THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION The Russian Revolution, 1917-1921 Written by Kathleen Ruppert Introduction The Russian Revolution was arguably one of the most important events of modern history. It was much more than a political event; 1917 also ushered in a radical cultural, social and economic experiment aimed at transforming society and the individual. The effects of this experiment continue to be felt in the ongoing national struggles of the former Soviet Union. But the events of 1917 also had a tremendous global impact, shaping world history throughout the twentieth century. For one thing, the Bolsheviks never intended the Revolution to be confined to Russia; rather, they intended to use their homeland as a springboard from which to bring about a global revolution. And although the Revolution clearly failed in this respect, it did serve as a model for many third world countries attempting rapid modernisation. Furthermore, revulsion against Communism as institutionalised by the Bolsheviks played a major part in advancing the cause of the extreme right in Germany, and fear
of the spread of Communism influenced American foreign policy throughout the Cold War era. From the standpoint of political history, the so-called Russian Revolution of 1917 is perhaps best understood as two separate revolutions. In February 1917, the monarchy was overthrown and replaced by a Provisional Government, which acted in uneasy co-operation with the socialistdominated Petrograd Soviet of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies. This system of ‘dual authority’ was fraught with tensions and contradictions. Coupled with social and economic crises made worse by Russia's involvement in the First World War, the system contributed to the growing radicalisation of Russian politics and culminated in the Bolshevik seizure of power in October—the ‘second’ Russian Revolution. The Bolshevik Party (renamed the Communist Party in 1918) proceeded to consolidate its power over the course of the next several years, as Lenin and the Bolsheviks employed ruthless measures to eradicate any political opposition, thus creating the first one-party state and providing a model for later totalitarian regimes. But even after the Bolshevik takeover, the Russian Revolution seemed to embody several overlapping revolutions, not all of them confined to the realm of politics. In addition to their replacement of the tsarist regime with a Communist dictatorship, the post-1917 regime instituted several important social changes: specifically, an economic revolution that introduced an experiment in socialism and a command economy, and a cultural revolution that aimed to remake the individual (Wade, Bolshevik Revolution 3). Additionally, it must be borne in mind that the Russian empire in 1917 was a vast and ethnically diverse entity. As one historian is careful to note, ‘The various regional Russian and non-Russian populations of the Empire experienced revolutions different from one another in origin, aspiration, evolution and outcome’ (Read 1). An awareness of such diversity has increasingly come to characterise the historiography of the Russian Revolution in recent years. Not surprisingly, the Russian Revolution has been the subject of great debate among historians. For many years, Western scholarship on the Revolution focused almost exclusively on the study of political leaders and institutions, and on the importance of competing ideologies in determining the course of the Revolution. While such work is certainly important and
has taught us a great deal about the events of 1917, it leaves out the perspective ‘from below’, failing to consider the experiences and aspirations of ordinary people. Social historians in recent decades have begun to redress that imbalance by considering how workers, peasants, soldiers and (to a lesser extent) women and national minorities both had an impact on and were impacted by the Russian Revolution. The effect of much of this social history has been to elucidate the ways in which the experiences of the Russian people—and not just the propaganda of intellectuals and party leaders—contributed to a radicalisation of politics both before and after February 1917. Such insights speak to one of the central questions in historical debate about the Russian Revolution: to what extent was the course of the Revolution dictated by Lenin and a tightly controlled party, and to what extent was it the product of war-weariness, food shortages, industrial decline and peasant demands for land? A related question has to do with the legitimacy of the October Revolution and, by extension, the regime that ensued. The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 fanned the flames of controversy among historians, as Richard Pipes reiterated his view that the October event was a coup d'état conducted by a band of ‘fanatical intellectuals’ with no popular mandate. Pipes accused revisionist historians of having been duped into accepting the approved Soviet view that ‘October was indeed a genuine mass revolution driven from below’ (Kowalski 8). As Pipes's comments show, the relative importance of political versus economic factors and of ideology versus popular aspirations, continues to be the subject of debate among historians seeking to understand both the underlying causes and the eventual outcome of the Russian Revolution. Causes The causes of the Russian Revolution were partly political. A growing segment of Russia's educated classes, many of them educated in the West, had come to resent the autocracy of Tsar Nicholas II. A series of Russian defeats in the First World War further undermined the Tsar's standing in the eyes of both the educated (particularly the radical intelligentsia) and uneducated classes. Social and economic factors also played a role in bringing about the Revolution. Inflation and food shortages fuelled popular discontent in
the towns and cities and led to an increase in strikes. In the countryside, peasant unrest was motivated by demands for land redistribution. These problems were exacerbated by WWI, which not only brought material hardships such as food shortages, but also undermined the security of the cities and towns by calling many troops away to the front. Effects Within Russia: The effects of the Revolution included the end of the monarchical system in Russia, the destruction of the landowning class and—with temporary reverses in 1921—the imposition of a communist economy. The Red Terror and the Russian Civil War also resulted in tremendous loss of life during the course of the Revolution. In the world: The Russian Revolution served as a model for many third world countries attempting rapid modernisation. By ushering in the first one-party state, it also served as a model for future totalitarian regimes. On the other hand, revulsion against Communism would later play a major part in advancing the cause of the extreme right in Germany. Further, fear of the spread of Communism would influence American foreign policy throughout the Cold War era.
Key People/Places Tsar (Emperor) Nicholas II (1868-1918): Emperor of Russia from 1894 until his abdication on March 2, 1917, Nicholas is generally characterised as an indecisive and ineffective ruler. With the encouragement of his wife, Tsarina (Empress) Alexandra (1872-1918). Nicholas clung to his status as an autocrat and thus served as an obstacle to meaningful political and social reform. Dislike for Empress Alexandra grew during WWI because of her German origins and because of her association with Rasputin (1869?-1916), (1869?-1916) , a peasant healer from Siberia who treated the young heir to the throne, Tsarevich (Crown Prince) Aleksei (1904-18) , for haemophilia. Many contemporaries, including conservative monarchists, regarded Rasputin's much-publicised drunkenness, debauchery and influence at court as dishonourable to the Crown. Rumours about Rasputin's alleged affair with the Tsarina, while false, contributed to the desacralisation of the monarchy and further undermined the imperial couple's popularity in the eyes of the Russian people. Sergei Witte (1849-1915): Witte was minister of finance under Nicholas II and the driving force behind industrialisation. It was Witte who persuaded the Tsar to make concessions to the liberals in October 1905 in order to save the monarchy. Peter Stolypin (1862-1911): Appointed minister of the interior in the spring of 1906 and chairman of the Council of Ministers a few months later, Stolypin devoted his first two years in office to quelling agrarian disturbances and political terrorism in the wake of the 1905 revolution. He is perhaps best remembered for his efforts to reform the peasant landowning system by weakening the commune and encouraging peasants to consolidate their holdings and create independent family farms. Stolypin was assassinated by a political terrorist in 1911. Alexander Kerensky (1881-1970): A moderate socialist, Kerensky was the only individual to hold positions in both the Petrograd Soviet and the Provisional Government. He rapidly became a key figure in the government, occupying several important posts in the course of 1917: minister of justice (Ma rch-April), mi nister of war (May-August) and minister-president (July-October). Kerensky's political career ended in October when the Provisional Government was overthrown. Paul Miliukov (1859-1943): Miliukov was a founding member of the Constitutional Democratic (Kadet) Party and the editor of that party's newspaper. Together with another prominent liberal, Prince Georgii Lvov (1861-1925) , Miliukov organised the first Provisional Government when Tsar Nicholas II abdicated. Miliukov served as foreign
minister in the Provisional Government until his unpopular policy in favour of Russia's continued involvement in World War I precipitated the April Crisis and led to his resignation. Lvov served as the first minister-president of the Provisional Government. He resigned in the aftermath of the July Days demonstrations and was replaced by Kerensky. Irakli Tsereteli (1881-1960): Tsereteli was a leading figure in the Petrograd Soviet during the early months of the Revolution. He is best known for having developed and promoted the doctrine of ‘Revolutionary Defencism’, which called for a negotiated peace without annexations annexations or indemnities. Unlike Lenin, Tsereteli—a Georgian Menshevik—advocated co-operation between socialists and liberals. Vladimir Lenin (1870-1924): As founder and leader of the Bolshevik Party, Lenin is perhaps the best-known (and arguably the most important) figure of the Russian Revolution. His 1902 treatise What Is to Be Done? calls for the formation of a small body of professional revolutionaries to cultivate revolutionary consciousness among industrial workers and lead them on the path to revolution. His real name was Vladimir Ulyanov. Leon Trotsky (1879-1940): Born Lev Bronstein, Trotsky did not join the Bolshevik Party until July 1917. Once a member, though, Trotsky quickly assumed a leadership position on the Bolshevik Central Committee. He was elected chairman of the Petrograd Soviet in September 1917 and later played a leading role in consolidating the Bolshevik regime. As commissar of war, Trotsky played an essential role in bringing about the Red (Bolshevik) victory in the Russian Civil War. After a power struggle with Stalin following Lenin's death, Trotsky was exiled and eventually assassinated by a Stalinist agent near his home in Mexico City. Joseph Stalin (1878-1953): Stalin served as commissar for nationalities in the first Bolshevik regime. Later, in his capacity as general secretary (1928-1953), (1928-1953), Stalin would demonstrate his capacity for ruthless leadership. Born Iusof (Joseph) Djugashvili, Djugashvili, he adopted the name Stalin—derived from the Russian word for steel —in —in 1913.
Lavr Kornilov (1870-1918): Appointed supreme commander in chief of the Russian army in July 1917, General Kornilov advocated harsh measures to restore order both at the front and at home. Kornilov was dismissed from his position in August 1917 amid suspicions that he planned to stage a counterrevolutionary coup against the Provisional Government. Following the October Revolution, Kornilov played an instrumental role in organising the Volunteer Army to fight against the Bolsheviks. Anton Denikin (1872-1947) succeeded Kornilov as commander of White forces in the south, while Alexander Kolchak (1874-1920) was the principal leader of White forces in Siberia and the east during the Russian Civil War.
On the other hand, economic historians have begun to challenge the notion that there was a decline in living standards in the Russian countryside in the decades leading up to the First World War. It must be recalled, however, that there was great variation from one region of the Russian empire to another, a fact that makes generalisation difficult. Additionally, Additionally, even where there was an improvement in living standards, it was not necessarily the case that peasant grievances had been assuaged. One indication of continued discontent is the fact that between 1910 and 1914 there were 17,000 agrarian disturbances recorded in European Russia (Channon 117).
The Legacy of Serfdom—Conditions in Late Imperial Russia At the beginning of the twentieth century, Russia was the only great power that still maintained an autocratic system of government. In the absence of either a centrally elected parliament or a constitution, constitution, the authority of Tsar Nicholas II was unlimited, and any expression of discontent was severely punished. In fact, the criminal code made it a felony to question the tsar's authority or to express a desire for social change. The police department engaged in secret surveillance of suspected political dissidents, who were subject to search and arrest, imprisonment and exile for up to five years without a trial (Pipes 16). Such civil liberties as freedom of expression and assembly were denied, making trade unions and political parties illegal until after the revolution of 1905. Political grievances were widespread, especially among the educated classes, many of whom were educated in the West. The absence of an effective forum for political participation participation or the redress of grievances undoubtedly contributed to the development of a radical intelligentsia bent on overthrowing tsarist autocracy. In addition to its practices of political repression, the tsarist regime routinely persecuted religious minorities—in other words, those outside the Russian Orthodox Church. Jews, for example, were confined to a specific region called the Pale of Settlement, where they were deprived of a range of basic civil rights (Lieven 193). National and ethnic minorities in general were subjected to ‘Russification’ policies aimed at imposing administrative uniformity—and, in some regions, Russian language and culture—on nonRussians. It should be recalled that Russia at the time was a diverse multinational empire that contained more than one hundred different ethnicities (Wade, Bolshevik Revolution 4). Peasants made up eighty percent of Russian society at the beginning of the twentieth century, and the fact that serfdom had survived until 1861 (when Russia became the last European country to abolish it) had created a number of difficulties. For one thing, the availability of unlimited cheap labour had removed incentives to modernise agricultural practices, so Russian agriculture remained profoundly ‘backward’ by Western standards.
At the heart of peasant unrest was the demand for a more just and equal distribution of land, a demand based on the belief that land should rightfully belong to those who work it. Rural overpopulation at the turn of the century intensified the agrarian crisis. Resentment was further exacerbated by the Stolypin reforms, which threatened to destroy the village commune system by enclosing communal plots and converting them to private property (ironically, those peasants who did take advantage of the Stolypin land reforms would have the land taken from them by the communes in 1917.) The tsarist regime was therefore confronted with ongoing agrarian disturbances in the years leading up to the Revolution. The legacy of serfdom made itself felt in other ways as well. For one thing, the Russian peasantry was never integrated into the political structure. Some historians argue that traditions of serfdom and the system of communal landholding prevented the peasantry from developing qualities required for modern citizenship (and hence, these historians conclude, it is no surprise that the Revolution replaced tsarist autocracy with a new form of despotism) (Pipes 386). Additionally, though it is difficult to assess the attitudes of a largely illiterate class, there is evidence that serfdom had inculcated in peasants a hostility toward their masters that survived abolition (and, in Soviet times, was transferred from the landowner to the state). According to one historian, the failure to overcome the cultural, political, economic and social legacy of serfdom was the prime cause of the Revolution (Read 28). Although Russia was considered a great power at the beginning of the twentieth century, it lagged behind the other great powers in terms of economic development. Efforts at rapid industrialisation produced a new working class with ‘enormous revolutionary potential’ (Wade, Bolshevik Revolution 5). For one thing, economic protests (over wages or working conditions) were likely to turn political in the face of harsh repression by state authorities (Fitzpatrick 20). Additionally, Additionally, the industrial industrial sector, while small, was highly concentrated geographically, thus facilitating efforts at organisation and education. Finally, the peasants' deeply rooted social antagonism against the propertied classes also appeared among certain groups of workers, most of whom had recently migrated from the countryside, and radical intellectuals capitalised on growing working-class consciousness to gain support for their revolutionary program. Historians debate the relative importance of social and political factors in explaining the Russian Revolution. Given the conditions of late imperial Russia, it seems clear that a combination combination of both types of factor generated mass discontent on a scale that threatened and ultimately undermined the tsarist regime.
1905 and the Constitutional Experiment On January 9, 1905, as a group of unarmed workers approached the Winter Palace to present a petition of grievances to the Tsar, they were fired upon by Cossack troops. At least two hundred demonstrators were killed and hundreds more were wounded. The incident, which became known as Bloody Sunday, sparked the 1905 revolution. Before Bloody Sunday, the Russian masses had not played a major role in the political turmoil of late tsarist Russia. That soon changed, however, as general demonstrations were held to protest the massacre, and several hundred thousand workers went on strike (Pipes 38-39). Liberals used the occasion to press the Tsar to abandon autocracy in favour of a constitutional monarchy. Nicholas's initial attempt to appease popular opinion backfired: he decided to allow university students to hold assemblies for the first time since 1884 and, quite unexpectedly, forbade the police to enter university grounds. But the universities consequently became more of a radical hotbed than ever as students, along with workers from nearby factories, held political rallies without any fear of police intervention.
By late summer and early autumn, the situation looked especially bleak from the Tsar's perspective, as fresh waves of workers' strikes spread across the country. At the same time, the regime was faced with continued student demonstrations, peasant disorders, mutinies in the armed forces, and unrest among national minorities in the non-Russian regions of the empire. According to one historian of the period, ‘The autocracy [. . .] was consistently consistently on the defensive, seized by panic and confusion and apparently unable to restore order’ (Fitzpatrick 33). In October, the minister of finance, Sergei Witte, convinced Nicholas to grant concessions to the liberals in order to separate them from the radicals and hopefully restore order. According to Witte, there was no other way to save the state (Pipes 41). It was with these objectives in mind that Nicholas signed the October Manifesto, by which he promised to grant civil liberties and create a nationally elected parliament, the Duma. Laws were passed during the next several months abolishing censorship and guaranteeing freedom of assembly and association. The concessions did not satisfy everyone, but they were effective in creating divisions among the revolutionaries (Marples 13). It was in large part the granting of such concessions that enabled Nicholas to weather the storm of 1905 and preserve his monarchy intact. The liberals withdrew
from revolutionary activity, at least in the short term, as they prepared for the upcoming Duma elections. At the same time, Russia, having suffered defeat in the war with Japan, was able to get out of that conflict quickly and come through the negotiations reasonably well. By no means, however, was stability restored to Russia in 1905. Political terrorism and social unrest remained key characteristics of Russian life: in 1908 alone, 1,800 officials were killed and 2,038 were wounded in politically motivated attacks (Fitzpatrick 35). Workers remained actively revolutionary and became increasingly militant throughout 1905. The intelligentsia became more, rather than less, radical; in general, they saw the events of 1905 as an episode on the road to fullscale revolution. Peasant uprisings swept the provinces, as peasants sacked and burned manor houses and attacked landowners and officials. By the winter of 1906-07, much of rural Russia was under martial law. A degree of order was restored only when Stolypin, chairman of the Council of Ministers, set up field courts-martial to dispense summary justice that often resulted in execution. With the publication of a constitution—the Fundamental Laws—in 1906, it became clear that Nicholas intended to retain what he could of his autocratic powers. In fact, the document still referred to the Tsar as ‘autocrat’. As promised in the October Manifesto, a two-chamber parliament was established, of which the lower house, the State Duma, was made up entirely of elected officials. But this was in some senses a hollow concession: the franchise system was designed to ensure the representation of the propertied classes at the expense of peasants, workers and ethnic minorities (Pipes 45). Further undermining the possibility of true reform was the fact that the Crown reserved the right to dissolve the Duma at any time, and Article 87 of the Fundamental Laws empowered the Crown, in emergencies, to rule by decree when parliament (which included both the Duma and the State Council) was not in session. In practice, Stolypin took advantage of Article 87 to enact a series of decrees that enabled peasants to withdraw from the commune and set up private farms. Ironically, these reforms were widely resented by a
majority of the peasants, who chose to remain in the commune because of their traditional opposition to private landownership and because of the greater security the commune offered; most peasants felt threatened by the reform, which aimed to destroy the commune system (Pipes 50). After the government dissolved the Second Duma in June 1907, Stolypin also used Article 87 to enact a new electoral law that increased the representation of propertied classes even further, a change that eventually led to a more conservative legislature (Pipes 51). The outcome of the 1905 revolution was therefore somewhat ambiguous. While the Russian people certainly enjoyed greater civil and political liberties than they had in the past, the ease with which the authorities could circumvent the Duma—coupled with the continued prevalence prevalence of the police regime— meant that those liberties were somewhat limited in practice.
Popular Aspirations In the weeks following February 1917 and the overthrow of the old regime, the popular mood in Russia was one of extreme optimism. A festive atmosphere was particularly apparent in the cities, where massive rallies and parades were held, red flags and banners were waved, and revolutionary songs were sung (Wade, Russian Revolution 87). The creation of the Provisional Government seemed to hold out promise of great things to come, not least of which was to be the convening of a Constituent Assembly elected by universal franchise. A host of grievances, from economic dislocations to Russian defeats in World War I, had been blamed on the ineptitude and backwardness of the old regime. Now, it was hoped, the new government could get on with the business of satisfying popular aspirations. In the case of peasants, this meant, first and foremost, the redistribution of landed property—that is, lands held by the nobility, the state and the church—to the communes. For urban workers, major aspirations included wage increases, an eight-hour workday and workers' supervision (i.e., the right to have some supervisory function over factory production and working conditions) (Wade, Russian Revolution 92). Soldiers, for their part, desired a change in the nature of military service, as evidenced by their support of Order No. 1.
They also, to varying degrees, wanted to see an end to Russia's involvement in World War I. Meanwhile, several national minority groups sought at least some kind of national autonomy within a federal state. But on the most urgent issues confronting it—the Constituent Assembly, land reform, the national question, peace—the Provisional Government moved slowly if at all, and consequently some of the optimism of February began to erode. Over time, it became clear that, largely due to factors beyond its control, the government was unable to satisfy popular aspirations. Perhaps most telling was fact that the government kept postponing Constituent Assembly elections, not with any Machiavellian intent, apparently, but simply because it had more pressing matters to attend to (Pipes 95). Radical socialists capitalised on this failure, arguing that only a Soviet government could guarantee guarantee a Constituent Assembly. Meanwhile, the government procrastinated on other major issues, claiming that only the Constituent Assembly would have the authority to deal with them. Food shortages and economic hardship contributed to growing popular disillusionment with the Provisional Government throughout the summer of 1917. Peasants continued to press for land distribution, while inflation and economic crisis made workers fear they would lose any gains they had made since February. Separatist movements in some of the non-Russian regions, most notably Ukraine, gathered strength and added to the instability of the period. Discontent over Russia's involvement in the war continued to increase, particularly after the government launched an unsuccessful military offensive in June. The Bolsheviks, having remained aloof from the coalition government, continued to benefit politically from all this discontent by positioning themselves as an alternative to the Provisional Government. Thus popular aspirations and objective social and economic circumstances contributed to the development of a second revolution in October. While recognising that fact, however, we should not neglect the role that the Bolshevik leadership, and especially Lenin, played in shaping the nature of that second revolution. The Bolshevik Party was able to increase its popular following in the summer and autumn not simply through default—that is, not simply because it offered an alternative to the largely discredited Provisional Government—but Government—but because it capitalised on popular aspirations to make its programme attractive to a number of groups.
Lenin and the Bolsheviks Any consideration of the Russian Revolution must take into account the role played by the Bolshevik Party and its leader, Lenin. This is by no means an unproblematic task, of course. Lenin, for instance, has been variously labelled a brilliant idealist, an opportunistic and powerhungry politician, and a leader who happened to be in the right place at the right time. But the usual problems of historical interpretation have in this case been further complicated for nearly a century by the blackout of information that accompanied the Cold War. Most historians now agree that Lenin's successful bid for power was made possible in part by a willingness to form temporary alliances with groups whose long-term aspirations he did not share, at least in the period before the Bolshevik coup. Lenin had outlined this approach as early as 1902 in his treatise What Is to Be Done? ‘Our task’, he counselled fellow Bolsheviks, ‘is to use every manifestation of discontent, and to gather and turn to the best account every protest, however small’ (Lenin 151). Thus, although Lenin was in theory opposed to transferring land to the peasants, he realised that peasant support was essential, and therefore embraced, at least in the short term, the Socialist Revolutionary plan that called for the transfer of all land to the peasant communes (Pipes 108). It was partly through the use of such tactics that the Bolsheviks came to enjoy widespread popular support in Petrograd by the autumn of 1917. Others suggest that the Bolshevik coup had something to do with the forcefulness of Lenin's personality, although it is difficult to measure how much this interpretation may have been influenced by Soviet propaganda, which lionised Lenin after his death. It is true that given the political climate brought about by the Kornilov Affair in August—a climate favourable to the radical left—Lenin urged immediate action and recommended an armed insurrection to overthrow the government. Although more moderate Bolsheviks—most notably Lev Kamenev and Grigori Zinoviev—preferred to await the convocation of the Second Congress of the Soviets, at which time they felt they would be able to assume power by legitimate means (Pipes 137-38), Lenin was ultimately able to persuade them to follow his plan. Still, it is difficult to measure the extent to which the
Bolsheviks were determining the course of events as opposed to merely responding to them. In October, when the Bolshevik-controlled Petrograd Soviet created the Military Revolutionary Committee (MRC), effectively undermining the power of the Provisional Government, Kerensky responded by shutting down the leading Bolshevik newspapers. This made possible an armed insurrection that the Bolsheviks could claim was in defence of the Revolution. According to some historians, the Bolsheviks adopted an offensive strategy
and intentionally provoked the government into retaliatory measures because they wanted to cloak their seizure of power in the guise of defending the Revolution (Pipes 141). But others maintain that the Bolsheviks acted defensively, and that the October Revolution was not created by Lenin or a particular Bolshevik plan, but rather was a spontaneous response to Kerensky's efforts to suppress the left (Wade, Russian Revolution 232).
Ultimately, it appears that the Bolshevik seizure of power was attributable both to deliberate manoeuvres by Lenin and his party and to and to the favourable circumstances they found themselves in. It is important to note that the transfer of power, carried out with remarkably little bloodshed in Petrograd (though the same could not be said of Moscow), was made in the name of the Petrograd Soviet, and not the Bolshevik Party (Wade, Russian Revolution 238-39). The slogan ‘[a]ll power to the Soviets!’ had been popular at least since the summer, and though the Bolsheviks (or at least Lenin) had no intentions of sharing power with other socialist parties, they carefully manipulated this slogan to ensure popular approval, or at least acceptance, of the events of October 25. On the other hand, transforming a seizure of power in the name of the Soviets into a Bolshevik regime was facilitated to some extent by the decision of Menshevik and Social Revolutionary delegates to walk out of the Congress of Soviets in protest. This act left the Bolsheviks with an absolute majority in the congress, and was arguably tantamount to handing the revolution to them (Wade, Russian Revolution 239). Historians continue to debate the significance of Lenin's role in the Russian Revolution. Soviet historiography has traditionally portrayed Lenin as an infallible leader—a sort of demigod—without whose leadership the October Revolution would not have been possible. These accounts depict the Bolshevik Party as a well-organised and unified body and pay little or no attention to dissenting voices. Such interpretations dominated Soviet historiography from the early years of the Revolution and have been attributed to the Communist regime's need to legitimise its monopolisation of political power after 1917. As one historian paraphrases the official Soviet interpretation: ‘Without the Party, the masses would have remained insufficiently conscious and organised to seize power, without the Party the revolution would not have survived the civil war [. . .]’ (Kowalski 3). Recent scholarship has challenged this view of the Party, arguing instead that the leadership often lagged behind the aspirations of the rank and file (Kowalski 6). Similarly, the myth of Lenin as an infallible demigod has been debunked, although historians continue to acknowledge the vital role that Lenin played in shaping the Revolution.
The Civil War(s) Recent studies on the Russian Civil War (which followed the Revolution) emphasise the complexity of the event, pointing to two or even three distinct conflicts where scholars used to emphasise only one. The focus of conventional analyses has been the period from the autumn of 1918 until the autumn of 1920, which witnessed a prolonged and bloody struggle between the Reds (the Bolsheviks) and the Whites (Russian nationalist officers, supported by industrialists and former landowners). But another conflict preceded that one in the second half of 1918, when Bolsheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries struggled for control. And yet another conflict occurred after the final defeat of the Whites in the autumn of 1920, when the focus of fighting shifted to widespread insurrections of disgruntled peasants, collectively referred to as the Green movement (Kowalski 114). The first serious challenge the Bolsheviks faced in 1918 came not from White armies, but from a group that called itself the Committee of Members of the Constituent Assembly (the Komuch). The Right Socialist Revolutionaries (the SR party had officially split in December 1917) set up the Komuch in Samara in June 1918 with the aid of insurgent Czechoslovak legions, and through it established a regional government for the Volga based on the platform of the Socialist Revolutionary party. The Komuch attempted to secure the support of the peasants and workers by promising them a share in the fruits of the Revolution. The main objectives of the Komuch were to restore the Constituent Assembly and tear up the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (Kowalski 115). Despite failed attempts at mass mobilisation, the People's Army (as the army of the Komuch was called) was nevertheless able to capture Kazan in August.
Bolshevik success against the White armies has also been attributed in part to Bolshevik control of the Russian heartland, which gave them access to a better communications system and to the Moscow and Petrograd factories that had recently been harnessed for World War I. In addition, the Bolsheviks had better organisation and leadership, while the Whites suffered more from internal divisions (Marples 79). A crucial shortcoming for the White armies—the social composition of which was the property-owning minority—was their failure to garner support among the peasantry. The reluctance of most White officers to offer significant concessions to nonRussian minorities further hindered White chances of success. For example, relations between Denikin and the Cossacks, especially the Kuban Cossacks, were strained by Denikin's emphasis on a ‘Russia one and indivisible’ (Mawdsley 208-09). Finally, the level of foreign intervention on behalf of the White forces appears to have been greatly exaggerated in Soviet mythology (and in the accounts of some historians). In reality, most scholars now agree, the support from the Allies was half-hearted at best (Swain 3). With the defeat of the White Army in the autumn of 1920, peasant revolts erupted across Russia on an almost unprecedented scale. Many of the peasant guerrilla leaders had formerly been allied with the Red Army in defeating the White forces; as the threat of a White victory (which would have meant the return of the landlords) receded, however, revolt against Bolshevik policies spread (Williams 127). Leaders of the so-called Green armies appealed to the peasants with promises of local autonomy. The peasants' aim was to rid themselves of Moscow's control and govern themselves through popularly elected local soviets (Williams 128). The revolt spread to Siberia in February 1921, and grain supplies to Moscow were cut. It took a combination of concessions (most notably the introduction of the NEP) and brutal repression to finally quell the peasant revolts.
The Civil War between Bolsheviks and the Komuch ‘patriotic socialists’—so called because of their opposition to the Brest-Litovsk Brest-Litovsk treaty—was in a sense undermined and ultimately hijacked by the decision of White generals to stage a coup in Omsk in November 1918. At that Given the complexity of the Russian Civil War, it is worth considering why point, the Civil War truly the historiography of the event has for so long been focused almost became a conflict between exclusively on the struggle between Red and White forces. Several historians Red and White (Williams attribute the conventional oversimplification oversimplification to Communist attempts to 106). It was a conflict that justify an d glorify the B olshevik vi ctory. As one historian summ arises the the Bolsheviks would win for official Communist view: ‘The villains were the Whites, hirelings of world a number of reasons. Geoffrey imperialism and reactionaries [. . .]. They failed miserably in their counterSwain has made the compelling revolutionary endeavours because the entire Russian people, so the myth suggestion that the involvement goes, rose in heroic effort to defend their own Soviet power of workers and of White forces ensured Bolshevik peasants’ (Brovkin 3). By reducing the complexity of the Civil War to a victory by ‘throwing waverers into simple dichotomy of Red versus White, revolution versus reaction, Soviet the arms of the Bolsheviks’; the historians were able to minimise the extent of opposition to the Bolshevik newfound commitment came out of a regime among the very classes the Bolsheviks claimed to represent. Since the desire to fight what they perceived to opening of Soviet archives 1991, historians in the former Soviet Union and be the greater of two evils (Swain 251). in the West have been discovering that the Russian Civil War was a much
Building a One-Party State Upon assuming power in October 1917, the Bolsheviks quickly turned to repressive measures to consolidate their authority, in what some would argue was one of the great ironies of the Revolution. The first law passed by the new regime instituted press censorship, and opponents' newspapers were quickly shut down. On November 28, the government ordered the arrest of leading Kadets, calling that liberal liberal party ‘a party of the enemies of the people’ (Wade, Bolshevik Revolution 60). On December 7, a special organisation was established to combat enemies of the Revolution, real or imagined; this Extraordinary Commission for Combating CounterRevolution, Sabotage and Speculation (or Cheka, as it was more commonly called) quickly became the main vehicle for political terror. The use of political terror increased in 1918, especially after an attempt on Lenin's life in August. Authorities announced 512 executions in Petrograd alone on a single day in September (Wade, Bolshevik Revolution 182). Both Lenin and Trotsky defended the use of terror against class enemies as an essential part of the dictatorship of the proletariat. They called for terror to be used not only against the old exploiting classes (landowners, wealthy peasants, capitalists and so on), but also against other socialist groups who opposed the Bolshevik program. Lenin regarded any criticism of the regime as treasonous, seeing it as ‘actually impeding impeding our our struggle, actually assisting the White Guards’ (Williams 106-07). And according to Trotsky, socialism could not be achieved (at least not in Russia at that time) without revolutionary violence and repression. Thus, for Lenin and Trotsky, anyone who desired the end of socialism must accept the means of terrorism (Kline 158). Historians generally agree that the Bolsheviks could have avoided such extreme measures and spared Russia the tragedy of civil war, had they been willing to form a coalition government with other socialist groups. When elections to the Constituent Assembly made it clear, however, that the Bolsheviks would not hold a majority of the seats, the Bolshevik-controlled government forcibly dismissed that body after it had been allowed to convene for a single day. This act had serious implications; by dispersing the Constituent Assembly, the Bolsheviks made it clear that they would not be voted from power and this consequently opened the door to civil war. The dispersal of the Constituent Assembly also led a number of nationalities to assert full independen independence. ce. Some historians have argued that the Bolsheviks' decision to abandon electoral politics and thus rule by force laid the foundations of the dictatorship and political culture of the future Soviet Union (Wade, Russian Revolution 282). Others, like Richard Pipes, trace the roots of Russian totalitarianism totalitarianism back even further, calling attention to the similarities between the autocracy of
the tsars and the one-party state created by the Bolsheviks. As Pipes points out, ‘Marxism had libertarian as well as authoritarian strains, and which of the two prevailed depended on a country's political culture’ (394). Other recent works similarly argue that tsarist Russia failed to produce the political institutions and legal traditions that served, in France and elsewhere, as a basis for liberalism (Kotkin 397). Still other historians argue that it was contradictions at the core of Bolshevik ideology, rather than something inherent in Russia's political tradition, that led the Soviet regime down the path of authoritarianism (Kowalski 12). Contemporaries were not unaware of the similarities between tsarist Russia and the Bolshevik regime that developed in the wake of the revolution. When a procession of workers, demonstrating in favour of the Constituent Assembly, was dispersed by force in January 1918 (resulting in a number of deaths), one Russian newspaper compared the incident to Bloody Sunday of 1905 (Williams 98). A famous contemporary anarchist, Peter Kropotkin, wrote a pamphlet in which he denounced the destruction of the free press and of free elections, along with the enormous bureaucratisation of every detail of life (all of which were reminiscent of the old regime). Kropotkin condemned the Bolsheviks for returning to the past (Burbank 522). Ironically, the Bolshevik revolution, which was supposed to smash all traces of the old regime and radically overhaul Russian society, ushered in a new despotism that was similar in some key respects to tsarist autocracy.
‘War Communism’ and the New Economic Policy (NEP) The economic policies pursued by the Bolshevik/Communist Party from 1918 until 1921 had both a pragmatic and an ideological component (Fitzpatrick 78). With regard to the former, the Bolsheviks had inherited from the Provisional Government—and the Provisional Government had inherited from the old regime—an economy that was near collapse. Inflation and food shortages, exacerbated by the First World War, had created tremendous economic instability. instability. It was left to the newly formed Bolshevik regime to get the economy back on track—but of course the track that they chose to take was based on certain ideological assumptions. Above all, the Bolsheviks believed that the capitalist system was not only unjust but also unproductive. Socialism, they argued, would prove a much more more efficient system because resources would be allocated in a rational manner (Pipes 192). Beginning in 1918, the Communist Party enacted a number of measures designed to place the entire economy under state control. These measures, known collectively as ‘War Communism’, Communism’, included the nationalisation of the means of production and transport, the nationalisation of retail and wholesale trade, the abolition of money as a unit of exchange and the imposition of a single plan that would govern the whole economy (193). Whereas the Bolsheviks had endorsed ‘worker control’ of industry in 1917, they now seemed to favour a system through which managers appointed by the state would run the factories according to the directions of a central planning agency (Fitzpatrick 81). In the countryside, the People's Commissariat of Food Procurement was given dictatorial authority to centralise and fully control the requisitioning of food for the cities and the army. Believing that wealthy peasants were hoarding vast amounts of grain, the Soviet
authorities attempted to foment class warfare by enlisting the help of the poorer peasants in forcibly extracting the grain from the barns of their richer neighbours. The plan failed, in part because land redistribution of 1917-18 had had a levelling effect in the villages, thus undercutting Bolshevik ideological assumptions about the sharp class divide between rich and poor peasants (Wade, Bolshevik Revolution 73). In fact, one historian of the Russian peasantry argues that it is a mistake to divide the peasantry into two hostile classes—the rural proletariat and the bourgeoisie (or kulaks)—even kulaks)—even in the period before the Revolution. Such a distinction, he insists, hardly existed in reality (Figes, ‘The Peasantry’ 543). In any case, without much help from the Committees of Poor Peasantry, the government had to resort to more direct seizure of peasant surplus, which in turn reinforced peasant suspicions of ‘outsiders’, including Soviet officials.
‘War Communism’ suggests, the measures were introduced in the context of Russia's Civil War. Thus, although the Communist Party (and specifically Lenin) recognised by 1921 that the measures were ineffective, the policies could be characterised as emergency measures necessitated necessitated by the circumstances of the Civil War, a characterisation that allowed them to continue despite their ineffectiveness (Pipes 192-93). Historians disagree as to whether such a characterisation was merely a rationalisation, or whether it was an accurate assessment of the situation. Pipes takes the former position, arguing that the real objective of War Communism was ‘realising genuine communism’, and that the needs of the Civil War were at best a secondary consideration (193). Others conclude that it was most likely a combination of ideology and economic need during the Civil War years that pushed the Bolsheviks toward increasingly centralised control of the economy.
The difficulty of assessing pragmatic versus ideological motives behind the enactment of these economic policies lies in the fact that the policies were not enacted in a vacuum. On the contrary, as the label
The Russian Revolution, 1917-1921. ProQuest. History Study Center. ProQuest LLC. 21 June 2010 .
By 1921, although the White Army had been defeated, the government was confronted with widespread peasant revolts and industrial strikes, accompanied by cries for ‘Soviet power without the Communists!’ When revolt broke out among sailors at the Kronstadt naval base near Petrograd, Lenin was forced to reconsider his policies. He did so not only to quell discontent, but also because the economy by that point was in shambles. In March 1921, Lenin announced a fundamental change in the economic policies of the Communist Party, introducing what came to be known as the New Economic Policy (NEP), a temporary measure intended to stimulate the economy. The new policy ended the requisitioning of peasant surplus, substituting instead a fixed tax in kind. The consumer economy was opened up to free enterprise enterprise and efforts at nationalisation were scaled back, although the state did maintain control of heavy industry, banking, wholesale and foreign trade and transport (Pipes 352). While the NEP certainly represented a retreat from communism in the strict economic sense, it was accompanied by a tightening of political control by the Communist Party. And in 192829, Stalin replaced the NEP with a policy of forced collectivisation collectivisation and industrialisation. industrialisation.
Timeline Note: Until the Bolsheviks consolidated their power in early 191 8, Russia used the Julian calendar as opposed to the Western Gregorian; the latter was thirteen days ahead. This This foll ows the Julian calendar calendar w hen examining events that occurred before this transition, and the Gregorian when examining events that occurred after.
Petrograd from exi le in Siberi a, and and he and the Revolution Revolutionary ary Defencists Defencists quickly establish leadership of the Soviet.
January-June 1918 April-June 1917
Popular dis content, content, exacerbated by Russia's unpopular unpopular and unsuccessful involvement in the Russo-Japanese Russo-Japanese War, explodes into revolution in January, when police and and tsarist troops fire on unarmed demonstrators demonstrators attempting to petition Nicholas II for redress of their g rievances. ‘Bloody Sunday’ (Janua (January ry 9) sparks r iots and demonstrations demonstrations across Russia. In late September and early October, a fresh wave of industrial str ikes forces the Tsar to make concessions. On October 17, Nicholas si gns the October Manifesto, in which he pledges to grant civil liberti es and to establish establish a parliament based, in part, on popular elections.
Returning Returning from S witzerland, Lenin Lenin arrives in Petrograd on April 3 and issues the April Theses, outli ning his plan for the course of the Revolution. The Provisional Government faces its fir st major political crisis in mid-April when Foreign Minister Miliukov's controversial policy of continuing the war to victory leads to massive street demonstrations demonstrations and armed clashes between rival demonstrators. demonstrators. In the wake of the ‘April C risis ’, the government government is reorganised on May 5. Miliukov resi gns and is replaced by Kerensky as minister of war. Several leaders of the Petrograd Soviet, including Tsereteli, are brought into the government to form the firs t coalition government of socialists and nonsocialists. nonsocialists. In June, the coalition government launches launches a mili tary offensive, hoping to lend diplomatic weight to Russi an efforts to s ecure a negotiated peace. peace. The offensive is politically unpopular unpopular and militarily dis astrous, andcontributes to the continued continued radicalisation of popular poli tics.
1907
July-September 1917
Stolypin diss olves the second Duma and and restricts the electoral franchise in June, thus increasing the likelihood of a future revolution.
The summer is marked by almost continual continual gov ernmental ernmental instability. On July 1, a delegation from the P rovisi onal Government Government reaches an agreement with the Central Rada (a Ukrainian council that had declared Ukrainian independence in June) on limited selfgovernment for Ukraine. The agreement leads to the resignation of Kadet ministers and the collapse of the first coalition gov ernment. ernment. During the July Days (July 3-5), garrison soldiers and workers take to the streets to demand ‘[a]ll ‘[a]ll power to the Sov iets!’ The demonstrations demonstrations are fi nally suppressed on July 5, and Lenin and other Bolshevik l eaders are forced into hiding. On July 11, Kerensky replaces Lvov as prime minis ter. Kornilov's attempted attempted coup in late August (22-27) seems to confirm fears of a counter-revolutionary movement. The government collapses once again, resulting in nearly a month of renewed renewed political crisis. On September 25, Trotsky i s elected chairman of the Petrograd Soviet; the s ame day, a third coalition government is formed under Kerensky.
1905
1914-16
Russia faces a series of defeats in the First World War that contribute to gr owing popular dis content content among both the educated educated elite and the masses. February 1917
Widespread industrial strikes sweep Petrogr ad during the second second week of February. On February 22, Nicholas l eaves for the front. Over the course of the next several days, street demonstrations begun in Petrograd on International International Woman's Day (February 23) expand to include thousands thousands of disgruntled workers. On February 26, acting on orders from the government, the the Pavlovski i Guard Regiment fires on a crowd that refuses to dis perse. The massacre sparks a mutiny of the Petrograd garrison, as several regi ments vote to disobey further command commandss to fire on civili civili ans. Throughout the day on February 27, there is widespread looting of shops and private resi dences. Some uniformed policemen are l ynched, and and several mili tary officers are assaulted and killed. Although Nicholas has ordered the Duma dissolv ed, Duma leaders leaders for m a ‘Temporary Committee of the State Duma’ to take over governmental responsibility i n Petrograd. On the same night (February 27-28), the Petrograd Soviet (a local council providing an opportunity opportunity for participatory self-government) is formed. March 1917
On March 1, the Petrograd Soviet is sues Order No. 1, which fundamentally fundamentally alters the structure of the mil itary and effectively subordinates the armed forces to the Soviet. On March 2, Nicholas II abdicates the throne. The same day, Soviet and Duma negotiators announce announce the formation of a Pr ovisional Government that will govern Russia until the Constituent Assembly, which is to be elected by universal franchise can be convened. convened. Leaders of the Sovi et pledge to support the new g overnment as long as that government pursues policies wi th which the Soviet approves; this pledge ushers
White Army forms in the south.
October 1917
On October October 21, the Mil itary Revolutionary Committee (MRC) warns military authorities in Petrograd that henceforth any any orders not countersigned countersigned by the MRC will be considered invalid. On October 24, Kerensky attempts to shut down the leading Bolshevik newspapers, newspapers, but the next day, the Bol sheviks, acting in the name of the Soviet, assume power in Petrograd with remarkably little bloodshed. At the Secon Second d All-Russia Congress of Soviets that evening, representatives representatives of the Menshevik and Socialist Revolutionary (SR) parties walk out, leaving the Bolsheviks in full control of the congress. Under Bolshevik l eadership, the congress congress declares that the Prov isional Gover nment nment has been deposed and that political authority now rests with the Congress of Soviets. On October 26, Lenin introduces the Decree on Peace and the Decree on Land, Land, and a new all-Bolshevik government, the Council of People' s Commissars (Sovnarkom), is formed. By November 2, after considerable bloodshed in Moscow, the Bolshevik r egime has defeated defeated its immediate military adversaries. November-December 1917
The new Bolshevik regi me abolishes ranks and titles, and passes decrees on marriage, divorce and civil regi stration. The Cheka is
The Soviet g overnment officially accepts accepts Finnish independence independence on January January 4. The Constituent Assembly is convened on January January 5 and forcibly dissolved by the Bolsheviks the next day. On Janua January ry 9, the Ukrainian Rada declares independence. The Red Army is created on January January 15 under the direction of Trotsky . On January January 20 , the Bolsheviks i ssue a decree calling for the confiscation of church church property. On February 1, Russi a adopts the Western calendar, which is thirteen days ahead (consequently, (consequently, February 1 becomes February 14). In the early weeks of March, the Cossack and Volunteer Army opposition in s outh Russia collapses, the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk is si gned (March 3), and and the seat of government is moved from Petrograd to Moscow. The rebellion of the Czechoslovak Legion breaks out in late May. July-December 1918
The summer of 1918 sees civ il war in the Russian countryside as peasants peasants refuse to surrender their gr ain to the government. The Komuch government is founded at Samara on June 8, presenting the first major challenge to the authority authority of the Bolsheviks. In late June, the government issues a decree calli ng for the nationalisation nationalisation of industry. Nicholas II and his family are executed at Ekaterinburg on July 16. Throughout August, Denikin's army makes important advances advances in the s outh. On August 6, Czech and Komuch forces capture Kazan. The Red Army retakes Kazan on September 10. Meanwhile, the attempt attempted ed assassination of Lenin on August 30 leads to the extensive use of terror as a security measure. 1919
Fighting continues between Red and and White forces. The Third or Communist International (Comintern) is founded in March and given the task of promoting wor ld revolution. In November, the Red Army captures the White Army' s Siberi an capital, capital, Omsk. Red troops have continued success through November and December, taking most of Ukraine and south Russia. 1920
The White Army s uffers major setbacks as Kol chak is captured and and executed in February and Denikin's army retreats in March. Poland attacks attacks in April, begi nning the Russo-Poli Russo-Poli sh War. Peasant revolt is widespread and their their so-called Gr een armies clash with Bolshevi k troops. The last White Army is destroyed by November. 1921
The peasant revolt continues in Tambov and the surrounding provinces. By early 1 921 the Red Army has reconquered most of the remaining terri tories that had declared independence; independence; Poland, Finland and the Baltic States remain independent. The Kronstadt rebellion occurs in the first two weeks of March while the Tenth Party Congress is in sessi on. At the congress, congress, Lenin introduces the New Economic Policy (NEP). The Treaty of Riga ends the war with Poland on March 18. The Tambov rebellion is suppressed in May, amid conditions of widespread famine. In all, the famine crisi s of 1920-21 claims approximately five million lives (Figes 775).
