Tibor Valuch:
The social position, life strategies and identity of
Hungarian industrial/urban workers/working
class in the second half of the 20th century
Industrial Heritage, Historical Culture and Regional Identity in regions / cities
undergoing structural transformation
1- 3. December, 2016 Ruhr-University Bochum Institute for Social Movements
Introduction
• About the research (goals, sources and methods)
• The meaning of cultural/industrial heritage from the point of view social history (eg the system of traditions and habits, the culture
of work, the social culture and custom of behaviour, the culture of identity)
• The problems of contemporary national, local and working class memory/identity in contemporary Hungary from the point of view
cultural heritage of industry
• The main questions of my presentatiton
The inner structure of the working class according to the parentage, education and skills among the changing conditions
How did all these factors influence the prestige relations within particular groups of workers? What were the main
components of the stratification of the working class? What kind of adaptation strategies became formulated? What
characterizes workers’ identities and values in the different epochs?
• Outline:
Social-demographic changes of the urban working class
Changes in social stratification
Self-image, identity and life strategies
The material cultural consequences of transformation
Conclusion
Social-demographic changes of the urban working class
• The concept of urban workers/urban working class
• Life style, mentality, cultural capital as the factors of social stratification
and fragmentation
• The increasing number of urban workers
• Distribution of workers (skill, gender, area, private and state sector)
• As a result of the de- and post-industrialisation the content of labour
became transformed.
The Distribution of non-agricultural active earners in Hungary 1941-1990 (Person)
3500000
3000000
2500000
2000000
1500000
1000000
500000
0
1941
1949
1960
Industry
Building Industry
1970
Traffic
1980
Commerce
1990
All
Year
State industry
Manual workers
Building industry
Other employees
All together
Manual workers
Other employees
All together
1949
387 096
133 021
520 127
51 000
-
.
1950
496 000
170 000
666 000
153 000
45 000
198 000
1960
897 000
247 000
1 144 000
182 000
57 000
239 000
1970
1 137 000
380 000
1 517 000
193 000
87 000
280 000
1980
1 097 000
295 000
1 392 000
211 000
79 000
290 000
1990*
995 000
287 000
1 282 000
188 000
72 000
260 000
The number of manual workers and other employees in state industry and building industry between
1950 and 1990 (person)
Source: Hungarian Statistical Yearbook, 1970, 1980, 1990.
* 1990 includes the data of all industrial workers (state, private, cooperative)
Year
Industry
Skilled worker
Semi-skilled
worker
Building industry
Unskilled worker
Skilled worker
Semi-skilled
worker
Unskilled worker
1949*
289 060
121.946
123.608
41.494
1.945
23.492
1960
349.952
329 094
193.783
56.314
16.361
84.259
1970
521.512
538.850
254.490
108.439
65.526
74.808
1980
518.788
532.605
132.295
146.706
82 027
37.718
1990
494.906
404.378
79.936
125.809
51.941
21.319
Distribution of workers according to skills in the industry and the building industry between 1949 and 1990 (person)
Source: Statistical Yearbook, 1970. 1980. Budapest, KSH. 1971. 1981. Employment data of the 1990 census. Budapest, 1994, KSH.
* The data of the year, 1949 contains the data of all industrial labourers excluding miners.
The territorial transformation of Hungarian Industry after 1989/90
Changes in social stratification
• The stratification and also the social composition of industrial workers have changed significantly
after the communist takeover. Why and how?
• Increasing role of the ‘first generational’ or ‘new’ workers, also named as ‘peasant workers.’
• According to ancestry and education three-four larger and several smaller distinct groups can be
identified within the urban workers of the second half of the 20th century in Hungary.
• The first group consists of skilled workers of having working class family background since several
generations.
• The second group consisted of less educated semi-skilled traditional workers having several
generations of working class ancestors.
• Workers of the private sector constituted also a separate, fairly small group of twenty-thirty
thousand members.
• The fourth, the largest social group of workers consisted of the ‘first generational’ or ‘new’
workers.
• The social stratification effect of 1989/90 transition
The transformation of industrial employment in Hungary 1990-2009
Self-image, identity and life strategies I.
• Hungarian working class used to formulate a rather closed, strictly stratified social layer with a strong identity at
the turn of the 20th century before the communist takeover.
• Workers who originated from multi-generational working class families had significant roles within the
communities of large plants and factories.
• The main elements of their identity – work as a profession, special knowledge, experiences, loyality to the
workplace, reputation and social representation, respect for good performance at work
• Their lifestyles and ways of thinking was already significantly influenced by the elements of the petit
bourgeoisie’s (lower middle-class’) patterns.
• The groups of unskilled labourers (constituting the lower working class) had much more uncertain self-image and
they also had weaker bonds to the factory and the local community.
• The insignificant role of political capital in the mid-20th century.
• The relatively closed nature, that characterised Hungarian working class before WW2, in social terms and values
started to get dissolved on the turn of the 1940’s and 1950’s.
• As a result of the nationalisation most of the workers became state employees and therefore the identityformulating potential of particular factories lessened.
• After 1956 in the Kádár regime the communist power gradually decreased direct interventions
• . Independently of the ideological background and the mainstream propaganda, most of the employees experienced
their situation as classical wageworkers and formulated their relationship to the employers representing the state
ownership according to this.
Self-image, identity and life strategies II.
• Instead of the image of the conscious worker, defending his own interests and
expressing solidarity with his fellow workers, rather the image of the skilful
person mostly capable of enforcing individual interests were determining
workers’ identity of the Kádár-era
• The question can be raised to what extent the processes of losing traditions and
cultural background contributed to the formulation of ‘political loyalty’ of those
who became labourers in the 1950s and 1960s?
• The changes of worker’s identity after 1989/90 – traumatic transformation
• Lack of organizational culture and experience
• The disintegration of the working class
• „I’m not worker, I’m operator”
Worker’s images
Group of upper workers, 1941
Hungarian Stakhanovite workers, 1955
Conclusions
• Both the number and the composition of the Hungarian workers significantly
changed during the period in question. Due to the repeated changes of political
and economic circumstances, life strategies have also altered as a result of
compulsions to accommodate. Different elements of the traditional working class
identity lost importance and the elements of the identity formulating in the new
situation, remained fragmented. The social and economic changes following the
1989/90 system transformation ended the history of the traditional urban
workers in Hungary.
Csepel Steel Factory in 1967 and MiskolcDiósgyőr Steel Factory in 1970
Broken-hearted workers after announcement of the close-down - 1994
The territory of the former steel factory nowadays
Stagnant and decaying industrial territory, Budapest, Csepel Factory
Fragmented redevelopment – Csepel Factory, Budapest
Adaptable renovation – former Bolt Factory, Budapest
Total reconstruction - shopping areas and office buildings
Váci street – former industrial center - Budapest
Former workers colony at the and of 1930s and now in Ózd
Former worker colony in Salgótarján nowadays
Salgótarján,Steel Factory street – 1940, 2010
Thank you for your attention!
[email protected]
This Presentation was made with the support of a CEU IAS Senior Core Scholarship and OTKANKFIH (Hungarian National Research Foundation) 116625. project.