Antropologicheskij forum, 2019, no. 41

THE BOLSHEVIK PARTY MEETING AND THE REGULATION OF TIME IN ITS STRUCTURE: EVIDENCE FROM THE LENINGRAD RCP(b) ORGANISATION

Timofey Rakov
Independant researcher
St Petersburg, Russia
timofey.rakov()gmail.com

Abstract: The article is devoted to the analysis of the role of time regulation in the Bolshevik party in the 1920s. It is suggested that — along with the regulation of time during the campaign to rationalize labor — the Bolsheviks should have transferred such measures to their own party. Time control in the party is analyzed in three aspects: the “time budget” of an ordinary party member, time within party meetings and its influence on internal party discussions, and the representation of party debates over time. The regulation of time within the framework of discussions is treated as a political practice of the Bolsheviks, i.e. as certain actions that have their goal in the incarnation of a certain ideology. Such an approach, pointing to Louis Althusser’s thoughts on the correlation of practices and ideologies, suggests considering the practice at the level of the local party organization; the Leningrad branch, in this case. The main sources used in the article are the protocols and transcripts of the party meetings and conferences, the protocols of the Leningrad Provincial Control Commission, questionnaires on the survey of assignments of the party members, as well as newspaper publications on discussion meetings. The analysis conducted in the article makes it possible to suggest that the regulation of time during the political processes of the 1920s was a significant problem for party leaders. The party leaders struggled to completely control the time of the party members and its organization within party meetings and conferences — at least until the middle of the decade in question.

Keywords: time, practices, Bolshevism, party meeting, discussions, Leningrad.

To cite: Rakov T., ‘Bolshevistskoe partiynoe sobranie i regulirovanie vremeni v ego strukture: na primere Leningradskoy organizatsii RKP(b)’ [The Bolshevik Party Meeting and the Regulation of Time in Its Structure: Evidence from the Leningrad RCP(b) Organisation], Antropologicheskij forum, 2019, no. 41, pp. 55–71.

doi: 10.31250/1815-8870-2019-15-41-55-71

URL: http://anthropologie.kunstkamera.ru/files/pdf/041/rakov.pdf