From Border Fetishism to Tactical Socialism
In: East Central EuropeSearch for other papers by Gabriela Nicolescu in
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This article discusses the meeting point of two political systems with their distinctive value imprints on individuals’ everyday lives. It focuses on two stories of care, aesthetics and labor of Romanian women before the fall of the socialist regimes in Eastern Europe and in the first two decades after 1989. The first account comes from an expert, the head of the Union of National Cooperatives of Production (ucecom) during socialist Romania, the main producer of artizanat objects for export. She tells the story of the benefits of employment in state factories for women, and how socialist products were sold for Western markets in the 1970s and 1980s. The second account is of a former Romanian factory worker who after 1989 quit her job in Romania when state socialist factories were about to collapse and became a healthcare worker in Italy, for a larger salary and more stable employment. This second ethnographic example discusses migration for caregiver jobs in Italy as the transborder continuity of autonomy and employment practices that survived socialism. It is also a form of downward migration, where former state socialist professionals are paid as unskilled migrant workers. This article emphasizes the persistence of socialism in post-1989 practices and values embodied by people’s work habits not only in Eastern and Central Europe, but in unexpected places, such as southern Italy. This article applies the idea of “tactical socialism” as a strategy derived from a close analysis of work practices, with their positive accomplished effects, in contexts where jobs are distributed by the state and citizens feel protected.
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From Border Fetishism to Tactical Socialism
In: East Central EuropeSearch for other papers by Gabriela Nicolescu in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
This article discusses the meeting point of two political systems with their distinctive value imprints on individuals’ everyday lives. It focuses on two stories of care, aesthetics and labor of Romanian women before the fall of the socialist regimes in Eastern Europe and in the first two decades after 1989. The first account comes from an expert, the head of the Union of National Cooperatives of Production (ucecom) during socialist Romania, the main producer of artizanat objects for export. She tells the story of the benefits of employment in state factories for women, and how socialist products were sold for Western markets in the 1970s and 1980s. The second account is of a former Romanian factory worker who after 1989 quit her job in Romania when state socialist factories were about to collapse and became a healthcare worker in Italy, for a larger salary and more stable employment. This second ethnographic example discusses migration for caregiver jobs in Italy as the transborder continuity of autonomy and employment practices that survived socialism. It is also a form of downward migration, where former state socialist professionals are paid as unskilled migrant workers. This article emphasizes the persistence of socialism in post-1989 practices and values embodied by people’s work habits not only in Eastern and Central Europe, but in unexpected places, such as southern Italy. This article applies the idea of “tactical socialism” as a strategy derived from a close analysis of work practices, with their positive accomplished effects, in contexts where jobs are distributed by the state and citizens feel protected.
| All Time | Past Year | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 440 | 68 | 4 |
| Full Text Views | 73 | 2 | 0 |
| PDF Views & Downloads | 72 | 8 | 0 |