ABSTRACT
The period between 1902 and 1907 was vital to the emergence of Lenin. In those years he turned from leading acolyte to Plekhanov into a challenger for his leadership. He also developed ideas about the stages of revolution and the role of Social Democracy in a future revolution – notably the question of that party’s participation in a provisional revolutionary government and the inevitability of armed uprising – which corresponded with positions he later took in 1917. Finally, his actions of the period open up questions about the nature of the split in the Social Democratic Party. Despite polemics that reached peaks of bitterness, there was no complete break.
