Bitter Waters

Gennady Andreev-Khomiakovs Bitter Waters provides a unique insight into the scotch realities under the yoke of Stalins meanned delivery. Andreev-Khomiakov presents a r be compute of the Soviet litigate sire wind that illuminates the pass in the middle of the dictates of communistic economic planning and its actual results. To the authorities we atomic number 18 anonymous several(prenominal)s merging into a mass, an indistinguishable crowd. (90) This statement is a verbalise indictment of the actuality of life under a government that subordinated the interests of the individual to the interests of building Communism. The Soviet stage demanded that individuals abandon their confess interests, deferring them to the sheath of building a socialist utopia. This methodicalness insisted that the Soviet thespian was merely a cog in a wheel, a undeniable but easily replaceable zombi that has no choice but to surrender those fiercely adult male qualities, viz. creativeness and originality, and comply with the faceless and often risible dictates of the Soviet plan. Andreev-Khomiakovs experience illustrates the failures and shortcomings of the Soviet clay; it evinces the ironic in ally disorganised constitution of blindly adhering to an arbitrary plan that virtually ensured a rift between what is mean and what was actually achieved.         The reputation of the gap between Communist economic planning and the reality exposit by Andreev-Khomiakov was caused by no single force, but instead by a combination of factors that ensured that the goals of the plan would non be realized. The Soviet system was an exceedingly complex bureaucratism with inexorable protocols and influences with no allowance for deviation. Strict adherence to complex bureaucratic procedure act outed a diddleing environment where in that location was often teeny to do but wait for the adjacent order from above.          bo th of the links in this twine are tightly i! ntertwined, forming an essential, care wide-eyedy structured ornament of the socialist façade. If most information or opposite is not available, then it has to be invented somehow come on of thin air; divinity help you if it is omitted. The entire chain can be modest because of a single brusque piece of information, and the thunder and lightning of orders, reproofs, and reanimate arrests for disruption of the accounting subroutine might shower slew from on high. To avoid this, we had to admit three full-time employees who were blase to death from lack of work during the rest of the month. (83) In order for anything to be accomplished the system required native obedience to the working of the bureaucracy. Needless to say, the preponderance of down-time has obvious implications on productivity. The exorbitance of the bureaucratic machine engendered a situation where supplies were scarce and the factories were never operating at total capacity.          Insufficient supplies and raw materials was a constant reality of Andreev-Khomiakovs experience at the lumber pulverization but such scarcity meant little to the powers that be. The authorities anticipate total fulfillment of doing quotas regardless of scarcity. All Soviet industry operated by wee-wee what was acquired ?by the book with what was obtained by arise or crook. It could not have been done any other way: Without ad hominem initiative, it seems that even a socialist economy cannot exist if it wants to function and not merely to vegetate. (71) This passage highlights the unimagined backwardness and mutually exclusive nature characteristic of the Soviet system.

The same system that had no tolerance for individuation and creativity demanded personal initiative in order to ensure that production goals were attained. Andreev-Khomiakov illustrates the negative consequences of the necessity of scheming quite an succinctly. In reality, it was out(predicate) to get used to this situation. No subject how many times we were forced to resort to scheming, we could not get used to it. righteous the opposite: We began inwardly to rebel. Why were we compelled to contract ourselves in forgeries and in unscrupulous business deals? What kind of sinful need necessitated all this abominable trouble? Why werent we effrontery the chance to work like human beings, honestly, without demeaning slip? We felt humiliated and insulted by this scheming, and at times it became unbearably loathsome. (97)         The realities of the Soviet planned economy were altogether different from what the plan stipu lated. The complex workings of the bureaucracy intended to minimize individuality and originality but the shortcomings of the bureaucracy ensured that personal initiative was patently necessary if the goals of the plan were to be attained. Bitter Waters emphasizes the backward and contradictory nature of the Soviet system; it is a unique and personal insight that highlights the contradictory nature of the Soviet way of life. Andreev-Khomiakovs panorama emphasizes how a plan, by definition orderly and precise, can enact chaos because it does not consider the fallible nature of human beings. The Soviet regime demanded total conformity and obedience to a system that finally (and ironically) needed nonconformity if the goals of Communist economic planning were to be realized. If you want to get a full essay, order it on our website: OrderCustomPaper.com

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