Factory regime and class formation: The petrochemical workers in Brazil.

摘要

The dissertation reviews the recent Marxist theories on class formation and other related fields in order to propose a new theoretical understanding of the historical constitution of the working class in Brazil. The review yields the conception of class formation as a process without any a priori defined content or any teleological direction, whose main determinants can only be established through the analyses of concrete historical conjunctures. A conjunctural analysis follows outlining the actual historical determinants of class formation. Through this analysis the paramount importance of the factory regimes that have prevailed in leading monopoly industries in the country, over the last ten years is identified. The argument is put forward that the same set of material conditions provided by this factory regime can lead both to the formation of a labor aristocracy or a class vanguard depending on whether or not the historical context is dominated by a solid bourgeois hegemony. In order to verify such a hypothesis, a case study was designed that examines the actual mechanisms through which factory regimes are determining class formation in present day Brazil. A single segment of workers was chosen--the petrochemical workers in Bahia--and a detailed analysis of the factory regime and of the petrochemical working class movement was carried out. These workers while presenting the required economic characteristics, are located in a region lacking any strong working class culture. In methodological terms, this configures a critical case. The findings of the study strongly support the research hypothesis. Factory regimes, those with relatively high wages and major fringe benefits, are not only incapable of avoiding, but even reinforce the socialist pattern of working-class formation in a context dominated by a crisis of bourgeois hegemony. The core of the dissertation presents the mechanisms through which a factory regime enhances class formation in this historical context.