Social developments, 1917–85 Flashcards
(73 cards)
1
Q
What two principles did Lenin introduce to transform work through The Declaration of the Rights of Toiling
and Exploited People?
A
- The Declaration abolished the private ownership of land. Therefore capitalists could no longer make money simply by owning things.
- The Declaration introduced universal labour duty. This was designed ‘to eliminate the parasitical layers of society’ by ensuring that everybody worked and therefore capitalists could no longer simply live off the labour of others.
2
Q
How did War Communism use rationing?
A
- The widespread unemployment of early 1918 was ended by the introduction of compulsory labour. From September 1918 able-bodied men between 16 and 50 lost the right to refuse employment. People in work were issued a work card which entitled them to food rations.
- Rations were allocated according to occupation. The rationing system was based on class, so that working-class people received the highest rations, but people working in middle-class occupations such as medical doctors received less.
- At the height of the rationing system 36 products were rationed and there were 22 million people entitled to ration cards.
3
Q
What benefits did workers have during War Communism?
A
- Workers also had access to other benefits, at least in Moscow and Petrograd. For example, a work card entitled workers to travel on public transport. Communal dining halls were set up in factories to feed workers.
- The government claimed that 93 per cent of people living in Moscow in 1920 were regularly fed in communal dining halls. Other communal facilities such as laundries and crèches were also provided in urban centres, in part to help women work in factories.
4
Q
Why ws the system of compulsory work and government provision was unsuccessful?
A
- Compulsory labour proved unsustainable in the conditions of the Civil War. By July 1920 factories were beginning to close due to fuel shortages. The government responded by forcing unemployed people to search for fuel or join food detachments, groups of men organised in a similar way to the army who were responsible for searching villages for food.
- War Communism never provided more than 50 per cent of the food and fuel that people needed to live on. In the short term, people turned to the black market.
- In the longer term, workers fled the cities seeking work and food on farms. Between 1917 and 1921 the population of Petrograd dropped by 50 per cent. The total population of factory workers reduced by 25 per cent during the Civil War.
5
Q
Why did unemployment surge under the NEP?
A
The relationship between compulsory work and government benefits disappeared under the New Economic Policy. Lenin conceived the NEP as a return to state capitalism, with the goal of promoting economic growth.
- In 1921 and 1922 soldiers from the Red Army were demobilised and found it hard to get work.
- As War Communism ended, the government sacked around 225,000 administrators who had been employed administering the system.
- Additionally, funding for crèches was ended. These policies, and traditional sexism, meant that women were far more likely to be unemployed than men. Indeed, in 1922, 62.2 per cent of unemployed people in the Soviet Union’s towns and cities were women.
6
Q
What attempts were made during the 1920s to make sure workers benefited in the 1920s?
A
- The 1922 Labour Law gave unions the right to negotiate binding agreements about pay and working conditions with employers.
- Social insurance, which paid disability benefits, maternity benefits, unemployment benefits and medical benefits covered nine million workers.
- The government invested in education for urban workers and their families.
7
Q
Why did employement increase under Stalin?
A
- Rapid industrialisation led to full employment for men and women.
- Moreover, relatively well-paid jobs in the cities attracted peasants fleeing the horrors and poverty associated with Collectivisation. However, full employment did not lead to a rising standard of living.
8
Q
Why were standards of living low under Stalin?
A
- Safety was not a benefit that Stalin prioritised for his workers. Therefore working conditions deteriorated as a result of the Five-Year Plans. Speedy construction was more important to Stalin than clean and safe workplaces.
- Equally, miners worked in dangerous conditions as meeting production targets was more important than the health and safety of workers.
- Stalin also introduced harsh labour discipline: Lateness was criminalised, unions lost the right to negotiate with factory managers, damaging factory property was criminalised, strikes were banned.
- Stalin also introduced the ‘continuous work week’. Workers still received one day off a week, but it changed from week to week.
9
Q
How did the Five-Year Plans lead to improved employement benefits?
A
- Workers were entitled to food rations.
- By 1933 most Soviet citizens had access to electricity.
- During the 1930s, 30,000 km of railways were built, increasing access to transport. Passenger traffic increased by 400 per cent in the 1930s.
- The Moscow Metro opened in the 1930s, providing underground transport to the population of the capital.
- There was a significant increase in healthcare provision, including mass vaccination campaigns dealing with smallpox, diphtheria, malaria and typhoid.
- Factory and farm canteens provided meals for workers.
10
Q
Why did some citizens benefit more than others during the 1930s (employement)?
A
- Peasants benefited much less than workers. For example, they were not entitled to rations, and food was much scarcer on farms than it was in cities as the government seized the vast majority of farm production.
- Soviet healthcare operated a **‘Party first’ **policy, where Party members were guaranteed vaccines and other workers could queue for any medicine that remained.
- For example, in Dnepropetrovsk, a city in the Ukraine, all Party officials were vaccinated against typhus, and yet there were 10,000 cases of malaria among the working population in 1932 and 26,000 in 1933.
11
Q
How much did the industrial workforce increase after WW2?
A
- From 8 million to 12.2 million between 1945 and 1950 largely as a result of returning soldiers.
12
Q
Why did food shortages have a significant impact on the benefits workers receive? (1945–53)
A
- Eating in communal canteens cost workers between 250 and 300 roubles a month in 1947, about half of a worker’s monthly wages.
- Workers under 18 were entitled to three subsidised meals a day in factory or farm canteens. However, the subsidies only covered 2.3 kg of meat and six eggs a month, and most young workers could not afford to pay for the meals.
- As a result there was a marked decline in communal eating following the war.
13
Q
How did healthcare improve significantly from 1940?
A
- Infant mortality declined by 50 per cent between 1940 and 1950.
- The number of medical doctors increased by two-thirds between 1947 and 1952.
- Vaccines for common diseases such as typhus and malaria were made universally available from 1947. Malaria declined radically from 1949 onwards.
14
Q
How did health of the Soviet people decline from 1940?
A
- The planned economy struggled to produce simple things like soap, warm clothing and shoes, which led to greater health problems.
- Food was a major problem. In order to make up for shortages, work canteens used rotten food, animal feed and other products that were unfit for human consumption. This led to illness.
- Sanitation in factories and farms was often inadequate, leading to lice infestations and outbreaks of dysentery and vomiting.
- Hygiene education was poor. It was not until 1947 that there was a publicity campaign encouraging workers to ‘use the toilet in a civilised fashion’ and wash their hands after using toilets.
15
Q
How was property redistributed between 1918-28?
A
- From the beginning of 1918 working people in cities had forcibly taken property away from aristocrats and the middle class.
- Under the NEP between 60 and 80 per cent of urban housing was denationalised. However, after Lenin’s death there were fresh attempts to redistribute housing. In 1923–24 large town houses were ‘socialised’.
- Experiments with rent-free housing came to an end
in 1921 when rent was reintroduced. Under the conditions of the NEP 89 per cent of house building was undertaken by private companies.
16
Q
What were Kommunalka?
A
- In existing cities Soviet authorities divided buildings into small kommunalka (communal apartments). By 1940 the average kommunalka was 4 square metres. Often buildings were divided up into barely useable spaces.
- The government also failed to invest in sewerage or communal facilities. For example, bathhouses were scarce. The 650,000 people in the Liubertsy district of Moscow, for example, did not have a single bathhouse.
- Coal sheds and under-stairs cupboards were converted into accommodation. In one case in Moscow a family of six lived in an under-stairs cupboard.
17
Q
What were factory towns?
A
- New buildings were constructed under Stalin to support the new factory towns like Magnitogorsk. Accommodation in the new factory towns was often inferior to the kommunalka.
- The best of these were built of timber and insulated with straw. They did not have running water or bathrooms. New factory towns also lacked other basic necessities, such as paved streets and electric lights.
18
Q
Why did WW2 worsen housing?
A
- Approximately one-third of urban housing was damaged or destroyed between 1941 and 1945. However, Stalin continued to prioritise industrial buildings over housing.
- By 1947 the average worker in a kommunalka had four square metres of space, and the average worker living in a dormitory had three square metres.
- All kinds of furniture were scarce. There was one table between every 10 workers, one wardrobe for every 27 workers and one wash basin for every 70 people.
- House building was not a major priority under the Fourth Five-Year Plan (1945–50). Budgets were small, and management inefficient.
19
Q
What was Khrushchev, socialism and sausage?
A
- Khrushchev summarised his approach to socialist economics and politics with the phrase ‘What sort of Communism is it that cannot produce sausage?’
- Communism, for Khrushchev, implied a better standard of living for working people. Therefore Communism was impossible without a plentiful supply of consumer goods and food.
- This focus on plenty was evident in his Virgin Lands Scheme and his policy of increasing the production of consumer goods. His welfare and housing policies also reflected this commitment.
20
Q
What were the results of Khrushchev’s investement in healthcare?
A
- The Soviet healthcare budget more than doubled in Khrushchev’s first years, from 21.4 billion roubles in 1950 to 44.0 billion roubles in 1959.
- Soviet health greatly improved, particularly in the countryside. Death rates and infant mortality rates both dropped.
- Major reforms introduced in 1961 improved social benefits significantly. New laws introduced:
● free lunches in schools, offices and factories
● free public transport
● full pensions and healthcare rights for farmers.
21
Q
What was Khrushchev’s policies on housing?
A
- First, Khrushchev ordered a halt to new government and communal buildings.
- Secondly, he invested in new materials and techniques in order to solve the problem of housing. He argued that cheap mass housing was necessary in the short term, and that in the 1980s these houses could be replaced by more sophisticated housing.
- The result was a new kind of low-cost housing block nicknamed Khrushchyovka.
- Khrushchev ordered architects to abandon grand Stalinist architecture - the result was the K-7 apartment block, which could be constructed quickly and easily from large prefabricate concrete panels and standardised windows and doors, rather than being built slowly from brick.
22
Q
What was the ‘Social contract’ by Brezhnev?
A
In essence Brezhnev’s government promised a rising standard of living and greater social benefits in return for obedience and conformity. The government guaranteed:
- job security through guaranteed full employment
- low prices for essential goods
- a thriving second economy, free of government
interference
- social benefits such as free healthcare
- some social mobility.
23
Q
How were standards of living under Brezhnev?
A
- Under Brezhnev standards of living increased significantly. Social benefits included subsidised rent, and utilities such as electricity and water were provided practically free of charge.
- The government also provided healthcare and pensions. Indeed, spending on health and pensions grew by between four and five per cent a year under Brezhnev. From 1970 subsidies extended to holidays.
24
Q
How did Brezhnev’s ‘social contract’ lead to stagnation?
A
Brezhnev’s refusal to tackle economic and social problems led to a re-emergence of old problems.
- Estimates suggest that in the 1970s there was hidden unemployment of around 20 per cent.
- At the same time there were serious labour shortages. In the late 1970s there were at least 1 million vacancies in Soviet industry that went unfilled.
- Soviet health declined. Infant mortality rates increased from three to seven per cent in the 1970s while life expectancy declined from 68 to 64 years for men in the same period. Alcoholism was one of the main causes.
25
How did women play a supporting role between 1917–40?
- One of the most famous statues that symbolised the Soviet Union under Stalin was the **‘Worker and Kolkhoz Woman’ (1937)**. Soviet propaganda posters of this period often contain a male industrial worker and a female peasant representing the whole nation. The distinction between the two types of worker emphasises a difference in role between men and women.
- Industrial workers played the **leading and decisive role**, whereas peasants played a **supporting role**. By routinely depicting men as industrial workers and women as peasants, the Soviet government believed that men played the primary role in society.
- In that sense, Soviet iconography indicates that attitudes to women **changed little** in the first few decades after the revolution.
26
How were women feautured in Soviet propaganda during the Second World War?
- The poster **‘The Motherland is Calling’** presented a woman as the symbol of the Russian nation and celebrated the vital work of women during the war.
- However, Soviet propaganda still presented women as **vulnerable and in need of male protection** during the war.
- For example, in 1942 Pravda media published a series of explicit pictures of **Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya (widely known as ‘Tanya’)**, an 18-year-old woman who was enslaved, tortured, mutilated and hanged by German soldiers.
- Soviet propaganda linked defending the motherland with defending Soviet women regularly in this period.
27
How were women presented after the Second World War?
- **Devushkivoiny (girl-warriors) and frontovichki (women who served on the front line)** were a feature of top level speeches, including **Khrushchev’s Secret Speech, and of Soviet war films** all the way through to the 1980s.
- Additionally, in 1963 Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman in space and the Soviet Union’s new woman hero. According to the head of the Soviet Space Programme she was nothing less than **‘Yuri Gagarin in a skirt’**.
28
How did Soviet propaganda towards women change under Brezhnev?
- Propaganda in the late 1960s and early 1970s emphasised that a true Soviet woman should be an **exemplary worker and caring wife and mother**.
- Falling birth rates led to a campaign encouraging women to have babies. Brezhnev’s **pronatal campaign** emphasised **‘natural differences’** between the sexes, stressing women’s ‘natural’ ability to nurture and ‘natural’ need for a strong man.
29
How did women work during the Civil War under Lenin?
- During the Civil War, **Zhenotdel – the women’s department of the Communist Party** – recruited women from the towns to fill jobs in nursing and food distribution.
- However when the Civil War ended, women who had been working in industry were **sacked** so that men could take the industrial jobs.
30
What were the employement oppurtunities for women under the NEP like/
Under the NEP opportunities for women in factories were limited. **Female prostitution** was also widespread, as it was legal and one way of making money. During the 1920s, it is estimated that **39 per cent of urban men** used prostitutes, indicating that it was a large market.
31
How did the Five-Year Plans affect women's employement oppurtunities?
- Women joined the industrial labour force in large numbers due to the demands of the Five-Year Plans. In 1928, the last year of the NEP, only **3 million women** worked in Soviet industry. By 1940 that figure had leapt to **13 million**.
- By 1940, **41 per cent of workers** in heavy
industry were women.
- Soviet authorities recognised the importance of women in industry and therefore allocated an increasing number of places in higher or technical education to women: from **20 per cent in 1929 to 40 per cent in 1940**.
- Women doing the same jobs as men were only paid **60–65 per cent of men’s wages**.
- Equally, women were subjected to **verbal and physical** abuse in factories.
32
What new trends developed in terms of women working in the cities after WW2?
During the 1960s, around **45 per cent of industrial jobs** went to women. However, women tended to be restricted to:
- Production line work in **light industry**, which was
intensive but required low levels of skill, such as textile
production.
- Heavy manual labour, which was also **low skilled**.
- Under Stalin, women tended to do all kinds of factory work, but be **paid less**. After the war, women tended to be employed in **low-skill sectors of industry**, whereas men were employed in high-skill sectors.
- In the mid-1960s, **74 per cent of people** employed in clerical positions in health services and education were women.
33
What was the BAM recruitment campaign under Brezhnev?
- In 1974, Brezhnev initiated the construction of the Baikal–Amur Mainline (BAM), a 4324-kilometre rail line across the north of the Soviet Union.
- The campaign stressed that building the BAM was an opportunity for women to gain **true liberation through work** and establishing new homes in the north of the country.
- Bamovkas were expected to preserve their femininity by being caring, wise and maintaining, what BAM adverts called, their **‘delicate female features’**.
- In many ways the BAM recruitment campaign exemplified the Soviet attitude to urban women: they were expected to be independent and equal, but in a way that **served the interests of men**.
34
How educated were women in the 1960s?
- By the 1960s women made up **half of the Soviet Union’s graduates**. As a result of women’s education, by the 1970s women dominated certain professions. By 1985 around **70 per cent of medical doctors** were women, about **75 per cent of employees in universities** were women and around **65 per cent of people employed in art and culture** were women.
- Significantly, pay scales in these **‘feminised’** industries were lower than in factory management, which was dominated by men.
35
What was a 'triple shift' performed by women in agriculture?
- They provided agricultural labour on farms, they were responsible for household chores and they were often engaged in handicrafts to supplement the family income.
- Some women on collective farms achieved a high social status. Specifically, female tractor drivers could earn a relatively high wage. However, female tractor drivers made up less than 0.5 per cent of the total rural female population.
36
What were the oppurtunities for women like during the Virgin Lands scheme?
- Women in the Virgin Lands tended to do the lowest paid and most demanding jobs. For example, of the **6400 women** recruited in August 1958, less than **450 found work in well-paid** professional jobs.
- Few women from cities stayed in the Virgin Lands long.
- Female farm workers in the Virgin Lands were often subject to **sexual abuse and rape**. Although there are no exact figures, apparently sexual violence was common.
37
How were womens employement oppurtunities in farming between 1970s and 1980s?
- By 1970, **72 per cent of the lowest paid** Soviet farmers were women. Professional opportunities also reflected the general prejudice that women played a nurturing role rather than a leadership role.
- By 1980, 80 per cent of teachers in rural schools were women, whereas only 2 per cent of farm managers were women.
38
What roles did women have in the military force?
- In 1941, fighting was still considered a man’s job and women who tried to enlist were turned away. However, by 1945, **800,000 women** had served in combat roles.
- One female squadron were nicknamed the **‘Night Witches'** due to their deadly skill.
- However, after the war many male soldiers went on to have long careers in the military. Women, by contrast, were **demobilised and denied entry** to Soviet military academies.
39
What roles did women have in the party during the Civil War and after?
- During the Civil War, female Party members tended to work in the Commissariat of Social Welfare, the Commissariat of Health or the Commissariat of Education, whereas male Party members worked in government departments dealing with the economy or the military.
- Generally, in the first ten years of communist rule, female participation in politics stagnated. Around **10 per cent of Party members in 1918 were women; by 1928 that figure was 12 per cent, only a small increase**.
40
How were female Party members expected to behave during the 1930s?
- Female Party members were expected to play a homemaking role in the 1930s.
- Female Party members who married were expected to give up work and join the **obshchesttvennitsa** movement: the **‘movement of wife activists’**.
41
What roles did women play in the party from 1950s?
- From 1953, women played a slightly larger role in Soviet politics. However, as in the 1920s, women were expected to contribute to political work that concerned health, social services and education, reflecting their **‘natural’ role as nurturers**.
- Women played a significant role in **local soviets**. However, soviets played a very small social role, and in the most senior parts of the Soviet system, women never made up more than **10 per cent of deputies**.
42
What did Alexandra Kollontai believe in?
- Alexandra Kollontai believed that the family was an oppressive social organisation. She advocated replacing the family with communal living and **monogamous marriage with free love**.
43
What steps were taken to reform the traditional family and liberate women after the revolution?
- **Education**: Zhenotdel worked with the Commissariat of Education to introduce **co-education**. They also established women’s reading rooms in urban centres where women could study.
- **Legal rights**: Zhenotdel collaborated with the Commissariat of Justice to enshrine women’s rights in law. From 1919 women were given a legal right to equal pay for **equal work, and equal voting rights**.
- **Reproductive rights**: The Soviet Union was the first country to introduce a legal right to abortion on demand. **Contraception** was also legal during the 1920s.
- **Marital rights**: During the 1920s ‘postcard divorce’ was available to men and women.
- **Sexual rights**: Lesbianism was not criminalised before the revolution and was never regarded as a criminal offence in the Soviet Union.
44
Why did early policies to liberate women fail?
- Legal and political equality was largely meaningless because democracy was suspended in mid-1918 and effectively **abolished in 1921**.
- Equally, men made use of the new divorce rights in order to **divorce women** soon after they became pregnant.
- Zhenotdel was also unwilling to help women who were victims of **sexual harassment**. Indeed, Soviet law did not recognise sexual harassment as a crime.
- Finally, under the NEP the government did not fund **crèches or day care facilities**. Groups of children who had lost their parents in the Civil War or who had been abandoned due to family breakup lived through petty crime.
45
What was the Great Retreat, 1936–53?
During the mid-1930s, government policy towards the
family became much more conservative. Stalin’s key aim was to **increase birth rates and cut divorce rates**. To achieve this, significant legal changes were introduced in 1936:
- **Abortion was criminalised** unless the life of the pregnant woman was in danger.
- **Contraception was banned**.
- **Male homosexuality was criminalised**.
- Lesbianism was treated as a **‘disease’**.
- Sex outside of marriage was **stigmatised**. Collective farm managers carried out **‘medical virginity checks’** on young women to enforce sexual abstinence.
- Divorce was made **expensive** and difficult to obtain.
46
How were women and the family treated between 1953–85?
- Generally, Khrushchev wanted women to continue to perform their **traditional roles** as wives and mothers, but he wanted to make these roles easier.
- By 1956 there were several national women’s magazines including **Woman Worker, Peasant Woman, Women of the World, and Soviet Woman**. These magazines carried articles by women describing their lives and exposing the inequalities that persisted in Soviet society.
47
What policies did Khrushchev introduce to make family life easier for married and unmarried women?
48
How did Khrushchev aim to improve women's rights?
- Khrushchev focused on women’s rights in the context of **traditional families**. Generally, Khrushchev wanted women to continue to perform their traditional roles as wives and mothers, but he wanted to make these roles easier.
- By 1956 there were several national women’s magazines including **Woman Worker, Peasant Woman, Women of the World, and Soviet Woman**. These magazines carried articles by women describing their lives and exposing the inequalities that persisted in Soviet society
49
What policies were introduced by Khrushchev to improve the lives of women?
- In 1955 abortion was **legalised**.
- The Seven-Year Plan aimed to eliminate the **‘double shift’** by introducing convenience foods and mass produced clothing, ending the need for women to cook and sew.
- The Seven-Year Plan also aimed to make **refrigerators** widely available, ending the need for daily shopping trips.
- However, the Sixth Five-Year Plan and the Seven-Year Plan **failed to end the double shift**. Domestic appliances were either **less helpful than anticipated or less widely available**. Surveys continued to show that women spent more time doing household chores than men and therefore had less access to leisure activities or education than men.
50
How were women treated under Brezhnev?
- By 1982, official figures indicated that women spent twice as much time doing domestic chores as men. Brezhnev viewed this as part of the **natural order and applauded women for their sacrifice**.
- As noted above, Brezhnev’s main concern was for women to have more babies and to look after them properly. Therefore the government did nothing to address **sexual inequality in domestic labour**. Brezhnev did introduce some reforms to make women’s lives easier. For example, he lowered the pension age for women from **60 to 55**.
51
What were Unified labour schools introduced in 1918?
In October 1918, the Soviet Government issued a decree introducing a series of reforms which:
- Established **unified labour schools** to provide free polytechnic education to all children aged 8 to 17
- Banned religious instruction in schools
- Introduced co-educational schools, **ending gender segregation of schooling**.
- Abolished **corporal punishment**, homework and exams.
- Promised free breakfasts for schoolchildren and free medical examinations
- Allowed church buildings to be converted into schools
- Made education compulsory.
52
How did the NEP affect education?
- Forced some schools to **close** to save money.
- Introduced **fees to pay** for primary and secondary education for all except the poorest children and the children of those unable to work due to war injuries
- Scrapped plans for opening children’s homes linked to schools for the **7 million children** orphaned by the Civil War.
53
How was education later expanded under the NEP?
- First, from 1927 **fees for primary schools were abolished**, and from then on the majority of children received a four-year primary education. By 1928 about 60 per cent of Soviet children of primary school age were in school, around 10 per cent more than prior to the revolution.
- However, the **countryside children** were unlikely to complete three years of education.
- Secondary education took a new direction during the 1920s. Local soviets simply took over existing gymnasia, schools that had been set up by the Tsarist regime. Around **97 per cent of students paid fees to attend**. Therefore the schools tended to be dominated by the children of the wealthy.
- The government wanted teachers to teach the history of class struggle and of the working class. However, teachers tended to continue to teach the history of Russia, particularly the achievements of the **Tsars**.
54
How did Lenin try and tackle illiteracy?
- The Communist Government published **6.5 million textbooks** containing simple rhymes that taught the alphabet. Therefore there was **a rise in the number of people who could identify letters, but this campaign did not lead to an increase in genuine literacy**.
- Lunacharsky also set up a network of reading rooms or **likpunkty (liquidation points)** in towns and villages. They offered six-week intensive courses in reading and writing, and were designed to **‘liquidate’ illiteracy.** However, learning was not a priority for those trying to survive the Civil War.
55
Why was Lenin's literacy campaign set back?
- The majority of teachers in 1917 did not support the regime; they **advocated Western-style democracy**. Indeed, teachers went on strike in early 1918 in protest at the new government.
- The government **prioritised military victory** and economic survival over education.
- Many schools were requisitioned by the army and turned into stores or barracks; therefore **education ceased**.
- The war economy did not produce or distribute educational products. By 1920 the schools that were open reported that they had one pencil **for every 60 students and one pen for every 22**.
- The war disrupted education across the country.
56
57
How did the NEP try improving literacy?
- In May 1925 the government announced an initiative to ensure that all adults in the Soviet Union were literate by October 1927.
- Working with trades unions the government set up libraries and reading groups in factories to educate workers. The Transport Workers Union achieved **99 per cent literacy by 1927**.
- Overall, literacy rates improved from **38 per cent in 1914 to 55 per cent in 19288*. However, the achievement was extremely uneven and rates of illiteracy began to **increase** after the illiteracy liquidation campaign ended in 1927.
58
Why were teachers treated poorly during Stalin's war against literacy?
- The government recruited **3 million volunteers** from Komsomol to educate workers and peasants. The campaign was organised in a military fashion. Volunteers were called **‘cultural soldiers’, organised in ‘cultural battalions’** and tasked with fighting a ‘cultural war’ against illiteracy.
- However, the campaign took place in the midst of Stalin’s campaign to collectivise agriculture and so teachers were attacked.
- Around **40 per cent of teachers** were physically attacked in the first year of the campaign.
- Teachers were also **poorly equipped and poorly supported**. They often arrived with no textbooks or writing materials.
59
How was Stalin's war against literacy successful?
- During the first Five-Year Plan **90 per cent of Soviet adults** had attended a literacy course. These courses were not wholly successful, but approximately **68 per cent of people were literate** by the end of the First Five-Year Plan, a significant improvement from 1928.
- Stalin’s campaign continued throughout the 1930s. By 1939 over **94 per cent of Soviet citizens** were literate.
- While around 97 per cent of men were literate only 90 per cent of women could read and write.
60
How was the curriculum controlled by the state under Stalin?
- In order to ensure that young people became good workers on collective farms or in government factories, schools emphasised **discipline, hard work and traditional skills**.
- Additionally, in order to ensure that children became **obedient citizens**, schools began to emphasise patriotismnand respect for great Russian leaders. Teachers too were expected to embrace the values and methods of the **command economy**.
61
How was the curriculum shifted under Stalin to stress regimented discipline?
- Teachers were required to ensure that students **attended regularly and were punctual**, and were also required to set regular homework.
- Moreover, there was a **national code of conduct** which covered the correct way to stand and sit in classes. Students could also be expelled from school for misconduct.
- Finally, in 1935 a system of **national examinations** was introduced. These were designed to grade the workforce of the future so students with good grades could be identified and trained for management posts, and less successful students would be assigned more manual jobs.
62
How did Youth Groups act under Stalin?
- During the 1930s members of Komsomol and the Young Pioneers were expected to spy on their parents and report any criminal behaviour to the police.
63
How did Stalin expand education prior to WW2?
- The government set the target that **100 per cent of children** aged between 8 and 12 would be enrolled for primary schools by 1932. Official figures show that they achieved the enrolment of **95 per cent of children.**
- The number of universities increased by around **800 per cent**, from 105 in 1914 to 817 in 1939.
- Secondary education also expanded. By 1939 approximately **1.5 million Soviet citizens**, seven per cent of the child population, completed their secondary education compared to just 216,000 in the last years of the NEP.
64
How did Stalin expand education after WW2?
- Almost 100 per cent of children aged 8 to 12 gained the full four years of primary education.
- Around 65 per cent of children aged 12 to 17 gained some secondary education
- Around 20 per cent of children aged 15 to 17 completed secondary education.
65
66
What were Labour Reserve Schools?
- These were established by the **Ministry of Labour in 1940** in order to train young men between the ages of 14 and 17 in specialisms in industry.
- Additionally, the LRSs started **recruiting women**. Conditions in the LRSs were harsh and students who deserted could face sentences of between **one year in prison and ten years in a gulag**.
- LRSs were another feature of **government control of the curriculum**, as the government set the quotas for the number of people to be trained and the areas of industry they should study.
67
What were the effects of WW2 on university education?
- The Second World War decimated the university sector, and by 1944 only **227,000 students remained at university**. However, by 1953 the university sector had been extensively reconstructed with approximately **1.5 million students** at Soviet universities.
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How did Khrushchev improve education in towns and cities?
- Khrushchev doubled the number of schools in towns and cities. He also invested in teacher training and recruitment.
- The number of teachers rose from **1.5 million in 1953 to 2.2 million in 1964**. Moreover, the level of teachers’ education also improved under Khrushchev. In 1953 only **19 per cent of teachers had a university education; that rose to 40 per cent in 1964**.
- Perhaps the most important reform in terms of improving access to education was the **abolition of fees for students attending secondary school and university in 1956**.
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How did de-stalinisation affect educational reforms?
- Stalinist discipline was relaxed in November 1960 when a **new code of conduct** was introduced which abolished the rules about correct sitting and standing postures.
- In 1961 Khrushchev ordered a new emphasis on learning foreign languages. Again this reflected a rejection of Stalin’s emphasis on **cultural isolation**.
- The requirement to set homework was also dropped, and final exams, introduced by Stalin in the 1930s, were replaced by **continuous assessment**.
- In June 1962 teachers lost the right to expel students who were **underachieving**.
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Why did Khrushchev's educational reforms fail?
- They were unpopular because most parents wanted their children to get an academic education, rather than complete **vocational courses**.
- The slackening of discipline was generally ignored by teachers, who continued to set homework and insist on correct standing and sitting postures. Curriculum reforms were not implemented in **47 per cent of schools**.
- Moreover, Khrushchev’s reforms did not address some of the **fundamental problems** in Soviet education, such as poorly maintained or poorly built school buildings and the shortage of teachers in rural areas
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What were the small-scale reforms made by Brezhnev towards education?
- During the 1970s attempts were made to increase **peasant participation** in schooling by requiring all schools to provide hot school meals. Free meals were available to poor students. Additionally, in the late 1970s **textbooks** were made available to students free of charge.
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How did University education improve 1953-85
- Between 1953 and 1980 student numbers in higher education grew from about **1.5 million to over 5 million, around 19 per cent of the population**.
- Academic staff increased from **87,000 to 380,000** between 1958 and 1980 to teach the growing number of students.
- There were attempts to serve the diverse communities that comprised the Soviet Union. For example, in 1954 Khrushchev initiated the building of five new universities to serve students from **non-Russian ethnic backgrounds**. Brezhnev continued this initiative by founding 18 universities in non-Russian Soviet republics including Kazakhstan, Tadzhikistan, Armenia and Azerbaijan.
