Encyclopedia of Russian History

by James Millar

  BIBLIOGRAPHY

  Balzer, Harley. (1989). Soviet Science on the Edge of Reform. Boulder, CO: Westview Press. Graham, Loren. (1967). The Soviet Academy of Sciences and the Communist Party, 1927-1932. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Graham, Loren. (1987). Science, Philosophy, and Human Behavior in the Soviet Union. New York: Columbia University Press. Joravsky, David. (1970). The Lysenko Affair. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Lubrano, Linda, and Solomon, Susan. (1980). The Social Context of Soviet Science. Boulder, CO: Westview Press. Parrott, Bruce. (1983). Politics and Technology in the Soviet Union. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

  PAUL R. JOSEPHSON

  SCIENCE FICTION

  Science fiction is a literary genre that extrapolates from existing knowledge about the real world to speculate about alternative worlds. It always includes an element of the fantastic, since it aims to go beyond what is, to give a literary model of

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  “what if?” Unlike pure fantasy or utopian literature, however, science fiction posits a rational exploration of as-yet inexplicable phenomena and unknown corners of the human psyche. In Russia the most important works of science fiction have usually been viewed as subversive to the regime in power because of their ability to model alternative realities, to evade censorship by displacing political allegories to the juvenile realm of cosmic adventure, and to tap into the Russian readership’s persistent longings for a more just society.

  The first, mid-nineteenth century works of Russian science fiction blend the rational utopianism of European models with the age-old Russian folk vision of communal justice and abundance for all. The idea that Western-oriented scientific and technological progress might be combined in Russia with egalitarian values, avoiding the evils of both autocracy and capitalism, is one of the strongest and most consistent strains in Russian science fiction. Nikolai Chernyshevsky’s 1862 novel What Is to Be Done? created a fictional model of this idea that inspired generations of Russian revolutionaries, including Lenin. Alexander Bogdanov’s The Red Star (1908) depicts a socially and scientifically progressive society on Mars that is superior to existing earthly alternatives. In the decade following the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution, many stories extolled a cosmic revolution, anticipating the victorious spread of classless societies to other planets with the help of futuristic technology and radically evolved human consciousness. As late as the 1970s, the writers Arkady and Boris Strugatsky countered official literary depictions of Soviet society with science fiction imaginings of alternative societies where rationality, science, and human freedom are not at odds.

  A second, and opposing strain, is the dystopian vision of society dehumanized by the relentless rationalization of work, health, social, and spiritual life. Yevgeny Zamyatin’s novel We (1924, unpublished; 1989) is a brilliant philosophical satire depicting “mathematically happy” workers in the One State, where free will has been all but eliminated. Extrapolating tendencies from both bourgeois and socialist systems of conformity, We insists on the paramount value of individual free will. Zamyatin’s novel, and later Western novels based on similar ideas (e.g., George Orwell’s 1984 ) were banned in the Soviet Union. After 1957, the launch of Sputnik and the gradual relaxation of ideological restrictions inaugurated a new era of Soviet science fiction. In the immensely popular works of Ivan Yefremov and the brothers Stru1354 gatsky, Russian readers found a forum in which their authentic political and cultural aspirations were given a voice-along with an exciting plot. They offered richly imagined histories of the future to remind the reader of the outcome of ethical choices made in the present. Russian literature has often served as the conscience of the nation, and twenty-first century Russian science fiction continues the tradition of ideological engagement, by addressing such themes as contemporary social malaise and the search for a new, post-Soviet Russian cultural identity. See also: CHERNYSHEVSKY, NIKOLAI GAVRILOVICH

  BIBLIOGRAPHY

  Fetzer, Leland, ed. (1982). Pre-Revolutionary Russian Science Fiction: An Anthology. Ann Arbor: Ardis. Gomel, Elana. (1999). “Science Fiction in Russia: From Utopia to New Age.” Science Fiction Studies 26(3): 435-441. Howell, Yvonne. (1994). Apocalyptic Realism: The Science Fiction of Arkady and Boris Strugatsky. New York: Peter Lang. Suvin, Darko. (1979). “Russian SF and Its Utopian Tradition.” In Metamorphoses of Science Fiction: On the Poetics and History of a Literary Genre. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

  YVONNE HELEN HOWELL

  SCIENTIFIC SOCIALISM

  The term scientific socialism was used by Friedrich Engels to characterize the doctrines that he and Karl Marx developed and distinguish them from other socialist doctrines, which he dismissed as utopian socialism. Engels regarded the Marx-Engels doctrines as scientific in that they laid bare the secret of capitalism through the discovery of surplus value, and explained (with a theory known in the USSR as historical materialism) how capitalism would inevitably be overthrown and replaced by socialism. The concept “scientific socialism” made Marxist doctrines more attractive to many than rival socialist doctrines by suggesting that equality and the end of exploitation were not only desirable but also inevitable.

  Scientific socialism was introduced to Russia in the late ninenteenth century. After the Bolshevik victory in the civil war, scientific socialism became

  ENCYCLOPEDIA OF RUSSIAN HISTORY

  SCISSORS CRISIS

  part of the official ideology of the USSR. The term itself was frequently used loosely to designate a doctrine concerning the development of a Soviet type of society. Much of the actual content of the doctrine varied over time in accordance with the concrete policies of the Soviet state.

  Socialism as a comprehensive social system failed to spread to the advanced capitalist countries (although “pension fund socialism,” the growth of government welfare and regulatory programs, the expansion of employee rights, state-owned industries, public education, and universal suffrage, were widespread and important). This failure, along with other developments such as the collapse of the USSR, indicated that scientific socialism was an imperfect guide to the future. By the end of the twentieth century, the term was mainly of historical interest. See also: IDEALISM; MARXISM; SOCIALISM

  BIBLIOGRAPHY

  Engels, Frederick. (1880). Socialism: Utopian and Scientific. «http://csf.colorado.edu/psn/marx/Archive/ 1880-SUS». Lichtheim, George. (1962). Marxism. New York: Praeger.

  MICHAEL ELLMAN

  SCISSORS CRISIS

  The Scissors Crisis occurred in the Soviet Union during the New Economic Policy (NEP) era of the 1920s and refers to the movements, over time, of the relative prices of industrial and agricultural products. When the movements of relative prices are presented graphically, the observed patterns resemble the open blades of a pair of scissors; hence the term Scissors Crisis.

  The observed price movements in the Soviet Union during the 1920s can be explained by the relatively quicker recovery of the agricultural sector (the relative prices of agricultural products falling) vis-?-vis the apparently slower recovery of the industrial sector (the relative prices of industrial goods increasing). This recovery occurred after the collapse of the Soviet economy during the tumultuous era of war communism (1917-1921). Such a pattern of recovery following collapse is not unusual. Moreover, the observed changes in relative prices would be expected in a market economy

  ENCYCLOPEDIA OF RUSSIAN HISTORY

  where the degree of decline and the subsequent rate of recovery differ by sector of the economy.

  The underlying issues of the Scissors Crisis are important to the understanding of Soviet economic policy in the 1920s, especially the response of the Soviet state to these price changes. Soviet agriculture during the NEP was based largely on a private peasant economy. The development of modern agriculture was a major focus, cast within the framework of socialist economic thought. Although industry was recovering after war communism, it was hampered by substantial state ownership and the concentration of in
dustry in the form of trusts, allowing for the exercising of monopoly power. In light of Josef Stalin’s dramatic economic changes beginning in the late 1920s (full nationalization, collectivization of agriculture, and the replacement of markets by the administrative command system), the issues and discussions of the 1920s assume great importance in one’s understanding of Soviet economic history.

  First, if agriculture is a major component of total output in the economy, and agricultural output is to be both a source of food and a source of financing to promote the process of industrialization, the terms of agricultural production (amount, source, and means of distribution) have a major impact on the size and the distribution of the share dedicated to the financing of industrialization.

  Second, the nature of property rights and the organizational arrangements in the agricultural sector were both matters of contention during the Soviet pre-plan era. Specifically, during the 1920s, experimentation with different forms of cooperative farm organizations was intended to change production arrangements as well as state access to the agricultural product; these changes could limit or eliminate market forces.

  Third, Stalin argued, as a major justification for collectivization (beginning in 1929), that in fact the pace of industrialization would be limited by the ability of peasants under private property arrangements to withhold production in part to manipulate (increase) prices. According to Stalin, this would affect the terms of trade between the city and the countryside and thus reduce the pace at which industrialization could be pursued.

  Fourth, the policies chosen for addressing the Scissors Crisis form an important component of the assessment of the NEP economy of the 1920s. Specifically, it was argued that there was a significant element of monopoly in Soviet industry at

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  this time. State policy focused on this issue, threatening good intervention or the introduction of competing imports to force a reduction of industrial prices. In addition, threats were made to limit the access of industry to capital and thus change the behavior of the industrial sector.

  Although the behavior of agricultural and industrial prices in the Soviet Union during the 1920s can be explained by the underlying market forces of supply and demand, nevertheless within the context of events of the 1920s and subsequent behavior by Stalin, the events of the Scissors Crisis have assumed major importance for understanding the NEP period. Moreover, the issues involved are fundamental components of contemporary theorizing about the process of economic development. See also: NEW ECONOMIC POLICY

  BIBLIOGRAPHY

  Gregory, Paul R., and Stuart, Robert C. (2001). Russian and Soviet Economic Performance and Structure, 7th ed. New York: Addison Wesley Longman. Nove, Alec. (1982). An Economic History of the U.S.S.R. New York: Penguin. Sah, R. K., and Stiglitz, J. E. (1984). “The Economics of Price Scissors.” The American Economic Review 74(1): 125-138.

  ROBERT C. STUART

  SCYTHIANS

  The Scythians were a large confederation of Iranian-speaking (or headed by an Iranian-speaking military-political elite) tribal unions, known in classical sources since around the eighth century B.C.E. or about the time they migrated to the North Pontic steppe zone where they supplanted and apparently absorbed some of the Cimmerians who occupied the region. As with their predecessors, it is not clear from where the Scythians migrated, but their most likely homeland was Central Asia from where they moved under pressure of other nomadic peoples. Organized in supra-tribal confederations, the Scythians made raids and full-blown invasions from the northern Caucasus into Media and Assyria in northern Mesopotamia, reaching as far as Palestine and Egypt throughout the period of 670-610 B.C.E. After suffering major defeats towards the end of the seventh century, they transferred their locus of power to the North Pontic

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  region. By the third century B.C.E., the Scythians came under pressure of the nomadic Sarmatians who destroyed and absorbed most of them into their loosely-organized tribal structure.

  Nomadic in origins, the Scythian peoples and the “Scythian” culture also included agriculturalists and hunter-gatherers who paid tribute to their nomadic lords with grain and other goods that the nomads could not produce themselves. In turn, these items were traded with the Greek colonial cities of the northern Black Sea region for wine, precious metals, and other goods.

  While Scythia proper, as it was known in Greco-Roman sources, was located to the north of the Black Sea region (from the Danube to the lower Don and Volga), “Scythic” culture occupied a much greater territory of Eurasia, stretching as far east as southwestern Siberia and eastern Kazakhstan. Elements of this culture can be summarized as follows: the use of (1) iron; (2) short swords; (3) conservative artistic motifs (especially the animal style, e.g., the stag and the animal combat); (4) nomadic lifestyle organized around a patriarchal, little centralized social structure; (5) improved compound bows; (6) bronze cauldrons; (7) making of deer-stones; and, (8) complex horse harness. All of these components were shared across a huge area not only by Iranian-speakers, but also by Turkic and Mongolian nomads of steppelands of Inner Eurasia. See also: CENTRAL ASIA; CIMMERIANS; SARMATIANS

  BIBLIOGRAPHY

  Christian, David. (1998). A History of Russia, Central Asia and Mongolia Vol. 1: Inner Asia from Prehistory to the Mongol Empire. Oxford, UK/Malden, MA: Blackwell. Golden, Peter B. (1990). “The Peoples of the South Russian Steppe.” In The Cambridge History of Early Inner Asia. ed. Denis Sinor. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Talbot-Rice, Tamara (1957). The Scythians [Ancient Peoples and Places, vol. 2], ed. G. Daniel. London: Thames and Hudson.

  ROMAN K. KOVALEV

  SECOND ECONOMY

  The second economy of the USSR included economic activities that supplemented the command, or first, economy. As defined by Gregory GrossENCYCLOPEDIA OF RUSSIAN HISTORY

  SECOND ECONOMY

  man, the second economy consisted of all production and exchange undertaken directly for private gain, knowingly illegal in some substantial way, or both. This definition encompassed both legal and illegal activities, but most studies focus on the illegal part, also referred to as underground, unofficial, or shadow economy, or the black market.

  The legal second economy was made up mainly of private agriculture, small-scale construction services, extraction of precious metals, hunting of valuable wild animals, and certain professional services, such as those provided by physicians, dentists, and tutors.

  The illegal economy was significantly larger than the legal part of the second economy. Legal private activities often served as fronts for illegal ones. The most common illegal economic activity in the USSR was theft of state property. Presumably the second-most widespread illegal activity was the corruption that reached into the highest echelons of power; one purpose of corruption was to protect the functioning of the rest of the illegal economy. Another major illegal activity was speculation, defined as resale of goods by individuals for profit. Unlike theft from the state sector and corruption, which would be illegal anywhere, speculation was a crime only in socialist economies.

  Illegal production by individuals or by teams was also significant. Much of the illegal production for private purposes took place at state enterprises. Output was usually sold privately, but sometimes it was distributed through the official retail trade network. Private manufacturing without an official facade also existed.

  None of the major conditions giving rise to the existence of a large underground economy were unique to the USSR, but the way they came together in Soviet society was unusual and created a highly favorable environment for an illegal economy. These conditions included price controls on virtually all consumer goods, the prohibition of many private economic activities and high taxes on others, the ubiquity and poor protection of public property, the immense discretionary power of poorly paid bureaucrats, and social attitudes that tolerated theft of state property, corruption, and many other economic illegalities.

  While the Soviet se
cond economy was large, its magnitude, especially in the illegal sphere, is difficult to ascertain. One widely used way to estimate the extent of the second economy was based on interviewing emigrants from the USSR about their lives prior to emigration. Three major surveys were performed in Israel and the United States in the 1970s and 1980s. The Berkeley-Duke household budget survey, the only one focused explicitly on the second economy, implied that about 27 percent of urban household income in Russia in the late 1970s was derived from the second economy. The corresponding estimates from the other two surveys were about half that amount.

  Evaluating second economy dynamics is even more difficult. One methodology infers the growth of the second economy from comparisons of electricity consumption with the official Gross Domestic Product. This approach indicates that Russia’s second economy grew by more than 80 percent between 1979 and 1989.

  The rise of the second economy amounted to an implicit market reform within the Soviet system, but it also facilitated or even compelled the partial reforms of perestroika, which expanded the scope of the legal second economy. Nonetheless, the illegal and quasi-legal economy also mushroomed, undermining central planning and leading to the economic transition to markets starting in 1992. During the transition, the notion of a second economy was restricted to illegal activities, the growth of which continued throughout the 1990s. The reasons for this growth included persistent excessive regulation of the economy, high statutory tax rates, weakening of official institutions and their inability to protect property rights protection and enforce contracts, lack of credibility of government reform policies, and continued corruption. The illegal second economy may have benefited from the emergence of the mafia, which taxes underground firms but also provides property rights protection for its victim/clients.