Centralized planning in the industrial sector of the economy of the Union of Soviet Republics

The major portion of this thesis will be devoted to the Soviet industrial planning mechanism and its related problems. This mechanism grew out of the great industrialization drives of the late 1920's and the 1930's. The mechanism was characterized by the use of non-economic devices to force new economic and social behavior patterns, by the forced groxN7th of heavy industry, and by rigid control of the economy by the Communist Party. The economy was essentially controlled and directed in a manner characteristic of a country at war. Political objectives, rather than economic objectives, x>7ere forced on the economy. The system used campaigns, experienced chronic shortages, was characterized by arbitrariness, and neglected economic criteria of efficiency. Over the years this type of system becomes unmanageable. When a modern industrialized economy has been developed, the system has a tendency to break down due to the increasing complexity of the economy.