Stalinism and the Politics of Mobilization : Ideas, Power, and Terror in Inter-war Russia

Stalin's Terror of 1937-8 is one of the most extraordinary events of the twentieth century. His seemingly irrational attack on the military, technical, and political élite on the eve of war, precisely the time when he needed them most, remains difficult to understand. Stalinism and the Politics of Terror provides a new explanation of the political violence of the late 1930s by examining the thinking of Stalin and his allies, and placing it in the broader context of Bolshevik ideas since 1917. Stalinism and the Politics of Mobilization offers a new interpretation of Bolshevik ideology, examines its relationship with Soviet politics between 1917 and 1939, and sheds new light on the origins of the political violence of the late 1930s. While it challenges older views that the Stalinist system and the Terror were the product of a coherent Marxist-Leninist blueprint, imposed by a group of committed ideologues, it argues that ideas mattered in Bolshevik politics and that there are strong continuities between the politics of the revolutionary period and those of the 1930s. By exploring divisions within the party over several issues, including class, the relations between elites and masses, and economic policy, David Priestland shows how a number of ideological trends emerged within Bolshevik politics, and how they were related to political and economic interests and strategies. He also argues that central to the launching of the Terror was the leadership's commitment to a strategy of mobilization, and to a view of politics that ultimately derived from the left Bolshevism of the revolutionary period. The relationship between ideas and politics in inter-war Russia has long been controversial, and historians have been sharply divided over the influence of Marxism on Stalinist politics. This study presents a reassessment of Bolshevik ideology, and of the ways in which it interacted with other political forces during the period. By analysing the political discourse of the Bolshevik leadership, it shows how differing interpretations of Marxism-Leninism informed contrasting political. and economic strategies. In particular, it traces the emergence of a strategy of mobilization, which was closely.

Stalin's Terror of 1937-8 is one of the most extraordinary events of the twentieth century. His seemingly irrational attack on the military, technical, and political élite on the eve of war, precisely the time when he needed them most, remains difficult to understand. Stalinism and the Politics of Terror provides a new explanation of the political violence of the late 1930s by examining the thinking of Stalin and his allies, and placing it in the broader context of Bolshevik ideas since 1917.

'Stalinism and the Politics of Mobilization' provides a new explanation of the political violence in Stalin's Soviet Union during the late 1930s by examining the thinking of Stalin and his allies, and placing it in the broader context of Bolshevik ideas since 1917 In October 1917, Lenin and the Bolsheviks came to power promising a radically new type of participatory democratic state based on the soviets, the elected workers' and soldiers' councils which had emerged in Russia since February.