12/07/2011

readings today deal with a transitional juncture in American history.

titled “the crisis of liberalism”

typically this is identified with the late 60s, with (1) civil rights movement; (2) anti-war movement; (3) decline of American economic hegemony

but, Vivek is saying, the core institutions of the 'liberal order' begin to degrade earlier. the quick collapse of liberalism is hard to understand unless you also understand the earlier erosion of the institutions that underpinned it.

what the readings today reveal is that many of labour's gains had already been lost/squandered—through, for example, the nature of Taft-Hartley in1947. or, the break-up of the CIO and the expulsion of the Communists in the early 1950s devastates the labour movement, changing the very image of what the labour movement ought to have been (i.e., towards officialdom, away from rank-and-file).

by the late 1950s, labour is in fact structurally very weak. it's ability to defend itself against capital is weak.

this weakness is masked by two factors:

1. despite the defeats that sidelined efforts to institutionalize the shop-steward system, the shop-stewards haven't quite been displaced by the early- to mid- 1950s. this keeps alive some organizational capacity on the part of American workers, despite structural weakness.
2. more importantly, the period from 1945 to mid-50s, profits are heady and the going is good. workers win gains.

with the end of the 1950s, though, the economic downturn begins to win. the pillar supporting whatever little power labour had is taken away, and employers begin to launch an offensive against rank-and-file power. by the 1960s, the day-to-day negotiation that shopstewards carried out with management is being replaced by a bureaucratic grievance procedure.

workers find their power decreased, in short. grievances filed by workers start to pile up—unacknowleded and unaddressed.

as a consequence of this, the trade union leadership's legitimacy starts to erode. union leaders are doing nothing to defend workers through the grievance procedure.

the rebellion in the late 60s, which is the consequence of this, has the potential of reproducing the 30s. but it very quickly meets with defeat.

the rank-and-file rebellion was more the 'last gasp' of the compact.

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