Forgotten Men of History- Julius Martov

Article by Rob Russell. Edited by Claire Stratton. Additional Research by Lauren Puckey.

In this issue of Forgotten Men of History, the character who I believe deserves more time in the spotlight is Julius Martov. He was a political revolutionary in Russia, who was hugely influential during the period of political unrest in Russia; stemming from the 1905 revolution and culminating with the 1917 October Revolution. Despite the annals of communist history being filled by the infamous Lenin and Stalin, it could all have turned out far differently.

Martov, born in Istanbul in November 1873, was a committed political activist and communist revolutionary until his death in April 1923, aged just 49. Originally, he had a close relationship with Lenin helping to form the, ‘St. Petersburg. League of Struggle for the Emancipation of the Working Class’, in 1895. Clearly, two such brilliant individuals had more pressing matters to attend to than creating catchy slogans for their organisations. Whether it was the chunky, rather noticeable name, or the revolutionary activities of such an organisation, the Tsarist authorities forced both Martov and Lenin into exile. From here, Martov joined and soon became influential in the RSDLP, the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party. This led to him establishing and becoming an editor in the party newspaper, Iskra, in 1900.

Martov’s importance to the history of communism is perhaps most significant in 1903, at the second party congress of the RSDLP. Here he came to intellectual blows with Lenin, as they disagreed on the membership of the party, with Martov advocating a wide open party, and Lenin a restricted party for enthusiasts only. Such a disagreement caused the infamous split of the RSDLP into two factions; Martov’s Mensheviks and Lenin’s Bolsheviks. Despite attempts to heal such a fractious relationship, the spilt was formalised in 1907.

A key difference between the two factions was their interpretation of Karl Marx’s earlier work. For those of you unaware of Karl Marx, he was the founder of Marxism, the father of communism if you will. The bearded wonder wrote his influential works, The Communist Manifesto, in 1848 (with the often neglected Friedrich Engels) and, Das Kapital, in 1867. The focal point of Marxism, and also a hugely decisive issue was his critical stages of history. Beginning with primitive communism in tribe culture, Marx believed history moved through further stages, next came feudalism, which is soon followed by capitalism. At this point Marx crucially believed that the proletariat gained political consciousness and via a revolution would overthrow the bourgeois; this ultimately led to Marx’s idealistic communist society. It was the interpretation of Marx’s work which is so crucial to the differences between the Mensheviks and Bolsheviks. Lenin, being a little bit power hungry, impatient and a bit of a cheat decided to ignore Marx’s critical stages of history, and proclaimed Russia ready for a revolution, and the rest as they say is history. Martov however, despite claims of indecisiveness was merely following Marx’s textbook instructions: waiting until Russia had fulfilled her capitalist political phase, before implementing the revolution.

The rest of the story is well known, under the leadership of Lenin, the Bolshevik party grew stronger and stronger, and eventually lead to a coup d’etat in October 1917. Meanwhile the Menshevik faction continued to wait for what they believed to be the right time to act upon their revolutionary intent. The consequences of which was seventy years of Bolshevik rule in Russia and the Soviet Union as a whole, in tandem with the international spread of communist ideology. Such a history of communism is largely met with negative connotations, yet had Martov’s Menshevik faction gone on to control Russia this may have been completely different.

Thus, although it was Lenin and his Bolshevik party who gained most of the historical headlines, much attention should be given to Julius Martov. A hugely influential figure in Russian communist politics and a man who could well have been leader of the country. Admittedly it is somewhat of a cliché to say history is full of ‘what ifs’ yet, had Martov and his Menshevik faction come to power, who knows how the history of communism may have panned out?

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Martov was one of the key Menshevik leaders, along with George Plekhanov, Fedor Dan and Irakli Tsereteli.

Leon Trotsky was also a member of the Menshevik faction but broke away from them after a short period of time.

After the February Revolution in 1917, Martov was unable to prevent some Mensheviks joining the Provisional Government. He strongly criticized figures such as Irakli Tsereteli and Fedor Dan who, now part of Russia’s government, supported the war effort.

During the Russian Civil War, the Mensheviks were banned along with other political parties by the Soviet government.

Martov based many of his ideas on the socialist parties that existed in other European countries, such as the British Labour Party.

As the leader of the Mensheviks, Martov edited the journal Iskra from November, 1903 to its end in October, 1905. He used the journal to attack Vladimir Lenin and the Bolsheviks.

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