Historiography of the Russian Provisional Government 1917 in the USSR

Historiography of the Russian Provisional Government 1917 in the USSR Ian D. Thatcher ussian Marxists were as divided in 1917 over the replacement executive of the Russian Empire following the abdication of Tsar Nicholas II, as over other pressing issues. For leading socialists from I. G. Tsereteli to G. V. Plekhanov the Russian Provisional Government (hereafter RPG) was an appropriate regime for a ‘bourgeois’ revolution. Indeed there would be positive beneits for Russia’s workers as the new government set about repealing the most repressive aspects of Romanov rule. At long last socialists could emerge out of the underground and begin a lengthy process of building a strong radical proletarian movement that would eventually lead to a socialist Russia. Even V. I. Lenin admitted that soon after the February Revolution Russia was the ‘freest’ out of all the belligerent nations. Lenin however was impatient for the rapid overthrow of the RPG. For Lenin, the RPG embodied all of the rapacious and repressive urges of the ancien regime. It may have had a democratic façade, but in essence the RPG was imperialist. he slogan of the hard-left in World War One – turn the international imperialist war into a domestic civil war of the proletariat against the bourgeoisie – had to be urgently promoted and fought for. his was Lenin’s stance upon his return to Russia in April 1917. It did not command immediate, complete acceptance in Bolshevik ranks, but it did win out in the October Revolution that ended the RPG.1 Once established, the Soviet regime, one may imagine, would not have been the most conducive environment to conduct ‘objective’ historical investigations into the RPG. Indeed, several scholars suggest that Soviet R Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 108 10/02/2015 12:43:30 Historiography of the Russian Provisional Government 1917 in the USSR 109 studies of the RPG are noticeable mainly for their skewed ideological distortions.2 Of course, one cannot deny or overlook the importance of context. In the USSR Marxism was de facto a state ideology before this was declared oicially in the 1977 constitution. It would be impossible to imagine a Soviet historical profession that did not draw upon and employ Marxist categories of analysis, particularly the primacy of class interests and their economic underpinnings. Within this, there are certain wellestablished and well-known turning points in the general atmosphere and reinterpretations of Marxism in which Soviet historians worked.3 he importance of periodisation notwithstanding, here Soviet historians’ work will be examined thematically as serious contributions to a historical understanding of the RPG. he relative paucity of interest in the RPG amongst western historians of the Russian Revolution is striking. Against this background, is there a case to suggest that it was precisely Soviet historians that produced the most thorough and informative studies of the RPG? To write Soviet literature of as ‘ideological’ is to miss the genuine contribution Soviet historians made to our general knowledge of the RPG.4 It may be the case that within a regime generally accepted as undemocratic,5 it was not only possible to maintain an education in and participate in the culture of scholarship, but also that scholarly landmarks and careers were not so diferent, East and West. Economic Policy Given Marxism’s emphasis on the ‘economic base’ and of the undoubted economic problems that Russia had in 1917, it is little wonder that Soviet historians studied the RPG’s economic policies. Indeed, some of the irst primary source documents to be published in early Soviet historical journals focused on economic and social issues.6 he irst notable attempt to digest these and other materials in a monograph on the RPG’s economic record, was made when Soviet Russia was grappling with the issue of markets and state direction during the New Economic Policy. Lozinskii’s (1929) account of the economic policy of the RPG described the economic catastrophe that formed in all sectors – heavy, inancial, service, agricultural – from February-October 1917.7 he general economic inheritance was extremely poor. Several years of war Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 109 10/02/2015 12:43:30 110 Ian D. Thatcher had left transport, numerous branches of industry, and the national inances, in a near ‘catastrophic’ condition. he continuing negative impact of the war on the economy was for Lozinskii obvious. However, Lozinskii argues that the RPG’s economic mismanagement was a key factor in taking the ‘near-catastrophic economy’ of February to the ‘actual economic catastrophe’ of October. To begin with, Lozinskii contended that the RPG paid insuicient attention to economic afairs, a remarkable fact given the obvious need for action to rebuild the economy. he irst government programme contained no concrete measures to tackle economic disintegration. Its successor, the irst coalition ministry (5 May-2 July) that included representation from the Petrograd Soviet of Workers’, Peasants’, and Soldiers’ Deputies (hereafter Petrograd Soviet), issued a irm, if general, commitment to improve economic performance via government intervention and control over production, transport, and the distribution of goods. However, in early June it then rejected a report on how the Russian war economy could be remodelled along German lines. Only on 22 June did it establish an Economic Council and a Main Economic Committee to develop an economic programme. It was typical of the RPG to resort to advisory committees, but these were slow in operation and soon bogged down in endless discussion. he Economic Council, for example, took one month to arrange its irst meeting, and then managed only eight further sessions before it was abolished. Its practical impact on economic policy was nil. he RPG’s inability to take decisive measures in the direction of further state regulation was also a product of political division and ministerial opposition. he Ministry of Trade and Industry, in particular, argued strongly for free market solutions and resisted government control of the economy. Lozinskii argues that this fatal procrastination and programmatic division was typical of the RPG’s record over other pressing issues, most crucially land reform. he peasantry had for long been convinced that the redistribution of private land holdings was the key to the resolution of Russia’s agrarian woes. he war, as in other areas had, for Lozinskii, compounded agricultural problems and gave further strength and urgency to peasant radicalism. In this context, the RPG refused to take decisive measures. Insisting that land reform had to be left to the promTwentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 110 10/02/2015 12:43:30 Historiography of the Russian Provisional Government 1917 in the USSR 111 ised but continually delayed Constituent Assembly, the RPG engaged in ‘preparatory’ measures for future land reform. hese included the establishment of committees at local, regional, and national level to investigate the situation in agriculture and collect relevant data. he attempt to keep the situation static in agriculture included restrictions introduced in July on private transactions in land sales. his ofended the Prime Minister Prince G. E. L’vov who then resigned from the RPG, creating further political diiculties. Above all, for Lozinskii, the RPG was dominated by the interests of large capital hence its half-measures, retreats, and bureaucratic and ministerial confusion that rejected anything that could have tread upon the rights of private property. Necessary measures such as the grain monopoly were thus undermined by the government that introduced them as it sought to soothe the concerns of industrialists and traders. he ‘pettybourgeois’ interests, subservient to large-capital, dominated each government, even following the realignments that saw socialists join the administration. he Menshevik Minister of Labour (M. I. Skobelev) failed to extend workers’ rights, just as the Socialist Revolutionary Minister of Agriculture (V. M. Chernov) made no progress on land reform. he only way in which economic disintegration could be arrested, for Lozinsksii, was through government control and radical reform, such as redistribution of agricultural resources to the peasants. hese were the very policies that large capital would not countenance. In the absence of an executive willing to adopt the necessary policies, it was left to ‘the streets’ to take over. In its economic policy (or lack thereof) the RPG oversaw a rapidly worsening economy. his prepared the ground for bolshevism. Most notably the antipeasant character of the RPG guaranteed for the Bolsheviks a crucial ally in the vast majority of Russia’s population. here is obviously an ideological framework and motivation to Lozinskii’s study. However, in obvious examples there are qualiications. he analysis of lower labour productivity in the post-February period, amongst other factors, refers to a fall in labour discipline, a lack of enthusiasm that resulted from a breakdown in social relations and intensiied class struggle. his contributing factor ‘from below’ has thus to be included alongside other factors, such as the reluctance of private domestic banks to issue necessary investment loans, and the unwillingTwentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 111 10/02/2015 12:43:30 112 Ian D. Thatcher ness of the Allies to grant credits to an RPG that was seemingly, not in control of the Russian economy. It is thus unfair to criticise Lozinskii for an overly narrow and strictly ideological approach. He was questioned both at the time and thereafter for paying too little attention to projects for economic regulation under the RPG that were subsequently employed by none other than the Bolsheviks.8 Lozinskii makes clear reference to such reports, such as the V G Groman report of March 1917 on a state-regulated economy. Lozinskii’s point, that is hard to refute, is that these reports were consistently rejected or rendered meaningless by the RPG.9 One cannot doubt that there were sections of the RPG and of society that wanted to uphold a free market and this acted as a brake on attempts to achieve government regulation.10 A recent critic highlights Lozinskii’s ‘one-sided’ account of the failure of the government’s grain monopoly. Lozinskii puts the blame on Russian landowners, whereas this critic highlights that the peasants were also opposed.11 It is always diicult to reconstruct why an author did not include a speciic point. It may have been the context of Soviet Russia at the end of the 1920s when it was perhaps best not to mention peasant resistance to grain seizures when this was happening under the break-down of the NEP.12 It may also have been due to incomplete statistical data or having another focus. As an early work there were inevitable gaps and omissions for future researchers to ill. Indeed, in economic policy studies and elsewhere, Soviet studies of the RPG gradually expanded the source base and extended its ield of vision. Monographs of late Soviet communism tended to begin with claims of much more thorough research than that typical of their predecessors. In this sense Soviet scholarship was building up incrementally, much as in western scholarship.13 Even as an early stab at its subject, Lozinskii’s contribution contained numerous factual data that could be and was drawn upon by marxist and ‘non-marxist’ scholars.14 he less than promising record of the economic committees has also entered general understandings of the RPG’s record on the economy.15 Foreign Policy If the war was a major factor underpinning Russia’s economic problems then international relations would be a factor of major importance in the Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 112 10/02/2015 12:43:30 Historiography of the Russian Provisional Government 1917 in the USSR 113 RPG. his held true not only in itself, but had a special meaning in Russia given the role and prominence of socialist opposition to the ‘imperialist conlict’ and the general desire for peace. Indeed, some western studies have emphasised the peace policy of the Petrograd Soviet as the body through which war and peace was played out and lost in 1917. In this rubric the RPG is a marginalised or secondary player.16 he temptation for Soviet historians to dismiss the importance of the RPG’s foreign policy would be obvious. Much marxist analysis of the First World War looked upon states not as independent actors with choices, but as driven by an imperialist world economy beset with insolvable problems and diiculties. his ideology is a component part of Soviet interpretations of the RPG on the world stage. Given its commitment to keeping Russia in the hostilities the RPG had to be deined in Soviet historiography as ‘imperialist’. hat said, there are diferences in approach and interpretation and far from simplistic analyses of a ‘rapacious Russian bourgeoisie’.17 If some authors, for example, focused mainly on high politics and diplomatic correspondence in the European theatre, others found originality by concentrating on domestic political parties and the RPG’s foreign policy and by extending the scope to include the RPG’s foreign policy in Latin America, Asia, and the neutral countries.18 Overall, Soviet historians appreciated that the RPG’s foreign policy was conducted against a background of a general (and at times dramatic) fall in Russian international prestige. Foreign relations had to be afected by Russia’s economic and inancial diiculties and by political uncertainty. Early and late Soviet studies of the RPG’s foreign policy efectively focused on the changing dynamic between Russia’s internal and international politics.19 Many valid and telling points are made that would be accepted outside a marxist framework. he RPG’s irst foreign minister (March-April), the Kadet leader Professor P N Miliukov, was the most outspoken exponent of Russia staying in the war for a victory that would bring territorial and other beneits. his was partly out of Miliukov’s understanding of Russian state interest, but also against a background in which the new government was held in high regard at home and abroad. Feeling the ground irm under his feet, Miliukov could be ambitious and bullish. his was soon to change. It became apparent that Britain and France did not wish to hold Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 113 10/02/2015 12:43:30 114 Ian D. Thatcher to ‘spoils of war’ agreements of 1915. Over a range of issues – Greece, the Straits, Central Asia – Russia was becoming an isolated power. For the Allies Miliukov was too aggressive. At home, Miliukov was losing support in the Cabinet to opponents, chiely to the then Justice and Finance Ministers A F Kerensky and M I Tereshchenko, who were both pro-war but much less concerned about territorial acquisitions than Miliukov. he Petrograd Soviet, that was slowly turning its attention to foreign policy, was suspicious of Miliukov. he Soviet’s Executive Committee was against ‘imperialist’ wars of aggression and desired a renegotiation of war aims away from territorial gains to a speedy and just peace. here thus formed a strong interest, domestic and foreign, in Miliukov’s removal. Yet it was precisely the strong domestic and foreign pressure that, for Soviet scholars, explains why Miliukov held out for his foreign policy. It was only by insisting even more vocally on Russia gaining vital spoils of war that Miliukov felt he could resist Allied attempts to undermine previous agreements and to keep domestic ‘defeatism’ at bay. However politic it may have been for Miliukov to be lexible and retreat, in the international and domestic bind in which he was entrapped, vocal defence of his position was Miliukov’s only option. It was precisely Miliukov’s intransigence, however, that ended his governmental career after the so-called April Crisis. Miliukov’s fall brought about a reorientation of the RPG’s foreign policy. His successor Tereshchenko was a close ally of the Minister of War Kerensky. Together they believed that the Russian soldier would be far more willing to engage in self-discipline and do battle if he thought that under the new foreign policy there was a just war of defence in the interest of Russian and global democracy. his brought about a new aspect to the international-domestic dynamic. On the one hand, the Allies were content for the RPG to renounce territorial acquisition on its own behalf, but they did not wish this principle to be extended to their own programmes. he Allies wanted Russian socialists to enter the RPG with the intention of improving the ighting capacity on the Eastern Front. London and Paris knew well that the best way to temper socialist opposition to war was to make them partially responsible for its conduct. Delegations of Allied pro-war socialists were sent to Russia to promote pro-war enthusiasm amongst their comrades in the East. On the other Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 114 10/02/2015 12:43:30 Historiography of the Russian Provisional Government 1917 in the USSR 115 hand, the Allies did not wish Russia to be so successful that it could export the RPG’s ‘romantic’ foreign policy. here thus formed a ‘tense’ coalition of interest around the need for a new ofensive on the Eastern front. Following the far from successful spring ofensive led by France on the Western Front, the Allies needed the Germans to be tied down by Russia. For the RPG a successful ofensive would demonstrate its ability to mobilise the army. his would give a much needed boost to its authority at home and abroad. It would be on the back of success in war that the RPG would see of domestic critics and force the Allies to the negotiating table to make a clear, loud statement of a just foreign policy. he quick failure of the June ofensive was thus a serious blow to the RPG’s big gamble. Following defeat there was much less room for manoeuvre and inluence. For the Allies there was no sense in placing any hope upon what was now seen as a moribund administration. he RPG was useful to the Allies only to the extent that it was able to keep the front active, however minimally. he Allies increasingly showed little regard for Russia as a great power and had little respect for Russian sovereignty. Russia was ignored, for example, at inter-Allied conferences even when Russia was the topic of discussion. Allied ambassadors were frequent visitors to RPG ministerial oices giving advice on what measures should be introduced to restore order to Russia.20 Despite recognition of the RPG as the legitimate Russian government, foreign diplomatic and elite circles were willing to lend an ear to any ‘right’ authoritarian response to Russia’s domestic political crises. With the Allies giving less than the promised support in military and economic matters and with the war increasingly unpopular at home, a key question for students of the RPG is why was it so committed to keeping the Russian front alive in alliance with the Entente? Soviet scholars point out that although the prospect of doing a deal with Germany was raised, there was little chance that the RPG would succumb to this temptation. Even though it failed miserably in this task, the RPG bourgeois rulers thought the Entente was the best guarantee of Russia’s future independence. Tereshchenko, for example, believed that a separate peace with Germany would result in Russia becoming a German colony. he Allies and their spare capital for investment, would bring much greater beneits to an independent Russia. Added to this, Russia Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 115 10/02/2015 12:43:30 116 Ian D. Thatcher was so entwined with British and French investment capital that the option of abandoning the Entente was never seriously considered. here was also the thought that although it might take time to reveal its full force, with American intervention the scales would swing in the Entente’s favour. It could only be a question of time until Germany’s surrender. Finally, if continuing the war was problematic for Russia, so was peace. Peace would have to be agreed internationally (with whom and on what terms?), and domestically how would the problems of demobilisation and land reform be resolved? In Russia peace as much as war would bring about revolution. Not surprisingly, for Soviet historians only a Bolshevik seizure of power could resolve Russia’s foreign-domestic diiculties. Although one might disagree with the linkage between the foreign policy issues and bourgeois rule, Soviet historians successfully highlighted the problems and dilemmas of defending Russia’s international position under the RPG during a period of international decline. The Political History of the RPG Histories of 1917 have concentrated on the Bolshevik Revolution. Historians have therefore focused attention on the events that led to this seminal event. In this narrative structure the RPG is marginalised. In the USSR the imperative to study the history of bolshevism up to the October Revolution was felt with even greater force. Nevertheless there have been notable attempts to think through events from the perspective of the RPG. his is evident in V. I. Startsev’s trilogy published in the late 1970s and early 1980s.21 he irst instalment examined the issue of ‘dual power’ between the RPG and the Petrograd Soviet. It illustrated that from the outset genuine control resided with the Petrograd Soviet.22 he latter was in place irst and it issued decrees and resolutions before the RPG’s formation. he RPG never had a free hand in its actions. Its programme had to be debated and agreed with representatives from the Petrograd Soviet. his was felt with particular force by the RPG’s irst Minister of War, A. I. Guchkov. Guchkov was dismayed by the Petrograd Soviet’s ‘Order Number 1’ to the capital’s soldiers that, amongst other things, legislated for the election of soldiers’ committees that would represent the army in Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 116 10/02/2015 12:43:30 Historiography of the Russian Provisional Government 1917 in the USSR 117 the Petrograd Soviet and oversee conditions in the forces. For Guchkov such ‘democratisation’ would lead to the army’s disintegration and a slave Russia under German tutelage. Startsev charts the various committee meetings of the Executive Committee of the Petrograd Soviet, of the soldiers’ section of the Petrograd Soviet, and of a crucial joint session of 6 March 1917 between Guchkov, General Potapov and a delegation from the Petrograd Soviet to discuss the army’s reorganisation and diferences in rules for the rear and the front. Although certain compromises were reached, it was clear to all that in the vital matter of state power and defence – control of the army – nothing could be achieved without the approval of the Petrograd Soviet to which the ordinary soldiers owed loyalty. he RPG’s attempt to introduce an oath of allegiance to itself was resisted and, for Startsev, produced only a further decline in the RPG’s standing amongst the rank and ile. Startsev ofers a detailed and nuanced reading of the major twists and turns in RPG-Petrograd Soviet relations. He does not shy away from controversial judgements. he disputes over foreign policy in the ‘April Crisis’ placed point blank, for Startsev, the question of power. He makes the bold claim that 20-21 April was the most critical crisis for the RPG in its irst form during which its very survival was in question. he Petrograd Soviet could easily, Startsev argues, have replaced the RPG as the country’s only government. After all, the RPG lacked what the Petrograd Soviet had in abundance: allegiance of the rank and ile in the armed forces. his was displayed most clearly on 21 April, when Guchkov and General Kornilov, attempted and failed, to order troops out of the barracks and onto the streets to disperse workers’ demonstrations. he soldiers refused unless conirmation was given by the Petrograd Soviet’s Executive Committee. In the event this was not given and Kornilov rescinded the order under guarantees that the Petrograd Soviet would answer for peace in the capital. he only reason why the RPG survived was the refusal of the SR-Menshevik defencist majority of the Petrograd Soviet’s executive committee to transfer all government power to the Petrograd Soviet. Instead they opted for a reformed coalition ministry in which members of the Petrograd Soviet would take up ministerial portfolios alongside representatives of the ‘bourgeois’ parties. he rationale that with Miliukov and Guchkov gone, a coalition ministry was Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 117 10/02/2015 12:43:31 118 Ian D. Thatcher best placed to construct a new ‘democractic’ foreign policy (to aim for peace without annexations and contributions on the basis of national self-determination); hold the army together to defend Russia; and to deal with pressing economic problems is presented quite fairly by Startsev, if rejected for its unavoidable support of an ‘imperialist’ war. hus, for example, with ‘socialists’ in government planning for an ofensive Miliukov could be content that in the realpolitik of international relations his foreign policy was in fact still being pursued.23 In the second instalment Startsev seeks to ill a lacuna in studies of the RPG, an examination of the internal policy of its irst cabinet (3 March-5 May). here is an excellent contextualisation of the environment in which the cabinet operated. First, one has to note the impact of tsarist political history. Political parties could not develop to their fullest extent given various restrictions. One cannot therefore assume a direct correlation between ‘party ailiation’ and a party controlling the executive. Indeed, individual ministers were clearly not bound by party discipline. For Startsev, the dominance of ‘individual conscience’ over collective responsibility further weakened the RPG’s power when it was severely constrained by the general impact of the revolution, most notably the collapse of the army and the police, the central props of the tsarist state. In a political analysis easily shared by western colleagues Starstev notes ‘in the irst Provisional Government there formed a bourgeois radical-democratic bloc that conducted a highly successful struggle against right-centrist elements in the government and this ruled out a pure Cadet hegemony’.24 Second, and very crucially, despite claiming for itself unlimited legal authority,25 the RPG had to accept the reality of the new state (dis)order after tsarism’s collapse. While some bourgeois politicians had hoped for the peaceful transformation of the autocracy into a parliamentary monarchy, Russia’s ‘bourgeois’ revolution at the very outset had outrun its normal boundaries, rendering central state power inefective.26 Following established marxist analysis, Startsev separates the state into three main constituent elements: (1) armed forces; (2) police and militia; (3) bureaucracy. he RPG had efective control of only the last, and even here not all ministers felt themselves in the right portfolio or very conident of success.27 he RPG is defended from critics who suggest that in abolishing state oices such as Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 118 10/02/2015 12:43:31 Historiography of the Russian Provisional Government 1917 in the USSR 119 the provincial governors and the land captains, and in decentralising control of the new people’s militia to local bodies, it efectively undermined its power. For Startsev, the RPG ‘could not have acted otherwise… it displayed elementary political realism’.28 Startsev also maintained that it would be wrong to assume that a largely powerless RPG had no contact with Russia. Bolsheviks apart, all political parties to varying degrees ofered to support the RPG.29 he national and local press were largely sympathetic. From 9 March, the Russian Orthodox Church changed its prayers from ‘Our Lord and Master the Emperor’ to ‘Our Lord and Master the Provisional Government’.30 A host of social organisations sent greetings and regards, by post and personally; a wave of enthusiasm that only began to wane in the latter half of April.31 Above all, the RPG displayed instincts for political survival in a largely successful propaganda campaign, conducted in a west European fashion. Here Kerensky is singled out for particular praise as yesterday’s revolutionary who had remained democratic and accessible after becoming today’s minister: ‘this impressed all sectors of society; everyone applauded Kerensky and this won over hearts and minds to the Provisional Government’.32 he case that the RPG was very constrained in its actions did not, for Startsev, render it irrelevant. Examining the legislation of the irst RPG, he identiies a contradictory process in which reactionary and progressive acts were evident.33 he latter included a political amnesty, full rights for national minorities, including crucially Jews and Poles, electoral reform of local government that for the irst time established the four-tail sufrage in Russia, and rights of association that took account of peculiarities of the Russia conditions, for example, workers’ committees in factories. While many of these acts conirmed de jure a de facto reality won by the people from below, legislation is nevertheless seen as important barrier to potential counter-revolution.34 he RPG became reactionary for Startsev, in its attempts to reconstruct state power and authority. It tried, for example, to shore up the power of its provincial commissars, to turn them from, as initially conceived, a communication link between the periphery and the centre, into an executive igure representing central authority in the provinces, along the lines of tsarist governors. In the key areas of change that would have solidiied and Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 119 10/02/2015 12:43:31 120 Ian D. Thatcher extended the Russian revolution’s progressive intent – land reform and the election of a constituent assembly – the RPG dragged its feet and urged patience and order. Here it expressed, for Startsev, its essentially reactionary bourgeois essence.35 he absence of efective social reform was however promised to be addressed by the irst coalition. he inal instalment examines why the promise of coalition government was not realised, focusing upon the last two months of RPG rule. It was a late summer and autumn full of events and adventure in which Russian politics underwent continual and fundamental change. Startsev recounts this in ine detail, including the failed revolt of General Kornilov (27-30 August) during which the second coalition collapsed (25 July-27 August), the formation of a Directory of Five under Kerensky (1-27 September), the negotiations around the formation of a third (and inal) coalition ministry (27 September-25 October), and the Democratic Conference (14-20 September) and its aftermath in the establishment of a Council of the Republic (or pre-parliament, 7-25 October).36 All of these startling developments revolved around the fundamental issues post-February. How to establish an executive that had authority; how to supply and establish order in the army; how to conduct a democratic foreign policy while maintaining the Entente Alliance; how to manage the economy; and how to ensure an orderly transition to a constituent assembly. he main players in this drama continued to be the seemingly irreplaceable Kerensky and the leading elites in the liberal and the moderate socialist camps. here had, however, been a radical alteration in the constellation of political forces that made the drama of high politics a world to itself, increasingly divorced from reality. Most importantly, the Petrograd and local Soviets, the loci for Startsev, of real power throughout 1917, were increasingly coming under radical left control of the Bolsheviks and their allies. No matter what the executive reorganisations and how sensible they may have seemed to the ‘bourgeoisie’, new cabinets and institutions were powerless when devoid of support in the soviets.37 Added to this, the coalition of liberal and moderate socialists around Kerensky was far from stable. On the contrary it overlowed with suspicion, conlicting intentions, and disbelief. Hit by never-ending political crises, the RPG was simply incapable of delivering the policies demanded by the people: Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 120 10/02/2015 12:43:31 Historiography of the Russian Provisional Government 1917 in the USSR 121 he Provisional Government created its own unpopularity – it was committed to a war hated by the masses, it procrastinated over agrarian reform and it delayed elections to the Constituent Assembly and to local government. It was too late to resort to force that it did not have and, in any case, its punitive measures were ignored or resisted. Only a decisive break with all previous policy, a genuine attempt at peace negotiations and a transfer of land to the peasants could have saved the Provisional Government, but of this it was incapable; it saw no need and considered its position sound. Meanwhile the country slipped away into the hands of the Soviets and day by day the Bolsheviks progressively and successfully planned their insurrection.38 here is a sense of inevitability (zakonomernost) in the RPG’s demise, but the outcome still requires an explanation and analysis. Startsev brilliantly conveys the drama and mounting tension of the parallel processes that, particularly from 13 October, led to the RPG’s collapse. He is unique in paying close attention to the debates in the pre-parliament and the draft protocols of cabinet meetings. he RPG was distracted by the attention ministers gave to their participation in the pre-parliament. Moreover, their reports gave a depressing account of ongoing and seemingly out of control disintegration in the military and in the economy. he debates and cross-examinations revealed no unity in the political elite – irrespective of a Bolshevik intervention, the political order was obviously in crisis, with continual suggestions of resignations, a reconiguration of coalitions and so on. here was no efective strategy, either in the pre-parliament or in the executive. A cabinet meeting of 17 October, for example, discussed the possibility of a Bolshevik uprising. For Startsev, the RPG, not knowing its enemy, seriously miscalculated: ‘it expected a semi-spontaneous outburst along the lines of the July demonstrations, and not a carefully planned armed uprising’. None of the necessary measures were taken: ‘no appointment to safeguard the city and no notion of how a revolt would be suppressed’.39 he Bolsheviks could thus quite easily close the pre-parliament (in what looks like a dress rehearsal for what would happen to the Constituent Assembly in January 1918) and arrest the RPG.40 Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 121 10/02/2015 12:43:31 122 Ian D. Thatcher Conclusion his historiographical review has skipped over many Soviet contributions on the RPG. he vast array of articles, doctoral, and individual chapter studies have not been discussed. he focus on largely monographic studies is suicient to illustrate unique contributions to the study of the RPG that were researched and written in the USSR. here are two aspects to this; one relating to scholarship on the RPG, the other to how we think about working conditions for historians in the USSR. It is striking that a seemingly less than friendly environment for the examination of Russian liberalism produced so many individual detailed studies of the RPG. It is clear that there was a marxist framework, but one that permitted diferences of opinion.41 In general one can well understand the emphasis on class analysis. he language of class is very much evident in 1917, with workers’ organisations being particularly sensitive to the possibility of bourgeois sabotage or betrayal of the democratic revolution. he fact that this paradigm entered the Soviet historical cannon with particular force cannot exclusively be explained by the state and its ideology. Class analysis would have appeared for the early Soviet historians to low from their remembrances of 1917. he centrality of class in the historical studies of the RPG in the USSR is therefore not necessarily an ‘ideological distortion’ but a legitimate and accurate paradigm for understanding 1917.42 If one concludes that Soviet scholars produced poor class analysis, there is still empirical evidence and suggestive interpretations that have a value in relation to marxism and outside the USSR. One may have to employ a nuanced reading, an ability to strip away the ideological kernel to see the content beneath, but it is unfair to write of a Soviet school notable only for a skewed ideological attack on the RPG. If ‘winners’ write history, then when historians think of the ‘losers’ the focus tends to be on reasons for that defeat. his is true of most, if not all, studies of the RPG. In this, Soviet historical work was at the forefront of attempts to understand why the RPG could not hold out until the convocation of its promised successor, the constituent assembly. It is no surprise therefore that western historians draw upon the work of their Soviet counterparts, even if in some cases in a cautious or critical spirit.43 A study of Soviet historians and the RPG highlights how historTwentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 122 10/02/2015 12:43:31 Historiography of the Russian Provisional Government 1917 in the USSR 123 ical methods, the reconstruction of the past via the study of documents, were shared across east and west. here is thus less rationale for referring to a ‘Soviet school’ as a deined ‘other’ or ‘outsider’.44 Soviet historians distinguished between what they thought and discussed in private and what they were willing to submit for publication; but they were serious about their professional standards regarding archival and other forms of evidence.45 he USSR’s demise does not mean that Soviet historians need to be relegated to history’s dustbin.46 Notes 1. For a good summary of Lenin’s hostility towards the RPG and how Bolshevik organisations were won over see, for example, V. I. Startsev, Revoliutsiia i vlast’ . Petrogradskii sovet i vremennoe pravitel’stva v martaprele 1917g., Moscow: Mysl’, 1978, pp39-47. 2. See, for example, Edward Acton, Rethinking the Russian Revolution, London: Edward Arnold, 1990, pp131-133, 135-136, 139-140, 142-143, 146, 148-149, 150-152. Without referring the reader to any Soviet work dedicated to the RPG, Acton presents a Soviet interpretation of the RPG as embodying bourgeois class interests and as such ‘over-schematic’. Elsewhere Acton does praise Soviet historians post-1953, for more careful source analysis. See, for example, Harold Shukman (ed.), he Blackwell Encyclopedia of the Russian Revolution, Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1988, pp8-9. See also: Christopher Read, War and Revolution in Russia, 1914-22, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013, p97; Mark D. Steinberg, Voices of Revolution 1917, London: Yale, 2001, p3. A recent biography of perhaps the leading politician in the RPG, Aleksandr Kerensky, by a former Soviet (now Russian) historian begins with a historiographical review of its topic in Soviet and Post-Soviet Russia. Soviet historiography is strongly criticised for its overly ideological approach: ‘One can only rejoice that this page in our homeland historiography has been turned and, one hopes, for ever’ (S. V. Tiutiukin, Aleksandr Kerenskii. Stranitsy politicheskoi biograii (1905-1917 gg.), Moscow: Rosspen, 2012, p7). Kerensky would approve. He wrote a special statement for inclusion in his co-edited collection of documents charting the history of the RPG, that describes all Soviet accounts as Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 123 10/02/2015 12:43:31 124 Ian D. Thatcher ‘falsiications’ and damns all non-Soviet accounts for their over-reliance on ‘pseudo-scientiic materials published in Moscow’ (Alexander F. Kerensky, ‘Statement by Alexander F. Kerensky’ in Paul Robert Browder & Alexander F. Kerensky (eds), he Russian Provisional Government 1917 Documents I, Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1961). Soviet historians responded in kind. One review, for example, concluded that ‘the tendentious selection of documents renders the three volumes unsuitable for studying the Provisional Government’ (‘amerikanskaia publikatsiia dokumentov o vremennom pravitel’stve’, Voprosy istorii, 5, 1963, pp147-159). 3. he major ‘signposts’ would include: Stalin’s intervention of 1931 that declared certain historical topics ‘of-limits’ and brought to a halt the promising work on the RPG headed by M. N. Pokrovskii and his specialist seminar at the Institute of Red Professors; the fundamental change in historical studies in the USSR following the Khrushchev ‘thaw’ with its reinvigoration of historical methods and history journals; the Brezhnev period most known for ‘stagnation’ but actually featuring some solid historical work; and the spur to Soviet historians characteristic of the Gorbachev years. See, for example, J. Barber, ‘Stalin’s letter to the editors of proletarskaya revolyutsiya’, Soviet Studies, 28(1), 1976, pp21-41; R. W. Davies, Soviet History in the Gorbachev Revolution, Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1989; Nancy W. Heer, Politics and History in the Soviet Union, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1971; Roger D. Markwick, Rewriting History in Soviet Russia: he Politics of Revisionist Historiography 1956-1974, Basingstoke: Macmillan, 2001. 4. he most sustained discussion of this topic to date is in S. Iu Malysheva, Rossiiskoe Vremennoe Pravitel’stvo 1917 Goda. Otechestvennaia Istorigraiia 20-x-serediny 60-x godov, Kazan: Kheter, 1999; S. Iu Maysheva, Vremennoe Pravitel’stvo Rossii. Sovremmennaia Otechestvennaia Istoriograiia, Kazan: Kheter, 2000. Here we cannot be as detailed as Malysheva in the breadth and depth of works discussed. Malysheva has undoubtedly made a major contribution that this review article cannot hope to replace or emulate. We agree with many of her speciic points and general conclusions, although there are diferences that will be noted. For an interesting attempt to take soviet scholarship seriously see Gwidon Zalejko, ‘Soviet Historiography as a “Normal Science”’ in Jerzy Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 124 10/02/2015 12:43:31 Historiography of the Russian Provisional Government 1917 in the USSR 125 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. Topolski (ed.), Historiography between Modernism and Postmodernism, Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1994, pp179-190. Note, for example, the common usage of living ‘under’ (east European) communism compared to ‘in a’ (western) democracy. See, for example, M. G. Fleier, ‘pen’sionnaia praktika vremennogo pravitel’stva’, Krasnyi Arkhiv, XXX, 1928, pp46-79; M. Martynov, ‘agrarnoe dvizhenie v 1917 godu po dokumentam galvnogo zemel’nogo komiteta’, Krasnyi Arkhiv, XIV, 1926, pp182-226; M. N. Pokrovskii (ed.), ‘ekonomicheskoe polozhenie rossii pered revoliutsii’, Krasnyi Arkhiv, X, 1925, pp69-94; B Romanov (ed.), ‘inansovoe polozhenie rossii pered oktiabr’skoi revoliutsii’, Krasnyi Arkhiv, XXV, 1927, pp3-33. For an example of excellent research produced on the basis of primary documents published in the Soviet Union see, for example, L. A. Owen, ‘he Russian agrarian revolution of 1917’, Slavonic and East European Review, 12, 1933/1934, pp155-166 & pp368-386. Z. Lozinskii, Ekonomicheskaia Politika Vremennogo Pravitel’stva, Leningrad: Priboi, 1929. Malysheva, Rossiiskoe Vremennoe Pravitel’stvo, p66. Lozonskii, Ekonomicheskaia Politika, p132. See, for example, Paul Robert Browder & Alexander F. Kerensky (eds), he Russian Provisional Government 1917 Documents II, Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1961, p481. Malysheva, Rossiiskoe Vremennoe Pravitel’stvo, p68. For an examination of trends and pressures in Soviet historical scholarship in the NEP period see, for example, George M. Enteen, ‘Soviet historiography in the 1920s’, Slavic Review, 35(1), 1976, pp91-110. It is particularly unfair of Malysheva to unfavourably compare Lozinskii with research of the 1960s. Of course, the latter was able to paint a much fuller picture and draw upon a broader source base. his was due to a host of factors, not least much better organized archives and altered working and publishing conditions. See Malysheva, Rossiiskoe Vremennoe Pravitel’stvo, pp139-144. P. V. Volobuev quite understandably wishes to claim for his study, a more thoroughly researched account of the RPG’s economic policy. He takes issue with Lozinskii over several points of detail. his said, there is much common ground, including the thesis that the RPG was not able to capitalize on the ‘bourgeois moment’. Volobuev Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 125 10/02/2015 12:43:31 126 Ian D. Thatcher 14. 15. 16. 17. argues that the RPG had a good grasp of economic problems but was clueless on solutions. Rather than shore up bourgeois power, its catastrophic mismanagement of the economy led to the Bolshevik overthrow. his latter occurred in the context of hunger and the replacement of a money economy with exchange by barter. See P. V. Volobuev, Ekonomicheskaia politika vremennogo pravitel’stva, Moscow: Akademii Nauk SSSR, 1962. Given Kerensky’s comment cited in fn. 2 above it is interesting to note how often he and Browder refer to Lozinskii as a source. See, for example, Browder & Kerensky (eds), he Russian II, pp500, 509, 510, 619(fn. 2), 631, 649(fn. 6), 662, 665, 666, 690, 704, 716-717, 729, 730, 755. See, for example, Browder & Kerensky (eds), he Russian II, p677. his has continued into the post-Soviet period. A recent study concludes: ‘he system of state committees that concerned Russia’s agrarian policy in this period was confused and bureaucratic. here was no clear separation of functions between the Ministry of Agriculture and the Main Economic Committee in the drafting and making of laws, with the latter trying to dominate...at the local level there was no unitary system of command’( N. E. Khitrina, Agrarnaia politika vremennogo pravitel’stv v 1917g., Nizhnii Novgorod: Nizhegorodskii gumanitarnyi tsentr, 2003, p335). See, for example, Rex A. Wade, he Russian Search for Peace FebruaryOctober 1917, Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1969. At the outset Wade declares: ‘If there was a locus of power between February and October, it was in the soviets, especially the Petrograd Soviet. he question posed, therefore, is not how the Bolsheviks seized power so much as how and why the moderates lost it’, ppv-vi. Another major nonSoviet study places the emphasis on the Allies rather than on the RPG. See Robert D. Warth, he Allies and the Russian Revolution: From the Fall of the Monarchy to the Peace of Brest-Litovsk, Durham, N C: Duke University Press, 1954. As well as marxism, Soviet scholars could draw on other outlooks that impacted on interpretations. In foreign policy studies nationalism and national pride could afect the analysis. V. S. Vasiukov, for example, clearly criticises the RPG for its incompetence in upholding Russian national interest. Nevertheless, fellow Soviet historians are criticised for not fully appreciating how independent the RPG was in its foreign Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 126 10/02/2015 12:43:31 Historiography of the Russian Provisional Government 1917 in the USSR 127 policy. here was a situation of mutual dependence between the RPG and the Allies. Even in its death throes the RPG served Allied interests in keeping the Germans bogged down in the East. In contrast to the Allies using any opportunity to make gains over Russia, the RPG in its last days, was making promises of aid to the Italian army. Winston Churchill is quoted as recognising that Russia sufered more losses than all other countries put together and made the vital contribution to Allied victory. See Vasiukov, Vneshniaia politika vremennogo pravitel’stva, Moscow: Mysl’, 1966, pp383-386. Vasiukov also takes Soviet colleagues to task for poor source interpretation. Several Soviet historians claimed that leading Cadets had wanted to conclude a separate peace with Germany. Vasiukov points out that such views may have been expressed in subsequent memoirs, but the Cadet leaders concerned were clearly pro-war with the Entente powers in their public statements and pronouncements in 1917. For Vasiukov, more care should be taken when using memoirs as sources. See his Vneshniaia politika, pp481-482. 18. See for example A. V. Ignat’ev, Vneshniaia politika vremennogo pravitel’stva, Moscow: Nauka, 1974, pp6-7. Ignat’ev successfully analyses the tensions that existed within, as well as between, political parties. he Bolsheviks are not presented as a united party and care is taken to pinpoint the exact extent of the inluence of various factional viewpoints. In March 1917 the Moscow Bolsheviks, for example, are criticised for ‘accepting the opportunistic idea of a general international socialist conference’ (ibid, p88) and in subsequent months it is noted that Lenin’s ideas published in the central party journals did not necessarily permeate into the regional party bodies (ibid, pp276, 285-286). His extended ield of vision throws interesting light on numerous issues in the RPG’s foreign policy, as for example, when discussing foreign policy in Siam and in Mongolia (ibid, pp267-268). 19. N Rubinshtein, ‘Vneshniaia politika kerenshchiny’ in M. N. Pokrovskii (ed.), Ocherki po istorii oktiab’rskoi revoliutsii Vol 2, Moscow: Gosudarstvennoe izdatel’stvo, 1927, pp349-450; Vasiukov, Vneshniaia politika; Ignat’ev, Vneshniaia politika. Of course the internal-international dynamic could work in all directions. It was claimed, for example, that Russia’s Western Allies used the conlict on the Eastern Front to impact Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 127 10/02/2015 12:43:31 128 Ian D. Thatcher upon Russia’s internal policy, encouraging the RPG to adopt a repressive domestic policy. See, for example, Ignat’ev, Vneshniaia politika, p317. 20. he memoirs of foreign ambassadors and statesmen were frequently and freely cited in Soviet studies of the RPG’s foreign policy. here was no need for censorship here as these sources evidence the lack of hope that foreign governments had in the RPG and in their recurring advice that the RPG adopt stern measures to produce order in Russia. 21. Startsev, Revoliutsiia i Vlast’; V. I. Startsev, Vnutrenniaia politika vremennogo pravitel’stva, Leningrad: Nauka, 1980; V. I. Startsev, Krakh Kerenshchiny, Leningrad: Nauka, 1982. Startsev is seen as one of the most ‘un-Soviet’ of Soviet historians. After his anti-Soviet historiography remarks (see fn. 2 above) Tiutiukin notes that Startsev published ‘several solid tomes on the Provisional Government’, Aleksandr Keresnkii, p9. A western historian comments on Startsev’s view that Minister of War General A. I. Verkhovsky’s October 1917 call for an immediate invitation to peace ‘had possibilities’ that could have complicated the Bolshevik seizure of power: ‘For a Soviet historian this statement is remarkably bold’, G.M. Hamburg in Paul N. Miliukov, he Russian Revolution 3, Gulf Breeze, FL: Academic International Press, 1987, p277, fn. 19. It would have been more accurate to write ‘for any historian’. Miliukov, for example, is rather dismissive of Verkhovsky’s amateurish foray into foreign policy (ibid, pp151-55). For a recent Russian (positive) appreciation of Startsev’s historical work on the RPG see: S. Iu Malysheva, ‘Istoriia rossiiskogo vremennogo pravitel’stva v trudakh V. I. Startseva’ in Peterburgskaia istoricheskaia shkola Al’manakh Prilozhenie k zhurnalu dlia uchenykh <Klio>, St Petersburg: Nestor, 2002, pp107-115. 22. Indeed on the vexed question of a deinition of what dual power consisted, Startsev made clear that it meant that genuine authority lay with the Petrograd Soviet (Vnutrenniaia politika, pp168-169). In a discussion of rule in the provinces during the irst weeks of the revolution, Startsev notes the tendency to form coalitions of social organisations, town dumas, and local soviets in which the local bourgeoisie took the lead supported by the local soviets. Because power in the provinces did not reside with the soviets as in the capital, Startsev concludes: ‘one cannot hardly apply the term “dual power” to the provinces’ (ibid, p204). Here Startsev seems to have a diferent deinition of ‘dual power’ to Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 128 10/02/2015 12:43:31 Historiography of the Russian Provisional Government 1917 in the USSR 129 23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30. 31. 32. Lenin, the latter quoted as stating that dual power involved the voluntary surrender of power by the Petrograd Soviet to the RPG (ibid, p175). Certainly this was Milukov’s view post-1917. For his praise of his successor M. I. Tereshehenko for in essence continuing Miliukov’s diplomacy in the coalition cabinets see, for example, Paul N. Miliukov he Russian Revolution 1, Gulf Breeze, FL: Academic International Press, 1978, pp135-138. Startsev, Vnutrenniaia politika, p117. he emphasis on personal proclivities is seen at its most extreme in the way key individuals in the government and in the Petrograd Soviet were connected via Masonic lodges. his is a recurring theme that certainly highlights Startsev’s individualism as a historian. See, for instance, ibid, pp121-123. An example of western political analysis of blocs in the irst RPG along Startsevian lines would be Rex A. Wade, ‘Political realignment and understanding the Russian Revolution of 1917’, he Soviet and Post-Soviet Review, 24(1-2), 1997, pp1-13. Startsev, Vnutrenniaia politika, pp116, 208. ibid, p186. here are some wonderful paragraphs in which Startsev contrasts the various ways in which ministers went to their ministries. Soviet historiography was not known for biographies, but Startsev permits some biographical moments noting, for example, ‘As in everything that he did then, A. F. Kerensky’s appearance at the Ministry of Justice was colourful and theatrical’ (Vnutrenniaia politika, pp. 190-193). Startsev notes that A. I. Shingarev’s background made him a good candidate for Minister of Finance, instead of which he received the poisoned chalice of Minister of Agriculture that he never mastered (ibid, pp215-216). ibid, p201. ibid, pp139-167. ibid, p132. ibid, p137. ibid, pp130-133. In another example of the new government’s ‘popular touch’ the then Minister of Finance Tereshchenko visited a factory to speak to the workers as they decided whether to continue a strike. In general Startsev regrets that the propaganda campaign for people to rally behind that RPG had not been studied by specialists. Startsev thus viewed historical knowledge as a living process. Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 129 10/02/2015 12:43:31 130 Ian D. Thatcher 33. ibid, pp208-245. 34. See, for example, ibid, p237. 35. See, for example, ibid, p243. Instances in which Startsev presents a onesided characterisation of a ‘bourgeois class rule’ sit uneasily with his general analysis of ‘contradictory tendencies’. He notes for example that landowners worried that the sanctity of private ownership was broken in the provision that land should not remain unsown and if it was it should be transferred for use to local production committees (ibid, p230). 36. Startsev conveys the drama of the Kornilov Afair as experienced in the elite group very well. He recounts, for example, the various meetings in which ministers updated journalists on developments and the scene in which Kerensky fell out politically with his Masonic comrade Nekrasov. It even appears that Startsev is having fun! (see, for example, ibid, pp3235). 37. ibid, p104. 38. ibid, pp179-180. 39. ibid, pp186-187. 40. he main role in arranging how the Bolsheviks would take advantage of the RPG’s disarray is given to Lenin. Startsev also notes the support of the Left SRs, and even though he unfairly identiies Trotsky’s insistence that the RPG’s overthrow should coincide with the 2nd All-Russian Congress of Soviets with Kamenev and Zinoviev’s objections, he does acknowledge some positive aspects to Trotsky’s role in becoming Chair of the Petrograd Soviet and in leading the Bolsheviks out of the preparliament. 41. here is also some relection upon soviet historiography and its failings. Startsev, for example, notes the attention given to Bolshevik inluence in the army in 1917, but the process of the old army’s disintegration in itself had been overlooked. his is a matter of regret, particularly as the primary sources for this analysis were published in the USSR in the 1920s (ibid, p154). 42. As has been noted in 1917 ‘in Russia’s political life the language of class dominated’, Boris I. Kolinitskii, ‘“Democracy” in the political consciousness of the February Revolution’, Slavic Review, 57(1), 1998, p103. One might also wish to take this general point and link it to the reliance upon Lenin as source in Soviet historical writing. Startsev, for example, claims Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 130 10/02/2015 12:43:31 Historiography of the Russian Provisional Government 1917 in the USSR 131 that only Lenin was able to make sense of Russia’s complex politics of 1917, Revoliutsiia i vlast’, p8. Putting the cult of Lenin in the USSR to one side, there may be something of worth in such sentiments. Note a recent evaluation: ‘political events were moving fast and Lenin was one of the most lexible and penetrating analysts of the moment’, Read, War and Revolution, p108. 43. A leading western historian uses a Soviet published article of 1957 to make the point that industrialist opposition was suicient for the RPG to drop plans for compulsory syndication of industry, James D. White, he Russian Revolution 1917-1921, London: Edward Arnold, 1994, p106. One of the best works of social history written by a western historian is based more upon soviet sources and (if critically) soviet scholarship than western colleagues. See S. A. Smith, Red Petrograd. Revolution in the factories 1917-18, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983. Christopher Read (War and Revolution, p97), mentions only that Steve Smith built upon ‘pioneering insights’ of Western historians. In email correspondence of 24 April 2013, I asked the author if soviet scholarship was also not important. Read replied: ‘I agree. Mints was one thing, Danilov and Zaiaonchkovsky something else. I used Soviet historians a lot for unavailable archive work…Writers like Startsev and Maliavskii were able to dig up material way beyond our reach at the time of writing.’ 44. his may be particularly the case in the example of the RPG when there is a shared discourse of failure between historians, east and west. Soviet scholars could at least agree with half of the following from a western historian: ‘hat Lenin and the Bolsheviks had the political sagacity to grasp the obvious and to campaign for peace, is more a relection on the sterility of bourgeois leadership than a credit to the mystic properties of Marxist dogma in the service of professional revolutionaries’, Warth, he Allies, p50. his may explain why soviet historians of the RPG could cite and quote from Western sources, including primary sources. 45. his is clear from the memoirs written by members of the Soviet historical profession. See, for example, R. Sh. Ganelin, Sovetskie istoriki: o chem oni govrili mezhdu soboi, St. Petersburg: Nestor-istoriia, 2004. In this context there are several examples of soviet historians discussing the use of sources. Startsev, for example, argues that the task of a ‘marxist historian’ is to explore the inner meanings of an exterior shell, but by ‘rooting Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 131 10/02/2015 12:43:32 132 Ian D. Thatcher oneself irmly in sources’ (Vnutrenniaia politika, p113). In another context, when discussing the issue of tsarist policy on the possibility of a separate peace with Germany, Ignat’ev explains diferences amongst Soviet historians by ‘insuicient and contradictory source materials,’ not ideological errors (Vneshniaia politika, p43). Finally, to return to the concluding sentence of the introduction, problems of favouritism, scholarly hierarchy, and the constraints of convention in scholarly writing, were hardly unique to the former USSR. 46. In historiography, as in other areas, the Soviet past continues to be felt in contemporary Russia. See, for example, A. V. Ignat’ev’s contribution to the collection Istoriia Vneshnei Politiki Rossii konets XIX-nachalo XX veka, Moscow: Mezhdunarodnaia otnosheniia, 1997. Twentieth Century Communism – Issue 8 20th Century Communism 8.indd 132 10/02/2015 12:43:32