The Narodniks[a] were an idealist revolutionary group in the Russian Empire. Unlike Marxists, they believed that the peasantry alone could overthrow Tsarism and landlordism without the proletariat. Russian Marxist Georgi Plekhanov was originally a Narodnik before becoming a Marxist and criticizing the Narondniks' idealist positions.[1]
History
In 1881, the Narodnik secret society Narodnaya Volya assassinated Tsar Alexander Nikolayevich. After the assassination, the Narodniks became reformists and began to support the kulaks. The Narodniks dissolved in the 1890s after being criticized by Lenin.[1]
Ideology
The Narodniks believed in an idealist theory of active "heroes" and a passive "mob," which asserted that the workers could not organize themselves and had to follow great individuals.[1] The Narodnik stance on Capitalism was that it was a stage of economic development that could be skipped. That it was possible for peasants to build a peasant-socialism without capitalists or proletarians.[2]
Notes
- ↑ Russian: Народники
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Joseph Stalin (1939). History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Bolsheviks): 'The Struggle for the Creation of a Social-Democratic Labour Party in Russia'. [MIA]
- ↑ “The Narodniks generally believed that capitalism was not a necessary result of industrial development, and that it was possible to skip capitalism all together, and enter straight into a kind of Socialism.
The Narodniks believed the peasantry was the revolutionary class that would overthrow the monarchy, regarding the village commune as the embyro of Socialism.”
Unknown. "Encyclopedia of Marxism, Glossary, Na" Marxists.org. Retrieved 2023-02-04.