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COOPERATION IN KWAZULU NATAL 381
‘diasporization’ would mean spreading this On the shop floors, the talk is still of soli-
energy across a broader terrain and its invo- darity/‘umadlandawonye’ and unfulfilled
lution into discordant cultural formations. promises, of hatred, of the scars of violence
A managerial cultural revolution that but also of the need for peace and growth.
views black workers as a human resource is a If our craft brings us back to the concerns
tremendous advance from the colonial man- of finite, vulnerable human beings, industrial
agerialism of the ‘old’ regime. But, resources and labour studies has to lend its voice to
are there to yield their effort, their gold, their their ‘recoiling and refracting’ agencies. The
bile, and such an instrumental view is self- plight of the self-employed woman selling
defeating. There is no solution unless partic- plastic containers near the Durban station is
ipation goes alongside with the recognition as worthy a topic of concern as the griev-
of the centrality of cultural formations, their ances of an operator of the latest numerically-
autonomy and their negotiated participation controlled lathe. Despite the dilemmas of
in defining the priorities of production. work and productivity, and of human capacity
But shifting the discourse of responsibility remains our chief concern – after all, we do
for national priorities onto ordinary people’s want to live in a real democratic country, we
shoulders is problematic: their capacity to do need prosperity – we cannot take the dom-
correct themselves without transforming the inant goals of power-elites as ‘given’.
structures of inequality is very unlikely. The Scholars of Industrial and Labour Studies
glossing of all that with pseudo-cultural lan- will have to be at war within their souls: a
guage, ‘ubuntu’, African humanism and its war between a realization that at the heart of
capacity to make profits for a couple of participation, cooperation and innovation,
bosses is self-serving nonsense. and the meeting of basic needs, there is a
On the one hand, managements are trying demand for supportive involvement and a
to push beyond the institutional cooperation commitment to a radical inquisition of the
embodied in collective bargaining to turn real gains ordinary people make. Our worth
what was a social movement with its disso- will not be counted by the applause of the
nance and alterity into a confluence of inter- powerful but by the discomfort the honesty
ests. Managements have been far-reaching in of our craft sustains. The people of KZN
their innovations. They have taken the most deserve no less.
exciting of the ideas developed in the creative
wings of the trade union movement and
turned them around to serve the priorities of
productivity. Worker theatre has turned into REFERENCES
industrial theatre; workshops and political
role-plays have turned into problem-solving Abu-Lughod, Janet, L. (1989) Before European
practices; worker self-expression has turned Hegemony: The World System 1250–1350.
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other hand, the trade unions have lost the Basckin, Jeremy (1991) Striking Back: A History
ability to provide platforms for the expres- of COSATU. Johannesburg: Ravan Press.
sion of alternatives: the Baba Khumalos have Berger, Peter L. (1987) The Capitalist Revolution:
Fifty Propositions about Prosperity, Equality
been silenced and the mobilizers of yesterday
and Liberty. Aldershot: Wildwood House.
are too unskilled for the new formal cooper-
Bonnin, Debby (1987) ‘Class Consciousness
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and Conflict in the Natal Midlands: The Case
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Study of BTR Sarmcol Workers’. MA Thesis,
‘And when the dust of our struggle settled, Durban: University of Natal.
there was nobody there … we were the lad- Bourdieu, Pierre (1989) Distinction: A Social
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spiked shoes’. Routledge.