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Lenin's Critique of Narodnik Sociology

Richard Swedberg Crit Sociol 1979 8: 52 DOI: 10.1177/089692057900800405 The online version of this article can be found at: http://crs.sagepub.com/content/8/4/52.citation

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52

LENINS CRITIQUE OF NARODNIK SOCIOLOGY

Richard

Swedberg

Lenins writings on Narodnik sociology are rarely mentioned today. This is unfortunate for two distinct reasons: first, these writings contain a quite thorough Marxist analysis of early academic sociology, and second, the now well-known Marxist

concept of &dquo;social formation&dquo; is introduced in them

for the first time.

Marxists who read if Lenins critique here was centered on what he saw as three problems with Narodnik sociology: (1 ) its subjectivism, (2) its moralism, and (3) its use of what can be called idealistic abstractions. A brief outline of all three follows.

By taking a close look at these writitngs by Lenin, this article hopes to show that they deserve a far better reception in the annals of social thought than they have had up to this point.
Many of Lenins works in the 1890s were directed against Narodnik ideology. The Narodniki (&dquo;friends of the people&dquo;) were part of the Russian

LENINS

CRITIQUE

OF

&dquo;SUBJECTIVE
own

SOCIOLOG Y&dquo;
The Narodnik thinkers called their
-

doctrine

bourgeois intelligentsia, a group which had been both progressive and revolutionary in the
mid-1800s. The Narodniki advocated a form of utopian peasant socialism and set their hopes on an alliance between the progressive intelligentsia and the peasant masses. Capitalism and industrialism, they believed, could and must be stopped. In the 1890s, when the Russian working class began to stir, the Narodnik analysis was becoming outmoded, and Lenin attacked it in various writings. He criticized its views on politics, economics, and sociology. The most famous of these critiques is The Development of Capitalism in Russia (1899), in which Lenin tried to show that capitalism not only was inevitable in Russia but also carried the seeds of 2 its own destruction within it.2 Lenins criticism of Narodnik sociology appears primarily in two writings: What the &dquo;Friends of the People&dquo; Are (1894) and The Economic Content of Narodism (1895).3 Of the two works, What the &dquo;Friends of the People&dquo; Are is of special interest; it is Lenins main work in this context and is usually the one quoted. However, the second chapter of The Economic Content of Narodism, entitled &dquo;A Criticism of Narodnik Sociology,&dquo; is quite relevant and inforrhative too; it contains some sharp ideas on the relation between Marxism and bourgeois sociology. The concept of social-economic formation,&dquo; which constituties Lenins major counter-concept to bourgeois sociology, is first outlined in What the &dquo;Friends of the People&dquo; Are and later used in The Development of_Capitalism in Russia. What the &dquo;Friends of the People&dquo; Are was written during the Spring and Summer of 1894 and was Lenin,? first major work. The details of its printing, writirag, and reception in Russian circles are somewhat unclear, but it is known that it made a strong and positive impression on the Russian

&dquo;subjective sociology.&dquo; By this they meant that they in the words of Mikhailovsky, their foremost theoretician - put &dquo;the living individual with his thoughts and feelings&dquo; in the center of the analysis.6 To Lenin this conception was totally insufficient and
at best
a

platitude.

In Lenins

opinion,

one

should

instead place emphasis on what determines the &dquo;thoughts and feelings&dquo; of the individual. Marx had succeeded in doing exactly this, according to Lenin, and thereby had &dquo;for the first time made a scientific sociology possible.&dquo; Marx had discovered that the key to the development of each society should be sought in its social-economic formation and that peoples consciousnesses actually counted for verb little in a societys development. This did not mean that the individual could not affect the outcome of social events - Lenin clarified this point in his
discussion of what &dquo;objectivism&dquo; from a Marxist perspective.8 What it did mean was that the individual could only be effective within the limits defined by the class struggle. Since the Narodnik sociologists were hot of the opinion that society had an economic basis, they were in Lenins mind incapable of making a proper analysis. The &dquo;subjective sociologists,&dquo; Lenin argued, were essentially unable to distinguish a relevant fact from an irrelevent one: &dquo;Hitherto, (that is, until the discoveries of Marx), sociologists had found it difficult to distinguish the important and the unimportant in the complex network of social phenomena (that is the root of subjectivism in sociology) ....&dquo;9 As a result, the Narodniki ended up being empty empiricists: &dquo;Their science (is) at best only a description of (ideological) phenomena, a collection of raw material.&dquo; Subjectivism, according to Lenin, thus confined the sociologist to the surface of society, and often supplied him /her with a heap of facts (s)he did not know what to do with. Even worse, subjectivism made the sociologist blind to his/her own role in the class struggle. As Lenin wrote: &dquo;it would be a

interesting

means

53
departure from the materialist method were I, when criticizing the views of the friends of the people, to confine myself to contrasting their ideas with the Marxist ideas. One must in addition explain the
our

Narodnik ideas, demonstrate the MATERIAL basis in social-economic relations.&dquo;&dquo; The narodnik method in sociology, according to Lenin, was not only subjectivistic but moralistic. The &dquo;subjective sociologists&dquo; had a certain ideal of what society should look like &dquo;Sociology must start with some utopia,&dquo; Mikhailovsky put it.2 They compared the existing society to their ideal and found society wanting. In Lenins opinion, this method was totally wrong and reminiscent of the one used by preMarxist socialists. Lenin objected to the fact that the Narodniki constructed an ideal society first and then criticized the existing society according to this ideal. This way of looking at reality, Lenin said, not only succeeded in misconstruing the true role of morality in the class struggle, but also gave a totally false view of society. The Narodniki, he claimed, were unaware of the strong link between their morality and the society they lived in. Morality is part of the class struggle, Lenin argued, and cannot be posited as an ideal outside it:
-

in general, they argue with the Spencers about the nature of society in general, about the aim and essence of society in general, and so forth.&dquo;&dquo; This way of approaching social reality Lenin found &dquo;absurd&dquo; and &dquo;useless.&dquo;6 Not only did it often entail a disregard for concrete details, but, more significantly, it led the sociologist to focus on the wrong unit of analysis. Lenin wrote, &dquo;The gigantic step forward taken by Marx in this respect consisted precisely in that he discarded all these arguments about society and progess in general and produced a scienfific analysis of one society and of one

society

progress - capitalist.&dquo;17
The accusation that Marx had not solved the riddle of history for all epochs, Lenin impatiently brushed aside; Marx had never aspired to develop a general philosophy of history but only to make a scientific analysis of one specific &dquo;social-economic formation,&dquo; viz. capitalist society. Besides, Lenin argued, the Narodnik sociologists tried to explain all of history and they miserable failed since they used bourgeois categories for all epochs. Using idealist abstractions thus led the Narodnik sociologists astray from the outset, in the sense that they did not know how properly to delimit their research.

The Narodnik
ideas
can

base their arguments on subjectivists &dquo;ideas,&dquo; without bothering about the fact that these
...

The certain reflection of facts from the same ideal; he does not Marxist compare it with &dquo;modern science and moral ideas however (Engels),&dquo; but with the existing class contradictions, and therefore does not formulate it as a demand put forward by &dquo;science,&dquo; but by such and such a class, a demand engendered by such and such social relations. If ideals are not based on facts in this way they will only remain pious wishes, with no chance of being accepted by the masses and, hence, of being 13 realized.3

only be proceeds

...

HOW TO MAKE A SCIENTIFIC ANALYSIS: &dquo;SOCIAL-ECONOMIC FORMATION&dquo;

In his analysis of the Narodniki, Lenin was concerned not only to point out what was wrong with &dquo;subjective sociology,&dquo; but also to demonstrate the
Marxist sociology. This part of Lenins work was centered around the concept of social and economic formation, the &dquo;single fundamental concept (of social science),&dquo; as he put it.8 Lenin sketched the theoretical dimensions of socialeconomic formation in What the &dquo;Friends of the People&dquo; Are and later used the concept in The Development of Capitalism in Russia. The fundamental qualities of a social-economic formation, Lenin claimed, are primarily three: it constitutes an organic whole; it is governed by natural laws; and these laws are centered around its economic development.&dquo; This by no means meant that Lenin took a mechanistic view of socialeconomic formations. He stressed that even though the economic is primary (&dquo;the skeleton&dquo;), the superstructure is indispensable in its own way for the functioning of society (&dquo;the flesh and blood&dquo;).2 Neither did Lenin identify the &dquo;natural sciences; &dquo;the scientific value of (this type of) inquiry lies in disclosing the special (historical) laws that regulate the origin, existence, development, and death of a given social organism....2 Though the concept of social-economic formation was developed theoretically in What the &dquo;Friends of the People&dquo; Are, it achieved concrete formulation in The Development of Capitalism in Russia. Lenins basic purpose in this latter work was to prove that

superiority of

The moralistic stance of the Narodniki, Lenin claimed, prevented them from developing a solid,
concrete picture of Russian society. Once having settled on an idea, Lenin argued, their emphasis shifted from a thorough and detailed analysis of social reality to a simplistic denunciation of it.
the difference between Narodism and Marxism lies criticism of Russian that to criticize capitalism it is sufficient to indicate the existence of exploitation, the interaction between exploitation and politics, etc. The Marxist thinks it necessary to explain and also to link together the phenomena of exploitation as a system of certain relations in production, as a special social-economic formation, the laws of the functioning and development of which have to be studied objec....

wholly in the character of their capitalism. The Narodnik thinks

timely.&dquo;

To summarize: Moralism, in Lenins opinion, prevented the sociologist from presenting a close and realistic picture of society. Finally, Lenin attacked the Narodnik sociologists for using idealistic abstractions. The Subjectivistic School conceived of &dquo;progress&dquo; and &dquo;society&dquo; as a general category: &dquo;... they talk of

54
Russia, as opposed to what the Narodniki claimed, &dquo;bourgeois in essence.&dquo;22 He did this through a concrete and extremely well documented study of Russian society. The skill with which Lenin carried out his analysis has made later Marxists associate
was
census of what means

&dquo;social-economic formation&dquo; exactly

the concept of social-economic formation with a concrete study of society. Lenins accomplishment in this study was very great; he has rightly been seen as the first Marxist to translate successfully the somewhat abstract analysis in Capital into a concrete portrait of society at a specific point of its

development.
Another high point of his study is Lenins of Russias contradictory social structure. Lenin found that even capitalism was becoming the predominant mode of production in Russia, some areas, especially the countryside, still had &dquo;two economic systems.&dquo;23 Russia was in &dquo;a transitional period,&dquo; and this gave birth to &dquo;a whole number of most profound and complicated conflicts and contradictions. &dquo;24 Lenins realization that a society does not consist of one pure mode of production, but instead contains old as well as new econoraic forms, was a major achievement in social

analysis

though

exists among Marxist scholars. The reasons for this are the following: Lenin developed the more interesting aspects of this concept in his study of Russia and not in the theoretical What the &dquo;Friends of the People&dquo; Are; and in The Development of Capitalism in Russia, as well as in many of his best writings, Lenin was not specifically concerned with giving definitions or drawing methodological conclusions from his work. Here, as elsewhere, Lenin was more concerned with understanding the concrete problems of the Russian class struggle. The notion of social-economic formation was little discussed, however, after Lenins use of it. But since World War II, the concept has more or less seen a renaissance. This was especially the case in France and Italy, where in the early 1970s &dquo;socialeconomic formation&dquo; became the focus of a debate within the French and Italian communist parties. 26 No concensus emerged, however, as to the exact meaning of the concept. This confusion in itself, though, is an argument for a revival of Lenins original writings on Narodnik sociology and the concept of social-economic formation.

thought.
In short, the concept of social-economic formation is valuable primarily in that it allows one to get closer to the concrete, always specific, historical reality. It is the natural point of departure for every concrete Marxist study of society and helps the researcher to take the first step in his/her analysis. As Godelier so aptly states it:
The notion of &dquo;social and economic formation,&dquo; it seems to me, is first of all a concept that can be used to analyze specific, concrete historical realities as they exist at a To certain time in one historically determined period
...

FOOTNOTES
1. The standard work is Franco Venturi, Roots of Revolution:
a

His.

social and economic analysis) means, from the Marxist point of view, to scientifically prepare to:

produce (such

identify the number and nature of the various modes of production that exist in a specific combination within a certain society and which constitute the economic basis during a special period;
1.

2.

identify the various elements of the social and ideological superstructure that correspond to these modes of production by virtue of their origin and functioning ;
3. define the exact combination of these modes of

tory of Populist and Socialist Movements In Nineteenth Century Russia, trans. Francis Haskell (New York: Knopf, 1960). 2. According to Althussers exaggerated claim, The Development of Capitalsim In Russia is "the only work of scientific sociology in the world, which all sociologists should study with care" — in Louis Althusser, Lenin and Philosophy, and Other Essays, trans. Ben Brewster (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1971 P. 105. 3. See V.I. Lenin, Collected Works, I, (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1972), pp. 128-332, 333-507. 4. See, for instance, Lucio Colletti, "Marxism as a Sociology," in his From Rousseau to Lenin: Studies In Ideology and Society, trans. John Merrington and Judith White (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1972), pp. 3-44. And see, among Henri Lefebvres work, for instance, "De I explication en economie politique et en sociologie," Cahiers Internationaux de Sociologie, XX (1956), pp. 19-36. The finest analysis of the relationship between Marxism and sociology can be found in the writings of these two authors. Special mention should also be made of Lucien Goldmanns "Y-a-t-il une sociologie marxiste?" Temps Modernes, 140 (Octobre 1957), pp. 729-725.
5. A summary of this information is located in the first volume of Lenins Collected Works, note 25, p.517. Additional information can be found in the articles by A. Ganchine, N. Kroupskaia, S. Mickiewicz, A. Oulianova-Elizarova, and M. Ganchine, N. Kroupskaia, S. Mickiewicz, A. Oulianova-Elizarova, and M. Silvine in Lenine Tel Qull Fut: Souvenirs de Contemporains, I, trans. Alice Orane (Moscow: Editions en Langues Etrangers, 1958). Cf. also Gunther Heyden, Einfuhrung In Lenins Schrift Was sind die "Volksfreunde" and wie kampfen sie gegen die Sozlaldemokraten? (Berlin: Dietz Verlag, 1977). 6. Lenin, pp. 397, 405, 408. 7. Ibid., p. 140 8. Ibid., pp. 400-401, 425. Lenin writes: "The objectivist speaks of the necessity of a given social-economic formation and of the antagonistic relations to which it gives rise. When demonstrating the necessity for a given series of facts, the objectivist always runs the risk of becoming an apologist for these facts: the materialist discloses the class contradictions and in so doing defines his standpoint. The objectivist speaks of "insurmountable historical tendencies"; the materialist speaks of the class which "directs" the given economic system, giving rise to such and such counteractions by other classes" (pp. 400-401). Lenin took the concept of "objectivism" from the preface to Eighteenth Brumaire, where Marx charged Proudhon with this tendency. 9. Lenin, p. 140. 10. Ibid.

in a hierarchy insofar as one of them dominates the others and thus somehow forces the others to submit to the necessities and logic of its own specific way of functioning, that is, more or less, integrates them into its own mechanism of reproduction;

production which exist

4. define the functions of all the elements of the superstructure and the ideology which in spite of their origin in different modes of production now exist in a special combination according to the way the different modes of

elements of the

production are interrelated; whatever their origins, these superstructure are thus in a way
redefined and filled with
a new
25 content.

The concept of social-economic formation is not without its difficulties, however. Unlike the concept &dquo;mode of production,&dquo; for instance, no con-

55
11. Ibid., pp. Ibid., pp. 13. Ibid., pp. 14. Ibid., pp. 15. Ibid., pp. 16. Ibid., pp. 17. Ibid., pp.
12.

233-234. 137. 416-417. 443-444. 137.

143-144. 145.

18. Ibid., p. 140.

19. Lenin does not consistently use one translation of Marxs "okonomische Geselischaftsformation," but uses a variety of terms: "social formation" (p. 162), "capitalist social organization" (p. 145). "capitalist social form" (p. 158). "capitalist form of society" (p. 178). and

"social-economic formation" (pp. 193, 446). 20. Lenin, p. 141. 21. Ibid., p. 167. 22. Ibid., p. 424. 23. Lenin, The Development of Capitalism in Russia (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1974), p. 197. 24. Lening Development, pp. 196-197. 25. Maurice Godelier, "Quest-ce que defenir une Formation Economique et Sociale? LExample des Incas," Pensee, No. 159 (Octobre 1971), 99-100. 26. See, for instance, the journals Critica Marxista (1970, 1972, 1977) and Pensee (1971).