Lenin's Impact on Youth

• Lenin recognised the importance of education in building a socialist society in Russia.
• Lenin's wife, Krupskaya, was Commissar for Education in the Sovnarkom and free education was provided at all levels for the first time in Russian history.
• The curriculum was organised within a Communist framework such as learning Communist ideology and visiting factories and industrial plants.
• However, during the NEP period, a degree of creativity and individual expression was allowed.
• A youth wing of the party was set up in 1918 and this was significantly expanded in 1926 and renamed Komsomol.
• Komsomol was divided into two organisations.

  • The Young Pioneers for children aged 10-14.
  • Komsomol for those aged 14-28.
• By the end of the NEP period in 1928, only 6% of eligible young people had joined Komsomol.
• The breakdown of the traditional family unit due to the social upheavals of the Civil War period and especially, the ease of divorce in the 1920s affected children significantly.
• There were 7-9 million orphaned and abandoned children in Russian towns and cities.
• The greater social freedom of the NEP period led to an increase in levels of drinking, gambling and prostitution among older youths who were earning a wage.
• Older Communists viewed "hooligan" activities as being the result of the corrupting influence of capitalist values within the NEP.