No, as far as I can tell, he's arguing that _even though_ the Jim Devine: now-defunct Soviet Union did not involve significant (real) democratic participation in production decisions (not to mention in government decision-making), even though the application of Taylorism reduced the craft content of work, even though the patriotic burst of volunteerism faded as 1917 fell far into hazy memories, a reserve army of unemployed labor and the like was not needed to motivate labor.
^^^^^ CB: Do you deny that in the history of the now-defunct Soviet Union an enormous amount of work was done ? No. You can't in the face of the material evidence of so many use-values produced. So, given all you say above, you are hard pressed to explain how and why so many Soviet people were motivated to do so much work. You are especially hard pressed to explain it since you seem to think there was no reserve army of unemployed to pressure them to work. So, from your standpoint all that was produced was done at gunpoint.