“Party principles” in the views of Grigory Evseevich Zinoviev

Sinin Evgenii Iurevich ORCID: 0000-0002-1444-5217 Postgraduate student; Department of History of the Institute of Humanities; Moscow City Pedagogical University 129226, Russia, Moscow, Second Agricultural ave., 4k1, room 3413 e.sinin@yandex.ru

The "Manifesto of the Communist Party", the main document declaring the principles of Marxist ideology, informed about the importance of the party. In the discourse of the historically most influential Marxists, the Russian Bolsheviks, this was emphasized at various stages of its existence. The doctrine of the Communist Party as a professional avant-garde of the working class possessing advanced theory was formulated in the work of V. I. Lenin "What should I do?" (1902) ^{[24, c. 25, 83-86, 90, 129-133, 171, 179]}. Bolshevism became the practical realization of this doctrine. Subsequently, the importance of the party for the Bolsheviks was only confirmed. Already after the revolution, in his work "The Childhood Disease of Leftism in Communism" (1920), Vladimir Ilyich defined the party as the highest form of class unification of the proletarians ^{[27, p. 33]}. Another Bolshevik leader, L. D. Trotsky, in the article "Lessons of October" (1924) supplemented this idea with the consideration that the revolution was doomed to defeat without the Communist Party leading it ^{[50, pp. XII–XIII]}. As a dogma, the doctrine of the exceptional role of the party in the revolution and the state was set out in the "Short Course of the History of the CPSU (b)" (1938) ^{[22, pp. 337-338]}. The leading role of the party as the only possible vanguard of the working class was also emphasized in late Soviet literature ^{[31, pp. 8-10]}.

The importance of the Communist Party was reflected not only in rhetoric, but also in practice. By 1917, Lenin's supporters managed to separate themselves from the Mensheviks and create a capable party organization operating under conditions of a revolutionary multiparty system. However, during the Great Russian Revolution, a one-party system of government actually developed. The events of the Civil War led to its conservation, and within the RCP (b) this was expressed in the official prohibition by the X Party Congress (1921) of the formation of factions and groupings ^{[53, pp. 585-605]}. By that time, the party had become the core of the political system: key decisions were made not in the Councils, but in it. This scheme generally lasted until 1991.

The theory and practice of the Communist Party require not only a description, but also a historical analysis, which will not only expand knowledge about Marxism and Bolshevism, but also answer the questions of Russia's political development in the 20th century, largely determined by this party. And although the historical part of the issue is generally known, there is a layer of relatively unaffected (in comparison with V. I. Lenin, I. V. Stalin and L. D. Trotsky) material - the political views of G. E. Zinoviev.

The importance of appealing to the views of Grigory Yevseevich Zinoviev (1883-1936) is determined by his place as an associate of V. I. Lenin, the leader of the cradle of the revolution – Petrograd, one of the founders of Bolshevism and the Communist Party. Even before the revolution, he was in the party leadership and had high authority in the party ^{[29, p. 296; 51, p. 508-509]}. 1917 confirmed Grigory Yevseevich in the rank of political magnitude. After October, he was a member of the Politburo, chairman of the Executive Committee of the Comintern, and one of the organizers of the anti-Trotskyist struggle. Zinoviev declared himself as the leader of the party, in particular, speaking at the XII and XIII party congresses with a political report and publishing in 1925 his interpretation of Ilyich's ideas – the book "Leninism".

The above determines the validity of the appeal to the ideological heritage of G. E. Zinoviev. It is proposed to analyze his views by dividing the problem into three significant areas from the point of view of his political biography: 1) the concept of the Communist Party, 2) the place of the party in the Soviet political system, 3) the boundaries of intraparty pluralism. The source for the analysis is the Zinoviev texts, mainly of the post-revolutionary period, due to the binding of the provisions expressed there to the practical steps of their author.

Primary attention should be paid to how Grigory Yevseyevich defined the Communist Party. The source of political thought for Zinoviev was Marxist doctrine, in the fundamental document of which – the Manifesto – postulated the need for a party due to the needs of the class struggle: the organization of the proletarians into a class required the isolation of their political representation in order to centralize the efforts of the working class ^{[30, pp. 433, 437]}. Moreover, the Communist Party was understood by the founders of Marxism as a universal entity, which manifested itself in the formation of the Union of Communists (1847-1852) and the First International (1864-1876). Political evolution in the context of capitalist development and the growing popularity of communist ideas led to the creation of social democratic parties in many countries of the world. And under the influence of the events of the First World War, when the official social democracy abandoned the revolutionary perspective, the Russian radical Social Democrats - the Bolsheviks - changed their self–designation to "Communists", appealing precisely to the term embedded in Marxism ^{[26, pp. 42-44]}.

G. E. Zinoviev also turned to the Marxist tradition of understanding the party as the vanguard of the working class. Even before the revolution, in 1909, he defined the party as the vanguard of the revolutionary army ^{[16, p. 189]}. And in 1920, systematizing the understanding of the issue, Zinoviev turned to the "Manifesto" as the source of the concept of "party", to the etymology of this word, and focused on the fact that it was the advanced part of a certain class, and the Communist Party was precisely the worker ^{[6, p. 4, 6]}. Moreover, without the party, it is impossible to achieve the "dream of the happiness of mankind", since for the working class it is like hands and brain ^{[6, p. 6]}. In the "History of the RCP(b)" (1923), he revealed this idea: "the party is part of a certain class," and politically organized, being its vanguard and sources of revolutionism ^{[10, pp. 11-14, 26, 30]}. In this and subsequent works, Grigory Yevseyevich also repeatedly referred to the idea of a centralized party led by a "scientific theory" formulated by V. I. Lenin in "What to Do", in the activities of Iskra, as well as the decisions of the II Congress of the RSDLP(b) ^{[7, p. 10; 10, pp. 86-89, 97-98]}.

Such a party could exist for G. E. Zinoviev under certain conditions. Firstly, it had to be class–based - they denied the existence of inter-class parties ^{[10, pp. 29-31]}. Secondly, although several parties could exist within the working class, but there was only one advanced and proletarian among them – the communist one ^{[10, pp. 33-34]}. Moreover, this party was not only identified with the ideal vanguard party, but also with the cause of the revolution itself, and also had the monopoly right to represent the interests of the proletariat - the rest of the parties, especially the social democratic ones, were regarded as an "abscess" on the body of the working class ^{[8, pp. 32-33; 11, pp. 6-7, 11-12, 32-33; 15, pp. 64-65]}. Thus, Grigory Yevseyevich saw only a specific RCP(b)/VKP(b) as true ^{[7, pp. 31, 40]}. In our opinion, this understanding lay in the general Bolshevik mainstream: the concept of the party as an expression of the interests of the working class came from Lenin's work "One Step Forward, Two Steps Back" (1904), as well as from the history of Bolshevism, which consisted in constant splits with the "opportunists". The specifics of Zinoviev's application of this idea will be discussed below, but for now we note his general understanding of the Communist Party as the political vanguard of the proletariat.

The vanguard of the proletariat had to not only represent the interests of the workers, but also consist of them. Sources allow us to trace this idea in G. E. Zinoviev. In the 1920s, he repeatedly pointed out the need to maintain and increase the share of "machine workers" in the party, seeing this as one of the guarantees of a correct political line ^{[18, p. 15, 20]}. The largest campaign of this kind, the Lenin conscription of over 100,000 people into the party in the spring of 1924, was regarded by him precisely in the key of raising the share of workers ^{[10, pp. 5-8; 11, p. 16]}. Ideally, G. E. Zinoviev proposed a little later to increase the share of workers in the party to 90% ^{[12, pp. 364-365; 37, L. 5-15; 39, L. 153]}. Seeing this as a tool for implementing party policy and strengthening his own position as the leader of proletarian Leningrad, Grigory Yevseevich also relied on the inherent properties of the proletariat within the framework of Marxism: collectivism, class consciousness, identification with the cause of the Communist Party ^{[7, p. 57; 14, p. 45, 74; 52, p. 183-184]}. As a result, the working avant-garde was literally supposed to be such, embodying the unity of will and practice.

Unity was also expressed in the understanding of the party as a single entity. Indeed, in G. E. Zinoviev's works there were metaphors about a party that was cast "from one piece" and could unanimously "speak" on behalf of its members ^{[9, pp. 11-12]}. But in practice, all members of the party could not immediately and equally determine its policy. The logic of the party as an organization of professional revolutionaries led to the formation of a layer authorized to do this for people. In the post-revolutionary era, this stratum, with its old party and revolutionary experience, was called the "old guard", whose enormous role in the RCP (b) was mentioned by V. I. Lenin in 1922 ^{[28, p. 20]}. Zinoviev shared this understanding, transferring the right of the party to "speak" (as well as all the revolutionary charisma identified with it) to its leadership – the "core of Leninists", who drew legitimacy from the masses ^{[7, p. 35; 9, p. 12-13; 52, p. 182– 183]}. Moreover, Grigory Yevseyevich, who considered himself a Leninist, not only postulated this right, but also obeyed it. Thus, in one of the drafts for 1925, analyzing his struggle with the Stalinists, he pointed out: "the party will judge us" ^{[42, L. 80]}. After his expulsion from the CPSU(b) in November 1927, in an outline of the theses "Why we must honestly and seriously submit to the XV Congress", Grigory Yevseevich, in support of this idea, pointed to the supreme value of the party for the Bolshevik, which made it impossible to fight against old comrades ^{[47, l. 66]}. And even in prison (1935-1936) Zinoviev appealed to the party precisely as the supreme essence, which, in addition to fulfilling the general tasks of the proletariat, had to reveal the degree of conformity of each of its members to the ideas of communism ^{[20, pp. 8-10, 316-317]}.

Thus, G. E. Zinoviev defined the Communist Party as the only possible political vanguard of the working class. He saw the historical mission of the Communist Party as the organization of the proletariat to achieve revolution and the subsequent building of communism. At the same time, only the Communist Party could be the representative of the interests of the proletariat and the bearer of truth. Specifically, in Zinoviev's understanding, there was only one such party – the Bolshevik one. The other left–wing parties (especially the Social Democratic ones) could not be the vanguard of the proletariat.

If the party was the vanguard of the proletariat in the revolutionary process, then it would be logical to turn to its role in the post-revolutionary political system. This system was defined in the writings of its founder V. I. Lenin as the dictatorship of the proletariat – the class organization of power in the period from the revolution to the achievement of socialism, in which the leading role is played by the democratic management of society through the Soviets ^{[25, c. 18, 26-27, 34-35, 60, 87-90]}. However, the construction of the Soviet political system faced such difficulties as the conditions of the Civil War, an acute shortage of managerial personnel, and a shortage of material and organizational resources. Proceeding from this, G. E. Zinoviev's recognition in 1920 sounded characteristic that the power of the Soviets had actually turned into the power of executive committees ^{[41, l. 3]}. In turn, these executive committees (like all other organs of the dictatorship of the proletariat) were headed by party figures, which testified to the subordination of state bodies to the cadres and decisions of the ruling RCP(b).

The above reasons soon led to a discussion of the role of the party in the state system. At the XII Party Congress (1923), a resolution was adopted, which included the demand for the unconditional leadership of the party in the country, since "the dictatorship of the working class cannot be ensured except in the form of the dictatorship of its advanced vanguard, i.e. the Communist Party" ^{[54, p. 672]}. And before the adoption of the resolution, in the political report of the Central Committee, G. E. Zinoviev noted in a similar way: "the dictatorship of the working class has as its prerequisite the leading role of its vanguard, i.e. the dictatorship of its best part, its party," and the leading role of the party should increase, and she herself should lead the work of the Soviets ^{[54, p. 47, 51]}.

G. E. Zinoviev developed the concept of the dictatorship of the party further. In February 1924, he called the question of the relationship between the party and the state relevant, pointing out that "we stand firmly on the basis of the proletarian dictatorship, the iron dictatorship <...> the party leads the Soviet government, the party is its head" ^{[7, p. 67]}. In his program book Leninism (1925), Zinoviev wrote that "the dictatorship of the proletariat is impossible without the dictatorship of its vanguard, i.e. without the dictatorship of the proletarian party… The dictatorship of the party is a function of the dictatorship of the proletariat" ^{[12, pp. 359-360]}. In December 1925, Zinoviev called the very possibility of reducing the leading role of the party a revision of Leninism ^{[38, l. 91]}. The domination of the party over the Soviets and the state apparatus was actually conceived by him for the entire epoch before the construction of communism: "as long as there is a Bolshevik party, as long as there is Leninism, as long as there is a real proletarian dictatorship, until then the party will stand above the state apparatus, will lead, own it, and not vice versa" ^{[38, l. 92]}. Moreover, hypothetically, Zinoviev believed that the party would remain as the core of the system even in the era of a classless society ^{[2, p. 59]}. Grigory Yevseyevich, in fact, elevated the existing practice into law, proclaiming the leading role of the party in the Soviet system unshakable and consistent with the Leninist canon. Zinoviev adhered to the idea of the dictatorship of the party even after the defeat in the internal party struggle since 1927: in the notes of 1928, he considered the denial of this concept an ideological mistake ^{[43, L. 57]}. The hero publicly rejected it (as well as his entire interpretation of Leninism) only in a speech at the XVII Party Congress (1934) ^{[55, pp. 492-493]}.

It is worth noting that G. E. Zinoviev's views on the place of the Communist Party in the dictatorship of the proletariat did not differ from the general Bolshevik ones. However, to present his concept of the "dictatorship of the party", Grigory Yevseyevich used excessively radical rhetoric, which was used by anti-Soviet forces as a "recognition" of the Bolsheviks that the Soviet system represented the power of a narrow group of people. In this vein, G. E. Zinoviev was criticized twice (in 1924 and 1926) for the term "dictatorship of the party" by I. V. Stalin, who considered it a politically harmful perversion of Leninism ^{[5, pp. 298-300, 343-345]}.

Grigory Yevseyevich, in the concept of "the dictatorship of the party", meant that it was carried out by a single Bolshevik party. The question of the political leadership of such a party by a post-revolutionary society did not arise in ideological discourse until 1917. In those years, for Zinoviev, the model of a united party was the German SPD ^{[17, c. 80, 112, 207, 394-396]}. But within the RSDLP itself, during the revolutionary events, two parties actually operated – the Bolsheviks and the Mensheviks. At the same time, even before the revolution, Bolshevism recognized only itself as the representative of the interests of the proletariat, at the same time not denying the existence of other left-wing socio-political forces ^[35]. And even in 1917, some Bolsheviks, including Zinoviev, had a conflict with Lenin over the formation of a "homogeneous socialist government." Grigory Yevseyevich, supporting this idea at the time, in fact proposed a multiparty organization of power.

Influenced by the real experience of the one-party system and the conviction of the special historical role of the RCP (b), G. E. Zinoviev's opinion began to change. Already in 1922, Grigory Yevseyevich, recognizing theoretically the temporary possibility of the formation of left-wing coalition governments in European countries, unequivocally denied such a multiparty system in the USSR, referring to the bankruptcy of the Socialist Revolutionaries and Mensheviks in the past ^{[19, pp. 22-23]}. Two years later, Zinoviev noted with satisfaction that the Communist Party had "crushed" the rest of the political forces and appropriated a monopoly on power and the press ^{[7, p. 12]}. In his work Leninism (1925), he confirmed the truth of only one Communist party and its right to sole power ^{[12, pp. 356-357]}. And the lines from Zinoviev's letter to the French communist Calzan dated February 25, 1928 looked quite characteristic: "There is no other party that would lead the greatest proletarian revolution except the CPSU. There is no other Soviet government other than the existing Soviet government in the USSR. Attempts to form second parties... represent sheer adventurism. Nothing but bastard organizations ... will come of it" ^{[45, l. 134-135]}. Thus, during the Soviet period, Zinoviev was a firm supporter of the one-party system of government, not allowing any alternatives to the Bolshevik dictatorship.

It is quite possible to say that for G. E. Zinoviev, the leading place of the party in the Soviet political system was natural and positive. The fusion of the party-state apparatus and the party's monopoly on power seemed to him the norm during the dictatorship of the proletariat. To theoretically substantiate the specific Soviet experience, G. E. Zinoviev in 1923, based on the decisions of the XII Party Congress, developed the concept of "party dictatorship", which he actively applied in subsequent years (until the early 1930s). The radical rhetoric of the term provoked resistance from a number of party leaders (for example, I. V. Stalin), but in essence Zinoviev's idea did not go beyond the Bolshevik optics.

Since, in G. E. Zinoviev's understanding, the Communist Party was the only possible political instrument of the working class and the center of the organization of the dictatorship of the proletariat, it is logical to assume that he extended the principle of unity to its internal structure. The source of the idea was the Bolshevik tradition, in which the party was endowed with unity of will and deed. However, both before and after the revolution, disagreements arose in the party, leading to the formation of factions and currents, which violated the postulated unity. Moreover, G. E. Zinoviev managed to participate in splits and in their prevention during his life. Considering the specifics of the disputes is not our goal, but it is important to note that the unity of the party postulated as an ideal was inconsistently embodied in practice. As a party theorist and a participant in disputes, Grigory Yevseyevich could not but have a position on the issue of the boundaries of intraparty pluralism.

It is important to understand how G. E. Zinoviev came to social democratic ideas. Researcher V. N. Samokhodkin notes that his formation as a Bolshevik took place in 1903-1905 against the background of an internal party split ^{[48, pp. 156-160]}. And both sides of him fought for the title of true Social Democrats, and the Bolshevik rhetoric about unity attracted the hero, which he voiced in a speech at the V Party Congress (1907) ^{[36, pp. 157-161]}. However, the political atmosphere of the Stolypin reaction – the defeat of the governing bodies and the press of the RSDLP(b) – did not contribute to unity. In this situation, the Bolsheviks fiercely fought against the Mensheviks, Otzovists, liquidators and other factions, and doing so under the slogan of preserving the unity of the social democratic ranks. G. E. Zinoviev promoted this position during these years, presenting supporters of other factions as anti-Marxists, and the fight against them as rallying the party ^{[21, pp. 43-57, 84-89, 205-209]}. However, this message of unity did not prevent the Bolsheviks at the Prague Conference (1912) from actually becoming an independent party and, following Lenin's "before uniting, we must separate", consider only themselves as representatives of the interests of the working class. Later, in the 1920s, Zinoviev directly pointed out the permissibility of such divisive actions if they were conducted by "true revolutionaries" against anti-Marxists and revisionists ^{[13, pp. 17-18, 23-24]}.

However, during the separation of Bolshevism into a separate party, a view was formed within it on the inadmissibility of factionalism and splits. The subsequent experience of separating Bolshevism during the First World War with the majority of the then left camp, as well as governing the country in the extreme conditions of the Civil War (in particular, the Kronstadt Uprising) only contributed to strengthening the idea of intra-party unity. It was formalized in the resolution of the X Party Congress banning the formation of factions (March 1921), and the threat of a "new Kronstadt" was firmly entrenched in the minds of all the leaders of the RCP (b). The issue was actualized in 1923-1925: against the background of Lenin's retirement and the delay of the world revolution, discussions arose about the further development of the USSR, burdened by the struggle for power that began between the "troika" and Trotsky. And here G. E. Zinoviev became an ardent supporter of party unity.

We should immediately note that the demands made by the opposition for intra–party democracy did not apply to the Soviet system - multipartyism was not allowed either by the oppositionists or the Central Committee. Regarding internal pluralism, G. E. Zinoviev argued the impossibility of its expansion by a number of points. First, he pointed out the danger of criticism and discord for the stability of the party. For example, at the XII Party Congress in the spring of 1923, the hero declared: "Any criticism of the party line, even the so-called "left", is now objectively Menshevik criticism" ^{[54, p. 52]}. In December 1923, he admonished the delegates of the Petrograd Gubernatorial conference that "democracy" created factions and was more useful to the bourgeoisie, therefore, "in order to have a united workers' party, it is necessary to abandon the freedom of factional struggle <...> the current historical era requires that a political party be poured out of a single piece" ^{[18, p. 23]}. A similar thing was repeated in the work "Leninism" (1925): the current internal party democracy was enough, and "the party should be poured out of one piece. The consciousness of the need for voluntary iron discipline in its ranks must enter into the flesh and blood of the party" ^{[12, pp. 376-377]}.

Secondly, G. E. Zinoviev appealed to the essence of the Soviet system and ideology. Moreover, he did this, largely referring to Ilyich. In February 1924, Grigory Yevseyevich set up party recruits to work in "state building", deducing the unity of the party from "the covenants bequeathed to us by Vladimir Ilyich" and demanding from them "an oath to fight mercilessly against anyone who encroaches on this unity" ^{[10, p. 21]}. A little earlier, in December 1923, Zinoviev told Trotsky's supporters about the historical horizon of the legalization of factions: "We think that this time has not come, and it will not come at all in the era of the dictatorship of the proletariat" ^{[9, p. 13]}.

Thirdly, G. E. Zinoviev referred to the danger of a "petty-bourgeois environment." This term in the Bolshevik rhetoric of the 1920s reflected the smallness of the party and the working class in predominantly peasant Russia, which threatened both direct problems and the risk of the party's degeneration due to the penetration of representatives of alien class forces into it. In such a logic, any split within the party would be welcomed by the "third force" (Mensheviks, bourgeoisie, Nepmans, Kulaks, etc.), and opponents "carried out" alien class influence ^{[7, pp. 12-13, 22, 47-50]}. If internal pluralism were to expand too much, then the party factions would risk becoming the embryos of parallel power. Zinoviev repeatedly used this argument during the discussion in the autumn of 1923 ^{[7, pp. 43-44, 59; 18, pp. 23-24]}.

In our opinion, the above theses were based not only on the literal sense. Firstly, 1923-1925 was the time of the struggle of Ilyich's heirs for power. In its course, Grigory Yevseyevich intensified the accents in order to present opponents (primarily L. D. Trotsky) who did not belong to the Leninist cause. And secondly, it is worth taking into account the psychological characteristics of Zinoviev's attitude to the party. As early as 1923, A.V. Lunacharsky noted his romantic devotion to her ^{[29, p. 298]}. And even during the opposition struggle, he could not leave the party, identifying it with the cause of communism, as L. D. Trotsky later pointed out ^{[49, pp. 208-209]}. In 1928, Grigory Yevseyevich saw the merit of his surrender to Stalin precisely in preventing the split of the party ^{[41, L. 5, 58]}. In our opinion, during this period, Zinoviev still saw the CPSU(b) as the vanguard fulfilling the mission of the working class, and it was unacceptable to go against it. The hero himself spoke about this in 1924: you can go to a split if "this organization has become on the path of historical progress, if it prevents the victory of the revolution," but if not, then you need to be "for the unity of our party on the basis of Leninism, on the basis of that gospel of revolutionary Marxism that we received from the hands of Vladimir Ilyich" ^{[7, p. 72]}.

But G. E. Zinoviev nevertheless spoke out against the party majority. This happened at the end of 1925, on the basis of disagreements with I. V. Stalin about the peasantry and the construction of socialism in the USSR. The speech of Zinoviev, who had previously stood in the positions of the majority at the XIV Party Congress (and after him, joining the bloc with Trotsky) was perceived by the masses loyal to the Central Committee as unscrupulousness and politicking ^{[4, pp. 360-361; 32, c. 164, 166, 219, 333, 406, 616, 673]}. Some ambiguity of his opinion about intraparty pluralism in relation to himself may have contributed to the negative perception. As early as 1923, Grigory Yevseyevich spoke about the theoretical permissibility of fighting against the Central Committee in the event that it lost the "Leninist line" ^{[13, pp. 17-18, 23-24]}. At the same time, he stated that "it does not mean that we should declare all criticism factionalism." <...> those who scream about "party discipline", at every word of criticism, act as a Lord, should be ridiculed and displaced" ^{[13, c, 25]}. However, his own phrase from 1923 was quoted above about any criticism of the party line as Menshevik. Therefore, the inconsistency observed by us in the lines of the Zinoviev manuscript of 1926 about the October (1924) plenum of the Central Committee is characteristic.: "the struggle against factions and groupings is absolutely correct, provided that the Central Committee follows the proletarian Leninist line, it becomes harmful and dangerous when it is directed against real proletarian revolutionaries" ^{[44, l. 65]}.

Indeed, it is difficult to be a Leninist against a party that he and everyone called Leninist. Moreover, in the summer of 1927, Stalin's supporters accused the Trotskyist-Zinovievite opposition of organizing a "second party" ^{[33, pp. 25, 27; 34, pp. 144, 157.184]}. However, on a rhetorical level, both Zinoviev and Trotsky defined themselves as part of the CPSU(b), rejecting the idea of forming a second party expressed by radical associates ^{[23, pp. 151-152]}. In addition, Grigory Yevseyevich in the autumn of 1927 thought about ending the struggle in the event of total condemnation of the opposition by party structures. On October 30, in a note entitled "Amalgam", he noted that unity should not be violated, including because of the expectations of opponents of the Soviet government, and "we will give an indestructible rebuff to the Stalinist slogans of the two parties. The party will remain united and the only one" ^{[40, l. 30-39]}. The split of the party and the fear of the new Kronstadt outweighed for Zinoviev the considerations of his political correctness. In November of the same year, in a number of notes, he raised the question to his colleagues about subordination to the Stalinist line in view of the need to preserve "the unity of the CPSU (b) at all costs." The illegal methods of work of the minority were characterized by the words "stabbing, irreparable steps" ^{[1, p. 344; 43, l. 43, 47; 44, l. 83]}.

G. E. Zinoviev's self-restraint was also facilitated by his attitude towards subordination to the requirements of the leadership. Back in February 1924, Grigory Yevseyevich demanded that opponents "in a Bolshevik way ... honestly obey the decisions of the party" ^{[7, p. 58]}. When it was his turn to bow his head, he also turned to party traditions. In his draft statement for the XV Party Congress, which opened in December 1927, the idea was expressed as follows: "... the unity of the CPSU under the dictatorship of the proletariat is the main condition for the victory of the working class" ^{[47, L. 69]}. In addition, Grigory Yevseyevich, who was brought up in the Bolshevik tradition and denied the possibility of participating in politics other than the party, was afraid of "political non-existence," as he expressed in a draft letter to Trotsky ^{[47, L. 68]}. However, on November 14, Zinoviev was expelled from the party, and the decisions of the XV congress recognized the ideas of the opposition as incompatible with those of the party and defined a new reality – to return to the CPSU (b), it was now necessary to abandon not only anti-party affairs, but also thoughts.

The new, Stalinist boundaries of intraparty pluralism were narrower than Zinoviev's. Therefore, Grigory Yevseyevich, who set out to avoid political oblivion and return to the party (which he succeeded in 1928), was forced to adjust his rhetoric according to this pattern. This was evident in his texts and statements over the next few years. For example, in a request for the floor at the XVI Party Conference in 1929, he wrote that "I would like to declare my full solidarity with the line of the Central Committee, in particular on the issue of Trotskyism and right deviation" ^{[46, l. 152]}. And in the draft of a letter to I. V. Stalin (December 1930), Grigory Yevseyevich already directly recognized the correctness of the Secretary General in all matters and wrote about his humble "pride", as well as the justice of the "insults" inflicted on him ^{[47, L. 27]}. But Zinoviev was again expelled from the CPSU(b) in connection with the case of the "Union of Marxist-Leninists" in October 1932. The case became one of the first precedents of internal party persecution for thoughtcrime (the platform was only discussed, but not implemented). The political climate no longer allowed this: any, even verbal opposition was equated not only to a violation of the unity of the party, but also to counterrevolutionary action.

G. E. Zinoviev sought to deflect these accusations from himself with even greater praises. It is worth giving two fragments as proof. The first is lines from his letter to the Central Committee dated December 3, 1932. Sentenced to exile in Kostanay, Zinoviev conjured former comrades in loyalty, called Stalin Lenin's best student, and also stated: "I am clearly aware that if... I ever violated party discipline again, it would mean to permanently expel oneself from the ranks of the CPSU, and whoever breaks with the Bolshevik Party died as a communist."^[3] The second was a penitential speech at the XVII Congress in February 1934. According to Zinoviev, the speech was written by him, including with the expectation of loyalty to the party audience ^{[20, p. 288]}. In it, Grigory Yevseyevich equated the slightest difference from the Stalinist line with factionalism and declared that he had a "chain of mistakes" and a "claim" to impose a special understanding of Leninism on the party ^{[55, pp. 492-493]}. However, even such a change in his own position did not save Zinoviev from subsequent imprisonment and execution.

Thus, G. E. Zinoviev defended the general Bolshevik understanding of the boundaries of intraparty pluralism, which took shape on the Marxist basis and was formed in the decisions of the X Party Congress. In order to preserve the party and fulfill its historical tasks, a ban on factions was required. According to G. E. Zinoviev, unity based on "iron discipline" and subordination of apostates from the general line was required in the party. The main threat to him was the fear of infiltration of "petty bourgeois influence" into the party, which he and other Bolsheviks realized. The restrictions of intraparty pluralism were especially vigorously defended by the hero in 1923-1924, when he was at the forefront of the anti-opposition struggle. At the same time, Grigory Yevseyevich recognized the right of a minority to express its position, which justified his own controversial opposition experience of 1925-1927 from the point of view of party unity. But sincere faith in the unity of the party and its historical mission, as well as the threat of falling out of politics, led to subordination to the Stalinist line. In the following years, Zinoviev, proceeding from the goal of political survival, only intensified his criticism of intraparty pluralism.

Conclusion

Summing up the results of G. E. Zinoviev's analysis of the stated provisions, the following conclusions should be drawn:

1) G. E. Zinoviev defined the Communist Party as the advanced part of the proletariat, its professional political vanguard. The task of the Communist Party was to organize the working class for the cause of revolution and the building of communism. At the same time, only the Communist Party could express the interests of the working people and the truth of Marxism, only one such party (Bolshevik) can exist at a time. G. E. Zinoviev returned to the definition of the essence of the Communist Party throughout his political career, as it was central to his analysis of the issue;

2) G. E. Zinoviev consistently supported the Communist Party's monopoly on power within the Soviet political system. The fusion of the party-state apparatus, in his opinion, was not a disadvantage, but an advantage of the political system – the dictatorship of the proletariat. To characterize the place of the party in it, the hero in 1923 developed the concept of "dictatorship of the party", which consisted in recognizing the one-party organization of power as the core of the dictatorship of the proletariat that existed in the USSR. G. E. Zinoviev abandoned the concept of "dictatorship of the party" after 1928 due to the loss in the internal party struggle;

3) According to G. E. Zinoviev, the successful fulfillment of the role and function of the Communist Party required the strict observance of party unity. It was achieved both by strengthening consciousness and by establishing "iron discipline" with the subordination of apostates from the general line to it. Factionalism, permissible within the framework of left-wing parties and on behalf of its revolutionary part, was forbidden for G. E. Zinoviev for the RCP(b)/VKP(b) identified with the revolution. At the same time, in political practice, Grigory Yevseyevich sometimes deviated from the principles he proclaimed, in 1925-1927. being in opposition to the party majority headed by I. V. Stalin. But the priority of the idea of party unity, as well as the fear of political non-existence, led G. E. Zinoviev to abandon opposition activities and submit to the general line of the CPSU(b).