Page 112
Activity
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List two differences between the capitalist and socialist ideas of private property.
1. Ownership and Control: Under capitalism, property, factories, and the means of production are owned and controlled by private individuals for personal gain. Under socialism, private property is opposed, and all property and resources are controlled collectively by society or the state.
2. Distribution of Profits: In a capitalist system, the profits generated by workers' labor are accumulated solely by private owners and capitalists. In a socialist system, profits and produce are divided among members according to the work done and used for the collective welfare of society.
Page 114
Activity
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Imagine that a meeting has been called in your area to discuss the socialist idea of doing away with private property and introducing collective ownership. Write the speech you would make at the meeting if you are:
➤ a poor labourer working in the fields
➤ a medium-level landowner
➤ a house owner• A poor labourer working in the fields: "Brothers and sisters, I toil under the scorching sun day and night on fields that belong to another, yet my children go to bed hungry on an empty stomach while the landlord enjoys the wealth generated by our sweat. I whole-heartedly welcome the abolition of private property! If land belongs collectively to all of us who work on it, no single lord can exploit our helplessness, and every family will receive a fair share of the food produced."
• A medium-level landowner: "Friends, I understand the desire to end extreme poverty, but we must be cautious. My family has spent generations clearing, ploughing, and tending our small parcel of land through sheer perseverance and honest labor. Taking away our modest plots to put everything under a giant common pool will strip away our hard-earned security and our incentive to produce. Let us eliminate feudal tyranny, but allow those of us who work our own small holdings to keep the fruits of our labor."
• A house owner: "Fellow citizens, private property represents personal security, privacy, and years of hard-earned life savings. If the state or a commune takes ownership of our homes to dictate who lives where, individual freedom and personal responsibility will vanish. While we must help the homeless and build affordable shelter for workers, stripping citizens of their rightful homes will lead to chaos and unrest."
Page 122
Activity
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Why were there revolutionary disturbances in Russia in 1905? What were the demands of revolutionaries?
• Causes of Disturbances:
1. Autocratic rule of Tsar Nicholas II without any accountability to an elected parliament.
2. Severe economic distress in 1904, where prices of essential items soared rapidly and real wages fell by 20%.
3. The dismissal of four workers at the Putilov Iron Works, leading to a general strike of over 110,000 workers in St. Petersburg.
4. The 'Bloody Sunday' massacre, where police and Cossacks fired upon a peaceful workers' procession led by Father Gapon, killing over 100 people and injuring hundreds.
• Demands of Revolutionaries:
1. Framing of a Constitution by an elected Constituent Assembly.
2. Reduction of the working day to eight hours.
3. Increase in workers' wages and improvement in working conditions.
4. Civil liberties, including freedom of speech, press, and association.
Page 124
Activity
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The year is 1916. You are a general in the Tsar's army on the eastern front. You are writing a report for the government in Moscow. In your report suggest what you think the government should do to improve the situation.
To: The Imperial War Ministry, Moscow
From: General, Eastern Front, Imperial Russian Army
Subject: Urgent measures to arrest catastrophic breakdown on the front lines
Our forces have suffered devastating defeats against Germany and Austria, with casualties exceeding several million brave soldiers. Morale has completely collapsed due to acute shortages of ammunition, boots, winter coats, and medical supplies. The 'scorched earth' policy has turned millions of our own people into destitute refugees.
Urgent Suggestions:
1. Immediate Armistice Negotiations: End active offensives and explore terms of disengagement to stop needless slaughter.
2. Logistics Restoration: Rebuild crumbling railway lines and prioritize supply corridors to transport grain directly to frontline soldiers and hungry industrial centers.
3. Political Reform: The Tsar must work directly with elected leaders in the Duma to regain the trust and unity of the people.
4. Conscription Relief: Halt indiscriminate conscription of farm labor to restore domestic agriculture and prevent nationwide famine.
Page 128
Activity
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Look again at Source A and Box 1.
➤ List five changes in the mood of the workers.
➤ Place yourself in the position of a woman who has seen both situations and write an account of what has changed.• Five Changes in the Mood of the Workers:
1. From Secrecy to Open Defiance: Workers moved from holding quick, hidden meetings on factory staircases to launching broad daylight strikes across city streets.
2. Disappearance of Fear: The dread of factory managers and police phone calls was replaced by fearlessness and open confrontation.
3. Emergence of Women's Leadership: Women transitioned from passive participants into active vanguards who spearheaded walkouts.
4. Spontaneous Class Solidarity: Workers rejected individual bribes (such as a loaf of bread) to stand united with their hungry comrades.
5. Broader Political Purpose: The movement shifted from local shop-floor grievances to demanding democracy, the overthrow of autocracy, and an end to the war.
• Account of a Woman Worker:
"Only a few years ago, we had to whisper our grievances in dark stairwells, posting lookouts at doorways while an agitator delivered a hurried speech before the police arrived. We were terrified of losing our jobs and watched our children starve in silence. But on Women's Day this February, everything changed. When Marfa Vasileva at our factory refused the manager's loaf of bread and chose solidarity over selfish comfort, our fear evaporated. We walked out onto the Nevskii Prospekt in the broad light of day, joined hands with our brothers, and watched even the Tsar's mounted Cossacks refuse to shoot us. We are no longer frightened underground victims; we are the collective makers of our own destiny."
Page 136
Activity
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Read the two views on the revolution in the countryside. Imagine yourself to be a witness to the events. Write a short account from the standpoint of:
➤ an owner of an estate
➤ a small peasant
➤ a journalist• An Owner of an Estate: "The world we knew has vanished overnight. While some neighboring manors were looted and torn down in ruins, the local village committee arrived at our estate relatively calmly. The chairman left us two cows and two horses, and our former servants pleaded for our physical safety. Yet, our ancestral land has been confiscated and distributed among the villagers. We live in quiet humiliation, hoping rumors are true that order may yet return."
• A Small Peasant: "October brought the news we prayed for across generations: free land and peace! The manor house has been dismantled, its orchard cleared for timber, and the vast fields divided among us. For centuries our families starved while paying rents to the lord. Now the earth belongs to the commune that works it."
• A Journalist: "Traveling through rural Russia following the October decree reveals a landscape undergoing profound upheaval. In some villages, pent-up peasant fury has led to the violent destruction and looting of grand manors. In others, village soviets oversee the orderly partitioning of estates, granting former owners bare subsistence rations while re-allocating fields to peasant families."
Page 138
Activity
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Why did people in Central Asia respond to the Russian Revolution in different ways?
People in Central Asia responded differently because the revolution brought contrasting outcomes to different communities:
1. Hopes of Freedom and Autonomy: Many local indigenous peoples (like the Kirghiz and Kazakhs) initially welcomed the revolution because it overthrew Tsarist imperial tyranny and promised national self-determination, autonomy, and an end to colonial subjugation.
2. Disillusionment and Terror: However, the Bolshevik regime often imposed rigid central control, high taxes, and grain requisitioning. In places like Khiva, Russian Bolshevik colonists brutally massacred local nationalists. Furthermore, the Soviet policy of forcibly suppressing nomadism directly undermined their traditional pastoral way of life, generating deep resentment and fear.
Page 150
Activity
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Compare the passages written by Shaukat Usmani and Rabindranath Tagore. Read them in relation to Sources C, D and E.
➤ What did Indians find impressive about the USSR?
➤ What did the writers fail to notice?• What Indians found impressive: Both Usmani and Tagore were deeply inspired by the elimination of racial and social hierarchies. Usmani admired how Europeans and Asians mixed freely without religious or caste barriers, instilling dignity and eloquence in common workers and peasants. Tagore was astonished by the rapid eradication of illiteracy, ignorance, and helplessness among the impoverished masses in just over a decade, comparing the transformation to the work of a genie.
• What the writers failed to notice: Visiting as guests of state programs, they overlooked the severe repression, coercive state control, and widespread suffering hidden beneath the surface. As shown in Sources C, D, and E, millions suffered acute poverty, starvation, forced labor, crushing taxes on independent cultivators, brutal deportation of resisting peasants during collectivisation, and the total suppression of political dissent.
Page 152
Activities (Page 152)
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1. Imagine that you are a striking worker in 1905 who is being tried in court for your act of rebellion. Draft the speech you would make in your defence. Act out your speech for your class.
"Your Honor, I stand before this court accused of rebellion, but our only crime was demanding the right to live as human beings. We work 15 hours a day in airless, unheated factories for wages that cannot even purchase bread for our starving children. On Bloody Sunday, we marched peacefully to the Winter Palace with a petition in our hands, unarmed, singing hymns to our Tsar. Instead of hearing our prayers, the soldiers fired into our ranks and left our brothers bleeding on the snow. If asking for an eight-hour working day, fair wages, and a constitution is a crime, then it is hunger and injustice that have forced our defiance!"
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2. Write the headline and a short news item about the uprising of 24 October 1917 for each of the following newspapers:
• a Conservative paper in France
• a Radical newspaper in Britain
• a Bolshevik newspaper in Russia• Conservative Paper in France:
Headline: ANARCHY IN PETROGRAD: BOLSHEVIK REBELS SEIZE GOVERNMENT OFFICES
News Item: Extremist Bolshevik factions under Vladimir Lenin have staged an armed coup in the Russian capital, storming the Winter Palace and arresting ministers of the legitimate Provisional Government. This reckless subversion threatens to destabilize the Eastern Front and endanger the Allied war effort against Germany.
• Radical Newspaper in Britain:
Headline: WORKERS AND SOLDIERS OVERTHROW OPPRESSIVE REGIME IN RUSSIA
News Item: In a stunning triumph for popular democracy, the working masses and soldiers' soviets of Petrograd have dismantled the wavering Provisional Government. The bold uprising promises to fulfill the long-awaited demands of the working class: immediate peace, bread, and land for the people.
• Bolshevik Newspaper in Russia:
Headline: ALL POWER TO THE SOVIETS! SOCIALIST REVOLUTION TRIUMPHS
News Item: The Military Revolutionary Committee has successfully taken control of state authority in Petrograd. The bourgeois Provisional Government has fallen, and ministers are under arrest. Land is now social property, peace will be secured, and the All Russian Congress of Soviets has established a true workers' state! -
3. Imagine that you are a middle-level wheat farmer in Russia after collectivisation. You have decided to write a letter to Stalin explaining your objections to collectivisation. What would you write about the conditions of your life? What do you think would be Stalin's response to such a farmer?
• Letter to Stalin:
"Comrade Stalin, I write to you as an honest farmer who supports our homeland. Under collectivisation, local party squads have seized my livestock, grain stores, and horse-drawn ploughs. We are forced into collective farms where our labor is treated with disregard, while heavy grain quotas leave our own households facing starvation. We are not kulaks or hoarders; we are hardworking peasants who wish to cultivate our fields productively without having our tools confiscated."
• Stalin's Likely Response:
Stalin would view such a letter as counter-revolutionary resistance. The farmer would likely be branded as a "kulak sympathizer" attempting to subvert collective farming, resulting in heavy fines, arrest, deportation to Siberian labor camps, or execution.
Questions (Page 152)
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1. What were the social, economic and political conditions in Russia before 1905?
• Social Conditions: About 85% of the population were agriculturists. Peasants cultivated the land while the nobility, the crown, and the Orthodox Church owned vast estates. Nobles held power through service to the Tsar rather than local respect. Russian peasants pooled land periodically in their commune (mir). Industrial workers were divided by skill, origin, and gender (women were paid significantly less than men).
• Economic Conditions: Russia was a major grain exporter, but domestic industry existed only in pockets like St. Petersburg and Moscow. In workshops, working days lasted 12 to 15 hours for meager wages. In 1904, rising prices caused real wages to fall by 20%, triggering widespread labor distress.
• Political Conditions: Russia was an absolute autocracy under Tsar Nicholas II, operating without an elected parliament. All political parties were banned and forced to operate underground. -
2. In what ways was the working population in Russia different from other countries in Europe, before 1917?
1. Predominantly Agrarian Economy: About 85% of Russia's population depended on agriculture, compared to only 40% to 50% in France and Germany.
2. The Peasant Commune (Mir): Russian peasants uniquely pooled land together periodically, with the commune dividing it according to the size and needs of each family.
3. Peasant Attitude to Nobility: Unlike French peasants who often respected local nobility, Russian peasants had no respect for aristocrats, frequently withheld rents, and even attacked landlords.
4. Strikes and Unity: Despite internal divisions by skill and rural origin, Russian industrial workers organized exceptionally unified strikes when employers dismissed comrades or violated terms. -
3. Why did the Tsarist autocracy collapse in 1917?
1. First World War Disasters: Russian armies suffered over 7 million casualties between 1914 and 1916 against Germany and Austria. Retreating forces destroyed crops and buildings, creating over 3 million destitute refugees and totally demoralizing soldiers.
2. Economic and Industrial Collapse: Industrial supplies broke down due to the German blockade of the Baltic. By 1916, railway lines disintegrated, workshops closed from labor shortages, and grain sent to the war left cities facing acute bread shortages and riots.
3. Political Alienation: Tsar Nicholas II refused to consult the elected Duma, while Tsarina Alexandra's German origin and the influence of corrupt advisers like Rasputin made the court intensely unpopular.
4. Military Mutiny: During the February bread protests, regiments of the imperial army refused to open fire on striking workers, mutinied, and joined the demonstrators, causing the autocracy to collapse completely. -
4. Make two lists: one with the main events and the effects of the February Revolution and the other with the main events and effects of the October Revolution. Write a paragraph on who was involved in each, who were the leaders and what was the impact of each on Soviet history.
February Revolution:
• Main Events: Factory lockout on 22 February; strike by women and workers from 50 factories on 23 February (International Women's Day); government suspension of the Duma on 25 February; soldiers mutinying and joining demonstrators on 27 February; formation of the Petrograd Soviet; abdication of Tsar Nicholas II on 2 March 1917.
• Effects: Monarchy was abolished; a Provisional Government formed by Duma and Soviet leaders took over administration; restrictions on public speech and political associations were lifted.
October Revolution:
• Main Events: Formation of the Military Revolutionary Committee under Leon Trotskii; Bolshevik uprising initiated on 24 October; seizure of government offices, bridges, and telegraph stations; the cruiser Aurora shelling the Winter Palace; surrender of Provisional Government ministers.
• Effects: Fall of the Provisional Government; nationalisation of banks and industries; abolition of private land ownership; transfer of power to the Soviets; transformation of Russia into a one-party socialist state.
Participants, Leaders, and Impact:
The February Revolution was a spontaneous mass uprising driven by ordinary workers, women strikers (such as Marfa Vasileva), and mutinous soldiers, without direct coordination by a single party; its primary impact was dismantling the centuries-old Tsarist autocracy. In contrast, the October Revolution was a meticulously planned armed seizure led by Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotskii along with the Bolshevik Party and the Military Revolutionary Committee; its historical impact was establishing the world's first socialist government and laying the foundation for the USSR. -
5. What were the main changes brought about by the Bolsheviks immediately after the October Revolution?
1. Nationalisation: Most private industries and banks were nationalised in November 1917, placing ownership and management directly under the government.
2. Land Redistribution: Land was declared social property, and peasants were authorized to take over estates belonging to the nobility and the Church.
3. Urban Housing: In cities, the Bolsheviks enforced the partitioning of large private houses according to the family needs of working people.
4. Abolition of Aristocratic Titles: Old aristocratic titles and ranks were legally banned.
5. New Symbols and Uniforms: New uniforms were introduced for the military and bureaucracy, including the iconic Soviet hat (budeonovka).
6. Exit from World War I: The Bolsheviks signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk with Germany in March 1918 to end Russia's participation in the war.
7. One-Party Rule: The Bolshevik Party was renamed the Russian Communist Party (Bolshevik), the Constituent Assembly was dismissed, and Russia became a one-party state with the secret police (Cheka) silencing opposition. -
6. Write a few lines to show what you know about:
• kulaks
• the Duma
• women workers between 1900 and 1930
• the Liberals
• Stalin's collectivisation programme.• Kulaks: Kulaks was the Russian name for well-to-do, prosperous peasants. During the grain shortages of the late 1920s, Stalin accused them of hoarding grain for speculative profit. The Soviet regime raided their holdings and launched a violent campaign to 'eliminate kulaks as a class', confiscating their land and deporting or executing thousands.
• The Duma: The Duma was the elected consultative parliament established by Tsar Nicholas II during the 1905 Revolution. However, the Tsar resisted sharing authority; he dismissed the first Duma in 75 days, dismissed the second Duma in three months, and altered electoral laws to pack the third Duma with pliant conservative aristocrats.
• Women workers between 1900 and 1930: By 1914, women made up 31% of the Russian factory labor force, yet they were paid between half and three-quarters of men's wages. Women boldly led the sympathy strikes on 23 February 1917 (International Women's Day) that sparked the February Revolution. In the 1920s and 1930s, the Soviet government established factory crèches, opened technical training, and encouraged female employment in collective farms and heavy industries.
• The Liberals: Liberals were a political group in nineteenth-century Europe that sought religious tolerance, individual rights against arbitrary government, and an elected parliamentary system with an independent judiciary. However, they were not democrats; they opposed universal adult franchise, arguing that only propertied men should vote, while denying voting rights to women.
• Stalin's collectivisation programme: Launched in 1929 by Joseph Stalin to eliminate small-scale peasant holdings and modernize Soviet agriculture through mechanization. Peasants were forced into collective farms (kolkhoz), where land and tools were pooled and output shared. Peasants violently resisted by slaughtering one-third of their livestock; resisting farmers were arrested, exiled, or executed. The disruption led to a devastating famine between 1930 and 1933 in which over 4 million people perished. -
7. Locate these places on the World map given beside.
a) The country where the 1917 Revolution took place.
b) The country that had 'Marseillaise' as its war song.
c) The country where the Industrial Revolution first began in Europe.Item Ans a) The country where the 1917 Revolution took place. Russia (Russian Empire / USSR) b) The country that had 'Marseillaise' as its war song. France c) The country where the Industrial Revolution first began in Europe. Britain (England / United Kingdom)
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