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Life Under Stalin

Life Under Stalin. The Purges & the Great Terror. The Purges & the Great Terror. Early 1933: Dissident party members calling for an end to collectivization, return of powers to trade unions & removal of Stalin 800,000 expelled by the end of 1933 340,000 expelled in 1934

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Life Under Stalin

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  1. Life Under Stalin

  2. The Purges & the Great Terror

  3. The Purges & the Great Terror • Early 1933: Dissident party members calling for an end to collectivization, return of powers to trade unions & removal of Stalin • 800,000 expelled by the end of 1933 • 340,000 expelled in 1934 • No death penalty at first • 1934 ‘assassination plot’ changes things • Purges & executions rise from then on

  4. The Purges & the Great Terror • 1936-1938 – The Great Terror • Number of victims is still disputed • Modest estimates of those executed & sent to labor camps over 3 million between 1937-8 • Hundreds of officials arrested, tortured & forced to make false confessions in show trials • They were found guilty & either sent to a labor camp or executed

  5. The Purges & the Great Terror • ‘Old Bolsheviks’ (Zinoviev, Kamenev & Bukharin) were executed • Trotsky sought out & murdered in Mexico City in 1940 • 5-8 million innocent people were sent to labor camps

  6. Women & the Family • Difficult life due to so many ‘disappearances’ of men • Collectivization • Famine • Purges • Double duty of women • Workforce during industrialization drive • Mothers & wives

  7. Women & the Family Strategies to build stronger families: • Daycares & nurseries provided for children • Laws passed to encourage women to have as many children as possible • Abortion made illegal • Up to 16 weeks maternity leave • Subsidies & benefits for pregnant women • Heavy burden on working-class & peasant women (double duty)

  8. Women & the Family • Elite & educated had it easier (married or single) • State used these women as part of the campaign to ‘civilize’ the masses • The Wives’ Movement (1936) • Raise the culturedness of people the wives came into contact with (workplaces of husbands) • Make a comfortable home life for their husbands & families • Women encouraged to learn new roles as war approached: • Driving lorries (truck for transporting troops) • Shooting skills • Flying planes

  9. Education • One of the greatest achievements of the Stalin regime – free, mass education • All children 8-11 required to enroll in schools (1930) • Increase in pupils 14-20 million between 1929-31 • Literacy rates (1939): • City = 94% • Rural = 86% • Literacy rates (1959): • City = 99% • Rural = 98%

  10. Education Ulterior motive: turning the younger generation into ideal Soviets • Religion presented as ‘backwards or superstitious’ • Traditional teaching methods used • Teachers with more authority & strict discipline • High stakes examinations • More time spent on mathematics & science

  11. Religion • lsd

  12. Religion • Many Bolshevik leaders were atheists • Religion was the ‘opium of the masses’ • Lenin savagely attacked the Orthodox church during his reign • Much more tolerant after his death • Stalin secretly ordered local party organizations to attack churches & priests • Slaughter & destruction • Spread to other religions as well (Muslim & Jewish leaders) • Opinions changed during WWII • Church leaders helped morale

  13. Literature • Authors encouraged to write ‘socialist realism’ • ‘ideological remolding and re-education of the toiling people in the spirit of socialism.’ • Some popular works • Nikolai Ostrovsky’sHow the Steel was Tempered • Mikhail Sholokov’sVirgin Soil Upturned about collectivization • The best works were banned • Pasternak’s Dr. Zhivagopublished after Stalin’s death • Bulgakov’s The Master and the Margarita

  14. Literature • At least 600 writers died in prisons or labor camps. • Obsession with ‘socialist realism’ died off • Throwback to classical Russian literature • Pushkin, Tolstoy, Gogol, Turgenev, & Chekhov brought back into fashion

  15. Art, Architecture & Music • Social realism was emphasized • No abstract art • Scenes from the revolution or civil war • Workers fulfilling their targets • Revolutionary leaders • Sculptors limited to busts of Stalin and Lenin

  16. Art, Architecture & Music • Music – similar pattern to literature • ‘Modernism’ of Western music condemned • Attitude relaxed in the mid-1930s • Non-classical, jazz, dance, & ‘light’ music allowed • Classical composers experienced some successes • Prokofiev – Romeo & Juliet ballet & Peter & the Wolf • Shostakovitch – mixed success until his Fifth Symphony

  17. The Cinema • Stalin viewed film as the most important form of communication • Messages could reach millions of people • Wanted film to convey proletarian values, classless Soviet nationalism, heroic exploits of revolutionaries, & a prosperous communist future • Sergei Eisenstein – successful Soviet film maker • Early 20s successes (Strike, Battleship Potemkin, & October) • No success again until 1938 (Alexander Nevsky)

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