Your Revolution in Five Simple Steps
On Straightforward Class Struggle
“There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen.”
― V.I. Lenin
Writing this edition, I’ve had a few key beliefs that motivated its authorship. Namely, I believe that we are experiencing a time of significant revolutionary potential, or opportunity. I also believe that true liberation, while immensely complex, is never too complicated to understand nor to support.
With those beliefs in mind I hope to construct a real, valuable blueprint for the dismantling of the capitalist class — one which is both understandable and applicable. We’ll be able to see where our movements are strong, and where they are weak. Lastly, I hope through any means we can move forward through the persistent stagnation that plagues all contemporary revolutionary movements.
1 | Raising Class Consciousness
The number-one priority of our rulers is to obscure the fundamental class antagonism that defines our society. Before we can act on anything, we must understand our situation, and thus the first and most crucial step is to awaken the masses to their true position within the capitalist system.
Through accessible articles, social media/physical propaganda campaigns, and community workshops, we will deconstruct the bourgeois ideology by systematically exposing the lies of capitalist propaganda. It must be demonstrated to the people that the economic system, not individual failings, is the root cause of poverty, inequality, and social injustice.
When the masses understand how surplus value is extracted from the labor of the working class, the revolutionary collective can highlight exploitation in everyday working life. Over time, we will build solidarity by demonstrating not only the behavior of the enemy, but by transcending divisions of race, gender, nationality, and religion that capitalism exploits to weaken us.
We are one people, with one common enemy.
How to measure the results: with successful class consciousness comes increased participation in labor actions, shifts in public opinion, and media engagement — but most importantly — it comes with increased growth of revolutionary organizations. These are all measurable outcomes, but there is a particular significance in measuring the actual increase in membership and active participation in Marxist-Leninist study groups and political organizations.
2 | Building the Vanguard
Consciousness alone is not enough; we will need a disciplined, dedicated, and theoretically grounded vanguard party to lead the struggle — especially through the later steps. This shouldn’t be your introduction to the concept, so feel free to check out my article on what composes an ideal vanguard party:
To summarize, through the intensive study and dissemination of Marxist-Leninist theory and a robust, democratic-centralist organizational structure, we will form localized parties that are theoretically grounded and capable of coordinating action on a wide scale. There needn’t be a single, lone vanguard party, until much later in the process — by then, things will be so different that the necessity of a unified party will become more apparent than anything.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. For this step, local, small ML-chapters are fine! Look for parties that are practicing: specifically, parties that are in the damn streets! There are always people to be fed and people to be protected.
3 | The General Strike
Once class consciousness has sufficiently matured and the vanguard party has established its leading localized roles, the time will come for an incredible display of proletarian power: the global general strike!!!
This is no protest; it is an economic paralysis, a direct assault on the very mechanisms of capitalist production and distribution.
It will need to function through coordinated action; the vanguard party, in collaboration with revolutionary unions and workers’ committees, will orchestrate a simultaneous cessation of all labor across vital sectors of the national and global economy. This includes transportation, energy, communication, manufacturing, and food production.
The goal is to bring the capitalist system to a grinding halt, demonstrating that it is the labor of the working class, and not the capital of the bourgeoisie, that truly generates wealth and sustains society.
The strike will be accompanied by mass demonstrations, factory occupations, and community assemblies (for the purposes of things like food and aid distribution) — all to further solidify the unity and resolve of the working class.
4 | People’s War
While the general strike cripples the old order, it does not, by itself, dismantle it. Following the initial shock and disruption, the ruling class will inevitably attempt to reassert its control. This is where the principles of Mao’s People’s War become crucial, and here I’ve attempted to adapt them for the conditions of a developed, online society, and to incorporate the nuances of different reader perspectives.
Strategic Defensive (Guerrilla Warfare): This initial phase is concerned with survival, building strength, and eroding the enemy’s power through attrition.
For the disillusioned worker who is online, this phase is about decentralizing digital resisitance. Think secure communication networks, spreading counter-information, hacking capitalist infrastructure (non-violently disruptive cyber-attacks targeting financial systems, not essential services), and organizing underground support networks. This is about being elusive and constantly undermining the enemy’s narrative and control.
For the militant organizer who is on the ground, this phase involves establishing ‘red bases’ of influence within communities, where revolutionary organizations provide mutual aid, educational programs, and self-defense training. It’s about building parallel power structures that challenge the state’s legitimacy.
For the student or intellectual, who can be online or offline, this phase is about an intense ideological struggle, exposing the contradictions of the capitalist system in academic and popular forums, and developing sophisticated counter-narratives that win over hearts and minds. It’s about intellectual guerrilla warfare.
Strategic Stalemate (Equilibrium): Here the enemy’s offensives are contained, and available revolutionary forces are able to launch larger-scale attacks.
This is characterized by widespread worker self-management initiatives, the establishment of independent media, and the emergence of ‘dual-power’ structures where revolutionary councils begin to administer essential services. The state’s authority will be visibly eroding.
Online, I would argue that secure, encrypted platforms will become essential for mass coordination, citizen journalism exposing state atrocities, alongside the use of decentralized autonomous organizations for resource allocation and decision-making within revolutionary communities.
Strategic Offensive (Annihilation of the Enemy): In this phase, the revolutionary forces are strong enough to launch decisive, conventional attacks, leading to the final overthrow of the old regime.
For all readers, this involves mass uprisings, the seizure of key state infrastructure (like media, communications, and transportation hubs), and the ultimate establishment of the dictatorship of the proletariat. This is the moment where the people, unified and armed, seize power definitively.
5 | Establishing the Dictatorship of the Proletariat
This is the part where it gets a little spooky for people who haven’t been exposed to this concept before. However, said ‘dictatorship’ has some key features that make it a lot less scary.
It starts with smashing the bourgeois state apparatus, by disbanding the old army, police, and bureaucratic structures that served capitalist interests. From there, we build workers’ democracy, establishing workers’ councils and localizations as the primary organs of state power, ensuring direct democratic participation from the grassroots.
Under this dictatorship, there will be enacted the nationalization of key industries, bringing all major means of production under social ownership and democratic control. This includes factories, land, banks, utilities — all of it! There will be developed a centrally planned economy focused on meeting the needs of the people, rather than generating private profit.
However, there will be an ongoing struggle against bourgeois ideology and remnants of class society in all spheres of life, fostering a new socialist culture based on cooperation, solidarity, and collective well-being. This goes hand-in-hand with international solidarity, where we extend the hand of revolution to oppressed peoples globally, recognizing that true liberation cannot be acheived in isolation.
Congrats! You made it to your freedom, or more specifically, the only trajectory to it. I hope it’s clear that the global movement is very much still in the first ‘step’; so, in a call to all the other avid writers on this site, I ask you — write, and read! And as you go, get better at reading and writing! Create rhetoric, have arguments, get lost in the weeds, join study groups, and overall we will find that the ball will be past rolling. The ideas are already flowing.
Thank you for taking the time to read this work. Never forget that we can and must forge a new world.