Worker-Bolshevik who demanded press freedom from Lenin, sparking the 'myasnikovshchina' polemic
'Seventeen, then. Too many. But there is no other way. Revolution is not a ball.' — Myasnikov, planning the execution of Mikhail Romanov, 1918.
A Russian revolutionary and Motovilikha metalworker. He joined the Bolsheviks in 1905 and as deputy chairman of the Perm Cheka organized the execution of Grand Duke Mikhail Romanov in 1918. After the Civil War he openly attacked party censorship, demanding press freedom 'from monarchists to anarchists inclusive', a challenge that provoked Lenin's direct rebuttal and was branded 'myasnikovshchina.' Expelled from the RCP(b) in 1922, he founded the Workers' Group. In French exile he published 'The Latest Deception,' theorizing the USSR as state capitalism. He returned in 1944, was arrested, and executed the following year.
Career Timeline
- 1905–1906Metalworker at Motovilikha arms plant; joined SRs then switched to RSDLP (Bolsheviks); combat-squad member
- 1906–1917Repeated arrests, escapes, and exile; Oryol Central Prison; freed by February Revolution
- 1917–1918Chairman of Motovilikha Soviet; VTsIK member; deputy chairman of Perm Cheka
- 1918–1920Organized execution of Grand Duke Mikhail; commissar 16th Division; chairman of Perm Gubernia Party Committee
- 1921–1923Founded Workers' Group; open polemic with Lenin over press freedom — 'myasnikovshchina'; expelled from RCP(b), arrested
- 1928–1944Fled via Iran and Turkey to France; wrote 'The Latest Deception,' theorizing the USSR as state capitalism
- 1944–1945Returned on Soviet embassy invitation; arrested immediately; executed 16 November 1945 (rehabilitated 25 December 2001)
Related historical events
- 1905–1907The Revolution of 1905Combat druzhina fighterIn 1905–1906 he fought as a member of Bolshevik armed druzhinas in Perm and Motovilikha, engaging in combat with tsarist police.
- 1918–1922The Civil War and Foreign InterventionDeputy head of the Cheka and involved in the execution of Grand Duke Mikhail
- 1921–1928The New Economic Policy (NEP)Workers' Opposition
The Workers' Group and 'Myasnikovshchina'
In May 1921, Myasnikov circulated a memorandum calling for press freedom for everyone 'from monarchists to anarchists inclusive,' arguing that the Bolsheviks must appear to the proletariat as a 'komyacheika' (party cell), not a 'komicheika' (party garrison). Lenin responded with a direct rebuttal, and the Central Committee condemned Myasnikov's views as 'incompatible with the interests of the party.' Nevertheless, the Motovilikha party organisation adopted his position, and the resulting polemic was branded 'myasnikovshchina.'
After his February 1922 expulsion from the RCP(b), Myasnikov, together with N. V. Kuznetsov and B. P. Moiseev, founded the Workers' Group of the Russian Communist Party. Its February 1923 manifesto demanded: election of workers' councils in all nationalised factories with participation in management; administration of industry by 'producers' soviets' elected at each workplace; freedom of expression for all manual workers; and abolition of the Council of People's Commissars, with its functions transferred to the All-Russian Central Executive Committee. The group warned that the NEP risked becoming a 'New Exploitation of the Proletariat' without workers' democracy, and it criticised both the Democratic Centralists (for concerning themselves only with intra-party democracy) and the Workers' Truth group (for tolerating capitalist restoration).
The group attracted roughly 300 members in Moscow alone and drew support from former adherents of the Workers' Opposition, it was among the signatories of the 'Letter of the Twenty-Two' to the Comintern in 1922 alongside Alexander Shlyapnikov and Alexandra Kollontai, though organisationally it remained distinct. During a wave of strikes in summer 1923 it planned a general strike, but in September the OGPU carried out mass arrests of its leading activists, effectively dismantling the group. Fragments continued underground, publishing a clandestine newspaper, The Workers' Way to Power, into the late 1920s. The Workers' Group stands as one of the earliest organised oppositions within the Soviet system to demand workers' democracy from inside the party; it later forged ties with the Communist Workers' Party of Germany (KAPD) and the Communist Workers' International.