RUSSIA Social Developments PART 1 Flashcards
What did the Bolsheviks do as soon as they had seized power to improve the lives of women?
Established a women’s branch of the Central Committee in 1917, Zhenotdel, to promote the status of women within socialist notions of equality
What were the series of decrees introduced as soon as the Bolsheviks were in power to give women greater status and freedom in marriage? (4)
Divorce was made easier; laws that made a woman obey her husband repealed, live with him and take his name were abolished; women no longer needed their husband’s permission to take a job/study in further education
What did the 1920 decree on Womens health do to provide abortions?
Made it free in hospitals
What did the 1920 decree on womens health do to discourage backstreet abortions?
Any doctors/nurses found carrying it out oustide hospital immediately suspended
When did Lenin address a women’s congress and suggest the derogatory term ‘baba’ should be banned?
1918
When was the principle of equal pay for men and women passed into law and maternity leave arrangements granted?
December 1917
What declared that were men and women were equal?
Soviet constitution of 1918
How many divorces were still initiated by men?
70%- often abandoning women who had become pregnant
What was the main problem with Lenin’s early decrees?
The male population were very resistant
How many women fought in the Red Army during the civil war?
Over 70,000- but few held high rank
How many women and children worked in factories in the Civil War? (very vague just get order of magnitude)
Millions
WHat happened to many women who worked in the Civil War after?
They were generally unskilled or thought unsuitable for labour so lost their jobs
When was the famine that followed the civil war?
1921-22
Alexandra Kollontai
Leading Bolshevik figure in early years of the regime and first woman to be a member of a government in Europe; feminist and believer in free love; member of the Central Committee
When was Kollontai made head of Zhenotdel?
1920
When did Kollontai’s influence wane?
After 1921
Which areas were particularly resistant to change?
Muslim areas of Central Asia
When was the campaign against the veiling of women?
1927
What sometimes happened to Muslim women who refused to wear traditional dress?
Killed by members of their own family in ‘honour’ killings
Where was a Zhenotdel meeting attacked by Muslim men with dogs and boiling water?
Baku
When did the Party close down Zhenotdel, claiming that women’s issues had been solved?
1930
When did the status of rural women improve slowly?
Khrushchev and Brezhnev years- social provision, such as health care and maternity benefits, was extended to the countryside
When was the internal passport system extended to collective workers?
1974
How did the number of female industrial workers rise during the 1930s?
From 3 million in 1928 to over 13 million in 1940
In which industry did women dominate the workforce?
Light industry, especially textiles
Which male-dominated industries did women enter?
Construction industry- lumbering and engineering
Who was the tractor driver used as a role model for Soviet women?
Praskovia Angelina
Which city’s underground was built partly by brigades of female workers?
Moscow
How many alcoholics were there estimated to be in 1987?
20 million
How many higher education places did the government reserve for women in 1929?
20%- modest increase on the 14% already occupied by women
How many engineering students were female by 1940?
Over 40%
When was an initial wave of women volunteers for the Red Army turned away?
1941
What caused the government to reluctantly change its mind about women being involved in active combat during WW2?
Heavy losses
How many women served in the armed forces during WW2?
800,000
Where did most women serve in the armed forces during WW2?
Medical units but also as pilots, machine-gunners and tanks crews
How many women received the Soviet Union’s highest military award, ‘Hero of the Soviet Union’?
89
When was the attitude that women were expected to work and could do so in a wide range of occupations widespread?
By the 1950s
When had women been given the vote for the first time?
Provisional Government of 1917
How many women made up Party leadership in 1932?
16%
When did female delegates at Party congresses exceed 10%?
1939
When did Kollontai serve as a people’s commissar?
Commissar for Public Welfare from 1917-18
How many women were members of the Central Committee before WW2?
Only 7
Who were the two most prominent women in politics pre-WW2?
Nadezhda Krupskaya; Alexandra Kollontai
Who was the first woman to become a full candidate member of the top body within the Party and a favourite of Khrushchev?
Ekaterina Furtseva
What was the Politburo renamed?
Presidium
When did Ekaterina Furtseva become a member of the presidium?
1957
After Furtseva, when did the Soviet Union have to wait until before another woman made it into the Party’s top body?
September 1988- Alexandra Biryukova
Who was one of the most famous ballerinas at the Bolshoi Ballet company?
Natalia Bessmertnova
Which actress became famous for her role in the Soviet film War and Peace (1967)?
Ludmila Savelyeva
Who became the first woman in space in 1963?
Valentina Tereshkova
When did the commuters in Moscow complain about being robbed by young thugs on evening trains?
1970s
What did the Bolsheviks’s Family Code of 1918 make easier?
Divorce
What was the divorce rate in 1979?
33%
When did a new marriage law give equal status to registered and unregistered marriages?
1927
By when was Russia’s divorce rate the highest in Europe?
Mid-1920s
When was the Family Code revised to make divorce even easier, leading to so-called ‘postcard divorces’?
1926
By 1926, how many marriages in Moscow ended in divorce?
50%
How did abortions outnumber live births in Moscow?
3:1
When did the government become so concerned about the detrimental effects of family breakdowns, that measures were introduced to raise the status of marriage?
Mid-1930s
When was Stalin’s ‘Great Retreat’?
1936
Great Retreat
Stalin issued a series of more conservative laws
How was divorce made more expensive as a result of the Great Retreat?
Increased from 4 roubles to 50
What was declared illegal as part of the Great Retreat?
Male homosexuality
What was outlawed as part of the Great Retreat?
Abortion
How was the status of pregnant women increased during the Great Retreat?
Pregnant women were guaranteed job security and the right to be given lighter work; maternity leave was extended to 16 weeks
Which marriages lost their legal status as part of the Great Retreat?
Free marriages
As part of the Great Retreat, what reappeared in shops after being branded as ‘bourgeois’?
Gold wedding rings
How did the number of nursery places change between 1928-30?
Doubled and continued to grow during the 2FYP
When did further strengthening of the family take place?
July 1944
During the Great Retreat, what was was the concept of family suggested to be?
Necessary unit of socialist society
How was the family unit strengthened in July 1944?
‘Mother-heroine’ awards; tax on single people; divorce made more complicated
What was much of the social stability of the Khrushchev years underpinned by?
Government’s promotion of the family as a social unit
How much of the workforce did women make up by 1960?
49%
Which family members sometimes took up domestic duties as a result of wives being in full-time employment?
Babushki
When was abortion legalised again?
1955
When did the government reinforce traditional values with the a new Family Code?
1968
In the 1970s, what put extra pressure on economically productive family members?
Declining rate of population growth- by 1982, growth had fallen to just 0.8%
Where were the birth rates higher?
Central Asian republics
How many children did the average family have in 1970?
2.4- a drop from 2.9 in 1959
What did the Party leadership discuss the for inclusion in the 1981 Party Programme?
Use of ‘birth incentives’
What continued to put strain on family relationships in the 1970s?
Shortage of adequate housing
How much alcohol was the average Soviet consuming by 1982?
18 litres of spirits per year
What did the Family Code of 1968 require?
Couples to give 1 month’s notice before a wedding
