workers' control

Workers' control is participation in the management of factories and other commercial enterprises by the people who work there. It has been variously advocated by anarchists, socialists (notably Trotskyists), communists, social democrats, distributists and Christian democrats, and has been combined with various socialist and mixed economy systems. Workers' councils are a form of workers' control. Council communism, such as in the early Soviet Union, advocates workers' control through workers' councils and factory committees. Syndicalism advocates workers' control through trade unions. Guild socialism advocates workers' control through a revival of the guild system. Participatory economics represents a recent variation on the idea of workers' control. Workers' control can be contrasted to control of the economy via the state, such as nationalization and central planning (see state socialism) versus control of the means of production by owners, which workers can achieve through employer provided stock purchases, direct stock purchases, etc., as found in capitalism.

Workers' control is participation in the management of factories and other commercial enterprises by the people who work there. It has been variously advocated by anarchists, socialists (notably Trotskyists), communists, social democrats, distributists and Christian democrats, and has been combined with various socialist and mixed economy systems. Workers' councils are a form of workers' control. Council communism, such as in the early Soviet Union, advocates workers' control through workers' councils and factory committees. Syndicalism advocates workers' control through trade unions. Guild socialism advocates workers' control through a revival of the guild system. Participatory economics represents a recent variation on the idea of workers' control. Workers' control can be contrasted to control of the economy via the state, such as nationalization and central planning (see state socialism) versus control of the means of production by owners, which workers can achieve through employer provided stock purchases, direct stock purchases, etc., as found in capitalism. ===Australia=== In Northern Queensland from 1908 to 1920, the IWW and the Australasian Meat Industry Employees Union organized a degree of workers' control among meat industry workers. From 1971 to 1990, Australia saw a massive wave of workers' control corresponding with strikes all over the country. Some authors have argued that the green bans constitute a form of workers' control. Including: 1971: Harco Work-In 1972: Clutha Development Mine Work-In 1972: Sydney Opera House Work-In 1972: Whyalla Glove Factory Work-In 1974: Wyong Plaza Work-In 1975: Nymboida Mine Work-In 1975: Coal Cliff Work-In 1978: Sanyo Television Factory Work-In 1979: Union Carbide Work-In 1980: Department of Social Security Work-In 1990: Melbourne Tramworkers' Strike ===France=== In 1871, the Paris Commune placed 43 enterprises under workers' control as one of the first experiments in modern socialism. Another famous example of workers' control is the LIP clock factory, which was occupied in 1973 and operated as a worker cooperative. ===Germany=== Germany has a history of "Mitbestimmung" (Codetermination) since 1891 (see Codetermination in Germany). The Weimar Republic required workers' consultative committees in every business employing 20 people, which the Nazi government abolished. Works councils were authorized by the Allied Control Council in 1946 and required by the West German government in 1952; codetermination has been mandatory in all large companies (2,000 employees¹) since 1976. ===Indonesia=== During the Indonesian National Revolution, railway, plantation and factory workers across Java implemented workers' control from 1945 to 1946, until it was crushed by the new Indonesian Nationalist Government. In 2007, over a thousand workers in Jakarta inspired by workers' control in Argentina and Venezuela took over a textile factory in response to wage cuts, repression of a recently organized union and efforts to fire and intimidate union organizers. ===Ukraine=== Workers' control was practiced by the Makhnovshchina in both factories and farms from 1918 to 1921, when it was crushed by the Red Army. ===United States=== Workers' control was practiced in Seattle in 1919, as workers organized milk deliveries, cafeterias, firefighting and laundry before being suppressed by the government. From 1968 to 1972, General Electric experimented with workers' control in River Works, Massachusetts to great success. ==See also== Anarcho-syndicalism Co-operatives Direct democracy Inclusive democracy Industrial democracy Industrial Workers of the World Paris Commune of 1871 Participatory democracy Participatory economics Trotskyism Worker cooperative Worker self-management Workplace democracy Edvard Kardelj ==References== ==Further reading== Maurice Brinton, The Bolsheviks and Workers' Control. Montreal: Black Rose Books, 1978 ==External links== Trotsky on workers control Democracy At Work sv:Självförvaltning

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