History SL&HL Authoritarian States: Russia (1917–53)

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Chapter 1: The Emergence of the Authoritarian State in Russia

• Long-term conditions that gave rise to the Soviet state
• The development of political opposition
• The 1905 Revolution: long-term weaknesses of Tsarism highlighted
• Reforms
• Short-term conditions that gave rise to the Soviet State in Russia
• Short-term causes of the 1917 Revolution
• The February Revolution of 1917
• The October Revolution of 1917
• Methods used to establish an authoritarian state
• How the Bolsheviks were able to seize power in October 1917
• The October Revolution
• Key Historical Perspectives: The October Revolution

Chapter 2: Consolidation and Maintenance of Power by Lenin

• Bolshevik decrees and measures
• The Civil War (1918-20)
• The course of the Civil War
• War with Poland (1920-21)
• The consequences of the Civil War and of the Communists’ victory
• The establishment of single-party rule
• The creation of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR)
• The nature of the Party and the State in the USSR

Chapter 3: Aims and Results of Lenin’s Economic Policy

• The New Economic Policy (1921-28)

Chapter 4: Stalin’s Rise to Power

• The Politburo (1924-26)
• The struggle to succeed Lenin
• Key historical perspectives: Stalin

Chapter 5: Aims and Results of Stalin’s Economic Policy

• Collectivisation
• Key Historical Perspectives: Why did Stalin call a temporary halt to Collectivisation in 1930?
• Rapid industrialisation (1928-41)
• The First Five-Year Plan (1928-32)
• The Second Five-Year Plan (1933-37)
• The Third Five-Year Plan (1938-41)
• Implementing industrialisation plans
• Key historical perspectives: Could the USSR have closed the gap economically with the West without Stalin’s methods?

Chapter 6: Aims and Results of Lenin and Stalin’s Social Policies

• Communist Party policy towards religion
• The Orthodox Church
• Muslims
• Communist Party policy towards national minorities
• Policy in the 1920s
• Policy under Stalin
• Communist Party policy towards education
• Policy in the 1920s
• Policy under Stalin
• Youth movements
• Communist Party policy towards women and the family
• Policy under Lenin
• Policy under Stalin

Chapter 7: Stalin’s Maintenance of Power

• The role of force
• The Great Terror (1936-38)
• Key historical perspectives: Stalin’s Purges
• The role of propaganda and the cult of personality
• Propaganda and the arts
• The cult of personality
• The role of Soviet foreign policy
• Soviet foreign policy (1917-53): an overview
• Worldwide revolution and isolation (1917-33)
• Stalin’s foreign policy
• Soviet insecurity at the end of the Second World War

Chapter 8: The Post-war Period: Stalin’s Last Years (1945-53)

• The Fourth Five-Year Plan (1946-51)
• Continuing repression: ‘hysterical isolationism’
• ‘Zhdanovism’ (1946-48)
• The Leningrad Affair (1948)
• Antisemitism and the Doctors’ Plot (1953)

Chapter 9: Essay-writing Activities – The Rise and Rule of the Bolsheviks