For almost 20years, since the early 1990s, Professor Simon Clarke led multiple
international research projects in Russia, China and Vietnam studying labour
relations, enterprise restructuring and household economics under post-socialist
transition. Breaking out of post-socialist scholarship’s narrow confines, both
social and ideological, he led an exploration of the void opened by former
Soviet Union disintegration reconnecting with those who brought the brunt of it. Equally unique among western scholars was his promotion of a vast network
of former Soviet Union researchers and activists, later formalised in the Institute
for Comparative Research in Labour Relations. Here, for the first time, some of
its leading scholars reflect on his legacy, methods and ever-lasting contribution
to the advancement of sociology and social activism in Russia. Their accounts
convey the radically alternative character of the overall project, returning both
achievements and limitations. In substantive terms, the emerging picture confirms
the indeterminacy and complexity of Clarke’s original findings: no linear
development from ‘the subsumption of labour under capital’ to ‘familiar patterns
of class conflict’ has occurred. Instead, growing labour protests follow labour
degradation and restructuring, a strong state becoming the arbiter in the standoff between neoliberalism and workers’ resistance.