Vanguardism

In the context of the theory of Marxist revolutionary struggle, vanguardism is a strategy whereby the most class-conscious and politically advanced sections of the proletariat or working class, described as the revolutionary vanguard, form organizations in order to draw larger sections of the working class towards revolutionary politics and serve as manifestations of proletarian political power against its class enemies.

In theory, the revolutionary vanguard is not intended to be an organization separate from the working class that attempts to place itself at the center of the movement and steer it in a direction consistent with its own ideology. It is instead intended to be an organic part of the working class that comes to socialist consciousness as a result of the dialectic of class struggle.

Vladimir Lenin popularized political vanguardism as conceptualized by Karl Kautsky, detailing his thoughts in one of his earlier works, What is to be done?. Lenin argued that Marxism's complexity and the hostility of the establishment (the , semi-feudal state of Imperial Russia) required a close-knit group of individuals pulled from the working class vanguard to safeguard the revolutionary ideology within the particular circumstances presented by the Tsarist régime at the time. While Lenin wished for a revolutionary organization akin to the contemporary Social Democratic Party of Germany, which was open to the public and more democratic in organization, the Russian autocracy prevented this.

Leninists argue that Lenin's ideal vanguard party would be one where membership is completely open: "The members of the Party are they who accept the principles of the Party programme and render the Party all possible support." This party could, in theory, be completely transparent: the "entire political arena is as open to the public view as is a theater stage to the audience." A party that supposedly implemented democracy to such an extent that "the general control (in the literal sense of the term) exercised over every act of a party man in the political field brings into existence an automatically operating mechanism which produces what in biology is called the “survival of the fittest”." This party would be completely open to the public eye as it conducted its business which would mainly consist of educating the proletariat to remove the false consciousness that had been instilled in them.

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