Finnish labour leader who became the world’s first Social Democratic head of government and then joined the Red government
Born in Kannus in Central Ostrobothnia in 1873, he emigrated to America at 17, worked in the mines and joined the radical Western Federation of Miners. Back in Finland from 1900, he entered Parliament for the Social Democrats in 1907, chaired the Finnish Trade Union Federation in 1912–1917 and was Speaker in 1913. In 1917 he became vice-chairman of the Senate’s economic department, the world’s first social democratic prime minister. In the civil war he was commissar for supply in the People’s Delegation, signed the 1 March treaty with Soviet Russia and fled to Russia after the defeat. In 1919–1920 he advised the British-organised Murmansk Legion, for which the Communist Party of Finland sentenced him to death. From 1922 to 1949 he edited the social democratic paper Raivaaja in the United States, and the 1944 Lex Tokoi cleared him of the civil war charges.
Career timeline
1907–1918Social Democratic member of the Parliament of Finland
1912–1917Chairman of the Finnish Trade Union Federation
1913Speaker of the Parliament of Finland
1917Vice-chairman of the Senate’s economic department (head of government)
1918Commissar for supply, Finnish People’s Delegation
The Menshevik statistician who designed Gosplan's early control figures and balance method, leading voice of genetic planning
December 27, 1929, at the All-Union Conference of Marxist Agrarians. Stalin, from the rostrum, aimed directly at Groman's theory that 'the October Revolution gave the peasantry less than the February Revolution.' When a voice from the audience asked 'Who was it?' Stalin answered: 'It was Groman.' In that moment, genetic planning received its political death sentence.
Statistician and economist, born in Moscow to a German father and Russian mother. Joined the RSDLP in 1898 as a Menshevik, co-authoring the agrarian program; as head of the Penza statistical bureau he developed a multi-phase sampling method. After the February Revolution he chaired the Petrograd food-supply commission, and in 1921 joined Gosplan where he headed the Conjunctural Institute, designing the first Control Figures and the balance method. With Bazarov he championed the genetic planning approach; after Stalin's public condemnation he was arrested in 1930 and as lead defendant in the 1931 Menshevik Trial received ten years, dying in the Suzdal camp.
Career timeline
1894–1908Entered Moscow University; expelled for revolutionary activity; graduated externally 1908
1898–1905Joined RSDLP; stayed Menshevik after 2nd Congress; co-authored agrarian program; began statistical work in exile in Vyatka and Yenisei
1909–1914Headed Penza provincial statistical bureau; developed multi-phase sampling method for peasant household surveys
1917–1918After February Revolution: chairman of Petrograd Soviet food commission and Central Food Administration; after October: Northern Regional Food Administration head
1921–1926Headed Gosplan's Conjunctural Institute; designed first Control Figures and the balance method; formulated 'restorative growth' concept
1926–1929Chaired Gosplan agricultural section; with Bazarov championed genetic planning; publicly condemned by Stalin at All-Union Conference of Marxist Agrarians
1930–1940Arrested in 'Union Bureau of Mensheviks' case; 1931 trial: 10 years; died in Suzdal ITL 1940; rehabilitated 1991
A social democrat who changed course between revolution and economics
At the Northern Front, he reported to Kerensky the reality that soldiers no longer wanted the offensive.
Vladimir Voitinsky was a Russian revolutionary and economist who explored both the labor movement and theories of markets. After Bolshevik work during the 1905 Revolution and exile in Siberia, he moved toward the Mensheviks in 1917 and sought cooperation between the soviets and the Provisional Government. As commissar of the Northern Front, he helped prepare the June Offensive but then confronted soldiers exhausted by war and unwilling to obey orders, exposing the limits of revolutionary military authority. After October he lived in exile and became an international labor and economic researcher who argued for democratic social reform.
Career timeline
1905–1907Worked in the RSDLP Petersburg Committee and organized a council of the unemployed
1908–1912Arrested in Yekaterinoslav, sentenced to hard labor, and exiled to Siberia
1914–1916Worked with Siberian Zimmerwaldist social democrats
1917.04Member of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and editorial board of its newspaper
1917.06–10Commissar of the Northern Front, involved in June Offensive preparations and political work at the front
1918–1935Represented the Democratic Republic of Georgia, wrote for European socialist publications, and worked with the International Labour Organization
1935–1960Conducted economic and labor research for the U.S. Census Bureau, Social Security Committee, and other institutions
