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Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic

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"Soviet Russia" redirects here. For the federation of national republics as a whole, see Soviet Union. For other uses, see Soviet Russia (disambiguation).

The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic[a] (Russian SFSR or RSFSR), previously known as the Russian Soviet Republic[2] and the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic,[3] and unofficially as Soviet Russia,[4] was an independent federal socialist state from 1917 to 1922, and afterwards the largest and most populous constituent republic of the Soviet Union (USSR) from 1922 to 1991, until becoming a sovereign part of the Soviet Union with priority of Russian laws over Union-level legislation in 1990 and 1991, the last two years of the existence of the USSR.[5] The Russian SFSR was composed of sixteen smaller constituent units of autonomous republics, five autonomous oblasts, ten autonomous okrugs, six krais and forty oblasts.[5] Russians formed the largest ethnic group. The capital of the Russian SFSR and the USSR as a whole was Moscow and the other major urban centers included Leningrad (Petrograd until 1924), Stalingrad (Volgograd after 1961), Novosibirsk, Sverdlovsk, Gorky and Kuybyshev. It was the first socialist state in history.

Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic
Российская Советская Федеративная Социалистическая Республика
Rossijskaja Sovetskaja Federativnaja Socialističeskaja Respublika
1917–1991
Flag of Russian SFSR
Flag:
  • Top: 1918–1937
  • Bottom: 1954–1991
Emblem (1978–1991)
The Russian SFSR (red) within the Soviet Union (red and white) between 1956 and 1991
The Russian SFSR (red) within the Soviet Union (red and white) between 1956 and 1991
Status
Capital
Largest cityMoscow
Official languagesRussian
Recognised languagesSee Languages of Russia
Religion
Demonym(s)Russian
Government
Head of state 
• 1917 (first)
Lev Kamenev
• 1990–1991 (last)
Boris Yeltsin
Head of government 
• 1917–1924 (first)
Vladimir Lenin
• 1990–1991
Ivan Silayev
• 1991 (last)
Boris Yeltsin
Legislature
History 
7 November 1917
1917–1923
• Soviet republic proclaimed
25 January 1918
30 December 1922
19 February 1954
12 June 1990
12 December 1991
• Russian SFSR renamed into the Russian Federation
25 December 1991
26 December 1991
25 December 1993
Area
1956[citation needed]17,125,200 km2 (6,612,100 sq mi)
Population
• 1989[citation needed]
147,386,000
CurrencySoviet ruble (SUR)
Time zone(UTC 2 to 12)
Calling code 7
ISO 3166 codeRU
Internet TLD.su
Preceded by		 Succeeded by
Russian Republic
Russian Federation

The economy of Russia became heavily industrialized, accounting for about two-thirds of the electricity produced in the USSR. By 1961, it was the third largest producer of petroleum due to new discoveries in the Volga-Urals region[6] and Siberia, trailing in production to only the United States and Saudi Arabia.[7] In 1974, there were 475 institutes of higher education in the republic providing education in 47 languages to some 23,941,000 students. A network of territorially organized public-health services provided health care.[5] The economy, which had become stagnant since the late 1970s under General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev, began to be liberalized starting in 1985 under Gorbachev's "perestroika" restructuring policies, including the introduction of non-state owned enterprises (e.g. cooperatives).

On 7 November 1917 (O.S. 25 October), as a result of the October Revolution, the Russian Soviet Republic was proclaimed as a sovereign state and the world's first constitutionally socialist state guided by communist ideology. The first constitution was adopted in 1918. In 1922, the Russian SFSR signed a treaty officially creating the USSR. The Russian SFSR's 1978 constitution stated that "[a] Union Republic is a sovereign [...] state that has united [...] in the Union"[8] and "each Union Republic shall retain the right freely to secede from the USSR".[9] On 12 June 1990, the Congress of People's Deputies adopted the Declaration of State Sovereignty, established separation of powers (unlike in the Soviet form of government), established citizenship of Russia and stated that the RSFSR shall retain the right of free secession from the USSR. On 12 June 1991, Boris Yeltsin (1931–2007), supported by the Democratic Russia pro-reform movement, was elected the first and only President of the RSFSR, a post that would later become the Presidency of the Russian Federation.

The August 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt in Moscow with the temporary brief internment of President Mikhail Gorbachev destabilised the Soviet Union. Following these events, Gorbachev lost all his remaining power, with Yeltsin superseding him as the pre-eminent figure in the country. On 8 December 1991, the heads of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus signed the Belovezha Accords. The agreement declared dissolution of the USSR by its original founding states (i.e., renunciation of the 1922 Treaty on the Creation of the USSR) and established the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) as a loose replacement confederation. On 12 December, the agreement was ratified by the Supreme Soviet (the parliament of the Russian SFSR); therefore the Russian SFSR had renounced the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR and de facto declared Russia's independence from the USSR itself and the ties with the other Soviet republics.

On 25 December 1991, following the resignation of Gorbachev as President of the Soviet Union (and former General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union), the Russian SFSR was renamed the Russian Federation.[10] The next day, after the lowering of the Soviet flag from the top of the Senate building of the Moscow Kremlin and its replacement by the Russian flag, the USSR was self-dissolved by the Soviet of the Republics on 26 December, which by that time was the only functioning parliamentary chamber of the All-Union Supreme Soviet (the other house, Soviet of the Union, had already lost the quorum after recall of its members by the several union republics). After the dissolution, Russia took full responsibility for all the rights and obligations of the USSR under the Charter of the United Nations, including the financial obligations. As such, Russia assumed the Soviet Union's UN membership and permanent membership on the Security Council, nuclear stockpile and the control over the armed forces; Soviet embassies abroad became Russian embassies.[11]

The 1978 constitution of the Russian SFSR was amended several times to reflect the transition to democracy, private property and market economy. The new Russian constitution, coming into effect on 25 December 1993 after a constitutional crisis, completely abolished the Soviet form of government and replaced it with a semi-presidential system.

Nomenclature

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See also: Name of Russia

Under the leadership of Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924) and Leon Trotsky (1879–1940), the Bolshevik communists established the Soviet state on 7 November [O.S. 25 October] 1917. This happened immediately after the October Revolution toppled the interim Russian Provisional Government (most recently led by opposing democratic socialist Alexander Kerensky (1881–1970)) which had governed the new Russian Republic after the abdication of the Russian Empire government of the Romanov imperial dynasty of Tsar Nicholas II the previous March (Old Style: February). The October Revolution was thus the second of the two Russian Revolutions of the turbulent year of 1917. Initially, the new Soviet state did not have an official name and was not recognized by neighboring countries for five months.

Anti-Bolsheviks soon suggested new names, however. By 1919 they had coined the mocking label Sovdepia (Russian: Совдепия) for the nascent state of the Soviets of Workers' and Peasants' Deputies.[12] Speakers of colloquial English coined the term "Bololand"[13] to refer to the land of the Bolos (a term identified from 1919 onwards with the Bolsheviks).[14]

On 25 January 1918 the third meeting of the All-Russian Congress of Soviets proclaimed the establishment of the Russian Soviet Republic.[15][3][2] In July 1918, the fifth All-Russian Congress of Soviets adopted both the new name, Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic (RSFSR), and the Constitution of the Russian SFSR.[16][better source needed]

Internationally, the Russian SFSR was recognized as an independent state in 1920 only by its bordering neighbors (Estonia, Finland, Latvia and Lithuania) in the Treaty of Tartu and by the short-lived Irish Republic of 1919–1922 in Ireland.[17]

On 30 December 1922, with the treaty on the creation of the Soviet Union, Russia (the RSFSR), alongside the Transcaucasian SFSR, the Ukrainian SSR and the Byelorussian SSR, formed the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The final Soviet name for the constituent republic, the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, was adopted in the later Soviet Constitution of 1936. By that time, Soviet Russia had gained roughly the same borders of the old Tsardom of Russia before the Great Northern War of 1700 to 1721.

The RSFSR dominated the Soviet Union to a significant extent. For most of its existence, the Soviet Union was commonly (but incorrectly) referred to[by whom?] as "Russia". While the RSFSR itself was only one republic within the larger union, it was the largest, most powerful and most highly developed[quantify] of the 15 republics. According to Matthew White it was an open secret that the country's federal structure was "window dressing" for Russian dominance.[speculation?][better source needed][18]

On 25 December 1991, during the collapse of the Soviet Union, which concluded on the next day, the RSFSR's official name was changed to the Russian Federation, which it remains to this day.[19] This name and "Russia" were specified as the official state names on 21 April 1992, in an amendment to the then existing Constitution of 1978, and were retained as such in the subsequent 1993 Constitution of Russia.

Geography

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At a total of about 17,125,200 km (6,612,100 sq mi), the Russian SFSR was the largest of the fifteen Soviet republics, with its southerly neighbor, the Kazakh SSR, being second.

The international borders of the RSFSR touched Poland on the west; Norway and Finland on the northwest; and to its southeast in eastern Asia were the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea), Mongolian People's Republic (Mongolia) and the People's Republic of China (China, formerly the Republic of China; 1911–1949). Within the Soviet Union, the RSFSR bordered the Slavic states: Ukrainian SSR (Ukraine), Belarusian SSR (Belarus), the Baltic states: Estonian SSR (Estonia), Latvian SSR (Latvia) and Lithuanian SSR (Lithuania) (Included in USSR in 1940) to its west and the Azerbaijan SSR (Azerbaijan), Georgian SSR (Georgia) and Kazakh SSR (Kazakhstan) to the south.[5]

Roughly 70% of the area in the RSFSR consisted of broad plains, with mountainous tundra regions mainly concentrated in the east of Siberia with Central Asia and East Asia. The area is rich in mineral resources, including petroleum, natural gas, and iron ore.[20]

History

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Early years (1917–1920)

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Vladimir Lenin, founder of the Soviet Union and the leader of the Bolshevik party.
 
Leon Trotsky, founder of the Red Army and a key figure in the October Revolution.

The Soviet government first came to power on 7 November 1917, immediately after the interim Russian Provisional Government headed by Alexander Kerensky, which governed the Russian Republic, was overthrown in the October Revolution, the second of the two Russian Revolutions. The state it governed, which did not have an official name, would be unrecognized by neighboring countries for another five months. The initial stage of the October Revolution which involved the assault on Petrograd occurred largely without any human casualties.[21][22][23]

On 18 January 1918, the newly elected Constituent Assembly issued a decree, proclaiming Russia a democratic federal republic under the name "Russian Democratic Federal Republic". However, the Bolsheviks dissolved the Assembly on the following day and declared its decrees null and void.[24] Conversely, the Bolsheviks also reserved a number of vacant seats in the Soviets and Central Executive for the opposition parties in proportion to their vote share at the Congress.[25] At the same time, a number of prominent members of the Left Socialist Revolutionaries had assumed positions in Lenin's government and lead commissariats in several areas. This included agriculture (Kolegaev), property (Karelin), justice (Steinberg), post offices and telegraphs (Proshian) and local government (Trutovsky).[26] Lenin's government also instituted a number of progressive measures such as universal education, healthcare and equal rights for women.[27][28][29]

On 25 January 1918, at the third meeting of the All-Russian Congress of Soviets, the establishment of the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic (RSFSR) was proclaimed.[15][3][2] On 3 March 1918, the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was signed, giving away much of the westernmost lands of the former Russian Empire to the German Empire, in exchange for peace on the Eastern Front of World War I. In July 1918, the fifth All-Russian Congress of Soviets adopted the Constitution of the Russian SFSR.[16][better source needed] By 1918, during the Russian Civil War, several states within the former Russian Empire had seceded, reducing the size of the country even more, although some were conquered by the Bolsheviks.

1920s

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The Russian SFSR in 1922
 
The Russian SFSR in 1924
 
The Russian SFSR in 1929

The Russian famine of 1921–22, also known as Povolzhye famine, killed an estimated 5 million, primarily affecting the Volga and Ural River regions.[30]

The economic impact of the Civil War was devastating. A black market emerged in Russia, despite the threat of martial law against profiteering. The ruble collapsed, with barter increasingly replacing money as a medium of exchange[31] and, by 1921, heavy industry output had fallen to 20% of 1913 levels. 90% of wages were paid with goods rather than money.[32] 70% of locomotives were in need of repair[citation needed], and food requisitioning, combined with the effects of seven years of war and a severe drought, contributed to a famine that caused between 3 and 10 million deaths.[33] Coal production decreased from 27.5 million tons (1913) to 7 million tons (1920), while overall factory production also declined from 10,000 million roubles to 1,000 million roubles. According to the noted historian David Christian, the grain harvest was also slashed from 80.1 million tons (1913) to 46.5 million tons (1920).[34]

On 30 December 1922, the First Congress of the Soviets of the USSR approved the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR, by which Russia was united with the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic and Transcaucasian Soviet Federal Socialist Republic into a single federal state, the Soviet Union. The treaty was included in the 1924 Soviet Constitution,[clarification needed] adopted on 31 January 1924 by the Second Congress of Soviets of the USSR.

One of the early ambitious economic plans of the Soviet government was GOELRO, Russian abbreviation for "State Commission for Electrification of Russia" (Государственная комиссия по электрификации России), which sought to achieve total electrification of the entire country. Soviet propaganda declared the plan was basically fulfilled by 1931.[35] The national power output per year stood at 1.9 billion kWh in Imperial Russia in 1913, and Lenin's goal of 8.8 billion kWh was reached in 1931. National power output continued to increase significantly. It reached 13.5 billion kWh by the end of the first five-year plan in 1932, 36 billion kWh by 1937, and 48 billion kWh by 1940.[36]

Paragraph 3 of Chapter 1 of the 1925 Constitution of the RSFSR stated the following:[37]

By the will of the peoples of the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic, who decided on the formation of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics during the Tenth All-Russian Congress of Soviets, the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic, being a part of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, devolves to the Union the powers which according to Article 1 of the Constitution of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics are included within the scope of responsibilities of the government bodies of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

1930s

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The Russian SFSR in 1936

Many regions in Russia were affected by the Soviet famine of 1932–1933: Volga, Central Black Soil Region, North Caucasus, the Urals, the Crimea, part of Western Siberia, and the Kazakh ASSR. With the adoption of the 1936 Soviet Constitution on 5 December 1936, the size of the RSFSR was significantly reduced. The Kazakh ASSR and Kirghiz ASSR were transformed into the Kazakh SSR (now Kazakhstan) and Kirghiz Soviet Socialist Republic (Kyrgyzstan). The former Karakalpak Autonomous Socialist Soviet Republic was transferred to the Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic (Uzbekistan).

The final name for the republic during the Soviet era was adopted by the Russian Constitution of 1937, which renamed it the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR).

1940s

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See also: Eastern Front (World War II) and Great Patriotic War (term)
 
The Russian SFSR in 1940

Just four months after Operation Barbarossa, the Wehrmacht was quickly advancing through the Russian SFSR, and was approximately 10 miles (16 km) away from Moscow. However, after the defeat in the Battle of Moscow and the Soviet winter offensive, the Germans were pushed back. In 1942, the Wehrmacht entered Stalingrad. Despite a deadly five-month battle in which the Soviets suffered over 1,100,000 casualties, they achieved victory following the surrender of the last German troops near the Volga River, ultimately pushing German forces out of Russia by 1944.

In 1943, Karachay Autonomous Oblast was dissolved by Joseph Stalin (1878–1953), General Secretary of the Communist Party, later Premier, when the Karachays were exiled to Central Asia for their alleged collaboration with the invading Germans in the Great Patriotic War (World War II, 1941–1945), and territory was incorporated into the Georgian SSR.

On 3 March 1944, on the orders of Stalin, the Chechen-Ingush ASSR was disbanded and its population forcibly deported upon the accusations of collaboration with the invaders and separatism. The territory of the ASSR was divided between other administrative units of Russian SFSR and the Georgian SSR.

On 11 October 1944, the Tuvan People's Republic was joined with the Russian SFSR as the Tuvan Autonomous Oblast, becoming an Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic in 1961.

After reconquering Estonia and Latvia in 1944, the Russian SFSR annexed their easternmost territories around Ivangorod and within the modern Pechorsky and Pytalovsky Districts in 1944–1945.

 
The Battle of Stalingrad, considered by many historians as a decisive turning point of World War II

At the end of World War II Soviet troops of the Red Army occupied southern Sakhalin Island and the Kuril Islands off the coast of East Asia, north of Japan, making them part of the RSFSR. The status of the southernmost Kurils, north of Hokkaido of the Japanese home islands remains in dispute with Japan and the United States following the peace treaty of 1951 ending the state of war.

On 17 April 1946, the Kaliningrad Oblast – the north-eastern portion of the former Kingdom of Prussia, the founding state of the German Empire (1871–1918) and later the German province of East Prussia including the capital and Baltic seaport city of Königsberg – was annexed by the Soviet Union and made part of the Russian SFSR.

1950s

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The Russian SFSR in 1956–1991

After the death of Joseph Stalin on 5 March 1953, Georgy Malenkov became the new leader of the USSR. In January 1954, Malenkov transferred Crimea from the Russian SFSR to the Ukrainian SSR. On 8 February 1955, Malenkov was officially demoted to deputy Prime Minister. As First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party, Nikita Khrushchev's authority was significantly enhanced by Malenkov's demotion.

The Karelo-Finnish SSR was transferred back to the RSFSR as the Karelian ASSR in 1956.

On 9 January 1957, Karachay Autonomous Oblast and Chechen-Ingush Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic were restored by Khrushchev and they were transferred from the Georgian SSR back to the Russian SFSR.

1960s–1980s

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Ethnographic map of the Soviet Union, 1970

In 1964, Nikita Khrushchev was removed from his position of power and replaced with Leonid Brezhnev. Under his rule, the Russian SFSR and the rest of the Soviet Union went through a mass era of stagnation. Even after Brezhnev's death in 1982, the era did not end until Mikhail Gorbachev took power in March 1985 and introduced liberal reforms in Soviet society.

On 12 April 1978, a new Constitution of Russia was adopted.[38]

Early 1990s

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Main articles: Declaration of State Sovereignty of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, 1991 Soviet coup d'etat attempt, Belovezh Accords, and 1993 Russian constitutional crisis

On 29 May 1990, at his third attempt, Boris Yeltsin was elected the chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR. The Congress of People's Deputies of the Republic adopted the Declaration of State Sovereignty of the Russian SFSR on 12 June 1990, which was the beginning of the "War of Laws", pitting the Soviet Union against the Russian Federation and other constituent republics.

 
Flag adopted by the Russian SFSR national parliament in 1991

On 17 March 1991, an all-Russian referendum created the post of President of the RSFSR and on 12 June, Boris Yeltsin was elected president by popular vote.

During the unsuccessful 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt of 19–21 August 1991 in Moscow, the capital of the Soviet Union and Russia, Yeltsin strongly supported the President of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev. On 23 August, Yeltsin, in the presence of Gorbachev, signed a decree suspending all activity by the Communist Party of the Russian SFSR in the territory of Russia.[39] On 6 November, he went further, banning the Communist Parties of the USSR and the RSFSR in the RSFSR.[40]

On 8 December 1991, at Viskuli near Brest (Belarus), Yeltsin, Ukrainian President Leonid Kravchuk and Belarusian leader Stanislav Shushkevich signed the "Agreement on the Establishment of the Commonwealth of Independent States", known in media as the Belovezh Accords. The document, consisting of a preamble and fourteen articles, stated that the Soviet Union no longer existed "as a subject of international law and geopolitical reality". However, based on the historical community of peoples and relations between the three states, as well as bilateral treaties, the desire for a democratic rule of law, the intention to develop their relations based on mutual recognition and respect for state sovereignty, the parties agreed to the formation of the Commonwealth of Independent States. On 12 December, the agreement was ratified by the Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR by an overwhelming majority: 188 votes for, 6 against and 7 abstentions.[41] The legality of this ratification raised doubts among some members of the Russian parliament, since according to the Constitution of the RSFSR of 1978 consideration of this document was in the exclusive jurisdiction of the Congress of People's Deputies of the RSFSR.[42][43][44][45] However, by this time the Soviet government had been rendered more or less impotent, and was in no position to object. On the same day, the Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR denounced the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR and recalled all Russian deputies from the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union. A number of lawyers believe that the denunciation of the union treaty was meaningless since it became invalid in 1924 with the adoption of the first constitution of the USSR.[46][47][48] Although the 12 December vote is sometimes reckoned as the moment that the RSFSR seceded from the collapsing Soviet Union, this is not the case. It appears that the RSFSR took the line that it did not need to follow the secession process delineated in the Soviet Constitution because it was not possible to secede from a country that no longer existed.

On 24 December, Yeltsin informed the Secretary-General of the United Nations that by agreement of the member states of the CIS the Russian Federation would assume the membership of the Soviet Union in all UN organs (including the Soviet Union's permanent seat on the UN Security Council). Russia took full responsibility for all the rights and obligations of the USSR under the Charter of the United Nations, including the financial obligations, and assumed control over its nuclear stockpile and the armed forces; Soviet embassies abroad became Russian embassies.[11] On 25 December – just hours after Gorbachev resigned as president of the Soviet Union – the Russian SFSR was renamed the Russian Federation (Russia), reflecting that it was now a sovereign state with Yeltsin assuming the Presidency.[49] That same night, the Soviet flag was lowered and replaced with the tricolor. The Soviet Union officially ceased to exist the next day. The change was originally published on 6 January 1992 (Rossiyskaya Gazeta). According to law, during 1992, it was allowed to use the old name of the RSFSR for official business (forms, seals, and stamps).

On 21 April 1992, the Congress of People's Deputies of Russia approved the renaming of the RSFSR into the Russian Federation, by making appropriate amendments to the Constitution, which entered into force since publication on 16 May 1992.[50]

Government

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Main article: Government of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic
See also: List of leaders of the Russian SFSR

The Government was known officially as the Council of People's Commissars (1917–1946) and Council of Ministers (1946–1991). The first government was headed by Vladimir Lenin as Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the Russian SFSR and the last by Boris Yeltsin as both head of government and head of state under the title of president. The Russian SFSR was controlled by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union until the 1991 August coup, which prompted President Yeltsin to suspend the recently created Communist Party of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic.

Autonomous republics within the Russian SFSR

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Economy

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In the first years of the existence of the RSFSR, the doctrine of war communism became the starting point of the state's economic activity. In March 1921, at the X Congress of the RCP (B), the tasks of the policy of "war communism" were recognized by the country's leadership as fulfilled, and a new economic policy was introduced at Lenin's suggestion.

After the formation of the Soviet Union, the economy of the RSFSR became an integral part of the economy of the USSR. The economic program of the RSFSR (NEP) was continued in all union republics. The Gosplan (State General Planning Commission) of the RSFSR, which replaced GOELRO, was reorganized into the Gosplan of the USSR. His early task was to develop a unified national economic plan based on the electrification plan and to oversee the overall implementation of this plan.

Unlike the previous Russian constitutions, the 1978 Constitution devoted an entire chapter (Chapter II) to the description of the economic system of the RSFSR, which defined the types of property and indicated the goals of the economic tasks of the state.[51]

As noted by Corresponding Member RAS RAS V. I. Suslov, who took part in large-scale studies of the relationship between the economies of the republics of the USSR and the RSFSR in the late Soviet era: "The degree of inequality of economic exchange was very high, and Russia was always the losing side. The product created by Russia largely supported the consumption of other union republics".[52]

Culture

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See also: Culture of Russia

National holidays and symbols

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Main articles: Public holidays in Russia and Public holidays in the Soviet Union

The public holidays for the Russian SFSR included Defender of the Fatherland Day (23 February), which honors Russian men, especially those serving in the army; International Women's Day (8 March), which combines the traditions of Mother's Day and Valentine's Day; Spring and Labor Day (1 May); Victory Day; and like all other Soviet republics, the Great October Socialist Revolution (7 November).

Victory Day is the second most popular holiday in Russia as it commemorates the victory over Nazism in the Great Patriotic War. A huge military parade, hosted by the President of Russia, is annually organised in Moscow on Red Square. Similar parades take place in all major Russian cities and cities with the status Hero City or City of Military Glory.

 
Matryoshka doll taken apart

During its 76-year existence, the Russian SFSR anthem was the same as the Soviet anthem (unlike other republics): The Internationale until 1944 and then the State Anthem of the USSR. In 1990, the RSFSR adopted its own separate anthem called Patrioticheskaya Pesnya, which went on to become the anthem of independent Russia since 1991. In 2000, Vladimir Putin re-introduced the Soviet anthem. The motto "Workers of the world, unite!" was commonly used and shared with other Soviet republics. The hammer and sickle and the full Soviet coat of arms are still widely seen in Russian cities as part of architectural decorations. The Soviet red stars are also encountered, often on military equipment and war memorials. The Red Banner continues to be honored, especially the Banner of Victory of 1945.

The Matryoshka doll is a recognizable symbol of the Russian SFSR (and the Soviet Union as a whole) and the towers of Moscow Kremlin and Saint Basil's Cathedral in Moscow are Russian SFSR's main architectural icons. Chamomile is the national flower while birch is the national tree. The Russian bear is an animal symbol and a national personification of Russia. Though this image has a Western origin, Russians themselves have accepted it. The native Soviet Russian national personification is Mother Russia.

Flag history

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Main article: Flag of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic

The flag of the Russian SFSR changed numerous times, with the original being a field of red with the Russian name of the republic written on the flag's centre in white. This flag had always been intended to be temporary, as it was changed less than a year after its adoption. The second flag had the letters РСФСР (RSFSR) written in yellow within the canton and encased within two yellow lines forming a right angle. The next flag was used from 1937, notably during World War II. Interesting because it was used until Stalin's death when a major vexillological reform was undertaken within the Soviet Union. This change incorporated an update for all the flags of the Soviet Republics as well as for the flag of the Soviet Union itself. The flag of the Russian SFSR was now a defaced version of the flag of the Soviet Union, with the main difference being a minor repositioning of the hammer and sickle and most notably adding a blue vertical stripe to the hoist. This version of the flag was used from 1954 all the way to 1991, where it was changed due to the ongoing collapse of the Soviet Union. The flag was changed to a design that resembled the original ensign of the Tsardom of Russia and the Russian Empire, with a notable difference of the flag ratio being 1:2 instead of the original 2:3 ratio. After 1993, when the Soviet form of government was officially dissolved in the Russian Federation, the flag of the Russian Federation was changed to the original civil ensign with its original 2:3 proportions.

Bibliographies

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Notes

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  1. ^ Russian: Российская Советская Федеративная Социалистическая Республика, IPA: [rɐˈsʲijskəjə sɐˈvʲetskəjə fʲɪdʲɪrɐˈtʲivnəjə sətsɨəlʲɪˈsʲtʲitɕɪskəjə rʲɪˈspublʲɪkə] ⓘ
  2. ^ Later used as a national flag of the Russian Federation until 1993.

References

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  1. ^ After the October Revolution, the Bolsheviks, the Left SRs, and the Menshevik-Internationalists formed a Socialist coalition government that lasted until March 1918 (Historical Dictionary of the Russian Revolution. J. Davis. p. 58); the Mensheviks were allowed to legally hold a congress in 1920 and continued to be elected to the Congress of Soviets until being outlawed in 1921 (Lenin's Legacy. R. Wesson, 1978).
  2. ^ a b c Конституции РСФСР 1918 г. Archived 2 July 2018 at the Wayback Machine (in Russian). Hist.msu.ru. Retrieved on 22 June 2011.
  3. ^ a b c Besier, Gerhard; Stokłosa, Katarzyna (2014). European Dictatorships: A Comparative History of the Twentieth Century. Cambridge Scholars Publishing. p. 67. ISBN 9781443855211.
  4. ^ Declaration of Rights of the laboring and exploited people (original VTsIK variant Archived 7 August 2011 at the Wayback Machine, III Congress revision), article I.
  5. ^ a b c d The Free Dictionary Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic Archived 13 August 2011 at the Wayback Machine. Encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com. Retrieved on 22 June 2011.
  6. ^ Peterson, James A.; Clarke, James W. "Petroleum Geology and Resources of the Volga-Ural Province, U.S.S.R." (PDF). Pubs.USGS.gov. 1983, U.S. Department of the Interior – U.S. Geological Survey. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2 April 2015. Retrieved 11 March 2015.
  7. ^ Sokolov, Vasily Andreevich (2002). Petroleum. Honolulu: University Press of the Pacific. p. 183. ISBN 0898757258. Archived from the original on 2 April 2015. Retrieved 11 March 2015.
  8. ^ Article 76
  9. ^ Article 72
  10. ^ The names Russian Federation and Russia have been equal since 25 December 1993
  11. ^ a b Letter to the Secretary-General of the United Nations from the President of the Russian Federation
  12. ^ Mawdsley, Evan (2007). "Sovdepia: The Soviet Zone, October 1917 – November 1918". The Russian Civil War. Pegasus Books. p. 70. ISBN 9781933648156. Retrieved 25 January 2014. The Bolsheviks' enemies gave the name 'Sovdepia' to the area under the authority of the Soviets of Workers' and Peasants' Deputies. The comic-opera term was intended to mock [...].
  13. ^ Note especially: Patenaude, Bertrand M. (2002). The Big Show in Bololand: The American Relief Expedition to Soviet Russia in the Famine of 1921. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press. p. 687. ISBN 0804744939. Retrieved 16 April 2024. [Turrou] had succeeded in gaining the confidence of the Soviet leaders and had thus been able to learn the inside story about Bolo affairs.
  14. ^ "Bolo". Oxford English Dictionary (Online ed.). Oxford University Press. (Subscription or participating institution membership required.) - "Misused for: a Bolshevik. Also collective singular = the Bolshevists. Also attributive."
  15. ^ a b Service, Robert (2005). A History of Modern Russia from Nicholas II to Vladimir Putin. Harvard University Press. p. 84. ISBN 9780674018013.
  16. ^ a b Soviet Russia information Archived 26 August 2010 at the Wayback Machine. Russians.net (23 August 1943). Retrieved on 22 June 2011.
  17. ^ Carr, EH The Bolshevik Revolution 1917–23, vol. 3 Penguin Books, London, 4th reprint (1983), pp. 257–258. The draft treaty was published for propaganda purposes in the 1921 British document Intercourse between Bolshevism and Sinn Féin (Cmd 1326).
  18. ^ White, Matthew (2012). The Great Big Book of Horrible Things. W. W. Norton. p. 368. ISBN 978-0-393-08192-3.
  19. ^ Chronicle of Events Archived 27 July 2011 at the Wayback Machine. Marxistsfr.org. Retrieved on 22 June 2011.
  20. ^ "Russia the Great: Mineral resources". Russian Information Network. Archived from the original on 19 January 2011. Retrieved 22 November 2010.
  21. ^ Shukman, Harold (5 December 1994). The Blackwell Encyclopedia of the Russian Revolution. John Wiley & Sons. p. 343. ISBN 978-0-631-19525-2.
  22. ^ Bergman, Jay (2019). The French Revolutionary Tradition in Russian and Soviet Politics, Political Thought, and Culture. Oxford University Press. p. 224. ISBN 978-0-19-884270-5.
  23. ^ McMeekin, Sean (30 May 2017). The Russian Revolution: A New History. Basic Books. pp. 1–496. ISBN 978-0-465-09497-4.
  24. ^ Ikov, Marat Sal. "Round Table the Influence Of National Relations on the Development of the Federative State Structure and on the Social and Political Realities of the Russian Federation". Prof.Msu.RU. Retrieved 9 February 2021. However, historically, the first proclamation of the federation was made somewhat earlier – by the Constituent Assembly of Russia. In his short resolution of 6 (18) January 1918, the following was enshrined: 'In the name of the peoples, the state of the Russian constituent, the All-Russian Constituent Assembly decides: the Russian state is proclaimed by the Russian Democratic Federal Republic, uniting peoples and regions in an indissoluble union, within the limits established by the federal constitution. Of course, the above resolution, which did not thoroughly regulate the entire system of federal relations, was not considered by the authorities as having legal force, especially after the dissolution of the Constituent Assembly.'
  25. ^ Deutscher, Isaac (1954). The Prophet Armed Trotsky 1879-1921 (1954). Oxford University Press. pp. 330–336.
  26. ^ Abramovitch, Raphael R. (1985). The Soviet Revolution, 1917-1939. International Universities Press. p. 130.
  27. ^ Adams, Katherine H.; Keene, Michael L. (10 January 2014). After the Vote Was Won: The Later Achievements of Fifteen Suffragists. McFarland. p. 109. ISBN 978-0-7864-5647-5.
  28. ^ Ugri͡umov, Aleksandr Leontʹevich (1976). Lenin's Plan for Building Socialism in the USSR, 1917–1925. Novosti Press Agency Publishing House. p. 48.
  29. ^ Service, Robert (24 June 1985). Lenin: A Political Life: Volume 1: The Strengths of Contradiction. Springer. p. 98. ISBN 978-1-349-05591-3.
  30. ^ Courtois, Stéphane; Werth, Nicolas; Panné, Jean-Louis; Paczkowski, Andrzej; Bartošek, Karel; Margolin, Jean-Louis (1999). The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression. Harvard University Press. p. 123. ISBN 9780674076082. Archived from the original on 27 June 2018. Retrieved 5 May 2019.
  31. ^ R. W. Davies; Mark Harrison; S. G. Wheatcroft (9 December 1993). The Economic Transformation of the Soviet Union, 1913–1945. Cambridge University Press. p. 6. ISBN 978-0-521-45770-5.
  32. ^ Lih, Lars T. (1990). "8 Leaving Troubled Times". Bread and Authority in Russia, 1914-1921. UC Press E-Books Collection, 1982-2004. Archived from the original on 27 October 2021. Retrieved 27 October 2021.
  33. ^ "Source List and Detailed Death Tolls for the Primary Megadeaths of the Twentieth Century". Necrometrics. February 2011. Retrieved 12 December 2017.
  34. ^ Christian, David (1997). Imperial and Soviet Russia. London: Macmillan Press Ltd. p. 236. ISBN 0-333-66294-6.
  35. ^ Развитие электроэнергетики в СССР (к 80летию плана ГОЭЛРО) (in Russian). Archived from the original on 22 October 2018. Retrieved 8 April 2013.
  36. ^ Никитин, Олег (February 2010). Плюс электрификация. Forbes (in Russian).
  37. ^ Constitution (Basic Law) of the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic (approved by Twelfth All-Russian Congress of Soviets on 11 May 1925).
  38. ^ The Constitution (Basic Law) of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic.
  39. ^ Decree of the President of the Russian SFSR of 23 August 1991 No. 79
  40. ^ Decree of the President of the Russian SFSR 06.11. 1991 N169 "On activity of the CPSU and the Communist Party of the Russian SFSR"
  41. ^ Francis X. Clines, "Gorbachev is Ready to Resign as Post-Soviet Plan Advances", The New York Times, 13 December 1991.
  42. ^ V.Pribylovsky, Gr.Tochkin . Kto i kak uprazdnil SSSR
  43. ^ Из СССР В СНГ: подчиняясь реальности
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  45. ^ Воронин Ю. М. Беловежское предательство Archived 12 August 2020 at the Wayback Machine
  46. ^ Исаков В. Б. Расчленёнка. Кто и как развалил Советский Союз: Хроника. Документы. — М., Закон и право. 1998. — C. 58. — 209 с.
  47. ^ Станкевич З. А. История крушения СССР: политико-правовые аспекты. — М., 2001. — C. 299—300
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  49. ^ Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR approved the Law of the RSFSR #2094-I of 25 December 1991 "On renaming of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic" Archived 20 May 2009 at the Wayback Machine // Congress of People's Deputies of the Russian SFSR and Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR Daily. – 1992. – No. 2. – Article 62
  50. ^ Закон Российской Федерации от 21 апреля 1992 года № 2708-I «Об изменениях и дополнениях Конституции (Основного Закона) Российской Советской Федеративной Социалистической Республики» // «Российская газета», 16 мая 1992 года, № 111 (447), с. 3–5
  51. ^ "Конституция РСФСР в редакции от 12 апреля 1978 г." constitution.garant.ru. Retrieved 17 November 2021.
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