Overcoming Russia’s Labor Dilemma

This concluding chapter reflects on Russia's labor dilemma. Top officials, from Vladimir Putin on down, have declared that boosting labor productivity has become a paramount goal, in order to kick-start economic growth. One avenue for doing so is to focus on “cities instead of oil” — that is, to direct government attention and resources toward building a handful of “global cities” beyond Moscow and St. Petersburg. However, a major policy plan to shift investment elsewhere runs no small risk of greater protest down the road. The only alternative to further neoliberal reforms imposed on society in the hopes of jump-starting economic growth, or economic stagnation alongside an evermore severe paternalism, would be to permit society to organize, allow real trade unions to assert the interests of their members, to push up wages and benefits for the unemployed and the poor.