Explain why in the years 1906 to 1911, Stolypin attempted to reform agriculture. (12 marks) Stolypin attempted to reform agriculture for many reasons, one of the most important being to strengthen tsarist autocracy. He strongly believed that the future of Russia depended on building a prosperous peasantry. There was widespread rural poverty but an upper class of peasant that farmed efficiently and were wealthier, they were known as the Kulaks. Stolypin believed that the encouragement of a class such as the Kulaks would make them hostile to further change therefore more conservative and loyal to the Tsar as the Tsar had made them wealthy.
To achieve self- sufficiency: • Stalin wanted to make the USSR less dependent – especially on Western manufactured goods. • It was important that the USSR had a strong industrial base to produce the goods people needed. • He wanted to make Russia more self-sufficient and less dependent. To increase grain supplies: • Stalin wanted to end the dependence of the economy on a backward agricultural system – he did not want the new socialist state to depend on the peasantry for agricultural supplies. To move towards a socialist society: • According to Marxist theory, socialism could only be created in a society where the majority of the population were workers – but in 1928, only 20% were workers in the USSR.
Conversely, the higher-value rouble helped increase the prices of goods. Witte's main method for raising the capital and modernisation would be the Trans-Siberian Railway, which from 1881 to 1900 increased from 13,000 to 33,000 miles. It was hoped it would encourage east to West migration of workers, to feed in to industry, however this did not happen. Instead, it helped growth and exports of Russia by making transportation of materials far easier. On the other hand, the growth in population compared with national output shows less production per head, and therefore less efficient production.
The decrease in agricultural production also affected the soviet government. Since 1921, Russia’s government had been selling grain surpluses abroad in order to gain foreign currency necessary to provide resources for industrialisation. Clearly, if there were no grain surpluses there was no money to build up Russia’s industry. Collectivisation aimed to hold out the prospect of many economic benefits. First, large farms would increase efficiency.
Wheat production yo-yoed from 25 to 18 million between the years 1928-1937. Throughout the Second Five-Year Plan, wheat production did increase to about 50 million tons, which shows a large increase. The Second Five-Year Plan seemed more successful for farming than livestock. With the changes of collectivizing, he used methods that some might say seemed unfair. The results of farm collectivization were debatable.
Much like Tsarist reforming leaders, Witte and Alexander II, a poor economic situation also significantly influenced Lenin’s reforms, showing a nuanced continuity between factors influencing reforms in the Tsarist and Communist state. The peasants were at first discontented by the reform, for” a tax of 10% was imposed upon the harvest” (Acton), leading to crop prices temporarily rising, causing a famine reminiscent of the Tsarist age, indicating little change. However a year later the grain harvest increased by 19 million tonnes, this proved to be significant as the impacts of the NEP allowed Russian society to become more self-sufficient, without the need for imports. The reform was also significant, as it encouraged the growth of a bourgeoisie in the form of NEP men; older Bolsheviks viewed them as a threat to the socialist government, yet they accepted that a middle class was a necessary step towards complete socialism. The view that Lenin’s reforms were significant, therefore is credible, for despite gaining a government that had been ravaged by two wars, and rapid inflation, after about eight years Lenin’s NEP encouraged great economic growth, thus consolidating the position of the Bolshevik government in Russian society based upon Lenin’s work as a reforming
How successful was Stalin’s economic policy In terms of how successful was Stalin’s economic policy we need to take into consideration the successes and failures of collectivisation, moreover the economic successes and failures, and also the limitations the three five year plans. In reference to the successes of collectivisation, this included economic accomplishment for the government whereby the state procurement did not decline in which the government had collected all the grain they needed in order to sell it abroad to pay for industrial equipment, moreover in relation to achievement due to collectivisation the peasants had fled to the towns which meant there was more labour for setting up factories, which helped in Stalin’s dream of rapid industrialisation in Russia. Furthermore in mention of successes for the government and undoubtedly a success for Stalin’s economic policy; collectivisation was a political success. The party gained control of the villages and this meant the government did no longer have to bargain with the peasants anymore moreover collectivisation in terms of a political success for the government it was an essential part of modernising Russia. However the failures of collectivisation may contradict the theory of Stalin’s economic policy being a success; whereby this is in relation to how collectivisation resulted in both economic failure and human cost.
Document 2 is also a chart showing cotton yarn production in the same years as document 1, but in Japan. It was also gathered by a government power, making it trustworthy as well. As in document 1, it shows a huge increase in machine-spun yarn production, jumping from 5 million to 666 million pounds per year in 30 years. This shows how Japan also had a huge increase in production of cotton materials starting in 1884. Document 6 restates the idea in document 1 of the increase in machine textiles and the decrease of hand-weavers due to unmatchable competition with industry.
To the government the whole reason of the law was to guarantee land owners profits of which they had became accustomed to during the war. However opponents of the regime both inside and outside of the regime only saw the law as a class piece of legislation in which the law saved landowners from three things: cheaper foreign grain, stabilised prices and making corn more expensive for the consumer. This concept and idea was not new, a similar law 1804 had been introduced to guarantee 80 shillings a quarter. In spite of this the government had problems to face including riots, petitions and demonstrations. The main protest for this law, was the Luddism riots and machine breaking.
His “Great Turn” can be seen as a realistic and attractive policy, suited to the rank and file of the party, that he did not adopt earlier in the 20’s since it was not a fitting policy at the time. The problems in ideology could be seen to link to the problems with agriculture as it was the Kulak class that Stalin held responsible for hoarding the grain and demanding higher prices for it, thus if the ideology changed to rid Soviet society of such elements, then haste could be seen to be of importance. However this was not the only problem with Russian agriculture. Farming methods were