Vladimir Lenin’s Bolsheviks came to power in 1917 promising to establish a democratic, egalitarian society based on the ideas of Karl Marx. The October Revolution was supposed to create a modern Russia out of the ashes of the First World War and the autocratic Tsarist system which had ruled Russia for centuries. Instead, the dictatorship of Josef Stalin moved the Soviet Union far away from the ideals of 1917.
This course examines the development of Russian society and politics and explores how the dream of socialism became a nightmare of dictatorship. It considers the ways in which the Bolshevik Party changed between 1917 and 1921 and assesses the impact that this had on the development of the Soviet state. It then focuses on Stalin’s Russia as a modern, industrialised system emerged alongside a brutal dictatorship. It concludes by considering the changes in the USSR in the 1940s and 1950s, as the country was now one of two nuclear superpowers fighting a new, cold, war.
Learning outcomes
- An appreciation of the changes and continuities in post-revolutionary Russia;
- An understanding of the development of the Soviet system during the Stalin years;
- An ability to compare and contrast Lenin’s Russia with Stalin’s.
