Fiddling, drinking and stealing: moral code in the Soviet Estonian mining industry

Abstract

This article explores workplace cheating taking place in the oil-shale mines in the north-eastern part of Soviet Estonia from the 1950s to 1980s. The author focuses on four different types of workplace cheating and misbehaviour: fiddling with production numbers; fiddling with health and safety; drinking and absenteeism; and stealing. These were not the only types of cheating taking place, but were more significant in the mining area and most prevalent in the memoirs and oral histories recorded or published in the 2000s. Analysing these four types, the author carves out the moral code of workplace cheating, as well as the acceptable levels of each of these activities. She also emphasises that this type of cheating was closely tied to the overall logic of the Soviet system in which fiddling required co-operation with colleagues, often between workers and managers, while also looking out for individual interests. Further, the author shows that due to the similar shared experiences of workers and engineers/managers, their overall class experience and consciousness, including their moral code regarding cheating at the workplace, was very similar.

Keywords:

• Soviet Estonia
• mining
• workplace
• cheating
• moral code
• miners
• engineers

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Frances Pine, Mao Mollona, David Pepper and the two anonymous reviewers for feedback on this article. This research would not have been possible without the retired miners' and mine engineers' warm reception and willingness to share their stories. My doctoral research was funded by the Estonian Archimedes Foundation's programme ‘Kristjan Jaak's doctoral studies abroad’.

Notes

 1. Kaugver, Seitsmendas Läänes [In West Seven], 184–5.

 2. Crowe, “The History of the Oil Industry in Independent Estonia”; Metsaots, Sepp and Roose, “Evaluation of Oil Shale Mining Heritage in Estonia.”

 3. Holmberg, “Survival of the Unfit: Path Dependence and the Estonian Oil Shale Industry,” 134, 176.

 4. Printsmann, “Public and Private Shaping of Soviet Mining City: Contested History?”; Vseviov, Kirde-Eesti urbaanse anomaalia kujunemine ning struktuur pärast Teist maailamsõda [The Formation and Structure of the Urban Anomaly in Northeast Estonia after WWII].

 5. Käosaar, “Mälestused” [Memoirs], 649, Nurklik, “Estonia Kaevandus” [“Estonia” Mine].

 6. Ashwin, Russian Workers: The Anatomy of Patience, 3–4.

 7. Cook, The Soviet Social Contract and Why it Failed.

 8. Filtzer, Soviet Workers and De-Stalinization.

 9. Studies like that by Baron about the brutal suppression and violence used against the worker protest in Novocherkassk in 1962 support this view. See Baron, Bloody Saturday in the Soviet Union.

10. Kotkin, “Coercion and Identity: Workers' Lives in Stalin's Showcase City”; Kotkin, Magnetic Mountain: Stalinism as a Civilization; Siegelbaum and Suny, Making Workers Soviet: Power, Class, and Identity.

11. A similar argument is presented by Sarah Ashwin (Russian Workers: The Anatomy of Patience, 3–16) who believes that in order to understand the quiescence of Russian workers after socialism, it is necessary to understand the particularities of the Soviet workplace structure. She argues that Soviet workers were incorporated into society through the labour collective that they genuinely appreciated, but at the same time were atomised by the need to approach management individually and by direct competition with other workers for privileges. Ashwin, Russian Workers: The Anatomy of Patience, 3–4.

12. Mars, Cheats at Work: An Anthropology of Workplace Crime.

13. Ledeneva, Russia's Economy of Favours; Ledeneva, Lovell and Rogachevskii, Bribery and Blat in Russia.

14. Braverman, Labor and Monopoly Capital.

15. cf. Sewell and Wilkinson, Empowerment or Emasculation?; Sewell and Wilkinson, “Someone to Watch Over Me.”

16. Smith and Thompson, “Re-evaluating the Labour Process Debate,” 215.

17. I have changed the names of the informants who gave me oral-history interviews, to protect their identities. I have referred to the authors of the published memoirs by their real names.

18. Suuroja, 90 aastat põlevkivi kaevandamist Eestis.

19. Burawoy and Lukács, The Radiant Past: Ideology and Reality in Hungary's Road to Capitalism; Filtzer, Soviet workers and De-Stalinization; Verdery, What Was Socialism, and What Comes Next?

20. Kogerman, “Noore naisinsenerina Eesti põlevkivitööstuses” [In the Estonian Oil Shale Industry as a Young Female Engineer].

21. Memoirs from another mine nearby present a story of Maria Malm, a tall and strong quality controller. Two miners decided to seek revenge for losing their bonus. When the drunk miners encountered her on her way home from work and wanted to punish her for overly strict control work, she grabbed them by their collars, banged their heads together and threw them into a ditch, frightening off the revenge seekers for a long time. Kaup and Nugis, “Kaevandus nr 4” [Mine no 4].

22. Memoirs from another mine nearby present a story of Maria Malm, a tall and strong quality controller. Two miners decided to seek revenge for losing their bonus. When the drunk miners encountered her on her way home from work and wanted to punish her for overly strict control work, she grabbed them by their collars, banged their heads together and threw them into a ditch, frightening off the revenge seekers for a long time. Kaup and Nugis, “Kaevandus nr 4” [Mine no 4], 232.

23. The requirements for a Hero of Socialist Labour, the highest award a miner could receive, were good work results, being a member of the Communist Party, having at least two children, and not having problems with alcohol. On alternate years, the hero had to have an either Estonian or Russian surname.

24. A similar account of sacrificing health over money and comradeship in the British mines is given in McIvor and Johnston, Miners' Lung: A History of Dust Disease in British Coal Mining, 237–71.

25. Kaup and Nugis, “Kaevandus nr 4” [Mine no 4].

26. Kaup and Nugis, “Kaevandus nr 4” [Mine no 4], 249.

27. Kaup and Nugis, “Kaevandus nr 4” [Mine no 4]

28. Kaup and Nugis, “Kaevandus nr 4” [Mine no 4]

29. Nevertheless, there were also other cases for absenteeism: for example, queuing up for provisions that were in short supply could take a whole work day.

30. Kaup and Nugis, “Kaevandus nr 4” [Mine no. 4], 238.

31. Kaup and Nugis, “Kaevandus nr 4” [Mine no. 4], 248.

32. Kiristaja and Rannus, “Kohtla kaevandus” [Kohtla Mine], 126.

33. Kaup and Nugis, “Kaevandus nr 4” [Mine no 4], 250.

34. Sevin, “Rahaasjad laokil” [Disorganised Finances], 2.

35. Nurklik, “Estonia Kaevandus” [“Estonia” Mine].

36. Nikolai, “Ahtme Kaevandus” [Ahtme Mine].

37. Nikolai, “Ahtme Kaevandus” [Ahtme Mine], 199–200.

38. Firlit and Chłopecki, “When Theft is Not Theft.”

39. Ledeneva, “Blat Lessons: Networks, Institutions, Unwritten Rules,” 122.

40. Scott, Weapons of the Weak.