LogFAQs > #941428221

The23rdMagus posted...

Or "I had power during this revolution - why should I, or my family/supporters/military, ever give it back to the people?"

Its not like Russia ever was or became democratic. The utter lack of social institutions means consolidating power is quick and relatively easy, and the pressure to do so in the face of a brutal civil war is great. At the time of the Russian revolution, the Paris Commune was the revolution everyone talked about, and they basically spent most of their brief existence hashing out a framework for government and holding elections. All their commitment to democracy got them was a visit from the freshly-consolidated forces of the 3rd Republic. There was a general feeling the Communards would have had better luck had they gone for the kill and hashed things out afterwards.

As for communism, there are a lot of different strains of communism, but 20th-century revolutions either intentionally patterned themselves after Russian Bolshevism/Stalinism or arose in areas without social institutions that could temper the impulse to consolidate power. Most on the left today consider those revolutions to be failures not worth replicating.