The centre of this relatively more pluralistic form of Bolshevism was Moscow. The strength of the movement for Bolshevik pluralism, if we may use this term, reflected the city's distinctive social character, something that had become apparent in the late tsarist period. Moscow provided fertile soil for pluralistic Bolshevism, as opposed to the monist Leninism that provided the framework for the later Stalinist consolidation. Here opposition to the Bolshevik seizure of power was particularly strong, and a deep undercurrent of resistance persisted all the way into the 1920s. For our purposes, it was here also that the inner-party debates were not only pervasive, but also suggested an awareness of the dangers of trying to hold on to power in a society that had not yet 'matured' for socialism. The fundamental argument of the coalitionists and their successors was that although Russian society was backward, the more progressive elements could nevertheless be a partner in the struggle to achieve socialism.
In broader terms, throughout the Soviet period the tension between Moscow and what became Leningrad persisted. Party programmes alternated between a 'Moscow line', somewhat nativist and neo-popu- list, accompanied by stability in the state system (espoused by Nikolai Bukharin, Georgy Malenkov and Alexei Kosygin); and a 'Leningrad line', advocating a harsh revolutionary internationalism (whose advocates included Grigory Zinoviev, Andrei Zhdanov, Frol Kozlov and Grigory Romanov).1 It was the Moscow line that triumphed in Gorbachev's perestroika between 1985 and 1991. This was not simply the 'reform of communism', which suggests mainly an attempt to make the system work better, but a far more profound attempt to achieve the 'reform communism' that was espoused by some of the party reformers in the Civil War years and by the Prague reformers in 1968. Although the early oppositionists would not have dared to talk about a 'humane and democratic socialism', certainly not within earshot of Lenin, the struggle for pluralism within the revolution was a theme taken up by proponents of 'socialism with a human face' in the 1960s, the Euro- communists in the 1970s and by Gorbachev in the 1980s. Gorbachev appealed for a return to Leninist principles, but in fact, as his critics so vigorously pointed out to him, it was these 'Leningrad' principles that had facilitated the rise of Stalin. If he had been more sophisticated theoretically, he would have talked about a return to the latent pluralism within the Bolshevik party in the early years of Soviet power.
THE SPECIFICITY OF MOSCOW
In recent years there has been a spate of books describing the diversity of late tsarist society. These in particular focus on the development of liberalism and civil society, and thus reject the traditional idea that the autocracy was monolithic and effectively suppressed the development of a pluralistic public sphere. Indeed, the picture that overwhelmingly emerges is that late tsarist society was developing on 'Western' lines, with a vibrant environment for cultural and intellectual life, all ofwhich was cut short by the Bolsheviks in their first months in power.2 A notable example of this is Fedyashin's study of 'Liberals under Autocracy', an examination of the thick journal Herald of Europe (Vestnik Evropy), which gradually gained in stature from its foundation in 1866 until its peak in 1904, and continued to publish until its demise under the Bolsheviks in 1918. The journal was at the centre ofdebates over the potential of local government, notably in the form of the zemstvo assemblies introduced into the thirty-four provinces (guberniya) of old Russia in 1864 as part of the great liberal reforms of Alexander II, to foster participation and citizen development in Russia from the grass roots. In keeping with Alexander Solzhenitsyn's view that Russia needed to develop authentic forms of democracy, the zemstvo movement in this reading was a form of liberal praxis that did not borrow from the West.3
Numerous studies have demonstrated the extensive development of civil society before 1917. Joseph Bradley describes the development of various professional associations and philanthropic organisa- tions.4 The ten years from 1905 were marked by astonishing economic progress, with extensions to the railway system and the doubling of its traffic and revenue. Consumption statistics show great improvements in the standard of living, and the production of consumer goods was higher than in Germany. The industrial sector represented not so much an enclave, as is common in developing countries, but was organically linked to the rest of the economy through market and financial ties. By 1914 the vigorous social and economic developments of the past half century had closed the gap between Russia and the more developed countries and had elevated it to fifth place in the league of industrial powers. Above all, hegemonic strategies of rule were being devised that sought to bridge the gulf between state and society, the privileged and the outcast, with developments in the old capital ofMoscow standing in sharp contrast to the polarisation in St Petersburg.5 Moscow became a more inclusive city than Petersburg. In contrast to the northern capital, there was extensive development of public transport, social insurance and workers' housing.6 However, while socio-economic progress was encouraged the autocracy tried to retain its political pre-eminence, provoking multiple contradictions. These may well have been resolved organically, but the First World War in the end provoked a revolutionary breakdown.
There are numerous differences between Moscow and Petrograd. Moscow was far more based on native capital, which developed the textile industry, whereas the metallurgical industry in the northern capital relied on foreign capital, above all from France. Moscow was a city of the Old Believers, whereas St Petersburg was a city of the administrative classes and the ruling elite. Moscow was more 'peasant', yet this suggested deeper organic ties with its hinterland and the country as a whole, less receptive to the revolutionary socialism that in the end triumphed in the north. In short, when it came to Moscow, Antonio Gramsci's observation that in Russia civil society was 'primordial and gelatinous' applied with less force. As Gramsci puts it:
In Russia, the State was everything, civil society was primordial and
gelatinous; in the West, there was a proper relation between State
and civil society, and when the State trembled a sturdy structure of civil society was at once revealed. The State was only an outer ditch, behind which there stood a powerful system of fortresses and earthworks.7
What he called Jacobinism was able to impose itself on society with relative ease in Petrograd, but in Moscow there was spirited resistance from the ramparts of civil society against the imposition of a monist form of revolutionary power.
THE MULTIPLICITY OF RUSSIAN REVOLUTIONS
Georgy Plekhanov, the founder of the social democratic movement in Russia, condemned the development of what was to become democratic centralism in the Bolshevik party, and he denounced Lenin's seizure of power in October 1917. His most famous book, published in 1895, was called The Development of the Monist View of History, and defended the materialist conception of social development.8 In practice, although Plekhanov was a committed Marxist, he defended a pluralistic conception of politics, and it this tradition that inspired the opposition to Bolshevik monism.