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War communism in brief. Economic policy of Soviet power

The first steps of the Soviet government in the economic sphere were based on the theoretical ideas of the Bolsheviks - in the transition period to socialism it is necessary to eliminate private property, nationalize production, form economic connections based on the decisive role of the center. On November 14, a decree and the “Regulations on Workers’ Control” were adopted.

It was introduced wherever hired labor was used. According to the decree, workers' control was introduced as a mandatory measure in all sectors of the economy, in enterprises that had hired workers; covered the production, purchase, sale and storage of products and raw materials, as well as financial activities enterprises. Control was carried out by the workers of a given enterprise through elected organizations (factory committees, councils of elders, etc.) with the participation of representatives from employees and technical personnel. Trade secrets were abolished. The decisions of the Workers' Control bodies were binding on entrepreneurs. According to the All-Russian Industrial Census of 1918, by the middle of this year special control bodies functioned at 70.5% of enterprises with more than 200 workers. Leading business organizations called on their members to oppose the implementation of this decree. The owners began to close their enterprises and in response the Bolsheviks began to nationalize them. That is, they began to take private enterprises, left without owners, into their own hands. On December 1, 1917, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee formed the Supreme Economic Council to manage and regulate the country's economy.

Nationalization of banks. One of the first actions of the Bolsheviks during October Revolution there was an armed seizure of the State Bank. The buildings of private banks were also seized. On December 8, 1917, the Decree of the Council of People's Commissars "On the abolition of the Noble Land Bank and the Peasant Land Bank" was adopted. By the decree “on the nationalization of banks” of December 14 (27), 1917, banking was declared a state monopoly. The nationalization of banks in December 1917 was supported by confiscation cash population. All gold and silver in coins and bars, paper money, if they exceeded the amount of 5,000 rubles and were acquired “unearnedly,” were confiscated. For small deposits that remained unconfiscated, the norm for receiving money from accounts was set at no more than 500 rubles per month, so that the non-confiscated balance was quickly eaten up by inflation.

Establishing control over foreign trade. At the end of December 1917 foreign trade was placed under the control of the People's Commissariat of Trade and Industry, and in April 1918 declared a state monopoly. The merchant fleet was nationalized. The decree on the nationalization of the fleet declared shipping enterprises belonging to joint stock companies, mutual partnerships, trading houses and individual large entrepreneurs owning sea and river vessels of all types.

Nationalization of industry. On June 28, 1918, all large-scale industry passed into the hands of the state.

During the same period, peasants in the villages divided the lands they had inherited. On February 19, 1918, a law on the socialization of the land was adopted. By the spring of 1918, the land use system was under the control of the Left Social Revolutionaries. Private ownership of land was abolished, the state acted as the owner of the land, and peasants became users of the land on the basis of equalizing labor standards. At first, the government used commodity exchange to obtain food, but in the context of the collapse of the economy, there were not enough industrial goods, and the peasants were in no hurry to give bread to the state in exchange for requisition checks. The threat of famine loomed over the country. In the capitals, 50-100 g of bread per person were given out per day. On May 13, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee established per capita standards for bread consumption for peasants. All the bread is over established norm was subject to confiscation. In December, the committees of the poor, which undermined Soviet power in the villages, were dissolved. They were unable to increase the supply of bread and provoked a number of anti-Soviet uprisings.

On January 11, 1919, the decree “On the allocation of grain and fodder” appears. The state's needs for bread were determined in advance and distributed among the territories. Fulfillment of the grain procurement plan was mandatory. The peasants could keep the surplus for themselves.

War communism. Economic policy in the years Civil War", carried out by the Bolsheviks, began to be called war communism." By “war communism” we mean the economic policy of 1918-1920, characterized by extreme centralization of management national economy, nationalization of not only large, but also medium and partly small industry, state monopoly on bread and many other products agriculture(prodrazverstka), prohibition of private trade and curtailment of commodity-money relations, equalization in distribution based on class rations, militarization of labor. The listed features of the economic policy of that time were reminiscent of the principles on the basis of which, according to Marxists, a communist society would arise: the absence of private ownership of the means of production, money and commodity-monetary relations, equality in the distribution of material goods. But communism, according to the teachings of Marxism, presupposes a highly developed technical base and an abundance of material goods. The “communist” beginnings of the civil war period arose in the absence of these conditions and were imposed by administrative-command methods. Hence the name “war communism” that appeared after the transition to the NEP.

At first, only the main means of production should pass into the hands of the proletariat (through the expropriation of capitalists), while the proletarian state will have to transfer private small production into public production not by force, but by example, providing assistance to it.

Marx and Engels believed that under socialism there would no longer be commodity-money relations, they would be replaced by direct product exchange. Lenin also adhered to this view. History has shown the utopian nature of this approach. However, the founders of Marxism, as well as Lenin, did not at all assume that the abolition of commodity-money relations would happen immediately; they believed that this was a process that would take a long time.

A very important feature of the policy of war communism was the introduction of universal labor service.

Introduction of universal labor conscription. It was introduced first for the “non-working classes”. The labor code adopted on December 10, 1918 established labor service for all citizens of the RSFSR. “He who does not work does not eat.” Decrees adopted by the Council of People's Commissars on April 12, 1919 and April 27, 1920 prohibited the unauthorized transition to new job and absenteeism, strict labor discipline was established at enterprises. The system of unpaid work on weekends and holidays in the form of “subbotniks” and “resurrections” has also become widespread. According to the decree of the Council of People's Commissars of January 29, 1920 “On the procedure for universal labor service”, the entire working population, regardless of permanent job, was involved in performing various work tasks. By decree under the Defense Council, the Main Committee for General Labor Service (Glavkomtrud) was created, headed by Dzerzhinsky.

At the beginning of 1920, in conditions when the demobilization of the liberated units of the Red Army seemed premature, some armies were temporarily transformed into labor armies, which retained military organization and discipline, but worked in the national economy. This was initiated by Trotsky.

Since all these measures were taken during the Civil War, in practice they were much less coordinated and coordinated than planned on paper. Large areas of Russia were not under the control of the Bolsheviks, and the lack of communications meant that even regions formally subordinated Soviet government often had to act independently, in the absence of centralized control from Moscow. The question still remains: was there war communism? economic policy in the full sense of the word, or just a set of disparate measures taken to win the civil war at any cost.

Results of the policy of war communism. By 1921, industrial output had decreased threefold, and the number of industrial workers had halved. At the same time, the staff of the Supreme Council of National Economy increased approximately a hundredfold, from 318 people to 30 thousand; A glaring example was the Gasoline Trust, which was part of this body, which grew to 50 people, despite the fact that this trust had to manage only one plant with 150 workers.

The situation in Petrograd became especially difficult, whose population decreased from 2 million 347 thousand people during the Civil War. to 799 thousand, the number of workers decreased five times.

The decline in agriculture was just as sharp. Due to the complete disinterest of peasants in increasing crops under the conditions of “war communism,” grain production in 1920 fell by half compared to pre-war.

The policy of “war communism” (especially the surplus appropriation system) caused discontent among broad sections of the population, especially the peasantry (uprising in the Tambov region, Western Siberia, Kronstadt and others). By the end of 1920, an almost continuous belt of peasant uprisings (“green flood”) appeared in Russia, aggravated by huge masses of deserters and the beginning of mass demobilization of the Red Army.

The difficult situation in industry and agriculture was aggravated by the final collapse of transport. The share of so-called “sick” steam locomotives went from pre-war 13% to 61% in 1921; transport was approaching the threshold after which there would only be enough capacity to service its own needs. In addition, firewood was used as fuel for steam locomotives, which was extremely reluctantly collected by peasants as part of their labor service.

Commodity-money relations, payments for housing, transport, public utilities. The state took over the maintenance of the workers. But despite all the bans, illegal trade continued to exist. The state and the “black market” provided the population with food equally.

All these measures were caused primarily by wartime conditions. In March 1921, at the X Congress of the RCP(b), the objectives of the policy of “war communism” were recognized by the country’s leadership as completed and a new economic policy was introduced. V.I. Lenin gave such explanations about the causes and results of war communism. In one case he wrote: “War Communism was forced by war and ruin. It was not and could not be a policy that corresponded to the economic tasks of the proletariat. It was a temporary measure."

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At the end of the Civil War, the Bolsheviks introduced a special economic public policy, the basis of which was war communism.

Less than a century after the events of 1918, modern historians consider the introduction of war communism not as a means of economic rehabilitation after internal confrontation and external intervention, but rather as a planned action that primarily strengthened the ideological positions of Bolshevism.

Introduction of War Communism

After a long destructive confrontation between the Red Army and the White Guards, the economic situation in the country was extremely difficult, which affected the authority of the Bolsheviks.

The communist government saw a way out of such an unfavorable situation in introducing the policy of war communism, which consisted of the nationalization of all large and medium-sized enterprises, surplus appropriation and universal labor conscription.

The transition to monopolization of strategic industrial facilities began at the end of 1918. Gradually, all enterprises that employed 5 or more people came into state ownership, which put an end to the existence of private small farms of farmers and artisans.

Management of industrial and agricultural enterprises was concentrated in the hands of the chairman of the Supreme Council of the National Economy.

War communism provided for food appropriation, which consisted of the forced confiscation of bread and other products from the peasants. The executive detachments of the People's Commissariat for Food actually robbed rural population, selecting virtually 80% of manufactured products.

Cash payments were completely replaced by food and labor payments. Transport and utilities were free at this time. For such a “liberal” grant of power, urban workers were forced to work for free in factories, factories and in the service sector.

Instead of wages the state provided workers with essential products: bread, milk, cereals and butter, previously confiscated from the peasants. Since 1920, compulsory universal labor service was introduced in the country, which affected mainly the peasantry.

In addition to food donations, villagers were required to provide wide range services to the state: harvest wood, produce fabric, provide horse-drawn transport.

Popular resistance

The first to confront the policy of war communism were the peasants, who on principle refused to cultivate their lands in order to evade surplus appropriation. Later, city workers joined them.

The harmfulness of war communism became clear and for the Bolsheviks the state economy suffered an even greater loss compared to the period of the Civil War. A series of protests swept across the state under the slogans: “Power to the Soviets, but not to the party.”

It was from this moment that the leadership of the RCP (b) began repressions against the protesters, organized special penalty teams and the first concentration camps.

The crisis was comprehensive: *economic devastation (inactive transport, sown areas reduced by half, inflation measured in thousands of percent per year, collapsed financial system)

*complemented by social catastrophe (declining living standards, high mortality, famine)

* political tension (distrust of Soviet power, strengthening of anti-Bolshevik sentiments).

The crisis was not only a consequence of the war. He testified to the collapse of “war communism” as an attempt at a direct, rapid, violence-based transition to communism. In the spring of 1921, at the X Congress of the RCP (b), a new economic policy (NEP) was announced - new because it recognized the need for maneuver, allowing some freedom economic activity, trade, commodity-money relations, concessions to the peasantry and private capital.

The NEP included a number of measures:

Replacement of surplus appropriation with a smaller tax in kind;

Allowing free trade in agricultural products;

Denationalization of small and medium-sized industry while retaining the state's so-called commanding heights (metallurgy, transport, fuel industry, oil production, etc.);

Association large enterprises into trusts that worked on a self-financing basis and were subordinate Supreme Council national economy;

Abolition of labor conscription and labor mobilization, introduction of wages at tariffs taking into account the quantity and quality of products;

Allowing freedom of private capital in industry, agriculture, trade, and the service sector (with restrictions), encouraging cooperation;

Admission of foreign capital (concessions, leases); reconstruction of the banking and tax systems;

Carrying out monetary reform based on limiting emissions, replacing Sovznak and introducing a stable currency - the chervonets.

The achievements of NEP are significant: to In 1925, the pre-war level of industrial and agricultural production was basically achieved, inflation was stopped, the financial system was stabilized, and the financial situation of the population improved.



At the same time, the successes of the NEP should not be exaggerated. It led to the restoration of backwardness: it did not solve the problems of modernization that faced the Russian economy already at the beginning of the 20th century. Moreover, NEP was characterized by very serious contradictions.

The contradictions of the NEP were manifested in:

- economics(technical backwardness of industry - high rates of its recovery, urgent need to update production capacities - lack of capital within the country. impossibility of widely attracting foreign investment, absolute predominance of small, semi-subsistence peasant farms in the countryside);

- social sphere (increasing inequality, rejection of NEP by a significant part of the working class and peasantry, a sense of the temporary nature of their situation among many representatives of the NEP bourgeoisie);

- politics(understanding of NEP as a temporary retreat, a maneuver necessary to regroup forces, the preservation of numerous restrictions on private capital in industry, trade and agriculture, intense struggle on issues related to the prospects of NEP).

The most important thing was the contradiction between economics and politics: an economy based on partial recognition of the market and private property could not develop stably under the conditions of a tightening one-party political regime, the program goals of which were the transition to communism - a society free of private property.

The abandonment of NEP was officially announced in December 1929.

Reasons for the liquidation of the NEP:

*contradictions

*Dominance in society of the Bolshevik attitude towards the temporary and transitional nature of the NEP, towards a non-market vector of economic development

*Internal political struggle for power in the 20s. and the victories of supporters of the NEP deployment

*self-isolation of the Soviet economy and lack of broad economic ties with the world community.

*NEP came into crisis (in fact, no one invested money in new production)

* NEP was not part of their plans to build socialism. They considered private property a relic

Positive results of the NEP:
1. It was possible to restore the national economy and even surpass the pre-war level due to internal reserves.
2. Revive agriculture, which made it possible to feed the country’s population.
3. National income increased by 18% per year and by 1928. - by 10% in per capita terms, which exceeded the level of 1913.
4. The growth of industrial production was 30% annually, which indicated rapid growth labor productivity.
5. The country's national currency has become strong and stable.
6. The material well-being of the population grew rapidly.
Negative results of the NEP:
1. There was a disproportionate development of the main sectors of the national economy.
2. The lag in the pace of industrial revival from agricultural production led the NEP through a period of economic crises.
3. In the village there was a social and property differentiation of the peasantry, which led to increased tension between different poles.
4. Throughout the 20s, the number of unemployed in the city increased, which by the end of the NEP amounted to more than 2 million people.
5. The financial system strengthened only for a while. In the second half of the 20s, due to the active financing of heavy industry, market equilibrium was disrupted, inflation began, which undermined the financial and credit system

1. Reasons for the introduction of “war communism”.

1.1. Bolshevik political doctrine. The economic policy of the Bolsheviks during the Civil War was called “war communism” (although the term itself was introduced into circulation in the summer of 1917 by the famous socialist A.A.Bogdanov). This concept included not just economic policy in wartime conditions, but also a certain doctrinal concept of building socialism in one country. The party documents of the RCP(b) (in particular, the second Party Program adopted by the VIII Congress in 1919) were dominated by the idea of ​​a direct transition to socialism without a preliminary period adapting the old economy to a socialist economy. It was assumed, as V.I. Lenin noted, that the direct order of the proletarian state would establish government proceedings and state distribution of products in a communist manner in a petty-bourgeois country, including with the help of funds borrowed from capitalist states, primarily Germany. As prerequisites for building socialism, V.I. Lenin called the presence of such subjective factors as the dictatorship of the proletariat and the proletarian party. As for the material prerequisites, they were associated with the victory of the world revolution and the help of the Western European proletariat.

In some textbooks There is a statement that the Civil War became the main reason for the policy of war communism. At the same time, the Soviet government took the first steps within the framework of this policy even before the outbreak of the national war. V.I. Lenin himself wrote later: At the beginning of 1918, we made the mistake that we decided to make a direct transition to communist production and distribution... We assumed, without sufficient calculation, by the direct orders of the proletarian state, to establish state production and state distribution in a communist way.

At the same time, the Civil War also played a role in the development of some military-communist measures.

1.2. Conditions of the Civil War. The war confronted the Bolsheviks with the task of creating a huge army, maximizing the mobilization of all resources, and hence the excessive centralization of power and its subordination to the control of all spheres of the state. At the same time, the wartime tasks coincided with the Bolsheviks’ ideas about socialism as a commodityless, marketless, centralized society.

1.3. The essence of the policy of war communism. Thus, the policy of military communism pursued by the Bolsheviks in 1918-1920 was built, on the one hand, on the experience government regulation economic relations during the First World War (in Russia, Germany), on the other hand, on utopian ideas about the possibility of a direct transition to marketless socialism in anticipation of a world revolution, which ultimately led to accelerating the pace of socio-economic transformations in the country during the Civil War .

2. Key elements of the policy

2.1. In the field of agriculture.

2.1.1. Food dictatorship introduced by the decrees of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of May 9 and 27, 1918, showed its ineffectiveness: less than 10% of the planned grain was collected. In turn, the pro-armies operating at that time caused massive uprisings of peasants who supported the anti-Bolshevik forces. Therefore, in November 1918, the food army was dissolved and, by decree of January 11, 1919, surplus appropriation.

2.1.2. Prodrazverstka, in contrast to the policy of the summer - autumn of 1918, was already ordered confiscation of bread. The state reported the figure for its grain needs, then this amount was distributed (allocated) to provinces, districts and volosts. The food detachments that collected grain did not proceed from the capabilities of peasant farms, but from very conditional state needs, but at the same time they were forced to leave part of the grain to the peasants.

In addition to surplus appropriation - grain duty in kind - the system of coercion, which was actively practiced during the war, included a set of labor duties in kind (road clearing, firewood collection, horse-drawn duty, etc.).

Since the autumn of 1919, the allocation extended to potatoes and hay. With the end of the Civil War, this policy was expanded, and from 1920, meat and 20 more types of raw materials and food were included in the allocation.

2.1.3. Creation of state farms and communes. In order to create a unified production economy that would supply the country with everything necessary, a policy was adopted towards the accelerated unification of individual farms into collective farms, as well as the creation of state farms (Soviet farms). Transition to communist production and distribution In agriculture, two documents were legally formalized:

Resolution of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of February 14, 1919. Regulations on socialist land management and on measures for the transition to socialist agriculture and

The Decree on Land was practically cancelled. The land fund was transferred not to all workers, but first of all to state farms and communes, and secondly to labor artels and partnerships for joint cultivation of the land (TOZ). An individual peasant could only use the remnants of the land fund.

2.2. In industry and trade.

2.2.1. Nationalization of industry. V.I. Lenin believed that the new socialist system implies the greatest centralization of large-scale production throughout the country. As a result, on the basis of the decree of July 28, 1918, the accelerated nationalization of all industries, and not just the most important ones, was carried out. At the end of 1918, out of 9.5 thousand enterprises in European Russia, 3.3 thousand were nationalized. By the summer of 1919, 4 thousand enterprises were under the control of the Supreme Economic Council, and a year later up to 80% of large and medium-sized enterprises were nationalized. The nationalized sector employed 2 million people - 70% of the employed.

After the end of the Civil War in November 1920, the Supreme Economic Council adopted a resolution on the nationalization of all, now small, industry, but this measure was never implemented.

2.2.2. Liquidation of the market and commodity-money relations. Naturalization of economic ties. The nationalization of the economy and the implementation of the idea of ​​socialism as a commodity-free and moneyless society led to the abolition of the market and commodity-money relations. On July 22, 1918, a decree of the Council of People's Commissars was adopted About speculation, which prohibited all non-state trade. By the beginning of 1919, private trading enterprises were completely nationalized or closed. Providing the population with food and personal items was carried out through the state supply network, for which cards, rations and distribution norms were introduced. In 1919-1920 was created consumer cooperation- government organization involved in distribution.

In these conditions they flourished bagmanship and the black market, where prices were tens and hundreds of times higher than state prices, but thanks to them people were somehow able to feed themselves.

After the end of the Civil War, the transition to full naturalization of economic relations. On January 1, 1921, free supplies of food, industrial goods and services to workers and employees of state-owned enterprises, members of their families and Red Army soldiers were introduced. Then fees for fuel and utilities were abolished.

2.2.3. Over-centralization of economic management. During the Civil War, a centralized state and party structure was created. IN public sphere power passed to the executive bodies of the Council of People's Commissars - the Small Council of People's Commissars, the Council of Workers' and Peasants' Defense (November 1918), chaired by V.I.Lenin and the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic headed by L.D. Trotsky. Since 1920, the entire national economy came under the jurisdiction of the Defense Council.

A negative attitude towards the market stimulated the transition to extreme centralization of management of the national economy, primarily industry and distribution (through the Supreme Economic Council, People's Commissariat for Food, etc.). The peak of centralization was Glaucusism. In 1920 there were 50 Glavkov, subordinate to the Supreme Economic Council, coordinating related industries and distributing finished products - Glavtorf, Glavkozha, Glavstarch, etc. Enterprises and their associations did not have any independence.

Consumer cooperation was also centralized and subordinated to the People's Commissariat for Food.

2.3. Elements of violence and coercion.

2.3.1. Forced nature of labor. During the period of war communism, universal labor conscription was introduced, first for bourgeois elements, and from April 1919 - for the entire population aged 16 to 50 years (the slogan of the time is “He who does not work, let him not eat!”). Labor became obligatory and forced. To secure the workforce in one place, work books were introduced in June 1919.

2.3.2. Militarization of labor became another element of the policy of war communism. The workers turned into fighters labor front. Militarization first affected workers and employees of the military industry; in November 1918 - all those employed in railway transport, and from March 1919 - in sea and river transport. Since 1920, workers and peasants were transferred to the position of mobilized soldiers. In January 1920, at the suggestion of L.D. Trotsky, supported by Lenin, the creation began labor armies from rear army units in the Urals, in the Volga region, in Z western provinces, in the Caucasus.

2.3.3. Activities of emergency authorities. The Civil War was a time of emergency powers, special powers and terror. Among the special bodies during this period, the most prominent was All-Russian Extraordinary Commission for Combating Counter-Revolution and Sabotage (VChK)), which in June 1918 surpassed the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs in numbers (about 1000 people, in 1921 already more than 137 thousand). September 5, 1918, after the assassination attempt on V.I. Lenin and the murder of the chairman of the Petrograd Cheka M.S.Uritsky, was accepted Decree on the Red Terror, which opened up wide scope for the activities of repressive bodies. By the beginning of 1920, there were 13,900 people in concentration camps, 4,100 in labor camps, and 36,500 in prisons.

But terror was not the monopoly of the Reds. White armies resorted to the same brutal retaliation against their opponents. They had security services, special anti-subversive teams and punitive groups. Whites used individual and mass terror against the population, participated in executions and reprisals against communists, council members and entire villages. Pogroms, murders and atrocities by white, red, green and simply bandit formations were a widespread phenomenon during the war years.

4. consequences of the policy of war communism

4.1. As a result of the policy of war communism, socio-economic conditions for the victory of the Soviet Republic over the interventionists and the White Guards. The Bolsheviks managed to mobilize forces and subordinate the economy to the goals of providing the Red Army with ammunition, uniforms, and food.

4.2. Economic crisis. At the same time, for the country's economy, the war and the policy of war communism had severe consequences. By 1920, national income had fallen from 11 to 4 billion rubles compared to 1913; production of large-scale industry was 13% of the pre-war level, incl. heavy industry - 2-5%. The workers went to the village, where they could still feed themselves. The end of hostilities did not bring relief. At the beginning of 1921, many of the enterprises that were still operating were closed, including several dozen of the largest Petrograd factories.

The surplus appropriation system led to a reduction in plantings and the gross harvest of major agricultural crops. Agricultural production in 1920 was two-thirds of the pre-war level. In 1920-1921 famine broke out in the country.

4.3. Socio-political crisis. The policy of war communism, based on violence and emergency measures, primarily against the peasantry, caused a real war in the countryside and called into question the very fact of maintaining the power of the Bolsheviks. During the Civil War, when the White governments tried to ensure the return of land to large owners, the peasants' struggle with the Bolsheviks weakened and turned against the Whites. But with the end of active hostilities, it flared up with renewed vigor.

Until August 1921, the army operated N. Makhno. At the end of 1920 and beginning of 1921, peasant uprisings continued in a number of regions of Russia (including Western Siberia, Don, Kuban). In January 1921, peasant detachments with a total number of 50 thousand people under the command of A.S. Antonova liquidated the power of the Bolsheviks in the Tambov province, demanding not only the abolition of the surplus appropriation system, but also the convening Constituent Assembly. Only in the summer of the army M.N. Tukhachevsky managed to suppress the uprising using artillery, tanks and even aviation.

At the same time, workers' strikes and protests in the army and navy took place, the largest of which was the uprising of Kronstadt sailors, who spoke out under the slogan Soviets without Bolsheviks. It is significant that the rebels were supported by the majority of the Kronstadt Bolsheviks.

4.4. Abolition of the policy of war communism. The phenomenon of war communism included not only economic policy, but also a special political regime, ideology and type of social consciousness. In the process of implementing the policy of war communism in public consciousness certain ideas emerged about the model of socialism, which included the destruction of private property, the creation of a single national non-market system through the elimination of commodity-money relations, the naturalization of wages as the most important condition building a communist cashless economy.

But the acute political and economic crisis pushed the party leaders to reconsider their entire point of view on socialism. After a wide discussion at the end of 1920 - beginning of 1921 with the X Congress of the RCP (b) (March 1921), the abolition of the policy of war communism began.

QUESTIONS AND TASKS

Name the main elements of the Bolshevik economic policy in the field of distribution during the Civil War.

What are the consequences for the system? public administration had this policy?

What were the doctrinal (theoretical) foundations of the policy of war communism?

Show what the attempt to accelerate the introduction of socialist forms of management in the countryside led to?

Why, in your opinion, did the dictatorship of the proletariat during the war inevitably lead to the dictatorship of the party? Compare the size of the RCP(b) on the eve and after the end of the Civil War.

literature

  1. History of the Fatherland in documents. Part 1. 1917-1920. - M., 1994.
  2. Korolenko V. Letters to Lunacharsky.// Notes of an eyewitness: Memoirs, diaries, letters. M., 1989. P.585 623.
  3. Buldakov V.P., Kabanov V.V. War communism: ideology and social development. M., 1998.
  4. Kabanov V.V. Peasant farming under war communism. - M., 1988.
  5. Pavlyuchenkov S.A. War communism in Russia: power and the masses. - M., 1997.
  6. Sokolov A.K. Well Soviet history. 1917-1940. M., 1999. Part 1. R.4-5.

War communism (policy of war communism) is the name of the internal policy of Soviet Russia, carried out during the Civil War of 1918-1921.

The essence of war communism was to prepare the country for a new, communist society, which the new authorities were oriented towards. War communism was characterized by the following features:

  • extreme degree of centralization of management of the entire economy;
  • nationalization of industry (from small to large);
  • a ban on private trade and the curtailment of commodity-money relations;
  • state monopolization of many branches of agriculture;
  • militarization of labor (orientation towards the military industry);
  • total equalization, when everyone received an equal amount of benefits and goods.

It was on the basis of these principles that it was planned to build a new state, where there are no rich and poor, where everyone is equal and everyone receives exactly as much as is necessary for normal life. Scientists believe that the introduction of new policies was necessary in order not only to survive the Civil War, but also to quickly rebuild the country into a new type of society.