Despite its eventual failure, the Bolshevik experiment remains the sole example of revolutionary socialist rule. From 1917, the Bolsheviks confronted the fundamental questions of our time: how can a real alternative to capitalism be achieved? Can mass democracy triumph over bureaucracy? Nikolai Bukharin took a leading role in grappling with such problems. Sometimes brilliantly successful, at times mis-guided, Bukharin's career never failed to illuminate these issues. After Lenin's death, Bukharin was - with Trotsky and Stalin - one of the three key figures in the struggle for power and ideas in Russia. He was assassinated in 1928. This book challenges recent interpretations of Bukharin's legacy and brings to life a relatively neglected period of Russian history that began with the optimism of 1917 and ended with Stalin's final destruction of the revolution in 1929.