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Book cover for Lenin and the Revolutionary Party
Book cover for Lenin and the Revolutionary Party
Lenin and the Revolutionary Party
For generations, historians of the right, left, and center have all debated the best way to understand V. I. Lenin’s role in shaping the Bolshevik party in the years leading up to the Russian Revolution. At their worst, these studies locate his influence in the forcefulness of his personality. At their best, they show how Lenin moved other Bolsheviks through patient argument and political debate. Yet remarkably few have attempted to document the ways his ideas changed, or how they were in turn shaped by the party he played such a central role in building.

In this thorough, concise, and accessible introduction to Lenin’s theory and practice of revolutionary politics, Paul Le Blanc gives a vibrant sense of the historical context of the socialist movement (in Russia and abroad) from which Lenin’s ideas about revolutionary organization spring. What emerges from Le Blanc’s partisan yet measured account is an image of a collaborative, ever adaptive, and dynamically engaged network of revolutionary activists who formed the core of the Bolshevik party.
Reviews
  • Praise for Lenin and the Revolutionary Party:

    "A work of unusual strength and coherence, inspired not by academic neutrality but by the deep conviction that there is much to learn from the actual ideas and experiences of Lenin and the revolutionary party he led.”
    —Michael Löwy

    Praise for Revolution, Democracy, Socialism:

    “We desperately need the resurrection and revival of the kind of strategic thinking and principled commitment that Lenin epitomised in the era of 1917, and all that it promised. For those interested in this rebirth of the politics of alternative to capitalism, Paul Le Blanc's account of the democratic, socialist, and revolutionary Lenin will prove indispensable. Reading it is a reminder that what is, need not be, and that what has, seemingly, failed, can be reconstituted anew.”
    —Bryan Palmer

    Praise for Marx, Lenin and the Revolutionary Experience:

    “Looking back at the tumultuous events associated with revolutionary Marxism in the past century, Paul Le Blancoffers us an insightful, sympathetic, and even-handed assessment of the sources of its dynamism as well as the causes of its decline.”
    —Walden Bello
  • Praise for Lenin and the Revolutionary Party:

    "A work of unusual strength and coherence, inspired not by academic neutrality but by the deep conviction that there is much to learn from the actual ideas and experiences of Lenin and the revolutionary party he led.”
    —Michael Löwy

    Praise for Revolution, Democracy, Socialism:

    “We desperately need the resurrection and revival of the kind of strategic thinking and principled commitment that Lenin epitomised in the era of 1917, and all that it promised. For those interested in this rebirth of the politics of alternative to capitalism, Paul Le Blanc's account of the democratic, socialist, and revolutionary Lenin will prove indispensable. Reading it is a reminder that what is, need not be, and that what has, seemingly, failed, can be reconstituted anew.”
    —Bryan Palmer

    Praise for Marx, Lenin and the Revolutionary Experience:

    “Looking back at the tumultuous events associated with revolutionary Marxism in the past century, Paul Le Blancoffers us an insightful, sympathetic, and even-handed assessment of the sources of its dynamism as well as the causes of its decline.”
    —Walden Bello

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