Bank Muñoz om globalisering och klass på fabriksnivå

Sociologen Carolina Bank Muñoz har skrivit en häftig bok om globalisering och klassrelationer på mikronivå, på fabriksnivån, Transnational Tortillas: Race, Gender, and Shop-Floor Politics in Mexico and the United States (Ithaca, NY: Cornell UP, 2008). Hon har där studerat två tortillafabriker som tillhör samma företag: en fabrik i Kalifornien (kallas "Hacienda CA" i boken) och en i distriktet Baja California i Mexiko (kallas "Hacienda BC" i boken). Hon använder sig av intersektionell analys men det betyder inte att det ekonomiska eller klassperspektivet skyms undan:

"Workers at Hacienda CA and Hacienda BC endure primarily despotic labor control strategies because the workers have essentially no alternatives other than relying on their employers to purchase their labor power. This occurs because workers in each of these factories do not have a buffer (union, welfare state protections, etc.) between themselves and their employers and because workers have no exit route from their employment (no viable alternatives).
The lack of a buffer and an exit route is a result of two macro-structural conditions. First, over the past thirty yeaers, we have witnessed a shift from the Keynesian state to the neoliberal state. This has resulted in the undermining of unions and other safety nets, but it has also resulted in closing off alternative job prospects. For example, the shift to neoliberalism has wiped out subsistence farming in Mexico and has diminished job creation in both the United States and Mexico. Second, globalization, racism, and sexim push workers into secondary and informal labor markets. At the same time, shifts in immigration polict reduce the range of jobs available to undocumented immigrants in the United States (therefore exit becomes difficult for men at Hacienda CA) and make crossing the border a treacherous and costly alternative for workers in Mexico (reducing the exit route for women at Hacienda BC." (s 176)

Man kan konstatera att hon gör en del här obelagda antaganden (att nyliberalismen minskat job creation t.ex.), men inte desto mindre är det övergripande resonemanget relevant, tror jag. (Jag har också länkat till några förklaringar av begrepp som kanske inte är helt klara för den ovane läsaren.)

För övrigt konstaterar hon också något relevant om nyliberalismen och staten:

"Neoliberalism certainly has its contradictions. For example, the state is growing weaker in terms of labor protection, but stronger with regard to border enforcement." (s 176)

Jfr Georg Menz, "Employers, Trade Unions and Labor Migration Policies: Examining the Role of Non-State Actors", (pdf) Paper, 17 May 2007:

”Whoever claimed that the state is ‘retreating’ has obviously never studied migration policy. Claiming that policy and politics do not matter in this domain would simply be preposterous.” (s 29)