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> You were free to go anywhere in USSR. No, you weren't. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propiska_in_the_Soviet_Union https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propiska_in_

> You were free to go anywhere in USSR. No, you weren't. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propiska_in_the_Soviet_Union https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propiska_in_the_Soviet_Union https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/101st_kilometre https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/101st_kilometre

SomeoneFromCA 6y ago
Propiska had nothing to with freedom of movement. What it had to do though was the right to establish permanent residency away from you primary dwelling. You were free to move anywhere in the country, just not free to establish a permanent residency. When I was a child, we had relatives from all over USSR come to visit us. All you are saying is so misundersstood and so disconnected from the reality, as if it was take out of some Cold War era propaganda pamphlet. 101-st km was applicable only to Olympic games of 1980.
- gridlockd 6y ago
  Freedom of movement, as a human right, implies the freedom to change residency. When I wrote "move freely", this is what I was referring to. My point was that it's easy to not have slums when you can simply keep out the poor peasants away from the cities by law. This is exactly what happened in the Soviet Union, the system prevented people from the countryside to move into the city on their own accord, unless they happened to fit within some quota for laborers. None of this is propaganda, it is historical fact that you seem to conveniently choose to ignore.
  - 082349872349872 6y ago
    I believe SomeoneFromCA has experienced the USSR, and gridlockd has experienced some western country without domicile registration. I have worked in the US, and my 3rd world country has domicile registration[1], so I'll offer my impression of the usual differences between the systems, and you all can correct me. Someone wants to move to the big city from flyover country in 1980[2]. In the US: Unless they're rich, they first get a job in the big city, then run a credit check and pay deposit and get an apartment and open bank accounts, etc. If they are hustling and have friends in the city they crash with them while looking for a job. In the USSR: Unless they're rich, they first get a job in the big city, then change their propiska and get an apartment and open bank accounts, etc. If they are hustling and have friends in the city they crash with them while looking for a job. [1] My wife lived with me for years but never bothered updating her papers until we married, at which point we were doing the paperwork anyway. No one cared. One advantage of the registration is that here, just as it is illegal to be homeless, it is illegal for one's registered domicile not to provide housing. The law cuts both ways. (Similar symmetry occurs with health insurance: it's illegal to not carry insurance, but it's also illegal for an insurance company to deny anyone coverage.) The en.wikipedia article suggests the USSR had similar advantages: > "On the other hand, the propiska underlined the mechanism of the constitutional obligation of the state to provide everyone a dwelling: no one could refuse or be stripped of the propiska at one location without substitution with another permanent propiska location. > All employers were strictly forbidden to give jobs to anybody without a local "propiska". To provide themselves an extra labour force, the largest enterprises had to build housing for their workers beforehand." [2] Peter Norman got all sorts of grief for his role in "politicising the games" but the latter seems not to have been a major talking point in 1980.
  - SomeoneFromCA 6y ago
    The slums, not as geographic location, euphemistically called "inner cities", but as areas of extreme poverty. They did not exist in the USSR, on the scale they did in US, period. There was no horrible segregation policies, women till 1980-s had a lot more rights, there were so many things not to like in the US and some other western countries to counterbalance the abundance of western supermarkets. Even today, I live in a big Central Asian city, and I see a lot less despair and disparity than what I saw in Philadelphia and NYC. While it is true, you could not easily move out of a village into a big city, both my grandparents were from poor rural families, and both got PhDs and lived in major Soviet cities.
    - gridlockd 6y ago
      > The slums, not as geographic location, euphemistically called "inner cities", but as areas of extreme poverty. They did not exist in the USSR, on the scale they did in US, period. Yes, I accepted that from the outset, and I gave you the reason: Lack of freedom of movement. Poverty in the USSR was spread out further across the countryside. Either way, it's easy to show that, by the soviet states own admission, poverty even in relative terms was greater in the USSR: https://www.nytimes.com/1989/01/29/world/soviet-openness-brings-poverty-out-of-the-shadows.html https://www.nytimes.com/1989/01/29/world/soviet-openness-bri... In absolute terms, the difference is far greater. Living below the poverty line in the US was materially better than in the USSR. > Even today, I live in a big Central Asian city, and I see a lot less despair and disparity than what I saw in Philadelphia and NYC. What you see is not a statistic. If all that despair may be hidden from plain sight, how do you know it doesn't exist? Just because there's few people suffering in the city doesn't mean there aren't people suffering in the countryside. > There was no horrible segregation policies... I beg to differ: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racism_in_the_Soviet_Union https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racism_in_the_Soviet_Union > ...women till 1980-s had a lot more rights... Sure, because that happened to be part of the ideology. A particular women in the USSR may have had some rights that a woman in the US may not have had, at that time. Within a communist regime that limited rights in general, of course. > ...there were so many things not to like in the US and some other western countries to counterbalance the abundance of western supermarkets. And yet, of all the people that managed to emigrate to the US, few would return. > While it is true, you could not easily move out of a village into a big city, both my grandparents were from poor rural families, and both got PhDs and lived in major soviet cities. I think that's the crux of it. The soviet system treated you relatively well, brought you "progress". I'm aware that in central asia, support for the Soviet Union was the greatest even at the time of its dissolution, while other more developed countries couldn't wait to leave. However, the USSR dissolved for a good reason: It was, overall, an dysfunctional system. Surely there were people who profited, many peasants were turned into great mathematicians or musicians. I wouldn't deny that. We can compare the US system with the soviet system all day, either has had winners and losers, either has had done certain things better than the other. However, the soviet system is dead and gone, and communist parties in former soviet countries rarely form a democratic majority.

SomeoneFromCA 6y ago

Propiska had nothing to with freedom of movement. What it had to do though was the right to establish permanent residency away from you primary dwelling. You were free to move anywhere in the country, just not free to establish a permanent residency. When I was a child, we had relatives from all over USSR come to visit us. All you are saying is so misundersstood and so disconnected from the reality, as if it was take out of some Cold War era propaganda pamphlet. 101-st km was applicable only to Olympic games of 1980.

gridlockd 6y ago
Freedom of movement, as a human right, implies the freedom to change residency. When I wrote "move freely", this is what I was referring to. My point was that it's easy to not have slums when you can simply keep out the poor peasants away from the cities by law. This is exactly what happened in the Soviet Union, the system prevented people from the countryside to move into the city on their own accord, unless they happened to fit within some quota for laborers. None of this is propaganda, it is historical fact that you seem to conveniently choose to ignore.
- 082349872349872 6y ago
  I believe SomeoneFromCA has experienced the USSR, and gridlockd has experienced some western country without domicile registration. I have worked in the US, and my 3rd world country has domicile registration[1], so I'll offer my impression of the usual differences between the systems, and you all can correct me. Someone wants to move to the big city from flyover country in 1980[2]. In the US: Unless they're rich, they first get a job in the big city, then run a credit check and pay deposit and get an apartment and open bank accounts, etc. If they are hustling and have friends in the city they crash with them while looking for a job. In the USSR: Unless they're rich, they first get a job in the big city, then change their propiska and get an apartment and open bank accounts, etc. If they are hustling and have friends in the city they crash with them while looking for a job. [1] My wife lived with me for years but never bothered updating her papers until we married, at which point we were doing the paperwork anyway. No one cared. One advantage of the registration is that here, just as it is illegal to be homeless, it is illegal for one's registered domicile not to provide housing. The law cuts both ways. (Similar symmetry occurs with health insurance: it's illegal to not carry insurance, but it's also illegal for an insurance company to deny anyone coverage.) The en.wikipedia article suggests the USSR had similar advantages: > "On the other hand, the propiska underlined the mechanism of the constitutional obligation of the state to provide everyone a dwelling: no one could refuse or be stripped of the propiska at one location without substitution with another permanent propiska location. > All employers were strictly forbidden to give jobs to anybody without a local "propiska". To provide themselves an extra labour force, the largest enterprises had to build housing for their workers beforehand." [2] Peter Norman got all sorts of grief for his role in "politicising the games" but the latter seems not to have been a major talking point in 1980.
- SomeoneFromCA 6y ago
  The slums, not as geographic location, euphemistically called "inner cities", but as areas of extreme poverty. They did not exist in the USSR, on the scale they did in US, period. There was no horrible segregation policies, women till 1980-s had a lot more rights, there were so many things not to like in the US and some other western countries to counterbalance the abundance of western supermarkets. Even today, I live in a big Central Asian city, and I see a lot less despair and disparity than what I saw in Philadelphia and NYC. While it is true, you could not easily move out of a village into a big city, both my grandparents were from poor rural families, and both got PhDs and lived in major Soviet cities.
  - gridlockd 6y ago
    > The slums, not as geographic location, euphemistically called "inner cities", but as areas of extreme poverty. They did not exist in the USSR, on the scale they did in US, period. Yes, I accepted that from the outset, and I gave you the reason: Lack of freedom of movement. Poverty in the USSR was spread out further across the countryside. Either way, it's easy to show that, by the soviet states own admission, poverty even in relative terms was greater in the USSR: https://www.nytimes.com/1989/01/29/world/soviet-openness-brings-poverty-out-of-the-shadows.html https://www.nytimes.com/1989/01/29/world/soviet-openness-bri... In absolute terms, the difference is far greater. Living below the poverty line in the US was materially better than in the USSR. > Even today, I live in a big Central Asian city, and I see a lot less despair and disparity than what I saw in Philadelphia and NYC. What you see is not a statistic. If all that despair may be hidden from plain sight, how do you know it doesn't exist? Just because there's few people suffering in the city doesn't mean there aren't people suffering in the countryside. > There was no horrible segregation policies... I beg to differ: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racism_in_the_Soviet_Union https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racism_in_the_Soviet_Union > ...women till 1980-s had a lot more rights... Sure, because that happened to be part of the ideology. A particular women in the USSR may have had some rights that a woman in the US may not have had, at that time. Within a communist regime that limited rights in general, of course. > ...there were so many things not to like in the US and some other western countries to counterbalance the abundance of western supermarkets. And yet, of all the people that managed to emigrate to the US, few would return. > While it is true, you could not easily move out of a village into a big city, both my grandparents were from poor rural families, and both got PhDs and lived in major soviet cities. I think that's the crux of it. The soviet system treated you relatively well, brought you "progress". I'm aware that in central asia, support for the Soviet Union was the greatest even at the time of its dissolution, while other more developed countries couldn't wait to leave. However, the USSR dissolved for a good reason: It was, overall, an dysfunctional system. Surely there were people who profited, many peasants were turned into great mathematicians or musicians. I wouldn't deny that. We can compare the US system with the soviet system all day, either has had winners and losers, either has had done certain things better than the other. However, the soviet system is dead and gone, and communist parties in former soviet countries rarely form a democratic majority.