Lesson 3-How Successful Was Stalin's First Five-Year Plan? Flashcards
When was the First Five-Plan?
1928-1932
What Was this first five-year plan a set of targets for?
Industrialisation
What is crash industrialisation?
Industrialisation as quick as possible
Who were the Gosplan?
State planning committee
Define the term commodities
A raw material or primary agricultural product that can be bought and sold, such as copper or coffee
What were foundational industries?
Heavy industries that would lay the foundation for future industrial development
What Was the proletarian advancement?
The removal of existing ‘bourgeois specialists’ and replacing them with newly trained working-class ‘red specialists.’
What is the free market?
An economic organisation where citizens are free to compete against each other as purchasers and providers of goods and services.
Who has a very limited role in the free market?
The government
In a free market, what are consumption and prices determined by?
The needs of the consumers
What is the black market?
Similar to free market but trading of the goods and services on the black market is illegal.
Subsequently, trading of this kind is kept secret.
What is a speculator?
Someone who makes money buying and selling, rather than producing goods.
What did Communists believe about speculators?
Speculation is an extremely Capitalist activity which exploited those who produced goods.
What are show trials?
An event in which people are publicly shamed for allegedly criminal acts.
What is the purpose of show trials?
To make an ‘example’ of the ‘criminals’.
To persuade the public that similar activity should be avoided.
Who are shock workers?
Volunteers who are sent to work on projects for short periods of time in order to speed up their completion.
Define gigantomania.
The worship of size for its own sake
the creation of abnormally large works.
What is Magnitogorsk?
A place that went from being a small village in 1928 to a town of 25,000 people in 1932
What were the FYPs designed to break away from?
NEP and its Capitalist elements
What were the main targets of the FYPs?
Bring about rapid industrialisation
Modernise the economy
Move towards Socialism
What did Stalin hope the expansion of industry would increase?
The size of the proletariat
Who are the proletariat?
Working class.
Someone who sells their labour in order to earn a living.
Why did Stalin want to increase the proletariat?
It would create more loyal party members
Why did Stalin think his enemies would do?
Crush the only Communist state
What did Stalin feel could only defend the USSR?
Only an economically and militarily strong USSR could defend itself
Why was NEP becoming increasingly unpopular?
Party members who were recruited under the Lenin Enrolment believed it wasn’t helping to create an equal society.
Why did the party members under the Lenin Enrolment believe that the NEP was not helping to create and equal society?
They believed it encouraged the growth of Nepmen and Kulaks.
Who were Nepmen?
businesspeople in the early Soviet Union, who took advantage of the opportunities for private trade and small-scale manufacturing provided under the New Economic Policy
When was NEP?
1921-28
What was economic progress like by 1928 and why?
It was slowing
The NEP was not delivering the industrialisation the USSR needed.
What did Stalin say in regards to Russia being behind other countries (a quote)?
‘We are 50 to 100 years behind advanced countries. We must make good this distance in 10 years. Either we do it or we shall be crushed.’
What was this rapid industrialisation and important part of?
Stalin’s cry of ‘Socialism in one country.’
What type of economy did the FYPs call for?
Command Economy
At what Party Congress was the decision to abandon NEP made?
Fifteenth Party Congress in 1927
What did the plans aim to use to make the USSR self-sufficient?
The most advanced technology applied with an emphasis on heavy industry.
What did the plans rely on?
The mass mobilisation of people and resources.
What is mass mobilisation?
Growing the movement
a process that engages and motivates a wide range of partners and allies at national and local levels to raise awareness of and demand for a particular development objective through face-to-face dialogue.
What did Stalin have to introduce to make sure the FYPs worked?
a Command Economy
What is a command economy?
Where production levels and prices are set by the government
Who did Stalin turn to when he needed to introduce a Command Economy?
Gosplan
Who were Gosplan?
The State Planning Committee
What did Gosplan set targets for?
Industry
Where were targets set by Gosplan sent to?
Each region of the country
Where were the targets set for each region of the country sent to?
Each factory, mine etc
Who did factory managers set targets for?
Every worker
What did Gosplan fail to do in regards to targets?
Say how they should be achieved
Who was figuring out how the targets should be achieved left to?
Individual managers
What specific dates was the First FYP?
October 1928-December 1932
What are some examples of heavy industries the First FYP aimed at developing?
Coal
Iron
Steel
Oil
Heavy machinery
What did Stalin believe about heavy industry?
He believed they were the building blocks for an advanced industrial economy.
Which countries were being developed economically for the first time during the First FYP?
Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan
Where were new industrial plants built?
To the East of the Ural Mountains.
Why were new industrial plants built to the East of the Ural Mountains?
So they would be safe if the USSR was invaded from the West.
Which is the most important city which was built from scratch?
Magnitogorsk
Despite being a significant advancement, what were the negatives of Magnitogorsk?
People lived and worked in terrible conditions.
What other aspect was vital to the First FYP?
Electricity
Which project was built in regards to electricity?
Dnieprotroi Dam
What was the Dnieprotroi Dam?
A massive hydroelectric dam
What type of factories were built in Stalingrad?
Tractor
What type of factories were built in Moscow?
Car
What did canals help to do?
Connected Moscow with the River Volga
Connected Leningrad with the White Sea
Who built the canals?
Prisoners
In what ways was the USSR economically behind Europe?
Technology was outdated
Could not keep up with the needs of the growing Soviet population
Give an example of an objective of the First FYP regarding certain groups of people.
To abolish detested Nepmen, private business owners and traders
Why did Stalin say the quote about being 50 to 100 years behind advanced countries?
He feared foreign invasion.
What were people encouraged to do?
‘Storm’ and ‘conquer’ on many ‘fronts’
Which industries were only targeted by the government?
Those who the government saw as a priority.
Resources were allocated accordingly.
What did the FYPs see an extension over?
The state and economy
Why were People’s Commissariats set up?
To co-ordinate the differing branches of industry
What were Party Officials used for?
Used at the factory level to ensure orders from the centre were carried out
What were small businesses and shopkeepers forced to join?
State co-operatives
Who were there concerted campaign against?
So-called ‘bourgeois experts’
Who were these so-called ‘bourgeois experts’?
Those who kept their jobs because of skills
Opening their jobs to the more loyal (even if less trained)
Who were the 1928, series of show trials against?
The bourgeois experts who were accused of ‘wrecking’ and deliberate sabotage.
Who was concentrating on the rapid growth of heavy industry recommended by?
Super Industrialists
Whose ideas did Stalin use though he did not acknowledge this?
Economic theorist
Evgeny Preobrazhensky
What sector was neglected during the First FYP?
Consumer goods/industries
Give some example of consumer industries which were neglected.
Textiles and producers of household goods
Why did the First FYP not focus on consumer goods?
Wanted to build up an industrial infrastructure of factories, communication networkers and plant before other sectors could flourish
How did the targets develop along the course of the First plan?
At start=Ambitious targets
As the plan was put into effect=Constantly raised to even more unrealistic heights
What did McCauley say in 1993 regarding the targets of the First plan?
‘As if mathematics had ceased to function.’
The goal became not just fulfilling the plan but what?
Over-fulfilling
To not over fulfill the plan would be a sign of what?
Lack of commitment
Although targets were not achieved, what were achievements like?
They were impressive.
What did the impressive achievements of the First FYP transform the Soviet Union into?
A major industrial power with a modern if unbalanced economy
What was industrial expansion only due to?
The efficient use of existing factories and equipment
New plants did not have an impact until what year?
1934
Apart from Magnitogorsk, what other large industrial centre was built from scratch?
Gorki
In 1929 how many people were there living in Magnitogorsk?
Only 25
In what year had the population of Magnitogorsk increased to 250,000?
Three years later
In 1932
What was life like in these large industrial centres?
Centres were primitive (ancient)
Work was hard
Rewards were limited
By 1933, how much of the workforce in Moscow was skilled?
Only 17%
What did the government rely on since lots of people were unskilled?
‘Shock bridges’
What were ‘shock bridges’ made up of?
The best workers to set an example
Who was the most well-known model worker?
Alexei Stakhanov
What types of rewards were there for model workers?
E.g., New flat and bigger rations
What was done with slackers?
They were ridiculed
What did sites have to motivate the workers?
Statues of Lenin
What could the government use as a last resort to make sure large building projects were complete?
Slave labour
Where did nobody want to collect resources from?
Serbia
A lot of the increasing Gulag population were members of?
Serbia
Where did labour camp prisoners divert to?
Mines
Railway construction
Other projects
Give an example of a project which labour camp prisoners worked on.
The White Sea Canal
How many prisoners were employed to work on the White Sea Canal by 1932?
180,000
How many prisoners had died on the White Sea Canal project?
10,000
What did the deaths of 10,000 prisoners on the White Sea Canal project signify?
The attitude towards human loss
What was the completion of the White Sea Canal hailed as?
A propaganda triumph
Why was the White Sea Cana useless for all but small barges?
It had cuts
How did factory managers try to meet their unrealistic targets?
Ambushed resources from other factories.
Through bribery.
What was often sacrificed in order to meet targets?
Quality
How much tractors was the Stalingrad factory supposed to produce a month in 1930?
500
In June of 1930, how much tractors had the Stalingrad factory managed to built?
8
What happened to the 8 tractors which the Stalingrad factory managed to build?
They all broke down
