Soviet Planning in Theory and Practice. From Marxist Economics to the Command System

Abstract

The centrally-planned Soviet command economy was one of the twentieth century’s most radical and complex economic, political and social experiments. Its establishment did not coincide with the onset of Soviet power across the former Russian Empire in 1917-1918, but instead resulted from fifteen years of shifts, readjustments and breaks, and through experiments with both quasi-socialist market economics and centralised administrative command practices. The present article surveys the conflictual relationship between Soviet planning and Marxism in this period. It demonstrates how the Stalinist command economy contradicted much of the theory and practice that the Bolsheviks themselves had thought ought to characterise the new economic system.