scholarly journals Reassessing the Standard of Living in the Soviet Union: An Analysis Using Archival and Anthropometric Data

2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Brainerd
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Standard Of Living ◽  
Anthropometric Data ◽  
The Soviet Union

scholarly journals Reassessing the Standard of Living in the Soviet Union: An Analysis Using Archival and Anthropometric Data

2010 ◽  
Vol 70 (1) ◽  
pp. 83-117 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Brainerd
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Infant Mortality ◽  
Physical Growth ◽  
Standard Of Living ◽  
The Political ◽  
Archival Data ◽  
Anthropometric Data ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Child Height ◽  
Adult Stature

This article uses anthropometric and archival data to reassess the standard of living in the Soviet Union. In the prewar period, the population was small in stature and sensitive to the political and economic upheavals experienced in the country. Significant improvements in child height, adult stature, and infant mortality were recorded from approximately 1945 to 1970. While this period of physical growth was followed by stagnation in heights, the physical growth record of the Soviet population compares favorably with that of other European countries at a similar level of development in this period.

Cold War in the Kitchen: Gender and the De-Stalinization of Consumer Taste in the Soviet Union under Khrushchev

Slavic Review ◽  
2002 ◽  
Vol 61 (2) ◽  
pp. 211-252 ◽  
Author(s):  
Susan E. Reid
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Consumer Goods ◽  
Standard Of Living ◽  
Soviet Culture ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Good Taste ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Economic Capacity ◽  
The Ideal

Consumption, a key issue in the study of post-Soviet culture, was already a central concern during the Cold War. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, the Khrushchev regime staked its legitimacy at home, and its credibility abroad, on its ability to provide its population with consumer goods and a decent standard of living. Despite promising "abundance for all" as the precondition for the imminent transition to communism, the regime could not afford to leave abundance undefined. In this article, Susan E. Reid examines the way discourses of consumption, fashion, and the ideal Soviet home sought to remake consumers’ conceptions of culturedness, good taste, and comfort in rational, modern terms that took into account the regime’s ideological commitment and economic capacity. Such efforts to shape and regulate desire were directed above all at women. Reid proposes that the study of consumption provides insights into the ways in which post-Stalinist regimes manipulated and regulated people through regimes of personal conduct, taste, and consumption habits, as opposed to coercion. Indeed, the management of consumption was as significant for the Soviet system's longevity as for its ultimate collapse.

The Condition of Labor in Post-Soviet Russia

2004 ◽  
Vol 28 (4) ◽  
pp. 637-665 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lewis H. Siegelbaum
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Standard Of Living ◽  
Survival Strategies ◽  
World War ◽  
Attitudes And Practices ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Enterprise Level ◽  
Soviet Russia ◽  
Wage Arrears

Labor (meaning both wage workers as well as their collective representation) in Russia was a major loser in the decade following the collapse of the Soviet Union. Aggregate data on prices, average wage and pension levels, wage arrears, and unemployment indicate a serious decline in workers’ standard of living that is unprecedented in the post-World War II era, while strike data show an upsurge in this form of worker militancy during the mid-1990s but a decline thereafter.This article seeks to explain both why these developments occurred and what prevented workers from adequately defending their collective interests. Four explanations have been advanced by Western and Russian scholars. The first is that workers were victims of state policies pursued in line with the“Washington consensus” on how to effectuate the transition from an administrative-command to a market-based economy. The second points to workers’ attitudes and practices that were prevalent under Soviet conditions but proved inappropriate to post-Soviet life. The third, claiming that several key indices of workers’ standard of living are misleading, denies that labor has been a loser. The fourth and most compelling of the explanations is derived from ethnographically based research. It argues that despite changes in the forms of property and politics, power relations at the enterprise level remained intact, leaving workers and their unions dependent on the ability of management to bargain with suppliers of subsidies and credits. The article concludes with some observations about workers’ survival strategies and the extent to which collective dependence on economic and political strongmen has worked against structural change in favor of labor.

“After the Putsch”: Prospects for Independent Ukraine

1993 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 35-46
Author(s):  
David R. Marples
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Winter Wheat ◽  
Standard Of Living ◽  
Declaration Of Independence ◽  
European State ◽  
Grain Crops ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Future ◽  
Former Soviet Republics

There has been considerable speculation as to which of the former Soviet republics could become viable economic entities following the Putsch of August 19-21, 1991, and the resultant dissolution of the USSR. The consensus is that after Russia, Ukraine has the best chances of survival as a European state with a highly developed economy. Yet the picture remains a bleak one. Although Ukraine has advanced industry and has been a major source of grain crops (of winter wheat in particular), a declining standard of living had been forecast by its economic experts for the period 1991-1995, even before the August 24 declaration of independence. The following study will show Ukraine's major advantages and weaknesses, and what sort of prospects lie ahead for an independent Ukraine. As with any statements on the future of the former territories of the Soviet Union, they have to be qualified with the phrase “pending future political developments.” For the most part, the assumption is made that relations between Ukraine and its once and future economic partners will be amicable.

scholarly journals Socio-Economic and Political Motivations of Russian Out-Migration from Central Asia

2013 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 146-153 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aijaz A. Bandey ◽  
Farooq Ahmad Rather
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Central Asia ◽  
Standard Of Living ◽  
Labour Migration ◽  
Economic Prosperity ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Job Opportunities

The unexpected fall of Soviet Union left ethnic Russians, outside Russia with many questions and concerns. Many of them emigrated to Russia from the erstwhile Soviet Union, for better conditions there. The disintegration of Soviet Union – a state created on the ideology of Communism was one of the reasons, apart from economic, political, socio-cultural, reasons besides the failure of Communism to keep the Soviet Union together were the main causes of Russian out-migration from Central Asia. The out-migration of Russians from Central Asia to Russia began in the 1970s as internal labour migration shifted in the wake of better job opportunities. It accelerated tremendously after 1991, and touched its highest mark in 1994, as a response to the relative economic prosperity of Russia at that time. Thus the improved standard of living in Russia and the desire to return to their cultural homeland were some major issues that concerned people to shift to Russia.

Review of Social Thought in the Soviet Union.

1969 ◽  
Vol 14 (9) ◽  
pp. 516-516
Author(s):  
Morton Deutsch
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Social Thought ◽  
The Soviet Union
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