| Abstrakt: |
The article presents information on agricultural policy and the struggle over the destiny of collective farms in Estonia. The principal goal of the Estonian urban political and cultural elite has been the privatization of agriculture, replacing the system of Soviet-type farms with western family farms. This article examines the origins of that goal, and the reasons why it was carried into political practice despite the fact that a clear majority of kolkhoz and sovkhoz workers were in favor of preserving the system of large-scale farms. The author's hypothesis proposes the following explanation: government policy was not articulated to the interests of the people, whereupon the abstract restitution ideology of the nationalist movement and the ultraliberalist ideas later adopted by the government became an article of faith determining agricultural reform, unconnected with the resolution of immediate practical problems. The outcome of decollectivization in many respects also depended on the inner struggles between different status groups on the farm. This struggle was, however, fought under the constraints of a recently established government policy, which the agricultural population was no longer able to influence. |
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