Only the workers can free the workers: the origin of the worker's control tradition and the Trade Union Advisory Coordinating Committee (TUACC), 1870-1979

[摘要] With the rise of the new social movements and increasing number of protests over servicedelivery in South Africa’s poorest townships, many activists have started to questionwhether unions are able to relate to the demands of the unorganised and poor. It is arguedthat under the new democracy COSATU has become bureaucratic and is too closelyaligned to the ANC to challenge government policies and play a transformative role insociety. Such concerns are not entirely new. Labour historians and industrial sociologistshave long debated the political potential and democratic character of trade unions andthere is a vast literature documenting the organisational styles of unions in South Africatoday and in the past. Based on examination of union archival records and interviewswith key informants, this study traces the emergence of the 'workers control’ tradition inSouth African trade unions. 'Workers control’ is a unique approach based on non-racial,industrial trade unions, which are democratically organised on the factory floor. Suchunions, which are ideally controlled by elected worker representatives at all levels andunited nationally on the basis of sharing common policies and resources, create the basisfor an autonomous movement that promotes the interest of workers.Although most closely associated with FOSATU (1979-1985), this study found thatworkers control had deeper historical roots. Workers control was a product of theideological and organisational renewal that characterised the 1970s and was initiallycreated by the Trade Union Advisory Coordinating Committee (TUACC) in Natal and,later, the Witwatersrand. TUACC, which included significant numbers of womenemployed as semi-skilled production workers and unskilled migrant men, reflectedcomplex shifts in the labour market and the economy. It was in this context that ordinaryunion members together with a diverse layer of activists developed TUACC’s uniqueapproach to organisation. The power of white university trained activists in determiningunion policies has been overestimated and worker leaders, particularly more educatedwomen workers, played an important role in building TUACC unions. Based on aGramscian analysis, TUACC maintained that democratic unions based on strong shopfloor organisation could exploit loop holes in the law and participate in industrialstructures without undermining union autonomy and democracy. TUACC, however, wasless clear of how to relate to political movements and parties. TUACC distanced itselfofficially from the banned ANC to avoid repression, but some workers and unionistslooked to homeland and traditional leaders for alliances. This tension between thecreation of a democratic trade union culture and the workers’ support of more autocraticpolitical and traditional leaders and populist movements was never resolved.All of TUACC’s affiliates were founder members of COSATU and this study gives ussome insight into the traditions that inform COSATU’s responses to social movements,political parties and the state today. Drawing on the insights of the Anracho-syndicalism,this study also highlights some of the dangers of separating the economic and politicalactivities of workers into unions and political parties respectively.

[发布机构] University of the Witwatersrand