The Socialist Revolutionary Party, or the Party of Socialist-Revolutionaries (the SRs, , or Esers, russian: эсеры, translit=esery, label=none; russian: Партия социалистов-революционеров, ), was a major
political party
A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular country's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific political ideology ...
in late
Imperial Russia
The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the List of Russian monarchs, Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended th ...
, and both phases of the
Russian Revolution
The Russian Revolution was a period of Political revolution (Trotskyism), political and social revolution that took place in the former Russian Empire which began during the First World War. This period saw Russia abolish its monarchy and ad ...
and early
Soviet Russia
The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, Russian SFSR or RSFSR ( rus, Российская Советская Федеративная Социалистическая Республика, Rossíyskaya Sovétskaya Federatívnaya Soci ...
.
The SRs were
agrarian socialists and supporters of a
democratic socialist
Democratic socialism is a left-wing political philosophy that supports political democracy and some form of a socially owned economy, with a particular emphasis on economic democracy, workplace democracy, and workers' self-management within a ...
Russian republic. The ideological heirs of the
Narodniks
The Narodniks (russian: народники, ) were a politically conscious movement of the Russian intelligentsia in the 1860s and 1870s, some of whom became involved in revolutionary agitation against tsarism. Their ideology, known as Narodism, ...
, the SRs won a mass following among the Russian
peasantry
A peasant is a pre-industrial agricultural laborer or a farmer with limited land-ownership, especially one living in the Middle Ages under feudalism and paying rent, tax, fees, or services to a landlord. In Europe, three classes of peasants ...
by endorsing the overthrow of the
Tsar
Tsar ( or ), also spelled ''czar'', ''tzar'', or ''csar'', is a title used by East Slavs, East and South Slavs, South Slavic monarchs. The term is derived from the Latin word ''Caesar (title), caesar'', which was intended to mean "emperor" i ...
and the
redistribution of land to the peasants. The SRs
boycotted
A boycott is an act of nonviolent, voluntary abstention from a product, person, organization, or country as an expression of protest. It is usually for moral, social, political, or environmental reasons. The purpose of a boycott is to inflict som ...
the
elections
An election is a formal group decision-making process by which a population chooses an individual or multiple individuals to hold public office.
Elections have been the usual mechanism by which modern representative democracy has operate ...
to the First
Duma
A duma (russian: дума) is a Russian assembly with advisory or legislative functions.
The term ''boyar duma'' is used to refer to advisory councils in Russia from the 10th to 17th centuries. Starting in the 18th century, city dumas were for ...
following the
Revolution of 1905
The Russian Revolution of 1905,. also known as the First Russian Revolution,. occurred on 22 January 1905, and was a wave of mass political and social unrest that spread through vast areas of the Russian Empire. The mass unrest was directed again ...
alongside the
Russian Social Democratic Labour Party
The Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP; in , ''Rossiyskaya sotsial-demokraticheskaya rabochaya partiya (RSDRP)''), also known as the Russian Social Democratic Workers' Party or the Russian Social Democratic Party, was a socialist pol ...
, but chose to run in the elections to the Second Duma and received the majority of the few seats allotted to the peasantry. Following the
1907 coup, the SRs boycotted all subsequent Dumas until the fall of the Tsar in the
February Revolution
The February Revolution ( rus, Февра́льская револю́ция, r=Fevral'skaya revolyutsiya, p=fʲɪvˈralʲskəjə rʲɪvɐˈlʲutsɨjə), known in Soviet historiography as the February Bourgeois Democratic Revolution and somet ...
of March 1917. Controversially, the party leadership endorsed the
Russian Provisional Government
The Russian Provisional Government ( rus, Временное правительство России, Vremennoye pravitel'stvo Rossii) was a provisional government of the Russian Republic, announced two days before and established immediately ...
and participated in multiple
coalitions
A coalition is a group formed when two or more people or groups temporarily work together to achieve a common goal. The term is most frequently used to denote a formation of power in political or economical spaces.
Formation
According to ''A Gui ...
with
liberal
Liberal or liberalism may refer to:
Politics
* a supporter of liberalism
** Liberalism by country
* an adherent of a Liberal Party
* Liberalism (international relations)
* Sexually liberal feminism
* Social liberalism
Arts, entertainment and m ...
and
social-democratic
Social democracy is a Political philosophy, political, Social philosophy, social, and economic philosophy within socialism that supports Democracy, political and economic democracy. As a policy regime, it is described by academics as advocati ...
parties, while a radical faction within the SRs rejected the Provisional Government's authority in favor of the
Congress of Soviets
The Congress of Soviets was the supreme governing body of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and several other Soviet republics from 1917 to 1936 and a somewhat similar Congress of People's Deputies from 1989 to 1991. After the crea ...
and began to drift towards the
Bolsheviks
The Bolsheviks (russian: Большевики́, from большинство́ ''bol'shinstvó'', 'majority'),; derived from ''bol'shinstvó'' (большинство́), "majority", literally meaning "one of the majority". also known in English ...
. These divisions would ultimately result in the party splitting over the course of the summer of 1917 into the Right and
Left SRs
The Party of Left Socialist-Revolutionaries (russian: Партия левых социалистов-революционеров-интернационалистов) was a revolutionary socialist political party formed during the Russian Revol ...
. Meanwhile,
Alexander Kerensky
Alexander Fyodorovich Kerensky, ; Reforms of Russian orthography, original spelling: ( – 11 June 1970) was a Russian lawyer and revolutionary who led the Russian Provisional Government and the short-lived Russian Republic for three months ...
, one of the leaders of the February Revolution and the second and last head of the Provisional Government (July–November 1917) was a nominal member of the SR party but in practice acted independently of its decisions.
By November 1917, the Provisional Government had been widely discredited by its failure to withdraw from
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
, implement
land reform
Land reform is a form of agrarian reform involving the changing of laws, regulations, or customs regarding land ownership. Land reform may consist of a government-initiated or government-backed property redistribution, generally of agricultural ...
or convene a
Constituent Assembly
A constituent assembly (also known as a constitutional convention, constitutional congress, or constitutional assembly) is a body assembled for the purpose of drafting or revising a constitution. Members of a constituent assembly may be elected b ...
to draft a Constitution, leaving the
soviet councils in
de facto
''De facto'' ( ; , "in fact") describes practices that exist in reality, whether or not they are officially recognized by laws or other formal norms. It is commonly used to refer to what happens in practice, in contrast with ''de jure'' ("by la ...
control of the country. The Bolsheviks thus moved to hand power to the 2nd Congress of Soviets in the
October Revolution
The October Revolution,. officially known as the Great October Socialist Revolution. in the Soviet Union, also known as the Bolshevik Revolution, was a revolution in Russia led by the Bolshevik Party of Vladimir Lenin that was a key moment ...
. After a few weeks of deliberation, the Left SRs ultimately formed a
coalition government
A coalition government is a form of government in which political parties cooperate to form a government. The usual reason for such an arrangement is that no single party has achieved an absolute majority after an election, an atypical outcome in ...
with the Bolsheviks – the Council of People's Commissioners – from November 1917 to March 1918 while the Right SRs boycotted the Soviets and denounced the Revolution as an illegal
coup. The SRs obtained a majority in the subsequent
elections
An election is a formal group decision-making process by which a population chooses an individual or multiple individuals to hold public office.
Elections have been the usual mechanism by which modern representative democracy has operate ...
to the
Russian Constituent Assembly
The All Russian Constituent Assembly (Всероссийское Учредительное собрание, Vserossiyskoye Uchreditelnoye sobraniye) was a constituent assembly convened in Russia after the October Revolution of 1917. It met fo ...
, with most of the party's seats going to the Right faction. Citing outdated voter-rolls which did not acknowledge the party split, and the Assembly's conflicts with the Congress of Soviets, the Bolshevik-Left SR government moved to dissolve the Constituent Assembly by force in January 1918.
The Left SRs left their coalition with the Bolsheviks in March 1918 in protest against the signing of the
Treaty of Brest-Litovsk
The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (also known as the Treaty of Brest in Russia) was a separate peace, separate peace treaty signed on 3 March 1918 between Russian SFSR, Russia and the Central Powers (German Empire, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Kingdom of ...
. An
uprising against the Bolsheviks by the leadership of the Left SRs in July 1918 resulted in the immediate arrest of most of the party's members. Most of the Left SRs who opposed the uprising were gradually freed and allowed to keep their government positions, but were unable to organize a new central organ and gradually splintered into multiple pro-Bolshevik parties, which would all ultimately merge with the
Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks)
"Hymn of the Bolshevik Party"
, headquarters = 4 Staraya Square, Moscow
, general_secretary = Vladimir Lenin (first) Mikhail Gorbachev (last)
, founded =
, banned =
, founder = Vladimir Lenin
, newspaper ...
by 1921. The Right SRs supported the
Whites
White is a racialized classification of people and a skin color specifier, generally used for people of European origin, although the definition can vary depending on context, nationality, and point of view.
Description of populations as " ...
during the
Russian Civil War
, date = October Revolution, 7 November 1917 – Yakut revolt, 16 June 1923{{Efn, The main phase ended on 25 October 1922. Revolt against the Bolsheviks continued Basmachi movement, in Central Asia and Tungus Republic, the Far East th ...
of 1917–1922, but the White movement's
anti-socialist
Criticism of socialism (also known as anti-socialism) is any critique of socialist models of economic organization and their feasibility as well as the political and social implications of adopting such a system. Some critiques are not directed ...
leadership increasingly marginalized and ultimately purged them. A small Right SR remnant, still calling itself the Socialist Revolutionary Party, continued to operate in exile from 1923 to 1940 as a member of the
Labour and Socialist International
The Labour and Socialist International (LSI; german: Sozialistische Arbeiter-Internationale, label=German, SAI) was an international organization of socialist and labour parties, active between 1923 and 1940. The group was established through a me ...
.
History
Before the Russian Revolution
The party's ideology was built upon the philosophical foundation of Russia's
Narodnik
The Narodniks (russian: народники, ) were a politically conscious movement of the Russian intelligentsia in the 1860s and 1870s, some of whom became involved in revolutionary agitation against tsarism. Their ideology, known as Narodism, ...
–
populist
Populism refers to a range of political stances that emphasize the idea of "the people" and often juxtapose this group against " the elite". It is frequently associated with anti-establishment and anti-political sentiment. The term developed ...
movement of the 1860s–1870s and its worldview developed primarily by
Alexander Herzen
Alexander Ivanovich Herzen (russian: Алекса́ндр Ива́нович Ге́рцен, translit=Alexándr Ivánovich Gértsen; ) was a Russian writer and thinker known as the "father of Russian socialism" and one of the main fathers of agra ...
and
Pyotr Lavrov
Pyotr Lavrovich Lavrov (russian: Пётр Ла́врович Лавро́в; alias Mirtov (); (June 14 O.S.">Old_Style_and_New_Style_dates.html" ;"title="une 2 Old Style and New Style dates">O.S. 1823 – February 6 anuary 6 O.S. 1900) was a ...
. After a period of decline and marginalisation in the 1880s, the Narodnik–populist school of thought about social change in Russia was revived and substantially modified by a group of writers and activists known as ''neonarodniki'' (neo-populists), particularly
Viktor Chernov
Viktor Mikhailovich Chernov (russian: Ви́ктор Миха́йлович Черно́в; December 7, 1873 – April 15, 1952) was a Russian revolutionary and one of the founders of the Russian Socialist-Revolutionary Party. He was the primar ...
. Their main innovation was a renewed dialogue with Marxism and integration of some of the key Marxist concepts into their thinking and practice. In this way, with the economic spurt and industrialisation in Russia in the 1890s, they attempted to broaden their appeal in order to attract the rapidly growing urban workforce to their traditionally peasant-oriented programme. The intention was to widen the concept of the people so that it encompassed all elements in society that opposed the
Tsar
Tsar ( or ), also spelled ''czar'', ''tzar'', or ''csar'', is a title used by East Slavs, East and South Slavs, South Slavic monarchs. The term is derived from the Latin word ''Caesar (title), caesar'', which was intended to mean "emperor" i ...
ist regime.
The party was established in 1902 out of the Northern Union of Socialist Revolutionaries (founded in 1896), bringing together many local socialist revolutionary groups established in the 1890s, notably the Workers' Party of Political Liberation of Russia created by
Catherine Breshkovsky
Catherine Breshkovsky (real name Yekaterina Konstantinovna Breshko-Breshkovskaya (born Verigo), russian: Екатерина Константиновна Брешко-Брешковская; born 25 January (13 January old style) 1844 – 12 Sept ...
and
Grigory Gershuni
Grigory Andreyevich Gershuni (russian: Григорий Андреевич Гершуни; – ) was a Russian revolutionary and one of the founders of the Socialist-Revolutionary Party.
Early life
Gershuni was born in Kaunas, in the Kovno Go ...
in 1899. As primary party theorist emerged
Viktor Chernov
Viktor Mikhailovich Chernov (russian: Ви́ктор Миха́йлович Черно́в; December 7, 1873 – April 15, 1952) was a Russian revolutionary and one of the founders of the Russian Socialist-Revolutionary Party. He was the primar ...
, the editor of the first party organ, ''Revolutsionnaya Rossiya'' (''Revolutionary Russia''). Later party periodicals included ''Znamia Truda'' (''Labour's Banner''), ''
Delo Naroda'' (''People's Cause'') and ''Volia Naroda'' (''People's Will''). Party leaders included Grigori Gershuni, Catherine Breshkovsky,
Andrei Argunov
Andrei Aleksandrovich Argunov (Russian: Адрей Александрович Аргунов) (19 October 1866 – 7 November 1939) was a Russian revolutionary political activist and one of the leaders of the Socialist-Revolutionary Party.
Bo ...
,
Nikolai Avksentiev
Nikolai Dimitrovich Avksentyev (russian: Николай Дмитриевич Авксентьев; 28 November 1878, Penza – 24 March 1943, New York City) was a leading member of the Socialist-Revolutionary Party (PSR). He was one of the 'He ...
,
Mikhail Gots
Mikhail Rafailovich Gots (Russian: Михаи́л Рафаи́лович Гоц; 1866 – 26 August 1906) was a Russian revolutionary, member of 'The People's Will' (''Narodnaya Volya'') and one of the founders of the Socialist-Revolutionary Party ...
,
Mark Natanson
Mark Andreyevich Natanson (russian: Марк Андре́евич Натансо́н; party name: Bobrov) (25 December 1850 ( N.S. 6 January 1851) – 29 July 1919) was a Russian revolutionary who was one of the founders of the Circle of Tchaikov ...
, Rakitnikov (Maksimov),
Vadim Rudnev,
Nikolay Rusanov
Nikolay Sergeyevich Rusanov (russian: Никола́й Серге́евич Руса́нов; September 16 (28), 1859 in Oryol – July 28, 1939 in Berne), also known under the pseudonyms of K. Tarasov and N. Kudrin, was a Russian revolut ...
,
Ilya Rubanovich
Ilya Adolfovich Rubanovich (22 May 1859Rubanovich's year of birth is also given as 1860. – 16 October 1920) was a Russian revolutionary who joined 'The People's Will' ('Narodnaya Volya') in the 1880s. In 1881, this group assassinated Tsar Aleks ...
and
Boris Savinkov
Boris Viktorovich Savinkov (Russian: Бори́с Ви́кторович Са́винков; 31 January 1879 – 7 May 1925) was a Russian writer and revolutionary. As one of the leaders of the Fighting Organisation, the paramilitary win ...
.
The party's programme was
democratic and
socialist
Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the e ...
— it garnered much support among Russia's rural
peasant
A peasant is a pre-industrial agricultural laborer or a farmer with limited land-ownership, especially one living in the Middle Ages under feudalism and paying rent, tax, fees, or services to a landlord. In Europe, three classes of peasants ...
ry, who in particular supported their programme of land-socialization as opposed to the Bolshevik programme of land-nationalization—division of land into peasant tenants rather than collectivization into state management. The party's policy platform differed from that of the
Russian Social Democratic Labour Party
The Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP; in , ''Rossiyskaya sotsial-demokraticheskaya rabochaya partiya (RSDRP)''), also known as the Russian Social Democratic Workers' Party or the Russian Social Democratic Party, was a socialist pol ...
(RSDLP) — both
Bolshevik
The Bolsheviks (russian: Большевики́, from большинство́ ''bol'shinstvó'', 'majority'),; derived from ''bol'shinstvó'' (большинство́), "majority", literally meaning "one of the majority". also known in English ...
and
Menshevik
The Mensheviks (russian: меньшевики́, from меньшинство 'minority') were one of the three dominant factions in the Russian socialist movement, the others being the Bolsheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries.
The factions eme ...
— in that it was not officially
Marxist
Marxism is a Left-wing politics, left-wing to Far-left politics, far-left method of socioeconomic analysis that uses a Materialism, materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to understand S ...
(though some of its ideologues considered themselves such). The SRs agreed with Marx's analysis of capitalism, but not with his proposed solution. The SRs believed that both the labouring peasantry as well as the industrial proletariat were revolutionary classes in Russia. Whereas RSDLP defined class membership in terms of ownership of the means of production, Chernov and other SR theorists defined class membership in terms of extraction of surplus value from labour. On the first definition, small-holding subsistence farmers who do not employ wage labour are — as owners of their land — members of the petty bourgeoisie, whereas on the second definition, they can be grouped with all who provide rather than purchase labour-power, and hence with the proletariat as part of the labouring class. Chernov considered the proletariat as vanguard and the peasantry as the main body of the revolutionary army.
![1904-kamf](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cc/1904-kamf.jpg)
The party played an active role in the
1905 Russian Revolution
The Russian Revolution of 1905,. also known as the First Russian Revolution,. occurred on 22 January 1905, and was a wave of mass political and social unrest that spread through vast areas of the Russian Empire. The mass unrest was directed again ...
and in the
Moscow
Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 million ...
and
Saint Petersburg Soviet
The Petersburg Soviet of Workers' Delegates (later the Petersburg Soviet of Workers' Deputies) was a workers' council, or soviet, in Saint Petersburg in 1905.
Origins
The Soviet had its origins in the aftermath of Bloody Sunday, when Nicholas II ...
s. Although the party officially boycotted the first
State Duma
The State Duma (russian: Госуда́рственная ду́ма, r=Gosudárstvennaja dúma), commonly abbreviated in Russian as Gosduma ( rus, Госду́ма), is the lower house of the Federal Assembly of Russia, while the upper house ...
in 1906, 34 SRs were elected while 37 were elected to the second Duma in 1907. The party also boycotted both the third Duma (1907-1912) and fourth Duma (1912–1917). In this period, party membership drastically declined and most of its leaders emigrated from Russia.
A distinctive feature of party tactics until about 1909 was its heavy reliance on assassinations of individual government officials. These tactics were inherited from SRs' predecessor in the populist movement,
Narodnaya Volya
Narodnaya Volya ( rus, Наро́дная во́ля, p=nɐˈrodnəjə ˈvolʲə, t=People's Will) was a late 19th-century revolutionary political organization in the Russian Empire which conducted assassinations of government officials in an att ...
(“People's Will”), a conspiratorial organisation of the 1880s. They were intended to embolden the "masses" and intimidate ("terrorise") the Tsarist government into
political concessions. The
SR Combat Organisation (SRCO), responsible for assassinating government officials, was initially led by Gershuni and operated separately from the party so as not to jeopardise its political actions. SRCO agents assassinated two Ministers of the Interior,
Dmitry Sipyagin
Dmitry Sergeyevich Sipyagin (russian: Дми́трий Серге́евич Сипя́гин) ( – ) was a Russian politician.
Political career
Born in Kiev, Sipyagin graduated from the Judicial Department of St Petersburg University in 18 ...
and
Vyacheslav von Plehve
Vyacheslav Konstantinovich von Plehve ( rus, Вячесла́в (Wenzel (Славик)) из Плевны Константи́нович фон Пле́ве, p=vʲɪtɕɪˈslaf fɐn ˈplʲevʲɪ; – ) served as a director of Imperial Russ ...
,
Grand Duke Sergei Aleksandrovich, the Governor of Ufa N. M. Bogdanovich and many other high-ranking officials.
In 1903, Gershuni was betrayed by his deputy,
Yevno Azef
Yevno Fishelevich Azef (russian: Евгений Филиппович (Евно Фишелевич) Азеф, also transliterated as ''Evno'' Azef, 1869–1918) was a Russian socialist revolutionary who also operated as a double agent and agent ...
, an agent of the
Okhrana
The Department for Protecting the Public Security and Order (russian: Отделение по охранению общественной безопасности и порядка), usually called Guard Department ( rus, Охранное отд ...
secret police, arrested, convicted of terrorism and sentenced to life at hard labour, managing to escape, flee overseas and go into exile. Azef became the new leader of the SRCO and continued working for both the SRCO and the Okhrana, simultaneously orchestrating terrorist acts and betraying his comrades. Boris Savinkov ran many of the actual operations, notably the assassination attempt on Admiral
Fyodor Dubasov
Admiral Fyodor Vasilyevich Dubasov (russian: Фёдор Васильевич Дубасов ) (3 July ( O.S. 21 June) 1845 – 2 July (O.S. 19 June) 1912, Saint Petersburg) was, Governor General of Moscow from 24 November 1905 to 5 July 1906.
Fy ...
.
However, terrorism was controversial for the party from the beginning. At its 2nd Congress in
Imatra
Imatra is a town and municipality in southeastern Finland. Imatra is dominated by Lake Saimaa, the Vuoksi River and the border with Russia. On the other side of the border, away from the centre of Imatra, lies the Russian town of Svetogorsk. ...
in 1906, the controversy over terrorism was one of the main reasons for the split between the
SR Maximalists and the
Popular Socialists
The Popular Socialist Party () emerged in Russia in the early twentieth century.
History
The roots of the Popular Socialist Party (NSP) lay in the 'Legal Populist' movement of the 1890s, and its founders looked upon N.K. Mikhailovsky and Alex ...
. The Maximalists endorsed not only attacks on political and government targets, but also economic terror (i.e. attacks on landowners, factory owners and so on) whereas the Popular Socialists rejected all terrorism. Other issues also divided the defectors from the PSR as Maximalists disagreed with the SRs' strategy of a two-stage revolution as advocated by Chernov, the first stage being popular-democratic and the second labour-socialist. To Maximalists, this seemed like the RSDLP distinction between bourgeois-democratic and proletarian-socialist stages of revolution. Maximalism stood for immediate socialist revolution. Meanwhile, the Popular Socialists disagreed with the party's proposal to socialise the land (i.e. turn it over to collective peasant ownership) and instead wanted to nationalise it (i.e. turn it over to the state). They also wanted landowners to be compensated while the PSR rejected indemnities). Many SRs held a mixture of these positions.
In late 1908, a Russian Narodnik and amateur spy hunter
Vladimir Burtsev
Vladimir Lvovich Burtsev (russian: Владимир Львович Бурцев; November 17, 1862August 21, 1942) was a revolutionary activist, scholar, publisher and editor of several Russian language periodicals. He became famous by exposing ...
suggested that Azef might be a police spy. The party's Central Committee was outraged and set up a tribunal to try Burtsev for slander. At the trial, Azef was confronted with evidence and was caught lying, therefore he fled and left the party in disarray. The party's Central Committee, most of whose members had close ties to Azef, felt obliged to resign. Many regional organisations, already weakened by the revolution's defeat in 1907, collapsed or became inactive. Savinkov's attempt to rebuild the SRCO failed and it was suspended in 1911. Gershuni had defended Azef from exile in Zürich until his death there. The Azef scandal contributed to a profound revision of SR tactics that was already underway. As a result, it renounced assassinations ("
individual terror") as a means of political protest.
With the start of
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
, the party was divided on the issue of Russia's participation in the war. Most SR activists and leaders, particularly those remaining in Russia, chose to support the Tsarist government mobilisation against Germany. Together with the like-minded members of the Menshevik Party, they became known as ''oborontsy'' ("defensists"). Many younger defensists living in exile joined the French Army as Russia's closest ally in the war. A smaller group, the internationalists, which included Chernov, favoured the pursuit of peace through cooperation with socialist parties in both military blocs. This led them to participate in the
Zimmerwald
Zimmerwald was an independent municipality in the Canton of Bern, Switzerland until 31 December 2003. It is located on a hill in the proximity of the city of Bern in the Bernese Mittelland. On 1 January 2004 Zimmerwald united with the municipality ...
and
Kienthal
Reichenbach im Kandertal is a village and municipality in the Frutigen-Niedersimmental administrative district in the canton of Bern in Switzerland. Until 1957 it was known as Reichenbach bei Frutigen. Besides the village of Reichenbach, the muni ...
conferences with Bolshevik emigres led by Lenin. This fact was later used against Chernov and his followers by their right-wing opponents as alleged evidence of their lack of patriotism and Bolshevik sympathies.
Russian Revolution
![1917PartiyaSoz-Rev](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6b/1917PartiyaSoz-Rev.jpg)
The February Revolution allowed the SRs to return to an active political role. Party leaders, including Chernov, returned to Russia. They played a major role in the formation and leadership of the soviets, albeit in most cases playing second fiddle to the Mensheviks. One member,
Alexander Kerensky
Alexander Fyodorovich Kerensky, ; Reforms of Russian orthography, original spelling: ( – 11 June 1970) was a Russian lawyer and revolutionary who led the Russian Provisional Government and the short-lived Russian Republic for three months ...
, joined the Provisional Government in March 1917 as Minister of Justice, eventually becoming the head of a coalition socialist-liberal government in July 1917, although his connection with the party was tenuous. He had served in the
Duma
A duma (russian: дума) is a Russian assembly with advisory or legislative functions.
The term ''boyar duma'' is used to refer to advisory councils in Russia from the 10th to 17th centuries. Starting in the 18th century, city dumas were for ...
with the social democratic
Trudoviks
The Trudoviks (russian: Трудова́я гру́ппа, translit=Trudovaya gruppa, lit=Labour Group) were a social-democratic political party of Russia in early 20th century.
History
The Trudoviks were a breakaway of the Socialist Revolut ...
, breakaway SRs that defied the party's refusal to participate in the Duma.
After the fall of the first coalition in April–May 1917 and the reshuffling of the Provisional Government, the party played a larger role. Its key government official at the time was Chernov who joined the government as Minister of Agriculture. Chernov also tried to play a larger role, particularly in foreign affairs, but he soon found himself marginalised and his proposals of far-reaching agrarian reform blocked by more conservative members of the government. After the failed Bolshevik uprising of July 1917, Chernov found himself on the defensive as allegedly soft on the Bolsheviks and was excluded from the revamped coalition in August 1917. The party was now represented in the government by Nikolai Avksentiev, a defensist, as Minister of the Interior.
This weakening of the party's position intensified the growing divide within it between supporters of the pluralistic Constituent Assembly, and those inclined toward more resolute, unilateral action. In August 1917,
Maria Spiridonova
Maria Alexandrovna Spiridonova (russian: Мари́я Алекса́ндровна Спиридо́нова; 16 October 1884 – 11 September 1941) was a Narodnik-inspired Russian revolutionary. In 1906, as a novice member of a local combat group ...
advocated scuttling the Constituent Assembly and forming an SR-only government, but she was not supported by Chernov and his followers. This spurred the formation a small breakaway faction of the SR party known as the "Left SRs". The Left SRs were willing to temporarily cooperate with the Bolsheviks. The Left SRs believed that Russia should withdraw immediately from
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
and they were frustrated that the Provisional Government wanted to postpone addressing the land question until after the convocation of the
Russian Constituent Assembly
The All Russian Constituent Assembly (Всероссийское Учредительное собрание, Vserossiyskoye Uchreditelnoye sobraniye) was a constituent assembly convened in Russia after the October Revolution of 1917. It met fo ...
instead of immediately confiscating the land from the landowners and redistributing it to the peasants.
Left SRs and Bolsheviks referred to the mainstream SR party as the "Right SR" party whereas mainstream SRs referred to the party as just "SR" and reserved the term "Right SR" for the right-wing faction of the party led by
Catherine Breshkovsky
Catherine Breshkovsky (real name Yekaterina Konstantinovna Breshko-Breshkovskaya (born Verigo), russian: Екатерина Константиновна Брешко-Брешковская; born 25 January (13 January old style) 1844 – 12 Sept ...
and Avksentiev. The primary issues motivating the split were participation in the war and the timing of land redistribution.
At the
Second Congress of Soviets on 25 October, when the Bolsheviks proclaimed the deposition of the Provisional government, the split within the SR party became final. The Left SR stayed at the Congress and were elected to the permanent
All-Russian Central Executive Committee
The All-Russian Central Executive Committee ( rus, Всероссийский Центральный Исполнительный Комитет, Vserossiysky Centralny Ispolnitelny Komitet, VTsIK) was the highest legislative, administrative and r ...
executive (while initially refusing to join the Bolshevik government) while the mainstream SR and their Menshevik allies walked out of the Congress. In late November, the Left SRs joined the Bolshevik government, obtaining three ministries.
After the October Revolution
In the
election to the Russian Constituent Assembly held two weeks after the Bolsheviks took power, the party still proved to be by far the most popular party across the country, gaining 37.6% of the popular vote as opposed to the Bolsheviks' 24%. However, the Bolsheviks disbanded the Assembly in January 1918 and after that the SR lost political significance. The Left SRs became the coalition partner of the Bolsheviks in the Soviet government, although they resigned their positions after the
Treaty of Brest-Litovsk
The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (also known as the Treaty of Brest in Russia) was a separate peace, separate peace treaty signed on 3 March 1918 between Russian SFSR, Russia and the Central Powers (German Empire, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Kingdom of ...
(the peace treaty with the Central Powers that ended Russia's participation in World War I). Both wings of the SR party were ultimately suppressed by the Bolsheviks through imprisoning some of its leaders and forcing others into emigration. A few Left SRs like
Yakov Grigorevich Blumkin joined the
Communist Party
A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of ''The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. A ...
.
Dissatisfied with the large concessions granted to Germany by the Bolsheviks in the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, two
Chekists who were left SRs assassinated the German ambassador to Russia, Count
Wilhelm Mirbach
Wilhelm Maria Theodor Ernst Richard Graf von Mirbach-Harff (2 July 1871 – 6 July 1918) was a German diplomat, and was assassinated while ambassador to Moscow.
Biography
Born in Bad Ischl in Upper Austria into a Catholic Rhenan aristocratic ...
early in the afternoon on 6 July.
Following the assassination, the left SRs attempted a "
Third Russian Revolution" against the Bolsheviks on 6–7 July, but it failed and led to the arrest, imprisonment, exile and execution of party leaders and members. In response, some SRs turned again to violence. A former SR,
Fanny Kaplan
Fanny Efimovna Kaplan (russian: Фа́нни Ефи́мовна Капла́н, links=no; real name Feiga Haimovna Roytblat, ; February 10, 1890 – September 3, 1918) was a Ukrainian Jewish woman, Socialist-Revolutionary, and early Soviet dissi ...
, tried to assassinate Lenin on 30 August. Many SRs fought for the
Whites
White is a racialized classification of people and a skin color specifier, generally used for people of European origin, although the definition can vary depending on context, nationality, and point of view.
Description of populations as " ...
or
Greens in the
Russian Civil War
, date = October Revolution, 7 November 1917 – Yakut revolt, 16 June 1923{{Efn, The main phase ended on 25 October 1922. Revolt against the Bolsheviks continued Basmachi movement, in Central Asia and Tungus Republic, the Far East th ...
alongside some Mensheviks and other banned socialist elements. The
Tambov Rebellion
The Tambov Rebellion of 1920–1921 was one of the largest and best-organized peasant rebellions challenging the Bolshevik government during the Russian Civil War. The uprising took place in the territories of the modern Tambov Oblast and part ...
against the Bolsheviks was led by an SR,
Aleksandr Antonov. In
Ufa
Ufa ( ba, Өфө , Öfö; russian: Уфа́, r=Ufá, p=ʊˈfa) is the largest city and capital of Bashkortostan, Russia. The city lies at the confluence of the Belaya and Ufa rivers, in the centre-north of Bashkortostan, on hills forming the ...
the SRs'
Provisional All-Russian Government
The Provisional All-Russian Government (PA-RG), informally known as The Directory, The Ufa Directory, or The Omsk Directory, was a short-lived government during the Russian Civil War, formed on 23 September 1918 at the State Conference in Ufa a ...
was formed. However, after
Admiral Kolchak
Alexander Vasilyevich Kolchak (russian: link=no, Александр Васильевич Колчак; – 7 February 1920) was an Imperial Russian admiral, military leader and polar explorer who served in the Imperial Russian Navy and fought ...
was installed by the Whites as "Supreme Leader" in November 1918, he expelled all
Socialists
Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the eco ...
from the ranks. As a result, some SRs placed their organisation behind White lines at the service of the Red Guards and the Cheka.
Following Lenin's instructions, a
trial of SRs was held in Moscow in 1922, which led to protests by
Eugene V. Debs
Eugene Victor "Gene" Debs (November 5, 1855 – October 20, 1926) was an American socialist, political activist, trade unionist, one of the founding members of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), and five times the candidate of the Soc ...
,
Karl Kautsky
Karl Johann Kautsky (; ; 16 October 1854 – 17 October 1938) was a Czech-Austrian philosopher, journalist, and Marxist theorist. Kautsky was one of the most authoritative promulgators of orthodox Marxism after the death of Friedrich Engels in ...
, and
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein ( ; ; 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist, widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest and most influential physicists of all time. Einstein is best known for developing the theory ...
among others. Most of the defendants were found guilty, but they did not plead guilty like the defendants in the later
show trial
A show trial is a public trial in which the judicial authorities have already determined the guilt or innocence of the defendant. The actual trial has as its only goal the presentation of both the accusation and the verdict to the public so th ...
s in the Soviet Union in the late 1920s and the 1930s.
In exile
The party continued its activities in exile. A Foreign Delegation of the Central Committee was established and based in
Prague
Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 million people. The city has a temperate ...
. The party was a member of the
Labour and Socialist International
The Labour and Socialist International (LSI; german: Sozialistische Arbeiter-Internationale, label=German, SAI) was an international organization of socialist and labour parties, active between 1923 and 1940. The group was established through a me ...
between 1923 and 1940.
[Kowalski, Werner. ]
Geschichte der sozialistischen arbeiter-internationale: 1923 - 19
'. Berlin: Dt. Verl. d. Wissenschaften, 1985. p. 337.
Electoral history
State Duma
See also
*
Narodniks
The Narodniks (russian: народники, ) were a politically conscious movement of the Russian intelligentsia in the 1860s and 1870s, some of whom became involved in revolutionary agitation against tsarism. Their ideology, known as Narodism, ...
*
Revolutsionnaya Rossiya - organ of the Party
* - cultural almanac connected with esers
*
Russian Civil War
, date = October Revolution, 7 November 1917 – Yakut revolt, 16 June 1923{{Efn, The main phase ended on 25 October 1922. Revolt against the Bolsheviks continued Basmachi movement, in Central Asia and Tungus Republic, the Far East th ...
**
Green armies
The Green armies (russian: Зеленоармейцы), also known as the Green Army (Зелёная Армия) or Greens (Зелёные), were armed peasant groups which fought against all governments in the Russian Civil War from 1917 to 1922 ...
*
Russian Social Democratic Labour Party
The Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP; in , ''Rossiyskaya sotsial-demokraticheskaya rabochaya partiya (RSDRP)''), also known as the Russian Social Democratic Workers' Party or the Russian Social Democratic Party, was a socialist pol ...
*
Ukrainian Socialist-Revolutionary Party
Ukrainian Socialist-Revolutionary Party (russian: Украинская партия социалистов-революционеров uk, Українська Партія Соціалістів-Революціонерів) was a political ...
Notes
Bibliography
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External links
Programme of the Socialist Revolutionary PartyPartija Socialistov-Revoljucionerov (Rossija) Archivesat the
International Institute of Social History
The International Institute of Social History (IISH/IISG) is one of the largest archives of labor and social history in the world. Located in Amsterdam, its one million volumes and 2,300 archival collections include the papers of major figur ...
{{Authority control
1901 establishments in the Russian Empire
1940 disestablishments in the Soviet Union
Democratic socialist parties in Europe
Agrarian parties
Democratic socialist parties in Asia
Narodniks
Political parties disestablished in 1940
Political parties established in 1901
Organizations of the 1905 Russian Revolution