How far can the October revolution be considered a popular revolution?

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How far can the October revolution be considered a “popular” revolution?        

The October revolution of 1917 can be described as both a popular overthrow and a coup d’état. Although the Bolshevik party did not in any way have the full, clear support of the working and agrarian classes, these classes were however the ones who pushed them forward: with support for the Provisional Government dwindling, these classes were looking for an alternative to fill in the power vacuum, and with their promises for “Land, Peace and Bread”, the Bolsheviks had stepped in just in time to present the solution.

        The term “popular” is quite ambiguous for Russian terms. As mentioned above, the Bolsheviks did not have the full support of the majority of the population in Russia or in St. Petersburg at any point during their rise in power – indeed the actual take-over of power on the 25th of October involved just about 25.000 to 35.000 thousand (with this estimate been said by Trotsky himself) – a rather petite minority of the St. Petersburg population. This situation was proven again later on in the elections for the Constituent Assembly, where the Bolsheviks only got one-third of the seats. However, in the chaotic situation that ruled over Russia and especially over St. Petersburg in the months after July, popularity is really very relative, as no party had any steady majority to side with it. The only point in time at which the political directions of all the parties and all the workers and soldiers united was in the March revolution, and even then their only common aim was essentially their desire to remove the Czar from power. In addition to this, the fragmentation within the rest of the political parties is made very clear when the coalition of the Whites during the Civil War is looked at: ideology ranged from hardcore monarchists to liberalists! It is therefore for this reason that the Bolshevik Revolution can be deemed popular: at a time where no other ideology or political group seemed to have substantial support compared to their rivals, the Bolsheviks emerged “victorious” in having achieved to convince a relative majority to side with them; they had managed to bring the necessary components of power to work on their side, and it was in this way that they accomplished to be the source of power within St. Petersburg – they had control of the key points of the city’s infrastructure, without which St. Petersburg functioning would break down.

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For a long time since, the people had been displeased with the Provisional Government – in the midst of a radical and revolutionized society, elements from the overthrown Czarist system were hardly desirable in government. It was however tolerated by the people, and more specifically by the Petrograd Soviet, which chose not to risk its power over the people and rather act “behind the scenes”. So went the infamous system of ‘dual government’. However, this situation could not be kept up, as the people soon came to realize that still many of their demands were not being carried out: an ...

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