ABSTRACT
Of the series of crucial problems facing the Bolsheviks upon the seizure of power, their relationships with the peasantry were destined to affect the lives of a larger number of people than any other. In the late twenties and early thirties the Russian Communists found themselves compelled to reorganize the life of the peasants and to introduce a new way of life among the most tradition-bound mass of the population. According to the official Soviet ideology, the selection of the leaders within the kolkhoz takes place by democratic methods. The Communist leaders of Russia have endeavored to introduce into the collective farms a system of incentive arrangements and organized inequality similar to that which prevails in industry. Within the present institutional framework of the collective farms, certain divisive tendencies which the government has been forced to combat may be observed.
