Prolegomena to a New Global Labour History for Eastern and Central Europe

The article investigates the recent attempts to integrate Eastern Europe in global labour history as a
unique opportunity to formulate an intellectual agenda that would place the region on the global map, but on
its own analytical terms. Based on two interconnected research projects on industrial labour in socialist
Romania, I argue that these integration efforts have to start with a systematic endeavour to bring labour history
and the history of capital formation in the region together. The endeavour of articulating a truly global labour
history from a specifically Eastern European angle requires us to reconsider the scale(s) at which we construct
our narratives, moving away from an epistemological perspective that favours eventful fractures and towards
a processual analysis of labour in the region.