Principle of Democratic Centralism

Democratic centralism is the fundamental system of organization and the organizational principle in leading the proletarian party.

In 1898, when the First Congress of the Russian Social-Democratic Labor Party convened, the urgent task before the RSDLP was to determine the principles which should be used to organize the party and to form a tight network and organic whole from the central to the local level so that it could give full play to the vanguard role of the party organization. In this Congress Lenin argued advocated that RSDLP should create and develop its own organizational principles according to the unique situation of the movement in Russia. In 1899, in “Our Immediate Task”, he mentioned for the first time about two particularly important problems of the RSDLP, one being “the narrowly isolated functioning of separate local organizations of the party” … which should be overcome by unification and a single—and, consequently, a centralist—party should be established, and the central and local activities of the party must be properly combined ; and the second was: “How can we combine the striving of Social-Democracy to become a revolutionary party that makes the struggle for political liberty its chief purpose, in Russia”. Here Lenin first introduced the concept of “centralism” and the idea of combining democracy with centralism in the party. In his One Step Forward, Two Steps Back—The Crisis in Our Party written in 1904, Lenin summarized the basic idea of party building organizationally as the idea of centralism, which should be incorporated in the entire party constitution and be the fundamental organizational principle of the communist party. In December 1905, in the document “The Reorganization of the Party” of the Bolshevik Tampere Congress, the concept of “democratic centralism” was used for the first time, stating: “The Congress affirms that the principle of democratic centralism is indisputable and considers that it is necessary to introduce a broad electoral system, that the elected The Congress of Deputies should be given full powers to exercise ideological and practical leadership, and that they should be removable, that their activities should be widely publicized and that a strict system of reporting on their work should be observed.” In March 1906, Lenin pointed out in the section “Principles of Party Organization” of A Tactical Platform for the Unity Congress of the R.S.D.L.P. that “the principle of democratic centralism in the Party was hereafter generally recognized”. In April of the same year, on the proposal of Lenin, the Russian Social-Democratic Labor Party held its Fourth Congress, and the principle of democratic centralism was incorporated into the party constitution approved by the Congress, which stipulated that all party organizations should be established and work according to the principle of democratic centralism. Since then, the principle of democratic centralism became a fundamental principle in the organizational construction of the R.S.D.L.P. and gradually began to gradually spread to various other countries and guide the organizational construction of proletarian parties.

Lenin pointed out: “We advocate democratic centralism, but we must recognize how different it is from bureaucratic centralism on the one hand, and from anarchism on the other”. The basic elements of democratic centralism advocated by Lenin are as follows: (1) Insist on collective leadership. That is, all major issues of the Party must be discussed and approved by the collective in the Party Congress, the delegates’ meetings, the plenary session of the Central Committee and the Party Committee, and no individual should decide major issues beyond the Central Committee and place himself above the Party’s Central Committee. Lenin further pointed out in his article “All Out for the Fight Against Denikin!" “In order to deal with the affairs of the workers’ and peasants’ state, collective leadership must be practiced”. (2) Division of responsibility among individuals. Lenin stressed that anytime, in any case, the collective leadership should be implemented with the clearest definition of each cadre’s individual responsibility for certain tasks. To refer to collegiate methods as an excuse for irresponsibility is a most dangerous evil, threatening all who have not had very extensive experience in efficient collective work; in the army it all too often leads to inevitable disaster, chaos, panic, division of authority and defeat. (3) Development of intra-party democracy. Lenin argued advocated that to ensure the active participation of all party members, even the most backward ones, in the organizational activities of the party, it is necessary to have democratic elections and to allow freedom of discussion among different opinion holders and freedom of criticism. Only in this way can we mobilize the enthusiasm of the whole Party, constantly overcome and correct shortcomings and mistakes in our work and push forward the cause of revolution and construction. (4) Consistency in political action. Lenin advocated that at different stages of the revolution democracy or centralization can be emphasized in different degrees. However, in any case, democracy and centralism cannot be treated separately or as opposed to each other, the two of them must be unified and combined. The party should uphold the principle of minority being subordinate to the majority, each organization and organizations at all levels should be strictly subordinate to the Central Committee, all decisions of higher bodies shall be absolutely binding on lower bodies and on all Party members; thus the party should implement strict centralization and iron discipline in order to consolidate the ideological unity of the Party with the “material unity of the Party organization” and in order to ensure the unity in the political activities to win victories in the revolution.