Writing Landscapes of Class, Power, and Racial Division

2001 ◽  
Vol 27 (2) ◽  
pp. 237-250 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Self
Keyword(s):  
Class Power

Kapitalistische Krisen mit und ohne systemischer Herausforderung.

2016 ◽  
Vol 46 (185) ◽  
pp. 543-560 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ingo Schmidt
Keyword(s):  
World Market ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Deep Penetration ◽  
World War ◽  
Major Overhaul ◽  
Domestic Markets ◽  
Global Restructuring ◽  
Social Divisions ◽  
Class Power ◽  
Second World

This article draws on Marxist theories of crises, imperialism, and class formation to identify commonalities and differences between the stagnation of the 1930s and today. Its key argument is that the anti-systemic movements that existed in the 1930s and gained ground after the Second World War pushed capitalists to turn from imperialist expansion and rivalry to the deep penetration of domestic markets. By doing so they unleashed strong economic growth that allowed for social compromise without hurting profits. Yet, once labour and other social movements threatened to shift the balance of class power into their favor, capitalist counter-reform began. In its course, global restructuring, and notably the integration of Russia and China into the world market, created space for accumulation. The cause for the current stagnation is that this space has been used up. In the absence of systemic challenges capitalists have little reason to seek a major overhaul of their accumulation strategies that could help to overcome stagnation. Instead they prop up profits at the expense of the subaltern classes even if this prolongs stagnation and leads to sharper social divisions.

scholarly journals Trade unions in transnational automotive companies in Russia and Slovakia: Prospects for working-class power

2016 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 97-112 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Hinz ◽  
Jeremy Morris
Keyword(s):  
Working Class ◽  
Empirical Data ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
Industrial Relations ◽  
Structural Power ◽  
Institutional Power ◽  
Class Power ◽  
Unconventional Methods

This article compares industrial relations in production sites in Slovakia and Russia owned by a single transnational automotive firm, Volkswagen. We analyse the empirical data using a working-class power approach. In Slovakia, associational and institutional power is well developed and influenced by the model of German work councils, but structural power is weakly exercised and unions rely on non-conflictual engagement with management. In Russia, structural working-class power remains strong, but the opportunities for transforming this into lasting associational, let alone institutional power, remain limited; thus, new unions make use of unconventional methods of protest to promote worker interests.

scholarly journals China's Rural Migrant Workers, the State, and Labor Politics

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jenny Chan ◽  
Mark Selden
Keyword(s):  
Migrant Workers ◽  
The State ◽  
Labor Politics ◽  
Rural Migrant ◽  
Industrial Labor ◽  
Class Power ◽  
The Individual ◽  
New Generation ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Rural Migrant Workers

The proletarianization of rural migrants is distinctive to contemporary China's development model, in which the state has fostered the growth of a “semi-proletariat” numbering more than 200 million to fuel labor-intensive industries and urbanization. Drawing on fieldwork in Guangdong and Sichuan provinces between 2010 and 2014, supplemented with scholarly studies and government surveys, the authors analyze the precarity and the individual and collective struggles of a new generation of rural migrant workers. They present an analysis of high and growing levels of labor conflict at a time when the previous domination of state enterprises has given way to the predominance of migrant workers as the core of an expanding industrial labor force. In particular, the authors assess the significance of the growing number of legal and extra-legal actions taken by workers within a framework that highlights the deep contradictions among labor, capital, and the Chinese state. They also discuss the impact of demographic changes and geographic shifts of population and production on the growth of working-class power in the workplace and the marketplace.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document