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» babble   » walking the talk   » labour and consumption   » : Labour Capitalism, the CLC and Leftist Solutions.

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Author Topic: : Labour Capitalism, the CLC and Leftist Solutions.
Boinker
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Babbler # 664

posted 27 August 2004 04:15 PM      Profile for Boinker   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
Canadian Dimension is a left wing magazine that is bravely critical of the regressive elements in the Canadian Labour movement.

But what I find undiscussed is the practical reality of the alternative to the labour - capital - goverment partnerships discussed in the article.

Things need to be built and regardless of how you slice it there are no public construction firms, land developers, carpenters, electricians, brick layers etc. The entire workforce is employed by private corporations.

It has always been so. In the past all governments have done is put up the money. General contractors direct subtrades and they are all private corporations.

So what exactly is the alternative to P3 anyway?

Chavez in Venezuela has trained the army to build houses and such. Local communities are funded to develop schools and hospitals. The operating social organization is not an elite corporation acting as agent for a docile and essentially witless population. Venezuelans are engagedand directly involved with building their society.

see
Beyond Populism: Venezuela and the International Left by Jonah Gindin in the same issue.

Of course, CD is opposed to any accmodation with the Capitalist system but unless they are prepared to deal with the realities then their critique will be more useful in a literary sense and have little to do with the mundane realities of society maintenance.

Over the next few months however they will be writing a series of articles on the "new deal" for the cities. This should prove interesting.

http://www.canadiandimension.mb.ca/frame.htm


From: The Junction | Registered: May 2001  |  IP: Logged
lagatta
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posted 27 August 2004 04:28 PM      Profile for lagatta     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
It is indeed an interesting discussion. I'd certainly be opposed to militarisation à la Chavez of public building projects - doubt THOSE workers have much of a right to strike or to refuse hazardous working conditions - but one point would be to re-establish public employment in the many paragovenmental jobs that have been privatised or contracted out.

The people teaching ESL and FSL to civil servants (just to use a self-serving example) used to be civil servants themselves; perhaps it was temporary contract work but it was directly to the government or a government agency. Afterwards, such programmes were cut and that work was contracted out to private language schools that offer shitty conditions and no security, no right to post to other jobs, to their employees. There are countless such examples.

A lot of ill has been said about "make-work" projects because they are easily subject to graft and silly work, but as we've seen with the recent sponsorship scandal, contracting them out is no cure for that. There are a hell of a lot of socially necessary projects that don't get done by "the market", such as a massive social housing programme (including co-ops and other forms as well as public housing) and investment in public transport to reduce the need for private vehicles in urban areas.


From: Se non ora, quando? | Registered: Apr 2002  |  IP: Logged
Boinker
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posted 27 August 2004 06:21 PM      Profile for Boinker   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
I think one way to protect the interests of civil servants is by establishing constitutional guarantees for public servants' collective bargaining rights.

In other words when times get tough guys like Trudeau and Rae wouldn't be allowed to punish public servants in vain attempts to get brownie points with a disaffected puiblic.

I would certainly be in favour of restructuring the military to create things rather than destroy them. Why would it be so difficult?

For example, General Pershing, the civil war general invented "collateral damage" as a weapon of war in order to defeat the south. So why wouldn't the inverse be a "weapon of peace"?

Use armies of civil servants to rebuild and create new communities with new and iniovative approaches to work, the environment, etc.

I mean isn't this essentially the brilliant idea behind Israel's "kibutz" movement where everyone was in the army for a couple of years but it wasn't all war and killing but farming, desert reclamation, etc., etc?

If there is going to be a big push to establish a big infrastructure program I think it shouldn't be given to the greedy pigs in the private sector.

It should be truly public works project...

[ 27 August 2004: Message edited by: Boinker ]


From: The Junction | Registered: May 2001  |  IP: Logged
Rufus Polson
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posted 01 September 2004 05:09 PM      Profile for Rufus Polson     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
Originally posted by lagatta:
It is indeed an interesting discussion. I'd certainly be opposed to militarisation à la Chavez of public building projects - doubt THOSE workers have much of a right to strike or to refuse hazardous working conditions

Well, yes. Different situation here, what? In the Venezuelan case it was more of a public-buildingification of the military, but that isn't needed here.

Are there any co-operative building firms? How much capital do you need to start up something like that? Do they generally own the dozers etc., or do they rent them? Certainly it seems like building companies can start up, fold and restart under a different name fairly easily. Seems like what you need is the expertise (in building itself, submitting bids, dealing with regulatory agencies and whatnot), and the contacts in the industry more than you need a great deal of money. It seems to me that as the unionized construction space gets squeezed, expert workers might do worse than get together in co-ops. Has anything stopped this from happening, aside from the concept being rather "fringe"?


From: Caithnard College | Registered: Nov 2002  |  IP: Logged

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