What made Soviet state terror distinctive was its scale. Based just on the size of its population, the Soviet Gulag system – comprising regular and special prisons, filtration camps, POW camps, corrective labor colonies,special settlements, and scientific prisons – was about twenty-five times larger than its counterpart in Nazi Germany. This population included both political and criminal inmates, the former of whom were typically convicted under Article 58 of the Soviet penal code.
In force between 1927 and 1961, Article 58 established a broad class of“counter-revolutionary” crimes, including treason, insurrection, terrorism,espionage, industrial sabotage, contacts with foreign states, propaganda,agitation, and a failure to report any of the above. Most of these crimes carried mandatory minimum sentences, from six months to ten years. Some offenses, like espionage and treason, were potentially punishable by death.The range of activities that fell under Article 58 was so wide that even mildly critical or heterodox political statements could become cause for arrest – or concern among others that they could be arrested for failing to report. By creating strong incentives to inform, Soviet authorities drew local communities directly into the repression process. As many inmates landed in the camps following accusations from neighbors, co-workers and family members, the space for public and even private expression of political preferences gradually shrank.
Between 1921 and 1953, the Soviet state convicted 3.8 million people under Article 58. A typical case began with a person’s detention, interrogation and (forced) confession, often followed by an expedited trial and conviction by a “special troika” – comprising an NKVD officer,party secretary and prosecutor – and transfer to a labor camp. According to one report, of 1.5 million individuals the NKVD arrested in 1937-1938, troikas convicted 85.4 percent.
Beyond their punitive function, Gulags served an economic purpose, as a source of cheap labor that the state regularly mobilized for large construction works, gold, metal and coal mining, logging and other engineering projects. At its peak, the Gulag accounted for two percent of all laborers in the Soviet Union. These 12-14 hour daily heavy labor shifts, combined with harsh climate and malnutrition,contributed to a very high mortality rate. In 1937-1938, average life expectancy in the Gulag was between two and five years, despite an average length of sentence of 10-25 years.
Those fortunate enough to survive the Gulag returned to a life of permanent political disenfranchisement and social alienation. Some of these long-term costs also extended to family members, especially if the latter did not originally report the crime. The wives, children and siblings of those convicted as ‘traitors of the Motherland’ were subject to prosecution and imprisonment under Article 58. Children of the repressed lost voting rights, paid higher taxes, and had difficulty obtaining university education and professional advancement in most industries.
For the disenfranchised, rehabilitation was a long and uncertain process.It involved multiple redemptive steps, including engaging in “socially useful labor” and demonstrating loyalty to the regime. Even then, rehabilitation was neither automatic nor irreversible. Some were disenfranchised and reinstated multiple times, and even those wrongly deprived of rights had to formally appeal. Some forms of collective punishment of kin (e.g.exile of Kulaks’ families) concluded in the late 1930s. Other policies, like internment of children in special settlements, continued until 1954.
Stalin’s Terror and the Long-Term Political Effects of Mass Repression, Yuri M. Zhukov and Roya Talibova, 2017 pp. 6-7.