pARTisan_32

— As you know, it was «depeasantization» which determined
the level of modernization, whereas peasantry was seen as
an obstacle to further progress. It was not an exception to
the Bolshevik’s version of modernization. The new socialist
society was procliamed to be a society of high culture and
everyday life: peasants had to be taught not only to read and
write, but also to follow personal hygiene procedures at a due
level. Also they had to be helped to overcome those things
which in the language of the official propaganda were called
«savagery and bigotry» or «religious prejudices», «remnants
of the past», among which alcoholism, drug addiction and
prostitution were mentioned.
If the 1920s were only marking the beginnig of such
«culturalization» and it was the propaganda of the new
way of life which was mostly relied on, in the 1930s the
situation changed radically – all those people who did not
fit the image of the ideal Soviet man could be isolated from
the Soviet society. Interesting studies have been recently
published that shed the light on mass arrests of «anti-social
elements», Soviet society outcasts.
— And how did the peasants themselves see all the
things happening to them in the 1920–1930s? Can
certain prevailing attitudes be named?
— Certainly, the «invisible people» themselves left us virtually
no evidence of their own perception of the events of that
time. However, in the 1920s and especially in the 1930s the
authorities closely monitored the social moods and carried a
kind of «public opinion study». Numerous examples of those
«monitoring» processes are preserved in the archives. Among
them there are staff reports from different special agencies
(the People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs and others)
regarding people’s attitudes to latest authorities’ activities.
They contain certain opinions, rumors, speculations and
legends, political folklore, excerpts from letters and so on.
Obviously, not the whole range of people’s attitudes could
get in those reports, however, it is possible to name some
prevailing tendencies as well as to imagine their approximate
scale.
According to numerous documents, in Belarus (and not only
there) in the 1920-1930s the dominating mood was connected
to the expectations of war. The Belarusians were «waiting for»
the Poles, the Germans, the Japanese, and even the British
to attack them. The peasants «knew exactly» when the war
was to break out. As noted by Sheila Fitzpatrick, a famous
American researcher of Stalinism, many, if not most, peasants
believed that the war was actually not such a bad thing, as
long as it brought them liberation from kolkhozes.
Kolkhozes were unequivocally considered to be associated
with evil, mischief and robbery. Cases of kolkhozes organized
on a voluntary basis by people who truely believed in the
idea were few, and even less often one could find examples
of them created by the voluntary association of property by
those who had something to share with others. It is enough
just to look at kolkhozes that existed in 1927, before the mass
and forced collectivization: from 369 almost half was created
in the course of the campaign of granting land to the Jews,
and the other half – on the basis of the estates forcibly taken
from landowners.
— To what extent did the life in the Soviet village differ
from that of the Soviet city?
— At that time, a fairly large percentage of the Jews who
differed in religion, the level of education and types of
employment was living in town. In their occupation, the
Belarusians, who were living in the city and especially in
towns, were closer to the villagers. Whereas the Jewish
population, thanks to the disappearance of all the limitations
associated with the liquidation of the Pale of Settlement,
was given new opportunities then. The Jews were allowed
to cultivate the land, although actually they were not
really interested in it. They were much more attracted by
a chance to move to Moscow, Leningrad and enter any
higher educational establishments of the country. During
that period the Jews from the territories of the Pale of
Settlement (including the territory of the BSSR) began to
move everywhere around the USSR. The Belarusians and
the Jews maintained a certain isolation from each other and
thus had a low level of assimilation. Conflicts on the national
basis occurred, as well as the use, in cases of conflicts, of the
«traditional» curses associated with one’s national identity.
The Bolsheviks declared themselves defenders of the
formerly oppressed nationalities and started fighting
against anti-Semitism. Intelligence data collection on anti-
Semitic manifestations was organized in all the strata of the
Soviet society, show trials against anti-Semites aimed at the
education of the population were conducted. However, it is
interesting to note that in 1925, for example, at a meeting
of the Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist
Party of Byelorussia it was stated that anti-Semitism among
Belarusian peasants was not particularly strong with the
antagonism between the Belarusian and Polish population
being much more pronounced. The campaign against anti-
Semitism reached its peak in 1929 – the early 1930s, and then
gradually faded.
— If to speak about the communist idea and Stalin, to
what extent were they popuar in Belarus in the 1930s?
How much did people actually believe in communism?
— The village of the 1920s knew very little about socialism.
Its only connection to the Soviet power were taxes. The
number of newspapers which were spreading the Soviet
ideas was about two per one village council. The agitators
did not always reach distant regions, either. In the 1920s the
village was following a traditional and conservative lifestyle.
In the 1930s the situation changed dramatically: the
Soviet power started «knocking» on very single house’s door,
classifying and transforming everything and everyone.
— As for the cult of Stalin, in the 1930s the propaganda
was certainly working pretty well. But again the
question is rising — who did it mostly affect and how?
— If we talk about the «conservative» older generation of
peasants, they had their own experience, the life they had
been living and thus it was difficult to influence them. The
propaganda was affecting certain groups, such as the youth
raised in new environement of the new Soviet school system.
It is interesting to mention that
individual statements about
Lenin were recorded in the
form of direct speech with
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all the impartial epithets