Recuperated Enterprises in Argentina: Reversing the Logic of Capitalism

by Marie Trigona
Mar 17
Argentina’s worker-run factories are setting an example for workers around the world that employees can run a business even better without a boss or owner. Some 180 recuperated enterprises up and running, providing jobs for more than 10,000 Argentine workers. The new phenomenon of employees taking over their workplace began in 2000 and heightened as Argentina faced its worst economic crisis ever in 2001. Nationwide, thousands of factories have closed and millions of jobs have been lost in recent years. Despite challenges, Argentina’s recuperated factory movement have created jobs, formed a broad network of mutual support among the worker-run workplaces and generated community projects.
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Representatives from worker-controlled factories and businesses from Argentina, Uruguay, Venezuela, and Brazil organized the First Latin American Congress on Recuperated Enterprises October 28 and 29, 2005 in Caracas to build coordinated strategies against government attacks and dog-eat-dog markets. Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez inaugurated the event with more than 1,000 self-managed workers present who are putting into practice the slogan: Occupy, Resist, and Produce. The Congress served as an initiative to build an economic and mutual support network among the some 300 businesses and factories currently run by worker self-management in Latin America.

Late this year, the Venezuelan government passed a number of legal decrees expropriating abandoned factories for workers to start up production. During the Congress, Chávez signed a decree for the expropriation of two factories. Recuperated enterprises in other countries look to Venezuela as a model for state-supported laws in favor of worker expropriation.

Many of the employee-run companies had the expectation of signing trade agreements and technological exchange accords during the congress. President Chávez promised to provide support to recuperated enterprises in the form of low-interest loans and bilateral cooperative agreements. However, months after the Congress many of the government-supported initiatives have been delayed or forgotten.

The agreements between recuperated enterprises have had the most concrete impact. Even in the case of Venezuela, Latin America’s recuperated factories have had to learn that workers can’t rely on the state to move a business forward. The occupied factories and enterprises are proving that they are organizing to develop strategies in defense of Latin American workers susceptible to factory closures and poor working conditions. While these experiences are forced to co-exist within the capitalist market they are forming new visions for a new working culture. The experiences of worker self-management and organization have directly challenged the capitalist structures by questioning private property, taking back workers’ knowledge, and organizing production for objectives other than profits.

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