Abstract
<jats:p>The article investigates the challenges of managing and organizing the mass physical culture movement in the USSR during the period from 1945 to 1953. The research aims to assess the effectiveness of state policy in physical culture and sports during the postwar years. The work examines the contradictions between ambitious government plans and actual socio-economic capabilities. Particular attention is given to the mechanisms used to achieve mass participation, including the establishment of physical culture collectives, the implementation of the GTO (Ready for Labour and Defence) complex, the organization of socialist emulation, and the ‘city patronage over the countryside’ initiative. The author thoroughly investigates propaganda campaigns and directive documents that shaped the ideological discourse on the national importance of physical culture. For the first time, the study provides a comprehensive analysis of the everyday practices of the grassroots administrative level – district sports committees – identifying systemic dysfunctions common throughout the country (staff shortages, underfunding, reporting formalism, and diversion to auxiliary tasks). The research findings indicate that the mass physical culture movement in the USSR from 1945 to 1953 remained more of a declared ideological objective than a genuinely achieved goal of state policy.</jats:p>