Soviet Question

The Soviet Question is a dispute amongst the British left-wing on whether the British left-wing should adopt and adhere to Russian-style Bolshevism, or to continue along an independent trajectory. On one side, supported by many members of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), advocates hold that it is necessary for the British socialist movement to adopt Bolshevist tendencies if revolutionary action is to succeed. On the other side, proponents of ideological independence hold that, while solidarity with the Russian Bolsheviks is necessary for victory, ideological homogeneity is not, and resultingly oppose any efforts by the CPGB and its allies to shift the rest of the movement towards a Russian ideological machine.

Origins
The conflict emerged during the Cardiff conference, as delegates flooded in.

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Cardiff Conference
Main article: Cardiff Conference

At the Cardiff Conference, delegates assembled to decide the future of their movement, called during the height of the civil war, and of their movement's strength, they gathered to discuss several pressing issues. Being the first to take the podium and address the thousands of delegates, R. Palme Dutt, a committed member of the CPGB and Bolshevik supporter, addressed the convention in an opening statement by saying how, the British revolutionaries would succeed only if they followed the model, the example, set by both Russia and France, which entailed the success of the revolution through the success of vanguard movements.

What followed was a general uproar from the independent-minded delegates at the convention, who coalesced behind several key figures, such as ILP member Philip Snowden, feminist Sylvia Pankhurst, Labour minister Arthur Henderson, the second of the three was nominated by the opposing delegates to speak on their behalf. Citing her experiences with Russia, including her correspondances with Lenin, and her visits to the country, she illustrated her harsh criticism of Russia and Bolshevism, citing the decline in standards of living in the country, as well as its decline into authoritarian tendencies as the reasons to oppose alliance and ideological solidariy with Russia.

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Supposed resolution
Following Dutt's flight to the Soviet Union, he called a second conference which decided firmly on supporting the Soviet line and that the former Cardiff Conference had been swung against them by counterrevolutionaries and reactionaries, hostile to the successes of the Soviet system. This resolution was not widely recognized outside of Russia, France, which had accepted numerous of the opposition delegates, declined to support the resolution and, many of the opposition delegates decried the resolution as being issued not by Britons, but by Russians.

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Decline the question
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