Capital & Class. - 1983. - Issue 19 issue 19

C CABLE TECHNOLOGY

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Conservative Government designated 1982 as Information Technology Year (IT82), and told us all that IT was the hottest thing since toasted sandwiches! Scattered through their glossy dross of propaganda were predictions of an industrial recovery in the UK derived from the new technologies . However, such industrial development would rely on a national electronic grid, based on an expansion and integration of present cable sytems, through which the vast amount of electronic data - crucial to an `information society' - could be transmitted . After months of rivalry between Departments on the subject of cable expansion, the THE UNITED KINGDOM'S

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government ended IT82 by postponing any decision on cable expansion until the advent of a Home Office White Paper, expected in early 1983 . After a year in which the government had been encouraging the expansion of cable systems as fast as possible, it suddenly slammed on the brakes . We shall argue that this is because it realised that its attitude to cable expansion - an attitude derived from its monetarist view of the present role of the UK state - has failed to win the support of industrial and finance capital in the UK .

Contradictions By the time you read this, that White Paper may well have been published . This material aims to help you judge whether the contents of that White Paper has enabled the government to reconcile the mass of contradictions which constitute its present approach to cable expansion . At the heart of this government's strategy for the UK communications industry are two contradictions . Firstly between the roles of the Home Office and of the Department of Industry (DOI) ; secondly between the government's rhetoric of reducing state intervention and their practice of selectively funding industrial development . Throughout 1982, these contradictions threw the government's policies on communications and on Information Technology into chaos . Its lack of a coherent plan for the expansion of cable as a communications medium is only an illustration of an overall lack of a policymaking mechanism appropriate to the increasing rate of technological change in communications . The overall result has been that a series of ad hoc committees has been established, resulting in policy-formation by the back door .

While this mechanism guarantees a fast government response to current developments in the communications industry, it avoids forward planning, and stifles public discussion . What this means in practice was shown by the way in which the fates of four TV channels were decided . In February 1982, Home Secretary W hitelaw announced that the BBC was to be allocated two satellite television channels . Then, in November, he revealed that the two frequency-bands currently assigned to 405-line television were to be re-assigned to mobile radio . These decisions, and the way they have been taken, have profound implications for public control of UK communication development . These four television channels have been given away by a handful of engineers, politicians and civil servants in a little under 12 months! In the case of cable expansion, those two contraditions - between Home Office and DOI, and between rhetoric and practice - have been combined into a tussle for power over communications policy between the two departments . Home Secretary W hitelaw has waved the flag of 'non-interventionism' in his espousal of the hope that the cable companies themselves will expand their cable systems without the assistance or investment of state funding . Information Technology Minister Baker has waved the `interventionism' flag in describing the technical details of such expanded systems, and in sponsoring the development of IT manufacturing companies which would market some or all of the components for such systems . The stage was set for the actual dominance of the DOI's approach to cable - as opposed to the public dominance of the Home Office - with the publication in March 1982 of the `Report on Cable

BEHIND THE NEWS Systems', written by the Cabinet's Information Technology Advisory Panel (ITAP), which was appointed by the Prime Minister in July 1981 . The ITAP report recommended that private companies (such as Rediffusion, Visionhire, and Telefusion, the UK's three biggest cable companies, should be encouraged to establish a chain of local cable networks, with a minimum capacity of, say, 30 channels each, and that the operator of each network should be given monopoly control over its contents . It also said that cable operators should be freed from government control, and should be positively encouraged to install new cable systems to provide entertainment and also home-banking, -shopping, and -voting, plus remote metering of gas, water and electricity, together with domestic security systems . Implicit in the ITAP proposals was the provision of an electronic grid, complementing exactly the DOT's emphasis on information technology as the key to industrial development . This is a view shared by other sections of the Conservative Party : prior to the 1979 General Election, a draft policy document had asserted that `the battle lines are already being drawn for the struggle to control information in Britain . . .Information is the commanding height of tomorrow's economy' .

Hunt Committee On the day the ITAP report was published, Home Secretary Whitelaw told the House of Commons that ` . . .there should be an independent enquiry into the important broadcasting policy aspects . . . (of cable expansion) . . .' The enquiry was conducted by the Hunt Committee, whose Report was published just over six months later in October .

Much-applauded by the media - but to a lesser extent by the City of London the Hunt Report is only a blueprint for inertia . Firstly, it allows the existing cable companies to expand their network's capacity NOT by encouraging them to lay new co-axial cable (giving a band-width equivalent to at least 30 television channels, as compared with the four channel capacity of 85% of the UK's outdated cable networks), but by removing their requirement that they should carry all nationally available television channels - ie BBC and ITV . This frees four channels for the companies to transmit Pay TV . Although this arrangement is only supposed to last for five years, Hunt has no suggestions on how the national service should be re-inforced thereafter . More importantly, Hunt has created uncertainty about the future importance of any particular medium of information-transmission . Will entertainment concentrate on cable, satellite, or some mixture of the two? Will business data-transmission occur on cable, microwave or radio? This uncertainty could lead to inadequate investment in UK communications technology at a time of massive state-led investment overseas . Large amounts of industrial capital are tied up in a service sector which is relatively unproductive but also relatively vulnerable to mechanisation using information technology, for example, the banks and the retail trade . More than 33% of the workforce in the OECD countries are now in information-related jobs, of which 2/3 are vulnerable to mechanisation . A national, integrated, high-capacity cable system could carry massive amounts of business data, far beyond the amount which British Telecom (BT) already carries . However the govern-

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CAPITAL & CLASS 8 ment's present approach to cable accords no role to BT, but concentrates instead on the cable companies . Ministers hope that investment in cable expansion will be 'entertainment-led' through subscriptions for Pay TV delivered to subscribers' homes through high-capacity cables . Once in place these cables could also be used for the transmission of business data . But how realistic is this plan? The cable companies appear to have no incentive to upgrade their present separate networks, since they will get Pay TV anyway on all four existing channels under the recommendations of the Hunt Report . All the current visions of cable subscribers sitting in their homes with a keyboard and a video screen revelling in the joys of 'tele-banking', 'teleshopping', or `tele-homeworking' would require complete rewiring of current cable networks . Even if the cable companies were able to find finance capital eager to invest in an upgrading of their system, which they can't do at present, each cable company would upgrade one or more of its networks in isolation from the others and in isolation from other companies' networks, which precludes a national network . For the state to intervene in the upgrading and expansion of the United Kingdom's telecommunication and cable TV networks would be a classic example of the state `servicing' the needs of capital, as has been the case with, for example, a transport infrastructure and an educated and trained workforce .

Profitability The present Conservative government, however, is intent on concentrating the role of the UK state on market regulation - in particular through con-

trolling the money supply and the workforce . Consequently, its communication policies represent an abdication of the organising role of the state, through a reduction in state spending . This is particularly significant in the case of expansion of cable systems because the cable companies are having difficulties in finding finance capital ready to invest in u pgrading . U K stockbrokers and potential investors are sceptical about the profitability of upgraded cable systems . If there is a profit to be made, it is felt, it would only be in the long term . Kitkat and Aitken, a Stock Exchange research firm, surveyed about 50 investment institutions in 1982 ; some were mildly enthusiastic about cable expansion, but most tended to be lukewarm, severely reducing hopes for a private-sector-funded expansion of cable systems . Much of the City's caution is due to the high capital investment which would be required . Using figures from the us cable sector, Stock Exchange researchers de Zoete and Bevan show that financing of cable systems involves the absorption of a substantial proportion of cash flow in the form of interest payments . In this situation, an alliance between capital and the Labour Movement is possible in the development of an expansion of cable systems . W e are familiar with the Conservatives using their alliance with capital to `hive off' profitable sections of nationalised or state-run activities, such as British Rail hotels, Britoil, British Telecom, and so on . At both local and regional levels, it is possible now for Labour Local Authorities to use an alliance with capital to `hive on' the needs and wishes of the Labour movement to the private interests which are not being served by the present government's approach to the

BEHIND THE NEWS expansion of cable systems . Given that Labour Councils which are becoming interested in cable expansion are doing so from within their attempted local Alternative Economic Strategies (AES), then their local/regional policies towards cable could be regarded as pilots for a national Labour policy within a national AES . The sorts of results we might see as a result of this 'hiving on' would be cable systems in which access wasn't solely dependent on ability to pay ; which had extensive interactive capability enabling their users to be other than just viewers of predetermined material ; which had the capacity and facilities to represent the plurality of views which exist on social, political, economic and cultural issues ; and which could facilitate communications between different interest groups (eg Trade Unions) at national, regional and local levels .

Alliances In the current political/economic climate, no Local Authority can expect on its own to exert a major influence on central government's communications policies - and especially not the left wing Labour Councils which are most likely to want to `hive on' social interests as has just been described . This judgement has been reinforced by the determination of the Hunt Committee to exclude Local Authorities from every aspect of the development of cable systems . Accordingly, we feel that Local Authorities will be most able to exert influence and develop new policies from within some form of alliance between public and private sectors . To see what such alliances look like in practice, we will examine the very real possibilities of Local Authorities becoming members of consortia for the purposes of operating

and installing expanded cable systems . 9 Before we do that however, let us note that at the national level, the Labour Party's `shadow cabinet' has been as incoherent as the government in formulating its oppositional policies on communications, precisely because it is a `shadow' of the government's division of responsibilities . It has also largely accepted the proposition that `cable' is synonymous with `cable TV . Since it was Home Secretary Whitelaw who was chosen to open the Commons debate on Cable and the Hunt Report on the 2nd of December 1982, Labour chose its shadow Home Secretary - Roy Hattersley - to lead what little reply they had to make . However, the real work on cable expansion has been undertaken in the DOI and it was noticeable in that Commons debate that although Whitelaw gave a general indication of government thinking on the regulation of whatever expanded cable systems might appear, it was the DOI - in the form of Information Technology Minister Kenneth Baker - which spelt out the beginnings of a technical framework for cable expansion which would decide just what systems would be capable of doing . Significantly, and crucially, Labour put up no speaker of equivalent stature to Baker . It was left to Labour backbencher MP Geoffrey Robinson, 3'h hours into the debate, to make the point that `there is an urgent need to discuss with British Telecom and other (sic) cable manufacturers the timescale and standard of advanced internationally competitive technology for establishing a national electronic grid' . Conservative backbenchers were not so slow in puncturing the balloon of `cable = cable TV = Home Office' . As Geoffrey-Johnson Smith put it ; `Judging from the debate, one would imagine that . . .(television) was the sole

CAPITAL & CLASS 10 and run expanded cable systems . A particular Local Authority may wish to have a direct input, eg representation by Councillors on the consortium's Board, or an indirect input, such as representation on the Board by members of a ing but about the central nervous system of the whole modern economy . . .we should have our sights firmly set upon establishing a national electronic grid' .

Forum lacking The lack of a Minister of Communications and an opposition `Shadow' has been a major reason why new communications policies in the UK have developed in a vacuum . Currently there is a lack of any public forum in which the many and varied issues surrounding the development of communications technology can be discussed . In particular, there is no opportunity for the producers and consumers of this technology to discuss the current and future development of this industry . A number of Labourcontrolled Local Authorities realise the importance of participation in expanded cable systems in their area . Thus the task of creating communications policies which are coherent at local and national levels has, in our opinion, been placed firmly on the political agenda for the Labour Party . Local Authorities can fill that vacuum we spoke of earlier by establishing Communications Committees, closely linked to their industrial, economic, and employment committees . The immediate task of these committees would be a 'watch-andcomment' brief: to scrutinise, analyse and criticise existing and proposed state policies relating to communications and information technology, and thus to formulate a comprehensive, oppositional framework . In doing so, we

would suggest that members of these committees establish and maintain regular contacts with the relevant trade unions and industrial associations ; indeed, Councillors on these committees may wish to consider co-opting individuals from these organisations onto their committees to supplement their own knowledge and experience . Their oppositional communications policy framework should include proposals for democratic control at a regional level of the whole range of activities within the information technology and communications industries . Accordingly, we would suggest that another task of these committees would be to hold regular seminars with local industries and unions in order to relate their policies to the practical details of industry in their area . These discussions could, we suggest, form the basis for future planned industrial growth in these industries . Although our emphasis throughout these proposals has been on the implications of communications technology development for the future of the workforce and of the UK industrial sector, this is not to ignore the programmes and data that are produced and transmitted via that communications sector . Indeed, we have suggested that these Local Authority Communications Committees are located within the orbit of industry and employment precisely to raise the issue of `content' in discussions about jobs, thereby linking the interests of consumers with those of producers . The final task of these Committees would be to formulate communications policies for discussion in meetings of the full Council . On the particular subject of cable expansion, we have found considerable interest in the idea of Local Authorities participating in local consortia to provide

BEHIND THE NEWS 11

reason for having cable in Britain . However, it is not . The only reason for cable television is that it is one way of helping to finance the cabling of Britain' . Even Ian Wriggelsworth (SDP) was clear that, `we are talking not just about broadcastlocal enterprise/development organisation . The formation of a local cable consortium would, of itself, be an argument for the establishment of a cable franchise corresponding to the local basis of a Communication Committee's activities . Despite Hunt's opposition to Local Authority involvement in cable franchises - which is likely to be reflected in the White Paper - local cable consortia could provide a focal point around which could gather the interests (both public and private) behind information technology . The formation of consortia could be an occasion on which a number of policy issues of general public concern and particular concern to the economic and industrial policies of the local authority could be publicly aired . These would include such questions as : will the cable systems be technically compatible with each other, and thus capable of forming an integrated national network - an electronic grid? Will the re-cabling process increase the range of sociallyuseful products which are being manufactured, in the form of physical components and data/programmes? Will the re-cabling use components and the technology which will stimulate and contribute to the development of a strong UK communications componentmanufacturing industry? Once constructed, will there be improved access to facilities and training to ensure that there is plurality in the data and programmes which the cable systems transmit?

Interests We have already identified the interests behind IT in general and cable in particular as those of finance and industrial capital, as well as that of British Telecom (which would benefit from any increase in data/transmission) . From the point of view of a Local Authority contemplating membership of a local cable consortium, there is an overlay of other interests, ie the specific interests of the workers in IT - as represented by their Unions - and the more general interests of workers and consumers as represented (at a regional and local level) by Local Authorities . A consortium should, we suggest, include the following interests : the Local Authority, British Telecom (via its Regional management), the cable TV companies operating in the area, component manufacturers in the area, and Regional representatives of the BBC and the IBA . It is likely that the relations which each member of a consortium will have with other members will lie somewhere along a spectrum . The spectrum would range from `informal informationexchange' at one end, to 'financial/legal partner' at the other . At one end of that spectrum, the consortium's members could be an informal associations of interests which wish to make their collective voice heard in debates about IT policy . Or it could be a formal association which decides policies (which could be held as binding) regarding its members' practices, eg it could decide mutually-beneficial technical standards . Moving towards the other end of the spectrum ; the consortium may well develop two classes of member once it forms itself into a legal/ financial association . Some or all of the members may wish to form a company

CAPITAL & CLASS 12 to manufacture and/or market particular products . Some or all of the members may wish to form a company to bid for a cable franchise . In those situations, members of the consortium who can't/ won't enter into a financial/legal association might establish informal links with those which do . In summary the key note is flexibility . The overall objective in forming a consortium would be to provide that forum - currently non existent - for public debate and for planned industrial development in the UK communications/IT industry . In order to avoid the wasteful duplication of resources, and to avoid swamping the vulnerable UK IT industry with imports, IT needs to develop within a framework of planned industrial/social growth . The effectiveness of such a framework will depend upon its comprehensiveness : the greater its ability to include co-existing interests and to take account of conflicting interests, than the greater the degree of coherence is possible in planning that industrial/social growth . To put this another way : if your industrial plan ignores a major company in the sector, then in reality it's no plan at all .

Tasks In one way or another, such consortia would exist to provide mass-access highcapacity communications cable systems for their areas . We would agree, therefore, that the tasks of each consortium would be grouped around three chronological stages, each relating to particular technologies . The first stage would be based on the communications cables that are in use now, and the task of the consortium would be to co-ordinate (and thus maximise) the use of these disparate services, including telephone lines, cable TV systems, and electricity mains cables .

The second stage would be the demographic and geographic expansion of those co-ordinated existing services, plus planning for their upgrading . The third stage would entail replacement of existing cables in the area by optical fibre cables, to produce a wide band highcapacity system, and would be likely to start in the mid 1980s . Consequently, the range of practical activities to be undertaken by members of consortia will be very wide - which is why we have proposed consortia with a wide membership . In describing the stages of development of the consortium, it should be clear that it gives the flexibility for any member to withdraw at any stage, while the consortium as a whole has an overall orientation towards a comprehensive recabling programme for the area in question . The first task of a local cable consortium, then, will be to coordinate the communications systems already offered to customers by the members of the consortium . Only in later years does the consortium need to undertake re-cabling of its area of operation . Many of the much publicised `new cable services' are in fact already available in some form or another . Thus, a form of home-banking ('tele-banking') is being tested by the Midland Bank, using ordinary telephone (HF multipair) cable . A (limited!) form of home-shopping ('tele-shopping') already exists on BT'S 'Prestel' system . Remote metering of gas, water and electricity is being tested by Thorn EMI in collaboration with the Water Boards, etc . Pay TV is already being provided through the many cable systems operated by the cable TV companies . Domestic/business data-transmission already occurs using the telephone cables, as well as BT'S packet-switching trunk service for business . A variety of feature films is already

BEHIND THE NEWS available through the rental/sale of video cassettes and video discs, and BT is set to test a wide band high-capacity network - which would bring all the services together - in upwards of 10,000 homes . Given that the advantages of co-axial cable can already be achieved through a co-ordination of service delivery mostly through HF multipair telephone wires - and that optical fibres will be available on a mass basis in 1985, the economics of recabling now with co-axial cables are suicidal, given co-axial's imminent obsolescence . Finance is unlikely, in this situation, to be forthcoming for companies wishing to immediately re-cable with co-axial cable ; hence the lack of enthusiasm from the City for the current proposals from the cable TV companies to upgrade their systems using co-axial cables .

Effectiveness In the first stage, the consortium would be establishing working links between service and maintenance staff across the range of services to be provided, and in order to do that effectively, it would have to try to include all those services, and thus all their providers . The current existence of all those services - albeit on disparate systems - means that the question of whether or not to re-cable is changed to the question of what you lose by not re-cabling immediately . The actual task of co-ordinating existing service delivery will include the synchronising of installation/removal of infrastructure and components ; ensuring that if/when the different services need to interact, that they are technically compatible ; monitoring the effectiveness of existing service delivery, particularly if this would involve more than one

member of the consortium ; and attempting to centralise subscribers' payment for whatever range of services she or he chooses to have from the range available . This policy has a clear parallel at a national level in an Alternative Economic Strategy : `A policy for expansion can be divided into two stages . In the first stage, the prime objective would be to bring unused resources into production to provide employment and high levels of surplus . In the second stage, once full employment has been reached, further expansion can be achieved only by using resources more efficiently and by employing new techniques of production' ('The Alternative Economic Strategy' CSE London Working Group, 1980 . Page 35) . The consortium's second task would be to encourage an increase in the distribution and use of the existing information-delivery systems, such as telephone and cable TV . Expansion would increase the number of subscribers to the existing systems and, consequently, provide a stimulus to the relevant component-manufacturing sectors . By so doing, it will increase mass-access to electronic channels of communications, and will generate employment through planned industrial growth . The easiest way of making the facilities available to more people would be by socialising access to them, through a combination of a library and a `information shop' . These hybrids could be established in existing premises belonging to members of the consortium ; eg through the rental/sale shops of the cable TV companies ; Local Authorities' libraries, housing offices, etc . This policy would have the advantage of being able to offer a small input of resources initially, and then building as demand grows . A comparison could be drawn

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CAPITAL & CLASS 14 with the recent growth in the numbers of `corner shop' instant printers . This is not to suggest that the various facilities will only be available at those information shops, merely that they will be available there to everyone who wants to use them . This would occur in parallel to the development of identical `home information systems', and would mean that access to information would be less based on income . The parallel with the current library service is clear . The final and continuing task of the consortium would be the upgrading of the co-ordinated services, both in terms

band integrated national system, would clearly not occur for some time, given the technical and organisational difficulties involved . However, the first steps outlined above are practical and immediate, and there is an urgent need for moves to be made towards formulating an oppositional communications policy to set against the government's actions . The labour movement must seize the opportunities offered by the technological developments in the communications industry . Without a major encouragement and reorganisation of the UK in-

of technology and in terms of organisation . It is at this stage that the relations between the consortium's members become crucial, in that the technological change to optical fibres implies the organisational change to the integrated

formation industry and communications industries, they will be crushed under the weight of imports for multinational communications companies . The demise of those industries will eliminate the major hope of a significant revival in UK manufacturing .

provision of services . The upgrading to a high capacity network, designed to be a part of a wide-

Patrick Hughes Neil McCartney





BEHIND THE NEWS 15

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Democratic Socialism People are starting to wonder if there isn't an alternative to the domination of the world by huge multinational corporations on the one side and Communist dictators on the other . Democratic socialism - the socialism of Francois Mitterand, Willy Brandt and Poland's "Solidarity" -is that alternative . There is a new international magazine dedicated to democratic socialism, with an emphasis on theory and analysis -The New International Review . Recent issues have featured articles by Nobel Peace Prize recipient Dr. Andrei Sakharov, authors Michael Harrington and Irving Howe . prominent international trade unionists such as Charles Levinson, Dan Gallin and Carl Wright, economist Daniel Fusfeld, political scientists John Kautsky and Nancy Lieber, as well as new translations and reprints of such classic democratic socialist writers as Eduard Bernstein, Rosa Luxemburg, Karl Kautsky, Julian Martov, and, of course . Karl Marx (whose most timely "Letter to Polish Socialists" appears in our 1 I th issue).

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CAPITAL & CLASS



Ron Smith

Abstract

Aspects of militarism of Militarism to modern society makes it a question of major theoretical concern . The end of detente, escalating military budgets, the increased domestic use of the armed forces, and the prevalence of war have also made it an urgent political question . These notes provide some background to the various aspects of militarism and suggest a broad framework within which they may be understood . The level of analysis adopted will be of immediate complexity, lying between the specific conjunctural questions like Trident, Cruise and the Falklands and the systemic questions about the operation of the state or capital in general . But at that level, the notes will try to draw together the wide range of issues pertaining to militarism .' THE CENTRALITY

What is militarism? The degree of fragmentation in the literature relating to the military is striking . Not only are there a wide variety of theories on the Left, orthodox writing is equally diverse . Strategic, tactical, technical, political, sociological and economic writings on the subject have few points of contact . The difficulty of establishing a frame of reference is increased because it is necessary to keep changing the mode of discourse employed . For instance, one mode involves the clinical discussion in game theory terms of nuclear stability, mutual assured destruction, counterforce capability and targeting options . But while the analysis is perfectly

Although militarism is central to modern society, the analysis of it is very fragmented . This fragmentation arises because militarism is not a unitary phenomenon, but a portmanteau description covering a number of distinct aspects . These include : high levels of military expenditure ; the militarisation of domestic social relations ; the use of force in international relations ; and the nuclear arms race . Each of the different aspects of militarism arises in an organic way from major conflicts in the modern world . Each has a particular momentum which arises partly from the dynamic of the conflict and partly from the dynamic of the corresponding form of military 17 organisation and technology .

CAPITAL & CLASS 18

logical in its own terms, these rational decisions produce the prospect of the ultimate irrational outcome . For this outcome the peace and medical community have a quite different mode of discourse to describe the consequence of holocaust . This fragmention in language, theory and approach is a major obstacle to understanding the phenomenon . The importance of the linkages between the political, economic, and strategic aspects of the military, the pervasive nature of militarism, and the political need to oppose it, all demand an analysis which integrates the military into a more general theory of society . On the face of it, Marxism seems more likely to provide such an integration because the framework explicitly takes account of the connections between economics, politics and ideology . In addition there is a long tradition of Marxist writing on the subject . Engels, Liebknecht, Luxemburg, Lenin and Trotsky all considered it 2 as have many more recent Marxists' . On the whole, Marxists have not tried to provide a general theory of militarism, but have theorised the links between specific aspects of militarism, civil society and the economy . They have not treated militarism as some underlying unitary phenomenon, as has been common elsewhere, but have analysed specific historical connections . This appears to be the appropriate approach for reasons which will be explained . But in this light one can interpret the fragmentation in military studies as reflecting real features of the phenomenon, rather than merely being a product of the divergent modes of discourse employed . The term militarism usually carries the connotation of excessive influence of the military in society, but more precise definition becomes problematic . In a recent book on militarism 14 of the 19 papers were concerned with attempting to define it' . These definitional difficulties arise because the term is effectively a portmanteau description covering a number of separate phenomena . These include : (a) (b) (c) relations (d)

high levels of military expenditure the militarisation of domestic social relations tendencies towards war and the use of force in international the nuclear arms race

It seems more useful to treat these four as distinct responses covered by a generic descriptive term, militarism, rather than regarding each as merely a manifestation of some unitary abstract force, militarism . It is important to regard militarism as a description rather than an abstraction because although there are conjunctural associations between the four aspects there seems to be no real structural relation between them, except that each involve the military .

ASPECTS OF MILITARISM A number of examples might illustrate the lack of structural relation . By criterion (c) Britain has historically been a very militaristic society with a high proclivity to go to war and to resort to force in international relations . In the Richardson list of wars 1820-1952, Britain participated in a fifth of the wars catalogued, many more than any other nation . I But this was combined with a very limited role of the military in domestic society by international standards and low shares of military expenditure in output . 6 Thus on citeria (a) and (b) Britain was a very unmilitaristic society . It could be so because other forms of regulation maintained social order and power relations and made unnecessary domestic military involvement . The ruling class, in fact, saw the army as a potential threat to themselves . In addition, for Britain, war mongering was relatively inexpensive because the navy was a cheap way to project force and the colonies bore much of the cost . One might anticipate an association between (b), (a) and (c) since military governments, the extreme form of militarism of domestic social relations, might be expected to spend more on the armed forces and be internationally more bellicose . However, the evidence does not suggest that this is true . On average military rulers do not increase the size of military budgets .' There is in addition a tendency for involvement of the military in domestic politics and power to create promotion patterns, organisational structures, and values which are detrimental to combat effectiveness . The poor performance of military regimes in conflicts with other states (e .g . the Greek and Argentinian Juntas) should caution them against starting wars . Defining a military government raises problems . For instance, should the us be regarded as having a military government between 1953-60, because Eisenhower was a general? The example also illustrates that military affiliation cannot be identified with militarist tendencies . In many ways Eisenhower was the least militaristic of recent us presidents . He gave the world the term `military industrial complex' and warned of the dangerous power of the alliance between arms firms, service chiefs and defence bureaucrats . He stopped us intervention in Vietnam after Dien Bien Phu, and refused to be alarmed by the imaginary `missile gap', between the us and USSR, which Kennedy campaigned on . There are enough historical anomalies of this sort to make searching for a single underlying force or personal characteristic which explains abstract tendencies towards militarism an unhelpful approach . Instead it seems more useful to examine each of the four elements separately and to try to identify the historical and structural factors that give rise to each of them .

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CAPITAL & CLASS 20 Levels of military expenditure

The post-war period has seen a much higher proportion of output devoted to military expenditure than earlier periods, and the world total is now over 600 billion dollars . This high share of output by historical standards seems to be the pattern in capitalist, socialist and less developed countries alike, though there are individual exceptions, of which Japan is the most notable . Over the 1960's and 70's military expenditures were growing faster in the Third World than elsewhere, though the rapid planned growth in NATO expenditures may change that . High military expenditures are of concern both because of the vast waste of resources involved and because of the effects of the creation of a military industrial complex . The international articulation of state and private capital is highly developed in the military sphere, and the expansion of this sector has marked effects on social, political and economic organisation' The economic effects of high military expenditure are a subject of controversy . A major ideological argument for military expenditure rests on the idea that it creates jobs, and some marxist writers have emphasised the use of military expenditure by capitalist states to meet economic needs . These might be the needs of individual capitalists - to provide profits for arms manufacturers - or the needs of capital in general - to offset tendencies to crisis . With respect to the latter, it has been suggested that this might be achieved in three different ways, each corresponding to a different theory of crisis . Military expenditure may absorb surplus allowing capitalists to realise it as profit . It may slow the rate of increase in the organic composition of capital by diverting capital from accumulation, while technological spin-off from military R and D might cheapen the elements of constant capital and increase relative surplus value . It might change the balance of class forces by ideology, coercion or the co-option of members of the working class, enabling capitalists to raise the rate of exploitation and the share of profits . Each of these theories about how military expenditure might contribute to counteracting the tendency to crisis has its proponents . However, there is no necessary reason why it should be military expenditure rather than some other form of capitalist regulation that is used for these purposes, nor is it clear that military expenditure need have these effects in practice . The historical evidence suggests that in the post-war period military expenditure has been detrimental to accumulation . In the UK and us, the two major imperial powers that maintained high shares of military expenditure, this burden has reduced investment ; diverted R and D funds and scarce scientific and technical skills from civilian to military projects ; and resulted in lower growth rates in productivity and output, loss of markets

ASPECTS OF MILITARISM 21

and rising unemployment .' The form of the interaction between military expenditure and the economy will depend on the historically specific stage of development with its associated structure of industry, military organisation and class relations . Within postwar capitalist societies the structure of the interaction is such that it seems highly unlikely that the military expenditure was prompted by economic motives .

The use of militarism to inhibit working class struggle against the system and to raise the rate of exploitation has a long history . Militarism may be used in a coercive way through direct repression by troops or in an ideological way to instil values of hierarchy, discipline and national interest . Culture becomes suffused with military images of war, heroism and obedience, images which have great political power . The public response to the Falklands adventure shows the deep roots such responses have in English life . In the third world where colonial borders have left new nations to face deeply rooted regional conflicts and internal separatist movements, the army may be the only truly `national' institution and have an important cohesive role . A role involving not only the use of force but also the creation of a nationalist ideology, and a national citizenship . Maintenance of a social formation rests, in the last resort, on ruling class control of the armed forces . But to the extent that economic, political and ideological forms of civilian regulation are effective, military forms may not be used at all . During the long post-war boom, prosperity, cold-war rhetoric and social democratic consensus maintained the general legitimacy of capitalist power relations in the west, within a framewrk provided by us hegemony . The end of that era, the generalised crisis, and the collapse of the material basis for a civil ideology of Keynesian welfare capitalism has prompted the return to more coercive forms of regulation and greater use of militarist ideology . Economic coercion operates through higher unemployment and reduced welfare benefits . Political coercion operates through more repressive industrial and social legislation and increased power for the security forces ." In the UK the transfer of tactics acquired in Northern Ireland ; the concern with subversion and low intensity operations in certain parts of the military ; the development of a Home Defence network which integrates military and civilian command structures ; and the transformation of police and legal structures in response to riots and terrorism ; all constitute actual or potential threats to democratic civil rights . The state has a continuum of instruments of coercion from social security administrators through police to the army . Thus

Militarisation of society .

CAPITAL & CLASS 22

increased repression may or may not involve increased use of the military . Firstly, the use of militarism as an ideology, in establishing the legitimacy and political influence of the armed forces and their role as representatives of national unity, is effective only to the extent that the military are not used as agents of terror . Secondly, the ruling class may see the armed forces as a threat to themselves, and this threat may be increased by their domestic use . Military recruitment and structure is often dominated by non-capitalist, typically feudal, class affiliations, and military rule or values may constitute an obstacle to accumulation . Thus the role of the military in the domestic maintenance of a social formtion is not a simple one .

International use of force

The end of the Second World War also marked the beginning of a continuous Third World war . Decolonisation, superpower proxy conflicts, regional antagonisms and competition for scarce resources have generated over 150 wars, mainly in Africa and Asia, in which tens of millions have died . U K armed forces have been involved in armed conflict almost continuously for the past forty years and the US and USSR have each used force or threat of force repeatedly against third parties to attain their objectives ." International law, diplomacy, arbitration or the United Nations have not yet provided acceptable alternatives to war as dispute settlement procedures . The consequence has been prolonged slaughter in the South . The prevalence of conflict has caused Third World governments to increase their military expenditures rapidly and acquire the most modern weapon systems, including nuclear ones . The burden of the defence budgets adds to the death, disease and famine that follow war, by diverting skills, foreign exchange and technology from pressing development needs . These wars in the periphery tend to get taken for granted in the West . Film from Beirut, Afghanistan, Cambodia, or the Ogaden may temporarily shock, but is then forgotten . But these wars are important for many reasons, primarily because of the hardship and loss of life they cause . Secondly, because they decide power relations, control over trade and minerals, and mode of life over a large part of the globe. After a period of containment in the 1960s, the seventies saw capitalist clients displaced in South East Asia, Southern Africa, Latin America and the Middle East . Thirdly, any one of these wars could provoke conflict in the North . When two heavily armed and hostile camps, like NATO and the Warsaw Pact, confront each other with limited opportunity to back down or negotiate then rigid mobilisation timetables and domestic incentives for belligerence can cause minor incidents to start wars . During crises

ASPECTS OF MILITARISM 23

decision-makers tend to become rigid and inflexible, impulsive and myopic, as the run-up to the Falklands war showed . Information overload and massive uncertainty increase the dangers . ' 2 World War I provides the standard example of a relatively unimportant event provoking massive slaughter . In 1914 railway timetables determined the pace and character of decisions ; now missile launching schedules do . In the Falklands, there were three days to make the decision to send the Task Force, and three weeks to negotiate while it sailed, yet still the war was not avoided . In a nuclear confrontation the times might be 3 hours and 3 minutes . While the provocation for World War III need be no larger than that for World War I, the slaughter certainly would be because of the final aspect of modern militarism, the nuclear arms race .

The first three aspects of militarism were familiar to Engels writing over a century ago . The threat of nuclear annihilation is a recent addition . Although the world has lived with the threat of nuclear destruction since 1945, vertical (within states) and horizontal (among states) proliferation continues . There are now over 50,000 warheads in the stockpiles and a new round of escalation is under way . It is difficult to convey the extent of this destructive potential when one Polaris submarine carries more explosive power than was used in the whole of War War II, including the two atomic bombs . There are six definite nuclear weapons states, another two which almost certainly have nuclear capability, and it is possible that there will be half a dozen new additions to the club in the next decade . The risk of use increases with each new weapon and each new decision centre . Despite the incredible convolutions the concept provokes, the success of deterrence in postponing war between the super-powers must be recognised . The costs of use of nuclear weapons dwarf the benefits . But it is difficult to have confidence in that success being indefinitely repeated . Soviet or American leaders might, in certain circumstances, see the risks as being worth taking, and the incentives faced by small nuclear weapons states are quite different . Nor need use be deliberate policy . Technical malfunction, or human failure, a misinterpreted incident or unauthorised action could all cause an accidental holocaust . The well publicised defects in the North American nuclear attack warning system (NORAD) which led to three false alarms in 1979-80 are such a possible cause . The effects of even a limited nuclear war, namely one in which only military installations are targeted, would be so catastrophic that this threat must colour any analysis of late twentieth

Nuclear proliferation

CAPITAL & CLASS 24

century society ." In Europe the threat is greater since it is the battlefield for which most preparations have been made . NATO strategy, which still relies on the first use of nuclear weapons, increases the danger . The structure of the confrontation and the type of weapons deployed create powerful incentives towards pre-emptive bombardment on both sides . The instability of the position is increased because, while it only requires one nation to start a nuclear war in Europe, it needs agreement by the four nuclear powers operating there to stop it . 14 The centrality of nuclear proliferation to modern society has been argued most strongly by E P Thomspon . To him the bomb is the object of a new social order which has shaped and structured the societies out of which it grew, a social order he labels exterminism . 16 He asks 'if "the hand-mill gives you society with the feudal lord ; the steam-mill society with the industrial capitalist" what are we given by those Satanic Mills which are now at work grinding out the means of human extermination?' His answer is that the weapon systems have become independent variables in an arms race that has acquired an autonomous dynamic in both domestic and international politics . This dynamic which is out of control, inertial and irrational, conditions the whole of world politics . Exterminism has become 'a non-dialectical contradiction, a state of absolute antagonism in which both powers grow through confrontation, and which can only be resolved by mutual extermination .'

Understanding militarism

The discussion of the four aspects of militarism above suggests some elements of an explanation . Military power is a particular form of coercion which is used as an instrument by states to meet their objectives in the major conflicts they face . In using military power the states set in motion a process which has a form of militarism as the end product . Militarism cannot be explained in terms of the objectives of the state alone because these are constrained by the nature of the environment in which the state operates . In particular the nature of the prevailing class relations, the nature of each conflict, and the nature of the instrument itself, military force, all influence the process . Each of these has dynamics of their own which in interaction lead to the development of the various distinct aspects of militarism . To begin with the nature of the conflicts . The international community is composed of nation states divided loosely into three blocs : capitalist, socialist and poor ; the first, second and third world . 16 From this perspective, the world order may be thought of as an ellipse with two foci and a periphery, within which individual states are located . The ruling class in any state is

ASPECTS OF MILITARISM then involved in four major types of relationship which define the political fractures of the modern world . These are the intra-state confrontation arising from domestic class antagonisms ; the intrablock rivalry with other states sharing a common form of economic organisation and certain shared material interests ; and two inter block competitions in which it participates against each of the other systems . Thus the British state would be in conflict on its own with (a) its domestic working class ; and (b) the other capitalist states to maintain interimperialist advantage ; and in conjunction with other capitalist states in conflict with (c) socialist states to maintain the capitalist sphere of influence ; and (d) the third world to maintain control of markets and materials . In any specific dispute the four types of conflict are overlaid and this introduces considerable complexity . The fact that it may pay to ally with a traditional enemy to deal with a more pressing antagonist, does not lessen the material basis of the conflict with the old enemy . To a large extent, the British nation united to fight the Nazis as did the us and USSR with it ." But this was a temporary and partial lull in class conflict and mutual hostilities . Even in a single conflict the process and outcome cannot be explained in terms of the operation of a single force . The impact of opposing groups changes the direction of development of the conflict and the s ystem . US and Soviet societies cannot be understood in isolation from their impact on each other, because that interaction has changed the character of both societies . Likewise not only does the present structure of imperialism reflect both the internationalisation of accumulation and the fight for self-determination in the periphery, but the struggle between them has changed the nature of both accumulation and self-determination . For our purposes the complexity of the conflicts is secondary to the point that although military power plays a role in each, the type of force involved differs between conflicts . The strategic weaponry of the superpower confrontation, the rapid deployment forces used for imperial interventions in Shaba, Afghanistan, or the Falklands and the militias used in domestic peace keeping involve different technologies, organisations and structures . That differentiation has implications for the forms of militarism that develop . At a very simple level, the different services are often dissimilar in recruitment patterns, class affiliations and political outlook . At a more general level one can see that three of the aspects of militarism considered above correspond broadly to three types of fracture associated with major conflict . The militarisation of society is associated with intrastate class struggle ; the increased tendency to war with the split between centre and periphery ; the nuclear proliferation with the

25



CAPITAL & CLASS 26

confrontation between capitalism and socialism, NATO and the Warsaw Pact . The levels of military expenditure, the fourth aspect, reflect the need to finance both the armed component of each of these conflicts and the military element in interalliance bargaining and cohesion . Thus the first element in our explanation of militarism sees the various aspects of it as manifestations of the major fractures that divide the modern world, and their development as reflecting the dynamic of those conflicts . But a second element is needed . The military is not a passive instrument in these conflicts, the technology and social relations of force have a dynamic of their own, and application of this instrument changes both the user and those on whom it is used . This happens not only through the political and ideological consequences of use, but also through the economic impact of financing the military burden . Militarism is a contradictory response in that it undermines the system it was designed to defend . The inherent dynamic of military development and its interaction with civil society has been a topic of marxist interest, since Marx and Engels . Marx asked `Is there anywhere where our theory that the

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ASPECTS OF MILITARISM organisation of labour is determined by the means of production is more brilliantly confirmed than in the human slaughter industry' and in Anti-Duhring Engels developed this analysis . This momentum of military development has been formalised by Mary Kaldor'", who uses an analogy with standard marxist terminology to provide a theory of the laws of motion of the mode of destruction or warfare, rather than of production . The development of the means of production themselves, whether human or technological, generate new weapons systems . These weapons systems, which combine technological and social relations, condition more general forms of military organisation and operation . This creates a specific labour process, which in the competition with other military organisations, develops an internal logic and laws of motion of its own . Such a mode of destruction is constituted as the articulation of forces and relations . The forces of destruction correspond to the military technology now embodied in the weapon system (e .g . tank, aircraft, battleship), an integrated combination of offensive and defensive capability with associated methods of mobility, command and control . The relations of destruction correspond to the forms of social relations and organisation within the armed forces and between them and the rest of society, themselves conditioned by the character of the technology they operate . Under the coercive force of competition between combatants these are articulated into a system with its own contradictions and momentum . So far the discussion has been in terms of a general mode of destruction or warfare, but a similar dialectical argument can be applied to the specific forms, nuclear confrontation, peripheral warfare and domestic militarism, and each has its own contradictory system . Perhaps the most important question is the form of resolution of these contradictions . Engels saw Militarism as containing the seeds of its own destruction . Expenditure on armed forces hastened financial catastrophe, universal military conscription transformed the army of the princes into the army of the people, and the sophistication of the weapons made them outrageously costly and unusable in war . 19 None of these arguments seems to apply to nuclear weapons, which are relatively cheap and very much under the control of the princes . An alternative interpretation is that war becomes the resolution, the means of resolving the antagonistic contradictions in class society ." Given that the forces of destruction have now reached their highest stage in the mass of inter-continental ballistic missiles with their multiple warheads and secure launching platforms few in the west find appealing the Chinese extension of this argument : that the mutual destruction of the two hegemonic powers will provide

27

CAPITAL & CLASS 28

the material foundation for socialism . Within the dialectical framework the theoretical and political problem is that when thesis and antithesis appear to be the confrontation of two highly militarised hostile blocs and the destructive powers of the nuclear forces they are each geared to develop, the most likely synthesis is mutual annihilation . Such a synthesis would be profoundly unsatisfactory, not only on the practical grounds that we do not relish our destruction but on the theoretical grounds that it makes military organisation, a feature of the superstructure and an epiphenomenal product of the operation of the mode of production, ultimately determinant . Theoretical misgivings will not, however, halt the drive to extermination, halting that drive is a political process ."

Conclusion

After a period when the Left showed little concern with the military, there has been a revival of interest and a renewed awareness of the threat that militarism poses . The argument here has been that militarism should not be seen as an undifferentiated concept, it has distinct aspects each of which need to be analysed in a historically specific way . If this is done the different facets of militarism arise in an organic way from each of the major conflicts in the modern world . The momentum of each of the aspects nuclear, domestic, expenditures, and peripheral wars - comes from the dynamic of each conflict and of the corresponding forms of military organisation and technology . The analysis does suggest that militarism contains the seeds of its own destruction, but that destruction could come about in either of two ways . Militarism could create the opposition that will destroy it, by generating class, peace, and national liberation movements against it . Alternatively, militarism coud lead to the annihilation of civilisation, destroying itself along with everything else .



ASPECTS OF MILITARISM 29

This is a revised version of a paper presented to the SSRC Political Economy Study Group . I am grateful to the SSRC for financial support and the editors of Capital and Class for helpful comments . The range of issues is well covered in New Left Review 1. (1982), which is essential reading for anyone interested in militarism . A convenient collection of the classics is provided by 2. Semmel (1981) . The major omission from it is Liebknecht (1973) . On Luxembourg, see Ch . 9 of Rowthorn (1980) . 3. Reviews of more recent theories are provided in Mackenzie (1983) and Smith (1977) . Eide and Thee (1980) . 4. 5. Richardson (1960) and Wilkinson (1980) . Counting wais is a minor academic industry . It is estimated that Britain has been involved in 88 since World War II (State Research Bulletin, p .139), but this uses a different definition of war from Richardson . The definition used by Small and Singer (1982), another major source for war counting, tends to exclude the sort of wars Britain indulged in . The historical pattern of British military expenditure since 6. 1689 is analysed in Kohler (1980) . The UK's high defence burden since the Korean war is a break from the historical pattern . 7. Measuring the effects of military governments on military budgets is another minor academic industry . A good review, on which the conclusionin the text is based, is Zuk and Thompson (1982) . 8. Cis (1982) provides information on the Military Industrial Complex in the UK . The empirical evidence is summarised in Georgiou and Smith 9. (1982) . These trends are well documented in the journal State Research . 10 . 11 . Two Brookings studies, Kaplan et al (1981) and Kaplan and Blechman (1979) document 190 Soviet and 215 us incidents in which the superpowers used military force as an instrument of diplomacy . Dixon (1976) discusses these features of the decision making 12 . process during crises . The standard study of the effects of nuclear war is Office of 13 . Technology Assessment (1980) ; Greene at al (1982) describe the possible effects on London ; Trompe and Laroque (1982) on Europe . The issues associated with Nuclear War in Europe are discussed 14 . in Trompe and Laroque (1982) . Thompson's article and rejoinders to it are reprinted in New Left 15 . Review (1982) . The blocs are distinguished by their different forms of economic 16 . organisation . The exact nature of the differences, whether they constitute co-existing modes of production, different social formations within capitalism, or whatever, while an important question, is not germane to the argument here . However, it will be assumed that whatever the material basis of the class divisions, they all remain class societies in which antagonistic social relations persist and that militarism is a characteristic of class societies and not peculiar to capitalism . The significance of these coalitions for the UK is discussed in 17 . Barnett (1982) .

Notes



CAPITAL & CLASS 30

In New Left Review (1982) . She develops the concept of a 18 . weapon system in Kaldor (1981) . 19 . Anti-Duhring Part II, Ch . III . 20 . Byely (1972) . 21 The politics of anti-militarism is discussed in Mackenzie (1983) and New Left Review (1982) . UK aspects are discussed in Smith (1983) .

References

Barnett, Anthony (1982) `Iron Britannia' New Left Review No . 134 July-August . Byely, et al. (1972) Marxism-Leninism on War and Army Progress Publishers . cis (1982) War Lords, cis Report on the uK Arms Industry Counter Information Services, Anti-Report 31 . Dixon, Norman F . (1976) `On the Psychology of Military Incompetence', Jonathan Cape . Eide, Asbjone and Thee, Marek (1980) Problems of Contemporary Militarism Croom Helm . Georgiou G . and Smith R .P. Assessing Effects of Military Expenditure on OECD Countries Birkbeck Discussion Paper No . 124 . Green, O . (et al) (1982) London After the Bomb Oxford University Press . Kaldor, M . (1981) The Baroque Arsenal Hill and Wang . Kaplan, Stephen S . and Blechman, Barry (1979) Force Without War : us Armed Forces as a Political Instrument Brookings . Kaplan, Stephen S . (et al) (1981) Diplomacy of Power : Soviet Armed Forces as a Political Instrument Brookings . Kohler, G . (1980) `Determinants of the British defence burden' Bulletin of Peace Proposals No . 1, p .79-85 Liebknecht (1973, translation) Militarism and Anti-Militarism Cambridge . Mackenzie, Donald (1983) `Militarism' Capital and Class 19 . New Left Review (1982) Exterminism and Cold War Verso . Office of Technology Assessment (1980) The Effects of Nuclear War us Congress, Croom Helm . Rowthorn, Bob (1980) Capitalism, Conflict and Inflation Lawrence and Wishart . Semmel, Bernard (1981) Marxism and the Science of War Oxford University Press . Small, M ., and Singer, J . D . (1982) Resort to Arms Sage Publications . Smith, R .P . (1977) `Military expenditure and capitalism' Cambridge Journal of Economics Vol . I No . 1 . Smith, R .P . (1983) `UK defence policy' Socialist Economic Review 1983 Merlin . Trompe, H .W . and La Rocque, G .R . (1982) Nuclear War in Europe Groningen University Press . Richardson, L . F . (1960) Statistics of Deadly Quarrels Boxwood . Wilkinson, D . (1980) Deadly Quarrels University of California Press . Zuk G . and Thompson W .R . (1982) `The post-coup military spending question' American Political Science Review March, Vol . 76 No . 1, p .60-74 .

ASPECTS OF MILITARISM 31

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CAPITAL & CLASS

Donald MacKenzie

Militarism and socialist theory 1980s militarism has returned to the centre of the political arena . December 1979 looks likely to be seen in retrospect as a crucial divide, even though the events of that month had much earlier origins . The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation confirmed its earlier decision to introduce some six hundred new, highly accurate nuclear missiles to Europe ; and Soviet troops entered Afghanistan . The resurgence of the Cold War evoked an equally dramatic resurgence of the peace movement . Both far larger and geographically far more widespread than earlier movements against nuclear weapons, the new movement in less than two years has markedly altered the political climate of Western Europe, and has had ramifications both in the East and across the Atlantic . British politics in particular have recently been dominated by war in a way unprecedented since Suez . The short, brutal little conflict in the South Atlantic brought with it uncomfortable lessons - that war could still command considerable popular support, that a seemingly marginal and resolvable dispute could lead to war, that the considerable inroads made by the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament in the Labour Party and elsewhere were not easily translatable into effective opposition to a'conventional' war, even one with nuclear weaponry in the combat zone . In this situation, socialist analysis of militarism, long neIN THE EARLY

C & C 19 - C

This article argues that we should not explain militarism only economically, nor see it as having merely an `internal' logic . The state and the international system of states are centrally important in militarism . We urgently need further work on militarism and gender, on militarism as culture and on the socialist use of armed forces . 33

CAPITAL & CLASS 34

glected, has begun to revive .' I intend this paper to help this process, largely by reviewing the resources available within the Marxist tradition, widely conceived, that might assist us in our understanding . I would neither claim to be comprehensive in my coverage of these resources,' nor pretend that I have solutions to the difficulties of existing analyses of militarism . In some areas (such as the sections on weapons production and the law of value or on gender, militarism and the state) I have been able to do little more than point to the need for particular kinds of analyses . Nevertheless, I am convinced that there are few areas where the development of our theory is more important . I don't mean that `the movement' needs the `right' theory to stop it going off the rails . That sort of assertion - the typical arrogance of Marxist intellectuals - is at best an idealist oversimplification of the real conditions shaping the growth and decline of social and political movements . But it remains true that after the initial flowering of a movement such as the peace movement there often comes a period where taking stock, gathering resources and formulating goals are useful . Part of that process - though only part of it - is a careful examination of what we are opposing, its roots, manifestations, strengths and weaknesses, its connections to other aspects of our society . The core of contemporary militarism is often seen as weaponry, as in its common characterisation as an `arms race' . Accordingly, I shall - after a short discussion of the key term , militarism'- begin by discussing weapons, focusing particularly on how weapons are produced, and on some important consequences of the way they are produced . Then I will discuss briefly explanations of militarism that see its cause as being weapons production and the undue influence of those who benefit from the production of weapons . I'll argue that though those explanations capture a lot of important phenomena of contemporary weapons production, they fail if put forward as ultimate or complete explanations . In the next main section I'll examine the theories of militarism that are most commonly regarded as Marxist : economic explanations of militarism . I shall argue that these explanations both oversimplify the complex and historically variable impact of militarism on capitalist economies, and are wrong in their exclusive focus on the `economic' . In the following section I'll argue that a much more satisfactory starting point for explanations of militarism is the state, particularly as embedded in an international system of states . Marxist state theory in recent years has had a strange tendency to be silent on the military activity of states, and a parallel reticence on states' relations to other states as key determinants of their development . Here, I shall suggest,

MILITARISM AND THEORY is a particularly vital area where our theory needs to be developed if we are to understand militarism . Militarism, too, plays a key role in defining the relation between the state and its `citizens', and one that operates very differently for women than for men . Male domination, militarism and the state are closely tied in ways that urgently need unravelling . In the penultimate section I'll turn to the cultural roots of militarism . `Falklands Britain' revealed starkly the continuing, if subterranean, vitality of militarist culture . However problematic the `cultural' is for socialist theory, here is a further area that no comprehensive political economy of militarism can neglect . Finally I shall argue that an entirely proper and appropriate focus on capitalist militarism should not blind us to militarism as a problem for socialism . Many socialists throughout the world from Iran to Ireland to Nicaragua - have felt forced to the conclusion that only through armed force can socialist goals be achieved . Whether that is so is a decision that we in the capitalist heartlands may eventually have to take . The orthodox answer of the Marxist tradition to the dilemma this poses- that armed force is a neutral instrument of the social forces that wield it - is glib . At the least, we ought to reckon on the very real social and political consequences that may flow from resort to organised armed force . A troublesome problem of definition obstructs the start of our enquiry . There is no consensus as to the meaning of the term `militarism' . I have no intention of entering here into a semantic debate, and so offer the following rough-and-ready, but serviceable, meaning . Militarism is a condition in which war, or the preparation of the means of war, are major social concerns, commanding a significant proportion of resources and enjoying a substantial degree of legitimacy .

However we define it, we need some term such as this that captures this vital and widespread feature of contemporary capitalism . (Although of course we must not imply that only capitalist societies are militarist, or that all contemporary capitalist socieites are equally militarist . Patently, neither is true .) But I cannot pretend that the choice of words is neutral . To talk of militarism rather than `exterminism' - E P Thompson's preferred term - is to say, amongst other things, that it is not only the drift towards mass destruction that matters . To talk of militarism rather than the `arms race' is to say that it is not only weapons that matter . To talk of militarism rather than the `Cold War' is to say that it is not only the East-West divide that deserves our attention . To talk of militarism rather than the `war drive' is to remind us that the politically effective use of military force often stops short

35

What `militarism' means

CAPITAL & CLASS 36

of actual fighting . Of course, the users of these terms are far from tied by these implications of them, but it seems worth choosing a term that - despite its ambiguities and difficulties' - conveys the scope of what we are opposing .

Capitalism and the production of weapons

The successful pursuit of war - militarism's rationale - has at least two preconditions . People (in practice, normally, men) have to be forced or persuaded to fight, and have to be trained and organised to do so effectively . This first precondition I shall return to below . Secondly, these people have to be provided with the physical wherewithal to make it possible for them to fight : food, clothing, shelter, transport and, in particular, weapons . As warfare has developed, the last of these preconditions has become more and more salient . Of all the means of war, weapons have become the central area of attention and debate, and the advanced capitalist states now spend approximately as much on procuring weapons as they do on paying, training and organising people to use them . So Engels (1878/1976 : 211-22) was right to place the question of the production and availability of weapons at the centre of Marxist analysis of military force . Just how are weapons produced? Until fairly recently, states directly organised the production of weapons using their own facilities and their own employees . The wind-powered wooden battleships that were the early foundation of Britain's imperial might were produced in Royal Dockyards . The armouries that supplied the armed forces of the United States - and in which crucial aspects of assemblyline technology were developed (Merritt Roe Smith, 1977)-were also state-owned . But, first in late nineteenth century Europe, and much later in the United States, private capital began to enter the production of weapons (Kaldor, 1982b :271) . The key firms involved - Vickers, Krupp, Mitsubishi, Lockheed, Boeing and the like - became central contributors to the war-fighting capacity of their respective states . Some weapons are still produced exclusively by the state . This is most obviously true for the actual assembly of nuclear bombs . But the means of delivering these bombs to their targets, and the equally important systems of communications and control that make them useable, are in the United States largely the product of private capital, and in the United Kingdom are made by a mix of private capital and of nationalised and seminationalised firms like British Aerospace that operate as quasiautonomous capitals . `Conventional' weaponry - a deceptively bland term that covers a vast range of weapons whose capacity to

MILITARISM AND THEORY kill and maim has been increased very dramatically since 1945 is, similarly, produced predominantly by private capitals . It would be quite mistaken, however, to see weapons production as simply a classic case of capitalist production for the market . Not only are there relatively few major producers (not in itself an uncommon situation in late capitalism), but, at least until fairly recently, there was only one buyer, the state . While again this is not a situation unique to weapons production, these factors combine with others to produce a system of production significantly different from that analysed by Marx in Capital, and different too from that commonly assumed in bourgeois economic theory . Two major recent attempts to grasp the `laws of motion' of this production system are Kaldor (1982a) and Gansler (1982), and what follows draws heavily on their work . I'll talk primarily about the United States, since that is not only the most important, but also the best-studied, of the Western weapons-production systems . The weapons-production system

At only one stage is there typically competition between firms involved in weapons production : the very early state of preliminary research and development . If a new missile, say, is to be developed, several firms may bid for the contract to do the initial development work . In practice, of course, only a very small number of firms have the capacity to undertake such a project, and the number may effectively be reduced further by long-term links between one particular firm and the wing of the military involved . While both Boeing and Lockheed have the capacity to design and build major strategic nuclear missiles, Lockheed has become the supplier to the United States Navy and Boeing to the United States Air Force (Gansler, 1982 : 36) . In countries other than the United States it may well be that in fact only one firm could possibly produce the weapon involved, so that even this stage of competition disappears . Once the first development contract is sealed, competition effectively ceases and - bar the risk of cancellation of the projectthe firm and the state are locked together for the duration of the development and production cycle of the weapon . For complex weapons such as missiles or aircraft that is for a very long time ten years or more . Because the product will be technically new, neither exact design or price can be specified in advance . This factor helps make weapons work and similar high-technology projects different from other forms of contract work for the state . It is in the interests of the firm to modify the contract as much as possible once the competitive phase has ended, in part because it

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will often have submitted an unrealistically low initial bid to secure the contract (Gansler, 1982 : 93) . Notoriously, contracts typically `grow' by 50%, 100% or sometimes more from the initial planning estimate . Pricing is typically on a `cost-plus' basis : the firm is recompensed for its total outlays, plus an agreed percentage profit . That percentage profit appears low, often being no higher than 4% or 5% in the United States . It is held down both as a matter of state policy and sometimes by penalties imposed on contractors . But, significantly, firms can achieve a much higher rate of profit on capital employed : 15% or even 30% or higher . This is because their needs for capital are reduced both by the fact that a lot of capital equipment (machine tools and so on, even whole factories) is supplied to them by the state, and also by the system of regular monthly progress payments for partially completed work . Furthermore, weapons work can be a hidden subsidy to other aspects of a firm's activities . Research and development costs are reimbursed in full, often with little monitoring of the outcome of the work, and with no restriction on the civilian exploitation of military-funded work . Profit rates vary considerably from firm to firm . Missile work - where in the United States the government supplies nearly all plant and equipment - is extremely good business . Shipbuilding - where this tends not to happen - is much less

MILITARISM AND THEORY profitable . Large firms do much better than small ones . They corner the role of `prime contractor' on major contracts, leaving small firms the much less profitable and rapidly fluctuating subcontracting work . They monopolise the state-owned plant and equipment in private hands, plant and equipment worth perhaps $50 billion at replacement cost . Above all they monopolise the crucial research and development money .' At the same time, Gansler (1982) emphasises that a whole set of barriers operates to deter other capitals, even big capitals, from entering those areas of military production where profit rates are significantly higher than average . A totally new entrant would have to buy the equipment that existing weapons producers have often got for nothing . It would have to undermine the close links that exist between existing producers and the parts of the military that buy from them . It would need to prove - without any `track record' to go on - that it could come up with a better product . It would need to build up a large and highly specialised research, development and marketing capability in order even to begin to compete . Weapons production, the labour process and the law of value

When Marx discusses value in chapter one of Capital, he emphasises that the value of a commodity reflects not the actual time required to produce it, but the time socially necessary to do so . `Inefficient' producers, those whose products embody more actual labour-time than the socially necessary minimum, still have to sell their products for the same as do the more `efficient' producers . Marx points to the example of the hand-loom weavers, crushed by the competition of the labour-time reducing powerloom, crushed by the `law of value' . At the very heart of capitalist production, Marx postulates, is thus a drive to reduce to a minimum the labour-time it takes to produce commodities . But this drive becomes an actuality, he reminds us, only through `the coercive laws of competition' (Capital 1, Penguin edn ., 433) . In weapons production those `coercive laws' are suspended to a degree remarkable even for contemproary monopoly capitalism . Weapons production, I would suggest, is substantially insulated from the operation of the law of value . There is no clear incentive for capitalists to seek to minimise the labour-time it takes to produce weapons . Indeed, the institutional system of weapons production tends to reward companies that raise the costs of production rather than lower them . And, because weapons typically do not, at least until quite recently, enter a market, there is no straightforward exchange process by

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which the labour-time involved in producing one is equated with the labour-time involved in producing another . No exchange process . But as Mary Kaldor (1982b) emphasises, `there exists another form of commensuration for armaments : war' . In time of war, especially total war, there certainly is a pressure to reduce labour-time in weapons production . There is no exact parallel with the law of value . It is more a question of producing the maximum quantity of weapons in the minimum period of time with physical limits on available labour power and raw materials . But the Fordist techniques of law-of-value dominated civilian production proved transferable to such a task . As Kaldor (1982a) describes, the American triumph in the Second World War was the triumph of the assembly line . Workforces largely of newly-recruited women toiled for the same companies that had produced the Model T Ford and its successors . They made tanks and jeeps on the assembly lines that had produced millions of cars, and on newly constructed assembly lines started to produce aircraft . Ford `set a critically important example to the aircraft industry' . One single aircraft plant, the Ford plant at Willow Run, Michigan, succeeded in attaining a monthly output half that of the entire German aircraft industry at its peak (Kaldor, 1982a : 59 and 55) . Even shipbuilding, that bastion of craft procedures, began to be decisively affected by Fordist production techniques . In the absence of the stimulus of war, however, the dynamic affecting the labour processes of weapons production appears to be quite different . We simply lack the sort of systematic comparison of civilian and weapons-production labour processes that would enable any secure conclusion to be reached, but there are some significant clues . Despite the technically advanced nature of the products, and despite huge state investment in plant, the equipment on which American weapons are produced is typically old, `much older than the average American manufacturing equipment' (Gansler,1982 :57) . The people that actually produce weapons are also often old - in sharp contrast to production workers in 'Fordist' factories . In 1976 the average age of production workers at Lockheed California was 55, at Fairchild Long Island 56, and at Lockheed's aircraft plant at Marietta, Georgia it was a scarcely credible 62 (Gansler, 1982 :53-54) . And, of course, the numbers of weapons produced are lower - many times lower- than at the peak of World War 2 . So while commentators still speak of `production lines' for weapons, this use often appears to be metaphorical rather an actual description of the labour process . Such inadequate information as I have been able to gather suggests that much of the labour process in, say, aircraft production is `nodal' (workers going to the work) rather than

MILITARISM AND THEORY assembly line (the work coming to the workers) . One informant told me that when the production of F-4 phantom fighterbombers had to be boosted during the Vietnam War, McDonnellDouglas engineers had to go to Detroit to learn genuine production-line techniques from the car industry . What all this points to is, I think, neatly captured by both Mary Kaldor and Jacques Gansler . Technical design and innovation in civilian industry has at least to pay attention to production processes as well as to the characteristics of the product . In military industry, design and innovation is focused on the product alone . Its destructiveness, speed, accuracy, or whatever, is the key criterion . That is what the buyer wants, and such marginal competition as exists between producers focuses on these characteristics of their product . How the product is to be produced, and what it costs to produce it, are strictly secondary considerations . Indeed, as suggested above, the interest of the producing firm actually lies in coming up with a product that is more difficult and more expensive to produce . There is no effective institutional mechanism forcing the kind of `rationalisation' of production processes common in civilian industry . One important consequence of this is that direct attempts by firms to `convert' from military production to production for capitalist markets have often gone badly wrong . Gansler (1982 :49) writes that it can be `very difficult to convert engineering and manufacturing forces to the lower-cost practices of the commercial world' . Kaldor (1982a :42-49) describes in some detail the problems faced by Vickers in attempting to turn to civilian production during the periodic down-turns in twentieth-century British military spending . The law of value strikes back

Despite the considerable degree of insulation of weapons production from the law of value, the indirect effects of that law cannot be escaped here any more than they can be escaped in other aspects of life within capitalism . Most obviously, the price of weapons relative to civilian goods has shown a tendency to rise sharply . One estimate (Gansler, 1982 :15) would suggest that the cost of weapons is escalating on average at a rate 5% per annum greater than the civilian rate of inflation, the compounded cumulative effect of which is considerable, weapons doubling in relative costs about every 14 years . Furthermore, in reality cost increases are far from following smooth annual increments . One weapons system tends to be replaced in a finite length of time by another whose cost in real (constant £ or $) terms is sharply higher . Two mechanisms account for this . One, of course, is the

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rising complexity of weapons, the result of the constant trend to product `improvement' . Modern weapons are more destructive, faster, more accurate, and so on, than their predecessors . But it is far from clear that the resultant increases in military effectiveness are commensurate to the increases in price required to purchase them . The question is of course largely unanswerable - though Kaldor (1982a) marshalls a compelling body of evidence that increasing complexity implies greater vulnerability and liability to breakdown, and thus in a significant sense decreasing military effectiveness . But what is overwhelmingly clear is that with military budgets until fairly recently relatively constant in real terms, the numbers of weapons that could be bought has fallen rapidly as the price of each individual weapon has risen . In the 1950s the United States military could buy 3,000 tactical aircraft a year . By the 1960s that figure had fallen to 1,000 a year, and by the 1970s to about 300 a year (Gansler, 1982 :17-21) . The second mechanism involved has already been discussed at some length - the lack of any real incentive to cost reduction in weapons production . Investment in defence plant and equipment by firms is low, `around 50 percent less [than] that being made by other comparable sectors of American industry' (Gansler, 1982 :58), partly because of the availability of often old, but free, government plant and equipment . While civilian producers have often been able to -indeed in a sense have had to - improve products while reducing real costs (colour televisions typically cost less in real terms than black-and-white ones did fifteen years previously), weapons producers have markedly failed to do so, even where quite similar electronic technologies are involved (Gansler, 1982 : 15-21) . Excessive costs and waste in the weapons industry have of course been complained about for decades by those concerned to get `more bang for the buck', but the resultant reforms have had no more than marginal effects . The causes of these phenomena are rooted in the institutional structure of the weapons-production system . One major change has, however, taken place in that structure in the last fifteen or so years . The single buyer situation characteristic of weapons production until the mid-1960s has been dramatically replaced by an accelerating trend to multiple buyers and the emergence of at least the beginnings of an international market in weapons . This market involves not only relatively simple weapons such as rifles (where indeed a market existed well before the 1960s) but also the most highly sophisticated weapons systems . The heart of this trend has been in the changing nature of arms transfers to the Third World . Up to the early 1960s, that transfer consisted largely of military `aid' given by the Soviet



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Union or (predominantly) the United States, and took the form mainly of second-hand or obsolete weapons . But more recently Third World countries have been buying weapons, buying them in ever-increasing quantities, and seeking to buy the `best' that money can buy . The impact of this trend has been marked . The leading British weapons producer, British Aerospace, now depends on export markets . Two-thirds of its military aircraft sales and half its missile sales are abroad, with the Third World being as important as Europe and the USA as a market (Counter Information Services, 1982 :19) . In the depths of the trough of us military spending between Vietnam and the new Cold War, more than half American military aircraft and missile production was for foreign sales (Gansler, 1982 ; 26) . Exactly what kind of market in arms is emerging internationally is unclear . Prices are `largely determined by a process of political bargaining' between states (Kaldor, 1982b : 271), and far from forcing production costs down there is evidence that exports can be `significantly inflated' in price (Gansler, 1982 : 89) . Third World states are prepared to, and often want to, buy the most `advanced' technology - even when this has been proved militarily ineffective in Third World conditions - and so the `product improvement' dynamic is largely unchallenged . Nevertheless, it seems to me unlikely that in the long run the only effect of the emergence of the market on the weapons production system will be to reinforce its existing characteristics and support it where it might otherwise have collapsed . Orientation to the world market must surely give rise to attempts to hold down costs, to `rationalise' production and possibly even to test the marketability of simpler and cheaper products . Already there has been conflict between the Navy and British Shipbuilders over the design of the new 'Type-23' frigate . The Navy wanted an advanced, ultra-sophisticated frigate ; British Shipbuilders a somewhat more basic, cheaper frigate that, they believed, might generate larger Third World sales (The Scotsman, 10 February 1982) .

The weapons-production system is both massive - it employs perhaps a third of all scientists and engineers in the Unted States, and about a tenth of all production workers'- and highly resistant to fundamental institutional change . Furthermore, it is tightly linked by personal contact and overlapping (though not identical) interests to the military users of weapons, a linking that has led many to speak of the 'military-industrial complex' . This complex has powerful means at its command for influencing state policy .

Is the weaponsproduction system the cause of militarism?

CAPITAL & CLASS 44

It monopolises the sources of information about military matters, and so can play a part in generating `scares' such as the `missile gap' . Those beholden to it are often to be found in high office, and it can and does lobby and bribe . Congressional or parliamentary representatives concerned about the economies of, and employment in, their localities have a powerful incentive to support weapons producers with factories there . Considerations like these suggest that the weaponsproduction system, or the military-industrial complex as a whole, might be in some sense the cause of militarism . Thus Mary Kaldor writes (1982b : 274) that `the permanent arms race, at least on the western side . . . can be explained entirely without reference of an opponent' . EP Thompson argues that `the USA and the USSR do not have military-industrial complexes : they are such complexes' . 'Exterminism', as he describes it, has its own internal dynamic and logic . `Weapons innovation is self-generating' . Exterminism has as its `institutional base . . . the weapons system, and the entire economic, scientific, political and ideological support-system to that weapons-system - the social system which researches it, "chooses" it, produces it, polices it, justifies it, and maintains it in being' (Thompson, 1980 : 23, 8 and 22) . Certainly there is an impetus to the weapons-production system that is relatively impervious to its surroundings . The time scales of weapons production and of politics are quite different . Political crises can develop in a matter of months or less, and the international climate shifted from detente to renewed Cold War in less than three years . When weapons take a decade or longer from initial research and development to final assembly, we can see why their production cycles are not, and cannot be, closely tied to the immediate political situation . In addition, what Kurth (1973) calls the follow-on imperative is a powerful factor . He identified nine major aerospace production facilities in the United States - those of General Dynamics, North American Rockwell, Boeing, Lockheed Missiles and Space, Lockheed Georgia, McDonnell-Douglas Missouri, McDonnell-Douglas California and Ling-TemcoVought . These facilities were kept in virtually continuous production in the years Kurth studied (1960 to 1973) . As one major product was finished, a new, similar but more advanced project was phased in, usually within a year . The history of Lockheed Missiles and Space in California is typical . From 1960-68 it produced Polaris missiles . As Polaris production was phased out, Poseidon was phased in . Before Poseidon production ended, work on Trident I began . Now, of course, preparations are being made for Trident II . The factories of destruction cannot be allowed to lie idle ; that is the follow-on imperative .

MILITARISM AND THEORY Follow-on is not simply a matter of profit-seeking by weapons producers ; indeed follow-on is perhaps most clearly to be seen in the Soviet Union, where profit is not a motive at all (Holloway, 1980 : 144-45) . For a state apparatus committed to militarism, a major weapons-production plant is a national resource not to be jeopardised by failure to follow-on . Consider the £1 billion Chevaline alterations to the Polaris warhead . Without Chevaline, pursued in secret for virtually a decade before it was announced to Parliament, the Ministry of Defence Atomic Weapons Research Establishment at Aldermaston would simply not have had enough to do . And for the past seven years - well ahead of the official 'decision'- work has gone on at Aldermaston on the design of a warhead to fit Trident (Counter Information Services, 1982 :3) . Despite these very real considerations, however, I am not convinced that an inertial impetus or internal logic deriving from the weapons production system is sufficient to explain militarism . The military-industrial complex is far from all-powerful . It faces influencial opposition from within the ranks of capital (Lo, 1982) . It is by no means clear that rising military spending is in the economic interests of any other than weapons-producing capitalists (see the next section) . The long-term trend of Americian military spending, measured in real dollars, was actually level from the early 1950s to the mid 1970s, with rises - Korea, the Kennedy administration, Vietnam - balanced by later falls . As a percentage of gross national product, or of total government expenditure, military spending fairly steadily fell . In the early 1950s military spending was equivalent to about 10% of us gross national product ; by the mid 1970s, that figure had fallen to around 5% . Of course, since the mid '70s military spending in the United States has shifted to a sharply rising trend line - the Reagan Administration is currently trying to raise it by 8% per annum in real terms - though its NATO allies, with the partial exception of Britain, have avoided doing likewise . But whatever explanation one constructs for this - domestic political circumstances, the crisis, the changing world balance-it clearly involves factors outside the military production system . There is no plausible evidence that the military-industrial complex, on its own, has the capacity to achieve such dramatic shifts in state policy . Indeed, it would appear that much of the influencing, bribing and lobbying work of both arms producers and the armed services has had to do with trying to maintain or alter the division of a more-or-less predetermined defence `cake', rather than with trying to increase the overall size of that cake . In no sense does this prove that the weapons-production

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system or military-industrial complex are without power. But they do not have absolute power or, on their own, even predominant power ; to assume that is, indeed, to foreclose the very interesting empirical and theoretical issue of the nature and sources of that power . My own guess is that study of this will reveal that their power is real but exists in interaction with wider structures, particularly (to jump ahead in my argument) the state and the international system of states . The military-industrial complex is certainly not the neutral instrument of the state or capital as a whole, but neither is it their straightforward master .

Economic explanations of militarism

`Orthodox' Marxist analysis of militarism has indeed typically rejected the theory of the military-industrial complex as the explanation of militarism . Instead, it is argued that militarism is economically functional for capitalism as a whole, and not just for those capitalists that produce weapons . Economic explanation is indeed what is generally held to characterise Marxist accounts of militarism . For example, Quincy Wright in his mammoth A Study of War subsumes `the Marxian theory' under the topic of `the economic motive' for war (1942/65 :284) . Basic to such explanations of militarism is the assertion that militarism contributes to the accumulation of capital . There are two strands to this assertion, which are sometimes combined but more usually separate . The first strand is the claim that military spending is, in itself, beneficial to capitalism . The second strand is the claim that militarism benefits capitalism (or, at least, particular national capitalisms) by permitting economic gains abroad . The Permanent Arms Economy Ever since the publication of Rosa Luxemburg's The Accumulation of Capital (1913/51) the economic effects of arms spending have been controversial within Marxist economics . In chapter 32 of that book Luxemburg argued that `from the purely economic point of view' militarism contributed directly to the accumulation of capital . Marxist writers after 1945 often agreed . Before their eyes they saw both an historically unprecedent capitalist boom and an historically unprecedented level of'peacetime' arms spending . That the two were connected seemed a plausible inference . Most notably, Vance (1951/70), Baran and Sweezy (1968) and Kidron (1970) argued that post-war arms spending stabilised capitalism . That theory, especially as proposed by Kidron, became popularly known as the theory of the permanent arms economy, and was adopted as the official position

MILITARISM AND THEORY of the International Socialism group (now Socialist Workers Party) . It might well be better, though, to speak of permanent arms economy theories, rather than theory, as different proponents of the position believed in different, and sometimes incompatible, accounts of the effects of arms spending . At the price of gross oversimplification, however, it is possible to isolate out three main economic `benefits' of arms spending that were claimed . First, arms spending stimulated technical innovation, which diffused into the civilian economy as `spinoff .. This was an argument particularly associated with Ernest Mandel (e .g . Mandel, 1975 : 274-309) . Second, arms spending stimulated total demand in the economy, alleviating potential problems of 'under-consumption' (see, especially, Baran and Sweezy, 1968) . Thirdly, arms spending slowed the tendency of the rate of profit to fall by siphoning off surplus value that would otherwise contribute to over-investment in constant capital .' This last argument was the distinctive contribution of Kidron . The theory of the permanent arms economy has fallen out of favour quite dramatically in recent years . It has been argued against empirically . Szymanski (1973) and Ron Smith (1977) have shown that on the whole capitalist countries with high levels of arms spending have performed worse economically than those that spend little on arms . But this is hardly the only reason for the theory's fall from favour - indeed the more sophisticated proponents of the theory were well aware of the overall effect pointed to by Szymanski and Smith, even if they were unaware of the detailed correlations they reveal . Rather, what has changed is the capitalist world . We now face not boom plus arms spending but recession plus arms spending . It is no longer intuitively plausible to believe that arms spending benefits capitalist economies . Indeed it seems politically dangerous to believe it . If it were true, then maybe Thatcher's Britain or Reagan's United States really could spend their way militarily out of recession . It would be tempting to conclude that the theory of the permanent arms economy is simply false, and that arms expenditure is unequivocally detrimental to capitalist economies . R But to my mind that would be mistaken, and would forget the genuine insights contained by the theory of the permanet arms economy . Rather, we should seek to place those insights in historical context, to realise their historically limited nature, and to accept that there may be no single `effect' of arms spending, but different effects in different historical phases .

While this is dangerous terrain for someone who is not an

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economist to venture onto, I would speculate that one can identify a very real difference in this respect between, on the one hand, the late 1940s, the 1950s and perhaps early 1960s, and, on the other, the present . The former period is the one whose experience is crystallised in the theory of the permanent arms economy . In it, `spinoffwas clear and obvious . The civil jet aircraft industry was crucially dependent on military planes . Solid state electronics - the transistor and the like - was almost completely dependent on military funding and military purchases in its early years (Braun and MacDonald, 1978) . Civil nuclear power arose directly from the military use of nuclear energy . The first British nuclear power stations were little more than plutonium factories that produced electricity as a by-product ; the key United States commercial reactor design (the Pressurised Water Reactor, as in Three Mile Island) can be traced back directly to the reactors of nuclear submarines (Durie and Edwards, 1982 ; Kevles, n .d .) . Numerically controlled machine tools were invented for military production, and their development carefully nurtured by the United States military (Noble, 1978) . Similarly with the demand-boosting effects of military spending . In the late 1940s and 1950s, United States capitalism enjoyed unquestioned world dominance . Recession could be warded off by boosting demand at home through military spending and sustaining the buying power of Western Europe through Marshall Aid and `defense support' economic aid (Kolko and Kolko, 1972) . Such was the us dominance that it scarcely mattered that national capitalisms with low military spending, especially Germany and Japan, could enjoy the benefits of this without bearing the costs .' Further, if there is any period in which siphoning off surplus value has been beneficial, then this is surely the most plausible candidate, being a period in which capitalist growth proceeded relatively smoothly and without a major crisis even potentially attributable to over-accumulation . The situation in the 1980s is more complex . Spin-off from military technology is no longer obvious . That should not lead us - as it has led some commentators - into assuming that it no longer exists . But its nature has changed . Kaldor (1982a) and Rothschild (1980) are right to point to the increasingly specialised and `baroque' nature of military hardware - of tanks, missiles and planes . No civilian analogues of the MX missile or of the Multi-Role Combat Aircraft Tornado will ever be marketed . The area of major potential spin-off is rather the very large-scale electronic command, control and communications systems within which military hardware is now inserted - computer networks, satellite communications and the like . These are very important to contemporary capitalism : multinationals, for example, are

MILITARISM AND THEORY increasingly using the civil analogues of world-wide command, control and communications networks to organise production on a world scale . It remains quite unclear, however, whether these technologies can in any sense form the foundation of a renewed wave of capital accumulation .'° Demand boosting through military spending is perhaps the area where the effects of changed circumstances are clearest . The interconnection of capitalism as an economic system has grown, while us economic dominance has been replaced by the three separate poles of America, Europe and Japan . The Vietnam boom in us military spending perhaps marks the turning-point . That weakened the relative position of the United States in the international capitalist economy, and arguably played an important part in destablising that economy as a whole . It is clearly a matter of major concern to the present us administration that its allies have been, and may continue to be lagging behind it in boosting military spending . While it still too early to tell, the present spending boom seems likely to weaken even further the United States' competitive position .

The economic effects of arms spending, then, are complex and historically variable . A further difficulty arises if we draw on those claimed effects to explain militarism functionally . For even if the effects of military spending were unequivocally beneficial to capitalist economies, we would still have to prove that only military spending, rather than any other form of state spending, could have these beneficial functions . Why not spending on hospitals or schools, or massively expensive `pure science' projects, or the Keynesian digging and filling in again of holes? Where the proponents of the permanent arms economy have touched on this problem, they have either shifted their ground C & C 19 - n

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(claiming other, quite separate, benefits to capital from militarism, as do Baran and Sweezy, 1968), or they have argued that what is unique about military spending is that one country doing it forces other countries to do it (Kidron, 19870 : 56-61) . But the latter argument is not convincing, because this effect precisely fails to operate where it most needs to, if international capitalism is to be stabilised : i .e . between capitalist `allies' . Imperialism

The permanent arms economy is a relative newcomer amongst economic explanations of militarism . The classic economic explanation of militarism is that of the theory of imperialism : militarism makes possible external economic gains . Historically, these gains have included straight forward booty and colonial tribute . In the epoch of capitalism they are typically access to markets, to raw materials, and to opportunities for profitable investment . In a world of competing imperialisms, militarism becomes a necessity . Economic `interests' abroad have to be defended, not only against indigenous peoples, but against competing imperialist powers . Such was the economic core of the explanation of the Marxists of Lenin's generation for the capitalist militarism of their period .'' To apply it to the post-1945 world has necessitated some modifications, but the essence of the theory has stayed the same . Rivalry between capitalist imperialisms has become less important, and repression of anti-imperialist struggles more so . And the emergence of the Soviet bloc has had to be taken account of, whether it is seen as the growth of a rival, somewhat different, imperialism, or as the development of a pole of support, however reluctant, for anti-imperialist movements . The problems of economic imperialism explanations arise most immediately when applied to particular uses of military force . Undoubtedly there have been some instances where the use of force has been subject to conscious calculations of economic profit and loss . Eighteenth century British wars seem to have been of that kind (Best, 1982 ; 30 and 91) . But those are scarcely typical . Take the Falklands War as an example . The costs of British military action far outweigh any British economic 'interests' in the Falkland Islands . The total sales (let alone profits) of the Falkland Islands Company in 1981 were a mere £3 million (Revolutionary Communist Party, 1982 : 18) ; the total financial cost of the war will be many hundred times that . Reserves of oil have also been mentioned, but the outcome of the war, an outcome obviously desired by the Thatcher government, is pre-

MILITARISM AND THEORY cisely an outcome that will prevent any commercial exploitation of these . No oil company is going to invest in oil rigs off the Malvinas until there is a permanent settlement and no threat of a resumption of hostilities . Much the same could be said of a much more major instance of military intervention, the United States involvement in Vietnam . There, again, the total costs of military action far outweighed the likely economic gains from Vietnam, or even South-East Asia as a whole, to United States capitalism . Of course, it can be argued that actions such as the Falklands or Vietnam defend not simply one set of investments or markets but a national capitalism's total overseas economic interests (see, for example, Socialist Challenge, 4 June 1982 : 2, re the Falklands) . If one attack on these interests succeeded, other attacks would be encouraged . Yet even this generalisation of the theory is dubious . The costs of militarism are so huge that they can quite possibly exceed even the returns on total, worldwide overseas investment . Harman (1982 : 49) claims that `at no stage in the 1940s or 1950s did total us overseas investment (let alone the much smaller return on that investment) exceed us spending on arms' . By the early 1980s overseas investment was certainly much greater, but military spending was `still substantially more than the profits that could possibly accrue from that investment' . Not just economics

Does this mean that we are forced to conclude that contemporary capitalist militarism is indeed irrational, even in capitalist terms? Does it, for example, override my earlier reservations and force us to accept an `internal logic' explanation of militarism? I think not, and the reason has to do with the basic way capital and capital accumulation are conceived both by the theory of the permanent arms economy and by conventional imperialism theory . Both theories tend to conceive of their subject matter in highly economistic terms . But capital is not just a sum of money or of commodities . It is a'social relation between persons' (Capital 1 : 932) . Economics, narrowly conceived, can never give a full account of the capital relation, because that relation is a matter of law, the state and culture as well as economics . Law and the state, because the capital relation is by definition a relation between two different kinds of `commodity owners' (Capital 1 : 874), capitalists and `free workers, the sellers of their own labour-power' . Culture, because the creation of the capital relation is simultaneously the attempt to create a whole new set of attitudes, beliefs and social

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practices, as EP Thompson emphasises in his discussion of capitalism and time (Thompson, 1967) . Maintaining or extending the capital relation is thus never simply a matter of economics . Nor is it a matter primarily of economics and then only secondarily ('superstructurally') of the state, politics and culture . For if recent Marxist theory of the state carries any message, it is that it is quite mistaken to see Marxist theory as explaining politics in terms of'economics . Rather, the state has to be seen as an integral part of the capitalist mode of production, and the very separation of politics and economics a creation of that mode of production . Economistic imperialism theory is wrong, then, to assume that the, competition between states is necessarily at root economic, and that political, cultural or military competition are derivative and to be judged as irrational or not according to the weight of the `basic' economic issues involved . When the British Government talks of resisting `aggression' in the Falklands, or of defending British `sovereignty' (Foreign and Commonwealth Office, 1982), we need not assume that these words merely rationalise economic calculation . Certainly we can translate these words into other terms . Resisting aggression means that underdog violators of the international status quo will not go unpunished . Defending sovereignty means that the authority of the British state will not be tampered with lightly . What was being punished in the Malvinas was an offence against the British state, against the system of states, and against Britain's claimed place in that system . So the problem may lie not with the explanation of militarism in terms of imperialism, but rather with economistic conceptions of imperialism . In recent years some theorists have formulated sharply their dissatisfaction with these . Thus Aglietta: `Imperialism is typically seen in a reductive economistic perspective that distorts its significance . There is hardly a domain in which unswerving fidelity to Lenin has been more damaging' (1979 : 29) . Certainly, detailed historical discussions of particular instances of imperialism rapidly show the inadequacies of economism . Perhaps the most revealing of those instances from this point of view is that of us foreign policy in the 1940s and 1950s . For it is at least arguable that in this case a powerful policy-making elite attempted to shape us diplomacy and military activity with consciously economic goals in mind - the international free circulation of capital and commodities, the stabilisation of the world financial situation and open markets for American exports . Yet what emerges from Kolko and Kolko's mammoth account of this history (1972) is that in actual practice those economic goals

MILITARISM AND THEORY became totally enmeshed in attempts to reform, shore up or recreate an entire social system threatened by collapse and rebellion . In those attempts economic considerations had as often as not to be subordinated to political, ideological and military ones, and the lot given a quite spurious coherence as'anti-communism' . Indeed those who did try to submit policy to considerations of cost-effectiveness seem to have ended up as its opponents, even as isolationists . 12

Contradictions of imperialist policy `Imperialism', suggests Aglietta (1979 :30), `can only be grasped on the basis of a fully developed theory of the state' . While we might wish to add, `and not just that . . .', the point is well taken . If nothing else, thinking about imperialism in relation to theories of the state should warn us against overestimating the coherence of imperialist policy, against trying overrationalistically to deduce the `real strategy' underlying diverse acts of policy (a very common risk in many Marxist accounts) . For as Hirsch (1978, 101) warns us, the state cannot resolve the contradictions of capital . They have a nasty habit of reappearing, even within the state apparatus itself . The `needs' of capital are not unitary, but contradictory . Measures taken to fulfil one `need' tend to intensify problems in other areas, and often fail to achieve even their supposed purpose . Thus when Davis (1982 :58) looks at Reagan's `deeply reasoned' strategy, he notes, amongst other things, that `as interimperialist economic competition reaches a post-war height, the New Cold War provides an invaluable framework for reimposing Western "unity" and American hegemony' . He is not alone in this claim : Dan Smith and Ron Smith gave precisely the same estimate of the New Cold War's `function' in the pages of Capital and Class two years previously (1980/1 : especially 41) . Yet that is precisely what the `New Cold War' hasfailed to do . The resistance evoked by the Cruise and Pershing decisions has been one factor ; so have the strains within the West brought on by high American interest rates, themselves in part caused by the booming defence budget . The Reagan administration's attempt to scupper the gas pipeline between Siberia and Western Europe because of the strategic risks it saw in the scheme came close to provoking one of the most serious trans-Atlantic crises yet . While Davis, Smith and Smith may well be correct in their assessment of the intentions of Washington, the actual outcome of those intentions has been very different . That is perhaps a general phenomenon from which we should take heart . Our opponents (even if we think of them as abstractly as `imperialism') are

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neither all-knowing nor all-powerful . Our image of them should not be of the chess-player, rationally evaluating a situation and choosing a clearly objectively best move . Rather, they are in the situation of someone trying to force a hopelessly ill-fitting lid onto a tin of paint . The more they try to push it down on one side, the more it bulges up on the other.

Militarism and the State

The connections between militarism and the state are indeed so intimate that it is worth approaching them directly, rather than through the detour of even a revitalised theory of imperialism . For several centuries war and its preparation have overwhelmingly been the concern of states, and not of other forms of social organisation . The history of the modern form of state and the modern form of militarism are deeply interwoven . The State and violence

Max Weber went as far as to define the modern state in terms of violence and coercion . Speaking at Munich University in 1918, he argued that `today . . . we have to say that a state is a human community that (successfully) claims the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory' (1918/1970 : 78) . Marxist state theory has not put the matter quite as starkly as that . Nevertheless, recent Marxist theorists have placed great weight on the notion that the capitalist state comes into being through the taking away of relations of force from the immediate process of production and their placing in a body separate form that process . In feudalism, the use of force was diffused through the entire society . Force could be directly employed by feudal lords to extract surplus from their peasantry . Under capitalism, surplus is extracted by `economic' processes ; the policeman and the soldier are not normally found inside the factory . Coercion is thus at one remove from the process of production . It needs to be there - otherwise there can be no guarantee that the `economic' rules of the game will be adhered to - but it can be kept as a last resort . Unlike feudal production, capitalist production is quite compatible with formal legal equality between exploiter and exploited as commodity owners, and with the state as standing above both, as sole locus of `the legitmate use of physical force' ." Historically, then, there is a close parallel between the emergence of the state as separate from society and the concentration of legitimate violence in a specialised body, the military . The state and concentrated, organised violence are more than `just good friends' . Yet despite the overall insight into necessity of

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the connection offered by Marxist theories of the state, the connection itself remains little discussed and elaborated . It receives, for example, scarcely any attention in Holloway and Picciotto (eds) (1978), and little more than scattered insights in Urry (1981) or Jessop (1982) . From the point of view of understanding militarism that is a great pity . For in several vital ways state theory could have a lot to contribute to the understanding of militarism .

Internal order, the state and militarism The use of force as the guarantee of order may be a last resort for capitalist societies, but it is nevertheless resorted to moderately often . The military can be used to repress unrest within a continuing framework of `liberal democracy' ; it may of course also supplant that framework and replace it with some form of military rule . Internal repression is a major activity of most armed forces . Indeed there are some armed forces for which it is the major military activity . The armies of Latin America, for example, have seen much more of this than they have of war between states .

Prague 1968 : Russian tanks crash popular unrest

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Although straightforward repression is crucial, practically and theoretically, the relationship between militarism, the state and order does not end there ." Power, as Foucault emphasises, is not merely negative and repressing - power actually creates order, rather than merely maintains it . The modern state is by no means simply a body that maintains order through the punishment of violations . It creats order by, for example, constituting its subjects as citizens, individual bearers of political and legal rights and responsibilities ." `Soldier' and `civilian' may be opposites . `Soldier' and `citizen' are not . From Ancient Rome and Sparta, through the city-states of the Middle Ages to modern capitalist nations, the connections between the two categories have been close - although, of course, the nature of both soldiering and citizenship has altered radically . To gain some insight into the nature of the modern connection, it is perhaps worth a digression to consider armed forces where that connection was lacking . The armed forces of both eighteenth-century Britain and the contemporary Continental absolutisms seem strange indeed to modern eyes . They were national in only a very weak sense . Recruitment to them was often from abroad : half the Prussian army, for example, was non-Prussian . Many foreigners were recruited from amongst enemy prisoners of war ; others were various forms of mercenary . The non-foreigners were largely coerced, either through press-gangs or as an alternative to prison or the gallows . The aristocratic officers of these armed forces were an `international elite with transnational interests' . `Nothing ill was thought in the professional military world of moving from one sovereign's service to another, as opportunity and careerprospects offered .' (Best, 1982 : 32 and 27-28 ; see also Engels, 1878/1976 : 214) . Such armies were extremely constrained in the way they fought by their social composition . Their commanders feared desertion by their own men as much or more than they feared defeat at the hands of the enemy . They often dared fight only in tightly restricted formation, in daylight and on flat open ground . Hills, woods, marching by night, free-ranging patrols and skirmishing - all these opened too many opportunities to men who could not be trusted . Frederick of Prussia, the virtuoso of such militarism, knew it to be necessary to make his soldiers fear their own officers more than they feared the enemy ; discipline in his army was `famously ferocious' (Best, 1982 : 32) . The armed forces of the French revolution broke radically with this pattern . `A force appeared', wrote Carl von Clausewitz, , that beggared all imagination . Suddenly war again became the business of the people - a people of thirty millions, all of whom

MILITARISM AND THEORY considered themselves to be citizens' (Clausewitz, 1832/1976 : 591-2 ; quoted by Best, 1982 : 63) . After the revolutionary army defeated the Prussians at Valmy in 1792, 'Goethe ended the day sitting with some Prussian soldiers around what would in better weather have been a camp fire . . . "At last, someone asked me what I though about it all . . . I said : From this place and from this day begins a new era in the history of the world, and you will be able to say, I was there"' (Best, 1982 : 81) . Armies of citizen-soldiers were different from the mercenary armies of the preceding century, although some reforms were already on the way before the French Revolution . Discipline could be less brutal, and a greater freedom of military action achieved . But we need to be very careful of the kind of romanticism to be found in Engels (1878/1976 : 214) about the military virtues of those `fighting for their own interests' . Battle is a brutal and terrible experience and modern states have not relied on either ideology or material interests to sustain their soldiers' will to fight . Coercion, John Keegan reminds us (1978 : 330), remains central to armies, and desertion may well have been reduced less by commitment to a cause than by the fact that on a modern battlefield - defoliated and many miles deep - there is simply nowhere to desert to . 16 The true significance of the citizen soldiers arguably lies outside the conduct of battle, and has to do with the provision of people and finance for war . Partly it has to do with consent . These necessaries are more easily found from a willing population - though again we should be wary of assuming that general approval of a war or of a state's armed forces translates into readiness to join up or to pay . Perhaps more significantly, mass citizen armies imply a different institutional relationship of the person to the state than did the eighteenth-century mercenary armies . Obviously, a citizen army requires citizens ; if they do not volunteer themselves in sufficient numbers, they have to be conscripted, and this, minimally, requires a state to know who its citizen's are, how many of them there are, and where to find them . Citizens need to be named and numbered, too, not just as potential conscripts but also as taxpayers . Ad hoc, inefficient and corrupt tax-gathering machinery has to be replaced by as efficient and universal a system as possible . Thus the relationsip between the creation of `modern' armies and the creation of `modern' states is far from accidental . Both, too, are closely interwoven with the creation of the `nation', for the modern army is of course a national army, and the modern state predominantly a nation state (rather than, say, the ramshackle multinational Austro-Hungarian Empire) . This state of affairs is now so much taken for granted that it is easy to forget it

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is a creation less than two centuries old . It is perhaps again worth reminding ourselves, this time in the words of Clausewitz - who lived through the change - of how different things were previously : Armies were paid for from the treasury, which rulers treated almost as their privy purse or at least as the property of the government, not of the people . Apart from a few commercial matters, relations with other states did not concern the people but only the treasury or the government . . . A government behaved as though it owned and managed a great estate that it constantly endeavoured to enlarge - an effort in which the inhabitants were not expected to show any particular interest . . . War thus became solely the concern of government . . . Their [governments'] means of waging war came to consist of the money in their coffers and of such idle vagabonds as they could lay their hands on either at home or abroad . (Clausewitz, 1832/1976 : 589) The creation of the potent modern mix of militarism, citizenship, the nation and the modern state was not instantaneous . It was `exported' by Napoleonic France, as its defeated rivals, such as Prussia, found that they themselves had to resort to similar institutional changes to compete militarily . The archconservative Prussian state raised something quite like a people's militia - previously a liberal, even revolutionary, demand - to combat Napoleon . Though it promptly retreated from the notion once the immediate danger was past, the connection between institutional reform and military necessity was to reappear . Thus Bismarck wrote in his memoirs : `The acceptance of general suffrage was a weapon in the struggle against Austria and the rest of the foreign powers' (quoted by Therborn, 1977 : 22) . Indeed Therborn finds from his survey of the major bourgeois democracies that `national mobilisation in the face of external threat has been a most important factor in the history of bourgeois democratization' (1977 : 23) . Time and time again extensions of the rights (and, let it be said, duties) of citizenship have coincided with military emergencies and the need to collect as much as possible of the human, financial and physical means of war . And from the time of Bismarck onwards, war and the preparation of war have been vitally important in the gradual widening of the meaning of citizenship as the citizen came into relation to the state not merely as legal subject, voter and taxpayer but also as welfare recipient, patient and parent . `Modern war', said Titmuss (1958, 86), `has had . . . a profound influence on social policy' - a statement which recent historians of the welfare state have amply confirmed ."

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Gender, militarism and the state A crucial proviso is however in order here, one on which books like Best (1982) tend to remain silent . The institutional changes associated with national mobilisation have been markedly different for women and men . The nineteenth century citizensoldier was a man . Although women have fought in popular uprisings and guerrilla wars, it has been the almost universal practice of states to exclude women from combat . Again, this is something so much part of our taken-for-granted world that it is only very recently that it has typically been thought worthy of comment . One issue intimately connected to this is the use of physical coercion in relations between men and women . For it is not true, despite Weber's claim, that the state seeks to monopolise all physical force . As the burgeoning literature on domestic violence has shown, a `private sphere' of accepted physical force has typically been left to men by modern states . Even rape is treated quite differently, in practice, from other violent crime . Feminist pressure may have had some successes in this sphere in recent years, but it is surely misleading to claim, as does Randall Collins, that women `gained [an] ally in the modern state' (1975 : 246) . It is difficult to judge just how important is men's exclusive involvement in military force for their capacity to coerce women at the individual level . That women are denied access to, and at least some men given access to, the physical and mental `skills' of violence must, at the very least, reinforce existing patterns . What has been at least as important - and unlike this last point, an area of active feminist campaigning for a century or more - has been the unequal nature of the `citizenship' associated with the militarised nation-state . Until recently, the state taxed its male subjects (see Bradby, 1982 : 126-7), conscripted its male subjects, and correspondingly granted the full status of citizen only to these . As the inequalities of political and legal citizenship have declined, so those of what Marshall (1963) calls `social' citizenship have become more salient . Here too militarism is central . For if militarism wishes the man to be a soldier, so it wishes the woman to be the mother of fit and healthy soldiers . Nira Yuval-Davis is describing contemporary Israel, but her words have wider application (see, for example, Davin, 1978) : women have another national military function perceived as primary to them . That primary function is motherhood - women as national reproducers of the future military force . . . It has been a common reaction in Israel, when greeting a pregnant woman, to say, `Congratulations! I see

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you are soon to bring a small soldier into the world' (YuvalDavis, 1981 : 77) So while militarism's exaltation of motherhood has brought some gains in welfare provision, it has been at the cost of a crystallisation, in the form of that state provision, of gender stereotypes . Take for example the most famous of war-induced welfare plans, the Beveridge Report : In the next thirty years housewives as Mothers have vital work to do in ensuring the adequate continuance of the British Race and of British ideals in the world . (quoted by London-Edinburgh Weekend Return Group, 1980 : 68) The family, and stereotypes of family relations, have been central to militarism ever since the active involvement of the population in war and its preparation began to be felt to be of importance . The stereotypes of the fighting man protecting `his' wife and children at home, and of the woman as comforter and encourager of her soldier son, husband or lover, have been drawn on frequently . That sexually stereotyped image was prominent in media coverage of the Falklands War . It has been an image acted out by both men and women - most famously in the First World War, with women taunting men who had not joined up . Its more subterranean reverse image - that women `cannot resist a uniform', that soldiers can expect sexual favours - has also been employed as an inducement to recruitment . These are all ways in which militarism has reinforced and drawn on existing gender relations . Yet its effects have not been straightforward . Most obviously, twentieth century total war required the industrial mobilisation of women and the consequent breakdown of carefully preserved gender hierarchies in the workplace - though the effects of this proved temporary, and the gender order was more-or-less successfully reimposed after 1918 and after 1945 . Very recently, too, there have been signs of changes within armed forces . Pressure for equal opportunities coincided with anxieties about `manpower', and have led to concerted efforts throughout NATO to increase the recruitment of women to the armed forces . In this situation it has proven difficult to restrict women to their traditional military roles in administration, nursing and communications . Clearly, feminists have found women's recruitment, and the pressure for access to combat roles, profoundly contradictory (Chapkis, ed ., 1981) . 1 am painfully aware that these remarks on gender scarcely scratch the surface of the topic . They are in a sense simply a plea for further work . The relations between patriarchy and capitalism have received a great deal of theoretical attention in recent years . Those between patriarchy and the militarist state are deserving of no less .

MILITARISM AND THEORY The system of states Another proviso about the relationship of militarism and the state that can only be sketched, but is nevertheless important also, has to do with the fact that it is misleading to talk of the state . For, in reality, no such entity exists . Individual states exist not in isolation but in the context of other states, as part of the system of states . Marxist theory can help us understand militarism only if it stops being theory of the state, and becomes a theory of states in the plural . 1 I The modern state system has not always existed . For most of recorded history, large areas of the globe were `dominated by an empire that considered itself essentially alone in the world as it knew it' . In mediaeval Europe, both the Catholic Church and Holy Roman Empire had sought such quasi-global authority (Poggi, 1978 : 88-89) . The failure of those attempts left a continent divided amongst a multiplicity of sovereign states . The Peace of Westphalia (1648), ending the bloody and protracted Thirty Years War, recognised formally that `the idea of an authority and organisation above the sovereign states is no longer' (Leo Gross ; quoted by Poggi, 1978 : 89) . The sovereign state as part of the system of states has a dual aspect : it simultaneously faces both inwards and outwards . This duality is built into the very notion of sovereignty . It means both that a state has exclusive rights of rule within its territory, and that it is subordinate to no other rule outside it, that it has `independence beyond its borders' (Hintze, 1906/1975 : 192) . Militarism is directly and immediately tied up with the system of states . War is typically war between sovereign states ; most preparation of war has that type of war in mind . As discussed in the section on economic explanations of militarism, it may on occasion be the case that such conflicts have straightforward economic causes, but that is unusual . Reductionist explanations of conflicts and developments within the system of states do not in general seem viable ." The system of states has to be taken seriously as a topic to be analysed in its own right . If the state system is not taken seriously, then major problems will arise in trying to explain developments even within one individual country . Some of those problems were pointed to in the previous section, where the considerable influence of inter-state conflict on the developing forms of states was discussed . Even to think of writing the history of the Prussian/ German state, say, without making this a central part of the account, would be ridiculous . The continuity of the British state, and Britain's freedom from dramatic impingements of the state system such as foreign invasion, make the point easier to forget in

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Britain . But, if nothing else, the Falklands War reminds us of the indelible stamp left on the British state by the fact that `Britain is not just any capitalist society in general . It was for two centuries the greatest of the capitalist powers and the first imperialist state in the world' (Ross, 1982 : 122) . Even revolution does not guarantee escape from the logic of the system of states . Surveying the history of the French, Russian and Chinese revolutions, Theda Skocpol points to the significance of the system of states in both the coming about of the revolution and the development of the post-revolutionary state . `Classical Marxism', she concludes, `failed to foresee or adequately explain the autonomous power, for good and ill, of states as administrative and coercive machineries embedded in a militarised states system' (Skocpol, 1977 : 292) . This could easily begin to sound like a counsel of despair . It is not intended as such . Rather, the point of focusing on the system of states as central to militarism is to argue the need to think in terms of the dismantling of that system . Here, some recent Marxist state theory is helpful . In its focus on the form of the state, it has shown that the state is not just a set of people, or a set of organisations, but a way in which relations between people are structured (London Edinburgh Weekend Return Group, 1980) . 20 Similarly, the state system is a way in which relations between people are structured ('internationally') . It is not the only way in which they could be structured . The concept of working-class internationalism pointed (and still points, however weakened it has become) to another way . But the state system dominates, and `the global hold . . . of the state form of institutionalization of social relations reinforces existing antagonisms and gives them the tremendous violence of a conflict of state powers' (Aglietta, 1979 : 31) . Dismantling the state system as a `form of institutionalization of social relations' sounds utopian . Nevertheless, if it is seen as a process rather than an endpoint the idea might still be useful . For example, the idea suggests a distinction between two types of action against militarism . On the one hand, some campaigns against militarism run through the state system . 'Multilateralism' as a strategy for disarmament most obviously does this, in its call for negotiations between states to reduce armaments levels . Reliance on the United Nations is similar, because of the way that body tends simply to reproduce the state system, with its hierarchies and conflicts, rather than to transcend it . During the Falklands War, many socialists put forward the slogan 'Negotiations through the United Nations' as an alternative to Tory policy . At least in Scotland, that approach largely failed to generate and fuse opposition to the war-in large part, I feel, because of

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the abstractness of its reliance on the state system - where more direct anti-militarist approaches were much more successful ." On the other hand, some campaigns against militarism undermine the state system . That is where they build direct links across borders, links that bypass states . An opportunity of this kind was missed during the Falklands War when little was made of the offer by the Argentinian trade union congress (not an Argentinian state body, indeed oppositional) of direct talks with the British labour movement over the Malvinas and the war . While that would almost certainly not have altered the course of events, such talks would have been important in giving flesh to a genuine alternative to the state system form of international relations . The movement against nuclear weapons - because it is already an international movement, with some strands crossing the East-West divide - will hopefully offer many openings for initiatives that bypass the state system . Certianly it is to be hoped that END, the European Nuclear Disarmament campaign, does not come to see its job as somehow bringing European states together to agree on disarmament . Undermining the state system does not even need to begin with across border links, although these obviously make it many times more effective . Unilateral nuclear disarmament is a policy against the logic imposed by the state system (unless, that is, it simply becomes an argument that `we' could defend ourselves as well or better without nuclear weapons) . Campaigning for unilateral disarmament thus tends implicitly to be a protest against the existing state form of international relations . If that protest can be tied to the development of alternative forms, then the dismantling of the state system might no longer seem quite so distant . A focus on the state system ties several other political issues in to antimilitarism . Perhaps most important are those that represent attempts to impose state boundaries on the free movement of people and ideas . Immigration controls, nationality laws and censorship - all these clearly have to be opposed by those who oppose the state system . And however tempting arguments for import controls may be, campaigns for them can hardly do other than reinforce the logic of the state system .

Of course, one of the many factors that make the dismantling of the state system difficult is the active loyalty that many people feel to `their country', to its state, and to its military activities . We are only at the beginning, I feel, of unravelling the sources of that loyalty . Clearly, it is a loyalty not merely dependent on ideas . As outlined above, it is tied historically to changes in

Militarism as culture

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state forms, in actual material forms of social organisation . Yet attitudes, beliefs, ideas and values - culture in a broad sense - are also enormously important in its reproduction . Typically, these attitudes and beliefs are rooted in a constructed and idealised past . Their persistence was dramatically revealed by the Falklands War, which as Anthony Barnett's essay demonstrates, was constructed in a forty-year old idiom (Barnett, 1982) . The dominant imagery was of the Second World War : Galtieri as Hitler, Thatcher as Churchill, San Carlos Bay as the Normandy Beaches . Some images went back even further than that, into an English22 past of Drake, Rayleigh and of warships putting out to sea from Portsmouth . 23 Interrupting the `cultural reproduction' of militarism is vitally important . Occasionally, there are clear focuses to be found for such action . In contemporary Japan there have recently been sharp conflicts beteen the peace movement and teachers' union, on the one hand, and the government, on the other, over the rewriting of school history texts . As part of its (and the Reagan administration's) campaign to remilitarise Japan, the government is seeking to whitewash past Japanese militarism ; at the same time, several films are appearing glorifying Japan's role in the Pacific war (The Guardian, 2 July 1982) . The difference between Japan and British, unfortunately, is that in the latter country cultural reproduction of militarism is so pervasive that it is difficult in a similar way to isolate particular instances to oppose . In Britain, the distinctive problem is the cultural residue of Britain's former paramount place in the system of states, and the way that residue remains open to capture by right-wing populism . As Stuart Hall, above all, has emphasised, Thatcherism is a cultural, as well as an economic and political, project . The family, race and law-and-order are drawn on in an attempt to `ground neo-liberal policies directly in an appeal to "the people" ; to root them in the essentialist categories of common sense experience and practical moralism' . The Falklands War has allowed Thatcher to add imperialist militarism to this heady brew . `Gut patriotism . . . feeds off the disappointed hopes of the present and the deep and unrequited traces of the past, imperial splendour penetrated into the bone and marrow of the national culture .' It is not enough, suggests Hall, simply to ignore this culture, to hope, as many Labour politicians clearly do, that the `Falklands factor' will dissipate and politics return quickly to `normal' . For `an imperial metropolis cannot pretend its history has not occurred' . We need to make `more modern thoughts . . . grip the popular imagination, bite into the real experience of people, and make a different kind of sense .' Yet the left lacks

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both the sense of the importance of, and the tools for, such an effort : `no national paper . . . no powerful journal of opinion, no political education, no organic intellectual base from which to engage popular consciousness, no alternative reading of popular history to offer, no grip on the symbolism of popular democratic struggle' (Hall, 1982 : 6-7) . Sexism, too, is central to the cultural reproduction of militarism . Albrecht-Heide (1981) describes well its role in generating the male bonding that is so crucial to functioning armies ." In the world of barracks and the field, men who do not conform to military expectation are labelled `queer', and the images of women are the `male bonding images of . . . Mother, Sister, Prostitute, Madonna' . Though at their strongest in the armed forces, these mechanisms clearly operate more widely . It is surely not accidental that more men than women approve of nuclear weapons, and that those men that oppose them often do so for more superficial reasons . 'I

Finally, what of our own relationship, as socialists, to militarism . It would be reassuringly simple to convey the impression that socialism is an unequivocally anti-militarist tradition . But it would be quite false . For all the strength of socialist antimilitarism (for which see Shaw, n .d ., and Liebknecht, 1907/1973), there is a powerful strand of militarist thinking within socialism . From Engels, nicknamed `the General' by his friends, through to Lenin and Mao, war and its preparation have been major concerns of Marxists ." And the states formed by socialist revolution have certainly not been antimilitarist states . Marxist orthodoxy has had a simple answer to the problems posed by this : that capitalist militarism and socialist militarism are essentially different . Lenin, for example, divided wars into `just' and `progressive' wars on the one hand, and `imperialist' wars on the other . The criterion was not who struck the first blow, nor how a war was conducted, but the class nature of the sides involved and their goals . Echoing Clausewitz, Lenin (in Semmel, ed ., 1981 : 172) argued famously that `theoretically, it would be absolutely wrong to forget that every war is but the continuation of policy by other means' . Paradoxically, it was Trotsky, military organiser and commander of the Red Army, practitioner of what he himself described as the `cruel and sanguinary art' of war, who implicitly pointed out the glibness of this way of thinking of things . `War is a continuation of politics : whoever wishes to understand the "continuation" must get clear on what preceded it . But continuation - "by other means" - signifies : it is not enough to be well C & C 19 - E

Conclusion : socialism and militarism

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Portugal 1974: Workers and soldiers come together during revolution

oriented politically in order to be able therewith also to estimate correctly the "other means" of war .' War has its own 'independent character', its own `inner technique, structure, its methods, traditions and prejudices' . `This means that the profession of war and its problems cannot be dissolved into social and political categories .' (Trotsky, in Semmel, ed ., 1981 : 60, 144 and 143) War and its preparation are not neutral tools . While I have argued throughout this paper that militarism is tightly related to the form of society in which it is found, that relation is a dialectical, not a uni-directional one . Militarism is not a simple, 'technical' instrument of social interests ; it has a momentum of its own and becomes embodied in institutions that seek to mould their environment to secure their survival . There is a thread - however discontinuous - between Trotsky, reluctant practitioner of the `cruel and sanguinary art', and the entrenched Soviet generals with their SS-20s targetted on the working class of Western Europe . Personally, I cannot see an absolute pacificism as a viable alternative . It is, of course, absurdly naive to imagine that a popular revolution could defeat the intact repressive machinery of a modern state . Even as long ago as 1848 the barricade was a symbolic rather than a military instrument . `It was solely a question of making the troops yield to moral influences . . . if [the insurgents] do not succeed in this, then, even where the military are in the minority, the superiority of better equipment and training, of unified leadership, of the planned employment of

MILITARISM AND THEORY military forces and of discipline makes itself felt' (Engels, in Semmel, ed ., 1981 : 202-3) . Nevertheless, the question of the repressive machinery of the state - or of semi-official bodies such as the Latin American death squads - cannot be avoided by those seeking socialist change . In mainland Britain the question may still have an abstract air, but, as emphasised in the introduction, in many parts of the world it is a very real one . In countries such as Nicaragua and Cuba, where something of a socialist state has been estabilished but is threatened from abroad, the question becomes not simply one of insurgency, but of the construction of `socialist' armed forces for national defence . So it may be that socialists cannot in certain circumstances avoid resort, however reluctantly, to armed force . What I would argue strongly for, however, is awareness not simply of the human costs of violence (that, I hope, should not need to be said), but also of its political costs, costs that are typically ignored in Leninist orthodoxy . Amongst these, three stand out . One is that the large-scale organised use of, or preparation of, armed force tends to be inextricably tied up with a strengthening of the state, rather than its `withering away' . It is no coincidence that the military might of the Soviet Union grew simultaneously with both the strengthening and rigidifying of its state apparatus and the rejection of proletarian internationalism in favour of attention to the Soviet Union's position in the system of states . The second is that the adoption of violent practices, or even of a militarist style, will strengthen within any organisation those more at ease with violence and more habituated to that style thus, for example, will strengthen men at the expense of women . The third is that because violence has its own momentum and imperatives, and particular urgency, it will tend to submerge all other forms of opposition and resistance . That last is a risk that has perhaps been exemplified at some points in time by the impact of armed resistance to British rule in Ireland on other forms of opposition . There are difficult problems here, too difficult to resolve now . But if we believe - as I do - that only the construction of socialism can ultimately end the threat of militarism, war and a holocaust, then we have a particular responsibility to ensure that our path to socialism does indeed lead us away from these things, and does not lead to their re-incarnation in new form . In essence, the quesiton is one of what kind of socialism we want to build . If socialism means a strong state and a continuance of male domination, then I fear it will be a militarist socialism . There is much work to be done in thinking through, as well as in constructing, an alternative socialism that will finally make these things no more than bad memories .

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Donald MacKenzie is involved in both the Conference of Socialist Economists and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament in the Edinburgh area, and was active in the Stop the War Committee set up in Edinburgh to oppose the Falklands war . He teaches sociology at Edinburgh University .

Notes

This paper was originally a workshop contribution at the 1982 CSE Conference . Thanks to those there for a helpful discussion, and thanks also to those colleagues and friends who read and constructively criticised earlier drafts, and who fed in ideas to the process of writing, particularly Stuart Anderson, Barry Barnes, Cynthia Cockburn, Angus Erskine, Lynn Jamieson, Dave McCrone, Russ Murray, Gian Poggi and Howard W ollman . More `impersonal' thanks to those whose work I've drawn on here, particularly Mary Kaldor . I saw Kaldor 1982b only after this paper was substantially completed, but I'm happy to acknowledge considerable overlap between it and this paper . 1.

Although much subsequent work has been critical of his position,

EP Thompson has been as important in this theoretical revival as in the

political revival of the peace movement . See in particular Thompson (1980) . Further references will be found in the article by Ron Smith in 2. this issue. Shaw (n .d .) is a useful introduction to the classical Marxist analyses militarism . See Ron Smith's article in this issue for some of these . 3. Probably the most commonly quoted definition of militarism is that of Vagts (1959 : 13), who distinguishes between militarism and the `military way' . `The military way is marked by a primary concentration of men and materials on winning specific objectives of power with the utmost efficiency, that is, with the least expenditure of blood and treasure . It is limited in scope, confined to one function, and scinetific in its essential qualities . Militarism, on the other hand, presents a vast array of customs, interests, prestige, actions, and thought associated with armies and wars and yet transcending true military purposes .' Even if Vagts' distinction could really be sustained, which is dubious, it would still seem wrong to exclude the `efficient' and `scientific' military way from our analysis . In the text I am therefore deliberately defining militarism in a way that avoids such distinctions . The data on which the last two paragraphs are based were drawn 4. from Gansler (1982) . Much of it derives from the Department of Defence `Profit '76' study . `Here, for the first time, individual defense profit centres within large corporations were looked at, and the data "cleansed" by certified public accountants' (Gansler, 1982 : 87) . While neither of these processes guarantee accuracy, the overall patterns identified seem plausible . 5. Estimates in this area are difficult because of lack of information, difficulties of definition, and the problem of `multiplier' effects (the spending by weapons workers and weapons firms made possible by defence work) . The rough estimates in the text are based on Gansler



MILITARISM AND THEORY (1982), though with account taken of much higher estimates for the percentage of scientists and engineers supported by the weaponsproduction system . For some of the complexities of calculation in this latter field, see Woollett (1980) . The quantitative information on which the last two paragraphs 6. are based is largely drawn from Gansler (1982) and SIPRI (1982) . This claimed effect was the most controversial theoretically, and 7. in the early 1970s the internal bulletin of the International Socialism group was filled with debate over its validity, complete with three-bythree matrices! The crucial issue was whether `siphoning off' really works . The surplus value siphoned out of the civilian economy is invested in arms production, which was assumed, perhaps not altogether accurately, to have a high ratio of constant capital to living labour . On the face of it, then, arms spending seemed likely to increase, not decrease, the overall organic composition of capital (the ratio of constant capital to living labour) . Thus it could not sustain the rate of profit . Defenders of the theory countered by arguing that the organic composition of capital in arms production had a different status from that in civilian production, because armaments did not `reenter' the economy (unlike, say, wage goods or machinery) . The transformation of values into prices worked in such a way that while the price of arms rose above their value, the price of civilian goods fell below their value . Capitalists were then able to buy means of production more cheaply, and to pay workers lower wages, thus boosting the rate of profit. For relatively accessible statements of the two opposed positions, see Mandel (1975 : 287-93) and Harman (1981 : 51-55) . 8. This is essentially the position taken up by the excellent CND campaigning pamphlet, The Arms Drain (Webb, 1982) . 9. The rearmament at the time of the Korean War is particularly fascinating in its economic effects . Japanese export trade `increased 61% during the first year of the Korean War', while West German exports in 1953 were four times what they had been in 1950 (Kolko and Kolko, 1972 : 634 and 644) . On the other hand, Britain, which did re-arm, suffered a drastic long-term weakening of its competitive position, as key export industries were re-directed to arms production . 10. The argument of this paragraph owes a great deal to discussions with Stuart Anderson . 11 . Explaining militarism was not the main goal of their theorising, however . Liebknecht (1907/73) apart, they were more interested in understanding the changing nature of capitalism as a whole than in analysing militarism in detail . So their theory of militarism tended to remain rather schematic . McCarthyism, for example, was not merely official anti12 . communism gone paranoid . It contained a critique of the cost of foreign commitments, and suggested that the best, and cheapest, place to fight communism was at home (Kolko and Kolko, 1972 : 649-50) . 13 . This is essentially the account of the state given by Holloway and Picciotto (1977) . 14 . Indeed, it is perhaps significant that in most advanced capitalist countries attempts have been made to separate institutionally wars and their preparation (the job of the armed forces) from the maintenance of

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public order (the job of the police of of specialised paramilitary units) . 15 . See, for example, London Edinburgh Weekend Return Group (1980) for this argument applied to the modern welfare state . 16 . Such evidence as does exist on soldier's will to fight, which is based largely on studies of the us armed forces in the Second World War, suggests that what matters is not membership of a `nation' or of a large organisation such as a regiment, but of a very small closely-knit group, where personal survival is seen as depending on survival of the group and where `fear of incurring by cowardly conduct the group's contempt' is a real factor (Keegan, 1978 : 51) . 17 . Space prohibits examination of a further important aspect of the relationship between militarism and the state : the connections between military discipline and wider forms of discipline and between military organisation and civil bureaucracy . For some interesting suggestions, see Foucault (1979) and Hintze (1906/1975) . Even if exaggerated, Weber's comment points to a real phenomenon: `Military discipline gives birth to all discipline' (Weber, 1968, 3 : 1155) . 18 . One of the few pieces of Marxist state theory to attempt fully to take this into account is Braunmnhl (1978) . 19 . Aside from the particular types of economic reductionism discussed in the text, there is a more general form of economic reductionism, that of Immanuel Wallerstein and the `world systems' analysis associated with him . For a pertinent comment, see Skocpol (1979 : 22) ; see also Skocpol (1977) . 20 . It is interesting that Skocpol (1979) adheres explicitly to a different way of seeing the state . `The perspective on the state advanced here might appropriately be labeled "organisational" and "realist" . . . states are actual organisations controlling (or attempting to control) territories and people' (1979 : 31) . Useful and valid for many purposes as this perspective is, it seems to me that exclusive reliance on it makes it more difficult to see how we might begin to tackle the state system as a political problem . For Skocpol's own, brief, thoughts on that problem see (1979 : 292-3) . 21 . In Edinburgh an antimilitarist demonstration unprecedented in size since the campaign against the Vietnam War was organised in little more than a week . Leaflets for it combined a direct `stop the killing' appeal with a contrast between the Tory government's military adventures and welfare cutbacks . 22 . Not Scottish, nor Welsh - as the much lower support for the war in Scotland and Wales perhaps indicated . 23 . The television coverage of the departure of the task force was a particularly clear example of this . The Royal Navy is an interestingly powerful symbol, commanding for several centuries much greater popular support than the army . Because they could not be used for internal repression, `royal navies were never felt to be the props of despotism that royal armies were' (Best, 1982 : 69) . 24 . The militarily crucial small groups described in footnote 16 above are of course groups of fighting men . 25 . See the Gallup poll reported in the December 1982 issue of Sanity . The gender difference in overall approval/disapproval is small enough for it to be a chance effect, but its direction is consistent with that

MILITARISM AND THEORY 71

shown in other studies . Women in the United States were consistently more opposed than men to the Vietnam War, for example (Schuman and Converse, 1970) . It is interesting to speculate whether the apparent erosion of the Conservative Party's traditional relative advantage amongst women voters is connected to the growing polarisation of British party politics around nuclear weapons . 26 . Even though both the collection and editor's introduction are somewhat one-sided, this emerges powerfully from Semmel, ed ., Marxism and the Science of War (1981) .

Aglietta, M . (1979) A Theory of Capitalist Regulations: the us Experience . (New Left Books) Albrecht-Heide, A. (1981) The peaceful sex, in W . Chapkis, ed . (1981 : 83-87) Baran, P .A . and Sweezy, P.M. (1968) Monopoly Capital: an Essay on the American Economic and Social Order . (Penguin) . Barnett, A . (1982) Iron Britannia, New Left Review 134 : 5-96 . Best, G . (1982) War and Society in Revolutionary Europe, 1770-1870 . (Fontana) . Bradby, B . (1982) The remystification of value, Capital and Class 17 : 114-133 . Braun, E . and MacDonald, S . (1978) Revolution in Miniature : the History and Impact of Semiconductor Electronics . (Cambridge University Press) . Braunmihl, C . von (1978) On the analysis of the bourgeois nation state within the world market context . An attempt to develop a methodological and theoretical approach, in John Holloway and Sol Picciotto, eds (1978 : 160-77) . Chapkis, W ., ed . (1981) Loaded Questions: Women in the Military . (Transnational Institute) . Clausewitz, C . von (1832/1976) On War (trans . Michael Howard and Peter Paret) . (Princeton University Press) . Collins, R . (1975) Conflict Sociology: Toward an Explanatory Science . (Academic Press). Counter Information Services (1982) War Lords: the utc Arms Industry (Anti-Report no . 31) . (Counter Information Services) . Davin, A . (1978) Imperialism and motherhood . History Workshop 5 : 9-65 . Davis, M . (1982) Nuclear imperialism and extended deterrence, in New Left Reveiw, ed . (1982 : 35-64) . Durie, S . and Edwards, R . (1982) Fuelling the Nuclear Arms Race : the Links between Nuclear Power and Nuclear Weapons . (Pluto) . Engels, F . (1878/1978) Anti-Duhring (Herr Eugen Duhring's Revolution in Science) . (Foreign Languages Press) . Foreign and Commonwealth Office (1982) The Falkland Islands: the Facts . (HMSO) . Foucault, M . (1979) Discipline and Punish: the Birth of the Prison . (Penguin) .

References

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Gansler, J . S . (1982) The Defense Industry . (MIT Press). Hall, S . (1982) The empire strikes back . New Socialist 6 : 5-7 . Harman, C . (1981) Marx's theory of crisis and its critics . International Socialism series 2, 11 : 30-71 . Harman, C . (1982) State capitalism, armaments, and the general form of the current crisis . International Socialism series 2, 16 : 37-88 . Hintze, O . (1906/1975) Military organization and the organization of the state, in Felix Gilbert (ed .) The Historical Essays of Otto Hintze . (Oxford University Press) . Hirsch, J . (1978) The state apparatus and social reproduction : elements of a theory of the bourgeois state, in John Holloway and Sol Picciotto, eds (1978 : 57-107) . Holloway, D . (1980) War, Militarism and the Soviet State, in E .P . Thompson and Dan Smith, eds (1980 : 129-69) . Holloway, J . and Picciotto, S . (1977) Capital, crisis and the state . Capital and Class 2 : 76-101 . Holloway, J . and Picciotto, S ., eds (1978) State and Capital: a Marxist Debate. (Arnold). Jessop, Bob (1982) The Capitalist State : Marxist Theories and Methods . (Robertson) . Kaldor, M . (1982a) The Baroque Arsenal. (Deutsch) . Kaldor, M . (1982b) Warfare and capitalism, in New Left Review, eds (1982 : 261-87) . Keegan, J . (1978) The Face of Battle : a Study of Agincourt, Waterloo and the Somme . (Penguin) . Kevles, D . J . (n .d .) Before Three Mile Island : reflections on the history of nuclear power in the United States . Typescript. Kidron, M . (1970) Western Capitalism since the War . (Penguin) . Kolko, J . and Kolko, G. (1972) The Limits of Power: the World and United States Foreign Policy, 1945-1954 . (Harper and Row) . Kurth, J .R . (1973) Why we buy the weapons we do, Foreign Policy 11 : 33-36 . Liebknecht, K . (1907/1973) Militarism and Anti-Militarism . (Rivers Press) . Lo, C .Y .H . (1982) Theories of the state and business opposition to increased military spending, Social Problems 29 : 434-38 . London Edinburgh Weekend Return Group (1980) In and Against the State, London : Pluto . Luxemburg, R . (1913/1951) The Accumulation of Capital . (Routledge and Kegan Paul) . Mandel, E . (1975) Late Capitalism, London : New Left Books . Marshall, T .H . (1963) Citizenship and social class, in his Sociology at the Crossroads . (Hienemann) . New Left Review, ed . (1982) Exterminism and Cold War, London : Verso . Noble, D .F . (1978) Social choice in machine design : the case of automatically controlled machine tools, and a challenge for Labour, Politics and Society 8 : 313-47 . Poggi, G . (1978) The Development of the Modern State: a Sociological Introduction . (Hutchinson) . Revolutionary Communist Party (1982) Malvinas are Argentina's,

MILITARISM AND THEORY London : Junius Publications . Ross, J . (1982) British politics in the 1980s, CSE Conference Papers : 122-27 . Schuman, H . and Converse, P .E . (1970) `Silent majorities' and the Vietnam War, Scientific American 222 (6) : 17-25 . Semmel, B . ed . (1981)Marxism and the Science of War . (Oxford University Press) . Shaw, M . (n .d .) Socialism and Militarism . (Spokesman Pamphlet no . 74) (Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation) . SIPRI [Stockholm International Peace Research Institute] (1982) The Arms Race and Arms Control . (Taylor and Francis) . Skocpol, T . (1977) Wallerstein's world capitalist system : a theoretical and historical critique, American Journal of Sociology 82 : 1075-90 . Skocpol, T . (1979) States and Social Revolutions : a Comparative Analysis of France, Russia and China . (Cambridge University Press) . Smith, D . and Smith, R . (1980) British military expenditure in the 1980s, in E .P. Thompson and Dan Smith, eds (1980 : 186-202) . Smith, M . R . (1977) Harpers Ferry Armory and the New Technology . The Challenge of Change . (Cornell University Press) . Smith, R . (1977) Military expenditure and capitalism . CambridgeJournal of Economics 1 : 61-76 . Szymanski, A . (1973) Military spending and economic stagnation, American Journal of Sociology 79 : 1-14 . Therborn, G . (1977) The rule of capital and the rise of democracy, New Left Review 103 : 3-41 . Titmuss, R .M . (1958) War and social policy in his Essays on `the Welfare State' . (Allen and Unwin) . Thompson, E . P. (1967) Time, work-discipline and industrial capitalism Past and Present 38 : 56-97 . Thompson, E . P . (1980) Notes on exterminism, the last stage of civilization New Left Review 121 : 3-31 . Thompson, E .P . and Smith, D ., eds (1980) Protest and Survive . (Penguin) . Urry, J . (1981) The Anatomy of Capitalist Societies : the Economy, Civil Society and the State . (Macmillan) . Vagts, A . (1959) A History of Militarism, Civilian and Military . (Hollis and Carter) . Vance, T .N . et al (1951/1970) The Permanent War Economy . (Independent Socialist Press) . Webb, T . (1982) The Arms Drain : Job Risk and Industrial Decline . (Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament) . Weber, M . (1918/1970) Politics as a vocation, in H .H . Gerth and C . Wright Mills (eds) From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology . (Routledge and Kegan Paul) . W eber, M . (1968) Economy and Society : an Outline of Interpretive Sociology (ed . Guenther Roth and claus Wittich) . (Bedminster) . W oollett, E . L . (1980) Physics and modern warfare : the awkward silence . American Journal of Physics 48 : 104-11 . Wright, Q . (1942/1965) A Study of War . (Chicago University Press) . Yuval-Davis, M. (1981) The Israeli example, in W . Chapkis, ed . (1981, 73-77) .

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The paper discusses the growing importance of the decentralisation of production, as one capitalist response to declining profits and workers' resistance in Italian manufacturing industry . It argues that decentralisation and automation have reduced the traditional strength and quantity of male workers in large factories and have generated new sectors within the industrial working class . The paper ends with the suggestion that the labour movement needs to reshape its organisation and its strategies which erroneously still continue to reflect only the needs of the traditional mass worker .

74

Fergus Murray

The decentralisation of production the decline of the mass-collective worker? I want to examine one of the changes that have been taking place in the organisation of production and the labour process since the early 1970s, that is, the decentralisation of production . While the geographical dispersal of production is a long established feature of capitalism, in the last ten years decentralisation has undergone a quantitative increase and qualitative change . For example, in Italy large firms have reduced plant size, split-up the production cycle between plants, and increased the putting-out of work to a vast and growing network of small firms, artisan workshops, and domestic outworkers .' In Japan large firms using advanced production techniques have insisted that their small supplier firms raise productivity through technological innovation, while moves are underway to link the small firms by computer to the large ones, thereby greatly increasing the control of the large corporations over production . In America and Britain increasingly mobile international capital in high technology small units has been moving into areas of high unemployment, for example in the southern `sun belt' states of the US and in S . Wales and Scotland in Britain, where careful labour recruitment exploits and exacerbates the segmentation of the labour market and divisions in the working class . And recently a statement in the Soviet press drew attention to decentralisation when it criticised the way in which Russian inIN THIS PAPER

DECENTRALISATION dustrialisation continues to be based on huge factories and proposed a policy for the reduction of plant size and the development of small, flexible, highly specialised and technologically advanced production units . The article cited the example of General Electric which continues to reduce plant size despite the fact that all its 400,000 employees already work in factories of less than 1,500 workers .' . There is then a growing body of evidence which challenges the idea that the progressive centralisation and concentration of capital necessarily leads to a physical concentration of production that the small production unit is the remnant of a disappearing traditional, backward sector of production . For generations Marxists have assumed that the tendency of capitalism was to the greater and greater concentration of production, and massification of the proletariat . Indeed there were excellent historical reasons for making this assumption, as the development of both the basic commodity industries of the first industrial revolution and the mass production industries of the post-war boom led to a high concentration of workers in large integrated plants in large industrial towns .' Nevertheless the above evidence suggests that the size and location of production cannot be drawn from theoretical premises but rather that they are historically determined, depending on the particular circumstances capitalist production faces in different periods . This paper draws on empirical material from Italy to show how the use of decentralisation has been intensified and has changed through the introduction of new technology as Italy's dominant firms have sought to restructure production in their struggle against declining profitability . In Italy the combination of automation and decentralisation has been specifically aimed at destroying the power and autonomy of the most militant and cohesive section of the Italian proletariat and this strategy has met with considerable success . This suggests that the political hopes pinned on the mass-collective worker in the seventies need to be carefully reconsidered in the light of decentralisation and the recomposition of the proletariat this implies . The paper is organised as follows : The first section examines the determinants of the dominant organisational form of post-war industry, the large factory, and suggests that this form is historically specific, being contingent on the balance of class forces and the technologies available to capital . Using empirical material the second section attempts to define the different forms of decentralisation in order to bring out the wide variety of different workplaces and workers which decentralisation creates through its physical fragmentation of the

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labour process . The third section analyses the way in which the application of information technology in production management not only gives capital a greater potential control over labour in the large factory, but also gives it the possibility of coordinating production and labour exploitation that is increasingly dispersed in small production units, artisan workshops and 'home-factories' . The last part of the paper suggests that decentralisation has created new divisions in the industrial working class by increasing the number of workers living and working in conditions that greatly differ from those of the mass-collective worker . The transformation of the large factory and the rise of small production units has made collective action considerably more difficult . The paper ends by asking how both old and new divisions can be effectively challenged by the labour movement and the left, with a strategy and organisations that give voice to the different needs and desires of different parts of the proletariat, while also giving them a unity that can overcome divisions rather than exacerbating them .

The large factory : Is it inevitable?

The term `decentralisation of production' has been used in Italy to describe a number of distinct features of the organisation of production . In general, decentralisation refers to the geographical dispersal and division of production, and particularly to the diffusion and fragmentation of labour . However this can take place in a number of ways : i) The expulsion of work formerly carried out in large factories to a network of small firms, artisans or domestic outworkers . ii) The division of large integrated plants into small, specialised production units . iii) The development of a dense small firm economy in certain regions such as the Veneto and Emilia Romagna in Italy . In Italy `decentralisation' has been used to cover all the above developments . In this paper `decentralisation' is used to refer to the expulsion of production and labour from large factories, either in the form of in-house decentralisation (splitting-up) or inter-firm decentralisation (putting-out) within the domestic economy . This is because the paper focuses on the way large and medium firms in Italy have used decentralisation to reduce costs and increase labour exploitation, rather than on the development of districts of independent small firms that are not directly subordinate to larger firms . The analysis of this latter process has been an important part of the Italian debate on decentralisation (e .g . Brusco, 1982 ; Paci, 1975 ; Bagnasco et al, 1978) .

DECENTRALISATION An assumption has prevailed that large corporations operating in such sectors as engineering and electronics will organise production in large factories, in that they will amass large amounts of fixed capital and workers in particular, on any given site . However factory size is not given, and least of all does not necessarily correspond with the size of a firm or corporation's turnover, or their market and financial strength . Rather it is determined by the specific configuration of the conditions for profitable production prevailing in any given period . For example, the integrated car plant developed in rapidly expanding markets, with the balance of class forces intially in capital's favour, which made possible and profitable a particular combination of technology (mechanised flow line production) and labour domination (Taylorism) . It was the coincidence of all these factors that made the integrated plant the most profitable form of production organisation in the post-war consumer durables industries . When labour rebelled and markets began to stagnate the `efficiency' of this form of production was undermined and both capitalists and bourgeois economics discovered `diseconomies of scale' . The ending of the long wave of expansion, the development of new technologies, and new management techniques have all contributed to change the form of the division of labour and the labour process within the large corporation . Five of the more important factors that influence factory size are the type of product being made, the technologies available, product control, industrial relations and State legislation . I shall consider the role of these factors in turn .

Product Type Product type is important in determining the degree to which the production cycle for a given product can be divided between separate factories . Industries where there is a high divisibility of the production cycle include aeronautics, machinery, electronics, clothes, shoes, and furniture . In contrast the steel and chemical industries tend to require a large unified production site, although the optimum plant size is not always as large as some people, for example BSC management, think (Manwaring, 1981 :72) . One particularly important development that has been taking place in the structure of some products is a process known as modularisation . Although there has been a diversification in the number of models in many ranges of consumer goods, this has been underlain by a standardisation of the major subassembled parts of the product . These sub-assembled parts are the basic modules of the product and can be made in different

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factories and put together at a later date . For example, as argued in Del Monte (1982 :154-6) at one time televisions were assembled in a linear manner on a long assembly line . The frame of the television would be put on the line, and individual parts then added to it . In modular production each module is assembled separately, and a much shorter process of final assembly is required . At present modular production is mainly limited to commodities from the electronics sector, but advances in product redesign facilitated by the introduction of microelectronic components suggest that it will be used elsewhere . (See the example of Fiat later .) If we recall how the bringing together of large numbers of workers on assembly lines in the sixties fuelled workers' spontaneous struggles, modular production, plus the increasing automation of the assembly areas themselves, can serve as important weapons for capital in reducing worker militancy through decentralisation . Technology

Brusco (1975) argues that Marx's explanation for the concentration of production in large factories was partly based on the necessity of running machines from a central energy source - the steam engine . As steam was replaced by electricity as the principal energy source for industry this particular decentralising tendency was weakened . Initially the expense of electric engines meant that one central engine and a system of transmission shafts and belts were used to drive the different machines . But as electrical technology developed and the price of engines fell, each machine was fitted with its own motor .' Other technological changes that affect the product and the organisation of production include shifts in materials, for instance, from steel to plastics, but the most important change that has been taking place in the last decade is the introduction of the microchip into the production of many commodities . While the microchip tends to a lessening of worker control over machines, it is also changing the nature of those machines . Generally there is a trend towards a replacement of electro-mechanical parts with microelectronic components, and from worker control of the machine to the installation of the unit of control in the machine which leads to changes in the production of the product and its associated labour process . Olivetti has been transformed from an engineering multinational to an electrical one over twenty years, and in many engineering firms electrical control systems are now taking over from mechanical ones . This implies a reduction of machine shop work in production . It is also interesting to note that electrical work, such as wiring and the assembly of circuit boards has in some

DECENTRALISATION cases proved suitable for putting-out to tiny firms employing semi-skilled women workers - so suitable, according to Wood (1980) in Japan there are an estimated 180,000 domestic outworkers in the electrical components industry alone . Similarly, a firm in Bologna making control units for machine tools did some quite radical experimenting with decentralisation as it shifted from electro-mechanical to electronic control systems . According to the Bologna metalworkers' union (FLM Bologna, 1977 :78), with the appearance of micro-electronics in the seventies the firm began to run down its machine shops and progressively intensified putting out which eventually accounted for 60% of production costs . At this time the firm employed about 500 workers directly and over 900 indirectly as outworkers . A couple of years later with the introduction of automation the firm recentralised production and an estimated 600 outworkers lost their jobs . There are then techological changes taking place that allow decentralisation and falling factory sizes but it needs to be stressed that these changes don't automatically lead to decentralisation . It is the particular capitalist's use of technology and the conditions of profitability that will determine how the organisation of production changes . Product Control The making of many commodities requires huge amounts of co-ordination and control of production and pressure to reduce dead time, stocks, and all types of idle capital has increased markedly since 1974 . In a big plant, production is difficult to supervise at every level and the sheer size of the factory and the bureaucracy needed to run it can hide huge amounts of waste . This would suggest that for the capitalist the division of production and management into smaller and more easily controlled units would be a cost effective strategy . 9 The introduction of computer assisted management allows production to be split-up by making the co-ordination of production in different plants considerably easier . General Motor's new `S' car, for example, is being built in GM's European production network which employs 120,000 workers split-up in 39 plants in 17 countries (Financial Times, 28 .9 .82) Industrial Relations The reduction of factory size and relocation of production are contingent upon the extent to which `unfavourable' industrial relations are an important reason for restructuring in different

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industries in different countries . Prais (1982) suggests that factories in the UK with over 2,000 workers are 50 times more vulnerable to strikes than those with less than 100 workers, and he goes on to say in his academically refined union bashing tone, that big plants in UK car assembly, steel production, and shipbuilding develop endemic strikes "which impedes the pursuit of efficiency, and leads ultimately to self-destruction" . (p . 103) . In the late 60's labour militancy in many Italian industries reached levels that directly threatened firm profitability and management undertook a series of strategies designed initially to reduce the disruptiveness of militant workers . One of these strategies, decentralisation, was in part underlain by a management view, typified by the director of a Bologna engineering firm to whom I spoke, which saw a direct correlation between factory size and industrial relations in Italy in the 1970s . This director argued that a significant improvement in industrial relations could be achieved in a factory employing 100 rather than 1000 workers . This is not to say there is an automatic relationship between industrial relations, labour militancy and factory size . Rather large plants in the post-war boom appear to have created conditions favourable to an intense and often `unofficial' shop floor struggle that has been very disruptive for capital . It would be wrong therefore to equate the rise of smaller production units with the end of labour militancy on the shop floor . It seems that capitalists expect substantial `improvements' in industrial relations from smaller scale production units . Clearly this will impose new and real difficulties for the autonomous organisation of workers and the forms it should take in small plants . However, the struggles at Plessey Bathgate and Lee Jeans have shown that these are not unsurmountable .

State Legislation Central and local state legislation will be important in determining factory size and location in a number of ways . Incentives, grants subsidies, and factories themselves may all be used to persuade firms to set up additional sites, as can be seen by the unco-ordinated efforts of the various regional development agencies in the UK . Employment legislation, and its implimentation, may also be very influential . In Italy important parts of the Worker's Statute do not apply in firms employing less than 15 workers . And the smaller the plant the more possibility there is of using illegal employment practices, such as the use of child labour, and the evasion of tax and national insurance payments' .



DECENTRALISATION Using empirical material from the Bologna engineering industry, this section examines the two forms of decentralisation that have been used most extensively in Italy by large and medium sized firms . The intention here is to examine the way decentralisation changes the nature of work and workers and the relationships that exist between firms . An analysis of the relationships between firms is important for the left, especially in view of assessing the accuracy and implications of two trends that are supposedly taking place, one is the vertical disintegration of many corporations and the other is the growing wave of support, in Britain especially, for small business from the State and even the banks . On the basis of Macrae's analysis (1982), one would, think that the power of monopoly capital was withering away to open a new golden age for the entrepreneur . However, while it may be true that some corporations are withdrawing from direct control of some production this in no way implies a weakening of their power . Rather, through decentralisation these corporations may maintain a strict control over production while letting the small firm pay the costs and face the risks of production, thereby using decentralisation as a means for reducing and shifting the corporation's risks and losses . In this way corporations maintain their ability to cover fluctuating markets while concentrating on the most profitable areas of production . This of course, does not mean that all small firms are subordinate to a particular corporation and manymay even find a degree of independence .' Putting-out Putting-out involves the transfer of work formerly done within a firm to another firm, an artisan workshop or to domestic outworkers . After the initial transfer, putting-out can be used to describe a semi-permanent relationship between firms . Within the Italian economy putting-out appears to have contributed significantly to the rise of small firms and to the surprising shift that has taken place in industrial employment in the last ten years . In 197122 .9% of the total industrial workforce were employed in `mini-firms' of less than 19 employees . By 1978 this figure had risen to 29 .4%, an expansion of employment in the , mini-firms' of 345,000 . Furthermore the number of men employed in these firms rose by only 8 .3% in this period, whereas the number for women grew by 33 .8% . While it is difficult to generalise from such disaggregated data, they do indicate a steady growth of employment in very small production units for which the putting-out and the geographical fragmentation of production have been partly responsible . The period from 1974-8 is particularly interesting as a fall of employment of 52,000 occured in C & C 19 -

Different 81 forms of decentralisation

CAPITAL & CLASS 82

firms of over 500 employees, whereas employment rose by 160,000 in the 'mini-firms' (see Celata, 1980 :85) In the Bologna engineering industry, in the period 196880, the number of artisan firms employing between 1-15 employees rose from 6,602 to 9,436, an increase of 42 .9% and nearly a third of the Bologna engineering labour force of 88,000 was working in these workshops in 1980 (see FLM Emilia Romagna, 1981 :18-19) The existence of this dense network of artisans workshops and small firms and its expansion due to an initial restructuring of the Bologna engineering industry in the 1950s, has been one of the vital preconditions for the development of putting-out and the increasing division of labour between small firms . As the example that follows suggests, decentralisation has passed through two phases : a first phase between 1968-74 when puttingout was used less out of choice than necessity due to intense shop-floor struggles in the large and medium factories ; and a second phase, since 1975, of more systematic use of decentralisation, with the introduction of information technology into production planning and the appearance of numerically controlled machine tools in increasingly specialised artisan shops, accompanined by a gradual reversal of some of labour's gains on the shop floor . In this second phase it is possible to see an implicit shift from the direct control of labour on the shop-floor in the large Taylorised factory to a more articulated and flexible system of the organisation of production where the labour process extends beyond the factory into the artisan workshop . In the artisan workshop the unmediated forces of the market that threaten the artisan's very existence ensure a high degree of 'self-exploitation' often reinforced by the paternalistic despotism of the small entrepreneur . In the Bologna engineering industry there appear to be three motives for putting-out : to reduce fixed costs to a minimum ; to benefit from wage differentials between firms ; to maximise the flexibility of the production cycle and of labour exploitation . The nature of putting-out is examined below through its use in a Bologna precision engineering firm . The strategy of this firm, according to the management, has been to invest in labour and machinery just below the level of minimum expected demand . Any increase of production above this level has been met by putting-out, rather than risking an expansion of the factory or the workforce . However, contrary to management's claims, it is not true that the size of the labour force has always depended upon the level of demand . Until 1969, that is until when the first big strikes occurred, the size of the workforce grew steadily . However, after 1969, although pro-

DECENTRALISATION duction output rose rapidly for a number of years, the level of employment of production workers and productivity in the firm, actually fell . It therefore appears that a decision was taken to limit employment in the firm as militancy on the shop-floor increased and to cover rising demand by massively raising putting-out . In 1972 46% of production work was put-out of the firm, employing indirectly the equivalent of 570 full-time workers in small firms and workshops, whereas in 1969 only 10% had been put-out . In 1974-5 production fell rapidly, and work put-out dropped to almost nothing, resulting in the loss of approximately 550 jobs . That is, while the level of employment in the firms working for the company went through a massive fluctuation, employment in the company itself was relatively stable . The company putting the work out did not then pay a penny of redundancy money and nor was there any disruptive and socially embarassing struggle over job losses . This illustrates clearly the flexibility putting-out can provide . In this instance the reason for putting-out was not so much the exploitation of wage differentials as the minimisation of costs and conflict over job losses with the union . However, the same firm does also put-out work for savings on wages, where the outworkers are paid up to 50% less than their counterparts in the factory . The work put-out here is not mechanical work, but wiring and circuit board assembly and involves women working in small firms and sweatshops where they have no legal or union protection . With the introduction of computer assisted management and with the changes taking place in modular design, the firm has recently overhauled its putting-out system . Formerly, work of a once only basis was put-out to artisan shops the basis of very short lived and verbal agreements . The firm now encourages these artisans, who often employ less than five people, to group themselves together in order to amass the machinery and skills necessary for the production and sub-assembly of modules on a more regular basis . Meanwhile, management has won back some of its former power on the shop-floor with the help of computer aided production and an increase in internal labour mobility . The introduction of the computer has given management an increasingly refined control over the co-ordination of production both within and outside the factory, and putting-out is now used more routinely, while special and rush jobs are done in the factory due to the increased mobility of labour, achieved after six years of almost total rigidity . Putting-out here has gone from a contingency solution of special problems to a more structured system . Initially flexibility was found in putting-out to artisan workshops to get around

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rigidity in the factory . Now it is the whole system, factory production and putting-out, that works to give flexibility . Putting-out in Bologna engineering varies from skilled well-paid work using advanced technology to dirty dangerous and deskilled work . Within this there is a clear division of putting-out based on sexual and racial divisions in the labour market . The skilled workers and artisans are almost exclusively middle aged men, while women, the young, and migrants from the South of Italy and North Africa are concentrated in the dirtiest, most precarious and worst paid work . The other extensive form of putting-out is to domestic outworkers in industries like clothing, electrical components, and toys . This form of putting-out has received a good deal more attention than putting-out to small firms (e .g . Young, 1981 ; Rubery and Wilkinson, 1981 ; Goddard, 1981) and will therefore not be dealt with here . Another increasingly important type of putting-out is that which takes place across national frontiers where either parts of the production cycle are contracted out or the firm contracts out the production of the finished commodity it already makes, using its own specifications and technology for production in the subcontracting firm and its marketing network for the sale of the commodity . An example of the former type of international putting-out is cited in Frobel et al (1980 :108) and refers to the extensive use the West German textile industry makes of textile firms in Yugoslavia, where firms send out semi-finished products from Germany to be worked up into the final product . And an example of the latter can be found in Del Monte's study (1982) of the electronics industry in Southern Italy, where, again West German firms making televisions, contract out the production of complete sets to medium sized firms around Naples . The firms doing the work use the German firm's know-how and marketing services, not being big enough themselves to break into the world market . They, in turn, put out work to smaller firms in the area . (pp . 150-1) Putting-out then cannot be equated with an archaic and disappearing system of production . Rather it seems to have been reinforced as specific sectors of industry have faced altered condition in the harsh economic and political climate of the seventies as the long-wave of expansion ground to a halt . Therefore it would be mistaken to continue to segment firms in terms of the dualist opposition between large firms using high techology and small firms using outdated technology and traditional production techniques .'

DECENTRALISATION Splitting-up production

The second form of decentralisation is the splitting-up of production between factories of the same firm . Clearly firms will relocate factories, and change the organisation of production between them for many and inter-linked reasons . Here, I want to look specifically at splitting-up where it has been strongly motivated by management's desire to make the workers' organisation as hard as possible, and where management has realised the potential dangers involved in concentrating large numbers of workers in large factories located in the large industrial town . While, with the internationalisation of production the fate of the domestic industrial working class is increasingly linked to the fate of the international working class, it is important to understand how the location and structure of the domestic proletariat is changing in a period of restructuring in the national and international economy .' Here I will examine some of the ways localised splitting has been used in the Italian economy . In one of the Bologna engineering firms referred to previously, the upsurge of union militancy in the early seventies was met not only by an increase in putting-out but also by a partial splitting-up of production . While employment was allowed to fall in one factory in the firm, another small factory employing 80 workers was established an hour's drive away in a depressed agricultural region . Although the shop stewards were not slow to make contact with the workers in the new factory it has been difficult to take unified action . The workers at the small plant came from rural areas, do semi-skilled work, and are willing to work `flexibly', that is they are prepared to change shifts and work over-time so that they can also work their plots of land . In contrast, the workers in the main factory are more skilled, they come from an urban background and are endowed with a militant trade union tradition . Once the small factory was set up management then tried to put-out work from it into the surrounding area, but found that there were not enough small firms in the area to allow this . However, the tendency to set up `detached workshops' has been widespread where production permits this . One of the few studies of Fiat's decentralisation of production into Central Italy (Leoni, 1978) has shown how, in its lorry division a mixture of splittingup and putting-out has been used to maximise the dispersion of the directly and indirectly employed workforce in many very green 'greenfield' sites in a rundown agricultural area . Another type of splitting-up is when the firm loses a central factory to become an agglomeration of `detached workshops' . Although this strategy is less common one example from Bologna

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is striking . In this firm there are three `major' production sites, three `minor' ones, a stores site, a research site, and an administrative site spread out in the periphery of Bologna . In all, the firm employs 300 people dispersed in the different sites . Along with this fragmentation of production the firm also practices a high level of putting-out, and is progressively running down its machine shops to concentrate only on assembly, design and marketing activities . A final example of splitting-up is provided by the electric domestic appliance company belonging to Vittorio Merloni, who is the head of the Italian employers federation, the Confindustria . The firm employs 2,000 workers who work in nine different sites and no factory has substantially more than 200 workers . The Small Firms tits, ,,,Putting-out A schematic representation of the decentralisation of production

--_

City Factory

dispersion

putting-out

Formally independent firms

Rural/Third World Factories

0

putting-out

Small firms directly created by firm A

Formally independent firm

III III

sub-putting-out,

,

,

Domestic out workers

DECENTRALISATION 87

basis of managerial strategy is to take work to the workforce in the depressed agricultural regions of Central Italy, where higher transport costs are easily offset by the `industrial tranquility' of the environment . One of the Merlonis specifically acknowledges that it is "an advantage to have reduced concentrations of workers, and where possible, to know each worker" . And he goes on to explain that the firm has tried to create "a group spirit in and outside the plants" to encourage workers to identify with the firm without losing their roots in the rural community . The idea behind this is to soften and control the traumatising and often radicalising, transition from peasant production to work in a capitalist factory . Meanwhile, to keep things even more `tranquil' the Merlonis concentrate their efforts on doing pressed steel, assembly and finishing work while the rest of production is put-out to small firms and artisan shops often directly created by the Merlonis, who have paternalistically handed ex-workers the chance to `go it alone' (see Lotta Continua, 22 .5 .80 and 23 .5 .80) . By way of ending this section on decentralisation, the diagram below shows how different types of decentralisation could be used by one firm to create a diffused production network, or as some Italians say, a `diffused factory' .

Within any mode of production the collection, analysis and circulation of information is vital . Within capitalism a particular form of factory production has arisen where one of the functions of the factory is the provision of a structure where information can be collected, co-ordinated and controlled . As communication technology has developed, the emergence of multi-plant and multinational enterprises has been made possible . Although telephones, telex and teletransmitters and the like are in no way determinants of the organisation of production, they have allowed the centralisation of control over capital to increase with the internationalisation and geographical dispersion of production . However, the large factory has remained the basic unit of capitalist production . The structure of the factory has developed, among other things, to ensure the free flow of information from the bottom of a pyramidal hierarchy to its top, and the free flow of control from the top downwards . Information, and access to it, are the key to formulating and understanding a firm's strategy . For this reason a firm uses a lot of people to collect and transmit information in the factory and this information is carefully guarded . The people who have the greatest amount of information are in a superior position to judge and make decisions, and they will argue that they are `objectively' correct because of their access to recorded

The Computer in the factory

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`knowledge' . In short, access to and the control of information is an instrument of class and sexual power . In an engineering firm making complex automatic machines there may be as many as 20,000 separate pieces circulating in the factory . For management, this represents big problems and costs . As orders come in and are changed, the production of each piece must be planned and co-ordinated so that the final product is ready on time . Fixed capital and workers must not be allowed to stand idle, detailed plans of machine loadings, stocks and work schedules have to be made and a change in orders, a delay by a supplier, a strike, an overtime ban or a breakdown can all upset these plans . At present many firms incur high management costs to ensure the co-ordination and monitoring of production within the factory . Traditionally this monitoring has been carried out by people writing things on bits of paper, passing them up the hierarchy, amassing them, analysing them and issuing orders based on them . Yet an increasingly flexible production orgnisation is needed to get round worker-imposed rigidity, to ensure the full use of increasingly large amounts of fixed capital and to cut costs `down to the bone', in the face of the burgeoning contradictions of the system . The introduction of computer assisted management is a potentially valuable weapon for capital because it can increase management's control over all aspects of production, firstly through the further expropriation of worker's knowledge (mental labour) and secondly, through an `objectification' of control over labour that ensures the maximum saturation and co-ordination of labour time . In one Bologna engineering firm there is a computer terminal for every thirteen employees . The terminals are used to both issue orders and to collect, feed back, memorise and coordinate information . The course of each part is monitored and information about individual machines and workers, such as work times and `performance' are constantly recorded . Information from the four basic divisions of the factory, production, marketing, stock control, and planning arrives at the central computer and data base and is recorded and analysed on a day-to-day basis . Information arriving from one department will automatically lead to co-ordination with other departments through the computer's central programme . This gives the management the possibility to foresee where and when bottlenecks will occur, and allows management to experiment with `dry' production runs on the computer to examine the ways in which potential blockages in production, including strikes, can be overcome through changing production plans in the factory and by increasing or changing plans for putting-out .

DECENTRALISATION I'll now briefly point to three other areas where management benefits from the computer in production . Firstly, idle capital can be reduced to a minimum, whether through a greater control of labour or of stocks, as is achieved by the Japanese 'kanban' (just-in-time) system of stock control . This system uses computers to co-ordinate in-house production and to link its surrounding ring of external suppliers so that stock requirements are calculated on an hourly and not a daily or weekly basis . Production is maintained by `suppliers feeding a wide array of components, in the right order, through the right gate in the assembly complex to reach the line at the right time' . Secondly, automatic machines and robots can be linked together and run by a central computer, as is beginning to happen in the fully automated flexible manufacturing system . For example, General Electric has recently announced a new computerised system of information control and co-ordination which will enable robots `to communicate with each other' and link all machines with electrical control into an integrated system, the remote parts of which can be connected by satellite links . (Financial Times 30 .3 .82 .) Thirdly, computerised information allows the decentralisation of day-to-day management decisions while centralising strategic control in the hands of a slimmeddown board of directors . 10 For supervisory staff the introduction of information technology makes their information gathering role potentially obsolete, as the factory hierarchy changes from a function of production command to a more subtle one of political mediation . Fiat has taken this process further and in workshops and offices where now there are no shop stewards, `Fiat takes care of the problem of mediation with its sociologists, its new 'vaseliners' who talk to the workers about their problems' ." For shop-floor and office workers, computers mean stricter control through an impersonal and distant centre, rather than through face-to-face confrontation with the factory hierarchy . Anything a worker does may be recorded by the computer and used against her/him at a later date, while informal breaks won through struggle tend to be formalised and handed out as and when management see fit . And the versatile computer doesn't lose its temper, can also issue orders in Swedish, Finnish, Yugoslavian and Turkish, as the ones used at Volvo do . (See Zollo, 1979 ; Dina, 1981 ; Ciborra, 1979) However, a computer system is only as good as its programme and the degree to which workers are willing to cooperate with management . That is, the potential gains from the

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introduction of information technology are contingent upon management's ability to erode worker resistance to the technology and prevent new forms of resistance from developing . In one Bologna firm the introduction of terminals on the shop-floor was met by an `information strike' where the workforce refused to co-operate in the collection of information . One of the major benefits for capital is that computer assisted management can largely replace the function of the factory hierarchy as an information collecting network . And this in turn opens up the theoretical possibility of changing the organisation of production radically through restructuring . Ferraris (1981) sums up the situation well . `The new technology of the product (modularisation), of production (automation), and information (distributed information and telecommunications) opens up new spaces to the process of decentralisation of work and machines, which advances simultaneously with the concentration of management and control . This permits the overcoming of the historical tendency of the physical concentration of labour and fixed capital as a necessary condition for the centralisation of command and profits .' (p .25) So far, I have tried to show how the tendency towards decentralisation of production and centralisation of command is taking place . In order to reinforce the argument put forward, I shall cite some Italian examples where it is possible to see this process taking place . Olivetti Olivetti's gradual transformation from an engineering group to an electrical one has been speeded up rapidly in the last few years, with the appearance of the dynamic management techniques of C . De Benedetti . Four particular processes can be seen at work : i) At the financial level, Benedetti has arranged a bewildering series of deals with other international electronics producers which include, Hitachi (marketing), St . Gobain (funds and access to the French market), Data Terminal System (acquisition) and Hermes (take-over of a Swiss typewriter producer) . ii) Within Olivetti's Italian plants there is a move towards automation, using robots and the introduction of computer controlled testing of standardised modules . iii) Most assembly work is still done manually, but the increasing flexibility needed due to the rapid development and obsolescence of models led management to introduce non-linear

DECENTRALISATION assembly in the form of work-islands . iv) While most assembly work is done in the factory some operations like circuit board assembly and wiring are put out to domestic outworkers in the North of Italy . This process is discussed in Pervia (1980) . Benetton Benetton is an Italian clothes producer with a turnover of £250 million a year and sells under the names of Jean's West, Mercerie, Sisley, Tomato, 012, My Market and Benetton . Production and marketing strategies are aimed at achieving two things, the minimisation of costs, the maximisation of flexibility and naturally, profits . This is achieved in the following ways i) Since the fifties Benetton has increasingly decentralised production . It now directly employs only 1,500 workers and puts work out to over 10,000 workers . The directly employed workers work in small plants of 50-60 employees, where the union is `absent or impeded' . ii) In its marketing structure, Benetton has 2000 sales points, but owns none of them . It gives exclusive rights to them . This strategy effectively reduces not only the selling price of the product by cutting the wholesaler out of operation, but it also externalises risks ensuing from fluctuating demand . iii) Computers are used to keep track of production and sales and to swiftly analyse market trends . Stocks are kept to a minimum of undyed clothes that are dyed when required . (See Ferrigolo, 1980) Fiat At Fiat there are four particular things to note : i) a massive expulsion of labour after the defeat of the 1980 strike ii) a big move towards automation with the LAM engine assembly plant and the Robogate body plant, both of which are highly flexible robots operated by a centralised computer system . iii) the introduction of work islands in the LAM system iv) Fiat's use of decentralisation . This has taken three forms : firstly the export of integrated production units to E . Europe, Turkey and Latin America in the early 1970s ; secondly the splitting-up of the integrated cycle and the creation of small specialised plants in the South of Italy, which also began in the early 1970s ; and thirdly, the putting-out of work from the Turin plants to local firms, artisans and outworkers . Following the Japanese model Fiat has recently declared

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that in addition to assembly work, it will only produce the suspension systems and technologically important parts of the car in house . All the rest of the work is to be decentralised, although it is unclear what form this decentralisation will take . There has recently been a devastating rationalisation of outside suppliers, with Fiat cutting the number of its suppliers by twothirds and `encouraging' the survivors to raise productivity and begin to sub-assemble parts in their own firms . Already 40% of the Ritmo model is sub-assembled outside of Fiat's factories . Vittorio Ghidella, managing director of the car division says, `What we have done is to transfer employment from Fiat to outside companies" 2 in order to disintegrate vertically as the Japanese have done . A worker from Fiat's Lingotto pressed steel plant said in 1978 that small is hardly beautiful when you're working in one of the 70 firms with 30-50 employees that make parts of Fiat's decentralised lorry bodywork, where you work Saturdays, and do 10-12 hours overtime each week . He maintained that, `The question of decentralisation and the lack of unity between small and big factories has been the weakest link in the struggles of the past years .' (II Manifesto, 5 .10 .78) Fiat's policy then seems to be aimed at automising what can be automised and decentralising as much as possible so that `decentralisation is the other, almost necessary, face of robotisation and the LAM .' (II Manifesto, 4 .4 .80)

The decline of the mass-collective worker?

In Italy the increased pace of decentralisation, automation, internationalisation and an eventual frontal attack on the working class were provoked by two principal developments - the emergence of a militant, well organised labour movement and the stagnation of world markets . The heightened shop floor struggles in the large and medium factories threatened the very `efficiency' of Fordist production techniques, based on the maximum flexibility and total subordination of labour to capital . The strength and combatitivity of the large and medium factory proletariat made impossible a restoration of managerial control through economic recession and increased factory repression, as had happened in 1963-4 . Increased competition in world markets and the slump of 1974 made it difficult for firms to pass on the costs imposed on them by labour's gains, while labour rigidity reduced their ability to respond to fluctuations in increasingly unstable markets . As a consequence large firm profit rates fell . Decentralisation was then grasped on initially as a shortterm strategy aimed at evading the labour movement's advances, in that it attempted to compensate high labour costs and low

DECENTRALISATION flexibility in the large and medium factories by directly creating or putting work out to small production units, artisans and domestic outworkers, where the influence of the unions was minimal (the small firms in question often being hidden in the submerged economy) . However, the longer term aim of decentralisation, automation, and the over-arching control of production by electronic information systems is the destruction of the spontaneous organisation of the mass worker on a collective basis . The dramatic confrontation at Fiat in 1980 hides a strategy which implies much more than a temporary political defeat for the large factory proletariat . Whereas decentralisation was initially a short-term response, its very efficacy has largely precluded a recentralisation of production . Indeed it has been used in conjunction with automation to begin to dismember the large factory proletariat through the increasing division and dispersion of into small plants and into the sweatshop where accumulation is unrestrained by organised labour . This is not to imply that the mass-collective worker is now politically insignificant . Indeed the power of organised labour based largely on the mass-collective worker is such, that Frobel et al (1980) say, `Any company, almost irrespective of its size, which wishes to survive is now forced to initiate a transnational reorganisation of production .' (p . 15) in order to take advantage of the cheap abundant and well disciplined labour of the underdeveloped countries . Undoubtedly an international reorganisation of capital is taking place but as Graziani argues (1982 :34), decentralisation draws attention to the fact that an abundant, potentially cheap and well disciplined labour force is also available within some advanced capitalist countries . In addition, decentralisation reveals how capital gains access to that labour, while at the same time attempting to `run down' the large factory proletariat, in an effort to restore the competitiveness of mature technology commodities in European markets . If the aim of decentralisation is ultimately the destruction of the large factory proletariat, its consequence is the recomposition of the industrial working class along new lines and divisions . As we have seen decentralisation takes many forms and to each of these forms correspond different and often new, types of worker . The splitting-up of the production cycle, which is often combined with a restructuring of the labour process creates highly mobile small production units . As Amin (1983) shows, the firm undertaking splitting-up may then search out a particular labour force that embodies the socio-economic characteristics that it considers to be optimal for profitability, taking the fixed

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capital to the labour force rather than risking its `contagion' through migration and education in the large industrial town . Putting-out creates a whole myriad of workers who are seldom immediately visible . In the small firm the labour process and conditions of work vary enormously between firms in the same industry, while the composition of the labour force, its traditions, experience and aspirations largely remain a mystery . An `apprentice' working in a tiny firm in Turin expresses some of the contradictions that are lived by a small firm worker, `The tiny firm is an inferno, but it is also a hope, and something near to yourself . Yes, but I know . . . that here the work is also being deskilled, but the idea still exists that you can learn a skill here, that they'll teach you something . You're a worker, but at least you can hope to become a good one . Its not really like this deep-down, and everyone knows it, but where do you go if not here? Do you think Fiat's better? The big factory, in a certain sense, scares everyone ; these days you only go when you've given up hope . . . . Here they exploit you but you're part of town, your place . You're treated badly, slapped around, but in that place, you see yourself in the work you do .' (II Manifesto, 16 .5 .80) Paternalistic relations are common on the shop-floor, with absolute power resting in the hands of the entrepreneur, whereas familial and social ties often link worker and boss outside the factory . In the small firm the relation of labour to capital is often unmediated by unions and labour legislation . It is factory despotism without the large factory and implies the reproduction of the mass, but non-collective, worker at a higher stage of the real subordination of labour to capital where the labour process is fragmented between many small production units, or into the minute division of labour between outworkers and artisans who supervise their own exploitation . Graziosi (1979) who has done some fine work on restructuring in Italy, makes an important point when he says, `The kernel of the strategy of decentralisation lies in the marginalisation, the increasing precariousness of vast social strata starting with the young, women and the old .' (p .152) It needs to be stressed that the marginality of these social strata is not economic - since they play a vital role in capitalist acuumulation - but rather it is political and social ." The Bologna engineering industry illustrates the complexity of the composition of just one part of the proletariat and the divisions and potential for marginalisation that exist in it are many . In it are found so called `unskilled' women workers doing assembly work in the submerged economy, N . African men in small foundries, workers

DECENTRALISATION in artisan shops supervising numerically controlled machine tools, workers with strong economic and cultural ties with the land working in remote rural factories, plus the workers in the larger factories with their militant uniion tradition and relatively privileged position . It is conceivable that at one time all these workers might have been employed in the same factory and joined by the formal and informal networks and organisations that workers establish, from which their demands and grievances are voiced and from which a collective response is developed . With workers in a firm scattered territorially, socially and culturally, in different conditions of work and often invisible from one another, the problem of uniting a single workforce, let alone the class, is daunting . This raises the question as to whether the shop-floor organisation of unions - in Italy, the factory council and its delegates - can be an effective unifying organisation if it is confined to one factory when the production cycle is being fragmented between plants and firms and domestic outworkers . The recomposition of the Italian industrial working class is then exacerbating and creating new divisions which are leading to the growth of new sections of the proletariat and to the future weakening of a declining and besieged large factory proletariat . A first conclusion that can be drawn from this is that any faith in a recuperation of the union movement `in the economic upturn' is fundamentally misplaced and it is sadly ironic, but indicative, that the Fiat workers were beaten when the Italian economy was experiencing a mini-boom . A `clawback ; is made unlikely because the mass-collective worker is being displaced and probably no longer has the strength and cohesion to lead the industrial working class : in future struggles . This does not imply however that the decline of the large factory and the mass-collective worker can be equated with the end of the shop floor or class struggle . Rather the problem is finding the strategy and organisational forms that will allow new and changed members of the proletariat to express their needs and desires and unite with the older sections of the class to fight for common ends . The Italian experience shows that this is a difficult task and many mistakes have been made . Unions forged out of the struggles of the mass-collective worker have too often tried to impose unsuited strategies and organisations on small firm and diffused workers, while obstructing the creation of organisational forms more suited to their particular circumstances and grievances . This can be seen especially in the failure to form horizontal organisations that link workers in different firms at the local level in Italy, particularly in areas where decentralisation has led to the weakening of informal social and political networks that link workers and collectivise their experiences . In Britain it can be

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seen by the continuing lack of official support for combine committees . (See Lane, 1982 :8) The Italian labour movement has been quick to recognise that `diffused' workers exist but for many reasons it has been extremely slow to find out what these workers want from the unions . A consequence of this is that there is a great deal of misunderstanding between the labour movement, which sometimes seethe `diffused' workers as docile, passive and of marginal significance, and the `diffused' workers themselves, who see the labour movement as being deaf and blind to their grievances and vulnerability . Britain is not Italy and the mass-collective worker has not dominated the British labour movement to the same extent as in Italy, but this paper has suggested that decentralisation, automation and information technology are particularly effective means for attacking organised labour's power and autonomy, through the expulsion and dispersion of labour from large factories, sites and industrial towns . In Britain, the US and Japanese firms in S . Wales and Scotland are the result of but one type of decentralisation, while the domestic outworkers recently reported to be earning less than £35 a week are another . The textile firm director who `optimistically' told the Financial Times

(4 .8 .82), `I have this vision that St Helens could become the Hong Kong of the North West' is the voice of a growing submerged and dispersed economy . The British industrial working class is iteslf being rapidly restructured but the labour movement still largely clings to craft organisations and traditions . Holland (1982) and Lane (1982) have both recently drawn attention to decentralisation in Britain and raised serious doubts about what Lane calls the unions' attempts to, `take themselves by the scruff of the neck and shake themselves into the shape necessary to cope with what is effectively a new environment .' (p .13) This paper suggests that the reshaping of industry and the working class may accelerate further and faster than has yet been generally realised by the labour movement and the left in Britain . Hopefully the issues are becoming clearer, even if the answers seem to be a long way off.

I gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the SSRC for this research . And many thanks to Ash Amin, Bob Mannings, Donald MacKenzie, Mario Pezzini, Harvie Ramsay and everyone else who read and commented on earlier drafts of this paper .



DECENTRALISATION (1) For other articles on decentralisation in Italy in English see Amin (1983) Brusco (1982) Goddard (1981) and Mattera (1980) . (2) "`Small is lovely' says Soviet economist" Financial Times 9 .12 .82 . (3) Blair (1972) says, p.113 "Beginning with the new technologies of the Industrial Revolution, the veneration of size has come to take on the character of a mystique, and, like most mystiques, it has come to enjoy an independent life of its own ." (4) See Brusco in FLM Bergamo (1975) p .45-7 . Prais (1976) p .52-3 Blair (1972) ch . 5 and 6 and Marx (1976) p .603-4 . (5) see Marx (1976) p.604-5 for a discussion of the Factory Acts and the effect they had on domestic industry . (6) For a typology of small firms see Brusco and Sabel (1981) . They suggest a lot of small firms in Emilia are relatively independent whereas Del Monte (1982) is less optimistic about the position of small firms in the South of Italy (p.125) . And many small firms in Japan are `wholly dependent on a single buyer' Patrick and Rosovosky (1976) p .509-513 . (7) In Japan there has been a `rather rapid filtering down' in the form of numerically controlled machine tools from big to small firms (Financial Times Survey (1981) . Macrae (1982) cites the example of the small Japanese firm where a leased, second hand robot system hammers out components in a 'backshed' workshop . For work on Britain in this area see Massey and Meegan (1982) (8) Fothergill and Gudgin (1982) and Lane (1982) . `us Auto makers reshape for world competition', in Business Week (9) 21 .6 .82 . See also Griffiths (1982) . (10) See Manacorda (1976) . See also the excellent pamphlet produced by the Joint Forum of Combine Committees (1982) . Quote from a union militant in Turin, in Il Manifesto, (11) special supplement on Cassa Integrazione, 1982 . Cited in, `Fiat Follows Japan's Production Road Map' Business (12) Week 4 .10 .82 . See also Sunday Times Business News 10 .10 .82 and Amin (1983) . For a discussion of Taylorism, the mass-collective worker and the (13) changing class composition in Italy see Ferraris (1981) Rieser (1981) Santi (1982) and Accornero (1979) and (1981) . (14) This process of marginalisation and division has been aided by left analysis where `women are seen as marginal workers and hence as marginal trade unionists' . (csE Sex and Class the labour process debate has limited its analysis to those labour processes, that are found in big factories largely employing men . The fact that in Britain, men have largely theorised this labour process, while women have been largely responsible for an analysis of domestic outwork is indicative of the difficulties facing the labour movement and the left . It is vital that left theorists should avoid reproducing the very divisions they are studying . Accornero, A . (1979) `La classe operaia nella societa' italiana' Proposte n .81 Accornero, A . (1981) 'Sindicato e Rivoluzione Sociale . Il caso Italiano degli anni '70" Laboratorio Politico n .4. Amin, A . (1983) `Restructuring in Fiat and the Decentralisation of Production into Southern Italy' in, Hudson R and Lewis J, C & C 19 - G

Notes

References

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Dependent Development in Southern Europe, Methuen, London . Bagnasco, A . Messori, M . Trigilia, C . (1978) Le Problematiche dello sviluppo Italiano Feltrinelli, Milan . Blair, J .M . (1972) Economic Concentration ; Structure, Behaviour and Public Policy Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, New York . Brunetta, R . Celata, G . Dalla Chiesa, N . Martinelli, A . (1980) L'Impresa in Frantumi Editrice Sindacale Italiana, Rome . Brusco, S . (1982) `The Emilian Model ; Productive Decentralisation and Social Integration' Cambridge Journal Of Economics n .2, June . Brusco, S . and Sabel, C . (1981) `Artisan Production and Economic Growth' in Wilkinson (1981) . Celata, G . (1980), 'L'operaio disperso', in Brunetta, R et al . Ciborra, C . (1979) L'automazione nell 'industria dell 'auto' Sapere n .816 . CSE Sex and Class Group (1982) `Sex and Class' Capital & Class n . 16 . Del Monte, A . (1982) Decentramento internazionale e decentramento produttivo II caso dell'industria elettronica Loescher, Turin . Dina, A. (1981) Lotta operaia a it nuovo use capitalistico delle macchine' Unita' Proletaria 3/4 1981 . Ferraris, P. (1981) Taylor in Italia : conflitto e risposta sulla organizzazione del lavoro `Unita' Proletaria 3/4 . Ferrigolo, A . (1982) 'Sogno italiano per famiglia veneta' 11 Manifesto 3 .6 .82 . Financial Times Survey : Japan the Information Revolution 6 .7 .81 . FLM Bologna (1975) Occupazione, Sviluppo Economico, Territorio sEUSi, Rome. FLM Emilia Romagnia (1981) Quaderni di Appunti, Bologna FLM Bergamo (1975) Sindacato e Piccola Impresa De Donato, Bari . Fothergill, S . and Gudgin, G . (1982) Unequal Growth Heinemann, London . Frobel, F. Heinrichs, J . Kreye, O . (1980) The New International Division of Labour cup Cambridge . Goddard, V . (1981) `The Leather Trade in Naples' Institute of Development Studies Bulletin 12,n .3 Graziani, A . (1982) `La macchina dell'inflazione e la mano invisibile dei padroni .' Unita' Proletaria n . 1-2, September . Graziosi, A . (1979) La Ristrutturazione nelle Grandi Fabbriche 1973-6 Feltrinelli, Milan . Griffiths, J . (1982) `Robots March into European Factories' Financial Times Survey of the Motor Industry 19 .10.82 . Hall, S . (1982) `A Long Haul' Marxism Today November . Joint Forum of Combine Committees (1982) The Control of New Technology . Lane, T . (1982) `The Unions : Caught on the Ebb Tide' Marxism Today Sept . Leoni, G . (1978) `Economic sommersa, ma non troppo' I Consigli 57/8 . Macrae, N . (1982) `Intrapreneurial Now' Economist 17 .4 .82 . Manacorda, P . (1976) 11 Calcolatore del Capitale Feltrinelli, Milan . Manwaring, T . (1981) `Labour Productivity and the Crisis at BSC : Behind the Rhetoric' Capital & Class 14 . Marx, K . (1976) Capital Vol . I Penguin, Harmondsworth .

DECENTRALISATION Massey, D . and Meegan, R . The Anatomy of7ob Loss Methuen, London . Mattera, P . (1980)'Small is not beautiful : decentralized production and the underground economy' Radical America October/September 1980 . Paci, M . (1975) 'Crisi, Ristrutturazione e Piccola Impresa' Inchiesta October/December 1975 . Paci, M . (1980) Famiglia e Mercato del Lavoro in un'economia periferica Angeli, Milan . Patrick, H . and Rosovsky, H . (eds) (1976) Asia's New Giant Brookings Institute, Washington . Perna, N . (1980) `L'operaio, punto debole du una macchina altrimenti perfetta' Quaderni di Fabbrica e Stato 14 . Prais, S . J . (1976) The Evolution of Giant Firms in Britain 1909-1970 cup, Cambridge . Prais, S .J . (1982) `Strike frequencies and plant size : a comment on Swedish and UK experiences' British Journal of Industrial Relations March, XX, I . Revelli, M . (1982) `Defeat at Fiat' Capital & Class 16 . Rieser, V (1981) 'Sindacato e Composizione di Classe' Laboratorio Politico 4 Rubery, J . and Wilkinson, F . (1981) `Outwork and Segmented Labour Markets' in Wilkinson (1981) . Santi, P . (1982) `All'origine della crisi del sindicato' Quaderni Piacentini Wilkinson, F . (1981) The Dynamics of Labour Market Segmentation Academic Press, London . Wood, R .C . (1980) `Japan's Multitier wage system' Forbes August 18th . Young, K . (ed) Of Marriage and the Market CSE Books, London . Young, K . (1981) `Domestic Outwork and the Decentralisation of Production' Paper presented to ILO Regional Meeting on Women and Rural Development, Mexico . Zollo, G . (1979) 'Informatizzazione, Automazione e Forza Operaia' Unita' Proletaria 3/4 .

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Lorelei Harris

Industrialisation, women and working class politics in the west of Ireland A mass entry of women into industry has been the result of state-sponsored industrialization in Ireland . This study of women at work in multinational enterprises in Co . Mayo examines the implications for trade unionism . It is argued that while women have weakened the possibilities for trade union militancy in the private sector, the increased female presence in the labour force will have a positive long term effect on working class politics in the Republic, since women now have a voice outside the home .

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1958, Ireland' has experienced a prodcess of rapid, state-sponsored industrialisation . This article is about one aspect of that process . It looks at the regional effects of contemporary industrialization in the west of Ireland and, more specifically, at the implications of these effects for British working class politics . The main thrust of the Irish state's strategy for industrialisation has been premised on the development of an international system of production in transnational corporations and on the increased potential which this has implied for the location of branch plants on the European periphery . Embodied in the planning policies and activities of the Development Authority Industrial (IDA), 3 this strategy has consisted primarily in attracting foreign capital through a range of grants and incentives made available to potential investors on a sliding scale depending upon location SINCE

INDUSTRIALISATION AND WOMEN throughout the Republic .' It has been aided at different times by a varying combination of factors such as proximity to European markets, the possibility of a relatively cheap and/or malleable European labour force and appallingly low level of environmental legislation . The result has been two major patterns of foreign investment . The early 1960s and 1970s saw small firms locate in Ireland mainly because of export profit tax relief (EPTR) and low labour costs in comparison with other European countries . In the mid 1970s, however, this pattern gave way to one of largescale, high technology units of multinational corporations . This may be explained partly by rising labour costs and the fact that EPTR, which is due to be phased out completely by 1990, is no longer made available to incoming firms . More importantly, the critical incentives to invest during the earlier period were superseded in the mid 1970s by considerations such as Ireland's membership of the EEC, its lack of environmental and/or effective health constraints on industry, the possibility of nonrepayable grants of up to sixty per cent on fixed assets and, since 1978, the introduction of a low rate corporation tax of ten per cent for manufacturing industries which is guaranteed until 2000 . It is against this background of a high level of dependence on foreign capital and of state intervention in the economy that the social effects of Ireland's industrialisation have to be viewed . One of the most important has been a restructuring of the Irish working class in terms of sectoral composition, geographical distribution and gender composition . New industry has meant a growth in the private manufacturing sector, though the extent of this is frequently exaggerated . It has also res-

ulted in a massive growth of state sector employment to service incoming industry . At the same time, the IDA's locational policy has led to a partial deindustrialisation of Dublin and the creation of an industrial labour force in areas such as the Shannon region, Galway and north Mayo . Finally, the mainly semi-skilled character of the new manufacturing work has, as elsewhere, resulted in a mass entry of women into industry . This restructuring has had important consequences for trade unionism . The past thirty years have seen increasing trade union militancy in the state sector which has not been matched in the private sector . This can be explained partly by the effects of branch plant location on working class organisation (Wickham : 1980) and by the muzzling nature of industrial agreements . However, by assuming a totally male working class and/or by aggregating women to men, most analyses underplay the significance of gender in the uneven development of trade union militancy . This article is an attempt to redress the balance . It looks at the entry of women into industry in north Mayo' and the implications of this for trade unionism . In describing the factory work which women do and the way they view their work it will be argued that in the context of recent Irish industrialisation, women have weakened the possibilities for trade union militancy in the private sector . In other directions, however, the very fact of an increasing female presence in the labour force' has positive long term implications for working class politics in the Republic . Industrialisation and the Wild West In the IDA Regional Industrial Plans 1973-1977, County Mayo was earmarked

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CAPITAL & CLASS 102 as one of six counties requiring `special remedial action' to alleviate `regional imbalance' (IDA : 1972 : pt .I : 28-37) . Between 1961 and 1971, Mayo had the second highest levels of population decline and unemployment in the Republic . Of its working population, with 56 .4 per cent in agriculture, forestry and fishing and 28 .7 per cent in services, only 14 .9 per cent were involved in industry . The industry which existed was mainly in areas which employed men : water and electricity supply ; turf production ; building and construction . The majority of the `gainfully occupied' female population (15 .6 per cent of the total female polulation at the 1966 census) worked in the service sector . Mayo thus became one of the IDA's `designated areas' in which greater incentives are offered to potential investors than elsewhere in the state . In relation to north Mayo, the `special remedial action' meted out by the IDA consisted in grouping together four towns and placing a combined planning target of six hundred new manufacturing jobs on the towns and their rural catchment areas (IDA ; 1972 : pt 2 .20) . Through both IDA planning and local efforts, 7 two multinational branch plants were established and already operative firms within the town grouping were given small and/or new industry grants . The short term effects were dramatic . By 1979, north Mayo was heading for the peak of a boom period . With an increasing number of returned emigrants and migration from neighbouring counties its population grew at a faster rate than at any time since the famine of the 1840s . An already well-developed service sector expanded further to cater for the newly established industries and the buying power generated in wages and salaries . In turn, this meant that

more non-unionised tertiary sector jobs were created for women . Since the factories had not been too carefully sited, the romanticised west of Ireland marketed by Bord Failte (Tourist Board) was transformed overnight into the IDA's wild west, attracting a multitude of cowboys to the new industrial frontier . As one of the local inhabitants drunkenly put it : `These factories are the IDA's paper tiger' . In industry, the initial effects were to be seen in job creation and a changing gender composition of the manufacturing industrial labour force . By 1979, the multinationals had generated approximately 2,100 jobs of which 1,785 were held by women . The reasons for this large-scale entry of women into new industry are clear . Firstly, the new firms, involved variously in the manufacture of medical and pharmeceutical products and synthetic fibre, provide predominantly `feminine' work : that is, semiskilled jobs entailing high levels of manual dexterity and an ability to work at speed . Secondly, with some of these firms involved in continuous production, a relatively malleable labour force is important : women, as will be shown, suited the bill . Besides the multinationals, a further eight companies were employing a mainly female labour force for similar kinds of work . These offered approximately 672 jobs of which 541 were held by women .' This, then, was the picture in north Mayo from the time the factories first opened in the mid 1970s until the middle of 1980, when closures and redundancies finally came to the west of Ireland . Women were recruited into factory jobs through personal contacts (friends and/or relatives already working), through individual enquiries to personnel officers, through the National

INDUSTRIALISATION AND WOMEN Manpower agency (state employment bureau) or through advertised interviews held regularly in one of the local hotels . While most women workers were young (under tenty-five) and single, there were also a considerable number of older and married women working in the factories . Slightly more than half of the women tended to come from farm backgrounds and commuted to work . Alternatively, they lived in Ballina (the main town) during the week and returned home at weekends . The remainder was drawn from working class families in the towns, and, to a lesser extent, from lower middle class families . Before recent industrialisation, the north Mayo working class was predominantly male and employed mainly in state sector industry . By contrast, the newly emerged working class is predominantly female and employed in private industry . While the creation of a new working class in such areas has obviously increased the numerical strength of the working class in the Republic, this does not necessarily imply an increase in trade union militancy . One woman worker highlighted some of the main problems experienced in the new factories : In a factory like Naguishi 9 there's an awful lot of people who have an agricultural background and who do parttime farming and that . There's a different traditon . . . We haven't had fathers and grandfathers who've been fitters in Guinness's (in Dublin) for twenty-five years .

Women and work This description is based on a study of three factories : two multinationals and an Irish public company with a high proportion of British shareholders . 11 The

multinationals make plastic medical products and synthetic fibre mainly used in industry . The Irish firm makes a range of plastic and vinyl toys and footballs ." production processes While the involved do not exhaust the full spectrum of industrial work open to women in the area, they are nevertheless representative of it . Women's employment is subject to protective legislation . They cannot be employed in industrial work between 10 .00p .m . and 8 .00a .m . on consecutive days or work without a break of eleven hours between the end of one working day and the beginning of the next (Conditions of Employment Act : 1936 : pt . III : section 45(1)) . Within these parameters, each factory employs female labour in a different way . In both of the multinationals, women's working day is divided into two shifts after an initial training period on days : in one, the day and evening shifts are rotated on a weekly basis ; in the other the shift staffs are permanent . In the third factory, women work a flat day shift consisting of four nine and a half hour days and one fivehour day a week . The actual work varies from factory to factory depending on the products being manufactured . In Brentwood, the American multinational, female workers are divided into permanent sections of between six and ten women who are responsible for assembling and/or testing ostomy bags and medical identity bracelets for infants . This work is done on the basis of a daily quota allotted to each woman within a section and, by implication, to the section as a whole . In Naguishi, the Japanese multinational, all the women workers are employed in the spinning shop which is divided into four sections, each containing high technology spinning machines . As the un-

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CAPITAL & CLASS 104 processed fibre moves from one machine to another, it is progressively and automatically spun into finer yarn . Here, women's work consists of patrolling the machines, making sure the yarn remains continuous throughout its spinning and splicing/re-joining it when it becomes snarled . Though the machines differ slightly from section to section, women do the same tasks in each section . As in Brentwood, there is no task rotation in Naguisihi . Women in other factories are only trained to operate one kind of machine . In Naguishi, however, sectional work is not of the assembly line type with respect to either the tasks involved or to some kind of implied sociability . The spinning shop has an extremely high noise level and this, in combination with the fact that each woman has to patrol a section of machinery within one of the four sections, means that the work is highly isolated . In any case, women's work in West Limited would dispute an image of the assembly line as giving rise to sociability, congeniality and so on . With the exception of the football section in West, all of the women work on assembly lines . Each line is responsible for assembling or spray painting a particular toy and the number of women on a line varies with the item in production at any one time . Work is organised on an hourly quota system, with a bonus scheme for any production over the quota . Whether because of the quota system or the bonus scheme, assembly line work in West creates more dissention, anxiety and tension than any other aspect of work in the factory (cf. Herzog : 1980) . It is also the only one of three factories in which tasks are rotated . Over a period of approximately fourteen months, most of the women work the full range of jobs open to them ." In a context of labour intensive producion,

where skill consists mainly in speed and speed means more money in their hands, the women in West resent task rotation bitterly . They feel (quite rightly) that it disadvantages them in relation to the bonus scheme . As soon as they get their speed up to the required level on one line, they are moved to another . These differences aside, women's work in the factories shares certain characteristics . First, women are not employed in skilled jobs or to serve craft apprenticeships . With the exception of (unskilled) cleaners, they are taken on to do semiskilled work which falls exclusively at the lower end of the semi-skilled pay scale . All of the jobs done by women entail mindlessly boring, repetitive and exhausting tasks which require high levels of manual dexterity and the acquisition of non-transferable skills . Second, these skills, though surrounded by an aura of high technology and glossy sophistication, remain at the level of hard physical labour . As the women say, it does not take genius or extensive training to do their jobs . It is likely that women aquire the skills they need before going to work, through their upbringing in the home (Elson and Pearson : 1981 : 93-94) . This is suggested by the appalling training conditions in all three factories . Yet in-job training is written into job descriptions and trade union agreements in the form of probationary periods with lower wages . Furthermore, as part of the IDA strategy, grants are provided for training . Third, the work done by women tends to militate against shop floor solidarity . The divisive implications of quota and bonus schemes, noise levels and physical isolation all contribute towards individualising women workers through an unremitting combination of

INDUSTRIALISATION AND WOMEN tension and fear . Fortunately, this is mitigated by the other side of factory work : the informal and/or anti-work aspects of a highly regimented and authoritarian system of work organisation . Though generated exclusively at work, these `informal work practices' remain formally unrecognised in the scope, organisation and structure of factory work . It is possible to distinguish three types of informal work practice . These are firstly, practices which are tacitly recognised but not formally acknowledged by management, such as private transport systems to and from work, forms of assistance given to pregnant women on the shop floor and ways of dealing with the absence of maternity leave . Secondly, there are a range of informal work practices which are neither recognised or acknowledged by management . The prime example of these is `dossing' : ways of taking time off between meal breaks . Thirdly, there are practices which fall completely outside the sphere of management authority and exist independently of it in overt expressions of solidarity among workers . Examples are anniversary and ceremonial cards, collections for wreaths or wedding presents and so on . Through such informal work practices, workers establish bonds of solidarity with one another which cut across the individualising routine of factory work . Such bonds may operate regularly for short periods of time, as in the daily car pools . Alternatively, they may exist sporadically over longer/shorter periods, as in task exchange between pregnant and non-prenant women . Known as `the crack' (fun/what's going on), their significance lies in the definite space workers negotiate for themselves within the realm of formal work . These practices do not

necessarily provide the basis for institutionalised opposition within a trade union structure . However, they do indicate that women workers can and do create solidarity among themselves, contrary to management myth on the subject . Given this, why do women working in the private sector find it diffificult to become actively involved in the trade union movement?

Gender and Trade Unionism Part of the answer undoubtedly lies with the unions themselves . While there is growing concern in the labour movement about the position of women in industry and the low level of active female participation, individual unions reproduce gender divisions and inequalities through their activities at branch and shop floor level . This may be seen clearly in north Mayo . Between 1976 and 1979, the north Mayo membership of the Irish Transport and General Workers Union (ITGWU), the largest trade union in the area, more than doubled from 2,000 to 4,500 ." this increase was largely due to the expansion of industry and to the existence, until 1980, of closed shop agreements which the ITGW U had with most of the factories . Since approximately 1,785 women entered industrial wage-labour during this time, semi-skilled women workers accounted for around 71 .4 per cent of the new membership . Given this, it is surprising how little the ITGWU has done for its women members . Take three simple ways in which the unions could act for women in the factories : creche facilities, paid maternity leave and equal pay . None of the north Mayo factories has creches . Furthermore, the question of day care amenities for the children of

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CAPITAL & CLASS 106 working mothers (and fathers) has not even arisen at branch or shop floor level . It is not considered a relevant trade union issue . Part of the responsibility for this lies with the women themselves . There is still a considerable degree of social shame attached to the idea of women with preschool children going out to work . It raises the spectre of inadequate motherhood and neglected children . Waves of migration from the West of Ireland have also taken their toll . Quite apart from the standard idea that women's place is in the home, the notion of motherhood as sacrifice is still very deeply rooted . For working women with young children, wage labour is a question of necessity . It is not something to be `flaunted' or `celebrated' publicly . An overt demand for creche facilities at work would have the following implicatons . Firstly, it would mean supporting a demand with which most working women disagree fundamentally . Secondly, for working mothers with young children, it would bring social shame on themselves and their families . Thirdly, it would cut across bonds of solidarity which women workers, irrespective of age and marital/maternal status, have fledged among themselves . The other part of the responsibility for the lack of creche facilities lies with the union . The ITGWU articulates a spurious argument about trade union democracy : since women have not demanded creches, the union will not fight for them . However, when craft workers want to quit the union for craft unions the ITGWU is quick to ignore their wishes and defuse industrial action . Settling a maintenance fitters' dispute in a continuous production factory is of concern to both union and management . The rights of semi-skilled women

workers are not . Women workers are expendible ; male craft workers are not . Women's rights are ignored by the union because they would rock the trade union-management boat, carefully constructed through a series of `sweetheart' agreements, worked out before there is any factory or workers . By the day the first worker clocked on, bargaining power had been pre-empted through the closed shop, pay, sick pay, holiday and sick leave conditions . In refusing to tackle `women's issues' the ITGWU has effectively colluded in the reproduction of gender inequalities . This will continue to be the case until such time as the unions take an unequivocal stand on such questions . 11 The same conditions apply in relation to maternity leave . None of the north Mayo factories has paid maternity leave ." Women therefore have three alternatives after the birth of a child . Firstly, they can give up work permanently until social circumstances allow them to return (for example, children going to school) . Secondly, they can leave work for a few months, have their jobs provisionally held open and return at a probationary rate of pay . This affects their rights to redundancy pay and, since redundancies operate on a `last in first out' basis, women stand to lose seniority through childbirth . Thirdly, women can stay `on the sick' for a few weeks after giving birth . Few women do this . As already mentioned, peer group pressure militates against women returning to work with a young baby at home . Pressure from husbands, relatives and friends also dictates that women should stay at home (preferably permanently) after the birth of a child . In any case most women find they are too exhausted and, anyway, cannot cope with work and a new child simultaneously .



INDUSTRIALISATION AND WOMEN While the union does nothing about paid maternity leave, issues of this nature exacerbate existing gender divisions within the factories . When one of the few women shop stewards to have survived the ribald sexism of her fellow trade unionists raised the question at a shop stewards' meeting, she got this response : . . .There was the usual crack about it . I forget the actual words but it was a bit of a laugh and `can't they take the pain' . And somebody said : `Well there aren't any married women here anyway, so it's not a major issue' and I said : `I'm not talking about married women or single women, I'm talking about women' . And somebody said : `The young kids will be getting up the stick (pregnant)' . You know, this kind of shit and . . . there's no enthusiasm down there for it, because as soon as you mention `women's matters', as they see it, that's it . And they all sit back and light fags, you know . A similar situation applies with respect to equal pay . The Anti-Discrimination (Pay) Act 1974 came into operation at the end of 1975 . As elsewhere, it places the onus upon women to prove that they are performing like work (Wayne, 1980 : 163-164) . Given the lack of cooperation between female and male workers, this frequently becomes extremely difficult, if not impossible . In north Mayo, only one factory has equal pay . When women in Naguishi first raised the issue, the gender divisions within the factory became very clear : When it was first annouced that we were going for equal pay, it was funny . . . well, it really wasn't funny at all . . . This shop steward in the same section as me he calls himself `the shop steward for the fellas' - called this meeting at the Hotel to object to the fact that they weren't consulted as to whether we

deserved equal pay or not . He got all these guys worked up about it and that it was eroding their differentials-which was cock and bull . He just expected the men to go so they could discuss it among themselves and settle it and come back and tell us, you know . We went to the meeting . And all these fellas got up and made these speeches and said it was insulting and degrading . This shop steward made out a speech and said it just wasn't on and all this kind of thing . All of the factories in north Mayo have (or have had) women shop stewards . However, as the same woman indicates, they face a series of problems in relation to the union bureaucracy : I represent all the women on the shift and, until lately, I represented women in the other shift as well . But it was kind of impossible because I never saw them . There's a girl who's doing it now . . . she's only elected two days and she says she doesn't want to do it any more . They're a particularly nervy crowd anyway . People are militant in a certain way but there's this thing about going into the office . . . actually going into meetings . Like if ten fellas and one girl went to a meeting, someone would always crack a joke . All the fellas would say : `Oh good, a gang bang' and this sort of stuff . And they were always at it, so if you were particularly sensitive, it'd wear you down pretty quick . So that this is the thing . Women would like to do it but they don't want to do it . . . that sort of way . They (male shop stewards) put shop stewards (women) through their fingers like sweets . According to the branch secretary, women are encouraged to attend union meetings and to become actively involved in the ITGWU . To this end, shop

107

INDUSTRIALISATION AND WOMEN stewards' courses are run locally from time to time and/or people are sent to attend courses in Dublin . According to the women, however, they are frequently not told when union meetings are to be held . Alternatively, they find meeting times set before or at the end of shift inconvenient in the face of domestic responsibilities and/or travelling distances between work and home . They also feel that discussions of male differentials/ grading and craft workers' problems have little do with them . North Mayo is no exception . Throughout the country, trade unions are reluctant to take up `women's matters' at branch and shop floor level . This has two major effects upon women workers . Firstly, as has been mentioned, it reproduces and exacerbates gender divisions at work . Through their ambiguous attitude to women's rights at branch level, the unions have effectively licensed sexism on the shop floor . Women, in turn, define themselves in opposition to both management and male workers . Thus, while women and men share the same informal work practices, these assume very different meanings . For men, `the crack' is a continuation of forms of male association which exist outside work . For women, on the other hand, it is specific to work . It gives them a way of defining themselves sharply against male workers and a weapon against the gender inequalities they see as emanating from men on the shop floor, backed by the unions . Secondy, it leads directly to the situation lamented by trade unionists at a national level : a lack of involvement of women workers in the trade union movement . Most women see the trade unions as something completely outside their world : a bureaucratic hierarchy

that sometimes fixes things and most of 109 the time does not . In north Mayo, few women have a notion of the ITGWU as a nationwide organisation which they in their part constitute through membership : Dublin and Saint John Kennedy and James Connolly'h are just from another cosmos entirely and all that's familiar is if you saw it on the screen . . . Ah, did you ever know! Rather, they view the union as simply an organisation which takes subscriptions off their wages each week and does nothing in return . This view has been reinforced partly by the closed shop : W e were brought up here at about eleven o'clock, up to the Transport Office and signed something and given a slip and then went home . In fact, it was the bloody mangement who mentioned the union . It was as if Transport was a side office of Brentwood . There was no difference . You signed for Brentwood, you signed for Transport . . . `We're all in the same boat' . Actually, it was worse . I could have been joining the Gestapo . I wouldn't have known the difference if I didn't particularly care . And nobody has made a conscious decision to join the union . However, women's view of the union may also be seen as part of a vicious circle of inactivity, initiated by the lack of concern and interest in the needs of female members : I won't say Transport, but I'll say a lot of people in Transport pay lip service really . Their heart isn't in it, you know . I think a union should be radical on things like this (women's issues) . . . They seem to be half apologising and have to tread softly `because we might tread on their dreams' sort of thing and : `men's ego

CAPITAL & CLASS 110 after thousands of years is suddenly being attacked' and all this kind of shit . Transport Union reminds me of a large political party . . . a complacent political party . We'll take for example Fianna Fail . They're big and they've got a thousand typewriters and a few computers and this kind of thing . . . they just don't give a damn .

Women and Ideologies of Work The attitude of the trade unions is not the only explanation for the lack of female activism . A second aspect of the problem emerges if we look at the ideologies of work held by women . It lies in the fact that women go into the factories with a model of work mapped out in the context of marriage, the family and domestic labour . While this may well be convenient to `the needs of capital' at specific conjunctures, women's unconscious acceptance of their subordination within a structure of patriarchal relations militates against strong and militant trade unionism . Women take patriarchal ideologies into work in the form of their attitudes to wage-labour . They see a woman's place as that of a male-supported dependent in the home and, consequently, view factory work in an extremely short term perspective . The material reality of long term industrial wage-labour is completely irrelevant to this attitude . Women dream that some man will shortly come along and remove them to his home or that their husbands will soon have the means to keep them at home . Women in north Mayo go to work in the factories because there are few viable economic alternatives open to them in the area . The service sector has remained relatively non-unionised and wages are considerably lower than those in in-

dustry . Furthermore, the higher status of shop, office and hotel work does not compensate for the untenable working conditions which are usually justified with notions of being `one of the family' . Trade unionism in industry has resulted in a clear delineation of worker responsibility and management prerogative . While women factory workers thus acquire a dignity and security which is often denied to women in service industries, this has not developed into a notion of a woman's career or independence from men . Work is a necessity and factory work is simply the lesser of the various evils : you clock on, you clock off and you get paid once a week ; `the crack' is better and you meet more people . Within this general attitude to factory work, the reasons for seeing it as essentially short term vary in relation to factors such as age and marital status . Young single women see it as a stop gap until something better comes along. Irrespective of education, this frequently takes the form of aspirations to enter the lower professional occupations which have long atracted Irish women : nursing, banking and the civil service ." Young engaged or married women also regard factory work as transitory, though this is closely related to the men upon whom they see themselves as dependent . They work in factories in order to acquire household commodities and help pay off the builders or the mortgage, until 'HE' can afford to transform them into housewives' 8 . For older married women, work is largely the means to improved living conditions : new furniture, new and better housing, educating children, holidays and so on" . In all three cases, work is seen instrumentally in relation to marriage and the family : as something to be endured until it is no longer necessary, though

INDUSTRIALISATION AND WOMEN this decreases with age . The fact that the short term becomes longer term does not alter the notion of temporary wagelabour . Since women do not see themselves as being in permanent factory work, they tend to regard struggles for better working conditions as external to their world unless there are immediate results . The second way women import domestic models into work lies in the way they do paid labour . Wage-labour tends to assume many of the characteristics usually associated with domestic labour . Most women treat their work as a permanent service rendered to management, beginning with the male supervisor . Arguments over badly done work take the same form as they might over meals being late, shirts not ironed or money wrongly spent . They are seen as personal attacks and internalised as such . Similarly, bonus schemes are not regarded as a dubious way of avoiding payment of good basic wages or as an unacceptable method of raising productivity . Rather, women tend to view them as standing in lieu of verbal praise and as an acknowledgement of their personal efficiency . In other words, women accept male authority in the factory in much the same way as they accept male authority in the home . The work hierarchy is understood in the same terms as the patriarchal hierarchy of the family : on a completely personalised basis as an attribute or effect of individual women's behaviour . Given this, it is perhaps not accidental that most of the supervisory and management staff are men . Work is verbally personalised and specific tasks jealously guarded, as are tools and work benches . While men might also do this, the attributes of good workpersonship differ significantly between the sexes . The criteria for women are the same as

those of an efficient housewife : tidyness, 111 nimbleness, frugality with time and movement and, perhaps most importantly, a personal method of getting through work . In combination with their disillusionment at trade union reticence in pursuing issues relating to women, this introduction of a domestic labour model to deal with the damands of wage-labour hampers a more active female participation in the labour movement . Until such time as one or both of these change, the informal basis of solidarity among women workers will remain, metaphorically, at the level of a chat over the garden wall .

Women and Social Power Before recent industrialisation, women in north Mayo had a limited range of alternatives open to them . A few entered the lower professional ranks or made advantageous marriages . For most women, however, the 1950s and 1960s were bleak . Between 1951 and 1961, the number of women employed in agriculture decline by more than half 20 Though there was a slight increase in female service sector employment during the same period 21 , such jobs were scarce and even more badly paid than they are today . Three main alternatives were open to women . First, they could enter religious orders . Until recently, most Irish religious orders were ranked on a quasiclass basis into choir nuns and lay nuns . Choir nuns were drawn from (relatively) wealthy families, paid a dowry on entering their order and were professionally employed as nurses, teachers and so on . Lay nuns entered without dowries and received housing, clothing, food and an ambiguous social status servicing their follow `sisters' in the confines of the con-

CAPITAL & CLASS 112 vent . The second alternative was emigration . Many women went into service in Britain . They were recruited through Dublin-based employment agencies which placed them with families and hotels ; through friends and relatives who were already working in Britain ; through their own initiative . Other women, particularly those from Donegal and Mayo, joined the annual potato `squads' which moved around Scotland for several months of the year, picking potatoes on a jobbing basis . Still others went further afield to Canada and the United States . Thirdly, women could marry and make ends meet within the home . Given a low and declining female labour force participation rate between 1951 and 1966 11 , it seems probable that many women availed themselves of this choice . However, with high levels of male migration and unemployment, marriage did not necessarily represent the best alternative . The factories, with all their disadvantages, have given women the right to work in the geographical area of their choice . More importantly, industrialisation has resulted in the possibility of a mass female access to social power for the first time in the history of the region . Whatever the myths and realities of the dominant Irish mother, women in the home are to a great extent outside society . Enshrined and sanctified in the 1937 Constitution, the family and women's position within it have been privatised increasingly by successive legislation . It is a familiar story : married women have minimal welfare rights ; restricted parental rights ; no rights to the control of their bodies and fertility . In combination with this legal position, women in the home are further marginalised insofar as they take their class positions from those of their husbands

and/or fathers . Their social universe is largely mediated by their kinship and marital relationships with men . The form of power they enjoy is thus a specific form of dominance within an overall subordination : submission to an ultimate patriarchal authority structure . While this will continue as long as existing family structures endure, the movement of women into wage-labour is nevertheless an encouraging sign of the appropriation of social power . In north Mayo, this appropriation of social power by women is almost totally focussed through money and cash buying power . Women workers indulge in a flurry of conspicuous consumption, adorning themselves and their homes from the weekly wage packet . Young women, in particular, buy clothes on an almost weekly basis for the weekend pub gatherings and discos . At these social events, presentation is the key and women match men, one large round of drinks following another as if Monday never comes . Consumption among engaged and married women is slightly different, though clothing remains an important component . Apart from the usual social round, the onus is on engaged women to provide lavish weddings and the trappings of a future home . Married women, on the other hand, put most of their money towards the household budget . However, in keeping with an ideology of women working for `pin money', they also use part of their wages to buy ornaments and modern household conveniences ; to repaint and repaper on an annual basis . In a sense, therefore, material objects have come to stand as the outward symbols of women's social power . This is by no means inappropriate . Women's wage-labour represents an important incursion into the terrain of male social

INDUSTRIALISATION AND WOMEN control . By working outside the home, women short-circuit the economic mediation of their social world by men . Money means power : it confers social adulthood and a degree of independence . In this context, the significance of changing consumption patterns should not be denigrated . Rather, they should be read as symptomatic of women's transition into society . In north Mayo, women's conspicuous consumption has resulted in a curious inversion of the forms of labour in which they engage . Domestic labour has gone on display and wage-labour has become hidden . In the factories, home and hearth are a constant topic of discussion, with women showing off their purchases and mulling over future aspirations for their houses . The last ten minutes of the working day are dedicated to the creation of a public face . Cosmetics, hair, clothing : women transform themselves once again into housewives and potential housewives . At weekends, this continues into the supermarkets, shops, pubs and discos . Consumption becomes a method of locating `good' wives and mothers . Alternatively, it signals single women's potential in these directions . In a very real sense, women become what they buy . Female wage-labour, the means whereby such levels of consumption are possible, is swept to one side . So, too, is the fact that many women effectively hold down two full-time jobs, working long hours in the home and the factory in order to facilitate the scale upon which domesticity is displayed . While conspicuous consumption is one aspect of women's appropriation of social power, there is another aspect to this process which might well be of greater long term significance for Irish working class politics . As has been indicated in relation to money and cash buyC & C 19 - H

ing power, women's entry into wage 113 labour puts an end to certain forms of male mediation of their social universe . This is by no means restricted to an economic level . As women go to work in the factories, they come to occupy a plurality of class positions independent of those occuppied by the significant men (husbands/fathers) in their lives . As wage workers, they become working class in their own right . In a predominantly agricultural area such as north Mayo, this has led to the emergence of two kinds of class contradiction, both of which have progressive implications . The first of these are contradictions among the diversity of class positions occupied by women in their role as workers, wives, mothers and daughters . Contradictions of this kind have been discussed here in relation to women's participation in the trade unions . The second type of contradiction which emerges with women's entry into wage-labour is between genders : the totality of class positions occupied by women workers as opposed to those occupied by their (increasingly defunct) male mediators . Contradictions of this kind were nowhere more explicit than in the 1979/80 PAYE demonstrations . The main issue involved in the PAYE (Pay as you earn) taxation demonstrations was that waged and salaried workers bore the brunt of taxation, while farmers and the self-employed paid virtually no tax . The PAYE system also discriminated against married women and single people (Bradby and Wickham : 1980 ; Raftery : 1982 ; Rottman and Hannon : 1982) . The demonstrations were nationwide and, in Dublin, the first PAYE demonstration amounted to a general one-day strike involving 200,000 workers . Initiated by the Dublin Council of Trade Unions, an organisation close

CAPITAL & CLASS 114 to the rank and file, these demonstrations received varying support from the trade union bureaucracy . However, as Bradby and Wickham (1980) argue, the PAYE issue formed the focus of a popular movement entailing a complex articulation of social classes . Unlike in Dublin, the March 1979 demonstration was not overwhelmingly successful in the west of Ireland . The lack of trade union leadership resulted in confusion about the issues involved and what action (if any) should be taken . ITGWU members in north Mayo were waiting for the Dublin bureaucracy to call for an official stoppage but no clear direction came through in time" . In the aftermath, many rural workers felt bitter and angry . They saw the first PAYE demonstration as yet another example of the ways in which Dublin excluded and ignored them . They also became determined that it would not happen again . The PAYE movement became the subjective symbol of rural workers' incorporation into the Irish working class . It is against this background that the remarkable rural support for the second PAYE demonstration in early 1980 must be viewed . In Ballina, a town with a population of approximately 7,500 people, 7,000 workers took to the streets and closed the business sector for an afternoon . Though an unofficial stoppage, it was largely orchestrated at a local level by the ITGWU with (for once) the undivided approval of its members . Yet the accompanying festivity and celebration hid a multitude of ambiguities and anxieties experienced by the demonstrators and particularly, the women involved . The rhetoric of the PAYE movement was directly mainly against `the farmers' . In other words, the main thrust ofits attack on an unfair tax system was against a range of social practices in

which many women are integrally involved : I mean, there's a lot of people down at work with me who are going out with farmers . They feel, you know, they can go out about tax and they'll protest about tax and at the same time they'll think : `my father's only got twenty acres of bog' . They're sort of on the ditch, being pushed backwards and forwards and they feel half guilty . When they sit at the table (in the canteen), they'll say about how unfair the tax system is and then they'll suddenly say : `Well, you know now there's an awful lot of rubbish being talked about the farmers' . I hear it all the time . And like its easy for Dublin to go out and rise a few people in Ballyfermot . 24 Just mention the word `farm' and that's it . I'm not saying there's anything wrong with the people in Ballyfermot . It's just that they've no understanding of agriculture, whereas people around here have . So its no big thing to go into a factory in Ballyfermot and get everybody to down tools and out . But I think it takes a helluva lot to do the same thing around here and to do it successfully . Despite these contradictions, the vast majority of female workers in north Mayo demonstrated against the tax system . Many made a conscious attempt to hide their faces, afraid that relatives and friends might see them or that their photographs would appear in the local newspapers . The ultimate sign of `betrayal', the second PAYE demonstration was also one of the first signs of the positive direction in which the class contradictions experienced by women workers can move . Conclusion W e cannot consider the Irish working class as geographically and sectorally un-

INDUSTRIALISATION AND WOMEN differentiated . Nor can we consider it as ungendered . It consists of women and men and, given existing gender inequalities, it is ridiculous to assume a complete congruity of interests . The question we need to ask, therefore, is : what are the implications of industrialisation for women in the west of Ireland? Posed thus, the picture which emerges is by no means negative . By facilitating female consumerism, industrialisation has created new icons in the west of Ireland . Dolly Parton has superceded the Virgin Mary ; hedonism has replaced religious asceticism and Saturday night fever reigns . With the advent of the factories, women have begun to move from a private into a public sphere . They are out of the home, appropriating social power by right . The form which that power takes at present is irrelevant, since it can develop as long as women remain visible . At the end of the day, it is the fact that women have a voice outside the home which is ultimately of importance to Irish working class politics .

NOTES 1 . This article was originally written as part of a project done by the Three Green Fields Collective in Dublin . I am grateful to members of the collective for their constructive criticism, support and editorial work . 2 . Throughout the article, `Ireland' will be used to refer exclusively to the twenty-six county state . 3 . The IDA is one of a series of semi-state bodies which form part of the Irish state apparatus . Under the 1969 Industrial Development Act, the IDA was given responsibility for national and regional industrial development within the Republic . 4 . For a more detailed account of IDA grants to industry, see McAleese (1977) . 5 . While the western counties differ con-

siderably, north Mayo is a good example of 115 post-1958 industrialisation in the region . First, it has none of the urban peculiarities of Co . Galway or the rural remoteness of Co . Donegal . Second, it shows the role of the IDA's locational policy in industrialising the western seaboard . Thirdly, it is an area which has experienced the second pattern of industrialisation (multinational branch plant location) . 6 . Here it should be noted that the total female labour force participation rate has not increased greatly in recent years . Female employment in new industry represents a marked increase in specific regional rates . However, in terms of national statistics, it masks a serious rundown of female employment in traditional industries . 7 . It would be mistaken to view post-1958 industrialisation purely in terms of state intervention in the economy . In areas such as north Mayo, IDA planning policy has been greatly facilitated by local efforts to attract industry . Much of this local activity has been conducted within a framework of community action . 8 . Interview with trade union branch secretary, north Mayo . All of the figures presented here are approximate because of (a) fairly wide monthly fluctuations over a fourteen month period and (b) discrepancies between factory records and trade union books . It should also be noted that these figures refer to a wider area than the town grouping concerned . They include Achill, Castlebar and Ballyhaunis . Disaggregated figures were not made available . 9 . For reasons of confidentiality, the names of all the factories discussed here have been changed . 10 . The research for this study was conducted between March 1979 and May 1980 . It consisted primarily of participant observation and included a three-month period of work in one of the factories discussed here . My thanks are due to the women who allowed me to take up their time with interviews . 11 . The firm here referred to as West Limited has closed since the time of the research . It has recently reopened on a far smaller scale of operation .

CAPITAL & CLASS 116 12 . The only jobs which are not subject to rotation are (a) hand-painting on samples and (b) some of the spray line jobs . 13 . Interview with trade union branch secretary, north Mayo . These figures incorporate Achill, Castlebar and Ballyhaunis . 14 . No Irish trade union, with the exception of the (British-based) National Union of Journalists, has come out in support of issues which are elsewhere considered to be basic women's rights . The prime example of this appalling lapse is the lack of trade union support for the legalisation of abortion in Ireland - an issue which is somewhat separate from opposing the proposed constitutional amendment to extend the legal bar on abortion . 15 . This was the case throughout the period of research . While maternity leave has since become statutory (in order to bring Ireland into line with the EEC), there is little evidence of its effective implementation in the north Mayo factories . 16 . These are all familiar icons of the Irish labour movement . After John F . Kennedy's visit to Ireland in 1963, he acquired a status not far below that of the popular domestic saints . His picture and plastic busts vied with the saints for pride of place over many mantlepieces . He came to represent an almost archetypal rags-to-riches story of the Irish boy who had made it so good that he was elected President of the United States . 17 . Maire, for example, wanted to be a nurse. She had just failed the Leaving Certificate (A level equivalent and a prerequisite for getting into nursing in Ireland) but fostered an idea that she'd get accepted to do nursing in an English hospital . When this failed, she managed to get work as a telephonist with the Department of Post and Telegraphs in Dublin . She's now worried that she'll be made redundant in the near future and be back at square one . 18 . Take the case of Brid : Her father owned a fifty acre farm about ten miles from Ballina . When she became engaged to a man who worked for the local corporation (town council), her father gave her an acre of land on which to build a house . Two months before she was due to get married, the house was completed . She was working so that they

could afford to furnish it, and, also, to pay off a bank loan . She wanted to carry on working in the factory for a year and then settle down to the business of having children . 19 . Geraldine, a quality assurance inspector at Brentwood, provides a good example . She was married to a teacher, had two children and was pregnant with a third . She didn't want to be out at work but she and her husband were in the process of building a house and needed her wages to live off in the meantime . She hoped either to get promoted to a management job or to stop working in the next few years . 20 . At the time of the 1951 Census of Population, 52 .8 per cent of the `gainfully occupied' female population was engaged in agricultural pursuits . By 1961, this had declined to 40 .6 per cent and by 1966, to 31 .2 per cent (Census of Population of Ireland, 1951 : vol . 111 : pt .1 ; 1961 : vol .111 ; 1966 : vol .111) 21 . At the time of the 1951 census, 16 .6 per cent of the `gainfully occupied' female population was involved in services . By 1966, this had increased to 27 per cent . 22 . In 1951, 21 .3 per cent of the total female population was returned as being `gainfully occupied' . By 1961, this had declined to 16 .4 per cent and by 1966, to 15 .6 per cent . 23 . As far as it is possible to ascertain the ITGWU's position clearly, no official stoppage was called . It was left up to individual branches to do what they saw fit . While this worked extremely well in Dublin and the ITGWU band led the first PAYE demonstration, it led to chaos in areas such as north Mayo . 24 . Ballyfermot is an old established working class estate in Dublin .

References Bradby, B . and Wickham, J . 1980 `The State of PAYE' . CSE Conference Papers . Elson, D . and Pearson, R . 1981 `Nimble Fingers Make Cheap Workers : An Analysis of Women's Employment in Third World Export Manufacturing' . Feminist Review, 7, 87-107 . Herzog, M . 1980 From Hand To Mouth: Women and Piecework . Harmondsworth :



INDUSTRIALISATION AND WOMEN Penguin Books . IDA Ireland 19721DA Regional IndustrialPlans

1973-1977 . Dublin : IDA Ireland . McAleese, D . 1977 A Profile of Grant-Aided Industry in Ireland. Publication Series Paper 5 . Dublin : IDA Ireland . Raftery, J . 1982 `Patterns of Taxation and Public Expenditure : Towards a Corporatist Approach' in Kelly, M ., O'Dowd, L . and Wickham, J . Power, Conflict and Inequality, Dublin Turoe Press .

It

i

Rottman, D . and Hannon, D . 1982 `The Impact of State Taxation and Transfer Policies on Income Inequality in the Republic of Ireland' in Kelly, M ., O'Dowd, L . and Wickham, J . Power, Conflict and Inequality . Dublin Turoe Press . Wayne, N . 1980 Labour Law in Ireland. Dublin : Kincora Press . Wickham, J . 1980 `The New Irish Working Class?' . Saothar 6, 81-86 .

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John Grahl

The general notion of `restructuring' in capitalist crises is often put forward by Marxists . But what changes in structure actually take place? How rapid are they? And in what circumstances can they prepare the way for renewed economic expansion? Taking the example of West European industry this article looks at some recent views of the restructuring process and surveys some of the economic trends which are important for the overall pattern of change .

118

Restructuring in west European industry' A CLASSICAL THEME

in the Marxist theory of capitalist crisis is

restructuring . The general notion is that capitalist economies re-

currently exhaust the possibilities for profitable expansion ; the ensuing crisis restores the conditions for renewed development by enforcing structural change on the system . Although this view of crisis seems generally fruitful, in itself it does little more than indicate a possible line of enquiry . To give operational value to the term we have to be precise about the content of the restructuring process, the actual or potential changes which seem central to the outcome of the present, historically specific, economic upheavals . (A closely related task is to respond critically to competing views of structural change those advanced, for instance, by Kynesians or neo-liberals . ) The following paper offers only a few, very preliminary, notes towards this more concrete grasp of the restructuring process . After pointing to some empirical difficulties in the notion of restructuring it looks at two recent accounts of the restructuring process - a Keynesian view which focusses on energy consumption in Western Europe and an important Marxist model of crisis and adaptation in West European industry . The very limited nature of the exercise should be stressed . Apart from a brief and somewhat speculative conclusion no attempt is made to discuss restructuring of the social relations of production in any inclusive sense . The aim is simply a survey of economic data relevant to that broader discussion .

RESTRUCTURING A preliminary qualification necessary to the restructuring thesis is to acknowledge that restructuring may simply not take place . The alternative to rapid structural change is stagnation : development cannot continue in the old directions, but the changes required to alter the direction of development are blocked or retarded . Indeed, powerful economic groups may prefer stagnation to a pattern of change which menaces their interests . An outstanding example of this kind of argument, in the Marxist tradition, is the work of Josef S Steindl on the us depression of the thirties .' For Steindl, restructuring - which he largely understood as the elimination of high cost productive capacity - was blocked by a failure of competition . In the us oligopoly prevented the elimination of weaker or less efficient enterprises, since these were large powerful companies with the profits and financial resources to withstand the impact of recession . Today, and in Western Europe, it may be implausible to suggest that the same blockage exists . It is doubtful whether less efficient companies are similarly able to withstand competitive pressure, given the present intensity of international competition . Nevertheless, a host of other factors may be working to prevent or delay the elimination of high cost capacity, in this case via political pressure and state intervention . Anyway, it is certainly the case that it is easier at present to find evidence of stagnation than of accelerated structural change . The most obvious sign of stagnation is simply unemployment (Table I) . This is currently over 16 millions in Western Eureope according to official figures and is projected by the OECD to rise to 17 1/2 millions by the end of 1983 . (Other forecasts take a similarly TABLE I

Standardised Unemployment Rates, per cent W . Germany France UK

Italy Austria Belgium Finland Netherlands Norway Spain Sweden EEC

Source :

OECD

1965 0 .3 1 .5 2 .3 5 .3 1 .9 1 .8 1 .4 0 .5 1 .8 2 .5 1 .2 2 .1

1970 0 .8 2 .4 3 .1 5 .3 1 .4 2 .1 1 .9 0 .9 1 .6 2 .4 1 .5 2 .7

1975 3 .7 4 .1 3 .9 5 .8 1 .7 5 .1 2 .2 4 .0 2 .3 3 .7 1 .6 4 .3

Economic Outlook, July 1982 .

1980 1982 Q1 3 .1 5 .5 6 .3 8 .2 7 .4 12 .4 7 .4 9 .1 1 .9 3 .4 9 .0 12 .3 4.7 5 .9 8 .9 4 .9 1 .7 2 .0 11 .2 15 .0 (1981 Q4) 3 .0 2 .0 9 .0 7 .9

Restructuring or stagnation?

119

CAPITAL & CLASS 120

pessimistic view - for instance the EEC Commission has recently revised its medium term projections of unemployment upwards to a figure of 11 % in 1985 .') Correspondingly, there is stagnation of output . After a weak, 'non-cumulative' recovery from the low point of 1974/75, real GDP in Western Europe fell by '/a% in 1981 . Growth was 1'h% in 1982 and very low rates are projected for 1983 and beyond . Again there is evidence of a considerable overhang of excess industrial capacity . The OECD no longer publishes data on capacity utilisation, perhaps because it is unclear whether idle capacity is being mothballed or simply scrapped and thus unclear too what the implications are for potential employment . There is, however, plenty of evidence of idle capacity, particularly in steel, petro-chemicals, motors, textiles and shipbuilding . 4 And in a pattern of behaviour reminiscent of Steindl, there are signs that individual enterprises and countries may be delaying the closure of their own plant in the hope that someone else will give way first and ease the pressure . On the other hand, there is also some evidence of determined efforts at restructuring . Firstly, investment as a proportion of output is being sustained . While fixed investment was hit more than consumption in the recession of 1974/75 it has recovered more strongly . The typical depression pattern of falls in investment far more pronounced than falls in consumption is not apparent (Table II) . TABLE II

Fixed Investment as Percentage of GDP W . Germany France UK

Italy EEC

West Europe Source :

1960 24 .3 20 .1 16 .4 22 .6 20 .7 21 .0

1965 26 .1 23 .3 18 .3 19 .3 22 .4 22 .7

1970 25 .6 23 .4 18 .6 21 .4 22 .9 23 .1

1975 20.7 23.3 19.5 20.6 21 .2 21 .9

1980 23 .6 21 .6 17 .8 20 .0 21 .2 21 .3

OECD Economic Outlook .

Secondly, the strongest component within fixed investment is, in many cases, for new machinery and equipment while construction, residential and otherwise, is relatively stagnant . This may indicate that much of the investment is for industrial restructuring rather than expansion (Table III - these are gross figures which include replacement investment but the latter may, of course, involve cost-reducing innovations) .

RESTRUCTURING 121

TABLE III

Volume of Fixed Investment (Volume of Fixed Investment in Equipment in Brackets). Index Nos ., 1975 = 100

W . Germany France Italy UK

1976 104 .8 (106.1) 103 .5 (109.7) 102 .4 (109.2) 101 .1 (101 .1)

1977 108 .8 (113 .8) 102 .3 (109 .3) 102 .0 (109.4) 98 .4 (105 .2)

1978 115 .1 (122 .8) 103 .3 (113 .5) 101 .9 (109 .5) 101 .9 (110 .5)

1979 125 .1 (134 .4)

n .a . n .a . 106 .5 (106 .5) 100 .5 (117 .9)

Source : European Economy, 1981 . Thirdly, there is a considerable body of informal evidence of industrial restructuring and reorganisation at the level of particular enterprises, although its anecdotal character prevents any assessment of its quantitative significance . On balance, it is probably true that intense efforts are being made to accelerate structural change in most West European economies, but these are as yet insufficient in quantity and duration to clear the path for profitable expansion of industry . A correct view of the restructuring proposition must also include the major elements of continuity between boom and slump . Many economic trends persist from the fifties and sixties into the eighties - it is not a question of all trends being reversed, but rather of the promotion of some previous trends to new significance together with the emergence of some new trends . For example, the trend towards urbanisation of the rural labour force continues in most West European countries (though at a slower rate) but this is no longer the decisive factor that it was in the post-war boom, since the industrialisation of Northern Europe is basically complete . (Table IV) . Within industry there are again many signs of continuity in development . A recent UN survey of patterns of industrial output in West Europe concludes :' `The dominating feature . . . is the resilience of the underlying trends which were already evident in the 1960s . . . the basic pattern is much the same for all the individual countries : manufacturing industry is continuing to shift away from traditional unskilled labour-intensive industries, such as textiles and clothing, towards the more advanced, capital- and especially skilled-labour- intensive

Continuity and change



CAPITAL & CLASS 122

industries such as chemicals and machinery .' The degree of continuity is indicated in Table V . For several reasons, however, this kind of conclusion and its apparent refutation of the restructuring hypothesis is open to serious qualification : The changes in structure (defined simply as thedistribution (a) of manufacturing output among sectors) are measured at a highly aggregate level, with manufacturing industry being divided into 18 broad branches . It is clear that such an approach leaves out a lot - at this level of aggregation, for instance, British and West German industry appear to have very similar structures, in spite of the qualitative difference in their performances .' Again, the relative expansion of `chemicals' as a whole masks two completely opposed trends - stagnation in heavy chemicals such as bulk plastics and syntehtic fibres together with a move towards fine TABLE IV

Reductions in Agricultural Employment per cent per annum

Austria France W . Germany Italy Netherlands Sweden Switzerland Source :

1974-78 -3 .6 -3 .5 -3 .8 -2 .1 -1 .6 -2 .1 -2 .0

1970-73 -5 .3 -5 .1 -5 .0 -1 .9 -2 .3 -5 .0 -2 .7

1979 -3 .5 -2 .8 -4 .0 -2 .7 -1 .8 -2 .4 -1 .3

1980 -2 .0 -2 .9

n .a . -2 .7 -1 .1 -0.4

n .a .

UN, Economic Survey of Europe in 1980

TABLE V

Rising, Falling and Stable Branch Shares in West European Manufacturing Industry in the 1960s and 1970s Employment Output 1958-1970 1970-1978 1958-1970 1970-1978

Textiles Chemicals Petroleum products Basic metals Machinery

+ + +

+ 0 +

+ 0 +

+ 0 +

Countries included : Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, UK Stable (0) = less than 0 .2% change in the branch share .

Source :

uN, Economic Survey of Europe in 1980 .

RESTRUCTURING 123

chemicals such as pharmaceuticals . (b) Output levels may not be the best indicator of the crisisrelated restructuring in which we are interested . Major change in the relative output of different industries is almost necessarily the work of boom periods . What might happen in a crisis are preliminary steps towards change in the pattern of output - changes in the distribution of investment and in the institutional framework of the economy which will determine which are the passive and which the more active sectors in the ensuing expansion .' The UN comparison of industrial change before and after (c) 1970 raises the question of the proper dating of boom and slump in the West European economy . Many economists (particularly Marxists) would argue that the turning-point came in the late sixties, signalled by the first post-war recession in West Germany (1966/67) . The relative weight of the oil crisis of 1973/74 as against purely internal tendencies towards stagnation in Western Europe is an empirical question - but important restructuring tendencies were already apparent in the West German economy in the late sixties when, at least, the era of European 'supergrowth' came to an end . I

Nevertheless, it is convenient to begin by discussing restructuring of energy supply and consumption, since a recent assessment of the European economy from the Cambridge Economic Policy Group (CEPG) puts energy contraints in the centre of its analysis of the slump .' Their argument is that the way out of crisis is an expansion of demand but that this is held back by the need to restructure the energy sector to economise on OPEC oil . To what extent is this true? In physical terms, considerable adjustment has been achieved . Imports of oil into Western Europe are considerably lower than they were prior to the first oil shock of 1973/74. Energy use as a whole has been precariously stabilised . These achievements, however, were only made through the reversal of the limited and incomplete recovery of 1976/79 . (Table VI) . Some further points should be noted : Energy consumption is partly being held down by the (a) depth of recession in particular industries such as steel or synthetic fibres which use a lot of energy . Much of the energy saving so far has been through (b) relatively simple economies or substitutions which may be harder to obtain in the future . There is less sign of the very large scale private and public investment which would be needed to drastically reduce West Europe's dependence on imported oil . (Japanese energy saving has been three times as rapid as

The CEPG view : Energy as the key

CAPITAL & CLASS 124

Europe's .) The gains from physical economies (which have reduced EEC dependence on imported oil from 61 .7% of primary energy suppliers in 1973 to 41 .3% in 1981) have, of course, been more than obliterated by successive price increases (Table VII) . There can be little doubt that, as the Cambridge Report argues, these financial outflows have become a major inhibiting factor to West European economic recovery . 10 But it should be stressed that the constraint is macro-economic and financial, not a direct resources scarcity . The increase in the oil bill, massive as it is, would represent little more than one year's aditional output at the rapid growth rates of the fifties and sixties . Rather the oil bill constrains output : (a) Through the inability or unwillingness of European countries to increase their indebtedness by increasing all imports enough to sustain economic expansion . The problem in this case TABLE VI

Consumption of Energy and Imports of Oil (millions of tons of oil equivalent) EEC

Consumption 919 .1 847 .4 902 .0 897 .9 924 .5 969.3 925 .9 917.0

1973 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 1981

Imports 585 .8 482 .6 517 .8 481 .1 472 .1 474 .2 420 .3 389 .0

Source : European Economy, 1981 . TABLE VII

Price of Oil and EEC Net Oil Import Bill

1973 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 1981

Average price per barrel, us $ Net Import Bill, billion us $ 2 .6 12 .6 10 .3 39 .9 11 .4 45 .2 12 .6 48 .9 12 .8 47 .9 19 .5 69 .7 31 .3 101 .0 36 .0 106 .0

Source : European Economy, 198 1 .

RESTRUCTURING is not oil imports, but unrequited oil imports, that is the surpluses of the OPEC countries which represent oil not paid for with goods . (b) Through the impact of oil scarcity on other countries which are similarly constrained and thus unable to finance imports from Europe . (c) Through the intensification of these financial pressures which tends to accompany economic expansion as a result of the sensitivity of the price of oil in Western demand . It seems likely that any sustained upswing will lead to further price increases which would mean, at least temporarily, substantial deflationary pressure on the international economy ." The first point above leads us to consider - as part of the restructuring process - the reorientation of West European exports towards oil-exporting countries . The West European response to expanding OPEC markets has tended to be rapid . By 1979 exports to OPEC accounted for 6 .9% of all exports from Western European countries . In 1980, consequent on the second oil shock, there was a further 16% expansion in these exports . In spite of this response, however, most European countries suffered a drastic decline in their balance of payments figures as a result of the second shock (Table VIII) . (Britain and Norway were cushioned by their possession of oil reserves .) Of particular importance here is the rapid and massive deterioration in the German payments position since, as the `dynamo of Europe', West Germany has a decisive effect on the general level of economic activity . 11 Appealing to this kind of data, the Cambridge group report puts almost complete emphasis on the `oil constraint' as a uniquely important factor in the EEC's economic situation . Internal explanations of recession are `not entirely convincing . . . since most of the internal phenomena to which attention is drawn appear to be consequences, rather than independent causes, of the slowdown in growth . This is clearly the case as regards low profits, lack of investment, low productivity growth and reduced borrowing ." 3 The Cambridge group study is valuable for its quantification of the energy restructuring needed . Acceleration of energy saving in Europe to Japanese rates would, they estimate, ease the EEC's payments position by $25 billion by 1985 . This is a large fraction of what is needed to remove payments constraints on EEC expansion, although not in itself sufficient for full employment . Two lines of criticism of the Cambridge position will be suggested . Firstly, on historical grounds it is one-sided to make OPEC surpluses the only villain in the piece . The vulnerability of European economic development to external shock is itself evi-

125

CAPITAL & CLASS 126

TABLE VIII

Current Balance of Payments . Billion us Dollars .

Austria Belgium - Luxembourg Denmark Finland France Germany, FR Ireland Italy Netherlands Norway Sweden Switzerland UK

Industrial West Europe Source :

UN

1978 1 .4 - 0 .9 1 .5 0 .6 3 .8 8 .7 - 0 .3 6 .4 - 1 .4 2 .1 - 0 .3 4 .4 1 .2 17 .2

1979 - 1 .8 - 3 .4 - 3 .0 - 0 .3 1 .5 - 6 .3 - 1 .5 5 .1 - 2 .4 - 1 .2 - 2 .6 2 .4 - 3 .8 -17 .3

1980 - 3 .6 - 6.0 - 2 .5 - 1 .7 - 7 .8 -15 .5 - 1 .2 - 9 .5 - 2 .4 0 .9 - 4.9 - 0 .6 5 .3 -49 .5

Economic Survey, 1980 .

dence of internal economic weaknesses . In particular, low profits and productivity problems seem to have been apparent long before the oil crisis of 1973/74 .'° It would be consistent with many views of the economic cycle and economic crises to make a distinction between the endogenous tendency of a boom to become increasingly fragile, for example, increasingly susceptible to financial dislocation ; and the exogenous events which may precipitate recession ." Secondly, there is an inadequacy in the general Keynesian procedure . The typical response of Keynesians to the present stagnation can be specified as follows : postulate a general economic expansion ; identify the immediate constraints which such an expansion would run up against - internal bottlenecks, rising wage costs, import penetration or whatever ; the task of restructuring then becomes the relaxation of these constraints . This approach is incomplete, and may be said to lead to a conservative bias . What is lacking is a specification of the direction of the general expansion, the social tasks it will perform . Two types of discussion are assimilated - the question of renewing economic development becomes a continuation of the previous question of sustaining the last phase of expansion . The goal is simply to expand production and incomes - the nature of the production is largely unspecified (left, in fact, for market forces to dictate) . Since Keynesian thought in general, and the work of CEPG in particular, have been - very deservedly - influential in the British Labour movement, it is worth while pointing to this

RESTRUCTURING limitation which characterises, for example, many presentations of the Alternative Economic Strategy . Before leaving the specific question of energy, two subsidiary constraints, reinforcing the oil shortage, which are identified by the Cambridge study can be mentioned . (The suspicion is that new constraints will come rushing in behind each other until positive restructuring clearly determines an appropriate line of advance .) Firstly, the competive strength of West Germany within the EEC is such that a relaxation of the overall EEC balance of payments constraint is likely to lose a lot of its potential effect . Any general expansion of EEC demand would be met to a great extent by West German industry . Other countries would still, therefore, be faced with payments constraints at high levels of unemployment unless the West German economy grew at a much faster rate . But this is implausible as it would mean considerable over-heating of the domestic German economy . Table IX indicates that there is, in fact, less room for output growth in Germany than in other EEC countries . TABLE IX

Income growth rates required to reduce recorded unemployment to 5% in 1985 per cent per year

W . Germany France Italy Netherlands Belgium United Kingdom Ireland Denmark EEC

Actual growth of real income 1973-81

Required growth of real income 1981-85

1 .7

3'/z

1 .9 1 .6

61 6'/z

1 .1 0 .7 0 .2

4 7 51

1 .6

6 1/2

0 .4 1 .3

4 51

Source : Economic Policy Review, 1981, No .2 . The second subsidiary constraint implicit in the Cambridge study could be described as one of the `limits of the mixed economy' . The need for a massive increase in demand to restore full employment follows from the limits to job-creation and job-sharing programmes . It is suggested, quite plausibly, that this kind of employment programme would require unacceptably high rates of taxation . If these high taxes are an obstacle to the rapid growth of public sector employment (or employment supported by the public sector) then general expansion becomes the only way back to full employment and it is the need for this

127

CAPITAL & CLASS 128

general expansion which makes the problem of energy supplies so intractable . (Table X) . 16 Thus, even in the exploration of energy restructuring we come upon very different factors behind the stagnation - on one hand the consequences of highly uneven levels of European development, on the other a potential fiscal crisis of the West European states .

TABLE X Growth of government and private expenditure 1973-81 (per cent per annum)

Govt . expenditure Govt . expenditure Privately financed on goods and on transfers expenditure services Germany France Italy Netherlands Belgium United Kingdom Ireland Denmark EEC

2 .9 3 .3

4 .5 5 .5 3 .1

3 .2 2.3 3 .9 0.6

5 .9 4 .8 4 .9

4.0

4 .7

3 .6 2 .5

6 .0

4 .7

1 .3 0 .5 0 .8 0 .1 0 .2 -1 .4 2 .0 -2 .3 0 .3

Source : Economic Policy Review, 1981, No .2 .

Overaccumulation in Northern Europe

In contrast to the Cambridge Group's stress on energy as an external constraint, there has developed a body of theory, classically Marxist in tradition, which starts from an examination of the intrinsic limits to capital accumulation on the postwar pattern the limits to a `model of accumulation' based on the industrial development of Northern Europe, above all in West Germany . 17 A recently translated book by three German Marxists, Frdbel, Heinrichs and Kreye, presents an empirical assessment of the restructuring process from this point of view . 'x These writers see Northern European expansion as having culminated in an overaccumulation of capital which led to rapidly rising labour costs and the rising costs of associated labour-saving investment (the latter is often referred to by German Marxists as a `rising organic composition of capital"') . The restructuring process stemming form this overaccumulation is characterised by : the emergence of West Gerany as a major exporter of capital, reversing the net flow of us direct investment to West Germany and halting the flow of labour in Northern Europe - either by automation or through a more

RESTRUCTURING

129

intense technical division of labour within multinational enterprises, so that labour-intensive functions are more easily transferred to other countries . It should be added that similar types of analysis are frequently put forward about Japan, where a qualitatively similar (but quantitatively more pronounced) restructuring involving accelerated capital exports has been identified ." The model has some very powerful features - perhaps most impressively it gives a unified account of several restructuring tendencies without simply attributing them to competition, since it makes this an endogenous factor . Intensified international competition is seen as a consequence of slower rate of accumulation in a group of leading industrial countries, together with a drive towards internationalisation of production by their major industrial companies . This perspective seems particularly important in Britain where international competition is often taken as a given `environment' within which national issues must be discussed .

The lines of criticism of the overaccumulation-restructuring model which will be developed focus on its exaggeration of the spontaneity of the restructuring process . (This is a weakness of some versions of the model, not the approach as such . The work of Aglietta 21 on the us economy is an example of a less deterministic understanding of crisis and accumulation in the same broad tradition .) It will be suggested that the patterns of capitalist response which are emphasised are simply not strong enough, or well enough directed, to overcome stagnation . This emphasis on innate, automatic restructuring can make the classical Marxist view very close to neo-liberal views of adaptation which are similarly optimistic . Frobel, Heinrichs and Kreye are clearly working with classical Marxist theories of imperialism in the background . It is important as a first qualification to distinguish between contemporary imperialism in its politico-military aspect (the us, Britain, France) and the more purely economic expansionism of West German and Japanese captial . Data on West German external investment assembled by Michael Hudson 22 and a critical paper by Grazia Gillies 23 both suggest that Frobel, Heinrichs and Kreye overemphasise the role of developing countries in German restructuring . Clearly, the overall pattern of German direct investment is determined more by uneven development within the industrialised world than by the pull of cheap labour in the third world . (This is not to question Frobel et al's discussion of world production sites but to C & C 19 - I

A new Imperialism?



CAPITAL & CLASS 130

say that it may not be the most important trend .) The significance of manufacturing exports from developing countries to Europe is frequently exaggerated in discussion of the restructuring process, both on the left and the right . Most of the exports come from a handful of countries, mostly with 'authoritarian' regimes (Table XI) .

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339, West Side Station,

RESTRUCTURING 131

TABLE XI

Leading Developing Economy Exporters of Manufactures in 1975 Percentage Share 1975 Cumulative Share 1975

Hong Kong (including reexports) Taiwan Korea Yugoslavia Singapore (including reexports) Brazil India Mexico (including border) Argentina Malaysia Pakistan All Developing Countries Source :

16 .8 13 .0 12 .5 8 .4

16 .8 29 .8 42 .3 50 .7

6 .7 6 .6 6 .3

57 .4 64 .0 70 .3

5 .9 2 .3 2 .0 1 .8

76 .2 78 .5 80 .5 82 .3

100

100

The Challenge of Interdependence .

The real weakness of the neo-liberal position is that it offers no means of adapting to this change in trade patterns (even when it is quite minor) other than catastrophic unemployment in the industries affected . TABLE XII

Evolution of EC Trade Balance with South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore millions EUA 1967

1970

1973

1977

1978

105 66 52 333 556

118 155 116 529 1,118

509 184 343 691 1,727

916 659 497 1,167 3,239

1,058 1,001 665 1,650 4,374

49 20 67 391 527 +29

122 59 143 609 933 +185

359 238 454 1,074 2,125 -398

633 1,262 1,079 2,005 4,979 -1,740

638 1,421 1,204 2,230 5,493 -1,119

EC Exports

Singapore South Korea Taiwan Hong Kong Total EC

Imports Singapore South Korea Taiwan Hong Kong Total Total Balance Import/Export Coverage

Source :

105%

119%

The Challenge of Interdependence .

81%

65%

80%

CAPITAL & CLASS 132 The international division of labour within Europe

An equally important implication of the overaccumulation theory is an intensification of the division of labour within Western Europe itself : West Germany, and perhaps a few other regions in Northern Europe tending to occupy the most advantageous positions while routine functions making intensive use of unskilled labour are dispersed to a Southern European periphery whose economic dependence is thereby increased . An EEC study in 1979 examined the structure of specialisation in international trade of member countries . 26 Traded products in three categories were separated out : those most exposed to competition from NICS ; those requiring big inputs of skilled labour ; and those `fundamental' to control over the international division of labour (because of technological dynamism or because they are principal capital goods) . It was argued that strong export performance in the third category revealed a country's capacity to `control rather than be controlled by the international division of labour since a favourable situation in these sectors not only permits relative independence in achieving specialisation and possibly changing its direction, but also ensures a degree of control over the other productive systems through the spread of their production standards' . However, this pattern does not seem to be the consequence of any accelerated restructuring in German trading patterns so much as of a pattern of export specialisation already established by 1963, i .e . during the boom . In this there is a marked contrast with Japan, where the specialisation pattern changed dramatically between 1963 and 1977 (as much before 1970 as after - which indicates that the more highly organised capitalists of Japan have been able to anticipate and forestall some of the emerging crisis tendencies) . In other words, the widening of the gap between Germany and the rest of Western Europe appears to be a consequence of changes in world market conditions and their impact on preexisting industrial structures as mucha as any differential response to the crisis . (We can qualify these conclusions to some extent - the classification may not be fine enough to pick up some structural changes in German industry where there has been `defensive' restructuring . For example, W . Germany has dramatically increased its productivity lead in textiles, an `exposed' product . Again, reexports may distort the European data . On the other hand, the data is accurate enough to define clear market advantages for the US and Japan, as well as British decline .) The implication is that uneven development in the seventies was very largely a result of qualitative differences in the development achieved in the fifties and sixties . To some extent

RESTRUCTURING these differences were masked by the boom - for example, in Britain we often tended to conflate the economic `miracles' (super-high growth rates) of Germany, Italy and even Spain . The macroeconomic mechanisms of high growth in all three countries may have been similar; but there were massive differences in the depth of development which only became apparent when growth slackened . For example, in 1974 the Spanish balance of payments collapsed as a result of a series of long-run weaknesses : workers' remittances from Northern Europe failed ; tourist revenues fell ; oil accounted for virtually all of primary energy ; the markets for consumer products such as cars declined ; foreign investment was choked off. All these weaknesses had been there before; the oil crisis revealed them dramatically ." On the other hand, there is still every possiblity that existing differentials in industrial performance and specialisation will be widened by the restructuring process now taking place, unless effective political intervention prevents this from happening . German industrial companies can expoit their existing lead to intensify their advantages in the future, while countries like Spain are prevented by their subordinate position and the extent of the crisis from mobilising national resources to close the gap .

TABLE XIII Manufacturing Trade : Export Specialisation Indices A.

Activities exposed to NIC competition

(i)

intensive use of unskilled labour us

Japan W . Germany France Italy UK

(ii)

1963 0 .70 1 .64 0 .62 1 .13 1 .60 0 .78

1970

1977

0 .50 1 .15 0 .73 1 .00 1 .64 1 .03

0 .60 0 .71 0 .79 0 .97 1 .69 1 .25

1970

1977

0 .32 0 .85 0 .69 1 .30 3 .24 0 .75

0 .41 0 .23 0 .87 1 .27 3 .37 0 .93

1963

1970

1977

1 .20 0 .61

1 .21 0 .62

1 .22 0 .64

very low capital content us

Japan W . Germany France Italy UK

1963 0 .45 1 .58 0 .59 1 .60 3 .23 0 .61

B.

Activities using higly skilled labour

(i)

capital intensive us

Japan

133

CAPITAL & CLASS 134 W . Germany France Italy (ii)

1 .14 0 .99 0 .81 UK 0 .88 low or medium capital content Us

Japan W . Germany France Italy UK

C. (i)

1 .11 1 .08 0 .71 1 .10

1 .07 1 .04 0 .60 1 .26

1963

1970

1977

1 .46 0 .64 1 .04 0 .73 0 .79 0 .99

1 .65 0 .92 0 .99 0 .77 0 .77 1 .03

1 .60 0 .96 0 .96 0 .84 0 .74 1 .04

Activities 'fundamental' to the division of labour

products basic to technical progress 1963

1970

1977

1 .15 Japan 1 .47 W . Germany 1 .43 0.73 France Italy 0.80 UK 1 .05 main investment goods

0 .93 2 .08 1 .24 0 .88 0 .99 0 .96

0 .95 2 .04 1 .19 0 .83 0 .73 0 .89

1963

1970

1977

us

(ii)

1 .20 1 .34 1 .28 0 .56 0 .79 0 .91 Japan W . Germany 1 .56 1 .39 1 .33 France 0 .80 0 .89 0 .98 Italy 1 .08 1 .13 1 .04 1 .20 1 .14 1 .09 UK Specialisation index : Japan's specialisation in group x would be Japan's share of total OECD exports of x divided by Japan's share of overall OECD exports of manufactures ; thus an index greater than one indicates a degree of specialistion . The composition of the categories is not given in the study except that `products basic to technical progress' include computers, telecommunications, machine tools . Source : European Economy, Special issue, 1979 . us

There are many reports of this kind of process in W . German industry which fit very well the basic overaccumulation model . Domestic production is being reorientated towards output with high value added making intense use of skilled labour and new technology ; more simple manufacturing processes, using less skilled labour are being relocated, automated or closed down . Examples : 2 B a) Motors: 81% expansion of foreign production between 1970 and 1978 as against 9% increase in domestic production . Production by Daimler in Brazil, vW in Egypt, Mexico, the us . b) Chemicals : In an industry 40% devoted to exports, big problems with plastics, fertilisers, man-made fibres ; increasing

RESTRUCTURING 135

strength in paints, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, lubricants . Big increases in research expenditure, relocation of production abroad . c) Steel: Attempts to recover from slump by moves into special steels, labour- and energy-saving technology, diversification into steel-related industries . d) Electrical Industry : Big problems in domestic appliances, entertainment electronics, power generation equipment ; strength in data processing, measurement and control, communications . e) Mechanical Engineering : Attempt at recovery linked to general move towards capital goods . f) Shipbuilding: Response to declining markets, specialisation in container vessels, roll-on/roll off ships, liquefied natural gas tankers . To qualify this picture, however, we can point to the huge quantitative problems of restructuring an industry which in the mid-sixties covered the whole spectrum of manufacturing activities and where high wage costs (an irreversible aspect of overaccumulation) have been for ten years powerfully re-inforced by an appreciating mark . It also appears to be the case that German workers have very little to gain from restructuring on these lines . Whereas, in less advanced European countries, it is possible for the labour movement to associate itself with the demand for accelerated restructuring - at least in certain of its aspects German restructuring on this patter must involve wholesale disqualification and unemployment, since demand for specialised products is unlikely to compensate for the general recession and accelerated automation . Both the views of restructuring so far discussed - the external energy constraint and the regroupment of German capital - place heavy emphasis on restructuring within industry . In both cases this is because of a concentration on international trade ; manufactures are far more preponderant in international trade than in output as a whole . In the case of the Marxist overaccumulation theory there is also the weight of a tradition concerned centrally with the industrial labour process . However, this may be a misleading and restrictive focus . It is not clear that restructuring of manufacturing alone is capable of renewing the dynamic of European economic development . This question is not raised out of any sympathy with the type of `zero growth' romanticism which takes for granted the benefits of industrial growth for the middle strata but sees ecological catastrophe in extending them to the masses . Rather the point is made, firstly, because of the importance of non-industrial sectors in European production . (Table XIV) .

Industry and services



CAPITAL & CLASS 136

TABLE XIV

Sector shares in value-added and employment Six EEC countries (excluding Greece, Luxembourg, Ireland, Denmark) ofGDP Value-added Employment

Agriculture Manufacturing Services 1960 1973 1977 1960 1973 1977 1960 1973 1977 6 5 4 29 32 31 52 50 53 17 9 8 30 31 29 43 50 54

Source : Boyer and Petit,

Cambridge Yournal of Economics 1981 .

Secondly, the balance between broad sectors is raised because it may well be a key element in the economic restructuring process as a whole . There is good reason to associate the boom of the post-war decades with a specific historical function, that of completing the urbanisation/industrialisation of Northern Europe . This task is now complete (in the case of West Germany, indeed, it may have gone too far, in terms of overall economic and social balance .) The suggestion is that manufacturing industry, or major parts of it, may be incapable of resuming their previous role of economic dynamo . Rather they may be likely to play a more passive role, comparable to that of agriculture in the fifties and sixties . That is, some manufacturing would become dependent on growth elsewhere for the maintenance of demand, while a tendency of productivity to outstrip demand would imply a trend loss of employment . If this kind of restructuring is on the agenda-which might be suspected from a comparison of the balance between broad sectors in Western Europe and the us - then the evidence is that it has hardly begun . A very interesting paper by Robert Boyer and Pascal Petit 29 argues that the Western European economy is still tied to manufacturing as leading force - even though this close tie may be anachronistic : `None of the changes in the data for the six EEC countries taken together lead us to believe that there was a significant change in the mechanisms of economic growth after 1973 . . . The correlation between annual growth of the manufacturing sector and annual growth of GDP appears even stronger when data for 1974-77 are added .' (Table XV .) Boyer and Petit reached an open conclusion : either industrial growth must be resumed or `some new mechanism for employment creation' provided . It might be argued that building such a new mechanism is the primary task of restructuring - in which case much of the industrial change we have been consider-

RESTRUCTURING 137

ing has a largely negative significance, removing some barriers to development but not contributing much to specifying its direction . TABLE XV

Correlations of sector value-added with GDP growth Six EEC countries 1960-73

Agriculture Energy Manufacturing Construction Marketed Services

0 .00 0 .52 0 .85 0 .06 0 .76

1960-77 0 .06 0 .68 0 .93 0 .45 0 .87

Source : Boyer and Petit, Cambridge Journal of Economics, 1981 . The notes above have concentrated on industrial production, and are, perhaps, relatively uncontroversial . More important is the framework in which industrial trends are evaluated . The following conjectures are offered as consistent with the facts . The European boom of the fifties and sixties indicated an approximate correspondence between a particular pattern of capital accumulation and determinate phase of socio-economic development . The (relatively unproblematic) content of the latter was, quite classically, industrialisation . In this period the industrial development of Western Europe was completed, a judgement which is broadly unaffected by the major divergences betwen particular regions and countries which remain after the inevitably uneven expansion . The first concrete indication that this period was ending, and thus that the established pattern of accumulation had lost its historical basis, was pressure on wage costs-particularly in West Germany, the centre of post-war industrial development . The fact that pressure came first from the side of costs, and only subsequently from the failure of markets, is relatively contingent . It shows that working people had maintained a strong and assertive position during the boom . But the epoch was over in any case : other, more profound, signs of this were a developing crisis of motivation within industry (appearing first in Britain where industrial development was already mature in 1945, but becoming quite general by the early seventies) and the increasing waste and despoliation of nature impled by rapid industrial growth . The European economic crisis, then, has two sides : a crisis of socio-economic development - in what way can Europeans build on their constructive achievements? what new tasks and motivations are appropriate, given the highly developed produc-

Conclusion



CAPITAL & CLASS 138

tive infrastructure? ; on the other hand, there is a crisis of capital accumulation - how can the major capitals be rescued from their entanglement with an obsolete pattern of development? ; where are new sources of profit to be located? The suggestion here is that the answers to these two types of question may be radically disjointed . The logic of social development requires a wide exploration of the emancipatory possibilities of an achieved industrial civilisation . The drive for renewed profitability points elsewhere - towards a retardation and distortion of post-industrial productive activity and a global reorientation (perhaps towards the Pacific) which will tend to marginalise Western Europe as a field of accumulation . Longrun stagnation seems a very real possibility : it would reflect this incomatibility between the new exigencies of centralised surplus value extraction and control . Yet the intensified competition - international and domestic - which results from the crisis tends strongly to suppress any definition of developmental questions which does not put financial stabilisation and renewed profitability ('competitiveness') in the centre of discussion . In countering this archaic, `commonsense', view of the restructuring process, it is essential to insist on the wider, more forward-looking, themes which popular discussion started to raise at the end of industrial expansion and which point towards new needs and the objective possibility of their satisfaction : relaxation of the disciplines of industrial production ; open and decentralised regulation of productive and administrative processes ; an attack on the ferocious inequalities of the industrialising phase ; forms of economic development which respect the natural, urban and cultural environment . Whatever happens, it is likely that existing industry within Western Europe will play a more passive role, analogous to agriculture previously . Productivity will decisively outstrip demand, releasing labour for - what? The use that is to be made of this potential accession of wealth in the form of human energy is a central issue of contemporary European development .

Notes

1 My thanks to Cynthia Cockburn, who acted for the editorial board of Capital and Class, for her help and encouragement . Thanks also to John Harrison and Hugo Radice, who as referees, made critical comments on the first draft . I have not responded to all their points as this would have meant writing at least one completely new paper . 2 Steindl (1952) . 3 `Commission dash hopes of EEC recovery', Financial Times, 3 .11 .82 . 4 Shipbuilding : `In 1980 Community production was 2 .4m . cgrt .



RESTRUCTURING (compensated gross registered tons) a drop of 18 .4 per cent compared with 1979 and 52 per cent compared with 1976 . The Commission does not anticipate any change in the situation in 1981' - `Gloomy Days in Shipbuilding', EC Commission Background Report 11/1/82 . Petrochemicals : `Europe's loss-making petro-chemical and plastics producers have closed 4 .8m . tonnes - 14 .7 per cent - of their effective capacity over the last 15 months, according to analysis at W . Greenwell, a stockbroking firm . But Greenwell says that "nowhere near enough" plants have yet been shut down . It stresses that in the "worst" product areas between 30 per cent and 40 per cent of capacity needs to "disappear" .' `Europe's Petrochemical Crisis', Financial Times, 5 .4 .82 . p .3 . Motors : `There is over-capacity in the European car industry, which is capital intensive and needs to use its plant at a high rate before the break-even point is reached .' `European Motor Industry', Financial Times Survey, 13 .10 .82 . Evidence on textiles and steel is even easier to find . 5 UN (1980) . 6 This point was made by Ajit Singh (1977) . 7 Fine and Harris (1976) made the rather infuriatingly nonoperational remark that the purpose of restructuring in the slump is to prepare the way for further restructuring in the boom . Nevertheless, it seems true - the gloss put on it here is that the crisis sees a restructuring of allocation, preliminary to a new structure of output in the boom . 8 The term 'super-growth' is used by Kindleberger (1967) . For discussion of early W . German restructuring see Minnerup (1976) and Droucopoulos (1977) . 9 CEPG (1981) . 10 Ibid . 11 Ibid . p . 14 . 12 This dominance is well analysed by Ricardo Parboni (1981, Chapter 4) . 13 CEPG (1981) p . 14 . 14 For evidence on the long-run declines in profitability, evident from the early sixties, see Hill (1979) . `An expansion becomes more sensitive to accidental disturbances 15 after it has reached a certain stage, and similarly a contraction can be more easily stopped and reversed by some stimulating factor, after it has progressed for some time . Therefore, even if we were not in a position to prove rigorously that expansion generates contraction and contraction generates expansion, a fairly regular succession of periods of prosperity and depression, of expansion and contraction, might be explainedby accidental shocks distributed in a radom fashion over time .' Haberler (1952) p .347 . But note that in Sweden in 1971 public sector incomes accounted 16 for 51% of GNP (Lindbeck, 1975) . It is not suggested that this state of affairs could be easily generalised . This term is used by Samir Amin in Frank (1981) . 17 18 Frobel et al . (1980) . This is the term used, for example, by Joachim Hirsch (1980) . 19 For example by Makoto Itoh (1980) . 20 21

Aglietta (1979) .

139



CAPITAL & CLASS 140

22

Hudson (1982) gives the following table, for example :

Regional Structure of FRG Direct Investments Abroad (Total assets in Billion DM and %) Country

Industrialised Countries in general EEC USA

Developing Countries in general Latin America Brazil Africa Asia ASEAN Countries Oil-producing countries TOTAL

23 24 25

1970 Billion DM % 14 .9 7 .3 1 .8

6 .2 3 .7 1 .5 1 .0 0 .4 0 .04 0.1 21 .1

1975 Billion DM %

70 .6 34 .6

29 .7 14 .8

8 .5

29 .4 17 .5 29 .4 4 .7 1 .9 0 .2 0 .5 100 .0

1979 Billion DM 47 .9 21 .8

4 .2

70 .7 35 .2 10 .0

12 .3 5 .5 2 .9 2 .1 1 .4 0 .2 0 .9 42 .0

29 .3 13 .1 6 .9 5 .0 3 .3 0 .5 2 .1 100 .0

18 .1 8 .6 5 .0 2 .6

12 .3

2 .3 0 .5 1 .8 66 .0

72 .6 33 .0 18 .6

27 .4 13 .0 7 .6 3 .9 3 .5 0 .8 2 .7 100 .0

Gillies(1982) . EC Commiston (1980) .

For a clear presentation of the neo-liberal position see Wolf (1981) which mounts a strong critique of the EEC's external commerical policies . 26 EC Commission (1979) . 27 Wright (1977) . 28 Alltakenfrom Financial Times Survey,`WestGermany',27 .10 .80 . 29 Boyer and Petit (1981) .

References

Aglietta, M ., (1979), A Theory of Capitalist Regulation : The us Experience, London, (New Left Books) . Boyer, R . and Petit, P ., (1981), Employment and productivity in the EEC, Cambridge Journal of Economics, 6, 1, March . (1981), The European Community : problems and prospects, Economic Policy Review, 7, 2, December . Droucopoulos, V ., (1977), West German expansionism, New Left Review, 105, September/October . EC Commission, (1979), Changes in industrial structure in the European economies since the oil crisis, European Economy, special issue. EC Commission, (1980), Community Third World: The Challenge of Interdependence, Brussels . Fine, B . and Harris, L ., (1976), The debate on state expenditure, New Left Review, 98, July/August . Frank, A .G., (1981), Reflections on the World Economic Crisis, London, (Hutchinson) . CEPG

RESTRUCTURING Frobel, F ., Heinrichs, J . and Kreye, 0 ., (1980), The New International Division of Labour, (Cambridge up) . Gillies, G ., (1982), The new international division of labour and developments in world trade and international production, mimeo, London, Polytechnic of the South Bank . Haberler, G ., (1952), Prosperity and Depression, third edition, London, (Allen and Unwin) . Hill, T .P ., (1979), Profits and Rates of Return, Paris, OECD . Hirsch, J ., (1980), Developments in the political system of West Germany since 1945 in Scase, R . (ed .), The State in Western Europe, London, (Groom Helm) . Hudson, M ., (1982), West German foreign investment since 1960 : tables and notes, mimeo, University of Leeds . Itoh, M ., (1980), Value and Crisis, London, (Pluto Press) . Kindleberger, C .P., (1967), Europe's Postwar Growth, The Role of Labour Supply, Cambridge, Mass ., (Harvard up) . Lindbeck, A ., (1975), Swedish Economy Policy, London, (Macmillan) . Minnerup, G ., (1976), West Germany since the War, New Left Review, 99, September/October . Parboni, R ., (1981), The Dollar and its Rivals, London, (New Left Books) . Singh, A ., (1977), UK industry and the world economy, Cambridge Journal of Economics, 1, 2, June . Steindl, J ., (1952), Maturity and Stagnation in American Capitalism, New edition, London, (Monthly Review Press), 1976 . United Nations, (1980), Economic Survey of Europe, New York . Wolf, M.H ., (1982), The EEC and trade policy . Paper presented to the British Association, September . Wright, A ., (1977), The Spanish Economy 1959-76, London, (Macmillan) .

141

Winston James This article deals with the eight years' and eight months' rule of the Manley regime in Jamaica . It analyses the nature of the regime and focusses on its internal contradictions . Its main argument is that the collapse of the PNP government in 1980 is best explained not by external interference but by its internal contradictions . Like other socialdemocratic regimes, it aspired to achieve equality while A MOST IMPORTANT chapter in the history of Jamaica came to an abrupt close on October 30, 1980 . The results of the general maintaining private . In Jamaica elections held on that date brought to power the right wing property this Jamaica Labour Party led by Edward Seaga and ended the eight by rhetorical promises wasyerndightmosrulefthPop'sNainlPrtyedb far in the enigmatic and self-styled `democratic socialist', Michael excess of political action . Manley . In the elections of February 1972, the PNP had won handsomely by a landslide of 36 to the JLP's 17 seats with the slogans of `Better Must Come' and `Power for the People .' In addition, on December 16, 1976, the PNP were to extend their margin of electoral support by once again routing the JLP (by 47 to 13 seats) even more convincingly under the most testing of circumstances . Yet, in October 1980, the PNP were humiliatingly defeated by the JLP who took 51 out of the 60 parliamentary seats under the slogan of `Deliverance .' It is indeed very ironic, even by Jamaican political standards, that a party which came to power on the crest of a wave of popular support under the banner 143 of `Better Must Come' was ousted in no uncertain terms by another demagogically promising `Deliverance .' Now, how do we explain this major turn-around of events? How do we account for the crash of the Manley regime in the most bloody election in Jamaica's history? To my mind these events cannot be explained in terms of CIA machination, 'destabilisation,' IMF parsimony and vindictiveness, nor even by the

The decline and fall of Michael Manley : Jamaica 1972 .1980

CAPITAL & CLASS 144

appalling levels of violence which accompanied the elections . Although the CIA, the IMF and political violence were all significant factors in determining the fate of the Manley regime, these in and of themselves cannot be considered to be adequate explanations of the collapse of the PNP government in Jamaica without reducing complex processes to the level of mere conspiracies . The contention of this essay is that the root cause of the fall of the PNP is to be found within the intrinsic contradictions of the PNP regime itself. More specifically, it will be argued here that in the most immediate sense, the rout of the PNP is to be explained by the fact that the regime, especially towards its bloody close, served neither the interests of capital nor that of labour effectively . Indeed, it had managed simultaneously to antagonise both the historic classes of Jamaican society . On a more complex and less immediate level of analysis, it will be argued that the crux of the demise of the PNP is to be found in its simultaneous quest for a greater degree of equality while maintaining the existing structures of private property . Moreover, it will be argued that the electoral catastrophe of the PNP was symptomatic of the way in which the economy collapsed . It is therefore, not enough to say that the economic collapse led to electoral defeat in an unmediated manner . Instead, we need to point out that it was not economic collapse per se which drove the working class to vote for the JLP or not to vote at all, but that it was the fact that the economic crash fell on the heads and shoulders of the most exploited and destitute of Jamaican society, and left them with no prospect of amelioration under the PNP . What is perhaps even more tragic is the fact that the capitalist `strike', sabotage and the remarkably high levels of destabilisation unleashed upon Jamaica by the internal and external bourgeoisies was generated less by concrete policies which directly benefitted the working class and more by issues such as rhetoric and international relations which delivered virtually no immediate fruits to the exploited and oppressed . In short then, the Manley regime did not answer to the needs of the working class and at the same time did not comply with the demands of the ruling class on the terms on which the latter would continue to operate units of production . This resulted in a state of total impasse and consequently the economy haemorrhaged heavily and the massses teetered on the brink of physical survival . It is therefore argued herein, that regimes such as the PNP's are intrinsically unviable : the PNP did not establish a modus vivendi with capitalism which would have enabled the latter to function and at the same time it did not challenge capitalist

JAMAICA 1972-1980 relations of production to enable production to take place under a higher, socialist, mode of production . Not surprisingly, then, economic catastrophe ensued, and the regime got voted out of office . The PNP regime could not `get on' with domestic or foreign capitalists but at the same time it did not embrace the alternative of socialism . For the PNP, despite its rhetoric, capitalism was its system, albeit one that wreaked total havoc in Jamaica . Although the PNP and Manley declared that they wanted equality they argued with equivalent vehemence for the prevention of any infringement of the rights of private property . It was in the end, this grotesque and seemingly idiotic philosophical antinomy and explosive political contradiction, of equality and private property, which brought the PNP regime tumbling down on October 30, 1980 . The following are some rather dry but important and immensely telling statistics which give an appreciation of the scale of the economic and social devastation . Between the years 1974-1980 real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) experienced a cumulative decline of 19 .8% . One sector of the economy, construction and installation, which is crucial to economic growth because of its multiplier effects and high level of employment, experienced between 1972 and 1980 nothing short of a catastrophe : it underwent a cumulative decline in production of no less than 83 .3%! Gross Capital formation as a percentage of the GDP fell from a level of 35 .1% in 1969 to 15 .7% in 1980 . The budget deficit increased more than eleven-fold, from J$66 .8m . in the financial year 1972/73 to a phenomenal J$750m . in 1979/80 . Net national debt shot through the roof, increasing by over 800% from J$431 .4m in 1973 to J$3, 8 84 .9m . i n 1980 . Moreover, the external position of the national debt increased even more sharply, from J$150 .4m . in 1973 to an astonishing J$1,544 .9m by the end of 1980 - an increase of 927 .2% . Net foreign reserves, in correspondence with the economic decline fell from a positive figure of J$130 .2m . in December 1974, to minus J$961 .1m . by the time the PNP left office in October 1980 . In the meantime, not surprisingly, the victims of unemployment increased from 24% of the labour force in 1972 to 31% in 1979 down to 26 .8% in November 1980 . Even more significantly real disposable income per capita fell to the levels they were around thirteen years previously, in 1967 . And, in keeping with the other macroeconomic indicators, the standard of living of the working class fell dramatically . Between April 1975 and November 1980 while wages increased by 98 .5%, prices, over the same period had increased more than twice as much, by 204 .7% . Real wages had thus declined by more than one-half in less than six years . Not surprisingly, between 1974 and 1980 decreases in the real con-

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CAPITAL & CLASS 146

sumption of the following basic items occurred, at a time, we should add, when the population of Jamaica was increasing : Food 31 .31% Non-alcoholic beverages 76 .71% Clothing and footwear 59 .26% Furniture, furnishings, household equipment and operation 22 .5% Source : Calculated from the Dept . of Statistics, National Income and Product, 1980, Kingston 1981, pp .62ff. On a more human level, the painful close of the Manley regime was symbolised by the increase in the number of poor people suffering from mental illness, many of whom were seen to roam the streets of Kingston . In fact some, their bodies emaciated, walked the streets of the capital as naked as the day they were born . This latter phenomenon is arguably hitherto unseen in Jamaica . Not surprisingly, by January 1980, there were reports that the island's main mental hospital, Bellevue, had a major problem in coping with this veritable epidemic of mental illness . (Beckford and Witter, 1982 :105) What we have here then, in Jamaican parlance, is a country that has been definitely `hushed up' . However, to get the statistics in their full perspective, it must be stated here that in the early years of the PNP regime, the Jamaican masses experienced an unprecedented improvement in their standard of living . Wages had kept well ahead of inflation up to the end of 1976 and the level of unemployment was reduced from an estimated 25% in 1971 to a low of 19 .9% in April 1975 . However, by the close of 1976, it had begun to move once more, in the pre-1972 direction . In addition to these early, but somewhat ephemeral successes, the social wage had significantly increased by, amongst other things the implementation in 1973 of free school uniforms for primary school children whose parents could not afford them, and the introduction of free secondary and university education . Other noteworthy reforms during these early years, were : compulsory trade union recognition by employers, a national minimum wage, paid maternity leave, an adult literacy programme and a land reform programme - albeit a rather timid one, as we shall see . Economic growth and social crises : prelude to the PNP victory

During the two decades to 1972, the Jamaican economy experienced an unparalleled development in its productive forces as measured by the nominal and real growth of the GDP . Between 1950 and 1971 nominal GDP had increased from a meagre J$152 .4m . to J$1,120 .2m, a jump of over 635% . From 1950 to 1968 the average annual rate of growth of the real GDP was a respectable 6 .7% and between 1959 and 1972 the real GDP had

JAMAICA 1972-1980 more than doubled from J$407m to J$825 .2m . Real per capita income also increased by more than 100% between 1950 and 1968 ; and from 1950 to 1960 it increased at an annual rate of 5 .4%, slowing down to increase at an annual rate of 2 .9% between 1960 and 1968 . Significantly, however, the dynamic of the Jamaican economy at this time was largely determined by the rhythm of the investment pattern in the bauxite-alumina industry which had expanded quite dramatically during these two decades . This sector had a profound influence upon the construction industry which latter in itself has the most allembracing effect upon the economy . Therefore, the period of construction and expansion in the bauxite-alumina industry had what the Keynesian economist would call an important 'multiplier effect' upon the rest of the economy . The problem of course is that once the construction and expansion phase of the bauxitealumina industry comes to a close a crisis is precipitated in the rest of the economy ; and this is precisely what occurred at the beginning of the 1970s . (Cf. Girvan, Bernal and Hughes, 1980) We shall return to this problem later . For the moment, however, what is important to note is that despite the secular growth in the GDP, capital formation, and indeed, emigration on a massive scale from the island, the rate of unemployment actually doubled during the decade of the '60s, from about 12 .5% in 1960 to 25% in 1971 . The distribution of income, not to mention wealth, became even more skewed . Thus, while in 1958 the top 10% of income recipients gobbled up 43 .5% of the total income received, by 1971-72, instead of decreasing, the figure increased to 49 .3% . Not surprisingly, there was an estimated fall in the earned money income of the poorest 40%, from 7 .2% to 5 .4% . Absolute poverty also grew : between 1958 and 1968 it is estimated that the absolute income of the poorest 30% of the population fell from J$32 .00 to J$25 .00 per capita, in constant 1958 dollars . And in 1962, some 60% of the labour force was earning less than J$20 .00 per week - the amount of the fixed minimum wage in 1975 . (McLure, 1977 :17 and Girvan et al . 1980 :115) In the countryside, the distribution of land, a subject we shall return to, became more skewed and the income of the peasants and agro-proletariat declined . Thus while in 1961 the average size of all farms under 5 acres was 1 .8 acres, by 1968, the average size of such farms had fallen to 1 .5 acres . Moreover, while in 196170 .84% of all farmers were in the under 5 acres category, by 1968, almost 80 .0% were in this group of minifundistas . In the meantime, the average size of the largest estates (i .e . those in the 500 acres and over category) increased from 2,210 acres to 2,340 acres . And so when we examine more closely what seems to be a

147

CAPITAL & CLASS 148

major economic accomplishment we find that there were clear manifestations of major stress-faults : high unemployment despite heavy emigration, with the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer, existing cheek-to-jowl beside spectacular aggregate economic growth . In addition, the accusation of economic mismanagement, political victimisation, corruption on a massive scale and at the highest levels of public life, coupled with police brutality against the poor during the JLP regime, were pervasive . The combination of these factors clearly provided the recipe for social discontent . And discontent was certainly quite widespread in Jamaica, especially towards the close of the 'sixties .' In August 1965 there were riots against Chinese business establishments, and in particular against those in the Kingston area after a black woman was allegedly beaten up by four Chinese brothers during a dispute over a radio she was in the process of buying from them . When the dust was finally settled, numerous Chinese businesses were looted and/or burnt out, two policemen were shot (one accidentally shot dead) six civilians were suffering from bullet wounds, ninety arrests were made, and the fire brigade had answered over seventy-one calls . In the following year, there was a wave of disturbances ranging from massive strikes across the island, to inter-party clashes over jobs and houses in western Kingston . These latter do not only reflect the successful division of the working class and oppressed by both parties ; it also points to the material basis which facilitates the butchery of worker by worker . That material basis is, in a word, poverty . The `scarcity' of employment, housing and other social amenities create the environment within which it was quite conducive for those in desperate need of them to be successfully and cynically manipulated by local party bosses . (Cf. Stone 1980) In any case as a consequence of the disturbances, a state of emergency was declared on October 2, 1966, which lasted for the ensuing month . The most disturbing event of the sixties for the Jamaican ruling class, however, was not the displaced rising against the Chinese retail sector, or the disturbances of 1966, but the'Rodney Riots' of October 1968 . The events were sparked off when students and radical lecturers of the University of the West Indies demonstrated on the streets of Kingston against the banning by the JLP government of Dr . Walter Rodney, the Guyanese Marxist historian who was brutally murdered in 1980 by the Burnham regime in the country of his birth . Many of the youths of Kingston joined the demonstration with enthusiasm and rioted after the march, which had been up to that point peaceful, was attacked by thugs from an office of the JLP-aligned Bustamante Industrial Trade Union and by the police . By the time the rioting

JAMAICA 1972-1980 had ended over one million pounds worth of damage had been done to property (which, significantly enough, was predominantly owned by North American capital), looting had taken place on a grand scale, fourteen buses were totally destroyed with thirty-five others badly damaged, two people were killed and one seriously wounded . One senior member of the Jamaica Defence Force four years later in cool hindsight assessed that 1968 was `a half-cocked urban insurrection . . . but it was leaderless and soon lost its form .' But half-cocked or not, it certainly shook the Jamaican ruling class to its very bones out of its illusory, smug nonchalance of unchallenged hegemony . When we leave the streets of Kingston with their riots and running battles in the 1960s and go to the point of production proper, we find the same increasing expression of dissatisfaction . As the statistics reveal, there was at the end of the 'sixties a marked increase in the combativity of the Jamaican working class . From thirty-seven in 1965, the number of strikes had increased to 187 by 1970, and involving, not the 25,316 workers of 1965 but 39,401 and accounting for, not the 290,162 workdays lost in 1965 but 384,636 . The conclusion is clear : seething beneath the facade of economic stability was a volcano of growing dissatisfaction and militant action on the part of the working class . During the turmoil of the'60s, the PNP was quite outspoken about police harassment and the curtailment of civil liberties . Indeed, in 1968, the PNP MPs had walked out of parliament in protest over the banning of Walter Rodney . By 1969, Norman Manley had retired from active politics and predictably, his son, Michael succeeded him as leader of the party . The PNP by this time had grown in popularity . And by the time of the 1972 general elections, members of all the social classes of Jamaican society (including a significant sector of the capitalist class) supported the PNP, less perhaps for what it stood in its own right than for what it stood against . The result of this was that the PNP scored a landslide victory over the JLP in the February election of '72 .

Now during the election campaign of 1972 the PNP never used the slogan `socialism' . There was talk of `popular participation' and `social justice' but never once was there any talk of socialism by Manley and his colleagues . Indeed, on coming to power, Manley reiterated time and again that he did not believe in any 'isms' . In his recent book, however, Manley tells us that at the first National Executive Committee meeting of his party after the victory of '72 he urged his party to return to its socialist roots and

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The meaning of `Democratic Socialism'

CAPITAL & CLASS 150

to systematically re-examine its ideology . The final product of this long process of self-reflection on the part of the party came in late 1974 : the PNP declared to the public that its ideology was `democratic socialism' . However, the document published by the party in November 1974, Democratic Socialism: The Jamaican Model, is more a declaration of principles than a call to action . To the party, the document reads : Socialism is first an ideal, a goal and an attitude of mind that requires people to care for each other's welfare . Socialism is a way of life . A Socialist Society cannot simply come into existence . It has to be built by people who believe and practice its principles . Socialism is the Christian way of life in action . It is the philosophy that best gives expression to the Christian ideal of equality of all God's children . It has as its foundation the Christian belief that all men and women must love their neighbors as themselves. (Manley, 1976 :158) This good-intentioned but very vague and thus virtually empty formulation is characteristic of the whole document . Little or nothing is said about how this new society is to be achieved . The closest it gets to specifying concrete measures to be taken in the creation of socialism in Jamaica is to put forward the classic social democratic formula of the `mixed economy' without really specifying what the `mixture' will be between the private and the public sectors . It speaks about the quest for equality, but at the same time clings to the sanctity of private property . The question of how this equality is to be achieved without seriously challenging the profoundly unequal distribution of wealth and income based on the inequalities in the possession of private property is not addressed in this pamphlet . Moreover, the PNP states quite categorically and indeed in italics, `This Government rejects any form of expropriation .' The document also made it quite clear that capitalists have a permanent place and role in the new democratic socialist Jamaica . All that they needed to do in their quest for profits was to be `responsible' and operate `within the bounds of the National interest and the rights of the people,' a formulation, so vague that it is rendered utterly meaningless . Foreign capital was promised a warm welcome and was `assured a fair return on investment and fair and consistent treatment,', provided that : (a) the investment was in accordance with the `national interest' ; (b) the investor did not object if s/he was required to enter into joint ventures with the state and/or Jamaican capital ; and (c) s/he was willing to operate in Jamaica on a basis of an un-defined conception of `good corporate citizenship .'

JAMAICA 1972-1980 Some of the mysteries of `democratic socialism' are however, dispelled when we consider that Manley and his colleagues in 1974 considered Britain, Sweden, Holland, Australia, New Zealand, India, Zambia, and Tanzania to be countries under `socialist governments' . Needless to say, not one of these countries had or has broken with capitalist relations of production . Indeed, what we have in this list is a motley collection of imperialist and de facto third world dictatorships - with the qualified exception of Tanzania . When we look at the dynamic of public ownership under the Manley regime we find that the actual nature of this whole process differed quite markedly from the pronouncements of the PNP : the little extension of public ownership which occurred under the PNP government, followed the exigencies of political and economic crises rather than conscious political intentions informed by a radical programe . 51% of bauxite production and all bauxite land have been bought by the state, but the crucial and lucrative alumina processing sector, was and is, in reality untouched by the powers of the state . Consequently, when we examine the ownership of the bauxite/alumina industry as a whole, we find that the state owns a mere 8%! Secondly, the PNP moved against the bauxite companies when the crisis within the world economy and in Jamaica deepened and the need to control to a greater extent the sector which accounts for over 70% of export revenue became crucial . Likewise the taking over of the operations of Barclays Bank occurred after the bank decided to ends its operations in Jamaica . This closure would certainly have created, had the state not intervened, a great rupture within the financial structure of the island . Again in the hotel industry, state ownership occured after hotels were closed or their owners indicated that they had no wish to continue operations in a depressed Jamaican tourist industry . The partial state ownership of cement production occurred, true to form, after Caribbean Cement attempted to sabotage production by stating that it had not the resources to carry out vital expansion to facilitate increased output . Here again, then, nationalisation occurred after the state was presented with an inescapable fait accompli - an offer it could not have refused . In effect then, the 'nationalisations' and move towards the so-called `mixed economy' came about more by default, rather than by conscious political desire and action guided by a radical programme . In any event, despite the PNP's rhetoric about controlling the commanding heights of the economy ; after eight years and eight months `in power' the state controlled a meagre 18% of the economy, co-operatives 1%, and capital the remaining

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81% . Whereas the state owned 8% of the bauxite/alumina industry, private (completely foreign) capital owned and controlled the remaining 92% of this vital industry ; likewise only 9% and 2% of manufacturing and distribution respectively were state owned at the close of the PNP regime . (PNP, 1980 :20 and National Planning Agency, 1977) But what is the objective basis of such an ideology within the PNP? Why this simultaneous and contradictory quest for equality and the defence of private property? To my mind, the material basis and explanation is to be found in the fact that the PNP has always been, and especially after 1952, as much a party of the Jamaican bourgeoisie as that of the subaltern classes of Jamaican society . Indeed historically the main financial support of the PNP as mentioned above, has never come from its impoverished working class base, but from members of the Jamaican petit-bourgeoisie at home and abroad, and by 1953, the haute bourgeoisie (members of the `twenty-one families') of Jamaican society, and in particular the wealthy Matalon family . (Munroe, 1972 :83-84) 2 As if this was not enough, the influence of the Jamaican bourgeoisie on the policies of the PNP was not solely confined to the fact that they held the purse strings and paid the piper, they also had influential positions within the party itself . The Minister of National Security in Manley's first Cabinet was Eli Matalon, the former mayor of Kingston and member of the Matalon family . This is the root of the remarkable tension within the party between a plebeian base demanding equality, and the bourgeois apex of the party defending the sanctity of private property . `Democratic Socialism' is thus the legitimate, if feeble offspring of this most unhappy and seemingly unlikely marriage . In sum, then, it is clear that despite the rhetoric, all that is to be found at the core of the PNP's ideology of democratic socialism is the sanctity of capitalist relations of production and nothing of the `fundamental change' which Manley had demagogically promised, but which he himself in another context disparagingly terms the `politics of tinkering .' (Manley, 1974 :23 and 34) Democratic socialism in fact ends up, like a sermon, little more than moral exhortation (a la `socialism is love', all God's children are equal) within the boundaries of capitalist exploitation . It as such manifests the classical traits of what Marx and Engels term `conservative or bourgeois socialism' . And it was for this reason that it was not at all surprising that even the Daily Gleaner, the mouthpiece of the Jamaican ruling class since 1834, did not scream `Murder!' but commented : `There is no reason why the private sector of the nation should not thrive as well or even better within the guidelines

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of Socialism as under laissez faire Capitalism . Certainly, business will be allowed fair profits and an adequate return on capital investment . There does not seem anything frightening about the kind of Socialism the government is implementing.' (Daily Gleaner, 24 Nov . 1974 ; emphasis added) . To be sure the Gleaner (owned and scrupulously controlled by perhaps the most powerful of the `twenty-one families', the Ashenheims), was not long in changing its verdict on `democratic socialism', but it is nonetheless significant that it held, and moreover, divulged in such unequivocal terms its really quite ungrudging acceptance of `democratic socialism' when it was first announced . We now need, however, to return to the central question of why the bourgeoisie launched its prolonged but ultimately successful offensive against the PNP . As I have indicated above, the evidence suggests that factors of ideology and international relations as opposed to the concrete measures taken by the PNP domestically hold the key to answering this question .

There is no doubt that certain economic measures which were taken by the PNP offended the bourgeoisie and thus aroused the latter's opposition . Issues such as the dearth of foreign exchange currency, certain taxation measures, and the Minimum Wage Law deeply worried the bourgeoisie . However, more often than not the capitalist class managed to successfully bring their enormous weight to bear upon the government, which either resulted in the former being outrightly victorious, or a compromise was struck between the state personnel and the indigenous bourgeoisie . Indeed, the PNP took more concrete measures in aid of capital in Jamaica than the JLP under Shearer, ever did . In 1971, the last full year of the previous JLP government, subsidies to industry stood at J$8 .535m ., however, by 1978 under the democratic socialist regime of Michael Manley, these subsidies to industry increased by an astonishing 23 .6 fold to J$201 .9m . (Dept . of Statistics, 1981 :52-53)' To be sure these figures are in current values, but neither inflation nor devaluation can deny this significant increase in state assistance to industry . Incentives, such as tax holidays for certain industries, were made more generous . The tax concession period for some industries was extended from seven to ten years . In addition, the tax-free period for companies operating under the incentive legislation in the rural areas of the island was extended to fifteen years . The Kingston Export Free Zone offered such accom-

The Jamaican Bourgeoisie and the PNP

CAPITAL & CLASS 154

modating incentives such as : (a) 100% tax holiday on profits in perpetuity for all enterprises in the Zone ; (b) Goods or raw material brought into the Zone will be free from Customs Duty ; (c) Minimal exchange control for foreign based operations ; (d) Companies operating in the Free Zone will not be subject to import licensing ; (e) Foreign personnel employed in the Zone will not be required to pay work permit taxes ; (f) Freedom from quantitative restrictions ; (g) No minimum investment is required ; (h) The Free Zone legislation, by its structural and functional aspects, does not restrict the repatriation of original investment plus any capital gain ; and just in case the investor is still not persuaded : (i) Around the clock security services are provided by the Port Authority, including patrol dogs with handlers ; (Kingston Export Free Zone, 1979 :16-18 andJamaica Chamber of Commerce Journal Vol . 33, No . 1, 1977 :4-5) . Rather than being introduced by Shearer and Seaga, staunch advocates of Puerto Rico's Luiz Mutioz Marin's `operation bootstrap' recipe, these incentives were promoted by the `democratic socialist' PNP. It must also be borne in mind that this was not a political aberration deemed necessary by force of circumstances, as the New Economic Policy (NEP) under Lenin was : it was an integral element of the party's strategy for development . Indeed, it should also be remembered that the first PNP government (1955-1962) under the leadership of Michael Manley's father, Norman Manley, adopted and practised with religious zeal the `Puerto Rican Model' of `industrialisation by invitation' . The 1972-80 PNP regime, then, was in this respect merely following the well-trodden path of the Party . And what did the PNP government gain from this somewhat absurd and veritable bending over backwards to accommodate foreign capital? Well, in 1979 after over three years of operation the Kingston Export Free Zone had twenty-four factories in operation, but employed a mere 400 workers . In relation to the incentives granted, these jobs must surely rank among the most costly in the world in macro-economic terms . Many measures were also taken to assist and encourage small businesses, including the granting and guaranteeing of loans on extremely favourable terms to those enterprises . More significantly, in 1974 along with the bauxite levy also came the Capital Development Fund, an institution through which the funds from the transnational corporations (TNcs) could

JAMAICA 1972-1980 be transferred to private industry ostensibly to diversify and strengthen the island's economic base . (See Workers' Liberation League, 1974 ; Maingot, 1979 and Reid, 1978) . Finally, the state took on the role of guarantor on an unprecedented scale of loans raised by private Jamaican capital on the foreign capital markets . As a consequence of this by October 1980 almost a third (J$597 .3m) of the total net external debt (J$1,649m) was attributable to government guaranteed external loans . (Bank of Jamaica, 1981) So, true to its ideology of democratic socialism the PNP did not attack capitalism but instead supported it on a scale that the Jamaican state had never done . In the light of the above, then, what caused the bifurcation of the PNP regime and the local bourgeoisie? The evidence points to two factors : (a) the party's rhetoric and (b) its new international relations, and especially those with Cuba and other `progressive regimes .' When one systematically peruses the major organ of the Jamaican bourgeoisie, theJamaican Chamber of Commerce journal we find that the major issue of concern was not so much the government's economic and social policies, but the rhetoric of the party which made the bourgeois class not so much fear the present, as view the future with great trepidation . This explicit disquiet of the Jamaican bourgeoisie goes as far back as 1973 and was to become more audible and vociferous as time went on . In Feburuary 1975 the then President of the Jamaican Chamber of Commerce, Mr . Winston Weeks, said : "It is no secret to most if not all of us that there are forces in the society conspiring to remove the terminology "Private Enterprise" from the vocabulary of Jamaicans in as short a time as possible . It is no secret that these are crucial times for us, for Jamaica and for the stability of all that is important in our Nation . Regardless of the platitudes that have been mouthed and the oratorical outbursts shouted from platforms in recent times to gloss over the sugar coated pill that is being pushed down the throats of many, few of us are fooled as to what could result from a relaxation of vigilance and should not allow ourselves to be lulled into a feeling of false security in the face of this monster problem . Near and far, far and wide, socialism is being preached in the land . After many an attempt to clothe this macabre being in as many dresses as there have been addresses by spokesmen for the Government, at long last it has been suitably attired as far as the protagonists are concerned in the robes of Democratic Socialism ." From the general tenor of Mr Week's speech it is evident

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that he was disturbed by the ideology of the PNP, not so much for what it entailed at that particular point in time, but for what it implicitly and potentially holds for the future . As Weeks said : "We see the writing of the future vaguely on the wall. Do we want it clearly spelt out for us?" It was in the same vein that Edward Seaga in a speech to the Kingston Jaycees declared : "the real socialism is yet to come ." The Jamaican bourgeoisie's attitude to the closer relations with Cuba established by the Manley regime is well known . The more intimate Cuba/Jamaica relations were from the very beginning received with universal condemnation by the Jamaican Establishment . This "anti-communist" hysteria finally reached a crescendo with the abrupt severing of diplomatic relations with Cuba by the new Seaga regime . But why did the Jamaican bourgeoisie find the rhetoric of the Manley regime so frightening? After all, the bark of democratic socialism was infinitely worse than its bite, so why the panic? There seem to be two reasons . Firstly, as we have already indicated, the rhetoric created uncertainty and capitalist planning cannot take place effectively in conditions of uncertainty and instability . This was especially worrying for the Jamaican bourgeoisie because they saw Manley, in particular, as being extremely mercurial politically . According to them, one could never be quite sure of what Manley was going to do next . Indeed the causal relation between the populist rhetoric and the capitalist panic and stampede has been acknowledged by sources as diverse in political perspectives as the World Bank and Michael Manley himself.' The second major worry about the populist rhetoric for the Jamaican bourgeoisie was the radicalising effect it had on the already volatile Jamaican masses, and especially the urban youth and workers . Indeed, the PNP was accused of "stirring up" the workers and "raising expectations ." It is certainly true that the ideology of "democratic socialism" raised the confidence of the Jamaican masses and their combativity : it is no accident that soon after the declaration of "democratic socialism" in 1974 several large estates in Western and Eastern Jamaica were "captured" by landless peasants and agro-proletarians under the slogan, "it is socialism time now" . Before we go on to consider the relation between the external bourgeoisie (basically, American capital) and the PNP regime, it is worth registering at this point that the dynamic of the PNP government unleashed a tragic and viciously destructive cycle . First of all came the declaration of `democratic socialism' and the attendant disproportionately fiery rhetoric ; this in its turn led to a decline in the levels of investment (foreign as well as

JAMAICA 1972-1980 domestic) and flight of capital .' As a consequence of the tremendous hardship inflicted upon the poor by this veritable strike and sabotage undertaken by the bourgeoisie, the PNP condemned (verbally) the culprits as the `unpatriotic oligarchy and clique' . (Manley) . 6 This rhetoric in its turn instead of stemming the flight of capital, exacerbated it . Because of the dramatic fall in production, exports and foreign exchange, the government finally turned to the IMF . The IMF medicine did not work, indeed the economic and social conditions worsened and the standard of living of the working class and oppressed plummeted : instead of curing the patient the IMF medicine, rather like the prescription of a quack all but killed it . The base of the party became restless ; violent demonstrations (detonated by the increase in the price of gasoline) occurred in early 1979 . The PNP pressurised by the JLP opposition, the masses and the trade unions, blamed the IMF for the harshness of the conditions imposed and the nonmaterialisation of anticipated results even when the IMF guidelines were obediently and rigorously adhered to . The IMF responded in equally belligerent terms making its measures even tougher and described Jamaica as an ungrateful `spoilt child' .' The bourgeoisie in the meantime took to the warpath and heightened its offensive against the government . While the economy haemorrhaged, the poor suffered from malnutrition ; the PNP regime in its turn provided a generous dose of the only thing it had in quantity, demagogy . Although Manley intimated that he would take over the factories if the owners did not intend to produce,' in the event, the PNP did not . Because of the sanctity of private property to the Party, no expropriation took place, and even where nationalisation did take place, it was done under close observation of `the principle of reasonable compensation' . But there is a major problem if the coffers of the state are empty . There can be no nationalisation ; factories and productive units which have been closed are then left idle ; the economy enters reverse gear ; there is no production but there is also no expropriation ; the result? A state of catastrophic impasse . The PNP did the only thing that was left open to it to do : call a general election . The party had reached the objective limits of all possible reforms in Jamaica - to have gone on further it would have had to `violate' the rights of private property and this it is congenitally unable to do . Regis Debray is therefore right in his assessment of reformist parties : the problem with them is not that they are reformist per se, it is that they are not reformist enough . The extent of the reforms they are willing to undertake are rather limited ; moreover, they are oblivious to the fact that to sustain the momentum of reform a'revolutionary leap forward' is necessary :

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`It is not applying reforms instead of "making the revolution" that makes a man reformist . You are a reformist if you imagine that reforms can take place without eventually leading to a revolutionary situation ; if you think that the same methods which make it possible to introduce reforms will make it possible to resolve a situation of revolutionary crisis - when what is at stake is not just modifying a particular article of the constitution or deciding which firms are to be nationalised, but the life or death, the defeat or victory of one side or the other .' (Debray, 1977 :284) .

The external Bourgeoisie and the PNP

W e have still to consider the question of why foreign capital, and American imperialism in particular, pulled out all the stops against the Manley regime . In this context the role of the bauxite levy and nationalisation, though certainly important, have largely been over-emphasized in analyses of the Manley regime . There is a major difference, which has often been ignored, between the importance of bauxite to the Jamaican economy and the importance of the latter to the us economy and thus the impact of the bauxite levy and nationalisation on the fortunes of the us economy . The bauxite production levy and measures to `nationalise' the bauxite industry did not come about because of any intrinsic radical thrust within the PNP, but were brought into being by the exigencies of what James O'Connor terms a `fiscal crisis of the state' .' In addition, it followed from the rupture created within the economy by the steep increase in the price of manufactures and food imported from the advanced capitalist countries, taken together with the OPEC oil price increases which followed the Arab-Israeli War of late 1973 . The Bauxite Production Levy Act came into being in late 1974 after ten fruitless weeks of negotiations between a team led by eminent members of the Jamaican bourgeoisie (Matalon, Ashenheim, Rousseau) and the bauxite companies . It increased the rate of taxation per ton of bauxite produced by 480%, from J$2 .50 to J$14 .51 . This of course in relative terms is a massive rise in the rate, but in absolute terms it was far less significant . As a consequence of the increased rate, the state revenue from the bauxite/alumina enclave increased 650% between 1972 and 1974 from J$22 .71m to J$170 .34m respectively . However, when we examine the real material impact of the levy on the us economy on the firms involved, and indeed, ask the important question, could the bauxite levy be sustained, we get a very different, but more realistic picture . While the OPEC price increases detonated a massive rupture within the us

JAMAICA 1972-1980 economy by increasing its oil import bill by us$32 billion in 1973 alone, the combined price increases of the International Bauxite Association (IBA) 10 increased expenditure on bauxite importation by a mere us$300 million . The Joint Senate Committee on Commerce and Government Operations of the us heard that the Jamaican levy would amount to an 8% increase in the price of aluminium, while the price of bauxite itself would be increased by three cents per pound . At the time, the price of bauxite was US25 .33 cents per pound . The three cents increase in the price of bauxite, then in percentage terms was a relatively small 11 .8% (US Congress, 1974 :75) . Moreover, because of their monopoly position the companies could and indeed explicitly stated that they would merely pass the increases on to the consumer . (us Congress, 1974 :13) . When we examine the prospects of sustaining the bauxite levy and the IBA, we get a very bleak picture which really makes one wonder if Girvan and his colleagues at the National Planning Agency and the Jamaica Bauxite Institute could have really expected the levy to stick and the IBA to survive as a serious and viable cartel . To start with, aluminium is the most common metal in the world . It has been estimated that 8% of the earth's crust is made up of the substance . This is more than that of all other metals combined . The us Bureau of Mines estimates of proven world reserves of bauxite in 1973 was of the order of 15 .5 billion tons - a quantity sufficient to supply all the world's smelters for more than 230 years at the 1974 rate of consumption . Australia's known reserves alone could supply the entire world's aluminium smelters for more than 70 years at the 1974 rate of use (us Senate, 1974:290) Jamaica at the time, accounting for only 6 .5% was not in an especially privileged position in the ranking of world reserves . This wide spread of the world's bauxite resources hampered the objective potential of the IBA . The members (Australia, The Dominican Republic, Guinea, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Sierra Leone and Surinam) were far too disparate in their political outlook and degree of dependence upon their respective bauxite industries to have put up a united front against the more cohesive companies ." Guinea for instance, pursued obsequious policies in relation to the transnational corporations," while the presence of Australia among the members of the IBA was always somewhat incongruous . Here was a member of the OECD countries, possessing the largest reserves of bauxite among a group of poor third world countries . Australia had always lent a sympathetic ear to its advanced capitalist partners, including the USA, and more disturbingly, Australia's dependence upon bauxite for foreign

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exchange and general economic well-being had always been, in relation to the other IBA partners, very slight . While Jamaica, for instance, depends upon bauxite/alumina exports for over 70% of its export earnings, Australia (although the world's leading producer of bauxite and alumina) only earns 4% of its foreign exchange from the bauxite industry, and to top it all bauxite is merely one of a staggering total of forty-six minerals produced on that rich continent . (Latin American Regional Reports : The Caribbean, Oct . 31, 1980) . It was therefore clear to the companies that the bauxite levy could not be sustained : the latter could make an impact (albeit a small one in absolute terms) but it would be short-lived . Small wonder then that James Burrows, an expert on minerals and investment policies (and indeed one of the most astute among those who testified before the us Senate Sub-Committee) rightly noted that although Jamaica and the other Caribbean countries possessed a certain degree of leverage as a consequence of the level of investment in these countries, the prospects, nevertheless for the IBA were not very good . Indeed, the constraints on the IBA were so great that government to government negotiations were unnecessary, all that was required, he declared, was for the companies to `chip away at the cartel ." 3 And this was precisely what they did . Jamaica's bauxite and alumina production were drastically cut back : bauxite production in 1976 was 32 .1% less than it was in 1974, the year the levy was first introduced ; alumina production fell even more catastrophically - by no less than 48 .8% between 1974 and 1976 . (Dept. of Statistics, 1979 :30) What is important to note here is that this massive reduction in production was the end result of a deliberate and systematic switch of the transnational to other, more accommodating sources of bauxite . At a time when Jamaica's bauxite production was falling away world production expanded from 71 .8m tons in 1973 to 74 .8m tons in 1976 . A sharp re-arrangement of the world production league occurred with Guinea jumping from 3 .9% in 1973 to 15 .37% of world production in 1976 . What is even more dramatic is the way in which the us switched its market for bauxite importation . Again the case of Guinea is very telling . In 1970 Guinea accounted for only 3 .9% of us bauxite imports, while Jamaica accounted for 56 .2% . By 1976, however, things had changed significantly : Guinea took up 23 .9% of the us market, while Jamaica's share declined to 49 .0% . When we note the change in the share of the us market taken up by Jamaica and Guinea over the seven year period (1970 to 1976), the significance of the transformation is brought into full relief : Jamaica's share of the us market falling from 56 .2% to 49 .0% over the period amounts to a relative decline of 13%, while Guinea's increase

JAMAICA 1972-1980 from 3 .9% to 23 .9% indicates a phenomenal increase of no less than 513%! It was because of such a classic divide and rule strategy that an exasperated Dr . Carlton Davis, the Director of the Jamaica Bauxite Institute (JBi) described the IBA as a mere `talking shop .' (LA Regional Reports : The Caribbean, 31/10/80 ; South, 15 JanFeb, 1981 :71) . The state coffers (already under the strains of a severe fiscal crisis) felt the full impact of the sabotage of the transnational corporations - state revenue from the bauxite/ alumina industry declined between 1974 and 1976 by no less than 30 .46% . Thus by July 1979, a battle weary PNP regime finally succumbed to the heavy artillery of the transnational corporations by (among other concessions), reducing the rate of the levy from 7 .5% of the averaged realised price of primary aluminium in the us to a figure of about 6 .5% . This in effect amounted to a reduction in the levy rate by 13 .3% ." Finally, it is important to note that the TNCS have successfully managed to foil all attempts to nationalise them, and especially their more lucrative alumina processing sectors . Despite the great populist fanfare about taking control of the `commanding heights' of the economy and state acquisition of the bauxite/alumina industry, in 1979 the Jamaican state, as was mentioned above, controlled a mere 8% of the industry . There has certainly been some degree of state re-acquisition of bauxite mining and land held by the companies ; but the Jamaican state, `democratic socialist' or not, has not really challenged the hegemony of the giants in the alumina refining sector . So having considered the fairly mild material impact of the measures on the us economy and companies concerned, the question then arises, what created such a major outcry by the companies and what engendered such a murderous response? To my mind, the answer to this question is that it was felt that Jamaica had to be taught a lesson for demonstrative and pedagogical purposes . This was because it was thought that (a) the PNP had set a bad and unacceptable precedent, and (b) by attempting to establish an international cartel (the IBA) which could, had it been established solidly, have created a great deal of uncertainty in the operations of these companies in the future . The concerted counter-offensive of the bauxite companies against the levy was generated more by what it was conceived to represent rather than what it amounted to in dollars and cents . As everyone knows, one of the factors cherished most by these companies (as it is by every capitalist enterprise) is long term stability . The bauxite levy disrupted this cherished dream of capitalism in Jamaica and in addition sent out a lot of ripples to other producer countries which culminated in the formation of C a C 19 - K

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the IBA . This, for the TNCS, did not augur well for the future . Jamaica had to be taught a lesson, and in the event it was . Charles Parry of The Aluminium Company of America (ALCOA), put the position of the TNCS clearly : `Unilateral action by foreign governments violating contracts for vital resources has serious disruptive consequences for the us economy and for world trade . Companies and financial institutions that provide funds for industrial development base their decision on such contracts . If experience shows that contracts can be cast aside at the will of the host country, these institutions can no longer be expected to support foreign industrial development . The continued absence of strong United States Government reaction to such moves, of course, results in additional pressure on governments in other countries supplying raw materials to take similar action . This goes far beyond bauxite : it will extend to all types of raw materials . (Parry, 1974 :7) And more specifically, he told a member of the Senate Subcommittee : `Jamaica is just the first, Senator, there are going to be others if they can get away with it .' The offensives launched by the CIA and the State Department were for geo-political rather than for directly economic reasons . It was not the bauxite offensive which elicited their wrath but the fact that, as their logic went : here was Jamaica, a country in the US's `backyard' and astride essential foreign trade routes,' 5 courting Cuba the little bete noire of American imperialism, making noises about apartheid and shouting loud and clear in dissatisfaction about the present international economic order at the UN and other international forums, declaring `democratic socialism' at home and supporting the MPLA in Angola . In the eyes of Washington, Jamaica under Manley was on the road to becoming `another Cuba' . This could not be allowed to occur, not so much for directly economic reasons, as for geo-political ones : Jamaica was in the eyes of Washington, one of the floating battleships of the Caribbean sea which was threatening to lower the Stars and Stripes and hoist the flag of the Hammer and Sickle . When Henry Kissinger took a vacation-with 70 advisors! - in Jamaica late in 1975 he did not raise the question of the Bauxite levy . Instead, he demanded an end to the support of the MPLA assisted by the Cubans in Angola. 16 Manley could not (and for various political reasons which we cannot explore here) did not oblige . Indeed, it is very ironic that Kissinger's visit to Jamaica coincided with that of a three-person MPLA delegation invited by the Manley government . Unlike Kissinger, the Angolans were very warmly received by the Jamaican masses,

JAMAICA 1972-1980 especially the urban Rastafarian youth . Again in marked contrast to the MPLA delegation, Kissinger returned home empty-handed and disappointed ." Soon afterwards, Washington was to unleash its whole arsenal (short only of overt military intervention, Dominican-style) on the Manley regime . In the ensuing months, hundreds of Jamaicans were killed in the run-up to the December 1976 General Elections . Philip Agee, a former CIA agent, went to the island, identified and disseminated detailed information on eleven CIA agents operating from the us embassy in Kingston . In addition he informed the Jamaican people at public meetings of the murderous activities of the CIA world-wide . Also in 1976 a plan by an extreme right wing group to wreak havoc in Jamaica (code named Operation Werewolf) was foiled by security forces, who discovered detailed plans, arms, and ammunition that were to be used in an attempt to oust Manley . In response to the right wing offensive, the Jamaican workers, peasants and unemployed (despite the massive defection of the Jamaican middle class to the right - the usual reaction of this class when the class struggle heightens) as the table below shows, returned Manley in the December 1976 elections with an even greater mandate to continue his programme of reforms . Class Alignments Supporting the PNP PNP

Unemployed & Unskilled Manual Wage Labour White Collar Wage Labour Business and Management Class & High Income Professionals Farm Labour Small Peasants Source: Stone (1981 : 40)

Vote

PNP

vote

PNP vote

1972 52% 61% 75%

1976 60% 72% 57%

1980 40% 48% 37%

60% 52% 47%

20% 56% 45%

14% 42% 35%

In the USA in the meantime, a Democratic president in the form of Jimmy Carter came into power and in marked contrast to the Nixon-Kissinger and Ford-Kissinger administrations was more accommodating to the Manley regime . Funds from the us government agencies such as the us Agency for International Development (USAID) began to flow once again in accordance with the diagnosis that the Caribbean was a `tinder box ready to explode' that needed Aid instead of clobbering . 1 e However, with the coming of the intervention of the Soviet Union in Afghanistan, a new Cold War epoch was opened and a chill wind swept through the Caribbean . The spotlights were once again turned on to Cuba and on those who befriended it. Manley therefore came under increasing scrutiny by the US state . The shift in the balance

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of forces within the Carter administration from the relatively liberal Cyrus Vance (who later resigned over the abortive attempt to rescue the American hostages in Iran) and his supporters, to the hardline position of Brzezinski along with the ousting of Andrew Young, facilitated the `putsch' against the PNP regime . Manley's speech at the Summit Meeting of the Non-Aligned nations in Havana, attacked nearly everything the us stands for and defends - the question of Cuba, Puerto Rico, Southern Africa, Nicaragua, Vietnam and Kampuchea, the Polisaro guerillas, Palestine, the New International Economic Order, and so on . The right in the us jumped on this, in the `I told you so' fashion convinced that Manley's pronouncements proved definitively that he was a `Communist' . Cyrus Vance expressed his fury to the Deputy Prime Minister, and Minister of External Affairs, PJ Patterson while the latter was on a visit to Washington . As in 1976, so again in the months preceding the 1980 elections, the whole battery of us and imperialist `non-military' weapons were unleashed against the Manley regime : the CIA support for right wing oppositionists in Jamaica ; press campaigns not only in Jamaica itself, but also in the us and Canada 19 and indeed other Western countries such as Britain where the rightwing Daily Telegraph was most virulent against Manley-, the credit squeeze placed on Jamaica by the financial institutions, both the so-called multilateral ones such as the IMF and the

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World Bank, and the commercial banks in Europe and North America, which were literally just waiting for the Manley regime to tumble and thus resume their lucrative, if somewhat precarious, business with Seaga . Unlike 1976, however, in 1980 the forces of reaction succeeded in unseating Manley . It is important to note though that the PNP regime was not ousted by a military coup (although a plan for one was uncovered and thus foiled) but by a popular vote, albeit one accompanied by an unprecedented and remarkably high level of violence .

We therefore need to establish the causes behind the switching of allegiance in the October 1980 elections from the PNP (and at least by default) to the JLP . This task is especially important because the PNP owed its 1976 electoral victory to the overwhelming support of the Jamaican working class and oppressed . Now the evidence suggests that there was an unparalleled improvement in the standard of living of the working class in at least the first four years of PNP rule . Apart from a greatly increased social wage, for instance, free school uniforms for primary school children (1973), free secondary and university education (1973), there was also significant (but fluctuating) increases in real wages until 1977, which was, significantly, the year the first IMF agreement was signed . It is worth noting here that it was no accident that the fall in the standard of living coincided with the IMF intervention . Although Manley and his colleagues attempted (but conspicuously failed) to implement a series of wage restraints (from 1975 onwards), well before the IMF came into the picture, the real turning point occurred when the massive devaluations in the Jamaican dollar were demanded by the IMF as a condition of assistance . Despite strong opposition in Jamaica, including some from inside Manley's party itself, devaluation was conceded by the PNP . The increased prices of imported goods including basic items such as food added fuel to a major inflationary spiral which eroded the gains won by the working class in the preceding years . One of the major and most urgent tasks which the PNP had set itself on coming to power in February 1972, was the reduction of the chronically high levels of unemployment, which the previous year was running at an estimated 25% of the labour force . A crash programme of job-creation (the Impact Employment Programme) was introduced in 1972 which involved the provision of work for the unemployed by means of street cleaning and other work for the municipal authorities, especially in Kingston . By the end of 1972 this provided employment for 31,888 persons (excluding another 1,000 people who were taken on by private

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industry which initially worked with the scheme) . Along with general stimulation of the economy through greater government expenditure, this helped reduce unemployment so that by April 1973 the proportion of the labour force out of work had fallen to 21 .4% ; but the level of unemployment was not to fall below the April 1975 level of 19 .9% . Indeed, by October 1979, partly due to the floods earlier in the year, it had reached 31 .1% and despite various efforts to reduce this level in order to gain popular support in the election year, it had fallen to only 26 .8% by November 1980 . In fact, bad though these aggregates are in themselves, they disguise the very high levels of underemployment, youth unemployment and the astonishingly high rate of female unemployment which on average amounts to almost twice the national level . The underlying cause in the marked deterioration of the unemployment situation towards the end of the government was the flight of capital and the investment strike which the capitalist class unleashed against the PNP regime after 1975, and, after 1977, the austerity measures introduced by the government under the aegis of the IMF . Despite the concessions made by the PNP to the exploited and oppressed of Jamaican society (especially in the early years of the regime), there were however, also major attempts to slow down the march of these classes and in particular, that of the organised working class . Thus, in 1975, the Labour Relations and Industrial Disputes Act came into force . The unions, during the formative stages of the bill, managed to win concessions from the regime including redundancy payments, compulsory union recognition by employers, etc . However, in spite of the strong resistance put up by the unions and from within the PNP itself, the Act made strikes illegal in certain industries and sectors of the economy defined as `essential' . Significantly, this Act was strikingly similar to Edward Heath's notorious Act of the same name . (Hart, 1974, Cf. Kirkaldy, 1979) 20 And like Heath's Act, Manley's became a dead letter, since the unions ignored it and continued to struggle at the workplace in defence of their rights and standard of living . Again in 1975, the PNP in an attempt to appease the bourgeoisie, also introduced measures aimed at restraining wage increases . Contrary to popular mythology about the PNP, the IMF did not introduce wage limits in Jamaica, the latter merely recharged and streamlined the `social contract' when it arrived in 1977 . Following an IMF demand, the list of basic items under price controls was reduced from nearly 100 to 40 between 1977 and 1979 . This combined with the devaluation of the Jamaican dollar, caused prices to shoot through the roof as capitalists ruthlessly but not surprisingly attempted to maintain their profit

JAMAICA 1972-1980 margins . The official annual rate of inflation thus increased from 8 .1 % in the year 1975/76 to 49 .4% in the year 1977/78 . And in the latter year, the price of food and drink alone, had increased by no less than 54 .1% . In a period of spiralling inflation, the workers understandably resisted the wage restraint vigorously . And so from a figure of 551 industrial disputes in 1975, there was an increase to 687 in 1978 and 609 in 1979 . In the latter year, the number of work stoppages reported was 182, which resulted in the loss of 82,093 work-days . Instead of seriously dealing with the root cause of poverty and inequality in Jamaica, namely dependent capitalism, Manley and his colleagues endeavoured to deal repressively with its symptoms . Thus, in accordance with its promise to the Jamaican electorate in 1972 to `destroy the gun', the PNP introduced a whole plethora of repressive measures, proudly but accurately dubbed `heavy manners' . Among these pride of place was given to the Gun Court where (despite strong opposition from the legal profession and other quarters in Jamaica), persons convicted of the illegal possession of firearms would be kept in detention indefinitely . This was later changed to mandatory life imprisonment . To this day the Gun Court is still in operation . Indeed the story takes on a somewhat macabre and ironic twist because Seaga on coming to power tried to use the Gun Court Act to obtain the head of the bogey man of the Jamaican bourgeoisie, the PNP's radical General Secretary, Dr . DK Duncan, by means of what seems to be a clumsy and desperate frame-up . It should be noted here that the first serious attempt to bring an end to party-political gang warfare in the ghettoes, the Peace Movement, which was initiated in 1978 by the lumpen youths and poor people in the slums of Kingston themselves, was brutally sabotaged . Nine months after the famous Peace Concert of April 1978, one of the main parties to the agreement, Claudie Massop of the JLP was killed by a hail of bullets as police ambushed and opened fire on the taxi in which he was travelling ." Soon afterwards his PNP counterpart to the agreement of 1978, Bucky Marshall, was gunned down in cold blood in a New York nightclub . Also in late 1978, Peter Tosh, the well-known Jamaican reggae artiste (and perhaps the most radical and outspoken of the Jamaican musicians) who at the Peace Concert attacked quite vigorously the politicans and the brutality meted out daily by the police to the youths of the ghettoes, was himself brutally beaten up by the police on the pretext that he was seen smoking a marijuana `joint' . (Tosh, 1978) The motive and forces behind the destruction of the Peace Movement are far from clear . There have been, however, plausible allegations to the effect that the politicans of both parties

167

Peter Tosh at the peaceralley

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finding that they could not make good the demands of the united people of the ghetto decided to revert to the classic divide-andrule strategy which had served them well in the past . Therefore, so the argument goes, once one or both of the signatories to the Peace Treaty was eliminated the whole peace process would be destroyed and the people of the ghetto would once again turn in upon themselves and continue the `tribal war' over the crumbs which the politicans and the ruling class care to throw their way . In fact, this is precisely what occurred after the police had murdered Massop : the situation in the ghetto quickly reverted to a state of fratricide . The unequal distribution of land in Jamaica has already been mentioned . The best index of the barbarity of agrarian relations in Jamaica are the following statistics which are to be found in the most recent Census of Agriculture (1968/9) : In 1968/69, a mere 293 farms of 500 acres or more in size, occupied 44 .85% of the island's agricultural land, while 151,705 farms under 5 acres in size occupied a mere 14 .84% of the land . And with about 60% of the island's population still living in the countryside, the average income for each employed person in agriculture was as low as one-third of the national average between 1960 and 1972 . (Robotham, 1977 :45) In addition the workers and peasants in the countryside suffer the brunt of the economic backwardness of the country as a whole : illiteracy, malnutrition, and as the statistics show, land-hunger . After a spate of land occupations in the 1960s, the PNP came to office in 1972 with a massive mandate for the transformation of the rural economic relations in Jamaica . Manley recognised the importance of the task . Within two days of coming into office he had promised to `get to the heart of the farmers' problems . . . Jamaica's future will make or break on how quickly we get down to the heart of the agricultural problem, effect reconstruction and get this vital area moving .' Daily Gleaner, 4/3/72 ; Manley, 1974 : 96-100, 205-206) But as we shall see presently, the PNP merely tinkered with rural relations in Jamaica . Moreover, it is indeed arguable that the major beneficiaries of the land reform programme were the landowners who sold or leased poor quality land to the state at extortionate rates. The strategy of the PNP was to buy or lease (never to expropriate) idle land from the owners of large estates of over 50 acres in area . The PNP did not succeed in acquiring arable and irrigated land . It is by now a well established fact that the areas in which the bulk of the tenant farmers were placed were also (by no coincidence) the most infertile and barren parishes of the island . Where owners did not want to comply with the government's wishes, they merely presented it with the most palpably bogus

JAMAICA 1972-1980 `development plans' which the government accepted without challenge . (Harriot, 1979 ; Grant, 1977 :61) From an unofficially estimated area of 500,000 acres of idle land, the PNP at December 1979 had investigated a total of 2,434 properties with gross acreage of 184,679 ; of which 483 with an arable area of 67,546 had been leased to some 36,467 farmers . (NPA, 1980 : 7 .3-7 .4) . The average arable area per farmer, then, was a mere 1 .8 acres . This certainly did not herald the change of relations in the Jamaican countryside . 22 To make matters worse, the programme was inefficiently organised, incompetently executed, and riddled with nepotism and clientelism . These factors have often been noted by both left and right wing critics of Manley's agrarian reform in practice . Less frequently mentioned is the fact that more technical and material resources (including land itself) were needed if the programme was to have had a serious chance of succeeding . Apart from the fact that the amount of land distributed was grossly inadequate in area, the farmers were not provided with enough tools, fertilisers" and indeed stronger protection from the serious problem of predial larceny ie . crops on the land being stolen . Thus as a consequence of the combined effect of inefficiency, corruption and lack of equipment, the various schemes failed despite their limited nature . The Food Farms before expiring due to lack of results expended $3 for every $1 of food produced . (Stone 1981 : 125) The Pioneer Farms (worked by unemployed youths between the ages of 18 and 25 years) were in the end virtually left unattended . The initial figure of 363 persons quickly declined to 198 having put only 116 acres into production from an area of 1,417 acres of arable land available on the 11 farms . By December 1979 only 9 farms were left in operation, with a total of a mere 132 farmers . (Stone 1981 :126, NPA 1980 :7 .3) By this time, the farm credit schemes were also in a state of disintegration . The number of farmers under the Crop Lien Loan Programme declined by 81% for the year ending March 1979 with the number of participating farmers falling from 30,328 in 1977/78 to 5,855 in 1978/79 . Likewise, the acreage under the scheme over the same period, fell from 27,946 to 6,579 . From a collection target of $10m . for the year 1978/79, only $409,056 was realised . Since the scheme commenced in 1977, nearly $13 .5m had been pumped into it, but less than $1 .9m had been recovered (Daily Gleaner : 8/9/79) . This gross discrepancy between loans and anticipated repayments should not be interpreted as indicating inherent criminality among Jamaica's peasants, but instead should be seen to be an indication of the poverty of small farmers . The evidence suggests that they simply could not repay

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these loans ." To make matters worse agricultural production per capita, either stagnated or declined . Thus between 1972 and 1977, domestic agricultural production after declining, reached J$39 .00 per capita from a figure of J$37 .00 . Export agriculture declined by a third over the same period from J$21 .00 to J$14.00 per capita . Agricultural production per capita in toto fell from J$88 .00 per year in 1972 to J$84 .00 in 1977 . At the same time importation of food went on unabated . In 1973, Jamaica's food import bill was J$84m ; by 1978 it had jumped to J$234 .5m, and in 1979 it declined somewhat (but not because of increased domestic production, but because of the foreign exchange crisis and the fall in the real consumption of food) to J$226 .9m . The cosmetic effect of the so-called land reform programme of the PNP is brought into full relief when we compare the total amount of farmers placed, with the number of people unemployed . In 1979, after six years of land reform, whilst (by the most generous of calculations) the number of farmers engaged by Project Land Lease and other agrarian reform programmes was 44,775 ; the number of people unemployed in October 1979 was 264,700 . (NPA, 1980 : chap . 7 and Table 16 .1) In other words, the number of those unemployed in October 1979 was almost six times the number of people engaged in the `democratic socialist' land reform programme . To summarise the performance of the PNP vis-a-vis the working class, peasants and the unemployed, it is evident that in the first few years of the regime the real standard of living (as measured by real median weekly income) increased quite dramatically . However by 1977 the tide had turned : by 1979 unemployment had reached 31 .1% ; and in 1980 real incomes were below the levels they were in 1974 . The consumption of food, non-alcoholic beverages, clothing and footwear in 1980 was down quite significantly in relation to the 1974 levels . The land reform programme was totally cosmetic and did not alter the relations of forces in the Jamaican countryside . In short the PNP had run out of steam and had very little to offer . It would have indeed been a miracle or a massive political fraud had the PNP won the 1980 elections - just as it would have been such had the JLP won in February 1972 when the PNP first came to power. There is no sense in saying that the people voted for Seaga because of the violence and the bullying of the JLP as some maintain . There is no doubt that the violence contributed to the vote against Manley, but to make this single factor the fulcrum of any explanation of the fall of the PNP is, to my mind to avoid the crucial issues and to dodge the difficult questions . It is true to say that gunmen and indeed security forces were `out of

JAMAICA 1972-1980 171

control' (Manley) and that officially 856 people were shot dead in the political mayhem . But in 1976, the same scenario unfolded (although the violence did not reach the horrendous and unparalleled pitch of 1980), nevertheless the workers, peasants and unemployed of Jamaica went out in unprecedented numbers to vote for Manley and the PNP. In 1980 they did not repeat their actions because the Manley regime in their eyes had failed to deliver, and `mashed up' Jamaica . 25 It mashed up Jamaica because in a most utopian and adventurist manner it attacked imperialist interests and did not expect a retaliation and most certainly was not prepared to deal with one when it predictably and almost inevitably materialised . The PNP regime, true to the stipulations of the Jamaican constitution on the rights and safeguards of private property literally inscribed in the latter by the Jamaican bourgeoisie (at the behest of its imperialist senior partners) did not expropriate nor sanction the expropriation of one single capitalist enterprise, thus enabling the production of at least certain basic goods to be continued . Like Goethe's sorcerer's apprentice, the PNP under Manley unleashed processes that it could not, and was not prepared to control . Now it is the height of political irresponsibility if a regime does not allow, or create conditions condusive to the continued operation of the capitalist mode of production and simultaneously, does not attack capitalist relations of production so that the goods and services needed by that society can be continued to be produced . At least a less reformist and less verbose bourgeois democratic regime proper ensures a continued supply of basic necessities such as food . The PNP lost the support of both the ruling class (internal and external) and the working class and the oppressed, because by 1980 it served the interests of neither class effectively . At the same time the bloody offensive of the Jamaican bourgeoisie and the American state against the PNP was due to factors of ideology, rhetoric and international relations, rather than in response to policies such as expropriation, wholesale land nationalisation, and so on, which would have directly enhanced the well-being of the working class and created a major shift in the balance of power in Jamaican society . The Marxist economist Osker Lange once wrote : `An economic system based on private enterprise and private property of the means of production can work only as long as the security of private property and of income derived from property is maintained . The very existence of a government bent on introducing socialism is a constant threat to this security . Therefore,

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the capitalist economy cannot function under a socialist government unless the government is socialist in name only .' (Lange 1964 : 123) . The experience of the Manley regime however, suggests that Lange's last sentence needs a small but noteworthy amendment : the capitalist economy cannot function under a socialist government unless the government is socialist in name only and, in adddition, does not espouse rhetoric and pursue foreign policies which create alarm and uncertainty among the bourgeoisie . But thus doing, the flight of capital and bourgeois sabotage is obviated, or at least the likelihood of such an eventuality has been relatively minimised . This addendum is necessary because the Manley regime was `socialist in name only', yet the capitalist economy did not function under the PNP administration . And this decline and catastrophic stagnation of the capitalist economy in Jamaica was caused primarily by the uncertainty about the future engendered by the (at least in hindsight) disingenuous and pugnacious rhetoric of the PNP. As such, the whole trajectory of the PNP regime tragically demonstrated (for yet another painful time) the limits of reformism . The self-professed vanguard of the Jamaican class and oppressed must seriously draw the evident conclusions from this experience : the mythology (which has been dangerously elevated to the dizzy heights of a political strategy), of an alliance between a (non-existent) `patriotic national bourgeoisie' and the working class, should be abandoned . (Cf. Post 1980 : 14-16 and Aubursley 1981) The more difficult but ultimately more fruitful task of creating a genuinely independent organisation of the working class free of disingenuous uncritical `critical support' of what amounts to a section of the Jamaican bourgeoisie, is of vital necessity if the genuine process of the emancipation of the Jamaican working class and oppressed from wage slavery as well as chattel slavery is to be begun and realised . One must never forget that the Manley regime was a bourgeois regime with a conscience, but a bourgeois regime nonetheless . Needless to say, no bourgeois regime or party has led or can lead (by definition) the working class and oppressed (despite how reformist it may pretend to be) to the final assault on the ramparts of capitalist relations of production . It is a patently absurd fantasy to expect the bourgeoisie to expropriate itself. The PNP is, and the Manley regime was, reformist but bourgeois : their reforms never challenged nor did they intend to challenge, capitalist relations of production in Jamaica . The PNP regime objectively merely attempted to ameliorate the conditions of the working class within the confines of bourgeois society so that the latter could function so much the better . The PNP was

JAMAICA 1972-1980 merely the `bomb disposal expert' which came on the scene at the end of the ineffectual JLP governments of the 'sixties to render harmless the time bomb of excessive poverty, oppression and growing resistance, threatening the very foundations of capitalism in Jamaica . The Jamaican bourgeoisie and its external partners in their typically parsimonious short-sightedness and fear of greater radicalisation did not allow this attempt to succeed . The PNP did not effect any really serious (and even less, lasting) reforms never mind fundamental change . The problems of Jamaican society which afflict the poor and exploited are deep-rooted and fundamental . And serious and fundamental problems require serious and correspondingly fundamental solutions . I am not alone in the holding of the view that the massive mandate of December 1976 could have been used by the PNP, had the latter so wished, to advance the process of working class unity in an effort to make an assault on the exploiters of the Jamaican working people . Instead the PNP, partly for the political reasons mentioned above, but also partly as a consequence of its shortsightedness in economic policies turned to the IMF for `help' whose policies, even by its own yardstick, simply did not work . The major and indeed predictable consequence of the turn to the IMF was that the Jamaican people suffered immense hardships . For this reason it was not at all surprising that the PNP was voted out of office . Manley in his recent book, (1982 :221) re-affirmed his pledge if re-elected in the future, to once again follow what he

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terms the `Third Path' . By this he means a route to economic and social development which is neither synonymous with the `Cuban Road' (which he regards to be `totalitarian') nor the `Puerto Rican Model' (which he regards to be economically inegaliarian) . In short, he intends to continue on the same course which he followed between February 1972 and October 1980 . From the analysis attempted here, it should be clear that there is no good reason to think, or even believe, that the results for the Jamaican people will be any less disastrous than the previous experiment . This is why Jamaican socialists should perhaps take more seriously than ever the Marxian maxim : `The emancipation of the working class must be the act of the working class itself . In the meantime Jamaica, under the austere and authoritarian rule of Edward Seaga (Reagan's willing and favourite Caribbean vassal), celebrated its twentieth anniverary of Independence in August last year, ironically, perhaps more a colony than it ever was in 1962 . Two years ago, Seaga came to power under the slogan of `Deliverance', and he has in fact delivered . But what he did not tell the Jamaican electorate at the time was : who was going to be delivered to whom? Now the people of Jamaica no doubt know .

I am grateful to the editors of Capital and Class, especially Judy W ajcman and Andy Friend for their valuable help in the preparation of this article . I would also like to thank Fitzroy Ambursley, Robin Cohen, Honor Ford-Smith, Stuart Hall, Richard Hart, Rod Prince, Ian Roxborough, Amon Saba Saakana and Jasmine Taylor for their comments on earlier drafts of this text . I alone, however, am responsible for any errors of judgement or fact therein .

Notes

1 More details on the following incidents can be found in T . Lacey (1977), on which the ensuing paragraphs on outbreaks of violence are based . 2 For the seminal analysis of the `twenty-one families' see Reid (1977) . Unfortunately, due to lack of space a section on the history of the PNP had to be omitted from this article . Readers who are interested in exploring the history of the PNP in greater depth are therefore referred to Post (1978 and 1981), Munroe (1972), Harrod (1972), Lindsay (1978), James (1983c), Cohen (1982) and James (1983a) . The latter two are review articles on the Post volumes . 3 In 1979 and 1980, no doubt due to the over deepening crisis of the economy, the subsidies to industry decreased to J$150 .8m and J$93 .lm respectively . 4 IBRD/World Bank, (1981 :73) . Manley admitted to a us Congressional delegation that `there was some excessive rhetoric' during the early years of his government which discouraged investors and entrepreneurs . `But, we have tried to change the atmosphere for investors .' Manley, in his recent book, however, has attempted to dismiss the argument that rhetoric played a crucial role . He nevertheless had to



JAMAICA 1972-1980 concede that there were cases of what he terms `irresponsible comments' (1982 :125) In 1976 alone, it was conservatively estimated that over us$300m . 5 had left the country illegally. Manley, on the return from his historic state visit to Cuba (an 6 experience which seemingly influenced him deeply) told millionaires that they were not wanted in Jamaica and advised would-be millionaires that there were five flights per day from Jamaica to Miami . 7 This remark was made by an IMF official ; see Financial Times, April 3, 1980 . Cf. also A Sampson (1981 :30) . I have not examined the role of the IMF in Jamaica at any length in this essay because frankly, it would not have revealed anything new about the IMF and its role in the third world and especially the effects of its prescriptions for reformist regimes in such countries : the consequences of the IMF policies were predictable and thus somewhat of a foregone conclusion . What is important for understanding the dynamic of the regime is precisely why it had to turn to the IMF in the first place for, what is euphemistically and inaccurately called, `assistance' . Indeed, Manley himself, interestingly enough, had this to say in his New Year's Address to the Nation of 1979 : `There are people in Jamaica who really believe that the IMF is the cause of our present difficulties . This is not so . Actually, the presence of the IMF is an indication of how bad the problems are' . (M . Manley `New Year's Message to the Nation 1979', in appendix to us House of Representatives (1979 :37)) . In this clear attempt to appease the IMF and stem the tide of growing opposition to its policy at the time, Manley's analysis clearly bends the stick too far in the opposite direction, and as such his conclusion, though having a certain element of truth in it, lacks verisimilitude . The fact of the matter is that although it is true that the IMF came on the scene ostensibly to help solve the extant problems of 1977, by 1979 its policies had palpably and disastrously failed . Indeed, it had seriously exacerbated the problems of the Jamaican economy . As such then, by 1979, although the IMF had apparently intervened in the economy to aid in the solution of the `difficulties' (as Manley has kindly put it), it also had by then itself become a part of the problem it was supposed to have put right . For more on the IMF in Jamaica see the important article by Girvan et . al., (1980) and also N. Girvan, (1980) . `But let them (the capitalist - wl) understand, we ask for 8. co-operation . But understand, if they will not co-operate, the socialist movement will find other ways to run the industries' . M . Manley (1976 :17) . `We have termed this tendency for government expenditures to 9. outrace revenues the `fiscal crisis of the state' . J . O'Connor (1973 :2), A Maingot (1979) . Inspired by the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries 10 . (OPEC) the IBA came into being on July 29, 1975 with its headquarters in Jamaica . Its members are Australia, the Dominican Republic, Guinea, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Sierra Leone and Surinam . For more on the relations between the companies see S . Keith and 11 . R . Girling, (1978), F . Goff, (1978 :8-9) and M . Moskowitz et . al . (1980 :542ff) . Thomas O . Enders, then Assistant Secretary for Economic and Business Affairs, in the us Dept . of State, told a Congressional hearing in 1974 that not only did the companies work in `unison' on the Jamaican bauxite levy, but in addition `not only were we (the State

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Department-w1) very closely informed of the course of this negotiation, but we did express to the Jamaican government in as clear terms as we could what we thought would be the consequences of certain actions proposed by them .' us Congress (1974 :185ff) . Thus Manley, Horace Clarke (the former Minister of Mining) 12 . and officials of the IBA, urged Sekou Toure, the President of the Republic of Guinea, on his visit to Jamaica, to, along with the other members of the IBA, develop strategies to prevent `each being played off against the other .' Not surprisingly, nothing positive emerged from their talks . Weekly Gleaner, Sept . 19, 1979 . Cf. Manley (1982 :100-102) . 13 . us Congress (1974 :60) . Charles Parry (Manager, Corpor ate Planning, Aluminium Company of America - AICOA), explicitly stated that the bauxite industry was the worst one in which to develop a cartel - the metal is far too common in his view to sustain such an endeavor . Parry believed that the industry would be adversely affected in

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JAMAICA 1972-1980

the short-run, but was confident that the problems would be overcome in the long-run, precisely because of the fragility of the IBA . See us House of Representatives (1974 :329ff) . 14 . Cf. W .A . James (1981 :16) for more on this . Significant though it was, Manley in his new book does not even mention this retreat by the PNP . The impression given by his book is that the PNP stuck to its guns right down the line . And this is not true . 15 . `More oil flows through the Caribbean in one day than through the Strait of Hormuz,' said Ms . Sally Shelton, us Ambassador to the Eastern Caribbean . Washington, Oct . 17, 1980, Inter Press Service (IPs) . I am extremely grateful to Rod Prince and his colleagues at Latin American Newsletter in London, for giving me access to their files of unpublished press releases and other information on the Caribbean . 16 . S . Keith and R . Girling, (1978 :31) . Cf . A . Pollack (1976 :5) This is also borne out by Manley (1982 :97ff) . For a highly informative and moving document on the Cuban `mission' to Angola, see the article by the celebrated Columbian novelist, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, (1977) . 17 . Despite his vacillations and sometimes downright reactionary policies at home, to his eternal credit Manley, maintained a consistently radical and principled stance on the liberation movements of the world and especially those of Southern Africa . 18 . This was the remark of Philip Habib, Carter's special envoy to the Caribbean, after a visit to the area . See Caribbean Business News . Vol XI, No . 2, Feb . 1980 . 19 . For the Jamaican press campaign see for example F . Landis (1980) and for the North American press, see Cuthbert (1979) and Landau (1976 :49-55) . These press campaigns, especially in North America, were aimed at, and had the effect of, derailing the tourist industry which after bauxite is the largest single earner of foreign exchange for Jamaica . Visitors from the USA (which accounted for over 75% of all tourists to the island in 1975), declined by 39 .5% between 1975 and 1977 as the distorted reports of violence in Jamaica hit the headlines of the North American newspapers and magazines . And although the net receipt from foreign travel increased from the all time low of J$42 .6m . in 1976 to reach J$85 .2m. in 1977, this seems to have been largely due to nominal increases (as the Jamaican dollar became devalued) as opposed to a real jump in expenditure by visitors to Jamacia, since, while in 1975 and 1976, American visitors to Jamaica expended us$118m . and us$109m . respectively, in 1977 they had spent even less that they had in 1976 . Department of Statistics (1980 :550&556) Bolyard (1978 :65) . Manley in his book (1982), of course writes of the compulsory 20 union recognition, generalised minimum wage, maternity leave and redundancy payments, which were introduced by his government, but makes no mention whatsoever of the anti-strike clauses in the Act . Thus, on this point and indeed several others, Manley distorts the true record of his regime not so much by the explicit lies but by significant and misleading silences . It is not surprising then, that reviewers (especially in the UK) who are understandably somewhat ignorant of the intricacies of the Manley regime have, with the exception of only one, remarked upon the `honesty' of the former Prime Minister's book . But how can one tell if a report is honest or accurate if the external evidence which is necessary

177

CAPITAL & CLASS 178

to provc or disprove its veracity has not been examined? This is the question which the reviwers of the book in The West Indian World, The Caribbean Times and more surprisingly, City Limits and Socialist Challenge did not ask . The only reviewer who has attempted to seriously come to grips with the book is Cecil Gutzmore (1982) . But unfortunately, Gutzmore concentrated on the inaccuracies to be found in the historical section of the text to the detriment of an adequate handling of those extant in the later sections of the book which deals with the PNP regime proper in the 1970's . 21 On December 2, 1982, the 10 policemen indicted with the murder of Claudius Massop and indeed, two other people who were travelling with him in the taxi when the police opened fire were found `not guilty on any count' . This verdict was reached in spite of the fact that the prosecution had called 20 witnesses, including the driver of the taxi which was transporting Massop at the time he was killed, in support of the case of murder . (The Weekly Gleaner, 15/12/82) . It has been widely alleged that after helping to found the Peace Movement, Massop broke with the JLP . Furthermore, he had apparently told Edward Seaga that he had intended to stand against the JLP leader in the forthcoming general elections in the latter's Western Kingston constituency . It was also claimed, that Seaga, angered by this challenge went so far as to publicly slap Massop across his face and called him a `boy' . The policemen accused of murdering Masop are widely believed to have been JLP supporters . 22 Although there are certain striking similarities between Salvador Allende's Popular Unity government in Chile and Manley's `democratic socialist' regime in Jamaica, in the realm of land reform the former accomplished far more in less than two years than the latter did in some eight years and eight months . Thus while Manley was playing games with the 'landgods' of Jamaica, and giving the peasants tiny plots of barren land, `By the end of 1972 Popular Unity had completed its expropriation programme which gave the agrarian reform area 33% of agricultural production, about 20% of the total rural labour force, and about 50% of the irrigated land of the country' . I . Roxborough, P. O'Brien and J Roddick (1973 :137-138) Emphasis mine . 23 The situation of course, deteriorated in tandem with the rest of the economy . The consumption of fertilisers, for instance, in Jamaica in 1971 was 80,000 tons, in 1977 it was halved to 40,000 tons . Imports of agricultural machinery and implements declined sharply from J$10m . in 1975 to J$2m in 1977, a fall of 80% . See us Dept . of Agriculture (1978 :23-29) . 24 See us Dept . of Agriculture (1978) for more on the poverty of the Jamaican peasants ; cf. Robotham (1977), Miller, (1974) Beckford, (1974) and Williams (1975) . 25 It really is passing the buck when it is argued that the economy was destroyed because of imperialist and capitalist machinations . There is, evidently, a world of difference between conspiring towards the overthrow of a regime and succeeding in doing so. It seems to me, and it is indeed more obvious by now, that if a regime carries out measures of one sort or another, that the us finds offensive, then that regime should expect a retaliation . Such a reaction is predictable . The resistance of

JAMAICA 1972-1980 capitalists to what they consider to be measures inimical to their interests is as intrinsic to the capitalist mode or production as the insatiable thirst for profit . This has become especially evident since the Cuban Revolution, the Dominican intervention, the Vietnam War and the Chilean experiment . It must therefore, be taken as a matter of course by now that the enemy is going to wreck economic and political havoc, and `play holy hell' with regimes such as the PNP's . Therefore, the onus of blame is always on the side of the regime if such measures are allowed to succeed without putting up a serious and concerted fight . And the PNP by no stretch of the imagination, can be adjudged to have put up such a struggle .

Ambursley, F . (1981)Jamaica : the demise of `Democratic Socialism', New Left Review, 128, July-August 1981 . Beckford, G . (1974) Plantations, peasants and proletariat in the West Indies . Socialism (Theoretical organ of the Workers' Liberation League), vol . 1, no .3, Sept . Beckford, G. and Witter, M . (1982) Small Garden . . .Bitter Weed: Struggle and Change in Jamaica (Zed Press) . Bolyard, J . (1978) International travel and passenger fares, 1977, Survey of Current Business, Vol . 58, no .6, pt . 1, June . Cohen, R . (1982) Althusser meets Anancy : Structuralim and popular protest in Ken Post's history of Jamaica, The Sociological Review, vol . 30, no .2, May . Cuthbert, M . (1979) News selection and news values : Jamaica in the foreign press . Caribbean Studies, vol .19, nos. 1-2, April-July . Debray, R .(1977) A Critique of Arms (Penguin) . Department of Statistics (1979) Production Statistics, 1978 (Govt . of Jamaica) . (1980) Statistical Yearbook ofJamaica, 1979 (Govt . of Jamaica) (1981) National Income and Product, 1980(Govt . of Jamaica) Emmanuel, A (1979) The state in the transitional period . New Left Review, 113-114, Jan-April . Girvan, N (1971) Foreign Capital and Economic Underdevelopment in Jamaica (Institute of Social and Economic Research) . Girvan, N . (1976) Corporate Imperialism : Conflict and Expropriation (Monthly Review Press) . Girvan, N . (1980) Swallowing the IMF medicine in the seventies . Development Dialogue, no 2 . Girvan, N . et at. (1980) The IMF and the third world : the case of Jamaica, 1974-80 . Development Dialogue, no .2 . Girvan, N . and Bernal, R . (1982) The IMF and the foreclosure of development options : the case of Jamaica . Monthly Review, vol .33, no .9, Feb . Goff, F . (1979) Aluminium giants . NACLA : Reports on the Americas, vol xii, no .3, May-June . Gutzmore, C . (1980) . Review of Manley (1982) Frontline, Dec . Harriot, T . (1979) The IMF and the struggle for land . Socialism, vol .6, no .2, April . Harrod, J . (1972) Trade Union Foreign Policy : A Study of British and

179

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American Trade Union Activities in Jamaica (Douleday) . Hart, R . (1972) Jamaica and self-determination, 1660-1970 . Race, vol .xiii, no .3 . Hart, R . (1974) Anti-working class legislation in Jamaica . The Black Liberator, vol .2, no .3 June . James, W .A . (1983a) The hurricane that shook the Caribbean (Review of Post, 1978 and 1981) . New Left Review (Forthcoming) . James, W .A . (1983b) The IMF and `Democratic Socialism' in Jamaica, in Latin America Bureau (ed) The Poverty Brokers: the IMF and Latin America (LAB, forthcoming) James, W .A . (1983c) On `Democratic Socialism' in Jamaica (forthcoming) . James, W .A . (1981) The state class and dependent capitalism in contemporary Jamaica ; paper presented to the Fifth Annual Conference of the Society for Caribbean Studies, Hoddesdon, Herts ., U .K ., May. Keith, S . and Girling, R . (1978) Caribbean conflict : Jamaica and the us NACLA : Reports on the Americas, vol .xii, no .3, May-June . Kirkaldy, S . (1979) An Introduction to Industrial Relations and Labour Law in Jamaica (uwi) . Lacey, T . (1977) Politics and Violence in Jamaica, 1960-70 (Manchester University Press) . Landau, S . (1976) Prepared statement, in us House of Representatives (1976) . Landis, F . (1980) Psychological Warfare in the Media : the Case ofJamaica (Press Assoc . of Jamaica) . Lange, O . (1964) On the economic theory of socialism, in O . Lange and F .M . Taylor On the Economic Theory of Socialism (MacGrawHill) . Lindsay, L . (1975) The Myth of Independence : Middle Class Politics and Non-Mobilization in Jamaica (ISER Working Paper, no . 6) . Maingot, A . (1979) The difficult path to socialism in the Englishspeaking Caribbean, in R . Fagen (ed) Capitalism and the State in Us-Latin American Relations (Stanford University Press) . Manley, M . (1974) The Politics of Change: A Jamaican Testament (Andre Deutsch) . Manley, M . (1976) The Search for Solutions : Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Michael Manley, Ontario . Manley, M . (1976) Not for Sale (Editorial Consultants, Inc .) . Manley, M . (1979) New Year's Message to the Nation, 1979, in us House of Representatives (1979) . Manley, M . (1982) Jamaica : Struggle in the Periphery (Third World Media/Writers and Readers) . Marquez, G .G . (1977) Operation Carlota, New Left Review, 101-102, Feb-April . McLure, C .E . (1977) The Incidence ofJamaican Taxes, 1971-72 (ISER) . Miller, C . (1974) The roots of rural poverty, racial oppression and Manley's agrarian reform, Socialism, vol .1, no .3, Sept . Moskowitz, M . et al (eds .) (1980) Everybody's Business (Harper and Row) . Munroe, T . (1972) The Politics of Constitutional Decolonization : Jamaica,

JAMAICA 1972-1980 1944-62 (ISER) . National Planning Agency (NPA) (1977) Five Year Development Plan, 1978-82 (Govt . of Jamaica) . 1980 Economic and Social Survey, Jamaica 1979 (Govt . of Jam .) O'Connor, J . (1973) The Fiscal Crisis of the State (St . Martin's Press) Palmer, R . (1979) Caribbean Dependence on the United States Economy (Praeger Publishers) Parry, C . (1974) Prepared Statement, in us Congress (1974). PNP (1980) Political Education Programme : Canvassers' Training 1979/81, Pt . 1, (PNP) . Pollack, A . (1976) Under heavy manners, in Agee-Hosenball Defence Committee (ed) Jamaica Destabilized, London . Post, K . (1978) Arise Ye Starvelings : The Jamaican Labour Rebellion of 1938 and its Aftermath (Martinus Nijhoff) . Post, K . (1980) Capitalism and social democracy in Jamaica, Caraibisch Forum, no .1, Jan . Post, K . (1981) Strike the Iron : A Colony at War-Jamaica 1939-1945 (in 2 vols) (Humanities Press) . Reid, S . (1977) An introductory approach to the concentration of power in the Jamaican corporate economy and notes on its origin, in C . Stone and A . Brown, (eds) Essays on Power and Change in Jamaica (Jamaica Publishing House) . Reid, S . (1978) Strategy of Resource Bargaining: A Case Study of the Jamaican Bauxite-Alumina Industry since 1974 (ISER) . Robotham, D . (1977) Agrarian relations in Jamaica, in Stone and Brown, op .cit. Roxborough, I . et al (1976) Chile : the State and Revolution (Macmillan) . Sampson, A . (1982) The Moneylenders (Hodder and Stoughton) . Stone, C . (1981) Democracy and socialism in Jamaica, 1962-1979, Journal of Commonwealth and Comparative Politics, vol .xix, no.2, July . Stone, C . (1980a) Democracy and Clientelism in Jamaica (Transactions Books) . (1980b) Jamaica's 1980 elections, Caribbean Review, vol .x, no .2 . Tosh, P . (1978) Interview, London, Dec . 6, 1978 . us Congress (1974) Outlook for Prices and Supplies of Industrial Raw Materials . Hearings before the Subcommittee on Economic Growth of the Joint Economic Committee . July 22, 23, and 25 . (USGPO) .

us House of Representatives (1974) Overseas Hearings on Mineral Scarcity . Hearings before the Subcommittee on Mines and Mining of the Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs, March 20 . us House of Representatives (1976) Soviet Activities in Cuba : Parts VI and VII : Communist Influence in the Western Hemisphere . Hearings before the Subcommittee on International Political and Military Affairs of the Committee on International Relations, Oct . 7, 1975, June 15 and Sept . 16, (USGro) . us House of Representatives (1979) Caribbean Nations: Assesments of Conditions and us Influence . Report of a Special Study Mission to Jamaica, Cuba, The Dominican Republic, and the Guantanamo Naval Base, Jan . 3-12, 1979 . To the Committee on Foreign

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CAPITAL & CLASS 182

Affairs . (usGPo) .

us Senate (1974) Domestic Supply Information Act . Joint Hearings before the Committee on Commerce, and Committee on Government Operations . April 29, May 9, 10 and June 17, 1974. (uscwo) . us Dept . of Agriculture (1978) The Small Farmer in Jamaican Agriculture : An Assessment of Constraints and Opportunities . Report of the Agriculture Assessment Team of the Office of International Cooperation and Development . (usAID/Jamaica) . Williams, J . (1975) We support the peasants of Westmoreland, Socialism, vol .2, no .7, July . Worker's Liberation League (1974) Bauxite : How the PMP Liberals Satisfy the Local Capitalists and Betray the Masses, Socialism, vol .1, no .1, July . World Bank/lBDR (1981) World Development Report, 1981, Washington, D .C ., August .

George Georgiou

The political economy ~V of military i expenditure Writers on the political economy of military expenditure and the arms race are categorised into several schools of thought . Emphasis is put on the technical and historical limitations of the arguments put forward by each school . The author argues that the dynamic nature of the historical process results in socio-political and economic changes within a specific mode of production thus making attempts to formulate a general theory of military expenditure futile .

Introduction The end of the Second World War has usually been interpreted as the onset 183 of a period of peace, a period where for the past thirty six years the major industrialised countries have, the Cold War apart, coexisted without conflict . However, a very different picture emerges when one considers the number

CAPITAL & CLASS 184 of post-1945 conflicts throughout the world which have included revolutions, military coups, civil wars, and inter state wars, and which have either directly or indirectly involved the two major superpowers . The period 1945-60 saw the development of three phenomena that have come to dominate the current international political and strategic environment . These were ; the creation of two competing military powerblocks, NATO dominated by the USA, and the Warsaw Pact, dominated by the Soviet Union, the proliferation of nuclear arms, and an arms race incorporating both conventional and nuclear weapons . Arms races between competing states are nothing new . Indeed, arms races and military expenditure are both the consequence and the expression of militarism in general, which is itself not specific to the capitalist mode of production . We can, as Leibknecht (1973) does, distinguish between capitalist and noncapitalist forms of militarism but this is operationally unhelpful since within a specific mode of production militarism, as expressed through military expenditure (ME) and the arms race, will change over time . For example, before the Second World War ME had an essentially quantitative aspect whereas after the War it took on an increasingly qualitative aspect so much so that the qualitative aspects have now overtaken the quantitative aspects . No longer is the argument just about the quantity of armaments and troops but rather it is about the quality of the arsenal, specifically which country has the type of sophisticated nuclear weapons and weapons systems which are capable of inflicting the utmost devastation upon its enemy . In fact if we concentrated only on the quantitative aspects of military expenditure and the

arms race by looking at the share of ME in GNP spent by the two superpowers we might conclude that since 1969 the arms race has not been as intense as, say, between 1951 and 1954 . But such a conclusion would ignore such recent developments as the neutron bomb, cruise missiles, trident, polaris and pershing missile systems, SS-20 missiles, SAM, etc, the R & D into, if yet not deployment of, chemical weapons, and numerous improvements to existing weapons systems, etc . Even if we ignore the qualitative aspects of ME and concentrate only on the quantitative aspects then it still represents a large proportion of current economic resources devoted to the means of destruction, as is shown by Table A . Yet despite the increasingly ferocious attack that is being undertaken by the Governments of the liberal bourgeois democracies on public expenditure many of these governments are commited to increasing ME in real terms . Several questions arise : what role does ME play in capitalism? Does it stimulate capitalism or does it contribute to its demise? How do economists analyse the arms race? Can ME and the arms race be analysed by economists independently of the socio-political dimension? And perhaps more importantly, can there be a general theory of ME and the arms race or are they historically contingent? The purpose of this paper is to bring to the attention of the reader the different theoretical approaches which have attempted to answer some of the above questions . The paper will not, therefore, be concerned with the specificity of the current debate on deterrence and disarmament, but instead it will be concerned with the political economy of militarism with particular emphasis on ME and the arms race .

MILITARY EXPENDITURE 185 TABLE A' Military Expenditure 1979 US $ mn 112,279 4,119 3,631 1,518 22,667 24,777 7,784 5,037 1,453 19,121 863 3,493 2,053 9,337 3,100

USA

Canada Belgium Denmark France W. Germany Italy Netherlands Norway UK

Austria Sweden Switzerland Japan Australia Source :

SIPRI

%GDP

5 .2 1 .8 3 .3 2 .3 4 .0 3 .3 2 .4 3 .4 3 .1 4 .7 1 .3 3 .3 2 .2 1 .0 2 .7

Yearbook 1982

For reasons of conciseness and accessibility the discussion will be presented in a taxonomic manner concentrating only on the major and, in some cases, most original contributors to each school of thought . Thus for example in discussing the underconsumptionist approach within the Marxist school we refer only to the works of Baran and Sweezy, and Kidron even though there have been more recent underconsumptionist contributions . Most of these recent contributions are merely restatements, albeit in a different form, of Baran and Sweezy's original thesis . Before we discuss the major schools an important caveat needs to be inserted . The presentation of the various approaches to ME and the arms race is not theoretically sacrosanct or scientifically more correct than any other categorisation . For example an alternative categorisation may be literature which

can be classified as a) theoretical economic analysis, b) macro-statistical analysis, using aggregate data from various national economies, or c) microstructural analysis, using case studies relating to the level of the individual firm .2 However, it is our belief that the categorization presented in this paper is, conceptually, the simplest (i .e . the least technical and the most jargon free) and hence the most accessible to the noneconomist . It is also useful in that it enables us to identify the political, ideological and theoretical perspectives of the literature which are not always explicitly stated by the writers .

1 . Marxist approaches The current debate on the left regarding disarmament has focused essentially on the socio-political and strategic aspects of the arms race paying

MILITARY EXPENDITURE little attention to the economic aspects of this arms race which itself is only one aspect of military expenditure and more generally, militarism . What little has

with militarism in general and military expenditure in particular . This neglect of militarism in Marx and Engels work is not the `astonishing' omission that

been said of the economic aspects of militarism has been either in the context of the juxtaposition of arguments for and against the maintenance of the welfare state in the light of the present Tory government's attempt to dismantle it, so that, for example, when arguing in favour of the health workers pay claim one argument that has been employed is along the line `if the Government found the money to finance the Falklands War then it can find the money to finance the health workers pay claim' ; or, in the

writers such as Silberner (1946) claim it is . Even Silberner acknowledges that Marx and Engels were concerned with the historical genesis, functioning, and ultimate fate of capitalism and not with any particular sector of the economy .

context of arguments about the costs of defense in general and the costs of specific defense projects . There is, however, a tradition amongst marxist political economists, stretching back to Marx and Engels, which has considered various aspects of militarism, including, certainly in the case of Rosa Luxemburg, the political economy of military expenditure . The term `Marxist school' encompasses a large body of literature which itself can be divided into subcategories so that within this school we can identify four approaches and these are the approaches of (i) Marx and Engels, (ii) Rosa Luxemburg, (iii) the underconsumptionists, most notably

•

Baran and Sweezy, and writers associated with the theory of the Permanent Arms Economy, and (iv) recent nonunderconsumptionists .

Marx and Engels • •

There is in Marx and Engels no systematic analysis of militarism . What analysis there is seems to deal specifically strategy, and the with wars, development of weapons, rather than

Thus it is no more `astonishing' for them to have omitted an explicit and comprehensive analysis of militarism than it is for their omission of an explicit analysis of and comprehensive education, public health, etc . For Marx and Engels militarism, particularly in the guise of war, is a social and political phenomenon which has economic consequences . Moreover the cause and conduct of militarism tend to be related to economic factors . In other words militarism is seen to be a phenomenon or consequence of the social and political superstructure of society where the latter is dependent upon the economic base . This is argued most clearly by Engels in `Anti-Duhring' . In discussing the army and navy Engels says, `Force, nowdays, is the army and navy and both as we all know to our cost are `devilishly expensive' . Force, however, cannot make any money . . .force is conditioned by the economic order, which furnishes the resources for the equipment and maintenance of the instruments of force" Furthermore, their (army and navy) `armaments, composition, organisation, tactics and strategy depend above all on the stage reached at the time in production and communications . It is not the `free creations of the mind' of generals of genius which have revolutionised war, but the invention of better weapons and changes in the human material, the

187

CAPITAL & CLASS 188 soldiers' . 4 In a well known quote, Marx seems to share the views of Engels, thus he says, `Is there anywhere where our theory that the organisation of labour is determined by the means of production is more brilliantly confirmed than in the human slaughter industry' .' A serious contradiction in Engel's writings on militarism is to be found in his attitude towards the relationship between war and socio-political and hence economic progress . At a conference of the International Working Men's Association held in London in 1871, Engels argued that wars paralyze socio-political and hence economic progress . However in 1888 we find Engels arguing that a world war would result in the `general exhaustion and the establishment of the conditions for the ultimate victory of the working class' . The contradiction seems to arise because Engels does not make it clear whether his 1871 statement refers only to localised wars or whether it refers, as does his 1888 statement, to world wars . Rosa Luxemburg Luxemburg was the first marxist to deal explicitly with the political economy of ME . In `The Accumulation of Capital' Luxemburg cites several functions of militarism in a capitalist economy . First, militarism, in the form of conquest, serves as a catalyst for primitive accumulation . Secondly, following the conquest of the New World, militarism serves to subjugate the peoples of this conquered world by force and repression thus creating colonies in which the indigenous population becomes divided into classes . This force and repression involves, inter alia, the destruction of the indigenous cultures and industries of the newly created colonies and imposing

upon these colonies political, social and economic hegemony . Thirdly, militarism is responsible for `enforcing the claims of European capital as international leader" . Fourthly, militarism serves as a weapon in the struggle between capitalist states for the domination of the non-capitalist world . Luxemburg then proceeds to identify what she claims to be a `purely economic' function of militarism . The purely economic function of militarism is that `it is a pre-eminent means for the realisation of surplus value ; it is in itself a province of accumulation' .' It is this purely economic aspect of militarism that Luxemburg is concerned with and her analysis makes use of Marx's scheme of expanded reproduction using two departments. Department I produces the means of production and Department II produces the means of subsistence . The kernel of Luxembourg's argument is that militarism is financed by tax revenue ; specifically indirect taxation extorted from the working class by the state . How this affects the capitalist sector will depend on the form that the military expenditure takes . Luxemburg first considers the case where indirect taxes are levied on the working class which are then used to finance the salaries of state officials and regular army personnel . In this case Luxemburg argues that there would be no change in the reproduction of social capital as a whole . `Both Departments II and I remain constant because society as a whole demands the same kind of products in the same quantities ." In other words the capitalist sector does not benefit since the scale and pattern of demand for goods produced by capitalists remains unchanged as does the average rate of profit . As Rowthorn (1980) points out to arrive at this con-

MILITARY EXPENDITURE clusion Luxemburg explicitly assumes that the reduction in the consumption of goods by the working class (a result of the indirect taxation), is exactly matched by an increase in the consumption of the same goods by the state officials and the regular army . Whilst this assumption may hold in the abstract there is no attempt by Luxemburg to justify such an assumption . Luxemburg then considers the case where the indirect tax revenue is used by the State to finance the production of weapons . The result of a weapons producing sector will be to establish a secure market for the products of modern industry and also to increase the average rate of profit . To show this Luxemburg employs a numerical example using Marx's scheme of expanded reproduction the details of which need not detain us here : suffice it to say that in order to arrive at this conclusion Luxemburg employs what Tarbuck calls `slapdash methods' which result in her making `elementary mistakes in the handling of the schemes' .' We have already stated that Luxemburg considers military expenditure financed by taxing the working class as being beneficial for the capitalist sector since the effect will be to increase the average rate of profit . The increase in the rate of profit comes about because the indirect taxes extorted from the working class can be thought of as a reduction in wages which acts to boost profits . Alternatively one can think of the indirect taxes as reducing v so that assuming s remains constant then r= (

s/v ) c/v + 1 increases . This of course assumes that the increase in s/v will be larger than any actual increase in c/v .

The argument that s/v increases rests 189 on the assumption that s remains constant when workers from the civil sector are transferred to the arms sector . In other words when the civil sector shrinks due to the levying of indirect taxes on the working class, the transfer of surplus workers from this sector to the arms sector does not affect surplus value because these workers were originally producing consumer goods for the working class and were not therefore (according to Luxemburg) creating surplus value . This argument is made by Luxemburg in the folowing terms : `the value of the aggregate social product may be defined as consisting of three parts, the total constant capital of the society, its total variable capital, and its total surplus value, of which the first set of products contains no additional labour, and the second and the third no means of production . As regards their material form, all these products come into being in the given period of production though in point of value the constant capital has been produced in a previous period and is merely transferred to new products . On this basis, we can also divide all the workers employed into three mutually exclusive categories : those who produce the aggregate constant capital of the society, those who provide the upkeep for all the workers, and finally those who create the entire surplus value for the capitalist class .

If, then, the workers' consumption is curtailed, only workers in the second category will lose their jobs . Ex hypothesi, these workers had never created surplus value for capital, and in consequence their dismissal is no loss from the capitalists' point of view but a gain, since it decreases the cost of producing surplus value' .' ° The above quoted passage contains several serious mistakes . Rowthorn

CAPITAL & CLASS 190 points out that in this passage Luxemburg confuses use-value with value and surplus product with surplus value . Moreover, Luxemburg classifies labour as being productive or unproductive according to who buys its produce . This differs from the usual categorisation of productive and unproductive labour where labour is considered to be productive if it produces surplus value under the direct control of the capitalist . Once we accept the usual definition of productive labour then Luxemburg's argument no longer holds because it is quite possible that when workers are transferred from the civil sector to the arms sector surplus value in the former sector will actually fall and not remain constant . The fall in surplus value may match or even exceed the fall in v and thus the rate of exploitation may remain constant or even fall rather than rise as postulated by Luxemburg . Luxemburg's analysis is further flawed by her argument that one can treat the workers producing aggregate constant and variable capital, and aggregate surplus value as mutually exclusive . This is wrong both from an empirical and .theoretical point of view . Consider the circuit of industrial capital for a single capitalist : M

C P C' LP (v)

MP (c)

LP (v)

M'

MP S (c) (M' + M)

Suppose the individual capitalist is a producer of cars using standard methods of production on a production line in a multi-purpose plant . The implication of Luxemburg's argument is that we can somehow differentiate, in this hypothetical plant, workers producing v from those producing c and those producing s! Moreover, not only can we differen-

tiate these groups of workers but each group is mutually exclusive from the other! The Underconsumptionist School By 'underconsumptionist' we mean simply the school of marxist economists associated with the argument that military expenditure aids caitalism by absorbing the surplus it produces, a surplus which canot otherwise be absorbed due to lack of effective demand . The two writers most closely associated with the underconsumptionist explanation of military expenditure are Baran and Sweezy . Baran and Sweezy In `Monopoly Capital' Baran and Sweezy argued that under monopoly capitalism there is a tendency for aggregate economic surplus to rise . Economic surplus is defined to be `the difference between what a society produces and the costs of producing it ."' What is the cause of this tendency and, more importantly for our purposes, how is the surplus absorbed? With regard to the first question Baran and Seeezy argue that the answer is to be found in the price and cost policies of the large corporations . Assuming that corporations are profit maximisers and accumulators of capital, they argue that the appropriate price theory of firms under monopoly capitalism is the monopoly price theory of neo-classical economics . Whereas neo-classical economics treats monopolies and oligopolies as exceptions to the rule under monopoly capitalism such exceptions become the rule . In oligopolistic price theory it is difficult to reduce prices (they tend to be `sticky' in a downward direction) and since large corporations under monopoly capitalism adopt such pricing behaviour

MILITARY EXPENDITURE then, combined with the observation that large corporations tend to pursue a policy of minimising costs, which they are able to do through economies of scale, `it follows with inescapable logic that surplus must have a strong and persistent tendency to rise' . 'Z Having established the cause of the tendency of surplus to rise under monopoly capitalism Baran and Sweezy proceed to answer the second question `How is the surplus absorbed?' They identify three ways in which the surplus may be absorbed . First, by capitalist consumption ; secondly, by capitalist investment ; and thirdly, by waste . Under the heading `waste' is included a) the sales effort (advertising, product differentiation, etc) ; b) government expenditure for civilian purposes (welfare services such as transfer payments, education, etc) ; and c) military expenditure . The authors emphasise the importance of c) followed by b) and a) respectively . Their thesis is very simple . Basically, they argue that it is in the military sector of the economy that most of the expansion in the absorption of surplus has taken place . Moreover should such expenditure be reduced it would have a detrimental affect on the economy . Speaking of the USA's post-Second World War prosperity, they state : `This massive absorption of surplus in military preparations has been the key fact of postwar American economic history . . . If military spending were reduced once again to pre-Second World War proportions, the nation's economy could return to a state of profound depression . . . such as prevailed during the 1930's' ." And again, `the difference between the deep stagnation of the 1930's and the relative prosperity of the 1950's is fully accounted for by the vast military outlays of the 50s' ."

Several criticisms of their thesis can 191 be made . First, is it true that there is a tendency for the economic surplus to rise under monopoly capitalism? For example, Bleany has argued that their analysis of the tendency of surplus to rise depends to a large extent on the assumption that the working class is powerless or at least passive and thus it cannot determine or even influence the size of the surplus . Once this assumption is dropped, then it does not necessarily follow that there is a tendency under monopoly capitalism for the economic surplus to rise . The size of the economic surplus will, presumably, be contingent on the state of the class struggle . Secondly,it can be argued that their concept of surplus is, unlike the marxian concept of surplus value, too general and hence not specific enough to the capitalist mode of production . Thirdly, Baran and Sweezy are not clear as to how military expenditure is financed . Some writers would consider this important in determining the resulting effect on the absorption of the surplus . For example, Kalecki (1974) argued that if militarism is financed by taxing the working class then the effect upon the absorption of national product is negligible because the new markets for armaments are offset by a reduction of workers consumption . But if armaments are financed by governments borrowing in the bond market then the surplus is sold by capitalists in exchange for the revenue obtained by the government through the sale of securities to the financial capitalists . Although "Monopoly Capital" was first published in 1966 more recent marxist writings on military expenditure have been merely restatements of the orginal thesis of Baran and Sweezy" . An

CAPITAL & CLASS 192 example of such a restatement is the work of Kidron and his thesis of the Permanent Arms Economy . Kidron and the Permament Arms Economy Kidron's (1970) thesis as expanded in his book `Western Capitalism since the War' is that post-World War II western capitalism has been faced with a permanent threat of overproduction and unemployment and that what prevented capitalism during the 1950s and 1960s from actually collapsing into overproduction and unemployment was a permanently high level of military expenditure identified as the Permanent Arms Economy (PAE) . According to Kidron, the PAE stabilises capitalism by stimulating investment, demand for labour (manual and non-manual), technological 'spinoff, and international trade . Military expenditure is effective because a) it is politically and ideologically acceptable to the bourgeoisie whilst at the same time having no adverse effect on the general rate of profit ; and b) it has a 'domino-effect' which gives rise to an arms race which in turn acts to stabilise capital on an international, as well as national, scale . Kidron's thesis bears a close resemblance to the underconsumptionist thesis of Baran and Sweezy . Whereas the latter talk of the `tendency for economic surplus to rise', the absorption of such a surplus being constrained by a deficiency in the effective demand for commodities, Kidron talks of the `permanent threat of overproduction' . One is merely a corollary of the other . An important criticism Purdy (1973) makes of Kidron, and one that is applicable to Baran and Sweezy also, is that his thesis is ahistorical . For Purdy the arms

race is `a historically specific feature of a particular stage of capitalist development 76 and it is precisely this historical aspect of the arms race that Kidron's analysis ignores . Instead, Kidron, as with other underconsumptionists such as Baran and Sweezy, treats military expenditure in an ahistorical functionalist manner : he is concerned with the economic function of military expenditure within an unchanging capitalist economy . Before we can consider the writings of the recent non-underconsumptionist school we need to clarify why we distinguish between Rosea Luxemburg and the orthodox underconsumptionist writings of political economists such as Baran and Sweezy . Up until 1976 the consensus view amongst economists on the Left was that Luxemburg was an underconsumptionist . Amongst the many economists who interpreted Luxemburg in this manner were Dobb (1955), Kalacki (1971), Kemp (1967), Sweezy (1970) and Robinson in the Introduction to Luxemburg (1971) . A typical statement from these economists is that of Robinson in her Introduction to Luxemburg's `The Accumulation of Capital' where she states : `The analysis which best fits Rosa Luxemburg's own argument, and the facts, is that armaments provide an outlet for the investment of surplus (over and above any contributions there may be from forced saving out of wages), which, unlike other kinds of investment, create no further problem by increasing productive capacity (not to mention the huge new investment opportunities created by reconstruction after the capitalist nations have turned their weapons against each other)' ." Bleany (1976) has put forward the

MILITARY EXPENDITURE argument that the underconsumptionist interpretations of Luxemburg are wrong . Bleany argues that whilst there is a superficial resemblance to a Malthusian type of underconsumption theory ultimately Luxemburg's theory cannot be classified as underconsumptionist because at no stage in her analysis is it specifically consumer demand that is lacking : " . . .although she frequently phrases the question in terms of consumers, it would be more accurate to designate it as one of demand or of markets, words which do not have associations with a specific branch of production . In any case, the mistake which lies at the bottom of her analysis has nothing to do with a conception of the special importance of consumption goods production, but relates to her understanding of the general process of the circulation of capital' . II A more recent attempt to defend Luxemburg against the accusations of being an underconsumptionist has been that by Rowthorn . His defense of Luxemburg is neatly summarized in the following quote : ` . . .Rosa Luxemburg had a very broad vision of militarism's role in the accumulation of capital, as a factor aiding the development of dynamic and technically progressive branches of production and clearing away internal obstacles to capitalist expansion . Such a vision is very different from a Keynesian approach which stresses the short-term conjunctural problem of effective demand and ignores more fundamental problems of long-term development' . 19

Recent Non-Underconsumptionists Two examples of the recent nonunderconsumptionist literature are provided by the work of Kaldor and Smith . W e first look at the work of Kaldor . For Kaldor militarism in the us (and by

implication in the Western World) `must be understood in terms of a decline in the us economy, that the relatively high level of military spending . . . reflects and reinforces this decline' . 20 This thesis rests on three propositions : first, a constant peacetime increase in the production of arms both absolutely and in relation to GNP marks the beginning of a period of economic decline ; secondly, military production gathers a momentum of its own which stems from the momentum of the arms industry ; and thirdly, an increase in military production and/or military expenditure in general, accelerates the process of economic decline . The first of Kaldor's propositions is based on the observation that the most important military techniques are usually based on the dominant industries . As the dominant industries begin to decline, due to, say, a recession, many companies face the threat of collapse and so one way of saving some of these companies is through the increase in the number of military contracts . The second of Kaldor's propositions is based on the observation that in the traditional arms industry technical progress takes the form of improvement in the products rather than improvements in the method of producing these products . The result is an ever increasing sophistication of weapons which are more and more expensive to produce . Kaldor's third propositon is based on the assertion that an increase in ME involves a diversion of resources away from dynamic and productive industries into declining and/or unproductive industries . In order to give some substance to this assertion Kaldor argues that a) there is an inverse correlation between the share of GNP devoted to ME and the share of GNP spent on capital investment

193

CAPITAL & CLASS 194 (see table B) ; and b) countries in which expenditure on military research and development (R & D) is low, experience a high expenditure by firms on productive civil R & D (see table C) . `Taken together, the three propositions - that an increase in the procurement of arms is a response to economic decline, that the procurement of arms attains an independent momentum, and that an increase in the procurement of arms accelerates economic decline amount to a feedback mechanism in which the armament process becomes part of a more general process of economic decline' . 21 Smith (1977) argues that the prevalent view amongst left wing writers, that military expenditure is necessary to offset a tendency towards stagnation within

capitalism, is not supported by empirical evidence . He rejects the underconsumptionist view on theoretical grounds also, arguing that such a view assumes that there is a purely economic `function' for ME . Smith offers an alternative explanation arguing that ME is a contradictory requirement of capitalism : `At a political and ideological level it is necessary to the system, but its economic consequences are such that it undermines what it was meant to maintain' .22 Smith's explanation of ME en)phasises its strategic requirement for dapitalism : `the need to create a political and military superstructure to defend the economic system' . 23 There are three dimensions to this strategic requrirement . First, capitalism needs to be defended against communism in the guise

TABLE B 24 USA

UK

6 .2

France 5 .6

FRG

1963 Military burden 8 .8 Rate of investment 16 .8 1973 Military burden 6 .0 Rate of investment 18 .0

15 .2 5 .0

20 .0 3 .8

25 .7 3 .4

22 .1 3 .4

22 .0 3 .4

27 .9 0 .8

18 .0

25 .0

25 .5

24 .0

22 .0

37 .2

5 .2

Netherlands Sweden Japan 1 .0 4 .4 4 .2

TABLE C25 Patterns of Resources Devoted to Research and Experimental Development in the Area, 1963-71 R&D as a percentage of GNP

Government Defence Space Nuclear Other Business Enterprise Other Total

USA

UK

1 .2

France 1 .1

FRG

1 .4 1 .1 0 .3 1 .0 0 .1 2 .5

0 .6 0 .6 0 .9 0 .1 2 .3

0 .7 0 .5 0 .6 1 .8

0 .3 0 .6 1 .1 0 .1 2 .1

0 .9

OECD

Netherlands Sweden Japan 0 .6 0 .8 0 .5 0 .3 0 .3 0 .9 0 .1 1 .6

0 .1 0 .7 1 .1 2 .0

0 .1 0 .4 1 .2 1 .6



MILITARY EXPENDITURE of the Warsaw Pact . Secondly, in order to maintain capitalist confidence on an international scale, a hegemonic power is needed, (the USA) . This dominant power arises from military strength . Finally, ME enables the ruling class with-

Smith, indeed such strategic aspects are discussed by under-consumptionists ,such as Magdoff (1970) . Where Smith differs from the underconsumptionists is his empirical results which lend

in each capitalist state to enhance its dominant position and hence preserve the existing order . Thus ME in this context refers not just to the money spent on military hardware, but also to the money spent on para-military forces, on propoganda aimed at fostering feelings of nationalism and patriotism, on internal security aimed to counteract potential rebellion, etc, in other words, money spent on the ideological capabilities of militarism . The discussion of the preceding strategic aspects of ME is not exclusive to

support to the thesis that far from contributing to the economic stability of capitalism ME actually contributes to its demise by reducing accumulation and growth . On the basis of results such as those in Table D, Smith concludes that the ME incurred by some of the advanced capitalist economies has `imposed a substantial cost, primarily in terms of over accumulation and slower growth' ." Further substantiation of Smith's conclusion can be found if we compared Table E with Table F . From Table F we see that the USA and the UK have sub-

TABLE D 27 Correlation matrix for 15 industrial countries, between ME and other economic variables . -----------------C 0 .34 I -0 .73* -0 .76* CG 0 .01 -0 .08 -0 .30 Y 0 .72* 0 .14 -0 .41 Y/P 0 .04 -0 .38 0 .54* 0 .63* G -0 .54* -0 .50 -0 .08 0 .25 S -0 .26 P -0 .38 -0 .16 0 .27 M C I * M C I CG Y G S P

= = = = = = = =

0 .20 0 .36 -0 .36 -0 .21 0 .16 CG

0 .49 -0 .18 0 .16 -0 .44 Y

-0 .58* -0 .29 -0 .30 Y/P

Significantly different from zero at the 95% level . Share of ME in GDP Share of private consumption in GDP Share of investment in GDP Share of civil government expenditure in GDP 1965 GDP, Y/P = 1965 per capita GDP Average growth rate Standard deviation of growth rate, 1960-70 Average rate of inflation

0 .54* 0 .36 G

0 .09 S

195

CAPITAL & CLASS 196

TABLE E28 Growth rates of GDP and GDP per employee for 12 Developed Countries for the period 1951-70* Per Cent Per Annum GDP GDP/Employee Countries Employment Japan W . Germany Italy Netherlands Austria France Canada Denmark Norway Belgium

9 .5 6 .0 5 .3 5 .2 4 .9 4 .7 4 .5 4 .4 4 .1 3 .7 3 .6 2 .6

USA

United Kingdom

7 .9 4 .8 4 .6 4 .0 4 .6 4 .4 2 .2 3 .3 3 .7 3 .2 1 .9 2 .0

1 .6 1 .2 0 .6 1 .2 0 .3 0 .3 2 .3 1 .1 0 .4 0 .5 1 .7 0 .6

* The period 1951-70 was used except in the following cases : Japan 1953-69, Canada 1951-69, USA 1951-69, France 1951-69, Denmark 1954-69, 1951-69 .

UK

TABLE F 29 The pattern of Military Expenditure (ME) . Shares of ME in output*(%) 1954 1964 1973

Canada Us Belgium Denmark France W . Germany Italy Netherlands Norway

7 .0 11 .6 4 .8 3 .2 7 .3 4.0 4 .0 6 .0 5 .0 8 .8 2 .7 4 .9 0 .1 2 .1 3 .6

3 .6 8 .0 3 .4 2 .8 5 .3 4 .6 4 .6 4 .3 3 .4 UK 6 .1 Switzerland 2 .8 Sweden 4 .1 Austria 1 .5 Japan 0 .9 Australia 3 .4 * Output is GDP at purchasers' prices .

2 .0 6 .0 2 .7 2 .1 3 .8 3 .4 3 .4 3 .4 3 .1 5 .0 2 .0 3 .4 1 .0 0 .8 2 .7

1973 Total ME Per Capita ME ($ billion) ($) 2 .4 78 .4 1 .4 0 .6 9 .8 13 .3 4 .1 2 .1 0 .7 9 .0 0 .8 2 .0 0 .3 3 .7 2 .0

109 372 139 125 189 215 75 157 169 161 124 246 39 35 154

MILITARY EXPENDITURE stantially above average shares of ME in GNP, and yet from Table E we see that it is these two countries that have experienced the lowest growth rate in GDP . Conversely, we see that Japan's share of ME in GDP has been below average and yet Japan has experienced the fastest growth in GDP . Finally we see that Denmark's share of ME in GDP has been close to the average and this has also been the case with regard to its growth rate .

2 . Non-Marxist Approaches The non-Marxist literature can be divided into three schools of thought . The first is the liberal school which places emphasis on the Military Industrial Complex (MIC ) and/or the internal bureaucratic process of military related decision making . It maintains that militarism is irrational and that disarmament is both desirable and feasible . The second school has a long tradition in game theory and is usually referred to as the action-reaction (A-R) school . With regard to ME the A-R school maintains that `actions by one nation trigger specific reactions by the other that offset whatever advantge the first nation gained by its initial action 70 . The result is a zero sum game" . Finally, the third school is the neoclassical school which assumes that the state pursues the objectives of maximum output and maximum security where the latter is directly related to ME . The Liberal School

At the centre of the liberal approach to militarism is the concept of the MIC . Rosen (1973) lists the following characteristics of the MIC : 1) The MIC consists of a class of individuals whose interests are served by

197 defence spending' . 2) The MIC arises because the superpowers devote a considerable proportion of GNP to ME . 3) The MIC justifies its existence by manipulating, not always consiously, the fear of an external threat . This external threat provides the rationale for ME which in turn depends on the Cold War and the concomitant arms race . How the MIC operates is not clear . For example, for Rosen the MIC should be understood as a complex interaction of interests wheras for Melman (1971) the MIC operates in a quasi-conspiratorial manner . Liberals see peace itself as being desirable and that militarism, in the guise of war or peacetime arms production, is irrational and immoral . Moreover militarism is seen as having no significant economic role . The perception of militarism as irrational and immoral is shared by other schools and is therefore not exclusive to the liberal school ." However the liberal school adopts a very naive attitude towards the curtailment of militarism in general and military expenditure in particular . For example, Rosen argues that there should be closer monitoring of R & D, more public accountability by the MIC, balancing the power of opposing bureaucratic and corporate alliances, and in the long-run, `alternation of threat perspectives to weaken the strategic rationale' . An important criticism of the liberal school has been made by Smith (1976) who argues that the liberal explanation of militarism which concentrates on the concept of the MIC is compatible with an explanation which sees wars as being an accident rather than as the outcome of inter-state (or inter-imperial) rivalry . Thus the Vietnam war can be explained by a liberal as being a `mistake' gener-



CAPITAL & CLASS 198 ated almost unintentionally by what Mills (1970) called the `power elite' or what the liberals call the Mic . Hence although war may be generated by politicians pursuing a `hard-line' for reelection, by generals seeking promotion, and by the military-industrial firms seeking to maximise profits, such wars are not, according to liberals, in the `national interest' or in the interests of capitalism . The implication of this which is explicitly advocated by Rosen, is that once we remove these 'baddies' from the centre of the political arena, then together with the correct monetary and fiscal policies in order to accomodate civil rather than military production, disarmament and peace is perfectly feasible . With the possible exception of Melman, liberals tend to neglect the economic role of ME . They avoid asking questions about the relationship between ME and the standard economic variables such as investment, growth, profits, inflation and unemployment, in other words accumulation in general . Given this neglect of the economy it is of little surprise that liberals see the 'solution' to militarism purely in terms of politics, that is the removal or political control of the MIC .

The Action-Reaction (A-R) School The essence of the A-R thesis can be summarised by the following statement made by the former American Secretary of Defence, Robert McNamara : `What is essential to understand is that the Soviet Union and the United States mutually influence one another's strategic plans . Whatever be their intentions, whatever be our intentions, actions - or even realistically potential actions - on either side relating to the build-up of nuclear forces, be they either

offensive or defensive weapons, necessarily trigger reactions on the other side . It is precisely this action-reaction phenomenon that fuels an arms race' . 34 In other words actions by one nation lead to reactions by another that offset any advantage the first nation may have initially gained . An important implication of the A-R thesis is that the arms race is irrational since no one can gain an advantage, at least no one can sustain that advantage . The result is an intense arms race which can result in war . The first systematic statement of the A-R thesis was made by L F Richardson in 1919 and expanded later in 1939 39 and 1960 . 36 Richardson begins with the premise that the stimulus to, or the slow down, in the arms race between two nations (or two groups of nations), call them X and Y, is motivated by fear, mistrust, and rivalry . Added to this is the assumption that there is a tendency for countries to reduce their `armaments in order to economise expenditure and effort' ." Using the aforementioned assumptions, Richardson derives the now classic equations which provided the springboard for subsequent A-R theorists . Richardson's equations are as follows, dx/dt = C (-P, / . 2) or ( d

( Q( 2

P

If P i) . then the system

2 # 2)>(o(

2)