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date: 02 July 2022

Abstract and Keywords

Two years after the revolution in Russia, the social revolution was once again fermenting on the ruins of the empires defeated in the war. The First World War was turning into a civil war and not only in countries defeated in the war. The year 1919 saw the spread of workers’ and soldiers’ councils and a series of anti-colonial revolts in the Middle East and Far East. As yet, the link between these and the October Revolution was largely symbolic, since the Communist International generally learned of events only after the fact even as it endeavoured to integrate them within a global theoretical framework. Nevertheless it felt as though revolution were spreading like a contagion, at the same time as a wave of repression no less generalized was building up. Opening in revolutionary struggle, the year 1919 would end in victory for counter-revolution.

Keywords: civil war, Communist International, council, counter-revolution, anti-colonial, First World War, imperialism, repression, October Revolution

Jean-François Fayet

Jean-François Fayet teaches in the Department of History in the University of Geneva. He has published extensively on the history of international communism and is author of Karl Radek (1885–1939). Biographie politique (Berne: Lang, 2004).

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