Discuss the causes of the Russian Revolution
Answers
Answer:
1917 saw two distinct revolutions in Russia: the overthrow of the Tsarist regime and formation of the Provisional Government ( February Revolution), and the October Revolution in which the Bolsheviks overthrew the Provisional Government. The causes of these two revolutions encompass Russia’s political, social, and economic situation. Politically, the people of Russia resented the autocracy of Tsar Nicholas II and the corrupt and anachronistic elements in his government. Socially, Tsarist Russia stood well behind the rest of Europe in its industry and farming, resulting in few opportunities for fair advancement on the part of peasants and industrial workers. Economically, widespread inflation and food shortages in Russia contributed to the revolution. Militarily, inadequate supplies, logistics, and weaponry led to heavy losses that the Russians suffered during World War I; this further weakened Russia’s view of Nicholas II. They viewed him as weak and unfit to rule.
Answer:
The Russian Revolution took place in 1917, during the final phase of World War I. It removed Russia from the war and brought about the transformation of the Russian Empire into the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), replacing Russia’s traditional monarchy with the world’s first Communist state. The revolution happened in stages through two separate coups, one in February and one in October. The new government, led by Vladimir Lenin, would solidify its power only after three years of civil war, which ended in 1920.
Although the events of the Russian Revolution happened abruptly, the causes may be traced back nearly a century. Prior to the revolution, the Russian monarchy had become progressively weaker and increasingly aware of its own vulnerability (and therefore more reactionary). Nicholas II—the tsar who led Russia in the years leading up to the revolution—had personally witnessed revolutionary terrorists assassinate his grandfather and, subsequently, his own father respond to the assassination through brutal oppression of the Russian people. When Nicholas II himself became tsar in 1894, he used similarly severe measures to subdue resistance movements, which were becoming bolder and more widespread every year. As Nicholas’s newly imposed oppressions in turn incited still more unrest, he was forced to make concessions after each incident: it was in this manner that Russia’s first constitution was created, as was its first parliament. These concessions continued gradually until Nicholas II’s grip on power became very tenuous.
As Nicholas II grew weaker, Vladimir Lenin rose to prominence as the most powerful figure in Russia. Although this famous leader of the October Revolution was not even in Russia for the February Revolution—he had lived in self-imposed exile in Europe since 1900 and returned to Russia only in April 1917—he nonetheless exerted tremendous influence. Whatever history’s judgment of him, few other Russian revolutionaries possessed Lenin’s decisiveness and strength of vision for Russia’s future. Born in 1870 in the provincial town of Simbirsk as Vladimir Ilich Ulyanov, the young Lenin was profoundly affected by his older