Beyond and beneath the hierarchical market economy: Global production and working-class conflict in Argentina’s automobile industry

Abstract

This paper argues that the Hierarchical Market Economy (HME) category does not provide an adequate starting point for addressing capitalist diversity in Latin America. Building from a critical perspective on the Global Commodity Chain (GCC) and Global Production Network (GPN) approaches it will instead consider the impact of firms transnational relations and the often neglected role of working class struggles. It will argue that capitalist diversity can only be understood at the nexus of these ostensibly global and local phenomena. By specifying the strategic decisions taken by firms in Argentina s automobile industry, it will account for the failure of this sector. I will also examine the role of working class struggles in the industry in Córdoba, Argentina, arguing that these were vital in shaping the specific and unstable form of capitalist diversity in Argentina, as well as potential alternatives to it.

Rethinking Varieties of Capitalism from the Latin American Periphery

“…However, the debates, which VoC’s appearance on the scene has triggered, have similarly exposed a large number of flaws and omissions inherent in the approach and extending in many aspects to the entire global VoC-inspired research agenda (for a recent summary overview, see Bruff, Ebenau, and May 2015). The reasons for which these problems ensue, their empirical relevance, and their politico-intellectual consequences have been amply documented and discussed elsewhere (specifically, on the Latin American context, see Boschi 2011; Ebenau 2012; Fernández and Alfaro 2011; Fishwick 2014), and we do not intend to repeat these arguments here. Rather, with David Coates (2015: 24), we hold that now “[i]t is time for New Directions”: for the development of alternative perspectives on capitalist models that move beyond the shortcomings of conventional perspectives such as VoC, likely drawing in the best of critical institution-centered approaches and combining them with critical materialist theory.…”

“…Early on, the underestimation of the state or even its analytical dilution as “just another institution” (Schmidt 2007) has been pointed out, a criticism picked up by Latin American scholars in the (neo)developmentalist tradition (see, for example, Boschi 2011). More recently, the virtual absence of any serious treatment of organized labor has also been criticized as an omission (see, for example, Fishwick 2014).…”

La contribución teórica y la recepción global de "Dependencia y desarrollo en América Latina"

“…Interesantemente, y parecido a lo que ocurría en América Latina en la década de 1960, dichas teorías rápidamente dieron cabida a críticas que en gran parte se inspiraron en el trabajo de Cardoso y Faletto. De este modo, los académicos latinoamericanos han criticado el concepto de economías de mercado jerárquicas como un relato funcionalista y apolítico que ignora tanto los conflictos políticos internos como el modo en que América Latina se ha incorporado en relaciones capitalistas trasnacionales (Ebenau 2012;Fishwick 2014). Asimismo, académicos de Europa del Este han desafiado la noción de Economías de Mercado Dependientes precisamente por su sesgo tendiente a la estabilidad y por su excesivo énfasis en las limitaciones externas que reproducen su ventaja comparativa inicial.…”

Labour Control and Developmental State Theory: A New Perspective on Import‐substitution Industrialization in Latin America

“…Automobile production led this upturn, with Ford, General Motors, Citroën, Peugeot, Chrysler, Mercedes Benz and Fiat engaging in joint ventures or opening new subsidiaries (Fishwick, ; Nofal, ). To circumvent the challenges presented by the trade unions established after 1946, the sector was increasingly fragmented (Fishwick, ). Firms imported second‐hand technology (Guillen, : 4) and established factories at 10 to 15 per cent of the typical size (Katz and Kosacoff, : 54).…”