"The French Revolution had guillotined its enemies; the proletarian revolution would compel them to work for it"
- E. H. Carr,
The Bolshevik Revolution Volume 2, 1952
When I started teaching the HSC National Study 'Russia and the Soviet Union 1917-1941' (otherwise known by the equally uninteresting name of 'Option G') there was one thing that really bothered me. I understood that Lenin and Trotsky had wrestled power from the Provisional Government to create the world's first communist state, and I understood how they had achieved this by appealing to the masses and using the Kornilov Affair to their advantage. But what I didn't understand was how they physically changed Russia from a burgeoning capitalist Euro-state into something completely new and different.
How was it done? Russia is a big place, how exactly do you suddenly convert all those factories and businesses into socialist organs of the state? Russia had just been through the crippling autocratic reign of the Tsar, two revolutions, and a horrendous war with Germany - Lenin was not exactly flush with the resources or manpower to achieve his communist dream. So how on Earth did he actually make it happen?
I picked up the above book by Carr in a secondhand bookstore. It's brown and smells like decay in that way that all old, unloved books smell, but it's also by E. H. Carr, who factors quite significantly into the History Extension course (which I also teach) so I figured I could kill two birds with one stone by reading it. It's a fairly dry text in every sense of the word but the content also went a long way in explaining how the Russian economy worked, and how it bent to the will to historical forces and people.
Just what I was after!
Carr grapples with the problem of which came first (the big events of Russian history or the economic conditions?) and manages to illuminate this conundrum as much as possible by refusing to pick an order of cause and effect. Instead he alternates back and forth between the two, arguing that the economy both informed the big events and was also shaped by them. He believes that they're inextricably tied together.
As I read Carr's treatise on this subject I quickly became conscious of the fact that there would be very little in this book that I could explicitly use with my Year 12 Modern History class. It's just too complex, and the last thing I want to do is bore or confuse them.
However, I have no qualms at all about boring or confusing YOU, the internet reader and possible fellow teacher. So here's a bit of context about Marxism before I talk about Russia, c. 1917:
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| Karl Marx = not Santa Claus |
A Crash Course in Marxism
- Karl Marx and his good ol' buddy Engels believed that society would always organise itself in a way that would make the best use of resources. There's a belief out there that communism is something that exists as an alternative to capitalism, but that isn't strictly what Marx was suggesting when he formulated his theory. Marx believed that communism was the future in the most literal sense. He saw capitalism as a necessary step towards communism; and capitalism was merely the stage of a society's development that took place after feudalism.
- Here's a better way of thinking about it. First, a society organises itself into a feudal state so that the land-owning aristocracy can make the best possible use of a country's resources. Then, a middle class emerges - the bourgeoisie - and their amassing of capital wealth (as opposed to land wealth) gives them the means to take power from the aristocracy. This changes the society from a feudal one into a capitalist one. The bourgeoisie then better organise resources by using their extensive capital wealth to motivate the lower class - the proletariat - in going to work for them. Eventually the proletariat will realise that the real power resides with them, and the resources of the society can be spread more equitably by the ousting of the bourgeoisie class. This changes the society from a capitalist one into a socialist one. The next, and final stage, is the removal of the instruments of government - a conversion from a working class-run capitalist society into a communist society. A society that essentially runs itself through the equitable allocation of its resources.
- Or; Feudalism (aristocracy, bourgeoisie, proletariat) becomes > Capitalism (bourgeoisie, proletariat) becomes > Communism (proletariat).
- Marx had several rules that would help the proletariat in manifesting their power - common sense things like the abolition of child labour, free education for everyone, equal obligation to work, abolition of inheritance... then there were the harder to sell ideas of abolition of private property, state ownership of factories, and state-controlled media/communication channels.
- Once the theoretical Marxist society had re-organised itself accordingly, the perfectly functioning economy that would result from all this equitable re-distribution of wealth would render the concept of a 'state' useless. No more government. No more nations. No more borders. So that's what John Lennon was on about!
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| I placed this image in the centre, but maybe it should've been placed to the left. |
The 1917 Revolution
Back to Russia 1917; the new Russian middle class had teamed up with the proletariat to depose their 19th century tyrant, the oddly mild-mannered but wholly ineffectual Nicholas Romanov II. This in itself wasn't that unusual. A rather 'soft' industrial revolution had moved the British middle class into co-power with their aristocracy in the 1850s, and the French had formed a democratic republic before that with more than a few dropped blades. However, what was different with Russia was that the working class and peasantry had Marxist-educated representatives who were eager to skip the capitalist stage as quickly as possible now that their Tsar had been de-throned.
Lenin spake, "We want the peasantry to go further than the bourgeoisie and seize the land from the land-owners".
What's worth noting is that there were essentially two revolutions happening in Russia at the same time. The peasants had revolted against the land-owning aristocracy, whilst the workers (and socialists) were rallying against a bourgeoisie/capitalist paradigm. The two had become bedfellows in the face of the Tsar's corrupt autocracy, but their views weren't always compatible.
In relation to this, a curious situation had arisen in post-Tsarist Russia. Two governments were in operation. The official one was the Provisional Government - a democratic and largely bourgeoisie organ that had developed from the Duma, the Tsar's previous and thoroughly unpopular attempts at reasonable governance. The other government was the Petrograd Soviet, which was a loose conglomeration of socialist groups and workers' unions. An uneasy alliance had developed between the two out of necessity but neither was in any fit state to run the country on their own. In fact, even whilst working together they weren't doing that great a job of it.
Then Lenin arrived on the scene, fresh from exile and political imprisonment, and Trotsky came back in from the wilderness to put aside his problems with the factionalism that had previously been occurring within the Russian Socialist party. Together they bloodlessly removed the Provisional Government (a fascinating story for another day) and set up a Bolshevik Government in its place.
One of the many problems of the Provisional Government was that they had no ideological motivation to re-organise Russia's resources in order to feed the starving Russian people. The factories in the Russian cities were still too closely tied to the bourgeoisie, so the Provisional Government was not willing to shake things up too much by forcibly moving resources away from the 'haves' to the 'have nots'. Instead, Kerensky's government suggested that the peasants come to a 'voluntary agreement with their landlords' in regards to food and land.
A voluntary agreement?! "Can we please have some food for free?" When has that ever worked?
The Bolsheviks were the only group to give their blessing to the peasants in regards to seizing land for themselves. Lenin put out word that all private property in land was to be abolished and placed at the disposal of the peasants (the only group he considered off-limits were the Cossacks, he said they could keep their land - a shrewd political move that kept their muscle on his side). A further caveat was that every man was only entitled to as much land as he could work, and as much as could feed his family.
Articles 3 of Lenin's new laws; "The right to use the land belongs to him who cultivates it with his own labour".
Alongside this was a call for the workers to take control of the factories, a necessity that would draw resources and money into the control of the state.
Making Things Happen
But how did he enforce this? Much has been said of Lenin having very little power to actually make this happen... all he could do is suggest it and give the new Bolshevik Government's blessing, and hope that the peasants and workers would do the rest.
Well, one thing that Carr's book sheds light on is the role of the trade unions. They assisted in keeping order during this messy and chaotic transition process. The Soviets were more powerful than the trade unions because they had soldiers, but an alliance was still needed in order to organise the factories and the workers As you could imagine there were a lot of problems during this stage, and here are some examples:
- A series of button factories were sabotaged by the former manager who had been kicked out by the workers (he was sent to a labour camp for his troubles).
- Some workers, once they had control of their factories, sold off all the equipment and stock for their own financial gain (I guess it had yet to be impressed upon them that capitalism in Russia was soon to be over).
- Some workers kicked out their managers and then later had to beg them to come back in order to help run the factories (this is communism in action - Marx postulated that the bourgeoisie and proletariat would eventually merge into one larger proletariat class under the new socialist model of society).
Some communists (both at the time and in hindsight) argued that this chaos was necessary, that destroying the economy was actually part of the communist process. The workers were (unknowingly) 'smashing the economic machine' and therefore allowing for the state to be rebuilt as a socialist utopia.
Of course, as you and I know, there would never be any such utopia for Russia. Lenin's early death, Trotsky's exile from Russia, the rise of Stalin... any number of factors could be blamed, but the point remains that Russia's sheer size, string of historical tragedies, and dearth of social happiness perhaps made it impossible for such a communist paradise to ever be achieved.
Lenin felt that a state-run form of capitalism would easily supersede the form of capitalism that had arisen towards the end of the Tsar's reign. This would provide a transition phase before moving towards collectivisation; the process in which huge communal farms would become the building block for a socialist Russia.
This more 'fair dinkum' version of communism never happened during Lenin's lifetime, but Stalin would eventually have his own crack at collectivisation after disposing of nearly every other revolutionary in the 1920s communist government.
It could therefore be argued that communist Russia never really materialised under Lenin. Many have pointed to the New Economic Policy that emerged in the early 1920s as a step backwards towards capitalism, but Lenin knew he had to generate some wealth in order to nurse Russia back to health after all the damage wreaked by the Tsar, World War I, the 1917 Revolution, and the Russian Civil War. This would also buy him more time to continue the extensive reforms that were rapidly transforming the country's economy.
A New Vision for Russia
The shift from a feudal state through a capitalist one into a communist nation in just the space of a few years is incredible and astounding, especially in a country as huge as Russia. So, here is how Carr says that Lenin managed to achieve this:
- Nationalisation of all of Russia's banks into one state-run bank. The banks responded to this by refusing to open, or to only open their doors for a few hours a day, and to give no credit. The Bolsheviks threatened imprisonment and sent soldiers to the banks, but the banks called their bluff and the boycott continued. Eventually, Lenin confiscated all their gold and bullion. After the Civil War then came and went, the banks were in so much disarray that it was quite easy for a centralised money-lending institution to be installed.
- Nationalisation of trade syndicates. Lenin took control of the country's big resources - sugar, iron, coal, oil - things like that. The syndicates were evidently less bourgeois than the banks as they rolled over a lot more easily.
- Establishment of state monopolies in place of capitalist ones. This was easy once Lenin had control of the banks and all their cash.
- Forced unification of smaller enterprises. A step towards collectivisation that sounded easier to achieve than the great melding of the farms. I'm not sure if this one was all that successful either but perhaps there was a trickle-down effect from Lenin's seizure of the trade syndicates.
- Abolition of commercial secrecy. A nice thought.
- Nationalisation of the factories. Fun fact: when Lenin and his Soviets sent out representatives to nationalise industry in rural areas like Turkestan, they found that it had already been done by the workers and peasants. Approximately half of all Russia nationalised on its own without direct intervention. How's that for the power of an idea?
- Regulation of consumption. This was achieved through rationing. Once the Civil War started this was facilitated by special rural soviets of 25 peasants each, who would requisition grain from farms on behalf of the state. Prior to this, the Bolshevik government attempted to scapegoat 'bagmen' - semi-mythical capitalist pigs who exploited the countryside by buying up food and reselling it at an exorbitant price - and issued a decree that any such criminals would be shot. There is limited evidence that such men ever existed during the famine.
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| The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk |
The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk had seen a lot of Russia's more lucrative industry ceded to Germany. This prompted a lot of German interest in Russia's commercial branches, and, after large slabs of the Ukraine had been absorbed by Germany, the Kaiser's businessmen began buying up more Russian factories on a large scale. There was a lot of worry in Russia that Germany's influence would make possible an economic invasion far more devastating than the war had been, so this prompted much quicker nationalisation of industry then would normally have been possible. It also didn't help that Russia was now also being blockaded by the Allies for making peace with Germany, so (as a result) by 1918 nearly all industries had been declared property of the Russian Socialist Federal Soviet Republic - with very little resistance.
The next step in Lenin's state-run economy was for equal distribution of wages. In Lenin's words, "he that does not work, neither shall he eat". Under socialist policy this meant equal wages to all. The salary of commissars was limited, so in this system even Lenin earned a wage that was just comparable to a skilled factory worker. It soon became apparent, however, that this idea was very hard to put into practice as a fixed rate of productivity was needed in order to guarantee everybody the same wage. And how do you regulate an industry that was, in the words of some, being 'smashed' for the benefit of tearing down the old order?
So, as you can see, the Bolshevik Government did manage to enact some kind of widespread economic change in the years that immediately followed the 1917 Revolution. Different elements were either exacerbated or lubricated by the brutal chaos of the Civil War that ravaged Russia between 1918 and 1921, and nearly all of it had been radically changed by the time of Lenin's death in 1924.
Where things went from here were entirely up to one seemingly innocuous Georgian pen-pusher, Josef Stalin...
