Moving the Social

The paper examines the connection between economic development and the genesis of different forms of nationalism in socialist Yugoslavia with its specific system of workers self-management. It seems that the pivots of divergent national interests reflecting particular economic situations of industrial concerns in individual republics were engaged, on the federal level, in a fierce competition for the limited economic resources, in other words, national rivalry found expression primarily in economic terms, subsequently to be emotionally charged with the rather familiar historical, linguistic and cultural arguments (as became dear in the movement known as the "Croatian Spring" of 1971). The preliminary results of a research project on "Socialist State Enterprises and the Spread of Nationalism on a Regional Level: the Example of Yugoslavia, 1953-1974" seem to support the view that a national mobilization took place only after economic conflicts had taken hold of lar...

Despite all the political and ideological pronouncements, there were also various forms of social inequality in the ‘real existing socialism’ of the GDR (German Democratic Republic). These have been extensively studied at the latest since the construction of the Berlin Wall. Since these years, there has been an intensified preoccupation with socially deviant living conditions, which have been documented statistically. How- ever, these figures raised questions about the limits of socialist communisation and the realisation of the ideologically articulated goal of bringing about a convergence of the ‘classes and strata’. Therefore, the goal was to synchronize these figures with the state’s self-image, which in turn revealed numerous contradictions. Based on a deconstruction of contemporary statistical measurement procedures as well as studies and the resulting interpretations of social inequality, the article first proposes a phase classification of this approach to social differentia...

From 1870 to 1920 the internationalist ideas in multi-ethnic countries of the Americas were strongly influenced by revolutionary syndicalism. The distinctively international and trans-cultural working class identity of multi-ethnic subaltern classes in South America developed in the context of European mass immigration, urbanisation, and industrialisation. Many thousands of immigrants contributed to social struggles for better living and working conditions fighting against political exclusion. The examples of Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay illustrate that the subjectification of the international proletariat can be seen as collective identity construction of a libertarian subculture which developed in response to global capitalism. The revolutionary movements in South America and Europe formed the Libertarian Atlantic as one international movement.

The tumultuous events of 1968 had a profound and lasting impact on society, culture and politics on a global scale. In Britain, the effects of the upswing in radicalism were powerfully registered in developments and departures in cultural and intellectual life. Recent contributions to the history of the intellectual Left during this period, including the traditions of the New Left, cultural studies, and feminism, have documented many of the decisive shifts in theoretical outlooks and thematic focus. Less frequently acknowledged, however, has been the formation of a distinctive ‘politics of knowledge’, which contested established hierarchies and norms of academic work through forms of collective and democratic practice. This article argues that this project was a decisive outcome and achievement of the post-68 conjuncture, becoming part of a much broader democratising front in the 1970s and 80s that centred upon sites of cultural and intellectual expression. The key features of this ...

In the twentieth century, the coal mines in the neighbouring regions of Dutch Limburg and Liege had to fall back regularly on labour migrants from abroad. However, the number of foreign workers differed considerably regionally and in time. In this article the different migration histories are analysed in the context of the different life cycles of mining in each district. In the older mining basin of Liege the occupation of miner had been transferred from generation to generation from the nineteenth century onwards. In the period until ca. 1935 this tradition started to disappear, but the mines in Liege could still find enough workers on the inner-Belgian labour market, most of them Flemish. The Dutch mining industry only started to grow from the beginning of the twentieth century. The German hinterland had to provide the majority of experienced miners. For that reason, until the 1930s the recruitment of foreigners was considerably larger in the Netherlands than in Liege. By contras...

In 2015, sex worker activists across Europe celebrated the 40th anniversary of their political mobilisations. Despite having sustained and further institutionalised their transnational movement, these activists are currently confronted with an increasingly adversarial context formed by neo-abolitionist prostitution opponents and repressive policies. In this paper, I explore how sex workers in Europe engage in activism in this adversarial context and investigate how the latter impacts on their contemporary mobilisations. My analysis of the movement’s framing processes demonstrates that it is indeed strongly influenced by neo-abolitionism and repressive policies. Yet, activists continue to mobilise and adjust strategically in an attempt to reclaim self-representation, build coalitions, achieve legislative reform and ultimately, drive social change.

The article examines the forced labour of prisoners of the Karlag labour camp in Karaganda/ Kazachstan over the time period from 1929 to 1960. On the basis of new archival material from the archive of the Karlag camp new light is shed on the forced labour of prisoners in the coal mines, which belonged to the camp. Most evident is the growing economic significance of forced labour: while at the beginning the punishment and reeducation of the prisoners who worked under extremely hard conditions in the coal mines stood in the foreground later on, in connection with an increasing demand for coal the economic aspects of forced labour became more and more important. The growing interest of the state in the coal production of the prisoners also led to a general improvement of their working and living conditions and health care.

The question of Slovene statehood has its origins in the Second World War, when it became obvious that the Yugoslav state did not live up to the confidence and the loyalty with which the Slovenes had joined it. The discussion on the future fate of the Slovene nation developed both in the clerical camp and in the camp which had gathered around the liberation front. Subsequently, the Yugoslav option prevailed and was intended to be based on federalism and on a Slovene autonomous republic, including the right to secession. In the framework of such a scheme the liberation front, during the war, introduced a series of administrative measures and important decisions which became the pillars of Slovene statehood (e. g. an independent army). Although the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, after it had taken over in 1945, attempted to shape the Yugoslav federation according to the principle of “democratic centralism” as it had been coined by Lenin, it did not fully succeed in oppressing the auto...