|
|
|
|
|
|
by open_bear
3117 days ago
|
|
|
> nearly feral generation of children that almost collapsed the country Care to provide a source? We have kindergartens that accept children as young as 1.5 y.o, older kids (3+) typically stay at kindergarten for 8 hours a day. |
|
|
Nuclear families were already under pressure in by the 1920's due to the impacts of World War One which resulted in a surplus of women and internal displacement that broke up many nuclear families. This was compounded by the family code of 1918 which liberalized divorce and resulted in many men abandoning their families. A 1926 Atlantic archive summarizes illustrates the impact:
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1926/07/the-rus...
With the breakup of the nuclear family as an economic unit many women and children entered a workforce that was ill-equipped to receive them depressing factory wages. The shift of labor from child rearing to the production of consumer goods resulted in an increase in the besprizorniki, or the "unattended".
The most complete works on the subject are by Wendy Z. Goldman including The "Withering Away" and the Resurrection of the Soviet Family, 1917-1936 and Women, the State and Revolution Soviet Family Policy and Social Life, 1917–1936. Copies of the second can be found online and a quote on page 76 summarizes the cycle.
The decrease in children's homes and daycare centers inadvertently increased the numbers of besprizorniki as the needs of women and the needs of children formed the tight, alternating links of a vicious circle. Without daycare, many single mothers were unable to search for work, and without work, they were unable to support their children, who in turn ran away from impoverished homes to join the besprizorniki on the streets. The large numbers of besprizorniki then forced the state to divert scarce resources from daycare centers to children's homes, increasing the hardships of both employed and unemployed mothers, and ultimately increasing the numbers of besprizorniki.