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Radical Change in Socio-Economic
and Class Structure of Society

p The age-long dream of those who lived under oppression had been of a system of government under which there would be no oppressors and no oppressed, no dominant and no subjugated peoples, no hungry and destitute men, women and children. The peoples of the USSR were the first to make that dream come true. As a result of far-reaching reforms in all spheres of political, economic and cultural endeavour, socialism may be said to have been achieved in the main in the Soviet Union during the pre-war years. Specifically, the most important achievement was the radical change worked in the socio-economic and class structure of the society. A powerful public economy was set up during the first two decades of Soviet power, a first-class state industry and the greatest mechanised agricultural sector in the world. Thus the material and technical basis of socialist society was laid down. Socialist relations founded on public ownership of the instruments and means of production prevailed throughout the national economy.

p This radical socio-economic transformation brought about a complete change in the class structure of the society. The landed proprietors and big bourgeoisie had made their exit from the historical arena in the early years of Soviet power after the confiscation of landed estates and the nationalisation of industrial enterprises. Thoroughly defeated in the Civil War, most of them had fled abroad. A part of the bourgeoisie had remained, however. And when the New Economic Policy was inaugurated there was a certain numerical increase in the urban and rural bourgeoisie, though their share in the total population was never important. The rural bourgeoisie—the kulaks—for instance, accounted for 4-5 Per cent of the peasantry. The relative importance of the urban bourgeoisie was even less.

p Private capitalist industry and trade had been completely ousted from the national economy in the early 1930s, and the vast majority of the owners had gone to work. The kulaks had been 100 Emacs-File-stamp: "/home/ysverdlov/leninist.biz/en/1974/2SHW519/20070310/199.tx" eliminated as producers during the First Five-Year Plan period. The final disappearance of the exploiting classes from Soviet society took place during the Second Five-Year Plan period. The causes that engendered exploiters and exploitation of man by man were eliminated at the same time.

p The changes that came into the lives of the working classes of the Soviet society were truly of historic significance. The working class was no longer an exploited, an oppressed class. It was now a new class, one whose existence was founded on free labour in socialised state-owned enterprises. The gigantic growth of socialist industry was paralleled by the numerical growth of the working class: in 1939, workers (and members of their families) accounted for nearly one-third of the country’s population. Moreover, the working class had attained a much higher cultural and technical level, made significant gains in the organisational field, and achieved greater political consciousness. Socialist emulation expanded from year to year, testifying to the existence of a new attitude towards work. Therein lay the main driving force behind the unceasing and rapid development of the national economy.

p The Soviet peasantry, too, was no longer the oppressed class that it used to be. Its main oppressors had been overthrown in the early years of Soviet power. Complete emancipation of the Soviet peasantry from all forms of exploitation, however, including that at the hands of the kulaks, came with the transition to collective farming.

p The tractors, harvesting-combines and other farm machines that had replaced primitive implements and manual labour had made the peasant’s work not only easier, but also more productive. Besides, the nature of farm work had changed. Peasants used to work each on his own plot of ground, with an envious eye on their neighbours, if the latter were successful. Fences and boundary strips made for isolation or estrangement in the village. The collective farm brought about a radical change in the situation, getting the peasants to work together. Farming became a work in common and, as such, promoted interest in making the farm a prosperous enterprise, since each collective farmer’s well-being depended on that common prosperity. Comradely co-operation and mutual aid became characteristic of relations among them.

p Living standards in the countryside improved, both on the material and cultural plane. According to the 1939 census data literacy among the peasants stood at 76.8 per cent (at 66.6 per cent for women). Peasants were taking a much greater interest in political activities, participating in the administrative work of the Soviet Government.

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p The intelligentsia, too, underwent a change. In pre- revolution_ary Russia the intelligentsia had been unconcerned about the needs, the interests of the masses, and these masses quite rightly regarded the intellectuals as an alien and hostile caste, as belonging to the exploiting elements.

p The process of socialist construction created a new intelligentsia, millions strong, from among the workers and peasants. This new intelligentsia played an active part in building the new society and loyally supported the Communist Party and the Soviet Government in the communist education of the people.

All these changes in the class structure of the Soviet society led to the creation of social, political and ideological unity of the Soviet people, which is one of the main sources of the strength and the power of the socialist system.

The New Soviet Man

p In the process of building socialism the Soviet system moulded the new man. It educated people in the spirit of high moral principles, cultivated in them qualities of courage, staunchness, collectivism, and patriotism, readiness to give their lives for their country. The rescue of the Chelyuskin expedition, which won the admiration of all the world, was a striking manifestation of these admirable qualities of the Soviet man. The Chelyuskin, a big freighter, left Leningrad on July 12, 1933 carrying an expedition headed by O. Y. Schmidt, prominent scientist and member of the Communist Party.

p The purpose of the expedition was to traverse the Northern Sea Route, from Murmansk in the west to the Bering Strait in the east, in one navigation season. The ice situation in the Arctic was extremely unfavourable, however, and in September 1933, the Chelyuskin found itself icebound and unable to break out. A powerful ice nip followed on February 13, 1934, and the Chelyuskin went down, crushed by the ice. The personnel and crew, numbering 103 men and women and two babies, had disembarked and a stock of supplies and equipment, including food, fuel and tents, had been landed.

Thus "Camp Schmidt" was set up in the heart of the Arctic, with the Arctic winter well advanced. For two months these men and women lived and worked courageously in the face of frightful hardships. Scientific research work went on day after day without a break. The day after the camp had been set up wireless contact Was made with the mainland, which operators E. Krenkel, V. Ivanyuk and S. Ivanov maintained to the very last day of the expedition’s stay in the Arctic.

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p Meantime a government commission had been set up under V. V. Kuibyshev to direct rescue operations. Planes, ice-breakers and a sledge caravan were sent out to the spot where the Chelyuskin had foundered. Overcoming great difficulties, seven Soviet fliers: M. Vodopyanov, I. Doronin, N. Kamanin, S. Levanevsky, A. Lyapidevsky, V. Molokov and M. Slepnev, in an operation^ that lasted from April 7 to April 13, flew all the inhabitants of "Camp Schmidt" back to the mainland. In acknowledgement of this feat the seven fliers were awarded the honorary title of Hero of the Soviet Union, just established. All members of the Chelyuskin expedition were awarded the Order of the Red Star.

p Eighth to receive the title of Hero of the Soviet Union, in September 1934, was M. Gromov, a noted Soviet flier, who, with his crew, covered 12,411 kilometres in a 75-hour non-stop flight, setting a world record. In 1937 a similar award went to fliers V.’Chkalov, A. Belyakov and G. Baidukov, who flew their ANT25 non-stop from Moscow to the United States in 62 hours. Their feat was next duplicated by M. Gromov, A. Yumashev and S. Danilin, flying a similar plane over the same route.

p Next to receive the title of Hero of the Soviet Union, in 1938, were four prominent explorers of the Arctic: I. Papanin, E. Krenkel, Y. Fyodorov and P. Shyrshov, who were landed, on May 21, 1937, from a USSR N-170 plane piloted by M. Vodopyanov, in 103 the vicinity of the North Pole. Making their camp on a drifting ice-floe, they kept up their scientific observation work for 274 days, covering in this time over 2,500 kilometres. They carried on their work even when, on February 1, 1938, their ice-floe broke up into several pieces. The four explorers were taken off the floe on February 19 by ice-breakers sent for the purpose.

A remarkable non-stop flight was made in September 1938, by three women fliers: V. Grizodubova, P. Ossipenko and M. Raskova, over a distance of 5,908 kilometres. They, too, were awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.

Towards Socialism,
By-Passing Capitalism

p One of the most important results of the development of the Soviet society over the first two decades that followed the October Revolution was the political, economic and cultural renaissance of the formerly backward peoples of Russia and their transition to socialism, by-passing the capitalist phase of development. The peoples of Uzbekistan, Turkmenia, Tajikistan, Kirghizia, Kazakhstan, and many peoples of the Caucasus and the Russian Far East, who were still in the phase of feudalism or in transition to that of capitalism when the socialist revolution occurred in Russia, underwent in the space of twenty years a historic transformation by building—along with the other peoples of the USSR and with their help—a socialist society.

p As a result of the October Revolution these peoples created national Soviet states of their own, which, led by the Communist Party, rallied the working people against feudalism and capitalism at home. Ways and means of democratic and socialist construction were devised with reference to local tradition, to the influence of tribal institutions and the priesthood, etc. Here and there Soviet courts of law co-existed for a while with Sheriat or Cadi courts  [103•1  governed by religious rules or customary law. In the economic sphere many reforms were introduced at a slower pace. Such, for instance, was the case with abolition of landlord title to landed estates, which was implemented in Central Russia during the first year of Soviet power and only in the later 1920s in Central Asia.

p Whatever the differences in the manner in which the masses were drawn into participating in the work of socialist construction 104 and in the rate at which the building of a socialist society proceeded, the pattern followed by the national republics was the same as in Russia proper. Socialism won out in all the republics and regions of the USSR through socialist industrialisation, collectivisation of agriculture and cultural revolution.

p Work on the establishment of industrial centres in the outlying areas of Russia was undertaken concurrently with the reconstruction of the national economy. Entire industrial plants, printing houses, etc., were moved from Russia proper to Central Asia and Transcaucasus; power stations were built and other installations set up. In the later 1920s industrial construction was launched on a vast scale in Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and other republics; and it was carried on much more rapidly in these erstwhile backward republics than in the old established industrial regions of the USSR. The Union government channelled large funds into the industrialisation of the national republics, and this policy paid dividends: in the Turkmen SSR, for example, which had been among the most backward regions of tsarist Russia, after completion of the Second Five-Year Plan industrial output began to account for over two-thirds of the aggregate output of the republic’s economy.

The socialist system helped overcome the inequality which had been left to the peoples of the USSR as a legacy of pre- revolutionary times.

Living Standards Raised

p The main, the basic task of the Socialist Revolution, stated briefly, was to make the working man’s life free, secure, happy, intelligently lived and supplied with adequate amenities. All for the benefit of the working men, that was the motto of the Revolution.

p Tangible material and spiritual benefits, which meant improved living standards, accrued to the working people in the early years of Soviet power, along with the genuine political freedom brought to it by the Socialist Revolution. On the fourth day of the Revolution the working class secured for itself—for the first time in its history—an eight-hour working day and a six-hour working day for youngsters under eighteen, paid annual leaves, social security at the expense of the state and employers in case of sickness or unemployment. The Soviet Government ruled out the employment of youngsters under sixteen and introduced equal wage rates for men and women. Hundreds of thousands of working class families that had lived in slums, basements, barracks, etc., before the Revolution were moved into houses provided with all the amenities, formerly the property of the bourgeoisie.

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p The Soviet Government nationalised medical establishments, pharmacies, health resorts, etc., and provided the entire population with competent free medical care.

p The abolition of landlord ownership of land and a radical curtailment of kulak land tenure were measures which in themselves meant a great deal to the working peasantry. "It was the peasantry as a whole who were the first to gain, who gained most, and gained immediately from the dictatorship of the proletariat,” wrote Lenin in 1919. "The peasant in Russia starved under the landowners and capitalists. Throughout the long centuries of our history, the peasant never had an opportunity to work for himself: he starved while handing over hundreds of millions of poods of grain to the capitalists, for the cities and for export. Under the dictatorship of the proletariat the peasant for the first time has been working for himself and feeding better than the city dweller. For the first time the peasant has seen real freedom—freedom to eat his bread, freedom from starvation."  [105•1 

p A radical improvement in living standards, however, came with the complete and final elimination of exploitation of man by man in the Soviet Union, along with the causes that bred it. All working people in the Soviet Union are free workers working for themselves and for the society as a whole, instead of for any exploiters. The Soviet people’s greatest achievement has been the complete liquidation of unemployment in the land. Back in April 1929, there were still 1,700,000 unemployed; but the vast scale of industrial construction under the First Five-Year Plan put them all to work by 1931.

p A seven-hour working day was established under the First Five-Year Plan: the shortest working day in the world. The eight-hour working day was temporarily re-introduced by the Soviet Government in 1940, in the years of the Second World War, only in order to speed up industrial production, including armaments.

p Increased prosperity is derived by the Soviet people from the national income, which, in 1940, was six times that of 1913. Inasmuch as there are no exploiting elements in the country, it is distributed entirely for the benefit of the working people, 75 per cent being paid out in wages and 25 per cent going to the social fund, that is, to finance the further development of the national economy, cultural needs, public health, social security, housing, defence, etc.

p The growth of the national income was paralleled by a steady growth of the real income of the workers and employees, which 106 comprises individual money wages, social security benefits, other allowances, pensions, scholarships, paid leaves, free tuition, free or cut-rate sojourns at sanatoriums or rest homes, etc. Before the Revolution rent and public utilities took up twenty and sometimes as much as thirty per cent of a working family’s income. Since the Revolution this item has been reduced to four or five per cent of its budget. Various payments made by the state or the enterprise over and above earned wages have been growing from year to year.

p A history-making achievement of the Soviet people was the establishment of free medical care. Nearly 791,000 hospital beds were available free of charge to the population in 1940, not counting military hospitals. In the event of illness workers and employees drew’an allowance of up to 90 per cent of their wages until they were able to resume their work, besides getting free medical care at home or in hospitals. In cases of temporary disablement due to injury on the job or occupational disease this allowance equalled 100 per cent of the wages.

The Soviet Government showed particular concern for mother and child care. A broad network of maternity homes and obstetrical stations was established and made available to mothers and expectant mothers free of charge. All working women were given a four months’ maternity leave with pay, and in the case of birth given to two or more babies or abnormal delivery the leave was extended. Mothers of large families were paid a monthly allowance by the state. An extensive system of creches and kindergartens was set up.

Soviet Constitution of 1936

p The victory of socialism made it possible to continue the process of democratisation of the country’s socio-political system and to lift the temporary restrictions of democracy which had been necessary during the period of socialist construction, in conditions of violent class struggle within the country.

p All of this found an expression in the Soviet Constitution of 1936. The draft of this Constitution was prepared by a special commission in collaboration with a large number of experts. Following its approval in principle by the Party and government authorities concerned the draft Constitution was published for discussion by the people at large. Over 50,000,000 took part in this discussion, which continued nearly six months. This was without precedent in the history of mankind.

p The draft Constitution was enthusiastically approved by the Soviet people. Many of the corrections, addenda, amendments and 107 revised versions suggested during the discussion were taken into account in the text of the Constitution which was adopted on December 5, 1936, by the Eighth Extraordinary Congress of Soviets of the USSR.

p The victory of socialism in the USSR and the fundamental principles of socialism found their legal forms in the new Constitution. "The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics is a socialist state of workers and peasants,” says Article 1. The political foundation of the USSR is the Soviets of Working People’s Deputies, from the Supreme Soviet of the USSR down to the local Soviets; and the economic foundation is the socialist system of economy and the socialist ownership of the instruments and means of production and planned economic management. Exploitation of man by man is precluded.

p The Constitution proclaimed work to be a duty and a matter of honour for every able-bodied citizen, in accordance with the principle, "He who does not work, neither shall he eat”, and conferred the power of law on the socialist principle, "From each according to his ability, to each according to his work”. The Constitution confers upon the citizens of the USSR the supreme right to work, to education, to leisure and rest, to maintenance in old age and also in case of sickness or disability. Women are accorded all rights on an equal footing with men in all spheres of activity. Equality of rights of citizens of the USSR, irrespective of their nationality or race, is an indefeasible law. Citizens of the USSR are guaranteed inviolability of the person, the homes, privacy of correspondence, and the democratic freedoms: freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, including the holding of mass meetings, freedom of street processions and demonstrations, and freedom to unite in mass organisations.

p At the same time the Constitution imposes on the citizens of the USSR the duty to abide by the Constitution, to observe the laws, to maintain labour discipline, honestly to perform public duties, to respect the rules of socialist society, and to safeguard and strengthen socialist property. "To defend the country is the sacred duty of every citizen of the USSR,” says Article 133 of the Constitution.

p The Constitution of 1936 provides that members of all Soviets of Working People’s Deputies, from the urban and rural Soviets on up to the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, shall be elected on the basis of universal, equal and direct suffrage by secret ballot. It is the duty of every deputy to report to his electorate on his work and on the work of his Soviet, while the electors are entitled to recall at any time a deputy who fails to justify their confidence. The Constitution lifted all restrictions on the suffrage rights of non-working citizens and abolished all the advantages 108 hitherto enjoyed by urban electors by comparison with rural electors.

p On December 12, 1937, the Soviet people for the first time took part in the elections to the Supreme Soviet of the USSR on the basis of the new electoral system. Communists and non-Party people formed a single election block, jointly nominating candidates by electoral districts. Participation was extremely active, nearly 97 per cent of the electorate casting votes. The candidates nominated by the block of Communists and non-Party people collected 90,000,000 votes or 98.69 per cent of all cast. Elections to the Supreme Soviets of the Union and Autonomous republics took place in 1938, those to local Soviets in 1939.

p The period under review was marked by gross violations of Party and Soviet democracy and socialist legality in consequence of the Stalin personality cult, which were in direct contradiction with the principles of socialist democracy.

p J. V. Stalin had held, since 1922, the post of General Secretary of the Communist Party Central Committee. He had made important contributions to the implementation of the Party’s policy of socialist construction in the USSR, and he had won great popularity by his relentless fight against the anti-Leninist groups of the Trotskyites and Bukharinites. Since the early 1930s, however, all the successes achieved by the Soviet people in the building of socialism began to be arbitrarily attributed to Stalin. Already in a letter written back in 1922 Lenin warned the Party Central Committee: "Comrade Stalin,” he wrote, "having become General Secretary, has concentrated boundless authority in his hands, and I am not sure whether he will always be able to exercise that authority with sufficient discretion."  [108•1  During the first few years after Lenin’s death Stalin reckoned with his critical remarks. As time passed, however, he abused his position of General Secretary of the Party Central Committee more and more frequently, violating the principle of collective leadership and making independent decisions on important Party and state issues. Those personal shortcomings of which Lenin had warned manifested themselves with greater and greater insistence: his rudeness, capriciousness, intolerance of criticism, arbitrariness, excessive suspiciousness, etc. This led to unjustified restrictions of democracy, gross violations of socialist legality and repressions against prominent Party, government and military leaders and other people.

Harmful though it was, the Stalin personality cult was unable to change either the nature of the Soviet socialist system or the 109 activities of the Party and the people, aimed at building socialism and communism in the USSR. The Soviet people, directed by the Communist Party, achieved outstanding successes in socialist construction, in the development of socialist relations within the society, and in following a consistent policy of peace, which opened up boundless prospects for the continued advancement of the Soviet society. The personality cult was something quite alien to the Soviet system of government. Marxism-Leninism holds that the people are the true makers of history, creating all material and spiritual values and building a new world under the guidance of the Communist Party. Socialism in the USSR was built by the working class, the working peasantry, the Soviet intelligentsia, under the leadership of the Communist Party and in accordance with the blue-print prepared by Lenin.