Blanquism

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Blanquism
"He who has iron has bread."
Basic Information
Aliases	Central Revolutionary Committee Conspiratorial Socialism Oligarchic Socialism Authoritarian Babouvism Unironic socialism for the rich Leninism
Alignment(s)	AuthLeft   Feminists   Socialists
Ideological Information
Influenced by:	Anti-Marxism Anti-Populism Non-Marxist Socialism Babouvism State Atheism State Socialism
Notable people	Louis Auguste Blanqui (1805-1881) France
Character Information
Likes	Coups Left-wing elites Non-Marxist Socialism
Dislikes	Masses Populism Virtue signaling Marxism Pluralism (Political theory)
Song	Arditi - Imposing Elitism

"Humanity ... is never stationary. Its progressive march leads it to equality. Its regressive march goes back through every stage of privilege to human slavery, the final word of the right to property."

Louis Auguste Blanqui

Blanquism is an authoritarian, economically left ideology and revolutionary strategy based on the ideas of Louis Auguste Blanqui. It advocates for revolutionaries to take the most radical line possible, and to never accept compromises in any situation at all. It also believes in the idea that revolutions are dictated by a small minority through careful planning.

Alleged Connections to Lenin and Leninism

Leninism has often been compared to Blanquism, usually by left-wing critics of it. Rosa Luxemburg was one of the first to make the comparison, due to Lenin's vanguardism, and his favoring of highly centralized and repressive governance. Modern-day council communists, libertarian socialists and anarcho-communists also often criticize Leninism as being similar to Blanquism. Lenin himself rejected this comparison, and was heavily critical of Blanquism, as he said, "We have always heard a chorus of accusation that we were too inflexible and ossified, too adamant. And yet our opponents call us “Blanquists”, “anarchists” and “true socialists”. The Blanquists are conspirators (they have never been in favour of the general strike), they exaggerate the importance of revolutionary government" and "To become a power the class-conscious workers must win the majority to their side. As long as no violence is used against the people there is no other road to power. We are not Blanquists, we do not stand for the seizure of power by a minority. We are Marxists, we stand for proletarian class struggle against petty-bourgeois intoxication, against chauvinism-defencism, phrase-mongering and dependence on the bourgeoisie".

History

Comrade Plekhanov published a detailed account in Kurjer, entitled Where is the right?, in which he accuses the so-called Bolsheviks of being “Blanquist”.

Our aim is not to defend the Russian comrades, against whom Comrade Plekhanov aims the batteries of his wisdom and dialectics, as they certainly can do that themselves. But it is true that the question deserves some attention, and may also be of interest to our readers, which is why we have opened a space for it now.

In order to characterize Blanquism, comrade Plekhanov quotes Engels about Blanqui, a French revolutionary of the 1840s whose name ended up baptizing the entire movement. “In your political activity,” says Engels

, “[Blanqui] was basically a ‘man of action. He believed that a well-organized minority, which, at the right moment, attempts a revolutionary sleight of hand, is already able to drag the popular mass along with the first successes and thus make a successful revolution. […] From the fact that Blanqui conceives any revolution as a coup d'état of a small revolutionary minority, the necessity of dictatorship follows after the success – of course, not of the entire revolutionary class of the proletariat, but of the small number of those who carried it out. the coup and which, beforehand, will once again be organized under the dictatorship of one or a few”.

Friedrich Engels, a collaborator of Karl Marx, is undoubtedly a great authority, but whether or not this characterization of Blanqui applies remains an open question. For in 1848 Blanqui need not necessarily assume that his club would remain a “small minority”; on the contrary, in that epoch of a great revolutionary movement he certainly counted on the whole working people – if not in France, at least in Paris – to follow his call to fight against the sneaky and shameful policy of the bourgeois ministry, which tried to “ wrest their conquests away from the people'. But this is not the case, it is the fact that Plekhanov tries to prove that Engels' characterization of Blanqui could be applied to the so-called Bolsheviks (which Comrade Plekhanov now calls a minority, because during the party's unification congress they turned out to be a minority).

Literally he puts it this way: "The whole of this characterization may be fully applied to our present minority." He then confirms his own words this way: “The relationship between Blanquists and the masses was utopian in the sense that they did not understand how important their revolutionary autonomy is. In his plans, in fact, only conspirators participated, the mass appeared only when it was dragged along by the well-organized minority”.

Therefore, Comrade Plekhanov thinks that the Russian Bolshevik comrades (let us stick to the usual expression) are hostages to this “original sin of Blanquism”. In our opinion, Comrade Plekhanov has not substantiated his accusation. Comparison with the Populists, who were actually Blanquists, proves nothing, and the malicious remark that Sheljabov, hero and leader of Narodnaya Volya, would have had a keener political instinct than Lenin, the leader of the Bolsheviks, is too bad. I like that we dwell on it.

We believe that it is enough to put the questions in this way so that everyone who is even a little familiar with the current revolution and who has come into contact with it directly can answer in the negative. Therein lies the whole difference between conditions in the year 1848 in France and those in the Russian state today, because the proportion between the “organized minority” – that is, the party of the proletariat – and the mass has fundamentally changed. In the year 1848, self-styled socialist revolutionaries were making desperate efforts to inoculate these masses with socialist ideas, in order to draw them away from the support of empty bourgeois socialism. Socialism itself was ill-defined, utopian, petty-bourgeois. In Russia, the matter today presents itself differently: neither our putrid progressive democracy, nor the cadet society, nor the tsarist constitutionalists in Russia, nor any other bourgeois “progressive” party in other parts of the state has managed to win over the broad masses. workers. Today, these masses are uniting themselves around the banner of socialism: since the outbreak of the revolution, they have spontaneously and by their own motto followed the red flag. Our own party offers the best proof.

How to draw

Flag of Blanquism

1. Draw a ball with eyes
2. Fill it red
3. Inside it draw a white sword

Color Name		HEX	RGB
	Red	#FF0000	255, 0, 0
	White	#FFFFFF	255, 255, 255

Relationships

Friends

• State Socialism - Based. In fact, to be able to put in practice socialism, we need to have authoritarianism and have a centralized authority. The LeftUnity and the LibLeft are just naive people.
• Syndicalism - Trade unionism can be a good fighting tactic, the CRC has supported various workers' strikes.
• Centralism - We need a strong state!
• Oligarchy - The best form of government to achieve socialism.
• Progressivism - Long live the human progress!
• Patriotism - I'm a patriot!
• Jacobinism - French Revolution was great!
• Neo-Babouvism - I would define myself more as a follower of Hébert rather than Babeuf but we were allies during the Paris commune.
• Republicanism - Down with the monarchy!
• Enlightenment Thought "The philosophy inaugurated in the 18th century by Diderot and Holbach, proclaimed and promulgated in the 19th century as the unanimous verdicts of science, is the only possible basis of the future. The experiment is over. All the abortions of the Revolution since 89 are due to the abandonment of this philosophy. One must choose between it or the Middle Ages. It will be our flag."
• State Atheism - Irreligion and materialism is the only way.
• Reactionary Socialism - You are WAY TOO religious, decentralized, and culturally right for me, but you are a fellow authoritarian, elitist, and anti-Marxist socialist, so I consider you a comrade!
• Burmese Way to Socialism - We both have state socialism as an end goal and support coups as a method of takeover.

Frenemies

• Christian Socialism - At least the league of the just participated in my failed Parisian uprising of 1839.
• Utopian Socialism - I am technically a form of you, but you're pretty cringe most of the time.
• Left-Wing Populism - While I appreciate your socialism, you need to realize that ELITISM AND AUTHORITARIANISM ARE NECESSARY TO CREATE SOCIALISM!!
• Illuminatism - Blf ziv yzhvw, yfg R droo mvevi gifhg blf, zmw ru hlnvlmv nfhg xlmgilo vmgriv xlfmgirvh, vhkvxrzoob Uizmxv, gszg hlnvlmv nfhg yv nv, mlg blf. Mlgsrmt kvihlmzo. (You are based, but I will never trust you, and if someone must control entire countries, especially France, that someone must be me, not you. Nothing personal.)
• Boulangism - Général Revanche caused a split in my party, with some arguing that it was a form of Jacobin nationalism that could lead to socialism.
• Leninism - Unfortunately you are a Marxist but this story of vanguardism is interesting.
• Italian Left Communism - Long live The Regime! o7 (Though you should drop the marxism and start liking me unironically)

Enemies

• Marxism - You are cringe, old idiot. I disagree with you about so many things that I don't even know where to start. And... It should be me that the leftists around the world look upon as a reference person, not you. Damn it!
• Bismarckism - Dirty Prussian reactionary who helped the bourgeois "republic" to destroy the glorious Paris commune!
• Monarchism - I participated in the July revolution to oust Charles X, unfortunately it led to the birth of another monarchy.
• Bonapartism Every edifice built by the Empire and the Restoration must be overthrown, and since not one single stone of this edifice is yet to fall, they will work indefatigably to demolish and destroy it.
• Propertarianism - Private property is a source of exploitation and injustice.
• Spartacism - Rosa Luxemburg is incredibly cringe.
• Social Democracy - Crazy reformist.
• Anarcho-Communism - No coups? No elitism? Anarchism? CRINGE, CRINGE, CRINGE!
• Populism - Why do you want to be helped by the stupid masses? How can you trust them to do what you want to do politically? They will ruin your plans. I do not understand you. CRINGE!
• Right-Wing Populism and Islamic Populism - You are right-wing, religious and populist? TRIPLE CRINGE!
• Populareism - ...You're just pathetic.
• Ochlocracy - Never trust the masses, ladies and gentlemen.
• Catholic Theocracy - "Catholicism is the tomb of intelligence, of thought, of brain...
• Protestant Theocracy - ...Protestantism, the tomb of conscience, of feeling, of heart."
• Capitalism - Not much different from slavery.

Further Reading

Wikipedia

• Blanquism
• Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Central Revolutionary Committee
• Socialist Revolutionary Party
• Revolutionary Socialist Central Committee

Literature

• First Proclamation by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Appeal to the students, December 11, 1830 by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Reception Procedure of the Society of the Seasons by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Project for a Revolutionary Proclamation (Call to Arms) by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Declaration of the Provisional Committee for Schools by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• French: Lettre de Blanqui, probablement écrite en prison – 1831 by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Speech before the Society of the Friends of the People by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Defence Speech at the 'Trial of the Fifteen', 12 January 1832 by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• French: Rapport sur la situation intérieure et extérieure de la France depuis la révolution de juillet (Discours prononcé à la séance du 2 février 1832 de la Société des Amis du Peuple) by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Democratic Propaganda by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Organization of the Society of Families by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• First issue of “Le Libérateur” by Louis Auguste Blanqui
  • Equality is Our Flag (Le Libérateur no. 1, 2 February 1834)
  • Why There Are No More Riots (Le Libérateur no. 1, 2 February 1834)
• Social Wealth Must Belong to Those Who Created It (Le Libérateur no. 2, February 1834) by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Who Makes the Soup Should Eat It by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Blanqui’s Notes for his Defence at the ‘Gunpowder Trial’ (October 1836) by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Initiation ceremony of the Society of the Seasons by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Appeal of the Committee of the Society of the Seasons by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Speech at the Prado (25 February 1848) by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• For the Red Flag by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Second Petition for the Postponing of Elections by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• To The Democratic Clubs of Paris by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Address of Central Republican Society to the Government by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Address to the Provisional Government (20 April 1848) by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Central Republican Society to the Provisional Government by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• The Massacre in Rouen: The Central Republican Society to the Provisional Government by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Parisians! by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Response to the Tascherau Document by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• The Union of True Democrats (November 1848) by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Response to the Request for a Toast for a Workers’ Banquet (November 1848) by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• To the Mountain of 1793! To the Pure Socialists, its True Heirs! (3 December 1848) by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• French: Les Accusés du 15 mai 1848 devant la Haute Cour de Bourges — Compte rendu exact de toutes les séances avec les incidents. by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• On Revolution by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Warning to the People (The London Toast — February 25, 1851) by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Concerning the Clamour Against the ‘Warning to the People’ (April 1851) by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Work, Suffer and Die (c.1851-52) by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Letter from Maillard to Blanqui (Barcelona, 1 April 1852) by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Letter to Maillard (Belle-Île, 6 June 1852) by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Letter to Tessy (Belle-Île, 6 September 1852) by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• French: Proclamation à l'armée by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Proclamation of February 20, 1866 by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Proclamation to Parisians by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Letter to Blanqui’s supporters in Paris by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Manual for an Armed Insurrection by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• The Sects and the Revolution by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Working-Class Exclusivism by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• French: Fatal, fatalisme, fatalité by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Instructions for an Armed Uprising by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Notes on Positivism by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• French: L’usure by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• French: Le communisme, avenir de la société by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• One Last Word by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• Eternity by the Stars by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• French: Fragments philosophiques et politiques
• The Army Enslaved and Oppressed by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• French: L'armée esclave et opprimée by Louis Auguste Blanqui
• French: Banquet des Travailleurs socialistes, président: Auguste Blanqui détenu à Vincennes - 1849 (Toast à Blanqui) by Auguste Salières

Websites

• The Blanqui Archive

Gallery

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