Example Of Stalin's Propaganda example essay topic

In this essay I will be looking at sources A through I and determining for each source whether or not it agrees with the statement: "Throughout his rule of the USSR, Stalin retained the support of the Russian people" I will answer using the sources and my own knowledge. Source A totally agrees with the statement. It is written in the year Stalin died, by the American journalist Walter Duranty. He thought that Stalin was the man to get Russia back on its feet. He supports this argument with such sentences such as "Am I wrong in believing Stalin is the greatest living statesman?" he lists all of Stalin's good points, and achievements, such as the 5 year plans. This means that this source shows how popular Stalin was, even with people who aren't from Russia, and how famous he was worldwide.

The bad thing about this source is that it shows none of his bad points. This source was only 1 person's opinion of Stalin, and does not represent the whole of the United States opinion. Most Americans were anti communism, and hated Stalin, and as Duranty spent time in Russia, he was probably swayed by the cult of Stalin to be biased towards him. This shows that although Stalin had many supporters, he still had to rely on propaganda to make him as popular as he was. Source B is an example of this.

It is a painting of Stalin, standing with workers in front of a dam, which represents the 5-year plans. Stalin is talking to the workers, like he is their friend. It is painted by a Russian artist, and shows how Stalin would like himself to be portrayed. This backs up what Duranty said in source A, and shows Stalin in all his glory. However, again, it does not show Stalin's bad points. Stalin would vary rarely treat workers as if they were friends, he used to torture them to get them to work, he forced labour upon them.

He killed the workers he didn't like. As this source is blatant propaganda, it is one sided towards Stalin. It is proven that Stalin never had much contact with his workers, which helps us to prove that this is propaganda. It is by a soviet artist, who would have been influenced by the cult of Stalin to paint this one sided picture, and its main use is to show us how the cult of Stalin effected people. Source C could also be linked to source A, in the way that it supports communism. It is an extract from Stalin's biography, written by G F Alexandros, a Russian who was undoubtedly effected by the cult of Stalin.

We can see this in the first line of the extract: "Stalin is the genius, the leader and teacher... captain of army's... ". Stalin is described as the "Lenin of today", Lenin of course saving Russia. This source shows how Stalin was seen by his people, because it was written by a soviet under the influence of Stalin's propaganda, therefore only commenting on the good side of Stalin. This source does not give any bad points at all about Stalin, due to the propaganda used, and it also does not show any of his achievements. This may be because they felt that Stalin was so popular that he didn't need to list his achievements to be great.

This source was written close to the death of Stalin, and gives us no information about how people felt when Stalin first stepped up. Source E is an extract from a British newspaper, the guardian, the day after Stalin died. Even though most British people hated Stalin, the newspaper gives a fair view, and gives a reason from both points of view, but leans more towards Stalin's favour. It says that he transformed Russia from a backward country into a major world power, which is a magnificent achievement. The source may have been a bit biased towards Stalin because it was the day after he had died, and they felt sympathetic towards him, but this is highly unlikely. The only downside to the source is that it gives no clue whether Stalin's people supported him or not, but we could answer yes to this question because if British people are supporting him, surely his own country would be supporting him as well.

It gives his achievements and his downsides, which makes it an unbiased source, and this helps us understand that even though his fans knew that Stalin wasn't perfect, they were still willing to follow him. Source G is a photograph of Stalin's 70th birthday celebration, it shows millions of people gathering to celebrate Stalin. This is useful because it shows us how many people came to celebrate Stalin out of their own choice, without anyone forcing them too. This source has many disadvantages though, on the colour version of the picture, the crowd look quite false, and even if this is an unedited photo, it only shows 1 town, the celebrations might not have been as widespread as the source makes out. This source could be linked to source B, because it is another example of Stalin's propaganda, in this photo he has made himself look superior to the public. Looking at all the knowledge I have gained, it seems that Stalin did have lots of supporters, but whereas most of his support was gained through propaganda, the cult of Stalin, and tricks, only a small percentage were supporters because of his actions.

The evident truth about Stalin was that he was not a very nice person, who found himself to be above everyone else, he used to kill all his enemies, and labour his workers, as we will now find out. I will now look at all the sources that oppose Stalin. Source D is the first source that disagrees with him. It is a French poster, used to steer people away from the cult of Stalin. It pictures Stalin leaning against a building, with slaves at gunpoint, dragging huge blocks that are twice as tall as the slaves. This source shows Stalin as a violent dictator, who only did things when he could see what was in it for him.

The fact that we know about the purges and secret police supports this source. Stalin controlled most of his workers through forced labour, as this source suggests. Workers were also threatened by the fact that if they did not work to a good enough level they lost their homes, money, and everything else, so this source could be classed as true, but we are deterred by the fact that it is produced in France, so it is most likely to be biased, because the French government were scared of communism and wanted to deter it in as many ways as possible. The downside to this source is that it does not show the upsides of Stalin, and how he rewarded hard workers (stackanovites). This is an example of French propaganda, which is anti Stalin instead or for Stalin.

This source was written in Stalin's early rule, so they knew nothing about Stalin's success of the 5 year plans, which happened later on in his career. Source H is a speech written by a member of the communist party, 3 years after Stalin's death. It describes Stalin in the worst possible light, calling him brutal, violent, and distrustful. It talks about the way he used propaganda to his own advantage, which can be seen in the other sources.

All of the evidence against Stalin in this source, can be found in other sources, e.g. use of propaganda, the cult of Stalin. This source shows us that in his later years, Stalin did not have as much support as he had at the height of his career, and that even though he removed his opposition, he still had opposition within his own party. Although because a communist wrote this, it has little chance of being biased, they are more likely to tell the truth, but we must take in mind that this is only 1 persons opinion within the party, there would be people arguing against the person who wrote the speech. Source F is different to all the others, it is written by Stalin's own daughter. She is totally unbiased, and just describes how he used his power to get to the top. She describes his rule as a "bloodbath of absolute dictatorship" but she also says that he was neither insane nor mislead.

She says that he had the support of Russia, but only gained I through evil doings and propaganda. This is backed up by lots of the other sources, and things that Stalin did, such as the purges. Looking at all the sources and evidence I have looked at, I think that I can come to the conclusion that yes, throughout Stalin's dictatorship, he was widely supported, but most of this came from his propaganda and the cult of Stalin, and very few people were actually following Stalin for the achievements he did. We must also comment on the fact that we do not have any evidence to tell us whether or not the cult of Stalin continued after he died.