‘Idlemen’ and ‘Parasites’ in Collective Farm Village of the Ukrainian SSR with the Backdrop of Decree of February 21, 1948: Anthropological Dimension
Abstract
The purpose of the research paper is to analyze, based on an anthropological approach, the motives and some types of behavior of peasants and the local Party-Soviet apparatus during the implementation of the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of February 21, 1948 ‘On the Deportation from the Ukrainian SSR of Persons Who Maliciously Evade Labor Activity in Agriculture and Lead an Anti-Social, Parasitic Way of Life’.
The scientific novelty. It has been found out that the studied repressive Decree was an attempt to suppress the passive resistance of peasants to work on a collective farm; several types of behavior of collective farmers and the local Party-Soviet apparatus are identified to emerge during the organization of the process of evicting collective farmers who did not fulfill the required minimum number of workdays (trudoden).
Conclusions. After the end of World War II, the peasants did not receive the long-awaited improving of financial situation. The communist regime continued to demand exhausting and almost free labor on the verge of survival.
The Decree of February 21, 1948, was an excuse for forced labor, another ‘cleansing’ of the rural population of collaborators and politically disloyal peasants, as well as a demonstration of the communist regime’s readiness for mass repressive actions similar to those of 1937-1938.
The main reasons for deportation were economic (among which failure to fulfill the minimum number of working days, ‘speculation’, and ‘theft of public property’) and political (among which ‘anti-Soviet’ and ‘anti-collective farm agitation’, ‘anti-social, parasitic, malicious, incorrigible element’, attempts to survive and collaboration in various forms with the Nazi administration, and ‘threats to local authorities’) markers.
It is noted that the behavior patterns of the lower-level Party-Soviet apparatus had not changed significantly from previous repressive campaigns: the overwhelming majority of officials sought to prove their political allegiance, as their career growth and material well-being were contingent upon it. A small proportion of officials demonstrated passivity or opposed deportation, trying to convey to the leadership the primary economic reasons for evading collective farm labor.
The variability of the peasants’ reaction to the Decree was as follows: active manifestations of protest (escape and revenge on the village authorities); the majority of peasants acted depending on the existing situation, formally/passively supporting the eviction; active support for deportation was provided by village activists and collective farm superproductive workers (udarnik), whose well-being contingent upon their political allegiance.
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