tunisia after 14 january and its social and political economy - Refworld

T U N I S I A A F T E R 1 4 J A N U A R Y A N D I T S S O C I A L A N D P O L I T I C A L E C O N O M YT H E I S S U E S A T S T A K E I N A R E C O N F I G U R A T I O N O F E U R O P E A N P O L I C Yfacto (tacit) moratorium on wages to keep their jobs. 104 Despite the strength of the unrestand the continuing conflicts in many sectors and regions, the confrontation betweenTunisian workers and bosses generally seems to have been concluded in favour of thelatter: faced with demands for permanent jobs, the bosses were able to respond withblackmail, threatening the closure of the company. While Tunisian employees demandpermanent jobs first and foremost and an end to the CDD and job insecurity, Tunisianentrepreneurs are often willing to make wage concessions, but definitely not to reviewemployment terms.We find the same inequality in the ‘race for el khobza’ which was simultaneously thesource of obedience (for years) and rebellion (for a few months): while employeeschase el khobza in an attempt to make it more secure, employers base their profits ontheir ability to render el khobza uncertain. 105 These adjustments do not undermine thedevelopment model chosen, based on a competitiveness involving pressure on wagesand specialization on just-in-time production based on flexibility of work. 106 Instead, onemight even say that the end (perhaps temporary) of conflict has resulted in an evenstronger reaffirmation of this ‘historical necessity’ of insecurity.104 Interviews in Tunis, March 2011.105 The expression ‘the race for el khobza’ (literally ‘the race for bread’) is an attempt to express thesituation in which, in order to find a means of living (or surviving), one has to accept a day-to-dayexistence made of labour and privation, to have to domesticate uncertainty, insecurity, violenceand risk in order to have any chance of gaining access to material resources. See Hamza Medded,‘L’ambivalence de la “course à el khobza”’.106 The ‘just-in-time’ principle involves organizing production so as to minimize stocks and ‘in-hand’manufacture, and reducing to the minimum each stage of production time from raw materials to endproduct.65The reconfiguration of power, the socio-economicchallenges of the revolution, and European policy