Stalin and russia

• Features of communism

  1. opposition to capitalism
  2. creation of a classless society
  3. shared ownership
  4. no religion
  5. international cooperation among workers
• Experience of life in USSR under Stalin

  1. propaganda
  2. industrialisation
  3. collectivisation
  4. the great terror
• USSR:

  • union of soviet socialist republics
  • socialist state, from 1922-1991
  • consisted of Russia and 14 surrounding countries
• Propaganda

  • all centred around building a ‘cult of personality’
  • towns named after him=Stalingrad
  • stalins cult of personality displayed him as a ‘god like figure’
  • newspaper, radio, cinema all controlled by Stalin
• Industrialisation

  • 1st 5 year plan aimed at industrialisation of economy
  • emphasis on heavy industry- coal, iron, steel
  • construction of public work schemes were key element of 5 year plan eg) railway system in Moscow
• Industrialisation

  • industrial centres built throughout USSR= city of magnitogorsk
  • produced= 5 million tons of steel, 4.5 million tons of iron
  • by 1939 employed 45,000
• Collectivisation

  • Stalin needed to make agriculture more productive to feed the growing pop of USSR
  • 1st 5 year plan= transformed small farms to large ‘collectivisation farms‘
  • 5 million kulaks were sent to gulags
• Collectivisation 2

  • people slaughtered their livestock rather than giving it to stalin
  • stalin started a famine in Ukraine- holodom 1932
  • raised grain quota by 44%
  • 6-7million died in Ukraine
  • by 1939, 90% of the 25 million farms had been turned into collectivised farms
  • 10 million died due to this
• The great terror-purges

  • Stalin Wanted to remove any threat to his power
  • murder of Sergei Kirov in 1934 triggered start of the purges
• The great terror- NKVD

  • aim= root out enemies of the state
  • monopoly over the law enforcement
  • used state policy interrogation methods and carried out unauthorised executions
• The great terror-gulags

  • prisoners known as Zeks, worked 14 hours a day, limited food
  • kolyma= Siberia, 6 times the size of France , up to 100 gulags here
• Death toll

  • 1937 USSR census- massive drop population, in response Stalin murdered all census staff and labelled them as ‘spies’
  • stalins great terror= 30 million died
• Stalins five year plan

  • a series of economic plans launched in 1928 to improve the soviet unions domestic policy
  • the policies were centred around rapid industrialisation and collectivisation of agriculture