Reframing the Lupeni Strike of 1929: State Intervention and Organized Labor in Romania’s Jiu Valley

Abstract

The article examines the Lupeni strike action of 1929. While Communist-era historiography exalted the strike as a political action led by party members, the strike was atypical for local labor organization. Placing the strike in the wider context of 1920-1931, the article traces the interaction between local organized labor, the coal companies of the Jiu Valley, and state agents, both locally and in Bucharest. In the post-1918 period, the unions pressed for miners to receive reasonable compensation; given the state’s demand for coal and the companies’ need for labor, this initially fostered compromise. The Romanian state was willing to tolerate local labor unions led by Social Democrats, while using repression — including the army — to suppress strikes and ensure an uninterrupted coal supply. Shifts in the market and coal production, however, reduced the need for miners — resulting in the fragmentation of local unions. In 1929 the combination of a relatively liberal regime, coal companies seeking rationalization of their work force, and a radicalized fringe group resulted in the strike. While rejecting pre-1989 depictions of the strike, the text argues that labor history helps to reveal the limits of Romanian interwar democracy in ways that political and legal approaches may not.