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Social Citizenship and the Transformations of Wage

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Social Citizenship and the Transformations of Wage SOCIAL CITIZENSHIP AND THE TRANSFORMATIONS OF WAGE LABOUR IN THE MAKING OF POST-APARTHEID SOUTH AFRICA, 1994-2001 Franco Barchiesi A dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, in fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Johannesburg, 2005 I declare that this dissertation is my own unaided work. It is submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. It has not been submitted before for any other degree or examination in any other university. ______________________ (Name of candidate) _______ day of _______________________, 2005. 1 To my father, Ugo, my mother, Cesira, and my sister, Beatrice. And to Miranda: here it is, at last. 2 “The spectacle corresponds to the historical moment at which the commodity completes its colonization of social life. It is not just that the relationship to commodities is now plain to see. Commodities are now all that there is too see; the world we see is the world of the commodity.” (Guy Debord, The Society of the Spectacle, New York: Zone Books, 1995, p.29) “I decided that salaries should be determined by a factor that averaged the arduousness, tediousness, futility and imbecility of a job. The richest people in the world then would be coal miners. Injection-moulding machine operators or tenders would fly to work in their own planes, and competition for such work would be stiff. Having had the experience, I would be quite content to be poor.” (Luc Santé, “Plastics”, Granta, No. 89, 2005: 164) “I’ve worked myself up from nothing to a situation of extreme poverty.” (Groucho Marx) 3 Table of Contents Acknowledgements vi Preface xi 1.Research Topic and Questions xi 2.Intellectual Origins and Rationale of the Dissertation xiii 3. Methodology and Research Strategy xxi 4. Outline of Chapters xxx Chapter 1 - Debating the Work-Citizenship Nexus: Wage Labour Discipline and Contested Signification 1 1.1 Introduction 1 1.2 Wage Labour, the State and the Rise of the “Social Question” in Western Industrial Capitalism 2 1.3 Radical Critiques to Social Citizenship as a Governmental Practice 14 1.4 Work and Welfare under Neoliberal Globalisation 21 1.5 Work and Social Citizenship in Colonial and Postcolonial Modernity 34 1.6 Conclusion 51 Chapter 2 - Work and Social Citizenship in South Africa: From the Racial State to National Liberation 53 2.1 Introduction 53 2.2 “Schooling Bodies to Hard Work”: Commodification, Work Ethic and Wage Labour Discipline in the Formation of a Racialised Welfare System 55 2.3 Apartheid Social Engineering and the Coercive Enforcement of Wage Labour Discipline 67 2.4 The Black Labour Movement and the Re-emergence of Social Citizenship Discourse 77 2.5 Conclusion 88 Chapter 3 - Wage Labour, Social Vulnerability and Commodification in the Post-Apartheid Transition 91 3.1 Introduction 91 3.2 Wage Labour and Social Citizenship in the Policy Context of the Democratic Transition 93 3.3 Labour Market Changes and the Rise of the Working Poor 104 3.4 Commodification and the Widening Wage-Income Gap 116 3.4.1 Non-Contributory Grants: A Strained Social Safety Net 119 3.4.2 Contributory Provisions: Unemployment Insurance, Retirement Benefits and the Reproduction of Exclusion 121 3.4.3 Healthcare Policy: Universalising Private Access? 126 3.4.4 Housing Policy: Public Expenditure as an Incentive to Commodification 130 3.5 Conclusion: Decoupling Wage and Income in the Transitional Social Citizenship Arrangement 138 Chapter 4 - Case Studies of a Changing World of Work. I: Industrial Crises and Wage Labour Decline in the East Rand 142 4.1 Introduction 142 4.2 Manufacturing Decline and the Changing Geography of Production on the East Rand 144 4.3 Labour Politics from Apartheid to the Transition: Community and the Urban Space as Terrains of Citizenship 151 4.4 Industrial Change and the Crisis of Wage Labour: Sectors and Company Cases 162 4.4.1 Trends in Employment Decline, Casualisation and Deunionisation 162 4.4.2 Presentation of Individual Company Cases 170 4.5 Conclusion 190 Chapter 5 - Case Studies of a Changing World of Work. II: Johannesburg Municipal Workers and the Corporatisation of Service Delivery 194 5.1 Introduction 194 5.2 “iGoli 2002”, Market Regulation and the Transition to the Contracting State in Municipal Services 195 5.3 The Reorganisation of Waste and Roads Services under iGoli 2002 204 5.4 iGoli 2002, Wage Labour Changes and the Reassertion of Managerial Control 209 5.5 Trade Unions’ Responses to iGoli 2002: The Case of SAMWU 220 5.6 Conclusion 227 ii Chapter 6 - When the Workplace Disappears. The Unfulfilled Promise of Wage Labour in Changing Experiences of Life at Work 230 6.1 Introduction 230 6.2 The Weight of the Past: The Unfulfilled Promise of Workplace Change 232 6.2.1 Fear and Loathing on the East Rand: The Betrayal of Shopfloor Transformation 232 6.2.2 New Canaan, New Egypt: Constructing Memories at Johannesburg Municipality 245 6.3 Casualisation, Workplace Insecurity and the Crisis of Work-based Identities as Vehicles of Social Emancipation 251 6.4 Beyond the Factory: Individualisation and Entrepreneurialism as Responses to the Crisis of Wage Labour 266 6.5 Conclusion 273 Chapter 7 - Workers’ Experiences of Commodification and Contested Social Citizenship Discourses 275 7.1 Introduction 275 7.2 Commodification and the Reconfiguration of Working Class Lives 277 7.2.1 Access to Company-Subsidised Healthcare 278 7.2.2 Housing Financing and Loans 286 7.2.3 Retirement Benefits 291 7.2.4 Municipal Services and Utilities 297 7.3 Impacts of Commodification on Living Standards and Community Life 299 7.4 Workers’ Agency and Social Citizenship Discourse in the Crisis of Wage Labour 310 7.5 Conclusion 325 Chapter 8 - Wage Labour Discipline in South Africa’s Social Citizenship Discourse: From “Developmental Social Welfare” to “Comprehensive Social Security” 328 8.1 Introduction 328 8.2 “Laudable Citizens” and “Silly Fools”: Developmental Social Welfare Policy as a Work-Commodification Nexus 331 iii 8.3 Comprehensive Social Security, Decommodification and the Crisis of Waged Employment 348 8.4 “The Wage-Income Relationship is Breaking Down”: The Taylor Committee’s Problematization of the Work-Citizenship Nexus 361 8.5 Conclusion 377 Conclusion 381 List of Interviews 388 References 393 List of Tables Table 3.1. Job Losses in Manufacturing, 1996-2000 106 Table 3.2 Forms of Employment by Race, 1999 106 Table 3.3 Minimum Wages for Selected Sectors, 1998-1999 107 Table 3.4. Access to Enterprise Benefits for Regular and Temporary Workers, 1996 114 Table 3.5. Percentage of Income Required to Provide Retirement Benefits at 60/65 Years of Age Euivalent to a SOAP of R410/month, 1995 125 Table 4.1 Total Housing Subsidies Approved, Gauteng and East Rand, 1995-2001 159 Table 4.2 Poverty Levels on the East Rand, 1995 160 Table 4.3 Unemployment Levels in Selected East Rand Townships, by Ward, 1996-2001 161 Table 4.4 CEPPWAWU Membership, February 1999, Disaggregated by Region and Sector 166 Table 5.1 Employment and Workloads in Waste Management, 1998 211 Table 5.2 Dependants for Members of Main GJMC Medical Schemes, 1997 218 Table 5.3 SAMWU Membership, 1987-2003, and Members in Transvaal/Gauteng Region 222 Table 6.1 Seniority and Job Changes by Sectors (Workplaces Investigated) 246 Table 7.1 Remittances and Family Support Networks of Employed Workers 271 Table 7.2 Impact of Social Provisions Expenditures on Wages 280 Table 7.3 Types of Housing and Housing Expenditures 286 iv List of Figures Figure 4.1 Sectoral Contribution to East Rand’s GGP, 1999 147 Figure 4.2 Employment by Sector in East Rand Towns, 1999 148 Figure 4.3 Manufacturing Employment in the East Rand, 1988-1999 149 Figure 4.4 Contribution of Manufacturing to GGP, East Rand 1991-1999 150 Figure 4.5 Average Number of Employees per Establishment, East Rand 1988-1996 151 v Acknowledgements The work for this dissertation has developed over almost six years, a taxing period when the necessary commitment has not always accompanied my efforts. Therefore, support, encouragement and stimulation from my family and many friends and colleagues have been of decisive importance, especially when my resolve was fledgling. Living in Johannesburg from 1994 to 2002 I have had the fortune and the privilege to directly experience the South African transition while working in the country’s most exciting intellectual location, the University of the Witwatersrand. My years of teaching and research at Wits have taken place in a scholarly engaging environment to which greatly contributed the often exceptional qualities of the people I have worked with. My first acknowledgement goes therefore to all my colleagues in the Department of Sociology and the Sociology of Work Unit (SWOP), which have invaluably contributed to making South Africa my home and to developing my interest in South African labour and the social dimensions of the transition. My dissertation supervisor, Eddie Webster, has constructively, patiently and comradely seen this work through. I am grateful for his advice and inspiration, and for a mutual respect that even in moments of frank debates and constructive disagreement has never been lacking. Many colleagues have shaped over the years my intellectual perspectives and interests, and I wish here to thank Glenn Adler, Shireen Ally, Andries Bezuidenhout, Belinda Bozzoli, Jackye Cock, Jon Hyslop, Sam Kariuki, Geoffrey Nkadimeng, Debbie Posel and Lucien van der Walt. My acknowledgements are extended to the administrative personnel of SWOP and the Sociology Department: Michelle Browne, Annele de Villiers, Magda Gale, Khayaat Fakier, Zodwa Mbembe, Beata Mtyingizana and Shameen Singh.
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