An Analysis of Sheila Fitzpatrick's Everyday Stalinism – Soviet Russia in the 1930s – Routledge

How was the Soviet Union like a soup kitchen? In this important and highly revisionist work, historian Sheila Fitzpatrick explains that a reimagining of the Communist state as a provider of goods for the ‘deserving poor’ can be seen as a powerful metaphor for understanding Soviet life as a whole.By positioning the state both as a provider and as a relief agency, Fitzpatrick establishes it as not so much a prison (the metaphor favoured by many of her predecessors), but more the agency that made possible a way of life.Fitzpatrick’s real claim to originality, however, is to look at the relationship between the all-powerful totalitarian government and its own people from both sides - and to demonstrate that the Soviet people were not totally devoid of either agency or resources.Rather, they successfully developed practices that helped them to navigate everyday life at a time of considerable danger and multiple shortages.For many, Fitzpatrick shows, becoming an informer and reporting fellow