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Soviet Union proved there are worse choices than democracy

By Gary Johns - posted Friday, 13 January 2017


At the democratic conference in September, the soviet leaders were found wanting. The skills of parliamentary decision-making proved beyond them. The Bolsheviks were the better organisers, "the undisputed masters of factional politics".

On October 10, only 12 of 21 members were present at a secret meeting of the Bolshevik central committee. Lenin and nine others, a minority of the full committee, decided to launch an unarmed ­insurrection. Two voted against it. This was the Leninist coup.

Paradoxically, the soviets had created a climate of such uncontrolled freedom that there was a desperate need for stronger ­government. As Lenin put it, Russia had become the "the freest country in the world" - and, as Figes argues, "he was the first to exploit it".

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The non-Leninist socialist leaders, a huge majority of the broader socialist movement, not to mention the liberals and democrat parties, feared the uncontrolled anger of the street mobs.

Lenin, on the other hand, was the darling of the mob. But Lenin had a pitiless contempt "for the lives of ordinary people". He turned the Bolsheviks away from the broader social democratic movement. The Leninist Bolsheviks did not topple the tsar: they toppled the people.

Beware, my young Australians: if you think politicians muck about, it is not because they don't care. There are much worse ways to sort out differences in society.

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This article was first published in The Australian.



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About the Author

Gary Johns is a former federal member of Parliament and served as a minister in the Keating Government. Since December 2017 he has been the commissioner of the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission.

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