Collected Works of V. I. Lenin - Vol. 31 - From Marx to Mao

44V. I. LENINthe interests of the bourgeoisie. It all adds up to that pettybourgeoisdiffuseness and instability, that incapacity forsustained effort, unity and organised action, which, if encouraged,must inevitably destroy any proletarian revolutionarymovement. From the standpoint of communism, repudiationof the Party principle means attempting to leap fromthe eve of capitalism’s collapse (in Germany), not to thelower or the intermediate phase of communism, but to thehigher. We in Russia (in the third year since the overthrowof the bourgeoisie) are making the first steps in the transitionfrom capitalism to socialism or the lower stage ofcommunism. Classes still remain, and will remain everywherefor years after the proletariat’s conquest of power.Perhaps in Britain, where there is no peasantry (but wherepetty proprietors exist), this period may be shorter. Theabolition of classes means, not merely ousting the landownersand the capitalists—that is something we accomplishedwith comparative ease; it also means abolishingthe small commodity producers, and they cannot be ousted,or crushed; we must learn to live with them. They can (andmust) be transformed and re-educated only by means ofvery prolonged, slow, and cautious organisational work.They surround the proletariat on every side with a pettybourgeoisatmosphere, which permeates and corrupts theproletariat, and constantly causes among the proletariatrelapses into petty-bourgeois spinelessness, disunity, individualism,and alternating moods of exaltation and dejection.The strictest centralisation and discipline arerequired within the political party of the proletariat in orderto counteract this, in order that the organisational roleof the proletariat (and that is its principal role) may beexercised correctly, successfully and victoriously. The dictatorshipof the proletariat means a persistent struggle—bloody and bloodless, violent and peaceful, military andeconomic, educational and administrative—against theforces and traditions of the old society. The force of habitin millions and tens of millions is a most formidable force.Without a party of iron that has been tempered in thestruggle, a party enjoying the confidence of all honest peoplein the class in question, a party capable of watchingand influencing the mood of the masses, such a struggle