Brezhnev's Economic Policy

We have already covered agricultural and social policy under Brezhnev, now we shall look at his other economic policy and industrial reform. This ties nicely into his doctrine of Developed Socialism as well.

Brezhnev’s Economic Policy

Following his death in 1982, people criticised Brezhnev for leading a regime of complacency and mismanagement, allowing the economy to stagnate, some claiming this even made collapse inevitable.

However, he did not invent the flaws that already existed in the Stalinist command model:

·         Poor quality goods

·         Neglect of industries

-          Agriculture

-          Consumer

·         Excess of waste

·         Reluctance to innovate new technology or methods of economic administration

Despite such faults, this economy had succeeded in helping the USSR recover from the GPW, making it hard to criticise.

Furthermore, Khrushchev’s dismissal reminded Brezhnev of the danger of tinkering economic reform without immediate positive results.

Although there was not a complete ban on reform, the regime hoped to address defects within a state-controlled and directed economy.

Kosygin Reforms

Kosygin was a reactionary whose reform was introduced in 1965, which tried to:

·         Encourage innovation and responsibility

-          Gave enterprise managers more incentives and independence

·         Encourage taking costs and profits into account

-          Asked managers to set sales targets

-          Reduce red tape by cutting number of plan indicators

This tinkering wasn’t effective because the dead weight of the centrally-planned economy remained.

·         Inevitable clashes/compromises between the managers prepared to innovate and conservative bureaucrats whose responsibility was to ensure targets were met

·         Many administrators/managers unenthusiastic or afraid to innovate

-          Managers didn’t want to halt production for technological changes to be introduced if they were penalised for failing to meet a short-term target

-          Work bonuses still linked to fulfilment of targets based on quantity, not quality

-          Consumer wishes still low on list of priorities

·         Central authorities refused to give up power

·         Prices decided centrally & bore no relation to relevant indicators (costs and profits, demand or need)

-          No incentive for enterprises to reduce costs

-          Prices for coal arbitrarily set too low, this and similar industries operating at a loss

-          Oil and gas more profitable

-          Light industry generally ran at a loss

·         Poorly-performing enterprises rarely penalised.

-          Workers weren’t sacked, had little incentive to work hard

-          Employers often kept more workers on their books than they could use, if they were needed in the future

-          “We pretend to work and they pretend to pay us.”

-          Attempts to reduce employees or boost productivity might result in enterprise being set higher targets

Kosygin’s reforms were abandoned in 1970, but it wasn’t just his ideas that didn’t take root:

·         Idea of enterprises being able to set own plans and negotiate them with Gosplan

·         Evsey Liberman – advocated decentralised planning and taking profit motive into account and laws of supply and demand

Such ideas were treated as heresy and too radical for the 1960s, but came into fashion under Gorbachev.

Industrial Reform and Developed Socialism

While Khrushchev had made grossly exaggerated claims that the Soviet economy was overtaking the West and that the USSR would have reached Communism by 1980, Brezhnev proclaimed his doctrine of “Developed Socialism” in 1977. This said:

·         It was not yet possible to launch “the direct transition to Communism”

·         This was despite the fact that the Soviet economy rested “on a powerful, advanced industry” and on “a large-scale, highly mechanised agriculture”

·         There had been “the gradual obliteration of any essential distinctions between town and country, between mental and physical labour, and adoption by all working people of the ideological and political positions of the working class”

Brezhnev didn’t feel a need to advocate major industrial reform, but in any case there were limits on what reform could be discussed.

1972 – the regime accepted the concept of a 15-year programme with specific scientific and technological goals, linked to economic progress

But despite increasing recognition that old Five Year Plans were a blunt instrument in developing an advanced economy, Gosplan wouldn’t acknowledge a rival planning agency. Furthermore, there was the official refusal to accept the possibility of an economy based on market forces rather than goals determined by the State.

Economic Progress? (No, obviously)

The indications of industrial and technological advance weren’t more promising.

1964 – Oil discovered in western Siberia with huge deposits of other mineral resources. The issue was accessing this inhospitable area, BUT

By 1983 – 357 million tonnes of oil had been extracted = 60% of annual Soviet oil production

10^th & 11^th Five Year Plans (1976-80 & 1981-85) put high priority on developing vast reserves of gas and coal

1974-1984 – 30 billion roubles spent on over 3000km of Baikal Amur Railway (BAM) to exploit reserves + 3500-mile pipeline built to Siberia to carry gas west.

Investment in southern & Asian regions of USSR (Turkestan) – no account taken of environmental concerns!

E.g. diversion of rivers through irrigation systems led to drying up of Aral Sea.

Continued disparity between rates of growth in Republics. Russian Federation invested less per head of population than most other Republics.

Scientific progress confined to defence & space industries, deemed necessary by defence and political establishment but a great drain on resources.

·         Civilian sectors (computer technology) largely neglected

·         Basic technology (typewriters, computers, photocopying) regarded with suspicion as they threatened State’s control over spread of information

Targets set by 9^th five year plan not met, including consumer goods that were supposed to overtake industrial output. Insufficient resources were diverted from other projects.

Meanwhile the 10^th and 11^th plans recognised the problems and reduced emphasis on productive capacity, rather on efficiency and quality.

BUT – GNP continued to decline (growth at its lowest in early 1980s), the economy was suffering the same issues as under Khrushchev, but were intensified.

-          Production costs rose without increases in output or efficiency

-          Ministries continued tinkering but never considered major restructuring – couldn’t move economy away from Stalinist model under which they had grown up

-          1979 – Deputy PM Kirillin called for radical industrial restructuring to avert economic crisis, he was immediately sacked and copies of the speech were suppressed

To summarise this section, nothing changes economically after Kosygin is abandoned, and because of the inconsistency and ideological paradoxes Brezhnev’s policies became, the economy stagnates and nothing is done to stop this. Boring? Yes, but necessary for your exam if Brezhnev comes up? Absolutely (unfortunately)

Historiography

I've collected some historiography for the entire course that has been organised in chronological order of leaderships, enjoy.

Stalin

Great Patriotic War

HARRISON: “If WWII was a test then the Soviet economy passed it.”

DAVIES: “The armaments industry of the 1930s was by far the most outstanding success of the Soviet pre-war economy”

OVERY: “The pre-war experience of economic planning and mobilisation helped the regime run a war economy on an emergency basis.”

PEARSON: “Stalin’s first, most fatal error was not to allow his troops to mobilise in time before impending Nazi disaster.”

DOCKRILL: [Stalingrad] “the beginning of the end for Germany”

NAGORSKI: [Kursk] “the turning point of WWII”

PEARSON: “Stalin played a pivotal role in every aspect of the war effort.”

OVERY: “The war effort was not the product of one man.”

ZHUKOV: “The USSR couldn’t have won the war without foreign aid.”

LAVER: “Stalin believed too strongly in the invincibility of the Red Army.”

LAVER: “Stalin was an effective symbol of resistance.”

Economic

NOVE: “agriculture, in Stalin’s final years, was characterised by excessive centralisation of decision, insufficient investment, extremely low prices and ill-judged intentions.”

KENEZ: “it is still indisputable that the speed of reconstruction was impressive.”

KENEZ: [agriculture] “the always neglected stepsister of industry”

Political

THATCHER: “aggressive foreign policy”

THATCHER: [Stalinism]

1. Dictatorship of one man

2. Dominant ideology

3. Cult of Personality

4. Use of terror

5. Aggressive foreign policy

6. Command economy

LAVER: [Cult of Personality] “Stalin disliked this, but recognised its ideological importance”

OVERY: “The Soviet state was transformed by this process [becoming superpower] and Communism, close to collapse in the Autumn of 1941, came to be a dominant political force”

LAVER: “Stalin was obsessed with a supposed national threat.”

LYNCH: “Paranoia had a large part to play in the Soviet politics at the time”

Khrushchev

Economic

FILTZER: “Khrushchev never attempted to remove the basic levers of Stalinism within the USSR; those of central planning.”

LAVER: “Khrushchev’s reforms did not really help the economy”

FILTZER: [decentralisation] “bureaucratic anarchy”

KENEZ: “He sometimes made it worse by creating confusion.”

KENEZ: [decentralisation] “It grew out of a general need, but was insufficiently considered, inadequately prepared, and ultimately created more problems than it saved.”

LAVER: [industry] “No clearly coordinated, coherent structure.”

KEEP: [agriculture] “Kept peasant affairs at the centre of attention for an entire decade.”

KEEP: “To challenge collectivisation would have been “heresy”.”

Political

FILTZER: “It was Khrushchev who placed the Party back at the centre of the political stage.”

LAVER: [De-Stalinisation] “The removal of Stalinist excesses, such as the cult of personality, from Soviet politics, post-1953.”

LAVER: “The essential features of Stalinism survived intact”

LAVER: “The party diehards would not easily forgive Khrushchev for placing such obstacles in the path of traditional Soviet communism.”

LAVER: “Through nationalist reform, the USSR was also discouraged”

MCCAULEY: [Khrushchev] “demanded and expected too much”

MCCAULEY: “hasty reforms due to optimism”

MCCAULEY: “The Khrushchev period was one of hope and despair”

KENEZ: “His failures showed that the problems he recognised were inherent in the system that he wanted to save.”

FILTZER: “Pushed through his policies bureaucratically and often with little foresight or planning.”

Social

MCCAULEY: “made life more comfortable”

Brezhnev

Economic

NOVE: “Economically speaking, the Brezhnev period has to be seen as a disaster.”

GENERAL: “Era of Stagnation”

Political

LAVER: “Brezhnev presided over a crucial period of Soviet Foreign Policy.”

LAVER: “Ideology had all but lost its meaning to many within the USSR by 1982.”

THOMPSON: “a man of the centre”

THOMPSON: “a cult without personality”

LAVER: “If there was a nationalist threat, then Brezhnev did not solve it.”

LAVER: “Let sleeping dogs lie”

KEEP: [The Party] “a refuge for nostalgias”

GENERAL: “Era of Conservatism”

Social

LAVER: [Developed Socialism] “unfortunately, the reality did not live up to the aspirations.”

LAVER: “no evidence of widespread dissatisfaction”

THOMPSON: “By the early 1980s the regime appeared to have crushed the dissident movement.”

Andropov and Chernenko

Andropov

LAVER: “Following in the footsteps of Khrushchev without the unpredictability.”

Chernenko

LAVER: “did not have coherent policy”

Gorbachev

Political

MARPLES: “Gorbachev refused to recognise that Yeltsin and the radicals were the future.”

VOLKOGONOV: [Gorbachev] “the last Leninist”

PRAVDA: [Glasnost] “the timely and frank release of information shows trust in the people, respect for their intelligence and their ability to assess events.”

LAVER: “Glasnost proved a double-edged sword for Gorbachev”

LAVER: “A style of leadership not seen before in the USSR.”

LAVER: [break-up] “It was difficult for any one man to prevent”

Economic

LAVER: “Perestroika appeared to be making things worse”

POPOLOV: [Perestroika] “It was done with slogans, not a programme of reform that ordinary Russians could understand”

GORBACHEV: “The old system collapsed before the new one could begin to function.”

LAVER: “If anything, alcoholism increased.”

LAVER: “A hotchpotch of initiatives.”

KEEP: “He undermined the old system before he had laid the foundations of a new one.”

KEEP: [Crisis] “had its roots in the decisions taken (or not taken) in the early phases of Perestroika.”

Nationalities

LAVER: “a time-bomb waiting to explode.”

WARD: “No one saw it coming”

BRESLAUR: “Gorbachev’s greatest error was not to reconcile the results of Glasnost with the rise of nationalism in the USSR”

LAVER: “Other fundamental problems made collapse inevitable”

LAVER: Gorbachev “never understood the strength of nationalist feelings and he never dealt with it effectively.”

Social

GORBACHEV: “There was a gradual erosion of ideological and moral values”

LAVER: “Over the previous decade or more, many people had increasingly benefitted from the existing system”

“Für die meisten Leute ging es zunächst um das tägliche Überleben.”

Ich weiβ nicht, genau was dieses Aufsatz bekommen hat, aber die einzige Kritik war, dass ich nicht Akkusativ und Dativ anerkenne. Der Inhalt war prima, deshalb ist es immer noch ein gutes Beispiel.

“Für die meisten Leute ging es zunächst um das tägliche Überleben.”

Inwiefern stimmt diese Aussage für den von Ihnen gewählten Zeitraum? Begründen Sie Ihre Antwort.

                In den Augen der Geschichte gibt es eine facettenreiche Zusammenfassung über den Zeitraum der DDR während 1961 bis zum Jahr 1989. Manche Leute setzen voraus, dass der Alltag eines in der DDR lebenden Bürgers lebensbedrohlich war. Wenn ich nicht dieses Thema tief untersucht hätte, wäre ich eher geneigt gewesen, dieser Aussage zuzustimmen. Es lässt sich nicht leugnen, dass es für eine Minderheit zu einem gewissen Grad ein Element von Drohung gab. Es hing davon ab, ob man der Parteilinie folgte oder nicht. Wegen der Stasi, dem Staatssicherheitsdienst, konnte man seine Meinung nicht äuβern. Dennoch bin ich jetzt fest davon überzeugt, dass für die meisten Leute es nicht um das tägliche Überleben ging. Obwohl die Lebensstandards schlimmer als die westlichen Lebensstandards waren,  lasse ich mich nicht davon abbringen, dass es nicht so verdorben war, dass es eine Bedrohung des Lebens war.

                Es wird im Film “Das Leben der Anderen” gezeigt, wie weit die Bevölkerung durch ein Überwachungsprogramm bespitzelt worden ist. Es gab inoffizielle Ermittler, die etwas total allgemein wie ein Nachbar waren, oder Mikrophone wurden in Häusern gesteckt. Deswegen musste man sein eigenes Verhalten verändern, um die Aufmerksamkeit der Stasi zu vermeiden. Hätte ich in der DDR gelebt, wäre das ein totaler Albtraum gewesen, da ich die Prinzipien von Demokratie und Freiheit völlig unterstütze. Laut Westernhagern, Freiheit sei das Einzige was zählt, aber wenn man für Freiheit kämpfte, wurde man von der Stasi gefoltert. Sie waren nicht “die meisten Leute”, aber es ist wichtig anzuerkennen, was für eine Bedrohung Intellektuellen erfahren hatten, um Ihre Beitrag zu schätzen. Beispielsweise indem sie Freiheitskampagne gegründet hatten oder die SED-Führung kritisiert hatten, und ohne solche Beiträge, wäre die Wiedervereinigung nie möglich gewesen.

                Es gab auch Leute die nicht nur gefoltert wurden, sondern auch getötet; beispielsweise DDR-Bürger, die versucht hatten, aus der Deutsche Demokratische Republik durch Ostberlin zu fliehen. Während der Führung von Erich Honecker gab es keine Reisefreiheit, wegen der Furcht, dass man in Westen fliehen würde. Als die Mauer erst gebaut wurde, gab es Personen wie Konrad Schumann, ein Soldat der DDR, der entschied, über Stacheldraht zu springen, der ürsprunglich die Berliner Mauer war. Aber als Stacheldraht zu einem Wand wurde, war es sogar unmöglich, Ostberlin für Westberlin zu wechseln. Zudem, gab Erich Honecker einen Schieβbefehl, damit es allen Überläufern nicht gelungen war, aus Ostberlin zu flüchten. Während der Zeit der Berliner Mauer wurden 126 in der DDR wohnenden Personen erschossen und ums Leben gekommen. Weil es solche Risiken gab, zeigt das, dass es um das tägliche Überleben ging? Ich bin immer noch eher geneigt zu sagen, dass das nicht der Fall war.

                Ich möchte betonen, dass solche Opfer während dieses Zeitraums eine Minderheit waren, und dass die meisten von Ostdeutschen der Parteilinie folgten, und viele hatten den Alltag in der DDR genossen. Unter Sozialismus kümmerte der Staat sich um die Bevölkerung durch Initiativen wie Plattenbauten, alles was man braucht angebotende Wohnungen, damit es selten Obdachlosigkeit gab. Ausserdem hatte man Sicherheit durch die Tatsache, dass es selten Arbeitlosigkeit gab, denn zwei oder drei Bürger der DDR wurden angestellen für den gleichen Job eines BRD-Bürgers. Ich muss zugeben, dass das System nicht perfekt war, und als eine Sozialistin durch und durch ist das schwer zu sagen. Dennoch waren die Lebensstandards schlimmer als die in der BRD erhaltenden Lebenshaltungen. Beispielsweise gab es einen Mangel an Bedarfsgüter, und als Ergebnis davon musste man in einer langen Schlange stehen, um nötige Lebensmittel zu bekommen. Trotzdem im Gegensatz zu anderen Ostblockstaaten war es immer noch besser, und es war nie der Fall, dass der Alltag ein Kampf des Überlebens war, egal wie ernsthaft man das darstellen möchte. Solange man der Parteilinie folgte, konnte man Nutzen aus dem System ziehen.

                Jedoch wenn man nur die Lage innerhalb der DDR in Betracht zieht, ist das eine begrenzte Bewertung. Der Zusammenhang von dem Zeitraum bedeutet, dass es den Hintergrund des kalten Kriegs gab. Ostdeutschland war ein Pufferstaat zwischen der UdSSR und USA, deswegen wenn es einen echten Krieg gegeben hätte, wäre die DDR eine Schiessscheibe gewesen. Obwohl es die Ostpolitik von BRD-Politiker Willy Brandt gab, die friedliche Koexistenz förderte, gab es langfristige Spannung zwischen Ost und West, besonders während der „Star-Wars“ Politik von Reagan. Dies war nur konkretisiert als beide Seiten im Wettrüsten teilgenommen haben, und die Bedrohung von einem Atomkrieg  wurde eine Gefahr im Verzug. Obwohl es schwer zu unterstreichen ist, was nur Propaganda im Vergleich zu was echt war, es lässt sich nicht leugnen, dass es immer noch die Angst gab, ob eine Seite den roten Knopf drücken wird, wie es in der Fernsehsendung Deutschland 83 gezeigt wurde. Es waren nicht nur die Ost- und Westdeutschen, die Ihren Atem anhielten, sondern die ganze Welt. Deswegen stimmt diese Aussage zu einem begrenzten Grad für den von meinen gewählten Zeitraum, aber nur bis zur Führung Gorbatschows, da er auch friedliche Koexistenz fördern würde.

                Wenn es nach mir ginge, würde ich die Betrachtung von Filmen wie „Das Leben der Anderen“ oder die Fernsehsendungen wie „Deutschland 83“ obligatorisch für diejenigen machen, die über die Geschichte dieses Zeitraums unterrichtet werden, da sie eine echte Darstellung der Gefahren von dem Alltag in der DDR anbieten. Für Intellektuelle und Künstler wie Bärbel Bohley, die für Freiheit in den Montagsdemonstrationen gekämpft hatten, ging der Alltag total um das tägliche Überleben, angesichts der Macht der Stasi und SED-Führung. Aber solche Leute waren nicht die Mehrheit der DDR-Bevölkerung; die meisten Leute waren zufrieden mit dem sozialistischen System, das Sicherheit und genügend Vorräte angeboten hat; nach der Wiedervereinigung gab es eine „Ostalgie“, als Ostdeutchen die Wehmut über ihre Vergangenheit fühlten. Wenn alles in Betracht gezogen wird, war die Gefahr der Stasi nur ein Tropfen auf einen heiβen Stein.

“Stalin’s leadership was the most significant reason for Soviet victory in the Great Patriotic War.”

This question was written in exam conditions and received 42/45, which is band 5 and an A*! I’ll be uploading a mind map for this question in my essay plan section. Stalin looks likely to be a question on the exam this year so here’s hoping it’s similar to this one.

“Stalin’s leadership was the most significant reason for Soviet victory in the Great Patriotic War.”

Assess the validity of this view.

                The Great Patriotic War lasted between the USSR and Germany between 1941-45, following the German invasion known as Operation Barbarossa on June 22^nd 1941. By this time, Stalin had placed himself in command of a centralised leadership and economy, having total control of the USSR. His leadership must therefore be considered a major factor in the Soviet victory. As Pearson notes, “Stalin played a pivotal role in every aspect of the war effort.” However, unlike the centralised Soviet system, the responsibility for Soviet victory cannot be placed on Stalin as a sole individual, there were external factors such as German errors, the success of the Russian economy and the notorious 1941 winter that accumulated towards victory, not to mention the role of Stalin being downplayed by his own flaws as a leader. Therefore, Stalin’s leadership was not the most significant reason for Soviet victory.

                Stalin had many successes as a wartime leader, and it must be acknowledged that he held some responsibility for victory. He had propaganda value as a figurehead, and was willing to divert focus from Communist sentiments towards patriotism in enlisting soldiers through propaganda campaigns. The war became a fight for “Mother Russia”, a fight for the nation as opposed to the regime, which yielded great success. Within a fortnight of the invasion, 10 million soldiers were enlisted into the Red Army. Stalin’s willingness to shift focus from Communism to patriotism encouraged the iron will of the people to sustain the many hits of the Germans, and so the success of propaganda must be considered as a successful aspect of Stalin’s leadership. Furthermore, Stalin enacted a reversal on religious oppression in his conscious decision to have a revival of the Russian Orthodox Church, which as part of Stalin’s propaganda campaign portrayed the way as a Holy War. By the end of 1943, there were over 15,000 functioning orthodox churches in the USSR, encouraging millions of previously persecuted Christians to contributed to the war effort, adding to the numbers of the military and Soviet population that dwarfed Germany’s, thereby enabling them to sustain losses. The Church also encouraged allies to open up a 2^nd Front, forcing Hitler to scatter his already weakened military further across Europe, weakening the German army to Soviet counter-attacks. These examples of Stalin’s cunningness demonstrate significant contributions he made to the war effort.

                But, as historian Pearson also acknowledges, Stalin made “fatal errors” at the beginning of the war, most notably not allowing “his troops to mobilise in time”. He relied too much on the 1939 Nazi-Soviet Pact, deluding himself that Hitler wouldn’t invade, as well as signing a 1940 trade pact that gave Hitler the necessary resources to strengthen his army. Stalin ignored 80 warnings that Hitler intended to invade; rather than mobilising his army in preparation, he had the German informant shot. This meant when the invasion arrives, the USSR was not in the military capacity to fight the Germans off. Within hours of Operation Barbarossa, Blitzkrieg tactics had shot down 1200 Soviet aircraft, and the Germans were advancing 50 miles a day. Following the invasion, Stalin had fled Moscow without a centralised military command, preventing effective decision-making, and his pre-war purges of over 22,000 officers caused troop shortages, leading to initial defeats. This suggests his leadership was detrimental to the war effort, therefore it was not a significant factor. However, Stalin was able to learn and make up for his mistakes in recognising his incapacity in the military, devolving decision-making down to his trusted generals like General Zhukov, as opposed to political commissars, so they could actually make effective contributions to the war effort. His centralised military command could bypass bureaucracy and address immediate military concerns. Therefore, while Stalin did make mistakes to being with, in the later years of the war he lead effectively, but it was due to other factors that he was given the chance to lead the Soviets to victory.

                Based on the early years of the war, German victory seemed inevitable. However, German error obstructed this victory, and allowed the Soviets to counterattack. While Stalin lead a centralised economy directed towards the war effort, Hitler chose not to unilaterally do so, and deprived the army of supplies. 250,000 German soldiers died of frostbite in the harsh winter of 1941, opening the chance for a Soviet counterattack. While it seems Stalin cunningly seized on this moment, this would not have occurred had Hitler organised his economy towards the war. Another gross error of Hitler was failing to utilise the support of the nationalities. During the invasion, the German army was welcomed as the Soviet people’s liberators in many provinces, especially the Ukraine, who had become disillusioned by Stalin’s harsh collectivisation drive in the 1930s. It is estimated that as many as one million Soviets defected to fight with the Germans. Were it not for the Germans’ barbaric treatment of 6 million prisoners of war, this figure may have been greater. It provoked pro-Soviet sentiment and gave rise to the anti-German propaganda of Stalin, assisting him in encouraging ordinary citizens to fight with the Red Army in any way they could, defending major cities in digging trenches, seen in the Battle of Moscow as 250,000 women dug trenches. But Hitler’s fatal flaw was to invade the USSR to begin with, opening the Second World War to a second front that Germany in both its economic and military capacity couldn’t sustain. Stalin cunningly seized on this fact by turning the Great Patriotic War into a “war of attrition”. Quantitatively, the Soviet Army dwarfed Germany’s and 25 million Soviet troops died in the war which totalled 30% of Germany’s 1940 population, but less than 15% of the USSR’s. Hitler underestimated the length of the war, and was therefore unprepared to sustain gradual losses while Stalin consciously knew the USSR could. But ultimately, it was Hitler’s own errors that allowed Stalin’s counterattack, and had Hitler not made mistakes, the war would have been won by the Germans sooner, while Stalin was having to come to terms with his own flaws. Stalin’s leadership can therefore not be considered the most significant reason for victory.

                The Allied efforts also had a part to play in the war, although they were not the most significant. By opening up additional fronts in Italy and France, they forced Hitler to divert troops from Stalingrad and Kursk, weakening the numbers of his army in the USSR, and allowing Stalin the chance to counterattack. Foreign aid also assisted the USSR. The Lend-Lease scheme in 1942 totalled $111 billion in aid, and accounted for an estimated 1/5 of Soviet resources. It filled the gaps left in the economy, covering the blind spots that the Germans could have outnumbered the USSR in. While Stalin’s leadership may have played a role in this factor, in that he established these foreign relations in the first place, it was also his failure to provide for soldiers through consumer industry production, as well as in transport, where the USSR only built 52 trains as opposed to the 1000 provided by the USA, that meant foreign aid was required to begin with. Although foreign aid was not the significant factor for victory, it highlighted Stalin’s deficiency that prevents him from also being a significant factor.

                Historian Harrison states “If WWII was a test then the Soviet economy passed it.” Overy correlates the war effort’s failure in 1941-2 to economic failure, and victory to economic success. The economy played a pivotal role in Soviet victory. Industry was mobilised further away as resources could be effectively prioritised, provided by direct order under centralised system. 3500 new factories were built, while 2593 were rebuilt in the Urals away from German occupation. This meant that despite German occupation of the USSR, including 1/3 of its industrial base, the USSR could continue to produce the necessary materials for the war effort. This economic success certainly ties back to Stalin’s 1930s policies of his 3^rd Five Year Plan and industrialisation, as well as establishing a centralised economic system that bypassed bureaucracy in the war. But the economy was supported by the iron will of the Soviets, whom, despite being encouraged to work by propaganda, continued to sustain the war of attrition based on its sheer quantity and patriotism, which Stalin capitalised on, but didn’t have total responsibility for.

“Dream can be seen as a cathartic and illuminative experience, for both characters in the play and the audience outside watching it."

This has been my favourite essay so far to attempt because of its difficulty, but mainly because your points can be as unconventional as you want/need. But also because I got full marks for it…just saying.

“Dream can be seen as a cathartic and illuminative experience, for both characters in the play and the audience outside watching it."

By exploring Shakespeare’s treatment of dreams and dreaming, evaluate this view.

                As the title of the play suggests, the literary device of dreams plays a significant role in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, both thematically and structurally. To the mortal Athenians, their entire experiences within the forest, which has been likened to critic Northrop Frye’s literary concept of the Green World, are reduced down to dreams as a product of the overactive imagination. But as unrealistic and implausible as such “dreams” may seem, they are illuminating in exploring the themes of love and contemporary theatre, and allow the characters to undergo personal catharsis, accumulating to the entire reconciliation of the play. But this is not limited to the characters of the play; the play itself becomes a dream of the audience watching it, highlighted explicitly through the meta-theatrical structure of the play-within-a-play. Through this, Shakespeare hopes to illuminate contemporary social issues, so like the characters in the play, the audience can also learn from experiences that aren’t necessarily real.

                Following the discourse of reason in the City World of Athens, particularly of Egeus as he explains to Theseus:

                “And what is mine, my love shall render him.

                And she is mine, and all my right of her

                I do estate unto Demetrius.”

The possessive anaphora and formal blank verse explicitly emphasising the notion of patriarchal rationality behind his wishes, the play then transfers to the Green World of social disorder and chaos, serving as the antithesis to the City World. To the Athenians who move into the world, their visions within the forest become dreams, due to their implausibility and irrationality. Critic Nicole Smith draws a comparison between A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Twelfth Night for their “dream-like scapes” that serve “to bring about the concluding resolution” of each play. Even if the mortals cannot accept the events from the forest to be real, as Bottom says:

                “I have had a dream – past the wit of man to say what dream it was.”

Even if a “dream” transcends the “wit of man”, the lovers are still illuminated by the experiences they have undergone with this “most rare vision”, the quantifier of “most” with “rare” extending the implausibility of this dream, and it is this epiphany provoked by their dreams that brings about a resolution. In Theseus’ soliloquy of Act V, he mocks imagination, thereby dreams, even suggesting that such visions can be dangerous:

                “The lunatic, the lover and the poet

                Are of imagination all compact”

By bringing lunacy, love and literature together through imagination, Theseus attempts to discredit their authenticity by claiming that they are nothing more than fabrications. But in stressing “poet”, Shakespeare may be referencing himself, thus contributing to the irony of Theseus’ statement. By opposing dreams and imagination because they transcend reason, he fails to recognise that it was reason that caused the conflict of the main narrative, and the lovers’ dreams that resolved this conflict, which Hippolyta is not afraid to say as their dreams, she claims:

                “And grows to something of great constancy;

                But, howsoever, strange and admirable.”

Despite also speaking in blank verse which would suggest the formal rationality of the City World, Hippolyta, who acknowledges that however “strange” dreams maybe, they “admirable” in how they are illuminative beyond “fancy’s images”. As critic Garber notes, “Reason is impoverished without imagination and that we must accept the dimension of dreams in our lives, without this knowledge”, there can be no self-knowledge. The symbiosis between reason and imagination is demonstrated in how Hippolyta can accept and praise imagination while still using the discourse of reason in “And” and “But”. Dreams therefore serve as an illuminative experience, despite being dismissed by those entrenched within the limits of reason.

                When it comes to dreaming becoming catharsis, this is most prevalent in Hermia’s dream during her time in the forest, or rather, her nightmare.

                “Ay me for pity! What a dream was here.

                Lysander, look how I do quake with fear.

                Methought a serpent ate my heart away,

                And you sat smiling at his cruel prey.”

The structure of heroic couplet cements the contrast between what Hermia believes to be a dream and her reality, but the catalectic iambic pentameter of the final line retains an element of ambiguity, representing the anxieties of the dream. Many modern adaptations, including a Regent’s Park adaptation from 2012, have picked upon the undercurrent of male violence that may not have been acceptable to Shakespeare’s contemporary audience. This has led critics, particularly feminist, to suggest that Hermia’s dream act as a catharsis for her anxieties of Lysander’s potential sexual predatory actions from the preceding scene, before he accedes to her request to “lie further off. In human modesty”. These anxieties are only confirmed when Hermia sees that, under the influence of the love potion, Lysander’s fancies have been diverted to a woman who is prepared to be “a spaniel”, to “spurn” and “strike”, the sibilance of this creating a harsh hissing sound that draws on the violent nature of this line. Violent eros is also communicated through the sibilance of “serpent”, which in Elizabethan literature symbolised sexual corruption for its phallic imagery and biblical implications. Therefore, while Hermia’s dream acts as a catharsis for anxieties she believes to be irrational, it is also illuminative in that it bears some resemblance to her circumstances in the forest.

                However, Shakespeare’s treatment of dreams doesn’t only affect his characters, but his audience as well. Through the play-within-a-play structure of “Pyramus and Thisbe”, the experience of the characters watching that play parallels the audiences’, although Shakespeare doesn’t intend for his actual audience to recognise this. Theseus comments how:

                “The best in this kind are but shadows, and the worst are no worse if imagination amend them.”

Although this is rude discourse during the mechanicals’ performance, encompassed by the form of prose, this line of prose reiterates the role of imagination in theatre, transforming the stage into the dream of a spectator. Even the best actors are only “shadows”, it takes the imagination of the audience to see whay they represent. Through imagination, the deficiencies of acting and stagecraft can be amended, but because the men are constricted by their loyalty to reason, the faults of the mechanical’s play cannot be amended, including their grammatical errors and malapropisms such as confusing “Ninus” for “Ninny’s Tomb”. But despite its mistakes, the “Lamentable Comedy” of Pyramus and Thisbe is also cathartic, as critic Arden has referred to it as an “exorcism” of the tragic elements of the play, leading to blessed consummation of marriage at the end. But it is after this reconciliation that Robin directly addresses the audience for their own resolution, as he says:

                “If we shadows have offended

                Think but this, and all is mended

                That you all have slumbered here

                While these visions did appear.”

His alternation between catalectic and complete trochaic tetrameter shows his supernatural and otherworldly nature, creating the tone of a lullaby or sleeping spell, perhaps as the audience’s own cathartic exorcism. But within these lines, the events on stage are reduced to the state of a dream, drawing the parallels of theatre and dreams together as critic Jung suggests, “a dream is a theatre in which the dreamer is himself the scene, the player, the producer and the critic.”