Modern times, ancient hours : working lives in the twenty-first century

296 Pages·2003·11.294 MB·English

by  Pietro Basso, Giacomo Donis

M
S
MODERN TIMES, ANCIENT HOURS
Working Lives in the Twenty-first Century
PIETRO BASSO
Translated and edited by Giacomo Donis
$27/£19/$40CAN
It is a commonly expressed view that the sickness
of our society is unemployment. Less frequently
argued is the fact that this same society is
suffering from overwork. And less frequently still
that in our capitalist market society the two
sicknesses, unemployment and overwork, feed off
one another and jointly attack the working classes
of the world.
Pietro Basso's thesis is that the average working
time of wage labourers is now more intense, fast-
paced, “flexible" and longer than at any time in
recent history. This is true, he argues, not only in
industry and agriculture, but also, and particularly,
in "services". It is also increasingly true for all
Western countries and not just the USA. The
introduction of the thirty-five-hour working week
in France notwithstanding, all the signs of a
creeping deterioration in the working lives of
millions of people are evident: a reduction in the
purchasing power of wages, the mass downsizing
of corporations, the continual erosion of company
and state-ensured benefits, and the availability of
much cheaper labour from Latin America, Asia,
Africa and eastern Europe.
Modern Times, Ancient Hours combines a
theoretical explanation of the causes of this
“paradoxical" evolution of working hours with an
impressively broad range of empirical
documentation, making the book a highly
significant and timely contribution to the study of
the way in which most people’s working lives are
now lived. The book also reminds us that the
human aspiration to do work that does not break
the body or the spirit is universal and deep-rooted.
Workers will rise, Basso argues, if they continue to
be pushed beyond their limits.

Modern Times, Ancient Hours
V

Modern Times, Ancient Hours
Working Lives in the Twenty-first Century
PIETRO BASSO
Edited and translated
by Giacomo Donis
V
VERSO
London • New York
ALEXANDRIA LIBRARY
ALEXANDRIA. VA 22304
First published as Tempi moderni, orari antichi by FrancoAngeli 1998
© Pietro Basso 1998
Updated and expanded edition first published by Verso 2003
©Verso 2003
All rights reserved
The moral right of the author has been asserted
Verso
UK: 6 Meard Street, London wif oeg
USA: 180 Varick Street, New York, NY 10014-4606
Verso is the imprint of New Left Books
isbn 1-85984-565-7
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress
Designed and typeset in Monotype Bembo by Illuminati, Grosmont
Printed by R.R. Donnelley & Sons, USA
Contents
Introduction
1 The Question of Working Hours
2 Long-term Trends 1945-89
Keynes’s Prophecy • The Harsh Response of History •
The Situation in the United States and Japan • The Situation
in Europe • The Lengthening and Restructuring of Hours,
after the Crisis of 1974-75 * Technical Progress, Profit,
Working Time
3 The Confirmation of the 1990s
The Diffusion ofToyotaism • The Diffusion of Variable Hours •
The Diffusion of Shiftwork • The Diffusion of Neoliberal Policies •
(Official) Hours and Labour Productivity
4 A Reply to Some Objections
The Numbers, Today and Yesterday • The Driving Force of
the Reduction of Hours • Contradictions in the Calculation
of Working Time • A Return to the Nineteenth Century? •
The Presumed Disneyland of ‘Services’ * The Presumed Difference
of Europe • The Presumed Cure-all of Part-time Work • Quantity
and Quality
Appendix a Second European Survey on Working
Conditions 140
Appendix b Vietnam: 24-hour Continuous Shifts 147
5 Towards the 35- or the 45-hour Week? 150
The German Case • The French Case • The Italian Case
6 Modern Times, Ancient Hours: An Enigma? 183
I. Theses of Neoliberalism 183
II. First Elements of a Critical Analysis 192
Social Labour, Private Appropriation • Capitalism, Production
for Profit • Profit, Unpaid Working Time • The Capitalist
Use of Science and Technology • The Paradox of Labour
Productivity • Globalization and Working Hours
Notes 217
Index 265