Thoughts on Argentina's Conjunctures :: Recuperating Work, Recovering Life (2005-2007)

Around the world on a tandem bike...uniting the universities of the south

2007-10-02T08:38:00.000-04:00

My friends, Andrés Ruggeri and Karina Luchetti, embarked on their one year, round-the-world tandem biking odyssey on Sunday, September 30, 2007. There's even a Toronto connection. The trailer you see in the picture was purchased at the worker-run coop, Urbane Cyclist, on John St. in Toronto and I shipped it to Andrés just in time for his trip thanks to the help of Sean Smith of the CAW. That Urbane is a worker coop is perhaps not as coincidental as it might seem. I told Andrés about the bike shop and he energetically poured over its online catalog looking for the trailer he eventually found.

Workers' cooperativism is close to Andrés's heart and the thought of getting the trailer from Urbane gave him joy. Andrés happens to also head the Argentine Worker-Recovered Documentation Centre out of the worker cooperative and worker-recovered Artes Gráficas Chilavert. He is an expert on Argentina's worker-recovered workers' cooperatives, co-authoring The [Worker-]Recovered Enterprises in Argentina with Hugo Trinchero and Carlos Martinez.

For more, see The World in Tandem, Andrés and Karina's 'official' trip website.

Interview with Eduardo Murúa, President of the National Movement of Recovered Enterprises of Argentina

2007-09-04T12:43:00.001-04:00

Conducted during his trip to Canada last year in June 2006 by Jennifer Moore
Translated by Marcelo Vieta

Eduardo Murúa, president of Argentina's MNER (National Movement of [Worker] Recovered Enterprises) has taken more of a back-seat role in the effort to organize Argentina's almost-200 worker-recovered enterprises as of late. Between 1997 and 2005, Murúa was very active in lobbying for a national law of expropriation for these workers' coops, assisting militant workers in the occupation of failed firms and restarting production under self-management, and for reforming Argentina's bankruptcy laws to better favour worker-recovered firms. As of late-2005, Murúa has, in a sense, gone underground, due to the fragmentation of the once-influential MNER due to internal differences between its most politically active protagonists as to what political tactics the movement should take, how the recovered enterprises should face their continued economic challenges within the still-powerful neoliberal system and in light of President Nestor Kirchner's centerist labour policies, and -- more concretely -- with the handling of the ongoing economic difficulties of one of the first worker-recovered enterprises, IMPA, early last year.

Despite the more subdued role that Murúa has chosen to take as of late, and some of the controversies that might surround his leadership (all currently open to debate in Argentina), there is no question that he has played a central part in articulating the path to self-management for Argentina's worker-recovered enterprises. For a good account of this, see, in particular, Magnani's blog and book by the same name, El cambio silencioso and my forthcoming writing on the plight of IMPA, MNER, and Murúa's recent attempts to salvage the economically-challenhttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifged and deeply fractured IMPA and his other initiatives.

The following interview was conducted in June 2006 while Murúa was in the Toronto, Canada and the Southern Ontario region for various public talks, meetings with local unions, and visits to local workers' coops (for some info on this visit, go here.) In the interview (see the end of this post) he expresses clearly and with passion his vision for a different Argentina, one where wealth might be distributed more equitably and where work doesn't necessarily, in contrast to Peron's much-quoted vision, equal dignity if one's work continues to be permeated by alienated and exploitative forms of labour. In this sense, Murúa moves beyond his militant Peronist roots and sounds more like a traditionalist Marxist, although in other comments he also come close to sounding like an autonomist (for similar sentiments expressed by Murúa in another place and also in English, see the recently published collection of interviews on Argentina's worker-recovered enterprises in the online journal Affinities, assembled by TSCI.

Download the PDF version of the June 2006 Eduardo Murúa interview here.

"Militancy in Images": A long lost documentary about the Cordobazo of May-June 1969, Argentina's May '68, is recovered and screened

2007-08-25T20:39:00.000-04:00

On Saturday the Latin American Museum of Art in Buenos Aires(MALBA) screened a long lost documentary looking at El Cordobazo of 1969, pieced together from footage taken at the time and edited in clandestinity. It was confiscated and "disappeared" by the military dictatorships of 1976-1983. On December 10, 1976, Enrique Juarez, the film's militant director, was also disappeared by the dictatorship. Juarez's feature on the major events of El Cordobazo, Ya es tiempo de violencia (Now Is the Time for Violence) (1969), and his short La desconocida (The Unknown One) (1962) were recently restored and remastered. A copy of Ya es tiempo de violencia, as it turned out, was found in the the Instituto Cubano del Arte e Industria Cinematográficos (Cuban Institute for Art and Cinema) in Havana, Cuba, Ana Bianco of Pagina/12 relates. Bianco further writes: "Fernando Krichmar, from Cine Insurgente (Isurgent Cinema), brought the found copy to Buenos Aires and APROCINAIN (Argentina Association for the Support of Audiovisual Patrimony) was able to create another negative for its preservation."

Juarez's film is part of a long tradition of underground and anonymous activist cinema in Argentina where the aim was to erase any sign of individual authorship (one could call it "imperceptible authorship"). Instead, creators would opt for processes of collective creation. Their reasoning was both political and practical - anonymous authorship was both an ethico-political positioning of the creator as well as being a matter of safety and protection in a society where the eyes of dictators, censors, and repressors were always close by. Such collectives in Argentina with roots in the alternative cinema movement of the 1960s and 1970s include Grupo Cine Liberación (the Liberation Film Group) and Grupo Cine de la Base (The Base Film Group). Contemporary examples of this collective and imperceptible authorship in Argentina, inspired by these older organizations, include groups such as Colectivo Situaciones, Lavaca, Grupo Alavio, and AgoraTV. As Lucio Mufud writes, the collective authorship movement of the 1960s and 1970s was, "among other things, about erasing any authorial mark. It concerned itself, on the one hand, with protecting the militant creators from state repression. But it was also about having their voice coincide with the 'voice of the people.'" (see Mufud 2007).

To read more on Juarez, his recently found film, and the Argentine film collectives, see: La militancia en imágenes

Las empresas recuperadas por sus trabajadores como cooperativas de trabajo

2007-08-24T08:27:00.001-04:00

Una breve mirada a las cinco características que distinguen el caso argentino

Ponencia de Marcelo Vieta, basado en un artículo escrito por Andrés Ruggeri y Marcelo Vieta para el PRIMER ENCUENTRO INTERNACIONAL DE DEBATE:
FACULTAD DE FILOSOFÍA Y LETRAS, UNIVERSIDAD DE BUENOS AIRES: “LA ECONOMÍA DE LOS TRABAJADORES: AUTOGESTIÓN Y DISTRIBUCIÓN DE LA RIQUEZA” (ver también: http://www.recuperadasdoc.com.ar/encuentro/index.htm)

19-21 julio 2007, Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, Universidad de Buenos Aires

Parte 1: Las cinco características de las ERT

Parte 2: Algunas influencias de las cinco características de las ERT en la organización del trabajo autogestivo
[A continuación | Forthcoming]

Music rally in support of the Hotel BAUEN workers' latest struggles with eviction

2007-08-21T19:10:00.000-04:00

The former owners of the Hotel BAUEN want it back. And this time they just might get it. The last owners of the emblematic, worker-recuperated hotel in the heart of downtown Buenos Aires recently took the case to court and a local judge decided in favour of the returning patrón who abandoned the hotel in 2001, ordering the eviction of all of the "occupying" workers by the middle of next month at the latest. This decision not only puts at risk the jobs of over 150 hotel workers -- jobs that have been recovered since 2003 (see links below for details) -- but also risks setting a new precedence for more than 180 other worker-recovered enterprises that currently exist across Argentina. In this current conjuncture, as the city of Buenos Aires waits for a new right wing mayor to take office in December and as national elections near, not only is Argentina's best known worker-run hotel at risk, but the very movement of worker-recovered enterprises that spans most of Argentina's economic sectors is once again under direct threat from still-powerful capitalist business interests.

Facing the possibility of imminent eviction, the Hotel BAUEN workers are taking their protest to the streets just outside of the hotel on Callao St. near Corrientes. And thousands of people from a vast swath of Argentina's social movements are joining the BAUEN workers as I write this. Workers from dozens of worker-recuperated enterprises from the city and province of Buenos Aires, social movement activists, and hundreds of other people in solidarity with the BAUEN workers have joined the hotel workers en masse and are swaying to the music of some of Argentina's most popular radical bands and musicians, such as Arbol and Leon Gieco. In between the acts, announcers are reading out the messages of support and solidarity from myriad social movements across Argentina, dozens of academics and political activists from across the world, and even from Lula's Worker's Party.

Activist reporter Marie Trigona's recent ZNet article sums up nicely the current struggles of the Hotel BAUEN workers.

Here are some more images I just took of the rally:

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A short history of the Hotel BAUEN's workers' struggles:

LA INSOLITA TRAMA DE NEGOCIOS QUE RODEA EL CONFLICTO POR EL HOTEL BAUEN: El padre, el hijo y un espíritu non sancto::Today's front page coverage of the current struggles of the Hotel BAUEN, in Pagina/12 (August 21, 2007).
Por la expropiación del BAUEN::Página/12 (August 10, 2007)
Hotel BAUEN: Un nuevo fallo en contra de la gestión de la cooperativa. Esta medida peligra la fuente de trabajo de más de 150 familias::Hotel BAUEN flyer (July 2007)
Autogestión: crisis dentro de la principal organización de compañas tomadas por los trabajadores::Luisina Casigliona, Diagonal (July 9, 2006)
More tribulations for Hotel BAUEN workers::"Wednesday December 6, 2005, the Buenos Aires city Legislature passed a law that will in effect evict the workers' cooperative at the Hotel Bauen. This law, voted for by 29 legislators, ‘invents’ a boss for a workplace without bosses."
World solidarity over the latest struggles of the Hotel BAUEN workers for legal recognition of their worker coop::Announcement for Hotel BAUEN workers march on city of Buenos Aires legislature (November 13, 2005).
Witnessing the Political on the Streets of Buenos Aires: Flaneuring from 9 de Julio to Plaza de Mayo::Marcelo Vieta (July 29, 2005)
The BAUEN hotel fights for Temporary Permit of Expropriation::Marcelo Vieta (July 21, 2005), with links to related Argentine newspaper articles from the time.
Wikipedia backgrounder on the Hotel BAUEN, with links to some good articles written over the last few years.

List of papers given at “LA ECONOMÍA DE LOS TRABAJADORES: AUTOGESTIÓN Y DISTRIBUCIÓN DE LA RIQUEZA" conference in Buenos Aires

2007-08-17T16:54:00.000-04:00

List of papers delivered at "LA ECONOMÍA DE LOS TRABAJADORES: AUTOGESTIÓN Y DISTRIBUCIÓN DE LA RIQUEZA"

Por la expropiación del Bauen

2007-08-10T13:31:00.000-04:00

Página/12: Por la expropiación del Bauen

Por Laura Vales

Quien visite el Hotel Bauen por estos días podrá ver, en el lobby de entrada, una muestra de retratos. Son fotografías que exhiben a los 154 trabajadores de la cooperativa que hace cuatro años recuperó el lugar, abandonado por sus antiguos dueños, y que ahora enfrentan una intimación de desalojo. Los trabajadores terminaron de colgar los retratos ayer, para que sirvieran de marco a la conferencia de prensa en que figuras de organismos de derechos humanos, organizaciones sociales, gremiales y políticas hicieron un llamado de alerta. En el encuentro con los medios, hubo duras críticas a la decisión judicial y se reclamó al Gobierno que “asuma la responsabilidad de dar una solución”. Traducido: que expropie el hotel mediante una ley del Congreso Nacional.

Hotel BAUEN: Un nuevo fallo en contra de la gestión de la cooperativa. Esta medida peligra la fuente de trabajo de más de 150 familias.

2007-08-06T12:03:00.000-04:00

1978: Para en Mundial de Fútbol se construyó el Hotel BAUEN S.A gracias a la estrecha vinculación de su titular Marcelo Ircuvich con miembros de la Dictadura Militar. Accedió a un crédito otorgado por el BANADE, actualmente en manos del Banco Nación. Iurcovich, titular de esta empresa nunca habilitó el hotel, jamás pago el préstamo al Estado, no pagó impuestos y se endeudó por millones de pesos. Bajo esta metodología Iurcovich acumuló grandes ganancias. En 1997 le vendió el Hotel al grupo económico Solari S.A. Su titular, Solari operó de idéntica manera a su predecesor, solo pagó la primer cuota... Gestionó el Hotel hasta diciembre del 2001 cuando se le decretó la quiebra dejando a 80 familias en la calle sin explicación alguna.

2003: Se crea la Cooperativa BAUEN. Los trabajadores lo encontraron absolutamente vaciado y destruido. Los últimos cuatro años tuvieron que reacondicionar todas las instalaciones y pusieron en marcha esta exitosa gestión. Generaron más de 150 puestos de trabajo cuando el país pasaba su peor crisis económica. En 4 años demostraron que la gestión sin patrón es absolutamente viable. Los resultados están a la vista. Tal vez sea este el motivo que más incomode a quienes piensan que una administració n seria y exitosa no puede ser propia de los trabajadores.

20 de julio de 2007: La jueza Paula Hualde dictaminó el desalojo del Hotel y otorga 30 días de plazo para que se retiren inmueble. Este fallo favorece a quienes vaciaron el Hotel, generaron pérdidas al Estado y echaron a los trabajadores y atenta contra uno de los derechos básicos de la constitución argentina: poder trabajar libremente.

Los trabajadores del BAUEN queremos que toda la sociedad se entere de este atropello contra nuestros intereses. Trabajar dignamente, seguir desarrollando nuestras capacidades y generar más puestos de trabajo. Apelaremos la medida de la jueza Hualde. No bajaremos los brazos.

Contamos con el apoyo solidario de organizaciones políticas, movimientos sociales, culturales y de la comunidad. Vamos a resistir esta medida y estamos organizando diversas actividades para que toda la sociedad nos pueda acompañar en esta lucha.

6 de Agosto: Movilización al Juzgado (Callao y Marcelo T. Alvear)
9 de Agosto : Conferencia de prensa en el Hotel.
24 de Agosto: Acto masivo con importantes bandas y personalidades destacadas.

prensatrabajadoresd elbauen@yahoo. com.ar Tel : 43719505
El BAUEN ES DE TODOS. NO AL DESALOJO!!

ACTIVIDADES EN APOYO DEL BAUEN

Viernes 27 y sábado 28 de julio: volanteada en el recital de Ataque 77 en Temperley
Viernes 3 de agosto - 18 hs: Recital de Poder Sikuri y La Covacha en Callao y Corrientes - Organiza la Asamblea de San Telmo.
Lunes 6 de agosto: Movilización y entrega de apelación al juzgado de Callao y M.T. de Alvear. Concentración a las 11 hs en la puerta del hotel. Actividades teatrales y murga. Los que no puedan concurrir a las 11hs pueden hacerlo al juzgado hasta las 13 hs.
Jueves 9 de agosto - 18 hs: Conferencia de prensa en el hotel con la participación de personalidades del ámbito político y social.
Jueves 16 de agosto, 19 hs: obra teatral "Maquinando", la historia de la Gráfica Patricios - Dir Norman Briski - Auditorio del Bauen
Viernes 24 de agosto - 17 hs: Acto masivo y recital en Callao y Corrientes, con la presencia de todas las organizaciones sociales que apoyan al Bauen.

MESAS DE DIFUSION

Mesa en estación Once:
Martes 31 de julio, 17 hs - Responsable Daniel
Miércoles 1 y viernes 3 de agosto, 17 hs - responsable Gabriel

Mesa en estación Constitución
Lunes 30 martes 31 de julio, miércoles 1 de agosto, 17 hs - responsable Alberto
Martes 7 y Miércoles 8, 17 hs - responsable luciano

Mesa en estación Retiro
Miércoles 1 de agosto, 17 hs - responsable Matías

Mesa en Florida y Av de Mayo
Lunes 30 de julio, 17 hs - responsable Juan Carlos y Susana
Martes 31 de julio, miércoles 1 de agosto, jueves 2, 14 hs -

Mesa en Corrientes y Callao
Lunes 30 de julio, 17 hs - responsable Marcos
Miércoles 1 de agosto, 17 hs - responsable Nadia

Mesa en Plaza Dorrego
Sábado 28 y domingo 29 de julio, todo el día - responsable asamblea de San Telmo
El jueves 2 de agosto, 18 hs en el hotel, evaluamos la marcha de las actividades

OTRAS ACTIVIDADES
Difusión: volanteada en la zona norte, hospitales , parque centenario, facultades

Solicitada: en periódicos Pág 12 y Clarín. Se solicita colaboración para financiarlas. Comunicarse con la oficina de prensa del bauen - 4373-9009 y 4371-9505 o cel 1157285920 (Fabio), 1557445208 (Federico), 1564677765 (Jaime)

Cada organización puede realizar actividades de difusión en su ámbito de acción. Pueden retirar volantes en la oficina de prensa o confeccionar e imprimir otros, con su firma.

Con nuestro agradecimiento por su solidaridad - trabajadores del bauen

Síntesis del Primer Encuentro internacional “La economía de los trabajadores”

2007-08-05T11:31:00.000-04:00

Facultad de Filosofía y Letras-Universidad de Buenos Aires
19,20 y 21 de julio de 2007

Organizado por el Programa de Extensión Universitaria Facultad Abierta (Facultad de Filosofía y Letras de la Universidad de Buenos Aires), se desarrolló en tres intensas jornadas el Primer Encuentro Internacional “La economía de los trabajadores: autogestión y distribución de la riqueza”.

Con más de trescientos participantes de Argentina, Cuba, México, Perú, Colombia, Chile, Brasil, Sudáfrica, Alemania, Croacia, Estados Unidos y Canadá, entre trabajadores, dirigentes y militantes de organizaciones sociales y políticas e investigadores y representantes del mundo académico, el Encuentro debatió en profundidad temas relacionados con el papel de los trabajadores en la gestión de la economía a partir de las experiencias de autogestión, como las empresas recuperadas argentinas, y de las luchas del movimiento obrero en el marco de los cambios en el mundo del trabajo en esta etapa del capitalismo neoliberal global.

En la apertura del encuentro, el jueves 19, hicieron uso de la palabra Andrés Ruggeri, director del Programa Facultad Abierta y responsable general de la organización del evento y Hugo Trinchero, Decano de la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, junto con representantes de las entidades co-organizadoras: Betsy Bowman (Centro para la Justicia Global, San Miguel de Allende, México), Gabriel Martínez (Federación de Trabajadores de la Energía de la República Argentina), Claudio Lozano (Instituto de Estudios y Formación de la Central de Trabajadores Argentinos), Marcelo Vieta (Centro de Estudios para América Latina y el Caribe, Universidad de York, Toronto, Canadá) y Graciela Monteagudo (Proyecto Argentina Autonomista).
Posteriormente, se desarrollaron paneles sobre los distintos ejes de trabajo de la convocatoria: 1) La economía capitalista hoy: etapa del capitalismo global desde los movimientos populares; 2) La economía autogestionaria: debate sobre las experiencias autogestionarias en la era del capitalismo global (empresas recuperadas, cooperativas rurales, emprendimientos autogestivos solidarios, movimientos cooperativos, redes de intercambio y comercio justo, etc.); 3) Los desafíos de los gobiernos populares en la gestión social de la economía y el Estado; 4) Balance crítico del movimiento cooperativo; y 5) Nuevos desafíos del movimiento sindical: sindicatos, agrupamientos de trabajadores, cogestión y participación en las decisiones.

La riqueza del debate se dio, entre otras cosas, por el hecho de compartir un espacio de discusión trabajadores e investigadores de varios países, intercambiando experiencias y reflexiones sobre los ejes de debate propuestos, con la intención de que generar insumos para la acción política y organizativa de los trabajadores, junto con el enriquecimiento de los análisis teóricos en torno a los problemas de la autogestión obrera y la lucha sindical. Entre los investigadores y académicos, participaron: Hugo Trinchero (antropólogo y Decano de la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, UBA); Betsy Bowman (Centro para la Justicia Global, EE.UU./México); Marco Gómez y Celia Pacheco (Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana, México); Karin Berlien Araos (Universidad de Chile); Patricia Díaz (CERLAC, Colombia/Canadá); Daniel Maidana (UNGS); Ruth Muñoz (Espacio de economía social, IEF-CTA); Pablo Rodríguez (departamento de Economía Social-CTA Capital); Andrés Ruggeri (Filosofía y Letras, UBA); Carlos Martínez (FFyL-UBA, UNC); Ana M. Fernández (Fac. Psicología, UBA), Graciela Monteagudo (UMASS, EE.UU./Proy. Argentina Autonomista); Sonia Alvarez (UMASS, EEUU); Enrique Zothner (FIUBA); Luis Guerra Chacón (Universidad de La Habana, Cuba); Héctor González (INTI); Bob Stone (Centro para la Justicia Global, EE.UU/México); Julio Gambina (Centro Cultural de la Cooperación); Marcelo Vieta (CERLAC, Canadá); Holm Detlev-Kohler (IIS, Universidad de Oviedo, España/Alemania); Ana Lúcia Marques Camargo (USP, Brasil); Mlodan Jakopovich (Croacia); Peter Ranis (CUNY, Estados Unidos); Flavio Chedid (Brasil, UFRJ); Neville Alexander (Universidad del Cabo, Sudáfrica); Caroline Baillie (Queens University, Canada); Eric Feinblatt (Fashion Institute Technology, NY, USA) y Hernán Harispe (Argentina/Francia), entre otros.

Entre los trabajadores y representantes de organizaciones sociales, expusieron: Carlos Chile (Movimiento Territorial de Liberación); Gustavo Giménez (Coordinador nacional Movimiento Sin Trabajo Teresa Vive; Silvia Díaz (Cooperativa La Cacerola); Cándido González (Cooperativa Chilavert); Fabio Resino (Cooperativa Bauen, FACTA); Derrick Naidoo (IIS, Sudáfrica); Mario Barrios (ANTA-CTA); Avelina Alonso y Ricardo Mascheroni (Área de recursos naturales de la CTA); Javier López (ANTA-CTA); Gabriel Martínez (FETERA-CTA); Sean Smith (Canadian autoworkers, Canadá), Sergio Escobar (cuerpo de delegados del Astillero río Santiago); Rhiannon Edwards (IWW, Canadá); Guillermo Pacagnini (CICOP, Prov. de Bs. As.); y trabajadores representantes de las cooperativas El Petróleo (Neuquén), El Diario de Villa María (Córdoba), Clínica Junín (Córdoba), Unión Saladeña (Corrientes), Cooperativa 16 de diciembre (Jujuy), UST (Buenos Aires), Cogtal, Grácfica Patricios, Gráficos Asociados y Artes Gráficas El Sol (Red Gráfica Cooperativa), Cooperativa 17 de febrero (Córdoba), Mesa de Empresas Recuperadas de Mendoza; y de los Astilleros Río Santiago, Tandanor y Navisupe, , entre otros participantes.

Se presentaron además cerca de 50 ponencias, muchas de las cuales se pueden consultar en el sitio web del Centro de Documentación de Empresas Recuperadas del Programa Facultad Abierta (www.recuperadasdoc.com.ar).

Retomando las cuestiones planteadas en el documento de convocatoria del Encuentro, los debates giraron alrededor de los límites y potencialidades de los procesos de autogestión en el marco de economías capitalistas y la posibilidad de reconstrucción de proyectos político-económicos que tomen en cuenta las experiencias autogestionarias. Otra discusión que atravesó varios de los paneles y exposiciones fue acerca de la caracterización de la llamada economía social, donde se pudieron advertir a grandes rasgos dos posiciones básicas. Una, rescatando el proyecto de la economía social como posibilidad de construcción de alternativa económicas http://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifrelacionadas con el l fenómeno caracterizado como de exclusión social; la otra, enmarcando estos fenómenos, sin desconocer sus características y potencialidades autogestionarias, como parte de una “economía para pobres” que encubre fenómenos de trabajo precario y subsunción a las nuevas formas de superexplotación que adquiere la economía global. Esta última postura se encadena también con la insistencia, especialmente por parte de representantes de organizaciones de trabajadores, de contextualizar estas experiencias como parte de la reconstrucción de una alternativa político-social de los trabajadores, lo cual, a la postre, quedó como un saldo importante de los debates realizados.

Es de destacar el alto nivel de participación en los espacios de discusión posteriores a las exposiciones de los panelistas, a pesar de que el nutrido programa, que superó las expectativas de los organizadores, obligó a trabajar con márgenes de tiempo muy acotados.

También se destacó el trabajo voluntario de los estudiantes colaboradores del Programa Facultad Abierta (muchos de los cuales también fueron expositores) y del arduo y excelente trabajo realizado por los intérpretes solidarios de Babels, que posibilitó la participación y el debate más allá de las barreras idiomáticas.
Por último, las distintas organizaciones participantes expresaron su voluntad de dar una continuidad en el futuro a este evento.

Programa Facultad Abierta
Secretaría de Extensión Universitaria
Facultad de Filosofía y Letras
Universidad de Buenos Aires

(Ver acá, también)

Página/12 sobre Zanón: "Para sacarles la fábrica a los obreros" | "In Order to Take Away the Factory from its Workers"

2007-08-01T12:11:00.000-04:00

Synopsis: SACMI, an Italian financial organization that lent money to FaSinPat's (ex-Zanón) former owner, has appealed to the Argentine legal system for a quicker "resolution" to the fate of the recovered factory rather than having to wait the three years of control the recovered-factory's workers were granted by the courts last October. At core, claims one of the workers interviewed by Pagina/12, SACMI's desire is to not only get its money back but to also give back the largest ceramics manufacturer in Argentina to its former owner. According to the article, SACMI is in cahoots with the former ownership, recently pardoning a loan of $13 million Argentine pesos it had granted to Luigi Zanon.

Ver artículo | Read article .

La Economía de los Trabajadores: Autogestión y Distribución de la Riqueza | The Workers' Economy: Self-Management and the Distribution of Wealth

2007-07-25T07:48:00.000-04:00

(Más fotos del Encuentro | More photos of Encuentro)

(See below for version in English)

19-21 de julio, 2007 | Universidad de Buenos Aires

Trabajadores autogestionados y asalariados, militantes sociales y sindicales, dirigentes políticos e investigadores se reunieron durante tres días en la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras de la Universidad de Buenos Aires. Fue en el marco del primer encuentro internacional “La economía de los trabajadores: autogestión y distribución de la riqueza” que terminó el sábado con un plenario de debate y conclusiones. Las actividades comenzaron el jueves con el objetivo de “poner en debate la superación de las experiencias particulares de autogestión y las discusiones que los trabajadores tienen alrededor de sus luchas políticas y gremiales por la distribución de la riqueza”.

Durante las tres jornadas se discutió, entre otros temas, en torno a las formas de trabajo no asalariadas e informales, a la situación y proyecciones de las experiencias autogestivas del trabajo tanto nacionales como internacionales - de las que hubo representantes de Sudáfrica, Canadá, EEUU, Croacia, Brasil, México, Chile y Cuba -, la relación con el movimiento cooperativo y los nuevos desafíos del movimiento obrero.
(Cortesía de ACTA)

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July 19-21, 2007 | University of Buenos Aires

Self-managed and salaried workers, social and union activists, political leaders, and researchers recently met over three days at the Faculty of Philosophy and Letters, University of Buenos Aires. The conference was conceptually framed within the themes of the "workers' economy," "self-management," and the "redistribution of social wealth" and ended this past Saturday with a plenary that debated the new challenges faced by workers' struggles around the world today. The conference began last Thursday with the objective of "debating how particular experiences of self-management and the discussions that workers are engaging in concerning their political and labour struggles can be extended to include the (re)distribution of the wealth" workers themeselves create.

During the three days, the debates pivoted around, amongst other related themes, informal and non-salaried work, the outlook for contemporary labour struggles, the similarities and differences between work and labour struggles in the North and South, and the situation and prospects for the experiences of self-management both in Argentina and around the world.

It was felt by the vast majority of participants that the conference proved to be an extremely fruitful space where unionized and self-managed workers, cooperativists, political activists, and researchers were able to share experiences and debate and discuss the past, present, and future of work, more egalitarian and democratic forms of reconstituting working life, and actual workable alternatives to the contemporary hegemonic neoliberalist model. The conference saw the participation of individuals and organizations from Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Cuba, the United States, Chile, Mexico, South Africa, Croatia, and Germany.

Some of the papers delivered can be accessed at http://www.recuperadasdoc.com.ar/encuentro/index.htm . The team from the Open Faculty Program, Faculty of Philosophy and Letters at the UBA will be making the conference proceedings and recordings of some of the debates available to the public in the coming months (I will be providing ahttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gif link to this archive, so check this blog in the next few months).

(Ver acá, también | Go here, as well)

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Links de web relacionados | Related links:

Mario Alberto Barrios of the UST workers' coop and ANTA in Argentina, comes to Canada

2007-04-23T10:06:00.000-04:00

In one of four morning workshops held during the Building Power conference at Ryerson University on April 14, 2007, Mario Alberto Barrios, General Secretary of the National Association of Self-Managed Workers (ANTA) of the Argentine Workers’ Central (CTA) inspired a lively discussion among those present concerning a new politics for labour in Canada. Mario got the workshop started with a challenging question to the 20 or so academics, activists, and union reps from CUPE, CAW, the Ontario Teachers’ Federation, Canadian Union of Postal Workers, and the Steelworkers present in the workshop: “How is another politics possible for organized labour?” This is, he told us, one of the most important questions for a new politics in Argentina and in the struggle for the transformation of workers’ lives.

Read my notes from the April 14, 2007 workshop.

Autogestión in Argentina: Self-Management, Recovering Work, Recovering Life

2007-04-16T07:31:00.000-04:00

Mario Alberto Barrios
General Secretary of the National Association of Self-Managed Workers of the Industrial Federation, Argentina Workers’ Central
Secretario General de la Asociación Nacional de Trabajadores Autogestionado (ANTA), Federación Industrial, Central de Trabajadores Argentina (CTA)

Moderator and discussant: Marcelo Vieta
PhD Student in Social and Political Thought, York University

Tuesday, April 17
5.00-6.30
Room 7-162, OISE/UT
252 Bloor St West

In Spanish, “autogestión” means to self-manage work cooperatively. More specifically, it is to “self-constitute” social and productive lives while minimizing the intrusive mediation of traditional bureaucracies, hierarchical organization, or the state. In Argentina, especially since the socio-economic crisis of 2001 and 2002, countless grassroots groups—the piqueteros, worker-recovered factories, microenterprises, human rights groups, environmental and rural groups—have been experimenting with and concretely practicing forms of autogestión that both contest the neoliberal enclosures of life and, at the same time, move beyond them.

Since December 2005, the Argentina Workers’ Central (CTA) has embarked on a project of organizing Argentine workers involved in self-managing their workspaces and jobs under the auspices of the National Association of Self-Managed Workers (ANTA). This was a response to the reality of the state and traditional unions turning their backs on the plight of the cooperatively employed, underemployed, and the unemployed. Initially made up of 83 organizations and over 800 members, ANTA lobbies for and assists self-managed workers in their struggle to secure pensions, fight for just work conditions, and access favourable loans, all the while attempting to give political voice to the voiceless via collective organizing.

In this presentation, Mario Alberto Barrios will discuss his work in the struggle for the rights of self-managed workers in Argentina. Involved in labour education and union leadership since 1986, Mario has been ANTA’s general secretary since its first days in late-2005. With Mario we ask three fundamental questions: How viable is self-management (autogestión) today? Can self-managed work relations lead to a better way of life? Can self-management work in Canada?

Seminar organized by Diálogo Argentina-Canada, CERLAC (York University), Transformative Learning Centre and Social Economy Centre (OISE/UT)

The travel of Mario Barrios is sponsored by CAW Sam Gindin Chair in Social Justice and Democracy, Ryerson University

Autogestión: Self-Management in Argentina

2007-04-16T07:26:00.001-04:00

A conversation with Mario Alberto Barrios, General Secretary of the National Association of Self-Managed Workers of the Industrial Federation, Argentina Workers' Central.

Monday, April 16, 7-9 pm
Tequila Bookworm
512 Queen St. West, Toronto

In Argentina, especially since the socio-economic crisis of 2001-02, an array of grassroots groups has been carrying out experiments in autogestión, or self-management. To self-manage is not only to organize and produce cooperatively. It is also to transform traditional economic relations into 'social economies' that foster more equitable, humane, and horizontal relations among individuals and groups. Toronto School of Creativity & Inquiry invites you to join us for a conversation about self-management with Mario Alberto Barrios, who is active in struggles for the rights of self-managed workers in Argentina. This conversation is a continuation of TSCI's Laboratory Latin America series, a series built on the exchange of collective experiments in the production of new forms of working, living, and creating.

The Worker-Recovered Enterprises Movement in Argentina:...

2007-03-23T12:16:00.000-04:00

... Workers’ Self-Management and Hope within Social-Economic Crisis

The text and accompanying PowerPoint slides for my
March 20, 2006 CERLAC Brown Bag presentation.

This presentation covers the latest key themes in my ongoing in situ PhD research looking into the worker-recovered enterprises (empresas recuperadas por sus trabajadores, or ERT) in the city of Buenos Aires, Argentina.

CERLAC Presentation text.
PowerPoint presentation. (Note: Numbers in Word doc above correspond to slide numbers in PowerPoint presentation doc.)

RedPepper magazine articles on Venezuela

2007-03-17T17:29:00.000-04:00

Red Pepper | On the Venezuelan Bolivarian Revolution

Agora TV - Online films on Argentina's experiments with social resistance

2007-03-17T16:45:00.000-04:00

AgoraTV

THE WORKERS’ ECONOMY: SELF-MANAGEMENT AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH

2007-03-16T17:09:00.000-04:00

Invitation to participate in…

“THE WORKERS’ ECONOMY:
SELF-MANAGEMENT AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH”

FIRST INTERNATIONAL GATHERING TO DEBATE AND DISCUSS SELF-MANAGEMENT (AUTOGESTIÓN)

Faculty of Philosophy and Letters, University of Buenos Aires

Dates:
July 19-21, 2007

Location:
University of Buenos Aires
217 – 25 de Mayo Avenue
Autonomous City of Buenos Aires, Argentina

CALL FOR PAPERS AND PROPOSALS FOR: COMPLETED OR ONGOING PROJECT PRESENTATIONS, PAPERS, ROUNDTABLE THEMES, DEBATE AND DISCUSSION THEMES

Please send a 250-word (max) abstract by July 1, 2007, or any other correspondence to:
Correspondence in Spanish: fabierta@filo.uba.ar
Correspondence in English: UBA.selfmanagement@gmail.com

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The current debates surrounding self-management: A brief overview

Workers’ struggles have reemerged with force in the last decade in numerous forms—union-based struggles, self-managed workspaces, rural movements, unemployed workers’ movements…. These are responses to the hegemony of neoliberal globalization imposing itself throughout the world with absolutist pretensions after the debacle of so-called “real socialism.”

At the same time, the old methods and strategies of struggle—class-based parties and traditional unions, amongst others—have by now shown themselves to be, at minimum, insufficient. Old debates and ideological frameworks are now in crisis. The dominant discourses used to describe the functioning of the capitalist world system can no longer explain quickly enough (never mind predict) the changes in this system that have been occurring over the past few decades, while popular struggles have had to create new paths without having a clear horizon in sight from which to map out a final destiny. And the plethora of means ever available for capitalism to respond to threats against it, as well as the sheer force and relentlessness of its repressive power, amply overcomes the popular sectors’ capacity for change…with tragic consequences.

While the taking of State power has been the driving objective of political forces for more than a century now, more recently there have appeared compelling movements that, on occasion, have questioned such objectives for revolutionary action. At minimum, these movements distance their strategies and tactics from the aims of taking State power, recognizing the difficulties of such a task. But, as evidenced in various Latin American contexts, some popular movements with solid historical roots have ended up allying themselves with national governments swept into power via electoral triumph. And so, when they least expected it, these movements found themselves at times controlling key sectors of the State’s administrative apparatus which, in turn, needed to be profoundly transformed in order to be oriented towards grassroots-based policies.

Of particular importance for many of these grassroots groups are those policies that relate to managing production and the (re)distribution of wealth.

Wavering between these situations and theoretic-ideological debates, workers have been generating—through their actual practices—an alternative course for steering life between inaction and resignation on the one side and the fight for total political power on the other. Subjected to the permanent crisis provoked by neoliberal capitalism, a growing number of workers are playing an increasingly key role in the re-creation and self-management of greater portions of the means of production and the economy as an immediate outcome of their struggles and resistances. And this despite being in the middle of a capitalist ocean. In some countries, workers’ take-over of government and their increased control of the state apparatus (i.e., Venezuela, Bolivia) have, sooner rather than later, positioned grassroots workers’ organizations and their methods of self-management as legitimate vehicles for administrating the economy and as decisively important forces for controlling the strategic economic means of society.

Recovered factories, diverse kinds of self-managed microenterprises, rural cooperative settlements, new types of unionized workers’ movements, networks of fair trade and fair work, and numerous other kinds of organizations and forms of struggle are part of this new landscape. Sometimes they take on autonomous forms. In certain situations they are fragmented. In other situations they form part of powerful and popular political movements, larger social movements, political parties, leftist fronts and coalitions, and even programs that are at times stimulated by the State or, more directly, by a government’s actual public polices.

Regardless of the size and shape of these worker-contoured social-political landmarks, this new alternative landscape puts back on the table the question of the legitimate role of workers in the management of a society’s economy. The working class still does, after all, make up the majority of the world’s population. And workers still depend on their own labour for their sustenance, be they engaged in wage-labour, partaking of the cooperative management of their collective labour, or living in more dire circumstances such as the structurally unemployed, the overexploited, the marginalized, and the poor.

A debate and discussion around these issues, therefore, is needed now more than ever: While the processes and consequences of globalization have been deeply and consistently questioned by numerous social and international movements, the project of actually creating an alternative that can supercede the merely declarative, or intellectual-theoretic reflection, has not advanced much, at least in a form that consistently takes into account both the theoretical and the practical aspects of self-management. (This is not to ignore or lessen the very real, efficacious, and practical outcomes realized in efforts such as the World Social Forum.) Rather, what is increasingly and definitely advancing are the myriad resistances to neoliberal capital that have centred on self-management as a creative force for inventing new experiences and new lives. However partial and nascent these advances might or might not be, they can serve to fruitfully inform and inspire the greater global analyses and debates that are looking for alternatives to capitalist life.

The questions raised by self-management:

What we are proposing for this First International Gathering, however, is not what might be interpreted, at first glance, as a debate on the “social economy” (as fomented, for example, by the World Bank and NGOs focused on “social containment”). Rather, we are proposing the reverse: We would like to engage in discussions centred on the socialization of the economy. Instead of waiting for the fulfillment of the promises set in a far-off utopia grounded in a revolutionary conquest of political power, workers from around the world are presently advancing projects that are giving them back their lives and labour. However fragmentary and limited these projects might currently be, they tend to be rooted in actual practices and concrete experiences rather than in the promissory and the abstract.

What conclusions and lessons can we take from these experiences, then? What connections do these workers’ struggles have with traditional social and political struggles? How do they relate to, or interconnect themselves within, the popular, grassroots-based governments that are increasingly taking hold of power in Latin America? How do these experiences of economic self-management survive in the hostile markets of global capital? How can they generate a new business logic of self-management within the framework of a suffocating system? Can they survive without change to the actual economic system and without transforming those very forms of organizations that they are attempting to overcome? Are they isolated instances of resistance, consequences of the very crisis of global capital, or do they show a path toward a new way of organizing production within a more just social system? Can workers already organized in unions once again come to pressure capital and dispute capital’s power-base, or should the struggle to overcome capital now be engaged from within the actual spaces of production and be about the actual self-management of production by workers? Will these struggles actually be used and appropriated by capital to more efficiently accumulate capital? These are just some of the questions that we feel should be at the centre of the debate amongst workers, intellectuals, and social and political organizations.

This is not just an academic debate, however. It is essentially a political one that should be moved forward with the participation of workers and their organizations. Proceeding in any other way would render the debate an interesting intellectual exercise with little practical consequence. But those who are thinking about these and other issues related to social movements and alternatives to capital from within an intellectual perspective should also of course, out of necessity, participate in these debates. Also at the table should be social and political leaders that encompass views from the perspective of labour organizations and political processes that are disputing State power and that, as in Venezuela or Bolivia, are carrying forward policies that are fostering these experiences of self-management.

From the Faculty of Philosophy and Letters at the University of Buenos Aires, we propose further strides towards this necessary debate. For five years now we have been working in conjunction with workers in Argentina’s recovered factories and workspaces, attempting to support their processes, document their experiences, investigate their practices, and to better comprehend and reflect on the consequences of their experiments. From the Open Faculty Program (Programa Facultad Abierta) and the Interdisciplinary Program in Scientific and Technological Transference with Worker-Recovered Enterprises (Programa Interdisciplinario de Transferencia Científico Tecnológica con Empresas Recuperadas por sus Trabajadores) we have been developing with these workers projects that seek to extend technological capabilities, develop skills, build capacity, and strengthen the viability of these cooperative workplaces, investigating, on a broader level, the self-management of productive unities abandoned by their owners and recovered and reopened by workers. For us, and we hope for many others, the time has come to incorporate the conclusions stemming from these lessons and experiences—both from the perspective of workers and also academics—into the debate that is occupying the world more and more, a debate that is fundamentally about the direction of these struggles and the change needed in the system of social, political, and economic relations.

From this place we convene this First International Gathering to debate and discuss self-management and its possibilities and challenges…

By: Andrés Ruggeri
Translated by: Marcelo Vieta

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“THE WORKERS’ ECONOMY:
SELF-MANAGEMENT AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH”

Dates:
July 19-21, 2007

Location:
University of Buenos Aires
217 – 25 de Mayo Avenue
Autonomous City of Buenos Aires, Argentina

Organizers
The Open Faculty Program (Faculty of Philosophy and Letters, University of Buenos Aires)
Co-Organizers:
Center for Global Justice, San Miguel de Allende, Mexico (http://www.globaljusticecenter.org/)
International Institute for Selfmanagement, Frankfurt, Germany (http://www.iism.net/)
Argentina Autonomista Project (http://www.autonomista.org)

Conference format:

Debate Roundtables:
Debate and discussion roundtables based on central themes, interspersed with panels to guide the discussion.

A final synopsis of each roundtable will be realized and made available as conference proceedings.

Opening and closing plenary sessions will be held.

The debates and discussions will be filmed and recorded for archival and educational purposes in order to make available materials and resources for research purposes, consulting purposes, and for assisting current and future self-management projects.

Thematic Roundtables:
More specific roundtables and panels will be convened focusing on particular themes of interest to participants.

Presentations:
Presentations of documents and already completed or ongoing work for discussion.

Those who forward their work to the gathering’s organizers with enough lead-time will have their work published in a CD before the conference to be available at the conference. Please forward materials to include in the CD by April 30, 2007 to: fabierta@filo.uba.ar

Preliminary conference schedule:
Thematic debates and project roundtables (first two days):
• The capitalist economy today: Stages of global capitalism from the perspective of popular movements.
• The self-managed economy: Discussions concerning the experiences of self-management in the era of global capitalism (recovered enterprises, rural cooperatives, self-managed and solidarity microenterprises, cooperative movements, alternative networks of exchange, fair trade and fair work initiatives, etc.)
• The challenges faced by popularly-based, grassroots-supported governments regarding the social management of the economy and the State.
• A critical look at the cooperative movement.
• New challenges faced by union movements; unions; new types of workers’ organizations and collectives; co-management and participatory decision making.
• Plenary sessions (last day)
• The (re)distribution of wealth: The social economy or the socialization of the economy? Suggestions being offered by workers’ movements.
• The limits of self-management: The political possibilities and challenges of a production regime under workers’ control.
• Articulations, expressions, and experiences of the struggle for self-management with regard to other political struggles and other social movements.

Special roundtables:
• The environment and workers’ self-management.
• Experiments in self-management with regard to other social-political struggles and social movements.
• Work from the perspective of gender.
• The role of the university and intellectuals in workers’ struggles.

Free admission, donations accepted:
The gathering is free for participants and audience members. We invite donations for assisting the travel expenses of workers from outside of the Buenos Aires area. For U.S. tax-deductible donations, checks in U.S. dollars should be made payable to: Research Associates Foundation. Please write “Workers' Economy Conference” in the memo, and send it to:
9902 Crystal Court, Suite 107, BC-2323, Laredo, TX 78045. Donations can also be made on-line at www.globaljusticecenter.org Please again note Workers' Economy Conference.

My upcoming talk on the worker-recovered enterprises in Argentina

2007-03-15T17:03:00.000-04:00

York University
March 20, 2007
2:30-4:30
York Lanes, room 280

"The Worker-Recovered Enterprises in Argentina: Worker Self-Management and Hope Within Socio-Economic Crisis"

Defining States. Mattering Differently.

2006-12-01T19:17:00.000-05:00

A Conversation with Brian Massumi and Erin Manning

A Toronto School of Creativity & Inquiry Event

Saturday, November 25, 2006
2:00 – 4:00 pm
LOCATION: Faculty of Architecture, Landscape and Design, University of Toronto

Let’s get to the heart of the matter. Nation state. Rogue state. Natural state. State of exception. State form. Head of state. Police state. State of grace. State of mind. State variable. State of fear. State of emergency. Indeterminate state. Nascent state. Static. State your point. Mental state. Emotional state. Altered state. State jurisdiction. State of the union. State of affairs. State your name. Stately. Statism. Subject of the statement. State your purpose. Smattering. Grey matter. Anti-matter. Love matters. Matter and energy. Matter and memory. Matter of principle. Reading matter. Matter of minutes. Matters of the heart. Matter of course. Matter of opinion. For that matter. Money matters. What does it matter? Mind over matter. Fecal matter. No matter what. Matter-form. Matter of fact. Matter of habit. What’s the matter? Matter of life and death.

“… the question is not how to elude the order-word but how to elude the death-sentence it envelops, how to develop its power of escape”

–Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari

What can be done in the face of states of domination that are able to thrive on the assaults against them? Can we defy these states? Can we matter differently? Join us for an intimate conversation around these questions with Brian Massumi and Erin Manning.

Brian Massumi specializes in philosophy, media theory, and visual culture. He is the author of Parables for the Virtual: Movement, Affect, Sensation and A User’s Guide to Capitalism and Schizophrenia: Deviations from Deleuze and Guattari. His translations from the French include Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari’s A Thousand Plateaus. He teaches in the Communication Department of the Université de Montréal, where he directs the Workshop in Radical Empiricism.

Erin Manning is a philosopher, visual artist and dancer. She is assistant professor in Studio Art and Film Studies, Concordia University and director of The Sense Lab, an interdisciplinary research-creation laboratory. She is the author of Ephemeral Territories: Representing Nation, Home and Identity in Canada and Politics of Touch: Sense, Movement, Sovereignty.

About Toronto School of Creativity & Inquiry
Collaborating with a diffuse network of activists, artists, and theorists, Toronto School of Creativity & Inquiry initiates events that inquire into the new enclosures and creative pathways beyond them.

Contact
www.tsci.ca
torontoschool@sympatico.ca

Defining States. Mattering Differently.

2006-11-01T04:56:00.000-05:00

The disappearance of a key witness...

2006-09-23T11:42:00.001-04:00

...in the first conviction to life imprisonment of one of the repressors of the 1976-1983 dictatorship in the past week. BBCMundo.com coverage. López has been missing since last Sunday. Nora Cortiñas mentioned this in her talk at York Unversity yesterday.

Nora Cortiñas gave a talk at York University yesterday

2006-09-23T11:18:00.000-04:00

Last night I went to a stirring talk given by Nora Cortiñas, President and one of the founding members of the Madres de Plaza de Mayo, Linea Fundadora (Mothers of May Square), at the Centre for Research on Latin America and the Caribbean (CERLAC)at York University. Her talk was the 2006 Michael Baptista Lecture. Having talked about the plight of here still-missing son, Carlos Gustavo, hundreds of times by now, she spoke completely off notes. She received two standing ovations. Her continued struggle was an inspiration to us all.

I'll post my notes form the talk in the coming days. For now, here's a synopsis of some of the themes she touched - themes and tactics that are crucial for NSMs in Argentina these days:
*the continued fight against repression (state and other kinds),
*the importance of memory,
*reconceptualizing the 76-83 dictatorship as a "civic-militarist" government,
*corruption,
*"justicia y castigo" (justice and punishment) for those that continue to live with impunity,
*solidarity between Las Madres, other Argentine social moveements, and international NSMs and "madres de los desaparecidos" in other Latin American countries,
*the effects of internal and external exile and the disappearance of 30,000 of Argentina's most progressive and militant voices on the country and on the struggles for liberation,
*the "escrache" as a tactic of "social justice" in light of chronic impunity,
*the loss of identity of the children of the disappeared,
*the effects of the long era of neoliberalism in Argentina and its crystalization in the dictatorshio of 76-83,
*the tensions between securing a democratic state (to avoid the tragedies of the past and secure human rights) and the desire for autonomy.

From the event's announcement

This year marks the thirtieth anniversary of the 1976 military coup d'état that ushered in a seven-year military dictatorship in Argentina. An estimated 30,000 people were forcibly "disappeared", tortured and murdered during this period, among them, Cortiñas' son, Carlos Gustavo, a university student and member of the Peronist youth movement. Shortly after her son's "disappearance" in April 1977 and at the height of the military dictatorship, Nora joined a group of mothers who had met in the waiting rooms of police stations while trying to discover the whereabouts of their children and organized the first of a continuing series of demonstrations in front of the Presidential Palace in the Plaza de Mayo in Buenos Aires.

Ever since, each Thursday afternoon, the Mothers continue to march in the Plaza de Mayo, demanding that the fate of the victims be made known. The enormous risks they took was illustrated by the fact that some of them, including Azucena de Villaflor, their first president, themselves disappeared. Because of their bravery and sacrifices the Madres have become an important political force in Argentina and aninternational symbol of human rights activism. They continue to demand that the fate of the victims be made known and that justice be served for these crimes.

Cortiñas will discuss the history of the Madres and the role of women in struggles for human rights.

An internationally renowned human rights activist, Nora Cortiñas is a social psychologist and recipient of several honorary doctorates including from the National University of Salta and the Université Libre de Bruxelles. She holds a chair in the Economics Department at the University of Buenos Aires where she teaches on the
relationship between economic power and human rights.

Autogestión: crisis dentro de la principal organización de compañas tomadas por los trabajadores

2006-09-09T00:44:00.000-04:00

07-09-2006

Varias empresas recuperadas argentinas crean una coordinadora más participativa
Luisina Castiglioni

Diagonal

Las fábricas recuperadas suponen una de las luchas sociales más relevantes en Argentina. Tras la crisis de 2001, como respuesta a los problemas laborales, trabajadores de cientos de empresas decidieron apoderarse de ellas y gestionar la producción. Actualmente, a causa de la fragmentación del Movimiento Nacional de Empresas Recuperadas (MNER) generada por los personalismos de sus dirigentes, trabajadores de las cooperativas han dejado de reconocer a la dirección del MNER. Proponen reorganizarse en un movimiento nuevo, donde se refleje la autogestión y la democracia directa que ya viven en sus trabajos.

Todavía sin nombre, sin representaciones, sin definiciones marcadas, un grupo de cooperativas gestionadas por sus trabajadores decidieron embarcarse en la conformación de un espacio nuevo donde verdaderamente se sientan representadas y puedan construir en forma colectiva el tipo de movimiento que los cobije.

De esta manera, a partir de la crisis del Movimiento Nacional de Empresas Recuperadas (MNER) que los aglutinaba, trabajadores del Hotel BAUEN, Gráfica Patricios y Viniplast impulsaron reuniones informales junto a otras cooperativas.

Los dos últimos años el MNER se había transformado sólo en un nombre desprestigiado por la política y los personalismos de sus dirigentes. De tinte peronista, con un dilema de interpretaciones, había nacido en aquel convulsionado 2002, con el objeto de aglutinar y participar en la recuperación de las empresas. Su política se basaba en la reivindicación, en el marco de un proyecto de consolidación industrial nacional, de la ocupación de fábricas como una nueva forma de luchar contra la desocupación. Sin embargo el desempeño de sus dirigentes estuvo lejos de esa proclama. Los trabajadores dijeron “¡basta!”, ignoraron a las dirigencias originarias y comenzaron a autoorganizarse para refundar, no sin resabios, un nuevo movimiento cooperativo, ya teniendo en claro que ésta vez querían ser voz propia del espacio del que formarían parte.

Construcción colectiva

De esa forma, el 5 de agosto pasado 11 cooperativas localizadas en Buenos Aires se reunieron en un plenario para comenzar a repensar una forma de construcción colectiva. Las definiciones aún no están cerradas, pero sí existe la intención de buscar otro tipo de relaciones sociales solidarias cuyos valores organizativos intenten encaminarse a la horizontalidad, la cooperación recíproca y la transmisión del conocimiento acumulado por las experiencias anteriores, así como acompañar, en concreto, tanto los conflictos venideros como los procesos una vez recuperados.

En la jornada plenaria estuvieron presentes el Hotel BAUEN, La Nueva Esperanza (ex Global), Viniplast, Ceres, Cooperpel, Lácteos Monte Castro, Gráfica Patricios y Rabbione. Se sumaron como invitadas las cooperativas La Unión de Miramar, el Frigorífico de Bahía Blanca (actualmente en conflicto), entre otras. En un documento todas concluyeron: “El MNER está agotado, y es necesario fundar una organización nueva”.

La ocupación, la experiencia concreta de lucha y las relaciones de explotación desembocaron en el planteo de construir otro tipo de articulaciones entre empresas. De esa manera, las cooperativas decidieron conformar una mesa horizontal con dos representantes por empresa, de carácter revocable, cuyo compromiso es incentivar y crear las condiciones para la participación de base a través de reuniones abiertas, espacios comunes y actividades grupales de integración como instancias de democratización de las herramientas de información a través de publicaciones resolutivas e informativas.

Otro de los principios hace referencia a las formas de organización: la no autoexplotación ni la explotación. Se trata de una de las bases asumidas por las cooperativas. En ese sentido, se plantearon instancias de concienciación sobre qué es ser un trabajador de una empresa recuperada, qué implica el compromiso colectivo, social y de cooperación mutua tanto dentro de cada uno de las empresas como con el resto de las cooperativas. Esta concienciación estaría asentada en trabajar sobre “quienes somos”, “no olvidar de dónde venimos”, “no perder la memoria de todo lo que pasamos”.

Desde esta perspectiva, el debate también debe estar abierto para los socios que tratan como empleados al resto de sus compañeros. El molde que traen los compañeros de la experiencia anterior donde había una relación de patrón-empleado, lleva en algunos casos (sobre todo a los socios originarios) a querer ser patrones de los socios nuevos y en otros a falta de compromiso, donde sólo cumplen horario y no se comprometen, como si fueran sólo empleados.

Por otra parte, ante la falta de formación técnico-administrativa se estableció que, si bien esta tarea está fuertemente centrada en cada una de las cooperativas, el movimiento tendrá la responsabilidad de promocionar y propiciar todas las capacitaciones y especializaciones que estén dirigidas a completar la formación del conjunto de los compañeros y el perfeccionamiento en cada uno de sus perfiles. La formación remite a aumentar la rentabilidad, con el objeto de abrir fuentes de trabajo y sumar más trabajadores desocupados al empleo autogestionado.

Falta de legislación

La inexistencia de una legislación que ampare a las empresas recuperadas supone que el paso a la legalidad dependa de la voluntad del juzgado de turno o a la legislatura de la jurisdicción, en caso de que el conflicto se dirima en alguno de los dos poderes. Por ello plantearon la necesidad de diseñar estrategias que conlleven a expropiaciones definitivas de los bienes muebles e inmuebles.

De tal desprotección legislativa se desprenden otros problemas estructurales a resolver, como la falta de créditos que frena la renovación tecnológica, la imposibilidad de efectuar aportes jubilatorios y la tenencia de una cobertura médica. Ante estos aspectos, el plenario dio cuenta de la necesidad de atribuir un rol más amplio al nuevo movimiento. Aún los planteamientos son frescos, entusiastas e intentan poner en escena el protagonismo de trabajadores que se animaron a pelear por sus fuentes de trabajo y desafiar, muchos sin saberlo, el sistema social que se encarga de repelerlos.

“Sabemos lo que no queremos pero todavía no sabemos hacia dónde vamos”, expresó Cecilia Casablanca integrante del nuevo espacio. Eso sí, ya están pensando otro nombre que los identifique. Uno de los propuestos evoca el protagonismo que los pone en escena como partícipes, no sólo en el proceso productivo, sino también en la dirección de la empresa: Asociación de cooperativas argentinas sin patrón. Sea este u otro nombre, la reorganización de los trabajadores siempre es una forma de descolonizar el orden vigente.

Zanon: por la gestión obrera

Los obreros de la planta cerámica de Zanon vienen llevando adelante una serie de movilizaciones para exigir a los diputados que den curso al proyecto de “Expropiación definitiva”. Tras la reforma constitucional provincial, un articulado dispuso que la legislatura estará obligada a tratar cualquier proyecto de “iniciativa popular” que cuente con el apoyo de 8.000 firmas de sus habitantes. En mayo, los obreros presentaron el proyecto acompañado de 19.600 firmas. Logró tener carácter parlamentario. Pero los legisladores siguen sin dar respuesta, lo que ha llevado a incrementar las protestas de apoyo. En ese marco, en octubre vence el plazo que el juez de la causa les otorgó, un año atrás, para la explotación de la planta. No obstante, los obreros no esperan. La gestión sigue creciendo y las obras solidarias ya son naturales. Este mes incorporaron 15 nuevos trabajadores, construyeron una vivienda para una familia de niños huérfanos, continúan donando cerámicas a sectores sociales de bajos recursos y aportando fondos para trabajadores en proceso de lucha.

Cara y cruz para el BAUEN

Los trabajadores del autogestionado Hotel BAUEN volvieron al trote en la pelea por la expropiación. Tres meses atrás, un fallo judicial contravencional favoreció a la cooperativa al momento que dio el aval a la declaración de posesión del bien, levantó la clausura administrativa y abrió cauce a una investigación penal sobre los ex propietarios por presunto vaciamiento empresarial y falso testimonio. Sin embargo, la jueza de la causa comercial, amparándose en la petición de restitución de sus dueños y la ley votada en diciembre del año pasado de llamar a una mesa de concertación a 120 días para negociar las condiciones de devolución, exigió a los trabajadores la presentación de informes sobre la situación de la cooperativa. Mientras tanto, los trabajadores dan la batalla en la legislatura para lograr que los legisladores voten el proyecto modificatorio presentado por el jefe de Gobierno que reemplazaría al sancionado en diciembre del año pasado. A su vez, la cooperativa, a través de diputados nacionales, presentará un proyecto de ley de expropiación en el Congreso argentino.

A call to refusal, blackout style

2006-08-22T09:21:00.000-04:00

A fine proposal for going off-grid and reclaiming our lives from the overwhelming pace of electric/digital life:
Proposal for the Adoption of the Blackout as a Holiday, by J. Sinopoli, Care of The New York Ministry of Unofficial Popular Holidays