Interrogations - anno VI - n. 17-18 - giugno 1979

tuates inequality. As a consequence of this technical division the private ownership of power continues its existence despite the fact that in the technologically advanced countries the private ownership of the means of production has disappeared (or is heading towards exitinction): whoever gives the orders has power and whoever carries them out is excluded from power. Surplus value, extracted by the holders of decision-making positions from those who carry out the orders, is no longer related to labour or its produce, but to the availability of choice, of creativity, intellectual enrichment linked to the monopolistic exercise of these functions by a minority. The main objective must be, therefore, not so much the overthrow of private property, as much as of the socia! and technical division of labour, because there lies the root of inequality. The path we must follow is that of the maximum possible automation of the productive processes and of the distribution of the human labour which remains amongst all the active members of society, in an egalitarian manner: the transformation therefore of the socia! and technical division of labour through the socially egalitarian distribution of work itself. Self-management is a dependent variable of such a socially egalitarian distribution. In its absence the separate instances of self-management merely become « concessions » by the hòlders of decision making power, deprived of any possibility of achieving social transformation. MEISTER - In this article the term « self-management » is used to signify the collective management, by all the personnel of an enterprise, of the activities of the enterprise itself, forward planning, execution, contro!, etc. The application of « self-management » in countries with planned socialist economies (Yugoslavia, Algeria) has given rise to what is defined as « autogestion », whilst in those with economies of a « free market » type it has produced so-called « cooperativism ». As regards the first case the author notes that the existence of a (more ox:less binding) pian which lays down economie objectives which bave to be attained, limits de facto even the organizational autonomy of the enterprises and hence diminishes the possibilities of the initiation of real « self-management ». In Yugoslavia and in Algeria, in fact, observation show that autogestion is, in reality, a rneans for bringing about the integration of the rnasses with the objectives of the ruling class and does not have as its goal « self-rnanagement » in and for itself. In the « free market » states, on the other band, the Jack of binding planning allows enterprises alrnost tota] autonorny. But the praticai experiences of « co-operatives » is that whilst they can achieve alrnost total internal « self-rnanagernent », they are incapable of contributing to the transforrnation of circurnarnbient reality along the same lines: greater internal « democracy », attained by the practice of « selfrnanagernent » rernains circumscribed within the limited environment of the enterprise. In the field of education analogous problerns are encountered. At the leve! of school teaching the existence of a national pian (leaving aside certain structural characteristics) lirnits the possibilities of autonorny and hence of « self-management » de facto. In the field of post-school education (professional training, adult education, etc., defi234

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