Evan Mawdsley and Stephen White
- Published in print:
- 2000
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780198297383
- eISBN:
- 9780191599842
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0198297386.003.0007
- Subject:
- Political Science, Russian Politics
The Central Committee was never a ‘representative’ elite. Like other revolutionary elites, it was disproportionately male and well educated; but it was generally more representative of the mass ...
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The Central Committee was never a ‘representative’ elite. Like other revolutionary elites, it was disproportionately male and well educated; but it was generally more representative of the mass membership and of the population as a whole than the national party leadership. A system for the distribution of material benefits gradually developed to service its requirements, one that came increasingly to identify Central Committee members as a privileged group of a kind that had been characterized by Trotsky as a bureaucracy. But there were internal divisions and internal safeguards that helped to prevent the formation of an exploitative as well as politically dominant group.Less
The Central Committee was never a ‘representative’ elite. Like other revolutionary elites, it was disproportionately male and well educated; but it was generally more representative of the mass membership and of the population as a whole than the national party leadership. A system for the distribution of material benefits gradually developed to service its requirements, one that came increasingly to identify Central Committee members as a privileged group of a kind that had been characterized by Trotsky as a bureaucracy. But there were internal divisions and internal safeguards that helped to prevent the formation of an exploitative as well as politically dominant group.
David Ayers
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780748647330
- eISBN:
- 9781474453820
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748647330.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism
Modernism, Internationalism and the Russian Revolution examines responses to the Russian Revolution and the formation of the League of Nations in literature and journalism in the years following ...
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Modernism, Internationalism and the Russian Revolution examines responses to the Russian Revolution and the formation of the League of Nations in literature and journalism in the years following 1917. It examines early attempts to assess the Revolution, how the Bolsheviks intervened in the British public sphere, how visitors to Moscow responded to meeting Lenin and Trotsky, and the manner in which the League and Revolution occupied the work of such figures as T.S. Eliot, Leonard Woolf, Maynard Keynes, Clare Sheridan and H.G. Wells. This study reveals the extent and complexity of the debate about revolution and nationalities which was a dominant feature of public discourse. Drawing on the responses of journalists and literary authors, including some figures rarely considered in the context of literary modernism, such as Tomáš Masaryk and Henry Noel Brailsford, it gives new insights into the relationship between modernist literature and the geopolitical shifts which governed the period, and demonstrates how a new age of transnational politics began.Less
Modernism, Internationalism and the Russian Revolution examines responses to the Russian Revolution and the formation of the League of Nations in literature and journalism in the years following 1917. It examines early attempts to assess the Revolution, how the Bolsheviks intervened in the British public sphere, how visitors to Moscow responded to meeting Lenin and Trotsky, and the manner in which the League and Revolution occupied the work of such figures as T.S. Eliot, Leonard Woolf, Maynard Keynes, Clare Sheridan and H.G. Wells. This study reveals the extent and complexity of the debate about revolution and nationalities which was a dominant feature of public discourse. Drawing on the responses of journalists and literary authors, including some figures rarely considered in the context of literary modernism, such as Tomáš Masaryk and Henry Noel Brailsford, it gives new insights into the relationship between modernist literature and the geopolitical shifts which governed the period, and demonstrates how a new age of transnational politics began.
Richard Landes
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780199753598
- eISBN:
- 9780199897445
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199753598.003.0011
- Subject:
- Religion, World Religions
This chapter traces how the dynamics of apocalyptic disappointment, led millennial ideologues (Bakùnin, Lenin, and Trotsky) to turn the politique du pire into coercive purity, setting the stage for a ...
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This chapter traces how the dynamics of apocalyptic disappointment, led millennial ideologues (Bakùnin, Lenin, and Trotsky) to turn the politique du pire into coercive purity, setting the stage for a shift from the revolution occurring in the industrial West to the agrarian East. Totalitarianism, in this context, arises from the unintended consequence of an apocalyptic movement that took power, and, with the failure of its expectations of a spontaneous millennium, carved out the “perfect” society from the body politic. The chapter concludes with a discussion of Hannah Arendt's analysis of totalitarianism, the phenomenon of “fellow travelers” as a (post-)apocalyptic phenomenon, and the contribution of apocalyptic paranoia to the spread of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, setting the stage for Hitler's emergence after WWI.Less
This chapter traces how the dynamics of apocalyptic disappointment, led millennial ideologues (Bakùnin, Lenin, and Trotsky) to turn the politique du pire into coercive purity, setting the stage for a shift from the revolution occurring in the industrial West to the agrarian East. Totalitarianism, in this context, arises from the unintended consequence of an apocalyptic movement that took power, and, with the failure of its expectations of a spontaneous millennium, carved out the “perfect” society from the body politic. The chapter concludes with a discussion of Hannah Arendt's analysis of totalitarianism, the phenomenon of “fellow travelers” as a (post-)apocalyptic phenomenon, and the contribution of apocalyptic paranoia to the spread of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, setting the stage for Hitler's emergence after WWI.
Larry Ceplair
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- January 2021
- ISBN:
- 9780813179193
- eISBN:
- 9780813179445
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University Press of Kentucky
- DOI:
- 10.5810/kentucky/9780813179193.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, World Modern History
Bucking the current trend of explaining revolutions via impersonal forces, this book argues that without revolutionary personalities revolutions would not occur. The great revolutionaries of the past ...
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Bucking the current trend of explaining revolutions via impersonal forces, this book argues that without revolutionary personalities revolutions would not occur. The great revolutionaries of the past two centuries have arrived in pairs. Though each pair differed in how they met, bonded, and diverged, they were similar in having an alpha partner, who recognized his need for the other and never seriously contemplated a separation. This book, in comparing the revolutionary careers of the five pairs also offers a cross-cultural analysis of revolutions, and, by focusing on the personal dimensions of the revolutionary process, puts meat on the bones of the current approach.Less
Bucking the current trend of explaining revolutions via impersonal forces, this book argues that without revolutionary personalities revolutions would not occur. The great revolutionaries of the past two centuries have arrived in pairs. Though each pair differed in how they met, bonded, and diverged, they were similar in having an alpha partner, who recognized his need for the other and never seriously contemplated a separation. This book, in comparing the revolutionary careers of the five pairs also offers a cross-cultural analysis of revolutions, and, by focusing on the personal dimensions of the revolutionary process, puts meat on the bones of the current approach.
David Wingeate Pike
- Published in print:
- 1993
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198203155
- eISBN:
- 9780191675751
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198203155.003.0004
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
This chapter discusses the Spanish refugees in Russia by category; Committee meetings with the Comintern; the fate of the children and their teachers; the PCE leaders; the Spanish refugees in the ...
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This chapter discusses the Spanish refugees in Russia by category; Committee meetings with the Comintern; the fate of the children and their teachers; the PCE leaders; the Spanish refugees in the Americas; the transfer to Mexico of Spanish and Catalan communist leaders; opposition to Stalin’s policy; Spanish officers in Moscow admitted to the Frunze Academy, the Voroshilov Academy, and the Planiernaya School of Leninism; Stalin’s assassination team in Mexico; the assassination of Trotsky, Krivitsky,and Tresca; and Gorkin and Sala escape.Less
This chapter discusses the Spanish refugees in Russia by category; Committee meetings with the Comintern; the fate of the children and their teachers; the PCE leaders; the Spanish refugees in the Americas; the transfer to Mexico of Spanish and Catalan communist leaders; opposition to Stalin’s policy; Spanish officers in Moscow admitted to the Frunze Academy, the Voroshilov Academy, and the Planiernaya School of Leninism; Stalin’s assassination team in Mexico; the assassination of Trotsky, Krivitsky,and Tresca; and Gorkin and Sala escape.
Christoph Irmscher
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- January 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780300222562
- eISBN:
- 9780300227758
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Yale University Press
- DOI:
- 10.12987/yale/9780300222562.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, American History: 20th Century
The definitive biography of radical activist, poet, editor, and public intellectual Max Eastman (1883–1969), based on unrestricted access to the Eastman family archive. Considered one of the “hottest ...
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The definitive biography of radical activist, poet, editor, and public intellectual Max Eastman (1883–1969), based on unrestricted access to the Eastman family archive. Considered one of the “hottest radicals” of his time, Eastman edited two of the most important modernist magazines, The Masses and The Liberator, campaigned for women’s suffrage, sexual freedom, and peace, and published several volumes of poetry and two books on laughter. A fierce critic of Joseph Stalin, Eastman befriended and translated Leon Trotsky and remained unafraid to express unpopular views, drawing criticism from both conservatives and the Left. Maintaining that he had never changed his political opinions and that, instead, the world around him had changed, Eastman completed his public turn to the right by becoming a contributor to Reader’s Digest. A stubborn, lifelong admirer of Lenin as well as a defender of the Vietnam War, Eastman, who now called himself a “libertarian conservative,” died in Bridgetown, Barbados, on March 25, 1969. Set against the backdrop of several decades of political and ideological turmoil, this biography interweaves Eastman’s singular life with stories of the fascinating people he knew, loved, and admired, including Charlie Chaplin, Florence Deshon, Claude McKay, and Leon Trotsky.Less
The definitive biography of radical activist, poet, editor, and public intellectual Max Eastman (1883–1969), based on unrestricted access to the Eastman family archive. Considered one of the “hottest radicals” of his time, Eastman edited two of the most important modernist magazines, The Masses and The Liberator, campaigned for women’s suffrage, sexual freedom, and peace, and published several volumes of poetry and two books on laughter. A fierce critic of Joseph Stalin, Eastman befriended and translated Leon Trotsky and remained unafraid to express unpopular views, drawing criticism from both conservatives and the Left. Maintaining that he had never changed his political opinions and that, instead, the world around him had changed, Eastman completed his public turn to the right by becoming a contributor to Reader’s Digest. A stubborn, lifelong admirer of Lenin as well as a defender of the Vietnam War, Eastman, who now called himself a “libertarian conservative,” died in Bridgetown, Barbados, on March 25, 1969. Set against the backdrop of several decades of political and ideological turmoil, this biography interweaves Eastman’s singular life with stories of the fascinating people he knew, loved, and admired, including Charlie Chaplin, Florence Deshon, Claude McKay, and Leon Trotsky.
Marc Mulholland
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- January 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780199653577
- eISBN:
- 9780191744594
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199653577.003.0009
- Subject:
- History, World Modern History, History of Ideas
The arrival of mass suffrage, in countries with governments responsible or irresponsible to elected parliaments, gave rise either to ‘umbrella’ pan-class parties, or sectional parties of class or ...
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The arrival of mass suffrage, in countries with governments responsible or irresponsible to elected parliaments, gave rise either to ‘umbrella’ pan-class parties, or sectional parties of class or nationality and/or religious identity. These gave rise to variations in circumstance determining the likely degree of socialist-liberal cooperation. On balance, socialists and liberals did cooperate, but only to a limited extent. The 1905 Revolution in Russia re-opened the debate about possibilities for overturning entrenched state power. It was also important in revealing the likelihood that liberal revolution could easily displace bourgeois leadership and present opportunities for socialists basing themselves upon the proletariat. Debates on this matter involving Rosa Luxemburg, V.I. Lenin, Karl Kautsky, and Leon Trotsky are examined. Whether militarism and imperialism was inherent in capitalism was debated by Kautsky, Rudolf Hilferding, and Lenin: Lenin's conclusion that bourgeois liberalism was defunct is foreshadowed.Less
The arrival of mass suffrage, in countries with governments responsible or irresponsible to elected parliaments, gave rise either to ‘umbrella’ pan-class parties, or sectional parties of class or nationality and/or religious identity. These gave rise to variations in circumstance determining the likely degree of socialist-liberal cooperation. On balance, socialists and liberals did cooperate, but only to a limited extent. The 1905 Revolution in Russia re-opened the debate about possibilities for overturning entrenched state power. It was also important in revealing the likelihood that liberal revolution could easily displace bourgeois leadership and present opportunities for socialists basing themselves upon the proletariat. Debates on this matter involving Rosa Luxemburg, V.I. Lenin, Karl Kautsky, and Leon Trotsky are examined. Whether militarism and imperialism was inherent in capitalism was debated by Kautsky, Rudolf Hilferding, and Lenin: Lenin's conclusion that bourgeois liberalism was defunct is foreshadowed.
Julia Elsky
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- May 2021
- ISBN:
- 9781503613676
- eISBN:
- 9781503614369
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Stanford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.11126/stanford/9781503613676.003.0003
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Jewish Studies
This chapter extends further into the years of the Occupation, deepening the analysis of multilingual immigrant identities in French in the Polish-born writer Jean Malaquais’s portrayal of the ...
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This chapter extends further into the years of the Occupation, deepening the analysis of multilingual immigrant identities in French in the Polish-born writer Jean Malaquais’s portrayal of the accents of Eastern and Central European refugees trying to leave France for the Americas through the port of Marseille in 1942. In Planète sans visa (World without Visa), Malaquais reappropriates Jewish refugee accents from the mockery of the antisemitic press to show that accents do not reveal immutable and inassimilable racial traits. On the contrary, they are the spaces in which language plays as well as expressions of the ways intimacy and love are formed. As such, an attachment to the French language is not innate, inherited, or linked to the soil. Malquais’s text demonstrates that French literary language itself is capable of containing multiple registers of ethnicity, including a Jewish accented voice.Less
This chapter extends further into the years of the Occupation, deepening the analysis of multilingual immigrant identities in French in the Polish-born writer Jean Malaquais’s portrayal of the accents of Eastern and Central European refugees trying to leave France for the Americas through the port of Marseille in 1942. In Planète sans visa (World without Visa), Malaquais reappropriates Jewish refugee accents from the mockery of the antisemitic press to show that accents do not reveal immutable and inassimilable racial traits. On the contrary, they are the spaces in which language plays as well as expressions of the ways intimacy and love are formed. As such, an attachment to the French language is not innate, inherited, or linked to the soil. Malquais’s text demonstrates that French literary language itself is capable of containing multiple registers of ethnicity, including a Jewish accented voice.
Burnett Bolloten
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781469624464
- eISBN:
- 9781469624488
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of North Carolina Press
- DOI:
- 10.5149/northcarolina/9781469624464.003.0040
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
This chapter looks at the activities of the Partido Obrero de Unificación Marxista (POUM) in the Catalan political arena, as well as its efforts to dissociate itself from Trotskyist accusations. ...
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This chapter looks at the activities of the Partido Obrero de Unificación Marxista (POUM) in the Catalan political arena, as well as its efforts to dissociate itself from Trotskyist accusations. Formed in September 1935 through the fusion of the Izquierda Comunista and the Bloque Obrero y Campesino, the POUM grew to be a powerful force in the region. A vigorous advocate of Socialist revolution and the dictatorship of the proletariat, an unrelenting critic of the Popular Front and of Stalin's trials and purges, the POUM would find itself denounced as “Trotskyist.” Despite the fact that some of its leaders had once maintained connections with Leon Trotsky, the POUM was not a Trotskyist party, and it frantically attempted to prove it was not in numerous articles and speeches.Less
This chapter looks at the activities of the Partido Obrero de Unificación Marxista (POUM) in the Catalan political arena, as well as its efforts to dissociate itself from Trotskyist accusations. Formed in September 1935 through the fusion of the Izquierda Comunista and the Bloque Obrero y Campesino, the POUM grew to be a powerful force in the region. A vigorous advocate of Socialist revolution and the dictatorship of the proletariat, an unrelenting critic of the Popular Front and of Stalin's trials and purges, the POUM would find itself denounced as “Trotskyist.” Despite the fact that some of its leaders had once maintained connections with Leon Trotsky, the POUM was not a Trotskyist party, and it frantically attempted to prove it was not in numerous articles and speeches.
Sabine Dullin
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748622191
- eISBN:
- 9780748651290
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748622191.003.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, Russian Politics
The political history of the Soviet Union has for a long time been disembodied because of a lack of archive material, apart from the omnipresent figures of Stalin and his rival Leon Trotsky. Behind ...
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The political history of the Soviet Union has for a long time been disembodied because of a lack of archive material, apart from the omnipresent figures of Stalin and his rival Leon Trotsky. Behind them, there existed a shadowy bureaucracy that was nothing more than a generalised and reified concept. The political system that Stalin created in the 1930s has partly remained an enigma. Were they fanatics, believers, lucid individuals who were prisoners of the system, or opportunist apparatchiks, who were either cynical or manipulated? In moving from the general to the particular, from outside the country to within, in examining the paradoxes of one man, Maxim Litvinov, and a group of senior civil servants, the diplomatic corps, this book seeks to unravel the human contradictions within a largely inhuman system.Less
The political history of the Soviet Union has for a long time been disembodied because of a lack of archive material, apart from the omnipresent figures of Stalin and his rival Leon Trotsky. Behind them, there existed a shadowy bureaucracy that was nothing more than a generalised and reified concept. The political system that Stalin created in the 1930s has partly remained an enigma. Were they fanatics, believers, lucid individuals who were prisoners of the system, or opportunist apparatchiks, who were either cynical or manipulated? In moving from the general to the particular, from outside the country to within, in examining the paradoxes of one man, Maxim Litvinov, and a group of senior civil servants, the diplomatic corps, this book seeks to unravel the human contradictions within a largely inhuman system.
Christoph Irmscher
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- January 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780300222562
- eISBN:
- 9780300227758
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Yale University Press
- DOI:
- 10.12987/yale/9780300222562.003.0007
- Subject:
- History, American History: 20th Century
In 1922, Max Eastman travels to Europe to take part in the Genoa Conference, where he meets his future wife, Eliena Krylenko, sister to Nikolai Krylenko, later Stalin’s Commissar of Justice. A ...
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In 1922, Max Eastman travels to Europe to take part in the Genoa Conference, where he meets his future wife, Eliena Krylenko, sister to Nikolai Krylenko, later Stalin’s Commissar of Justice. A prolonged stay in Moscow, where Max tours the Kremlin and attends the Fourth Congress of the Third Communist International, leads to his gradual disenchantment with Bolshevism, though not with Trotsky, whose biography he writes. Living in Sochi on the Black Sea, Max perfects his command of Russian and begins work on a novel. He develops his concept of “social engineering” against Stalin’s attempt to make a religion out of the Communist Party. After marrying Eliena, Max leaves Moscow and lives on the Côte d’Azur and in Paris, implementing his free love philosophy and completing books on Marx, Lenin, and Trotsky. After he publishes Lenin’s “Testament,” with its criticism of Stalin, Trotsky disavows him. In Vienna he meets Freud, who encourages him to write a book about “America the miscarriage.”Less
In 1922, Max Eastman travels to Europe to take part in the Genoa Conference, where he meets his future wife, Eliena Krylenko, sister to Nikolai Krylenko, later Stalin’s Commissar of Justice. A prolonged stay in Moscow, where Max tours the Kremlin and attends the Fourth Congress of the Third Communist International, leads to his gradual disenchantment with Bolshevism, though not with Trotsky, whose biography he writes. Living in Sochi on the Black Sea, Max perfects his command of Russian and begins work on a novel. He develops his concept of “social engineering” against Stalin’s attempt to make a religion out of the Communist Party. After marrying Eliena, Max leaves Moscow and lives on the Côte d’Azur and in Paris, implementing his free love philosophy and completing books on Marx, Lenin, and Trotsky. After he publishes Lenin’s “Testament,” with its criticism of Stalin, Trotsky disavows him. In Vienna he meets Freud, who encourages him to write a book about “America the miscarriage.”
David Ayers
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780748647330
- eISBN:
- 9781474453820
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748647330.003.0006
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism
This chapter narrates the visit to Moscow of the sculptor Clare Sheridan, cousin of Winston Churchill, who caused a scandal when she accepted an invitation to the Kremlin to create busts of the ...
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This chapter narrates the visit to Moscow of the sculptor Clare Sheridan, cousin of Winston Churchill, who caused a scandal when she accepted an invitation to the Kremlin to create busts of the Bolshevik leadership, including Lenin and Trotsky. Her account of the sittings, first published in the Times and subsequently as a book, offered a remarkable account of her sittings, notably her dealings with Trotsky. As a consequence of her visit she was rejected by British high society and accepted a role as a correspondent which took her to Ireland, where she interviewed Rory O’Connor at the Four Courts, Italy, where she was assaulted by Mussolini, and Turkey, which became one of the sites in her first, semi-autobiographical novel, Stella Defiant. The novel, subtitled ‘The Passionate History of a Modernist Woman’, narrates its protagonist’s repudiation of modernism in favour of communism, and subsequent rejection of the latter in favour of Islam.Less
This chapter narrates the visit to Moscow of the sculptor Clare Sheridan, cousin of Winston Churchill, who caused a scandal when she accepted an invitation to the Kremlin to create busts of the Bolshevik leadership, including Lenin and Trotsky. Her account of the sittings, first published in the Times and subsequently as a book, offered a remarkable account of her sittings, notably her dealings with Trotsky. As a consequence of her visit she was rejected by British high society and accepted a role as a correspondent which took her to Ireland, where she interviewed Rory O’Connor at the Four Courts, Italy, where she was assaulted by Mussolini, and Turkey, which became one of the sites in her first, semi-autobiographical novel, Stella Defiant. The novel, subtitled ‘The Passionate History of a Modernist Woman’, narrates its protagonist’s repudiation of modernism in favour of communism, and subsequent rejection of the latter in favour of Islam.
David Ayers
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780748647330
- eISBN:
- 9781474453820
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748647330.003.0008
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism
This chapter narrates the moment in which T.S. Eliot came to identify the Russian Revolution as the main event of the war and the motive for a re-evaluation of Europe’s position in the world. Eliot’s ...
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This chapter narrates the moment in which T.S. Eliot came to identify the Russian Revolution as the main event of the war and the motive for a re-evaluation of Europe’s position in the world. Eliot’s review of Trotsky in the Criterion introduces an account of the extensive and prominent publication of Trotsky’s works in Britain and responses to them by such figures as Maynard Keynes and even Stanley Baldwin, and the chapter concludes with an account of Valéry’s role in shaping Eliot’s thought on Europe, in the famous essay which he wrote for Middleton Murry’s Athenaeum.Less
This chapter narrates the moment in which T.S. Eliot came to identify the Russian Revolution as the main event of the war and the motive for a re-evaluation of Europe’s position in the world. Eliot’s review of Trotsky in the Criterion introduces an account of the extensive and prominent publication of Trotsky’s works in Britain and responses to them by such figures as Maynard Keynes and even Stanley Baldwin, and the chapter concludes with an account of Valéry’s role in shaping Eliot’s thought on Europe, in the famous essay which he wrote for Middleton Murry’s Athenaeum.
Stephanie J. Smith
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9781469635682
- eISBN:
- 9781469635699
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of North Carolina Press
- DOI:
- 10.5149/northcarolina/9781469635682.003.0004
- Subject:
- History, Latin American History
Chapter Three focuses on the ongoing debates between Diego Rivera and David Alfaro Siqueiros, including their central disagreements over Leon Trotsky and his significance to global revolution, to ...
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Chapter Three focuses on the ongoing debates between Diego Rivera and David Alfaro Siqueiros, including their central disagreements over Leon Trotsky and his significance to global revolution, to analyze the multiple roles of culture within Mexican society and the profound connections between art and politics during the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s. This chapter examines the importance of art and artists in Mexico’s post-revolutionary state formation to argue that the radical artists and government officials utilized art and culture as a medium to negotiate larger issues whose general relevance fell well beyond art’s more traditional influence. Chapter 3 also utilizes the arrival of Trotsky to Mexico in January 1937 to highlight a crucial time in Mexico’s history when the artists influenced Mexico’s politics in profound and lasting ways.Less
Chapter Three focuses on the ongoing debates between Diego Rivera and David Alfaro Siqueiros, including their central disagreements over Leon Trotsky and his significance to global revolution, to analyze the multiple roles of culture within Mexican society and the profound connections between art and politics during the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s. This chapter examines the importance of art and artists in Mexico’s post-revolutionary state formation to argue that the radical artists and government officials utilized art and culture as a medium to negotiate larger issues whose general relevance fell well beyond art’s more traditional influence. Chapter 3 also utilizes the arrival of Trotsky to Mexico in January 1937 to highlight a crucial time in Mexico’s history when the artists influenced Mexico’s politics in profound and lasting ways.
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- June 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780804744751
- eISBN:
- 9780804783743
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Stanford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.11126/stanford/9780804744751.003.0002
- Subject:
- Law, Philosophy of Law
This chapter considers the two major influences on Selznick's early thought about politics and sociology: Leon Trotsky and Robert Michels. Trotsky represented both the incarnation and the failure of ...
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This chapter considers the two major influences on Selznick's early thought about politics and sociology: Leon Trotsky and Robert Michels. Trotsky represented both the incarnation and the failure of exalted ideals. He also identified a specific culprit for that failure: the Soviet bureaucracy. To an extent unprecedented and uncomfortable within orthodox Marxism, the concept and machinations of bureaucracy had dominated the Trotskyist worldview by the time Selznick was initiated into it. The message from Michels had a similar subject but broader implications. The propensity of bureaucracy to undermine cherished ideals was not, on his analysis, a conjunctural, tactical danger, a temporary backstep ultimately to be overcome. It was, as it were, ontological, written into the nature of political life and above all into the need for organization in politics.Less
This chapter considers the two major influences on Selznick's early thought about politics and sociology: Leon Trotsky and Robert Michels. Trotsky represented both the incarnation and the failure of exalted ideals. He also identified a specific culprit for that failure: the Soviet bureaucracy. To an extent unprecedented and uncomfortable within orthodox Marxism, the concept and machinations of bureaucracy had dominated the Trotskyist worldview by the time Selznick was initiated into it. The message from Michels had a similar subject but broader implications. The propensity of bureaucracy to undermine cherished ideals was not, on his analysis, a conjunctural, tactical danger, a temporary backstep ultimately to be overcome. It was, as it were, ontological, written into the nature of political life and above all into the need for organization in politics.
Robert Daniels
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- October 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780300106497
- eISBN:
- 9780300134933
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Yale University Press
- DOI:
- 10.12987/yale/9780300106497.003.0008
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
One reason why Russian radicals were interested in Marxism at the turn of the century was the attraction of its quasi-scientific laws of progress towards utopia, even though the doctrine was ...
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One reason why Russian radicals were interested in Marxism at the turn of the century was the attraction of its quasi-scientific laws of progress towards utopia, even though the doctrine was difficult to apply to a country that seemed unprepared for proletarian revolution and socialism. Leon Trotsky articulated a broad theory of the nature of revolution, but the events which he tried to understand and in which he was involved actually led to his downfall. For Trotsky, revolution was a long but interconnected process of political and social struggle. This chapter explores Trotsky's conception of the process of revolution in the context of the Russian Revolution of 1917. It discusses Marxism in Russia and its flawed notion of revolution, Karl Marx's theory of revolution, the connection between revolution and capitalism, Trotsky's “theory of permanent revolution” or “uninterrupted revolution,” Thermidor and the rise of postrevolutionary dictatorship in Russia, and Trotsky's view of the War Communism.Less
One reason why Russian radicals were interested in Marxism at the turn of the century was the attraction of its quasi-scientific laws of progress towards utopia, even though the doctrine was difficult to apply to a country that seemed unprepared for proletarian revolution and socialism. Leon Trotsky articulated a broad theory of the nature of revolution, but the events which he tried to understand and in which he was involved actually led to his downfall. For Trotsky, revolution was a long but interconnected process of political and social struggle. This chapter explores Trotsky's conception of the process of revolution in the context of the Russian Revolution of 1917. It discusses Marxism in Russia and its flawed notion of revolution, Karl Marx's theory of revolution, the connection between revolution and capitalism, Trotsky's “theory of permanent revolution” or “uninterrupted revolution,” Thermidor and the rise of postrevolutionary dictatorship in Russia, and Trotsky's view of the War Communism.
Robert Daniels
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- October 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780300106497
- eISBN:
- 9780300134933
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Yale University Press
- DOI:
- 10.12987/yale/9780300106497.003.0014
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
The Russian revolutions of 1917 were driven by socialism, embraced by revolutionaries of whatever party affiliation as a utopian antithesis to present reality rather than a projected set of ...
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The Russian revolutions of 1917 were driven by socialism, embraced by revolutionaries of whatever party affiliation as a utopian antithesis to present reality rather than a projected set of institutions. Marxism failed to clarify the meaning of socialism as Marxists, subscribing to the doctrine of the natural transition from capitalism through socialism to “communism,” did not give much attention to the details of the future society. The civil war provided an opportunity to formulate definite conceptions for the road ahead. This consideration of future alternatives was initiated by the so-called Trade Union Controversy that featured three competing platforms: the Leninists, the Trotskyists, and the Workers' Opposition. It was the centrists that presented the first clear position on the trade unions, beginning with Leon Trotsky's call for the militarization of labor early in 1920 that was criticized by the Ultra Left. The Ultra Left's position did not sit well with either Trotsky and Vladimir Lenin. Trotsky and Nikolai Bukharin offered the two most systematic rationales for War Communism in Terrorism and Communism and The Economics of the Transformation Period, respectively.Less
The Russian revolutions of 1917 were driven by socialism, embraced by revolutionaries of whatever party affiliation as a utopian antithesis to present reality rather than a projected set of institutions. Marxism failed to clarify the meaning of socialism as Marxists, subscribing to the doctrine of the natural transition from capitalism through socialism to “communism,” did not give much attention to the details of the future society. The civil war provided an opportunity to formulate definite conceptions for the road ahead. This consideration of future alternatives was initiated by the so-called Trade Union Controversy that featured three competing platforms: the Leninists, the Trotskyists, and the Workers' Opposition. It was the centrists that presented the first clear position on the trade unions, beginning with Leon Trotsky's call for the militarization of labor early in 1920 that was criticized by the Ultra Left. The Ultra Left's position did not sit well with either Trotsky and Vladimir Lenin. Trotsky and Nikolai Bukharin offered the two most systematic rationales for War Communism in Terrorism and Communism and The Economics of the Transformation Period, respectively.
Robert Daniels
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- October 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780300106497
- eISBN:
- 9780300134933
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Yale University Press
- DOI:
- 10.12987/yale/9780300106497.003.0016
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
Leon Trotsky was a fierce enemy of Leninism prior to the Russian Revolution, but also its most ardent exponent in the revolution and in the civil war. His political outlook changed dramatically ...
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Leon Trotsky was a fierce enemy of Leninism prior to the Russian Revolution, but also its most ardent exponent in the revolution and in the civil war. His political outlook changed dramatically during the succession struggle that erupted in 1923. Trapped between the rigidity of his theoretical commitments to Leninism and Marxism and the bitter political adversity that hounded him in mid-career, Trotsky took the Communist Party leadership to task for violating the workers' democracy that was supposed to be the Communist norm. In 1928, Joseph Stalin broke with Nikolai Bukharin's right wing of the party, a decision that had little immediate impact on Trotsky's thinking despite the capitulation of many of his supporters. Before his expulsion from the USSR, Trotsky considered writing a more systematic treatise on the problem of bureaucracy. During his exile, he continued to follow the factional and doctrinal infighting among Communists outside the Soviet Union.Less
Leon Trotsky was a fierce enemy of Leninism prior to the Russian Revolution, but also its most ardent exponent in the revolution and in the civil war. His political outlook changed dramatically during the succession struggle that erupted in 1923. Trapped between the rigidity of his theoretical commitments to Leninism and Marxism and the bitter political adversity that hounded him in mid-career, Trotsky took the Communist Party leadership to task for violating the workers' democracy that was supposed to be the Communist norm. In 1928, Joseph Stalin broke with Nikolai Bukharin's right wing of the party, a decision that had little immediate impact on Trotsky's thinking despite the capitulation of many of his supporters. Before his expulsion from the USSR, Trotsky considered writing a more systematic treatise on the problem of bureaucracy. During his exile, he continued to follow the factional and doctrinal infighting among Communists outside the Soviet Union.
Robert Daniels
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- October 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780300106497
- eISBN:
- 9780300134933
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Yale University Press
- DOI:
- 10.12987/yale/9780300106497.003.0017
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
Both Western historians and Soviet writers have often considered Leon Trotsky and Trotskyism as the forerunner of Stalinism rather than an alternative to it. According to this interpretation, Joseph ...
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Both Western historians and Soviet writers have often considered Leon Trotsky and Trotskyism as the forerunner of Stalinism rather than an alternative to it. According to this interpretation, Joseph Stalin came out the winner in a purely personal struggle for the leadership role, but this analysis fails to take into account the distinctive sources and premises of the Left Opposition in comparison with the Communist Party's Leninist and Stalinist leadership. Between 1923 and 1927, the Left Opposition tried to change the direction of Russia's national policy, which it accused of ruining the goals of the Bolshevik Revolution. Left Bolshevism, before and after the revolution, differed from the position represented by Vladimir Lenin, in terms of membership: it was made up of intellectuals who had been in emigration. The Left Opposition believed in the virtue and mission of the working class and advocated industrialization, which was inseparable from the question of agriculture and the peasantry. Both Left and Right viewed the peasantry as both a problem and a resource for progress toward socialism.Less
Both Western historians and Soviet writers have often considered Leon Trotsky and Trotskyism as the forerunner of Stalinism rather than an alternative to it. According to this interpretation, Joseph Stalin came out the winner in a purely personal struggle for the leadership role, but this analysis fails to take into account the distinctive sources and premises of the Left Opposition in comparison with the Communist Party's Leninist and Stalinist leadership. Between 1923 and 1927, the Left Opposition tried to change the direction of Russia's national policy, which it accused of ruining the goals of the Bolshevik Revolution. Left Bolshevism, before and after the revolution, differed from the position represented by Vladimir Lenin, in terms of membership: it was made up of intellectuals who had been in emigration. The Left Opposition believed in the virtue and mission of the working class and advocated industrialization, which was inseparable from the question of agriculture and the peasantry. Both Left and Right viewed the peasantry as both a problem and a resource for progress toward socialism.
Robert Daniels
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- October 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780300106497
- eISBN:
- 9780300134933
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Yale University Press
- DOI:
- 10.12987/yale/9780300106497.003.0035
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
During the first dozen years of Soviet rule, the Communist oppositions encompassed all the waves of criticism in the Bolshevik/Communist Party that resisted the decisions and policies of Vladimir ...
More
During the first dozen years of Soviet rule, the Communist oppositions encompassed all the waves of criticism in the Bolshevik/Communist Party that resisted the decisions and policies of Vladimir Lenin and of the leadership that succeeded him. Their story sheds light on the Soviet background of post-Communist Russia and their travails highlight the multistage revolutionary process that created and shaped the Communist regime. In addition, their historical existence challenges the ideological assumption that the only way to understand Lenin and Leninism properly is Joseph Stalin's way. Leon Trotsky has often been represented as the first Stalinist, a notion that stems from the image he established during the period of War Communism as the ultimate militarist and apologist for terror. The rightists, the party of Thermidor, did their best to adapt Marxism and proletarian dogma to the reality of a predominantly peasant country. In contrast, Stalin focused on exploiting the economic difficulties of the New Economic Policy to enhance his personal power. It was up to Boris Yeltsin to reject the October Revolution and the practice of a tempered socialism.Less
During the first dozen years of Soviet rule, the Communist oppositions encompassed all the waves of criticism in the Bolshevik/Communist Party that resisted the decisions and policies of Vladimir Lenin and of the leadership that succeeded him. Their story sheds light on the Soviet background of post-Communist Russia and their travails highlight the multistage revolutionary process that created and shaped the Communist regime. In addition, their historical existence challenges the ideological assumption that the only way to understand Lenin and Leninism properly is Joseph Stalin's way. Leon Trotsky has often been represented as the first Stalinist, a notion that stems from the image he established during the period of War Communism as the ultimate militarist and apologist for terror. The rightists, the party of Thermidor, did their best to adapt Marxism and proletarian dogma to the reality of a predominantly peasant country. In contrast, Stalin focused on exploiting the economic difficulties of the New Economic Policy to enhance his personal power. It was up to Boris Yeltsin to reject the October Revolution and the practice of a tempered socialism.