Written: April–May 1920
Source: Collected Works, Volume 31, pp. 17–118
Publisher: Progress Publishers, USSR, 1964
First Published: As pamphlet, June 1920
Translated: Julius Katzer
Online Version: marx.org in 1996, marxists.org 1999
Transcribed: Zodiac
HTML Markup: Brian Baggins and David Walters
Proof reading: Steve Iverson, 2014. Alvaro Miranda 2022.
Contents:
In What
Sense We Can Speak of the International Significance of the
Russian Revolution (9 k)
An Essential
Condition of the Bolsheviks’ Success
(9 k)
The Principal
Stages in the History of Bolshevism
(19 k)
The Struggle
Against Which Enemies Within the Working-Class Movement
Helped Bolshevism
Develop, Gain Strength, and Become Steeled
(28 k)
“Left-Wing”
Communism in Germany. The Leaders, the Party, the Class, the
Masses (28 k)
Should
Revolutionaries Work in Reactionary Trade Unions?
(29 k)
Should
We Participate in Bourgeois Parliaments?
(32 k)
No Compromises?
(33 k)
“Left-Wing”
Communism in Great Britain
(35 k)
Several
Conclusions
(38 k)
Appendix (28 k)
The
Split Among the German Communists
The
Communists and the independents in Germany
Turati
and Co. in Italy
False
Conclusions from Correct Premises
Note
from Wijnkoop, June 30, 1920
With this now-classic work, Lenin aimed to encapsulate the lessons the Bolshevik Party had learned from its involvement in three revolutions in 12 years—in a manner that European Communists could relate to, for it was to them he was speaking. He also further develops the theory of what the “dictatorship of the proletariat” means and stresses that the primary danger for the working-class movement in general is opportunism on the one hand, and anti-Marxist ultraleftism on the other.
“Left-Wing” Communism: an Infantile Disorder was written in April, and the appendix was written on May 12, 1920. It came out on June 8–10 in Russian and in July was published in German, English and French. Lenin gave personal attention to the book’s type-setting and printing schedule so that it would be published before the opening of the Second Congress of the Communist International, each delegate receiving a copy. Between July and November 1920, the book was republished in Leipzig, Paris, and London, in the German, French, and English languages respectively.
“Left-Wing” Communism: an Infantile Disorder is published according to the first edition print, the proofs of which were read by Lenin himself.