Prisoners

This chapter describes the kinds of prisoners the Gulag mostly employed and how they were perceived in the Gulag system. Contrary to popular belief, the majority of prisoners in Stalin's labor camps and colonies were not intellectuals, former communists, perceived spies and saboteurs, or other “counterrevolutionaries.” Most were ordinary workers and peasants, largely ethnic Russian and less educated, who had been arrested for routine Soviet crimes, such as workplace infractions, speculation, theft, or internal passport violations. This prisoner profile satisfied the Gulag's need for prisoners who could perform heavy physical labor. Bolshevik ideology made productive labor the defining feature of the Soviet citizen. This produced a system of values wherein the stronger represented the morally superior. In this worldview, frail and sick individuals constituted an inferior population.