[albionfagan]

I've been reading a lot about the fascinating character of Nechaev of late and it seems that he has a largely negative reputation, even amongst the Bolsheviks. His idea of Revolutionary Catechism expounds upon Chernychevsky's rather obscure hero Rahkmetov, and sets the prototype for the true revolutionary, he advocates violence but can't this also be said of Marx etc? It seems that his personal life and the murder of Ivanov has marred the image of Nechaev, despite his 'revolutionary catechism' being one of the most important revolutionary documents of all time.

Why was Lenin so keen to distance himself from Nechaev's ideals?

[Potemkin]

Nechaev was a protege of Bakunin, who was an Anarchist who was bitterly critical of Marx and frequently attacked Marx's ideas in the revolutionary press. Add to that the fact that Lenin disagreed with the Anarchists' revolutionary strategy of using terrorist attacks against Tsarist officials, and it becomes perfectly understandable that Lenin would seek to distance himself from Nechaev's ideas.

[albionfagan]

So you do not think Nechaev had any profound impact on the revolutionary movement? He is simply Bakunin's protege? I think that is a little harsh, in the end Nechaev himself was critical of Bakunin. Nechaev was closer to Marx than Bakunin ever was, he shared the idea of barracks communism with him in fact and unlike Bakunin he never really gave full support to anarchism, he sought to destroy rather than construct, although it could be argued this one of the key failures of anarhism too.

[Potemkin]

Nechaev was closer to Marx than Bakunin ever was, he shared the idea of barracks communism with him in fact

Marx was always contemptuous of what he called "barracks communism".

[albionfagan]

Sorry, I didn't explain that very well. What I meant was that Nechaev was a proponent of the idea of 'barracks communism', which Marx did critique, but Nechaev's goals were not explicitly anarchist. We do not even have to look at his eventual aims, simply how the revolutionary behaves, I see many parallels with the Bolsheviks.

[Potemkin]

We do not even have to look at his eventual aims, simply how the revolutionary behaves, I see many parallels with the Bolsheviks.

The main parallel is his emphasis of the need to be a professional revolutionary. Apart from that, Nechaev had almost nothing in common with the Bolsheviks, either ideologically or in terms of revolutionary strategy.