Dekulakization

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Dekulakization (Russian: раскулачивание) was the Soviet campaign of political repressions, including arrests, deportations, and executions of millions of the better-off peasants and their families in 1929-1932. The richer peasants were labeled kulaks and considered class enemies. More than 1.8 million peasants were deported in 1930-1931.^[1]^[2] The stated purpose of the campaign was to fight the counter-revolution and build socialism in the countryside. This policy was accomplished simultaneously with Collectivization in the USSR and effectively brought all agriculture and peasants in the Soviet Russia under state control.

The "liquidation of the kulaks as class" was announced by Stalin on 27 December 1929.^[1] The decision was formalized in resolution "On measures for the elimination of kulak households in districts of comprehensive collectivisation" on January 30, 1930. All kulaks were divided to three categories: (I) to be shot or imprisoned as decided by the local Gosudarstvennoye Politicheskoye Upravlenie; (II) to be sent to Siberia, North, the Urals or Kazahstan, after confiscation of their property; and (III) to be evicted from their houses and used in labour colonies within their own districts.^[1]

A combination of dekulakization, collectivization, and other repressive policies led to mass starvation in many parts of the Soviet Union and death of at least 14.5 million of peasants in 1930-1937, including 5 millions who died in Ukraine during Holodomor, according to estimate by historian Robert Conquest.^[1]

[edit] References

^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Robert Conquest (1986) The Harvest of Sorrow: Soviet Collectivization and the Terror-Famine. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-505180-7.
^ Nicolas Werth, Karel Bartošek, Jean-Louis Panné, Jean-Louis Margolin, Andrzej Paczkowski, Stéphane Courtois, The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression, Harvard University Press, 1999, hardcover, 858 pages, ISBN 0-674-07608-7