Comte what usually happens after a revolution takes place. The mechanism of revolutions is based on five factors

In November 2017, it will be one hundred years since the event that began to be called the October Revolution took place in Russia. Some argue that it was a coup d'etat. Discussions on this matter continue to this day. This article is intended to help understand the problem.

If there is a coup

The past century was rich in events that took place in some underdeveloped countries and were called coups. They took place mainly in African and Latin American countries. At the same time, the main government bodies were seized by force. The current leaders of the state were removed from power. They could be physically eliminated or arrested. Some managed to escape into exile. The change of power happened quickly.

The legal procedures provided for this were ignored. Then the new self-appointed head of state addressed the people with an explanation of the lofty goals of the coup. In a matter of days, there was a change in the leadership of government bodies. Life in the country continued, but under its new leadership. Such revolutions are nothing new. Their essence is in removing from power those who are endowed with it, while the institutions of power themselves remain unchanged. Such were the numerous palace coups in monarchies, the main instruments of which were conspiracies of a narrow number of individuals.

Often coups occurred with the participation of the armed forces and security forces. They were called military if changes in power were demanded by the army, which acted as the driving force behind the changes. In this case, the conspirators could be some high-ranking officers, supported by a small part of the military. Such coups were called putsches, and the officers who seized power were called juntas. Typically, a junta establishes a military dictatorship. Sometimes the head of the junta retains the leadership of the armed forces, and its members occupy key positions in the state.

Some revolutions subsequently led to a radical change in the socio-economic structure of the country and took on a revolutionary nature in their scale. The events that took place in the last century in some states, which were called coups, may have their own characteristics. Thus, political parties and public organizations can be invited to participate in them. And the coup itself can be a means of usurping power by its executive branch, which assumes all power, including representative bodies.

Many political scientists believe that successful coups d'etat are the prerogative of economically backward and politically independent countries. This is facilitated by the high level of centralization of government.

How to build a new world

Sometimes society finds itself in a situation where, for its development, it is necessary to make fundamental changes in it and break with the state that exists. The main thing here is a qualitative leap to ensure progress. We are talking about fundamental changes, and not about those where only political figures change. Such radical changes affecting the fundamental foundations of the state and society are usually called revolution.

Revolutions can lead to the replacement of one structure of the economy and social life by another. Thus, as a result of bourgeois revolutions, the feudal structure was changed to capitalist. Socialist revolutions changed the capitalist structure to a socialist one. National liberation revolutions liberated peoples from colonial dependence and contributed to the creation of independent nation states. Political revolutions make it possible to move from totalitarian and authoritarian political regimes to democratic ones, etc. It is characteristic that revolutions are carried out in conditions where the legal system of the overthrown regime does not meet the requirements of revolutionary transformations.

Scientists studying revolutionary processes note several reasons for the emergence of revolutions.

• Some of the ruling plates are beginning to believe that the head of state and his entourage have significantly greater powers and capabilities than representatives of other elite groups. As a result, the dissatisfied can stimulate public indignation and raise it to fight the regime.
• Due to the decrease in the flow of funds at the disposal of the state and elites, taxation is being tightened. The salary of officials and the military is decreasing. On this basis, dissatisfaction and protests by these categories of state workers arise.
• There is growing public resentment, supported by elites and not always caused by poverty or social injustice. This is a consequence of the loss of position in society. People's discontent develops into rebellion.
• An ideology is being formed that reflects the demands and sentiments of all segments of society. Regardless of its forms, it raises people to fight injustice and inequality. It serves as the ideological basis for the consolidation and mobilization of citizens opposing this regime.
• International support, when foreign states refuse to support the ruling elite and begin cooperation with the opposition.

What are the differences

1. A coup in a state is a forceful replacement of its leadership, carried out by a group of people who have organized a conspiracy against it.
2. Revolution is a powerful multifaceted process of radical changes in the life of society. As a result, the existing social system is destroyed and a new one is born.
3. The organizers of the coup aim to overthrow the leaders of the state, which happens quickly. Typically, a coup does not have significant popular support. A revolution presupposes a profound change in the current system of government and social order. The revolutionary process takes a long time, with a gradual increase in protest sentiments and increased participation of the masses. Often it is headed by a political party that does not have the opportunity to gain power through legal means. This often ends in bloodshed and civil war.
4. A coup usually does not have an ideology guiding its participants. The revolution is carried out under the influence of class ideology, which changes the consciousness of a significant part of the people.

Nowadays, if there are any riots or uprisings in different countries, they are immediately labeled as a revolution. Will this actually be correct? Let's find out.

What are the features of the revolution? Revolution is a fundamental change in the social and political structure of society. Most often, revolutions occur from below by dissatisfied masses of people who have been driven to despair. The latter is the state of a person when, even being the most apolitical, he becomes passionate.

Excellent examples of revolutions can be considered those moments in history when transitions occur from one social system to another. These are the Bourgeois Revolution in England in 1642, when the transition to capitalist relations took place, and the Great Bourgeois Revolution in France in 1789.

Also, revolutions can be national liberation, the goal of which is to create a national state. An excellent example is the revolution in the United States of 1776, which declared the independence of the United States, the South American revolutions from the Spanish yoke, etc.

A revolution can be initiated “from above” - when revolutionary changes occur on the initiative of the authorities, without changing them. We can observe such a phenomenon in Japan in 1867-1868, when there were cardinal changes and a transition from feudalism to capitalism, as well as, in part, the reforms of Alexander II, but here it is worth making a remark that this revolution turned out to be “unfinished” due to death of the emperor.

A coup d'état is a moment in the life of the state when other elites come to power and only the top of the government changes; no fundamental changes occur in the life of society.

The dispersal of the Supreme Soviet of Russia in 1993 was a coup d'état. The overthrow of Peter III and the accession of Catherine II was also a revolution. The “color revolutions” of the last two decades are also coups d’etat.

There was also a coup in Ukraine. People have not received any fundamental changes in the political or socio-economic sphere of life. It’s just that instead of one gang of elites, new ones came. There is a redistribution of property, and this makes the common man neither cold nor hot.

Many of you have noticed that I did not say a word about the February and Great October Socialist Revolutions. Nowadays, many anti-Sovietists call these two phenomena nothing more than “coups.” Even now I can say that in institutes, first-year undergraduates are taught that the February Revolution was a revolution, but the October Revolution was a revolution. Let's look at it objectively: after the February events, there was a transition from a monarchy to a republic. Dramatic change? Cardinal, which can determine further transformations in society. What happened during the October events? There was a transition from a republic to the dictatorship of the proletariat, a rejection of capitalist relations, nationalization of the economy (Oh God, which was not even dreamed of at that time by the bourgeois circles of the West and the Atlantic), and the construction of a socially oriented state began. Revolution? Revolution.

I would also like to note such a concept as “Counter-revolution”. This is an attempt to return to the political or socio-economic system that was lost as a result of the revolution. Counter-revolutionary movements include the White Guards, loyalists, and the Guomidian movement.

I hope that we will be able to see the Russian national liberation and pan-Slavist movement in Ukraine and its further victory in this confrontation.

It is common to think that people go out to demonstrations en masse and begin to make a revolution when they have nowhere to escape from hunger and poverty...

But actually it is not.

In the USSR, under the International Department of the CPSU Central Committee, there was a special institute, which was vaguely called the “Institute of Social Sciences.” This institute trained professional foreign revolutionaries, taught communists of other countries to control the crowd, manage rumors, and political sentiments.

Based on decades of practical and theoretical work by the staff of this institute, a course “Psychology of spontaneous mass behavior” has been developed, which is taught at Moscow State University and the Russian Academy of Civil Service under the President of the Russian Federation.

In the mid-1990s, one of the authors of this course, Professor A.P. Nazaretyan, academy students, mayors and governors often asked the same thing: “Akop Pogosovich, our people are now poor, poor, living from hand to mouth. When can we expect mass uprisings, demonstrations? Or maybe there will even be a revolution, like in 1917?”

To which Hakob Pogosovich Nazaretyan replied:

“There will be no protests, no revolution. Now the people are not so pampered and rich to make a revolution. For a revolution, a completely different mood is needed.”

And, indeed, there was no revolution in Russia in the 1990s.

So what kind of mood is needed for a person to start dreaming of revolution?

Analyzing the prerequisites for revolutionary situations in different countries and eras, the American psychologist J. Davis compared two versions - the version of K. Marx and the version of the French historian A. de Tocqueville.

According to the first version, the revolution occurs as a result of the unbearable impoverishment of the people. The author of the second version points to the fact that a revolution is always preceded by an improvement in the quality of life (economic growth, expansion of political freedoms).

For example, before the revolution of 1789, the standard of living of French peasants and artisans was the highest in Europe. And the first anti-colonial revolution - the US War of Independence - took place in the richest and best-governed colony in the world.

The American psychologist Davis showed that both K. Marx and A. de Tocqueville were right. It turned out that the revolutionary crisis was indeed preceded by a long period of economic recovery. During this period, the population has more financial opportunities, rights and freedoms, and most importantly, RISING EXPECTATIONS further well-being.

However, sooner or later, against the backdrop of this rise in expectations, SMALL economic recession caused by objective reasons: an unsuccessful war, depletion of resources, population growth, etc.

At this point, the gap between EXPECTATIONS And REALITY, and this gap is assessed by people as CATASTROPHE, as a collapse of foundations, as an incredible infringement of basic rights, vital needs, etc.

It is this discrepancy between expectations and possibilities that gives rise to mass discontent and leads to a crisis and a revolutionary situation.

Over the past 150 years, such a situation has happened in Russia three times.

During the first half XIX century, the economic standard of living and the volume of freedoms of the Russian peasantry steadily increased. Therefore, if at the beginning XIX centuries, peasants did not even think about changing the status of serfs, then by the middle XIX century, this situation no longer satisfied them.

When the Crimean War began in 1853, a rumor spread throughout the provinces that its participants would receive a free diploma. This led to massive requests for parcels to go to the front. However, the war ended unsuccessfully, and the rumor about freedom turned out to be a lie.

The gap between expectation and reality turned out to be great, and a revolutionary situation arose - mass riots and arson of boyar estates. The authorities found the strength to undertake reforms - in 1861, serfdom was abolished, which saved the country from revolution.

To the beginning of XX century, Russia was the most dynamically developing country in the world, a kind of economic miracle, GDP was growing rapidly, there was a process of industrial modernization and an increase in entrepreneurial activity.

However, the war with Japan lost in 1905 and the unsuccessful course of the World War of 1914-1917 led to unexpected difficulties in the economy and caused widespread disappointment.

Mass discontent gives rise to an acute emotional state of a dramatic, unbearable crisis.

The formal impetus for the revolution was difficulties with grain supplies. Moreover, it was not even the fact of lack of bread that started the whole process, but only themselves gossip that in St. Petersburg they may limit the distribution of bread several times.

The untimely delivery of food to the store began to be assessed as “hunger,” and the authorities’ attempt to restore order on the streets as “unbearable repression.” All this led to the revolution.

And, of course, neither this “hunger” nor the “repression” were objective. Is it what happened in February 1917 in St. Petersburg? HUNGER?

Later, 25 years later, in 1941-1942. the city on the Neva will experience a real HUNGER, and even go as far as cannibalism, but at the time of the blockade will there be even the slightest hint of an uprising against Soviet power? Although outwardly everything is very similar - the same city, the same Germans, a similar war, but psychologically everything is the opposite.

Revolution and crisis are the result of a discrepancy between the expected and the actual, between what was planned and what is.

Against the background of successful growth, suddenly at some point the satisfaction of needs decreases somewhat (often as a result of rapid demographic growth, or an unsuccessful war, which was thought of as “small and victorious”), and expectations continue to rise by inertia. The gap gives rise to frustration, the situation seems unbearable and humiliating to people, they look for those to blame - and aggression, which does not find an outlet outside, turns inside the system, the emotional resonance provokes mass unrest...

But if people live consistently poorly (from the point of view of an external observer), they do not experience painful dissatisfaction, do not have inflated expectations, and therefore the likelihood of internal explosions (revolutions) is extremely low.

The collapse of the USSR followed the same scenario. At that time, residents of most of the national outskirts lived richer than residents of the RSFSR - this, as they say, was the policy of the party: residents of the USSR went to the Baltic states to see “how they live in Europe”; We flew to Alma-Ata to go skiing, and to Georgia to lie on the beaches on the shores of the beautiful sea.

The standard of living (and therefore the expectations) of people living in the national republics of the USSR was significantly higher than that of residents of the Russian hinterland. Therefore, the fall in oil prices, shortages and the introduction of food stamps sharply increased revolutionary sentiment in the national outskirts.

As a result, the richest republics - Lithuania and Georgia, Estonia and Latvia - were the first to leave the USSR. It was the residents of these republics who subjectively felt themselves to be the most affected by the economic crisis into which the USSR then found itself. And only after this the revolutionary process captured other republics.

So, the main source of revolutionary sentiment is painful dissatisfaction from unfulfilled expectations.

Revolution...
They scare her, they wait for her, they cover up dirty deeds with her name, they celebrate her anniversaries, they curse her...
Why did this happen, and what is the original meaning of this concept and the social significance of this event? What is it - degradation, devastation and bloody chaos, destroying all the best, or progress, prosperity and a step forward? Is there a difference between a revolution and a coup d'etat, and in whose interests does it occur?
We are trying to answer these and other questions that are becoming increasingly relevant in the political and economic reality around us.

Introduction

There are terms that seem obvious and self-evident to most people, but in reality it turns out that everyone understands different things by them, sometimes completely opposite. This especially often affects political terms that have a strong emotional connotation and great significance for the past and present. Revolution is one of them. We are not going to beat around the bush and say frankly: a revolution will most likely be a necessary condition for the implementation of the changes proposed by the project in society. Therefore, we must first decide what we mean by this word.

Given the situation, it is likely that the first things that come to mind when hearing the word “revolution” are various “Rose Revolutions”, “Revolutions of Dignity”, “Arab Spring” and other similar phenomena, usually referred to as revolutions in the media of “developed countries”. Why are they called revolutions, although we are just talking about coups d'etat, when one group of the “elite” pushes another away from the trough with the support of street extras? Is a revolution really just a change of scenery and people in power, and also an incomplete one? Is the point of the revolution to ensure that its sponsors line their pockets deeper at the expense of ordinary people, whose discontent they take advantage of to defeat their competitors?

Of course no.

Why then are these events persistently called revolutions? Because it is beneficial both to those who commit them and benefit from it, and to their formal opponents in power. No matter how much the word “revolution” is erased from memory, it still evokes positive associations and hopes among dissatisfied people. Therefore, the media and the authorities of “developed countries” like to label any coup carried out by the elite group they support as a “people’s revolution”. For them, a “popular revolution” is when people convenient for them come to power, and an “illegal coup” is when these people are overthrown. Everything here is clear, like all their so-called “universal” morals and standards.

In other countries, the same “revolutions” are used as a bogeyman with which it is convenient to intimidate the people. The destructive results of these coups d'etat are presented as the consequences of any possible change of power, or simply the struggle for a better life for the majority. Thus, such an interpretation of the word “revolution” is beneficial to the entire ruling class as a whole: those who are already in power, and those who dream of getting there, both the governments of “developed” and the authorities of “developing” countries.

Since, through the efforts of domestic and foreign propaganda, it is precisely this definition that dominates the public consciousness, it is necessary to explain what real revolution, a social revolution in the interests of the working majority, and how exactly it differs from the “revolutions” mentioned above.

Revolution as a natural event

Taking of the Bastille. One of the symbols of the Great French Revolution

A real revolution is not just a replacement of people in power, accompanied by a change of flag, symbols and other tinsel. This is a serious, turning point historical event. During a revolution, power is replaced not for the sake of seizing power, but with the goal of radically transforming the entire economic, political and social system.

The old government is not just seized - it is destroyed, and in its place a new one is built, with its own institutions and on its own principles. The old orders are not simply improved or softened - they are abolished, and new ones are introduced in their place, more consistent with the real interests of the majority and the requirements of progress.

After the revolution, people begin to live not just better or worse - people begin to live differently.

A typical historical example is the Great French Revolution, which finally destroyed feudal society in France and greatly weakened it throughout Europe. It is precisely by its principles that the entire modern “civilized” world formally lives - and yet back in the middle of the 18th century, from an official point of view, they were dangerous nonsense, “irresponsible fantasies,” and in some places even blasphemy. And it’s hard to deny that this has overall turned out to be a good thing for humanity. The return of class society is usually dreamed of either by fools who sincerely believe that they would have been nobles back then, or by “respectable gentlemen” who would have had a good time even then, since titles were in practice bought and sold. But they would not have to pretend that they are formally equal to the “common people.” Even now they are offended by this.

The October Revolution in Russia is also such an example, no matter what those who make their living by indulging the opinions of the ruling “elite” may say about it. It is to her, and the ruling minority’s fear of its repetition, that the entire “civilized” world owes the eight-hour working day, pension, disability benefits and other manifestations of the “welfare state,” “capitalism with a human face” and “socially responsible business.” That is why the ruling minority is so afraid and hates it to this day, although its main brainchild has been formally dead and buried for a quarter of a century. That is why not a month can pass without the Western or Russian media kicking it, the long-dead Bolsheviks and the long-collapsed Soviet Union.

What is characteristic is that the gains of both of these revolutions, both French and Russian, were not completely canceled after the collapse of the regimes they created, even in the conditions of the formal restoration of the old order. They changed the world so seriously that a complete rollback was very difficult or even impossible.

The collapse of the USSR, the “velvet revolutions” in the countries of Eastern Europe and all kinds of Maidans and coups in the countries of the “Third World” cannot serve as examples of revolutions. Yes, people’s dissatisfaction with the Soviet nomenklatura was used to formalize the final funeral of the Soviet project, but it itself has not gone away. On the contrary, its representatives and their children, having turned into oligarchs and officials of the new Russia, had the opportunity to fatten at the expense of the rest of the population in a way that they would never have been able to before. As a result of the “orange revolutions” and other coups, one clan in power also changes to another. No historical progress is taking place - on the contrary, the ugliest remnants of the past are coming to light, from religious fanaticism to extreme nationalism.

A real revolution has one more feature that distinguishes it from ordinary and unusual coups. Contrary to what supporters of the current government or various “saviors of the fatherland” constantly say, revolution is impossible entirely set up from abroad or “done” through the efforts of a group of conspirators. Such a misconception stems either from attempts to pass off wishful thinking, or from the desire to obscure the true, objective reasons for the revolutions of the past, and to present them as the work of a small group of fanatics or the fruit of the work of foreign intelligence services.

The deep cause of a revolution is always a crisis of society, either because in its development it has outgrown the economic and political system established in it, or because the course that the ruling minority is leading it is destructive and leads to degradation. Begin A revolution in favorable conditions can be carried out by a separate group, party or organization, but without communication with the majority of workers and support from them, it is doomed to failure.

This separate group, party or organization, as a rule, is also a concentrated expression of the interests, aspirations and aspirations of the majority, its most active part. Since the revolution is historically inevitable and objectively conditioned, one might think that it is enough to wait for a revolutionary situation when everything will happen somehow “by itself.” And in the present you can do nothing, which is very convenient for those who think so. But this is as stupid as expecting to make a revolution solely on your own.

First, the revolution may well fail. It may be crushed, and then it will go down in history, written by the victors among the ruling class, as another failed uprising. As the famous expression says, “a rebellion cannot be successful - then it is called differently”.

Secondly, if you do nothing, then nothing will happen. Nothing is ever done “by itself.” The masses of the people making a revolution are not some aliens existing besides us, they are us, and no one will do this except ourselves.

Thirdly, in the absence of progressive forces, or in case of their weakness, political forces and organizations that are not at all interested in progress and improving the lives of the majority can take advantage of popular discontent - this is what happened, for example, during the revolution in Iran, which is now called “Islamic” ".

The objectively existing revolutionary process lies precisely in the fact that changes in the economy, working and living conditions, and other areas of human life give the working majority new opportunities and pose new problems and tasks for them. This, in turn, leads to an increasingly massive emergence of active and progressive-minded people coming from this majority and expressing its aspirations and interests.

About revolutionary violence

Storming of the Moscow Kremlin in 1917

Ordinary citizens are often intimidated by revolution as a bloody event, the onset of complete chaos, which can only be desired by narrow-minded fanatics or dishonest people wishing to fish in troubled waters. In this way, official propaganda calls for tolerating the current order of things, because “it’s better this way than nothing.”

The fear of revolution as bloodshed is, in principle, justified.

If we talk specifically about Russian realities, we can see that in the conditions of the “new Russia” social ties are destroyed and people are confidently dehumanized Those. They stop treating each other (and sometimes themselves) as people, and begin to perceive others as objects with whom they can do whatever they want in the name of satisfying their own needs. , which means that the further this process goes, the more atrocities the rebel people will be ready for when the order built on their backs collapses for some reason.

The bloodiness of a revolution, a change of power, and indeed any large-scale changes in society, as well as the level of everyday violence in it, strongly depend on the level of development of the society itself: the more primitive it is, the poorer the people, and the smaller the feeder for the “elites,” the more bloody it usually is turns out to be any redistribution or uprising. The relationship between the level of violence, measured by the number of murders per 100 thousand people, and the standard of living, measured by the UN Human Development Index, is quite clear: the lower the HDI, the more murders and domestic violence, in principle. This can be seen, for example, in this document from the relevant UN organization.

It should be noted that the second important factor is the level of socio-economic inequality in society: the higher it is, the more bitter people are, the higher the crime and domestic violence. And this is a very logical pattern:

The greater the gap between classes, the less their representatives see each other as people.

Russia is socially degrading, with the exception of several large cities, where some progress has been observed from a purely consumer point of view, and over the years of a market economy, various outdated stereotypes of behavior and social structure are being carefully revived, which means that:

The later the revolution occurs, the bloodier it will be.

The easiest way to show this is with an example accessible to everyone. Revolution is a painful but necessary solution to a problem, like making an unpleasant but inevitable decision, or a surgical operation. If you put off making a decision for a long time, or neglect the disease for fear of surgery, you can end up with complications that are much more dangerous to your health. History is full of examples from completely different spheres, be it politics or medicine, when the pure delay in making any decision and fear of radical measures led to much worse consequences than any revolution.

The longer the problem is pushed deeper and not allowed to be resolved, the more destructive the explosion will be.

What will the revolution be like?

A revolution is not just a replacement of people in power, or even lustration, so beloved by liberals, that is, a more or less complete change of the entire bureaucratic composition. Revolution means the complete dismantling of the old state apparatus, with all its vices, principles and practices, from the government and parliament to the army and police in their current form. Even the most shabby bureaucratic offices in the most remote corners of the country should not remain untouched.

"But wait,- some may object, - How can you run a country without bureaucracy? Complete chaos will ensue, and it will only get worse, not better! And why do it so radically at all, because you still can’t do without specially trained people in administrative positions.” The historical example of the Soviet Union clearly shows us that the separation of managers into a separate layer with their own interests and privileges is a disastrous phenomenon for a society that is trying to focus on equality and satisfying the interests of the majority. How exactly can one live without state bureaucracy, and therefore without the risk of its degeneration into the “Soviet nomenklatura” - is written in the Project Program.

All economic orders will also be transformed beyond recognition. Unlike various “color revolutions”, where the “right” oligarchs replace the “wrong” ones in power under the guise of popular discontent, after the real revolution there will be no oligarchs left. No freedom and no power of the majority is possible as long as practically everything that this majority uses for life and work is owned, and therefore in the power, of the “wealthy” minority.

In the same way, the “office plankton” that serves the activities of this minority will decrease. The introduction of modern information technologies and the elimination of many “economic entities”, each of which produces its own accounting and document flow, will free a huge number of people from the fate of mindless paper shufflers and will give them the opportunity to engage in real, productive work.

“Yes, you’re just jealous of wealthy people,- one of the ideological servants of this very minority would answer contemptuously, - Revolution is an attempt to take away from successful people and divide among losers, perpetrated by the hands of thugs and drunken sailors.”. In general, defenders of the existing system love the idea that only embittered nonentities can want to shake the existing order of things. They say they failed to realize themselves in other areas of life, and they blame anyone but themselves for their own troubles. This is a very convenient position, since this type of people really exists, and everyone has probably met them at least once.

But that's not true.

A revolutionary is a progressive-minded person, aware of the need for radical changes in social relations. Of course, at the same time, he cannot be marginalized or a weak-willed idiot, and sit on benefits, parental handouts and other types of dependency. A revolutionary is, first of all, one who earns his living by his labor, makes his personal contribution to the creation of human civilization, and therefore sees from personal experience how unfairly and ineptly his efforts and the efforts of all other working people are wasted - and cannot do this any longer tolerate.

Famous electrical engineer and underground Bolshevik L.B. Krasin

A revolutionary can be someone who finds it unpleasant to lead a seemingly settled life in an unsettled society, or someone who simply finds it painful to look at the suffering and degradation of the people around them. A typical example is Dr. Ernesto Guevara, for whom his origin and profession prepared him for a seemingly completely comfortable existence. However, after traveling around Latin America, he was so struck by the unsanitary conditions and poverty in which the majority of the population of these countries lived that he became a professional revolutionary from a successful young doctor.

It is precisely such people who are able to express the interests of the working majority and change society in its interests - because they are flesh of the flesh of this very majority. But they themselves will most likely be much smaller, since the existing conditions in which this majority is forced to live and work allow only a limited part of it to think and act normally.

It turns out to be some kind of contradiction - the interests of the majority are expressed and fought against by the ruling minority, which is also sort of like a minority. But the ruling class also does not completely rule the state and make laws. This is done by a minority that has emerged from it and is in direct control of the levers of power. But without support - voluntary or forced - from its class, this power will ultimately be overthrown, so it is forced not only to respect its narrow interests, but also to serve the interests of its entire class as a whole.

Some ruling groups do it worse, some better, and sometimes a coup occurs and one of them replaces the other - but power remains within the same social class.

The task of revolutionaries is to ensure that power passes from one class to another, to the working majority, even if represented at first by a small but active and conscious group of them. Without the support of the majority, this group will not succeed. After all, in the end, it is the majority that must learn to govern themselves independently, which will change the face of the entire society beyond recognition.

This will be a real social revolution.

1 If you often look at the website of the same BBC, and not their Russian service, but the original, English-language one, you will notice that articles about the “horrors of the Soviet Union” appear there with enviable regularity, although the topic for residents of the UK, it would seem, is not very relevant .

2 In Russia, this is aggravated by the tense situation and the general constant fear of the “elite” for their fortunes, which, unlike their colleagues from “developed countries,” they plundered not figuratively, but literally.

3 For example, the Napoleonic Code was the most comprehensive of the first civil codes, and laid the foundation for purely bourgeois social relations not only in France, but throughout Europe. It is still used in a modified form, although after the restoration of the monarchy it was renamed the Civil Code.

4 Thus, on October 29, 1917, the Soviet government adopted a resolution introducing an 8-hour working day, which, coupled with the fear of the revolution spreading throughout Europe, further prompted the governments of other countries to also take steps in this direction. In 1918, a 48-hour work week was recognized by the legislation of Germany, Poland, Luxembourg, Czechoslovakia, and Austria; in 1919 - Yugoslavia, Denmark, Spain, France, Portugal, Switzerland, Sweden, Holland, Belgium, Italy (48-hour - because they worked 6 days a week then, and the only day off was Sunday). Most of the “civilized world” still lives with this eight-hour working day.

5 It is most clearly seen who exactly benefited from the destruction of the socialist camp, according to the seemingly loyal report of the chief economist of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development S. Guriev, which can be viewed. Despite ritual incantations in support of the market and democracy, the picture is disappointing: there are more losers from the transition to a market, inequality is growing, the gap with developed countries is decreasing slowly, and those born during the transition to a market are 1 cm shorter than those born before or after - the effect. comparable to a full-scale war. In Russia specifically, everyone but the richest lost, and the notorious “average” income growth actually applies to the top 20% of the population. And most importantly, for those born, or even those who began studying, after 1987, the greatest role in obtaining an education and a good job is played by the characteristics of their parents, or, more simply, their origin. That is, the inequality of opportunity has become much deeper than before.

6 The overthrow of the Shah's regime in Iran took place against the backdrop of mass strikes and popular unrest, the causes of which were inflation and the growing gap between rich and poor, including geographical ones. However, Islamist organizations managed to ride this social protest in time and direct popular discontent towards the “depraved Western way of life” and the Shah’s administration drowning in it, instead of the ruling class of owners and its privileged position. As a result, all progressive forces after the revolution were exterminated by Islamists, and a theocracy was established in the country.

7 There are indeed many historical examples that can be cited. From military history, one can note the indecisive actions of generals Gorchakov and Dannenberg, which cost the Russian army defeat in the Battle of Inkerman, as well as General Kuropatkin, notorious for his indecisiveness, who managed to lose all the land battles of the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905, in which he had to command troops . From political history, the most striking example is the rise to power of the Nazis in Germany and the subsequent policies of European leaders aimed at appeasing their aggressive aspirations, which served as a prologue to the Second World War.

8 In this sense, it is especially significant that, despite all the demonstrative fight against corruption and the increasing suppression of dissent, the authorities are willing to soften the legislation in that part that concerns economic crimes, that is, business. And soon they will be allowed to engage in entrepreneurial activity without leaving the pre-trial detention center. Almost like the liberal opposition dreams of. Which is not surprising - after all, the difference between them is not at all small, it’s just that some want those who have power to have money, and others want those who have money to have power.

Sociologists and the Revolution of 1848

When I begin to search for the real reason that caused the fall of the ruling classes in different centuries, different eras, among different peoples, I perfectly imagine such and such an event, such and such a person, such and such a random or external cause, but believe me, that the real, actual reason why people lost power was because they became unworthy to have it.
Alexis de Tocqueville
The study of the positions taken by the sociologists we examined regarding the revolution of 1848 is of more than formal interest.
Revolution first 1848 g., the short-term existence of the Second Republic, the coup d'etat of Louis Napoleon Bonaparte successively marked the destruction of the constitutional monarchy in favor of the republic, then the destruction of the republic in favor of the authoritarian regime; The background of all events remained the threat of a socialist revolution or the persistent thought of it. During this period - from 1848 By 1851 g. - The temporary dominance of the provisional government, in which there was a strong influence of the socialists, the struggle between the Constituent Assembly and the population of Paris, and finally, the rivalry between the Legislative Assembly (with a monarchical majority), defending the republic, and the president, elected on the basis of universal suffrage, followed each other law, which sought to establish an authoritarian empire.
In other words, during the period between 1848 and 1851 France experienced a political battle similar to the political battles of the 20th century. more than any other event in 19th century history. Indeed, in the period from 1848 to 1851, one could observe a three-way struggle between those whom XX V. called fascists, more or less liberal democrats and socialists (such struggles could be seen, for example, in Weimar Germany between 1920 and 1933 gg.).
Of course, the French socialists 1848 g. do not look like communists of the 20th century, Bonapartists 1850 g. - not Mussolini’s fascists, not Hitler’s National Socialists. But nonetheless
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It is true that this period of the political history of France in the 19th century. already reveals the main characters and typical rivalries of the 20th century.
Moreover, Comte, Marx and Tocqueville commented, analyzed and criticized this interesting period in itself. Their judgments about those events reflect the characteristics of their teachings. These sociologists help us to understand simultaneously the diversity of value judgments, the difference in systems of analysis, and the significance of the abstract theories developed by these authors.
1. Auguste Comte and the Revolution of 1848
The case of Auguste Comte is the simplest. From the very beginning he rejoiced in the destruction of representative and liberal institutions, which, in his opinion, were associated with the activities of critical and anarchistic metaphysical reason, as well as with the peculiar evolution of Great Britain.
Comte, in his youthful works, compares the development of the political situation in France and England. In England, he thought, the aristocracy merged with the bourgeoisie and even with the common people in order to gradually reduce the influence and power of the monarchy. The political evolution of France was completely different. Here, on the contrary, the monarchy merged with the communes and the bourgeoisie in order to reduce the influence and power of the aristocracy.
The parliamentary regime in England, according to Comte, was nothing other than a form of domination by the aristocracy. The English Parliament was the institution through which the aristocracy ruled in England, just as it ruled in Venice.
Consequently, parliamentarism, according to Comte, is not a political institution with a universal purpose, but a simple accident of English history. To demand the introduction in France of representative institutions imported from the other side of the English Channel is to make a gross historical mistake, since the most important conditions for parliamentarism are missing here. In addition, this means making a political mistake, fraught with disastrous consequences, namely, wanting to combine parliament and the monarchy, since it was the monarchy, as the highest manifestation of the previous regime, that was the enemy of the French Revolution.
In a word, the combination of monarchy and parliament, the ideal of the Constituent Assembly, seems impossible to Comte, because it is based on two fundamental errors, one of which concerns the nature of representative institutions in general* and the second - the history of France. Moreover, Comte is inclined to
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the idea of ​​centralization, which seems to him natural for the history of France. In this regard, he goes so far that he considers the distinction between laws and decrees to be a vain trick of metaphysical legalists.
According to this interpretation of history, he is therefore pleased with the abolition of the French parliament in favor of what he calls a provisional dictatorship, and applauds the action of Napoleon III in decisively putting an end to what Marx would call parliamentary cretinism.
A fragment from the Course of Positive Philosophy characterizes Comte's political and historical point of view on this matter:
“Based on our historical theory, due to the previous complete concentration of the various elements of the previous regime around royal power, it is clear that the main effort of the French Revolution, aimed at moving away irrevocably from the ancient organization, was bound to lead to a direct struggle of the people with royal power , the superiority of which since the end of the second modern phase was the only one distinguished by such a system. However, although the political purpose of this preliminary era in fact turned out to be not at all the gradual preparation for the elimination of royal power (which at first even the most courageous innovators could not imagine), it is noteworthy that constitutional metaphysics passionately desired at that time, on the contrary, an indissoluble union of the monarchical principle with power people, as well as a similar union of the Catholic government with spiritual emancipation. Therefore, the inconsistent speculations would not deserve any philosophical attention today if they were not to be seen as the first direct revelation of a general error, which, unfortunately, also contributes to the complete concealment of the true character of the modern reorganization, reducing such a fundamental revival to a vain all-embracing imitation of the transitional state structure, characteristic of England.
Such, in fact, was the political utopia of the main leaders of the Constituent Assembly, and they undoubtedly sought its immediate implementation; in the same way, it then carried within itself a radical contradiction with the distinctive tendencies of French society.
Here, then, is the natural place for the direct application of our historical theory to help us quickly appreciate this dangerous illusion. Although in itself it was too primitive to require any special analysis, the seriousness of its consequences is imperative.
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I want to inform readers of the basics of the study, which they can, however, easily continue spontaneously in line with the explanations typical of the two previous chapters.
The absence of any sound political philosophy makes it easier to understand what empirical measure naturally predetermined this error, which, of course, could not but become extremely inevitable, since it could completely deceive the mind of even the great Montesquieu" (Cours de philosophie positive , t. VI, p. 1902).
This passage raises several important questions: is it true that conditions in France at that time precluded the continuation of the monarchy? Is Comte right in believing that an institution associated with a certain system of thought cannot survive under the conditions of a different system of thought?
Of course, the positivist is right in believing that the French monarchy was traditionally associated with the Catholic intellectual and social system, with the feudal and theological system, but the liberal would answer that an institution consonant with a certain system of thinking can, by transforming, survive and perform its functions in a different historical system.
Is Comte right in reducing British-style institutions to the peculiarities of a transitional government? Is he right in regarding representative institutions as inextricably linked with the dominance of a commercial aristocracy?
Guided by this general theory, our graduate of the École Polytechnique, without chagrin, believed that a secular dictator would put an end to the vain imitation of English institutions and the pretended domination of the garrulous metaphysicians of Parliament. In “The System of Positive Politics” he expressed satisfaction with this and even went so far as to write in the introduction to the second volume a letter to the Russian Tsar, where he expressed the hope that this dictator (whom he called an empiricist) could be taught positive philosophy and thus to decisively promote a fundamental reorganization of European society.
The appeal to the Tsar caused some excitement among the positivists. And in the third volume, Comte's tone changed somewhat due to the temporary delusion to which the secular dictator succumbed (I want to say - in connection with the Crimean War, for which Comte seems to have blamed Russia). In fact, the era of great wars was historically over, and Comte congratulated the secular dictator of France for putting an honorable end to the temporary aberration of the secular dictator of Russia.
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This way of considering parliamentary institutions - if I venture to use Comte's language - is explained exclusively by the special character of the great teacher of positivism. This hostility towards parliamentary institutions, taken to be metaphysical or British, is still alive today. Let us note, however, that Comte did not want to completely eliminate representation, but it seemed sufficient to him that the Assembly should convene once every three years to approve the budget.
Historical and political judgments, in my opinion, follow from the basic general sociological position. After all, sociology, as Comte imagined it and as Durkheim also applied it, considered social rather than political phenomena to be the main ones - even subordinating the latter to the former, which could lead to a belittlement of the role of the political regime in favor of the main, social reality. Durkheim shared the indifference, not free from aggressiveness or contempt, towards parliamentary institutions characteristic of the creator of the term “sociology”. Fascinated by social issues, questions of morality and the transformation of professional organizations, he looked at what was happening in parliament as something of secondary importance, if not laughable.
2. Alexis de Tocqueville and the Revolution of 1848
The antithesis of Tocqueville - Comte is amazing. Tocqueville considered the great plan of the French Revolution to be precisely what Comte declared to be an error into which even the great Montesquieu fell. Tocqueville regrets the defeat of the Constituent Assembly, i.e. the defeat of bourgeois reformers who sought to achieve a combination of monarchy and representative institutions. He considers administrative decentralization important, if not decisive, which Comte views with the deepest contempt. In short, he strives for constitutional combinations that Comte casually dismissed as metaphysical and unworthy of serious consideration.
The social status of both authors was also completely different. Comte lived for a long time on the small salary of an examiner at the Ecole Polytechnique. Having lost this place, he was then forced to live on the allowance paid to him by the positivists. A solitary thinker who did not leave his home on the Rue Monsieur-le-Prince, he created the religion of humanity, being at the same time its prophet and great priest. This peculiar situation could not but give
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to give his ideas an extreme form that does not correspond to the complexity of events.
At the same time, Alexis de Tocqueville, who came from an old French aristocratic family, represented the English Channel department in the Chamber of Deputies of the July Monarchy. During the revolution 1848 he was in Paris. Unlike Comte, he left his apartment and walked along the street. The events deeply disturbed him. Later, during the elections to the Constituent Assembly, he returns to his department and collects a huge majority of votes there in the elections. In the Constituent Assembly he plays a significant role as a member of the commission for drawing up the constitution of the Second Republic.
IN May 1849 , at a time when the President of the Republic was the one who was still called only Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, Tocqueville, in connection with ministerial reorganization, entered the cabinet of Odilon Barrot as Minister of Foreign Affairs. He will remain in this post for five months, until the President of the Republic recalls this ministry, which still showed too parliamentary habits and was under the dominant influence of the former dynastic opposition, that is, the monarchical liberal party, which became republican due to temporary impossibility of restoring the monarchy.
Thus, Tocqueville 1848 - 1851 gg. - a monarchist who became a conservative republican due to the impossibility of restoring either the legitimist monarchy or the Orleans monarchy. However, at the same time he is hostile to what he called “illegitimate monarchy”; he noticed her barely appearing threat. The “illegitimate monarchy” is the empire of Louis Napoleon, which all observers, even those endowed with a minimum of foresight, feared from the very day when the French people in their vast majority voted not for Cavaignac, the republican general, defender of the bourgeois system, but for Louis Napoleon, who had almost nothing behind his soul except his name, the prestige of his uncle and a few funny pranks.
Tocqueville's responses to the events of the revolution 1848 g. are contained in his passionate book “Memoirs”. This is the only book that he wrote, surrendering to the flow of his thoughts, without correcting or finishing them off. Tocqueville carefully worked through his works, thought a lot about them and corrected them endlessly. But regarding the events of 1848, for his own pleasure, he poured out his memoirs on paper, where he was remarkably sincere, since he forbade their publication. In his formulations he did not show
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shows condescension towards many contemporaries, thus leaving an invaluable evidence of the true feelings that participants in great or insignificant history experienced for each other.
Tocqueville's reaction to February 24, the day of the revolution, reflects almost despair and depression. A member of Parliament, he was a liberal Conservative, resigned to the democratic atmosphere of the times, passionate about intellectual, personal and political freedoms. For him, these freedoms were embodied in representative institutions, which are always exposed to danger during revolutions. He was convinced that revolutions, by expanding, reduce the likelihood of maintaining freedoms.
“On July 30, 1830, at dawn, on the outer boulevard of Versailles, I met the carriages of King Charles X with traces of scraped coats of arms, moving slowly one after another, like a funeral procession. This sight brought tears to my eyes. This time (i.e. in 1848) my impression was different, but even stronger. This was the second revolution that took place before my eyes in the last seventeen years. Both brought me grief, but how much worse were the impressions caused by the last revolution. I felt to the end the remainder of my hereditary affection for Charles X. But this monarch fell for violating the rights dear to me, and I still hoped that freedom in my country would rather rise than die with his fall. Today this freedom seemed dead to me. The fleeing princes were nothing to me, but I felt that my own cause was ruined. I spent the best years of my youth in a social environment that seemed to be once again becoming prosperous and noble and free. In it I was imbued with the idea of ​​moderate, orderly freedom, restrained by beliefs, morals and laws. I was touched by the charm of this freedom. It has become the passion of my life. I felt that I would never be consoled by losing her, and that I had to renounce her” (?uvres completes d"Alexis de Tocqueville, t. XII, p. 86).
Next, Tocqueville retells a conversation with one of his friends and colleagues, Ampere. The latter, Tocqueville claims, was a typical writer. He rejoiced at the revolution, which, as it seemed to him, corresponded to his ideal, because supporters of reforms prevailed over reactionaries like Guizot. After the collapse of the monarchy, he saw prospects for the prosperity of the republic. Ampère and Tocqueville, according to the latter, quarreled very passionately, discussing the question: was the revolution a happy or unlucky event? “Having shouted enough, we ended up both appealing to the future - the judge
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enlightened and incorruptible, but, alas, always arriving too late” (ibid., p. 85).
A few years later, Tocqueville, as he writes about it, is more convinced than ever that the revolution 1848 was an unfortunate event. From his point of view, it could not have been different, since the end result of this revolution was the replacement of a semi-legal, liberal and moderate monarchy with what Comte called a “secular dictatorship”, and Tocqueville called an “illegitimate monarchy”, which we trivially call an “authoritarian empire” " Moreover, it is difficult to believe that from a political point of view, the regime of Louis Napoleon turned out to be better than the regime of Louis Philippe. However, we are talking about judgments colored by personal preferences, and besides, today school history textbooks reproduce the enthusiasm of Ampère rather than the gloomy skepticism of Tocqueville. The two characteristic attitudes of the French intelligentsia - revolutionary enthusiasm, whatever its consequences, and skepticism regarding the final result of upheavals - are alive today, and they will probably be alive when my listeners begin to teach others what to think about the history of France .
Tocqueville naturally tries to explain the causes of the revolution and does this in his usual style, which goes back to the tradition of Montesquieu. The February Revolution of 1848, like all great events of this kind, was generated by general causes, supplemented, so to speak, by accidents. It would be just as superficial to derive it from the former as to attribute it exclusively to the latter. There are general causes, but they are not enough to explain a single event, which could have turned out differently if not for this or that case. Here is the most typical fragment:
“In thirty years the Industrial Revolution made Paris the first factory city in France and brought into its borders a completely new working population, to which the fortification work added more farmers who were now left without work; the thirst for material pleasures stimulated by the government more and more excited the crowd and caused a feeling of envy tormenting it - this disease inherent in democracy; emerging economic and political theories introduced the idea that human misfortunes are the products of laws, not Providence, and that poverty can be eliminated by changing places of people; contempt arose for the former ruling class, and especially for the people who led it - contempt so widespread and deep that it paralyzed the resistance of even those who were most interested in maintaining the overthrown power; centralization reduced all revolutionary operations to the pursuit
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become the master of Paris and take over the control mechanism; finally, the impermanence of everything was observed; institutions, ideas, morals and people in a disturbed society, shaken by seven great revolutions in less than sixty years, not counting many minor minor shocks. These were the general reasons, without which the February Revolution of 1848 was impossible. The main accidents that caused it were the fervor of the dynastic opposition, which prepared a revolt demanding reform; suppression of this at first exorbitant in its claims, and then helpless rebellion; the sudden disappearance of former ministers, who suddenly broke the threads of power, which the new ministers, in their confusion, were unable to either seize in time or restore; the mistakes and mental disorders of these ministers, unable to confirm that they are strong enough to remove the hesitation of the generals; lack of uniform principles that are understandable to everyone and full of energy; but especially the senile insanity of King Louis Philippe, whose impotence no one could have foreseen and which seems almost incredible even after it was revealed by chance (ibid., pp. 84 - 85).
This is the style of analytical and historical description of the revolution, characteristic of a sociologist who does not believe either in the inexorable determinism of history or in a continuous series of accidents. Like Montesquieu, Tocqueville wants to make history understandable. But to make history understandable does not mean to show that nothing could have happened otherwise - it means to reveal the combination of general and secondary causes that make up the fabric of events.
By the way, Tocqueville discovers a curious phenomenon in France: the contempt with which people in power were surrounded. This phenomenon appears again and again at the end of every regime, and it explains the fact that little blood was shed in most French revolutions. In general, regimes collapse at a time when no one wants to fight for them anymore. Thus, 110 years after 1848, the political class that ruled France collapsed in an atmosphere of contempt so widespread that it paralyzed even those most interested in self-defense.
Tocqueville understood very well that at first the revolution of 1848 was socialist in nature. However, while entirely a liberal in politics, he was a conservative in social terms. He thought that social inequality in his time was the order of the day, or at least ineradicable. That is why he extremely harshly condemned the socialists from the Provisional Government, who, as he believed (like Marx), had exceeded all tolerable limits of stupidity. However, several
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Reminiscent of Marx, Tocqueville notes purely contemplatively that in the first phase, between February 18 4 8 and the convening of the Constituent Assembly in May, the socialists had significant influence in Paris and, therefore, throughout France. Their influence was sufficient to terrify the bourgeoisie and the majority of the peasantry, and at the same time insufficient to consolidate their position. At the moment of the decisive clash with the Constituent Assembly, they had no other means of gaining the upper hand except rebellion. The socialist leaders of the revolution of 1848 were unable to take advantage of the favorable circumstances between February and May. From the moment the Constituent Assembly was convened, they no longer knew whether they wanted to play into the hands of the revolution or the constitutional order. Then, at the decisive moment, they abandoned their army, the workers of Paris, who in the terrible days of June fought alone, without leaders.
Tocqueville is sharply hostile towards both the socialist leaders and the June rebels. However, intransigence does not blind him. In addition, he recognizes the extraordinary courage shown by the Parisian workers in the fight against the regular army, and adds that the erosion of trust in the socialist leaders may not be final.
According to Marx, the revolution of 1848 demonstrates that henceforth the most important problem of European societies is social. Revolutions of the 19th century will be social, not political. Tocqueville, overwhelmed by anxiety for individual freedom, considers these riots, uprisings or revolutions to be a disaster. But he is aware that these revolutions are distinguished by a certain socialist quality. And if for the time being the socialist revolution seems to him delayed, if he judges poorly of a regime resting on foundations other than the principle of property, then he nevertheless cautiously concludes:
“Will socialism remain buried under the contempt that justly covers the socialists of 1848? I ask this question without answering it. I have no doubt that the basic laws of modern society have not changed much over time; in many of their main parts they have already been determined, but will they ever be destroyed and replaced by others? This seems to me impracticable. I will not say anything more, for the more I examine the previous state of the world, the more detailed I see the world of today; when I consider the enormous diversity that I encounter here, not only of laws, but also of the foundations of laws, and the various forms of land ownership, both outdated and still existing today - no matter what they say about it, I really want to believe: the institutions that are called necessary
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we are often institutions to which we are simply accustomed, and in the sphere of social order the field of the possible is more extensive than people living in each individual society imagine” (ibid., p. 97).
In other words, Tocqueville does not exclude the possibility that the socialists, defeated in 1848, could, in a more or less distant future, be the ones who transform the social organization itself.
The rest of Tocqueville’s memoirs (after describing the June days) are devoted to the story of the writing of the constitution of the Second Republic, of his participation in the second cabinet of O. Barrot, of the struggle of the liberal monarchists, who became republicans through an effort of will, against the royalist majority of the Assembly and at the same time the president, suspected of to the restoration of the Empire4.
Thus, Tocqueville understood the socialist nature of the revolution of 1848 and condemned the activities of the socialists as reckless. He belonged to the party of the bourgeois order and during the June uprising was ready to fight the rebel workers. In the second phase of the crisis he became a moderate republican, a supporter of what was later called the conservative republic, and also became an anti-Bonapartist. He was defeated, but was not surprised by his defeat, because... from the February days of 1848, he believed that independent institutions were doomed for now, that the revolution would inevitably lead to an authoritarian regime, whatever it may be, and after the election of Louis Napoleon he easily foresaw the restoration of the Empire. However, since hope is not necessary to undertake a task, he fought against the outcome that seemed to him both the most likely and the least desirable. A sociologist of the Montesquieu school, he did not believe that everything that happens is exactly what was bound to happen by the will of Providence, if it were favorable, or in accordance with Reason, if it were omnipotent.
3. Marx and the revolution of 1848
Marx lived through the historical period between 1848 and 1851. differently than Comte or Tocqueville. He did not retire to the ivory tower on the Rue Monsieur-le-Prince; Moreover, he was not a member of the Constituent Assembly or the Legislative Assembly, or a minister in the cabinet of Odilon Barrault and Louis Napoleon. A revolutionary agitator and journalist, he actively participated in the events while in Germany at that moment. However, he had previously been to France and turned out to be very knowledgeable
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in politics, knew the French revolutionaries. Thus, with regard to France, he became an active witness. In addition, he believed in the international character of the revolution and felt directly affected by the French crisis.
Many of the judgments that we find in his two books, “Class Struggle in France with 1848 By 1850 G." And“The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte” is consonant with Tocqueville’s judgments reflected on the pages of his “Memoirs”.
Like Tocqueville, Marx was struck by the contrast between the uprisings of 1848, when the workers of Paris fought alone for several days without leaders, and the unrest 1849 when, a year later, the parliamentary leaders of the Mountain tried in vain to foment an insurrection and were not supported by their troops.
Both Tocqueville and Marx were equally aware that the events of 1848 - 1851 no longer represented simply political unrest, but foreshadowed a social revolution. Tocqueville states with horror that from now on the very foundations of society, the laws revered by people for centuries, are being called into question. Marx triumphantly exclaims that the necessary, in his opinion, social upheaval is taking place. The value scales of the liberal aristocracy and the revolutionaries are different and even opposite. Respect for political freedoms (for Tocqueville something sacred) in the eyes of Marx is the superstition of a man of the previous regime. Marx has not the slightest respect for parliament and formal freedoms. What one wants to save most, the other considers secondary, perhaps even an obstacle to what is most important, in his opinion, namely the socialist revolution.
Both of them see something like historical logic in the transition from the revolution of 17 8 9 to the revolution of 1848. From Tocqueville's point of view, after the destruction of the monarchy and the privileged classes, the revolution continues, raising the question of social order and property. Marx sees in the social revolution the stage of the emergence of the fourth estate after the victory of the third. Different expressions, opposing value judgments, but both agree on the main thing: since the traditional monarchy has been destroyed and the aristocracy of the past overthrown, it is in the order of things that the democratic movement, striving for social equality, opposed the existing privileges of the bourgeoisie. The fight against economic inequality, according to Tocqueville, at least in his time, was doomed to failure. Most often, he seems to consider inequality ineradicable, because it is connected with the eternal social order. For his part, Marx believes that by reorganizing society it is possible
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reduce or eliminate economic inequality. But both of them draw attention to the transition from a revolution directed against the aristocracy to a revolution directed against the bourgeoisie, from subversion against the monarchical state to subversion against the social order as a whole.
In a word, Marx and Tocqueville agree on defining the phases of development of the revolution. Events in France in 1848 - 1851. hypnotized their contemporaries, and today they still fascinate with the similarity of conflicts. In a short period of time, France suffered most of the typical situations characteristic of political conflicts in modern societies.
During the first phase, from February 24 to May 4, 1848, the uprising destroys the monarchy and the Provisional Government includes a few socialists who exert predominant influence for several months.
With the convening of the Constituent Assembly, the second phase begins. The majority in the Assembly, elected by the whole country, is conservative or even reactionary and monarchical in mind. A conflict arises between the Provisional Government, dominated by socialists, and the conservative Assembly. This conflict develops into the June riots of 1848, into an uprising of the Parisian proletariat against the Assembly, elected on the basis of universal suffrage, but due to its composition, perceived by the Parisian workers as an enemy.
The third phase begins with the election of Louis Napoleon in December 184 8 or, according to Marx, from May 1849, with the death of the Constituent Assembly. The President of the Republic believes in the Bonapartist right of succession; he is considered a man of destiny. President of the Second Republic, he first fights with the Constituent Assembly, which has a monarchical majority, then with the Legislative Assembly, which also has a monarchical majority, but also includes 15 O representatives of the Mountain.
With the election of Louis Napoleon, an acute, multilateral conflict begins. Monarchists, unable to reach agreement on the issue of the name of the monarch and the restoration of the monarchy, move, due to their hostile attitude towards Louis Napoleon, into the camp of defenders of the Republic in defiance of Bonaparte, who wanted the restoration of the Empire. Louis Napoleon uses methods that parliamentarians consider demagogic. Indeed, in the tactics of Louis Napoleon there are elements of the pseudo-socialism (or genuine socialism) of the 20th century fascists. Since the Legislative Assembly makes the mistake of abolishing universal suffrage, on December 2 Louis Napoleon abolishes the constitutional
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tion, dissolves the Legislative Assembly and at the same time restores universal suffrage.
Marx, however, also tries (and this is his originality) to explain political events with the help of a social basis. He strives to show in purely political conflicts the manifestation, or, so to speak, the emergence to the political level of deep divisions between social groups. Tocqueville clearly does the same. It shows clashes between social groups in France in the mid-19th century. The main characters of the drama - the peasants, the petty bourgeoisie of Paris, the Parisian workers, the bourgeoisie and the fragments of the aristocracy - are not very different from those whom Marx brought to the stage. But by emphasizing the explanation of political conflicts by social strife, Tocqueville defends the specificity, or at least the relative autonomy, of the political order. Marx, on the contrary, under any circumstances tries to discover a literal correspondence between political events and events in the sphere of the basis. To what extent did he succeed?
Two pamphlets by Marx - "The Class Struggle in France from 1848 to 1850" and “The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte” are brilliant works. It seems to me that in many respects they are deeper and more significant than his great scientific works. Marx, revealing the insight of a historian, forgets about his theories and analyzes events like a brilliant observer. Thus, to demonstrate how politics is expressed through the basis, Marx writes:
“December 10, 1848 [i.e. the day of the election of Louis Napoleon. - P.A.] was the day of the peasant uprising. Only from this day did February begin for French peasants. The symbol that expressed their entry into the revolutionary movement, clumsily crafty, roguishly naive, absurdly sublime, calculated superstition, pathetic farce, brilliantly absurd anachronism, a mischievous joke of world history, an incomprehensible hieroglyph for the civilized mind - this symbol clearly bore the stamp of that a class which is the representative of barbarism within civilization. The Republic declared to him its existence as the figure of the tax collector; he declared to it its existence as the figure of the emperor. Napoleon was the only person in whom the interests and imagination of the newly formed in 1789 found an exhaustive expression. peasant class. By writing his name on the pediment of the republic, the peasantry thereby declared war on foreign states and the struggle for their class interests within the country. Napoleon was not a person for the peasants, but a program. With banners and music they walked to the ballot boxes, exclaiming: “Plus d" impots, a bas les riches, a bas la republigue, vive
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Getregeshg!" - "Down with taxes, down with the rich, down with the republic, long live the emperor!" Behind the emperor's back was a peasant war. The republic they had voted out was a republic of the rich" (Works, vol. 7, pp. 42 - 43).
Even a non-Marxist will not hesitate to admit that the peasants voted for Louis Napoleon. Representing the majority of voters at the time, they chose to elect the real or fictitious nephew of Emperor Napoleon rather than the Republican General Cavaignac. In the context of a psychopolitical interpretation, one could say that Louis Napoleon, because of his name, was a charismatic leader. The peasant - the least civilized, Marx notes with his disdain for the peasants - preferred the Napoleonic symbol to the real republican personality, and in this sense Louis Napoleon was the man of the peasants against the republic of the rich. What seems problematic is the extent to which Louis Napoleon, by the very fact of his election by the peasants, became a representative of the interests of the peasant class. The peasants did not need to elect Louis Napoleon in order for him to express their class interest. Moreover, there was no need for the measures taken by Louis Napoleon to correspond to the class interests of the peasants. The emperor did what his talent or his stupidity told him to do. The peasants' vote for Louis Napoleon is an irrefutable event. The transformation of an event into a theory is the proposition: “The class interest of the peasants found its expression in Louis Napoleon.”
This event allows us to understand the passage from The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte, which refers to peasants. Marx describes in it the position of the peasant class:
“Since millions of families live in economic conditions that distinguish and hostilely contrast their way of life, interests and education with the way of life, interests and education of other classes, they form a class. Since "there is only a local connection between the parcel peasants, since the identity of their interests does not create between them any community, no national connection, no political organization, they do not form a class. They are therefore not able to defend their class interests on their own behalf, be it through parliament or through a convention. They cannot represent themselves, they must be represented by others. Their representative must at the same time be their master, an authority above them, an unlimited government power, protecting them from other classes and sending down rain and rain for them from above. sunlight The political influence of the parcel peasantry is ultimately expressed
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therefore, the fact is that the executive power subjugates society to itself” (Works, vol. 8, p. 208).
There is a very insightful description of the ambiguous position (class and non-class) of the mass of peasants. The peasants' mode of existence is more or less similar, and this distinguishes them as a social class; but they lack the ability to recognize themselves as a whole. Unable to form an idea of ​​themselves, they therefore form a passive class, which can only be represented by people outside it, which explains the very fact that the peasants elected Louis Napoleon, a man not from their midst.
However, the main question remains: is what is happening on the political stage adequately explained by what is happening in the base?
According to Marx, for example, the legitimate monarchy represented the landowners, and the Orleans monarchy represented the financial and commercial bourgeoisie. However, these two dynasties could never come to understand each other. During the crisis of 1848 - 1851. discord between the two dynasties served as an insurmountable obstacle to the restoration of the monarchy. Were the two royal families unable to agree on the name of the claimant because one was the banner of landed property and the other of industrial and commercial property? Or were they unable to come to an agreement because, essentially, you can only have one contender?
Whether the question is inspired by the critic's preconceptions or by cunning, it raises the important problem of interpreting politics by means of a basis. Suppose Marx is right, a legitimate monarchy is essentially a regime of large landed property and hereditary nobility, and the Orleans monarchy represents the interests of the financial bourgeoisie. Was it a conflict of economic interests that prevented unity, or a simple, dare I say it, arithmetic phenomenon that there could only be one king?
Marx, naturally, is seduced by the explanation of the impossibility of agreement by the incompatibility of economic interests5. The weakness of this interpretation is that in other countries and under other circumstances, landed property was able to find a compromise with the industrial and commercial bourgeoisie.
The following passage from The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte is particularly significant:
“The diplomats of the Party of Order hoped to end the struggle by uniting both dynasties, through the so-called merger of the royalist parties and their royal houses. The actual merger of the Restoration and the July Monarchy was
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a parliamentary republic in which Orléanist and legitimist colors were erased and various types of bourgeois were dissolved in the bourgeois in general, in the bourgeois as a representative of the race. Now the Orléanist must turn into a legitimist, and the legitimist into an Orléanist” (Oc. vol. 8, p. 186).
Marx is right. Nothing of the kind can be demanded, unless the claimant of one of the families agrees to disappear. Here the interpretation is purely political, precise and convincing. Both monarchical parties could agree only on a parliamentary republic, the only means of reconciling two claimants to a throne that tolerates only one invader. When there are two contenders, it is necessary that no one comes to power: otherwise one will end up in the Tuileries Palace, and the other in exile. A parliamentary republic in this sense was a way of reconciling two dynasties. And Marx continues:
“The monarchy, which personified their antagonism, was to become the embodiment of their unity; the expression of their mutually exclusive factional interests was to become the expression of their common class interests; the monarchy had to accomplish what could and was accomplished only by the abolition of both monarchies, only by a republic. Such was the philosopher's stone, over the discovery of which the alchemists of the Party of Order racked their brains. As if a legitimate monarchy could ever become a monarchy of the industrial bourgeois, or a bourgeois monarchy a monarchy of a hereditary landed aristocracy. As if landed property and industry could coexist peacefully under one crown, while the crown could crown only one head - the head of an older or younger brother. As if industry can generally make peace with landed property until landed property decides to become industrial itself. If Henry V had died tomorrow, the Count of Paris would still not have become the king of the Legitimists, unless he had ceased to be the king of the Orléanists” (Oc., vol. 8, p. 186).
Marx, therefore, resorts to a sophisticated, subtle, double explanation: a political one, according to which two claimants are fighting for the French throne and the only means of reconciling their supporters would be a parliamentary republic, and a significantly different socio-economic explanation, according to which landowners could not to reconcile with the industrial bourgeoisie, unless land ownership itself became industrial. We still find a theory based on this last explanation today in Marxist works or in works inspired by Marxism, dedicated to
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puppies of the Fifth Republic. The latter cannot be a Gaullist republic: it must either be a republic of modernized capitalism or have a completely different basis6. This explanation, of course, is deeper, but its accuracy is not absolute. The impossibility of reconciling the interests of landed property with the interests of the industrial bourgeoisie exists only in a sociological phantasmagoria* Over time, when one of the two princes does not have an heir, the reconciliation of the two contenders will take place automatically and a compromise of once opposing interests will be miraculously achieved. The impossibility of reconciliation between the two contenders was essentially political.
Of course, the explanation of political events through a social basis is legitimate and acceptable, but its literalism largely smacks of sociological mythology. In fact, it turns out to be a projection onto the basis of everything that was noticed in the political arena. Noting that both applicants could not understand each other, they declare that landed property cannot be reconciled with industrial property. However, a little further this position is refuted in the course of explaining that reconciliation can be achieved within the framework of a parliamentary republic. For if agreement is impossible on a social level, then it will be just as impossible in a parliamentary republic as under a monarchy.
In my opinion, this is a typical case. He demonstrates simultaneously what is acceptable and even necessary in social explanations of political conflicts, and what is wrong. Professional or amateur sociologists experience something of a remorse when they limit themselves to political explanations of changes in the system and political crises. Personally, I am inclined to believe that the particulars of political events rarely rest on anything other than the relations between people, parties, their disputes and ideas.
Louis Napoleon is the representative of the peasants in the sense that he was elected by the peasant voters. General de Gaulle is also a representative of the peasants, for his activities were approved in 1958 by 85 percent of the French. A century ago, the psychopolitical mechanism was essentially no different from today. But it has nothing in common with today's mechanism in that part that concerns differences between social classes and the class interests of a given group. When the French are tired of hopeless conflicts and a man of destiny arises, all classes of France rally around the one who promises to save them.
Marx, in the last part of his work “The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte,” analyzes in detail the government of Louis Na-
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activity of members of society and became the subject of government activity - starting from a bridge, a school building and the communal property of some rural community and ending with railways, national property and state universities in France. Finally, the parliamentary republic found itself, in its struggle against the revolution, forced to strengthen, along with measures of repression, the means and centralization of government power. All the revolutions have improved this machine instead of breaking it. The parties, which, replacing each other, fought for dominance, considered the capture of this huge state building as the main spoil of their victory” (Works, vol. 8, pp. 205-206).
. In other words, Marx describes the colossal development of a managerial, centralized state. This state was also analyzed by Tocqueville, who showed its pre-revolutionary origins and noted that they gradually developed and gained strength as democracy developed.
Whoever controls this state inevitably has a significant influence on society. Tocqueville also believes that all parties contribute to strengthening the enormous administrative machine. Moreover, he is convinced that the socialist state will further contribute to the expansion of state functions and administrative centralization. Marx argues that the state has acquired a kind of autonomy over society. Enough is “some adventurer who has come from a foreign land, raised to the shield by a drunken soldier, whom he bought with vodka and sausage and which he still has to please with sausage again and again” (Oc., vol. 8, p. 207).
The true revolution, according to Marx, will consist not in mastering this machine, but in its destruction. To which Tocqueville would answer: if ownership of the means of production should become collective, and economic management centralized, then by what miracle can we hope for the destruction of the state machine?
In reality, Marx has two views on the role of the state in revolution. In "The Civil War in France" (dedicated to the Paris Commune) he hints that the Commune, i.e. The fragmentation of the centralized state and complete decentralization constitute the true content of the dictatorship of the proletariat. However, elsewhere we find the exact opposite idea: in order to make a revolution, it is necessary to maximize political power and state centralization.
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Tocqueville and Marx, therefore, both paid attention to the centralized state machine. Based on his observations, Tocqueville came to the conclusion that in order to limit the omnipotence of the state and its endless expansion, the number of intermediate bodies and representative institutions should be increased. Marx recognized the partial autonomy of the state in relation to society (this formula contradicts his general theory of the state as a natural expression of the ruling class) and at the same time expected the destruction of the administrative machine from the socialist revolution.
As a theorist, Marx strives to reduce politics and its conflicts to class relations and class struggle. But in several essential matters his observational insight prevails over his dogmatism, and he, so to speak, spontaneously recognizes the strictly political causes of conflicts and the autonomy of the state in relation to different groups. To the extent that this autonomy exists, the formation of societies is not reducible to class struggle.
The most striking example of the specificity and independence of the political system in relation to social battles is, however, the Russian revolution of 1917. A group of people, having seized power, like Louis Napoleon, although in a more violent way, was able to transform the entire organization of Russian society and build socialism, starting not with the rule of the proletariat, but with the omnipotence of the state machine.
What we do not find in Marxist theory is either in the historical research of Marx, or in events whose participants refer to Marx himself.
The four authors whose works we examined in the first part lay the foundation for three schools.
The first is what could be called the French school of political sociology, its founders being Montesquieu and Tocqueville. In our time, Eli Adevi7 belongs to it. This is a school of somewhat dogmatic sociologists, primarily interested in politics; This is the school of those who, without underestimating the social basis, emphasize the autonomy of the political system and think liberally. Probably I myself am a late scion of this school.
The second school is the school of Auguste Comte. It was developed by Durkheim at the beginning of this century, and perhaps today’s French sociologists are also aligned with it. It belittles the importance of politics and economics and highlights the social as such, placing emphasis on the unity of all manifestations of the social and
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the basic concept of consensus. Represented by numerous studies and developed a conceptual apparatus, the school strives to reconstruct the integrity of society.
The third school is Marxist. She achieved her greatest success, if not in the classroom, then at least on the stage of world history. As its teachings have been interpreted by hundreds of millions of people, it combines an explanation of the social whole, starting from a socio-economic basis, with a scheme of formation that guarantees victory for its adherents. It is the most difficult to discuss due to its historical successes. Because you never know whether to discuss a version of the catechism that is obligatory for everyone? th doctrine of the state, or a very sophisticated version, the only one acceptable to great minds, especially since both versions are constantly in a state of interaction, the modalities of which vary depending on the unforeseen vicissitudes of universal history.
These three sociological schools, despite differences in the choice of values ​​and in the vision of history, represent varieties of interpretations of modern society. Comte is an almost unconditional admirer of modern society, which he calls industrial and which, he emphasizes, will be peace-loving and positivist. Modern society, from the point of view of the political school, is a democratic society, which should be considered without frenzied enthusiasm or indignation. It probably has peculiar characteristics, but it is not the fulfillment of a person’s destiny. As for the third school, it combines Comtean enthusiasm for industrial society with indignation against capitalism. Highly optimistic about the distant future, it is distinguished by gloomy pessimism about the immediate future and foreshadows a long period of catastrophes, class battles and wars.
In other words, Kont's school is optimistic, with a touch of serenity; the political school is reserved with a tinge of skepticism, and the Marxist school is utopian and inclined to wish for catastrophes to occur or, in any case, to consider them inevitable.
Each of these schools restructures the social system in its own way. Each offers a certain interpretation of the diversity of societies known in history and its own understanding of the present. Each is guided by both moral convictions and scientific claims. I have tried to take both these beliefs and these statements into account. But I do not forget that even one who wants to distinguish between both elements does so in accordance with his own convictions.
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Chronology of events of the 1848 Revolution and the Second Republic

1. - 1848 gg. Campaigning in Paris and in the provinces for the electoral
   reform: banquet campaign.
2. g., February 22. Despite the ministerial ban, a banquet in Paris
   and reformist demonstration.

1. February. The Paris National Guard participates in the demonstration
   to cries of “Long live reform!” Guizo leaves V resignation. Veche
   rum - a clash between troops and people, the corpses of demonstrators will be
   transported around Paris at night.
2. February. In the morning there is a revolution in Paris. Republican insurgents

capture the Town Hall and threaten the Tuileries. Louis Philippe abdicates the throne in favor of his grandson, the Count of Paris, and flees to England. Insurgents seize Parliament in order to prevent the regency of the Duchess of Orleans. By evening, a Provisional Government was formed. It includes Dupont de L'Eure, Lamartine, Cremieux, Arago, Ledru-Rollin, Garnier-Pagès. Armand Marrast, Louis Blanc, Flocon and Albert became the secretaries of the government.

1. February. Proclamation of the Republic.
2. February. Abolition of the death penalty for political crimes. Co-

building of “national workshops”.
February 29. Abolition of titles of nobility.
2nd of March. Establishment by decree of a 10-hour working day in Paris, an 11-hour day in the provinces.
5th of March. Call for elections to the Constituent Assembly.
? Martha. Garnier-Pagès becomes Minister of Finance. It increases an additional tax of 45 centimes on every franc of direct taxes.
16 Martha. Manifestations of bourgeois elements of the National Guard
in protest against the dissolution of the elite companies.
17 Martha. Counter-demonstration of the people in support of the Provisional Government
government Socialists and left-wing republicans demand a postponement of the day
elections.
16 April. A new popular demonstration for postponing election day. The provisional government calls on the National Guard to control the demonstration.
April 23. Election of 900 representatives to the Constituent Assembly. The Progressive Republicans have only 80 seats, the Legitimists - 100, the Orléanists, united and ununited, - 200. The majority in the Assembly - approximately 500 seats - belongs to the moderate Republicans.
10 May. The meeting appoints an “Executive Commission” - a government of five members: Arago, Garnier-Pages, Lamartine, Ledru-Rollen, Marie.
15 May. Manifestation in defense of Poland, led by Barbes, Blanqui, Raspail. Demonstrators seize the Chamber of Deputies and the Town Hall. The crowd even announces the creation of a new government. But Bar-bes and Raspail are arrested by the National Guard, which disperses the demonstrators.
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v4 - June 5. Louis Napoleon Bonaparte was elected deputy in three departments of the Seine.
21st of June. Dissolution of the "national workshops".
June 23 - 26. Insurrection. All of Paris, including the city center, is in the hands
the rebel workers, who took refuge behind the barricades thanks to the inaction of War Minister Cavaignac.
June 24. The Constituent Assembly votes to grant all rights
Notes of power to Cavaignac, who suppresses the uprising.
July - November. Formation of a large “party of order”. Thiers promotes Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, who is also very popular among the working class. The National Assembly drafts the constitution.
November 12. Promulgation of the Constitution, which provides for the post of chief executive, elected in general elections.
December 10. Election of the President of the Republic. Louis Napoleon gets 5.5 million votes, Cavaignac - 1,400 thousand, Ledru-Rollin - 375 thousand, Lamartine - 8 thousand votes.
20th of December. Louis Napoleon swears allegiance to the Constitution.
1849 March - April. Trial and conviction of Barbes, Blanca,
Raspail - leaders of the revolutionary uprisings in May 1848.
April - July. Expedition to Rome. The French expeditionary force captures the city and restores the rights of Pope Pius IX.
May. Elections to the Legislative Assembly, which now includes 75 moderate republicans, 180 Montagnards and 450 monarchists (legitimists and Orléanists) of the “party of order”.
June. Demonstrations in Paris and Lyon against the expedition to Rome.
1850, March 15. Fallou Law on the reorganization of public education.
May 31. Electoral law requiring three months' residence in the canton where voting takes place. An estimated three million migrant workers lack the right to vote.
May - October. Socialist agitation in Paris and departments.
Aug. Sept. Negotiations between Legitimists and Orléanists on the restoration of the monarchy.
September October. Military review at the Satori camp in honor of the Prince President. The cavalry parades to the shouts of “Long live the Emperor!” The struggle between the majority in the Legislative Assembly and the Prince-President.
1851, July 17. General Magnan, devoted to the Prince President,
appointed military governor of Paris instead of Chargarnier, parties
nickname of the monarchist majority in the Legislative Assembly.
December 2nd. Coup d'etat: declaration of a state of siege, dissolution of the Legislative Assembly, restoration of universal suffrage.
20th of December. Prince Napoleon, with 7,350 thousand votes and 646 thousand against, was elected for 10 years and received full powers to develop a new constitution.
1852, January 14. Promulgation of the new constitution.
20 November. The new plebiscite approves with 7,840 thousand votes and 250 thousand against the restoration of imperial dignity in the person of Louis Napoleon, who took the title of Napoleon III.
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Notes
However, Comte did not belong to the Bonapartistsskoy tradition. Since his studies at the Montpellier Lyceum, he has not been verywas sympathetic to Napoleon's policies and the legend about him. Ifnot to count the period of the Hundred Days, when Comte, then a student at the Polytechnicnic school, was influenced by Jacobin enthusiasm,swept Paris, Bonaparte seemed to him like a type of greata man who, not understanding the course of history, was only a reactionaryand left nothing behind. December 7, 1848, on the eve of the preziDental elections, he wrote to his sister: “As far as you know me eat, I have not changed in the feelings that I experienced in 1814 in relation to the retrograde hero, and I will consider it shameful for my country for the political restoration of his breed." Later he will betalk about the “fantastic vote of the French peasants, whichsome could also grant their fetish longevity of two centuries and fromrelief from gout." Nevertheless, on December 2, 1851, he applaudedcoup d'etat, preferring dictatorship to parliamentaryrepublic and anarchy, and this attitude of his even leads to the departureLittre And liberal supporters of a positivist society. In prothan, this will not prevent Konta from being called a “mommy masquerade”combination of popular sovereignty with the principle of inheritance, whichswarm was allowed by the restoration of the Empire in 1852, and he would then be beforesay the collapse of the regime in 1853. Several times - in 1851, thenin 1855 - Comte, publishing an appeal to conservatives, expressed hopeduh that NapoleonIII will be able to convert to the positivist faith. However, just as often he turns his hopes to the proletarians, whose philosophical virginity he admires and which he contrasts with the metaphysics of educated people. In February 1848, his heart was with the revolution. In June, locked in his apartment on the Rue Monsieur-le-Prince, located not far from the barricades surrounding the Pantheon, where fierce battles were taking place, Comte was on the side of the proletarians, against the government of metaphysicians and writers. When he talks about the rebels, he says “we,” but he regrets that they are still seduced by the utopias of the “reds,” these “monkeys of the great revolution.” Comte's political position during the Second Republic may therefore appear to be vacillating and contradictory. However, it is a logical consequence of the point of view that places the success of positivism above all, cannot recognize it in any party and sees, in any case, in the revolution only an anarchic, passing crisis. But one thing prevails over all feelings: contempt for parliamentarism.
Excerpt from the preface to the second volume of the “Positive System” politics,” published in 1852, on the eve of the restoration of the Empire, is a concentrated statement of Comte’s views on the events of the previous four years: “Our last crisis, it seems to me, contributed to the irrevocable transition of the French Republic from the parliamentary phase, which could befits only a negative revolution, a dictatorial faknowledge, the only one suitable for a positive revolution. Consequence all this will be a gradual healing of the Western disease, following the example of the final reconciliation between order and progress.
Even if the newborn's dictate is too viciousry forced to replace its main body, this unpleasant necessity will nevertheless not restore the dominance of any assembly - except for a short time, which is necessary for the advent of a new dictator.
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According to the historical concept I created, the entire past of France always contributed to the central power gaining the upper hand. This normal disposition would never have ceased to exist if power had not ultimately acquired a reactionary character, starting from the second half of the reign of Louis XIV. The consequence of this was, a century later, the complete abolition of royal power in France, hence the short-term dominance of the only assembly, which in our country was to become truly popular [i.e. Convention].
His authority was only the consequence of dignified submission to the energetic Committee which arose within his bosom for the purpose of directing the heroic defense of the Republic. The necessity of replacing royal power with a real dictatorship soon arose as soon as sterile anarchy began to develop within the framework of our first experience of constitutional order.
Unfortunately, the necessary dictatorship did not hesitate at all to choose a deeply reactionary direction, combining the enslavement of France with the oppression of Europe.
Only in contrast to this deplorable policy did French public opinion then allow the only serious experiment that could be tried in our country - a trial of a regime peculiar to England.
It suited us so little that, despite the benefits of the peace concluded in the West, its official imposition during the life of one generation became more destructive for us than imperial tyranny, habitually perverting minds with constitutional sophisms, corrupting hearts with corrupt or anarchic morals and corrupting characters. increasingly complicated parliamentary tactics.
In view of the fatal absence of any true social doctrine of ET.OT, the disastrous regime continued to exist in other forms after the republican explosion of 1848. This new situation, which spontaneously guaranteed progress and carried with it a serious concern for order, doubly required the normal authority of the central power.
On the contrary, at that time they thought that the elimination of vain royal power should contribute to the complete victory of the opposing power. All those who actively participated in the establishment of the constitutional regime - in government, in opposition or in conspiracies - should have been irrevocably removed from the political scene four years ago as unfit or unworthy to govern our Republic.
But blind, widespread enthusiasm put them under the protection of the Constitution, which directly secured parliamentary omnipotence. The intellectual and moral devastation of this regime, which had hitherto affected the upper and middle classes, even reached the proletarians thanks to universal suffrage. "
Instead of the preponderance that the central power was supposed to provide, it, thus losing its inviolability and continuity, nevertheless retained the constitutional ineffectiveness that had previously been hidden.
Reduced to such a limit, this necessary power has only recently successfully and vigorously resisted an intolerable situation, as destructive to us as it is shameful to it.
The people instinctively moved away from the anarchist regime without defending it. In France it is felt more and more that the constitutional regime corresponds only to the so-called monarchical situation, while our republican situation allows for wild
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tattoo and demands it" (Auguste Comte. Systeme de politigue positive, t. II, Preface, lettre a M. Vieillard du 28 Fevrier 1852, p. XXVI - XXVII).
For all this see: H.Gouhier. La Vie d "Auguste Comte. 2nd ed. Paris, Vrin, 1965; H.Gouhiei. La Jeunesse d'Auguste Comte et la formation du positivisme. Paris, Vrin, 1933, t. I.
Let us note in passing: what Comte calls in this passage a general error continues to be observed in the middle of the 20th century, since the transitional stage of government characteristic of England, i.e. representative institutions are gradually becoming widespread throughout the world, although, admittedly, with varying degrees of success. The delusion becomes more and more common, more and more meaningless.
3 hours
I receive quite regularly a small publication called
The "New Regime" and drawing inspiration from a typically positivist way of thinking. It is opposed to the representative fiction of parties and parliament in a real country. The editors of this magazine are also very smart. They are looking for a different way of representation than the one we are familiar with from parties and parliament.
Of the bravura fragments, one cannot help but quote the most effective characterization given by Lamartine: “I never met a man whose mind was more devoid of concern for the public good.” And of course, one cannot fail to mention Tocqueville’s portrait of Louis Napoleon.
In this regard, an excerpt from “The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte” is indicative: “The Legitimists and the Orléanists constituted, as has been said, two large factions of the party of order. What tied these factions to their pretenders and mutually separated them? Is it really only lilies and a tricolor banner, the House of Bourbon and the House of Orleans, various shades of royalism, and is the royalist religion at all? Ruled under the Bourbons large landed property with their priests and lackeys, under the Orleans - the financial aristocracy, large industry, large trade, i.e. capital with his retinue of lawyers, professors and talkers. The legitimate monarchy was only a political expression of the hereditary power of land owners, just as the July Monarchy was only a political expression of the usurper power of bourgeois upstarts. Thus, these factions were not separated by so-called principles, but by the material conditions of their existence, by two different types of property; they were separated by the old antithesis between city and country, the rivalry between capital and landed property. That at the same time they were connected with one or another dynasty by old memories, personal enmities, fears and hopes, prejudices and illusions, likes and dislikes, beliefs, creeds and principles - who would deny this? Above the various forms of property, above the social conditions of existence, rises a whole superstructure of different and unique feelings, illusions, ways of thinking and worldviews. The entire class creates and shapes all this on the basis of its material conditions and corresponding social relations. An individual, to whom these feelings and views are transmitted by tradition and as a result of upbringing, can imagine that they form the real motives and the starting point of his activity. If the Orléanists, the Legitimists, each faction tried to convince itself and others that they were divided by attachment to two different dynasties, then facts subsequently proved that, on the contrary, the opposition of their interests made a merger impossible
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v two dynasties. And just as in everyday life a distinction is made between what a person thinks and says about himself, and what he is and what he actually does, so much more in historical battles should a distinction be made between the phrases and illusions of parties and their real nature, their real interests, between their self-image and their real essence. The Orleanists and Legitimists found themselves in the republic next to each other with the same claims. If each side, contrary to the other, sought restoration his own dynasty, this only meant that each of two major factions into which it is divided bourgeoisie- land ownership and financial capital - sought the restoration of its own supremacy and the subordinate position of the other. We are talking about two factions of the bourgeoisie, because “large landed property, despite its flirtation with feudalism and its patrimonial arrogance, has become thoroughly bourgeoisized under the influence of the development of modern society.” [TO. Marx and F. Engels. Soch., vol. 8, p. 144 - 146).
Particularly noteworthy are the articles by Serge Malle, collected in a book entitled “Gaullism and the Left” (see: S. Mallet. Le Gaullisme et la Gauche. Paris, Seuil, 1965). According to this sociologist, the new regime is not a historical accident, “but an ordering of the political structure in accordance with the requirements of neo-capitalism.” Gaullism is the political expression of modern capitalism. We find a similar, but not Marxist, analysis in Roger Priure, for whom “de Gaulle came to power in 1958 not only as a result of the upheaval in Algeria; he believed that he had established a regime conceived in accordance with his views on history, and, based on this, he adapted political life to the state of society " (Roger Prioret."Les institutions politiques de la France en 1970". - In: "Bulletin S.E.D.E.I.S.", n. 786, supplement “Futuribles”, 1st May 1961).
From the works of Eli Alevi we refer to the following: Elie Halevy. La Formation du radicalisme philosophique. Paris, Alcan, 1901 - 1904 (3 vols.: t. I, La Jeunesse de Benthame; t. II, L "Evolution de la doctrine utilitaire de 1789 a 1815; t. III, Le Radicalisme philosophique); Histoire de peuple anglais an XIX siècle. Paris, Hachette, 6 vol. (the first four volumes are devoted to the period from 1815 to 1848, the last two to the period from 1895 to 1914); . Paris, Gallimard, 1938; Histoire du socialisme europeen (presented from course notes). Paris, Gallimard, 1948.
Bibliography
P. Bastid.1848. L "Avenement du suffrage universel. Paris, P.U.F., 1948.
P. Bastid. Doctrines et institutions politiques de la Seconde Republique. 2 vol. Paris, Hachette, 1945.
A. Cornu. Karl Marx et la Revolution de 1848. Paris, P.U.F., 1948. G. Duveau. 1848. Coll. "Ideas". Paris, Gallimard, 1965.
M. Girard. Etude comparee des mouvements revolutionnaires en France en 1830, 1848, 1870 - 1871. Paris, Center de documentation universitaire, 1960.
F. Ponteil.1848. 2nd ed. Paris, A. Colin, 1955.