Symposium on Brave rman

BETWEEN MARXIST ORTHODOXY AND CRITICAL THEORY:

COMMENTS ON BRAVE RMAN' S LABOR AND MONOPOLY CAPITAL

Michael Burawoy

One of the remarkable features of Harry Brave rman' s Labor and

Monopoly Capital has been its appeal to a wide range of different groups.

It is used for courses in universities at both graduate and under-

graduate level and in a variety of departments. It is used in commun-

ity colleges, in trade union schools, in all sorts of study groups among

workers and professionals. It is clearly destined to emerge as one of

the giants of the Marxist tradition. But it will not be confined to

this tradition, since it has caught the imagination of non-Marxists

as much as of Marxists. Not surprisingly, therefore, Labor and

Monopoly Capital can be read in many different ways, and today I want

to place it in the context of Marxist debate.

It is curious to note that widely divergent forms of Marxism have

embraced Labor and Monopoly Capital as a pillar in their own tradition.

In this book they have all found confirmation of their own position. In

part this may reflect the fact that Labor and Monopoly Capital is one

of the first attempts to rewrite volume one of Capital in the light of

a century of development in both Marxism and capitalism. However, an

equally important reason for its appeal among divergent Marxisms lies

in its combination of themes from orthodox Marxism with themes from

critical theory. Thus Paul Sweezy - a relatively orthodox Marxist -

can write that in terms of theory there is very little that is new in

this book, while critical theorists have embraced it as a major theor-

etical contribution in the tradition of Lukacs, Adorno, Horkheimer,

Marcuse and others. In this talk I propose to argue, like critical

theorists, that the novelty of Labor and Monopoly Capital lies in



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harnessing their ideas to the understanding of monopoly capitalism

through the examination of the labor process. But I shall also argue

that this novelty is the very feature that poses an obstacle to

Braver-man's understanding of the nature of monopoly capitalism.

What is this critical component in Braverman? The subtitle of

the book - "the degradation of work in the twentieth century" - indi-

cates a critique in the obvious sense of the negative connotation of

"degradation." But it involves another element, namely the notion of

an alternative to the nature of work as we know it today. This refers

not merely to an alternative in the past but more significantly to an

alternative for the future. To critique, then, is to seek out the

unrealized potential in the present and to point to the gap between

what is and what could be. Critique declares that what exists is not

natural, inevitable or necessary but the product of very definite

conditions which are not themselves immutable. Thus, Braverman attrib-

utes the degradation of work and the commodifi cation of life in general

to the domination of capital. It is not only that work under monopoly

capitalism becomes fractionalized into meaningless tasks but market

forces invade all arenas of life turning relations among people into

relations among things. Even the family is "stripped for action in

order to survive in the market society."

In the remainder of this talk I shall argue that this critical

component in Braverman's analysis, while offering an appealing and

plausible description of monopoly capitalism, only expresses rather

than reveals the forces at work in an advanced capitalist society.

First, his critique tends to interfere with the understanding of

control characteristic of the capitalist labor process. Second, it

allows him to leave out of his analysis the political and ideological

aspects of work. Third, the form of critique allows him to ignore



j Symposium on Braverman

different forms of struggles as forces shaping the labor process.

Fourth, his conception of the capitalist totality prevents him from

understanding how it reproduces itself. Fifth, his point of critique

leads him to portray socialism as a reversion to the past. Sixth,

and finally, Braverman misses the specificity of the conditions of

which Labor and Monopoly Capital is a product, namely the specificity

of monopoly capitalism in the United States. In all these respects, I

shall argue, Braverman 's analysis is limited by his critique but let

me stress it is not critique per se but the particular critique which

Braverman adopts that poses as an obstacle to the understanding of

monopoly capitalism.

1 . Capital ist Control

To engage in critique is to evaluate and this involves the adop-

tion of a standpoint, that is a point of critique. There was a time

when Marxists were unanimous in taking the standpoint of the proletar-

iat. The position and interests of the proletariat provided a unique

basis for understanding the capitalist totality. This optimism has

lapsed as the working class of the advanced capitalist society has

appeared to lose the revolutionary potential it may have had and as

it has become involved in various forms of reactionary politics.

Critical theory has been left equivocating over its standpoint. In

contrast to this studied skepticism Braverman makes his point of

critique unambiguously clear. It is the craft worker. Moreover, it

is not the craft worker dislocated from any historical context but

the craft worker of early capitalism that Braverman takes as a point

of departure. With the rise of monopoly capitalism skill is expropri-

ated from the craft worker and placed in the hands of the agents of

capital. Mental and manual labor are systematically divided or more

precisely, as Braverman puts it, there is a systematic separation of



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conception and execution. Braverman constitutes this development as

the organizing principle of the labor process and social structure of

monopoly capitalism. The separation of conception and execution is

identified as the control peculiar to the capitalist labor process in

general.

However, one cannot get at what is fundamental to the capitalist

labor process or capitalist control by looking at variations within

capitalism as Braverman does. What is fundamental to capitalist control

is what all forms of capitalist control share and this can only be

understood by contrast to forms of control under non-capitalist modes

of production. There are a number of possibilities. One could

examine the labor process under some pre-capitalist mode of production

or pre-capitalist modes of production in general or one could draw

upon notions of "control" or absence of control under socialism.

Unfortunately, but not surprisingly, our notions of socialism tend to

be vague and too restricted by what we don't like about capitalism to

be of much use as an analytical tool. Rather 1 prefer to turn to the

feudal mode of production and to begin from a conventional understanding

of its labor process. While there is no time to enter into details

here, by adopting feudalism as a point of departure the significant

feature of capitalist control becomes the simultaneous obscuring and

securing of surplus. Whereas under feudalism surplus is pumped out

of the direct producers through rent, is transparent and therefore has

to be legitimated, under capitalism the existence of that surplus is

obscured and this poses the problem of ensuring its existence.

Only when one has posed the question of capitalist control in

such a general way can one return to the issue of the relationship of

the separation of conception and execution to the capitalist labor

process. We can ask, for example, about the limits on the separation

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y Symposium on Braverman

of conception and execution. Thus, one might argue that if this separ-

ation is pushed too far then the securing of surplus becomes problemat-

ical, whereas if it is not pushed far enough the obscuring of surplus

becomes problematical. In addition, the precise limits on the separ-

ation of conception and execution will themselves depend on certain

historical conditions, revolving around the level of political and

ideological as well as economic struggles.

My first point, then, is that in taking the particular standpoint

of the craft worker, Braverman mistakes what is but a particular

expression of the capitalist labor process for its essence.

2. The Political and Ideological Aspects of the Labor Process

In his concern for critique Braverman quite deliberately restricts

his analysis to the objective aspects of the labor process. The

elimination of subjectivity is part and parcel of his critical analysis.

Under capitalism we lose control over the labor process, indeed over

our lives in general and history is made behind our backs according to

the imperatives of capital accumulation. But Braverman not only

speaks of control in this negative sense. He also speaks of it in

the positive sense of extracting surplus labor time, compelling or

persuading people to work hard enough to produce not merely the equiv-

alent of their wage but in addition a surplus which can then be realized

by the capitalist as profit. Such control, however, presupposes the

existence of a minimal consent to capitalist relations and this can be

only understood through the study of the "subjective" components of

the labor process, or what I shall call its ideological and political

aspects. In other words, the very objective Braverman sets for himself-

to explain the generation of surplus under capitalism - is incompatible

with a critique that restricts the analysis of work to its "objective"

component.



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What, then, are the political and ideological dimensions of the

labor process? Again I cannot enter into details now, suffice to say

that the political dimension refers to maintenance or reproduction of

what I call the relations in production, that is the immediate produc-

tion relations or the relations at the point of production among

workers, supervisors, etc. on the shop floor. The ideological dimen-

sion refers to the production of experience, in particular the exper-

ience of the relations in production, how workers experience their

position in the productive process and how their interests emerge out

of the organization of work. In other words, the study of the

political and ideological aspects of the labor process allows us to

understand how surplus is produced through the organization of

struggles and consent at the point of production.

It is precisely in this area that industrial sociology sheds light

on the labor process and the experience it produces. Yet, Braverman

dismisses this excellent body of literature because it concerns itself

with subjective responses to work, with modes of adaptation to the

objectifying features of industrial labor. He rejects industrial

sociology, therefore, because it illuminates the very processes which

are crucial to the understanding of capitalist control. For it is in

the attempt to cope with, to compensate for the inherent deprivation

in capitalist work that laborers generate a world of their own which

shapes the ideological effects of work, which explains how workers sub-

mit to or resist the separation of conception and execution on the one

hand and consent to the production of surplus on the other. To

dismiss industrial sociology, as Braverman does in the name of his

critique, is to miss the fact that it not only conceals but also

expresses an underlying reality. It is for Marxists to appropriate

the "rational kernel" of sociology by placing it in a Marxist framework.

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Symposium on Braverman

3. Struggles and Competition

It is not only that Braverman gives short shrift to day to day

adaptation but he also allows little room for the types of struggle

which shape the movement of capital. Instead capital flows from one

arena to the next with its own inexorable logic and similarly the

separation of conception and execution invades all aspects of social

life. Resistance is reduced to a mere friction - a derivative and

ineffectual response which does not affect the direction or pace of

change. Insofar as Braverman does point to a motor of this movement,

it is the unilateral power of the capitalist class. This would appear

to rest on three assumptions. First, it presumes that the capitalist

class identifies its interests as lying in the separation of conception

and execution. Second, it presumes that the capitalist class or its

agents have the power to implement those interests, that is they have

the power to enforce the separation of conception and execution against

resistance from other classes. Third, it presumes that the separation

of conception and execution as a mode of "control" is actually in the

interest of all or at least some of the fractions of the capitalist

class. I find all three assumptions to be problematical. Historically,

there have been occasions when capitalists have not identified their

interests as lying in the separation of conception and execution;

they have not always had the power to expropriate skill and there have

been times when such expropriation was at odds with their interests,

when it created more trouble than it was worth.

An alternative approach would be to look upon changes in the labor

process as the outcomes of struggles between capital and labor on the

one hand and competition among capitalists on the other. It is the

particular constellation of struggle and competition that shapes

managerial strategies and leads to the introduction of new forms of



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control in the labor process. It is only in this way that we can

begin to explain why Taylorism or mechanization are introduced in

different places at different times. Moreover, such changes have had

the effect of reorganizing struggle and competition and hence to

further changes in the labor process. At the same time one should

not make the mistake of regarding the managerial class or managerial

group within a single firm as a monolithic entity. It is itself

composed of different levels (shop floor, middle and top management)

as well as different fractions (departments) which compete with each

other with immediate effects on the organization of work.

In avoiding the study of changing patterns of competition and

struggle Braverman has difficulty in developing an adequate notion of

the periodization of the capitalist labor process. What he offers is

the coincidence of the emergence of monopoly capitalism, Taylorism and

the scientific-technical revolution. However, it is by no means clear

that they all occurred at once. Rather it has to be posed as a question

for historical research as to when Taylorism and mechanization appeared

and where and how their timing related to the rise of the large

corporation. To do this it is also necessary to have an adequate

picture of the labor process prior to the rise of the large corporation,

that is the labor process under competitive capitalism. At best

Braverman presents a false comparison between monopoly capitalism as

characterized by the systematic separation of conception and execution

and competitive capitalism as the lost paradise of craft autonomy.

Obviously neither picture is adequate even as an approximation.

The transition from competitive to monopoly capitalism refers to

the emergence of the "monopoly" sector of the large corporations. What

was the nature of the labor process during this transitional phase and

to what extent was the labor process itself responsible for the

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Symposium on Braverman

capital and so on, that Offe, Habermas, O'Connor, Man del , Castells and

others find the sources of various crises. While this is no place to

enter into a discussion of their studies, it is important to note that

it is in the analysis of the conditions of. existence of capitalism, how

it persists, how it is at all possible that Braverman offers nothing

and thereby gives the impression of the permanence of capitalism.

The alternative to Braverman's expressive totality is to examine

how the different parts of a social formation are functionally inter-

related to ensure its continuity over time. Moreover, in pursuing

such a "reproduction" analysis one can also explore the reproduction of

contradictions that are inherent in the social formation. One is led

to view parts not merely as expressions of a single dominant principle

but, in addition, as possessing a certain coherence and logic of their

own. However, just as Braverman's critique, as reflected in the

expressive totality, is by itself inadequate so the reproduction

analysis of the structured totality is equally unsatisfactory in that

it disguises itself in some neutral garb without posing the problem

and potential of socialism.

5. Socialism

So what shall we mean by socialism? Braverman's notion of

socialism stems from his point of critique and therefore involves the

reunification of conception and execution. Although he vehemently

denies it, his critique taken as it is from within capitalism leads

in the direction of the resurrection of his lost paradise of the craft

worker. Perhaps it might have been more useful if Braverman had

distinguished between the reunification of conception and execution

at the individual level - job control - and at the collective level.

The latter notion is more compatible with the idea of society in which

history is made consciously through a genuine collective organization

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of production, distribution and consumption.

Braver-man's somewhat limited vision of socialism is linked to his

notion of technology as neutral. It is in connection with the role

of forces of production in the development of capitalism and the

transition to socialism that Braverman rejects critical theory at its

most powerful and embraces orthodoxy at its weakest. Although there

are places which suggest the opposite, he tends to argue that there

is nothing inherent in capitalist technology and machines which prevents

the realization of socialism. To the contrary, with a few exceptions

such as the assembly line, advanced capitalist machines can be harnessed

to relations of production under socialism. Capitalist relations of

production make themselves in the factory not through the imperatives

of machine technology but through the organization of relations around

machines. This view is at odds with a stream of thought associated with

critical theory, that capitalist machines themselves embody capitalist

relations of production; they themselves carry with them technical

imperatives incompatible with the notion of emancipatory work. Thus,

for Marcuse socialism must inaugurate its own technology and machinery

and not import that which is most advanced under capitalism.

Having said that, then we can no longer assert that the major

contradiction and developmental tendency of capitalism rests in the

expansion of the forces of production. To the contrary under such view

the forces of production rather than undermining the relations of

production, reinforce those relations. In Marxist literature this is

now a common place observation.

6. The Specificity of Capitalism in the United States

Labor and Monopoly Capital is a product of a particular time and

place. It reflects the very real power of capital in the United States

during the third quarter of the twentieth century. But this domination

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Symposium on Braverman

of capital is not something to be taken as given but, as I have already

suggested, its presuppositions should themselves become the object of

study. Indeed, the more powerful that domination appears to be, the

more important it is to unmask it, to reveal its premises and to place

it in its political and economic context. In other words we must

examine the specificity of capitalism in the United States - its

origins, development and reproduction - rather than projecting its

attributes as the attributes of the capitalist mode of production in

general. There are a number of conventional explanations for the

distinctive strength of capital in the United States. The supposed

absence of a feudal mode of production also meant the absence of what

Gramsci referred to as viscous sedimentations that might resist

capitalist hegemony. The corporate liberal thesis argues for the

existence of an enlightened bourgeoisie, constituted during the

Progressive Era, which cemented the dominant classes and organized

the incorporation of the working classes. Other theories focus on the

open frontier or the successive waves of immigrants that divided the

working class into antagonistic ethnic and racial segments thus

facilitating the domination of capital.

Here I want to suggest an alternative approach which might be of

more use in understanding the specificity of the labor process in the

United States. The critical factor, I would suggest, in shaping the

development of the labor process in different capitalist social form-

ations is the relative timing of unionization and mechanization. In

contrast to the United States, where mechanization preceded large

scale unionization, in Britain mechanization could only proceed in

the face of powerful resistance presented by an already organized

working class. Indeed, to this day workers on the shop floor are more

militant and exercise a greater control over the labor process than

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their counterparts in the United States who never built a strong trade

union movement to resist mechanization. In exploring the relative

timing of unionization and mechanization one is examining the specific

constellation of competition and struggle as it shapes the development

of the labor process. In this way one can begin to explain variations

in the labor process over time both within and between different

countries. Rather than attributing variations to positions on a

continuum of becoming or to some spiritual lag we explore the very

real political and economic forces that determine variations in the

labor process and in this way gain a sense of the limits of the possible

and the conditions for the transcendence of capitalism.

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