6533b839fe1ef96bd12a6dfa

RESEARCH PRODUCT

Agricultural Policy and the Struggle over the Destiny of Collective Farms in Estonia

subject

description

The principal goal of several Estonian governments has been the privatization of agriculture, replacing large collective farms with western family farms. This has happened despite a clear majority of kolkhoz and sovkhoz workers who favoured preserving the system of large-scale farms. The abstract restitutionalist and ultra-liberalist ideas became a fixed dogma, unconnected with resolving immediate pragmatic problems, because government policy was not articulated with the interests of the agricultural population. Nevertheless, the large-scale system has been partially preserved thanks to the resistance of the rural population. In many respects the outcome of decollectivization also depended on inner struggles on the farm. These struggles were fought between two nationwide networks, the ‘old guard’ (who held posts in the Soviet administrative system) and the ‘new guard’ (which arose from the nationalist movement). This struggle contributed to the destructive character of decollectivization.