Lenin writes on national self-determination

The essay condemned socialist leaders who supported wartime governments and argued that imperialist rivalry had exposed their reformism. It connects anti-war politics with Lenin’s analysis of...

Lenin argued that a federated Europe under capitalism could not remove imperialist rivalry and might reinforce it. His analysis linked regional integration to colonial power and class relations, a...

Lenin’s notebooks from intensive reading of Hegel, especially the Science of Logic, show a renewed engagement with dialectics during the war. They are working notes rather than a finished treatise and...

Socialists from neutral and belligerent countries met to oppose the war. Lenin’s more radical position was a minority within the conference, showing that anti-war internationalism contained...

Lenin drafted Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism, analyzing monopoly, finance capital, and colonial rivalry. The work connected European class politics to imperial extraction, though its...

In his 1916 essays, Lenin argued that socialists in oppressor nations had a duty to defend the right of oppressed nations to secede. This principled distinction challenged empire but remained tied...

In letters written before returning to Russia, Lenin argued that soviets and the Provisional Government represented competing centers of authority. His analysis helped frame Bolshevik debate, but...

Mass strikes, demonstrations led in large part by women workers, and soldiers’ mutinies forced Nicholas II to abdicate. The revolution opened a period of dual power between the Provisional...

Lenin returned via Germany, Sweden, and Finland amid wartime conditions and political controversy. His arrival energized Bolshevik debate, but the party initially resisted parts of his new line,...

The theses called for no support to the Provisional Government, transfer of power to soviets, land redistribution, and an end to the war. They reframed Bolshevik policy around immediate popular...