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Nationality Doctrine in Soviet Political Strategy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 August 2009

Extract

Modern totalitarianism combines appeals to both nationalism and internationalism. Of course this statement applies with much greater force to Soviet than to Nazi totalitarianism. The latter was primarily a national movement, but with international ideological overtones, and with some elements of an international elite cadre and even of an international mass following. Soviet communism began as a faction of the Russian affiliate of international social democracy, and then acquired the territorial base which has given it the national characteristics it now possesses.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © University of Notre Dame 1954

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References

1 The author is writing a book on Great Russian nationalism in Soviet ideology. He wishes to express thanks to Yale University for making available funds necessary in the pursuit of this study.

2 A theory of the organizational aspects of the above process is given in Selznick, Philip, The Organizational Weapon (New York, 1952)Google Scholar. The still vital role of ideology is brought out in Gurian, Waldemar, Bolshevism (Notre Dame, 1952)Google Scholar. See also Hunt, R. N. Carew, The Theory and Practice of Communism (New York, 1951).Google Scholar

3 Elf Jahre in Sowjetischen Gefangnissen und Lagern (Zurich, 1950), pp. 234236.Google Scholar

4 Lenin, , Izbrannye proizvedeniya (Moscow, 1943), II, 553555Google Scholar. This was a basic theme of many of Lenin's writings. Cf. Wolfe, Bertram, Three Who Made a Revolution, (New York, 1948), p. 122.Google Scholar

5 Stalin, , Problems of Leninism (Moscow, 1940), pp. 6, 113, etc.Google Scholar

6 Lenin, , op. cit., I, p. 217.Google Scholar

7 Ibid., pp. 225–226.

8 On this doctrine, see Lenin, , “Two Tactics of Social Democracy in the Democratic Revolution,” published in the above collection in Vol. 1, pp. 427513Google Scholar, and also numerous works of the years 1916 and 1917.

9 Lenin, , Iz. Proiz., I, 619662.Google Scholar

10 Lenin, , Complete Works (in Russian), 2nd ed., XIX, 245.Google Scholar

11 Stalin, , Sochineniya, I (Moscow, 1946), pp. 3255Google Scholar. This first volume has recently been translated into English, although at the time of writing it is apparently not yet available in the United States.

12 Lenin, , Iz. Proiz., II, 596597.Google Scholar

13 Ibid., 567–568.

14 Quoted from Blueprint for World Conquest (Washington and Chicago, 1946), pp. 124125Google Scholar. The documents translated and contained in the above collection set forth the essential principles of the international communist movement.

15 Stalin, , Soch., VII (Moscow, 1947), 133.Google Scholar

16 Among recent contributions to this literature may be mentioned Kolarz, Walter, Russia and Her Colonies (London, 1952)Google Scholar, and Soviet Imperialism, ed. by Gurian, Waldemar (Notre Dame, 1953).Google Scholar

17 Stalin, , Soch., IV (Moscow, 1947), p. 3.Google Scholar

18 For a brief discussion of this period see the contribution by Richard E. Pipes to the Notre Dame symposium referred to above. Dr. Pipes plans soon to publish an intensive treatment of this period.

19 Stalin, , Soch., IV, 407.Google Scholar

20 On the Ukraine during the revolutionary and civil war period see Reshetar, John S., The Ukrainian Revolution (Princeton, 1952).Google Scholar

21 Stalin's letter to Ukrainian education Commissar Shumski on this subject, in Stalin, , Soch., VIII (Moscow, 1948), 149153.Google Scholar

22 Stalin, , Soch., XIII (Moscow, 1951), 2327.Google Scholar

23 See my article, “Stalinism and the Russian Cultural Heritage,” The Review of Politics, XIV, No. 2, pp. 178203, 04, 1952.Google Scholar

24 Krizis Kolonial'noi sistemy (Moscow, 1949), p. 123.Google Scholar

25 Fedoseev, P., “Sotsializm i patriotizm,” Kommunist, IX, 1953, pp. 1228Google Scholar, was unusual in its criticism of survivals of “great power” as well as local nationalism. The article criticized “some historians” for “idealizing” Tsarism. However, the main emphasis was on savage anti-Westernism and the alleged benefits to the non-Russians of Russian conquest. See especially pp. 12–13 and 25–26. This issue was released by the censors prior to the announcement of Beria's arrest and hence might be classified as belonging to the period of “relaxation.” I feel strongly that one part of Stalinism that may have died with “Vozhd” is the privileges accorded to the Caucasian clique in the “apparatus.” Rule by the non-Russian Stalin was bitterly resented by many Russians.