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I started adding to Sovkhoz and writing kolkhoz, but soon realized that the articles share much. Also, comparison of these forms is required. I suggest to make a single article, Collective farming in the USSR. Also, to avoid confusion, I suggest eiher to rename Collectivisation in the USSR into History of collectivisation in the USSR or to make it into a section of the new article. Any opinions? Please put them into the Talk:Sovkhoz page. Mikkalai 04:38, 17 May 2004 (UTC)

Collectivisation impact

From Talk:Kulak

The collectivization campaign turned Russia from major agricutlural exporter into a country unable to feed itself.

I don't think this isn't true per se, but I do think it could be worded in a much more NPOV 130.157.90.64

Thank you for poining out at this phrase. In fact, it is false. Collectivization per se didn't destroy the productivity of Russian agriculture. (By the way, even in 1913 Russian agriculture was retarded with respect to the rest of the world.) The long chain of disasters: WWI, Russian Revolution, Russian Civil War, aggravated by two droughts (of 1920s and 1930s), did that. If someone wants to discuss the issue further, let's do it at the Talk:Collectivisation in the USSR page. I am copying this dialog there. Mikkalai 01:20, 10 Sep 2004 (UTC)

It is hard to show that collectivization reduced productivity as the control situation of an alternative to collectivization, in Russia, cannot be compared to it. But one might note that problems with food production in China ceased when collectivization was abandoned. Fred Bauder 03:53, Sep 10, 2004 (UTC)

Problems with food production in China became quite serious when collectivisation was abandoned. Even Dazhai, China's most successful commune, did not raise enough grain to feed itself in 1987, four years after it was forcibly disbanded by the government. See William H. Hinton, The Great Reversal: The privatization of China, 1978–1989 (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1990), ISBN 0-85345-794-8. Shorne 22:50, 28 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Shock brigades

In an attempt to overcome this resistance, shock brigades were used to coerce reluctant peasants into joining the collective farms between 1929 and 1933.

To assist collectivisation, the Party decided to sent 25,000 "socially conscious" industry workers to the countryside. These workers have become known as twenty-five-thousanders ("dvadtsatipyatitysyachniki").

It happens that the "dvadtsatipyatitysyachniki" movement occurred exactly during the same time frame: 1929-1933. I strongly suspect that the author of the "shock brigades" phrase merely provided his own interpretation of the fact. Unless someone sheds an additional light (i.e., evidence) on the usage of the "shock brigade" buzzword from the U.S. military slang, the sentence is out. Mikkalai 20:28, 11 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I agree that "shock brigade" is POV. Shorne 21:27, 11 Oct 2004 (UTC)