Communism and Joseph Stalin What were Stalin’s changes to the Leninist ideology? What split the communist world apart?

November 29—What do you know about Joseph Stalin?

The Soviet Union in the Interwar period

Key Terms New Economic Policy (NEP) Politburo Leon Trotsky Five-year plan Collectivization The Great Purge

Lecture Outline I. Lenin A. NEP B. Politburo II. Stalin A. Five-Year Plan B. Collectivization C. Great Purge

New Economic Policy In March 1921, Lenin abandoned war communism, in which the government had extensive control of the economy, in favor of his New Economic Policy (NEP). The NEP was a modified version of the old capitalist system. Peasants were allowed to sell their produce openly. Retail stores could be privately owned and operated.

NEP (con) Heavy industry, banking, and mines remained in the hands of the government. The NEP saved the Soviet Union from complete economic disaster, but it was meant to be a temporary retreat from the goals of communism.

What is the Politburo? It is a seven-member committee that became the leading policy-making body of the Communist Party in Russia. When Lenin died in 1924, there was a power struggle among the members of the Politburo.

Who is Leon Trotsky? Leon Trotsky led one of the groups in the Politburo. He was also the commissar of war.

Leon Trotsky He wanted to end the NEP and launch Russia on a path of rapid industrialization; chiefly at the expense of the peasants. He also wanted to spread communism abroad and believed that the revolution in Russia would not survive unless other nations adopted communism.

The other group The other group in the Politburo wanted to focus on building a socialist state at home and continue Lenin’s NEP. This group believed that rapid industrialization was too radical a plan and that such a plan would lower the peasants standard of living.

Joseph Stalin He was the general secretary of the Communist Party and he used this power to make him a dictator by 1929.

Stalin’s Changes to Leninism Stalin believed that historical progress had come about because of the state controlled by the Communist Party. Class enemies remained a constant threat to the socialist society and communist state.

Stalin’s Changes to Leninism Subordination of all foreign communist parties, and later states, to the needs of the Soviet Union. Other communists were expected to serve the interests of the USSR and its leaders.

Five-Year Plans He ended the NEP in 1928 and launched his first Five-Year Plan, which set economic goals for five-year periods. Their purpose was to transform Russia virtually overnight from an agricultural into an industrial country.

Collectivization The first five-year plan focused on the production of armaments and capital goods such as heavy machinery and collectivization of farms. It was a system in which private farms were eliminated and the government owned all of the land while the peasants worked it.

Reactions to collectivization Many peasants actively resisted it. They would rather hoard crops or kill livestock, than have them taken. By 1930, 10 million peasant households had been collectivized. Four years later, roughly 26 million family farms had been collectivized into 250,000 units.

Effects of Stalin’s leadership The hoarding of food and slaughter of livestock by peasants resisting collectivization resulted in famine. 10 million peasants died in the famines of 1932 and Anyone who resisted Stalin was sent to the gulags, forced labor camps in Siberia. Much of the social legislation passed in the 1920s was overturned, including equal rights for women.

The Great Purge Occurred in the 1930s Stalin removed the Old Bolsheviks and other opponents by putting them on trial and condemning them to death. Stalin also purged many army officers, diplomats, union officials, party members, intellectuals, and numerous ordinary citizens. An estimated 8 million Russians were sent to gulags, from which they never returned.