Piers and Greg, remember that virtually EVERY freedom you have is as a direct result of the Russian revolution. There would have been no concessions to trades unionism at all but for the fear of revolution in the west, and the best you would have had now would be in a far- eastern style sweatshop. And grateful for it, at least you don't starve this week.

As for the horrors of the revolution, they weren't entirely caused by the Bolsheviks, were they? The Kerensky government was doomed from the moment they elected to continue the policies of the Czarist government, and continue the war. The Bolshevik/ Left Social Democrat alliance worked for the moment- but the exigencies of the civil war brought repression, after all, if you don't survive, there can't be any reform. That's not an excuse, it's just history.

Russia was a marginally- industrialised country, and subsequently, progressives were hoping that the economic development which Stalin promised (and delivered, at horrific cost) would bring about the circumstances in which a classically Marxist proletarian state could exist. Misguided, yes. But what better model did they have? Liberal socialism, with its history of beiing absorbed into token gestures? Anarcho-syndicalism? Mussolini's state was syndicalist. Or just let capitalism win, and hope for the best?