Was 'Soviet Democracy' ever put into practice in the USSR?

[Red Star Rising]

So, Soviet Democracy (at least I think) means workers electing members of a workers' council who in turn elect representatives for the central government. Was a system like this ever put into practice after the 1917 revolution?

[RedWorker]

Yes, Lenin was elected as head of government by this for instance.

[Red Star Rising]

Yes, Lenin was elected as head of government by this for instance.

Wan't there a severe decline in soviet democracy after 1920 though? when the unions were basically placed under the command of state officials during the period of War Communism.

[Sperm-Doll Setsuna]

Wan't there a severe decline in soviet democracy after 1920 though? when the unions were basically placed under the command of state officials during the period of War Communism.

Think you are confused on the temporal location of war communism. War Communism is 1917-1921, at which time the NEP was introduced.

[Red Star Rising]

Think you are confused on the temporal location of war communism. War Communism is 1917-1921, at which time the NEP was introduced.

ik but I thought the militarisation of the unions only happened in 1920, or was it straight from the onset of war communism that they were absorbed into the state monopoly?

[Q]

Yes, Lenin was elected as head of government by this for instance.
And in the elections that the Bolsheviks lost, the elections were annulled or soviets were dismantled from January 1918 on.

[Red Star Rising]

And in the elections that the Bolsheviks lost, the elections were annulled or soviets were dismantled from January 1918 on.

It was pretty authoritarian from the word go then?

[Q]

It was pretty authoritarian from the word go then?
Well, the nuance is that it was a civil war from the get go. Whether that justifies such steps is a tactical point. But soviet democracy, such as it existed, died an early death.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

ik but I thought the militarisation of the unions only happened in 1920, or was it straight from the onset of war communism that they were absorbed into the state monopoly?

The unions were never militarised. There were two proposals to that effect, the first by the PLSR at the First Congress of Trade Unions (note: the PLSR, which is viewed as anarchist by many people on RevLeft), the second by Lenin and Trotsky in 1920. Both were voted down (so much for supposed Bolshevik autocracy).

For that matter, War Communism did not involve a "state monopoly"; it was a system focused on requisitioning materiel for the war, taking it from enterprises that in many cases remained private. The title "War Communism" was a bit of black humour, a riff on German "War Socialism". Again, people on RevLeft seem to imagine that War Communism was some kind of scheme to build socialism in one country years before SioC was "discovered".


And in the elections that the Bolsheviks lost, the elections were annulled or soviets were dismantled from January 1918 on.

What soviets are you talking about? Because in any specific case I can think of (Izhevksk for example), the supposed dissolution of soviets was in fact the Bolsheviks walking out, because they refused to cooperate with the Mensheviks and Esers, and the soviet collapsing.

In fact, simply tolerating the Mensheviks and the Esers in the soviets is a testament to how committed the Bolsheviks were to democracy. One wouldn't expect to find much in the way of Southern Democrats in the US Congress during the civil war, after all. And compared to the Russian civil war - where Mensheviks and the Esers were on one side and the Bolsheviks on the other - the Civil War in the US was a minor spat.

[Red Star Rising]

The unions were never militarised. There were two proposals to that effect, the first by the PLSR at the First Congress of Trade Unions (note: the PLSR, which is viewed as anarchist by many people on RevLeft), the second by Lenin and Trotsky in 1920. Both were voted down (so much for supposed Bolshevik autocracy).

For that matter, War Communism did not involve a "state monopoly"; it was a system focused on requisitioning materiel for the war, taking it from enterprises that in many cases remained private. The title "War Communism" was a bit of black humour, a riff on German "War Socialism". Again, people on RevLeft seem to imagine that War Communism was some kind of scheme to build socialism in one country years before SioC was "discovered".

War communism as based on the German war economy yes, who suggested otherwise? And it certainly wasn't SiOC (again, who suggested that?) but it did involve extensive nationalisation. Part of this was establishing state officials, appointed from above, at the head of the unions who oversaw the partial militarisation of the labour force. Thus absorbing the labour force into the state monopoly rather than granting them control over the means of production. That was nothing if not authoritarian in nature.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

War communism as based on the German war economy yes, who suggested otherwise? And it certainly wasn't SiOC (again, who suggested that?) but it did involve extensive nationalisation. Part of this was establishing state officials, appointed from above, at the head of the unions who oversaw the partial militarisation of the labour force. Thus absorbing the labour force into the state monopoly rather than granting them control over the means of production. That was nothing if not authoritarian in nature.

Several people on this site seem to think that War Communism was an attempt to implement socialism immediately (I can post links to previous discussions). As for nationalisation, that happened in two waves.

First, foreign, particularly German, property was nationalised, due to diplomatic reasons.

Second, every enterprise whose capital exceeded, I think 10000 rubles (I might be off by an order of magnitude), was nationalised, in order to improve efficiency.

The point was never to nationalise the economy entirely, but to win the war and wait for the help of the more advanced German workers' state.

As for the state appointing union heads, I don't really know what you're talking about. Union heads were elected throughout the period, and a lot of them, including Bolsheviks, voted against government resolutions, which annoyed the Bolshevik leadership to no end. The only time the Bolsheviks moved against a union was the militarisation of the railways, which was necessary as the VIKZheDor was running them into the ground.

And of course, for Marxists, the control the working class (note: the working class, not one or the other specific group of workers) exercises over the means of production is organised by the transitional, revolutionary state. To complain of a "state monopoly" is to miss the point.

[RedWorker]

Wan't there a severe decline in soviet democracy after 1920 though? when the unions were basically placed under the command of state officials during the period of War Communism.

Your question was:


So, Soviet Democracy (at least I think) means workers electing members of a workers' council who in turn elect representatives for the central government. Was a system like this ever put into practice after the 1917 revolution?

So your reply makes no sense. Obviously there was a decline in democracy as time passed - how else would Stalin have come to power? Anyone who has studied history for 5 minutes knows very well that the Bolsheviks engaged in many authoritarian actions. Why is this being portrayed as a surprise in this thread? If what you want to hear is merely about the decline of soviet democracy, then why ask the opposite when starting the thread?

[Red Star Rising]

So your reply makes no sense. Obviously there was a decline in democracy as time passed - how else would Stalin have come to power? Anyone who has studied history for 5 minutes knows very well that the Bolsheviks engaged in many authoritarian actions. Why is this being portrayed as a surprise in this thread? If what you want to hear is merely about the decline of soviet democracy, then why ask the opposite when starting the thread?
Am I not allowed to use the same thread to ask multiple, interlinked questions?

[Red Star Rising]

I'd also add that democracy being put into practice doesn't mean "democracy, until we lose an election."

[RedWorker]

I'd also add that democracy being put into practice doesn't mean "democracy, until we lose an election."

Which shows a serious lack of analysis. Would Bolsheviks have ever behaved that way if the opposition did not stage a civil war for the return of a tyrannical dictatorship? Maybe, maybe not.

[Red Star Rising]

Which shows a serious lack of analysis. Would Bolsheviks have ever behaved that way if the opposition did not stage a civil war for the return of a tyrannical dictatorship? Maybe, maybe not.

That's irrelevant - it still wan't democracy in practice, as a direct result of government action.

[Red Star Rising]

I'm not trying to argue whether or not the Bolsheviks were right to do what they did, those kinds of arguments don't get us anywhere. I was simply inquiring into whether Soviet Democracy worked in practice. Right now I don't much care about whether it was morally correct given the circumstances.

And responding to the threat of the re-establishment of a tyrannical dictatorship with the establishment of another one does not indicate either moral correctness or any kind of faith in democracy.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

I'm not trying to argue whether or not the Bolsheviks were right to do what they did, those kinds of arguments don't get us anywhere. I was simply inquiring into whether Soviet Democracy worked in practice. Right now I don't much care about whether it was morally correct given the circumstances.

And responding to the threat of the re-establishment of a tyrannical dictatorship with the establishment of another one does not indicate either moral correctness or any kind of faith in democracy.

Moral correctness, haha. Moral correctness doesn't win wars.

You still haven't really explained what union heads were appointed by the state. Honestly, one gets the impression that you're just throwing accusations around and seeing what sticks.

[Rafiq]

The movement is in nature democratic, but the consolidation of power cannot abide by the limits of "democracy" as such. It possesses a democratic character, but abides by no eternal truths. We Communists understand democracy not as the inclusion of all, but the recognition that the proletariat is by nature a democratic force. The peasantry, of whom were responsible for the Bolsheviks losing the election, are not. What we ought to understand is that freedom is not free, and the fight for democracy is not democratic.

[RedWorker]

I'm not trying to argue whether or not the Bolsheviks were right to do what they did, those kinds of arguments don't get us anywhere. I was simply inquiring into whether Soviet Democracy worked in practice. Right now I don't much care about whether it was morally correct given the circumstances.

The point is that the only way to reply to this:


I'd also add that democracy being put into practice doesn't mean "democracy, until we lose an election."

is speculation about how they would have behaved in other conditions.

[Red Star Rising]

The point is that the only way to reply to this:



is speculation about how they would have behaved in other conditions.

No, the primary question was "Was Soviet Democracy put into practice in the USSR? (in any reasonable way)"

If it was not due to the Bolsheviks seizing power and then acting in an authoritarian fashion from the onset of civil war, then the answer is no. I'm not interested in other, hypothetical conditions - we could go on all day like that. I'm interested only in whether Soviet Democracy ever saw any genuine realisation that did not rest on the barrel of a Bolshevik gun in the USSR, that is to say, the actual conditions of the actual world.

[Red Star Rising]

Moral correctness, haha. Moral correctness doesn't win wars.
Again, when did I dispute this? On the contrary, in the post you are responding to I specifically stated that:

"I'm not trying to argue whether or not the Bolsheviks were right to do what they did."


You still haven't really explained what union heads were appointed by the state.
What? Do you want the names of all the individual officials? I'm afraid I can't provide that.

What I do have is a qoute from a critically acclaimed book by a Marxist political scholar - "As the pressure of the civil war ended, demobilised units of the Red Army were assigned to particularly urgent tasks and there was a partial militarisation of the labour force under the discipline of Trade Union officials who were appointed from above."

This source seems reliable enough and such action seems right in check with Bolshevik authoritarianism in this period, so I will not doubt its accuracy until you provide me a different source that is not just your own perfect unassailable self.

[RedWorker]

If it was not due to the Bolsheviks seizing power and then acting in an authoritarian fashion from the onset of civil war, then the answer is no. I'm not interested in other, hypothetical conditions - we could go on all day like that. I'm interested only in whether Soviet Democracy ever saw any genuine realisation that did not rest on the barrel of a Bolshevik gun in the USSR, that is to say, the actual conditions of the actual world.

Yes it did, the soviets had power...

And if the only thing you care about is the government elections, then obviously you had already answered your own question before asking it. This is the point.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Again, when did I dispute this? On the contrary, in the post you are responding to I specifically stated that:

"I'm not trying to argue whether or not the Bolsheviks were right to do what they did."

The point is that you even mention "moral correctness" in a discussion about revolutionary politics.


What? Do you want the names of all the individual officials? I'm afraid I can't provide that.

What I do have is a qoute from a critically acclaimed book by a Marxist political scholar - "As the pressure of the civil war ended, demobilised units of the Red Army were assigned to particularly urgent tasks and there was a partial militarisation of the labour force under the discipline of Trade Union officials who were appointed from above."

This source seems reliable enough and such action seems right in check with Bolshevik authoritarianism in this period, so I will not doubt its accuracy until you provide me a different source that is not just your own perfect unassailable self.

Oh, and what "Marxist political scholar" might that be? Because I certainly don't remember the quote form anywhere, and nothing turned up after a quick Google search.

As for my sources, it's very difficult to provide a source for something not happening. You might note, however, that S. Malle's extensive "Economic Organisation of War Communism" doesn't mention the appointment of union heads at all. Sorenson, a pro-Menshevik author (!), describes the elections in the VIKZheDor. And so on.

[GiantMonkeyMan]

No, the primary question was "Was Soviet Democracy put into practice in the USSR? (in any reasonable way)"

If it was not due to the Bolsheviks seizing power and then acting in an authoritarian fashion from the onset of civil war, then the answer is no. I'm not interested in other, hypothetical conditions - we could go on all day like that. I'm interested only in whether Soviet Democracy ever saw any genuine realisation that did not rest on the barrel of a Bolshevik gun in the USSR, that is to say, the actual conditions of the actual world.
It seems like a sort of black and white question that doesn't properly reflect on the realities of the situation within Russia during the October Revolution and the Civil War as a wider event in history.

Firstly you have the Soviet in Tashkent seizing power and then being suppressed by the Kerensky Government on September 20th. Then the Soviet in Reval on 27th September. Then, just a few days before the October Revolution you see the Kerensky government shooting on the Soviet at Kaluga.... Suffice to say there was a revolutionary movement of the working people, before any organised Bolshevik uprising, that was being attacked and suppressed by the bourgeois government led by Kerensky and the right-wing of the Essers. Victor Serge, former anarchist, writes: "All over this immense country, the whole labouring masses are moving towards revolution: peasants, workers, soldiers. It is an elemental, irresistible surge, with the force of an ocean."

By September and October, the Bolsheviks had truly become the party of the majority. The Essers might have been popular amongst the peasants but it was the programme of the Bolsheviks that seized the imaginations of the workers within the cities and it was the Bolsheviks that became the leaders of the revolutionary movement through virtue of their willingness to succeed in the place of mediocrity. And thus the Soviet government superseded the Constituent Assembly and its ilk. The soviets only ever lost their position as the centre of organising for the revolution as part of a wider movement to save the revolution from the counter-revolutionary suppression of the Whites.

[Red Star Rising]

As for my sources, it's very difficult to provide a source for something not happening. You might note, however, that S. Malle's extensive "Economic Organisation of War Communism" doesn't mention the appointment of union heads at all. Sorenson, a pro-Menshevik author (!), describes the elections in the VIKZheDor. And so on.

http://www.palgrave.com/page/detail/marxism-after-marx-david-mclellan/?K=9781403997272

Chapter 8 - Russian Marxism in the 1920s - War Communism - page 124

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

http://www.palgrave.com/page/detail/marxism-after-marx-david-mclellan/?K=9781403997272

Chapter 8 - Russian Marxism in the 1920s - War Communism - page 124

First things first, McLellan is not a Marxist. And second, the book is not about trade union policy during War Communism, in fact it tries to cover so much ground in around 400 pages that it's widely considered a bit on the shallow side. I think Sorenson's book, which specifically concerns trade union policy, and Malle's overview of War Communism, are far better sources.

(Sorenson's book is "The Life and Death of Trade Unionism in the USSR, 1917-1928.)

[Red Star Rising]

First things first, McLellan is not a Marxist. And second, the book is not about trade union policy during War Communism, in fact it tries to cover so much ground in around 400 pages that it's widely considered a bit on the shallow side. I think Sorenson's book, which specifically concerns trade union policy, and Malle's overview of War Communism, are far better sources.

(Sorenson's book is "The Life and Death of Trade Unionism in the USSR, 1917-1928.)

From Mclellan's Wikipedia page (which is more reliable than it is given credit for) - "David McLellan (born 1940) is a British scholar of Marx and Marxism."

He's written 10 books defending the Marxist position. How does that make him "not a Marxist" or render his work, which is complete with extensive bibliographies which prove its factual accuracy invalid?

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

From Mclellan's Wikipedia page (which is more reliable than it is given credit for) - "David McLellan (born 1940) is a British scholar of Marx and Marxism."

He's written 10 books defending the Marxist position. How does that make him "not a Marxist" or render his work, which is complete with extensive bibliographies which prove its factual accuracy invalid?

Yes, British scholar of Marxism. Not a Marxist. Just as most scholars of fascism are not fascists. That's a fairly elementary distinction. He also hasn't written ten books "defending the Marxist position", but ten books on Marxism, for an academic audience.

I'm not saying his scholarship is shoddy per se. I'm saying that trade union policy in the USSR wasn't the focus of his study, unlike the works I cited. It's a comment made in passing. I don't know where McLellan got the idea, but it's contradicted by everyone who has studied trade unions in the USSR. Even Brinton, who can't be accused of partiality toward the Bolsheviks, mentions elections for trade union positions (while complaining that the state had to ratify the results of elections, as if anything else would have made sense).

[Red Star Rising]

Yes, British scholar of Marxism. Not a Marxist. Just as most scholars of fascism are not fascists.

And why on Earth does that matter? Are you seriously taking the "Everyone who does not believe what I do must be a liar!" standpoint? Are scholars of Fascism any less factually accurate on the nature of Fascism than Fascists? And my Father was at the University of Kent where he worked and based on what I'm told, I can assure you, he's a Marxist.

Again, I fail to see why that would matter anyway.

[Red Star Rising]

Yes it did, the soviets had power...

And if the only thing you care about is the government elections, then obviously you had already answered your own question before asking it. This is the point.

If you are going to lecture me on the implications of my own question I would ask that you please be more specific.

What power did the soviets have exactly?

in what ways, other than elections, was democracy manifested that can be considered anything like the Soviet Democracy Lenin wrote of in State and Revolution?

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

And why on Earth does that matter? Are you seriously taking the "Everyone who does not believe what I do must be a liar!" standpoint? Are scholars of Fascism any less factually accurate on the nature of Fascism than Fascists? And my Father was at the University of Kent where he worked and based on what I'm told, I can assure you, he's a Marxist.

Again, I fail to see why that would matter anyway.

You're missing the point again. I'm not saying that someone must be lying if they are not a Marxist. Neither Sorenson nor Malle are Marxists, and Sorenson is in fact sympathetic to Menshevik pond life. I was just commenting on your description of McLellan as a Marxist scholar.

Nor did I imply that McLellan was lying. I was implying the point of his work was something else, so he probably didn't concern himself overly with researching trade union policy during War Communism. So it's odd to focus on one statement, in an unrelated work, when every other source, most of which actually focus on economic policy, mentions elections in the trade unions.

If I write a book on reactionary thought in 19th century England, and accidentally misremember when Carlyle's "Sartor Resartus" was published, that doesn't mean I'm lying. It also doesn't mean I trump people who actually studied "Sartor Resartus" in their works, as a source.

[Red Star Rising]

You're missing the point again. I'm not saying that someone must be lying if they are not a Marxist. Neither Sorenson nor Malle are Marxists, and Sorenson is in fact sympathetic to Menshevik pond life. I was just commenting on your description of McLellan as a Marxist scholar.

Nor did I imply that McLellan was lying. I was implying the point of his work was something else, so he probably didn't concern himself overly with researching trade union policy during War Communism. So it's odd to focus on one statement, in an unrelated work, when every other source, most of which actually focus on economic policy, mentions elections in the trade unions.

If I write a book on reactionary thought in 19th century England, and accidentally misremember when Carlyle's "Sartor Resartus" was published, that doesn't mean I'm lying. It also doesn't mean I trump people who actually studied "Sartor Resartus" in their works, as a source.

Then you will be able to contribute something a bit more useful to this discussion - and explain to what extent was there democratic power in the hands of the workers/soviets under the Bolsheviks. If you have such impeccable knowledge of the topic.

[Red Star Rising]

The movement is in nature democratic, but the consolidation of power cannot abide by the limits of "democracy" as such. It possesses a democratic character, but abides by no eternal truths. We Communists understand democracy not as the inclusion of all, but the recognition that the proletariat is by nature a democratic force. The peasantry, of whom were responsible for the Bolsheviks losing the election, are not. What we ought to understand is that freedom is not free, and the fight for democracy is not democratic.

You can't just shift the goal posts like that. You can't redefine terms at your whim. Democracy means rule by the people (Demo - Kratos, people power). Anything that is not that is not democracy, especially not if it involves an authoritarian force overriding the will of a great many people. If the proletariat are the driving force of democracy, then democracy can't possibly work in a place where the proletariat are a minority.