Beyond the Victimhood Narrative: A Case Study of Unexpectedly Successful Collectivization in Communist Poland

Abstract

Abstract This article is a micro-historical study of the collectivization of agriculture carried out by the communist authorities in Central and Eastern Europe after 1945. Using the example of the village of Gierczyce in the Kielce region (Central Poland), it shows under what conditions collectivization, resisted in most of the Polish countryside, was able to succeed, and it traces the long-term effects of this process on Gierczyce’s social structure and social relations. It also analyzes this rural community’s contemporary memory of the emergence and functioning of the production cooperative. Thus, it critically engages with, and questions, the “resistance paradigm” dominant in studies of collectivization. Enriched with a broader regional and national comparative context, the article is based on the analysis of archival material from central and regional archives, personal documents, and extensive field research.