The right of nations and nationalities to self-determination as a political and legal problem. The right of nations to self-determination in the context of modern development The international right of nations to self-determination

Jurisprudence is a complex science, and international law even more so. There are no clearly defined codes, but there are separate documents adopted by the UN, but the trouble is that their compliance cannot always be achieved due to the inferiority of enforcement mechanisms. Militarily strong countries often take actions that do not fit into the resolutions, and nothing can be done about it. There is only one thing left to do - to rely on precedents and consider them as the main arguments for the correctness or, on the contrary, violation of international law. What should you do if part of a state has announced its decision to secede from it? What if he also wants to join another? There are already many such cases.

Legal document

The simplest and most obvious way to solve this problem is a referendum. Just take it like this and ask people whether they want to live separately or are more inclined to maintain the status quo as part of a single country. There is a generally accepted document on this topic. This is the UN Charter. Its first article directly states the right of peoples to self-determination, as well as to the free disposal of natural wealth and resources. Moreover, this historical community cannot be deprived of its means of subsistence. And all signatories of the document (including Ukraine) promised to respect and encourage the opportunity to use this right, and if any country has a trust territory, then it is responsible for it. This is the fundamental principle of all international law. All clear. But why in reality does everything often happen differently, and each time differently?

Kosovo incident

During the Balkan crisis, independent countries emerged on the territory of the former unified federal federal state - Croatia, Slovenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina. Europe and the United States welcomed this decision of the peoples, citing the already mentioned UN Charter. At the same time, the Serbian Krajina was denied this right. Ethnic cleansing began, which was mutual in nature, but only one side of the conflict was found guilty. Ultimately, after the NATO intervention, Kosovo was recognized as an independent state, and there was no need to even hold a referendum there. This case became a precedent, after which the division of the country into separate parts was no longer perceived as something extraordinary. The people decided - so so be it. The right of a nation to self-determination is sacred, but the question arises: what is it? What are people? What do you mean by this word?

What is a nation?

Previously, during the times of the USSR, any student who studied at least conscientiously could answer this question. He knew that a people is a large community of people, united by a number of characteristics, including language, territory and some other criteria, including even temperament. This long formulation was invented by J.V. Stalin himself, who, as you know, was a great expert on the national question. It was believed that there were as many peoples in the Soviet Union as there were its constituent republics, that is, fifteen (most of the time the USSR existed). However, besides them, there were also nationalities, this is about the same thing, only smaller in size and without the right to self-determination prescribed in the Constitution. That is, theoretically (and as it later turned out, practically) the Ukrainians, Azerbaijanis or Armenians could secede, but the Ingush or Karyaks could not. But time moves forward, concepts change, are filled with new content, and the Stalinist definition of peoples (nations) no longer works. For example, Bosnian Muslims do not even fall under the definition of a nationality. These are the same Serbs, they speak the same language, but they profess Islam.

Russia

Yes, this case is very complicated. A huge number of nationalities united by one state structure in a vast territory with its own languages, culture and religious views. In the 90s economic crisis and the loss of a single ideological platform led to the generation of centrifugal tendencies and threatened the collapse of the country. This manifested itself most acutely in the Chechen Republic, and the war began. At the same time, the policy of foreign leaders was complex; on the one hand, they supported territorial integrity (in words), on the other, they hinted at the right of the people to live independently. In Chechnya, massive ethnic cleansing of the Russian-speaking population was carried out, the center behaved clumsily and used force disproportionately, however, ultimately, the conflict was extinguished with great difficulty and considerable losses, to the considerable chagrin of the West, which hoped that the process of disintegration would proceed like an avalanche . Fortunately, the conclusions the Russian leadership made were correct.

Crimea

The situation with Crimea appears to be extremely clear. The population of the peninsula expressed its attitude towards its future in two referendums. However, it was in this case that the so-called “world community” took a tough position. They say that the referendum on the entry of the autonomous region into Russia is unauthorized, it was held “at gunpoint.” Residents of Europe and the United States are unobtrusively presented with a terrible picture: gloomy patrols are walking around occupied Sevastopol (Simferopol, Yalta, etc.), the residents are intimidated, the Tatars are terrorized, and, in general, the occupation is obvious.

Moreover, if you ask almost any German, for example, what to do if the majority of people want to live as part of Russia, he will answer without hesitation: “Well, if yes, then why not?” It simply does not fit in his European consciousness how anyone can be forced to do something, especially in such a vast territory as Crimea. It’s just that Westerners don’t yet believe that the referendum was conducted fairly. Probably, if the Russian leadership were offered to repeat it under the supervision of international representatives, then to close the issue, it would most likely agree. But for some reason this option is not being considered.

North Ossetia, Abkhazia and other “frozen” conflicts

In these republics there was also a struggle for territorial integrity, and the more fierce it was, the less chance of success there remained. Naturally, the Georgian leadership did not hold a referendum, apparently believing that it would not lead to anything good. However, it took place in both Abkhazia and North Ossetia, these autonomies separated and, most likely, forever. Much earlier, similar things happened in other hot spots. former USSR, in Transnistria and Nagorno-Karabakh. These conflicts are defined as “frozen”, and, probably, this is the only way to prevent further bloodshed.

Donbass

“Individual areas,” as representatives of official Kyiv sometimes call them, are also actually located in the zone of a “frozen” (not quite yet) conflict. There is less and less reason to hope for their return to the united Ukrainian state; there are too many victims for the local population to be willing and able to forgive them. And again there is a referendum, and again it is, as it were, illegitimate. However, Kyiv also cannot admit the loss of territories. The main argument, if we omit the feverish slogans about a “united Ukraine,” is approximately the same: “There is no such people - Donetsk (Lugansk, Crimean). And at the same time, the most active supporters of decommunization somehow do not notice that they are still using the same old Stalinist definition of a nation.

Worldwide

Problems of self-determination are characteristic not only of the post-Soviet space. The desire for independence is expressed by the Catalans, residents of Northern Ireland and even the state of Texas. In most cases, these issues are resolved peacefully, for example, after the war, the Saarland region “moved” to Germany. In 1962, India annexed the Portuguese colony of Goa and a number of other territories. In 1965, Singapore declared its independence from Malaysia. Few people remember that Norway was part of Sweden until 1905 (another 111 years ago!). And there are other examples. In most cases, a referendum was held, and that's it - there is one more country. And there is no need to fight. People decide for themselves what is best for them.

In connection with the annexation of Crimea by Russia, Russian politicians and diplomats tried to very clumsily present the right of peoples to self-determination as the main argument justifying this annexation. Let's try to understand this rather complex even for the modern science of international law, an issue that has a very long history.

So, in the most general sense, the right to self-determination is understood as “the right of a people to choose their own legal and political institutions and status in the community of nations.” At the same time, in the science of international law, the question remains debatable as to whether national self-determination is a political concept, a theoretical principle or a legal right. While some lawyers generally deny the legal nature of this right, others, considering it simultaneously as a legal principle and a political postulate, emphasize that this right applies mainly to colonial peoples and peoples located in occupied territory. For example, in the German doctrine of international law, the legal nature of the right to self-determination of peoples is seriously questioned, in particular due to the fact that a people, as a rule, is not considered a subject of international law.

Initially, the right to self-determination in the history of international relations was considered as a purely political principle. Thus, this right as a political postulate begins to manifest itself during the First World War against the background of the desire of a number of peoples to create independent states on the ruins of the then empires. In this regard, at the end of the First World War, two political and philosophical concepts of the right of nations to self-determination were formed, one of which was formulated by Lenin in 1917, and the second by American President Woodrow Wilson in 1918. Lenin's concept of self-determination of nations was radical in nature and envisaged granting this right in full, up to the possibility of forming their own state, to all peoples and nations without exception. On the other hand, as Lenin and the Bolsheviks were sure, ultimately, as a result of the world revolution, all nations would unite into a single world republic of councils.

The concept of self-determination of nations, proposed by US President Woodrow Wilson, was of a liberal democratic nature, based on the “consent of the governed” and expressed the idea that each nation has the right to independently choose the form of its government. In the doctrine of international law, Wilson's concept of self-determination of nations is usually called “internal self-determination.” This political concept concerned mainly those nations that were part of the empires defeated in the First World War.

Both concepts of self-determination of nations, the radical Leninist and the liberal Wilsonian, neutralized each other so effectively that the principle of self-determination was not even mentioned in the 1919 League of Nations Charter. Despite this, the principle of self-determination, as a political rather than a legal principle, had some influence on the interwar international order, as exemplified by the 1920 decision of the Commission of International Jurists regarding the Finnish-Swedish dispute over the status of the Åland Islands, in which it was said that “... self-determination of nations - as opposed to territorial integrity - is just a political postulate and must be understood and applied as such.”

During the interwar period in Germany, the concept of self-determination was also formed in the circles of Western European social democracy, one of the authors of which was Karl Renner, according to which the self-determination of a people or nation within a multinational state can be achieved by granting this people or nation broad internal autonomy in this multinational state. And although this concept was not widely recognized during that historical period, it nevertheless had a great influence on modern German scholarship on international law, which, apparently, still adheres to this understanding of the right to self-determination.

The principle of self-determination of nations (peoples) acquired a legal form of existence only in the post-war period in connection with the emergence of the UN, in the Charter of which it was first mentioned as one of the principles of an international legal nature. Article 1, paragraph 2 of the UN Charter states that one of the goals of this international organization is to develop friendly relations between nations based on respect for the principle of equality and self-determination of peoples.

The science of international law writes that in the initial period of its existence, the principle of self-determination, expressed in the UN Charter, had the character of lex imperfecta, i.e. at that time it had not yet received full recognition as a principle of international law, and its specific content was unclear even to the creators of the UN Charter. Thus, the American researcher on the rights of national minorities, Inis Cloud, argues that the UN Charter was created without taking into account the issue of the principle of self-determination, which arises in connection with the consideration of the problem of the status of national minorities, since at the time of the creation of this Charter the world was dominated by the concept of the nation state as basic unit of political organization. Moreover, as another researcher, Jennifer Jackson Preece, notes, in the post-war period there was a deliberate movement towards discrediting the idea of ​​self-determination, understood in ethnic categories. This was a reaction to the failed experiment of the League of Nations in connection with the practice of implementing the right of nations to self-determination.

Here's how Jennifer Jackson Preece explains the sociopolitical context in which the principle of self-determination was formed: “As a result of World War II, national self-determination—and the secession and separatism it could provoke—was seen as a perceived threat to the international order. Such fears were heightened by the prospect of the spread of decolonization and the creation of new, potentially weak, states in Asia and Africa. As a result, the United Nations Charter, in the hope of avoiding minority controversies that would undermine the United Nations system, contains a vague phrase: “self-determination of peoples” as opposed to the more familiar and discredited “national self-determination.” Articles 73 and 76 further define such “peoples” in terms of colonial territory rather than according to their ethnic origin. The use of civil categories to evaluate claims to self-determination was motivated by the desire to maintain the territorial status quo in the colonies, and through this international peace and security. This position was particularly expressed and reaffirmed in 1960 in the United Nations Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples, which clearly stated that “any attempt tending to destroy, in part or in whole, the national unity and territorial integrity of a country, is incompatible with the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations."

It must be said that some lawyers generally deny the legally binding nature of the right to self-determination as expressed in the UN Charter, since the text of the Charter does not contain any instructions regarding the content of this right, its subjects and specific rights and obligations arising from this right.

One of the first international documents revealing the content of the right of peoples to self-determination was the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples, adopted by resolution 1514 (XV) of the UN General Assembly on December 14, 1960. According to this resolution, “all peoples have the right to self-determination; by virtue of this right they freely establish their political status and pursue their economic, social and cultural development.” At the same time, this resolution especially emphasized that “any attempt aimed at partially or completely destroying the national unity and territorial integrity of the country is incompatible with the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations,” and also that “all states must strictly and to observe in good faith the provisions of the Charter of the United Nations, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and this Declaration on the basis of equality, non-interference in the internal affairs of all States, respect for the sovereign rights of all peoples and the territorial integrity of their States.”

In a word, initially the right of the people to self-determination had a purely anti-colonial orientation, and should not have violated the territorial integrity of states.

This right was subsequently enshrined in such international documents as the Final Act of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe of 1975 and in the “Declaration on Principles of International Law concerning Friendly Relations and Cooperation among States in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations”, adopted by the General Assembly By the UN Assembly on December 24, 1970. In addition, the right to self-determination was also expressed in the 1966 Human Rights Covenants, also in an anti-colonial spirit.

Regarding the content of the right to self-determination in the Declaration of Principles of International Law of 1970, the outstanding international lawyer, member of the International Court of Justice Eduardo Jimenez de Arechaga wrote: “It is obvious that an unrestricted interpretation of the principle of self-determination would contribute to the emergence of separatist movements and movements of minorities for achieving independence in different countries of the world and could lead to the dismemberment of existing states. Such a possibility could not be allowed by an international organization consisting of states like the UN, except in very special cases.”

In the 50s and 60s of the twentieth century, the first attempts to use the right to self-determination appeared in order to carry out secession, i.e. separation from the existing state. However, these attempts met with strong resistance from UN member states. So, in 1970, in connection with unsuccessful attempt secession of the Nigerian province of Biafra, then UN Secretary-General U Thant stated: “... The United Nations has never agreed, and I do not believe that it will ever agree, to the existence of the institution of secession of part of the territory of a Member State.”

In the 1990s, due to the collapse of the USSR and the SFRY, the international community was faced with the strengthening of separatist movements seeking, under the slogan of the right to self-determination, for secession and the formation of their own states. As a result, pockets of interethnic conflicts broke out in the post-Soviet space and Europe, resulting in numerous casualties. All this, of course, could not but cause concern in the world community about the too broad interpretation of the right to self-determination, which separatist movements resorted to in a number of countries. The reaction to this on the part of the international community was the adoption in 2000 of the United Nations Millennium Declaration, in which the UN mentioned the right of peoples to self-determination only as the right of those peoples who remain under colonial rule and foreign occupation. Thus, the UN actually spoke out in favor of an anti-colonial and anti-occupation interpretation of the principle of self-determination of peoples.

If we talk about the modern science of international law, then it is clearly dominated by the opinion that the right of peoples (nations) to self-determination does not include the right to separation (secession) from an existing state. Thus, the famous English international lawyer, former judge of the International Court of Justice Rosalyn Higgins believes that the people in the sense of the entire population of a given state have the right to self-determination, while the national minority living on the territory of this state does not have such a right. Representatives of the French school of international law tend to perceive the right to self-determination in its narrow anti-colonial meaning. As French international lawyers write, “modern international law still does not recognize the legality of secession.”

It is important to note that most representatives of modern Russian science of international law interpret the principle of self-determination in the sense that the people, understood as the entire population of a given state, have the right to self-determination. At the same time, they strongly oppose secession. Thus, Russian international lawyer S.V. Chernichenko in his fundamental work “The Theory of International Law” notes: “Self-determination of nations at the expense of other national groups forming a single people with the main (titular) nation is a perversion of the idea of ​​self-determination and could only lead to ethnic cleansing, so sharply condemned by the UN, and interethnic conflicts."

At the same time, the Russian literature on international law emphasizes that the principle of self-determination of peoples is “directed primarily against colonialism” and “accordingly, the main attention is paid to the external aspect of the principle - liberation from foreign oppression.”

In the doctrine of international law, there is still a debate about who exactly - a people or a nation - is the subject of the right to self-determination. Moreover, both concepts do not have a clear legal content.

If some authors, in the context of the right to self-determination, prefer the term “nation”, since, in their opinion, the principle of self-determination applies to all nations, regardless of their level of development and form of political existence, then others argue that only the people can be the subject of the right to self-determination , not a nation.

Professor James Summers, in his book Peoples and International Law, attempted to understand such basic concepts associated with the right to self-determination as “people”, “nation”, “minority” and “indigenous people”. Thus, he defines a people as a national group with certain national characteristics. The word “people” is used in this sense both in everyday speech and in international law. However, as Professor Summers acknowledges, the question remains what exactly these national characteristics are. At the same time, he also notes that the concept of “people” in law can be significantly narrower in content than the same concept in everyday speech.

The concept of “nation,” according to Summers, is close to the concept of “people,” understood as a national group. Therefore, in everyday speech, both words are often used as synonyms. Legal research, this author believes, has not been able to draw a clear boundary between the concepts of “people” and “nation”. Both the people and the nation, in his opinion, have the right to self-determination. Moreover, the concept of “nation” can be broader than the concept of “people” and also mean political institutions. What's interesting is that, as Summers writes, if the word "nation" in English language is often used as a synonym for the word "state", the word "state" is rarely considered as synonymous with the word "people".

As for the concept of “minority”, as Summers notes, there is no generally accepted definition of this concept in legal science. At the same time, international law has drawn a legal boundary between the concepts of “people” and “minority”, since minorities, unlike peoples, do not have the right to self-determination. Although there is no generally accepted definition of a minority as such, minorities, according to Summers, have characteristics such as: 1) individuals within a minority share common ethnic or national characteristics and 2) constitute a numerical minority (not a dominant minority) in that political education as a state.

The concept of “indigenous people” also does not have a generally accepted definition, and scientists are still arguing about its content. At the same time, it is often characteristic of indigenous peoples that: 1) their representatives have common ethnic or cultural characteristics; 2) they are historically associated with a certain territory; 3) they found themselves in a non-dominant position in this territory under the influence of another population that came later.

As we see, the science of international law has not yet developed a clear system of key concepts for the right to self-determination, which rather testifies in favor of the theory that this right is not so much legal as political.

There are also no objective criteria in international law that would make it possible to distinguish a nation from a minority. An ethnic group that is less numerous than the ethnic group that created the state (the “titular nation”) is not a “nation of a multinational state,” but is an ethnic or national minority.

In this regard, in the literature of international law one can often find the statement that a national minority does not have the right to self-determination in the form of secession, i.e. does not have the right to create his own state, since he already has his own national state and has thereby already “determined himself.” However, the problem with this statement is that national minorities, in principle, do not have the right to self-determination and are not a collective subject of international law.

The international community was faced with the problem of protecting the rights of national minorities after the end of the First World War, which was reflected in the special legal institutions of the League of Nations aimed at protecting these rights.

At the same time, national states in Europe, recognizing the presence of national minorities on their territory, were not particularly willing to grant them certain rights, because they feared that the consolidation of national minorities on their territory could lead to the growth of separatist sentiments and, as a result, a threat to their territorial integrity.

A classic example during this period was Hitler's active use of rhetoric defending the rights of the Sudeten Germans, which allowed him to first annex part of the territory of Czechoslovakia and then completely occupy it.

As experience has shown, in some cases, under the pretext of protecting the rights of national minorities, the territory of states where these minorities live can be annexed. And since national minorities lived on the territory of many states in Europe, in order to avoid the threat of secession, states sought to prevent the recognition of international legal personality for national minorities. As a result, national minorities today are not recognized as subjects of international law, and when we talk about the rights of national minorities, we mean the rights that belong not to national minorities as such, but to their individual representatives. In other words, the rights of national minorities are not collective, but individual in nature. As the American international lawyer Peter Malanchuk writes in this regard, “in the process of the development of international law since the Second World War, minority rights are formulated as a category of human rights that must be exercised by an individual belonging to a minority, and not group rights inherent in a collective subject as such "

Even the Commission of Jurists, created by the League of Nations to study the situation related to the Åland Islands, concluded that “positive international law does not recognize the right of national groups as such to secede from the state of which they are part, by mere expression of desire.”

As the Polish author Maciej Perkowski writes in this regard: “The doctrine as a whole denies minorities the right to self-determination, as expressed in the reports of the special rapporteurs of the Subcommittee on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities of the UN Commission on Human Rights. The practice of states in relation to minorities does not provide grounds for including them among the subjects having the right to self-determination. Just the opposite - states, creating legal regulation self-determination of nations, have formulated separate regulations in relation to minorities, the content of which indicates that they are talking about individual human rights.”

American international lawyer Peter Malanchuk, analyzing the content of Article 27 of the 1966 Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which deals with the rights of ethnic, linguistic and religious minorities, comes to the conclusion that “minorities, at least in principle, do not have the right to secede (in the sense of “external” self-determination),” and “their right is limited to a certain form of autonomy within the structure of a given state (sometimes called “internal” self-determination).”

As this author writes: “Confirmation of this conclusion is the wording of Article 27 of the Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which does not grant minorities the right of secession, but only limited rights “to enjoy their own culture, to profess and practice their own religion, and to use their own language.” " Minorities themselves are not recognized as subjects of international law. Even the rights in Article 27 are formulated as individual rights, rights of members who belong to minorities, and not as a collective right.”

What conclusions follow from the above analysis of the history and content of the right of peoples (nations) to self-determination in relation to the current situation in Crimea?

First of all, the Russian national (ethnic) minority living on the territory of Crimea is not a separate people or nation, but is precisely a national minority that has not a collective right to self-determination, but certain individual rights.

Secondly, in any case, even if such a minority is recognized as having the right to self-determination, then even then this right does not include the right to secede (secession) and create its own independent state.

At the same time, it should be emphasized that, unlike the “Russian-speaking minority” living in Crimea, the Crimean Tatar people, who have the status of an indigenous people, have an indisputable right to self-determination. Thus, the 2007 UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples affirms the right of indigenous peoples to self-determination. It is noteworthy that this Declaration speaks of the collective rights of indigenous peoples, which puts these peoples at greater risk high level legal protection in comparison with national (ethnic) minorities, whose representatives, as most lawyers believe, have individual rather than collective rights.

Article 3 of the Declaration of Indigenous Peoples declares: “Indigenous peoples have the right to self-determination. By virtue of this right they freely establish their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development.”

Article 4 of the Declaration states: “Indigenous peoples, in the exercise of their right to self-determination, have the right to autonomy or self-government in matters relating to their internal and local affairs and the ways and means of financing their autonomous functions.”

It is also important that Article 46 of the Declaration very clearly provides: “Nothing in this Declaration shall be interpreted as implying any right of any State, people, group of persons or individual to engage in any activity or perform any act in violation of the Charter of the United Nations or be considered as authorizing or encouraging any action that would lead to the dismemberment or partial or complete violation of the territorial integrity and political unity of sovereign and independent States.”

As we see, even when it comes to the rights of indigenous peoples, including their right to self-determination, the international community still strives to put the principle of territorial integrity and the principle of political unity of sovereign states above the principle of self-determination.

Thus, the general conclusion can be formulated as follows: the “self-determination” of the residents of Crimea, who voted in the “referendum” organized by the separatists, not only blatantly violates the law of Ukraine, but is also in sharp contradiction with the principles of modern international law; As for the self-determination of the Crimean Tatar people, it fully complies with the requirements of international law to the extent that it does not violate the territorial integrity of Ukraine.

It seems that if Russia really believed that “self-determination of the people of Crimea” does not violate international law, it would, without hesitation, agree to have this issue considered by the International Court of Justice. However, apparently, Russian politicians and lawyers, including members of the Constitutional Court, are well aware that Russia, by annexing Crimea, has thereby committed an international crime and are terrified of consideration of this issue by international judicial bodies.

In conclusion, I would like to express regret that modern Russian lawyers have actually abandoned an objective scientific approach to determining the right to self-determination in the context of solving the problem of Crimea and have sunk to an unprincipled propaganda apology for the annexation of Crimea.

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THE RIGHT OF NATIONS TO SELF-DETERMINATION AND MODERN INTERNATIONAL CONFLICTS

The right to self-determination is one of the most important generally recognized principles of international law. Its essence, as is known, is the right of peoples (nations) to determine the form of their state existence as part of another state or as a separate state. It is often believed that this principle was recognized during the collapse of the colonial system, which, in fact, was reflected in the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples, adopted by the XV UN General Assembly on December 14, 1960, and in subsequent international covenants and UN declarations1 . However, in reality, the idea of ​​this right was born in the 16th -19th centuries. during the period of national liberation movements in Europe and the American colonies. It was believed that the basic principle of self-determination is the right to create one’s own state under any circumstances: “One nation

One state" (P. Mancini, N.Ya. Danilevsky, A.D. Gradovsky). Moreover, this principle applied only to “civilized peoples,” thereby presupposing the existence of colonial possessions and colonial forms of oppression of peoples. Active discussion of the foundations of this principle began at the end of the last century, on the eve of World War I and at the very “height" of the colonial policy of the leading countries of the world. For example, in the decisions of the London International Congress of the Second International in 1896, the foundations of this principle were formulated as a regulator of interethnic

1 The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights of December 19, 1966 (Article 1) states: “All peoples have the right to self-determination. By virtue of this right they freely establish their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development... All States Parties to the present Covenant... shall, in accordance with the provisions of the Charter of the United Nations, promote the exercise of the right to self-determination and respect this right.”

The Declaration of Principles of International Law (October 24, 1970) states: “By virtue of the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples, enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, all peoples have the right to freely determine, without outside interference, their political status and to pursue their economic, social and cultural development, and every State is obliged to respect this right in accordance with the provisions of the Charter.”

The same Declaration states that the means of exercising the right to self-determination may be “the creation of a sovereign and independent state, free accession to or association with an independent state, or the establishment of any other political status.”

relationships. But, despite this, right up to the start of the war, in the ranks, first of all, of Social Democracy there was a fierce discussion on the problems of its essence, social origins and the appropriateness of its use in resolving the national question. It took the collapse of all European empires during an unprecedented war and a series of revolutions before the principle of national self-determination was proclaimed by Soviet Russia and later by US President Woodrow Wilson, who declared this right at the Versailles Peace Conference. However, another one was about to break out World War and several more decades would pass before the right of nations to self-determination became a generally accepted principle of international law.

However, both earlier and now this principle is still being questioned from the point of view of the effectiveness of application in international practice, its essence and content are being clarified, the idea of ​​the subjects of relations regulated by it is changing, etc. This happens whenever new Interethnic and interstate conflicts reveal contradictions of a different nature and intensity, highlighting new aspects of the process of self-determination of nations. An example is the period of collapse of a number of former socialist states, such as Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, and the Soviet Union, when the world witnessed new ethnic conflicts in the context of seemingly unshakable post-war borders. The complexity and inconsistency of these conflicts required a return to the phenomenon of national self-determination as the most important regulator of international relations, on the one hand, and as one of the likely sources of the emergence of interethnic contradictions, on the other.

As already noted, the right of nations to self-determination is historical. Interesting in the sense of the proposed historical periodization, although not indisputable in its conclusions, is the book of the American legal scholar Hurst Hannum “Autonomy, Sovereignty and Self-Determination”. In it, the author argues that views on the right of nations to self-determination have changed dramatically at least three times over the last century, thereby forming unique stages of this process.

The first period began at late XIX century and ended around 1945. Then, for the first time, in the system of the principle under consideration such concepts as “nation”, “language”, “culture” - on the one hand, and “state

2 See: Hurst Hannum, Autonomy, Sovereignity, and Self-Determination: The Accommodation of Conflicting Rights. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. 1994.

ity" - on the other. During this period, the principle of national self-determination was purely political - nationalists for the most part did not demand separation from large states, but the acquisition of autonomy in some form.

The second period began in 1945 - after the formation of the United Nations. The UN initially considered the right to self-determination to be the right of states, but not of peoples, and, moreover, did not consider it absolute and inalienable. Thus, in 1960, the UN General Assembly adopted the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Peoples. According to this document, the principle of national self-determination actually became synonymous with the concept of “decolonization”: not minorities within the new states received the right to independence, but only colonies that had the right to be states independent of the mother countries. The borders of the newly formed states were established along the boundaries of the former colonial possessions, which initially did not take into account ethnic and religious factors. The result is that these states began to be rocked by internal ethnic conflicts.

The third period began in the late 1970s and continues today. It, according to the author, is characterized by attempts to prove that absolutely all peoples have the right to their own state. However, this idea was not reflected in the fundamental documents of international law and was not accepted by any existing state in the world. Apparently, therefore, there are no specific and clear criteria on the basis of which a new state can be recognized or not recognized by the international community, and the existing de facto system cannot guarantee either the national integrity of states or the right of nations to self-determination. In fact, depending on political interests, the priority is either the principle of territorial integrity or the right of nations to self-determination.

For example, the first reaction of the international community to the ongoing process of the collapse of the USSR was to confirm the inviolability of state borders: many feared that the collapse of the USSR would lead to destabilization of the situation in the region and throughout the world. This position was clearly expressed by Bush Sr. in early August 1991 during his visit to Kyiv. He stated that the United States would support freedom in Ukraine, but not Ukraine's independence from the USSR. However, just three weeks later, Ukraine declared its independence, and the views of the international community were urgently adjusted to the changing

realities: the right of nations to self-determination was once again put at the forefront3. So, is this principle just a means for solving short-term political interests? Does it have no objective basis?

The problem is that most often, when considering the right of nations to self-determination, a well-known one-sided approach is used: the right is interpreted only in the political-ethnic aspect, in isolation from its socio-economic basis. In reality, the basis of national movements and the processes of formation of national states lies precisely in the material, economic life of people, primarily market relations, which require uniform economic and legal rules, uniform monetary circulation within certain borders and, accordingly, a single state, which is formed primarily in the process of population identification by language and culture. The process of the formation of a nation, thereby, becomes the process of the formation of a national state, and issues of national development are in one way or another intertwined with issues of development of the national state. These are also historical examples: the formation of nations in the XVI - XVII centuries historically coincided with the formation of market relations and the formation of national centralized states.

Russia did not escape this process, although, as is known, unlike Europe, the formation of a centralized Russian state occurred not only and not so much due to economic reasons, how many for foreign policy reasons, determined, first of all, by the need to protect against external aggression. To no small extent, it was precisely this circumstance that contributed to the fact that the Russian centralized state initially arose and developed as a multinational state, uniting many peoples, either conquered during numerous wars, or voluntarily joined it, seeing in this step the only possible way of self-preservation .

Thus, in the words of the classic, “the formation of national states that best satisfy... the requirements of modern capitalism is therefore a tendency (aspiration) of any national movement,” and the self-determination of nations, in essence, is the process of the formation of national states. From here, he emphasized, two rather forgotten historical trends follow: the first is centrifugal, manifested in

3 See: Principles of self-determination in modern world/ http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/

the awakening of national life and national movements, the struggle against national oppression, the desire for isolation, the creation of national states; the second is unifying, associated with the development and intensification of all kinds of relations between nations, the breaking down of national barriers, the creation of international unity of the market, economic life, politics, science, the desire, ultimately, for the integration of already established national states, etc.4 The first trend , as a rule, is accompanied by interethnic tensions and conflicts, including armed ones. It was the desire to prevent the latter, to ensure the free formation and development of numerous nations and nationalities of the country that once motivated the Bolsheviks in their efforts for the national-administrative arrangement of the state and the formation of the USSR on the principles of the national policy of a socialist state, proclaimed in the first documents of Soviet power - the law of peoples and nations for self-determination, equality and sovereignty, abolition of all national privileges and restrictions, free development of national minorities, socialist federation. Moreover, the recognition of the right of nations to self-determination and upholding the principles of the voluntary unification of nations into a Union of States inherently reflected both the first and second historical trends. And it was relatively easy for the builders of the USSR to implement these ideas because of the established economic and social homogeneity in the territories of victorious socialism. They seemed to go beyond the boundaries of the original field of action of the right of nations to self-determination - from real market relations, which is why even the well-known carelessness with which they often treated the drawing of national-administrative boundaries without taking into account the ethnic factor did not cause any noticeable political conflicts: multinational the population had equal rights and was provided with all rights and freedoms, uniform throughout the entire territory of the formed Union.

Under these conditions, during the entire period of the existence of the Soviet state, the proclaimed right of nations to self-determination turned out to be applicable only once, in the first years of the existence of the new republic, when the Soviet government recognized the independence of Poland, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, the Soviet republics of Transcaucasia, Belarus, Ukraine, which were part of more recently, it became part of the Russian Empire. Later, during the formation of the Union

4 See: Lenin V.I. Complete collection of op. 5th ed. T. 24. P. 124.

Soviet states, the procedure for exercising the right to secede of one or another nation of the Union was clarified, which was to be implemented only on the basis of expediency, from the point of view of “the interests of all social development, the interests of the struggle for universal peace and socialism.” At the same time, an essentially limited application of this right was established: not for all national

state entities, but only for those that could actually take advantage of it, located on the borders of the Union, and which therefore received the status of a “union republic”. Despite the fact that all peoples were guaranteed state self-government and protection of their national interests (national culture, language, school, national customs, religion, etc.), not every nation or nationality could form a union republic (officially - for reasons of small numbers, not forming a majority in the territory it occupies, etc.). For most of them, the principle of autonomy was applied: nations and nationalities were united into autonomous republics, regions or national districts, including within the union republics.

In 1991, with the signing of the Belovezhskaya Agreement, Russia, Ukraine and Belarus left the USSR. This act, in continuation of the declarations on secession from the USSR adopted in 1990-1991 by the Supreme Soviets of the ESSR, Lithuanian SSR and Latvian SSR, finally destroyed the Union and marked the “parade of independence” of the remaining union republics, becoming, unfortunately, the initial circumstance of the beginning of interethnic conflicts in the territory of the former USSR .

All newly formed states in the post-Soviet space, to varying degrees of openness and effectiveness, focused on market relations. This, in fact, was the essence of the transformations that took place that led to the disappearance of the Soviet superpower. Therefore, those earned economic mechanisms, which in a number of cases, under the influence of the emerging national market, again brought to life the same historical trend in the national question: the desire for free self-determination of nations that are part of already separated states. As a rule, this happened with their border ethnic groups or national state entities. Moreover, the interethnic contradictions that arose in this case most acutely, even to the point of armed confrontation, manifested themselves where special political and ethnic conditions arose. They, in fact, constitute a distinctive feature of modern interethnic conflicts.

Firstly, these conflicts most likely arose where national administrative entities were determined by boundaries that did not take into account the characteristics of the historically established areas of residence of ethnic groups.

The division of ethnic groups and the inclusion of more or less significant groups of them in other national-state formations as an ethnic minority is a serious prerequisite for the emergence of interethnic conflicts.

Often this division was the result of deliberate policies, as in most cases of the formation of new states in Asia and Africa during the collapse of the colonial system, the boundaries of which reproduced the boundaries of the former colonial possessions, without taking into account ethnic factors. This approach was based on the belief that such action could minimize the risk of new conflicts. Thus, the right to self-determination could be exercised not by peoples, but by former colonial territories. Paradoxically, the dwarf states of Europe are permanent members of the UN, but, for example, the 30 million Kurdish people, who do not have their own state, are not.

At the same time, such demarcation of borders occurred due to the difficulty of taking into account the ethnic characteristics of the territories due to the historically mixed residence of opposite ethnic groups, and as a result of the historically developing political situation and even the characteristics of natural conditions. As a result, for example, the former republics of Yugoslavia - Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Macedonia - were recognized within their existing borders without taking into account the ethnic factor. Thanks to this, a significant Serbian “minority” was formed in Croatia, and representatives of many nations were forced to coexist in Bosnia.

Special historical conditions predetermined the concentration of the Russian-speaking population in Transnistria: in 1924, on the initiative of G.I. Kotovsky, P.D. Tkachenko and others, the Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic was created here as part of the Ukrainian SSR with its capital Balta (a Ukrainian city transferred to the MASSR together with neighboring areas to increase its territory), then from 1929 - Tiraspol, which retained these functions until 1940. It was to the MASSR that in 1940 part of the returned Bessarabia was annexed, the unification of which marked the proclamation of the union Moldavian SSR. After the creation of the MSSR in Transnistria

Numerous immigrants from Russia and Ukraine went to the region to help create local industry, since the economy of the rest of Moldavia (Bessarabia) during the Romanian occupation of 1918 - 1940 was mainly agrarian in nature and was the most backward of all the provinces of Romania. Transnistria is becoming predominantly Russian-speaking. It was these circumstances that became the basis for the Second Extraordinary Congress of Deputies of all levels of Transnistria (in anticipation of the declaration of independence of Moldova, focused on reunification with Romania), to proclaim the Transnistrian Moldavian Republic on September 2, 1990 based on the results of a national referendum.

Another example is Nagorno-Karabakh. Originally - December 1920

Both Soviet Russia and the Workers' and Peasants' Government of Azerbaijan unconditionally recognized Nagorno-Karabakh, Zangezur and Nakhichevan as “an integral part of the Armenian Socialist Republic.” This position was explained by the fact that the attitude of the local population to the issue of self-determination was expressed back in 1918. Until Sovietization in 1920, the Armenian population successfully repelled all attempts by the Musavatists and the Turkish army to establish control over these territories. However, in July 1921, after the ultimatum of the Council of People's Commissars of the Azerbaijan SSR, which threatened the resignation of the government, the Caucasian Bureau of the Central Committee of the RCP (b), with the participation of Stalin, decided to include Nagorno-Karabakh and Nakhichevan into the Azerbaijan SSR - while completely ignoring the opinion of the population of Nagorno-Karabakh and Nakhichevan. The Bolsheviks in 1921 could again consider this decision unprincipled in the light of the world revolution. But the world saw the consequences of this decision already in the late 80s - early 90s. XX century

The Ossetians, during Mongol rule, were driven out of their historical habitats south of the Don River in modern Russia, and some further into the Caucasus, into Georgia, where they formed three separate subethnic groups. The Digors in the west came under the influence of neighboring Kabardians, from whom they converted to Islam. The Ironians in the north became what North Ossetia is now.

tiya, which became part of the Russian Empire in 1767. Tualag in the south is present-day South Ossetia, as part of the former Georgian principalities, where Ossetians found refuge from the Mongol invaders. At one time, Academician N.F. Dubrovin wrote: “Lack of land was the reason that some Ossetians moved to the southern slope of the Main Ridge and voluntarily gave themselves into bondage to Georgian landowners. Having occupied the gorges of Big and Small Liakhvi, Rekhula, Ksani and its tributaries, the Ossetians became serfs of the princes Eristavov and Machabelov. These migrants make up the population of the so-called South Ossetians.”5. Thus, partly the historically natural division of the territory of traditional residence of the Ossetians also determined the historical division of a single people into northern and southern, into North Caucasian and Transcaucasian Ossetia. But the political need to prepare conditions for the inclusion of Transcaucasia as a single state entity into the future USSR predetermined the creation of the South Ossetian Autonomous Region within Georgia by decree of the Central Executive Committee and the Council of People's Commissars of Georgia on April 20, 1922.

Secondly, the most persistently, as a rule, strive for the realization of the right to self-determination, and the most irreconcilable in achieving this, are those minority ethnic groups that either have their own statehood in the form of sovereign neighboring states (Serbia - the Croatian and Bosnian Serbs, Albania - among the Kosovo Albanians, Russia - among the Russian-speaking Transnistria, North Ossetia within Russia - among the South Ossetians, Armenia - among the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh, Azerbaijan - among the Azerbaijanis of Nakhichevan, etc.), or who do not have any statehood at all (Palestinians , Jews before the formation of Israel, Kurds, etc.).

In all of the above cases, the declaration of independence, that is, the realization of the right to self-determination of one or another union state, immediately caused the desire of the national state-autonomous entities included in it to unite with their historical ethnic group, especially having their own statehood recognized by the community, which in the first place expressed in the desire for their own state self-determination. The political consequences of this are known. The stages of development of an interethnic conflict are approximately the same.

5 Dubrovin N. History of war and Russian rule in the Caucasus. St. Petersburg, 1871. T. 1. P. 187.

1). The reluctance to remain part of a state of a different ethnic group led to the desire of ethnic minorities to exercise their right to self-determination, and above all in the form of forming their own independent ethnic state. This happened both when there was no such state (as in the case of the proclamation of the Serbian Krajina, the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic, etc.), and when this state existed in one form or another of autonomy (the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, created from Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Region as part of the Azerbaijan SSR, the Republic of South Ossetia - from the South Ossetian Autonomous Region as part of the Georgian SSR, etc.).

2). Based on the principle of territorial integrity, even when this integrity was legitimate only within the framework of already non-existent states (for example, the SFRY and the USSR), the new central government is taking all possible measures either to prevent the formation of new independent state entities on the territory of the country, or to prevent exit of former autonomies from the state. In essence, self-determined states demonstrated non-recognition of the right to self-determination and free development of their ethnic minorities. Moreover, in almost all the territories mentioned above, the measures taken by the new central government one way or another reached the extreme, that is, the use of armed means. Thus, immediately after the declaration of independence by Azerbaijan on August 28, 1991, in early September, at the Joint Session of the Nagorno-Karabakh Regional and Shaumyanovsky District Councils of People's Deputies, the formation of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (NKR) was proclaimed within the borders of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Region (NKAO) and the populated Armenians of the adjacent Shaumyan region of the Azerbaijan SSR. But already on September 25, the 120-day shelling of Stepanakert with Alazan anti-hail installations begins, the escalation of military operations unfolds throughout almost the entire territory of the NKR, and on November 23, Azerbaijan annuls the autonomous status of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Events in the Georgian-Ossetian conflict unfolded according to the same scenario. November 10, 1989 The Council of People's Deputies of the South Ossetian Autonomous Region of the Georgian SSR decides to transform it into an autonomous republic. The Supreme Council of the Georgian SSR immediately recognizes this decision as unconstitutional. At the end of November, with the direct assistance of

The top officials of the republic, more than 15 thousand Georgians, are trying to arrive in Tskhinvali in order to hold a rally there. In clashes between protesters, Ossetians and the police on the way to the city, at least six people died, 27 received gunshot wounds and 140 were hospitalized.

September 20, 1990 The Council of People's Deputies of the South Ossetian Autonomous Region proclaims the South Ossetian Soviet Democratic Republic, and the Declaration of National Sovereignty is adopted. In November, an emergency session of the Council of People's Deputies stated that South Ossetia should become an independent subject to the signing of the Union Treaty. On December 9, 1990, elections to the Supreme Council of the South Ossetian Republic are held. But already on December 10, the Supreme Council of the Republic of Georgia decides to abolish Ossetian autonomy. On December 11, 1990, three people died in inter-ethnic clashes. Georgia introduces a state of emergency in Tskhinvali and the Java region, and on the night of January 5-6, 1991, Georgian police and national guard units entered Tskhinvali. Open armed clashes begin. Similar events took place in Croatia, Bosnia, Kosovo, and Moldova in conflict with Russian-speaking Transnistria.

3). In the current conditions, in a number of cases fraternal peoples rise up to defend self-proclaimed states; states are drawn into internal conflict, the ethnic majority of which are representatives of a self-defined ethnic group, or interested states-allies of one or another conflicting parties. The internal conflict, thereby, develops into an interstate, international one: Western countries are actively participating in the armed conflict in Croatia and Bosnia, NATO planes are bombing Belgrade; on the territory of the former USSR, for the first time in more than 70 years of history, a bloody war breaks out between newly independent Armenia and Azerbaijan; units of the 14th Army of Russia are taking part in armed clashes in Transnistria; Volunteers from North Ossetia and Cossacks are fighting in South Ossetia.

Thirdly, not all self-determination of nations causes extreme political consequences. As a rule, this happens in cases where ethnic minorities, even having their own statehood as part of another state, experience hidden or obvious, current or expected in the future inequality on the part of the dominant ethnic group and its state.

new car. In this case, the need for the free development of the nation in new economic conditions pushes minorities to exercise their right to self-determination as a means of eliminating obstacles to this development.

A similar action was characteristic of almost all of the above national movements, but was especially clearly manifested in the Georgian-Abkhaz conflict, in which the Abkhaz side, which does not have any other external statehood other than an autonomous republic within the Georgian SSR, not divided into ethnic parts by state borders, actively advocated independence . The reason is the strengthening of calls by Georgian nationalist groups in the late 1980s for independence from the USSR and a revision of the status of Georgian autonomies. The Abkhaz leadership, especially after mass demonstrations took place in Tbilisi in 1989, during which demands were made for the liquidation of Abkhaz autonomy, declared their intention to remain part of the USSR. Fearing a new wave of “Georgianization,” the Abkhaz authorities began to consider separation from Georgia as the most preferable option, although at that time, the Abkhaz constituted a national minority in the republic.

On July 16, 1989, armed riots broke out in Sukhumi, caused by a scandal surrounding violations of the rules for admitting students to the local university (ASU). The dead and wounded appeared. Troops are used to stop the unrest. And soon, with the collapse of the USSR, political conflicts in Georgia move into the phase of open armed confrontation both between Georgia and the autonomies (Abkhazia, South Ossetia), and within Georgia as such. On February 21, 1992, the ruling Military Council of Georgia announces the abolition of the Soviet constitution and the restoration of the 1921 constitution of the Georgian Democratic Republic, essentially abolishing the autonomous status of Abkhazia. In response, on July 23, 1992, the Supreme Council of the Republic restored the Constitution of the SSR of Abkhazia, according to which Abkhazia is a sovereign state. A decision is made in Tbilisi to send troops into the autonomy. The armed conflict of 1992-1993 begins, in which they won a military victory Armed forces Abkhazia. The republic becomes a de facto independent state, but de jure remains part of Georgia. This became a manifestation of the contradiction between two principles of international relations that guided the conflicting parties: the right of a nation to self-determination, which

was supported by the Abkhaz side, and the principle of the territorial integrity of the state, on which Georgia insisted.

The last principle means that the territory of a state cannot be changed without its consent. The inability of the parties to find a peaceful solution to such a contradiction leads to the aggravation of national conflicts and their escalation into military confrontation. At the same time, in defense of their position, representatives of the central government usually cite a statement about the priority of the principle of territorial integrity in relation to the right to national self-determination.

Meanwhile, one cannot help but see that the principle of territorial integrity is aimed exclusively at protecting the state from external aggression. This is precisely what its wording in paragraph 4 of Art. 2 of the UN Charter: “All Members of the United Nations shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any State or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.” Moreover, the application of the principle of territorial integrity is actually subordinate to the exercise of the right to self-determination. Thus, according to the Declaration of Principles of International Law, nothing in the actions of states “shall be construed as authorizing or encouraging any action that would lead to the dismemberment or to the partial or total violation of the territorial integrity or political unity of sovereign and independent States, observing in their actions the principle equality and self-determination of peoples"6. In other words, the principle of territorial integrity is inapplicable to states that do not ensure equal rights for the peoples living in it and do not allow their free self-determination.

This understanding is especially relevant after the tragic events of August 2008 in South Ossetia. The territorial integrity of Georgia within the borders of the former Georgian SSR is a completely acceptable requirement, but subject to its observance of equal rights and ensuring the free development of its non-Georgian

6 See: Declaration of Principles of International Law concerning Friendly Relations and Cooperation among States in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations (adopted on 24.10.1970 by Resolution 2625 (XXV) at the 1883rd plenary meeting of the UN General Assembly)

ethnic minorities7. Unfortunately, and historical experience shows this, it is impossible to convince a nation that has experienced a war of extermination that it can prosper as part of a state that has organized the genocide of its people.

Fourthly, self-determination of nations consists not only in the separation of ethnic groups from the central government and the formation of sovereign national states, but also in the right to voluntarily join other states, unite with them, create unions of states, etc., that is, independently decide their fate . Therefore, one of the features of modern national movements is, in fact, the simultaneous updating of two trends in the national question: the desire for isolation and the desire for unification. Peoples striving for independence or newly formed national states, as a rule, initially gravitate toward one or another that is stronger politically, economically, militarily, etc. relations between states, either ethnically related, or ethnically or historically close. There are at least three reasons for this.

1). As already noted, many states that have declared independence link their prosperity to unification with their ethnic brethren, who have either their own sovereign state or a state within a federation. Hence the ineradicable, persistent desire of Nagorno-Karabakh for Armenia, Nakhichevan for Azerbaijan, South Ossetians for the North Ossetians within the Russian Federation, Transnistria for Russia, etc.

2). Small, newly formed states, especially during periods of their international non-recognition, objectively need the protection of their independence by states that are stronger and more independent in economic, political and military terms.

3). For free and sovereign development, newly formed states need not only the declaration of independence, but also its international recognition. Otherwise, the encroachments of the former central authorities on the independence of their minorities, attempts to “fasten” them at any cost to their former statehood will be permanent. And to achieve this, nation states need a strong mediator and alliance.

7 By the way, Western politicians adhered to a similar point of view in resolving the problem of Kosovo’s sovereignty.

Nick, who would actively contribute to the recognition of new independence in the international community, including by his own example.

Of course, the recognition of new states means a revision of established borders in the region and the world. It is clear that making such a decision is a decisive step, often constrained by certain political considerations. Heed, for example, Russia to the persistent requests of Abkhazia and South Ossetia to accept them into the Russian Federation- means immediately extremely complicating your already difficult relations with the West (suffice it to recall the West’s reaction to the Statement of the President of the Russian Federation on the recognition of their independence). But, at the same time, this step corresponds to the objective historical trend towards unification, without the implementation of which it is impossible to resolve the national issue in the region, it is impossible to prevent attempts to resolve the problem by force by the “great power” leadership of Georgia. At the same time, this step would demonstrate Russia’s commitment to the generally recognized principles of international law, its firmness in pursuing a consistent national policy, and legitimate support for small nations in their aspirations for self-determination and satisfaction of the legitimate right to free, equal development.

Fifthly, in connection with the above, it is necessary to dwell on one more aspect of modern interethnic relations: Russia’s position on the issues of independence of Kosovo and Chechnya. According to the already ingrained practice of unscrupulous Western politicians, “blaming a sore head on a sound one,” the Russian Federation is often accused of a policy of “double standards”: supporting the self-determination of the peoples who were part of Georgia under the USSR, and not recognizing such a right among the Kosovo Albanians and Chechnya.

As for the independence of Kosovo, the position of the Russian leadership was at one time openly and unequivocally communicated to the world community: recognition of Kosovo’s independence is a precedent for resolving its own issues.

In the absence of assistance in this matter, an attempt is made to compensate for the non-recognition of self-proclaimed states by the international community by mutual recognition of these states, as happened in mid-2001 in Stepanakert, when the Commonwealth of Unrecognized States (CIS-2) was formed - an informal association created for consultations, mutual assistance, coordination and joint actions by unrecognized self-proclaimed state entities on post-Soviet territory - Abkhazia, the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, the Transnistrian Moldavian Republic and South Ossetia.

national issues by other unrecognized state entities, which, in fact, was confirmed by the events in the Caucasus.

Regarding Chechnya. It is necessary to distinguish between the right of nations to self-determination and outright separatism, in which separation from the state is required not by an ethnic group, which is granted all the rights and conditions for equal, free development, but by a certain militarized minority of the population under the slogans of Wahhabism - one of the most radical and terrorism-oriented religious political movement in Islam. That this is so is evidenced by those essentially feudal orders that were established by this minority throughout Chechnya after the first Chechen war, and the inability of the exalted leadership to establish a peaceful life in the republic, the complete ruin of the common population, and, as a way out of crisis

Criminal “economy”, banditry elevated to the rank of state policy, widespread hostage-taking, robbery and ruin of the population, terrorist attacks on Russian territory, an attempt to transfer separatism to Dagestan - a neighboring subject of the Russian Federation, etc. Such a policy had nothing in common with the nation’s right to self-determination and, thereby, to create conditions for its free development, and could not have.

Thus, the right to self-determination is the inalienable right of a nation to independently decide its destiny with the goal of free and equal development with other nations and peoples. The need for its application objectively matures in the depths of the social coexistence of ethnic groups united by one or another statehood, and, having matured, urgently requires its implementation. This especially needs to be taken into account in the implementation of the domestic and foreign policy strategy of a multinational state. An ahistorical approach, a short-sighted national policy towards ethnic minorities, the desire of the authorities, contrary to objective laws, to prevent the free expression of the peoples - are always fraught with severe ethnic conflicts, bloody armed consequences, and often outright genocide of a small people, which is recognized by the UN as an international crime.

Respect for the right of every people to freely choose the paths and forms of their development and self-determination is one of the fundamental foundations of international relations. The emergence of the principle of self-determination of peoples was preceded by the proclamation of the principle of nationality, which assumed self-determination only on the basis of nationality. At the present stage of development of international law, the principle of self-determination of peoples and nations as a mandatory norm was developed after the adoption of the UN Charter. One of the most important goals of the UN is “to develop friendly relations between nations on the basis of respect for the principle of equality and self-determination of peoples...” (Clause 2 of Article 1 of the Charter).

The principle of self-determination has repeatedly received confirmation in other UN documents, in particular in the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples of 1960, the Human Rights Covenants of 1966, the Declaration of Principles of International Law of 1970. The Declaration of Principles of the Final Act of the CSCE especially emphasizes the right of peoples to control their own destinies, however, due to the collapse of the colonial system, the question of self-determination of nations was largely resolved.

In Resolution 1514 (XV) of December 14, 1960, the UN General Assembly explicitly stated that “the continued existence of colonialism impedes the development of international economic cooperation, retards the social, cultural and economic development of dependent peoples and is contrary to the ideal of the United Nations of universal world." Other UN documents express the main normative content of the principle of self-determination. Thus, the Declaration of Principles of International Law of 1970 states: “The creation of a sovereign and independent State, free accession to or association with an independent State, or the establishment of any other political status freely determined by a people, are forms of the exercise by that people of the right to self-determination.” .

The right of national self-determination does not disappear if a nation has formed an independent state or became part of a federation of states. The subject of the right to self-determination is not only dependent, but also sovereign nations and peoples. With the achievement of national independence, the right to self-determination only changes its content, which is reflected in the corresponding international legal norm. Without strict respect and adherence to the principle of self-determination of peoples, it is impossible to achieve many of the vital tasks facing the UN, in particular, it is impossible to promote universal respect and observance of human rights and fundamental freedoms for all, without distinction as to race, gender, language and religion. Without strict adherence to this principle, it is also impossible to maintain relations of peaceful coexistence between states. Each state, in accordance with the 1970 Declaration, is obliged to refrain from any violent action that could prevent peoples from exercising their right to self-determination. An important element of the principle is the right of peoples to seek and receive support in accordance with the purposes and principles of the UN Charter in the event that they are deprived of the right to self-determination by force.

The principle of self-determination of peoples and nations, as emphasized in the literature, is precisely the right of peoples and nations, and not an obligation, and is closely related to the freedom of political choice. Self-determined peoples freely choose not only their status as an independent participant in international relations, but also their internal structure and foreign policy course. Inherently connected with the principle of peoples’ exercise of the right to self-determination is the principle of cooperation between states, which is expressed, regardless of differences in their political, economic and social systems, in various spheres of international relations in order to maintain international peace and security and other goals enshrined in the UN Charter.

Simultaneously with the UN Charter, the principle of cooperation was recorded in the founding documents (charters) of many international organizations, in international treaties, numerous resolutions and declarations.

With the adoption of the Charter, the principle of cooperation took its place among other principles that must be observed under modern international law. Thus, in accordance with the Charter, states are obliged to “carry out international cooperation in resolving international problems of an economic, social, cultural and humanitarian nature,” and are also obliged to “maintain international peace and security and to this end take effective collective measures.”

The principle of cooperation is also contained in Art. 55 and 56 of the UN Charter. For example, in Art. 55 of the Charter establishes the obligations of UN member states to cooperate with each other and with the Organization in achieving the goals provided for in the Charter.

The obligation of states to cooperate with each other presupposes that states comply in good faith with the norms of international law and the UN Charter. If any state ignores its obligations arising from the generally recognized principles and norms of international law, then this state thereby undermines the basis of cooperation.

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Paragraph nine of the Russian Marxists’ program, which speaks of the right of nations to self-determination, has recently (as we already pointed out in Enlightenment)* caused a whole campaign of opportunists. And the Russian liquidator Semkovsky in the St. Petersburg liquidationist newspaper, and the Bundist Libman, and the Ukrainian National Socialist Yurkevich - in their organs attacked this paragraph, treating it with an air of the greatest disdain. There is no doubt that this “invasion of twelve languages” of opportunism on our Marxist program is in close connection with modern nationalist vacillations in general. Therefore, a detailed analysis of the issue raised seems timely to us. Let us only note that not a single independent argument was brought forward by any of the named opportunists: they all repeat only what Rosa Luxemburg said in her long Polish article of 1908-1909: “The National Question and Autonomy.” We will most often take into account the “original” arguments of this last author in our presentation.

1. WHAT IS SELF-DETERMINATION OF NATIONS?

Naturally, this question comes to the fore when attempts are made to consider so-called self-determination in a Marxist manner. What should be understood by it? Should we look for an answer in legal definitions (definitions) derived from all sorts of “general concepts” of law? Or should the answer be sought in the historical and economic study of national movements?

It is not surprising that Messrs. The Semkovskys, Libmans, Yurkeviches did not even think of posing this question, getting off with simple giggles about the “obscurity” of the Marxist program and, apparently, not even knowing, in their simplicity, that it speaks not only about the self-determination of nations Russian program 1903, but also the decision of the London International Congress of 1896 (more on this in its own place). It is much more surprising that Rosa Luxemburg, who declaims a lot about the supposedly abstract and metaphysical nature of this paragraph, herself fell into precisely this sin of abstractness and metaphysicality. It is Rosa Luxemburg who constantly strays into general discussions about self-determination (even to the point of quite amusing speculation about how to find out the will of the nation), without posing anywhere a clear and precise question: are the essence of the matter in legal definitions or in the experience of national movements around the world?

A precise formulation of this question, inevitable for a Marxist, would immediately undermine nine-tenths of Rosa Luxemburg’s arguments. This is not the first time that national movements have arisen in Russia and are not unique to it. All over the world, the era of the final victory of capitalism over feudalism was associated with national movements. The economic basis of these movements is that for complete victory commodity production it is necessary to conquer the internal yearbook by the bourgeoisie, it is necessary for the state to unite territories with a population speaking the same language, while eliminating any obstacles to the development of this language and its consolidation in literature. Language is the most important means of human communication; unity of language and unhindered development is one of the most important conditions for a truly free and broad trade turnover, corresponding to modern capitalism, a free and broad grouping of the population into all individual classes, and finally, a condition for the close connection of the market with each and every owner or owner, seller and buyer.

The formation of national states that best satisfy these requirements of modern capitalism is therefore a tendency ________________________

* See Works, 5th ed., volume 24, pp. 113-150. Ed.

(aspiration) of any national movement. The deepest economic factors push towards this, and for all of Western Europe - moreover, for the entire civilized world - the national state is therefore typical, normal for the capitalist period.

Consequently, if we want to understand the meaning of self-determination of nations, without playing with legal definitions, without “composing” abstract definitions, but by analyzing the historical and economic conditions of national movements, then we will inevitably come to the conclusion: by self-determination of nations we mean their state separation from foreign national groups, of course the formation of an independent national state.

We will see below even other reasons why it would be wrong to understand the right to self-determination as anything other than the right to a separate state existence. Now we must dwell on how Rosa Luxemburg tried to “get rid of” the inevitable conclusion about the deep economic foundations of the desire for a nation-state.

Rosa Luxemburg is well aware of Kautsky’s pamphlet: “Nationality and Internationality” (supplement to “Neue Zeit”1, No. 1, 1907-1908; Russian translation in the journal “Nauchnaya Mysl”, Riga, 19082). She knows that Kautsky*, having examined in detail the question of the national state in § 4 of this pamphlet, came to the conclusion that Otto Bauer “underestimates the strength of the desire to create a national state” (p. 23 of the quoted pamphlet). Rosa Luxemburg quotes Kautsky’s own words: “The nation state is the form of state that most corresponds to modern” (i.e., capitalist, civilized, economically progressive, as opposed to medieval, pre-capitalist, etc.) “conditions; it is the form in which it can most easily fulfill its tasks” (i.e., the tasks of the freest, broadest and fastest development of capitalism). To this we must add the even more precise concluding remark of Kautsky that states that are nationally variegated (the so-called states of nationalities in contrast to nation states) are “always states whose internal structure, for one reason or another, has remained abnormal or underdeveloped” (backward). It goes without saying that Kautsky speaks of abnormality solely in the sense of non-conformity with what is most adapted to the requirements of developing capitalism.

The question now is how Rosa Luxemburg reacted to these historical and economic conclusions of Kautsky. Are they true or false? Is Kautsky right with his historical-economic theory, or is Bauer, whose theory is fundamentally psychological? What is the connection between Bauer’s undoubted “national opportunism”, his defense of cultural-national autonomy, his nationalist passions (“in some places the strengthening of the national moment,” as Kautsky put it), his “enormous exaggeration of the national moment and complete oblivion of the international moment” ( Kautsky), with his underestimation of the strength of the desire to create a national state?

Rosa Luxemburg did not even raise this question. She didn't notice the connection. She did not think about the whole of Bauer's theoretical views. She did not even oppose historical, economic and psychological theory on the national question. She limited herself to the following remarks against Kautsky.

“...This “best” national state is only an abstraction, easily amenable to theoretical development and theoretical defense, but not corresponding to reality” (“Przeglad Socjaldemokratyczny”, 1908, No. 6, p. 499)

And in support of this decisive statement comes the argument that the development of great capitalist powers and imperialism make the “right to self-determination” of small peoples illusory. “Can we seriously talk,” exclaims Rosa Luxemburg, “about the “self-determination” of formally independent Montenegrins, Bulgarians, Romanians, Serbs, Greeks, and partly even the Swiss, whose independence itself is a product of political struggle and the diplomatic game of the “European Concert”?”! (p. 500). The best fit for the conditions is “not the national state, as Kautsky believes, but ________________________

* In 1916, while preparing a republication of the article, V.I. Lenin made a note to this place. “We ask the reader not to forget that Kautsky, until 1909 and before his excellent pamphlet “The Path to Power,” was an enemy of opportunism, the defense of which he turned to only in 1910-1911, and more decisively only in 1914-1916.”

the state is predatory.” Several dozen figures are given about the size of the colonies belonging to England, France, etc.

Reading such reasoning, one cannot help but marvel at the author’s ability to not understand what’s what! To teach Kautsky with an important air that small states are economically dependent on large ones; that there is a struggle between bourgeois states due to the predatory suppression of other nations; that imperialism and colonies exist is some kind of funny, childish cleverness, because all this has nothing to do with the matter. Not only small states, but also Russia, for example, are entirely economically dependent on the power of the imperialist financial capital of the “rich” bourgeois countries. Not only the Balkan miniature states, but also America in the 19th century was, economically, a colony of Europe, as Marx pointed out in Capital3. All this is, of course, well known to Kautsky and every Marxist, but on the question of national movements and the national state this is decidedly neither village nor city.

Rosa Luxemburg replaced the question of the political self-determination of nations in bourgeois society, of their state independence, with the question of their economic independence and independence. This is as smart as if a person discussing the programmatic demand for the supremacy of parliament, i.e., the assembly of people's representatives, in a bourgeois state, began to lay out his completely correct conviction in the supremacy of big capital in all kinds of systems in a bourgeois country.

There is no doubt that most of Asia, the most populous part of the world, is in the position of either colonies of “great powers” ​​or states that are extremely dependent and nationally oppressed. But does this well-known circumstance in any way shake the indisputable fact that in Asia itself the conditions for the most complete development of commodity production, the most free, wide and rapid growth capitalism were created only in Japan, that is, only in an independent national state? This state is bourgeois, and therefore it itself began to oppress other nations and enslave colonies; We do not know whether Asia, before the collapse of capitalism, will have time to form into a system of independent national states, like Europe. But it remains indisputable that capitalism, having awakened Asia, gave rise to national movements everywhere there too, that the tendency of these movements is the creation of national states in Asia, that best conditions The development of capitalism is ensured by precisely such states. The example of Asia speaks for Kautsky and against Rosa Luxemburg.

The example of the Balkan states also speaks against it, because everyone now sees that the best conditions for the development of capitalism in the Balkans are created precisely to the extent that independent national states are created on this peninsula.

Consequently, the example of all advanced civilized humanity, and the example of the Balkans, and the example of Asia prove, contrary to Rosa Luxemburg, the unconditional correctness of Kautsky’s position: the national state is the rule and “norm” of capitalism, a nationally variegated state is backwardness or an exception. From the point of view of national relations, the best conditions for the development of capitalism are undoubtedly provided by the national state. This does not mean, of course, that such a state, on the basis of bourgeois relations, can exclude the exploitation and oppression of nations. This only means that Marxists cannot lose sight of the powerful economic factors that give rise to the desire to create nation-states. This means that “self-determination of the nation” in the Marxist program cannot have, from a historical and economic point of view, any other meaning other than political self-determination, state independence, and the formation of a national state.

From a Marxist, i.e., class proletarian, point of view, what conditions are involved in supporting the bourgeois-democratic demand for a “national state” will be discussed in detail below. Now we limit ourselves to defining the concept of “self-determination” and must only note that Rosa Luxemburg knows about the content of this concept (“national state”), while her opportunist supporters, the Libmans, Semkovskys, Yurkevichs, do not even know this!

2. HISTORICAL CONCRETE STATEMENT QUESTION

An unconditional requirement of Marxist theory when analyzing any social issue is to place it within a certain historical framework, and then, if we are talking about one country (for example, about a national program for a given country), taking into account the specific features that distinguish this country from others within the same historical era.

What does this unconditional demand of Marxism mean when applied to our question?

First of all, it means the need to strictly separate two, fundamentally different, from the point of view of national movements, eras of capitalism. On the one hand, this is the era of the collapse of feudalism and absolutism, the era of the formation of bourgeois-democratic society and the state, when national movements for the first time become mass, one way or another drawing all classes of the population into politics through the press, participation in representative institutions, etc. On the other hand, we are faced with an era of fully established capitalist states, with a long-established constitutional system, with a highly developed antagonism between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie - an era that can be called the eve of the collapse of capitalism.

The first era is characterized by the awakening of national movements, the involvement of the peasantry in them, as the most numerous and most “difficult to rise” segment of the population in connection with the struggle for political freedom in general and for the rights of nationality in particular. The second era is characterized by the absence of mass bourgeois-democratic movements, when developed capitalism, increasingly bringing together and mixing nations already fully involved in trade, brings to the fore the antagonism of internationally merged capital with the international workers' movement.

Of course, both eras are not separated from each other by a wall, but are connected by numerous transitional links, and different countries also differ in the speed of national development, the national composition of the population, its distribution, etc., etc. There can be no question of approaching the national program of the Marxists of a given country without taking into account all these general historical and specific state conditions.

And this is where we come across the weakest point in Rosa Luxemburg’s reasoning. With extraordinary zeal, she decorates her article with a set of “strong” words against § 9 of our program, declaring it “sweeping,” “template,” “metaphysical phrase,” and so on endlessly. It would be natural to expect that a writer who so excellently condemns metaphysics (in the Marxian sense, i.e., anti-dialectics) and empty abstractions, would give us an example of a concrete historical consideration of the issue. We are talking about the national program of the Marxists of one specific country, Russia, of one specific era, the beginning of the 20th century. Probably, Rosa Luxemburg poses the question of what historical era Russia is experiencing, what are the specific features of the national question and national movements of a given country in a given era?

Rosa Luxemburg says absolutely nothing about this! You won’t find a shadow of an analysis of the question of how the national question stands in Russia in a given historical era, what are the characteristics of Russia in this regard!

We are told that the national question is posed differently in the Balkans than in Ireland, that Marx assessed the Polish and Czech national movement in this way in the specific conditions of 1848 (page of extracts from Marx), that Engels assessed the struggle of the forest cantons of Switzerland in this way against Austria and the Battle of Morgarten, which took place in 1315 (a page of quotes from Engels with a corresponding commentary from Kautsky), that Lassalle considered the peasant war in Germany in the 16th century reactionary, etc.

It cannot be said that these remarks and quotes sparkle with novelty, but, in any case, it is interesting for the reader to remember again and again how exactly Marx, Engels and Lassalle approached the analysis of specific historical issues of individual countries. And, re-reading instructive quotes from Marx and Engels, you see with particular clarity what a ridiculous position Rosa Luxemburg has put herself in. She eloquently and angrily preaches the need for a concrete historical analysis of the national question in different countries at different times - and she does not make the slightest attempt to determine what historical stage of development of capitalism Russia is experiencing at the beginning of the 20th century, what are the features of the national question in this country. Rosa Luxemburg shows examples of how others analyzed the issue in a Marxist way, as if deliberately emphasizing how often hell is paved with good intentions, good advice covers up the reluctance or inability to use them in practice.

Here is one instructive comparison. Revolting against the slogan of Polish independence, Rosa Luxemburg refers to her work in 1898, which proved the rapid “industrial development of Poland” with the marketing of factory products in Russia. Needless to say, this means absolutely nothing follows on the question of the right to self-determination, that this only proves the disappearance of the old gentry Poland, etc. Rosa Luxemburg imperceptibly moves constantly to the conclusion that among the factors connecting Russia with Poland , purely economic factors of modern capitalist relations now predominate.

But then our Rose turns to the question of autonomy and - although her article is entitled “The National Question and Autonomy” in general - begins to prove the exclusive right of the Kingdom of Poland to autonomy (see about this “Enlightenment” 1913, No. 12 *). To confirm Poland's right to autonomy. Rosa Luxemburg characterizes the political system of Russia according to characteristics that are obviously economic, political, everyday, and sociological - a set of features that add up to the concept of “Asian despotism” (No. 12 “Przeglad"a”4, p. 137).

Everyone knows that this kind of political system is very strong in cases where the economy of a given country is dominated by completely patriarchal, pre-capitalist features and insignificant development of the commodity economy and class differentiation. If, however, in a country in which the political system is distinguished by a sharply pre-capitalist character, there is a nationally delimited region with the rapid development of capitalism, then the faster this capitalist development, the stronger the contradiction between it and the pre-capitalist state system, the more likely is the separation of the advanced region from the whole , - an area connected with the whole not by “modern-capitalist”, but by “Asian-despotic” connections.

Rosa Luxemburg, therefore, did not make ends meet at all even on the question of social structure authorities in Russia in relation to bourgeois Poland, and she did not even raise the question of the specific historical features of national movements in Russia.

We must dwell on this issue.

3. SPECIFIC FEATURESTHE NATIONAL QUESTION IN RUSSIAAND ITS BOURGEOIS-DEMOCRATIC TRANSFORMATION

“...Despite the extensibility of the principle of “the right of a nation to self-determination,” which is the purest commonplace, being, obviously, equally applicable not only to the peoples living in Russia, but also to the nations living in Germany and Austria, Switzerland and Sweden , America and Australia, we do not find it in any program of modern socialist parties...” (No. 6 “Przeglad"a”, p. 483).

This is what Rosa Luxemburg writes at the beginning of her campaign against § 9 of the Marxist program. By foisting upon us the understanding of this point of the program as “the purest commonplace,” Rosa Luxemburg herself falls into precisely this sin, declaring with amusing boldness that this point is “obviously equally applicable” to Russia, Germany, etc.

It is obvious, we will answer, that Rosa Luxemburg decided to give in her article a collection of logical errors that are suitable for school students. For Rosa Luxemburg's tirade is completely nonsense and a mockery of the historically specific formulation of the question.

If we interpret the Marxist program not in a childish way, but in a Marxist way, then it is very easy to realize that it refers to bourgeois-democratic national movements. If so - and this is undoubtedly so - then it is “obvious” that this program applies “indiscriminately”, as a “common place”, etc., to all cases of bourgeois-democratic national movements. It would also be no less obvious to Rosa Luxemburg, with the slightest reflection, that our program applies only to cases where such

________________________

* See Works, 5th ed., volume 24, pp. 143-150. Ed.

movements.

Having thought about these obvious considerations, Rosa Luxemburg would have easily seen what nonsense she said. Accusing us of presenting a “commonplace”, she brings up the argument against us that self-determination of nations is not mentioned in the program of those countries where there are no bourgeois-democratic national movements. A wonderfully clever argument!

Comparison of the political and economic development of different countries, as well as their Marxist programs, is of enormous importance from the point of view of Marxism, since both the general capitalist nature of modern states and the general law of their development are undoubted. But such a comparison must be made skillfully. The basic condition for this is to clarify the question of whether the historical eras of development of the countries being compared are comparable. For example, the agrarian program of Russian Marxists can only be “compared” with Western European ones by complete ignoramuses (like Prince E. Trubetskoy in Russian Thought), because our program provides an answer to the question of bourgeois-democratic agrarian transformation, which is not even discussed in Western countries .

The same applies to the national question. In most Western countries it was resolved a long time ago. It’s funny to look for answers to non-existent questions in Western programs. Rosa Luxemburg lost sight of the most important thing here: the difference between countries with long-completed and unfinished bourgeois-democratic transformations.

This difference is the crux of the matter. Complete ignorance of this difference turns Rosa Luxemburg's lengthy article into a collection of empty, meaningless platitudes.

In Western, continental Europe, the era of bourgeois-democratic revolutions covers a fairly specific period of time, approximately from 1789 to 1871. This era was precisely the era of national movements and the creation of nation states. At the end of this era, Western Europe turned into an established system of bourgeois states, according to general rule at the same time nationally united states. Therefore, now to look for the right of self-determination in the programs of Western European socialists means not to understand the ABCs of Marxism.

In Eastern Europe and Asia, the era of bourgeois-democratic revolutions only began in 1905. Revolutions in Russia, Persia, Turkey, China, wars in the Balkans - this is the chain of world events in our era of our “East”. And in this chain of events, only a blind person could fail to see the awakening of a whole series of bourgeois-democratic national movements, aspirations for the creation of nationally independent and nationally united states. It is precisely because and only because Russia, together with neighboring countries, is experiencing this era that we need a clause on the right of nations to self-determination in our program.

But let’s continue with the above quote from Rosa Luxemburg’s article:

“.. In particular,” she writes, “the program of the party, which operates in a state with an extremely diverse national composition and for which the national question plays a primary role, the program of Austrian Social Democracy does not contain the principle of the right of nations to self-determination” (ibid. ).

So, they want to convince the reader “in particular” with the example of Austria. Let's see, from a specific historical point of view, how much is reasonable in this example. Firstly, we pose the main question of the completion of the bourgeois-democratic revolution. In Austria it began in 1848 and ended in 1867. Since then, for almost half a century, an established, by and large, bourgeois constitution has prevailed there, on the basis of which a legal workers' party legally operates.

Therefore, in the internal conditions of development of Austria (that is, from the point of view of the development of capitalism in Austria in general and in its individual nations in particular), there are no factors that generate leaps, one of the companions of which may be the formation of nationally independent states. By assuming with her comparison that Russia is, on this point, in similar conditions, Rosa Luxemburg not only makes a fundamentally incorrect, ahistorical assumption, but also unwittingly slides into liquidationism.

Secondly, the completely different relationship between nationalities in Austria and Russia on the issue that concerns us is of especially great importance. Not only was Austria for a long time a German-dominated state, but the Austrian Germans claimed hegemony among the German nation in general. This “pretension,” as Rosa Luxemburg may deign to recall (who so dislikes commonplaces, templates, abstractions...), was crushed by the war of 1866. The dominant nation in Austria, the Germans, found itself outside the boundaries of the independent German state, which was finally created by 1871. On the other hand, the Hungarians’ attempt to create an independent national state failed back in 1849, under the blows of the Russian serf army.

Thus, an extremely peculiar situation was created: on the part of the Hungarians, and then the Czechs, the inclination was not precisely towards separation from Austria, but towards preserving the integrity of Austria precisely in the interests of national independence, which could be completely crushed by more predatory and powerful neighbors! Austria developed, due to this peculiar position, into a two-center (dualistic) state, and is now turning into a three-centered (trialist: Germans, Hungarians, Slavs).

Is there anything similar in Russia? Do we have a tendency among “foreigners” to unite with the Great Russians under the threat of worse national oppression?

It is enough to raise this question to see to what extent the comparison of Russia with Austria on the issue of self-determination of nations is meaningless, stereotyped and ignorant.

The peculiar conditions of Russia, in relation to the national question, are precisely the opposite of what we saw in Austria. Russia is a state with a single national center, Great Russian. The Great Russians occupy a gigantic continuous territory, reaching approximately 70 million people. The peculiarity of this national state, firstly, is that “foreigners” (who make up the majority of the population as a whole - 57%) inhabit precisely the outskirts; secondly, the fact that the oppression of these foreigners is much stronger than in neighboring states (and not even only in European ones); thirdly, the fact that in a number of cases, oppressed peoples living on the outskirts have their relatives on the other side of the border, enjoying greater national independence (it is enough to recall, at least on the western and southern borders of the state - Finns, Swedes, Poles, Ukrainians, Romanian); fourthly, the fact that the development of capitalism and the general level of culture is often higher in the “foreign” outskirts than in the center of the state. Finally, it is in the neighboring Asian states that we see the beginning of a period of bourgeois revolutions and national movements, partly capturing related nationalities within Russia.

Thus, it is precisely the historical specific features of the national question in Russia that give us special urgency in recognizing the right of nations to self-determination in the current era.

However, even from a purely factual point of view, Rosa Luxemburg’s statement that the Austrian Social-Democrats are in the program. there is no recognition of the right of nations to self-determination, incorrect. It is worth opening the minutes of the Brunn Congress, which adopted the national program5, and we will see there the statements of the Ruthenian Social-Democratic Party. Gankevich on behalf of the entire Ukrainian (Rusyn) delegation (page 85 of the protocols) and the Polish Social-Democrats. Reger on behalf of the entire Polish delegation (p. 108) that the Austrian Social-Democrats. Both of these nations include among their aspirations the desire for national unification, freedom and independence of their peoples. Consequently, Austrian Social Democracy, while not directly emphasizing the rights of nations to self-determination in its program, at the same time is completely reconciled with the demands of national independence by sections of the party. In fact, this means, of course, recognizing the right of nations to self-determination! Rosa Luxemburg's reference to Austria thus turns out to speak against Rosa Luxemburg in every respect.

4. “PRACTICISM” IN THE NATIONAL QUESTION

The opportunists took up with particular zeal the argument of Rosa Luxemburg that § 9 of our program does not contain anything “practical”. Rosa Luxemburg is so delighted with this argument that we sometimes see this “slogan” repeated eight times per page in her article.

§ 9 “does not,” she writes, “give any practical guidance for the daily policy of the proletariat, no practical solution to national problems.”

Let us consider this argument, which is also formulated in such a way that § 9 either expresses absolutely nothing or obliges us to support all national aspirations.

What does the requirement of “practicality” mean in the national question?

Either support for all national aspirations; or the answer: “yes or no” to the question of the separation of each nation; or even the immediate “feasibility” of national requirements.

Let us consider all these three possible meanings of the requirement of “practicality.”

The bourgeoisie, which naturally acts as its hegemon (leader) at the beginning of any national movement, calls support for all national aspirations a practical matter. But the policy of the proletariat in the national question (as in other issues) only supports the bourgeoisie in a certain direction, but never coincides with its policy. The working class supports the bourgeoisie only in the interests of national peace (which the bourgeoisie cannot completely provide and which can only be realized to the extent of complete democratization), in the interests of equality, in the interests of the best conditions for the class struggle. Therefore, it is precisely against the practicalism of the bourgeoisie that the proletarians put forward a principled policy on the national question, always supporting the bourgeoisie only conditionally. Every bourgeoisie wants in the national cause either privileges for its nation or exceptional benefits for it; this is called “practical”. The proletariat is against all privileges, against all exclusivity. Demanding “practicalism” from him means following the lead of the bourgeoisie and falling into opportunism.

Give a “yes or no” answer to the question about the separation of each nation? This seems like a very “practical” requirement. But in reality it is absurd, metaphysical in theory, but in practice it leads to the subordination of the proletariat to the politics of the bourgeoisie. The bourgeoisie always puts its national demands first. He puts them unconditionally. For the proletariat they are subordinated to the interests of the class struggle. Theoretically, one cannot guarantee in advance whether the separation of a given nation or its equal status with another nation will end the bourgeois-democratic revolution; for the proletariat it is important in both cases to ensure the development of its class; It is important for the bourgeoisie to complicate this development by pushing its tasks aside from the tasks of “their” nation. Therefore, the proletariat limits itself to a negative, so to speak, demand for recognition of the right to self-determination, without guaranteeing any nation, without pledging to give anything about another nation.

It may not be “practical,” but it actually guarantees the most democratic possible solution; The proletariat needs only these guarantees, and the bourgeoisie of each nation needs guarantees of its benefits without regard to the situation (possible disadvantages) of other nations.

The bourgeoisie is most interested in the “feasibility” of this demand - hence the eternal policy of deals with the bourgeoisie of other nations to the detriment of the proletariat. What is important for the proletariat is to strengthen its class against the bourgeoisie and educate the masses in the spirit of consistent democracy and socialism.

Even if this is not “practical” for opportunists, it is the only guarantee in practice, a guarantee of maximum national equality and peace in spite of both the feudal lords and the nationalist bourgeoisie.

The entire task of the proletarians in the national question is “impractical”, from the point of view of the nationalist bourgeoisie of each nation, for the proletarians demand “abstract” equality, the fundamental absence of the slightest privilege, being hostile to any nationalism. Not understanding this, Rosa Luxemburg, with her unreasonable celebration of practicality, opened wide the gates precisely for opportunists, especially for opportunist concessions to Great Russian nationalism.

Why Great Russian? Because the Great Russians in Russia are an oppressive nation, and in national terms, naturally, opportunism will express itself differently among the oppressed and among the oppressing nations.

The bourgeoisie of the oppressed nations, in the name of the “practicality” of their demands, will call on the proletariat to unconditionally support its aspirations. It is most practical to say a direct “yes” for the secession of such and such a nation, and not for the right to secede of all and any nations!

The proletariat is against such practicality: recognizing equality and an equal right to a national state, it values ​​and places above all else the union of the proletarians of all nations, assessing every national demand, every national secession from the angle of the class struggle of the workers. The slogan of practicality is in fact only a slogan of the uncritical adoption of bourgeois aspirations.

We are told: by supporting the right to secede, you support the bourgeois nationalism of oppressed nations. This is what Rosa Luxemburg says, this is what the opportunist Semkovsky repeats after her - the only representative, by the way, of liquidator ideas on this issue in a liquidationist newspaper!

We answer: no, it is the bourgeoisie who is important here for a “practical” solution, while the workers are important for the fundamental identification of two tendencies. Since the bourgeoisie of an oppressed nation fights against the oppressor, we are always and in every case most decisively for it, for we are the most courageous and consistent enemies of oppression. Since the bourgeoisie of the oppressed nation stands for its bourgeois nationalism, we are against it. The fight against the privileges and violence of the oppressing nation and no condoning of the desire for privileges on the part of the oppressed nation.

If we do not put forward and carry out the slogan of the right to secession in our agitation, we will play into the hands of not only the bourgeoisie, but also the feudal lords and the absolutism of the oppressing nation. Kautsky put forward this argument against Rosa Luxemburg long ago, and this argument is undeniable. Afraid of “helping” the nationalist bourgeoisie of Poland, Rosa Luxemburg, by denying the right to secession in the program of the Russian Marxists, in fact helps the Black Hundreds and Great Russians. It actually helps opportunistic reconciliation with the privileges (and worse than privileges) of the Great Russians.

Carried away by the fight against nationalism in Poland, Rosa Luxemburg forgot about the nationalism of the Great Russians, although it is this nationalism that is most terrible now, it is less bourgeois, but more feudal, it is the main brake on democracy and the proletarian struggle. In every bourgeois nationalism of an oppressed nation there is a general democratic content against oppression, and it is this content that we unconditionally support, strictly emphasizing the desire for our own national exclusivity, fighting the desire of the Polish bourgeois to crush the Jew, etc., etc.

This is “impractical” from the point of view of the bourgeois and tradesman. This is the only practical and principled policy that really helps democracy, freedom, and the proletarian union on the national question.

Recognition of the right to secession for everyone; an assessment of each specific question of secession from a point of view that eliminates all inequality, all privileges, all exclusivity.

Let's take the position of the oppressor nation. Can a people who oppress other peoples be free? No. The interests of freedom of the Great Russian population* require a fight against such oppression. The long history, the centuries-long history of suppressing the movements of oppressed nations, the systematic propaganda of such suppression on the part of the “higher” classes created enormous obstacles to the cause of freedom of the Great Russian people themselves in their prejudices, etc.

The Great Russian Black Hundreds consciously support these prejudices and inflame them. The Great Russian bourgeoisie puts up with them or accommodates them. The Great Russian proletariat cannot realize its goals, cannot clear the path to freedom for itself, without systematically fighting these prejudices.

The creation of an independent and independent national state still remains in Russia the privilege of the Great Russian nation alone. We, Great Russian proletarians, do not defend any privileges, and we do not defend this privilege either. We are fighting on the basis of a given state, we unite the workers of all nations of a given state, we cannot vouch for this or that path of national development, we are moving towards our class goal through all possible paths.

But it is impossible to achieve this goal without fighting all nationalism and without defending the equality of different nations. Whether, for example, Ukraine is destined to form an independent state depends on 1000 factors not known in advance. And, without trying to “guess” in vain, we firmly stand on what is certain: Ukraine’s right to such a state. We respect this right, we do not support the privileges of the Great Russian over the Ukrainians, we educate the masses in the spirit of recognition of this right, in the spirit of denying state privileges of any nation.

In the races that all countries experienced during the era of bourgeois revolutions, _______________________

* To a certain L. Vl. from Paris this word seems un-Marxist. This L. Vl. funny “superklug” (ironically translated into Russian as “voumny”). “Vumny” L. Vl. is apparently going to write a study on the expulsion from our minimum program (from the point of view of the class struggle!) of the words “settlement”, “people”, etc.

clashes and struggles over the right to a nation-state are possible and probable. We, proletarians, declare in advance that we are opponents of Great Russian privileges and conduct all our propaganda and agitation in this direction.

Chasing “practicalism,” Rosa Luxemburg overlooked the main practical task of both the Great Russian and foreign proletariat: the task of everyday agitation and propaganda against all state-national privileges, for the right, the equal right of all nations to their own national state; This is our main (now) task in the national question, for only in this way do we defend the interests of democracy and the equal union of all proletarians of all nations.

Let this propaganda be “impractical” both from the point of view of the Great Russian oppressors and from the point of view of the bourgeoisie of the oppressed nations (both demand a definite yes or no, accusing the Social Democrats of “uncertainty”). In fact, it is precisely this propaganda, and only it, that ensures the truly democratic and truly socialist education of the masses. Only such propaganda guarantees both the greatest chances of national peace in Russia, if it remains a motley national state, and the most peaceful (and harmless for the proletarian class struggle) division into different national states, if the question of such a division arises.

For a more specific explanation of this, the only proletarian, policy on the national question, we will consider the attitude towards “self-determination of nations” of Great Russian liberalism and the example of the separation of Norway from Sweden.

5. LIBERAL BOURGEOISIEAND SOCIALIST OPPORTUNISTSIN THE NATIONAL QUESTION

We have seen that Rosa Luxemburg considers one of her main “trump cards” in the fight against the program of Russian Marxists to be this argument: recognition of the right to self-determination equals support for the bourgeois nationalism of oppressed nations. On the other hand, says Rosa Luxemburg, if by this right we understand only the struggle against all violence against nations, then a special point in the program is not needed, because the Social-Democrats. in general against all national violence and inequality.

The first argument, as Kautsky irrefutably pointed out almost 20 years ago, dumps nationalism from a sore head onto a healthy one, for, fearing the nationalism of the bourgeoisie of the oppressed nations, Rosa Luxemburg finds herself in fact playing into the hands of the Black Hundred nationalism of the Great Russians! The second argument is, in essence, a timid evasion of the question:

Does recognition of national equality include or does not include recognition of the right to secede? If yes, then it means that Rosa Luxemburg recognizes the fundamental correctness of § 9 of our program. If not, then it does not recognize national equality. Evasiveness and subterfuge will not help matters here!

However, the best test of the above and all similar arguments is to study the attitude of the various classes of society to the issue. For a Marxist such verification is obligatory. We must proceed from the objective, we must take the relationship of classes on this point. Without doing this. Rosa Luxemburg falls into precisely that sin of metaphysics, abstraction, common place, sweepingness, etc., of which she tries in vain to accuse her opponents,

We are talking about the program of Russian Marxists, that is, Marxists of all nationalities in Russia. Shouldn't we look at the position of the ruling classes in Russia?

The position of the “bureaucracy” (we apologize for the imprecise word) and feudal landowners such as the united nobility is well known. Unconditional denial of both the equality of nationalities and the right to self-determination. An old slogan taken from the times of serfdom: autocracy, Orthodoxy, nationality, and by the latter we mean only Great Russian. Even Ukrainians are declared “foreigners”, even their native language is persecuted.

Let's take a look at the Russian bourgeoisie, “called” to participate - very modest, it is true, but still participate in power, in the system of legislation and management of “June 3rd”. That the Octobrists are actually following the right in this matter, there is no need to waste many words on this. Unfortunately, some Marxists pay much less attention to the position of the liberal Great Russian bourgeoisie, progressives and Cadets. Meanwhile, those who do not study this position and think about it will inevitably fall into the sin of abstraction and unfoundedness when discussing the right of nations to self-determination.

Last year, Pravda’s polemics with Rech forced this main organ of the Cadets Party, so skillful in diplomatically avoiding a direct answer to “unpleasant” questions, to make some valuable admissions. Syr-boron caught fire due to the All-Ukrainian student congress in Lvov in the summer of 19136. A sworn “Ukrainian expert” or a Ukrainian employee of “Rech”, Mr. Mogilyansky, published an article in which he showered the most selective curses (“nonsense”, “adventurism”, etc.) on the idea of ​​​​separation (separation) of Ukraine, an idea advocated by National Socialist Dontsov and which was approved by the said congress.

The newspaper “Rabochaya Pravda”, without at all identifying with Mr. Dontsov, directly pointing out that he is a National Socialist, that many Ukrainian Marxists do not agree with him, stated, however, that the tone of “Rech”, or rather: the principled formulation of the question “Rech” completely indecent, unacceptable for a Great Russian democrat or a person who wants to be known as a democrat*. Let Rech directly refute Messrs. Dontsov, but it is fundamentally unacceptable for a Great Russian body of supposed democracy to forget about the freedom of secession, the right to secede.

A few months later, Mr. Mogilyansky, in issue No. 331 of Rech, made an “explanation”, having learned from the Lvov Ukrainian newspaper Shlyakhi7 about the objections of Mr. Dontsov, who, by the way, noted that “the chauvinistic attack of Rech” was properly tarnished (branded?) only the Russian Social-Democrats. press". Mr. Mogilyansky’s “explanations” consisted in the fact that he repeated three times, “criticism of Mr. Dontsov’s recipes” “has nothing to do with the denial of the right of nations to self-determination.”

“It should be said,” wrote Mr. Mogilyansky, “that the “right of nations to self-determination” is not some kind of fetish (listen!!), which does not allow criticism of unhealthy living conditions; nations can give rise to unhealthy tendencies in national self-determination, and reveal the latter does not yet mean denying the right of nations to self-determination.”

As you can see, the liberal’s phrases about “fetish” were quite in the spirit of Rosa Luxemburg’s phrases. It was obvious that Mr. Mogilyansky wanted to avoid a direct answer to the question: does he recognize or not the right to political self-determination, that is, to secession?

And “Proletarskaya Pravda” (No. 4 of December 11, 1913) pointedly raised this question to both Mr. Mogilyansky and the Cadets. parties**.

The newspaper “Rech” then published (<№ 340) неподписанное, т. е. официально-редакционное, заявление, дающее ответ на этот вопрос. Ответ этот сводится к трем пунктам:

1) In § 11 of the program of k.-d. The party speaks directly, precisely and clearly about the “right of free cultural self-determination” of nations.

2) “Proletarskaya Pravda,” according to Rech, “hopelessly confuses” self-determination with separatism, the separation of one or another nation.

3) “Indeed, the Cadets. never even undertook to defend the right of “separation of nations” from the Russian state.” (See article: “National liberalism and the right of nations to self-determination” in “Proletarskaya Pravda” No. 12 of December 20, 1913**)

Let us first pay attention to the second point of the Rech statement. How clearly he shows the Semkovskys, Libmans, Yurkeviches and other opportunists that their cries and talk about the supposed “ambiguity” or “uncertainty” of the meaning of “self-determination” represent in reality, that is, in terms of the objective correlation of classes and class struggle in Russia, a simple rehash of the speeches of the liberal-monarchist bourgeoisie!

When “Proletarskaya Pravda” staged Messrs. The enlightened “constitutional democrats” from Rech have three questions: 1) do they deny that in the entire history of international democracy, especially since the middle of the 19th century, self-determination of nations means precisely political self-determination, the right to form an independent national state? 2) do they deny that the famous decision of the London International Socialist Congress of 1896 has the same meaning? and 3) that Plekhanov, who wrote about self-determination back in 1902, understood by it precisely political ________________________

* See Works, 5th ed., volume 23, pp. 337-348. Ed.

** See Works, 5th ed., volume 24, pp. 208-210. Ed.

*** See Works, 5th ed., volume 24, pp. 247-249. Ed.

self-determination? - when “Proletarskaya Pravda” raised these three questions, the Cadets fell silent!!

They didn't answer a word because they had nothing to answer. They silently had to admit that “Proletarskaya Pravda” was certainly right.

The cries of liberals about the vagueness of the concept of “self-determination”, about its “hopeless confusion” with separatism among the Social-Democrats. is nothing more than a desire to confuse the issue, to evade recognition of a principle generally established by democracy. If Messrs. The Semkovskys, Libmans and Yurkeviches were not so ignorant; they would have been ashamed to speak before the workers in a liberal spirit.

“Indeed, the Cadets never undertook to defend the right of “separation of nations” from the Russian state” - these words of “Rech” were not without reason recommended by “Proletarskaya Pravda” to “New Time” and “Zemshchina”8 as an example of the “loyalty” of our cadets. The newspaper “Novoe Vremya” in No. 13563, without missing, of course, the opportunity to remember the “Jew” and say all sorts of barbs to the Cadets, however, stated:

“What for the Social Democrats constitutes an axiom of political wisdom” (i.e., recognition of the right of nations to self-determination, to secession), “in modern times, even in the Cadet environment begins to stir up disagreements.”

The Cadets took a fundamentally identical position with Novoye Vremya, declaring that they “never undertook to defend the right of nations to secede from the Russian state.” This is one of the foundations of the national liberalism of the Cadets, their closeness to the Purishkeviches, their ideological-political and practical-political dependence on these latter. “The gentlemen Cadets studied history,” wrote Proletarskaya Pravda, “and they know perfectly well what, to put it mildly, “pogrom-like” actions, the application of the Purishkevichs’ primordial right to “drag and not let go” often led in practice.”9. Knowing perfectly well the feudal source and the nature of the omnipotence of the Purishkeviches, the Cadets nevertheless become entirely based on precisely this class of created relations and boundaries. Knowing very well how much is non-European, anti-European (Asian, we would say, if it didn’t sound like an undeserved disdain for the Japanese and Chinese) in the relations and boundaries created or defined by this class, gentlemen cadets recognize them as the limit, and you will not cross it .

This is adaptation to the Purishkevichs, servility to them, fear of shaking their position, protecting them from the popular movement, from democracy. “This means in practice,” wrote “Proletarskaya Pravda,” “adaptation to the interests of the serf owners and to the worst nationalist prejudices of the ruling nation instead of a systematic struggle against these prejudices.”

As people familiar with history and laying claim to democracy, the Cadets do not even attempt to assert that the democratic movement that today characterizes both Eastern Europe and Asia, striving to remake both on the model of civilized, capitalist countries, that this movement must certainly leave unchanged the boundaries defined by the feudal era, the era of the omnipotence of the Purishkeviches and the lack of rights of broad sections of the bourgeoisie and petty bourgeoisie.

That the question raised by the polemics of “Proletarskaya Pravda” with “Rech” was not at all just a literary question, that it concerned the real political topic of the day, this was proved, by the way, by the last conference of the Cadets. party March 23-25, 1914. In the official report of Rech (No. 83, March 26, 1914) about this conference we read:

“National issues were also discussed particularly lively. The Kiev deputies, joined by N.V. Nekrasov and A.M. Kolyubakin, pointed out that the national question is an emerging major factor that needs to be met halfway more decisively than it was before, F.F. Kokoshkin pointed out, however” (this the same “however” that corresponds to Shchedrin’s “but” - “the ears do not grow higher than the forehead, they do not grow”), “that both the program and previous political experience require very careful handling of the “elastic formulas” of “political self-determination of nationalities””

This extremely remarkable reasoning at the Cadet Conference deserves the enormous attention of all Marxists and all democrats. (We note in parentheses that “Kievskaya Mysl”, apparently very well informed and, undoubtedly, correctly conveying the thoughts of Mr. Kokoshkin, added that he specifically put forward, of course in the form of a warning to his opponents, the threat of the “disintegration” of the state.)

The official report of Rech was compiled masterfully and diplomatically, in order to lift the veil as little as possible, in order to hide as much as possible. But still, in basic terms, it is clear what happened at the cadet conference. The delegates - liberal bourgeoisie, familiar with the state of affairs in Ukraine, and the “left” cadets raised the question of political self-determination of nations. Otherwise, Mr. Kokoshkin would have no need to call for “careful handling” of this “formula.”

In the cadet program, which, of course, was known to the delegates of the cadet conference, it is not political, but “cultural” self-determination. This means that Mr. Kokoshkin defended the program from delegates from Ukraine, from left-wing Cadets, he defended “cultural” self-determination against “political” self-determination. It is quite obvious that, rebelling against “political” self-determination, putting forward the threat of “collapse of the state,” calling the formula of “political self-determination” “extensible” (quite in the spirit of Rosa Luxemburg!), Mr. Kokoshkin defended Great Russian national liberalism against more “left-wing” ones. or more democratic elements of the Cadets. party and against the Ukrainian bourgeoisie.

Mr. Kokoshkin won at the cadet conference, as can be seen from the treacherous word “however” in the Rech report. Great Russian national liberalism triumphed among the Cadets. Won't this victory help clarify the minds of those unreasonable units among the Marxists of Russia who, like the Cadets, also began to fear “extensible formulas for the political self-determination of nationalities”?

Let’s look, “however,” on the merits of the matter, at Mr. Kokoshkin’s train of thought. Referring to “previous political experience” (i.e., obviously, to the experience of the fifth year, when the Great Russian bourgeoisie was afraid for its national privileges and frightened the Kadet party with its fear), putting forward the threat of “collapse of the state,” Mr. Kokoshkin revealed an excellent understanding of that political self-determination cannot mean anything other than the right to secede and to form an independent national state. The question is, how should we look at these concerns of Mr. Kokoshkin from the point of view of democracy, in general, and from the point of view of the proletarian class struggle, in particular?

Mr. Kokoshkin wants to assure us that recognition of the right to secession increases the danger of “collapse of the state.” This is the point of view of the guard Mymretsov E.G. with his motto: “drag and don’t let go.” From the point of view of democracy, in general, it’s just the opposite: recognition of the right to secession reduces the danger of “collapse of the state.”

Mr. Kokoshkin argues entirely in the spirit of nationalists. At their last congress, they smashed the Ukrainian “Mazepa” people. The Ukrainian movement - exclaimed Mr. Savenko and Co. - threatens to weaken the connection between Ukraine and Russia, because Austria, through Ukrainophilia, strengthens the connection between Ukrainians and Austria!! It remained unclear why Russia could not try to “strengthen” the connection between Ukrainians and Russia using the same method that Messrs. Are Savenki blaming Austria, i.e., for granting Ukrainians freedom of their native language, self-government, autonomous Sejm, etc.?

Reasonings of Messrs. Savenko and Messrs. The Kokoshkins are completely homogeneous and equally funny and absurd from a purely logical point of view. Isn’t it clear that the more freedom the Ukrainian nationality has in one country or another, the stronger the connection between this nationality and this country will be? It seems that one cannot argue against this elementary truth unless one decisively breaks with all the premises of democracy. Can there be greater freedom of nationality, as such, than the freedom of secession, the freedom to form an independent national state?

To further clarify this question, which is confused by liberals (and those who foolishly repeat them), let us give the simplest example. Let's take the issue of divorce. Rosa Luxemburg writes in her article that a centralized democratic state, fully reconciling itself with the autonomy of individual parts, should leave all the most important branches of legislation and, by the way, legislation on divorce under the jurisdiction of the central parliament. This concern for ensuring freedom of divorce by the central government of a democratic state is quite understandable. Reactionaries are against freedom of divorce, calling for its “careful handling” and shouting that it means “the breakdown of the family.” Democracy believes that the reactionaries are hypocrites when they actually defend the omnipotence of the police and bureaucracy, the privileges of one sex and the worst oppression of women; - that in fact, freedom of divorce does not mean the “disintegration” of family ties, but, on the contrary, strengthening them on the only possible and sustainable democratic foundations in a civilized society.

To accuse supporters of freedom of self-determination, i.e., freedom of separation, of encouraging separatism is the same stupidity and the same hypocrisy as accusing supporters of freedom of divorce of encouraging the destruction of family ties. Just as in a bourgeois society the freedom of divorce is opposed by defenders of the privileges and venality on which a bourgeois marriage is built, so in a capitalist state the denial of freedom of self-determination, i.e., the secession of nations, means only the defense of the privileges of the ruling nation and police methods of government to the detriment of democratic .

There is no doubt that the politicking caused by all the relations of capitalist society sometimes gives rise to extremely frivolous and even simply absurd chatter from parliamentarians or publicists about the secession of this or that nation. But only reactionaries can allow themselves to be intimidated (or pretend to be intimidated) by such chatter. Anyone who takes the point of view of democracy, i.e., the solution of state issues by the mass of the population, knows very well that there is a “huge distance” from the chatter of politicians to the solution of the masses10. The masses of the population know perfectly well, from everyday experience, the importance of geographical and economic ties, the advantages of a large market and a large state, and they will secede only when national oppression and national frictions make living together completely unbearable and hinder all and every kind of economic relations. And in such a case, the interests of capitalist development and freedom of class struggle will be precisely on the side of those separating.

So, no matter how you approach Mr. Kokoshkin’s reasoning, it turns out to be the height of absurdity and a mockery of the principles of democracy. But there is a certain logic in these arguments; this is the logic of the class interests of the Great Russian bourgeoisie. Mr. Kokoshkin, like the majority of the Cadets party, is a lackey of the money bag of this bourgeoisie. He defends her privileges in general, her state privileges in particular, defends them together with Purishkevich, next to him - only Purishkevich believes more in the serf’s club, and Kokoshkin and Co. see that this club has been badly broken for the fifth year, and they rely more on bourgeois means of deceiving the masses, for example, by intimidating the bourgeoisie and peasants with the specter of the “collapse of the state,” by deceiving them with phrases about combining “people’s freedom” with historical foundations, etc.

The real class significance of liberal hostility to the principle of political self-determination of nations is one and only one thing: national liberalism, the defense of state privileges of the Great Russian bourgeoisie.

And the Russian opportunists among the Marxists, who have taken up arms precisely now, in the era of the June Third system, against the right of nations to self-determination, all of these: the liquidator Semkovsky, the Bundist Libman, the Ukrainian petty bourgeois Yurkevich, in fact are simply trailing in the tail of national liberalism, corrupting the working class with national-liberalism. liberal ideas.

The interests of the working class and its struggle against capitalism require complete solidarity and the closest unity of workers of all nations, require resistance to the nationalist policies of the bourgeoisie of any nationality. Therefore, a deviation from the tasks of proletarian politics and the subordination of the workers to bourgeois politics would be like that if the Social-Democrats. began to deny the right of self-determination, that is, the right of secession of oppressed nations, and even then, if the Social-Democrats. undertook to support all the national demands of the bourgeoisie of the oppressed nations. The hired worker does not care whether his predominant exploiter is the Great Russian bourgeoisie in preference to the foreign bourgeoisie, or the Polish bourgeoisie in preference to the Jewish one, etc. The hired worker, conscious of the interests of his class, is indifferent to the state privileges of the Great Russian capitalists and to the promises of the Polish or Ukrainian capitalists that things will be settled heaven on earth when they will have state privileges. The development of capitalism is and will go forward, one way or another, both in a single motley state and in individual national states.

In any case, the wage worker will remain an object of exploitation, and a successful struggle against it requires the independence of the proletariat from nationalism, complete, so to speak, neutrality of the proletarians in the struggle of the bourgeoisie of different nations for primacy. The slightest support by the proletariat of any nation for the privileges of “their” national bourgeoisie will inevitably cause distrust of the proletariat of another nation, weaken the international class solidarity of the workers, and divide them to the delight of the bourgeoisie. And denying the right to self-determination, or secession, inevitably means in practice supporting the privileges of the dominant nation.

We can see this even more clearly if we take the specific example of the separation of Norway from Sweden.

6. SEPARATION OF NORWAY FROM SWEDEN

Rosa Luxemburg takes exactly this example and discusses it as follows:

“The latest event in the history of federal relations, the separation of Norway from Sweden, - at one time hastily picked up by the social-patriotic Polish press (see the Krakow “Napshud”) as a gratifying manifestation of the strength and progressiveness of the aspirations for state separation, - immediately turned into striking proof of that that federalism and the state secession that follows from it are by no means an expression of progressiveness or democracy. After the so-called Norwegian “revolution,” which consisted of the removal and removal of the Swedish king from Norway, the Norwegians calmly chose another king, formally rejecting the project of establishing a republic by popular vote. What superficial admirers of all national movements and all semblances of independence proclaimed as a “revolution” was a simple manifestation of peasant and petty-bourgeois particularism, the desire for their money to have their “own” king instead of the one imposed by the Swedish aristocracy, and therefore was a movement that had absolutely nothing in common with revolutionism. At the same time, this history of the rupture of the Swedish-Norwegian union again proved to what extent, in this case, the federation that existed until then was only an expression of purely dynastic interests, and therefore a form of monarchism and reaction” (“Przeglond”).

That's literally all Rosa Luxemburg says on this point!! And, I must admit, it would be difficult to reveal the helplessness of her position more clearly than Rosa Luxemburg did in this example.

The question has been and continues to be about whether Social-Democrats need it. in a motley nation-state, a program recognizing the right to self-determination or secession.

What does the example of Norway, taken by Rosa Luxemburg herself, tell us on this issue?

Rosa Luxemburg talks about anything without saying a word on the substance of the issue!!

There is no doubt that the Norwegian petty bourgeoisie, wishing to have their own king for their money and failing by popular vote to establish a republic, revealed very bad petty-bourgeois qualities. There is no doubt that “Napshud,” if he did not notice this, revealed equally bad and equally philistine qualities.

But what does all this have to do with it??

After all, we were talking about the right of nations to self-determination and the attitude of the socialist proletariat to this right! Why doesn't Rosa Luxemburg answer the question, but beats around the bush?

They say that for a mouse there is no beast stronger than a cat. For Rosa Luxemburg, apparently, there is no beast stronger than the “tailcoat”. “Fracks” is the colloquial name for the “Polish Socialist Party,” the so-called revolutionary faction, and the Krakow newspaper “Napshud” shares the ideas of this “faction.” Rosa Luxemburg's struggle against the nationalism of this “faction” blinded our author to such an extent that everything except “Napshud” disappears from his horizons.

If “Napshud” says “yes,” Rosa Luxemburg considers it her sacred duty to immediately proclaim “no,” without thinking at all that by such a technique she reveals not her independence from “Napshud,” but, quite the opposite, her amusing dependence on “fraks”, his inability to look at things from a point of view a little deeper and broader than the point of view of the Krakow anthill. “Napshud”, of course, is a very bad and not at all a Marxist organ, but this should not prevent us from analyzing the essence of the example of Norway, since we have taken it.

To analyze this example in a Marxist way, we must dwell not on the bad qualities of the terribly terrible “frocks”, but, firstly, on the specific historical features of the separation of Norway from Sweden and, secondly, on what were tasks of the proletariat of both countries during this separation.

Norway is brought closer to Sweden by geographical, economic and linguistic ties no less close than the ties of many non-Russian Slavic nations with the Great Russians. But the union of Norway with Sweden was involuntary, so Rosa Luxemburg is talking about a “federation” in vain, simply because she doesn’t know what to say. Norway was given to Sweden by the monarchs during the Napoleonic Wars, against the will of the Norwegians, and the Swedes had to send troops into Norway to subjugate it.

After this, for many decades, despite the extremely broad autonomy that Norway enjoyed (its own Diet, etc.), friction between Norway and Sweden existed continuously, and the Norwegians tried with all their might to throw off the yoke of the Swedish aristocracy. In August 1905, they finally overthrew him: the Norwegian Diet decided that the King of Sweden had ceased to be the King of Norway, and the subsequent referendum, a survey of the Norwegian people, gave an overwhelming majority of votes (about 200 thousand against several hundred) for complete separation from Sweden . The Swedes, after some hesitation, came to terms with the fact of separation.

This example shows us on what basis cases of separation of nations are possible and occur in modern economic and political relations, and what form secession sometimes takes in an environment of political freedom and democracy.

Not a single social democrat, unless he decides to declare the questions of political freedom and democracy indifferent to himself (and in that case, of course, he would cease to be a social democrat), can deny that this example actually proves the obligation for class-conscious workers to systematically propaganda and preparation to ensure that possible clashes due to the separation of nations are resolved only in the way they were resolved in 1905 between Norway and Sweden, and not “in Russian.” This is precisely what is expressed by the programmatic demand for recognition of the right of nations to self-determination. And Rosa Luxemburg had to talk herself out of a fact that was unpleasant for her theory through formidable attacks on the philistinism of the Norwegian philistines and on the Krakow “Napshud”, for she perfectly understood to what extent this historical fact irrevocably refutes her phrase that the right of self-determination of nations is a “utopia”, as if it is equal to the right to “eat on golden plates,” etc. Such phrases only express a pathetically smug, opportunistic belief in the immutability of the given balance of power between the nationalities of Eastern Europe.

Let's move on. In the question of self-determination of nations, as in any other question, we are interested first of all and most of all in the self-determination of the proletariat within nations. Rosa Luxemburg modestly avoided this question, feeling how unpleasant it was for her “theory” to analyze it using the example of Norway.

What was and should have been the position of the Norwegian and Swedish proletariat in the conflict over secession? The class-conscious workers of Norway would, of course, vote for a republic after secession*, and if there were socialists who voted differently, this only proves how much stupid, petty-bourgeois opportunism there is sometimes in European socialism. There can be no two opinions about this, and we touch on this point only because Rosa Luxemburg is trying to hush up the essence of the matter with off-topic talk. On the question of secession, we do not know whether the Norwegian socialist program obliged the Norwegian Social-Democrats. hold one definite opinion. Let us assume that no, that the Norwegian socialists left open the question of how sufficient Norway’s autonomy was for a free class struggle and how much the eternal friction and conflicts with the Swedish aristocracy hampered the freedom of economic life. But that the Norwegian proletariat had to go against this aristocracy for Norwegian peasant democracy (with all the petty-bourgeois limitations of the latter) is undeniable.

What about the Swedish proletariat? It is known that Swedish landowners, assisted by Swedish priests, preached war against Norway, and so ________________________

* If the majority of the Norwegian nation was for the monarchy, and the proletariat for the republic, then, generally speaking, two paths were open to the Norwegian proletariat: either revolution, if the conditions were ripe for it, or submission to the majority and long-term work of propaganda and agitation.

Since Norway is much weaker than Sweden, since it has already experienced a Swedish invasion, since the Swedish aristocracy has very strong weight in its country, this preaching was a very serious threat. We can guarantee that the Swedish Kokoshkins long and diligently corrupted the Swedish masses with calls for “cautious handling” of “extensible formulas for the political self-determination of nations”, painting over the dangers of “collapse of the state” and assurances of the compatibility of “people's freedom” with the foundations of the Swedish aristocracy. There is not the slightest doubt that Swedish Social Democracy would have betrayed the cause of socialism and the cause of democracy if it had not fought with all its might against landowner and “Kokoshkin” ideology and politics, if it had not defended, in addition to the equality of nations in general (recognized and Kokoshkin) the rights of nations to self-determination, freedom of secession of Norway.

The close alliance of the Norwegian and Swedish workers, their complete comradely class solidarity, benefited from this recognition by the Swedish workers of the Norwegian right to secede. For the Norwegian workers were convinced that the Swedish workers were not infected with Swedish nationalism, that brotherhood with the Norwegian proletarians was higher for them than the privileges of the Swedish bourgeoisie and aristocracy. The destruction of the ties imposed on Norway by European monarchs and Swedish aristocrats strengthened the ties between Norwegian and Swedish workers. The Swedish workers proved that, through all the vicissitudes of bourgeois politics, it is quite possible on the basis of bourgeois relations to revive the forced subjugation of the Norwegians to the Swedes! - they will be able to preserve and defend complete equality and class solidarity of the workers of both nations in the struggle against both the Swedish and Norwegian bourgeoisie.

This shows, by the way, how unfounded and simply even frivolous are the attempts sometimes made by the “fraks” to “use” our differences with Rosa Luxemburg against Polish Social Democracy. “Fraki” is not a proletarian, not a socialist, but a petty-bourgeois nationalist party, something like the Polish social revolutionaries. Not about any unity of the Russian Social-Democrats. there was never and could never be any talk with this party. On the contrary, not a single Russian Social Democrat has ever “repented” of rapprochement and unification with the Polish Social-Democrats. Polish Social Democracy has the enormous historical merit of creating for the first time a truly Marxist, truly proletarian party in Poland, thoroughly imbued with nationalist aspirations and passions. But this is the merit of the Polish Social-Democrats. is a great merit not due to the fact that Rosa Luxemburg spoke nonsense against § 9 of the Russian Marxist program, but in spite of this sad circumstance.

For Polish Social-Democrats The “right of self-determination”, of course, does not have such an important meaning as for Russians. It is quite understandable that the fight against the nationalistically blinded petty bourgeoisie of Poland forced the Social-Democrats. Poles with a special (sometimes, perhaps a little excessive) zeal to “go too far.” Not a single Russian Marxist ever thought of blaming the Polish Social-Democrats for being against the secession of Poland. These Social-Democrats are making a mistake. only when they try - like Rosa Luxemburg - to deny the need to recognize the right to self-determination in the program of Russian Marxists.

This means, in essence, transferring relations understandable from the point of view of the Krakow horizon to the scale of all peoples and nations of Russia, including the Great Russians. This means being “Polish nationalists inside out,” and not Russian, not international social democrats.

For international social democracy stands precisely on the basis of recognition of the right of nations to self-determination. This is where we now turn.

7. LONDON DECISIONINTERNATIONAL CONGRESS 1896

This solution reads:

“The Congress declares that it stands for the full right of self-determination (Selbstbestimmungsrecht) of all nations and expresses its sympathy with the workers of every country currently suffering under the yoke of military, national or other absolutism; The congress calls on the workers of all these countries to join the ranks of the class-conscious (Klassenbewusste = conscious of the interests of their class) workers of the whole world, in order to fight together with them to overcome international capitalism and to realize the goals of international social democracy.”*

As we have already indicated, our opportunists, Messrs. Semkovsky, Libman, Yurkevich simply do not know about this decision. But Rosa Luxemburg knows and cites its full text, which contains the same expression as in our program: “self-determination.”

The question arises: how does Rosa Luxemburg remove this obstacle that stands in the way of her “original” theory?

Oh, quite simply: ...the center of gravity here is in the second part of the resolution... its declarative nature... it can only be referred to through a misunderstanding!!

The helplessness and confusion of our author is simply amazing. Usually, only opportunists point out the declarative nature of consistent democratic and socialist program points, cowardly avoiding direct polemics against them. Apparently, it was not for nothing that this time Rosa Luxemburg found herself in the sad company of Messrs. Semkovsky, Libman and Yurkevich. Rosa Luxemburg is undecided whether she considers the above resolution correct or wrong. She dodges and hides, as if counting on such an inattentive and ignorant reader who forgets the first part of the resolution, reading up to the second, or has never heard of the debates in the socialist press before the London Congress.

But Rosa Luxemburg is very mistaken if she imagines that she will be able, in front of the class-conscious workers of Russia, to so easily step on the resolution of the International on an important question of principle, without even deigning to examine it critically.

In the debates before the London Congress - mainly in the pages of the German Marxist journal Die Neue Zeit - the point of view of Rosa Luxemburg was expressed, and this point of view was essentially defeated before the International! This is the essence of the matter, which the Russian reader in particular should keep in mind.

The debate was about the question of Polish independence. Three points of view were expressed:

1) The point of view of the “frocks”, on whose behalf Hecker spoke. They wanted the International to recognize in its program the demand for Polish independence. This proposal was not accepted. This point of view was defeated by the International.

2) Rosa Luxemburg's point of view: Polish socialists should not demand the independence of Poland. From this point of view, there could be no question of proclaiming the right of nations to self-determination. This point of view also suffered defeat before the International.

3) The point of view that was then most thoroughly developed by K. Kautsky, speaking out against Rosa Luxemburg and proving the extreme “one-sidedness” of her materialism. From this point of view, the International cannot at present make the independence of Poland its program, but the Polish socialists, Kautsky said, may well put forward such a demand. From the point of view of socialists, it is certainly wrong to ignore the tasks of national liberation in an environment of national oppression.

The resolution of the International reproduces the most essential, fundamental provisions of this point of view: on the one hand, a completely direct and not allowing for any misinterpretation recognition of the full right to self-determination for all nations; on the other hand, an equally unequivocal call by the workers for the international unity of their class struggle.

We think that this resolution is absolutely correct and that for the countries of Eastern Europe and Asia at the beginning of the 20th century, it is this resolution, and precisely in the inextricable connection of both of its parts, that gives the only correct directive of proletarian class policy on the national question.

Let us dwell in more detail on the three above points of view.

It is known that K. Marx and Fr. Engels was considered absolutely obligatory for all Western European democracy, and even more so for social democracy, _________________________

* See the official German report on the London Congress” “Verhandlungen und Beschluesse des intemationalen sozialistischen Arbeiter- und Gewerkschafts-Kongresses zu London, vom 27 Juli bis 1 August 1896”, Berlin, 1896, S. 18 (“Minutes and resolutions of the international congress of socialist workers' parties and trade unions in London, from July 27 to August 1, 1896”, Berlin, 1896, p. 18. Ed.) There is a Russian brochure with the decisions of international congresses, where instead of “self-determination” it is translated incorrectly: “autonomy”.

active support for the demand for Polish independence. For the era of the 40s and 60s of the last century, the era of the bourgeois revolution in Austria and Germany, the era of “peasant reform” in Russia, this point of view was completely correct and the only consistently democratic and proletarian point of view. While the popular masses of Russia and most of the Slavic countries were still sleeping soundly, while in these countries there were no independent, mass, democratic movements, the gentry liberation movement in Poland acquired gigantic, paramount importance from the point of view of democracy, not only all-Russian, not only all-Slavic, but also Pan-European*.12

But if this point of view of Marx was completely correct for the second third or third quarter of the 19th century, then it ceased to be true by the 20th century. Independent democratic movements and even an independent proletarian movement have awakened in most Slavic countries and even in one of the most backward Slavic countries, Russia. Gentry Poland disappeared and gave way to capitalist Poland. Under such conditions, Poland could not help but lose its exceptional revolutionary significance.

If the PPS (“Polish Socialist Party”, today’s “fraks”) tried in 1896 to “consolidate” the point of view of Marx of a different era, then this already meant using the letter of Marxism against the spirit of Marxism. Therefore, the Polish Social Democrats were absolutely right when they opposed the nationalist hobbies of the Polish petty bourgeoisie, showed the secondary importance of the national question for the Polish workers, created for the first time a purely proletarian party in Poland, and proclaimed of the greatest importance the principle of the closest alliance of the Polish and Russian workers in their class struggle .

Did this mean, however, that the International at the beginning of the 20th century could recognize the principle of political self-determination of nations as unnecessary for Eastern Europe and Asia? their rights to secede? This would be the greatest absurdity, which would be equivalent (theoretically) to the recognition of the completed bourgeois-democratic transformation of the Turkish, Russian, Chinese states; - which would amount to (practically) opportunism in relation to absolutism.

No. For Eastern Europe and Asia, in the era of the beginning of bourgeois-democratic revolutions, in the era of awakening and intensification of national movements, in the era of the emergence of independent proletarian parties, the task of these parties in national politics should be two-sided: recognition of the right to self-determination for all nations, because bourgeois- The democratic transformation is not yet completed, because workers' democracy consistently, seriously and sincerely, not in a liberal, not in a Kokoshkin way, defends the equality of nations - and the closest, inextricable union of the class struggle of the proletarians of all nations of a given state, for all and every vicissitudes of its history , with all and all alterations by the bourgeoisie of the borders of individual states.

It is precisely this two-sided task of the proletariat that the International resolution of 1896 formulates. This is precisely, in its fundamental principles, the resolution of the summer meeting of Russian Marxists in 1913. There are people who find it “contradictory” that this resolution in paragraph 4, recognizing the right to self-determination, to secession, seems to “give” the maximum to nationalism (in fact, in recognizing the right to self-determination of all nations there is a maximum of democracy and a minimum nationalism), - and in paragraph 5 he warns the workers against the nationalist slogans of any bourgeoisie and demands the unity and fusion of workers of all nations in internationally united proletarian organizations. But only completely flat minds can see a “contradiction” here, unable to understand, for example, why the unity and class solidarity of the Swedish and Norwegian proletariat won when the Swedish workers defended the freedom of Norway to secede into an independent state.

_______________________

* It would be a very interesting historical work to compare the position of the Polish nobleman rebel of 1863 - the position of the all-Russian democrat-revolutionary Chernyshevsky, who also (like Marx) knew how to assess the significance of the Polish movement, and the position of the Ukrainian tradesman Drahomanov, who spoke much later, who expressed the point of view of the peasant, so still wild, sleepy, accreted to his pile of manure, that because of the legitimate hatred of the Polish lord, he could not understand the significance of the struggle of these lords for all-Russian democracy (Cf. “Historical Poland and Great Russian Democracy” by Drahomanov) Drahomanov fully deserved the enthusiastic kisses that later he was awarded by Mr. P.B., who had already become a national liberal. Struve.

8. UTOPIST KARL MARXAND PRACTICAL ROSE LUXEMBOURG

Declaring the independence of Poland a “utopia” and repeating this often ad nauseum, Rosa Luxemburg ironically exclaims: why not demand the independence of Ireland?

Obviously, the “practical” Rosa Luxemburg does not know how Karl Marx felt about the issue of Irish independence. It is worth stopping at this point in order to show the analysis of the specific demand for national independence from a truly Marxist, and not an opportunist, point of view.

Marx used to “test the teeth,” as he put it, of his socialist acquaintances, testing their consciousness and conviction13. Having met Lopatin, Marx wrote to Engels on July 5, 1870, a highly flattering review of the young Russian socialist, but added:

“...Weak point: Poland. On this point, Lopatin speaks in exactly the same way as an Englishman - say, an English Chartist of the old school - about Ireland.”14

Marx asks a socialist belonging to the oppressing nation about his attitude towards the oppressed nation and immediately reveals a common shortcoming among the socialists of the dominant nations (English and Russian):

misunderstanding of their socialist responsibilities towards oppressed nations, chewing on prejudices adopted from the “great power” bourgeoisie.

It is necessary to make a reservation, before moving on to Marx’s positive statements about Ireland, that Marx and Engels were strictly critical of the national question in general, assessing its conditional historical significance. Thus, Engels wrote to Marx on May 23, 1851, that the study of history leads him to pessimistic conclusions about Poland, that Poland’s significance is temporary, only until the agrarian revolution in Russia. The role of the Poles in history is “brave nonsense.” “It cannot be assumed for a minute that Poland, even only against Russia, successfully represents progress or has any historical significance.” There are more elements of civilization, education, industry, and bourgeoisie in Russia than in “gentry-sleepy Poland.” “What do Warsaw and Krakow mean against St. Petersburg, Moscow, Odessa!”15. Engels does not believe in the success of the uprisings of the Polish gentry.

But all these thoughts, in which there is so much genius and insight, did not in the least prevent Engels and Marx, 12 years later, when Russia was still sleeping and Poland was seething, from treating the Polish movement with the deepest and most ardent sympathy.

In 1864, while composing the address of the International, Marx wrote to Engels (November 4, 1864) that he had to fight Mazzini’s nationalism. “When the address speaks of international politics, I speak of countries, not of nationalities, and I expose Russia, and not less important states,” writes Marx. Compared to the “labor question,” the subordinate importance of the national question is beyond doubt for Marx. But his theory is as far from ignoring national movements as heaven is from earth.

The year 1866 comes. Marx writes to Engels about the “Proudhonian clique” in Paris, which “declares nationalities to be nonsense and attacks Bismarck and Garibaldi. As a polemic against chauvinism, this tactic is useful and understandable. But when believers in Proudhon (my good friends here, Lafargue and Longuet also belong to them) think that all of Europe can and should sit quietly and meekly on its backside until the gentlemen in France abolish poverty and ignorance... then they are ridiculous.” (letter dated June 7, 1866).

“Yesterday,” writes Marx on June 20, 1866, “there was a debate in the Council of the International about the current war... The debate came down, as one might expect, to the question of “nationalities” and our attitude towards it... Representatives of the “young France” (non-workers) put forward the point of view that every nationality and the nation itself are outdated prejudices. Proudhonist Stirnerianism... The whole world must wait until the French are ripe for making a social revolution... The English laughed very much when I began my speech with the fact that our friend Lafargue and others, who have abolished nationalities, address us in French, i.e. i.e. in a language incomprehensible to 9/10 of the meeting. I further hinted that Lafargue, without realizing it, by the negation of nationalities seems to mean their absorption into the exemplary French nation”16.

The conclusion from all these critical remarks of Marx is clear: the working class is least likely to create a fetish for itself out of the national question, for the development of capitalism does not necessarily awaken all nations to independent life. But, once mass national movements have arisen, to dismiss them, to refuse to support what is progressive in them, means in fact to succumb to nationalist prejudices, namely: to recognize “one’s” nation as a “model nation” (or, let us add on our own, a nation with the exclusive privilege of state building)*.

But let's return to the question of Ireland.

Marx's position on this issue is expressed most clearly in the following passages from his letters:

“I tried to provoke a demonstration of English workers in favor of Fenianism in every possible way... Previously, I considered the separation of Ireland from England impossible. Now I consider it inevitable, at least after secession things came to federation.” This is what Marx wrote in a letter to Engels dated November 2, 1867.

“What should we advise the English workers? In my opinion, they should make it a point of their program to repeal the union” (Ireland with England, i.e., the separation of Ireland from England) - “in short, the demand of 1783, only democratized and adapted to modern conditions. This is the only legal form of Irish liberation and therefore the only one possible for acceptance into the program of the English party. Experience must subsequently show whether a simple personal union can exist for a long time between the two countries...

Irish people need the following:

1. Self-government and independence from England.

2. Agrarian revolution...”

Attaching enormous importance to the question of Ireland, Marx read one and a half hour-long reports on this topic to the German workers' union (letter dated December 17, 1867)17.

Engels notes in a letter dated November 20, 1868, “hatred of the Irish among English workers,” and almost a year later (October 24, 1869), returning to this topic, he writes: “From Ireland to Russia il n"y a qu"un pas (just one step)... Using the example of Irish history, one can see what a misfortune it is for a people if they enslaved another people. All English villainy has its origin in the Irish sphere. I still have to study the Cromwellian era, but in any case it is clear to me that things in England would have taken a different turn if there had not been a need to dominate Ireland militarily and create a new aristocracy.”

“In Poznan, the Polish workers carried out a victorious strike thanks to the help of their Berlin comrades. This struggle against “Mr. Capital” - even in its lowest form, the form of a strike - will put an end to national prejudices more seriously than declamations about peace in the mouths of bourgeois gentlemen.”18

The policy on the Irish question which Marx pursued in the International is clear from the following:

On November 18, 1869, Marx writes to Engels that he gave a speech at 11/4 o'clock in the Council of the International on the question of the attitude of the British Ministry to the Irish amnesty and proposed the following resolution:

“It was decided

that in his response to Irish demands for the release of Irish patriots, Mr. Gladstone deliberately insults the Irish nation;

that he associates political amnesty with conditions equally humiliating for the victims of a bad government and for the people they represent;

that Gladstone, bound by his official position, publicly and solemnly welcomed the rebellion of the American slaveholders, and now begins to preach the doctrine of passive obedience to the Irish people;

_______________________

* Compare also Marx’s letter to Engels dated June 3, 1867 “... It was with real pleasure that I learned from the Paris correspondence of The Times about the Polonophile” exclamations of the Parisians against Russia... M. Proudhon and his little doctrinaire clique are not that, that the French people.”

that his entire policy in relation to the Irish amnesty is a very real manifestation of that “policy of conquest”, by the exposure of which Mr. Gladstone overthrew the ministry of his opponents - the Tories;

that the General Council of the International Workers' Association expresses its admiration for the courage, firmness and sublimity of the Irish people in their campaign for amnesty;

that this resolution must be communicated to all sections of the International Workers' Association and to all associated workers' organizations in Europe and America."19

On December 10, 1869, Marx writes that his report on the Irish question to the Council of the International will be structured as follows:

“... Quite apart from any “international” and “humanitarian” phrase about “justice for Ireland” - for this goes without saying in the Council of the International - the direct absolute interest of the English working class requires the severance of its present connection with Ireland. This is my deepest conviction, and based on reasons which I partly cannot reveal to the English workers themselves. I have long thought that it was possible to overthrow the Irish regime by the rise of the English working class. I have always defended this view in the New York Tribune (an American newspaper in which Marx contributed for a long time)20. A deeper study of the issue convinced me of the opposite. The English working class will do nothing until it gets rid of Ireland... The English reaction in England is rooted in the enslavement of Ireland” (Marx’s italics)21.

Marx's policy on the Irish question should now be quite clear to readers.

The “utopian” Marx is so “impractical” that he advocates the secession of Ireland, which turned out to be unrealized half a century later.

What caused this policy of Marx and was it not a mistake?

At first, Marx thought that it would not be a national movement of an oppressed nation, but a labor movement among the oppressor nation that would liberate Ireland. Marx does not make any absolutes out of national movements, knowing that the complete liberation of all nationalities can only be achieved by the victory of the working class. It is impossible to take into account in advance all possible relationships between the bourgeois liberation movements of oppressed nations and the proletarian liberation movement among the oppressing nation (precisely the problem that makes the national question in modern Russia so difficult).

But the circumstances were such that the English working class fell under the influence of the liberals for quite a long time, becoming their tail, beheading itself with liberal labor policies. The bourgeois liberation movement in Ireland intensified and took revolutionary forms. Marx reconsiders his view and corrects it. “It is a misfortune for a people if it enslaves another people.” The working class in England will not be freed until Ireland is freed from English oppression. The reaction in England strengthens and feeds the enslavement of Ireland (just as the reaction in Russia is fueled by its enslavement of a number of nations!).

And Marx, carrying out a resolution of sympathy in the International for the “Irish nation”, “the Irish people” (the smart L. Vl. would probably have scolded poor Marx for forgetting the class struggle!), preaches the separation of Ireland from England, “at least after separation the matter will came to the federation.”

What are the theoretical premises of this conclusion of Marx? In England, in general, the bourgeois revolution ended long ago. But in Ireland it is not finished; it is only being completed now, half a century later, by the reforms of English liberals. If capitalism in England had been overthrown as quickly as Marx first expected, then there would have been no room for a bourgeois-democratic, national movement in Ireland. But once it has arisen, Marx advises the English workers to support it, give it a revolutionary impetus, and carry it to completion in the interests of their freedom.

The economic ties of Ireland with England in the 60s of the last century were, of course, even closer than the ties of Russia with Poland, Ukraine, etc. The “impracticality” and “impossibility” of secession of Ireland (at least due to geographical conditions and due to the immense colonial power of England) were striking. Being a principled enemy of federalism, Marx allows in this case a federation*, as long as the liberation of Ireland occurs not in a reformist, but in a revolutionary way, due to the movement of the masses of the people in Ireland, supported by the working class of England. There can be no doubt that only such a solution to the historical problem would be most favorable to the interests of the proletariat and the speed of social development.

It turned out differently. Both the Irish people and the English proletariat turned out to be weak. Only now, through the pitiful deals of English liberals with the Irish bourgeoisie, the Irish question is being resolved (the example of Ulster shows how difficult it is) with land reform (with a buyout) and autonomy (not yet introduced). What? Does it follow from this that Marx and Engels were “utopians”, that they put forward “impossible” national demands, that they succumbed to the influence of Irish nationalists - petty bourgeois (the petty-bourgeois character of the “Fenian” movement is undeniable), etc.?

No. Marx and Engels also pursued a consistently proletarian policy on the Irish question, which truly educated the masses in the spirit of democracy and socialism. Only this policy could save both Ireland and England from half a century of delay in necessary reforms and from their mutilation by liberals for the sake of reaction.

The policy of Marx and Engels on the Irish question provided the greatest example, which has retained enormous practical significance to this day, of how the proletariat of oppressing nations should relate to national movements; - gave a warning against the “servile haste” with which the bourgeoisie of all countries, colors and languages ​​hasten to recognize as “utopian” the change in the borders of states created by the violence and privileges of the landowners and the bourgeoisie of one nation.

If the Irish and English proletariat had not accepted the policies of Marx, had not made the secession of Ireland their slogan, this would have been the worst opportunism on their part, oblivion of the tasks of a democrat and a socialist, a concession to the English reaction and the bourgeoisie.

9. THE 1903 PROGRAM AND ITS LIQUIDATORS

The minutes of the 1903 congress, which adopted the program of Russian Marxists, have become extremely rare, and the vast majority of modern workers in the labor movement are not familiar with the motives for individual points of the program (especially since not all of the literature related to this enjoys the benefits of legality...). Therefore, it is necessary to dwell on the analysis of the issue that interests us at the 1903 congress.

Let us note first of all that, no matter how meager the Russian Social-Democrats are. literature relating to the “right of nations to self-determination”, yet it is quite clear from it that this right has always been understood in the sense of the right to secession. Gg. The Semkovskys, Libmans and Yurkevichs, who doubt this, declare § 9 “unclear”, etc., only out of extreme ignorance or carelessness talk about “ambiguity”. Back in 1902, in Zarya, Plekhanov**, defending the “right to self-determination” in the draft program, wrote that this requirement, not obligatory for bourgeois democrats, “is obligatory for social democrats.” “If we forgot about him, or did not dare to expose him,” wrote Plekhanov, “for fear of affecting the national prejudices of our compatriots of the Great Russian tribe, then in our mouths ... the cry ... would become a shameful lie ...: “proletarians of all countries, unite !”22.

This is a very apt description of the main argument for the point under consideration, so apt that it is not without reason that the “unremembering kinship” critics of our program timidly avoided it. Refusal of this point, no matter what the motives may be given for it, in fact means a “shameful” concession to Great Russian nationalism. Why does the Great Russian, when talking about the right of all ____________________________

* By the way, it is not difficult to see why the right of “self-determination” of nations cannot, from a social democratic point of view, be understood as either federation or autonomy (although, abstractly speaking, both fit under “self-determination”). The right to federation is generally nonsense, because federation is a bilateral agreement. Marxists in general cannot include the defense of federalism in their program; there is nothing to say about this. As for autonomy, Marxists defend not the “right to” autonomy, but autonomy itself, as a general, universal principle of a democratic state with a variegated national composition, with a sharp differences in geographical and other conditions. Therefore, recognizing the “right of nations to autonomy” would be as meaningless as the “right of nations to federation.”

** In 1916, V.I. Lenin made a note to this place: “We ask the reader not to forget that Plekhanov in 1903 was one of the main opponents of opportunism, far from his notorious turn to opportunism and subsequently to chauvinism.”

nations for self-determination? Because we are talking about separation from the Great Russians. The interest of uniting the proletarians, the interest of their class solidarity requires recognition of the right of nations to secede - this is what Plekhanov recognized in the quoted words 12 years ago; Having thought about this, our opportunists would probably not say so much nonsense about self-determination.

At the congress of 1903, where this draft program, defended by Plekhanov, was approved, the main work was concentrated in the program commission. Unfortunately, her minutes were not kept. Namely, on this point they would be especially interesting, because (only in the commission the representatives of the Polish Social-Democrats, Warsaw and Ganetsky, tried to defend their views and challenge the “recognition of the right to self-determination.” A reader who would like to compare their arguments ( set out in Varshavsky’s speech and in his and Ganetsky’s statement, pp. 134-136 and 388-390 of the protocols) with the arguments of Rosa Luxemburg in her Polish article analyzed by us, would have seen the complete identity of these arguments.

How did the program commission of the Second Congress, where Plekhanov opposed the Polish Marxists most of all, react to these arguments? They laughed cruelly at these arguments! The absurdity of the proposal to the Russian Marxists to throw out the recognition of the right to self-determination of nations was so clearly and clearly demonstrated that the Polish Marxists did not even dare to repeat their arguments at the full meeting of the congress!! They left the congress, convinced of the hopelessness of their position before the supreme meeting of Marxists, both Great Russian, Jewish, Georgian, and Armenian.

This historical episode is, of course, very important for anyone seriously interested in their program. The complete defeat of the arguments of the Polish Marxists in the program commission of the congress and their refusal to attempt to defend their views at the congress meeting is an extremely significant fact. It was not for nothing that Rosa Luxemburg “modestly” kept silent about this in her article of 1908 - apparently the memory of the congress was too unpleasant! She also kept silent about the ridiculously unsuccessful proposal to “correct” § 9 of the program, which Warsaw and Ganetsky made on behalf of all Polish Marxists in 1903 and which neither Rosa Luxemburg nor other Polish leaders dared (and will not dare) repeat. Social-Democrats

But if Rosa Luxemburg, in concealing her defeat in 1903, kept silent about these facts, then people interested in the history of their party will take care to know these facts and think through their meaning.

“...We propose,” Rosa Luxemburg’s friends wrote to the 1903 congress, leaving it, “to give the following wording to the seventh (current 9th) point in the draft program:

§ 7. Institutions guaranteeing complete freedom of cultural development to all nations that are part of the state” (p. 390 of the protocols).

So, the Polish Marxists then came out with views on the national question so vague that instead of self-determination, they essentially proposed nothing more than a pseudonym for the notorious “cultural-national autonomy”!

This sounds almost incredible, but it is, unfortunately, a fact. At the congress itself, although there were 5 Bundists with 5 votes and 3 Caucasians with 6 votes, not counting Kostrov’s advisory vote, there was not a single vote for eliminating the clause on self-determination. Three votes were in favor of adding “cultural-national autonomy” to this clause (for Goldblatt’s formula: “the creation of institutions that guarantee nations complete freedom of cultural development”) and four votes for Lieber’s formula (“the right to freedom of their nations’ cultural development”) .

Now that the Russian liberal party, the Cadets party, has appeared, we know that in its program the political self-determination of nations has been replaced by “cultural self-determination.” The Polish friends of Rosa Luxemburg, therefore, “fighting” the nationalism of the PPP, did so with such success that they proposed replacing the Marxist program with a liberal program! And at the same time they accused our program of opportunism - is it surprising that in the program commission of the Second Congress this accusation was met only with laughter!

In what sense did the delegates of the Second Congress understand “self-determination”, of whom, as we have seen, not a single one was found against “self-determination of nations”?

This is evidenced by the following three extracts from the minutes:

“Martynov finds that the word “self-determination” cannot be given a broad interpretation; it only means the right of a nation to separate itself into a separate political whole, and not at all regional self-government” (p. 171). Martynov was a member of the program commission, in which the arguments of Rosa Luxemburg’s friends were refuted and ridiculed. In his views, Martynov was then an “economist”, an ardent opponent of Iskra, and if he had expressed an opinion that was not shared by the majority of the program commission, he would, of course, have been refuted.

Goldblatt, a Bundist, took the floor first when the congress discussed, after commission work, § 8 (now 9) of the program.

“Nothing can be objected to the “right to self-determination,” said Goldblatt. If any nation is fighting for independence, then it cannot be resisted. If Poland does not want to enter into a legal marriage with Russia), then it should not be interfered with, as Comrade Putin put it. Plekhanov. I agree with this opinion within these limits” (pp. 175-176).

Plekhanov did not speak at all at the full meeting of the congress on this item. Goldblatt refers to the words of Plekhanov in the program commission, where the “right to self-determination” was explained in detail and popularly in the sense of the right to secession. Lieber, speaking after Goldblatt, remarked:

“Of course, if any nationality is not able to live within Russia, then the party will not interfere with it” (p. 176).

The reader sees that at the Second Party Congress, which adopted the program, there were no two opinions on the issue that self-determination “only” means the right to secede. Even the Bundists internalized this truth at that time, and only in our sad time of ongoing counter-revolution and all kinds of “renunciation” were people brave in their ignorance who declared the program “unclear.” But before we devote time to these sad “also-Social Democrats,” let’s put an end to the attitude towards the Poles’ program.

They came to the second (1903) congress with a statement about the need and urgency of unification. But they left the congress after “failures” in the program commission, and their last word was a written statement printed in the minutes of the congress and containing the above proposal to replace self-determination with cultural-national autonomy.

In 1906, Polish Marxists joined the party, and, neither entering it nor a single time after (neither at the congress of 1907, nor at the conferences of 1907 and 1908, nor at the plenum of 1910), they did not make a single proposal about changing § 9 of the Russian program!!

It is a fact.

And this fact clearly proves, contrary to all phrases and assurances, that the friends of Rosa Luxemburg considered the debate in the program commission of the Second Congress and the decision of this congress exhaustive, that they silently recognized their mistake and corrected it when they joined the party in 1906, after leaving since the congress in 1903, without ever attempting to raise the issue of revising § 9 of the program through party channels.

Rosa Luxemburg's article appeared under her signature in 1908 - of course, it never occurred to a single person to deny the right of party writers to criticize the program - and after this article, likewise, not a single official institution of Polish Marxists raised the question of revising § 9- th.

Therefore, Trotsky truly does a disservice to some admirers of Rosa Luxemburg when, on behalf of the editors of Borba, he writes in No. 2 (March 1914):

“...Polish Marxists consider the “right to national self-determination” to be completely devoid of political content and should be removed from the program” (p. 25).

The helpful Trotsky is more dangerous than the enemy! From nowhere other than from “private conversations” (i.e., simply gossip on which Trotsky always lives), he could not borrow evidence to count “Polish Marxists” in general as supporters of every article of Rosa Luxemburg. Trotsky presented the “Polish Marxists” as people without honor and conscience, who did not even know how to respect their convictions and the program of their party. Helpful Trotsky!

When in 1903 the representatives of the Polish Marxists left the Second Congress over the right to self-determination, then Trotsky could say that they considered this right to be devoid of content and subject to removal from the program.

But after this, Polish Marxists joined the party that had such a program, and never made a proposal to revise it*.

Why did Trotsky keep silent about these facts to the readers of his magazine? Only because it is profitable for him to speculate on stirring up disagreements between Polish and Russian opponents of liquidationism and to deceive the Russian workers on the issue of the program.

Never before had Trotsky had strong opinions on any serious issue of Marxism, always “cracking through the cracks” of one or another disagreement and running from one side to the other. At the moment he is in the company of the Bundists and liquidators. Well, these gentlemen do not stand on ceremony with the party.

Here's the Bundist Liebman.

“When Russian Social Democracy,” writes this gentleman, “15 years ago in its program put forward a point on the right of every nationality to “self-determination,” then everyone (!!) asked himself: what does this fashionable (!!) expression actually mean? ? There was no answer to this (!!) This word remained (!!) surrounded by fog. In reality, it was difficult to clear this fog at that time. The time has not yet come for this point to be concretized - they said at that time - let it now remain in the fog (!!), and life itself will show what content to put into this point.”

Isn’t it true how magnificent this “boy without pants”23 is, mocking the party program?

Why is he mocking?

Only because he is a complete ignoramus who has not studied anything, has not even read the history of the party, but simply ended up in a liquidationist environment, where it is “customary” to walk naked on the issue of the party and party affiliation.

Pomyalovsky’s student boasts about how he “spit in a tub of cabbage”24. Gg. The Bundists went forward. They release the Libmans so that these gentlemen can publicly spit into their own tub. That there was some kind of decision of the international congress, that at the congress of their own party two representatives of their own Bund showed (what were the “severe” critics and determined enemies of Iskra!) full ability to understand the meaning of “self-determination” and even agreed with it, what It's all about this sir. Libmans? And wouldn’t it be easier to liquidate the party if the “party’s publicists” (don’t joke!) treat history and the party’s program like Bursats?

Here is the second “boy without pants,” Mr. Yurkevich from “Dzvin.” Mr. Yurkevich probably had in his hands the protocols of the Second Congress, because he quotes the words of Plekhanov, reproduced by Goldblatt, and shows familiarity with the fact that self-determination can only mean the right to secede. But this does not prevent him from spreading slander among the Ukrainian petty bourgeoisie about Russian Marxists, as if they stand for the “state integrity” (1913, No. 7-8, p. 83, etc.) of Russia. Of course, there is no better way than this slander to alienate Ukrainian democracy from the Great Russians. The Yurkevichs couldn’t come up with it. And such alienation lies along the lines of the entire policy of the literary group “Dzvina”, which preaches the separation of Ukrainian workers into a special national organization!**

It is quite fitting, of course, for a group of nationalist philistines splitting the proletariat—this is precisely the objective role of “Dzvin”—to spread godless confusion on the national question. It goes without saying that Messrs. The Yurkevichs and Libmans - who are “terribly” offended when they are called “near-party people” - did not say a word, literally not a single word about how they would like to resolve the issue of the right to secession in the program?

Here is the third and main “boy without pants,” Mr. Semkovsky, who, on the pages of the liquidationist newspaper in front of the Great Russian public, “smears” § 9 of the program and at the same time declares that he “does not share, for some reasons, the proposal” for expulsion this paragraph!!

Unbelievable but true.

In August 1912, the liquidators' conference officially raised the national question. For a year and a half, not a single article, except for Mr. Semkovsky’s article, on the issue of § 9. And in this article the author refutes _______________________

* We are informed that at the summer meeting of Russian Marxists of 1913, Polish Marxists participated only with an advisory voice and did not vote at all on the issue of the right to self-determination (secession), speaking out against such a right in general. Of course, they had every right to do this and continue to agitate in Poland against its secession. But this is not exactly what Trotsky is talking about, because the Polish Marxists did not demand the “removal from the program” of § 9.

** See in particular the preface by Mr. Yurkevich to the book by Mr. Levinsky: “Drawing the development of the Ukrainian labor movement in Galicia”, Kiev, 1914 (“Essay on the development of the Ukrainian labor movement in Galicia” Kiev 1914. Ed.).

program, “not sharing for some (secret disease, or what?) reasons” proposals to correct it!! We can guarantee that throughout the world it is not easy to find examples of such opportunism and, worse than opportunism, renunciation of the party or its liquidation.

It is enough to show what Semkovsky’s arguments are with one example:

“What to do,” he writes, “if the Polish proletariat wants, within the framework of one state, to wage a joint struggle with the entire Russian proletariat, and the reactionary classes of Polish society, on the contrary, would want to separate Poland from Russia and would gather a majority in a referendum (general poll of the population) votes in favor of this: should we, Russian Social-Democrats, vote in the central parliament together with our Polish comrades against secession or, so as not to violate the “right to self-determination,” for secession?” (“Novaya Rabochaya Gazeta” No. 71).

From this it is clear that Mr. Semkovsky does not even understand what we are talking about! He did not think that the right to secede presupposes that the issue should be resolved not by the central parliament, but only by the parliament (Sejm, referendum, etc.) of the separating region.

Childish bewilderment about “what to do,” if in a democracy the majority is for reaction, obscures the question of real, real, living politics, when both the Purishkeviches and Kokoshkins consider even the thought of secession criminal! Probably, the proletarians of all Russia need to fight not with the Purishkevichs and Kokoshkins today, but, bypassing them, with the reactionary classes of Poland!!

And such incredible nonsense is written in the organ of the liquidators, in which Mr. L. Martov is one of the ideological leaders. The same L. Martov who drafted the program and carried it out in 1903, who later wrote in defense of freedom of secession. L. Martov now argues, apparently, according to the rule:

You don't need to be smart there,

Send Read,

I'll take a look25.

He sends Read-Semkovsky and allows in the daily newspaper, in front of new layers of readers who do not know our program, to distort and confuse it endlessly!

Yes, yes, liquidationism has gone far - from party affiliation among many, even prominent former Social-Democrats. not a trace remained.

Rosa Luxemburg, of course, cannot be equated with the Liebmans, Yurkevichs, Semkovskys, but the fact that it was precisely such people who clung to her mistake proves with particular clarity the kind of opportunism she fell into.

10. CONCLUSION

Let's summarize.

From the point of view of the theory of Marxism in general, the question of the right of self-determination does not present any difficulties. There can be no serious question of challenging the London decision of 1896, nor of the fact that self-determination means only the right to secede, nor of the fact that the formation of independent national states is a tendency of all bourgeois-democratic revolutions.

The difficulty is created to a certain extent by the fact that in Russia the proletariat of the oppressed nations and the proletariat of the oppressing nation are fighting and must fight side by side. To defend the unity of the class struggle of the proletariat for socialism, to repel all bourgeois and Black Hundred influences of nationalism - that is the task. Among oppressed nations, the separation of the proletariat into an independent party sometimes leads to such a fierce struggle against the nationalism of a given nation that the perspective is distorted and the nationalism of the oppressing nation is forgotten.

But such a distortion of perspective is only possible for a short time. The experience of the joint struggle of proletarians of different nations shows too clearly that we must pose political questions not from the “Cracow”, but from the all-Russian point of view. And all-Russian politics is dominated by the Purishkevichs and Kokoshkins. Their ideas reign, their persecution of foreigners for “separatism”, for thoughts of separation is preached and carried out in the Duma, in schools, in churches, in barracks, in hundreds and thousands of newspapers. This Great Russian poison of nationalism poisons the entire all-Russian political atmosphere. The misfortune of a people who, by enslaving other peoples, strengthens the reaction throughout Russia. The memories of 1849 and 1863 constitute a living political tradition, which, unless storms of a very large scale occur, threatens to hamper any democratic and especially social-democratic movement for many decades to come.

There can be no doubt that, no matter how natural the point of view of some Marxists of the oppressed nations may sometimes seem (“the misfortune” of which sometimes consists in blinding the masses of the population with the idea of ​​“their” national liberation), in fact, according to the objective correlation of class forces in Russia, refusal to defend the right to self-determination amounts to the worst opportunism, infection of the proletariat with the ideas of the Kokoshkins. And these ideas are, in essence, the ideas and policies of the Purishkevichs.

Therefore, if Rosa Luxemburg’s point of view could be justified at first as a specific Polish, “Krakow” narrowness*, then at the present time, when nationalism and, above all, governmental, Great Russian nationalism has intensified everywhere, when it directs politics, such narrowness becomes unforgivable . In fact, opportunists of all nations cling to it, shunning the ideas of “storms” and “leaps,” recognizing the end of the bourgeois-democratic revolution, and clinging to the liberalism of the Kokoshkins.

Great Russian nationalism, like any nationalism, will go through different phases, depending on the dominance of certain classes in a bourgeois country. Before 1905 we knew almost only national reactionaries. After the revolution, national liberals were born among us.

In fact, this position is held by both the Octobrists and the Cadets (Kokoshkin), that is, the entire modern bourgeoisie.

And then the birth of Great Russian national democrats is inevitable. One of the founders of the “people’s socialist” party, Mr. Peshekhonov, already expressed this point of view when he called (in the August book of “Russian Wealth” for 1906) for caution in relation to the nationalist prejudices of the peasant. No matter how much they slander us Bolsheviks that we “idealize” the peasant, we have always strictly distinguished and will distinguish between peasant reason and peasant prejudice, peasant democracy against Purishkevich and the peasant desire to reconcile with the priest and the landowner.

Proletarian democracy must take into account the nationalism of the Great Russian peasants (not in the sense of concessions, but in the sense of struggle) now and will probably take this into account for quite a long time**. The awakening of nationalism in the oppressed nations, which had such a strong impact after 1905 (let us recall at least the group of “autonomist-federalists” in the First Duma, the growth of the Ukrainian movement, the Muslim movement, etc.), will inevitably cause strengthening of the nationalism of the Great Russian petty bourgeoisie in the cities and in the villages. The slower the democratic transformation of Russia goes, the more persistent, crude, and fierce the national persecution and squabbling of the bourgeoisie of different nations will be. The particular reactionary nature of the Russian Purishkevichs will give rise to (and strengthen) “separatist” aspirations among certain oppressed nations, sometimes enjoying much greater freedom in neighboring states.

This state of affairs presents the Russian proletariat with a double, or rather, two-sided task: the struggle against all nationalism and, first of all, against Great Russian nationalism; recognition not only of the complete equality of all nations in general, but also of equality in relation to state building, that is, the right of nations to self-determination, to secession; - and along with this, and precisely in the interests of a successful struggle against all kinds of nationalism of all nations, upholding the unity of the proletarian struggle and proletarian organizations. their closest merging into an international community, contrary to bourgeois aspirations for national isolation.

______________________

* It is not difficult to understand that the recognition by Marxists of all of Russia and, first of all, by the Great Russians, the right of nations to secede in no way excludes agitation against secession by Marxists of one or another oppressed nation, just as the recognition of the right to divorce does not exclude agitation in one case or another against divorce. We think , therefore, that the number of Polish Marxists will inevitably grow, who will begin to laugh at the non-existent “contradiction”, now “fueled” by Semkovsky and Trotsky.

** It would be interesting to trace how, for example, nationalism in Poland changes, turning from gentry to bourgeois and then to peasant. Ludwig Bernhard in his book “Das polnische Gemeinwesen im preussischen Staat” (“Poles in Prussia”; there is a Russian translation), himself taking the point of view of the German Kokoshkin, describes an extremely characteristic phenomenon: the formation of a kind of “peasant republic” of the Poles in Germany in the form close unity of all kinds of cooperatives and other unions of Polish peasants in the struggle for nationality, for religion, for the “Polish” land. German oppression rallied the Poles, isolated them, awakening the nationalism of first the gentry, then the bourgeoisie, and finally the peasant masses (especially after the German campaign that began in 1873 against the Polish language in schools) This is the case both in Russia and not only in relation to Poland.

Complete equality of nations; the right of self-determination of nations; the unification of the workers of all nations - this national program is taught to the workers by Marxism, the experience of the whole world and the experience of Russia.

The article was already typed when I received No. 3 of Our Rabochaya Gazeta, where Mr. Vl. Kosovsky writes about the recognition of the right to self-determination for all nations:

“Having been mechanically transferred from the resolution of the First Party Congress (1898), which, in turn, borrowed it from the decisions of international socialist congresses, it, as can be seen from the debates, was understood by the 1903 congress in the same sense as the socialist one put into it International: in the sense of political self-determination, that is, the self-determination of a nation in the direction of political independence. Thus, the formula of national self-determination, denoting the right to territorial isolation, does not at all concern the question of how to regulate national relations within a given state body, for nationalities that cannot or do not want to leave the existing state.”

From this it is clear that Mr. Vl. Kosovsky had in his hands the protocols of the Second Congress of 1903 and knows perfectly well the real (and only) meaning of the concept of self-determination. Compare with this the fact that the editors of the Bundist newspaper Zeit are releasing Mr. Liebmann to mock the program and declare it unclear!! Strange “party” morals among Messrs. Bundists... Why does Kosovsky declare the adoption of self-determination by the congress to be a mechanical transfer, “Allah knows.” There are people who “want to object,” but what, how, why, why, this is not given to them.