From:
Announcement list for BASEES members [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Brendan Francis McGeever
Sent: Monday, September 25, 2017
11:11 AM
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Subject: [BASEES-MEMBERS] World
Revolution and Early Soviet Society, 1917-1927
Dear BASEES Members,
All are welcome to the next session of Social Histories of the
Russian Revolution, a monthly series of talks marking the centenary of Russia’s
revolutions of 1917.
Gleb Albert (University of
Zurich) 'World Revolution and Early Soviet Society, 1917-1927'
Thursday September 28 18.30
Room 417, Birkbeck, University of London, Malet
Street Building (enter via Torrington Square) WC1E 7HX
When the Bolsheviks came to power in 1917, they
did so on the premise that their new state would not stay isolated. They were
counting on the masses in Europe (and, in the long run, all over the world) to
overthrow their governments, end the bloodshed of World War I, and team up with
Soviet Russia to form a global socialist commonwealth. When, one year later,
the monarchy was overthrown in Germany and Austro-Hungary, and a whirlwind of
revolutionary upheaval swept over most of Europe, the Bolsheviks, for a moment,
thought that their dreams had become a reality. However, they had to realise
quite soon afterwards that even those revolutions that were not crushed did not
result in an outcome in their favour. By the mid-1920s, this disappointment set
the ground for Stalin’s “socialism in one country”.
But was it all just the concern of the Soviet
political elites? Did rank and file activists and the general population,
absorbed by day-to-day violence and survival, ignore the revolutionary events
abroad? Or did at least some of them share the Bolshevik vision of world
revolution? Is there an early Soviet social history of world revolution – and
if there is, how can it be told? This talk, based on extensive archival
research in Russia, will explore the resonance of world revolution in early
Soviet society – a story of appropriation, misunderstandings, enthusiasm, and
disappointment. It will highlight why revolutionary internationalism mattered
for certain strata of the Soviet population, how popular projections coincided
with real revolutionary events abroad, how militant solidarity was slowly
supplanted by charity, and how world-revolutionary charisma came into conflict
with the social order of the New Economic Policy (NEP) – even before Stalin
abolished NEP and internationalism altogether. The talk will lay bare a
forgotten layer of history without which our picture of early Soviet culture
and society remains incomplete.
All welcome. Free Entry. Book tickets here.
This talk is part of the year-long Social Histories of the Russian Revolution series.
Please also see our Facebook page for more information.
The Organisers
Social Histories of the Russian Revolution
Dr. Brendan McGeever
Lecturer in the Sociology of Racialization and
Antisemitism
Department of Psychosocial Studies
School of Social Sciences, History and Philosophy
Birkbeck, University of London
26 Russell Square
Room G23
London WC1B 5DQ
t: 020 7631 6723
e: [log in to unmask]
t: @b_mcgeever
w: http://www.bbk.ac.uk/psychosocial/our-staff/full-time-academic-staff/brendan-mcgeever