 He still perceived himself as an orthodox Marxist, but he began to diverge from some of Marx's predictions about societal development; whereas Marx had believed that a "bourgeoisie-democratic revolution" of the middle-classes had to take place before a "socialist revolution" of the proletariat, Lenin believed that in Russia, the proletariat could overthrow the Tsarist regime without an intermediate revolution.In February 1917, the February Revolution broke out in St. Petersburg—renamed Petrograd at the beginning of the First World War—as industrial workers went on strike over food shortages and deteriorating factory conditions.The unrest spread to other parts of Russia, and fearing that he would be violently overthrown, Tsar Nicholas II abdicated.