“Learning to Lead our Lives”

The impact of war Communism and the NEP

Skill: Problem Solving

NGfL: Russia 1900-1924

 The Impact of War
Communism and the New
Economic Policy.
Skill: Problem Solving
 The famine affected
both the countryside and the
cities. There were reports of
cannibalism in some
What do
districts. This was written
you think
1922
"Sometimes mothers and
is
fathers feed their children
human meat as a last resort.
happening
Sometimes a starving family
eats the body of one of its
in this
junior members.
Sometimes parents at night
picture?
seize part of a body from a
cemetery and feed it to their
children”.

Photograph used with the kind permission of the David King Collection, London
What does this tell you about the
conditions in Russia at this time?
Consequences Sailors protested about
their living conditions
of War and how the Agricultural
Communism. Communists did not Collapse –
appear to have any 5 million die of
regard for ordinary starvation
people. Lenin called this
‘a lightning flash that
lit up reality’
Currency
collapse:
Payment in
Cities in chaos: food and fuel
*orphaned children
*burglary
Problems Getting
with people on
Industry your side
Imagine that you are an
advisor to Lenin. You have
to try to find solutions to
these three BIG problems.
What do you suggest?

Problems
with
Farming
 Lenin’s answer –
The New Economic
•Stopped the
Policy •Small
Practice of factories
requisitioning (those
food employing
less than 20
•Peasants now workers) were
had to supply privatised.
amount of what
they grew to the •However, all
government important
New Rouble was introduced industries,
•Any extra they to end inflation. such as coal
were allowed to and steel
Programme of electrification
keep or even sell remained
continued and extended to
for profit! rural areas. nationalised
Do you think the New Economic policy was a good idea?

Lenin called the

NEP
‘ONE STEP
FORWARD TWO
STEPS BACK’

Picture reproduced with the kind permission of the David King Collection, London

Would People in Russia like to see

images such as this?
An American journalist describes the economic conditions in
Moscow in 1921.

'One morning at the top of my street I saw a man sitting on a

sidewalk selling some food packets given by a famine-relief
agency. By mid November he had rented a tiny store across
the street, handling milk, vegetables, chickens and the
freshest eggs and apples. By the following May he had four
salesmen in a fair-sized store, to which the peasants brought
their produce fresh each morning.'
 Imagine that you are a
reporter investigating
Russian responses to
the NEP. Write a
‘sound bite’ for each of
the characters below.

A Russian A communist A Private An

Peasant party member trader Industrialist
 WJEC EXAM PRACTICE
SECTION B

A. Describe the events at Kronstadt in 1921.

[2]
B. Explain why there was such serious famine
in Russia in 1921. [4]
C. How successful was the New Economic
Policy? [5]