Models of Consumer Behavior of the Kyiv Residents and the Modernization of Urban Way of Life in the UkrSSR in 1955–1965

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.15407/uhj2021.05.131

Keywords:

everyday life, history of soviet retail, consumer, urban way of life, UkrSSR, Kyiv

Abstract

This article exam unfamiliar in the modern Ukrainian historiography issue is a consumer behavior of soviet citizens.

The purpose of the article is a foundation a research concept of changes in the daily life of the urban population in the middle of the twentieth century.

Methodology and research data. It is undeniable, that society got a new impulse for development during this period. This statement has formed a number of different methodological approaches and theories that interpreted society after the World War II. One of them is the theory of modernization, which is supported by the author of the article.

The author uses an ethnographic approach to determine the consumption strategies used by the citizens of UkrSSR in the second half of the 20th century. In-depth interviews with Kyiv residents are the main source for the study of this issue. The global modernizations that had began in North America and Western Europe in the 1950s changed our world dramatically. These changes were very broad in nature, embrace political life, culture, ordinary life, technology, and the social structure of the population. The new way of life became available to many people and cultural practices became common to people through the world. The author of the article asks: is that process was appropriated of the USSR and how did the communist regime influenced the modernization of everyday life of Ukrainians in 1950–1960?

The foundation and continues attempt to solve this issue is a novelty of current research.

It is concluded, that Soviet trade was copied European and American patterns of approaches for retail, but was contradictory. Soviet consumers were left between the propaganda image of a society of prosperity and the trade deficit. Between these polar extremes, a unique culture of life-support of the Soviet people in the cities was formed, which is reflected in this article.

Published

2024-11-08

How to Cite

Borysenko, M. (2024). Models of Consumer Behavior of the Kyiv Residents and the Modernization of Urban Way of Life in the UkrSSR in 1955–1965. Ukrainian Historical Journal, (5), 131–142. https://doi.org/10.15407/uhj2021.05.131

Issue

Section

HISTORICAL ARTICLES