rational means of production. However, the people who had recently been
released from the autocratic rule of the czar's, wanted only one
thing: self-determination and autonomy. Faced with these difficulties
Lenin finally devised a formula which would yoke the revolutionary
potential of nationalism to marxist socialism. He argued that the
promise of self-determination would rally the suppressed
nationalities to the revolutionary cause and the revolution in turn
would hasten the disappearance of nationalism.
With Stalin newly installed as the People's Commisssar for
Nationalities the Bolsheviks prepared to put Lenin's formula to the
test. Yet almost immediately, and amid the chaos engendered by the
civil war, nationalities began peeling away from the Bolshevik sphere
of influence. The Baltic states, with British help, escaped from
soviet rule, as did the Finns after fighting a civil war with
communist inspired insurgents. With Poland already gone, the Ukranian
nationalist assembly, in 1917, established a Ukranian Peoples
Republic and supported the Whites during the civil war. Less than one
month later, however, the Red Army seized control of the entire
Ukraine, and the region was incorporated into the Soviet Republic.
Likewise, the independent Menshevik government in Georgia (1918-20)
was toppled by the Red Army, with Stalin insisting that proletarian
self-determination dictated that it was in the interests of the
workers to remain part of a larger proletarian state. The other
nationalities of Central Asia and the Transcaucus succumbed to the
Bolshevik pressure, lacking powerful allies, or indeed, the internal
governmental structure to offer an alternative to communist rule. The
Bolsheviks went on to reinforce the local soviets with communists
sympayhetic to their aims and secured further adherence to the
proletarian cause with units of the Red Army and Russian settlers.
After the storm, however, was the calm. Lenin was pragmatic
enough to realise that force alone would not suffice to hold the new
Soviet polity together, and that the non-Russians would have to be won
over with concessions. The raw materials, goodwill and cooperation of
the non-Russians were vital to sustain the already precarious Russian
economy. As Stalin himself put it in October 1920... "Central Russia,
that hearth of world revolution, cannot hold out long without the
assistance of the border regions, which abound in raw materials, fuel
and foodstuffs..." (Swoboda:p.352) Therefore, in the face of strong
nationalist feelings and the overwhelming need for stability and
productivity; Lenin made two essential concessions which hardly
accorded with the Party's marxist inheritance. He granted cultural
autonomy to the non-Russian nationalities and adopted an element of
federalism in the formal structure of the state.
The non-Russians were subsequently offered an implicit
national contract. In essence, they were promised sovereign statehood
and equality within a federal structure. The new policies of
'Korinezatsiya' (meaning nativisation) were introduced in 1923 and
were designed to promote the training and development of native
personnel, rather than Russian or Russified elements, in order to
complete the process of building their nation-states within the
Soviet federal framework. Other policies included emphasis on local
language, culture and education. The Russian language was purposely
discrimminated against in the Ukraine and Belorusssia, while great
efforts were made by Moscow to improve the economic and educational
well-being of the more backward Central-Asian Republics. In return
for these considerable cultural and administrative guarantees of
autonomy, which became known as the 'Leninist Principles', the non-
Russian nationalities would give up their present form of state
sovereignty and become part of a socialist federation of states. In
effect there was no longer to be any ruling nation, only a fraternal
brotherhood of socialist states.
At first glance, the Union Treaty of 1922 may have seemed
to be advocating and perpetuating national identity and differences;
a direct rebuttal of marxist doctrine. However, Lenin believed that
with the establishment of socialism the 'sblizhenie' (coming
together) of nations was inevitable. This in turn would lead to the
'sliyanie' (merger) of the proletariat of different nations. This
programme was at the heart of Lenin's nationalities policy. However,
the fatal flaw in this plan was that the power needed to implement
these policies was concentrated in the ruling Communist Party, which,
in turn, was dominated by the Russians. Lenin firmly believed that a
true socialist union could only be achieved through the suppression
of 'Great Russian chauvinism'. In this respect he became bitterly
disillusioned and alarmed at the strength of Russian chauvinism in
the Party; on his deathbed, he lamented that the state which he had
built was ending up 'more Russian than Soviet'. He went on to add...
"We must in all conscience admit, that the apparatus we call ours is,
in fact, still quite alien to us; it is a bourgeois and tsarist
hotch-potch.... There is no doubt that the infinitesimal percentage
of Soviet and sovietized workers will drown in that tide of
chauvinistic Great-Russian riffraff like a fly in milk."
(Swoboda:p.353) The fears of Lenin were well founded. For a time
during the 1920's the national contract was observed and non-Russian
peoples enjoyed a brief moment of national revival and cultural
autonomy, but, as Stalin increased his control over the party
apparatus the national contracts began to be systematically
abrogated.
Ultimately, Stalin perceived the non-Russian nationalities
as a threat to his far-reaching economic policies of collectivisation
and industrialisation. He equated the indigenisation, and consequent
centrifugal tendencies, as tantamount to a bourgeois mentality and a
threat to his power. In referring to the non-Russian nationalities,
he noted in a 1934 speech that... "survivals of capitalism in the minds
of men are much more long-lived in the realm of the national question
than in any other area." (Smith:p.6) This set the tone for the
remainder of his regime. As well as forcibly reoccupying the Baltic
states, russification and oppression of the 'fraternal and equal'
republics began with a vengeance. All of Lenin's policies were
reversed; cultural diversity was stamped out and the Russian language
was promoted vigorously. The russification of the Soviet Union reached
its apogee during, and after, the 'Great Patriotic War'. Stalin
removed any doubt that the Russian people were pre-eminent in the
USSR when, as part of the 1945 victory celebrations, he proposed..."a
toast to our Soviet people, and in particular to the health of the
Russian people.... the leading nation of all nations belonging to the
Soviet Union, because in this war, the Russian people have earned the
general recognition as the guiding force of the Soviet Union among
all the other peoples of our country." (Smith:p.7) Like Lenin before
him, Stalin was quite aware of the potency of the national problem.
However, he relied upon a combination of terror and Great Russian
chauvinism to keep the non-Russians subdued.
In 1956, at the historic 20th Party Congress, the new
General Secretary, Nikita Kruschev, publicly rebuked Stalin and his
practices. He exposed the mass deportation of non-Russian's and
promised, selectively, to restore both their nationality contracts
and their homelands. Regional economic councils were introduced, with
substantial autonomous powers, in an effort to bring the living
standards of all the republics into line. However, the relief among
the non-Russian nationalities, at the reversal of Stalin's policies,
was tempered by the education reforms of 1958-59. which promised to
promote the Russian language as the favoured means of communication
at the expense of the native tongue. It rapidly became clear that the
commitment to 'sblizhenie' was to be a purely partisan affair on
behalf of the non-Russian peoples. This policy became stronger as the
Kremlin found that the economic autonomy of the republics was
diverted into 'national narrow-minded development'. However far off
Kruschev believed 'sliyanie' to be, he championed a policy that was
to be maintaned for the next twenty five years. Separate national
cultures were to 'flourish' alongside their 'drawing together' until
their final 'merger' was realised. Hiding behind these semantic
somersaults was the rationale that: increased modernisation and social
mobilisation, together with camouflaged russification and the inter-
mixing of populations, would eliminate non-Russian nationalisms and
break down national identities. This policy was actively pursued
throughout the Brezhnev era, and combined with a recentralisation of
power plus suppression of the cultural and national rights of non-
Russian nationalities
The Brezhnev regime was committed to social stability and
and harmonious development and abandoned much of Kruschev's reforms.
The emphasis was on a gradual rise in the standard of living and
plenty of sausage to eat! The relations between the Kremlin and the
republics became increasingly corporatist and, although there was
greater local appointments to Party posts and administrative leeway,
there was a noticeable convergence of interest between the elites to
maintain the status quo. The nationality question was so effectively
stifled during this period that, during the run up to the 1977 Soviet
constitution, there was considerable feeling that the rapprochement of
the Soviet nations had proceeded sufficiently to make the abolition
of nationality-based administrative units feasible, and therefore,
federalism redundant. Brezhnev, however, and quite wisely, objected
to any artificial process to speed up the 'coming together of
nations'. He firmly believed that this process could best be served
by the balanced development of the whole USSR, for which the
republics should contribute their fair share. Like his predecessors,
Brezhnev continually reminded the USSR of the disinterested
assistance of the Russian people in the socio-economic development of
the republics. Reinforcing these attitudes was the widespread
propaganda about the emergence of a new historical community, that of
the Soviet people (Sovetskii narod). As one publication proudly
proclaimed in 1977, when discussing the contribution of Lenin to the
nationalities question.... "The soviet people is a fundamentally new
social and international community of people. The USSR now consists
of a single and friendly family of over 100 nationalities, jointly
building commuinism; our social relations are based on friendship,
complete equality, multifaceted fraternal cooperation and mutual
assistance..." (Problems of Communism, vol 32:p.38) This, of course,
was complete fabrication, and toadying on a grand scale. A rather
cynical anecdote gives a much fairer reflection of the 'fraternal
brotherhood of nations' during the Brezhnev period.... "Radio Yerevan
asks: 'what is the meaning of friendship among the peoples?' Radio
Yerevan replies: 'Friendship of the peoples is when Armenians.
Russians, Uzbeks, Ukranians and Latvians go together to beat up a
Georgian!'. (Problems of Communism, vol 32:p.39)
Thus, throughout the Brezhnev era any discussion on the
relations between the nationalities of the Soviet Union was pushed
quietly to one side. Lip service was paid to the idea that a new
'soviet people' had emerged, which, naturally, as Brezhnev pointed
out at the Twenty-Sixth Party Congress (1981), would generate certain
problems. However, these 'problems' were never elaborated on, and the
cooperation and frienship of the peoples proceeded smoothly.
Underpinning this was the tacit assumption that the predominant role
of the Russians in such a nation would lead to the denationalisation
of all others. This cultural assimilation was fostered by
intensifying Russian-language education from kindergarten to
university. Therefore, while the concept of the merging of nations
had been dropped from party propaganda, the policies of achieving
this aim went ahead unabated. But, as Andropov and Chernenko
indirectly began to acknowledge, the very policies that were supposed
to eradicate non-Russian nationalism had the reverse effect. The
resentment engendered by the failure of Russians living in other
union-republics to learn the the native language, was fuelled by the
corruption, economic malaise, and falling living standards which were
the legacy of the Brezhnev years. All of these factors contributed to
a reassertion of national consciousness which Gorbachev, in turn,
failed to address.
Despite Gorbachev's willingness to tackle many of the
internal and external problems facing the USSR, he continued to treat
the nationality question as of little importance and referred vaguely
to the 'flourishing of nations' and a "united soviet people, cemented
by the same economic interests, ideology and political goals"
(Smith:p.13). His ambivalence and insensitivity to the multiethnic
nature of soviet society was evident in a speech given at Kiev, in
June 1985, when he twice referred to the Soviet Union as Russia. For
all its veneer of radicalism, the Gorbachev leadership was extremely
reluctant to review and alter soviet nationalities policy: preferring
to stress the need for more tact, and perhaps a reappraisal of
Lenin's national contracts. However, the democratisation process
provided channels to express long-held national grievances; against
the Russians themselves, and also between other ethnic groups. The
Alma Ata riots, the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh, and the unrest in
the Baltic states, punctured the ephemereal harmony of the USSR, and
elicited a stern response from Gorbachev; he maintained that there
would be no break up of the Union. However, the rapid collapse of
communist rule in Eastern Europe questioned the legitimacy of the
CPSU, and the Baltic states became more vociferous in their demands
for sovereignty. Rather than dictating policy, Gorbachev began to
react to the rapidly unfolding events while still searching for a
solution in the national contract policies of Lenin. This search was to
prove fruitless; republic after republic declared sovereignty and
prepared to secede from the Union. In short, after more than seventy
years, it finally dawned in Moscow that the centrifugal forces of
nationalism could not be reconciled with the centripetal forces of
russification and the Soviet state.
CONCLUSIONS
The Soviet Union has always straddled the often precarious divide
between state and empire. The aim of the Soviet state, at its
inception, was to merge the diverse nations and ethnic groups into an
homogenous economic and political unit which would reflect the needs
and wishes of the proletariat, rather than bourgeois national
aspirations. Unfortunately, these aims acquired a distinctly Russian
flavour and abrogated the equality and harmony required to achieve
these goals. The fluctuations in the assimilative policies of the
soviet leaders, from mild discouragement of ethnic affiliation to
outright repression; suppressed ethnic identification but engendered
long-term hostility. "This is especially so when the system claims to
promote equality, because the glaring contrast between theory and
practice arouses first expectations, and then resentments."
(Gitelman:p.13) Furthermore, Gorbachev's policies of 'glasnost'
'perestroika' and democratisation, reduced the level of coercion in
the system and allowed people to express their national and cultural
aspirations, and air their grievances about their status. When these
grievances were combined with the changing demographic trends in the
Soviet Union, and the general economic malaise, national and ethnic
chauvinism began to gather momentum and become reinforcing; as one
ethnic group asserted its identity, so another would be spurred to
action. At the heart of this lay the corrruption of Lenin's
nationality principles into purely Russian nationality principles .
Ultimately, the USSR had been conceived as an ideological state: a
state in which class consciousness and solidarity were to be more
important than national or ethnic affiliations, when this ideology
proved flawed, and the power of the CPSU finite, the raison d'etre of
the Union collapsed and another institutionalised form for its
expression had to be adopted.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
ZVI GITELMAN THE POLITICS OF NATIONALITY AND THE EROSION OF THE USSR 1992
WALTER LAQUEUR THE LONG ROAD TO FREEDOM 1989
THEODORE LAUE WHY LENIN ? WHY STALIN ?
GORDON SMITH SOVIET POLITICS 1991
GRAHAM SMITH THE NATIONALITIES QUESTION IN THE USSR 1990
VICTOR SWOBODA THE SOVIET DISUNION 1990
PROBLEMS OF COMMUNISM VOL.32 1983
PROBLEMS OF COMMUNISM VOL.38 1989
