The Lost Politburo Transcripts: From Collective Rule to Stalin's Dictatorship
Paul Gregory and Norman Naimark
Abstract
In this book, Western and Russian scholars examine the “lost” transcripts of the Soviet Politburo, a set of verbatim accounts of meetings that took place from the 1920s to 1938 but remained hidden in secret archives until the late 1990s. Never intended for publication or wide distribution, these records (known as stenograms in Russia) reveal the actual process of decision making at the highest levels of the Soviet communist party. The transcripts also provide new, firsthand records of the rise of Stalin's dictatorship. The contributors to the book explore the power struggles among the Politbur ... More
In this book, Western and Russian scholars examine the “lost” transcripts of the Soviet Politburo, a set of verbatim accounts of meetings that took place from the 1920s to 1938 but remained hidden in secret archives until the late 1990s. Never intended for publication or wide distribution, these records (known as stenograms in Russia) reveal the actual process of decision making at the highest levels of the Soviet communist party. The transcripts also provide new, firsthand records of the rise of Stalin's dictatorship. The contributors to the book explore the power struggles among the Politburo members, their methods of discourse and propaganda, and their economic policies. Taken as a whole, the chapters shed light on early Soviet history and on the individuals who supported or opposed Stalin's consolidation of power.
Keywords:
Soviet Politburo,
stenograms,
decision making,
Soviet communist party,
Stalin's dictatorship,
power struggles,
Politburo members,
propaganda,
economic policies,
early Soviet history
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2008 |
Print ISBN-13: 9780300134247 |
| Published to Yale Scholarship Online: October 2013 |
DOI:10.12987/yale/9780300134247.001.0001 |
