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Keynesianism, Monetarism, and the Crisis of the State is perhaps Simon's greatest intellectual and political contribution. This article sets the book in the context of his teaching at Warwick and the development of his thought through Marx, Marginalism and Modern Sociology to the publication of Keynesianism. Building on his analysis of the ideological dimensions of classical political economy, Simon set himself the ambitious task of grasping the coherence and complexity of the relationship between economics, politics and ideology in the crisis-ridden development of capitalism. In so doing, he developed a work of immense significance fusing conceptual and empirical analysis to produce a devastating critique of social democracy, neoliberalism and reformism. Although read widely within Conference of Socialist Economists circles, Keynesianism has not achieved the recognition it clearly deserves. Post-Keynesianism, Simon extended his analysis to worker organisation in Russia and beyond. His theoretical and empirical work on capitalism in all its forms offers a unique and enduring contribution to everyone interested in socialism and the limits of reform. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Trade unions across a range of countries are engaging in a new environmental politics. This article considers emerging environmental politics among Australian unions who have sought to advance policy efforts to reduce carbon emissions and green jobs while minimizing the social impacts of a more carbon-constrained environment on jobs and regions. Against this background, this article seeks to advance a theory of union environmental politics by considering the organizational constraints unions operate within, their relationship with local communities and governments, and how they have sought to extend their capacities and organizational form through confederations and alliance-building with other actors. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Australia has been one of the world's leading proponents of privatisation. One of the key arguments about privatisation is that it would end the inefficient state monopoly of public services and reduce the power of public sector trade unions. Within a relatively short period of the privatisation of the energy and transport sectors in Victoria Australia, there was a reconsolidation of ownership which raised new challenges for the trade unions. After this phase, the main trade unions in these two sectors took steps to meet these new circumstances to renew and rebuild their structures and strengthen their capacity to challenge the new private oligopolies. Thus, paradoxically some unions were able to open up space to renew and rebuild in the post–privatisation world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The current circumstances of trade unions are subject to extensive debate. As a contribution to these debates, three sets of issues are addressed: how unions organize and operate in relation to members, how unions reposition and rebuild themselves against changing forms of ownership and different managerial practices, and how unions attempt to face the challenges of multinational capital. Unions have sought to renew and revitalize themselves by changing organizational practices or changing aims and ambitions, as well as by recomposing past relationships, especially between unions and state bodies. These themes are addressed via three case studies chosen to exemplify particular aspects of union organization and activity. The study concludes with a comparative evaluation of the three cases in terms of the principles of union renewal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Looks at state restructuring in Great Britain. Forms of state restructuring and its associated social values; Features of managerialism; Implications for labor; Challenges facing organized labor as a result of these developments.

Throughout the 1980s and into the 1990s, union membership declined massively, and many union leaderships lost their former eminence in the economic and political arenas. In an examination of recent developments in manufacturing and the restructured public sector, it is argued that unions face a set of problems, associated with economic restructuring, institutional reorganisation of the state sector and the uncertainties of internationalised economies. There has been a recomposition of power relations within the current political economy, so that even with diminished power and in more difficult circumstances, unions face new prospects and possibilities. The implications of these developments and the prospects for union renewal are reviewed with reference to the changing patterns of trade unionism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the increasing popularity of Neo-Liberalism in Australia. On August 19, 996, thousands of trade unionists and others stormed the Australian Parliament protesting against the Coalition Government's Workplace Relations Bill. This outbreak of anger might be thought to herald a reaction to heightened attacks on the Australian working class. The Coalition Government comprised a traditional conservative alliance between the Liberal Party and the rural-based National Party. While the Liberal Party promised change, there is a continuity of the core neo-liberal economic agenda. The philosophy and practice of Australian "Laborism" was erected in the early years of the twentieth century upon a tripod of "White Australia," conciliation and arbitration, and strong tariff barriers. According to the authors, a new political force has recently arisen in Australian politics which challenges the bipartisan trade orthodoxy. The advent of an Australian managerial state was part of a more wide-ranging restructuring in which control over strategic state assets has been transferred from the public to the private sector.

The article presents information on the workers' movement in Russia. The program of perestroika initiated with the election of Mikhail Gorbachev, general secretary of the Communist Party of Russia, in 1985 was essentially a program which sought to restructure production relations from above, unleashing a factional struggle within the ruling stratum which increasingly centred on the transformation of class relations. As this factional struggle polarized, each party sought to secure the support of the working class. Gorbachev himself initiated the process of working class mobilization in 1987. In the first stages this involved the attempt to provide incentives for the transformation of production relations, and to open new channels for workers' self-determination, but still within the limits of the old system of enterprise and ministerial direction. The failure to make headway led Gorbachev to call for a more active response from the workers, to sweep away managerial and ministerial resistance to reform, in 1989.