Soviet Farms Research Articles

Evolution of the State-Legal Foundations of the Soviet Agrarian System in the 20s of the XX Century

Introduction. The history of the Soviet state law is of great interest to the modern researchers. A number of aspects of the New Economic Policy development and implementation in Russia are presented in the works of historical, economic and political science scholars. However, in our opinion, the number of research referring to the 20s of the XX century conducted by the legal science scholars is definitely not enough. The article investigates the evolution of the state-legal foundations of the Soviet agrarian system as reflected in the USSR Constitution of 1924, the RSFSR Constitution of 1925, the RSFSR Land Code of 1922, the USSR General Principles of Land Use and Land Management of 1928, and in a number of decrees and other normative legal acts. The relevance of this topic is induced by the theoretical and practical significance of the legal regulation of the agrarian sphere of the society and the reform of the agrarian policy of the modern Russia. On the one hand, the relevance of the topic lies in the need to study the transitional state of the Soviet agrarian legislation, since, according to V. I. Lenin, the New Economic Policy (NEP) implied “transition from the civil war to civil peace”. On the other hand, in the late 20s of the XX century the Soviet leadership had abandoned many of the NEP legislation principles. However, six decades later they were successfully revived and developed in the People's Republic of China during the economic reform. The aim of this study is to reveal the evolution features of the Soviet agrarian system state-legal foundations of the 20s of the XX century. Materials and Methods. The research methodology comprises the general scientific and specific juridical methods, including the historical-legal and legalistic (dogmatic) methods. Due to the rapidly changing attitude towards these methods in the scientific community, the priority in the research has been given to the modern sources. The authors' concept statements have been analysed, which, in synthesis with the authors' empirical background, made it possible to formulate a number of new provisions. Results. The main acts that had legally formalized the state-legal foundations of the Soviet agrarian system in the 20s of the XX century were studied. The huge number of the agricultural laws is explained by the decision of the Soviet party and state leadership of the early 20s to start the recovery of economics with the agrarian sector — the backbone of the national economy of that period. The features of the NEP are elucidated not only as the change of the economic policy, but as the integrated legal policy, being a combination of the public and private law regulation upon absolute predominance of the public principles. It has been substantiated that transition to the NEP entailed the abolishment of the agrarian laws of the times of “war communism” and return to the principles of the peasant Mandate of 1917 — the most important element of the Decree on Land. Deep controversy of the agricultural legislation of the NEP period has been established, which in no way should be defined as a time of abandoning the concept and practice of the collectivization of agriculture. The party and state leadership continued to consider the individual peasant land use as having no economical prospect and dangerous for building socialism. Discussion and Conclusion. The evolution features and distinctions of the Soviet agrarian system state-legal foundations of the 20s of the XX century have been revealed. In normative legal acts and party-state documents of the studied period, the preference continued to be given to the collective farms with the various degree of land and means of production collectivization. Communes and the state-owned agricultural enterprises, sovkhozs (Soviet farms), were considered the most desirable farms, as the ones most closely corresponding to the socialist ideal. The agricultural cooperation, whichhighest form were the kolkhozs (collective farms), was also appreciated by the authorities. The theoretical significance of the conducted research lies in the fact that the state-legal foundations of the socialist agrarian system had been set in the studied period, when the policy of collectivization and public agriculture was stipulated in the Soviet legislation, the rules and norms for creation, organization and operation of the various forms of collective farms were developed, wherein the agricultural commune was considered the form closest to the socialist ideals. Taking into account all the above, further investigation of the process of developing the model Charters of communes, artels and partnerships for joint cultivation of land seems a forward-looking objective.

Fur Processing in Raižiai in the 20th Century: Craft and Image

Fur Processing in Raižiai in the 20th Century: Craft and Image

Problems of economic effi ciency of state farms in 1940–1952 (based on materials of declassifi ed archive materials)

The article, based on archival sources that have been under the heading of secrecy for many years, analyzes the problems of economic efficiency of Soviet farms (state farms) in the first years after the end of World War II. The huge human and material losses suff ered by agriculture predetermined the diffi culties of the restoration period. Analysis of various statistics showed the following results. The yield of feed, technical and grain crops grew weakly, it was not possible to significantly increase the number of livestock. The increase in wages on state farms was not accompanied by an increase in labor productivity. Despite the improvement in the technical equipment of state farms, it was not possible to achieve the application of the achievements of agronomic science; signifi cant losses were observed in harvesting. The existing system of pricing agricultural products gave rise to a significant difference in the planned and actual cost, which, in turn, exceeded government prices. The most important mechanism for eliminating this discrepancy was the subsidy of state farms at the expense of budgets of different levels. More than 80 % of agricultural enterprises were on state subsidies, of which about 60% of farms had losses that could not even compensate for the allocated funds. At the same time, the state received economic benefi ts from the activities of state farms. The funds allocated to finance the activities of state farms were half as much as the state gained from the sale of agricultural products. Despite certain successes in agricultural production, state farms were unable by the beginning of the 1950-ies to increase labor productivity, significantly increase yields and multiply livestock, actively implement the achievements of agronomic science and rationally use technology.

The attitude of the soviet authorities to the first wave of ‘nomaders’ according to the documents of the ‘special folders’ of the CC CP(B)K

The central party organs dealt with all issues of the internal and foreign policy of the republic, led the national economy, public organizations, and personnel policy. Therefore, the documents of the ‘special folders’ of the Central Committee of the Communist Party (b) Kazakhstan reflect various spheres of the life of the republic, which for a long time were not available to researchers due to the highest secrecy stamp imposed. The article deals with one of such areas of the problem – the settlement of Kazakh repatriates and representatives of other nationalities from China, who left during the civil war, collectivization, famine and repressions, who, unable to withstand the attitude of local residents and the persecution of the authorities of the country, republic or regions to which they moved, returned back to Kazakhstan. The ways of solving problems related to their settlement in Soviet farms, organization of trade with them, their cultural services, medical care, their resettlement, maintenance and veterinary services for their livestock are analyzed. Authors describes the reasons and measures to prevent the mass return of "nomads" back to China, despite all the decisions taken, the measures taken by the leadership of the republic in connection with the gaps made by some representatives of local authorities during their placement.

Mashaveras Gora: New investigation of Shulaveri-Shomutepe Culture Neolithic Settlement

Archaeological excavations at Mashaveras Gora (Bolnisi municipality, Kvemo Kartli, Georgia) were carried out in 2020-2021 archaeological season by a Georgian National Museum team. The Mashaveras Gora settlement belongs to the Shulaveri-Shomutepe Neolithic culture. With its location of confluence of two main river Khrami and Mashavera the mound appears to be one of the main settlements of South Caucasus Neolithic life. Discovery of Mashaveras Gora is related to the Soviet farm building. Short period excavation was carried out in 1988 by D. Gogelia. Since that the site was abandoned until now. The 2020-2021 excavation goal was to renew archaeological excavation on the Mashaveras Gora. The results of archaeological investigation gave us opportunity to shed a light on new architectural building tradition, which is quite different from typical Shulaveri-Shomutepe Neolithic architecture. Excavations focused on the north part of the settlement, where was excavated nine trenches, also in the west side of the mound with two new trenches for the stratigraphy of the mound. Neolithic rounded houses with its small storage buildings and several fragments of walls had been documented. Also, significant number of archaeological materials belonging to the neolithic activity. New investigated site provides material on Neolithic society practices in everyday life in the Southern Caucasus, as well as ritualistic concepts and perspectives.

THE HISTORY OF THE FORMATION OF THE NATIONAL INTELLIGENTSIA IN TURKESTAN AT THE ORIGINS OF SOVIET POWER

The article describes the process of active formation on a socialist basis of social units of the structure of a socialist society, like Soviet workers and intelligentsia. The creation of completely new social strata, characteristic only of Soviet society, is also noted - cooperative handicraftsmen, collective farmers, workers of Soviet farms. But due to the small number and economic weakness, their activities were practically not noticeable either in the city or in the village. KEY WORDS: intelligentsia, society, education, profession, industry, citizen, party, socialism, bolshevik, paniIslamism, panturkism, clergy, school, madrasah, university.

Wang Zhen's Role in the Recovery of the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corpus (Early 1980s)

The Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps (XPCC) or Bingtuan originates to the ancient military settlements (Tuntian or Tunken) on the border territories. Their goal is to protect and develop border areas, restore and progress the economy. Tunken, regardless of historical conditions, has always been an exclusively state-owned economic system. Therefore, the XPCC, despite the fact that it originated in 1952; it is based on the long tradition of its historical predecessors. At the same time, during the Soviet period, Tunken absorbed communist ideals, the experience of Soviet state farms, scientific achievements in the social and national building and military defense. In the subsequent period, in the Cultural Revolution, Bingt^n fell into disrepair and was liquidated. A new stage in the history of the Xinjiang Corps came with the beginning of the era of reform and opening. But all over china, the time of Bingtuan has come to an end: many state-owned enterprises and state farms associated with the development of border territories have totally transformed into independent economic units focused on the market. Thanks to the activities of Wang Zhen, who was well aware of the social realities of the region, an exception was made for Xinjiang, in which Bingtuan was restored in the early 1980s. The paper examines Wang Zhen's role in the revival of the XPCC, the reasons that influenced his position.

Боротьба кримських татар із радгоспами на південному березі Криму у 1923 році (за матеріаліами літерної справи «Міллі-фірка» iз ГДА СБУ)

Introduction. The mass artifi cial famine of 1921–1923 in Crimea arose as a result of a combinationof the military-communist policy of Soviet Russia, which seized the Crimean peninsula in November 1920, withthe consequences of several years of wars and revolutions and unfavorable natural and climatic conditions.Without the policy of the Russian communist regime, the losses among the Crimean people and in the agriculturalsector of Crimea would not have been so catastrophic. As a result of the famine, approximately 100,000 peopleor almost 14% of Crimeans died. The vast majority of victims were Crimean Tatars.Purpose of the study is to study the struggle with Soviet farms (state farms) at the fi nal stage of the massartifi cial famine of 1921-1923 of the Crimean Tatar peasantry of the Southern coast of Crimea on the basis ofanalysis of the case of the “counterrevolutionary organization “Milli Firka””.Results. The communist regime in the late 1920s and early 1921s actively planted state farms in thenationalized lands of Crimea, but due to their ineffi ciency and resistance of the peasantry, the number of suchfarms decreased by almost 10 times in a year. The exception was the southern coast of Crimea, where most statefarms continued to operate in the former lands of the imperial family, aristocracy and imperial dignitaries. Thisled to a deepening catastrophe during the famine among the peasants of the southern coast, the vast majority ofwhom were landless Crimean Tatars and suffered from the inability to rent land. The analysis of the materialsof the case «Milli-Firka», which in 1928-1930 was conducted by the punitive and repressive bodies of theUSSR against the Crimean Tatar intelligentsia and activists, shows the active actions of the Crimean Tatarintelligentsia and peasants to seize land and distribute state farms near Yalta.Conclusions. Analysis of information from the case “Milli-Firka” clarifi es the notions present inhistoriography about the «passivity» of Crimean Tatars during the mass artifi cial famine in Crimea in 1921-1923, from which the Crimean Tatar people suffered the most among all Crimean ethnic communities. Materialscontained in the cases of punitive and repressive bodies of the USSR testify to the active attempts in 1923 byCrimean Tatar peasants and intellectuals to resolve the issue of landlessness and scarcity of land on the southerncoast of Crimea by seizing the lands of state farms. This region was characterized by a noticeable concentrationof state farms, while in other parts of the Crimea most of them were liquidated in 1921. At least one case isknown when an anti-farm action was carried out in the village of Kyziltash, Yalta district, formed a «national»artel, uniting peasants regardless of property status. It seems that the organizers and participants of such actionstried to give their attempts to protect the interests of the Crimean Tatar peasantry forms externally loyal to theSoviet government. This is evidenced, in particular, by the use of red fl ags and artel forms of self-organization.The success of these anti-state farm`s actions could have been facilitated by the political situation when, in thecontext of the proclamation of the RCP (B) policy of indigenization, representatives of the nationally orientedCrimean Tatar political militia (“millifi rkivtsi”) cooperated with the National Communists among the CrimeanTatar

Electric and gas-generating tractors in the agricultural sector of the South of Russia in the 1930s: mass-staffs and application features

The article is based on the materials of the Don, Kuban and Stavropol regions as the most important agricultural regions of Russia, highlights the process of development and introduction of gas-generating tractors in Soviet agriculture during the 1930s, which represented a special direction of mechanization of agricultural production in the period under review. The author’s statement that in the 1930s the author’s work was carried out is convincingly justified. Representatives of the Party-Soviet leadership paid close attention to the development of gas-generating equipment as consuming cheaper fuel in comparison with petroleum products and it led to the rapid development of these technical devices and their quantitative growth, including in Soviet and collective farms. It was proved that, despite the efforts of the designers, gas-generating tractors had a number of significant drawbacks, which made their operation difficult and became one of the most important reasons for their usage stopping in agriculture.

Совхозы Архангельской области в годы Великой Отечественной войны (по данным сводных годовых отчетов)

On the basis of consolidated annual reports, this paper studies the condition of the material and technical resource base and the development of agricultural production on the state farms (sovkhozes)of the Arkhangelsk Region in 1941–1945. The composition and structure of the machine and tractor fleet is analysed, showing that the deficit of fuel and lubricants in combination with worn-out equipment, lack of spare parts and underqualified machinery operators resulted in a deterioration of the use of machines. In wartime conditions, the material and technical resources of Soviet farms in the Arkhangelsk Region shrank dramatically. As a result, the volume of tractor work per farm decreased by the factor of 7.6 during the war. Unlike other regions of the country, the European North of the RSFSR saw no improvements in the material and technical resource base on its state farms at the war’s final stage. Further, the paper describes the dynamics of acreage, yield and gross harvest of agricultural crops. It was established that with the onset of war, the state farms scaled down their cropping, which was manifested in the reduction of sown areas. At the same time, the share of grain in the structure of sown areas remained unchanged, while the role of fodder crops decreased significantly and that of potatoes and vegetables increased. As a result of reduced sown areas and lower yields, the gross harvest of agricultural crops decreased. State farm animal husbandry found itself in a difficult situation as well, with reduced feed supply, deteriorated veterinary services, and widespread epizootics. The animal yield dropped markedly while the loss increased. By the end of the war, animal husbandry on the state farms of the Arkhangelsk Region was reduced to a minimum level. Simultaneously with livestock reduction, its productivity fell, which seriously affected the gross and marketable outputs of the state farms. In conclusion, the paper demonstrates the role of Soviet farms in the region’s agricultural production and determines their contribution to the victory in the war.

State Farm in Eastern Siberia in the Years of the Great Patriotic War (According to Consolidated Annual Reports)

The research used the materials of the consolidated annual reports of Soviet farms in the Krasnoyarsk Territory, Irkutsk and Chita Regions, Buryat-Mongol and Yakut Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republics and Tuva Autonomous Region to examine the state of agricultural production in the state farms of Eastern Siberia in 1941-1945. We analyzed the information on the size and structure of cultivated areas, agricultural yield and gross collection. The study also examined the data of the Central Statistical Bureau of the USSR on the state of farm animal production at the regional state farms, including the cattle's crop and its loss, its abundance, and performance rate. The influence of the war on the agricultural situation is studied. The study revealed that compared to agriculture extreme wartime conditions began to affect farm animal production somewhat later.

The "Magic Tablecloth": Personal Property and Sovkhoism in Soviet and Post-Soviet Russia

This paper discusses the concept of personal property as an ideological construct of Soviet power in its agricultural application. The case in point is the collectivized reindeer husbandry of the Russian Far North. I argue that personal property, as it developed in Soviet agricultural history, was a critical, informally employed tool in the creation of an existentially secure, paternalistic reality, represented by the Soviet farm (sovkhoz). "Sovkhoism" is introduced as a cover term for the practices and general worldview symbolized by the sovkhoz. A methodological claim I make is that reindeer husbandry provides the best possible example of how sovkhoism was engendered and developed. The paper also looks at post-Soviet reinterpretations of sovkhoism and makes predictions for its future. I conclude that the study of personal property and the worldview of sovkhoism calls attention to the role of mixed property categories and, further, the blurring of categorial distinctions in general. The blurring of the line between private and public (collective) property in the case discussed, with its lasting attractiveness for powered and disempowered actors alike, provides a hitherto ignored explanation for the popularity of Soviet and Soviet-like regimes.

Сельские коммуны и советские хозяйства накануне и во время крестьянского восстания 1920–1921 гг.

We examine the state of communes and farms, the attitude of the rural population to their organization and activities, as well as the state of collective farms on the eve and during the Tambov rebellion of 1920–1921. The relevance of the topic is determined by the need for a scien-tific understanding of the problem of insurrection in the Civil War and its manifestation in the form of a peasant rebellion led by A.S. Antonov. The purpose of the study is to establish the fate of collective farms during the armed protest of the Tambov peasants. The work was carried out on the basis of a wide range of archival sources, some of which are introduced into scientific circulation for the first time. The analysis of the problem is carried out taking into account the achievements of modern historiography of the issue and the use of scientific tools of advanced methodological approaches. We apply the entire arsenal of methods of historical research based on the principles of historicism, objectivity and consistency. It is established that the armed raids of rebel detachments on agricultural communes, Soviet farms were due to the need of the partisans for food, horses, forage, and the active participation of the local population in them stemmed from their view of the land and property of collective farms as rightfully belonging to them.

Semantic and Word-Formation Features of Horse Names in the History of the Russian Language (Based on the Inventory Books of Vologda Monasteries in the 16th — Early 18th Centuries)

The paper considers a historical aspect of zoonymic studies which has not been sufficiently developed. The history of Russian horse names (hipponyms) is explored using zoonymic data from the inventories of the Vologda monasteries in the 16th — early 18th centuries, the materials from Listings of horses (Moscow, 1665), and archival documents of the Soviet farms of Sevmaslotrest from 1930s. The author identifies the lexical structure of Early Modern Russian hipponymy, delves into the meaning of names and appellatives they derive from, analyses the structure of horses’ names, and describes the name formation techniques. The studied sources bring the picture of the general development of lexical patterns in the Russian hipponymy. As it turns out, the vocabulary of Early Modern Russian hyponymy is almost identical with the Old Russian anthroponomy, which attests to their genetic unity. At the same time, the use of Christian names is noted, with these becoming more popular in the given period. The article also deals with structural types of Early Modern Russian hipponyms: zoonyms having a substantive form (nicknames formed from onomastic, agential, zoological, and object nouns; zoonymic compounds; suffixal compounds); adjective-based zoonyms; mixed names. In monastic scripts of the 16th — early 18th centuries, the vast majority of units used as hipponyms are “prefabricated” traditional names, the cases of creating original animal names are rare. In the latter case, zoonyms are usually formed using suffixal patterns peculiar for agentive and anthroponomic vocabulary. The word-building patterns include the onymisation of appellatives (sometimes by metaphoric transfer), substantivisation (nominalization) of adjectives, transonymisation of personal and place names. Due to the semantic, structural, and word-formation proximities between Early Modern Russian zoonymy and Old Russian anthroponomy, zoonymic vocabulary of the 16th–18th centuries provides a reliable source on Old Russian onomasticon, as well as explains the “anthroponymic” nature of modern Russian zoonymy and the active use of personal names for animals at present. This practice turns out to have deep historical roots.

Baltic mikroraions and kolkhoz settlements within the Soviet architectural award system

The focus of this paper is how the Soviet architectural award system from the 1960s to the 1980s functioned in relation to the industrialisation of housing and planning for new types of residential units such as the mikroraion (large housing estate) in urban environments and kolkhoz (collective farm) settlements in rural areas. Despite the importance attached to mass housing declared by the Communist Party in 1955, the Soviet Union’s most prestigious state award, the Lenin Prize, was only ever conferred upon two model sites: the Lazdynai large housing estate in Vilnius, Lithuania, in 1974, and the Juknaičiai soviet farm village in south-western Lithuania in 1988. The paper seeks to address several questions: What role did official awards play in the context of Soviet mass housing and new settlement planning ideology? How and why were certain (Baltic) sites selected and awarded? What aspects played a major role in both professional acknowledgment and the fulfilment of ideological requirements? The research is based on material held by the Russian State Archives for Literature and Arts in Moscow (RGALI), the Lithuanian National State Archives (LCVA), interviews with architects in Lithuania, and an overview of the contemporary Soviet press.

“Uncontrolled sovkhoism”: administering reindeer husbandry in the Russian far north (Kola Peninsula)

ABSTRACTSovkhoism is a world-view extolling the virtues of the Soviet Farm (sovkhoz) as the foundation of a grassroots-friendly socio-economy. We discuss the post-Soviet “uncontrolled” state of sovkhoism in Murmansk Region reindeer husbandry. We argue that the key descriptor of the state of reindeer husbandry: the head-count (pogolovye) is often an arbitrary figure in a subsidy-producing narrative. In it, overall head-count numbers tend to be inflated, while a critical differentiation between the categories of personal vs. private reindeer is obliterated. Further, the head-count/subsidies narrative reproduces the central features of Soviet-era socio-economy of sovkhoism. The present, post-Soviet state of this process, we discuss as lacking previously existing mechanism of outside control. We conclude that reindeer husbandry in the Russian Far North is in need of returning to a relatively controlled state by the introduction of independent and publicly transparent controlling agency. Non-sovkhoist, “fully private” development is seen to be unrealistic at this stage, apart from isolated cases in the region concerned.

Works in Progress: Plans and Realities on Soviet Farms, 1930–1963. By Jenny Leigh Smith. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2014. x + 272 pp. Illustrations, maps, notes, glossary, and index. Cloth $85.00.

<i>Works in Progress: Plans and Realities on Soviet Farms, 1930–1963.</i> By Jenny Leigh Smith. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2014. x + 272 pp. Illustrations, maps, notes, glossary, and index. Cloth $85.00.

Lenkų kalba Semeliškių apylinkėse: leksikos ypatumai

The article deals with the Polish language features common in Semeliskių surroundings. This area belongs to the West region of Vilnius dialects, which is characterized by regressive, or minimal, bilingualistic type. Such variation of the Polish language is used by the old and only a small part of the middle generation. Only very rarely is this language used to interact in a public environment, Lithuanian language is more common. Primary schools, where the teaching language was Polish, were common in these areas only during the interwar period. Currently only Lithuanian educational institutions are in place. Residents of these dialectical areas know the Russian language, especially prevalent during the heyday of Soviet farms; the Belarusian language is also common. Features of the Polish language are described in the lexical basis. Lexis reflects well both Lithuanian language substrate, as well as the later adstratic and superstratic layers. Separated from the general Polish language, Polish dialects in the region managed to maintain Polish archaisms over time, lexical lituanizms, which entered the Polish dialects in different periods and in different ways, are widely prevalent. The old Lithuanian language borrowings can create synonym doubles with nearby used Polish archaisms, old baltarusisms, rusisms.

Jenny Leigh Smith, Works in Progress: Plans and Realities on Soviet Farms, 1930–1963

Jenny Leigh Smith, <i>Works in Progress: Plans and Realities on Soviet Farms, 1930–1963</i>

Gorbachev’s Agriculture Agenda: Decollectivization and the Politics of Perestroika

Gorbachev’s Agriculture AgendaDecollectivization and the Politics of Perestroika Chris Miller (bio) “Whenever I talk to Sovietologists,” wrote the economist Abel Aganbegian in 1989, “they always return to the same question: why did we not do as in previous reforms and start out perestroika with agriculture?”1 When Mikhail Gorbachev came to power in 1985 and launched his program of perestroika, it was widely recognized that the Soviet Union’s agricultural system needed to be made more efficient. Since Iosif Stalin collectivized farmland in the 1920s and 1930s, the Soviet Union had suffered repeated crop failures and persistently low agricultural productivity. Grain had been one of Russia’s main exports under the tsars, but during the 1970s and 1980s the Soviet Union had to import food to feed its population. Such grain as was produced domestically required increasingly large capital inlays. Fixed capital investment in agriculture increased by 4.7 times from 1965 to 1981, even though output less than doubled. That meant capital investments were becoming much less productive.2 Despite declining returns to investment, Moscow’s central planners plowed tremendous resources into the agricultural sector during the postwar period. Soviet farms used tractors, fertilizer, and labor at far higher rates than comparable countries.3 During Leonid Brezhnev’s premiership, fertilizer usage [End Page 95] doubled and tractor deliveries tripled, even as productivity stagnated.4 This nearly limitless supply of funds supplied to the Soviet countryside constituted the largest farm subsidy program in history.5 But because Soviet farms were so wasteful, new investment did relatively little to boost farm output. If perestroika was to succeed in lifting the Soviet Union out of stagnation, the country’s farms would have to be made more efficient. It is often argued, as Aganbegian noted, that Gorbachev did little to address the USSR’s agricultural problems. Many scholars have suggested that, had Gorbachev focused on farms rather than industry, perestroika might have succeeded.6 In fact, this article suggests that Gorbachev had a clear policy toward agriculture, dating from the early years of perestroika, which was far more radical than many realized. Historians of the perestroika era have long relied on published sources—newspapers, public statements, and memoirs—to understand Gorbachev’s policies.7 But Gorbachev was a wily political operator, and he knew better than to show his cards to the public before assembling the coalition needed to operationalize his ideas. That was particularly true in agriculture, where Gorbachev’s vision diverged sharply from the long-standing Soviet consensus, which backed collective farms and permitted individual farming only in limited circumstances. Thousands of pages of documents from the perestroika era are now available to historians, but scholars studying the economic policies of perestroika have barely begun to make use of them. That is particularly true of documents from Gorbachev’s personal archive—above all, notes from perestroika-era Politburo meetings, some of which have even been published.8 [End Page 96] Historians who study Soviet foreign policy have long treated the Gorbachev Politburo notes as a central source for understanding the 1980s, but few scholars of Soviet economic policy have yet made use of them. Given how rarely they are cited in the literature, many historians appear to be unaware that they exist. Yet the Politburo papers are a goldmine for scholars seeking to understand the politics and policies of perestroika—far more useful than the often unreliable memoir literature and contemporary journalism upon which existing accounts of perestroika are based. The papers of Gorbachev and his advisers show a general secretary striving toward a market economy in the face of tenacious political opposition, not the indecisive ditherer that most accounts of Gorbachev’s tenure suggest.9 Agriculture is a prime example. The Politburo notes and other archival sources demonstrate that Gorbachev long wanted to decollectivize agriculture and to provide farms with market incentives. As early as 1986, during the initial days of perestroika, Gorbachev set forth to his Politburo colleagues an agenda of far-reaching agricultural transformation. Many other top officials, however, disagreed with Gorbachev’s agricultural ambitions for reasons of ideology and bureaucratic politics. Gorbachev’s proposals to empower individual farmers against the collective-farm leadership not only...