Working-class conditions and resistances in contexts of austerity in Argentina

Abstract

This chapter analyses the working-class characteristics in Argentina beginning with the conservative turn configured during the government of Mauricio Macri at the end of 2015, considering the conditions under which workers face the current crisis, intensified by the COVID-19 pandemic. In this sense, the points to highlight were wage depreciation, unemployment increase and flexibilization and precarization of labour conditions. These trends represent structural characteristics configured along the last quarter of the 20th century, unresolved during the Kirchnerist governments, and intensified by the austerity policies applied during Macri's administration. Within this framework, the COVID-19 pandemic has strengthened the pre-existing economic crisis, impacting even more on precarious working conditions and on the deterioration of working-class' living conditions. In this context, the research also focuses on the outstanding resistance experiences that arose. In these experiences non-traditional sectors, such as popular economy workers and women's movement, claimed with formal workers for a more combative strategy on the part of conservative trade unions and union confederations. The text is structured in four sections. Initially, the wage and employment conditions since 2015 are presented; second, the dynamics of labour and social conflict are analysed, considering both formal and informal workers and their different levels of representations; then the characteristics of collective bargaining as an expression of the balance of power between capital and labour is studied. Finally, in the conclusions, the research warns about the importance of union organization autonomous from the employers and the State to resist the current capitalist offensive and to prevent austerity from materializing into labour regulations and working-class life conditions.