10.17- The Emancipation of Labor Group

Episode Summary

Executive Summary: The episode traces the formation of the Emancipation of Labor Group, the first Russian Marxist organization, amid Alexander III’s crackdown after Alexander II’s assassination. It explains why Plekhanov and allies rejected populism and terrorism, embraced Marxism and historical materialism, and argued Russia must pass through capitalism and a bourgeois revolution before socialism.

Main Topics: Aftermath of Alexander II’s assassination and state repression (Priority: 5/5): Alexander III responds to his father’s assassination by reversing reforms and expanding police powers, creating an increasingly effective repressive apparatus to crush revolutionary groups. The rise and collapse of People’s Will and Black Repartition (Priority: 5/5): The episode contrasts terrorism-focused revolutionary tactics with the Marxist breakaway group that emerged from former populists disappointed by violent strategy and repression. Founding of the Emancipation of Labor Group (Priority: 5/5): Plekhanov, Axelrod, Zasulich, and Deutsch form an explicitly Marxist exile organization in Geneva in 1883 devoted to translating, explaining, and propagandizing Marxism for Russia. Plekhanov’s theory of historical materialism and the 'two revolutions' (Priority: 5/5): Plekhanov argues Russia cannot skip stages: capitalism must develop first, enabling a bourgeois democratic revolution, then a later proletarian socialist revolution. Debate over peasants, proletariat, and revolutionary strategy (Priority: 4/5): The episode explains why Plekhanov rejects peasant-centered populism and terrorist vanguardism, insisting the urban proletariat—not the peasantry—will become the revolutionary class. Western socialism and Marx/Engels’ skepticism of Russia (Priority: 4/5): Western socialists mostly want the Tsar toppled, while Marx and Engels themselves are skeptical that Russia follows the same path as Western Europe, invoking the Asiatic mode of production. Early marginalization and later vindication of Russian Marxists (Priority: 4/5): The group remains tiny, poor, and ignored through the 1880s, but the episode foreshadows that industrialization will later make Plekhanov’s analysis look prescient.

Key Arguments: Alexander III’s reactionary turn and the Okrana’s expanded powers made underground revolutionary activity far harder and effectively turned the empire into a police state. Terrorism failed strategically: killing the Tsar did not bring socialism any closer, and violent tactics provoked devastating repression. Plekhanov’s Marxism offered a 'scientific' framework, unlike populist and anarchist theories, because it claimed to explain historical development through material conditions. Russia could not bypass capitalism; according to Plekhanov’s reading of Marx, bourgeois development had to precede proletarian revolution. The peasantry was not the revolutionary future; the urban proletariat created by industrial capitalism would be the class capable of socialist struggle. The Emancipation of Labor Group positioned itself as a propaganda and education organization, not a terror cell, translating Marx and Engels into Russian and writing explanatory works. Marx and Engels were not uniformly supportive of Russian Marxism; they often saw Russia as an 'Asiatic mode' society and doubted that Russian history matched Western Europe’s path.

Data Points: Assassination year: 1881 - Alexander II is killed, triggering Alexander III’s crackdown. Age of Alexander III at accession: 26 - The new emperor is described as 26 years old when he responds to his father’s assassination. Third Section office size: 12 detectives - The Okrana began as a small St. Petersburg office created in 1866 after an earlier assassination attempt. Initial renewal period of emergency statute: 3 years - The Statute on Measures to Preserve Order and Public Peace was drafted to expire after three years. Okrana offices expanded to: 3 offices - Additional offices were created in Moscow and Warsaw after 1881. Emancipation of Labor Group founding year: 1883 - Plekhanov, Axelrod, Zasulich, and Deutsch form the group in Geneva. Preliminary works published: 3 major works - Plekhanov’s early program includes two 1883 publications and Our Differences in 1885. Capital Russian edition publication year: 1872 - Marx’s Capital is legally published in Russia and later becomes influential among the intelligentsia. Capital first Russian print run: 3,000 copies - The Russian edition was the first foreign edition of Capital and sold out in a year. Length of Deutsch’s later memoir title: 16 years - Deutsch’s exile later becomes the subject of his memoir Sixteen Years in Siberia. Estimated active supporters in Russia: less than 10 - Deutsch reports almost no one in the empire cares about the group’s work by the mid-1880s.

Pivotal Quotes: "Orthodoxy, autocracy, nationality, it was back and it was back with a vengeance." — Narrator: Describes Alexander III’s ideological reaction after Alexander II’s assassination. "You cannot skip from feudalism to socialism." — Narrator: Summarizes Plekhanov’s historical-materialist argument for two revolutionary stages. "They were not even revolutionaries anymore. They were sociologists." — A Bakuninist veteran (quoted by narrator): A dismissive reaction to the Emancipation of Labor Group’s propaganda-and-theory approach.

Implications: The episode shows Russian Marxism becoming a serious alternative to populist terrorism by grounding revolution in class development, not conspiratorial violence. It foreshadows that industrialization will transform Russian politics and make the proletariat central.