Dariusz Aleksandrowicz Aleksandrowicz - Europa-Universität ...

D. Aleksandrowicz: The Socialist City and its Transformation 7
with was a continuation of the respective relation between the plant and the city in
the changed situation of the post-communist period. At that time, that is at the begin
of 90’s, all of the best land around Naberezhnye Chelny belonged to Kamaz. The
plant has bought this land from the surrounding collective and state-owned farms -
the kolkhozes and the sovkhozes. Kamaz has exercised political influence to move
the farms to sell the land, despite of the resistance of their staff “Kamaz is an empire,
it can exercise power.” 12 The chief argument in the bargaining could in turn be easily
used as a purely ideological one. It referred to the needs of the workers of Kamaz
who are looking for new houses to be built – a slogan which was impressive for
minds that grown up on ideas once promoted by the communists. 13
Unlike the conditions of the Soviet society, there are now some capitalist elements
that determine the situation of the involved actors. Among others, it is land property
(although there is still no genuine private land property) as an important factor in the
context of the economic game. Methods used by the plant to improve its position in
the new context, however, follow from the old repertoire. They consist in political
pressure and ideological argumentation. It is therefore still the standing of the actors
within the distribution of political power that decisively influences the results of this
special type of competition. 14
The respective evolution, the core of which is the specific constellation of economic
and of political factors, occurred also within Kamaz itself. The former socialist
“production plant” acquired some features of an “enterprise” and it became divided
into what in Poland is being called “nomenclatura joint-stock companies.” This is a
special type of organization of an enterprise in the transitory period that in a peculiar
way combines politics and economy. The semi-owners of the companies
usually come from the ranks of the former members of the communist nomenclatura 15
(usually of the leadership of the respective plant). In post-communist Russia, there
are hardly the rules of the market that form the framework of the nation-wide economic
process. Therefore, individuals involved into networks emerging from the
system of the nomenclatura are in a position to implement the political means at
their disposal in order to approach economic objectives. At the same time, they
12
Unauthorized record of an interview with Director of Kamaz Incorporated Design and Production
Company Nilov W. Stepanovitsh. The interview was organized by Peter Marcuse at September
15th 1993. At the interview participated except Marcuse and myself also Amine Benaissa,
James Hansen and Alastir McAuley.
13
In fact, building of dwelling place for workers has been at that time drastically reduced as compared
with the communist period.
14
Also the question as to whom - to the city or the plant - should the biggest hotel in the town
belong, was to be answered according to the very same mechanism. It was to be decided by way of
political power-play and not, for instance, with respect to some legally defined procedure.
15
The term was originally used in the official Soviet language. It referred to all positions in the
system for the performance of which the individual was to be “named” by the executive of the
Communist Party at the respective level of Party’s hierarchy. It gained then international and
theoretical relevance owing to the book of Voslensky (1980).