The New Economic Policy (NEP) as an Economic System

Abstract

! BRIE period of the New Economic Policy (NEP) is a dynamic episode I in the history of the Soviet Union. During the early months of 1921, danger signals such as the Kronstadt rebellion and the centripetal forces in the nonRussian Soviet Republics gave ample evidence that the regime of War Communism would no longer be tolerated. Consequently, the NEP was hastily introduced by a succession of legislative moves that laid the basis for a new economic order. But already in 1927 there were signs of new radical changes in the making, which materialized with the introduction of stern five-year plans and the compulsory collectivization of agriculture. An attempt to conceive such a rapidly changing economy as an economic system poses methodological difficulties. The ushering in of the NEP appeared to many observers as a capitulation of the Communist experiment to the only "rational" system based on private initiative and markets. Partly for this reason, the Westerners took little interest in the Soviet economy during the 1920's. To others, who either anticipated or observed the transformation of the economy in 192829, the NEP appeared as a prelude to the socialist theme. Maurice Dobb's writings