Gramsci, the Via Italiana, and the Classical Marxist‐Leninist Approach to Revolution

1979 ◽  
Vol 14 (01) ◽  
pp. 66-95 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph V. Femia
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
Antonio Gramsci ◽  
Marxist Approach ◽  
The Russian Empire ◽  
Advanced Capitalist ◽  
The Revolution

IT IS NOW COMMON (AND QUITE CORRECT) TO PRAISE ANTONIO Gramsci as the first Marxist theorist to understand that the revolution in Western Europe must deviate sharply from the strategic path taken by the Bolsheviks in Russia. With characteristic disdain for old and rigid formulae, he pointed to the crucial differences between advanced capitalist countries and the Russian Empire of 1917, and he attempted in his prison notebooks (Quaderni) to develop criteria of orientation and action appropriate to modern circumstances. What he offered was a new What is to be done? for the developed West, a fundamental reassessment and revision of the accepted Marxist approach to revolution. The nature of this enterprise has prompted many – critics and admirers alike – to lay emphasis on the tie between Gramsci and Togliatti-ism. Gramsci put forward ideas, it is claimed, whose logic is manifest in the ‘Italian (read “constitutional”, “parliamentary”, “democratic”, “pacific”) road to socialism’. It is now casually assumed in many circles that he was the ideological progenitor of what has come to be known as Eurocommunism, the increasingly influential body of doctrines that purports to marry liberalism and Marxism. In the following pages, this assumption, and other related ones, will be closely examined and evaluated.

scholarly journals Reform or Consensus? Choral Synagogues in the Russian Empire

Arts ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 72
Author(s):  
Vladimir Levin
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
Reform Movement ◽  
Religious Significance ◽  
Initial Wave ◽  
Social Prestige ◽  
Religious Meaning ◽  
The Russian Empire ◽  
The Revolution

Many scholars view the choral synagogues in the Russian Empire as Reform synagogues, influenced by the German Reform movement. This article analyzes the features characteristic of Reform synagogues in central and Western Europe, and demonstrates that only a small number of these features were implemented in the choral synagogues of Russia. The article describes the history, architecture, and reception of choral synagogues in different geographical areas of the Russian Empire, from the first maskilic synagogues of the 1820s–1840s to the revolution of 1917. The majority of changes, this article argues, introduced in choral synagogues were of an aesthetic nature. The changes concerned decorum, not the religious meaning or essence of the prayer service. The initial wave of choral synagogues were established by maskilim, and modernized Jews became a catalyst for the adoption of the choral rite by other groups. Eventually, the choral synagogue became the “sectorial” synagogue of the modernized elite. It did not have special religious significance, but it did offer social prestige and architectural prominence.

Prerequisites for the reforms of the Russian Empire in the 1860s: a historical analysis

2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 (10-2) ◽  
pp. 176-184
Author(s):  
Dmitry Nechevin ◽  
Leonard Kolodkin
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Historical Analysis ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
Economic Relations ◽  
The Sixties ◽  
The Russian Empire ◽  
Political Economic

The article is devoted to the prerequisites of the reforms of the Russian Empire of the sixties of the nineteenth century, their features, contradictions: the imperial status of foreign policy and the lagging behind the countries of Western Europe in special political, economic relations. The authors studied the activities of reformers and the nobility on the peasant question, as well as legitimate conservatism.

The Population Ecology of Corporations in the Russian Empire, 1700–1914

Slavic Review ◽  
1991 ◽  
Vol 50 (4) ◽  
pp. 807-826 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas C. Owen
Keyword(s):  
Population Ecology ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Statistical Tests ◽  
Far East ◽  
The United States ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
Corporate Development ◽  
The Far East ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Russian Empire

In investigations of the evolution of the corporation in Europe, North America, and the Far East, historians have illuminated variations in the structure of large enterprises in different times and places and investigated responses to legal environments. In tsarist Russia as well, the development of corporations on the national, regional, and sectoral levels was influenced by legal and economic institutions. Data on Russian corporations, however, have been inadequate for the complex statistical tests applied to the European and North American economies. This article offers a preliminary overview of trends in Russian corporate development from 1700 to 1914 in light of a new database and the recently articulated theory of organizational ecology. Although the theory provides stimulating approaches to the history of Russian corporations, it also appears unduly specific in some respects to the history of western Europe and the United States.

The Revolution of 1905 in the Baltic Provinces and Finland

Slavic Review ◽  
1984 ◽  
Vol 43 (3) ◽  
pp. 453-467 ◽  
Author(s):  
Toivo U. Raun
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Ethnic Diversity ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
Comparative Perspective ◽  
Comparative Case Study ◽  
Land Area ◽  
The Russian Empire ◽  
The Baltic ◽  
The Revolution

Historical studies of the Russian empire in upheaval in the first two decades of the twentieth century have tended to be animated by a narrow centralist bias or an equally narrow regional one. Although it is clear that the primary impulse for revolutionary situations in 1905 and 1917 resulted from events in St. Petersburg/Petrograd, a Russocentric approach to a society that was less than 50 percent Russian is surely inadequate. At the same time, studies of individual minority nationalities, however thorough, tend to view these groups in isolation. A comparative perspective, which could identify broader uniformities as well as local peculiarities, is usually lacking. In this article I shall present a synthesizing and comparative overview of the Revolution of 1905 in the Baltic Provinces and Finland. Although these areas constituted only 2 percent of the land area of the Russian empire and had less than 4 percent of its population in 1905,2 they were among the most modernized in the country, and their ethnic diversity and differing histories provide abundant material for a comparative case study.

scholarly journals The Revolution of 1905 in Częstochowa – based on the memories of Bronisława Zejden

2021 ◽  
pp. 209-224
Author(s):  
Karolina Studnicka-Mariańczyk ◽  
Bartłomiej Frukacz
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Metropolitan Areas ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
Political Factors ◽  
Working Classes ◽  
Imperial Russia ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Russian Empire ◽  
The Revolution

The revolution of 1905 eludes simplistic and schematic interpretations. The event engulfed the Russian Empire and it spread to the territory of the Kingdom of Poland. The revolution had a complex background, but the rising discontent of the working classes and peasants played a crucial role. Political factors and opposition against Russian absolutism were equally pivotal. In the Kingdom of Poland, left-wing revolutionary forces’ attempts to regain national independence and sovereignty strongly contributed to the insurgency. The most significant acts of rebellion took place in the major Russian cities and the Vistula Country that had been incorporated into Imperial Russia. The key metropolitan areas at the beginning of the 20th century were St. Petersburg, Warsaw, Riga, Łódź as well as Częstochowa. The revolution of 1905 attracts considerable interest and stirs much controversy among contemporary historians. The events surrounding the revolution have been well documented by the existing research into worker movements and the history of political parties. However, not all sources have been identified and published, which creates new opportunities for expanding the existing knowledge. One of such undiscovered sources is a short diary of Bronisława Barc (née Zejden) who participated in the strikes in Częstochowa.

scholarly journals PANTELEIMON KULISH AND THE "JEWISH QUESTION" IN THE MID-NINETEENTH CENTURY

2019 ◽  
pp. 60-66
Author(s):  
Victor Dotsenko
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
Jewish Question ◽  
Russian Society ◽  
Difficult Situation ◽  
Anti Semitism ◽  
The Russian Empire ◽  
Great Writer

The author attempts to analyze the views of Panteleimon Kulish on the history, culture and everyday life of Jews who lived along with Ukrainians in the Ukrainian provinces of the Russian Empire, to determine what factors and stereotypes formed the outlook of the great writer and his attitude to the Russian imperial project of resolving the "Jewish question". With the growing of Russian imperial messianism and chauvinism, Ukrainian intellectuals appeared in a difficult situation. The tsar held assimilation policies towards both Jews and Ukrainians. At the same time, Jews additionallly suffered from manifestations of state anti-Semitism. Engagement of Ukrainian Christians in anti-Semitic actions has intensified the position of Russifikators of Ukrainian lands. The Ukrainian elite aimed to stop these manifestations of anti-Semitism by its actions. Obviously, the Ukrainian protest did not condemn anti-Semitism without reservations, because its authors suggested that Jews should partly share responsibility for anti-Semitism. The idea of protesting Ukrainian intellectuals coincided with ideas of Russian liberals who offered to consider Russian Jews as carriers of "civil autonomy and moral independence," and urged them to abandon their national-religious prejudices. While supporting the civil rights of Jews, Kulish at the same time realized that the Ukrainians themselves belonged to the oppressed nations in the Russian Empire, where, in general, social and national rights and freedoms were much less than in the constitutional states of Western Europe. Therefore, he found it impractical to move from there to Russian blindly a practice of artificial support for only Jewish nationality, because in imperial terms this meant only a change in the configuration of national unequal, and not the elimination of it at all. P. Kulish's views on the "Jewish question" of the mid-nineteenth century corresponded to the conceptions of Russian liberal intellectuals regarding the modernization of Russian society. He supports the proclaimed liberal ideas of the need to integrate Jews into imperial life. Jews must be the most interested in destroying of the traditional world of the Jewish town. Giving the Jews of secular education, adopting by them the modern values could lead to the elimination of intolerance and manifestations of anti-Semitism in the society. The Jews himself, according to P. Kulish had to go towards society and change their social mood.

scholarly journals Ioannites - the course of the chiliastic-eschatological orientation of Orthodox origin

2006 ◽  
pp. 145-153
Author(s):  
Liudmyla M. Shuhayeva
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
The Other ◽  
The Caucasus ◽  
Late Eighteenth ◽  
Southern Russia ◽  
Kingdom Of Christ ◽  
The Russian Empire ◽  
The One ◽  
Xix Century

In the first decades of the XIX century. the territory of the Russian Empire from Western Europe is beginning to penetrate chiliastic ideas. The term "chiliism" refers to the well-known doctrine of the millennial kingdom of Icyca Christ on earth, dating to the first centuries of Christianity. The ideas of chilias became especially popular during the reign of Alexander I, who himself was sympathetic to the mystical-chiliatic teachings. Chilias in the Russian Empire spread in two ways. On the one hand, chiliastic ideas penetrated with the works of German mystics of the late eighteenth - early twentieth centuries. On the other hand, in anticipation of the fast approaching of the millennial kingdom of Christ, the German cultists of the Hiliists moved large parties across southern Russia to the Caucasus, thereby facilitating the spread of their ideas. The religious formations of the Orthodox sectarianism of the chiliastic-eschatological orientation are represented by the Jehovah-Hlinists ("Right Brotherhood"), the Ioannites, and the Malavans.

scholarly journals Artistic Alliances and Revolutionary Rivalries in the Baltic Art World, 1890–1914

2016 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 42-72
Author(s):  
Bart Pushaw
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
Art World ◽  
Cultural Autonomy ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Common Interests ◽  
German Minority ◽  
The Russian Empire ◽  
The Baltic ◽  
The Revolution

In the areas now known as Estonia and Latvia, art remained a field for the Baltic German minority throughout the nineteenth century. When ethnic Estonian and Latvian artists gained prominence in the late 1890s, their presence threatened Baltic German hegemony over the region’s culture. In 1905, revolution in the Russian Empire spilled over into the Baltic Provinces, sparking widespread anti-German violence. The revolution also galvanized Latvian and Estonian artists towards greater cultural autonomy and independence from Baltic German artistic institutions. This article argues that the situation for artists before and after the 1905 revolution was not simply divisive along ethnic lines, as some nationalist historians have suggested. Instead, this paper examines how Baltic German, Estonian and Latvian artists oscillated between common interests, inspiring rivalries, and politicized conflicts, questioning the legitimacy of art as a universalizing language in multicultural societies.

scholarly journals Political Terrorism in the Russian Empire in 1901-1911 and Its Role in the Historical Memory of Russia

2020 ◽  
pp. 51-56
Author(s):  
Т. Rocchi
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Historical Memory ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
Russian Revolution ◽  
Socialist Revolution ◽  
Criminal Violence ◽  
Political Terrorism ◽  
The Russian Empire ◽  
The Revolution

The first outbreak of mass political terrorism in the 20th century took place in the Russian Empire, especially in the First Russian Revolution of 1905-1907. However, these events have not received proper attention in the historical memory of Russia and Europe and in the history of world terrorism. The author examines the factors enabling the continued existence of a huge “blank spot” in the memory of Russia and the world. The under-evaluation of the significance of terrorism in the first decade of the 20th century is closely connected with the under-evaluation of the First Russian Revolution as an independent revolution. In the Soviet Union, historians emphasized that the Revolution of 1905-1907 was “the dress rehearsal” for the Great October Socialist Revolution of 1917. In post-Soviet Russia, many historians and publicists consider the Revolution of 1905-1907 “the dress rehearsal” for the “Golgotha” of 1917. There is a strong tendency to idealize the autocracy and right-wing movements and to demonize socialists and liberals. Many solid monographs and articles about terrorism are now being published in Russia. However, we still do not have exhaustive investigations covering the entire period of terrorism between 1866 (attempted assassination of Tsar Alexander II on April 4, 1866 by the revolutionary D.V. Karakozov) and 1911, examining the ideologies and tactics of different parties and movements, the government’s policies on political crimes, the relationships of society, especially among different political movements, to terrorism, and the differences between terrorism and other types of mass violence such as mass protest movements of different strata of the population and criminal violence. Only through a painstaking and multi-sided analysis of the terrorist phenomenon in the European-wide historical context we can determine the place of terrorism in the historical memory of Russia and Europe.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document