Learn about the Soviet Union's centralized economic planning, including the Five-Year Plans, industrial growth, collectivization, and the impact on workers and peasants under Stalin's regime.

Soviet Centralized Economic Planning: From Agrarian Backwardness to Industrial Power

• • The Bolsheviks nationalised industries and banks during the Civil War.
  • Peasants were allowed to cultivate land that had been socialised, using confiscated land to demonstrate collective work.
  • A centralised planning system was introduced:
    • Officials set five-year targets for economic growth.
    • During the first two Five-Year Plans (1927-1932 and 1933-1938), all prices were fixed to promote industrial growth.
  • Centralised planning resulted in significant industrial growth:
    • Industrial production, including oil, coal, and steel, increased by 100% between 1929 and 1933.
    • New factory cities like Magnitogorsk emerged.
• Challenges of Rapid Industrialisation
  • Construction projects like the Magnitogorsk steel plant were completed quickly but led to:
    • Poor working and living conditions.
    • 550 stoppages of work in the first year of Magnitogorsk's operation.
    • Severe hardships in worker accommodations during extreme winters.

    

  • Efforts were made to improve worker conditions:
    • Crèches for children of women workers were established in factories.
    • Cheap public healthcare and model living quarters were provided.
• Educational and Social Reforms
  • Extended schooling systems allowed factory workers and peasants to enter universities.
  • Social support was limited due to constrained government resources, leading to uneven outcomes.
• Collectivisation of Agriculture
  • In 1927-1928, towns faced acute grain shortages, leading to government intervention:
    • Grain supplies were confiscated as peasants resisted selling at fixed prices.
    • The government accused rich peasants (kulaks) of hoarding grain.
  • Stalin’s collectivisation programme (1929 onward) aimed to:
    • Replace small peasant farms with large state-controlled collective farms (kolkhoz).
    • Modernise agriculture using industrial machinery.
  • Consequences of collectivisation:
    • Mass resistance by peasants, including the destruction of livestock.
    • A decline in cattle numbers by one-third between 1929 and 1931.
    • Severe punishments for resisting peasants, including deportation and exile.
    • Devastating famines between 1930-1933 caused over 4 million deaths.
• Repression and Criticism
  • Critics of collectivisation and industrial confusion faced accusations of conspiring against socialism.
  • By 1939, over 2 million people were imprisoned or sent to labor camps, many under false charges.
  • Numerous professionals and innocent individuals were executed after forced confessions.
• Personal Accounts and Government Reports
  • Accounts of hardships:
    • A 13-year-old worker's letter highlighted the struggle to study amidst poverty.
    • A peasant resisted collectivisation due to high taxes and property confiscation, losing all possessions by 1937.
  • Government measures to suppress opposition:
    • Mass arrests and executions of resisting peasants, especially in Ukraine during 1930.
    • Collectivised grain, livestock, and tools were forcibly taken from peasants.