Stalin’s “New Soviet Woman”

Abstract

The goal of this paper is to evaluate the extent to which Stalin has used the ideology of communism to promote feminism in Soviet Union in the 1930s and early 1940s. In order to do so, this paper focuses on one of the central notions of Stalin's domestic policies, the "New Soviet Woman." This concept stresses on two major elements, industrial productivity and reproductivity at home, and praises women's roles as workers and mothers. After a series of study on the propaganda Stalin has used and the legislations he has enabled to fulfill these two goals, I come to a conclusion that Stalin uses the emancipation of women as a pretense to mobilize women mainly for economic development and military preparation. To prove that Stalin has failed to promote feminism, the paper is structured as followed. First, there is a specific definition of feminism, which is constituted of two parts: equality and freedom. For each of them, the paper lists out some of Stalin's policies that are evidence of positive but limited feminist progress to explain the definition and also to qualify the main argument. Then, there are two major sections, which correspond to the two focuses of the "New Soviet Woman." Within each part, there are two subparts that discuss how Stalin's policies have violated the two fundamental principles of feminism, equality and freedom, respectively. With this paper, I distinguish opportunities from equality, prove that public expectations restrict freedom, and thus challenge the conventional view of the absolutely positive relationship between a communist regime and the growth of feminism under it.

The Status of Women in the Soviet Union

“…They had to work as hard as men in factories and fields and, upon returning home, they were to spend several hours a day in endless lines at the grocery stores. Women had to cook and clean because Soviet men (to preserve their masculinity) refused to share domestic duties (Liu, 2019). In a new Soviet culture, gender equality and respect for women were falling apart; therefore, everyday life and the existing reality of the Soviet Union remained detached from the communist ideology.…”