The Object of Labor: Commodification in Socialist Hungary

Did socialist policies leave the economies of Eastern Europe unprepared for current privatization efforts? Under communist rule, were rural villages truly left untouched by capitalism? In this historical ethnography of rural Hungary, Martha Lampland argues not only that the transition to capitalism was well under way by the 1930s, but that socialist policies themselves played a crucial role in the development of capitalism by transforming conceptions of time, money, and labor. Exploring the effects of social change thrust upon communities against their will, Lampland examines the history of agrarian labor in Hungary from World War I to the early 1980s. She shows that rural workers had long been subject to strict state policies similar to those imposed by collectivization. Since the values of privatization and individualism associated with capitalism characterized rural Hungarian life both prior to and throughout the socialist period, capitalist ideologies of work and morality survived unscathed in the private economic practices of rural society. Lampland also shows how labor practices under socialism prepared the workforce for capitalism. By drawing villagers into factories and collective farms, for example, the socialist state forced farmers to work within tightly controlled time limits and to calculate their efforts in monetary terms. Indeed, this control and commodification of rural labor under socialism was essential to the transformation to capitalism.

Table of Contents:
List of Tables List of Figures Linguistic Conventions Acknowledgments 1: Introduction 2: Struggling for Possession 3: Severing Ties 4: Reforming Notions 5: Planning as Science, Planning as Art 6: The Space to Work 7: Conclusion Bibliography Index

About the Author :
Martha Lampland is professor of sociology and faculty director of the Science Studies Program at the University of California, San Diego. She is the author or editor of several books, including Standards and their Stories and The Object of Labor, the latter published by the University of Chicago Press.

Review :
"What Lampland does so admirably and that, in my view, constitutes the enduring value of her work is to amply document how socialism functioned in everyday life--warts and all--and to present her evidence with an open recognition of its limits. Lampland was one of the few scholars who had the courage to investigate 'really existing socialism' first hand, with open eyes, and she should be applauded resoundingly for it. This book is a modern classic, and it sets a standard for scholarship that we should all strive to emulate."-- "Dialectical Anthropology"