Political consciousness and political action of industrial workers in Ghana: a case study of Valco workers at Tema
What is the political consciousness of Ghanaian workers in large-scale foreign and state enterprises and what action have they engaged in? The present study, based on fieldwork in Ghana in 1975, attempts to answer these questions with regard to answer these questions with regard to industrial workers in a multi-national corporation at Tema, Valco (Volta Aluminium Company). Notes, ref., tab.
The Political Potential of African Urban Workers
RESUMELa classe ouvriere a, l'hisioire le demontre, joue un role important lorsqu'il s'est agi d'encourager a la fois les reformes sociales et la revolution dans les pays industrialises. Peut-on s'attendre a ce que les travailleurs urbains jouent un role analogue en Afrique tropicale etant donne les caracteristiques bien differentes du capitalisme peripherique? Les partisans de la theorie de l’ « aristocratie ouvriere » diraient que non. Mais cette theorie n'est pas seulement vague sur le plan abstrait et faible sur le plan pratique en ce qui concerne l'emploi pour l'ensemble des travailleurs en Afrique tropicale, elle est aussi simpliste de par son grossier materialisme. Alors que l’ « economisme » s'avere une tendance generale parmi les mouvements ouvriers des villes, certains segments en sont venus a une conception sinon revolutionnaire, du moins « populiste » qui transcende l'econo- misme. Certains des facteurs de politisation qui favorisent chez les travailleurs une mentalite populiste et partisane d...
Labour Protest Activity in Sierra Leone during the Early Part of the Twentieth Century
Wage employment on any scale on a more or less continuous basis had developed in Sierra Leone by the latter half of the nineteenth century.1 This growth inevitably made demands upon the Colonial Administration for effective recruitment, supervision and control of the emerging wage labour force. Since little difficulty was experienced in recruitment of labour, primarily for construction work in Freetown, government attention from the late 1800s focused upon supervision and control of wage labour. During the first decades of the present century disturbances, often in the form of worker strike action, drew the attention of government officials. Reaction to such disturbances w7as usually suppressive. Not until the late 1920s and the following decade was the adminis tration persuaded to experiment w7ith a more liberal policy. The con ventions of the International Labour Office and the increased concern of the British Colonial Office for labour matters throughout the Commonwealth generated pressures on the Sierra Leone Government to adopt a new course. Complementing this outside pressure were internal developments in the form of labour protest demonstrations, fast-growing wage employment in the mining industry, and the emer gence by the late 1930s of the Sierra Leone Youth League, an outspoken, nationalistic political group. In this paper, the focus will be on the nature of these internal forces for change and the reaction to them on the part of the Colonial Administration and the British Colonial Office. The time period will cover primarily the inter-war years. During this period three forms of urban-based protest can be defined and each related to a given combination of economic, social and political currents.2 The sequence of movements progresses from the mass demonstration of popular unrest throughout the country which came shortly after World War I. The cause of the disturbances was primarily economic and it followed in the wake of the 1919 strike by daily-paid railway workers. The second important protest movement was the 1926 strike among all grades of the African staff in the Railway Department. Both the nature of this protest form and the cause of the strike provided marked contrasts with the 1919 disturbances. For example, the growth of the Railway Workers' Union during the early 1920s gave the strike an