Trade Unions and the Belo Horizonte Bank Workers Union Strike: Obstacles and Motivating Factors to the Movement for the Constitution of Class Consciousness

Abstract

In this article, the necessary and contingent class consciousness and the union organization are discussed as an obstacle and potentiating practice of the concrete movement of the constitution of the consciousness of the historical task of the workers. A study was carried out with bank workers during the strikes of 2013 and 2014. Interviews, systematic observations and documental analysis provided an opportunity for the formation of the empirical corpus that supports the analytical generalizations made. The interviews were conducted with members of Banco do Brasil and Caixa Econômica Federal and were carried out up to the point of saturation. The conditions that hinder the movement of class consciousness of the working class when they carry in themselves the potentiality of criticism and denial of the way in which labor consents to capital can be described in five large sets to be exposed and debated in the text. These determinations include union structure, bureaucratization, people management techniques, the strike simulation and the unsatisfactory achievements made in the face of real class demands.