The State and Revolution

Lenin's most important and controversial theoretical text

Lenin’s booklet The State and Revolution struck the world of Marxist theory like a lightning bolt. Written in the months running up to the October Revolution of 1917, Lenin turned the traditional socialist concept of the  state on its head, arguing for the need to smash the organs of the bourgeois state to create a ‘semi-state’ of  soviets, or workers’ councils, in which ordinary people would take on the functions of the state machine in a new and radically democratic manner.

This new edition includes a substantial introduction by renowned theorist Antonio Negri, who argues for the continued relevance of these ideas.

Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, better known by the alias Lenin (1870–1924), was a Russian communist revolutionary, politician, and political theorist. He played a leading role in the Bolshevik revolution of October 1917.