Natural Disaster and Human Actions in the Soviet Famine of 1931–1933

Abstract

Until recently both scholarly and popular discussions of the catastrophic famine in the Soviet Union in 1931-1933 invariably have described it as an artificial or ''manmade" famine. Certain well-known scholars have dominated this discussion, expressing two main interpretations of the famine. A Ukrainian nationalist interpretation holds that the Soviet regime, and specifically losif Stalin, intentionally imposed the famine to suppress the nationalist aspirations of Ukraine and Ukrainians; revisionists argue that the leadership imposed the famine to suppress more widespread peasant resistance to collectivization. According to these views, a natural disaster that could have caused a famine did not take place in those years.