Everyday Stalinism

[Yoshie Furuhashi]

>  > Sheila Fitzpatrick, _Everyday Stalinism -- Ordinary Life In
>>  Extraordinary Times: Soviet Russia in the 1930's_:
>>  <http://www.oup.co.uk/isbn/0-19-505000-2> &
>>  <http://www.oup.co.uk/isbn/0-19-505001-0>.
>>
>>  Sheila Fitzpatrick:
>>  <http://history.uchicago.edu/faculty/fitzpatrick.html>
>>
>>  jobs. As Fitzpatrick points out, this gambling mentality was the
>>  antithesis of the official mentality stressing rational planning.
>>  Outwardly obedient, Homo sovieticus retained a degree of skepticism.
>>  "Homo sovieticus was a string-puller, an operator, a time-server, a
>>  freeloader, a mouther of slogans, and much more. But above all, he
>  > was a survivor" (p. 227).
>
>Such a passage written by an American writer is in the same class as a
>Nazi hack reproaching Soviets for their anti-semitism or labor camps. 
>For the gambling games Homo americanus  play at work see Michael
>Burawoy, _Manufacturing Consent_.
>
>Wojtek

I haven't read _Everyday Stalinism_ -- you may very well be right 
about it overall, though I don't see any reproach in the particular 
quotation on which you comment.  I'm sure parallels existed between 
American and Soviet shop floors, but you can't learn about lives of 
Soviet citizens by reading _Manufacturing Consent_.  I'm intrigued by 
what appears to be a new interest in everyday life of Soviet citizens 
in all periods of Soviet history, written by scholars with 
wide-ranging political persuasions.  _Everyday Stalinism_ is just one 
example of many new (or newish) publications on the subject (see my 
other posts).  Taken as one perspective among many, it should offer 
some things of interest.
-- 
Yoshie

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