Legal Marxists
As Legal Marxism were in Russia of the 19th century (1894-1899 / 1901) towards the end of social science journalist referred that from the Marxism were derived that Russia a gradual capitalist imminent development. Since they rejected the Narodnik movement and tended to be reformist-oriented, revolutionary Marxists were in exile and had no ties to larger parts of the population, they were briefly allowed to legally publish certain Marxist-arguing works in tsarism in order to support the opposition movement Volksstümler, who was also partly influenced by Marxist ideas, to weaken. Tony Cliff writes about this:
- “As early as the 1880s, an agent of the secret police advised his superiors to allow the establishment of the Marxist forces as a counterpart to the more dangerous popularists. Since most of the Marxist writings somehow discredited folklore, officials suspected they would help eradicate the more important ideology of resistance. The government did not expect any problems from the Marxists themselves. Typically, a police colonel from Nizhny Novgorod expressed the opinion that they "are not dangerous at the moment"; and a St. Petersburg prosecutor regarded them as "so far only theoreticians."
Peter Struve is considered the best-known representative of the legal Marxists . His work "Critical Notes on the Economic Development of Russia" contained not only a criticism of folk tinkering but also a justification of capitalism in Russia. Later, the legal Marxists tended politically towards liberalism and rejected Lenin's rise to power in October 1917 as culturally and socio-economically premature.
Other Marxists in the legality phase
In the yearbooks, edited volumes, etc. The like of the legal Marxists also published Plekhanov and Lenin at the beginning , until the Social Democratic Labor Party of Russia produced their own publications . Lenin was also able to publish his comprehensive work "The Development of Capitalism in Russia" (1899) from exile. Even at this time Lenin was expressly distancing himself from other legally published texts that took up Marxist theories. With Plechanov, on the other hand, sympathies with certain standpoints of the legal Marxists can be identified.
Works during the legal phase in Russia from 1894 to 1899
- Peter Struve, Critical Notes on the Economic Development of Russia, 1894.
- Lenin, The Development of Capitalism in Russia, 1899.
- Engels, The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State , 1884/1894 in Russian.