A-Infos (en) Britain, Aanarchist journal Direct Action #40 - history - Factory committees in the Russian Revolution

The idea of revolution in Russia had been growing since the general strike of 
textile workers that shook St. Petersburg in 1896. The Russian anarchists argued 
that Russia would not have to have a bourgeois revolution similar to those 
witnessed in Germany and France and that the way forward was the revolutionary 
general strike. Mass strikes continued throughout the next two decades up to the 
beginning of the First World War. ---- The repression in Russia and the growth 
of Zubatovian (state controlled) unions meant that independent mass workers 
organisations and trade unions which were common in Britain and Germany during 
the same period did not develop. In the revolution of 1905 the unrest was 
sparked and co-ordinated not by the political parties, but by factory committees 
elected directly in the workplace.

Strikes were called spontaneously and often spread beyond a single factory to 
become local or regional general strikes. This level of action proved its worth 
and workers began to elect delegates from local factory committees to 
co-ordinate action within the locality. These committees became the embryo from 
which would grow the Councils of Workers' Deputies, which were later to become 
known as the Soviets.

At the outbreak of the 1917 revolution factory committees sprung up and mass 
assemblies came to full maturity as many workers, instead of staying out on 
strike, took their workplace over and carried on producing for the community. 
They did not look to any central planning but began organising production and 
distribution themselves. The factory committees took responsibility for 
everything from production, distribution and the acquisition of raw materials to 
the payment of wages (or payment in kind) and the organisation of workers' 
militias. Anarcho-syndicalists were gaining more influence as they urged the 
development of these committees and assemblies in the direction of workers 
management over all industries.

Both the anarcho-syndicalists and the Bolsheviks successfully resisted attempts 
by the moderates to absorb the factory committees into the trade unions. 
Although the influence of the anarcho-syndicalists increased, and was 
disproportionate to their actual numbers, it was the Bolsheviks with their 
centralised organisation and leadership that gained the most ground. The factory 
committees had been initially rejected by the Bolsheviks but when Lenin returned 
to Russia in April 1917 he realised the mood and feeling was definitely 
libertarian and the Bolsheviks rallied behind the anarchistic slogans of 
'factories to the workers' and 'all power to the soviets'. At the 1918 All 
Russian Trade Union Convention Lenin declared that "the factory is a 
self-governing commune of producers and consumers". This was sheer opportunism 
in order to gain support until they were able to seize power and use the state 
to enforce their will on the committees and soviets.

Before the workers had time to establish a federation of producers and 
consumers, the Bolsheviks asserted central control over industry under the 
banner of 'war communism'. They stripped away piece by piece all expressions of 
workers management until the factory committees became nothing more than an 
appendage of the state.

Only in Ukraine did a sizeable free federation of soviets and committees appear. 
Even though Ukraine was signed over by Trotsky to Austria under the treaty of 
Brest-Litovsk a guerrilla army, organised by the anarchist Nestor Makhno, beat 
back the invaders. This enabled over two million workers to take part in the 
first test of libertarian communism through free soviets and factory committees 
under the direct management of the workers and the community. Initially the 
Bolsheviks allied themselves with Makhno in his fight against the Tsarist White 
Army but once the time was right Trotsky marched the Red army against Makhno to 
suppress the revolution and bring Ukraine under Bolshevik rule.

With the defeat of the revolution at the hands of the Bolsheviks, their 
implementation of the 'workers state' and dictatorship of the proletariat 
revealed the true face of bureaucratic despotism.

The factory committees during the Russian revolution showed but a glimpse of the 
ability of the working class to be masters of their own communities, workplaces 
and lives.
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