UDC

94(47).084

DOI

10.17238/issn2227-6564.2019.3.14

Authors

Anna V. Kryzhan
Kursk State University; ul. Radishcheva 33, Kursk, 305000, Russian Federation;
e-mail: kryjhan@mail.ru

Abstract

This article dwells on the use of scientific management tools by local bodies and institutions of justice in the second half of the 1920s, when these institutions experienced considerable difficulties with financing and enrolling qualified personnel. Elements of scientific management are considered here as one of the ways to overcome these difficulties. Moreover, it is emphasized that scientific management was implemented in the new Soviet state on a firm scientific and organizational basis. The author turns to Yezhenedelnik Sovetskoi Yustitsii – an official periodical of the People’s Commissariat for Justice of the RSFSR – and archival materials in order to analyse the forms of documents that had been suggested by the Commissariat and used in records management by local institutions of justice as well as the proposals made by local personnel concerning their optimization. It should be noted that such proposals were submitted by ordinary employees, which shows their dedication and constructive approach to the work. Further, the paper looks at the new – registration-free – system of records management based on the practices that were applied in Western European countries and were at that time a highly relevant trend of the emerging science: management theory. In addition, the article analyses the pros and cons of the registration-free system. The author reveals the essence of the discussion that took place in the periodical concerning the record management reform. It was initiated by the employees of the Organizational and Planning Bureau of the People’s Commissariat for Justice, who worked with document management and developed documentation forms. The author comes to the conclusion that employees of local judicial and investigating bodies as well as public prosecutor’s offices took a nonformalistic approach to the tools of scientific management, seeing in them a possibility for saving material resources and rationalizing production processes, which improved these institutions’ performance in general.

Keywords

scientific management, People’s Commissariat for Justice, local institutions of Soviet justice, organization of records management

References

1. Bakulin V.I. Problema nauchnoy organizatsii truda v SSSR (20-e gg.) [The Problem of Scientific Management in the USSR (1920s)]. Bakulin V.I. Listaya istorii stranitsy: Vyatskiy kray i vsya istoriya Rossii v XX veke [Turning over the Pages of History: Vyatka Region and the Entire History of Russia in the 20th Century]. Kirov, 2006, pp. 131–146.
2. Bakulin V.I. Na puti intensifikatsii promyshlennogo proizvodstva (iz opyta 20-kh gg.) [On the Way to Intensification of Industrial Production (Experience of the 1920s)]. Yekaterinburg, 1992. 162 p.
3. Zavgorodnyaya O.N. Politika RKP(b) i sovetskogo gosudarstva v sfere organizatsii truda promyshlennykh rabochikh (1917–1920 gg.) [The Policy of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks) and the Soviet State in the Sphere of Organization of Labour of Industrial Workers (1917–1920): Diss. Abs.]. Moscow, 2006.
4. Oleynik I.I. Organy yustitsii sovetskoy Rossii v 1917–1936 gg. [Judicial Bodies in Soviet Russia in 1917–1936]. Ivanovo, 2003. 232 p.
5. Gavrilova A.V., Kozlova N.V. Obrazovatel’nyy tsenz kak kriteriy professionalizma kadrovogo sostava v pravookhranitel’noy sisteme v Sovetskom gosudarstve [Educational Qualification as a Criterion of Professionalism in the Law-Enforcement System in the Soviet State]. Sovremennaya nauchnaya mysl’, 2017, no. 6, pp. 218–225.
6. Solomon P. Soviet Criminal Justice Under Stalin. Cambridge, 1996. 494 p. (Russ. еd.: Solomon P. Sovetskaya yustitsiya pri Staline. Moscow, 2008. 462 p.).
7. Gimpel’son E.G. Sovetskie upravlentsy. 1917–1920 gg. [Soviet Managers. 1917–1920s]. Moscow, 1998. 257 p.
8. Kryzhan A.V. Finansirovanie i material’noe obespechenie mestnykh organov i uchrezhdeniy yustitsii Sovetskoy Rossii v 1918–1930-e gg. [Financing and Material Support of Local Authorities and Institutions of Justice in Soviet Russia in 1918–1930s]. Ekonomicheskiy zhurnal, 2015, no. 2, pp. 122–129.
9. Mayer N.V. Sluzhba v Komissariate yustitsii i narodnom sude [Service in the Commissariat of Justice and the People’s Court]. Arkhiv russkoy revolyutsii [Archives of the Russian Revolution]. Moscow, 1991. Vol. 8, pp. 56–109.
10. Kryzhanovskiy S.E. O kharaktere gosudarstvennogo stroya v Rossii (iz zapisok S.E. Kryzhanovskogo 1926 g.) [On the Nature of the State System in Russia (from the Notes of S.E. Kryzhanovsky Dated 1926)]. Voprosy istorii, 2008, no. 3, pp. 3–32.
11. Yarov S.V. Konformizm v Sovetskoy Rossii: Petrograd 1917–1920-kh godov [Conformism in Soviet Russia: Petrograd of the 1917–1920s]. St. Petersburg, 2006. 569 p.
12. Livshin A.Ya. Nastroeniya i politicheskie emotsii v Sovetskoy Rossii: 1917–1932 gg. [Sentiments and Political Emotions in Soviet Russia: 1917–1932]. Moscow, 2010. 343 p.
13. Sakharov A.N. 1930: god “korennogo pereloma” i nachala Bol’shogo terrora [1930: The Year of the “Radical Change” and the Onset of the Great Purge]. Voprosy istorii, 2008, no. 9, pp. 40–69.