Labour Power and International Competitiveness: A Critique of Ruling Orthodoxies

Abstract

From the standpoint of the Left it is quite clear that the policy consequences of the dominant neo-liberal orthodoxy are unacceptably severe. The creation of 'flexible labour markets' by parties of the Right have significantly reduced the rights and rewards of labour through the introduction of low wages, short contracts, unregulated working conditions and intensified managerial control of the work process. In Western Europe at least, such policies are now commonplace, and are legitimated (as a necessary response to globalisation) in the conventional language of neo-classical economics: which is why an effective rebuttal of neo-liberalism is currently so essential an element in the formulation of a coherent left-wing response to new global pressures. The widespread temptation on the Centre-Left, however, has been to make that rebuttal by canvassing varying versions of the consensual corporatist alternative: offering either modest industrial 'partnerships' or even full-blown 'class compacts' as a more civilised and effective route to the international competitiveness prioritised by neo-liberalism. The purpose of this paper is to argue that such a response is inadequate to the task, by indicating the weaknesses of both neo-liberal and centre-left understandings of how - in contemporary capitalism - labour power and international competitiveness interact.