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Politics1917

Russian Revolution

The tsarist monarchy fell and the Bolsheviks seized power. The Soviet Union was founded in 1922.

Lenin at the second anniversary of the October Revolution, Moscow, 7 November 1919
Lenin at the second anniversary of the October Revolution, Moscow, 7 November 1919

L.Y. Leonidov · Public domain · Source

Under tsarist autocracy Russia’s peasants remained poor even after the emancipation of the serfs (1861), and late industrialisation swelled the working class. "Bloody Sunday" in 1905, during the Russo-Japanese War, set off a revolution that won a parliament (the Duma), but autocracy continued. Defeats in the First World War and worsening food shortages brought discontent to a head.

In March 1917 (February in the old Russian calendar) workers and soldiers in Petrograd rose up, Nicholas II abdicated and the Romanov dynasty ended (the February Revolution). When the Provisional Government kept fighting the war, Lenin, back from exile, raised the slogan "All power to the Soviets", and in November (October, Old Style) the Bolsheviks overthrew the Provisional Government in an armed uprising (the October Revolution).

The Bolshevik government nationalised the land for the peasants to use, nationalised the banks and major industries, and made peace with Germany in 1918. After winning a civil war against counter-revolutionary forces and foreign intervention, it founded the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) in 1922.

The Russian Revolution created the world’s first socialist state and began the 20th-century confrontation between capitalism and socialism. The Comintern (1919), founded by Lenin, supported national movements in the colonies, influencing Korean socialist movements in the Russian Far East and elsewhere and the founding of the Chinese Communist Party.

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States at the time
Russia

4 parts of this event

  1. 1
    1917February Revolution

    Exhausted by war and hunger, the workers and soldiers of Petrograd rose up; Nicholas II abdicated and the Romanov dynasty came to an end. Power was split between the Provisional Government and the Soviet.

  2. 2
    1917October Revolution

    The Bolsheviks led by Lenin overthrew the Provisional Government in an armed rising and set up a Soviet government — the world’s first socialist regime.

  3. 3
    1918 – 1922Russian Civil War and War Communism

    The Bolsheviks’ Red Army fought and defeated the counter-revolutionary Whites and foreign interventionist forces, while the government imposed War Communism — forced grain requisitioning and the nationalization of industry.

  4. 4
    1921 – 1928New Economic Policy (NEP)

    With the economy shattered by civil war and peasants in revolt, Lenin ended grain requisitioning and allowed small-scale private trade and enterprise. The economy gradually recovered to pre-war levels.

Before and after

Earlier
1914 Korean Gwangbokgun Government
Later
1918 Treaty of Brest-Litovsk

Related works

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Themes that include this event

  • World War I and the Russian Revolution1908 – 1923

    From the Balkan crises to a war of trenches and total mobilization that toppled four empires; the Russian Revolution it unleashed, which created the first socialist state; and the Versailles settlement of national self-determination and the League of Nations