Cooperatives as an inbuilt element of the strategy for Organizing the Workers Surendra Pratap , Centre for Workers Edu

1. Cooperatives as an inbuilt element of the strategy for Organizing the Workers SurendraPratap, Centre for Workers Education, New Delhi

2. 403,000 people in India die every year due to work-related problems WE ARE Wage Labour Minimum wage becoming the maximum Working 10-12 hours Rampant violation of labour laws Total membership of CTUs-24.8m T (including others)-30m Unionization-Only 6.35% Including others 7% Ratio of labour cost to total cost decreased from 7.78 to 5.81% (2000-01to-2004-05 Labour cost increased by 36%, Profits by 305%

3. Competition between states takes form of a war against their own working class Appearance: competition between labour of various countries Footloose Capital exploiting the global reserve army of labour WHO WE ARE? Informalization of labour and Post fordist Global Factory • Offering • Cheap labour • Cheap land and resources • Peaceful IR • By • Making laws meaning less • Allowing Self certification • Making SEZs and NMIZs • Expanding reserve army of labour • Trade union repression Hazardous and labour intensive operations shifting to developing countries Asia as one of the hubs of Global Factory For attracting capital all the governments are competing with each other

4. Labour Wants Job security and pension Decent wages and working conditions More leisure less workload Better future for children Democratic institutions to ensure redistributive justice The Conflict Capital Wants More profit, less costs Privatizing and Commoditizing everything Control over labour and all resources Expanding the reserve army Linking all econ. activities with global value chain So that labour reproduces labour Balance of power decides the fate of labour Labour has only power-Its united strength If no union,labour laws become meaningless Only unions ensure workers’ rights

5. For Labour Building unity in diversity Reducing the reserve army of labour Reducing the control of capital by creating alternative ways of living and working Building new hope by providing a socio-cultural, economic& political alternative For Capital Increasing competition& disunity by increasing diversity Expanding reserve army of labour Establishing dominance of capital in all spheres of life Exercising political control by propagating TINA syndrome ORGANIZING Balance of power depends on who’s politics, economics and culture gets dominance in people’s life

6. CHALLENGES OF ORGANIZING LABOUR Increased capital’s control over labour Divisions and Competition among workers—creating difficulty in developing collective consciousness Sward of unemployment is always hanging on the head TINA syndrome established by: Capital’s propaganda at various levels from factory to society; No space for alternative ways of living and working; Downfall in the working class movement State openly favoring capital Unemployment and huge reserve army of labour Resurgence of informal sector Post fordist models of production scattering the production operations to various countries on the one hand and to various smaller units and up to the home based level on the other Informalization of labour-casualization, contractualization-very few stable workforce in factories Large scale divisions in the workforce: big factory workers, small factory workers, home based workers, casual, contract & regular workers—caste and gender divisions

7. TASKS FOR ORGANIZING LABOUR Organizing the informal sector workers Organizing the informal workers in formal sector (casual, contract and home based) and in the process building unity between formal and informal workers Building unity among all workers of the same industry Building inter-sectoral solidarity Building national and international solidarity Developing collective consciousness and Rights consciousness among workers Insuring job security by way of unionization and building industrial and regional working class solidarity Reducing the capital’s control over labour by breaking the TINA syndrome --by projecting political alternative and by creating spaces for alternative ways of living and working

8. SCOPES FOR ORGANIZING Organizing the workers also in community along with at workplace - Effective for organizing in new situations-may strengthen the unionization at workplaces Also may widen the horizons of trade union activity & transform it in to a real working class organization Organizing the Industry or sector trade unions and forcing the state for industrial collective bargaining and for setting industrial standard for wages and working conditions Forming cooperatives as a strategy to organize the self employed producers, home based wage workers and service workers of various kind Forming cooperatives of workers as consumers Developing a system of workers’ education as a strategy for organizing Developing alternative media for raising workers’ consciousness and projecting a political alternative

9. Cooperatives as an Inbuilt Element of Organizing Strategy As we know that Most effective weapon of capital is to exercise effective control on overall life of workers and people at large For Reducing the reserve army of labour By organizing the informal sector workers For Reducing the control of capital by creating alternative ways of living and working We also know that More than 56% workers in India are self employed and majority of wage workers are informal

10. Cooperatives as an Organizing Strategy towards Formalisation of Informal Workers Three approaches for transforming informal sector • The Reformist socio-polit. forces • Transforming informal sector by forming cooperatives of the informal workers to make their skills and their products competitive and to transform them in economies of scale • Pro-capital forces • With the economic development (process of capital accumulation) traditional occupations and small economic units may be absorbed (or destroyed) by the larger economic units and disappear • The left and trade unions • Transforming the informal sector by way of regulating the working conditions and labour relations in all economic units including the small ones +

11. Formalization by absorbing or destroying informal sector Many traditional informal sectors almost completely disappeared, for example handloom, traditional pottery, traditional utensils, traditional carpentry, traditional iron implements, traditional shoe makers, traditional oil business, traditional toy making etc. Capitalist development could not advance at steady rate and very soon entered in a crisis, particularly during 1970s New Informalization: Reinventing Informal sector as a source of capital accumulation in new international division of labour and post fordist models of production-- Converting informal sector producers/workers in to wage labour at their own workplaces New discourse on informalization: advocating for welfare of informals and not formalization-i.e. maintaining them as reserve army of labour Two tendencies operate simultaneously; many informal sectors or units are destroyed and at the same time many new ones are created

12. Formalization by regulating the working condition and IR Legislations for regulating working conditions and labour relations in different sectors like plantations, mining, Beedi industry etc. Agriculture Workers Act in Kerala and Tripura Industrial Disputes Act 1948 was amended in 1976 to extend applicability of Chapter V-B, and thereby extending the job security to workers in enterprises with 100 or more workers, rather than the earlier threshold limit of 300 or more workers Enactment of Contract Labour (Regulation &Abolition) Act 1970, which ensured regularization and job security to contract and casual workers engaged in core activities and in jobs of perennial nature Shops and Establishments Act in different states of India were legislated to regulate the smaller informal sector establishments which were not covered by the labour laws.

13. Formalization by Way of forming cooperatives Hundreds of examples of successes and failures Most widely discussed success stories are of Amul Dairy Cooperative and Kerala DineshBeedi cooperative Several examples created by SEWA-recent interesting example of construction workers cooperative But cooperative movement could not emerge as a dominant social force. Few if any, in-depth studies exploring on this issue with above perspective One of the critical factors behind the failure: More emphasis on its economic aspect and ignoring its political aspect (alternative ways of living and working) Linked with the inability in synthesizing the left and reformist strategies which is reflected in the disunity between the left and the reformist political forces

14. Forms of Cooperatives Production Cooperatives Consumer Cooperatives Service Cooperatives

15. Production Cooperatives Scopes Cooperatives of self employed producers-agriculture, fisheries etc Cooperatives of self employed wage labour---home based industry workers, garments, beedi etc Example of Thailand garment cooperative-Creating Brand (TRIMS??) Scope of Adda workers cooperative in Delhi-Job work for factories Better collective bargaining power Cheaper inputs and better prices Better wages to home based workers Collective consciousness and collective political power of workers Inter-linkages may reduce control of capital and market Alternative way of living and working

16. Service Cooperatives Scopes Cooperatives of various kinds of self employed service workers like masons, barbers, tailors, plumbers, electricians, and the workers doing various kinds of repair works Cooperatives of construction workers------SEWA example May ensure Better collective bargaining power May ensure a sustainable livelihood May develop a Collective consciousness of workers Alternative way of living and working

17. Consumer Cooperatives Scopes Cooperatives of workers as consumers for purchasing the consumer items in bulk at cheaper prices Cooperatives may run schools, medicine stores, hospitals etc Cooperatives may run community kitchens May ensure Better collective bargaining power May reduce the cost of living and ensure better life and better future May develop a Collective consciousness of workers May develop a collective power of workers as consumers and citizens Alternative way of living and working

18. Challenges for Workers Cooperatives Acquiring a factory and running it as a workers cooperative is highly difficult because they are completely different economies Capitalist factory bases more on capital , Cooperative bases more on labour Linkages of capitalist factory in the market may not be favourable for cooperative Cooperative needs to build its own linkages in the market and society according to its own social structure and economy. This transformation needs a longer period and generally before it happens, cooperatives collapse Building a sustainable workers’ cooperative needs a completely new initiative-primarily as an initiative of organizing the self employed producers or home based workers, or the workers as consumers—A process in which gradually a collective enterprise emerges with its own market and its own social linkages

19. Challenges for Workers Cooperatives Primary aspect of Cooperatives is politics and not economics It is bound to fail or loose its significance if there is more emphasis on economics than politics Politics here means an alternative way of living and working It helps in organizing the workers and its success and significance depends on organized strength of workers

20. Lastly Cooperatives can also be looked at as a practical way to challenge privatization—along with challenging the privatization at policy level If the state is vacating the spaces for private capital, the people’s forces can also compete for those spaces (with in their limitations) by way of building cooperatives

21. Thank You