Temptations of the new economic policy: malfeasances of the Ural responsible officials and economic executives in the 1920s

With the beginning of the New Economic Policy in the Soviet Russia, the external environment of the func­tioning of the Soviet system of governance changed, because "rules of the game" in economic sphere were changed, and free entrepreneurial activity was revived. New entrepreneurs established informal personal contacts with representatives of the government who were often materially stimulated by the Nepmen. There was no ef­fective mechanism of control over the activity of Party, Soviet and economic organizations of local authorities in the 1920s which led to favorable conditions for misuses. The Soviet administrative elite with no constant moni­toring from the higher authorities and sometimes with low moral characteristics sought to "cash out" administra­tive resources for getting material benefits. Official misuses began to spread widely with the beginning of the New Economic Policy because it allowed for favorable economic environment in which those vices extended to grow. Economic executives, government authorities and law enforcement authorities experienced the tempta­tions of the NEP, but there was also infiltration of the new psychology into the ranks of the Party which was the core of the emerging Soviet system of government. The deviant behavior of the communists expressed in the misuse of official position, bribery, embezzlement of public funds, maintaining a bourgeois way of life. Such behavior of the Soviet elite undermined authority of the power and worsened psychological climate of the socie­ty. The Party leadership tried to counteract such negative phenomena and to limit their spread by issuing several resolutions and organizing various mass events aimed to improve the Party's ranks. However such preventive and repressive measures of the Party authorities during the NEP period did not succeed in eliminating corruption practices, bribery and other mismanagement among the Party, government and economic executives, but only kept them within certain limits.