Political Strand Lenin

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  • Political
    • Lenin
      • October Revolution 1917
        • Small party of 300,000
        • Represented interests of workers- portrayed as a mass uprising of workers (limited support needed force)
        • Opposition Left: SRs+Mensheviks who hoped to share gov.- call for socialist coalition
          • Constituent Assembly Jan 1918: Bolsheviks: 175 seats- 9m votes, SRs: 410 seats- 21m votes
            • Lenin dissolved: Instrument of bourgeouise
      • Creation of a one party state
        • March 1918: renamed communist party
        • 1921: all other parties banned
        • First 3 months of April 1921, 5000 Mensheviks arrested
      • The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, 1918
        • End to involvement in WW1, peace conducted through treaty
        • Russia lost control of baltic states
          • Seen as a humiliation for military leaders: wanted to overthrow regime and reject the treaty
            • Allied powers of BR, FR, USA & JA were keen to keep Russia in WW1 and willing to provide arms, money and trrops to those who would ensure Russia rejoined
      • Russian Civil War 1918-21
        • How did they win?
          • Organised, whites only united on desire to get rid of reds: cooperation limited, corruption and inefficiency
          • Trotsky: commissar for war: introduced conscription and extended gov. direction to spread resources (war communism)
        • Results of civil war: state highly centralised, power in hands of gov. and party, use of terror against political opponents, reinforced militaristic values
      • 10th party congress 1921
        • Membership in 1917: 300,000, by 1921: 730,000
          • 1924: 1 million
        • Ban on formation of factions
      • One party state
      • Sovnrakom
        • Council of peoples commissars, top government ministers, made key decisions and orders, 20 members, elected by Central Executive Committee
        • Central Executive Committee
          • Larger group elected by congress of soviets-oversaw work of government and administration
          • All Russian Congress of Soviets
            • Supreme law making body "highly representative"
        • Polituro
          • 7-9 leading members of party, chosen by central committee, made key decisions and took over from larger CC, met daily and became more important than sovnarkom
          • Central Committee
            • 30-40 members, chosen by party congress- made decisions on policy
            • Party congress
              • Representative of local branches-discussed general programmes
              • Local party branches
                • Headed by a party secretary
    • Democratic socialism
      • Soviets used as bodies that represented workers at local levels- wishes expressed through structure of representative organisations, decisions then made in interests of people
    • Nomenklatura: list of approved party members
    • Use of terror
      • Cheka headed by Felix Dzerzhinsky Dec 1917 to deal with counter revolutionaries
      • between 1917-1923: responsible for assassination of 200,000 people
      • 40,000 members in December to 250,000 by 1921

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