A Russian Factory Enters the Market Economy

by Morrison; Claudio

• ISBN13: 9780415418782
• ISBN10: 041541878X
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2007-11-05
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

This book charts the experiences of a textile enterprise in Russia during the 1990s, analysing post-Soviet management and managerial practices in order to illuminate the content, nature and direction of industrial restructuring in the Russian privatised sector during the years of economic transition. Based on extensive factory-level fieldwork, it focuses upon changes in ownership, management and labour organisation, unveiling the complex texture of social, communal and gender relations in the workplace over an extended period of time, including through crisis and bankruptcy, acquisition by new capitalist owners and attempted restructuring. It argues, contrary to dominant Western managerial theories which blame the failure of transition on the irrationality of Russian managerial strategies, that the rationale for the continued reliance on Soviet era managerial practices lay in the peculiar form of social relations in the workplace which were characteristic of the Soviet system. It engages with keyissues, often neglected in the literature, such as social domination, power and conflict, that capture the problematic and open-ended character of social and economic transformation in post-Soviet production. It demonstrates that far from a simple transition to a market economy, the post-Soviet transition has reproduced most of the features of the old Soviet system, including its patterns of labour relations.

Table of Contents

List of tables
Preface	p. 1
Introduction	p. 5
Background to the research	p. 8
Sources and methodology	p. 9
The struggle for access : exposing the centrality of personal relationships	p. 12
Out of neutrality, taking the Russian side	p. 13
The role of gate keepers : gaining access	p. 14
Integrating into the social texture of the enterprise	p. 16
Negotiating identities, establishing communication : nationality, class and gender in the field	p. 18
Fieldwork in the shop : method and meaning in Soviet factory research	p. 25
Soviet factory, Russian factory : observations about the typicality and relevance of the case-study	p. 31
Transition and the Soviet legacy : Western ideology and Soviet reality	p. 35
Managerial control and its limits in the Soviet economy	p. 37
The Soviet system : a centralised command economy?	p. 37
The Soviet economic system : an imperfect system of social domination	p. 39
The enterprise in the Soviet economy	p. 42
Crisis and reforms : the Soviet system in question	p. 53
A world of textiles : the market, the industry and the enterprise	p. 63
Market and industry in textiles : the global context	p. 64
Market and industry in textiles : Russia and the lvanovo region	p. 66
Case-study background : the Upper Volga Textile Combine	p. 74
Structures and strategies in transition	p. 81
Organisation, ownership and control : formal structures and real powers	p. 82
Managerial strategies : the enterprise versus the market and the State	p. 102
The consequences of outsider control	p. 114
Industry structure and holdings' strategies : consolidation and monopolisation	p. 115
Management and restructuring in holding companies : two case-studies	p. 119
Summary and conclusions	p. 133
Controlling workers : the policy of productivity in transition	p. 134
The 'socialist ' wage system and its post-reform legacy : formal and informal practices	p. 136
Crisis and reform : the wage system in transition	p. 143
The 2000-2 outsider control : a new wage policy?	p. 152
Work and wages after the reform : managerial implementation and workers' response	p. 162
Summary and conclusions	p. 172
Labour and technological discipline	p. 173
Transition to increased indiscipline	p. 174
From Soviet populism to managerial authoritarianism?	p. 183
Summary and conclusions	p. 196
Conclusions	p. 198
Social relations in production and the fate of enterprise restructuring in Russia	p. 199
Restructuring in holding companies : trends and tasks	p. 204
Post-Soviet management and the future of Russian capitalism	p. 206
The role of the 'public hand' : industry perspectives and policy options	p. 214
Final considerations	p. 217
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