Historiography Flashcards
1905 rev - Pipes
“the terrible weakness of the bonds holding the mighty Russian empire together became apparent to all”
1905 rev revolutionaries - Figes
“the revolutionaries played a marginal role until October”
1905 - Trotsky
“although with a few broken bones, Tsarism had come out of the experience alive and well”
revolution intelligntsia- Pipes
“the masses neither wanted nor desired a revolution - the only group interested in it was the intelligentsia. Stress on alleged popular discontent and class conflict derives more from ideological preconceptions than from the facts at hand”
Duma - Floyd
“the Duma never became a parliament in the European sense.. The simple fact of its existence was important in itself”
1905 rev - Fitzpatrick
“outcome ambiguous and unsatisfactory to all”
BS - Pipes
“damaged irreperably the image of the good tsar”
Duma - Pipes
“both the liberals and Tsar viewed the Duma as an arena of combat.. sensible voices pleading for co-operation found themselves villified by both parties”
Bolsheviks - Figes
“were simple young men, doers ratther than thinkers. Lenin offered them the idea that something could be done”
inevitability - Figes
“the tsarist regime’s fall was not inevitable, but its own stupidity made it so”
Stolypin - Figes
“had Stolypin succeeded in broadening the social base of government in the countryside, then perhaps it would not have collapsed so disastrously”
Bolshevik organisation - Figes
“as the party was quite undisciplined, it had many different factions and often proved unable to impose its will on them”
reasons for Tsar fall - Service
“the general situation and not the Tsar’s personality had enfeebled the regime’s reaction to the assaults made against it”
Marxism - Figes
“it was not Marxism that made Lenin Revolutionary, but Lenin that made Marxism revolutionary”
WW1 - Figes
“worker’s strikes came to a halt. Socialist united behind the defence of the Fatherland”
WW1 Tsar - Figes
” even in war the Tsar struggled to impose his patrimonial autocracy”
Feb Rev - Trotsky
“neither at the front nor at the rear was there a brigade or regiment prepared to do battle for Nicky”
Tsar fall - Figes
“the undoing of the tsar was not a weakness of will, but a willful determination to rule from the throne despite clearly lacking the necessary qualities to do so”
Feb Rev - CCP
“the revolution was victorious because its vanguard was the working class”
Feb Rev - Figes
“by and large a spontaneous reaction to the repressions of the 26th”
Feb Rev - leaders - Figes
“real strike leaders were the skilled and literate workers on the shop floor, with no party affiliation”
Feb Rev rev parties - Mstislavsky
“the revolution found us, party members, asleep”
Tsar fall - Pipes
“the Tsar yielded not to a rebellious populace but to politicians and generals and he did so out of patriotic duty:”
Oct Rev - CPSU
“the working class followed the Bolsheviks”
July Days - CPSU
“the Bolshevik party was opposed to armed action at the time”
July Days - Pipes
“orchestrated as a power seizure..masked as spontaneous when failed”
July Days - Fitzpatrick
“caught off balance… had talked of insurrection in a general way but not planned it”
Feb Rev - Wildman
“had smashed traditional authority beyond repair”
Soviets - CPSU
“the Soviets were unwilling or unable to check the criminal deeds of the Provisional Government, and themselves trailed in its wake”
Prov Govt - CPSU
“Bols exposed the govt of kerensky to the masses. whole policy was in effects assisting Kornilov’s counter-revolutionary plot”
Kornilov - Pipes
“Kerensky plot” supressing an imaginary revolution would elevate his popularity and power, enabling him to meet the Bolshevik threat
July Days - Figes
“made up everything as they went along”
October Rev - Figes
“was a coup d’etat.. but it took place amidst a social revolution that centered on the popular realisation of soviet power”
October Rev - Ulam
“did not seize power, they picked it up”
October Rev - CPSU
“was confronted by an enemy so compartively weak, so badly organized and so politically inexperiences as the Russian bourgeoisie”
October Rev - Fitzpatrick
“many of the Bolsheviks were inclined to use their position in the Soviet to achieve a non-violent transfer of power”
Stolypin - Pipes
“a sense of national hope and unity”
June Offensive - Pipes
“bolster the Government’s prestige and lift national morale”
Prov Govt - Smith
“reluctant revolutionaries”
class - Smith
““…the Russian Empire was deeply fissured between the government and the tsar’s subjects; between the capital and the provinces; between the educated and the uneducated; between Western and Russian ideas; between rich and poor; between privilege and oppression; between contemporary fashion and centuries-old custom”.
1905 - fIGES
No-one believed more than Father Gapon in the bond between Tsar and people”.
WW1 outcome - Figes
“The First World War was a titanic test for the states of Europe – and one that Tsarism failed in a singular and catastrophic way”.
WW1 - HIll
“War accelerated the development of revolutionary crises, but their deep-lying causes could not be wished away in times of peace”.
Feb Rev - Wood
““Despite the disaffection of the military, however, it was neither the high command nor the Duma politicians, still less the revolutionary parties, which finally brought about the downfall of ‘Bloody Nicholas’. It was caused by the spontaneous upsurge of the politically radicalized masses”.”
Feb Rev - Figes
“For the Romanov regime fell under the weight of its own internal contradictions. It was not overthrown”.”
Prov Govt - Fitzpatrick
“The popular revolution became progressively more radical, while the elite revolution moved towards an anxious conservative stance in defense of property and law and order”.”
Prov Govt - Taylor
““Though called democratic, this government had no popular mandate and little popular support. It simply carried on the old system, just as a hen continues to run around the yard when its head has been cut off. No one knew how to change direction”.”
Prov Govt - Pipes
“Russia was governed – or rather misgoverned – by a regime of dual power, under which the soviets subverted the authority of the administration without assuming responsibility for the consequences”.”
April Thesis - Wood
“Lenin’s programme manifestly reflected and articulated the increasingly radical temper of the party rank-and-file and the militant workers and troops”.”
Prov Govt compromised - Wood
““The ‘collaboration’ of Menshevik and SR ministers with the bourgeois, pro-war government meant that the Bolsheviks were now the only political faction which pursued an unswervingly anti-war policy”.”
role of class - Rosenberg
““Indeed, as imperial Russia’s state-capitalist structure did begin to crumble, at once cause and consequence of the deprivations of war and revolution, the analytic logic of class difference and conflict became the insidious, ideologized passions of class warfare”.”
role of Bols - Nove
“They sought to reap the whirlwind. They contributed to the breakdown but did not cause it”.”
role of bols - Sevice
““If Lenin had never existed, a socialist government would probably have rule Russia by the end of [1917].””
Oct Rev - Wood
“It succeeded by default rather than design…the events of 24-26 October were marked by confusion, apprehension, uncertainty and opportunism…After hours of indecision and ignored ultimatums punctuated by sporadic and innocuous shell-fire, the Palace was infiltrated (not stormed)”.”
Bolchevik organization - Hill
”. The party’s organisation allowed great flexibility in maneuver, combined with firmness and strength in pursuit of the clearly envisaged ultimate objectives”
Bolshevik organization - Rosenberg
“the notion of the party as a disciplined conspiratorial block determined from the start to seize power is and has always been a distorting caricature”.”
Oct Rev popular - Ulam
““Except for the workers at some factories there was no pro-Bolshevik enthusiasm in the population, only apathy”.”
WW1 - Pipes
“It is a mistake to attribute the February Revolution to fatigue with the war. The contrary is true. Russians wanted to pursue the war more effectively, and they felt that the existing government was not capable of doing it, that existing political structures were in need of a major overhaul”
Oct Rev - Salisbury
“The Bolsheviks did not seize power in one bold clandestine move. They blundered into power, divided, fighting against each other, and until the final moments Lenin had only an occasional role in what happened. “
