What does the Chavez victory mean for workers?

Opinions

 

The Venezuelan elections at the beginning of October attracted widespread international attention.

Many media observers predicted that the tensions between rival supporters of Chavez and the opposition candidate would result in one side or the other refusing to accept defeat, leading to uncontrollable post-election violence.

Social media messages tried to incite panic buying, not just of basic necessities but also domestic appliances; they failed to stir much of a reaction.

None of the upheaval predicted actually materialised. The elections passed peacefully, virtually without incident.

Turnout (over 80 per cent) was very high from the early hours of the morning and the results came through quickly.

The opposition candidate, Henrique Capriles, instantly recognised his rival’s victory, thus avoiding any trouble from radical groups on his side, which limited their reaction to furious and bitter protest on the internet.

The presence of trade unions during the electoral battle was scarce on both sides.

Much has changed since the days when the trade union bureau of Acción Democrática, one of the two main parties in the two-party system that governed the country until the end of the 20th century, played a decisive role in the election of candidates.

The new labour legislation promoted by the government and passed just months before the elections was, however, a hotly debated issue.

With the coming into force of the new labour law in May 2012, the government honoured its pledge to restore the rights workers had lost with the "flexibilisation" measures brought in by the Caldera government.

The law offers a modest reduction of the working week, bringing it down to 40 hours for day workers, but establishes a significant gain with the introduction of a statutory weekly rest period of two consecutive days.

In global terms, the legislation served the government’s strategy of pitting its labour policies against the rolling back of labour and social security rights in Europe and the United States.

In addition, it establishes the Workers’ Councils as "expressions of people’s power for key participation in the social process of work with the aim of producing goods and services that satisfy the people’s needs".

The Councils offer the workers’ movement a very interesting space for dialogue. The idea is to limit and control employers’ powers in private and public institutions and companies.

The legislation sets out to distinguish the Councils’ functions from those of trade unions, recognising the latter’s key role in collective bargaining and strike action.

Accordingly, the health and safety representatives will exercise their role in monitoring the working environment and conditions, the unions will handle demands and grievances, and the Councils will act at the level of workers’ control and co-management.

The debate on this issue raises ideas on how to take workers from being simple work providers and turn them into citizens that are aware of their rights and duties.

In our production culture, democracy seems to stop at the door of the workplace, where the bosses’ hegemony and autocratic rule is deemed "natural".

This raises the question: if there is a consensus among all Venezuela’s political forces, regardless of their different and sometime contradictory stands, that democracy is the system of government best equipped to solve our problems, why not democratise the workplace and workplace relations?

It is essential that the debate should start with this essential paradigm shift, with the engagement and empowerment of workers as key players.