The soviet model of economic management: Gastev's «labor institutions» and the industrialization of the 1920s and 1930s

Abstract

The article examines the formation of the Soviet model of economic management in the context of the ideas of A. K. Gastev and the activities of the Central Institute of Labor (CIT) in the 1920s and 1930s. Special attention is paid to the concept of «labor institutions» as the organizational basis of industrialization and a tool for disciplining mass labor. Based on the analysis of normative documents, Gastev's program texts and the practice of introducing labor methods in industry, the features of the interaction between the technocratic and ideological components of the Soviet management system are revealed. The author concludes that the model of labor regulation proposed by Gastev has become one of the ideological and methodological sources for the formation of the planned administrative economy of the USSR.