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Soviet Union [USSR] Khrushchev's Reforms and Fall
Throughout his years of leadership, Khrushchev attempted to
carry out reform in a range of fields. The problems of Soviet
agriculture, a major concern of Khrushchev's, had earlier attracted
the attention of the collective leadership, which introduced
important innovations in this area of the Soviet economy. The state
encouraged peasants to grow more on their private plots, increased
payments for crops grown on the collective farms, and invested more
heavily in agriculture. In his dramatic
virgin land campaign (see Glossary) in the mid-1950s, Khrushchev
opened to farming vast
tracts of land in the northern part of the Kazakh Republic and
neighboring areas of the Russian Republic. These new farmlands
turned out to be susceptible to droughts, but in some years they
produced excellent harvests. Later innovations by Khrushchev,
however, proved counterproductive. His plans for growing maize and
increasing meat and dairy production failed miserably, and his
reorganization of collective farms into larger units produced
confusion in the countryside.
Khrushchev's reforms in industry and administrative
organization created even greater problems. In a politically
motivated move to weaken the central state bureaucracy, in 1957
Khrushchev did away with the industrial ministries in Moscow and
replaced them with regional economic councils. Although Khrushchev
intended these economic councils to be more responsive to local
needs, the decentralization of industry led to disruption and
inefficiency. Connected with this decentralization was Khrushchev's
decision in 1962 to reorganize party organizations along economic,
rather than administrative, lines. The resulting bifurcation of the
party apparatus into industrial and agricultural sectors at the
oblast (see Glossary) level and below contributed to the disarray
and alienated many party officials at all levels. Symptomatic of
the country's economic difficulties was the abandonment in 1963 of
Khrushchev's special seven-year economic plan (1959-65) two years
short of its completion.
By 1964 Khrushchev's prestige had been injured in a number of
areas. Industrial growth slowed, while agriculture showed no new
progress. Abroad, the split with China, the Berlin crisis, and the
Cuban fiasco hurt the Soviet Union's international stature, and
Khrushchev's efforts to improve relations with the West antagonized
many in the military. Lastly, the 1962 party reorganization caused
turmoil throughout the Soviet political chain of command. In
October 1964, while Khrushchev was vacationing in Crimea, the
Presidium voted him out of office and refused to permit him to take
his case to the Central Committee. Khrushchev retired as a private
citizen after his successors denounced him for his "hare-brained
schemes, half-baked conclusions, and hasty decisions." Yet along
with his failed policies, Khrushchev must also be remembered for
his public disavowal of Stalinism and the cult of personality.
Data as of May 1989
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