Transformation of the subject field of Russian sociology of labor: from a system of labor relations to the constructivist perspective

The article is devoted to the processes of transformation of the content and boundaries of the subject field of Russian sociology of labor, which occurred from the late 1980s to the present. To achieve this goal, the tasks are solved, consisting in the analysis of scientific and educational literature on the subject of labor sociology; the description of the main methodological approaches to the study of labor relations; the construction of the content of the subject field of labor sociology from the standpoint of the latest concepts of the sociology of life and the existing experience of the Samara School of Sociology of Labor. It is emphasized that in Russian literature there are at least six approaches to the consideration of the subject of sociology of labor, which are mainly based on the systemic approach that prevailed back in Soviet times. In terms of content, one or another aspect of social interaction in the field of work is most often declared the subject of labor sociology: 1) the attitude of society to work (work as a social phenomenon), 2) relations between participants in the labor process (labor relations), 3) the attitude of participants in the labor process to their work. The methodical and methodological difficulties of analyzing labor relations are associated with the existence of many overlapping and contradictory approaches within the directions of sociological realism, nominalism and constructivism, which interpret both their content and the factors influencing them in different ways. The most promising direction of modern analysis of labor relations is the application of the constructivist concept of the sociology of life, in which labor relations can be considered as a synthesizing (unifying) concept in relation to the key components of the employee's life world (labor consciousness, labor behavior and the work environment), which in turn consist of a number of elementary concepts (labor motivation, social well-being, social tension, involvement in labor activity) in the space of the social and labor sphere of society (a structure-forming concept). Based on the experience of empirical research accumulated during the post-Soviet period and using new theoretical foundations, the main directions of modern research in the subject field of Russian sociology of labor are: 1) study of the behavior and life world of subjects of labor relations in conditions of precarious employment, 2) analysis of the content and composition of participants (subjects) of labor relations, 3) problems of inequality and social justice in conditions of everyday labor interactions.