V. I.   Lenin

NOTEBOOK “γ”

(“GAMMA”)

Dr. Robert Redslob, Dependent Countries (An Analysis of the Concept of Original Ruling Power), Leipzig, 1914 (352 pp.). Purely legal study. Constitutional-law position of

Examination of part of the chapters (x) shows that the author cites interesting excerpts from laws indicating growth of independence in these British colonies, which have almost attained the position of free countries. Nevertheless, they are dependent countries, says the author, since they do not enjoy full freedom (though development is obviously in that direction....)

[BOX ENDS:] [[ separation is spoken of freely.
Agreement with Britain on legislation. ]]

[BOX:] [[ Use for comparing imperialism (economic) and political independence. ]]

Things are moving towards free federation. Britain has granted parliamentarism, the author concludes, which she is now combining with “the organisation of a federal state” (p. 347). The South African parliament has authority to alter colony frontiers, unite several colonies into one.   “But only at the request of the colonies concerned” (339)....

In Australia, parliament can divide colonies into smaller units, can merge colonies—“but only with the consent of the population concerned, or of its parliament” (p. 335). || N.B.

(( there were plebiscites; the drafting of a constitution with the consent of all the colonies—by agreement with Britain.... ))

p. 330, a note, Mr. Dibbs (an Australian) spoke freely of secession from Britain and the formation of an independent Australian republic.... __ __ __

1900: “An Act to Constitute the Commonwealth of Australia” (July 9. 63 and 64. Victoria).

[QUADRUPLE LEFT-BOTTOM-RIGHT BOX ENDS:] [[ A simple, brief account of the development of federalism and political freedom in Canada, South Africa and Australia. Very interesting, and should be used against the idiocy of the “imperialist Economists”....^[1] ]]

Notes

[1] “Imperialist Economists”—an opportunist trend in the international Social-Democratic movement which made its appearance during the First World War. In the R.S.D.L.P. it came out in the open at the Berne Conference of the Party’s sections abroad in the spring of 1915, when N. I. Bukharin put forward theses defending anti-Marxist views, which Lenin subsequently described as “imperialist Economism”. Bukharin’s theses were later supported by G. L. Pyatakov and Yevgenia Bosh. Similar ideas were expressed in the Draft Programme o? the Revolutionary-Socialist Association and Social-Democratic Labour Party of Holland, in the American Socialist Labour Party, and in other parties. Lenin called “imperialist Economism” an international malady and launched a vigorous campaign against it. The “imperialist Economists” opposed self-determination of nations and the entire R.S.D.L.P. minimum programme, which envisaged a struggle for democratic changes. Lenin stressed the great significance of the national self-determination slogan in the era of imperialism. Marxists, he emphasised, should use all democratic institutions to prepare the overthrow of the bourgeoisie. “Through utilisation of bourgeois democracy to socialist and consistently democratic organisation of the proletariat against the bourgeoisie and against opportunism” (see present edition, Vol. 23, p. 27).

Lenin’s criticism of “imperialist Economism” can be found in his works: “The Nascent Trend of Imperialist Economism”; “Reply to P. Kievsky (Y. Pyatakov)”; “A Caricature of Marxism and Imperialist Economism” (ibid., pp. 13–21, 22–27, 28–78) and in other writings. p. 247