The earliest known examples of workers' councils on a smaller scale occurred during the
Russian Revolution of 1905, including the
Revolution in the Kingdom of Poland (1905–1907), which spread throughout the lands of the
Russian Empire; early soviets were active particularly in
Central Russia and
Congress Poland, where workers took over factories, districts, and sometimes even entire towns or regions before the tsarist authorities reclaimed control. Near the end of the
First World War, soviet republics started appearing on a larger scale as short-lived communist revolutionary governments that were established in what had been the Russian Empire after the
October Revolution and under its influence. These states included some such as the
Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic and the
Latvian Socialist Soviet Republic which won independence from Russia during the
civil war period. Others such as the
Ukrainian Soviet Republic and the
Socialist Soviet Republic of Byelorussia later became
union republics of the Soviet Union and are now independent states. Still others such as the
Kuban Soviet Republic and the
Bukharan People's Soviet Republic were absorbed into other polities and no longer formally exist under those names. In the turmoil following World War I, the Russian example inspired the formation of Soviet republics in other areas of Europe including
Hungary,
Bavaria,
Slovakia and
Bremen. Soviets also appeared within towns throughout Poland, known as
rady delegatów robotniczych (councils of workers' delegates), mostly throughout 1918 and 1919. One year later a
Provisional Polish Revolutionary Committee was created under the patronage of Soviet Russia with the goal to establish a Soviet republic within
Poland (it was later dissolved following the
Red Army's defeat in the
Polish–Soviet War). Short-lived
Irish Soviets also briefly emerged during the
Irish War of Independence, most notably the
Limerick Soviet. Soviet republics, most notably the
Chinese Soviet Republic (Jiangxi Soviet), later appeared in China during the early stages of the
Chinese Civil War. Other than these cases, "soviet republic" typically refers to the administrative
republics of the Soviet Union. == List ==