Marxism and World Revolution
Haz Al-Din
Abstract
This essay reinterprets the Marxist-Leninist conception of world revolution in the context of contemporary debates on multipolarity. Contrary to the Trotskyist association of world revolution with “permanent revolution,” Haz Al-Din argues that Marxism historically unites proletarian internationalism with the strategy of building socialism in one country. Revisiting the long-noted “paradox” of Marxism — its insistence on both objective historical laws and the decisive role of subjective political will — the essay draws on Lenin to resolve the tension. Lenin’s view situates political consciousness as a force that accelerates or delays, but does not create or negate, the objective trajectory of history. World revolution, therefore, is not a voluntarist project but a probabilistic inevitability emerging from material contradictions whose expression is often accidental and unconscious. The role of Marxism is to scientifically concentrate existing, disparate revolutionary forces — national liberation movements, socialist states, and anti-imperialist actors — into a unified plane of struggle. This unification distinguishes Marxist-Leninist world revolution from Trotskyism and offers a framework for understanding contemporary global conflicts as components of an already-unfolding revolutionary process.
Keywords
Marxism, Marxist-Leninism, proletarian internationalism, multipolarity, socialism in one country, permanent revolution, trotskyism, class consciousness, Haz Al-Din
