‘Stalin’s industrial policies were more successful than his attempts to modernise agriculture’ - How far do you agree with this view?

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Sam Daniels                30/04/2007

‘Stalin’s industrial policies were more successful than his attempts to modernise agriculture.’ How far do you agree with this view?

The USSR was 50 – 100 years behind the west. They had to catch up within 10 years or go down. It needed to compete with the USA by reorganizing and modernizing. This was done by introducing the Five Year Plans in 1928.The first five year plan concentrated on the heavy industries such as coal, iron, oil and steel. Stalin ordered these to double in five years. The second Five Year Plan began in 1933 and focused on consumer goods, but by 1934 the emphasis had changed to military expenditure. A third Five Year Plan was begun in 1938, but was cut short by the German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941. Collectivisation was part of the first Five Year Plan and was an attempt to move peasants to large collective farms so machinery and skilled labour could be used more effectively, ad so no individuals gained profit. Sovkhozy was a state farm where all produce went to the state, and workers were paid a fixed amount whether they worked or not. Kolkhozy was a collective farm where workers had to produce a fixed amount and sell it to the state. If they produced nothing more than what they sold, they starved.

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Stalin’s industrial policies were very successful in some ways. The Five Year Plans increased production by 400%. From the 1928 – 1940, coal production increased from 35 million tonnes (mt) to 164.6 mt, steel production increased from 4 mt to 18.4 mt and iron production increased from 3.2 mt to 14.8 mt. Some of the targets were achieved due the Shock Brigades: volunteers being sent to inspire and inform the workers in the factories, and keen energetic activists from Komosol: the youth wing of the Communist Party. The coal industry boomed due to Alexei Stakhanovite: a role model who ...

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