What About the Workers? Workers and the Transition to Capitalism in Russia

by Burawoy, Michael; Clarke, Simon; Fairbrother, Peter; Krotov, Pavel

• ISBN13: 9780860916666
• ISBN10: 0860916669
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1993-11-17
• Publisher: Verso

Summary

Most writing on the dramatic events in the former Soviet Union has been based on the assumption that Russia is engaged in a transition from “state socialism” to capitalism, and focuses on political and ideological debates formulated in these terms.

This book questions whether Russia is in transition to capitalism and looks behind the political and ideological debates to focus on the development of the social relations of production, and on the class struggles to which these give rise. Simon Clarke introduces the book with an examination of the crisis of state socialism, in order to identify the dynamic of change in contemporary Russia. Michael Burawoy and Pavel Krotov develop a detailed case study of one Russian enterprise, which is followed by an analysis of the role of the trade unions in the Soviet system by Simon Clarke and Peter Fairbrother, on the basis of which they develop an analytical account of the development of the workers’ movement in Russia since 1987. Simon Clarke concludes the book with a detailed examination of struggles around privatization.

The common conclusion is that beneath the political turmoil the dominant class has renewed and restructured itself, but has not managed to overcome the challenge presented by the working class. The fragmentation and atomization of the working class remains a problem, but the struggle over the transformation of class relations is only just beginning.

Author Biography

Simon Clarke is Professor of Sociology at the University of Warwick.

Peter Fairbrother is Professor of International Employment Relations at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology.

Michael Burawoy is Professor of Sociology at the University of California, Berkeley.

Pavel Krotov is a sociologist working in the Russian Academy of Sciences, Syktyvkar.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Class Struggle and the Development of Capitalism in Russia	p. 1
The Contradictions of 'State Socialism'	p. 5
The Crisis of the Soviet System	p. 30
The Soviet Transition from Socialism to Capitalism: Worker Control and Economic Bargaining in the Wood Industry	p. 56
Trade Unions and the Working Class	p. 91
The Origins of the Independent Workers' Movement and the 1989 Miners' Strike	p. 121
Beyond the Mines: The Politics of the New Workers' Movement	p. 145
The Strikes of 1991 and the Collapse of the Soviet System	p. 161
After the Coup: The Workers' Movement in the Transition to a Market Economy	p. 173
Privatisation and the Development of Capitalism in Russia	p. 199
Bibliography	p. 242
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