[WS:] It seems that you make certain assumptions about the source of slacking that are rooted in bourgeois/neoliberal way of thinking. For the neoliberal ilk, everything originates in preferences, human nature and kindred mental states. Thus, slackers slack because that is in their nature (hence 'socialism will never work").
But if you reject that assumption and instead consider that actions are "socially constructed" in a particular type of social relations - as social scientists have been claiming for a long time - it becomes quite obvious that slacking on the job is a product of capitalist relations, particularly taylorization (i.e. breaking jobs into a series of low skill mundane tasks and relegating most control functions to the management.) It further follows that democratization of the workplace would significantly reduce if not altogether eliminate slacking by eliminating capitalist relations.
Wojtek
On Thu, May 27, 2010 at 5:20 PM, brad <babscritique at gmail.com> wrote:
> Carrol wrote:
>
> Please tell us how to Select the Selectors, Judge the Judges. And who
> judges those who judge who should do the judging?
> Carrol
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Is that a joke? It is exactly the type of pitiful binary thinking I
> was pushing against, but old habits die hard. There is a more radical
> way to look at the issue. Someone mentioned how this would not be a
> problem in a democratic workers situation and I agree. In that type
> of situation people don't let slackers fuck around too long. They say
> 'hey you slacking off is making me have to work harder to pull your
> weight, how about you find another job that you might want to actually
> apply yourself at'. I have lived through this type of thing in
> activist groups, movement event preparations, and during strikes. It
> is rather organic how people are able to self organize and in the
> process accomplish much more than is possible with some manager
> directing everything (yes, people are naturally social animals). But
> if we just want to argue bullshit binaries...'they said work harder so
> we say work less!'...
>
> Brad
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