Experiencing Russia's Civil War: Politics, Society, and Revolutionary Culture in Saratov, 1917-1922

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A comprehensive history of the total experience of the Russian Civil War. Focusing on the key Volga city of Saratov and the surrounding region, Donald Raleigh shows how the experience of civil war embedded itself into both the people's and the state's outlook and behaviour. He demonstrates how and why the programs and ideals that had propelled the Bolsheviks into power were so quickly lost and the repressive Soviet party-state was born. "Experiencing Russia's Civil War" is based on exhaustive use of previously classified local and central archives. It is also bold and ambitious in its breadth of thematic coverage, dealing with all aspects of the war experience from institutional evolution and demographics to survival strategies. Complicating our understanding of this formative period, Raleigh provides compelling evidence that many features of the Soviet system that we associate with the Stalin era were already adumbrated and practiced by the early 1920s, as Bolshevism became closed to real alternatives. Raleigh interprets this as the consequence of a complex dynamic shaped by Russia's political tradition and culture, Bolshevik ideology, and dire political, economic, and military cr

Reviews

"By revealing the complexity of the civil war in one province, Raleigh's book will revitalize scholarly debate on the civil war."--S. A. Smith, Slavic Review "An excellent work that will become required reading for all students of this turbulent period in twentieth-century history."--Jack M. Lauber, History: Review of Books "This book makes an outstanding contribution to scholarship through its exhaustive and shrewd examination of new archival materials. It also makes imaginative and original use of language and ideology as tools of historical interpretation."--N.G.O. Pereira, American Historical Review "Very readable and convincingly argued, this book is a much needed and anticipated revelation of local experience of the Civil War. This jewel of Soviet studies is not to be missed by any student or scholar of the Soviet Union."--Irina Mukhina, Journal of Social History

Author Bio

Donald J. Raleigh is Professor of History at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. He has edited and translated many volumes on Russian history and is the author of "Revolution on the Volga".