Joseph Stalin established a modern totalitarian government in Soviet Russia. He is known as the “Man of Steel”. A totalitarianism is a type of government that takes total, centralized, state control over every aspect of public and private life of their people. His rule had changed the people of his empire in numerous ways. Stalin had total control over economic needs. According to document 6 “By 1940 Russia produced more pig iron than Germany, and far more than Britain or France. Numbers of cattle grew in the 1920s, but fell increasingly during the collectivization of agriculture after 1929, and by 1940 hardly exceeded the figure for 1920. Since 1940 the industrial development of the Soviet Union has been impressive, but agricultural production has continued to be plumiding”. The document illustrates how pig iron had significantly increased as a result of the “Five Year Plan”, however heavy industry led to expense of food supplies. This would cause limited production of consumer goods. It caused a step back because of the severe shortages of housing, food, clothing as well as other necessary goods. The Five Year Plan didn’t help much to excel their economic as Stalin hoped, it impacted by creating famine. Stalin rising to power promised an economic boom for Russia however, in that process many people suffered and died of starvation. According to document 5, “The purge began its last,…
Over the period from 1855 to 1964, Russia saw various reforms and policies under the Tsars and the Communist leaders that had great impacts on its economy and society both positive and negative. Lenin definitely implanted polices that changed society and the economy for example with war communism. However whether his policies had the greatest impact is debatable and in this essay I will be assessing the view whether Lenin had the greatest impact on Russia’s economy and society than any other ruler between the period from 1855-1964.…
During The Cold War, There was a total of 4 change in power. Joseph Stalin being the first dictator of The Soviet Union during The Cold War, Nikita Khrushchev being the second, Leonid Brezhnev the third, and Mikhail Gorbachev the final leader of The Soviet Union. “While this meant change the underlying political reality was that the Soviet system did not trust the people. Government was retained in the hand of Party apparatchiks which the public had no role in choosing. Economically there were improvements.” Despite the improvements, living conditions were poor for the citizens of The Soviet Union. “Agriculture remained a major weakness with poor yields”. Although The Soviet try to improve life for people, life was still poor. The economics…
Stalinism, the term used to embody the form of government experienced by the Soviet Union under Stalin’s rule, had a significant and lasting impact on the USSR. Stalinism impacted on several aspects of life. Collectivisation was introduced which assisted in the funding of industrialisation, terror was used to create a communist state. Stalin centralised every aspect of life, from the single leadership of Stalin himself to party control of the state and its functions. Free will disappeared and service to the state was expected. Consequently a Stalinist state which had a major impact on the USSR was created.…
Command economy is defined in the textbook as, a government run economy. The government owned all industries and set quotas that favored heavy industry over the production of consumer goods and products. What advantages and disadvantages did Russians experience with a command economy? How about a market economy? One of the many disadvantages of this command economy was that supply and demand did not dictate what products would be produced. The authoritative government would determine what was to be produced and how many were needed. There was no freedom as to what was made or sold. One advantage of this economy was that government kept providing jobs due to its many investments. Now on to the market economy, what is a market economy? A market…
In 1957, Khrushchev attempted to decrease the amount of power the central government had and instead give power to regional governments. In turn, the economy was severely impacted. It was very hard to restructure the USSR without having a strong central authority. Additionally, the Soviet economy was full of imbalances especially in consumer industries. The USSR tried to produce only what was necessary in order to eliminate waste, however they usually did not produce enough which caused a shortage of goods. Furthermore, the Soviets did not have much money to invest elsewhere as they spent a good portion of their GDP on their military and their various space programs. Finally, Khrushchev spread the investments he could make to widely which, consequently, did not result in anything efficient being done due to the lack of…
In the period before 1941, Stalin was able to institute his economical policies of Collectivization and the 5-year plans. ‘Backwards was to be defeated and enslaved’. Russia had to make up for 100 years of lost time for fear of being consumed by the western world. Stalin, sole leader of the Bolsheviks by the late 1920’s, believed that Russia could modernize their Agricultural and Industrial sectors through his policies.…
Stalin launched his first Five-Year Plan in 1928 by setting up a command economy. The purpose of the Five-Year plan was to create a road map for Stalin’s great goals of industrialization and the development of the Soviet Unions (OI.) Specific goals were set in the areas of electricity, coal, oil, pig-iron, and steel (DOC 2.) The Five-Year plan resulted in strengthening the Soviet Unions economic position and turned it into a powerful industrial state. In an excerpt from The Land of the Soviets its stated, “The rate of industrial growth in the USSR considerably exceeded that of the capitalist countries.” (DOC 8.) This is proven in several charts showing the rapid growth in farming and industrialization (DOCS 2, 3, 4.) Stalin said, “To slow down would mean falling behind. And those who fall behind are beaten. But we do not want to be beaten! One feature of the old Russia was the continual beatings she suffered for falling behind, for her backwardness….” (DOC 1.) This momentum helped arouse Russian pride to motivate the people. Stalin’s method of motivation imposed the people to come together as one and get ahead in order to dodge falling behind or any kind of harm to their country (OI.)…
In 1917, Russia was crumbling into pieces. The World War I was draining all of Russia’s resources. There was shortage of food throughout the country, which left people starving. At the battlefront, millions of Russian soldiers were dying, they did not possess many of the powerful weapons that their opponents had. The government under Czar Nicholas II was disintegrating, and a provisional government had been set up. In November of 1917, Lenin and his communist followers known as the Bolsheviks overthrew the provisional government and set a communist government in Russia. However, in 1924, Lenin died and Josef Stalin assumed leadership of the Soviet Union, which was the name for the communist Russia. Stalin was a ruthless leader who brought many changes to the Soviet Union. Stalin’s goal was to transform the Soviet Union into a modern superpower and spread communism throughout the world, and he was determined to sabotage anyone who stood in his way. He used many methods such as collectivization, totalitarianism and five year plan’s to achieve his goals. Stalin’s rule brought both harmful and beneficial consequences to the Soviet Union; however, the negative factors were so terrible, that they overwhelm the positive factors.…
Despite the poor working conditions and the inequality that industrialization under capitalism creates (“The Industrial Revolution and Economic Growth”, 529) it is still a necessary step for Russia because it lays the groundwork for a successful socialist and eventually communist system of government that will allow all members of Russia to flourish. “[The Communist] openly declare that their ends can be attained only by the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions;”(Carl Marks and Friedrich Engel, The Communist Manifesto) Therefore it is important to note that capitalism is an impractical form of government that should not be implemented for any long term scenario it is merely a stepping stone that is unfortunate but essential to the development of a successful government. Then why must Russia endure capitalism? Why not skip straight to communism? It is for this reason, A does not equal C meaning that each step in the process is essential to getting the end result.…
Russia’s economy suffered worse during the war than most of the other participants due to its underdeveloped Industrial sector. Eventually, the toll on the Russian economy and quality of life caused the Russian people to rebel against Czar Nicholas II and a revolution took place in 1917. When Vladimir Lenin of the Bolsheviks came to power, he withdrew Russia from the war in order to begin ameliorating working conditions and quality of life, but before he could begin stabilizing the economic and political climate in Russia, a Civil War broke out. Ultimately, the Bolshevik regime won the war and Russia emerged as the Soviet Union: the first communist country in…
The major difference between a command economy and a market economy is that a command economy is told what to do by the government. A market economy does things for the people, the people decide what they want. The command economy is told what to produce, who to produce to, and how to produce by the government. The market economy is told is told what to produce, who to produce to, and how to produce by the people.…
Recently, over this summer there has been hundreds of children who have illegally entered the United States from Central and South America. They snuck here because a lot of their parents sent them here in search of a much safer life with more opportunity ahead of them instead of being under a gruesome government control over in there home country. I believe they should be sent back to their country because, these kids could potentially be a liar and or a threat to our countries safety, and it is unconstitutional to make exceptions for anyone that doesn’t abide by the law, especially if they’re not a United States citizen, that entered the U.S illegally.…
The Soviets had a command economy, an economy where the government decides what goods will be produced, how much is produced, and the pricing of the goods. At first there was a very long period of rapid growth from 1950-1973. The Soviet economy posted an estimated annual growth rate in gross national product of 5.7% from 1950 to 1960, and 5.2% from 1960 to 1970(JOHNSTON, Paragraph 6). Because the Soviet Union’s economy was so underdeveloped and controlled, it could easily adapt to and imitate the newest western technology. While this strategy was very effective short-term, The forced industrialization at the expense of personal consumption led to the country being unable to innovate in its economy.…
Another factor of Communist Russia is that it was primarily supported by a command economy. A command economy, imposed by Stalin during the Russian Revolution, is when the government establishes all economic decisions and regulations, and the government manages all businesses and farms. Stalin permitted no private businesses during this time period. This…