The History of the Industrialization of Soviet Union 1938 - 1941

The task of the first five‐year plan, set by the Communist Party, was to build the foundation of a socialist economy in the shortest possible time in the form of powerful heavy industry and socialist agriculture, to strengthen the countryʹs defense capability, and to eliminate the capitalist elements of town and country. Proceeding from this task, almost three quarters of capital investments in industry were directed to heavy industry, which produces the means of production. The implementation of the first five‐year plan took place in a difficult situation and with enormous difficulties associated with the capitalist encirclement, the class struggle within the country, the actions of the right opposition against the high rates of socialist construction, and the attack on the kulak.

The economic tasks of the second five‐year plan, set by the party, were to master the advanced technology of newly built and reconstructed enterprises during the first five‐year plan, complete the technical reconstruction of the entire national economy, create the latest technical base for all its branches and continue the industrial development of the eastern regions of the country. In the second five‐year plan, it was also planned to ensure a higher rate of growth in the production of consumer goods. Based on these tasks, it was necessary to significantly increase the volume of capital construction not only of machine building plants, but also of power plants, enterprises of ferrous and non‐ferrous metallurgy, coal mines, textile and shoe factories.

Socialist industrialization is the most important part of Leninʹs plan for building socialism in our country. ʺThe only material basis of socialism,ʺ wrote V. I. Lenin, ʺmay be large‐scale machine industry capable of reorganizing agriculture as wellʺ

From War Communism (1917/18 to 1921) and the New Economic Policy (N.E.P.) there was continual debate and revision of economic policy, on labour management and economic planning, till in 1928 the Stalin faction in the Bolshevik Party launched an all drive to "collectivize agriculture" and launch the "Forced Industrialization" drive from 1928. The effects and "politics of production" is discussed critically.

This paper considers modernisation as a historical phenomenon in the worldwide context and from the point of view of the historical development of Russia. The interrelations of the stages of Russian modernisation and their principal features, as well as the key positions, causes and results of industrial construction as its main components, are analysed. Much attention is paid to the most important features and historical role of Soviet modernisation, in particular its endogenous character. The stipulation of the forced version of Soviet industrialisation is shown. We conclude that the success of an industrialisation process is determined not only by the form of the political system, but also by the civilisational features of the particular country.

2018

The opening of the Soviet archives has enabled us to obtain a much more accurate understanding of the character and scope of the terror, its various phases and their interconnection. From the beginning of 1936, on Stalin's initiative, the treatment of the former members of the party oppositions changed for the worse (Vol. 6: 281-283). In previous years many of them were expelled from the party, and some were confined to prison or exiled. But many others were given posts in the party or in government departments. In 1936, however, measures were prepared and enforced which indicated that the whole group was to be eliminated. The visible manifestations of these repressions were the public trials of August 1936 and January 1937. Early in 1937 a general purge of senior economic officials was launched, extending well beyond the former oppositionists, and this was accompanied by an attack on the middle ranks of the official strata more generally, including leading personnel in the regions. This continued during 1937 and 1938 and, on a reduced scale, in the last two and a half years before the war. These developments may be categorised as the nomenklatura purge. The nomenklatura was a list (or rather a set of lists) of posts, appointments to which were approved by the party. Such lists existed at many levels of the hierarchy and in every region. By extension, Soviet officialdom has often been called 'the nomenklatura.' We had a general understanding of the nomenklatura purge of the late 1930s before the opening of the archives, because many of its actions were reported in the press at CHAPTER 1

Research Report of Kochi University, 1979

This paper is an attempt to reappraise Nikolai Bukharin, who endeavored to preserve the NEP (New Economic Policy) for his life and was finally defeated by Joseph Stalin. For writing this paper I was very much indebted to works by A. A. Barsov including Balance, seen from the viewpoint of value, of Exchanges beween Cities and Rural Areas. The construction of socialism after the "the great turn" at the end of 1929 not only transformed a backward agricultural country into an industrial country, but also fundamentally remolded the Soviet society as well as the Communist Party of the Soviet Union itself. The situation such as fusion, an adhesion and an unification of the Party and the State, in other words, "etatization of the Party" was completed in the political sphere.

Східноєвропейський історичний вісник, 2018

2022

This work, "The development of the Soviet Economy" gives, in accordance with Stalin's periodization of the history of the CPSU(b), a picture of the development of the Soviet economy. It is a manual for teachers of political economy, Marxism-Leninism, the history of the national economy of the USSR, for graduate students in economics, students of socio-economic universities and party and Soviet activists.