Trade Unions and the Phenomenon of Globalization[1]
Femi
Aborisade
The
Polytechnic, Ibadan
Paper
Outline
This paper is structured as follows:
- Understanding Globalization
- Periodisation of Capitalist Development and Expansion, and the
Mode of Surplus Transfer from the Periphery to the Core
- Monocropping and
Monotasking in Globalisation
- From Capital
Valorization to Capital Decomposition and Accumulation by Dispossession
- Privatisation as a
solution to declining profitability
- Monopoly as a likely
solution to declining profitability
- Trade liberalization
as a likely solution to declining profitability
- Removal of subsidies
as a likely solution to declining profitability
- Commodification as a
likely solution to declining profitability
- Commercialization as
a step towards privatization
- Contracting
out/outsourcing
- Public-Private
Partnerships as a form of privatization
- State stoppage of
providing goods or services
- Intense Exploitation
as a likely solution to declining profitability
- Monstrous violence
against the working class in defense of profit
- Under Globalization:
Rule of law is rule of capital, in defense of profit
- Some implications of
globalization on the private sector
- Opposition to unionization,
in defense of profit
- PROPOSED POLICIES TO
DEAL WITH THE THREATS AND NEGATIVE EFFECTS OF GLOBALIZATION: Action
Programme
- The role of the
state
- Employment security
- Increased investment
in education and health
- Basic incomes and
commodities
- Improved capacity of
the state to manage the economy
- Workers’ and Civil
Society Power
- Conclusion
Understanding Globalization
Conceptualizing appropriate alternatives to globalization requires
an understanding of globalization and its essence. Yet, the term ‘globalization’
is a highly controversial and contested concept. There is no universal
consensus on its conceptual meaning. There are controversies, not only in
defining the term but also in explaining its significance because whether the
individual accepts it or not, each definition is informed by a given
theoretical paradigm, a given historical context, certain normative
perspectives, defined ideals and specific political interests. It is the
contention in this paper that globalization represents the contemporary mode of
exploitation of the working class. In
other words, it represents the contemporary capitalist surplus accumulation
mode, which is dominant to a greater or lesser extent across the world,
depending primarily on the degree to which the working class has been defeated
locally.
Capitalist commodity production regularly takes place in an arena
that is structured by power relations between states internationally (Wallerstein,
1979). However, the dominant
arena is the class struggle and the extent to which the working class has
been fundamentally (but not permanently) defeated – as in the US and the UK
Hoogvelt (1997:15) explains that the coordination of the capitalist
system neither takes place in a spontaneous nor peaceful manner, which deals
fairly to all players:
‘At all times, and at all levels, the ‘invisible
hand’ is guided and steered by politics and power, and that it always, and
indeed cumulatively so, ends up in concentration of wealth and prosperity for
some people in some places, while causing abject misery, poverty and appalling
subjugation for a majority of people in most other places. (Hoogvelt, 1997:15)
Historically, the first capitalist countries, called the
‘core’ states, which gained historical upper hand, protected and assisted, with
gunboat diplomacy and other forms of political coercion, their own capitalists
in imposing world market relations in the periphery and shaping these to their
own advantage. However, by no shred of imagination is it implied that
workers in the core capitalist nations are partakers in the exploitation of the
periphery countries. It is
important notwithstanding to appreciate that globalization seeks to
restructure the world economy, including national economies, in the interest of
international capital. From this perspective, globalization is viewed as a
dynamic that is bound up with the pattern of European (and increasingly US (in
the 20th century) and Chinese (now) - capitalist development,
which demands with threats of sanctions that:
…every set of social arrangements must establish its position in
relation to the capitalist West… it must relativize itself. It must be said that in increasing sectors of
the World this relativization process involves a positive preference for
Western and capitalist possibilities (Waters, 1995: 3-4).
But then, what is accumulation model? ‘Accumulation’ refers to the valorization
nature or self-expanding value of capital.
Accumulation model therefore refers to the dominant way in which
capitalists in the leading branches of economic activity make their
profits (Hoogvelt, 1997:45). It also
refers to the particular type of leading innovation or invention, which is
introduced in one industry first before spreading to the rest. (Amin, 1975). Profit-making and profit
maximization are the key concerns in any accumulation model - profit being the
primary goal, the defining criterion or characteristic of capitalist production
system. It is therefore imperative to present a sketch of the previous
accumulation models (in the history of world capitalism) up till the present.
The periodisation below is related to Nigeria
PERIODISATION OF CAPITALIST DEVELOPMENT
AND EXPANSION, AND THE MODE OF SURPLUS TRANSFER FROM THE PERIPHERY TO THE CORE
|
Date
|
Historical Phase
|
CORE-PERIPHERY RELATIONSHIP
|
|
1500-1800
|
Mercantile Pre-competitive Phase
|
Transfer of economic surplus through looting, plundering disguised
as trade, and direct slave trade.
|
|
1800-1960
|
Colonial Phase
|
Transfer of economic surplus through resource-bondage,
characterized by unequal terms of trade inherent in the imposed international
division of labour.
|
|
1960-1977
|
Early post-colonial phase
|
Transfer of economic surplus through unequal terms of trade and
technological rents.
|
|
1977-1985
|
Late post-colonial or the crisis phase
|
Transfer of economic surplus through debt-peonage.
|
|
1986 - ???
|
Globalization Phase
|
Economic debt-equity swap, liberalization and privatization
policies – the age of unprecedented immiserization of the people.
|
As indicated above, profit-making and maximization are the key
concerns of capitalist production system. Globalisation should therefore be
seen as a term that captures the latest
form in which capitalist multinational corporations, capitalist governments
and the international supranational organizations (political, economic and
financial) which are controlled by them seek to restructure the whole global
economy in order to facilitate outright
looting of resources and extraction
of profit from the labour power of the working class.
Globalisation means global spread of brutal exploitation, primitive
accumulation and immiserisation of the working class on a scale never before experienced in history. From the standpoint of looking at capitalism purely as an exploitative
system, the definition of imperialism offered by Lenin fits the definition of
globalization – ‘a special stage in the
development of capitalism’, ‘the highest
stage’ or ‘the latest stage’ so
far of capitalism. From the point of view of the former colonial world, Alex
Callinicos (1994) conceptualization of imperialism equally fits globalization –
continuation of the domination, throughout history of industrially weak
countries by stronger states or as the latest policy pursued by the Great powers
in formally subordinating most of the rest of the world to their rule.
Monocropping and
Monotasking in Globalisation
Thandika Mkandawire’s (2007:7) monocropping and monotasking, which
characterize the World Bank/IMF policy framework for African States, can be
used in explaining the essence of globalization. Monocropping has to do with
the perception that there is only one optimum toward which all countries must
move and only one policy is good enough to attain that end. In this regard, the
idea of promoting the private sector as a policy is central to economic
globalization. Monotasking is concerned with assignment of only one task to
institutions. In this aspect, all institutions are assigned the task of
encouraging or attracting (mainly) foreign investments, reinforcing property
rights, promoting competition – virtually everything has to be harnessed to the
task of safeguarding private property. Even the judiciary is assigned the task
of protecting private property.
FROM CAPITAL VALORIZATION
TO CAPITAL DECOMPOSITION AND ACCUMULATION BY DISPOSSESSION
Whereas profit-making under capitalism should arise from the
self-expansion of capital through investment and re-investment, engendering
increased employment, today, capital decomposes bringing in its wake, mass
unemployment (as it did in the 1930s and to a lesser extent in the early 1980s).
Karl Marx’s description of the manner in which capital penetrates the globe in
search of profit is aptly applicable to what is termed ‘globalization’. To
understand globalisation from the point of view of the world’s labouring masses
is to see it in the context of the several methods adopted to ‘drive beyond every spatial barrier to
conquer the world for its market and profit’. Some of the primitive methods
of wealth accumulation, which are adopted in the age of globalization with a
view to attempting to solve the profit crisis are highlighted below. But at the
level of ideas, they are not new. Neoliberalism was a minority view eg of the Chicago Chile
Privatisation as a
Solution to Declining Profit
The most historic face of globalization is the universal
implementation of privatization policy as a globalized product. In this case, it is simply looting. In majority of the cases, as made clear in an analysis of
official reports by the privatization agency, the Bureau of Public Enterprises
(BPE), many of the purportedly sold enterprises have not been paid for.
(Aborisade, 2006). In other cases where payments might have been made, the
enterprises were sold at ridiculously low prices. For those of them who do not
close down production of goods and services after purchase of public
enterprises, privatization means that
while the new capitalist owners spend little or nothing on fixed capital, land,
buildings, and machinery, they are in a position to earn super profit.
Privatization is one of the elements of what David Harvey calls
‘accumulation by dispossession’. (Harvey
Monopoly as a Likely
Solution to Declining Profitability
Entrenchment of private
monopolies is another way by which globalization seeks to solve the problem
of declining profit. There is the goal of replacing public monopolies with
private monopolies in critical sectors of the economy. The private monopolies
charge more or less the same rates and conspiratorially avoid competition that
may drive any of them out of the market. In that way, they make super profits
in the process of ripping off consumers and earning the wealth which should
have been earned by public enterprises for the common good.
Trade Liberalization as a
Likely Solution to Falling Profitability
Trade liberalization is another way by which the industrially strong
economies compel the opening up of the industrially weak ones. They want to be
able to have free, unhindered access to inputs (in the form of primary raw
materials) cheaply and return outputs such as manufactured goods. Having
compelled and conspired with their agents who control political power in the
periphery countries to adopt liberalization policy, many multinationals engage
in the manufacturing of ‘goods for export’, which are below the standard of
those consumed in the North.
Jonathan Neale (2002: 207-208) shows for example, how the bulk of
the 300-page North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) is ‘devoted to
exceptions, mostly so that parts of US
Removal of Subsidies as a
Solution to Falling Profitability
Another way by which pro-globalisation forces seek to solve the
profit crisis is to ask governments in the periphery capitalist states to remove subsidies on strategic goods and
services and raise their prices so that investors in those areas of the economy
may make more profit. A good
example is the perennial increases on the prices of petroleum products in the
domestic market in Nigeria UK spends $7billion annually on supporting agriculture,
though lower than what obtains in Europe, US and Japan
Indeed, there is a contradictory development in which
pro-privatization forces in Nigeria
Commodification as a
Solution to falling Profitability
For the sake of profit from any source and regardless of effects on
human lives, globalization also represents the stage of rabid commodification of all aspects of life,
including recreational facilities and social services generally.
By commodification, we mean a situation in which everything is
reduced to a product to be sold and bought for
profit. Capitalist investors put
pressure on the state to privatize sectors of the economy, such as hospitals,
schools, and so on, where they may not have to make much capital investment
before they begin to reap profit from existing facilities. Their concern is money and profit. That access to strategic goods and
services is a fundamental right is not a consideration in the age of
globalization. Commodification of every aspect of life is now the rule.
Commercialization. Under commercialization, the objective of public parastatals
changes to having to make a profit like a private business. Hence, subsidies
are often removed or reduced from certain categories of public enterprises not
yet sold so that economic prices may be charged in the name of
commercialization. Charges are either introduced or increased on the goods or
services being produced. Commercialization has the likelihood of poor people
not being able to access social services such as hospitals, schools or being
unable to meet basic bills as a result of soaring cost of living.
Commercialization is often an initial step to full privatization. Removal or
reduction of subsidies is often used to undermine the capacity of public
enterprises, as a prelude to rationalizing commercialization or privatization
to frustrated consumers.
Contracting
out/Outsourcing
Contracting out or outsourcing is a situation in which a particular
service or good that had previously been provided by the state is handed over
to a private company. This may also involve management contracts in which the management of an enterprise is
contracted out to a private company while whatever is declared as profit is
shared between the state and the management contractors. In the context of
contracting leasing, the enterprise is to be run purely on commercial or profit basis; the concern is not provision of the
good or service based on need. Private
companies also engage in outsourcing when operations considered non-core are
awarded to contractors who then employ labour either on casual or contract
basis. Contracting out or outsourcing has the implication of cutting costs,
particularly on the long run, because, the employer will not have
responsibility for retirement benefits, including pension.
Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) or Joint Ventures
PPP refers to joint funding or management of an enterprise by the
state and the private sector. Though such partnerships take various forms, in
all of them, the preoccupation of the private partners is to make or maximize
profit. Joint venture projects are a common feature in many sectors of the
economy under globalization. It also, like contracting out/outsourcing, has the
implication for cost-cutting as the state frees itself from the responsibility
for employing those working in the joint ventures and paying pensions, and so on.
Those working in the joint ventures are thus left to the whims and caprices of
the private employers who tend to fix pay and conditions of service arbitrarily
as opposed to adopting the framework of collective bargaining.
Stoppage of Goods or Services
Provisioning
Another form of privatization is when the state stops providing a
service or good in expectation that the private sector will exploit the
opportunity or fill the vacuum. The
failure of the state to provide sound social services such as housing, health
care, water, education, transportation, and so, or their epileptic supply is a
form of privatization because it is often done deliberately in order to
encourage, facilitate or justify private sector participation. Thus, in the
context of Nigeria
Intense Exploitation as a
solution to Declining profits
Intense exploitation is
another way by which globalization seeks to solve the problem of declining
profitability. This consists of:
- Setting high targets for Managers and other categories of staff in the banking industry, accompanied with the constant threat of sack, which result in extreme stress for staff. At a stage, the bank unions castigated the practice of banks distributing condoms to newly employed young female graduates with a view to protecting them from STDs while sleeping with male Business Executives in the search for deposits. One female Branch Manager once told this author that she could never encourage any of her children to work in the banking industry, on account of degree of stress in the industry.
- Increased working hours and payment of more or less the same rate of remuneration.
- Spending less on safety thus making work environment more hazardous
- Mass lay-offs and re-employment of a portion of those laid off on casual, temporary or contract basis, with all the attendant negative implications on job security
- Opposition to unionization and promotion of deunionisation
Monstrous Violence against
the Working Class as a Ruling Class Solution to falling Profitability
One hallmark of capitalism in the phase of globalization is the strengthening of the apparatus of coercion.
With all the frenzied call for privatization, there has been no call for privatization
of the state and particularly the security arms. As John Rees (2001:6) puts it,
Internationally,
the state remains indispensable in underpinning the activities of
multinationals. There are no proposals, even from the most hysterical free
marketers, to return to the infancy of the capitalist system, when
….corporations like the East India Company would employ their own troops. Armed
action or the threat of armed action by the state remains the last resort for
every capitalist corporation whose markets or production facilities are
endangered by international rivals, be they states, other corporations or
restive foreign populations unconvinced of the virtues of the free market’
Thus, the US
government, representing the interests of the US
The lessons of
history are clear: market economies, not command-and-control economies with
heavy hand of government are the best ways to promote prosperity and reduce
poverty. Policies that further strengthen market incentives and market
institutions are relevant for all economies (US
National Security Strategy, 2002)
But in case of resistance or reluctance to adopt pro-business
policies anywhere in the world, then force will be used:
While the United States
The monstrous military face of globalisation declared by the US government is also being demonstrated in Nigeria
We were very
prudent and humane about the management of the crisis because if we relied on
the law, we would be justified to have done otherwise; but for the uniqueness
of that strike. We have legal right to kill and we chose not to exercise our
right’
(Nigerian Tribune, 24 July 2003:3).
It should be recalled that not
less than 28 persons were killed during the said strike. The casualty would
have been more if the police were to have exercised their right!
The point therefore is that the
traditional role of the state to repress the poor strata of the society who do
not own property in protecting the barefaced profit interest is strengthened
unabashedly under globalization. For, it is admitted that the ‘legal right’ of
security agents to kill is not a creation of ‘globalisation’, that tendency is
only strengthened. The 1999 Constitution of Nigeria provides exceptional
circumstances when the fundamental right to life may be violated. One of the
exceptional circumstances is in the course of suppression of riot:
‘A person shall not be regarded as having been deprived
of his life in contravention of this section if he dies as a result of the use,
to such extent and in such circumstances as are permitted by law, of such force
as is reasonably necessary –
(c ) ‘for the purpose of suppressing a riot’
(Section 33 (2) (c)
Under Globalisation: Rule
of Law is Rule of Capital, in Defense of Profit
Under globalization, the myth surrounding rule of law is formally
removed and rule of law is openly and formally declared as rule of capital. As
Mkandawire (2007:9) points out, monotasking has sought to reduce the functions
of the judiciary to the task of protecting private property. According to a
World Bank lawyer, judicial reform is part of a larger effort to make the legal
systems in developing countries and transition economies more market friendly. (Messick, 1999:118, cited in Mkandawire,
2007:9).
One of the ways by which the policy of privatization is imposed on
society by force is the control of the judiciary to dispense ‘justice’ from the
standpoint of capital. To ensure that
the Nigerian judiciary plays a role supportive of successfully imposing
privatization policy, the World Bank and the Nigerian privatization agency had
to organize a training programme for the judiciary. One of the stated goals of
the training programme was ‘to put the
courts in a better position to handle cases connected to the privatization
programme and to handle such matters in a speedy and efficient manner’
(BPE, Annual Report, June 2000 – June 2001:42). In a paper, the then Chief
Justice of Nigeria
One crucial and
important role of the Judiciary in the privatization programme is to ensure
that the programme has credibility…the most significant role of the Judiciary
in the privatization programme is in the readiness and preparedness of the
Judiciary to provide effective protection of law to investors, speedily and
efficiently. Any suspicion that the judicial system will be incapable or
unwilling to give such protection is fatal to any privatization programme,
particularly where the enterprise concerned demands huge injections of
investments (Uwais, 2000:14)
There is no pretension, under globalization, that the judiciary is a
class judiciary, to protect primitive accumulation by dispossession. This, in
spite of the fact that the Constitution, which the judiciary should interpret
and defend unequivocally provides against privatization:
The State shall direct its policy towards ensuring –
(a) that the
economic system is not operated in such manner as to permit the concentration
of wealth or means of production and exchange in the hands of individuals or of
a group
(1999 Constitution of the Federal
Republic of Nigeria
Some Implications of
Globalisation Policy on the Private Sector
The neoliberal
globalization policy does not just affect the public sector. It has implications for the
private sector as well. For example, the Association of Food, Beverage and
Tobacco Employers (AFBTE) laments that ‘liberalising
importation of finished products into Nigeria
With a view to achieving profit expansion, a new approach to
organizing production is being promoted and implemented. This is referred to as
Lean production or Workplace
restructuring. Emphasis is placed on labour
market flexibility, meaning that employers should be allowed to exercise
management prerogatives in terms of not being required to strictly observe laws
that are in favour of the working class such that standards and conditions
(wages, working hours, and so on) are allowed to be varied from enterprise to
enterprise and sector to sector. The neoliberal perspective has brought such
concepts and practices as down-sizing,
right-sizing or rationalization. In the context of such stressful
circumstances, demands are placed on employees to be more internationally competitive, being able to do new or different jobs, often
referred to as multi-skilling.
The overall implication of the foregoing is additional pressure on
the workers to produce more goods within the same or shorter timeframe based on
reduced workforce and less budget. The concern is to restrain the rights of the
working class and reduce the responsibility of the employer to the worker so as
to provide an avenue for profit expansion. This is the reasoning behind the new
pension reform, for example. A reading of the 2006 (Annual) Report of the
Association of Food, Beverage and Tobacco Employers (AFBTE) strikingly reveals
the focus of the employing class, as far as pension and gratuity are concerned.
The focus is to reduce the ‘financial liability of companies’ and ‘arrest the
spiraling growth of the liability of employers and make the scheme sustainable
and realizable’ (AFBTE 2006 Report: 48). Hence, instead of employers being required to ‘Pay
As You Go’, there is a change in perspective that employees are to ‘Keep As
You Go’, as far as pension schemes are concerned.
Opposition to Unionization
In the interest of keeping
down wage bills and maximizing profit, there is a mounting hostility to
unionization, under globalization. The rule in the privatized enterprises tends
to be ban on trade union membership and activity. In new tertiary institutions
of learning being set up, unions as well as strikes are purportedly outlawed.
For example, Governor Olagunsoye Oyinlola of Osun State in his inaugural speech
at the take off of the Osun State University,
outlawed strikes and by extension, unions. (Saturday Sun, 22 September 2007:11).
PROPOSED POLICIES
TO DEAL WITH THE THREATS AND NEGATIVE EFFECTS OF GLOBALIZATION: Action
Programme
The Role of the State
First, there is a need to understand
that the crisis of globalization, as reflected in the downside effects, is a
reflection of a monumental contradiction between private ownership and the vast
opportunities for wealth creation on a world scale. The International Labour
Organization (ILO) has estimated that only
about 2 per cent of the world GDP committed
to social good would abolish poverty on the face of the earth. What stands in
the way of allocating a mere 2 per cent of the world GDP is the priority given
to the protection of the greed of a few for profit rather than the need of the
overwhelming majority. The lack of concern for the welfare of ordinary people
is also shown graphically with the UN Council meeting which admitted that MDGs
would not be met in Africa . It needs $70billion compared to $700billion
that Bush wants to give to the US Iraq Nigeria , Nigeria
has foreign reserves of over $63 billion, idling away in the US
The foregoing shows that the economic system based on private
ownership cannot take the world forward.
There is a need to eliminate the chaos and antagonism among individual
capital owners, nations, international and regional economic groupings. This is possible only if production is
organized to meet the needs of the whole world populations, rather than for the
greed of a few for profit. To this extent, the state, not the private sector,
must be seen as the engine of economic growth. The epochal unprecedented
development in the world today is the conspiracy to hijack the state from even
serving minimally the interests of the ordinary people to serving just the
interest of big business, the interest of profit.
Arising from the above arguments, the basic
needs listed below should be recognized as fundamental rights. Advocacy built
around them could help to encourage the self activity of the labouring masses,
ensure real economic development and a major reduction in the all pervasive
globalisation-induced poverty currently found in many less developed countries.
Employment Security
Trade unions should consider adopting the following policies:
- Employers must be compelled to open the books for inspection by workers and their representatives, though unions must also engage in independent research on the companies, their income and expenditure profile.
- Employers, the state and the private sector, should be made to link the state of the economy to levels of employment by adopting the policy of increased appointments based on higher productivity and profits.
- A campaign for reduced number of working hours should be undertaken at the level of central labour organizations so that more of the unemployed hands can have opportunity for employment on the basis of increased leisure time for workers.
- Making it more costly to retrench than to retain workers on their jobs could discourage arbitrary layoffs. This is achievable by campaigning for enhanced terminal benefits and higher pension liability on the part of the employer.
Increased investment in education and health:
- Free
education at all levels, including books, subsidized meals and hostel
accommodation in tertiary institutions
- Free health,
including medicines
- Free
anti-retroviral (ARV) medicines to fight HIV/AIDS
- Free water
(at least 50 litres per person per day)
Basic
income and commodities
- A basic
income grant – a realistic, minimum living wage, pension or unemployment
benefit.
- Stabilisation
of basic food prices relative to minimum wages or wage indexation – wages
rising as inflation rises
- Free
electricity up to a prescribed minimum limit per person per day
- Subsidized
public housing and opposition to sale of government housing units and
evictions
- Re-introduction
of agricultural marketing boards (providing interest free credit to
farmers and stable prices for their produce)
- The right of
all workers to join and organise effectively in trade unions
Improved Capacity of the State to
Manage the Economy:
- An end to
privatisation and commercialisation of parastatals and other government
bodies; no more outsourcing or public private partnerships (PPPs)
- Establishment
of Public-Public Partnerships, nationally and internationally, involving
collaboration between public agencies.
- An end to
retrenchments in all government departments and parastatals.
- Nationalisation,
without compensation, of all major companies that have been privatised;
confiscation of all wealth acquired through corruption by public officers.
- A ban on all
public officials patronizing private education and health services; all
public officials, their families and relatives to use public utilities.
Workers’ and Civil Society
Power
The workers of Argentina
‘drew up a detailed
plan for socially useful products and new forms of employees development. They
put forward the plan as an alternative to redundancy and to arms production. In
doing so, they demonstrated in a most practical way how people without any
official power might reverse both the drive towards militarism and the growth
of unemployment’.
The comments of a British worker provide justification for the above
measures:
‘There is talk of
crisis wherever you turn. I think we have to stand back from that crisis for a few
moments and see where we are in relation to it. For it is the present economy
that has a crisis. We don’t. We’re just as skilled as we were; miners can still
dig coal, bricklayers build houses, and we can still design and produce things’
– Mike Cookey, a British engineer in Lucas Aerospace, an arms producing
company.
(Cited in Wainwright and Elliot, 1982: 7).
Conclusion
The challenges of globalization to the working class are numerous as
they are enormous. However, the negative consequences of globalization cannot
be reversed without the conscious self-activity of the working people to resist
attacks on their rights and strive to change the world in their interest. As a
scholar activist, Went (2000), has aptly put it, the critical challenge is a
realization that action by living, breathing social forces can transform even
the most seemingly inextricable economic and political situation. The ultimate
challenge is that the working class works out what Bond (2007:1) calls strategic resistance – organizing industrially
and politically, locally, nationally, regionally and globally to change a world
based on the principles of globalization, where the riches of the world are
monopolized by a few. Another world, where the riches of the world are shared
by all, is not only possible; it is indeed, a necessity. But the attainment of
this change is conditioned on the continued self activity of the poor and the
dispossessed. That fighting to defeat globalization and all its attendant
negative consequences is attainable can be seen in the reversal of the sale of
unity schools (Federal Government owned secondary schools) and the
establishment of committees, which include labour representatives to review
sale of some key public enterprises, including the refineries. (See for
example, Saturday Sun, 22 September
2007: 11). Similarly, for over five years now, the price of petrol per litre
has not been raised – thanks to mass resistance!
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[1] Paper presented at the Workshop organized
by the Food, Beverage and Tobacco Senior Staff Association (FOBTOB) on Friday, 21st
to Saturday, 22nd May 2010 at
Eastgate Hotel, Plot C11, Ugwu-Orji, Okigwe Road, Owerri, Imo State.
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