Open AccessExile and Discipline: The June 1948 Campaign Against Collective Farm Shirkers
Author(s) -
Jean Lévesque
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
the carl beck papers in russian and east european studies
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2163-839X
pISSN - 0889-275X
DOI - 10.5195/cbp.2006.129
Subject(s) - ukrainian , decree , communism , agrarian society , state (computer science) , political science , legislation , law , work (physics) , economic history , political economy , sociology , history , agriculture , politics , engineering , archaeology , philosophy , linguistics , algorithm , computer science , mechanical engineering
In February and June 1948, the Stalinist state issued two decrees aimed at a radical solution of the problem of labor discipline among Soviet collective farm peasants. Borne out of the initiative of the Ukrainian Communist Party Secretary N.S. Khrushchev, who found examples of community self-policing in tsarist legislation, the decrees granted collective farm general meetings the right to deport to distant parts of the Soviet Union peasants reluctant to fulfi ll the minimal labor requirements set by the state. Based on a wide array of formerly classifi ed Russian archival documents, this study draws the complete story of this little known page in the history of Stalinist repression. It demonstrates that despite the harshness of the measures employed, the decree did little to force peasants back to work on collective farms given the seriousness of the postwar agrarian crisis.