War Communism
Then, this entire process of revolutionary
change was brought to a crisis by mid-1918. The
revolutionary forces were confronted by Civil war
in the form of armed hostility of the forces of the
former landed aristocracy and the bourgeoisie,
which merged with an equally determined armed
intervention by the capitalist countries to dislodge
the new socialist regime. The Bolsheviks
responded in Jun 1918 with a series of economic
and political measures that have subsequently
been designated as War Communism. Loss of
economically rich resource areas during war, and
the emphasis on production for war effort and
machinery to broaden the production base, led
to decline in production of consumer goods.
The Soviet Government responded with
forced requisition of grain surplus from the
peasants in order to feed the urban poor and
soldiers, and state control of all enterprises in
order to revive industry. Nationalization of
industrial enterprises was accelerated for
maximum mobilization of resources. By a March
1918 decision the railways were taken away from
'workers' control and place under semi-military
command. While the failure on the economic front
led to peasant wars and urban disaffection, the
growth of black market encouraged an ethos
inimical to socialist ideals.
The spirit of voluntarism came under severe
strain even as the 'world socialist revolution' in
Europe failed to materialize. Recruitment for the
Red Army became a problem. Workers opposition
to the principle of sate control and the uprising
of kronstadt sailors in February 1921 was the
final straw after the wide spread peasant
rebellions. Lenin was forced to announce that
change of policy had become necessary.
NEP
The New Economic Policy (NEP) was a
response to a political and economic crisis, though
at its core were economic changes that marked
a change in the strategy of transition to socialism.
Grain requisition was replaced by a fixed tax. In
1924 the tax in kind was replaced by a money
tax, followed by legalization of private trade. On
17 May 1921 the decree nationalizing small scale
industry was revoked and smaller units were
actually de-nationalized, some of them being
restored to their former owners.
Just as War Communism had enabled the
Bolsheviks to tide over the immediate difficulties
and to consolidate the Revolution, the NEP (New
Economic Policy) changes made possible
economic recovery in the ensuing years and also
won the confidence of the majority of peasants.
However, potential for conflict again between
town and country, the peasant and working class
remained in a long term sense. Reason was that
private sector was predominant in agriculture
throughout NEP, and a lot of industry was still
a state monopoly. NEP changes could not resolve
the problems and social contradictions that
derived not merely from the war situation or
specific polices but from the larger social
contradictions that arise when the revolutionary
working class is called upon to build socialism in
the midst of a vast peasant majority.
The early socialist state heroically
experimented with guaranteeing full employment,
free and equal education for all, free
healthcare, equal access to culture and cultural
advance, and equality for women.
Internationalism
For the Bolsheviks the Russian revolution was
always inseparable from the world socialist
revolution. This, together with the cardinal
Marxist principle of the unity of the interests of
working classes all over the world, and their
socialist vision of an oppression-free world, was
the basis of their internationalism. This
internationalism was given shape in the form of
the Socialist international.
When the social-democratic parties of
Western Europe refused to oppose their own
ruling classes in the interest of the working classes
in Europe, as the Bolsheviks saw it, the Bolsheviks
broke away from them, changed their name to
communist party, and accordingly formed a new
Communist International. Initially, for the
Bolshevik their revolution had to spread
elsewhere, as, backward Russia did not have the
productive capacity to sustain advanced
socialism. However, it was Russia that gave the
first Socialist State.
The Communist International was envisaged
as the vanguard of internationalism of revolution.
As soon as the Bolsheviks proclaimed in
November 1917 the right to secession as part of
self determination, the Allied powers made this
issue a part of their armed intervention. The
Comintern, at this stage modified their right to
be that of the workers and peasants in the
different areas. It developed the idea of a United
Front between national liberation movements and
the Communist Parties in Europe and Soviet Russia.
The strategy of the communists in these areas
was strongly influenced by the Comintern, where
the national-liberation struggles were seen as not
only against the imperialist powers and the feudal
landlords in their own country, but also against
the bourgeoisie in their own country. The agrarian
revolution was seen as the basis of the national
liberation struggles with the workers playing the
leading role.
In the 1920s as the Bolshevik's struggle with
their peasantry seemed muted with the NEP
changes, a similar accommodation occurred in
the Comintern policy towards the co-relation of
social forces in the national liberation struggles.
The Comintern recognized and supported the
'positive' role of the bourgeoisie in these countries
against Imperialism. This policy continued well
into the 1920s and Communist Parties were formed in many Asian countries. The links with
China were particularly strong, and early
strategies of the communist groups in China,
India, Turkey and Afghanistan were strongly
influenced by Comintern polices. Communist
members of these countries were also represented
in Comintern.
