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History Essay On the turn of the 20 th century Russia survived economic and social crises. The First World War expenditure exhausted economics of Russia and this resulted in growing the amount of poor in the country and worsening conditions of living for peasants and working people. Hard labour, low wages and semi-slave existence of Russian working class led to social disagreement between rich and poor in the country. The ideological core was found in Communism, which was based on Marx and Engels Communist Manifesto issued in the first half of the 19 th century. Communism as a social system suggested the idea of society with no state, no social classes and no private property. As an ideology Communism is considered to be a synonym of Marxism, also it is called Marxism-Leninism.
Marxism proposed four stages of economic development, where Communism is the final one and the most advanced. According to Marxism Conception of History class struggle is a dialectical process which refines society. So this Conception saw the way out from collapse of the Russian Empire in overthrowing feudalism, refining the society and establishing Communism where everyone would be equal in rights, poor would never be oppressed by rich. Communism had followers among radical political groups in Russia. Lenin was one of the leaders and soon headed the political organisation demanding radical changes which could be achieved by means of spontaneous revolution.
He called to disrupt government and install Communism. The disaster of the First World War gave Lenin the chance to get rid of opposing parties and sweep away moderate democrats and his leftist rivals. In 1919 - 1920 the Civil War occurred during which communists beat the remaining groups of Czarism army and their foreign allies. Lenin set the dictatorship of proletariat which as he thought was an emergency measure to gain control over new Soviet Republic. The ideas of Communism were spread and popularized by means of radio, press, slogans and songs. Communist military men were given the power to kill anyone who did not share Communist ideology, i.
e. enemies of Soviet Republic, without investigation and trial. Lots of innocent people became the victims of this red terror. Thus Lenin wanted to refine the society and make it serve the juggernaut of communism. One of the goals of Communists was to achieve world domination of the proletariat, the working class, and to install Communism in all the countries. Thus the communist party took steps to set communist regime in all former parts of Russian Empire and in the neighbour countries.
Stalin, this ruthless butcher, headed the government after Lenin's death. Stalin ruled by fear. He made Lenin's emergency measures permanent and soon the Communist party and its secret police (KGB) controlled everything in the country: industry, agriculture, economy, culture and even private life of the citizens. During the regime of Stalin, it was believed that the common people had right to choose, to vote, to influence the government, but in real life the major part of the human rights was not preserved. Individualism was eliminated. At the period of Stalin's ruling another dictator, Hitler, came to power in Germany.
Hitler was the leader of fascists, the political party which had lots of common with communists. Fascists emerged in the country of post-war depression with political uprisings, very high unemployment, increasing amount of poor and surviving children. They became popular as they fed the despair of the frustrated peasants, ruined small business people and the lumpen proletariat. They also, as the communists, belonged to the radical forces and they stated that any actions would be justified for the noble national cause, that facts did not matter.
Fascists also approved the idea of country where would be just will and unity under charismatic leader. They pulled anti-capitalist demagogy and said they had a mission of salvation. The fascists goal was to overthrow the system, the liberal institutions such as legislatures and courts, to keep absolute political power. When the fascists took the government they used the same techniques as the communists: party hierarchy, propaganda, sham ideology, mass demonstrations.
Like the communists they stated to demonize their enemies (local minorities and foreigners), the fascists glorified their imperial past. But the fascists did not have any ideological core. Their program led to expropriations and conquest. Hitler did not approve democracy in any form. In the period of his ruling middle class did not play an independent political role. The fascists organized Storm Troops, the Sturm-Abteilung (SA), and the SS (Elite Guard) which aimed at threatening and shaping the society in the necessary way.
Thus the politics of Hitler merely coincided with Stalin's. Both the regimes analyzed above collapsed. They failed to set their doctrines for a long period of time. But they had a strong impact on the development of the societies afterwards. The case of communist dictatorship suits the characteristics of a peasant revolution which is considered to be one of the ways to modernity.
The other path of modernization is through a revolution from above that results in fascist dictatorship. Both the regimes appeared to be two different ways to reformation of society and its modernization.
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Research essay sample on First World War Russian Empire
