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COOPERATION IN KWAZULU NATAL 375

alongside such ‘indirect rule’, ‘tribal’ or norms, values and symbolic markers, and
‘traditional’ forms of consent and coercion. belonging to a group is not only driven by
Black workers were not only denied labour practical and instrumental considerations.
rights because trade unions were seen to be Second, I would like to posit a distinc-
an anathema to the factory owners – far from tion between ‘dissonance’ and ‘alterity’.
it, trade unionism was seen as a necessary ‘Dissonance’denotes the relationship between
headache among white, Indian and coloured organizational goals and the practices that
workers – but because they were seen to be result from ‘defensive combinations’. There
‘foreign’ to African culture and aspirations. is always dissonance between the perform-
Our focus on managerialism was the first ance demands of an organization and the
contribution in industrial and labour studies. actual rhythms of work on the shop floor.
The second, and my work has incessantly Such dissonance, if not managed, creates a
chipped away at this, was to understand ordi- ‘drift’ between the definition of a ‘good
nary people’s cultural formations and, as a worker’ and the actual empirical sum of
participant, to fathom the ‘creative energy’ workers and their actions in the engine room.
that animated the trade unions throughout the Consequently, organizational life becomes a
1980s. Before analyzing the significance of shifting terrain where managements try and
this militant tradition, I will outline a series turn dissonance into productive engagement
of concepts that define the parameters of the by force or fiat.
formation of this new consciousness. ‘Alterity’ denotes a relationship between
organizational goals and the actions of ‘cul-
tural formations’. Here, the organizational
goals and worker goals are distinct and
THE SOURCES OF DISSONANCE, follow differential trajectories. Such a differ-
ALTERITY AND RESISTANCE ON THE ence and indeed tension is not necessarily
SHOP FLOOR conflictual, but it can lead to organizational
inertia. The cultural formations of ordinary
The following lists the operative concepts, workers can always present the demands of
used for an understanding of dissonance, managements as ‘external’ to their aspira-
alienation and resistance. tions and logic.
First, I would like to posit a distinction The struggle to transform conditions of
between ‘defensive combinations’ and ‘cul- dissonance and alterity into constant produc-
tural formations’. In the context of modern tive adjustment constitute the sphere of shop
institutional and organizational life, with its floor politics.
work patterns, its repetitive tasks and routines, Third, I would like to posit a distinction
people recoil from and refract pressures by between ‘domination’ and ‘hegemony’.
forming groups, networks and informal ‘Domination’ is the ability of a group,
associations. Defensive combinations are a power-bloc, a class, to exercise its will
so many practical ways of regulating the with or without its subordinates’ consent.
rhythms of work, of regulating social interac- ‘Hegemony’ is the ability of a group, a
tion, of regulating relationships to authority power-bloc, a class, to exercise moral and
and power. In the classic work on asylums by intellectual leadership or authority and
Erving Goffman (1974) we were shown how through that gain its members’ or subordi-
the patients coped in their total institution nates’ consent. Consent might be unifocal:
and developed a public and a private world, involving a feeling of total ‘belonging’; it can
which regulated the perceptions and interac- also be based on differentiation: involving a
tions. ‘Defensive combinations’might turn to feeling of being legitimately different –
‘cultural formations’ if the regulation of e.g., despite poverty and obvious wealth, the
everyday life is underpinned by reciprocal poor might come to think that they deserve