In his book titled We Are Our Own Liberators, which offers us many significant insights into what kind of organizational and political conceptions are needed by the revolutionary movement, Jalil Muntaqim describes “democratic centralism” in these terms: “All members, committees, and groups of the national liberation front may discuss or constructively criticize and contribute to the development of a particular directive or policy, but once a decision has been made all members, committees, and groups must abide by it.”^[1]

In its Draft Programme, which likewise contains many points that are, in my view, essential to a vision of revolutionary change in today's world, the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) offers this description:

Democratic centralism entails the subordination of the minority to the majority when it comes to the actions of the party. That does not mean that the minority should be gagged. Minorities must have the possibility of becoming the majority. As long as they accept in practice the decisions of the majority, groups of comrades have the right to support alternative platforms and form themselves into temporary or permanent factions and express their views publicly.^[2]

Similar conceptions of “democratic centralism” abound. I cite these two only because I have come across them recently.

In this article, I will argue that the approach outlined above is only partially correct. Key elements needed to make our appreciation and practice of revolutionary democratic centralism complete are missing. The prevalence of this incomplete understanding has, in my view, been a significant contributing factor in the process of splitting into smaller and smaller groups that has plagued the Left in the United States (and elsewhere) for decades. Indeed, the only group I am aware of that has understood the correct approach to this issue was a current of expelled members of the US Socialist Workers Party (SWP) called the Fourth Internationalist Tendency, of which I was a part in the mid-to-late 1980s. We did better than most in our application of democratic centralism because we set ourselves the conscious task of considering how and why the SWP had gotten this aspect of revolutionary functioning wrong. Much of what I write here is informed by that experience.

There may be other collectives I am unaware of who are pursuing or have pursued their practice of democratic centralism in the spirit I will suggest below. The “you” in the title of this article does not apply to such groups or their members. I address myself to all the others who subscribe to the incomplete version of this concept. I hope you will feel that I am doing so with respect. There are many—including Jalil Muntaqim, the CPGB, and more—whom I do respect because they are engaged in positive work to build revolutionary consciousness and revolutionary formations during these difficult times. But when it comes to “democratic centralism,” what it is and how to apply it, I will assert that our collective appreciation needs to be dramatically improved.

One further note before we begin: I have put the word “revolutionary” in the title of this article. There are, I would like to suggest, other varieties of “democratic centralism” and, in a sense, every coherent organization that isn't completely top-down and bureaucratic practices “democratic centralism” to one degree or another—or else it would cease to be a coherent organization. Even a group as loose in its so-called discipline as the Democratic Party follows “democratic centralism” understood in its broadest sense: when there is a legislative question that matters to those who make strategic decisions, you will find Democrats in the House and Senate lining up to vote as directed, whatever their personal beliefs.

This is all consistent with a point I make below, which discusses “unity in action when it really matters.” That one point, by itself, is sufficient for the Democratic Party—when combined with what is, of course, the fairly limited reality of actual democratic decision making within that party. But I will argue that an adherence to all four of the principles described below is required for a truly satisfactory practice of revolutionary democratic centralism. There must, of course, also be a commitment to revolution—that is, the complete and total overthrow of empire-capitalism and its replacement with a system that moves toward global production-for-use rather than production-for-profit, combined with the working class creating new state forms that will facilitate this transformation. Such a genuine commitment to revolution combines with the democratic-centralist organizational form to create the “revolutionary democratic centralism” we talk about in this article.

Let us enumerate the four relevant principles of revolutionary democratic centralism:

1) The Search for Consensus is an Essential Element of Internal Debate

This is going to be difficult for some to grasp. Even groups that claim to practice the search for consensus often do it badly. The Green Party in the USA, on whose National Committee (NC) I currently serve, is one example. In the Green Party, despite the fact that every proposition voted on by the NC starts with the assertion that the party seeks to work based on consensus, as soon as differing viewpoints are expressed the tendency is to divide up into camps and, often, go to war with each other. Under such conditions, “consensus” can only be achieved when there is already 100 percent agreement in advance of any discussion. But there's no trick to achieving that kind of “consensus,” and the term therefore loses any real meaning.

Further, most groups that believe they are practicing “democratic centralism” don't even have the word “consensus” in their vocabulary. The division into camps that, too often, go to war with each other when disagreements arise—in particular, leaderships waging war against rank-and-file members who challenge a leadership decision—is so common that it has almost become an unstated organizational norm for many sectarian Marxist collectives. I can testify first hand that this was the approach in the SWP during the 1970s and ‘80s. I was never a member of the International Socialist Organization (ISO), but based on what I observed from the outside, as well as the testimony of participants, this relationship between the leadership and the rank and file was also a major factor in the demise of that organization.

Both the Maoist and sectarian Trotskyist Left also abound with groups that pursue this approach. It's the wrong approach, however. I have heard it said about Lenin, an advocate of democratic centralism whom most of us would like to emulate, that when he wanted a resolution the entire Bolshevik Party could unite around he would take the two individuals with the most extreme viewpoints on opposite sides of the relevant subject, put them in a room and tell them not to come out until they had a draft they could both agree on. This was a form of genuine consensus building. Even if the actual story is apocryphal, it does represent, I will argue, a real aspect of Leninist functioning that the rest of us ought to emulate more often.

The search for consensus takes time and work. These are, of course, the primary reasons it's practiced so rarely. It's far easier to divide into camps and resolve any issue with a vote, especially when you are a leadership that's busy on many fronts trying to get something done. Instead of this, however, whenever a dispute develops in a revolutionary collective, advocates on both sides should stop and ask themselves two questions:

1. What is it in the position being presented by others that is correct and might represent a weakness in my own viewpoint that I can acknowledge and incorporate into my thinking?
2. What points of disagreement that remain are essential and demand that I insist on my point of view; which ones are secondary and can be set aside for future discussion or resolution?

Asking these two questions is especially important for those in leadership positions, because a collective’s leadership has the first responsibility to set the proper tone in dealing with disagreements that might arise.

Most often, the reality is that none of the competing positions initially expressed in such a debate will be either 100% correct or wrong (though we acknowledge, of course, that there are exceptions). Such a process of active listening will likely lessen the dispute, even if a consensus cannot be reached. There will also be times when interrogating the relevant difficulty in this way allows everyone involved to realize that the points of agreement are central, while the areas of disagreement that remain are secondary, thus generating the potential for an amicable resolution through developing a consensus motion or text focused strictly on the primary questions. This is a result we should strive for in every conversation over disputed issues, even when it turns out not to be possible.

I have often used a short-hand statement that might guide us effectively while we are engaged in this kind of process: the proper goal of discussion in the revolutionary movement is not to determine who is right, but to determine what is right.^[3] When such discussions become the norm—rather than the variety we end up with when participants set themselves the goal of simply affirming and then reaffirming their own point of view—it will have a dramatic and extremely positive effect on the “unity in action” side of the democratic centralist formula.

If any minority knows that the majority has made every good-faith effort to investigate the differences honestly, seeking to discover “what is right” rather than to simply “prove” their own original thesis, when a collective tradition has been established of people consistently making reasonable adjustments in order to accommodate viewpoints developed by those who disagree with them, a sense of good-will and collectivity results which is, in turn, a strong impetus to the pursuit of united action in the full sense of that term. The unity will develop because a minority values being part of a collective that can engage in this kind of honest, productive, fact-based conversation more than it values the immediate continuation of an effort to validate its own ideas. A unity of this kind is worth far more than the variety that's imposed strictly by a reliance on organizational statutes.

Note that we are not talking here about absolute consensus requiring 100% unanimity, but rather the genuine search for consensus before deciding that we do indeed have a meaningful disagreement and will therefore have to take a vote to determine how we are going to proceed.

Note also that we are likewise not talking about diplomatic formulas that paper over differences. A genuine search for consensus must acknowledge and deal with whatever substantive disagreements actually exist in order to resolve or, at least, to minimize them.

2) Unity in Action When Disagreements Remain Should be Pursued Only When United Action is Needed

This is an aspect of democratic centralism that has not been included in any definition that I am aware of except my own, but it ought to be. Thus, we should talk about “unity in action when that really matters.”

During my my early years as a member of the SWP in the late 1960s, the practice was for our “antiwar fraction” (the party members who were actively involved in the anti-Vietnam war movement) to go into a meeting or conference with a common front on every potential issue that might come up, down to the question of what park the next demonstration should take place in. This was seen as part of our role as “the vanguard” of the movement.

The approach is wrong, both on the level of the party's relationship to the mass movement and in terms of its own internal functioning. In relation to the movement, engaging in this way will severely limit, and often completely negate, the essential spontaneity of a genuine mass organization. There are times when the non-party masses will be far more creative than the party itself in ways that the movement can benefit from. When that is true, a “vanguard” that tries to decide every detail in advance of a meeting becomes a drag on the struggle rather than playing a vanguard role.

A revolutionary organization must, once again, sort out what is truly necessary to fight for in a unified fashion and what might best be left to the creativity of the masses. The reader can probably extrapolate from the example above (about what park the next demonstration should be held in) and think of many similar issues. Workers on strike, masses in motion everywhere, often find solutions to difficulties they confront that are far better than anything that might be cooked up at party headquarters. There is no scientific law that can determine what tactical and strategic questions it’s necessary for the party to organize a disciplined fight around and what can be left to the creativity of the movement in any given situation. Figuring that out is part of the art of revolutionary leadership, and one reason why cultivating this art is as much an indispensable necessity for us as studying revolutionary theory.

On an internal level, the call for “discipline” by individuals who still disagree, even after the best kinds of discussions described above, inevitably creates a tension in the group that tests collective unity. There are times when such a call means a split, with the minority walking out of the organization, or being expelled because it rejects the call for united action. If a majority or leadership imposes “unity in action” on every question, no matter how small, because “unity in action” (full stop) is part of its definition of “democratic centralism,” it's far more likely to generate hard feelings and resentments that can build up over time, contributing to the potential for a split at some critical moment. If, on the other hand, minority currents know from experience that the party’s call for united action is not being imposed by rote simply because “unity in action” is written into the party's statutes, that it is issued instead after a proper consideration of the stakes involved at a specific moment, this significantly increases the potential for the collective unity to be strengthened rather than challenged by the process.

Then there are the times when it may not be so clear what the “correct” decision ought to be, and the vanguard grouping is better off simply asking for everyone's honest opinion rather than trying to impose some unified judgment that it comes to on its own. Let us take, as an example, the case of a union that's considering a strike. Suppose party members who are also members of this union are divided on the question of whether a strike is a good idea. If the vote is close in the union, a unanimous vote for or against the strike by party members could easily tip the balance artificially—in a situation where it would be better (for the union itself, and therefore for the party too) to simply take an honest reading of the level of support for a strike before calling one.

And once again, consider the effect of an experience such as this on an organization's internal unity. Members who disagree with the call for a strike, but are forced by discipline to vote for it in the union, will likely be alienated from the “democratic centralist” collective by that experience—especially if the strike really was ill-advised and leads to a defeat.

Finally, on this point, there are also times when it makes the most sense to experiment with different party branches or groups of party members, pursuing alternative approaches in action to the same movement or struggle as a way of gathering collective experience to help in drawing future balance sheets that can guide further work. This represents another time when insisting on unified action and party “discipline” is both unwarranted and far less productive than the alternative.

This takes us logically to our next point.

3) A Vote Does Not Determine the Correct Viewpoint, Only What the Group Will Do

This may seem obvious, but it's worth highlighting. Majorities can be wrong and minorities can be right. Our ability to convince others of whatever viewpoint we develop is only partially dependent on logic and reason, and even if logic and reason predominate in our discourse, the reasoning we rely on can and often will be faulty. A host of factors—including social pressures, lack of adequate experience or information, unforeseeable events in a particular movement or struggle, misunderstandings generated by imperfect discussions, etc.—effect how people develop their views on any topic, how they vote on specific motions, and whether collective decisions turn out to be right or wrong (or both at the same time).

Majorities in particular need to keep in mind the potential that they might be mistaken, in whole or in part. This is why the time-honored tradition just mentioned, of drawing balance sheets on collective experiences, is a basic aspect of group functioning for a genuinely democratic-centralist organization. In that process, everyone must look back at the debate that led up to the original decision and ask themselves: to what degree was the majority viewpoint confirmed by our experience? To what extent was it challenged, with aspects (at least) of the minority viewpoint validated? I would like to suggest that here, too, there will almost always be some of each. The most important measure of any individual leader and of any leadership collective is not whether they get every question right, since no one can, but whether they contribute honestly and effectively to the process of collective learning from experience and are willing to modify their own viewpoint if needed based on that experience.

When a particular group of revolutionaries establishes a process of drawing honest balance sheets in this way—rather than in the form of a majority or a leadership trumpeting its own absolute correctness on every occasion—the process once again contributes to the potential for united action when truly needed. A minority is far more likely to join enthusiastically in an action that has been decided on, even though they continue to disagree, if they know that this united action will be treated by everyone as an experiment with an honest assessment made of the results after a period of time. The minority will be impelled to join in the collective action by this potential for collective growth, rather than by the whip of an artificially imposed “discipline.”

I stress once again that the development of such a collective culture takes time. It is not achieved by voting for some set of statutes that say this is what we will do, only by an actual practice of strategic reflection and refinement over a series of activist engagements. This is one important reason why it takes years for a truly disciplined revolutionary cadre formation to establish itself. To borrow words from Maurice Bishop, used originally in a different context: it's not a cup of instant coffee.

Understanding the stage a particular collective has reached in the coffee-brewing process, then utilizing a variety of internal tools to further cultivate a genuine collectivity, is another expression of the art that's essential for any leadership of a revolutionary organization to cultivate. It allows us to think through how we can engage the next debate or disagreement in a fashion that will strengthen rather than challenge the specific collective unity of the organization we are leading.

4) The Call For United Action Must Be Consistent With the Degree of Unity On Programmatic and Theoretical Matters Achieved

This is another reason why the development of a disciplined, truly “democratic centralist” revolutionary cadre takes time. The process cannot be short-circuited. No set of statutes declaring the group to be “democratic centralist” can make it so.

Consider the ultimate test of our “democratic centralism” which will be in the crucible of revolution itself: the moment of insurrection, when masses of people have (a) established counter-institutions that are capable of replacing the old state power and (b) developed the collective will necessary to make it happen. The stakes at that moment will, indeed, require united action by a revolutionary formation that has achieved sufficient mass influence to actually play the role of a vanguard.

What if differences arise at such a decisive moment (as inevitably they will) over how to proceed? We must, of course, still pursue the consensus-seeking approach outlined at the start of this essay, hoping to resolve or at least minimize any disagreements. But in the end, a vote is probably going to be taken. At that moment, if the majority is asking the minority to act in accord with the collective decision, thereby actually putting their lives on the line, that majority will have to rely on far more than a set of organizational statutes that declare “unity in action.” It will need to have pre-established a clear track record, spanning many years, of engaging in discussions and balance sheets as part of an honest, truth-seeking enterprise rather than as a form of self-validation. And it will also have to depend on ties of trust forged over these same years between comrades, each one knowing from past experience that s/he can rely on others to always put the best interests of the struggle above any personal considerations.

The best historical example of this is, of course, the Russian Bolsheviks, who engaged in sharp debates but were able to do so without becoming enemies and without engaging in splits based on secondary disagreements. Even the Bolshevik’s democratic centralism became frayed during the process of insurrection, with Zinoviev and Kamenev publicly defecting from the collective decision to have the Soviets declare themselves the governing power in October 1917. For the most part, however, the party maintained its unity through this most decisive of moments. This was not because there were no disagreements or issues in dispute. Lenin and Trotsky in particular disagreed about the timing of the insurrection–Lenin wanted something more immediate for fear the insurrectionary moment might pass, while Trotsky won a majority to the plan that the insurrection should wait for the Congress of Soviets to give it a democratic mandate. The unity was maintained because comrades, including Lenin and Trotsky, had more than a decade of experience with each other as individuals who were committed to making revolution, whatever the personal cost might be, which allowed them to put a priority on the collective need for unity in action (when it really mattered).

It’s an interesting historical footnote, of course, that Lenin demanded the expulsion of Zinoviev and Kamenev for their violation of party discipline, and that a majority of the party rejected Lenin’s demand. This should give us just a hint that the Bolshevik understanding of democratic centralism was not the rigid and schematic notion that prevails in most contemporary collectives who would ordain themselves “Bolsheviks.”

In the earliest stages of the development of a cadre formation, we are, inevitably, far from the level of political and programmatic homogeneity and collective experience that is required under such truly revolutionary circumstances. We cannot, therefore, impose the same expectation regarding unity in action. Our calls for unity must, in addition to meeting principle two’s test of “what is essential,” also meet the test of “what is appropriate given our current level of collective understanding and our history as a group engaged in common work.” Once again, this cannot be scientifically quantified or written into a set of bylaws. It's simply another factor contributing to the need for us to actively cultivate the art of revolutionary leadership at least as much as the science.

There are moments, after all, when revolutionaries are confronted with a variety of potential choices, none of which are definitively right or wrong, offering instead a series of competing positive and negative consequences—perhaps even with unpredictable consequences because we do not know how others will respond to our actions. At such a moment, we still have to choose to act or not to act, without any “scientific” guidance based on rules we might be able to derive from past experience. It is like the choice of the poet to use shorter lines in a particular stanza rather than longer ones, or of an artist to use a lighter tint rather than a darker one in a portion of a painting, or the choice of a musician to use a particular rhythm or melody. The choice of when and how to apply the “rules” of democratic centralism in a particular context is like that. Any revolutionary leadership has to have a feel, almost an aesthetic sense, for what will have the optimum effect in a specific collective at a particular moment.

1. Jalil Muntaqim, We Are Our Own Liberators: Selected Prison Writings (Arissa Media Group, 2010), 168.

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2. Communist Party of Great Britain, Draft Programme, 2023, 54, https://communistparty.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/Draft-Programme-Post-print-With-Cover-August-2023.pdf.

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3. The best historical example is the debate between Lenin and Trotsky from 1905 to 1917 that focused on two questions: What will be the class nature of the coming anti-Tsarist revolution in Russia? What kind of party is needed in order to lead that revolution? Both adjusted their thinking on these questions (Trotsky on the party, Lenin on the class nature of the revolution) based on the experience of 1917 itself because they were simply focused on discovering what was right--and the decisive test of what was right was not in their polemics with each other, but in the class struggle itself. This enabled them to join forces as co-leaders of the Bolshevik party during the key months that led to October. Neither of them was concerned, at that moment or subsequently, with considering who was right or wrong in previous polemics.

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