editorial

From the editorial board: A new stage

The publication of the first issue of “Communist Prometheus” is a natural result of nearly thirty years of work done by our group. In conditions of extreme weakness on the part of the contemporary workers’ movement and fragmentation of Marxist forces, we are not trying to start all over. On the contrary, we draw upon accumulated political and theoretical experience. Our praxis has passed through several stages, each one required a refinement of strategy and the consistent application of the Marxist method to changing historical conditions.

Contents

1998: THE FORMATION OF A FOUNDATION IN CONDITIONS OF CRISIS

The first step was the publication of the newspaper “Komsa”, launched in June 1998 against the backdrop of a profound economic crisis in Russia. Unlike many “leftist” groups, we did not regard 1991 as a “bourgeois counter-revolution”; for us, it had already taken place in 1925, when Stalinism, having triumphed in the USSR, abandoned the course towards world revolution.

Our emergence was an objective response to the social collapse of the 1990s. The initial impulse was largely rooted in a spontaneous rejection of the “new” bourgeoisie – drawn from the Party and Komsomol nomenklatura. However, this rejection quickly developed into the formulation of a clear political foundation: the necessity of the complete abolition of private property and commodity-money relations, as well as the recognition of the dictatorship of the proletariat as an inevitable transitional stage towards communism.

2014: THE TEST OF INTERNATIONALISM

The principles of proletarian internationalism were inherent to our organisation from the very beginning. Therefore, when the inter-imperialist conflict intensified in 2014 and Ukraine became one of its military fronts, we had no need to revise our positions.

This period compelled us to deepen our analysis of the uneven development of capitalism and the shifting balance of powers on the world stage. At a time when a significant part of the so-called “left” descended into social chauvinism, we consistently defended the classical Marxist thesis: the proletariat has no fatherland, and every modern nation is merely a political and economic shell of capital. The task of the working class in any imperialist conflict is reduced to a single principle: the main enemy is at home.

2026: “COMMUNIST PROMETHEUS” AND THE TASKS OF PARTY-BUILDING

Today, the situation demands that we advance to the next stage. As stated in the published “Manifesto”, the era of bourgeois-democratic revolutions and national liberation movements has definitively come to an end. Capitalism has finally bound the planet in the chains of the world market, while leaving the class of wage labourers divided.

The publication of “Communist Prometheus” is dictated by the necessity of moving towards practical work on the formation of a world communist party. We assess our forces soberly, do not regard ourselves as a fully formed party, and recognise ourselves only as one part of the practical movement towards it. Along this path, we remain open to collaboration with all left-communist organisations that consistently uphold the positions of Marxism and proletarian internationalism.

THE MEANING OF THE NAME AND OUR TASKS

The image of Prometheus reflects our central task – overcoming the bourgeois monopoly on knowledge and bringing Marxist consciousness into the proletariat’s class struggle. Without the assimilation of theory, spontaneous protest remains confined within the limits of economic demands and is incapable of threatening the foundations of the system of wage slavery.

The path from the newspaper “Komsa” in 1998 to the journal “Communist Prometheus” in 2026 represents a process of political and organisational maturation. We critically reassess our past experience and take the next logical step.

We present this journal not just for reading, but as a working instrument for theoretical discussion and organisational co-ordination. We call upon those who share our positions to join the work on the publication and to participate in the process of forming the communist party.

April 2026

Suggest changes