End of NEP and Start of Collectivisation Flashcards
(40 cards)
What was urban unemployment in 1922? 1929?
1922 - 160,000
1929 - 1,741,000
Were wages higher or lower than 1913 levels in 1926?
Still lower
When was rationing stopped for the workers? Where was it reintroduced in 1928?
1923
Reintroduced in Leingrad and Moscow in 1928
What measures were introduced against Nepmen/private traders in 1926? Which article of the criminal code made private traders liable to arrest and imprisonment?
- Tax introduced on “superprofits”
- High rail tariffs on private traders
- Three year prison sentence for “evil intentioned increases in price”
- Article 107 of the criminal code made private traders liable to arrest and imprisonment
Why was tax in kind changed to monetary tax payments for peasants in 1923?
To solve the scissor crisis - use the cash to artificially bring down the price of industrial goods
What proportion of farms by 1927 were collectivised? What measures had been introduced in 1925 to the benefit of the richer peasants?
1927 - 0.6% of farms collectivised 1925: - Allowed to rent and lease land - Allowed to hire labour - Reduced agricultural taxes for richer peasants
How much of the harvest was still cut by hand by 1928? What was the dominant farming method?
50% of harvest still cut by hand in 1928. Strip farming was the dominant method.
What was the GDP of Russia in 1928 compared to 1913? How did this compare to the rest of the world?
It was $900 per capita by 1928 which equalled the same level as 1913. The main other European countries and the USA had however managed to exceed their 1913 GDP levels.
How much grain had the government secured in December 1927 compared to the year previously despite a good harvest? What were the causes of this?
Only 50% of December 1926 levels.
Caused by the state lowering the price they were willing to pay for the grain and the shortage of goods for farmers to buy in the towns and cities (partly caused by lowering numbers of Nepmen following harsher regulation). This gave peasants few incentives to sell grain.
What did the State do to tempt farmers to sell their grain in 1928? Why was this ineffective?
They raised the price they were willing to pay for grain by 20%. However, private traders were still willing to pay peasants more than the state. The lack of industrial goods still prevailed - this meant the peasants still lacked an incentive to sell grain in the first place.
How did the grain crisis have an impact on industrial development?
It meant that grain could not be sold abroad to raise foreign capital so as to fund industrialisation in the USSR. Likewise, it meant that workers suffered food shortages, which shrunk their productivity.
What events abroad culminated to the war scare in the Soviet Union? Why did this prompt a questioning of the NEP?
1926:
- Germany joined the LON, meaning the USSR became even more isolated in Europe
- Marshal Pilsudski seized power in Poland in 1926. He was the person who led the Polish forces against the Red Army in the civil war and was strongly anti-Communist.
1926:
- Chinese Communists were defeated by the Kuomintang
- Britain broke off diplomatic relations with the USSR in 1927 after the MET police found incriminating evidence of the USSR working secretly to bring about a Marxist revolution.
NEP was thus questioned since it did not put the USSR in a strong enough economic position to sustain a war effort, both in terms of industrial and agricultural capacity.
What were the fundamental aims of collectivisation?
- Instill socialist ideals in the peasantry
- Increase state control of the countryside
- Increase grain production and ensure provision for the cities
- Modernise the peasantry
- Show off the merits of communism
- Also helped Stalin come to power against the rightest elements of the party
How many farmers were in collective farms by 1928? What was the target set by congress for 1933?
1928 - 2%
Target for 1933 was 20%
Which enemy within would collectivisation deal with?
Kulaks
How many communists were there in the peasant households/countryside?
Only 1 communist per 125 peasant housholds
What was the benefit of collectivised farms in comparison to strip farms?
They provided economies of scale, which allowed for larger grain production and the use of more modern farming techniques
What did the emergency measures of January 1928 mean?
Emergency measures meant that the state was allowed to take grain forcefully and some 100,000 party workers, factory workers and Komsomol members entered farms that summer to help with their harvest.
What was the Urals Siberian method and when was it approved by the Central Committee?
The use of force to encourage peasants to produce grain surpluses. It had been used in Siberia from 1918.
Approved by the CC in November 1928
What incentive was provided to peasants to expose Kulak families in the villages?
Peasants were to be given 25% of the confiscated grain if they denounced a kulak family
What occurred in November 1929 which accelerated the collectivisation drive?
The Central Committee agreed to speed up the process of collectivisation and sent 25,000 more factory workers into the villages to organise them into collective farms
What proportion of farms were collectivised between November 1929 and March 1930?
60%
What was set up to make recommendations about the Kulaks? What category system did they make up to deal with kulaks? How many Kulaks were affected by these measures? What proportion of them were transported according to L. Viola?
A separate Politburo committee created a three tier system:
- The most dangerous Kulaks were to be imprisoned or shot
- The dangerous Kulaks were to be transported to the North or beyond the Urals
- The least dangerous Kulaks were to be given marginal land outside the collective farms
Over 1 million Kulak families affected by these measures. 1/3 of them were probably transported according to L. Viola
Why did lots of non-Kulak families still get treated as Kulaks by collectivisation squads?
Since the collectivisation squads had quotas to fill but identifying Kulaks was extremely difficult in the countryside. Lots of the villagers didn’t consider the richer peasants to be Kulaks since they all worked together.
