Women workers in the Soviet mining industry: A case-study of labour protection

Europe - Asia Studies

Volumn 48, Issue 8, 1996, Pages 1387-1401

  Ilič, Melanie ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF BIRMINGHAM   (United Kingdom)

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 0038764513     PISSN: 09668136     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/09668139608412418     Document Type: Article

References (64)

1. I am grateful to Professor R. W. Davies, Dr E. A. Rees, Dr J. Russell and participants at the SIPS (CREES University of Birmingham) seminar, where this article was first presented for their comments. Dr R. Starr and P. Dooley also read early drafts and I am grateful to them both for their helpful suggestions.
2. These measures are outlined in M. Ilic, 'Soviet Protective Labour Legislation and Female Workers in the 1920s and 1930s', in M. Liljestrom et al., Gender Restructuring in Russian Studies (Tampere, 1993) pp. 127-138. This paper also discusses the arguments against the 'protective' nature of these early legislative measures. For example, it has been suggested that they denied women 'equal standing before the law' and operated in such a way as to restrict the areas of female employment.
3. See also, for example, M. Ilic, 'Soviet Women Workers and Menstruation: A Research Note on Labour Protection in the 1920s and 1930s', Europe-Asia Studies, 46, 8, 1994, pp. 1409-1415.
4. Archival sources are drawn from the People's Commissariat of Labour (fond 5515) and the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions (fond 5451) collections held at GARF. The pioneering study of British women mine workers was published by Angela John, By the Sweat of Their Brow (London, 1984).
5. The employment of women in the mining industry during the tsarist period is discussed in passing in T. H. Friedgut, Iuzovka and Revolution: Life and Work in the Donbass, 1869-1924 (New Jersey, 1989). Meyer states that 'as early as 1915 women began working in mining operations underground, as did juveniles of 12 years or older'. See A. Meyer, 'The Impact of World War I on Russian Women's Lives', in B. E. Clements et al., Russia's Women: Accommodation, Resistance, Transformation (Berkeley, CA, 1991) pp. 213-214.
6. The employment of women in the mining industry during the tsarist period is discussed in passing in T. H. Friedgut, Iuzovka and Revolution: Life and Work in the Donbass, 1869-1924 (New Jersey, 1989). Meyer states that 'as early as 1915 women began working in mining operations underground, as did juveniles of 12 years or older'. See A. Meyer, 'The Impact of World War I on Russian Women's Lives', in B. E. Clements et al., Russia's Women: Accommodation, Resistance, Transformation (Berkeley, CA, 1991) pp. 213-214.
7. See for example GARF, f. 5515, o. 4, d. 298, . 9, 14.
8. B. Markus, 'Okhrana truda v gornoi promyshlennosti v 1924-1925 gg.', Voprosy truda, 1926, 1. pp. 34-42.
9. Ibid., p. 36.
10. Ibid., p. 37.
11. Izvestiya NKT, 1925, 45 (8 November), pp. 8-10.
12. GARF, f. 5515, o. 4, d. 298, 1. 38.
13. GARF, f. 5515, o. 13, d. 6, II. 77-79 (23 December 1927).
14. See 'zaklyuchenie po voprosu o prigodnosti zhenshchin k trudu mashinista v shakhtakh', GARF, f. 5515, o. 13, d. 6, I. 80.
15. GARF, f. 5515, o. 4, d. 33, I. 70.
16. GARF, f. 5515, o. 4, d. 34, II. 26-27.
17. J. Smith, Woman in Soviet Russia (New York, 1928), pp. 23-24.
18. See for example H. Browning, Women Under Fascism and Communism (London, nd), p. 34.
19. M. Jordan, Woman in Soviet Society (A Russia Today Publication) (London, 1944), p. 11.
20. GARF, f. 5515, o. 13, d. 6, I. 31. The proportions were significantly higher (ranging from 22.5% to 23.4%) in the extraction and processing of minerals.
21. 'Okhrana truda shakhterok plokho okhrunyaet (po shakhtam Donbassa)', GARF, f. 5451, o. 11, d. 384, II. 12-13.
22. It is unfortunate that the archival reports offer no more detail of such incidences than is noted here.
23. N. Afanas'ev, 'Sostoyanie okhrany iruda v gornoi promyshlennosti Shakhtinskogo okruga', Voprosy truda, 1929, 2, pp. 102-108.
24. Women in Russia (London, 1928), p. 19.
25. ibid., p. 18.
26. Russia as seen by Two Tilmanstone Miners. A Record of a Tour to the Donetz Basin in Aug.-Sept. 1929 (Dover, 1929).
27. Ibid., pp. 12-13.
28. Ibid., p. 19.
29. N. Popova, Women in the Land of Socialism (Moscow, 1949), p. 64.
30. GARF, f. 6983, o. 1, d. 159, I. 270.
31. GARF, f. 6983, o. 1, d. 159, I. 271.
32. See the SNK SSSR report, 'Zhenskii trud v pyatiletnoi plane narodnogo khozyaistva', GARF, f. 6983, o. 1, d. 159, II. 73-76.
33. 'Ob utverzhdenii spiska professa i dolzhnostei, iz kotorykh primenenie zhenskogo truda dolzhno byt' znachitel'no rasshireno', postanovelnie NKT no. 114 (19 May 1931), Iyestiya NKT, 1931, 14-15 (31 May), pp. 268-271.
34. 'Ob utverzhdenii novogo spiska osobo tyazhelykh i vrednykh rabot i professii, k kotorym ne dopuskayutsya zhenshchiny', postanovlenie NKT SSSR no. 118, Izvestiva NKT, 1932, 22-23 (10 August), pp. 296-298, restating the provisions of the 1925 decree in respect to the mining industry. The list had already been reissued on 17 May 1930. See Izvestiva NKT, 1930, 16 (10 June), pp. 861-863.
35. 'Ob utverzhdenii novogo spiska osobo tyazhelykh i vrednykh rabot i professii, k kotorym ne dopuskayutsya zhenshchiny', postanovlenie NKT SSSR no. 118, Izvestiva NKT, 1932, 22-23 (10 August), pp. 296-298, restating the provisions of the 1925 decree in respect to the mining industry. The list had already been reissued on 17 May 1930. See Izvestiva NKT, 1930, 16 (10 June), pp. 861-863.
36. GARF, f. 5451, o. 16, d. 557. II. 1-2.
37. 'O massovoi rabote sredi zhenshchin po soyuzu rabochikh ugol'noi promyshlennosti', GARF, f. 5451, o. 15, d. 360, II. 208-217, dated 1 October 1931.
38. See ibid. and GARF, f. 5451, o. 16, d. 557, I. 30.
39. See Izvestiya NKT, 1931, 5-6, p. 109, and 1931, 14-15, pp. 268-269.
40. See Izvestiya NKT, 1931, 5-6, p. 109, and 1931, 14-15, pp. 268-269.
41. GARF, f. 5515, o. 20. d. 83, II. 197-198.
42. GARF, f. 5451, o. 15, d. 357, I. 40.
43. GARF, f. 5451, o. 16, d. 557, I. 30.
44. GARF, f. 5451, o. 16, d. 557, II. 30-31. GARF, f. 5451. o. 15, d. 360, 1. 208 cites the figure of 5.6% for the proportion of women employed in underground work on 1 May 1931 and notes that this figure increased to 9.4% by July/August 1931.
45. 'Itogi vnedreniya zhenskogo truda v promyshlennost' (za 1-oe polugodie 1931)', GARF, f. 6983, o. 1, d. 165, I. 18.
46. GARF, f. 5451, o. 16, d. 557, I. 31.
47. GARF, f. 5451, o. 15, d. 360, 1. 211.
48. 'Sostoyanie massovoi raboty sredi rabotn. v svyazi s vovlechniem novykh sloev zhenshchin v shakhte 'Il'ich' i No. 22', GARF, f. 5451, o. 15, d. 360. II. 183-191.
49. The research and findings are outlined in G. Serebrennikov, 'Itogi nauchno-issledovatel'skoi raboty po izucheniyu zhenskogo truda', Voprosy truda, 1933, 2-3, pp. 63-67.
50. S. M. Kingsbury & M. Fairchild. Factory, Family and Woman in the Soviet Union (New York, 1935), p. 115.
51. 'More Women in Russian Pits', Daily Telegraph, 19 October 1954.
52. K. Legay, Un mineur francais chez les Russes (Paris, 1937), pp. 56-60.
53. See GARF, f. 5451, o. 19, d. 277, II. 4-11 for the initial plans for the project. The findings of the investigation into the mining industry are in the file at II. 47-141.
54. The findings of the survey at the Il'ich mine are recorded in GARF, f. 5451, o. 19, d. 277, II. 86-90.
55. Women, therefore, constituted almost 22% of the total labour force. The 467 women employed in underground work constituted just over 10% of the total labour force and over 47% of the total number of women employed at the mine.
56. This age breakdown totals 982, despite the recorded 984 in employment.
57. Again these figures add up to 39 instead of 36, although it is possible here that women were employed in more than one of the tasks listed.
58. See for example the reports of Mine no. 18 of the Stalin Trust and Mine no. 1 of the Krasnaya Zvezda Trust in GARF, f. 5451, o. 19, d. 277, II. 84, 96.
59. Mine no. 17 of Stalinogorskugol', GARF, f. 5451, o. 19, d. 277, I. 129.
60. See the report of Mine no. 10 in the Don region for example. GARF, f. 5451, o. 19, d. 277, I. 130.
61. Mine no. 8 of Stalinogorskugol' reported that there was not one single child-care institution provided for the whole mine. GARF, f. 5451, o. 19, d. 277, I. 128.
62. GARF, f. 5451, o. 19, d. 277, 1. 121.
63. V. Zubkova, 'Zhenshchiny prishli na shakhty', Industriya, 26 June 1939.
64. See for example, N. Dodge, Women in the Soviet Economy (Baltimore, MD, 1966), p. 59.