In the final analysis, capitalism can destroy the very foundation of its own existence, namely the Earth, and thereby prepare for a regression into barbarism or even the extinction of all life. Both Marx and Lenin were driven by the understanding that a conscious intervention by the proletariat, organized as a class, is necessary to achieve a new society. This is only possible through the overthrow of the rule of the capitalist class. However, since this class is well organized in contrast to the proletariat and possesses armed organs to defend its rule in the form of the bourgeois state, the oppressed must also organize to put an end to this. "State and Revolution" intensely addresses the question of how the victorious working class can maintain its rule against the exploiting class. In doing so, it also refutes.