The Story of Russia:Before and After WWI

Chapter 27, Section 3 andChapter 28, Section 5

Russian Revolution

PART 1

Keep these in mind!Essential Questions

• What are the foundations of economic theories?

• Why do nations adopt different economic policies?

• How do individuals gain and maintain power?

Russia in WWI

1. How did WWI show Russia’s economic weaknesses?– Not enough food, appropriate armaments, or

reliable roads to supply the army– Russian people lose confidence in their

government and the czar (Nicholas II) by 1917• Thought Tickler?– What were the people of Russia looking for?

Struggle for New Leadership: Russian Revolution

2. The Russia monarchy served for 350 years. When Czar Nicholas II and his family fled out of fear, what two groups of people starting fighting for power?– Mensheviks (moderates) – Bolsheviks (radical)

3. Which group eventually won and what was their winning slogan?– Bolsheviks, “peace, bread, and land”

Results of the Russian Revolution4. Who was the leader of the winners of the Russian

Revolution? Whose ideas was he inspired by?– Vladimir Lenin -Karl Marx

5. What did the Bolsheviks rename themselves in 1918?– The Communist Party

Communists Flex their Muscles

6. What drastic step did the communists take in July of 1918 to stop the monarchy from coming back to power?– Executed the imprisoned czar and his entire family

7. What broke out for three years in Russia? What were the two armies of this conflict?– civil war, Reds vs Whites

8. Who did the U.S. (the Allies) support in this civil war? Who eventually won anyway in 1921?– U.S. supported the Whites with arms, money, troops– The Communist won

A New Russia

9. What did the Communists change the name of the country to in 1922?– Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR)– Better known as the Soviet Union

Dictatorship in the Soviet Union

PART 2

“Workers of the world, unite!”

1. What was “War Communism”?–Policy of nationalizing Russian industries

between 1918-1921a. Did it help?•NO!!! Less grain and far less factory

production than before war

2. How did the New Economic Policy change Russia?– Major industries (heavy industry,

communications, transportation, credit) still under government control

– Some free enterprise allowed, especially with farm products

– Farmers encouraged to produce more to become kulaks (wealthier people who got to employ others)

– Small businessmen (Nepmen) traded some

3. What is a collective farm?– Land pooled into large farms where

people worked together as a group, sharing supplies, machinery, etc.

Women

4. How did women’s roles change during the start of the Communist reign?–More equality (army, etc.)–Women could get maternity leave– Easier to obtain divorce (which was unusual in

Europe at the time)– However, few women had high-ranking

positions, pay was unequal, female unemployment higher

Education5. How did education change during the start of

the Communist reign?– Greater emphasis on education– Goal was to increase literacy, teach socialism,

train tech workers through Vo-Tech schools (BCIT, anyone?)

– But didn’t work because of limited funds (pencils, notebooks, heat in winter)

– Also, greater emphasis on higher education over elementary education

– By 1925, Soviet students averaged fewer than 3 years in school

Trotsky and Stalin

6. Contrast the views of Leon Trotsky and Joseph Stalin.– Trotsky believed that for socialism to succeed, revolution should take

place all over the world– Stalin believed that for socialism to succeed, the Soviet Union needed

to serve as a modela. Who ended up taking control of the Soviet Union, and why?

– Stalin won an internal power struggle, took over in 1928 (Lenin had died in 1924)

b. What happened to the other guy?– Trotsky was exiled, later murdered in Mexico on Stalin’s orders

Under Stalin7. Did Stalin increase or decrease government control over the economy? Why?– Increased (he thought economy was not

growing quick enough, peasants weren’t charging gov’t-recommended low prices on wheat)

– Created a command economy, in which government controlled all economic decisions

Under Stalin8. What was Stalin’s Five-Year Plan, and how did it affect Soviet

life?– Plan for economic growth and industry; collective farming

would produce enough food for Soviets plus enough to export, which would pay for modern machinery, which would grow industry

– Government forced collective farms (execution, exile, prison were possible alternatives)

– Decreased agricultural production; millions died of famine and crop failure

– However, economy grew overall (especially steel production)– Second five-year plan gave more gov’t control, more focus

on industry, less on goods for people (not rewarded for good economy)

Religion and Art

9. How did religion and art in the Soviet Union change during Stalin’s rule?– Soviets discouraged worship, seized property of Orthodox

Church– Churches and synagogues destroyed or converted to public

buildings– Ministers, priests, rabbis imprisoned, executed– Artists, musicians, writers were censored… ordered to

produce works of “socialist realism” to prove loyalty to state

Dealing with the Opposition10. How did Stalin react when an important

Communist Party official was assassinated in 1934?– He ordered purge of party members who were

supposedly disloyal to him– This spread to army, and then ordinary people

What does the world think of Stalin?

Dealing with the Opposition11. How many people were arrested, imported, imprisoned in labor

camps or executed by 1939?– 5 million– "The investigators began to use force on me, a sick 65-year-old

man. I was made to lie face down and beaten on the soles of my feet and my spine with a rubber strap... For the next few days, when those parts of my legs were covered with extensive internal hemorrhaging, they again beat the red-blue-and-yellow bruises with the strap and the pain was so intense that it felt as if boiling water was being poured on these sensitive areas. I howled and wept from the pain. I incriminated myself in the hope that by telling them lies I could end the ordeal. When I lay down on the cot and fell asleep, after 18 hours of interrogation, in order to go back in an hour's time for more, I was woken up by my own groaning and because I was jerking about like a patient in the last stages of typhoid fever." – a theatre director accused of “spying”

Foreign Policy and Gulags

12. How did the Soviet Union’s foreign policy change during the 1920s and 1930s?– They tried to get other countries to accept them– However, they also supported Comintern, which was founded to

spread revolutions throughout the world13. What were gulags, and why were people sent there?

– Labor camps, many in Siberia, for those who spoke out against Stalin’s rule

– Had to work in mines, on building projects, many died, others executed

Answers please!Essential Questions

• What are the foundations of economic theories?

• Why do nations adopt different economic policies?

• How do individuals gain and maintain power?