Collected Works of V. I. Lenin - Vol. 16 - From Marx to Mao

400V. I. LENINout Russia as they were in the St. Petersburg and Warsawareas, the total number of strikers would have been twice asmany. This conclusion can also be expressed in the followingway: the workers were able to estimate only one-half of theirstrength in this sphere of the movement, for they had notyet brought the other half into play. In geographical terms,this may be stated as follows: the West and Northwest hadwoken up, but the Centre, the East and the South were stillhalf asleep. The development of capitalism contributessomething every day to awakening the tardy.Another important conclusion from the figures by areasis that in 1906 compared with 1905 the movement declinedeverywhere, although unevenly; in 1907 compared with 1906there was a very large decline in the Warsaw area and arather slight decline in the Moscow, Kiev and Volga areas,whereas in the St. Petersburg and Kharkov areas there wasan increase in the number of strikers. This means that,with the level of political consciousness and preparednessof the population as it was at the time, this particular formof the movement had exhausted itself in 1905; inasmuch asthe objective contradictions in social and political life hadnot disappeared, the movement was bound to pass to a higherform. But after a year of recuperation, as it were, or ofthe mustering of forces during 1906, there were signs of a newupsurge, which actually began in part of the country. Inappraising this period the liberals, echoed by the liquidators,speak contemptuously about “the expectations of theromanticists”; a Marxist, however, must state that by refusingto support this partial upsurge the liberals frustratedthe last opportunity of upholding the democratic gains.As regards the territorial distribution of the strikers, itshould be noted that the vast majority of them is accountedfor by six gubernias with highly developed industries, andwith big cities in five of them. The six gubernias are: St. Petersburg,Moscow, Vladimir, Warsaw, Petrokov and Livonia.In 1905 there were 827,000 factory workers in these gubernias,out of a total of 1,661,000; thus they accounted fornearly half of the total. As for the number of strikers in thesegubernias, there were 246,000 in all during the decade 1895-1904, out of 431,000, or about 60 per cent of the total numberof strikers; in 1905 there were 2,072,000 out of a total of