Workers Control and Socialist Democracy

Workers Control and Socialist Democracy PDF Author: Carmen Sirianni
Publisher: Verso Books
ISBN: 1789607272
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 566

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Book Description
Recent scholarship has rediscovered the genuinely mass character of the Bolshevik-led revolution that toppled Russian absolutism in 1917. In this major study, Carmen Sirianni undertakes a comprehensive study of the forms of popular power that emerged in the course of the struggle against Tsarist, and their destiny in the formative years of the new Soviet state. He successively discusses the factory committee movement, the attitudes of the trade unions and the left parties towards workers control, the unfolding of dual power, the tole of the peasantry, and the organization of labour and industry in the civil war. The developing theme of these chapters - the unsettled, often antagonistic relationship between working-class and peasant initiatives and demands and Bolshevik political and economic conceptions - is subjected to theoretical examination in the second part of the book. Here Sirianni analyses the particular constitution of Lenin's Marxism, and discerns in it a 'productivist evolutionism' which, he maintains, adversely affected the Bolsheviks' appreciation of working-class self-organization both in industry and in the exercise of political power, and vitiated their perception of the rural masses. Finally, Sirianni sets Russian policy and experience in its international context, considering the different, but also limited, views of Gramsci and Pannekoek, and the 'councilist' movements of Western Europe. He concludes with a reflection on the subsequent course of the revolutionary state and the options available to its leaders, as the defeat of the Left Opposition and then of Bukharin prepared the triumph of Stalinism. Workers Control and Socialist Democracy unites historical, political and theoretical judgement to make a fundamental contribution to our understanding, both of the Russian Revolution and of central unresolved issues of socialism in the twentieth century.

Workers Control and Socialist Democracy

Workers Control and Socialist Democracy PDF Author: Carmen Sirianni
Publisher: Verso Books
ISBN: 1789607272
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 566

Get Book Here

Book Description
Recent scholarship has rediscovered the genuinely mass character of the Bolshevik-led revolution that toppled Russian absolutism in 1917. In this major study, Carmen Sirianni undertakes a comprehensive study of the forms of popular power that emerged in the course of the struggle against Tsarist, and their destiny in the formative years of the new Soviet state. He successively discusses the factory committee movement, the attitudes of the trade unions and the left parties towards workers control, the unfolding of dual power, the tole of the peasantry, and the organization of labour and industry in the civil war. The developing theme of these chapters - the unsettled, often antagonistic relationship between working-class and peasant initiatives and demands and Bolshevik political and economic conceptions - is subjected to theoretical examination in the second part of the book. Here Sirianni analyses the particular constitution of Lenin's Marxism, and discerns in it a 'productivist evolutionism' which, he maintains, adversely affected the Bolsheviks' appreciation of working-class self-organization both in industry and in the exercise of political power, and vitiated their perception of the rural masses. Finally, Sirianni sets Russian policy and experience in its international context, considering the different, but also limited, views of Gramsci and Pannekoek, and the 'councilist' movements of Western Europe. He concludes with a reflection on the subsequent course of the revolutionary state and the options available to its leaders, as the defeat of the Left Opposition and then of Bukharin prepared the triumph of Stalinism. Workers Control and Socialist Democracy unites historical, political and theoretical judgement to make a fundamental contribution to our understanding, both of the Russian Revolution and of central unresolved issues of socialism in the twentieth century.

An Alternative Labour History

An Alternative Labour History PDF Author: Assistant Professor Dario Azzellini
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1783601566
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 362

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Book Description
The global financial crisis has led to a new shop-floor militancy. Radical forms of protest and new workers' takeovers have sprung up all over the globe. In the US, Republic Windows and Doors started production under worker control in January 2013. Later that year workers in Greece took over and managed a hotel, a hospital, a newspaper, a TV channel and a factory. The dominant revolutionary left has viewed workers' control as part of a system necessary during a transition to socialism. Yet most socialist and communist parties have neglected to promote workers' control as it challenges the centrality of parties and it is in this spirit that trade unions, operating through the institutional frameworks of government, have held a monopoly over labor history. Tracing Marx's writings on the Paris Commune through council communism, anarcho-syndicalism, Italian operaismo, and other "heretical" left currents, An Alternative Labour History uncovers the practices and intentions of historical and contemporary autonomous workers' movements that until now have been largely obscured. It shows that by bringing permanence and predictability to their workplaces, workers can stabilize their communities through expressions of participatory democracy. And, as history has repeatedly shown, workers have always had the capacity to run their enterprises on their own.

Workers' Control and Socialist Democracy

Workers' Control and Socialist Democracy PDF Author: Carmen Joseph Sirianni
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Communism
Languages : en
Pages : 1260

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Book Description


Workers' Control and Socialist Democracy

Workers' Control and Socialist Democracy PDF Author: Carmen Sirianni
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Socialism
Languages : en
Pages : 630

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Book Description


Ours to Master and to Own

Ours to Master and to Own PDF Author: Immanuel Ness
Publisher: Haymarket Books
ISBN: 160846119X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 458

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Book Description
From the dawning of the industrial epoch, wage earners have organized themselves into unions, fought bitter strikes, and gone so far as to challenge the very premises of the system by creating institutions of democratic self-management aimed at controlling production without bosses. With specific examples drawn from every corner of the globe and every period of modern history, this pathbreaking volume comprehensively traces this often underappreciated historical tradition. Ripe with lessons drawn from historical and contemporary struggles for workers’ control, Ours to Master and to Own is essential reading for those struggling to create a new world from the ashes of the old. Immanuel Ness is professor of political science at Brooklyn College, City University of New York, and edits WorkingUSA. Dario Azzellini is a writer, documentary director, and political scientist at Johannes Kepler University in Linz.

Workers' Control

Workers' Control PDF Author: Gerry Hunnius
Publisher: Random House (NY)
ISBN:
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 516

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Book Description
Compilation of articles on workers self management and workers participation, with particular reference to Canada and USA - discusses the problems inherent in assembly line work, the changing role of trade unions and collective bargaining, describes the current levels of self management achieved in Sweden, Germany, Federal Republic, Israel and Yugoslavia, and includes articles on possible future trends towards social change through workers control. Bibliography pp. 486 to 488, references and statistical tables.

The Socialist Manifesto

The Socialist Manifesto PDF Author: Bhaskar Sunkara
Publisher: Basic Books
ISBN: 1541674006
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 288

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Book Description
A "razor-sharp" introduction to this political and economic ideology makes a galvanizing argument for modern socialism (Naomi Klein) -- and explains how its core tenets could effect positive change in America and worldwide. In The Socialist Manifesto, Bhaskar Sunkara explores socialism's history since the mid-1800s and presents a realistic vision for its future. With the stunning popularity of Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Americans are embracing the class politics of socialism. But what, exactly, is socialism? And what would a socialist system in America look like? The editor of Jacobin magazine, Sunkara shows that socialism, though often seen primarily as an economic system, in fact offers the means to fight all forms of oppression, including racism and sexism. The ultimate goal is not Soviet-style planning, but to win rights to healthcare, education, and housing, and to create new democratic institutions in workplaces and communities. A primer on socialism for the 21st century, this is a book for anyone seeking an end to the vast inequities of our age.

Social Democracy and the Aristocracy

Social Democracy and the Aristocracy PDF Author: John H. Kautsky
Publisher: Transaction Publishers
ISBN: 9781412834308
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 250

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Book Description
Ever since the rise of mass labor movements in the late nineteenth century, socialism has been seen as an inevi- table and antagonistic response to capitalism and the spread of industrialization. Over the course of the twentieth century, however, socialism's failure to gain ground in the United States and most of the non-Western world exposed the limited, Eurocentric views of socialist theorists, and also the inadequacy of the theory as it applied to Europe as well. John Kautsky argues that a key factor in the development of social democratic labor movements was the persistence of powerful remnants of aristocratic institutions and ideologies whose survival into the industrial age preserved exclusionary hierarchies. These led, in turn, to radicalism and class consciousness among workers. Kautsky traces the evolution of socialist labor movements in Europe and Japan where aristocratic elements were still strong, detailing the survival of aristocratic privilege and the concomitants of worker class consciousness and demands for equality. He shows how social democratic reliance on free elections was primarily a weapon against the aristocracy rather than capitalism. Contradicting socialist theory, working-class growth came to an end, class lines became blurred, and a considerable degree of equality was achieved through the welfare state. Kautsky turns to those countries that were sufficiently industrialized to have large numbers of workers, but also had reasonably free elections, civil liberties, and less repression of trade unions. Though the United States, Canada, post-Soviet Russia, Mexico, and India have very different histories and societies, their workers have not confronted a powerful aristocracy. Great Britain, the first and for long the most advanced industrial country, was virtually the last to develop a socialist labor movement. In contrast, socialist movements in Canada and the United States, where egalitarian traditions were strong, found little support. Kautsky's concluding chapters treat the spread of corruption, the rise of new oligarchies in Russia, and the position of workers no longer honored and politically weak. In its innovative perspective on long-held theories and its currency for contemporary problems, Social Democracy and Aristocracy is an important contribution to political thought in the post-Marxist world. Its global approach makes it uniquely valuable for the comparative study of labor history and economic development.

Work and Democracy in Socialist Cuba

Work and Democracy in Socialist Cuba PDF Author: Linda Fuller
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780877228936
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 274

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Book Description
In contrast to the common image of Cuba as a totalitarian dictatorship, Linda Fuller argues that, as Cuban socialism has matured, important democratic advances also have been made. Tracing the path of reform in the area of workplace democracy in Cuba over the last thirty years, she compares the expansion of workers' control after 1970 with the situation in the 1960s. The question that guides this comparison is complex as well as controversial: What would the democratization of work actually entail? The author addresses it through in-depth interviews with Cuban workers, primary documents, and a close look at a variety of institutions, including unions, the party, management and planning systems, and grievance Committees. Fuller also examines how and why changes toward greater democratization of work occurred in Cuba. She approaches this question through a historical analysis of the politics of institutionalizing socialism in Cuba. The key to this history is not, as has often been argued, Castro's personality, the Soviet Union, or even the global political economy. Instead, it can be found in the relationship between the country's political leaders and the mass of Cuban citizens in the 1950s and 1960s, a relationship unlike those that developed in most other socialist countries. Throughout the book, the author draws attention to the relevance of the Cuban experience for tempering the authoritarian control of production in other settings. "A world so backward in democratizing work relations," she concludes, "can ill afford to ignore either Cuba's deficiencies or its unique and numerous accomplishments."

Socialism, Democracy and Self-management

Socialism, Democracy and Self-management PDF Author: Michel Pablo
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 218

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Book Description