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The violence of stability : an investigation of the subjectivity of labour in Argentina
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Dinerstein, Ana C. (2001) The violence of stability : an investigation of the subjectivity of labour in Argentina. PhD thesis, University of Warwick.
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Official URL: http://webcat.warwick.ac.uk/record=b1375719~S15
Abstract
This thesis offers an investigation of the transformation of the subjectivity of labour in
Argentina. The global capitalist crisis of the 1970s produced a unique recomposition of
capitalist social relations worldwide. For the first time capital asserted itself as a global social
imagery in which it was seen as free and detached from labour. This 'disconnection' between
capital and labour is deeply disempowering, for it denies the source of social transformation
(labour) in favour of the reification of an abstraction (capital). In Argentina this was
manifested during the 1990s through the exaltation of 'Stability' as the solution to
Argentine's chronic political and economic crisis, as well as the belief in the defeat of labour
altogether. Although stability was considered the main achievement of President Menem's
period in power (1989-1999), persistent social and labour conflict evoked a re-examination of
widely shared assumptions regarding both the crisis of labour and the triumph of neoliberalism
in Argentina. Analyses of what Menemism meant in political, economic, social and
legal terms are abundant. Yet, missing has been an adequate interrogation and questioning of
the theoretical categories and methods used to grasp the new reality of labour. The thesis aims
to contribute to an understanding of the current forms of resistance in Argentina by means of
a theoretical proposal and an historical and empirical analysis. The thesis is divided into three
parts and a theoretical introduction. Chapter one considers Marx's writing and recent
developments in Marxist theory of the state, value, money and subjectivity. The chapter
discusses the significance of Marx's method of determinate abstraction for an understanding
of the subjectivity of labour in capitalist social relations. Going beyond the formulation that
the state, money and the law are real illusions which mediate the capital relation (Clarke,
1991, Holloway and Picciotto 1977), I offer the notion of subjectivity of labour as a
determinate abstraction, i. e. as a transient and contradictory form of being which emerges
vis-ä-vis a particular- and contradictory-articulation of the subjective aspects (identity,
organisations and resistance) and the social forms (political, economic and social) which
mediate labour as a social activity. Subjectivity is a 'site of conjunction' which articulates the
concrete and abstract aspects of labour within the subject. This theoretical framework
constitutes the analytical and methodological bases for my research. Part I explores five
historical forms of subjectivity which emerged as dramatic expressions of the social relation
of capital: the Anarchist (1920s), the Peronist (1940s), the Anti-imperialist (1960s), the
Revolutionary (1970s) and the Democratic (1980s). The historical journey aims to show how
labour made history by taking dramatic forms which encapsulated crisis, deconstruction and
renewed integration into another form. The three chapters which comprise Part II offer a
detailed analysis of the transformation of the subjectivity of labour in the 1990s, by looking at
the recomposition of the state, labour reform and stabilisation policies, and employment and
social policy. Although stabilisation policies led to the halt of hyperinflation, they became the
lynchpin for the deep social, economic and political recomposition of social relations, leading
to the decentralisation of labour, the reorganisation of trade union activity into business and
opposition unionism, the expansion of social conflict, the casualisation and flexibilisation of
labour, social insecurity, unemployment and poverty. The notion of subjectivity as
determinate abstraction allows us to understand the paradoxical disjunction between the
policies presented as the source of stability and the unstable, insecure and unhappy forms of
private and social life. Moving beyond the debate of 'stability vs. instability', this paradox is
explored through a detailed study of one of the main forms of social protest in 1990s
Argentina: the roadblocks organised by casual and state workers, the unemployed and the socalled
marginal social layers. As a determinate abstraction, the roadblock appears as an
embodiment of the subjective, political, economic and social transformation within stability.
Thus, roadblocks do not destabilise stability, as some scholars suggest, but rather stability
destabilises human lives, since, as a form of class antagonism, it legalises, legitimises and
celebrates uncertainty - the end of labour as the source of power in society and the end of
politics. The roadblock stands against the violence of stability which causes labour to
virtually disappear through poverty and unemployment.
Item Type: | Thesis (PhD) | ||||
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Subjects: | H Social Sciences > HC Economic History and Conditions H Social Sciences > HD Industries. Land use. Labor |
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Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): | Argentina -- Economic conditions -- 20th century, Capitalism -- Argentina, Labor -- Argentina | ||||
Official Date: | June 2001 | ||||
Dates: |
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Institution: | University of Warwick | ||||
Theses Department: | Department of Sociology | ||||
Thesis Type: | PhD | ||||
Publication Status: | Unpublished | ||||
Supervisor(s)/Advisor: | Clarke, Simon, 1946- | ||||
Sponsors: | Committee of Vice-Chancellors and Principals of the Universities of the United Kingdom ; University of Warwick ; Argentina. Ministerio de Cultura y Educación | ||||
Extent: | xvii, 388, xxxi leaves | ||||
Language: | eng |
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