Fighting drunkness without the prospect of becoming winners (legal and organizational aspects of combating drunkness in the Ukrainian SSR in the 1960s)

The article examines the main directions of the fight against drunkenness in the Ukrainian SSR carried out during the 1960s. The number of citizens detained in a drunken state during this period was consistently high and was calculated in the republic by hundreds of thousands of people per year. From 1959 to 1967, the number of patients with alcoholism grew steadily and increased by 4.8 times, which was a very significant indicator and indicated a sharp increase in the incidence of alcoholism. In socialist society, alcohol consumption was associated with a low standard of living of the population, a negative tradition of drunkenness characteristic of the Russian people, which spread to Ukraine, and a low level of general culture. In the conditions of Soviet reality, drinking was most often the only form of leisure and a way to "relax" and relieve stress. The Communist authorities were forced to maneuver between the fight against alcohol and the fact that it was a significant part of the state's income and the sale of alcoholic beverages increased significantly over these years. It should be noted that the actual consumption of alcoholic beverages was much higher than official data, since a large amount of home-made wine was consumed in the republic. In addition, moonshine brewing was widespread in all regions of the republic and the production of moonshine increased significantly. Cases of criminal and penal moonshine brewing increased especially – more than 2 times. Moonshine was seized for this period almost one and a half times more. Most of the most serious crimes were committed while intoxicated. Their number increased in percentage terms by 2.1 times, and the consumption of alcoholic beverages by 1.95 times, that is, the correlation was significant, although the growth in the number of crimes committed while intoxicated (as a percentage of the total number of crimes solved by the criminal investigation department) slightly outpaced the growth in the consumption of alcoholic beverages. The data on malicious hooliganism committed while intoxicated were especially indicative – their share was 3/4. The number of drivers who committed a traffic accident while intoxicated increased by 1.5 times, which was a significant indicator. All these data once again confirm that the consumption of alcohol was and is a criminogenic factor.

Ukraine, 1960s, drunkenness, moonshine brewing, Ministry of Internal Affairs, police