Introduction

Abstract

The demise of the Soviet Union was the culmination of a decade of remarkable political, economic and social change in that country. The Soviet state’s metamorphosis from apparently omnipotent monolith into fragmented commonwealth reflected, in turn, one of the most profound ideological revolutions witnessed this century. This transformation found especially dramatic expression in changing official conceptions of the role and nature of labour in Soviet society. In less than a decade, from the death of Brezhnev in November 1982 to the Union’s dissolution in December 1991, Soviet labour ideology degenerated from a seemingly timeless philosophy based on immutable principles, into a shifting set of ad hoc propositions dominated by considerations of tactical expediency. Over the same period, a more or less coherent economic system characterized by full and compulsory employment gave way to a disintegrating structure in which unemployment became recognized as a permanent socioeconomic phenomenon.