How Did Lenin Contribute To The Rise Of Bolsheviks

Between 1917 and 1920, the Bolshevik party underwent a massive transformation, as it evolved from a revolutionary splinter group into the party in full control of the Soviet state. The Bolsheviks emerged from the Russian Social Democratic Party – who believed that the industrial workers were the only revolutionary class. In the February Revolution of 1917, Tsar Alexander II was overthrown, effectively ending the three-hundred-year-old Romanov Dynasty. During the February Revolution, Vladimir Lenin had been living in exile in Switzerland – and the Bolsheviks were largely not involved in this event. Following the overthrow of the tsarist regime, however, Lenin returned to Russia and began his effort to place Russia under Bolshevik control. Lenin
utilized the weaknesses of the Provisional Government to promote his agenda. Further, he emphasized the economic problems within Russia and the continuation of World War I despite opposition from within the country. The Bolsheviks had participated in Russian politics before 1917, but support for them among Russians was fairly low. Generally, citizens preferred the more centrist policies of other revolutionary groups, including the Social Revolutionary party. However, the Bolsheviks were far more organized than other factions, and utilized the Russian people’s frustration with the Provisional Government to seize control of the revolutionary movement.
The Provisional Government was created in the aftermath of the February Revolution –making clear the weaknesses of Russia and paving the way for the rise of the Bolsheviks. When Tsar Alexander II was overthrown, the members of the Duma set up a Provisional Government to replace tsarism. This Provisional Government, led first by Prince Georgi Lvov, and later by Alexander Kerensky, was created to take on “full governmental responsibility, while the Ispolkom [the Petrograd Soviet] acted as a kind of supreme court of the revolutionary conscience.” In other words, the Provisional Government held the executive authority and the Ispolkom possessed control over legislation – creating a system of shared power. This notion was highly impractical – and largely ineffective – because the involved parties had widely contrasting ideas about governing. Further, the government’s sheer temporariness prevented any major reform in Russia. The Provisional Government made advancements toward “universal suffrage without distinction of sex” and improving individual freedoms for Russian citizens. However, this success was not enough to mollify the expanding Bolshevik party. The Provisional Government used an “extreme form of political
laissez-faire” in governing, which in a time of war and political chaos, was a massive oversight. Further, the Provisional Government made a large mistake in their decision to keep Russia in World War I. Kerensky was under immense pressure from the Allies to remain in the war effort. Further, he had been offered the city of Constantinople by France and Great Britain in the case of victory. For Kerensky, this proposal was a difficult one to forgo. Thus, he opted to keep Russia in World War I despite financial hardships within the country. This decision largely proved to be the downfall of the Provisional Government – Kerensky himself argued that “only the war with all its material and psychological consequences… provoked the collapse of the democratic revolution.” In other words, World War I magnified the weaknesses of the Provisional Government. As a result, the Provisional Government collapsed after a mere eight months of existence. With such a short duration, this administration is often “treated as a meaningless and irrelevant interlude between Tsarism and Bolshevism,” but in fact it was much more important. The Provisional Government was certainly symbolically important – as its introduction marked the end of tsarism. However, the Provisional Government was inherently weak and failed to stabilize Russia after the February Revolution – thus ushering in the success of Lenin and the Bolsheviks.