Education and Social Mobility in the Soviet Union, 1921-1934

The disintegration of the Soviet Union is an essential case for the study of ethnic politics and identity-based mobilization. However, analyses in this article demonstrate that commonly used measures of ethnic diversity and politically relevant group concentration show little consistent relationship with events of ethnic mobilization in Soviet regions during the period 1987-1992. In contrast, the proportion of a regional population that did not speak a metropolitan language has a consistently strong negative relationship with mobilization across these regions. In line with recent work on identity politics, I argue that a lack of proficiency in a metropolitan language marks nonspeakers as outsiders and hinders their social mobility. Regions with many of these individuals thus have a relatively high potential for identity-based mobilization. These findings provide further impetus for looking beyond ethnic groups in measuring identity-based cleavages, and indicate that language can play an important role in political outcomes aside from proxying ethnicity.

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Stalled Social Mobility in Post-Soviet Russia

Current History ◽

10.1525/curh.2018.117.801.258 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 117 (801) ◽

pp. 258-263

Author(s):

Theodore P. Gerber

Keyword(s):

Soviet Union ◽

Middle Class ◽

Social Mobility ◽

The Soviet Union ◽

The World ◽

Soviet Russia

“The fall of the Soviet Union sparked hopes that a Russian middle class would emerge and thrive, but so far it has not.” Second in a series on social mobility around the world.

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Purges and Forced Retirements of Soviet Party Elites as Power Tools of Social Mobility

Canadian-American Slavic Studies ◽

10.1163/22102396-04803005 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 48 (3) ◽

pp. 329-345

Author(s):

Katya Vladimirov

Keyword(s):

Soviet Union ◽

Social Status ◽

Social Mobility ◽

Communist Party ◽

Central Committee ◽

The Soviet Union ◽

Party Elites ◽

History Of ◽

Power Tools ◽

High Social Status

The article presents a tumulus seventy-year history of the top party élite, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CC CPSU), by profiling the anatomy of historical generations that embodied it. Five district generations in power and various political “teams” had been locked in ferocious battle for access to political capital, high social status, coveted positions, ranks, and privileges. Their survival and advancement demanded perseverance, bargaining skills, and ruthless elimination of competitors. Purges and forced retirement were essential power tools used in their generational struggle for power and status. The article discusses these methods of compulsory “exclusion” and offers innovative and revealing perspective on the nature of the Soviet political structure as well as on the techniques of its internal combat.

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Education and Social Mobility in the Soviet Union 1921-1934

British Journal of Educational Studies ◽

10.2307/3120576 ◽

1980 ◽

Vol 28 (2) ◽

pp. 161

Author(s):

John Dunstan ◽

Sheila Fitzpatrick

Keyword(s):

Soviet Union ◽

Social Mobility ◽

The Soviet Union

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Students, Workers, and Social Change: The Limits of Czech Stalinism

Slavic Review ◽

10.2307/2500787 ◽

1997 ◽

Vol 56 (2) ◽

pp. 307-335 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

John Connelly

Keyword(s):

Higher Education ◽

Social Support ◽

Soviet Union ◽

Social Mobility ◽

The Other ◽

Social Classes ◽

The Soviet Union ◽

Elite Status ◽

Working Class Students ◽

Upward Social Mobility

Only a few years after the defeat of Nazi Germany, communists throughout eastern Europe began constructing new societies according to models imported from the Soviet Union. One of the most important tasks facing them in this enterprise was to establish firm bases of social support. For this, the Soviet model seemed straightforward: communists had to destroy the power of the old elites and recruit new elites from underprivileged social strata. In the 1920s the Bolsheviks had attempted to achieve these goals through higher education. By using affirmative action in student admissions and setting up worker preparation courses—the rabfaky—they broke the ability of the former upper classes to bequeath status and rapidly increased the numbers of workers and peasants among university students. Between 1927-28 and 1932-33 the number of working-class students doubled to half of all students, while the total number of students more than doubled. Issues of ideology aside, the logic of this transformation was simple: underprivileged social classes were likely to reward communists with loyalty in exchange for upward social mobility. The middle and upper classes, on the other hand, had considered it their prerogative to aspire to elite status. Their attachment to communism would always seem suspect, because in the best of cases it was based upon ideological commitment alone.

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