Atlas / Comparisons / Anarcho-Communism vs Bolsheviks
Anarcho-Communism and Bolsheviks
Measured distance across six axes
Opposed programmes with little shared ground. They agree within three points on EC, CU, ID. They diverge by eight points or more on AU, SC.
Axis by axis
| Axis | Kropotkin | RSDLP(b) | Gap | Reading | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| EC · Economic organisation | −09 | −09 | 0 | Agrees | Effectively the same position. Not what an argument between them is about. |
| CU · Social and cultural order | −07 | −05 | 2 | Agrees | Effectively the same position. Not what an argument between them is about. |
| AU · Organisation of power | −10 | +08 | 18 | Diverges | Carries the disagreement. Any claim that these two are alike has to explain this. |
| SC · Scale of decision | −10 | +07 | 17 | Diverges | Carries the disagreement. Any claim that these two are alike has to explain this. |
| ID · Rule of membership | −08 | −07 | 1 | Agrees | Effectively the same position. Not what an argument between them is about. |
| CH · Method and tempo | +06 | +10 | 4 | Differs | Real difference, but not the dividing line. |
Each axis runs from −10 to +10; the distance is the straight-line separation across all six at once, out of a maximum of 49.0. How the scoring works →
The evidence behind the widest gaps
A distance figure is worth nothing unless the scores behind it can be checked. These are the artefacts supporting the axes that separate these two most.
Kropotkin · AU −10
At the floor. The state is not to be captured, reformed or used, but abolished.
- ScholarshipThe 1872 Hague split of the First International turned on precisely this question.
RSDLP(b) · AU +08
Other parties, factions and the elected assembly were removed within four years.
- Documented act or statuteThe Constituent Assembly, in which the Socialist Revolutionaries held a majority, was dissolved by force after one sitting in January 1918.
- Documented act or statuteThe Cheka was established in December 1917, six weeks after the seizure of power.
Kropotkin · SC −10
At the floor: the commune is the unit and federation is voluntary and revocable.
- Programme textKropotkin's model is a federation of communes with no superior body possessing coercive authority.
RSDLP(b) · SC +07
Formally federal, actually centralist, with the party structure overriding the republican one.
- Documented act or statuteThe 1922 union treaty created republics whose communist parties were branches of a single centralised party.
What this comparison does not establish
Proximity means similarity of stated position. It carries no claim about competence, circumstance, scale of operation, or what either organisation actually did to the people under it. Two organisations can sit close together and produce entirely different histories, because those things are not on any axis and could not be.
Anarcho-Communism
1872– · Russia, Europe
Abolish the state and private property simultaneously; distribution according to need through voluntary federation.
Bolsheviks
1903–1924 · Russia
A disciplined vanguard party seizes power in the name of the working class and imposes socialism from above.
Distance is not the whole answer. Two organisations can sit the same distance apart for entirely different reasons, and the reason is the content of any claim about them. Open the comparison in the atlas to weight the axes yourself.
Open in the atlas