April Theses

The April Theses (Russian: апрельские тезисы, transliteration: aprel'skie tezisy) were a series of ten directives issued by the Bolshevik leader Vladimir Lenin upon his return to Petrograd from his exile in Switzerland via Germany and Finland. The Theses were mostly aimed at fellow Bolsheviks in Russia and returning to Russia from exile. He called for soviets (workers' councils) to take power (as seen in the slogan "all power to the soviets"), denounced liberals and social revolutionaries in the Provisional Government, called for Bolsheviks not to cooperate with the government, and called for new communist policies. The April Theses influenced the July Days and October Revolution in the next months and are identified with Leninism.

The February Revolution had resulted in the abdication of Tsar Nicholas II, the collapse of Imperial Russia, and the establishment of the liberal Provisional Government under Georgy Lvov and later Alexander Kerensky. The Provisional Government was dominated mainly by liberals and moderate socialists who wanted to instigate political reform, creating a democracy with elections for an executive and a constituent assembly.