On Karelian Regional Committee of Bolsheviks’ Party nomenclature development in 1920s

The article deals with some special aspects of the party nomenclature origin in the middle of 1920s on the example of Karelian ASSR. Early in 1920s, the practice of taking high public offices by the communists was spontaneous. Due to the critical shortage of qualified personnel with competitive knowledge of Karelian and Finnish languages a serious competition for human resources between administrative authorities and the party’s district committees was observed. In order to settle these controversies, contestants often appealed to the regional committee of the party, which defined the area where different specialists should serve. The regional party specialists were not ready to take on the responsibility for the lack of human resources in the region. The first variants of Karelian Regional Committee (Obkom) nomenclature lists, sent to the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks (CC AUCP(B)), revealed a serious shortage of qualified personnel able to manage development of the region. Based on the materials from the National Archives of Karelian Republic, the Central State Archives of Historical and Political Documentation of St. Petersburg the author comes to a conclusion that the process of nomenclature system development in Karelian ASSR had a contradictive character. Later introduction of the nomenclature system helped to organize informal practice of employee’s selection and placement and increased the party’s responsibility for territories’ development.