Book review: Seleev S., Pavlov A. (2016) Garazhniki [Garagenicks], Moscow: OZ Land

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Garagenicks: Smoke from Intermediate Technology and Mirrors of Sociological Concepts

Book review: Seleev S., Pavlov A. (2016) Garazhniki [Garagenicks], Moscow: OZ Land;

Pavlov A. (2016) Demon peremen. Vvedeniye v operativnuyu alkhimiyu rossijskoj zhizni [The Demon of Change. Introduction to the Operational Alchemy of Russian Life], Ul’yanovsk: Pavlov A.B.

D. KHAUSTOV*

*Dmitry Khaustov – PhD in Economics, Associate Professor, Department of Finance and Accounting, Irkutsk State Transport University. Address: 15, Chernishevskij St., Irkutsk, 664074, Russian Federation. E-mail: dmitry.khaustov1982@mail.ru

Citation:  Khaustov  D.  (2018)  Garagenicks:  Smoke  from  Intermediate  Technology  and Mirrors  of  Sociological Concepts. Mir  Rossii,  vol.  27,  no  3,  pp.  198–210  (in  Russian). DOI: 10.17323/1811-038X-2018-27-3-198-210

Abstract

The so-called ‘informal economy’ and ‘informal employment’ have recently attracted a lot of attention from the state, the public, and the academic community. While the interest of the state is driven primarily by pragmatic fiscal considerations, the general public and the academic community seek to understand the Russia that lies beyond the ring of Moscow. The book by Sergey Seleev and Alexander Pavlov, ‘Garagenicks’, definitely contributes to this understanding by exploring informal economic relations in garage-building cooperatives. This is a deep socio-anthropological study relying on numerous field studies of the garage economy in a number of cities in the European part of Russia. In a separate, smaller book (written in a more journalistic manner), ‘The Demon of Change’, Alexander Pavlov summarizes other informal knowledge about the phenomena in question and provides additional insights about the grass-root economic practices underpinning the garage economy. The ‘demon’ in the title is a metaphor for the state’s influence on society, i.e. its attempts to organize social and economic reality in such a way that makes the garage economy less convenient to engage with.The review focuses on the parallel analysis of the concepts of ‘the garage economy’ and ‘intermediate technology’. The concept of ‘intermediate technology’ was introduced by the British economist of German origin, Ernst Schumacher, for emerging economies. It  unites  the techniques and  technologies  inscribed  in  the  cultural  structure  of  host communities, which are relatively cheap to implement, but at the same time are more expensive than similar available technologies in recipient societies. The author concludes that the  garage  economy  in  Russia  can  be  treated  as  a  specific  case  of  appropriate technology in the terms of Ernst Schumacher. 

Key  words: garagenicks, garage economy, informal employment, informal economy, intermediate  technology,  appropriate  technology,  pre-Revolutionary  handicraftsmen, Ernst Schumacher

In the project's boundaries: Гаражная экономика в российской провинции — ХАМОВНИКИ (khamovniky.ru)