The Fate of the Bolshevik Revolution: Illiberal Liberation, 1917-41

Description

How did a regime that promised utopian-style freedom end up delivering terror and tyranny? For some, the Bolsheviks were totalitarian and the descent was inevitable; for others, Stalin was responsible; for others still, this period in Russian history was a microcosm of the Cold War. The Fate of the Bolshevik Revolution reasons that these arguments are too simplistic. Rather, the journey from Bolshevik liberation to totalitarianism was riddled with unsuccessful experiments, compromises, confusion, panic, self-interest and over-optimism. As this book reveals, the emergence (and persistence) of the Bolshevik dictatorship was, in fact, the complicated product of a failed democratic transition. Drawing on long-ignored archival sources and original research, this fascinating volume brings together an international team of leading scholars to reconsider one of the most important and controversial questions of 20th-century history: how to explain the rise of the repressive Stalinist dictatorship. Cover Contents Contributors Introduction: Illiberal Liberation, 1917–41 Lara Douds, James Harris and Peter Whitewood Part I Bolshevik Ideology and Practice 1 Dictatorship Unlimited: Lenin on the State, March–November 1917 Erik van Ree 2 The Permanent Campaign and the Fate of Political Freedom in Russia Lars T. Lih Part II Workers’ Democracy and Soviet State-Building 3 Local Government, Disorder and the Origins of the Soviet State, 1917–18 Dakota Irvin 4 Lenin’s ‘Living Link’? Petitioning the Ruler across the Revolutionary Divide Lara Douds 5 The Communist Party and the Late 1930s Soviet Democracy Campaigns: Origins and Outcomes Yiannis Kokosalakis Part III Internal Party Democracy 6 Trotsky and the Questions of Agency, Democracy and Dictatorship in the USSR, 1917–40 Ian D. Thatcher 7 Discipline versus Democracy: The 1923 Party Controversy James Harris Part IV Repression and Moderation 8 Democracy and Violence, 1917–37 J. Arch Getty 9 Stalinist Moderation and the Turn to Repression: Utopianism and Realpolitik in the Mid-1930s Olga Velikanova Part V National Tensions and International Threats 10 Debating the Early Soviet Nationalities Policy: The Case of Soviet Ukraine Olena Palko 11 The International Situation: Fear of Invasion and Growing Authoritarianism Peter Whitewood Part VI Culture and Society: Experimentation and Control 12 Bolshevik Revolution and the Enlightenment of the People Sheila Fitzpatrick 13 Walking the Razor’s Edge: The Origins of Soviet Censorship Polly Corrigan 14 Revolutionary Participation, Youthful Civic-Mindedness Andy Willimott 15 Liberation and Authoritarianism in the Early Soviet Campaign to ‘Struggle with Prostitution’ Siobhán Hearne 16 Soviet Canteens in Pre-War USSR, 1917–41: Promises of Emancipation and Everyday Violence François-Xavier Nérard Notes Select Bibliography Index