Transcript Authoritarian Regimes - Greater St. Albert Catholic Schools

Authoritarian Regimes
Chapter 3
Essential Questions
for Russia, Germany and Japan
• What role does leadership play in shaping
the face of a country?
• Is Public Opinion spontaneous?
Rise of Communism
Failure of Monarchy +
Provisional Government
How did Stalin come
To power?
Stalin’s strength vs.
Weaknesses of rivals
Communist Russia
How successful was
Stalin’s policies?
Does the end justify
the means?
What was life like
Under Stalin’s rule?
Political, economic, social
Psychological
Background of Russia
• Russia as a very divided society.
- Capital (St. Petersburg) vs. Provinces
(90% were from countryside)
- Educated vs. Uneducated
- Russian vs. Western ideas
- Rich vs. Poor
History of Revolution in Russia
• 1905 Revolution “Bloody Sunday” : When a
peaceful demonstration led by Father Gapon
turned bloody and innocent civilians were killed.
Protests spread across the country in reaction.
-Result: Image of monarchy took a beating.
• 1905 Russia lost to Japan in Manchuria.
-Result: Myth of regime’s invincibility smashed.
Emergence of illegal political parties working to
overthrow monarchy and establish another
political system.
History of Revolution in Russia
• 1) Social-Democratic Labour Party: Marxist. Split into
Bolsheviks (Majority) and Mensheviks (minority)
• 2) Party of Socialist Revolutionaries: Agrarian Socialist
• 3) Constitutional- Democratic Party: Liberals
• Autocracy was under attack in Russia.
• In 1905: the Marxists in St Petersburg founded a Soviet
(Council of workers’ deputies
• Tsar responded by proposing a Manifesto which
promised civil liberties/rights and an elected Duma
(parliament). Therefore managed to get moderate middle
class to support him. And successfully suppressed
rebellion
WWI allowed these opposition
parties to gain an upper hand.
Why?
Impact of WWI on Russia
• Living conditions in Russia deteriorated as
a result of WWI. Most Russians wanted
the Tsar to end the war. PEACE
• Insufficient food, due to diversion to army
and inadequate transport system. Led to
massive inflation. BREAD
• Peasants wanted a fairer distribution of
land. (even before WWI) LAND
Changes of government in Russia
• March/Feb 1917: Kaiser abdicates. (Did
not have the support of army or people)
Unpopular as the Russians were losing
badly in WWI. Low morale amongst Army
+ people.
• Provisional Government (Moderates)
established to run the country in place of
the Tsar.
Role of the Provisional Government
• To govern Russia until new elections can
be held for a new Parliament.
• To hold elections by end of 1917
• To cooperate with committees of workers,
peasants and soldiers (soviets) who had
taken over the major Russian cities. E.g.
St Petersburg/Petrograd (name changed
after 1914).
Failure of the Provisional
Government
• 1) Chose to keep Russia in WWI
• 2) Did not carry out land reform. (Vested interest
of members) Peasants took matters into own
hands.
• 3) Power struggles:
-Increasing power of Soviets. Soviet could provide
food for the Russian people.
-Kornilov Affair: Controversy about this. General
Kornilov said that Kerensky (leader of the
provisional government) had asked for his help
to re establish order in Petrograd. But Kerensky
said that Kornilov was attempting a military
coup. Kerensky turned to Bolsheviks for help.
Failure of the Provisional
Government
-Bolsheviks formed Red Guards with weapons
provided by the Provisional Government.
-Germans facilitated the movement of Lenin from
Switzerland (was living in exile), hoping that his
return to Russia would create political unrest
back there.
-November 1917: Lenin led the Red Guards in
taking over key buildings in Petrograd and
arrested members of the Provisional
Government.
-First Communist State established.
Russian Civil War
Reds (Bolsheviks) vs. Whites (Social
revolutionaries, landowners, navy and
army officers, monarchists and other
conservatives + foreign aid)
Bolsheviks were victorious.
• Russian Civil War 1918-1921.
• Red Army led by Leon Trotsky was a
disciplined and united force.
• 1924: Formation of the Union of Soviet
Socialist Republics. (USSR) New capital in
Moscow.
Rise of Stalin
Account for the Rise of Stalin
I.e. Which were the most important
factors?
When in power, how did Stalin
consolidate his hold on it?
Rise of Stalin
Weaknesses of his
Rivals
-Personal weaknesses
(Trotsky’s arrogance)
-Allowed themselves
To be manipulated
(Kamenev + Zinoviev)
Stalin’s strengths
-Outwitted his rivals
Used his position as
Secretary-General to
Appoint his supporters
Into important posts.
Loyal to Stalin.
Made alliances to
Get rid of
Opponents.
(Nobody is
indispensable)
Stalin Takes Power 1924–1929
•
•
Lenin died in 1924.
Everyone thought Trotsky, the brilliant leader of the Red Army would become
leader – especially as Lenin left a Testament (will) saying that Stalin was
dangerous and should be dismissed.
• But it was Stalin who took power.
Source A
I am not sure that Comrade Stalin will always use his power properly.
Comrade Trotsky, on the other hand, is distinguished by his outstanding ability.
Lenin’s Will (1923).
Secretary
• Stalin was made General Secretary of the Communist Party in 1922.
• Everybody thought it was a dull, unimportant job.
• Stalin used it to get his supporters into important positions.
Trotsky was unpopular
• Trotsky was brilliant, but nobody liked him: they thought he was too bigheaded.
• Secretary Stalin told him the wrong date for Lenin’s funeral, so he missed it –
this made him more unpopular.
• Trotsky also wanted to try to cause a world revolution; many Russians feared
that this would ruin Russia.
Politically ruthless
• The Politburo was divided into two halves. .
• The Leftists (Zinoviev and Kamenev) wanted world
revolution, and to abolish the NEP, but they hated
Trotsky because they thought he was too ambitious.
• The Rightists (Bukharin, Rykov and Tomsky) wanted to
continue the NEP until the USSR was stronger.
• Stalin played one side against the other to take power:
• First, he allied with Zinoviev and Kamenev to cover up
Lenin’s Will and to get Trotsky dismissed (1925).
Trotsky went into exile (1928).
• Then, he advocated ‘Socialism in one country’ (he said
that the USSR should first become strong, then try to
bring world revolution) and allied with the Rightists to get
Zinoviev and Kamenev dismissed (1927). Stalin put his
supporters into the Politburo.
• Finally, he argued that the NEP was uncommunist, and
got Bukharin, Rykov and Tomsky dismissed (1929).
Campaigning for Lenin’s
position
Lenin died in January 1924.
Activity
•
•
•
•
•
Stalin + 3 publicity managers = 4
Trotsky + 2 publicity managers = 3
Kamenev + 1 publicity manager = 2
Zinoviev + 1 publicity manager = 2
1 Private Investigator hired by Trotsky to keep an
eye on Stalin: Need to reveal Stalin’s underhand
tactics.
• Possible successors: You need to appeal to the
Committee members to vote for you as the new
leader
• Publicity managers: Help to do research on the
character, and to dig up factual information that
will discredit the other person.
Schedule
• Spend 10 minutes reading the notes +
textbook.
• Next 10 min: Formulate argument
• Each potential successor will have 3 (max)
minutes to make your appeal about why
you should be the new leader, and not
anybody else. (Total 15 mins)
Stalin outwitted his rivals and
established himself as the leader
of the Communist Party.
He established an authoritarian
regime and ruled as a dictator.
Other political parties
Banned. Establishment of
The Party-State.
Opponents put on show
Trial and thrown into jail/killed
Can make and pass laws
Without support from people
Or other members of
Government
Establishment of
Dictatorship
Used propaganda to
Persuade people to accept
+ obey him.
Exaggerated achievements
Centralized the Education system
Put under government control.
Indoctrination of pro-CCP/Stalin
Sentiments to instill loyalty to party/state
In students
Authoritarian Regimes
• No separation of powers between Legislature,
Executive and Judiciary. All under Stalin’s
control
• No accountability to the people. People not
consulted. Alternative voices not allowed. Only
voice = Voice of the Party-State.
• Untruthful: used propaganda to transmit false
information that served the purposes of the
Party-State
• Party-State: The Party and the State are
synonymous. The Party is the governing Body,
rather than an elected Parliament which has
members from different political parties.
Stalin’s aim was for Soviet Union
to be a modern industrial state
that will be more powerful than
USA and Britain.
2 Policies:
-Rapid Industrialisation
-Collectivisation of Agriculture
Why was Russia so easily
defeated by Germany previously
(in WWI)?
Why was it important for Russia to
build itself up now?
Industry and the 5-Year
Plans
Summary
•Stalin modernized industry by means of the 5-Year
Plans.
•He achieved fantastic successes, but at the most
appalling human cost, and while industrial output
soared, the production of consumer goods remained
static.
•There were three Five Year Plans – 1928–33 and
1932–1937. 1938-1942 (Disrupted when Germany
invaded Russia)
What does this
poster suggest
about the 5 yr plan?
• A propaganda poster of 1934.It is
titled: 'Peasants can live like a Human
Being'.
• Study the poster - can you see how it
•
•
•
•
•
•
is promising people the
following:
enough to eat,
adequate clothing,
the latest consumer goods,
electricity,
education,
happiness.
Reasons
1. Many regions of the USSR were backward. Stalin said
that to be backward was to be defeated and enslaved.
‘But if you are powerful, people must beware of you’
2. Stalin believed (with Lenin) that the USSR should
‘overtake and outstrip the capitalist countries’. He
believed in ‘Socialism in one country’ – the USSR would
become strong enough to survive, then would take over
the rest of the world.
3. He believed Germany would invade. In 1931, he
prophesied: ‘We make good the difference in 10 years
or they crush us’.
4. The 5-year plans were very useful propaganda – for
Communism and for Stalin.
How was it achieved?
1. Plans were drawn up by GOSPLAN (the state planning
organization)
2. Targets were set for every industry, each region, each mine and
factory, each foreman and even every worker.
3. Foreign experts & engineers were called in
4. Workers were bombarded with propaganda, posters, slogans and
radio broadcasts.
5. Workers were fined if they did not meet their targets.
6. Alexei Stakhanov (who cut an amazing 102 tons of coal in one
shift) was held up as an example. Good workers could become
‘Stakhanovites' and win a medal.
7. (After the First 5-year plan revealed a shortage of workers) women
were attracted by new crèches and day-care centres so that
mothers could work.
8. For big engineering projects such as dams or canals, slave labour
(such as political opponents, kulaks or Jews) was used.
9. There was a concentration on heavy industry at the expense of
consumer goods or good housing.
10.Stalin attacked the Muslim faith because he thought it was holding
back industrialisation
How successful?
Results
• Production levels rose dramatically (see Successes)
Successes ...
1. The USSR was turned into a modern state (which was able to resist
Hitler's invasion).
2. There was genuine Communist enthusiasm among the young
‘Pioneers’.
3. There were huge achievements in the following areas:
• new cities, dams/ hydroelectric power, transport & communications
• the Moscow Underground
• farm machinery
• electricity
• coal
• steel
• fertilizers
• plastic
• no unemployment
• doctors & medicine
• education.
Source B (Results)
Electricity ('000 million kw)
Coal (million tons)
Oil (million tons)
Steel (million tons)
1927
5
35
12
4
1933
13
64
21
6
1937
36
128
47
18
(from official government figures.Note that historians have found that Stalin's statisticians
overstated the increases by about a third - they dared not do anything else!
It was the official line that Stalin had achieved a remarkable improvement, and a
statistician who found otherwise would have been sent to Siberia.)
http://russian.psydeshow.org/magnitogorsk/
Note: Magnitogorsk was an industrial city that was built
Mainly from slave labour.
Failures/ Criticisms
1.
Poorly organised – inefficiency, duplication of effort and waste.
2.
Appalling human cost:
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
3.
discipline (sacked if late)
secret police
slave labour
labour camps (for those who made mistakes)
accidents & deaths (100,000 workers died building the Belomor
Canal)
few consumer goods
poor housing
wages FELL
no human rights
Some historians claim the tsars had done the ‘spadework’, setting
up the basis for industrialisation, and that Stalin’s effort had very
little effect on a process that would have happened anyway.
Source C:
• “Mines and factories were claimed to have
doubled their production since 1928. This was
an exaggeration. Yet even sceptical estimates
put the annual expansion in industrial output at
10% between 1928 and 1941; and the
production of capital goods probably grew at
twice the rate of consumer goods during the
Five-Year Plan. The USSR had at last been
pointed decisively towards the goal of a fully
industrialised society.”
• British Historian on the gains of Industrialisation
Stalin’s policies
(Central Planning)
Aim: To build up Russia
Economically + Militarily
Means: Industrialisation
Five-year Plans
(1928-1932/1933-1937/
1938-1942)
Aim: Increase food supply and
Therefore make food prices more
affordable for the urban masses
Means: Collectivisation of Farm
Land. + Improving farming methods
“Free farmers from land so that they
Can work in factories”
Aim: To ensure support
For above policies
Means: TERROR
(To punish opponents,
To deter others from
opposing Party-State)
Collectivisation
• Small private farms amalgamated into large pieces of
collective land, with modern equipment like tractors.
• Aim: To make farming more efficient.
• (i) By increasing crop yield through use of technology,
which in turn requires fewer farmers to work the land.
• (ii) Surplus farmers can be re-located to factories to
work, thereby contributing towards the Industrialisation of
Russia.
• However, there were opponents to this scheme.
• The so-called ‘Kulaks’ or ‘rich peasants’ who did not
want to relinquish the system of private ownership of
land under the previous New Economic Policy advocated
by Lenin.
• The Kulaks were ruthlessly purged. 4-5 million died from
this collectivisation and grain seizures.
What form did Collectivisation
take?
• Sovkhoz (Ideal) : Collective farm where the
peasants members are paid fixed wages,
regardless of output.
• Kolkhoz (Reality): Collective farm where
peasant members are rewarded by results.
• I.e. They were paid out of the farm revenue,
according to their number of ‘labour days’
(contribution). If the quota was not met, the farm
was not paid.
Consequences of Collectivisation
•
USSR able to:
(i) Export grain to other countries. This revenue
from exports enabled the USSR to pay for its
import of industrial machinery
(ii) Provide the cities with adequate food.
State grain collections rose from 10.8 million tons
in 1928-9 to 22.8 million tons in 1931-32.
However, this meant that in case of a harvest
failure, it was the countryside rather than the
towns which went hungry.
Some questions
• How successful were Stalin’s policies of
Industrialisation and Collectivisation?
• “Stalin’s use of terror tactics was justified.”
Discuss.
• Points to consider:
• Does the end justify the means of achieving
them?
• Is the price for the creation of an industrialised
and modern Russia worth paying?
Stalin’s Terror
Summary
• The most famous aspect of Stalin's Russia was
the Terror. This grew from his paranoia and his
desire to be absolute autocrat, and was
enforced via the NKVD and public 'show
trials'. It developed into a centrally-enforced
'cult of Stalin-worship', and a terrifying system of
labour camps - 'the gulag'.
• “A witch-hunt atmosphere was concocted. For
Stalin used the party as a weapon to terrify all
opposition to his economic policies.” British
Historian Robert Service. (Service, 2003: 185)
Reasons for the Terror
Why did Stalin use Terror?
• (Why Unnecessary Purges?)
• 1. Whole Country
• Stalin believed that Russia had to be united – with him
as leader – if it was to be strong.
• 2. Urgency
• Stalin believed Russia had 10 years to catch up with the
western world before Germany invaded.
• 3. Paranoia
• Stalin became increasingly paranoid (seeing plots
everywhere) and power-mad (he demanded continuous
praise and applause). In 1935, his wife killed herself.
• ** Ultimately terror was needed to scare people into
supporting Stalin/Stalin’s policies.
The Apparatus/tools of Terror: How did he terrorize
USSR? (Stalin Takes Total Control)
1. Secret Police
• The CHEKA became the OGPU (1922), then the NKVD
(1934).
2. The First Purges, 1930–33
• Including anybody who opposed industrialisation, and
the kulaks who opposed collectivisation.
3. The Great Purges, 1934–39 “Witch-hunts”
Political Opponents
• 1934: Kirov, a rival to Stalin, was murdered. Although he
probably ordered the assassination, Stalin used it as a
chance to arrest thousands of his opponents.
• 1934–1939, Stalin’s political opponents were put on
‘Show trials’, where they pleaded guilty to impossible
charges of treason (e.g. Zinoviev and Kamenev 1936/
Bukharin, Tomsky & Rykov 1938).
The Apparatus of Terror
(Stalin Takes Total Control)
• The Army
• In 1937, the Commander-in-Chief of the Red Army and 7
leading generals were shot. In 1938–39, all the admirals
and half the Army’s officers were executed or
imprisoned.
• The Church
• Religious leaders imprisoned; churches closed down.
• Ethnic groups
• Stalin enforced ‘Russification’ of all the Soviet Union.
• Ordinary people
• Were denounced/ arrested/ sent to the Gulag (the
system of labour camps). 20 million Russians were sent
to the camps, where perhaps half of them died. People
lived in fear. ‘Apparatchiks’ (party members loyal to
Stalin) got all the new flats, jobs, holidays etc.
• The most famous description of
Stalin's Terror is The Gulag
Archipelago, by Aleksandr
Solzhenitsyn.
One reviewer writes:
• 'Drawing on his own experience
before, during and after his eleven
years of imprisonment and exile, on
evidence provided by more than
200 fellow prisoners, and on Soviet
archives, Solzhenitsyn reveals the
entire apparatus of Soviet
repression - the secret police
operations, the labor camps and
prisons, the uprooting or
extermination of whole populations.
The Apparatus of Terror
(Stalin Takes Total Control)
4. Cult of Stalin
• Censorship of anything that might reflect badly on Stalin
• Propaganda everywhere - pictures, statues, continuous
praise and applause
• Places named after him
• Mothers taught their children that Stalin was ‘the wisest
man of the age’
• History books and photographs were changed to make
him the hero of the Revolution, and obliterate the names
of purged people (e.g. Trotsky).
1. 'The worst aspect of the Terror was not the deaths, but
the stultifying effect it had on the everyday life of ordinary
people' Using Source A, discuss this claim with a friend.
Source A
At the end of the conference, a tribute to Comrade Stalin was called for.
Of course, everyone leapt to his feet.
However, who would dare to be the first to stop – after all, NKVD
men were in the hall waiting to see who quit first. And in that
obscure hall, unknown to the Leader, the applause went on – 6, 7, 8
minutes! They couldn’t stop now till they collapsed of heart attacks!
Aware of the falsity of the situation, after 11 minutes, the director of
the paper factory sat down in his seat.
And, oh, a miracle took place! Everyone else stopped dead and
sat down.
That, however, was how they found who the independent people
were. And that was how they set about eliminating them. They
easily pasted 10 years in a labour camp on him.
Solzhenitsyn, writing about a Communist Party meeting in 1938
2. An amazing aspect of the Show Trails was that the
accused often pleaded guilty to crimes they could not
possibly have done. Using Source B, discuss about why
they might have done this.
Source B
I plead guilty to being one of the leaders of this 'Bloc of
Rightists and Trotskyites.' I plead guilty to the sum total
of crimes committed by this counter-revolutionary
organization, whether or not I knew of, whether or not I
took part in, any particular act...
For three months I refused to say anything. Then I
began to testify. Why? Because while in prison I made
a revaluation of my entire past. For you ask yourself: "If
you must die, what are you dying for?"
Nikolai Bukharin's Last Plea to the court in 1938
Results of the Terror
• (Results Of The Terror – Insane Stalin Grabs All
Power)
• 1. Russification – Russia came to dominate the whole
USSR.
• 2. Orthodox Church attacked
• 3. Twenty million arrested – perhaps half died.
• 4. Terror – People lived in fear of the Secret Police.
• 5. Industry – grew (the Terror provided free slave
labour), but technology and science were held back by
loss of top engineers and scientists.
• 6. Stalin Cult
• 7. Gulag
• 8. Army and navy weakened by purges of leading
officers
• 9. Purges – political opponents eliminated
Instead of the State fading away,
in the final stage of Communism,
it actually grew stronger in
‘Communist’ Russia.
State controlled economy (Stateplanned economy), social life,
information (Media), even minds.