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

Priestland, David

 
9780199245130: Stalinism and the Politics of Mobilization: Ideas, Power, and Terror in Inter-war Russia
Hardcover
ISBN 10: 0199245134 ISBN 13: 9780199245130
Publisher: OUP Oxford, 2007

Synopsis

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.

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Review

This book's careful and intelligent discussion of key issues in the existing historiography ... is extremely well done, offers highly interesting new perspectives...an original and challenging interpretation of the Stalinist Terror. (Miriam Dobson The English Historical Review)

David Priestland's book is a contribution to the academic study of the history of the USSR, and in particular the origins of the 1930s terror. It is distinguished by the attempt to take seriously the political ideas of the Stalinists and their connection to, and partial divergence from, the ideas of the Bolsheviks after the revolution. It is this, as well as the wealth of documentation on the book-especially of political turns within the regime-that makes it worth reading. (Mike Macnair, Weekly Worker, issue 736)

Synopsis

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.

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Publisher
OUP Oxford
Publication date
2007
Language
English
ISBN 10 
0199245134
ISBN 13 
9780199245130
Binding
Hardcover
Number of pages
487