The Right Opposition (Russian: Правая оппозиция, romanized: Pravaya oppozitsiya) or Right Tendency (Правый уклон, Praviy uklon) in the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) was a label formulated by Joseph Stalin in Autumn of 1928 for the opposition against certain measures included within the first five-year plan, an opposition which was led by Nikolai Bukharin, Alexei Rykov, Mikhail Tomsky, and their supporters within the Soviet Union that did not follow the so-called "general line of the party". It is also the name given to "right-wing" critics within the Communist movement internationally, particularly those who coalesced in the International Communist Opposition, regardless of whether they identified with Bukharin and Rykov.
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👉 Right Opposition in the context of Anti-Stalinist left
The anti-Stalinist left encompasses various kinds of left-wing political movements that oppose Joseph Stalin, Stalinism, neo-Stalinism and the system of governance that Stalin implemented as leader of the Soviet Union between 1924 and 1953. This term also refers to those that opposed Joseph Stalin and his leadership from within the Communist movement, such as Leon Trotsky and the party's Left Opposition.
In recent years, the term may also refer to left and centre-left wing opposition to dictatorship, cult of personality, totalitarianism and police states, all being features commonly attributed to Marxist-Leninist regimes that took inspiration from Stalinism such as the regimes of Kim Il Sung, Enver Hoxha and others, including in the former Eastern Bloc. Some of the notable movements within the anti-Stalinist left have been Trotskyism and Titoism, anarchism and libertarian socialism, left communism and libertarian Marxism, the Right Opposition within the Communist movement, Eurocommunism, ultra-leftism, democratic socialism and social democracy.
In this Dossier
Right Opposition in the context of Moscow trials
The Moscow trials were a series of show trials held by the Soviet Union between 1936 and 1938 at the instigation of Joseph Stalin. They were nominally directed against "Trotskyists" and members of the "Right Opposition" of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
- The "Case of the Trotskyite–Zinovievite Terrorist Center" (or Zinoviev–Kamenev Trial, also known as the 'Trial of the Sixteen', August 1936);
- The "Case of the Anti-Soviet Trotskyist Center" (or Pyatakov–Radek Trial, also known as the 'Trial of the Seventeen', January 1937); and
- The "Case of the Anti-Soviet 'Bloc of Rightists and Trotskyites'" (or the Bukharin–Rykov Trial, also known as the 'Trial of the Twenty-One', March 1938).
The defendants were Old Bolshevik Party leaders and top officials of the Soviet secret police. Most were charged under Article 58 of the RSFSR Penal Code with conspiring with imperialist powers to assassinate Stalin and other Soviet leaders, dismember the Soviet Union, and restore capitalism. Several prominent figures (such as Andrei Bubnov, Alexander Beloborodov, Nikolai Yezhov) were sentenced to death during the Stalin era outside these trials.
Right Opposition in the context of POUM
The Workers' Party of Marxist Unification (Spanish: Partido Obrero de Unificación Marxista, POUM; Catalan: Partit Obrer d'Unificació Marxista, POUM) was a Spanish communist party formed during the Second Republic and mainly active around the Spanish Civil War. It was formed by the fusion of the Trotskyist Communist Left of Spain (Izquierda Comunista de España, ICE) and the Workers and Peasants' Bloc (BOC, affiliated with the Right Opposition) against the will of Leon Trotsky, with whom the former broke.
Right Opposition in the context of Case of the Anti-Soviet "Bloc of Rights and Trotskyites"
The Case of the Anti-Soviet "Bloc of Rightists and Trotskyites" (or "Bloc of Rights and Trotskyites"; Russian: Процесс антисоветского «право-троцкистского блока»), also known as the Trial of the Twenty-One, was the last of the three public Moscow trials charging prominent Bolsheviks with espionage and treason. The Trial of the Twenty-One took place in Moscow in March 1938, towards the end of the Soviet Great Purge. The accused were tortured to extract confessions and publicly admitted their guilt during the show trial. Most of the accused, including Nikolai Bukharin, Alexei Rykov and Genrikh Yagoda, were convicted, and sentenced to death. All charges are considered fabricated except the against NKVD chief Genrikh Yagoda of poisoning Valerian Kuybyshev, Vyacheslav Menzhinsky, and Maxim Gorky; Yagoda might indeed have conducted the poisoning with the assistance of "Kremlin's doctors" Pletnyov and Lev Levin, but they did it on the orders from Stalin himself.