Crista
Lewis
4-15-02
Martin Spence, "Soviet Power: Nuclear Energy
in the USSR," Capital and Class, No. 21, 1983.
Main Point:
In this article, Spence
examines the Soviet nuclear power program in the context of energy and economic
policy and the class struggle. He
also compares the nuclear policy in the USSR to that of the U.S. in terms of
their origins and interests they serve.
Summary:
Economic
Crisis—
In the early 1980s, the Soviet Union was plagued with its own economic difficulties primarily rooted in productivity problems. Low growth rates arose in the early 1960s. Industrial growth in 1982 reached 2.8%, the lowest level since WWII. Soviet planners found that increasing labor productivity would ultimately foster economic growth; however, various institutional, geographic, and sectoral problems have impeded improvements in productivity. First, governing institutions are greatly hierarchical and bureaucratized and were unable to “plan” and handle the vast amounts of information characteristic of a highly industrialized and interdependent economy. Secondly, Stalinist industrialization stressed development in the Western (European) USSR. Lastly, the structural tendencies of Stalinist industrialization focused on achieving quantitative targets and discouraging innovation. Persistently, low productivity is also inherent in the imposition of work and the federal guarantee of full employment on the Russian working class. Since workers were unable to unite, resistance was manifested through absenteeism and lack of commitment. Even though the current structure of a bureaucratically organized economy is not flexible enough to accommodate ingenuity or technological change to bolster productivity, the Soviet government must try to improve output per labor hour within this framework because of potential working class opposition that could result from a shift to a market economy.
Energy
Policy—
Since the potential to
exploit coal-based and hydroelectric power in the USSR has been exhausted, oil
and gas have become dominant as new energy resources—not merely for domestic
consumption but for export to other CMEA and Western countries. Despite the implementation
of myopic production and extraction techniques, the USSR has become the world’s
leading oil producer. Further, it
holds about 1/3 of global gas reserves.
Since oil and gas sales comprise 75% of Soviet exports to the West,
production also provides a source of hard-currency
reserves.
Once Khruschev fell from
power, the development of the nuclear power program struck new heights, two
favorable reactor designs were constructed and the goal to construct 6,000-8,000
MW of new nuclear capacity by 1976 was close to being realized. This would result in a quadrupling of
nuclear capacity over a 5-year period.
By 1980, nuclear power was expected to provide 10% of the nation’s
electricity and by 1985, 14%.
Unlike the West, advances in the USSR went unhampered by political and
market resistance. Moreover, both
private and public capital funded nuclear development programs in the West,
while most of the development in the USSR is state funded. Another chief advantage of nuclear power
is location; plants weren’t positioned evenly throughout the country, but were
concentrated around the industrialized, metropolitan areas of the European
USSR.
After the OPEC price hikes
of the 1970s, the export of oil and gas was used to earn the foreign currency
reserves necessary for the purchase of food and technology from the West. Food was used to ameliorate the causes
of numerous strikes, and technology was imported because the organization of the
Russian economy stifled domestic productivity development. The augmentation of nuclear power
programs was instrumental in Russia’s overall strategy. First, nuclear expansion reduces the
domestic demand for fossil fuels, which could now be exported abroad to earn
reserves in order to finance productivity improvements. Also, nuclear power is a relatively
inexpensive alternative source of power, for the high transportation costs (from
E. Siberia, where most of the remaining oil reserves can be found, to the W.
European USSR) associated with fossil fuels would challenge the “renovation and
modernization” efforts associated with the industrial areas of the European
USSR.
Due
to the dangers associated with a nuclear meltdown and the complexity of
extracting nuclear energy, the process of nuclear fission along with other
processes of the nuclear fuel cycle (fabrication, enrichment, reprocessing)
require a high level of division of labor. This implies an austere work discipline
among both technicians and the rank-and-file with explicitly defined roles. With the emergence of nuclear power, the
balance of delivered energy is moving toward electricity. This movement toward electricity would
boost industrial modernization efforts and productivity in Western USSR
factories. Researchers have found
that possibly “25% (15 million) of productive workers could be removed from the
Soviet economy, and overall production would rise as a result.” Therefore, not
only does nuclear technology pose health hazards to workers, but it also
represents a considerable affront to the rights and employment privileges of the
working class.
Despite the advantages this
strategy poses to the Soviet ruling class, there are several indicators that
this approach is doomed to fail.
First, the U.S. recession will likely weaken oil prices as foreign
consumption falls. Second, some of the new technologies being imported entail a
“socialization” of the labor process; the political ramifications of this could
be dramatic. Third, factories and
construction companies in the European USSR are reluctant to undertake
renovation projects. Fourth, delays
in the Soviet nuclear power program are inevitable given “shoddy engineering
work, poor management, bad design, bad workmanship, and poor scientific backup.”