Rule of Inclusion: The Politics of Postwar Stalinist Care in Magnitogorsk, 1945–1953

Based on archival research and using the major industrial center of Magnitogorsk as a case study, this article analyzes nature of the social welfare practices during the postwar Stalinist era. Scholars have emphasized that the Stalin regime exercised the rule of “exclusion,” by which the regime ruled out the unproductive population. Paying more attention to the limits and ineffectiveness of Soviet welfare system, they have considered the Stalinist welfare practices as mere “rhetoric” and “propaganda” or as a post-Stalin phenomenon, appearing in the Khrushchev era. However, this article shows that the comprehensive welfare system was developed during the late Stalin period. Although the postwar Soviet state lacked the resources necessary for such a welfare blanket, it used social guardianship to offload responsibility for the needy on to local enterprises and institutions. In doing so, the Stalin government succeeded in instilling its paternalistic image among its citizens. Along with the emergence of other signs of “normalization” in daily life, the postwar Stalinist system of care enabled local people to internalize official ideology and maintain their belief in the progress of Soviet society toward communism.