Supreme Council of the National Economy
최고국민경제회의
The name of the supreme state institution that managed the national economy, chiefly industry, in Soviet Russia and later the USSR, covering two separate bodies that existed in different periods. The first existed from 1917 to 1932, created by a joint decree of the Council of People's Commissars and the All-Russian Central Executive Committee on 5 (18) December 1917, and from 1923 a separate all-Union body also operated. In its first period, under War Communism, it held powers of confiscation, requisition, sequestration, and forced syndication, which gave it the character of an organ of the proletarian economic dictatorship. Under the New Economic Policy it managed industry on the principles of khozraschyot, and from 1963 to 1965 it was re-established under the Council of Ministers of the USSR as part of Khrushchev's decentralization of industrial management.
In depth
Two bodies
The name covers two bodies that existed in different periods. The one that lasted from 1917 to 1932 was charged, under the Council of People's Commissars, with organizing the national economy and state finances, and from 1923 a separate all-Union body managed the economy of the USSR under the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR. The 1963 to 1965 body was re-established under the Council of Ministers of the USSR.
Organization and operation
The first body was governed by a plenum, a presidium, and a bureau that coordinated current work. The plenum was the highest organ and the presidium the standing executive body. In the War Communism years it exercised powers of confiscation, requisition, sequestration, and forced syndication of branches of industry and trade, which made it an organ of the proletarian economic dictatorship.
With the New Economic Policy its operating principle became khozraschyot. The khozraschyot industrial trust became the basic economic unit, and in 1928 the USSR VSNKh grouped about 80 all-Union trusts, more than 100 republican trusts, and about 400 local trusts, covering 2.7 million workers and employees.
In the late 1920s it was reoriented toward centralized planned management. Private capital was squeezed out of industrial enterprises, production was concentrated, and branch administration was strengthened while the role of the local sovnarkhozy narrowed. In 1932 the body was reorganized into the People's Commissariats of Heavy Industry, Light Industry, and Forestry, and the all-Union VSNKh of the USSR was abolished on 5 January 1932. The RSFSR body was transformed in March 1932 into the People's Commissariat of Light Industry of the RSFSR.
Re-establishment
In 1963 Khrushchev re-established the body together with the decentralization of industrial management, and it was subordinated to the Council of Ministers of the USSR. This re-establishment was a separate institution, distinct in lineage and function from the first period that ended in 1932.