Everyday life and the political mood of the peasantry of Kalmykia in the 1920s

The article examines the everyday life of the Kalmyk peasantry in close connection with its political mood in the 1920s. It highlights economic, social and political factors which affected their life and political mood. These factors comprise anti-Bolshevik insurgency, organized criminal activity, the policies pursued by the Bolshevik party and the Soviet government to bring the Kalmyks to the settled way of life, the new economic and taxation policies. Social, economic and political changes transformed the relations among the peasants in their labour and everyday activities, in their lifestyle. The peasantry actively entered into new social relationships and the transformed rural way of life. Nevertheless, the changes initiated by the central and local authorities were not always supported by the rural population. Whereas the peasants approved of the measures performed by the Soviet government aimed at restoring and developing their economy, it was not a rare occasion when the social and economic work of the authorities and bureaucracy made the Kalmyks dissatisfied. This dissatisfaction triggered both hidden and open counteraction on the part of the peasants against the central and local authorities, the most common acts being failure to observe the laws and orders adopted by the state as well as tax evasion. Sometimes concealed opposition gave way to open military resistance. Generally, the Kalmyk peasants, limited by the needs of their own households and their families' routine in their locality, were indifferent to the political appeals of the Soviet power.