"LIBERAL-REFORMIST TREND" IN THE AGRARIAN POLICY OF THE SOVIET STATE IN THE MID-1950s - EARLY 1960s
S.N. Andreenkov
Institute of History SB RAS, Novosibirsk, Russian Federation
Keywords: agrarian reforms, agrarian policy, agriculture, collective farms, state farms, machine-tractor stations, N. S. Khrushchev
Abstract
The main study objective is to identify the features of implementing measures of the supreme power in the middle 1950s - early 1960s initiated by Soviet scientists-economists, supporters of development under conditions of state and group ownership of market relations. The article substantiates the thesis that the “liberal reformist course” realization led to a significant transformation of the existing agrarian system. Based on the analysis of the peculiarities of the collective farm-state farm system functioning during I.V. Stalin’s reign, and relying on new factual material, the author reveals the specifics of post-Stalinist reforming the procurement and pricing mechanism in agriculture, the system of material and technical services for collective farms, the procedure of functioning of the collective farm self-government, and analyzes the anti-crisis initiatives of the supreme power and scientists-economists in the first half of the 1960s. The paper argues that during the period under review, the Stalinist agrarian model foundations were dismantled - natural tax procurements, the system of low-paid forced labor of collective farmers, machine and tractor stations. The transition to purchasing agricultural products at uniform prices took place. The guaranteed cash wages were introduced, the collective farms received ownership of agricultural machinery. However, realizing the “liberal reformist direction” of the agrarian policy was hampered by the parallel implementation of Khrushchev’s leftist reformist initiatives, which provided establishing the domination of state ownership over group and personal ones, forced industrialization of agriculture, and using mobilization tools to solve production tasks. Therefore, the most important agricultural measure - MTS reorganization - was carried out in a short time without taking into account the real capabilities of farms by N.S. Khrushchev’s demand, and therefore did not lead to the high economic results predicted by its developers in short terms.
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