The New Economic Policy Flashcards
Why the fuck did Lenin introduce the NEP?
Clue: a variety of reasons ;);)
- retain POLITICAL POWER— NEP described by Lenin as an economic retreat, designed to stop a political defeat
- REVIVE THE ECONOMY: Lenin needed a policy that would stimulate grain production to end the famine
- to BUILD SOCIALISM: Lenin hoped the NEP would generate wealth that could be used to industrialise and modernise the Soviet economy
NEP: Compromise with capitalism
NEP ended War Communism by creating a mixed economy.
• FARMING left to the free market: peasants could buy, sell, produce freely. Grain requisition ended, replaced by a tax in kind.
• SMALL FACTORIES & WORKSHOPS: denationalised, allowed to trade freely— many were returned to their former capitalist owners
• LARGE FACTORIES & MAJOR INDUSTRIES: remained nationalised
• MONEY was reintroduced
What were the consequences of the NEP?
✅ led to political and economic stability
❌ did not lead to rapid industrial growth
❌ not wholly popular within the Party: compromise with capitalism
What were the consequences of the NEP on farming?
- Ending grain requisitioning= extreeeeeeeeemely popular among the peasants.
- Free trade= encouraged peasants to grow more food
SO
✅ famine ended
✅ farming revived
What were the consequences of the NEP on industry?
Growth !
Lenin authorised a major ELECTRIFICATION campaign— revived an industry that had effectively been destroyed by the civil war.
❌ but industrial recovery was slow
What was the ‘scissors crisis’?
Agriculture recovered quickly, industry recovered much more slowly—>
This IMBALANCE led to:
1) fall in the price of food
2) rise in the price of industrial goods
—> gap opened up between farmers incomes and industrial prices
Trotsky nicknamed the ‘scissors crisis’—> lines on the graph looked like scissors blades
Government forced to step in and impose price cuts on industrial goods.
How was inequality a consequence of the NEP?
It re-emerged:
🙂large farms prospered ;
☹️little farms did less well.
🙂“NEPmen” (traders, travelled the country selling highly desirable goods) grew rich
🙁^^^^ Communists viewed them as parasites (made money without producing anything)
^^^^ arrested by the Cheka from time to time for ‘profiteering’
The re-emergence of inequality horrified many communists
How was corruption a product of the NEP?
- gambling
- prostitution
- drug dealing
Prostitution beside wider social and economic problems that led to widespread poverty among women in the 1920s
Why was political stability a consequence of the NEP?
Peasants 💜d ending grain requisitioning 🔜 they began to support the regime
^^^^ deliberate part of Lenin’s policy:
He argued that the Communist government was based on an alliance (‘smychka’) between the workers and the peasants,
which was made possible by the NEP
Why were divisions in the party a consequence of the NEP?
- RIGHT-WING supported the NEP: a form of state capitalism & a necessary transitional stage
- LEFT-WING opposed the NEP: it was allowing the problems of capitalism to re-emerge
- CENTER supported the NEP: it was helping to rebuild the economy
