There were two groups of early revolutionaries- the Socialist Revolutionists and the Social Democrats. The Social Revolutionists wanted a democratic republic. They were against all sorts of exploitation the Russians faced. Their slogan ‘Land and Liberty’ was powerful and expressed their hostility towards all exploiting classes. The Socialist Revolutionists were widely supported by the peasants and industrial workers.
The Social Democrats were led by Georgi Plekhanov and Lenin, and their programme was based on the theories of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. The Social Democrats later split into the Bolsheviks led by Lenin, and the Mensheviks led by Plekhanov. But why did they split into two groups?
In 1898, a revolutionary socialist party called the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party was formed. Vladimir Lenin later joined the party. In 1903, the Party held meeting to debate events and actions. It was here that Vladimir Lenin argued for a party composed only of professional revolutionaries. Lenin wanted to give the movement a core of experts rather than a mass of amateurs. Plekhanov did not agree to Lenin’s idea. He wanted mass membership like any other western European social-democratic parties. These conflicts resulted in the formation of two groups- the Bolsheviks and the Mensheviks.
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