# Question regarding collectivisation in Russia under Lenin and China under Mao **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 29, 2021, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-collectivisation-in-russia-under-lenin-and-china-under-mao/938971 "2021-03-29T15:37:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2021, 11:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-collectivisation-in-russia-under-lenin-and-china-under-mao/938971/21 "2021-04-02T23:40:54Z")
OK. But the problem in the situation you’re describing isn’t only, or even primarily, that the farmers can’t sell the land. It’s that they can’t make their own decisions as to what to grow, or how to grow it, or what to do with the crops once grown; or, very likely, about any non-crop use they might make of it. Whereas the post of yours that I was quoting only mentioned the inability to sell the land, as if that were the only possible benefit one could take from having it. ---
**Author:** ![md-2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9d8465/32.png) [@md-2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md-2000)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2021, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-collectivisation-in-russia-under-lenin-and-china-under-mao/938971/22 "2021-04-03T04:35:33Z")
As the old saying goes - In capitalism, man exploits his fellow man. In Communism, it’s the other way around. The other joke from collectives in Russia - “We pretend to work, they pretend to pay us”. So the reforms of the 1860’s “freed” the peasants, but they were not given land - they were free to keep working the land belonging to the nobles. Yes, some peasants did own their land through accidents of history, just as in other countries (IIRC, that was what a freeman was in England?) Some managed to actually make money and buy land. After the revolution, if you are free to farm a plot, but not to sell it (or even give it away) then you have two choices- farm it or starve. Eventually, Communism allowed them to do both at once. Maybe here in Canada we get a biased view from the Ukrainians who heard from relatives back home - but the general consensus was that Stalin deliberately imposed punitive confiscation on the rich peasants (and eventually most peasants) in Ukraine. First, the Kulaks were well off- making money was anathema to the Soviet model of “everyone shares”; so was keeping enough food for yourself, or asking a market price for food when the state needed to save its money for other things. Regardless, the kulak economy did not conform to the Communist model, so it was corrected - the kulaks, not the model… ---
**Author:** ![Paul\_was\_in\_Saudi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/b77776/32.png) [@Paul\_was\_in\_Saudi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paul_was_in_Saudi)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2021, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-collectivisation-in-russia-under-lenin-and-china-under-mao/938971/23 "2021-04-04T02:36:51Z")
After the fall of the Soviet Union, I had a chance to attend a lecture by a Russian Air Force officer. He had commanded some airbase up near Finland. After he spoke he took questions. Someone asked how large his airbase was. He thought about it and could not give an answer. "Over here is the Air Force, over there is the railway, that part over there belongs to the town. "There did not seem to be any system for the vast empty spaces between them. ---
**Author:** ![Octagon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/2acd7d/32.png) [@Octagon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Octagon)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2021, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-collectivisation-in-russia-under-lenin-and-china-under-mao/938971/24 "2021-04-09T19:19:01Z")
Thank you Sam\_Stone. Thank you all. This discussion has been very enlightening. ---
**Author:** ![Drsunflower1](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drsunflower1/32/12711_2.png) [@Drsunflower1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drsunflower1)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2021, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-collectivisation-in-russia-under-lenin-and-china-under-mao/938971/25 "2021-04-11T17:04:07Z")
> [@md-2000](#): > > Maybe here in Canada we get a biased view from the Ukrainians who heard from relatives back home - but the general consensus was that Stalin deliberately imposed punitive confiscation on the rich peasants (and eventually most peasants) in Ukraine. Het did. It resulted in a famine that claimed at least three million lives and is memorized as the holodomor. Anne Applebaum wrote a book about it, as did, no doubt, many others. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-collectivisation-in-russia-under-lenin-and-china-under-mao/938971.md?page=1)