13th Congress of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks)

1924 meeting of Soviet delegates February 2018 August 2014 The 13th Congress of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks) was held during 23–31 May 1924 in Moscow. Of the delegates attending, 748 had voting rights, and 416 had consultative rights.Thirteenth Congress of the Russian Communist Party Bolshevik in The Great Soviet Encyclopedia, 3rd Edition (1970–1979) The congress elected the 13th Central Committee. This congress was the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks)' first to take place after the death of Vladimir Lenin, and represents a transition between the Lenin and Joseph Stalin regimes. It was also the first confrontation between the Left Opposition (led by Leon Trotsky) and the "troika" (led by Stalin, Grigory Zinoviev, and Lev Kamenev). Background By the time of Lenin's death on 21 January 1924, the New Economic Policy (NEP) had produced some economic stability after the famines and crises that had plagued the post-Civil War Soviet economy, such as the "sales crisis" of 1922.Suny Ronald Grigor The Soviet experiment : Russia, the USSR, and the successor states 1998 Oxford University Press 0-19-508104-8 New York 151 36800716 The posthumous cult of Lenin became a strategic tool for various Party leaders vying for the leadership. Party membership expanded by more than half during the February "Lenin Enrollment," while Stalin gave a series of lectures later titled Foundations of Leninism.Suny Ronald Grigor The Soviet experiment : Russia, the USSR, and the successor states 1998 Oxford University Press 0-19-508104-8 New York 148 36800716 Even though Stalin had been condemned as "too rude and... intolerable" and recommended for dismissal by the late Lenin in his "Last Testament,"Lenin Vladimir Letter to the Congress https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1922/dec/testamnt/congress.htm live 2021-04-09 www.marxists.org https://web.archive.org/web/20000122081938/http://www.marxists.org:80/archive/lenin/works/1922/dec/testamnt/congress.htm 22 January 2000 Stalin nonetheless successfully retained his position as General Secretary and crafted a powerful public association with Lenin's personality cult. Stalin's supporters used Trotsky's former disputes with Lenin to condemn him, and his theory of "permanent revolution" would become the main object of attack in the great theoretical debates following the 13th Party Congress. Discussions Among the many issues that dominated the 13th Party Congress, the factional split between the Left Opposition and the "troika" was a major divider. Trotsky and the Left Opposition argued that world revolution was required for the success of socialism, since the Soviet Union could not survive on its own without any aid from Western economies. On the other hand, Stalin, Zinoviev, and Kamenev of the "troika" argued that the Politburo should proceed to organize socialism on a national scale, a policy known as "socialism in one country." On 27 May, Stalin declared Trotsky's line a "petty-bourgeois deviation."Thirteenth Congress of the R.C.P.(B.) https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1924/05/24.htm 2021-04-10 www.marxists.org Lenin's "Letter to the Congress" was also read out loud to the 13th Party Congress, and among its criticisms of the different leading personalities of the Politburo, the most condemning was of Stalin. Nonetheless, the Congress chose not to publish this letter, and Stalin retained his post as General-Secretary until his death in 1953.Yurchak Alexei September 2017 The canon and the mushroom: Lenin, sacredness, and Soviet collapse https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.14318/hau7.2.021 HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory en 7 2 165–198 10.14318/hau7.2.021 149135486 2575-1433 subscription Aftermath The 13th Party Congress marked the beginning of the Stalinist era, and the factionalism that emerged set the stage for the next five years, during which further struggles would emerge between factions over Soviet and international policy.Suny Ronald Grigor The Soviet experiment : Russia, the USSR, and the successor states 1998 Oxford University Press 0-19-508104-8 New York 167 36800716 See also Lenin's Testament References Communist Party of the Soviet Union 11 Congress Category:1924 conferences Category:May 1924 in Europe