At the end of December 1929, Joseph Stalin announced that the kulaks should be eradicated as a class. We know the story of Pavlik Morozov's father and other cases of "dispossession", but how did the "kulak" differ from its neighbor?
Up to the seventh sweat
The peasant consciousness was based on a simple concept: you can only earn good by honest labor. And not just any work, but physically very hard. It was precisely this kind of work that included work on the ground: plowing, haymaking, harvesting. But the trade, in the conviction of the peasants, was not entirely honest labor, it is not for nothing that the people said “if you won’t cheat, you won’t sell”. The nickname "kulak" was received by those peasants who, in the opinion of the majority, had unearned income, that is, they had acquired wealth through buying and usury. By the way, ofeni also called the usurers-dealers kulaks.
Strong master
A little later, fists began to call the grasping and cunning people whom God rewarded with a cold and calculating mind. Perhaps these people were not very pleasant, but they were not absolute scoundrels either - that's for sure. Many of them worked on their land no less, and, at times, more than hired workers. And the work on the fist allowed some farm laborers to simply survive.
The reasons for poverty could be different: bad luck, illness, debts, but in any case, it was an abyss from which it was almost impossible to get out. And also a sharp mind and business acumen helped the kulaks to adapt to the new rules of the game, which were proposed, for example, by the NEP. They said about such people: "Strong master!"
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The community life, "with the whole world" instilled in the peasants confidence in the future. Fellow villagers will not leave, if any trouble happens, relying on the general sense of collectivism: today I am for you, tomorrow you are for me. Those who tried to disrupt the usual order were called "kulaks" or "eaters". Vladimir Dal points to several meanings of the word "world eater": it is "a parasite, staggering around, living at the expense of the world, society", then it is a "hustler-rascal, intercessor for peace, robbing peasants and constantly inciting them to various litigations."
Public Enemies
Another "destroyer" of the order established in the countryside was the Bolsheviks. The food appropriation system and the "struggle for bread" were supposed to solve not only the food problem, but also to destroy the old ties and foundations - to fulfill the propaganda, "educational" task. Kulaks, middle peasants and poor peasants were divided into two categories by the decree on the destruction of estates and civil officials in 1917: those who had rights, and the disenfranchised (the latter, by the way, were completely deprived of their civil rights). The disenfranchised category included those who resorted to hired labor for profit, including peasants who hired at least one person.
Decide
The local Bolsheviks and their main "assistant" - the poor - evaluated the "kulak" in a more practical way: anyone who hides bread. Lenin's words served as a message to form such an assessment. The leader "turned" into a kulak, exploiter and speculator "every peasant who hides bread", even if collected by his own labor, without the use of hired labor. At the same time, Lenin himself later, trying to separate the kulak from the middle peasant, first writes that the middle peasant is not an exploiter, but a peasant who lives by his own labor, and then allows both the exploitation of labor power and the accumulation of capital. Not surprisingly, on the ground, the performers were “at a loss” and “diligently” tried not to miss.
Unreliable
Under the conditions of the NEP, every "rich man" turns into a kulak. The concept of "owner-farmer" does not take root; wealthy peasants continue to be called kulaks. The poor are finally getting an advantage: they are exempted from the tax in kind, they receive privileges when entering an educational institution or work, they have more chances to join the Komsomol or a party, to be elected to leadership positions in village councils. As contemporaries noted, “today it is not profitable to go into the wealthy. Everyone crawls into the poor. " Perfectly aware of their position, the well-to-do peasants tried with all their might to protect themselves from the "label" of the kulak, which confidently informed everyone about the unreliability of its owner.
Let's destroy the fist as a class
In 1924, the newspaper "Bednota" conducted a poll in which it was proposed to determine the criteria for identifying a kulak. The problem was that many of the former kulaks lost their fortune, while the poor, on the contrary, became relatively wealthy. As a result, the respondents, with a general negative attitude towards the kulaks, agreed that a dispossessed kulak is more dangerous for the revolution than a bourgeois who has made good and is using it now. The kulaks did not manage to escape the "popular dislike".
In 1929, signs of kulak farms were formulated: the systematic use of a little labor, the presence of a mill (oil mill, drying, etc.), the leasing of agricultural machinery (with a mechanical engine) and premises, as well as trade, usury, intermediation, the presence of unearned income (here was about the clergy).
In the course of collectivization, carried out in 1928-1930, a course was taken to "liquidate the kulaks as a class." Without trial or investigation, prosperous peasants using hired labor were dispossessed, deprived of land, property and all civil rights, and then either evicted to remote regions or shot.