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On Rights and Duties
Challenges Confronting the Worker
By Avijit Pathak
In
recent times the nation has been debating on the culture of work that
prevails in different sites—government offices, factories, colleges and
hospitals. Because it has often been felt that we do not work honestly, we
escape from our responsibilities, and as a result, the nation suffers.
Perhaps the Supreme Court judgement that ‘government employees do not have
a legal or fundamental or equitable right to go on strike’ has given new
momentum to the debate. What is the meaning of work? Is it possible for the
worker to reconcile the discourse of rights with that of responsibilties?
Work,
it can be argued, is inseparable from our existence. Because it is through
the cultivation of physical and mental faculties that we relate to our
surroundings, and create conditions for our survival. It is this experience
of work that is reflected when a mother nurtures her child, a farmer
produces crops, or a teacher trains the younger generation. Indeed, work
makes us capable of deserving the right to survive. Work, livelihood and
social well-being ought to constitute a whole.
¨
This
general understanding is not, however, sufficiently adequate to comprehend
the deeper meaning the worker attaches to his or her work. In fact, there
are primarily three meanings that can be attached to work. First, work can
be seen as a vocation—an urge from within to engage oneself in a task that
is intrinsically fulfilling. Work becomes one’s swadharma. One cannot live
without it. This is the work of an artist when his or her creation is
unconditional. Or this is the work of a teacher when teaching emerges out of
his or her urge to share ideas and disseminate knowledge. In fact, no
pragmatic or instrumental scale can make sense of this kind of work—its
inherent creativity.
Second,
work can also be seen as a commitment to a higher social purpose that
transcends the worker. It is like working selflessly for the welfare of the
larger society—say, creating a socialist state, fulfilling a grand
nationalist agenda, or spreading the message of love to the poor. It
requires an extraordinarily high degree of motivation. It is the work of a
doctor who establishes a free dispensary in a working class colony. It is
the work of an engineer who evolves convivial tools for empowering the
public. Or it is the work of a missionary who establishes a school for the
tribal children.
And
third, work can also be seen as just an instrument that one sells in order
to earn one’s livelihood. It means a contract. “I have a skill. Let me
sell it. And you give me due wages.” It has nothing to do with one’s
vocation. It is devoid of a higher purpose. It is the work of a clerk/a bank
employee/ a factory worker who works in the allotted time, and earns money.
This sort of work can be equated with what Karl Marx would have regarded as
narrow/fragmented/alienated work. In modern capitalist societies it is the
destiny that awaits most of the workers.
When
work becomes merely a contract, alienates the worker from the higher social
purpose, the relationship between the worker and the employer becomes
tension-ridden: filled with suspicion and conflict. The employer wants
profit; the worker demands better wages. Ethical issues relating to mutual
cooperation and collective bondage become secondary. Everyone becomes
concerned with his/her own right. In fact, the history of the trade-union
movement or the determined struggle of the workers has to be situated in
this discourse of rights. ‘Workers of the world unite’ —an inspiration
of this kind has given them the right to fight against exploitation, and the
right to a decent living.
This
worker-friendly milieu is, however, changing. Globalisation and economic
liberalisation have created a new techno-managerial class that seeks to
replace the ‘politically conscious’ workers by a ‘skilled, efficient,
individualistic’ being working day and night for enhancing the
productivity of the corporation and thereby improving his career prospects.
Under these circumstances, the vision of ‘workers unity’ receives a
severe blow. Second, it is argued that in a country like ours the workers
engaged in organised sectors are a ‘privileged lot’, particularly if we
look at the plight of those who work in unorganised sectors. As a result,
when government employees, university professors or bank officers go on
strike, it loses accountability. No wonder, the media project it as an
‘irresponsible’ act. Possibly the Supreme Court judgement articulates
the mood of the changing times.
¨
Yes,
it is possible to argue that the Supreme Court judgement would enable the
workers to see beyond the discourse of rights, and think of their duties and
responsibilities. But then, as we have already indicated, the meaning of
work in the existing social system is such that it is devoid of a higher
purpose; it cannot see beyond the discourse of rights. In fact, if we are
really eager to regain the other experiences of work—work as an offering,
and work as a service to humankind—we need to alter the existing
work-milieu. The minimum condition that needs to be fulfilled is that the
asymmetry of power that prevails between the employer and the worker is
reduced. This requires effective engagement of the workers in the
decision-making process, and their share in the fruits of their work. In the
absence of these measures a legal ban on strike looks somewhat arbitrary.
But
then, it is equally important on the part of the workers to become more
experimental, imaginative and creative in their modes of protest. Let them
convey a new message: ‘See, I do not escape from my work, I do not want
you—poor peasants, slum-dwellers, riskshaw-pullers, old people—to suffer
for my protest. But I want you to listen to my grievances so that
collectively we can create a better world.’ Imagine a new style of protest
by, say, the employees of a government hospital. Instead of going on strike,
let the doctors, nurses and other employees serve the patients as honestly
as they can, and also mobilise them, and make them aware of their
plight—bad infrastructure, lack of medicine and shortage of
doctors—through street demonstrations, posters and groups meetings. It is
quite likely that the protest that reconciles rights and duties becomes more
communicative and hence effective.
Courtesy http://www.mainstreamweekly.com
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