The place of the author in Soviet publishing policy is determined by his status as the creator (or compiler, or editor) of publishable material; and by the fact of his being, not part of an enterprise or industry with which publishing – as itself an industry – can conduct relations on the usual inter-sector plane, but one of thousands of individuals at work on books, very many of whom are not full-time writers, and who, even in their capacity as writers, can be institutionalised to only a limited degree. In its concern with the author, Soviet publishing policy bears upon the rights and responsibilities attaching to him as the creator of a manuscript; on the nature of the state's interest in the manuscript itself and its powers with regard to it; on regulation of the author's relationship (contractual and otherwise) with the publishing-house; on regulation of fees paid to the author; and on the position and influence accorded to writers' organisations.

The author's rights

The author's general rights (avtorskoe pravo, a term of wider application than ‘copyright’) are deemed in the Soviet Union to be a matter of civil law. They are specified in outline in the USSR's fundamentals of civil legislation, and in expanded form in the civil codes and other legislation of the constituent republics. Like other civil rights in the USSR, they may be exercised only ‘in conformity with their purpose in a socialist society in the period of building communism’.