Raised under Stalin

Seth Bernstein

Description

In Raised under Stalin, Seth Bernstein shows how Stalin's regime provided young people with opportunities as members of the Young Communist League or Komsomol even as it surrounded them with violence, shaping socialist youth culture and socialism more broadly through the threat and experience of war. Informed by declassified materials from post-Soviet archives, as well as films, memoirs, and diaries by and about youth, Raised under Stalin explains the divided status of youth for the Bolsheviks: they were the "new people" who would someday build communism, the potential soldiers who would defend the USSR, and the hooligans who might undermine it from within. Bernstein explains how, although Soviet revolutionary youth culture began as the preserve of proletarian activists, the Komsomol transformed under Stalin to become a mass organization of moral education; youth became the targets of state repression even as Stalin's regime offered them the opportunity to participate in political culture. Raised under Stalin follows Stalinist youth into their ultimate test, World War II. Even as the war against Germany decimated the ranks of Young Communists, Bernstein finds evidence that it cemented Stalinist youth culture as a core part of socialism.

Sujets

• Former Soviet Union
• Histoire
• Post-Soviet states
• Russia
• History of Europe
• Russie

Informations

• Publié par: Cornell University Press
• Date de parution: 15 août 2017
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781501709388
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 3 Mo

Extrait

RAISEDUNDERSTALIN

RAISED UNDER STALIN YoungCommunistsand the Defense of Socialism

CORNELL UNIVERSITY PRESS

SethBernstein

ITHACA AND LONDON

Copyright © 2017 by Cornell University

All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in a review, this book, or parts thereof, must not be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the publisher. For information, address Cornell University Press, Sage House, 512 East State Street, Ithaca, New York 14850.

First published 2017 by Cornell University Press

Printed in the United States of America

Library of Congress CataloginginPublication Data Names: Bernstein, Seth, author. Title: Raised under Stalin : young communists and the defense of socialism /  Seth Bernstein. Description: Ithaca : Cornell University Press, 2017. | Includes bibliographical  references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2017004652 (print) | LCCN 2017005181 (ebook) |  ISBN 9781501709883 (cloth : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781501712029 (epub/mobi) |  ISBN 9781501709388 (pdf) Subjects:LCSH:Socialismandyouth—SovietUnion—History.|Vsesoiuznyı˘ leninskiı˘kommunisticheskiı˘soiuzmolodezhi—History.|Youth—  Soviet Union—History. | Soviet Union—History—1925–1953. Classification: LCC HQ799.R9 B385 2017 (print) | LCC HQ799.R9 (ebook) |  DDC 305.2350947084—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017004652

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March of Young Pioneers in gas masks, 1935. Photograph by Viktor Bulla. Tsentral′nyi Gosudarstvennyi Arkhiv Kinofotofonodokumentov SanktPeterburga (TsGAKFFD SPb).

Contents

ListofFigures Acknowledgments NoteonConventions

Introduction:TheFirstSocialistGeneration 1.  Youth in the Stalin Revolution 2.  Cultural Revolution from Above 3.  Class Dismissed? 4.  The Great Terror as a Moral Panic 5.  The Rehabilitation of Young Communists 6.  A Mass Youth Organization 7.  Paramilitary Training on the Eve of War 8.  Youth at War Conclusion:TheAftermathofWar

AppendixofTables Bibliography Index

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Figures

1.1  Young Communists in 1920 1.2  “Complete komsomolization,” 1930 2.1  Aleksandr Kosarev in 1925 2.2  Children at an equipped Osoaviakhim corner, 1934 2.3  Pioneers in formation, 1936 2.4  Kosarev in uniform at the Tenth Komsomol Congress, 1936 3.1  Kosarev, Joseph Stalin, and Andrei Andreev 4.1  “Old man in the Komsomol,” 1934 5.1  Kosarev in 1936 6.1  Admissions to the Komsomol at a department store in Sverdlovsk, 1937 6.2  Political education at a factory Komsomol 7.1  Military training in Ordzhonikidze territory, 1937 7.2  March of Young Pioneers in gas masks, 1935 7.3  Militarized march in Gorkii province, 1940

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Acknowledgments

Ihaveputmyselfinagreatdealofintellectualdebtwhilewritingthisbook.Atthe risk of forgetting some of my obligations, though, I will keep these acknowledg ments short. Lynne Viola deserves a special place in this work. Her guidance was fundamental as I wrote and revised this book. My Higher School of Economics colleague Oleg Khlevniuk has my particular appreciation for reading the entire manuscript and providing detailed suggestions that improved it. In addition, the first ranks of recognition must include Doris Bergen, Michael DavidFox, Thomas Lahusen, David Shearer, and Alison Smith. Anumberofcolleaguesprovidedmewithinvaluableassistanceasreaders, commentators, and supporters. These include Susan Grant, Anna Hajkova, Aaron HaleDorrell, Sam Hirst, Rob Hornsby, Matthew Lenoe, Vojin Majstoro vic, Tracy McDonald, Brandon Miller, Lilia Topouzova, Jon Waterlow, and Zbigniew Wojnowski. In addition, Oleg Budnitskii and Liudmila Novikova not only provided me with important suggestions on my work but also with a home in Moscow where I could finish this manuscript. Writingthisbookwouldhavebeenimpossiblewithoutthehelpofarchivists in Kiev, Moscow, Petrozavodsk, and Riazan. I will single out the incomparable Galina Mikhailovna Tokareva, who never tired of seeing me after several years in the former Komsomol Archive (now a part of the Russian State Archive of SocialPolitical History). Elena Pozdniak of the State Archive of Riazan Province first introduced me to archival research as a young postgraduate student and welcomed me back in subsequent years. Maria Panova organized a formative research trip to the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) Archive in Kiev. IthasbeenapleasureworkingwithCornellUniversityPress.Inparticular, Roger Haydon not only curated this publication but also provided insightful comments on the manuscript. This work also benefited significantly from the readings of the two anonymous reviewers. I am grateful for Karen Laun’s excel lent coordination of this book’s production and Carolyn Pouncy’s thorough editing. ThisbookhasledmefarfrommyfriendsandfamilyintheUnitedStates.My parents, Jim Bernstein and Lynn Franklin, and sister Miranda Bernstein have been supportive no matter where my curiosity has taken me. My Moscow family, Tanya and Teo Glakhov, made the book worth writing.

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