Eri Zhdanov Research Paper

Andrei Zhdanov was born on the 26th of February, 1896 in Mariupol, in what is now southeastern Ukraine. His family was forced to travel throughout Russia in order to find work after his father died when Zhdanov was four years old. The family settled in the city of Tver, and Zhdanov began studying at a vocational school at the age of nine. Like many Russians he became interested in Bolshevik ideas while working in factories and began taking a role in political rallies in 1912 and by 1915 Zhdanov had joined the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party and sided with the Bolsheviks. Zhdanov enrolled in the Russian army in 1916 when he was twenty years old. He spent four months training in Tbilisi, Georgia and then was stationed to Shadrinsk where he showed himself to be a good leader …show more content…
Stalin made sure that Zhdanov’s work was recognized by people across the Soviet Union and Zhdanov used his ties to Stalin’s allies, which he formed during the Civil war, to protect himself. Like Zhdanov, much of the political power Soviet leaders had derived from personal bonds. During Zhdanov’s time in the region of Nizhny Novgorod it quickly became a leader in constructing heavy machinery and metal working factories. This quick change was achieved mainly to the detriment of the local peasantry. Zhdanov was not allowed to make too many mistakes as provincial leader or, as had happened to other regional leaders, his career or life may have ended abruptly. Zhdanov spoke at the All-Union Congress of Soviet Writers where he asked the authors to help “the cause of the people, the cause of Lenin and Stalin, the cause of Socialism." Overtime Zhdanov would develop this idea into party policy, which was called Socialist Realism or Zhdanovism and was exported to other communist countries like China and North Korea. Zhdanov would enforce this policy following the Second World War when he began purging artists who did not conform to his