Nikolai Bukharin

Nikolai Bukharin
Николай Бухарин
Bukharin in 1930
General Secretary of the Executive Committee of the Communist International
In office November 1926 – April 1929
Preceded by	Grigori Zinoviev
Succeeded by	Vyacheslav Molotov
Editor-in-chief of Pravda
In office November 1918 – April 1929
Preceded by	Joseph Stalin
Succeeded by	Mikhail Olminsky
Full member of the 13th, 14th, 15th Politburo
In office 2 June 1924 – 17 November 1929
Candidate member of the 8th, 9th, 10th, 11th, 12th Politburo
In office 8 March 1919 – 2 June 1924
Personal details
Born	Nikolai Ivanovich Bukharin (1888-10-09)9 October 1888 Moscow, Russian Empire
Died	15 March 1938(1938-03-15) (aged 49) Moscow, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union
Cause of death	Execution by firing squad
Resting place	Kommunarka shooting ground
Political party	RSDLP (Bolsheviks) (1906–1918) CPSU (1918–1937)
Spouses	Nadezhda Lukin Esfir' Gurvich Anna Larina
Children	2
Alma mater	Imperial Moscow University (1911)
Known for	Editor of Pravda and Izvestia author of The Politics and Economics of the Transition Period, Imperialism and World Economy co-author of The ABC of Communism principal framer of the Soviet Constitution of 1936

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Nikolai Ivanovich Bukharin (Russian: Николай Иванович Бухарин, pronounced [nʲɪkɐˈlaj ɪˈvanəvʲɪt͡ɕ bʊˈxarʲɪn]; 9 October [O.S. 27 September] 1888 – 15 March 1938) was a Russian revolutionary, Soviet politician, and Marxist theorist. A prolific author on economic theory, Bukharin was a prominent Bolshevik and was active in the leadership of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1917 until his purge in the 1930s.

Born in Moscow to two schoolteachers, Bukharin joined the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party in 1906. In 1910, he was arrested by tsarist authorities, but in 1911 escaped and fled abroad, where he worked with fellow exiles Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky and authored works of theory such as Imperialism and World Economy (1915). After the February Revolution of 1917, Bukharin returned to Moscow, where he became a leading figure in the party, and after the October Revolution became editor of its paper, Pravda. He gained a high profile as a Left Communist, a position which included, in opposition to Lenin, a continuation of Russia's involvement in World War I. During the Russian Civil War, Bukharin wrote works including Economics of the Transition Period (1920) and The ABC of Communism (also 1920; with Yevgeni Preobrazhensky).

Bukharin was initially a proponent of War Communism, but in 1921 supported the introduction of the New Economic Policy (NEP) and became its chief theorist and advocate, supporting the party leadership against Trotsky and the Left Opposition. By late 1924, this stance had positioned Bukharin favourably as Joseph Stalin's chief ally, with Bukharin soon elaborating Stalin's new theory and policy of "socialism in one country". From 1926 to 1929, Bukharin enjoyed power as General Secretary of the Comintern's executive committee. However, following Stalin's decision to proceed with agricultural collectivisation in the Great Break, Bukharin became the leader of the Right Opposition and was expelled from Pravda and the party leadership in 1929.

After a period in lower party positions, in 1934 Bukharin was reelected to the Central Committee and became editor of Izvestia. He became a principal architect of the 1936 Soviet constitution. In February 1937, during the Stalinist Great Purge, Bukharin was accused of treason and executed after a show trial in 1938.