Babas at the Bench: Gender Conflict in Soviet Industry in the 1930s

Abstract

In the annals of industrialisation, the scale and speed of the Soviet experience was unique.¹ The changes that transformed Europe over centuries were telescoped into a mere decade. The Soviet working class grew at an unprecedented rate, changing in size and social composition. Even more striking was the critical role played by women: in no other country did women come to constitute such a significant part of the working class in so short a time. In 1930 alone, 473 000 women entered industry, followed by 587 000 more in 1931. Between 1929 and 1935, almost 4 million women began to work for wages, 1.7 million of these in industry. By 1935, 42 per cent of all industrial workers were women.² Not only did women enter the labour force in record numbers, but they moved into industries that were traditionally dominated by men. Crossing older lines of sex segregation, they entered new industries such as machine building and electronics, as well as new and expanding branches of older industries such as mining, metallurgy and chemicals. They filled newly-created, semi-skilled jobs as well as older jobs previously held exclusively by men. Their sheer numbers and new position overwhelmed the older patterns of sex segregation that had persisted in Soviet industry through the 1920s. As the strict hierarchies of skill and gender were unexpectedly undercut, male workers were forced to re-examine their ideas about skill, ‘masculine’ and ‘feminine’ work and women’s role in the workplace.

* Baba means woman, and could also carry a derogatory connotation; ‘at the bench’ refers to skilled machine work.