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Labor and hegemony: a reply

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 May 2009

Robert W. Cox
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Extract

When I wrote “Labor and hegemony,” I anticipated two kinds of critical reaction: one on the ground that the method and approach was at variance with mainstream political science; the other in defense of two institutional establishments whose ideological foundations were challenged in the article— those of the ILO and the AFL-CIO. Both these organizational establishments place great stock in the idea of tripartism, representing it as a form of pluralism or a bargaining relationship of independent actors—unions, employers, and government. In “Labor and hegemony,” I argued that this appearance of independence has to be understood as the ideological expression of a particular structure of social power, a particular form of hegemony that is found in advanced capitalist societies with the emergence of a corporative form of state. This blocco storico is the proper object of study, and since it has international as well as national dimensions its study can be a fruitful approach to international affairs and international organization.

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International Organization , Volume 34 , Issue 1 , Winter 1980 , pp. 159 - 176
Copyright
Copyright © The IO Foundation 1980

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References

1 On the derivation and meaning of the concept, see Gramsci, A., Quaderni del carcere (Turin: Einaudi, 1975), vol. 2, pp. 1051–52, 1237–38, 1300, 1321 and vol. 4, p. 2632.Google Scholar

2 Dunning, H. A., “Communications,” International Organization 32.2 (Spring 1978): 576–578CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Cox, R. W., “Communications,” International Organization 33.2 (Spring 1978): 579.Google Scholar

3 Roy, Godson, American Labor and European Politics. The AFL as a Transnational Force (New York: Crane, Russak, 1976). This is a published version of a dissertation accepted by Columbia University in 1972 for a Ph.D. in political science.Google Scholar

4 Godson, , op. cit., pp. 149, 157–159, 161.Google Scholar

5 Stephen, D. Krasner, Defending the National Interest. Raw Materials Investments and U.S. Foreign Policy (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1978) writes of the Frei measures: “The companies, particularly Kennecott, were generously compensated through tax reductions, new financing from the state, and liberal provisions for the expatriation of foreign exchange earnings” (p. 230)Google Scholar. Norman, Girvan, Corporate Imperialism: Conflict and Expropriation (White Plains, N.Y.: M. E. Sharpe, 1976) writes: “Kennecott willingly agreed to Chileanization—indeed, the company claimed to have taken the initiative in suggesting it to the government—and it secured a favorable price considerably in excess of the book value for the equity sold to the government,” (p. 69). The less perceptive management of Anaconda resisted Chileanization at the outset but later did a complete volte face and asked to be fully nationalized. Both companies retained effective managerial control under formal Chilean state ownership.Google Scholar

6 Girvan, , op. cit., pp. 136—156.Google Scholar

7 This thesis is developed by Girvan, op. cit., pp. 152–156. A more comprehensive analysis of this phase of the world economy broadly consistent with Girvan's thesis, though emphasizing manufacturing more than minerals extraction, is Charles-Albert, Michalet, Le capilalisme mon-diale (Paris: Presses universitaires de France, 1976).Google Scholar

8 Krasner, , op. cit.Google Scholar

9 This is discussed in Perry Anderson, “The antinomies of Antonio Gramsci”, New Left Review 100, 11 1976–01 1977.Google Scholar

10 Schmitter, P., ‘Still the century of corporatism?” in The New Corporatism, Pike, F. B. & Stritch, T., eds. (Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 1974).Google Scholar

11 Godson seemed to take this approach but satisfied himself with the platitudes politicians are wont to offer as explanations of their conduct. He wrote that since the 1880s, American trade union leaders “have been seeking an amalgam of what they have regarded as worldwide democracy and free trade unionism, peace and stability, and economic and social justice.” (op. cit., p. 55.)

12 Tolstoy, L., War and Peace, Book III, Part II, chapter 28. The setback to the French forces at Borodino was attributed to the fact that Napoleon had caught cold, which adversely affected the genius of his military dispositions. The cause of his cold might thus have been traced to the valet who had not properly dried his boots, and the valet would thereby bear responsibility for the turning point in the war and ultimate defeat of the Empire.Google Scholar

13 This period is well analyzed in John, P. Windmuller, American Labor and the International Labor Movement, 1940 to 1953 (Ithaca, N.Y.: Institute of International Industrial and Labor Relations, Cornell University, 1954).Google Scholar

14 “Labor and hegemony”; p. 399 (footnote 28) and p. 403 (footnote 32).Google Scholar

15 American Institute for Free Labor Development. Hearing before the Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate, 91st Congress, 1st Session, with George Meany, President, AFL-CIO, 1 August 1969 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1969), pp. 46–47.Google Scholar

16 Ibid.pp. 58–59.Google Scholar

17 Foreign and Military Intelligence. Book I. Final Report of the Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with respect to Intelligence Activities. United States Senate, 26 April 1976 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Offices, 1976). See especially, pp. 145–149, 445–446.Google Scholar

18 Ibid., p. 179, 451.Google Scholar

19 Ibid., p. 451.

20 I refer the reader back to “Labor and hegemony”, pp. 390–391 for a discussion of this dualism in the labor force.Google Scholar

21 Godson, , op. cit., pp. 52–53.Google Scholar

22 It should be noted that Douglas and Godson do not challenge my assertion that the AFL and AFL-CIO worked with and were subsidized by the CIA. Nor do they challenge my reference to Agee as a source, though they do appear to cast doubt upon the value of other references, namely Goulden's biography of Meany and Romualdi's memoir, both, incidentally, cited in reference by Godson in his book.

23 Covert Action in Chile, 1963–1973. Staff Report of the Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with respect to Intelligence Activities. United States Senate (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1975), p. 19.Google Scholar

24 Hearings before the Sub-Committee on Inter-American Affairs, House of Representatives, 5 August, 17, 18 September, 1974 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1975), p. 229.Google Scholar

25 Foreign and Military Intelligence, op. cit., p. 146.Google Scholar

26 Hersh, Seymour M., The New York Times, 20 09 1974.Google Scholar

27 Covert Action, op. cit., p. 2.Google Scholar

28 Information about the roles of AIFLD contacts in Pinochet's Chile has been collected by concerned groups and investigative reporters—e.g., North American Congress on Latin America, Berkeley, Calif.; Northern California Chile Coalition, Berkeley, Calif.; Research Associates International, Marina del Rey, Calif. The substance of what these sources have reported is confirmed in an article by Andrew McLellan, Interamerican Representative of the AFL-CIO, published in AFL-CIO Free Trade Union News, December 1975; namely, that AIFLD associates are “the surviving nucleus” of Chilean trade unionism, and that the AIFLD “serves as a rallying point and source of encouragement” for them. The same issue of Free Trade Union News carries with editorial approval a statement by Eduardo Rios Arias, an AIFLD associate who was placed by the military in charge of the Maritime Confederation of Chile after they had removed the elected CUT-oriented officers. Rios was appointed by the junta to represent Chilean labor at the ILO Conference.

29 In a resolution adopted by the AFL-CIO Executive Board at its meeting of 5–6 August 1974 and adopted again in substantially the same terms by the AFL-CIO Convention in October 1975, it is stated that “a majority of the Chilean people… accepted the coup as a necessary act …” and that “the desire of the people … was, and is, a return to the freely elected and constitutional government …” (AFL-CIO Free Trade Union News, September 1974 and December 1975). In documents of this sort, one cannot imagine even a touch of irony, having regard to the fact that the overthrown government and assassinated president were both constitutional and freely elected.

30 AFL-CIO Free Trade Union News, February 1977.Google Scholar

31 Andrew, McLellan, in the article cited above (footnote 28) criticized the ICFTU for its support of “Communist and Maoist exiles” of the CUT and for all but disowning its regional affiliate, the ORIT. Though technically an organ of the ICFTU, the ORIT has in fact been a creature of the AFL-CIO.Google Scholar

32 A theme developed in another article written by Stuart Elliot in the December 1975 issue of Free Trade Unions News–the same which contained the McLellan and Rios statements (footnote 28). Godson, op. cit., p. 42, pointed out that Irving Brown is the author of the doctrine that the overthrow of right-wing dictatorships creates a most dangerous situation favoring communist take-over.

33 Covert Action, op. cit., p. 9.

34 There is the considerable work of John Windmuller, who has maintained a consistent scholarly detachment. Jeffrey, Harrod'sTrade Union Foreign Policy (New York: Doubleday, 1972), a study of British and U.S. trade union penetration in Jamaica, was a path-breaking study that has suffered an almost systematic lack of recognition.Google Scholar