Lower Classes Of Russia example essay topic

Though Stalinist Russia and Hitlerian Germany had different rhetoric, they were both totalitarian dictatorships that sought to attain total power for both leaders. Both evidenced a singleness of aim combined with complete tactical flexibility and shared a passion to dominate all around them. Appeal to the lowest classes ensured that the masses supported their rule, as both realised that one of the central ideas to attaining power was through the lower classes. Both used government to control and exercise power; Hitler, by legal ising his actions, and Stalin, by using force. Propaganda and secret police ensured that, if indoctrination failed, then terror would reign supreme, instilling fear into the people and ensuring their control. Part of elevating themselves to total power was their appeal to the lower classes.

Because lower and middle classes made up the majority of Germany, and basically all of Russia, they reached the highest positions by appealing to the lowest classes. Like Stalin, Hitler treated policies and tactics as matters, not of principle, but of expediency, the object of which was to gain support and win power. For example, the lower classes that had been absorbed into the Nazi party were seduced by the promise of the closing down of the big department stores and consumer co-operatives. This was an attractive promise to the lower class because they were the smaller competition to these big businesses and they would benefit economically by their elimination as rivals. However, Hitler had no intention of doing this, but used its promise to gain support from the lower classes. (Bullock, 1991) Stalin wooed the lower classes of Russia to gain power.

He broadened the base of the Communist Party by insisting it had to recruit 50 000 more workers. This helped public perception that the party embraced the proletariat. Stalin saw the support of the proletariat necessary because of the size of Russia's peasant population, which was around eighty percent of the whole population. Since the peasants lived in abject poverty, Stalin believed he could win them through promising economic and social reform through collectivisation.

Collectivisation was the conversion of the individual farms and strips of land owned by the peasants into large collective farms. Collectivisation was attractive to the peasants because it 'promised' to end the centuries old backwardness of Russia and turn it into a modern, industrialised society. (Bullock, 1991, p 303) By appealing to the lower classes, each man attained support of their totalitarian dictatorships, which thus allowed them to elevate their power. Both emphasised leadership as a means of national unification to establish their total control. Stalin created an ideology based on a perversion of communism. He preached 'Socialism in One Country', which meant that everybody had to work to ensure the victory of communism in Russia.

The building of 'Socialism in One Country', he preached, would enforce unity in Russia. But communism is about class conflict, and unifying people to one goal turned communism into nationalism, so this was Stalin's way of obtaining power, perverting communism so that the people turned to him, unified. (D'Encausse, 1981, p 12) Stalin took power by emphasising leadership to ensure the victory of the already established communist state. He saw his mission as ending the centuries old backwardness of Russia and turning a peasant society into a modern industrialised one. Hitlerian Germany was based on the Fuhrerprinzip, visualizing the concentration of power in the hands of a leader, unlimited by any kind of constitutional or parliamentary control, with authority to direct the state. 'The National Socialist party is Hitler and Hitler is the party.

The National Socialists believe in Hitler, who embodies their will. Therefore our conscience is clearly and exactly defined. Only what Adolf Hitler, our Fuhrer, commands, allows, or does not allow is our conscience' (Party doctrine sited in Hitler's War Aims; Rich, Norman, p 28) Nazi ideology was Hitler's ideology, and he manipulated and indoctrinated his followers to achieve his aims and beliefs. This is shown in Nazi rhetoric: "One nation, one people, one leader!" Both emphasised their leadership as a mean of national amalgamation to ensure their total power. Both.