Labour: Theoretical and Historical Perspectives

Ankita Chakrabarty

Response Note 1

Entry no.: 2019HUZ8703

Date: 08/03/2020

Labour is a process integral to the working of the society as a whole has been vital to Marx
and his followers including the Neo-Marxists. However, one can see a gulf of difference in
their approaches to analyse labour as subject and object on the other hand. It is an important
juncture where Marxist ideology has to be understood as it is opposed to capitalism and mass
production. In the perusal of two vital path-breaking texts namely, Harry Braverman’s
Labour and Monopoly Capital (1974) and Michael Burawoy’s The Politics of Production
Factory Regimes under Capitalism and Socialism (1985), opens many debatable extensions
from Marx’s Capital. Looking at the process of labour and production of commodities, these
scholars have taken difference stance on their analysis. While both stand on different
positions to talk about the structure of labour and its varied characteristics, it has to be kept in
mind that Burawoy’s work was mainly influenced by that of Braverman and many other
thinkers like Gramscii and so on. Therefore, much the aforementioned book discusses and
critiques the ideas put forth by Braverman and adds more to it. The crux of both the books
can be summarized and said to have dealt with labour in the production process. Braverman
manages to focus on the instinctual part that differs amongst animals and humans. Human
labour not being instinctual is something more than it and involves intellectual capabilities
and pressure. He talks of the labourer as a passive character who is all dominated by different
levels of authority in Weber’s analysis (like bureaucracy) in the forms of managerial
autarchy, scientific temperaments, Taylorist production process and so on. Capitalist
production takes away the labour power of the workers. Burawoy on the other hand, collects
the subjugation part of the workers from Braverman but also adds more to it. He introduces
the concept of consent within which the labourers participate in a game like situation which
increases the efficiency as well as exploitation, example that he specifies is the ‘piece-rate
pay’ system. He analyses the condition in different ideal types of factories across nations to
understand the politics within the factory as well as the external world. Braverman focusses
mostly in the basic proposition of how in capitalism, “de-skilling” workers was prevalent so
as to obscure the actual value of labour by various ways of structuring and restructuring of
organizational development such as the introduction of managers (onlookers) and scientific
production methods like Taylorii suggested.

The major methodological difference between Burawoy and Braverman lies in their treatment
of labour. The former critiques Braverman by rejecting his idea of seeing capitalism as
despotic in nature which only de-skills the labourers. Burawoy sees the factory scenario as
not just demeaning and de-skilling, rather an overt from of hegemonic ideas into play with
some extent of co-optation and coercion. He bases his arguments as opposed to the Marxist
question of “Why do workers work at all (given their interests are opposite to those of
capitalists)?” and rather ponders on why do the workers work as hard as they do (knowing the
fact that their surplus is being finally expropriated by the capitalists). Therefore, it is not just
skill that counts but also “ingenuity” which would leave the workers with much of their
innovations and this heterogeneity in different forms of factories in the picture. Burawoy
rightly concludes by saying that capitalism as a major force of objectification of work cannot
be brought down to such a simple process. In fact is subjective and works under the umbrella
of consent. It is the consent of the labourers that accomplices in their own subordination.
(Burawoy, 1974: 10).

Elizabeth Dunn in Privatizing Poland (2004) provides an analytical discussion of the

gendered division of labour in the Post- Socialism country of Poland. This gendered form of
labour created an altogether new personhood based on the identity of motherhood, an
enabling status of a labourer creating baby food for the country. This sense of obligation
together with the idea of ‘sacrifice’ for earning a wage, essentialized the kind of labour
required in the production of baby food. The women folk ostensibly participated in the
production process under the given condition with very little scope of negotiation out of the
obligation of goodness generated towards the well being of the children of the country.
Similarly, Elana Shever (2012) focuses attention on the familial sentiments as a means to
generate a kind of labour based on allegiance to the State owned oil production. The idea of a
certain kind of citizenship initiated the form of labour out of the YPF iii family. According to
Braverman, this labour can also be seen as a voluntary act, provided it is the only option that
the workers are left with in the end of the day. He goes deeper into the process and concludes
that as the labour starts in the process, it aids in the process of expansion of capital and
creation of surplus. Thus, this can be seen as an important tool, in fact the most important tool
in the accumulation of capital. In fact, labour itself becomes a part of capital by the means of
rigorous organizational structure.

Worker here is seen as an active creator of collective life and shaper into the politics of
production unlike Braverman who limits workers to passive existence. Hence Braverman
failed to capture the gendered aspect of division of labour and saw it only as a humanly
attribute. It is in this context that the works by Dunn and Shever present a first-hand
ethnographic experience of labourers from their workplace rather than theoretizations.
Therefore, it will be too simple to understand labour bereft of the context, background and
the organisational set up of the worker that essentialize voluntarism and consent.

Bibliography

1. Braverman, H. (1974). Labour and Monopoly Capital. Monthly Review Press: New
York
2. Burawoy, M. (1985). The Politics of Production Factory Regimes under Capitalism
and Socialism. Verso: London
3. Dunne, E. (2004). Privatising Poland: Baby Food, Big Business, and the Remaking of
Labor. Cornell University Press: New York
4. Marx, K. (1974). Capital (Vol. I). London: Lawrence and Wishart.
5. Shever, E. (2012). Resources for Reform: Oil and Neo-liberalism in Argentina.
Stanford University Press. California

i
Burawoy refers to the idea of hegemony from Gramsci’s Prison Notebooks (1926) and applies it in
the sphere of the factory production system by contextualizing it as a process of change and intrinsic
element in the labour process and expropriation by the petty bourgeoisie.

ii
Frederick Taylor in his Shop Management (1903) introduces the method of scientific management
which believes in efficiency and labour productivity by applying the tenets of science and
engineering. It can also be seen as the first step towards capital intensive maneuvers of production or
labour exploiting methods.

iii
YPF (Yacimientos Petroliferos Fiscales) was Argentina’s state oil company.