ECONOMY UNDER STALIN

Question 1

What did NEP produce that was an issue?

Answer 1

NEPmen and a private market that was too strong.

Question 2

What were urban workers suffering from under NEP?

Answer 2

High unemployment and low wages.

Question 3

What were the figures for export and import levels in 1926?

Answer 3

Exports were at 33% of 1913 level and imports were at 38% of 1913 level.

Question 4

What did the government replace grain tax with under NEP?

Answer 4

A monetary tax.

Question 5

How did the peasants avoid selling their grain to the state for a lower price under NEP?

Answer 5

They started to hold food back from the market. They even fed it to their animals rather than sell t.

Question 6

What were the figures for grain procurement in 1927?

Answer 6

Only 75% of 1926 grain was procured.

Question 7

When was collectivisation introduced?

Answer 7

1929.

Question 8

Why did Stalin need to reform the economy to create a stronger military?

Answer 8

To fight a modern war, a country had to have a well-developed industrial base. There were also war scares in the early 1930s.

Question 9

What did Stalin want Russia to become?

Answer 9

The ‘Soviet America’.

Question 10

How would economic reform make Russia more self-sufficent?

Answer 10

Make Russia less dependent on western manufactured goods.

Question 11

What did Stalin want to end regarding grain supply through the new economic structure?

Answer 11

End the dependence of the economy on a backward agricultural system as this had created major problems in the past.

Question 12

Why did the current social structure of Russia make it difficult for Stalin to move towards a socialist society?

Answer 12

According to Marxist theoreticians, socialism could only be created in a highly industrialised state.

Question 13

How much of the population were workers in 1928?

Answer 13

Only 20%.

Question 14

What were Stalin’s economic policies central to?

Answer 14

Him establishing his credentials, as he needed to prove himself as an equal of Lenin.

Question 15

How would the new economic policies improve living standards?

Answer 15

Catching up with the west as industrialisation created wealth which could prove communism created a good life.

Question 16

What had Stalin announced at the 1926 Party Congress?

Answer 16

The aim was ‘to transform our country from an agrarian to an industrial one.’

Question 17

What did collectivisation represent?

Answer 17

A major shift in the direction of the economy towards central planning or a “command economy”.

Question 18

What was the idea behind the implementation of collectivisation?

Answer 18

Larger units of land could be farmed more efficiently through mechanisation.

Question 19

What was an MTS? What did these create?

Answer 19

MTS = tractors and machinery would be supplied by the state through huge machine and tractor stations. In order to create mechanised agriculture.

Question 20

What are the three main types of collective farms?

Answer 20

• Toz
• Sovkhoz
• Kolkhoz

Question 21

What crisis occured in 1928-9?

Answer 21

A grain procurement crisis.

Question 22

How did Stalin use the ideology of a “class enemy”?

Answer 22

To blame kulaks and begin a process of dekulakisation.

Question 23

What did Stalin announce in December 1929?

Answer 23

Stalin announced the liquidation of the kulaks. The aim was to frighten the middle and poor peasants into joining collective kolkhoz.

Question 24

What was mass collectivisation?

Answer 24

Stalin enlisted 250,000 volunteers and conscripts to revolutionise the countryside.

Question 25

What were the kulaks in the end?

Answer 25

Scapegoats.

Question 26

How many peasants were on collective farms in mid 1929?

Answer 26

Less than 5%.

Question 27

What did peasants resist bitterly?

Answer 27

Stalin’s announcement in Jan 1930 that 25% of grain-producing areas were to be collectivised by the end of the year.

Question 28

How did the peasants resist collectivisation after the announcement in January 1930?

Answer 28

Organised protests and many slaughtered their animals and ate or sold the meat rather than hand them over.

Question 29

When was “dekulakisation” complete?

Answer 29

By May 1930.

Question 30

What did Stalin write in the article for Pravada when concerned with rising resistance?

Answer 30

He had moved too quickly and accused some urban activists as being ‘dizzy with success’.

Question 31

When did Stalin return to the aggressive policy of forcing peasants into collectives?

Answer 31

From 1931.

Question 32

How much grain had been requisitioned by the end of 1931?

Answer 32

22.8 million tons.

Question 33

When was the famine?

Answer 33

Developed by 1931 and last until 1934.

Question 34

Although collectivisation had failed to deliver, what did it become?

Answer 34

The weapon to break peasant resistance once and for all, so it was continued.

Question 35

What was the ‘law of seven eights’?

Answer 35

Stealing property meant a ten year jail sentence and this was later changed to a death sentence.

Question 36

By the end of 1934 and by the end of 1936, how many peasant households were said to be in collectives?

Answer 36

1934: 70%
1936: 90%

Question 37

When was the first five year plan?

Answer 37

October 1928 - December 1932

Question 38

When was the second five year plan?

Answer 38

January 1933 - December 1937

Question 39

When was the third five year plan?

Answer 39

January 1938 - June 1941

Question 40

What were the positives for electricity, coal and iron in the first five year plan?

Answer 40

Electricity output trebled.

Coal and Iron output doubled.

Question 41

What was the issue in consumer industries and chemical targets in the first year plan?

Answer 41

Consumer industries experienced very little growth and chemical targets were not fulfilled.

Question 42

What was the overall result for the first five year plan?

Answer 42

Many targets were not met and the Great Depression had driven down the price of grain and raw materials.

Question 43

By 1937, under the second five year plan, what had Russia achieved?

Answer 43

Virtually full self-sufficiency in machine-making and metal working.

Question 44

What was the issue with consumer goods and oil production under the second five year plan?

Answer 44

Consumer goods industries were still lagging and oil production did not make the expected advances.

Question 45

What was the period of 1934-36 known as?

Answer 45

The ‘three good years’.

Question 46

What was positive for heavy industry and defence under the third five year plan?

Answer 46

Heavy industry continued to grow and defence and armaments grew rapidly as resources were diverted to them.

Question 47

What was the issue with consumer goods and steel output under the third five year plan?

Answer 47

Steel output grew insignificantly and consumer industries once again took a backseat.

Question 48

What was the targeted output for coal? What was the actual output?

Answer 48

Targeted: 68 million tons of coal.
Actual: 35 million tons of coal.

Question 49

How did Stalin go about implementing the ‘superstructure’?

Answer 49

Through a command economy centred on the Five-Year Plans and collectivisation.