Collectivization in the Soviet Union

Collectivization in the Soviet Union was a policy pursued under Stalin between 1928 and 1940. The goal of this policy was to consolidate individual land and labour into collective farms (Russian: колхо́з, kolkhoz, plural kolkhozy). The Soviet leadership was confident that the replacement of individual peasant farms by kolkhozy would immediately increase the food supply for urban populations, the supply of raw materials for processing industry, and agricultural exports. Collectivization was thus regarded as the solution to the crisis of agricultural distribution (mainly in grain deliveries) that had developed since 1927. This problem became more acute as the Soviet Union pressed ahead with its ambitious industrialization program.[1]

Already in the early 1940s over 90% of agricultural land was "collectivized" as rural households entered collective farms with their land, livestock, and other assets. The sweeping collectivization often involved tremendous human and social costs while the issue of economic advantages of collective farms remained largely undecided.

The idea of collective farms was seen by peasants as a revival of serfdom[2] and has since been perceived by historians such as Lynne Viola as a Civil War of peasant against Bolshevik Government and the attempted colonisation of the countryside.[3]

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