The transformation of work and industrial relations in the post-Soviet bloc: 25 years on from 1989

Abstract

The uprisings of 1989 in the Soviet sphere were momentous in their political impact. Examination of this prolonged transformation is timely. We progress from case study analysis of the workplace – important in the early stages of transformation – to reflective overviews which consider the accumulated experience of a quarter of a century of post-communism. Our overview studies highlight, for example, aspects of gender difference within the frame of ‘winners and losers’. The commonalities of ‘state capture’ are revealed across the states and geographical differences emerge in post-communist ‘recovery’ which highlight processes of uneven and combined development. Finally we identify relationships between state, labour and capital which stand outside the economic prescribed orthodoxy and the expected convergence of East with West. Instead of convergence to liberal economic values and practices we find crony capitalism associated with clientelism and mafia crime forming the backdrop to institutional failure.