People of the Revolution and the USSR
Political and party leadership
Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP)
Background: Russia
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GlossaryRussian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP)
- Pavel Borisovich Axelrod Павел Борисович Аксельрод Theorist of the mass workers' party: the argument that lost to Lenin's vanguard
- Georgi Valentinovich Plekhanov Георгий Валентинович Плеханов The father of Russian Marxism: against his own pupils’ revolution
- Alexander Nikolayevich Potresov Александр Николаевич Потресов One of the six who built Iskra: the Menshevik theorist who parted with Lenin
- Nadezhda Konstantinovna Krupskaya Надежда Константиновна Крупская She built the Soviet school and library system from the shadow of her husband
- Vladimir Ilyich Lenin Владимир Ильич Ленин The helmsman who changed course at every fork
- Leonid Borisovich Krasin Леонид Борисович Красин From revolutionary engineer to Soviet diplomatic architect, the only Bolshevik who could do business with Western capital
- Fyodor Ilyich Dan Фёдор Ильич Дан Menshevism's theoretical pillar who stood for democratic socialism against Lenin
- Alexandra Mikhailovna Kollontai Александра Михайловна Коллонтай The first woman cabinet minister, who made women's liberation the revolution's business
- Viktor Pavlovich Nogin Виктор Павлович Ногин First commissar to resign demanding a coalition, buried on Red Square
- Emelyan Mikhailovich Yaroslavsky Емельян Михайлович Ярославский The Party's Chief Atheist, Called 'the Soviet Priest'
- Vladimir Viktorovich Adoratsky Владимир Викторович Адоратский IMEL director and the first Marxist philosopher to publicly anoint Stalin as a theorist
- Serafima Ilyinichna Gopner Серафима Ильинична Гопнер First woman to lead the Ukrainian Bolshevik party; delegate to all seven Comintern congresses
- Platon Mikhailovich Kerzhentsev Платон Михайлович Керженцев Proletkult theorist who became architect of Stalin-era arts censorship
- Lev Borisovich Kamenev Лев Борисович Каменев The party’s licensed voice of caution: his warnings outlived him
- Olga Davidovna Kameneva Ольга Давыдовна Каменева Trotsky's sister and Kamenev's wife: the architect of Soviet cultural diplomacy with the West
- Alexander Konstantinovich Voronsky Александр Константинович Воронский Editor of Krasnaya Nov, Marxist critic who discovered Babel and Pasternak and led Pereval against RAPP
- Andrei Sergeyevich Bubnov Андрей Сергеевич Бубнов From October Revolution Politburo member to the Enlightenment Commissar who led the fight against illiteracy
- Yevgeni Alexeyevich Preobrazhensky Евгений Алексеевич Преображенский The theorist of primitive socialist accumulation
- Valerian Vladimirovich Kuibyshev Валериан Владимирович Куйбышев Planning official of the first Five-Year Plans
- Nikolai Ivanovich Bukharin Николай Иванович Бухарин The “favourite of the whole party,” killed in its name
- Grigory Yakovlevich Sokolnikov Григорий Яковлевич Сокольников The finance commissar of NEP stabilization
- Vyacheslav Mikhailovich Molotov Вячеслав Михайлович Молотов “Stone-arse”: the man who never changed his mind
- Leonid Petrovich Serebryakov Леонид Петрович Серебряков The Left Opposition secretary whom Lenin called a 'brilliant worker'