Moscow, Nauka Publ. 1984. 198 p.

The history of the Soviets, which are the political basis of our society and a powerful instrument of socialist construction, rightfully occupies one of the prominent places among the key problems of the national history of the era of socialism. Historians and lawyers are actively studying the process of formation of Soviets and their transformation into state authorities .1 The literature also reflects the history of the regional link of the Soviet system-regional associations that played a significant role in the victory of the Great October Socialist Revolution and the consolidation of its conquests. 2
In her new monograph, which is the first generalizing work on the history of regional councils of national districts of the country, Senior researcher of the Institute of History of the USSR of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, Candidate of Historical Sciences Z. L. Serebryakova develops the provisions and conclusions that she came to earlier as a result of studying the history of regional associations of I'll watch some of them-

1 Gorodetsky E. N. Rozhdenie Sovetskogo gosudarstva [The Birth of the Soviet State], Moscow, 1965; Morozov B. M. Partiya i Sovieti v Oktyabrskoy revolyutsii, Moscow, 1966; Andreev A.M. Soviets rabochikh i soldatskikh deputatov ne predlo Oktyabrya, Moscow, 1967; Soviets in the first year of the Proletarian Dictatorship. October 1917-November 1918. Moscow, 1967; Soviets for 50 years. Moscow, 1967; Gimpelson E. G. Iz istorii stroitelstva Sovetov. Moscow, 1967; Sovetskoe gosudarstvo - god pervyi. Moscow, 1973; Khesin S. S. Stanovlenie proletarskoi diktatury v Rossii. Moscow, 1975; Razgon A. I. VTSIK Sovetov v pervye mestyami diktatury proletariata [The Formation of the Proletarian Dictatorship in Russia]. Moscow, 1977; Istoriya natsionalno - gosudarstvennogo stroitel'stva v SSSR [History of National-State Construction in the USSR], Ed. 3-E. T. 1, Moscow, 1979; Krushanov A. I. Pobeda Sovetskoi vlasti na Dalnem Vostoke i v Zabaikalie (1917-April 1918). Vladivostok. 1983; and others.

2 Serebryakova Z. L. Regional associations of Soviets of Russia (March 1917-December 1918). Moscow, 1977.

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The author reproduces the conclusions and assessments of the first book in the reviewed monograph as a starting point for studying the process of formation and activity of Soviet associations of national regions of Russia, in particular, the conclusion that the territories united by regional Soviets basically corresponded to the territorial framework of regional organizations of the Bolsheviks, created in the illegal conditions of the party's work. Justifying this with facts from the history of the formation of regional Councils of national districts, Z. L. Serebryakova traces the interrelation of the activities of party and Soviet associations on a regional scale, the process of searching for the most appropriate organizational forms and methods of work of leading party and state bodies. At the heart of this relationship, the book emphasizes, was the leading role of the party in the struggle for the social liberation of workers of all nationalities and, consequently, in the creation and operation of the Soviets, which were the instrument of such liberation, as well as the fact that both the party itself and the Soviets were deeply international organizations in their essence.

As in the first book, in the new monograph Z. L. Serebryakova shows the positive role of regional associations of Soviets in guiding the construction of a new local government, in overcoming the centrifugal tendencies that emerged as a response to the policy pursued by the tsarist autocracy, and then by the bourgeois Provisional Government, trends that at this stage were fraught with danger disunion of the working people's forces and rampant anarcho-syndicalism.

Without limiting the characterization of associations of national regional Councils as active agents of the Soviet government's local policy, the author shows that they were at the same time a kind of intermediate form of building national statehood among the previously oppressed peoples of Russia. By studying this form, Z. L. Serebryakova makes a significant contribution to the reconstruction of the history of the initial stage of national and state construction in our country, fills with concrete historical material the conclusion of the Resolution of the Central Committee of the CPSU on the 60th anniversary of the formation of the USSR, that "being the first multinational Soviet state, the RSFSR was the prototype of the USSR" 3 . The formation of regional Soviets as organs of power in national regions and their acquisition of autonomy is rightly described in the book as one of the concrete embodiments of Lenin's program on the national question (p.157).

The leading role of V. I. Lenin, the Central Committee of the Bolshevik Party in national and state construction is convincingly and vividly shown in the monograph. At the same time, a large body of factual material, drawn from both published sources and the collections of central, republican, and regional party and state archives, reconstructs the picture of the selfless activity of local Bolshevik organizations aimed at turning the regional Councils of national regions of Russia into combat organs of the revolution. A lot of new information is given in the book about the leaders of regional councils, soldiers of the Lenin Guard Ya. Anvelt, V. Kingisepp, E. Peters, A. Myasnikov and others.

Thanks to the firm Bolshevik leadership, the author notes, the regional Soviets were able to resist the bourgeois nationalists who united in Moldova around the Sfatul Tsarii ,in Belarus-around the Belarusian Rada, in Estonia-around the Provisional Zemstvo Council of Estonia, in Latvia-around the so-called National Council, which, in addition to the Latvian bourgeoisie, was supported by the local baronial aristocracy large landowners ("gray barons"), as well as the kulak strata of the village, who created their own counter - revolutionary organization-the Peasant Union.

The monograph shows that, having won the sympathy of broad strata of the working people of the national regions, the regional Soviets led by the Bolsheviks were able to ensure a triumphant march of the socialist revolution where until recently the local bourgeois nationalists and the right - wing socialist parties and groups that supported them-the Belarusian Socialist Community, Estonian Trudoviks, Estonian, Latvian and other Social Revolutionaries and Mensheviks-considered themselves masters of the situation.

3 On the 60th anniversary of the Formation of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, Resolution of the Central Committee of the CPSU of February 19, 1982, Moscow, 1982, p. 4.

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In a relatively short period of time, the regional Soviets managed to launch active work not only to build a new government, attract workers and peasants to run the state, but also to implement the first revolutionary socio-economic transformations. Unfortunately, this aspect of the activities of regional Councils of national districts is not fully covered in the book. The author pays relatively much attention to the characterization of the activities of regional councils in the field of resolving the agrarian question, noting both strengths and weaknesses in the implementation of Lenin's Decree on Land in the territory of the Estonian Workers ' Commune, Latvia and partly Belarus (p. 104 - 106, 118 - 120, 128), but only casually mentions their work on the implementation of workers ' control, nationalization of banks, food supply. The fragmentary coverage of these issues does not allow us to reveal the correlation between the general and the special in the socio-economic transformations of Soviet power in the national regions of the country, and therefore, to show in full the creative nature of the practical activities of regional Councils, the versatility of their real contribution to the treasury of the historical experience of the Great October.

An interesting study in general is somewhat impoverished by the too concise description of its source base, especially those documents and materials that the author introduces into scientific circulation for the first time. The historiographical part of the introduction is also not entirely satisfactory - it is almost impossible to determine what exactly the author's numerous predecessors, researchers of history, did in the field of studying the initial stage of Soviet construction in the national regions of the country' The October Revolution in Latvia, Estonia, Belarus and Moldova and what problems remain unresolved. It would be useful to expand the scientific and reference apparatus of the book - to give a subject index and notes with brief characteristics of prominent party and state figures mentioned in the text.

These and other remarks do not call into question the main thing: while highlighting the origins of nation - state building in our country, Z. L. Serebryakova's monograph sheds new light on the complex and insufficiently studied issues of the formation of a single multinational Soviet state, on some aspects of the historical experience of solving the national question in the USSR. The publication of this monograph is a notable event in the historiography of the Great October.

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