The Communist Party in Moscow 1925-1932

THE COMMUNIST PARTY IN MOSCOW 1925-1932 CATHERINE ANNE MERRIDALE Thesis submitted to the Faculty of Arts of the University of Birmingham for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Centre for Russian and East European Studies University of Birmingham September 1987 University of Birmingham Research Archive e-theses repository This unpublished thesis/dissertation is copyright of the author and/or third parties. The intellectual property rights of the author or third parties in respect of this work are as defined by The Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 or as modified by any successor legislation. Any use made of information contained in this thesis/dissertation must be in accordance with that legislation and must be properly acknowledged. Further distribution or reproduction in any format is prohibited without the permission of the copyright holder. X *•,» o 7 >? r/ C Synopsis. The thesis examines the Communist Party in Moscow between 1925 and 1932. Its structure, role and membership are studied, together with its relationship with the population of Moscow. A study is also made of politics in the period, with special reference to the oppositions of the 1920's. Four broad problems are discussed. The first is the relationship between the central Party leadership and the Moscow Committee. Second is the role of the grassroots activist in political life. Thirdly, the failure of the oppositions is studied in detail. Finally, popular influence over the Party is examined with a view to discussing how far the revolution had been 'betrayed' in this period. It is found that the Moscow Committee was less autonomous than other regional organs, but that grassroots initiative played an important part in political life. In general, people were reluctant to engage in formal opposition. This largely explains the defeat of the Left and Right oppositions, who failed to attract significant support. The majority of Muscovites remained apathetic or hostile to the Party, but a core of committed activists within it was responsible for many of the period's achievements. To the extent that they supported and even initiated policy, Stalin's 'great turn' included an element of 'revolution from below'. The total number of words in the thesis (excluding footnotes, appendices, etc.) is approximately 76,000. Acknowledgements To the many friends and colleagues who have helped me in the course of this research I gratefully acknowledge my debt. Particular thanks are due to the British Academy and to the Provost and Fellows of King's College, Cambridge, for providing me with the studentship and fellowship which successively enabled me to carry out my research. I should also like to thank the British Council and the Soviet Ministry of Higher Education, under whose auspices I spent five months at Moscow State University in 1986; the librarians at the Alexander Baykov Library in Birmingham, Jenny Brine and Jackie Johnson; and the staffs of Cambridge University Library, the State Archive of the October Revolution in Moscow, especially Lyudmila Evgenevna Selivanova, the INION Library in Moscow, the Lenin Library, and the Academy of Sciences Library in Leningrad. To the people who have helped me with the writing of this work at various stages I owe special thanks. In particular, I am indebted to Professor R. W. Davies, who has patiently and good humouredly supervised my research since 1982, and to Dr. R. Service and Dr. S. G. Wheatcroft, both of whom, as supervisors at different times, helped enormously with their comments and encouragement. I should also like to thank my supervisor in Moscow, A. I. Vdovin, for his assistance while I was attached to the History Faculty at MGU. Other people whose help was invaluable include the members of the Soviet Industrialisation Project Seminar in Birmingham, especially Vlad Andrle, Hiroaki Kuromiya, Arfon Rees and Chris Ward; Nick Lampert and Nobuo Shimotomai, both of whom generously provided me with source materials from their own collections; Fiona Miller and David Shearer. Finally, I should like to thank my husband, John Barber, to whom I owe the greatest debt of all. Without his practical help and endless encouragement, this thesis might never have been completed. He has also campaigned to eradicate the idiosyncratic meanderings of my prose; any that remain are my responsibility. For his generous-hearted support I am extremely grateful, and to him I dedicate this work. CONTENTS Introduction 1 Chapter 1. The Structure of the Party in Moscow, 1925-32 22 Chapter 2. Political Change in Moscow, 1925-32 50 Chapter 3. Party Membership and Recruitment in Moscow 119 Chapter 4. The Moscow Party Organisation and Moscow Industry 146 Chapter 5. 'Political Education', Agitation and Propaganda 176 Chapter 6. Political Participation and Party Democracy 204 Chapter?. Conclusion 236 Maps 247 Diagrams 250 Tables 257 Appendices 264 Glossary of Russian terms used in the text 277 Abbreviations used in the footnotes 279 Bibliography 280 Introduction This thesis deals with the Moscow Communist Party organisation at a crucial time in its history. For Moscow, as for the whole of the USSR, these were years of transformation, when the broad promise of the revolution finally narrowed into the Stalinist political and economic system. The period saw rapid economic change, the transition from the New Economic Policy to state-directed industrialisation. Soviet society was transformed with unprecedented rapidity and turbulence. It was also in these years that the foundations were laid of the political system which was to dominate the USSR for three decades. In 1925, the Communist Party was still a small fraction even of the urban population. It lacked an acknowledged leader or an agreed programme. Nowhere were the debates over policy more bitter than in the Soviet capital. By 1932, all this had changed. The Party had grown more than threefold, the majority of the new recruits being concentrated in urban areas like Moscow. This expansion at the base was accompanied by the ascendancy of a powerful single leader at the top. Within the Party, and indeed in society as a whole, debate had become muted and policy was formed by leaders who insisted on inflexible unanimity. These developments may well be described as a 'second revolution1. Events so significant have naturally provoked a great deal of historical controversy. When they look at this period, historians disagree about the methods by which the various changes were achieved, especially the degree to which they were imposed from above. Their lack of agreement to some extent reflects the range of political responses to the USSR in the West. Because of its importance in ideological discourse, the writing of Soviet history has been invested with a special significance. In general, the result has not been healthy from the academic point of view 1. Serious scholarly work has been hindered by the political implications of its findings. Historians may agree that 'objectivity' is neither possible nor desirable, but the 1 Walter La queur, who also noted the political importance of the study of Soviet history in the West, took the view that Western experiences helped to 'promote a better understanding of the significance of the Russian revolution'. However, he was prepared to concede that 'distortion set in ... when the impact became too overwhelming or when Western students accepted passing political phases...as permanent absolutes.' The Fate of The Revolution (New York, 1967), p. 161. involvement of committed partisan interests in their work is a different matter. The controversy is important, and some idea of its dimensions is desirable to set the present work in context. One of the most influential theories in the study of Soviet politics has been totalitarianism2. It has now become so regular a target that its merits need not be discussed here3. It is important for us only because of its effect on the writing of Soviet political history. Although it was never the only acceptable model in the field, its influence, especially in the USA, was pervasive. As a result, until recently, the work of historians interested in the political development of the Soviet Union concentrated mainly on a narrow clique of Party leaders, Stalin and his immediate entourage4. Where scholars strayed beyond the Kremlin, it was usually to discuss the means - police, army, propaganda - by which totalitarian control might have been achieved. Even critics of the theory often chose to attack it on its own ground. Historians looking at the period before the emergence of the totalitarian system were influenced by the need to explain its antecedents. There was little room for studies which looked at society and its influence on the political process. The totalitarian theory, indeed, required that society be viewed as inert, 'atomised', incapable of influencing politics to any significant degree. 2 Definitions of the term vary in their choice of emphasis, but in general the idea of a single hierarchical ruling party, usually led by one man, is central to the interpretation. See, for example, Leonard Schapiro, Totalitarianism (London, 1972), pp. 124-5. Other common features of 'totalitarian regimes' include the use of psychological or actual terror as a means of control, backed up by powerful official ideologies which promise future rewards for present sacrifices, central control of the armed forces and mass media and the centralised direction of the economy. These characteristics are based on the influential model provided by C. J. Friedrich and Z. K. Brzez inski, Totalitarian Dictatorship and Autocracy (New York, 1956), pp. 9-10. 3 The totalitarian thesis has been under attack since the 1950's, partly as a result of political changes within the countries (especially in Eastern Europe) to which it was applied. The academic discussion has been voluminous. Schapiro's book gives a defence of the model, written in the light of a number of criticisms.

Load more