The forms of organization and association of recuperated enterprises’ workers in Argentina (2000-2015).

Abstract

In general terms, worker-recuperated enterprises are based on associative work and joint ownership of the means of production, which is why they constitute productive forms not based on salaried relationships. In these enterprises, work is organized upon more horizontal and flexible patterns, and workers’ participation and subjectivity acquire relevance. The objective of this article is to describe the forms of organization and association that these workers without boss, at a supra-productive unit level, integrate and/or create to achieve a multiplicity of objectives. The methodological design is of a qualitative type and triangulates a series of research techniques: interviews with key informants, analysis of documents and bibliography, and systematic research and analysis of journalistic articles on collective actions carried out by organizations linked to the process of worker-recuperated enterprises. It is observed that while, at first, these workers create social organizations that integrate a social movement, with the stabilization of the process, the movement tends to fragment and leads to cooperative convergence in organizations of second and third degree, union approach, and the formation of cluster networks. Towards the end of the period, an incipient revitalization of the worker-recuperated enterprises’ movement is observed.