On Sat, Mar 16, 2024 at 02:50 PM, Michael Meeropol wrote: > > ...what is the power relationship at the POINT of production. Are workers > even partially in CONTROL?
Interesting question, Michael, but, as Vladimiro says, I don’t think there is any one answer. I would say it mostly depends on the level of political consciousness. In normal times, the great majority of workers are mainly concerned with improving their pay and benefits rather than managing the workplace (workers control). Which is not to say they will not, where they are unionized, seek to limit management rights over matters like discipline, promotion, vacation and shift scheduling, contracting out, health and safety, layoff procedures, etc. Like most of us, I haven’t lived through turbulent periods of social crisis so the following are only impressions formed through reading and discussion. When surpressed class antagonisms have come to the surface, previously apolitical but newly radicalized workers have engaged in various forms of militant action to promote the class struggle both inside and outside the workplace. These have included factory occupations, industrial sabotage, the formation of all-union committes to debate politics and to maintain public order and the provision of necessary services which have broken down. The historical high point of such worker militancy were of course the workers'soviets which played a pivotal role in the Bolshevik Revolution and which were emulated in other warring countries inspired by the events in Russia. But the 30’s also saw sit-down strikes for union recognition in a non-revolutionary context. Where the revolutions succeeded in overthrowing capitalism, the working class movement quickly split. The anarchist and syndicalist minority demanded that the workers exercise direct control of production through a pyramid of self-governing councils while the victorious Communist parties in the Soviet Union, China, and elsewhere insisted that production necessarily had to be planned and executed through the party and the workers' state. When the revolutionary crisis passed, the working class was satisified to leave the management of production to state appointees and to take action as the party and party-controlled unions dictated. The more ideologically-motivated workers threw themselves into production, the less committed ones tended to slack off. As for modern China, I haven’t seen anything to date to distinguish the interests and activity of Chinese workers from those in the US abd other countries in the West other than mandatory attendace at party meetings in the workplace and assembling to sing the Internationale at state-sponsored events outside of it. But maybe that’s an underestimation of the degree of labour unrest and independent working class organization in the country and someone who regularly follows the China Labor Bulletin can correct me. -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Groups.io Links: You receive all messages sent to this group. View/Reply Online (#29484): https://groups.io/g/marxmail/message/29484 Mute This Topic: https://groups.io/mt/104961025/21656 -=-=- POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. #4 Do not exceed five posts a day. -=-=- Group Owner: [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://groups.io/g/marxmail/leave/8674936/21656/1316126222/xyzzy [[email protected]] -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
