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370 THE ISA HANDBOOK IN CONTEMPORARY SOCIOLOGY

transformation of aptitudes and attitudes, research has shown (Kruger and Sitas, 1995),
hinges on four frames: such a sense of cooperative bargaining is
(a) Necessity: the new globalized world held in high regard in most managerial cir-
economy demands a new competitive capacity. cles in the largest corporations of KZN. As a
Therefore, as neo-liberal economists insist, human resource practitioner in one of these
labour needs to develop a new sense of disci- giants asserted (Kruger and Sitas, 1995: 11))
pline, indeed some have gone far enough to with enthusiasm:
call for what amounts to, in the words of
to look at how people have changed and how the
Michel Foucault (1979), a new ‘disciplinary paradigms are beginning to change themselves, all
regime’ that would develop in tandem with a this ... elasticity! The old ... is starting to burst.
new productive culture. Without it, local, Soon a new one will come through the gap with a
regional and national economies will buckle new colour mentality, a new way of doing things.
At the moment it is mainly subliminal than out in
under the productivity-driven miracles of the
the open.
East. As Peter Berger argued recently the East
had found an economic culture, which brought Despite the ‘subliminal’ nature of the
about modernization and a ‘secularity of its ‘new’, growth and development is seen to be
own’ (1987: 162). Oriental Confucianism with the consequence of serious motivational
its ‘respect for superiors, its collective solidar- strategies for worker participation. ‘We need
ity and its emphasis on discipline’ (Berger, to motivate our workers to be part of the pro-
1987: 163) has created a new dynamo in the ductive effort’, asserted a senior HR Director
world economy, without undergoing Western- in KZN and added with conviction that,
style ‘individuation’ (Berger, 1987: 170). ‘when a black man clocks in the morning,
(b) Nation-Building: the new South Africa he’s clocking out, in his mind’. The new
demands a move from a culture of adversari- paradigm, the new ‘glue’ is the latest mana-
alism between capital and labour, between gerial rage.
white power-blocs and black people, to a new The need for a new motivational approach
system of cooperative bargaining based on has been trumpeted further by the Government
‘corporatist’ relations between the state, capi- of National Unity: no lesser man than Nelson
tal and labour. The glue for this new ‘growth’ Mandela has argued that motivation, respon-
and ‘development’ or to use a more scientific sibility, self-discipline, all embedded in the
description, the ‘synergy’ between compet- ‘Masakhane’ campaign, were central for the
ing interests is to be provided by the delivery of the RDP and the building of a
Reconstruction and Development Programme democratic ‘rainbow nation’.
in the name of the national interest. (c) Current Incapacity: Both the competi-
Of course as Mike Morris has argued tive demands of a new world economy and
(1991: 34), ‘the composition … of the national the need to build a developed country are
interest is precisely a site of struggle between faced with a devastating weakness: our
the various contending classes and social forces defective human resource capacities. As the
in any historical situation’. Nevertheless, such RDP stated (1994: 58), racial domination cre-
struggles are seen to be postponed given the ated nothing short of ‘destruction, distortion
RDP’s holistic, moral and consensual and neglect’. The black population lacks the
approach to growth. Very few people would skills, suffers from illiteracy, and lacks tech-
deny the need for meeting basic needs, devel- nological education and training. Nothing
oping our human resources, restructuring the short of a human resource revolution would
economy and democratizing our society, in be able to create the human capital for inter-
short, burying Apartheid’s legacy with deter- national competitiveness and economic
mination and vigour. growth.
At a micro-level, managements have been As Manuel Castells stated too, in his remark-
receptive to the RDPs priorities too. As recent able work, The Informational City (1989: 15),