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The Wonderful Quality of Life for Families in the Soviet Union

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The view of the Soviet family equally the basic social unit in society evolved from revolutionary to conservative; the government of the Soviet Union start attempted to weaken the family and and so to strengthen it.

According to the 1968 law "Principles of Legislation on Marriage and the Family unit of the USSR and the Union Republics", parents are "to raise their children in the spirit of the Moral Code of the Builder of Communism, to attend to their physical development and their instruction in and preparation for socially useful activity".

Bolshevik woman in the Soviet household [edit]

Soviet women'southward periodical founded in 1914 that featured relatively liberal content

The function of the Bolshevik adult female has been of much controversy, particularly at the get-go of the post-revolutionary Russian era. Prior to this revolution, the role of the Bolshevik adult female was to tend to the household. Making sure the children were brought up in the traditional Soviet manner of life was of utmost importance in the household of the boilerplate Bolshevik. The boilerplate woman would prepare a meal that consisted of bread, vegetables and broth; and for wealthier families cheese, and a source of poly peptide. In Bolshevik folklore the mother had the influential function of raising the children in the household; specifically about the household, values and the culture that would exist represented amid family members. The success and the rise of the Bolshevik regime, and the downfall of Tsar Nicholas Two and essentially his unabridged family unit, would afterwards leave a unique opportunity for the women of Russia. The Revolutionary War, and the large number of soldiers necessary to have an adequate defense left a void in the industrial sectors of the workforce, and that void was filled with hundreds of thousands of women, who had to assume the function left absent, by soldier fathers. As a platform Bolshevism advocated for the evolution of traditional gender roles; instead offer opportunities for women inside of the party when the Department for Work Among Women was created in 1919. Despite this potent push for change by the Zhenotdel, the immensely patriarchal society that had existed for hundreds of years prior, would supersede these efforts.[1]

The feminist motion was seen by the bulk peasant and workforce population every bit bourgeois, and therefore represented something opposite of the Bolshevik idea. The emphasis on the immediate household equally priority was pertinent, particularly to the 1930s era of Soviet Russia. Since the Paleolithic era of Russian federation, there has been a fascination with the immortalization, of the mother figure. "The Motherland Calls", statute spoke up well-nigh the unrealistic expectations that the Soviet Union had on their female person mothers. Motherhood, they posited, was not some divine consciousness, but instead something inherently learned equally a result of being a woman. Some argued that the traditional office of the mother should be challenged, and that information technology was non like it had been in years passed. In many instances the domestic work was piled onto the female caput of the house, despite promotion of equality between genders. This left in unequal workload on the adult female, who would as well take a chore outside of the home to help provide in a specially difficult economy where food and adequate housing was oftentimes scarce. All the same, despite this argument, the role of the Bolshevik woman remained static. Stalin himself held both men and women to the same standard, with equal harshness doled out to both sexes. In the 1960s, it was expected of the Russian woman to fall in line with the patriarchal leadership of her husband. [2]

Some other heavily relied on role that women held in the Soviet household was that of the Grandmother. In many cases, she would practise all the housework and raise the children. This was because the parents were ordinarily too busy working to do either of these. This ended up hurting the installment of Soviet values into the minds of the youth, every bit the Grandmother would unremarkably teach her grandchildren more traditional values. [iii]

Bolshevik vision of the family [edit]

Marxist theory on family established the revolutionary ideal for the Soviet state and influenced country policy concerning family in varying degrees throughout the history of the country. The principals are: The nuclear family unit of measurement is an economic arrangement structured to maintain the ideological functions of Commercialism. The family unit perpetuates course inequality through the transfer of individual belongings through inheritance. Post-obit the abolition of private property, the bourgeois family unit will cease to be and the union of individuals will become a "purely private affair". The Soviet state'due south first code on marriage and family was written in 1918 and enacted a series of trans-formative laws designed to bring the Soviet family closer in line with Marxist theory.[iv] [1]

1918 Code on Union, the Family and Guardianship [edit]

One year later on the Bolsheviks took ability, they ratified the 1918 Code on Marriage, the Family and Guardianship. The revolutionary jurists, led past Alexander Goikhbarg, adhered to the revolutionary principals of Marx, Engels, and Lenin when drafting the codes. Goikhbarg considered the nuclear family unit to exist a necessary but transitive social arrangement that would quickly be phased out by the growing communal resources of the land and would eventually "wither away". The jurists intended for the code to provide a temporary legal framework to maintain protections for women and children until a organisation of total communal support could be established.[1]

The 1918 code also served to recognize the legal rights of the individual at the expense of the existing tsarist/patriarchal organization of family and marriage. This was accomplished by allowing hands obtainable "no-grounds" divorces. Information technology abolished "illegitimacy" of nascency as a legal concept and entitled all children to parental support. It abolished the adoption of orphans (orphans would be cared for by the state to avert exploitation). A married couple could take either surname. Individual property would be retained in the event of divorce. An unlimited term of alimony could be awarded to either spouse, but upon separation each party was expected to care for themselves. Women were to be recognized as equal under the police; Prior to 1914, women were not allowed to earn a wage, seek education, or exchange property without the consent of their husband.[1] [5]

Family Code of 1926 [edit]

The 1918 code accomplished many of the goals that the jurists had sought to set into motility, but the social disruption left in the wake of Globe War I exposed the inadequacies of the code to alleviate social problems. The 1926 code would revive a more than conservative definition of the family in a legal sense. "The 1918 code had been motivated by a desire to lead society forward to new social relationships in line with socialist idea on matrimony and family, the 1926 code attempted to solve immediate problems, in particular to ensure the fiscal well-being".[5] The hotly debated social concerns included: the unmanageable number of orphans, the unemployment of women, the lack of protection after divorce, mutual belongings and divorce, and the obligations of unmarried, cohabitating partners.

In 1921 alone, seven 1000000 orphans were displaced, roaming town and countryside.[6] Regime agencies just did non have the resource to care for the children. An adopted kid could be cared for past a family at nigh no cost to the state. The 1926 code would reinstate adoption as a solution for child homelessness.

In 1921 New Economic Policy (NEP), brought about a limited restoration of private enterprise and free markets. It also brought an end to labor conscription. The result was a spike in female person unemployment as "War Communism" came to an stop and NEP emerged.[2] Hundreds of thousands of unemployed women did not have registered marriages and were left with no means of back up or protections following a divorce under the 1918 code. The 1926 code would make unregistered marriages legal in order to safeguard women past extending alimony to unregistered, de facto wives, the purpose being that more women would be cared for in times of widespread unemployment.

Nether the 1918 code, in that location was no division of property in the event of a divorce. Wedlock was not to be an economic partnership and each party was entitled to individual property. This meant that women who ran the household and cared for the children would non be entitled to any material share of what the "provider" had brought to the matrimony. In another bourgeois move, the 1926 lawmaking would require an equal division of holding acquired during a marriage. All property acquired during the course of a marriage would become "common".[2] With intentions similar to the legal recognition of de facto marriages, this new property police force was a response to the lack of protections offered to women in the outcome of divorce.[7]

Additionally the code would do away with the 1918 concept of "collective paternity" where multiple men could be assigned to pay alimony if the father of a child could non be adamant. According to the 1926 lawmaking, paternity could be assigned by a judge. It too enlarged family obligations by expanding alimony obligations to include children, parents, siblings and grandparents. Alimony would besides have set time limits.[v] The 1926 code would signal a retreat from many policies that served to weaken the family in 1918. The jurists were non pursuing an ideological maneuver away from socialism, rather than taking more "temporary" measures to ensure the well-existence of women and children since communal intendance had yet to materialize.[v]

Family Lawmaking of 1936 [edit]

Unlike earlier codes that bundled for temporary and transitive laws as a step toward the revolutionary vision of family; the Lawmaking of 1936 marked an ideological shift abroad from Marxist / revolutionary visions of the nuclear family.[eight] Congruent with the rise of Stalinism, the constabulary demanded the stabilizing and strengthening of the family. "The "withering-away" doctrine, one time key to socialist understand of the family, law, and the state, was anathematized."[1]

The 1936 code emerged forth with an eruption of pro-family propaganda.[8] For the first time, the code put restrictions on abortion and imposed fines and jail time for whatever that received or performed the service. The code besides enacted a bevy of laws aimed to encourage pregnancy and child birth. Insurance stipends, pregnancy leave, job security, light duty, kid intendance services and payments for large families. In another desperate motility, the code made it more difficult to obtain a divorce. Under the code, both parties would demand to exist nowadays for a divorce and pay a fine. There could be harsh penalties for those who failed to pay alimony and child-support payments.[i]

"Our demands grow twenty-four hours to day. We need fighters, they build this life. Nosotros need people."[ane] The wider campaign to encourage the family unit of measurement elevated motherhood to a form of Stakhanovite labor. During this fourth dimension, maternity was celebrated as patriotic and the joys of children and family were extolled by the country'due south leaders.

Family Edict of 1944 [edit]

The Family Edict of 1944 would be a continuation of the conservative trending of the 1936 code. Citing the heavy manpower losses and social disruption post-obit World State of war II, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet enacted laws that would farther encourage marriage and childbirth.

The 1944 Edict offered greater state-sponsored benefits to mothers, including: Extended maternity leave, increased family allowances even to unmarried mothers, promises of burgeoning kid care services, targeted labor protections, and nearly notably, country recognition and the honorary title "Mother Heroine" for mothers who could produce large families.[9]

The edict also sought to preserve the family unit by making divorces even more difficult to obtain. Fines were increased and the parties were often ordered to endeavor reconciliation. Divorce also became a public matter. Divorcees were required to appear in public court and their intent was published in the local newspaper.[10]

Evolution of the Soviet family [edit]

The early Soviet land sought to remake the family unit, assertive that although the economic emancipation of workers would deprive families of their economic role, information technology would not destroy the institution but rather base of operations family relations exclusively on common affection. The Bolsheviks replaced religious marriage with civil marriage, divorce became easy to obtain, and unwed mothers received special protection. All children, whether legitimate or illegitimate, had equal rights before the constabulary, women gained sexual equality nether matrimonial police force, inheritance of property was abolished, and abortion was legalized.[11]

In the early 1920s, however, the weakening of family ties, combined with the devastation and dislocation caused by the Russian Civil War (1918–21), resulted in nearly 7 million homeless children. This state of affairs prompted senior Bolshevik Party officials to conclude that the State needed a more than stable family life to rebuild the country's economy and shattered social construction. Past 1922 the government allowed some forms of inheritance, and after 1926 total inheritance rights were restored. By the late 1920s, adults had been made more responsible for the intendance of their children, and common-law marriage had been given equal legal status with civil spousal relationship.[xi]

During Joseph Stalin's rule (late 1920s to 1953), the trend toward strengthening the family continued. In 1936 the government began to accolade payments to women with big families, banned abortions, and made divorces more difficult to obtain. In 1942 it subjected single persons and childless married persons to boosted taxes. In 1944 only registered marriages were recognized to be legal, and divorce became subject to courtroom discretion. In the same year the regime began to honor medals to women who gave birth to v or more children and took upon itself the back up of illegitimate children.[11]

Subsequently Stalin'due south death in 1953, the government moved in a more than revisionist direction and rescinded some of its natalist legislation. In 1955 it declared abortions for medical reasons legal, and in 1968 information technology declared all abortions legal, following Western European policy. The country as well liberalized divorce procedures in the mid-1960s, but in 1968 introduced new limitations.[eleven]

In 1974 the government began to subsidize poorer families whose average per-capita income did non exceed 50 rubles per calendar month (later raised to 75 rubles per calendar month in some northern and eastern regions). The subsidy amounted to 12 rubles per calendar month for each child below 8 years of historic period. It was estimated[ by whom? ] that in 1974 about iii.5 one thousand thousand families (xiv one thousand thousand people, or about five% of the entire population) received this subsidy. With the increase in per-capita income, all the same, the number of children requiring such aid decreased. In 1985 the regime raised the age limit for assistance to twelve years and nether. In 1981 the subsidy to an unwed mother with a child increased to 20 rubles per month; in early 1987 an estimated ane.five one thousand thousand unwed mothers were receiving such assist, or twice equally many as during the tardily 1970s.[11]

Family size [edit]

Family size and composition depended mainly on the place of residence—urban or rural—and indigenous group. The size and limerick of such families was also influenced past housing and income limitations, pensions, and female person employment exterior the domicile. The typical urban family consisted of a married couple, two children, and, in about 20% of the cases, ane of the grandmothers, whose assistance in raising the children and in housekeeping was important in the large majority of families having two wage earners. Rural families generally had more children than urban families and frequently supported three generations under i roof. Families in Fundamental Asia and the Caucasus tended to take more than children than families elsewhere in the Soviet Union and included grandparents in the family structure. In general, the average family size followed that of other industrialized countries, with college income families having both fewer children and a lower rate of baby bloodshed. From the early 1960s to the late 1980s, the number of families with more than one kid decreased by nigh 50% and in 1988 totaled ane.ix million. About 75% of the families with more than i child lived in the southern regions of the country, half of them in Central Asia. In the Russian, Ukrainian, Belarusan, Moldovian, Estonian, Latvian, and Lithuanian republics, families with i and two children constituted more than than ninety% of all families, whereas in Fundamental Asia those with 3 or more than children ranged from xiv% in the Kyrgyz Republic to 31% in the Tajik. Surveys suggested that most parents would have had more children if they had had more living space.[11]

Offset in the mid-1980s, the government promoted family planning in club to wearisome the growth of the Central Asian indigenous populations. Local opposition to this policy surfaced especially in the Uzbek and Tajik republics. In general, however, the government continued publicly to honor mothers of large families. Women received the Motherhood Medal, 2d Class, for their fifth alive birth and the Female parent Heroine medal for their 10th. Most of these awards went to women in Central Asia and the Caucasus.[11]

Reproduction and family planning [edit]

The primary form of contraception practiced in the early on USSR was coitus interruptus. Scarcity of rubber made condoms and diaphragms unavailable, and contraception was rarely discussed by political figures.[i]

The U.S.Due south.R. was the showtime state in the earth to legalize abortion. For many years prior to the October Revolution, ballgame was not uncommon in Russia, although it was illegal and carried a possible sentence of hard labor or exile.[12] After the revolution, dearth and poor economic conditions led to an increase in the number of "back aisle" abortions, and after pressure from doctors and jurists, the Commissariats of Health and Justice legalized abortion in 1920. Abortions were free for all women, although they were seen as a necessary evil due to economic hardship rather than a woman's correct to command her ain reproductive system.[xiii]

Through the 1930s, a ascent number of abortions coupled with a falling birthrate alarmed Soviet officials, with a recorded 400,000 abortions taking place in 1926 lone.[12] In 1936 the Soviet Central Executive Commission made ballgame illegal in one case once again. This, forth with stipends granted to contempo mothers and bonuses given for women who bore many children, was office of an effort to combat the falling birthrate.[1]

Family and kinship structures [edit]

The extended family was more prevalent in Fundamental Asia and the Caucasus than in the other sections of the state and, generally, in rural areas more than in urban areas. Deference to parental wishes regarding marriage was specially strong in these areas, even amidst the Russians residing there.[xi]

Extended families helped perpetuate traditional life-styles. The patriarchal values that accompany this life-fashion affected such issues as contraception, the distribution of family power, and the roles of individuals in union and the family. For example, traditional Uzbeks placed a college value on their responsibilities as parents than on their own happiness as spouses and individuals. The younger and amend educated Uzbeks and working women, however, were more likely to behave and think similar their counterparts in the European areas of the Soviet Union, who tended to emphasize private careers.[11]

Extended families were not prevalent in the cities. Couples lived with parents during the first years of marriage but because of economics or the housing shortage. When children were born, the couple normally acquired a divide apartment.[11]

Office of the family [edit]

The government causeless many functions of the pre-Soviet family. Various public institutions, for example, took responsibility for supporting individuals during times of sickness, incapacity, erstwhile age, maternity, and industrial injury. State-run nurseries, preschools, schools, clubs, and youth organizations took over a great part of the family unit'south role in socializing children. Their office in socialization was limited, however, because preschools had places for only one-half of all Soviet children under vii. Despite authorities assumption of many responsibilities, spouses were withal responsible for the cloth support of each other, small children, and disabled adult children.[11]

The transformation of the patriarchal, three-generation rural household to a mod, urban family of ii adults and 2 children attests to the great changes that Soviet society had undergone since 1917. That transformation did non produce the originally envisioned egalitarianism, but it has forever changed the nature of what was once the Russian Empire.[11]

Diet and diet of the Soviet family [edit]

The history of the Soviet Union diet prior to World State of war 2 encompasses unlike periods that have varying influences on food product and availability. Periods of low crop yields, and restrictive distribution of food in the early 1920s, and again in the early 1930s brought almost great famine and suffering in the Soviet Spousal relationship.[xiv] Farming was i of the chief efforts for food production, and was at the middle of evolution in support of Soviet communism. When crops failed or suffered from low yields, Soviet peasants suffered profoundly from malnutrition. The traditional types of food plant in the Soviet Union were made up of diverse grains for breads and pastries, dairy products such equally cheese and yogurt, and various meats such as pork, fish, beef and chicken.[15] Past 1940, certain products such as vegetables, meat and grains were less abundant than other forms of nutrient due to the strain on resources and poor ingather yields. Bread and potatoes were very important staples for Soviet families, both in cities and in the countryside.[xvi] Potatoes were easily grown and harvested in many different environments, and were usually reliable equally a food source. Malnutrition was a prominent cistron in poor wellness weather condition and private growth during this period in the Soviet Union.[17] Much similar the Western tradition of iii main meals a 24-hour interval, the Soviet meals consisted of breakfast (zavtrak), lunch (obed), and dinner (uzhin). Soups and broths made of meats and vegetables when available, were mutual meals for the Soviet peasant family.

See as well [edit]

  • Demographics of the Soviet Matrimony
  • New Economic Policy
  • New Soviet human being
  • Order of Maternal Glory
  • Orphans in the Soviet Marriage
  • Tax on childlessness

References [edit]

Citations [edit]

  1. ^ a b c d e f thousand h i Z., Goldman, Wendy (1993). Women, the country, and revolution : Soviet family policy and social life, 1917-1936. Cambridge: Cambridge Academy Press. ISBN9780521458160. OCLC 27434899.
  2. ^ a b c Women in Russia . Atkinson, Dorothy, 1929-2016., Dallin, Alexander, 1924-2000., Lapidus, Gail Warshofsky. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Printing. 1977. ISBN0804709106. OCLC 3559925. {{cite volume}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
  3. ^ Stalinist Guild, Chapter: Family Values, Mark Edele
  4. ^ Marx, Karl (2012). The Communist manifesto. Engels, Friedrich, 1820-1895,, Isaac, Jeffrey C., 1957-, Lukes, Steven. New Oasis: Yale University Printing. ISBN9780300163209. OCLC 794670865.
  5. ^ a b c d Quigley, John (1979-01-01). "The 1926 Soviet Family unit Code: Retreat from Complimentary Love". The Soviet and Post-Soviet Review. 6 (i): 166–174. doi:10.1163/187633279x00103. ISSN 1876-3324.
  6. ^ Goldman, Wendy (1984-11-01). "FREEDOM AND ITS CONSEQUENCES: THE Contend ON THE SOVIET FAMILY CODE OF 1926". Russian History. 11 (4): 362–388. doi:10.1163/18763316-i0000023. ISSN 1876-3316.
  7. ^ Warshofsky., Lapidus, Gail (1978). Women in Soviet society : equality, development, and social change. Berkeley: Academy of California Press. ISBN0520028686. OCLC 4040532.
  8. ^ a b Cultural revolution in Russia, 1928-1931 . Fitzpatrick, Sheila., American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies. Inquiry and Development Committee., Columbia University. Russian Found. Bloomington: Indiana Academy Press. 1978. ISBN0253315913. OCLC 3071564. {{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
  9. ^ "Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union of July 8, 1944". Retrieved 2018-04-22 .
  10. ^ Field, Deborah A. (1998-10-01). "Irreconcilable Differences: Divorce and Conceptions of Private Life in the Krushchev Era". Russian Review. 57 (iv): 599–613. doi:10.1111/0036-0341.00047. ISSN 1467-9434.
  11. ^ a b c d e f chiliad h i j k l Text used in this cited section originally came from: Soviet Wedlock State Study from the Library of Congress Country Studies project.
  12. ^ a b Avdeev, Blum, Troitskaya, Alexandre, Alain, Irina (1995). "The History of Abortion Statistics in Russian federation and the USSR from 1900 to 1991". Population: An English language Selection. 7: 39–66. JSTOR 2949057. {{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  13. ^ Kiaer, Naiman, Christina, Eric (2006). Everyday Life in Early Soviet Russia: Taking the Revolution Inside. 601 North Morton Street, Bloomington, IN, United states: Indiana University Printing. pp. 61–70. {{cite volume}}: CS1 maint: location (link)
  14. ^ Dando, William (1994). "Harvard Ukrainian Studies". Harvard Ukrainian Studies. 18 (3–4): 396–397.
  15. ^ Romero, Gwynn (1997). "Dietary Practices of Refugees from the Old Soviet Union". Nutrition Today. 32 (4): 2–three.
  16. ^ Zubkova, Elena (2004-03-01). "The Soviet Regime and Soviet Lodge in the Postwar Years: Innovations and Conservatism, 1945–1953". Journal of Modern European History. ii (1): 134–152. doi:x.17104/1611-8944_2004_1_134. ISSN 1611-8944 – via SAGE Publishing.
  17. ^ Brainerd, Elizabeth (2010). "Reassessing the Standard of Living in the Soviet Union" (PDF). The Periodical of Economic History. seventy (one): 83–117. doi:x.1017/S0022050710000069. hdl:2027.42/40198.

Notes [edit]

  • Public Domain This commodity incorporates public domain cloth from the Library of Congress Country Studies website http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/.

Bibliography [edit]

  • Clements, B., & Lanning, R. (1999). Bolshevik women. Science and Lodge, 63(1), 127–129.
  • Wieczynski, J. (1998). Bolshevik Women. History: Reviews of New Books, 26(4), 191–192.
  • Marx G, Engels F, Isaac J, Lukes S. The Communist Manifesto. New Haven: Yale University Printing; 2012.
  • Goldman Due west. Women, The State, And Revolution. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 2004.
  • Quigley J. The 1926 Soviet Family Code: Retreat from Free Honey. The Soviet and Post-Soviet Review. 1979;half-dozen(1):166–174. doi:10.1163/187633279x00103.
  • Mccauley, Martin. Stalin and Stalinism: Revised 3rd Edition (Seminar Studies) (Kindle Locations 2475–2479). Taylor and Francis. Kindle Edition.
  • Nakachi, Mie. (2021). Replacing the Dead: The Politics of Reproduction in the Postwar Soviet Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

The Wonderful Quality of Life for Families in the Soviet Union

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Family_in_the_Soviet_Union

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