Zombezia (1991), XVIII (i).AN EVALUATION OF WORKERS' REALPARTICIPATION IN DECISION-MAKINGAT ENTERPRISE LEVELDOROTHY MUTIZWA-MANGIZADepartment of Sociology, University of ZimbabweIN 1980 WORKERS' participation in decision-making was introduced in linewith government's desire to create a 'democratic, egalitarian and socialistsociety' (Zimbabwe, 1981a). Workers' participation organs, in the form ofworkers' committees and works councils, were to be established 'at theworkplace and the shopfloor and in all government and parastataloperations and in private activities' (Zimbabwe, 1982). The governmentexpressed its intention that workers' participation would develop intoworker self-management. By mid-1981 the Riddell Commission found thatmost medium- and large-sized enterprises had established workers'committees (Zimbabwe, 1981b).Ten years later the workers' participation organs are still in place butlittle progress has been made towards worker self-management. No incre-mental changes have been effected to the workers' participation organs togive workers a more meaningful role in decision-making at enterpriselevel. Thus instead of workers' participation organs leading the trans-formation to worker self-management, they are now supplementing weaktrade unions. The government is now fully committed to collective bar-gaining within a tripartite system, even though the socialist rhetoric is stillheard now and again. No workers' committees have been established forcivil servants.This article analyses the efficacy of workers' participation in decision-making at enterprise level through a case study in 1988 of the sameparastatal as that studied by Shadur slightly earlier. I attempt to explainwhy there has been no progress towards more effective workers' partici-pation. In order to attain this goal, purposive sampling was carried out toensure representation of all categories and grades of workers. A sample of75 workers was chosen, comprising 38 ordinary workers, 18 members ofthe workers' committee, 6 members of senior management, 2 controllersand 8 supervisors. Two questionnaire schedules were used, one for workersand another for management. In-depth interviews were also held withmembers of the personnel department, the chairman of the workers'committee, some heads of departments and skilled workers, and with thehead of the Industrial Relations Department of the United Food and AlliedWorkers Union (UFAWU), to which the workers in this organization were3536 WORKERS' REAL PARTICIPATION IN DECISION-MAKINGaffiliated by 1988.1 also attended two meetings of the workers' committeeand undertook a content analysis of all the minutes of the workers'committee and works council meetings since November 1981. 'Parastatal's'Trade Employment Regulations and Grievance Procedures were alsocarefully studied.The aim of the study was to examine the extent to which thegovernment's objectives in introducing workers' participation have beenrealized. More specifically, the study attempted to assess the workers'participation organs' ability to bring about better worker-managementcommunication, increased productivity, effective handling of grievances,industrial peace and industrial democracy. Nangati (1987), in a similarstudy carried out in this country, concluded that private ownership of theorganization, among other things, was a major obstacle to worker partici-pation. Maphosa (1985) concluded that the existence of the CompaniesAct (Chapter 190) makes ownership and control synonymous. Makanya(1987) argued that private capital tends to be authoritarian and intransigentin its relations with workers. A parastatal corporation was therefore chosento find out how government's policy would be implemented in its ownbackyard, where there are no obstacles of private ownership. It wasassumed that a government committed to socialism would want its para-statals to set an example in personnel practice. (Countries like Malta andIndia introduced workers' participation into parastatals first, to avertopposition from the private sector.) The study hypothesized that workers'participation in the parastatal in question would lead to industrial peacebut not democracy. The responsiveness of parastatal management togovernment directives would contribute mainly to good worker-manage-ment relations.The efficacy of workers' participation is largely determined by thelevel, scope and degree of participation allowed by the participation organsŠ i.e. implementation of policies should result from workers' influencerather than managerial goodwill. Workers' participation in Zimbabwe islimited to the shop-floor. It is concerned with trivial welfare issues ratherthan important ones such as personnel, wages, production, technology,etc. The degree of influence granted to workers is only consultative, notco-determination or worker self-management. Workers have no right toinformation and they have no veto power.Stevens (1980) states that workers' participation structures can havea transformative or integrative function. Those with a transformativefunction facilitate the gradual transfer of power from owners to workersuntil the achievement of worker self-management, in which workers havefull control of the decision-making process at enterprise level. Workers'participation that has an integrative effect facilitates acceptance of theexisting system by the workers. An examination of the workers' partici-DOROTHY MUTIZWA-MANGIZA 37pation organs in Zimbabwe shows that they lead to integration of theworkers into the existing system, because they do not allow any meaningfulparticipation of workers in decision-making at enterprise level, even thoughthe Transitional National Development Plan (Zimbabwe 1982) presentedworkers' committees as one of the means of transformation from capitalistto socialist relations of production. In spite of government's announcedcommitment to transformation to socialism, the worker's participationorgans that were provided were more concerned with the realization ofindustrial peace and productivity rather than with democratization of thedecision-making process at enterprise level.THE ORGANIZATION OF PARASTATAL IN 1988Parastatal was formed in 1952 as a state trading corporation, and is todayboth a business and a development organ of government policy. Parastatalfalls under the direct control of the Agricultural Marketing Authority(AMA). At the time that the research was carried out, the now-defunctParastatals Commission was still in operation. Its duties included theappointment of members to boards of parastatals, as well as generalmanagers and their deputies, and the general control and supervision ofpersonnel issues in all parastatals. The chain of command, as Shadur hasalready indicated, is quite long. At Parastatal, it started with the CabinetCommittee on Parastatals and went down through the short-lived Para-statals Commission, which dealt with personnel issues, through the Ministryof Agriculture, which set selling and buying prices, through the AgriculturalMarketing Authority, which controlled capital expenditure, through theAMA Committee which dealt specifically with this industry, to the generalmanager of Parastatal, his deputy general managers, assistant generalmanagers and regional managers.This lengthy chain of command had serious implications for workers'participation in decision-making, since different decisions were made atdifferent levels. Before the establishment of the Parastatals Commission,all personnel decisions were made by the AMA, which also controlled thecapital budget. Overall authority lay with the Cabinet Committee onParastatals. The pricing of Parastatals' products was determined by theMinistry of Agriculture. Workers participated in decision-making only atregional level: they met only with the regional manager or hisrepresentatives. But the regional manager was only an executant ofdecisions made elsewhere. The important question, then, is: to whatextent could workers influence decision-making in their workplace whendecisions were made several rungs above the highest level at which theycould operate (i.e. in the works council)?38 WORKERS' REAL PARTICIPATION IN DECISION-MAKINGWORKERS' PARTICIPATION STRUCTURESWorkers at Parastatal participated in decision-making in several forums.The workers' committee and the works council were established in 1980.There were also two suggestion boxes strategically placed in the canteen,one for general issues and another for occupational safety. Workers atParastatal were also represented at the National EmploymentRepresentative Meeting, which consisted of the workers' committee chair-men of the six separate processing plants. They met up to three times ayear, with expenses met by Parastatal, to discuss issues common to all sixplants. The six workers' committee chairmen also attended an annualconference, usually held at one of the tourist resorts (e.g. Nyanga), atwhich regional and general management discussed annual plans and anyprojects in the pipeline. The workers' committee chairman at the Harareplant also attended Friday management meetings. On the surface, then, itappears that Parastatals' workers had many opportunities for participationand access to considerable information, but, in most cases, this informationconcerned decisions that had already been taken.The structural limits to participation through the workers' committeesand works councils have already been discussed. At the Harare processingplant workers were allowed to raise any issues pertaining to their welfareand the operations of the organization. An analysis of the minutes showsthat workers' committees asked for annual bonuses, protective clothingfor certain categories, a pension scheme, medical aid, overtime pay, actingallowances, regular working hours, a canteen, the introduction of long-service awards, an increase in the number of leave days, the abolition oftwo separate conditions of service (for established and non-establishedworkers), wage increases, and so on. These demands were raised in theworks council, and management representatives patiently listened andassured the workers that, as decisions were made elsewhere, regionalmanagement would forward their demands to the relevant authorities.Most of these demands were, in fact, later implemented. But what wasnotable about proceedings in the works council was that management didnot remind workers' representatives that their demands were outside thejurisdiction of the participation organ, as provided for by the workers'committee guidelines, as was the case in the organizations studied byMaphosa (1985) and Makanya (1987). Most of the time, however, theworkers' committee dealt with complaints about acting allowances, jobgrading, disciplinary cases, etc.The workers' committee chairmen at Parastatal often ended theirmeetings by asking representatives to encourage workers to work harderand refrain from indiscipline. Though relations in the works council werecordial, the workers actually had no more power to force the implemen-DOROTHY MUTIZWA-MANGIZA 39tation of their demands than workers in other organizations did. In otherwords, workers' participation remained consultative. They had no right toinformation (though it was given to them, mostly after the decisions hadalready been made). They had no veto power. The suggestion boxespresented even less opportunity for meaningful participation than theworkers' committees and councils. Workers could make demands orexpress their dissatisfaction in these ways but it was up to managementwhether to respond or not. In fact, the benefit to management was greaterthan to workers, because management got to know workers' feelings andproblems through this one-way communication. The only advantage toworkers was that a management keen to improve industrial relations andworker morale might decide to take note of workers' demands and actupon them.Workers' representatives at Parastatal did negotiate wage increasesin the earlier absence of a trade union in the organization. Agreementswere reached but were overtaken by national wage increments as a resultof the onerous decision-making process within the parastatal. The longbureaucratic ladder proved an obstacle to worker participation.The presence of the workers' representatives at the annual conferencewas more a goodwill gesture on the part of management than anythingelse. Delegates at the meeting discussed plans that had already beenmade. Information is power, and the week-long annual conference couldcertainly have benefited workers had they been able to understand theproceedings. As it was, workers' representatives stated that most of theissues discussed were well beyond their comprehension, except fordiscussion on personnel and other welfare issues, so they did not attendmost of the sessions because they found them too technical yet theycontinued to be invited. The calibre of the workers' representatives (asMaphosa also notes in this volume) was, therefore, a hindrance toparticipation. None of these representatives had more than eight years ofeducation (i.e. Standard Six).Participation at the weekly management meetings, to which theworkers' committee chairman had access, was also hindered by his inabilityto comprehend the proceedings, which he described as highly technical.To that extent, workers' participation in these meetings was again a goodwillgesture by management, of which workers were not able to take advantage.Workers' representatives at Parastatal also participated in the job-evaluation exercise. Again, this was pseudo-participation. Paterson (1972)recommends that workers' representatives be present during job evaluationso that they can explain queries to workers; in other words, workers'representatives are used to sell the controversial results to workers.Because of their participation in the exercise, which they do not fullyunderstand themselves, they have to abide by the results and encourage40 WORKERS' REAL PARTICIPATION IN DECISION-MAKINGother workers to accept them as well. The popularity of a workers'committee often depends on the workers' reaction to job-grading exercises,for participation in this forum benefits management more than workerssince workers' representatives do management's work for it by 'selling'the unpopular job-grading to workers.WORKERS' PARTICIPATION IN PRACTICEAs stated earlier, one of the main objectives of this study was to examinethe extent to which workers' participation had actually brought aboutindustrial democracy, better communication between workers and manage-ment, an improvement in worker-management relations (industrial peace),higher productivity and an effective grievance-settling machinery. I shallnow examine my detailed findings on each of these aspects in turn.Industrial democracyMany changes have taken place at Parastatal since Independence. Bothordinary workers and members of the Harare workers' committee attributedthese changes to the efforts of the workers' committee. The changesincluded: the standardization of regular working hours; the provision ofprotective clothing; acting allowances; overtime payments; formal jobevaluation; the adoption of formal grievance and disciplinary procedures;bonus payments; the building of new canteen; an increase in leave daysfor non-established staff; an end to abrupt dismissals; a pension scheme;medical aid cover; and a base wage for commission workers. These changeshave greatly improved the lot of workers. But, despite the popular view,the implementation of these workers' demands was not really a result ofthe workers' participation in decision-making since they had (and stillhave) only consultative competence.What appears to have happened is that the workers' demandscoincided with the decision to rationalize and humanize personnel policiesin keeping with the new political climate. If the AMA had not decided toimplement these changes, not even Parastatal's management could havedone much about it as they cannot effect such major changes. Thus thereal credit should go to the AMA, rather than to either management or,least of all, Parastatal's workers' committees. While the central workers'committee did raise these issues with management, if an inflexible andunresponsive management had refused to listen, the workers would nothave been able to force the implementation of their demands without thepower to do so. Most workers, however, were not conscious of this fact.They were of the opinion that an aggressive and dynamic workers'committee chairman could force the implementation of workers' demands.Workers were consulted and management certainly allowed them to makeDOROTHY MUTIZWA-MANGIZA 41suggestions, but the ultimate decision lay beyond management, though asa state corporation it had to be seen to be doing away with obvious racistand exploitative tendencies. Management was aware that improvementswere necessary for good worker-management relations and increasedproductivity. The workers' committee, no matter how dynamic, had onlyconsultative powers and management was not obliged to implementworkers' demands.In reality, workers' influence has remained minimal and confined totrivial issues. Workers' participation at Parastatal was no more meaningfulthan in other, privately-owned organizations precisely because of thedegree of control specified by the state in the worker participation organs.Parastatal's workers' committees were operating in a relatively friendlyatmosphere, and certainly had access to a lot of information which workerselsewhere might not have been privy to, but they could not use it to besteffect because of the low level of education among the workers'representatives. So my conclusion is that there was effectively no industrialdemocracy at Parastatal. The long, state-bureaucratic chain of commandeffectively removed decision-making from any forum in which the workersactually participated.These workers' participation organs also afforded participation indecision-making only to the unskilled and semi-skilled portion of theworkforce and excluded skilled, clerical, secretarial and supervisoryworkers. Their grievances could be dealt with by the workers' committeebut they had no input into its day-to-day operations. Until 1986, the policyof ParastataJ had been that these workers could not join the workers'committee. In 1986 a memorandum from the head office specified that anyworkers who were not in managerial positions or who were not secretarialstaff handling confidential material could join the workers' committee; allother workers could stand for election to the workers' committee. But thisinformation had not been relayed to workers up to 1988, when this researchwas carried out. However, the committee itself allowed only unskilled andsemi-skilled workers to vote for or be voted on to the committee. This wasmost unfortunate indeed, for those who were excluded would have beenin a better position to use the information provided and to challenge someof the decisions and might thus have been able to participate moremeaningfully.My conclusion regarding industrial democracy, then, is that theparticipatory organs had, in fact, played a divisive role among the work-force, which benefited management's interests. Moreover, the ease withwhich management manipulated and co-opted members of the workers'committee (detailed later, under Worker-Management Relations) alsoexplains why management was strongly opposed to trade unionism withinParastatal. In negotiations with a trade union some of the representatives42 WORKERS' REAL PARTICIPATION IN DECISION-MAKINGwould have been outsiders who could not have been bought off usinginternal resources, in the way that some members of the workers' committeeswere, in order to limit the extent of workers' real participation.Communication between workers and managementAt the Harare plant, the workers' participation organs certainly provided achannel for communication between management and workers. The workscouncil met every month. Workers' committee chairmen attended theweekly management meetings. The chairman of the workers' committeealso had access to the general manager at the annual conference. In anycase, the regional manager had an open-door policy where workers'committee members were concerned. Members of the workers' committeesdid not need to make an appointment to see him if they needed to. Bothworkers and management agreed that the workers' committee provided achannel for easy access to management, but this applied only to the lower-paid sections of the workforce, the non-established workers, as notedearlier. In most cases, the skilled, supervisory, secretarial and clerical workerswent to the workers' committee only to complain about their subordinates,not with their own grievances. The workers' committee was not seen asproviding these groups with a channel for communication with management.The groups that were excluded were dissatisfied because they couldnot air their grievances through the workers' committee. The establishedworkers stated that they liked the idea of a workers' committee, but theypreferred sectional representation, otherwise they would not stand achance at elections since they were a minority. They also felt that thecalibre of the workers' committee members was not sufficient to articulatetheir problems. The skilled workers in particular had no mouthpiecethrough which to articulate their dissatisfaction with management. Theydid not even belong to a trade union and stated that they were veryvulnerable to the individual whims of their immediate bosses who coulddemote them or deny them promotion.As a special category of skilled workers, supervisors were especiallybitter and dissatisfied because they heard of organization plans from theirsubordinates on the shop-floor who were on the workers' committee andattended either the works council or the weekly management meetings.They pointed out that workers were confined to a small task on the shop-floor while management were locked up in their offices. Supervisors, theyinsisted, were the only ones with an overview of the whole organization,yet no one wanted to hear their views. The supervisors' denigration ofworkers' participation organs was to be expected because they lost themost from the establishment of the workers' committees and felt thattheir positions were being subordinated to those of the workers' represen-tatives. Skilled workers and supervisors had formed their own staffDOROTHY MUTIZWA-MANGIZA 43association, but this did not survive as it was not provided for by law. Inany case, management concentrated on the workers' committee.My assessment, then, of the effectiveness of the workers' participationorgans in providing a channel of communication between workers andmanagement at Parastatal is that they were very effective but only forcertain levels of workers: those who were most likely to strike and whosewithdrawal of labour was likely to hit the enterprise hardest. The type ofworkers' participation organs provided, enabled workers to overlook theimbalance of power between themselves and management, giving asemblance of equality where there was none. Provision of such organs ofworkers' participation represents a typically ameliorative 'human relations'approach which believes that conflict is a result of poor communication.In fact, the name 'liaison committee' (by which workers' committees wereinitially called by the then Minister of Labour, Manpower Planning andSocial Welfare) should have been maintained, as it is more consistent withtheir functions.Worker-management relationsBoth workers and management at Parastatal stated that their relationswere good. Those few workers who stated that worker-managementrelations were bad had just been downgraded in a recent job-evaluationexercise. All the workers interviewed stated that relations were certainlymuch better than before Independence. They stated that they regardedthe organization as a good employer compared to others in the privatesector. However, relations between skilled workers and the rank and filewere not very good. Unskilled workers expressed the view that most oftheir problems were caused by the skilled people under whom they workedand for that reason they opposed their inclusion in the workers' com-mittee. That workers' participation had brought about good worker-management relations is shown by the fact that there had not been astrike or threat of one since 1981, even though these workers had been thefirst to strike after Independence. Judging from the minutes of the workscouncil which were analysed, these meetings were characterized by mutualrespect between the two sides.Shadur (this volume) attributes these good relations to the workers'committee and the realization by workers that government would notsupport them in a fight against management. My study, in contrast,attributes the good worker-management relations to a number of differentreasons. Firstly, the workers and regional management did not have muchto fight over as all important decisions were made elsewhere. All potentiallycontentious decisions of any importance were made outside the enterpriseand workers were well aware of this. When the workers met managementwith demands, management was very understanding and sympathetic and44 WORKERS1 REAL PARTICIPATION IN DECISION-MAKINGworkers understood that management at enterprise level was almost aspowerless as they themselves were. A former chairman of the workers'committee stated that initially he had been really 'hot' and had thoughtthat he could force the implementation of workers' demands, but he hadlater realized that he was not given the power to do so by the workers'committee guidelines which were later embedded in the Labour RelationsAct. He said that he had realized that implementation depended on thegoodwill of management and so he had set out to cultivate good relationsand had concluded that management in the enterprise was receptive toreasonable demands. Ironically, he was voted off the workers' committeeby workers who felt that he had sold out to management.Secondly, worker-management relations were good because themembers of the workers' committee were not sufficiently knowledgeable,to question those decisions that were taken by regional management,such as the acceptance of annual plans and other financial and technicaldecisions. The workers' committee members were also unable to under-stand many of the technical and financial issues, thus lessening the risk ofacrimony. But, in addition, management had manipulated this situation bydeliberately keeping secret its own memorandum allowing other, moreeducated workers to join the workers' committee. For example, skilledworkers and supervisors wanted to know the criteria used for grantingpersonal loans. They stated that some people had been given these loansseveral times yet other applications were consistently rejected. This issuewas not raised by the existing workers' committee representatives becauseat their job level they did not qualify for such loans and many therefore didnot appreciate the other workers' grievance. This issue was one thatmanagement could noi have ducked because such decisions were made atenterprise level. This denial of a forum to knowledgeable, established workersthus helped to suppress potential conflict.Thirdly, managers had also co-opted the workers' committee membersthrough contrived personal contact. Senior management at Parastatal hadinvited some of these workers' representatives to their homes at weekends.One former workers' committee chairman nostalgically recalled how aformer general manager had often invited him and the secretary of theworkers' committee to his house at weekends for a whisky. None of theother levels of workers were so privileged. Workers' committee membersalso attended the annual Christmas party without paying while everyoneelse, including the regional manager, paid. The invitation to the touristresort for the annual conference for a whole week was also intended topromote goodwill, and (as 1 have already indicated) did not require on theworkers' full attendance at all sessions.Fourthly, as Shadur (this volume) also notes, two outspoken workers'committee chairmen had in the past been promoted to Parastatal'sDOROTHY MUTIZWA-MANGIZA 45personnel department. Paradoxically, these examples encouraged otherworkers' committee members to be less vocal so that they might also bepromoted. During the course of this research, the post of assistantpersonnel officer fell vacant and the then chairman of the workers'committee was one of the contenders for the post. He did not have thepaper qualifications that were asked for, but he thought his position in theworkers' committee would be adequate, not least since no acrimoniousissues has been raised while he was in office. Other workers accused him of nottaking up issues with management because he did not want to spoil his reputation.The possibility of promotion had therefore resulted in the modification of hisbehaviour by this chairman, and possibly also by management.Fifthly, while worker-management relations undoubtedly improvedas a result of the removal of the overtly racist and authoritarian tendenciesof the former White management, there is no doubt that the new Blackmanagement was very responsive to government directives. A managementmanual in Parastatal describes one of the policies of the organization asthat of 'developing and maintaining a sound industrial relations policythat is consistent with government policy'. Accordingly, management wasprepared to concede to workers' demands which were within their sphereof authority and which did not involve large costs. Workers at the Harareplant were not often reminded of the limits of their influence, as was thecase in the organizations studied by Maphosa (1985) and Makanya (1987).Clearly, the effects of worker participation on worker-managementrelations at Parastatal had been largely positive. Management and workerscovered by the participation organs both rated their relations as good.Other indicators also show that relations were, indeed, good and definitelymuch better than they had been before Independence. The workersattributed this improvement to the workers' participation organs whichfacilitated communication between the two parties, enabling them to sortout any issues before they became serious. However, the relations betweenmanagement and skilled and supervisory workers were not so good, mainlybecause of the lack of a forum in which the latter could express theirviews. Supervisory workers were especially unhappy because they hadbeen marginalized. Workers' participation had, therefore, only partlyfulfilled its function. To what extent these organs would still have broughtpeace if all workers had been included is debatable. Possibly relationswould not have been so good, since skilled workers and supervisors werecapable of challenging management knowledgeably whereas the calibre ofthe workers' committee at the time of my research did not present achallenge to management.ProductivityParastatals' management stated that productivity had gone up and attributed46 WORKERS' REAL PARTICIPATION IN DECISION-MAKINGthis to hard work on the part of its workers. Managers stated that theam cabl^relaUons facilitated by the workers' committees were responsibleS the° ncreased productivity. Workers also agreed that they were workingharder Thanbefore, but could not understand why there was a growingSeicU Each workers' committee meeting called on workers represen-fatives to encourage workers to work hard and to refra.n from theft andndTscphne Periodically, the workers' committee cha.rman and secretarywe e provided with a company car and a driver to v».t all depots m theHarare region to deal with grievances and to promote production. Theworkers -mmittees became so committed to these managerial pnont.esThat they named 1983 the Year of Higher Product.v.ty and 985/86 theYear of Cost-Cutting (Shadur, 1989). Membership of the workers committeeappears to have instilled in workers what management would call aSensible attitude, indicating that workers accepted managena. pnont.es.Training also seems to have played some part as shown by a letterwritten by one of 'Parastatal's' personnel officials to S.lve.ra House, wh.chprovided the training: 'There is no doubt the delegates to those courseshave changed their approach to management. Product.v.ty .s slowlyimproving which is a result of the mutual understanding between workerand management.' From the above statement, it appears that these trainingcourses have had more of an integrative than a transformat.ve effect.Workers' representatives attending them promoted management s pri-orities, instead of attempting to increase workers' influence in Parastatal.Grievance-settling procedure .The workers' committee at the Harare processing plant played a s.gmf.cantrole in handling workers' grievances. The workers' committee cha.rmanwas called out to different departments as often as five times a day to heara complaint either from a supervisor or a worker, or just to be presentwhile a worker was being warned or disciplined. As early as 1982, workersrequested management to release one of the workers' committee membersto deal with workers' problems on a full-time basis. They also askedmanagement to provide a room for this purpose but management turneddown this request. The rate of consultation continued and the chairman ofthe workers' committee stated that he was not able to finish his formalworkload and often came in on Saturdays to finish it off. As Shadur (1989)noted, this workers' committee was indeed supplementing a weak (or,rather, non-existent) trade union.The effectiveness of this system caused both workers and managementto state their preference for workers' committees rather than for tradeunions. For management, there was the added benefit that workers'committees were easily manipulated as all their members were workerswithin the organization. On the part of workers, this preference was firstlyDOROTHY MUTIZWA-MANGIZA 47due to the ineffectiveness of the trade union to which they were nominallyaffiliated; but most importantly it was due to their ignorance of the functionsof trade unions.CONCLUSIONSWorkers' participation at Parastatal showed that some of the government'sobjectives had been realized through the workers' committees which hadprovided a channel for communication between workers and management,which in turn had led to the improvement of worker-management relationsin the whole enterprise. Even management's manipulative strategies weresuccessful only because of the existence of the committees. Better worker-management relations had led to higher productivity. The operation ofworkers' committees as an informal grievance-settling machinery haddeflected potential conflict which, if left unattended, could have interferedwith production in the workplace. Both workers and managers benefitedfrom the presence of these participation organs. Workers worked in afriendly environment, with a management which was as responsive ascould be expected of one trained to lead workers expected to obey.Everyone in Parastatal expressed their desire that workers' participationshould continue. Workers had gained invaluable experience of interactingwith management and expressed their desire to participate in moreimportant issues such as salaries, production levels, etc. Whether it was aresult of their ignorance of the provisions of the legislation or of theirdissatisfaction with their present degree of influence, workers undoubtedlywanted an extension of their influence in the workplace.My detailed examination of workers' participation in Parastatal hasshown how powerless Zimbabwean workers really are. Their post-Independence gains have resulted from the goodwill and responsivenessof management, directed by the state, rather than from their own influencein enterprise decision-making. Parastatal management generally had toset an example in industrial relations in line with government directives.Studies carried out in other organizations thus present a more directreflection of the real balance of power between management and workers.Little progress has been made to bring about more meaningful workers'participation, largely because of government's lack of political commit-ment and the existence of private ownership in the Zimbabwean economy.For example, government has no policies to strengthen the existingparticipatory organs. The level, scope and degree of control has remainedthe same in ten years. Stevens (1980) states that for consultative participationto lead to more meaningful participation there is a need for strong andideologically committed trade unions which can mobilize workers forparticipation. Such trade unions have not materialized, partly because of48WORKERS' REAL PARTICIPATION IN DECISION-MAKINGthe internal weaknesses of the trade union movement in Zimbabwe butalso because of government's inertia. Government has not adopted thevarious policies recommended by the Riddell Commission, such as theintroduction of an automatic check-off system, the setting-up of a TradeUnion Education Authority, or the establishment of an Economic AdvisoryCommittee comprising workers' organizations, employers and government.Legislative curtailment of the strike weapon has seriously reduced theworkers' power to the extent that future collective bargaining may notsucceed, as both sides are aware of the workers' lack of ammunition withwhich to push for a more favourable settlement.The various statements that have been made by government lead oneto conclude that it has no clear conception of workers' participation. In1981 government announced its intention that workers' committees shouldeventually become self-management committees. That, as explained earlier,would represent a transformative process towards worker self-manage-ment, in which enterprise ownership may be divorced from its control.But in the same year, 1981, the then Minister of Labour expressed hiscommitment to the ILO principles of collective bargaining within a tripartitesystem. Clearly, collective bargaining is incompatible with worker self-management, because collective bargaining presupposes capitalist hege-mony. In 1986, at a May Day rally, the then Prime Minister announced hiscommitment to both collective bargaining and worker self-management,possibly as a result of a confused conception of participation. This sup-position of a lack of conception of workers' participation is not too far-fetched, considering that some speeches for the Minister of Labour areknown to have been lifted verbatim from a pre-Independence Minister ofLabour's speeches (Wood, 1987). Alternatively, this contradiction couldbe due to what Ake has termed 'defensive radicalism', in which a leadercontinues to spout socialist rhetoric while implementing reactionarypolicies. The socialist rhetoric, Ake insists, is intended to confuse andsoothe radicals (Ake, 1978).The Zimbabwean government has now shown clearly its commitmentto collective bargaining. Government's past inability to pass legislationsupportive of worker self-management has not only been due to its lack ofpolitical commitment but also to objective constraints such as privateownership of the means of production. It seems that any future attempt toincrease the influence of workers in decision-making will be stronglyresisted. In any case, laws such as the Companies Act will have to beradically amended before meaningful participation can be effected. Thusthe government's lack of political commitment to socialism and fear ofantagonizing the private sector have led to its adoption of a pragmaticstance, that is, collective bargaining at the expense of meaningful workers'participation.