Lenin

LENIN

What did life look like for the Russians before Lenin came to power?
Before Lenin came to power, Russia was in war with Germany. The Russian army was badly organized. All the food and money went to the soldiers that caused food shortages in the cities. Even in 1915, when the Tsar took personal command of the army, the circumstances were still bad. A lot of people hated their tsar, because he wasn’t involved and didn’t care about his people. The tsar had a lot of power, and so he made a lot of laws and policies to prevent revolts against him.
Also, the Russians were divided up into different classes (1: clergy, priests/2: nobles/3: bourgeois, peasants). Per class they had to wear different clothes, which made the peasants and bourgeois to stand out even more.
Most Russians were peasants; they had to work very hard for very low pay by farming the land (which often wasn’t even owned by the farmers) or, in case of the peasants living in towns, they had to work in factories. There were few machines to do the work and the living conditions were bad. Factory workers often had to share houses with each other.
The transport also was very slow. Russia was a very big country, and at much of the Russian land weren’t living any people. An improvement was when the Trans-Siberian Railway was finished in 1905.
Russia was a too large country to be ruled by one man and to assist him the tsar had the Russian civil service, some of them were very able and clever but also many of them were corrupt, poorly educated and unwilling to take any decisions themselves. Therefore there were long delays while even the most unimportant questions were sent to provincial capitals, then to Moscow or even sometimes to St Petersburg for settling. If you desperately wanted a decision you handed over money to encourage a speedy conclusion to your business.
Tsar Nicholas and his family had a key advisor, Rasputin. He was an orthodox monk and helped the tsar’s son from haemophilia (a dangerous disease that stops blood from clotting). Somehow he stopped the bleeding, and so he was as a hero in the royal family. However, he was often drunk and had sexual orgies, so most people disliked him.

What happened during the February and the October Revolution?

The February Revolution (1917) was the first stage of the Russian Revolution.
The February Revolution took place in March 1917 of the modern calendar (Gregorian calendar). In the calendar Russia was using at the time (Julian calendar), the events occurred in February, which would explain the revolution's name (which is the same for the October/November revolution).
The First World War caused a very bad economy for Russia. Food was in short supply and this led to rising prices. By January 1917 the prices in Petrograd had increased six times. Industrial workers went on strike in Petrograd, to try to get higher wages, and people took to the street demanding food. On the 11th of February, 1917, a large crowd marched through the streets of Petrograd breaking shop windows and shouting anti-war slogans.
The situation got worse on the 22nd of February, when the owners of the Putilov Iron Works locked out its workforce after they demanded higher wages. Led by Bolshevik agitators (people who tried to stir up everyone), the 20,000 workers took to the streets. The army was ordered to stop the demonstrations but they were unwilling to do this and in some cases the soldiers joined the protestors in demanding an end to the war.
Other workers joined the demonstrations and by 27th February an estimated 200,000 workers were on strike. Nicholas II, who was at Army Headquarters in Mogilev, ordered the commander of the Petrograd army to suppress "all the disorders on the streets of the capital". Next day troops fired on demonstrators in different parts of the city. Others refused to obey the order and the Pavlovsk regiment mutinied. Others regiments followed and soldiers joined the striking workers in the streets.
On 26th February the star ordered the Duma (an organization who approved laws, which had been announced by the tsar himself) to close down. Members refused and they continued to meet and discuss what they should do. Michael Rodzianko, President of the Duma, sent a telegram to the Tsar suggesting that he’d appoint a new government led by someone who had the confidence of the people. When the Tsar did not reply, the Duma nominated a Provisional Government headed by Prince George Lvov.
The High Command of the Russian Army now feared a violent revolution and on 28th February suggested that the tsar should abdicate in favour of a more popular member of the royal family. Attempts were now made to persuade Grand Duke Michael Alexandrovich to accept the throne. He refused and on the 1st March, 1917, the Tsar abdicated leaving the Provisional Government in control of the country.
The October Revolution took place in October 1917 of the modern calendar (Gregorian calendar). The October Revolution, also known as the Bolshevik Revolution, was the second phase of the Russian Revolution of 1917. The October Revolution was led by Bolsheviks under the leadership of Lenin and marked the first officially Communist revolution of the twentieth century, based upon the ideas of Karl Marx. The crucial revolutionary activities in Petrograd were under the command of the Petrograd Soviet's Military Revolutionary Committee.
The October Revolution was a much well considered event, organized by a small group of people. The Bolsheviks prepared their coup in only six months. They were generally viewed as an extremist group and had very little popular support when they began having serious tries in April 1917. By October, the Bolsheviks’ popular base was much larger; though still a small amount of people within the whole country had built up a big amount of support within Petrograd and other urban centres.
Leon Trotsky urged the overthrow of the Provisional Government. Lenin agreed and on the evening of 24th October, 1917, the Bolsheviks began to occupy the railway stations, the telephone exchange and the State Bank. The following day the Red Guards surrounded the Winter Palace. Inside was most of the country's Cabinet.
The Winter Palace was defended by Cossacks, some junior army officers and the Woman's Battalion. At 9 p.m. the Aurora and the Peter and Paul Fortress began to open fire on the palace. Little damage was done but the action persuaded most of those defending the building to surrender. The Red Guards, led by Vladimir Antonov-Ovseenko, now entered the Winter Palace and arrested the Cabinet ministers.
After October, the Bolsheviks realized that they could not maintain power in an election-based system without sharing power with other parties and coming to agreements. As a result, they formally abandoned the democratic process in January 1918 and declared themselves the representatives of a dictatorship of the proletariat. In response, the Russian Civil War broke out in the summer of that year.
The Great October Socialist Revolution was the official name for the October Revolution in the Soviet Union since the 10th anniversary celebration of the Revolution in 1927. Today this name is used mainly by Russian Communists.

What is meant by communism?

Communism is a theory and a system of social and political organization. Communism is a classless society in which all property is owned by the community as a whole and all people have an equal social and economic status. The communism sought to overthrow capitalism through a workers’ revolution and redistribute the wealth in the hands of the proletariat (working class). According to the Marxism the society had to evolve from feudalism, to capitalism, to socialism and eventually into communism.
No one really knows who invented the communism, but it exists since ancient times. Primitive humans worked for the benefit of their entire tribe by sharing their fruits and labour. This early form of communism spread around during the 18th century, and gave philosophers many new ideas. Idealists in the 19th century who didn’t like the Industrial Revolution formed communities with the communist ideas, but they were of short life only.
Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels transformed communism into a revolutionary movement. They claimed that the communism had to become globally. Together they wrote down their ideas what became the Communist Manifesto. According to the Manifesto all history can be explained in terms of class struggles. In each society, a minority of people owned or controlled the means of production, constituting the ruling class. The majority of people owned and controlled a little. At the stage of capitalism, the bourgeoisie (capitalist who controlled the means of production) used the proletariat by paying low wages while keeping the profit themselves. Subsequently capitalism would evolve into socialism and then eventually to communism. Marx specified a transitional period in which the workers would form a socialist society. A temporary dictatorship of the proletariat would be needed to seize property from the bourgeoisie.
During the 20th century countries were run by a Communist Party, for example the Soviet Union, China and Cambodia. Nowadays there are still countries with this kind of government like Cuba. In all countries where there was soviet styled communism there were no free elections.

How did Lenin’s early life influence his later ideas and career?

Lenin’s youth and early life had a lot of influence in his career. His father died early of a bleeding in his brains, and his older brother was arrested and hanged for participating with threatening Tsar Alexander III. His sister was banished to Kokushkino, in Russia. These events moved Lenin and made him being revolutionary. He once saw a famous painting called ‘We will follow a Different Path’. This phrase also describes Marxist way to revolt, because he could also have been an anarchist or other methods.
Lenin became interested in Marxism and was involved in student protests and was subsequently arrested. He was then expelled from Kazan University for his political ideas. He continued to study independently, however, and it was during this period that he first familiarized himself with Karl Marx’s book: Das Kapital. Lenin continued with his studies at the University of Saint Petersburg. In January 1892, Lenin was awarded a first class degree in law by the University.

Where did Lenin get his ideas from & what did they look like?

The Bolshevik leader Vladimir Lenin idea’s were based on the Marxism, and is known as the Leninism or Marxism-Leninism. He argued that the proletariat, the working class in Russia, could only achieve a revolution through the efforts of a communist party. Lenin further believed that such a party could only achieve its aims through a form of disciplined organization known as democratic centralism. Other beliefs were that the Communism had to be spread around to other countries, a belief that imperialism is the highest stage of capitalism, and also the exclusion of compromises with the Bourgeoisie.
Differences between the Marx’s views and Lenin’s views were that Lenin believed that the socialism stage can’t be reached if the country hasn’t passed through the development of industrial capitalism. Marx viewed the socialist revolution as arising out of the industrial proletariat. At the time of the Bolshevik Revolution, Russia wasn’t an industrial country; it was primarily an agricultural country, with peasants working on the land, there weren’t much industrial workers and almost no sign that a revolution was in advance of industrial nations.

What did Lenin believe in?

• He felt that the rich abused the poor and that they should help them
• He believed that anybody making a profit was abusing everybody else
• He believed that everybody was equal (but some are more equal than others)
• He wanted a government that truly represented the people
• He wanted the overthrow of the Russian government as it supported a system that kept the huge majority of Russian people in misery
Lenin argued that Marx had failed to considered the effects of imperialism and that the advanced industrial nations were avoiding revolution by forcing their excess production into captive colonial markets and exploiting those colonies for their resources. This strengthened capitalism to the point that the revolution would not occur in the most advanced nations but rather in the weakest imperialist state, that being Russia. Many Marxist critics of Leninism, which included social democrats and Eurocommunists held that the Bolshevik program was contrary to Marx's theory of history.
The policies of Leninism were superseded in the Soviet Union by Stalinism. In China, Leninist ideology and structure were the basis of organization for both the Kuomintang and the Communist Party of China and formed the starting point for Maoism.
Leninism was popular in the third world as it offered a development model and ideological framework for political policy. The popularity of Leninism in the third world concerned the United States during the Cold War. After the fall of the Soviet Union, Leninist policies became considerably less popular in the third world. Although abandoning much of his economic policy, the Communist Party of China is still organized along Leninist lines.
Stalin, leader of the Soviet Union after Lenin, used the similar ideas of the Leninism, although he had published these ideas before the Revolution

What do you think about the way (his methods) Lenin did try to change Russia? (was it good/bad/necessary, explain)

Russia by 1918 appeared to be in the hands of the communists (Bolshevik Party) led by Lenin. The Provisional Government had been overthrown and the Bolsheviks had appeared to have gained power in Russia and that the country’s problems seemed to be over. In Fact, those problems had only just begun.
• He had limited control of Russian territory
• Many groups were against his rule
• Russia was still in World War One
Lenin pulled Russia out of the war with the Treaty of Brest-Litvosk. This wasn’t a nice treaty, because Russia had to give of very much land, what included 25% of her farming land and 75% of her iron ore and coal deposits. These pieces of land included 60 million people. All this had to be given to the Germans.
The groups who opposed Lenin’s rule were called the Whites. They fought the Reds, but because it were all different small groups, so the Whites were easily defeated. Ex-tsarist officers controlled the armies. The discipline was harsh, and if a unit performed badly in battle, its leader was shot and the men sent to prison.
Lenin did other things that were really horrible. If there were problems, he sent the feared communist secret police, the Cheka. They were used to keep people in order during the civil war. Because of the civil war, Lenin introduced War Communism;
• The government had complete control in the factories. Workers didn’t have the right to run factories anymore. The workers were said what to do.
• The Cheka was sent out to take food from the peasant farmers. If they kept the food themselves they were shot. Most of the peasants produced only food for themselves, so the cities were on shortage of it. Many people were shot by the secret police.
• The economy of Russia had been devastated because of the civil war.
The crime increased, agriculture had been ruined and the industry was at a low level.
To get control of whole Russia, the Reds treated the people very well, while the Whites abused those who lived in areas that they were in. The Reds also promised land to the peasants, while the Whites promised to restore land back to its original owner. Because of this the Reds won the support of the people. Now the Whites were out of Russia or dead, Lenin had Russia under his control.
More and more people were opposing Lenin by 1921. Workers wanted higher wages, more food and control of the industry again. Lenin knew he had to change the economy to survive, so he changed the War Communism into the New Economic Policy (NEP);
• The Cheka stopped taking food form the farmers. The farmers had to give a set amount each year in tax. Extra grain could be sold in the open market.
• Traders could buy and sell. This was illegal under War Communism.
• Small factories producing things that weren’t necessities were returned to their original owner.
• Larger factories producing essential items remained under the control of the government.
Well, because of the NEP, Russia was better of then before but not much. There were still major problems like unemployment, crime and most of the peasants were very poor.
If you take all these points into consideration, you will see that most of the things Lenin did were bad. It looks like that Russia had become worse than in the time of the Tsar. To establish the Soviet Union land had been lost, many people have been killed or died because of famine or Canibalism (15 million in total), people got unemployed and billions of roubles were the cost. Other the other hand, Lenin did manage to bring a better standard of living for many. But this doesn’t balance all the bad and cruel things he has done.

Was Lenin a Villain or a Hero?

Let’s first answer this question: “What is a villain and a hero?”. A villain is a person who is wicked or evil. And a hero is somebody who, in the face of danger or position of weakness, displays courage and the will for self-sacrifice for the greater good. Looking at these descriptions, you can’t describe Lenin in one of them. Would Lenin self sacrifice himself for his people or is he wicked, we don’t think so.
In Russia has been a survey among the habitants with the question: “Do you think Lenin was a good or a bad person?”. 59 % said good, 11 % said bad and 30 % said hard to answer. The majority thought he was a good person.
We don’t understand why most of the Russian people see Lenin as a good person, maybe they don’t want to hurt other Russian their feelings and don’t want to talk bad about another Russian. Look at all the bad things he had done in comparison with his good points. In an eye-blink you can see that the right column is much longer. In our eyes wasn’t Lenin the evil, mean, stingy person you see in the movies, but he wasn’t the kindest person.
Good:
• Get Russia out of the WWI
• Equal rights given to women
• Provided free education
• Free medical services
• Liquidation of illiteracy
• Eight hour work day
• NEP → improved economy & industry
• Ended class-system

Bad
• Cheka - Shot many people, labour camps
•No free elections – No democracy
• Famine
• Ordered people to kill priests
• People killed without a trial
• Fight against religion
• Supply lots of money to workers all over the world in an attempt to have a revolution of a global scale
• Caused a civil war between the Reds & Whites
• Took food from farmers
• War treaty → lost lot of land & people
• War Communism
• Lenin was like just like dictator
• Much money used
• Didn’t promise his people ‘Peace, land, bread’
• Russia became ‘State-Capitalism’
• No freedom of speech (except the Bolsheviks)
• Damaged Russian culture
• Modernised Russia very slowly
• Anti-liberty
• The government has too much control over your personal lives
• People are not equivocally rewarded for the job they perform, there is no stimulation to better yourself. A doctor would make the same salary as a store clerk.

As conclusion, we think Lenin isn’t a hero, nor a villain, but maybe he is a mixture of them; a Heroic Villain. A villain because most of his actions weren’t the best, and heroic because he brought some great improvements to the world.
In May 1922, Lenin got a disease, from which he healed. Later on he got more diseases and once when he got a stroke, he lost his power of speech. Finally he died at the 21st of January 1924 in Gorki Leninskije, a village located 10 km south from Moscow. Though his widow Kroepskaja didn't agree, his embalmed body was showed in a mausoleum at the Red Square in Moscow, where he still is lying. Every two weeks his body is treated with special care.

Sources:

Internet:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_Lenin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist
http://www.essortment.com/all/biographyvladim_myd.htm
http://www.allaboutphilosophy.org/communism.htm
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/RUSmarchR.htm
http://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leninism
http://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marxism
http://www.answers.com/topic/leninism
http://www.spiritus-temporis.com/leninism/
http://www.lenin.fi/uusi/uk/tbdone.htm
http://www.answers.com/topic/leninism
http://encyclopedia.kids.net.au/page/le/Leninism
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080403102352AAR7xWY
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_factors_lead_Lenin_to_develop_his_ideas_about_communism
http://encyclopedia.kids.net.au/page/co/Communism
http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/russia_1918_to_1921.htm
http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/vladmir_lenin.htm
http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/november_1917.htm
http://www.st-petersburg-life.com/st-petersburg/1917-russian-revolution
http://www.essaysample.com/essay/001481.html
http://www.spiritus-temporis.com/october-revolution
http://www.sparknotes.com/history/european/russianrev/summary.html
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/RUSnovemberR.htm
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Books:
History book: Digging Deeper, into the twentieth century
De Russische Revolutie; John Bradley