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( Bolshevik)
The Bolsheviks, originally also[1] Bolshevists[2] (Russian ??????????, ????????? (singular) Russian pronunciation&_160;[b?l???'v?ik], derived from bol'shinstvo, "majority", which comes from bol'she, "more", the comparative form of bol'shoi, "big") were a faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) which split apart from the Menshevik faction[3] at the Second Party Congress in 1903. The Bolsheviks were the majority faction in a crucial vote, hence their name. They ultimately became the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.[4] The Bolsheviks came to power in Russia during the October Revolution phase of the Russian Revolution of 1917, and founded the Soviet Union. The Bolsheviks, founded by Vladimir Lenin, were an organization of professional revolutionaries under a democratic internal hierarchy governed by the principle of democratic centralism, who considered themselves as the vanguard of the revolutionary working class of Russia. Their beliefs and practices were often referred to as Bolshevism. Bolshevik revolutionary leader Leon Trotsky frequently used the terms "Bolshevism" and "Bolshevist" after his exile from the Soviet Union to differentiate between what he saw as true Leninism and the regime within the state and the party which arose under Stalin. In the 2nd Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, held in Brussels and London during August 1903, Lenin advocated limiting party membership to a smaller core of active members, as opposed to "card carriers" who might only be active in party branches from time to time or not at all. This active base would develop the cadre, a core of "professional revolutionaries", consisting of devoted communists who would spend the majority of their time organising the party toward a mass revolutionary party capable of leading a workers' revolution against the Tsarist autocracy. The base of active and experienced members would be the recruiting ground for this professional core. Sympathizers would be left outside and the party would be organised based on the concept of democratic centralism. Julius Martov, until then a close friend and colleague of Lenin, agreed with him that the core of the party should consist of professional revolutionaries, but argued that party membership should be open to sympathizers, revolutionary workers and other fellow travelers. The two had disagreed on the issue as early as March-May 1903, but it was not until the Congress that their differences became irreconcilable and split the party.[5] Although at first the disagreement appeared to be minor and inspired by personal conflicts, e.g. Lenin's insistence on dropping less active editorial board members from Iskra or Martov's support for the Organizing Committee of the Congress which Lenin opposed, the differences quickly grew and the split became irreparable. The two factions were originally known as "hard" (Lenin's supporters) and "soft" (Martov's supporters). Soon, however, the terminology changed to "Bolsheviks" and "Mensheviks", from the Russian "bolshinstvo" (majority) and "menshinstvo" (minority), based on the fact that Lenin's supporters narrowly defeated Martov's supporters on the question of party membership. Neither Lenin nor Martov had a firm majority throughout the Congress as delegates left or switched sides. At the end, the Congress was evenly split between the two factions.
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