Solidarity Reindustrialization and the New Industry Brazil

07/11/2024

Science and Technology • Partners • Economy

By RENATO PEIXOTO DAGNINO*

A debate that can lead to a policy-making process that increases the effectiveness of New Industry Brazil

The objective is, taking as a reference the proposals of corporate reindustrialization and solidarity reindustrialization, to identify the convergences that can contribute to increasing the effectiveness of Nova Indústria Brasil (NIB).

The first formulation of the concept of solidarity reindustrialization was presented at a seminar promoted by the Center for Monitoring Public Policies for the Solidarity Economy of the Perseu Abramo Foundation (NAPP), at the Federal Chamber, in March 2022.

Speaking in sociotechnical terms, solidarity reindustrialization has three well-known historical references.

In the economic-social plan, the concept of “Industrious revolution” systematized by Vries (2009) to denote virtuous processes that preceded those with socioeconomically disruptive implications associated with the Industrial Revolution.

On the economic-productive level, the seminal experiences of organizing the work process in a self-managed manner by workers' collectives in times of capitalist crisis.

In the Brazilian reality, the path that has been underway for more than three decades has been to consolidate the Solidarity Economy, based on solidarity, collective ownership of the means of production and self-management.

Since then, continuing the work that had begun two years earlier, the NAPP team produced documents highlighting the differences and complementarities with the proposal that was then being formulated in other areas; and which it called corporate reindustrialization.

Following the publication by the Ministry of Development, Industry and Commerce, in February 2024, of Nova Indústria Brasil, which in several dimensions embodied that proposal, its differences and complementarities in relation to solidarity reindustrialization were addressed in articles that appeared in the left-wing media.

The debate is based on the perception that for New Industry Brazil to be able to face the challenges of our reindustrialization, and fulfill its role of driving public policies, it is necessary to identify the convergences between those two proposals.

The figure illustrates the content of the debate that is expected to take place.

To serve as an anchor for the participants, a comparative table was prepared that allows the characterization of each of them based on some attributes.

	Corporate Reindustrialization (RE)	Solidarity Reindustrialization (RS)
Macroeconomic objective	Job and salary generation in the company through inclusive capitalism	Job and income generation in alternative arrangements to Ecosol
“Macroeconomic inspiration”	Recent Asian catch-up trajectories	Counter-hegemonic experiences of associated work
Microeconomic objective	Production of goods and services intensive in “emerging technologies” in the global market in private companies	Production of industrial goods and services intensive in “solidarity technoscience” in Ecosol Networks
“Microeconomic inspiration”	Competitive companies promote income distribution and “emerging technologies” enable “transitions” (climate, energy, etc.)	Ecosol promotes self-sustainable production and “solidarity technoscience” guarantees “sustainability” to “transitions”
“Societal inspiration”	Competition between companies and people leverages competitiveness, equality and well-being	Solidarity, collective ownership of the means of production and self-management leverage Good Living
Focus	Mission-driven programs explored by companies	Opportunities opened by public procurement, and Ecosol's idle potential
State support and subsidy	Tax exemption, credit, support for R&D, stimulus to exports	Support for Ecosol's training, R&D and reorientation of state purchases
Reallocation of public procurement (18% of GDP)	Favoring “strategic” sectors that are intensive in emerging technologies	Growing participation (today tiny) of Ecosol; “with 0,5% of the BF GDP it was possible to lift 30 million out of poverty…”
Result in public accounts	Reduction in tax evasion (10% of GDP) and corruption	Smaller scale and greater transparency increase efficiency and effectiveness
Implications for workforce occupation	Increase in employees, protected by CLT (45 million), in the total of PIA (150 million)	Absorption of the 80 million who have never had or will have a job and the 50 who want what the CLT provides
Implications of social spending	Lower labor costs increase competitiveness and boost well-being	It acts directly on inclusion, promotes the decommodification of goods and services, and avoids privatization
Social spending synergy	More qualified and better paid workers boost competitiveness and growth	“The next Minha Casa Minha Vida must have aluminum windows produced by RS”
Productive course of action aiming at convergence	Identify within the scope of NIB's missions what can be done via RS Identify bankrupt companies that can be recovered	Identify what, from whom, for how much, and how the State purchases Identify which of them can be recovered by its workers
Bureaucratic-legal course of action	Identify elements of the legal framework that can be used in the RS	Mapping the “bureaucratic-legal rubble” that prevents public agents from purchasing from Ecosol
Political support	Shift of power from financial to productive capital	Shift of power from the owning class to the working class
Governance	Co-optation of the upper and middle classes increases governability	Awareness, mobilization, organization, participation and empowerment of the working class increases governability

The expectation is that the debate illustrated by the previous figure can lead to a policy development process that increases the effectiveness of the New Industry Brazil.

PS A debate on this subject will be held this Friday, November 08th, in the Auditorium of the Rectory of UnB, with the participation, among others, of Olgamir Amancia, Ricardo Neder, Renato Dagnino, José Dirceu, Ricardo Capelli, Gustavo Alves and José Luis Oreiro.

* Renato Dagnino He is a professor at the Department of Scientific and Technological Policy at Unicamp. Author, among other books, of Solidarity Technoscience, a strategic manual (anti-capital fights).