Joseph Stalin Leadership and the Machiavellian Principles
Joseph Stalin Leadership and the Machiavellian Principles
Joseph Stalin was born to peasant farmers in Gori, Georgia in 1879. Stalin was originally known as Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili and was the second leader of the Russian Soviet Union. His second name-Stalin-was coined during the Russian revolution originally as a nickname through the use of “stal,” which in Russian meant steel and “Lenin” (Spartacus Educational, 2011).” Joseph Stalin was known to have been referred to at least by several other names which were used in communication in his secret operatives, however; these are unknown. Stalin’s childhood is said to have been characterized with bitterness due to harshness and maltreatment from his father. Psycho-analytics claim that his vengeful nature and harsh spirit can be attributed to his early childhood mistreatment, which led to his resentment of anyone with power. Stalin’s path is contrary to her mother’s plan which involved making him a Russian Orthodox priest by taking him through seminary. However, whilst at the seminary Stalin became involved with the socialist movement that was growing at the moment and this earned Stalin an expulsion in 1899 (Rossiter, 2009). This led to his work in the underground political Caucasus, where he ardently followed the political ideologies set forth by Vladamir Lenin. These ideas were centered on strong revolutionary party leadership and centralism (Rossiter, 2009). The experience gained landed Stalin a useful position on the Bolshevik party led by Lenin, and which finally led to the revolution in 1917. Thereafter, Stalin was elected to the position of “General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union” in 1922. Stalin took his early years after the Lenin led revolution to build his post within the communist party (Spartacus Educational, 2011). After the death of Lenin in 1924 Stalin joined Zinoviev and Kamenev to oppose Trotsky (left winger) and Bukharin (right winger), but soon there after he joined Bukharin. They fought against Zinoviev, Trotsky and Kamenev. In 1928 Stalin reached the helm of his power and control over the party and nation. His power did not however come to full realization till the purges were accomplished between 1936 and 1938. The final rise to power was marked by the assassination of Trotsky that had been exiled to Mexico (Mawdsley, 2003).
Stalin had ruled with an iron-fist characterized with heavy purges of all that opposed or seemed to oppose his leadership. Stalin applied four major controls that helped him keep his grip on the leadership with greater firmness and these included the spreading of propaganda, purging of opponents, collectivization and His leadership was so stern and it was characterized by fear and strict adherence imposed by his secret police known as the NKVD (Mawdsley, 2003). Stalin used some of the major Machiavellian principles in his leadership with greater success. Perhaps the major Machiavellian principle used by Stalin was that of the necessity to get and retain good reputation amongst the citizenry whilst actually taking all steps necessary in doing whatever wrong that might be necessary in the situation at hand in order to retain power and rule. In this regard according to Machiavelli private morality depends on various factors such as personal character, divine approval or abstract duties; but in public only the blame and praise of other fellow humans matter. In line with this principle Stalin used purges conducted by the NKVD to exert his control, but since he knew this would taint his reputation he made a lot of propaganda as well as “show trials” in public to legitimize some of his murderous actions so as to prevent the public from revolting. Stalin initiated collectivization which he used to legitimize the purges of all those that seemed to oppose the principle of collectivization (Rossiter, 2009). Collectivization was a sign of generosity to the landless, but which did not go down well with the Kulaks who were the wealthy land owners that seemed to resist collectivization. As a result, Stalin decided to use force to eliminate them through the purges so that he could instill fear in them which would prevent their resistance from ever occurring. Therefore a leader should seem to appear generous, but while in the real sense they spend their money in a wise manner and treat their armies with cruelty. The leader is advised to act cunningly in a bid to cultivate a reputation of integrity. This Machiavellian principle identified the power of fear in leadership. Machiavelli stated that it would be desirable to be feared and loved by the subjects under him/her, but was quick to recognize that these two would not be attainable in the actual world and therefore stated that it would be far safer for the leader to be feared rather than loved. The principle of preferring to be feared is one of the most applied principles by Stalin’s police force which simply unleashed terror on citizens to create fear (Mawdsley, 2003).
Stalin was successful in retaining his leadership through extensive purges. The purges were his main elements of leadership. But it is good to note that these were not used on their own, but in combination with other factors such as the spread of propaganda and the making of public trials. The show trials are associated with NKVD because NKVD was actually responsible for the public trials. The public trials were used to give a false impression of transparency amongst the people and were thus used as form of legitimization of actions carried out by NKVD. The use of public trials was accompanied by the spread of propaganda which was meant to ensure that Stalin was not blamed. The show trials are also linked to collectivization in which all the resisting kulaks got purged. The propaganda was also linked to the making of Stalin’s name to appear clean and hence make him free of any blame from the evil happenings in the purging. Stalin pretended not to know what was going on during the purging events, but in the real sense he was fully aware of what was going on (Ulam, 2007). Therefore, with the collectivization as a political tactics Stalin was able to reward the landless and subtly woe them into participating in his course without complains and resistance. Of course Stalin was as cunning as a fox because he knew the poor peasants would be wooed into the collectivization because it was like some sort of salvation to their poor states. On the other hand he knew the wealthy land owners (Kulaks) would be defeated by the process because they were outnumbered. In engaging in collectivization he was adhering to the principle of Machiavellian explained under the quality of leadership as follows; “No matter what idealistic notions are adopted as principles of private morality… no guarantee that people will follow them… to achieve success in public life, the ruler must know precisely when …to do what no good person would ever do (Kemerling, 2002).” The propaganda spread was also linked to the purges and NKVD in that anyone that did not listen to the propaganda would also get purged. Therefore, people were supposed to listen and adhere to the propaganda and buy its content wholesale without any questions. The propaganda simply told the people that if they did not listen to Stalin’s propaganda then they would get purged. The propaganda was also linked in this maze to the economic policies and plans under Stalin’s economic plans in that people that did not meet their targets risked getting purged. Internal passports prevented people from leaving their work if at all they did not like the job, because they feared to be purged if they did not meet their targets.
Despite the fact that Stalin was able to follow most of Machiavellian rules, he deviated greatly on some Machiavellian principles. According to Machiavelli, a state is too complex and too big and the ruling intricacies cannot allow an individual to effectively rule on his own and therefore, there is a need for the leader to adopt some assistance(Kemerling, 2002). This assistance arises out of complexities within the state, and thus necessitates the use of advisors in establishing good ruling. Notably, Stalin did not make use of any advisors and many of his decisions were made in many cases in solitary. The independence of his decision-making may be portrayed by how even those close to him as aides got purged or mysteriously killed (Ulam, 2007). Stalin was a kind of paranoid individual that had least trust with anyone and never even trusted those close to him. His rule never made use of advisory services and when it did this was possibly in search for intelligence to conduct a certain act which many at times would involve purging people that seemed to be resistant elements in the society. The Machiavellian principles also recognized the hand of fortune and fate in society. According to the principle human beings cannot simply leave their lives in a manner that is swayed by the winds, and leaders are no exception and they should thus act on uncertain situations in order to take full responsibility of what is left after fate and fortune have taken their share. Stalin played along well with this principle and it can notably be seen that he did not want to live much to fate. He was what may be termed as a control addicted person that desired to have everything under him in total control. The purges are a great indicator of how he never wanted to leave anything to fate. The killing of all people that were either found to work against him or suspected to be against him were either purged of send to the Gulags where they would serve long sentences and finally die under hard work and labor (Spartacus Educational, 2011). Stalin did not hesitate to purge everyone that seemed to be a threat to him and this portrays how he desired so much to control the last bit of what fate would leave him. Perhaps the biggest fulfillment of Machiavellian principles by Stalin could be simply put as the total disregard of morality with regard to the exercise of leadership. There is no count of events under which Stalin is known to have acted morally for the sake of leadership. Instead his leadership survived on inflicting terror and fear (Kreis, 2009).
Despite the fact that Stalin’s era was characterized with terror, fear and purging, there were some advancements in life that were able to be achieved through the leadership of Stalin. Stalin generated 5-year economic plans with policies that would guide the Russian people towards a better and industrialized future. Stalin intended to modernize the manufacturing industry and strengthen the USSR industry (Shriberg & Shriberg, 2009). He also wanted to enhance collectivization and make the farming practice more modern. These plans offered the Russian people something to look up to and be positively expectant. The five-year roadmaps provided a blue print needed. As a result the Russian people were made optimistic as they anticipated proudly that they too would be able to match other nations that were actually on their brinks of poverty. The people spreading these propaganda actually attributed every gain made in their times to Stalin and therefore making him their hero. In the third phase of his plans Stalin ensured that items which people really desired such as radio were being made. The introduction of collectivization also proved to be beneficial when viewed from any perspective because it allowed plenty to reach those that did not have anything yet. Collectivization improved food supplies because food was being produced in plenty all over the nation (Shriberg & Shriberg, 2009). This was a good tool to help keep people under control because the country had sufficient food for the population. The sufficiency of food supply that lasted throughout Stalin’s leadership was attributed to his effort which may be well explained by the policy of collectivization. The policy of collectivization coupled with the control over work and restriction of movement by passes to avoid people’s escape from their duties and failure to fulfill their targets. Despite the abundance the only people that seemed to be unhappy about the collectivization despite its success were the Kulaks, but then the remaining kulaks had either been purged or sent to the Gulags where they would labor for a very long time (Kreis, 2009).
During the December of 1936 Stalin unveiled a new constitution for the Soviet Union. This activity was seen as one of his greatest efforts in the development and advancement of the Soviet Republic. The event was marked in history and Stalin was accorded the title Pravda. This literarily translated to; “genius of the new world, the wisest man of the epoch, the great leader of communism.” But contrastingly most western historians viewed the constitution has having been a meaningless document meant to spread and perpetuate his numerous propagandas (Shriberg & Shriberg, 2009). Other developments during the Stalin era included the forging of closer cooperation between the USSR and the West nations. This initial step saw the USSR participate in various global events such as the “World Disarmament Conference.” In 1933 relations between the USSR and the United States were diplomatically restored and finally in 1934 the USSR got into the League of Nations. In later years, that followed the Soviet Union got into better relations with international nations under the Stalin rule.In conclusion it can be stated that Stalin was a successful leader in enhancing his grip on leadership and making control according to the Machiavellian principles. However, his methods of exerting control were somewhat paranoid, weird, intolerant and unacceptable, because they led to lose of a lot innocent lives and a lot of injustices. Despite his failure in this respect, Stalin was able to steer the country towards its first bid for getting industrialized. He also managed to forge better international relationship between the Soviet Union and many other nations, especially; in the West.
References
Kemerling, G. (2002),. Machiavelli: Principality and Republic, retrieved on 29th May 2011 from http://www.philosophypages.com/hy/3v.htm
Kreis, S. (2009),. The age of totalitarianism: Stalin and Hitler, retrieved on 29th May 2011 from http://www.historyguide.org/europe/lecture10.html
Mawdsley, E. (2003),. The Stalin years: the Soviet Union 1929-1953, 2nd edition: Manchester University Press
Shriberg, D. and Shriberg, A. (2009),. Practicing Leadership Principles and Applications, 4th edition; John Wiley and Sons
Spartacus Educational (2011),. Stalin, retrieved on 29th May 2011 from http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/RUSstalin.htm
Rossiter, C. (2009),. How did Stalin become the leader of the Soviet Union, retrieved on 29th May 2011 from http://socyberty.com/history/how-did-stalin-become-the-leader-of-the-soviet-union/2/
Ulam, B. A. (2007),. Stalin: the man and his era, Tauris Parke Paperbacks
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