How successful were Stalin's economic policies?
How successful were Stalin's economic policies?
Stalin's economic policies were successful to an extent, especially when looking at the increases in production of heavy industry. However they also failed in several important areas such as agriculture, meaning the overall success was limited. Also, when evaluated in terms of the effects on the people of the Soviet Union, the policies had, in many cases, a disastrous effect.
Stalin's aim with his pre-war economic policies was to achieve rapid industrialisation of the Soviet Union, in order to protect it against the threat of war, which he believed to be always present. This belief had been heightened in 1928, after a war scare, making the need to industrialise seem even more urgent. Stalin believed that: "We are fifty or a hundred years behind the advanced countries. We must make good this distance in ten years. Either we do it, or we shall be crushed." This shows that to Stalin, industrialising quickly was just as important as industrialisation itself. Because of this, he set high targets for the Five-Year Plans, encouraging workers to significantly increase their productivity, in order to achieve his ambitious plans.
Stalin's aims were partially achieved. During the first Five-Year Plan especially, but also throughout the whole process of industrialisation, emphasis was placed on heavy industries, for example coal, iron, steel and electricity. As a result of the large amount of investment put in to these areas, the production of heavy industry greatly increased, though it is difficult to know the exact increase achieved, due to the unreliability of the official Soviet Union figures. Between 1928 and 1941, coal production is thought to have increased six-fold, while steel production quadrupled. In addition to the funding it received, increased production in heavy industry was achieved by improving efficiency in existing factories, as well as developing new industrial plants.
The plans focused not only on developing traditional industrial centres, such as Moscow, the site of the new Metro, and Leningrad, but also made new industrial centres of less developed parts of the country, for example Kazakhstan and Georgia. These industrial centres, started under the first Five-Year Plan, greatly helped the success of the second plan, as by that time, the centres were completed and in production. The focus of the Five-Year Plans saw the completion of ambitious projects to provide power for the growth in industry, for example the Dneiper Dam.
However, while there were improvements in industrial production, few industries succeeded in meeting the ambitious targets of the plans therefore failing to meet Stalin's aims. After seeing the initial success of the first Five-Year Plan, Stalin increased targets, therefore putting more pressure on factory managers to achieve greater output. However, the chaotic implementation and planning of the plans meant this was not possible and limited further growth. Some production managers were forced to go to great lengths to meet their targets, due to the fear of retribution should they fail. There were reports of managers hijacking trains full of ...
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However, while there were improvements in industrial production, few industries succeeded in meeting the ambitious targets of the plans therefore failing to meet Stalin's aims. After seeing the initial success of the first Five-Year Plan, Stalin increased targets, therefore putting more pressure on factory managers to achieve greater output. However, the chaotic implementation and planning of the plans meant this was not possible and limited further growth. Some production managers were forced to go to great lengths to meet their targets, due to the fear of retribution should they fail. There were reports of managers hijacking trains full of workers and other resources and diverting them to different factories.
Another limiting factor in the achievements of the Five-Year Plans was the decision by Stalin that the economy would be controlled by centralised government rather than local authorities. However the planners based in Moscow did not understand local conditions in remote areas of the Soviet Union and this led to failures because resources were inappropriately allocated resulting in wastage. State control of the economy also led to disruption of the plans when managers and workers who failed to achieve targets were prosecuted and removed from their positions.
Heavy industry was not the only area affected by the plans. Consumer industry also developed, though did not necessarily improve. Throughout the Five-Year Plans, there was some growth in consumer goods, for example footwear production increased as did food production. Greater focus was placed on consumer industry in the second and third Five-Year Plans and improvements made in the late 1930s began to have an impact on living conditions, with new bakeries, ice-cream production and meat-packing factories established. However there were not enough of these to have a significant impact and shortages of goods meant that the new facilities could do little good. In addition to this, international tension towards the end of the plans meant that resources were diverted towards heavy industry and armaments.
When looked at from a purely economic point of view, it could be claimed that Stalin's policies were generally successful as they helped to achieve Stalin's aim of industrialisation. However, industrialisation was not the only result of the plan and other areas were not as successful.
Running alongside the Five-Year Plans was the policy of collectivisation, which aimed to provide agricultural improvement in order to feed the growing population of workers. Attempts were made to modernise farming methods so that fewer peasants would be needed to work the land and could instead go to the cities and work in the factories. However, collectivisation was not as successful as industrialisation. Rather than increasing, grain production fell between 1928 and 1934, decreasing from 73.3 million tonnes to 67.7 million tonnes. Even more disastrously, levels of cattle fell from 70 million in 1928 to almost half that, less that 39 million in 1933. This happened as a result of peasants deliberately killing cattle to avoid it falling in to the hands of the state.
Decreases in production were not the only outcome of collectivisation. There was also an enormous human cost. An estimated fifteen million Kulaks, though some Historians place the figure even higher, were eliminated through Stalin's process of dekulakisation, which aimed to get rid of those 'rich' peasants thought to have benefited from the NEP. In addition to this a further four million peasants were estimated to have died after a famine in 1933 in the Ukraine, an event which was firmly denied by the Soviet government. They have since been accused of deliberately ignoring the famine in order
Agricultural output did begin to recover in the late 1930s, due to the more widespread use of agricultural machinery but productivity remained low and agricultural targets consistently failed to be met. It took decades for Soviet agriculture to meet its pre-collectivisation production figures. The threat of war once again meant that arms production took priority and the development of agricultural machinery became less important, contributing to the continued low achievements of collectivisation.
The labour and living conditions of the citizens of the Soviet Union were also affected by Stalin's economic policies. For those that worked hard and showed a commitment to the plans by consistently achieving their targets, they were rewarded with higher wages and improved living conditions, for example larger apartments. The Stakhanovite movement, which swept the country in 1935 after a coal worker - Alexei Stakhanov - mined 102 tons of coal in one shift, mined encouraged workers to exceed their targets and provided an accessible image for workers to aspire to. Skilled workers were also given higher wages in order to encourage more workers to acquire the skills needed to improve productivity.
However, the workers receiving these benefits were very much in the minority. For the majority, working conditions were incredibly harsh, with the plans requiring workers to devote all their energies to achieving targets. There was a high level of absenteeism which showed that not all workers were won over by the slogans or propaganda of the party. Not all workers were willing; the government often used slave labour to complete large projects and this workforce often experienced even worse conditions than the ordinary worker, with many dying due to their conditions.
The Soviet Union also had the problem that there were not enough skilled workers. In 1933, only seventeen percent of the Moscow workforce was skilled. The government attempted to introduce training schemes in order to decrease the number of unskilled workers but they had limited success.
In addition to poor working conditions, workers and managers lived in constant fear of punishment, should they not achieve their targets. Managers who did not achieve their personal factory targets were accused of sabotage by the government and used as scapegoats when the targets of the Five-Year Plans were not achieved. For these people Stalin's economic policies led to a downturn in their conditions and cannot be seen as a success of the policies.
The accusations of sabotage eventually led to the beginning of the purges, show trials used by Stalin in order to eliminate his enemies, both in and out of the party. In 1928, the Shakhty Trial was held, in which managerial and technical staff from the Shakhty coal mine were accused of counter-revolutionary activities. The trial was held in full view of the public, in order for the people to see that Stalin was dealing with those who failed to follow the Five-Year Plans, though in actual fact the accused were not guilty and were simply being used as scapegoats. The trial also served as a warning to managers and party officials as to what would happen if they failed to go along with the pace of industrialisation. All of the accused were forced to confess and five were executed, while the remainder were given long prison sentences.
The Shakhty Trial gave an idea of what was to come. From 1936, the Show Trials began in earnest and in 1937, an explosion at Kemerovo mine was blamed on sabotage, leading to a hunt for conspirators. As a result, three Trotskyites and leading industrial figures, Pykatakov, Radek and Sokolnikov, were arrested and accused of working for Trotsky and foreign governments to undermine the Soviet economy. In reality, however, their main crime was to criticise the Five-Year Plans. Stalin was able to use the accusations of wrecking to have all three executed.
It was not just industrial figures were executed as a result of the purges. Stalin also used them to get rid of his political rivals, including Zinoviev, Kamenev and Bukharin - those old Bolsheviks who knew of his past and the views expressed by Lenin in his testament. He also purged senior members of the NKVD when he believed them to know too much about his actions. However, all these purges came after the original Shakhty Trial, which was enabled as a result of Stalin's economic policy. Therefore, to Stalin this is another way in which the policies can be seen as successful. To the victims of the purges, however, and to those people who have studied them since, they are seen as one of the most serious results stemming from the Five-Year Plans, due to the thousands of deaths which they led to.
For the ordinary citizens of the Soviet Union, living conditions . Many peasants moved to the cities in order to find work but this led to overcrowding and poor conditions. Real wages remained low making it difficult for workers to purchase the few available consumer goods. There were some improvements after 1933, with cheap food made available in workforce canteens and work clothes given free of charge, as well as public transport being developed, but the cities remained overcrowded.
Overall, Stalin's economic policies had limited success. Industrial output increased and by the time of the Second World War, the Soviet Union had been transformed from a backward agricultural country to a modern industrial nation, on its way to becoming a leading economic power. However, Stalin believed in achieving these results whatever the cost and this meant that the policies failed to take in to account the Soviet citizens who experienced a decline in their living and working conditions. When looking at the direct results of Stalin's policies the biggest failure was the agricultural decline and the resulting famine. Despite the policy of collectivisation, agricultural output simply could not keep up with industrial output and without food to feed the workers, the policies of Stalin in regards to industrialisation would always be limited in what they could achieve. In addition to this, the long term result of the purges and the thousands of deaths they caused, can be seen as one of the most disastrous consequences of Stalin's economic policies and, in my opinion, cannot be justified no matter what the improvements made by industry.
Hannah Evans
