Five-Year Plan

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Five-Year Plan

USSR 1927

Synopsis

The Five-Year Plans were programs of economic development instituted in the USSR by Joseph Stalin. The first, announced in 1927, began thorough industrialization under state planning and collectivized agricultural production. Despite successes on paper, the state planning suffered from mismanagement, investment was often squandered on grand projects, and the human cost was immense. In spite of these problems, Stalin managed to transform backward Russia into the modern, industrial power that was the USSR, an achievement that, for many, proves the benefits of planning under a socialist government.

Timeline

1911: In China, revolutionary forces led by Sun Yat-sen bring an end to more than 2,100 years of imperial rule.
1917: On both the Western Front and in the Middle East, the tide of the war begins to turn against the Central Powers. The arrival of U.S. troops, led by General Pershing, in France in June greatly boosts morale and reinforces exhausted Allied forces. Meanwhile, Great Britain scores two major victories against the Ottoman Empire as T. E. Lawrence leads an Arab revolt in Baghdad in March, and troops under Field Marshal Edmund Allenby take Jerusalem in December.
1922: Inspired by the Bolsheviks' example of imposing revolution by means of a coup, Benito Mussolini leads his blackshirts in an October "March on Rome" and forms a new Fascist government.
1924: V. I. Lenin dies, and thus begins a struggle for succession from which Josef Stalin will emerge five years later as the undisputed leader of the Communist Party and of the Soviet Union.
1927: Stalin arranges to have Trotsky expelled from the Communist Party.
1927: Charles A. Lindbergh makes the first successful solo nonstop flight across the Atlantic, and becomes an international hero.
1927: American inventor Philo T. Farnsworth demonstrates a working model of the television, and Belgian astronomer Georges Lemaître proposes the Bang Theory.
1927: The Jazz Singer, starring Al Jolson, is the first major motion picture with sound. Within a few years, silent movies will become a thing of the past.
1927: Babe Ruth hits sixty home runs, establishing a record that will stand until 1961.
1930: Naval disarmament treaty is signed by the United States, Great Britain, France, Italy, and Japan.
1932: When Ukrainians refuse to surrender their grain to his commissars, Stalin seals off supplies to the region, creating a manmade famine that will produce a greater death toll than the entirety of World War I.
1937: Japan attacks China and annexes most of that nation's coastal areas.

Event and Its Context

Planning: The Early Stages

The Russia inherited by the Bolsheviks in 1917 was economically backward; industry was underdeveloped and agricultural production was in crisis. These conditions were exacerbated by civil war. If Vladimir Lenin was to establish the socialist state, as he had claimed on 8 November 1917, it had to be done almost literally from nothing with very weak raw materials. The years of famine, when masses had died of starvation and disease and others resorted to cannibalism, had exacted a high cost on the Russian people.

Lenin made some attempts to restructure society. War communism segregated the people into exploiters and exploited with the former becoming the slaves to the new system. Propaganda tried to establish a new "socialist" popular culture, however, both the nation and the Communist Party (CPSU), the new name for the Bolsheviks, were deeply divided. The combination of Marxist economic theory and czarist repression drove the nation forward and defined the character of the USSR.

Lenin's new government attempted economic reforms, based on the state ownership model. Widespread demonstrations that culminated in a revolt at the Kronstadt naval base in March 1921, the center of Bolshevik power in 1917, encouraged Lenin to alter his course. At the Tenth Congress in 1921, the Central Committee of the CPSU endorsed the New Economic Policy (NEP), which was designed to "[build] socialism with capitalist hands." The policy combined the artificial creation of a market economy, nationalization of small-scale enterprises, and integration of these businesses into the market. The reforms and the taxes levied against small holders were instituted unequally across Russia, and a number of unscrupulous local bureaucrats prospered illegally. As Lenin's health deteriorated, however, political progress slowed and the factions within the CPSU battled for power.

Lenin's preferred successor was Leon Trotsky, who seemed more responsive to the effects of policy. Trotsky himself failed, however, to present Lenin's case to the Twelfth Party Congress in April 1923. This allowed Joseph Stalin to become general secretary. This marked the triumph of "socialism in one country" over Trotsky's theory of "permanent revolution." Stalin created a power base for himself prior to reorienting the NEP.

Socialism by Force

Under the NEP, the majority of Russian people were left without interference. The state did little to enforce progress toward socialism. Everyone, it appeared, subscribed to Bukharin's notion that the USSR should "creep at a snail's pace towards socialism"—everyone, that is, except Stalin. He allowed the lack of urgency to continue only until he had secured his position over the CPSU. By the time Stalin inaugurated the First Five-Year Plan in February 1928, he had the mechanisms in place to control both the party and society. A secret police force, OGPU, maintained order by fear. This organization, the largest employer in the USSR, had access to all parts of the USSR and all levels of society. As Stalin unveiled his plans for remolding society, OGPU officers were deployed to ensure compliance. This marked the start of the modernization of Russia and the beginning of Soviet totalitarianism.

The practical aims of Stalin's plans were to increase industrial production, including consumer goods, by 250 percent and to increase agricultural production by 130 percent. The means to achieve this was to convert the entire Russian labor force, both rural and urban, into employees of state-controlled enterprises. There were, however, further and more far-reaching objectives toward which Stalin aimed. The first was modernization, an aspect of which was the removal of all conservative elements from Soviet society. The chief target was the kulaks, the smallholders who clung possessively to land gained from the czarist reforms. Stalin saw these as a reactionary people and a major obstacle to progress. The aim for the USSR to overtake Western Europe and the United States in industrial production and economic growth encompassed Stalin's goals of modernization and growth. Historian Adam Ulam suggested that this reflected Stalin's obsession with personal greatness. Ulam argued that Stalin saw himself as a modern incarnation of Ivan the Terrible or Peter the Great, and he therefore tried to be both architect and manager of the reformation and rebuilding of Soviet Russia.

The major obstacle to success was Stalin's limited knowledge of economics or how to achieve sustainable growth. His response to failure was irrational accusations and brutal repression. This was first evidenced by his destruction of the kulaks. The fact that 96 percent of Russian land was in kulak ownership meant that they were clearly an obstruction to the collectivization of agriculture. Opposition to Stalin's orders was widespread and attacks upon officials, the slaughter of livestock, and burning of crops was common. These tactics were met, however, with severe brutality. Thousands were killed and thousands more were transported to concentration camps. The inefficient management of collective farms, the lack of skilled or enthusiastic labor, and bad harvests in 1931-33, however, led to widespread famine. Estimates of the deaths range from five to 50 million between 1928 and 1933.

In the long term, the record of collectivization is mixed. Crop production increased: in 1940 it was 80 percent greater than in 1913. The collective farms, which employed and housed up to 75 million people, were also able to feed the population of the USSR throughout World War II, which was crucial to the war effort. Furthermore the increased production allowed substantial amounts to be exported, which provided extra capital for industrial development. On the negative side of the balance sheet, apart from the human cost, collectivization was detrimental to Russian agriculture. Livestock production decreased as husbandry skills became marginalized, which made meat a luxury item. The size of the collective farms caused inefficiency, and the fact that the workers owned none of their output was a disincentive to hard work and to attentiveness to tasks. Although collectivization solved some of the problems of Russian agriculture, largely these successes were only achieved in an atmosphere of fear and disenchantment.

Industrial development required massive investment. The targets set were too high and therefore unrealistic, but industries such as machine production and the manufacture of electrical goods showed great successes. The chief problems were caused by Stalin's desire to outstrip the West. Grand projects, such as the metallurgical center at Magnitogorsk, were costly and detracted investment from more needy areas. Therefore in attempting to build the "socialist utopia" as an example to the nonsocialist world, Stalin caused a decline in the standard of living, maintained food shortages, and pursued his economic aims regardless of the cost in hardship.

Industry was transformed and by 1932-33 the unskilled laborers that had been drafted into the urban production centers were skilled craftsmen. The USSR achieved growth in manufacture and engineering, without massive human cost, and was soon self-sufficient. By 1933, in response to Hitler's ascendance in Germany, Soviet industry made an easy transition to arms production. This was facilitated by massive increases in the production and quality of coal, pig iron, and steel under the second and third five-year plans. The goal of transforming backward Russia into a great industrial nation had been achieved.

Planning, Successes, and Failures

The transition in Soviet industry did, however, result in social problems, though the number of workers purged as wreckers in the wake of unmet goals often obscures the social disturbances. The high turnover of labor between the collective farms and industry led thousands of people to become rootless within the new USSR, and workers often moved from city to collective in search of better wages. Stalin introduced incentives for effort by recasting wage scales and he turned a coal miner named Stakhanov, who had achieved 14 times the output of his peers, into a cultural icon: a shining example of the "new Soviet man." This led to greater stability as workers competed against each other for higher wages and so remained in one place and established a good range of skills instead of drifting between different trades. Fear, rather than Stalin's incentives, however, was the primary motivation that made workers remain in one trade and work harder.

Despite the repressive nature of the USSR under Stalin, the plans were applauded by a variety of commentators from Western nations. As the Wall Street Crash caused economic depression to sweep the United States and Europe, the USSR stood prosperous and immune from danger. Agitprop, the Soviet propaganda department, organized guided tours to introduce Soviet planning techniques to the world. Two British economists and social theorists, John Maynard Keynes and G. D. H. Cole, both extolled the benefits of planning for Western Europe. Thus the Soviet example gained an influential audience of sympathizers. Nazi Germany and the European Economic Community both benefited from the influence of those who had analyzed the Soviet model, though their versions were heavily adapted and Stalin was seldom given credit for the ideas. Had the transformation of the USSR not involved such a high human cost, Stalinism arguably would have stood as an example to the world. Unfortunately, because of the tactics employed, planning and state control became discredited as synonymous with totalitarianism and repression. That is perhaps the lasting legacy of Stalinism.

Key Players

Bukharin, Nikolai (1888-1938): An ally of Lenin but seen to be on the right of the Communist Party under Stalin, Bukharin heavily criticized Stalin's planning and was eventually dismissed from the party. As a focal point for opposition to Stalin, Bukarin was arrested, charged with treason and executed.

Djugashvili, Iosif Visarionovich (Stalin; 1879-1953): A revolutionary guerrilla (1905-1917), Stalin became a trusted servant of the Bolshevik leaders. He succeeded Lenin as leader of the Soviet Union and redesigned Marxist-Leninism as socialism in a single country.