Geography of the Gulag Archipelago

A geography of the Gulag can at last be outlined, with new data. More than 2 million workers in more than 2,000 establishments make the Gulag a very big business, whose various productive functions are analysed here. It provides in particular a large temporary labour force for building sites, mines and high risk factories. The geographical distribution of the camps, corresponding to that of the general population of the USSR and their spatial organisation, of which models are presented here, show that the Gulag is a subsystem of regulation within a stabilised national system, and that it is extremely, albeit marginally, useful. Once again, spatial analysis proves necessary to the full understanding of a society and of a mode of production. Radical geography and system analysis both provide converging and useful elements.Brunet Roger. Geography of the Gulag Archipelago. In: Espace géographique. Espaces, modes d'emploi. Two decades of l'Espace géographique, an anthology. Special issue in English. 1993. pp. 221-239