THE EXTENT OF HOW DIFFERENT LENIN AND TROTSKY'S IDEAS WERE

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George Nyarko

Grade 11

        THE EXTENT OF HOW DIFFERENT LENIN AND TROTSKY’S IDEAS WERE

Trotsky, even whilst working under the flag of the Bolsheviks party, was said to have opposing ideas to that of the party’s patron, Lenin. These differences were further pointed out in J.V. Stalin’s speech “Trotskyism or Leninism”. It’s on this motion, that this essay discusses to what extent were the ideas of Lenin and Trotsky different.

The main most discussed difference between Lenin and Trotsky was Trotsky’s theory of permanent revolution, which signifies “that the complete and genuine solution of the their task of achieving democracy and national emancipation is conceivable only through the dictatorship of the proletariat as the leader of the subjugated nation, above all its peasant masses”. With this Trotsky was implying that for a revolution to occur, it all depended on the efforts of the proletariat. He expressed the proletariat as the main force behind every revolution and that even though in alliance with the mass peasantry, it is only achievable as a dictatorship of the proletariat that leads the peasant masses behind it. This idea however differs with that of Lenin, because from his point of view the passing of the first stage of revolution, of which the proletariats place power in the hands of the bourgeoisie to the second stage where power, is placed “in the hands of the proletariat and the poorest sections of the peasants”. This shows that Lenin unlike Trotsky saw the mass peasants as an important asset to the proletariat, in any revolution. Therefore, the main difference between these two ideas, were how much emphasis both placed on the peasants as the backbone of the proletariat. However, it is also speculated that Trotsky, during the 1905 revolution, held a slogan “Neither Tsar nor Zemtsi (i.e. liberals), but the People! I.e. a slogan embracing the workers and peasants, which are contrary to the ideas of Trotsky us discussing now. However, evaluating both ideas from the two leaders, there isn’t really much difference, since both of them placed much more emphasis on the proletariat in achieving a revolution than the peasants. The slight difference between this two ideas is of how vital is the peasants role in the revolution, whereby Lenin takes more into the consideration the peasants, whiles Trotsky considers the proletariat as the sole and major force in the revolution.

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Apart from the above stated point, I think the best way to find the difference between these two leaders’ ideology, is to distinguish between their aims, objectives and methods. Although these are all intertwined in the first paragraph, I would like to place more emphasis on each category in this paragraph. Beginning with Lenin, the text showed that Lenin was more interested in educating the public about the errors the Provisional government omitted which I prove by Lenin’s statement “I attacked the Provisional Government for not having appointed an early date or any date at all, for the convocation of ...

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