WI no collectivization in the Soviet Union?

Isn't communism all about abolishing private property? Why wouldn't they collectivize farms?

"Communism" is about that, but "bolshevism" or "trotskyism" isn't necessarily so.

Marxism views that the value form relationship of capital to labour is the fundamental relationships of the capitalist mode of production. The Bolsheviks in the Soviet Union didn't collectivise villages by state force until the late 1920s. They relied on voluntary collectivisation until that time. "it is complex." and the Bolsheviks in the soviet union weren't necessarily the best marxists nor the best communists.

But the concrete material situation on the ground, where urban workers demanded to eat, and rural workers and peasants demanded leisure, produced a situation where they had to choose as an undemocratic (in the economic, not the parliamentary sense) unit.

My great-grandfather was considered Kulak during stalinist period in Poland, as the first peasant in village, who started to use artifical fertilizers (yes, there was anti-Kulak campaign in Poland too, just not as brutal as Soviet one, communists also tried to create class of small farmers in places, where they practically did not existed-in former Prussian provinces of Posen and West Prussia, dominated by large, highly productive farms (effect of Prussian method of abolishing serfdom) by giving land from land reform to people, who had nothing in common with farming).

What about Russian mir? Could it be described as some sort of proto-kolkhoz?

Yes, a bunch of "communists" lower-c described the mir as such. But the Bolshevisation of communism in the soviet union limited the capacity for voluntary collectivisation, and the cretinism of post-lenin recruits[*1] promoted hostile actions towards rural proletarians and small peasants.

yours,
Sam R.

[*1] Lenin isn't necessarily responsible for this cretinism. I am politically hostile to Lenin in my non-historical life, but my professional ethics as a historian make me want to assign blame or praise (depending on your value-judgement about a particular policy) to where it is responsible. Lenin was very much in favour of increasing proletarian and small-peasant recruits to the Bolshevik party, even as he decried the possibility of such recruits forming a political conception independent of the small-intelligentsia and soon to be nomenklatura position within the party.
 
I wonder if without the collectivization and the great hunger that triggered, the areas of southern Russia would now have a much larger percentage of Ukrainians, as this guy claims:

Almost certainly not. The Ukrainian population in Kuban did not decline because of the famine (as Russians also suffered from the famine), but due to the Bolsheviks ending the policy of enforcing an Ukrainian identity which had not really existed before that. Also, Ukraine could not expand to the west or get the Crimea without Soviet assistance.
 
My great-grandfather was considered Kulak during stalinist period in Poland, as the first peasant in village, who started to use artifical fertilizers . . .
I hope your great-grandfather made it okay. It sounds like he was a peasant who was an innovator and could have well been a leader.

I think we should generally leave the productive farmers alone, and help other farmers be just as productive.
 
Zionovev? He seemed the least blood thirsty of the communist elite. He might have maintained the new economic policy a middle class is vital for social order.
 
I wonder if without the collectivization and the great hunger that triggered, the areas of southern Russia would now have a much larger percentage of Ukrainians, as this guy claims:

Good grief that is a bad video.

It simplifies things in rather misleading ways. Or outright wrong... Like saying Ukrainian-Russian ethnic tension didn't exist before the Revolution. Russification and Hapsburg efforts to foster a separate Ukrainian nationalism (to undermine both the Poles and the Russians) meant there was already growing tension between the Ukrainians and the Russians.

(And that's only the bit that grated the most for me.)

fasquardon
 
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Now that is quite interesting. I didn't know this about Poland!



Stalin was definitely paranoid. But I am not sure how many people would be able to avoid being paranoid in the same situation. If you've not read Kotkin's biographies of Stalin or listened to any of his talks on Stalin I very much recommend his work. It certainly makes a compelling argument that there wasn't anything inherently broken about Stalin - but rather he was a human being with too much power and too much belief in his ideas.

As to what might happen if the rest of the Politburo told Stalin "no" about Collectivization - I don't think it would be the change you think. Stalin does not seem to have forced through measures that were strongly opposed by the Politburo. So if the Politburo opposed him and remained opposed to him over Collectivization... Well, he may well have just focused on other priorities. And I think to get a strong Politburo and a weak Stalin you need to radically change the personalities involved or have Stalin not be general secretary of the Party either because Lenin never gives him the job or the Politburo accepts his resignation over the supposed letter of criticism Lenin wrote.



The Holodomor also devastated southern Russia.



Firstly, there's the question of how we avoid Collectivization. Let's say that Bukharin manages to convince Stalin that the time is not yet and that Collectivization should remain a voluntary process until the country is more prepared (so some point in the 40s). Of course, before that can happen, WW2 happens, and in the violence and then the painful reconstruction afterwards, Stalin never does feel the time is right, and after he is dead, his successors are too cautious to push the policy through, even though it remains a goal of the Party in theory.

Potentially, this is a colossal change. It's hard to say exactly however, since so much information is still hidden in those parts of the former Soviet archives that are still secret. If indeed the full story ever was committed to paper.

Firstly, it's important to recognize that no Collectivization does not necessarily mean no de-Kulakization. There was real anti-Kulak sentiment among the bulk of the peasantry (who had not done so well during the NEP) and the anti-Kulak campaign may well have partially been aimed at increasing support for the Party among the peasants by hammering down the "sticking out nails" that were irritating their communities. Similarly, the Soviet regime is still likely to be cracking down on what they termed "economic criminals" - which could either be unscrupulous profiteers or honest businessmen who happened to get on the wrong side of their communities or the local Party (a campaign which hit the Jewish community in the Soviet Union hard) and the Soviet regime is still likely to engaged in forced resettlement of groups.

Secondly, even without Collectivization, there is still likely to be a famine due to the poor infrastructure in the country and due to several years in a row of bad weather. Likely it kills only thousands or low hundreds of thousands of people however.

Thirdly, if Allen is right in his book Farm to Factory, a continuing NEP means slower growth rates in the early 30s, but faster growth in the late 30s, meaning the USSR would be only slightly behind the OTL USSR in terms of industrial development in 1941. Likely that means that the Red Army can't get as many weapons in the mid 30s as OTL, which could be a blessing in disguise given the rapid changes of military technology in the 30s. Or it could lead to the Red Army being just weak enough compared to OTL that the Germans can do that little bit better during Barbarossa... Where that goes is hard to predict.

Fourthly, Stalin seems to have been really hurt by how much criticism he got for seeing Collectivization through - he'd taken the universally agreed policy of the Bolsheviks and implemented it for the good of the people. And in return he got flak from the Party and unrest in the general population seems to have shot up. And possibly, elements of the military were so horrified that they began considering a coup. It may well be (though all the evidence we have is circumstantial, if this can be proven definitively, it can only be done with access to the KGBs internal security archives) that the backlash to Collectivization directly caused the Purges - at least the Purges as we know them. As we know, the Purges gutted the Red Army, the Old Bolsheviks, the rank and file of the Party itself and the general population. It was a disaster for the country and especially the Party itself, and it did much to horrify and repel foreign observers - directly contributing to the Soviet diplomatic isolation in the late 30s, which of course led to the Hitler-Stalin pact of 1939. We can't say for sure, but it is very possible that no Collectivization would mean no Purges (though lesser purges where the purged are fired, not murdered, as Lenin did after the end of the Civil War and systemic violence like the anti-Kulak campaign are still very likely to continue through the 30s and 40s), a stronger Red Army, no Commissars crippling the ability of army officers to act decisively, a stronger more ideologically diverse Party, and a stronger population.

Fithly... I started off saying that Collectivization could be put off until the mid-40s and rendered moot by WW2... But what if the lack of Purges means WW2 is avoided? What if the Soviet Union becomes an ally of Britain and France in the late 30s and the trio contain the forces of Nazism successfully without a major war? Well... We may have just postponed Collectivization. Even with the NEP proving fairly successful as an interim measure, no Bolshevik, not even Bukharin, wanted to keep the NEP going forever. And I am just not aware of an alternative they discussed other than Collectivization like that in OTL. It may be that postponing it means the worst of it is avoided though - if Collectivization is done during good years, and at a time when the USSR has better transport networks, greater wealth, better foreign relations and greater institutional strength... Well. The exact same policy aims, enacted with the exact same ruthlessness, might still produce radically different outcomes. But maybe the Collectivization campaign happens during bad years as it did in OTL, just later on, and millions still die.

My gut feeling is that things go much, much better for the Soviet Union if there is no forced Collectivization. And things are much better for the rest of the world too. But there are ways that worse outcomes or indifferent outcomes could occur as well.

As far as agricultural production and famine... I don't see there being much difference in overall agricultural output, other than the Soviets avoiding the artificial depression that Collectivization caused. Soviet farms may be less labour efficient and Soviet cities more labour efficient through the 30s and the 40s (due to more people staying on the land for longer). There will be a famine in the early 30s, but it would be much less severe. Depending on how WW2 goes, if it goes at all, there may be another famine in the late 40s.

fasquardon
I wonder how no collectivsation would affect the Soviet Union demographically in the longterm. Would you see a larger and more rural Soviet population that might be more traditional and religious. Which areas of the Soviet Union would be most affected by this ATL with not collectivsation.

Also how would no collectivsation ATL likely affect Soviet WW2 experience? Would there be higher casusalties due to slower industrialisation?
 
Whatever the means and reasons, Ukrainians in the USSR had practically disappeared outside of the Ukraine SSR by 1979.

Gotta say that it's pretty suspicious how all the Ukrainians left the Kuban region. It could have been the Holodomor, or the population movements at the end of WW2.
After the famine there was some migration to the Kuban from russian core areas. This combined with state sponsored sometimes forced assimilation of Ukrainians into russification.
 
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