FINAL REPORT TO NATIONAL COUNCIL FOR SOVIET AND EAST EUROPEAN RESEARCH
"Career Patterns in the TITLE: Soviet Bureaucracy, 1917-1941"
AUTHOR: J. Arch Getty William Chase
CONTRACTOR: University of California, Riverside
PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR: J. Arch Getty
COUNCIL CONTRACT NUMBER: 628-3
DATE: January 10, 1986
The work leading to this report was supported by funds provided by the National Council for Soviet and East European Research.
THE NATIONAL COUNCIL FOR SOVIET AND EAST EUROPEAN RESEARCH
Edward L. Keenan Suite 304 Chairman, Board of Trustees 1755 Massachusetts Avenue, N.W. Vladimir I. Toumanoff Washington, D.C. 20036 Executive Director (202) 387-0168
INTRODUCTORY NOTE
This paper is an interim progress report at the end of two years of a three year project intended to:
(1) assemble, test, and disseminate a computerized data bank of biographical and career information on approximately 30,000 Soviet Government and Party officials over the period 1917-1941; (2) analyze the structure and operation of the Soviet bureaucracy in that period. Preliminary findings are presented here, and the authors hope to present a Final Report analyzing changes in the bureaucracy in late 1986. Thereafter the full data bank will be made available to the scholarly community and general public by deposit with the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Science Research (at the University of Michigan) and the State Data Bank at the University of California, Berkeley.
The project is being funded jointly by the National Council, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Fund for the Eighties
BOARD OF TRUSTEES: George Breslauer; Herbert J. Ellison; Sheila Fitzpatrick; Edward A. Hewett; David Joravsky; Edward L. Keenan (Chairman); Andrzej Korbonski; Herbert S. Levine; Leon S. Lipson (Vice Chairman); Paul Marer; Daniel C. Matuszewski; Alfred G. Meyer; Marshall D. Shulman; Vladimir I. Toumanoff; Richard S. Wortman
SUMMARY
Despite the significant number of studies of aspects of the
Soviet state and Communist Party bureaucracies in the inter-war period, few works employ aggregate analysis as a means of examining and understanding the overall patterns, behaviors, relationships and internal structure of these bureaucracies during this formative period. This study, which is based on a partially completed data bank containing officeholding and biographical data of Soviet bureaucrats, applies aggregate analysis to selected aspects of bureaucratic practices and behavior from 1925 to 1931. The years 1925, 1927,
1929 and 1931 were chosen for analysis and data were drawn primarily from Vsia Mo3kva, the Moscow city directory. For substantive and methodological reasons, this analysis is restricted to three issues:
(1) multiple officeholding and persistence (conversely turnover) as examples of aggregate behavior; (2) the extent and nature of "family circles"; and (3) the structure of the Central Committee. Because the data base on which this analysis is based is only partially completed, this is not a full-scale study of the state and party bureaucracies but rather a series of diagnostic probes and systematic observations.
Given the well-known shortage of competent and politically reliable administrators in the 1920s and early 1930s, one might expect multiple officeholding to be common. Yet an analysis of multiple officeholding by national and RSFSR party and state bureaucrats reveals that it was, in fact, quite uncommon — less than 20% held more than one office. Although the exception among all officeholders, multiple officeholding by the bureaucracies' top leaders was somewhat more frequent. Nonetheless, more than 93% of the top leaders held only Page 2 one or two offices simultaneously. Despite the rarity of multiple officeholding, the proportion of officials and especially top leaders who held more than one office grew steadily between 1925 and 1931.
One of the most striking features of the USSR and RSFSR bureaucracies during this period is the startling low level of persistence and high rate of turnover among officials — only 11% of officials in selected USSR state agencies and 5% in selected RSFSR agencies held their position for six years. Among those agencies' leading personnel the persistence rate was comparable — 14% and 4% respectively. Precisely why the persistence rate among RSFSR officials was so low is unclear, but one possible explanation can definitely be eliminated — RSFSR officials were not moving into USSR-level positions. The RSFSR commissariats were not a training ground for USSR offices; on the contrary, the two were separate career tracks.
An examination of biannual turnover rates revealed that turnover was high (64%) in 1925-1927, lower (43%) in 1927-1929, and highest
(77%) in 1929-1931. Although political purging (i.e. of Left and Right
Oppositionists) accounts for some of the turnover, it was considerably less significant than structural factors. One fact is incontestable — high rate of turnover meant that the vast majority of bureaucrats, including top leaders, were new to and inexperienced in their jobs. The result was undeniably confusion, inefficiency, and dysfunctional behavior. One can not help but wonder how a bureaucracy in chaos managed to govern effectively.
To reduce the inefficiency which turnover bred, one might expect that top bureaucratic leaders brought with them to their new positions a coterie of experienced, competent and reliable administrators, a Page 3
"family circle". But the evidence clearly indicates that family circles were virtually unknown until 1929, and even during 1929-1931 were few in number and usually very small. In some cases, personal secretaries comprised the entire "family". These circles, even the largest ones, were especially small given the population at risk. In those family circles which did exist, the members' experience suggests that the circles were primarily functional rather than political in nature.
Our examination of the Central Committee reveals that, unlike the low rate of persistence within state agencies, persistence among
Central Committee members was several orders of magnitude higher. In fact, the Central Committee during 1925-1931 was fairly stable.
Demotions from or within the Central Committee were nearly always related to factional/oppositional membership rather than structural changes. Robert Daniels' finding that the Central Committee was selected from bureaucratic constituencies is correct. Despite it3 remarkable structural consistency, two constituencies within the
Central Committee received preferential treatment when it came to promotions during this period — regional party secretaries and
Vesenkha (Supreme Council of National Economy) presidium members.
The rise of the regional party secretaries during this period was
probably related to the process and regional needs of
collectivization. To ensure the successful implementation of that
policy, it was necessary to give regional secretaries more power. The
increased importance of Vesenkha presidium members undoubtedly
reflected the Central Committee's increased concern with implementing
it3 newly adopted economic policies, especially industrialization. The Page 4 promotion of both Vesenkha and regional party secretaries suggests that the structural arrangements of the Central Committee depended on economic goals and policies rather than on the whims of Stalin or others in selecting members. Introduction
Analyses of the Communist Party and Soviet state bureaucracies during the interwar years are common to Soviet studies. Historians and political scientists have published numerous works which inform readers about the formation, evolution and structure of these bureaucracies. While all such studies focus on bureaucracy to understand the structure of power, they utilize a variety of approaches. Some seek to demonstrate the role of the bureaucracies in the formation of totalitarianism, others come to the subject armed with interest group theory, and still others employ traditional political narrative. Irrespective of the approach used, all these studies of necessity focus to some extent on structure. Yet most confine their analyses to content and behavior, usually the membership and behavior of one or, at best, a few agencies.
Another approach is to analyze the overall structure of the bureaucracy. One need not be a Straussian to recognize that structure is important in its own right. This study will not argue that the
Communist Party's or the Soviet state's bureaucracy was a determining factor in anything. Rather it emphasizes structure as a research strategy which seeks to expose aggregate patterns. Aggregate analysis is relatively new to Soviet studies. Few works exist which deal with overall patterns, behaviors, relationships and internal structure of the party and state bureaucracies during their formative years. Yet aggregate analysis of selected aspects of officeholding can provide some answers to longstanding questions and raise new questions about these bureaucracies.
This paper confines itself to the period 1925-1931 for both Page 2 substantive and methodological reasons. These years span a period of profound political importance and major upheavals in Soviet society associated with the fall of a moderate political leadership, the rise of Stalin, the collectivization of agriculture, the end of the New
Economic Policy experiment in market socialism, the beginnings of planned industrialization, and a cultural revolution. In one way or another, the party and state bureaucracies were affected by and involved in these events. Overall changes in the structure, composition and behavioralpatterns withi n these bureaucracies provide another vantage point from which to observe this important period.
Methodological and evidentiary issues also accounted for the choice of this period. The data needed to sustain aggregate analysis were available. Specifically, our data consist of listings of bureaucratic personnel in national and RSFSR level agencies from 1925 to 1931 taken from Vsia Moskva, the Moscow city directory. This study is part of a long-term project to construct a computerized data bank of officeholding and biographical information on members of the party and state bureaucracies from 1917 to 1941. The data bank is still in the process of creation; as of this writing, it is about 40% completed. But when it is finished, it will house officeholding data on all bureaucrats listed in Vsia Moskva who served in the USSR,
RSFSR, and Moscow province, city and raion-level bureaucracies. The data base will also house biographical information on several thousand of these bureaucrats.
The data analyzed in this paper are drawn from the Vsia Moskva listings for 1925, 1927, 1929 and 1931.[1] (For a discussion of Vsia
Moskva, see Appendix A.) Although this represents but a portion of the Page 3 data in the data bank, we have confined ourselves to this data for several reasons. First, the data is complete and ha3 been statistically verified. While a large volume of officeholding data drawn from other sources is in the data bank, some of it remains unverified and not all of the data from these sources has ben eentered. Therefore, we have limited the sources for our analysis.
Second, the data bank contains extensive biographical information on many officeholers, but that data is either incomplete or has not been verified. Hence any analysis of it would contain a significant bias though of an undetermined nature.
Our analysis is divided into three sections which examine (1) multiple officeholding and persistence (and conversely turnover) as examples of aggregate behavior in the upper echelons of the national and, in some cases, RSFSR bureaucracies; (2) the extent and nature of
"family circles"; and (3) the structure of the Central Committee. This is not a full-scale analysis of the party and state bureaucracies' structure and behavior during 1925-1931, nor is it a systematic analysis of the leading members' behavior. Rather it is a series of diagnostic probes and systematic observations of some aspects of those
bureaucracies and the aggregate behavior of their members. Much more data and study are necessary before a complete picture of these
bureaucracies is possible, but hopefully the contours of change and
patterns of behavior which emerge from our probe3 and analysis
resemble the fundamental tendencies.
Multiple Officeholding Page 4
One might expect that the well known shortage of competent and politically reliable administrators in the 1920s and early 1930s would lead to a high incidence of multiple officeholding, as the regime tried to fill as many positions as possible from a limited pool of qualified and acceptable personnel. Indeed, some of the highest leaders held many positions simultaneously. M.I. Kalinin, chairman of the soviet apparatus, held ten distinct posts in 1925. Bolshevik industrial commissar V.V. Kuibyshev must also have been busy in 1927 as he dashed to and from meetings of the twelve diverse departments, agencies, and commissions in which he worked.
Yet when one looks at the leadership as a whole, the statistical patterns of individual officeholding suggest that multiple officeholding was not the rule, and was common only at the highest levels of the state and party bureaucratic apparatuses. Information on multiple officeholding in this period is presented in Tables 3 and M.
Two things stand out. First, the vast majority — more than 80 percent — of officeholders held only one office at a time. Second, while the proportions of individuals holding the same number of jobs in these two years appear similar, there was a steady increase in the number of persons who held two positions simultaneously. The proportion of persons with two positions doubled in the period. If we narrow our focus to the higher echelons of the bureaucracy (Table 4), we find the same trend. This makes sense: we would not expect bureaucrats who held mid- or low-level management positions to have more than one job; and if we expected multiple officeholding we would expect it among top level leaders.
Clearly, within the leadership as a whole, multiple officeholding Page 5 was uncommon in this period and was evident only at the top of the
bureaucracy. There was a tendency over time, however, for
officeholders to occupy more than one post. Again, this tendency was
most pronounced at the top of the hierarchy. The points to note are
that multiple officeholding was not the rule and that the
possibilities of interlocking directorates were axiomatically limited
to a small segment of the bureaucratic apparatus.
It seems reasonable to assume that multiple officeholding is
related to the availability of acceptable personnel. A perceived
shortage of competent (and/or politically reliable) administrative
talent would predictably lead to a growth in multiple officeholding.
In the late twenties, this growth proceeded steadily.
One could argue that the regime's political control would
increase as its individual members controlled more of the levers of
power and that multiple officeholding might seem politically desirable
to the elite. Yet there is no reason to believe that the regime found
this practice attractive from a functional point of view. An official
with two or more jobs was probably unable to devote full attention to
any one of them. Party pronouncements in the 1930s on making
administrators more responsible for successful task implementation, on
strengthening government staffs with "new men", and on freeing party
secretaries from the details of economic administration show that the
leadership wa3 sensitive to such functional questions.
The growth of multiple officeholding at the end of the New
Economic Policy may have been symptomatic of a shortage of experienced
personnel in times of industrial expansion and the implementation of a
planned economy. The increase in the practice may therefore have been Page 6 a response to particular problems as much as an active attempt to ensure that members of the inner circle dominated key positions. To further investigate the nature and parameters of officeholding in the
Soviet bureaucracy and to understand the administrative environment which the Bolsheviks faced, it is necessary to look further into the dynamics and patterns of the bureaucracy. For example, the length of time one held an office is as important as the number of offices one held in understanding the overall structure of the bureaucracy. To study these patterns might help to explain the Bolsheviks' approach to the problem of government.
Persistence
We are accustomed to thinking of the NEP as a period of relative job stability and of long tenures in office. N.I. Bukharin edited
Pravda for twelve years until 1929. V.V. Shmidt was Commissar of Labor for a dozen years after the revolution, and A.V. Lunacharskii ran the
Commissariat of Enlightenment continuously in the same period. Our conception has been that with the exception of occasional demotions of
Trotskyists from the Central Committee, job stability and tenure were relatively high until Stalin's revolution of 1929-1931 removed the NEP political establishment.
Yet our data clearly demonstrate that thi3 impression is incorrect. The state bureaucracy, especially in the early Stalin period, was a system through which large numbers of officials came and went with great frequency. The data show, for example, that the likelihood of a given person persisting even in the upper-levels of the bureaucracy was low and that officeholders moved in and out of the
V3ia Moskva-defined leadership stratum from one year to the next. Of Page 7
3,203 people in our sample whom we know held national office in either
1929 or 1931, 2,169 did so in 1929 and 1,470 in 1931. Yet, only 436 individuals (20.1% of all 1929 officeholders) held the same office in both 1929 and 1931, suggesting a generally low level of persistence.
Of the 436 individuals whom we know held the same office in both
1929 and 1931, 359 (82.3 percent) came from the upper echelon3. While this means that persisters were more likely to be top level officials, it is also the case that the top-level management of the state apparatus in 1931 had extraordinarily little experience in their positions. Only 359 of 903 top-staffers in 1931 (39.5 percent) had more than two consecutive year3 of experience at the upper levels.
Considering that the number of top-level positions did not increase markedly from 1929 to 1931, the change in the bureaucratic apparatus was clearly in personnel. Moreover, upper level persisters were more
likely to hold more than one office in both years than were members of
the group as a whole. Thu3, men with experience were spread even more
thinly in 1931 than in 1929.
The lack of persistence among 1929 officals suggests startling
mobility at the highest levels of the Soviet bureaucracy in this
period. Tables 5-11 provide a detailed breakdown of personnel turnover
within selected state agencies. The tables show the percentages of
officeholders in a given agency who had worked in the same agency in
previous years.
Table 5 examines 1925-1931 persistence within selected all-union
(USSR)agencies for persons of all ranks; Table 6 does the same for
agencies at the Russian Republic (RSFSR) level. These tables show
astonishingly high personnel turnover over the five year period. In Page 8
USSR agencies, fewer than 11% of the 1931 leaders and staffers had worked in the same agency five years before; in RSFSR agencies, the average figure was less than 5%.
Where was turnover greatest? Did the administrative staff remain the same despite political changes at the very top of the agency? Or was the reverse true? Was there stability in the top leadership while the lower staff renewed itself? To find out (and to control for the progressive underrepresentation of lower level officials in later editions of Vsia Moskva—see Table 1), we excluded ranks below department level in our calculations. Tables 7 and 8 evaluate the same years, levels, and agencies as Tables 5 and 5, but are limited to the higher ranks. The turnover rates are quite similar to those for all ranks and tend to confirm the data in Tables 5 and 6. It seems, therefore, that high levels of personnel turnover were common at all rank levels and that the reporting characteristics of Vsia Moskva do not seem to bias measurements of this kind. Both upper and lower leadership ranks seem to have suffered from the same high renewal rates over the period.
However, turnover was somewhat greater (6-10% higher) in RSFSR agencies than in those at the USSR level. It is difficult to account for this difference. One might hypothesize that RSFSR agencies served as training grounds for officials who then went on to USSR commissariats. Yet analyses of the previous positions of USSR state officials suggest that earlier service in RSFSR agencies was quite rare. Similarly, there were almost no cases in which officials held
USSR and RSFSR posts simultaneously (either in comparable or different commissariats). Thus careers in the republican and all-union state Page 9 agencies seem to have followed one or the other path, and the two levels represented separate and independent career tracks.
To refine our knowledge of turnover in the 1925-1931 period, we can break the span into three segments: 1925-27, 1927-29, and 1929-31.
Tables 9» 10, and 11 respectively show the levels of turnover in selected USSR agencies in this period. Of those in a particular agency in 1927, an average of 64% had not worked there two years before. The
"not in agency previously" average falls to 43% for 1927-29, and then rises again to 76% for 1929-1931.
We find, then, that turnover was high in 1925-27, lower in
1927-29 (but still nearly half), and then very high (over three-fourths) between 1929 and 1931. Given the bureaucratic purges and reorganizations related to the Stalin revolution of 1929-31
(expulsion of rightists, reassignment of personnel to cope with industrialization and collectivization, etc.) the high turnover in the latter period is explainable. It is harder to account for the varying turnover levels in the 1925-27 and 1927-29 periods.
It may be that these three periods of change were related to political purges. The relatively high 1925-27 turnover might well represent a purge of Trotskyists, the 1927-29 "low" turnover might be a period of stable NEP personnel, and the 1929-31 change a purge of rightists. This hypothesis is difficult to sustain. Although the completed data bank will contain extensive records on oppositioanl membership thereby allowing us to correlate it with personnel changes, at this time the data is incomplete. Even if it were complete, the hypothesis regarding the fluctuation in biannual turnover has another limitation. While many Trotskyists were demoted or transferred in Page 10
1925, others continued to hold their offices in Moscow until late 1927 when they were expelled from the party and exiled to the hintherlands of the USSR. If political purging were a primary factor in the high
turnover rate, one would expect that the 1927-1929 turnover rate would
be higher given that Vsia Moskva was always published in the first quarter of the year and hence the removal of Trotskyists in late 1927 would appear in the 1927-1929 turnover figure.
But even if we assume that all Trotskyist officeholders lost
their jobs in 1925 (a dubious assumption as noted above), political purging does not appear to explain the magnitude of the turnover. If we assume that political purging was not on the agenda in 1927-29,
turnover resulting from personnel shortages, bureaucratic confusion, and general administrative instability was nearly half. Were we to assume a "base line" turnover attributable to such long-term
structural factors of around 45%, then the difference between that
level and the levels in years associated with political purges
(1925-27, 1929-31 would be about 20-30$. This would mean that only about a quarter of all turnover would appear to be related to
political or factional issues. If these assumptions are accurate (and
there is ample reason to doubt them), then political purging was only half as important as structural personnel problems in explaining
turnover. To the extent that 1925-27 and 1929-31 were tumultuous years
because of economic factors, political considerations would be even
weaker in explaining turnover.
Top and middle-level management in those agencies in our sample
experienced considerable turnover. Three-quarters of the management in
these agencies had less than two years experience in that agency at Page 11 that level; 96% of them had less than five years experience. This suggests that the bureaucratic apparatus chronically lacked experience at the upper levels.[2]
One can only suspect that a bureaucracy in which personnel stability was so low could not have functioned smoothly or efficiently. It would appear difficult to characterize such a tumultuous administration as "totalitarian". Constant turnover, purging, and reassignment of administrative cadres must certainly have been the causes (or perhaps symptoms) of a bureaucracy in chaos.
"Family Circles" in the Bureaucracy
The numbers of leading officials who were nearly always new to their positions are staggering. It is difficult to understand how the government continued to function effectively, if indeed it did. We might suppose that the bureaucracy coped with such a chaotic situation through the use of cohesive patronage networks in the absence of a stable and effective personnel policy.
As in most political systems, patronage in the Soviet bureaucracy allows officials to create "family circles" of subordinate clients.
Family circles exist at all levels of Soviet society from individual units within enterprises all the way up to the Central Committee.
Without a large volume of "inside" information on the content and membership of family circles in the 1925-1931 period, it is difficult to measure their size or importance. One type of family circle which we can measure is composed of the group of clients which a major
leader brings with him when he move3 to a different agency. We have Page 12 long thought that Soviet officials carry a khvost, or bureaucratic tail, with them as they move from position to position. Theoretically, we should see the official taking key members of his client group from his old agency to his new one.[3]
But how common were family circles? Table 12 shows the movement of all-union commissars and chairmen of state agencies and lists the number of officials they carried with them in the 1925-31 period: the
"Tail" column shows the number of officials which the leader brought from his old agency to the new one.
In this period, there were 17 instances in which a USSR agency chairman or commissar moved from one agency to a new a different one.[4] Of the 17, 4 cannot be measured for lack of complete data at this stage of the project. Of the remaining 13 moves, one took place in 1925-27, two occurred in 1927-29, and ten happened in 1929-31.
Table 12 shows that bureaucratic "tails" were uncommon and when they did exist, were rather small.
Of the 13 instances of movement which we can measure, 4 involved no apparent tail. Another five consisted of tails with only one or two persons. All tails consisting of two or more persons — there were only five of these — existed in the 1929-31 period, which included 10 of the 13 measurable groups. This distribution tends to support the observations made above that most multiple officeholding, least persistence, and greatest turnover/reorganization took place in the
1929-31 period: the years of the Stalin revolution and the worst period of bureaucratic turmoil. Notwithstanding the relatively large number of 1929-31 tails, the practice does not seem to have been common even among top leaders. Page 13
Among those leaders who did bring groups with them, a common practice was to bring along one's personal secretary. Between 1927 and
1929, N. Uglanov became Commissar of Labor and brought one of his administrative assistants (I.P. Itskov) along with him from the Moscow
Party Committee. In 1930, Ordzhonikidze brought his personal secretary
Semushkin along with him, and Kuibyshev brought M.F. Feldman. Ianson could not do without A.M. Pintsel; Mikoian brought E.I. Efimov; and
Rukhimovich took G.I. Trukhmanov. In some cases, the leaders promoted
their personal secretaries to key positions in their new agencies.
Ianson made Pintsel a Collegium Member of the Commissariat of Water
Transport; Rukhimovich made Trukhmanov his new Chief of Administration
in the Commissariat of Transportation; and Kuibyshev made Feldman
Chief of Administration in Gosplan. Personal secretaries, therefore, were powerful figures and frequent members of family circles.
Sometimes, key officials brought apparently large groups of
clients with them to new agencies. In 1929, M.L. Rukhimovich had been
Deputy Chairman of Vesenkha (The Supreme Council of the National
Economy) and head of the its Planning Department. In 1930, he became
Commissar of Means of Communication (Transport). He brought with him
from Vesenkha to Transport a total of nine persons, including his
personal secretary and two key members of his Vesenkha Planning
Department. The other six were heads or deputy heads of various
Vesenkha departments. Rukhimovich installed his men in key positions
in the Commissariat of Transport. His new Deputy Commissar, Chief of
Administration, and seven key department workers had come with him
from Vesenkha.[5]
One of the major personnel changes in thi3 period involved Page 14
Vesenkha. In 1930, Sergo Ordzhonikidze replaced V.V. Kuibyshev as chief of Vesenkha; Kuibyshev became head of Gosplan — almost certainly a demotion. In this game of bureaucratic musical chairs, both leaders brought family circles with them: Ordzhonikidze from
Rabkrin (Commissariat of Workers' and Peasants' Inspection) to
Vesenkha and Kuibyshev from Vesenkha to Gosplan.
Ordzhonikidze brought ten functionaries with him from Rabkrin and four from the Central Control Commission (Ts.K.K.) to Vesenkha. (Until
1934, Rabkrin and Ts.K.K., although charged with distinct functions, were united under one commissar.) In his reorganized Vesenkha, the
Secretary to the Chairman, the Deputy Chairman, and seven members of the Collegium had been Rabkrin veterans. Eight Rabkrin alumni now headed Vesenkha departments: The Fuel, Supply, Planning, Machine
Building, Labor, Finance, Building and Timber, and
Organization/Rationalization of Production were headed by Rabkrin or
Ts.K.K. alumni.[6]
We should also note that of the ten Rabkrin workers whom
Ordzhonikidze brought to Vesenkha, seven had been heads of Rabkrin
Operational-Inspection Groups in the twenties. Each of these groups had been in charge of inspecting a particular branch of the national economy. It seems, therefore, that Ordzhonikidze took the inspectors who specialized in certain areas of production and made them the administrators of those sectors. The watchdogs became the administrators.
Kuibyshev brought seven of his former Vesenkha officials with him to Gosplan, including his personal secretary, four members of
Vesenkha's Scientific-Technical Department, and the heads of Page 15
Vesenkha's Kustar and Chemical Committees. Of the seven, one became
Gosplan's Chief of Administration, one became head of the Construction
Department, and five became members of the Gosplan Standing Committee on Cnemicals.[7]
The members of Kuibyshev's 1931 Gosplan Standing Committee on
Chemicals were an interesting group. Of the total of fifteen members, six had come with Kuibyshev from Vesenkha. The fifteen members of the
1931 Gosplan committee seem to have been divided into two groups. At least five members of the committee (those from Vesenkha) were chemical experts. Another group within the committee, however, consisted of high-ranking party and Control Commission members
(including Rudzutak, Unshlikht, Zatonskii, and Kuibyshev). Of this latter group of eight party officials, six were Central Committee members or candidates. Presumably, their assignment was to keep an eye on the chemical specialists. Thirteen of the fifteen had also been on the Sovnarkom Chemical Committee back in 1929, and had thus worked under Rykov. We might note in this connection that by 1938, all fifteen except one (Krzhizhanovskii) had been shot or were in prison.
One, Rataichak, was a defendant at the 1937 Moscow show trial, and confessed to wrecking in the chemical industry.
There are other examples of 3uch family circles following leaders through the bureaucracy. A.I. Mikoian had been Commissar of Trade in
1929, but in 1930 became head of the newly-created Commissariat of
Supply. He brought with him his former Deputy Commissar, his personal secretary, two members of his collegium, and one of his chief inspectors. He made his two former collegium members into Deputy
Commissars of Supply (M.A. Chernov and M.I. Khlopliankin), his former Page 16
Deputy Commissar into his new commissariat's Chief of Planning, and his former inspector into the Chief Quality Control Inspector in
Supply.[8]
While it might seem from these examples that travelling "tails" were common in upper and middle management during the 1929-31 period, there are several aspects of our findings which suggest otherwise.
First of all, while bearing in mind that the figures in Table 12 represent only upper- and middle- management personnel, we can note that these family circles seem quite small; some officials have none at all. The circles seem particularly small when we consider that the size3 of 1929 "old" agencies in each case were quite large. Thus the
"population at risk" to become part of a circle was enormous compared to the actual size of the circle drawn from it. While most leaders took at least someone with them, they do not seem to have brought large contingents to their new bailiwicks. Further research is needed to evaluate the prevalence of family circles in other agencies and at lower levels, but so far there are reasons to doubt their universality.
Second, it seems that some agencies or situations were less susceptible to the migrations caused by family circles. The USSR
Council of Peoples' Commissars remained relatively stable, despite a drastic change in its top leadership. Throughout the 1920s, A.I. Rykov had been Chairman of the Sovnarkom — the equivalent of Prime
Minister. With the fall of the "Right Opposition", Rykov was replaced by V.M. Molotov and demoted to Commissar of Posts and Telegraphs.
Rykov brought no one with him from Sovnarkom to Posts and Telegraphs, not even a personal secretary. While we might suspect that such Page 17 political demotions and humiliations precluded the bringing of a circle, we should note that Molotov also brought no circle with him to
Sovnarkom. There are no known veterans of Molotov's Moscow party organization working in his 1931 Sovnarkom.
Sovnarkom actually consisted of two parts: a collegium composed of the various Peoples' Commissars, and an operational staff of workers who handled the day to day work of the Council. While the upper echelon changed as Commissars were reassigned, the staff remained relatively stable in thi3 period and included no former
Moscow party officials. It seems then, that some agencies, like
Sovnarkom, were immune to the movement of family circles.
Therefore, large family circles were neither common nor large, at least at the highest levels. Paradoxically, their rarity may have led to the conclusion that they were commonplace. If few leaders actually had visible family circles, then the ones who did must have stood out.
Ordzhonikidze's Rabkrin takeover of Vesenkha must have been obvious and striking, and a few such glaring examples could lead us to conclude that the practice was universal. We can look at such examples of family circles and suspect that they represent the tip of the iceberg, but the evidence presented here makes us wonder if there is anything below the waterline.
Finally, in those family circles which did exist, the circles' members (excluding personal secretaries) appear to have possessed valuable experience in their areas of responsibility. The most obvious example is that of Kuibyshev's chemical experts. This leads one to hypothesize that family circles were functional rather than political
in nature. That is, commissars transferred to a new agency brought Page 18 with them proven administrators whose experience (and probably trustworthiness) would be of value to a commissar who now directed an otherwise unproven staff.
Structural Changes in Central Committee Membership
An examination of the structure and personnel of the Central
Committee should tell us something about the nature of the high bureaucracy and the priorities of the regime. Prosopographical analyses of various Central Committees have told us a good deal about the age structure, background, and careers of Central Committee members at certain times in Soviet history, but we still know little about the structure of the Committee itself and the selection process that formed it during this period.[9]
Robert Daniels has suggested that the Central Committee was selected from particular bureaucratic "constituencies".[10]
Accordingly, heads of various key agencies and departments were endowed with Central Committee membership to reflect their importance.
Similarly, were we to find a concentration of Central Committee members in a certain agency, we might well suspect that this agency enjoyed enhanced prestige and power. This approach does not deny that
Stalin personally selected Central Committee members, but it does suggest that members were selected purposefully and functionally.
Daniels has examined the constituency patterns for the 1925 Central
Committee. The following analysis extends this work to the Central
Committees elected in 1927 and 1930 and evaluates the changes in composition. Page 19
The first thing one notices are the continuities. Of the 63 full members elected in 1925, 51 (81 %) continue as full members in 1927. Of the 42 candidate members in 1925, 38 (90%) either remained candidates or were promoted to full member. Of the 71 full members in 1927, 63
(90i) had been members or candidates in 1925. We find similar high levels of persistence between the 1927 and 1930 Central Committees. Of the 71 full members in 1930, 55 (73%) had been members of the previous
Central Committee, and another 12 had been candidates previously. So,
87 percent of the 1930 Central Committee had been either members or candidates at the time of their election. In comparison with other agencies, the persistence rate in the same agency for Central
Committee members is extremely high. Between 1925 and 1927, persistence in commissariats averaged only 36%, compared to 81% for the Central Committee; for the following period, the figures were 56% compared to 78%. (See Tables 9 and 10)
Certain common patterns of Central Committee membership hold throughout the period. Virtually all Peoples' Commissars were full members as were the chairmen of Gosplan, Vesenkha, Sovnarkom, the
Central Executive Committee of Soviets (Ts.I.K.), and the
GPU/OGPU.[11] Comintern Secretaries were often full members, as was the Secretary of the Trade Union International (Profintern). Each
Central Committee contained four chiefs of Central Committee departments (as full or candidate members). Central Committees usually had five to six Moscow party leaders and three to four Leningrad officials as members or candidates.
One way to study upper bureaucratic change and priorities is to examine the promotions and demotions within the Central Committee from Page 20
1925 to 1930. If we look at the bureaucratic agencies, or constituencies, in which those demoted or promoted were working, we see some interesting patterns.
At the time of the election of the 1927 Central Committee, eight former members were dropped. Nearly all were prominent members of the recently defeated Left Opposition, including Trotsky, Zinoviev,
Kamenev, Evdokimov, Piatakov, Rakovskii, and Smilga.
Nineteen Central Committee members or candidates in 1927 failed to be elected to the 1930 Central Committee, and four full members in
1929 were demoted to candidates in 1930 -- a total of 23 apparent demotions. (Of the 23, two had died and three were transferred to posts on the Central Control Commission — which precluded Central
Committee membership — leaving 18 demotions in all.) Of the 18, the largest single group (7) consisted of union and labor officials.[12]
The others had represented Vesenkha (1), Foreign Affairs (1),
Transportation (1), Sovnarkom (1) and unknown posts (6). The widespread demotion of labor and union officials suggests the fall of the Right Opposition and of the clients of Mikhail Tomskii in the unions. It seems clear that demotion from or within the Central
Committee was usually the result of ideological or political defeat.
These demotions, however, did not change the structural arrangement of the Central Committee. For example, the 1930 Central Committee contained eight "slots" for labor and union officials, as had the 1927
Committee.
If demotions fell heavily on union officials, Central Committee promotions benefitted other constituencies. There were three types of promotion to and within the Central Committee. One could be promoted Page 21 from outside the Central Committee to either candidate or full member status, or one could rise from candidate to full member. Promotion patterns for individuals elected to the 1927 and 1930 Central
Committees are given in Tables 15 and 16.
These tables clearly show that promotions to or within the
Central Committee in this period were proportionally similar in 1927 and in 1930. The two constituencies most favored by Central Committee membership were regional party secretaries and members of the Vesenkha presidium.[13] In this period, Vesenkha officials (many with Rabkrin backgrounds) and provincial party leaders came to comprise a central core of the Central Committee.
Of those promoted to or within the Central Committee in 1930,
31.9% were regional secretaries and at least 10.6% were Vesenkha presidium members- (No regional party secretary and only one member of
Vesenkha's presidium had been demoted). The proportions of regional secretaries and Vesenkha presidium members among those promoted were far higher than their numbers (at risk to be promoted) on the 1927
Central Committee, so their promotions had both statistical and political significance.[14]
Looking first at the members of Vesenkha's presidium (Table 17), we can see that from 1927 to 1930 Vesenkha's strength on the Central
Committee increased tremendously. One-third of Vesenkha's presidium in
1930 was composed of Central Committee members. However, this phenomenal growth in Vesenkha representation did not result solely from the promotion of Vesenkha presidium members to Central Committee membership. Of the seven Vesenkha presidium members who were full
Central Committee full members in 1930, six had already been full Page 22
members in 1927. [15] Similarly, six of the eight 1930 Central
Committee candidates had already enjoyed that status on the previous
Central Committee. Of the six Rabkrin veterans whom Ordzhonikidze
installed on Vesenkha's presidium in 1930-31, none were Central
Committee members or candidates in either year. It is clear, then,
that the main cause for Vesenkha's rise, at least with regard to its
representation on the Central Committee, was the appointment of
already serving Central Committee members and candidates to Vesenkha's
expanded presidium. Whatever the cause (and one suspects that it
reflected the party's increased concern with economics at a time of
profound change in economic policy), the result by 1931 was a major
enhancement of the power of Vesenkha and its leader, Sergo
Ordzhonikidze.
While the rise of Vesenkha presidium members is striking, the
officials who benefitted most from Central Committee promotions in
this period were the regional party secretaries. In both years, about
one-third of all promotions were from the ranks of regional
(non-Moscow) party secretaries. It is also clear that these promoted
regional party secretaries were working their ways up the Central
Committee ladder. Of 30 instances of regional secretary promotion in
both years, all but two were regular promotions up the line from
outside the committee to candidate member or from candidate to full
member. Aside from the fact that they comprised about one-third of all
promotions, we can note that one half of those promoted from candidate
to full member in 1927 were regional secretaries; between 1927 and
•1930, this figure was two-thirds.
If we look only at full members of the Central Committee and Page 23 expand our focus to include the entire decade of the 1930s, a clearer pattern emerges. Table 18 shows the rise and fall of the regional party secretaries during the Stalin Revolution. The rise in power of the regional secretaries was reflected (or perhaps based) on the phenomenal growth in their local machines. If Smolensk is typical, the patronage power of the oblast' secretary grew astronomically between
1929 and 1936. In 1929, the Smolensk obkom's nomenklatura (right of appointment) controlled 504 party and state appointments. By 1936, the obkom disposed of slightly over 3,000 posts. In the economic and state apparatus, the obkom's nomenklatura grew from 453 to 2,453 positions, and in agriculture from 40 to 832 posts in this period.[16]
The rise of the regional secretaries could have several explanations, most of which remain hypothetical. It is hard to avoid
the impression that the rise of the secretaries was somehow tied to
the imperatives of collectivization and to problems of central/regional integration and balance of power. We might expect
that the implementation of collectivization on such an unprecedented
scale would involve the delegation of tremendous power to the regional
officials who carried it out. Indeed, the recent literature on
collectivization suggests that oblast' secretaries were key figures in
the planning and execution of the scheme.[17] It is also significant
that mo3t of the regional secretaries promoted to or within the
Central Committee between 1927 and 1930 were from grain-surplus areas
and/or areas of intensive collectivization.[18]
The story of the fall of the regional secretaries is a
complicated one which involved a major power struggle between the
center and the provinces from 1934 to 1937 and which ended in a bloody Page 24 victory for the centralizing forces. Since this drama falls outside
the chronological limits of this paper, we need not discuss it here except to note the precipitous nature of the fall. Aside from the drastic decrease in representation on the Central Committee noted
above, it is worth observing that all regional secretaries on the
Central Committee in 1937 (save Khrushchev, Beria, and Zhdanov) were
arrested in the Ezhovshchina.[19]
Summary
This paper has tried to show some of what we can learn from
aggregate analysis. We have perhaps raised as many questions as we
have answered. Yet, it seems as important to establish what we do not
know as it is to clarify what we do. The chief advantage of aggregate
analysis is that it can establish the central tendency. Knowing what
is normal can help us better analyze and so better understand the
exceptional and unique. While our smorgasbord approach to the study of
bureaucratic structure precludes any final conclusions, we believe
that what our data suggest is worth future study.
The data on multiple officeholding, persistence, and turnover
strongly suggest bureaucratic upheaval and change of major proportions
which coincided with the social and economic revolutions of the
period. Beyond wondering how the government functioned, we have to ask
ourselves how the system held together at all. How did the regime cope
with this administrative chaos and retain its hold on power? How did
it prevent centrifugal fragmentation? What held it together?
Unhappily, we do not have very many satisfactory answers. Our Page 25 data suggest that organizationally multiple officeholding, job tenure, and patronage networks do not seem widespread enough to have functioned as a powerful cohesive factor. On the other hand, the government may have partially coped with the situation by bringing significant numbers of regional officials (including party secretaries) into the Moscow leadership circle. Given the diffusion of power to the provinces, they had to.
On a different level, we might speculate on the ideological or emotional factors making for cohesion during these revolutions. Some authors have mentioned the campaign mentality of the times. The Civil
War motif of military struggle for the revolution may have been a powerful unifying element. We might note further that this was precisely the time that Stalin's "cult of personality" became loud and pervasive. The more chaotic the social, economic, and bureaucratic realities became, the louder the worship of Stalin intruded itself into Soviet life. We might speculate that the Stalin cult may have had practical uses over and above the gratification of the dictator's ego.
Deification and adulation are powerful unifiers.
It may well be that such speculations are weakly grounded in empirical evidence, but it is difficult to resist suggesting answers to these nagging questions. We may know a little more about what happened, but we are 3till in the dark about why and how. Page 25
Appendix A
Vsia Moskva and its Limitations
To appreciate the nature of the data on which this study is based, it is worth examining briefly the contents of Vsia Moskva. For
the modern historian, archives remain the sources of choice for analyzing social and political phenomena. But for the Soviet period, problems of access and availability force scholars to use a wide variety of often disparate sources. Published frequently but irregularly in the 1920s and 1930s, Vsia Moskva, which is but one albeit the most extensive of Soviet city directories, contains a wide range of detailed information about urban and bureaucratic life. It is a combination government, service and telephone directory and a city guide with sections on the city's history, economy, transportation, architecture, districts, neighborhoods and suburbs. Although only available for 1923, 1925, 1926, 1927, 1928, 1929, 1930, 1931 and 1936,
Vsia Moskva constitutes a resource of unparalleled value to researchers.
The sections of Vsia Moskva on which this study is based are
those which list the party and state bureaucratic apparatuses. In general, Vsia Moskva contains listings for agencies, commissariats, and organizations at the USSR, RSFSR, and Moscow province, city and raion levels — in short, the organizational arms of the bureaucracy
located in Moscow.[20] A typical listing for a commissariat, party committee or institute might begin with a short description of the agency's competencies, responsibilities, and relation to other agencies, plus its address and hours of operation. Next would come the
names, titles, business addresses, and telephone numbers of the Page 27 agency's personnel from the chairman or commissar, through departments and sub-departments, sometimes even to clerical levels. Like their counterparts dealing with social services (such as hospitals), the bureaucratic listings seem designed to provide detailed information
for Muscovites. For the historian and political scientist, V3la Moskva
is a good guide to the Soviet bureaucratic hierarchy.
Although Vsia Moskva appears to provide a complete breakdown of
the party and state bureaucracies, it omits certain types of
bureaucratic organs. The police, Central Committee departments, the military (with the exception of some scanty listings) and other such
sensitive organs are missing from the directory's listings. Vsia
Moskva also omits the entire national (USSR) party apparatus from the
listings; only that of the local, Moscow city party is included.
Logically enough, the provincial bureaucracy, except for that housed
in Moscow, is afforded little space.
Our data, therefore, provide a solid view of only the upper
echelons of the state apparatus: what we might consider the
bureaucracy's top and middle-level managerial corps. Personnel from
chairman to technicians appear in Vsia Moskva listings, but there is
little doubt that only the highest levels are systematically
represented. The same is true of party officeholding. Simple numbers
make the point. One of the only accounts that tries to assess the size
of the Central Committee Secretariat in 1926 fixes it at 767-[21] In
contrast, the total number of top staff positions listed in all
national party agencies in Vsia Moskva for 1926 was 301. Obviously,
our listings do not reflect the complete bureaucracy, only its upper
echelons. Vsia Moskva listings are also not comparable from year to Page 23 year. The 1929 directory, for example, lists 2,270 state positions, while the 1931 edition contains only 1,439 — over 37 percent fewer.
The discrepancy stems from the fact that the latter edition under-represents low level positions. (See Table 1) The 1929 edition of Vsia Moskva contains entries for 1,050 positions at the sub-department level (sub-department chiefs, deputy chiefs and secretaries); the 1931 listings contain only 468 — fewer than half.[22]
Most problems can be resolved by limiting analysis to the top staff, presidium and department level positions, which seem to be fully reported. Table 2 displays the average number of positions of the three highest levels in the state agencies for the four editions of Vsia Moskva utilized here. The most notable change was in the average number of presidium level jobs, which rose from between 14 and
15 to 20 in 1931. It is impossible at this time to fully explain the growth of presidium slots relative to other positions of leadership, but it seems worth noting that presidium positions were the only segments of the upper levels of the state apparatus which expanded between 1929 and 1931, suggesting that these may have been easier to create than either top staff or functional department level slots. Page 29
Table 1
USSR State Positions Listed in Vsia Moskva: 1925, 1927, 1929, 1931
Rank Year
1925 1927 1929 1931
Commissar/Chairman 41 86 67 80
Presidium 200 181 192 282
Dept. Head 167 127 123 207
Dept. Member 298 457 281 218
Sub-Dept. Head 500 575 614 370
Sub-Dept. Member 1013 913 436 98
Tech. Specialist 253 170 192 68
Personal Secretary 22 44 50 27
Total State Posts 2925 2970 2270 1439
Sources and notes: see text, Page 30
Table 2
Average Number of Positions in State Agencies,
By Level, 1925-1931
Level 1925 1927 1929 1931
Top Staff 2.9 6.1 5.6 5.4
Presidium 14.2 14.5 17.2 19.8
Department 33.4 45.0 33.9 30.1
Total 50.5 65.5 56.7 55.3
(N) 13 13 12 14
Sources and notes: see text. Page 31
Table 3
Profile of National, State and Party
Officeholding, 1925-1931: Multiple Officeholding
Individuals
(All Levels)
1929 1931 1925 1927 Percent Number of Percent Percent Positions Percent
Held 86.2 83.2 90.4 88.0 1 9.2 12.5 6.7 8.1 2 2.7 2.9 1.8 2.4 3 1.0 .9 .8 .7 .5 .8 .9 5+ .3
2127 1419 2220 2673
Sources and notes: see text. Page 32
Table 4
Profile of National State and Party
Officeholding, 1925-1931: Multiple Officeholding of Top Leaders
Individuals
(Top Staff, Presidium, Department Members)
1925 1927 1929 1931 Positions Percent Percent Percent Percent Held
1 85.5 82.7 82.4 76.3
2 11.2 11.0 11.5 17.3 3 2.7 4.9 4.7 4.9
4 .4 1.2 .9 1.2
5+ .2 .2 .5 .3
552 848 788 832
Sources and notes: see text. Page 33
Table 5
Turnover of Officials in Selected USSR
State Agencies, 1925-1931
Number of Not Staffers In Agency In Agency Agency in 1931 in 1925 in 1925 No. Pct. No. Pct.
Ts.I.K. 127 22 17.3 105 82.7
Sovnarkom 81 18 22.2 63 77.8
Gosplan 54 1 1.9 53 98.1
Comm. of Foreign Affairs 94 29 30.9 65 69.1
Comm. of Transportation 143 6 4.2 137 95.8
Comm. of Posts and Telegraphs 47 3 6.4 44 93.6
Comm. of Labor 101 2 2.0 99 98.0
Comm. of Finance 43 2 4.7 41 95.3
Vesenkha 205 15 7.3 190 92.7
Mean 10.8 39.2
Notes: Number of positions given is the number reported in Vsia
Moskva. Page 34
Table 6
Turnover of Officials in Selected RSFSR
State Agencies, 1925-1931
Number of Not Staffers In Agency In Agency Agency in 1931 in 1925 in 1925 No. Pct. No. Pct.
Ts.I.K. 112 14 12.5 98 87.5
Sovnarkom 94 0 0.0 94 100.0
Comm. of Agriculture 46 0 0.0 46 100.0
Comm. of Enlightenment (Educationn) 68 3 4.4 65 95.6
Comm. of Labor 33 0 0.0 33 100.0
Comm. of Finance 37 0 0.0 37 100.0
Comm. of Justice 75 13 17.3 62 82.7
Vesenkha 80 2 2.5 78 97.5
Mean 4.6 95.4
Notes: Number of positions given is the number reported in Vsia
Moskva. The Commissariat of Agriculture existed only at republic level until 1930 when the USSR Commissariat was formed. For the purposes of this table, it is treated as one agency, 1925-1931, in order to evaluate continuity of personnel. Page 35
Table 7
Turnover of Upper Level Officials in Selected USSR
State Agencies, 1925-1931
Number of Not Top Staffers In Agency In Agency Agency in 1931 in 1925 in 1925 No. Pct. No. Pct.
Ts.I.K. 79 16 20.3 63 79.7
Sovnarkom 34 7 20.6 27 79.4
Gosplan 27 0 0.0 27 100.0
Comm. of Foreign Affairs 35 14 40.0 21 60.0
Comm. of Transportation 54 4 7.4 50 92.6
Comm. of Posts and Telegraphs 16 3 18.8 13 81.2
Comm. of Labor 23 0 0.0 23 100.0
Comm. of Finance 42 2 4.8 40 95.2
Vesenkha 105 13 12.4 92 87.6
Mean 13.8 86.2
Notes: Number of positions given is the number reported in Vsia
Moskva. The top staff positions considered include chairman/commissar, deputy chairman/commissar, all presidium/ collegium members, department heads, and department members. Page 36
Table 8
Turnover of Upper Level Officials in Selected RSFSR
State Agencies, 1925-1931
Number of Not Top Staffers In Agency In Agency Agency in 1931 in 1925 in 1925 No. Pct. No. Pct. Ts.I.K. 52 7 13.5 45 86.5 Sovnarkom 49 0 0.0 49 100.0
Comm. of Agriculture 46 0 0.0 46 100.0
Comm. of Enlightenment (Education) 40 3 7.5 37 92.5
Comm. of Labor 28 0 0.0 28 100.0
Comm. of Finance 3t 0 0.0 31 100.0
Comm. of Justice 16 1 6.3 15 93.7
Vesenkha 40 1 2.5 39 97.5
Mean 3.7 96.3
Notes: Number of positions given is the number reported in Vsia
Moskva. The top staff positions considered include chairman/commissar,
deputy chairman/commissar, all presidium/ collegium members, department heads, and department members. The Commissariat of
Agriculture existed only at republic level until 1930 when the USSR
Commissariat was formed. For the purposes of this table, it is treated as one agency, 1925-1931. Page 37
Table 9
Turnover of Upper Level Officials in Selected USSR
State Agencies, 1925-1927
Number of Not Top Staffers In Agency In Agency Agency in 1927 in 1925 in 1925 No. Pct. No. Pct.
Ts.I.K. 65 31 47.7 34 52.3
Sovnarkom 49 18 36.7 31 63.3
Gosplan 35 18 51.4 17 48.6
Comm. of Foreign Affairs 47 24 51.1 23 48.9
Comm. of Transportation 139 21 15.1 118 84.9
Comm. of Posts and Telegraphs 25 2 8.0 23 92.0
Comm. of Labor 23 11 47.8 21 52.2
Comm. of Finance 46 15 32.6 31 68.4
Vesenkha 99 34 34.3 65 65.7
Mean 36.0 64.0
Notes: Number of positions given is the number reported in Vsia
Moskva. The top staff positions considered include chairman/commissar, deputy chairman/commissar, all presidium/ collegium members, department heads, and department members. Page 33
Table 10
Turnover of Upper Level Officials in Selected USSR
State Agencies, 1927-1929
Number of Not Top Staffers In Agency In Agency Agency in 1929 in 1927 in 1927 No. Pct. No. Pct.
Ts.I.K. 68 43 63.2 25 36.8
Sovnarkom 31 23 74.2 9 25.8
Gosplan 29 20 69.0 9 31.0
Comm. of Foreign Affairs 28 18 64.3 10 35.7
Comm. of Transportation 52 20 33.5 32 61.5
Comm. of Posts and Telegraphs 23 12 52.2 11 47.8
Comm. of Labor 25 14 56.0 11 44.0
Comm. of Finance 48 23 47.9 25 52.1
Vesenkha 76 34 44.7 42 55.3
Mean 56.7 43.3
Notes: Number of positions given is the number reported in Vsia
Moskva. The top staff positions considered include chairman/commissar, deputy chairman/commissar, all presidium/ collegium members, department heads, and department members. Page 39
Table 11
Turnover of Upper Level Officials in Selected USSR
State Agencies, 1929-1931
Top Not Level Staffers In Agency In Agency Agency in 1931 in 1929 in 1929 No. Pct. No. Pct. Ts.I.K. 82 33 40.2 49 59.8
Sovnarkom 36 11 30.6 25 69.4
Gosplan 28 4 14.3 24 85.7
Comm. of Foreign Affairs 35 20 57.1 15 42.9
Comm. of Transportation 55 9 16.4 46 83.6
Comm. of Posts and Telegraphs 17 4 23.5 13 76.5
Comm. of Labor 30 1 3.3 29 96.7
Comm. of Finance 42 6 14.3 36 85.7
Vesenkha 105 12 11.4 93 88.6
Mean 23.5 76.5
Notes: Number of positions given is the number reported in Vsia
Moskva. The top staff positions considered include chairman/commissar, deputy chairman/commissar, all presidium/ collegium members, department heads, and department members. Page 40
Table 12
Size of Bureaucratic "Tails"
of All-Union Commissars and Chairmen, 1925-1931
New Old Size of Agency Agency "Tail" 1925-1927:
Ordzhonikidze, G.K. Rabkrin Transcaucasus Party ?
Kuibyshev, V.V • Vesenkha Rabkrin ?
Smirnov, I.N. Comm. of Posts/Teleg. Comm. of Finance 0
1927-1929:
Miliutin, V.P Cen. Statistical Adm. Rabkrin 0
Uglanov, N. Comm. of Labor Moscow Party 1
1929-1931:
Ordzhonikidze, G.K. Vesenkha Rabkrin/Ts.K.K. ,4
Rukhimovich, M .L Comm. Transport Vesenkha 9
Kuibyshev, V.V • Gosplan Vesenkha 7
Mikoian, A.I. Comm. Supply Comm. Trade 5
Iakovlev, Ia.A • Comm. Agriculture Rabkrin 2
Grin'ko, G.F. Comm. Finance Gosplan 1
Ianson, N.M. Comm. Water Trans. RSFSR Justice 1
Rozengol'ts, A .P. Comm. Foreign Trade Rabkrin 1
Molotov V.M. Sovnarkom Moscow Party 0
Rykov, A.I. Comm. Posts & Teleg. Sovnarkom 0
Andreev, A.A. Rabkrin N. Caucasus Party ?
Tsikhon, A.M Comm. Labor Unknown ? Page 41
Table 13
Changes in Central Committee Size, 1925-1927
Full Members
63 Size in 1925 8 C 12.7%) Removed 2 (3.1%) Died 0 (0.0%) Demoted to Candidate Status 2 (3.1%) Transferred to Control Commission
51 (80.9%) 1925 Members who Persist as 1927 Members
12 Promoted 1925 Candidate Members 8 New Members not in 1925 Committee 71 Size in 1927
Candidate Members
42 Size in 1925
4 (9.5$) Removed 12 (28.5$) Promoted to Full Status
26 1925 Candidates who Persist as 1927 Candidates + 24 New Candidates 50 Size in 1931
Sources and notes: see text. Page 42
Table 14
Changes in Central Committee Size, 1927-1930
Full Members
71 Size in 1927
10 (14.12) Removed 2 (2.8%) Died 4 (5.6%) Demoted to Candidate Status
55 (77.5%) 1927 Members who Persist as 1930 Members
+ 12 Promoted 1927 Candidate Members + 4 New Members not in 1927 Committee
71 Size in 1930
Candidate Members
50 Size in 1927
7 (20.1$) Removed 12 (24.0$) Promoted to Full Status
31 1927 Candidates who Persist as 1930 Candidates
+ 4 1927 Members Demoted to Candidates + 31 New Candidates
66 Size in 1930
Sources and notes: see text. Page 43
Table 15
Positions of Individuals Promoted to the
Central Committee in 1927
Brand Brand Candidates New New Made Candidates Members Members Totals
Regional Party Secretaries 8 1 6 15
Vesenkha Presidium Members 1 1 1 3
Peoples' Commissars 1 1
Deputy Commissars
Moscow Party Officials 1 1
Military 1 1
Union 2 14
Komsomol
GPU/OGPU 1 - - 1
C.C. Department Workers 1 1 1 3
Central Control Commission - 3 - 3
Provincial Industry - -• 2 2
Other 1 1 1 3
Known Positions 17 8 12 37
Unknown Positions 8 0 0 8
Total Promotions 12
Sources and notes: see text. Page
Table 16
Positions of Individuals in 1927 Promoted to the
Central Committee in 1930
Brand Brand Candidates New New Made Candidates Members Members Totals
Regional Party Secretaries 6 1 15
Vesenkha Presidium Members 1 5
Peoples' Commissars - 2 3
Deputy Commissars 3 - 3
Moscow Party Officials 2 - 3
Military 2 - 2
Union 1 - 2
Komsomol 1 - 1
GPU/OGPU 1 - 1
C.C. Department Workers 1 _ 1
Known Positions 21 11 36
Unknown Positions 10 1 11
Total Promotions 31 12
Sources and notes: see text. Page 45
Table 17
Central Committee and Vesenkha Presidium
Membership, 1929-1931
1929 1931 Proportional
Change
Size:
Vesenkha Presidium 19 47 147%
Central Committee 121 138 14%
Membership: Vesenkha Presidium Members Sitting on Central Committee 3 15 400%
Vesenkha Share of all Central Committee Positions 2.4% 10.9% 354%
Central Committee Share of all Vesenkha Presidium Positions 15.8% 31.9% 102%
Sources and notes: see text. Page 46
Table 18
Full Central Committee Membership of
Regional Party Secretaries, 1927-1939
Full Central Committee Membership
1927 1930 1934 1939 No. Pct. No. Pct. No. Pct. No. Pct.
Obkom and Kraikom Secretaries 3 4.2 11 15.5 12 16.9 3 4.2
National Party Secretaries 2 2.8 2 2.8 7 9.9 4 5.6
All Regional Secretaries 5 7.0 13 18.3 19 26.8 7 9.8
Size of Full Central Committee (71) (71) (71) (71) Sources and notes: see text and note 1. Page 47
Notes
1. Data on state officeholding is drawn largely from Vsia
Moskva. Adresnaia i spravochnaia kniga na 1925g. (Moscow, 1925); Vsia
Moskva. Adresnaia kniga na 1927g. (Moscow, 1927); Vsia Moskva.
Adresnaia i spravochnaia kniga na 1929g. (Moscow, 1929); and Vsia
Moskva. Adresnaia i spravochnaia kniga na 1931g. (Moscow, 1931). Data on party officeholding is taken mainly from E.L. Crowley, et.al., eds., Party and Government Officials of the Soviet Union 1917-1967,
(Metuchen, N.J., 1969).
2. This, in turn, provides a plausible, though hypothetical, explanation for the increase in presidium level slots in 1931 noted above. Proportionally, few top staffers with any top-staff experience survived the general reorganization that was taking place. To compensate for the lack of general experience in managing agencies, larger presidiums, containing experienced personnel, may have been created in an attempt to manage by committee. Persisting officials, while relatively few in number, were experienced not only at upper-level management, but at holding more than one office, and thus could provide needed expertise.
3. In a static situation, it is difficult to tell how many of a leader's subordinates actually belong to his circle, how many he inherited from the previous chief, how many were forced upon him, etc.
Only when a leader moves can we identify his "tail".
4. This total does not count those officials whose new positions resulted from renaming, etc. Thus, Menzhenskii "moved" from
GPU to OGPU, and Rozengol'tz "moved" from the Commissariat of Foreign Page 48
Trade to the Commissariat of Trade due to bureaucratic reorganization.
5. Rukhimovich's nine followers were: P.B. Bilik, B.G. Kaplun,
V.N. Ksandrov, A.I. Lokshin, I.S. Morozov, F.I. Portenko, A.M.
Postinkov, M.S. Raskin, G.I. Trukhmanov.
6. Ordzhonikidze's tail consisted of A.M. Fushman, S.I. Ignat,
M.M. Kaganovich, I.P. Pavlunovskii, A.D. Semushkin, Z.G. Zangvil, V.I.
Grossman, A.I. Gurevich, K.F. Martinovich, S.Z. Ginzberg, G.D.
Veinberg, Iu.P. Figatner, A.E. Bliznichenko, and F.G. Ego. Because these bureaucratic changes took place in 1930, the 1930 edition of
Vsia Moskva provided supplementary information in this case.
7. Kuibyshev's circle and their new Gosplan positions were:
A.N. Bakh, E.V. Britske, N.P. Gorbunov, A.I. Iulin, S.S. Lobov (all members of the Standing Committee on Chemicals), M.F. Fel'dman (Chief of Administration), and D.N. Shapiro (Chief of Construction Dept.).
8. In addition to Chernov and Khlopliankin, Mikoian's group included N.B. Eismont (the new chief of planning) and B.P. Nekrasov.
9. Examples of such group studies include: Yaroslav Bilinsky,
Changes in the Central Committee, Communist Party of the Soviet Union,
(Denver, 1957); M.P. Gehlen and M. McBride, "The Soviet Central
Committee: An Elite Analysis", American Political Science Review, 62,
(1968).
10. Robert V. Daniels, "Evolution of Leadership Selection in the
Central Committee, 1917-1927", in Walter M. Pintner and Don Karl
Rowney, eds., Russian Officialdom, The Bureaucratization of Russian
Society from the Seventeenth to the Twentieth Century, (Chapel Hill,
1930).
11. There were two exceptions. (1)In 1930, G.F. Grin'ko was USSR Page 4 9
Commissar of Finance, but was neither a member nor candidate of the
Central Committee. (2) Also in 1930, M.M. Litvinov was Commissar for
Foreign Affairs, but was only a candidate member. His predecessor, G.
Chicherin, had been a full member.
12. The demoted labor/union officials were: V.M. Mikhailov
(Moscow Trade Union Council), A.I. Dogadov (All-Union Trade Union
Council), V.A. Kotov (Dept. Chief, Commissariat of Labor), N.A.
Uglanov (USSR Commissar of Labor), R.O. Ugarov (Leningrad Trade Union
Council), A.T. Markov (Member, Council of Textile Unions), G.N.
Mel'nichanskii (All-Union Trade Union Council).
13. Regional party secretaries are here defined as kraikom,
obkom, and republic party secretaries. Moscow and Leningrad party
secretaries are excluded from these calculations.
14. Regional secretaries accounted for only 13% of 1929 Central
Committee members and candidates, but comprised nearly 32% of all
promotions. Vesenkha presidium members were 2.4% of 1929 Central
Committee members and candidates but constituted 10.6% of all
promotions.
15. The six previous Central Committee members were Bukharin,
Krzhizhanovskii, Shvernik, Tolokontsev, Moskvin, and Zhukov. Piatakov
was the newly promoted Central Committee member.
16. The 1929 figures are from Smolensk Archive file WKP 33, pp..
1-8, and WKP 42, passim. The 1936 figures are from Smolensk Archive
file RS 924, protocol no. 156. Our thanks to Peter Gooderham for the
1929 reference. Much of the increase in local nomenklatura power
. resulted from the creation of raions (each requiring an appointed
staff) in 1930-31. Page 50
17. See R.W. Davies, The Socialist Offensive: The
Collectivization of Soviet Agriculture, 1929-1930, (Cambridge, Mass.,
1980), esp. chaps. 3-7.
18. The obkom and kraikom secretaries who were full members of the 1931 Central Committee were from the following regions: West
Siberia*, East Siberia*, The Urals, Central Volga*, North Caucasus*,
Smolensk, Voronezh*, Stalingrad*, Ivanov, Ivanovo-Voznessensk, and
Gorkii*. An asterisk (*) indicates a promotion to full membership.
19. For the fall of the regional secretaries see J. Arch Getty,
"Party and Purge in Smolensk, 1933-1937", Slavic Review, 42, 1
(Spring, 1933), 60-93. A fuller treatment will be found in J. Arch
Getty, Origins of the Great Purges: the Soviet Communist Party
Reconsidered, 1933-1933 (forthcoming, 1985, Cambridge University
Press).
20. For a systematic treatment of the changing institutional arrangements of the bureaucracy, see A. A. Nelidov, Istoriia
Gosudarstvennykh Uchrezhdenii SSSR, 1917-1936gg: uchebnoe posobie,
(Moscow, 1962).
21. Jerry F. Hough and Merle Fainsod, How the Soviet Union is
Governed, (Cabridge, Mass., 1979), 127.
22. Our categorization of rank levels is as follows:
Top Staff: The executive leadership of the agency — Commissar
(or Chairman), Deputy Commissar (or Deputy Chairman), Member (i.e.
Member of Gosplan), First Secretary (party only), Secretary (party only), Deputy Secretary (party only), Second Secretary (party only).
Presidium: The members and candidate members of the agency's presidium or collegium. Page 51
Department: The first subdivision of the agency's hierarchy; variously called otdel, Upravlenie, or less commonly sektor or
sektsii. Ranks at this level include Department Chief, Deputy Chief,
Assistant, Secretary, Member, Instructor and Consultant.
Sub-department: A subdivision of a department; usually called
sektor, chast', grupp, and less commonly otdel.
Standing Committee: Department-level body usually composed of members of the presidium or other leading officials of the agency.
Technicals: Ranks such as engineer, referrent, specialist,
controller, bookkeeper, inspector.
Personal Secretaries: Clerical officials attached explicitly to a
leading official.
The 1931 edition of Vsia Moskva sometimes omits detailed listings
for personnel at the sub-department level and below. For example, the
personnel listing for a lower level committee might include only the
chairman, deputy chairman and secretary. Careful testing can detect
most of the flaws and the researcher must take them into account.