goals

• Communists


  Believed that education was important
• Lenin


  Believed that a high level of education, with basic literacy, was an essential part of building socialism
• Socialism


  • Required industrialisation
  • Required a well-educated workforce who could understand the complex process of industry
• Education


  Served the long-term goals of the revolution by laying the foundations for industrialisation
• Lunacharsky


  Believed that the primary goal of education was to allow the individual students to flourish
• Lunacharsky's belief


  The revolution should liberate the student, rather than education serving the goals of the revolution
• Questions raised about education

  • Should Communists continue with traditional forms of education or create a new kind of revolutionary education?
  • Should Communists work with educated people even though they were part of the original elite?
  • How should Communists educated the millions of workers with little to no formal education?
• Practical problems of organising education included:
• Practical problems of organising education

  • Low levels of literacy, only around 32% of the population could read and write by 1914
  • Educational inequalities, Russians tended to be better educated than non-Russian
  • Urban education > Rural education
• Practical problems and ideological debates were complicated by the notion that after 1918, Russia was in a state of transition rather than an actual socialist state
• Some Communists argued that in the short term, compromises were vital between socialist principles and the need to rebuild society after the Civil War