I notice something that shows up in a few of these interviews with well known older authors.. they never pause to think about a question before answering. They have their “core thesis” and backing points, and no matter what question you ask, they always steer the answer back to their core thesis even if it doesn’t apply. He did this with the (very interesting) question “imagine Stalin wasn’t in control but he’s still just as conniving and politically savvy, how would he avoid being purged” — he just ignored it entirely despite you re-clarifying the question 3 times. I noticed that Sarah Paine (whom I adore) did the same thing in the live talks, would just not really answer novel questions you came up with. It’s almost like they feel that they need to have all the answers to maintain credibility and so they can’t just stop to think about a novel question for 10 seconds
This one was kinda painful to listen to, he doesn’t seem to understand the concept of discussion and instead just pontificated over you for 2 hours. Lots of good things to say, but not a good discussion
It would have been nice if North Korea was a bigger part of the conversation. To say nothing of the figure of Lenin, who was every bit as much of a murderous sociopath as Stalin was, and may have been the model. See here, for instance: https://newcriterion.com/issues/2019/10/leninthink
An excerpt:
“The citizen belongs to the state and must have no other loyalty, not even to the state ideology,” Kołakowski observes. That might seem strange to Westerners, but, “it is not surprising to anyone who knows a system of this type from within.” All deviations from the Party line, all challenges to the leadership, appealed to official ideology, and so anyone who truly believed the ideology was suspect. “The [great] purge, therefore, was designed to destroy such ideological links as still existed within the party, to convince its members that they had no ideology or loyalty except to the latest orders from on high . . . . Loyalty to Marxist ideology as such is still—[in 1978]—a crime and a source of deviations of all kinds.” The true Leninist did not even believe in Leninism.
A note on other reading - Kotkin's biography is quite good, but I find the explanations that decenter Stalin's individual decision-making more persuasive. The social structure of the post-NEP Soviet state is fascinating, and I recommend historians like Sheila Fitzpatrick and R. W. Davies on the topic, who look deeper than Kotkin into the periphery of the Soviet state - such as how local committees made decisions independent of the Central Committee and how haphazard and improvised the 5-year plans were. Fitzpatrick is excellent for understanding the incentives facing agents under Stalinism. I also cannot recommend more Simon Pirani's The Russian Revolution in Retreat, a detailed account of how the Bolshevik party and the nomenklatura disempowered the democratic institutions that emerged from the Revolution, with workers self-management of factories terminated by the time Stalin consolidates power within the Party.
These works helps answer questions like the Bukharin counterfactual. What would have happened if the Bolshevik leadership had refused to bring about collectivization? Likely, they would have been taken out the back and shot by urban workers, who would have then proceeded with grain seizures. Mass violence is overdetermined by the character of the regime: an isolated, party-state entirely reliant on the cooperation and relative docility of its working class base, who genuinely believe in the messianic nature of the project and are also heavily armed and organized - with no democratic mechanism to resolve conflicts between social classes.
Brilliant conversation. Nice one!
I notice something that shows up in a few of these interviews with well known older authors.. they never pause to think about a question before answering. They have their “core thesis” and backing points, and no matter what question you ask, they always steer the answer back to their core thesis even if it doesn’t apply. He did this with the (very interesting) question “imagine Stalin wasn’t in control but he’s still just as conniving and politically savvy, how would he avoid being purged” — he just ignored it entirely despite you re-clarifying the question 3 times. I noticed that Sarah Paine (whom I adore) did the same thing in the live talks, would just not really answer novel questions you came up with. It’s almost like they feel that they need to have all the answers to maintain credibility and so they can’t just stop to think about a novel question for 10 seconds
This one was kinda painful to listen to, he doesn’t seem to understand the concept of discussion and instead just pontificated over you for 2 hours. Lots of good things to say, but not a good discussion
Strongly recommend that you seek out Joseph Torigian for a chat.
Great conversation, “D.K”!
It would have been nice if North Korea was a bigger part of the conversation. To say nothing of the figure of Lenin, who was every bit as much of a murderous sociopath as Stalin was, and may have been the model. See here, for instance: https://newcriterion.com/issues/2019/10/leninthink
An excerpt:
“The citizen belongs to the state and must have no other loyalty, not even to the state ideology,” Kołakowski observes. That might seem strange to Westerners, but, “it is not surprising to anyone who knows a system of this type from within.” All deviations from the Party line, all challenges to the leadership, appealed to official ideology, and so anyone who truly believed the ideology was suspect. “The [great] purge, therefore, was designed to destroy such ideological links as still existed within the party, to convince its members that they had no ideology or loyalty except to the latest orders from on high . . . . Loyalty to Marxist ideology as such is still—[in 1978]—a crime and a source of deviations of all kinds.” The true Leninist did not even believe in Leninism.
A note on other reading - Kotkin's biography is quite good, but I find the explanations that decenter Stalin's individual decision-making more persuasive. The social structure of the post-NEP Soviet state is fascinating, and I recommend historians like Sheila Fitzpatrick and R. W. Davies on the topic, who look deeper than Kotkin into the periphery of the Soviet state - such as how local committees made decisions independent of the Central Committee and how haphazard and improvised the 5-year plans were. Fitzpatrick is excellent for understanding the incentives facing agents under Stalinism. I also cannot recommend more Simon Pirani's The Russian Revolution in Retreat, a detailed account of how the Bolshevik party and the nomenklatura disempowered the democratic institutions that emerged from the Revolution, with workers self-management of factories terminated by the time Stalin consolidates power within the Party.
These works helps answer questions like the Bukharin counterfactual. What would have happened if the Bolshevik leadership had refused to bring about collectivization? Likely, they would have been taken out the back and shot by urban workers, who would have then proceeded with grain seizures. Mass violence is overdetermined by the character of the regime: an isolated, party-state entirely reliant on the cooperation and relative docility of its working class base, who genuinely believe in the messianic nature of the project and are also heavily armed and organized - with no democratic mechanism to resolve conflicts between social classes.