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The Concept of ‘Working People’

In: Labour Questions in the Global South

Author

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  • Issa G. Shivji

    (University of Dar es Salaam)

Abstract

This chapter interrogates the concept of ‘working people’. Lenin and other classical Marxists commonly used terms like labouring people, working people, or rural poor. Typically, they were used as descriptive, or, at best, as terms of political art rather than theoretical science. The inspiration in this article for the use of the term ‘working people’ comes from Walter Rodney. Building on previous work, the article relates the concept of working people to a modified definition of primitive accumulation under neo-liberalism, that is, as a process of surplus extraction by capital based on expropriation of a part of necessary consumption of the producer. It is argued that this is the material basis common to all sectors of what is here understood as working people.

Suggested Citation

  • Issa G. Shivji, 2021. "The Concept of ‘Working People’," Springer Books, in: Praveen Jha & Walter Chambati & Lyn Ossome (ed.), Labour Questions in the Global South, chapter 0, pages 49-62, Springer.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:sprchp:978-981-33-4635-2_3
    DOI: 10.1007/978-981-33-4635-2_3
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