Socialism, Police and the Government or State, Part One

Mr. Gindin, in his article We Need to Say What Socialism Will Look Like argues the following:

The expectations of full or near-full abundance, added to perfect or near-perfect social consciousness, have a further consequence: they imply a dramatic waning, if not end, of substantive social conflicts and so do away with any need for an “external” state. This fading away of the state is, as well, rooted in how we understand the nature of states. If states are reduced to only being oppressive institutions, then the democratization of the state by definition brings the withering away of the state (a “fully democratic state” becomes an oxymoron). On the other hand, if the state is seen as a set of specialized institutions that not only mediate social differences and oversee judicial discipline but also superintend the replacement of the hegemony of class and competitive markets with the democratic planning of the economy, then the state will likely play an even greater role under socialism.

I will deal with Mr. Gindin’s inadequate conception of freedom and necessity in a socialist society in a later post that continues a description of what socialist society may look like. Here, I will begin a critique of Mr. Gindin’s idealization of the state when he implies that the nature of the state will expand under a socialist system.

Mr. Gindin, as his typical of his social-democratic point of view, vastly underestimates the importance and nature of the existing repressive nature of any government or state that presupposes the legitimacy of the power of a class of employers. He refers to “superintend the replacement of the hegemony of class and competitive markets” while simultaneously referring to the state as “overseeing judicial discipline.” What would “overseeing judicial discipline” mean in a socialist society? What would “judicial discipline” mean in a socialist society? No one will find an answer to these questions in his article since Mr. Gindin’s reference is simply vague.

Let us assume, however, that by “judicial discipline” Mr. Gindin means “the rule of law.” What does the “rule of law” mean? Many who refer to the rule of law believe that it prevents the government from infringing on the rights of citizens. This is a myth since the rule of law is just as vague as Mr. Gindin’s reference to “overseeing judicial discipline” or even “judicial discipline.”

What is the myth of the rule of law? It is the myth that citizens are somehow protected, by means of the law, from arbitrary actions by government officials of one form or another. The rule of law, rather, is a rule of order. This is the real function of police. The rule of law, for example, is supposed to limit the power of police–but does it?

From Mark Neocleous, The Fabrication of Social Order: A Critical Theory of Police Power, pages 112-113:

Since, as we have seen, law-enforcement is merely an incidental and
derivative part of police work, and since, as Lustgarten has noted, the police
invariably under-enforce the law, the equation of policing with law enforcement
is clearly untenable.68 The police enforce the law because it
falls within the scope of their larger duties of regulating order which, in
an ideological loop of remarkable ingenuity, is then justified in terms of
crime control and the need to ‘uphold the law’. In other words, law enforcement
becomes part of police work to the same extent as anything
else in which the exercise of force for the maintenance of order may have
to be used, and only to that extent. Police practices are designed to conform
to and prioritize not law, but order, as the judges and police have long
known.69 Law-enforcement is therefore a means to an end rather than an
end in itself, as witnessed by the fact that, for example, police often prefer
to establish order without arrest. The assumption central to the rule of law
that people should not take the law into ‘their own hands’ reminds us not
only that the law is meant to be used and controlled by chosen hands, as
Bauman puts it,70 but that police do in fact handle rather than enforce the
law. The law is a resource for dealing with problems of disorder rather than
a set of rules to be followed and enforced. The kind of police behaviour
which offends the sensibilities of civil libertarians or which seems at odds
with the assumptions in the liberal democratic conception of the rule of
law in fact turns out to be within the law and exercised according to the
need to deal with things considered disorderly. The police follow rules,
but these are police rules rather than legal rules. Thus when exercising discretion,
the police are never quite using it to enforce the law, as one might
be led to believe. Rather, officers decide what they want to do and then fit
their legal powers around that decision. Hence the main ‘Act’ which police
officers purport to enforce is the ‘Ways and Means Act’, a set of mythical
powers which they use to mystify and confuse suspects, and the question
of whether an officer should detain a suspect on legal grounds is displaced
by the question ‘which legal reason shall I use to justify detaining this person’.
Exercised according to police criteria rather than specific legal criteria,
the rules are rules for the abolition of disorder, exercised by the police and enabled by law.

Mr. Gindin’s reference to “judicial discipline” assumes that the judiciary will continue to exist as a separate institution–like now. He presumably also assumes that police will never be abolished since he eternalizes “scarcity” (as noted above, I will criticize this view in another article). With scarcity, there will be necessary some external force to ensure that people who do not follow the (mythological) law will be properly “motivated” to follow not the law but the order of scarcity. Socialism in such a situation will resemble the capitalist order in various ways.

The social implication of the rule of law or “judicial discipline” can also be seen in terms of the effects on how people would feel in Mr. Gindin’s “realistic socialism”–fear. From Mark Neocleous, The Fabrication of Social Order: A Critical Theory of Police Power, page 113:

‘We fear the policeman’ then, as Slavoj Zizek comments, ‘insofar as he is
not just himself, a person like us, since his acts are the acts of power, that
is to say, insofar as he is experienced as the stand-in for the big Other, for
the social order.’73 And it is because the police officer is the stand-in for
social order that order is the central trope around which even the smallest
police act is conducted. As a number of ex-police officers have testified,
the police themselves are obsessed with order, being institutionalized to
achieve order at all times and in all contexts. Malcolm Young has commented
on how one folder containing a record of the Orders by a range of
senior officers reveals ‘how everything in this world had an ordained place
and could therefore be controlled, ordered, disciplined, checked, scrutinized’.
Likewise ex-police sergeant Simon Holdaway has pointed to the
way prisoners are treated as ‘visible evidence of disorder’. Needing to
detect and end disorder among citizens, the police cannot cope with ambiguity
in any way.74 In dealing with any particular situation a police officer
makes a decision about what, if anything, is out of order and then makes a
decision about how to overcome it. Because each individual officer is institutionalized to achieve order at all times the police institution must have
a strong sense of the order they are there to reproduce, reflected in the
activities they are taught to pursue, the techniques they use in pursuit, and
compounded by a unitary and absolutist view of human behaviour and
social organization.75

The police as the representative of “order” entails not only fear but a need for the expression of deference. From Mark Neocleous, The Fabrication of Social Order: A Critical Theory of Police Power, pages 113-114:

So for example, failure to display deference to an
officer significantly increases the probability of arrest, for it is understood
as a failure to display deference to an officer’s demand for order. Any hostility
directed to them is treated as an attack on their authority and power
to order, and thus an attack on authority and order in general, mediated by
a supposed hostility to the Law. Antagonistic behaviour is a symbolic rejection
of their authoritative attempt to reconstitute order out of a disorderly
situation; it is this which may result in more formal (i.e. legal) methods of
control.76 Regardless of the legal issues pertinent to the situation, the failure to display deference is therefore likely to make one an object of the law as
an arrested person as a means of reproducing order.

Mr. Gindin’s world of scarcity probably looks a lot like the capitalist world order.

This view is consistent with Mr. Gindin’s conservative attitude–he could not even criticize the conservative pairing of a movement for increasing the minimum wage to $15 and for instituting needed employment law reforms with the idea of “fairness.” He even claimed that the justification by some trade unionists here in Toronto who used the term “decent work” were using it in a purely defensive manner–which is nonsense.

Indeed, the term “decent work” is linked to the repressive nature of the capitalist government or state since those who perform “decent work” in a society dominated by a class of employers can thereby pat themselves on the back while they look down on those who lack “decent work.” From Richard Ericson, Reproducting Order: A Study of Police Patrol Work, page 204:

The police can easily justify additional resources, including the latest in
protective headgear, because they have a solid populist constituency among
the ‘hard hats’ of ‘decent working people.’ These people have a great stake in
the status quo because they have invested their very lives in it. In relation to
them, the politics of ‘lawandorder’ is part of ‘the politics of resentment.’
According to people who analyse this politics (e.g. Friedenberg, 1975,1980,
1980a; Gaylin et al, 1978) these individuals are apparently frustrated by the
imprisonment of conformity within the status quo. Conformity yields
payouts which they judge to be meager; the payouts are assessed relatively
and thus prove insatiable. These people take out their frustrations against
those contained in the criminal prisons, and against all others who do things,
however vaguely defined, which suggest that they are gaining pleasure outside
conventional channels. For these conventionals, it is better to seek the
painful channels of convention and to avoid pleasures. For this reason, they
support the construction of an elaborate apparatus aimed at ensuring that
those who seek to experience disreputable pleasures and to avoid pain will
eventually, and often repeatedly, suffer pain that more than cancels out their
pleasures. Moreover, it seems that people are willing to support the construction
of this apparatus at all costs.

Mr. Gindin, far from providing a critique of the modern social order, panders to such an order and reinforces the proclivity of Canadians to call for more order (a stronger police presence and a stronger police state). From Richard Ericson, Reproducting Order: A Study of Police Patrol Work, page 204:

This mythology is so dominant that even when a major crisis
erupts, and the media help to reveal systematic structural flaws in control
agencies, public support for the police remains strong. This is clearly evident
in the continuing revelations about the wide net of illegal practices cast by the
RCMP (see Mann and Lee, 1979). In spite of repeated revelations about illegal
practices against legitimate political groups, illegal opening of the mail, illegal
trespasses and thefts in private premises, and the manufacturing of news
stories to serve its own interests, the RCMP still maintains its popularity in
public opinion polls (ibid). Indeed, some politicians have responded to this
exposure by calling for legislation to legalize previously illegal practices and
for a reassertion of authority within the administrative structure of the RCMP.
As Friedenberg (1980, 1980a) points out, this type of response is typical
of the Canadian reaction to any crisis in authority: ‘The solution for the
failure of authority is more authority …

Mr. Gindin’s view of the future “expansion of the state” simply ignores the repressive nature of the modern state and claims that it merely needs to be transformed. What he means by “transformation” seems, however, to be more of the same–repression, fear, deference. After all, with scarcity, property rights must be protected to ensure that workers are motivated to engage in work (rather than pilfering from others).

Such is the real nature of socialism for Mr. Gindin.

In a future post, I will, unlike Mr. Gindin, continue a critical analysis of the police, the law and the government or state that protects class order–the class order of employers above all.

Of course, workers also call the police in order to protect themselves from each other–to deny that would be naive. That workers experience the police as oppressive does not prevent them from relying on the police to protect what limited rights they do have on occasion–but the extent to which the police and the courts protect workers’ rights should not be exaggerated. Nor should it prevent us from seeing the major function of the police to protect the existing order–and use the law as a means to that end. The primary issue for the police is order–and to seek justifications for maintaining or reestablishing order–including using the law to justify their actions after the fact.

Socialism, What It May Look Like, or Visions of a Better Kind of Society Without Employers, Part Six

The following is a continuation of previous posts on the possible nature of socialism that excludes the power of employers as a class.

In the following, Tony Smith elaborates on the capital-assets tax, which is the basis for the generation of new investment and the supply of public goods. From Globalisation: A Systematic Marxian Account (2006. Boston: Brill), pages 304-305:

(v) The origin of funds for new investment and public goods is a flat tax
on the non-labour assets of all enterprises.16 In Schweickart’s proposal, the
rate of this tax is initially set by a democratically elected legislature, operating
on the national level. This legislature also decides on the appropriate division
of revenues between funding for national public goods and funds that are
allocated to democratically elected regional and local legislative bodies. Each
of these assemblies, in turn, must also decide upon the level of funding for
public goods to be supplied in the relevant geographical area vis-à-vis the
level of funds set aside for distribution to the level below it. These legislative
bodies can also set aside a percentage of funds for investment in areas of
pressing social needs.

(vi) After all decisions have been made regarding the general level of new
investment and the order of social priorities, and after funds required for
public goods on the national, regional, and local levels have been allocated, the remaining revenues are distributed to local communities on a per capita
basis (at least this should be the presumption in the absence of compelling
reasons to do otherwise, such as the need to temporarily favour historically
disadvantaged regions). Community banks would then undertake the actual
allocation of new investment funds to worker collectives. The boards of
directors of these banks would include representatives of a broad range of
social groups affected by the banks’ decisions. New enterprises would be
formed, and existing ones expanded, through allocations by community banks
rather than private capital markets.

The capital-assets tax assumes that the workers have right of use of most of the means of production of our lives (there may be some room for independent businesses, but they do not form the bulk of economic activity). If they do, then instead of new investment being derived from the private decisions of boards of directors of corporations, it is derived from a democratically-elected national legislature which sets the rate of the capital-assets tax.

There are two general aspects to the tax (like any tax): the flow from a source to the government and the flow of the tax to institutions. The source is the capital assets used by democratic worker cooperatives. It is a flat-rate tax based on the value of the means of production that is applied to capital assets used by workers.

The flow of the revenue generated by the tax to people only arises after deductions from revenue required for investment in projects at the national level. Once this has been deducted, then the revenue is distributed to the regional communities on a perc capita (per person) basis; the regional democratic bodies which in turn allocate investment funds for investment in projects at the regional level. The remainder is then allocated to the local community via public banks, likewise on a per capita (per person) basis.

This principle of distribution of the revenue generated from the capital-assets tax on a per capita basis means that, in areas where there is a concentration of means of production relative to the number of people who live in the area, the outflow of taxes paid will be relatively greater than the inflow of revenue from taxes when compared to areas where the concentration of means of production is relatively smaller.

The capital-assets tax is to replace interest and dividend payments. As noted in the previous post on this topic, since many workers in the more industrialized capitalist countries have at least some investments in the stock market or hold bonds, GICs, and so forth and, furthermore, pension funds are generally linked to investment, a policy that at one sweep sought to abolish interest and dividend payments may well be opposed by the working class, initially. Consequently, some form of transitional program may be necessary, one where interest and dividend payments are gradually phased out, or one where compensation for nationalization occurs. In any case, the ultimate goal is to abolish interest and dividend payments and replace them with a flat capital-assets tax.

Do Collective Agreements Convert Working for an Employer into Decent Work?

Tracy McMaster is a union steward for Local 561 of the Ontario Public Service Employees Union (OPSEU); she was also vice-president of the local union at one point. However, she prides herself most on her activity of organizing part-time college workers (she works at a college as a library technician). . On March 25, 2019, in a short video (Stewards Assembly 2019), she refers to the need to organize part-time college workers (where she works). She also refers to “a full-time decent unionized job.” This implies that as long as it is full-time and unionized, the job is decent.

Of course, organizing part-time workers so that they obtain increased wages or salary and better benefits (or receive benefits in the first place since many part-time workers do not receive benefits at all) is something to be praised. However, the standard of evaluation for what constitutes a decent job is whether there is a collective agreement that protects a certain level of wages and working conditions.

Such a standard is never questioned. Ms. McMaster never questions that standard throughout the video. Indeed, right after the quoted reference “full-time decent unionized jobs,” she ends with the rhetorical question: Right? Exactly. She believes that a full-time, unionized jobs are by definition decent. To question such a view does not form part of her union activity.

She argues that part-time workers were working under “unjust, awful condition…takes away the dignity of everybody’s job.” Since employers (presumably, or perhaps also students and others–she leaves it unspecified what she means by “people treating others with disrespect”) treat part-time workers with little respect, then full-time unionized workers find that others do not treat them with respect.

She points out that she received solidarity from both the local union presidents in 24 different colleges as well as various labour councils throughout Ontario and especially the labour council in Toronto.

She then claims that it was “an amazing, amazing accomplishment” that the part-time workers “just last week have their first collective agreement.” She is “so proud” that she “was involved in this project.”

Of course, she should feel that she, along with others, has accomplished something. The question is: Is it enough? She herself claims that the job of the labour movement is to find workers who need a union and to organize them. The standard or definition of what constitutes decent work is, then: organized workers who belong to a union.

When I questioned this definition when Ms. McMaster called for solidarity for striking brewery workers here in Toronto because all the striking workers wanted were “decent jobs” and “fair wages,” , the “labour movement” reacted to my questioning with hostility (For example, Wayne Dealy, executive director for Local 3902 of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), called me a “condescending prick.”)

Let us take a look at the collective agreement–“an amazing, amazing accomplishment” according to Tracy McMaster.

The memorandum of agreement contains typical clauses in a collective agreement: union representation, rights of union representatives, within limits, to take time off for union business (with compensation in some cases); work hours and scheduling, wages, rate of increase of wages and when that will take affect, period of paying the wages, shift premium, reimbursement of tuition and maintenance of salary if time off is required for courses approved by the employer, kilometrage allowance, developmental leave for furthering academic or technical skills that will enhance their work for the College, holidays, vacations, personal leave without pay, bereavement leave, jury/witness duty, citizenship leave, pregnancy leave, parental leave, health and safety (provision of clothing, work stations, safety devices, environmental conditions, seniority and its loss, layoff and recall, waiver of rights/severance, job postings/promotions, excluded positions, complaints/grievances, duration (until January 31, 2021).

This set of clauses is certainly likely better than wages and working conditions for part-time workers in many industries. As a consequence, as I have indicated in various posts, unions are much more preferable than non-unionized settings for many workers (although wages and working conditions for other industries should also be compared to gain a more accurate picture of workers’ situations in various non-unionized and unionized settings. Fear of unionization by some employers may motivate them to enhance wages and working conditions in non-unionized industries.)

Granted that, should we still not ask whether such jobs are decent?

How does the above change the general power of employers to treat workers as things that do not participate in the formulation of the goals of the organization to which they belong? Thus, the management rights clause states, in “Memorandum of Settlement:
The College Employer Council for the College of Applied Arts and Technology and Ontario Public Service Employees Union on behalf of the College Support Staff Part-Time”:

5 MANAGEMENT FUNCTIONS

Union Acknowledgements

The Union acknowledges that it is the exclusive function of the Colleges to:
•maintain order, discipline and efficiency;
•hire, discharge, transfer, classify, assign, appoint, promote, demote, lay off, recall and suspend or otherwise discipline employees subject to the right to lodge a grievance as provided for in this Agreement;
•generally to manage the College and without restricting the generality of the foregoing, the right to plan, direct and control operations, facilities, programs, courses, systems and procedures, direct its personnel, determine complement, organization, methods and the number, location and positions required from time to time, the number and location of campuses and facilities, services to be performed, the scheduling of assignments and work, the extension, limitation, curtailment or cessation of operations and all other rights and responsibilities not specifically modified elsewhere in this Agreement.

The Colleges agree that these functions will be exercised in a manner consistent with the provisions of this Agreement.

Ms. McMaster does not even bother to explore whether her characterization of inclusion of such part-time workers under the rule of managerial power–despite the existence of a collective agreement–actually expresses something decent. She ignores completely the management-rights clause and idealizes the collective agreement. This is typical of the social-democratic, reformist left.

Despite Ms. McMaster’s rhetoric to the contrary, the collective agreement cannot be characterized as amazing–unless you have a low standard of what amazing means. Part-time workers now have some protection from arbitrary treatment by employers (subject to a grievance process) and some control over their working lives. However, the collective agreement only limits management rights–like all collective agreements. It does not prevent workers at the various colleges from being used, day after day, for purposes over which they have no control (see The Money Circuit of Capital). To call this “dignity” is rhetoric. It is undignified and humiliating. All workers deserve to control their lives collectively–and that does not mean by limiting such control via management rights.

There is, of course, little point in trying to convince Ms. McMaster and other trade unionists of their lack of critical distance from collective agreements and collective bargaining. They wholeheartedly identify with the process and consider any questioning of such a process and its results to be tantamount to insanity.

It is better to practice the politics of exposure–showing the limitations of their own point of view and the limitations of what their own standards of evaluation for justice and fairness (in the video, Ms. McMaster wears a t-shirt with the inscription “We Stand For Fairness!”). Behind her, there is a poster with what appears to be the inscription “The Future Needs Good Jobs.”

The future certainly does not good jobs–but jobs controlled by workers and their community–without employers.

The future of good jobs for the social-democratic left, however, is just more of the same–collective agreements and the daily grind of working under the dictatorship of employers, limiting their power but not struggling to abolish it.

What if a worker works in a unionized setting but does not find that the work reflects being a decent job? For unionists, the worker should try to change working conditions through the next round of bargaining. However, if the worker finds working for any employer to be objectionable, unionists having nothing to say–except “Suck it up.” Or, alternatively, they will express the rhetoric of “decent work” and so forth and ignore the reality of managerial power and how degrading it is for a majority of workers to be dictated by a minority of representatives of employers.

Ms. McMaster, like her social-democratic colleagues, have a lot to answer for when they idealize collective agreements. They ultimately justify the dictatorship of employers over workers despite their rhetoric to the contrary.

It is, of course, ultimately up to workers themselves whether they wish to organize for purposes of remaining within the limits of the power of the class of employers or whether they wish to organize for going beyond that power. The attempt to go beyond that power is both much more difficult and much more risky. On the other hand, given the emergence of right-wing movements and political parties, it is also risky organizing only to limit the power of employers.

To sum up: Evidently, it it has been argued that the answer to the question whether collective agreements convert working for employers into decent work depends on the level of your standard for deciding what decent work is. The level of many unionists is the collective agreement itself. I have argued, in this and other posts, that level is wholly inadequate. Workers deserve a much higher standard, but to achieve such a standard requires going beyond limitations to employer power and to the power of their representatives via management; it requires questioning any agreement between employers and workers as embodying decent work.

We deserve much better than just collective agreements. We deserve to control our own lives collectively.

The Poverty of Academic Leftism, Part Three: Collective Bargaining and the Interests of the Working Class

This is a continuation of a critique of an academic leftist (aka academic historical materialist), the philosopher Jeff Noonan.

Another example of the limitations of Professor Noonan’s analysis is the following
(from Thinkings 4: Collected Interventions, Readings, Evocations, 2014-2015,page 10):

And sometimes it is necessary to struggle to protect or extend our rights as workers to help determine our conditions of work.

The context for the statement is Professor Noonan’s defense of workers’ right to strike. The problem with this argument is located in his use of the word “sometimes.” Since order-in-council 1003, enacted in 1944 during the Second World War, workers have not had the right to strike during the terms of a collective agreement in Canada. What happens during the terms of a collective agreement? Workers are generally expected to grieve an order, a procedure and so forth by management but continue to work. Is this something with which Professor Noonan agrees? His use of the word “sometimes” seems to imply that as well as his defense of the right to strike–a right that legally arises only after the expiration of a collective agreement.

But what of the need to struggle during the terms of a collective agreement? It may appear that Professor Noonan is sympathetic to the working class and to socialism, and yet his silence concerning, on the one hand, the general legitimacy of collective agreements in the context of the power of a class of employers and, on the other, his silence concerning the need to engage in struggle during the terms of a collective agreement demonstrate the limitations of his approach.Indeed, the International Workers of the World (IWW) have recognized the need to engage in struggle in various forms, with escalating consequences rather than just the strike; the strike, rather, is a high-end pressure tactic and not generally the first form of tactic to engage in in order to achieve workers’ own ends.

This does not mean that workers will engage in struggle continuously; workers of course need to pick and choose their struggles. However, the defense of the right to strike without any mention of the need to struggle against employers during the term of a collective agreement (and not just in the form of grievances) is a very limited defense of the interests of the working class.

It may seem that Professor Noonan recognizes the limitations of collective bargaining. He says the following (page 11):

Collective bargaining is a difficult process. At its best, it is a rare opportunity for workers to participate in the determination of their conditions of work, rather than simply accept whatever conditions are offered. Collective bargaining allows workers to deliberate together as a democratic body about how they think their work should be organized and compensated and to make their case to the employer. Despite what employers publicly maintain, there is no equality of power. Since employers retain ultimate legal control over the workplace, since they continue to draw full salary during any work stoppage, and since the legislative deck is stacked in their favour, without solidarity, both between members of the bargaining unity and between the bargaining unit and the wider community of labour and concerned citizens, the employer is typically in an advantaged position.

How does “solidarity, both between members of the bargaining unity [unit?] and between the bargaining unit and the wider community of labour and concerned citizens” overcome the power of employers as a class? A particular employer may have to concede relative defeat due to certain favourable conditions of a particular section of the working class, but the fact that workers still have to work for an employer involves “an advantaged position” of employers as a class–including the relatively “disadvantaged” employer.

Further evidence of the inadequacy of Professor Noonan’s position can be seen from the following (page 11):

We have only taken strike votes in the face of protracted impasses at the bargaining table over issues of fundamental importance to the membership.

Professor Noonan is trying to present the Windsor University Faculty Association as being reasonable; it does not engage in needless strike votes but only “over issues of fundamental importance of the membership.” This seems eminently reasonable–except it neglects the management rights clause, implicit or explicit, in collective agreements. What if an issue arises “of fundamental importance” to “the membership” during the term of a collective agreement that is not grievable?

Professor Noonan, further, argues the following (page 12):

Why, then, has bargaining often stretched into the fall? The answer is that both sides have too often brought so many items to the table that it took that long to work through them all in a responsible manner.

Perhaps university professors, who have greater control over what they do, how they do their work, and when they do their work than most other employees, need not bring “so many items to the table,” but the implicit or explicit management rights clause for most employees involves the general power of employers and their representatives, managers, to determine what to do, how to do it and when to do it. It is quite understandable why there are many items on the negotiating table from employees’ point of view–the collective agreement is a limiting document, restricting the power of management to exercise its right as management.

In fact, when I was a member of a negotiating team for Operating Engineers Local 858, Prince George, British Columbia, Canada, I consciously tried to show the workers how many items on the table we had to remove in order to obtain what we obtained by presenting all items desired on the left-hand side of the bargaining bulletin and either an x or check mark on the right-hand side. The union business manager had to present this format to a ratification meeting for those in Prince George (because she had asked me to draft it), but since the bargaining unit extended beyond Prince George, ratification also assumed the form of mail-in ballots. The union business manager changed the format to show only what we won before sending out an information bulletin.

Professor Noonan says, further (page 12):

Nevertheless, despite the nightmares of right-wing pundits, university faculties are not full of rabid leftists chomping at the bit to prosecute the class struggle (there are a few of us still left, but I can assure everyone we are in a small minority). Most faculty members care most about their research and their teaching, they do not want either interrupted by either lockouts or strikes, and most are loath to engage in struggles that might harm the reputation of the institutions in which their own reputations as academics are forged. You really have to push academics hard to anger them enough as a collective to make them want to strike (or a strongly resist an imposed lockout).
Although some or even many or even most university professors may find doing research and teaching meaningful in itself, as you go down the line of jobs, with less and less control and more precarious work, the extent of a job being meaningful probably decreases correspondingly. Even jobs in schools, with some control over pedagogy can be less important than other aspects of the job (such as pay and vacation). Although workers try to find meaning in their work in various ways (in the brewery, for example, some workers would play “ball” with beer bottles when the foremen were not looking), many workers have families and find the work more a means to an end rather than an end in itself. (This is the “decent work” that social democrats and reformers persistently talk about–without discussion–such clichés).

In the context in which Professor Noonan is speaking–a union of university professors–it may make sense to speak of striking as a last ditch effort by them to avoid a strike if at all possible–it makes less sense as the work becomes less and less meaningful. Workers in various sectors (whether public or private) may not like to strike–it interrupts their own lives and makes life difficult in various ways–but even when a collective agreement is signed, they are more prone to strike and engage in covert (and, if necessary, overt) actions that express their treatment as things to be used by employers.

Professor Noonan’s neglect of the relatively privileged status of university professors in relation to other workers leads him to assert the following:

Whether or not it was ever practiced in reality, the principle of collegial self-governance is the goal to which universities should aspire. Unlike for profit businesses, universities do not have owners whose goal is to maximise profits. Instead, all members of the institution– faculty, librarians, learning specialists, lab technicians, students, support workers, and administration have the same goal—the advance of human knowledge and creativity in the widest and most comprehensive sense. If that claim is true, then it should follow that all the groups who together make up the university ought to cooperate (not without respectful disagreement) in the determination of the budgets, policies, rules, and goals that guide the institution’s mission. The best ideas emerge through deliberative and democratic argument—no one group knows best just because of the position they occupy in the hierarchy.

This view is ideology in the worst sense of the term. In a society dominated by employers–including public-sector employers like universities, it is highly unlikely that such workers as “lab technicians, students and support workers” have the same goal–“the advance of human knowledge and creativity in the widest and most comprehensive sense.” Such a view may apply in a socialist organization, but to assume such a situation in universities, which function in a capitalist context, is bound to lead to inadequate policies and theories.

Consider support workers. I worked twice at a university library, once doing my practicum to obtain a library and information technology diploma from the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology (SAIT) at the University of Calgary main library, in the cataloguing department. At the University of Calgary, I noted that the work situation was characterized by a very hierarchical, top-down power structure. One worker commented that she would prefer a benevolent dictator to a mean one; of course, but why have a dictator at all? At least this worker recognized that there was a dictator–unlike Professor Noonan.

At the University of Manitoba Dafoe Library, the same hierarchy existed, but there was even more repression (including racist oppression). Was “the left” at the University even aware of this? Not that I could see. Has Professor Noonan even inquired about the working conditions of subordinates at the University of Windsor? Has he tried to criticize trade unionists who adopt an ideology of “decent work?”

It is much easier to criticize from afar than near at hand–much less dangerous. Talk of “democracy” that does not threaten one’s own work position is pure rhetoric.

As I wrote in my previous post:

Furthermore, a few privileged sets of workers (such as tenured university professors) may seem to have “decent jobs,” but even that situation has eroded over time. It should not be forgotten that such relatively privileged workers exist in a sea of workers, whether unionized or not, who are things to be used by employers systematically and legally. University professors cannot engage in research, teaching and administrative activities unless there are other workers who produce their food, clothing, cars and so forth.
This division of labour is implied in a poem by one of the most famous poets of Guatemala, Otto Rene Castillo (from Apolitical Intellectuals):
“Apolitical Intellectuals
One day
the apolitical
intellectuals
of my country
will be interrogated
by the simplest
of our people.
They will be asked
what they did
when their nation died out
slowly,
like a sweet fire
small and alone.
No one will ask them
about their dress,
their long siestas
after lunch,
no one will want to know
about their sterile combats
with “the idea
of the nothing”
no one will care about
their higher financial learning.
They won’t be questioned
on Greek mythology,
or regarding their self-disgust
when someone within them
begins to die
the coward’s death.
They’ll be asked nothing
about their absurd
justifications,
born in the shadow
of the total lie.
On that day
the simple men will come.

Those who had no place
in the books and poems
of the apolitical intellectuals,
but daily delivered
their bread and milk,
their tortillas and eggs,
those who drove their cars,
who cared for their dogs and gardens
and worked for them,
and they’ll ask:
“What did you do when the poor
suffered, when tenderness
and life
burned out of them?”
Apolitical intellectuals
of my sweet country,
you will not be able to answer.
A vulture of silence
will eat your gut.
Your own misery
will pick at your soul.
And you will be mute in your shame.”

Collective agreements do not exist in a vacuum but form part of interrelated social relations; to exclude such relations when considering the nature and legitimacy of collective agreements is to empty collective agreements of the background conditions which give them meaning in the first place.

What’s Left, Toronto? Part Five

As I indicated in an earlier post, on September 19, 2018, several leftist activists gave a talk about what was to be done in the city of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The talks were posted on the Socialist Project website on October 7, 2018 (also posted on YouTube) (What’s Left, Toronto? Radical Alternatives for the City Election). As I indicated in my earlier posts, over the next few months, I will be analyzing some or all of the talks from a Marxian perspective.

The fourth presenter is preceded by a few comments from Herman Rosenfeld, the moderator of the series. Mr. Rosenfeld made the following remarks about the next presenter, James Nugent: “James was involved in some of the struggles to try to reclaim and create decent jobs in a number of neighbourhoods in Toronto.” I had occasion to remark about a similar comment when Mr. Rosenfeld opened the series. I wrote in the first post:

He [Mr. Rosenfeld] mentions “decent, secure jobs with decent pay.” Why any self-declared socialist feels compelled to declare, at this stage of capitalism, to pair the term “decent” with “jobs” and “decent” with “pay” other than fear of alienating his social-reformist allies or due to opportunism is beyond me.” I leave it to the reader to make her/his own judgement. (See further What’s Left, Toronto? Part One).

Now, let us proceed with an analysis of James Nugent’s presentation. Mr. Nugent refers to community benefits agreements (CBAs). They have employment equity or affirmative action conditions attached to them. Mr. Nugent refers to the Eglinton Crosstown CBA and the Woodbine Casino CBAs. A CBA imposes conditions of employment that are linked to benefiting the community or communities where a project is being built. For example, in the case of the Woodbine Casino CBA,

The agreement requires that 40 per cent of all new employees will be hired from the local area, with some of those jobs filled with the assistance of social organizations in the community. The agreement also stipulates that 10 per cent of all construction-related job hours will have to be filled using apprentices or journeypersons from the surrounding area. (Council Approves Community Benefits Agreement for Woodbine Casino)

Mr. Nugent argues that there are several problems with such agreements, ranging from trade offs between different neighbourhoods or different social groups to merely reformist efforts or even neoliberal CBAs or negotiated neoliberalism.

Nonetheless, he identifies some positive aspects to CBAs, such as bringing to the public eye in an the idea of employment equity again, which had been suppressed since the 1990s; employment equity or affirmative action has an advantage over protests of being an offensive rather than an offensive tactic. Furthermore, it also permitted grassroots social groups and unions to meet in the same room in order to discuss issues rather than going their separate ways, which is usually the case.

Despite these positive benefits, Mr. Nugent’s focus is allegedly elsewhere: he argues that the CBAs have a radical potential if the focus is not on the outcomes but rather on the potential for radical organizing. He outlines five principles for transforming CBAs into a radical movement.

The first principle is that work on a CBA should not focus on results or outcomes but rather on organizing for power and building a radical movement that is capable of forcing the government to give them what they want. There should not be a continual process of negotiations for meager reforms. The goal should be for building a powerful social movement.

The second principle is that it is necessary to raise expectations. This raising of expectations, however, needs to be done honestly. It is necessary to indicate that no positive outcomes may result but that if no one tries, then there will automatically be no positive changes. It is in the process of trying to win honestly that power structures will be created.

The third principle (it is unclear to me whether raising expectations honestly is the third principle, but I assume it forms part of the second principle) is that coalitions that lead to the creation of structures of power need to be led by grassroots groups, not by social agencies that are too tied to the state and funding.

The fourth principle is the building of a broad-based coalition for struggle. Our strength is in numbers. What is necessary is link up issues, such as the CBA with affordable housing groups, anti-poverty groups, groups working with ex-offenders and anti-privation groups.

The fifth principle is that it is necessary to engage, to organize and not focus on servicing the needs of a few (however real such needs are). Employment equity is important, but what is more important is consciousness-raising. People involved in CBAs need to understand the broader picture, understand that they are part of a social movement and themselves become leaders of such a movement.

Mr. Nugent then seems to add a sixth principle: leadership needs to emerge from the social movement itself and not from some professional individuals (such as unionists). In this way, a radical democratic and decentralized organizing structure of power will emerge.

Mr. Nugent sums up by arguing that CBAs need to become a movement building tool to build radical and lasting power.

These principles seem sound for developing some power, but what kind of power? And what does Mr. Nugent mean by radical? Like other presenters, he never gets around to discussing what that means. He never relates this to the issue of how the building of power is to be related to the power of employers at work–a daily experience for billions worldwide and millions of workers within Canada.

The idea of radical democratic organizations sounds very fair and open-minded. However, it is, in the context of lives dominated by the power of employers as a class, just rhetoric. Building structures of power that fail to have the focus of taking back control of our lives by taking back and reorganizing the property of the conditions for producing our lives (the machines, buildings and land required for us to produce our own lives) are bound to fail.

In other words, it is an issue of the kind of structures of power that are built that will decide whether they are really radical or not. Are such structures that are built designed to fight against the power of employers as a class? Or are they designed to fight within such structures? For example, what is Mr. Nugent’s position with respect to collective-bargaining structures? To unions? Such structures, if challenged by grassroots leaders, are bound to push back and fight against such grassroots leaders. He skirts the question entirely by claiming that leadership needs to arise organically and not be part of professional organizations (such as unions).

He also skirts the question by claiming that traditional work in CBAs is valuable in itself; he probably fears alienating union leadership directly. Thus, John Cartwright, president of the Toronto and York Region Labour Council, indirectly endorses traditional CBAs; in the fall 2016 Toronto & York Region Labour Council newsletter, Labour Action, Mr. Cartwright, in his “Message from the President,” refers to such agreements; he is also a member of the Community Benefits Ontario network.

Employment equity or affirmative action as a goal need not of course be opposed and can be beneficial to certain groups, but if they are framed entirely within the general social relation of employer-employee relations, then they will inevitably have limits imposed on them not just externally but internally. The participants will subjectively consider employment equity without considering how to frame such a policy in such a way that it questions the class of employers.

Where is there evidence that Mr. Cartright questions the legitimacy of the power of employers as a class? As I wrote in another post:

Consider the rhetoric of John Cartwright, president of the Toronto & York Region Labour Council, in his open letter of January 30, 2018, wrote the following: “We need to fight for labour law reform including broader based bargaining so that precarious workers can have a vehicle in which to achieve dignity and economic justice.”

What does Mr. Cartwright mean by economic justice? Collective agreements? Since he does not explain what he means (a characteristic of rhetoric), we will assume that he means collective agreements between employers and unions.

Collective agreements, as I have persistently argued, are generally better than just relying only on employment law, but to imply that they somehow embody economic justice as Mr. Cartwright does justifies the continued treatment of human beings as things, as means to ends defined by dictators called employers (see The Money Circuit of Capital).

Mr. Nugent, perhaps, believes, like Mr. Rosenfeld, that the goal should be “decent jobs.” That is to say, the goal is to create unionized jobs for all. For anyone who has read some of the posts on this blog, it is obvious that the concept of “decent jobs,” with their associated collective agreement (and collective bargaining), are generally better than jobs without unions, without collective bargaining and without collective agreements.

Collective agreements, however, as this blog constantly stresses, are holding agreements that continue to express exploitation and oppression. A few privileged sets of workers (such as tenured university professors) may seem to have decent jobs, but even that situation has eroded over time. Furthermore, it should not be forgotten that such relatively privileged workers exist in a sea of workers, whether unionized or not, who are things to be used by employers systematically and legally. University professors cannot engage in research, teaching and administrative activities unless there are other workers who produce their food, clothing, cars and so forth.

This division of labour is implied in a poem by one of the most famous poets of Gutemala, Otto Rene Castillo (from Apolitical Intellectuals):

Apolitical Intellectuals

One day
the apolitical
intellectuals
of my country
will be interrogated
by the simplest
of our people.

They will be asked
what they did
when their nation died out
slowly,
like a sweet fire
small and alone.

No one will ask them
about their dress,
their long siestas
after lunch,
no one will want to know
about their sterile combats
with “the idea
of the nothing”
no one will care about
their higher financial learning.

They won’t be questioned
on Greek mythology,
or regarding their self-disgust
when someone within them
begins to die
the coward’s death.

They’ll be asked nothing
about their absurd
justifications,
born in the shadow
of the total lie.

On that day
the simple men will come.

Those who had no place
in the books and poems
of the apolitical intellectuals,
but daily delivered
their bread and milk,
their tortillas and eggs,
those who drove their cars,
who cared for their dogs and gardens
and worked for them,
and they’ll ask:

“What did you do when the poor
suffered, when tenderness
and life
burned out of them?”

Apolitical intellectuals
of my sweet country,
you will not be able to answer.

A vulture of silence
will eat your gut.

Your own misery
will pick at your soul.

And you will be mute in your shame.

In relation to Mr. Nugent’s presentation, the vagueness of the concept of what is radical permits Mr. Nugent to propose what he calls radical without really detailing what he means–a very unfortunate characteristic of these presentations so far. Vagueness of meaning permits individuals to evade intellectual (and, ultimately, practical) responsibility for their beliefs, as John Dewey, the American philosopher of education noted long ago (from How We Think, 1910/2011, How We Think, pages 129-130):

A being that cannot understand at all is at least protected from mis-understandings. But beings that get knowledge by means of inferring and interpreting, by judging what things signify in relation to one another, are constantly exposed to the danger of mis-apprehension, mis-understanding, mis-taking—taking a thing amiss. A constant source of misunderstanding and mistake is indefiniteness of meaning. Through vagueness of meaning we misunderstand other people, things, and ourselves; through its ambiguity we distort and pervert. Conscious distortion of meaning may be enjoyed as nonsense; erroneous meanings, if clear-cut, may be followed up and got rid of. But vague meanings are too gelatinous to offer matter for analysis, and too pulpy to afford support to other beliefs. They evade testing and responsibility. Vagueness disguises the unconscious mixing together of different meanings, and facilitates the substitution of one meaning for another, and covers up the failure to have any precise meaning at all. It is the aboriginal logical sin—the source from which flow most bad intellectual consequences. Totally to eliminate indefiniteness is impossible; to reduce it in extent and in force requires sincerity and vigor. To be clear or perspicuous a meaning must be detached, single, self-contained, homogeneous as it were, throughout.

Mr. Nugent is certainly correct to emphasize the need for focusing on having individuals and groups start to look at the bigger picture, but he fails to delve into the nature of that bigger picture.

My prediction is that, in say three years, the issue of the power of employers as a class will not be addressed by Mr. Nugent; his radicalism probably will extend only within the limits defined by such power.

What’s Left, Toronto? Certainly not a radical agenda–so far.

Employers as Dictators, Part Two

Union reps typically refer to fair compensation in order to justify their short-term actions. Of course, there is nothing wrong with short-term goals as such, but when they are presented as the same as what should be a long-term goal (fairness and freedom), then such goals become an ideology that justifies the power of employers as a class.

Contrast, for example, the following quote from Ms. Anderson’s book and a discussion I had with a union rep.

From Elizabeth Anderson, Private Government: How Employers Rule Our Lives (And Why We Don’t Talk about it), page 40:

I expect that this description of communist dictatorships in our midst, pervasively governing our lives, open to a far greater degree of control than the state, would be deeply surprising to most people. Certainly many U.S. CEOs, who think of themselves as libertarian individualists, would be surprised to see themselves depicted as dictators of little communist governments. Why do we not recognize such a pervasive part of our social landscape for what it is? Should we not subject these forms of government to at least as much critical scrutiny as we pay to the democratic state?

The social-democratic left do not engage in “critical scrutiny” of the “forms of government” of employers. Rather, they use as their standard improved working conditions relative to immediate working conditions–but they leave out any reference to the need to critique the dictatorship of employers.

Thus, I had a conversation with a union rep on Facebook–Dave Janssen–on the issue of fair compensation. Mr. Janssen, according to the Facebook page, “is an integral leader with the TAWC [Toronto Airport Workers’ Council] and the IAMAW [International Association of Machinists & Aerospace Workers] . He continuously strives to improve safety standards and the overall working conditions for the 49,000+ workers at Toronto Pearson [International Airport].”

Here is the following conservation:

Dan Janssen is at Toronto Pearson International Airport.
June 23 at 1:59 PM · Mississauga ·
Today was the Safety Expo event at Terminal 3 for the Canadian Airports Safety Week. It was a great opportunity to speak to my coworkers at YYZ [Toronto Pearson International Airport] about the importance of coming together to improve working conditions. Amazing to see so much support for flight attendants, as they need a change to federal labour laws that will ensure they are fairly compensated for their work. TAWC: Toronto Airport Workers’ Council [Facebook page]
9 Comments
Fred Harris What determines being “fairly compensated?” Can labour laws really ever “ensure they are fairly compensated?” Or is this an illusion? A cliche? Can any amount of money be considered “fairly compensated” when the people receiving the money are used as things for other persons’ purposes?
Please explain what “fairly compensated” means. Otherwise, the reference to “fairly compensated” is a cliche and does workers a disservice.
Dan Janssen For flight attendants, being fairly compensated means actually being paid for hours worked. The current model used around the world allows FAs to be paid only when the door of the aircraft is closed prior to pushback, not for any time spent prior to the flight departing.
Fred Harris It is more fairly compensated if they are paid for hours worked. How is it fairly compensated if they receive such pay?
When I worked in a brewery, we were paid for hours worked according to that definition (of course, not for travel to and from work). If we were paid for travel time and for hours worked, would we then have been fairly compensated?
I fail to see how that can be so. Firstly, we were things to be used by employers for the end of profit–no matter what our current pay. Secondly, of course the question arises: where does the profit come from except from the workers’ labour in the first place.
Thirdly, even if there were no profit, flight attendants would still be things to be used for purposes external to their own lives; it is not they who democratically control their own working lives.
Fourthly, flight attendants operate within a social division of labour that is determined by the general structure of the economy. They are not free to choose different kinds of activities, within the limits of their time and abilities and those of other workers because they are economically dependent on an employer.
They are unfree in various ways.
Fighting for higher earnings is always necessary–to refer to “fairly compensated”–that does workers a disservice. How can any compensation be adequate to such a lack of freedom when working for an employer?
Dan Janssen I see where you are coming from. This campaign for fair compensation has been resonating with all of our coworkers in support of flight attendants since it was launched. We are open to suggestions if you would like to put forward any ideas.
Fred Harris My suggestion is: cease referring to it as fair compensation. Use the relative term “fairer” and explain why there can be no such fair compensation. Explain that workers deserve much more than that–to control their own working lives and that a fight for increasing compensation for flight attendants is one step in a link of steps to eliminate the power of employers over workers and over our lives in general.
In other words, what is needed is an approach that links up, explicitly, one particular fight against employers with a general fight against employers.
Another aspect would be to start a discussion–or campaign–to question both explicit and implicit management clauses in collective agreements. Why do they exist? Why do employers have such power? What are the implications of managerial power for the limitations of legal union power?
What of collecting several management rights clauses in various collective agreements at the airport and having discussions over such clauses via emails, to the general membership, asking them what they think about this power? What of steward training that shows the limitations of collective agreements in relation to the power of unions?
Why not expand such discussions by linking them to other aspects of power by employers (their legal power, their political power, their social power and so forth)?
Fred Harris Any responses to the suggestions?
Dan Janssen Yes Fred, please come out to one of our TAWC open meetings and put your ideas forward to the council to be actioned. Our meetings are open to all airport workers, unionized or not and anyone can bring forward ideas, events, actions, etc. Decisions are made as a group. Message the page with your email and we will add you to our email list.
Fred Harris Another suggestion: Have a discussion (both among union reps and among the general membership of various unions) concerning the lack of discussion about the origin and nature of employers in the Ontario history curriculum (and the origin and nature of employees, of course, since employers without employees is impossible).
In other words, have a discussion about this issue in order to counter the silent indoctrination of hundreds of thousands of students concerning their probable future lives as subordinates to the power of the class of employers–unless they organize not only to oppose that power but to overcome it.
Fred Harris Not really feasible. I already attempted to question the idea of $15 and Fairness” at a public forum, and despite raising my hand a number of times to ask a question, I was not recognized by the chair–Sean Smith.
Secondly, I have experienced hostility by union members (rather, union reps) before concerning such ideas. I doubt that my ideas would be taken seriously if I broached the issue.

To be fair to Mr. Janssen, he did invite me to attend the Toronto Airport Workers’ Council (TAWC), but as I indicated above, in a public forum, I was not recognized by Sean Smith (a member of another union, Unifor), and Mr. Smith is a member of TAWC. Indeed, on the TAWC Facebook page, along with Mr. Janssen and others, there is a short passage about Dan Janssen and Sean Smith : ” Sean Smith (UNIFOR) and Dan Janssen (IAMAW) spent some time going over the history, past actions and structure of the Toronto Airport Workers’ Council to a captive audience of MAN [Manchester International Airport) workers from various companies and job functions.”

Although it is possible that Mr. Smith inadvertently did not recognize me when I raised my hand several times to ask the question about why the campaign for $15 and “Fairness” had the campaign linked to the concept of fairness, I am skeptical about such a view. I was sitting on an end chair in a direct line of sight with Mr. Smith. Furthermore, when one of the members of the audience who was instrumental in campaigning for the $15 and “fairness” raised her hand (Pam Frache), she was not only recognized by the chair but spoke for much longer than normal.

Given my skepticism about Mr. Smith’s attitude towards my views, and given the close relation between Mr. Smith and TAWC, it is unlikely that my views would be taken seriously at such meetings. Mr. Janssen’s invitation, then, though it may look democratic, may be less so.

Or perhaps I am wrong. Should I attend such meetings despite the probable ridicule of my views? What do you think? Any suggestions about what should be done?