...the Russians -- the only empire that survived into the mid 1980's" (Luttwak, 1). In their Communist Manifesto of 1848, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels applied the term communism to a final stage of socialism in which all class differences would disappear and humankind would live in harmony. Marx and Engels claimed to have discovered a scientific approach to socialism based on the laws of history. They declared that the course of history was determined by the clash of opposing forces rooted in the economic system and the ownership of property. Just as the feudal system had given way to capitalism, so in time capitalism would give way to socialism. The class struggle of the future would be between the bourgeoisie, who were the capitalist employers, and the proletariat, who were the workers. The struggle would end, according to Marx, in the socialist revolution and the attainment of full communism (Groiler's Encyclopedia). Socialism, of which "Marxism-Leninism" is a takeoff, originated in the West. Designed in France and Germany, it was brought into Russia in the middle of the nineteenth century and promptly attracted support among the country's educated, public-minded elite, who at that time were called intelligentsia (Pipes, 21). After Revolution broke out over Europe in 1848 the modern working class appeared on the scene as a major historical force. However, Russia remained out of the changes that Europe was experiencing. As a socialist movement and inclination, the Russian Social-Democratic...
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...The October Revolution The Great October Socialist Revolution, known more commonly as the October Revolution or the Bolshevik Revolution, occurred in 1917 in Russia, and the revolt resulted in a leftist government coming to power. The uprising started in the then-capital city of St. Petrograd, now St. Petersburg, and spread nationwide. Headed by Vladimir Lenin of the Bolshevik party, the October Revolution was the first communist rebellion of the 20th century and was founded on the beliefs of Karl Marx. The events of the October Revolution helped lay the groundwork for Stalinism and the Cold War. The Stage Is Set The Bolshevik Revolution in Russia in 1917 was initiated by millions of people who would change the history of the world as we know it. When Czar Nicholas II dragged 11 million peasants into World War I, the Russian people became discouraged with their injuries and the loss of life they sustained. The country of Russia was in ruins, ripe for revolution. Provisional Government Established During a mass demonstration of women workers in February of 1917, the czar's officials called out the army to squelch the protesters. The women convinced the soldiers to put their guns away and help them in their cause. Czar Nicholas II was dethroned in Russia during this, the "February Revolution." The Provisional Government was formed to replace the void left by the deposed czar. This provisional government was made up of bankers, lawyers, industrialists, and capitalists. The...
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...Russia 1. General Information: St. Petersburg, Russia is the country’s second largest city and is located in the Northwest Federal District. It is approximately 1400 square kilometers in size and has a population of 4.6 million people (as of 2005). The time zone is +3 GMT and +8 from the east coast of the United States. The government of St. Petersburg includes a governor, a city administration and a single-chamber legislative body, the City Legislative Assembly. In 2006, the governorship became an appointed position. The current governor, Valentina Matviyenko, was elected to the position in 2003, and then appointed by the President of the Russian Federation in 2006. The main airport servicing St. Petersburg is Pulkovo International Airport. If traveling by train, St Petersburg has five railway terminals – Baltiysky, Finlyandsky, Ladozhsky, Moskovsky and Vitebsky – within its borders. St. Petersburg features an extensive public transportation system consisting of an underground metro, trams and buses. The underground metro system, the most efficient of the options, opened in 1955 and features five color-coded lines. The fare for the underground transport system is always the same, no matter the distance traveled, and can be paid by token or metro pass. 2. Recent foreign investment: In 2009, the top five countries investing in St. Petersburg (categorized by percentage of total investment volume) were Belarus (15.8 percent), Switzerland (14.7...
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...This article was downloaded by: [University of Sussex Library] On: 31 August 2011, At: 03:33 Publisher: Routledge Informa Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registered office: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK Economy and Society Publication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/reso20 Trotsky, Gerschenkron and the political economy of late capitalist development Ben Selwyn Available online: 25 Jul 2011 To cite this article: Ben Selwyn (2011): Trotsky, Gerschenkron and the political economy of late capitalist development, Economy and Society, 40:3, 421-450 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03085147.2011.574425 PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE Full terms and conditions of use: http://www.tandfonline.com/page/termsand-conditions This article may be used for research, teaching and private study purposes. Any substantial or systematic reproduction, re-distribution, re-selling, loan, sub-licensing, systematic supply or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden. The publisher does not give any warranty express or implied or make any representation that the contents will be complete or accurate or up to date. The accuracy of any instructions, formulae and drug doses should be independently verified with primary sources. The publisher shall not be liable for any loss, actions, claims, proceedings, demand...
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...of Nottingham, UK It is obviously necessary to begin with Karl Marx. According to Vorlander, ‘The ¨ moment anyone started to talk to Marx about morality, he would roar with laughter’ (Vorlander, 1904, p. 22; Lukes, 1985, p. 26). Yet the normative element is central to ¨ Marx’s thinking and the resolution of the paradox is to be found, according to Lukes, in the distinction between a bourgeois morality of law and a revolutionary morality of class emancipation. Marx is interested fundamentally in the moral education of the proletariat through the liberating process that accompanies revolution. It has been argued that in order to explain the motives of the socialist revolutionary, Marx needs such a theory of moral education that is, at the same time, his normative objective. In particular, it is said, ‘he needs an account of how vast numbers of working people acquire a commitment to make a revolution in their common interest’ (Miller, 1998, p. 377). Moreover, this must be powerful enough to break the economic, social and ideological grip of the capitalist system that he has analysed and exposed in such detail. The mode of production is the economic key, as it was for the emergence of capitalism. However, the development of capitalism itself creates a fresh social and psychological context, providing the proletariat with the opportunity to recognize their common circumstance as an incentive to further self-transforming struggles. In The Communist manifesto, Marx argues that historically...
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... The Cold War was started by the principal victors of World War II: the United States of America, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and to a lesser extent Britain. The Cold War was essentially an ideological struggle which but soon adopted all facets of full international conflict with its geopolitical, economic and also scientific-technological aspects. The earliest stages of the Cold War coincided with the final defeats of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan in the first half of 1945. Both Communists and Capitalists were anxious to fill the power vacuums that the defeated Axis powers were leaving behind in Central Europe and the Pacific. From the setting of the scene at Yalta in February 1945, to the embittered conclusion of the Warsaw Pact on 14th May 1955, the worst obstacle to achieving a peace settlement was a mutual and deep-seated sense of suspicion, which the powers on either side of the 'Iron Curtain' must be held responsible for. "Twenty years ago I strove with all the energy in my power against Communism, because at that time I considered Communism, with its idea of world revolution, the greatest danger to the British Empire ... Nowadays German Nazism, with its idea of the world hegemony of Berlin, constitutes the greatest danger for the British Empire ... If the danger for the British Empire from the side of Fascism were to disappear and the danger from the side of Communism were to rise again, I - I say this absolutely frankly - would begin to strive against...
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...perceived interest. Parts of Ukraine have been under Russian rule sine the 17th century. Eastern parts of Ukraine had been continually subjected to dominance from the Russian Empire and later the Soviet Union. Western Ukraine did not join the Soviet Union until 1939. The country has a history of fragmentation that continues to this day, this is exasperated Russia's continued desire to meddle in the domestic affairs of former republics of the Soviet Union. When the Soviet Union dissolved in in 1991, Ukraine received their independence but there was no great change in policy. Former members of the Communist Party managed to remain power without much difficulty. Opposition parties found it difficult to break their stranglehold on power. In the late Soviet era the Communist Party of Ukraine began to accumulate vast sums of sums of cash.[1] Much of this cash disappeared when the Communist Party disbanded after the collapse of the Soviet Union. However much of this money was reinvested to ensure the same people form the Communist Party stayed in power. Leonid Kuchma was elected President in 2004. he had previously been Prime Minister without much note. However he won the election against incumbent Leonid Kravchuk with 52% of the vote.[2] Due to his election as a democrat there was no focus on any potential authoritarian tendencies he may have had, rather, the main concern during the election was that Kuchma might be too pro-Russian. Throughout his time as President, Kuchma repeatedly...
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...Khan 15020568 Professor Erum Haider Pol 320 6 May 2014 How do social media shape the social movements in modern times? A comparative study of Ukraine Crimea crisis and Egyptian revolution for democracy! A social movement can look like and be called many things. Whatever their appearance or name, the goal of all social movements is presumably the same: a change for the better. If this is indeed the ultimate objective of a social movement, it is well worth considering how successfully a movement achieves that objective. In the past ten years, several social movements have grabbed the world’s attention for the change they promised. Deemed successful for achieving their goal of change, though not necessarily change for the better, further evaluations have been sparsely performed. However, in judging social movements, what happens is shaped to a greater degree by the media, specifically. We shall look at modern day Egypt and Ukraine in our analysis. The effect of social media—and the Internet more generally—in both sets of protests is undeniable yet also distracting. Like most historic events, these protests and revolutions were in part possible due to a new technology. Flipping through the pages of history we see that The Reformation in Europe was aided by the invention of the printing press; the revolutions of 1848 occurred in some respect thanks to the invention of the telegraph which transmitted news across Europe of one set of protests overnight; the age of modern terrorism, from...
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...Initial patriotism. At the beginning of the war, all forms of patriotic material emphasised caricatures of the enemy and heroic interpretations of Russian exploits.Wilhelm II with his distinctive moustache and inevitable spike helmet was the overwhelming favorite for abuse in all media. All Germans, led by their Kaiser, were gross beer-drinkers and sausage-eaters as well as rapacious aggressors. The other two enemies, Austria and even Russia's historic foe Turkey, usually appeared as contemptible puppets of the Germans. Hubertus Jahn in Patriotic Culture in Russia during World War I, "Russian patriotism quickly became more differentiated, simultaneously reflecting separate and even disparate loyalties within society". http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=488 * Early successes against Austro-Hungarian Empire battle of galicia- a major battle between Russia and Austria-Hungary during the early stages of World War I in 1914. In the course of the battle, the Austro-Hungarian armies were severely defeated and forced out of Galicia, while the Russians captured Lemberg and, for approximately nine months, ruled Eastern Galicia. * Battle of Tannenberg Allied with France and Britain, Grand Duke Nicholas, the Russian commander, agreed to help relieve the French, under attack from Germany, with an offensive in East Prussia. Two Russian armies invaded German East Prussia in August 1914. The plan began well at Gumbinnen on 20 August, when Rennenkampf's First Army defeated eight...
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...became proficient in French and the culture of France. The biggest influence at this time was his friendship and relationship with one of the founders of modern anarchism, Pierre-Joseph Proudhon. They were very much alike in personality and shared the passion for freedom that each of them yearned for. “Both deal more readily in negations, and their attacks are directed against the same objects: the state, religion, and property. Both recommend ‘social revolution’ as a means of escape from the intolerable social situation” (Pyziur 32). However, it would be a while yet before Bakunin finally took the standard of anarchism and made it his own, for his revolution in this period was still with Pan-Slavism. In 1847 he was invited to speak at a banquet for Polish revolutionaries, and the speech he gave proved that he was a great orator and helped give him recognition as a revolutionary. In the speech, Mikhail “...proposed a form of revolutionary alliance between the Russian and Polish oppressed. He emphasized how miserable the Russian people were under the regime of Nicholas I...” so that the two Slavic peoples could unite to end each others’ suffering (Masters 83). Following his speech in 1847, he published his Appeal to the Slaves in 1848, which is “...one of his most famous works” (Masters 100). In this book he expressed his opinions on bringing all the Slavs together. His revolutionary spirit shone brightly these years, as it would for the rest of his life....
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...and Japan (the Allied Powers). The Allies were joined after 1917 by the United States. The four years of the Great War–as it was then known–saw unprecedented levels of carnage and destruction, thanks to grueling trench warfare and the introduction of modern weaponry such as machine guns, tanks and chemical weapons. By the time World War I ended in the defeat of the Central Powers in November 1918, more than 9 million soldiers had been killed and 21 million more wounded. WORLD WAR I BEGINS (1914) Though tensions had been brewing in Europe–and especially in the troubled Balkan region–for years before conflict actually broke out, the spark that ignited World War I was struck in Sarajevo, Bosnia, where Archduke Franz Ferdinand, nephew of Emperor Franz Josef and heir to the Austro-Hungarian Empire, was shot to death along with his wife by the Serbian nationalist Gavrilo Princip on June 28, 1914. The assassination of Franz Ferdinand and Sophie set off a rapid chain of events: Austria-Hungary, like many in countries around the world, blamed the Serbian government for the attack and hoped to use the incident as justification for settling the question of Slavic nationalism once and for all. As Russia supported Serbia, Austria-Hungary waited to declare war until its leaders received assurances from German leader Kaiser Wilhelm II that Germany would support their cause in the event of a Russian intervention, which would likely involve Russia’s ally, France, and possibly Great Britain...
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...An understanding of the Russian nihilism of the 1860s begins with an attempt to understand the concept of nihilism. This is naturally difficult because if there is a word that has even more loaded, and negative, connotations than anarchism it would be nihilism. This is particularly because the primary vehicle of our modern understanding of nihilism is through the fiction of Turgenev and Dostoevsky. Neither of these authors were particularly sympathetic to nihilism and provided nihilist characters primarily as a frame with which to drape their morality tales. The version of nihilism offered by these authors is then, primarily, a snapshot of the popular culture in which nihilism dwelt as much as it is a recollection of the trend. This time in Russian history is part of the story of nihilism and will be part of the story in bridging the gap between the mythological Bazarov, Verkhovensky, or Raskolnikov and figures like Nicholas Chernyshevsky, Dmitry Pisarev, and to some extent Sergey Nechayev. What then was nihilism? Nihilism was a youth movement, a philosophical tendency, and a revolutionary impulse. Nihilism was the valorization of the natural sciences. Nihilism was a specific fashion style. Nihilism was a new approach to aesthetics, criticism and ethics. Nihilism was the contradiction between a studied materialism and the desire to annihilate the social order. Nihilism was also a particularly Russian response to the conditions of Tsarist reform and repression. Nihilism has...
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...Sources: Donald Kagan et al: A Political History of Europe, since 1814 by Charles Seignobos, S. M. Macvane, The Western Heritage, Brief Edition, 2003 Websites: The course focuses on European history from the early 17th century to the end of the Second World War. The following aspects of political history of five selected countries - France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy and Spain- are covered : early kingdoms, unification, nationalism movements, political philosophies, conferences, alliance systems and conflicts which had an impact on Europe during the 17th, 18th, 19th and 20th Centuries.Topics such as the Enlightenment, the French Revolution, the Concert of Europe, and the two world wars will also be discussed. Special emphasis will be placed on the relationship between the rise of liberalism and nationalism, the industrial revolution, and the emergence of modern political systems in Europe. Contents Introduction Chapter 1 Political history of France : Chapter 2 Political history of Germany: Chapter 3 Political history of Great Britain: Chapter 4 Political history of Italy: Chapter 5 Political history of Spain: Introduction In studying political history of European states, we put a focus on the beginning of the 18th century as a starting point in the rise of major European powers in the face of waning non-Western empires, which led to the consequent politicization of the region as a whole, raising the stakes in the division and distribution of resources, areas...
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...Introduction In the past hundred years Russian history has been littered with Revolutions, from the 1905 Revolution to the fall of Communism in 1991. Throughout this time Tsars, Communists and Democrats have exercised different systems of government in order to stay in power or gain power by offering huge economic reforms in order to appease the masses or to keep most important sectors of society prosperous and content. Although historians would argue that in many of these cases change occurred for political reasons, it is equally as easy to argue, if not more so, that at the heart of every issue that caused or had the potential to cause revolution were underlying economic motives, either for the common man or the ruling elite. This on-going theme of economic concessions can be seen at various points throughout the past hundred years and proved a key factor to the longevity of the regimes in charge. The first such example of this post-1900 occurred after the 1905 Revolution. Despite The October Manifesto in 1905 which granted political freedoms, little of which benefitted the peasantry, It was Stolypin’s reforms as Prime Minister for Nicholas II that achieved most after the 1905 revolution, quelling the peasant threat that had emerged prior to the revolution and afterwards, much more so than the introduction of the Dumas - representative assemblies granted in the October Manifesto. Similarly Lenin’s New Economic Plan dealt with the ever increasing militant peasantry...
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...THE FAMILY The Consanguine Family (The First Stage of the Family) The Punaluan Family The Pairing Family The Monogamous Family The Iroquois Gens The Greek Gens [The Rise of Private Property] The Rise of the Athenian State The Gens and the State in Rome The Gens Among Celts and Germans The Formation of the State Among the Germans Barbarism and Civilization Appendix: A Recently Discovered Case of Group Marriage INTRODUCTION After Marx’s death, in rumaging through Marx’s manuscripts, Engels came upon Marx’s precis of Ancient Society – a book by progressive US scholar Lewis Henry Morgan and published in London 1877. The precis was written between 1880-81 and contained Marx’s numerous remarks on Morgan as well as passages from other sources. After reading the precis, Engels set out to write a special treatise – which he saw as fulfilling Marx’s will. Working on the book, he used Marx’s precis, and some of Morgan’s factual material and conclusions. He also made use of many and diverse data gleaned in his own studies of the history of Greece, Rome, Old Ireland, and the Ancient Germans. It would, of course, become The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State – the first edition of which was published October 1884 in Hottingen-Zurich. Engels wrote The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State in just two months – beginning toward the end of March 1884 and completing it by the end of May. It focuses on early human history, following...
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