The Bolsheviks success in the 1917 October revolution, gave them full power under the leadership of Vladimir Lenin. Their aim after successfully overthrowing the Russian autocracy was to create a socialist state. “His[Lenin’s] view was that socialism should be a society where the working people control their own fate, a society organized to benefit the vast majority. This view was the foundation for Lenin’s efforts in socialist construction.” In order to create this society they; formed a new socialist government; introduced the ‘first stage’ of communism- state capitalism; issued a decree on land as promised in their manifesto and focused on industrialising and collectivising in order to facilitate a socialist state. However, problems which may cause failure in the creation of a socialist state include the civil war for slowing down progress, the introduction of the NEP- (a revert back to capitalism?), the need to consolidate power and the brutal use of the red army.
The Bolshevik’s first protocol was to create a socialist government. Lenin began by replacing the government of the capitalist class with the rule of the working people. This new socialist government was compiled of mass organizations called Soviets, councils democratically elected by workers, peasants and soldiers. One of the key functions of the socialist government, in Lenin’s view, was guaranteeing democracy for the working people. As opposed to a capitalist government which exists to ensure the
Analyzing the Bolshevik State compared to Marxism can be difficult because Marx, Engels and their followers gave relatively little thought to what the state would look like after a socialist revolution. Engels famously wrote, “the state is not ‘abolished,’ it withers away,” which highlights the hazy and unfixed nature of Marx and Engle’s writings on the ultimate, classless society they envisioned. Further, what they did write is subject to the differing interpretations by numerous socialist parties all claiming to be Marxist. As discussed earlier, Lenin claimed he simply reshaped Marxism to fit the conditions of Russia. Others argue his interpretation was not true Marxism at all. However, the basic principles of a socialist state in the eyes of Marx’s are outlined in the Communist Manifesto as follows:
During the 1900’s the Russian Government made it extremely hard for the Bolsheviks to progress which made them revolt against the government making this a prime matter for the start of the Revolution. The Czarist government was ostracized by the common people of Russia so Tsar Nicholas II was overthrown by the Provisional Government, whom later on were overthrown by Lenin and shortly after the Bolsheviks took control over Russia. Russia was hard to develop because of the major leaders who had control; Lenin, Stalin, Trotsky. Almost overnight an entire society was destroyed and replaced with one of the most radical social experiments ever seen. Poverty, crime, privileged and class-divisions were to be eliminated, a new era of socialism
Almost everyone knows what a monster Adolf Hitler was, but most people do not know that one of the great ally leader of World War II, Joseph Stalin, had committed even greater atrocities than Hitler. Joseph Stalin was a ruthless and yet diligent dictator of the Soviet Union, whose rise to power influenced a multitude of major events in his country’s history. Due to Stalin’s impactful reign, he made the Soviet Union become a global superpower, underwent difficult hardships such as the Great Famine in the Soviet Union, and after his death, caused the Soviet Union to go through a process known as de-Stalinization.
The Bolshevik revolution came to prominence because of the Provisional Government’s inability to gain support from the Russian population. ‘The government enjoyed little confidence amongst the masses; and many of its members were largely unknown to the new Russia that had burst upon the political scene.’[3 ] Kerensky himself comments on the problematic circumstances his government experienced, ‘the old (governmental machine) had disappeared; the new was not yet established.’ The support of the peasantry was critical in establishing popular rule, as historian Richard Abraham comments, ‘the largest social class in Russia was still the peasantry.
The first section of Fitzpatrick’s essay discusses how Marxism was such an important part to creating classes during the Bolsheviks rule in the beginning of the 20th Century. She notes that this western belief system was popular with Russian intellectuals, especially on revolutionary left. (173) However, around the 1890’s industrialization was starting to catch up with the Marxist dreams, and the first soviets were founded in Moscow and Petersburg in 1905 helped bring down the tsarist regime in February 1917 (Suny 173).
The concoction of communist regime caused paranoia within the people which lead to riots. The history of the Soviet Union greatly contributed to this unjustified fear. During the nineteenth century, Karl Marx, a revolutionary socialist, wrote the “Communist Manifesto” which presented the idea of Communism. In this political ideal, property is publicly owned and workers are paid to extent of their abilities and needs. Nowhere does the theory state dictatorship or any type of totalitarian government. This revolutionary speculation remains as Russia’s greatest achievements in history and unforgotten. However when Vladimir Lenin took control of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in 1917,
Socialism must be implemented, according to Marx, in the wake of a successful and vast capitalistic structure. Russia was without such a structure, so Lenin and the Bolsheviks, insistent on their socialist dreams by any means necessary, turned to force to institute their version of socialism. The atrocities committed by the newly coined Soviets, their Red Army, and the Cheka or police force, against their enemies and those who resisted came to be known as the Red Terror.
According to the History.com Staff, “The October Revolution began on November 6 and 7, 1917 (or October 24 and 25 on the Julian calendar).” (Russian Revolution”). The October Revolution has also been called the Bolshevik Revolution since the Bolshevik Party played a crucial role in the revolution. The leader of the Bolshevik Party, Vladimir Lenin was a big supporter of Karl Marx. Another Marxist who leads this revolution was Leon Trotsky. In an article by the History.com Staff, “Lenin had created an, almost, bloodless coup d’état against the provisional government.” (“Russian Revolution”). The Bolshevik revolution started when, Alexander Kerensky, rather than follow an order. On October 24th, Kerensky ordered troops that were loyal, to act against the Bolshevik. Encyclopædia Britannica tells us that, “Kerensky was a socialist revolutionary who served as head of the Russian Provisional Government.” (“Aleksandr Kerensky”).
Upon the creation of the USSR, Lenin introduced new rule that would ensure greater totalitarian control. Only communists would be able to stand for the soviets, and so this meant that the communist party had the true control over the
The 1917 Bolshevik Revolution was the seizure of power by the radical Marxists led by Vladimir Lenin and was one of the pivotal moments of the 20th Century. The ramifications of the event, and the subsequent establishment of the world's first Communist regime were immediately obvious, but also had continuing repercussions for decades. This essay will argue that although Lenin and Stalin seemed to have conflicting views, in reality they shared very similar policies; Stalin just took these policies to an extreme.
The Measures of the Bolsheviks to Maintain Power and Address the Problems of Russia Before the Outbreak of Civil War
In 1917, in the midst of the Great War, Russia faced one of the biggest political shifts that the Tsarist-ruled country had ever known-the Bolshevik Revolution. There are two significant time frames associated with the Bolshevik Revolution. In the February revolution Tsar Nicholas II abdicated his throne and a Provisional Government took control. In the October revolution the Bolsheviks took power by overthrowing the Provisional Government. How did the October revolution become a reality? What factors facilitated the Bolshevik Revolution of October 1917? Two important factors were the July event at Taurida Palace, and the Kornilov Affair. Richard Pipes describes in detail how Lenin influenced the Bolshevik party throughout the
The Bolsheviks, commonly known as the Reds, had one aim: to take over the current government and create a
There were many different equally important reasons why Lenin and the Bolsheviks were able to hold on to their power. For Lenin, and the Bolsheviks, winning political power was relatively easy, compared with retaining it. They had many different objects to overcome, such as; Russia was in chaos, politically and economically, and normal government had broken down in large areas, yet despite all these problems Lenin was able to consolidate his power – and create the world’s first communist state.
The Success of the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917 Part 1 Karl Marks was not Russian and he died 34 years before the Russian revolution, he was a German who spent most his life in England. He worked as a journalist but wrote books on history, religion, economics, society, and philosophy. Marx hated the system of capitalism because he thought that it was capitalism that had produced the problems of industry, poor living conditions and the social gap of the rich and poor. He thought that the system destroyed people and made them greedy and that people only wanted something if it was worth money. Karl Marx realised that there was not enough money to make everyone rich but he did thin k the world