic determinism of Second International theorists represented by Kautsky from a philosophical perspective, highlighting the status of revolutionary dialectics; [3] subsequent positioning of this debate by Western scholars has largely followed this direction. After the start of the Cold War, "Leninology"—the study of Leninism and Lenin’s intellectual relationship with other theorists—became popular in Western academia. Some scholars, represented by Marcel Liebman and John Kautsky, advocated for "rereading Lenin" and "rereading Kautsky," positing that Kautskyism was a direct source of Leninism. By denying the fundamental ideological divergence between the two, they severed the relationship between Leninism and Marxism. Research within Chinese academia on the divergence between the two has focused mainly on issues such as democracy versus dictatorship, views on imperialism, and revolutionary paths and strategies. While there is no shortage of valuable research insights, a reconstructive selection of topics often struggles to explain the root causes of the theoretical rift between Lenin and Kautsky. Upon examining scholarly research on this debate, one finds that Western Marxists correctly posed the question—that is, they discovered the central position of concepts like revolutionary dialectics, subjectivity, and revolutionary will within the dispute. However, Kautsky did not entirely negate the role of the will as some scholars suggest; in his book The Materialist Conception of History, he explicitly stated that "the materialist conception of history does not deny the power of the human will." Therefore, reconsidering the true theoretical attitudes of Lenin and Kautsky regarding the question of revolutionary will can not only further clarify the root of their disagreement over the October Revolution but also serve as a key to our understanding of the historical materialist perspective (the materialist conception of history).

Revolutionary will generally refers to a spiritual quality possessed by the party and the masses during the revolutionary process; it manifests as a firm confidence in the entire revolutionary cause and can be transformed into a powerful driving force for revolutionary development. Compared to concepts like class consciousness, political identity, or group consciousness, revolutionary will focuses more specifically on the particular historical process of revolution: the overthrow of the old society and the establishment of a new one. In the debate between Lenin and Kautsky, Lenin adhered to a logic of "manufacturing" revolutionary will—that is, emphasizing that under special revolutionary conditions, a powerful force of revolutionary will can be "manufactured" based on the historical situation, allowing backward Russia to "leap" into the socialist stage. After the revolution, the role of revolutionary will must likewise be fully exerted to advance the work of socialist construction. Kautsky, conversely, supported a logic of "generation" regarding revolutionary will—arguing that, as a part of the superstructure, revolutionary will must "generate" naturally upon a mature economic base. He believed that violating objective conditions and the laws of development would inevitably lead to the alienation of revolutionary will.

II. The Mechanism of Occurrence and the Form of Action of Revolutionary Will

Both Lenin and Kautsky gave full attention to the relationship between revolutionary will and socialist practice. Kautsky proposed: "What are the prerequisites for the realization of socialism? Every conscious action of man presupposes the will. The will to realize socialism is the first condition for its realization." "Without the will, there can be no revolution, and indeed, no history." [4] Lenin elevated the subjective status of people in revolution and the role of revolutionary will to an extremely high position. He believed that in a proletarian revolution, "what plays the decisive role is the consciousness and firmness of the working class. If the working class is prepared to make self-sacrifices, if it shows that it can exert every effort, then the task can be fulfilled." However, regarding the mechanism of occurrence and the form of action of revolutionary will, Lenin and Kautsky exhibited many cognitive differences, forming two distinct theoretical paths: "manufacturing" and "generation." Their divergence in understanding revolutionary will focused on different aspects at different times, specifically manifesting in the following three areas: the objective conditions for the production of revolutionary will, the way revolutionary will is shaped for further development, and the limits of its role after the revolutionary victory.

(i) Objective Conditions: Whether Backward Russia Could Produce a Revolutionary Will of a Progressive Nature

From the perspective of the conditions for revolution, Russia on the eve of the October Revolution did not conform to the "general laws of history" summarized by Marx in works such as Capital; its degree of capitalist development was quite immature. Although Marx and Engels in their later years supplemented their understanding of the particularity of the revolutionary process in backward countries through their "Russian Question" studies, [5] for Marxists at the time, the theoretical problem was whether to view Russia's backwardness and crisis as an obstacle to revolution or as an advantage for a "leap." Starting from the historical context of Russia, Lenin creatively decomposed the steps for a backward country to move toward socialism into two stages, elucidating the dialectics of "difficult" and "easy": "it is much more difficult to start a revolution in Europe... but it was much easier for us to begin, though it will be more difficult for us to continue." [6] He proposed that the advantages of backwardness could first be utilized to fully exert the role of revolutionary will in establishing a socialist system, and then political advantages could be used to drive the development of conditions in other areas. This was a socialist path conceived under the guidance of the logic of "manufacturing" revolutionary will.

Lenin's understanding of revolutionary will was primarily based on his judgment that "backwardness is precisely an advantage" in the context of the revolutionary outbreak. Before the October Revolution, in works such as The Collapse of the Second International and Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism, Lenin launched a relentless critique of Kautsky's theory of "ultra-imperialism." Based on his accurate analysis of imperialism and the domestic situation, Lenin keenly realized that the "special and particularly 'unpleasant' state that a backward country... must inevitably go through" [7] created a complex objective environment where backwardness and crisis coexisted, providing the ground for the production of revolutionary will. Faced with this reality, Lenin chose to respond with the posture of an active revolutionary. He proposed that Russia’s actual situation made the start of the socialist revolution much easier than in Europe. On the one hand, this was because Russia did not have a powerful capitalist reactionary force like Europe; on the other hand, social contradictions in Russia were more intensified than in Europe, moving closer to the point of revolutionary eruption. In contrast, Europe was in a relatively peaceful state, and many of the "backward masses" were heavily influenced by bourgeois-democratic and parliamentary prejudices, leaving their revolutionary will relatively weak. The Russian masses were less dominated by various notions and prejudices in the pre-revolutionary period and were in a state of "ignorance," making it easy for their revolutionary will to be produced under backward conditions. Lenin argued that "backwardness is precisely an advantage" for the Russian socialist revolution from the angles of social contradictions and revolutionary will. However, unlike the Russian Narodnik [8] thinkers who advocated for "village commune socialism," Lenin limited the advantage of backwardness to the outbreak phase of the revolution; he did not entirely negate the role of capitalism as the Narodniks did. This shows that Lenin already recognized the adverse effects of insufficient capitalist development on the Russian revolution. He analyzed the role of capitalism in the socialist revolution by dividing it into two stages, believing that the obstacles brought by Russia's backward capitalist development would only gradually appear in the later stages of the revolution, while backwardness remained an advantage in the initial outbreak.

In response to the revolutionary will "manufactured" by Russia by relying on the advantages of backwardness, Kautsky raised doubts at a qualitative level. In August 1918, he published a pamphlet in Vienna titled The Dictatorship of the Proletariat, in which he fiercely criticized the Russian October Revolution and the revolutionary will it shaped. Kautsky believed that the criterion for judging whether a revolutionary will is progressive lies in whether it conforms to Marxist theory and whether it is based on mature objective conditions. Since the Russian revolution did not conform to the basic Marxist conception of socialist revolution, it was non-Marxist. The revolutionary will produced in Russia also lacked a socialist character; it was merely a will full of blindness in the sense of mass psychology, and thus non-progressive in nature. He argued that the Bolsheviks, "by regarding the blind will of the masses as the driving force of the revolution, abandoned the Marxist system they had previously helped to reach such heights." In his view, a true socialist revolutionary will must take material conditions—namely the full development of large-scale enterprises—as its prerequisite and rely on a certain economic base. In such a case, large enterprises dominate society, the number of small enterprises gradually decreases, and the majority of people are forced to pin their hopes on the socialization of production to improve their living conditions; the revolutionary will to implement a socialist revolution naturally "generates" during this process. From this, it is evident that Kautsky closely linked the nature of revolutionary will to the objective conditions of its production, believing that "our desires and capabilities are governed by material conditions... even the strongest will, if it delusions itself into rising above these conditions, is powerless." Therefore, only mature conditions can generate an advanced revolutionary will, while backward conditions must inevitably correspond to blindness and failure.

In contrast, Lenin believed that practice is the standard for judging whether a thing is progressive. Russia before the October Revolution was in a state of exhaustion following the war; to restore economic production as quickly as possible and save the working class, it was necessary to employ a powerful revolutionary will to break through the "weakest link" [9] in the imperialist chain and implement the dictatorship of the proletariat to ensure the working class would not starve or perish. In Lenin's view, the revolutionary will called upon and organized under backward conditions adapted to the needs of Russia's development, thereby manifesting historical necessity and a progressive nature based on reality. What generates naturally is not necessarily in accordance with laws, nor is what is "man-made" necessarily blind; the key lies in whether it accords with reality. Furthermore, does this revolutionary will, starting from Russian reality, violate the basic principles of Marxism as Kautsky claimed? Within the theoretical horizon of Marx and Engels, the analysis of the revolutionary process contains two dimensions: first, the general laws of revolution using Western Europe as the analytical model; and second, the actual revolutionary processes of various countries worldwide. Undoubtedly, the analysis of the Russian revolution cannot merely compare it against general laws; it requires a concrete and meticulous analysis using the method of historical materialism. As Marx stated: "One will never arrive there by using as one's master key a general historico-philosophical theory, the supreme virtue of which consists in being super-historical." [10]

(ii) Shaping Methods: Does Soviet Democracy Forge a "Unified Will" or "Unified Opinions"?

After the victory of the revolution, the newly established Soviet power faced an exceptionally critical external and internal situation, being both isolated and suffering from the effects of war and famine. In this context, Lenin proposed that a "unified will" must be forged, because only if the proletarian masses possessed such a revolutionary will could they achieve their arduous tasks of dictatorship and leadership in a peasant country. Undoubtedly, this "unified will" is indispensable for any great undertaking, especially one in crisis; "unity" is a vital characteristic of revolutionary will in its collective form.

However, within the revolutionary milieu of the proletariat, a unified revolutionary will rarely takes shape spontaneously. On this point, both Kautsky and Lenin once supported the "theory of infusion" [11]—the belief that socialist consciousness should be instilled into the proletariat from the outside, transforming the spontaneous labor movement into a conscious revolutionary movement. In What Is to Be Done?, Lenin even directly quoted Kautsky’s discourse, calling it "profoundly true and important words." Here, socialist consciousness—or the class consciousness of the proletariat—manifests concretely in the revolutionary cause as the revolutionary will. Yet, regarding the method of infusion, a massive conceptual divergence existed between Lenin and Kautsky. Lenin placed greater emphasis on forging proletarian class consciousness through the trials of discipline in actual revolutionary struggle and administrative work. Kautsky, conversely, believed that the revolutionary will to realize socialism should be generated naturally through parliamentary democracy; he emphasized methods of propaganda and education so that the proletariat might form a unified will on the basis of free will.

In Lenin’s vision, the revolutionary "unified will" was results-oriented, with the focus on using "unified will" to drive "unified action" to transform Russia’s state of crisis. Therefore, it was both a law summarized from revolutionary history and experience, and a consideration rooted in Russian reality. Through the 1905 Revolution, the February Revolution, and the October Revolution, Soviet democracy gradually established itself as an organizational form of state power, proving in practice that the method of will-shaping advocated by Lenin—characterized by rigorous discipline and the centralized leadership of professional revolutionaries—possessed formidable combat effectiveness. Starting from Russia’s backward conditions, Lenin pointed out that for the proletariat to forge a revolutionary will capable of tackling special tasks in a short time, they had to employ special methods and means. This mode of shaping had two primary characteristics. First, it emphasized centralized democracy. Lenin believed that in the face of an exceptionally urgent revolutionary situation, the revolutionary will of the proletariat must sometimes even manifest as the will of a single person. This was the most efficient way: "the will of a class is sometimes fulfilled by a dictator, who sometimes does more alone and is often more necessary." [12] Second, it stressed the "ordeal of discipline"—that is, shaping the revolutionary will of the proletariat through work rather than through books. Lenin argued: "Only such criticism... is useful and effective revolutionary work; it educates the 'leaders' to be worthy of the working class and the laboring masses, and it educates the masses, teaching them to correctly analyze the political situation and understand the often extremely complex tasks arising from it." Due to the urgency of the work and the backwardness of the Russian working class in terms of organizational management experience and cultural level, the working class had to grow rapidly through revolutionary struggle and practical work to build the foundations of socialism. This "conscious construction of the foundations by the broad masses of workers" did not mean "they picked up a book or read a pamphlet. Consciousness here is expressed in their own efforts, in their own hands-on engagement with an extraordinarily difficult undertaking, making thousands of mistakes, where each mistake both makes them suffer and tempers them in industrial management." To sum up, both before and immediately after the victory of the revolution, Lenin focused primarily on how Russia could obtain and consolidate proletarian rule in the short term. From this starting point, one could not wait for the proletariat to slowly mature alongside the development of the productive forces, nor could one simply adopt theoretical propaganda to educate the masses via books. The most important educational task was to teach workers self-sacrifice, conscious discipline, and endurance of hardship, allowing the proletariat to forge an ironclad, realistic revolutionary will within the "boiling pot of practical life."

Regarding the mode of shaping the Soviet revolutionary will—especially its democratic theory—Kautsky expressed clear opposition in The Dictatorship of the Proletariat. First, Kautsky pointed out that what the Soviets produced was not a "unified will" but merely "unified opinion." Only under a system of universal suffrage in a "pure democracy," ensuring the "free will" of the people, could the generation of a truly mature revolutionary will of the proletariat be promoted. Kautsky believed that "unified will" must first be built on the foundation of "free will." In his view, socialism meant "freedom and bread for all," and "the need for freedom and self-determination is as much a part of human nature as the need for food." Russia’s attempt to transition to so-called socialism without pain by manufacturing a "unified will" was merely a forced exclusion and restriction of all dissenting voices. This would not eliminate inherent contradictions; rather, it led to civil war and caused even greater destruction to the country's already backward material base. Second, Kautsky pointed out that the realization of a socialist revolution must be based on "pure democracy" rather than the democracy of a small minority; the socialist will, at the very least, cannot violate the "will of the majority." He argued that under the Soviet regime of the time, "only a very small stratum of the proletariat is struggling, but they are filled with the highest degree of theoretical interest and enthusiasm inspired by noble goals." This was not, in fact, an expression of revolutionary will but merely a struggle to secure privileges for themselves. The revolutionary will of socialism should be realized on the basis of the expressed will of the absolute majority. In short, for Kautsky, the method of shaping the revolutionary will was paramount; one could not simply emphasize the realization of socialist goals while ignoring the legitimacy of the means.

In response to Kautsky's views, in November of the same year that Kautsky’s The Dictatorship of the Proletariat was published, Lenin published the long article "The Proletarian Revolution and the Renegade Kautsky" in Pravda, attacking Kautsky’s concept of "pure democracy" and further elaborating the theory of the dictatorship of the proletariat. Upon reading Lenin's response, Kautsky published Terrorism and Communism in June 1919, intensifying his criticism of the October Revolution. He proposed that "the success of a revolution will largely depend on whether it can find the correct method to communicate the revolutionary mission to the proletariat." At that time, Russia did not yet possess the conditions to cultivate such a revolutionary will; its revolutionary leaders lacked practical experience, and the revolutionary masses remained ignorant and uncultured. Kautsky believed that only the more large-scale enterprise developed and the higher the degree of democracy (referring here to "pure democracy") became, the more sufficient the possibility of producing a revolutionary will and the masses' ability to exercise that will would be. "The democratic education and training of the masses and their leaders is a necessary condition for implementing socialism. It is impossible to jump from autocracy into a socialist society in one step."

It can be said that as the question of revolutionary will increasingly became an issue of practical application, the theoretical divide between "manufacturing" and "generation" in Lenin and Kautsky became increasingly evident and irreconcilable. The reasons for their divergence were, to a considerable extent, closely related to their respective roles and horizons. In this debate, Lenin was an active participant and leader of the Russian Revolution; his thinking took the objective existence of the revolutionary subject itself as its premise. Kautsky's rebuttal, however, proceeded from the perspective of an onlooker, occurring under the condition of a substitution of the subject. While the eye of the onlooker might more easily judge the revolution from the perspective of logical rigor, it is also highly prone to epistemological bias. When reflecting on the internal contradictions and crises of a revolution, "one must explore the errors of revolutionaries by combining revolutionary strategy and tactics with concrete situations, rather than making a totalizing negation of the revolution based on general principles of freedom and human rights."

(3) Limits of Efficacy: Does the Will of the Revolutionary and War Periods Apply to Socialist Construction?

In their "skipping" [13] hypothesis, Marx and Engels mentioned that although Russia could avoid the disastrous fluctuations brought by the capitalist system, it needed to "appropriate all the positive achievements created by the capitalist system." As a "natural historical process," the developmental stage of the productive forces cannot be skipped. However, regarding how to appropriate the advanced productive forces created by the capitalist system, and how to develop when they have not yet been appropriated, Marx and Engels did not provide sufficient discussion. To some extent, this provided new theoretical space and historical tasks for the construction of socialism in backward countries in reality.

In Lenin's view, for backward Russia, the construction of socialism was likewise a revolution; therefore, the powerful will of the revolutionary period had to be sustained. On the one hand, this was necessitated by Russia’s arduous reality. Lenin pointed out that the Russian Revolution under conditions of backwardness and crisis was easy to start but difficult to complete. In socialist construction, it was still necessary to maintain the revolutionary will through collective effort and to implement a relatively more difficult revolution—namely, "applying this unity of will to industry and agriculture," strengthening organizational work and creative production, consolidating the fruits of the revolutionary victory, and building a "socialist fortress" for the arrival of the European revolution. Lenin noted that the revolutionary will generated under difficult conditions was not only a permissive condition for the occurrence of the socialist political revolution but would also help Russia—which was backward yet at the vanguard of the world revolution—solve a series of production and organizational problems. "Since the state has achieved a decisive victory on the military front, it should use military methods to fulfill economic tasks." Guided by this thinking, a series of War Communism policies and the revolutionary will spawned by war were applied to the defense of the Soviet Russian regime. Although the revolutionary will produced as a "survival choice" carried more characteristics of being "man-made," Lenin believed that the War Communism policy was "a merit" under the objective conditions of Russia at that time.

On the other hand, the continuation of revolutionary will during the period of socialist construction reflects the powerful inertia of social consciousness. North once summarized institutional inertia as "path dependency" [14]; the reason this institutional path dependency can hold true is largely related to the inertia of social consciousness. In Russia during the early days of revolutionary victory, inspired by revolutionary enthusiasm, people believed that since using extraordinary measures—especially a tenacious revolutionary will—could achieve military victory and defend Soviet power, why could these extraordinary measures not continue to be used as a shortcut to building socialism? Driven by this idea, from the leadership down to the common people, all of Russia was permeated with a powerful confidence in extending the role of revolutionary will to the cause of socialist construction.

In response to this view, Kautsky wrote the article "The National Assembly and the Soviet Congress" at the end of 1918, opposing the Soviet use of political revolutionary logic to carry out the work of social revolution, and proposing that the form of a National Assembly should be utilized to lead the country out of its state of turmoil. He acknowledged the great achievements of the revolutionary will in the Bolsheviks' seizure of power but argued that this will could only play a temporary role. If extended to the second stage of the revolution, it would spawn a "barracks socialism." Therefore, after the proletariat seized power, it should immediately transform the wartime revolutionary will into an investigation of actual conditions, striving to use existing conditions to create the factors that would "generate" a socialist revolutionary will; it must never "risk economic failure for the sake of a justified ultimate goal." Thus, in Kautsky’s theory, socialist construction must emphasize the importance of laws over will, and "generation" over "manufacturing." The previous stage of the revolution might succeed by luck through pure violence and primitive impulse, but development in the latter stage requires a whole set of material and spiritual conditions. To expect to continue promoting economic and cultural development through the enthusiasm of revolutionary will would bring many dangers to the revolution.

Kautsky’s criticism of the "strong-will" developmental model remaining in Russia after the October Revolution is thought-provoking, but it also has limitations. He only saw the deviation of the War Communism policy in terms of ideology and mental inertia, failing to recognize its considerations in the sense of a "survival choice." In recent years, as research on Lenin has deepened, people have gradually transformed their understanding of War Communism measures. To a large extent, they were not a "shortcut" that Lenin intended to use to push Soviet Russia "along the current" into pure socialism, but were rather a means of coping with the hardships of socialist construction in Soviet Russia. In the later New Economic Policy and his final reflections, Lenin further explored questions of "direct transition" and "indirect transition," cultural revolution and cultural construction, Soviet democracy, and institutional reform, providing precious intellectual wealth for the construction of socialism in economically and culturally backward countries.

III. The Internal Logic of Revolutionary Will and the Divergence in the Conception of Historical Materialism

Viewing this historical debate between Lenin and Kautsky through the lens of revolutionary will allows for a clearer observation of their theoretical divergence across the two dimensions of "fabrication" and "generation." Furthermore, the disagreement between Kautsky and Lenin involves their differing understandings of historical materialism.

(1) The Counter-Correction of Historical Dialectics against "Economic Fatalism"

As a form of social ideology, the different ways of interpreting revolutionary will stem primarily from differentiated understandings of the relationship between the economic base and the superstructure in the materialist conception of history. In this debate centered on revolutionary will, both Lenin and Kautsky acknowledged Russia's backwardness, yet they arrived at starkly different judgments regarding the revolutionary situation of the time. Kautsky believed Lenin had committed an "idealist" error, ignoring the immaturity of revolutionary conditions and overemphasizing the role of will and determination; Lenin, conversely, called Kautsky a "man in a case" [15], who one-sidedly seized upon the end of economic necessity and attempted to interpret revolutionary practice strictly according to a schema of productive forces prescribed by theory.

In 1927, Kautsky completed the three volumes of The Materialist Conception of History. This work concentrated his understanding of historical materialism, emphasizing "materialism" as the theoretical foothold and opposing the practices of the Paris Commune and the October Revolution for placing too much importance on revolutionary will. On one hand, he strove to draw a line between himself and the economic determinists and Neo-Kantians of the time; on the other hand, he exhibited a tendency toward economic fatalism by emphasizing "economic conditions" and "economic development." He argued that although social-historical development is not determined by a single economic factor, it is "dependent upon certain economic conditions," and socialist practice should be no different. He contended: "According to Marx’s view of history, socialism is the product of special economic conditions, that is, a product of highly developed industrial capitalism. A mass movement cannot be fabricated by the subjective will of a few individuals; even if they possess self-sacrificing spirit and perseverance, it is to no avail." Furthermore, although Kautsky pointed out the unified relationship between objective economy and subjective will, he understood "will" more as a life requirement—the basis for adjusting the development direction of the relations of production. That is to say, for Kautsky, while human will is important, it absolutely cannot allow the "omnipotence of violence" to leap over the limits of economic development. The reaction of human will upon the development of production and human development is also very limited; if one does not conform to the law of the economic base determining the superstructure, it will bring about great harm. This led Kautsky to take it for granted that Russia, under backward conditions, could not produce a socialist, progressive revolutionary will.

One could say that materialism is the most critical element within the Marxist materialist conception of history. However, overemphasizing the "unavoidability" and "unstoppability" of social development under specific economic conditions inevitably leads Marxism toward an "economic fatalism." Kautsky’s advocacy for waiting for the natural generation of revolutionary will is, to some extent, precisely an expression of the economic fatalist materialism he held.

In contrast, Lenin emphatically developed the historical dialectical thinking within the materialist conception of history, stressing the handling of the dialectical relationship between the economic base and the superstructure based on human social history itself. Guided by this historical dialectic, Lenin continuously explored the path toward the victory of the proletarian revolution in backward Russia, proposing that "the world does not satisfy man, and man decides to change it by his activity," thus exalting human subjective agency. However, this did not mean Lenin denied the decisive role of the economic base; he posited that "only by reducing social relations to relations of production and the latter to the level of the productive forces, could one have a firm basis for regarding the development of social formations as a process of natural history." Lenin regarded economic theory as the "skeleton" of the materialist conception of history and, on this basis, further indicated the need to "trace the superstructure appropriate to these relations of production in all its parts, to clothe the skeleton in flesh and blood," thereby demonstrating the dialectical unity of the economic base and the superstructure. Faced with Russia's specific revolutionary tasks, Lenin emphasized the role of the superstructure beyond the "skeleton," pointing out that viewing problems politically is of equal importance to viewing them economically, because "politics is a concentrated expression of economics," and "a class cannot maintain its rule, and consequently cannot settle its production problem, unless it takes the correct political approach."

It was precisely through historical dialectics that Lenin found the logical pivot for the success of the Russian proletarian revolution. His understanding of the Russian "leap" went beyond specific issues such as the rural commune and focused on using the methodology provided by Marx and Engels to conduct a seek truth from facts analysis of the process of socialist revolution. As a theorist and revolutionary practitioner who "worked dialectically," Lenin not only criticized the erroneous tendencies of Kautskyism regarding revolution and revolutionary will but also perceived the root of the problem, achieving a counter-correction of Kautskyist economic fatalism.

(2) The Relationship Between the General and the Particular in the Analysis of the Actual Revolutionary Process

The materialist conception of history is the science of the general laws of human historical development, as well as the scientific methodology for guiding the study of specific social formations. In applying the materialist conception of history to analyze the actual socialist revolution, Kautsky, who supported the "generation" theory, emphasized general laws, whereas Lenin, who supported the "fabrication" theory, emphasized national characteristics. This led to a massive divergence between them on issues such as whether the October Revolution violated the basic principles of Marxism. How to correctly handle the relationship between the general and the particular in the analysis of actual revolution is a crucial issue in their debate over revolutionary will.

When discussing revolutionary will, Kautsky particularly emphasized general laws. In his view, Marx’s point in Capital that a society "can neither leap over the natural phases of its development nor shuffle them out of the world by decrees" is an insurmountable general law of actual social development; the revolutionary development of all countries in the world should follow this ideal model, or else failure would ensue. From this standpoint, Kautsky, on one hand, resolutely denied the necessity and legitimacy of the October Revolution, believing that Lenin relied too heavily on revolutionary will and ignored the necessary prerequisites for the occurrence of socialist revolution. On the other hand, he criticized Lenin for holding excessively high expectations for European revolution, pointing out that hoping to popularize the Russian revolutionary experience to European countries was unrealistic and full of utopianism. Kautsky believed that what was truly universal was the practice of Western European countries like Britain, France, and Germany, and that this "general" should prescribe the Russian "particular." Facts proved that Kautsky's predictions regarding the Russian proletarian revolution and the world revolutionary process had some merit, but also possessed obvious mechanized and simplistic tendencies, which were closely related to his understanding of the materialist conception of history.

Lenin placed more emphasis on revealing special laws based on the general laws of historical development, believing that "revolution cannot be made to order." In Lenin’s view, the significant value of the materialist conception of history lay in discarding "arguments about society in general and progress in general" and focusing on the scientific analysis of "one society (capitalist society) and one progress (capitalist progress)." Under this line of thought, Lenin always emphasized that the Russian October Revolution was a revolution possessing particularity, while Kautsky’s problem lay precisely in ignoring the complex social-historical phenomena of various countries and overemphasizing theoretical generality and abstraction. Lenin pointed out: "If Kautsky had wanted to argue in a serious and honest manner, he would have asked himself: Are there historical laws governing revolutions which admit of no exception? And the reply would have been: No, there are no such laws." Therefore, when applying the materialist conception of history to analyze the specific development process of the proletarian revolution, one must correctly handle the relationship between the general sequence and specific steps, between the general and the particular, and—taking into account the resultant of historical forces—add back what had been abstracted away. Lenin later explicitly proposed in Our Revolution: "The general laws of world history... by no means exclude, but on the contrary, presuppose the possibility that individual stages of development may manifest peculiarities either in form or in the order of development." This profound thought of Lenin’s had a far-reaching influence on the subsequent socialist movement.

(3) How to Understand the Relationship Between the Scientific and Revolutionary Nature of the Materialist Conception of History

In the debate between Lenin and Kautsky, the more fundamental divergence lay in their different understandings of the scientific and revolutionary nature of the materialist conception of history. As a student of Marx and Engels, Kautsky dedicated his life to the study and interpretation of the materialist conception of history and was one of the most important theorists of the Second International. Lenin had once commented: "We know from many of Kautsky’s works that he knew how to be a Marxist historian; and that such works of his will remain the permanent possession of the proletariat in spite of his subsequent apostasy." However, Kautsky had deviations in his understanding of the materialist conception of history, especially regarding the relationship between its scientific and revolutionary nature, which manifested in his perception of the October Revolution and revolutionary will. This was also one of the important reasons why he gradually moved from being a Marxist to becoming a social democrat.

Kautsky understood the materialist conception of history as a science without philosophy. In his correspondence with Russian workers, he once revealed an affinity for Machism [16], suggesting that "Marxism is not a philosophy, but an empirical science, a special view of society," and that the materialist conception of history is a science that "abolishes philosophy," while philosophy "strives to establish the unity of thought in the world process, a unity which science cannot prove." The science Kautsky understood was incompatible with philosophy; the ultimate result of this perception was the reduction of the materialist conception of history to a form of naturalistic or positivist scientism. Looking at Kautsky’s personal intellectual trajectory, he admitted that in his early years, he was a faithful follower of Darwin and confessed that "my historical theory is nothing but the application of Darwinism to social development." Although Kautsky later strove to purge the Darwinian influence from his materialist conception of history alongside his intellectual transition, from some of his specific viewpoints, his understanding of the materialist conception of history remained saturated with naturalistic colors, using evolutionary thought to understand social history. He believed that human society is a "special part of nature with special laws, and these laws, if one wishes, can be called natural laws, for in essence, the former are no different from the latter." This understanding, when reflected in practical revolutionary issues, manifested as a mechanized interpretation of general laws and economic necessity, viewing revolutionary will likewise as a product of "natural evolution" and "natural generation," while ignoring the creative role of humans in the social-historical process. Furthermore, influenced by the positivist trend of the time, Kautsky regarded Marxism as "pure science" and "applied science," thereby pitting the scientific nature of the materialist conception of history against its revolutionary nature. This tendency was particularly prominent in his discussions on democracy, such as emphasizing general democracy in an abstract sense, opposing class-based interpretations, and valuing the politics of the statistical majority.

Marxism is the theory regarding the liberation of the proletariat and the liberation of humanity, which dictates that Marxism is a science characterized by the unity of scientific and revolutionary nature. Lenin once pointed out that one of the outstanding values of Marxist theory lay in "the fact that it combines the quality of being strictly and supremely scientific (being the last word in social science) with that of being revolutionary." Lenin linked the fate of the materialist conception of history more closely with the liberation of the proletariat, keenly recognizing Marx and Engels’ emphasis on the revolutionary subject and class consciousness in their analysis of the revolutionary path and strategy. From this, he formed a proletarian revolutionary theory with a strong sense of Party spirit and class character, leading the Bolshevik Party and the people to the victory of the October Socialist Revolution.

Conclusion

As Lenin pointed out when analyzing the social roots of Kautskyism, "Kautskyism is not a fortuitous phenomenon, but a social product of the contradictions within the Second International." In the era Lenin lived in, many new changes occurred in capitalism, posing many new questions for the proletarian revolution. The debate between Lenin and Kautsky around the issue of revolutionary will was an epitome of the struggle between Russian Marxism and the "orthodox Marxism" of the Second International. In this debate, Lenin provided in-depth interpretations of major theoretical issues such as the general laws and particularities of world history, the level of development of productive forces and socialist revolution, and revolutionary will and the "leaping" of backward countries. This provided a scientific guide for the Russian Revolution and for socialist construction after the victory of the revolution.

As stated above, according to Lenin’s interpretation, Marx’s idea that the high development of productive forces is a practical prerequisite for a socialist revolution reveals the general laws of world-historical development, while the different manifestation in Russia’s developmental sequence represents a particularity occurring within world history. However, after the October Revolution, the victory of socialist revolution in relatively backward countries became the "general," while victory in developed countries became the "particular." Mao Zedong further developed Lenin's thought based on the historical experience of the Chinese revolution and the world socialist movement. From late 1959 to early 1960, during his talks while reading the Soviet Textbook on Political Economy, Mao Zedong once said: "Up until now, among the countries where socialist revolution has succeeded, only East Germany and Czechoslovakia had relatively high levels of capitalist development; in the other countries, the levels of capitalist development were all relatively low. In Western countries where the level of capitalist development is very high, revolutions have not taken place at all." [17] "The history of all revolutions proves that it is not first having fully developed new productive forces and then transforming backward relations of production; rather, it is first necessary to create public opinion, carry out revolution, and seize political power, only after which is it possible to eliminate the old relations of production. Once the old relations of production are eliminated and new relations of production are established, this opens the path for the development of new productive forces." To first "seize political power, then resolve the issue of ownership, and then greatly develop the productive forces—this is a general law." History is the concrete unity of subject and object, unfolding specifically within a certain historical structure through the creative activity of the subject. The "general law" emphasized by Mao Zedong—first creating public opinion and carrying out revolution, and then developing productive forces after seizing power—highlights the important role of the will of revolutionaries as subjects of historical activity in social revolution.

Just as Lenin quoted the famous saying of the Russian revolutionist Chernyshevsky [18] after the victory of the October Revolution, "historical activity is not the pavement of the Nevsky Prospekt"; there is no level road to travel. Socialist construction after the victory of the revolution still possesses the characteristics described by Lenin as "easy to begin but difficult to complete" and "easy to seize power but difficult to build"; it still requires carrying out "great struggle" and advancing the "great social revolution." This requires the Marxist governing party to continue maintaining its revolutionary spirit and revolutionary fighting will, leading the people to create history and push society forward with a historical consciousness [19] that unifies the grasping of historical laws with the mastery of historical initiative. As Xi Jinping has pointed out: "Historical development has its laws, but people are not purely passive or inactive within it. As long as we grasp the laws and general trends of historical development, seize the opportunities of historical change, act in accordance with the trend, and act with vigor, we will be able to advance better." The spirit of great struggle [20] centrally embodies the spiritual character of the Chinese Communists throughout their century of struggle, running through the various periods of Chinese revolution, construction, and reform. Persisting in and developing Socialism with Chinese Characteristics in the New Era is an arduous and great social revolution; it is necessary to carry out a "great struggle with many new historical characteristics." Xi Jinping has repeatedly emphasized the need to "cultivate and maintain a tenacious spirit of struggle, a resilient will to struggle, and superb fighting skills," to "grasp the historical characteristics of the new great struggle, carry forward the spirit of struggle, grasp the direction of struggle, grasp the initiative of struggle, strengthen the will to struggle, master the laws of struggle, and enhance fighting skills, so as to effectively respond to major challenges, resist major risks, overcome major obstacles, and resolve major contradictions," opening up new horizons for the development of our cause through a revolutionary spirit of struggle and will to struggle. Since the 18th National Congress of the CPC, our Party has firmly grasped the historical initiative in the development of the cause of the Party and the state, persisting in and developing Socialism with Chinese Characteristics in the New Era with greater composure, confidence, and wisdom. We have created the great achievements of the first decade of the New Era, and the process toward comprehensively building a great modern socialist country and achieving the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation has entered an irreversible historical course.