dictatorship of the proletariat

English

Alternative forms

• DOTP, DotP (initialism)

Etymology

Calque of German Diktatur des Proletariats.

Initially worded as Diktatur der Arbeiterklasse “dictatorship of the working class” and Klassendiktatur des Proletariats “class dictatorship of the proletariat”, both attested earliest in Karl Marx's series The Class Struggles in France, 1848 - 1850 [1850].

Two early appearances of the precise wording Diktatur des Proletariats “dictatorship of the proletariat” are in:

• Joseph Weydemeyer's article “Die Diktatur des Proletariats” [1 January 1852]; and
• Marx's letter to Weydemeyer [5 March 1852].

Noun

dictatorship of the proletariat (countable and uncountable, plural dictatorships of the proletariat)

1. (Marxism) A socio-political power, as opposed to the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, characterized by a struggle to achieve a communist society.

   Antonym: dictatorship of the bourgeoisie

   • 1962 [1852], Joseph Weydemeyer, “The Dictatorship of the Proletariat”, in Hal Draper & Horst Duhnke, transl., Labor History, volume 3, number 2, translation of original in German, page 217 of 214 - 217:

     If a revolution is to be victoriously carried through, it will require a concentrated power, a dictatorship at its head. Cromwell's dictatorship was necessary in order to establish the supremacy of the English bourgeoisie; the terrorism of the Paris Commune and of the Committee of Public Safety alone succeeded in breaking the resistance of the feudal lords on French soil. Without the dictatorship of the proletariat which is concentrated in the big cities, the bourgeois reaction will not be done away with.

   • 1852, Karl Marx, “Abstract from Marx to J. Weydemeyer in New York”, in Marxists Internet Archive‎^[5]:

     What I did that was new was to prove: (1) that the existence of classes is only bound up with particular historical phases in the development of production, (2) that the class struggle necessarily leads to the dictatorship of the proletariat, (3) that this dictatorship itself only constitutes the transition to the abolition of all classes and to a classless society.

   • 1917, Lenin, V. I., “The State and Revolution”, in Lenin Collected Works, volume 25, Moscow: Progress Publishers, translation of original in Russian, published 1964, 1974, 2011, page 418 of 381 - 492:

     Bourgeois states are most varied in form, but their essence is the same: all these states, whatever their form, in the final analysis are inevitably the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie. The transition from capitalism to communism is certainly bound to yield a tremendous abundance and variety of political forms, but the essence will inevitably be the same: the dictatorship of the proletariat.

   • 1957, Chung-cheng (Kai-shek) Chiang, “Beginnings”, in Soviet Russia in China: A Summing-up at Seventy‎^[6], New York: Farrar, Straus and Cudahy, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 39:

     Only after it was all over did I learn of their plan to seize me on board the Chungshan when I was to take it to go back to the Military Academy at Whampoa from Canton. They would then send me as a prisoner to Russia via Vladivostok, thereby removing the major obstacle to their scheme of using the National Revolution as a medium for setting up a "dictatorship of the proletariat."

Translations

a socio-political power

• Albanian: diktatura e proletariatit f
• Arabic: دِكْتَاتُورِيَّة بْرُولِيتَارِيَا f (diktātōriyya broletāriyā)
• Aragonese: dictadura d'o proletariau f
• Asturian: dictadura del proletariáu f
• Azerbaijani: proletariat diktaturası
• Basque: proletarioen diktadura
• Belarusian: дыктату́ра пралетарыя́ту f (dyktatúra praljetaryjátu)
• Bulgarian: диктату́ра на пролетариа́та f (diktatúra na proletariáta)
• Catalan: dictadura del proletariat f
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 無產階級專政／无产阶级专政 (wúchǎn jiējí zhuānzhèng)

• Czech: diktatura proletariátu f
• Danish: proletariatets diktatur n
• Dutch: dictatuur van het proletariaat f
• Esperanto: diktatoreco de la proletaro
• Estonian: proletariaadi diktatuur
• Finnish: proletariaatin diktatuuri, työväen diktatuuri, työväenluokan diktatuuri
• French: dictature du prolétariat (fr) f
• Galician: ditadura do proletariado f
• Georgian: პროლეტარიატის დიქტატურა (ṗroleṭariaṭis dikṭaṭura)
• German: Diktatur des Proletariats (de) f
• Greek: δικτατορία του προλεταριάτου f (diktatoría tou proletariátou)
• Hebrew: דיקטטורה של הפרולטריון f
• Hindi: सर्वहारा की तानाशाही f (sarvahārā kī tānāśāhī)
• Hungarian: proletárdiktatúra (hu)
• Ido: diktatoreso dil proletariaro
• Indonesian: diktator proletariat
• Italian: dittatura del proletariato f
• Japanese: プロレタリア独裁 (プロレタリアどくさい, proretaria dokusai), 無産階級独裁 (むさんか​いきゅうどくさい, musankaikyū dokusai)
• Korean: 프롤레타리아 독재 (peurolletaria dokjae), 무산계급 독재(無産階級獨裁) (musan'gyegeup dokjae)
• Kyrgyz: пролетариат диктатурасы (proletariat diktaturası)
• Latvian: proletariāta diktatūra f
• Lithuanian: proletariato diktatūra f
• Malay: kediktatoran proletariat
• Malayalam: തൊഴിലാളിവർഗ സർവാധിപത്യം (toḻilāḷivaṟga saṟvādhipatyaṁ)
• Nepali: सर्वहारावर्गको अधिनायकत्व (sarvahārāvargako adhināyakatwa)
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: proletariatets diktatur n

• Persian: دیکتاتوری پرولتاریا (diktâtori poroletâriyâ)
• Polish: dyktatura proletariatu (pl) f
• Portuguese: ditadura do proletariado (pt) f
• Punjabi: ਪ੍ਰੋਲਤਾਰੀ ਦੀ ਡਿਕਟੇਟਰਸ਼ਿਪ (proltārī dī ḍikṭeṭarśip)
• Romanian: dictatura proletariatului (ro) f
• Russian: диктату́ра пролетариа́та (ru) f (diktatúra proletariáta)
• Slovak: diktatúra proletariátu f
• Spanish: dictadura del proletariado f
• Swedish: proletariatets diktatur c
• Tajik: диктатураи пролетариат (diktatura-yi proletariat)
• Tamil: தொழிலாளர் சர்வாதிகாரம் (toḻilāḷar carvātikāram)
• Turkish: proletarya diktatörlüğü
• Ukrainian: диктату́ра пролетаріа́ту f (dyktatúra proletariátu)
• Vietnamese: chuyên chính vô sản

See also

• class struggle