Revolutionary spontaneity, also known as spontaneism, is a
revolutionary socialist tendency that believes the
social revolution
Social revolutions are sudden changes in the structure and nature of society. These revolutions are usually recognized as having transformed society, economy, culture, philosophy, and technology along with but more than just the political syst ...
can and should occur spontaneously
from below by the
working class itself,
without the aid or guidance of a
vanguard party and that it cannot and should not be brought about by the actions of
individuals such as
professional revolutionaries or
political parties
A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular country's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific ideological or pol ...
who might attempt to foment such a revolution.
In his work ''
What Is to Be Done?
''What Is to Be Done? Burning Questions of Our Movement'' is a political pamphlet written by Russian revolutionary Vladimir Lenin (credited as N. Lenin) in 1901 and published in 1902. Lenin said that the article represented "a skeleton plan t ...
'' (1902),
Vladimir Lenin argued fiercely against revolutionary spontaneity as a dangerous
revisionist concept that strips away the disciplined nature of
Marxist political thought and leaves it
arbitrary and ineffective.
Rosa Luxemburg
Rosa Luxemburg (; ; pl, Róża Luksemburg or ; 5 March 1871 – 15 January 1919) was a Polish and naturalised-German revolutionary socialist, Marxist philosopher and anti-war activist. Successively, she was a member of the Proletariat party, ...
, who defended spontaneity on ''
Organizational Questions of the Russian Social Democracy'', and the
Spartacist League
The Spartacus League (German: ''Spartakusbund'') was a Marxist revolutionary movement organized in Germany during World War I. It was founded in August 1914 as the "International Group" by Rosa Luxemburg, Karl Liebknecht, Clara Zetkin, and other ...
which had attempted to overturn capitalism during the 1919
German Revolution
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany (of or related to)
**Germania (historical use)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
**Ger ...
would become main targets of Lenin's attacks after
World War I.
Mao-Spontex
The term Mao-Spontex refers to a political movement in the Marxist and
libertarian
Libertarianism (from french: libertaire, "libertarian"; from la, libertas, "freedom") is a political philosophy that upholds liberty as a core value. Libertarians seek to maximize autonomy and political freedom, and minimize the state's e ...
movements in Western Europe from 1960 to 1970. Mao-Spontex came to represent an ideology promoting the ideas of
Maoism, along with some ideas from
Marxism and
Leninism
Leninism is a political ideology developed by Russian Marxist revolutionary Vladimir Lenin that proposes the establishment of the Dictatorship of the proletariat#Vladimir Lenin, dictatorship of the proletariat led by a revolutionary Vanguardis ...
, but rejecting the total idea of
Marxism–Leninism. Lenin's work ''What Is to Be Done?'' especially is criticized as dated and Lenin's critique of spontaneity is rejected. Lenin's idea of democratic centralism is supported as a way to organize a party, but a party must also have constant conflict inside of it to remain revolutionary. The revolutionary party discussed must also always be from a mass worker's movement.
See also
*
Anarchism
Anarchism is a political philosophy and movement that is skeptical of all justifications for authority and seeks to abolish the institutions it claims maintain unnecessary coercion and hierarchy, typically including, though not necessa ...
*
Crowd psychology
Crowd psychology, also known as mob psychology, is a branch of social psychology. Social psychologists have developed several theories for explaining the ways in which the psychology of a crowd differs from and interacts with that of the individ ...
*
Impossibilism
Impossibilism is a Marxist theory that stresses the limited value of political, economic, and social reforms under capitalism. As a doctrine, impossibilism views the pursuit of such reforms as counterproductive to the goal of achieving socialism a ...
*
Invisible dictatorship
*
Left communism in China
*
Luxemburgism
Rosa Luxemburg (; ; pl, Róża Luksemburg or ; 5 March 1871 – 15 January 1919) was a Polish and naturalised-German revolutionary socialist, Marxist philosopher and anti-war activist. Successively, she was a member of the Proletariat party, ...
*
Spontaneous order
Spontaneous order, also named self-organization in the hard sciences, is the spontaneous emergence of order out of seeming chaos. The term "self-organization" is more often used for physical changes and biological processes, while "spontaneous o ...
*
Immediatism
*
Spontis The Spontis or ''Sponti movement'' was left-wing movement in West Germany in 1970s-1980s. the name is an abbreviation for the word "spontaneous", in reference to their preference of " revolutionary spontaneity of the masses" over theoretically- and ...
References
{{revolutionary socialism
Anarchist theory
Communism
Revolution terminology