- Vassiliy Igorevich, hello.

- Hello.

- Our newspaper has decided to apprise of such an interesting and romantic profession as the professional revolutionary. Tell, please, how long have you been revolutionising?

- I began to revolutionise in a Marxist manner in the late nineties of the past century, when I became aware of my vocation to be a leader of the proletariat.
But really it all began ten years earlier. In that time I had revolutionised as a theosophist and anarchist-syndicalist. But now I am a Marxist-Bolshevik.

- But how did you become a Marxist?

- My former means of revolutionising were coming to an end, but then just in time I made acquaintance with some members of the Marxist Revolutionary Party. Once finding out beyond doubt that this party possessed the means necessary for my aims, I realised I had become a Marxist.

- Were there already any supporters in this party of the idea of professional revolutionaries?

- Yes, there were a full two persons in this organisation who stood for the institution of professional revolutionaries. They became convinced of this due to their position as freed workmen. Having joined the Party myself, I introduced into the organisation Comrade Wrecker, and once this was done we were able to get to work...

- Apropos, who are these "freed workmen"? From what and by whom are they freed?

- Though your question looks a bit like a provocative one, I will give you a brief answer. The Party frees these people from the need to earn a living via their own labour.

- And how did other members of the organisation perceive your position - such as those who did not agree with the professional revolutionising?

- They started to come out against me and other newly joined [persons], motivated by the fact that the MRP programme did not aim to bring professional revolutionaries to power. They even criticised their own former freed workmen for the low efficiency of their paid activity.
They spoke that they wanted to bring the proletariat to power. That the class conscious proletarians were capable of doing party work without ceasing to earn a living by their own productive labour. They even came to the point of uttering that such proletarians could do no less than freed workmen.
But me, I became a Bolshevik because the freed workmen clearly explained to me: already Kautsky and Lenin had spoken that the working class were simply not capable of rising above trade-unionism and that a vanguard party was necessary for the establishment of socialism. Exactly the vanguard of the proletariat must govern the proletariat itself, and the vanguard of the proletariat must consist of professional revolutionaries. Well and the professional revolutionaries must not, of course, take care of earning a living. These ideas are absolutely correct, because they are true. I have successfully proved them in practice! Though I am a technician myself and have been through higher education, I have worked only a few months in various enterprises. For 15 years I've been basically living at the expense of my professional revolutionising.

- We know that the Marxist Revolutionary Party resulted in splitting, and that all the old party members said goodbye to you...

- Yes, so it was. And as a professional revolutionary with the long term experience in how to live without earning by one's own productive labour, I was able to play first fiddle in these events.
Our actions did not correspond to the documents of the programme of the organisation...but what of them?! We simply changed these documents! We know how to do this professionally! And now our actions correspond to the documents. (laughs)

- What is the most difficult thing for you in the activity of a professional revolutionary?

- As I'm sure you can understand, the most difficult thing is to revolutionise so that you don't lose the job of a revolutionary. Sometimes you have to quickly work out what new organisation it is necessary to join for this. Besides, the professional revolutionaries of Russia are discontented with the salary they are paid.

- And so you decided to create a trade union of professional revolutionaries?

- Yes, there was no other choice for us. I was the initiator of this. And I was supported by other professional revolutionaries. So we created our trade union. - Let employers know that we are ready to stand for our rights!

- 'Employers' - are they the parties, whose members the professional revolutionaries are?

- I'll willingly explain this to you from the positions of Marxist political economy. As is well known, an employer can be private, but can also be collective. But even if the party employer is formally collective, all the same there is an analogue of a joint-stock company before us: there are majoritarians - those whose who have at their disposal a great amount of shares or "actions" - if we take a French term - and whose voice is accordingly decisive, but there are minoritarians, i. e. those who can vote, but who do not possess the deciding amount of votes. It's clear that we, the trade union of professional revolutionaries, pattern our behaviour on the party majoritarians ?

- 'Les actions' in this instance - are they famous "action directe", i. e. concrete practical actions or??

- L’action" as an ‘action directe’ is anarchism! And I have completely parted with the anarchist naivete. For it only defers me from the goal to revolutionise professionally! And now for me “l’action” is the share in the authorised capital stock of a company….I mean of a party, of course…

- That is you want to say that the party member, who has a possibility to invest more bankrolls in the party pay-desk, has a casting vote in any case? But insofar as I know, such regulations are absent in the Statutes of parties. At least, of the left parties for sure?

- The whole point is that the Marxism comes from the objective economic relations, rather than from the formal legal technicalities! The freed workmen in the Marxist Revolutionary Party, which I consciously joined, understood this well and in their activity had patterned their behaviour on the opinion of Party 'Krassins' and 'Parvuses', rather than on the minoritarian-proletarians! (Smiles) So we perfectly understood each other literally from our first meeting?

- And how can you exert influence upon employers?

- As hired workmen we can go on strike according to all the new Labour Code rules. In the last resort, we can try to find another job in our profession. But it's certainly better to come to an agreement with the current employer. And here our skills in influencing the minoritarian-proletarians can be useful in order to enlist their support at the general meeting of shareholders...pardon me...I mean at the party convention. (Smiles)

- But after all it was precisely the proletarians within the party who said goodbye to you?

- Well, this is not quite so….first, we have been able to enrol in lieu several new ones, who wholly agree with our status. Secondly, our relations with the majoritarians have become more concrete – akin to the terms of a private businessman with a hired workman on a contract. And as a trade union we do greet such certainty!

- Do you stage sit-down strikes?

- Your question is not quite correct. Most of his time a modern revolutionary just sits at the computer.

- You write many historical articles?

- Mainly I write very many circulars and instructions for other professional revolutionaries. And they also write for me. On the greater scale this makes up the international. And in this function we account before the employer.

- But what if the employer - that very majoritarian - asks you to do something else for him?

- The specific character of working for the party employer is in the fact that the labour contract with him formally coincides with the Party Statutes. Being a party member, the majoritarian in any case offers to do what goes for the good of his party. But the good of his party is good for us as well! In short, it's Democratic Centralism. As it was written on posters in Central Asia in the time of my childhood, "Partia plannari - khallik plannari" ["Plans of the Party are the plans of the people"]. (laughs)

- Thank you for having found the time to answer our questions. All the best!

- And the same to you!

We are very thankful to Comrade Dan Read (the UK) for his help in translating from Russian.