[Note for bibliographic reference: Melberg, Hans O. (1997), Reply to Egge's
Comments, http://www.oocities.org/hmelberg/papers/970104b.htm]
Interpreting History (Melberg's review of Egge)
Kommentarer (Egge's comments on the review- In Norwegian)
Reply to Comments (Melberg replies to Egge's comments)
Reply to Egge's Comments
by Hans O. Melberg
Egge rightly criticises me for calling his book "seriously flawed." The book
as a whole does not deserve that label. It is - as I also tried to say in the review - a
clear, well written, and useful overview of Russian history. However, I still maintain
that some of his interpretations are flawed.
1. Coup or Revolution
Egge's first argument is that I misunderstand him when I write that he wants to call the
events of October 1917 a revolution and not a coup. He tried, he writes, to avoid using both
terms in his book. This may be, but he explicitly discusses the issue in a paragraph on p.
103 in which he writes that "The October revolution is often characterized as a
Bolshevik coup but the justification for doing so is dubious." (my translation). It
is with this I disagree and not the relatively innocent and standard use of the phrase
"The October Revolution". Nor do we disagree on the facts - that a minority
group too power (see the rest of the quote on p. 103). Hence, although the discussion is
not a major theme in the book, I still believe that Egge indicates a position in the
"coup v. revolution" debate and this is a position with which I disagree.
Egge also argues that to call the events a coup is wrong because it conveys the
impression that the Bolsheviks were a small minority without mass support. I admit that
the Bolsheviks had some mass-support, but this is a question of degrees. How low
percentage of the population have to support a change of power before Egge is willing to
call it a coup? How large support does Egge believe the Bolsheviks had? What if this mass
support was gained by making false promises which the leaders did not intend to keep? Does
Egge believe the Bolsheviks used this tactic to gain support? These seems to me the
central questions which must be answered.
Egge then introduces a new argument: In a revolutionary situation - defined as a
situation in which constitutional rule is suspended - one cannot conduct a coup since
there is no legal regime to conduct a coup against. I have to admit I do not quite
understand this argument. The core meaning of a coup is that a minority takes power
against the wishes of a majority and this criteria does not presuppose the existence of a
constitutional regime. If we - as Egge - make the existence of a constitutional regime a
condition and if we - also as Egge - argue that this did not exist in Russia in October
1917 then we could not call it a coup even if a small group of army leaders had taken
power instead of the Bolsheviks. This seems counterintuitive and consequently I do not
agree with Egge's argument that a coup cannot be performed unless a constitutional regime
exists.
2. Ideology or Circumstances
In his reply Egge argues that the ideology of the Bolsheviks was ambiguous and that
circumstances determined which elements of the ideology that was emphasised. In this way
circumstances are more important than ideology in explaining the nature of the Communist
regime.
There is a great deal of truth to Egge's argument. For example, the concept of
"socialism in one country" is best explained as an adaptation of ideology to
circumstances. Nevertheless, I maintain the relative supremacy of ideology. First,
circumstances are not enough to explain the actions of the Bolsheviks. For example, the
attempt to eliminate money is best explained by the Bolshevik anti-capitalist ideology -
not circumstances. Second, there were limits to the ambiguity of Bolshevik ideology. A
good illustration of this is the non-ambiguous and explicit rejection of private ownership
of industry (the means of production). Hence, while I agree with Egge that this is a
question of degrees and that there are valid arguments on both sides, it is still my
impression that Egge places too much weight on circumstances and not enough on ideology.
One reason for the emphasis on ideology, is that some of the circumstances were not
exogenously caused. Assume that a party comes to power and tries to implement a programme
based on their ideology. This attempt gives rise to a new situation - a new set of
circumstances - to which they have to react. If this is the true story it would be wrong
to view the Bolsheviks as passive victims of unfavourable circumstances since they
themselves were the creators of these circumstances. Furthermore, it would be wrong to
argue that circumstances were more important than ideology since ideology would be a cause
of the circumstances.
Now, moving from the world of possibilities to what actually happened one would have to
admit that the Bolsheviks were faced with both exogenous and endogenous circumstances. The
Bolsheviks, for example, can hardly be blamed for the Polish invasion. On the other hand,
the civil war cannot be viewed as an unfortunate accident with which the Bolsheviks had to
cope. On the contrary, the aims and policies of the Bolsheviks - their ideology - was an
important cause of the civil war which, in turn, shaped the nature of the new regime. On
the question of whether the exogenous or the endogenous causes were most important in
shaping the Bolshevik regime, I have no firm opinion. But, I believe that some of the
circumstances were endogenously determined and for these circumstances it is deceptive to
focus exclusively on the middle step - the circumstances - in the causal chain.
3. Seriously Flawed and Unacademic?
I have already admitted that it was wrong of me to call the book as a whole
seriously flawed. This does mean that I have radically changed my opinion on whether I
will recommend the book or not. It is perfectly valid - and not unscholarly or unacademic
- to turn down a book because of disagreements on the arguments presented in the book.
These are scholarly debates as long as we use facts which are relevant to the truth-value
of the arguments. When one ceases to use these facts, and starts to arguments irrelevant
to the truth-value of a statement in order to throw doubt on it - such as the political
opinions of the person behind the argument - the debate becomes unscholarly.
It is in the light of the last paragraph that I object to Egge's statements that my
interpretation is too much influenced by "extreme right-wing Americans", that it
is "unacademic", too much influenced by my own political opinions, and in
disagreement with what other reviewers wrote. I prefer to keep the argument focused on the
issues - not on who or what inspires me to argue as I do, what other people say, or the
general political attitudes of the author. That was why I did not refer to Egge's leftist
political opinions in my review, nor did I think it was relevant that the book had
received acclaim from other reviewers. These facts are irrelevant to the truth-value of
the real issue: Which interpretation is most likely to be true given the facts we know.
Conclusion
Having admitted that my characterisation of Egge's book as "seriously flawed" is
exaggerated, it follows that I believe students can do far worse than reading his book.
However, I also believe it is possible to do better. For example, two good alternatives
are Mary McAuley's short book Soviet Politics 1917-91 and L. Kochan and R.
Abraham's The Making of Modern Russia (Middlesex: Penguin Books Ltd., 1983).
---x---
[Note for bibliographic reference: Melberg, Hans O. (1997), Reply to Egge's Comments,
http://www.oocities.org/hmelberg/papers/970104b.htm]
Interpreting History (Melberg's review of Egge)
Kommentarer (Egge's comments on the review- In Norwegian)
Reply to Comments (Melberg replies to Egge's comments)