Social security for employees of the correctional labor system in Western Siberia from 1930 to 1934

Based on regulatory legal acts sourced by the author from the archives of the State Archive of the Russian Federation, this article attempts to reconstruct the social security system for employees of the correctional labor system of the People’s Commissariat of Justice of the RSFSR during the formation and development of the command-administrative system. Emphasis is placed on the fact that the development of the system of places of deprivation of liberty in the 1930s required from the state unprecedented in importance measures of social support, which made it possible to staff the Corrections Officers of correctional institutions established in remote areas of the country. Measures taken in the 1930s allowed for an increase in the social status of correctional labor institution employees in the eyes of ordinary people, contributing to the enhancement of the service’s prestige, and emphasized their affiliation with the command-administrative system. Analysis of the normative legal acts of the Main Directorate of Correctional Labor Institutions of the People’s Commissariat of Justice of the RSFSR allows us to state the continuation of the policy of closed departmental norm-setting of the correctional labor system, including social security for employees. A unified system of monetary allowances and social benefits was created and extended across the entire RSFSR territory, including the West Siberian region and the Far East.