A Call for a Democratic Workplace!

Analysis reveals that much of our citizenship and political learning occurs informally (and is absorbed passively). The workplace represents a key site for this process of 'acculturation' into the current, hegemonic power structure of society. In addition to providing the means for attaining our most basic needs, work is also necessary for social fulfillment and for leading a balanced, productive life. The very act of producing something is a very human activity that can have a profound impact our worldview. Unfortunately, most of us work in settings that are not democratically organized – in places where decisions are not made collectively and where people are not allowed to developed their full potential as human beings, let alone allowed to get fair compensation for their efforts based on equal profit-sharing. Moreover, all of this happens within an economy that is not designed to meet human needs but create human wants. In our societies, there is a hegemony of the elite and a tyranny of manufactured good that act as carrot and stick! Because of all this, it is quite likely that most of us automatically assume that the model of the workplace represents the best way to organize a nation's politics, with a CEO (the President or Prime Minister) at the head of Nation, Inc., the Board of Directors (the cabinet) setting national policy, and the hive of mignons who form the bureaucratic corps and execute policy initiatives flowing from the top and address the needs of those at the bottom of the hierarchy. Because of the way most workplaces are currently organized, it is possible that we've become so accustomed to being actively 'managed' that we readily and willingly transfer and relinquish our political decision-making powers to others.

The reconstruction of politics on the model of corporate efficiency began in the second and third decades of the twentieth century with the development of Fordism and deepening of Taylorist principles of scientific management in the United States (which eventually spread worldwide). Thereafter, the American obsession with scientific management and efficiency reached into every aspect of our lives, including the way local political institutions were organized. It was hoped that a new generation of professional managers would replace political appointees throughout the administrative structure, making government more scientific and efficient. New professional schools were established to teach students how to apply the principles of scientific management to governance, with the aim of replacing the art of politics with the science of administration. Hundreds of cities created planning commissions and agencies to more efficiently coordinate commercial and residential development and operate municipal utilities and services. Many cities replaced mayors with city planners and commissioners – generally architects, engineers, and other specialists. In addition to providing services to the growing postwar population in an efficient and timely manner, the scientific management of government set up a system of checks and balances, making government less prone to patronage and corruption. However, this came at a very high price. Putting all their faith and trust in technology and favouring the rule of science, the new managerial cadres of technocrats held a deep distrust in human abilities along with a disdain for popular democracy. Since then, many optimistic individuals outside of the inner circle of technocrats have hoped that increased technology would eventually lead to greater democracy. However, with each passing decade, these hopes have been dashed as our current economy has become ever more hinged upon the undemocratic control of technology. Indeed, all over the world, technology is controlled undemocratically by people who scorn, fear or simply want to use their fellow human beings and deny them from attaining their full potential as free human beings. How can a system that meets human needs develop from such a situation?

Just as the deepening ecological crisis has led some citizens to question their blind trust in science and technology, the multiple crises of liberal democracy have equally necessitated a fundamental questioning of how we do politics. In an era of massive corruption and insider dealings, spending cuts and massive layoffs, abuse of public resources and corporate irresponsibility, some have begun to raise serious objections to the managerial, hierarchical corporate culture that has dominated our lives and maintained control over the vital economic decision-making processes that affect all of our lives. Today, people have begun to realize that things do not necessarily have to be organized in this way – that there are creative, innovative alternatives! What is required is a new vision and impetus to implement them. The only way this can materialize is through active struggle.