Petrograd Workers The Russian Revolution

David Mandel, Ph.D. (1977), Columbia University, is a professor of political science and a labour activist. He has authored monographs and articles on politics and labour in revolutionary Russia, the Soviet Union, and in post-Soviet Russia, Ukraine and Belarus.

“Given the importance of the workers of Petrograd in the Russian revolution [...] the value of Mandel’s work can hardly be overstated. Painstakingly researched, it illuminates the connections between debates among party leaders and the underlying tensions affecting workers’ lives. This leaves the reader with a much richer understanding of how the working class, in all its complexity, acts collectively to make history.” —Ted McTaggart, Against the Current

• List of Tables and MapsGlossaryIntroduction1 Types of Political Culture in the Industrial Working-Class of PetrogradThe Skilled WorkersUnskilled WorkersThe ‘Worker Aristocracy’The Generational Factor2 The Social Composition of the Industrial Working Class of Petrograd and its DistrictsThe Social Composition of Petrograd’s DistrictsThe Vyborg DistrictPetergof and Narva DistrictsVasilevskii ostrovPetrograd DistrictMoskovskaya zastavaNevskii-Obukhovskii DistrictKolomna DistrictSecond City DistrictFirst City DistrictRozhdestvenskii DistrictOkhta and Porokhovskii Districts3 The Honeymoon Period – From the February to the April DaysThe Labour Movement during the WarThe February Revolution – The Birth of Dual PowerCensus SocietyDual Power in Light of Attitudes before the RevolutionWhy Dual Power?4 The February Revolution in the FactoriesThe Eight-Hour DayWagesThe Press Campaign against ‘Worker Egoism’Worker-Management Relations: ‘Democratisation of Factory Life’Purge of the Factory AdministrationsThe Factory Committees5 From the April to the July DaysThe April DaysThe First Coalition GovernmentThe Break with Census SocietyUnderlying Causes of the Shift to Soviet Power6 The Struggle for Power in the Factories in April–June7 The July DaysThe Workers and the Menshevik-SR Soviet MajorityThe July DaysReaction Unleashed8 Rethinking the Revolution: Revolutionary Democracy or Proletarian Dictatorship?Census Society on the OffensiveFinal Rejection of ‘Conciliationism’The Question of ‘Revolutionary Democracy’9 From the Kornilov Uprising to the Eve of OctoberThe Kornilov UprisingThe Democratic ConferenceSetting Course for Soviet Power10 Class Struggle in the Factories – September–OctoberThe Factory Committees under AttackThe Struggle for Production – Workers’ Control CheckedFrom Workers’ Control and towards Workers’ ManagementFactory Committees under Pressure ‘from Below’The Struggle for Production and the Question of State PowerQuiet on the Wage Front11 On the Eve12 The October Revolution and the End of ‘Revolutionary Democracy’Workers’ Attitudes towards the InsurrectionThe Question of a ‘Homogeneous Socialist Government’Unity from Below13 The Constituent Assembly and the Emergence of a Worker OppositionThe ElectionsDissolution of the Constituent AssemblyThe Chernorabochie and the Upsurge of Anarchist InfluenceThe Lines Harden14 The October Revolution in the Factories‘Active’ or ‘Passive’ Control?Towards NationalisationManagement in Nationalised Enterprises15 Summon Up Every Last Ounce of Strength or Accept Defeat!Dispersal of Petrograd’s Working ClassThe ‘Obscene Peace’Rise and Failure of the OppositionConclusionBibliographyIndex