Workers' Opposition

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The Workers' Opposition was a faction of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union that emerged in 1920 as a response to the perceived over-bureaucratisation that was occurring in the Soviet Union. It was led by Alexander Shlyapnikov and consisted of trade union leaders and industrial administrators who had formerly been industrial workers. Alexandra Kollantai was the group's mentor and advocate. The Workers' Opposition advocated the role of unionized workers in directing the economy at a time when increasingly Soviet government organs were running industry by dictate and trying to exclude trade unions form a participatory role.

Specifically the Workers' Opposition demanded that trade unions direct the economy. Unionized workers (blue and white collar) would elect representatives to a vertical hierarchy of councils that would oversee the economy. At all levels, elected leaders would be responsible to those who had elected them and could be removed from below. The Workers' Opposition demanded that the Communist Party cease petty interference in the operations of trade unions and that trade unions should be reinforced with staff and supplies to allow them to carry out their work effectively. Leaders of the Workers' Opposition were not opposed to the employment of "bourgeois specialists" in the economy, but did oppose giving such individuals strong administrative powers, unchecked from below.

The Tenth Congress of the Communist Party, in 1921, condemned the Workers' Opposition for factionalism, but adopted some of its proposals, including conducting a purge of the Party and organizing better supply of workers, to improve workers' living conditions. Several leaders of the Workers' Opposition, including Shliapnikov, were elected to the Party Central Committee. Nevertheless, Party leaders undertook a campaign to subordinate trade unions to the Party.

Members of the former Workers' Opposition continued to advocate their views during the period of the New Economic Policy but increasingly became politically marginalized. Shliapnikov and his supporters conducted discussions with Gavril Myasnikov's Workers' Group, but unlike Myasnikov, were determined not to leave the ranks of the Communist Party.