PUBLIC LECTURE: Terrorizing Russia: From Revolutionary Tactics to State Terrorism 1850-1950

Abstract Terrorism is not a new phenomenon. The conscious use of violence for political ends was born in the French revolution, which gave it its name. Ever since 'le terreur' such political violence and the state's reactions to it played a major part in European history. Russia is a particularly interesting case for studying the impact of terrorism on a social and political order. Originally conceived of as a means to topple autocracy and bring about a popular revolution, terrorism instead lead to the rise of a police state in the second half of the nineteenth century. After the Bolshevik revolution, terror became a technique of state domination. Applied first to the perceived enemies of the revolution (who were presumed to to terrorists), terror eventually engulfed the new elite itself. This lecture charts the history of political violence in Russia between the middle of the nineteenth and the middle of the twentieth century as a means to introduce the lecture series as a whole.

Biographical note Mark Edele received his education at the Universities of Erlangen and Tübingen in Germany before moving on to a doctorate from the University of Chicago. He is a specialist in 20th century Russian and Soviet history. Currently he is working on a book on Second World War veterans in Soviet society between 1945 and 1995. Dr Edele teaches the history of nineteenth and twentieth century Europe in the School of Humanities at UWA.

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