Labor and Monopoly Capital

Labor and Monopoly Capital

HARRY BRAVERMAN's book Labor and Monopoly Capital carries the tradition of Marxist schools. The author focuses on the labor process under the Fordism, arguing that how the work, under the discipline of scientific management, becomes disjointed, dull, and repetitive. According to him, the work is degraded. Like Marx, Braverman is a deterministic and looks into the question of how technological change in Fordism affected the attributes of work and the discrimination of working class.

The labor process under capitalism is one of the central themes of Braverman. Its main emphasis lies in providing a voice to the working-class movement. Taking his insights from Marx, Braverman is considered the latest follower that has accurately appreciated the profundity of Marx's work. Supporting his work from Marx himself, and drawing on his own experience as a trained craftsman, a socialist militant and journalist, and a manager of two publishing concerns in a period of rapid technological change, Braverman has argued on the rejection of popular academic wisdoms of sociology, which believe the irrelevance of Marx's work. Labor and Monopoly Capital shows the critical examination of methods of managerial control, of the relationship between technological innovation and social class, and of the suppression of skill from the work. For him, the main work was, therefore, to show the relevance of Marxism in new time, so that Marxism could be a tool for revolutionary struggle in the United States and other advanced capitalist societies. In other words, he was trying to defend old positions so that he could conquer new ones. Braverman notes several times in the book that he is carrying the Marxist tradition and the application of Marx's method to an understanding of the labor process under Monopoly Capitalism and how the structure of the working class people had distorted under the weight of it.

Braverman also discusses how computers and data processing technologies would change insurance companies and other businesses in the financial sector and how automation and computer control would change the service industry as well as basic industry and would make the workers deskilled (Braverman, 1955: 8). Braverman also analyzes the work of a number of mainstream industrial sociologists and argues that these industrial sociologists do not address a crucial question of how work can be made a satisfactory part of life for common workers. Braverman explores the issues of the structure of the working class and the nature of the labor process.

In sum, Braverman discusses the degradation of Marxism in the 20th century. This degradation, according to him, resulted from a number of forces acting against the labor movement. According to him, focus on Capitalism in the present time has become as a mode of distribution rather than a mode of production.

Braverman concludes that the problem is not with Marxism, but with the failure of Marxists to reapply the Marx's method to a changing capitalist reality. Braverman sets out to reapply Marx's method, to renovate the Marxist critique of the mode of production and the Marxist analysis of the working class. Braverman also seeks to build a New (Marxist) Left. This New Left, according to him, will be based on a vibrant, renovated Marxist critique of capitalism as a tool for revolutionary action. In addition, this New Left will have intellectual centers, which could again make socialism a decisive and stimulating venture and could revive the interest in the message and cause among new groups of students, intellectuals, and workers (Braverman, 1959: 16). The New Left will also have collegial, nonsectarian collaboration among revolutionaries.

CRITIEQUES

HARRY BRAVERMAN tries to create a New Marxist Left to create intellectual centers and renovate Marxism. In his efforts to create a New Marxist Left he was both unsuccessful as well as successful. He failed the main objectives as mentioned above but left us a lasting intellectual and political legacy.

According to him, manufacturing firms were engaged primarily in production. By the end of the century their primary activity had become the pursuit of monopoly power.

The objective of monopoly power is to increase the margin of price over production cost for the firm's products and to increase the sale of the products at these prices. These activities include research and development, discovering new products, and reducing production costs, selling and advertising to increase sales and the markup of price over production costs. They also include labor relations to persuade or threaten workers to produce more or accept lower wages. They also embrace political contributions, lobbying and corruption of government officials in order to obtain natural resources on favorable terms and other favors of government. In addition, they include the employment of lawyers, accountants, and financiers to avoid and evade taxes and to influence tax legislation. However, Braverman made a wrong calculation, since in a larger perspective, technological innovations, when driven towards cost-saving and enhancing efficiency, bring new jobs and competitiveness of the industry and economy-wide. For example, in the U.S. economy, when the IT investment soared in service sector during the 1980s, unemployment rate first skyrocketed, but later with the rapid diffusion of IT, unemployment rate fell sharply in the 1990s. If Harry Braverman's thinking had been true, the economy would end up in a failure.