In order to justify permanent control of a monopoly
single-party hierarchy over the Soviet Union the doctrines of ’the
dictatorship of the proletariat’ and ‘democratic centralism' were
developed. The party leadership was seen as representing the emer- gent majority — the working class - that would be the majority as
industrialisation roceeded. Lenin develo ed Marx's conce t of the-dictatorship of the proletariat to mean ’the organization of the
advanced guard of the oppressed as the ruling class, for the purpose of crushing the oppressors' (Lenin, 1917: 225).