Terry Cox
3 s
CO
USSR under Gorbachev : the first two years It is now a little more than two years since Mikhail Gorb...
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Terry Cox
3 s
CO
USSR under Gorbachev : the first two years It is now a little more than two years since Mikhail Gorbachev became General Secretary of the Soviet Communist Party, and, since then, the constant theme in the news from the Soviet Union has been one of change . This has been reflected in the style of leadership, and in the slogans adopted by the new administration, such as `reconstruction', `renewal', and `acceleration' . There has also been much talk of new policy directions, but how significant have the changes really been, and what are their consequences for Soviet society?
Criticism from above The most obvious change has been the willingness of Gorbachev and other members of the new leadership to publicly voice quite harsh criticisms of the Soviet system . The low rate of economic growth, poor living standards, poor food supply, problems in the development of electronics and computer technology - these have all been targets of official criticisms, as have growing problems of alcoholism, drug addiction, and falling life expectancy . Leading politicians have also criticised attitudes of Party and government officials, attacking examples of corruption, laziness, in-
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8 efficiency and officiousness . In their place, Gorbachev has called for greater political commitment, efficiency and `glasnost' (openness) in public life . Associated with such criticisms, there have been changes in the manner in which Soviet politics has been conducted . Gorbachev has adopted a more informal public style, and has used the media to create the impression of a more accessible government . More importantly, the new leadership have used their authority to launch new policy ideas before they have been fully debated and decided upon . There has also been a very extensive turnover of people in official positions at all levels of Party and government institutions . The new leadership have been helped here by the fact that so many of the previous leadership had become so old that they died in office or had to retire through ill health . However, some opponents of Gorbachev, such as Grigorii Romanov, have been forced to resign, and others, most notably Dinmukhamed Kunaev, the former Party leader in Kazakhstan, have been dismissed amid charges of corruption . Less publicised changes have been made at all levels of the system, and it seems likely that more are to come . Gorbachev has made a number of speeches identifying bureaucratic and cynical attitudes of Party officials as a major cause of the problems faced by Soviet society, and has linked this with calls for secret ballots and choice between candidates in elections for local soviets, and for Party secretaries at all levels . Indeed there was a choice of candidates in the local soviet elections in June this year . A major achievement of the new leadership has been to make it possible for Soviet citizens to publicly express a
much wider range of opinions than was formerly allowed . Previously taboo subjects, such as prostitution, homosexuality, and drug addition, are now discussed in the Soviet media . Formerly banned novels can now be published, including Pasternak's Dr Zhivago and Bulgakov's The Master and Marguerita (which is reputedly very poular among Soviet young people) . More controversial films and plays are also performed, including one which portrays Trotsky and Bukharin as playing a positive role in the 1917 Revolution . The last few months have also seen the release of some political dissidents, especially better-known figures such as Andrei Sakharov and Josef Begun, and even a greater toleration than before for street demonstrations . A few writers are testing the extent to which the concepts of official Marxism-Leninism can be questioned . For example, in a recent issue of the widely-read weekly paper, Moscow News, Anatoli Butenko has discussed the question of conflicts of interest between different groups in Soviet society, especially over their attitudes to Gorbachev's campaign for `reconstruction', and has suggested that if the Party fails to adopt correct policies, then the 'non-antagonistic contradictions' which are officially held to be typical of socialist society, might turn into `antagonistic contradictions', involving social conflict . Until recently such ideas could only have been expressed in the illegal `samizdat' publications of dissident groups . Economic reform All these changes have had a dramatic impact in Soviet society, and presumably they have been introduced not simply for themselves, but because they
Behind the news
are seen as a necessary basis for `perestroika' (reconstruction) which goes beyond political and cultural changes, to a restructuring of the Soviet economy and the organisation of production . However, in the crucial area of economic reform, the extent and significance of the changes is less clear . Gorbachev and his colleagues have been more outspoken in their criticisms of Soviet economic performance than any previous leadership, and they have certainly not been lacking in ideas for reform of the economy . Gorbachev has recruited specialist economic advisers such as Abel Aganbegyan and Tatyana Zaslavskaya who were among the most radical thinkers outside the dissident movement . Yet, so far, many of the changes have been of a piecemeal or experimental nature, and for the most part have not extended to the economy as a whole . In this area, there has also been a significant degree of continuity between current economic policy and those of previous administrations . As under Brezhnev, current policy stresses the need to adopt new technology, for example, with increased investment in the machine tool industry, in electronics, and in computerisation . There is also a continuing stress on centralised management of the economy . For example, in agriculture, the machine tool industry, and export trade, the various economic ministries dealing with policy in these three sectors have been amalgamated into three new , super-ministries', one for each sector . Similar reorganisations may follow later in other sectors of the economy . Also, centralised control over production has been reinforced by much stricter quality control on industrial products, carried out by newly-created state institu-
tions, and backed up by sanctions 9 against the enterprise producing poor quality goods . For workers in factories where low quality products have been rejected, it has meant loss of bonuses and more hard work to meet production schedules . There are rumours of growing worker resentment as a result . Alongside such centralising tendencies, however, a significant amount of decision-making is also being devolved to enterprise managers . Local managements have been given more power to allocate the funds they receive from the state . Building on existing trends which have allowed greater flexibility in the production and social welfare funds at their disposal, managers are now being given greater decisionmaking power over capital building and R&D funds, and over how to spend profits made by their enterprise . There is also continued debate about allowing managers more power over the wages funds of their enterprises . For many years now, managers in the chemicals industry have been able to lay off workers and use any funds saved to award bonuses to the remaining workforce, or to pay for other ways of improving productivity . Modified versions of the scheme have also been extended to some other industries but, despite dramatic improvements in productivity, such measures have not been applied generally in the Soviet economy . Greater powers for managers have been accompanied by greater responsibilities . A growing number of enterprises are to be self-accounting and self-financing . Their managements will have to ensure that the quality of product is satisfactory, and that it can actually be sold . Failure to sell the product or to meet quality standards
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will have to be paid for from enterprise funds . Such a scheme is to apply especially in export industries where enterprises can hold foreign currency funds, keeping a share of hard currency earnings and using them to import machinery from abroad . Similarly, the Gorbachev administration is encouraging the further expansion of the brigade system of work organisation, and especially of economically accountable brigades . Such groups of workers are both made more free to organise their own work, and more responsible for meeting production targets . Perhaps the best-publicised new economic measure has been the easing of restrictions on private enterprise in certain areas of the economy . This came into force on 1 May this year, and allows local soviets to license individual or family-owned small businesses, mainly in services and small-scale production . The rate of profit from such enterprises will be limited by high levels of tax, and the private employment of wage labour remains illegal . Alongside this development, it will also be easier to set up workers' cooperatives, and for more people to exercise the long-established right to a small plot of land for private agriculture . The aims of these measures would seem to be to improve the provision of services and the supply of fresh food, and to encourage improvements in the state sector through competition with private and cooperative enterprises . These are just some of the changes taking place in the Soviet Union . In many cases they are trends rather than completed changes . In the area of economic reform, progress has been much slower than with cultural and political changes . Why should this be? How likely is the Gorbachev leadership
to succeed in its aim of reconstruction? In trying to understand possible barriers to Gorbachev's reforms, I will first discuss the character of the current regime, and then look at some features of the society they are trying to change .
The character of the new regime Despite the changes taking place, and the others planned, the main aim of the new Soviet leadership is to make reforms, and especially to improve economic performance, within the existing structure . For example the Gorbachev administration is not proposing to democratise Soviet society by allowing organised opposition, either in the form of rival parties or of formally organised factions within the Communist Party . Nor is it in favour of independently organised trades unions . Although, in an economic sense, the Gorbachev administration might be seen as liberal, at least by Soviet standards, it is also true to describe it as pragmatist, technocratic, and authoritarian . The means it is adopting to achieve its goals reflect its social background . The two most noticeable things about the new Soviet leadership (apart from being just as predominantly male, though younger than the previous leadership) are first, that they are better educated and have a more technical and scientific background, often combined with extensive experience in industrial management, and secondly, that the KGB is more heavily represented among them . Leading figures with a technocratic background include Nikolai Ryzhkov, the Prime Minister, and Boris Yeltsin, the Moscow Party leader . KGB influence is represented by Viktor Chebrikov, its current chairman, but other members of the Polit-
Behind the news buro, Geidar Aliev and Foreign Minister, Edvard Shevardnadze were associated with it earlier in their careers . Given such a mix of social backgrounds, it is perhaps not surprising that current policy reflects a mixture of pragmatism and paternalism . For pragmatic reasons, in view of the recent poor performance of the old system of economic management in which the state took a direct administrative role in managing the economy, a new role for the state is being introduced, in which it will attempt to exercise control by setting general guidelines and offering incentives . On similar pragmatic grounds, if private enterprise is more effective, it will be allowed to operate, with restrictions . On the other hand, strong state control is to be maintained where this is considered necessary . In order to ensure quality control, new sanctions are imposed, and new interventionist state organisations are created . Controls on the production and sale of alcohol are introduced with the aim of reducing absenteeism from work through drunkenness . In all this, there is a notable absence of ideology . Unlike previous leaderships, Gorbachev and his associates have not offered any thereoretical analysis of the present stage of development of Soviet society . The severity of their criticisms of Soviet society, and of the policies of the Brezhnev period, would imply doubts about such terms as `mature socialist society' or `developed socialist society' which were coined under Brezhnev . However, instead of producing an alternative analysis, the revised Party programme, adopted at the 27th Party Congress last year, sets itself the more vaguely worded aim of `the all round perfection of socialism', with no time
scale attached . References to Communism and `the withering away of the state' are avoided, and socialism, far from involving the overthrow of capitalism, is merely described as `offering advantages' over it . In short, there is little evidence of any influence of Marxist theory in the thinking of the current Soviet leadership, and unlike previous generations, they seem to have given up even the pretence of being influenced by it . The irony then, is that the new reformists in the Soviet Union may not have a very clear view of where they are going . Gorbachev, judging from his speeches over the past three years, began with an optimistic view of how easy it would be to revive the Soviet economy and to change people's ways of behaving, but more recently, has tended to see `reconstruction' as a longer-term process . His own thinking about the process seems strong on rhetoric, but vague about some of the practicalities . When asked at a public meeting last year, how people should go about `reconstruction', his only advice was that they should look to the reconstruction of their own psychology . Clearly there is no fully worked out programme of wider social reform . The new leadership are working it out pragmatically . Probably, the reforms are also being continually debated as they are introduced . Although Gorbachev has had a unique opportunity to replace a large proportion of the top leadership with his own nomineees, and although they tend to share a similar general outlook and style, it should not be assumed they are always in agreement . A look at the speeches of different Politburo members tends to suggest differences between them . For example, Ligachev
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would seem to be more conservative than either Ryzhkov or Gorbachev . Different political leaders are also likely to hold different views depending on the institutional or regional interests they represent as part of their particular political positions . For example, there are likely to be informal lobbies representing different sectors of the economy, the military, the KGB, and the interests of different regions and nationality groups in the Soviet population . Cutting across all such divisions is the debate between supporters and opponents of `reconstruction' . While the reformers have largely won the battle at the upper reaches of the political system, with only a few conservative Brezhnev appointees remaining, among middle and lower level officials, there will be many opposed to change . Some will see demands for greater openness and accountability as threats to their power and prestige, while for others greater accountability and responsibility will mean more hard work, or lower incomes if they are unsuccessful . It is clear from the speeches of Gorbachev and his colleagues that such officials are seen as a major threat to the reform, and it is against them that the campaign for greater openness is being carried out . In view of its composition and structure, the new Soviet leadership is still likely to be relatively cautious about the changes they introduce . It is unlikely that any of them could have risen to their present ranks without developing such an attitude . Also, as can be seen from the features of the regime described above, a number of different interests and attitudes are represented . This gives rise to different factions, to some extent, pulling differ-
ent ways . At the least, some reforms are likely therefore to be delayed pending further discussion, while a consensus is sought . Other changes may meet outright opposition from particular factions . In themselves, these features of the regime may be enough to explain some of the constraints on reform . However, they are related in turn to features of Soviet society at large, which will influence the progress of reforms and the leadership's perception of them .
Soviet society and the reforms The two main aims of the reforms are to improve economic performance and popular morale . However, despite the claims of Soviet official social theory, the Soviet population are far from homogeneous, and any changes will affect the interests of different social groups in different ways . At the risk of some over-simplification, I will discuss some problems of the impact of the reforms on the intelligentsia and the working class . a) The intelligentsia
In the Soviet Union this term is usually used to describe those with higher education, or those in the kind of jobs for which higher education is usually a requirement . As a group, they have seen the clearest improvement in their situation as a result of the reforms . There has long been support among the intelligentsia for greater freedom of expression and many of the dissidents have sprung from more critical sections of this group . Therefore calls for openness, the relaxation of censorship, and the release of dissidents such as Andrei Sakharov have proved very popular . Also welcome among an important
Behind the news
section of the intelligentsia have been recent reforms in the education system, accompanied by a rise in teachers' pay . Various professional groups, including teachers and doctors, will probably approve of the new legislation enabling them to offer private services such as tuition or medical examinations in their spare time . A general improvement in various consumer services will undoubtedly be popular among all sections of the intelligentsia . An important effect of the Gorbachev reforms has been to bring Party and government officials closer to the rest of the intelligentsia, with whom they share a similar social and educational background, as well as family and friendship ties . The most likely meaning of many of the recent reforms is that a decision has been taken to stop trying to play off the intelligentsia against the working class, and to win the support of the intelligentia . It marks a further step in a long-term trend towards the consolidation of the intelligentsia as the ruling class, as the class from which different factions would compete to exercise state power . Whether such a trend will ever be fully consolidated is another matter . Other aspects of the reforms may pull in other directions . The crucial question here will be the effect of the economic reforms . A likely consequence of moves to make enterprises self-accounting will be to increase competition among them . Those involved in the administration of the economy will have to work in conditions increasingly like those of the market . Inequalities are likely to grow . Modern enterprises with efficient management and higher worker morale will be more successful at meeting orders, winning contracts and gaining
loans from the state bank . Meanwhile, enterprises with out-of-date equipment, poor work organisation, or poor supply of components and raw materials will increasingly fail to win contracts and loans . If such disparities are allowed to grow, those sections of the intelligentsia involved in material production may well be split in their attitude to the reforms . Others, not engaged in production may also feel disadvantaged because they will be excluded from opportunities to compete in the growing market economy . Various government officials and professional workers could fall into this category . If an effect of the reforms is to increase such disparities, reconstruction may founder as opposition from sections of the intelligentsia grows . b) The working class
In reality of course, such developments take place in the context of the changing position of the workers . As noted above, moves to ensure better quality control in industry are already causing some disgruntlement . Workers in inefficient factories will find it difficult to meet quality requirements . The introduction of self-accounting enterprises and work brigades in such circumstances is likely to make matters worse . Like managers, workers will be responsible for meeting targets themselves, and if they fail, they may have to accept less income and more work . A further possible consequence of the reforms is unemployment . The experimental reforms in the chemicals and other industries have shown the advantages for management, in terms of increased productivity, of allowing them to lay off workers . In the ensuing debate, clear support has been expressed for extending the scheme but,
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so far, more cautious views have prevailed . Within the chemicals industry, it seems, redundant workers have been successfully relocated, and there are no signs of significant opposition from workers . It is more doubtful, however, whether the effects of lay-offs could be managed so smoothly if the reform were applied across the economy as a whole . In a society where the working class hve been brought up to believe the ruling party represented their interests, and where the right to work has been ensured by law, the introduction of widespread unemployment could be political dynamite . Of course, if the majority of workers can be assured jobs and increased bonuses as a result of the reform, the Gorbachev administration may be able to divide the working class, and defuse opposition . In making the attempt, however, they will be taking a big risk, and it is this consideration which has probably delayed any decision so far to extend the reform . A political risk of similar proportions could be involved if it is decided to reduce subsidies on food, housing and other services . Such a move has been argued for by influential advisors such as Aganbegyan, who sees the 12% of the national budget currently spent on them as wasteful . His argument seems to be that if economic reforms are able to revitalise production and give rise to higher incomes, then it would be possible to reduce subsidies and allow prices to rise, thus freeing more of the state budget for productive investment . Again the degree of risk for political stability becomes clear if it is remembered that it was a rise in meat prices which sparked off demonstrations eventually leading to the formation of Solidarity in Poland .
The question of support for the regime Although the reforms are a bold attempt to resolve problems of stagnation in the Soviet economy, they could give rise to a number of possible social tensions within the working class and the intelligentsia, which could form the basis of opposition, not only to the reforms, but to the Gorbachev administration and the Communist Party more generally . This helps explain the slow pace of the introduction of actual reforms, which are clearly lagging well behind the proposals of Gorbachev . Apart from opposition from more traditionalist elements and bureaucratic vested interests within the Party, it is likely that Gorbachev is also meeting opposition, or at least caution, from practical politicians who are scared of rocking the boat . The basic problem for the Soviet Communist Party under Gorbachev is whether it has sufficient support throughout Soviet society for its proposed reforms to be able to carry them out despite the tensions and possible opposition they are likely to create . In the past, for example during the collectivisation of agriculture, and in World War II, the Party survived severe crises . It successfully suppressed internal opposition, rallied popular support, and was able to rely on an impressive mixture of dedication, heroism and ruthlessness among its activists . The Soviet Union still has people with those qualities, as was clearly shown in the operation to deal with the Chernobyl disaster . On the other hand, Party workers would seem to be divided over Gorbachev's calls for openness and reconstruction . Also, the Soviet people, including the working class, are more socially differentiated
Behind the news now, and have developed a different political consciousness from that prevailing in the 1930s and 1940s . While there is no reason to doubt that the Russian working class would still support the Party and the Soviet government in time of war, it does not follow that they would also support policies which seemed to adversely affect their standard of living or their constitutional rights, especially their right to work . When it comes to the Central Asian peoples of the Soviet Union, however, there may be more general doubts about their support . Kazakh national consciousness, along with anti-Russian feelings were probably behind the rioting that took place in January this year, following the replacement of Kunaev, a Kazakh national, by a Russian as Party leader in Kazakhstan . Furthermore, it is reported that only soldiers of the European national groups are sent to fight in Afghanistan because Soviet military leaders have doubts about the loyalty of Central Asian soldiers . Another probable area of concern for Soviet leaders is the attitude of Soviet youth . In the 1950s, when Yevtushenko was filling large stadia with recitals of his poetry, Soviet youth culture was generally patriotic and idealistic, exhibiting great faith in the modernisation being achieved in the Soviet Union . Now there is much less political idealism . Detached or cynical attitudes to authority are more common and the influence of the Komsomol, the youth wing of the Soviet Party, has seriously declined . The older generation in the Soviet Union often express total incomprehension of the attitudes and behaviour of young people . There has been a growing interest among Soviet young people in Western
popular music and fashion . Others have turned to mysticism . In the new industrial suburbs, where young people often have few social and recreational facilities, there has been a growth of gangs who assert control over their own territory, sometimes becoming involved in black market and petty criminal activities . The best-known gang of this type are the 'Luberi', from a Moscow industrial suburb, who have proclaimed themselves defenders of `true' Soviet values, and are prepared to beat up young people following `decadent' Western fashions and interests . In such a differentiated society, political leaders must have severe doubts about popular morale and social cohesion . This is probably one factor explaining government interest in promoting a less restricted press so that more accurate information about society can be gathered . There are also fewer restrictions on the scope of sociological research now . A different reflection of the same problem is the growth of influence of the KGB in the country's leading policy-making bodies . In the current period of rapid change, the Party needs the support of the KGB with its extensive networks of information on the population, and its capacity to exert control over opposition. By looking at the nature of the political system which will have to carry out reconstruction, and of the society to which it will apply, a number of reasons for the delay, or even the failure of Gorbachev's reforms can be seen . The news from the Soviet Union over the next two years is likely to be as eventful as it has been over the last two years . The outcome of the reforms, however, remains to be seen .
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David Ransom GATT and Uruguay Last December the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) began its latest round of talks in Uruguay . David Ransom here provides a succinct account of the grim realities which have overtaken Uruguay as it turns increasingly towards the local giant, Brazil, itself facing crisis . The delegates to the latest round of talks in the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade began their meeting in the Uruguayan town of Punta del Este, the most exclusive holiday resort in Latin America . The million-dollar mansions and yachts, the international hotels and the windsurfers provide what is for the delegates, no doubt, a familiar and reassuring environment . No sign here of the ravages of the legendary repression and poverty of Latin America . No sign, either, of many Uruguayans, for Punta del Este
Behind the news
is a foreign enclave into which few Uruguayans can afford to enter . So it seems unlikely that the GATT deliberations will respond in any way to the desperate economic conditions in Uruguay and indeed in Brazil and Argentina also . All three countries have, in the recent past, begun to emerge from the most prolonged, savage and destructive period of repression in their histories as independent nations . All three have found that the most tangible economic legacy of repression is foreign debt of astronomic proportions . All three share with the Group-of-24 `developing' countries an increasing sense of desperation in the face of a net transfer of financial resources back to the 'industrial' countries, growing protectionism, unstable exchange rates, high interest rates, low commodity prices and a sharp deterioration in the terms of trade . The `honeymoon' period of Alfonsin in Argentina, Sarney in Brazil and Sanguinetti in Uruguay (all three the first civilian Presidents for a decade or more) is rapidly running out, if it has not done so already . But political opposition, disintegrated by years of repression, remains confused and uncertain . The mere absence of repression does not alter the dismal economic outlook for the `debtors' of the world economy . There is as yet no reason to believe that elected government will prove more resilient this time than it has in the past . But the `military alternative' remains in complete discredit, not least among the military themselves . The lack of credible economic or political strategies makes this a crucial period for all three east coast Latin American countries, and possibly for the continent as a whole . In Uruguay the phantom elections C & C
32-B
of 1984 (when some parties and even 17 individual Presidential candidates were banned) marked the end of the blind alley into which an isolated and universally despised military regime had taken the country . For a brief period after the elections economic conditions improved ; the fall in international interest rates, in the price of the dollar and of oil produced an unexpected bonus and scope for the first real increase in wage levels for a decade . But this small improvement was relative to the absolute economic catastrophe that had overtaken Uruguay for the preceding 30 years at least . The catastrophe was exaggerated to a grotesque degree by the `Chicago' economic policies of the military . (The city of Chicago must be just about as reviled in Latin American demonology as the United States itself these days .) In ten years, between 1970 and 1980, real wage levels in Uruguay were halved . Real levels of unemployment rose to thirty per cent or more . Something like a third of the population was thrown into homelessness and destitution ; a tenth of the population, 300,000 Uruguayans, left the country . By 1987, levels of economic activity are still nowhere near those achieved during the Korean War, thirty years earlier . Organised labour was savaged to an extent not even Chile or Argentina could match; in the mid-1970s, Uruguay had the highest proportion of political prisoners per capita of any country in the world .' The issue of foreign debt is, for Uruguay, far more pressing than it is even for her two giant neighbours . Compare the situation in Uruguay with that in Brazil . The Brazilian debt, now around the US$110 billion mark, is of course the largest in the world . It works
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out at something like US$800 per head of the 132 million population . The Uruguayan foreign debt, at over US$5 billion, is equivalent to the entire Gross National Product, consumes more than 60 per cent of total Uruguayan foreign currency earnings in service charges, and works out at US$1,700 per head of the population - double that of Brazil . Even supposing more favourable international economic conditions, the scope for growth in the Uruguayan economy is now so constricted that it is virtually impossible to construct credible circumstances in which growth could occur . Much of the foreign debt was acquired by Uruguay's large landowners (traditionally the most powerful political group in the country) in the late 1970s and early 1980s . By 1982, however, they were beginning to default on their debts . These debts had been contracted largely with private banks, among them the Bank of America and the Banco de Credito which is owned by the Moonies . These private banks, themselves facing a potential crisis, joined together to make an extraordinary threat : either their bad debts were taken on by the Uruguayan Central Bank, or they would liquidate the landowners and, thereby, Uruguay's most important export earners . There was, of course, a good measure of bluff in this threat, and it hardly represented good banking business practice for the Central Bank . But under pressure from the military, the Central Bank agreed . It borrowed US$600 million from the same foreign banks, in order to acquire their own bad debts . 2 The Uruguayan Central Bank now has a notional claim to ownership over a large chunk of Uruguay's meat- and
wool-exporting industries . For the time being the Uruguayan economy as a whole, through the Central Bank, must carry the burden of servicing the debt . But in the longer term, and certainly in the event of radical political change in Uruguay, the scope for intervention in agricultural production and land ownership, the two issues central to Uruguay's economic performance, is increased significantly . Culturally and economically Uruguay has always been much closer to Argentina than Brazil ; its population is made up of a similar mixture of Spanish and Italian immigrants as in Argentina, and the language is the same distinctive Spanish dialect . The military in Uruguay and Argentina worked closely together during the repression, and indeed most Uruguayans who `disappeared' did so in Buenos Aires, where many Uruguayans live . Much of the ostentatious wealth in Punta del Este is Argentine . During and following the Malvinas war, Uruguay has been able to extract a price from Argentina, in the form of favourable trade agreements, for its support - and in particular for refusing to allow the British to use the port of Montevideo . But in recent years it is to Brazil, rather than Argentina, that Uruguayan heads have begun to turn - on a recent visit, it was even suggested to me that Uruguay should `amalgamate' with Brazil . The Brazilian `economic miracle' has been notoriously slow in coming . But the post-repression trend is shown clearly in Uruguay's trade figures . In the first eight months of 1986, Uruguayan exports to Brazil reached US$164 .4 millions, compared with US$70 .0 millions in the same period a year earlier, and were rivalling
Behind the news
those to the entire EEC, traditionally Uruguay's largest export market . At the same time, imports of Brazilian goods (many of them manufactured) rose from US$79 .1 millions to US$121 .8 millions, making Brazil by far the largest importer and trading partner with Uruguay . 3 Brazil's price-freezing policies had much to do with this ; empty supermarkets in Southern Brazil led to excursions over the border to Uruguay for basic necessities . But the point has not been lost on many Uruguayans ; they are looking increasingly to Brazil, to the `populist' measures of the Sarney government and the impact of organised labour, together with the negotiations around the Brazilian debt, to provide an indication of their own future . Organised labour in Uruguay took a terrible battering under the military, but it has not been entirely crushed . There is general recognition that it was a successful general strike that put the final nail in the coffin of the military . Protracted and inconclusive industrial action continues, particularly in the state-owned industries, such as ANCAP, the major petroleum concern in Uruguay, and the postal workers, which experienced an unwelcome intimacy with the military during the repression . A unified trades union congress, the PIT/CNT, has been recreated and is Communist-dominated; militant action is not encouraged . The 1984 elections produced a minority Colorado conservative government ; on the face of it a paradox, since the Colorados came closest to overt support for the military . One recent study has, however, drawn attention to the disjuncture between voting and political or trade union
activity . 4 This is evident in the organisation of the Frente Amplio, the Uruguayan Broad Front modelled on Popular Unity in Chile and organised largely around neighbourhood committees or Comites de Base . In 1984, despite the banning of its leader Liber Seregni, the Frente recorded a substantial rise in its vote over the previous election in 1973 ; the largest increase was, however, in the vote for a slightly vague radical grouping within the Front known as the `Group for A Government of the People', while the vote for the Communist Party grouping (renamed to conform with their exclusion from the elections) most closely associated with the activists at neighbourhood level, actually declined . This disjuncture is as much to do with the phantom or restricted nature of the elections as with any real absence of support for radical politics . On the other hand, radical socialist analysis (and certainly active revolutionary commitment) have been slow to emerge in post-recession Uruguay . Incredibly enough, the Tupamaro group which for a brief period in the late 1960s and early 1970s practised spectacularly successful urban guerrilla tactics, and which provided the immediate excuse for military intervention, has emerged from the repression to form a revamped National Liberation Movement . Raul Sendic, their leader, who was shot through the mouth during his arrest in 1972, has been released under a general amnesty and recently returned from Europe, where he was reportedly seeking financial support from non-governmental agencies for the setting up of co-operatives in Uruguay . His collected speeches have been published, and they advocate the more obvious oppositional measures,
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including the nationalisation of the banks and land, and the non-payment of the foreign debt . 5 The Tupas recently applied for membership of the Frente Amplio but were turned down . They organise in the barrios or poor neighbourhoods, and publish a bi-weekly newspaper Mate Amarqo (the name is a play on words, referring both to a popular herbal tea and to a bitter aftertaste) . One of the more phlegmatic Uruguayan commentators recently observed in an editorial that perhaps the impoverishment of Uruguay has not been such a bad thing ; Uruguayans are no longer detached observers of the Latin American scene, perched on an isolated pinnacle of uneventful prosperity . One very much doubts whether his views are shared in the barrios of Montevideo . One incident just before Christmas illustrates the current situation well enough . A law was passed through the Senate giving effective impunity to the military for the violation of human rights during the repression . This law was passed not because the Senators believed it should be, but because the military simply refused to appear in court . That night, Montevideo erupted with a caceroleo, a ritual protest when empty pots and pans are banged together (the last time I had seen it used was during the Popular Unity government in Chile, when bourgeois women descended from their suburbs into the centre of Santiago to protest at shortages of consumer goods) . It was an impressive and moving display of resistance, and as an eye witness to it I can testify to its widespread nature . Outside the Senate, the Senators' cars were smashed by demonstrators . The Senate's response was to expel a Frente
Senator accused of orchestrating the violence . The only precedent for this was, apparently, an incident in the 1930s when a Senator was expelled for wearing alpargatas (a popular rope-sole shoe) in the Chamber . Events have moved on since then ; the grim-faced demonstrators in Montevideo that night were expressing at once their present impotence and their determination to bring about change . Whatever the immediate future might hold for them, it seems unlikely to resemble the immediate or even distant past . Notes 1 . Danilo Astori et al (1986) Los Marginados Uruguayos . Ediciones de la Banda Oriental, Montevideo ; and Comision Econ6mica para America Latina y el Caribe (CEPAL) (1986) Uruguay : Informe Economico 1985 . ARCA, Montevideo . 2 . Luis Stolovich et al (1986) Compra de Carteras : Crisis del Sistema Bancario Uruguayo . Ediciones de la Banda Oriental, Montevideo . 3 . Biisqueda : Revista Semenal . 23 December 1986 . 4 . Martin Gargiulo (1986) La Izquierda Politico y Sindical en al Uruguay postAutoritario in Cuadernos del Centro Latinoamericano de Economia Humana, No . 38 . 5 . Rat l Sendic (1986) La Tierra, La Banca y la Deuda Externa . Editorial TAE, Montevideo .
References Carlos Viera (1986) Cuando Crecer no Significa Mejorar: el Desenvolvimiento Economico en 1986, in Cuadernos de Marcha . December . Carlos H . Filgueira (ed .) (1986) Movimientos Sociales en el Uruguay de Hoy . CLACSO/ CIESU/Ediciones de la Banda Oriental, Montevideo . Alicia Melgar (1986) El Desafio de la Economia Uruguaya in Cuadernos del Centro Latinoamericano de Economia Humana . No . 38 .
M Peter Phillips and Chris Pyecroft The South African Development Co-Ordination Conference The Southern African Development Co-ordination Conference (sADCC) comprises the nine independent Southern African states - Angola,
M CO
Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe - and is expected to include Namibia on the latter's independence . It was formally created in 1980 by the Declaration of Lusaka, which set out SADCC's objectives . These are : i) the reduction of economic dependence, particularly, but not only, on the Republic of South Africa ; ii) the forging of links to create a genuine and equitable regional integration ; iii) the mobilisation of resources to the implementation of promote national, interstate and regional policies ; iv) concerted action to secure international cooperation within the frame-
21
Capital & Class 22
work of a common economic liberation .
strategy
for
The impetus for SADCC'S formation came from the shared experiences, both positive and negative, of the Frontline States (FLS) during the Zimbabwean liberation war . This period demonstrated their economic vulnerability, but also the benefits of cooperation . On Zimbabwean independence this was extended into the field of long-term economic cooperation between all the independent Southern African states . However, as we discuss, the inclusion of Lesotho, Malawi and Swaziland introduced complex new political factors . In practice, two objectives have emerged as central : the mobilisation of foreign funds for development projects ; and the reduction of dependence on South Africa . Even for the SADCC members more friendly with South Africa (Malawi, Swaziland and now also Lesotho, the reduction of dependence and diversification of economic links are important objectives, since their present level of dependence inhibits effective planning and thus renders `development' conditional and fragile . For all members, any new access to foreign funds is welcome .
Dependence on South Africa As members of the South African Customs Union (SACU), Botswana, Lesotho, Swaziland and South Africa have common tariffs, with South Africa dominant in decision-making . Lesotho and Swaziland are also part of the Rand Monetary Area, which limits their effective economic policy tools, and deepens their vulnerability to changes in the South African economy . SACU
membership makes it impossible to be precise about the amount of SADCC trade with South Africa and the amount that passes through South Africa . About one-third of all SADCC imports come from, or are sourced through, South Africa . These comprise a wide range of manufactured goods (including machinery and spares for the mining and transport sectors ; infrastructural materials and equipment; and consumer goods) ; foodstuffs (including staple foods and processed foods) ; and energy (including highgrade coal, refined oil and electricity) . A much smaller proportion of SADCC exports go to South Africa . Excluding the SACU countries, South Africa takes less than 5% of SADCC exports (Moorsom, 1986) . In 1982 and 1983, only Lesotho (41%), Swaziland (37%) and Zimbabwe (18 .5%) depended heavily on South African markets (SADCC Macro-economic Survey 1986, 1985) . Intra-SADCC trade is very small . Trade with the other eight SADCC countries combined does not account for as much as 10% of the trade of any SADCC member . Dependence on South Africa for transit cannot be quantified, but is very substantial overall, and critical for the SACU members and Zimbabwe, whilst Zambia and Malawi have significant dependence in this sector . South Africa's domination of the region's transport is the historical legacy of imperial interest in South Africa and its goldfields, superior transport infrastructure and South African economic power . With the assistance of clientgroups such as the MNR and UNITA, South Africa has maintained its position as chief carrier of the region's trade through a mixture of sabotage
Behind the news and military attack, withdrawing its engines and rolling stock, and slowing the movement of SADCC goods on its roads and railways . Several SADCC countries depend heavily on South Africa for employment, having supplied large numbers of migrant workers to South Africa since 1980 . Estimates of total numbers vary from 300,000 to nearer 400,000 . Income from employment in South Africa has been estimated to support 2 .5 million families in SADCC countries whilst providing nearly 700 million Rand in remittances (The Star, 21/7/ 86) . Dependence is deeper and more integral than any figures can suggest . Another form it takes is South African corporate power, which is most marked in the `commanding heights' of the Zimbabwean and Swazi economies, but also important in Botswana, Lesotho and Malawi .
Diversity in dependence The implications of dependence for security and economic planning do not need elaboration . For the Frontline States, its reduction is viewed as a prerequisite for genuine development . However, the degree of dependence differs enormously between SADCC members . On the one hand, Tanzania and Angola were never fully incorporated into the regional system, and have minimal trade with or labour migration to the apartheid economy . At the other extreme are the three SACU countries . As an enclave of South Africa, Lesotho's dependence is almost absolute . South Africa takes 41% of its exports and supplies 97% of its imports, as well as conveying the rest of its trade . In 1983, 146,000 migrant workers from
Lesotho were employed in South Africa, constituting the vast majority Lesotho's formally-employed of population . In the case of Lesotho, then, the entire economy depends on South Africa, for essential goods, government revenue and the survival of entire rural communities . These forms of dependence are experienced in acute form also by Swaziland and southern Mozambique . Botswana has other large sources of revenue, but could otherwise be grouped with these three ; whilst Zimbabwe is heavily dependent for transit, imports and exports . Malawi was previously a large supplier of labour to South Africa, but this has fallen markedly . It remains dependent on South African imports, transit and `aid' and investment . Zambia's dependence is manifested primarily in the transit and imports fields . Structures and procedures Neither the political homogeneity nor the economic conditions exist for SADCC to seek aims similar to the EEC's, such as integration of tariffs or of economic policy and regulation . SADCC members have heeded previous failures of economic cooperation in Africa, especially that of the East African Community, of which Tanzania was a member . Furthermore, SADCC members recognise that, in the context of economic and political diversity, if regional cooperation is to be successful, it must be firmly founded on tangible economic gains to the member-states . It is accepted, moreover, that member-states' perceived self-interest is likely to remain paramount . This analysis finds expression in SADCC's institutional set-up and in its
23
Capital & Class
24 projects . SADCC has no powers of compulsion over its members in any respect . `Decisions' are reached by consensus and there is no such thing as SADCC policy . In tangible terms, SADCC consists of its objectives, its projects and project-criteria, its changing programme priorities and its minimal bureaucracy . The latter consists of: a small Secretariat in Botswana, two permanent sectoral units (for transport in Mozambique and for energy in Angola), and a few permanent officials in certain agriculture sub-sectors in Zimbabwe and Botswana . Donor countries and international donoragencies are invited to an annual conference, at which funding is requested, negotiated and committed . At the annual Summit of the Heads of State, the main activities are to re-affirm unity, assess economic developments and priorities, and draw international attention to the cost of South Africa's destabilisation activities . There are also thrice-yearly ministerial meetings for the different sectors . Each sector is the responsibility of one member-state, but this is more an administrative arrangement than a political one . The real work of drawing up project-criteria and assessing project submissions takes place in the technical committees for each sector . Here members are represented by a non-political official from the relevant department, reflecting SADCC's emphasis on practical achievements .
Programmes and projects SADCC has programmes in seven sectors - Energy, Food and Agriculture, Industry, Manpower Development, Mining, Tourism, and Transport and Communications - and it is now giving
priority to increasing the minimal intra-regional trade . These programmes are a collection of memberstates' projects that have received ministerial and technical approval for forwarding as SADCC projects . They do not yet constitute integrated economic planning . Out of a total project cost by 1986 of US$5 .4 billion, 86% was defined as `foreign funding requirement' . 41% of the total had been secured or was under negotiation (SADCC Annual Progress Report 1985-6, Luanda, 1986) . From the available data it appers that the Comecon countries have no involvement with SADCC ; that China's support is very small ; and that USAID support is relatively small and focussed primarily on the Food and Agriculture sector . In contrast, NORAID, Sweden, the EEC, EEC members, and Canada have been major supporters, financially supporting, or potentially involved in, projects costing well over half a billion dollars . The implications of this pattern of funding are discussed later . Certain general and sectoral priorities are now clear . Projects that reduce dependence on South Africa and promote regional self-sufficiency have always been emphasised . However, self-sufficiency has largely been interpreted in an exclusively national sense, with projects' supposed regional contribution sometimes being difficult to discern . Another concern has been the lack of integration within and between programmes . Consequently, the Secretariat has requested more detailed plans from each sector, in order to develop a regional programme closely linked to SADCC objectives, and with which projects should accord . The priority now being given to intraregional trade also reflects these
Behind the news
concerns . Transport and Communications projects accounted, financially, for 55% of the total SADCC programme by 1986, and had received or was negotiating 45% of required funds . Its programme is dominated by very large projects for the rehabilitation and expansion of SADCC's major ports and the road and rail systems serving them, an indication of the emphasis on establishing direct links with the world economy in place of dependence on South African transport . Through its reports, research priorities and project-criteria, the Food and Agriculture sector has begun to stress support for the small farmer, in contrast to the earlier emphasis on largescale production . Although this change follows from, rather than precedes, shifts in national policy, the role of SADCC in exchanging information, experiences and ideas in the area of agriculture policy should not be underestimated . This has been especially important in the context of the severe drought which drew the attention of all governments to issues of food security and economic and physical access to food . Planning Apart from the lack of integration just noted, the development of strategies to achieve SADCC objectives has made limited progress, since it touches ideological differences between members . Furthermore, the critical issue of the distribution of gains and losses between members of different economic strength has not been openly confronted . Such distributional issues attain a particular sensitivity when dominant classes lack the power to either fully control the economy or to
ensure that economic developments contribute to internal accumulation (whether for class interest or `national' purposes) . The response of SADCC officials and the members most committed to SADCC (amongst them Angola and Mozambique) rests on the material and practical basis of SADCC's existence . They argue that shared perceptions will develop, not at the highest political levels but at the technical level, from regular meetings and the sharing of knowledge . This amounts to the assertion that central planning is a neutral matter, in which demonstration and information are all-important . When such arguments are made by the more radical members, who do not generally adopt technicist positions, one is forced to look for an explanation for such an approach . We would suggest that a powerful explanation lies in the political dimensions of SADCC, and in the importance, at this critical time, of postponing any issues which may deepen the divisions within SADCC . Economic impact of the SADCC Before turning to SADCC'S political importance, we should consider its economic impact so far . The problem lies in comparing the present situation with that which miht exist without SADCC . Thus although nearly US$2 .5 billion has been secured, a large part of this would have come to the region anyway, through bilateral aid . On the other hand, it is an important success to have directed most of this finance to projects concerning more than one country, or aimed at reducing dependence on South Africa . Negative per capita growth has been occurring in several SADCC countries since 1980, but this cannot be taken as
25
Capital & Class 26
evidence of a failure of SADCC . The region has been beset by problems, including South African destabilisation, contraction of the South African economy, depression in world trade and the severe drought . The economic benefits of SADCC are expected to accrue gradually . The long-term impact of sharing information and skills, of avoiding duplication, and of developing common perspectives at bureaucratic level, should not be underestimated . Such benefits could accrue specifically to those states sharing similar political perspectives and economic objectives . Perhaps the most important achievement has been to provide access to funds and technical assistance for members otherwise unable to obtain it, especially Angola and Mozambique . Furthermore, SADCC itself believes that it `would certainly be in an even worse position without the cooperation that has taken place among (members) .' The crisis it has faced `has served to underline the validity of the objectives of seeking economic liberation through regional cooperation and self-reliance' (SADCC Annual Progress Report 1984-5) . Political divisions Clearly SADCC could be more effective if it were a more homogeneous collection of countries . Added to diversity in dependence on South Africa, economic size and structure, which put strains on economic cooperation, are the political and ideological differences . These, however, are not manifested primarily as conflict between different forms of government or socio-economic system . The crucial matter is the relationship with the apartheid regime and the liberation movements . Within the SADCC region, this relationship cannot
be simply inferred from a country's position on a right-left continuum . Although the `left-wing' governments all have bad relations with the apartheid regime (though sometimes forced to make an accommodation with it), we cannot assume that `right-wing' governments are automatically friendly with it . The classic example is the government of the late Chief Jonathan in Lesotho, which, although with archetypal right-wing policies in most respects, adopted an increasingly antiSouth African and pro-ANC policy . Similarly, one might assume that the government of Botswana, whose ruling class is benefitting from close links with imperial capital, would support `moderate' black leaders and the gradual reform of apartheid . But in fact Botswana has been outspoken in its criticisms and has continued, despite threat, assassinations and military raids, to accept refugees, including members of the liberation movements . Swaziland's ruling group, based around the royal family, has close links with South African capital, through its investment trusts and its comprador role, and might perceive in the liberation of South Africa an ideological as well as economic threat . But even here the period since 1980 has not been one of unmarred friendship with South Africa or unremitting hostility to the liberation movements and refugees . Changes in policy can be explained by shifts in power within the Swazi ruling group (for instance, between the `traditionalists' and the 'modemisers') as well as in the degree of South African threat and pressure . Only Malawi has an uninterrupted record of de facto support for South Africa . Malawi has benefitted in a variety of ways from South African `aid'
Behind the news
and trade . Its actions have been by far the most damaging to regional attempts to form a united front against South Africa, in particular its continued support for the MNR in Mozambique . The conclusions from this brief resume are that analysis of SADCC's weaknesses and of attitudes to apartheid and the liberation movements, through analysing the class nature of the state, must take account of various complicating factors . One is dependence, which itself plays a part in the formation and room for manoeuvre of the classes controlling the state . Another is the historical relationship with South Africa and outside powers heavily involved in the region . A third is the weakness of the ruling classes and their inability to assert themselves through development strategies and through foreign policy . This weakness makes them vulnerable to in-fighting and changes of direction without any fundamental change in the state's class character . A fourth is the isolation of South Africa, which places a diplomatic and political cost on close relations with it . Finally, weak ruling classes preside over small economies beset by crises, and do not benefit from the long-term chaos and destabilisation in the region . All have an interest in stability and the reduction of dependence . Therefore, while different development strategies prevent the full integration of physical and economic planning, the conditions exist for a lower-level organisation such as SADCC .
The political dimension The political dimension has become especially crucial since the emergence of sanctions as a major international
issue, and has several aspects . The first is the use of SADCC in addressing the international community from the strong position of a regional organisation containing a variety of political systems . SADCC as a forum has been especially imprtant to those members who are the main victims of South African destabilisation - Angola and Mozambique, and to a lesser extent Botswana, Zimbabwe, Zambia and Lesotho . Attention has repeatedly been drawn to the human and economic costs of this aggression and its effects on SADCC's programme . Two conclusions have usually been left implicit - that the West (with its dominant economic and political influence) has not done all it can to prevent South African actions, thus calling into question its sincerity in supporting SADCC ; and that the costs to SADCC of sanctions and South African retaliation must be viewed in the context of the existing suffering under the status quo . The second aspect of this political dimension is SADCC's place in imperialism's attempts to re-build and insure its position in the region . As a regional institution, SADCC constitutes the beginnings of a political and economic alternative to support for, or involvement in, South Africa . The pattern of SADCC funding has been interpreted as demonstrating intra-imperialist competition within the West, with the EEC and its members in particular seeking to re-assert its regional role and to establish its position in a post-liberation Southern Africa through close involvement with the SADCC . The us, in contrast, seeks to influence both the South African and regional situation through bilateral policy . The more cynical interpret keen support for SADCC more as a matter of hedging bets
27
Capital & Class
28
and developing respectable policy alternatives to comprehensive sanctions, than demonstrating support for the idea of regionalism and for those states most endangered in the struggle against apartheid . It is argued, further, that this situation, and the rivalry between the EEC states, allows SADCC power to demand that donors accompany their funds with other measures . One, oft-repeated, is that maximum pressure be brought to bear on South Africa to abandon apartheid and desist from violence and sabotage .
and sanctions Having no powers of compulsion, SADCC can have no `Sanctions Policy', especially since its members are seriously divided on this issue . The three SACU countries are opposed to sanctions, which they consider pose threats to their economic survival . These fears have a strong foundation . Even committed supporters of sanctions, such as Zimbabwe, recognise that their impact, and especially South African retaliation, will have serious consequences for most SADCC states. Nevertheless, SADCC can play a part . Recently, the Right in Western Europe, in tandem with South Africa, has sought new arguments against sanctions . One of these has been to focus on their cost to SADCC countries (the thinly-veiled threat of South African retaliation is an additional cost) . Although SADCC cannot deny this cost, it can and does point out the support for sanctions from several of its members ; the current and historical costs of South African action against its neighbours (estimated by SADCC in 1985 as US$10 billion ; by Hanlon as SADCC
US£15 billion) ; and most of all the hypocrisy of the Right in employing such an argument whilst making no complaints about the existing suffering from apartheid . Furthermore, as more countries impose sanctions, SADCC has requested increased assistance to offset or plan against the consequences for its members . SADCC leaders have concluded that South African retaliation poses a greater threat to SADCC countries than do sanctions per se (see also Moorsom, 1986) . This retaliation will not, however, be total and immediate . Due to apartheid's contradictions, internally and in its relations with its neighbours, South Africa can only pursue maximum retaliation at great cost to its own economy, especially in exports, transport revenue and semi-skilled labour in its mines . Retaliation will therefore be selective, partial and staggered . If this analysis is correct, then it is possible for SADCC countries to plan for sanctions and retaliation . This point leads us back to SADCC's role as an economic grouping ; despite the limitations on supra-national planning in the region, SADCC is the only institution with any potential for planning and funding projects that concern more than one country . Clearly, the impact of sanctions and South African nonmilitary retaliation presents a great threat because of the extreme dependence of the SADCC states . Planning to minimise this impact is therefore closely related to SADCC's objectives ; is beyond the capacity of individual member-states ; and is inherently a regional matter .
Since six SADCC countries are landlocked, the regional aspect is most obvious in the transport sector, but is also central in other sectors . Cessation
Behind the news
of South African supplies and the ending of migrant labour, though unlikely to happen suddenly, will pose similar problems for several SADCC members; it is therefore logical to develop regional programmes to deal with alternative import supplies, to supplement lost government revenues, to provide settlement and employment for returned migrant workers and to accelerate rural development in the most affected areas . The political and economic diversity of SADCC finds fullest expression in the sanctions issue ; the greatest dangers are that different attitudes could cause political problems and that the more vulnerable states might be forced or tempted into collusion with South Africa in sanctions-busting . The latter could damage the effectiveness of sanctions . How SADCC can discourge this is an important question ; certainly it cannot do so politically, nor by imploring its members, since those likely to be involved are the most vulnerable . Its only opportunity lies in providing, through increased funding from donors, the incentives and economic security to discourage this . SADCC's role in the sanctions issue mixes various factors-i .e . maintaining its own unity; drawing attention to the costs of apartheid to SADCC programmes and its members' economies ; developing emergency programmes and seeking money for the accelerated reduction of dependence ; and minimising the consequences for its members, in so doing reducing their
propensity to sanctions-bust . It is possible, too, that the threat of sanctions and South African retaliation will provide the stimulus for greater integration in SADCC programming . Finally, the lesson is that not only is dependence on South Africa dangerous, but that undue dependence on the world economy poses similar logistical and economic dangers . The threat of sanctions, and the increased development assistance that the political and strategic configuration makes attainable, puts pressure on SADCC to confront the difficult problem of reorientating economic links and interdependence to within the region . This it is now seeking to achieve by building up productive capacity and trade in the major economic sectors within the SADCC . The challenge it faces is to achieve this and its other objectives without creating a new form of dependence, on national and international, primarily Western, official aid .
References SADCC (1985) Annual Progress Reports 1984-
5 . Gaborone . SADCC (1985) Annual Progress Reports 1985-
6 . Luanda . SADCC (1986) SADCC Macro-economic Survey,
1986 . Moorsom, R . (1986) Sanctions against South Africa: A Background Report prepared for Oxfam. Oxford . With thanks to Oxfam .
29
Martin Spence After Chernobyl
THE CHERNOBYL disaster was the greatest single setback suffered by the world's nuclear industries in their 40-year history . The scale of the problem can be illustrated simply by listing various global responses to this single incident : reactor orders were postponed or cancelled in Egypt, Finland, Italy, the Netherlands, Taiwan and Yugoslavia ; public protest and debate was sparked in East Germany, Poland and Romania; and Labour and Social Democratic parties swung to the anti-nuclear positions in Italy, Switzerland, the UK and West Germany . Capital & Class has, since 1982, provided a forum for debate on the politics of nuclear power from a Marxist point of view . In C&C 16, I argued that the nuclear industry is driven above all by the pressures of capital accumulation as it acts upon multinational companies in the power engineering industry, so that these companies seek to influence national policy both through political parties and through the state bureaucracy (Spence, 1982) . In C&C 20, Wolfgang Rudig took issue with this position :
•
30
After the Chernobyl accident several countries reassessed their commitment to nuclear power, leading to the cancellation or postponement of orders for reactors . Martin Spence examines the impact of these developments upon the world's nuclear industry . Through an assessment of the forces which have promoted nuclear technology, he concludes that the industry is far from being in a state of terminal decline .
I will challenge the view that the multinationals are the prime protagonists of nuclear power . I will argue instead that the State should be the central focus of analysis . . . (Rudig, 1983 : 118) In C&C 21 1 responded, seeking to avoid a possibly sterile debate about institutions, and to refocus upon class, and upon nuclear
After Chernobyl 31
power as an anti-working class technology, in both capitalist and state collectivist countries (Spence, 1983) . It is time to move on from this point, and to deepen our understanding of the politics of nuclear power . After Chernobyl, the whole debate has taken on a new and enduring urgency . The need for a coherent Marxist perspective on the issue, which can be fed into the wider debate, is greater than ever . My intention in the present article is to assess the state of the international nuclear industry in the aftermath of Chernobyl, while trying to develop a more refined analysis of the class politics of nuclear technology . This means careful study of the industry's development in different countries, and of the different class fractions which have acquired a material interest in it . All nuclear programmes have their origins in the atomic bomb . Even those countries which have imported only civil facilities are building on a body of technological experience acquired elsewhere while developing nuclear weapons . More specifically, most of the Western world's nuclear activities can be traced back to the wartime Manhattan Project in the USA, while Soviet and East European programmes are descended from the Soviet bomb project launched in 1942 . This historical connection is sometimes taken to imply that nuclear power is essentially a `smokescreen' for the expansion of nuclear arsenals . This is a misrepresentation of the relationship . Nuclear power is an established industrial technology in its own right, generating about 15% of the world's electricity (Bennett & Skjoeldebrand, 1986) . But in many countries it retains links and shares facilities with nuclear weapons programmes . A brief review of the `nuclear fuel cycle' will make the point, and will also introduce various technical terms employed below . 1) The necessary fuel for all nuclear activity is fissile material, i .e . material with an unstable atomic structure, so that particles can be knocked off the nuclei of its atoms . The element generally used is uranium, which is mined and treated in many countries . 2) Uranium must then be `enriched' - which essentially means separating out the most fissile, and therefore most valuable, type of uranium from that which is less fissile but more common . Most nuclear reactors need enriched uranium fuel . However, some use natural uranium fuel - see point 4 below . The key point about enrichment is that it is a cumulative process : more work done means a higher grade of fuel . Different reactors need different fuel grades, and the highest grades of all can be used for nuclear weapons . The economics of the process is such that, once uranium has been enriched up to `reactor grade', it requires relatively little extra work to bring it up to `weapons
The nuclear fuel cycle
Capital & Class 32
grade' . It follows that any enrichment plant is of potentially military significance . 3) Reactor-grade enriched uranium is manufactured into fuel-rods, also known as fuel-elements, for use in nuclear power stations . 4) Nuclear power stations work by means of nuclear fission . Within the reactor core, conditions are created which break down unstable uranium atom nuclei, releasing energy in the form of heat . This process produces certain completely new elements, `fission products' such as plutonium, and it creates quantities of radioactive waste . The process is essentially the same as the explosion of a primitive atomic bomb, with the crucial difference that the release of energy is controlled and sustained over time . This control relies on two factors : the moderator, which slows down the movement of atomic particles in the core ; and the coolant, which takes heat out of the core to boilers and turbines, to generate electricity . All reactors with moderators are known as thermal reactors . There are a number of thermal reactors operating in the world, and they can be broken down into three broad groupings, according to their moderator characteristics : Graphite moderated . Examples are Magnox and the AGR (UK and RBMK (USSR) . These reactors use either natural uranium fuel (Magnox) or low-enriched uranium (AGR & RMBK) . They are all high plutonium producers . Magnox and AGR use gas coolant, while RBMK uses boiling water coolant . Heavy water moderated . Example : CANDU (Canada) . `Heavy' or deuterium-enriched water is an excellent moderator, and is used with natural uranium fuel . Various coolants are used in CANDU reactors : pressurised heavy water, organic coolant, and boiling water . CANDU is a high plutonium producer . Light water moderated . `Light' water is normal water : it is called `light' to distinguish it from `heavy' water . Examples of light water models are the Pressurised Water Reactor (PWR) and Boiling Water Reactor (BwR), both widely used . The PWR is by far the most popular reactor type worldwide . It and the BWR both use enriched fuel ; both are relatively compact in design, lending themselves to serial production ; and both use the same water as both moderator and coolant . 5) After it has been used inside the reactor, fuel is highly irradiated and consists of unused uranium, new fission products such as plutonium, and large amounts of useless but dangerous radioactive wastes . It is allowed to cool for several months, and can then be reprocessed - a chemical procedure which separates out potentially `useful' material from the waste . The `useful' material is unused uranium, which is theoretically recyclable,
After Chernobyl 33
and plutonium . After plutonium has been recovered, it has two possible uses . It can itself be used as reactor fuel, in thermal reactors or in Fast Reactors (see point 6 below) ; or it can be used for nuclear weapons . It follows that any reprocessing plant is of potentially military significance . 6) The Fast Reactor is qualitatively different from the thermal reactors described in point 4 above . Its essential characteristic is that it has no moderator . The intention here is deliberately to create a `fast' chain reaction in the core, which not only generates heat but also `breeds' a net gain in fissile material, by using a fuel mix of plutonium and the less fissile form of uranium . It is this net gain which gives the reactor its popular tag `Fast Breeder' . Despite 30 years of R&D in many countries, no Fast Reactor is yet in commercial operation, and as a design it poses major economic and safety problems . A Fast Reactor accident could potentially be far more devastating than a thermal reactor accident . It is highly unlikely that Fast Reactors would ever replace thermal reactors . They need thermal reactors to generate initial stocks of plutonium, and reprocessing plant to separate it out . It is also worth noting that any commitment to the Fast Reactor means a commitment to the large-scale production and processing of plutonium, with clear military implications . 7) Unreprocessed and reprocessed nuclear wastes, including some which will remain radioactive for hundreds of thousands of years, need to be securely stored during this period . No secure techniques exist . All techniques are, by definition, relatively new and untried. Clearly, the most sensitive stages in the whole cycle are enrichment and reprocessing . These are the operations where the links between civil and military activities are most nakedly exposed . It follows that enrichment and reprocessing, which will be referred to below as `fuel cycle activities', need to be distinguished from the operation of nuclear power stations . The economic, political and strategic pressures on the two areas are significantly different .
(i) Western
reactor markets
Until the early 1960s there was virtually no commercial market for nuclear power . The US, UK and French governments were however committed to the bomb, and their first nuclear power reactors emerged from these military programmes . Canada also developed its own nuclear power stations, building on exC & C 32-C
Nuclear homelands 1 : The West
Capital & Class 34
perience acquired from wartime collaboration with the USA and Britain . But despite some ambitious plans on paper, nuclear power did not take off as a commercial prospect . Between 1955 and 1963, only 8 .6 Gigawatts (Gw) of nuclear capacity was ordered in the Western world (Walker & Lonnroth, 1983 : 25) . In sharp contrast, the period from 1964 to 1969 saw a breakthrough as reactors were successfully marketed by private corporations . The era of `commercial' nuclear power was heralded by GE's sale of a reactor at Oyster Creek in New Jersey - a deal that was subsequently revealed as a loss-leader . But it worked the trick . In the West, orders were placed for 94 GW of capacity, of which 81 GW were American-designed Light Water Reactors (LWRS) (Walker & Lonnroth, 1983 : 26-7) . The Western reactor
market was therefore dominated from the first by the USA . This development of a nuclear reactor market should be seen as part of a wider economic and political pattern . The period from the late 1940s to the late 1960s, the `Long Boom', was underpinned by a series of policies initiated by the us state, which created conditions for economic growth and profitable investment by US capital, in the core areas of the capitalist world . In the case of nuclear reactors, the links between private capital and state policy were fundamental, given the military origins of the technology itself : American LWRS, which were to conquer the world market for power-reactors, were originally designed to drive s ubmarines . u s corporations such as Westinghouse and GE built up their nuclear expertise on the basis of government military contracts ; built prototype nuclear power stations with government support ; and then expanded onto the world market from a sound domestic base, with financial support from the state-backed Export-Import Bank, and ideological support from Eisenhower's `Atoms for Peace' project (Pringle & Spigelman, 1983) . However, even in this period of apparently unproblematic growth, different fractions of capital had different specific interests . In his study of various circuits of capital in the North Atlantic area, Van der Pijl identifies two ideal-typical frames of reference, corresponding to the two fundamental fractions of capital : the 'Money-Capital concept', represented by the `liberal internationalism' of the early twentieth century ; and the 'Prod uctive-Capital concept', corresponding to sphere-ofinfluence concerns and imperialist rivalry, and represented by a 'State-Monopolist' tendency (Van der Pijl, 1984) . What happened for a brief period in the post-war world was a synthesis of the two, rooted in the unprecedented economic and military dominance of the USA, taking the form of `Corporate Liberalism' . This perspective offers an insight into the developmet of the
After Chernobyl nuclear reactor market, not only because it sets an overall framework for understanding that development, but also because the reactor-builders were based in certain industrial sectors, with certain allegiances and inclinations . Before the Second World War, the us electrical engineering industry, along with the motors industry, was a leading force in developing an internationalist orientation, which would eventually take the form of `corporate liberalism' (Van der Pijl, 1985 : 88-90) . The four giants of the pre-war world were the American companies GE and Westinghouse, and the German firms AEG and Siemens . These were locked into two transatlantic axes - GE-AEG and WestinghouseSiemens - and in addition the us companies held strong positions in Belgium, France and the UK . After 1945, with their German counterparts greatly weakened, and with all the advantages of the us home market and us state support, GE and Westinghouse were able to build upon their traditional connections in the new and favourable environment . Their reactor type, the LWR, was consequently adopted as a near-global standard . us domination continued until the mid-1970s . From 1971 to 1975, US corporations won 64% of all Western reactor orders (Falk, 1982 : 112), and in roughly the same period they took 84% of all export orders (Walker & Lonnroth, 1983 : 34) . However, from the late 1960s a generalised resistance to the USA was crystallising in other advanced capitalist countries, and especially in Western Europe . The nuclear reactor industry was no exception to this wider pattern . France, West Germany, Canada and the UK established independent reactor-building capacity France and West Germany by developing domestic versions of US LWRS, Canada and the UK by pursuing native designs . A renewed form of state-monopolism was on the agenda outside the USA, based on new industrial capacity established since the war, and finding its political expression in various, more or less overt forms of anti-Americanism . In the nuclear field, this meant a challenge to US non-proliferation policy (see section (ii) below), with both France and West Germany seeking to boost reactor exports by also making sensitive fuel-cycle facilities available to developing countries (Spence, 1984) . By the mid-1970s, therefore, the virtual US monopoly had gone, and there was sharp competition between rival reactor suppliers . The level of domestic orders varied greatly . In France, a political decision was taken to maintain a sustained and massive ordering programme throughout the 1970s, with five or six PWRs ordered each year . In the USA, on the other hand, market confidence evaporated . By 1983, 45% of all new nuclear capacity ordered since 1972 had been cancelled, with losses totalling $10 to $18 billion (FT, 17/5/83) . To compound us problems, the
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Capital & Class 36
export market in the late 1970s was 19 GW smaller than in the first half of the decade, and the us slice of this smaller cake was trimmed by 30%, to the benefit of France and West Germany (Walker & Lonnroth, 1983 : 34) . The differing fortunes of different national reactor industries since the mid-1970s are strongly related to the degree to which an effectively state-monopolist strategy has been pursued . There are two essential elements in this equation : the organisation of the power-engineering industry, and the organisation of the electricity utilities . France has the most fiercely integrated structure, and by far the largest nuclear programme . The single reactor-building corporation Framatome is almost entirely state-owned : 40% held by the nationalised engineering concern CGE, 35% by the state atomic energy commission cEA, 10% by the state-owned electricity utility EdF, and the remaining 15% shared between Framatome's management and the private construction group Bourguyes (FT, 31/8/85) . In addition, EdF monopolises electricity supply . Its reactor ordering programme, sustained at a high level until the early 1980s, was financed by foreign borrowing . However, this level of ordering is already falling, as EdF faces chronic electricity overcapacity, massive indebtedness, and pressure to export its surplus electricity all over Europe . Framatome will face major problems in the early 1990s as the last batch of orders work their way through . And EdF could face even worse ones, if a generic design fault were to appear in its enormous family of MRS, which now account for 75% of French electricity . Canada appears to have a similar integrated structure, a single state-owned reactor corporation (AECL) supplying a single publicly-owned regional utility, Ontario Hydro . However, the market is much smaller than in France, and there is a continuing commitment to coal as well as nuclear power . In addition, AECL has stayed with its heavy-water CANDU design, which is fundamentally different from the LWRS which dominate the world market . Since the early twentieth century, Germany has provided fertile ground for state-monopllism, a result of its historic `late arrival' vis-a-vis British imperialism . The German tradition is built not on direct state control, but on an interlocking network of private capital and state agencies, with the banks providing essential cement . In the nuclear field there is a single reactor corporation, Kraftwerkunion (KWU), the outcome of a merger between Siemens and AEG in 1969. KWU works closely with the chemicals company Hoechst, regional utilities such as RWE, the export credit agency Hermes, and the Dresdner bank . However, the situation is complicated by the federal political
After Chernobyl structure imposed on West Germany by the Allies after the Second World War . This allows state parliaments and courts considerable powers to challenge and block public policies . The result is that reactor orders placed by regional utilities have been challenged and delayed, and political opposition to nuclear power has crystallised in some state parliaments . In Hessen, a SPDGreen coalition was constructed in 1986, and foundered in 1987, precisely on the issue of nuclear power . The Japanese nuclear industry has a structure somewhat similar to that of West Germany . There is a closely-knit network of private corporations (Mitsubishi, Hitachi, Toshiba) and utilities (especially Tokyo Electric), but in Japan they operate under the close supervision of the Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI) . Britain is, formally, rather similar to France . It has a single reactor corporation, the National Nuclear Corporation (NNC) ; two state-owned utilities, the Central Electricity Generating Board (CEGB) and South of Scotland Electricity Board (sSEB) dominate power-station ordering ; and there is one state-owned research body, the UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) . However, the neatness of the structure belies the reality . The state-monopolist tendency does not have deep roots in the UK ; on the contrary, this is the homeland of classic liberal internationalism . The result in the nuclear industry is that, within the framework of national institutions, battles are still going on which were resolved elsewhere 20 years ago . At one level is is a battle over technology - us PWR versus native reactor design . On either side of this debate is an alliance of private capital and state agencies . Northern Engineering Industries (NEI, which is a member of the NNC, lines up with the SSEB and, more discreetly, the UKAEA, in supporting the British AGR . The Labour Party and most trade unions have traditionally favoured the AGR as well . On the other side, GEC (also a member of the NNC), the CEGB and the Conservative Party back the PWR . The AGR case is argued on grounds of technological independence and historic investment . The PWR case is argued on grounds of lower cost and export potential . In March 1987, the Conservative government decided to order a Westinghouse PWR for Sizewell, apparently resolving the debate . But it will take several years - more than the lifetime of the next parliament - before any PWR commitment can become irrevocable . There is no doubt that, in commercial terms, the PWR option was once more coherent than the disastrous, unsellable AGR . GEC's strategy in the early 1970s was to adopt us PWR technology, master it, and re-export it, just as Framatome has done . But this argument makes little sense in the late 1980s, in a
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shrinking world market already overfull with eager PWR suppliers . The GEC/CEGB axis now has the upper hand in terms of the domestic debate, but it has arrived too late on the world scene to become a major actor . Finally, and most importantly of all, the nuclear market in the United States is unique . Its structure conferred certain historic advantages until the mid-1970s, and historic liabilities ever since . Its main reactor suppliers are Westinghouse, GE, and (very much smaller) Combustion Engineering. The option of a single national reactor corporation has never been mooted : it would fly in the face of anti-trust legislation, the traditional Westinghouse-GE rivalry, and the whole culture of us capital . Equally, the utility structure in the USA is highly decentralised, a network of relatively small companies, operating on commercial criteria, and often drawing upon the savings of local consumers for their capital . Such companies are inevitably more vulnerable to shifts in market mood than are large state-owned utilities . In the 1960s and early 1970s, when nuclear power was generally regarded as the technology of the future and electricity demand was generally expected to rise indefinitely, they ordered reactors in large numbers : between 1971 and 1975, us reactor suppliers' annual orders averaged 19 .6 GW . But from the mid-1970s, as recession set it, rising electricity demand flattened out, and popular fears about radioactive pollution grew, the market turned and utilities started pulling out of nuclear power . During the 1976-80 period, us suppliers' annual reactor orders averaged just 2 .0 GW (Falk, 1982) . The emergence of broadly state-monopolist industrial structures has therefore protected several non-us reactor corporations from the market collapse experienced in the USA . But times are still hard . Reactor-building overcapacity in the West has been estimatd at about 90% (Walker & Lonnroth, 1983 : 9) . This has led to a further survival strategy, whereby reactor corporations enter into pragmatic alliances with each other, so as to share costs and risks . Some of these alliances are intra-European, such as the Framatome-GEC partnership which is selling a PWR to China at Daya Bay. But most are global in scale, linking North American, West European and Japanese companies . Westinghouse is collaborating with Mitsubishi on an `Advanced' PwR ; Hitachi is working with GE, and Toshiba with Asea of Sweden, on an `Advanced' BWR . Toshiba and Fuji are collaborating with KWU with a view to building its PWR in Japan ; and AECL and NEI are cooperating on a CANDU bid in Turkey . And to complicate things further, another generation of reactor suppliers is now entering the market . Thus Argentine and Spanish companies are trying to revive the Iranian nuclear power programme, working under the
After Chernobyl
aegis of the previous Iranian supplier, KWU . The current period in Western reactor markets is therefore a period of defensive alliances at both national and international levels, a period of biding time and waiting for an upturn . Some companies have decided to pull out - such as Gulf Atomic in the USA - or to shed labour and capacity - such as AECL and NEI . Others are hanging on . But the market, especially after Chernobyl, must remain uncertain . It is affected not only by changing energy trends and prices, but also by political change, by shifting public mood, and by the image of the industry presented in the media . It is clear that capitalism does not `need' nuclear power in some essential, functional way . But capitalism does need a large-scale, secure, flexible energy supply (Porter et al, 1986 : 119-25). Part of that energy must be delivered as electricity, and, other things being equal, nuclear power is a potentially profitable way of generating electricity . The problem for the reactor suppliers is that other things aren't equal . (ii) The nuclear fuel cycle It was stressed above that the nuclear industry is characterised by a `cycle' of industrial activities from uranium mining to radioactive waste disposal . The slowdown in reactor programmes since the mid-1970s has therefore caused overcapacity not only in reactor building itself, but at all other points in the cycle, including the militarily sensitive operations of enrichment and reprocessing . And this in turn means that the dynamics of capital accumulation in the relatively commercial reactor sector have an impact on military-strategic considerations at these other points in the cycle . Fewer reactors means a surplus of uranium, with world stockpiles in 1985 equal to six years' forward supply, or three times the normal level (FT, 4/1/85) . The Uranium Institute reports that this fall in demand is now made worse by technical progress in fuel conservation (FT, 29/1/87) . The reactor slowdown has also led to surplus uranium enrichment capacity, and it undermines the economic rationale for reprocessing and Fast Reactor programmes, both of which are based on the assumption that uranium is scarce . Meanwhile, technical problems with the Fast Reactor have led to a plutonium glut in several countries . Pressure is mounting to use this plutonium as thermal reactor fuel, a strategy which would diminish the plutonium surplus, but only by aggravating the uranium surplus . And so it goes on . Despite these problems, nuclear expansion continues . At the end of 1985, about 250 GW of nuclear capacity was installed worldwide, with another 142 GW under construction . Work was
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proceeding on 26 new units in the USA (mostly hangovers from the early '70s boom), 20 in France, 11 in Japan, 6 in West Germany, and 5 in South Korea (IAEA, 1986a, 1986b) . But even more striking is the continuing expansion of fuel cycle activities, despite overcapacity in uranium and enrichment, and despite the question mark over the whole rationale for reprocessing and the Fast Reactor . This can partly be explained by the enormous capital sums which have already been invested in these areas . The private companies and state agencies which have committed these sums are under market and political pressure to realise a return on their investments . And they are in a powerful position to pass the pressure on to other State bodies, for further orders, subsidies and support . However, the drive for nuclear expansion is not entirely explained by the inertia of past investment . The military-strategic nature of the technology means that state powers have, by definition, an active interest in its overall development, and especially in the sensitive areas of enrichment and reprocessing . Even states which do not openly wield nuclear weapons may choose to maintain such an infrastructure, to keep the option open . As President Zia of Pakistan correctly observed to Time magazine : Once you have acquired the technology . . . you can do whatever you like . You can use it for peaceful purposes only . You can also utilise it for military purposes . (FT, 24/3/87) Overcapacity in reactor markets has led, as we have seen, to a series of pragmatic international alliances between reactor corporations . We might expect similar links in fuel cycle activities . But the pattern here is very different, precisely because of the military-strategic implications of these activities . These implications are viewed very differently by different states, depending on their position in the world political order . The USA, with an initial lead in nuclear technology and a virtual monopoly in enriched uranium, has traditionally been strongly opposed to the spread of fuel cycle facilities . Its `Atoms for Peace' programme in the 1950s gave technical advice and training to many countries, and thus supported us corporations' reactor exports, but it resolutely refused to hand over enrichment or reprocessing technology . This stance was strengthened by Ford, and by Carter who stopped reprocessing and the US Fast Reactor programme . Under Reagan, the rhetoric has been more aggressively pro-nuclear and pro-fuel cycle, but the reality of us nuclear policy is much the same . Reagan tried to reopen the Barnwell reprocessing plant with private capital, but could find no takers (Walker & Lonnroth, 1983 : 131). More recently, the
After Chernobyl long-term trend was confirmed again as Exxon sold its fuel cycle business to Kwu (FT, 24/12/86) . Seen from Western Europe, us opposition to fuel cycle activity never seemed as high-minded as Carter claimed, but has looked rather like a hypocritical attempt to protect established market advantages . Both France and West Germany responded by exporting fuel cycle facilities during the 1970s, to countries such as Argentina, Brazil, South Africa and (nearly) South Korea . There is no doubt that this willingness to supply sensitive technology was a great help in winning reactor orders as well (Spence, 1984) . West European commitment to fuel cycle activities, and especially to the Fast Reactor-reprocessing option, is deep rooted . In fact a new pattern of fuel cycle collaboration is emerging, which may be significant not only as a pragmatic response to the problem of overcapacity, but also as a pointer to new forms of state power and military planning . What marks out this fuel cycle collaboration from the pattern of international reactor collaboration is that intra-European links are weak in the reactor sector, but strong in the fuel cycle . In enrichment, the Fast Reactor and reprocessing there is close collaboration between West European state agencies . The US monopoly in enriched uranium has been broken by two European consortia, Eurodif (Belgium, France, Italy and Spain) and URENCO (Netherlands, UK and West Germany). West European Fast Reactor programmes have since 1984 been pooled in a single joint project, consisting of Belgium, France, Italy, the UK and West Germany . This is built on a pre-existing base of Fast Reactor cooperation : Belgium, Italy, the Netherlands, UK, and West German Utility RWE have all invested in the French Fast Reactor project, while Belgium and the Netherlands have also put money into the West German programme . The West European Fast Reactor project requires joint work in reprocessing, where France and the UK already dominate the world market . One of them will host a new reprocessing plant to service the European Fast Reactor . In addition, there is talk of reopening the mothballed Belgian reprocessing facility at Mol, with financial assistance from West Germany or Switzerland ; and France is helping build a new West German plant at Wackersdorf on the Austrian border . International fuel cycle links do occur elsewhere . For instance, the French are selling reprocessing technology to Japan, and both the USA and Japan have expressed interest in the joint West European Fast Reactor programme . But the nature and depth of West European collaboration is striking . Part of the explanation lies in the pressure generated by past investments . Since the 1950s, West European states have devoted considerable
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resources to the `plutonium option', (reprocessing/Fast Reactor), as a strategic alternative to American domination in the fields of uranium enrichment and LWR technology . This European investment now seems ill-judged, in the context of a general surplus in uranium and in uranium enrichment capacity . But resources have been committed, expertise has been painfully acquired, and there is inevitable political pressure to continue, despite the costs . Here, after all, is an energy technology in which Western Europe has a world lead . Significantly, this collaboration is occurring at the same time as a series of moves towards closer West European military links . The joint Fast Reactor programme was announced in 1984 . In that same year, two semi-moribund European bodies were revived, the West European Union and the Independent European Programme Group, both of which exist specifically to advance West European military collaboration . France is the leading force in these developments . For some years it has been rethinking its nuclear strategy, and appears now to accept a new role within the wider framework of NATO nuclear planning, despite its formal absence from NATO (Johnstone, 1984 : 124) . Mitterrand has affirmed that French nuclear weapons would be available to `defend' West Germany, a political commitment which reflects its new technical capability, as long-range `Hades' missiles replace 'Pluton' . Across the board, there are increasingly close Franco-German military links (FT, 1/3/86) . However, the key relationship is between France and the UK . They are Western Europe's two existing nuclear weapons states, and the states with the most comprehensive nuclear fuel cycle facilities . Anglo-French military links, like Franco-German links, are closer than they have been for years . At a meeting of the two countries' defence ministers in March 1987, joint work on weapons development and procurement was agreed, including, in principle, nuclear weapons (FT, 11/3/87) . This followed a well-publicised visit to Paris, in September 1986, by Alliance leaders Owen and Steel, to float the idea of a `Euro-bomb' . Such developments are entirely compatible with the wider trend towards joint work in Fast Reactor development, reprocessing, and fuel cycle activities . In fact, having established joint programmes on the `civil' side, it makes both organisational and economic sense to take advantage of the resultant economies of scale and follow through into military collaboration as well . This is not to say that a political decision has already been taken to develop an Anglo-French, or West European, nuclear bomb . But the technical infrastructure for such a possibility is falling into place, and the political conditions for it are becoming more likely . This possibility must be seen in perspective . West European
After Chernobyl 43
states are not, at present, seeking to gain `independence' from the USA . On the contrary, the dominant fear in traditionally Atlanticist West European ruling circles is that the USA will go isolationist . The European-initiated decision to deploy Cruise and Pershing, and the widespread West European dismay when Reagan almost did a `zero option' deal with Gorbachev at Reykjavik, bear witness to these continuing fears . Even if the USA were to justify these fears, reduce its military commitment to Western Europe, and force the West European states to adopt a more independent military stance, this again need not imply immediate rivalry between the two . West European states have a clear interest in cooperating with the USA in defending world capitalism, especially against radical challenges from the Third World . This implies a `sharing out' of responsibility for military intervention, and it is evident from recent adventures in Chad, the Falklands, Lebanon and Zaire that West European states are willing to take on part of this burden . The siting of us Cruise missiles at Comiso in Sicily, perfectly placed for targets in North Africa and the Middle East, may represent a further step along the same road . Yet there are tensions between us capital and West European capital, there are differences of perspective with regard to the USSR, Eastern Europe, and areas of the Third World . These tensions may, over time, take on political and even military expressions (Kaldor, 1979 ; Furedi, 1986) . This is not to say that West European nuclear fuel cycle collaboration represents a deliberate plan to build a 'Euro-bomb', challenge the USA, and undermine NATO . Rather, it reflects a common intent by several states to realise some political and economic return on investments which go back decades . But intent and effect are two different things . Despite the immediate motives for fuel cycle collaboration, the fact is that a technological and organisational infrastructure is being put into place which will lend itself to joint West European nuclear weapons development . At some point, this could become a major factor in creating new tensions between Western Europe and the USA, with unforeseeable consequences . (i) The Soviet reactor programme It is clear from the discussion above that the nuclear industry in capitalist countries cannot be understood as a series of discrete `national' programmes . On the contrary, a shifting international network exists, within which particular state or corporate policies are played out . What's more, this network doesn't stop at the geographical frontiers of the capitalist world . It acts upon, and is acted upon by, the non-capitalist countries, and especially the largest non-capitalist country, the USSR.
Nuclear homelands 2 : The USSR
Capital & Class
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I have put forward elsewhere an outline of the Soviet nuclear power programme under Brezhnev, based upon an analysis of Soviet society as a non-capitalist social formation, which can be described as state collectivist (Spence, 1983) . The essence of the argument is that the USSR is a class society, characterised by a stand-off between the ruling class and working class, which has led to social and economic stagnation . Brezhnev pursued a policy of glacial stability within the party and state apparatus, avoiding conflict at all costs . Instead, he sought to buy time . One part of this strategy was literally to buy food and technology from the West, by selling Soviet raw materials - above all, oil and gas from Siberia, where vast resources were allocated to drilling operations . Meanwhile, nuclear power stations were built in the Western USSR - where 75% of the population lives - thus helping to maximise oil and gas exports from Siberia - where 80% of energy resources are located (Semenov, 1982) . Nuclear power under Brezhnev can therefore be seen as part of a wider policy for buying off working-class discontent, without confronting the working class directly . However, this strategy has come under attack since Mikhail Gorbachev assumed control of economic affairs in March 1984, and became General Secretary of the CPSU in March 1985 . The dangers of relying on oil and gas exports became clear in the mid-1980s, as falling world oil prices threatened to cut Soviet export earnings by 40% (FT, 8/2/86) . Furthermore, by prioritising short-term production targets, the oil industry has squandered enormous resources . According to Soviet sources, some oil fields have been operating at only two-thirds of their planned efficiency (FT, 26/6/85) . Within the sustained purge which has hit both party and state since Gorbachev came to power, the oil and gas industries have been especially hard hit : ministers, party bosses in oil provinces, and local managers, have been sacked for inefficiency and corruption . In the 1986-90 Five Year Plan, the emphasis is on energy efficiency, and industrial refurbishment in such areas as machine tools, machine building, computers and electronics . By 1990, it is intended that 51% of capital investment will be accounted for by technical re-equipment, compared to 38% in 1985 . And in the current Plan, twice as much obsolete machinery will be written off as in the previous Plan : 30% of Soviet industrial machinery is over 15 years old (FT, 6/7/85, 19/6/86) . The capital resources to finance this renovation programme are to come largely from the fuel and raw materials sector, which currently aborbs 19% of all capital investment (FT, 10/9/85) . One major implication of this sectoral shift in resources is a geographical shift away from Siberia, back to the Western USSR . This emphasis on re-equipping the
After Chernobyl existing industrial heartland, rather than sanctioning endless greenfield projects on virgin soil, is one of the hallmarks of Gorbachev's economic strategy . He represents the interests of a new coalition of social forces : central planners and technocrats, local enterprise managers, and the intelligentsia, all of whom can identify with the central goal of raising productivity more readly than can the middle level and provincial party and state functionaries who flourished under Brezhnev . But Gorbachev, like Brezhnev, still faces the problem of a fragmented but resistant working class . Gorbachev's programme for industrial renovation clearly requires a supportive energy infrastructure . More specifically, as machinery is updated and a greater role is given to electronics and computers, the strategic importance of electricity will increase . Secure, large-scale electricity supply in the Western USSR is as much a priority for Gorbachev as for Brezhnev, despite their other differences . A major source for this electricity is intended to be nuclear power . In 1985 the USSR had 23 GW of nuclear capacity installed, meeting about 9% of its electricity needs (FT, 22/2/85) . A further 40 GW was planned for the 1986-90 period, bringing its contribution up to 20% (FTEE, February 1986) . The Soviet programme is based on two reactor types . The first, the RBMK, has served as the workhorse of the nuclear programme in recent years, producing about 60% of nuclear electricity . The RBMK design was favoured on several counts : high power rating ; low fuel costs ; high plutonium output ; and a reputation as an intrinsically safe design . This last claim was comprehensively exploded at Chernobyl, and the RBMK design is being severely modified . The chief of the design team has been sacked, as have officials from the State Committee on Nuclear Safety, the Ministry of Power Engineering and Electrification, and the Ministry of Medium Machine Building . The second reactor type, the VVER, is the Soviet version of the West's PWR . Theoretically, it should be possible to build these reactors on a production line basis, and in the 1970s a giant factory, Atommash, was erected at Rostov-on-Don to manufacture VVERS . However, plans were set back by a major accident at the plant in 1983, with some loss of life . In addition, the VVER is proving susceptible to flooding and leaking (FTEE, February 1986) . The Soviet reactor programme will not, however, be abandoned . Firstly, as in the West, enormous resources have already been committed to the industry, and although there are not the same pressures of capital accumulation as operate in the capitalist countries, there is an institutional and industrial inertia which
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makes it unthinkable for the ruling class simply to write these investments off. Secondly, Gorbachev's programme for economic renovation requires significant new electricity capacity in the Western USSR, and the course of least resistance in meeting this target is to build new nuclear power stations, as opposed to coal-fired, hydro-electric or renewable (solar-powered, windpowered) stations . And thirdly, the USSR has been planning for some years not only to increase the domestic use of nuclear power, but also to export reactors . This strategy, constructed around the VVER, is still being pursued . Until now, exports have focussed on other members of the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (cMEA) . However, there are clear plans for further sales outside this circle : possible customers include Argentina, Egypt, Iraq, Indonesia, Pakistan, Syria, and most recently India . The Soviet export strategy has been underpinned by a careful courtship of the International Atomic Energy Authority (IAEA), the UN body which monitors nuclear developments with a view to preventing military proliferation . Since 1983, the USSR has invited IAEA inspectors to visit the reactor model `intended for export' (FT, 16/10/84), which is to say the VVER . This closeness to the IAEA has become even more evident in the aftermath of Chernobyl, as Soviet scientists have opened themselves up to a unique exercise in self-criticism, under IAEA auspices . However, throughout the post-mortem, there have been two clear intentions : firstly, to pin the blame on individual operators, working practices, and design characteristics, rather than on nuclear power as such ; and secondly, to restore and even improve its damaged international nuclear reputation, through a public display of openness and good neighbourliness . All in all, it adds up to a wide-ranging exercise in damage limitation, so as to keep open its nuclear options at home and in the export market . That is not to say that all will go according to plan . For instance, the remarkable international openness in the aftermath of Chernobyl may yet backfire domestically, by creating an informed anti-nuclear and environmentalist constituency in Soviet society, probably in the first instance among the intelligentsia and media workers who are among Gorbachev's key supporters (FT, 30/1/87) . A scientific lobby, critical of nuclear power, is known to have existed for some years . More liberal media, and more critical journalism, may give this lobby an opportunity to publicise and popularise its views . At a different level the nuclear industry will be affected, as will all other industries, by the long-term implications of Gorbachev's reforms, if they are allowed to work their way through . The moves to make enterprises responsible for their
After Chernobyl own profit and loss, and for price negotiations ; to reinforce central control over certain ministries and provincial parties which had become semi-autonomous ; and to tie workers to their enterprises through productivity deals and internal elections, all imply a very different economic structure . Most crucially, they imply less security, more mobility, and even an acceptance of unemployment in one form or another, within the working class . It is impossible to say what the long-term consequences may be, or even if the working class will be prepared to accept such changes . (ii) The nuclear fuel cycle In Western Europe, we have seen how commercial pressures in the reactor market had a knock-on effect in fuel cycle activities, encouraging a pooling of resources which, in turn, is creating the technical infrastructure for a new military-strategic alignment around a 'Euro-bomb' . In the USSR, there is an historic commitment to the Fast Reactor and reprocessing every bit as strong as that of France or the UK . There is a further similarity, in that Soviet fuel cycle activities are also under pressure as a result of developments on the thermal reactor side . In the USSR's case, the problem is Chernobyl . As explained above, the Chernobyl reactor is an RBMK, one of the stalwarts of the nuclear power programme, and a reactor design highly valued for its plutonium output . The RBMK family has always been closely associated with fuel cycle activities and with the Fast Reactor project, which is based at Beloyarsk, where two Fast Reactor units stand alongside RBMK prototypes (Pryde & Pryde, 1974 : 28) . Development plans are highly optimistic . Although the largest unit operating so far is only 600 MW, a 1600 MW model is being designed (SW, 11/2/84 ; Kozlov, 1984 :96), and Soviet estimates of Fast Reactor fuel efficiency are twice as optimistic as those of Western scientists (FT, 14/9/82) . But these depend on a continuing supply of plutonium, which is a further reason why the RBMK will not be abandoned, despite Chernobyl . The major difference from Western Europe is that the USSR will not seek to pool its fuel cycle resources with other countries . The Soviet authorities are acutely aware of the military applications of these facilities, and for many years they have pursued a rigorous non-proliferation policy . This concern goes back to the painful experience of the Sino-Soviet split, in which argumetns about the transfer of nuclear weapons technology played a major role . The same caution is seen today, as the USSR refuses to allow any of its CMEA partners to acquire independent nuclear weapons capability . Soviet nuclear safeguards within the CMEA are in fact
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stricter than the provisions of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (Moss, 1981 : 121) . Not only does the USSR insist on the return of all fuel after use, but it refuses to supply highly-enriched uranium at all (Pringle & Spigelman, 1983 : 204) . There is no indication that the Gorbachev period will mark a new attitude on these questions .
Nuclear export markets
So far we have looked at the nuclear industries of the world's major industrial countries, mainly in terms of their domestic programmes and their relationships with each other . This is the correct place to start ; it would be quite naive to analyse global nuclear developments as though they were merely `responding to demand' . However, with productive capacity in place, both private and state corporations will look for export markets where possible . There are essentially two such markets. Firstly, there are certain larger countries on the periphery and semi-periphery of the capitalist world, which we will call `developing' countries, while recognising the ideological overtones of this term . Most of these would qualify as `Newly Industrialising Countries' (NICS) . Secondly, there are the non-capitalist countries of the cMEA other than the USSR itself. These two markets are broadly distinct : the first mainly served by Western suppliers, the second mainly by the USSR.
(i) Capitalist `developing' countries Developing countries which have imported nuclear technology from the West, or have plans to do so, make up a long list : Argentina, Brazil, China, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Iran, Israel, Mexico, Pakistan, the Philippines, South Africa, South Korea, Taiwan and Turkey . In many of these cases, the dual nature of certain nuclear facilities is a major attraction, and the relative success of France and West Germany in nuclear export markets during the 1970s was largely due to their willingness to sell sensitive fuel cycle facilities (Spence, 1984) . Several developing countries are believed to have acquired `civil' nuclear equipment with military purposes in mind: Argentina, Brazil, India, Pakistan, Israel and South Africa . The possibility of these states actually using nuclear weapons cannot be discounted, especially given present conditions in southern Africa and the Middle East . However, military ambition is not a sufficient explanation for nuclear purchases by developing countries . A more fruitful line of approach is to recognise nuclear facilities as large capital projects, providing the basis for formid-
After Chernobyl able class alliances within capitalist developing countries . Projects such as these attract both local and multinational capital, because they provide a mechanism whereby large funds, borrowed on the international market by the state, can be channelled to these companies by awarding contracts (Tanzer & Zorn, 1985 : 88-91) . In addition they appeal to nationalist politicians, as symbols of prestige and modernisation ; they appeal to planners and industrialists by holding out the hope of large-scale elctricity supply to support economic development ; they appeal to scientists, engineers and bureaucrats by justifying the creation of large research and development institutes, with secure and well-paid career structures ; and in certain circumstances they may also appeal to the military, by providing a nuclear industrial base which may subsequently open up the option of nuclear weapons . With an alliance like this in prospect, no conspiracy theory is required to explain the import of nuclear technology . Countries outside the CMEA with current or recent nuclear import plans include China, Egypt, South Korea, and Turkey . None of these is thought to be using nuclear power as a covert way of building a nuclear bomb - in fact the likeliest candidate, China, already has the bomb . In all of them, nuclear power is seen primarily as a means of generating electricity for economic development . In addition, all of them find themselves now in a `buyers' market' . Nuclear overcapacity in the West, coupled with the prospect of an export drive from the USSR, and the likelihood of low uranium and oil prices for the foreseeable future, mean that potential nuclear importers are able to take their time, play off would-be exporters against each other, and drive a hard bargain . This hard bargaining takes several forms, but it always revolves around finance . Several nuclear importers have been crippled by debt burdens in the past . In the Philippines, the cost of a Westinghouse PWR doubled during construction, and became a focus of popular discontent in the campaign to oust Marcos . And in Brazil, a massive programme has been left half-finished, with the nuclear corporation virtually bankrupt . New nuclear customers intend to avoid repeating these experiences . China, for instance, has a deal with Framatome, in partnership with GEC, to build a nuclear power station at Daya Bay in Guangdong, opposite Hong Kong . However, the deal was only confirmed after long and tortuous price negotiations, during which the Chinese almost called the whole thing off, and finally won a 20% reduction (FTEE, February 1986) . Egypt has been seeking tenders for its first nuclear power station for over five years . At different times there have been different front-runners, and in each case the crucial factor has C & C
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been not the technology on offer, but the financial package attached to it . In mid-1984 the French bid was the strongest, backed by a Franco-Italian loan (FT, 10/7/84) . Then Westinghouse won new support from the us Export-Import Bank and leapt into the lead (FT, 28/12/84) . By late 1985, the West German credit agency had come up with an even better package, and KWU was the favourite (FT, 18/10/85) . The jostling is still going on . A different strategy is evident in Turkey, an oil-importing country with a major debt burden . Turkey has also been seeking tenders for its first nuclear power station for some years, and the two leading contenders are KWU and AECL . Until 1984 it was assumed that the reactor would be purchased in the usual way, backed by an export credit deal which would, inevitably, add to Turkey's foreign debt . But in that year the government announced that it would treat the contract not as a straight purchase, but as a foreign investment . The supplier would build the power station and then run it for 15 years on a commercial basis, recouping its investment by selling the electricity (FT, 20/9/84) . KWU was unhappy about this unconventional arrangement, and it now looks as if the contract will go to AECL in collaboration with NEI . This is a genuinely new departure in the nuclear market . Until now, importers have been paying for control of a new technology, at their own risk . Turkey is placing the emphasis not on controlling the technology, but on increasing its electricity capacity at minimum cost, while shifting the burden of risk onto the supplier and it can get away with this because of the chronic overcapacity in the world reactor market . However, it does run the risk of future disputes over tariffs and conditions of electricity supply, once the station is built . South Korea represents the oposite pole to Turkey . It already has a large nuclear programme, mostly based on Westinghouse reactors, though also including purchases from AECL and Framatome . The South Korean government, and the twenty huge export-oriented industrial corporations which dominate the economy, are well aware of world reactor overcapacity and of the bargaining power which this confers . However, their emphasis is not on electricity at minimal cost, but on technology transfer so as to buid up their own nuclear manufacturing base, almost certainly with a view to entering the export market in the 1990s, undercutting rivals in this sector as they have already done in shipbuilding . Korean conditions are that future reactor imports must be designed jointly by the foreign suppliers and the Korea Heavy Industries Construction Corporation, although any design flaws would be entirely the responsibility of the supplier . The successful supplier looks like being Combustion Engineering, the `third force' in the us reactor industry, although in March
After Chernobyl 1987 the contract was still under review by South Korea, as the technology transfer terms were still not adequate (FT, 10/3/87) . These four examples show a number of different approaches by potential nuclear importers, but they al highlight the fact that despite falling oil prices, and despite Chernobyl, there is still a market for nuclear power in certain developing countries . Nuclear slowdown and overcapacity in the West may even stimulate this market, as reactor suppliers are forced to concede new demands, such as those of Turkey or South Korea, in order to win a further order and keep their capacity employed .
(ii) East European importers The East European countries face a persistent energy crisis . Until 1981 all of them received subsidised oil from the USSR, but in that year deliveries were cut and prices raised, as the USSR sought to maximise hard currency revenues by switching exports to the West . In addition to problems with oil, East European countries have suffered regular power cuts each winter, due to production and transport difficulties with coal (Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary), and reduced hydro-electric output due to drought (Bulgaria, Romania, Yugoslavia) . Nuclear power is widely seen as the obvious answer to these problems . Rather than paying detailed attention to questions of energy efficiency at the point of consumption - which would require genuinely democratic and flexible planning mechanisms - the East European countries are seeking to increase the gross level of electricity output at the point of production . In this respect nuclear power represents the course of least resistance for them, as it does for the USSR. The country with the largest nuclear commitment is Czechoslovakia : it not only has the most ambitious domestic programme, but also cooperates with the USSR in building reactor components for the export market . The next largest programmes are in East Germany and Bulgaria, followed by Romania and Hungary . Poland's plans are quite modest - it is the only net fossil fuel exporter in Eastern Europe, due to its coal reserves . And Yugoslavia, which is outside CMEA for most purposes but has associate status in nuclear matters, also has limited ambitions . Most East European programmes are based on the Soviet VVER model . In addition, as explained above, they are entirely dependent on the USSR for fuel supplies, and for reprocessing and waste disposal services . However, Soviet domination is not universal: Romania has ordered two CANDU reactors, clearly intending to avoid Soviet fuel cycle controls, although Romania's debt problems cast a shadow over these orders ; and Yugoslavia has built a Westinghouse PWR .
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As in the USSR itself, all thse plans may be challenged by new anti-nuclear and environmentalist movements, rooted in the intelligentsia or 'sub-intelligentsia' (Rakovski, 1978) in the first instance . In the aftermath of Chernobyl, nuclear expansion plans certainly came under scrutiny . In Poland there were demonstrations and petitions against nuclear power and a senior official admitted that it now had a public relations problem (FT, 4/12/ 86) . In East Germany there have been petitions and an appeal for a referendum on nuclear power (LFEE, November 1986) . In Romania the programme has been put under review . In Yugoslavia a second reactor order, which would probably have gone to the USSR, has been postponed for several years, and anti-nuclear positions were taken by several leading participants at the congress of the League of Communists . Even in Bulgaria the authorities agreed to instal extra safety precautions at nuclear sites . Significantly, there is little sign of change in the key country, Czechoslovakia, where opposition continues to be hounded, and any hint of `reform' is treated with extreme suspicion even when it comes with a seal of approval from Moscow . There is no doubt that anti-nuclear sentiment in Czechoslovakia would be categorised by the authorities as part of the Charter 77/Jazz Section circle of unacceptable dissent . This is despite the fact that Czechoslovakian nuclear commitments are causing considerable economic problems, tying up scarce resources and leading to shortages and bottlenecks . Eastern Europe is not a single block, but a kaleidoscope of different social realities, different class and national circumstances . Because these countries are less exposed to the single, global logic of capital, these local differences may be all the more important in shaping events than are parallel local differences in the West . It is therefore impossible to lay down a single pattern for likely developments in the nuclear field . The interplay between domestic pressures for new electricity capacity, domestic opposition to nuclear power, and external pressure from the USSR and CMEA, will take a unique form in each country . However, the single most important country is undoubtedly Czechoslovakia, because of its role as a nuclear components supplier as well as its plans for a large domestic programme . Conclusions
We started by noting the impact of Chernobyl on the world's nuclear programme, in terms of reactor postponements, cancellations, and renewed public debate . There have always been voices gloomily prophesying that `One big accident' would kill off the nuclear industry . We have now had the accident - and nuclear power is not dead . It may not be as healthy as it would wish, but it is still with us . It is still with us becuse, although the
After Chernobyl debate around nuclear safety is crucial in the public arena, it is entirely marginal in the ruling circles where nuclear policy is decided . Nuclear power is not being pursued because it is dangerous . It is being pursued because it serves the interests of certain identifiable social classes and fractions of social classes, in both capitalist and non-capitalist societies . The argument put forward here is that the nuclear industry must be understood in class terms, and in global terms, and not merely as an aggregation of separate national programmes . However, this is a source of both strength and weakness . It is a source of strength, because international collaboration allows a pooling of resources and a sharing of risks by nuclear corporations and state agencies . But it is a source of weakness because, if antinuclear movements can gather enough strength within certain key countries, they can have a dramatic knock-on effect in others . For instance if a future British government abandoned its Fast Reactor programme, this could have a major impact on the whole trend towards joint West European fuel cycle collaboration . And if anti-nuclear sentiment became significant in the USSR or Czechoslovakia, this could have a major impact on plans throughout Eastern Europe . After Chernobyl, there is no reason to think that the nuclear industry must collapse - but equally, there is no doubt that the opposition to it is growing . One hopeful sign is that the theme is now being taken on board, however reluctantly and cautiously, by major Labour, Social Democratic and Communist Parties in Europe . Without harbouring any illusions about the work that is still to be done, we must recognise that this represents a major breakthrough, because it allows the nuclear issue to be confronted and debated as a class issue . Acknowledgement Many thanks to Kathy O'Donnell and the other Capital & Class readers for their comments, advice and support during the preparation of this paper .
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References Bennett, Leonard L . & Skjoeldebrand, Robert (1986) `Worldwide nuclear power status and trends', in IAEA Bulletin, vol . 28, no . 3 . Burn, Duncan (1978) Nuclear Power and the Energy Crisis . Macmillan, London . Falk, Jim (1982) Global Fission . Oxford Univerity Press, Melbourne . Furedi, Frank (1986) The Soviet Union Demystified . Junius, London . IAEA (1986a) IAEABulletin, vol . 28, no . 3 . IAEA (1986b) IAEABulletin, vol . 28, no . 4. Johnstone, Diana (1984) The Politics of Euromissiles . Verso, London . Kaldor, Mary (1979) The Disintegrating West . Penguin, Harmondsworth . Kozlov, Igor (1984) Socialism and Energy Resources . Progress, Moscow . Leveson, Ian (1984) `The European Plutonium Economy in Gestation' . (Unpublished .) Moss, Norman (1981) The Politics of Uranium . Andre Deutsch, London . Patterson, Walter C . (1983) Nuclear Power . Penguin, Harmondsworth . Porter, Andy, et al (1986) The Energy Fix . Pluto, London . Pringle, Peter & Spigelman, J . (1983) The Nuclear Barons . Sphere, London . Pryde, Philip R . & Pryde, Lucy T. (1974) `Soviet nuclear power', in Environment, vol . 16, no . 3 . Rakovski, Marc (1978) Towards an East European Marxism . Allison & Busby, London . Rudig, Wolfgang (1983) `Capitalism and nuclear power : a reassessment', in Capital & Class, no . 20 . Semenov, B .A . (1982) `Nuclear power in the Soviet Union', in IAEA Bulletin, vol . 25, no . 2 . Spence, Martin (1982) `Nuclear capital', in Capital & Class, no . 16 . Spence, Martin (1983) `Soviet power : nuclear energy in the USSR', in Capital & Class, no . 21 . Spence, Martin (1984) `Exporting the "Peaceful Atom"?' in No Clear Reason: Radical Science 14 . Free Association Books, London . Van der Pijl, Kees (1984) The Making of an Atlantic Ruling Class . Verso, London . Walker, William & Lonnroth, Mans (1983) Nuclar Power Struggles . George Allen & Unwin, London . Journals : FT.- Financial Times, London . FTEE: Financial Times Energy Economist, London . LFEE: Labour Focus on Eastern Europe, London . SW: Soviet Weekly, London .
Ray Hudson and David Sadler Manufactured in the UK? Special steels, motor vehicles and the politics of industrial decline IN 1983, for the first time in modern history, the UK recorded a balance of trade deficit in manufactured goods : one symptom of decline as an industrial nation . This long-running process was accelerated and intensified after 1979 as a central element of the Conservative political programme - reduction of the state sector - intermingled with another, encouragement to the private sector's rationalisation and internationalisation of production in the search for profitable investment opportunities . These have combined with the ravages of recession and a powerful ideological offensive to create and shape a much-changed political climate and industrial structure . The contours of this are still shifting but many of its main features are now clearly established . Creating this structure has been a political process and coming to terms with it poses a number of questions to do with political choices . What was in practice apparent before 1979, but has since become blindingly obvious, is that public ownership, or nationalisation, Morrisonian style, is an inadequate mechanism to ensure the rational organisation of production and the protection of jobs and communities . Public corporations under both Labour and Conservative administrations have danced to the tune of the international market (see Beynon et al, 1986) . A political strategy for ownership that was once thought of as a mechanism for at least partially insulating investment, output and jobs within the UK from the anarchy of international markets has in practice become the principal mechanism through which
•
A study of the crisis of the special steels sector in Sheffield reveals major weaknesses both in traditional strategies for restructuring such as nationalisation and in new ones such as local economic strategies . Strategic choices in the sector are constrained by interdependence with sectors like the automobile industry and by the political and economic restrictions of the EEC . Meanwhile creeping 55 privatisation continues . The authors argue that any alternative strategy must operate at each of these levels to be effective .
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the disciplines of international competition have been restored to their preeminent place as the steering mechanism within the British economy . The implication of this for the future of manufacturing industry in the UK is clearly a significant and sensitive issue . We seek here to examine this problem through the recent experience of one crucial branch of manufacturing industry, special steels production . The UK steel industry was, correctly, seen as an easy target for the post-1979 Conservative strategy, and after a three-month strike in 1980 the public sector was decimated in a fashion soon to be replicated in many other public corporations . There has always been a private sector of the UK steel industry . After the formation of the British Steel Corporation (BSC) in 1967 this was concentrated in special steels production .
The way in which change in the private sector has intermeshed with that at BsC, especially since 1979, is particularly illustrative of the changing balance of power between capital and labour, mediated via the state . On the one hand BSC has sub-contracted many of its operations to the private sector . On the other, the private sector has either moved into profitable market areas vacated by BSC, or bought in to joint ventures with the state company, in association with investment strategies targetted both down-stream and overseas . Special steels producers are historically concentrated in south Yorkshire . The area has a unique mixture of public and private steel companies . Employment in steel production slumped from 43,000 in 1979 to 26,000 in 1983, a decline which has led Sheffield City Counci to question future employment prospects (see Shutt, 1986) . Drawing upon research commissioned by the Department of Employment and Economic Development of this local authority (Hudson & Sadler, 1987) our starting point here is to identify precisely how this cutback came about, as one consequence of cuts in demand from UK steel consumers (see Sheffield City Council, 1984) . We consider the implications of prospects in the major special steels market area, motor vehicle production . Cars, commercial vehicles and steel are internationally traded commodities, and these politically determined patterns of trade are of immense significance to the future of UK steel employment . We therefore examine the experience of special steels production in three other European countries - Sweden, France and Italy - and the significance of the European Community for steel production and trade . We conclude by briefly returning to south Yorkshire, the question of national and local strategies for manufacturing industry, and the possibilities for a new politics of production .
Manufactured in the Steel production in Britain in the post-war period has consistently teetered on the brink between publicly and privately owned sectors of manufacturing . Britain's steel industry has been a central concern to most party political agendas . Partially nationalised under the 1945-51 Labour administration, it was returned to private ownership by the incoming Conservative government, only to be partially re-nationalised in 1967 to form the British Steel Corporation, from which some assets were sold off to the private sector by the 1970-74 Conservative administration (see Bryer et al, 1982 ; Ross, 1965 ; McEachern, 1979, 1980) . The post-1979 Conservative programme has acted selectively once again to redefine the ownership pattern of the industry . Employment at BSC has been cut from 186,000 to 54,000 whilst whole market areas have been sold to the private sector through a series of joint ventures known as the Phoenix companies (see table 1) . These involve BSC in partnership with international engineering conglomerates such as GKN and TI, forming hybrid companies as a prelude to the Conservative party's long-term aim of denationalisation of the remaining core of UK steel . In the process a new industrial structure has been created which has enabled companies such as GKN and TI to continue their policy of internationalising production and moving down-stream in the production chain, whilst securing for them a supply of steel at their remaining UK plants . This is how these changes were described by GKN'S chairman Sir Trevor Holdsworth in his foreword to the company's annual report for 1985 : To crystallise the transformation which has taken place in the composition of the Group's business over the last two decades, we think it appropriate and timely to propose a change in the Company name to 'GKN plc' . The names `Guest', `Keen' and 'Nettlefolds' are historically linked with businesses in steel, bolts and nuts and fasteners which have all now ceased to be part of our mainstream strategy ; the investments which we retain in steel, whilst important, are in the form of participation in joint ventures . Our principal business is now the development and manufacture of component systems and products for the world's vehicle industries, and our other core activities are in distribution and industrial services, with a rapidly developing business in the design and manufacture of defence products . Whilst companies such as GKN have diversified and invested overseas, the reorganisation of steel production in the UK since 1979 has not come about as a result of the unaided efforts of the private sector. In 1985 the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee examined the first two Phoenix mergers, Allied Steel
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and Wire and Sheffield Forgemasters (House of Commons, 1985) . Its conclusions revealed the extent to which state support had underpinned re-organisation . In relation to Allied Steel and Wire, the condition of the transferred GKN assets (plant and machines) was worse than that of BsC's, and they were worth less than the book value at which they were traded to the joint venture . Future financing requirements, under which the joint ventures relied on BSC, resulted in BSC providing substantial sums of cash in advance of the Phoenix companies' needs . This favoured the private sector, relieving them of the need to finance loss-making activities and doing so on favourable terms . The Committee also concluded that Sheffield Forgemasters represented no saving on the option of maintaining existing BSC businesses ; and that Allied Steel and Wire had cost more to establish than if the existing BSC business had been maintained . Alongside the re-introduction of private capital into the steel industry, and with a similar degree of state support, has gone the imposition of a series of changed work practices and a new industrial relations climate . One example is United Merchant Bar, a Phoenix company owned 75% by Caparo Industries and 25% by BSC . It processes steel at a mill inside the BSC Scunthorpe works which had been closed down by BSC in 1981 . Here, the Iron and Steel Trades Confederation signed the first single-union agreement in any company in which BSC has a stake . The deal also provides for flexibility between production and maintenance workers, two-year pay settlements and a no-strike clause . With the mill operating alongside the rest of BSC's Scunthorpe works, it comes as no great surprise to learn that management there are keen to adopt similar practices . A more draconian management style typifies another Phoenix venture, Sheffield Forgemasters . Faced with mounting losses at this company (which produces a number of strategically significant items), and at the instigation of the merchant bank Lazards and the Bank of England, a new chairman, Mr Kenny, was appointed from 1 January 1985 . His style was laid down in an address to senior management on 26 February 1985 . 1 The new ground-rules were forcibly spelt out . Continuing losses were unacceptable, he maintained -'the company is not yet in profit and that is my job and I intend to achieve it within a two-year span .' Management's aggressive support was to be organised through a series of weekend conferences, from which `if you choose to be absent, without good cause, then you may remain in that situation for the following years' . Job specifications were to be prepared for each and every member of staff . The new chairman was in no doubt that many employees were superfluous to his requirements : `I hazard a guess that you will be surprised at
Manufactured in the UK?
how many people are not doing a constructive job or who should not be on the pay roll .' To hasten the return of the company to profitability, it was to be re-organised into a number of subsidiary companies, where profits and losses were more readily identifiable : Presently, the company is managed on a divisional basis : this will change as quickly as possible subject to the speed the lawyers will work . A series of subsidiary companies will be incorporated . These subsidiary companies will be independent in terms of management, sales, marketing, accounting and all the other functions applicable to a manufacturing company . The local management will be responsible for the assets under their control . . . Each managing director with the help of others will be obliged to report each month in writing on the company for which he is responsible . . . The purpose of this action is to put the responsibility where it belongs and no more hiding or excuses behind the curtains of Head Office . This restructuring was formally announced in July 1985 and incorporated changes in the pattern of collective bargaining arrangements . Ten subsidiary companies each with their own industrial relations procedures, were to be established, sweeping away site-based shop steward representation . The two major sites - Atlas and River Don - were inherited from Firth Brown and BSc respectively . At the Atlas site five of the new companies were located but a position of full-time union representative was to be abolished . ISTC convenor Ronnie Ward recognised the role played by the new managing director appointed by Mr Kenny : The first thing he did was to say he doesn't believe in redundancies, then within weeks he announced two hundred of what he doesn't believe in . Then he withdrew a pay offer, terminated the works joint health and safety committee, and placed two convenors in the `jobs at risk' category on a redundancy exercise . We approached management with a request for a replacement part-time convenor . They said no, and they weren't even interested in alternative ways of funding the job . It was clear to us then that this was an attack on the trade union organisation and not a financial exercise. After a secret ballot at the Atlas site produced a clear majority in favour of strike action against these changes, the works came to a standstill . Taking its tradition of moderation to new extremes, the ISTC national executive instructed its members to return to work after indications from the Department of Trade and Industry that a £ l Om funding package for the group was being placed in
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jeopardy . A mass meeting voted overwhelmingly to ignore this call and it was soon repealed . The strike hardened when the company posted redundancy notices and declared that it would only settle on a return to work when given guarantees on productivity and a working week extended by two and a half hours for no extra pay . The River Don site was picketed out during January . It soon became clear that the (already financially stretched) company was desperate for money . Industry Minister Peter Morrison emphasised in a letter to group chairman Mr Kenny, though, that agreed support of £lOm would not be provided `until such time as all the major facilities of Sheffield Forgemasters are producing at normal levels of output' . 2 The Conservative government made it only too apparent that union negotiating rights (which the ISTC but not the workforce were willing to surrender) were to be minimised, and even withdrew financial aid until the company settled on terms which it regarded as acceptable . A settlement was reached in February 1986, after sixteen weeks in dispute . Its terms included re-instatement for dismissed workers and a Joint Consultative Committee across the major sites, to meet four times a year with management on a paid basis, and four times a year without pay or management . Pay and productivity bargaining, though, were to be decentralised to the new operating companies . In a very real and immediate sense, the Forgemasters dispute illustrated the need, possibilities and problems for a new negotiating procedure and trades union organisation within the Phoenix companies . Those working for companies subsumed within the new industrial structure are faced with a challenge of reorganisation in the face of a managerial offensive on productivity, flexibility and pay . This challange has been thrown down against an inauspicious political backcloth of intense pressure on this sector of manufacturing in the UK arising from international competition and the substitution of steel by other materials . These processes are most clearly evident in the major market for special steels, the motor vehicle industry .
Special steels and the motor vehicle industry
The major special steels producer in the UK is now United Engineering Steels, a Phoenix company formed in April 1986 by BSC and GKN with an annual capacity of approximately 2m tonnes . Its formation climaxed six years of negotiation and followed closure by the parent companies of steel works at Round Oak in the West Midlands, jointly owned by BSC with TI, in 1982 ; the Hadfields works in Sheffield in 1984 (bought out from Lonrho by BSC and GKN) ; and the BSC Tinsley Park works in Sheffield in
Manufactured in the 1985 . The new company employs 10,000 people at three works in south Yorkshire and one in north Wales . It is dependent for over 50% of its sales by volume on the motor vehicle industry . Roy Bishop, ISTC Divisional Officer for south Yorkshire, appreciates the close relationship between Sheffield steel and the motor component industry, especially in the West Midlands : It's only now that people are beginning to realise how closely connected Sheffield and Birmingham were . Alright, we used to say Birmingham was the workshop of the world, but we didn't realise they were using so much of our steel . This market for special steels has been particularly adversely affected by recent developments in the motor vehicle industry. Trading patterns in motor vehicles are indicative of the strength or weakness of an economy . Japanese global exports, for example, increased from virtually zero in 1963 to overtake the total of the four dominant European exporters of the UK, France, West Germany and Italy in 1980 . By contrast in 1985, the UK's trade deficit in completed cars and commercial vehicles was £3,200m . The UK car market is a relatively small one in global terms . 1985 sales amounted to 1 .8 million units against l lm in the USA and 3 .1m in Japan . Domestic production is further lessened by import penetration - 58% in the UK against 2% in Japan and 26% in the USA (table 2) . UK production in 1985 amounted to 1 .05m units . Motor vehicle production is overwhelmingly an international operation, dominated by a few major multinational corporations . The UK is strongly integrated into this system of production and trade, as the recent official opening of the Nissan factory at Washington emphasised (see Garrahan, 1986) . The Japanese switch to assembly within Europe and the us presents new conditions for steel and component producers . Historically the proportion of components exported from Japan (expressed in relation to the comparable steel volume exported in cars and commercial vehicles) has been much lower than that from Europe and North America . Increased emphasis on overseas assembly operations by Japanese car manufacturers will tend initially to increase this proportion . It will decrease again only when and if local sourcing of vehicle components is introduced . Within the UK, investigation of the top ten selling cars in 1985 reveals the extent to which cars and components are produced and sourced on an international basis (see table 3) . The percentage of vehicles imported ranges from nil in the case of the Austin Metro, Montego and Maestro to 100% of Vauxhall Novas, 64% of Ford Orions, 42% of Ford Escorts, 38% of Ford Fiestas and Vauxhall Astras, 36% of Vauxhall Cavaliers and 32% of Ford Sierras . Even the'UK-built' cars incorporate an array of compon-
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ents sourced from overseas, including 1 .1 . litre engines from West Germany and Australia for the Vauxhall Cavalier . The UK content of British-built cars measured by ex-factory gate prices ranges from around 95% for the Ford Orion, Escort and Sierra, down to 50% for the Vauxhall Cavalier and Astra . It is in this context that Derek Barron, chief executive of Ford UK, called for strict monitoring of the local content of cars produced at the Nissan UK plant at the time of its official opening in September 1986 . He proposed that the rules for cars to qualify as European-produced should stipulate a minimum 80% ECcontent measured on an ex-works cost basis . Current rules require a 60% EC-content measured on an ex-factory gate price, defined to allow all overheads and the company's profit margin to be included in the calculation . His proposal would effectively disqualify from European-content regulations any company importing engines or transmissions from outside the EC . In a similar vein motor industry expert Prof Garyl Rhys, in evidence to the House of Commons Trade and Industry Committee in 1987, warned that motor assembers' forecasts for an increase in UK car assembly of 250,000 by 1989 and 475,000 by 1991 should be treated with caution ; and that UK motor component suppliers will only benefit from this trend if the vehicles have an 80% UK content . Only at this level will high technology high value-added items like engines and gearboxes be UK-sourced . 3 Prospects for the car industry to 1990 are indicated in table 4 . World sales are projected to increase by 3 million units from 1985 but Western Europe is increasingly likely to become a battleground in the struggle between us and Japanese car companies for supremacy in the world car market, a conflict made more intense by looming over-capacity in the us and Japanese companies expanding production bases both there and in the UK . In 1984 for the first time, Japanese car sales exceeded 10% of the Western European car market, and in 1985 and 1986 the proportion increased again . Significant exports from South Korea and Taiwan are also expected by the end of the decade . The UK motor industry therefore faces an uncertain future, one which will undoubtedly have dramatic implications for component manufacturers and steel producers . Moreover, a further series of changes are taking place which will also affect these companies, relating to the amount and type of steel used in vehicle construction . Average steel usage per vehicle is a function of three factors : the relative proportion of different types and sizes of vehicles in production ; the average weight within each type ; and the share of steel in the total materials used in construction . A recent survey by the International Iron and Steel Institute (tisi, 1983) examined motor vehicle manufacturers' views of
Manufactured in the UK?
likely future trends in the average size and weight of motor cars . Over the decade 1980-90 the manufacturers predicted decreases in average weight of 9% in Western Europe, 15% in Japan, 17% in Latin America and 26% in North America - only there did manufacturers anticipate continued increased demand for smaller cars . In other parts of the world the main cause of forecast vehicle weight reduction was the use of lighter materials . In the mid to late 1970s the pressure on manufacturers to increase fuel efficiency was so great that vehicle designers considered substitution of lighter materials for steel even if this meant increasing overall production costs . Today, with fuel efficiency less of an urgent issue, cost reduction is generally regarded as a prerequisite for material substitution . The greatest physical advantage of steel remains its strength and rigidity for weight . Aluminium is light and corrosion-resistant and in certain alloy forms has good strength for weight ratios, but is expensive and difficult to weld . Its main use has been in the casting of complex parts where it has substituted for iron and non-ferrous materials rather than steel . Plastics afford greater design freedom, are corrosion-resistant and often easy to form . However, in their unreinforced state they have low strength and poor heat resistance, which is a handicap in the engine area . In their reinforced form they have found some body applications . It is not only plastics which are increasingly competitive against steel . In 1984 GKN announced the successful completion of tests on a glass fibre and expoxy resin composite (having discarded carbon fibre) as an alternative to the production of conventional steel springs used in commercial vehicles . The new materials produced 50% weight savings and GKN embarked on a £6 .4m investment programme to instal a new plant at Sankey near Telford capable of making 500,000 springs a year (for a world market of some 20m commercial vehicle springs annually) . Production was so automated that only 100 jobs were created . In 1986 GKN also announced that it was to develop and produce plastic composite suspension systems for cars, up to 70% lighter than conventional systems, to be commercially available within five years . In reponse steel producers have been active in devising a range of improved quality steels in an attempt to maintain market shares . A recent development has been dual-phased steel which combines excellent formability with high strength . There is also a marked trend towards increased use of galvanised or coated sheet to offer better corrosion resistance from lighter panels . Increased sales of four-wheel drive vehicles also raise requirements for high-grade steel due to the greater engineering involved . When asked by the iisi in 1983, European manufacturers
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expected the share of all steel in vehicle weight to fall by 5-10% over the decade to 1990, but with the share of high-strength steels in vehicle weight rising from 5-7% to 7-18% (without taking into account any reduction in the average weight of motor cars) . Plastics and aluminium were expected to gain whilst there were divergent views on the future for iron castings . Specific areas of likely substitution included car bodies (plastic), bumpers (plastic with high strength steel for support and brackets), fuel tanks (plastic or aluminium), truck cabs (aluminium or reinforced plastic), engine components (plastic or ceramics), and springs and prop-shafts (plastic and carbon-fibre) . These developments will have dramatic ramifications for the UK motor component industry . Most analysts agree that the single biggest future trend will be for the expansion of Japanese component manufacturers into Western Europe and the USA, partly as a consequence of local content regulations . In this process there will be great pressure exerted upon UK-based components suppliersby Japanese and established motor manufacturers alike to increase quality and reduce costs, or face the prospect of losing market share . Many Japanese component suppliers have already followed the Japanese vehicle manufacturers into establishing US production bases . Within the UK the Nissan plant has also already led to a number of such projects . TI Silencers has established a joint venture with Nihon Radiator to supply exhaust systems . Hoover Universal and Ikeda Bussan (a Nissan subsidiary) have formed another to produce seats . Another effect of increasing Japanese participation has been the adoption by European and us producers of Japanese production philosophies and systems (see Sayer, 1986) . Ford, for example, is introducing Statistical Process Control, a defect prevention system adopted from Japan, and vetting all its prospective suppliers as described by Ray Morgan, Chief Buyer at Ford UK : Ford will look critically at all its suppliers to check on their commitment to Statistical Process Control . Not all suppliers will meet the stringent requirements and, as a result, there will be a reduction in the number of suppliers . However, Ford will develop and maintain long-term relationships with suppliers who can demonstrate that they are in complete control of their processing, which will be to the long-term advantage of the remaining suppliers and Ford Motor Company . 4 Component suppliers in Japan itself are organised in a quite unique fashion . The eleven major vehicle assembers stand at the top of a closely integrated pyramid of suppliers accounting for
Manufactured in the
UK? 65
75% by value of all parts used . One of the larger assemblers has 168 primary suppliers, which depend upon 5,500 secondary sub-contractors, which in turn depend upon 36,000 tertiary sub-contractors . These, collectively, are the companies now being encouraged to start overseas production . At the same time their internationalisation has opened up the prospect of a (limited) number of joint ventures within Japan by European companies . SKF of Sweden, for example, established such a venture in 1986 with Koyo Seiko to produce and sell automotive bearings in Japan . The main shareholder in Koyo Seiko, with a stake of 20% is Toyota, Japan's largest car manufacturer . Similarly, GKN has established a company with Mitsubishi Steel Manufacturing to sell in Japan new composite springs for commercial vehicles manufactured at GKN Sankey, with the further option of introducing production in Japan later . The UK motor component industry has been slow to recognise these trends . The major components suppliers include Lucas, Chloride, AE, Smith Industries, Armstrong Equipment, Jonas Woodhead and Unipart . Mr Alan Morris, formerly product planning manager at Ford, has commented that `many of them seem to be just sitting around waiting to go out of business' . 5 Whether or not these companies do go out of business (taking with them more jobs in the UK steel industry if they do) is dependent upon a number of political decisions to do with the international production and trade of motor vehicles, components and steel . In other European countries different production and trade policies have been adopted towards special steels, sometimes with contrasting results . Since the onset of recession in 1974 crude steel production has fallen generally in the major industrialised countries, whilst in the global market over-supply has become increasingly apparent as developing countries continue to expand their steel producing capacity . Over this period, though, total special steels production has tended to rise as individual steel companies have restructured and moved into higher value-added products . This process is not confined to the industrialised economies - some newlyindustrialising countries such as Brazil and Spain have also been increasing their special steels output . In the UK, as table 5 shows, alloy steel production has slumped dramatically in comparison with other countries . Marginal growth in stainless steel output has not been sufficient to compensate for this decline . Combining alloy and stainless steel output in the period 1975-84, the UK was overtaken by countries as diverse as Brazil, Italy, Spain and Sweden . This is sharply indicative of the UK's changed position in the international political and economic order following a C 6 C
32-E
International trends in the production of special steels
Capital & Class 66
decade of exceptional decline within a stagnant global economy . Another indication of the UK's new role in the international geography of production is in the pattern of trade in scrap metal, the basic raw material for most special steel producers . In late 1979 the government lifted (but did not abolish) the quota and licensing system that had governed scrap exports for nearly twenty years . During the late 1970s more than 90% of scrap handled by British merchants was sold inside the country . Since then the rise of the scrap merchant as exporter has almost exactly paralleled the decline of the UK steel industry and the rise of foreign producers, especially in Spain . Between 1979 and 1982 the amount of Spanish steel produced in electric arc furnaces rose by 20% to 6 .7m tonnes . The producers needed more scrap, but the two traditional European exporters, West Germany and France, were tied to Italian plants in the Brescia region . Britain's big four merchants, 600 Group, Bird Group, Coopers (Metals) and Mayer Newman, filled the gap . They spent £lOm equipping deep-water berths at Tilbury, Cardiff and Liverpool with scraphandling equipment and in 1983, for the first time, UK exports of scrap (at 3 .8m tonnes) exceeded home sales of 2 .9m tonnes . Over 3m tonnes of the exports were to state-subsidised Spanish steel producers . Whilst Britain exports the remains of industrial contraction as raw material to Spanish steel works, other European countries have followed different poliices for their special steel industries . The extent to which Sweden has rationalised its steel industry provides an exceptionally clear illustration of the opportunities and problems in the special steels sector . Although total steel capacity is relatively small, at around 5 million tonnes annually, an unusually large proportion (around 30%) is of special grades, making the country's evolving special steel producers among the major European competitors . Retrenchment and reorganisation throughout the industry began well before most European steelmakers recognised the depth and severity of the steel crisis . The single largest move, which cleared the way for rationalisation in the special end of the industry, came in 1978 when the ordinary steel producers merged to form Svengst Stal . The Swedish government took a half share in the new company . By 1982 it had cut employment by a fifth to 14,000 and capacity by a quarter to 3 .1 million tonnes . Losses of SKr 2 .4bn between 1978 and 1982 were turned into small but increasing profits thereafter . Rationalisation in special steels has been concentrated in three product areas . By the mid-1970s the country's three leading tool steel producers had come together to form Uddeholm Tooling, the world's third biggest company in the sector after VEW of Austria and Thyssen of West Germany . In 1982 the high-speed
Manufactured in the
steel producers joined forces as Klosters Speedsteel, a world leader with an annual output of some 15,000 tonnes and a 20% share of the European market . And in 1984 the four stainless steel companies merged to form two units, eliminating overlapping production . Under the restructuring plan Avesta paid SKr 230m each to Uddeholm and Fagersta to leave the sector, concentrating into one company European market shares of 40% in stainless welded tubes and 30-35% in stainless strip and hotrolled plate . Sandvik created a wholly-owned subsidiary, Sandvik Steel, to specialise in production of seamless tubes, strip and wire . The Swedish government agreed to provide some SKr 460m in special financing to cover the agreements, mainly in the form of loan write-off, whilst the financial costs of laying off some 1,500 workers because of capacity closures were borne between Avesta and Sandvik . The restructured industry maintained a capacity of some 200,000-250,00 tonnes of stainless steel production a year, almost entirely for export to Europe . The stainless steel merger in many senses completed a reorganisation of the industry into discrete product areas each controlled by major producers . Ball and roller bearing production was concentrated throughout this period at SKF, whose low alloy special steel division, a market leader in bearing steel, produced some 400,000 tonnes in 1982 . So successful were the new ventures, hoever, that they were soon to fall foul of Sweden's position within the international system of trade . During 1983 the 1 .2 million tonnes they produced included more than three quarters of total Swedish steel exports (by value) . With the proportion of special steels output to ordinary grades more than double the EC average, Sweden was clearly heavily dependent upon export markets . These countries' own producers were themselves rationalising and seeking a degree of protection from competition . During 1984 Swedish producers were forced to agree to reduce exports of tool steel to the USA by some 20% . Later the same year West German steelmakers made it clear that they too were considering a complaint, following a 27% rise in imports of Swedish steel of all grades during 1983, to some 450,000 tonnes . And in October 1986 a group of us special steel companies filed antidumping petitions against Avesta and Sandvik - the fifth such action against Avesta in a ten-month period . The very success of Swedish steel producers' rationalisation in enhancing their competitiveness in the world market made them a target of international trade restrictions . Partly in response the Swedish steel industry began to internationalise production . In early 1985 Uddeholm announced its intention to take a 20% stake in a new, 15m dollar special steels plant near Pittsburgh in the USA . Later in the same year SKF
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formed a new operational division for roller bearings in North America, with the intention of expanding in the us market from the production base there . And in 1986 SKF Steel was merged with Ovako of Finland to form one of the biggest special steel producers in Europe with a workforce of 7,000, an annual production of about 1 .2 million tonnes, and a guaranteed market in bearing steel swith the SKF parent . In many ways, then, Sweden illustrates several typical responses to economic change from a relatively small, advanced economy where there is a strong state commitment to maintaining a presence in the crucial special steels sector-early rationalisation and investment in higher technology at the cost of some job losses, dependence upon continued exports, and internationalisation of production because of a threat to those export markets . Restructuring in the French steel industry has followed a pattern more similar to the UK in its complicated manoeuvres between public and private sectors . First special steels production was re-organised, then later parts of the down-stream engineering company of Creusot-Loire passed into the public sector, which subsequently continued its path of contraction . Reconstruction of the special steel side of the two major public sector steel producers, Usinor and Sacilor, was announced in April 1984 . The long product interests of the two companies were merged to form Unimetal, whilst the engineering steels interests were merged to form Ascometal, with sales of the latter running at about Fr 5 .5bn on an output of 1 .8 million tonnes a year . Formation of Ascometal was designed to help reduce surplus capacity, estimated to be about 50%, and to reduce losses of Fr lbn in the previous year . In the long-product venture, the steelworks at Neuves-Maison and most of the oxygen steelmaking capacity at Longwy were to be closed and each replaced with an electric arc plant . Both joint ventures were in the majority control of Sacilor . The two parent companies also retained some special steel capacity of their own . Usinor held two subsidiaries, which were later merged to form Usinor-Chatillon . Sacilor controlled stainless steel and high-alloy production in its subsidiaries, one of which was acquired from Creusot-Loire in 1983 . It was with regard to Creusot-Loire that a number of downstream developments emerged . Late in 1983 the heavily lossmaking company announced plans to lay off 4,000 workers, having already sold most of its steel-making businesses to Sacilor and Usinor . In April 1984 Creusot-Loire also sought either to shed its two remaining steel subsidiaries, employing 2,600, or to receive similar aid for them as given to the state-owned steel groups . The Belgian and Luxembourg holdings which dominated
Manufactured in the UK? the parent company, Schneider, were unwilling to invest further . By June no agreement was reached on a rescue package and Creusot-Loire asked to be placed into official receivership, the largest business failure in French history . Usinor and Framatome, the French nuclear reactor company, absorbed the energy, steel and armaments activities of the failed company, which employed 10,000 of the total workforce of 26,000 . Effectively, international capital in the form of the Schneider group achieved its objective of pulling out of unprofitable steel production in France, the burden being taken over by the French public sector companies for the time being at least . Schneider was left free to concentrate on more profitable engineering activities, while redundant French workers and the French state in various ways picked up the bill . Nor is the decline of the French steel industry completed yet . In 1986, for the first time, a joint chairman was appointed to Sacilor and Usinor . In November he outlined plans for a further cut in the joint workforce of 20,000, or almost a third, during 1987 . The third example is of a country which has seen relatively little in the way of steel capacity closures . Restructuring in the Italian steel industry only occurred belatedly in response to continued European Community pressure . The Italian industry is divided between the large, state-owned coastal plants run by Finsider, and the hundred or more private sector, smaller producers concentrated around Brescia in NW Italy . The first major production cuts were imposed by Finsider in 1982 as the large Bagnoli steelworks in Naples was virtually shut down . In June 1983 the EC demanded even greater cuts, amounting to 5 .8m tonnes by 1985, of which 4 .8m should fall in the public sector . A Finsider plan to cut capacity by 3 .8 million tonnes envisaged the private sector doubling its share of the allotted capacity closure to 2 million tonnes . The private sector was not so keen on this increased cutback and several companies proposed an alternative under which they would take over and operate part of Finsider's Cornigliano works, using the crude iron and steel production facilities to make billets for sale to the private sector, saving 1,500 of the 5,000 jobs under threat . In December 1984, however, the private sector steel companies informed the government that Finsider's asking price of L350bn for handing over the plant was too high, and pulled out . Finsider went ahead with the project on its own . By the end of 1985 a clear shape had emerged to the ownership of the steel industry, with Finsider concentrating on flat products and the private sector on long products . Privatisation continued as a pressing issue and re-emerged in June 1986 with fresh proposals for the Cornigliano works . Its operation by Cogea, a subsidiary of Finsider, produced 300,000 tonnes of bloom and
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billet the preceding year, with capacity expected to increase through the installation of two continuous casting machines to 1 million tonnes a year . The private sector viewed it as a cheaper source of semi-finished steel of acceptable quality for further processing, and a consortium of private steelmakers was in negotiation over its purchase . Italian observers saw this as a potential model for privatising large parts of the country's steel industry, creating a new set of industrial blocs across the old public/private sector divide and utilisng oxygen-steel-making technology to produce special grades of steel . Such negotiations offer important indicators to the rest of the European steel industry as one way of partially resolving the crisis in bulk steel-making - effectively, by transferring it to the `special' steels sector . All three countries - Sweden, France and Italy - have suffered from the effects of recession and have re-organised steel production of all grades . This has involved both public and private sectors . They have all been more successful than the UK in creating the conditions for growth in demand . Their output of alloy and special steels grew over the period 1975-84 whilst that in the UK fell . Here, there has been a reorganisation of domestic steel production through the Phoenix companies but no attempt to take account of the links with steel-consuming industries like motor vehicles . At the same time steel consumption in the UK has declined dramatically through the effects of domestic collapse and investment overseas . The examples of Sweden, France and Italy also demonstrate that whilst there are limits to what can be achieved by sector-specific industrial policies, and ultimately any national strategy for steel production is heavily constrained without some consideration of inter-industry linkages . A further constraining influence on national government policy to industries like steel is the presence of the European Community . European Community steel policies
From the foundation of the European Coal and Steel Community in 1951 there has been a European element to state policy towards steel production . More recently steel is unique amongst manufacturing industries to the extent of regulation and control exercised by the European Community . As the crisis deepened, EC crude steel production slumped from 156mt in 1974 to 125mt the following year, recovered unevenly to 140mt in 1979, collapsed again to 128mt in 1980 and fell lower still to 109mt in 1983 . In response to the first slump the Commission of the EC imposed a series of minimum prices . More drastically, since 1980 steel producers in the EC have been constrained by a system of controls on production imposed following the declaration by the Commission of `manifest crisis' in the industry . This in itself is an indication of the severity of the problem . Even during a similar
Manufactured in the crisis in the coal industry in the 1960s, no such measures were taken . Not surprisingly, the imposition of production quotas under the powers of the Commission has proved among the most contentious aspects of the past few years of steel's continuing decline . It has served to strain already fraught relations between steel companies, member state governments and the Commission . Originally the measures were scheduled to terminate in 1985 . That they are still partially in force illustrates both the continuing problems in steel production, and the negotiation of a number of compromises between the (sometimes reluctant) partners . These are essential in understanding the context for the future of the UK steel industry . Under the terms of the crisis regime, state support for steel companies has been permitted only in the context of specific restructuring plans aimed at reducing capacity and restoring profitability . In theory this gives the Commission the power to determine the capacity level of individual steel companies, to back up its allocation of production quotas for each quarter . It can levy fines on any company which exceeds these quotas . In practice this power is mediated by the role of respective national governments . Competing national interests and the trade-offs which governents are prepared to make with regard to other issues have been significant influences on the distribution of steel closures within the EC . These moves have been made against a background of continuing, even worsening problems of over-capacity in the European steel industry . In July 1985 the Commission called for a further 27m tonnes of crude steel capacity to be cut by the end of the decade . 6 In October 1986 it re-evaluated even these objectives and concluded that `there is still a structural imbalance between supply and demand and, in view of the restructuring already undertaken, it might be necessary to introduce changes in the configuration of the industry going well beyond the envisaged capacity reductions' . 7 Under these circumstances it proved impossible to end the quota system after 1985, as originally inteded . The European Commission is keen to push through a phasing-out of controls as `proof that its system of regulation is satisfactorily resolving the crisis in the industry . The West German government, which had initially opposed introduction of the quota system, emerged in favour of its continuation . To remove quotas, it argued, would invite a price-war with the state-subsidised competitors pitched against the big, private, West German steel companies . Other countries are more concerned to secure an increase in their quota within the existing system . At the end of October 1985 therefore temporary agreement was reached in the form of a classic com-
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promise, under which subsidies were only permitted to help plant closures in two specified ways ; some products, accounting for 15% of the output of products under control were removed from the quota system ; and two flexibilities were introduced to the method of allocating quotas . During 1986 negotiations continued over the structure of the steel quota regime from 1987 onwards . Initial Commission proposals published in September envisaged scrapping quotas from another 20% of the industry's output, reducing the proportion of products subject to control to 45% . Four categories were identified where deregulation was possible, and the Commission's desire to discontinue the whole quota system from the end of 1987 was reconfirmed . The proposal was unpopular with the big integrated steel producers and in November their association, Eurofer, put forward an alternative plan which entailed continuation of the existing quota regime until the middle of 1987 and replacement by an unspecified system of controls from 1 July 1987 to 1990 . During this period its members would close a further 11 .9m tonnes of surplus capacity . The plan called also for the creation of a social fund financed by the EC to compensate regions hit by steel closures . Quotas announced in December for the first quarter of 1987 only excluded two product categories and for most products were set at very low levels, reflecting both continuing pressures of over-capacity and the seriousness with which the Commission was considering the alternative plan from Eurofer. In March 1987 further reductions were offered by Eurofer, amounting in total to 15 .3m tonnes of capacity . Crucially, the plan offered no cuts in the hot-rolled production of coil where over-capacity is greatest and state assistance most obvious . The scheme was dismissed as inadequate by the Commission, and the steel producers were given more time to offer still further cutbacks . The current situation is further complicated by the recent accession of new members to the Community . The most significant steel producer is Spain, which produced 14 .2m tonnes in 1985 against just l .Omt in Greece and 0 .7mt in Portugal . The Spanish steel industry is currently in the midst of a restructuring plan started much later than those undertaken in the rest of the Community . It is due to be completed by the end of 1988 . The Spanish government has sought to emphasise that until consumption of steel per head of population within Spain increases to nearer the Community average, the steel industry will continue its current export drive - but `Spanish exports during the next three to four years will be directed to a considerable extent towards other non-Community countries' . The aim should be a
Manufactured in the zero trade balance with the rest of the Community during 1986, but `this balance should be positive for Spain in 1990' . 8 In other words Spain is keen to ensure an export market for its steel industry both within and outside the Community . There is a further aspect to the EC steel quota regime, one which has received relatively little attention to date . In 1980 the West German government only agreed to the quota system provided certain special steels were exempted from the proposals . Since then quotas have been applied to particular products regardless of the quality of steel . Recently, though, the Commission has recognised a need to take account of steel grade as well as product form in its regulation of the European industry . In 1985 it noted that `the refinement of manufacturing technology in melting shops and rolling mills that has taken place over the last few years has made it possible to obtain "ordinary" steels very similar to, but not as expensive as, "special" steels' . 9 Because the division between ordinary and special steels is becoming hazier, the crisis in bulk steel will be transmitted to the special steels sector . The Commission report concluded that `analysis of the capacities in the principal subsectrs of the special steel industry shows indeed a certain risk of over-capacity in the coming years .' This imposition of quotas since 1980 on the basis of product rather than grade has left companies free to move up-market into special steels production in the search for greater sales and profit . In other words existing special steels producers have been squeezed from two directions in that competitors are emerging from amongst the regulated bulk steel producers whilst their market is not regulated on a basis which gives respect to the grade of steel they produce . As the quota system limps on after 1985 the Commission has only just begun to recognise this problem . It is important to recognise also that the EC could pursue alternative policies towards steel . Even the most cursory comparison of EC policies towards agriculture and steel unambiguously confirms this . There is a glaring contrast between its policies to cut back steel production and employment with scant regard for the strategic economic and localised social costs of doing so, and its policies to prop up employment and sustain over-production in agriculture at virtually any cost . Over 70% of all Community spending is on agriculture, mostly to pay for surplus food mountains and lakes . While we would not wish to defend the irrationality of the CAP, the enormous difference between policy positions towards agriculture and steel does emphasise the importance of political choices in shaping patterns of production and trade . Why not an EC policy to sustain production and jobs in steel?
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Capital & Class 74 Conclusions
Such a policy could be borne of a radical re-appraisal of the politics of steel production . Amongst those who have experienced the changes of privatisation from BSC, there is general recognition that nationalisation was far from perfect . This often takes the form of criticism of the structure of BSC . One man put it like this : A Labour government might re-nationalise United Engineering Steels, but with my experience of BSC I don't want to see it . It became one big bureaucratic structure full of empire builders . I wouldn't like to go back to that . We enjoyed the benefits, but we ended up with the crumbs . Sentiments which are shared by this man from Sheffield Forgemasters, who worked previously at Firth Browns in the private sector : If steel was re-nationalised it should never go to the same sort of management that ran it previously . Nor should it be run on the same scale as in the past . You would have to have a holding organisation, but each plant should be allowed to perform individually, and people shouldn't be anonymous . People running it should be local people dependent upon keeping the business in the locality . Rather than go back to the old situation, it's better left in private hands . I'd much rather see a business run more efficiently, even if people work harder, so that there's more job security . Comments such as this are a cutting indictment of the past and pose acute problems to the formulation of an alternative strategy for steel production . All the more so since grass-roots trades union organisation is starting from a long way back in the new steel companies . Gone are the gestures to consultation such as BSC's worker directors of the 1970s (see Bank & Jones, 1977 ; Brannen et al, 1976) . In their place has come a new management style, likened by one seasoned shop steward to an earlier era : The difference between the '70s and now is that the people you were dealing with then were bastards, but they had integrity . Now they've got nothing . You've got shop stewards now who've got experience of what it's like not to be consulted . The situation is like what we had in the 1950s . What's horrifying about it is when somebody at the top sets a climate that reaches into every corner . The 1980 strike at BSC exacerbated divisions between steelworkers in the private and public sectors (as they were then constituted) which have posed some longer-term problems for trades union organisation . The same man commented on these in relation to Sheffield Forgemasters :
Manufactured in the UK? 75 Apart from the damage the strike caused in the public sector, there was the rift with the private sector . I held a meeting to try to get our people not to cross BSC picket lines, and I haven't been more unpopular in all my years as a convenor . I was probably more unpopular even than management . It was such a shock to met. A couple of lads came to see me, and said the feeling's not against you, it's against those lads in BSC . And that gave us tremendous problems when Sheffield Forgemasters was formed . To some extent these problems were resolved at Sheffield Forgemasters during the 1985/86 dispute . As this evolved the works committees from the two sites came together and gradually developed a stronger organisation . The nagging suspicion remains, though, that neither nationalisation as represented by BSC, nor the attitude of current management in the private sector (which increasingly resembles that at BSC), represent adequate means of safeguarding employment, still less form an adequate basis for a national steel policy . One way out of this impasse is seen in terms of a call for more local control, for decentralised operation of some kind of newlyreconstituted public-sector company . The effects of such a development would depend upon the broader political-economic context in which it occurred and the issues that it would have to confront are too often left unspoken . The roots of the crisis of the UK special steels industry, and of much other manufacturing activity, lie in the international character of production and trade . Any political strategy for production must recognise the implications of this . While there undoubtedly is scope for local authorities such as Sheffield to devise their own economic development programmes in an attempt to guarantee the future of employment in `their' areas, these cannot substitute for national strategies towards key sectors such as special steels . Indeed, if local authority strategies are to avoid becoming one more mechanism for dividing the labour movement via inter-area competition for investment and jobs, there must be a sensible political determination of the relationships between national and local policies . It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that most local authority strategies to date have and continue to perform such a divisive role . Acknowledging this is crucial in evaluating the policy stance of local authorities . Within Sheffield City Council, efforts are being made to overcome such problems . The research reported here, for example, was commissioned in an attempt to continue the work of the Department of Employment and Economic Development in stimulating and informing debate on and understanding of the processes of change within Sheffield's economy, amongst those
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76
most affected by them - in this case, workers in steel and related industries . This is all the more vital in the context of the marketled changes in prospect in sectors such as steel and motor vehicles, and continuing attacks on basic trade union rights . It is necessary too to demonstrate that decline in areas such as the Lower Don Valley, Sheffield's former steel heartland, is not inevitable, but rather the result of conscious political choices . All the more so as the city faces the possible prospect of continuing decline : The old Sheffield - city of steel and heavy engineering cannot be built again . The turnaround from steel city to service city has taken a generation . It is a long term structural change which the recession has reinforced . . . The outlook is still bleak . Manufacturing firms continue to shed over 200 jobs each month . If this trend continues with no reinvestment, the manufacturing sector could disappear completely by the year 2010 . That is what colours debates about manufcturing in Sheffield .
Such fears were expressed in the local authority's outline of its Employment Plan (Sheffield City Council, 1987), building on an earlier `Jobs Audit' which demonstrated the significance of council employment to the local economy (see Clark et al, 1986 for a summary) . Both are clear that local economic strategies depend upon a favourable political climate which allows the sensible co-determination of policies at national and local levels, worked out in consultation with those employed in industries such as steel and motor vehicles . We have seen how national strategies are fatally flawed without recognition of inter-industry and inter-national production linkages . The contrast between government policies and the business strategy of companies like GKN could not be sharper . A national framework enabling more flexible and decentralised decision making poses questions about the capacity of the UK to manage a national economy (Radice, 1984) and about the allocation of power within the state . But within all this, as we have argued elsewhere (Beynon et al, 1986), it is important not to lose sight of the relations between state and society through the politics of production . Assisting the rationalisation of capital can exacerbate current problems for localities such as Sheffield . We have tried to point to some of the souces of these problems for one branch of manufacturing . Seriously addressing them via an alternative strategy requires stepping back, in a sense, to question the purpose of production . It is certainly difficult to do so in the face of a radically transformed industrial and political structure in Britain - but it is not an impossible task and one that needs to be kept on the agenda .
Manufactured in the UK?
1. Chairman's address to the senior management of Sheffield Forgemasters at Sheffield on Tuesday 26 February 1985 . 2. Quoted in Financial Times, 9 January 1986 . 3. Quoted in Financial Times, 14 May 1987 . 4 . Rotherham and Wolverhampton Review, house journal of United Engineering Steels, August 1986 . 5. Quoted in Financial Times, 16 August 1985 . 6. General Objectives Steel 1990 COM(85) 450, 31 July 1985 . Report from the Commission to the Council on the General Objec7. tives Steel 1990 COM(86) 515, 7 October 1986 . 8. General Objectives Steel 1990 : position of the Spanish and Portuguese authorities COM(85) 774, 18 December 1985 . 9. General Objectives Steel 1990 .
Notes
Bank, J . & Jones, K . (1977) Worker directors speak . Gower, Farnborough . Beynon, H ., Hudson, R . & Sadler, D . (1986) `Nationalised industries and the destruction of communities : some evidence from north east England', Capital & Class 29, 27-57 . Brannen, P ., Batstone, E ., Fatchett, D . & White, P . (1976) The worker directors . Hutchinson, London . Bryer, R .A ., Brignall, T .J . & Maunders, A .R . (1982) Accounting for
References
British Steel. Gower, Aldershot . Clark, N ., Critchley, R ., Hall, D ., Kline, R . & Whitfield, D . (1986) `The Sheffield Council Jobs Audit - why and how?' Local Economy 1(4),3-21 . Garrahan, P . (1986) `Nissan in the north east of England', Capital & Class 27, 5-13 . House of Commons (1985) Control and Monitoring of investment by British Steel Corporation in private sector companies - the Phoenix operations. Public Accounts Committee, London . Hudson, R . & Sadler, D . (1987) Special steels in south Yorkshire, the UK and Europe . Report to Sheffield City Council . Copy available from Department of Employment and Economic Development, Pinstone Street, Sheffield . International Iron and Steel Institute (1983) Steel and the automotive sector . Brussels . McEachern, D . (1979) `Parry government and the class interest of capital : conflict over the steel industry 1945-70', Capital & Class 8, 125-43 . McEachern, D . (1980) A class against itself. power and the nationalisation of the British steel industry . Cambridge University Press, Cambridge . NEDO (1986) Steel: the world market and the UK steel industry . London . Radice, H . (1984) `The national economy - a Keynesian myth?' Capital & Class 22, 111-40 . Ross, G .W . (1965) The nationalisation of steel : one step forward, two steps back? Macgibbon and Kee, London . Sayer, A . (1986) `New developments in manufacturing : the just-in-time system', Capital & Class 30, 43-72 . Sheffield City Council (1984) Steel in crisis : alternatives to government policy and the decline in South Yorkshire's steel industry . Sheffield City Council (1987) Working it out - an outline employment plan for Sheffield. Shutt, J . (1986) Industrial decline in Sheffield : where will we be in 1990? Department of Employment and Economic Development, Sheffield City Council .
77
Table
BSC joint
l
ventures with the private sector -the Phoenix schemes
Company
Shareholdings
Products
Allied Steel and Wire Ltd (formed 1981)
50%Bsc
Wire rod, reinforcing bar and light sections and wire
50%GKN (BSC also has
68% of preference shares)
Sheffield Forgemasters Ltd (formed 1982)
50%Bsc 50% Johnson
British Bright Bar Ltd (formed 1983)
Bsc
Seamless Tubes Ltd (formed 1984)
BSC 75% TI 25%
Seamless tube
Cold Drawn Tubes Ltd (formed 1984)
Bsc 25% TI 75%
Cold drawn seamless tube
United Merchant Bar Ltd (formed 1984)
Bsc 25%
Light sections
United Engineerings Steels Ltd (from April 1986)
BSC 50%
Source :
NEDO,
1986
Forgings
Firth Brown (BSC also holds 50% of 13% unsecured loan stock) 40% Bright Bar 40% (Bsc also holds floating rate subordinated loan notes 1993 -43%) GKN
Camparo 75% (BSC also holds 100% of unsecured loan stock) GKN 50%
Engineering steels Closed die forgings
Table 2 Home produced market share of selected countries' car sales, 1985
USA
Japan West Germany UK
France Italy
Total market m units
Domestic production
imports
11 .0
74 98 69 42 63 60
26 2 31 58 37 40
3 .1 2 .4 1 .8 1 .8 1 .7
Source : Financial Times, 20 February 1 986
9 Table 3
Imports and UK content often top-selling British cars
il 11
t UK content of British-built units $Components of UK-built crs by country of origin
Model
*Total UK sales
Percentage imported
Ford Escort
125,571
41 .96
85
1 .3, 1 .6 all diesel engines ; manual gearboxes, bodies, interiors . Other : 1 .1 engines (Spain) ; automatic gearboxes (France) ; fuel injection (W . Germany)
Vauxhall Cavalier
110,621
35 .88
47 .5
UK: glass, wheels, tyres, paint, steering wheels, soft trim, minor engine parts (e.g . filters), steel for bodies Other : 1 .6, 1 .8 engines, estate car panels (Australia); 1 .3 engine (W . Germany) ; manual gearboxes (Japan), automatics (France)
Ford Fiesta
103,874
38 .35
62 .1
UK: 1 .3, 1 .6 engines ; bodies and interiors Other : 1 .1 engines (Spain), all transmissions (France)
Austin/ MG Metro
100,143
Nil
97
UK:
Ford Sierra
83,807
32 .43
74 .47
UK :
Austin/ MG Montego
61,463
Nil
95
UK : all except gearboxes-1 .3, 1 .6 from WV (W . Germany), 2 litre Honda (Japan), sunroof mechanism (W . Germany)
Vauxhall Astra
60,656
38
52 .5
Same as Cavalier, except bodies pressed in
Ford Orion
53,761
63 .58
83 .2
As Escort, but Spanish-built 1 .1 engine omitted from range
Vauxhall Nova
52,924
N/A
N/A
Austin/ MG Maestro
47,947
95
As Montego, except glass sourced from Belgium
100 Nil
UK:
all except glass (Belgium), oil coolers (us), and alternators (France)
bodies, most engines, gearboxes, interiors, rear axles Other : 2 .8V6 engines, gearboxes (W . Germany), 2 .3 diesels (France)
UK
*First nine months . tMeasured by ex-factory gate prices, including all overheads . $There are some UK parts on imported vehicles, e .g . Ford UK is the sole source of supply for all Escort diesel engines . Source : Financial Times, 26 October 1985
Et f''2
n A N N
n n
Table 4 Forecast car production and sales to 1990
1980
millions 1985
1990
World sales
28 .8
31 .9
34 .9
Western Europe : sales production
10 .1 10 .3
10 .6 11 .2
11 .5 12 .3
North America : sales production
9 .9 7 .2
12 .2 9 .3
12 .9 8 .8
Japan : sales production
2 .9 7 .0
3 .1 7 .6
3 .4 8 .1
Source : DRI World Automotive Report, 1 986
The main camps in the `value' debate are sketched and it is argued that it is wrong to reduce all `surplus theory' to the Sraffian approach . There are a plurality of surplus approaches and the Marxian one is uniquely equipped to answer the fundamental Marxian questions . The great virtue of the Marxian approach resides in its double structure of prices and value which places economic activity in the context of a broader redistributive class process . Nevertheless, it is recognised that the Steedman-type points in cases of joint production still 84 have a critical force . Consequently, it is demonstrated how they might be overcome with a different method for tackling the transformation issue .
Bruce Roberts Marx after Steed man : Separating Marxism from 'Surplus Theory' • IN THE LONG history of debates over Marxian value categories it may sometimes seem that there are as many different viewpoints as there are authors who have participated . There are, however, some clear-cut commonalities among sub-groups of participants, and of these probably the most unified and coherent shared position is associated with what is now increasingly referred to as , the surplus approach' . The goals of those who share this approach are of course much broader than merely criticising the use of labour values ; one recent formulation defines the tasks of `surplus theory' as continuing `the reconstructive work initiated by Sraffa, namely, to revive the earlier "classical" approach to distribution,' while simultaneously `incorporating new insights such as the effective demand principle of Keynes' (Editorial Committee, 1985 : 4) . Garegnani, Eatwell, Steedman and others' have taken up the challenge of this project and begun to extend the frontiers of the approach. On the whole I think this is a welcome development, one sure both to further the evolution of analytical critiques of the neoclassical orthodoxy and to produce both theoretical and applied results worthy of interest in their own right . Nevertheless, as a Marxist I think there is an unfortunate side to the growth of this surplus approach, and that is the increasing prevalence among its practitioners of the sometimes covert assumption that there is, or at least ought to be, a single kind of surplus theory, a unitary basis for the analysis done by
Marx after Steedman
anyone who approaches theory with a category of economic surplus . Certainly there is a diversity among surplus theorists, so that not all those who adopt the approach would necessarily share the polemical attitude of Steedman (1977 ; 1981)-that very little of contemporary interest remains of Marx, after Sraffa's reconstruction of the theory of value and distribution . But if there is anything held in common by these theorists, it is the common premise that out of Sraffa comes the only rigorous and viable surplus approach, the only one with a legitimate claim to stand as the alternative to neoclassical marginalism . There are, it seems, only two players in the game . This paper is not a critique of the body of positive theoretical propositions advanced by Sraffa or by contemporary Sraffians ; most of those propositions are logically rigorous and unassailable if the premises of the approach are granted . Frankly I am glad that literature exists and I wish its practitioners well . What I do wish to contest is the assumption that surplus theory exists in the singular . What in Sraffa (1960) were apparently choices made to facilitate the development and exposition of his analysis (e .g . the purely physical notion of surplus, the deliberate absence of the term `value') have become for some Sraffians effectively rules for the conduct of all analysis . Thre is no compelling reason to accept this ; Marxism has a surplus theory of its own, one that can neither be dismissed nor assimilated into a Sraffian approach . There is, I will argue, simply more than one surplus approach . The issues can be clarified by noting that in the entire history of economic thought only Marx is interested not merely in prices but in a set of values which differ from those prices . For Ricardo, labour values were natural prices, so an interest in one is the same thing as an interest in the other . For neoclassicals, subjective valuations are immediately reflected in prices, so again there is no separate sense to value as distinct from price . Contemporary Sraffians have dispensed entirely with any concept of value as they solve their linear price systems . Each of these approaches seeks as its solution a 'single-structure' of prices, a single number attached to each commodity . Only Marx and the Marxian tradition seek theoretically to determine a 'doublestructure', including both a commodity's price (or value-form) and, separate from that, its value . Why? Why does Marxism have this unique double-structure? There are two possible sorts of answers to this question . Either the double-structure represents a different way of doing the same things that other theorists are trying to do, or else it is a way of doing something different from other theories . The debate over the usefulness and validity of value calculation can be interpreted in the light of these two alternatives .
85
Capital & Class 86
Critics of value calculation have generally argued for the first of these alternatives . Steedman, for example, views the presence in Marx of a double-structure as an unusual theoretical tactic, but one which is employed for fundamentally the same analytical purposes as the more modern surplus approach . Therefore it can be dispensed with on quantitative grounds : since value calculation is at all times redundant and in many cases internally inconsistent, `Marx's value reasoning . . . must therefore be abandoned, in the interest of developing a coherent materialist theory of capitalism' (1977 : 207) . If there is any common denominator among the diverse sorts of Marxian responses to this critique, it is adherence to the second alternative above . Value categories can be viewed as a means to accomplish something qualitatively different from the goals of non-Marxian surplus theory, a social analysis of `the underlying relations between people and classes' (Sweezy, 1970 : 129), a task which demands more than simply the derivation of price and profit solutions from given data . Many otherwise dissimilar Marxists seem to have concluded that value categories must be preserved because of this qualitative contribution to a needed stress on class and the social conditions constitutive of class relations . 2 Each of these perspectives makes points which deserve respect . I share the view that Marx's focus on class as the object of his theory is quite distinctively different from the Sraffian approach . But the critics are correct to contend that an amorphous `qualitative' superiority is at best a weak defence for the sort of quantitative arguments often made with the additive numerical categories of value and surplus value . In contrast I will argue what I think is ultimately a fundamentally different position than any of the common views in the debate, that : one must have a double-structure of value and price categories in order to conceive Marx's object, the capitalist class process ; that project can be consistently and rigorously carried through, quantitatively as well as qualitatively ; and one should employ the double-structure because it permits a more powerful `vision' of the class structure of modern capitalism, a vision which precludes nothing of significance that Sraffians seek to show and yet provides a conceptual context which nothing in surplus theory can duplicate . The next section will go back to the basics and construct Marx's project from the bottom up, in the process pointing out contrasts to the surplus approach .
MARX'S GOAL is to produce a class analysis of capitalism . That means that the primary object of his discourse (that which
•
Marx after Steedman
the theory seeks to illumine) is the process through which classes are constituted . More particularly, he conceives that object as the process of performance, appropriation and redistribution of surplus labour via the production and distribution of a surplus product . The terms in this statement are in need of further clarification, but already the statement suggests the differences in both object and concepts which set Marx apart . From the first, classes in capitalism, as in any social formation, are conceived in relation to the doing of the social labour that makes material existence possible . Moreover, as an immediate part of his conception of what class means, Marx understands all the revenues which derive from the sale of the capitalist surplus product as unified : all are forms of existence of surplus labour . Every society generates a surplus, but the capitalist surplus is never simply and one-dimensionally a physical residual : `Capital obtains . . . surplus labour . . . This surplus labour appears as surplus value, and this surplus value exists as a surplus product' (Marx, 1967b : 819) . In contrast, a Sraffian approach allows for only one serious analytical meaning for the word `surplus', the physical surplus product . It simply could not be any other way for a singlestructure theory : the vector of prices which is sought as a solution is by definition that which distributes claims on the surplus product in conformity with competitively uniform profitability . The single structure of prices and the single sense in which surplus is meaningful are thus related, so that the object of the theory is conceived differently from that of Marx . Surplus theory takes as its object the 'long-period' relationships between pricing, distribution and reproduction (Eatwell, 1983a ; 1983b) . Class, conceived as the property and/or power preconditions for the long-period solution, thus becomes a debatably more or less important means to the understanding of that object, rather than being itself the object . For Marx, the presence of class as object, the multidimensionality of the concept of surplus, and the unique doublestructure (price and value) of his quantitative analysis - all are related . To begin to see why, consider economic activity at the most basic level . Every society at every moment is engaged in producing goods and services to meet its various needs . This requires that there be on the one hand some pattern of performance of labour, an allocation of effort to the different tasks involved in this social production. Simultaneously, of course, there must be some pattern of appropriation of these products, a social distribution of output, which is at the same time a pattern of appropriation of the labour performed in producing these products . There is no reason to expect these patterns of effort and reward to be the same : the labour an individual performs, if any,
87
Capital & Class 88
is likely to be both qualitatively and quantitatively different from the labour that produces the products which that individual gains through his/her place in the pattern of social distribution . The patterns of labour performance and appropriation will thus be different, and to a theory focussed on class in the Marxian sense, that difference must be more fully and precisely specified . When considering the commodity and wage relationships of a capitalist economy, it is the double-structure of Marx's theory of value which permits that more precise specification . Each capitalist commodity must be simultaneously `counted' in two distinct ways . One of these ways is, of course, a counting of payments (revenue and income flows) : attached to each commodity is a number expressing what it `brings in' in exchange, so that the heterogeneous total product can be added up as a sum of the incomes generated by the sale/purchase of each unit . The other, different but coequal, is a counting not of payment flows but flows of `doing', of performance : in this sense, attached to each commodity is a number which allows an adding of different commodities, not by what their owners can receive, but rather by how much is `put in' to create each good . It is Marx's simultaneous concern with, and distinction between, the counting of payments (value-form) and the counting of `doings' (value) which gives his theory its characteristic double-structure . This theoretical choice is neither arbitrary nor redundant, because a crucial aspect of what capitalist class relations are to Marx, is summarised in the fact that these simultaneous ways of counting, though related, are not identical . Each commodity `counts' simultaneously as a fraction of the total stream of income deriving from the total product, and as a fraction of the total `doing' involved in producing that total product . The numerical measure appropriate to quantify the payment made in an exchange is distinct from that which measures the activity of production, but the total product considered alternatively as a sum of payments and a sum of doings is still the same total product . Thus (given only the appropriate (labourtime) terms in which to think both payments and doings on the same scale), the total product as the sum of doings must equal the total product as the sum of payments . At the same time though, for any individual commodity, the `amount done' (the labourtime involved in its production) need not equal the `amount paid' (the labour-time expression for the incomes generated by its sale) . The question of precisely how these two scales are defined and determined will be taken up below ; in the present context what is important is the fact that, if they can be consistently specified, then this dual structure allows us to make statements which are qualitatively different from those possible within a
Marx after Steedman single (payment) structure of analysis . Two such statements emerge as fundamental to the Marxian understanding of class in capitalism . First, market transactions, buying and selling, the making of payments, the status of ownership - none of these is the same as the doing of labour ; therefore, for a payment to be made to someone who does not `do', there must be some `doing' done which exceeds the payment to the doer . In the simpler language of Marx's value theory, capitalist profit and other forms of property income are predicated on the existence of surplus labour, unpaid labour. 3 Second, since the payment received through selling a particular commodity and the doing involved in producing/creating that same commodity need not be equal, the general possibility exists for transfers of labour-time . For example, if the `amount paid' for a certain commodity exceeds the `amount done' in producing it, then the seller realises the differences as, in effect, a transfer of labourtime done elsewhere; conversely, if the latter exceeds the former, the seller is implicitly giving up a portion of the labour-time done in producing the commodity . Such outcomes are the rule rather than the exception ; for the structure of payments to fulfill any particular condition (such as equal profitability on capital), the payment for each commodity must diverge in a specific fashion from the amount of doing that commodity requires . In more direct terms, then, the capitalist distribution of profit revenues expresses a transfer or redistribution of unpaid labour-time through the mechanism of market pricing . Marxian thinking is every bit as concerned as the singlestructure, physical quantities approach to understand the structure of prices and the distribution of profits, but it seeks a solution for those dependent variables within a conceptual apparatus which explicitly juxtaposes a counting of payments (prices) and a counting of doings (values), because it is the relation between payments and doings which expresses the class basis of capitalist distribution. That relation is precise : the two countings are defined so as to permit two specific conceptual identities . As stated, the sum of payments (total price or valueform) is identically equal to the sum of doings (total value), since these are by definition simply different ways of accounting for the same total output . But in addition, Marx's multi-dimensional conception of the surplus is expressed in a further identity : the total revenue derived from the sale of the surplus product is necessarily equal to the sum of the incomes of 'non-doers' (surplus value), which is in turn equal to the total unpaid `doings' of doers (labour in excess of paid labour, or surplus labour) . Again, I stress, these are intended to be identities, properties of the concepts with which Marxian accounting is conceived, rather
89
Capital & Class 90
than conclusions to be debated or assertions to be disproven . Class in this Marxian sense is a process of surplus labour performance, appropriation and redistribution . One might well ask how (or whether) one can consistently think the issues this way, and one might ask why one should think the issues this way - valid questions both . But first it is important to be clear that, in the absence of the double structure provided by value categories, class in this Marxian sense literally cannot be conceived . From a single-structure perspective, there is only one relevant number for each commodity ; each commodity is counted by the income it generates, by the amount which must be paid for it . The profit realised by a capitalist is then a payment proportional to, but above and beyond, the amount that capitalist laid out, i .e . what he paid for as capital . There is nothing wrong with this, as far as it goes, since any theory must confront the structure of capitalist payments . But the very nature of the single-structure of numbers used means that, aside from the physical specification of inputs and outputs, only things that are `paid for' can be counted, and then only in terms of how much must be paid . The price that is paid for a thing, whether a physical good or `labour', measures it in the common unit of account . Thus, what is produced (output measured in price terms) and what is received (incomes or costs measured in price terms) are the same, both in the aggregate and for each individual commodity produced . Again, this is not `wrong', but it is not a sufficient specification for Marx, because this surplus approach restricts the operative meaning of class to, at best, a set of conditions external to and different from the distributional outcome specified . The problem is not one of inconsistency or error ; the problem is the restrictiveness of the concepts employed in the surplus approach . A single-structure theory cannot, by the very nature of the concepts it uses, give any serious meaning to the notion of something as `unpaid for' . If the only relevant way to count is with numbers measuring what is paid, then the capitalist meaning of the fundamental class-defining category of surplus labour has been all but ruled out in advance . To the extent that it has any meaning at all, surplus labour becomes simply the labour technically embodied in the physical surplus product (a notion which has its uses, but which is definitely not the same as Marx's conception of unpaid labour) . Marx's multi-dimensional conception of surplus is thus boiled down the physical surplus only, since only that restricted sense is required to derive the capitalist distribution of payments . Lost entirely is any remaining sense of that distribution of payments as a class distribution because it is simultaneously a redistribution of 'unpayments' . Class as the
Marx after Steedman object of Marxian inquiry becomes literally inconceivable, since the concepts necessary to think that object are absent . The `redundancy critique' of value categories can now be seen for what it is - irrelevant . To claim, a la Steedman, that value calculation is redundant to the real tasks which surplus theory ought to undertake is simply to substitute a different object of discourse for the class process which is Marx's object . If Steedman and those who share his views are not interested in surplus labour in the Marxian sense, they are certainly entitled to go their own way, but a profession of disinterest is not a critique which deserves to command attention .
• FAR MORE potentially serious is the charge of inconsistency levelled at value categories . If a double-structure of categories with the definitional properties described were impossible to construct, then the Marxian project would be fatally compromised . Most of the voluminous literature on values and the `transformation problem' would seem to lead inexorably to precisely that conclusion - that Marx's labour value categories cannot be consistently employed as a part of a defensible theory of price . The litany of complaints is by now familiar (e .g . only one'invariance postulate' can be imposed, not two ; positive profits can occur with negative surplus value under certain joint production conditions, etc .) . And the complaints are valid ones, on the condition that Marx's project is posed in a particular way : the critics take it as given that, in order to be judged consistent, Marx must demonstrate that the pattern of competitive prices and profits can always be derived from a known and prespecified structure of values and surplus values (where the term `value' designates the labour-time physically and technically embodied in a commodity) . In other words, the critique of the consistency of Marxian value theory rests on a particular premise : that one half of Marx's double-structure, the vector of values, is (a) defined independently of the other half (value-form or price) and therefore (b) the source from which that other half can and must be derived . The critique then consists of an elaboration of the ways in which a value vector which fulfills (a) will fail to fulfill (b) with all the requisite properties, or else a demonstration that there are possible production conditions under which no meaningful value vector fulfilling (a) can exist . Steedman then throws down the gauntlet :
` . . . should anyone wish to challenge [the conclusions he presents], they must do so either by finding a logical flaw in the argument or by rejecting explicitly and coherently one or more of the assumptions on which it is based' (1977 : 49) . Posing the problem in the form appropriate to a double-
91
Capital & Class 92
structure theory is precisely a rejection of the premises underlying Steedman's critique . The inconsistencies he stresses follow directly from the largely unconscious choice to treat values as simply a roundabout and antiquated means of fulfilling the goals of a single-structure theory . But there is no inconsistency if the two halves of the double-structure are viewed as interdependent, so that values and prices must be solved for together as the joint means to specify the surplus in its multi-dimensional Marxian sense. If one takes seriously the uniqueness of a double-structure approach, then value cannot be under all circumstances simply an expression of physical labour embodied, independent of the structure of payments . An alternative reading makes possible the consistent use of Marx's labour-time categories ; in particular, the aggregate relationships between values and production prices and between surplus values and profits (or, more generally, incomes other than the wages of productive labour) can be treated as simultaneously valid identities . 4 To see this, consider an economy with n single-product industries using only circulating capital . The physical data are defined as follows : A = [aij],
technology matrix (average amount of the ith good required as input per unit of the jth output), -
L = [Lj],
row vector of average direct labour required per unit output;
b = [bi],
column vector of commodities advanced per unit direct labour (the `real wage bundle' paid to labour-power) ;
X = [Xi],
column vector of gross output levels ;
Y = [Yi],
column vector of net output levels, where Y=X-AX .
Further, define the following symbols for the variables to be determined : V = [Vj], row vector expressing value (the amount of labour-time socially necessary to produce each unit of output) ;
Marx after Steedman
0 = [O]],
row vector expressing value-form (the amount of labour-time socially necessary as a market equivalent for each unit of output) ;
s = [si],
row vector of surplus labour (surplus value) per unit output ;
f(s) = [f(s)],
row vector of `surplus revenue' (payment in excess of cost, or profit) per unit output .
The following equations are effectively definitions of value and value-form : V=OA+L
(1)
0 = OA
(2)
+ ObL + f(s)
Equation (2) defines value-form as the sum of the labour-time equivalents paid for means of production and labour-power, plus the surplus revenue or profit realised . Equation (1) treats value as the sum of direct labour-time performed plus the labour-time which represents a market equivalent for the consumed means of production . This is a somewhat unorthodox reading of the value concept, but it is one which is necessary in a double-structure theory . 5 Marx makes this clear in discussing the relation of value to production price, the specific value-form appropriate for considering capitalist competition : It is clear that what applies to the difference between the [price of production] and the value of the commodity as such - as a result of the production process - likewise applies to the commodity insofar as, in the form of constant capital, it becomes an ingredient, a pre-condition of the production process . Variable capital, whatever difference between value and [price of production] it may contain, is replaced by a certain quantity of labour which forms a constituent part of the value of the new commodity, irrespective of whether its price expresses its value correctly or stands above or below the value . On the other hand, the difference between [price of production] and value, insofar as it enters into the price of the new commodity independently of its own production process, is incorporated into the value of the new commodity as an antecedent element (1971 : 167) . This is a usage of the value concept which is simply not consistent with the customary treatment of values as determined
93
Capital & Class
94
solely by the technical conditions of production . Value as described here can only be determined simultaneously with valueform (production price) . A commodity's value, Marx states, is, as in equation (1), the sum of two constituent parts : that `certain quantity of labour' performed in its production, plus the 'antecedent element', the labour-time which expresses an equivalent for the consumed means of production . Further, define surplus (unpaid) labour, or surplus value, as labour-time performed in excess of the labour-time equivalent paid for labour-power: (3) Marx states this explicitly (1968 : 868) in the context of Capital III : ` . . . the value of labour-power, is determined by the production price of the necessary means of subsistence . If the latter rises or falls, the former rises or falls accordingly,' so that the surplus labour is then labour in excess of that which creates an equivalent for the real wage bundle . Substituting (3) into (1) yields V=OA+QbL+s
(4)
so tht by comparing (4) and (2) it is evident that any difference between the elements of V and 0 is matched by an equal difference between the corresponding elements of s and f(s) : V-0=s-f(s)
(5)
This relation has the character of an identity, but it is as yet an identity without operational content, since no solution is possible until some rule of equivalence is specified to express the condition for equivalent exchange . In Capital I, Marx closes the system with the preliminary simplifying assumption that an equivalent exchange is one in which equal values change hands . 6 Thus he assumes that V = 0, where 0 is referred to as the `exchange value' ; the solution is then V = 0 = L[I-A] -1
(6)
Notice that, on the assumption of Capital I, value is indeed equal to the labour-time physically embodied in the commodity, but this is a consequence of the premise of value-equivalent exchange, rather than an absolute definition in its own right . The labourtime which is socially necessary to produce a commodity depends on the social form of exchange equivalence as well as the technical basis of production . But, in the particularly simple case of value
Marx after Steedman
equivalence, it is obvious that VX =OX and that sX = f(s) •X , since each pair of variables is identical for each commodity . However, in Capital III, Marx dispenses with the arbitrary assumption of value equivalence and poses a specifically capitalist equivalence of exchange, in which 0 and f(s) are consistent with a uniform rate of profit (r) on advanced capital in each industry . In other words, 0 (now labelled `production price') is such that (7)
f(s) = r[OA+ ObL]
i .e . profit per unit equals the rate of profit times advanced capital per unit, where LX - ObLX
sX
O[A+bL]X
o[A+bL]X
r=
(8)
In other words, the general rate of profit is the ratio of total unpaid labour to the labour-time equivalent advanced for total physical and labour inputs . The solution to the system defined by (1), (2), (7) and (8) again satisfies Marx's aggregate equalities . Equations (7) and (8) directly imply (9)
f(s)•X = sX
which in turn, via (2) and (4), implies OX = VX
(10)
Moreover, if we define the physical surplus produce as A = [I-A-bL]X, then the revenue derived from the sale of this surplus product (OK) is, via (2) and (9), also equal to the total unpaid surplus labour performed (i .e . 0A= sX) . For a numerical example, consider the following three industry cases presented by Steedman (1977 : 38) :
iron industry gold industry corn industry
iron 28 16 12 56
labour 56 16 8 80
iron 56
gold 48
56
48
corn
8 8
Steedman assumes, in effect, that the real wage bundle per unit labour is .0625 units corn, and takes gold as the commodity numeraire . Let P stand for numeraire prices . Treating wages as physical advances of corn, the standard Sraffian solution is r =
95
Capital & Class
96
.5208, Pi = 1 .7042 Pg = 1, P C = 4 .2958 . Alternatively, solving equations (1), (2), (7) and (8) yields : Oi = 1 .6552 r = .5208 O g = .9713 Oc = 4 .1724
Vi = 1 .8276 Vg = .8851 Vc = 3 .4828
The rate of profit is of course identical . The solution for 0 is directly proportional to Steedman's P or any other normalised set of Sraffian prices derived from the same initial data, as it must be for 0 to be validly used in conjunction with the profit rate . Sraffians certainly have no monopoly on correctly specified price equations, and Marx's production prices were intended to express competitive market exchange ratios . But 0 is a measure of price in labour-time units and is dimensionally the same as V . This is perhaps most obvious when one notes that equations (1) and (10) can be manipulated to yield, as an implicit `normalisation condition' for 0, the expression of 0Y = LX, so that the social net product (the physical analogue to the sume of wage and profit incomes) represents in the market a quantity of labour-time equal to the total direct labour performed in producing it . As a result, both aggregate equalities hold (OX = VX = 172 .6907 and f(s) •X = sX = 59 .138). Notice that each of these equalities, as well as equation (8) expressing r, is an aggregate relationship ; all industries, non-basic as well as basic, are equally relevant . This is so even though the solution for r is determined as always by the data on physical quantities for only those commodities which are Sraffian basics . Within this reading of Marx's categories the properties which Marx stressed are fully compatible with the well-known relations of mathematical determination which govern the profit rate and its associated ratios of exchange . Lest one think that these results depend on the absence of joint production, consider the example used by Steedman to demonstrate the possibility of `positive profits with negative surplus value' (1977 : 153) :
Process l Process 2
good 1 25 0 25
good 2 0 10 10
labour 5 1 6
good I 30 3 33
good 2 5 12 17
Dispensing with per-unit notation for the physical data, define B as the matrix of total outputs and redefine A and L to refer to total physical and labour inputs respectively . The real wage bundle per unit labour is 1/2 good 1 plus 5/6 good 2, with wages postpaid . With good 2 as numeraire, the price solution is r = .2, PI =
Marx after Steedman
1/3, P2 = 1 . The `value' solution in Steedman's terms, where 1 for value refers to the joint production analogue to equation (6) above (i .e. 1 = L[B-A] -1 ), is lI = -1,12 = 2 . As a result, total surplus value in this sense (the labour embodied in the physical surplus product : l[B-A-bL] 1, where 1 is a unit summation vector) is -1, a result which he claims deprives value magnitudes of any significance . When the double-structure system presented above is straightforwardly adapted for joint products, the solution is : r = .2
01 = .2069 02 = .6207
V 1 I = .2494 V2 = .5382
The rate of profit is the same, and 0 is again proportional to numeraire prices, but both values (in my sense) are positive and again both of Marx's aggregate equalities hold simultaneously (total value and price are 17 .3796 and total surplus value and profit are 2 .2759) . Steedman's `negative surplus value' is a consequence of his treatment of value as defined solely by the technical conditions of production ; in contrast, if one understands total surplus value as labour-time performed in excess of the (labour-time) equivalent paid for labour-power (L1 - obLI), surplus value can never be negative in an economically meaningful case where prices and the profit rate are positive . Joint production presents no difficulties for a double-structure theory . Thus there is a quantitative response to the analytical critiques which Steedman has so forcefully presented, but a precondition for the intelligibility of that response is the recognition that the purpose of a double-structure approach is entirely vitiated if the categories it requires are collapsed into the formal structure appropriate only for a single-structure theory . I have no doubt that some will be tempted to reject this approach by claiming that value and surplus value `really are' simply amounts of physically embodied labour and that any other treatment deviates from `what Marx really meant' . But the fact that there are different possible readings of Marx, each with its own array of supporting quotations, to me simply confirms the thesis that there is currently more than one possible form for a surplus theory . The analysis sketched above is a systematic and internally consistent means of deploying Marx's categories which preserves what, to me, are the crucial attributes of a double-structure approach .
ON THIS basis, if one accepts that the uniquely Marxian double-structure of categories can be consistently conceived, and •
C & C
32-G
97
Capital & Class 98
indeed must be employed if Marx's chosen object is to be confronted, the remaining objections boil down to one : why make this the project of analysis? Why should one think in this Marxian mold in preference to the alternative provided by the Sraffian version of surplus theory? A question such as this, directed from one framework of concepts towards another, is not so much a critique as it is an invitation for a statement of uniqueness . It asks, in effect, `what can you do that I can't do?' Ultimately it is not so much a difference in specific analytic results or conclusions which separates Marxism from a Sraffa-based approach, but the `vision' that Marxism presents . It is the presence of what to a Marxist is a compelling and unified vision that allows the response to be : `This is why .' Marx himself felt that one of his most significant contributions was . . . that in contrast to all former political economy, which from the very outset treats the particular fragments of surplus value with their fixed forms of rent, profit, and interest as already given, I first deal with the general form of surplus value, in which all these fragments are still undifferentiated - in solution, as it were . (Quoted in Baumol, 1974 :57) The fact that the `first' treats the `general form' (surplus value based on surplus labour) means that Marx can say, and see, something more than a theory which treats, however consistently, only the `particular fragments' into which the surplus product is ultimately divided . It is this notion of the `general form' which allows Marx, for example, to refer to the formation of the average rate of profit as . . . based on the conception that the capital in each sphere of production must share pro rata to its magnitude in the total surplus-value squeezed out of the labourers by the total social capital ; or, that every individual capital should be regarded merely as a part of the total social capital, and every capitalist actually as a shareholder in the total social enterprise, each sharing in the total profit pro rata to the magnitude of his share of capital . (Marx, 1967b : 209) That view of average profit as the outcome of a process of competitive `sharing' of surplus value is an obvious example of what I referred to above as Marx's redistributive conception of class . And the metaphor of `pro rata sharing' can be given a rigorous quantitative meaning : combining equations (7) and (8) yields
Marx after Steedman
f(s) =
o[A+bL]
99 sX
o[A+bL]L where each element of the vector in brackets expresses, per unit of output, the industry's proportional share of the total capital, so that `the capital in each sphere of production [shares] pro rata to its magnitude in the total surplus-value squeezed out of the labourers' (Marx, 1967b : 209) . As equation (5) implies, the competitive distribution of profit among industries is effectively a redistribution of the surplus labour performed . In the first numerical example above, by comparing 0 and V one can establish that competitive capitalist pricing involves an implicit redistribution of surplus labour-time within the capitalist class, from the iron industry where value exceeds price, to the gold and corn industries where prices exceed values . Similarly, in the joint production example, the implicit redistribution is from process 1 to process 2 . This is not simply an incidental point . Marx's interest in the pattern of surplus redistribution is a necessary consequence of his choice to treat class as the object of discourse . As a result, not merely does the equational structure of his analysis differ from that of surplus theory but in addition there are differences in the very form of the data employed . Surplus theorists explicitly seek a 'long-period' solution, and thus they specify the relevant technical data for price and profit calculation in terms of the `dominant' techniques of production (Eatwell, 1983a) . Indeed, a solution for the useful life of fixed capital equipment (i .e . a solution to the `truncation' problem) is treated as a part of the specification of dominant techniques, and thus as a prerequisite for the profit and price solution . These prices are then argued to be 'long-period' prices in the literal temporal sense that they are the ones toward which the economy will gravitate in the long-run under pressure of competition (as non-dominant techniques and unprofitable truncations are gradually eliminated) . Marx, in contrast, is quite explicit that the relevant technical data for value and price calculation must be the average of the actual conditions of production in use (see, for example, 1967a : 39 and 317 ; 1967b : 144 and 640-1 ; 1968 : 204-6) . This insistence on the average conditions is necessary, I argue, because the overarching goal of Marx's approach is to specify the various redistributions of surplus labour-time, and one such redistribution is generated by the presence of a range of different levels of efficiency based on different production conditions and different ages of fixed capital . Where firms within an industry operate with different levels of efficiency, then irrespec-
Capital & Class 100
tive of how the price for the industry's output is formed (i .e . irrespective of the criterion for exchange equivalence), there will be, in effect, a redistribution of surplus labour from less to more efficient firms (an idea Marx makes explicit in his treatment of `relative surplus value' in chapter 12 of Capital I) . Marx is no less interested in issues of technical choice than the surplus theorists, but the Marxian approach to those questions is tactically different . Instead of viewing it as the task of value theory to abstract through time to an outcome which competition will gradually enforce, Marx's value theory is focussed on structural rather than temporal questions : its goal is to specify the structure of the surplus redistributions occurring under current conditions, viewing that as a theoretical precondition for the examination of the temporal process of competitive change (including changes in technical conditions, industry size and composition, etc .) . Thus the Marxian solution for prices and values is intentionally not an attempt to solve for a long-period position . 7 Surplus redistributions such as these are at the heart of the `vision' which a double-structure theory makes possible . And there are a host of further such sources for intra- and inter-class redistributions . Merchant and bank capital, monopoly pricing, unproductive labour, ground rent, taxation - each of these represents, for any and all surplus approaches, a claim on the surplus product and thus a source of change in the structure of profits and prices . For Marx, though, in addition, each is conceivable as the source of a further qualitatively distinguishable redistribution, a further quantitative divergence between the pattern of labour performance and the ultimate pattern of labour appropriation . The `vision' that results is complex but unified : the distribution of income in a capitalist social formation is, in effect, an expression of `layer' upon successive `layer' of qualitatively distinct sorts of transfers of surplus labour, each of which can be quantitatively specified through the double-structure of Marx's theory of value and price . To a Marxist, and only to a Marxist, is the process of income distribution at once a multi-layered class process of labour-time redistribution . The presence or absence of such an overarching `vision' is not a trivial matter . Whatever the analytical triumphs of a theory in its specific technical applications, it is the theory's coherence and systematicity, its capacity to provide a unifying context for intepreting phenomena, which compels the allegiance of its practitioners . Neoclassical economics has its own such vision in the metaphor of the `invisible hand', one that expresses the classless nature of its conception of economic processes . A Sraffa-based surplus approach clearly does not share that neoclassical vision,
Marx after Steedman but as a single-structure theory it cannot share the Marxian vision either . Indeed, it is not obvious that Sraffian surplus theory has any such unifying vision at all, despite the rigour of many of its specific analyses . Thus I reply to the implied `why' directed by surplus theory towards Marxism : any and all significant analytical results of surplus theory can be expressed in and through the categories of the Marxian conception of surplus, and by doing so one gains the ability to see those results as outcomes occurring within a broader redistributive class process .
• IT MAY perhaps be an inevitable ideological task for a theory in the process of becoming a `school of thought' to rethink its own genealogy with the goal of reconstructing the past as an appropriate prologue to the present . In that regard the proponents of the surplus approach seem to be engaged in the same sort of rewriting of the history of economic thought which neoclassical theorists undertook a generation ago . Just as orthodox theory found it necessary to domesticate Keynes, to purge those critical or unique aspects of his work, in order to render him fit for readmittance to the house of supply and demand, surplus theorists seem to be facing a parallel problem with Marx . The unique and distinctive
aspects of Marx's approach have been dismissed, devalued, or 'disproven', so that Marx becomes a part of the past history of surplus theory, rather than being the progenitor of a different living tradition . This process, once begun, has a curious self-reinforcing capacity . It begins with what I have argued to be a misperception of the object of Marx's value theory . Marx's object is taken to be the pattern of prices, profits and rents necessary in a 'long-period position', rather than the structure of the class process of surplus labour performance and redistribution . But this initial step has further consequences: one who does not recognise the difference in the object of Marx's thought can't possibly make sense of the concepts uniquely appropriate to that different object . As a result, the categories employed with Marx's unique doublestructure approach are systematically misinterpreted . Values become nothing more than a sort of primitive price theory, at best a means to the derivation of the `right' (price) numbers with which to account for goods and incomes, rather than a necessary additional set of numbers existing under all circumstances right alongside the structure of prices . The vicious circle is then completed when the value concepts (already misinterpreted) are held up to scrutiny to show that they are useless in interpreting the (non-Marxian) object of theory, or worse, that there is no object at all which they can illuminate . It then becomes doubly difficult
101
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to confront the original misperception of Marx's object - the necessary double-structure has been collapsed into the form of a single-structure theory, and to revive it requires one to use value categories in what is currently regarded as a thoroughly unconventional fashion, as above, thus inviting dismissal for 'misusing' the very terms whose meanings were deformed in the first place by the single-structure approach . This sort of conceptual imperialism is explicable, but by no means necessary or inevitable . The Sraffa-based surplus approach is not so fragile that it can't survive the presence of other quite different surplus theories, but neither is it so compelling in the range of concerns it can encompass that it can simply demand the allegiance of anyone who rejects the neoclassical orthodoxy . There is simply more than one surplus approach ; faced with that multiplicity, we are each forced to choose and, in choosing, reject other alternatives . But while one can reject a theory for its inadequate answer to a given question, no theory has a monopoly on what the `right' questions are . Marxian questions still require uniquely Marxian answers . Notes
1. A very partial listing of works which exemplify the range of concerns of surplus theorists includes Garegnani (1970 ; 1976), Eatwell (1982 ; 1983a ; 1983b), Steedman (1977 ; 1981), as well as the various essays in Pasinetti (1980) and the newly founded journal Political Economy . Studies in the Surplus Approach .
2. On this broad point at least, there is a consensus which includes both those who espouse a traditional `embodied labour' view of value (e .g. Mandel (1968), Sweezy (1970) ) and those who utterly reject that position, viewing the calculus of embodied labour-times as a technicist or Ricardian misreading of Marx (e .g . Himmelweit & Mohun (1978), DeVroey(1982) ) . 3. Steedman (1981 : 17) is correct in pointing out that Marxists err if they assume that the existence of surplus labour `explains' the existence of profit . The point is not that one dimension of the concept of surplus is prior to another in some causal or logical sense, and I make no pretence here that surplus labour is the `essence' of the surplus product, or vice versa (indeed, as argued below, the relation between these different senses of the surplus has the character of an identity) . The real issue is how one conceives the surplus - whether one makes conceptual use of the fact that a surplus can be conceived in multiple senses . Steedman does not ; he treats `the existence of . . . exploitation and the existence of profit' as `simply "labour" and "monetary" expressions of the physical surplus' (1981 : 17), and thus he chooses to give priority to the physical surplus in his analysis . This choice necessarily implies that class, if it has any meaning at all, refers simply to the conditions which give rise to a physical surplus, rather than to a process through which surplus labour is performed, appropriated and redistributed . Steedman's choice is not `wrong', but neither is it necessary . 4. The following analysis is in part an extension of my previous work . See Roberts (1981 ; 1984) and Wolff, Roberts & Callari (1982 ; 1984) .
Marx after Steedman 103
5. See the extensive discussion in Roberts (1981) for the textual evidence supporting this reading of Marx's concept of value . 6. For a discussion of the reasons for this tactical choice, see Wolff, Roberts & Callari (1984) . 7. For an elaboration of these points, see Roberts (1984) .
Baumol, W . (1974) `The Transformation of Values : What Marx "Really" Meant (An Interpretation)',Journal ofEconomic Literature 12 . DeVroey, M . (1982) `On the Obsolescence of the Marxian Theory of Value : A Critical Review', Capital & Class 17 . Eatwell, J . (1982) `Competition', in Bradley, I . & Howard, M . (eds), Classical and Marxian Political Economy . St Martin's . Eatwell, J . (1983a) `Theories of Value, Output and Employment', in Eatwell, J . & Milgate, M . (eds), Keynes's Economics and the Theory of Value and Distribution . Oxford . Eatwell, J . (1983b) `The Long-Period Theory of Employment', Cambridge Journal of Economics 7 . Editorial Committee (1985) `Presentation', Political Economy : Studies in the Surplus Approach 1 . Garegnani, P . (1970) `Heterogeneous Capital, the Production Function, and the Theory of Distribution', Review of Economic Studies 37 . Garegnani, P . (1976) `On a Change in the Notion of Equilibrium in Recent Work on Value and Distribution', in Brown, M ., Sato, K . & Zarembka, P. (eds), Essays in Modern Capital Theory . NorthHolland . Himmelweit, S . & Mohun, S . (1978) `The Anomalies of Capital', Capital & Class 6 . Mandel, E . (1968) Marxist Economic Theory . Monthly Review . Marx, K . (1967a) Capital I . International . Marx, K . (1967b) Capital III . International . Marx, K . (1968) Theories of Surplus Value II . Progress . Marx, K . (1971) Theories of Surplus Value III . Progress . Pasinetti, L . (1980) Essays on the Theory ofJoint Production . Columbia . Roberts, B . (1981) `Value Categories and Marxian Method : A Different View of Value-Price Transformation', unpublished doctoral dissertation . University of Massachusetts, Amherst . Roberts, B . (1984) `Fixed capital and the Rate of Profit : Marx Versus the "Classical Synthesis" ',mimeo . Sraffa, P . (1960) Production of Commodities by Means of Commodities . Cambridge . Steedman, I. (1977) Marx After Sraffa . New Left Books . Steedman, I . (1981) 'Ricardo, Marx, Sraffa', in The Value Controversy. Verso . Sweezy, P . (1970) The Theory of Capitalist Development . Monthly Review . Wolff, R ., Roberts, B . & Callari, A . (1982) `Marx's (not Ricardo's) Transformation Problem : A Radical Reconceptualisation', History of Political Economy 14 . Wolff, R ., Roberts, B . & Callari, A . (1984) `A Marxian Alternative to the Traditional "Transformation Problem" ', Review of Radical Political Economics 16 .
References
Steve Ran k i n Exploitation and the Labour Theory of Value : a neo-Marxian reply
It is argued that the purpose of the Labour Theory of Value is to provide a theory of capitalist exploitation, not a theory of relative prices . As such, the Morishima-type approach to the Steedman critique offers a convincing restatement of the Fundamental Marxian Theorem associating profit with the performance of surplus labour time . By comparison, the Roberts approach involves some 104 strange arithmetic and the importation of a hybrid price/value term which makes it difficult to infer the Fundamental Marxian Theorem.
• DESPITE the fact that a decade has elapsed since the publication of Steedman's Marx afterSraffa (1977), Marxian economists are still unable to agree on what constitutes a defensible position in the joint production debate . Many who do not ignore Steedman's critique of the labour theory of value appear to accept it as decisive, at least in respect of the labour theory of value as a set of quantitative relationships . They are then led either to attempt a defence of the labour theory of value from a philosophical standpoint ; or to the abandonment of the labour theory of value altogether . Others continue to write as if Steedman's critique had never appeared . The result is that at the present time Marxian economics is in a state of hopeless disarray, a declining subject studied by a diminishing number of students, considered more from the standpoint of the history of economic thought than as a discipline capable of fulfilling Marx's objective of providing a contemporary critique of orthodox economics . The aim of the present paper is to argue that with suitable modifications Morishima and Catephore's (1978) linear programming analysis of capitalist exploitation provides the basis of an adequate defence of the labour theory of value in the presence of joint production . While it would be interesting to speculate on the reasons why the neo-Marxian approach, as based upon the work of Okishio (1963), Wolfstetter (1973), Morishima (1973, 1974) and others, has made so little impact on the literature of Marxian economics, particularly in Britain, the objective here is
Labour Theory of Value
105
a more limited one . By the use of two numerical examples (one of which is Steedman's (1975) two-sector joint production example), I hope to provide an accessible and convincing account of the rationale of the neo-Marxian approach which avoids altogether the use of advanced mathematical techniques . At the same time, our analysis will enable us to see why the `radical reconceptualisation' of value theory proposed by Wolff, Roberts and Callari (1982) and Roberts (1987) is unsatisfactory . It should be noted at the outset that neo-Marxian analysis makes no concessions to the labour theory of value as a theory of relative prices . For reasons recognised not only by Marx in volume III of Capital, but also by Ricardo in chapter 1 of the Principles, long-run equilibrium prices in a competitive capitalist economy will deviate systematically from relative labour values except in highly special cases . Moreover, there can be no meaningful sense in which these prices can be said to derive from, or be based upon, Marxian labour values . As demonstrated by Samuelson (1970, 1971), the transformation coefficients of von Bortkiewicz (1907) or any other economist's solution to the transformation problem are simply price-value ratios . This means that transforming values into prices consists simply in cancelling out the labour values in a set of value equations and multiplying the remaining physical magnitudes by their corresponding prices . As such, the transformation problem, despite the prominence which it enjoys in the traditional literature of Marxian economics, is devoid of economic significance . In what follows, we assume that the purpose of the labour theory of value is to provide a theory of capitalist exploitation . An integral part of this theory is the demonstration that long-run equilibrium profits derive from the performance of unpaid labour time by wage-labourers . Steedman's joint production arguments have been influential precisely because he appears to provide an example of a competitive capitalist economy with positive prices and profits, but an economically meaningless negative rate of exploitation . The present paper shows why, on the basis of classical Marxian criteria, the rate of exploitation is indeed positive in such an economy .
Before examining the joint production case, we first consider long-run equilibrium in a hypothetical two-sector competitive capitalist economy composed of single-product industries . In order to facilitate a comparison with Steedman's joint production example, we assume that wages are paid out of the net product at the end of the period of production . We assume further that production relations in the economy are described by the follow-
Single-product industries
Capital & Class 106
ing input-output table, where the columns denoted Ci, C2 and L denote physical quantities of commodities (1 and 2) and labour respectively, all measured in natural units (e .g . tons of steel, bushels of corn, and hours of labour) : Table I
Single-product industries inputs Industry 1 Industry II
Ci 25 0
C2
0 10
L 5 1
outputs Ci C, 33 0 0 17
By inspection, it is evident from the table that the six units of labour employed by capitalists in the economy produce a net output consisting of eight units of commodity 1 and seven units of commodity 2 ; that is, wage-labourers produce a net output bundle consisting of (yi, y2) = (8, 7) . If we assume further that the workers consume as means of subsistence three units of commodity 1 and five units of commodity 2, it follows that capitalists appropriate a surplus product consisting of five units of commodity 1 and two units of commodity 2 ; i .e ., surplus product = net product minus means of subsistence _ (8, 7) - (3, 5) _ (5, 2) Let us now assume that as a result of the long-run allocation decisions made by profit-maximising capitalists, levels of output are such that supply equals demand at prices which ensure an equal rate of profit in each industry . If we arbitrarily select commodity 2 as the numeraire in terms of which wages, price and profits can be expressed, then the following system of price equations must hold : (1 + r) 25pi + 5w = 33pi (1 + r) 10p2 + lw = 17p2 3pi + 5p2 = 6w p2 + 1, where pi is the price of the jth commodity, w is the wage rate and r is the rate of profit . Solving these equations using elementary arithmetical operations yields pi = pl /p2 = 25/3, r = .20 and w = 5 . Analysis of the price system leads to three observations, all of which would appear to be opposed to the view that profit has its origins in surplus or unpaid labour . Firstly, since the price system is fully determinate in respect of our being able to derive total profits (7r = 655/15 y 43 .67) from the physical production and wage data, it is not clear that a labour theory of value could have anything whatever to add in the explanation of profitability .
Labour Theory of Value
In a mathematical sense, total profits derive from, and are completely determined by, the physical production and wage data . From the indisputable fact of mathematical determinacy, it is tempting to conclude with Samuelson and the neo-Ricardians that profits depend only upon technology and wage data . Secondly, profit earned per unit labour employed differs markedly as between the two industries . In industry I, total = r25pi = 625/15 ~- 41 .67, whence profit per unit profit is labour employed is rn /Li = 625/75 = 8 .33 . For industry II, total = rlOp2 = 10/5 = 2, whereupon = 2. profit is given by Hence, if we confine our analysis to the price system alone, profitability appears to be uncorrelated with the quantity of labour employed . On the other hand, in long-run equilibrium profits in each industry are perfectly correlated with the value of the means of production advanced, a fact which, as Marx points out, gives rise to vulgar theories whereby profit is perceived to derive from the innate powers of inanimate capital goods . Finally, the payment system, whereby capitalists pay workers by piece rate or per unit labour time worked, appears to be inconsistent with the notion of unpaid labour time . In a feudal economy, the performance of unpaid labour time by serfs on the lord's land is a legal requirement which forms part of the feudal contract . By contrast, in the capitalist system the wage contract typically sets out hours of work and the payment to be received per hour ; hence, unpaid labour time appears to have been abolished during the transition from feudalism to capitalism . Marx's objective is to penetrate beneath the false appearances engendered by the price system and show that capitalist profit, like seigneurial income, does in reality derive from the performance of unpaid labour time by the labourers . To determine the magnitude of the surplus or unpaid labour performed in our hypothetical economy and to show the inadequacy of the neoRicardian view in the single-product case, we can make use of the individual labour values employed by Marx and the classical political economists . The value equations for our two-sector economy are given by the system 25 .(, + 5 = 334, 10%2+1=17/2 where i is the labour time required directly and indirectly to produce a single unit of the jth commodity . Hence, on this definition / i includes not only the quantity of labour directly employed by firms in the jth industry, but also indirect labour ; i .e . the labour required to produce the means of production used up in the production of the jth commodity . Solving this sytem of two equations in two unknowns, we obtain = 5/8 andA = 1/7 . It is evident from this definition that Marxian labour values 7T1
1T2/L2
?I2
L;
1K1
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are technological constructs, showing the relationship between labour input requirements and unit outputs which are implied by a particular technology . In the single-product case these labour values are well-defined and can be utilised to determine the labour input required to produce any given net output bundle . By necessary labour, Marx means the labour input required to produce the workers' means of subsistence . In our hypothetical example workers consume the wage bundle (3, 5) . Since the technology is such that the production of single units of commodities 1 and 2 require respectively 5/8 and 1/7 units of labour, it follows that production of the means of subsistence requires a total labour input V = 3, + 5/2 = 145/56 = 2 .59 . This labour input can be interpreted as the technologicallydefined minimum expenditure of labour which workers would have to perform even if they owned and controlled the means of production themselves, at least on the assumptions that they continued to utilise the same technology and consumed the same means of subsistence . Marx criticises as incomplete the view which he associates with Ricardo and his followers that profitability can be determined by technology and wage data alone . As noted above, technology defines a relationship between any given net output bundle and the labour input required to produce it . What cannot be taken as determined by the technology is the magnitude of the total labour input, and in Marx's view this is, for a given technology and wage-bundle, the crucial determinant of profits . Marx defines surplus labour to be the excess of total labour performed over the labour technically required to produce the means of subsistence . In our hypothetical economy, surplus labour is given by S = total labour minus necessary labour = 6 - 145/56 = 191/56 = 3 .41 . This surplus labour is precisely the labour required to produce the surplus product, since we have S = 5.(, + 242 = 25/8 + 2/7 = 191/56 = 3 .41 . Hence, we can say on the basis of our value analysis of the economy that wage-labourers work longer than the time required to produce their means of subsistence in order to produce the surplus product (5, 2) . As this surplus product is appropriated by the capitalists who own the means of production, the surplus
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labour performed is in essence unpaid labour, even though it is not identified as such in the wage contract . If we assume for our hypothetical economy that each labourer works a standard sixday week, then it follows from our analysis that technology is such that the means of subsistence could be produced if the labour force worked only 2 .59 days . Instead, for reasons which cannot be explained by reference back to technology or income distribution, workers work an extra 3 .41 days to produce a commodity bundle which they do not consume . On this interpretation, Marx's rate of exploitation is e = (L - V)/V = S/V = 191/145 = 1 .32, and tells us that wage-labourers in our capitalist economy work 132% longer than is technically required to produce their means of subsistence . Since total profit is simply the market's (long-run equilibrium) valuation of the surplus product (i .e . = 5p, + 2p2), both the existence of profit and its magnitude are dependent upon the quantity of surplus labour performed . It is in this sense that the rate of profit may be said to be dependent upon the rate of exploitation . We note, however, that it is not meaningful to conceive of total profit as `redistributed surplus value' . Profit and surplus value are essentially incommensurable magnitudes, the former measured in price terms, the other in units of labour time . While it is always possible to choose a numeraire for the price system in such a way that profit and surplus value are numerically equal, such a choice is essentially arbitrary, and the resultant equality would have no economic or social significance . 7T
Upon first consideration, Steedman's joint production example appears to have devastating consequences for the Marxian analysis of profitability as described above . He assumes a hypothetical two-sector economy with production relations which are identical to those of our example from the previous section, except that both industries now produce quantitites of both commodities . These production relations are summarised in the table below : Table 2
Joint product industries inputs
Industry 1 Industry II
outputs
Ci
C2
L
C,
C2
25 0
0 10
5 1
30 3
12
5
From an analysis of table 2, it is apparent that the total gross
joint production
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and net outputs are the same ; and on the assumption that the wage bundle is the combination (3, 5) as before, both economies therefore have an identical surplus product (5, 2) . In long-run equilibrium, where capitalists have allocated resources in such a way that the prices which equate supply and demand also ensure equality of profit rates as between industries, the following equations must apply : (1 + r) 25pi + 5w = 30p, + 5p2 (1 + r) IOp2 + 1w = 3p, + 12p2 3pi + 5p2 = 6w p2 = 1 . Solving this system of equations yields the relative price pi P1 /p2 = 1/3, a positive rate of profit r = .20 and a wage rate w = 1 . Hence, the economy is entirely viable in the capitalist sense of having positive prices and profits . By contrast, the system of value equations for the economy given by 254, + 5 = 30X1 + 5A2 10/si + 1 = 3/i + 12/<2 yields apparently perverse results . Solving, we obtain i = -1 and 2 = 2, whereupon surplus labour and the rate of exploitation are both negative, since S=5~,+4 2= - 5+4=-1 and e = -1/7 . Clearly negative quantities of labour time are economically meaningless . The conclusion which Steedman wishes to force upon us is that the labour theory of value, and therefore the foundations of Marxian political economy, are flawed in a fundamental sense . Using conventional techniques of economic analysis, it is not difficult to demonstrate that it is Steedman's argument which is flawed rather than Marx's economics . To show this, we first derive two equations which will tell us the net output of the economy which will be produced by any labour allocation of Li units of labour to industry I and L2 units of labour to industry II . By inspection of table 2, we can see that the 5 units of labour employed in industry I produce a net output for that industry consisting of the commodity bundle (5, 5) . Hence, under the assumption of constant returns to scale (made for the purposes of simplicity), it follows that a single unit of labour applied to industry I will produce the net output bundle (1, 1) ; and, correspondingly, Li units of labour allocated to industry I will produce the net output bundle (Li, Li) . Similarly, the table tells us that a single unit of labour in industry II produces an industry net output of (3, 2) ; hence, under the constant returns assumption, L2 units of labour assigned to industry II will produce a net
Labour Theory of Value
output of (3L2, 2L2) . Hence, it follows that for the economy as a whole, an allocation of Li and L2 units of labour to industries I and II respectively will enable workers to produce a net output bundle (Li + 3L2, Li + 2L2) . This means that we may define a Marxian production function F for the economy by the equation Y = (yt, y2) = F(Li, L2) = (L, + 3L2, L, + 2L2), a function which tells us the net output bundle (yi, y2) producible by any labour input combination (L1, L2) . We are now in a position to see why the traditional simultaneous equations approach is unsatisfactory ; and to explain the rationale of the mysterious phenomenon of negative labour values . In a general sense, we may interpret /.i as the direct and indirect labour required to produce the net output bundle (1, 0) for the economy as a whole . The question arises as to whether it is going to be possible to produce such a bundle given the fact that with joint production each industry produces a quantity of each commodity in fixed proportions . If it is possible, then on the basis of our reasoning in the previous paragraph, we need to find quantities of labour Li and L2 to be allocated to each industry which satisfy the equations 1Li + 3L2 = 1 11-1 +2L2=0 . Solving for Li and L2, yields Li = -2 and L2 = 1, whereupon we get Li + L2 = -1 =1(i as above . This means that with the available joint production technology, the only allocation of labour to the two industries which from a mathematical standpoint will produce exactly the commodity bundle (1, 0) is one which involves an economically meaningless allocation of a negative quantity of labour to one of the industries . Hence, we conclude that the commodity bundle (1, 0) is not economically feasible for this economy and that the labour value A1 is not defined . It also follows from the fixed proportions in which industry outputs are produced that it is not possible with our joint production technology to produce exactly the commodity bundle (3, 5) which the workers consume as their means of subsistence ; that is, no positive allocation of labour (Li, L2) exists which will satisfy the net output equations 1Li +3L2=3 1Li + 2L2 = 5 . The unique solution to these equations is given by L, = 9 and L2 _ -2, hence we conclude as before that it is not possible to produce precisely this net output bundle . How therefore are we to calculate necessary labour? The answer lies in adopting a modified version of the linear programming approach originally put forward by Morishima in his reply to Steedman . What the linear programming approach
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does is to provide us with an alternative technique for calculating necessary labour time in circumstances of joint production where the means of subsistence cannot be produced as net output in the exact quantities in which they are consumed . Necessary labour time is now defmed as the minimum amount of labour time which labourers must work if they are to produce a net output bundle (yi, y 2) which is at least as large as the means of subsistence ; i .e . where the quantity of the jth commodity produced as net output is equal to or larger than the quantity of the jth commodity contained in the wage bundle . In the case of our hypothetical joint production economy, we need to know the minimum amount of labour time which workers would have to work using the existing technology in order to produce a net output bundle (yi, y2) where yi , 3 and yz -- 5 . Mathematically, we may formulate this problem as follows : Minimise V = Li + L2 subject to 1Li + 3L2 , 3 1Li + 2L2 , 5 L, 5 L2 1 L,, L2 0 As formulated, the problem asks us to determine the smallest possible allocation of labour to each of the two industries which will still enable the workers to produce a net output as large or larger than their means of subsistence . The first two constraints derive from our net output production function above and state that Li and L2 must be such that the labour-minimising net output bundle must contain at least three units of commodity 1 and five units of commodity 2 . The next two constraints serve as capacity constraints to ensure that the problem is confined to the framework of the existing means of production, thereby meeting the criticisms of the original Morishima-Catephores formulation put forward by Armstrong, Glyn and Harrison (1978) . (See Rankin (1979) and Akyuz (1983) on the significance and importance of these capacity constraints .) Finally, the last constraint ensures that the solution is economically meaningful . The solution is easily found by employing the graphical method . The binding constraints are lLi + 2L2 , 5 and L2 -- 1, hence the solution is given by their point of intersection when they hold with strict equality . Solving simultaneously, it follows that the minimum allocation of labour which still enables workers to produce their means of subsistence is (Li*, L2*) = (3, 1) . This implies that necessary labour is given by V = L1 * + L2 * = 3 + 1 =4 .
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Correspondingly, surplus labour is therefore S=L-V=6-4=2 ; and the rate of exploitation is e = s/V = 2/4 = .50 ; i .e . wage-labourers work 50 per cent longer than the technology requires in order to obtain their means of subsistence . This is less than the rate of exploitation in our single product case precisely because the net output bundle produced by allocating L1* and L2* units of labour to industries I and II respectively is the net output combination (6, 5) .
In Bruce Roberts's (1987) paper published in this issue, we find a different proposed solution to Steedman's joint production problem, one which derives from the `radical reconceptualisation' of Marxian value theory developed jointly by Wolff, Roberts and Callari (1982) . Roberts's objective is to attempt to defend Marx's 'double-structure' theory by redefining individual labour values in such a way as to make surplus value equal to tatal profit ; and total values equal to total prices . For the case of Steedman's joint production example, Roberts's price system may be expressed by the following equations : (1 + r) 25pi + 5w = 30pi + 5p2 (1 + r) lOp2 + lw = 3pi + 12p2 3pi + 5p2 = 6w 8pi + 7p2 = 6 . Although Roberts uses ojs rather than pas to denote prices, and refers to 0 = [Od as the `row vector expressing value-form', it is evident that this is a standard neo-Ricardian formulation, differing from Steedman's price system only in the choice of the numeraire in terms of which prices are to be measured . Solving the system yields pi = 6/29, p2 = 18/29, r = .20 and w = 6/29 ; hence, relative prices are P1 /P2 = 1/3 and w/p2 = 1, exactly as in Steedman's solution . With this numeraire, total profits are 7T = 5pi + 2p2 = 66/29 t-- 2 .28 ; and the total wage bill is W = Lw = 36/29 = 108/29 --3 .72, thereby implying a profit/wages ratio rr/W = 66/108 = 11/18 .61, as in Steedman's neo-Ricardian price system . What is novel in Roberts's formulation is the attempt to redefine individual commodity values . Using Roberts's definition, the value system for our joint production example is given by 25pi + 5 = 30vi + 5v2 lOp2 + 1 = 3vi + 12v2 C & C
32-H
Roberts's reformulation
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where vi and V2 denote the Wolff-Roberts-Callari individual values . Solving this system yields vi = 72,355/290,145 and v2 = 156,165/290,145 . On this basis surplus labour is given by S = 5vi + 2v2 = 674,105/290,145 2 .32, and necessary labour by V = 3vi + 5v2 = 997,890/290,145 J-3 .44 . These calculations reveal immediate problems with the Wolff-Roberts-Callari reformulation . Firstly, with values defined by vi and v2, the sum of surplus labour and necessary labour is given by S + V = 1,671,995/290,145 y 5 .76 units of labour . But this is less than the six units of labour performed by workers in the economy, leaving an unexplained residual of 68,875/290,145 y .24 units of labour . Secondly, it follows from our linear programming analysis that with the existing technology, any allocation of less than four units of labour to the economy will be insufficient to enable the workers to produce a net output combination which contains at least three units of commodity 1 and 5 units of commodity 2 . For example, let us suppose that we allocated 2 .44 units of labour to industry I and one unit of labour to industry II, whence L = Li + L2 = 3 .44, as in the calculation of necessary labour above . Then from our net output production function, it follows that workers utilising the existing technology and means of production could produce only the net output bundle (5 .44, 4 .44) ; i .e . a deficiency occurs in the production of commodity 2 . We conclude that vi and v2 cannot be used as aggregators in the calculation of necessary labour time . Thirdly, it is simply not the case that total profit is equal to total surplus value in Roberts's formulation . Comparing total profits with total surplus value as calculated above, we find that 7r = 66/29 = 666,333/290,145 = 2 .28 < 2 .32 = 674,105/ 290,145 = S . On the other hand, total prices are equal to total values (i .e . 33p, + 17p2 = 33vi + 17v2), but this is purely a consequence of the arbitrary choice of numeraire . Finally, if Roberts's sums fail to tally when applied to a numerical example, it is because his values vi represent a bizarre hybrid which defy economic interpretation . Conceptually, it makes no sense to define quantities of socially necessary labour time in terms of the market price which a capitalist has to pay (in long-run equilibrium) in order to purchase the means of production used up . With the classical Marxian approach (as applied to single-product industries, 4j is the sum of the direct plus indirect labour which is required to produce a single unit of the jth commodity when workers utilise a particular technology . By contrast, Roberts's vj is the sum of direct labour employed in the
Labour Theory of Value 115
production of the jth commodity, plus the market price which capitalists must pay (in long-run equilibrium) in order to purchase the means of production used up in the jth industry . In what sense does this constitute a definition of socially necessary labour time? The purpose of the foregoing essay is to attempt to persuade Marxian economists that their apparent neglect of the linear programming approach in the analysis of capitalist exploitation is altogether unjustified . While most economists associate linear programming with problems of operations research and neoclassical economics, there is no reason why it should be regarded as the exclusive provenance of bourgeois economics . As argued above, its applicability to the Marxian theory of exploitation is entirely appropriate . It is simply a mathematical technique which enables us to calculate the minimum labour time required to produce a net output bundle which is not less (in any of its components) than the wage bundle consumed by workers under capitalism . Provided that one includes capacity constraints in the formulation of the problem, the set of feasible solutions will be restricted to those which can be produced with the existing technology and means of production . Linear programming therefore provides the appropriate technique for calculating Marxian necessary labour under conditions of joint production and constant returns to scale . It is important, however, to consider the limitations of our linear programming analysis . In particular, it is essential to appreciate that the neo-Marxian approach does not provide a mathematical proof of the existence of exploitation in a capitalist economy . Demonstrating the existence of surplus labour is clearly a necessary and indispensable part of the Marxian theory of exploitaton . But it is entirely possible to argue that the relationship between capitalists and workers is a non-coercive one and that the surplus labour which neo-Marxian analysis reveals is part of a voluntary exchange between capitalists and workers which reflects differences in subjective time preferences and attitudes towards risk . It is perhaps for this reason that Samuelson (1974) can refer to the Fundamental Marxian Theorem as 'harmless algebra' . By contrast, Marx aims to establish as a social fact that workers are coerced or compelled by capitalists into providing surplus labour . Resolving this issue and placing the Marxian theory of exploitation on firm analytical foundations requires that we go beyond the boundaries of the important but relatively narrow debate on the existence of surplus labour and its relationship to profitability .
Conclusion
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References Akyuz, Y . (1983) `Value and exploitation under joint production', Australian Economic Papers, pp . 171-179 . Armstrong, P ., Glyn, A . & Harrison, J . (1975) `In defence of value: a reply to Ian Steedman', Capital & Class no . 5, pp . 1-31 . Baumol, W . J . (1974) `The transformation of values : what Marx "really" meant (an interpretation)', Journal of Economic Literature, vol . 12, pp . 51-62 . Bortkiewicz, L . von (1907) `On the correction Marx's fundamental theoretical construction in the third volume of Capital', in E . von Bohm-Bawerk, Karl Marx and the close of His System, ed . P .M . Sweezy . New York : Kelley, 1966, pp . 199-22 1 . Morishima, M . (1973) Marx's Economics : A Dual Theory of Value and Growth . Cambridge : Cambridge University Press . Morishima, M . (1974) `Marx in the light of modern economic theory', Econometrica, vol . 42, pp . 611-632 . Morishima, M . (1976) `Positive profits with negative surplus value : a comment', Economic Journal, vol. 86, pp . 599-603 . Morishima, M . & Catephores, G . (1978) Value, Exploitation and Growth . London : McGraw-Hill . Okishio, N . (1963) `A mathematical note on Marxian theorems', Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv, vol . 91, pp . 287-299 . Rankin, S . (1979) 'Steedman, Morishima and Marx's theory of profit' . Mimeograph, University of East Anglia . Roberts, B . (1987) `Marx after Steedman : separating Marxism from "surplus theory" ', Capital and Class, no. 32 . Samuelson, P .A . (1970) `The "transformation" from Marxian "values" to competitive "prices" : a process of rejection and replacement', Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol. 67, pp . 423425 . Samuelson, P .A . (1975) `Understanding the Marxian notion of exploitation : a summary of the so-called transformation problem between Marxian values and competitive prices', Journal of Economic Literature, vol . 9, pp . 399-431 . Samuelson, P. A . (1974) `Insight and detour in the theory of exploitation : a reply to Baumol', Journal of Economic Literature, vol . 12, pp . 62-70, 75-77 . Steedman, I . (1975) `Positive profits with negative surplus value', Economic Journal, vol . 85, pp . 114-23 . Steedman, I . (1976) `Positive profits with negative surplus value : a reply', Economic Journal, vol . 86, pp . 604-8 . Steedman, I . (1977) Marx after Sraffa . London : New Left Books . Wolff, R . D., Roberts, B . & Callari, A . (1982) `Marx's (not Ricardo's) "transformation problem" : a radical reconceptualization', History of Political Economy, vol . 14, pp . 564-582 . Wolfstetter, E . (1973) `Surplus labour, synchronized labour costs and Marx's labour theory of value', Economic journal, vol . 83, pp . 787-809 . Wolfstetter, E . (1976) `Positive profits with negative surplus value : a comment', Economic Journal, vol . 86 .
Tim Blackman Craigavon : The development and dismantling of Northern Ireland's new town ; an example of capitalist planning and the management of disinvestment THE ARGUMENT of this article is that Northern Ireland's new town of Craigavon, designated in 1965 by the statelet's Unionistdominated regional government (Stormont), illustrates many aspects of the political economy of the region which have important implications for political struggles to unite its deeply divided working class against capital . This article argues that the state in Northern Ireland has had to secure conditions for the continued accumulation of capital, like the British, Irish or any other Western state . The difference is that the working class is much more divided, given the strong cultural as well as economic bases for such division . It has also had to manage support for the state and suppress or incorporate opposition . As in other capitalist states the decline of manufacturing employment has led to the creation of stagnant reserve armies of labour in what had been planned as growth centres, and were in effect unstable transnational outposts, which Craigavon exemplifies . Reproductive strategies in the `post-modern' era of deindustrialisation have been implemented under the period of Direct Rule, which has seen growing parallels between strategies for Northern Ireland and other peripheral regions of the UK under Thatcher's `two nations' project (Jessop et al, 1984; 1985) . The rise and fall of Craigavon and aspects of the popular experience of it have been shaped by the need for the capitalist state to reproduce the working class within capitalism, either as
•
117
The development of planning policy in Northern Ireland
A 0
1Baloymena Craigavon regional ./ ~'centre
Centres of accelerated growth Key centres
i ° Derry
Be
CraI avon ,,Emiskilen
T r
1 ~ .~
'.Newry
1 Matthew Plan 1963
2 Development Programme 1970-75
O
Major growth centres
•
District towns ~, Derry 0
kms
The rise and fall of Craigavon wage labour or as a reserve army . In Northern Ireland this reproduction occurs in relation to a deeply divided working class in which disproportionate numbers of catholics make up the social proletariat that occupy much of deindustrialised Brownlow and many other areas . Craigavon's inception as a growth centre for capital accumulation was a strategy forced upon the Unionist state because above all it was a capitalist state . The failure of the new town to generate the sustained employment and population growth which modernising Unionism intended, and its subsequent decline, led to the writing-off of huge state investments and the development of ghettoised areas housing marginalised working-class people managed by a variety of public agencies under Direct Rule . Many of the recent developments in state management of urban decline in Britain - especially the attempts to `depoliticise' urban management - echo the attempts to manage Craigavon in decline . Craigavon new town was part of a strategy of modernisation designed to accommodate on the one hand the demands of, most crucially, Belfast protestant industrial workers for jobs and a larger share of the fruits of the long capitalist boom, which had seen rising living standards in Britain, Ireland and other Western economies in the 1960s, and on the other the needs of transnational corporations for conditions in which they could make profits . The two were closely linked - more state spending on housing and infrastructure could be sold to the protestant electorate as a social reform and job spinner, while also attracting in branch plants to replace uncompetitive and declining local businesses, especially linen . But the Unionist bourgeoisie had more than just regional restructuring to manage . Under Captain Terence O'Neill, whose rise to the leadership of the Unionist Party in the 1960s was seen by many commentators at the time as inaugurating a new era of jobs, peace and prosperity in Northern Ireland, there were attempts to appease catholics and weaken Irish nationalism - to `stabilise' Northern Ireland and set it on a course of `normal' capitalist development . At the same time O'Neill had to reproduce the centrality of Unionism in the politics of the statelet, and the location of Craigavon in 'protestant territory' reflected this . O'Neillism failed to achieve its liberalisation of Unionism and was successfully challenged by the rise of Paisleyism which ruthlessly exploited the insecurities of protestant rural and urban workers . Modernisation had failed these workers : many communities in Belfast had been decimated by redevelopment and rural areas starved of investment . The fact that the new town did not attract large numbers of protestants because the jobs were not there or the costs of moving were too great, and that many of the
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jobs initially created in Craigavon, and much of the housing, went to unskilled catholics, meant there were few protests when the British government dissolved the Development Commission in 1973 after the shortest life of any new town development agency in the UK . Thus Craigavon was a product of the political economy of 1960s Northern Ireland ; it was a central element of the modernisation of Unionism's industrial heartland, the Belfast sub-region . Today its failure as a `growth centre' or even as a decent living environment is a target of criticism from all sides, condemning it as a result of autocratic planning and the destruction of old communities or as a Brasilia-type sectarian creation of the Orange political system . Craigavon's role in modernisation is made clear by the propaganda written by technocrats working on, or commenting on, the new town during its early development . A Craigavon Planning Executive publicity leaflet enticed people to move to the area by announcing that : Craigavon new town is about people and their way of life . The aim of the new town is to offer an alternative way of life to the present day city, in conditions of well paid jobs, attractive housing and local amenities and where there are plenty of facilities for leisure . When they were reluctant about leaving communities in Belfast, Lurgan, Portadown or in the countryside, The Economist wrote : Craigavon and the new developments planned for Antrim and Ballymena . . . should not simply be Ulster's showpiece but the forcing houses of social change . That is why in planning Ulster's future it is important that the emphasis should be placed more on the development of such new growth points than upon propping up the older and more strife-ridden centres of population . The people of Ulster have got to learn to mix together and, to make sure that happens, they have got to move (29 May 1971 ; emphasis added) . Thus spatial restructuring was a central part of modernisation . But although this grouping of labour into modern growth centres was legitimated as reform, it was also sectarian (clearly indicated, many would point out, by the decision to name the town after Northern Ireland's first and infamous prime minister, Lord Craigavon, and the appointment of a past chairman (sic) of Larne Divisional Unionist Association as the Development Commission's first chairperson) . The contradictions are well illustrated by the Development Commission's Fabian-minded first Chief
The rise and fall of Craigavon 121
Architect/Planner, Geoffrey Copcutt, imported from the team that had worked on Cumbernauld (the Clydeside new town) . In June 1964 he described Craigavon as a `stroke of genius' (Belfast Telegraph, 18 June 1969) . Two weeks later he resigned, alleging that : . . . the Stormont government would not countenance any scheme that would upset the voting balance between Protestants and Roman Catholics . . . Religious and political considerations are dominant in the new city decision . . . I have become disenchanted with the Stormont scene . . . it has asked us to engineer propaganda rather than design a new city . . . the rejuvenation of Londonderry should have preference (Irish Times, 15 August 1964) . The next sections of this article describe in more detail the history of Craigavon, its development, deindustrialisation and the management of decline . The history of Craigavon shows how the costs of Northern Ireland's relation to international capital are borne by the working class and managed by the state . In this framework, sectarianism is seen as a mediating ideology between labour and capital . This study of Craigavon attempts to illuminate how the state's reproduction of a divided working class within capitalist social relations is to the cost of the working class as a whole . It is argued that such an analysis is a first step in countering the ideology of sectarianism . In many respects this analysis is preliminary because far more work is needed on researching and conceptualising the actual working-class experience of capitalism in Northern Ireland . Hopefully the article will trigger a wider debate based on such research in the pages of Capital & Class .
There are more urgent problems to be considered in our existing towns . If the Minister would take off his rose-coloured spectacles and look at the appalling housing conditions which exist in our towns he would get a great deal of satisfaction from trying to alleviate problems that already exist, without creating further problems through the institution of a new town (Gerry Fitt, Parliament of Northern Ireland, 1964) . Craigavon was a product of the Belfast Regional Survey and Plan, a `growth centre' strategy drawn up for Stormont by Edinburgh University technocrat Robert Matthew . It was reformist and modernising in ideology and strategy, though confined by Stormont to the Belfast sub-region (Matthew, 1963) . Craigavon new town was to be a symbol of social and economic regeneration developed on greenfield sites between the existing
The state intervenes to build a new town
Capital & Class 122
towns of Lurgan (mainly catholic) and Portadown (mainly protestant), away from the old industrial conurbation of Belfast . Craigavon Development Commission took up its modernising remit vigorously . The first houses it erected were of similar good quality to many of those built by the Northern Ireland Housing Trust which had been created in 1945 in a similar reformist phase . The Commission pioneered the introduction of full Parker Morris housing standards into Ireland and the new town, which was to be a'rural city', had high quality landscaping and some of the most advanced planning concepts of the day . The ideology which imbued the design ideas implemented in Craigavon had many similarities with the social democratic `vision' which marked the first post-war new towns in Britain, particularly in trying to create harmonious, modern communities in semirural settings (Dickens, Duncan, Goodwin & Gray, 1985 : pp . 214-22) . In Northern Ireland however this ideology was imported through British planning concepts . Its implementation involved new state agencies `above' local clientelism and committed to technocratic modernisation, such as the new Ministry of Development and the Craigavon Development Commission, which had been opposed by the local councils . The Development Commission attempted to socially engineer religious mixing by integrating social facilities and amenities, something regarded as unachievable within the local council set-up, and it appears that it was seen as an efficient and fair authority by many catholic tenants (Craigavon Independent Advice Centre, 1982) . Its dissolution in 1973 saw the division of its functions among a series of newly-created bodies, all quangos, except Craigavon Borough Council which was directly elected, although with few powers . The return to local clientelism reinforced sectarianism ; the predominantly catholic labour pools of the new town housing estates were now caught within a strongly Loyalist borough . Prior to Matthew's growth centres, the Stormont government's industrial development legislation had made Northern Ireland more financially attractive to capital than British regions (Birrell & Murie, 1980 ; pp . 201-09) . However the growing domination of world markets by transnationals against which the local businesses owned by politically powerful Unionist families could not compete (most graphically in the case of textiles, where there were several sell-outs to transnational textile giants which the Unionists attracted into Northern Ireland) led to the adoption of measures that had been recommended after the second world war by civil servants, but shelved by anti-interventionist Unionist ministers . Stormont now accepted that capitalist restructuring had to be based on transnational corporations and that this
The rise and fall of Craigavon demanded regional physical planning of new `growth centres' of labour and modern infrastructure. If this was not done, the region would be economically marginalised . The Unionist Party had to abandon its traditional hostility to planning and under the new leadership of O'Neill in the early 1960s embarked on the series of measures to modernise capitalism, including massive infrastructure expenditures and improvements in health, education and training services . A refusal to intervene in securing a place for Northern Ireland's industrial workers in the new international division of labour would threaten the Unionist Party's working-class supporters . The history of this interesting period is well-documented by Weiner (1980) . The first sector of the new town earmarked for development between the existing centres of Lurgan and Portadown, and the only new sector to be completed, was named after William Brownlow, planter founder of Lurgan . Building began in 1967 with the crash development of the Meadowbrook and Moylinn estates for the large Goodyear plant . Goodyear was one of the first transnationals to locate in Craigavon, creating 2,000 jobs, many of which were unskilled and went to catholic workers . It was bought with an incentive grant believed to be 45 per cent of the £6 .5m needed to install the plant (Belfast Telegraph, 18 June 1969) . Within a few months Goodyear ran into a labour shortage which badly hampered production targets . The main reason was the new town's high rents which meant that workers from Belfast especially could not afford to move to Craigavon . The Managing Director of Goodyear argued that the new town's houses should have been built to lower standards and rented out more cheaply : I hate to say that housing in Craigavon is too good for those who come . I just think it is a little bit too rich for the pocket book . (Belfast Telegraph, 18 June 1969) And, indeed, some of the subsequent building used `quick and cheap package deals' . Though the problem of paying for the housing was eased by the introduction of means-tested rent rebates for low income tenants, the `experimental' design and construction defects of the new houses made them extremely difficult to let . Belfast was to supply much of the labour for the new town, and this involved the forced displacement from catholic and protestant working-class areas in the inner-city of what would have been thousands of families if the redevelopment programme had not been prematurely halted by community action, the recession and a switch of emphasis to rehabilitation (these were all related ; see Weiner, 1980 ; Parson, 1981 ; Blackman, 1984) . There was also a mobility scheme involving cash grants for
123
Capital & Class 124
people willing to move from Belfast to the new town, and consideration was given to ending the control of private rents in the city in the belief that this would `push' more tenants out to Craigavon and other `growth centres' in the Belfast sub-region . The attempt to engineer religious mixing in Craigavon failed . Far from population movement leading to mixing as The Economist had predicted, many of the new arrivals in Craigavon were predominantly catholic refugees from the violence in Belfast which was enforcing population movements there on a massive scale (Darby & Williamson, 1978) . Polarisation occurred, and violence and paramilitary activity greatly increased in many parts of the new town so that Craigavon came to constitute the apex of what many catholics call the `North Armagh Murder Triangle' . The new town was one of the few places where housing was immediately available because of the number of vacancies, but often catholics did not want to move where the vacancies were . A pattern of religious segregation became established, with the eastern portion of the new town mostly catholic and the western portion mostly protestant . More recently, another type of refugee has arrived in the town's ghettos - many of the Vietnamese boat people accepted by the UK have been housed in Craigavon's sink estates . Much of the new build in Brownlow was of a high standard and all the estates had good local facilities . By the early 1980s most of the estates had settled down and the new sector had a total population of 12,000 . However, the end of the 1970s had seen the emergence of a housing surplus due to stagnating economic and population growth and the unpopularity of the area . Growing numbers of houses began to stand empty in the most unpopular estates, especially among the groups of threestorey and split-level units built on the assumption of large families who could afford to furnish and heat them . Defects associated with system-built designs emerged and were compounded by bad construction . Expensive heating systems were abandoned by tenants in favour of cheaper alternatives which often caused damp and mould . Some of the layouts created a maze-like feeling and overblown car ownership projections led to groups of garages lying empty and vandalised, with people isolated from the main employment and leisure centres . Landscaped areas became overgrown and collected litter, while the neighbourhood centres were vandalised and scrawled with graffitti . Deindustrialisation and new town decline
The Northern Ireland Development Programme 1970-75 (Matthew, Wilson & Parkinson, 1970) had argued that 'Craigavon is poised to advance very quickly' (p . 136) but called on the government to locate more public projects in the area . Significant economic and
The rise and fall of Craigavon population growth were anticipated . By the early 1970s, however, it was clear that these forecasts were over-optimistic . But building continued, possibly because while the `catholic extension' of Lurgan had been completed, the final phases of the new town were a 'protestant extension' of Portadown, the Parkmore estate in the Mandeville sector . Furthermore, very heavy state investments had alredy been made and the money was there to continue the building programme . As in Britain, by 1977 the economic crisis and growing concern about the decline of inner urban areas, especially Belfast, led to a shift of resources away from greenfield development towards urban `revitalisation' . Craigavon Development Commission had already been disbanded in 1973, leaving Brownlow politically marginalised and underrepresented in the Borough Council which, with its Unionist majority mostly based in Portadown and Lurgan, was antipathetic to the area . Brownlow was left with inadequate local facilities and services, high housing and fuel costs and growing unemployment (Craigavon Independent Advice Centre, 1982) . The Northern Ireland Housing Executive replaced the Commission as the local housing authority in 1973 . In response to the deteriorating economic climate planning policy was revised and the Northern Ireland Regional Physical Development Strategy 1975-95 (Department of the Environment for Northern Ireland, 1976) replaced the growth-oriented Matthew Plan . The region's population would be concentrated into 26 `District Towns' and strict controls over residential development in the countryside would be implemented (which caused much protest and were eventually relaxed) . Craigavon was being left to `go it alone on the assumption that it is sufficiently established and dynamic to ensure regenerative growth' (unpublished consultants' report dated 1979) . In 1978 the Craigavon area recorded the lowest unemployment rate in Northern Ireland (Morrissey, 1980) . By the end of the decade, though, industrial decline had set in and investment dried up . Between 1960 and 1980 there were 52 closures in Craigavon, representing over half of those firms that were producing in 1960 (McCullough, undated) . Over the same period 60 new firms arrived, mainly state-assisted American, German and British companies, giving a net gain of only 8 firms despite massive public investment and promotion . Many of the remaining employers were public bodies or established local firms taking advantage of the new town's modern infrastructure and services . In April 1987 `official' unemployment in the Craigavon travel-towork area stood at 19 .1 per cent ; marginally below the Northern Ireland average of 20 .6 per cent (Department of Economic Development, 1987) . Community surveys of Brownlow, how-
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The rise and fall of Craigavon 127
ever, have indicated levels of unemployment two to four times higher than the Craigavon average . The Goodyear plant eventually closed in 1982 after a series of redundancies, with the loss of 750 jobs . It was soon followed by Ulster Laces, with the loss of 400 jobs . With such a high level of job losses the main reason why people might move to Craigavon disappeared . The population projected in 1967 was 100,000 by 1980 ; in September 1979 the population stood at 57,500 and was expected to rise to only 70-73,000 by the year 2000 (Northern Ireland Housing Executive, 1982) . The brief for Craigavon had been to plan for 120,000 by the 1980s, with growth potential to around 180,000 by the end of the century (Department of the Environment for Northern Ireland, undated) . Craigavon Independent Advice Centre (1982) summed up the new town's employment experience as follows : The construction of new roads, housing and industrial sites provided extensive employment opportunities . It is said of many local entrepreneurs at the time- `The M 1 made him'but it cannot be said that the workers of Lurgan received an equal and lasting share of such good fortune . (p . 5)
Welcome to the home of your dreams! (graffitti on a
Managing the
vandalised and boarded up house in Craigavon, 1982)
ghetto
The impact of these various problems was manifested on three estates in particular - Ridgeway, Rathmore and Rosmoyle . In 1981 only 25 per cent of the houses in the three estates were occupied . Ridgeway had been fully occupied at first, but 78 per cent of the 192 houses were vacant by 1981 . Conditions were poor : The 3-storey houses were unusual and alien in character and proved expensive to heat and furnish . Tenants have complained of roof and other defects resulting in damp penetration and condensation, and some of these defects may be traced to bad workmanship, during the disjointed contract phases . The 2-storey houses also gave cause for tenants' complaints related mainly to minor repairs . All these problems have been compounded by a casual level of provision of municipal services, viz . street lighting, street cleaning and refuse disposal . (Unpublished consultants' report, 1979) On 16 August 1979 the Lurgan Mail carried a major feature headlined The problems facing Ridgeway . It reported tenants' complaints about vandalism, house-stripping, bad designs, rats,
Capital & Class 128
lack of children's play facilities and the difficulty of heating the wooden-framed and badly insulated houses . The article stated : The first impression of Ridgeway is one of desolation . Of the 300 houses, only 30-40 are occupied . Windows, if not boarded up or bricked up, are smashed . Wall tiles have also been smashed by the vandals and broken glass litters the roads . . . This is contrasted with the neat, homely interiors of the occupied houses . A tenant told the reporter that : When we go into Lurgan to shop, we are ashamed to give our address because of the bad name the estate has got . . . The residents who are left are not the gypsies and problem families they are made out to be . . . Why should we pay extra rent for the shacks we are living in, the rent should be halved . Some of us are suffering from depression brought on by the conditions, and some are still recovering from injuries received in our homes . In June 1979 a group of tenants organised themselves into the Ridgeway Action Committee to demand a rent and rates reduction, a playground, quicker repairs, demolition of the threestorey houses and disconnection of water and gas supplies when vacant houses were boarded up . Local politicians showed little interest in these struggles . In September a protest march to the Housing Executive's District Office was well-supported by tenants . Demands were made for the cleaning out of vacant homes that were attracting rats . A list of repairs that needed doing was presented . These included leaking windows, rotting window frames, damp and mouldy bedrooms and leaking water pipes . However the Action Committee folded in the summer of 1980 . The Housing Executive's response to the actions and its own consultants' report on the problem was to grant all requests for transfer from estates like Ridgeway, rather than spend money on renovation . For the state, the job of community workers was to organise the social proletariat of Brownlow to help themselves ; to encourage `community activities' among a dominated and exploited section of the working class . Most looked for individual rather than collective solutions, and indeed individual refusals to live in the sink estates were very effective in their cumulative effect as rows of houses came to stand empty . In July 1980 the Housing Executive commissioned a further expensive study by the New University of Ulster, completed in 1981 . Assuming very low growth in the long term, this report recommended that existing tenants in the three estates be trans-
The rise and fall of Craigavon ferred to one estate, or one plus part of another estate, and the remaining housing areas be either demolished or `mothballed' . ' The issue was whether a future increase in demand was likely before vacant houses became vandalised and irrepairable . The Housing Executive spent several months considering these secret reports . They faced a number of problems . Firstly, there was a lack of demand for housing in the area . Secondly, much of the housing was unpopular and had become dumping estates . The strong kinship patterns still important in Northern Ireland had failed to develop . Thirdly, there was the attachment of people to their existing communities for reasons of local ties and security . Fourthly, the Executive was faced with a conflict between regenerating Belfast or filling empty houses in Craigavon . Privatisation of as much of the public sector housing as possible was seen as one solution ; already an estate originally built for renting had been sold for owner-occupation because the Executive was convinced they could not fill it as rented housing . Various packages were introduced to tempt buyers . One Housing Executive officer stated :
129
At the moment Brownlow is approximately 90 per cent Housing Executive stock . We hope that in five years time it will be 50 :50 . If people buy, people will stay . This was very optimistic . Although hundreds of houses were later sold cheaply to `homesteaders', many were demolished (and were included in Housing Executive claims of success in reducing vacancies!) . All the 192 derelict houses in the Ridgeway estate, twelve years old and with considerable debts remaining on them, were sold to a private developer for a reputed £500 each and demolished to make way for private bungalows . But there was more than this to the Housing Executive's privatisation `solution' : the whole exercise was packaged as a tenants' participation project . Throughout Northern Ireland the Housing Executive has been slow to promote tenant participation in housing management, largely because of an exaggerated fear that tenants' associations would be `taken over' by paramilitaries . The Chair of the Housing Executive until 1984, Charles Brett, wrote of tenant participation in his recent book : A new phrase has recently crept into currency- `meaningful consultation' - by which those concerned mean `consultation leading to the outcome we desire' . Any consultation which does not lead to that result is dismissed as cosmetic and , meaningless' . . . Let me make it plain that I am much in favour of tenant participation in any reasonably democratic, C &
C 32-I
The participation strategy
Capital & Class 130
united and homogeneous society . But in a community which is deeply divided, it poses extreme dangers . There is the recurrent fear that paramilitary organisations may, through unassailable spokesmen, gain control of tenant committees : far from improbable, it has happened on several occasions and in several places in Northern Ireland over the past decade . (Brett, 1986 : pp . 118-119) However, prompted by new legislation bringing Northern Ireland into line with the tenant consultation provisions of the 1980 Housing Act in England and Wales, and lobbying by a number of voluntary organisations for tenant involvement in housing management, the Executive agreed to `joint management' with tenants in Brownlow . The Executive had already worked successfully with the tenants' association in the Meadowbrook estate over heating conversions, and started to see the `joint management' approach as good public relations . Today the Housing Executive has the goal of joint management agreements with `representative' tenants' associations on all of its estates in Northern Ireland . But some community activists are suspicious about its motives and not without reason . A housing officer in Craigavon commented in an interview in October 1981 : The motive is self-interest in these exercises . The Executive doesn't have the resources to offer a comprehensive service to individuals . It's struggling to maintain its houses and collect the rent . That's why it's convenient to work with tenants' associatins . They're doing work that could be seen as that of the Housing Executive . We have to give them some power . We have to trade off satisfying a tenants' association against satisfying an individual tenant . The former always wins, it's good politics . . . It's no answer to bring the Housing Executive and community workers closer together . We must maintain our professionalism. Professional community workers are agency bashers . They don't have to make priorities between different areas . To them everything is a priority, but the Executive has to allocate finite resources . In effect the Housing Executive has been attempting to incorporate potentially disruptive tenants' associations into'nonpolitical' housing management. This is not surprising ; according to its first chairperson, Sir Desmond Lorimer, the Housing Executive was established to `take housing out of politics' (Rowland Report, 1979) . But while this was originally done to cope with civil unrest, it has become an accepted feature of housing policy in Northern Ireland and one that has even been
The rise and fall of Craigavon suggested as a model for Britain to follow (Brett, 1986) . This incoporation of a measure introduced to deal with an `emergency' situation into `normal' social policy has been documented by Ditch and Morrissey (1982), especially with regard to the punitive Payment for Debt Act which was originally introduced to deal with the rent strike against internment in 1971-72, but is now used to get the poor to pay their rent and fuel bills . In fact, housing managers have become poverty managers, with almost 80 per cent of Housing Executive tenants estimated eligible for housing benefit (Singleton, 1986) . The part played by the Executive in imposing the system's `logic' emerged clearly in an interview with one of its senior officers : In the early 1970s tenants' opinions about houses being uninhabitable couldn't be accepted . We're involved in a psychological war . We have to keep up the spirits of the tenants . Good housing management looks at what people's needs are, but we don't wash our dirty linen in public . . . The Executive makes representations to the government for funds based on these needs . We also have our own internal arguments, for example, with architects over flat roofs and grey bricks . . . I'm in favour of strong tenants' associations as consultative vehicles . Then we don't have to deal with individuals . But the Executive must watch for political motives, like councillors getting at the state . In these circumstances community workers had a role in helping to organise the social proletariat into responsible nonpolitical groups which the Housing Executive and other agencies of the state could work with . In Craigavon the fact that local community workers weren't doing that meant that the Housing Executive teamed up with a `respectable' voluntary organisation to parachute in someone who would . The Executive implemented a `priority estates' programme for Brownlow's ten emptiest estates . Its main interest in the strategy was to promote the sale of vacant units . But the most prominent feature was the appointment via the Northern Ireland Voluntary Trust (NtvT) of a Development Officer as an `honest broker' between tenants' groups and the Executive, and the appointment directly by the Executive of a Strategy Co-ordinator . A federal grouping of community group representatives which had been set up under the old Development Commission, Brownlow Community Council, was recognised as representing the tenants . This effectively short-circuited local councillors and the problems of operating in formal politics, especially in view of the particularly hard-line Loyalist make-up of Craigavon Borough Council and its hostility to community
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action in Brownlow which it regarded as republican-inspired (Craigavon Independent Advice Centre, 1982) . With the help of local community workers the Community Council drew up Brownlow Matters : the tenants' view on Brownlow, which outlined the main problems of the area and pressed for participation in decisions affecting the whole of Brownlow, rather than the selective consultation with tenants in `problem estates' that was on offer from the Executive . It argued for universal improvements to heating, housing and local facilities and services, rather than the Executive's selective `priority estates' approach . However Brownlow Matters was largely ignored by the Executive, which pursued its own strategy . One demand that could be conceded was the replacement of gas and district heating systems . According to the ex-Chair of the Housing Executive, District Heating had been imposed on the Board by the Ministry, while the Board was conscious that this could overstrain the low household incomes of its tenants : Putting it at its lowest, we said a tenant should have the right to burn his furniture or even our bannisters rather than freeze to death . (Brett, 1986 : p . 98) The Housing Executive's priority estates strategy diverted local activists into projects which largely failed to create 'communities' and essentially met on a small and cheap scale gaps in existing services . Some groups refused to participate ; the Craigavon Independent Advice Centre opted out of the priority estates strategy in January 1984, as did a few other tenants' associations which took up local issues themselves unfettered by any `joint management' agreement . The participation strategy was further developed however, only to flounder on the problems of sustaining autonomous organisations in neighbourhoods lacking identity or common class interests . The Northern Ireland Voluntary Trust and the Housing Executive jointly initiated a Tenant Liaison Officers Project in 1986 . Six community workers (TLOS) were employed to liaise between tenants' associations and the Housing Executive in six `problem' estates or groups of estates, including Brownlow . In Brownlow the major focus was to develop the `joint management agreement' between the Housing Executive and Brownlow Community Council . But despite the efforts of the Housing Executive to formalise the Community Council's representative but non-political role the Council failed to meet the Executive's requirement of `a high level of tenant representation' . Controversies about petty corruption and non-communication between leading figures in the Community Council and the TLO led to the joint management agreement being suspended by the Housing
The rise and fall of Craigavon 133
Executive . In the place of the Community Council the TLO formed a `more representative' support group from local tenants' associations but the Housing Executive appeared to be losing interest, not that the vacancy problem had been contained . Participaton had brought some gains, notably the dismantling of District Heating, but, as elsewhere, no real power shifted to the working class of Brownlow .
Ultimately, Craigavon was about reproducing the working class for capital . The aim was to make labour available for transnationals in the fashion described by Byrne and Parson in their comparative study of Northern Ireland and North East England (1983) . When the transnationals did not invest on the scale planned for, and when those that did come pulled out, the state moved in to manage large numbers of empty houses and workless tenants. Although amidst all this the military struggle continued in Craigavon, the processes and experiences this article has documented were, it is suggested, of greater moment for the working class although by no means separate from these other struggles . This final section attempts to explain why . The working class in Northern Ireland is deeply divided . Its reproduction involves complex relations which are far from stable and which have only fairly recently been subjected to detailed research . The analysis produced by Bew, Gibbon and Patterson (1979) has been particularly important in bringing to light evidence about how the reproduction of labour has been managed in Northern Ireland, and class responses to this process . The state plays a crucial part in their analysis . Although the Northern Ireland state was created by an external force, Britain, its origins lie in internal forces that were contingent on uneven capitalist development and its interaction with religious differences, which became deeply politicised . The protestant class alliance was a product of uneven capitalist development in Ireland . Hall and Morrissey (1984) point out that : By the early twentieth century, industrialization in the north-east was a process undertaken from within rather than as a result of the pursuit of superprofits by an external `power' and the essential relationship of dependency was that of a typical British region on the City of London as the gateway to truly colonial markets . . . It was this incorporation which was confirmed in the creation of the Northern Ireland state and the participation of the area in the postwar era of the welfare state . (pp . 24, 42)
Craigavon, capital and class
Capital & Class 134
To this could be added participation in the modernisation era of the 1960s . Such analyses counter the anti-imperialist school of Marxist thought on Ireland . The anti-imperialists argue that Unionism (and thus sectarianism) are sustained by the `prop' of the British state in Northern Ireland, rather than as a case of working-class division being reproduced by internal forces, notably the `anti-imperialist' military campaign . Thus Purdie (1983) writes : In fact Nationalism and Unionism are ideologies created by specific groups of Irish people, at a specific historical conjuncture, to advance and defend their different interests . In their conflict Britain has often been as much a symbol as an active participant . In any case if you remove the `prop', you will not wipe the minds clean . Rather you will intensify their rivalry as they struggle for advantage in the new situation . (p . 14) An alternative position is that of O'Dowd, Rolston and Tomlinson (1980) who argue that the Northern Ireland state is penetrated by sectarian class relations, i .e . the Northern Ireland state is part of the reproduction of sectarianism itself . For these writers it seems that the problem is not one of opposing the hierarchical division of the working class in capitalist structures (see Byrne & Parson, 1983, for such an account), but one of removing the structural cause of sectarianism which they see as the Northern Ireland state, even under Direct Rule . However Chapman et al (undated) point out in a critique of this analysis that the reproduction of working-class division does not stop at institutionalised sectarianism . What about Northern Ireland's deep gender divisions or the divisions between employed and unemployed or youth and adults? Sectarian relations, like gender and age relations, are crucial forms of domination/subordination . These they argue have to be challenged by forms of political action that involve the `dominating' group in the struggle to emancipate the `dominated' (e .g . the involvement of protestant workers in campaigns against discrimination or emergency legislation, or men's involvement in women's struggles) . My own conclusion from these debates is that sectarian relations are an example of relations of domination which divide the working class . As well as benefitting those who dominate they give rise to a range of different working-class experiences of exploitation under capital, which rules by division (see Miliband, 1985, for a fuller discussion) . Class relations are relations of exploitation (the appropriation of surplus value by capital) but capital maintains its hegemony by reproducing relations of domination - putting one section of the working class in charge of the
The rise and fall of Craigavon other (Byrne & Parson, 1983) . As Byrne (1986) states, the wage labour-capital relationship is the determinant of social existence in capitalism, giving rise to the need to discipline labour in work and control thos who are out of work - those who are `less eligible' and therefore forcibly deprived . The need to maintain this relationship led to the Matthew strategy in Northern Ireland and subsequently led to state strategies to control the reproduction of the social proletariat created by the deindustrialisation of Craigavon and other `growth centres' . The parallels between the above account of Craigavon and Byrne's (1986) account of the state's management of the marginalised working class in Gateshead are striking . He argues that the Gateshead-Newcastle Inner City Partnership is an increasingly common form of state administration which replaces local democracy, and the challenges for state power that can be made through it, with undemocratic corporate management, thus controlling rather than empowering the working-class poor . The Northern Ireland Housing Executive pre-dates the setting up of inner-city partnerships, but emerged out of circumstances that have a lot of similarities . Housing in Northern Ireland is an extreme example of functions too sensitive to form the focus of direct political mobilisation being removed into a quasigovernmental agency effectively unaccountable to elected representatives (Dunleavy, 1985) . The Gateshead Inner City Partnership, according to Byrne, arose out of capitalism's failure to deliver any more reforms once accumulation slowed down . In such a situatin the capitalist state needs control and reorganises its agencies to : . . . work by `depoliticising' or more precisely 'de-democratising' the processes of policy formation and implementation . A specific example is provided by the workings of the `Inner City Partnership' in GatesheadNewcastle which deals in large part with the management of the inner-city marginalised . The relation of administration to class is mediated through a set of `poverty professionals' who in day to day interaction impose the logic of the system on potentially disruptive groups of individuals . (p . 164) In many ways the crux of the Northern Ireland `problem' is that only those who supported partition and membership of the United Kingdom as a lasting and successful solution were defined as having a right to control the state structure (which, however, the protestant working class has never done), and this was defined in terms of a protestant/catholic divide . But a focus on this division alone gives a distorted understanding of Northern Irish
135
The rise and fall of Craigavon labour history by giving the struggle for a united privileged position (e .g. Farrell, 1976) . Purdie (1983) the implications of the evidence that has been coming to critique of the Chris Reeves Tv programme `The Cause of
Ireland a spells out light in a Ireland' :
Recent writing by socialists in Ireland has produced a far clearer understanding of the Protestant working class . Instead of cardboard cut-outs manipulated by their masters, we can see the way in which they have swung between a class opposition to the Unionist bourgeoisie and a class alliance against Irish nationalism . The empirical evidence is unshakeable . Fragmentation of the Unionist bloc occurs when a threat to the constitutional status quo is distant ; conversely when Irish nationalism is on the offensive, the alliance is reassmbled . (p . 14) Craigavon was born out of one such period when the constitutional threat appeared distant to most working-class protestants . The failure of the IRA's border campaign to destabilise Northern Ireland led to it being called off in 1962 . Economic growth during the mid-'60s saw Labour politics reassert itself in both the North and the Republic . The Unionist bourgeoisie had to respond to a changing agenda ; during the years 1958-1964 it was facing both mass protests against job losses from protestant workers and the beginning of demands for equal citizenship within the Northern Ireland state from catholics . The response was an era of modernisation tied up to attracting in the transnationals, a course which was being followed in other peripheral regions of the United Kingdom, especially North East England (Blackman, 1985) . In Britain the modernisation of the 1960s was a corporatist strategy . It was based on regional planning, redevelopment and new towns, with the incorporation of local Labour leaders and an acceptance that the needs of big industrial and construction capital were the same as the needs of working-class people . In Northern Ireland there were no such `Labour lieutenants of capitalism' . Northern Ireland's era of modernisation was to be overseen by a new `liberal' faction of Unionism led by Terence O'Neill . Under O'Neill the Irish Congress of Trade Unions was officially recognised for the first time, ambitious physical and economic plans were adopted and the historic act of inviting the Irish Republic's Prime Minister to Stormont for talks about economic cooperation took place . The costs of modernisation were borne by the working class, catholic and protestant, either through the destruction of communities by redevelopment overseen by a Nationalist Minister for Housing and Planning at one stage in 1974 - or through the creation of a social proletariat in the new town labour pools which were largely filled from
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redeveloped urban areas and the countryside . It is true that the social proletariat is predominantly catholic, but its protestant members - marginalised workers whose experience is more one of public sector housing, social security and community projects than of formal, permanent employment - have grown substantially in numbers in recent years . Although the politics of the Northern Ireland statelet have changed radically since it was established, Craigavon bears witness to its always capitalist nature . Many writers have pointed out Craigavon's sectarian origins ; its location `east of the Bann', its name and the choice of the Commission's first chairperson and the windfall land profits made by the large Unionist landowners while the small farmers had their land filched . However the ways new town planning actually reinforced sub-regional uneven development, excluded the working class and involved clientelist relationships between the local state and big capital have been documented for several British new towns (Robinson, 1983 ; Mullan, 1980 ; Austrin & Beynon, 1979 ; Dickens, Duncan, Goodwin & Gray, 1985) . The capitalist determinants which shaped planning in Northern Ireland and Britain were broadly similar ; there were even strong parallels in the social relations of the economy, state and civil society, although the question of who occupied places within such social relations (e .g . local state leaders and mangers, skilled and unskilled working class) was highly politicised in Northern Ireland because of the monopoly Unionists had over dominating positions which was made possible by the creation of the Northern Ireland statelet . While the subjugation of the social proletariat experienced in Brownlow is common to many other marginalised areas of the UK, in Northern Ireland such proceses are mediated by sectarian ideologies and practices . However the relations of both `sides' to the state have become increasingly problematic . The 'anti-imperialists' answer of military and political struggle against the state is serving to deepen working-class divisions and sectarianism within the Protestant working class, including its rapidly-expanding `residuum' of long-term unemployed . What follows from a class analysis of Craigavon's history is a need to promote discussions of such popular experiences across working-class areas in Northern Ireland, as part of a collective identification of future directions and possibilities . In this respect, the work of such groups as the Ulster Peoples College is of great importance . In Craigavon the work of Craigavon Independent Advice Centre, the Trades Council and other projects and activities has been important at a local level . The development of tenants' associations, welfare rights campaigns, advice centres and other bases for collective action that have potential for cross-
The rise and fall of Craigavon
locality alliances appears particularly important . The situation calls for support of struggles that combine pluralist and class politics, focussing especially on demands for the reconstruction of the localities most in crisis, such as Brownlow . The resources for such reconstruction, other than labour and land, do not exist in these localities : the struggles have to be taken beyond them and the 'localness' of social action to build alliances at the levels at which the powerful institutions of state and capital operate . The experience of being working class and struggling against class oppression is a widespread experience in Northern Ireland . The point has been made forcibly by Weiner (1980) and Parson (1981) in their accounts of housing campaigns . Socialists can contribute to this action and its autonomy through organisation and research support . Ultimately, however, what is called for is the building of a political vehicle, or an alliance of such vehicles, which have organic links with anti-sectarian class struggle in civil society and the economy . Capitalism and sectarianism have disorganised the working class in Northern Ireland ; socialist praxis can be aimed at the reorganisation of the class on the basis of common experiences and needs . It is at this level - in the difficult struggles to build the pre-conditions for democratic socialism in Northern Ireland - that reproductive struggles have their greatest significance .
Acknowledgements Thanks to Roberta Woods, who read and commented on earlier drafts, and to Brendan Carolan and his revealing MSc thesis on Craigavon . The co-operation of a number of people, especially in the Craigavon Independent Advice Centre, is gratefully acknowledged .
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Acheson, N . (1986) `Community House Project', Scope, No . 99, pp . 8-9 . Acheson, N . & Carolan, B . (1984) `Priority Estates : the Brownlow experience', Scope, No. 73, pp . 4-6 . Austrin, T. & Beynon, H . (1979) Global Outpost : the Working Class Experience of Big Business in the North East of England, 1964-1979 . Department of Sociology and Social Policy, Univerity of Durham . Bew, P., Gibbon, P . & Patterson, H . (1979) The State in Northern Ireland, 1971-72 . Manchester University Press . Birrell, D . & Murie, A . (1980) Policy and Government in Northern Ireland . Gill and Macmillan, Dublin . Blackman, T . (1984) `Planning in Northern Ireland : the shape of things to come?' The Planner, 70(1), pp . 12-15 . Blackman, T . (1985) `Disasters that link Ulster and the North East', Town & Country Planning, 54 . Brett, C . (1986) Housng a Divided Community . Institute of Public Administration, Dublin . Byrne, D . (1986) `State Sponsored Control-Managers, Poverty Professionals and the Inner City Working Class', in K . Hoggart & B . Kofman (eds), Politics, Geography and Social Stratification . Groom Helm, London, pp. 144-67 . Byrne, D . & Parson, D . (1983) `The state and the reserve army : the management of class relations in space', in J . Anderson, S . Duncan & R . Hudson (eds), Redundant Spaces in Cities and Regions? Academic Press, London, pp . 127-54 . Carolan, B . (1987) The Management of the Craigavon Housing Crisis : an assessment of the Northern Ireland Housing Executive's 'Craigavon Strategy' 1983-1986 . Unpublished MSc Dissertation, University of Ulster . Chapman, T ., Morrissey, M . & Pinkerton, J . (undated) `Towards a Critical Social Policy in Northern Ireland' . Unpublished paper . Craigavon Independent Advice Centre (1982) Craigavon in the 80s . Craigavon Independent Advice Centre. Darby, J . & Williamson, A . (1978) Violence and the Social Services in Northern Ireland . Heinemann, London . Department of Economic Development (1986) Press Notice, 16 October . Department of the Environment for Northern Ireland (1976) Regional Physical Development Strategy 1975-95 . HMso, Belfast. Department of the Environment for Northern Ireland (undated) Historical Background . Information paper on Craigavon . Dickens, P ., Duncan, S ., Goodwin, M . & Gray, F . (1985) Housing, States and Localities . Methuen, London . Ditch, J . & Morrissey, M . (1982) `Social policy implications of emergency legislation in Northern Ireland', Critical Social Policy 1(3), pp . 19-39 . Dunleavy, P. (1985) `The state we're in', New Socialist, No . 33, December, pp . 14-19 . Farrell, M . (1976) Northern Ireland : the Orange State. Pluto Press, London . Hall, R . & Morrissey, M . (1984) `The Northern Ireland economy and unemployment : an alternative prospective', in M . Morrissey (ed . ), The Other Crisis : Unemployment in Northern Ireland . Ulster Polytechnic, Jordanstown . Hutchinson, R . W . & Stark, T . (1981) The `Difficult to Let' Problems in Craigavon: a Solution Strategy . New University of Ulster, Coleraine .
The rise and fall of Craigavon Jessop, B ., Bonnett, K ., Bromley, S . & Ling, T . (1984) `Authoritarian populism, two nations and Thatcherism', New Left Review, 147, pp . 32-60 . Jessop, B ., Bonnett, K ., Bromley, S . & Ling, T . (1985) 'Thatcherism and the politics of hegemony : a reply to Stuart Hall', New Left Review, 153, pp . 87-101 . Martin, J . (1982) `The conflict in Northern Ireland : Marxist interpretations', Capital & Class 18, pp . 56-71 . Matthew, R. (1963) Belfast Regional Survey and Plan: Recommendations and Conclusions, Cmnd 451, HMso, Belfast . Matthew, R ., Wilson, T . & Parkinson, J . (1970) Northern Ireland: Development Programme 1970-75 . HMSO, Belfast . McCullough, M . (undated) Craigavon . Unpublished paper, College of Business Studies, Belfast . Miliband, R . (1985) `The New Revisionism in Britain', New Left Rview, 150, pp . 5-26 . Morrissey, M . (1980) The Limits of Community Action . Unpublished M . Phil thesis, Ulster Polytechnic, Jordanstown . Mullan, B . (1980) Stevenage Ltd : Aspects of the planning and politics of Stevenage new town 1945-78 . Routledge & Kegan Paul, London . Northern Ireland Housing Executive (1982) Annual Report 1981/82 . Northern Ireland Housing Executive, Belfast . Northern Ireland Housing Executive (1983a) Corporate Strategy Review . Northern Ireland Housing Executive, Belfast . Northern Ireland Housing Executive (1983b) Twelfth Annual Report 1982183 . Northern Ireland Housing Executive, Belfast . Northern Ireland Housing Executive (1986) Fifteenth Annual Report 1985/86 . Northern Ireland Housing Executive, Belfast . O'Dowd, L ., Rolston, B . & Tomlinson, M . (1980) Northern Ireland: Between Civil Rights and Civil War . CSE Books, London . Panitch, L . (1986) `The impasse of social democratic politics', The Socialist Register 1985/86. Merlin Press, London, pp . 50-97 . Parliament of Northern Ireland (1964) Parliamentary Debates (Hansard), Vol . 56, Session 1963-64 . HMSO, Belfast . Parson, D . (1981) `Urban renewal and housing action areas in Belfast', International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 15(2), pp . 218-29 . Purdie, B . (1983) `Is the Cause of Ireland the Cause of Labour?', Fortnight, November, pp . 14-15 . Robinson, R . (1983) `State planning of spatial change : compromise and contradiction in Peterlee New Town', in J . Anderson, S . Duncan & R . Hudson (eds), Redundant Spaces in Cities and Regions? Academic Press, London, pp . 263-84 . Rowland Report (1979) Report of the Investigatory Committee into Northern Ireland Housing Executive Contracts . HMSO, London . Singleton, D . (1986) `Northern Ireland housing : number one priority but for how much longer?' in D . Singleton (ed .), Aspects of Housing Policy and Practice in Northern Ireland 1984-1986 . Department of Town and Country Planning, Queen's University of Belfast . Weiner, R . (1980) The Rape and Plunder of the Shankill . Farset CoOperative Press, Belfast .
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COMMENTARY
John Holloway The Red Rose of Nissan Nissan factory in Sunderland was opened on 11 September 1986 with a great fanfare of publicity : television advertisements, documentaries, newspaper supplements, news coverage of the formal opening by the prime minister . The theme of all this publicity was that the Nissan plant opened a new age . Here is a factory where managers and workers alike wear white coats and share the same canteen, where managers and workers alike are young (average age in the late twenties), a company where there have never been strikes, where trade unions are not forbidden but are redundant because workers enjoy good conditions and identify with the aims of the company . The factory of the new age, of the new technology, of the new consensus . Light years away from the militancy of the car workers in the seventies . Light years away too from the macho man• THE NEW
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agement of Edwardes, MacGregor or Murdoch . Some weeks later, another event was surrounded by just as much glossy publicity, just as much sophisticated marketing : the launching of the newlook Labour Party at the annual Conference, the party of the new Moral Majority, the party of the new consensus . Here too is a new age, a break with the past . The lid is closed on the dustbin of history with its evil-smelling politics of conflict and trade union militancy . These evil odours are dispelled by the sweet smell of the red rose, the macho militants are replaced by the gentle man with the flower . The dawn of a new harmony in industry, the heralding of a new politics of consensus . Is this just coincidence, or does it tell us something about the direction being taken by capitalism in Britain?
The red rose of Nissan suggested by the Nissan publicity is a contrast with the British car industry of the 1970s, and particularly with British Leyland . If British Leyland can be seen as a symbol of crisis, then Nissan symbolises its successful resolution . British Leyland symbolises not just the crisis of the car industry, not just the crisis of British capitalism, but the crisis of a particular pattern of production often referred to as Fordism . In contrast, Nissan represents not just the success of Japanese capital, but a new model of production relations, a current trend often referred to as neo-Fordism or post-Fordism . The crisis at British Leyland in the mid-1970s is significant, not only because it was a very large company and the last bastion of the British car industry, but because it stands as a stereotype of the industry associated with the long post-war boom . Production took place in large factories organised around the assembly line, very much in accordance with the principles adopted by Ford in the production of the Model T . The vast majority of the work was repetitive and required little skill . All the workers were organised in trade unions and throughout the long period of boom when any car produced could immediately be sold, they managed to achieve relatively high and constantly rising real wages . Dull, repetitive, unskilled work in the factory, compensated for by relatively high wages : the typical Fordist peace bargain was maintained . Ford's production of the Model T was trendsetting not only because of his use of the assembly line for the production of cars, but also because of the way in which consumption was promoted as both reward for and stimulus to production . Ford paid his workers the THE CONTRAST
high wages of five dollars a day in return for the intensive, monotonous work on the assembly line . With this wage they could become rich enough to buy a cheap car, thus stimulating demand for more Model Ts, more monotonous work, and so on . At British Leyland the figures were different, but the essence was the same, the core principle of post-war capitalist domination : accept the deadly, deadening alienation of boring work in return for high wages which will allow you to live the life of mass consumption, which will in turn generate demand for the products of ever more alienating boring work . Since, generally, it was men in this case who did the work in the factory while women were seen as being more closely associated with consumption, this pattern of relations at work implied the development of a certain pattern of gender relations and a certain type of sexuality . The pattern of domination in the factory was complemented by a pattern of domination in the home and it was on the basis of these relations that cars were produced : alienation in the factory produces alienation in the home, which in turn provides a stimulus to go out to alienated work . The keystone holding this structure together was the trade unions and the practice of collective bargaining . Through the annual rounds of collective bargaining the trade-off between the death of alienated labour and the `life' of consumption was regularly negotiated and renegotiated . Within this equilibrium there were, of course, conflicts and shifts in power . The long period of relative prosperity allowed the workers to build up a considerable position of strength . In British Leyland the bargaining strength
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of the workers (and the consequent limitations on management) were expressed most clearly in the system of mutuality . Under the mutuality system, management accepted that no new technology or reorganisation of working practices could be introduced without the prior agreement of the shop stewards . Mutuality was a striking embodiment of the strength of the workers within the Fordist equilibrium : the mutuality principle did not assert a revolutionary claim by the workers to control production, but merely made clear that management's rights were limited and that any intensification of labour must be paid for . `Payment for change' was the key principle of the mutuality system . Of course this was never the whole story . The Fordist wage contract in the factory could no more run smoothly than the marriage contract in the home . The trade-off between boredom at work and `life' outside could never be entirely successful . Inevitably, there were struggles in the factory which did not fall neatly into the Fordist pattern : struggles not just for higher wages, nor indeed for the control of production, but revolts against work as such : sabotage, absenteeism, wildcat strikes etc . Revolts against work in the only form in which it existed : as death, as the negation of life and creativity . For a long time, however, these expressions of frustration posed little threat to the structure as a whole. The Fordist peace deal was never the whole picture, but it was sufficiently real to provide a framework for the rapid and sustained growth of the British car industry (and other car industries) throughout the 1950s and much of the 1960s . However, it rested on a very fragile basis (like all social harmony in
a class society) : on the one hand, the balance between frustration and consumption was always a delicate (and potentially explosive) one, and on the other hand, the whole system presupposed the expansion of the market, the relatively easy sale of the cars produced . In the late 1960s and early 1970s the whole pattern of domination-andproduction began to crack . Accumulated boredom combined with the confidence born of a long period of unemployment to make it more and more difficult to contain frustrations within the factory . The bursting frustration found expression in high labour turnover, increasing absenteeism and sabotage, and the frequent outbreak of strikes . In the British car industry as a whole, the level of strike activity rose markedly after 1963 and then very dramatically indeed in the late 1960s and early 1970s : from 1969 to 1978 an annual average of more than 1,800,000 days were lost through strikes in the car industry, as compared with an average of 377,600 working days lost pear year in 1950-63 (Marsden et al, 1985 : 121) . Significantly, the majority of these strikes were not for higher wages, but arose out of disputes concerning conditions at work . In his Annual Report for 1976, the chairman of BL recognisd this : `In BL, though relatively few industrial disputes have been directly concerned with pay, so many strikes have occurred with no benefit either to the company or to the employees that one is forced to the conclusion that the underlying reason is the desire to make a protest.' (quoted in Television History Workshop 1985 : 81)
The red rose of Nissan The rising militancy of the late 1960s did not just aim at the renegotiation of the Fordist deal - more wages for nasty work . It struck at the core of Fordism itself: high wages were no longer sufficient to contain the accumulated frustration . As one manager commented : BL
`This protest was, in my view, a protest against the capitalism and the democracy of this country .' (Television History Workshop, 1985 : 81) This was not a revolutionary situation . There was no question, at British Leyland or elsewhere in Britain, of a revolutionary assault on capital . But it would be totally wrong to conclude from that that capital was not threatened . The structure of control which was the basis of capitalist development in the post-war period was being undermined . The capitalist class was not in imminent danger of being toppled, but certainly no British Leyland manager could speak with the confidence of the centurion in the gospels : `I say unto one, Go, and he goeth ; and to another, Come, and he cometh ; and to my servant, Do this, and he doeth it' (Luke 7 : vii) . The authority upon which the whole capitalist system of production is premised was no longer functioning . The loss of authority within the factories blended with the collapse of the other fragile pillar of Fordism . Difficulties in production everywhere (due to a combination of rising militancy and the fact that investments in new machinery were no longer leading to significant increases in productivity) hit profits and brought to an end the constant expansion of the capitalist market on which the smooth functioning of the Fordist system had been C & C
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premised . It was no longer true by the late 1960s that any car produced could be sold without difficulty and by 1974, when world crisis was manifest and the rise in oil prices took its effect on motorists, car companies had to compete intensely to sell their products . The car companies were forced to change their production methods in order to compete . Management too was forced to attack the established patterns of relations at work . From both sides of the capital-labour relation, the relative stability of Fordism was under assault . The period of compromise in which the trade unions had held the two sides together in apparent harmony gave way to a period of open conflict, open struggle for power . As the BL manager already quoted put it : `The only thing that really stands out is the fact that both management and the shop stewards appreciated the situation - they both knew what their objectives were, and they both admitted to each other what they were doing . There was no question of it being a battle that was raging with people who were denying it - both sides openly admitted this was a struggle . Management were saying "We are going to win" . Shop stewards said "We are going to win" .' (Television History Workshop, 1985 : 81) The crisis at British Leyland was the breaking out of open battle . The Fordist equilibrium, which had succeeded in containing frustrations and maintaining an adequate structure of control for so long that it had shaped a whole generation's image of capitalism, was broken . Capitalist crisis is never anything other than that : the breakdown of a
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relatively stable pattern of class domination . It appears as an economic crisis, expressed in a fall in the rate of profit, but its core is the failure of an established pattern of domination . From the point of view of capital, the crisis can be resolved only through the establishment of new patterns of domination . This does not mean that capital has new patterns ready-made to impose on the working class . For capital, the crisis can be resolved only through struggle, through the restoration of authority and through a far-fromsmooth search for new patterns of domination . In the case of British Leyland, the re-establishment of control became identified with the question of raising productivity . Raising productivity was seen as the key to the survival of the company in the face of international competition . Raising productivity was not just a question of introducing new machinery, but of getting workers to work harder . As a Central Policy Review Staff report of 1975 said : `With the same power at his elbow and doing the same job as his continental counterparts, a British car assembly worker produces only half as much output per shift .' (CPRS, 1975) In these circumstances, there was little point in introducing new technology until new attitudes and a new discipline had been established . New technology would require a new type of control over the workforce, but at the same time it could also contribute to the creation of that control . As one manager in Ford put it when talking of the installation of 39 new industrial robots :
`We haven't got control of the labour force . We can't force each man to put each weld in the right place . So we've tried to build in quality through the machines .' (Scarborough, 1986 : 99) In British Leyland, the re-establishment of managerial control and the introduction of new technology were very tightly intertwined in the planning of a new car model, the Metro, to be produced at the end of the 1970s . The decision to use the most advanced technology (automated multiwelders and robots) in the production of the Metro was taken in the mid-1970s, partly out of a concern for quality (machines being considered more reliable than workers) and partly because `there were felt to be unquantifiable advantages in using a technology which resulted in management having to deal with far fewer direct operatives' (Willman & Winch, 1985 : 50) . Once the decision was taken to invest in high technology and to construct a new plant (the New West works at Longbridge), it became more urgent than ever to establish managerial control before the new plant was opened . The attempt by management to establish control can be seen in two phases . The first phase, running from the financial collapse of the company and the consequent takeover by the Labour government in 1974 to the appointment of Michael Edwardes as chief executive in October 1977, aimed at the incorporation of the shop stewards . When the finances of the company collapsed in December 1974, the government commissioned a report by Sir Don Ryder, chairman of the National Enterprise Board . The Ryder Plan, published in April 1975, under-
The red rose of Nissan lined the urgency of change at British Leyland, but, recognising the strength of the shop stewards within the company, it sought to achieve change through winning their cooperation . In particular, the Plan accepted the continuing existence of the mutuality system and established a structure of joint management-shop steward committees to discuss a wide range of issues relating to company performance . After heated discussion, the shop stewards agreed to cooperate in the participation scheme, some even enthusiastically . As Derek Robinson, the convenor of the shop stewards at Longbridge, put it : `If we make Leyland successful, it will be a political victory . It will prove that ordinary working people have got the intelligence and determination to run industry .' (Guardian, 9 .4 .1979, quoted in Scarborough, 1986 : 102) Robinson's enthusiasm was not borne out by the experience . Discussions in the joint committees took place within a framework already tightly defined by managerial decisions (on the Metro, for example), and they were separated from the structure of collective bargaining in which the actual decisions on working practices were taken . Consequently, the shop stewards found, on the one hand, that they had exercised little influence and, on the other, that they were often compromised in the eyes of the workers they represented by their participation in managerial decisions (Willman & Winch, 1985 ; Scarborough, 1986) . From the management point of view, the participation exercise was both a success and a failure . On the one hand, it did promote some degree of
acceptance of the need for change ; as one manager put it, `participation was a success and helped us in selling the changes we wanted' (Scarborough, 1986 : 103) . On the other hand, it was a slow and cumbersome way of bringing about change and it did not establish the clear authority that management required : the power of the shop stewards was recognised and yet strike activity continued at a high level . In the view of Michael Edwardes : `The three-tier employee participation structure - a cornerstone of the Ryder remedy to solve the entrenched industrial relations problems - only produced a bureaucratic paperchase dissipating management resource and effort . Some management decisions were delayed by months while the joint consultative machinery tried unsuccessfully to grind out a consensus . Procedure and consultation to avert industrial relations problems appeared to overwhelm decision-making and action-taking, yet during this time the number of disputes rose sharply .' (Edwardes, 1984 : 39) By 1977, it was clear that the Ryder strategy could not bring about the recovery of the company : productivity continued to fall and with it British Leyland's share of the market . Since effective managerial control could not be achieved through the incorporation of the shop stewards, it was necessary for management to become more openly aggressive . In October 1977, Michael Edwardes was appointed by the National Enterprise Board (with the approval of the Labour government) as Chairman and Chief Executive of British Leyland .
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For Edwardes, the key to success was the reassertion of capital's control over labour : the `sine qua non of survival was to establish the right to manage' (Edwardes, 1984 : 54), and this would involve `counteracting shop steward power' (Edwardes, 1984 : 79) . Crucially, establishing the right to manage meant breaking the mutuality system and asserting management's right to introduce new working practices without the prior agreement of the shop stewards . Although Edwardes' managerial style was abrasive from the beginning, he first attacked the established pattern of management by taking on not the shop stewards but the managers themselves, getting rid of many and moving others to new positions . It was two years before he engaged the shop stewards in direct confrontation over the issue of mutuality . During those two years the position of the stewards had been considerably weakened by a number of plant closures, by the inflexibility of management in wage negotiations and by the sharp rise in unemployment at a national level . It was also weakened by management's new populist strategy, designed to mobilise the workers against the shop stewards . Claiming that the shop stewards did not represent the wishes of their members, management developed a policy (after February 1979) of going over the heads of the shop stewards and appealing directly to the workers themselves . `This often meant sending letters to employees' homes (where they could calmly and deliberately consider the situation with their families), the issuing of factory briefing sheets, and posters . When we felt a particular issue had wider
significance we used newspaper advertisements and they seemed to be effective, for the militants invariably called "foul" .' (Edwardes, 1984 : 93) In this way, `democracy' became a managerial strategy : direct ballots of the membership were used to counter the established patterns of trade union representation . The confrontation over mutuality and managerial control came at the end of 1979 . It began when, in response to continuing economic difficulties, Edwardes unveiled a Recovery Plan, which provided for the loss of 25,000 jobs and the closure or severe cut-back of thirteen factories . The plan was initially opposed by the trade unions, but, in the face of management's assertion that the only alternative was closure of the company, the engineering unions decided to recommend acceptance in a ballot of the company's employees, and the ballot produced a large majority in favour . When a number of shop stewards then published a pamphlet criticising the plan (in November 1979), management responded by sacking Derek Robinson, one of the signatories of the pamphlet and chairman of the shop stewards' combine . A strike in support of Robinson soon collapsed, although the shop stewards continued to support Robinson and even re-elected him convenor of the Longbridge stewards in January 1980 . The stewards no longer wielded the same power as before . On the one hand, the national unions (particularly the engineers' union, the AUEW, of which Robinson was a member) failed to give him support : Robinson, and the shop steward power which he represented had long been a thorn in the
The red rose of Nissan flesh of the responsible national officials of the AUEW (Edwardes, 1984 : 117133) . On the other hand it became clear that the shop stewards could no longer count on the active support of the union members : an important element was undoubtedly the acceptance of the Ryder strategy of involving shop stewards in a participation scheme which did not have widespread support among the workers (Willman & Winch, 1985 : 83 ; Scarborough, 1986) . Although Edwardes' aggressive strategy appears to be the very opposite of the Ryder approach, it actually built upon it in important respects . Once the Recovery Plan was accepted, management spelt out some of the implications of the Plan in a 92-page document on changes in working practices . In Edwardes' own words : `At the heart of the 92-page document outlining the changes we needed was the challenge to "mutuality" .' (Edwardes, 1984 : 133) A document circulated at the time to management throughout the company emphasised : `1 . It is managers who have the responsibility for managing, leading and motivating employees and for communicating on company matters . . . shop stewards have the right to represent and to communicate trade union information to their members at the workplace but only within the rules and procedures jointly established . . . 3 . Every manager must play his part in defeating the small minority who would like to see BL fail . . .' (quoted in Willman & Winch, 1985 : 130) At issue was the extent of managerial control within the factory. Manage-
ment was aiming `to change the habits of two business lifetimes' (Edwardes, 1984 : 133), to recover for capital the authority of the proud centurion : I say unto one, Go, and he goeth . Negotiations over the 92-page document broke down : the stewards could not agree to the abandonment of mutuality . Management responded by circulating the document as the `Blue Newspaper' to all employees and gave notice that it would be implemented on 8 and 9 April 1980 : any worker arriving for work on that day would be deemed to have accepted the new working practices . The union response was uncoordinated and resistance quickly collapsed . Management had been successful : capital had asserted its right to rule : `On those two days, Tuesday 8th April and Wednesday 9th April 1980, thirty years of management concessions (which had made it impossible to manufacture cars competitively) were thrown out of the window, and our car factories found themselves with a fighting chance of becoming competitive .' (Edwardes, 1984 : 135) The power of the shop stewards had been effectively broken : management had won . The way was then clear for the launching of the Metro in October 1980 . Workers were carefully selected for the new plant to make sure that they had the right attitude and that anyone with a record of militancy was excluded . The success of the Metro depended on a blend of new technology and new workers : multiwelders and robots were of no use unless the workers had the right attitudes to go with them .
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The key word in the reform of working practices is `flexibility' . Flexibility means essentially the removal of barriers to management's right to tell the workers what to do, where to do it and at what speed . The workers should no longer insist on job demarcations : they must be `flexible' enough to move from one job to another. As one worker from the Cowley plant commented : `There's now a constant attack, and all the protective agreements that were established in the sixties are now all gone . Workers are herded around now like cattle in those plants. The protective agreements, the seniority agreements, which were the most important protective agreements, are now completely gone . We're seeing conditions where workers that have worked in off-track jobs for thirty or forty years are given five minutes' notice to get onto a track . Often with medical conditions . Often working in a pit, with overhead conditions that make it absolutely impossible for them to do the job . And they're just directed totally ruthlessly after forty years of working with the company . "Get in that pit and do that job or find yourself another job outside ." And I'm not exaggerating at all - that is what is happening every day . Every day in those plants . And the difference between that and what existed when the trade unions had power a few years ago is absolute difference if chalk to cheese .' (Television History Workshop, 1985 : 108) Shop stewards are no longer able to exert control over the speed of work or the mobility of the workers in the same way as before . The shop stewards'
organisation still exists, but stewards have far fewer facilities and a greatly reduced role : they no longer have any part in negotiating wages, bonuses or effort levels, being reduced mainly to the representation of workers in grievance procedures . The aim of management was never to destroy trade unionism within the company, merely to limit its scope so that it assisted rather than challenged managerial authority . Productivity on the Metro line surpassed even management expectations . Productivity rose sharply in other plants as well, suggesting that the rise was due at least as much to the new pattern of industrial relations as to the new technology . The level of strike activity also fell . The change in the position was so dramatic that by early 1984 Longbridge was reported to have the highest productivity of any car plant in Europe (Willman & Winch, 1985 : 155) . Raising productivity to European levels, however, is no longer sufficient to withstand international competition . BL (now the Rover Group) continues to face acute difficulties . The current challenge is to raise productivity and quality to Japanese standards . Raising quality and productivity to Japanese standards, however, requires further changes, not so much in technology as in workers' attitudes . What Edwardes (whose term of office ended in 1982) achieved was the destruction of the power of the shop stewards, the destruction of barriers to managerial control . This sort of aggressive managerial approach could (and did) force the workers to obey the commands of management, but it could hardly be expected to produce a devoted and enthusiastic workforce . It is, however, just this sort of devotion and enthusi-
The red rose of Nissan asm that is now considered necessary to ensure the quality of the products . The Edwardes `macho management' can now be seen as a transitional phase, necessary to destroy the obstacles to managerial control, but unable to establish the basis for a new stable pattern of industrial relations . What was achieved was the destruction of the old pattern of relations and a resounding defeat for labour . What management need to do now is build on this defeat and mould the submissive worker into an enthusiastic worker, proud of his company . Changes in this direction are already taking place at the Rover Group . When the appointment of the new chairman and chief executive, Graham Day, was announced early in 1986, it was questioned whether one of Edwardes' leading collaborators, Harold Musgrove, could stay on as chairman of Austin Rover, one reason being that it was doubtful `whether Mr Musgrove's approach - "whipping people's backsides to get the cars out of the plant" as one put it - is the right one today' (Financial Times, 22 March 1986) . And indeed, Mr Musgrove's resignation was one of the first consequences of Day's appointment . A more positive indication of the same trend can be seen in Austin Rover's current `working with pride' initiative . As Andy Barr, the managing director in charge of this initiative, put it : `We need to change attitudes and not just behaviour patterns . We need total involvement to ensure that quality and reliability of our products .' (Financial Times, 18 September 1986) Applicants for a job on the Rover
assembly line at Cowley now undergo a two-day assessment to discuss the aims and objectives of the company . Even parents or wives and children are encouraged to take part, 'to come along and judge whether Austin Rover is the company for their family' (Financial Times, 18 September 1986) . As Barr put it : `We are not looking just for manual skills and dexterity . We want to know whether their aspirations are the same as the company's . It is a two-way process . What is good for people is good for the company .' (Financial Times, 20 June 1986) The `macho management' style typified by Edwardes is being replaced by a new image : an image of a caring management supported by a proud and dedicated workforce . The image to which the Rover management aspire is already being presented by the new Nissan factory opened on 11 September in Sunderland . The company's television advertisements project a picture of a new harmony, far removed from the strike and acrimony of traditional British car manufacturing : `Imagine a car factory where no one goes on strike, and where no one is made redundant either . Imagine if the managing director dressed just the same as the men on the line . Imagine if the management and the workers got together every day to see how they could make things better . Imagine if work wasn't just about getting a better pay packet, but about working together to make something you could be proud of. Maybe then it would be possible to make a car so good,
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they'd have a 100,000-mile or three-year warranty . Or is this just a day-dream?' (Quoted in Bassett, 1986 : 148) All the advertisements have the same theme : with Nissan, motor manufacturing enters a new world . The relationship between management and labour is transformed . The Nissan worker is a new worker, so new that he is no longer a worker . He is a staffer : ,they don't have "workers" at Sunderland' (Nissan advertisement feature, Observer, 14 September 1986) . The 'staffers' were carefully chosen to make sure that they were really new men, that they bore no taint of the old trade union militancy . First the site for the factory was selected - `one of the most exhaustive location searches in commercial history, looking at more than fifty sites in all, with local authorities vigorously bidding against each other for the development' (Bassett, 1986 : 149) . Once the site was chosen (a former airport near Sunderland), the company set about choosing the `staffers' . Management had plenty of scope for rejecting anyone with unconstructive attitudes : `More than 11,000 applications were received for the first 247 posts at the new plant and everyone was put through one of the most intense and vigorous selection courses imaginable . The vacancies for 22 supervisors, a kind of hybrid foreman, attracted 3,000 applications .' (Advertisement feature, Observer, 14 September 1986) The option of creating a non-union plant was considered but rejected by the company because it was felt that
such a decision could be a constant source of friction . Instead, they decided that they would recognise only a single union and interviewed the various possible unions (T&GWU, AUEW, GMBATU) before making a choice : `We were forced to parade before prospective employers like beauty queens', as one of the regional secretaries put it (Bassett, 1986 : 149) . The company chose the engineering union, the AUEW, and concluded an agreement with it which virtually eliminates the possibility of a strike : all disputes are to be settled by negotiation, conciliation or arbitration . The question of union organisation is, in any case, peripheral if one follows the image projected by the company . Antagonism between management and labour is a thing of the past . Management and production workers wear the same clothes and eat in the same canteen ; workers are not required to clock on in the mornings ; wage packets are replaced by salaries paid directly into the employee's bank . All are part of a team, aiming to produce cars of high quality . Job demarcation has no place here, of course : the emphasis is on flexibility of crafts, skills and jobs . `The concept has been to create a team or small group of workers (sorry, "production staffers") using and swapping different skills .' (Advertisement feature, Observer, 14 September 1986) The whole world of motor manufacturing is transformed . Class struggle has no place here : there is apparently no antagonism . Struggle as such has no place here : the New Man does not fight . This new harmonious world has been achieved not by struggle, but by the rejection of struggle . Indeed, the new
The red rose of Nissan world represents liberation from struggle, from the old world of strife . Here at Nissan, managers and workers alike are able to do what they always wanted to do : to make products of high quality, unhindered by union interference . In this view, the militancy of the seventies defeated itself : it was both irrational and sterile . The New Man is not militant, he knows that all problems can be solved by communication : `He who communicates is very much king,' advocates Wickens (personnel director) . If the team leader is not happy he can chat to the supervisor and they all sit down and try to iron things out .' (Advertisement feature, Observer, 14 September 1986) The New Man is still a man, of course . The importance of ensuring reliability and keeping absenteeism to an absolute minimum `leads to very careful screening of recruits in order to ensure that they will have minimum distractions from the domestic sphere, which, in a patriarchal context means a stronger preference for male workers' (Sayer, 1986 : 67) . The New Man is still a man, but not an aggressive, unreliable man : he is a responsible, caring, family man with a good, stable, home environment . The world of Nissan is the world of new harmony, the new consensus . Militancy has been thrown into the dustbin of history, as has macho management : the names of Robinson, Scargill, but also Edwardes and MacGregor, are best forgotten as aberrations in the forward march of rational common sense . FROM THE crisis
at British Leyland and the establishment of Nissan, it is pos-
sible to draw some conclusions about capitalist development in Britain over the last fifteen years or so . The most obvious point is that the changes that have taken place cannot be understood without a concept of crisis . The crisis at British Leyland was a crisis in the established methods of producing cars . It was not just that the established technology was outdated, but that the patterns of relations between labour and management associated with semi-automatic assemblyline production were no longer viable . The crisis was above all a crisis in the relation of domination : the established patterns of control over labour had broken down . As such, it was necessarily also a crisis of management . New ways of managing labour had to be found (and in the process many of the old managers had to be sacked) . And it was also a crisis of the trade unions, because the established trade union structure was based upon the maintenance of a certain type of equilibrium between capital and labour . The crisis was an outbreak of open struggle between capital and labour . The established pattern of domination had broken down : this was not a revolutionary situation, but a situation in which everything seemed possible . Capital could not allow that to continue : it needed to reassert its right to rule, its arrogantly proclaimed `right to manage', its right to determine what is possible and what is not possible . There is no doubt that in this struggle capital was victorious and labour was defeated . In the case of British Leyland, managerial strategy went through various phases, the most effective of which was undoubtedly the aggresive `macho' management of Edwardes, but each apparent reversal
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of managerial strategy built upon the achievements of the previous phase . Edwardes was able to build upon the isolation of the shop stewards which resulted from : Ryder's corporatist approach, just as the present `working with pride' approach builds upon the crushing of the workers under Edwardes . Over the period as a whole, relations of production have changed in a way that would have been inconceivable in the mid-seventies . The reassertion of managerial authority has gone hand in hand with the exclusion of vast numbers of workers . The number of manual workers employed by BL fell from 120,000 to 26,000 in a space of eight years, a fall of almost 100,000, as compared with the 400-odd employed by Nissan . The restructuring of the labour process and of relations between management and labour is simultaneously the creation of large-scale unemployment . The two cannot be separated . Why was labour defeated? One factor was certainly the insecurity of existence on which capitalism is based : if you do not own property, you have to sell your labour power in order to survive at an acceptable standard . During the period of conflict at British Leyland, unemployment rose sharply and the threat of being made redundant was acute . In those circumstances it was easy for management to use the threat of closure to impose its will . A second factor was the way in which the shop stewards (and the national trade unions) were internally weakened just at the moment when their power appeared greatest . The involvement of shop stewards and officials in the participation scheme under the Ryder Plan (and, nationally
in the whole corporatist structure of the Social Contract) led to an alienation of the workers from their 'representatives' . Edwardes' strategy of direct communication with the workers was able to build very successfully upon this alienation . Participation had this effect because, inevitably perhaps, it meant participation in restoring the company to competitivity . The stewards accepted this goal, just as they did not question the need to introduce new technology in order to achieve it : there was no obvious alternative . In the absence of an alternative, the logic of capitalist development imposed itself: cars must be made as efficiently as possible, and management must manage . The law of value asserts itself as necessity in a capitalist society . It would be wrong to think that the crisis is over . The Rover Group (as it is now called) is still in grave difficulty and there are obviously problems in implementing the new methods that have become fashionable among managers . The legacy of Edwardes is not the best basis for building up a sense of dedication and pride among the workers . Nissan is instructive because it is able to start afresh, taking for granted the destruction of the old traditions . In Nissan it is possible to see, not yet a new established pattern of relations between management and labour, but trends that indicate the shape of a new emergent pattern . The extensive use of new technology means that many of the problems of control (such as control of the quality of welding of painting, for example) are transferred from direct supervision of the production workers to the design and especially the programming of the multiwelder or robot .
The red rose of Nissan Control of the workforce does not in any case present the same problems as before : establishing a new factory in a greenfield site in an area of high unemployment means that many of the problems of managerial control-can be transferred to the point of selection . By ensuring thad only workers with the right attitude are employed, management is able to resolve to a large extent not only the problem of militancy, but also the questions of quality, flexibility and discipline . It now becomes possible to expect the workers to identify with the company to the extent of being concerned about the quality of the product, to demand flexibility in the performance of jobs and to assume the sort of discipline that makes just-intime production (with its minimal stocking of components) possible . In this context, trade unionism comes to have a new meaning . The new factory does not exclude trade unions, but the unions, like the workers, undergo a process of selection and have to satisfy the company that they have the right attitude . The new trade union is cooperative and identifies with the interests of the company. For the leaders of the electricians' union, the EEPTU, and the engineers' union, the AUEW, the two unions most strongly identified with this trend, militancy is irrational and outdated : it has no place in this new world . The miners' strike, the printers' struggle at Wapping are untimely relics of a buried past. The new trade union, like the new workers, is liberated from the past, free to enjoy, on the graves of the defeated and to the exclusion of millions, the new harmony of suffocating conformism . Of course that is not the whole story . It cannot be .
THERE ARE striking parallels between the phases of managerial strategy in the car industry and the development of the British state . In the state too there is a certain equilibrium which holds until the mid1970s . As in British Leyland, that equilibrium is based on a recognition of the strength of the trade unions and therefore of their importance for the whole structure of government . In British Leyland this is known as mutuality, in the state it is called Keynesianism . Often the term 'Keynesianism' is used to refer to a set of economic policies designed to ensure full employment and the even development of the economy through demand management, or to the economic theory which supports those policies . The adoption of those policies and the development of that theory, however, were not just historical chance : policies and theory alike grew out of a recognition of the growing power (and therefore threat) of the working class, and of the need to develop a new form of controlling and harnessing that power. In Britain it was the outbreak of the Second World War which made this need particularly urgent and led to the coopting of trade union leaders into the government and the commitment by the state to maintain full employment and to implement welfare state policies after the war . In the post-war period, in which the expansion of mass production and the tight labour market consolidated the power of labour, Keynesianism became the established pattern of domination . Essentially mutuality and Keynesianism are the same thing . In both cases there is a recognition of the strength of the working class, and a recognition that that strength imposes limits on the
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power of the state (or management) to do as it wishes . At the level of the factory, it is recognised that management cannot introduce changes in technology or working practices without the prior agreement of the shop stewards . At the national level, it is accepted that the control of wages or other aspects of industrial relations cannot be imposed against the wishes of the trade unions, that this is an area in which the law should not intervene . In both cases too, there is an attempt to build the power of the unions into the structure of control and to use it to capital's advantage . The key principle is the conversion of the frustrations of the workers into monetary demands and the harnessing of those demands in such a way that they become a positive force for capital accumulation . In British Leyland and other companies, this is achieved through collective bargaining and the convention of payment for change . At the level of the state, the attempt to regulate demand in the interests of capital accumulation has the same end . Demand is the frustration of the working class converted into money . Demand management is precisely what it says it is : management of the monetised frustrations of the working class in such a way as to convert them into a stimulus for capital accumulation . In both cases it was clear by the late 1960s that the established structure of domination-and-compromise was obstructing the development of capitalism in Britain . However, it was still a very long way from the recognition that it was essential to break the established balance to actually being able to do it . In Britain Leyland, it was recognised in the late 1960s that there was serious `overmanning', but the chief executive
at the time, Stokes, held back from sacking 30,000 workers for fear of the consequences (Turner, 1973), and it was not until nearly ten years later that Edwardes was able to make a serious assault on the problem . At the level of the state, the attempts of both the Wilson governent (the `In Place of Strife' White Paper of 1969) and of the Heath government (the Industrial Relations Act of 1971) to radically restrict the power of the unions failed when confronted with the reality of that power . Agin, it was to take ten years or more to break the pattern . In both cases the crisis of control reached its peak in 1974-75 . At the level of the state, as in British Leyland, there was no question of a revolutionary situation ; but there was a serious crisis of authority and control . Events such as the failure of Heath's Industrial Relations Act after the freeing of the Pentonville Five in 1971 and the miners' strikes of 1972 and 1974 made very explicit the limits of the authority of the state . Rising inflation, soaring public expenditure, falling profits, high levels of strike activity : all made clear that the post-war equilibrium was breaking down . The Labour government's response to this dilemma was essentially to adopt the Ryder strategy : to get the trade unions to participate openly and explicitly in the management of the country, through the Social Contract . The experience of the Social Contract was remarkably like the experience of participation at British Leyland. Discussion took place within the framework of pre-defined objectives : restoration of competitivity and technological renewal at British Leyland ; restoration of competitivity and technological renewal in Britain as a whole . Since
The red rose of Nissan these objectives clearly involved reducing the power of the trade unions, participation by the unions could only mean participation in their own destruction . And so it happened . As the crisis deepened, and especially after 1975-76, it became clearer and clearer that the Social Contract meant nothing other than the participation of the trade unions in a policy which cut workingclass living standards and, by allowing unemployment to rise, eroded the basis of the unions' own power . The Social Contract, from capital's point of view, was both a success and a failure, in exactly the same manner as the Ryder strategy at British Leyland . It was a very striking success in that, by apparently giving the unions power, it effectively destroyed them . When they were directly attacked in the early 1980s, it became clear that the power of the unions was hollow : like the shop stewards at British Leyland, they had been discredited by their participation in management . The Social Contract both hollowed out trade union power and puffed the unions up so that they became an easy object for attack . The Social Contract was also a failure in exactly the same sense as the Ryder strategy at Leyland . It was expensive (because concessions had to be given to buy the unions' acquiescence) and cumbersome, and above all it could not achieve the clear reassertion of authority which was necessary if a new basis for capital accumulation was to be established . Edwardes finds a clear counterpart in Thatcher at the national level . She came to office over a year after Edwardes was appointed chief executive at British Leyland, with very much the same image and the same
message . The government would be firm, there would be no compromise ; it was the government's task to govern, just as it was management's task to manage . Keynesianism and the corporatism of the Social Contract were rejected . Thatcher, like Edwardes, was not simply attacking the trade unions . Like Edwardes, she was attacking a style of government (or management) which was based on a recognition of the power of the trade unions . Just as Edwardes had first attacked management and got rid of managers too committed to established practices, one of Thatcher's first objects of attack was the civil service and the established network of relations between civil servants, trade unionists and employers . Capitalist crisis involves not just an intensified attack on the working class, but the destruction of a whole structure of domination . That destruction is achieved largely through the operation of money, but an important role is also played by people who come from outside the established structures of power . That explains the particular prominence in recent years of managers brought in from outside a particular industry (like Edwardes or MacGregor), or of someone like Thatcher who came from outside the Conservative establishment . It explains also why people like Edwardes or Thatcher, although acting in the interests of capital, may be very unpopular with many individual groups of capitalists . Finally, it explains the particular importance of money under the Thatcher government : this is not because the government has been unduly influenced by finance capital rather than industrial capital, as is sometimes argued, but because money
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plays a central role in a period of crisis in the breaking and restructuring of patterns of domination . The post-war equilibrium lay in ruins, at least in rhetoric . In 1979, however, it was not entirely clear that the Keynesian-corporatist welfare state was as dead as Thatcher proclaimed it to be . There were still those who claimed that the social democratisation of the British state could not be reversed and who predicted that Thatcher would have to go through the same sort of U-turn as the Heath government ten years earlier . That view was overoptimistic : the Keynesian-corporatist state rested on a recognition of the power of the trade unions, and by the end of the 1970s that power had been substantially weakened . However, just as Edwardes had held back for two years before putting his rhetoric to the test in a direct confrontation with shop steward power, so the Thatcher government postponed its legal restriction of trade union power, prefering to introduce it little by little in the years after 1981 . It postponed too, quite deliberately, its major confrontation with the miners, until 1984 . In retrospect, it seems that Mrs Thatcher, far from being an `iron lady', was in fact very cautious in her approach to the trade unions . She waited to make sure that the enemy was really vanquished before cutting off its head . It was after the defeat of the unions that the harsh anti-union legislation became possible . It was not primarily the Thatcher government that brought the Keynesian era to an end ; nor was it the previous Labour government : Callaghan's famous speech at the 1977 Labour Party Conference recognised (or heralded) the death of Keynesianism, but did not bring it about . The
Keynesian system of government rested on a recognition of the power of the unions, but it was not the state that was chiefly responsible for breaking that power . The power of the unions was destroyed first and foremost in the industrial conflicts of the late 1970s and early 1980s, and the role of the state in these was important but secondary . If one had to put a date on the final death of Keynesianism, then it would not be Callaghan's speech, nor Thatcher's electoral victory, but 8 April 1980, the day on which mutuality ended at BL . It was that (together with a host of similar developments throughout industry) which eliminated the possibility of a U-turn, of a return to the patterns of post-war social democracy . To say that there can be no return to the old patterns of social democracy does not, however, mean that Thatcherism will necessarily provide a longterm model for government in Britain . On the contrary, the analogy with Edwardes at British Leyland would suggest that it is better to see Thatcherism as a transitional type of government, well suited to destroying the vestiges of Fordism/Keynesianism, but not suitable for establishing the political patterns of the brave new world typified by Nissan . It is premature to see in Thatcherism a model of the 'post-Fordist state' .
THE PARALLELS between changes in the managerial strategy and changes in state policy are striking . Striking too is the fact that the currents of influence do not run in the direction that the dominant state-centred view of society might lead one to expect . Naturally there is constant interaction, but on the whole it is changes in managerial
The red rose of Nissan strategy that point the way for changes in state policy . Rather than seeing Edwardes as the John the Baptist of Thatcherism, it is probably more accurate to see Thatcher as the St Paul of Edwardesism . Management leads, the state follows . 'Edwardesism' here stands for a whole sea-change in managerial strategy . The changes at British Leyland are particularly clear and well-documented, but they are not untypical . Edwardes himself was very influential in setting a managerial style throughout industry : but even where management did not become so overtly aggressive, management-labour relations almost everywhere were characterised by a sharp shift in the balance towards management, a weakening of the power of shop stewards and a tightening of managerial authority . Everywhere, the changes have been helped by an environment of high unemployment and by the introduction of new technology, which both facilitates and requires changes in working practices and the undermining of the power relations associated with the old patterns of work . The changes have not all been as sharp as at British Leyland, or as conflictual : often they have been achieved without battle waged . Nor have they all been simultaneous : some groups of workers (the miners and the printers in particular) have managed to hold on to their old patterns of work, Keynesian rocks withstanding the incoming tide of change . For that the price was isolation : when battle came, the old world was no longer there to give them full support . The new patterns being built on the ruins of the old do not all correspond to a strict model either ; yet Nissan can fairly be seen as representative of an
important trend . It represents not just the expansion of Japanese capital but, much more important, a significant trend in the structure of capitalist domination over work . The emphasis on quality, and therefore insistence on the workers' pride in `their' products ; the widespread subcontracting of component supplies to small and therefore dependent firms ; the reduction of stocking so that components arrive just in time for assembly ; the establishment of a factory in a greenfield site with an environment of high unemployment and no tradition of trade union militancy ; the stress on careful selection of a loyal workforce and exclusion of the disloyal and unreliable ; the conclusion of a strike-free deal with a cooperative trade union ; the international control of geographically separated groups of workers ; all of these are important trends in the current development of capitalism (see Sayer, 1986) . These trends are often referred to as the 'Japanisation' of production, but it is misleading to place too much emphasis on the place of origin of the managerial strategies : Nissan's management techniques in Sunderland may be of Japanese inspiration, but their real basis is the defeats of the workers at Cowley, Longbridge and elsewhere . It is these defeats that allow management to talk of introducing Japanese management techniques, of moving from just-in-case to just-intime production . Just-in-time production (which gets its name from the fact that components are delivered just in time for incorporation into the finished product rather than being stocked in large quantities to allow for possible disruptions) presupposes a certain, predictable environment (Graham, 1986), both in the factory itself and in
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the factory's suppliers . It is a style of management built on the assumption that workers are disciplined and loyal, that there will be no unexpected stoppages and that the quality of the products at every stage of the production process will be reliable . It assumes therefore that when the manager says Go, the worker goeth . The patterns exemplified by Nissan are trends, not universal reality . These trends are experiments in a new form of domination ; whether they will harden into a clear long-term pattern, it is still too early to say . Many firms have experienced difficulties in introducing quality control circles and justin-time production . Not every firm has had the advantages of Nissan, yet everywhere there are movements in the same direction . If changes in the car industry are representative of changes in the pattern of management-labour relations more generally, then it is not surprising that there are parallels between changes in managerial style and changes in the sate . The parallel development of management and the state has been presented here in the form of an analogy, but the similarities are not a matter of chance . Management and the state are two aspects of the same thing, they are two forms of the capital relation, the relation of domination between capital and labour . Both work in distinct but inter-related ways to ensure the profitable accumulation of capital, the continued exploitation of labour . It cannot be otherwise . Just as management depends on the state to provide (through the maintenance of public order) a disciplined environment for the exploitation of the workforce and the accumulation of capital, the state depends equally on the success
of capitalist exploitation for its own continued existence ; capital accumulation is both the source of the state's income (through taxation) and the basis for the maintenance of public order . Both management and the state depend on the successful exploitation of labour : the actions of both are ultimately directed to the same end ; both are shaped by the same constant struggle for capitalist authority . It is therefore the conditions of that exploitation, the struggles around the process of work, that are the key to understanding not only changes in management, but also the development of the state . Moreover, since management is closer and more responsive to the labour process, it is not surprising that trends in political development should be foreshadowed by trends in management . At the level of management, the tide has moved on from the macho management of Edwardes and MacGregor . Aggression was effective in breaking the power of the old worker and in hacking a new sharper division between the core, employed workers and the marginalised, peripheral workers . The state, under Labour and Tory governments, gave support to this approach in the late 1970s and early 1980s : through the appointement and support of people like Edwardes and MacGregor, through the acceptance and promotion of high unemployment, through public expenditure cuts, through legislation to curb strikes, through the mobilisation of the police, etc . If people like Edwardes and MacGregor hacked their way through the workforce and excluded millions from work, then Nissan suggests that the emphasis is now on integrating those that remain . While excluding the
The red rose of Nissan irresponsible masses, the focus has shifted to integrating the responsible worker, to holding him up as a model of virtue . Now that the bouncers have thrown out the unruly guests, they can retreat to their normal position at the door and the party-giver can concentrate on entertaining the well-behaved guests who remain. The roughing-up of those excluded continues : the police, the Manpower Services Commission and the Department of Health and Social Security see to that ; but that is in the background, behind the scenes, excluded from the press and from political debate . Attention is now focused on the `moral majority' whether they are actually a majority does not matter, since they are the only people who count . Like a mafioso in a gangster film, the party-giver's face changes suddenly . The thug turns around and smiles with charm at the remaining guests : the iron lady turns into . . . a fresh-faced boyo . Or does she? It does not really matter . It does not matter what her face, or sex, or name is . The point is that at the political level too the tide is changing . Whether Mrs Thatcher goes on or not, the aggressive stance associated with Thatcherism is giving way increasingly to a more humn face . The emphasis is moving towards the construction of a new consensus, not a consensus that will cover everybody, but a consensus among the responsible moral majority . Political competition is increasingly focused on the claim to speak for that majority . Who wins that competition - whether it is Thatcher with a revamped face, or a new, more moderate leader of the Conservative Party, or Owen, or Kinnock - matters a great deal to the participants in the competition, but it will probably not C & C
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make very much difference to anybody else . Democratic elections are not very much more relevant to the running of the country than they are to the management of a car company . And so : the Red Rose of Nissan . The caring, conformist worker of Nissan who firmly rejects all trace of militancy finds his counterpart in the caring, conformist Man with the Red Rose, who firmly rejects any irresponsible behaviour, any mindless militancy, the man who speaks for the Moral Majority, the New Man .
THE NEW MAN has strange acolytes . Not only the established bureaucrats of the labour movement, but many on the intellectual `Left' clamour to participate in the construction of the new pattern of domination . To justify their position they claim to have a basis in Marxism, a new Marxism of course, a Marxism of Today . To read these analyses of the changes in capitalism, of the `new reality' (e .g . Carter, 1986), one would suppose that no struggles had taken place over the last ten years . The new reality has not been created through struggle ; it has just `emerged' . The struggles that have taken place - the miners' strike, for example - are seen as struggles against reality . Heroic but anachronistic, they are out of tune with the new reality, `with the inescapable lines of tendency and direction, established by the real world' (Hall, 1985 : 15) . The miners, like the rest of us, are not the creators but the victims of the new reality . The new reality, apparently, is not constituted by the permanent conflict between capital and labour . It is a reality which emerges and confronts not
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classes but `people' . Class has no place in this world : change takes place not through incessant class struggles but through democracy and winning the support of public opinion . In this new reality, we are all staffers . The people of this new reality are all reasonable, gentle people . In a remarkable somersault from the feminist radicalism of the early 1970s, feminism is now used to justify passivity, and militancy is identified with machismo (Campbell, 1985 ; Hall, 1985 ; Carter, 1986) . The analysis which sees women as the victims of male violence - a strong current within the feminist movement - easily turns into the condemnation of all violence as an expression of male domination . The violence of the miners, for example, is seen, not as arising from righteous anger but as an expression of a macho culture, which we can (and must) condemn with a good conscience . And so the `Left' orchestrate Marxism and feminism in a remarkable concert of support for the new reality, new morality, new sexuality : a world of suffocating oppression . Against such views, it is important to emphasise some of the conclusions that stand out from the story of British Leyland and Nissan . Capitalism has indeed changed: capitalist society today is very different from the capitalist society of ten years ago . But many of the discussions of the `new reality', whether in Marxism Today or in the much richer debates on the neo-Fordist state (for an account see Bonefeld, 1987), overlook the most important features that are so striking if one focuses on the story of British Leyland and Nissan . The first point to emphasise is that neither the car workers, nor the miners, nor the women, are the victims of an
emergent new reality . Whether we like it or not, reality is constituted by struggle and we are part of that struggle . The `new reality' of the car industry was not something which simply emerged to confront the car workers as victims : the new `reality' was constituted through struggle, through the struggle of capital against labour and of labour against capital . All workers in the industry were part of that struggle, whether they wanted it or not . In that struggle, the odds were stacked against labour because we live in a society dominated by capital . Struggle in a capitalist society is not an equal struggle, but it is always both inevitable and unpredictable . The car workers, like the miners, were undoubtedly defeated in that struggle, but there is a world of difference between being temporarily defeated in a continuing struggle and being the victims of `the inescapable lines of tendency and direction established by the real world' . Struggle implies unpredictability, instability . Patterns of domination are inherently unstable in capitalism . Periodically, it becomes clear that the established pattern of domination is no longer functioning and there is an outbreak of more intense and open struggle to restructure or to break those relations of domination . During such periods, capitalist authority is particularly fragile . That is why the concept of crisis is central to Marxist analysis : in crisis the inherent instability of capitalism, the unreality of `reality' becomes clear . It is not possible, for example, to understand the changes in the car industry since the mid-1970s without a concept of crisis . yet the proponents of the `new reality' rarely mention crisis, for they have forgotten how fragile that
The red rose of Nissan reality is . Recovery from crisis means for capital above all the reassertion of its authority, its right to manage and to rule . It is in this context - in the context of crisis and not because of elections or some autonomous battle of ideas - that there is a turn in capitalist strategies towards more authoritarian ideas, more authoritarian management and a more authoritarian state . The increased authoritarianism does not result from the success of the New Right : on the contrary, the success of the New Right is the result of pressures for more authoritarianism . For capital, the reassertion of its authority is the precondition for everything else . The mere reassertion of authority does not yet constitute a new stable pattern of domination, however. Certainly, there are clear trends which indicate what a possible long-term pattern of domination may look like : that is the significance of Nissan and the Red Rose . But it would be wrong to see Nissanism as already established reality . For the moment it is merely an (increasingly influential) strategy for establishing a new pattern of domination . The Nissan strategy is proving very effective, but there are still major obstacles to its success . It is hard to imagine that the happy party guests will go on smiling for ever, when the party is based on their exploitation . And it is not at all clear that the bouncers on the door will be able to suppress indefinitely the frustrations of those who have been thrown out of the party and are constantly being told how nice it is inside . The Nissan strategy, and the justin-time approach with which it is associated, aims at the management of an
environment which is certain : it aims at replacing management against uncertainty with the management of certainty (Graham, 1986) . But the only thing that is certain in this world is death . The only `inescapable lines of tendency and direction' are the lines that lead to the grave . As long as there is life, it will be impossible to achieve anything other than management against uncertainty . That is why justin-time is proving so hard to implement on a wide scale . That is also why there is a contradiction at the very heart of automation, of the attempt to subject more and more processes within society to mathematical control - a contradiction expressed in the problems of software production (Pelaez, 1987) . And that is why the gleam of Nissan has already been tarnished by widespread reports of discontent among both managers and workers . To talk of `new reality' is to talk of certainty, of death . To talk of struggle is to talk of life and of the openness of the future . The working class has certainly been defeated, and the conformist world of Nissan daily declares, through the mouths of Kinnock and co ., that more and more types of opposition are illegitimate, irresponsible, immoral . But for capital, the struggle to subjugate and exploit labour is endless . And oppression by capital daily meets resistance from labour . The world of Nissan is suffocating, but occasionally a scream of protest breaks the silence . The miners' scream was long and loud and heartening : it was silenced, but it echoes still - as do the riots, as does Wapping, as do a thousand other daily screams that fill the air with echoes of hope . The cracks that appeared in capitalist domination in the late 1960s and
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early 1970s have been plastered over and it is not yet clear how they will reappear : in the inevitable reistance of the Nissan worker, pushed too far, or in the unpredictable explosions of those ,00who have been excluded from the party . One thing is clear : struggle is inseparable from domination . At the centre of capitalist society is a silent but explosive scream:
Central Policy Review Staff (1975) The
`Inside our ears are the many wailing cries of misery, Inside our bodies, the internal bleeding of stifled volcanoes . Inside our heads, the erupting thoughts of rebellion . How can there be calm when the storm is yet to come?' (Linton Kewsi Johnson, Two Kinds of Silence)
Labour Relations and Industrial Adjustment. Tavistock, London . Pelaez, E . (1987) The GOTO Controversy and the Software Crisis . PhD Thesis, Uni-
Future of the British Car Industry .
HMSO,
London . Edwardes, M . (1984) Back from the Brink . Pan Books, London . Graham, I . (1986) 'JIT with Uncertain Demand' . Unpublished paper, Heriot Watt University, Edinburgh . Hall, S . (1985) `Realignment for What?', Marxism Today, December, pp . 12-17 . Marsden, D ., Morris, T ., Willman, P . & Wood, S . (1985) The Car Industry:
versity of Edinburgh . Sayer, A . (1986) `New Developments in Manufacturing : the Just-in-Time System', Capital & Class 30 . Scarborough, H . (1986) `The Politics of Technical Change at British Leyland', in O . Jacobi, B . Jessop, H . Kastendiek & M . Regini (eds), Technological Change, Rationalisation and Industrial Relations. Croom Helm, London .
Television
History
Workshop
(1985)
Making Cars . Routledge & Kegan Paul,
London . Willman, P . & Winch, G . (1985) Innovation References
and Control: Labour Relations at BL Cars. Cambridge University Press,
Bassett, P . (1986) Strike Free: New Industrial Relations in Britain . Macmillan, London . Bonefeld, W . (1987) 'Fordism and the Reformulation of State Theory' . Unpublished paper, University of Edinburgh . Campbell, B . (1985) `Politics Old and New', New Statesman, 8 March, pp . 22-25 . Carter, P . (1986) Trade Unions - The New Reality. Communist Party Publications, London .
Cambridge . * The poem by Linton Kwesi Johnson is an extract from `Two Sides of Silence', from Dread Beat & Blood, Bogle L'Ouverture Publications, London, 1975 . ** The paper is the product of many discussions in Edinburgh - thanks to all who took part . *** The paper was written before the June 1987 election . The Red Rose has now been set to music, appropriately .
REVIEW ARTICLE
Green Economics The Living Economy . A New Economics in the Making Edited by Paul Ekins . Foreword by Christian Schumacher . Routledge and Kegan Paul 1986 . 398pp . £8 .95 p/b . Reviewed by Maureen Mackintosh
• GREEN ECONOMICS is strong it seems on stimulating and dubious one-liners . This alone makes it a pleasurable change from yet one more dry economics text . This book, though uneven, is highly readable and cannot fail to stimulate ideas and responses in any open-minded Capital & Class reader: all that is a recommendation in itself. But the book aspires to much more . Its authors do not lack ambition, and cheerfully aspire to nothing less than the complete replacement of current economic theory - neo-classical, postKeynesian, Marxist, and any other variants found under academic stones or in the popular press - with their own more acceptable and sustainable theories and proposals . In the words of the editor : ` . . . the New Economics . . . embodies a change in outlook as fundamental as, say, the Copernican revolution in astronomy .' (Ekins, p .xviii) What are the characteristics of this proposed change in `outlook'? On the evidence of this book, the most important are the following . First, the writers propose a change of starting point for economic analysis, to begin from a specific and overt moral stand . Rejecting individualism, and individual pursuit of own ends, the aim of the new economics is to build a calculus instead on `compassion and concern' (p .99, the phrase is from the paper by Galtung) . The philosophy is humanistic : not in the sense that it is anti-religious, but in that it is built on a recognition of the equal humanity of others . The implication is that human
`The assumption is that growth is good and more is better. It is as if economists had never heard of cancer.' (p .8 Ekins) `Scientific materialism . . . is now a dying orthodoxy .' (p .345 Harman) `No man or woman in their right mind would behave in the family as they do in the market.' (p .99 Galtung)
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needs can and must be assessed, generalised about, and responded to, and gains to one person are only counted as gains once we have subtracted the costs to others . This operates not only across the human race at present on this planet, but also across generations, the rights of future children being equally important as those of the present generation . This starting point provides the two other most important features of the New Economics . First, it implies that a central concern shall be resource depletion and sustainability of development . Green economists have attacked very effectively the environmental waste, the progressive poisoning of the environment, the threat to health, and the long-term unsustainability and non-replicability of the current pattern of development in Europe, East and West, North America, Australia and Japan . Ignoring economic systems, they have concentrated instead on the interaction between production and the environment, understood to include the health of human beings now and in the future . The result has beena powerful indictment, with great popular appeal, the basis of the strong environmentalist movements in the industrialised world . Second, starting from the question of human needs and their satisfaction also implies an approach to production which classifies it by type of output - by the use value of the output, in Marxist terms, but they do not use this terminology - and not by the organisation of production . All work which produces output that meets human need-satisfaction, is to be valued . Working, furthermore, may in itself fulfill human needs . The implication drawn is that the category of the economy, and output, includes all work done : the informal economy and domestic work, just as much as wage work . No special value attaches to work for wages . But some output from work may be a cost, not a benefit, to society, or may result from work done to clear up the costs created by other work . These two aspects of the approach to the economy in the `New Economics' lead in turn to the most important aspect of the economic proposals (it would not be quite accurate to call them policies) in the book . If all people's needs are of equal value, and if sustainable need-satisfaction is the key aim for economic activity, then one way to move towards this is to try to create situations which internalise the external costs of economic activity . This is the basic aim, it seems, behind all the proposals, so characteristic of this type of economics, for local self-reliance, small-scale production, and bounded economic systems . It is also the central aim behind the proposals for new forms of economic accounting and tax reform . The argument behind this is a powerful one . The economic-
Review Article ally powerful in current economic systems, it is argued, externalise the social and economic costs of their activities . For example, `the centre treats the periphery as the external sector of its own economy' (p .100 Galtung again) . The response therefore is to try to create the situation where, `Those who reap the benefits should also pay the costs' (p .22 Susan George) . The same applies to pollution from industry and to environmental contamination from modern agriculture . The `ethical economics' (Susan George again) pays organic farmers more, because they save society these costs (p .179 Bateman and Lampkin) . The same approach is applied to money, where the creation of local currencies in bounded economic systems is aimed at preventing wealthy communities trapping weaker ones in debt, and so draining their resources . Hence, too, the proposals for cooperative production activity, and mutual aid . The purpose, it is suggested, in another good one-liner, is for us all to be `able to lead nourishing and prosperous lives in an atmosphere of creative harmlessness' (p .271 Dauncey) . These main lines of thought, which I have extracted, I hope fairly, from a long, complex and sometimes contradictory book, lead to some other enjoyable illuminations . It is a pleasure, frankly, to read a book where the third person singular pronoun referring to `a person' is generally `she' in preference to `he' ; which points out the ways in which typical patterns of women's working lives may be a model, not a problem, when dealing with future employment patterns (p .210ff Rothwell) ; and which makes a genuine attempt not to be crassly Eurocentric (I do not think the attempt is successful, but it is an improvement on much Left economic writing) . What then of criticisms? Some of the problems - but not all of them - are inherent in the arguments just outlined . This book is as frustrating in its faults as it is serious and interesting in its strengths . Indeed, because there is a good deal which is illuminating about the approach, the faults are the more imprtant . The two most serious unanswered questions in the work recorded in this book seem to be to be : first, how do we get there from here? And second, what would be the role of the state, or states, in an economic system which generated ecologically sustainable and equitable production and consumption? The book in fact contains very little discussion of an economic and political process, of a path from here to a more sustainable economic system . It is on this issue that the book is at its most vague and contradictory . On the one hand, the authors appear to have a sense that history is with them . They see the old economics as a product of a `merchant' class, and the future evolving in a direction which will force a new economics . For example,
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Robertson argues (p . 85ff) that work patterns are shifting towards a pattern which he calls `SHE' : `sane, human and ecological' . Hence the pressure for (this) new theoretical approach . But is this sense of history prediction or exhortation? Much of the work seems to be cast as an argument, designed to convince people, as individuals with moral concerns, that a more sustainable economy is possible and should be their aim . But in whose interests will this shift be : who will carry it forward? Who will be the agents of change? How will opposition be overcome? All these questions, which come instantly to the mind of a Marxist reader, remain virtually unanswered . The main agent of change appears to be the power of reason, and concern for our fellow human beings, and no more . Now let me be clear . I am not arguing that such concern is absent among human beings . Nor that it cannot be drawn on as a force for change . On the contrary, the sheer humanity of people and their belief in the humanity of others is the basis of morality, and Marxism has always contained an unresolved clash between its concept of science and its appearl to morality (in, for example, the work of Engels) . But common humanity is not enough to bring about change . Despite the talk of income redistribution and local power, the concept of `we' and of `communities' (e .g . p .129 Ekins) is frequently appealed to but left virtually unexplored . The problem of class has almost completely disappeared from the analysis . This weakness, it seems to me, is lethal to the `New Economics' as it stands . For it leaves `us' with no plan of action and no assessment of the costs of transition involved . While the benefits of an ecologically sane economy are eloquently (if not always coherently) explored, the costs of change to whole countries and classes are less examined . For example, in Hueting's (p .242ff) very interesting exploration of the possibilities of a shift towards a 'conserver economy'- one of the few detailed reports of systematic research in the book - it becomes clear that the higher employment and lower pollution is generated partly through a familiar lower wages/higher employment tradeoff . How would political support for that be generated? What state would impose the incentives and controls to produce it, and under what pressures? Almost any conceivable incentive for transition (for example : much higher commodity prices, acid rain and the political response to it, a melting polar ice cap, the rise of new communicable diseases) will impose enormous costs . It is quite clear, reflecting on this book, that the transition proposed, whatever precisely its form, imposes lower standards of living on some people, now, but the conclusion has to be extracted virtually from between the lines, and the political implications and dangers are scarcely
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faced . Just how serious is this problem becomes clear in the discussion of examples from the Third World . In the chapter on `Learning from the South' the questions of class and the state emerge immediately as crucial . Two papers discuss the possibilities of self-organisation of the poor in their own economic interests, immediately raising the question of class division as the basis of organisation for change . And the paper on the Indian `Self Employed Women's Association' makes clear the extent to which that organisation has relied at times on the support of the local state, and has been directed at making demands on the state . At one point the organisation was rescued from the refusal of the private textile mill to sell scrap rags to their members by a contract with the government textile mills . There is a big gap between these papers and the rest of the book, precisely because they are about political organisation . This raises the problem of the state as the central absence in this book . The lack of exploration of the role of the state in transition, and in more sustainable systems, results, it seems to me, from a lack of analytical clarity about current economic systems and their potential successors . The book is full of half worked-through ideas about the undesirable effects of international markets and the benign effects of local markets . Limitations on international competition and limitations on lending and usury seem to be central ideas about a new economic system which restricted the imposition of economic costs on others . The aim at one point appears to be to construct an `economic maturity' where the market is not the main determinant of people's 'participation in production' nor of their `economic choices' (p .17 Fleming) . Other proposals aim at making markets work more fairly by changing tax rules, redistributing (new) assets, or restricting the freedom to sell property . All this creation and sustaining of bounded markets, and cutting back or 'delinking' from international economic relations would require a political authority for its imposition, just as current market structures do . Yet the whole book contains no discussion of how responsive, democratic states on a local level, able and willing to implement such policies might be created and controlled . In the end, then, though the book claims to be about'democratising the economy' (p .169 Ekins), it bases such democracy on market structures, and shies away from the issues of planning and political democracy needed to create juster market forms, or the conflicts involved in the creation of such a political and economic system . This is a book with the beginnings of a powerful and important vision ; but the writers are so far avoiding the political implications of their own arguments .
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Cynthia Cockburn
Machinery of dominance London : Pluto Press, 1985 Reviewed by Sonia Liff in engineering that offends most feminists describes two things that fit together by means of protruding parts on one and recessed parts on the other as `male' and `female' connectors . Reading Machinery of Dominance the image kept coming to mind . The emphasis on the complementarity of men and women represented in this crude physical form can also serve as an analogy for conceptions of masculinity and femininity . Cockburn's analysis of gender draws attention both to its essentialism (via appeals to what is `natural') and to its concentration on difference ('the opposite sex') . In Machinery ofDominance the focus is on the `masculine abilities' of technical competence, physical strength and analytical thought . Contrasted with these are the `feminine skills' of patience and caring, intuition and dexterity . Cockburn argues that it is not only people who are gendered, A TERMINOLOGY
but also occupations, and indeed virtually everything we encounter . Thus she argues, a breakdown in occupational sex-typing is inconceivable without the destruction of gender itself. The view of men and women as a `couple' fitting together through the complementarity of their abilities will have to be abandoned before women's ability to undertake technically-based occupations can be generally accepted . The transformation of `couples' into `pairs' or, in a wider sense, into communities would involve valuing strengths in people regardless of biological sex . Furthermore, for societies to use the potential benefits of their members' imagination and creativity, embodied in technological developments, in a genuinely progressive way, humanistic rather than masculine characteristics must be valued . At one level Machinery of Dominance is an investigation into the conse-
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quences of technical change in a range of industries and workplaces . It finds, perhaps unsurprisingly, but nevertheless dishearteningly, that women are failing to gain genuinely technical jobs . Cockburn, like other feminists, points to the disadvantages domestic responsibilites and past education impose on women . But she strengthens and develops an analysis by pursuing two other themes . One, familiar from earlier writings, is the stress on the workplace as a site within which gender identity is reproduced and gender relations expressed . This allows analysis of the part played by gender relations in the restructuring of the labour process . This approach has been adopted by other writers (see, for example, Game and Pringle's (1984) account of technical change in Australia) . However many feminists and socialist writers continue to see women's oppression in the workplace as the secondary consequences of domestic relations . The distinctiveness of Cockburn's analysis also derives from the model of gender that she has developed . A second theme examines the relationship between gender and technology . The strongest aspect of this is the gendered nature of technological competence through which men gain their dominance of technical jobs . Underlying all this is a concern to understand the failure of current policies such as WISE (Women Into Science and Engineering) Year which aimed to increase women's access to, and involvement in, technical occupations and to develop more successful strategies . Before discussing the degree to which these themes have been successfully developed it is useful to summarise
Cockburn's research .
Technologies examined In Britain, as elsewhere, men and women are concentrated within very different types of work . This is not a neutral division but one that leaves women with work lives characterised by low pay, insecurity, low levels of satisfaction and lack of opportunities . One particular aspect of this, with its roots in childhood games and choice of school subjects, is women's absence from jobs requiring scientific knowledge or technical competence . Current levels of unemployment, the increasing pace of automation and rapid technological development means that those without technical skills - and this includes almost all women - are likely to face deteriorating job opportunities and work experience . Formal antidiscrimination legislation and equal opportunities policies have failed to make a significant impact on this situation . Women's domestic responsibilities (and men's lack of them), the hostility of male work cultures and the indifference of male-dominated trade unions, all continue to pose formidable obstacles . Against this background, Cockburn's research examines the changes brought about by the introduction of three types of technology . First, the introduction of computer systems in the clothing industry which assist the production of patterns and computer-driven knives which cut material ; together creating a CADCAM (computer-aided design and manufacture) system for the pre-assembly stage of the clothing industry . Second, the adoption of computers to direct warehouse activities such as the `picking' process required to compile mail cata-
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logue orders . Third, the introduction of new technology into the National Health Service radiography departments . Computed Axial Tomography (CAT or CT) or cancer scanners in popular terminology which are able to produce cross-sectional pictures of the human anatomy and distinguish between a greater range of tissues than X-rays . In each case two or more workplaces were chosen to illustrate the way the work processes and relations are affected by technological developments . Firms in which such equipment was designed, developed or marketed were also included . The intention within these studies was to investigate the sexual and technical divisions of labour associated with a particular stage of technological development . By comparing firms with and without `new technology', it is also possible to gain some sense of future trends in each industry . In each workplace interviews were carried out with managers and employees which Cockburn uses to provide insights to the meanings they attribute to these situations . Effects of technical change i . The clothing industry The pattern-making, grading, laying out and cutting operations in the clothing industry were originally male craft-based occupations . Computeraided design has affected these jobs in a variety of ways . Workers no longer need to rely as much on memory and experience since the computer is programmed with the different standard size adjustments and can recall past pattern layouts . However the need for some skills remains since the use of the computer, at least at this stage of technological developments, appears to remain a tool
assisting the workers' decision-making rather than replacing it . The feedback the computer gives enables learning and thus skill development . The flexibility provided by CAD allows rapid style changes and is one of the major reasons for firms' adoption of this technology . It may also increase variety in the work . In the most sophisticated installations the CAD system is linked to the production process, automating the cutting operation . A magnetic tape is produced by the computer from the layout design and this is used to drive the cutting knives . The manual job of cutting cloth is replaced by one of machine minding . In the clothing industry the pattern of skills has undoubtedly changed . The increase in productivity is such that even successful firms are likely to have fewer workers . However technical change has not only involved changes to job content and numbers of jobs . It has also been accompanied by a breakdown in traditional job progression routes . Jobs previously only available to male craftsmen are being opened up to other workers, often women, allowing them access to new skills . ii . The mail order industry Before new technology was introduced the picker's job could be compared with going around a supermarket with a shopping list . One knows the goods to be collected and roughly where they are . A route can then be planned and the order of collection decided . One use of new technology reduces this degree of discretion . Instead the women receive a set of instructions from the computer telling them exactly how to carry out the task . The job remains but stripped of what little initiative was
Review Article involved in it to start with . In another workplace, Cockburn reports the technology being used in a different way to more radically restructure the work . The compilation of the order is achieved by a moving belt . The women remain in one spot contributing items within their reach to any particular order as directed . Here the intention seems likely to be not just greater control over the women's work process but also a restructuring of the job which will facilitate automation . iii . The radiography department The job of a radiographer involves considerable skill and background knowledge . In status it lies between that of a nurse and a doctor - sometimes described as a para-profession . The radiographers' specific expertise is acknowledged but their role in diagnostics and treatment is strictly limited . In contrast to the other technologies discussed, CAT is being introduced as an additional technology to X-rays rather than as a replacement for them . Further specialist staff have not been trained to monopolise the new technology . Thus radiographers can genuinely claim to have gained an additional skill, not just a replacement one . On the other hand the type of skills needed to operate CAT seem to be at a lower level than on conventional X-ray equipment since decision-making is more automated and accurate positioning is not required . Again on the negative side, radiographers find the way CAT has been implemented, makes caring for patients more difficult . From another perspective the technology gives radiographers at least a potentially greater role in diagnostics and treatment . In this case study, more than any of the others, the future seems uncertain .
The radiographer's job has the potential for restructuring such that the bulk of those doing it would require relatively little training and there would only be a few specialists . The boundaries of the job are also being contested by both technologists and doctors . The characteristics of the technology, the professional power of a variety of gendered occupations, and the organisational context of the health service, all come together to make the politics of technical change very complex . iv . The engineering industry Cockburn also sought to trace the origins of the technologies being adopted in the case studies . Given Britain's declining role in equipment design and production this was not always possible . This part of the research therefore also includes some consultancy firms and others involved in subcontracting . The jobs included traditional as well as electronic engineering, salesmanship, programming and training . Some semi-skilled assembly work was done by women and women were considered particularly suitable for training female operators in adopting firms . The presence of women in any other `high tech' job was extremely rare . These three technologies and four industrial areas thus form the context for the analysis . In discussing Machinery of Dominance, I want to focus on two main issues . First, I want to question some aspects of the labour process approach which provides the underpinning for Cockburn's analysis . Specifically I question the extent to which deskilling can provide a satisfactory account of the consequences for workers of technical change .
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Second, I want to try to distinguish between a number of different ways in which a gender analysis could be applied to technology and argue that there is scope for Cockburn's analysis to be taken further. In each area I am concerned to highlight both the theoretical issues raised and their significance for political strategies which overcome the narrowness of both craft unionism and equal opportunities approaches .
Deskilling Change in the labour process has been the focus of most radical analyses of technical change . Within this a rather narrow perspective has dominated : that of 'deskilling' . Craftworkers' control over their labour processes and ability to exercise skill is seen as being reduced by technology . The deskilling thesis suggests a disruption of the content rather than the form of jobs . It provides an account of technical change sucking out the substance of a job, leaving a hollow shell . The substance is the element of control or decision-making which managements need to claim for themselves to affect the balance of power in the workforce . There have been many critiques of this approach (see, for example, the collection by Wood, 1982) . Some feminists have pointed out that the concept does not have the same significance for women who have always been excluded from craft skills (see Beechey's contribution to Wood) . Friedman (1977), among others, argues that deskilling is an inappropriate strategy for managers to pursue with respect to some skilled workers . Many empirical studies (such as Wilkinson, 1983) suggest that worker resistance and/or technical limitations
may make deskilling untenable where it is attempted . Despite these extensive criticisms deskilling remains the dominant reference point for analyses of technical change at work . This may seem unimportant providing it is being examined in a critical way . However the danger is that an inadequate conceptual framework can restrict the ways in which we think about what is occurring, locking us in to a particular set of questions and concerns . The richness and complexity of Cockburn's research findings and analysis push against such limitations . Nevertheless a deskilling perspective is still present and in some places seems to have constrained the analysis and led some areas of investigation to be closed off . This can be seen most clearly in the clothing and engineering industry case studies .
CAD - whose
deskilling? One way of assessing whether deskilling is occurring is to look at whether there has been a reduction in skill requirements in the total work process ; that is in the sum of tasks required . It seems to be this which leads Cockburn to suggest that deskilling objectively defines the change in the relationship between management and workers in clothing . But `aggregate' deskilling of this kind cannot be translated in any straightforward sense into the experiences of individual workers . Deskilling may come close to describing the experience of some of the male craft workers but would have little resonance for the shop floor workers . Thus the use of an aggregate measure of 'deskilling' seems in danger of prioritising the interests of one particular group of craft workers . This is particularly the case in
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an industry like clothing where access to jobs has been restructured . This difficulty arises from the contradictory effects technical change can bring to capital/labour relations and relations between sections of the working class . A focus on deskilling tends to equate the interests of craft workers (who undoubtedly are losing power bases through this type of technical change) with the overall interests of the working class . Feminists are bound to feel ambivalent analysing such situations . It is hard to grieve very much for men who have made their power base in part through the exclusion of women . On the other hand the change in the balance of power in favour of capital means that whatever women may gain, it is unlikely to be as much as men have lost . Cockburn is of course well aware of these issues but her exploration of them is not helped by her focus on deskilling . A further difficulty with the concept of deskilling is that it prioritises a certain type of experience . Craft skills have played an important role in workplace politics . Thus the effect of technological change on the ability to exercise such skills is a vital area for investigation . However for other workers the ability to exercise skill may not be a particularly significant part of their work experience, before or after technical change . For them variety, ease of carrying out a task, overall workload and opportunities to socialise may be more important measures by which to judge the changes brought about by new technology . Many of these aspects can deteriorate with the introduction of new technology but management does not always have the same interest in directly attacking them as they do with craft skills . Indeed the automation of
parts of a routine repetitive job could both increase productivity and make a job more interesting. An attempt to gain an increased share of the market via more frequent product changes, as in the clothing industry, may also lead to a more varied workload . One of the difficulties with 'deskilling' as a central focus of analysis of the effect of technical change on work experience is that we may fail to fully explore such contradictory consequences for workers . These contradictions mean that workers in non-craft jobs may well feel quite positively about some aspects of new technology and its effects on their work (Labour Research, 1985 ; Liff, 1987) . Unless we have an analysis which understands this, we are unlikely to develop strategies which have much relevance to such workers .
How are deskilling technologies engineered? The preceding discussion suggests that a focus on deskilling can blind investigation of the effects of technical change on the workforce . The treatment of the engineering industry in Machinery of Dominance highlights this in a different way . Cockburn is primarily interested in the sexual division of labour in these firms . She looks at engineering because there are few jobs of a technological nature within the majority of firms adopting new technology . To see whether women are gaining any footholds in high technology occupations she needed to look at industries in which these exist . An investigation of these firms could have followed an additional line . It would have been possible to examine the labour process of these workers more directly to understand how these
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technologies are created . While it is clear that the skill of the craftsman is being embodied in the technology as dead labour, little attention is generally given to the process by which this occurs . Taking a broader perspective it becomes obvious that what was once the exclusive preserve of the craftsman becomes, for a time, the subject of the labour process of scientists, technologists and engineers . Thus, while 'deskilling' might be the outcome of the process, `distilling' might be a better term to describe the process itself . The skilled portion is separated out to be a part of a different process carried by other workers . Understanding this labour process could be very important both for assessments of the effects on workers in adopting firms and for the development of oppositional strategies . Gender relations in the workplace Cockburn is attempting to understand the occupational sex-typing she finds in the case studies as the outcome of a process shaped by gender relations as well as capital/labour relations . Unlike most feminist writers she is at least as intersted in men as in women . But the men who inhabit Machinery of Dominance are not the sexless workers of industrial sociology (and even of much labour process work), nor the oppressive but shadowy presences of many studies of women workers . Instead they are real people whose actions are shaped by their understanding of themselves as male . In her earlier book Brothers : Male Dominance and Technological Change, Cockburn showed it was possible to produce a feminist study of male workers without continually alluding to the absence of women in the workplace . Rather Cockburn achieved this by showing that an under-
standing of gender was as important to understanding men's concerns and actions as issues of class or economic power . For example, the desire to maintain certain occupations as male preserves cannot be explained solely in terms of their levels of pay or even working conditions . It is also important to look at the significance of certain types of work for confirming masculine gender identity . Furthermore one must recognise the vital role of occupational sex-typing in maintaining a conception of gender based on complentarity . This approach is continued in Machinery of Dominance and is one of the most significant developments Cockburn's work has brought to Marxist and feminist studies . Cockburn suggests that occupational sex-typing reinforces gender identity in part because occupations themselves are gendered . She argues : We and many of the things that surround us are either blue or pink . Occupations, with few exceptions, are two-tone also and we match ourselves to them . We partly take our own colouring from the job we do and in turn the colour of the job is affected by our presence in it . (p . 232) This, she seems to be saying, is not just a quirk of language that can be overcome by, for example, talking about chairpersons rather than chairmen (useful as this might be for drawing attention to the issue) . Rather, Cockburn says, it is a reflection of the significance of gender as `a major organizing principle, if not the organizing principle in our perception of the world and everything in it' (p . 251) (her emphasis) .
Review Article Technology as a medium of power in gender relations Asked to distinguish between jobs done by men and women most people resort to attributes such as the heaviness or dirtiness of the job . Feminists have tended to be dismissive of such explanations, pointing to many occupations which do not fit these stereotypes . At first sight technical/non-technical might seem an equally limited distinction ; contributing to our conceptions of gender but of little real value in understanding the pattern of sextyping . But technology, Cockburn argues, is different . It is the means by which we control the world and satisfy our needs and desires . `It is commonsense to suppose', she argues, `that technology, as a medium of power, will be developed and used in any system of dominance to further the interests of those who are on top' (p . 8) . The implication is therefore that although there is little reason why a dominant group should wish, for example, to monopolise heavy jobs rather than light ones, there are very compelling reasons for monopolising technical jobs rather than non-technical ones .
Technological competence and masculinity Many women in Cockburn's study work with technology . What they lack, she argues, is technological competence. Technological competence involves the ability not just to operate machines but also to design and maintain them . Men's monopoly of technological competence gives them a number of advantages . First, technological competence is a generic skill, not tied to particular occupations or industries . C & C
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Whereas craftworkers attempt to maintain their position by resisting certain types of change, technical workers can ride out changes, switching jobs or even industries . Thus the transferability of their skills gives these men an important advantage in the labour market . Second, management are less able to control the labour process of the technically skilled . The processes by which someone solves a technical problem are not sufficiently understood to be reduceable to a set of well-defined procedures . This works to the advantage of those with technical skills since they can demand and win a high degree of self-control over their labour processes . For example, a personnel manager is reported as saying of engineers : `It is a creative, innovative job, independent . . . Compared with the shop floor it is impossible to exert the same kind of discipline' (p . 160) . Another aspect of this is that these men can be fairly confident that technology which could make their skills redundant is a long way off. To see jobs requiring technological competence as male is more than saying that it is mainly men who hold such jobs . Otherwise, the association is merely a side-effect of occupational segregation . Instead, Cockburn argues, it is part of the process of gendering : `femininity is incompatible with technological competence ; to feel technically competent is to feel manly' (p . 12) . This analysis of the way in which skills and occupations can acquire a gender is extremely important . It goes some way towards explaining why being a man or a woman may be seen as a precondition for doing certain types of work . An equal opportunities approach relies on individuals being judged on
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their specific skills and encourages employers to ignore sex as an irrelevant characteristic of a job applicant . If we understand occupations as gendered then it is not surprising that sex will continue to be seen as a very relevant attribute in assessing applicants . It also explains how technological competence can continue to be seen as the preserve of one sex despite the presence of some women in jobs requiring that skill and evidence that many men are lacking such skills . It also makes clearer the difficulties women experience in undertaking `male jobs' . Added to the many issues already discussed, they face a challenge to their own gender identity . Thus crossing over the boundaries requires, Cockburn argues, an effort of adaptation `not just for one day's work but every day through a working lifetime' (p . 232) . Thus far the argument is compelling . However when one comes to examine the labour processes of the eingineers it becomes more difficult to see what is specifically masculine about them . Certainly the work environment is male, but this seems to be the result of male social relations rather than something which flows from, or is required by, the work process . The men certainly stress the dirty and heavy aspects of their work, and hence the need for masculinity, in justifying women's exclusion . But Cockburn is concerned that we understand this primarily in ideological terms, and this seems to be even more the case when the mental processes relating to design are discussed . Listening to them describe the pleasure they get from their work and their involvement in it, it certainly does not sound like the type of job women would immediately be repelled by or find alien .
Gendered technology? To disentangle some of these issues it is necessary to stand back from the case studies and pursue the connections between gender, capital and technology more directly . Technology is a medium of power in class relations through its contribution to the development of the forces of production . Radical writers on technology have argued that technology is not just used in capitalist ways, it also embodies the social relations of its production . It is in this sense that we should talk of it as capitalist technology. To what extent is Machinery of Dominance trying to make a similar argument about `masculine technology'? In Cockburn's analysis a number of different positions seem to be present and it is not entirely clear what weight is being given to each . One way of understanding technology as a medium of gender power is in men having preferential access to it which they use to reinforce their gender dominance . However a second interpretation could be that interaction with technology is seen as a male preserve . Another argument might be that technology embodies the social relations of a masculine production process, or finally that technology is designed to serve male interests . Technology is surely a medium of gender power in the first sense, if we mean by this that men use their economic power to control valuable resources . Women's dependence on men is thus reinforced since they have access only via men . A domestic example would be use of the family car . However at this level the argument remains primarily one about the social relations surrounding the use of technology, rather than the technology itself. The other possibilities are more contentious .
Review Article
From my reading of the argument, Cockburn makes the strongest case for the second interpretation . Women may be passive operators of technology but any interactive role is reserved for men . Thus technological competence is gendered male . We have seen how those workers with technological competence are at an advantage over others in their relations with management . But again this does not seem at first sight to mean that technological competence plays a direct role as an instrument of gender power . It is easier to see how this stronger argument might be made by looking outside the workplace . Technological competence is a skill which has value outside capitalist labour processes since it is required in order to do repairs about the house, to fix the car and so on . Women's lack of such skills reinforces their dependence on men in the domestic sphere . This pattern of relations can also be seen in the workplace where women operators have to wait around for the male mechanic to repair their machines . As was argued earlier it is more difficult to see the sense in which the engineers' work process is masculine and thus to see technology as embodying masculinity in this way . Neither is there any particular sense given in Cockburn's analysis of these engineers as men designing technology in men's interests . Rather they are portrayed as serving capitalist goals in design terms, their own being served by processes of occupational exclusion . Certainly the end product, the technology, is seen as masculine but this seems to be primarily due to an affinity created in the production process rather than something intrinsic to the technology . This could be seen as an example of the way the gendering
process transfers 'pinkness or blueness' between people, occupations and products . However in other passages it is less clear that this was the intended interpretation . These are the ones relating to women's reasons for rejecting training or jobs that involve working with technology . As well as references to male hostility there are suggestions of deeper problems . Current technological priorities are described as `destructive, exploitative and inhuman' and this is said to be offputting to many women . These values appear to be primarily capitalist ones, but ones that men are much more willing to collude with than women . The suggestion here being that women would create a different kind of technology . Thus the extent to which we can talk about technology (as opposed to access to technology or technological competence) as a medium of power in gender relations is not fully resolved . It seems to me to be a debate worth pursuing for a number of reasons . First because it mirrors the broader argument referred to above about the way in which women are subordinated in the workplace . In contrast to those who say that men and women are subject to the same capitalist social relations in the workplace, Cockburn and others have pointed to gender-specific practices such as occupational sex-typing, differentiated styles of supervision and sexual harassment . We are not yet clear what role technology plays in these expressions of gender relations but our analysis suggests it has one . Second it is important because it offers us a vision of a different kind of technology . `Alternative Technology' movements have so far concentrated on technology's capitalist aspects .
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Thus we have seen attempts to develop `socially useful products' for both Western and Third World contexts . Although emphasis has tended to be on products, production technology has not been entirely overlooked . However, in line with the focus on deskilling, such attempts (e .g . computercontrolled lathes in Britain, phototypesetting in Scandinavia) have concentrated on producing skill-enhancing technologies for craft workers . Feminist critiques have stayed at a more general level arguing that broad areas of research, such as weapons technology, should be discontinued and technologies which enhance the quality of life be supported . If we understood better the way in which technology acted as a medium of male power we would be able to encourage the development of feminist alternative technologies . Third, and again with important consequences for strategy, moving forward on debates about gender and technology would allow us to develop a stronger position on women's access to technological jobs . At the moment, women are faced with a twin dilemma ; co-option into the world of capitalist values and psuedo-male behaviour or exclusion from a set of skills which could increase their job opportunites and independence. The only possible solution seems for women to tread a tenuous path ; entering into the technical labour market in its less unpleasant parts, fighting to transform these and create additional spaces for other women . All this alongside the dismantling of gender ; it seems a pretty daunting task! It might initially seem even more depressing to argue that we also need a better understanding of the way in
which men as workers shape the products of their labour in their own image and interests ; since it seems to suggest that women have yet another battle to fight . However it does have a more positive side . If there was more investigation and understanding of the role which technical workers played in designing other people's labour processes then there could also be a recognition of the space this creates for a reshaping of technology . This could then form the basis of a strategy for transforming technology rather than merely gaining the power provided by technological competence to do management's bidding . It would also be a powerful additional argument for encouraging women's involvement in technically-based occupations since not only would they benefit individually in career terms but they could also affect the working conditions of women who are not interested in pursuing a technical career . Cockburn expresses one aspect of this when she says we need tc `domesticate technology and reforgc the link between making and nurturing' (p . 257) . However to transform technology we need a movement which encompasses more people than will ever become scientists and technologists . We need to find ways of genuinely democratising decision-making around technological issues . For this people's `technological literacy' has to increase and their alientation from science and technology be overcome . We also need to be clearer about the role of scientific and technological expertise in the decision-making process . We need experts to contribute to our discussions but not to substitute for them . These are debates which surface from time to time on the left, making only limited
Review Article
progress before they again sink from view . Perhaps a new feminist input could nudge them in a useful direction! Cockburn thus raises a variety of issues which need to be discussed further by socialists and feminists . The way that the book is written and researched should ensure that such discussions are productive . An enduring strength of her writing is that it operates at many different levels of analysis ; all of them handled sensitively and thoroughly . The empirical work is meticulously but never boringly documented ; the technology and the work processes are described in a way that allows one to visualise them and thus enter into the analysis ; interviewees are allowed to appear as real people expressing ambiguities and contradictions, rather than as witnesses for the prosecution or defence . There are no abstract theoretical chapters for which the case studies stand as `illustrations' . And however desperate the situation sounds, there is a detailed analysis of possible policies including short-term aims and longer-term visions . As such,
reading Machinery of Dominance is a stimulating, challenging and enjoyable experience .
References Beechey, V . (1982) `The Sexual Division of Labour and the Labour Process', in Wood, S . (ed .) (1982) . Cockburn, C . (1983) Brothers: Male Dominance
and Technological
Change .
London : Pluto . Friedman, A . (1977) Industry and Labour : Class Struggle at Work and Monopoly Capitalism . London : Macmillan . Game, A . & Pringle, R . (1983) Gender at Work . London: Pluto .
Labour Research Department (1985) vDus : Health &jobs . London : LRD . Liff, S . (1987) `Women's Experience of Technical Change at Work' . Paper for the 1987 British Sociological Association Conference . Wilkinson, B . (1983) The Shopfloor Politics of New Technology . London : Heinemann . Wood, S . (ed .) (1982) The Degradation of Work? Skill, De-skilling and the Labour Process . London: Hutchinson .
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Anne Phillips Divided Loyalties : Dilemmas of Sex and Class Vigaro, 1987 . 192 pp . Lynne Segal Is the Future Female? Troubled Thoughts on Contemporary Feminism Virago, 1987 . 265 pp . Reviewed by Ruth Pearson DIVIDED LOYALTIES gives a careful
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and well-documented account of the last 200 years of feminism in Britain, and the ways in which issues of class have divided feminists in both the political and theoretical spheres . Anne Phillips rejects an orthodox or sociological definition of class - no slide rule calculations of class position based on clear criteria - but points to both the complexities and changes of class identity and class interests and the ways in which these are interwoven
Book Reviews with gender interests which are equally heterogeneous and contradictory . This is an enormously informative and readable account which is refreshing in its respect for the many different strands which have contributed to feminist politics without seeking to underplay real political differences . She explains how ideas of radical feminism and the language of patriarchy and male domination entered the vocabulary of socialism and how the labour movement was forced - at a nominal level at least - to pay attention to women's issues which arose from their oppression by men - such as sexual harassment - as well as those which arose from their oppression by capital . She reviews the (in)famous `domestic labour debate'- not just from the point of view of the theoretical discourse but from the standpoint of feminist politics, using the example of `wages for housework' to demonstrate how various feminist demands look different according to which point on the class spectrum one stands and what economic and social alternatives to housework women have . She concludes that the question of whether class or gender should command our undivided loyalties is not resolvable . Whilst some might feel that this ducks the main questions she poses for herself, in my view she makes an authoritative case for the political and theoretical creativity which results from the on-going tension . An uncomfortable position, perhaps, but one which should be understood both by those who insist on hierarchising class as the only/primary axis of analysis as well as those within the feminist movement who use class to disenfranchise those with conflicting views and experiences .
Lynne Segal's project in Is the 183 Future Female? is different . She seeks to redress the `public' face of feminism in the eighties which she sees as an essentialism based on a polarised fundamental opposition of the female to the male . The `troubled thoughts' of the subtitle concern the `turnabout in feminist writing from an initial denial of the fundamental difference between women and men in the early 1970s to the celebration of differences by the close of that decade' . She seeks to challenge the populist view that there has been no fundamental change in women's circumstances over recent `decades, centuries or millennia' . Women, she argues, are not fixed and frozen within separate `private' or `public' worlds and that women's caring characteristics can be mobilised in the service of war and privilege as well as the promotion of peace and the struggle against exploitation . The insistence on a unique and historical female value system and the disconnected or antagonistic separatist policies which stem from this are a counsel and strategy for despair and must be resisted and transcended by socialist feminism in its efforts not only to achieve influence within the left but to retake the foreground of the feminist movement in Britain . Women's interests must be fought out within mixed fora - of the left, of progressive social movements - whatever the difficulties and dangers of this course . However, in arguing this strategy which many socialist feminists are currently adopting - Lynne Segal does less than justice to the political achievements of the various currents of feminist activities in this country . By using the heuristic device of focussing on major published feminist authors -
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184 particularly Mary Daly, Dale Spender and Andrea Dworkin - to establish the essentialism of popular feminism, which is reinforced by key pamphlets and theoretical articles by influential revolutionary feminists, she misses the creative and political contribution of many feminists - most of them not socialist feminists - to the enrichment of socialist feminist strategy over the 1970s and 1980s . There may well be some lesbian separatists whose analysis is based on the reductionism of attributing the complex and manifold aspects of women's subordination `to the power of the penis', and who collapse all heterosexuality into `male violence' . But there are also organised and active feminists - both lesbian and not, who have challenged police and judicial procedures on dealing with rape cases, the rights (and State abuse) of lesbian mothers, and the need for a more representative and helpful form of sex education material for young people - political actions which fall squarely into the realm of challenging sexist, and male-dominated social institutions which Segal sees as one of the principles which should guide feminist strategy in the future . The argument about male violence is contradictory . Segal quotes Coote and Gill (1975) approvingly, who argued in 1975 that `Like the battering of women in the home, rape is primarily a social problem . . . (which) cannot be tackled effectively unless changes are made in the social conditions that encourage violence and keep women in an inferior position .' But complains Segal, feminist rage was directed against men . Women, she argues, are right to be angry about male indifference to the suffering of women . But to be angry against men who perpetrate
the violence, and the institutions of the state and the ideology which condones violence is a `hostility towards men' which does not recognise that `women are trapped by economic powerlessness' and that `some men are brutalised by existing social conditions' . Indeed this is one of the issues that has sharply divided feminists of the left from others ; but writing as a socialist feminist I am troubled by the idea that social conditions are still being used to absolve individual men of their responsibility for violence towards women, or that the argument that most men are not habitual women abusers is being used to absolve men as a gender from the systematic abuse by men of women . `Men's violence towards women . . . comes from the inequalities of power between men and women as much as from any internal psychic dynamic in men . Men are simply more likely to get away with abusing women than venting their aggression or frustration on most other targets' . It is precisely the recognition of the way in which society condones and facilitates male violence that underlies the energy and the effectiveness of feminist campaigns in this area . This analysis of feminist responses to male violence mars what is elsewhere a lucid and wide-ranging assessment of the trajectory of British feminism since the 1960s . Particularly useful is the summary of the debates and developments within feminist analysis of sexuality, mothering, and psychoanalysis, which are made digestible and comprehensible to the nonspecialist, and which throw much light on the theoretical discussion in the earlier part of the book . The history of the women's peace movement well illustrates how women can be mobilised for war as well as peace, and the
Book Reviews complexities of the politics of disarmament . Segal recognises the impact on public opinion, and ultimately on Labour Party defence policy of the Greenham Women's Peace Camp . However she fails to capture its wider relevance for feminism in Britain. `A little like the first years of our women's movement, women have discovered at Greenham a sense of individual and collective power, how to love and respect one another and . . . they have found a new meaning for themselves as women .' But equally - like the first years of `our' women's movement, Greenham has given a whole new generation of women the confidence and the conviction to apply their feminism in other areas of political activity . Its radicalising influence on thousands of women is an important factor in the reemergence of local grass-roots activism which Segal notes in the 1980s, as important as the women's action committees which transformed the nature of the miners' strike in 1984 . The final chapter deals with Feminism, the Left and the Future . Segal argues that the bastions of white-maledominated institutions must be challenged from within by feminists who have the confidence and clarity to insist and insert feminist demands and visions into the Labour Party and the trade union movement . But she must also recognise the creativity that comes from a whole spectrum of feminist politics which has relentlessly remodelled the political agenda of the left and which gives feminists within mainstream structures their strength and their credibility . Anna Coote and Tess Gill (1975) The Rape Controversy . London : National Council for Civil Liberties pamphlet . p. 3 .
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Ralph Miliband, Leo Panitch, John Saville (eds) Socialist Register 1987 : Conservatism in Britain and America : rhetoric and reality London, Merlin Press, 1987 . 514 pp . £6 .50 (p/b) ISBN 0 85036 349 7 Reviewed by Bob Jessop of the Socialist Register is the third in a series devoted to specific themes . Following volumes dedicated to Anti-Communism (1984) and Social Democracy (1985-6), this year's register considers the new conservatism in Britain and the United States . In over 500 pages its contributors describe, explain, and criticise many different aspects of the Reagan and Thatcher governments : defence and foreign policies, monetarism and economic policies, trade unionism and industrial relations, welfare and social policies, THIS ISSUE
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policies towards women and the family, taxation, law and order. They also locate these governments in terms of their general political, ideological, and theoretical background as well as their origins in the changing balance of class forces in the 1970s . Finally, they consider the implications of the new conservatism for the left and democratic institutions . The editors must be congratulated for producing such an excellent compendium whose various analyses repay several readings and demand serious discussion . This short review cannot summarise all the contributions and it would be invidious to single out specific contributions for detailed comment . Thus I shall comment briefly on some common themes, some recurrent problems, and some general implications . Several contributors note how Reaganism and Thatcherism came to power by mobilising discontent with the Keynesian welfare state system and its reorganisation of social and political relations . But due weight is also given to their long-term role in creating the institutional conditions in both state and civil society for renewed capital accumulation . Unfortunately there is little discussion of whether this would involve a new regime of accumulation or the reassertion of older patterns . In general the conditions for renewed growth are either seen as redistribution of income and wealth towards the corporate rich and/or as producing greater freedom for capital and requiring more flexibility from labour . Questions such as flexible specialisation, post-Fordism, a new industrial revolution, or a new international division of labour, are not discussed . Because the most likely forms of renewed growth are not explored, it is hard to assess whether
Reaganism and Thatcherism represent coherent long-term strategies for capital or could consolidate a mass basis of support through `popular capitalism' or similar strategies . Another theme common to many contributions is the extent to which the success of Reaganism and Thatcherism depends upon (and also reinforces) social divisions and political disorganisation among opposing forces . It is less clear how these have occurred and how, if at all, they could be mended . In part this problem of (and for) the left is related to the fact - clearly analysed in several contributions - that Reaganism and Thatcherism have been through various phases and have made strategic shifts . They have conducted wars of manoeuvre as well as a long-term war of position and in this sense they constitute a moving target which continually keeps opposition off-balance . Moreover, whilst not denying significant `authoritarian populist' (AP) features of Reaganism and Thatcherism, several contributors cast doubt on the adequacy of the AP approach to Reaganism and Thatcherism whether seen as projects, movements, or regimes . Together with criticisms of a class politics analysis and of alternative economic strategies, this leaves somewhat of a vacuum for the development of a new strategy for the left - especially as the future trends in capital accumulation also go unexplored . In a closing essay Miliband and Panitch note that the new conservatism has not mobilised mass popular support and that the left itself is partly to blame for its defeat and demoralisation . In this sense there is still much to play for . What is needed is the reconstruction of socialist perspectives for the struggle against the new conservatism
Book Reviews
and against capitalism . They argue that only a regenerated socialist party rooted in the working class can provide the rallying point for social movements and other forces with interests in this struggle . In the meantime they caution us against mistaking self-indulgent political masochism for effective selfcriticism . The analyses presented in the current Socialist Register are not masochistic but nor are they sufficient to prepare the ground for the regeneration of the socialist project . It would be good if the editors could devote their next volume to a serious debate over the prospects for a regenerated socialist party . This cannot confine itself to Thatcherism and Reganism but must also consider the nature of the new industrial revolution occurring under their aegis . It must also look beyond the USA and Britain to Japan and Germany to see what lessons about the new conservatism, social democracy, and socialist alternatives can be learnt .
C . J . Arthur Dialectics of Labour: Marx and His Relation to Hegel Oxford and New York, Basil Blackwell, 1986 . 182 pp . £22 .50 (h/b), ISBN 0 631 15218 0 Reviewed by Scott Meilde deals with the relation of Marx's Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts to the thought of Hegel . It is an important topic, and one that has been subject to excessive vagary of interpretation . What makes it particularly interesting is the fact tht it was made politically contentious by Althusser, whose view was that the EPM was so Hegelian that compared to the `mature' works of Marx it could not be considered Marxist . Althusser's work on the EPM was influential out of all proportion to its value as scholarship, and set beside Arthur's book it has to be judged eccentric and inconclusive . Arthur executes his task with a developed understanding of Hegel and Marx and of the secondary literature, and reaches considered conclusions with standards of argument and scholarship that are not always to be found in the study of Marx . The treatment is mainly expository, and critical evaluation of competing interpretation is largely kept to one chapter . There is a revealing discussion of the view, advanced by Kojeve and Sartre and adopted by others, that in devising his theory of alienation Marx's debt to Hegel's Phenomenology was to the 'master-slave dialectic' . Arthur shows this not to be so, and shows that the debt is really to the `dialectic of negativity' . We are left to draw our own conclusions about why this error THIS BOOK
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188 should have been made in the 1930s and 1940s . This was the hey-day of the History of the cPSU(B) Short Course . So
what should we conclude from the fact, which Arthur draws out, that in the master-slave dialectic Hegel cracks up labour as something fulfilling for the slave, and holds that freedom can be enjoyed at any point in a hierarchy? It would have been a welcome thought to those given to the sentimental glorification of manual labour which was enjoined by Stalinism and Social Democracy alike, and which was part of the apologetic line that drew away from political economy and which put other things before Marx's own overriding concern with rolling back the `realm of necessity' and advancing the `realm of freedom' . Arthur argues also that the EPM is not merely a `materialist inversion' of Hegel, as Althusser had suggested in order that he might draw the conclusion that `alienation' was not a scientific category . Arthur is probably wise to let his argument speak for itself, and to treat Althusser's position as if it had been a disinterested mistake . But if that is what it was, it is not all that it was . In the loosening that followed Stalin's death, the EPM and the concept of `alienation' became important in many attempts at critical evaluation of the Soviet experience, and led to such questions as : `If the USSR is socialism, then how come there is alienation and non-freedom?' There was a real need for Soviet apologists to have a counter position, and it was in this context that Althusser made his discovery of an `epistemological break' in Marx's work which supposedly occurred after the writing of the EPM . It no longer mattered if Soviet workers were alienated, since `alienation' was
not a Marxist category . Arthur recognises Marx's abiding concern in all his work with human freedom, but he endorses Allan Wood's view that in the later work alienation ceases to be an explanatory concept and becomes a descriptive one (p . 141) . This needs qualification, since alienation and freedom are essential to Marx's theory of history, his understanding of the workings of the political economic contradictions of capitalism, of production by freely associated producers, and of the dynamic of the transition between them .
Development Economics On Trial : The Anthropological Case For A Prosecution Polly Hill
Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 1986 £7 .95 p/b . ISBN 0 52131096 2 Reviewed by Alan Sillitoe has conducted field work in West Africa and India for over thirty years and is best known for her work on cocoa farmers in Ghana . Like many other British anthropologists she has not directly contributed to the general debates on development theory over POLLY HILL
Book Reviews
the last two decades, but until recently her work, along with a handful of others', was constantly referred to for empirical support in the debates . This collection of essays is her direct contribution to the wider debates and her elegant, succinct and informed arguments make fascinating reading . I took delight in the way in which she dealt with perspectives I disagree with, only to be angered at the way she then dismissed notions I fondly adhere to . But her polemical style never drifts too far from the detailed empirical work on which her case rests so that her arguments cannot lightly be dismissed . We are not offered another grand theory . Rather, through tackling certain orthodox rural development economists, the very enterprise of grand theory is questioned . In her first five chapters she challenges such economists as Ghatak, Ingersent and Tondaro who have constructed theories of rural development . The main argument for the prosecution is that elaborate theories have been built on worthless data : edifices which would be follies worthy of admiration were not the consequences for government policy and undergraduate thinking so harmful . Hill undermines the data available for rural economic and social processes in such a way that anyone with first-hand experience should find convincing . The problems of collecting information from farmers on land use, crops grown, sources of income and forms of labour have rarely been recognised by governments or other agencies, yet what data is available is seized upon and subjected to sophisticated statistical techniques which give intellectual prestige and political influence to the practitioners . In a passage which sums up her argument, she asks, `How can
the international world be persuaded that the problems of collecting statistics, and allied material, at the ground level in the third world, are just as intellectually challenging, and far more important than mere mathematical processing?' Three of her chapters are headed `the vain search for universal generalisations' and in them she argues against such concepts as peasant, subsistence versus cash crops and household . Her arguments centre around showing that such concepts imposed from outside fit uneasily into the complexity and variety of rural life . Thus she argues that there are very few crops which are not sold on the market, that the concept of peasant fails to recognise widespread rural inequality or to incorporate the large number of landless rural dwellers . On the one hand, therefore, she questions the categories which are used for official statistics, and on the other she challenges many assumptions of Marxist and neo-Marxist researchers . but all the time she is pleading that with good quality field work it is possible to discover what is happening in rural areas that that it is possible to explain . As she says, especially within economics, too much research has been conducted to test models rather than to explain what is occurring . I found her dismissal of peasant studies unacceptable mainly because she refers to only a limited range of work : Henry Bernstein's work, for example, merits no attention . Yet one can agree that there are peasant studies which are insensitive to the extent of rural inequalities, the nature of and consequence of inheritance systems and the varieties of forms of labour . So whilst at times her conclusions may not seem justified, invariably her warnings
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about incautious generalising are powerfully argued . Anyone about to undertake research in rural areas in Africa, Asia or Latin America should read this as should anyone seeking to examine the methodological basis of development economics . The final nine chapters are a series of essays following up more specific issues raised by her polemic against development economics . She covers inheritance systems, rural indebtedness, migration, women, farmlabouring systems, rural class stratification and the farming household . Throughout she demonstrates the central importance of economic anthropology for the concerns of development economists, few of whom, she claims, have listened as they should have . Her liberal, eclectic approach enables her to castigate Marxists on one page and then to praise their contribution on another . But there is a consistency : where diversity and complexity is recognised, and where people have taken the time and effort to go beyond official statistics and sacred concepts then Polly Hill takes their work seriously . Hill raises a large number of other issues in such a short book which summarises a number of reflections from her academic life . It's a troublesome book for non-anthropologists who expect to be able to generalise and build theories . But we need not take the implication that only detailed case studies are worthwhile : indeed, with lack of British funding, we have to pursue other lines of understanding . What economists, sociologists and political scientists cannot do is ignore the kind of work which Polly Hill draws on .
Obituary : Raya Dunayevskaya As we go to press, with sadness we learn of the death of Raya Dunayevskaya . She was secretary to Leon Trotsky in Mexico until she broke with him at the time of the Hitler-Stalin Pact . She asserted that Russia had become a state-capitalist tyranny . At that time she was closely associated with C .L .R . James, being partners of the Johnson-Forrest Tendency of the Fourth International (see C .L .R . James, Notes on Dialectics, 1948, published London 1980) . Her writings on Marxist political economy and philosophy always stressed the critical Hegelian legacy and humanistic elements within Marx's thinking . Her writings include Nationalism, Communism, Marxist-Humanism and the Afro-Asian Revolution and Philosophy and Revolution . But
undoubtedly her outstanding book was Marxism and Freedom - from 1776 until today (1958, 1964) . She was also closely associated with the journal News and Letters.
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