What Happened To Joseph Stalin's Suicide

When Joseph Stalin rose to power in the late 1920’s and began to eliminate political dissidents, Kollontai realized her two options: flee or concede to Stalin’s regime. She chose to concede. While still living in diplomatic exile, Stalin’s government forced her to serve as his example of the emancipated Soviet Woman. Moreover, in 1935, they forced her to publically declare that “our government has given women access to all spheres of creative activity, and at the same time has guaranteed all the conditions necessary for woman to fulfill her natural duty- to be a mother, the educator of her children and the mistress of her home.” Though she fought for equal access to the public spheres of life, the natural duty of the woman as a mother and

In 1929, Stalin declared the Zhenotdel an unnecessary department and had its duties absorbed by the much larger Agit-Prop Department. Though this destruction of the department did not occur until 1929, the Zhenotdel had been slowly losing ground since Kollontai’s dismissal in 1922. With Kollontai’s diplomatic exile, any strong personalities left amongst the women in leadership positions of the department disappeared. The women of the Zhenotdel witnessed what happened to Kollontai for taking such strong, controversial views, and thus they turned away from the more radical work which had been undertaken while under Kollontai’s leadership. The Zhenotdel did continue to provide social welfare for women and their children, but shied away from pushing for any policy changes which altered a woman’s position as a mother or a

Unfortunately, Stites once again seems unable to differentiate from political concessions granted to women and tangible social change. Under Stalin’s government, the official party platform supported the rise of the nuclear family, with two working parents. The canonization of the nuclear family by the state remained tantamount to the state officially endorsing the “double burden” of the woman. By raising up the responsibilities of traditional family unit, the party moved away from the notion of community-based organizations taking on the load of the household chores as the women’s movement had desired. Further, the new marriage codes enacted in 1936 and 1944 made obtaining a divorce an expensive task and formally outlawed abortions. Coupled with the fact that women in policy making positions within the government continued to diminish with each passing year provides ample evidence of a lull in the work amongst women. Although Kollontai and her peers tried to alleviate the burdens placed on women, the state still viewed women as political