From: pvh-AT-wfeet.za.net (Peter van Heusden)
Date: Tue, 12 Mar 2002 12:29:31 +0200
Subject: Re: AUT: a new thread


This message didn't seem to go through the first time, for some reason
- so I'm sending it again. I think I've figured out the problem now, why 
my messages seem to not get to aut-op-sy - but if people get multiple 
copies of this, my apologies in advance.

Steve raised the question of the Bologna interview which someone
posted a link to recently.

I read the interview, which was interesting, but brief. Has anyone
seen the book he has written? I think an important point that Bologna
made in the interview was the need to tackle the question of
self-employment in a detailed, thorough way, taking seriously the
agency and subjectivity of the self-employed. I.e. not simply falling
into the left myth of a golden age of collectivist mass workplaces
replaced by a nightmare of precarious, individualising
self-employment.

Of course, Bologna's writing from his European experience. My South
African experience is quite different: here in South Africa, just over
50% of those who are employed (and only about 60% of the population
are employed in any way at all) are employed in the 'informal sector'
- that often means some form of self- employment (running a small
'spaza' shop in the townships, selling fruit by the side of the road,
shebeens, etc). Due to the massive poverty in SA townships, 
commercial
business development is not nearly as developed as it is in the
affluent suburbs - generally there are shops clustered around a small
number of 'town centres', but getting there involves a long walk or a
trip in a taxi (SA taxi = minibus that goes on a particular route,
collecting people along the way - standard cheap form of public
transport for the majority of South Africans), so any local economic
activity takes the form of 'informal' businesses (run from someone's
house, etc).

Anyway, again on the self-employed: of those activists who I know
through the Anti- Eviction Campaign in Cape Town, almost all are
either unemployed, or self- employed. Often this self-employment is a
conscious choice (as in my case as well), given the options available.
As one activist friend, Ben, said: "I am not much one for working."
Ben had a job, laying road for the city council - he lost the job, but
is not looking for a new one, rather trying to make money off a small
fruit stall, since the work available to him is hard manual labour, at
low pay, leaving little time to spend with his family and to do
activism. As to the question of income - the meaning of income is
altered by activities such as bypassing of electricity meters, chasing
the sheriff out of the area when evictions / repossessions are
happening, etc. Of course, these activities involve collective action.

So there is a rich vein of practice to explore on the question of
self-employement in the South African context. I'd be interested in
Bologna's book for comparison.

Finally, I think the question of self-employment in a case like mine
(more 'First World'ish) - high wage, part time or contract work as a
computer programmer - needs to be linked to a study of consumer
credit, and the uses thereof from a workers point of view. I know
credit cards, car payments, house payments, etc. are a powerful means
of regularising my need for income - money needs to come in in a
more-or-less consistent way. In some ways, self-employment is an
effective strategy for me to the extent that I manage to operate
without recourse to consumer credit. Certainly this is the case for my
lower-waged friends. From living a year in the UK, where consumer
credit is way more prevalent than in South Africa, I've got a feeling
that such regular debt payments are a crucial part of the work
discipline of the temp workforce I got to know there.

Anyway, Steve, thanks for raising the question. Anyone else feel like
taking it up?

Peter
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