Six Hour Day: What Ever Happened to the Eight Hour Day?

[JimmyJazz]

What Ever Happened to the Eight Hour Day?

By Arthur J Miller


Sometimes we do not realize that we are losing something until it is nearly gone. Something that we thought was a foundation of our society, something that we thought we had won long ago, something like the eight hour day.

More and more workers are finding themselves being forced to work longer and longer hours. And because of this we are finding out why the eight hour day was fought for many years ago. Over a hundred years ago the struggle for the eight hour day was a massive movement for working people. Because of that struggle the eight hour day became the standard working hours throughout industry.

This writing is not about statistics. It is hard to relate to statistics alone. For that reason this is a personalized account of forced overtime.

There are two basic reasons why we work overtime: 1. Because our employer demands it and we work it to keep our job. 2. Our wages have not kept up with the cost of living, so many of us have been forced to work overtime to be able to pay for those things we need.

But no matter how much we may make with overtime, we cannot buy back our lives and those things we have lost being slaves to continuous production. For when we work these long hours we have little time for anything else but to work, eat and sleep.

By giving up the eight hour day, we are not only dooming ourselves, but we are also dooming future generations. Because once we have lost the eight hour day, we will not regain it without another massive struggle.

This writing is based upon a shipyard job that I had where they were working us 14 hours a day, seven days a week for two and a half months.


GETTING UP FOR WORK

Sleep: a thing that if you do not get enough of because there just is not sufficient hours in a day, becomes one of the few pleasures of living. When working a 14 hour day, seven days a week, the only escape is found in sleep. You think about it all day long. You long for it. It becomes your greatest desire. And the greatest disappointment in your life is when your alarm wakes you from your slumber.

I am the type of person who must raise right up, dress myself and go off to work, if I give myself any time to think I'll talk myself into not going to work. Given the fact that you never seem to get enough rest when working such long hours, it does not take much for me to convince myself to go back to bed.

Most of my working life I have worked as a marine pipefitter in shipyards. The majority of the time I have had to drive long distances to get to work. Thus, my driving time must be included in the hours my jobs have taken away from my life. The overwhelming thought that is always on my mind is "why in the hell am I doing this?" And the answer is always the same. "Because I must."

Like many other working people in the trades, I am stuck in my trade. Once you have worked a trade for a number of years, employers do not like to give you a job outside of that trade. Even if you learn a new trade it is damn hard to find a job. I know for I have tried. Employers would rather give a job to someone younger than me.

The work that I am able to find in the shipyards in the last ten years has included massive amounts of overtime hours. This was not always the case, for when the industry was booming there was not so much overtime work. This may seem a little strange, but there are two reasons for this. First the shipyards are trying to maximize their profits by cutting labor cost, and it cost them less to work their workers long hours than it does to hire more workers. Second, it is hard to find skilled shipyard workers anymore.

While making my way to work I tend to think about all those things that I never have time to do. Half dazed, I arrive at work, punch in my time card and get ready for work.Read the rest here (http://www.iww.org/projects/4-Hours/8-Hours).

[JimmyJazz]

small bump

[Die Neue Zeit]

I prefer the 32-hour workweek (http://www.revleft.com/vb/32-hour-workweek-t88097/index.html) instead of merely "fighting again" for the eight-hour day.

[Q]

I prefer the 32-hour workweek (http://www.revleft.com/vb/32-hour-workweek-t88097/index.html) instead of merely "fighting again" for the eight-hour day.

Agreed. Fighting for a 32 hour working week, a 6 hour working day, or similar demands will put the working class again in the offensive. Fighting for the 8 hour day is instead putting us in the defensive (and thusly the bosses in the offensive). Of course these demands should be directly linked to the need to change the system.

[JimmyJazz]

Well, the very last sentence of that article calls for a 6-hour day.


Agreed.

:lol:

[Bilan]

Reformism. Nothing more needs to be said.

[Die Neue Zeit]

Agreed. Fighting for a 32 hour working week, a 6 hour working day, or similar demands will put the working class again in the offensive. Fighting for the 8 hour day is instead putting us in the defensive (and thusly the bosses in the offensive). Of course these demands should be directly linked to the need to change the system.

In my programmatic work, the demand is as follows:

"The reduction of the normal workweek – including time for workplace democracy, workers’ self-management, etc. through workplace committees and assemblies – to a participatory-democratic maximum of 32 hours or less without loss of pay or benefits (http://www.revleft.com/vb/32-hour-workweek-t88097/index.html), the minimum provision of double-time pay or salary/contract equivalent for all hours worked over the normal workweek and over 8 hours a day, the prohibition of compulsory overtime, and the provision of one hour off with pay for every two hours of overtime"

So there's both workplace democracy and participatory democracy outside the workplace being addressed. :)

[Bilan]

I don't see a point in that peculiarly reformist demand.

[Die Neue Zeit]

Why can't left-communists distinguish (http://www.revleft.com/vb/defensive-struggles-question-t102367/index.html) between "reforms that could strengthen the working class as an opposition against capitalism" and "reforms that could only buy out the working class" (http://www.revleft.com/vb/communist-parties-and-t103246/index.html?p=1377407) (Rakunin)?

[Bilan]

Because its not realistic, nor does it necessarily strengthen the working class.

[Die Neue Zeit]

Yeah, because the struggle for the eight-hour day wasn't "realistic" in its time, either. Heck, although not yet implemented, a "legal minimum wage, determined each year according to the local price of food, by a workers' statistical commission (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1880/05/parti-ouvrier.htm)" wasn't "realistic" in Marx's time, either (HINT: real GDP per capita (http://www.revleft.com/vb/sliding-scale-wages-t98609/index.html)). :rolleyes:

[Q]

In my programmatic work, the demand is as follows:

"The reduction of the normal workweek – including time for workplace democracy, workers’ self-management, etc. through workplace committees and assemblies – to a participatory-democratic maximum of 32 hours or less without loss of pay or benefits, the minimum provision of double-time pay or salary/contract equivalent for all hours worked over the normal workweek and over 8 hours a day, the prohibition of compulsory overtime, and the provision of one hour off with pay for every two hours of overtime"

So there's both workplace democracy and participatory democracy outside the workplace being addressed. :)
Yes, there is no disagreement here. It's vital to bring in the point about workers democracy, else it would hardly qualify as a transitional demand.


I don't see a point in that peculiarly reformist demand.
Ah yes, the ultra-leftist stance: either you call for the revolution, or you're anti-worker...

Reality however is a tad more complex. This goes not so much into the objective reality of the working class within capitalist society, but into its subjective factors, in other words: the political awareness of the working class. By putting forward demands that put the workers movement in the offensive and by linking these demands to the need to change the system, you're putting forward revolutionary politics, not reformism.

Opposed to this, simply stating "one solution: revolution!" is completely ignored by the movement.

[KC]

Because its not realistic, nor does it necessarily strengthen the working class.

Experience is gained through struggle. So if you don't see a point to this, then you don't see a point to struggle either. What are you doing on this forum, in that case?

[Die Neue Zeit]

Yes, there is no disagreement here. It's vital to bring in the point about workers democracy, else it would hardly qualify as a transitional demand.

Except I wasn't using the broad-economistic "transitional" method at all. :p ;)

As Comrade Rakunin noted, and as I noted (http://www.revleft.com/vb/begin-redefining-minimum-t90683/index.html), I am using the Erfurtian minimum-maximum approach, where "minimum" is NOT "social-democratic" (defensive or nostalgic). Workplace democracy isn't "transitional" at all, since some companies have this already.

[Bilan]

Experience is gained through struggle. So if you don't see a point to this, then you don't see a point to struggle either. What are you doing on this forum, in that case?

I don't see why this board should be dominated by unrealistic idealists, or pseudo-revolutionary reformists?
I mean, the struggle for a 6 hour day, amidst the general decline of capitalism...does that sound truly realistic?

[Plagueround]

I don't see why this board should be dominated by unrealistic idealists, or pseudo-revolutionary reformists?

I don't know...I know a lot of people that would kick it with the people who brought them a six hour work day.

[Bilan]

They might be disappointed, on account of it not being likely to occur. Are people honestly suggesting capitalists are going to accept the reduction of the creation of surplus value, without any sort of repercussions for that? And in the context of modern capitalism, how does this reformist demand stand up?

[ZeroNowhere]

They might be disappointed, on account of it not being likely to occur. Are people honestly suggesting capitalists are going to accept the reduction of the creation of surplus value, without any sort of repercussions for that?
You sound like you're surprised.


I don't know...I know a lot of people that would kick it with the people who brought them a six hour work day.
Right, because we're going to bring about a six hour work day without being a majority, because apparently the bourgeoisie are kind and generous enough to listen patiently to our demands and carry them out (or that's what the SPUSA seems to think, judging by its homepage. SPUSA demand an end to Iraq and Afghanistan wars! Also tonight: Nobody gives a fuck. Then again, I'm sure that people would be pretty thankful towards us for bringing about the 6 hour workday, eh?) And if we're a majority, why the fuck would we bother with this?
Either that, or we summon our mystical commie-faerie who implements the reforms through magick?
The capitalist state can give concessions, but they do it to stop the labour movement. "Reform if you would preserve," that is. Though I'm sure a longer-living and more qualified reserve army of labour helps too.

[Q]

I don't see why this board should be dominated by unrealistic idealists, or pseudo-revolutionary reformists?
I mean, the struggle for a 6 hour day, amidst the general decline of capitalism...does that sound truly realistic?
Of course it does. All we need for it is mass struggle to force it, which is the whole point. It's a matter of formulation though. For the current crisis we propose to share out the work, without loss of pay.


Make the bosses pay for their own crisis! Where manufacturing bosses threaten job losses or pay cuts, the unions should call for the opening of the books. Let the workforce see the bosses' real accounts! What happened to all the profits made in the boom period? No to cuts in jobs and conditions - share out the work with no loss of pay for any worker.

If the bosses fail to invest to keep plants open or to pay a living wage, workers should demand that the government nationalises them, with compensation only for the poorest shareholders.

We should fight for such companies to be run under democratic workers' control and management in an example of socialist nationalisation, unlike the capitalist nationalisation of Brown and Co! We need democratic socialist planning to meet the needs of working people.

We should also take a fighting approach to attacks on public services, with strikes and joint campaigns of public-sector workers and service-users. The capitalist class have declared war on the working class. It is time to reply in kind.
Source (http://socialistparty.org.uk/issue/569/7001).



They might be disappointed, on account of it not being likely to occur. Are people honestly suggesting capitalists are going to accept the reduction of the creation of surplus value, without any sort of repercussions for that?Really, with all this "realism" talk of yours, you sound like the real reformist here. Of course the bosses are not going to just accept it, what is your point?

[Coggeh]

Because its not realistic, nor does it necessarily strengthen the working class.
Fighting for reforms does not mean your reformist . Every gain strengthens the working class , the immovable rights to organise in trade unions just being one of these reforms .

[Tower of Bebel]

They might be disappointed, on account of it not being likely to occur. Are people honestly suggesting capitalists are going to accept the reduction of the creation of surplus value, without any sort of repercussions for that? And in the context of modern capitalism, how does this reformist demand stand up?
The key to success is the balance of class power. It's all about working class struggle and party building (since you're not fond of the party concept you may call it unions or other workers' organizations). The 32-hour workweek can only be achieved successfully if the working class organizes itself (around the demand) and fights for it.

Building an independent workers' movement is a precondition for the successful overthrow of the capitalist system. I think you can agree with me. That's why this demand for a 32-hour workweek differs greatly from other demands like lower taxes, free public transport or cheap medicines.

The latter are demands that function like a carrot (and the horrors of capitalism functioning as the stick) for electoral purposes. It's a reform for the sake of popularity. A reform for the sake of reform. The former however, is revolutionary in character because it's devised, together with orther demands, to organize the working class (politically) against the capitalist state. It's a reform for the sake of the revolutionary overthrow of capitalism by the working class as a whole.

The carrot versus working class organization debate (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1880/05/parti-ouvrier.htm) is going on since the late 19th century. While Marx wanted the working class to organize themselves in a political party in order to pose the question of class power, Jules Guesde proposed to you only demands that could lure the workers to the party.

For questions on the transitional approach (which differs from the so called "Erfurtian" approach) I would advise you to read gilhyle's remarks in this thread (http://www.revleft.com/vb/transitional-program-updated-t99491/index.html)and maybe also this article (http://www.socialismtoday.org/126/fight.html) (near the middle you'll find the info you need to understand what the approach does).

[Die Neue Zeit]

Building an independent workers' movement is a precondition for the successful overthrow of the capitalist system. I think you can agree with me. That's why this demand for a 32-hour workweek differs greatly from other demands like lower taxes, free public transport or cheap medicines.

Comrade, speaking of taxes, I already anticipate a "social-democratic" demand to be popularized for populist purposes (except amongst right-wing US national-chauvinists (http://frontpagemagazine.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=7A5CEA00-6DA0-4ED5-B340-6D7468F873FD) :rolleyes: ):

Making Bono pay taxes (http://www.revleft.com/vb/making-bono-pay-t103340/index.html)

[Namely, "Introduce a global taxation system to prevent transfer pricing and tax evasion," according to The global economic crisis: An historic opportunity for transformation by the Asia-Europe People's Forum. :glare: ]

Speaking of "free public transport," it's a shame that the recent amendments to the CPGB's draft program mentions such, among other "green" measures:

http://www.cpgb.org.uk/worker/759/debatingdraft.html


Free urban public transport. Nationalise the land. Tax polluters. Minimise carbon dioxide, methane and other such global warming gas outputs.
Sustainable development. For the re-establishment of an intimate connection between town and country, agriculture and industry, and a rational distribution of the population.
Concrete jungles, urban sprawl, huge farms and uninterrupted industrialised agriculture are profoundly alienating and inhuman.
Work and living should be brought closer together. Towns and cities should be full of trees, public gardens, wild parks and little farms. In the countryside extensive wilderness areas should be created along with the reintroduction of the full array of native plants and animal species.




The carrot versus working class organization debate (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1880/05/parti-ouvrier.htm) is going on since the late 19th century. While Marx wanted the working class to organize themselves in a political party in order to pose the question of class power, Jules Guesde proposed to you only demands that could lure the workers to the party.

Huh? I thought Guesde was a sectarian, not an opportunist. That certainly brings a new perspective (as per my Theory thread on "defensive struggles"): carrots for electoral purposes, or carrots for party-building purposes (and the fact that Marx basically said "Neither").




They might be disappointed, on account of it not being likely to occur. Are people honestly suggesting capitalists are going to accept the reduction of the creation of surplus value, without any sort of repercussions for that? And in the context of modern capitalism, how does this reformist demand stand up?

I don't think even left-communist workers working 50 hours a week have time to organize. As I said in my thread (and quoting Marx's Capital):

http://www.revleft.com/vb/32-hour-workweek-t88097/index.html


The Congress of the International Working Men’s Association at Geneva, on the proposition of the London General Council, resolved that “the limitation of the working-day is a preliminary condition without which all further attempts at improvement and emancipation must prove abortive... the Congress proposes eight hours as the legal limit of the working-day.”

Thus the movement of the working-class on both sides of the Atlantic, that had grown instinctively out of the conditions of production themselves, endorsed the words of the English Factory Inspector, R. J. Saunders: “Further steps towards a reformation of society can never be carried out with any hope of success, unless the hours of labour be limited, and the prescribed limit strictly enforced.”

[...]

Does this reform enable the basic principles to be “kept consciously in view”? Well, how can a highly class-conscious working class find the time to organize, let alone capture full political power and emancipate itself thereafter, without limitations on both the workday and the workweek?

[Bilan]

Of course it does. All we need for it is mass struggle to force it, which is the whole point. It's a matter of formulation though. For the current crisis we propose to share out the work, without loss of pay.

And this seems practical and realistic within the current framework of Capitalism? The most positive thing I can see from this is that its own futility as a goal will make clear the impossibility of real, permanent gains for the working class within the framework of capitalism, and the necessity for revolution.
It's even more futile as a goal in the current context because of the realisation that capitalism is in the process of being smashed by the biggest economic crisis since the Great Depression. Struggling for the 'eight hour day', or the 'six hour day' in this context makes about as much sense, and is about as close to pin pointing the central point of struggle as the Socialist Alliance stalls which are still going on about "free Palastine" while the capitalist economy is crumbling.
Have revolutionaries lost their sense of reality? Are we just giving up on analysising the nature of capitalism in its current context and then having our program based on this, and instead just acting and "giving it a whirl"?

There is no sense of reality in this program.

The crisis is here, and we need to be acting on it, not acting on other reformist shit.



Really, with all this "realism" talk of yours, you sound like the real reformist here. Of course the bosses are not going to just accept it, what is your point?



How do I sound like a reformist by rejecting reformist tactics? That makes no sense.

[Tower of Bebel]

And this seems practical and realistic within the current framework of Capitalism? The most positive thing I can see from this is that its own futility as a goal will make clear the impossibility of real, permanent gains for the working class within the framework of capitalism, and the necessity for revolution.
That's why the demand is part of the Transitional Program. The fact that such a demand seems impossibl under such circumstances creates a bridge between the subjective situation and socialism.

It's even more futile as a goal in the current context because of the realisation that capitalism is in the process of being smashed by the biggest economic crisis since the Great Depression. Struggling for the 'eight hour day', or the 'six hour day' in this context makes about as much sense, and is about as close to pin pointing the central point of struggle as the Socialist Alliance stalls which are still going on about "free Palastine" while the capitalist economy is crumbling.Capitalism or no capitalism; the workers need to have a job and spare time. The 32-hour workweek could be explained as a meassure against unemployment while also stressing the thoughts of Marx (as quoted by Jacob) on the subject of democracy through shorter working hours.

The crisis is here, and we need to be acting on it, not acting on other reformist shit.What's wrong with posing the demands we need to build a workers' movement capable of overthrowing the capitalist system? The use of the transitional approach, linking the day-to-day struggles with the goal of socialism, makes things even better. What would you propose?

Let me contrast it with a much more fanciful educational theory - I, or a small group of people advocate an ideal and human beings despite their conflicts of material interest, their emotional decision making processes, their varying educational levels, their varying informational sources, etc, etc, all (or rather almost all) just decide, in one grand leap, to adopt a totally different form of social organisation.

thats not what happened in 1917 its not what happened in 1871. Its quite true to say that those events dont seem to accomodate themselves easily to the model of revolution emerging from the building of a labour movement, either.

But that is not decisive.

However, lets be clear there are no Communist models of revoluton that are ever going to be adequately tested prior to their success. And the marxist model, based on class struggle, buildig a labour movement which has the capacity to take over the State as a precondition of taking over the state - itself based on the materialist conception of history - is significantly better articulated than the alternative of preaching and advocacy as a sufficient mechanism for the creation of social revolution.

[Bilan]

Shit, I just lost everything I wrote.


That's why the demand is part of the Transitional Program. The fact that such a demand seems impossibl under such circumstances creates a bridge between the subjective situation and socialism.

Yes, I agree, and I implied that above.



Capitalism or no capitalism; the workers need to have a job and spare time. The 32-hour workweek could be explained as a meassure against unemployment while also stressing the thoughts of Marx (as quoted by Jacob) on the subject of democracy through shorter working hours.

It's slightly more complex than that though. It can't be understood simply in terms of what Marx's said, because of the difference in the phase of economic development between our context and Marx's - i.e. ascendant, and decadent.



The domination of capital over the process of production expresses itself in the following ways. Labour is intensified. The work day is lengthened or shortened, according to the situation of the market. And, depending on the requirements of the market, labour is either employed or thrown back into the street.

As...

All these conditions underwent fundamental changes under decadent capitalism. The world has become too small to contain within it all the existing national capitals. In every nation, capital is forced to increase productivity (ie the exploitation of the workers) to the most extreme limits.

...
Inflation, a permanent phenomenon since World War I, immediately devours any wage increases. The length of the working day has either stayed the same, or has been reduced only to compensate for the increased time to get to and from work and to avoid the total nervous collapse of the workers, subjected to a shattering pace of life and work.

...

The distinction made by the workers’ movement in the nineteenth century between the minimum and the maximum programme has lost all meaning. The minimum programme is no longer possible. The proletariat can only advance its struggles by situating them within the perspective of the maximum programme: the communist revolution.

[Die Neue Zeit]

That's why the demand is part of the Transitional Program. The fact that such a demand seems impossible under such circumstances creates a bridge between the subjective situation and socialism.

Capitalism or no capitalism; the workers need to have a job and spare time. The 32-hour workweek could be explained as a measure against unemployment while also stressing the thoughts of Marx (as quoted by Jacob) on the subject of democracy through shorter working hours.

What's wrong with posing the demands we need to build a workers' movement capable of overthrowing the capitalist system? The use of the transitional approach, linking the day-to-day struggles with the goal of socialism, makes things even better. What would you propose?

I think you've just resolved your own "crisis of theory." If I'm correct, your interpretation is that my "neo-Erfurtian" stuff / broad-directional program is an unorthodox take on the Transitional Program, equalling the original Transitional Program minus what I see as narrow economism (sliding scale of wages at the shop or industry level) plus participatory-democratic perspectives (that is, less what can be seen as broad economism) and some post-modernist "anti-capitalist" contributions.

Most "transitional programs" out there would merely list the "32-hour workweek without loss of pay or benefits" as the anti-unemployment lead-in to the usual "sliding scale of hours" (Comrade Macnair's "Year Zero" ;) ), and might address leisure and environmental concerns (less pollution if working for four days) before the lead-in.


Shit, I just lost everything I wrote.

I tried to start a Theory thread critiquing the "globally social-democratic" (Walden Bello) and blatantly economistic Asia-Europe People's Forum program, but I too lost everything I wrote there. :(

[Honggweilo]

I don't see why this board should be dominated by unrealistic idealists, or pseudo-revolutionary reformists?
I mean, the struggle for a 6 hour day, amidst the general decline of capitalism...does that sound truly realistic?
in the wake of a violent class struggle, it can realistic. Its either give in or risk a full scale uprising for the bourgeoisie. They rather keep their labour force/consumers pacified until the very last profit. If they don't give in , the violent engine of history will decide their fate.

[Marxist]

6 hour day? We should worry about the 12 hour day around the globe...

[Tower of Bebel]

The minimum programme is no longer possible.Only if we rely on the bourgeosie for its implementation (instead of the working class); a.l.a. pure reformism.

Indeed. The programme of "classical social democracy", where "[...] the word socialism is used only for holiday speechifying" (Trotsky), is indeed "no longer possible". And I think the ICC refers to such minimum programmes of the reformst kind (Gotha, Chartre de Quaregnon, etc.), which demands reforms from the capitalist state through the capitalist state; just like Trotsky sometimes did in his Transitional Programme. There Trotsky defined the minimum programme as a programme "which limited itself to reforms within the framework of bourgeois society". This emphasis on its limitation within bourgeois society or bourgeois democracy comes from Karl - the renegade in progress - Kautsky. And I believe that was a mistake.

Reformist programmes differ from minimum programmes of the Marxist kind (which rely on working class struggle and independent working class self-organization). The Marxist minimum eventually is about working class rule, not necessarily extending bourgeois democracy. Demanding that the army would be disolved in favor of arming the proletariat (for example) isn't really a demand "limited [...] within the framework of bourgeois society". Is it?

Btw, the full implementation of the Marxist minimum program is, in the minds of class conscious workers, somewhat transitional in character.

[Die Neue Zeit]

There's a heated discussion on the minimum programme here:

http://www.permanentrevolution.net/entry/2579#comments


6 hour day? We should worry about the 12 hour day around the globe...

You don't solve the problem of the 12-hour day by merely advocating the 50-hour workweek (the old struggle for the 10-hour day) or even the 40-hour workweek again - like these economistic folks do:

"Stop labour law reforms aimed at extending hours of work and making it easier for employers to fire or retrench workers" (Asia-Europe People's Forum)

:(

After all, the struggle for "the reduction of the normal workweek – including time for workplace democracy, workers’ self-management, etc. through workplace committees and assemblies – to a participatory-democratic maximum of 32 hours or less without loss of pay or benefits, the minimum provision of double-time pay or salary/contract equivalent for all hours worked over the normal workweek and over 8 hours a day, the prohibition of compulsory overtime, and the provision of one hour off with pay for every two hours of overtime" must be transnational (global).

[Bilan]

Well, what do you know, the bourgeois here, parts of it are considering reducing the working day. Rosa proved oh so right. ;)

[Bilan]

There's a heated discussion on the minimum programme here:

http://www.permanentrevolution.net/entry/2579#comments



You don't solve the problem of the 12-hour day by merely advocating the 50-hour workweek (the old struggle for the 10-hour day) or even the 40-hour workweek again - like these economistic folks do:

"Stop labour law reforms aimed at extending hours of work and making it easier for employers to fire or retrench workers" (Asia-Europe People's Forum)

:(

After all, the struggle for "the reduction of the normal workweek – including time for workplace democracy, workers’ self-management, etc. through workplace committees and assemblies – to a participatory-democratic maximum of 32 hours or less without loss of pay or benefits, the minimum provision of double-time pay or salary/contract equivalent for all hours worked over the normal workweek and over 8 hours a day, the prohibition of compulsory overtime, and the provision of one hour off with pay for every two hours of overtime" must be transnational (global).

Jacob, you really have to work on your language. It's often quite hard to understand.

[Die Neue Zeit]

"Transnational" is a word used in the business world. "International" corporations are lower on the pecking order than multinationals and transnationals:

http://leeiwan.wordpress.com/2007/06/18/difference-between-a-global-transnational-international-and-multinational-company/



* International companies are importers and exporters, they have no investment outside of their home country.
* Multinational companies have investment in other countries, but do not have coordinated product offerings in each country. More focused on adapting their products and service to each individual local market.
* Global companies have invested and are present in many countries. They market their products through the use of the same coordinated image/brand in all markets. Generally one corporate office that is responsible for global strategy. Emphasis on volume, cost management and efficiency.
* Transnational companies are much more complex organizations. They have invested in foreign operations, have a central corporate facility but give decision-making, R&D and marketing powers to each individual foreign market.

Given my atypical educational background (not in sociology, polit-sci, or other humanities areas :rolleyes:) , my language is that of the business world: transnational, maximax and maximin (game theory) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maximin_(decision_theory)), information asymmetry (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asymmetric_information), etc.




Well, what do you know, the bourgeois here, parts of it are considering reducing the working day. Rosa proved oh so right. ;)

That SDKPiL sectarian was wrong. The class-strugglist interpretation of "reducing the working day" is always that of "reducing the working day without loss of pay or benefits."

[Black Dagger]

Thread renamed at user request.

[Bilan]

Granted, Jacob, but nevertheless, not all of us are from such a field, and find the language - especially when left unexplained, or which necessitates reading an overly long thread, with more links to unexplained words and ideas - overwhelming.
It's not much good when you have a theory which is not understood by your audience.

[Die Neue Zeit]

I also explained it in my theoretical work:


In an 1879 interview conducted by the Chicago Tribune, Marx commented on social revolution in the imperialist powers:

The deeds of the French Revolution may be enacted again in those countries. That is apparent to any political student. But those revolutions will be made by the majority. No revolution can be made by a party, but by a nation.

It is a great tragedy that he did not live as long as Engels to correct his statement above to consider two developments, the revolutionary-epoch mass organization (“party”) and transnational organization (going beyond even international organization and its emphasis on nation-states as the starting point).

"Inter-": between
"Trans-": across, over, beyond

[Bilan]

I didn't mean in regards to International and Transnational, Jacob. I meant generally. However, this is not relevant.

[Die Neue Zeit]

Since we should get back on topic, I made a brief remark at the end of post #33:

That SDKPiL sectarian was wrong. The class-strugglist interpretation of "reducing the working day" is always that of "reducing the working day without loss of pay or benefits."

:)