The course presents the life and deeds of Joseph Stalin, the leader of the Soviet Union from 1924 till 1953. It analyses the reasons for his actions and their results, as well as the causes of his popularity in Russia today. It offers an analysis of the phenomenon of Stalinism and of its significance for Russia and beyond. In the late 1920s – early 1930s Stalin directed the massive and rapid industrialisation of the country and the forced collectivisation of its agriculture. The industrialisation was based on forced labour, and collectivisation on repression, but both helped to create the material base for the Soviet defence industry. In the late 1930s Stalin unleashed mass terror against the Soviet people, in which millions perished. In his view this helped to rid the country of any potential internal enemies on the eve of the coming war. The USSR, together with its allies, won the Second World War, but at the cost of dozens of millions of lives. Stalin was instrumental in creating the post-war order. The system which he created in the 1930s shaped the USSR as it was during his lifetime and for decades after his death. It also influenced the lives of millions of people beyond the Soviet borders. The course will enable those who take it to develop an informed understanding of the Stalin era and of the phenomenon of Stalinism.
2.6.3. The Bolsheviks’ Push for Power
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En provenance du cours de National Research University Higher School of Economics
Stalin and Stalinism in Russian History
60 notes
National Research University Higher School of Economics
60 notes
À partir de la leçon
Between the Two Revolutions
Lecture 2 describes Russian revolutions of 1905 and 1917 and the place and role of the Bolsheviks in them. It follows Stalin’s career in the Bolshevik party and describes his activities during both revolutions.
Rencontrer les enseignants
Irina FilatovaProfessor
Faculty of Humanities / School of History
July 1917, saw a huge demonstration against the provisional government.
Historians argue until now,
whether it was actually an attempt to
overthrow the government or it was a peaceful demonstration.
What is quite clear was that the demonstration was heavily
armed and the numbers of people who participated increased by the hour.
It started with the first machine gun regiment in Petrograd.
Then it was joined by the cross-talk Marines and then of course the workers.
It is again, not clear whether the Bolsheviks decided
on the demonstration or not but they certainly instigated uprising.
And they certainly decided when it already started.
They decided to participate as they said later,
in order to keep it peaceful and in order to organize the people who demonstrated.
But they didn't manage.
The demonstration finally was about 500,000 people.
And when they got together,
the crowd became unmanageable.
Shooting started and some looting.
And even the Soviets were not,
even the Soviet, the Petrograd Soviet was not able to cope.
The provisional government decided to suppress the demonstration
because it thought that it was an attempt to overthrow the legitimate government.
So, this is the shooting of the demonstration.
And immediately, the provisional government
accused the Bolsheviks of organizing the demonstration,
and some of them were arrested and some had to go underground.
The provisional government also accused the Bolsheviks of being German spies.
And this tactics had some success for a short while because really,
even the soldiers knew that some leadership of the Bolsheviks
arrived in a German carriage through Germany.
Stalin did not take an active part in the demonstration.
He was considered a moderate,
both by Mensheviks and socialist revolutionaries
because during this demonstration or uprising,
if you want, Stalin was an intermediary,
negotiated between the Bolsheviks and the Mensheviks and
socialist revolutionaries when all the communication collapsed.
He was the only one who tried to establish the link.
Lenin went underground.
Here he is in disguise.
Now you can see, he's dressed as a worker.
Here is a very funny picture.
Part of the time in the underground.
Lenin spent in a village over Razliv,
in the suburbs of Sestroretzk town.
That is on the Baltic Sea.
He was supposed to be cutting grass.
He was supposed to be a peasant cutting grass.
But you can see that in a picture,
he had to be dressed in his usual white shirt and a tie.
It would be interesting how the police would
believe that he was really a peasant cutting grass.
In the absence of Lenin and all the senior Bolsheviks,
the sixth congress which took place in August,
1917, Stalin played a very prominent role.
You can see the presidium in the top row.
They are all people who were not there.
That is what the honorary presidium.
They were either in exile or underground or in prison.
The lower part of the picture is the presidium which really presided over the session.
And the Congress noted that the masses,
the people who were radicalized by the hour.
And that the Bolshevik influence, despite their arrests,
and despite the slander about spying for Germany,
the Bolshevik influence grew.
They also noted that the provisional government was impotent.
What helped the Bolsheviks unexpectedly,
was general Kornilov's attempted coup.
Again, it is not clear whether it was an attempted coup or an attempt to cooperate
with the provisional government and to reinstall the power of the provisional government.
Kornilov tried to get the Bolsheviks off the backs of the provisional government.
He tried to cooperate with Kerensky,
who was at that time chairman of the provisional government.
He also spoke about saving the motherland but Kerensky got scared.
Kerensky got scared of the general,
he thought that Kornilov was going to become a dictator.
So, Kerensky ran to the Bolsheviks and
rather to the Soviets and asked to help militarily,
to stop Kornilov troops.
But in the Soviets,
it was only the Bolsheviks who could help militarily,
because they control the troops.
They were the organizers among the troops.
So, they created the Red Guards.
And Kornilov attack was doomed because of several factors.
Kornilov was not prepared to shed blood.
Kornilov was worried that his own troops which were loyal
to him would be contaminated by Bolshevik propaganda.
And finally among his generals,
there were a lot of differences on how to proceed.
So, nothing happened but the provisional government was completely compromised.
The Bolsheviks had to be freed.
Then by September, they were in the majority in the Soviets.
It was obvious that the Kornilov coup helped the Bolsheviks
enormously and that the provisional government was
left without any support or without any troops.
On 10, October, the Bolshevik Party decided on the uprising.
Kamenev and Zinoviev still disagreed and
they published the decision or publicized the decision in a Menshevik paper.
Lenin was outraged.
He insisted on expelling both from the party.
Stalin objected and he managed to persuade Lenin.
He was the editor of the Pravda and an influential person.
What made him oppose Lenin?
Probably, he himself had doubts about
the wisdom of an uprising but probably,
he was just worried that if Zinoviev and Kamenev,
two senior Bolsheviks, are expelled,
this would increase the influence of Leon Trotsky.
Leon Trotsky was a prominent revolutionary. A Menshevik.
He joined the Bolsheviks only in May 1917 when he returned from exile.
In July after the demonstration or uprising,
he was arrested but he was let out.
In September, he became chairman of the Petrograd Soviet.
He was a wonderful speaker and he
concentrated his skills on propagating among the troops.
Here, he is with the Russian troops and Trotsky was also
the founder member and the chairman of
the military revolutionary committee of the Soviet.
As I said, provisional government did not have anybody to defend it.
Women's Death Battalion was just about
the only regiment which did not join the insurrection.
So, it was not difficult for the Red Guards to arrest
the provisional government. Look at this picture.
This is also not quite realistic
because if you look at this provisional government they have fur coats.
They are all old people or elderly people at least and this is not what was happening.
By then, provisional government consisted of
social revolutionaries or Mensheviks who were the revolutionaries themselves.
But be that as it may,
provisional government was indeed arrested.
This was announced by Lenin at
the second Congress of the Soviets which was taking place at that time.
The Bolsheviks formed a government because the Mensheviks and
the Socialist revolutionaries in protest left the Congress of the Soviets.
The only party that remained and which agreed to
support the Bolshevik coup was the left socialist revolutionaries.
But even they did not join the government.
They joined the government a bit later in a few months and stayed only for a few months.
So, the Bolshevik government was just a Bolshevik government.
The last attempt of Bolsheviks at legitimizing
the government power was the convening of the constituent assembly.
At the Congress of the Soviets,
they announced that they are forming a transitional government
that only the Constituent Assembly could create the real one, the real government.
So, they have to convene constituent assembly and they did.
But they discovered that they were in the minority in it;
90 million voters were in Russia at that time,
45 million voted for the constituent assembly and
only 22 percent of these people voted for the Bolsheviks.
So, the Bolsheviks could not pass any of their resolutions.
They could not pass any of the laws that they offered
and they decided to dissolve the constituent assembly.
Rosa Luxemburg, a German Communist,
founder member of the German Communist Party,
wrote, in 1918, she was in prison at that time.
"The Bolsheviks treated the constituent assembly
and the universal suffrage with cold contempt."
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