The Worse, The Better

I often hear students say that the reason there's no mass movement for revolution is that things haven't gotten bad enough yet. I argue back, explaining why worse doesn't automatically lead to better. Yet, I must admit, as a political activist, I routinely emphasize the depths of the latest crisis and warn of worse to come. If the path to liberation runs through catastrophe, why do I have such a hard time admitting that? If not, why do we on the Far Left revel in bad news? This essay answers these questions by comparing “the worse, the better” politics as attributed to Lenin with what Lenin actually said and did. I make a case for seeing a crisis as neither wholly good nor wholly bad, but instead as a collection of forces fueling resistance and reaction.