A secondary question which can be ignored if people don't feel like answering; Trotsky was the co-leader of the Russian Revolution, so his historical analysis of it is undoubtedly biased (to his credit he acknowledges this in the first pages of the book) - but when I read it I found that he leaned on a wide variety of primary and secondary sources both supportive and opposed to the revolution, and refrained from writing anecdotally based on his own personal perspective. Does this book hold up, historiographically?
Not very true. While it was true that farmers and factory workers now had more representation and political democracy, many key aspects about the government were controlled by high ranking communists. It's important to remember the soviets were in a civil war, so having a leader or small group have a lot of power was viewed as a temporary thing, and many people were fine with it. However when the civil war ended, lennin died and Stalin took power, these "temporary" powers were made much more permanent
Not very true. While it was true that farmers and factory workers now had more representation and political democracy, many key aspects about the government were controlled by high ranking communists. It's important to remember the soviets were in a civil war, so having a leader or small group have a lot of power was viewed as a temporary thing, and many people were fine with it. However when the civil war ended, lennin died and Stalin took power, these "temporary" powers were made much more permanent