ASSINGMENT ON RUSSIAN

REVOLUTION

SUBMITTED TO:SUBMITTED BY:DR RENU PANDEY

KASHYAP
MA 1ST SEM

JYOTI

BBAU,LUCKNOW

ASSINGMENT ON RUSSIAN
REVOLUTION

INTRODUCTION
The Russian revolution is the collective term
for the series of revolutions in Russia in
1917, which destroyed the tsarist autocracy
and led to the creation of the Soviet Union.
In the first revolution of February 1917
(March in the Gregorian calendar) the czar

was deposed and replaced by a provisional

government. In the second revolution of
October
that
year
the
Provisional
Government was removed and replace with
a Bolshevik (Communist) government.

Russian soldiers marching in Petrograd in February

1917

The February revolution (March 1917) was a

revolution focused around St Petersburg. In
the chaos, members of the imperial
parliament or Duma assumed control of the
country, forming the Russian Provisional
Government. The army leadership felt they

did not have the means to suppress the

revolution and Czar Nicholas 2nd of Russia ,
the last Czar of Russia , abdicated,
effectively
leaving
the
Provisional
Government in power. The soviets (workers
councils) which were led by more radical
socialist factions initially permitted the
Provisional government to rule, but insisted
on
a
prerogative
to
influence
the
government and control various militias.
The February revolution took place3 in the
context of heavy military setbacks during
the First World War, which left much of the
army in a state of mutiny.
The period of dual power ensued, during
which the Provisional Government held
state power while the national network of
soviets, led by socialists, head the
allegiance of the lower-class citizens and the
political left. During this chaotic period there
were frequent mutinies and many strikes.
When the Provisional Government choose to
continue Fighting the war with Germany, the
Bolsheviks and other socialists functions
campaigned for the abandonment of the
war effort. The Bolsheviks formed workers
militias under their control Red Guards

(later the red army) over which the exerted

substantial control.
In the October Revolution (November on the
Gregorian calendar), the Bolsheviks party,
led by Vladimir Lenin, and the workers
Soviets,
over
threw
the
Provisional
Government in Petrograd. The Bolsheviks
appointed themselves as leaders of various
government ministries and seized control of
the country sides, establishing the Cheka to
ruthlessly quash dissent. To end the war, the
Bolsheviks leaderships signed the treaty of
Brest-Litovsk with Germany in March 1918.
However4 a brutal civil war erupted
between the Red (Bolsheviks), and
white (anti-Bolshevik), factions which was
to continue for sever4zal years, with the
Bolsheviks ultimately victorious. In this way
the Revolution paved the way for the USSR.
While many notable historical events
occurred in Moscow and Petrograd, there
was also a broadly-based movement in
cities throughout the state, among national
minorities throughout the empire, and in the
rural areas, where peasantry took over and
redistributed land.

BACKGROUND
At the start of 1917 the country was ripe for
revolution - growing rapidly, creating
expanded social opportunities but also great
uncertainty. Poor villagers more and more
often migrated between agrarian and
industrial work environments, and many
relocated entirely, creating a growing urban
labour force. A mid class of white-collar
employees, businessmen, and professionals
(the letter group comprising doctors,
lawyers, teachers, journalists, engineers,
etc.) was on the rise. Even nobles had to
find new ways to subsist in this changing
economy, and contemporaries spoke of new
classes forming (proletarians and capitalists,
for example), although these classes were
also divided along crisscrossing lines of
status.

Soldiers blocking Narva Gate on Bloody Sunday

It was becoming harder to speak of clearlydefined social groups fractured in various

ways, their defining boundaries were also
increasingly blurred by migrating peasants,
worker intellectuals, gentry, professionals,
and the like. Here was a general sense that
the texture of people's lives was being
transformed by a spreading commercial
culture which remade the surfaces of
material life (buildings, store fronts,

advertisements,
fashion,
clocks
and
machines) and nurtured new objects of
desire.
By
1917,
the
growth
of
political
consciousness, the impact of revolutionary
ideas, and the weak and inefficient system
of government (which had been debilitated
further by its participation in World War 1st),
should have convinced the emperor,
Nicholas 2nd, to take the necessary steps
towards reform. In January 1917, in fact, Sir
George Buchanan, the British Ambassador
in Russia, advised the emperor to "break
down the barrier that separates you from
your people to regain their confidence." in
response to his advice, Nicholas effectively
disowned Buchanan.
Many of the people of Russia resented the
autocracy of Czar Nicholas 2nd and the
corrupt and anachronistic elements in his
government. He was seen as being out of
touch with the needs and aspirations of the
Russian people, the vast majority of whom
were victims of the wretched socioeconomic
conditions
which
prevailed.
Socially, Tsarist Russia stood well behind the
rest of Europe in its industry and farming,

resulting in few opportunities for fair

advancement on the part of peasants and
industrial
workers.
Economically,
widespread inflation and food shortages in
Russia contributed to the revolution.
Militarily, inadequate supplies, logistics, and
weaponry led to heavy losses that the
Russians suffered during World War 1st; this
further strengthened Russias view of
Nicholas 2nd as weak and unfit to rule.
Ultimately, these factors, coupled with the
developments (particularly during the years
following
the
1905
Bloody
Sunday
Massacre). Led to the Russian Revolution.
ECONOMIC CHANGES
An elementary theory of property, believed
by many peasants, was that land should
belong to those who work it. At the same
time, peasant life and culture was changing
constantly change was facilitated by the
physical movement of growing numbers of
peasant villagers who migrated to and from
industrial and urban environments, but also
by the migration of city culture into the
village through material goods, the press,
and word of mouth.

The Petrograd Soviet Assembly meeting in 1917

Workers also had good reasons for

discontent: overcrowded housing with often
deplorable sanitary conditions, long hours at
work (on the eve of the war a 10- hour
workday six day a week was the average
and many were working 11-12 hours a day
by 1916), constant risk of injury and death
from very poor safety and sanitary
conditions, harsh discipline (not only rules
and fines, but foremens fists), and
inadequate wages (made worse after 1914
by steep war-time increases in the cost of
living). At the same time, urban industrial

life was full of benefits, though these could

be just as dangerous, from the point of view
of social and political stability, as the
hardship.
There
were
many
encouragements to expect more from life.
Acquiring new skills gave many workers a
sense of self-respect and confidence,
heightening expectation and desires. Living
in cities, workers encountered material
goods such as they had never seen while in
the village. Most important, living in cities,
they were exposed to new ideas about the
social and political order.
SOCIAL CHANGES
The social causes of the Russian Revolution
mainly came from centuries of oppression of
the lower classes by the Tsarist regime and
Nicholass failures in World War 1ST. while
rural
agrarian
peasants
had
been
emancipated from serfdom in 1861, they
still resented paying redemption payments
to the state, and demanded communal
tender of the land they worked. The
problem was further compounded by the
failure of Sergei Wittes land reform of the
early
1900s.
Increasing
peasant
disturbances and sometimes full revolts

occurred, with the goal of securing

ownership of the land they worked. Russia
consisted mainly of poor farming peasants,
with 1.5% of the population owing 25% of
the land.
The rapid industrialization of Russia also
resulted in urban overcrowding and poor
conditions for urban industrial workers (as
mentioned above). Between 1890 and 1910,
the population of the capital, Saint
Petersburg, swelled from 1,033,600 to
1.905,600, with Moscow experiencing
similar growth. This created a new
proletariat which due to being crowded
together in the cities, was much more likely
to protest and go on strike than the
peasantry had been in previous times. In
one 1904 survey, it was found than an
average of sixteen people shared each
apartment in Saint Petersburg, with six
people per room. There was also no running
water, and piles of human waste were a
threat to the health of the workers. The poor
conditions only aggravated the situation,
with the number of strikes and incidents of
public disorder rapidly increasing in the
years shortly before World War 1st.

World War 1st only added to the chaos.

Conscription swept up the unwilling in all
parts of Russia. The vast demand for factory
production of war supplies and workers
caused many more labour riots and strikes.
Conscription stripped skilled workers from
the cities, who had to be replaced with
unskilled peasants, and then, when famine
began to hit due to the poor railway system,
workers abandoned the cities in droves to
look for
food.
Finally,
the soldiers
themselves,
who
suffered
from
the
elements, began to turn against the Tsar.
This was mainly because, as the war
progressed, many of the officers who were
loyal to the Tsar were killed, and were
replaced by discontented conscripts from
the major cities, who had little loyalty to the
Tsar.
POLITICAL CHANGES
Many sections of the crown had reason to
be dissatisfied with the existing autocracy.
Nicholas 2nd was a deeply conservative ruler
and maintained a strict authoritarian
system. Individuals and society in general
were expected to show self-restraint,
devotion to community, deference to social

hierarchy, and a sense of duty to country.

Religious faith helped bind all of these
tenets together as a source of comfort and
reassurance in the face of difficult
conditions and as a means of political
authority exercised through the clergy.
Perhaps more than any other modern
monarch, Nicholas 2nd attached his fate and
the future of his dynasty to the notion of the
ruler as a saintly and infallible father of his
people. This idealized vision of the Romanov
monarchy blinded him to the actual state of
his country. With a firm belief that his power
to rule was granted by divine right, Nicholas
assumed that the Russian people were
devoted to be unquestioning loyalty. This
ironclad belief rendered Nicholas unwilling
to allow the progressive reforms that might
have alleviated the suffering of the Russian
people. Even after the 1905 revolution
spurred the Tsar to decree limited civil
rights and democratic representation, he
work to limit even these liberties in order to
preserve the ultimate authority of the
crown.
Deposit constant oppression, the desire to
the people for democratic participation in

government was strong. Since the age of

enlightenment, Russian intellectual had
promoted Enlightenment ideals such as the
dignity of the individual and of the rectitude
of democratic representation. These ideas
were championed most vociferously By
Russias
liberals,
although
populists,
Marxists, and anarchists also claimed to
support democratic reforms. A growing
opposition movement had begun to
challenge the Romanov monarchy openly
well before the turmoil of World War 1st.
dissatisfaction
with
Russia
autocracy
culminated in the huge national upheaval
that followed the bloody Sunday massacre
of January 1905, in which hundreds of
unarmed protesters were shot by the Tsars
troops. Workers responded to the massacre
with crippling general strike, forcing
Nicholas to put forth the October Manifesto
which established a democratically elected
parliament (the state Duma). The Tsar
undermined this promise of reform but a
year later with Article 87 of the 1906
Fundamental State laws, and subsequently
dismissed the first two Dumas when they
proved uncooperative. Unfulfilled hopes of

democracy fuelled revolutionary ideas and

violent outbursts targets at the monarchy.
One of the Tsars principal rationales for
risking war in 1914 was his desire to restore
the prestige that Russia had lost amid the
debacles of the Russo-Japanese war.
Nicholas also sought of foster a greater
sense of national unity with a war against a
common and ancient enemy. The Russian
Empire was an agglomeration of diverse
ethnicities that had shown significant sings
of disunity in the years before the First
World War. Nicholas believed in part that the
shared peril and tribulation of a foreign war
would mitigate the social unrest over the
persistent issues of poverty, inequality, and
inhuman working conditions, instead of
restoring Russias political and military
standing, World War 1st led to the horrifying
slaughter of Russian troops and military
defeats that undermined both the monarchy
and society in general to the point of
collapse.
REVOLUTION
The February Revolution:

On 23rd February 1917 the international

Womens Day Festival in St. Petersburg
turned into a city-wide demonstration, as
exasperated women workers left factories
to protest against food shortages. Men
soon joined them, and on the following
day encouraged by political and social
activists the crowds had swelled and
virtually
every
industry,
shop
and
enterprise had ceased to function as
almost the entire populace went on strike.
Nicholas ordered the police and military to
intervene, however the military was no
longer loyal to the Tsar and many
mutinied or joined the people in
demonstrations. Fights broke out and
whole city was in chaos. On October 28 th
over 80,000 troops mutinied from the
army and looting and rioting was
widespread.
Faced with this untenable situation Tsar
Nicholas abdicated his throne, handing
power to his brother Michael would not
accept leadership unless he was elected
by the Duma. He resigned the following
day, leaving Russia without a head of
state.

The Provisional Government:

After the abdication of the Romanovs a
Provisional Government was quickly
formed by leading members of the Duma
and recognised internationally as Russias
legal government. It was to rule Russia
until elections could be held. However its
power by no means absolute or stable.
The more radical Petrograd Soviet
organisation was a trade union of workers
and soldiers that wielded enormous
influence. It favoured full-scale Socialism
over more moderate democratic reforms
generally favoured by members of the
Provisional Government.
After centuries of imperial rule Russia was
consumed with political fervour, but the
many different factions, all touting
different ideas, meant that political
stability was still a long way off directly
after February Revolution.
LENIN RETURNS TO RUSSIA
One person keep to take advantage of the
chaotic state of affairs in St. Petersburg
was Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov aka Lenin.
Lenin had spent most of the 20th Century

travelling and working and campaigning in

Europe partly out of fear for his own
safety, as he was known Socialist and
enemy of the Tsarist regime. However with
the Tsar under arrest and Russian politics
in chaos, Lenin saw the opportunity to
lead his party, the Bolsheviks, to power.
From his home in Switzerland he
negotiated a return to Russia with the help
of German authorities. (As a proponent of
withdrawing Russia from the Great War,
the Germans were willing to facilitate
Lenins passage back via a sealed train.)
Lenins return in April of 1917 was greeted
by the Russian populace, as well as by
many leading political figures, with great
rapture and applause. However, far from
uniting
the
fractious
parties,
he
immediately condemned the policies and
ideologies
of
both
the
Provisional
Government and the Petrograd Soviet. In
his April theses, published in the Bolshevik
newspaper Pravda, he advocated non-cooperation with the liberals (i.e. nonhardline Communists) and an immediate
end to the war.

At first his uncompromising stance served

to isolate Lenin and the Bolsheviks,
however with powerful slogans like
peace, land and bread; Lenin begin to win
the hearts of the Russian people who
were increasingly unable to stomach war
and poverty.
Summer of 1917:
During the summer of 1917 Lenin made
several attempts to invoke another
revolution the likes of which had taken
place in February, with the aim of
overthrowing the Provisional Government.
When the Machine Gun Regiment refused
to leave Petrograd (as St. Petersburg was
then known) for the frontline Lenin sought
to manoeuvre them instead into making a
putsch. However Kerensky, arguably the
most important figure of the time a
member
of
both
the
Provisional
Government and Petrograd Soviet
adeptly thwarted the coup. Experienced
troops arrived in the city to quell any
dissidents and the Bolsheviks were
accused of being in collusion with the
Germans. Many were arrested whilst Lenin
escaped to Finland.

Despite this PR disaster Lenin continued

plotting
and
scheming.
Meanwhile
Kerensky suffered his own political
setbacks and even had to appeal to the
Bolsheviks for military aid when he feared
his minister of War, Kornilov, was aiming
for a military dictatorship. By autumn the
Bolsheviks were climbing into the
ascendency, winning majority votes within
the Petrograd and Moscow Soviets. Leon
Trotsky was elected as presidents of the
former.
The October Revolution:
(Nb. By the Julian calendar used in Russia
at the time, the revolution took part in
November 1917, and is therefore often
referred to as the November Revolution)
With Russian politics still in a state of
constant flux Lenin realised that now was
the time to capitalise on his partys
popularity. He planned a coup detat that
would
overthrow
the
increasingly
ineffective Provisional Government and
replace them with the Bolsheviks. On
October 10th he held a famous meeting
with twelve party leaders, and tried to
persuade them that a revolution was

required. Despite receiving the backing of

only 10 of them plotting went ahead.
Octobers 24th was the date decided upon,
and on that day troops loyal to the
Bolsheviks took up crucial positions in the
city, such as the main telephone and
telegraph offices, banks, railroad stations,
post offices, and major bridges, Guards
commissioned
by
the
Provisional
Government, who had got wind of the
plot, fled or surrendered without a fight.
By the 15th October every key building in
St. Petersburg was under Bolshevik
control, except the winter palace where
Kerensky and the other Ministers were
holded up with a small guard.
At 1900 of that day Kerensky fled the
palace by car, never to return to Russia.
On the 16th the palace was taken with
barely a shot fired, and Lenins October
Revolution had been achieved with the
bare minimum of drama or bloodshed.

AFTERMATH AND CONSEQUENCES

Despite being allowed to seize power so

easily Lenin soon discovered that his
support was far from absolute. His peace
policy with the Germans was particularly
unpopular as it ceded large amounts of
Russian territory. Shortly after the October
Revolution, the Russian Civil War broke
out between the Reds (communists) and
the whites (Nationalists, Conservatives,
Imperialists and other anti-Bolshevik
groups).
After a bloody four year struggle Lenin
and the Reds won, establishing the Soviet
Union in 1922, at an estimated cost or 15
million lives and billions of roubles. In
1923 Lenin died and Stalin took over the
Communist Party, which continued to rule
Russia until 1991 when the USSR was
dissolved.
THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION AND THE
WORLD
Trotsky said that the goal of socialism in
Russia would not be realized without the
success of the world revolution. Indeed a
revolutionary wave caused by the Russian
Revolution lasted until 1923. Despite
initial hopes for success in the German

Revolution, in the short-lived Hungarian

Soviet Republic and others like it, no other
Marxist movement succeeded in keeping
power in its hands.
This issues is subject to conflicting views
on the communist history by various
Marxist groups and parties. Stalin later
rejected this idea, stating that socialism
was possible in one country.
The confusion regarding Stalins position
on the issue stems from the fact that he,
after Lenins death in 1924, successfully
used Lenins argument that socialisms
success needs the workers of other
countries in order to happen to defeat his
competitors within the party by accusing
them of betraying Lenin and therefor the
ideals of the October Revolution.
CONCLUSION
In conclusion, the working people of
Russia were tired of being pushed so hard
so they started to protest against the
government; the protests were successful
and the revolution was triumphal. They
lost 1500 people but were victorious. They
made
a
new
government,
which

immediately appointed people to areas

that needed attention. The people wanted
a good government, and for a while they
wanted.
The outcome of the revolution was this.
The imperial government was quickly
exercised effective political power, the
Retrograde Soviet of Workers and
soldiers Deputies and a Provisional
Government formed by the Committed of
the Duma. The soviet immediately
appointed a commission to cope with the
problem of ensuring a food supply for the
capital and ordered the release of the
thousands of political prisoners. On
February 28soviet decided to arrest
Nicholas ministers and began publishing
an official paper, Izvestia (Russian for
news). On March 1 it issued its famous
order no. 1 what this order said was that
the soldiers and the sailors in the navy
were now under Soviet control and were
to elect committees that would exercise
exclusive.

References:-

1. Arjun Dev, world history

2 .Norman Lowe, Mastering
3.