Forgotten History: Russian Prohibition Of 1985

A new year introduces a new series called Forgotten History, focusing on events that most people are not aware of.

Americans are familiar with our history of Prohibition during the 1920's and early 1930's, which helped give rise to gangsters like Al Capone and speakeasy clubs that sold illegal alcohol. But did you know another world power attempted their own prohibition, just two decades ago?

From Wikipedia:

"During 1985-1987 Mikhail Gorbachev carried out an anti-alcohol campaign with partial prohibition, colloquially known as the "dry law". Prices of vodka, wine and beer were raised, and their sales were restricted in amount and time of day. People who were caught drunk at work or in public were prosecuted. Drinking on long-distance trains and in public places was banned. Many famous wineries were destroyed and plantations of grapes uprooted, often of precious cultivars. Scenes of alcohol consumption were cut out from films.

The reform had effect on alcoholism in the country, as evident from statistics showing some fall in criminality and rise in life expectancy, but economically it was a serious blow to the state budget (a loss of approximately 100 billion rubles according to Alexander Yakovlev) after alcohol production migrated to the black market economy. Coupled with inflation of the Soviet rouble, these restrictions had a curious economical side effect: a bottle of vodka had become a kind of "hard currency". For example, a handyman would replace a window for a certain, fixed, number of bottles of vodka regardless its current price in rubles."

Sloshspot.com has a full page of great Russian prohibition posters.