Professions And The State (Labor And Social Change)

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PROFESSIONS AND THE STATE

Copyrighted Material

In the series Labor and Social Change, edited by Paula Rayman and Carmen Sirianni


PROFESSIONS AND THE STATE EXPERTISE AND AUTONOMY IN THE SOVIET UNION AND EASTERN EUROPE

Edited by

Anthony Jones

Temple University Press Philadelphia


Temple University Press, Philadelphia [9[22 Copyright © [99[ by Temple University. All rights reserved Published 1991 The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences-Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Professions and the state: expertise and autonomy in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe / edited by Anthony Jones. p. cm. - (Labor and social change) Includes bibliographical references. ISBN 0-87722-80 [-9 (c1.) I. Professions-Soviet Union-Sociological aspects. 2. Professions-Czechoslovakia-Sociological aspects. 3. Professions-Poland-Sociological aspects. I. Jones, Anthony. II. Series. HT687.P7S9S 1990 30S·S'S3'0947-dc20 90-41355


CONTENTS

VB

PREFACE CHAPTER 1

Professions and the State in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe: Theoretical Issues

3

Elliott A. Krause CHAPTER 2

The Hybrid Profession: Soviet Medicine

43

Mark G. Field 3 Lawyers in the Soviet Union CHAPTER

Louise I. Shelley CHAPTER 4 Soviet Engineers as a Professional Group

91

Eduard Gloeckner 5 The "Purposeful Science" of Soviet Sociology: Will It Become a Profession? CHAPTER

Liah Greenfeld 6 Teachers in the Soviet Union CHAPTER

Anthony Jones CHAPTER

7

Constraints on Professional Power in Soviet-Type Society: Insights from the 1980-1981 Solidarity Period in Poland

Michael D. Kennedy and Konrad Sadkowski


119

CONTENTS

VI

CHAPTER

8

Hierarchy of Status and Prestige within the Medical Profession in Czechoslovakia Alena Heitlinger CHAPTER

2°7

9

Professions, the State, and the Reconstruction of Socialist Societies Anthony Jones and Elliott A. Krause

233

ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTORS

255


PREFACE

The study ofthe professions is one of the most developed areas within sociology, in addition to which it is closely linked with other specialities, such as work and occupations, formal organizations, business and the economy, power and control, and stratification. It also has strong ties to professionals themselves, who are consumers ofmuch of the literature as well as being providers of information. The evolution of the sociology of the professions has brought it to an interesting juncture. The boundaries separating the central concerns of the field from other areas are becoming more and more blurred, and the concept of "profession" is itself being reconsidered. This is a result of the evolution of research away from trying to describe and define professions and toward explaining the emergence of professions-what has recently been called the move from naturalism to theory. In the early studies ofprofessions attention was given to developing case studies ofparticular occupations and to creating typologies. These concerns eventually gave way to attempts to come to grips with the process whereby an occupation becomes a profession, and with the stages through which it was thought it has to go. Two consequences flowed from this new focus. First, the array of occupations considered for the status of profession widened. Second, attempts to explain the process ofprofessionalization led to a proliferation of theories, oflevels of analysis, and of the number of factors that were seen as central to the process. It is here that the concerns of this volume enter the picture. The move from naturalism to theory gave greater centrality to the relationship between an occupation and its environment, and to the process whereby boundaries protecting an occupation from external controls are created. Although relations with the environment have always been a focus of concern, the issue was often a submerged one. Thus,


PREFACE

V11l

for the functionalists, it was the nature of the profession's contribution to the environment (to the client and to the wider society) that required the creation of boundaries for the protection of expert decisions, and that enabled the claim for self-regulation to be accepted. For theorists who emphasize the way that professions control their environment (rather than the way they contribute to it), the environment is given a more central place. Even here, though, the focus is still mainly "occupation-centric," the environmental factors being objects of manipulation rather than part of an interactive process. An exception to this rule is the recent interest in professional work carried out in bureaucratic settings. There is a great debate underway about the consequences of the bureaucratization of the work environment for the status of the professions themselves, for the income and power of the practitioners, and for the quality of services provided to the clients. Some see this as deprofessionalization, others as proletarianization, and some as the end of the profession. Another exception is the growing interest in the role of the state in shaping the development of the professions. These developments provide us with an opportunity to bring the socialist societies into the picture, since the state (and the party that controls it) has a broader, more open, and more central role in the organization of social life than is the case in capitalist or mixed economIes. Although these theoretical developments have made socialist societies an ideal testing ground for ideas about the role of the environment, the field has so far ignored this opportunity. In spite of its high level of empirical and conceptual development, the sociological study of professions has been built almost exclusively on the analysis of professional occupations in the United States and Western Europe. Not only has this ethnocentrism limited the range of situations covered, it has also prevented us from facing fully the question of the extent to which our theories of the professions are limited in their applicability. By looking only at liberal-democratic polities and at market-oriented economies, students of the professions have not been able to see if their findings apply in one-party states and in centrally planned and controlled economies. Theories of the professions rest on the view that the defining characteristic of a profession is its ability to control its position in a market. This is true of both functionalist and power-based theories. Although it is true that recent analyses have


PREFACE

IX

begun to look at the bureaucratic settings within which many professionals are increasingly operating, the benchmark is still that of the market-controlling profession. In many societies, and in particular the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, and China, professionals are (with a few exceptions) employees of the state and are not "free" professionals. Moreover, in socialist societies the significance of the state goes well beyond its status as an employer, for the state shapes the general environment in which all occupations operate. Concretely, this is the result of state control of the educational system, of the number and types of specialists produced, of employment and conditions of work and the absence of alternatives, of salaries, and of the general organizational, political, and ideological environment within which professionals work. Moreover, all professional organizations are controlled by the state, and access to professional counterparts in other societies is either extremely limited or subject to oversight by the state. Until recently, it was as difficult for professional interests to be expressed independently of the state as it was for the interests of civil society in general. All of these factors create problems for the development and maintenance of professional boundaries. The significance of this is that the presence of boundaries is ofcentral importance for issues of (I) control over entry to the profession, (2) the content of training, (3) certification, (4) the claim to technical expertise beyond the jurisdiction of outsiders, (5) control over conditions of work, (6) the sole right to make decisions on the basis of special knowledge, and (7) policing performance and enforcing ethics. All of these factors preserve the public definition ofthe profession, and therefore its right to autonomy and self-regulation. Professions create a special problem for the party and state in socialist societies. For most theorists it is the knowledge base of an occupation that enables it to create the power that comes with professionalization. In socialist societies it is precisely this characteristic of an occupation that poses the most danger to the party's control of the society. Professionals in socialist societies operate not within a market but within a bureaucratic setting, and within a general environment that differs from that in market societies. What happens to these occupations as a result? Can they, indeed, be called professions? What happens to the way the occupation is organized, to recruitment and


x

PREFACE

training, to the terms and conditions of work, to client-professional relations, to the quality of services provided, to the control of standards and practices, and so on? It is to these issues that this volume is addressed. In the chapters that follow, contributors look at professions in the USSR, Czechoslovakia, and Poland, and consider the same set of issues to the extent that their sources of information allow. Although the chapters are case studies, they aim not just at providing a picture ofa particular profession but at opening up theoretical issues as well. Since coverage is limited to three socialist societies, it is clear that the purpose of this volume is to begin the process of reassessing our understanding of the professions in the light ofempirical accounts ofa few professions in a few societies. There is no pretense of systematic coverage of all socialist societies or of all of the professions, the aim being, rather, to open up new questions for consideration. Finally, it should be noted that this volume comes at an opportune time. The current rapid and revolutionary changes occurring in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, and the decentralization that this entails, will have important consequences for the professions in these countries. It is precisely the physicians, lawyers, engineers, scientists, and other professionals who are taking over much of the decision making in the economy and society. This makes it even more imperative that we pay more attention to these groups and try to incorporate their experience into our thinking about the role of the professions in modern society. Since the authors in this volume wrote their papers before the scope of change in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union had become apparent, they were not able to extend their analyses to include the most recent developments. The purpose of this book, however, is not to provide an account of current affairs, but to address the consequences of the socialist period for professions, and for our understanding of the professionalization process. Future work in this area will of necessity be historical, but it will be no less significant for that.





CHAPTER I

Professions and the State in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe: Theoretical Issues Elliott A. Krause

Sociological approaches to the study of professions are incomplete if they do not focus on a central aspect of their existence-their relation to the state. First and foremost, professional groups provide skills and societal functions so critical to industrial nations that their activity cannot be ignored by the state. Since the time of the medieval guilds, professions have signed charters with the state combining some compromise between the rights of monopoly and self-regulation, on the one hand, with some kind of control or check on their central activity by the state, on the other, in return for such rights and privileges. 1 The state has been involved at every point. Yet, until recently, to use the phrase and general approach of Skocpol and her colleagues, we have not often "brought the state back in" to the analysis of professions. 2 In this approach, "A complete analysis ... requires examination of the organization and interests of the state, specification of the organization and interests of socioeconomic groups, and inquiries into the complementary as well as conflicting relationships of state and societal actors."3 It is the aim of this chapter to look at relations between the state and professional groups in a part of the world-Eastern Europe-where it is impossible to ignore the central role of the state in professional group activity. The hope is to do so in a way that raises some comparative and theoretical issues for a cross-national political sociology of profession-state relations in historical perspective.


ELLIOTT A. KRAUSE

4

Unlike the people in most occupations, professionals in Eastern Europe are often trained in universities, which are elements ofthe state in most nations; they are licensed by the state because of their central role; and to varying degrees, depending on the nation and the historical period, they are employed by the state as well. The corporate existence of professional groups, and this existence vis-a-vis the state over time, is the center of our interest here. To what extent do professions form their own corporate existence-a true solidary political community-and determine their own values, goals, and working conditions? Conversely, to what extent does the state do this for them? And how does this vary historically, from nation to nation, and from profession to profession within each nation? To even begin to answer these questions, and to see what theoretical issues arise from attempting to answer them, requires our observing the same profession, or group of professions, in nations with state structures and state action of different types. For example, we would need to look at American professions and the evolution of their role vis-a-vis the American state; at Western European professions in each nation and the evolution of their relation to each Western European welfare state; and at the evolution of the relation of professions in Eastern Europe with their states, before and after the founding of the present socialist regimes. In extending the study of profession-state relations to Eastern Europe, we shall suggest that there is a continuum of profession-state relations, ranging from the essentially "private" professions with limited state involvement and employment (the American example), to the state-involved professions of Western Europe, to the primarily state-located and state-employed professions of Eastern Europe. We shall also consider the question of an evolution of profession-state relations. Indeed, this will be one of our main questions, and the reason for viewing the profession-state relationship in historical perspective. To explore these questions and to propose a set of areas for further research, we need first to determine what dimensions of professional group and state action are of concern to us, as these dimensions or variables relate to previous approaches to the study of professions. Then, focusing more specifically on Eastern Europe, we must ask, what are the main dimensions or variables that, at a minimum, should be considered? A case example, inspecting briefly what these dimensions look like in the case of the Soviet Union, follows. Finally,



5

we conclude with the major comparative issues for theory and research on profession-state relations that arise in this initial, exploratory effort.

Previous Approaches Sociological approaches to the study of professions, especially in the case ofthe United States, have until the present decade concentrated on the profession-client relationship in functional terms, as in the work of Parsons;4 the socialization process within professional education, as with the work of Hughes and his colleagues;5 or with the factors affecting the autonomy ofindividual professionals in the workplace, as in most ofthe work ofFreidson. 6 The past decade has led to a broadening of focus, toward a critical political sociology of the professions as corporate group actors vis-a-vis markets, as in the work of Larson;7 capitalist rationalization of professionals as employees, as in the work ofDerber, 8 McKinlay, 9 McKinlay and Arches, 10 and Spangler; 11 or, as in my own current work, on the historical evolution of the relations among professions and the states and capitalist sectors that pressure professionals directly as employers and indirectly through their influence on the mechanisms and bureaus of the state, in given nations at given points in time. 12 Unless one considers the experience of Eastern Europe both before and after the creation ofsocialist regimes, there is a danger that conclusions on profession-state relations will be drawn that are relevant only to the capitalist world. A comparative, social-historical perspective would ask a basic question at this point. It is likely that no deep understanding of the role of professional groups in society-including their degree of autonomy in individual workplaces-is possible without understanding the role of states and markets in: (I) the education of professional groups or cadres; (2) the nature and conditions of their employment in "free professional" (petit bourgeois or self-employed) status or state locations, and (3) the overall evolution of the relationship between these two organizing forces-state and market-with respect to goods and services. Thus, we need to know to what extent professional services, their numbers, roles, and working conditions, are a result of the predominance of state action, of market forces, or of their own self-organized group action vis-a-vis state and market, at a given point in history in a


6

ELLIOTT A. KRAUSE

given nation. We also need to consider the extent to which changes in the balance of power between state, market, and professional groups lead to changes in the nature of professional work, and thus of professional services delivered to those who need them.

The Case of Eastern Europe: Dimensions for Analysis Although each of the analytical dimensions proposed here could easily be subdivided-or in some cases combined-it will be helpful to set them out, then consider each one in the case of the Soviet Union. These dimensions are relevant to professions and the state in Western Europe and the United States as well. They include: the state itself (its structure, power-efficiency, and degree oflegitimacy among the people), the nature and functions of an intelligentsia in the political definition of the term, the social role of the university in professional training, the role of political parties in professional training and employment, and the relation of the state to the market. The first dimension is really manifold-the various ways in which the state and its subdivisions can be viewed as interested political actors. These may be summarized under five main sets of issues that require further analysis and research. First we must look at what I call state "shape" or state "structure"such factors as the degree of centralization, federalization, decentralization, or simple disjunction and noncoordination of the state's elements historically, as well as after the advent of socialism. Second in this area, the dimension (really a complex set of variables) we call the power-efficiency of the state-the extent to which the state in a given nation is capable of imposing its will on a population, or on groups within it such as the professions. Third, after Montesquieu's concept of "l'esprit des lois," there is what we might call "l'esprit d'Etat"-the extent to which the citizens of a particular nation accept or reject the legitimacy ofa strong central state. 13 In Western Europe, for example, we have the strongly centralized French state with a history of the acceptance ofthis strength and centrality by the French people, and a federalized and partially suspect West German state (given the track record ofrecent strong central German states), which is nevertheless respected for its workforce-the traditionally highly prestigious Beamten class of civil servants. We also have the rather disjointed, somewhat decen-



7

tralized, and strongly regionalized Italian state, with an active distrust of the state by the majority of the population. 14 Could we, on these dimensions of state shape, state power-efficiency, and popular acceptance, pair France with the Soviet Union, West Germany with Yugoslavia, or Italy with Poland? If the state has centrality, power, and acceptance, what it may be able to do with respect to professional groups is rather different from what it could achieve if it is weak, decentralized, and distrusted. How has the action of the state affected the nature of university professional training and the degree of professional group power and corporate self-determination, as these relate in turn to state shape and action and citizen acceptance of central state power? For example, the state-prohibited or "flying" universities in Poland (as a protest against state intrusion in the regular university curriculum and attempts to repress faculty criticism of the society) and the existence of a private sector in medicine can be related historically to the Polish people's hatred of most of "their" states, and to the existence of resistance by the professions, by the Roman Catholic Church, and by the Solidarity movement. Yet these attitudes in Poland did not spring from the earth with the advent of the Soviet military occupation, nor did the problems of the Polish state begin then. We are asking for studies that relate the history ofstate-profession relations before socialism to that same set of relations afterward. A second, essentially historical dimension is the degree to which the nation had an organized, cross-professional, semi-solidary intelligentsia in the presocialist era, and the social role ofthis intelligentsia as a source ofsupportfor professional institutions after the advent ofsocialist states. For example, in late czarist Russia liberal reforming professional subgroups such as the Zemstvo physicians were part of a broader movement of the intelligentsia. 15 To what extent do such ties exist at present? It is significant that Gorbachev is presently trying to enlist the intelligentsia per se, not simply as an occupational category but to get the progressive and "regime critical" doctors, lawyers, scientists, and writers on his side. He views them, as a group, as an "invisible college" with the power to block or support changes in Soviet society. But to what extent does such a group, if it exists, ever involve itself in the specific problems of specific professions? Or does it move from issue to issue, while each professional group and its more parochial professional leaders work out for themselves their relation to the state, without the participation


8

ELLIOTT A. KRAUSE

of the intellectuals who may in fact belong by training to that very profession? Does the existence ofan intelligentsia support professional group power or act as a substitute for it, coopting professional elites into activity that may be important for the overall society but that ignores the needs of the professional masses? A third area of inspection is the social role oj the university in professional training. Central Europe shares the gymnasium (or lycee)-touniversity model of professional training, with liberal arts and basic sciences in the last few years at the lyeee (the equivalent ofan American two-year college degree, but with much higher standards) and then on to the university for immediate enrollment in a professional school or program. This model existed all over Europe well before socialism and is reviewed historically for the past century for Germany by Krau!. 16 University professors, usually in a steeply hierarchical department (of which they are the chair and the only full professor) are civil servants and are inspected for their political loyalty to the reg1me. A political review of the candidate before promotion and tenure at the professorial ranks was not invented by the Communist Party in East Germany after 1945 but in fact is a feature of the review process in West Germany today. With the state closely related to the funding of the university, it is not surprising in either Eastern or Western Europe that political parties in control of the state would be interested in the shapers of the political values and opinions of the educated elite. The trends of the past ten years, which may be for some pull-back by state and party from university and professional appointments, may be leading to a more autonomous professoriate in Eastern Europe than was the case at the end of World War II. What, then, is the role of the state, the practicing profession, the professoriate, in initiating new professional directions? Furthermore, is there in each nation a separate and parallel academy ofscience, with far-flung research labs ofits own, where most of the basic research of the nation goes on, where individual titles such as "academician" are far more prestigious than those of "professor"? This is the Soviet model, originating from Peter the Great's Russian Academy of Sciences. 17 Imagine the United States if the National Science Foundation had laboratories all over the nation, and the heads of these labs directed America's research, whereas in the university only applied work oflower prestige was carried on. We need to know more about how careers in science and social science are



9

affected by this dual university-academy system, in which the state funds both the Academy of Science's basic research bureaus and the state university system with its applied research. And what of the relative professional autonomy of academicians, on the one hand, and ordinary professors on the other? A fourth area ofinvestigation would specifically consider the role of the Communist Party in Eastern Europe, vis-a-vis the professions, over time, and by profession, .from nation to nation. We would need to consider the actions of the Party directly and indirectly, in the latter case meaning the setting ofpriorities for funding overall programs and subprograms dealing with health care, legal services, education, and technical development-which would of course markedly affect the environment of the medical, legal, academic, and engineering professions. We would need to know far more than we presently do about the strategies of intervention of the Party in the Soviet Union and in each other nation, as these strategies have affected each profession. This is a specific example, for Eastern Europe, of a general question in the analysis of professions: to what extent do political parties, working directly or through the state, shape the central services and the fate of those who provide them? To what extent is professional group power able to confront and either nullify or modify the power of the political party? Or to what extent are party priorities expressed through general state policies? How solidary is the party? The profession? How has the relationship evolved over time? We also need to know the difference, for the first time ascertainable with new quantitative studies coming out ofEastern Europe, between party priorities and goals and the realities of change. The attempt of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union to build professional cadres out of the devastation of civil war, massive terror in the Stalin era, and the destruction of World War II may be a more important long-term story than the well-publicized, and important, brutal interventions by Party ideologues into the function of the courts and the legal system, or the harassment of dissident intellectuals. We have few quantitative measures, to date, on whether party interference in professional institutions is increasing or decreasing. The few empirical studies we have in recent years on Soviet professional history since Khrushchev indicate that with some exceptions there has been a gradual pull-back of the Party, and especially of its ideologues, from most of the everyday functioning of the medical, legal, academic, and engineering pro-


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ELLIOTT A. KRAUSE

fessions. The functional role of such groups, as noted, gives them real leverage, especially in a society that is still partly underdeveloped and sets high priorities on their skills. Furthermore, and this needs to be explored further, the era 1960-198 5 may be one of increasing professional group solidarity, more national associations with real agendas for change toward greater professional autonomy from state and party control, even more openly expressed than ever, and discussed and covered by the national media. What are the trends here in the partyprofession relationship, nation by nation, profession by profession? Monographic social histories of given professions in given Eastern European nations, with a political analysis of interest struggles as above, are just beginning to become available. Fifth and finally, we have the overall theoretical issue of the relation of the state to the market and the implications ofthis relation for the professions .18 In the West capitalism grew without much intervention of the state, except to provide finance for colonialist ventures and, in a later industrial era, to provide the infrastructure for its development. After the mid-1800s Marx's model of the state as "the executive organ of the bourgeoisie," while oversimplified, carried much truth, certainly for the France he described in The Eighteenth Brumaire ofLouis Bonaparte. 19 But this situation changed. After World War II the large capitalist firms entered into much joint planning with the state. This planning was informal in the U. S. case but was formal in the French planning model. 20 It could also occur through corporatist or concerted semiformal interest-group bargaining, as in West Germany in the relations among the great banks, the business associations, the political parties, and the state. 21 Thus, the modern picture shows both a greater involvement by the state with capitalist sectors in planning for finance, production, and distribution, and a very recent (from 1980) degree ofdisengagement in those nations in the West that have conservative governments. In general, though, the post-World War II welfare states of Western Europe, with their publicly funded (and often publicly employed) doctors, lawyers, professors, and even engineers, show a major involvement of the state in the direction of professional work, and an impact on what professions are able to plan as a group. Conversely, the absence of a legal private market in the Soviet Union has led to a situation in which private practice by professionals (except by lawyers in the avocat role) is only semi-legal. Will the pull-back of the state



II

from the market-or the deliberate fostering by the state ofsmall freemarket or capitalist spheres within the overall socialist economycreate the climate for an upsurge in private practice and the development of an official private-practice sphere for such professions as medicine, law, and high-technology scientists and engineers? Since the example of the avocat does exist, and since avocats are clearly "guildorganized" and practice somewhat as English barristers do, perhaps other models will develop spontaneously, or even be fostered by the state. In general, then, will the freeing up of sectors of the economy include the professional services sectors? Will state control of training, practice, and salary-as well as service availability-change as the state lessens its involvement? Or will professions continue to be viewed (as they still are in much of Western Europe) as only a semieconomic social sphere? If so, the growth of a general market economy may not mean less state control over professional groups and their work.

Professions in the Soviet Union: The Dimensions Explored In this section we briefly explore the dimensions or questions for analysis outlined above by looking at the development of professionstate relations in the Soviet Union. In the conclusion we ask what overall social trends could be looked for when we explore these dimensions in other Eastern European nations, Western Europe, and the United States.

State Shape, Power, and Acceptance First there is the question ofstate "shape, " the question ofpower-efficiency, and the "esprit d'Etat" in the minds and hearts of the majority of the people. Clearly, prerevolutionary Russia was an extreme example of state centralization, with much power exerted from the center (often through the czarist secret police) and with a centralized and large state bureaucracy in place. The passivity ofthe Russian people vis-a-vis the czars and the absence on their part of much experience with democracy at the local level (excepting to some extent the village councilor mir and those Zemstvo local governments that worked for a while) meant that a hierarchical, centralized, and bureaucratized state


ELLIOTT A. KRAUSE

12

had been built and the people were resigned to it. There are differing opinions on the nature ofthe revolution, but instead ofthe state's being smashed as Lenin had expected in State and Revolution,22 the Central Committee of the Party took the place of the czar following the Bolshevik consolidation of power. Even the institution of the secret police was kept from the old regime, though it was renamed. The process of building a socialist economy and modifying the state to deal with it took far longer. In each step of state building-especially the building of modern social institutions of health care, legal services, education, and technology-the character of the state-profession relationship changed. There has been a succession of periods of social turmoil during which professional institutions were builteither from nearly nothing or from decayed fragments of a system serving only the upper class. After the civil war Lenin initiated a partially private, partially public economy, that of the New Economic Policy (NEP). His death led to Stalin's grasp for power and the further centralization of command, the five-year plans, the terror, the upheavals of World War II, followed by the Khrushchev reforms, slowdown and stagnation under Brezhnev, and now a second wave of reform under Gorbachev. Each of these periods has had implications for the role of the university and of the practicing professions. But it should also be noted that the consequences differed, depending also on which profession we are considering. Medicine was proletarianized and enlisted for a battle toward public health. Law was used, then ignored, then harassed, and finally after 1960 used centrally as a tool in economic development and legitimacy-building. The troubled career of the professoriate depended on the ideological priorities of the state and Party in each era. Only engineering, along with most scientific and technological development, found steady support through all the eras, although there was occasional interference even here. The state's role was understandably strong on issues involving the relation between pure and applied research, including how many people were to be trained to do each kind of work, and this remains so in the present era. 23

The Medical Profession In medicine each of these periods had its own health problems and policies, with implications for what Field has called "the taming of the



13

medical profession"-their change from a small, elite, prestIgIous profession working in private practice for the rich to a large, publicly employed mass profession serving all in a gigantic network of public clinics and hospitals spanning the entire Soviet Union. 24 The result is that the majority ofdoctors are in general practice, female, and poorly paid even by Soviet standards; a small, primarily male elite of professors and research academicians enjoys higher rank, with better benefits, but it also serves in the public sector. 25 The period of War Communism (1918-1921) was a period of epidemics-cholera, typhus, and the like, spread by both malnutrition and war. Much of the traditional profession had fled or had gone to fight on the White Army side. Lenin's observation for the revolution and the years of the NEP was, in his own words, that "either the revolution will defeat the lice, or the lice will defeat the revolution." Nationalization of the pharmacies and the majority of health care settings (clinics and hospitals) made possible rapid administrative changes in the system, but the changes were slowed by the opposition of a part of the prerevolutionary medical profession that still remained in the new nation. The period of the NEP (1921-1928) led to the state's allowing the return of private practice and private pharmacies, but this trend was reversed with the death of Lenin, Stalin's accession to power, and the final driving out of private practice (except for a small circle of the Party elite). What should be understood here is that the transition from a privately practicing profession to a publicly employed and statecontrolled one was not made overnight. Liberal and reasonably progressive physicians, members of the Pirogov Society, wanted to extend the service to the poor and working class but did not want a totally public profession in public employment. Field summarizes the situation at the beginning of the NEP: A thorn that remained in the side ofthe [Health] Commisariat and of Soviet medicine was the medical profession's generally cool response, particularly by those who had Pirogov leanings, to the measures adapted by "Soviet" medicine.. . They were later criticized in a resolution of the Congress which complained that "the majority ofphysicians' sections, in spite oftheir three-year existence within the Union, have not been penetrated by the general spirit of the proletarian professional movement. "26


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Field also notes that by the end of the NEP period their resistance had practically disappeared: "No trace was left of the medical profession as an organized, self-governing social group and social force. "27 The prewar Stalin years of forced collectivization and five-year plans (1928-1941) were years of growing state strength, extension of the power of the Russian republic over all Soviet regions and institutions (including the professions), and concentration of all power into the hands of Stalin and the secret police. Overt opposition to this regime now usually brought imprisonment, exile, or death. The state enlisted the medical professional into the industrial growth area. Structured strains were put on the physician role and the physicianpatient relationship in the network of factory-based clinics that complemented urban and rural clinics in each area. 28 Since workers needed an illness excuse to leave work and the state clearly warned the physicians against issuing too many of these, doubts were resolved in favor of production and state goals, regardless of the degree of illness or the doctors' desires. Finally, the state's emphasis was on the full use of the workforce and not on science or technology. A small elite of professors and researchers was allowed, but the design was to produce numbers fast. It was not until the Khrushchev era that the Soviet Union could begin to think deeply about the quality of training or improvements in technology, leaving the profession even today far behind in medical technology in comparison with the West, but quite modern in terms of the new emphasis on interpersonal clinical relations-always the strong point ofthe Soviet general practitioner. The war years led to many strains on the profession. It would be the mid-1960s before the Soviet Union would consider that its numbers of physicians were sufficient and that feldshers in rural areas could begin to be replaced by physicians. Recent reports on the Soviet medical profession and health care system, such as those by Knaus, reveal little real change from 1965 to 1985. 29 The mass of the profession are still general practitioners and pediatricians, still practicing in local clinic groups together with a nurse in urban and rural outpatient clinics, with about 20 percent going on for a second or higher medical degree and speciality training, usually wishing (and succeeding) to remain in or near Moscow, Leningrad, Kiev, or Odessa. Special hospitals for the nomenklatura (Party elite) are still a strain on the ideology of equality and constitute an important perquisite of high party membership. Here, all the technol-



15

ogy absent from most hospitals and clinics is present. Given the wide gap between elite and mass physicians, and the different worlds in which they practice, it is not likely that the near future will see the kind of organized or solidary resistance to state programs that was seen in the NEP years. In addition, the state is capable of crushing some, but not all, professional resistance if it wishes. A prime example here are the "psychiatric" prisons, operated by the KGB and not by the Ministry of Health, where dissenters are given punitive forms of "therapy" in special "hospitals for the criminally insane. "30 Recent dissenters have focused world attention on this situation. It shows the inability of the majority of Soviet psychiatrists, or the medical profession as a whole, to get the state to stop, even though the International Psychiatric Association has ostracized Soviet psychiatry until the situation changes. The elite of the medical profession are involved in research, in laboratories of the Ministry of Health, or, occasionally, within the network of the Soviet Academy of Science's laboratories. But they are very little connected to the world of practice, in line with the general divorce between university and research institute that still characterizes the nation. Consequently, a publicly employed, stratified, and nonsolidary profession, essentially formed by Lenin in the early years after the revolution, has maintained its form. Perhaps in the future greater activism by the professional group itself will provide a force for change, and for greater autonomy ofindividual practitioners. Also important would be a closer relationship between the university or research institute, on the one hand, and the ordinary vrach or general practitioner, on the other. This might help in keeping those on the "front lines" up to date, as is now beginning in the West.

The Legal Profession The nature of state-profession relations over time depends in part on the specific skills of the group and the state's need for those skills. The legal profession is an important case in point. Even very skilled czarist lawyers, especially defense lawyers, contended with a highly arbitrary, poorly codified, and often corrupt legal system. 31 As in continental Western Europe, Russia had (and the Soviet Union still has) an administrative, or Roman-law, judge-based legal system in which attorneys playa smaller role than in Anglo-Saxon systems. As in France, to name one such Western nation with an administrative-


16

ELLIOTT A. KRAUSE

law system, the lawyers are limited in terms of their number of appearances in court and the time they may take. Judges, not lawyers, are in control of calling witnesses, and no attempts to discredit witnesses by either lawyer are allowed-rather, the judge (and in capital cases, ajury) decides on such issues without such activity. "Truth" in this system is not expected to emerge out of a battle between attorneys. Since judges are so central and since much collusion occurred in czarist days between judges and lawyers, although services were effectively limited to the wealthy, the profession was widely hated and greatly distrusted by the Bolsheviks. Lenin's legal education and experience did not turn him into a partisan of the profession-rather the reverse. After the revolution, the role of the legal profession changed rapidly, again depending on the period ofstate building and politics of the state and the Party, as these contrasted with or harmonized with the interests of the bar. 32 In Lenin's first few years, there were many summary trials and executions. The "revolutionary tribunals" paid little more attention to defense lawyers than did the corrupt czarist courts. But this soon changed. In Lenin's NEP, especially with its mix of public and private business and the complexities of contracts, the legal profession, though still suspected of anti-Soviet prejudice, was not harassed but, rather, was harnessed and protected because of its central role in building a modern economy. Defense lawyers still contended with harassment if their client was in the political realm, but they began to practice more normally in most other spheres. Stalin's actions were more drastic. Under Andrei Vishinsky an effort was made ideologically to undermine the new Soviet constitution in ways that made ordinary defense work very much dependent on party preference and pressure on the judge. But another development, from the time of NEP right through Stalin and up to the present, was the creation of a British barrister-style set of collegia or lawyers' selfcontrolled practice groups, self-funding and attached to each major court, not only in the Russian republic but throughout the nation. These groups oflawyers can essentially be viewed as private, petit bourgeois "mini-guilds" within the state structure-an unusual situation that shows the continuity of professional forms, since something like these existed in czarist days. Soviet lawyers (defense lawyers or avocats) are grouped in a self-regulating, self-funding collective, with a base salary out of their state-set fees; with extra charges possible



17

depending on the client; with each group member assessed a fraction of income for group benefits (retirement, pension, and the like); and with the balance ofthe fees earned by each practitioner credited to each lawyer's individual account, depending on how much business was created and earned, much as in an American law firm. Collignon comments that though technically avocats are in the Soviet legal bureaucracy, in practice they function rather autonomously: Article 13 of the Fundamental Law affirms that the Colleges of Advocates are autonomous social organizations, "voluntary associations ofindividuals practicing the profession of advocate." ... One should not lose sight of the fact that these associations function to support the administration, and because of this are under their supervision. This said, it is nevertheless the case that the Colleges of Advocates are always independent of the other branches of the legal power structure (procuracy and judiciary). 33 Adding new and younger members to these law firms means sharing business, and in classic fashion not only are the younger members chosen by the senior partners, but the firms also tend to be exclusionary, as both medieval guilds and American law firms tend to be. Collignon comments: "Another factor which counts against the admission of young lawyers; the mode of remuneration, which depends on the sum ofall the business which the group has carried out. The less the number of advocates, the greater the funds they have, and thus they hesitate to recruit younger ones with whom they would have to share. "34 As officers of the court, as with advocates in most administrative systems and as with barristers in England, the avocats are theoretically under the supervision of the Ministry ofJustice (which itself dates from 1962). They are, and have been since the revolution, essentially semi-autonomous, fee-for-service private practitioners in a group practice arrangement! What Stalin did not support was a nationwide lawyers' association, for he felt this would give the profession too much power. But he was not able to smash this semi-traditional and certainly non-Soviet professional work arrangement. Stalin and Vishinsky did push for the creation and employment of more lawyers in industry: the "jurisconsult" role of company lawyer and legal fix-it, poorly paid in the style of the Soviet physician but with important functions to play in the Soviet work organization. 35 The jurisconsult role has become particularly important because of the


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ELLIOTT A. KRAUSE

complex ways in which the state intervenes in the economy-through GOSPLAN, the national economic plallning and production control agency. Complex contractual arrangements-and resulting damage suits by one firm against another when the materials are not sent on time and the dependent firm is blamed by GOSPLAN or some other manufacturer-have grown in number since World War II. Consequently, the legal needs of production organizations in the Soviet Union and the varied roles ofjurisconsults, as shown by Shelley and Collignon, are extensive, though they differ in being less specialized and segregated into the "house counsel" role found in American industry. An increasing number of new law graduates-actually a majority-now go into jurisconsult work as labor arbitrators, contract managers, legal advisers, or in some cases, into managerial positions. As the prestige and glamour of the engineering graduate has begun to fade in the last two decades, jurisconsults may begin to edge out engineers. Although jurisconsults are lowest on the prestige ladder within the legal profession (below advocates, who are in turn below members of the prosecutor corps and judges), they are a significant number of the Soviet lawyers in practice, are salaried, often provide free legal services for employees, and are intimately involved with the Soviet economy, in particular with the interface between state planning agencies and production firms. Finally, the state's priorities in related areas-particularly the ongoing campaigns against crime and the black market-have ironically put some pressures on the state itself to obey its own laws and let the courts do their work with less interference. This has the effect of increasing the influence and autonomy of the avocat corps. That is, if citizens are to be trained to respect the law, then the law itself has to be more equally enforced by the courts. Open complaints about Party interference in the work of the courts are now published in Izvestia and Pravda. Even as far back as the early 1960s, in Czechoslovakia, one judge thought that the Party called him in only in one case out of ten, though that did make him think about his decisions in the other nine cases, if Party members were on trial. 36 All leading students of change in the Soviet legal system since 1950, such as Cameron and Collignon, agree that much progress has been made toward an independent judiciary and more of a fair chance for the defense lawyers, even though in the case of political trials involving dissenters and spies, there is probably enough interference so that in these areas (unlike the vast majority



19

of cases) it is not accurate yet to say that the Soviet Union is operating under the rule of law. 37 But, given the constraints, the trend of autonomy of the avocat-never really affected as much as the doctor-is upward, toward greater group power than before World War II, and with much more of a fair trial than ever before. They are on the way toward corporate recognition as a "pressure group." Legal reforms in 1962 give Soviet avocats much more ofa role to play in the trial process as well, in spite of its being primarily an administrative, judge-based court system.

University Professors and Academicians When we consider the university professoriate and its relation to the Soviet state, we cannot consider it in historical perspective without simultaneously considering the Soviet Academy of Sciences and its chief researchers, or academicians. The relation or nonrelation between university and academy is essential in understanding the stateprofession relationship in the world of higher education and research. Perhaps the most important point is the historical one. Peter the Great set up the Russian Academy of Sciences (the forebear of the present Soviet Academy of Sciences) almost a century before the first university functioned, even marginally, in Russia. It would be a long fight against most czars (with the exception of the liberal reformer Alexander II) to create even the beginning of a semi-autonomous professoriate in Russia, nor very much of a university system except for a small beginning in Moscow and St. Petersburg. Consequently, the October revolution had the problem ofbuilding, almost from scratch, a university system across the Soviet Union, while buttressing and developing the (now Soviet) Academy of Sciences as a separate entity and highly prestigious organization. The international prestige of this organization was always important to the regime, which is why Stalin gave such autonomy and funds to the noted Soviet-hater Pavlov. 38 Most importantly, the professoriate as we now know it could not have existed without the long-term support of the Soviet state. The new state built the national public elementary, secondary (lycee), and university system as a tool for modernization and industrial development. Within the ranks of the professoriate itself, the ideology of the individual professors mattered more, or less, depending on the historical period. For example, Lenin was well aware, during the NEP period, that the university was a hotbed of anti-Soviet liberal reformers, most


20

ELLIOTT A. KRAUSE

of them members of the then-outlawed Constitutional Democratic (Cadet) party. Yet he needed them and the state needed them. Stalin, in consonance with his far greater centralized power in a now-established state, and with his ideologically related terror, purged and in fact murdered hundreds of these professors (many of them near their retirement) just before the onset of World War II. 39 Given these purges, and the subsequent losses to the war ofboth staffand facilities, it would be the task after the war to rebuild and to build, at the same time, the national system laid out by Lenin and begun by Stalin and the Party before the war. As noted above, for progress through the ranks, it is still helpful (but not absolutely necessary) to be a Party member. Above the rank of professor, Party membership still is necessary. Still, the "invisible college" of colleagues is strong in the Soviet Union, and the promotion ofParty hacks to professorships-and certainly into the Academy of Sciences-encounters so much ridicule and resistance that only a Stalin could try it, and even he had trouble when he "won" in this area. However, some areas-such as "philosophy" or "historical materialism"-are still political even today. When the Soviet Academy ofSciences and its "professors" or academicians is compared with the actual university professoriate (those teaching in universities, and until recent years usually not doing much research), the history is straightforward. The university system (with more than 80 percent of it vocationally oriented) and the Soviet Academy of Sciences research institute system are separate systems, with most basic research done in the Academy ofSciences centers, and most applied research in the university. Furthermore, most professors are viewed as teachers and are not expected to do much research, and until the very recent past, most research institutes under the academy did not do teaching, except for taking on a graduate student or two from a professor at a nearby university. The professors did not have appointments in the academy system. The full-time researchers and especially the senior academicians in most cases did not want the title (or the work) of the professor. The role of the state in the relative funding and mission defining of universities of different kinds (on the one hand) and of the Soviet Academy of Sciences (on the other hand) has always been a matter of complex internal politics in the Soviet Union. 40 In turn, these politics are connected with the international aims of the Soviet Union in science, intellectual prestige, and technologically based war. In part,


PROFESSIONS AND THE STATE,

21

the issue is simply the classical one of applied versus basic research. Adding to the complexity is the relation between some basic research (especially in physics) and military work. Military research and space research today are not in the academy, but in the war ministry, just as most health research is also not academy based, but is in institutes sponsored by the Ministry of Health. The complex politics of the growth of the Soviet university and research system, and the rise and fall of ideological Party interference in science in the Lysenko affair, will briefly be touched on below. In general, the growing need for technological development and basic research in areas related to space and energy, as well as the need to get better information on Soviet society per se, has led to increased funding not only for natural science but for some empirical social science as well. Consequently, the direction of group autonomy for the professoriate, at least since the time of the revolution, has been gradually upward, but with more bumps along the way than for the academy. State intrusion into science and purges in the social science community (as in sociology in the early 1970s) clearly shows that we are not yet dealing with a professoriate autonomous in the Western European sense-especially in terms of formally organized and active disciplinary associations, as well as in terms ofunion resistance to state control and interference. But the trend from 1945 to 1985 is clearincreasing funding support and less interference in careers, in topics studied, and in policy making (though always with the state having a policy input in such decisions, as might be expected in any statefunded system).

Engineering With the profession of engineering we can clearly see that the high priority the Soviet state placed on technological development led rapidly-and much more steadily than with the ups and downs of policies with respect to medicine, law, and the professoriate-to a massive investment in technical training. From the earliest days state salaries paid to graduate engineers, plus the opportunities for their employment, led engineering to be the practicing profession-always in salaried status-for those with some scientific ability. But often these candidates did not have enough ability (or in some cases enough political pull) to get into the ranks of the elite universities such as Moscow State or Leningrad, and thus into the orbit of the Soviet


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Academy of Sciences. For example, Gvishiani, Mikulinsky, and Kugel show that the numbers of both scientific workers and engineers increased 600 percent between 1950 and 1970 while the number of factory and office workers increased only by 200 percent, at a time when population growth was only about 75 percent. 41 The technocratic flavor of much Marxist rhetoric in the first decades after the revolution, under both Lenin and Stalin, provided support for the promotion of engineers into management. What is not clear, and would bear much further research, is the extent to which "engineers" in the Soviet sense were more like mid-range technicians or two-year engineering school graduates in the U. S. sense, rather than college graduates, theoretically trained engineers who come from our elite schools such as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Clearly, as with Soviet physicians in the NEP and later prewar years, many people were pressed into service with minimal qualifications. Special "workers' faculties" (RABFAK1) were set up in the 1920S to rush workers and peasants through higher education to form the new Soviet (red) specialists. Younger engineers were advanced more rapidly than older ones, breaking the solidarity of the profession. Since World War II, and certainly since the Khrushchev era, the percentage ofengineers with university graduate (or at least post-fyeee) training has been gradually increasing. State support for the growth of the profession, state support for the promotion of engineers into lower-level management, and in the postwar era, state enlistment of elite engineers into military and space research gives the overall group a continuity, and perhaps an esprit de corps as well. The romanticization of the "new Soviet engineer" in the early years of the Soviet Union was a clear consequence of the deliberate aim of Soviet ideology and state practice. Except for the prestige and aura surrounding graduates of the Ecole Polytechnique or Ponts et Chausees in France, little of this "we can conquer and rebuild the world" spirit presently exists in the West, though it certainly was part of the ideology of American engineering (and American technologically based capitalist firms) in the period 1900-1925. 42 Furthermore, pay differentials between engineers and ordinary workers have begun to narrow. The economic reward for going into the profession in the future may not be as attractive as it has been in recent decades, leading to downturns in applications to engineering schools. And is there a major pay difference in the USSR, as there is in the United States, between pay for



23

military jobs in engineering and pay in ordinary production sectors? On the other hand, if the Soviet Union and the United States cooperate and slow down the arms race, perhaps the rewards for civil engineering will increase in both nations.

Professional Self-Regulation and State Regulation Another important aspect ofstate regulation of professions in both the West and Eastern Europe is professional education as it relates to professional or state licensing and professional ethics and discipline. In the Soviet Union, as in some Western nations such as France and West Germany (but not Italy), there are numerous clausus rules, or yearly quotas, on the number of professionals to be trained in each group each year, as these are determined through studies of national workforce needs. The state, not the profession, sets these quotas. But we would expect much internal political struggle between state and profession in this area. Furthermore, state policy, at least since Khrushchev, has been to keep open mobility and open entry possible in some programs, such as training for law and engineering (including a high percentage in evening and correspondence programs), whereas for medicine and the professoriate the possibilities for part-time study are far lower. This is a change for medicine. Before Khrushchev, its training pattern, especially for the first degree to be a general practitioner or vrach, was often in part-time study. Now a slightly higher percentage are going into specialties, which implies a lowering in the percentages of those going part time, as the latter is an index of the development of the profession on Western division-of-Iabor lines usually in concert with higher requirements for entrance and more demands for full-time study. 43 As for professional self-regulation once the practitioner is at work, the regionalized structure of Soviet professional organizations connects regional ethics committees, whose members are elected by the profession, to the relevant regional government ministry. For example, the regional medical ethics committee is attached to, and works with, the regional ministry of health. In law the local collegia do elect members to a regional ethics committee. On the other hand, there is a separate oversight division. Here the Soviet procuratOr's division, in addition to regular criminal prosecution, also has the function oflegal


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ombudsman, allowing it to inspect the functioning of the role of the state itself and its legal divisions-possibly including the avocat corps, in ethical issues, to protect citizen interests, in a fashion roughly analogous to the Cour de Cassation in France. 44 The professoriate and the Soviet Academy of Sciences have jealously guarded their rights of evaluation, promotion, and degree awarding for candidates for positions and roles in the professoriate and the academy. Only in the most extreme cases, in the Stalin years, did the state violate this right. Career advancement, however, has been known to occur faster if one is a Communist Party member. Thus to be safe, many candidates for higher-especially administrative-positions in the university or the academy have joined the Party so that the lack of such membership would not count against them. But this should not be interpreted to mean-and almost all sources agree on this-that promotion or even flourishing in intellectual circles is impossible without Party membership. With each passing decade since the end of World War II, this seems to be less and less the case. But for official posts and highest rank, nomenklatura status and thus Party membership is still required. In general, the formal disciplinary committees do the work of professional self-regulation except in cases involving issues that contest state policy. In confrontation situations, special channels of state interference are sometimes still used. But here, on this specific issue, we have to agree with early hypotheses by Freidson, who noted that the possession of advanced professional skill, regardless of the regime and its attitude toward professional individual and group autonomy, gives the group some bargaining room for self- regulation, especially on the more narrowly technical skill issues. 45 And professions tend to define these "narrow technical" issues in very broad terms, to increase their room for movement.

The Role of the Intelligentsia Concerning the second major overall dimension of analysis, the existence and role of an informally organized, cross-professional intelligentsia, the Russian and then the Soviet case is complex. But clearly it is an indirect factor supporting the survival of some professional



25

group power and autonomy even in the times of greatest repression in both czarist and Soviet periods. Pipes notes: In Russia, the question of the social function and historic mission of the intellectuals always had and still has a particular urgency, first of all because the early and rapid Westernization of the country produced an extraordinarily large, virile, and self-conscious body of intellectuals, and, second, because this modernization has been carried out with greater intensity and single-mindedness than anywhere else in the world. 46 He goes on to note that their relations to other groups, in particular to "the technical and administrative bureaucracy," appear as an issue in every modern and developing nation. Part of the problem of this concept is that of defining it. Official Soviet use of the term "intelligentsia" is as a broad census category, almost equivalent to "brainworker" as against handworker. Yet historically and politically there is a narrower and more classical meaning, one I mean to use here. This is to define the intelligentsia as a cross-professional, "invisible college" organization, directing its critical intelligence against first the czarist and then the Soviet state, reformist and humanist in its orientation both before and after the revolution. The question then resolves itself into a series of subquestions in the Soviet case. First, to what extent did the intelligentsia, defined in this second way, successfully affect Communist Party policy and state relations to the professions in each of the eras that we have been considering? Second, to what extent do members of given professional groups (elite medical professors, leading Moscow advocates, critical and dissident academicians) work for reform and greater power and autonomy of their overall professional group (medicine, law, the professoriate)? But, and this is another possibility, to what extent do they ignore such mundane occupational group issues of their "home profession" as its problems at work, or group autonomy, for general issues such as overall Communist Party policy, freedom of speech, role of the KGB, and the like? This broad-issue activity ofintellectuals, characteristic in Western Europe and the United States of the "intellectual," tends to direct his or her attention away from the problems of the home profession. But sometimes these issues overlap. For example, the American


26

ELLIOTT A. KRAUSE

professoriate (or at least a fraction of it) took an intellectual's stance against the war in Vietnam and found the state decreasing the funding of social science research as a consequence-this area ofacademia having been accurately identified as the center of critique and protest. In the Soviet case, the Lysenko scandal led to a protest by the intellectuals against undue state interference in science, which then in turn definitely had long-term consequences leading to greater autonomy both for the professoriate and the Academy of Sciences, vis-a-vis the state and the Party. This needs reinspection, especially in the past fifteen years. As the state begins to pull back a little from the everyday issues of the individual Soviet professions, will the leading intellectuals begin to tackle, with more flexibility and freedom, the more mundane-but still very important-problems of professional autonomy at work? Will the intelligentsia complain more openly, as they are beginning to, in the pages of Izvestia and Pravda about "undue" state interference in professional matters, or even simple lack of support for the professions and their needs for resources? More careful empirical definition of the term "intelligentsia" and more social-historical studies that look at the specific social role of particular national intelligentsias with respect to the history of specific professional groups in specific states will begin to help us ascertain whether the intelligentsia has pursued its own goals (even to the gaining of state power, to take one rather extreme interpretation), or has alternated between critiquing the state and critiquing its "home" profession and its problems. My understanding of the Gorbachev program is that he wishes to enlist the support of the intelligentsia as a spur to bureaucratic reform. But he also may wish them to work as well for reform in their "home professions." Clearly, though, if the intelligentsia (in my definition) does not have state power, it has enough influence in the present-day Soviet situation for Gorbachev to wish to enlist it, instead of ignore it, in the programs for reform that he is proposing.

The Social Role of the University in Professional Training The Soviet case to date shows a widespread growth of the higher education (vuz) system and its role in pregraduate professional train-



27

ing. However, only 5 percent of "higher education" facilities are true universities. Available data also show a rather underdeveloped role for the university in internship and postdoctoral fellowship work, and very little relation between teaching and research. For example, until receiving the second or higher medical degree, the Soviet physician tends to be clinically trained, with little or no exposure to research while in training, in either the medical school or the hospital. This pattern is not necessarily basic to a strongly centralized, state-controlled program. In France after the revolution of 1789, the state nationalized the Paris hospitals and created both research-related internship and externship programs, with professorial roles that involved both teaching in the classroom and teaching plus research at the bedside. 47 In the Soviet Union, with so few research-oriented teaching hospitals and with medical research carried out separately from medical practitioner training in Ministry of Health research facilities or in some of the more applied institutes of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, the ties in the Soviet Union between teaching and research are weak. They are even more so in law, for a significant number of law students even today attend school part time, with little ties to legal research, which in any case is not carried out in universities but in a special branch of the Ministry of Justice, and also in the Academy of Science Institute of State and Law. In science, where such a relation would seem to be a necessity, it is only since about 1970 that closer ties are being formed between the professors of basic science in the universities and the far more prestigious full-time research scientists and social scientists in the institutes of the Academy of Sciences. Only in engineering, which is an applied field by definition, has a closer relation developed (of a work-study sort). But here advanced research is seldom found. What trends will develop in this area? Projections from the present predict an upgrading of the quality of professional training that results from a closer linking of the ordinary work of training new professionals with the prestige work in the research institutes-at least for the new graduates, if not for those still in regular university professional training. Given that the state might pressure the elite groups within each profession to mix with the run-of-the-mill training programs, and given that they will probably resist, I would expect slow progress here. The present situation shows the university to be a lower-level professional training resource, one without the stimulus of research for the next generation of students, who gain little "intern-


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ship" or supervised clinical or research experience while in school. American programs are superior here, but certain Western nations such as Italy have the same problem as the Soviet Union. 48

Relations between the Communist Party and the Professions The Soviets may provide an extreme case on the continuum between little or no political party interpenetration in professional affairs, on the one hand, and a close and intimate relationship, on the other. The Soviet case should not be construed, however, as a situation in which the political party dictates all decisions related to the life of the professional group. As Pipes noted: The other important area in which a certain degree of autonomy may be won from the government embraces some of the public activities which are most essential, but which the government may subject to strict controls and ideological strait jackets only at grave risk to its external power and security. Here is the plea for professional competence. First and foremost in this category are the natural sciences and several applied sciences, including economics. All these fields of activity have this in common, that they are of vital concern to the regime, but in order to flourish they demand intellectual freedom. 49 The influence of the Communist Party vis-a-vis the professions has historically been threefold: in setting the relationship between Party membership and professional career advancement; in setting state policies that have major consequences for professional institutions; and in the willingness or unwillingness of the Party to accept the professional colleague group as a rival center of power, as a legitimate interest group for policy making and social criticism on conditions and needs in the area of its professional expertise. As with each other variable, though there is no possibility of going into any detail here, the issue has to be understood historically. In the Civil War period, and in Lenin's NEP, the Party was so concerned with state building and establishing political hegemony over the far-flung land area that it did not have the time, the inclination, or the strength to thorougWy purge all professional groups of their leadership (unless they were violently



anti-Soviet). It was a matter ofbalancing ideological desires against the need for the groups' short-term support. Only when the state and Party were securely in power, in the prewar Stalin period, did the Party tum to professional affairs directly. To understand what happened historically requires first and foremost an understanding that the Soviet Union was an underdeveloped nation wanting rapid development on the Western industrial model. In these circumstances, the Party's primary goal was more: more doctors, more advocates and professors, more scientists and engineers. Even well-known critics of the new government, such as Pavlov, could continue to work if they were famous enough to be of international use to the Party. But by the time of the Stalin era Party membership became viewed as a dual insurance policy for professional advancement: more (but not complete) insurance against the political terror and possibly also more chance for promotion. The creation of a public, nationwide health-service system with all groups on salary; a legal system slowly in process of reconstruction; a massive increase in university and technological training; and a great build-up in research funding for the Soviet Academy of Sciences-all of these moves supported professional training and, by implication, slightly increased the leverage of professional groups viewed as interests within the wider society. In the Stalin era professional group dissent against appointing political hacks to positions of authority over much better qualified colleagues was real, but was muted and certainly not public, given the dangers to anyone stating such criticisms. With the death of professionals and destruction of infrastructures in World War II, the systems and professions had to be rebuilt a second time. Again, the primary goal of the Party, the state, and the professional groups themselves was for more, quantity first, and only then was a concern for quality of critical importance. Historical studies of the relationship of Party to profession show that a gradual trend toward the building of Western-style professional institutions and the gradual lifting of the heavy hand of the Party is clear, especially since 1960. The health care system, while reserving higher level medical professionals for those with nomenklatura status, managed to recognize colleague-designated skill in filling positions of authority in medical school professorships and in medical research. The ambivalence of the Party-especially among Marxist-Leninist ideologues and party "philosophers"-toward the judiciary and espe-


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ELLIOTT A. KRAUSE

cially toward the avocats was settled in the legal reforms and new court reform of 1958, clearly legitimizing the role of defense counsel within the system and reconfirming the autonomy and power of the local colleague group of avocats-the collegia-to decide fees within limits, to pick their own future group members, and to work essentially a feefor-service system within the shelter of the state itself. The highly visible and by now much studied intervention in the working of science-especially the Lysenko case, which promoted the nonscientific cult of this man and his followers and demoted, disemployed, and in some cases killed topnotch biochemical and research geneticistsbecame in the Soviet Union itself a symbolic "bad example" used by scientists and academicians within the nation to prevent future interventions by Party ideologues into the research world. Even publicly within the Soviet Union, scholars published analyses of the issue, and the conclusion was reached that this much loss of autonomy of such groups was bad for the nation. Needless to say, this does not mean that interference has ended, but now there is an open debate on the subject, and it is somewhat easier-and less dangerous-to resist state and Party interference. 50 Of course, in a nation where the state pays for all professional training and employs the vast majority of the graduates, the state will have a natural interest in the direction of research by professionals, especially on the dimension of funding basic research, on the one hand, and applied research, on the other. (This debate is a constant one in the United States and other Western nations, as well.) In the Soviet context the debate usually focuses on the percentage of funds given to applied research in the university versus the percentage given to the Academy of Sciences. Though the academicians have the prestige, the former get the bulk of the money, even in the 1980s. Military and space research, incidentally, come under the military budget, on which no information is available and so is not under discussion here. Social science is a particularly complex issue, when it comes to the role of the Party. Originally, Lenin's version of Marxian theory (rather than Marx's) became both a social science "theory" and a political dogma. By the mid-1960s, however, the need for empirical sociological data for social-planning purposes had led to the funding of economics and sociology as fields for investment of resources and creation of institutes. By 1970 the attempt to import Western social science met resistance, and there was a purge of several leading so-



31

ciologists of this type. Furthermore, Party membership was more important for advancement to leading positions here than in the natural sciences. Simirenko observes: "The most obvious way by which the party . . . exerts direct control over sociologists in the Soviet Union is through its system of nomenklatura under which the party controls some of the positions of the various vocations, and in the case of certain sensitive positions like sociology, all the positions. Positions filled by the nomenklatura are subject to constant monitoring and ideological scrutiny. "51 The continuing need for new data, however, and new interpretations, plus some dissatisfaction by the Gorbachev leadership with the uncritical, bland, and essentially unhelpful work by many Soviet workers in this field, has led to the new acceptance of the concept of "interests" within a Soviet state, which may now allow analysis of bureaucratic political infighting as a block to social change within the nation. 52 If the lifting of the requirement that all theory in the field must be Marxist-Leninist actually leads to interest-group analysis of a political-sociological sort, there could be a renaissance of such studies in the Soviet Union, given the large number ofsocial problems and the need for change. Concerning the interference of the Party in the work of the professions, it is helpful to review again, and in a little more detail, the "worst possible case," to see whether professional institutions were capable of some resistance and autonomy, even under Stalin, and under those of his successors who shared a dogmatic ideological view of science. At the height of Stalin's pressure to support Lysenko and discredit and fire those who opposed the Lysenko pseudo-science, the far-flung empire of the Soviet Academy of Science found jobs for now-unemployed geneticists in less visible laboratories, where they were able to eat and work, and to continue the work Stalin wished to bring to an end. During the Khrushchev thaw, and with the resurgence of biochemical and biophysical research in the Soviet Union and with the breakthroughs in molecular biology and DNA, new institutions were founded such as the Institute for Physical Biology, and some of these survivors found a new home. By continuing to criticize the pseudo-science even when it was risky to do so, by refusing to attend pseudo-science conferences, and in other ways, many Soviet professors and academicians managed to withhold legitimacy from the Lysenko effort. Even with the full force of Stalin and his ideo-


ELLIOTT A. KRAUSE

J2

logues behind it, it did not succeed. 53 And as we have noted, this combination of withholding of legitimacy by the professional community, job-finding in the vast network of the academy, and the real fiasco this created not only for Soviet science but also for Soviet agriculture, means that professional interests will be able to use the case for decades to come as an example of what can happen if the Party interferes too much with the details of a profession at work. Gorbachev's policies in general may simply be making more public a slowly developing change of the roles of the state vis-a-vis the Soviet working professional. The new Party elite may simply be making public what until now has been the private experience of the Party with professional groups over the past thirty years. There are even times when professional interests ofa very parochial sort may block the interests of the state in doing something that might be of value to the interests of a whole professional group. In the early 1980s the Soviet state may have been interested in creating a nationwide advocates' association. But at least as recently as 1977, articles in the Soviet press indicate that local collegia of avocats in Moscow were against this, for they feared, in their own elitist view, that they would be submerged in the mass of their colleagues from all over the USSR-instead of having, as they do now, a lot of de facto informal power over the stateprofession relationship by virtue of their location in Moscow, close to the center of state power. 54 These debates between conservative and progressive professional group interests, and between state and profession, are now beginning to be seen in the pages of Pravda and Izvestia. They are not secret and, since they are very much issues of real public policy, they have more than one possible outcome. Note, however, that both state and Party, on the one hand, and professional groups, on the other, have interests to defend, and leverage and institutional power with which to defend them. This is not the Party-profession relationship under Lenin (when the state and Party were very weak), or under Stalin, when state and Party were by far the more powerful actors.

The Relationship between State and Market In Western societies the organization of the economy of welfare states has been an important topic for study. The organization of interests



33

into bargaining groups such as the major unions, employers' associations, and banks enables them to work with the state, especially its economic planning bureaus, to decide on directions ofdevelopment in many capitalist, welfare-state economies. 55 If in Eastern Europe the state should pull back from complete planning control over the economy, would concerted economic interests, the state, a more powerfully solidary union organization, and professions constitute bargaining groups to direct the development of the economy? Might this in turn help to maximize productivity, human satisfaction, and, at the same time, protect the individual and the corporate rights of the actors? Vicarelli, for example, suggests that "we should be able to postulate that professional groups have a role in the dynamics of corporative systems, a role which according to some would tend to become predominant in contemporary society-directing our attention to those authors who until now have primarily been concerned with economic groups instead of professional groups. "56 She suggests that by looking at the economic and political role of professions in organizing markets in welfare states (and by extension, in socialist states), we might gain a more complete understanding of the play of interests in directing (or preventing) social change. Taking this to the Soviet case, we can ask several questions. To what extent is the overall degree ofstate planning and state control reflected in the relationship of the Soviet state to the Soviet professions? And to what extent will a loosening of direct state control over the economy have consequences that will affect the professions directly (with the state rescinding restrictions on private practice) or indirectly (with the state creating a free market sector in which formally state-based practitioners may practice part time)? It should be noted from the outset that other nations in Eastern Europe vary in the extent to which the professions, professional employment, and professional services are in the public, state-controlled sector. In health care, for example, the Hungarian model of a primary job in the public sector and either a different "moonlight" job in the private sector or extra practice of the same profession "after hours"57 is not that different from the present informal or unofficial Soviet model, and, for that matter, the full feefor-service practice that is the present and official model for the avocat, and to some extent for leading physicians as well. As for the jurisconsults in industry, the present close relationship between managers and jurisconsults in the public sphere could lead in the future (if GOSPLAN


ELLIOTT A. KRAUSE

34

pulls back and some firms become private) to an after-hours role-or eventually private law firms-where jurisconsults with expertise in industrial and contract law in the Soviet Union could become fee-forservice consultants to industrial sectors in general. A transitional stage might see them holding down a job in one firm and, after hours, consulting to others on similar legal, production, and contract problems on which they have developed a regional reputation for solving. Less likely in the short run would be major changes for scholarresearchers in either the professoriate or the Academy of Sciences. Simply put, the Soviet Union, as with most European nations, has a public university system. It is no more likely in the short run, or even in the long run, that a change in the context from a planned economy to a mixed planned-unplanned or public-private economy would change the role of the professors or the academicians here, any more than it would in France, where universities and most research institutes are part of the state system, where professors and senior researchers at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) are on civil service, although France is a capitalist nation and a welfare state with some planned dimensions, and definitely not a socialist state. Historically, continental Europe has had public, not private, universities, regardless of the state-market relationship, so a change in the state-market relation in the case of the Soviet Union is not likely to have much impact on the professional university teacher or on the academician. One possible exception exists, however, in the natural sciences. Were the Soviet Union to begin to develop high-technology, space, or bioengineering firms in the private sector, it would be very likely that professors in universities and science-based academicians would increasingly be asked to act as paid consultants in addition to their regular work, to aid these firms in the development of new products. Even without a private sector as yet, some consulting activity already exists. Also unlikely in the short run would be major changes in the role and conditions of practice of the engineering profession. Since (as also in the United States, Great Britain, and continental Western Europe) engineers are salaried technicians with various ranks and degrees of expertise, this is unlikely to change if the state begins to withdraw from the market. It might be that if change does occur, it could affect the patterns of relative upward mobility within firms ofjurisconsults



35

and engineers. But it is difficult to visualize the direction in which such change might occur. We are just at the beginning of Soviet experimentation in freemarket sectors within a primarily planned socialist economy. It might be very valuable at this time to begin a comparative U.S.-Soviet study of professional groups, and then to continue such a study over several years to get a sense of motion and change in the state-professional relationship, changes in the relevant power, solidarity, and autonomy of the relevant interests, and the consequences of these changes for the overall economy and society.

United States, Western Europe, Eastern Europe: Comparative Issues The analytical framework proposed herein allows us to view the evolution of professional group power and individual worker autonomy in the workplace in three different political-economic environments: the United States, continental Western Europe, and Eastern Europe. In historical perspective, and especially with respect to the post-World War II era, we may be seeing long-term developments that are leading to a growing power ofthe state and capitalist firms visa-vis professions in the U. S. case; a standoff in the Western European case; and a slow increase in power, solidarity, and professional group autonomy of professions with respect to state and Communist Party in Eastern Europe. In the United States the state, especially through the federal government's executive branch and regulatory agencies, is taking a far more active role than in previous eras in attempting to control both professional work in the workplace and the costs that professionals create. It is doing so because of two decades of intense effort by American corporations to pressure the government to take such stances, and because of the use of corporate power to prevent professions from effectively lobbying in Congress and thus stopping new laws that would restrict their freedom to operate. More direct capitalist rationalization of professional services with professionals in the role of paid employees in firms they do not own and control, more action by regulatory agencies of the federal government such as the Federal


ELLIOTT A. KRAUSE

Trade Commission (which has begun to place limits on the law of professional monopoly), and cost control bureaus in health care such as the U. S. Health Care Finance Administration-all of these actions, as well as increased activity by the state licensing boards, are redefining the nature and degree of autonomy of organized professional groups, at least since 1960. 58 In continental Western Europe the state has increasingly become involved (before World War II in some nations, after in others) in both the training ofall professionals and their employment as well. There is a trend for such central professionals as doctors and lawyers to work more on the state payroll and less in free professional or private practice situations. Crises in the past fifteen years in the Western European welfare state have led to some minor cutbacks in state funding for professional training and employment, and to a minor increase in pressure toward rationalization and speed-up in the professional workplace, though this had been stronger in some nations than in others. But the historical corporate organization of professional groups before the onset of the welfare state, their semi-autonomous corporate group strength within the state, and the protection of the services they provide by parties of the left outside the state have all put limits on the state's ability to rationalize work, to interfere too much with the professional training process, or to overcontrol the manner in which they provide services. In comparison, professions in Eastern Europe historically have had the same public university tradition and the same public lycee-touniversity model of professional training as continental Western Europe. Both continental Western Europe and Eastern Europe are founded on variations of either the old French lycee-to-university model or the essentially similar German gymnasium-to-university model. The advent of socialist regimes and a strong political Communist Party overlay on top of the already strong relation between state and profession have lent further support to state power, significantly reducing the corporate group power of the professions themselves, in the 1945-1960 period. However, the trend of the past twenty-five years may be related to the growing disengagement of the state from the market, from its direct planning of the economy to a fostering role, and to changed attitudes by the state and the Party toward professional hegemony, even in nations that remain strongly planned, as in the Soviet Union. This slow disengagement of state from market may



37

have consequences for professional group power and autonomy. Depending more on a professional intelligentsia for social reform, the bargaining may be to relax some direct party pressure on professional control over work, professional career advancement, or even the right to practice privately without much state control. Simultaneously, the need for expertise might allow some professionals and even members of an informal intelligentsia to rise to centers of power in the state and party-but without the intelligentsia's rising to such power as a group. This could lead to more ofa "western Europeanization" of the profession-state relationship in Eastern Europe, with profession and state jockeying for power, but with less day-to-day party interference with respect to the work or the views of the professions themselves. This freeing up of economic mechanisms-of which training and conditions of practice are a central aspect-combined with the effects of glasnost and "democratization" on the rights of professions to criticize their society and the role of their group within, could slowly lead to relatively greater autonomy of key professions in Eastern Europe. One way of discussing this inevitably leads us to use functionist terminology. For a socialist state to function effectively-ifcentralized planning has failed-it may be necessary to allow sectors of industry and key professional groups such as doctors, lawyers, academics, and technical engineers to have more of a corporate identity, with the profession taking its own stands vis-a-vis state and party. Too much repression has demonstrably weakened medical care, legal services, academic quality, and productivity, and even scientific progress in some areas (such as genetics and psychiatry). So seems to be the record in the Soviet Union, at least, and it is now being admitted either de facto or de jure. Professional morale is a tender plant, and overinterference with the intellectual professions usually leads to a lowering in quality of the product. The centrality of the skills allows some leverage and room for bargaining in "the politics of skill." The overall pattern of the past twenty-five years thus may be an increasing convergence on the dimension of group power and autonomy of the central professions, with the American professions losing some ground and the Eastern European ones gaining some. This is occurring for different reasons. In the United States the reason lies with the power of many capitalist sectors to pressure the state toward closer regulation and control of professions while marshaling their political power in legislatures to pass laws that restrict professional


ELLIOTT A. KRAUSE

autonomy, at the same time more directly employing professionals as salaried employees-particularly doctors and lawyers. In Eastern Europe, the party has lost its grip on the universities, on the professions, and on direct and total control ofthe economy, which leads to a greater opportunity for professional groups to speak freely about needed reforms and greater group power and autonomy. But we need far more information on whether this is occurring only with specific wellknown and central professions, as with the ones chosen here, or with all skilled work. Regardless of these broad trends toward a loss of autonomy and power of professional groups qua groups, which I am studying elsewhere for the American and Western cases, it is not quite accurate to state that the "convergence" is one ofchange ofemployment toward the Western (or Eastern) European model. The new, far more antiprofessional stance of the American state, combined with greater employment of key professionals by capitalists, leads to lowered autonomy. But no strong trend exists in the United States toward a massive increase in state employment, as in Western Europe. Having flown higher than professional groups in Western Europe, the traditional elite professions in the United States may now be losing ground, or even be getting relatively weaker than some professions in Western Europe. For there are no parties of the left to fight for continuation of medical and legal services when pressures escalate to cut them or rationalize them in a capitalist manner. Nor are the medical, academic, and engineering professions unionized, as they are in much ofWestern Europe. The Western European case-varying of course from nation to nation, profession to profession-can still be seen as more steady than that of the American case. Continental Western European states and professions will continue to struggle, with perhaps a slight trendnowhere near as marked as in the American case-toward a diminishing of professional group power and autonomy at work. State action confronts the free market ideologies of the segments of the medical and legal professions still in private practice. But the state-employed sectors ofeach of these professions does not share the aims of the "free professional" segment-and their practitioners usually belong to different political parties. Welfare-state crises lead slowly to a tightening of the resources available to the public-employee professionals and increased planning to a changed context for those in private practice. But nothing like the high rise and recent "crash" of professions in the



39

American case is in evidence, at least according to my own recent research. Rather, we have an equilibrium between professional group power, on the one hand, and the state's role, on the other, with capitalism more on the sidelines than in the American case. The state is more central in Western Europe, for it both trains and employs significant fractions of professional groups and also plans jointly with capitalist sectors in areas that will affect professional services, and thus the professions that provide them. The state is more likely to be a mediator and arbitrator on issues of professional power and autonomy than in the American case, where it is more truly a battlefield, on which the struggle between capitalist interests and the professional group is fought in a more direct way.

Notes I. See, for example, Henri Pirenne, Medieval Cities, trans. Frank Halsey (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1956); Jacques LeGoff, Time, Work, and Culture in the Middle Ages, trans. Arthur Goldhammer (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980); and especially Antony Black, Guilds and Civil Society in European Political Thought .from the Twelfth Century to the Present (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1984), pp. 135-189. 2. Theda Skocpol, ed., Vision and Method in Historical Sociology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984); and Peter Evans, Dietrich Reuschmeyer and Theda Skocpol, eds., Bringing the State Back In (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985). 3. Theda Skocpol, "Bringing the State Back In: Strategies of Analysis in Current Research," in Evans et al., Bringing the State Back In, p. 20. 4. Talcott Parsons, "A Sociologist Looks at the Legal Profession," in Essays in Sociological Theory (New York: Free Press, 1954). 5. See, e.g., Everett C. Hughes, Men and Their Work (Glencoe, lll.: Free Press, 1958); Howard S. Becker, Everett Hughes, Blanche Geer, and Anselm Strauss, eds., Boys in White: Student Culture in Medical School (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1961). 6. Eliot Freidson, Profession oj Medicine (New York: Dodd, Mead, 1971); idem, Professional Dominance (New York: Atherton, 1971); idem, Doctoring Together (New York: Elsevier, 1975); and idem, Professional Powers (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985). 7. Magali S. Larson, The Rise oj Professionalism (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977). 8. Charles Derber, ed., Professionals as Workers (Boston: G. K. Hall, 1982).


40

ELLIOTT A. KRAUSE

9. John McKinlay, "Toward the Proletarianization of the Physician," in Derber, Professionals as Workers, pp. 37-62. 10. John McKinlay and Joan Arches, "Towards the Proletarianization of Physicians," InternationalJournal of Health Services 15, no. 2 (1985): 161-195. I I. Eve Spangler, Lawyers fOr Hire: Salaried Professionals at Work (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1986). 12. Elliott A. Krause, Division of Labor: A Political Perspective (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1982); idem, "Professional Autonomy: A Comparative Socio-Historical Approach," paper delivered at the World Congress of Sociology, New Delhi, India, August 1986; idem, "Doctors and the State: An Italian-American Comparison," Research in the Sociology of Health Care 7 (1988): 227-245; and idem, "Les gildes, l'Etat et la progression du capitalisme: les professions savantes de 1930 a nos jours," Sociologie et Societes, 1989, pp. 9 1-124. 13. For an excellent discussion of Montesquieu on "l'esprit des lois" see Raymond Aron, Main Currents in Sociological Thought, vol. I, trans. Richard Howard and Helen Weaver (New York: Doubleday, 1968), pp. 46-68. 14. Franco Bassanini, Le regioni fra stato e communita locali (Bologna: 11 Mulino, 1976). 15. Nancy Frieden, Russian Physicians in an Era of Reform and Revolution, 1856-1905 (Princeton, N.].: Princeton University Press, 1981). 16. Margaret Kraul, Das deutehe Gymnasium, 1780-1980 (Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp, 1984). 17· Alexander Vuchinich, Empire of Knowledge: The Academy of Sciences of the U.S.S.R. (1917-1970) (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 18. Marzio Barbalgli, Educating for Unemployment: Politics, Labor Markets and the School System-Italy, 1859-1973, trans. Robert Ross (New York: Columbia University Press, 1982); and Willem Tousijn, ed., Le libere professioni in Italia (Bologna: Mulino, 1987). 19. Karl Marx, The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte (New York: International Publishers, 1963). 20. Stephen Cohen, Modern Capitalist Planning: The French Model (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1969). 21. Peter]. Katzenstein, Policy and Politics in West Germany: A SemiSovereign State (Ithaca, N. Y.: Cornell University Press, 1985). 22. V. I. Lenin, State and Revolution (New York: Vanguard Press, 1926). 23. Stephen Fortescue, The Academy Reorganized: The Rand D Role ofthe Soviet Academy of Sciences since 1961, Australian National University, Department of Political Science, Occasional Paper 17 (Canberra, 1983). 24. Mark G. Field, "The Taming of a Profession: Early Phases of Soviet Socialized Medicine," Bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine 48, no. I (1972): 83-92.



25. For a general discussion, see Mark G. Field, Soviet Socialized Medicine: An Introduction (New York: Free Press, 1967). 26. Ibid., p. 24. 27· Field, "Taming of a Profession," p. 91. 28. Mark G. Field, "Structured Strain in the Role ofthe Soviet Physician," AmericanJournal ofSociology 58, no. 5 (1953): 493-502. 29. William Knaus, Inside Russian Medicine (New York: Everett House, 1981 ). 30. Harvey Fireside, Soviet Psychoprisons (New York: Norton, 1979). 3I. 0. O. Gruzenberg, Yesterday: Memoirs of a Russian-Jewish Lawyer (Berkeley: University of California Press, 198 I).

32. See, e. g., J. N. Hazard, "Soviet Law: The Bridge Years, " in William Butler, ed., Russian Law: Historical and Political Perspectives (Leyden: Sijthoff, 1977), pp. 235-258; Eugene Huskey, "The Limits to Professional Autonomy in the Soviet Union: The Case of the Advocates," Cambridge, Mass., NASEES Conference, 1981; and Jean-Guy Collignon, Les juristes en Union Sovietique (Paris: Editions du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1977). 33. Collignon, Lesjuristes, p. 192. My translation. 34. Ibid., p. 205. My translation. 35. Louise I. Shelley, Lawyers in Soviet Work Life (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1984). 36. Otto Ule, TheJudge in a Communist State (Columbus: Ohio University Press, 1971). 37. George D. Cameron, The Soviet Lawyer and His System (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan, Division of Research, Graduate School of Business Administration, 1978). 38. Vuchinich, Empire ojKnowledge, pp. 1-19. 39. Sheila Fitzpatrick, The Commissariat of Enlightenment (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970). 40. Fortesque, The Academy Reorganized. 41. D. Gvishiani, S. R. Mikulinsky, and S. A. Kugel, The Scientific Intelligentsia ofthe Soviet Union (Moscow: Progress, 1976), p. 115. 42. For France, see Pierre Bourdieu, La noblesse d'Etat: Grandes ecoles et esprit de corps (Paris: Editions de Minuit, 1989); for the United States in the period 1880-1930, see Edwin T. Layton, Jr., The Revolt ofthe Engineers: Social Responsibility and the American Engineering Profession (Cleveland: Case Western University Press, 1971), and David Noble, America by Design (New York: Oxford University Press, 1986). 43. On the slight trend to greater specialization in Soviet medicine, see Mark G. Field, "American and Soviet Medical Manpower: Growth and Evolution, 1910-1970," InternationalJournal ofHealth Services 51, no. 3 (1975): 455-474·


ELLIOTT A. KRAUSE

42

44· Collignon, Les juristes, pp. 354-383. 45. Freidson, Profession oj Medicine, pp. 39-43. 46. Richard Pipes, ed., The Russian Intelligentsia (New York: Columbia University Press, 1961), p. ii (editor's introduction). 47. Edwin Ackerknecht, Medicine at the Paris Hospital, 1794-1848 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1967). 48. Giorgio Freddi, ed., Rapporto Perkoff: Salute e organizzazione nel Servizio Sanitario Nazionale (Bologna: II Mulino, 1984). 49. Richard Pipes, "The Historical Evolution of the Russian Intelligentsia," in Pipes, Russian Intelligentsia, p. 66. 50. Zhores Medvedev, Soviet Science (New York: Norton, 1978); Mark Popovsky, Manipulated Science: The Crisis oj Science and Scientists in the Soviet Union Today (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1979). 51. Alexander Simirenko, Professionalization ojSoviet Society (New Brunswick, N.].: Transaction Press, 1982), p. 134. 52. Current Digest ojthe Soviet Press 39, no. 16 (1987): 5-6. 53. Vuchinich, Empire ojKnowledge, pp. 247-256. 54. Collignon, Lesjuristes, p. 228, n. 37. 55. Philippe Schmitter, "Modes ofinterest Intermediation and Models of Societal Change in Western Europe," Comparative Political Studies 10, no. 1 (1977): 7-31. See also G. Lehmbrich and P. Schmitter, La politica degli interessi nei paesi industrializzati (Bologna: II Mulino, 1984). 56. Giovanna Vicarelli, "Professioni e Welfare State: I medici generici nel Servizio Sanitario Nazionale," Stato e mercato 16 (1986): 106. My translation. 57. E. Richard Weinerman and Shirley B. Weinerman, Social Medicine in Eastern Europe: The Organization ojHealth Services and the Education ojMedical Personnel in Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Poland (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1969). 58. See Krause, "Les gildes, I'Etat et la progression du capitalisme," to

compare the U.S. case here with Britain, France, West Germany, and Italy.


CHAPTER 2

The Hybrid Profession: Soviet Medicine Mark G. Field

The aim of this chapter is to examine the medical profession in the Soviet Union, the historical background of the profession, and its position in the late 1980s. "Profession" has a multiplicity of meanings. These range from a declaration or an oath (a "profession of faith") to that of a specialized occupation and a group of persons who are solidary because they perform the same work, as for example guilds in the Middle Ages or labor unions at the present time. Moreover, the adjective "professional" is often used to characterize something that is well done and thus distinguishes it from something that is "amateurish," done by a dilettante, and thus is "not serious." In Russian the cognate proJe55ia is meant generally as an occupation and does not necessarily denote a special type of occupation, as is generally the case in English. I shall focus, in general, on the collective aspect of profession, in the sense that we use the word when we talk about the "medical profession, " and sometimes the" organized medical profession." In that case, a professional association may have scientific or substantive functions, for example, the pursuit of knowledge and discovery, that is to say, a strictly intellectual, cognitive purpose, which may include, for example, the publication of a journal or the holding of scientific meetings. At the same time, but not always, the "profession" as a collectivity may have a socially and legally recognized status as an association and as an interest group. When this group is granted the right to exist and to pursue its interests within the limitations of its charter or articles of incorporation, it then acquires a political dimension. As such, it is


44

MARK G. FIELD

recognized that the professional association has, as one of its major functions, the defense of the interests of its members. Furthermore, the profession may have well-defined political and ideological views and the right to express these in whatever forums are appropriate. This includes the possibility (indeed, some would say the duty) to oppose governmental measures and policies if these are seen as detrimental to the professional members and to their ability to fulfill their professional duties and social obligations as they see fit. Indeed, professions usually defend their interests by claiming that curbing professional power and autonomy will eventually be detrimental to those served by the profession, and thus against the public interest. As we shall see, it was chiefly that feature, the ability to resist or contest the polity, that brought the demise of the medical profession in the early days of Soviet power and stripped it of any collective and political associational power. Talcott Parsons saw the development of the professions as the most important change that has occurred in the occupational system of modern societies. To distinguish the professions from other occupations, he lists the following minimal criteria: (I) the requirement of formal technical training, and an institutionalized mode to validate the adequacy of that training and the competence of trained individuals. The training must give prominence to an intellectual component and must give primacy to cognitive rationality as applied to a particular field. (2) Not only mastery of a cultural field must be achieved, but skills must be developed for the use of that mastery. (3) A "fullfledged" profession must have some institutional means of making sure that such competence will be put to socially responsible uses.! There are however other characteristics that give the professions their special characteristics. Probably the epicenter of that specialness is the nature of the functions performed by the professions. The professions deal with areas that are of profound and often emotional significance to the population, whether in areas dealing with ultimate values (the clergy); freedom, property, and due process (lawyers); mastery over nature (scientists and engineers); the environment and habitation (architects); life, health, and the ability to act (physicians). Because these domains are so important and because, in many instances, the client, penitent, or patient is unable to judge the quality ofservices performed (or even their nature), professional occupations usually embody a "fiduciary" and "service" orientation in which the immediate welfare


THE HYBRID PROFESSION

45

of the client or recipient of services is expected to come before that of the professional. The protection of the recipient of services from exploitation by the more knowledgeable and more skilled professional is usually embedded in a code ofethics of professional behavior, to which professionals are expected (indeed obligated) to subscribe. Given the asymmetry in knowledge and in power between recipient and provider of professional services, the assurance that the former will enjoy protection from the use or abuse of such power by the latter is an indispensable characteristic of the professional-client relationship, and of mutual trust. This caveat vendor injunction is in contrast to the more commercialized or business occupations, in which the customer is expected to exercise choice and caution, and in which the caveat emptor principle rules. Indeed, the institutionalized expectation is that the commercial vendor will attempt, within the rules of the game, to maximize selfinterests at the expense of the emptor. This does not, in any way, eliminate the central question of the remuneration for services performed by the professional. The professional must, like any other specialist, be compensated for work, whether it be a fee-for-service salary, capitation, or room and board. However, the professional ethic or custom is to attempt, insofar as possible, to "decouple" the remuneration from the service on the assumption that the professional will do his or her best regardless of the compensation (an assumption that does not usually hold for the commercial occupations, where "you get what you pay for!"). Finally, it should not, by any means, be assumed that the "altruistic" behavior of the professional in contrast to the "egotistic" behavior of the business person is simply an expression of basic psychological or character dispositions, those who are "service-oriented" going into the professions, the others into commercial pursuits. Rather, it is one ofinstitutionalized expectations and socially reinforced norms imposed upon the two groupS.2 In other contexts, the professional may well be oriented to the maximization of personal interests (for example, in selling a house), and a business person may be a pillar of the community and of the church outside of business hours. And in fact, a professional who consistently violated professional expectations in order to maximize self-interests would soon lose the respect of others (both professionals and clients) and would be penalized. Thus, in the typical professional case the pursuit of selfinterest is through altruistic occupational behavior.


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Let us now turn to the political aspects ofthe professions, that is, the power they enjoy in society as a corporate group, and the history of the medical profession in Russia and the Soviet Union.

The Loss of Corporate Power

In prerevolutionary Russia the medical profession had achieved a great deal of political power and associational strength and autonomy. It was part of the intelligentsia and of the intellectual ferment that was, basically and traditionally, in opposition to czarism and czarist policies. 3 Although the profession reflected the usual split between those who championed individual, personal, "professional," and liberal medicine, and those who were more interested in the larger issues of public health, hygiene, and social and political reforms that would, in their view, decrease the impact of social conditions on morbidity and mortality, physicians enjoyed a great deal of power, respect, visibility, and an ability to express their views (which often had political overtones and implications) with a great degree of independence. They certainly did not conceive of themselves as employees or functionaries, even those Zemstvo physicians who were hired to provide a modicum of attention to the rural populations after 1861. Most physicians, who were liberals in their ideology, viewed with alarm the coming to power of the communist regime. 4 They were concerned that, in the rush of revolutionary and egalitarian enthusiasm, their roles as experts and specialists would be looked upon as bourgeois, and that they would be placed under the control of ignorant or unqualified, but politically acceptable, subordinates in the medical field. There is, indeed, in any socialist or proletarian movement and revolution a deep streak ofantagonism and suspicion toward intellectuals, specialists, and the professions, as was the case in the French Revolution. This distrust comes, probably, from the fact that professional knowledge and techniques confer the kind of power that the laity neither controls nor easily understands. George Bernard Shaw expressed this idea most succinctly when he suggested that "every profession is a conspiracy against the laity." The association between educated specialists and the former exploiting classes is an easy one to make. In the Soviet Union nothing as extreme as what happened under the Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia took place,



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that is, the systematic elimination of the educated classes, but the fact remains that in the early days of the Soviet regime, specialists trained under the old regime remained under suspicion. As Hutchinson has pointed out, "physicians were usually perceived as the enemies of Soviet rule, and the majority of them had refused to recognize that the Provisional Government was dead, and that the Soviets were in power."5 There were cases when, in the glow of revolutionary enthusiasm, nurses or feldshers were indeed appointed directors ofhospitals and began giving orders to physicians, thus confirming earlier fears. Physicians also rejected the ideologically determined "class" approach-members of the proletariat and the peasantry should receive medical care ahead of other members of the population-as a simple case of retributive justice. It went against their ethical universalism, which held that a sick or wounded individual deserved care regardless of present or past social position or class membership. This the Bolsheviks in turn rejected as pure hypocritical cant, arguing that under the previous regime most physicians catered to the upper classes and paid but little attention to the lower orders. It was reported that in some instances physicians refused to treat Bolshevik wounded, or had to be coerced to do SO.6 There is evidence, however,7 that the new regime and Lenin, in particular, did not at first want to mount a frontal assault on the medical profession and associations and sought a modus vivendi with these "bourgeois" physicians, in particular with the Pirogov Society, the most visible and powerful medical association, and the most outspoken opponent of the new regime in the medical arena. The Pirogovists had also taken a strong adversarial stance against the czarist regime. What the Bolsheviks wanted was to secure, as far as one can determine it, the benevolent neutrality, if not the collaboration, of physicians' associations and to seize control of these associations in order to utilize them to achieve their aims. But the Pirogovists and others would have none of that, and eventually they and other "old regime" medical associations were dissolved on the now familiar ground that they were counterrevolutionary. This was consistent with Inkeles's observation that "totalitarianism does not merely subordinate the individual to the state, but it also preeminently subordinates human associations, the organizations and institutions that man creates to meet his social needs."8 This was the death-knell of the medical "profession," if by that


MARK G. FIELD

term we mean an association of practitioners who constitute a corporate group (or corporate groups) with a fair degree of political autonomy. Such a profession represents power: its practitioners, collectively, are capable of influencing decisions concerning practically all aspects of the practitioners' occupational life. They can propose, shape, and sponsor legislation, and they often control the number of students admitted to the medical schools (and thus the size of the profession). They can, and do, claim that because their work is so complex, only they are capable of passing judgment on the qualifications of new entrants into the profession, as well as on the misdeeds of their members. Moreover, as Freidson has pointed out, doctors constitute a dominant profession9 because they are able to give orders and determine the working conditions of a whole series of subordinate health personnel. They proclaim and enforce a code ofethical behavior and self-discipline, which they say ensures the highest standards of care and protection for the public. They can threaten to go on strike and indeed do strike if they so please in an effort to wring concessions from the government. It was precisely that kind of power that the Soviet regime could and would not countenance. It should be noted that Soviet power initially abolished the oath that physicians took upon completion of their studies because of its "bourgeois" character, and it was only in 1971 that a faculty oath was reinstituted. It emphasizes not only the duties of the physician toward patients but also toward the Soviet government and communist society. Perhaps the most dramatic and extreme illustration of the political nonexistence of the Soviet medical profession was the notorious Doctors' Case, which broke during the last few weeks of Stalin's life. Early in 1953 the entire Soviet press and media, echoed by the communist parties in the rest of the world, announced that a plot had been uncovered whereby top Soviet physicians and medical consultants had conspired, at the instigation of foreign intelligence organizations, to accelerate the death of prominent Soviet personalities through contraindicated and deliberately harmful regimens: in other words, they had committed medical murders. The Doctors' Case also had strong antisemitic overtones. The very implications of such charges for the legitimacy (and indeed the existence and practice of medicine) were staggering: the accusations were that of "medical sabotage," that is, of the misuse by physicians of the trust they had to enjoy to perform their functions. Instead of preserving life, they were destroying it. The



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"assassins in white coats," as these doctors were called, were pilloried and tortured in order to extract "confessions," and the mass media urged the population to increase its vigilance against the hidden enemies within who were being bribed by the enemies without. No stronger indictment could have been leveled at the medical profession. And yet, not a single voice was raised or could have been raised by the profession protesting the outrageous charges, demanding an inquiry or arguing that these accusations undermined the trust that the population had in the medical profession. Indeed, it was reported afterward that people became afraid to go and see physicians as a result. The doctors' plot was revealed, after Stalin's death, to have been a complete fabrication of the organs of state security,IO and the doctors were released without an apology (some died in prison as a result of the brutal interrogations to which they were subjected). This was assuredly an extreme and perhaps unique case, but the fact that it did take place illustrates the lack of corporate power of the profession. And yet, at the clinical level, health professionals do have a tremendous amount of power (indeed, it was the misuse of that power that served as the axis around which the Doctors' Case revolved). Physicians enjoy a great deal of autonomy and constitute, as seen earlier, a dominant profession: they dictate their terms to other members of the health occupations (nurses, attendants, and so on) and are usually unchallenged by their clients or patients, with some important exceptions, as we shall see. At the same time, the Soviet medical profession does not constitute an articulate interest group. It is generally incapable ofaffecting the conditions under which it works (hours ofwork, or rate of pay, for instance). It is therefore unable to organize independently of the regime and to exert a collective will, or to challenge its employer, the state. As such, politically the medical profession is inert. It is, therefore, simultaneously both powerful, when it deals with patients, and powerless, when it deals with the polity. Soviet physicians, trained and employed by the state, have in fact become "medical workers," performing their tasks at the behest of their employer, and for the benefit of the state and of the patient, in that order. It is true that there is a Union of Medical Workers, the major functions of which are to control the work of doctors and other health personnel and to take care of certain housekeeping functions (for example, the determination of pension entitlements, or the settling of administrative disputes). In no way, however, can that union be likened to the Ameri-


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can, or Canadian, or Japanese, or British medical associations. Such an association simply would not fit into the Soviet scheme of things. Politically, the medical profession has been emasculated, defanged, eliminated. This bears out the contention of Deborah Stone who, having examined the history of the German medical profession, concludes that "it seems clear ... that the idea that the medical profession's political strength derives entirely from its special status as a profession or from its monopoly of technical knowledge must be dismissed. "11 As we have seen, it was not always so, and it is possible to imagine that, in the wake of the Gorbachev reforms and the rise of all kinds of groups and associations in the Soviet Union, the situation may change. But at present, given the fact that the profession has been politically inert for seventy years or so, that it has no independent organizational bases under its control, and that it lacks the financial resources to make its voice heard, it remains an employee group rather than a profession.

The "Rationale" for Controls We have already examined some ofthe reasons for the conflict between the organized medical profession and the Bolshevik regime in the early phases of its history. But there were also other elements that entered into the equation: those few physicians who had sided with the Bolshevik regime, before and after the revolution, clearly had ideas about what form medical practice should take in a socialist society: medicine should be "socialized." The centerpiece of this process was the removal of "capitalistic" medical practice whose earmark was the private practice of medicine and the fee-for-service payment. Socialized medicine meant that the cash nexus between patient and doctor would be eliminated. The doctor would no longer be dependent on the patient for a livelihood and would thus not be tempted to treat only the rich, or to exploit patients through unnecessary services. The elimination of "commercialism" in medicine, the payment by society to the physician on a salaried and predictable fashion, would permit the physician to be concerned only with the medical aspects of the work. The physician need not be, any more, a "business person." The idea that the very manner in which physicians are paid for their



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services affects (although it normatively should not) the clinical relationship is not far-fetched. It does reflect a certain cynicism about human relationships and the Marxist orientation of the Bolsheviks. Furthermore, observations across the board strongly suggest that payment modes, whatever their nature, do have an effect on the doctorpatient relationship. 12 What the Soviet experience shows is that being dependent on the state for payment (rather than on the patient) does not necessarily ensure that the patient will receive better and more attentive care. Because the state is an abstraction anyway, and because the patient does not pay the bill (directly), Soviet physicians have shown an extraordinary ability, bred in the bureaucratic crucible, to neglect the interests of their patients. If we are to believe the complaints (primarily expressed through letters to the newspapers) that so often crop up in the Soviet press, this neglect takes the form of the indifference, "nine-to-five medicine," formalism, cruelty, and mercenary attitudes that are exhibited by the salaried Soviet doctors. To some degree, this is probably exacerbated by the high volume of patients that doctors have to see in the clinics available to the non-elite population, so that patients tend to be processed in an assembly-line fashion. The other problem is that, in most instances, the salaries allocated to health personnel are extremely low even by Soviet (already modest) standards. Roughly, a physician earns about as much as a qualified industrial worker. As a result, many physicians (particularly male physicians) take or have to take more than one official position, with a corresponding increase in hours of work. But even more of a problem is that medical personnel (particularly surgeons) demand or extort high fees for surgical interventions. These fees, illegal as they are, seem to range from one to several multiples of the average monthly salary of physicians. Since Gorbachev came to power, a general increase averaging about 36 percent has been decreed for health personnel. It is unlikely, however, that such an increase (which would raise the monthly salary of a regular physician to about 270 rubles) would radically change the situation. It would certainly improve the situation of those physicians who do not have the opportunity to extract money under the table from patients, but it would make no difference to those who do. As an illustration, let us briefly examine the following vignette reported by Daniil Granin, a highly respected Soviet author writing in Literaturnaia gazeta:


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The mother of an acquaintance of mine became sick. She needed an operation. He had heard that one has to "give" to the physician. This person, shy by nature but concerned with his mother's situation, overcame his shyness, and under the pretext that she would need certain medications, offered 25 rubles to the doctor. The physician threw up his hands and said: "I do not take such money." "And what kind do you take?" "Ten times more." My acquaintance is an ordinary engineer, not a rich person, but it was a question ofhis mother's health and so he gathered the money, brought it to the doctor (and because he was ashamed) gave it to him in an envelope. The physician had no such compunctions: he took the money out and counted the bills. After the operation, the mother died. The physician explained to my acquaintance: "I have checked; your mother died not as a result of the operation, but because her heart could not take it, and therefore I keep the money." Granin adds that the physician was convinced ofhis own decency: if the woman had died because of the operation, he would have returned the money. And, writes Granin, he related this episode not because such "envelope-passing medicine" (as it is called) is a rare occurrence, but because it is so common. 13 According to data gathered by sociologists, 74 percent of patients have resorted to such payment for medical attention. 14 The purpose of bringing up the case described by Granin is to indicate how far the doctor-patient relationship has deviated from professional norms. It is the essence of professional ethics that, as seen earlier, the physician must put the interests of the patient or client before personal interests, and that the quality of the professional service (by contrast to the commercial service) is held to be independent of the remuneration. It is indeed that capacity and obligation not to exploit the client's powerlessness that permits professionals to claim they are special, a "breed apart." The "decoupling" between payment and professional service mentioned earlier implies that the professional will perform to the best of his or her ability in every and any circumstances. Thus, if the patient dies, the physician will still send a bill. What we have seen in this Soviet case is the sliding of the professional relationship into the commercial mode where there is an assumed relationship between service and remuneration. In the Soviet context, physicians also think that patients are unable to judge the quality of services, and that they are the ones who determine it, and then decide



53

on their own whether the payment was justified or not. And thus, according to that code, they will, if indicated, return the money like any decent plumber, as the story by Granin suggests. One might also wonder whether the relatively miserable salaries of health care personnel are rationalized by the government because physicians have other possible sources of income. At the same time, as a commentator described in the case of Hungary, gratuities to doctors and nurses (and other purveyors of services) are socially condoned and regarded as a built-in part of the average salary. That "shadow market" serves to adjust the low salaries imposed by central authorities. IS The same seems to hold for the Soviet Union. The fine point, and one that cannot be determined, is whether these payments, whether solicited, requested, or hinted at, should be considered bribes for preferential treatment or tokens of gratitude, or both. But perhaps they also constitute a countervailing power at the disposal of the patient to exert some kind ofinfluence over the physician. It meets "the drive to have a choice, to gain some sense of control over the care received, to manipulate the bureaucracy, instead of the other way around. "16 Such payments, incidentally, may also express a belief that whatever is available free of charge is of no great value. There is, indeed, a Russian saying, "Lechitsa darom, darom Iechitsa, " which can be roughly translated as "Treatment for free is treatment in vain." 17

The "Power" of a Politically Powerless Profession Rudolf Virchow, a nineteenth-century German physician, expressed the idea that medicine was a social science, "and politics nothing but medicine on a grand scale. "18 By the same token, we might add that medicine may be "nothing but politics on a small scale." In this context, Soviet physicians by virtue of their knowledge and skills, and the fact that they are officials (perhaps in the same way as in the United States a lawyer is an officer of the court), have a great deal of"political" power at the microscopic level. Furthermore, given the hierarchical nature of Soviet society, the physician in most cases dominates the patient: there is thus a basic and double asymmetry between the physician and the patient. The physician, for instance, does have police or policing functions. He or she must sign a certificate (in Russian, a bulletin) to state officially that an individual is indeed sick


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and thus can be excused from coming to work. And, what is just as important, the bulletin not only legitimizes absenteeism but also enables the individual to claim compensation for time away from work. There is every indication that, in general, the authority of the physician is not questioned by the population. At least, one does not find in the Soviet Union either a movement or organization dedicated to promote patients' rights, to challenge physicians' judgments, or to institute suits against them for malpractice, in contrast to what is seen in many other countries. 19 Rather, the general impression is that what the doctor says goes, because he or she is after all a specialist and an official. The difference in status between patients and physicians in a hospital was well described by Knaus: "The patients usually walked close to the wall, moving slowly and keeping their hands in the pockets of their robes. The center was kept clear for physicians, nurses and visitors who walked quickly, arms swinging freely, talking loudly. "20 At the same time the political powerlessness of the medical profession (that is to say, its inability or incapacity to protest officially against governmental policies) and the doctor's role as a state functionary, paid and employed by the government, places him or her in a rather weak position when the government or, more likely, the organs of state security want to use the doctor's certification functions to serve the interests of the state. This has become most evident in the area of psychiatry where, for the past quarter of a century, it has been used to label certain dissidents as mentally sick, as suffering from "sluggish" or "creeping schizophrenia," and to incarcerate many of them in psychiatric hospitals. 21 There is abundant evidence that Soviet psychiatrists participated in the charade of declaring dissidents mentally incompetent, apparently because they saw that certification functions either as a fulfillment of good citizenship duties or the result of their not being able to resist pressures from the "organs" (of state security). Given the nature of Soviet political culture and the tremendous pressures for conformity, it is not unlikely that many physicians and psychiatrists consider the very fact of dissidence as evidence of maladaptation to reality, thus as a mental illness. 22 Although the Soviet Union has steadfastly denied the political use of psychiatry, the advent of glasnost has bared the degree to which psychiatrists can easily be bribed or manipulated, either by state officials or private parties, to declare individuals incompetent in a variety of situations and cases.



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Psychiatrists thus have delivered certificates of mental illness to criminals to help them a'.'oid long prison or camp terms,23 and to managers and other officials who simply wanted to get rid of inconvenient people, usually people who sought redress for real or alleged injustices. 24 In one well-publicized case three psychiatrists certified that a woman was mentally distraught when she signed a contract to sell her new car at a commission shop. With that certificate, she sought to have the sale annulled. Investigation revealed that she had asked the buyer for a large sum of money "under the table, " which he refused to pay. As a result, the psychiatrists were punished and sent to undergo recertification "to determine their fitness for holding their present professional positions. "25 It is quite possible that the current spate of articles on abuses in psychiatry is simply a ploy by the regime to exculpate itself for the political use of that branch of medicine, and to have the Soviet Union regain, in this area, the credibility it has lost in international psychiatric circles. Indeed, the Gorbachev regime is attempting, on a grander scale, to lay the blame for many of its problems at the door of the preceding administration of Brezhnev, in the same way that at an earlier period Khrushchev blamed Stalin for most of what was wrong in Soviet society in the 1950S and 1960s. But what is particularly interesting, as a result of these revelations, is the degree to which psychiatrists (and presumably other medical specialists) are depicted as having placed themselves "above the law." For example, A. Mann, writing in the Meditsinskaia gazeta, reports that "time and again, the same set of psychiatric experts has been 'manufacturing schizophrenics out of normal people.' "26 Another writer complains about a "complex phenomenon of our life-a mechanism for getting rid of people who are inconvenient, 'unneeded' and unable to defend themselves."27 And Anatoly Potapov declared in May of 1987 that "for a sum of money a healthy person can be turned into a sick one. Apparently there is nothing you cannot buy in the mental hospitals of the Moscow region. "28 Thus, from the viewpoint of press criticism, the medical profession, and in this case particularly the specialty of psychiatry, has endowed itself with too much power, too much autonomy, which it uses to enrich itself and which often perpetrates gross injustices and violations ofjudicial codes. This feeling was perhaps best expressed by M. Khazin in Izvestia: "this entire field of medicine has long since


MARK G. FIELD

assumed the aura of a caste to which the uninitiated are barred admittance. "29 The serious consequences alluded to by Khazin can, indeed, be devastating for individuals. Once a person is placed on the "psychiatric register," for example, he or she may not drive a car, use a hunting rifle, or apply to travel abroad. Other Soviet writers have commented on the casualness with which diagnoses of mental illness are made: "A person's fate is decided in a 1 s-minute interview. "30 The arrogance of these specialists has been reported time and again, and is based on their assertion that only a well-trained specialist can diagnose illness in an apparently normal individual. Thus, Dr. V. M. Morozov's observation, reported by an emigre psychiatrist, that "it is no secret to anyone that you can have schizophrenia without schizophrenia."3! In another context he was quoted as saying there can be schizophrenia without symptoms. 32 And when challenged, Soviet psychiatrists are likely to trot out their credentials and indignantly reject criticism, as for example Dr. Irina Matveyevna, who "in a few minutes diagnosed a patient as being schizophrenic in the acute stage, without hesitation and without getting in touch with the patient's relatives: 'I have been working for a quarter of a century, I have a candidate's degree, and I have studied the pathology ofthe aged. And I am not supposed to trust my own judgment?!' "33 Measures were taken by the regime in 1988 to decrease the arbitrariness of physicians' decisions and to hold them accountable for wrong diagnoses and dispositions. It is still a moot point whether these measures will decrease significantly the power of Soviet doctors in their dealings with patients. 34 They are, however, symptomatic of the latitude granted professionals in their own clinical bailiwick. Although we have tended to emphasize the case of psychiatry because it has been so much in the Soviet news recently and because the psychiatric diagnosis has such dire consequences, there is no doubt that the same general attitudes on the part of physicians in other specialties has been a bone ofcontention among the Soviet population. To be a state functionary and to hold the power of life and death in one's hands is a heady combination indeed. The Doctors' Case, mentioned earlier, also raises the intriguing question of the use (or misuse) of clinical power against those who detain real "political" power. In the absence of the strong mutual trust that usually characterizes the doctor-patient relationship when the



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profession is strong and independent (regardless ofwho the patient is), there is the lurking suspicion that manipulable physicians can use their power over life and death also for political purposes. Although the Doctors' Case proved to be a fabrication, its basis probably lay in Stalin's suspiciousness and paranoia, abetted by the organs of security, and their head Lavrenti Beria. As Gai reports, Professor Vinogradov, one of Stalin's medical consultants, noticed in one of his examinations that Stalin's health had so deteriorated that it was necessary for him to follow a strict regimen "strictly excluding any activity. "35 In doing so, Professor Vinogradov almost signed his own death warrant. For when Stalin heard (through Beria) about the medical recommendation, he flew into an indescribable rage, ordering that the professor be "put into irons." That outburst was, according to Gai, not accidental for Stalin probably remembered when Lenin had been ill, and his own role in isolating him from party work under the pretext of concern for his health. Now this was happening to him. In another case, a highly placed Party official was to be treated (or diagnosed) through a procedure that required the injection of a substance in his veins. The solution was first injected into the doctor's vein. The Doctors' Case is now part of history. But it represents, in a perhaps distorted and exaggerated fashion, some of the problems and dilemmas encountered by medical practitioners in the Soviet setting when dealing with highly placed patients. 36

Perestroika and the Medical Profession The set of reforms introduced by Gorbachev, and particularly the encouragement of private entrepreneurial activities, called cooperatives, also has had its impact on the practice of medicine. As a result of these changes, medical clinics operated for profits sprang up, and physicians were encouraged to set up private practices. But in both cases, as is also true of other entrepreneurial undertakings, the bureaucracy has devised measures to severely limit the scope of their activities. For example, in December 1988 medical cooperatives were forbidden to use or pay for state-owned diagnostic equipment-and cooperatives were barred from many medical activities, such as treating and evaluating severely ill psychiatric patients, treating cancers, drug addiction, occupational illnesses, providing obstetric care or


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abortions, performing any form of surgery, using invasive diagnostic methods or producing medications, including narcotics. 37 As a result, 30 percent of an estimated 4,500 clinics have closed. 38 According to the deputy director of a prosperous private clinic for children in Moscow, "It is the death of medical cooperatives. "39 Similar bureaucratic restrictions of all kinds are placed before physicians and dentists seeking to establish a private practice. 40 These restrictions are probably motivated by bureaucrats' fears of losing control over medical practice, as well as some of the problems encountered in most societies when a private and public health system exist side by side, as in England, for example. These restrictions are also, perhaps, motivated by the fear that private practice and private clinics could give rise to a more prosperous medical profession and the possibility (remote at this time) of its assuming greater autonomy and power to a degree resembling the situation in more pluralistic societies.

The Hybrid Profession It is this combination of political powerlessness and clinical (professional) powerfulness that may justify the appellation of"hybrid" when we look at the Soviet medical profession. It is more difficult, however, to measure accurately the prestige of the medical profession. The low official pay, the preponderance ofwomen, the residual priority that the regime assigns to health protection, the lack of a corporate association defending the interests and the good name ofdoctors, the bureaucratic nature of medical employment, and the general venality reported (particularly of surgeons) cannot be said to add much luster to that occupational group in the total Soviet scheme of things. On the other hand, Soviet doctors, like their counterparts elsewhere, deal with health, life, pain; they have the status ofeducated persons even though the medical schools are, in most cases, not faculties of universities but free-standing training institutes with a strong "vocational" orientation; they have esoteric knowledge and command the use of complicated equipment; they often speak a language or a jargon that is incomprehensible to patients; the patient is usually assigned to a doctor and cannot exercise a choice (and since physicians are often overloaded, patients must wait for hours, sometimes days, to spend a few minutes with a harried specialist); all of these characteristics reinforce



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the power that physicians have over the non-elite population. As mentioned earlier, patients do not have much countervailing power. They can, as we have seen, use money to obtain preferential treatment. They can and sometimes do send letters to newspaper editors complaining of rudeness, incompetence, bureaucratic cruelty, negligence of duty, indeed, in some instances, criminal acts. Besides these attempts to take doctors down a peg, there is little in the form of peer judgments or boards of ethics to examine the comportment of physicians in the professional sense of the word. The intriguing question, in a broader analytical and theoretical sense, is whether or not the situation of the Soviet physician is a portent of things to come, as, in the West, medicine is affected by general trends that lead to a weakening of professional power, and an increase both in the bureaucratization of medical practice and in controls exercised over physicians in order to decrease the spiraling inflation of medical costS. 41 There is serious discussion in the West of the proletarianization or the deprofessionalization of medicine. 42 These trends are accentuated by the increased use of technology, often very expensive technology, that may lead to the "veterinarization"43 of medical practice, that is, to an undue concentration on the physiological aspects of illness at the expense of psychological and emotional elements. The ideal, born in the nineteenth century, of the educated professional working independently and employed only by the patient, governed by a strong conscience and an accepted code of professional ethics, a person dedicated to service to others, a member of a highly respected and politically powerful and articulate constituency, has to a large extent disappeared in the Soviet Union. Could it be on its way out in other national settings?44

Notes I. Talcott Parsons, "Professions," in International Encyclopedia ofthe Social Sciences (New York: Macmillan and Free Press, 1968), 12: 536-546. 2. Talcott Parsons, "The Professions and Social Structure," in his Essays in Sociological Theory, Pure and Applied, 2nd ed., rev. (Glencoe, Ill.: The Free Press, 1958), pp. 34-49· 3. Nancy M. Frieden, Russian Physicians in an Era ofReform and Revolution, 1856-1905 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1981), pp. 231-31I. 4. Peter F. Krug, "Russian Public Physicians and Revolution: The Pirogov


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Society, 1917-1920" (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1979), p. 133· 5. John F. Hutchinson, "The Bolsheviks and the Politics of Medical Reform, October 1917-March 1918," paper presented at the meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies, Boston, Mass., November 5-8, 1987. 6. M. I. Barsukov, Velikaia oktiabr'skaia sotsialisticheskaia revolutisiia i organizatsia sovetskogo zdravookhraneniia: X, 1917- VII, 1918 (Moscow: Medgiz, 195 I). 7. See Krug, "Russian Public Physicians and Revolution." 8. Alex Inkeles, "The Totalitarian Mystique," in Carl J. Friedrich, ed., Totalitarianism (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1954), p. 90. 9. Eliot Freidson, Professional Dominance: The Social Structure of Medical Care (New York: Free Press, 1970). 10. David Gai, "The 'Doctors' Case,''' Moscow News 6 (1988): 16. I I. Deborah Stone, The Limits ofProfessiona I Power: National Health in the Federal Republic of Germany (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980), p. 53· 12. Mark G. Field, "The Doctor-Patient Relationship in the Perspective of 'Fee-for-Service' and 'Third-Party' Medicine," Journal of Health and Human Behavior, Winter, 1961, pp. 252-262. 13. Daniil Granin, "0 miloserdii," Literaturnaia gazeta, March 18, 1987, p. 13· 14. "Nationwide Discussion of Restructuring Health Care: Do We Need to Pay for Medical Treatment?" Izvestiia, September 19, 1987, p. 2. Translation in Current Digest ofthe Soviet Press 39, no. 41 (1987): 16. 15. Istvan Kemeny, "The Unregistered Economy in Hungary," Soviet Studies 34 (1982): 349-366. 16. David K. Shipler, Russia-Broken Idols, Solemn Dreams (New York: New York Times Books, 1983), p. 215. 17. Ibid., p. 217· 18. Cited in George Rosen, "The Evolution of Social Medicine," in Howard E. Freeman, Sol Levine, and Leo G. Reeder, eds., Handbook of Medical Sociology, 2nd ed. (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1972), p. 39. 19. See, for instance, Erica Bates, Health Systems and Public Scrutiny: Australia, Britain and the United States (London: Croom Helm, 1983). 20. William A. Knaus, Inside Russian Medicine (New York: Everest House, 198 I), p. 144. 2 I. Sidney Bloch and Peter Reddaway, Soviet Psychiatric Abuse: The Shadow over World Psychiatry (London: Gollancz, 1984). 22. Constance Holden, "Politics and Soviet Psychiatry," Science, February 5, 1988, pp. 551-553·



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23· M. Khazin, "Ironic Detective Story: Sick by Choice," Izvestiia, August 12, 1987, p. 6 (in Russian). 24· E. Maksimova and 1. Martkovich, "Defenseless," Izvestiia, July 1 I, 1987, translated in Current Digest ofthe Soviet Press 39, no. 29 (1987): I. 25· A. Moskvichev, "After Izvestia Has Spoken: Expert Commission Will Be High Quality," Izvestiia, September 16, 1987, p. 3, translated in Current Digest ofthe Soviet Press 39, no. 37 (1987): 17. 26. A. Mann, "The Price of Avoiding a Trial," Meditsinskaia gazeta, May 27, 1987, cited in Peter Reddaway, "Soviet Psychiatry: An End to Political Abuse?" Survey (London) 30, no. 3 (Autumn, 1988). 27· Komsomolskaia pravda, December 17, 1987, cited in Reddaway, "Soviet Psychiatry. " 28. Sotsialisticheskaia industria, May 20, 1987, cited in Reddaway, "Soviet Psychiatry. " 29· Khazin, "Ironic Detective Story" (emphasis added). 30. Maksimova and Martkovich, "Defenseless." 3 I. Holden, "Politics and Soviet Psychiatry." 32. Elizabeth Antebi, Droit d'asiles en Union Sovietique (Paris: Julliard, 1977), p. 101. 33. Maksimova and Martkovich, "Defenseless," p. I. 34. Felicity Barringer, "Soviet Psychiatry is Willing to Change, Up to a Point," New York Times, November 13, 1988, p. E4; "When Justice is Just Another Form ofInsanity," New York Times, January 24, 1988, p. E3; Felicity Barringer, "Despite Gorbachev Changes, Punitive Psychiatry Lingers," New York Times, October 21, 1987, p. I. 35. Gai, "The 'Doctors' Case.''' 36. See M. Buyanov, "A Sick Society or a Sick Leader?" Uchitel'skaia gazeta, November 15, 17, 19, 1988 (in Russian), p. 4, and Leonid Zagalskii, "Madness: Remarks on the Fields of the History of the Sickness of Our Psychiatry, ,. Lituraturnaia gazeta, June 28, 1989, p. 12 (in Russian). 37. Council of Ministers USSR, Decree of 29 December 1988 on the regulation of some aspects of the activities of cooperatives in accordance with the USSR law. "On Cooperation in the USSR," Izvestiia, December 29, 1988, p. 2 (in Russian), cited in Daniel S. Schultz, M.D., and Michael P. Rafferty, M. D., "Soviet Health Care and Perestroika," AmericanJournal ofPublic Health 80, no. 2 (February, 1990): 193-197. 38. B. Fein "More and More Private Soviet Medical Facilities, the Doctor is Out for Good," New York Times, March 5, 1989, I:3, cited in Schultz and Rafferty, "Soviet Health Care and Perestroika." 39. Bill Keller, "Soviets Curbing Private Businesses," New York Times, January 6, 1989, p. A6. 40. Iu. Biliev, "Private Practice," Meditsinskaia gazeta, June 8, 1988 (in


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Russian). "Nationwide Discussion of Restructuring Health Care: Should We Pay for Medical Treatment?" Izvestiia, September 23, 1987, p. 3. Available in a summary English translation in The Current Digest ofthe Soviet Press 39, no. 41 (1987): IS·

41. Paul Starr, The Social Transformation ofAmerican Medicine (New York: Basic Books, 1982). 42. John B. McKinlay and J. Arches, "Towards the Proletarianization of Physicians," International Journal of Health Services I S, no. 2 (198S)· 43. A. Bilibin, "The Physician-He Is a Thinker" (in Russian), Meditsinskaiagazeta, October 2S, 1986, p. 3. 44. John B. McKinlay and John D. Stoeckle, "Corporatization and the Social Transformation of Doctoring," International Journal of Health Services 18, no. 2 (1988): 191-20S.


CHAPTER

3

Lawyers in the Soviet Union Louise I. Shelley

The legal profession in the USSR is in a state of transition, as Gorbachev has made law one of his primary vehicles of change. The prestige of the legal profession has been enhanced. The role of the legal system in Soviet society and the function oflawyers within the state is under reassessment. Serious systematic research is being undertaken for the first time to address the questions discussed here-the relative prestige, the autonomy, the working conditions, and the attitudes toward law and legality ofthe members of the different branches of the legal system. 1 Gorbachev believes that a legal foundation is needed for reconstruction in the social, political, and economic arena. He seeks to democratize Soviet society by changing the substance of and attitudes toward law. His ultimate objective is the institutionalization of a socialist rechtsstaat (rule-of-Iaw state) in which state and Party organs are subordinate to the law. Yet this goal does not signal a Western approach to law. Soviet law will remain more intrusive in daily life than in Western democratic societies. The resolutions of the Nineteenth Party Conference, held in the summer of 1988, although failing to provide a cohesive program of law reform, are intended to move the Soviet Union toward the socialist rechtsstaat. The most important resolutions seek to redistribute power within the legal profession by increasing the importance of defense attorneys and augmenting the power and independence of the judiciary.2 This shift would occur at the expense of the procuracy, currently the most powerful element of the Soviet legal equation. Can legal perestroika proceed when it is opposed by the procuracy and other key conservative legal institutions within Soviet society? Evaluating


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this question is fundamental to appraising the possibilities ofachieving the Gorbachev reform agenda. Many ofthe generalizations made about law and lawyers in Western capitalist societies are not applicable to the USSR. Western sociologists of law discuss the market for lawyers' services; such analysis was nearly irrelevant until perestroika in the Soviet Union. 3 Until recently there has been a limited market for lawyers' services because most are governmental employees working either in the justice apparatus or state organizations. Citizens have needed less legal assistance than in capitalist society because the socialization of the means of production has eliminated most private litigation. Recently, with the privatization of the economy through the cooperative movement and joint ventures, there has been an increasing need for legal assistance, particularly in the area ofcivil law. The already limited number ofdefense attorneys are turning to this lucrative area, restricting citizen access to the lawyers in the advokatura (society of defense counsels) needed to resolve their family, labor, housing, and criminal law problems. Although the limited number of lawyers in the bar are paid by individuals rather than by the state, the rest of the legal profession is paid by the government and is directly supervised by the Party. There is no autonomy for the Soviet lawyer, whose job is to uphold the will of the state and ensure the maintenance of social, political, and economic order. The rule of law was never implanted in czarist or Soviet society. The role ofcriminal law was vitiated during the Stalinist period by the years of mass terror. Civil law was simultaneously emasculated by the socialization of the means of production. Lawyers were never perceived as central to the functioning of the state. Under such conditions the legal profession has not been (and cannot be) prestigious. In a society lacking respect for law and legality, lawyers are often those who bend rather than uphold the law. Lawyers personalize authority. The legal official enforcing the law is often more important than the codified regulation. This legal perspective grants the lawyer much more discretion than is known in Western society, where law is paramount. Many lawyers command fear but not respect. Corruption has become endemic in many branches of the legal profession, particularly in the justice arena. Citizens seek to influence a justice system that many view as arbitrary, harsh, and extremely powerful.


LA WYERS IN THE SOVIET UNION

An all-out assault on the legal profession has occurred since Brezhnev's death. Large numbers ofboth legal administrators and practicing lawyers on the state's payroll have been tried and convicted. Much fanfare has been given in the national press to these prosecutions and the need to establish a legal profession of integrity, responsive to the needs of the population and independent of the pressure of the Party apparatus. Many legal personnel had a very negative initial reaction to this campaign, as they rightly perceived that these revelations undermined their authority. But many have made an accommodation to the campaign, realizing that the ultimate result ofthis massive housecleaning will be greater respect for those who continue to work in the legal apparatus. The possibility of seeking a new role for lawyers and a new approach to law in Soviet society remains an enormous and fascinating challenge for Soviet society. It parallels the efforts of the liberal legal intelligentsia of a century ago to establish a new legal order within czarist society.

The Historical Development of the Soviet Legal Profession The advent of Soviet rule in 1917 wreaked havoc with the existing legal profession. In the immediate postrevolutionary period many lawyers were forced into emigration, others died ofstarvation, while a more limited number were allowed to serve the Soviet state. 4 The Soviet leadership, which originally believed that the state and law would wither away under communism, quickly came to its senses and realized the necessity oflaw in the new Soviet society. New laws were written. The justice system and legal institutions needed to be staffed. The Bolshevik leadership then turned to a limited number of former liberal czarist bar members, but most former officials were deprived of their legal careers. Positions in the judiciary, the procuracy, and the internal affairs organs had to be filled, but there were no Soviet-trained lawyers to fill these posts. Short-term training programs were established to brief individuals in the essentials of Soviet law. Yet, many of those who staffed the legal apparatus were unable to absorb much instruction, as they were illiterate or barely literate. Their political reliability rather


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than their knowledge of Soviet law was their service test. Numerous judicial mistakes were made as militia officials and procurators untrained in the law prepared cases poorly.5 The professionalism associated with many prerevolutionary lawyers perished with the revolution. The ensuing decades of the Stalinist period saw the growth of formal legal education. Many lawyers were graduated, but not enough to fill the thousands of positions in the legal apparatus. Many of the poorly or untrained personnel continued to serve in their positions and even advanced in the administrative hierarchy. The purges eliminated some of the original Bolsheviks in the legal profession, but the legal apparatus was not as hard hit as the Party cadres and the military. Some of the legal profession were innocent bystanders to the Stalinist purges, but many were collaborators. Officials of the Soviet procuracy, now charged with rehabilitating the numerous purge victims, point out that most victims perished at the hands of the extralegal troiki (kangaroo courts that dispensed long sentences and executions without adherence to legal norms).6 Yet thousands of innocent Stalinist victims recently rehabilitated by the procuracy indicate that many cases of political repression did proceed through the established investigatorial and judicial branches of the justice system. The post-Stalinist period heralded a new approach toward law. 7 Many lawyers trained with greater respect for legality assumed legal positions. Conflicts emerged between the poorly educated generation of the Stalinist period and the youthful professionals well versed in the law. A professional pride emerged among many lawyers, as they had a claim to expertise based on specialized knowledge. Removed from association with the extralegal procedures of the Stalinist years, the legal profession began to command more respect among the populace.

The Structure of the Legal Profession Legal practice in the USSR differs from that of most capitalist societies, as private economic interests are limited. In the Soviet Union the maintenance of political :md social order takes primacy over the regulation of the economy. The regulation of individual conduct has more importance than even state economic concerns. Consequently,


LAWYERS IN THE SOVIET UNION

in contrast with most capitalist societies, criminal law and lawyers in the USSR enjoy the most prestige. Whereas civil law predominates in most capitalist societies, it is secondary in the USSR, where there are no private corporations and limited private property. In the United States criminal lawyers are tainted by the low prestige of their clients. 8 Yet in the USSR the criminal population does not diminish the prestige of the legal professionals working in the justice system. Rather, these lawyers are seen to be helping the state deliver on one of its fundamental guarantees to its population-a greater degree of order than in Western society. Consequently, these lawyers who help fulfill a primary state objective are accorded more respect and power. A disproportionate amount of the legal profession's resources are devoted to the criminal justice system. Those lawyers who serve the economic interests of the state were at the lower end of the Soviet prestige hierarchy. But now, with the possibility of enterprise bankruptcies and increased emphasis on economic efficiency, lawyers serving the economic interests of society enjoy enhanced prestige. While American lawyers eagerly assume positions in corporations, as many as 100,000 law positions in Soviet enterprises remain unfilled. The shortfall is explained by the absence oflawyers as well as the poor compensation provided. Reformers now suggest that greater attention must be given to the lawyers regulating the economy ifGorbachev's economic program is to succeed. Yet the state so far seems unwilling to allocate the financial or human resources necessary to educate and staff the economy with legal professionals. Most Western research on legal professions focuses on the role of the law as a profession. But such a concept does not exist in the USSR because lawyers do not form a cohesive group. Until recently there was no organization that unified lawyers 9 and no established code of conduct. Although trained lawyers occupy most legal positions, in remote parts of the country individuals without legal training still provide legal services. Soviet lawyers lack a collective consciousness as well as a monopoly on legal positions. Lawyers are compartmentalized into groups depending on their specialization. Rarely referred to by their generic name, iuristy, but by the branch of law in which they practice-advocates, procurators, judges, iuriskonsulty (the lawyers who serve Soviet enterprises)lawyers have little to bind them together. "Besides a common legal


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education, there is little to instill in lawyers a single professional identity or consciousness. Professional rivalries between legal institutions are often intense, career mobility across legal institutions is low, and no inclusive organization exists to unite the separate branches of lawyers into a professional fraternity. "10 Each area oflegal employment has its own regulations and code of behavior, but all exist within a highly centralized, controlled setting. Those branches of the legal system that are closest to the Party apparatus, such as the procuracy and, to a lesser extent, the judiciary, carry more prestige than those that are viewed as autonomous, such as the advokatura. Members of the procuracy and the Ministries ofJustice and Internal Affairs are asked to serve on prestigious legal commissions, but such distinctions are rarely bestowed on defense attorneys who are not state employees. 11 Significant variations exist in the official and unofficial compensation of Soviet lawyers. Many legal specialists officially earn much more than doctors or engineers. The lowest paid legal group is that of the enterprise legal advisers, whose salaries range from approximately 130 rubles to 180 rubles a month (approximately $200 to $270). Their wages may be lower or on a par with those of skilled workers. Judges at the lowest court level earn at least 200 rubles a month, and those at higher levels earn appreciably more. Most affluent are the defense attorneys, whose monthly incomes may reach 800 rubles or more officially and whose unofficial gifts from clients may net the more renowned lawyers an additional 600 rubles monthly. The official compensation pales in comparison with the generous bribes that may be proffered to investigatorial personnel, as well as to procurators and judges. Prosecutions of justice personnel who have accepted bribes in tens or even hundreds of thousands of rubles are not unknown in the Gorbachev era. But such amounts are offered only to a select few. Most Soviet lawyers do not enjoy the fantastic wealth resulting from corruption but instead share the financial security and privilege accorded to the new Soviet trained intelligentsia.

The Advokatura (Defense Attorneys) The advokatura is the most independent of all branches of the legal system, but even now it is not removed from the oversight of the



Ministry ofJustice and the Party, even though efforts by members of the individual bar associations in different locales are fighting for more autonomy. This trend is most pronounced in the Baltics but is also very notable in large Russian cities where the bar leadership is aggressive and the newly elected city officials are radicals seeking independence from Party domination. Not all Soviet lawyers enter the bar. There are approximately 25,000 advocates, accounting for only about 10 percent of the entire Soviet legal profession. In the USSR advocates defend individuals in civil cases, represent citizens in civil and administrative matters, provide oral advice in their consultation offices, and serve enterprises and institutions on a contractual basis. 12 Paid by their clients rather than by the state, the advocates are organized into 163 colleges that exist in cities or regions. 13 Unlike U.S. lawyers who practice before the bar of the individual states, Soviet lawyers are not limited to representing clients in their immediate community or their republic but can travel anywhere that their services are requested. Until recently there was no unifying organization for members of the advokatura, and none was seriously considered before Gorbachev. The desirability of such an organization has been recently fiercely debated within the 160 different colleges of practicing defense attorneys. The Ministry ofJustice consistently opposed such an organization, fearing it would lose its grip over the practice oflaw. Advocates in the leading Russian cities have spearheaded the movement for a national organization in the face of ministerial opposition and the doubts of many lawyers. They believed such a body would allow them to publish and conduct research, participate in the legislative process, and, most significantly, be represented as a social organization on the newly constituted Supreme Soviet. 14 A congress called in December 1988 to establish the national organization was disrupted by the Ministry ofJustice, which "cancelled their hotel bookings and gave the conference hall to another group."15 Despite being treated like dissidents, many advocates persisted in their organizational efforts. At the end of February 1989 the Soviet Advocates' Association was established, the first Soviet bar association. 16 It is as yet unclear whether the association will permit lawyers greater independence or whether it will merely be a means to enhance state control. 1? Members of the organization govern themselves. A presidium


LOUISE I. SHELLEY

(elected by the membership in genuine elections) oversees the operation of its college, setting pay scales. With glasnost have come criticisms that the presidia of the colleges are too subservient to the justice ministry and that more independent individuals should be elected to the governing bodies. A maximum salary ceiling in existence for decades and established by the individual collegia was abolished in fall 1988, greatly raising the possible pay for defense attorneys. Some members of the bar have become less aggressive advocates of legal reform since the increase in their legitimate incomes. Although the different collegia of the bar have officially endorsed the Party conference resolution concerning earlier entry of defense counsel into criminal proceedings, before its adoption many defense attorneys privately opposed this reform, believing that it would reduce their incomes. Despite its adoption at the national level in late fall 1989, little progress has been achieved in this regard because most criminal defendants are indigent and are unable to compensate counsel adequately for the additional time needed for their defense. Furthermore, there is such a shortage oflawyers that they do not have the time to devote to this work. The authorization of the Ministry of Justice of greater compensation for advocates may have been an effective means of tempering the reformist zeal of defense attorneys. The bar is the only branch of the legal profession that operates in response to certain market conditions. The better known lawyers attract more clients and also have more possibility of attracting the semi-legal payments (known as Mikht) that clients provide to lawyers in addition to their standard fees paid to the college. 18 Furthermore, lawyers with a steady clientele can avoid work with indigent clients that is less lucrative. 19 In these respects the bar resembles Western professional models, where there is competition for goods and services. 20 Self-governance and autonomy only go so far in the Soviet context. 21 Although the presidium decides on the entry and expulsion of members, no lawyer may be admitted to the bar without the permission of the Ministry ofJustice, and individual colleges may be forced to expel or discipline members who have offended the Party. The bestknown example is the expulsion of Boris Zolotukhin from the Moscow bar in 1968 for his avid defense of the dissident Aleksandr Ginzburg. The presidium expelled him following pressure from the Moscow Party Committee. 22 Only twenty years later was this distinguished lawyer, himself once a member of the presidium, reinstated in



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the Moscow bar. 23 The new minister ofjustice, Benyamim Iakovlev, believes that his ministry should "administer as little as possible, " but there is as yet no firm indication that he has managed to significantly diminish the impact of his organization. 24 The bar is sometimes forced to accept individuals who have been expelled from other branches of the legal system for misconduct. 25 Party regulation also extends to the size of the bar. Although other branches of the legal profession have been permitted to grow along with the population, in Moscow, for example, the bar has remained virtually the same size while the population has more than doubled. Legal services remain a problem not only in Moscow; as one noted Soviet law scholar has commented, "In some countries there is one advocate for every 650 to 1,200 citizens but here it is one for every 1],000 citizens."26 Despite the lack of prestige27 or support for the advokatura, there is a certain esprit that is not found in other branches of the legal system. Its relative autonomy, the general affluence ofits members, and the legacy ofa prerevolutionary tradition all contribute to a sense of professionalism that is absent in areas of the law more dominated by the state. The entire defense practice no longer lies with the bar. In a new move that may acquire more significance in the future, lawyers have founded cooperatives outside of the advokatura. These cooperatives, often serving joint ventures and cooperatives, are sometimes affiliated with existing legal consultation offices or may be part of joint ventures. They present a new type oflegal advisory service outside ofstate domination that may be a model for the future democratization of the legal practice.

Judges In most Western societies judges are among the most prestigious of lawyers. But this is not the case in the USSR, where the lower levels of the profession are dominated by women and where judges are not immune from telephone calls from party officials. As the present minister ofjustice explained, law institute graduates assigned to court work consider this a punishment. 28 The Soviets long proclaimed the autonomy of the judiciary, but the muckraking literature of the Gorbachev era revealed a very different


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picture, in which judges are frequently telephoned by regional Party offices in reference to specific cases. This phenomenon is now commonly referred to as "telephone justice." A Ukrainian study reported that Party officials interfered in 12 percent of all cases. Leningrad judges reported that no specific orders were given, that Party officials merely expressed their interest in individual cases. 29 Research of the prestigious Institute of State and Law found an increase in the number of judges who felt they were subjected to unlawful pressure. In the 1970S only 10 percent of judges noted such influence, whereas the figure in the early 1980s was 25 percent. 30 Judges are influenced not only by telephone calls. Their dependence on local authorities for housing and other necessities has made them constantly susceptible to less subtle forms of pressure. Furthermore, the overall decision-making policies of a judge are under continual surveillance by the local Party organization. 31 Judges in almost all cases are not able to withstand Party, local soviet, or law enforcement pressure. 32 A judge in a small Russian town showed his independence and adherence to legal norms by withstanding militsiia pressure to incarcerate a hooligan and convict innocent construction workers. In small communities where alljustice personnel are connected, such autonomy is not tolerated. This judge, like many others, found himselfa subject ofa criminal investigation. 33 Judges preside in cases from the district level on up to the Supreme Court. One-third of all judges are women. 34 At the base of the judicial hierarchy are 10,000 people's court judges. 35 Before recent reforms, the previous system, in existence for decades, selected lower court judges by means of single candidate elections. Nominations for the position were made by the local Party organization. Judges preside over cases with two people's assessors. Assessors, drawn from the community at large, are supposed to represent popular opinion. The traditional method of selecting judges was challenged by the resolutions of the Nineteenth Party Conference. New legislation on the status of the judiciary was enacted in fall 1989; it provides for judges to be selected by governmental officials ofthe next highest level of government, to reduce the possibility that party or governmental officials at their rank will influence decision making. Under this plan judges in oblast courts who hear complex cases of banditism and premeditated murder would be chosen at sessions of the Supreme Soviet of the Union Republics. The regional (raion) or people's court



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judges, who hear 98 percent of all civil and criminal cases, would be chosen at sessions of the oblast soviets. Judges' terms have been increased from five to ten years. 36 Furthermore, there are strict penalties for interfering in judicial decision making. There are indications that the new selection process is already being implemented in parts of the country with positive results. But an accompanying reform that legitimized the jury system has not been implemented. Peoples' assessors still sit in the courtroom and, whether willingly or under pressure, they nearly always accept the will of the presiding judge. 37 Higher level judges are elected by the corresponding-level soviet on the basis of nomination by the Party. Approximately 2,600 judges serve in the middle and upper ranges, and though promotions do occur through the ranks, mobility is restricted. 38 But the number of judges is inadequate for the existing caseload, and there are presently one-sixth the number of judges per capita than in most Western societies. 39 At the higher court levels three professional judges hear appeals cases or those heard by protest. But judges lack specialization, and many critics believe there is a need for specialists in family and administrative cases as well as other legal fields. 40 As precedent carries no weight in Soviet law and judges make no laws, their role (as in the continental system) is primarily inquisitorial. They take an active role in the trial and promote the didactic elements of Soviet law in the courtroom. This is particularly true in family cases, which represent the majority of civil cases. It is in this area that female judges predominate. Didacticism also pervades the criminal courtroom. Unlike their Western colleagues, Soviet judges rarely determine innocence or guilt; until recently, only 0.2 percent of criminal cases result in acquittals. 41 Although the figure for acquittals has increased under perestroika, it is hard to assert that a presumption of innocence is operating in many Soviet courtrooms, as only 1,500 cases in all of the Russian republic in 1987 resulted in acquittals. 42 The number of acquittals has increased since then, but they still represent less than 2 percent of all cases heard by the courts. The accusatorial tone of the courtroom has diminished, but it still is evidenced in a recent Soviet survey of lawyers. Only 58 percent answered affirmatively to the question, "Is it better to let 10 guilty men go free than to convict a single innocent man?"43 Even in sentencing, judges usually take their clues from the procurator.


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Procurators The Soviet procurator is the kingpin of the courtroom but is not like the Western prosecutor. Procurators' authority extends beyond the courtroom and criminal cases. Although they are responsible for conducting or overseeing all criminal investigations and serving as a prosecutor in court, they also represent the states' interests in numerous civil cases. Furthermore, they exercise a general supervisory function ensuring that state institutions uphold the law. 44 The obshchii nadzor or general surveillance function encompasses even such institutions as the militsiia (regular police), labor camps, and the KGB (Committee on State Security, or secret police). The procuracy's functions are so encompassing and its powers are so great that individuals are afraid of the procurators and the institution. Although the procuracy is intended to uphold citizens' rights, the procurator is rarely perceived as the champion of the individual; rather, the procurator is the embodiment of the strong arm of the government. 45 The procuracy is a massive hierarchical institution encompassing more than 20,000 legal professionals. 46 Its ranks include administrators, procurators, and their assistants as well as a large number of investigators. The majority of procurators are male. Women work primarily as investigators. Although they generally stay at the lower ranks, some women assume important positions in the investigation of major economic crimes. 47 Yet they are generally isolated from the influential posts that would involve them with the Party. Most women in the procuracy, as in other branches of the legal system, enjoy a second-class status. But those few who have risen to top administrative positions enjoy authority and respect. 48 Centrally organized and stratified according to a complex ranking system, the procuracy is intended to enforce the law uniformly throughout the country. Significant variations in law enforcement do, however, occur in response to local conditions and traditions. Enforcement is much less vigilant in the Asian republics, where corruption is institutionalized. The efforts to restructure and democratize Soviet society are placing new pressures on the pro curacy. Although they have made an effort to retain their power, procurators have been forced to accept



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certain changes. The Soviet system has been an administrativecommand system, with the procuracy executing the Party's commands. 49 Procuratorial personnel must be reeducated to believe that they are not always right, probably the hardest lesson of perestroika for the members of this powerful institution. Simultaneously, they are expected to respond much more vigorously to the complaints of illegality by the citizenry. In Moscow alone, the procurator's office must now respond to 1,500 to 2,000 citizen complaints monthly. 50 Nationwide, the procuracy in 1987 lodged protests for more than 70,000 illegal acts committed by administrative personnel, filed an additional 220,000 actions against officials, and filed submissions concerning 170,000 breaches oflegality.5l The procuracy is forced to be more responsive, but a significant gap still remains between the needs of the citizenry and the performance of the procurators. Three primary means have been used to enhance procuratorial responsiveness. They are press criticism, corruption trials, and the oversight provided by the newly constituted Supreme Soviet. In 1987, 800 critical articles on the procuracy appeared in the Soviet press and had to be addressed. 52 Many of these articles concern the illegalities of procurators as a result of local Party pressure. 53 Yet these criticisms have not forced fundamental change in the institution, but only the rectification ofindividual problems. As a member of the Collegium of the USSR Procuracy admitted, if glasnost were to disappear, the system would function as before. 54 Massive shake-ups have occurred in the procuratorial apparatus, particularly in the Central Asian republics 55 and the Caucasus. 56 These individuals, most susceptible to the endemic corruption of the Brezhnev years, are being removed to de-Brezhnevize the system and to foster a more professional procuracy that upholds the law and operates with greater autonomy. The Supreme Soviet had to confirm appointments to the Collegium of the USSR Procuracy. In the Supreme Soviet proceedings held in summer 1989 the USSR procurator was questioned about the predominance of Russians on this governing board. Three of the individuals proposed for candidacy were not recommended by a legal subcommittee because of their past performance. 57 But despite these new checks on the work of the procuracy, procurators still fail to prevent the "unjustified institution of criminal proceedings and the detention, arrest and searching ofcitizens. "58 The


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current controversy over the visible prosecutor and legislator, Gdlyan, who is accused of using inappropriate techniques in his investigations, has raised questions about the approach of the procuracy to legality. The investigative commission of the Supreme Soviet has concluded that, at least in the Brezhnev period, such practices were condoned if not encouraged by the USSR procuracy. The broad criticism of the procuracy has demoralized personnel. Record numbers of individuals are departing to take legal and other kinds of work in the developing private sector. Once, the procuracy was a stepping-stone to prestigious positions in the Party hierarchy, 59 but the current crisis in the party has made the procuracy a less desirable career choice.

Iuriskonsulty (Legal Advisers)

The revelations of glasnost have discredited the procuracy and the judiciary. Yet the enterprise legal advisers (iuriskonsulty), for a long time the stepchildren in the legal profession, have been recently accorded new prominence. Perestroika, the platform of economic reconstruction set forth by Gorbachev, requires a more active role for law in the Soviet economy. Consequently, this large but previously unprestigious branch of the law faces new challenges as Soviet enterprises for the first time face bankruptcies, major reductions in personnel, and wages tied to performance. The legal adviser who serves as in-house counsel to organizations, enterprises, and institutions prepares and approves legal documents, advises management and workers on their legal problems, and represents the organization in court and at arbitration (arbitrazh) hearings. 6o Although the past decade has seen a growth in their prestige, the iuriskonsults are still poorly paid and far removed from the Party hierarchy. Even though some 80,000 individuals work as legal advisers, there is a constant shortage. Tens of thousands of organizations are presently without needed legal assistance, and the problem is particularly acute in rural areas. Pay raises for iuriskonsulty, greater authority within their organizations, and more specialized training within law school for this specialization are all changes being implemented to enhance the effectiveness of this professional group. If economic reforms proceed, work as a



77

iuriskonsult will no longer be a specialization of last resort for Soviet lawyers.

Other Legal Specializations Although the majority of lawyers work as iuriskonsulty, advocates, procurators, or judges, others find employment in the militsiia and the labor camp system within the Ministry ofInternal Affairs, as well as in the KGB. Still others work as arbitrators, hearing cases brought to them by iuriskonsulty at Soviet enterprises. Others find employment as notaries or as marshals, and some work within the administrative apparatus of the Ministry of Justice. There is also a sizable group of increasingly influential academics working both within the universities and the specialized research institutes. Few lawyers find employment within the Party or governmental apparatus. Unlike the situation in Western societies, where law school is often the preferred training for those who will enter the foreign service or legislative positions, in the USSR few lawyers are found in such positions. Gorbachev, the first general secretary since Lenin to have a legal education, has promoted few lawyers to top-level policy positions. If perestroika has created a new day for the Soviet trained lawyer, it is in the private rather than the state sector.

Education A diverse body of individuals chooses to go to law school. In most branches of Soviet law there is not a professional pride that results in the perpetuation of a family tradition. Only in the advokatura do parents urge their children to attend law school. In the larger Slavic cities it is not unusual to find both parents and children within the same college of defenders. Those who go into the other branches of the justice system usually come from less intellectual homes and may be drawn from the working classes or even from farm families in rural areas. In most areas, service in the judiciary or procuracy has not been hereditary. Recently, as service in the justice system has become so lucrative, parents have tried to gain entry for their children into law school through bribery. The dean ofMoscow University's law faculty,


LOUISE I. SHELLEY

for example, was thrown out as a result of such payoffs. In another case Aliev, after becoming Party secretary of Azerbaijan, closed the law school to the offspring ofjustice personnel as they threatened to become a hereditary financial elite. 61 Financial calculation rather than pride in professional identity account for the perpetuation of the legal profession within families. Those without ties to the legal profession choose to study law for a variety of reasons. Some are attracted by the romanticism of detective work, others seek a broad-based, humanities-oriented education, while others are encouraged to attend because of their political reliability.62 The diverse reasons for attendance creates student bodies ofheterogeneous backgrounds generally united by their political conformity. Throughout most of the Soviet period there has been a shortage of lawyers. As the rule oflaw has not been a priority, neither the number oflaw schools nor full-time enrollments have risen significantly, even in the face of increased demand for lawyers by the citizenry and state enterprises. Approximately thirty institutes and university departments of law presently train lawyers. 63 Part of the increased demand for legal professionals has been met by large numbers of part-time correspondence students. The overproduction of these underqualified lawyers has created a surfeit. 64 Yet many of these individuals cannot find positions because many older individuals with less legal training retain their jobs and many newly trained lawyers are unwilling to move to more remote regions of the USSR. Individuals enter full-time law school after rigorous competitive examinations. Many enter after military service; their political reliability as measured by their kharakteristika (personality characteristics) is often as important as their examinations in determining eligibility. Jews, formerly a bastion of the legal profession, were denied entrance to law faculties in the late 1970S and early 1980s. Women continue to assume a significant share of the places. Legal education in the Soviet Union consists of a five-year curriculum that students pursue following completion of high school. As in Western Europe where law school is an undergraduate degree, the curriculum is broader and contains more of a historical perspective than does the American curriculum. Social science, history, and language courses supplement more specific legal courses. But unlike European law schools, Soviet law schools devote much attention to Marxism-Leninism and Party history. Electives and clinical work sup-



79

plement the formal lecture work. During the final year of study students often work as interns in the MVD, procuracy, or at the bar to obtain practical experience. Law school classmates establish personal associations that may assist their future careers. Upon graduation from law school, full-time students are assigned legal positions under the system of raspredelenie. This system, which exists in all branches of higher education, distributes young specialists to all regions of the country. But there is a very uneven distribution oflawyers within the country. In Estonia there are 28 lawyers for every 10,000 inhabitants, whereas the comparable figure for Uzbekistan is 12. 65 The first two years after graduation are usually spent in some remote region, after which the recent graduate is free to find another position in a possibly more desirable area of the country. Law school graduates are assigned to a branch ofthe legal system, often taking into consideration the internship the student performed as an undergraduate. Those who worked as investigators might be assigned to the procuracy or to the MVD, and those who worked with a defense attorney might become members of the advokatura. These career specialization choices made for the individual by the raspredelenie commission of the Ministry ofEducation are often immutable. After their two years of postgraduation service, those who so desire may change their locations. It is much more difficult to change their area oflegal specialization; transfers, for example, between the procuracy and iuriskonsult work occur infrequently. Law school students generally have more collective identification with their legal institution and with their peers than they do with the concept of being a jurist. Interviews with many emigre lawyers66 indicate that attendance at reunions of law school classes is frequent. Gorbachev's attendance at his thirty-fifth law school reunion was filmed. 67 Yet the old school tie does not appear to be as important as it is in Western society. Membership in the different Party organizations that unite procurators and judges or defense attorneys apparently assumes more importance in professional "networking."

Training and Socialization Following assignment to a branch of the law, an individual usually goes into an extended training period. In regions where the procuracy


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or other legal institution is severely understaffed, the recent graduate may commence directly with his or her own legal work, but more frequently he or she works under the tutelage of an experienced legal specialist. The long-standing practice of "electing" recent graduates to the judiciary has come under criticism, as many feel that even with intensive training beginning lawyers are unsuited for this role. 68 In addition to the concrete knowledge that is imparted during this early training period, the new lawyer is also socialized into the mores of the particular branch of the legal profession. Many concerned with legal education are considering ways to enhance the development of a legal consciousness among law students. 69 In the advokatura the new defense attorney learns to juggle his or her time between the courtroom, case preparation, and the office. Hours are unscheduled, and one's income depends on one's own efforts. Surviving and prospering within the profession requires self-discipline and the ability to function without much external structure or guidance. The new defense attorney, like Western colleagues, must learn to adjust to competition. He or she must learn how to attract and serve clients. This is particularly true now that restrictions on income have been lifted. Specialization often begins as the lawyer acquires expertise in a particular branch of the law such as labor, housing, divorce, criminal law, and the new area ofjoint ventures. Senior members of the bar often guide the new, inexperienced defense attorneys in preparing cases, providing advice in consultation hours, and in preparhg their speeches and arguments for trial. 70 Patterns of socialization are very different in the other branches of the justice system, where individuals must learn to live within a complex bureaucratic structure and accustom themselves to the clues provided by the Party apparatus. While the bar has an ideology of service to its clients, the procuracy, judiciary, and MVD have a commitment to Party discipline. Their job is to ful61l the will of the Party-to ensure convictions of offenders, the execution of Party-orchestrated campaigns against drunks, hooligans, and embezzlers, and the maintenance of community order. In contrast to the situation in the advokatura, individualism in these branches is not encouraged. The executors of state justice policy must learn to interpret Party signals. Such signals may require the procurator to request, or the judge to impose, stiffer penalties for drunken individuals during an anti-alcohol campaign, to prohibit a divorce during a campaign to strengthen



81

the family, or to provide favorable treatment for an individual who has served the Party well. Bothjudges and procurators learned from Party supervisory sessions that leniency in law enforcement was not favored,71 and now they are instructed that "humaneness" is the appropriate tendency in law enforcement. In addition to gaining sensitivity to the will and desire of the Party, lawyers who go into the procuracy must also learn a wide range of skills and legislation. Those who start as investigators learn the specialized techniques of investigation. Those who start out as procurators' assistants in smaller communities must perform a wide range of tasks: dealing with the citizenry who file complaints, examining the complex bodies of regulations that govern the organizations they oversee, and representing the state in court. The diverse responsibilities of the procurator ensure that the beginning lawyer rarely has a structured day within an office, but all tasks are performed under the strict supervision of the regimented and centrally controlled procuracy. Adjustment to and advancement within the procuracy, an organization that most directly represents the state's interests in the courts and the community, requires both commitment and an appreciation of Party desires. It is imperative that the newcomer to the procuracy must learn to comply with, and to interpret, national Party directives while simultaneously following the orders of the local Party organization. 72 Although socialization into the justice apparatus requires sensitivity to Party needs, those who commence work as legal advisers find themselves far removed from the scrutiny of the Party apparatus. Unlike the procurators, judges, or advocates who identify with their professional group, iuriskonsulty lack a professional identity. Furthermore, though many employed in the justice system are united by their membership in a single Party organization, few iuriskonsulty are Party members. Those legal advisers who do belong are members ofdiverse Party organizations consisting of workplace colleagues rather than their fellow legal professionals. The iuriskonsult spends more time at the office than do lawyers in the justice system. Although he or she may leave the workplace to attend arbitration hearings, job requirements generally keep the iuriskonsult close to the enterprise. Lacking the variety of defense or investigative work, he or she enjoys a certain advantage. The work is not


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closely supervised either by a ministry nor by a centralized bureaucracy. Yet this type of lawyer is far from autonomous but is clearly subordinate to the manger or director of the organization. Continued service at the workplace depends on the good graces of the iuyiskonsult's supervisor. Socialization into iuyiskonsult work is also difficult. Often the legal adviser is the sole lawyer at the workplace. Only in large organizations may there be more than one stafflawyer facilitating on-the-job training. In the majority of organizations where there is no possible support from more seasoned lawyers, inexperienced legal advisers sometimes turn for help to the arbitrators who hear their cases or the ministry that supervises their work. Such support is not offered spontaneously but is obtained only at the initiative of the inexperienced iuyiskonsult. The isolation of these youthful lawyers and their lack of professional identity contribute to the low morale of many. All lawyers must be socialized into the particular mores and behavior of their branch of law, but in addition all face the unifying feature of the Soviet legal system-the pervasiveness of the paperwork and of bureaucracy. 73 The completion of massive amounts of time-consuming paperwork is an integral component of both the justice system and the economic system. Lawyers who fail to comply with bureaucratic demands can face serious repercussions. Yet the sanctions for these people are less than they are for those who fail to acquiesce to the will of the party.74 Sensitivity to the political significance of the legal process is a primary requirement for the Soviet lawyer.

Discussion A major debate between the functionalists and conflict theorists has been going on for a long time in the Western literature on professions. Are these Western perspectives applicable to this analysis of Soviet lawyers? The functionalist perspective suggests that the professions are distinguished from other occupations by the possession ofan arcane body of knowledge acquired only after years of training. Furthermore, professionals share many of the following attributes:



Professionals enjoy an unusual degree of autonomy vis a vis their clients in work decisions . . . ; professionals are generally accorded elevated social standing or prestige, and tend to be compensated accordingly; the professions manifest devotion to public service rather than narrow self-interest; and associated with this emphasis on duty, the professions inculcate in their members special standards ofethical conduct, which are far more specific and exacting than are the common norms of the society. 75 These attributes are shared by many members of the advokatura who, though lacking elevated prestige, enjoy a significant degree of autonomy and generally have high ethical standards. But these generalizations about professionals have very little bearing on the lives and careers of 90 percent of Soviet lawyers. Salaried Soviet lawyers enjoy almost no autonomy. The iuriskonsult is strictly subordinate to management, and continued employment depends on the satisfaction of his or her employer. Employees in the justice system are subordinate both to the demands of their highly centralized hierarchical organizations and to the demands of the national and local Party organizations. Lawyers do not enjoy particular prestige within Soviet society. Prestige rankings of professions in the United States consistently place Supreme Court justices at the top of the pyramid, but no such results would be obtained from a survey ofthe Soviet population. Neither law nor lawyers have enjoyed high status in the USSR. Individuals may acknowledge a grudging respect for certain branches of the law, but their view ofinfluential legal practitioners may be one offear and disdain. Salaries have recently been raised for many categories of lawyers, but their official incomes are not significantly higher than those of many other Soviet professional groups. Though high-ranking procuratorial and judicial personnel may enjoy certain privileges, their official compensation is far below that of the Party elite. The significant unofficial payments that occur result not from respect for justice personnel as trained professionals, but from the power that flows from their bureaucratic positions. Defense attorneys have a tradition of public service, and most members of the bar do provide service to indigent clients. The strong sense of duty and commitment to public service, traditions of the advokatura, survived even the most trying times of the Stalinist period. Yet for most of the legal community the legacy of the Stalin years is


LOUISE I. SHELLEY

that ofan interest in self-preservation. Even now, the majority oflegal professionals strive to control and regulate Soviet society rather than to serve the interests of the community. A sense of pride in addition to strong internal governance has helped ensure generally high ethical standards in the advokatura. The majority of defense attorneys are an anomaly among legal professionals, since most lawyers do not adhere to a more exacting sense of norms than that which prevails in Soviet society generally. Instead, the corruption in the legal apparatus has become so pervasive that Party officials feel that it might undermine the credibility of the system. The recent frequent and extensive publicity over the abuses and prosecutions of legal personnel at all levels 76 are meant to be a signal both to justice personnel and the populace that such behavior will not be tolerated. Clearly, Soviet lawyers at the workplace are not inculcated with special standards of ethical conduct. The Soviet legal profession does not fit the definitional criteria of a profession according to the functionalist school. Though the Soviet lawyer possesses specialized knowledge, he or she is not like many of Western counterparts. The Soviet lawyer is far from autonomous, lacks prestige, and has no strong commitment to public service or a higher ethical code. Most Soviet lawyers are part ofthe state apparatus and are beholden to the wishes of both the government and the Party. This one Western model of a profession seems inapplicable to the Soviet experience, but are there any other theoretical perspectives that might be more applicable to this centrally controlled hierarchical society? According to a leading conflict theorist, "the professional phenomenon does not have clear boundaries."77 Furthermore, conflict theorists question whether professional groups really have a service orientation or higher ethical standards. Instead, they argue that "the status of an occupation as a profession is not determined by its possession of some identifiable set of objective characteristics but rather that such status is politically determined-that the claim of professional status is a claim of entitlement to legitimacy or a form of power. "78 This theoretical perspective is more clearly suited to the Soviet experience. As the preceding discussion indicates, there is no one concept of a jurist in Soviet society and has been no unifying concept or organization for the legal profession. The prestige, work conditions, and autonomy of the lawyers of the diverse branches of the legal system depend on the political utility of the area oflaw in which they



85

are employed. Employees of the procuracy and judiciary, areas fundamental to the governance of Soviet society, enjoy less autonomy but more status and power. They are the executors of the Party's will. Soviet experience diverges from the conflict perspective in that Soviet lawyers do not need to claim professional status as an entitlement to power. The mere possession of their positions in a centrally controlled and hierarchical society is enough to confer power. Although those who now hold powerful positions in the justice system are usually lawyers, power and prestige was conferred on the holders ofthese same jobs in earlier decades when they were filled by those lacking legal educations. Power is not conferred because ofprofessional characteristics but, rather, by proximity to the powerful Party apparatus. The divergence between the attributes of the 10 percent oflawyers who constitute the advokatura and the remaining 90 percent of Soviet lawyers also reveals another fundamental difference between Western and Soviet legal practice. Members of the advokatura correspond in social background much more closely to those who form the upper echelon of American legal practice,79 but in the USSR defense attorneys do not enjoy high status. Rather, the heights of prestige are reserved for those who come from less prestigious backgrounds and serve state rather than private interests. The history and the nature of the Soviet state has created a situation for lawyers that is very different from that in Western capitalist societies. A legal profession lacking cohesion and prestige has developed in the past seventy years following the destruction of the entire czarist legal apparatus. Its power follows from its proximity to the state rather than its claim to expertise in a specific body of knowledge. The emergence of a prestigious legal profession, one of Gorbachev's objectives, requires a new approach to law and legality. Certain changes in the practice oflaw are already evident, with the growth of the cooperative movement that has permitted limited private business. It remains to be seen whether democratization and a continued transition away from a state-controlled, centrally planned economy will lead to more fundamental changes in the legal profession. Notes I. This study will be undertaken by the Sociology of Law division of the Institute ofState and Law. While a guest ofthe Institute in October I987, I had


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a chance to review the extensive questionnaire that will be distributed to lawyers in all branches of the legal system. 2. "0 pravovoi reforme," Literaturnaia Gazeta, July 6, 1988, p. 5. 3. See, e.g., John P. Heinz and Edward O. Laumann, Chicago Lawyers: The Social Structure of the Bar (New York: Russell Sage Foundation and the American Bar Foundation, 1982);Jerome E. Varlin, Lawyers on Their Own: A Study of Individual Practitioners in Chicago (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1962). 4. Eugene Huskey, Russian Lawyers and the Soviet State: The Origins and Development of the Soviet Bar, 1917-1939 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1986), pp. 77-79. 5. Peter H. Solomon Jr., "Local Political Power and Soviet Criminal Justice, 1922-1941," Soviet Studies I, no. 3 (1985): 307. 6. Interviews with the deputy procurator general of the USSR, the procurator general of the Ukraine, and the procurator of Leningrad in January and February of 1989. 7. For a discussion of this see Lawrence M. Friedman and Zigurds L. Zile, "Soviet Legal Profession: Recent Developments in Law and Practice," Wisconsin Law Review Oanuary 1964): P-77; Donald D. Barry and Harold]. Berman, "The Soviet Legal Profession," Harvard Law Review 82 (1968): 1-41. 8. See Heinz and Laumann, Chicago Lawyers, pp. 97-99. 9. L. Nikitinskii, "Gimacy iuridicheskogo Jitsa," Komsomolskaia Pravda, June 29, 1989, p. I. 10. Eugene Huskey, "Lawyers in the Soviet Union," in Joseph L. Wieczynski, ed., Modern Encyclopedia of Russian and Soviet History, Vol. 49 (Gulf Breeze, Fla.: Academic International Press, 1988), pp. 201-207. I I. Discussion with distinguished criminal law scholar, October 1987, on the means of enhancing the prestige of the advokatura and the reasons for its lowly status. 12. For an excellent discussion of the bar in English see Eugene Huskey, "The Limits to Institutional Autonomy in the Soviet Union: The Case of the Advokatura," Soviet Studies 34, no. 2 (1982): 200-227. 13. M. Iakovleva, "Advokat i advokatura," Vecherniaia Moskva, November 9, 1988, p. 3· 14. See ibid. 15. John H. Burns, "Sovict Lawyers, in Feisty Session, Form their First Bar Group," New York Times, February 26, 1989, p. AI2. 16. T. Feoktistova, "Soiuz Zashchitnikov," Literatumaia Gazeta, March I, 1989, p. I. 17. Michael Dobbs, "'You May Someday Have the Right to an Attorney, Comrade,'" Washington Post, February 26, 1989, p. Ap. For a fuller discussion of the conflicts surrounding the formation of this association see Robert



Rand, "Comrade Lawyers: A Study of Legal Practice in Moscow," Final Report to the National Council for Soviet and East European Research, January 1990. 18. A recent discussion of this appeared in Andrei Komarov, "'Novye metody' zashchity," Ogonek 26 (1987): 30-3 I. 19. See Louise I. Shelley, "Soviet Defense Counsel: Past as Prologue," American Bar Foundation Research Review 4 (1987): 9 I I. 20. See discussion in Richard L. Abel, "Comparative Sociology of Legal Professions: An Exploratory Essay," American Bar Foundation Research Journal I (1985): 6. 2 I. For a discussion of the control of the advokatura see G. K. Sharov and

B. A. Dashchinskii, "Nekotorye voprosy obshchevo rukovodstva advokaturoi, " in V. M. Savitsky, ed., Advokatura i sovremennost' (Moscow: Academy of Sciences, 1987), pp. 14-19. 22. Dina Kaminskaya, Final Judgment (New York: Simon & Schuster, 82 19 ), pp. 309-3 19. 23. Interview with Zolotukhin, January 1989. 24. "Proposals for Improving Legal System Noted," FBIS Daily Report, July 10, 1989, p. 88. See also Rand, "Comrade Lawyers," p. 78. 25. V. Savitsky, "Ways ofRestructuring the Legal System: The Prestige of the Bar," Current Digest ofthe Soviet Press 39, no. 12 (1987): 7. 26. A. Iakovlev and I. Gamaiunov, "V pol'zu spravedlivosti," Literaturnaia Gazeta, September 24, 1986, p. 13. 27. See Savitsky, "Ways of Restructuring the Legal System," p. 3. 28. "Proposals for Improving Legal System Noted," FBIS Daily Report, July 10, 1989, p. 88. 29. Interview with the chairman and judges of the Leningrad city court, February 3, 1989, and researcher, Ukrainian Institute ofState and Law, February I, 1989. 30. I. L. Petrukhin, "Justice and Legality," Soviet Law and Government, Winter 1988-89, p. 20. 3 I. O. Chaikovskaia, "Obizhaites' na menia, ne obizhaites'," Literaturnaia Gazeta, October 22, 1986, p. 12. 32. V. Savitskii, "Tak kakoi sud nam nuzhen," Pravda, October 26, 1988, P·3·

33. Aleksandr Borin, "Za chto sudili sud'iu?," Literaturnaia Gazeta, February 3, 1988, p. 13· 34. Natal'ia Buldyk, "Bez prava na osibku," Sovetskaia Zhenshchina 7 (1988): 14· 35. See Huskey, "Lawyers in the Soviet Union," pp. 201-207. 36. See Savitskii, "Tak kakoi sud nam nuzhen," p. 3, for a discussion of the

reforms when they were first proposed.


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37. G. Silina, "Osoboe mnenie monolog narodnogo zasedatelia," Literaturnaia Gazeta, December 24, 1986, p. I I; A. Vaksberg, "Komu eto nuzhno," Literaturnaia Gazeta, January 21, 1987, p. 12. 38. George Ginsburgs, "The Soviet Judicial Elite: Is It?" Review ofSocia list Law I I (1985): 27I. 39. Fedor Burlatskii, "Sudebnaia Reforma," Literaturnaia Gazeta, November 15, 1989, p. I. 40. Ibid. 41. Ger P. van den Berg, The Soviet System ofJustice: Figures and Policy (Dordrecht: Martinus Nijhoff, 1985), p. 261. 42. Leonid Lerov, "Osoboe mnenie," Ogonek 34 (1988): 30. 43. V. N. Kudriavtsev, "Demokratizatsiia i zakonnost'," Pravda, May 3, 1988, p. 3. 44. Gordon Smith, The Soviet Procuracy and the Supervision ofAdministration (Alphen aan den Rijn: Sijthoff and Noordhoff, 1978). 45. Aleksandr Borin, "Na ch'ei storone prokuror?" Literaturnaia Gazeta, August 31, 1988, p. 12. 46. See Huskey, "Lawyers in the Soviet Union," pp. 201-207. 47. Ernst Markin, "Zhenshchiny vymetaiushchie sor iz izby," Krestianka 9 (1988): 18-20, 32. 48. Interview with I. V. Katukova, deputy procurator of Leningrad, February 1989. 49. "Prosecutor Ponders Immediate Tasks ofJustice, " FBIS Daily Reports, June 30, 1988, p. 46. 50. S. Muladzhanov, "Zakon vremeni i vremia zakona," Moskovskaia Pravda, November 21, 1988, p. 4. 51. See "Prosecutor Ponders," pp. 46-47. 52. "Pravosudie i glasnost'," Literaturnaia Gazeta, March 30, 1988, p. II. 53. Arkadii Vaksberg, "Pravde v glaza," Literaturnaia Gazeta, December 17, 1987, p. 13; Igor' Gamaiunov, "Istoriia oshibochnogo osuzhdeniia agronoma Peztera Al'bi," Literaturnaia Gazeta, November I I, 1987, p. I I. 54. Interview with V. I. Andreev, member of the Collegium USSR Procuracy, January 27, 1989. 55. For a discussion of some of these see Louise Shelley, "The Political Function of Soviet Courts: A Model for One Party States?" Review ofSocialist Law 13, no. 3 (1987): 241-262. 56. Mikhail Iliadze, "Bez prava na oshibku," Zaria Vostoka, August 10, 1988, p. 3. 57. "Days Proceedings Described," FBIS Daily Report, July 10, 1989, p. 58. 58. "Prosecutor's Office Seeks to Improve Methods," FBIS Daily Report, March I, 1990, p. 72.



59· Eugene Huskey, "Specialists in the Soviet Communist Party Apparatus: Legal Professionals as Party Functionaries," Soviet Studies 40, no. 4 (1988): 53 8-555. 60. Louise I. Shelley, Lawyers in Soviet Work Life (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1984). 61. Antonina Grigo, "LetJustice Prevail," Joint Publication Research Service, December 2,1981, pp. RI5-24. 62. For a discussion of attitudes oflawyers see Louise Shelley, "Interviews mit emigrierten sowjetischenJuristen," Osteuropa 10 (1984): 796-803. 63· K. Mokichev and G. Dobrovolsky, "Problems and Judgments: The Jurist is Expected at Work," Current Digest ofthe Soviet Press 2I, no. 16 (1969): 21. 64. See Huskey, "Lawyers in the Soviet Union," pp. 201-207. 65. M. Marchenko and N. Kuznetsova, "Kadrovoe obespechenie pravovoi reformy," Sotsialisticheskaia Zakonnost' 5 (1989): 7. 66. See Shelley, "Interviews mit emigrierten sowjetischen Juristen," for a discussion of the socializing patterns of Soviet lawyers. 67. "Gorbachev Meets Former Classmates," RFE/RL Daily Report 120 Oune 26, 1990). 68. V. N. Kudriavtsev, "Pravo i demokratiia," Izvestiia, October 4,1986, p. 3; V. I. Terebilov, "Legal System Needs 'Major Restructuring,'" FBIS, December 3, 1987, p. 79· 69. A. A. Trevkov, "Aktuarnye problemy sovershenstvovaniia pravovogo vospitaniia," Sovetskoe Gosudarstvo i Pravo 6 (1988): 35-43, and A. D. Boikov, "Professionalizm iurista i ror pravovoi nauki v podgotovke kadrov," Sovetskoe Gosudarstvo i Pravo 6 (1988): 44-50. 70. See books of the closing arguments of distinguished lawyers presented by members of the bar, f~r example, K. N. Apraksin, Rechi sovetskikh advokatov po ugolovnym delam (Moscow: Iuridicheskaia Literatura, 1975). 71. Vaksberg, "Komu eto nuzhno," p. 12, discusses the relationship between the party and the judicial process. 72. Arkadii Vaksberg, "Old Lessons Revised: Lenin about the Guarantees of Legality, " Moscow News, November 15, 1987, p. 13. 73. Vasilii Gatov, "'Deputatskie papki'," Nedelia 5 (1990): 15. 74. See O. Chaikovskaia, "Obizhaites' na menia, ne obizhaites'," p. 12; S. Zamoshkin, "Prokuror i 'mestnaia vlast'," Literaturnaia Gazeta, January 14, 1987, p. 13· 75. See Heinz and Laumann, Chicago Lawyers, p. 22. 76. See, e.g., G. Tselms, "Courtroom Sketch: A Supplementary Ruling That Was Never Made," Current Digest ofthe Soviet Press 38, no. 42 (19 86): 56; B. Kibirev, "Response to Criticism: Sentence for Prosecutor," FBIS Daily Reports, September 22, 1987, pp. 54-55; "Bribe Takers Sentenced in Vol-


LOUISE I. SHELLEY

9°

gograd," FBIS Daily Reports, December 7, 1987, p. 67; I. Biryukova, "According to the Law ofSocial]ustice: Corrosion," FBIS Daily Reports, December 9, 1987, pp. 67-68. 77. Magali Sarfatti Larson, The Rise ofProfessionalism: A Sociological Analysis (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977), p. xi. 78. See Heinz and Laumann, Chicago Lawyers, p. 23. 79. See ibid.


CHAPTER

4

Soviet Engineers as a Professional Group Eduard Gloeckner

Historical and Sociological Background

Engineering as a Profession in the Pre-Soviet Period Since the time of the czars and the Russian Revolution of 1917, the engineering profession in Russia has changed in many regards. During the czarist period engineers could be described as technical assistants of the emperor and of his commanders. They were responsible for the construction of roads, bridges, channels, ports, shipyards, and sluices as well as of strictly military structures during military expeditions or battles. Czar Peter I, one of the most innovative emperors in Russia, founded the first engineering school in Moscow in 1712. The educational training of the first technical scientists in the eighteenth century consisted ofsubjects such as arithmetic, mechanics, architecture, technical painting, geography, and astronomy. "Engineering" as a specialty field in itself was introduced only in the nineteenth century. The first all-Russian census in 1897 recorded a total ofonly 130,000 specialists with higher or secondary technical education, a result of the limited industrialization of the country. By way of contrast, in 1985 9,437,000 "technical specialists" (that is, engineers and technicians) were employed in the economy. 1 The majority of the czarist technical intelligentsia had formal training neither at the university level (graduation with a diploma) nor at technical schools. According to the census of 1897, only 957 graduated technicians with such formal training lived at the time in the European part ofRussia, the most industrialized


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section of the Russian empire. 2 Young people from all levels and strata of society could gain access to the engineering institutes, such as the Petersburg Institute ofTechnology. At the Kharkov Practical-Technological Institute, nearly 60 percent of all technical students came from nonprivileged social groups. The engineering profession (in Russian: inzhener) was given a special place in the social order. In the late nineteenth century engineers even wore special uniforms of a military style, a status symbol of the time. 3 In the years before World War I, the inzhener became a symbol in Russian literature, a metaphor for the hopes, fears, and social opportunities of the new age of machinery. During the war itself Russia's engineers constituted an integral part of the influential group of experts with relations at the military-governmental level. 4 The Soviet Period

During the Soviet period virtually everything written about engineers referred to them as "engineering-technical personnel" (inzhenerno-tekhnicheskie rabotniki, or ITR).5 In this usage the engineering profession is defined very broadly, making it difficult to delineate clearly what it includes. Moreover, definitions of the term inzhener vary from author to author. The predominantly ideological definition of the engineering profession is based on the demand for "responsibility for an efficient execution of duties in the system of division of labor."6 The profession in the Soviet mind seems to be a code for the division of labor in general within the society, as well as within particular occupations in accordance with special knowledge, abilities, talents, and functions. 7 The general emphasis is put on the occupational experience instead of the educational profile. The inzhenerdesignate turns into a real engineer only upon acquiring professional skills or experience. That is why the occupational profile of the engineer is much broader in the USSR, thus promoting a professional atmosphere in which roles are not clearly delineated or defined. Typically, a Soviet engineer may be responsible for economic and organizational as well as technical issues. 8 To achieve professional maturity, Soviet engineers are required to reach a high educational level in their technical specialty field, after which they must complete an internship in which they learn practical skills for three to five years. Eighty-eight of the 2,000 professions listed in the labor statistics are considered engineering professions. Most of these are narrowly de-


SOVIET ENGINEERS AS A GROUP

93

fined specialty fields for engineers in different economic spheres or fields of scientific or applied research. 9 Of the forty-six types of engineering positions listed in a special handbook of qualifications, only sixteen are defined explicitly as engineering professions, such as "design engineer" and "technology engineer."l0 In general, we can argue that the engineering profession in the USSR is multifaceted and that highly differentiated occupational and educational profiles are the norm, in contrast to the typical Western portrayal of an engineer as a purely technical specialist. In practice, this narrowly defined professional is responsible for a broad range of tasks, as shall be outlined below.

Recruitment to the Profession and the Trial Period of Young Engineers

The Prestige ofthe Profession The professional profile of the future engineer is already decided with the initial choice of an institution of higher education (vuz). But does the preliminary decision to attend the vuz necessarily mean that the student has chosen to become an engineer? In one study, only 1030 percent of students at Soviet technical institutes could describe the profile of the engineering profession relatively well. Most (50-70 percent) had only a fragmentary conception of the profession. 11 It appears that in the course of their studies, students get a clearer conception of their chosen profession. Only one-half of the future engineers are motivated largely by the value and prestige of their future profession. One-third of the graduates of a vuz or of a polytechnical institute ostensibly hope to fill the economy's need for technical specialists. 12 The nation's need for technical specialists in the agricultural sector clearly fades into the background once agricultural engineers decide on their professional orientation, particularly at the end of their studies. The decision of many graduates to settle in rural areas is revised shortly before or after their graduation from a vuz. Many graduates, especially females, shrink back from agrarian labor or living conditions in rural environments, having accustomed themselves to the urban lifestyle while students. 13 Agrotechnical students are much


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94

more satisfied with their choice of career than are industrial engineering students, while they are still students. 14 It is also apparent that male engineering students are much more oriented toward (and satisfied with) their future choice of profession than are females. IS Families show a strong tendency to build up a succession of professional engineers (as also of medical doctors or scientists) from generation to generation. In such a context, the selection of a particuiar technical profession can be regarded as the expression of a desire for social status at least equal to the parents. For about 50 percent of all technical students, this desire for social status is the primary motivation for enrolling at a vuz or competing for a place at a university. The social orientation is more significant than professional interest in the choice of career. Future engineers strive to graduate from the vuz in the hopes of being included in the class of intelligentsia, and "not in order to gain the mastery of a concrete profession. "16 The wish to achieve the professional and social status of the parents (membership in the intelligentsia) is more common for sons (almost 90 percent) than for daughters (50 percent).17 Thus, the professional orientation of most vuz graduates is largely a reflection of the self-perpetuation and self-recruiting tendencies of the intelligentsia. 18 This tendency to selfperpetuation is initiated by the parents' selection of appropriate primary and secondary schools for their children. Two-thirds of the students attending elite primary schools (Soviet "special schools") and striving for future professions such as engineering and science have parents who are scientifically educated specialists (members of the intelligentsia). 19

Educating the Engineer As engineers-in-training, vuz graduates must first take note of the central ministerial regulations concerning job allocation: the so-called decree on "interrepublic, interinstitutional and personal distribution of young specialists. "20 Graduates of the technical vuzy are distributed among special plants, institutes, or institutions and are required to remain in these positions for three years. A special commission is responsible for this job allocation and distribution. As stated in the decree, after completing these three years of service, the graduate will be recognized as a junior specialist for engineering and as a professional engineer. The decree on job allocation obviously is deficient in a number of



95

respects. First of all, market conditions are not allowed to dictate the allocation of engineering jobs among the designated institutions. Second, what young vuz graduates tend to consider more important are the prospective material and social advantages of working for a specific institution: the size of the enterprise, potential social connections, and its location in a desired urban setting. A conflict between state and private interests often results from this regulatory process. Some young graduates ignore the official schedule ofdistribution altogether. More than a few young engineers leave their assigned positions before their three-year commitment is fulfilled-primarily because of unfavorable climatic conditions, because of unsatisfactory living conditions, or because of the low salaries paid to recent graduates. Although it is forbidden to quit these jobs before the three-year commitment is fulfilled, there is no established penalty for doing SO.21 Some argue that a suitable punishment for those who prematurely leave their assigned positions would be the requirement that they pay back their scholarships, or 50 percent of the educational expenses incurred by the enterprise or by the state. 22 A second decree (enacted in 1974) prescribes a one-year period of occupational probation (stazhirovka). According to this, vuz commissions were expected to coordinate the distribution of the young specialists among dozens of ministries and institutions engaged in the economy or in scientific research. This system has yet to become functional, as it lacks rules. An ordinance of the Ministry of Higher Education and of the Central Committee, passed in the fall of 1986, also failed to address this problem of coordination. 23 A major weakness is the great difference between what engineers are expected to do at their first job and what they actually have been trained to do at the vuzy. The vuz curriculum is centrally prescribed by the ministries and is not adapted to the real needs of different enterprises. This is the primary reason why the Soviet system of central distribution of engineering graduates fails to provide recent graduates with a reasonable chance of adjusting to their new working environments. Compounding this problem are the inadequate social and living conditions (community housing instead of apartments), which fail to facilitate professional stabilization. 24 In fact, most young specialists are more satisfied with their working conditions than with daily life or social infrastructure. 25 The satisfaction with the technological working conditions in their new professional lives binds


EDUARD GLOECKNER

young engineers to their jobs. On the other hand, they feel that there is a great lack of training in organizational and social skills in their professional development. 26 More and more young engineers also complain about the lack of computer knowledge, while the older directors, leaders, and senior engineers are largely satisfied with the knowledge and talents of their beginning engineers. 27 This discrepancy may be explained by the distance of these senior directors from their own studies and their clinging to obsolete knowledge. The professional instability and dissatisfaction of young engineers can clearly also be explained by the gap between their expectations for their professional lives and their actual experiences. Even the concrete expectations are more realistic than the original professional orientation: Although 60 percent do not expect to have an interesting professional experience, 90 percent hold onto that hope as an ideal. 28 Nearly 30 percent of the junior engineers are soon disappointed with regard to their profession. 29 To keep this disappointment from growing, the vuzy are making every effort to maintain contact with their graduates throughout their professional lives through a network of mentors and instructors. The nature of the contacts is quite varied-about one-half of the mentors cultivate extensive relationships, though usually they meet rarely with their advisees. Every third instructor corresponds with the manager of the firm in which the vuz graduate works, but these contacts are of a general nature. 30 In the past ten years respected vuzy such as the Bauman Institute in Moscow have begun to prepare their future engineers for their specific fIeld of work long before their professional lives actually begin. After this institute introduced new curricula for the "exam semester" at the end of a university training, the number of young engineers whose education did not match their jobs fell from 20 to only 12 percent. 31 Similar experiences with practically oriented curricula were reported by institutes for agricultural engineering. 32 A special engineering-production preparation system (IPP) was integrated in the curriculum. The students studying to be engineers were taught in accordance with a successive trainee model of adaptation. The rate of turnover of young engineers can be greatly reduced by such systems. 33 In some cases, as many as 40 percent of young engineers and graduates leave their jobs within the trial period of three to five years. In the big cities, this instability can be counteracted by these new experiments in socialization and adaptation. 34 It remains to be seen whether an economically based system of



97

cooperation between vuzy and enterprises, whereby the enterprise would bear the educational costs of a technical specialist by contract, giving the enterprise more of a stake in the well-organized adaptation and integration of the young engineer, will be broadly implemented. As suggested by Shukshunov, this proposal would provide better training and reduce the number OfITRS, while allowing for an increasing and more differentiated salary scale for the remaining engineers, in accordance with the level of their skills. 35 In this manner the nation could avoid perpetuating a situation in which millions of mostly young engineers are employed as blue-collar workers, in large part because of their low income as engineers. On the other hand, there are millions of practicing engineers who have jobs for which they had no higher educational training. As a result of these distortions of the ITR labor market, the engineering profession is suffering, and its image is declining. 36

Occupational Characteristics and Organization Types and Profiles

of the Engineering Profession

The engineer and the engineer's working environment can be examined along a number of dimensions, such as social position, professional status, occupational or professional ranking, educational profile, specialty, economic profile, industrial profile, or scientificresearch profile, national or ethnic group, size of enterprise, plant or organization, gender, or qualifications. Because of their educational profile, engineers belong to the technical intelligentsia; according to the Soviet definition, they are "specialists" with higher education. Relatively few ofthose who are classified as "specialists" in accordance with their educational training are engineers. 37 As of 1987, of the approximately 35.5 million specialists (intelligentsia), just over 15.5 million have a higher education; about 3 million ofthese are engineers. Of the 20 million specialists with a middle-level specialist training, about 25-30 percent are employed as technicians. 38 In the past several years there has arisen a ratio of about I engineer to 1.7 technicians, a ratio that varies in the different branches of the economy and of industry. According to the calculations of the Scientific Work Organization (NOT), a ratio of I to 4 would be sensible and justified econom-


EDUARD GLOECKNER

ically, representing an appropriate use of educational resources. It is, therefore, understandable that this imbalance shows some effects in the occupational structure, which deviates extensively from the current educational profiles. 39 Twenty years ago every third or fourth position for engineers was taken by a technician. 40 As a result of the officially low incomes of the technicians and engineers and the small difference between their incomes, an apparent professional mobility was set in motion some time ago. Technicians were promoted to the higher income levels of the engineers, and engineers were promoted to chief or senior engineers. In this manner it was and is possible in many cases to reduce dissatisfaction with work and the labor turnover among technicians. However, as a result the efficiency and professional prestige of engineers have suffered, because technicians can grow into their new roles only after they already are on the job. A sociological analysis of professions and labor in the USSR reveals that occupational profiles in technical and scientific research areas concentrate on the requisite abilities, responsibilities, and duties; the knowledge of management or economics is thereby neglected. 41 Most descriptions of the profile of engineers reflect the existing industrial profile with its technical limitations. 42 It is quite apparent that there is still no self-profile of the engineering profession done by engineers themselves. A functional description of the engineering profession is as follows: "Functions are to be satisfied in accordance with the job descriptions in the following manner: a.) Working out of prospective plans through evaluation and transfer of the results of scientific investigation into practical applications; b.) The engineer must concern himself with current production." Analogous functions on "a social level" are an additional responsibility.43 These "social" responsibilities include innovation and inventions (patents), rationalization and organization of productivity, as well as pedagogical and political-propagandistic tasks. The actual working environment often deviates significantly from such normative descriptions.

Occupational Settings SPHERE OF PRODUCTION Apart from the scientific and governmental areas (planning, branch ministries), engineers are conventionally employed in industry (in design departments, research laborato-



99

ries, operational management). More than one-third of the technical personnel in industry are engineers. On the other hand, about 20 percent of the engineers who are technical personnel have no special higher or secondary specialized education. In addition, there are many specialists in industry with higher but not technical education; about 50 percent have a middle-level technical education (technicians). More than 3 million engineers and technicians (including practitioners) were occupied in nonindustrial spheres in 1985.44 The greatest number of engineers is found in "Group A" of industry, which is designated as heavy industry (defense industries and space industry). Group A employs about 50 percent of the specialists with higher education, by the far the largest percentage. Group B (including light industry and consumer goods production) has a relatively low percentage of engineers (13.6 percent), while the branch of Group A that also produces "light industry" goods has 19.2 percent of engineers. 45 The best-qualified engineers are employed in the defense industry (which includes the space industry), a fact that statistics and sociological studies do not discuss. The engineering profession is tied very closely to the military-industrial complex and to the army, the reason being that "in all branches of the armed forces an engineering background is an indispensable qualification for many aspiring to the rank of officer. "46 An important characteristic of professional engineering is the congruence of educational background and job. Among the engineers who hold administrative positions at the highest levels (the sociologist Krishtanovskaya calls them kulachnye boitsy or "fist fighters"),47 the congruence is usually quite small. Congruence is usually greatest among the department chairs (77 percent) and smallest in the largest group ofengineers, the rank-and-file engineers in positions as foremen or in administrative positions (nearly 38 percent). 48 In a panel study by Shkaratan (1965, 1970, 1976/77), the different functional groups of engineers and technicians (ITR) were evaluated by plant managers according to the degree of congruency their employment had to their educations; the engineers were assessed according to their lack of abilities, lack of knowledge, and weaknesses. 49 (See Table 4. I.) As the data show, the top managers find a rather high percentage of ITR to have shortcomings injob-related skills. Qualities such as practical skills, theoretical knowledge, intellectual independence, or initiative are obviously not found to a great enough degree among ITRS. 50


100

EDUARD GLOECKNER

4. I. Evaluation by Managers of the Knowledge, Abilities, and Skills ofITR (in Percentages with Deficient Capabilities)

TABLE

Qualities with most significance for productivity

Practical skills Theoretical knowledge Innovative ability Willingness to take initiative Reliability Efficiency Intellectual independence Leadership ability Capacity for teamwork

[TR

of [TR of administrative dep'ts plants ITR

groups

Constructors and engineers

Heads, working collectives/ teams

Coefficient of Kramer and Chuprov

44.4

41.2

43.6

63.5

.443

46.3

40.6

34.5

33.3

.384

16.6

21.4

33.7

4.8

.388

35.9 22.4 8.1

32.7 17.0 4.1

31.8 12.9 5.3

23.8 11.1 9.5

.426 .269 .120

22.4

26.1

22.7

14.3

.293

18.9

12.3

12.5

22.2

.236

15.8

10.1

4.2

11.1

.247

Source: O. I. Shkaratan. ed .. Rabochii i inzhener: Sotsial'nye 1aktory e.JJektivnosti truda (Moscow,

[985), p. [81.

On the other hand, this poor performance is largely caused by the deficient organizational structure, which makes the working conditions of engineers more difficult. 51 The lower the functional level of the engineering positions, the less the congruence between the educational and occupational profiles of engineers. Mundane tasks must often be performed by the engineers because of the lack of supporting technicians and, in some cases, economists. Most of the rank-and-file engineers are not at all qualified to perform the organizational or administrative tasks of the missing management personnel. 52 A low degree of labor productivity and poor labor conditions are referred to by a majority of ITR specialists as reasons for poor job performance. Most of the engineers believe that good performance and high productive output are precluded by the prevailing organizational structures, and most engineers frankly confess that their use of time is often far from optimal. If they were better paid and worked



101

under improved labor conditions, a majority of engineers and managers would increase their productivity. 53 Most of the highly skilled specialists are oriented toward the managerial and organizational aspects of their jobs. Also ranking high is the desire to be engaged in varied, meaningful activities. In the third and fourth positions are the desire for further professional development and interest in material prosperity (better pay, lodging, and the like). Though far from being realized, professionalism and independence on the job are also ranked high. 54 It goes without saying that agricultural specialists and engineers in agricultural production units work under very different conditions than their industrial counterparts. The agrarian engineers are neglected in Soviet sociology and social statistics. The image of the Soviet engineer is predominately that of an industrial specialist. Nevertheless, the number of agriculturally oriented mechanical and electrical engineers increased in the 1970s, especially in the farms of the state sector, in which two out of three agricultural engineers are occupied. 55 However, on the average, only 30 to 40 percent of the state farms are profitable. 56 Under the reform policy of Gorbachev, the Central Committee of the cpsu (plenary session ofFebruary 1989) has allowed farmers to rent or lease or-since October 1989-to purchase and to bequeath state or collective farmland. Private ownership seems to be a more effective means of increasing productivity than an increase in the number of specialists, whose activities were often not well accepted by farmers. Even if there are differences between farm types and regions, the average agricultural engineer works much less overtime than do veterinarians, agronomists, zoological technicians, and others, including managers (directors) of farm units. Up to two-thirds of agrarian specialists are dissatisfied with their general labor conditions. 57 The work agricultural engineers do in the summer generally coincides with their educational training, but the work they do in the winter does not in more than 50 percent of all cases. 58 SCIENCE AND RESEARCH Not all engineers are occupied directly in the various branches of the economy, for many of them work in science and research. According to Soviet statistics, 1.5 million people with higher education are scientists. There are of course great differences in their educational backgrounds and therefore their positions


102

EDUARD GLOECKNER

and social status. Soviet scientists, the "scientific-technical intelligentsia, " can be classified as follows: • scholars of higher or highest qualifications: full or corresponding members of the Soviet academy; • scientific employees: junior or less qualified scientific researchers in academic or various other institutes (vuz or enterprise level); • technical specialists: collaborators at scientific research institutes (NIl), executing tasks in information, design, and innovation; • junior scientific-technical personnel: NIl collaborators in laboratory or technical work. 59 Engineers are found in the three highest groups of this classification scheme. These classifications may seem somewhat ambiguous or confusing. Sbytov suggested a new approach of classification and an additional "All-union" cross-national census for all scientists and engineers working in science (that is to say, in training, instruction, and research). Using a panel study (1981-1985) upon which to base his assertions, Sbytov discussed the high degree oflabor dissatisfaction among scientists and engineers. They suffer from unsatisfactory working conditions and few supporting technicians and staff. In the academic setting there is a ratio of 5 engineers to every technician, and 7 scientists to every auxiliary. 60 According to various studies of the working conditions of engineers, there is a significant lack of modernization in the workplace. While the computerization of jobs has been proceeding rapidly in the West for the past ten or fifteen years, most of the engineering processes in the Soviet Union have at best only partially modernized. 61 Roald Sagdeev complained about this lack of technological development in referring to the widespread lack of efficient computers in Soviet research institutes, comparing Soviet researchers and engineers to "soldiers attempting to fight a modern war with crossbows." In demanding improved conditions, he stated that "the most elementary personal computer for many scientists would dramatically improve their productivity. "62 Many engineers and scientists complain about their limited productivity and claim that they could greatly increase productivity if labor conditions and organizational structures were improved. 63 Furthermore, as a result of infrastructural deficiencies such as the



103

restricted flow ofinformation from the highly secretive defense industries, most rank-and-file engineers in scientific and applied research are not supplied with standard scientific or technological knowledge. Only a small minority of Soviet engineers, the highly skilled specialists, are well informed about advanced or new fields of research. 64 This elite is composed of members of the top-level institutes of the Academy of Sciences, of the research centers of the defense or space industries, or of special vuzy such as the Bauman Institute in MosCOW. 65 A serious deficiency in the Soviet system is that only this elite has access to information on the latest technological developments. An engineer's productivity and innovation seem to depend on the degree ofsatisfaction with educational background. Most NIl scientists are satisfied with their education, whereas a minority (up to 30 percent) ofhigWy skilled engineers or technical scientists feel the need for additional academic training and wish to have it. 66 Engineers with a doctorate are up to three times more productive and innovative than those with less academic training. 67 Among those professional engineers working within the system of the academy, every fourth one has earned an academic degree (doktor or kandidat nauk).68 The disinclination of Soviet engineers to increase their level of knowledge or skills beyond the level required by the institute at which they work is typical Soviet behavior, the tendency to avoid taking responsibility or taking the initiative. In discussing the balance between scientists' interest in their work and their preference for leisure time, Iadov found in the 1970S that most engineers tended to emphasize leisure time. Every third engineer showed no special preference. 69 According to Sbytov, only every third engineer or scientist with a technical profile expresses even a partial interest and feeling of responsibility for his job. A majority expresses a lack of interest in their work, low pay being a contributing factor to the lack ofenthusiasm. 70 Kozlova discovered a "breaking point" in the lives of young professionals around the age of thirty-five. In the 1980s, compared with the 1970s, engineers and technical scientists tended to reach their peak innovative productivity at a later age. 71 Productivity tends to decrease as these scientists grow older, and at pension age one expects no more innovative activity. 72 MANAGEMENT AND ADMINISTRATION A great many engineers assume administrative or managerial responsibilities on some level.


104

EDUARD GLOECKNER

An examination of the occupational profile of Soviet managers reveals the existence of a dual role as technical-scientists and administratorsexecutives. "The policy of merging organizational and technical functions in industry became a source of impediment for the intraprofessional distribution of technical specialists as administrational managers and as pure engineers. "73 Kryshtanovskaia has characterized the ethics of "limited responsibility" ofengineers in society. She stressed that the partial accountability of the current Soviet engineer gives this profession an increasing "characteristic of indetermination" with regard to the exact roles of engineers. To amend this she has suggested that the occupational sphere be reorganized with an improved and clear functional division of labor between engineers and management specialists. 74 The prevailing occupational deficiencies in the daily lives of engineers are closely related to the strictly hierarchical system of economic or state organization in which nobody claims full responsibility and there is a total lack of regard for the principle of "one-manmanagement" (edinonachalie). This dilemma will continue to persist because of: • the dual management of state and Party organs on nearly every level; • the lack of managerial training for economists and engineers; • the employment of specialists whose backgrounds are not appropriate for the industry in which they work; • the time-lag between vuz graduation and employment. 75 In a study of the Soviet elite, Schneider found that among the power elite of the Brezhnev years, an engineering degree was a prevalent characteristic. It should be taken into account that the knowledge and skills of these men in the technical and economic fields were largely antiquated and professionally obsolete. 76 The USSR lacks training centers for economic managers. Specialists call for a general, nationwide center for training in modern management. 77 It is generally recognized that the training methods for Soviet managers should be greatly improved-especially through foreign assistance from the West. 78 Another factor important for management to consider is that of participation in decision making. Soviet sociologists have played a very progressive role in promoting this issue. 79 They find that engi-



105

neers desire a voice in the selection in their managers despite the prevailing official pattern of formal participation only in campaigns for "socialist competition. "80 Quite obviously, the widespread frustration with and alienation from the oppressive and unproductive bureaucracies and their centralized hierarchical structures could be countered by a certain degree of participation of rank-and-file engineers and highly skilled workers through elections "from below. "81 The lower echelons of rank-and-file or staffengineers and other employees desire participation by the majority. 82 The cpsu (in plenary session of the Central Committee in January 1987) under Gorbachev has supported and promoted the election of managers from below: The law of the state enterprise Gune 1987) confirmed this objective of participation. 83 According to a recent opinion poll, however, the mentality of engineers and managers has not yet changed: the higher the managerial position, the less the inclination to support the election of management by the employees. Every second senior manager rejects this democratic pattern of behavior. Lower echelons are both suspicious and hopeful: They fear manipulation from above by the powerful bureaucracies. 84 It should be mentioned in this context that in past decades the managers of enterprises or research institutes (as well as of ministries) were part of the party nomenklatura, that is, they were selected from above. A majority were Party members. 85 On the other hand, the official (formal, not real) participation in elections in the past has been strongly supported by the managers, perhaps in the hope of better plan execution, as the Grancelli and the Orlov studies suggest. 86 Some managers and directors of institutes have argued that only highly qualified professionals of nearly the same level as the managers should be given voting privileges. In practice, this proposal has been rejected. 87 The elitist tendencies of many superiors have been described recently by Leonid Ionin as a "conservative syndrome."88 In general, the technical intelligentsia in Russia and the USSR never belonged to the outspoken critical or revolutionary elements of society. There obviously are different sociocultural and ethnic patterns of behavior in different regions. With the emergence of a new political culture in the Baltic republics and elsewhere, we may see a behavioral and paradigm change among engineering professionals some time in the future, in management, production, and scientific research. 89 In the past there have been some regional efforts toward reform, such as


EDUARD GLOECKNER

ro6

the critical approach of Baltic engineers toward the system in the time of Brezhnev. 90

Professional Organizations The history of the professional organizations for Russian and Soviet engineers reveals that the engineers' situation has not significantly improved in the seven decades since 1917. In 1919, shortly after the Bolshevik revolution, the All-Russian Union of Engineers was renamed the All-Russian Association of Engineers and again in 1926 as the All-Union Association of Engineers (VAI).91 The activities of VAl were not as dependent on state or Party authorities as was later the case. Members of VAl supported or suggested diverse projects, organized conferences on technology, and acted as experts and consultants on the state level. VAl'S partial autonomy was undoubtedly a major factor among those that led to its prohibition and dissolution under Stalin's rule in 1929. The Engineering-Technical Section (ITs) in the state trade unions, membership in which had become obligatory for engineers, was turned into an instrument for strict plan fulfillment and for collectivization campaigns. Stalin's dominant intention, apparently, was to thwart the potential resistance of engineers and other professionals against his centrally planned and brutally executed industrialization and rearmament program. "Houses for EngineeringTechnical Employees" were founded. Established as centers of ideological and party indoctrination as well as for reeducation of "bourgeois" engineers, they served the function of a transmission belt of the cpsu. In 1938 all members of the ITS were pulled into the trade union and thus were deprived of autonomous status. Innovative tasks were delegated to the Scientific-Technical Societies (NTO). The NTO, the successor organization of the former Russian Technical Society (RTO, founded in 1866), was reorganized in 193 I into Scientific EngineeringTechnical Societies (NITO). In 1954 NITO reassumed its former name, NTO, which did not change its productive-innovative functions until recently. The nationwide (All-Union) NTO comprised "a conglomerate of forty-eight affiliated professional societies, from chemistry to geography."92 At the Seventh All-Union NTO congress (February 2-4, 1988), the chairman, A. Iu. Ishlinskii, proposed that the scientifictechnical intelligentsia carry out an enhanced professional and functional role, which would enable it to support and accelerate technical progress in Soviet society. With that goal in mind, NTO was to be



107

reorganized into a professionally autonomous body, under the name Union of Scientific and Engineering Societies of the USSR (SNIO/ SSSR).93 SNIO'S organizational status does not seem to be fully autonomous despite its official independence from the Academy of Sciences of the USSR. The existing scientific organizations (nineteen on the level of the USSR) or professional associations (such as political sciences, economic sciences, and the like) are subordinated to the bureaucratic system of the Academy of Sciences. At the SNIO congress in 1988 Ishlinskii did not succeed with his proposal for the foundation of an "Engineering Academy" for "leading specialists and academicians of the applied sciences for the critical revision of main engineering projects. "94 This academy for engineers could be transformed into a professionalized countervailing power, which would influence and to some extent control the powerful state commission for planning and the ministries, by motivating the engineers and scientists to participate in the reform process more enthusiastically and intensely. 95 Since May of 1989, a group of scientists has likewise shown interest, proclaiming their intention of establishing a similar professional association. 96 Without a concrete professional representation to promote the interests of the ITR, however, the incentives for engineers to be innovative will be limited. Unlike the Soviet mining workers, who went on strike in the summer of 1989 and later, the engineers, because of their ineffective self-governing body, have not been able yet to become autonomous bargaining partners or even a countervailing power to the state. 97

Trends in the Profession

Changes in Prestige and Income Since the years in which Stalin's industrialization program was carried out in a regime of hunger and terror, no Soviet profession has undergone as great a change in status as has the engineering profession. We now recognize a decline in the prestige and social status of the engineer,98 in comparison with the profession's high prestige in the 1940S through the 1960s, when the engineer seemed to be a demigod of socialist industrialization. The high professional prestige was largely related to the progress in military developments such as the


108

EDUARD GLOECKNER

Ranking by Graduates from Secondary Schools, 1963 and 1973, of Engineering Professions According to Prestige

TABLE 4.2.

City school Male Radio technician (electrical eng.) Geologist Machine constructor (mechanical eng.) Master builder or architect Transport eng. Textile eng.

1973

1963

Engineering type

Female

Country school M

F

2 7 8

City school M

Country school F

M

F

7

12

2 3 14

18 12

35

12

18 29

13

31

28

34

Sources: G. A. Cherednichenko, V. N. Shubkin, Molodezh vstupaet v zhizn' (Moscow, 1985), pp. 58,61; Ferenc Gazho, Vladimir Shubkin, eds., Trudiashchaiasia molodezh': orientalsii i zhiznennye puti (Budapest, 1980), pp. 195, 198.

and to the ambitious space programs of the time, The cosmonaut, a kind of" cosmic engineer" in space, was the symbol of the lofty status of engineers in society, Kryshtanovskaia refers to the change of status in Soviet society that took place in the 1980s as follows: "the image of the 'pure engineer' was intensified-as a simpleton and unlucky fellow, "99 The engineer's professional quality was generally regarded as mediocre, The Chernobyl disaster obviously added to the pejorative image, The image of the engineer in the industrial branch of machine construction and design has suffered particularly greatly. As we see from Table 4.2, the engineer's prestige in general has suffered, particularly in the area of machinery design (mechanical engineers). It is possible, though, that computerization might be able to halt the decline of this image, and ecological thinking may increase the prestige afforded engineer-ecologists. 100 . The "administrated" nature of the Soviet labor market has had a decisive impact on changing the prestige values of professions, especially engineering. In the 1930S and 1940S the defense industry was in need of productive and creative engineers. An increase in income and high professional prestige for the engineering professions were the ICBM



109

results of that objective "bargaining position," largely because the number of available engineers was far lower than the demand. The more the number of professional engineers has increased since the I 940S and 1950S, the more the income level ofengineers relative to the wage level of blue-collar workers has fallen. Whereas in 1935 the general income level for the ITR was 236 percent of the average wage level of workers, it fell to 175 percent in 1950, to 133 percent in 1970, and all the way down to 110 percent in 1986, so that income levels for engineers and blue-collar workers were nearly identical. This leveling of incomes (uravnilovka) has apparently been reversed in 'the past five years, but not convincingly in the state sector. The pressure for income equalization comes to some degree from below. Dunin and Var'iash describe the uravnilovka as typical of the demands of lower social classes for equal status. lOi

Professional Mobility and Attestation ofEngineers The professional mobility ofengineers in different occupational settings depends greatly on seniority (stazh). The longer people remain in an occupation, the less they expect new career opportunities to develop.102 After a seniority offive years, 50 percent of the engineeringtechnical workers on the rank-and-file level expect no vertical mobility at all, according to Shkaratan. 103 The Iadov study revealed that the professional ability ofengineers is not decisive in determining upward mobility. Rather, the ability to assert oneself and to dominate an organization politically is a far more significant factor in determining promotion. It is the political person who is obedient to superiors who will be promoted, not the person who is most competent professionally. Presumably, the work of many engineers in the USSR is much more heavily based on managerial than on creative or innovative abilities. Most engineers or technical scientists who improve their professional knowledge can use this knowledge only to enhance their personal satisfaction with their work, since their improved knowledge or skills will not have a positive impact on their career. 104 In the case of horizontal mobility, though, many junior engineers tend to leave the enterprise for better jobs elsewhere, whereas most senior engineers (those beyond the age of forty-five or fifty) tend to stay. lOS A majority of engineers (60 percent) in the academy's highlevel institutes do not leave their institutional setting; 106 rank-and-file engineers and technical scientists in mid-level positions tend to be


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somewhat less inclined to remain in one position (40-50 percent). 107 Highly skilled technical scientists in general tend (up to 80 percent) to engage in professional mobility within the same branch of the industry.IOS According to another sample, a majority of engineers (71 percent) changed neither their professional nor their social status, while every tenth engineer changed both. Approximately 15 percent changed professional though not social status. 109 Most engineers who transfer to another institute of a similar profile do not succeed in advancing their professional career as such. Rather, they search for better living conditions or a richer cultural environment, preferring cities such as Moscow and Leningrad. 110 A special instrument for promoting professional careers from above is the so-called attestation (attestatsia). Every five years a reexamination or attestation of engineers takes place, in which performance, qualificational level, and (until now) political reliability are tested. This practice started in 1969 for engineers and other professionals in science and research. In 1973 professional reexamination was ordered by decree for engineers in production, design, and research settings. In 1986 a new decree confirmed the existing "attestation of management as well as scientific and engineering-technical professionals" and of similar specialists in research institutes and at vuzy. III The attestation commissions are expected to evaluate (I) the political reliability (nowadays referring to support for perestroika), (2) the ethical qualities of the professional, and, primarily, (3) the professional capabilities for the job. The results are based on the subjective evaluation and the actual personal composition of the commission (that is, in the case of party or KGB cadres, and in the defense industries with special military personnel, with regard to the political and security aspects of career policy). Today, one expects that the managerial and engineering personnel of attestation dominate the commissions, providing professional standards of competency. According to a sample of 300,000 in the construction industry, more engineers and technicians are assessed and evaluated positively as career reserve (upward mobility) than as workers to be downgraded. 1 12 In emphasizing performance in the occupational setting, the attestational reexamination of professionals in general, and of engineers in particular, is quite certain to become more performance oriented and less politically biased and influenced.



III

The Effects of Perestroika and Limited Autonomy Under the rule of the czars, engineers were granted some degree of professional autonomy. Following the revolution and the Bolshevik coup of 1917, the professional situation of engineers became highly political, and autonomy was abolished in a professional as well as organizational sense. As a result of Stalin's totalitarian rule, engineers fell to the level of technical implementors of assigned tasks and were no longer accorded the status of professionals. Under the "scientifictechnical revolution" of the Brezhnev era, engineers and technical scientists were regarded as instrumental components of the drive for progress in science and technology. Despite the increasing numbers of ITR in the past two decades, the working conditions for engineers have not been improved significantly. The fall in engineers' incomes to nearly the level of blue-collar workers' incomes in the last Brezhnev years led to a low propensity to innovation in the civic sector of the economy, which also had spillover effects in the more heavily financed defense industries. The development of autonomous professional conditions for engineers would facilitate an improvement in their economic efficiency and professional performance. Improvements in performance depend on what opportunities are made possible by the reform policy, which could create many market "niches" for innovation. Freeing engineers from the hierarchical planning system would allow them to operate more independently and to greatly increase their productivity and innovativeness. The prevailing prototype of the Soviet bureaucrat who operates according to instructions from above stands in direct contrast to the prototypical creative and innovative engineer who thrives under conditions that encourage the use of a variety of methods. The bureaucratic "manager" who strives only to maintain the institutional status quo and who relies on standardized orders aboutjob operation stands as an example of the Soviet system until now; under such a system the engineer shows a distinct lack ofcreative innovation, of responsibility, and ofaccountability because ofthe many limitations placed on professional autonomy and because ofthe vested self-interest of the bureaucrats. Allowing engineers to select their managers democratically could encourage them to use their innovative capabilities. The ability ofsNIo,


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the newest version of the Soviet professional association for engineers, to mobilize the creative talents ofits members depends on the degree of independence the organization is granted from Party and state. As a great many engineers have irreversibly become technical executors, the profession will probably not change until market structures with real economic incentives are established. It remains to be seen if the more dynamic junior engineers can rejuvenate the engineering profession through the activities of engineering-consulting firms, 113 halting deprofessionalization and regaining professional autonomy for engineers. Notes

Abbreviations used herein are: Sotsiologicheskie issledovanie Sovremennaia Vysshaia Shkola Vestnik Vysshei Shkoly Radio Liberty Research No. 82/1988

Sots. issled. SVSh VVSh RL 82/88

1. I. S. Mangutov, Inzhener: Sotsiologo-ekonomicheskii ocherk (Moscow: Sovetskaiia Rossiia, 1973), pp. 17-21; Sovetskaia intelligentsia: Slovar'spravochnik (Moscow: Politizdat, 1987), p. 129. 2. O. V. Kryshtanovskaia, "Inzhenery," Sots. issled. 3 (1988): 73. 3. See ibid., p. 74. 4. Ibid. 5. Mangutov, Inzhener, p. 129. 6. V. A. ladov, ed., Sotsial'no-psikhologicheskii portret inzhenera (Moscow: MysI', 1977), pp. 21-22. 7. O. I. Shkaratan, ed., Rabochii i inzhener: Sotsial'nye faktory effektivnosti truda (Moscow: MysI', 1985), pp. 47-48, 56,60. 8. See Mangutov, Inzhener, pp. 29-37. 9. 2,000 professii, spetsial'nostei, dolzhnostei: Entsiklopedicheskii spravochnik (Minsk: BeISE, 1986), pp. 70f., 99, lI8, 130-148, 323f. 10. Kvalifikatsionnyi spravochnik dolzhnostei sluzhashchich: Chast' II (Moscow: NIl truda, 1973), pp. 22-I03. 11. N. A. Aitov and R. T. Nasibullin, "Professional'naia mobil'nost' intelligentsii," Sots. issled. 2 (1980): 110. 12. L. la. Rubina, Sovetskoe studenchestvo: Sotsiologicheskii ocherk (Moscow: MysI', 1981), p. 88; M. N. Rutkevich and F. R. Filippov, eds., Vysshaia shkola kak faktor izmeneniia sotsial 'noi struktury razvitogo sotsialisticheskogo obshchestva (Moscow: Nauka, 1978), p. 193.



II]

13· G. A. Pchelintseva, "Zakreplenie spetsialistov v sel'skom khoziastve," Sots. issled. I (1985): 100. 14· See Rutkevich and Filippov, Vysshaia shkola, p. 194. 15· See Rubina, Sovetskoe studenchestvo, p. 70. 16. See Aitov and Nasibullin, "Professional'naia," p. 108. 17· G. A. Cherednichenko and V. N. Shubkin, Molodezh vstupaet v zhizn' (Moscow: Mysl', 1985), p. 135. 18. Ibid., p. 138. 19· See Rubina, Sovetskoe studenchestvo, p. 65; Rutkevich and Filippov, Vysshaia shkola, p. 193. E. K. Vasil'eva, Obraz zhiznigorodskoi sem'i (Moscow: Nauka, 1981), p. 51. 20. V. V. Khorolets, "0 pravovom statuse molodogo spetsialista," VVSh 5 (1988): 61. 21. See ibid., p. 63. 22. K. A. Timmermanis, "Ob uskorenii adaptatsii vypusknikov," VVSh 2 (1988): 54-56. 23. Ibid., p. 56. 24. See Khorolets, "0 pravovom," p. 62. 25. A. M. Tikhonov, "Ob usloviiakh truda i byta molodykh spetsialistov ugol'noi promyshlennosti USSR," Sots. issled. 2 (1984): 115. 26. E. K. Vasil'eva, ed., Sotsial'no-demograficheskii portret studenta (Moscow: Mysl', 1986), p. 71. Eduard Gloeckner, Der sowjetische Ingenieur in der industriellen Arbeitswelt: Eine soziologische Analyse der wissenschafilich-technischen Intel/igenz in der UdSSR (1965 bis 1975) (Berlin, Wiesbaden: O. Harrassowitz, 1981), pp. 87-9°· 27. E. Gloeckner, "Underemployment and Potential Unemployment of

the Technical Intelligentsia: Distortions between Education and Occupation," in David Lane, ed., Labour and Employment in the USSR (Brighton, U.K.: Wheatsheaf-Harvester, 1986), p. 227. Sotsiologiia vysshei shkoly (Gor'kii: "Gor'koyskii gosudarstvennyi universitet," 1985), pp. 8-10. 28. V. T. Lisovskii, V. A. Sukhin, eds., Kompleksnoe issledovanie problem obucheniia i kommunisticheskogo vospitaniia spetsialistov s vysshim obrazovaniem (Leningrad: Izdatel'stvo Leningradskogo universiteta, 1980), p. 86. 29. See ibid., p. 90. 30. S. A. Kugel', "Kvalifikatsiia i real'naia deiatel'nost' inzhenera," Sots. issled. I (1983): 95. 3 I. E. I. Bobkov, V. K. Baltian, "Effektivnost' sviazei s promyshlennymi predpriiatiiami pri podgotovke inzhenerov," S VSh 59, no. 3 (1987): 198-199. 32.· I. V. Kobzak, Inzhener na sele: Sotsial'nye faktory effektivnosti truda (Kishinev: n. p., 1988), p. 66.

33. Iu. S. Avraamov, N. G. Khokhlov, "Zavod-VTUZ-odna iz form podgotovki inzhenernykh kadrov," SVSh 51, no. 3 (1985): 89-91, esp. p. 86.


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34. V. N. Lukanin, "Sovershenstvovanie podgotovki inzhenerov dlia otraslevogo narodnokhoziastvennogo kompleksa," SVSh 60, no. 4 (1987): 68. 35. V. Shukshunov, "Skliad inzhenerov," Pravda,July 23,1988, p. 2. 36. A. a. Dregalo and O. V. Ovchinnikov, Master v zhizni proizvodstvennogo kollektiva (Moscow: Mys!', 1987), p. 36; T. A. Mozyreva, Tekuchest'i stabilizatsiia inzhenernotekhnicheskikh rabotnikov na predpriiatiiakh Sibiri (Novosibirsk: Nauka, 1986), p. 34. According to that study, 6.3 percent of the engineers and other highly skilled specialists and 34 percent of the technicians were occupied at blue-collar workshop places. Vilen N. Ivanov, ed., Sotsial'naia sjera: sovershenstvovanie sotsial'nykh otnoshenii (Moscow: Nauka, 1987), pp. 187-188; L. V. Ivanova, ed., Sovetskaia intelligentsia: Slovar'spravochnik (Moscow: Politizdat, 1987), pp. 198-199. 37. See Gloeckner, Der sowjetische Ingenieur, pp. 53, 6Iff.; Narodnoe khoziaistvo SSSR v 19 (Moscow: Finansy i statistika, various annuals). 38. SSSR v tsifrakh v 1987 godu. Kratkii statisticheskii sbornik (Moscow: Finansy i statistika, 1988), p. 190. 39. See Gloeckner, "Underemployment," pp. 226-229. 40. E. Gloeckner, "Fluktuation der Arbeitskrafte in der Industrie," in M. E. Ruban, E. Gloeckner et al., Wandel der Arbeits- und Lebensbedingungen in der Sowjetunion 1955-1980 (Frankfurt/New York: Campus, 1983), pp. 108117, esp. p. 115; Gloeckner, Der sowjetische Ingenieur, p. 63. 41. See 2,000 professii, p. 130. 42. See ibid., pp. 99, 130-148. 43. A. K. Tashchev, ed., Inzhenernyi trud v sotsialisticheskom obshchestve: Uchebnoe posobie dlia inzhenero-tekhnicheskikh rabotnikov, 3rd ed. (Moscow: Mysl', 1978), pp. 74-75. 44. See Ivanova, Sovetskaia intelligentsia, p. 129. Chislennos, , i sostav naseleniia SSSR (Moscow: "Finansy i statistika," 1984), p. 200; Ivanov, Sotsial'naia sfera, pp. 198-199, and 197. 45. Viktor Yasmann, "The Technical Intelligentsia, a Potential Ally for Gorbachev," RL 82/88, p. 4. 46. See ibid. 47. See Kryshtanovskaia, "Inzhenery," p. 81. 48. See Gloeckner, "Underemployment," p. 227. 49. See Shkaratan, Rabochii i inzhener, p. 18 I. 50. Slovar' prikladnoi sotsiologii (Minsk: "Universitetskoe," 1984), p. 68. 5 I. Ibid. See Shkaratan, Rabochii i inzhener, p. 18 I. 52. See Gloeckner, Der sowjetische Ingenieur, pp. 72-125. 53. E. M. Babosov, ed., Velikii Oktiabr' i sotsial'naia struktura sovetskogo obshchestva: Intelligentsia (Minsk: Nauka i tekhnika, 1988), pp. 99-101.



lIS

54. N. A. Aitov, V. G. Mordkovich, and M. Kh. Titma, eds., Sovetskiy gorod: Sotsial'naya struktura (Moscow: MysI', 1988), p. 104. 55. N. Mamatov, Sel'skaia proizvodstvenno-tekhnicheskaia intelligentsia (Tashkent: "Uzbekistan," 1982), pp. 32, 68. 56. V. I. Staroverov, "Ob osnovnykh napravleniiakh psikhologicheskoi perestroiki kadrov agropromyshlennogo kompleksa," Sots. issled. I (1987): 7. See also Ivanova, Sovetskaia intelligentsia, p. 155; Mamatov, Sel'skaia, p. 68. 57· See Pchelintseva, "Zakreplenie spetsialistov," pp. 95, 97. 58. See Kobzak, "Inzhener na sele," pp. 48-49. 59. See Ivanov, Sotsial'naia sfera, pp. 189-19°. V. F. Sbytov, "Shtrikhi k portretu sovetskoi nauchnoi intelligentsii," Sots. issled. 3 (1986): III. 60. See Sbytov, "Shtrikhi," p. 112. 61. A. G. Aganbegian. "Na novom etape ekonomicheskogo stroitel'stva," Ekonomika, organizatsiia promyshlennogo proizvodstva 8 (1985): 3-2 4. 62. Roald Z. Sagdeev, "Science and Perestroika: A Long Way to Go," Issues in Science and Technology, Summer 1988, pp. 48-52, esp. p. 52. He indirectly referred to the preferential treatment of defense and space research that resulted from the neglect of civic industrial research. The budget deficit has climbed to 15 percent of the 1989 budget of the USSR. 63. See Babosov, Velikii Oktiabr', p. 109. The results derive from a Belorussian sample of 1987, based on interviews in twelve institutes of the union-republican Academy of Science. 64. See Sbytov, "Shtrikh," p. 112; Tatiana Zaslavskaia (Tatjana Saslawskaja), Die Goratschow-Strategie. Wirtschafts- und Socialpolitik in der UdSSR (Vienna: Orac, 1989), p. 290. 65. See in particular the case studies of Phil Hanson, G. D. Holliday, S. E. Goodman, R. W. Campbell, J. Cooper et al. in B. Parrott, ed., Trade, Technology, and Soviet-American Relations (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1985); and C. Sinclair, ed., The Status oJSoviet Civil Science: Proceedings ofthe Symposium on Soviet Scientific Research, NATO-Headquarters, Brussels, 1986 (Dordrecht, Boston, Lancaster: M. NijhoffPublishers, 1987), pp. 3ff., 83ff., 97ff., 127ff., 143ff., 151ff. Julian Cooper, "The Civilian Production of the Soviet Defence Industry, " in Ronald Amann and Julian Cooper, eds., Technical Progress and Soviet Economic Development (Oxford, New York: Basil Blackwell, 1986), pp. 3Iff. See also Ivanova, Sovetskaia intelligentsia, pp. 77-78. 66. See Rutkevich and Filippov, Vysshaia shkola, p. 253· 67. See Sbytov, "Shtrikh," p. 113· 68. See Babosov, Velikii Oktiabr', p. II 8. 69. See Iadov, Sotsial'no-psikhologicheskii portret inzhenera, p. 109· 70. See Sbytov, "Shtrikhi," p. I 13·


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71. T. Z. Kozlova, Vozrastnye gruppy v nauchnom kollektive (Moscow: Nauka, 1983), pp. 41-42. 72. See Babosov, Velikii Oktiabr', p. I I 8. 73. See Kryshtanovskaia, "Inzhenery," p. 81. 74. 1. S. Mangutov, Master: Metody i praktika rukovodstva (Moscow: "Sovetskaia Rossiia," 1984), pp. 77-79. See Gloeckner, Der sowjetische Ingenieur, pp. 79ff. 75. See Mamatov, Sel'skaia, pp. 84-85. 76. Eberhard Schneider, "Veranderungen in der politischen Fiihrungselite der Sowjetunion in der Spatphase Breznevs," in Dieter Voigt, ed., Elite in Wissenschaft und Politik: Empirische Untersuchungen und theoretische Ansa·tze (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1987), pp. 249ff. 77. See Sbytov, "Shtrikhi," p. 113; V. A. Shakhovoi, Kadrovyi potentsial sistemy upravleniia (Moscow: Mysl', 1985), p. 87. Despite the existence of the governmental academy of the national economy and various training schools for management qualification on all levels (350 in 1983) and 80 special branch institutes, the large number (45,000 or more) of enterprises and organizations marks the limits and the disabilities of the training system. 78. Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, ed., FES-Information, No. 3/4 (MarchApril 1989): 14. 79. Nikolaj Nowikow, Die Soziologie in Rul3land: Ihre institutionelle Entwicklung von den Anflingen bis zur Oktoberrevolution 1917, vol. 24 (Wiesbaden, Berlin: 0. Harrassowitz, 1988), pp. 58-131. Eduard Gloeckner, "Aktuelle Probleme der Soziologie in der UdSSR," Osteuropa 8 (August 1977): 647-664. 80. See Gloeckner, Der sowjetische Ingenieur, pp. ro8ff., I 33ff., 227ff. 81. M. E. Dobruskin, Nesostoiatel'nost' antikommunisticheskikh kontseptsii roli sovetskoi intelligentsii (Kiev: "Vishcha shkola," 1983), pp. rolf. 82. E. Gloeckner, "Fuhrungsstile, Partizipation und informelle Beziehungen im Industriebetrieb," in Ruban, Gloeckner et aI., Wandel, pp. 123137; Murray Yanowitch, Work in the Soviet Union: Attitudes and Issues (Armonk, N.Y.: M. E. Sharpe, 1985), p. 121: "Party members mostly supported it because they presumably believed they could manipulate those elections." 83· Pravda, January 29, 1987· 84. Pravda, March 18, 1988, p. 4 (interview with T. Zaslavskaia). Ja. S. Kapeliush, "Vybornost' rukovoditelei: vchera i segodnia," Sots. issled. 2 (1988): 44ff., esp. p. 49. 85. See Shkaratan, Rabochii i inzhener, pp. 234-235. 86. A. K. Orlov, Sovetskii rabochii v upravlenie proizvodstvom (Moscow: Mysl', 1978), pp. 139, 144; Bruno Grancelli, Soviet Management and Labor Relations (Boston: Allen & Unwin, 1988), pp. 155-158. 87. M. W. Rutkevich, "Izmeneniia v sotsial'no-klassovoi strukture sovetskogo obshchestva v usloviiakh perestroiki," Sots. issled. 5 (1987): 42.



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88. Leonid G. lonin, "Konservativnyi sindrom," Sots. issled. 5 (1987): 22fT. 89. Alvin W. Gouldner, Die Intelligenz als neue Klasse: 16 Thesen zur Zukunji der Intellektuellen und der technischen Intelligenz (Frankfurt, New York: Campus, 1980), pp. 88-89. 90. Gruppa tekhnicheskoi intelligentsii Estonskoi SSR: "Nadeiiatsia ili deistvovat'?" in Memorandum akademika A. Sakharova (Frankfurt am Main: Possev, 1970), pp. 67f., 70; A. Gella, ed., The Intelligentsia and the Intellectuals (London, Beverley Hills, Calif.: Sage, 1976). 91. See Ivanova, Sovetskaia intelligentsia, pp. 33f., 46f., 84-86; cf. Yasmann, "The Technical Intelligentsia," p. 2. 92. See Yasmann, "The Technical Intelligentsia," p. 2; see Ivanova, Sovetskaia intelligentsia, pp. 33 f., 46f., 84-86; Pravda, February I, 1988. 93· Izvestiia, February 3, 4, 1988. 94. Pravda, February I, 1988, p. 3. 95· Pravda, February 3, 5, 9, 1988. 96. I. Vais and L. Nikishin, "Soiuz uchenykh nakanune rozhdenia," in Moskovskie Novosti 23 (June 4, 1989): 10. 97. "Zabastovki v SSSR: novaia sotsial'naia real'nost'," Sots. issled. I (1989): 21ff. 98. Vladimir Shlapentokh, Public and Private Life of the Soviet People: Changing Values in Post-Stalin Russia (New York, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989), p. 81. 99. See Kryshtanovskaia, "Inzhenery," pp. 73f. 100. A. B. Levin, D. N. Murusidze, "Ekologicheskie aspekty podgotovki inzhenernykh kadrov dlia sel'skogo khoziaistva," SVSh 54, no. 2 (1986): 125ff.,131. 101. V. S. Dunin, I. lu. Var'iash, "Inzhener-podruchnyi u rabochego," Sots. issled. I (1989): 54. 102. N. N. Mokliak, Sotsial'no-professional'nye peremeshcheniia na sotsialisticheskom predpriiatii (Kiev: "Naukova Dumka," 1977), p. 128. 103. See Shkaratan, Rabochii i inzhener, p. 182. 104. See ladov, Sotsial'no-psikhologicheskii portret inzhenera, pp. 77-78, 84. See Kugel', "Kvalifikatsiia," p. 202. 105. See Mokliak, "Sotsial'no-professional'nye peremeshcheniia," p. 136. 106. See Kugel', "Kvalifikatsiia," p. 2 I I. 107. Ibid.; see Mokliak, "Sotsial'no-proffesional'nye peremeshcheniia," p. 134· 108. See Aitov and Nasibullin, "Professional'naia,''' p. 109· 109. See Shkaratan, Rabochii i inzhener, p. 250. IIO. See Kugel', "Kvalifikatsiia," p. 227. See Mozyreva, Tekuchest', p. 41; Shkaratan, Rabochii i inzhener, p. 251.


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II I. See Ivanova, Sovetskaia intelligentsia, pp. I 6f.; see Gloeckner, Der sowjetische Ingenieur, pp. 165ff. 112. Gloeckner, Der sowjetische Ingenieur, p. 166 (cf. the Petrov sample of 1974). See Ivanova, Sovetskaia intelligentsia, p. 17. Spravochnik partiinogo rabotnika, Vypusk 14 (Moscow: Politizdat, 1974), pp. 131-133. II3. "Inzhenernyi tsentr," Ekonomicheskaia gazeta 35 (August 1985); Pravda, October 29, 1985; Pravda, December 4, 1985; "Inzhener pomozhet inzheneru," Pravda, January 22, 1988.


CHAPTER

5

The "Purposeful Science" of Soviet Sociology: Will It Become a Profession? Liah Greenfeld

In an article that has become a classic, "The Profession of Science and Its Powers," Joseph Ben-David summarized the reasons for regarding science as a profession, "like medicine, law and engineering." The features he saw as common to all these occupations, known as "liberal professions" or "professions" proper, which distinguish them from other vocations not considered as such, were the following: "I) a higher educational qualification as a prerequisite to entry into the occupation; 2) the privilege of monopoly in the performance ofcertain functions (such as treating patients, signing the blueprints for constructional projects); 3) a measure of control of admission into the occupation, as a means of maintaining its standards and status; ... 4) the formal or informal authority of a professional body over the conduct of its members, a resistance against lay interference in the affairs of the profession and regulation of competition among members of the profession, [and] 5) a limitation of the contractual obligations of the professional towards his client or employer."1 The professions, in other words, retain and exercise the privilege of corporate autonomy, and it is this which makes them different from other occupations. Science is a profession insofar as it, too, can and does function as an autonomous institution, insofar as it is indeed "liberal," free in this specific sense. One obvious reason for the exceptional treatment of professions by society-as compared with the numerous occupations that are not Copyrighted Material

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professions-is that without corporate autonomy the internal goals of these activities cannot be achieved. As long as the achievement of these goals is believed to be in the interest of society, the support of the conditions necessary for this achievement is to be expected and the corporate autonomy of the professions is considered legitimate. The internal goals of medicine and engineering are almost invariably believed to be in the interest of the society at large. The position oflaw, however, is more problematic-some societies, indeed, are willing to dispense with it. The position of science is problematic, too. Only certain societies recognize the goal of scientific activity-the understanding of empirical reality, the "search for truth" for its own sakeas legitimate, and only in certain societies does science exist unimpeded. 2 Societies that do not recognize the internal goal of science as legitimate and that try to impose on it external goals undermine the corporate autonomy ofscience. In such societies science may exist as a specialized occupation-as do shoemaking or any number ofothersbut it cannot become a profession. Unprotected by the societal agreement to its autonomy, science in such cases is vulnerable, and its development is at every moment in danger of being thwarted by political or other interference. It is significant, for the purposes of the present discussion, that alongside the fate of the sciences under Nazi rule, classical examples of such interference and its detrimental effects on the development of science have been drawn from several Soviet incidents such as the Lysenko affair. 3 Clearly, the corporate autonomy of science presents a problem for Soviet society, for autonomous science forms a preserve closed to the penetration of a totalistic ideology, thus undermining it. The Soviet authorities, desirous of the benefits ofunimpeded scientific growth, were, on the whole, forced to come to terms with and respect this autonomy. But since the core values of Soviet society imply no guarantee of such autonomy, this respect has necessarily varied, usually in accordance with the political sensitivity of scientific disciplines. At various times disciplines considered politically sensitive (such as theoretical physics, genetics, and sociology) have been denied corporate autonomy. The autonomy of science being only a reluctant concession on the part of the society at large (or, what for the purpose of this discussion is the same, of its leadership), the professionalization of any particular discipline could never be taken for granted. Can we call Soviet sociology a profession? Should the evident


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crystallization of this discipline be taken as a sign ofits professionalization in the present or as a guarantee of its professionalization in the future? This is the question addressed in the following pages. To answer it, I shall focus on the work produced in the framework of Soviet sociology in the last decade and try to establish what this new discipline is. How do Soviet sociologists, and those who use Soviet sociology, define it? To which scientific, academic, or broadly intellectual community do they see it as belonging? Who are Soviet sociologists-what are the educational backgrounds, and the occupations, of those who "do sociology" in the USSR? In answering these questions, I shall use various Soviet writings in and about sociology but rely mainly on the data provided by Sotsiologicheskie Issledovaniia, or Sociological Research (as I shall refer to it hereafter in the text)-the only professional sociological journal in the Soviet Union.

The History and Characteristics of Soviet Sociology It so happened that Russia was one of the first countries to have a department of sociology. Although a part of a private university (the Psycho-Neurological Institute in St. Petersburg), it existed there before the end of the first decade of this century, and by 1917 the discipline was taught in several universities. 4 Some research in sociology is said to have continued in the USSR until 1924. 5 At that time, however, it was suppressed, and for thirty years there was no discipline or activity bearing this name in the Soviet Union. The dislike of sociology by the Soviet leaders went back to Plekhanov and Lenin. The term "sociology" was firmly associated with "bourgeois sociology," which was attacked for advocating and trying to uphold the principle of neutrality, and therefore, it was rejected outright. So strong were the sentiments the discipline aroused that the use of this term itself was prohibited, as were the Russian derivations from its Latin half ("social" -sozialnyi, and so forth); words with a Russian root (obschestvo, obschestvennyi, and so forth) had to be employed instead. 6 The situation changed after the death of Stalin, and in the atmosphere of the "thaw" the word "sociology" was reintroduced. A distinction was now made between good sociology and bad sociology, bad sociology still being the aforementioned "bourgeois" one, and


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good sociology standing for a new entity-"the Marxist-Leninist sociology." This new Soviet discipline was born sometime in early 1956, the year in which the Soviet Union for the first time sent a delegation to the World Congress of Sociology. Its early history has been a subject of several detailed studies, augmented by many others. 7 Since there is no need to repeat the story, what follows is but a brief sketch of the main events. In 1958 a decree of the Presidium of the USSR Academy of Sciences ordained the formation of the Soviet Sociological Association (SSA), which, in 1983, after twenty-five years of existence, numbered 7,863 individual and 976 collective members. Although it did not convene in its entirety often (its fifth conference was held in 1983), already the SSA had branches in major cities and included 35 central and 150 regional research committees, which conducted approximately 400 studies and organized some 100 conferences a year. 8 The first centers for research in Marxist sociology appeared shortly after the formation of the association. The most important of these was The Sector for the Study of New Forms ofLabor and Daily Life, established in 1961 at the Institute of Philosophy of the USSR Academy of Sciences in Moscow. Eventually, this sector was reorganized and renamed, first, the Institute for Concrete Social Research, later-in the early 1970s-the Institute of Sociological Research (ISR), and, finally-in the fall of 1988-the Institute of Sociology. The discipline grew rapidly, both in terms of numbers of people engaged in it and of publications, and, apparently, in importance. This latter aspect was reflected in the vulnerability of sociology, and the intolerance with which the authorities treated what they regarded as deviations in it. The first purge in the young discipline took place in 1969. A two-volume course oflectures in sociology by a member of the institute, Iurii Levada, aroused the suspicion and indignation of authorities for its apparent leanings toward "bourgeois sociology," and the sociological community was publicly chastised. In the early 1970S the Central Committee of the CPsu organized an investigation of the scientific and ideological trends of the institute, the publication of its Information Bulletin was temporarily discontinued, some of the previous issues were confiscated and destroyed, and a change ofleadership in both the institute and the SSA followed. The dissatisfaction of the authorities did not arrest the growth of Soviet sociology; on the contrary, it was urged to develop further. In fact, after the purge, in



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1974 the institute was allowed to start the publication of the first specifically sociological journal, Sociological Research. Similarly, when at the first post-Brezhnev plenum of the CPsu Central Committee in June 1983 Chernenko expressed disappointment in sociology and emphatically stated that the Party "expected a great deal from the Institute" and that these expectations had been frustrated,9 this did not mean that sociology was to be suppressed, only that it was expected to reorient itself. The plenum emphasized the importance of the ideological work, and as a result such areas as the study of public opinion, propaganda, and criticism of bourgeois sociology rose in importance in Soviet sociology. A specialist on the sociology of propaganda, philosopher Vilen Ivanov, was appointed director of the ISR and a member of the editorial board of Sociological Research. Five other members ofthe board had resigned, and eight new ones were appointed. 10 It was ordained that a newall-union center for the study of public opinion be set up at the ISR. Such a center was organized in 1985. It was given the status of a research subdepartment of the ISR and made subordinate to its direction. 11 Other departments of the institute in 1987 included a Group for Critiquing Bourgeois Sociology, Department of Demography, Sociodemographic Problems, and Demographic Policy, Department for Methodology of Sociological Research, Sector for Social Prognoses, Sector of Social Problems of Family and Everyday Life, Sector for Social Development of the Intelligentsia, Department of Social Structure, and Sector for Time-Budgeting. 12 The training of professional sociologists seemed to lag behind the other developments. The first undergraduate course in methodology and techniques of social research was offered at Leningrad University in the 1960s. The first graduate program in sociology was established in 1969 at the Institute of Concrete Social Research. At the same time the first chair in sociology was established at the philosophy faculty of the Moscow University, and a course, restricted to graduate students, was offered there, too. In 1975 Urals (Sverdlovsk) and Leningrad universities opened undergraduate specializations in sociology; in 1984 the two first departments of "applied sociology" were opened at the Moscow and Leningrad universities. 13 However, recent information from the Soviet press makes it clear that the sociological education of most "sociologists" remains limited to on the job training, various seminars, and occasional courses at graduate or undergraduate schools


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for those who are better trained. 14 According to an estimate made by the SSA, 15 in 1982 not more than 10 percent of Soviet sociologists had some elementary sociological education, the percentage being smaller among industrial sociologists. Those who have called themselves sociologists and participated in social research have been philosophers, Party propagandists, economists, ethnographers, psychologists, and historians. 16 In 1987, out of the twenty-eight heads ofdepartments and chiefpersonnel of the ISR, eighteen were trained as philosophers, seven as economists, two as historians, and one was a writer. 17 The demands for formal education for sociologists have been made at least since 196618 and are still heard now. 19 The authorities evade the issue, at the same time providing perhaps the most important framework for the informal education of sociologists-the "sociological faculties" at the evening Universities of Marxism-Leninism systematically offer courses in methodology and techniques of sociological research. 20 In 1983 a representative of the graduate program in "applied sociology" at the ISR reported on the first twenty-four doctors and sixty-seven candidates ofsciences trained in the program. At that time another 181 persons were enrolled. They included students from almost all of the Union republics, as well as students from Bulgaria, Hungary, Mongolia, and Colombia. The representative of the program believed that this was "the only form of training of qualified cadres in sociology" in the USSR at the time and confessed that even this training is unnecessarily complicated because of the varying educational backgrounds of the participants. Undergraduates in 1983 did have the opportunity to take courses in "applied sociology" at several universities. In Leningrad University this possibility was open to students of economics, who could study the fundamentals of Marxism-Leninism, social planning, methodology, and techniques of sociological research, and even the basic trends of bourgeois sociology. The State University of the Urals provided for the students of its philosophy faculty courses in methodology and techniques of sociological research, a general course on Marxist-Leninist sociology, the history of sociology in the USSR, and statistics. And the Belorussian State University has reported with pride that since 1975 (with similar methods) it has trained more than 100 professional sociologists. 21 In a 1987 article the current president of the SSA, Zaslavskaya, however, expected the first 100 professional sociologists in the USSR to graduate in 1989.22 Given the nature of the political regime in the Soviet Union, it



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would be naive to suppose less than active involvement of the authorities in these developments. The support of the Party was absolutely necessary for the establishment of institutions and frameworks sponsoring social research, but its involvement was in no way restricted to such passive participation. Sociology emerged in the Soviet Union because Party officials wanted it to emerge. The reasons for the "scientistic" leanings of the Soviet authorities have been sufficiently elucidated,23 but it is important to emphasize again, as did Beliaev and Butorin in their 1982 article, that the development of sociology in the USSR was a "party directed process"; the Party was a "feverish supporter" and the "most important factor" in its growth, and it provided the "major counterbalance" to those who opposed the young sociology.24 From the start, the Academy of Social Sciences attached to the Central Committee of the cpsu played not a small role in the development of social research, its sociological sections being revealingly entitled "Research Team on the Effectiveness of Ideological Work," "The Sociological Section of the Institute of Scientific Atheism," and "The Sociological Group on the Scientific Management of Society." It was the major (Party) newspapers that organized the first (and not only the first) attitudinal surveys. The leadership of the sociological institutions-the Institute ofSociological Research, the sSA-has been recruited from the high Party officials, and in general the proportion of Party officials among Soviet sociologists has been high. 25 In 197 I at least forty Party regional committees and thirty Komsomol regional committees had staffs of specialists doing social research at their requests. 26 In 1983 there were hundreds of sociological groups attached to local Party committees, and it was said that in the future all of the more than 4,500 Party committees will have them. 27

The Reactions of Western Observers The reappearance in the Soviet Union of the word "sociology" was met with enthusiasm by Western observers. They assumed that the word necessarily designated the activity with which it had been associated before being banned by Soviet leaders and were not alarmed by the differences between the developing Soviet sociology and sociology as it was practiced elsewhere. Frequently these differences went unnoticed; when noticed, they were not regarded as inherent, but


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were attributed to the early stage of development of sociology in the Soviet Union or to differences in the processes of professionalization characteristic of Soviet as opposed to Western societies. 28 Virtually everyone writing on the subject before the end of the 1970s, whether enthusiastic or critical of Soviet sociology, assumed the fundamental similarity between it and its namesake in the West. 29 This assumption, when it was not explicitly stated, was expressed in the language the authors used. They talked of "our discipline" in the USSR. 30 The terms "revival," "reemergence," "rebirth" of sociology constantly reappeared. Nobody seemed to be aware of the possibility that what was emerging could in fact be something new and different. Some observers attracted attention to the topics of sociological research in the Soviet Union, noticing that this was "managerial science":3! research concentrated on the sociology of work and on subjects such as the effectiveness of Party political education work and propaganda among different groups; the causes of worker dissatisfaction; deviant attitudes; motivations oflabor turnover and migrations; leisure and time budgeting, urbanization, mass media, science and management, and ethnic relations. "In general, activity is greatest in those fields where the regime stands to benefit most from it," concluded Katz in his 1971 article, yet the tone of the paper was unambivalently optimistic: "At present, there is scarcely any branch of sociological research in which no work is being done in the USSR; Soviet delegations regularly participate in international conferences of sociologists; and in methodology and conceptualization-particularly in the application ofsophisticated mathematical methods and model-building-Soviet social scientists in the leading academic centers have attained professional standards as high as those reached anywhere else in the world."32 Even those who were bothered by the quite-and tellingly-limited range of topics dealt with by sociologists in the Soviet Union seemed not to see any restraints, inherent in Soviet sociology, that would prevent the young discipline from spreading over into the areas it did not cover yet and eventually converging with sociology in the West. Advances in the "craftsmanship" of Soviet sociologists 33 were emphasized, while their exclusive orientation toward the administrative needs of the Party and the fact that Soviet sociologists engaged in "concrete" but never in "empirical" research-noticed by everyone-did not arouse suspicion. There were some exceptions to this view. 34 But, by and large, few were willing to take seriously the warning in What is Sociology? by



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Inkeles-which should have been at least acknowledged as a meaningful hypothesis-that "sociology can thrive only under freedom," that "only a nation which provides the conditions for free inquiry may with reason hope for the development of social-science knowledge which permits ever deeper understanding of man in society. "35 There was more skepticism in the treatment of Soviet sociology as sociology in the 1980s. Beliaev and Butorin emphasized its ties to the Party and reinterpreted its "organizational advances" in the 1960s and 1970S as an intensification of the Party's control over sociology, and its centralization. Pankhurst stressed the "relative autonomy of the ideological influences" in the formation of Soviet sociology and raised the possibility that under these influences Soviet sociology could be something different from any other sociology (though this was not his conclusion; he believed that sociology in the USSR "approximated" the model of Western sociology). Finally, Novikov claimed that Soviet sociology is not sociology at all, but is instead an empirical branch of scientific communism. 36 It seems worthwhile, in view of this skepticism, to analyze the ways in which Soviet sociologists themselves perceive their activity and the ways in which their perceptions affect it, as well as to examine more closely what is actually defined as sociology in the Soviet Union. Sociological Research-the only professional sociological journal in the ussR-provides us with a convenient and reliable means for doing SO.37

Sociological Research Sociological Research, published by the Institute of Sociological Research (now, "of Sociology") of the USSR Academy of Sciences at Moscow, started publication in 1974. Until 1987 it was issued quarterly, the circulation reaching 9,000 copies in 1985. 38 In 1987 the publication was increased to six issues a year, and by late 1988 about 15,000 copies were being printed. The journal may be regarded as representative of the sociological work done in the Soviet Union. It serves as the main outlet for the work of the foremost Soviet sociologists-those who are also likely to publish books of a sociological nature-and it is probable that its audience includes all those related to sociology in one way or another.


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(Given that I I percent of the journal print run is distributed abroad,39 the remaining number of issues may at this point correspond exactly to the number of individual members in the SSA.) According to a survey conducted by the editorial board of the journal in 198 1-82,40 this audience consists of inhabitants of different cities (I I percent live in Moscow; 9 percent in Leningrad, Sverdlovsk, and Novosibirsk; 7 percent in the capital cities of the union republics; and 73 percent in other cities); and incumbents of different positions (28 percent teaching staff in institutions of higher education; 27 percent industrial sociologists; 20 percent sociologists in research institutions; and another 25 percent party and Komsomol officials, propagandists, and the like). Ninety-one percent of the readers considered the journal-as compared with scholarly monographs, other journals, contacts with colleagues and conferences-to be of the utmost importance for them as a source of scientific information.

The Substantive Coverage ojArticles In the issues that appeared before the end of 1986 there were 128 differently titled sections. The following topics appeared most frequently: applied sociology and social planning were treated under various headings in 193 articles. Among the topics most frequently treated were the sociology of work, the sociology of the family, issues of migration, and urbanization. A total of 157 articles dealt with sociological theory. Most of these papers combined issues of theory and methodology but also addressed subjects as heterogeneous as the sociology of propaganda, ethnosociological issues, the sociology of culture, the sociology of science, and others. There were ninety-eight purely methodological articles. The next most popular topic was the criticism of bourgeois sociology; eighty-five articles devoted to this subject appeared. Preparations for and reflections on international congresses (mostly ofsociology, but also of political science and other disciplines) were the subject of sixty-two articles. Fifty-six articles dealt with the state ofsociology in the Soviet Union. The relationships between the Party (or Komsomol) and sociology were discussed in forty-eight articles. Aspects of "ideological work" (propaganda) and the contribution of sociology to it were the focus of forty articles. Thirty-eight papers were devoted to the history of (mostly) Russian or Soviet sociology. The sociology of work was the subject of thirtythree articles (this, in addition to the papers on sociology of work in



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sections of applied sociology). Twenty-one articles reflected on social problems in bourgeois societies; nineteen papers were devoted to sociological problems such as intelligentsia, youth, the family, and the like. Marxist-Leninist sociology (specifically, not as a part of general sociological theory) was the subject of sixteen articles; the discussion ofsocial problems in the USSR was the focus offourteen papers, and the training ofsociologists the focus of thirteen. It is impossible, given the limitations of space, to devote attention to numerous other articles that do not fit these major categories. The Pattern ofAuthorship The last issues ofeach year from 1974 to 1986, or a total of thirteen, were selected for the analysis of the population of contributors to the journal as well as for the close examination ofits style. In these thirteen issues there appeared 368 papers (not including short comments and reviews); the number of contributors was 417 (108 papers were coauthored). Of the 4 I 7 contributors, the journal provides biographical information on 324. The following analysis is based on this figure. The 324 contributors were affiliated with 133 organizations. Of all the authors, 136 were affiliated with one or another branch, sector, or institute ofthe USSR Academy of Sciences. Ofthis number, sixty-seven were employed by the ISR and fifteen by the Leningrad Institute of Socio-Economic Problems. Forty-five authors were affiliated with other research and educational institutes in the USSR; these included pedagogical, polytechnic, agricultural, and medical institutes, as well as institutes of commerce, statistics, and the Moscow Institute of International Relations. Twenty-six contributors were employed by universities, seven of them by the Moscow University. Fourteen authors held a Party office (and this was stated as their main affiliation), of whom nine were affiliated with the Academy of Social Sciences attached to the Central Committee of the cpsu; nine were affiliated with various factories, and three with the press. Other affiliations included offices in the Young Communist League, Trade Union Organization, High Party Schools, military, police, and state administration organizations, as well as institutes of film research, the Ministry of Culture, the Pushkin Art Museum, and others. Two contributors were affiliated solely with the SSA. On the average, an author appeared in the journal I.2I times. An author from the Institute of Sociological Research, however, would


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on the average contribute 1.54 articles; an author from the Institute of Socio-Economic problems, 1. 53; and from the Academy of Social Sciences of the CPsu Central Committee, 1.56 articles. To facilitate the interpretation of these figures and put them into perspective, I compared the practices of Sociological Research with those of the two central journals that serve professional sociologists in the United States, the AmericanJournal of Sociology (A]S) and the American Sociological Review (ASR). For both, the first issues of the years 1975 through 1987 were analyzed (thirteen issues each sample). In each issue only articles proper (but not research notes, commentary, and review essays) were considered; there were on the average approximately six articles per issue in A]S and eight in ASR. In the A]S sample sixty-three different institutions were represented, and in the ASR sample, seventy-two different institutions. The great majority of these were universities in the United States. The distribution among these institutions was roughly equal, meaning that the chances that affiliates of all these universities have to publish in the two central sociological journals are approximately equal. There are exceptions. For the A]S these were the University of Chicago, where the journal is published (nine affiliates of which had six articles, less than IO percent, in the sample), and the University of California at Berkeley, whose five affiliates had four articles. For the ASR., the exceptions are Indiana University with ten affiliates and seven papers, SUNY at Albany with ten affiliates and six papers, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison with nine affiliates and seven papers. These figures should be compared with the rates of publication in Sociological Research by the members of the 1SR at Moscow. The affiliates of this institution, which publishes thejournal, constitute more than 20 percent of all its contributors and contribute more than 30 percent of the articles, while 42 percent of the contributors (the authors of more than 50 percent of the articles) are affiliated with the USSR Academy of Sciences in general. Given that the number of articles per issue is much smaller in both the A]S and ASR, the figures expressing the breadth of affiliational distribution of their contributors compare favorably with the 133 affiliations of the contributors to Sociological Research, and the authorship of the two American journals reflects a system that is considerably less centralized. At the same time, the range of institutions represented in the Soviet sample is broader, which might be reflective of the somewhat less exact and generally different definition of sociology in the Soviet Union.



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The distribution of the contributors to Sociological Research by discipline is as follows: I I lout of 324 authors (34.26 percent) were trained as philosophers; 44 (13.58 percent) as economists; 19 (5.86 percent) as historians; 14 (4.32 percent) as engineers, mathematicians, or technicians; 7 (2.16 percent) as psychologists; 5 (I. 5 percent) as lawyers; 3 (0.93 percent) as philologists; 2 (0.62 percent) as pedagogues; the education of the remaining 119 (36.71 percent) was not specified. Philosophers, economists, and historians contribute the bulk of the papers to the Sociological Research throughout the period, but there seems to be a change in the relative weight of the three in the I980s with the noticeably increasing number of economists among the authors of the journal. The great majority of the authors in the AJS (70 percent) and the ASR (84 percent) are professional sociologists (trained and working as sociologists), while the rest are specialists in other social sciences such as demography, political science, economics, anthropology, criminology, and psychology, many of whom hold joint appointments with sociology.

The Pattern ofReferences It is quite clear that the educational background of Soviet sociologists differs significantly from that of their counterparts in the West, and specifically in the United States; but so did the backgrounds of such Western classical sociologists as Weber, Durkheim, and others, which does not make us any less confident that what they were doing was indeed sociology. Can we be as confident in the case of Soviet sociologists? The answer to this question must be sought in the Soviet sociologists' own definition of their activity. One way to approach this definition is through the analysis of references in the articles published in Sociological Research. References designate professionally relevant others for the author and thus can help one to establish the intellectual community and tradition of which Soviet sociologists consider themselves a part. The way of referencing and the external appearance of an article may also be suggestive in this regard and help us to locate this discipline in the wider context. There is a noticeable difference between the papers published in Sociological Research and those appearing in the two American journals. The Sociological Research papers are relatively short. Each issue carries approximately twenty articles proper, several shorter research notes, reports about events in the Soviet sociological community, and


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review essays (five, five, and three on the average, respectively). The average length of the articles is 8.4 pages (they seem to grow shorter in the 1980s: the average length for the 1970S is 9.4 and for the 1980s, 7.5 pages). Other publications are much shorter, though usually the print used in their case is smaller, too. Whereas the average number of references per article is 49.6 for the A]S and 46.6 for the ASR, the average number of references per publication in Sociological Research is 10.9. The average for articles in theoretical or theoretico-methodological sections is 16.3; for sections on methodology, 10.5; the average number of references in research notes, reports, and review essays is 3.9. The greatest amount of references is constantly found in sections devoted to the criticism of "bourgeois sociology," the average number for papers on this subject being 24.9. 41 The nature of references characteristic of the papers in Sociological Research also differs noticeably from those of the papers in the American sociological journals. The largest single category in Sociological Research is made up of references to other works in Soviet sociology. These can be considered self-references, and their relative prevalence is not surprising; 32.6 percent of all references in Sociological Research are such self-references. The parallel numbers for the two Americanjournals are 82.7 percent for the A]S and 8 I. 3 percent for the ASR. 42 The next-largest category of references in Sociological Research includes references to the classics of Marxism-Leninism (mostly Marx, Engels, and Lenin), and to the sayings and writings of current Party leaders; 23.8 percent of all references belong to this category.43 There is no comparable category in American sociological journals. Another significant category, to which 20.8 percent of the references in Sociological Research belong, includes references to Western sociology: classic and modern American and European (of this number, 53 percent, or I I percent ofall references, are to works of recentnot older than ten years-American sociology). The only comparable category in the two American journals is the one including all the references to foreign work; it includes 9.9 percent of the references in the A]S and 8.0 percent in the ASR. References to Western sociology appear in Sociological Research mostly in papers devoted to the criticism of one or another school, approach, or author; very rarely are they used in other articles to substantiate a point or to locate it in a larger disciplinary context. The only exceptions to this are papers on methodology, where references to Western sociology for these purposes are



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occasionally made. The remaining 22.8 percent are references to Soviet and nineteenth-century and earlier foreign philosophy; Soviet psychology, economics, and history; Russian, Soviet, and foreign belles lettres, statistics and mathematics; and Eastern European sociology. A comparable category for the two American journals is the one that includes all references to nonsociology. To it belong 17.3 percent of the AJS references and 18.7 percent in the ASR. The nonsociological literature to which contributors to these two journals refer belongs to the fields of political science, psychology, and economics. 44 It is possible to derive from this analysis the following observations. (I) Clearly, Soviet sociology is a new, separate endeavor, with its own identity. This identity is not as clearly circumscribed as is the identity of American or Western sociology, and the dividing lines, or boundaries, between Soviet sociology and other intellectual activities are not as clear, but there is already a core ofwork specific to it and recognized by its practitioners. (2) This endeavor is not seen by the practitioners as identical, similar, or parallel to Western sociology (as, for instance Soviet and Western physics may be similar and parallel). The findings and conceptual apparatus ofWestern sociology are hardly ever used by Soviet sociologists, with the exception of methodology, the function of the Western discipline in Soviet sociology being rather that of an anti-model, a symbol the denunciation of which serves to sharpen the ideological position of Soviet sociologists and to assert their difference and therefore identity.45 (3) This new endeavor is perceived as directly linked to, though not identical with, the ideological tradition of Marxism-Leninism and related political institutions and, therefore, not as an autonomous intellectual enterprise.

Defining the Discipline To make clear this connection, and the influence it may have on the character of a social scientific discipline, it seems advisable to turn to the textual analysis of the definitions of Soviet sociology constantly reiterated in Sociological Research. In 1974, when the journal started its publication, the editors defined its goals and proposed functions thus: "The main tasks of the journal," they wrote in the editorial, "are: the assertion and strengthening of the principles of Marxism-Leninism in sociology, . . . the publication . . . of scientifically sound practical recommendations. The journal will systematically and consistently fight against bourgeois sociological concepts.... The activity of the


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journal will be another proof of the fact that sociology in the USSR is a Marxist-Leninist science. "46 This statement, to which the journal and Soviet sociology at large remain faithful, touched upon the two main related elements in Soviet sociologists' definition of their activity: the filial relation of sociology to Marxist-Leninist ideology, and its utility for the solution of practical problems faced by the government and society. The habit of viewing Soviet sociology as a species of Marxism goes back to the very first day of the discipline's existence. Although some claims have been made as to the change in emphasis regarding this relationship (for example, the substitution of the notion that Soviet sociology is an empirical aspect of historical materialism by the claim that it is an empirical aspect of scientific communism),47 it seems that, in general, there has been very little change in this regard. The 1974 editorial stated that "Marxist-Leninist theory is the methodological basis of sociological research," that sociological research is "tightly connected to the philosophy of Marxism," and that "historical materialism simultaneously serves as an integral part of the philosophy of Marxism and as the highest theoretical level of the Marxist-Leninist sociological science." Scientific communism was not neglected either. "Sociological research of Soviet society," wrote the editors, "is also immediately and organically related to scientific communism which studies the laws of the growth and development of the new communist formation, " and they insisted that "the all-round consideration of the specificity ofsuch object ofstudy as the socialist society in the USSR at its current stage of development is possible only on the basis of knowledge, and creative application, of the theory of scientific communism. "48 As a more recent example of this attitude, one can quote the chairman of the department of "applied sociology" at the Leningrad University, Professor Elmeyev,49 who in 1986 defined "sociology" as a genetic term for the system of social sciences, of which the most developed are historical materialism, political economy, and scientific communism. Soviet sociologists do not seem to grow tired of repeating that" our science develops and will develop on the unshakeable basis of Marxism-Leninism. "50 But what is the implication ofsuch statements? One issue related to the connection between sociology and the ideology of Marxism-Leninism is the issue of its attitude toward empirical knowledge. Facts have never seemed to have much authority in the eyes of



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Marxist-Leninist sociologists, and in the early days of Soviet sociology reliance on them for interpretation aroused suspicion. In the period under discussion there was probably more tolerance toward factual knowledge, and understanding of its necessity, expressed among other things in the liberal substitution of the term "empirical" for the euphemism "concrete," which was used to designate empirical research in the first decades of sociology's existence in the USSR. Yet, the attitude toward "empirical" continued to be quite ambivalent. "The overcoming of the limited nature of empiricism," claimed the first editorial, "is one of the most important creative achievements of the Marxist-Leninist thought."5! In 1980 an author ofa review article rejoiced: "Today one can consider the attempts to reduce sociology to the exclusive status of an empirical science of society, which could be Actually, Marxist found in scientific literature, a matter of the past sociology is first and foremost a theoretical science This science, a long time since, bears the name of historical materialism." "On the other hand," added the author, "sociological knowledge is not exhausted by general sociological theory"; he admitted that one had to know facts. 52 "The interconnection between theoretical and empirical knowledge in sociology," claimed a 1981 paper on the subject, "is, in its essence, the interconnection between historical materialism as the general theory of Marxism, and empirical research.. . The opposition of theoretical to empirical research, characteristic of the representatives of bourgeois sociology which considers absolute the role of empirical methods, is alien to Marxist-Leninist sociology." In practice, believed the authors, this interconnection was expressed in the following way: "Many concepts of historical materialism become concrete under the influence of the information acquired in sociological research. Thus, if in general sociological theory personality is defmed as the totality of social relationships, in concrete research, the concept of personality is specified with the goal of a more detailed study of the interrelationships between personality and social environment. . . . The family in the theory of historical materialism is defined as a form of social commonality, while in concrete research to define family one uses concepts such as 'institution' and .group'. "53 In 1983 an author went as far as to propose that the task and function of sociology is to study "live social life in its diverse expressions and continuous development." "This does not mean, of course," he added, "that sociological science can be reduced exclusively to its empirical aspects. It


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needs also theoretical generalizations, development of its conceptual apparatus on the basis ofhistorical materialism. However, these generalizations must be oriented first and foremost towards practical demands."54 The insistence on the practical orientation is another implication of the emphasized connection between sociology and the ideology of Marxism-Leninism. Soviet sociology is, essentially, a purposeful science. It exists in order to achieve practical goals of its client-the Party-in the absence of which it would have no raison d'etre. Usually, such an endeavor would be considered a technology. On a theoretical level the purposefulness of Soviet sociology is expressed in its attitude toward scientific objectivity. The principle of objectivity, one of the main values of science, is consistently rejected and replaced by the opposite principle of a class-based or Party-based research, called "partyness" (partiinost), namely, a principle of subjectivity or partiality that requires research to be exclusively oriented toward the service of particular interests. Soviet sociologists do not mince words in this context. "The organic connection, " reads the first editorial, "between theory and practice, science and ideology, the class-approach from the point of view of the working class in the solution of pressing problems of social development, these are the fundamental principles of the scientific and propagandist activity of sociologists." It stresses the "deep partyness ofour science." "A Marxist sociologist," insist the authors, "cannot be satisfied with the role of a 'diagnostician' of the maladies of his society, or with the pose of a 'disinterested scholar'; he must help the party in the further perfection of our socio-economic system, methods and forms of culturaleducational and ideological work.... Communist, Marxist-Leninist partyness does not contradict the scientific spirit, but presupposes and requires it, for the interests of the working class and its party perfectly coincide with the objective tendencies of the socio-historical development. "55 This position is constantly reiterated. In 1980 another editorial is entirely devoted to the subject of the "partyness ofsociological science." Starting with the accusation that Western sociologists commit ideological (capitalist) bias, it interprets such bias as another proof of the Marxist proposition, according to which knowledge cannot avoid expressing class interests, and states: "Marxist sociological science, from the moment of its emergence, is organically linked to the class struggle of the proletariat and all the working people for the



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triumph of socialism and communism. The goals of this struggle, ... as was convincingly proven in the works of Marx, Engels, and Lenin, reflect the objective tendencies of historical development of humankind.... Ideological activity of the proletariat and its avantgardeMarxist-Leninist parties-is, in its essence, identical with the activity of scientific cognition.... In their struggle with Marxism-Leninism, bourgeois sociologists frequently oppose objectivity to partyness. This objectivist tradition in sociology is a more refined defense of the interests of the exploitative classes, than open, militant bourgeois partyness ... only the analysis of social facts from the position of a class whose interests coincide with objective historical necessity and express this necessity, is able to achieve real objectivity in social knowledge. "56 Less fully articulated but equally clear expressions of the attitude toward objectivity in Soviet sociology can be found in every issue of the Sociological Research. No effort is made to conceal this position from sociologists abroad. When Soviet sociology is defined with a foreign audience in mind, this position is still explicitly stated and even emphasized. Rutkevich, commenting on a very positive review of Soviet sociology by Kolaja in Current Anthropology, writes in 1978: "Obviously, the control of society requires the utilization of data about society provided by all the sciences and, in particular, by sociology and therefore presupposes a union ofpolicy and sociology. On the other hand, in determining its research tasks and directions, Soviet sociology proceeds from political ends set before our society by the Communist Party and the Soviet state; it also requires a union of policy and sociology. This is the dialectical relation of sociology and policy. In a society in which policy is based on science, the opposition of scientific and political criteria, of the proper scientific and ideological functions of sociology, becomes absurd. Since the 6th World Congress of Sociology in 1966, where this problem was thoroughly discussed, the position of Soviet sociologists has not changed. "57 On a less theoretical level, the purposefulness of Soviet sociology is expressed in the way the concrete goals and functions of sociology are defined. Examples of such programmatic statements abound. "Soviet sociologists must continuously strengthen the effectiveness of research, turning in the first place to the most pressing problems.... the most important of them: the necessity to increase the effectiveness of labor and quality of work, . . . improvement of the ideological,


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politico-educational work. "58 "The first-heuristic-function of applied sociology has to do with obtaining reliable and exact information about the current state and tendencies of change of social phenomena and processes. .. the second, practical function-the recommendation, elaboration and substantiation of the ways to achieve concrete results.... How and with what means to guarantee the achievement of the given goals-this is the question which must be at the center ofa sociologist's concern. "59 "The essence of truly scientific methodology of social cognition can be expressed in the words of Lenin: 'sociological realism.' ... But, of course, the study of facts is not simply the description of facts. It must serve the end of the active transformation for the sake of social progress, the solution of the most important socio-economic and ideological problems. "60 The current director of ISR, Ivanov, in a 1983 article called for the increased practical significance of sociological research: "The main function of sociological science is to give substantiated and at the same time large-scale practical recommendations oriented towards the solution of pressing economic problems, the all-round development of every Soviet person, the improvement of conditions of ideological work. . . . Another important aspect of this endeavor is the elaboration of reliable social prognoses. .. [Sociologists] must combine the strictly scientific character of research with its orientation towards the achievement of the strategic goals of the Party. "61 He reiterated these statements almost verbatim in an 1985 article in the "Herald of the Academy of Sciences. "62 This utilitarian orientation of Soviet sociology determines the character of this discipline and is decisive in our understanding of it. In comparison, the specific relation of sociology to the tenets of Marxism-Leninism (for instance, of which part of it is it a part? and like questions) is of secondary importance. Sociology is seen as a tool for the implementation of the Party's goals, whatever these goals are. These goals change, however, and with them changes the meaning attributed to different aspects or branches of Marxism-Leninism. Adherence to the Manichean principles of the ideology on the part of a majority of specialists is necessary for the preservation of the regime they serve-which explains periodical extractions of "credo." But given that this basic faith exists, the logical consistency between an academic discipline and other aspects of the ideology (scientific communism or historical materialism) is far less important. In fact, these



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aspects (of dogma) themselves may be at times inconsistent with exigencies of the policy, always related to the Manichean principles of the ideology and yet changing with the changing circumstances. For example, the recent insistence on the crucial importance of the "ideological work" for economic development clearly contradicts the basic premises of historical materialism, especially in its orthodox interpretation accepted in the Soviet Union. The development of Soviet society is now claimed to be dependent upon the correct education of the masses. This current position of the authorities replaces all previous "sociological" principles, and one meets in the Marxist-Leninist sociological literature such astonishing (for orthodox Marxism) statements as: "World-outlook [Weltanschauung] is ... the ideological core of consciousness, which makes the latter an active force, a guide to action. . .. It follows that the cultivation of a world-outlook is the method ... of the organization ofactivity in the interests ofsociety. "63 Or: "Group and individual behavior influences all aspects ofeconomic activity and to a considerable degree predetermines its results. most important factors [of the economic nature] directly reflect the particular features of the existing system of economic management. Accordingly, in a certain sense it can be said that the economic management mechanism determines the social structure of society and the status of social groups. "64 When the Party calls, consciousness becomes the basis of existence, and Marx is replaced by a national version of "scientific management." Yet the nature of Marxist-Leninist sociology is not modified in the least. In a striking leading article, in the second issue of Sociological Research for 1987, Zaslavskaya claimed that sociology may be separated from scientific communism, which would make possible the recognition of sociology as an independent discipline. Such recognition is necessary, she insisted, and with a boldness made possible by the much-advertised glasnost and yet surprising and admirable, she also criticized the obstacles put in its way by the authorities who, where possible, still avoided even the word "sociology" itself. Zaslavskaya demanded that the journal be renamed Problems in Sociology and the Institute of Sociological Research "Institute of Sociology," like the leading journals and institutes of other disciplines. (The latter wish, as we saw, was granted in 1988.) But the rationale for the existence of an independent sociology called by its own name was not the demand for a social science free to pursue its own goals, but the ability ofa discipline commanding respect to better


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serve the goals of the authorities. The independence of sociology is demanded as a condition for its transformation "into a direct tool of the reconstruction" (the current goal of the Party) since with "the perpetuation of existing limitations one cannot seriously expect of science effective recommendations. "65 Mayall this be interpreted as simple lip service, meaningless slogans that have to be pronounced but that hardly affect anyone? One cannot be sure. It is very probable that Soviet sociologists firmly believe that such is indeed the nature and the purpose of sociology, and that sociology everywhere, by definition, is a technology explicitly oriented toward providing policy makers with scientific recommendations and facts (or, as it is called in the Soviet sociological literature, "scientific provision"). There is at least one piece of evidence that seems to support this latter possibility. In a 1979 interview given to Radio Liberty, a Soviet emigre sociologist, who could not be suspected of an exceeding faithfulness to the regime since he left of his own free will and who was unlikely to feel endangered and therefore intentionally misinform his interviewers, made the following revealing statement. "It would be mistaken to regard sociology in the USSR as hopelessly backward compared with that in other countries, including the U.S.," he said. "The advantages enjoyed by American sociologists should not be overestimated. Even with the aid of the best computers, as well as highly sophisticated computer programs and mathematical methods, American sociologists are often unable to obtain results ofpractical value to policymakers or to make any real contribution to the creation ofan acceptable social order. "66 Three and a half years of perestroika changed little in this instrumental definition of sociology. Faithful to its tradition to close supervision of the development of the discipline, the Central Committee of the CPsu issued yet another decree "On the enhancement of the role of Marxist-Leninist sociology in the solution of basic social problems of the Soviet society, "67 which was published in the October 1988 issue of Sociological Research. The decree stressed that "the realization of the programs of the XXVII Party Congress ... [regarding] the revolutionary perestroika, carrying out the radical economic reform, active social policy, all-round democratization of society, rejuvenation of its spiritual-moral sphere demands that the role of Marxist-Leninist sociology in the scientific provision of the perestroika, the solution of fundamental theoretical and practical problems of socialism, and the



formation of socio-political thinking within the broad masses of workers be strengthened." "The Central Committee believes, " it continued, "that the current state of affairs in sociology does not satisfy the requirements of society. Sociology has not yet taken its proper place in the creative development of Marxist-Leninist social sciences, the formation of the scientific world-view of the workers, and the realization of the social policy ofthe Communist Party." To correct the situation, the Party, in addition to renaming the institute, "determined the main directions ofthe sociological research" and entrusted regional Party committees "to realize constant control over the activity of sociological departments." In carrying out this important task, the Party committees were to remember that "the results of sociological research are required to actively contribute to the perfection of the style, forms and methods of the party leadership." This, one of the most recent issues of the journal, bears directly on the subject of this paper, for it carries several articles explicitly raising the issue of the professionalization of Soviet sociology, and, in addition, contains the text of the code of professional ethics for sociologists recently adopted by the SSA. An article appended to the code compares sociology, much as was done in the opening paragraphs of this paper, to other liberal professions, such as medicine and law, though-characteristically-including in the list occupations that would not be included among liberal professions in the West: journalism, acting, art, and teaching. The authors of the article explain what a profession is and call on the readers of the journal to behave as professionals. In another article sociologist-professionals are opposed to sociologisttechnicians. The difference, in the opinion of the contributors to Sociological Research, seems to be that of personal bearing: the bearing of a professional is expected to differ from that of a technician much the way in which the bearing of a free citizen differs from that of a subject. Professionals are expected to have a sense of personal investment in the fate of the country and its leadership, to take initiative in the collective effort to promote its goals-that is, perestroika-and to participate in this effort with enthusiasm and zeal absent from the dull work of a technician, who simply satisfies the external demand and cares for little after being paid for the job. This call for the professionalism of sociologists, so uniquely defined, fits well with the more general drive of the current leadership for increased involvement and enthusiasm, and thus efficiency, of the masses in the promotion of its


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policies (it is such increased involvement and efficiency that Gorbachev designates "democratization"). It is also reminiscent of the importation ofthe Western discourse ofcitizenship and patriotism into the Russia of the early eighteenth century by another great leader, Peter the Great, as an incentive and a boost in his own perestroika. The professional code of a sociologist, characteristically, opens with the following revealing preface: "Considering the high professional and moral responsibility of a sociologist for the society, especially in conditions of revolutionary perestroika of the economic mechanism, the development of socialist democracy and glasnost, of increasing necessity for the reliable information about social processes and positions of citizens, social groups and strata regarding important issues of social life, the leadership of the Soviet Sociological Association affirms the Professional code of sociologist." It is possible to conclude that Soviet sociology, as it is defined by those who practice it, is a utilitarian discipline with clearly political goals, in which one can distinguish two relatively independent parts: theory and research. The purpose of theory is to defend and propagate the ideas of Marxism-Leninism. The purpose of research is to obtain information relevant to the "strategic goals" of the Party. The connection between the two parts is unclear. The nonprogrammatic papers published in Sociological Research reflect this defmition. A typical theoretical article may discuss an important sociological concept, or social phenomenon, in the course of the discussion criticizing Western interpretations of it, and explicitly or implicitly advocating a MarxistLeninist interpretation acceptable in the given political and socioeconomic situation in the Soviet Union at the time. For example, in an article entitled "On the concept of social structure," the author criticizes several Western approaches, treating structural functionalism with particular severity. He then proposes that in Marxist sociology, social structure must have two meanings, one general, namely, the structure of a society, and the other specific, namely, the system of inequality between classes. The latter concept is especially relevant for the Party leadership, alarmed by the slow disappearance of such inequalities (if they disappear at all) in Soviet society, though according to certain prognoses the leadership has made at one time or another, they should have disappeared by now. In connection with this, research on stratification is a high priority, but stratification-evidently a malady of the bourgeois world-is always designated by the euphe-



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mism "social structure. "68 In a theoretical article that deals with the social structure of science, the author concludes that the "institutionalization of science under socialism fully answers the internal requirements of science itself as a dynamic, creative force of the social progress.... The normative structure of science and its values change in connection with the fact that the worldview of scientists is based on the principles of Marxism-Leninism. "69 Research papers-which constitute the great majority-deal with politically and economically relevant subjects, such as the effectiveness of labor and factors affecting it, the effectiveness of propaganda, the nature of groups manifesting responsiveness to propaganda from abroad, the family and issues ofdemographic policy, ethnic issues, and so forth. As a rule, such papers are limited to descriptive statistics, which is not surprising, given that one of the main theorists in Soviet sociology considers population censuses to be the best examples of sociological research on a mass level. 70 Many of these articles contain interesting information. For example, one can learn from an article on time budgeting that Soviet citizens spend on the average 20 percent of their time on the satisfaction of everyday life needs (cooking, grocery shopping, and the like), but only 17 percent on thejob. 71 An article on the family tells us that 44 percent of young married couples (in an apparently representative sample) live with the parents of one of the spouses, and that among such couples one finds I I percent more stable marriages than among couples living independently. 72 The 1987 issues of Sociological Research, written in the spirit ofglasnost, carry articles on alcoholism,73 drug abuse,74 the difficulties of consumers in the conditions of scarcity, 75 and tribulations of the single life and the relations between the sexes discussed in a rather open manner. 76 The methodological quality ofthese papers, or their" craftsmanship," as was noted by several observers, has been improving. Although one does frequently encounter work that, ifjudged by Western standards, would be considered methodologically flawed and even unsound, on the whole the data these papers provide seem reliable. It is not its methodological deficiency that is decisive for the assessment of Soviet sociology and the prospects of its professionalization. Perhaps more sophisticated research methods could serve its goals better, but, as it is, the methods used serve them quite well. What is significant for its understanding and therefore for the question of whether it is comparable to sociology as we know it and is likely to


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follow the latter and become a profession, is the character of these goals. The goals of Soviet sociology and of sociology outside the Soviet Union are indisputably different, and although the former uses the name of the latter, these are in fact two distinct endeavors. Not that nothing valuable can be found in Soviet sociology, or that sociologists in the West should completely disregard it. Soviet sociology, for its own purposes, or rather for the purposes of the regime, creates an extraordinary reservoir of empirical data that can be of great use to sociologists working in most diverse areas. Information useful to sociologists, however, is not in itself sociology. There is much useful data everywhere: in the daily press, on the streets, certainly in intelligence reports. Yet, we do not call either journalism or intelligence services "sociology." In distinction to such sources of almost raw data, Soviet sociology provides us with the information presented in a systematic, condensed, and processed fashion. Since sociologists in the Soviet Union now are making every effort to make data collection and processing methodologically sound (for they are expected to produce reliable information), the information indeed becomes an extremely valuable resource. Still, it is not the data that give sociology its uniqueness, but the fundamental purpose for which the data are sought and analyzed: the understanding of social reality. This assessment of Soviet sociology in no way implies that there is no sociologically valuable work (comparable to sociological work in the West) in the Soviet Union. For example, the most sophisticated theory of the sociology of literature was developed there in the late 1920S under the guise of literary theory.77 Also, much sociologically valuable work has been done by Soviet ethnographers, under the rubric of "ethnography."78 A careful sifting ofareas ofscholarship that on the face of it seem unrelated to sociology may yield unexpectedly rich results. Many people in the Soviet Union share in the universal interest in the workings of society, which lies at the basis of our discipline. But there, people with such an interest may not be called "sociologists."

Conclusions In general, after reviewing this third decade in the existence of Soviet sociology, one may conclude that Western observers were, on the



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whole, quite naive in believing that the reappearance in the USSR of the term "sociology" signified the rebirth of the profession of sociology. Though words have some binding power, they should not be overestimated, for such power is limited. The word "sociology" in the USSR was stigmatized by its association with an unacceptable activity. The destigmatization of the word, however, signified not the acceptance of the activity, but rather the separation (necessitated by considerations of international and domestic policy) of the activity and the word, which was then attached to another activity. The Soviets are entirely honest in this regard and do not make a secret of the fact that their sociology is an endeavor different from the social science called by this name outside of the USSR. That is why they call one"MarxistLeninist sociology" and the other "bourgeois sociology" and have no use for the latter, except as a source of techniques and a symbol against which they can assert their different identity. Soviet sociology thus does not provide us, as some thought, with "a rare opportunity to observe in vivo the evolution of sociology into an academic discipline. "79 And yet it is a paradigmatic case, for it is an example of the ambivalent Soviet-and Russian-attitude toward science in general, and the partial way in which science has been admitted to that society. Since the eighteenth century, indeed, its gates were sluice-gates for science whose technical might and potential were gladly accepted and nurtured, but to the spirit of which-its basic norms, values, and its goal of understanding reality-the gates were closed. It is because of the rejection of these values and goal that Soviet society found the corporate autonomy of science so difficult to accept. In the case of sociology on the level of a whole society the two elements cannot be separated. Inkeles was absolutely right in insisting that sociology cannot exist without freedom. Where other sciences, though jailed, continue to develop, jailed sociology is replaced by "sociological realism" and, like its counterpart in art-"the most purposeful art of our time, "80 socialist realism-it becomes a technology, an obedient tool in the hands of political power. The way in which the discipline of Soviet sociology has crystallized makes it impossible to regard it as a profession, unless we define a profession simply as a specialized occupation that serves as a source of livelihood for the people engaged in it. It is indeed in this sense that we frequently talk of professional cooks, professional revolutionaries, or professional politicians, and even professional thieves. There is no


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doubt that Soviet sociology is being organized in the manner that fits this latter definition. There is no indication, however, that it is on its way to becoming a profession in the narrower and more meaningful sense outlined in the beginning of this paper-of a specialized activity possessing the privilege of corporate autonomy and thus legitimately devoted to the achievement of its internal goals. The definition of Soviet sociology as a "purposeful science"-a science oriented to the achievement of the goals prescribed by the Party and the current interpretation of the ruling ideology-effectively prevents its transformation into a profession. Unless the definition of Soviet sociology changes, in which case we shall be talking about an altogether different discipline, professionalization will remain an unlikely development.

Notes I. Ben-David, "The Profession of Science and Its Powers," in Minerva 10, no. 3 (197 2 ): 362-384· 2. R. K. Merton, The Sociology ofScience (Chicago: University ofChicago Press, 1973). 3. L. Graham, Science and Philosophy in the Soviet Union (New York: Knopf, 1972); D. Joravsky, The Lysenko Affair (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1970); see Merton, Sociology of Science. 4. J. F. Hecker, Russian Sociology (New York: Augustus M. Kelley, 1969); A. J. Reiss, "Sociology: The Field," in International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences 15 (1968): 1-23; P. A. Sorokin, "Russian Sociology in the Twentieth Century," Publications ofthe American Sociological Society 2 (1926): 57-69; E. A. Weinberg, The Development of Sociology in the Soviet Union (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1974). 5. A. Simirenko, ed., Soviet Sociology: Historical Antecedents and Current Appraisals (Chicago: Quadrangle Books, 1966). 6. N. Novikov, "The Sociological Movement in the USSR (1960-1970) and the Institutionalization of Soviet Sociology," Studies in Soviet Thought 23 (1982): 95-118; D. N. Shalin, "The Development of Soviet Sociology: 19561976," Annual Review of Sociology 4 (1978): 171-19I. 7. E. Beliaev and P. Butorin, "The Institutionalization of Soviet Sociology: Its Social and Political Context," Social Forces 61, no. 2 (1982): 418-436; Z. Katz, "Sociology in the Soviet Union," Problems ofCommunism 20, no. 3 (1971): 22-40; M. Matthews and T. A. Jones, Soviet Sociology, 1964-1975: A Bibliography (New York, London: Praeger, 1978); V. Shlapentokh, Sociology and Politics: The Soviet Case (Falls Church, Va.: Delphic Associates, 1985);



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V. Shlapentokh, The Politics of Sociology in the Soviet Union (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1987); see Shalin, "Development of Soviet Sociology," A. Simirenko, "Soviet and American Sociology in the Seventies," Studies in Comparative Communism 6 (1973): 27-50; :ee Weinberg, Development ofSociology in the Soviet Union; V. Zaslavsky, "Sociology in the Contemporary Soviet Union," Social Research 44, no. 2 (1977): 330-353. 8. A. Hegelson, "Recent Developments on the Soviet Sociological Scene," Radio Liberty Research, RFE-RL 461/83 (1983); K. N. Momdjan, "Sovetskoi sotsiologicheskoi assotsiatsii-25 let," Sotsiologicheskie issledovania 4 (1983): 168-169. 9. K. Chernenko, "Aktual'nye voprosy Ideologicheskoi massovo-politicheskoi raboty partii," Pravda, June 15,1983 (Kommunist 15/26). 10. See Hegelson, "Recent Developments." I I. S. Voronitsyn, "New Center Created for the Study of Public Opinion," in Radio Liberty Research, RL 183/86 (1986). 12. S. Voronitsyn, "A Directory of Prominent Soviet Economists, Sociologists and Demographers by Institutional Affiliation," Radio Liberty Research (1987). 13. In 1987 there still was no faculty of sociology in the USSR; it is a Soviet faculty that corresponds to a full-fledged academic department in the United States. 14. T. Zaslavskaya, "Perestroika i sotsiologia," Pravda, February 6, 1987; T. Zaslavskaya, "Rol' sotsiologii v uskorenii razvitia sovetskogo obschestva," Sotsiologicheskie issledovania 2 (1987): 3- I 5. 15. V. A. Skripov, "Sotsiologicheskaia sluzhba v organizatsionnoi strukture predpriatia," Sotsiologicheskie issledovania 2 (1982): 148-154. 16. A. I. Demidova, "Professional'naia podgotovka sotsiologicheskikh kadrov," Sotsiologischeskie issledovania 3 (1978): 201-205;]. Kolaja, "An Observation on Soviet Sociology," Current Anthropology 19, no. 2 (1978): 373-375; L. L. Lubrano, W. A. Fisher,]. Schwartz, and K. Tomlinson, "The Soviet Union," in W. A. Welsh, ed., Survey Research and Public Attitudes in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union (New York: Pergamon Press, 1981). 17. This calculation is based on the data in Voronitsyn, "A Directory." 18. E. A. Weinberg, "Comments on Kolaja," Current Anthropology 19, no. 2 (1978): 377. 19. See Zaslavskaya, "Perestroika i sotsiologia," and "Rol' sotsiologii." 20. See Beliaev and Butorin, "Institutionalization of Soviet Sociology"; S. Voronitsyn, "Who Is Afraid of an Educated Sociologist?" Radio Research Liberty, RL 82/83 (1983). 21. "Where Are Sociologists Trained?" (Gde gotoviat sotsiologov?), Sotsiologicheskie issledovania 4 (1983): 170 - 171. 22. See Zaslavskaya, "Rol' sotsiologii."


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23. These reasons include the need for new, scientific methods of control after Stalin's death, considerations of national prestige, exigencies of the "ideological struggle," and the example of sociology in Eastern European societies. See Z. Bauman, "Eastern European and Soviet Science: A Case Study in Stimulus Diffusion," in R. Szporluk, ed., The Influence ofEast Europe and the Soviet West on the USSR (New York: Praeger, 1976); Beliaev and Butorin, "Institutionalization of Soviet Sociology"; Katz, "Sociology in the Soviet Union"; L. Labedz, "Sociology as a Vocation," Survey 48 (19 63): 5764; J. G. Pankhurst, "Factors in the Post-Stalin Emergence of Soviet Sociology," Sociological Inquiry 52, no. 3 (1982): 165-183. 24. See Beliaev and Butorin, "Institutionalization of Soviet Sociology,"

P·4 2 5· 25. V. Zaslavsky, "Sociology in the Contemporary Soviet Union," Social Research 44, no. 2 (1977): 330-353, mentions an instruction letter ofthe CPSU Central Committee in 1973, according to which the right to work in social sciences was reserved to Party members. Moreover, as V. Shlapentoch emphasized in his recent book (The Politics ofSociology in the Soviet Union [Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1987]), changes in Party leadership usually resulted in a change in the higher sociological personnel. A new Party chairman would bring along (or promote) a new director of the institute, or a new president of the SSA, and thereby sponsor a "new approach in Soviet sociology." 26. Katz, "Sociology in the Soviet Union." 27. V. Korobeinikov, "Partiinyi komitet izuchaet obschestvennoe mnenie," Kommunist 12 (1983): 122-125. 28. Simirenko used "professionalization" in the sense of an evolution into a specialized occupation, whether or not the process led to becoming a liberal profession. See Simirenko, "Soviet and American Sociology." 29. W. D. Connor, "Socialist Sociology," Problems ofCommunism 4 (1972): 90-93; E. Dunn and S. Dunn, "More on Soviet Sociology," Current Anthropology 20, no. 1 (1979): 191-192; A. W. Gouldner, The Coming Crisis ofWestern Sociology (New York: Basic Books, 1970); Katz, "Sociology in the Soviet Union"; Kolaja, "An Observation on Soviet Sociology"; Shalin, "Development of Soviet Sociology"; Simirenko, "Soviet and American Sociology"; Zaslavsky, "Sociology in the Contemporary Soviet Union." 30. Kolaja, "An Observation on Soviet Sociology." 3 I. Connor, "Socialist Sociology." 32. Katz, "Sociology in the Soviet Union," p. 22. 33. A. Simirenko, "Comments on Kolaja, " Current Anthropology 19, no. 2 (197 8): 37734. P. Hollander, "Comments on Kolaja," Current Anthropology 19, no. 2



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(197 8): 375-376; I. 1. Horowitz, "Comments on Kolaja," Current Anthropology 19, no. 2 (1978): 376-377; 1. Labedz, "The Soviet Attitude to Sociology," Soviet Survey 10 (1956): 6-15; see Labedz, "Sociology as a Vocation." 35· A. Inkeles, What Is Sociology? An Introduction to the Discipline and Profession (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1964), p. I I 7. 36. Beliaev and Butorin, "Institutionalization ofSoviet Sociology"; Novikov, "The Sociological Movement"; Pankhurst, "Factors"; M. Vaughan, "Socialist Stratification and Sociological Survival," British Journal of Sociology 32, no. 2 (1986): 157-179; Voronitsyn, "Who Is Afraid?"; Voronitsyn, "New Center Created." See also Shalin, "Development of Soviet Sociology." 37. I have also summarized and discussed the nature of publications in Sotsiologicheskie issledovania in the review "Soviet Sociology and Sociology in the Soviet Union" in Annual Review ofSociology 14 (1988): 99-123. 38. G. S. Batygin and V. A. Popov, "Zhurnalu 'Sotsiologicheskie Issledovania' 10 let" (The journal Sociological Research is ten years old), Vestnik Akademii Nauk SSSR (Herald of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR) 55 (1985): 101-105· 39. Ibid. 40. G. Zaikina, "Otvet chitateliam," Sotsiologicheskie issledovania 3 (1982): 215-218. 41. These are references to Western sociology, predominantly recent and American, but also European and classical. 42. Classics onlY-9.78 percent; current leadership onlY-14.0 percent. Occasional references to the body of Marxist literature in the AJS and ASR papers cannot be considered comparable to Marxist sources in Soviet sociology. Whereas in the former case this literature is treated as one among several traditions within the discipline, in the latter it is treated as the source of ideological legitimation. Usually it has no connection to the findings of the paper and is evoked as an assertion of identity. 43. The references to printed materials that in themselves constitute and are treated as data are excluded from these calculations. 44. This is a measure of the isolation of Soviet sociology of which T. A. Jones speaks in a recent paper ("Introduction," Soviet Sociology 27, no. 4 [1988]: 4-12), and one reason for the difficulties Soviet sociologists are experiencing as they try to become more sophisticated. They have, in a way, to reinvent the wheel. The situation might be changing right now. Yet, it is still impossible to regard the reviews of Western theories, which in the last two years appear in Sotsiologicheskie issledovania with increasing frequency, as in any way impartial. 45. Editorial, "Razvitie sotsiologicheskikh issledovanii v SSSR i zadachi zhurnala," Sotsiologicheskie issledovania I (1974): 3-12.


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46. Editorial, "Razvitie," p. 5. 47. Novikov, "The Sociological Movement"; see also Shalin, "Development of Soviet Sociology." 48. Editorial, "Razvitie," p. 4. 49. Quoted by Zaslavskaya, "Rol' sotsiologii." 50. P. N. Fedoseev, "Povyshat' rol' sotsiologicheskoi nauki v reshenii problem kommunisticheskogo stroitel'stva," Sotsiologicheskie issledovania 2 (1983): 5-9, passim. 5 I. Editorial, "Razvitie," p. 4. 52. Editorial, "Sotsiologicheskie issledovania: resul'taty, problemy i zadachi," Sotsiologicheskie issledovania I (1981): 1-15 (Kommunist 1980/13:199 2 ). 53. M. B. Mitin and T. B. Riabushkin, "0 sootnoshenii teoreticheskogo i empiricheskogo v sotsiologii," Sotsiologicheskie issledovania 2 (1981): 50-57. 54. Fedoseev, "Povyshat' rol' sotsiologicheskoi," p. 7. 55. Editorial, "Razvitie," p. 5. 56. Editorial, "Partiinost' sotsiologicheskoi nauki," Sotsiologicheskie ISsledovania 4 (1980): 3-8, passim. 57. M. Rutkevich, "On Soviet Sociology," Current Anthropology 19, no. 3 (1978): 621. Another excellent example accessible to English-speaking readers is the special issue of Current Sociology: G. V. Osipov and M. N. Rutkevich, "Sociology in the USSR, 1965-1975," vol. 26, no. 2 (1978). 58. Editorial, "Partiinost'." 59. Mitin and Riabushkin, "0 sootnoshenii." 60. See Fedoseev, "Povyshat' rol' sotsiologicheskoi." 61. V. N. Ivanov, "Sotsiologicheskuiu nauku-na uroven' sovremennykh zadach obschestvennogo razvitia," Sotsiologicheskie issledovania 4 (1983): 3-8, quote on p. 7. 62. V. N. Ivanov, "Problemy razvitia sotsiologii," Vestnik akademii nauk 10 (19 8 5): 59-67· 63. Ideino-politicheskoe stanovlenie molodezhi: opyt, problemy (obsuzhdenie za 'kruglym stolom' redaktsii zhumalov 'Politicheskoe Samoobrazovanie'i 'Sotsiologicheskie issledovania'), Sotsiologicheskie issledovania 2 (1987): 22-23· 64. T. Zaslavskaya, "Economika skvoz' prizmu sotsiologii," Ekonomika i Organizatsiia Promyshlennogo Proizvodstva (Economics and Organization of Industrial Production) 7 (1985): 3-22, quote on p. 12. 65. Zaslavskaya, "Rol' sotsiologii," p. 2. 66. "Notes on the State of Soviet Sociology Today (Interview with Vladimir Shlapentokh)," Radio Liberty Research, RFE-RL 246/79 (1979). 67. "0 povyshenii roli marksistsko-Ieninskoi sotsiologii v reshenii uzlov-



ykh sotsial'nykh problem sovetskogo obschestva," Sotsiologicheskie issledovania 5 (1988): 3-5. 68. M. Rutkevich, "0 poniatii sotsial'noi struktury," Sotsiologicheskie issledovania 4 (1978): 29-41; see also M. Matthews, "Commentary on 'Sociology in the USSR 1965-1975'," Current Sociology 28, no. 2 (1980): 126-132; and Vaughan, "Socialist Stratification." 69. V. Kelle, "Institutsional'nye aspekty nauki kak faktory ee razvitia," Sotsiologicheskie issledovania 4 (198 I): 35-41. 70. M. Rutkevich, "Sblizhenie natsional'nykh respublik i natsii SSSR po sotsial'no-klassovoi strukture," Sotsiologicheskie issledovania 2 (1981): 14-21. 71. V. D. Patrushev, "Osnovnye itogi i zadachi issledovanii biudzhetov vremeni v SSSR," Sotsiologicheskie issledovania 3 (1981): 17-23. 72. V. A. Sysenko, "Ottsy i deti," Sotsiologicheskie issledovania 2 (1986): 94- 100 . 73. V. B. Olshansky, "Nachalo polozheno. Chto dal'she?" Sotsiologicheskie issledovania I (1987): 13-17. 74. A. A. Gabiani, "Narkomania: gor'kie plody sladkoi zhizni," Sotsiologicheskie issledovania I (1987): 48-54. 75. I. A. Dikarevich, "Potrebitel'skoe povedenie v usloviakh defitsita," Sotsiologicheskie issledovania 2 (1987): 65-68. 76. E. K. Tokareva, "Uzy braka i uzy svobody," Sotsiologicheskie issledovania 2 (1987): 83-91. Since there is no interpretation or argument behind

the wealth of data in these articles on most diverse topics, it would be both futile and meaningless to attempt to summarize this information in several pages; at the same time these data (accessible to sociologists in English in such publications as Soviet Sociology and other journals of translations) may be of interest to comparative sociologists in the West. 77. L. Greenfeld, "Russian Formalism: A Sociologist's Perspective," Slavic Review 46, no. I (1987): 38-54. 78. E. Gellner, "The Soviet and the Savage," Current Anthropology 16, no. 4 (1975): 595-601; E. Gellner, "Ethnicity and Anthropology in the Soviet Union," Archives europeennes de sociologie 18 (1977): 201-220; E. Gellner, Review of M. Matthews and T. A. Jones, "Soviet Sociology 1964-75," Slavonic and East European Review 57 (1979): 473-474; Greenfeld, "Soviet Sociology"; Labedz, "The Soviet Attitude to Sociology"; V. I. Plotkin and J. Howe, "The Unknown Tradition: Continuity and Innovation in Soviet Ethnography," Dialectical Anthropology 9 (1985): 1-4· 79. Shalin, "Development of Soviet Sociology," p. 171. 80. A. Tertz, The Trial Begins, and on Socialist Realism (New York: Vintage Books, 1960), p. 50.


CHAPTER

6

Teachers in the Soviet Union Anthony Jones

"In this country, the profession of schoolteacher is one of those most honored, most respected by the people."! Teaching has an ambiguous status in theories of the professions, since along with nursing it does not fit most of the defining characteristics of a profession. Although some nevertheless accept it as a profession, others would rather define it as a "serniprofession," and still others would deny it even this status, claiming that it is not, and can never become, a profession. To a large extent this is a consequence of the historical development of teaching as an occupation. Since education came to be defined as a national issue at the same time that citizenship rights were becoming institutionalized, the state assumed responsibility for operating schools and policing teachers at a fairly early stage in the development of industrial society. Health care did not become a national issue until much later, after the development of the welfare state, by which time physicians had used their market position to stake a successful claim to professional status. Legal services are not even now defined as a national issue in most industrial societies, and lawyers have therefore had the same historical opportunities that doctors have had in laying claim to self-regulation. It may well be the case that what we now see as structural and knowledge-based reasons for the problems teachers have had in trying to claim the status of professionals may themselves be the result of historical accident. Whatever the reasons for the existing differences may be, attempts at an exclusive taxonomy are probably not very fruitful for an understanding of these occupations, it being preferable to use a continuum of some kind. This would then force us to investigate the characteristics of successful claims to professional status, and to compare them


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with claims that meet with less success. Another approach is to look at the status these occupations attain in relation to the state, the continuum here being that of degrees of state intervention and control. This approach seems especially promising for those who wish to extend the analysis of professions to socialist societies, since it is in precisely these societies that the role of the state has been greatest, most open, and most deliberate. In addition, the issue ofstate involvement also provides a link with the growing interest in bureaucratic settings. In what follows we shall treat teaching as an example of a bureaucratic profession, concentrating on those characteristics that differentiate it from the "free" professions. 2 The sociological literature in the West has surprisingly little to say about Soviet teachers, although the number of studies of teachers in Europe and North America is very large. There are a few studies of teachers in socialist societies, such as those of Fiszman and Singer on Poland, and that of White on China, 3 but there are no studies of teachers in the USSR. This is surprising given the large Soviet literature on the topic, including some good empirical sociological studies. Given the large number of issues involved and the amount of data available to us in the Soviet literature, it will not be possible in this chapter to do more than to indicate the outlines of the teaching profession in the Soviet Union. However, in an attempt to be systematic and to provide a basis for drawing some general conclusions, we have chosen to organize the materials using a checklist derived from Leggatt. 4 Though not exhaustive, this list does cover most of the more central issues.

Six Dimensions of the Teaching Profession

Characteristics ofthe Practitioner Group In all industrial societies teachers are the largest of the professions, typically accounting for one-fifth to one-quarter of all professionals. Doctors and lawyers, often thought of as the quintessential professions, generally are no more than 2 or 3 percent. The Soviet situation is a little different, in that the relative size of professional groups is not as unbalanced. Thus, in 1987 there were 2,807,000 teachers, compared with 1,231,000 doctors and 23°,3°0 lawyers. 5 Since 1960 teachers have


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been about 2 percent of the labor force but have declined as a percentage of the white-collar workers, down from 9.6 percent in 1959 to 6.5 percent in 1979. 6 They are also a declining part of the labor force with higher and specialized secondary education, having been about onethird in 1941 and currently about 10 percent. 7 For teachers, one of the consequences of being such a large group is that their salaries tend to be among the lowest of those of all professional groups, usually along with nurses, the next-largest group. This is true also in the Soviet Union, where teaching has traditionally been among the lowest paid of all the professions. However, one of the distinctive characteristics of the Soviet situation is that in general the professions are not well paid. Skilled manual workers earn on the average more than most professionals do, although at the upper levels of the sciences, academia, and the bureaucracy, professionals are comparatively well paid. Thus, compared to other occupations, teachers in the USSR are poorly paid, and they have actually fallen further behind during the past few decades. For example, in 1940 teachers were paid the average national wage, receiving about the same income as workers in industry and in construction. By 1985 the figures were 150, 210, and 236 rubles, respectively.8 In the mid-to-late 1980s pay raises for teachers were introduced, and the average pay of elementary teachers is now about 214 rubles a month, that for those teaching the fourth through the tenth or eleventh grades being 228. Those in the specialized secondary schools now receive on the average about 250 rubles. Directors of secondary schools have average incomes in the 300- to 33o-ruble range. To provide a point ofcomparison, a surgeon under the new pay scales can expect an average income of 288 rubles a month. 9 Although these increases should ease the burdens of teachers, it needs to be remembered that workers in general are getting increases of about 25 percent, and skilled workers get two or three times as much again. The relative position will not change much, therefore, and the inflation that is increasing under the current economic reforms (plus the very high incomes of those working in the newly legalized private sector) may well erode the improvements in the position of teachers. So, teachers are still going to be poorly paid relative to many other occupations. While rural and urban teachers are paid the same, there are, of course, differentials according to number of years of service as well as between teachers of "fundamental" subjects (such as mathematics,



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physics, and language) and of "nonfundamental" courses (such as music, labor, and physical education). A second characteristic ofthe teaching profession is that it has a high percentage of females, this too being the case in the USSR. As of 19851986, 73 percent of all Soviet teachers were women, which is actually higher than in 1940-1941, when the percentage was only 60 percent. 10 Currently in Western societies the feminization of teaching has been said to be linked to a low level of cohesiveness of the profession, to high turnover, and to casual entry into and exit from the occupation. It is not possible to gauge cohesiveness in the Soviet context, although it is clear that a high turnover rate and casual entry and exit are in evidence. The third characteristic of the practitioner group of relevance for professionalization is the segmentation of teachers. Not only do the levels of prestige and pay differ according to the level being taught (preschool, elementary, lower and upper secondary), and the specialty taught (vocational versus academic, for example), but the type of training required for each segment is very different. Teaching in the USSR is segmented as it is elsewhere, as is the type of training provided, a topic to which we shall turn later.

The Knowledge Base The knowledge base of teaching has traditionally been seen in the West as one of the major barriers to its full professionalization, and we would expect this to be true in the Soviet Union as well, given the similarity in the teaching activity itself. Moreover, economic and social development tends, if anything, to weaken the knowledge base even further. For example, whereas in 1939 only 24.2 percent of the urban labor force had received at least some secondary education, the percentage had risen to 90.9 percent by 1987. During the same period those with higher education increased from 0.8 percent to 9 percent. 11 So, as the educational level of the population has increased, the gap between the knowledge of teachers and that of the general population has decreased-indeed, among a growing part of the general population the level of knowledge exceeds that of teachers. This is especially true in the urban areas, which have the highest levels of general education. At the same time the content of the teacher's knowledge base can come to be seen as increasingly irrelevant, as old fashioned and not


ANTHONY JONES

useful. There is a further and crucial difference between the knowledge base of teaching and other professions, and that is that along with "information," teachers convey social values, which invites intrusion by outsiders into the content of what is taught. Such intrusion is especially the case in the Soviet Union, since teachers are explicitly given the role of "molders" of what used to be called the "New Soviet Man." The various words used to describe teaching functions indicate the high socialization content of the teaching role, teachers being referred to variously as uchiteli and prepodavateli ("teachers"), and vospitateli ("upbringers"). Indeed, the most frequently used Russian word for education (obrazovanie) comes from the verb "to form." The ideological importance of teaching means that the state is intrusive in all aspects of teaching, from curriculum creation to books used to teaching method to an emphasis on "correct" attitudes and responses. Also, political materials form a large part of the curriculum, not just in special courses but as part of the materials used in academic subjects.

Patterns of Recruitment Teachers have traditionally been drawn from lower socioeconomic strata than has typically been the case for the elite professions. This has contributed to the relatively lower status of the profession, for "clearly an occupational group that recruits so heavily from the lower social classes and that provides an important avenue for social mobility can have no more than intermediate standing itself. "12 The Soviet experience has been remarkably similar to that in the West. Teaching is a specialty that is more appealing to those lower down and is an important (and often the sole) channel of upward mobility. In fact, Soviet teachers are second only to engineeringtechnical specialists in the percentage coming from peasant and working-class families. 13 Those who enroll in teacher training institutes (pedvuzy) come predominantly from working and peasant families, and the lower the prestige of the institution and the more provincial its location, the lower the social origins of its students. In many pedvuzy as many as 80 percent ofthe students are from lower backgrounds, and rural students are frequently in the majority. Though generally oflow status among the professions, teaching is a major avenue of mobility for both males and females in rural areas, and although they are given priority in the admissions process (in order to try to solve the desperate



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shortage of teachers in rural areas), few of them actually return to the village, or even end up as teachers. Recruiting people into teaching has been a difficult task in the Soviet Union for a long time. Surveys of young people show that teaching is not in general ranked very high. For males, teaching usually comes about twentieth in studies of prestige rankings, whereas for girls it is usually in the top ten. For rural girls it frequently ranks in the first three, since it is one of the few specialties that they can realistically expect to use as a ticket out of the village ifthey do not have any special talents or aptitudes. A recent account of the state of the profession included the often heard lamentation that "in terms of popularity the teaching profession ranks almost last in our country today. Enrollment in teacher-training institutions is declining year after year. "14 Among the attempts to combat this problem has been a scheme to involve pupils in secondary schools in teaching activities, providing classes in pedagogy and onthe-job experience in an effort to encourage them to go into pedvuzy after graduating from high school. The quality of those pupils who become involved in this scheme, however, tends not to be very high. 15 The choice of teaching as a career in the Soviet Union seems to be a rather haphazard affair. Though it is true that many young people make a conscious and early decision to become a teacher, and apply for admission to a university or pedvuz with this in mind, others drift in or are drafted.

Training and Career For the professions the period of training is when access to the occupation's special knowledge base occurs. In the USSR, however, the extent to which professional preparation occurs is rather low and even haphazard. As in other societies, teacher training is segmented. Elementary school teachers are trained in special secondary schools, whereas those destined for the secondary levels are trained either in pedagogical institutes (pedvuzy) or in universities. Students go to the pedagogy schools mainly after finishing the eighth grade, at the age of fifteen. The course of study lasts for four years, except for a small number who enter after the tenth grade, who take only two years. Their experience oflife is therefore very limited, and their level of academic performance is generally not very high, either. Moreover, most of the tenth-grade entrants are not really


ANTHONY JONES

interested in becoming teachers and are only marking time while they try to get into higher education (but not into a pedvuz, however).16 Those in the pedvuzy are trained in one or more subjects (only 35 percent or so do one subject), and they are given courses in psychology, child development, and pedagogical methods, and are required to do practice teaching. Pedvuzy emphasize the socialization function of teaching and are supposed to be training teacher-propagandists, teacher-activists, and teacher-indoctrinators. 17 For decades, though, there have been complaints about the ineffectiveness of these programs, about the low level of knowledge and understanding of the students. Also, pedvuzy are often criticized for showing too much interest in research and not enough in political socialization, for putting too much emphasis on subjects at the expense of developing teaching interests and skills. Developmental psychology and child psychology are given only slight coverage. In the 1970s, in an attempt to recruit young people with an interest in teaching, future teacher divisions were set up in pedvuzy to target secondary-school pupils and prepare them for teacher training. Those in the universities, however, receive very little in the way of pedagogical training, the emphasis being on the academic subjectsthis in spite of the fact that in all but the most elite universities most graduates are sent into teaching. In the 1970S efforts were made to improve the preparation students receive in universities, and there was increasing emphasis on the introduction of courses in pedagogy. But the quality and quantity ofsuch exposure remains low, no more than 4 or 5 percent ofclassroom time being given to this. In general, then, we can say that professional socialization of teachers is rather weak at all levels of training. The first position a teacher obtains in his or her career is usually assigned by the ministry. Assignment time is a time of high stress for those newly entering the ranks of the profession. It usually means leaving the urban area where most pedvuzy and universities are and going to teach in the countryside, a fate to be avoided if possible. Most are not able to avoid it, however, and 60 to 80 percent of new graduates are assigned to rural areas. As a result, there is a long history of these teachers' not showing up at their assigned place of work. An additional problem is that most of the students in pedvuzy are women, and since they generally marry students from other colleges and specialities, this means that they have to be assigned a job in the same



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place as their spouse. As a result, much of the labor entering the profession is not flexible or very mobile geographically. The low commitment of many who end up assigned to teaching positions is shown by the fact that every year large numbers just fail to show up at their assigned school. The no-show rate at rural schools is very high, with reports in some areas of 40 percent or more not arriving where sent. Once in place, however, teachers have many opportunities for promoting their career. The state encourages teachers to upgrade their qualifications through further education, up to and including the candidate degree (roughly the equivalent of the Ph. D.). Also, teachers are encouraged to do research, to publish papers and articles (for which they are well paid), and to be active in teachers' organizations, to attend symposia and conferences, and go to regional and national conferences ofteachers. There are also many honors and awards for which teachers are eligible, some ofthem general awards and some ofthem specifically for teachers. These awards also carry an extra stipend. Since the 1970S certification has been made mandatory for continuing in the profession, and teachers are expected to attend refresher courses and to be recertified every five years. Although this requirement has not become universal yet (because of the great shortage of teachers in some areas), it has apparently improved the overall level of teachers. Once certified, teachers have tenure, providing, of course, that they do not commit some serious offense or become totally incompetent.

Organizational Context and Clientele Though practitioners from many professions work within organizations, teaching is unique in that it takes place entirely within an organizational setting. It is, as we defined it earlier, a bureaucratic profession, and this is the case in all societies. Nevertheless, there are some differences from society to society, mainly in the extent to which there are multiple forms of "ownership" of the organization. Although teachers generally work in publicly owned schools, in most societies there are also private schools and those run by religious organizations. As a result, schools may end up competing for pupils, and they may also be able to control who is enrolled and who is not. For example, teachers in a school that can admit and expel pupils as it sees fit are clearly in a different organizational context than teachers in


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schools that cannot. In the Soviet Union the absence of privately owned schools until very recently means that teachers have had only one potential employer, the state. Unlike other professions, therefore, there are as a rule almost none who are self-employed, save for those few who can survive as tutors. Tutoring is a major industry in the USSR, although it is done mainly as a sideline to full-time employment in a school. The organizational setting also means that teachers are not providing a service to single clients, but to groups. Moreover, teachers do not have much control over who their clients will be, since they are assigned to an already formed class. This multiple-client form of service also means that there is no "privacy" when providing the service. More than almost any other profession, teaching is a public act, making it very difficult to create and maintain an aura of mystery. The lack of an intermediary, such as a receptionist or a secretary, also means that teachers have no buffer between themselves and their clients. Lortie has suggested that teachers still have some protection through "zoned decision making, " which means that they may have a relatively free hand in the classroom, but the use of a curriculum can reduce even this degree of autonomy considerably. Soviet teachers have no control over the curriculum or the choice of books to be used. Moreover, the curriculum spells out in great detail the materials to be covered and the approach to be taken in presenting them. In providing clients, the organization also creates conditions that can further undermine professional status. Since attendance for pupils is compulsory, classroom concerns can quickly shift from attention to the knowledge base to concerns about maintaining order and discipline. Indeed, in many schools discipline has become a serious concern. Although discipline has apparently not become a major issue in the Soviet Union (although there are reports ofdifficulty in vocational schools and boarding schools), teachers have in recent years lost one of their means of eliminating problem pupils. Until the move to universal secondary education in the late 1960s and early 1970s, teachers could persuade pupils to leave after the eighth grade and go to work or to a vocational school. With the drive to keep pupils in school longer, however, teachers came under great pressure from the authorities to retain as many students in the system as possible, and at almost any cost. As in the West, this led to grade inflation as teachers were pressured by parents and pupils to give them grades that would keep



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them in school and not hurt their chances of going on to higher education. Since teachers were evaluated in terms of the grades their pupils received, there was little room for escape. To date, though, Soviet teachers do not seem to be as troubled as are their Western counterparts about issues of classroom order or safety. Unlike many professionals, teachers everywhere have an indeterminate clientele. It is not clear exactly who their clients are. Is it the pupils, the parents, or the school authorities? Or all three in varying combinations? In the Soviet case it is clear that the client is the state, although informal pressures can be exerted by parents and pupils, especially in the assignment of grades. Since the state is the client, however, the teacher has an enormous amount of power in dealing with parents, who are often given stern lectures on the shortcomings of their children. Even casual observation of parent-teacher "conferences" enables one to see how much teachers are able to dominate the situation. Relations with the Environment

Professions handle their relations with the environment through professional associations, which operate to restrict the intrusion of outside controls and to maintain the boundary between the profession and the outside world. Intrusion is a particularly difficult thing for teachers to prevent, however, given the characteristics of their work. A nonexclusive knowledge base, the transmission of values, and the retention of the right of parents to restrict what may be done to their children in the classroom all weaken the boundary of the teaching occupation. Although the state is highly intrusive, some degree of boundary maintenance is possible through various organizations. Most (more than 90 percent) teachers belong to the USSR Trade Union of Workers in Education, Higher Schools, and Research Establishments, as, however, do clerks, cleaners, and others who work in education. Although unable to bargain on behalf of its members, the union does act as a conduit for its members' interests. Until two years ago, it also published the main teachers' newspaper, The Teachers Gazette, which was a powerful vehicle for putting pressure on local and even national officials. In addition, teachers also have another dozen or so special newspapers that serve just them, and there are more than thirty pedagogical journals as well.


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The main organ of the profession is the Academy of Pedagogical Sciences of the USSR. This conducts advanced research, trains graduate students and staff for the pedvuzy, and advises the state on educational reforms. It is also involved in working out the details of educational reforms. Membership in the academy is by the election of its members, and not by outside appointment. It is difficult to measure how much power teachers and their organizations have, but there are indications that it might be considerable. For example, unpopular reforms have a habit of not being fully implemented or of being subverted (the list of examples is long), and the lack of progress of the 1984 reforms showed that resistance within the profession was making itself felt. In 1987 resistance of teachers at republic-level congresses to attempts to introduce new teaching methods was so strong that the national conference was postponed for many months to give the authorities time to deal with the situation. 18

Similarities and Differences between .the Soviet and Western Teaching Professions Emphasis on Socialization In the West education has been built on a socializing institution. As Banks has noted in the case of Britain and the United States, both are the inheritors in the late twentieth century of "a massive tradition of education as socialization: Schools are first and foremost about molding and shaping people and to only a secondary degree about the acquisition of skill, knowledge and understanding."19 This is even more true of the Soviet Union, where education is explicitly at the forefront of the institutions of socialization. White's comments on education in China are equally applicable to the USSR: "Since teachers are 'cultural intellectuals' not engaged in directly productive activity, the Party has regarded them as less sacrosanct than their technicoscientific counterparts, exerting greater political pressure with less fear of immediate damage to economic objectives. At the same time teachers have attracted political pressure because of their multi-faceted importance for socialist development: i.e. leaving aside their economic and technological role in training personnel for the modernization effort, they are ideologically crucial for transmitting 'correct' attitudes



to rising generations and politically crucial as a key component of the system of mobilization, control, and compliance which links the state with the nation's youth."20

Trends in Training and Social Background Although training remains more differentiated for teachers than for other professions, there is a trend in the West (in France, Britain, and Germany, for example) toward training teachers for all levels in universities, the United States having gone furthest in closing the gap. This trend is also occurring in the Soviet Union. In Britain and America the social background of teachers varies according to the grade taught, the socioeconomic status of their origins increasing as we move from the elementary grades to the upper levels of the secondary system. Over time, however, there has been a decline in the social status of those at the upper levels, among both men and women. There has been little change, though, at the elementary level, although some decline has occurred in the United States. 21 In the Soviet Union there has been a general decline in the social origins of teachers at all levels.

The Search for Innovation As the status of the profession has changed and as the complexity of the demands made on teachers has increased, many industrial societies have searched for innovative methods of teacher training. 22 Such a search has occurred also in the Soviet Union during the past twentyfive years, although attempts to encourage new methods have not been very successful. The ways in which teachers are evaluated and the extent to which the curriculum dominates the classroom have made it difficult for teachers to accept innovation. Yet another attempt is now being made to "destructure" the classroom, to move away from lectures and memorization toward interactive teaching, and to bring a degree of democracy and creativity. Though many teachers are open to such change, there is also a great deal of resistance.

Professional Attitudes and Identification Soviet research has not to date investigated the extent to which teachers perceive themselves to be a profession, but we do have some partial evidence from studies done by Horowitz. She compares the attitudes of American and Soviet teachers who have immigrated to


ANTHONY JONES

Israel. What she finds is that Soviet teachers apparently have a higher commitment to continuing to work in the occupation (78. I percent of her sample) than do American teachers (42.6 percent). Also, Soviet teachers were more likely to be members of professional associations in their home country (80 percent) than were the American teachers (58 percent). On a range ofissues related to professionalism, including commitment to the occupation, evaluation of the status of the occupation, receptivity to in-service training, desire for certification, and selfconfidence in the role, Soviet teachers were more positive in their attitudes than were their American counterparts. 23 One might tentatively conclude, therefore, that Soviet teachers are more "professional" in their orientation than are American teachers. On tests of attitudes toward teaching methods Soviet teachers were found to be far more "custodial" in their approach than were the American teachers. They put high emphasis on control and on keeping relationships with pupils as impersonal as possible. This maintenance of distance may be one of the ways a sense of professionalism is maintained. Horowitz's findings are surprising, since one might expect that the inability of Soviet teachers to form autonomous associations and the close political controls exercised over their teaching methods and curriculum content would counteract any tendencies toward developing a professional identity. Although it is not possible to say with certainty why such professionalism nevertheless develops, it may well be due to the environment in which the Soviet teacher works. In spite of a high level of intrusion from the environment, that environment seems to foster very strongly the notion of teaching as a professional activity. The close link between teachers and the regime's socialization goals means that teaching has great support from the ideological environment for its status, as it is perceived to be something beyond the mere conveyance of information. In addition, Soviet teachers benefit from being defined as part ofthe intelligentsia. This means that teachers are part of a stratum including physicians, lawyers, accountants, engineers, architects, and so forth. In the Soviet context the intelligentsia not only has high status, it is also virtually synonymous with the professions. Although teachers have fairly low status within the intelligentsia, their membership still conveys high status in the general occupational structure. The absence of a separate group of occupations called an intelligentsia in the West



probably makes it more difficult for teachers to sustain their claims to professional status.

Conclusion What this brieflook at teachers in the Soviet Union suggests is that professional status may not necessarily be more difficult to achieve merely because an occupation operates in a bureaucratic setting. It may well be that it is the kind and degree of support that the occupation receives from its environment that decides the extent to which professional status is acquired. It is ironic that the high degree of control that the state imposes on teachers in the Soviet Union seems to enhance their sense of being a profession, whereas the lower level ofintrusion in the West seems to make professionalism more difficult. The key in these differences may be that less intrusion means more fragmentation and weak occupational boundaries (and identification), whereas high intrusion prevents fragmentation and thus increases the possibility of professional identification.

Notes I. Leonid Brezhnev, quoted in F. R. Fillipov, "The Sociological Problems of Pedagogical Cadres," Soviet Education, October 1984, p. 7. 2. In this survey we shall consider school teachers only, not those working in higher education. 3. J. R. Fiszman, Revolution and Tradition in People's Poland (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1972); G. Singer, Teacher Education in a Communist State (New York: Bookman Associates, 1965); G. White, Party and Professionals: The Political Role of Teachers in Contemporary China (Armonk, N.Y.: M. E. Sharpe, 1981). 4. T. Leggatt, "Teaching as a Profession," in J. A. Jackson, ed., Professions and Professionalization (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970), pp. 153- 177. 5. Narodnoe khoziaistvo, Moscow, 1987, pp. 4 87, 54 1, 373· 6. Sotsial'naia sfera, Moscow, 1987, p. 2II. 7. Fillipov, "Sociological Problems," p. 72. 8. SSSR v tsifrakh v 1985g, Moscow, 1986, pp. 188-190. 9. Vestnik statistiki 5 (1988): 64, 66.


166

ANTHONY JONES

Vestnik statistiki I (1987): 56. Narodnoe khoziaistvo, Moscow, 1987, pp. 476-477. 12. Leggatt, "Teaching as a Profession," p. 160. 13. Fillipov, "Sociological Problems," p. 72. 14. Current Digest ofthe Soviet Press 36, no. 17 (1984): 15. 15. Ibid. 16. Fillipov, "Sociological Problems," p. 84. 17. J. Zaida, Soviet Education (New York: Pergamon Press, 1980), p. 235. 18. Current Digest ofthe Soviet Press 39, no. 23 (1987): 22. 19. O. Banks, The Sociology ofEducation (London: Batsford, 1976), p. 182. 20. White, Party and Professionals, p. 3. 21. M. Betz and J. Garland, "The Intergenerational Mobility Rates of Teachers," Sociology ofEducation 47 (1974)· 22. D. Lomax, ed., European Perspectives in Teacher Education (New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1976). 23. T. Horowitz, "Professionalism and Semi-Professionalism among Immigrant Teachers from the USSR and North America," Comparative Education 21, no. 3 (1985): 297-307. 10.

I I.


CHAPTER

7

Constraints on Professional Power in Soviet-Type Society: Insights from the 1980-1981 Solidarity Period in Poland Michael D. Kennedy Konrad Sadkowski

Professionalism is a matter of collective power. It is one strategy used by members ofhighly educated occupations to transform their control over scarce knowledge and skills into various forms of privilege. 1 Professional power is augmented when members of an occupation increase their ability (I) to control the conditions of their occupational practice and reproduction and (2) to shape other institutions, particularly of distribution, in their collective interest. Various occupations have had notably different measures of success in this professional project. U. S. physicians between 1900 and 1970 are considered the prototypical profession in both power and privilege. 2 Their professional power exceeds that of physicians in other societies where the state is more interventionist. 3 Sociologists also have used the U.S. medical profession as the standard by which to illustrate the more limited professionalization of other occupations. This standard is useful when considering U. S. engineers, as they seem to have been notably unsuccessful in their "professional" project. They were, however, rather successful in the first half of this century in blending their occupational interests with corporate power. 4 Understanding professionalism as a strategy for enhancing an occupation's power suggests that this concept is useful not only for etic


168

MICHAEL D. KENNEDY AND KONRAD SADKOWSKl

comparison but also for emic interpretation. This is especially true in Soviet-type societies,5 as professionals have used the historical success of U.S. physicians as a gauge of their own occupational accomplishments. In 1980-1981 Polish physicians and engineers struggled to increase their own professional power but were obliged to create models of professionalism appropriate to the contemporary conflict. By explaining the nature of the struggle for professionalization in this period in Poland, we can clarify both the constraints on and prospects for professional power in Soviet-type society.

Physicians and Engineers Comparing physicians and engineers6 is extremely useful for illuminating this professional project in Soviet-type society because these professions bring with them very different power resources. Physicians in the modern world system have an authority built into their professional work that provides a foundation for considerable power. Their practice is not only rooted in the sacrosanct belief system of modern science but their relationship to clients is relatively unmediated by external authorities. Their service is intangible and provided directly to final consumers. Although medical practice is legally sanctioned, it relies on personal trust. Physicians' professional power is rooted in a professional authority reproduced in interpersonal relations. Engineers also depend on modern science for their cognitive base. But unlike physicians, engineers produce a very tangible product. The engineer's practice therefore is regulated more easily by external agents. Too, the purchaser of the engineer's product is normally not the final consumer. In comparison with the physician, the engineer trades with a more organized and better informed client, representing an enterprise, the state, or some other complex organization. The engineer is also much more likely than the physician to be salaried rather than self-employed and thus is much less "professional." The engineer does not have the interpersonal foundation for professional power retained by physicians, but she might have greater organizational power at her disposal. Modern societies are differentiated not only by class but also organizationally. This is quite obvious in the analysis of capitalist labor


CONSTRAINTS ON PROFESSIONAL POWER

markets, where workers face very different possibilities depending on whether they are in monopoly or competitive sectors. Professionals also face this organizational inequality. Professionals who work in the organizationally privileged sectors of society face greater possibilities for power and privilege, regardless of their own internal organization. Throughout the world teachers are among the weakest professions not only because they are not well organized, or have not secured an exclusive cognitive base, but also because their entire sector is slighted in favor of more "productive" sectors like manufacturing, or more "influential" sectors like the military. Physicians are a relatively homogeneous group whose interest in healing can find considerable reward, but only in those societies sufficiently unequal that the wealthy can reward the physicians who attend them. Where health care has been socialized or nationalized, physicians face more limited prospects for power and privilege. In these conditions, the "collective health" must compete for resources with those sectors that are more "productive" and capital generating. Physicians, along with other care givers, will generally fare more poorly under these conditions. Engineers, by contrast, are potentially the ideal servant for industrial society. They are the profession that unites theoretical and scientific knowledge with the practical arts. Their innovations are those that can increase the efficiency and capital accumulation of manufacturing and increase the destructive potential of militaries' armaments. They are the likely allies of the organizationally powerful. Some, including Thorstein Veblen, even thought them to be a potentially new ruling class. 7 Engineers are, however, much more heterogeneous than are physicians. Their cognitive base is more varied, with more different intellectual ancestors than the physician's. The engineer is descended from the civil engineer, the military engineer, and the industrial engineer; the physician, from the healer. 8 This means that the power and privilege of engineers will likely be more differentiated than that of the physician. It also means that it will be more difficult to identify the "interest" of engineers. These remarks are applicable to engineers and physicians in most contexts, but engineers and physicians in Soviet-type societies have special institutional conditions that make their experience distinctive. In this system the rise ofengineers over other professionals symbolizes


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MICHAEL D. KENNEDY AND KONRAD SADKOWSKI

the triumph of revolutionary modernization. Although the professional power of physicians might also symbolize a new order, one that is more humane, physicians are not considered the principal representative of the new socialist intellectual. But like engineers in other countries, both physicians and engineers in Soviet-type society typically face a more powerful and more organized client than do physicians in the United States. In Soviet-type society the state aggregates to itself control over the conditions of occupational practice and reproduction as well as the logic of distribution. 9 The professional project in Soviet-type society thus must confront state power directly, and either push it back or coopt it. The activities of Polish physicians and engineers in the period from the summer of 1980 to December 13, 198 I, illustrate both forms of this struggle. The strikes of the summer of 1980 led to the formation of the independent self-governing trade union Solidarity. On December 13, 1981, martial law was declared by the Polish authorities, and the experiment with the institutionalization ofself-organization in Soviettype society was ended temporarily. Because of the period's organizational pluralism and limited censorship, professional discussions of the constraints on and prospects for professional power are readily accessible and can complement those interpretations based on a more etic model of professionalism. Before we turn to the main object of our inquiry, several contexts for that study must be established. First, we provide a brief portrait of the medical and engineering professions in Poland. Second, we clarify the relationship between professionalism and the other identity typically embraced by those with higher educations in Eastern Europe: the intelligentsia. Third, the place of professionals in the class structure of Soviet-type society is clarified. Last, the role played by professionals in the Solidarity period is surveyed briefly.

Polish Engineers and Physicians: A Statistical Profile

In 1980 the highly educated numbered 915,557 out of 12,797,900 employees (7. 15 percent) in the socialized economy. Physicians constituted 5.9 percent and engineers in technical, agricultural, and forestry occupations 38.0 percent ofthat highly educated group. Mechan-



ical and construction engineers were the most common specialties of engineers, with 24.4 percent and I I. 5 percent, respectively (Table 7. 1).10 Among physicians, internal medicine, pediatrics, and surgery are the most common, with 17.8 percent, 14.7 percent, and 12.7 percent, respectively. 11 Men and women are disproportionately represented in this distribution. Engineering is an overwhelmingly masculine occupation: women are only 19.9 percent ofengineers in technical occupations, although they are 41.0 percent of the profession in "nontechnical" fields like agricultural engineering. Among physicians, women are a majority, with 5I. 6 percent. In dentistry they are especially predominant, with 82.3 percent ofthis specialty (Table 7. 1).12 More women than men apply to medical schools, but law mandates that equal numbers of men and women be admitted. Nevertheless, women tend to wind up in less prestigious specialties than men, as men are more often found in surgery than women, and women more in pediatrics than men. The average monthly wage for all those in the socialized economy in 1981 was 6,040 zlotys. The average for all highly educated workers was 6,902 zlotys. The average monthly wage of engineers in technical fields was 7,704 zlotys, while physicians on average earned 7,800 zlotys. These means conceal extremely wide variation, however. Mining engineers were the most highly paid professionals, with a monthly wage Ofll,I62 zlotys in January 1981. Only 16.3 percent of all physicians earned more than 10,000 zlotys in that month. On the other side, zoological engineers and food industry engineers, both groups working in heavily feminized occupations, earned on average only 6,13 I and 6,276 zlotys per month, respectively. Likewise, dentists, in another feminized occupation, earned an average of 6,33 I zlotys (Table 7.1).13 In general, as in the West, the feminization of an occupation, or of a specialization within an occupation, is associated with its having lower wages. 14 Irena Reszke argues, however, that feminization does not affect the prestige ofa Polish occupation negatively. The central feature underlying the prestige of occupations is the "value of a given occupation for society. "15 Indeed, despite its relative feminization, the prestige of medicine remains quite high in Polish public opinion. In 1975 the physician ranked second in the prestige hierarchy ofoccupations, surpassed only by the university professor. The engineer ranked sixth, following the


172


7. I. State Sector Employees and Those with Higher Education, by Gender (1980) and Average Monthly Wage in Zlotys Oanuary 1981)

TABLE

All

Men

Women

Wage

% Women

12,797,000

7,107,100

5,689,900

6,040

44.5

Educated employees I

915,557

507,426

408,131

6,902

44.6

Engineers in technical occupations Mechanical Mining Electrical Electronic Metallurgical Road construction Sanitation Architectural Chemical Textile Food industry

300,503 85,009 10,612 36,826 19,471 10,064 39,977 10,914 7,882 26,227 5,674 6,781

240,779 79,356 9,676 32,905 16,525 8,540 30,687 7,020 5,003 13,716 2,966 2,850

59,724 5,653 936 3,921 2,946 1,614 9,290 3,894 2,879 12,511 2,708 3,931

7,704 7,832 11,162 7,796 6,953 7,886 7,720 7,712 7,851 6,877 7,780 6,276

19.9 6.6 8.8 10.6 15.1 16.0 23.2 35.7 36.5 47.7 47.7 58.0

Engineers in agricultural occupations 2 Forestry Veterinary Agricultural Zoological

55,482 4,733 8,140 20,508 9,057

35,114 4,095 6,898 12,521 4,474

20,368 638 1,242 7,987 4,583

6,702 6,437 8,091 6,704 6,131

37.2 13.5 15.3 38.9 50.6

Physicians

53,617

25,931

27,686

7,800

51.6

Dentists

15,692

2,775

12,917

6,331

82.3

State sector employees

1 That is to say. those with degrees. 2Including veterinarians.

Sources: Rocznik Statystyczny (1982), pp. 60, 121; Rocznik Statystyczny (1981), p. 170.

mmlster of national government, teacher, and chief manager in a factory (Table 7.2).16 Clearly, however, various specialties rank quite differently within these occupations. Experts in the analysis of socioeconomic differentiation and students both rank the surgeon in the top ten in a Soo-position occupational prestige scale; the director of a regional hospital is classified as number 27 among students and number 21 among experts. The rankings of engineers vary even more widely. An architectural engineer is ranked number 8 by students, while a mining engineer is ranked number 133 by them (Table 7.3).17


173


TABLE

7.2.

Prestige Hierarchy of Occupations in Poland, 1975

1. University professor 2. Physician 3. Minister of national government 4. Teacher 5. Chief manager in a factory 6. Engineer 7. Miner 8. Journalist 9. Priest 10. Agronomist 11. Army officer 12. Lawyer 13. Nurse 14. Supervisor on state farm 15. Office supervisor

16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30.

Factory foreman Accountant Lathe turner Electrical technician Small farmer Private locksmith Private tailor Truck driver Shopkeeper Sales clerk Office clerk Typist Unskilled construction worker Unskilled state farm laborer Cleaning woman

Source: Adapted from Michal Pohoski, Kazimierz Slomczynski, and Wlodzimierz Wesolowski, "Occupational Prestige in Poland, 1958-75," Polish Sociological Bulletin 4 (1975): 75.

In sum, professionals are among the most prestigious occupations in Poland, as they are in other industrial societies. Physicians are especially prestigious in Poland, although some specializations are more esteemed than others. Professional wages are higher than the average wage in Poland, but the feminization of a specialty is associated with lower wages, as is the case in other societies. Engineers are the most common professional in Poland, as they are in other Communist Party-led societies. But neither engineers nor physicians have the autonomous power normally indicative of professionalism, as we shall see. The "professional" is but one identity assumed by those with higher educations in Eastern Europe, however. In order to understand adequately the professional project there, we must understand also the relationship between the professional and the intelligentsia in Eastern Europe.

Professionals and Intelligentsia in Eastern Europe To use the term "professional" when referring to the highly educated in Eastern Europe requires caution. The traditional term used to de-


174


7.3. Engineering, Medical, and Other Selected Occupations and Their Rank Among 500 Occupations in Prestige Hierarchy, According to Students and Experts

TABLE

Students' Rank 1 2 7

8 12 14 16 17

24 27 34 35

40 44

52 58 66

74 83 105 107 123 129 133 135 144

204

Occupation Rector of Higher Study (head of a university) University professor Surgeon Architectural engineer Dept. director in ministry General of Polish army Scientific researcher with doctorate Director oflarge industrial enterprise Road construction engineer Director of regional hospital Dentist Chief engineer in production unit Asst. director for technical affairs in factory Chemical engineer Mechanical engineer Agronomical engineer Regional physician Director of medical outpatient clinic Veterinarian Sanitation engineer Sociologist Work norms engineer Grade school teacher Mining engineer Engineer of rail transportation Chemical technician Train conductor

Experts' Rank 2 4 9

36 1

5 23

8 93 21

60 33 50 70

65 84 55 54 94 87 107 141 171 44 100 195 229

Source: Adapted from Kazimierz Slomczynski and Grazyna Kacprowicz. Skofe Zowodow (Warsaw: Polish Academy of Sciences. 1979). pp. 71-87.

scribe this Eastern European intellectual stratum is "intelligentsia." This is not an East European equivalent for western "professionals." "Intelligentsia" is a word with East European origins connoting far more than people with a common type of occupation. In the early modern period it was more of an estate with a certain lifestyle, a particular ethos, and even a special morality. Gella defined the old Polish intelligentsia as "a culturally homogenous social stratum of educated people united by charismatic feelings and a certain set of



175

values. "18 When the term came to be applied to postrevolutionary Eastern Europe, it was changed so that it represented a set of people with certain nonmanual occupations. 19 Sometimes it referred to all those in nonmanual occupations, and other times only to those with higher educations. Polish sociologists have for the most part abandoned this term in their statistical research and refer to this group as "specialists with higher education" (specjalisci z wyzszym wyksztalceniem). The typical translation of this term is "professionals." The practical utility of such a translation is obvious. Many of the same occupations that constitute the professions in the West are those same occupations that constitute specialists with higher education in the East: engineers, physicians, lawyers, and so on. They share with Western professionals a similar cognitive base and a common form of discourse. 20 There are, of course, many ways in which professionals in Soviettype society differ from professionals in market societies. East European professionals share few of the characteristics of organizational autonomy sociologists consider indicative of an occupation's professionalism. 21 What is more, the rise of professionalism is linked to the development of an autonomous civil society within capitalism, whereas in East Central Europe, the growth of the intellectual and professional stratum was linked to the struggle by the intelligentsia to conquer the state apparatus. 22 Contemporary differences follow that historical pattern: Western professions are characterized by the services they provide to others, minimizing the goal-setting component of their activity; in contrast, the East European intelligentsia is defined in large part by this teleological component and thus represents a fundamentally different kind of intellectual. 23 Although there are several reasons why the East European intelligentsia can be distinguished from the Western professional in capitalism, in other important ways these intellectuals are sufficiently similar to merit use of a common term. Perhaps one of the most significant is their own self-consciousness and discourse. At the end of the I970S in Poland there was renewed interest in the proper role of the intelligentsia. A real intelligentsia, it was argued, should not be consumed with narrow self-interested careerism, but rather should be committed to defend the interests of the Polish nation. 24 The Workers Defense Committee (Komitet Obrony Robotnikow, or KOR) epitomized this traditional role of the intelligentsia, in



that intellectuals from different fields were actively engaged in common political work supporting oppressed workers and their famiii·es. 25 Alongside of this traditional intelligentsia model for the highly educated there is also a more "professional" model: the group Experience and the Future (Doswiadczenie i Przszyszlosc, or DiP).26 Here, instead of a generalized political opposition, members of the intelligentsia used their particular professional expertise to suggest concrete reforms in order to relieve specific problems facing Poland. There were groups specializing in social policy, economic policy, health policy, and so on. 27 Szelenyi's model of professionalism is more relevant to DiP, since its members emphasized technical expertise more than a general obligation of political leadership in their activities. 28 Both KOR and DiP were composed of intellectual elites. The masses of highly educated workers were not involved actively in these transformative groups, but they were a significant audience for their ideas. This became obvious in the Solidarity period, when all sectors of society contributed to the reconstruction of the institutions of Polish life. Professionals were involved in both general political (intelligentsia) and occupationally specialized (professional) forms. It is important to recognize, therefore, that among the masses ofthe highly educated in Poland there is a kind of dual consciousness: an affinity with the historical intelligentsia combined with a professional ethos. Among those without some kind of technical expertise, the traditional political role of the intelligentsia is more likely to be emphasized. KOR, for instance, was by and large composed of traditional intellectuals like writers and historians. 29 But for those with some kind of technical expertise, the traditional intelligentsia commitment to the nation is likely to be played out within some specific professional expertise. In the discourse of 1980-1981 we find engineers talking about helping the nation to escape the crisis through economic reform and self-management; physicians offer schemes to relieve the crisis in health care. Given this emphasis on technical expertise among the highly educated masses, especially among those with some form of technical or applied training, we think it legitimate to call some of the highly educated in Poland "professionals," even while noting that there are important differences between professionals in East and West.



177

Professionals in Between Class analysis in Soviet-type society normally identifies the ruling class as those having control over the means of production, a control that is based on their hegemony in the bureaucratic and planning apparatus. 30 The ruled or exploited class finds its center in the traditional working class but can sometimes incorporate all those who are employees of the state, including professionals. Some of the discourse of 1980-1981 reinforces this image. Representatives from several large enterprises formed an association called the Network (Siec) to promote social ownership of the means of production, so as to end "state capitalism" and the class privilege of the "owners of the Polish Peoples Republic."31 In this depiction of class relations, professionals and workers are equally dominated. The terminology of the period reflected this consciousness, too. In the "we" and "they" division, the "we" evolved from membership in a particular factory (my pracownicy zakladu X) to membership in a particular occupation (my gornicy) to "we workers" (my robotnicy) to "we authentic representatives of the class of employees" (my autentycznym representantem klasy pracujacej) to people of work (ludzie pracy)32 versus them, or the authorities (oni, wladzy), who were constituted in the institutions of the system. 33 Part of Solidarity's discourse was an emphasis on the absence of significant disagreements within the movement, leading some observers to complain that the union, through its "solidarism" (emphasizing the unity of society versus the authorities), discouraged the airing of quite legitimate differences. 34 Indeed, the natural basis for a separate "professional" consciousness seems to have been discouraged to a considerable degree. A "natural" basis for a separate professional consciousness is suggested by Ivan Szelenyi's analysis of the prospects for the class domination of the intelligentsia in Soviet-type society. 35 There are two principal legitimating bases for the distribution of the surplus in socialism: one that is based on superior teleological knowledge, favoring the Communist Party or the intelligentsia, and one that is based on actual production ofthe surplus, favoring direct producers. Emphasis on the latter basis leads toward a greater democratization of the society, whereas the former facilitates a class domination based on



expertise, either political or technocratic. In Szelenyi's scheme professionals benefit under the former mode of legitimation, especially in a situation where the arbitrary power of the political elite is restrained. Their potential class rule is mitigated, however, by their continued domination by political elites. Professional power would be enhanced by dismantling the tutelage of political elites, while at the same time maintaining the legitimation principle that the allocation of surplus should be based on what people know rather than who makes the surplus in the first place. An examination of professionals during the Solidarity period is particularly useful for illuminating the problems of, and prospects for, such class power by professionals in Soviet-type society. Although the demands of the Solidarity movement included an end to political domination of professionalism, at the same time parts of the movement recommended instituting new checks on the professional domination of direct producers. This discourse reflected the position of professionals in Soviet-type society: in between the political elites who in normal periods exert political tutelage over professionalism and the direct producers who are the power base for ending that tutelage. But professional activities during the Solidarity period should not be reduced to some simple reflection ofoccupational or class interests, since the Solidarity movement itself was more of a "total" movement encompassing several dimensions.

Professionals in the Solidarity Period Skilled workers in large factories were the leading group in the Solidarity movement, but professionals were certainly a close second in terms of influence. According to public opinion surveys, approximately two-thirds of those with higher educations were members of Solidarity in December 1981; Solidarity drew approximately the same proportion from groups with secondary educations or less. There were proportionately fewer engineers and managerial personnel in the union, but even they were more often than not members of Solidarity.36 The influence of those with higher educations is most apparent in the constitution of the leadership. The proportion of people with university or polytechnic degrees in the leadership far exceeds their representation in the labor force. Of the



179

thirty-three top activist-officials in the union, more than one-third (twelve) had higher educations from universities or technical institutes. Four of these leading figures were engineers. 37 The highly educated were also likely to be leaders in the regional bodies of Solidarity: approximately one-third (twenty-one) of the sixty-two members of Upper Silesian Regional Commission were highly educated (fifteen were engineers, four physicians, and two teachers). A significant number (thirteen) of "semi-professional" technicians were also members of the council. 38 This broad participation by professionals in Solidarity, however, should not be reduced to a single interest based on occupation or class. The movement was simultaneously a trade union movement of employees, a movement for the democratization ofsociety, and a national independence movement. 39 A nationwide poll of Solidarity's members found the national dimension to be the most fundamental reason for membership, although its status as an independent union was also important. However, these various qualities had an uneven appeal to different parts of the movement. National independence was relatively more important among delegates to Solidarity's Congress, while the independent character of the trade union was relatively more important to the rank and file. 40 Thus, to the degree that the Solidarity movement was simultaneously a movement for trade union rights, democracy, and national independence, professional support for Solidarity should not be reduced to some narrow occupational interest. Nor can professionals' considerable influence in the movement be interpreted as some simple indication that Solidarity was a vehicle to professional class power. Their particular professional expertise or interests were probably less important for explaining their frequent leadership than the discursive abilities derived from their educational background. Jadwiga Staniszkis 41 notes that nonworkers gained a disproportionate share of leading positions because election procedures required short speeches, discouraging and disadvantaging those workers with more limited "linguistic codes." Thus, in this sense, the participation of professionals as activists might be more in keeping with the historical legacy of the Polish intelligentsia, especially insofar as the highly educated led the membership to emphasize national goals. The relationship of Solidarity to the prospects for professional power can be found elsewhere. Solidarity was not only a movement of activists but a movement


180


that inspired the renewal of the entire society. It was a movement to create a "civil society" in Poland, one where plurality, legality, and publicity would reign over the state and not the state over them. 42 It was also a movement to restore rationality to a society racked by economic, social, and health crisis. As such, the highly educated were involved as professionals both inside and outside of Solidarity in efforts to resolve these problems and introduce reform. Discussions of these problems in various periodicals are of great value for giving us insight into the problems professionals consider most serious and the solutions they most favor. The discourse of 1980-1981 can illuminate the constraints on, and prospects for, professional power in Poland specifically, and perhaps in Soviet-type societies generally.

Obstacles to Professional Power and Control over Investment One of the principal professional complaints during the Solidarity period concerned the allocation of national resources. Both engineers and physicians decried the authorities' priorities and the mechanisms guiding investment decisions. This discourse was a departure from that which was heard a decade earlier.

Physicians The health profession was generally optimistic at the beginning of the 1970s. During Wladyslaw Gomulka's tenure as first party secretary between 1956 and 1970, health care and social policy were generally not matters for public debate or discussion. The very terms "social policy" and "social planning" entered the government's vocabulary only after Gierek took office. 43 At the Sixth Party Congress in 1971 health care and reform became an important ingredient in Gierek's new social contract with Polish society. Gierek's reform sought to reorganize the administration of health care, increase the ratio of doctors to population, expand hospital resources, widen public health care clientele to include private farmers, and institute an improved pay structure for health care employees. 44 In spite of this ambitious and expanded program, the real share of resources allocated to the health sector improved slightly if at all in Gierek's tenure. This expansion ofresponsibilities without an adequate



181

increase in resources was the principal theme in the DiP health commission's account of the origins ofthe health care problems. The share of total investment devoted to health and social care increased slightly in this period,45 but it was still comparatively small in comparison with the proportion of the budget it enjoyed in 1960. 46 Total health care expenditures did increase in the period, although they increased at a lower rate than total expenditures. In vivid contrast to the optimism of the early 1970s, by the end of the 1970S and early 1980s medical professionals were extremely critical of governmental budgetary priorities, especially in light of the fact that mortality rates and other indicators of Poland's health showed significant deterioration. Thus, DiP demanded that the government reconsider its budgetary priorities and allocate more funds to health care. The authorities also recognized the seriousness of the health crisis in this period, as the third plenum of the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers Party on June 30, 1980, was devoted to a discussion of these matters. 47 The considerable attention to health care problems before the rise of Solidarity is reflected in the Gdansk Agreement ofAugust 1980, which led to the union's formation. Point 16 of the agreement concerns the demands of the health sector. Although it begins with a plea for an increase in the resources given to the health sector, this point contains thirty specific demands, ranging from various kinds of wage demands to defining spinal diseases as occupational health hazards for dentists. 48 Thus, not only were medical professionals pushing for an increase in the resources allocated their sector, but from the very beginning of the Solidarity movement they were also quite specific about how those added resources should be used. Point 16 became the basis for subsequent medical sector organizing and negotiations between the Medical Section of Solidarity and the authorities. 49

Engineers Engineers were both more numerous than physicians and more widely dispersed throughout the economy. They were like physicians, however, in that they became part of the chorus of criticism in the late 1970S and early 1980s. And also as with physicians, this criticism reflected a change from the beginning of the 1970s. Gierek's assumption of power had prompted a grand optimism among engineers. Gierek fancied himself an expert manager and technocrat, and his regime portrayed itself as providing competent tech-


182


nocratic leadership. 50 The regime concentrated its energies on bringing Western technology to Poland and assumed that through this import living standards in Poland would be improved. Gierek emphasized that the party should stay out of the affairs ofadministration and leave matters to professionals. 51 Reflecting the fashion for professional titles, regime members went so far as to award themselves professional engineering titles despite their questionable credentials. 52 The alliance between engineers and the Gierek regime was represented further in the appointment ofJan Kaczmarek as the minister of higher education and the general secretary of the Polish Academy ofSciences. Kaczmarek is one of Poland's leading technocratic experts and was in 1988 the elected president of the Supreme Technical Organization (Naczelna Organizacja Techniczna, or NOT). As one Polish journalist put it, the 1970S was a period of "fascination with technical progress, an opening to the West, great programs of investment, great careers."53 The economic crisis, which first became apparent in 1976 and later peaked in 1980-1982, prompted many engineers to change their minds about the policies of the Gierek regime. Unlike physicians, engineers were not able to develop unity as to their profession's being shortchanged in the distribution of national resources. Some sectors in which engineers worked received many resources, while other engineers worked in relatively underprivileged settings. However, two alternative themes criticizing investment were relevant across sectors. One theme was the irresponsibility of the authorities for relying on foreign licenses when in fact Poland had the human capital to develop Polish technologies. In one particularly strong manifestation ofprofessional self-consciousness, Kazimierz Kloc 54 accused the authorities of following this policy with the specific intention of limiting the independent bargaining power of professional groups. We shall return to this issue of the autonomy of professional groups in the next section. This criticism was, however, a relatively new development. Individual engineers profited personally from the reliance on foreign technologies, in that they gained foreign contacts and were able to travel abroad. This criticism, although it may have existed in the 1970s, was probably not very popular. It became more important in 1980-1981 as it became useful in the redefinition ofengineers' alliances. The other major theme that runs through various critiques of investment policy concerns the "rationality" of the authorities' strategies



for development. Because the nature of the irrationality varies according to industry, much of the engineering analysis of investment policies focused on specific industries and the actual form rather than level of investment. Przeglad Techniczny, the official technical journal of Polish engineers and technicians, carried reviews of investment policies in several different industries. In a way, their critiques resemble Thorstein Veblen's early thesis that revolutionary engineers struggle for rationality against the captains of industry. But instead of railing against captains of industry, Polish engineers usually challenged governmentalofficials. For example, in the beginning of the I980s Poland faced severe shortages in several items, including white paper. One reason for this shortage, according to some Przeglad Techniczny authors, was a particular investment in Kwidzyn that produced no paper but absorbed most of the investment funds allocated to the paper industry. 55 The origins of this investment catastrophe lay in governmental ministry's ignoring the advice ofexperts from a research bureau and local agency. The Ministry of Forestry and Wood Industries and the State Presidium opted for a plan that required the purchase of a huge paper production plant "lock, stock, and barrel" from capitalist countries. The Presidium chose this most expensive option despite (I) advice from experts at the Bureau for Paper Industry Products calling for a combination of foreign and domestic technologies and contractors, and (2) a subsequent recommendation by the L6di Bureau for Paper Industry Products that domestic sources be the primary contractors. This foreign contract was made on the grounds that it would be completed the most quickly, in a matter of only four years after starting up in 1973. The project was fraught with delays, however. After one year no foreign contractor had been established. Finally, a Canadian firm was contracted for consultation in 1975. After one year ofwork on the project, the Association of Paper Manufacturers (Zjednoczenie Przemyslu Paperniczego, or zpp) charged that the plant could not be profitable. In reply, the Council of Ministers argued that the plant was indispensable. In 1977 the L6di Bureau and zpp argued that the Canadians were being paid too much and advocated that the Canadians be cut out of the project. The ministry and the Polish paper firm struggled to maintain the foreign connection and made a deal by which the Canadians received even more money for their startup costs. The plant was still not producing paper in 1985·



Those engineers interviewed for the article could point to other lower-level reasons for delays, too, but the blame usually began with the upper levels. One engineer, a director of investments for the ZPP, said, "Many people can be blamed for this, beginning with two vice premiers, the ZPP, the Planning Commission and the builders." The director of the Kwidzyn works focused his blame higher: "People from the Central Committee often came to inspect the site. They would make decisions and leave. At conferences, the completion of plans was not noted, only new ones undertaken. It's much easier to make decisions than check and account for unfulfilled duties." Ultimately, however, it was tough to fix blame on anyone person or body; the Kwidzyn debacle was the consequence of systemic failures. But certainly, one of the most important systemic failures concerned the power of governmental authorities to override expert opinions. Another investment debacle occurred in the mining areas ofSilesia. On a visit to West Germany, Gierek and his associates arranged a contract with a firm to produce gasoline from low-quality coal. 56 Gierek made this initial deal without counsel from chemical industry experts. The deal was reviewed subsequently by an expert commission, which offered a negative assessment and recommended against pursuing it. This review managed to delay the project for a while, but Prime Minister Piotr Jaroszewicz was able to revive it by camouflaging it. As the commission advised, this investment proved to be a completely irrational use of funds, since the gasoline produced from this coal would cost more than buying it on the international market, would be unsuitable for many ofits proposed uses in Poland, and the money used to produce it could be better spent establishing a new coal mine. Besides indicating these top political figures, the author of this Przeglad Techniczny article was critical oftheir advisers: "It's difficult to imagine that the advisers to Prime Minister Jaroszewicz, who legitimated themselves through high academic titles, did not know about this future gas production." Leading political figures normally had professionals supporting their policies of course. For some critics, however, these very links led the politicians' professional advisers to adopt questionable expert positions. Despite Gierek's fall in 1980, some professionals continued to support his strategy of borrowing from the West and building huge expensive plants. This fact was illustrated in a discussion with three engineers who serve as vice chairmen in the Central Union of Milk



Cooperatives. 57 In the beginning of the 1980s milk and milk products were in short supply. The Przeglad Techniczny interviewer challenged the milk industry engineers to admit that this was a consequence of the investment strategies of the 1970s, when huge dairies were constructed using foreign technologies. The engineers defended the investments, arguing that the huge plants were necessary for the increased demand for milk, especially in the large cities. Besides, these new plants were more productive than the old, small dairies. Further, Poland had to purchase machinery from abroad since there was no satisfactory domestic machinery for bottling, and for butter and cheese products. Finally, the engineers argued, production capacity had grown dramatically over the decade; the main problem was that consumption has grown faster. The interviewer disagreed with the engineers' proposals, arguing in his commentary that old solutions based on more money and investments were no solutions. Interviews with two research engineers supported the interviewer's skepticism. Both engineers advocated a greater decentralization of production and the establishment of true cooperatives, not top-down state-run enterprises. The research engineers were also critical of the extensive bureaucracy and advocated greater support for the small farmer, the direct producer. The implication of the research engineers' critique was that the first three engineers failed to find fault with the overcentralized and overbureaucratized organization of production because they were at the top of that organization. These investigations illustrate the nature of engineers' discourse in 1980-1981. They were mainly concerned with improving the "rationality" of investments and national resources. As with most of these other industries, these engineer critics believe that national resources are sufficient, but that they require a more rational form of distribution. Rationality comes from two major changes: a stronger role for independent professional bodies in determining governmental policy and freeing up the economy from political domination.

Obstacles to Professional Power and Self-Organization One of the most general themes of the Solidarity movement was the emphasis on self-organization. In fact, it can be considered the main


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principle defining conflict during the 1980- 198 I Solidarity period. 58 Autonomous professional organizations are instrument in establishing professional power. In general, professionals have the greatest power when their own profession is unified by a single organization that controls the reproduction of their ranks and the market for their services. When nonprofessional organizations interfere in such professional control, professional authority is undermined and the chances for its translation into other desired social values is reduced. Professionals in Soviet-type societies are limited in their power precisely because they do not have autonomous organizations they control themselves, and their client, the state, is itself highly organized.

Physicians Before World War II Polish professions were organized into autonomous organizations. After Poland regained independence in 1918, the medical profession was organized formally in 1921. The Polish parliament, the Sejm, legislated forty-nine articles on the medical profession and established the Izba Lekarska, or Physicians' Council, a professional body with control over the practice of medicine. Each province had its own Izba Lekarska, and a central Izba Lekarska negotiated with the government ministries. This body was an autonomous self-governing association and was the only body that could grant or withdraw the right to practice medicine. 59 After World War II and the establishment of political hegemony by the Polish United Workers' Party (polska Zjednoczona Partia Robotnicza, or PZPR), professional organizations lost their autonomy. In 1946 the Trade Union of Health Care Employees (Zwi~zek Zawodowy Pracownik6w Sluzby Zdrowia, or zzpsz) was founded. Campaigns were initiated against the Izba Lekarska and other physicians' associations, indicating them as class enemies and as being incompatible with socialism. The Izba Lekarska was disbanded, and health care was placed under the control of the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare. Physicians were organized within the union. In 1952 the Polish Physicians' Association (Polskie Towarzystwo Lekarskie) was formed as a scientific society. When Polish Stalinism was being dismantled in 1956, physicians sought renewed organizational autonomy, but to no avail. It was not until the founding of Solidarity that a medical organi-



zation independent of the authorities would appear: the Medical Section of Solidarity. Nurses and physicians had been active in the free trade union movement preceding Solidarity. Alina Pienkowska, a Gdansk nurse, was one of three women on the original eighteen-member Gdansk Interfactory Strike Committee and later became the chair of the Medical Section of Solidarity. She, along with Barbara Przedwojska, a Gdansk physician, composed Point 16 in the Gdansk Agreement. The Medical Section of Solidarity thus grew out of this larger self-organizing movement. Efforts to organize an independent health section spread widely after the signing of the Gdansk Agreement. The authorities tried to undermine these activities by introducing a medical reform bill (Resolution 8 I /80 in the Council ofMinisters) without negotiating with any representatives of the new self-organizing movement. The authorities also encouraged the old Trade Union of Health Care Employees (zzpsz) to adopt new statutes suggesting independence from the authorities in order to attract health care employees away from the new self-organizing movement. The Solidarity health care activists pointed out that this "old union in new clothing" was not really independent, since it pursued its autonomy on direction from the top.60 Thus, they argued, affiliation with Solidarity was the only way to achieve real autonomy. And they were in large part successful, since according to one of its leading activists, about 70 to 80 percent of the former members of zzpsz quit to join Solidarity.61 But was this professional organizational autonomy? This new medical section of Solidarity was not, after all, an exclusively "professional" organization. It included nurses, porters, ambulance drivers, and other health care employees too. Highly educated state employees in some areas did fear that their occupational concerns would be swallowed up by the larger union. 62 Government-affiliated branch unions tried to play on these fears among health care employees, too. However, Solidarity activists had a simple reply: Solidarity got more for health care workers through the Gdansk Agreement than these branch unions accomplished during thirty-six years of work. 63 Independent struggles had to take place through a solidary front of working people, they argued. They could not accomplish their aims separately.


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There were, however, independent organizations of professionals, too. Most notable is the Trade Union of Polish Physicians (Zwiazek Zawodowy Lekarzy Polskich, or ZZLP). In an article in Polityka in 1980 representatives ofthe zzpsz and ofSolidarity offered their views on the health situation. Their comments on the ZZLP are revealing about the place of independent professional organizations in 1980 Poland. Both spokesmen emphasized the good relations their organizations had with the professional union, but it was Biernacki, the spokesman for the ZZPSZ, who emphasized the success of the professional union in having about 9,000 physicians as members, or about 12 percent of those who were eligible. Marek Kulerski, a physician who represented Solidarity, instead emphasized, "In the field of health service, we are the only one that counts."64 Subsequent consultations confirm this divergence. Zofia Kuratowska, a physician activist who was recently elected to the Polish Senate, claims that such autonomous trade unions as the ZZLP were supported by the government with a goal of undermining Solidarity. Most who belonged to these autonomous unions belonged out of allegiance to the authorities. The motivations for the few "honest" people who belonged to the ZZLP, she supposed, was the belief that the business of physicians was very different from the business of others. But the power ofSolidarity, she argued, was that everyone was together. Only workers had the power to influence the authorities. "To be together with workers was really important. "65 One might find a touch of irony in the alliances drawn in 1980 and in 1946. The authorities found independent professional organizations antisocialist in the earlier period, whereas in the latter they found them to be a useful bulwark against the challenge posed by the solidary working class. Most physicians were content to organize through the multi-occupational Medical Section ofSolidarity. According to leading activists in the section, about 90 percent of physicians belonged, and about 20 percent were activists in the Medical Section. Thus, though selforganization was an important goal among physicians, the power relations of the conflict were such that independence from the authorities had first to be assured, and that could be achieved only through Solidarity. This is especially true when one considers the power to strike. Physicians and nurses would not strike during this period. According to Poland's leading medical sociologist, Magdalena Sokolowska, 66



health care is a humanitarian public service in the Polish social consciousness, and a strike would be anathema to that ideal. Beyond that service ideal, such a strike would probably be suicidal for the health section anyway, since it would only hurt and alienate the patients, who are the medical sector's allies. Most (77 percent) of the Mazowsze region of Solidarity felt that health care workers directly caring for the sick should not have the right to strike. 67 Since the health sector could not strike, it could not pressure the authorities to negotiate fairly. On two occasions the government representatives refused to reach reasonable compromises with the Medical Section. It was only afterthe Solidarity negotiators occupied a government building in Gdansk, medical students staged sit-ins throughout the country, and (especially) when workers from several large factories threatened to go out on a solidarity strike with the health sector that the authorities made a reasonable compromise. 68 Physicians, thus, were highly dependent on the Medical Section of Solidarity, which in turn was dependent on the larger union for pressing its aims.

Engineers The situation among engineers is analogous to that found among physicians. Engineers were also organized into a multi-occupational body with limited autonomy. With technicians, they formed the Supreme Technical Organization (Naczelna Organizacja Techniczna, or NOT), the main goals of which were: I. 2.

3. 4. 5. 6.

active cooperation in the construction of socialism in Poland; the development of technology and Polish technical thought; the defense of the occupation and interests of engineers and technicians; cooperation between the scientific-technological associations and members of NOT; representation of the Polish technical world in Poland and abroad at meetings and congresses; the popularization of technical and techno-economic principles in society. 69

as with trade unions in Soviet-type society, thus has two goals: first, the promotion of the welfare of the whole, and only secondly the self-defense of its members. One way for NOT to promote social NOT,


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welfare is to encourage responsible behavior among its members. During 1980- I98 I the leaders of NOT were encouraging engineers to work more diligently for the salvation of the economy.70 They raised the issue of engineering ethics,71 a theme raised many times before. 72 NOT leaders proudly noted that engineers were engaged in societal renewal in all sectors of society, in the Extraordinary Congress of the PZPR, in the branch unions, and were even among the authorities of Solidarity.73 However, NOT itself was an object of renewal and challenge in this period, too. Criticism came from within the authorities. Witold Ochremiak, a party representative working at Przeglad Techniczny, discussed NOT'S internal turmoil at considerable length. 74 NOT was made up of various more specialized associations, but members of these associations charged NOT with becoming too centralized and bureaucratic and therefore unresponsive to the needs of its associations. Ochremiak recommended that the organization follow the general wave of democratization in the society and decentralize. This kind of criticism by the authorities, however, missed the main challenge of 1980-1981. The authorities focused on conflicts within the association rather than on the relationship between the association and the authorities and between the association and the mass of engineers. It failed to ask whether engineers needed an independent association that would have as a higher priority the defense of engineers' interests. Engineers associated with Solidarity emphasized precisely these themes. In an article in the Solidarity newsweekly, Tygodnik Solidarnose, engineer Stanislaw Klimaszewski described the horrendous state of affairs in working conditions and living standards for engineers. 75 He linked this engineering crisis to the overall economic crisis, for which he blamed the investment policies of the early I970s. NOT did nothing to discourage those policies that created an unhealthy dependence on foreign technologies, despite being consulted about the policies. One solution, he thought, lay in an independent association of engineers and technicians. In August 1981 an appeal did in fact appear in Tygodnik Solidarnosc and Przeglqd Techniczny for the formation of a new NOT, but this time the Independent Technical Organization (Niezalezna Organizacja Technicza). The text of the appeal emphasizes that an organization needed to be formed that would defend the interests of engineers and techni-



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cians at both national and individual levels. The old NOT was not up to the task because it was "owned" by the authorities.?6 This organization apparently had neither the time nor the support to become a dominant organization among engineers. Engineers were more likely to be active in, and organized around, their workplace. This is not surprising, since engineering interests were so diverse and occupational interests were so closely tied to individual plants and ministries. As a consequence, engineers were more active in the form ofself-organization most relevant to their interests: self-management.

Obstacles to Professional Power and Self-Management

Engineers That engineers were engaged in the reforms surrounding selfmanagement should not be surprising since one of the principal complaints of engineers before this period was the political domination of production. Already in 1956 NOT submitted a document to the Council of Ministers providing the necessary professional qualifications for various positions in the economy, suggesting that the role of political qualifications be reduced. 77 Ultimately the government rejected NOT'S advice, but the tension between political loyalty and competence did not go away. It reappeared as a major theme in 1980-1981 in the struggle for self-management and the end of the "negative" selection of management through nomenklatura. In April of 1981 the Network of Enterprise Organizations of the Independent Self-Governing Trade Union Solidarity (Siec) was founded. Representatives of initially seventeen but eventually more than fifty of Poland's largest enterprises sought a way to reconstruct the failing economy that was combined with the organization of workers' councils. The Network based its plan on the "democratization" of the factories by creating "social enterprises." The enterprise would be run by democratically elected employee councils (rady pracownicze) that would be responsible for appointing the factory manager and negotiating with trade unions. The state would exert control over the enterprise through various economic instruments like taxes, customs duties, and credits, but not through direct political control. The "social enterprise" concept, initially conceived as a way of


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sharing management with the authorities, was eventually transformed into a means of getting the party out of the enterprise and the economy.78 Activists believed that central planning was the "main source of this country's economic crisis."79 The Network attacked thus the authorities' control over the economy and indeed the dependency of professionals on the good will of the authorities. Given the combination of councils and the union, managers eventually found that it was more important to maintain good relations with enterprise employees than it was with the authorities. 80 In some cases, managers went so far as to suggest that Solidarity form an alliance with management against the central apparatus in the name of efficiency. 81 Self-management and economic reform (for the two were by and large inseparable) were the dominant themes of the union between April and November 1981. They were also prominent in Przeglqd Techniczny in 1980-1981. Engi~eers, especially those in managerial positions or aspiring to them, would be affected directly. A relaxation ofpolitical controls over advancement would, according to the professional discourse, lead to a personnel policy based more on qualifications. Stanislaw Karas, writing in the Warsaw daily Zycie Warszawy, complained about the "negative selection" of managerial personnel that led to underemployment of the highly educated and the managerial ranks being filled with those having less than higher educations. 82 Solidarity's reforms would, on the contrary, emphasize managerial expertise in the election of managers from an open competitive pool. In fact, one self-management team from Wrodaw 83 wrote an article in Tygodnik SolidarnoH about how to choose the most competent director. In order to qualify for their competition, all of the candidates had to have higher educations. Of the twenty-three who competed, nineteen were engineers. The self-management movement in 1981 was the principal means by which engineers envisioned an end to their political tutelage by the authorities. The party would presumably still have some influence on managerial selection, but only as one representative on a factory council in which representatives of the unions in the enterprise were also representatives.

Physicians Physicians were involved in the self-management movement in a different way than were engineers. The functionally analogous move-



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ment for professional control over occupational practice among physicians was probably the effort to reconstruct the Izba Lekarska. This physicians' body was not as actively supported as self-management, for several reasons. The Izba Lekarska was an exclusively professional body whose reestablishment would lead to an absolute increase in professional privilege. It would lead to increased professional control over the conditions of physicians' practice and reproduction of their ranks through its control over the licensing of physicians. It did not have the same democratic potential as self-management, since nonphysicians did not have influence over the body, as workers had over engineers in self-management. Thus, the Izba Lekarska did not enjoy the enthusiastic support ofnurses and other medical personnel, who argued that if physicians could have such a body, why shouldn't they? Some physicians were also opposed to the establishment of the Izba Lekarska, especially those physicians outside the medical academies. One of the regional physicians interviewed by Kennedy in 1984 claimed that its reestablishment would lead to the further domination of medicine by the elites of the profession. There was resistance to the Izba Lekarska from within the profession and in the larger medical field, although attitudes toward it may have changed since 1981 among health care activists. In 1983 the Polskie Towarszystwo Lekarskie submitted to the Sejm Commission on Health Care the prospectus for the restoration of the Izba Lekarska. Health care activists seem to be in favor of its reestablishment if it is to be an independent organization. Magdalena Sokolowska sees it as a progressive move insofar as it represents a "decolonization" of the system through the creation of more autonomous groupS.84 Kuratowska argues that a new, independent, democratically elected Izba Lekarska should be formed to oversee ethical standards in the medical profession, given the real deterioration of those standards in recent years. 85 Kuratowska argues, however, that it must be completely independent. It would be too dangerous otherwise, since one can always say somebody is acting unethically and end that person's practice for political reasons. The Izba must also have real democratic elections in order for it to have real moral authority. Otherwise, it will become just another boring institution in which no one wants to participate. In 1987 she was in favor of the draft on the Izba Lekarska proposed by the


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Polskie Towarzystwo Lekarskie, although she found two major drawbacks. First of all, physicians belonging to the military service, secret service, and prison system are not subject to the Izba (which is horrible, since this is where the system of medical ethics is worst, she argues). This, she thought, was probably a necessary compromise, because the authorities otherwise would lose too much power in these sensitive sectors. The second limitation she noted refers to the continuing influence of the Ministry of Health, which could change the head of the Izba under "special conditions." It is, she argues, nevertheless good that the ministry cannot affect elections. 86

Obstacles to Professional Power and Educational Reform One of the principal means by which professionals established their power in Western capitalism is through the establishment of control over the reproduction of their ranks in higher education. During 1980-1981 there was considerable discussion about the reform of higher education. The Independent Student Union (Niezalezny Zrzeszenie Studentow) in particular worked for the elimination of obligatory courses in Russian, Marxist-Leninist ideology, and military training and for the establishment of a more autonomous and internally democratic university structure. 87 Most institutions of higher education seemed to be striving for the same things: autonomy, pluralism, better pay for the staff, and better organization and financing of institutions. 88 However, the relationship of these and other prospective reforms to professionals and the broader Solidarity movement is a complicated matter, deserving full treatment elsewhere. Nevertheless, we shall try to illustrate the complexity of this relationship by considering the higher education of engineers. World War II had devastating consequences for the Polish engineering profession. In 1938 there were some 12,000 to 14,000 engineers in Poland; after Poland was liberated from Nazi occupation, there were only about 7,000 engineers left. With the reconstruction of Poland's infrastructure and industry the top priority, higher education gave precedence to the training of engineers. The number of polytechnical schools and of technical students increased. In 1938 there were only 7,593 students enrolled in three polytechnical schools, but already by



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1945- 1946 there were nine higher technical schools with 12,465 students enrolled. Opportunities for becoming an engineer were expanded and the expectations for completing a degree were lowered. 89 In 1937-1938 only 15.3 percent of the students in higher education were in technical studies; by 1950-195 1,28.4 percent were in technical studies, with the increase in engineering students coming largely at the expense of students oflaw and the humanities. 9o As a consequence of these early educational reforms, Poland now has relatively more engineers than developed capitalist societies do: in the late 1970S France had 11.2 engineers per thousand persons employed; West Germany, 15.4; Great Britain, 8.7; the United States, 12.3; but Poland had 22.5 engineers per thousand persons employed. 91 The "success" of this engineering educational reform has led to the overproduction ofengineers and the inflation ofthe instrumental value of their degrees. Consequently, Janusz Tymowski, Poland's leading engineer-scholar, has argued that the current number of engineers needs to be reduced by about 20 to 25 percent. 92 Such a reduction could be approached most directly by reducing the number of people being trained as engineers. One plan offered in 1980-1981 sought to reduce drastically the number of slots in evening studies (mainly for older workers) and to eliminate from day studies (college-age students) the lower degree in engineering studies, and to offer only a master's degree in engineering (inzynier magister). One Solidarity activist participating in an educational reform commission argued against this policy, however, on the basis that it was an "elitist" reform that would restrict opportunities for the children of peasants who already suffer educational discrimination. 93 The obstacles to professional power we have so far considered (relating to control over investment, self-organization, and selfmanagement) were generally matters where the interests of Solidarity and professionals coincided. Educational reform is another matter. Although most of Solidarity would support democratization and other reforms of higher education, educational reforms designed to increase professional power are generally seen as elitist in that they would restrict the number of degrees offered and increase the standards of training provided. As a consequence, those Solidarity members who were not already professionals, or whose children were not already assured of professional education and status, are loathe to restrict educational opportunities. Thus, it seems that, at least in this



instance, professional power is unlikely to be enhanced by reforms inspired by pressure from below. In fact, although opposition to the authorities by the working class might restrict political tutelage over professionals, this opposition introduces its own new constraints on professional power.

Limits to Professional Power in Reform Even in the case ofa transformed Soviet-type society, where the partystate's organizational control is reduced and the state itself becomes subject to control by a civil society, professional power does not necessarily gain hegemony. It does not necessarily face a disorganized mass ofclients. On the contrary, in a transformation based on struggle from below, professionals face several constraints. In 1980-1981 Polish professionals faced a highly organized society that was capable of ending their political tutelage. This is evident in self-management. The director is no longer subject to political tutelage but now becomes accountable to the employee council of the enterprise. Accountability varied in the several versions ofself-management reforms being promoted, and the government's program for reform offered, not surprisingly, the least accountability. But even within Solidarity there was some disagreement about the scope of accountability. For some, self-management should merely assure the appointment of a competent manager and stay out of policy formation. For others, the employees' council should actually formulate broad enterprise policy and leave it to the manager to implement. For those who emphasized the workers' control element of this reform, these councils were to be first and foremost democratic institutions, as opposed to the boards of trustees (rady nadzorcze) that some professionals favored. One writer for Tygodnik Solidarnosc believed that the latter scheme would lead to the domination of representatives of industry (perhaps professionals?) and not to genuine democracy. He advised Solidarity members to remain vigilant in their struggle for democratic economic reform. 94 The self-management reform advocated by the authorities would have limited the influence of these employee councils far more, but then again this reform retained greater measures of political tutelage in both theory and practice. Economic reform in the past several years has had very limited success. It appears that in Poland, self-



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management faces insurmountable resistance without massive support from below. Professionals, in particular engineers, are "in between" once again. Although a successful self-management reform would eliminate political tutelage, it would replace it with a democratic control that might (depending on the nature of the accompanying economic reform) be more respectful of professional expertise. A self-management reform that limits democratic control from below faces little chance of success in the Polish context and, even if successful, would retain some measure of political tutelage. Physicians' professional power also would likely be constrained by popular organization in a Soviet-type society reformed on the basis of the Solidarity model. As we saw, physicians could not achieve much influence by themselves and in fact were dependent at two levels: (I) they were forced to ally with other health care workers in the Medical Section of Solidarity; and (2) since the majority of employees in that section would not strike, they were forced to rely on Solidarity strikes ofother organizations to pressure the authorities to negotiate in good faith. Although physicians were probably the most influential within the Medical Section, nurses remained quite influential. All of these anticipations of constraints on professional power in a reformed society rely on the model ofsocial transformation prompted from below. If the social transformation of Soviet-type society occurs under such a pressure, workers, nurses, and other nonprofessional or semi-professional organizations might be well enough organized in civil society to defend their interests against the domination of a new ruling class of professionals. But if social transformation occurs from the top down, as we might be seeing under Gorbachev, professional class domination becomes more possible as professionals take over the instruments of domination that afforded the political elites so much power before social transformation. A social transformation controlled from above would seem to reflect professional interests more than one driven from below. The fact that Gorbachev receives his greatest amount of support from the intelligentsia95 is consistent with this hypothesis. In this sense, professionals might take the same route to power as have American engineers, where the definition of professionalism came to be identical with corporate managerial success. 96 Professional power, rather than taking the classical route of American lawyers and physicians, might



take the bureaucratic route to hegemony. Although this reform prospect offers considerably more power than a reform based on pressure from below, professional power will nevertheless remain circumscribed for those with little access to bureaucratic power, as physiCIans. The health sector, along with education and other "nonproductive" sectors in the economy, is in a structurally weak position in contemporary Soviet-type societies. Heavy industry and other favored sectors benefit disproportionately from the national resources. Even in a transformed society, especially one that is transformed from the top down, there is no obvious reason why the health sector and its physicians would gain considerably more power or privilege at the macro level than they already have. If reform involved the restoration of private practice on a wide scale, physicians might benefit at the micro level, in terms of control over their relations with patients and their personal compensation therefrom. But that in no way guarantees a larger share of national resources. To the degree that medical clientele can pressure for health care reform, that is, through a Solidarity-type transformation, we can envision more resources going to the health sector than go now. But physicians by themselves do not have sufficient bureaucratic power to redistribute national resources to the medical sector. Thus, Daniel Bell's admonition to consider the different institutional situses of professionals in assessments of their potential for power97 becomes as important as considering pwfessionals in a transformed Soviet-type society as it is in its current form.

Conclusions The 1980-1981 Solidarity period in Poland is particularly helpful for clarifying constraints on professional power in Soviet-type society, and by extension, the possibilities for professionals as a whole to become a new ruling class. The criticisms offered by professionals illuminate the limitations that they find most problematic in the given situation. This is useful as a complement to those limitations that might be highlighted by some formal model of professionalism, for it shows us the distinctiveness of the "professional project" in Soviettype society.



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Physicians and engineers cast their critiques in three broad spheres: control over investment, self-organization, and self-management. Physicians and engineers are different in the specifics of their indictments. Given the concentration of physicians in the health sector, they could unify in a call for greater resources. Engineers could not make such a call, since they are in so many different places in the economy, some of which were supported quite well. Instead, engineers could unite in a call for a greater rationality of investment and the development of Polish technology. To assure this rationality, engineers argued that their association had to be more independent and their opinions more respected by the authorities. For physicians, self-organization was less important for the independent advice it could render than for its role in pressuring the authorities to relinquish more resources to the health sector. But this independence in self-organization was not completely realized, since the Medical Section depended on an alliance with other parts of society, particularly with skilled workers in large factories. The Medical Section of Solidarity had too little power by itself. Self-management was a less important and more controversial goal for physicians. Its manifestation for physicians would have been a vital Izba Lekarska, but this body could have denied the very solidarism that empowered society against the authorities. This same solidarism probably discouraged professional support for the elitist educational reforms that might have increased professional power but would have gone against popular sentiment in Solidarity. The idea of self-management among engineers, however, was less controversial, since it could be embraced by that ideology of societal solidarism. The idea of self-management in fact broadened the solidary front. Instead of workers versus the authorities, the alliance under the guise ofself-management could have pitted the entire world of work-managers and workers-against political elites. There was some controversy about the form that this self-management would take, but this was considered secondary to the struggle for freeing the enterprise and the economy from direct political control. The Solidarity period also suggested how the power of the highly educated might be constrained in a transformed Soviet-type society, especially one transformed on the basis of a challenge from below. A socialist civil society contains its own democratic constraints on professional power. A state dominated by civil society does not become


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an instrument for professional manipulation to establish professional privilege. On the contrary, professional power based on technical expertise might be balanced by the considerable organizational power of the masses in a Soviet-type society transformed on the basis of initiative from below. It is useful to keep in mind here that the power and privilege of classical professionalism, exemplified by American physicians, was achieved in a period when nonprofessionals were very poorly organized. The Solidarity period was quite the opposite, with skilled workers leading all, including professionals, in the struggle for self-organization. Although the class power of the intelligentsia might be circumscribed in a Solidarity-powered transformation, professional domination in Soviet-type society has greater prospects when reform is initiated from above, as in Gorbachev's plan. But Soviet experts have raised considerable doubt as to whether such a reform can succeed without mobilization from below. Repeated attempts at, and repeated failures in, economic reform in Poland reinforce that skepticism. Even if Gorbachev manages to succeed where Polish leaders have failed, a plan to unleash the "professional middle classes" might also spill over to self-organization and the social transformation ofthe rest ofsociety, as in the Prague Spring. It might thus increase the likelihood of reform only by increasing the likelihood of reaction by conservative forces. But these are questions we cannot yet answer. Here, we only hope to have shown what Polish professionals perceived to be constraints on their power, and what new constraints were embryonic in a society transformed by Solidarity.

Notes Acknowledgments: Michael Kennedy wishes to acknowledge the support of fellowships from the International Research and Exchanges Board and the Joint Committee on Eastern Europe of the American Council of Learned Societies and Social Science Research Council, both of which facilitated the collection and interpretation of some of the data in this chapter. A grant from the Center for Russian and East European Studies of the University of Michigan and a Rackham Faculty Research Grant from the University of Michigan also provided research support. We also wish to thank Andrzej Krajewski, Dietrich Rueschemeyer, and Michael Bernhard for their helpful comments on earlier versions of this chapter, one of which was presented at the 1987



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meeting of the American Sociological Association. This chapter was written before the revolutions of 1989, and bears the marks ofthat period. An analysis ofprofessional organization and discourse in a postcommunist epoch will find only some of the themes raised in 1980-1981 extended through the decade. A comparison of these periods of professional awakening needs to be undertaken. £. Magali Sarfatti Larson, The Rise ofProfessionalism (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977). 2. Eliot Friedson, Profession of Medicine (New York: Dodd and Mead, 1970); Paul Starr, The Social Transformation ofAmerican Medicine (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982). 3. See J. Frenk and A. Donabedian, "State Intervention in Medical Care: Types, Trends and Variables," Health Policy and Planning 2, no. 1 (1987): 17-3 I; Luis Duran-Arenas and Michael D. Kennedy, "The Constitution of Physicians' Power: A Theoretical Framework for Comparative Analysis" (forthcoming in Social Science and Medicine). 4. For the "failure" of American engineers, see Robert Perrucci and Joel E. Gerstl, Profession without Community: Engineers in American Society (New York: Random House, 1969). For this early twentieth-century success, see David Noble, America by Design (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT University Press, 1977). 5. We use the term "Soviet-type society" to refer to those societies whose political economic structure is modeled on the Stalinist-Brezhnevite Soviet Union. These are industrial societies with state ownership of the major means of production and an economy directed to some degree by a plan formulated under the leadership of a hegemonic Marxist-Leninist party. In 1990 no society in the region deserves the label, except for Albania. 6. This discussion draws heavily on Larson, Rise of Professionalism, pp. 26-29, but see also T. J. Johnson, Professions and Power (London: Macmillan, 1972). 7. The Engineers and the Price System (New York: Viking, 1965). 8. Larson, Rise ofProfessionalism , p. 26. 9. Michael D. Kennedy and Ireneusz Bialecki, "Power and the Logic of Distribution in Poland," Eastern European Politics and Societies 3, no. 2 (1989): 300-328. 10. Unless otherwise noted, all data in this section come from Rocznik Statystczny (1982): 51-60. II. Rocznik Statystyczny Ochrony Zdrowia (1981): 184· 12. Before World War II dentistry was already a feminized occupation, with over half of dentists being women in 1921. See Magdalena Sokolowska and Bozena Moskalewicz, "Health Sector Structures: The Case of Poland," Social Science and Medicine 24, no. 9 (1986):763-776.


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13. Rocznik Statystyczny (1981): 170.

14. It is also the case that professionals' wages overall declined in relation to the average industrial wage between 1970 and 1980. See Michael D. Kennedy, "Polish Engineers' Participation in the Solidarity Movement," Social Forces 65, no. 3 (1987):641-669, and Professionals, Power and Solidarity in Poland: A Critical Sociology of Soviet-type Society (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). 15. Irena Reszke, Social Prestige and Gender (Warsaw: Polish Academy of Sciences, 1984), pp. 79-80. 16. Michal Pohoski, Kazimierz Slomczynski, and Wlodzimierz Wesolowski, "Occupational Prestige in Poland, 1958-75," Polish Sociological Bulletin 4(1975):63-77. 17. Kazimierz Slomczynski and Grazyna Kacprowicz, Skale Zawod6w (Warsaw: Polish Academy of Sciences, 1979). 18. Aleksander Gella, "The Life and the Death ofthe Old Polish Intelligentsia," Slavic Review 30(1971):I. 19. Jan Szczepanski, "The Polish Intelligentsia: Past and Present, ,. World Politics 14(1962). 20. For this "cognitive base," see Larson, Rise of Professionalism. Alvin Gouldner, The Future of Intellectuals and the Rise ofthe New Class (New York: Seabury, 1979), calls the common discourse of all intellectuals the "culture of critical discourse." 2 I. For a valuable discussion of the criteria of professionalism, see Harold Wilensky, "The Professionalization of Everyone?" American Journal of Sociology 70(1964):137-158. 22. So Zygmunt Bauman argues in "Intellectuals in East Central Europe: Continuity and Change," Eastern European Politics and Society 1(1987): 162I 86. Michael Bernhard has suggested to me in correspondence that such revolutionary intellectuals do not leave so large a legacy in the postrevolutionary intellectual stratum. Indeed, the destruction of a revolutionary intelligentsia by the mass-based party, and its replacement by specialists from lowerclass backgrounds, most likely destroys the ethos of the intelligentsia. This subject is a difficult area, and one deserving of contest in academic discussion, as the relationship of the intelligentsia to the current highly educated stratum is contested within Polish society today. For an exceptionally insightful discussion of this matter, see Jolanta Babiuch, "Analiza Funkcjonowania Pojecia Inteligencji" (Ph.D. dissertation, Warsaw University, 1988). 23. Ivan Szelenyi, "The Intelligentsia in the Class Structure ofState Socialist Societies," in M. Burawoy and T. Skocpol, eds., Marxist Inquiries (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982). 24. Maria Hirszowicz, The Bureaucratic Leviathan (New York: New York University Press, 1980).



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25. See Jan Jozef Lipski, KOR: The Workers Defense Committee (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985). 26. See Jack Bielasiak, ed., Poland Today: The State of the Republic (White Plains: M. E. Sharpe, 1981). 27. For a discussion ofthe DiP commission on Health Care, see Michael D. Kennedy, Professionals, Power and Solidarity (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1991). 28. To the specialist on Poland, the distinction we draw between intelligentsia and professional models might resemble the distinction between romanticism and positivism in the Polish political tradition. The romantic tradition is based on an almost reckless disregard for the costs of complete defiance ofoccupying powers; the positivist approach advocates a greater reconciliation with those powers, trading compromise for stability. The professional and positivist political models are similar insofar as they both surrender some of their capacities to others: positivists to occupying powers and professionals to their clients or employers. The romantic political and intelligentsia identification are similar, insofar as both demand a more complete identification with the national cause, with little room for complicity or compromise. 29. The modal occupation for the founding and later KOR members identified by Lipski, KOR, pp. 50-58, was literary or linguistic experts with 8, followed by 6 historians, 4 lawyers, 3 sociologists or ethnographers, 2 philosophers, 2 priests, and 2 physicists, plus individuals in a variety of other occupations. 30. See, e.g., Milovan Djilas, The New Class (New York: Praeger, 1957). Jacek Kuron and Karol Modzelewski, "An Open Letter to the Party," New Politics 5(1966):5-47. 3 I. "Si~c," Zeszyty Glosu PANu, Krak6w NSZZ Solidarnsc, August 2, 1981. 32. Pawel Kuczynski, "Dwa Modele SwiadomoSci Politycznej Robotnik6w: Analiza Ruch Spolecznego w Okresie 1980-81," in W. Morawski, ed., Demokracja i Gospodarka (Warsaw: Warsaw University, 1983). 33. Grzegorz Lindenberg and KrzysztofNowak, "Swiadomosc Spoleczna wobec Kryzysu i Konfliktu Spolecznego-Na Przykladu Badan nad Robotnikami i Studentami Warszawy" (unpublished manuscript, 1985), p. 12. 34. Jadwiga Staniszkis, Poland's Self-Limiting Revolution (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1984), pp. 113- 11 4. 35. Szelenyi, "The Intelligentsia." 36 . Wladyslaw Adamski, "Przyzaleznosc Zwi~zkowa i Miejsce w Strukturze a Interesy Grupowe," in W. Adamski et al., Polacy '81 (Warsaw: PAN IFiS, 1982); Michael Kennedy, "Polish Engineers." 37. Jan Pakulski, "Leaders of the Solidarity Movement: A Sociological Portrait," Sociology 20(1986) :64-81.


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38. "Wybory," Informator NSZZ Solidarnosc Slqsku (Gliwice), 34/81 (August 16, 1981):2-4. 39. Alain Touraine, with F. Dubet, M. Wieviorka, and J. Strzelecki, Solidarity: The Analysis ofa Social Movement, Poland, 1980-81 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983). 40. "CzymJest Solidarnosc i Dlaczego do Niej Wst~pujemy?" Wiadomosc Dnia, November II, 1981, p. 2. The discussion groups in Touraine's research also showed different tendencies: the Upper Silesian region, including Katowice, tended to emphasize the union aspect; the Mazowsze-Warsaw region emphasized the democratic; in Wrodaw the nationalism of the "true Poles" came out most forcefully. The more highly educated males were the most extreme in regard to nationalism. 41. Staniszkis, Poland's Self-Limiting Revolution, p. 127. 42. Andrew Arato, "Civil Society Against the State," Telos 47(1981):2347· 43. Magdalena Sokolowska, "Social Science and Health Policy in Eastern Europe: Poland as a Case Study," International Journal of Health Services 4 (1974): 44 1-451. 44. Chris Russell-Hodgson, "Health Policy and Health Service Reform in the 1970'S," in Jean Woodall, ed., Policy and Politics in Gierek's Poland (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1982). 45. Rocznik Statystyczny (1981): 184. 46. The critique of health care that follows relies on the following, unless otherwise noted: Doswiadczenia i Przyszlosc (DiP), "Health and Health Protection of the Polish Population," International Journal of Health Services 13 (1983) :487-5 I 3. 47. Stanislaw Kania, "Zadania w Sprawie Dalszego Rozwoju i Doskonalenia Ochrony Zdrowia Spoleczenstwa," Nowe Drogi 7(374)Ouly 1980):7-27. 48. See Abraham Brumberg, ed., Poland: Genesis of a Revolution (New York: Random House, 1983), pp. 291-292. 49. Marek Kulerski, "Liczy sie tylko Solidarnosc," as interviewed by Andrzej Mozolowski in Polityka, November 29, 1980. 50. Interview: Wlodzimierz Wesolowski, August 20, 1987. 5 I. George Kolankiewicz, "The Technical Intelligentsia," in David Lane and G. Kolankiewciz, eds., Social Groups in Polish Society (New York: Columbia University Press, 1973). 52. "Jak Edward Gierek Zostal Inzynierem," Wiadomosc Dnia, March 3, 198 I, p. 2; also Hirszowicz, Bureaucratic Leviathan. 53. Jerzy Baczynski, "Zmaganie z Materia," Polityka 47(1983):]. 54. "Nie Straszmy Sie Samorz~dem," Przeglqd Techniczny 33-34(1981): 10-13·



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55· See Anna Wieczorskowska and Malgorzata Wozniak, "Za Kwidzyn pod Klucz," Przeglttd Techniczny 27-28(1981):9-12. 56. Czeslaw Mejro, "Licencja na Produkcje Czadu," Przeglttd Techniczny 35(1981 ):19-20. 57· Krystyna Karwicka-RycWewicz and Henryk Nakielski, "Kraj Mlekiem Plynacy," Przeglttd Techniczny 29-30(1981):20-24. 58. Kennedy, Professionals, Power and Solidarity. 59· See Cecylia Labanowska, Przemiany Wzoru Osobowego Lekarza (Ph.D. dissertation, Warsaw University, 1978); Josef Hornowski, "Historia Izb Lekarskich w Polsce," Medycyna, Dydakdyka, Wychowanie 13, no. 3(1981):198206,220. 60. Piotr Gmaj, "Stary Zwiazek w Nowej Szacie," Biuletyn Informacyjny NSZZ Sluzba Zdrowia "Pomost" (Gdansk) 2(September 21, 1980):4. 61. Kulerski, 1980. 62. Ireneusz Krzeminski, "Jak Powstal i Dzialal Niezalezny Samorzadny Zwi~zek Zawodowy Pracownikow Nauki Techniki i Oswiaty," in I. Krzeminski, ed., Polacy-Jesien 80 (Warsaw: University of Warsaw, Institute of Sociology, 1981). 63. "Solidarnosc a Interesy Zawodowe i Branzowe," NTO: Informator Wewnetrzny dla K61 Nauki, Techniki i Oswiaty, NSZZ SolidarnoH Region Mazowsze 4(October 26, 1980):11.

64. Kulerski, "Liczy sic tylko Solidarnosc." Also Mozolowski's interview with Janusz Biernacki, "Czego chcecie poza pieni~dzmi?" Polityka, November 29, 1980, p. 6. 65· Interview, July 26, 1987. 66. "Health as an Issue in the Workers' Campaign," Sysyphus 3(1982):91106. Dr. Sokolowska passed away in April of 1989. This article is but one of her many important contributions to medical sociology. She will be missed in both Poland and the international sociological community. 67. Z Prac OBS'u, Wiadomosc Dnia,June 1,1981, p. 2. 68. Kennedy, Professionals, Power and Solidarity. 69. Jan Hoser, "Srodowisko Zawodowe Inzynierow," in). Kulpinska, ed., Socjologia Przemyslu (Warsaw: PWE, 1974). See also his book, Zawod i Praw Inzyniera (Warsaw, 1970). 70. "Do Inzynierow i Technikow Polskich," Przeglad Techniczny 35 (1981): 16-17· 71. "Dyskusje i Decyzje," Przeglttd Techniczny 26 (1981):38. 72. Janusz Tymowski, "Etyka Inzynierska," in A. Sarapata, ed., Etyka Zawodowa (Warsaw: Kzi~zka i Wiedza, 1971). 73. "W Now~ Kadench," Przeglttd Techniczny 31-32(1981):9-10. 74. "Federacja i Nowy Statut," Przeglttd Techniczny 29-30(1981):10-11.


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75. Stanislaw Klimaszewski, "Zostane Inzynierem, Bc;dzie Mi Gorzej," Tygodnik Solidarnosc 23(August 21, 1981):13. 76. See "Apel 0 Niezalezna Organizacje Techniczna," PrzegltJd Techniczna 35 (1981 ):8, or in Tygodnik Solidarnosc 20 (August 14, 1981). In 1984 NOT's former chairman, Janusz Tymowski, acknowledged in an interview with Kennedy that NOT did not defend engineers' interests, especially in terms of personalliving standards, although he thought it ought to move in that direction. 77. Kolankiewicz, "The Technical Intelligentsia," pp. 195-198. 78. Touraine et aI., Solidarity, p. 163. 79. Stan Persky and Henry Flam, The Solidarity Sourcebook (Vancouver: New Star Books, 1982), p. 179. 80. Staniszkis, Poland's Self-Limiting Revolution, 207, 216. 81. Touraine et ai, Solidarity, p. 109. 82. Stanislaw Karas, "Kwalifakcje a Awans," Zycie Warszawy, June 16, 1981. 83. J. Kozinski, St. Kielczewski, T. Listwan, St. Witkowski, "Konkurs na Dyrektora," Tygodnik Solidarnosc I 8(July 31, 1981):1,6. 84. Interview, July 21, 1987. 85. Zofia Kuratowska, "Sluzba Zdrowia: Kto Winien?" Kultura (Paris), March 1987, pp. 83-97. 86. Interview, July 26, 1987. The Izba Lekarska was restored to its prewar position by the Polish parliament in 1990. 87. Stan Persky, At the Lenin Shipyard (Vancouver: New Star Books, 1982). 88. "Zalozenia programowe OZ NSZZ Solidarnose we PW," Pismo 02 NSZZ Solidarnosc w Politechnice Warszawskiej 4( 198 I): 9- I I. 89. Hoser, "Srodowisko." 90. Janusz Tymowski, Organizacja Szkolnictwa Wyzszego w Polsce (Warsaw: PWN, 1980), pp. 48-56. 91. Janusz Tymowski, "Sytuacja Inzynierow" (unpublished manuscript, 1982). 92. Janusz Tymowski, Problemy Kadr Wysoko Kwali.fkowanych (Wroclaw: Ossolineum, 1982). 93. Bronislaw Jacek, "Jaka Ma Bye Nowa Reforma Studi6w?" Informacje NSZZ Solidarnosc przy Politechnice Wroclawskiej, May 29, 1981, p. 4. 94. Szymon Jakubowicz, "Autentycznose: Warunkiem Zaufania i Poparcia," Tygodnik Solidarnosc 2(April 10, 1981):6-7. 95. Archie Brown, "A Reformer in the Kremlin," The Nation, June 13, 1987, p. 793; Moshe Lewin, The Gorbachev Phenomenon (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988), pp. 124-131. 96. See Noble, America by Design. 97. Daniel Bell, The Coming ofPost Industrial Society (New York: Basic, 1973).


CHAPTER

8

Hierarchy of Status and Prestige within the Medical Profession in Czechoslovakia Alena Heitlinger

There are many questions one could discuss in an examination of the hierarchy of status and prestige within the medical profession in Czechoslovakia. This study focuses upon three interrelated issues: (I) an exploration of the ways in which socialist medicine in Czechoslovakia can be defined as a bureaucratic profession; (2) an examination of the segmentation and rank ordering of various medical specialties, as well as of general practitioners, specialists, and administrators; and (3) a brief review of the ranking and power of socialist medicine in relation to other occupations. The examination of the attitudes and values concerning the prestige of professional medicine will take into account such "standard" sociological categories of social stratification and mobility analysis as age, gender, geographical location, and career structure.

Defining Socialist Medicine in Czechoslovakia As I have argued in my recent books, medicine under socialism constitutes what Fielding and Portwood call a "bureaucratic profession," an occupation that has achieved a formal working relationship with the welfare state.! However, as Krause has argued in Chapter I, unlike the "private" professions that have limited state involvement and employment (the American case) or the state-involved professions of


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continental Western Europe, professionals in Eastern Europe are primarily state located and state employed. Professional medicine depends on the socialist state for the overall financing and provision of the workplace, for medical supplies and technology, clientele, salaries, the license to practice, and an adequate supply of subordinate health care workers. However, the determination ofclinical practice has been left largely in the hands of the medical professionals themselves. The socialist party-state has decreed by fiscal and legislative or administrative means the organizational framework of health services, who shall receive the services and in what order of priority, but individual doctors have been left with substantial choice and work autonomy to decide how to handle their patients and how to practice their particular medical specialties. As we shall see, the greatest degree of state intervention has occurred in the field of the medical determination of work disability, which is an area characterized by divided loyalties between the work principles of professional treatment and bureaucratic rationality. As Mashaw has argued, a model of professional treatment finds its legitimacy in the provision of service to clients. 2 Its primary goal is client satisfaction, its work structure is interpersonal, and its cognitive technique is dominated by the clinical application of knowledge. In contrast, a model of bureaucratic rationality is legitimized by its adherence to values of accuracy and efficiency. Its primary goal is model implementation, its work structure is hierarchical, and its cognitive technique is based on information processing. In her comment on Mashaw's typology, Ramsay points out that "if the occupational specialists who meet their clients or patients judge their performance by how well they applied their clinical skills and knowledge, while the administrators of their service judge organizational success by criteria of accuracy and efficiency, then strains and tensions are inevitable."3 Though this is undoubtedly an accurate observation, Mashaw notes that, at least in the case of professions whose "professional culture is sufficiently robust" (and medicine definitely falls into this category), strains and tensions are normally resolved with the appeal to the professional treatment model rather than to the ideal of bureaucratic rationality. 4 Thus, "when action comes to be justified, sound professional judgment is an adequate explanation. And the adequacy of bureaucratic organization will be evaluated in terms ofits tendency to permit fulfillment of the professional's role in relation to client or


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patient needs." Mashaw also suggests that although an administrative superstructure may determine the total resources available for treatment, the use of these resources is governed by professional judgments that are acquired through professional training and peer interaction. Moreover, in his view "the dominance ofthe service ideal and the professional-client relational context are visible in the autonomy of the individual lawyer or doctor once the physician-patient or lawyerclient relationship has been established" (my italics). 5 As we shall see, the central aspects of the professional treatment model, especially the service ideal and the notion ofprofessional medical autonomy, also officially characterize socialist medicine in Czechoslovakia. For example, the 1966 Health Care Law, which fully institutionalized the principle of free universal health care (including dental care) by transferring entitlement from an insurance basis to entitlement based on citizenship, obliges socialist health care workers to perform their occupational activities "conscientiously, honestly, with deep human affinity towards citizens and with the full knowledge of responsibility towards society." Muller and Kapr, writing in the official journal of the Czech Medical Association, also acknowledge that medical theory and practice are governed by the tendency "to view practically every situation connected with medical intervention as a situation closed to the evaluation and control from the outside [that is, lay control]. This stand has led to the view that no one else other than the physician has enough expert knowledge and experience to control medical activity."6 Thus, with respect to professional clinical power, the medical profession in Czechoslovakia appears to be in a powerful position, since its clinical ideology and practice cannot be easily challenged either by the state or by organized consumer groups. However, its corporate political power is rather weak. Field's conclusion for the USSR holds as well for Czechoslovakia: In most democratic countries around the world, the medical profession and professional associations do have a clout and power; they will negotiate with Parliament or the Diet or lobby in Congress to protect their interests (which they link, of course, with those of patients). In other words they are able to take adversarial and oppositional positions (such as going, or threatening to go, on strike or blocking specific pieces of legislation and so on). In the Soviet Union, on the other hand, for better or for worse, the independent


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voice of the medical profession has been silenced, and doctors have become politically powerless. 7 Czech health officials have acknowledged, with considerable pride, that the socialist reorganization of the Czechoslovak health care system was based "on the principles, experiences and achievement of the Soviet health care system."8 These include: the separation of medicine into subdisciplines based on bodily functions and population group to be served; 2. a clear division of responsibilities between primary ambulatory care and the more specialized secondary out-patient and tertiary in-hospital care; 3. a centralized, top-down health care administrative pyramid, with a series of administrative levels serving as transmission belts for orders, directives, and policies from the top down, and transmission of reports, questions, and requests from the bottom up; 4. a system of special high-quality party and military clinics, restricted to high party officials and their families; 5. a restriction on the right of patients to choose their own physiI.

CIan;

6. a system of priorities in the provision of medical services, based on the officially perceived need of industrial development and population replacement. These principles can be used as a framework within which we can examine both the specific structure and organization of Czechoslovak medicine and the ways in which these have contributed to the rank ordering of specialties.

Segmentation and Rank Ordering of Primary Care Physicians

In line with the Soviet model, local medical care in Czechoslovakia is characterized by a physical and functional separation of health services for special population groups.9 The singling out of special population groups is based on age (in the case of pediatrics), sex (in the case



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of obstetrics-gynecology), and occupation (in the case of industrial workers), with the result that there are both separate and overlapping medical care systems for children, expectant mothers, factory workers, and the general community population. Moreover, unlike the Western countries, Czechoslovakia has neither the concept nor the clinical practice of family medicine. General community physicians, who are trained as internists rather than as family health care experts, tend to have little knowledge of their patients' living and working conditions, a shortcoming that is magnified by poor or nonexistent communication between community and industrial doctors, and between general practitioners and specialists. This communication gap is particularly unfortunate for women, whose health care is split between community and industrial physicians, who deal with general adult diseases, and between community and industrial obstetriciansgynecologists, who focus on reproductive health and pathology. Patients requiring care cannot freely choose their own physician but must see one in their place of residence or work. Patients can switch doctors officially only if they can prove that they had received inadequate care from the physician in their district, and then only after a lengthy bureaucratic procedure. On the basis of the results of a 198 I nationwide sample survey of 1,520 respondents, Pilkova reports that of the 429 patients who were highly dissatisfied with their medical care, more than 60 percent did not bother changing their physician. 10 Twenty-four percent found a new physician through informal networks, and only I I percent changed their doctor officially. However, more than 50 percent (57 percent in the Czech lands and 42 percent in Slovakia) would like to be able to choose their own physician. Twenty-six percent of the sample were satisfied with the current system and 20 percent did not express an opinion. Physicians working in the district or industrial clinic generally do not work in the hospital, and vice versa. One consequence of this rigid division of labor is a pronounced hierarchy of medical status and prestige, with primary clinical care at the bottom of the scale throughout Eastern Europe. For example, Millard reports that in Poland local doctors, particularly in urban areas, are often described primarily as clerks directing their patients to specialist consultation, having little job satisfaction and itching for a hospital post with its accompanying prestige, better facilities, and more interesting cases. 11 A similar state of affairs has been reported from the Soviet Union, where many


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primary care physicians resent being considered "mere qualified dispatchers" by the secondary and tertiary care specialists. 12 It is worth noting that the clear separation between the office practice of the general practitioner and the hospital base for specialist work is characteristic of most of Europe. 13 An organizational separation between the clinic and hospital services is also in evidence in Israel, with identical results. According to Shuval, this separation has resulted in the duplication of expensive tests and disruption of continuity of medical care. "No less important is the fact, " Shuval argues, "that it has resulted in a differentiation of status between professionals in the two settings and in a corresponding differentiation in quality of care: physicians practising in hospitals enjoy higher professional status and are generally thought to deliver higher quality care than their colleagues providing primary care in community clinics. "14 However, the East European pattern ofadministratively centralized programs, and of separately organized services for industrial, maternal, and child health, is clearly different from the pattern that prevails in Western Europe. As we noted, health services are delivered through a supposedly integrated (though in practice organizationally fragmented) hierarchical system of local, district, regional, and community levels as well as of industrial, therapeutic, and preventive health units. A "health community" is the basic unit of local health service, encompassing approximately 3,000-4,000 individuals (more in some rural areas and townships). A medical district is the most common administrative district, with 100,000-200,000 residents, who are served by polyclinics and sometimes small community hospitals. The polyclinic is a relatively large and specialized facility, usually not attached to a hospital. Here, specialists in most of the recognized branches of medicine hold office hours for patients referred from the local health communities. Laboratory and X-ray facilities are usually available, and various categories of nursing and technical assistants are also present. Each polyclinic both "serves" and "controls" a number of general practitioners, obstetricians-gynecologists, and pediatricians, who are sometimes physically incorporated in the same location, especially in the larger cities. IS There is a parallel system ofspecial health units for industrial workers. Each large plant (over 1,000 employees) has its own health unit and staff. In 1974 there were more than 2,300 such centers, compared with fifteen industrial centers in existence before World War II.16 As



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Weinerman has observed, "the industrial health services are both preventive and therapeutic in nature, with emphasis on plant safety and hygiene, special control of local occupational hazards, and general medical care of all illnesses and injuries, whether or not they are jobconnected disorders. Thus, much of the medical work of the factory unit consists of routine office care and treatment of minor injuries, including regular prenatal services for employed women and referral arrangements for those needing specialty care. . . . In general, the material resources and standards of service in the factory units are comparable to those for the general community. However, in certain of the more interested and 'wealthier' industries, such as mining and steel, supplements to the public health appropriations make extra services or equipment possible."17 Though some of the physicians who staff these centers have some training in industrial medicine, most of them are general practitioners. The questionable rationality of the division between community and industrial health centers is rarely addressed in Eastern Europe. According to Millard, this is so "probably because of the ideological aura surrounding the provision of separate treatment of industrial workers and the somewhat suspect notion that prophylactic measures are more effective when undertaken by doctors familiar with particular work conditions. "18 Thus, the particular nature of the administrative health unit is crucial in determining the scope of work of all primary care physicians. However, the levels ofquality and material adequacy of services for expectant mothers and children are generally above those for the adult services, in line with the higher priority assigned to reproductive and pediatric care. The health community center, or general physician's office, may range in design from a simple set of rooms for the local practitioner and an assisting nurse to a more elaborate, usually urban, group health center located within the polyclinic. Facilities are generally inexpensive, unadorned, and limited to necessities. The equipment available to the general physician is usually restricted to the simplest portable instruments for physical examination and medication. Laboratory, X-ray, or more specialized diagnostic equipment (for instance, for electrocardiography) are seldom on hand, although physicians whose offices are located within the polyclinic are usually aided by greater availability of consultant and diagnostic resources. The work day is seven or eight hours, of which two-thirds is spent in


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the office and one-third on house calls. Daily patient load is heavy, amounting to fifty to sixty visits, which works out to six to eight minutes per patient. 19 In addition to primitive work conditions, primary medical care is also characterized by a high degree of routinization and monotony of work. However, these latter characteristics are also related to a continuous organizational drive toward subspecialization. For example, since the 1976 reorganization of reproductive care, the work of district primary care obstetricians-gynecologists has been limited to giving contraceptive advice, writing prescriptions for birth control pills, inserting IUDs, performing routine antenatal care, filling in forms for an abortion, and, when required, referring women patients to other specialists and facilities. Zidovsky ignores this dimension of subspecialization, seeing in "the narrowing of the concentration of interest and effort of a great number of gynecologists and obstetricians ... the means towards the optimalization of patient care. "20 In contrast, K viz notes that "the knowledge of community gynecologists, fully separated from hospital beds, exceeds by far the tasks required of them in their restricted community practice. "21 These organizational limitations have in turn reinforced the low esteem in which specialists generally hold primary care physicians. As Pluhar has put it, the general physician, more than any other specialist, is led by a whole range of specialists. Each is leading him from the perspective of his specialty and the leadership consists mainly of placing demands. The majority of specialists do not see in a general physician a co-worker, but an object, from whom it is necessary to demand work, which can then be evaluated. 22 It is hardly surprising that community primary practice is an unpopular career choice. Between 1950 and 1970 the number of specialists grew by 81 percent, while that of general practitioners rose by less than 20 percent and that of industrial physicians by only 12 percent. Snajdr and Thiel explain these patterns largely in terms of medical work structures: From the perspective of the patient, practically all the more effective medical intervention has been .taken over by specialists of var-



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ious disciplines. District primary care physicians have been left with the difficult, responsible, thankless remaining work: high frequency of patients, visiting service in the apartments of ill patients, emergency services, review activity and the unpopular "paperwork"-the writing of certificates, suggestions, satisfying continuously increasing requests for the documentation of one's activity. This has been coupled with the declining respect from both the specialists and the lay public towards the role of the general practitioner who at most can become a distributor in a system of specialists. 23 Doubts about the erudition and usefulness of general practitioners were particularly prevalent in the 1960s and early 1970s. In recent years, the Czech Ministry ofHealth has begun to recognize the importance of general practitioners, seeing them as more knowledgeable of patients' overall personal situation, and as capable of integrating specialized care. 24 Finally, there is the issue of medical certification of workers' disability, which Weinerman estimates occupies 20 percent of the time of general physicians. 25 Compensation for wage loss due to sickness or injury is universally available in Czechoslovakia, allowing for cash payments up to 90 percent of wage levels for up to one year, with no waiting periods before benefits begin. Absenteeism from work due to illness is rather high (approximately seventeen days per year), with sickness benefits and other forms of social security constituting up to 24 percent of total per capita income. 26 A worker's inability to work and fitness to return to work are determined in most cases by the regular community or industrial primary care physicians under the jurisdiction at each district level ofa formal Work Assessment Service. The latter employs just over 2 percent of all practicing physicians-a relatively high proportion. 27 Assessing a worker's fitness for a given job, a professional activity that stems from the socially approved monopoly and legitimate right of professional medicine to define illness, typically involves physicians in a number of complex and contradictory obligations. On the one hand, there is frequent pressure from workers to be declared as "unfit for work," since the physician's certificate is the best and only sure method of escaping work without a major loss of pay. Field has summarized the dilemma facing the Soviet doctor as follows:


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It is difficult for the physician to sift the worthy from the unworthy

cases. Torn by claims of those who are genuinely in need of medical attention, those who do not need this attention but deserve an excuse, and those who do not, the doctor may oscillate between attitudes of indifference and compassion and acquire, in the long run, a deep sense of frustration. 28 On the other hand, there is also frequent pressure from higher authorities, interested in uninterrupted production, to reduce the number of medical certificates, especially ifthe workers are suspected ofmalingering. Csaszi and Kullberg report that in Hungary this situation leads to an atmosphere characterized by distrust and mutual suspicions of motives. 29 Physicians feel patients feign and exaggerate illness to receive sick leave benefits and other social advantages of illness; patients suspect doctors care more about their tip than about patients' needs; and administrators suspect that patients "buy" sick leave certificates with tips and that doctors collude in this malingering out of economic selfinterest. According to Parmeggiani, industrial medicine in Western Europe is also characterized by frequent external hampering or interference from the management or the state. 30 In contrast, Shuval argues that "conflicted loyalty between the welfare of the state and the individual's health is hardly sensed by the Israeli physician whose professional orientation is entirely focused on the latter." In her view "primary care physicians in Israel are guided by their own professional judgments and their dominant concern is the individual patient's health and welfare. With the possible exception of army physicians, there is little institutionalised societal pressure to counter these criteria of decisionmaking. The predominant concern of physicians in Israel is not to be 'exploited' or thought gullible by patients seeking such certification. Their responsibility is therefore to their own professional standards and to their patient's welfare. "31 The dual and contradictory accountability of the industrial physician to both the individual patient and the employer (which in the East European case invariably means the state) also brings into full view the social control aspect of medicine that Walsh equates with the concept of"dirty work." Walsh notes that "every occupation has certain dirty work that must be done, and those who do it are isolated from the occupational mainstream, so as to exonerate the 'good' people from



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responsibility for the dirty work carried on in their midst. This may provide a clue to the historical isolation [and one may add low prestige] of industrial physicians. "32 Thus, the specific structure and organization of primary medical care are characterized by physical isolation from specialist work in polyclinics and hospitals, weak technological foundations, high patient loads, routinization and monotony of work, dilemmas posed by "dirty work," limited intellectual stimulation, excessive paperwork, low pay, and low esteem from both the general public and colleagues in other specialties. These have resulted in a low professional and social status of primary care physicians, especially of general practitioners staffing community and industrial clinics. However, in line with the higher priority assigned to the care of the new generation, the prestige of pediatrics is somewhat greater. Research on the social prestige of various categories ofdistrict health care workers, conducted by the Prague Institute of Social Medicine and Organization of Health Care Services in the I970s, revealed pediatricians to have the highest prestige, almost as high as that ofspecialists in polyclinics. 33 Dunovsky attributes this higher standing to (I) the generally acknowledged high overall standard ofpediatric care in Czechoslovakia, (2) the almost immediate and more visible effect of medical intervention among children than among older people, and (3) the fewer unpopular matters (that is, there is less "dirty work") that the pediatrician has to deal with compared with the community or industrial physician. 34 Weinerman also notes that the "social status, relationship with patients and general level of morale and satisfaction" of pediatricians are usually higher than that of the general physician. 35 However, neither author explores the social significance of gender, which is particularly relevant and interesting in this case, since so many district pediatricians are women. Women currently constitute 77 percent of all pediatricians (compared with 52 percent of all doctors), and for a variety of reasons examined below, they are more likely to concentrate in primary rather than in the more specialized secondary and tertiary pediatric care.

The Career Paths and Prestige of Medical Specialists The hierarchy of professional status and prestige among medical specialists in Czechoslovakia broadly resembles similar hierarchies in


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existence in the West. It is based on age, gender, type of professional training and qualification, the nature of the specialty, salary (including unofficial "tips"), and the type and geographical location of the health institution. As in other countries, interns occupy the bottom of the scale. A one-year postgraduate internship is required of all medical graduates who have successfully completed five to six years of undergraduate study at a university medical faculty. The internship is characterized by a rotation throughout the four basic clinical services in a licensed hospital. This is followed by a three-year program of organized training for first degree certification (called atestace) in one of the twenty or so acknowledged specialties. The program consists of parttime attendance at a postgraduate course, normal clinical practice in a medical center or a hospital, and the passing of a relevant clinical and theoretical examination. The second degree specialty (or, more commonly, subspecialty) is obtained after three to four subsequent years of clinical practice, part-time study, and the passing of another relevant exam in the chosen specialty. Women interns face many problems not encountered by their male colleagues. Although the theoretical standards achieved by female medical students are often higher than those of their male counterparts, when it comes to clinical practice, it is the male doctor who is considered to be the more talented and skillful one. Patients tend to prefer and trust male doctors more than they trust females. The latter are not so much appreciated for their expertise as for their "human" (presumably, "maternal") approach to patients. (However, as we noted, patients cannot freely choose their physicians.) Women doctors are further handicapped by their domestic responsibilities, which prevent them from acquiring further qualifications and the more prestigious and better paid hospital jobs. Slovak women doctors spend at most two hours daily on further study, while their male colleagues can afford at least three hours a day, and often a whole day. Thirty-one percent of Slovak male doctors but only IO percent of female doctors acquire a specialist qualification (the first and second degree atestace) at the expected age of thirty-four. Twenty-five percent of Slovak women doctors do not obtain the second degree qualification because of domestic responsibilities. 36 What this means is that a disproportionate number of women are found among primary care physicians, for whom the second-degree atestace is not required. Individual medical careers are also related to specific geographical



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and institutional locations. Since the abolition in the mid-196os of the centralized command system of posting physicians where they were needed, medical graduates have been able to make their own choices. These typically involve various trade-offs between location, income, incentives in kind (that is, an apartment), the potential of obtaining valuable professional experience, and ultimate career prospects. The example of Northern Bohemia, characterized by a considerable shortage of doctors, confirms that the specific structure of professional prestige ranking does influence medical graduates in the kinds of career choices they make. Although Northern Bohemia offers higher salaries and bonuses, apartments, and varied and interesting clinical work (because of the shortage of specialists), its high degree of pollution (owing to the high concentration of chemical industries) makes it an unattractive place to live. In contrast, Prague's location is considered highly desirable, despite the fact that salaries and bonuses are generally low, not to mention the difficulty for junior staffmembers of getting anywhere close to "interesting" clinical cases. The comment from a medical student originally from Prague, quoted in an article on the shortage of doctors in Northern Bohemia in the Czech youth weekly, Mlady svlt, in February 1987, is quite revealing: I would like to work in a clinic in some large city, best in a top flight clinic in Prague. However, it is harder to assert oneself and reach some position there. I would not want to work in some small town, where it's possible to get some solid work much more quickly but at the price that one eventually ends up only as a district physician, at most a ward or hospital chief. The author of the article is quite critical of this and similar comments, characterizing medical graduates as selfish, too interested in "cold" professionalism and careerism, and lacking in philanthropy. However, the writer offered no expectation that things would look any different in the near future. The ranking of the various medical specialties is related not only to the required knowledge and technical skills but also to the social relations and social roles involved. Although all physicians tend to pay lip service to the importance ofsocial perspectives, medicine in Czechoslovakia, as in other countries, is basically physiological in its orientation. As Pavlusova puts it:


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Socio-medical questions are either debarred from medicine altogether, or they are understood in both research and practice in such a way that their solution is sought only in the course of application in the context of daily social practice. Of course we won't discover these tendencies in general proclamations, which always profess loyalty to socio-medical perspectives, if only because these perspectives are generally identified with political and ideological perspectives. But the tendency to biologize is quite evident when we analyse the nature of the solution of some medical tasks. 37 As an example of the dominant biological orientation of medicine, the author cites the national research program on cardiovascular diseases, which focuses on the biological body at the expense of its surroundings. Citing another Czech researcher, Pavlusova argues as follows: In theory we acknowledge that the decisive factor in determining the quality ofhealth is the environment. However, in practice we act in the opposite way, by looking for the essence ofhealth problems in molecular biology and immunology, at the level of biophysical and biochemical factors, that is, only at the level of the micro-world. Perhaps we think that it would not be very "scientific" to designate polluted environment, disturbed interpersonal relations, lack of physical activity, disorder in one's workplace, smoking, alcoholism and so on, as the causes of health problems. 38 The tension between medical and social criteria is particularly acute in women's medicine. As Vojta argues, gynecologists cannot be satisfied only with the fulfilment of tasks connected with the prevention and cure of women's illness. They are engaged to much greater extent than physicians of other specialties in the social problems of their women patients. Thus another requirement for gynecologists is to clarify and study what has changed in this field and how it contributes to the results of their work and mission as helpers of women. 39 However, many gynecologists resent having to deal with the "social problems of their women patients." This is particularly evident in cases involving abortions on social grounds-80 percent of all authorized abortions. As Kotasek put it, "we watch with certain bitterness the fact that we, executors of the law, deal with 80 per cent of cases which are



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outside the medical sphere. "40 What the doctors particularly resented was being put in the position of having to make what are essentially social policy decisions. Were unmarried status, inadequate housing, three or more children-the most frequently stated reasons in requesting an abortion-sufficient and justifiable reasons for performing it? These dilemmas were heightened (or minimized, as the case may be) by the existing division oflabor between primary care and tertiary care physicians. For ambulatory doctors and doctors who used to serve on abortion commissions (which were abolished as ofJanuary I, 1988, thus making abortion essentially available "on demand") dealt only with requests, while the actual operation was performed by the tertiary care physicians in the hospi~al, who only executed decisions made by somebody else. Another manifestation of the tension between the sociopsychological and medical criteria has been evident in the reluctance of obstetricians to promote psychoprophylaxis. According to Bruchic and Sochor, psychoprophylaxis "goes against the physiological conception of Czechoslovak obstetrics. "41 One way this tension has been "resolved," at least at the level of theory, is by "ghettoizing" social perspectives within the confines of a separate subdiscipline, called social gynecology, which in turn is a subspecialty of the low-prestige specialty of social medicine. Drbal argues that till the I 970S social medicine was seen as an aspect of social rather than medical science. 42 The institutional incorporation of social medicine into medicine as a whole is rather recent. In 1984 the Czech Ministry of Health issued directives on social medicine, defining it as follows: Social medicine and the organization of health services is a science dealing about the health of society and social problems of medicine. It studies the pattern of influence of social factors on the health of social classes, groups and individuals and investigates ways of their protection and strengthening. The organization of health services is a system of scientifically founded measures which constitute one of the most important social factors influencing the health status of the population. Another component of the discipline is health education which has its own established disciplinary framework. 43 However, neither social medicine linked with biologically oriented medicine nor social medicine linked with the various branches of social science appear to have high professional prestige among physi-


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cians. Social medicine is essentially seen as subservient to medicine as a whole. As Majek, a prominent physician who is also a member of the prestigious Academy of Sciences, acknowledges, there exists a problem of differentiation and integration of science.. There is a related need to accept new ideas about the relationship of medical disciplines to other "nonmedical" disciplines, without which the development of modern medicine is impossible. It is still necessary to struggle against the anachronistic view of the social sciences as "helping" or "servicing" disciplines, and treat them instead as equal partners. 44 Thus the "nonmedical" specialties involving doctors in environmental problems or in the social problems of their patients such as obstetrics-gynecology, epidemiology, public health, and health education have lower prestige than the more biologically, technologically, and clinically oriented branches of medicine, such as surgery or anesthesia. Weinerman also points out that physicians who elect to work in the hygiene and epidemiological services or in other medical administrative programs separated from clinical work experience a subtle loss of status and prestige in the professional hierarchy, both in the United States and Czechoslovakia. 45 The subtle (or not so subtle) loss of prestige is clearly evident in health education. The latter is almost entirely the responsibility of nurses, because doctors have neither the time nor the desire to engage in such work. In 1985, out of 55,871 physicians in active service (including 8,302 dentists), only 81 (which works out to 0.14 percent) were listed as employed in health education. 46 Health education has low occupational prestige even within nursing-of ten nursing roles, health education came lowest, together with social work nursing and "clerical" nursing in central documentation. In contrast, a survey of 182 public health nurses (including one man) revealed that most of these nurses liked their work, which they saw as creative, varied, autonomous, and interesting. 47 Physicians are also reluctant to participate in sex education, preferring to leave this activity to teachers and parents, who are, however, far less popular as instructors on this subject among young people. 48 However, there seems to be no clear-cut correlation between the



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prestige ofa given medical specialty and gender, that is, the proportion of women in a particular specialty. True, the proportion of women in the traditionally most prestigious branches of medicine is rather low: 13 percent in surgery and 8.5 percent in neurosurgery. However, other traditionally prestigious branches have relatively high female proportions: 32 percent in sport medicine, 37 percent in both plastic surgery and in nuclear medicine, 47 percent in otorhinolaryngology, 70 percent in hematology, and 72 percent in dermatology. Similarly, the less prestigious branches are by no means all dominated by women. Although women constitute 71 percent of all general practitioners, 77 percent of all pediatricians, 64 percent of all epidemiologists, and 61 percent of health educators, they constitute "only" 46 percent of all district community physicians and 54 percent of all enterprise physicians. The Work Assessment Service employs 39 percent of women among its staff doctors. Women constitute 55 percent of all psychiatrists and 3 I percent of an obstetrician-gynecologists. 49 Although Jancar argues that obstetrics-gynecology is considered one of the most prestigious medical branches in Hungary, this is apparently not so in Czechoslovakia. 50 My personal, anecdotal conversations with several pediatricians of both sexes revealed that, at least within pediatrics, obstetricsgynecology does not enjoy a great deal of prestige. "After all," went the typical comment, "obstetrics deals with essentially healthy people, doesn't it?" However, there was also a general sense of envy and resentment among pediatricians about the widespread practice of "tipping" (or "bribing") of obstetricians, which is apparently not so common in the more altruistic pediatrics. Thus, broad comparisons and evaluations of the significance of gender in "socialist" and "capitalist" medicine are premature without more careful and informed case studies than are currently available. The Czech data suggest that the relationship is far from simple. The professional status and prestige of practicing specialists is also circumscribed by their position in the institutional hierarchy. Both the work content and the work load ofspecialists restricted to the ambulatory care in the polyclinic are often quite similar to those of primary care physicians. This is the outcome of what Weinerman describes as the patterns of frequent and incompletely screened medical referrals, on the one hand, and the considerable volume of permissible selfreferrals, on the other, so that the clinical problems handled in the


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general physician's office and at the polyclinic are often quite similar. 51 It is only the medical administrator who enjoys a somewhat more prestigious status, especially if a large polyclinic is involved. In Weinerman's view, "the directors of regional and health departments and of major hospitals and polyclinics are relatively important in the medical establishment. They are also able to maintain some involvement with clinical practice, if this is individually desired. "52 As previously mentioned, the administration of the health care system in Czechoslovakia is set up as a bureaucratic pyramid. With few exceptions (for example, the health care services of the army and the railways), the entire health service is centralized under the federal and the two national ministries of health. The so-called chief specialist (a physician by training) is a full-time administrative official of the national ministry of health and is responsible for the expert direction and the improvement of standards of individual medical branches. 53 The chief specialist gives direction to the officially designated regional and district specialists. Party membership is normally a requirement for these administrative positions, but this is usually not necessary for the more directly clinical work of chiefs of hospital departments. In theory, the officially designated specialists, especially those at the regional and national level, combine authority based on expertise with that based on office, and they play an important role in the centralized planning ofhealth care. However, in practice, their influence is limited by the central economic plan, which not only specifies the overall budget for health care services (which is relatively low since health care belongs to the "non-preferred" public services) but also provides detailed spending norms within that budget.

The Ranking and Power of Socialist Medicine in Relation to Other Occupations Brown has argued in her study of the deprofessionalization of Soviet physicians that the prestige of physicians in the USSR is rather low, "on par with miners and transportation engineers and below such occupations as pilot, radio technician, and diesel locomotive engineer. "54 The situation in Czechoslovakia is more complex. Sociological studies on the significance ofscience and university education in rank ordering of occupations, conducted in the 1960s, revealed a high occupational



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prestige for medicine. Of thirty selected occupations, six requiring a university education were placed in the top third of a hierarchical prestige ranking scale. Moreover, of the six occupations requiring university education, that of medical doctor came on top. 55 In another study, modeled on the U.S. occupational prestige investigations conducted in 1947 and 1963 by the National Opinion Research Center, Kapr found that the prestige of physicians-specialists in Czechoslovakia was as high as the prestige of physicians in the United States. 56 However, some more recent evidence suggests gradual but growing dissatisfaction not only with the socialist health care system but with professional medicine itself. For example, one of the published reactions to the widely publicized and highly critical dissident Charter 77 document (No. 14 [84]) on the state of the health service in Czechoslovakia indicates the growing popularity ofself-healing folk medicine and acupuncture-acupressure. The anonymous author, a woman doctor, also expressed deep concern about the antidemocratic and authoritarian tendencies within the Czechoslovak health care system, "which are partly the result of bad legislation, routine, and medical practitioners' ways of thinking and working. "57 In fact, the hierarchy of status among doctors, nurses, and patients (in that order) is so pronounced in Czechoslovakia that a clinical psychologist interviewed in the summer of 1985 for my project on medical and state control of reproduction characterized to me the doctor-patient relationship as a "totalitarian" one, reflecting a "totalitarian" society. He confirmed the still marginal but growing disenchantment with Western scientific medicine among both patients and physicians, and its substitution by Oriental medicine and philosophy. However, the evidence is too anecdotal to be taken seriously at this time. The results of a published small-scale study on problems in doctorpatient relationship, based on a sample of fifty gynecological patients at the top-notch Prague Institute for the Care of Mother and Child, are more instructive. ]ohanovski found that almost 40 percent of patients were dissatisfied with the relationship. 58 In addition to their complaints about bad food, the high number of patients in a room, unpleasant surroundings, and low room temperature, the female patients were also highly critical ofdoctors and nurses, who were often in a bad mood and showed little interest in patients. The respondents were particularly unhappy about the general lack of information given to patients. More importantly, they were not very impressed with the


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physicians' expertise, although the author of the study gives no data on medical negligence and misdiagnosis, sepsis, or death that could substantiate the claim. Another large-scale study, based on a nationwide sample of 1,520 respondents, representative of age, sex, socioeconomic group, and residence, who were asked about their satisfaction with the health care system came up with more positive findings. The survey indicated that more than 50 percent were satisfied with all aspects of their health care and that only 18-28 percent, a much smaller proportion, had little trust in their doctor. 59 Since satisfaction with service is not the same thing as status given to a professional occupation, and since the available empirical evidence on patients' satisfaction is in any case so limited, the issue of the status of professional medicine in the eyes of the lay public cannot be currently resolved. As we noted earlier, the dominant clinical ideology and practice, which can be easily challenged neither by the state nor by organized consumer groups, place medical doctors in a rather powerful position vis-a-vis patients. In contrast, the corporate political power of professional medicine is rather weak. As Harding argues, the socialist state regards dissidence and conflict as "signs of individual morbidity or social malaise, outside, rather than constitutive of, politics. "60 Socialist professional associations (along with the trade unions, women's and youth organizations, and so on) only rarely involve themselves in interest politics, and then only at times of significant erosion of party power (for example, during the Prague Spring in 1968). However, interest politics is currently much more common in Hungary. The formation of new interest groups-private entrepreneurs and would-be entrepreneurs, like physicians-is regarded by Csaszi and Kullberg 61 as a direct outcome of the late 1960s social and economic reforms, which have emphasized decentralization ofcontrol and an increased reliance on market mechanisms within the socialized economy. In their examination of "tipping" and of three recent proposals to reform health care, the authors note the previously unthinkable ideological shift toward market values and commodification of medical care. Moreover, Csaszi and Kullberg argue, in promoting the valuation of health care in monetary terms, the medical "rhetoric serves to camouflage the self-serving nature of the proposal. The proposal does not, however, make any sense in market terms .... Its principal effect would be to increase bureaucratic control with the



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important by-product of securing higher salaries for physicians." In their conclusion the authors suggest that "the bold display of professional self-interest represented by doctors' plan attests to the growing influence physicians enjoy in Hungary. Although growth of political pluralism is hailed by many as a sign of democratization, these reform plans suggest that only the upper segments of Hungarian society are gaining a political voice. If so, current reforms have more potential to sharpen class divisions and maintain current social hierarchy than enhance democratic control. "62 If these trends continue, socialist medicine in Hungary will become almost indistinguishable in its major features from its Western counterpart.

Conclusion We have seen that socialist medicine in Czechoslovakia can be characterized as a state-located and state-employed "bureaucratic profession" that has considerable professional clinical power. In contrast, its collective political power to both influence policy and play an active part in interest politics is relatively low, although the recent Hungarian experience indicates that this is not so in all the socialist countries of Eastern Europe. In a similar vein the occupational prestige of physicians in Czechoslovakia appears to be much higher than in the Soviet Union. In fact, in the late 1960s the occupational prestige of doctorspecialists in Czechoslovakia was as high as the prestige of doctors in the United States. We have also noted that there seems to be no clearcut correlation between the prestige of a given medical specialty and gender, that is, the proportion of women in a particular specialty. The professional status and prestige of practicing physicians are quite clearly related to their position in the organizational hierarchy and to the social relations and social roles that characterize their various specialties. Primary clinical care and the assessment of a worker's fitness for a given job are at the bottom of the status and prestige hierarchy because of the physical isolation of primary clinical care from specialist work in hospitals and polyclinics, the dilemmas posed by "dirty work," weak technological foundations, high patient loads, the routinization and monotony of work, limited intellectual stimulation, excessive paperwork, low pay, and low esteem from both the general public and colleagues in other specialties.


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Given the existing evidence on hierarchy and prestige within the medical profession in Czechoslovakia, what do we need to ask about the future? We have to recognize that an alleged erosion of trust in individual doctors is not the same thing as an erosion of trust (and accompanying decline in prestige) of corporate body of medicine as a whole. When discussing a monopoly of knowledge, we have to draw a clear distinction between the range ofmedical knowledge attributed to the profession as a whole and to a particular "slice" of knowledge held by the individual practitioner. There is likely to be considerable variability of knowledge and expertise among individual physicians, and through experience, education, and so on, some specific patients may know more than their physicians. However, evidence on individual patients' dissatisfaction with their attending doctors, or instances of some patients' refusing to obey unquestionably their doctor's authoritative advice, tell us very little about the more important changes in the degree of unity and coherence within an occupation. However, these questions are likely to remain unanswered as long as medical sociology in Czechoslovakia remains underdeveloped and designed to produce work relevant to clinical practice rather than to academic sociology. What is needed is a sociology of, rather than in, socialist medicine.

Epilog This article was written prior to the Velvet Revolution, which in November 1989 so dramatically ended more than four decades of communist rule. The Civic Forurr., the Czech political grouping that, together with its Slovak counterpart, the Committee Against Public Violence, ended the communist rule gave health issues a high priority. By earlyJanuary, just over a month after the collapse ofthe communist rule, the Civic Forum's program committee of health care workers (composed largely of physicians) prepared a document entitled "Theses Toward a Program ofHealth. " The theses were very critical of the state socialist health care system and advocated major reforms. As a first step toward these reforms, the Czech Ministry of Health established a Working Group for Reform of Organization of Health Care, which presented to the general public its "Proposal for Reform of Health Care" at the end of May, shortly before the first free election. Civic Forum won these elections with an overwhelming majority.



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The health care reform document advocates greater individual responsibility for health, compulsory health insurance, the right to choose one's physician, more decentralized delivery and financing of health care, partial privatization of health care resulting in a two-tier health care system, greater preventive orientation of public health and of industrial medicine, full privatization of the pharmaceutical industry, higher salaries for health workers, and an independent selfgoverning professional medical association. So that major disruption in the functioning of the current health care system can be avoided, the various reforms will be implemented in stages over a period ofthree to four years. Ifeverything goes according to plan, the health care system in Czechoslovakia will be fully transformed by 1995. Its major characteristics are more likely to resemble the British system than the American health care system.

Notes

Acknowledgments: I am indebted to Eliot Freidson, Jan Hajda, and Rod White for helpful comments on the initial draft of this article. I. A. Heitlinger, Reproduction, Medicine and the Socialist State (London and New York: Macmillan Press and St. Martin's Press, 1987); E. G. Fielding and A. Portwood, "Professions and the State-Towards a Typology of Bureaucratic Professions," Sociological Review 28, no. 1(1980): 23-43. 2. J. Mashaw, Bureaucratic Justice (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1987), pp. 26-333. N. Rogoff Ramsay, "The Active Society Revisited," Acta Sociologica 29, no. 4 (19 86 ): 344· 4. Mashaw, BureaucraticJustice, p. 33· 5· Ibid., p. 32· 6. C. Miiller, and J. Kapr, "Psychosocialnf a modlnf aspekty vykonu lekafskeho povolanf," Prakticky lekaf 64, no. 5 (1984): 162. 7. Mark Field, "Whither or Wither the State in Yugoslav Health Care? Some Comparative Reflections," Social Science and Medicine 21, no. 7 (1985): 730. 8. E. Makovicky and collective, Socitilne lektirstvo a organizticia zdravotnictva: Compendium (Martin: Osveta, 198 I), p. 28 5. 9. Parts of the preceding and the two subsequent sections are derived from chap. 5, entitled "Socialist Medicine and Reproduction," in my book Reproduction, Medicine and the Socialist State. 10. J. Pilkova, "Uspokojovanie zdravotnickych potrieb obyvatel'stva," Sociologia 15, no. 4 (19 8 3): 443·


ALENA HEITLINGER

23°

I I. F. Millard, "The Health of the Polish Health Service," Critique 15 (1981): 60. 12. V. Navarro, Social Security and Medicine in the USSR: A Marxist Critique (Lexington, Mass., and Toronto: D. C. Heath, 1977), p. 60. 13. R. E. Weinerman, Social Medicine in Eastern Europe: The Organization of

Health Services and the Education ofMedica I Personnel in Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Poland (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1969), p. 177. 14. J. Shuval, Newcomers and Colleagues: Soviet Immigrant Physicians in Israel (Houston: Cap and Gown, 1983), p. 128. 15· J. Prokopec, Zdravi a spolelnost (Praha: Avicenum, 1975), pp. 58-59. 16. J. Cerny, O. Vogel, and M. Matejkova, Pece 0 zdravi pracovniku (Praha: Prace, 1977), p. 7. 17. Weinerman, Social Medicine in Eastern Europe, p. 53. 18. Millard, "Health of the Polish Health Service," p. 60. 19. J. K., "Poznamky teratologa k Cinnosti prenatalnfch poraden," Ceskoslovenskd gynekologie 43, no. 9 (1978): 660-667. See also Weinerman, Social Medicine in Eastern Europe, pp. 24, 36. 20. J. Zidovsky, "Ti'icet let vyzkumu v peCi 0 matku a dite," Ceskoslovenskd gynekologie 47, no. 2 (1982): 81. 21. D. Kviz, "PHspevek k historii vyvoje pracovni psychologie gynekologu," Ceskoslovenskdgynekologie 47, no. 3 (1982): 190. 22. F. Pluhaf, "Autorita llzemnmo nebo zavodnmo obvodruno lekafe, odbornika pro vseobecne lekafstvi," Prakticky Iekaf 64, no. 14 (1984): 558. 23. J. Snajdr and L. Thiel, "30 let obvodnmo systemu v CSSR-vyvoj a perspektivy," Ceskoslovenske zdravotnietvi 32, no. 5 (1984): 197. 24. See ibid., p. 205. 25. Weinerman, Social Medicine in Eastern Europe, p. 68. 26. D. Rydl, "1981 Microcensus and Its Basic Results," Demosta 15, no. 3 (1982): 22. 27. Statistickd rocenka CSSR 1986 (Praha: SNTL, 1986), p. 590. See also Weinerman, Social Medicine in Eastern Europe, pp. 67-68. 28. Mark Field, Doctor and Patient in Soviet Russia (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1957), p. 162. 29. L. Csaszi and P. Kullberg, "Reforming Health Care in Hungary," Social Science and Medicine 21, no. 8 (1985): 854. 30. L. Parmeggiani, "State of the Art: Recent Legislation on Workers' Health and Safety," International Labour Review 121, no. 3 (May-June 1982): 279· 31. See J. Shuva!, Newcomers and Colleagues, pp. 60, 58.

32. D. Chapman Walsh, "Divided Loyalties in Medicine: The Ambivalence of Occupational Medical Practice," Social Science and Medicine 23, no. 8 (1986): 792.



23 I

33· Since no survey characteristics are given, it is not clear how large and representative the sample was, or who were the respondents. Were they primary-care physicians, polyclinic-based specialists, or hospital-related specialists? Was the public included? However, since this is the only study available, we cannot be fussy about methodological shortcomings. 34· J. Dunovsky, "Postaveni obvodniho detskeho lekafe v rimci cs. zdravotnictvi a v rimci detskeho lekafstvi," Ceskoslovenska pediatrie 39, no. 3 (1984): 130-136. 35· Weinerman, Social Medicine in Eastern Europe, pp. 37-38.

36 . J. Jancovicova, "Problematika zeny v lekarskom povolani na Slovensku," Sociologia 6, no. 5 (1974). 37· J. Pavlusova, "Vyznam socialniho lekafstvi pro teorii prevence rozvinute socialisticke spoleenosti," Ceskoslovenske zdravotnictvf 28, no. 6 (1980):244. 38. See ibid., p. 245. 39. M. Vojta, "Aktualni moznosti zlepsit peCi 0 zeny v nasem socialistickem zdravotnictvi," in M. Horak, ed., Sbornfk pracf (Ostrava, 1971), p. 194· 40. Alfred Kotasek, "Nasledky po umelem pferuseni tehotenstvi," Ceskoslovenskagynekologie 35, no. 6 (1970): 328. 41. D. Bruchac, and J. Sochor, "Sucasne ulohy a riadiaca funkcia oddelenia starosdivosti novu generacii pri MZd SSR," Ceskoslovenska gynekologie 37, no. 8 (October 1972): 561-564. 42. C. Drbal, "Poznamky k pfedmetu oboru socialniho lekafstvi," in Ceskoslovenske zdravotnictvf 33, no. 4 (1985): 145-150. 43. Vestnfk MZd CSR (1984). 44. P. Malek, "Boj proti pfezitkum v lekafske vede," in Casopis Iekafu ceskych 121, no. 19 (1982): 579. 45. Weinerman, Social Medicine in Eastern Europe, p. 39. 46. See Statisticka rocenka CSSR 1986, p. 590. 47. Z. Hodanova, "Zdravotni vychovajako profese zeny-SZP," in Zdravotna vychova a zena v socialistickej spolocnosti (Bratislava: Institute for Health Education, 1977), pp. 56-59· 48. For a more detailed discussion ofintra- and interprofessional "jurisdictional" conflicts surrounding sex education, see Heidinger, Reproduction, Medicine and the Socialist State, pp. 44-51. 49. See Statisticka rocenka CSSR 1986, p. 590. 50. B. Jancar, Women Under Communism (Baltimore; Johns Hopkins University Press, 1978), p. 34· 5I. Weinerman, Social Medicine in Eastern Europe, p. 38. 52. Ibid., pp. 39-40 . 53. Zdravotnictvf CSR, 1945-1980 (Praha: Ministry of Health CSR, 1980), p. 18.

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54· J. Brown, "The Deprofessionalization of Soviet Physicians: A Reconsideration," International Journal ofHealth Services 17, no. 1 (1987): 65-76. 55. B. Vavakova and Z. Strmiska, "Sociology in Czechoslovakia," International Review ofModern Sociology 13, nos. 1-2 (1983). 56. J. Kapr, "Obeena struktura prestize povoIani," in P. Machonin and collective, eds., Ceskoslovenskd spoleenost: Sociologickd analyza socidlni stratifikace (Bratislava: Epocha, 1969), pp. 377-399. 57. "Health Care in Czechoslovakia," East European Reporter I, no. 1 (1985): 28-30. 58. L. Johanovska, "Nektere problemy ve vztahu pacient-Iekai'," Ceskoslovenskdgynekologie 48, no. 9 (1983): 672-677. 59· Pilkova, "Uspokojovanie," p. 442. 60. N. Harding, "Conclusion," in N. Harding, ed., The State in Socialist

Society (London: Macmillan, in association with St. Antony's College, Oxford, 1984), p. 309. 61. Csaszi and Kullberg, "Reforming Health Care in Hungary," pp. 849855· 62. Ibid., p. 853.


CHAPTER

9

Professions, the State, and the Reconstruction of Socialist Societies Anthony Jones Elliott A. Krause

Like any other group of societies, socialist nations have exhibited a great variety of forms in spite of their commonalities. Since their inception they have also been undergoing constant change. Moreover, they are currently undergoing a series of fundamental changes in their organization, ethos, and relationship with the world environment. All of this means that generalizations about the professions in these societies need to be hedged about with many qualifications and exceptions. That this is a very new endeavor only increases the problem. Despite the hazards of such an enterprise, we venture in this closing chapter to suggest some of the inferences that may be drawn from the case studies presented in this volume. In addition, we try to outline the ways in which the current changes set in motion by the Gorbachev policy of perestroika are likely to affect professional occupations. Finally, we are immodest enough to outline a research agenda for those who wish to join the attempt to integrate the socialist societies into the sociological analysis of the professions, and to suggest the possible benefits of such a course of action.

General Concerns

In the case studies included in this volume certain related issues seem to recur. First, there is the difference between control over the work of the profession (in Freidson's sense) and true group or guild power,


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through which the profession acts to control the training and admission of new members, the workplace, its relation to the economy, and its relation to the state. Second, there is the question ofcontinuity over time. And third, there are the changes currently in progress in the role of the state and in its relations with the intelligentsia. The future role and activities of the Communist Party are central to these changes, and these are likely to be different from country to country. On the first issue, we should remember that in the sociology of the professions there is no consensus on what constitutes the core of professional group power. Freidson says that it lies in the central tasks that each group claims for itself-and he correctly notes that in much of East Europe most professionals do have control over their immediate tasks.! But since they are state employed, most do not have much control over the numbers trained, the conditions of work, and policy issues (such as whether or not they are really to have an autonomous corporate existence as a solidary professional group, one with something to say about salaries, conditions, and the role of the profession in the society). Here, however, it is important to note that a comparison of the professions in the United States and East Europe is a comparison of two extremes. Rather, we ought to see the professions in East Europe against the background of professions in continental Western Europe. If we do so, we see both similarities and differences depending on which country we use as a comparison. Let's take France as an example. The French, since their revolution in 1789. have had a strong central state, one that has persisted through many types of regime, from the Jacobins to the Directoire to Napoleon, through modern regimes (including that of de Gaulle) to the present one. By the late 1800s in both France and Russia professional associations were founded and the basis laid for later professional group activity. Both in France and in Russia the state fought with the new professional associations, circumscribing their autonomy. Yet after the turn of the century and the revolution in 19 I 7, their histories diverged. France would eventually create a system in which state power would remain strong, even to the present, and in which professional groups would act as private bodies with delegated state power for disciplining members, with some independence, and with varying degrees of ability to practice privately. The present power of the American medical and legal professions has not, however, been achieved. In France today most doctors are part of the Social Security


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(health insurance) sector, and the legal system is judge-based, with the avocat (as with all continental systems) having a lesser role to play than in the United States. All university faculty are part of the state system, though they have unions to bargain for them, and secondary school teachers are often part of these same bargaining units. Conflict between doctors' unions, avocat associations, and professors' unions, on the one hand, and the state, on the other, is constant. The one missing ingredient in the East European systems is any real bargaining power over work conditions, pay, and the activities of the profession. This, rather than a state-centered system of professions, is the main difference between France and East Europe. There are, of course, other patterns in Western Europe. In Italy, for example, strong political parties intervene in both state and professional life; in West Germany a bargained equilibrium exists between the state, professional associations, and insurance agencies in health care, and all professions are united in the benefit association, the Bundersverband den Freien Berufen. But all continental systems educate through the state, and a considerable percentage of the graduates in many professions practice in state locations. It is the independent ability to bargain as a profession, not state employment, that constitutes the major differences among them. Second, when we look at the period of consolidation ofstate power under Lenin and Stalin, we see many continuities from those times to the present. In the case of each of the professions, the same story (in slightly different versions) unfolds. The medical profession was still in a self-employed or partially employed condition in the first years after the revolution. But once the rule of the Communist Party was established, the private profession was disbanded and in Field's term "tamed." In spite of the recent changes, to which we will return later, the situation is not essentially different today. An elite group of clinics serves the nomenklatura as a "perk," while the rest of the population gets by with the disinterested service of a mass profession that is poorly trained and even more poorly equipped. The legal profession must be viewed in continental, civil law terms and not in Anglo-Saxon (U.S. and U.K.) terms, because it is a variant of that found in the systems of Western Europe. In such systems, whether of France, Italy, or West Germany on the one hand, or of the Soviet Union or Poland on the other, the track is from a general legal education to specialization as an avocat, or a member of the prosecutor


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corps within the state, or in the judiciary itself. In the United States or in Britain, most cases would be decided by lawyers opposing one another, but on the continent they would be decided in small, specialized courts with nd avocat present. There are, though, some differences between eastern and western continental systems that need to be pointed out. First, the free economies of the West provide much more work for avocats and judges than is the case in Eastern Europe, where most of the work is on criminal cases. Second, working for the state, as prosecutors and judges do in Western Europe, means just that-a civil service and a fairly large degree ofautonomy. By contrast, working for the state in Eastern Europe means working for one political party, the Communist Party, and having the leeway to carry out the state's business "autonomously" only to the extent that the party wishes. Also, as Shelley notes, for most of these state jobs party membership is required. Only the avocats-the defense attorneysstand apart from the system. And only in the past ten years or so have they really begun to resemble Western avocats on the dimension of "independence." Third, the vast majority of jurisconsults-who might form an additional branch of a "free" or autonomous sector in the future-still work today for state enterprises; moreover, they must do so without either a national association to stand up for them, or much autonomy from their individual bosses. Talk of a socialist rechtstatt, a state oflaws and not persons (or a political party), is certainly welcome. But as long as party membership is required for those in the upper branches of the judiciary and procuracy, the nations of Eastern Europe will be living under the programs of individual persons and not the rule of law. The radical changes in the USSR and in Eastern Europe in late 1989 and early 1990, however, have made the issue of party membership irrelevant. It remains to be seen what the new situation will involve. Academics present a more complex case. In Greenfeld's chapter on sociologists in the Soviet Union, we are presented with the case of a profession that had begun an existence before the revolution, had been suppressed, and then was eventually replaced by a field that still has a "split personality"-it is given much autonomy in empirical work but is still constrained theoretically by Marxist-Leninist ideology. This is not a question of employment by the state or by the private sector, or even of whether or not a research institute is part of the university or is a branch of the Academy of Sciences. As long as the leaders of the field



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owe their allegiances to a particular political party rather than to an academic field, their work, no matter how sophisticated it is in research terms, serves an ideology rather than an internal, professional set ofstandards. But clearly the practice of history and sociology in the late 1980s is more "professional" than the heavily ideological work that was being done in the previous decades. Finally, in the case of Soviet school teachers we come up against an occupation that may have a more "professional" self-identity than is found in, say, the United States, even though Soviet teachers are paid relatively less than their American counterparts. According to Jones, this may be due to the fact that Soviet teachers are a part of the prestigious stratum of "intelligentsia," a form of social identity that does not exist in the West. This is strengthened, we think, by the fact that the traditional role of teacher in prerevolutionary Russia was a respected one, and that the educational system has become a key to upward social mobility as the importance of political criteria for advancement have declined. A third set offindings that these studies share is that the future need not be a simple repetition of the past. Changes are occurring at a startling rate, and they have direct and indirect consequences for the professions. We can consider these changes under three related headings-changes in the state's relation to the professions, changes in the role of the Communist Party, and changes within the intelligentsia at large. First, regarding the relationship between the state and the professions, there are at present no plans in Eastern Europe to privatize the educational system. As in Western Europe, education is public, and to some extent at least the number of professional students trained is under the control of the state. What we are talking about, therefore, are changes in the near future in the state's role in directing the system of practice, and in allowing the growth of independent associations of practitioners. In the case of the Soviet Union a start has already been made in this direction, but only for certain professions. For example, it is possible because ofperestroika for certain professionals to practice privately, and for professional associations to begin to develop more along the lines of the Western model-the cases ofphysicians and avocats are the most obvious ones. A small fraction of the Soviet medical profession has begun to work in the private sector, taking advantage of the new law


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on the cooperatives. Yet their very success has led to a response-they have been forbidden to use state property and the state's medical equipment for private practice as an open (legal) activity. However, since bribery is rampant both in general practice and in surgery, and bribery is money for special treatment, what this recent action has done has not been to end private practice but to simply drive it underground again. A more constructive approach, perhaps, would be to allow groups of doctors and other health workers to set up nonprofit health maintenance organizations and to borrow the money to purchase equipment from the West. Law is another example. Avocats have always practiced privately, as both Krause and Shelley point out. What has changed (to some extent, at least) is the degree of their success in winning cases against the state. But-and here Shelley cautions us against expecting rapid changesas many as 85 percent of all those trained in Soviet law do not work in private practice, but work either as jurisconsults for state factories or in the large corps of prosecutors and judges. The latter two groups work directly within the state, as they do in most parts of continental Western Europe. The issue is the extent to which they are subservient to the Communist Party instead of to some new-and as yet still not established-socialist rechtstatt. The main area of change in the future may be in that of the jurisconsults, if the companies for which they work become private or semi-private. Yet jurisconsults need at least to be in their own part of the firm, in a legal department perhaps, if they are to have the work autonomy that might lead them to think ofjoining the new national legal association. And here, the avocats in charge of this association face a crucial decision-whether membership is to be primarily for those in the avocat sector or open to all. Ifit is the latter, in the short run there will be many problems because of the fact that the majority of judges, practitioners, and jurisconsults do not think of themselves as members of a unified legal profession, any more than they do in France. Yet only if the different types oflegal personnel can really find common ground can such an association be anything but a short-lived experiment. Academics still are divided between university professors and academicians in answering questions about future developments, although relations between the two sectors should grow. (Individuals, of course, can be both.) There is some evolution in the key sectors of the social sciences such as sociology, history, and economics. Soviet



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natural sciences have the same funding problem as do Western (and especially American) natural sciences-namely, the percentage of its work that is defense related. But as long as Communist Party membership has been required for senior positions in the academy and in the running of the social science institutes, the theoretical foundations of professional science could not be free ofexternal limitations. This is not to say that excellent empirical work cannot be done-it can and it is. But the limits to the questions that can be asked and the range of answers that can be given remain bound by factors external to, and not within, the profession. This brings us to the second major area-changes in the Communist Party's relations to the professions and, more generally, the state. As it stands now, even after the early reforms of perestroika the Party remains in control of the professional occupations in the Soviet Union, though in Eastern Europe a more diverse system is evolving. As the chapters in this volume show, the role of the Party has been strong, but there are two main ways that change may occur; by getting the Party to pull back from all the directorships in health, law, the Academy of Sciences, journalism, and so forth, or by the creation of opposition political parties so that a position high in the state does not necessarily go hand in hand with a position in a particular political party. The second outcome (a loss of political monopoly) seems to be assured, given recent events. However, such a change does not guarantee that the role ofthe professions would necessarily change. To take the case of Poland, as it moves toward some new kind of system, the professions may not be the sector of most concern to Solidarity or to the general population. Kennedy's discussion of this is critical here: doctors who look to a return to presocialist domination of health care by physicians are reminded that Solidarity is almost as much against the return to a strong medical profession as was the Communist Party itself. Perhaps the avocats' position will be strengthened, but a future legal system will probably look more like that of France than of the United States. In the Soviet Union and in other nations in Eastern Europe political parties in addition to Communist Parties have already developed. But they may be no more likely than Solidarity to make major changes in the professions. What, then, of the resurgent political power of the intelligentsia? Here again, the term has to be given not only its narrow traditional



meaning, but it has to be seen as a phenomenon that varies from society to society. Certainly, both the USSR and Poland have an intelligentsia. Gorbachev has gone to great lengths to involve the Soviet intelligentsia in making perestroika work. Yet as the situation advances past the "less" stage (less Party control over spheres of life, less KGB involvement in domestic affairs, less violation of the law by officials, less control over the press), the intelligentsia may be expected to come up with more sophisticated and "rational" proposals for reform. We have no way of knowing what, if anything, they will propose for the professions. We also do not know what each profession will claim for itself, assuming, that is, that they have the freedom, the solidarity, and the association to act on behalf of the real interests of its membership.

The Consequences of Perestroika in the USSR Virtually no area of life in the USSR is being left unaffected by the general restructuring known as perestroika. Although it is still too early to know precisely what the consequences will be for the professions, it is obvious even now that they may well be far-reaching. Perestroika is relevant for the professions because of its effects in three areas. First, it involves a decentralization of decision making in a wide range of situations. The avowed aim of "getting the Party out of the details of daily life" means that decisions will increasingly be taken at the level at which they will have to be implemented. The purpose of this is clearly to make those decisions more closely reflect the real conditions and the real demands of the situation, and not the needs or interests of particular groups or individuals. Thus, decisions are to be made more and more on technical grounds, on the basis of the recommendations of "experts." This will obviously increase the involvement of professionals, and their ability to claim the superiority of particular decisions on the grounds that they have been arrived at on the basis of a professional evaluation of the situation. Second, perestroika involves changes in the general environment in which occupations operate. The introduction of glasnost, the increasing emphasis on legality, democratization, multiparty political systems, the right to free association and to the organization of unofficial groups, all create the conditions for a radical change in the opportunities for action and organization available to the professions.



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Third, the introduction of private enterprise now provides an opportunity for the provision of professional services outside of the official sphere, radically changing the conditions of work and of remuneration.

Some Specific Examples The Soviet Academy of Sciences has long been an arena in which conflict between political and scientific values has taken place. Although the academy managed to prevent Party members from being admitted in the 1920S, since 1929 political pressures on the academy have been very strong, and the leadership of the organization has been subject to the will of the Party. The retention of secret balloting, however, has enabled scientists to prevent the Party from completely taking over the academy-indeed, there have been a number of rather public refusals by the membership to admit unqualified people, and refusals to expel people for political reasons (for instance, Sakharov in 1980).2 At the same time, various ruses have been found, such as the creation of "special vacancies" in addition to regular positions, pressure being put on departments within the academy to accept someone put forward by the Party. Also, in personnel appointments, the ruling presidium of the academy can insist on open rather than secret voting. In the Gorbachev era the lack of open and democratic running of the academy has come under attack, with calls for increasing the power of scientists to make decisions on the grounds of merit, rather than on those of organizational or political requirements. Since membership brings substantial material rewards (an additional 500 rubles a month to one's income, access to special stores, clinics, and so forth) in addition to the prestige, the pressures for admission on any grounds can be intense. The academy came in for criticism among reformers in January 1989 when its presidium rejected Sakharov, Sagdeev, and Zaslavskaia (three highly visible and popular advocates of radical reform) as its candidates for election to the Council of People's Deputies. Following strong and widespread protest among scientists, the list of candidates was changed, and these people were then included. This event, though, renewed the attacks on the academy's lack of democracy, and there was even a call for the setting up of an association of scientists



that would be independent of the academy.3 There were also complaints in the press that the academy was hampering the development of Soviet science, and that the standards of scholarship ;.mong academicians had declined because of the growth of political appointees. In 1987 an outspoken article by academician Dmitrii Likhachev 4 claimed that scholarship in his specialty (philology) came in two kinds, official and unofficial; only the latter, he wrote, holds to high standards and has respect abroad. Science, then, has come under increasing criticism, by both reformers and scientists themselves. The backwardness of Soviet science, the inadequate education of scientists, the bureaucratization of science and its domination by poorly qualified administrators, the subjection of research to the plan, and a lack of resources have all come under fire. Also, the Chernobyl disaster, the environmental crisis, the economic crisis, the abysmal performance of agriculture, technological backwardness, and a string of major technological accidents, all point to the weakness ofSoviet science. As a result, since 1987 reforms have been developing aimed at decentralizing the control of science, improving higher education, increasing the ties to science abroad, and increasing investment in scientific research. Moreover, the reform of science research in the universities is also underway-in the USSR the academy has been the main center of research, with the universities and other organizations (such as the specialized academies for agriculture, pedagogical science, and so forth) taking a lesser place. Now there are plans to integrate research in the universities with that in the academy, and to encourage cross-institutional cooperative research. Also, organizations involved in applied research are being given the right to sell the products oftheir work and to use the income to finance their operations. More radical calls for a changeover to the grants system found in the West have not yet been heeded, though. 5 Because of the recent revelations about the dismal state of medical care in the Soviet Union, the medical profession finds itself the focus of attention. Like scientists, doctors have not been able to avoid the intrusions of the Party and the state. The practice of medicine can also come up against political problems, as the Sakharovs found when they each needed medical care after they had become anathema as a result of their involvement in the dissent movement. As Elena Bonner notes, she and her husband had difficulty getting treatment from someone they could trust, and one surgeon even canceled an appointment he



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had agreed to on the grounds that if he went ahead, he would not be allowed to defend his dissertation. Another doctor visited them in their home for a medical examination but was so frightened by having his papers checked by the police at the entrance to the building that he refused further help. "Yet," writes Bonner, "no one had actually threatened him. It was fear."6 The most notorious example ofpolitical actions against doctors that provoked fear was that of the so-called doctors' plot that began a few months before Stalin's death in 1953. The allegations, quite unfounded, were that Jewish doctors had poisoned two Soviet leaders and were planning the murder of Stalin himself. The details of this campaign are now being publicly aired in the USSR, thanks to glasnost, 7 as is the use of psychiatrists in the 1970S and early 1980s to persecute dissidents. 8 Moreover, many stories are now surfacing about the ways in which doctors have been persuaded to commit unprofessional acts in order to "help out" those who would gain at the expense of the unfortunate "patient." Though physicians have not remained aloof from corruption (as the chapter by Field shows), it is psychiatrists who seem to have been most deeply involved in political corruption, working with officials to remove people who were causing them trouble of some kind, or who were standing in the way ofsomeone's ambitions. 9 To the extent that perestroika has set in motion a housecleaning of the Soviet medical system, medicine is likely to become more professionalized, in the sense that pressures to make medical (as opposed to merely convenient) decisions are increasing. The development of private enterprise also provides an opportunity for the development of a legal private system of medical care, although this has already run into trouble. For example, the new private clinics that began to open in late 1987 were at first very successful and apparently very popular, since a waiting list was soon formed and branch clinics began to proliferate. Along with other forms of private enterprise in the Soviet Union (the so-called cooperatives), the clinics soon attracted criticism and in December of 1988 were subjected to severe restrictions (as were other kinds of private businesses). Thus, the new restrictions forbad "treatment of oncological patients: treatment of patients with infectious diseases, including venereal and contagious skin diseases; treatment of drug addiction; treatment of mental patients requiring urgent hospitalization due to the state of their health; issuing conclusions on the state of a patient's mental health; observation and treatment of preg-


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nant women; invasive methods ofexamination and treatment; surgical intervention, including abortions; conducting oflegally required periodic and preliminary check-ups and examinations of citizens. "10 This clearly does not leave much out, and if the resolution survives, it means there will be strong restrictions on the practice of private medicine. It will not eliminate private practice, though, for there is a provision allowing the offering of services not mentioned above if the practitioner works under contract to, and the supervision of, a state hospital or clinic. The justification for these restrictions is made on the ground that these kinds of medical services could pose a danger to health if provided outside of official control. Although there may be some practical reasons to accept this possibility, there are other factors at work as well. There is a feeling among a large part of the population that it is immoral to profit from people's need for health care, just as it is to profit from their need for education (although there are now a number of private schools), or from the shortage offood and other goods. The widely publicized case of a cooperative offering to sell blood to a foreign company reinforced the feeling that the "selfishness" and profit-oriented values of private enterprise were incompatible with medical needs. Moreover, there were many complaints during 1988 from hospitals that the private clinics were using state equipment and were taking already scarce resources away from the state sector. Reading the public debate on this issue and looking at the list of banned activities, one is also left with the very strong impression that people feel that doctors cannot be trusted to do the right thing or to provide competent care ifleft unsupervised. It remains to be seen how this conflict will resolve itself, although it is likely that the private provision of health care will continue in some form, whatever the law mayor may not say about it, because of the shortcomings of the official system and the large profits to be made as a consequence. Meanwhile, the ban has itself been challenged on the basis that only the new Supreme Soviet has the authority to make laws, and not the Council of Ministers that imposed the restrictions on cooperatives. The policy of strengthening "socialist legality" and of eventually moving to a "state of laws" creates a special role for Soviet lawyers. Although the Soviet Constitution states that judges "are independent and subject only to the law," a telephone call from a powerful source can easily decide the outcome of a case. 11 The past two or three years



245

have seen constant activity aimed at restructuring the judicial system, to get rid of"telephonejustice" and establish something closer to a rule of law. Visits of commissions to the West to study Western law, conferences on legal reform in the USSR, and a wide-ranging debate in the press on the legal profession, all point to the possibility that reforms professionalizing the legal system will become a reality. The outcome of this possible future can be seen in the resolution on legal reform of the Nineteenth Party Conference in 1988, which proposed: the setting up of a constitutional supervisory committee to ensure compliance with the Constitution (a kind of Supreme Court function); putting the investigation of most offenses under the control of a national organization (the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs) to avoid local interference; the election ofjudges by the next higher Soviet, to serve for longer terms; making interference with a judge a criminal offense; the introduction of something similar to a jury trial; making the role oflegal councils stronger and more independent; the provision of education on legal matters for the public; and a radical review of all laws. 12 Just a few months after this conference lawyers took an important step toward more autonomy with the creation in February 1989 of the USSR Lawyers Union, a self-governing public organization. Membership was set up on an individual basis, and not on the basis oforganizations' becoming members; in this way, the union would avoid falling under the jurisdiction of the Ministry ofJustice and its organs. As the chairman of this new union noted, "The way things are organized today the lawyer himself is not protected.... The main thing, where true independence for lawyers is concerned, is the guarantee of the rights of citizens who turn to them for legal assistance. The creation of a strong, independent public organization of lawyers has entered its first, the organizational, stage. "13 Just one month later the first vicechairman of the USSR Supreme Court (Sergei Gusev) announced the preparation of a draft law to strengthen the position ofjudges and to protect trials from external prejudicial actions. In addition to the introduction of the swearing-in ofjudges and people's assessors, the draft law "offers us a very interesting innovation in the form of a judges' conference and a professional-standards collegium. The latter, for example, would have authority for administering the exams taken by candidates for the bench, certifying them, concurring in the removal of a judge, etc. Disciplinary standards for judges, and their



recall and early dismissal, are the subjects of the draft law's next sections. "14 Whatever the eventual outcome of this draft law, it clearly moves the system closer to professional standards of operation. The policy of glasnost has affected journalists directly, and Gorbachev has used them as the front-line troops of his reform program. The astonishing changes in the Soviet press during the past two or three years is a testimony to the extent to which journalists have taken control of their occupations. Some of the publications now at the forefront ofglasnost (especially Ogenek and Moscow News) operate with seeming autonomy and have gone a long way toward establishing a professional journalism. Among the general public, though, there is as yet no recognition of the right ofjournalists and editors to decide what to write about, and how to write about it. As an editor of Novii Mir put it in 1987, his magazine is under great pressure (and even threats) to publish everything anyone submits-"People come to the editor's office in order to get important problems solved, they think they can reach Gorbachev through the magazine. [But] they don't recognise our right to choose our themes ourselves. And we're not obliged to give anybody a report on what our selection criteria are."ls Responding to criticism by Gorbachev of an article his magazine published, Strelyani said he will "publish what I consider to be necessary and important. This is our Russian misfortune-to look up to the bosses, to try to see whether they like it or not, how they'll react to this or that. What we need is a press that is independent of the Party bureaucracy and the state apparatus." 16 He then went on to enumerate all of the disasters that could have been avoided had there been an independent press in the past. The issue of press independence is one of the most difficult facing Soviet society. Since January 1987 there has been a great debate and a number of draft laws defining the role and status of the press. As Viktor Yasmann has put it, those trying to create a new law "are now having to grapple with the dilemma of reconciling the realities of the information age with Lenin's insistence on monopolizing control over the media. "17 The new developments have mixed implications forjournalists. On the one hand, in March 1987 the Union ofJournalists was changed into a creative union, raising the prestige of their occupation and giving it more control over its activities. On the other hand, draft laws also try to put restrictions on what journalists can publish, even though they



247

may get the "charter of immunity" that they are demanding. (This would protect them from arrest for exposing wrongdoing by highranking officials.) Another plus is the development of a legal basis for gaining unrestricted access to information from state organizations. 1s There is a difference in the extent to which journalism has become more open in its coverage, not only between publications (there is now a wide range of publications from the very conservative to the highly radical) but also of geographic area. The local (provincial) press has changed far less than has the central press, probaJly because of the presence ofless-educated and well-trainedjournalists in the provincial areas, plus the successful pressure put on them by local bosses who resist exposure and change. 19 At the journalists' congress in March 1987 delegates again raised the: old issue of the failure of the Union of Journalists to protect its people from attacks and control by officials. Many examples of this have been noted in the Soviet press-for example, an attack on journalists by the USSR procurator general for exposing shortcomings in the judicial process. 20 More recently, attacks on journalists have included accusations of their not providing enough coverage of events. For example, in November 1988 Pravda and other papers carried items complaining about coverage of the disturbances in Armenia and Azerbaijan, and claiming that "an information vacuum" is soon filled by rumors and misinformation that can only worsen the situation. 21 As of mid-1989 the situation was still in flux. Draft laws were still being drawn up, but none had gone through the process of becoming law within the newly elected Supreme Soviet. At the same time the Ministry ofInternal Affairs issued its own regulations making it necessary for journalists to obtain special passes before they can gain access to "scenes of emergency." These would include accidents and natural disasters, but authorities are also able to define rallies and elections as "emergencies" and so prevent coverage of them in the press. Journalists have not yet resisted these restrictions and draft laws as a body, though individuals and certain publications have. This lack of a concerted professional protest reflects the employment status of Soviet journalists-the only possible employment at present is with official publications (there is an increasing number of unofficial publications, but they do not yet provide any real alternative employment opportunities for journalists). Thus, their careers can come to an end very quickly if they antagonize the wrong people. Unlike doctors, lawyers,



and even teachers, journalists do not have the option of surviving and practicing their trade in the private sector, even though freelance writers do exist. At the same time, there are also signs ofa movement toward greater independence. For example, in February 1989 a special (extraordinary) meeting of the Latvian SSR Journalists' Association was held. A wide range ofissues was discussed, including journalists' pay, the definition of their role in society, the print runs of publications, and relations with the authorities. Not only was the association reorganized, but the new chairman elected by the members (70 percent of whom were party members, and almost a third of whom were members of the People's Front of Latvia) listed as his principal task "the preparation of a realistic schedule for the establishment of the IndependentJournalists Association ofLatvia which would cooperate with but not be subordinate to the USSR Journalists Union." A few weeks earlier a similar resolution had been adopted by journalists in Lithuania. 22 The fate of journalists under perestroika shows the contradictory forces currently affecting the professions. Although the general policy favors more independence, there are many constituencies whose interests would be damaged were true independence of journalists, lawyers, and doctors to develop. Although there are functional reasons why greater professional autonomy would help to solve some of the society's more pressing problems, and although the reformers clearly are in favor of this and are willing to put up with some of the less desirable consequences, there are those for whom such a development would be very dysfunctional. One way out of this difficulty would be for professionals to find support among a constituency whose interests would be served by greater independence in a more immediate and narrow way than just "helping perestroika." By associating their interests in autonomy with the interests of the nationalists in Latvia, the journalists there may have found solid local support for their aims. As we have seen, although support for the professionalization of occupations is being offered at the national level by the reform leadership, it is at the local level that resistance is most likely to be found. Though it is too early to generalize from the experience of one occupation in one republic, it may well be the case that proftssionals will seek to attach themselves more to such local interests in their search for greater control over their work. This path would seem to be especially relevant for lawyers, since the legal relationship



249

between the republics and the center is already being reconfigured. Even teachers may gain from this trend as the republics try to gain more control over the content of school curriculums, particularly in the areas oflanguage and history. The environmental movement also provides an excellent opportunity for professionals to make a public claim for the value of their potential contributions, and for the necessity to have more autonomy in developing and policing their expertise and fellow practitioners. An example of the formation ofjust such a "public interest" professional group is that of the newly formed (in 1989) USSR Nuclear Society, an informational, research, and lobbying group founded by some of the Soviet Union's most prestigious scientists in order to serve as a watchdog of the nation's nuclear industry. 23 Occupations that may be able to enhance their professional standing more easily with the help ofcentral authorities are those of science and engineering. In addition to the creative intelligentsia, which has provided many ofGorbachev's most visible and vocal supporters, science has provided both advisers and advocates for the reform leadership. The technical intelligentsia, however, has not yet been brought into the limelight, although in 1988 it became clear that this, too, is now on the agenda. In February of that year a new organization was created, the Union of Scientific and Engineering Societies of the USSR, with the same status as the creative unions (such as those for journalists, writers, and cinematographers). The purpose of this new organization (the first to serve engineers as a distinct group) is to "present alternative solutions to the scientific and technical policy of the ministries and subordinate branches, becoming a kind ofcritical opposition on behalf of society. "24 Although this is clearly a gain for Soviet engineers, it falls short of a plan put forward a year earlier by two academicians to create an academy of engineering, on the same footing as the academies for medical science, pedagogy, and agricultural science. The purpose was to give engineers a mechanism for selecting those who would enter the ranks of the most distinguished engineers, for setting standards for the profession, and for raising the prestige and influence ofits practitioners. Whether the organization would have been able to reduce the oversupply of engineers or to have improved their low incomes is doubtful, as is the likelihood that the newly formed union will be able to. Nevertheless, engineers are certainly in a better position to do so now than they were before, and given the importance of solving the nation's economic and technological woes, engineers are


250


likely to find continuing and increasing support at the top for their further professionalization. Moreover, the possibilities for starting a private practice are greater for engineers than for many of the other professions, and many have already opened engineering service centers, research collectives, consulting companies, and so forth. However, there are already signs of discontent over the privatization of engineering work among engineers themselves. Thus, since for many engineers their private work is in addition to their state job, what, asks one engineer, will be the effect on one's performance on one's state job? Moreover, he continues, why not improve work conditions and pay so that there will be no need to move to the private sector?25

Areas for Further Research As was emphasized in the Preface, the studies in this volume have been done to open up a series of questions and to extend the analysis of professions into a type of society hitherto ignored in the literature. Given the enormity of this undertaking, it has been possible to cover only a small range of professions and societies. It is clear that the issues raised by the authors in this volume need to be extended to all of the occupations that have some claim to professional status. We need to know much more about the relative successes and failures of these occupations, their differential relationship to the state, and their differing levels of control over their activities. In turn, this will lead us to develop an explanation of the pattern that emerges and to consider the extent to which it fits, or challenges, our ideas about the pattern found in Western societies. We also clearly need to develop analyses ofthe broad range ofsocialist societies. We have given so much attention to the Soviet case in this volume because it is not only the oldest socialist society in existence but also because it has to a greater or lesser extent "exported" its form ofsocial, economic, and political structure to other societies. Nevertheless, there is a great variety of forms and structures between these societies, in spite of their basic similarities, and this requires us to uncover the ways these different environments have influenced the organization and operation of professional occupations. Moreover, there is also the issue of differing levels of industrialization and presocialist structures, all of which may be expected to be ofsome importance.



Following the development of what we may call "basic" research into the full range of societies and professions, we need to look at the developing forces that promise to change the role of professions in socialist societies. This involves not only a general structural analysis, but a close, detailed empirical study of the interaction between forces within the professions and within the wider society. As we are already beginning to see, the reform of these societies is already unleashing a struggle between competing interests, and the social contract between groups (and between them and the state) is being reordered. What we would suggest, then, is a series of projects, some of which could be carried out by joint teams of researchers from the socialist and the nonsocialist societies. These would involve at least the following topics; full coverage of professions and nations in Western and Eastern Europe; comparative research on one or more professions in the United States, continental Western Europe, and Eastern Europe; and research on developments in the current decade. An agenda for this last item would include the differential roles of the leaders of the professions, the leaders of the state, and of the intelligentsia in general; developments within particular professions that are tied to broader social changes; and the broadest question of the overall role of the professions in satisfying the needs of consumers under all political and economIC regImes. It should be clear by now that we are advocating not only the integration of the historical experience of the socialist societies into the study of the professions, but that of the societies of Western Europe as well. As the chapter by Krause shows, it is not only the socialist societies that pose a challenge to the models we have developed on the basis ofstudies of professions in the United States-the western European societies do so as well. Indeed, there is a wider gap between the patterns of Western Europe and the United States than there is between the socialist societies and the capitalist societies. As has been pointed out over and over again, it is the American experience that is "out of step." The role of the state is clearly stronger and more central in Europe, East and West, than it is in the United States-as a result, we need to rethink our ideas on the ways in which the state structures the environment of professional occupations, and how this affects their place in the general society. It is an accident of recent history that the literature on American professions is so extensive, along with some work on the professions



in Britain. But a new generation of sociologists and social historians on the continent (and not just in France and Italy) are turning their attention to the function and role of professional groups qua professions and not simply as the building blocks oflarger groups. There is an urgent need to integrate these different strands of research. Much more attention needs to be given to the role professions play in the broader life of politics and the economy in all societies. This can become the basis for the development of a what we may call a broader "sociology of intelligentsias." The Polish case is a good example of what this might involve. Among the issues that may be raised are the extent to which members of the intelligentsia will staff the leadership of different parties or factions; the extent to which the differences between them will affect the future of the professions, and of other occupations and groups; and the extent to which these people, as they take power away from Communist Party bureaucrats, will hand it over to the leaders of narrow professional groups. Finally, let us end with the oft-invoked but seldom-studied consumer of professional services. Consumers are organized in minor ways in some Western countries, and to a greater extent in continental Western Europe in bargaining associations in the area of health care. But to what extent are health benefits being restricted, capped, or made more expensive in modern industrial societies, and how does the presence or absence ofconsumer groups affect this? Can some method be found to assess the degree of satisfaction of consumers with their health care, their legal services, the benefits they receive from science, technology, and higher education? And if we did these studies, would they have any affect on policies? The answer may well be changing from "no" to "perhaps"-the worldwide rise of the consumer movement with respect to the environment is a sign ofsuch a possibility. To conclude, the fields of research that could flow from further work would illuminate many areas and would be of use not only to social scientists and policy makers in the East and the West, but maybe eventually to the people they are supposed to serve.

Notes I. E. Freidson, Profession of Medicine: A Study in the Sociology of Applied Knowledge (New York: Dodd, Mead, 1970).



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2. See Zhores Medvedev, Soviet Science (New York: W. W. Norton, 1978); and Vera Tolz, "Academy of Sciences Criticized for Lack of Democracy," Radio Liberty 44 (1987). 3· Vera Tolz, "Vestnik Akademii Nauk SSSR Restructured," Report on the USSR I, no. 21 (1989). 4· Literaturnaiagazeta, December 2, 1987, p. 3. 5· For a survey of these changes see Alekseii Levin, "Soviet Science Policy in the Perestroika Period: An Overview, Report on the USSR I, no. 2 I (1989). 6. Elena Bonner, Alone Together (New York: Knopf, 1986), p. 22. 7· See Julia Wishnevsky, "The Doctors' Plot Revisited," Radio Liberty 208 (1988). 8. See Julia Wishnevsky, "Izvestia Exposes Psychiatric Abuse," Radio Liberty 277 ([987). 9. SeeJulia Wishnevsky, "Revelations of Corruption Among Soviet Psychiatrists," Radio Liberty 6 I (1987). 10. Current Digest ofthe Soviet Press 41, no. I (1989): 10. h

I I. Julia Wishnevsky, "Politburo Calls for Restructuring of Legal Bodies," Radio Liberty 386 (1986): 2. 12. Julia Wishnevsky, "The Party Conference Resolution on Legal Reform," Radio Liberty 302 (1988). 13. Current Digest ofthe Soviet Press 41, no. 8 (1989): 22. 14. Current Digest ofthe Soviet Press 41, no. 12 (1989): 26. 15. Quoted in Aaron Trehub, "Whom Does Silence Benefit?" Radio Lib-

erty 321 (1987): 3. 16. Ibid., p. 3. 17. Viktor Yasmann, "Soviet Jurists Discuss Draft Press Law," Radio Liberty 208 (1987): I. 18. Ibid. 19. Vera Tolz, "The Sixth Congress of Soviet Journalists," Radio Liberty 110 (1987). 20. See Vera Tolz, "Procurator General Rekunkov Attacks Journalists Who Criticize Soviet Justice Apparatus," Radio Liberty 265 (1986). 21. William Reese, "Situation in Armenia and Azerbaijan Said to be Exacerbated by Lack ofInformation, " Radio Liberty 532 (1988). 22. Dzintra Bungs, "Towards Independent Journalism in Latvia," Report on the USSR I, no. 15 (April 14, 1989): 8. 23. Current Digest ofthe Soviet Press 41, no. 6 (1989): 27. 24. Viktor Yasmann, "The Technical Intelligentsia, a Potential Ally for Gorbachev," Radio Liberty 82 (1988): 3. 25. Ibid.




MARK G. FIELD Professor Emeritus ofSociology, Boston University, and Fellow, Russian Research Center, Harvard University. One of the founders of the sociological study of the USSR in the United States, he is the author of many works on Soviet society, the sociology of medicine, and on the Soviet system of health care. His books include Doctor and Patient in Soviet Russia, Social Approaches to Mental Patient Care, Soviet Socialized Medicine, Evaluating Health Program Impact, and The Social Consequences of Modernization in Communist Countries (ed.).

EDUARD GLOECKNER Research Sociologist, Free University of Berlin. He is a specialist on the Soviet Union and has written on engineers, education, and employment in the Soviet Union, and on East-West diplomatic and military relations. Among his publications is Der Sowjestische Ingenieur in der Industriellen Arbeitswelt. LIAH GREENFELD Associate Professor of Sociology, Harvard University, and Fellow, Russian Research Center, Harvard University. She is a specialist on the study of, and has written widely on, Russia and the Soviet Union, issues of state formation, the sociology of science, and ideological systems. She is the author of Different Worlds: A Sociological Study of Taste, Choice and Success in Art, Center: Ideas and Institutions (edited with M. Martin), and a forthcoming vol-

ume on nationalism. ALENA HEITLINGER Professor of Sociology, Trent University, Canada. A specialist on Eastern Europe, she has published on a wide variety of topics including women's issues, health care, the family, and population dynamics. She is the author of Women and State Socialism and Reproduction, Medicine, and the Socialist State.



ANTHONY JONES Associate Professor of Sociology, Northeastern University, and Fellow, Russian Research Center, Harvard University. He has written on various aspects of Soviet society, including education, work and employment, pensioners, technology, and public opinion. He is the editor of the journal Soviet Education and has published Perestroika and the Economy (edited with W. Moskoff), Soviet Social Problems (edited with W. Connor and D. Powell), and Koops: The Rebirth ojEntrepreneurship in the USSR (with W. Moskoff). MICHAEL D. KENNEDY Assistant Professor of Sociology, University ofMichigan. He has written widely on aspects ofPolish society and social theory, including the Solidarity movement, religion, intellectuals and professionals, social structure, and urbanization. Among his publications is the volume Professionals, Power and Solidarity in Poland: A Critical Sociology oj Soviet- Type Society.

ELLIOTT A. KRAUSE Professor of Sociology, and University Distinguished Professor, Northeastern University. A specialist on the sociology of professions and on the sociology of health, he has published widely on these and other topics. Among his publications are Sociology ojOccupations, Power and Illness, Why Study Sociology?, Division oj Labor: A Political Perspective, and the forthcoming Death oj the Professions: Guild, State, and the Advance ojCapitalism, 1930-1990.

KONRAD SADKOWSKI Ph.D. candidate, Department of History, University of Michigan. His primary interests are the interactions of religion, nationalism, and socialism in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. His articles and reports have appeared in Poland Watch and Studium Papers. LOUISE I. SHELLEY Chair and Professor of the Department of Justice, Law and Society, American University. She has published many articles on law, the legal profession, and crime and delinquency in the Soviet Union, as well as on the relationship between crime and industrialization. She is the author of Crime and Modernization, Readings in Comparative Criminology (ed.), and Lawyers in Soviet Work Life.


Also in the Labor and Social Change series, edited by Paula Rayman and Carmen Sirianni

Solidarity and the Politics ofAnti-Politics Opposition and Reform in Poland since 1968 DAVID OST Based on extensive use of primary sources, David Ost provides an analysis of Solidarity from its ideological origins in the Polish "new left," through the dramatic revolutionary months of 1980-81, and up to the union's remarkable resurgence in 1988-89, when it sat down with the government to negotiate Poland's future. 296 pp.

1990

ISBN 0-87722-655-5

Worker Participation and the Politics ofReform Edited by CARMEN SIRIANNI Contributors include: Robert E. Cole, Robert Howard, Leslie Schneider, Andrew Martin, Giuseppe Della Rocca, Christopher S. Allen, George Ross, Ellen Comisso, Henry Norr, Jeanne L. Wilson, Evelyne Huber Stephens, and the editor. 384 pp.

1987

ISBN 0-87722-464-1

TEMPLE UNIVERSITY PRESS Philadelphia 19122

JONES I PROFESSIONS ANO THE STATE

ISBN 0-877-22801-9

111111111111111111111111111111 Copyrighted Material

9 780877 228011

Professions And The State (Labor And Social Change)

Social Theory, Social Change and Social Work (State of Welfare)

Health Professions and the State in Europe

Social Policy for Nurses and the Helping Professions (Social Science for Nurses and the Caring Professions)

The State and Labor in Modern Japan

Communities In Economic Crisis (Labor And Social Change)

Business Of Practicing Law (Labor And Social Change)

Nursing and Social Change

Self and Social Change

Social Change and Modernity

Discourse and social change

Young People and Social Change (Sociology and Social Change)

Faith and the Professions

Psychology for Nurses and the Caring Professions (Social Science for Nurses and the Caring Professions)

Newcomers in the workplace : immigrants and the restructuring of the U.S. economy (Labor And Social Change)

Modernising Health Care: Reinventing Professions, the State And the Public

The New Managerialism and Public Service Professions: Change in Health, Social Services and Housing

Islam, Gender, and Social Change

Religion, Ethnicity and Social Change

Race, Politics and Social Change

Women, religion, and social change

France: Political and Social Change

Women's health and social change

Ethnicity Gender and Social Change

Bilingual Education and Social Change

Ethnicity, Gender and Social Change

Climate Change and Social Justice

Language Planning and Social Change

The Internet, Organizational Change and Labor: The Challenge of Virtualization

Social Power and the Turkish State

Professions And The State (Labor And Social Change)

Social Theory, Social Change and Social Work (State of Welfare)

Health Professions and the State in Europe

Social Policy for Nurses and the Helping Professions (Social Science for Nurses and the Caring Professions)

The State and Labor in Modern Japan

Communities In Economic Crisis (Labor And Social Change)

Business Of Practicing Law (Labor And Social Change)

Nursing and Social Change

Self and Social Change

Social Change and Modernity

Discourse and social change

Young People and Social Change (Sociology and Social Change)

Faith and the Professions

Psychology for Nurses and the Caring Professions (Social Science for Nurses and the Caring Professions)

Newcomers in the workplace : immigrants and the restructuring of the U.S. economy (Labor And Social Change)

Modernising Health Care: Reinventing Professions, the State And the Public

The New Managerialism and Public Service Professions: Change in Health, Social Services and Housing

Islam, Gender, and Social Change

Religion, Ethnicity and Social Change

Race, Politics and Social Change

Women, religion, and social change

France: Political and Social Change

Women's health and social change

Ethnicity Gender and Social Change

Bilingual Education and Social Change

Ethnicity, Gender and Social Change

Climate Change and Social Justice

Language Planning and Social Change

The Internet, Organizational Change and Labor: The Challenge of Virtualization

Social Power and the Turkish State

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