A major contribution to the historiography of the world in the 20th century, The Bolsheviks in Power focuses on the fateful first year of Soviet rule in Petrograd. It examines events that profoundly shaped the Soviet political system that endured through most of the 20th century. Drawing largely from previously inaccessible Soviet archives, it demolishes standard interpretations of the origins of Soviet authoritarianism by demonstrating that the Soviet system evolved ad hoc as the Bolsheviks struggled to retain political power amid spiraling political, social, economic, and military crises. The book covers issues such as the rapid fall of influential moderate Bolsheviks, the formation of the dreaded Cheka, the dissolution of the Constituent Assembly, the Red Terror, the national government's flight to Moscow, and the subsequent rivalry between Russia's new and old capitals.
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Editorial Reviews
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"This briskly written, often riveting study of the evolution of Bolshevik authoritarianism provides a salutary corrective to the school of historiography that views Soviet Communism as totalitarian by nature." -- The Atlantic, December, 2008
"Thirty-one years have passed since the author's The Bolsheviks Come to Power..., the second volume in a projected trilogy on the Russian Revolution. The first two volumes documented Bolshevik success in the destruction of the Provisional Government in 1917. This third volume tells about the first year of Bolshevik power after the insurrection in October and the dispersal of the Constituent Assembly.... Rabinowitch display[s] broad control of sources... Recommended." -- Choice
"Rabinowitch's... reconstruction of Bolshevik politics from the first to the second October under Soviet rule gives altogether familiar events an unfamiliar and far deeper resonance.... [His] fine-grained history gives to largely foretold events a texture and complexity absent before." -- Foreign Affairs
"This is an important book. It describes in great detail the evolution of the Bolshevik regime over the first year of its existence." -- Iain McKay, Black Flag Magazine, 2008
"A meticulous and fine-grained study of the first year of 'soviet rule' in Petrograd.... Rabinowitch maintains a dispassionate tone and is scrupulously measured in his judgments.... His book can justly be said to provide a definitive political history of the city during the first year of Bolshevik rule." -- Steve Smith, New Left Review, July-August 2008
"Rabinowitch has culled an astonishing amount of new information from long closed archives... a compelling narrative accessible to specialists and general readers alike." -- Stephen F. Cohen, author of Failed Crusade: America and the Tragedy of Post-Communist Russia
"Rabinowitch demonstrates total mastery of the rich source material; a stunning command of politics during a time of crisis, turmoil, and shifting allegiances; confident, crystal-clear prose; originality; and profound appreciation of the circumstances in which his protagonists found themselves.... His new study addresses a central question of twentieth-century Russian history: what happened to the promises of 1917? Maintaining that his earlier efforts raised as many questions as they answered, he seeks to understand how the relatively democratic and decentralized Bolshevik party became transformed into 'one of the most highly centralized, authoritarian political organizations in modern history.'" -- Donald J. Raleigh, University of North Carolina
"This masterful volume fills one of the most glaring holes in the historiography of the revolution and twentieth-century Russian history. The archival research is truly impressive and will lend solid weight to the story Rabinowitch tells and the important revisions, modifications, and clarifications he makes in establishing the history of this extremely important period." -- Rex A. Wade, George Mason University
"What did Lenin's Bolsheviks do with the power they so boldly seized in October 1917? Alexander Rabinowitch is the first scholar to trace in detail, using newly available archives, the gripping story of the first year of Soviet rule in Russia. Concentrating on events in and around Petrograd, he explains why the Bolshevik government became more dictatorial, and even terroristic, as it struggled to control an increasingly impoverished and disaffected populace.... Written in an engaging style, The Bolsheviks in Power is a 'must read' for anyone interested in revolutionary change." -- John L. H. Keep, author of The Russian Revolution: A Study in Mass Mobilization
Thirty-one years have passed since the author's The Bolsheviks Come to Power (CH, Mar'77), the second volume in a projected trilogy on the Russian Revolution. The first two volumes documented Bolshevik success in the destruction of the Provisional Government in 1917. This third volume tells about the first year of Bolshevik power after the insurrection in October and the dispersal of the Constituent Assembly. Although Rabinowitch (emer., Indiana Univ.) in the three volumes manages to display broad control of sources, it would be an exaggeration to think that he has made obsolete the 1935 two -- volume work by W. H. Chamberlin, The Russian Revolution. The one irritant of Rabinowitch's first two volumes was that he managed to leave the impression that he sympathized more with the victorious Bolsheviks than with the democratic and socialist forces that they defeated. In the last 30 years, much has happened in Russia, new sources have opened, and much revisionist history has been written. The winds of change since Gorbachev's upheaval seem to have left the author untouched. The Cold War paradigm stands confirmed. Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates and above.A. Ezergailis, Ithaca College, Choice, July 2008
"This painstakingly researched and beautifully written book will be required reading for all specialists of the period and makes a great contribution to our deepening understandings of the course of revolution and civil war." -- Sarah Badcock, University of Nottingham, Revolutionary Russia, December 2008
"This work is a model for the historian's craft, which modestly but implicity redefines how we conceptualize the fields of history." -- Against the Current, May/June 2009
"This book is essential reading for those wanting to understand how the Bolsheviks took control of the Soviet State." -- Chartist, July/August 2009
"This is a thorough study of the high politics of the first year of Soviet rule in Petrograd. The level of detail is one of its many admirable features." -- History, July 2009
"Alexander Rabinowitch's account of the first year of Bolshevik politics is a work of outstanding merit that sets a standard rarely achieved in the genre of political history.... It is a history full of heroes, fools, and fanatics, yet recounted in a sober and nonjudgmental manner, a labor of love, over two decades in the making, the work of a skilled and devoted craftsman." -- Slavic Review, Spring 2010
"[T]his is by far the best book on the revolutionary period in Russian history, and one which should be obligatory reading for every serious student of the subject." -- Slavonic and East European Review, July 2010
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
11 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Professor Rabinowitch Has Done It Again,
By
This review is from: The Bolsheviks in Power: The First Year of Soviet Rule in Petrograd (Hardcover)
That is, write another engrossing history of the Bolshevik Party in revolution. This volume picks up seamlessly where his earlier "The Bolsheviks Come to Power" left off. For those of us who enjoyed his lucid and - at the time - groundbreaking reconstruction of 1917, this volume dealing with the revolutionary aftermath of October has been too long-awaited.
Although the writing gets dense at times, those interested in the subject will find a fascinating wealth of information on just how confused, ad hoc and improvisational were these early days of "Communist conspiracy" and "scientific socialism." Rabinowitch begins with the early negotiations between the Bolsheviks and other parties on the limits of inclusion in the new Soviet government, and concludes with the first-year anniversary of the October Revolution. Throughout the narrative his focus is on the moderate Bolshevik faction and how it was marginalized by Lenin, as well as the pressures of civil war. Realistically, however, Rabinowitch does not idealize these moderates nor overindulge the what-ifs of historiography. In outlining the transformation of Bolsheviks "from rebels to rulers" he keeps us aware of the harsh realities of civil war that made compromise and negotiation seem suicidal. And it must be remembered that attempts by moderate anti-Bolsheviks, to promote democracy and counsel conciliation on the White side, were brushed off by rightwing army officers and Western advisors who were determined to crush Bolshevism at all costs. With the narcosis of civil war gripping all parties it's very hollow indeed to berate the Bolsheviks alone for being dictators and fanatics, or expect them to rise above these circumstances. This is Rabinowitch's conclusion and is a refreshing counterpoint to the ideologically-driven anti-Bolshevik school led by Richard Pipes and Robert Conquest.
10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Enthusiastically recommended as an addition to college library world history shelves.,
By Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Bolsheviks in Power: The First Year of Soviet Rule in Petrograd (Hardcover)
Written by Russian and Soviet historian Alexander Rabinowitch (Professor Emeritus of History, Indiana University Bloomington), The Bolsheviks in Power: The First Year of Soviet Rule in Petrograd is an in-depth historiography of the Bolshevik Party's first year in power after the revolution of November, 1917 that so profoundly affected Soviet history and politics throughout the twentieth century. The Bolsheviks in Power denies the entrenched view that the party's severe ideology immediately changed the Soviet political system into one of brutal authoritarianism; rather, it is revealed that the Bolsheviks struggled to hold on to power amidst a sea of political, social, economic, and military crises, causing the oppressive regime that rose from it to appear virtually ad hoc. Issues discussed include the swift decline and fall of moderate Bolsheviks; the creation of the ruthless Cheka, the Bolshevik-Left SR alliance, and much more. Enthusiastically recommended as an addition to college library world history shelves.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Admirable Research; Mediocre Writing,
By
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This review is from: The Bolsheviks in Power: The First Year of Soviet Rule in Petrograd (Paperback)
I have now finished the trilogy (Prelude to Revolution, Bolsheviks Seize Power and Bolsheviks in Power). Although this review will concentrate on the third, much of my commentary applies to them all. First of all, Professor Rabinowitch is to be congratulated on the amount of detail that he has unearthed concerning the Bolsheviks and their relation to Petrograd in the period 1916-1919. However, it is not an easy read and the meetings and deliberations of such organizations as the Central Executive Committee, the Sovnarkom (Council of People's Commissars) and other entities merge into a bureaucratic morass.
Frankly, the second volume is the most interesting, since it is the narrative of the actual seizure of power. Professor Rabinowitch forcefully argues that the Bolsheviks were a relatively democratically-based organization, and I will concede his point. What he fails to do is explain how the Party became the totalitarian entity in a meaningful fashion. Yes, he does mention that the Red Terror was inspired by White threats and Allied machinations. However, there is no real sense of what has happened in Petrograd during this time. Zinoviev, the "boss" of Petrograd, is described as such, but there is no explanation of why he remained in Petrograd while many of the other Bolsheviks decamped to Moscow. Yes, there was the threat that the Germans might seize Petrograd, but who determined who left and who stayed? The assassinations of Volodarskii and Uritskii are not placed in an easy to understand context, while the chronologically related assassination attempt of Lenin does not even mention the assassin (Fanny Kaplan). Granted the latter assassination attempt occurred in Moscow, but the fact remains that it too was responsible for the Red Terror which spread to Petrograd. Most of the personalities are only described peripherally. They do not come alive in a cohesive fashion and they usually seem to be mere Party ciphers. Yet, there are instances of personal conduct which beg further explanation -- for example, the Shchastny Affair, wherein Trotsky arranges for the trial and execution of a Russian Captain who had become a naval hero. Professor Rabinowitch's tantalizing glimpses of this "show trial" are only that, and further references are to the Professor's own article (in Russian). Neither Figes nor Lincoln mention this episode in their histories of the Russian Civil War; Deutscher's first volume notes it in passing in a single page, while Volkogonov devotes two pages to it in his biography of Trotsky. Professor Rabinowitch notes that the Captain was rehabilitated in 1995, but there is so much more that could have been explained here. Kamenev seems to pop up here and there but is an overall enigma, as are Radek, Bukharin and many of the Old Bolsheviks. These books may well belong in university libraries, it is just that they are not overly enlightening for the reader.
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peasant section, mobilized sailors, food procurement detachments, obscene peace, immediate revolutionary war, trict soviets, duma boards, district dumas, annexationist peace, district soviet, nonparty workers, oblast government, viet power, revolutionary defense, district party committees, local chekas, peasant delegates, socialist coalition government, combating counterrevolution, unofficial conference, poorer peasantry, viet government, peasant congress, combat squads Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Constituent Assembly, Central Committee, Petrograd Soviet, Petersburg Committee, Red Army, Red Terror, Left Communists, The Defeat of the Moderates, Baltic Fleet, Central Bureau, Petrograd Left, Red Guards, Petrograd Bolsheviks, Northern Commune, Central Powers, Taurida Palace, Northern Oblast, History of the World, Soviet Russia, The Greatest Event, Forminga Government, Fort Ino, Pages School, Congress of Soviets, Field of Mars Browse Sample Pages:
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