Report of the Fourth Survey of Recovered Businesses - US Letter

7/18/2019 Report of the Fourth Survey of Recovered Businesses - US Letter

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Contents

1 Presentation and General Criteria 1

Some Conceptual Definitions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

2 The General Panorama of the Recovered Businesses as of December 2013 5

3 The New Recovered Businesses: 2010-2013 13

4 Conflict and Legal Framework 19

Conflicts, 2010-2013 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

The Reform of the Bankruptcy Law and its Consequences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

5 Production 27

6 The Workers 31

The Workers After Recovery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36

7 Management Structure 37Equality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

Assemblies and Councils . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39

Work Processes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40

8 Unions 43

Unionization of the Workers in Recovered Businesses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43

Current Relationship with Unions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45

Role of Stewards during the Recovery Process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

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9 Social Security 49

Legal Framework . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

Pension Contributions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50

Health Coverage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51

Coverage of Occupational Hazards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51

New INAES Resolution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52

10 The State and the Organizations 55

Support, Organization and Solidarity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

11 Final Words 63

Appendices 65

List of Surveyed Recovered Businesses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65

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Report of the Fourth Survey of Recovered Businesses in Argentina, 2014

General coordinator: Andrés Ruggeri

Texts: Andrés Ruggeri (general writing) Ayelén Aguilar, Javier Antivero, Emiliano Balaguer,

Paloma Elena, Cecilia Galeazzi, Fernando García, Matías Halpin, Florencia Olivera, Pablo Peláez,Natalia Polti.

Database creation and coding: Javier Antivero, Paloma Elena, Natalia Polti.

Field research: Florencia Abons, Leandro Agrofoglio, Ayelén Aguilar, Javier Antivero, Emil-iano Balaguer, Luciana Bourlot, Alfonso Desiderio, María Florencia Dopico, Paloma Elena, JésicaElizalde, Cecilia Galeazzi, Fernando García, Alejandra Glatzel, Matías Halpin, Fernando Marino,Melina Merkier, Florencia Pacific, Pablo Peláez, Natalia Polti, Florian Wagener, Petra WilsonJones, Josefina Yabor.

Ruggeri, Andrés

Report of the Fourth Survey of Recovered Businesses in Argentina, 2014: the RecoveredBusinesses in the Period 2010-2013. - 1st ed. - Autonomous City of Buenos Aires: CooperativaChilavert Artes Gráficas, 2014.

E-book.

ISBN 978-987-27253-4-1

1. Sociology of Labor. 2. Businesses Cooperatives. I. Title

CDD 306.36

Cataloging date: 26/06/2014

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0

This work is under a License Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 In-ternational. Permissions beyond what is covered by this license can be requested from: [email protected]

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Open Faculty Program

Secretariat of University Extension and Student Well-Being

School of Philosophy and Letters

University of Buenos Aires

Director: Andrés Ruggeri

Coordinators: Natalia Polti, Javier Antivero, Fernando García.

Team: Paloma Elena, Cecilia Galeazzi, Emiliano Balaguer, Ayelén Aguilar, Florencia Olivera, Flo-rencia Pacific, Pablo Peláez, Luciana Bourlot, Alfonso Desiderio, Jésica Elizalde, Matías Halpin,Fernando Marino, Josefina Galuchi, Natalia Reboledo.

School of Philosophy and Letters

University of Buenos Aires

Dean: Graciela Morgade

Vice-Dean: Américo Cristófalo

Secretary of University Extension: Ivanna Petz

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This is a derived work, translated from the publicly available document Informe del IV relevamiento

de Empresas Recuperadas en la Argentina, 2014 by Level Translation. Beyond the Creative Com-

mons license mentioned above, the translator also has express, written encouragement from Andrés

Ruggeri to create and distribute this work. This work, like the original, is under a Creative Com-

mons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International license.

5

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/

http://level.interpreters.coop/

http://www.centrocultural.coop/blogs/cooperativismo/2014/07/04/informe-del-iv-relevamiento-de-empresas-recuperadas-en-la-argentina-2014/

http://www.centrocultural.coop/blogs/cooperativismo/2014/07/04/informe-del-iv-relevamiento-de-empresas-recuperadas-en-la-argentina-2014/



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Chapter 1

Presentation and General Criteria

Since 2002, the Open Faculty Program has carried out a series of national surveys of businessesrecovered by the workers (BRWs). The purpose of these surveys is to build the most completeinformation possible about all of the recovered businesses in Argentina through a broad sample ofcases. Data was collected through a survey, which became complicated and was rewritten as thesituations of the research team and the workers developed. The fact that the different surveys were

done over a period of time between the middle of 2002 and the end of 2013 (the fourth, whichwe present here) also allows the information to be organized across more than a decade so far.Over this decade-and-some, the movement of businesses and factories recovered by the workershas solidified as a reality in the working world.

The first survey, done in the last months of 2002 and the first months of 2003, looked at 59 cases;the second, in 2004, 72; and the third, 85. While only three years have passed since the closure ofthe field stage of the third survey, and even less time since the presentation of the final report and itspublication in book form in 2011, we see the need to update the data, beginning with the perceptionof qualitative growth in the phenomenon of recovered businesses in recent times. So, this fourthsurvey is different: in contrast to previous ones, which gave an account of the phenomenon of theBRWs as a whole, in this work, we have focused on recent cases: those that we have learned of since

the close of the third survey, in March 2010. That is, this work is focused on the cases of recoveryof businesses by the workers that emerged between March 2010 and December 2013, which wecall the “new recovered businesses.”

In this regard, this work is not differentiated from the three previous surveys in its structure ormethodology, but rather in the composition of the sample and nature of information processed. Thesurvey used, which was the same as last time with some minor changes (enabling us to increase thesample size, which we considered necessary), was applied exclusively to BRWs that started up inthe specified period, which is why the profile of the data and the analysis we will do is limited tothe characteristics of these recent BRWs. There is also, of course, a first chapter of general data thatshows the evolution of the process as a whole, where we can also give an update on information thatshows remarkable growth in BRWs in the country. However, the objective of this work is not to

show the general panorama of the movement of business recovery in the usual detail (rather, only inthe broadest aspects), but the characteristics of these “newly recovered,” and the differences from,

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and similiarities to, those that came about previously, especially with the large group connectedwith the crisis of 2001, and what this current growth in the recovery of businesses corresponds to.

For this survey, as is the norm for our program, our work has had several fundamental premises:

the collaboration of the workers in the BRWs themselves, their willingness and trust that the infor-mation provided will be used for no other purpose than to strengthen their struggle through a betterknowledge of their own process; and the volunteer work of the team members and students whoparticipated, with little more in the way of resources than sheer will. As small as this group was, itwas decided not to call on others beyond those who were already working on tasks with the OpenFaculty Program and the Center for Documentation of Recovered Businesses.

Some Conceptual Definitions

It should be clarified, in the first place, that when we talk about a business recovered by the workers(BRW), we refer, as we have since the first report in 2003, to an economic unit, whether of goodsor services, that is in a process of going from private management to collective management byits former employees. In the course of this process, the workers take production or the economicactivity of the business into their own hands (generally due to abandonment or lockout for variousreasons), primarily seeking to keep their jobs. The legal form used in the large majority of the casesin Argentina is the worker cooperative, which turns out to be the most appropriate for collectivemanagement of workers, though this is not exclusively the case. The fundamental part of thisdefinition is the collective form of management, not the legal structure or the type of businessorganization, while still recognizing that the cooperative is the norm.

This way of defining a BRW differentiates it from other experiences of the solidarity economy orself-management thatdo not come from preexisting economic entities, and does not tie the existence

of the recovered business to a given legal form or legal process (because, while the existing casesshare certain characteristics, there are exceptions and different ways to arrive at worker managementof a business). It is central to the idea of recovery not simply that the business be reactivated, butalso that the resulting management be of a collective nature – in other words, self-management.

The latter, undoubtedly, is where most conceptual gaps and ambiguities appear, because the processof self-management is a collective and permanent dynamic, which notonly cannot and should not bereduced to a set of rules (like worker cooperativism) or a given predetermined way of functioning,but does not corrrespond – so far – to clearly defined models or to a mere discursive pronounce-ments. In this regard, while self-descriptionis not a sufficient criterion to clearly prove the existenceof real self-management, the framework of this survey does not allowfor the type of methodologicaltools that would be necessary to improve on that criterion, except in the case of clear and provable

evidence to the contrary. These considerations have also been made in other, similar research, like

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the survey done by a team of researchers in Brasil1 and in other research at the international levelthat has focused on this same problem.

Using these criteria, we find that the phenomenon of BRWs is not exclusive to the crisis that Ar-

gentina faced in 2001 and 2002, which is almost universally associated with the emergence of theBRWs. It is, rather, a process that has happened repeatedly in contemporary capitalist economies,and is found in the origin of the cooperative movement itself at the beginning of the nineteenth cen-tury. In our country, the first recovered businesses we have a record of date back to the ’50s, and theoldest that are part of the current wave – which is to say, using the neoliberal era as a starting point – are from 1992. But, in global terms, the worker self-management movement, which, in Argentina,its own protagonists called “recovered businesses,” has generally remained obscured under othernames that diffuse the process and make it into a particular manifestation of cooperativism: coop-eratives with unique and conflictive origins. The particularity of the movement in Argentina hasbeen (among other things) the way it has drawn global attention to this kind of process, and now thename “recovered business” (or “factory”) has been adopted in other countries, like Brazil, Uruguayand Venezuela, giving the problem an international nature that has even reached the self-described“developed world,” engulfed in its own international crisis, which has sparked “Argentina-style”occupations of factories in Greece, Spain, Italy, France, and even the United States. 2

The Argentine movement of recovered businesses, however, remains the deepest and most numer-ous. In Brazil, where an association of recovered businesses has existed since the early ’90s, ourcolleagues have found some 70 BRWs, and there are a handful of cases in the countries mentionedabove, but the Argentine recovered businesses have not only solidified, they continue growing,clearly demonstrating that this has become a common practice among workers facing the possibil-ity of the loss of employment because of the closure of their workplace.

When we say that the movement continues to grow, we are refering to a phenomenon with twodifferent parts: on the one hand, the “old” BRWs (those that emerged in the ’90s and during the

crisis of 2001 and following years), which are established and, in some cases, growing; and on theother hand, the “new” recovered businesses that are appearing. In previous surveys, we showedthis dual growth, but in this one, we not only focus on this process, but we can clearly observe thatthe increase in the number of BRWs is already almost as significant as the recovered businessesfrom the period of clear neoliberal hegemony and the crisis. We will need these data: this fourthsurvey shows 311 BRWs in Argentina, occupying 13,462 workers. Of these, the “new recovered,”those opened since the end of the third survey in March of 2010, total 63, of which 41 date from thetwo most recent years (2012 and 2013). Taking the end of 2004 as our cut-off date, the program’s

1 See Empresas recuperadas por trabalhadores no Brasil (Henriques et al., 2013).

2 Recently, and with the co-organization of our program, the regional European meeting of the “The Worker Economy”was heldin Gémenos, France,where Latin Americans and Europeans compared experiences and debatedthe topic. Par-ticipants included recovered or occupied factories, worker cooperatives, and unions from Spain, France, Italy, Greece,Serbia, Germany and England.

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second survey concluded that there were 161 BRWs. Since that year, which is to say, after thecrisis, in times of growth and recovery of the national economy, there are 144 more. So, we cansay that there are almost as many recovered businesses that began in the post-crisis period as thoseassociated with 2001 and the years immediately before and after.

It is important to keep this in mind to change the predominant view of BRWs as desperate responsesto widespread economic crises. If we understand recovered businesses as a response of the workersto the closure of economic establishments where they showed up as wage-earners, then we need toexpand this focus to a variety of critical circumstances that should not necessarily be contextualizedin large crises of a structural nature. At the micro level, each case is a tempest in a teapot witha enormous impact on the lives of the workers involved and their families, and that is how it isexperienced, but this does not necessarily happen in the framework of a macroeconomic crisis.

However, this phenomenon did not have public visibility prior to December of 2001. The busi-nesses remained hidden in the capitalist dynamic in which businesses, according to the neoliberalmetaphor, are like “living beings that are born, grow and die” – and the bankruptcy law, accord-

ingly, would be the instrument that “regulates” the process of the “death of a business.” The greatpower of the movement of those years was in turning these isolated cases into qualitatively relevantphenomena, into a rebellion of the apparently passive subjects in the path of that “living enter-prise” – the workers – against that fatalism of the economy and ideology of neoliberal capitalism.Because the real (and unique) living beings in a business are the human beings who make it up.The buildings and the machinery are dead structures without workers to make them work, makethem worth something, make them part of the economic dynamic, and even make them part of themarket. But those workers – who were disposable, a mere business expense – put them back inmotion.

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Chapter 2

The General Panorama of theRecovered Businesses as of December 2013

In December 2013, according to the data of this fourth national survey, there were 311 BRWs,

distributed throughout the nation, occupying 13,462 workers.The distribution as follows:

RegionCases in

2013% by

provinceNumber of

workers% of

workers

City of Buenos Aires 58 19.00 1902 14.14

Greater Buenos Aires 97 31.00 4406 32.76

Rest of Buenos Airesprovince

46 14.79 1726 12.83

Chaco 9 2.89 343 2.55

Corrientes 5 1.61 454 3.38

Entre Rios 5 1.61 328 2.44

Santa Fe 26 8.36 1191 8.85

Chubut 3 0.96 45 0.33

Córdoba 14 4.50 1003 7.46

La Pampa 5 1.61 157 1.18

La Rioja 4 1.29 133 0.99

Mendoza 7 2.25 173 1.29

Neuquén 6 1.93 837 6.22

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Rio Negro 8 2.57 256 1.81

San Juan 2 0.64 39 0.29

Tierra del Fuego 1 0.32 30 0.22

Catamarca 1 0.32 27 0.20

Jujuy 2 0.64 80 0.60

Misiones 4 1.29 93 0.69

San Luis 5 1.61 232 1.72

Tucumán 1 0.32 7 0.05

Total 311 100 13,462 100%

Table 2.1: Total of cases of BRWs and number of workers by province. Average of workers per BRW: 43.84.

There is a presence of recovered businesses in 21 of the 24 provinces in the country. Aside fromremarkable quantitative growth compared to 2010,1 in this table, we see a more widespread distribu-tion across the national territory, with more provinces. In some of them, we see significant growth,while in others, like Mendoza, which had established and relevant representation in the interior,no changes are observed. If we look at the spatial distribution of the BRWs by region, remarkablegrowth is observed in the interior, though half of them are still located in the Metropolitan Area ofBuenos Aires [“the AMBA”]. Compared to what was recorded in previous reports, we see that theconcentration in the AMBA is steadily decreasing, approaching a balance between the AMBA andthe rest of the country. While this arrangement continues to be highly concentrated, of course, andis the result of the economic and industrial structure of Argentina, it is clear that, proportionally,the cases of BRWs in the provinces have grown more than the those of Buenos Aires.

If we distribute this same information by regions, the concentration in the region of the pampas

appears even more clearly, because adding together the AMBA and this region (the provinces ofBuenos Aires, Córdoba, La Pampa and Santa Fe), we find that they are home to 81% of the BRWs.

1 See Report of the Third Survey on the website of the Open Faculty Program:http://www.recuperadasdoc.com.ar/Information%20relevamientos/informeTercerRelevamiento2010.pdf

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Figure 2.1: Distribution of BRWs between the AMBA and the rest of the country according to data from the

four surveys.

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Region Number %

AMBA 155 50%

Pampas 96 31%

Northeast 18 6%

Northwest 8 3%

Cuyo 14 4%

Patagonia 18 6%

Total 309 100%

Table 2.2: Distribution by regions. N: 311.

Concerning the third survey, we should provide the caveat (which we had opportunely warned ofas a possibility in the report itself) that the total of 205 BRWs we arrived at was lower than thereal number by more than 40 cases. The majority of these were in the provinces in the interior, towhich we had the least access (due to a shortage of resources), and most of them make little impacton the media or even on each other. Of these cases not detected by our team in 2009-10, severalwere recoveries that were in progress at the time of the investigation, having begun after the fieldstage of the survey started, which meant they were left out of the database that was used. However,even after raising the figure of existing BRWs in March of 2010 to 247, in the following period,yet another 63 BRWs were added, which we are calling here the “new” recovered businesses, and

which constitute the detailed objective of this report. Meanwhile, only six of the 205 BRWs from2010 have closed their doors, for various reasons. If we compare this with the normal “mortality” oftraditional businesses, we can see that the survival rate of the recovered businesses is astonishinglyhigh. If we make a table of the progression of the cases of BRWs, beginning with the data from theprevious surveys, both in the form of total numbers measured at the time and reconstructed from thedata in each of the reports, we can see the growth of the phenomenon of the recovery of businessesby the workers in the country. The rising curve clearly shows this growth.

Looking at distribution by sector, we find that, while metallurgical companies continue to be themost numerous sector, their relative importance in the total continues to decrease, which is a ten-dency that we had already identified in 2010. Indeed, great diversification in economic sectorsis observed, making the process of recovery of businesses less and less predominantly industrial.

Rather, it clearly appears to be a process that includes all economic sectors where wage labor ex-ists. However, 50.4% of recovered businesses are still manufacturing establishments, with the restdivided between between different kinds of services, food, health, and education.

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Figure 2.2: Growth of the number of cases based on the data in the four surveys.

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SectorNumber of

BRWs % of BRWsNumber of

workers

Metallurgy 61 19.61 2937

Printing 31 9.97 879

Textiles 26 8.36 1070

Restaurants 16 5.14 328

Glass 7 2.25 327

Chemicals 8 2.57 197

Plastic 5 1.61 95

Meat 22 7.07 2041

Shipbuilders 2 0.64 62

Food 40 12.86 1036

Construction 17 5.46 938

Leather 6 1.93 380

Health 11 3.53 517

Education 7 2.25 215

Hotels 5 1.61 233

Woodworking 8 2.57 146

Fuel 4 1.28 77

Papermaking 2 0.64 71

Shoemaking 5 1.61 601

Transportation 7 2.25 720

Logistics andmaintenance

6 1.93 154

Media 6 1.93 244

Rubber 1 0.32 13

Retail 3 0.97 109

Mining 1 0.32 13

Others 3 0.97 59

Table 2.3: Total BRWs in December of 2013 by sector and number of workers.

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We can see this tendency most clearly in the following graphic, where, grouping different sectors,we can see the growth between 2004 and 2013:

Figure 2.3: Distribution by sector in the three last surveys.

Finally, the panorama of the BRWs at the end of 2013 shows that the average numbers of workerswe observed previously, approximately 40 workers per BRW, has remained. The exact number is43.84 workers on average. This number varies by industry and by province, which will be analyzedin the corresponding chapter.

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Chapter 3

The New Recovered Businesses:2010-2013

If we look at this same information for the BRWs that began between 2010-2013, we find ourselveswith a panorama of great variety, which confirms that the trend in recent years has been mostlynon-industrial establishments with considerable diversity. The percentage of industrial businesses

has been reduced to 44%, and within that number, we find that the recovered metallurgical busi-nesses are a minority in the last three years (only 6, or 9.5%), and instead, print shops are the mostnumerous [new] BRWs, with 11 cases, only one more than food businesses. Restaurants (where theinfluence of the chain of the five recovered restaurants in the City of Buenos Aires is notable) andtextiles are the other two outstanding sectors, and the rest is distributed with considerable disparity.Metallurgical companies, despite having fewer businesses, continue to occupy the most workers,27% of the total, which is higher than the percentage that metallurgical workers make up of theBRWs as a whole. In this case, the Indiel company, with two plants (in Greater Buenos Aires andin the province of San Luis), has the largest part of those workers, raising the total amount abovethe average number of workers at the other establishments.

Sector Number ofBRWs % of BRWs Number ofworkers

Metallurgy 6 9.5 715

Printing 11 17.4 305

Textiles 9 14.3 480

Gastronomy 9 14.3 226

Glass 1 1.5 20

Meat 5 7.9 192

Food 10 15.9 384Construction 5 7.9 134

Health 1 1.5 18

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Education 1 1.5 58

Woodworking 1 1.5 18

Papermaking 1 1.5 13

Shoemaking 1 1.5 18

Media 1 1.5 34

Retail 1 1.5 29

Total 63 100 2644

Table 3.1: Total of new cases of BRWs and number of workers per industry.

The “new recovered businesses,” which, in this work, are those whose conflict of origin beganbetween March of 2010 (the closing date of the previous survey) and December of 2013 (close of

the present survey), number 63 in total. This figure is, as we said, significant to contradict the ideathat the recovery of businesses by the workers is a practice that took place mostly in 2001 and theyears immediately following. If we disaggregate those 63 cases year by year, we note importantgrowth in 2012, with 23 cases, and 17 in 2013. These two years saw the creation of 40 of the 63new BRWs, a number similar to the prior peak of occupations that led to the formation of recoveredbusinesses, 2008 and 2009, when there were 44. Both moments coincide with the strongest throesof the global economic crisis in the country: in 2008-2009, with the outbreak of the so-called“subprime crisis” in the United States, and in the most recent, the expansion of the recession to theEuropean Union. To find a year with that number of BRWs, one has to go back to 2004, which isto say, the beginning of the country’s economic recovery after the crisis of December of 2001.

It is interesting to note how macroeconomic conditions strongly influence the number of recoveredbusinesses. A simple comparison between the percentages of growth (or decline) of the GrossDomestic Product of Argentina and the curve of recoveries shows an inverse relationship of notablesymmetry: the greater the crisis, the more BRWs; the greater the stability and growth, the fewerBRWs. As we already know, the biggest wave of recoveries happened in the course of the crisis of2001, and as the situation stabilized, the curve fell until it leveled out at a few cases per year (around10 between 2005 and 2007). The crisis of 2008-2009, for the first time in the post-crisis period,reduced growth to less than 1% of GDP (and the curve of BRWs rose). Then growth returned tothe prior rate in 2010 and 2011, and again decreased over the last two years, together with the risein the cases of BRWs. What changed, besides the numbers, is the type of businesses, which nolonger as heavily concentrated on industry but, as already we have indicated, includes all mannerof enterprises.

This analysis, to not be one-dimensional, must be complemented with the broader characteristicsof the process beyond the numbers. The decline in the percentage of metallurgical and other in-dustrial sectors strengthened by the process of reindustrialization of the last decade, added to the

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Figure 3.1: Relationship between growth of the Argentine GDP and recoveries per year. Source: created bythe authors, based on data from INDEC and data from the Fourth Survey of BRWs.

bargaining power and strengthening of the unions in the sector, correlates with the increase in casesin other industries and parts of the economy where business machinations, outsourcing, and laborprecariousness are the order of the day, like the textile industry or restaurants. That is where wecurrently find the greatest number of BRWs. In other cases, like the printing industry, growth canbe associated with the influence of a union policy that seeks to support recovery processes, keepthose workers within the context of the union, and help build a cooperative graphic sector with closeties to the union.

We can also observe, in geographical distribution, a greater impact of the movement on the interiorthan in the AMBA for the first time. The BRWs emerging in the City of Buenos Aires and GreaterBuenos Aires scarcely come to 24, compared to 39 in the rest of the country (62%), even though inquantity of workers, they continue to make up 55% of the total.

ArgentinaTotal cases2010-2013

% byprovince

Number ofworkers

% of totalworkers

CABA 15 23.8 509 19.3

GBA 9 14.3 947 35.8

BA (interior) 11 17.5 389 14.7

Chaco 1 1.6 14 0.5

Entre Rios 1 1.6 11 0.4

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Santa Fe 5 7.9 185 7.0

Chubut 1 1.6 23 0.8

Córdoba 5 7.9 99 3.7

La Pampa 1 1.6 39 1.5

La Rioja 1 1.6 17 0.6

Neuquén 1 1.6 73 2.8

Rio Negro 3 4.8 98 3.7

Catamarca 1 1.6 27 1.0

Jujuy 1 1.6 20 0.7

Misiones 3 4.8 65 2.4

San Luis 4 6.3 150 5.7

Total 63 100 2644 100

Table 3.2: Distribution of BRWs by province, 2010-2013.

The BRWs of this period are distributed across 14 provinces plus the City of Buenos Aires. If welook at distribution by region, we observe that the greatest concentration, logically, is still in theAMBA and the pampas region, which contain the bulk of economic activity in the country, but withmore occurrences in zones that, until now, had had negligible numbers of recovered businesses, likethe Northeast (in this case, the provinces of Chaco and Misiones) or Patagonia (Neuquén, Rio Negroand Chubut).

Figure 3.2: Distribution by regions. 2010-2013.

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To finalize this first approximation of the results of this survey, we can synthesize that the conceptof businesses recovered by the workers has been solidified as a valid tool for the preservation of jobs threatened by bankruptcies and lockouts. We can affirm that not only have the BRWs createdduring the crisis of the 2001 kept working, but new cases have appeared continually, and their

number has increased when economic activity declined as a more-or-less direct consequence of themacreconomic situation, framed in the international crisis. Additionally, in the period studied, thephenomenon of the BRWs has diversified both its geographic distribution and sectors of activity,resulting in degrowth in industrial areas that have benefitted from the new economic cycle and agreater union presence and, in contrast, an expansion in those sectors known for precariousness,outsourcing and labor fraud.

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Chapter 4

Conflict and Legal Framework

Conflicts, 2010-2013

In previous reports, the chapters dedicated to conflict and the legal framework were presented sep-arately. In this fourth survey, we have opted to put the data and its interpretation in the sameparagraph, given the close identifiable relationship, in the period analyzed, between the way con-

flicts happen that lead to, or end in, recovery (or attempts at recovery) of businesses by the workers,on the one hand, and the existing legal framework, on the other. This is basically an evaluation ofthe impact of the reform of the bankruptcy law passed in 2011 by the National Congress, which wasproposed by the Executive Branch and approved withwide backingby the majority of parliamentaryblocs.

We are not going to spend too much time talking about how conflicts happen, given the clear con-tinuity with previous years. As we have said on numerous occasions, the conflictive origin of theBRWs is the point of greatest media and even political attention to the processes. The attractionthat an eviction or an occupation has for the media, leaders, political militants, and even researchersmakes this is the best-known phase of recovery processes. The association of the recovered busi-nesses with the crisis of 2001, still predominant in the social and political imagination, is clearly

related to this stage. But it is important to point out, once again, that every recovery process, eventhose where there is no takeover of the establishment or any process of mobilization visible fromthe outside, is going through a period of conflict, which is between the crisis of the economic unitin question and the establishment of worker management. In this transition stage, there is an in-evitable tipping point where the preservation of jobs is at risk. Going from private managementto collective, even on the best terms possible (for example, in the case of the owner of a small ormedium family business who agrees to transfer the business to its workers because of his/her in-ability to keep it going), continues to create concerns and fears in the workers, who have to shiftfrom wage labor to self-management, and see how management, which is usually concentrated inthe owner or “specialists,” must come into their hands. This is even more the case when this pointis preceded by largely unmistakable signals that the business is in crisis: problems paying wages,

the obvious decrease in the rate and volume of work, the disappearance or lack of maintenance ofmachines, and other kind of signs that usually precede closure.

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In this regard, the cases in the period studied are not very different from the earlier ones. The formsof asset stripping or business deterioration are basically the same: unpaid wages, firings, theft, saleor neglect of machinery and facilities, usually reaching the point of a meeting with creditors andbankruptcy. This is a conjunction of factors that contribute, to a lesser or greater extent, to the clo-

sure of the establishment, whether due to fraud or not. Problems paying wages, or the total absenceof pay, happened in more than 80% of the 31 cases in the sample of recovered businesses between2010 and 2013, and in 60%, asset-stripping was clearly seen, though relatively few people werefired (prior to closure). By way of comparison, in 2010, we observed all these aspects combinedin more equal proportions, and in 2004, the lack of wage payment was the least-mentioned reason.This is an indication that we are looking at conflicts that are prolonged and predictable (or moreidentifiable to the workers) before giving rise to the beginning of the recovery process.

These data are consistent with the duration and the difficulty of the conflicts of this period. Theproportion of occupations or protests remains almost unchanged (61% said they have resorted tooccupation or protests of different kinds, compared to 62% in 2010) and of these, nearly 60% wasoccupations, and the rest was encampments, generally combined with marches, strikes and othermeasures.

At the same time, repression of occupations and protests organized by the workers was down com-pared to the numbers from 2010. Compared to the 50% who had suffered some type of repressivemeasure (basically, evictions or attempted evictions) that we observed in the prior report, we seenow a drop to 37%. However, it must be taken into account that this percentage records attemptsat State repression (generally ordered by judges), which have not always succeeded, but more than20% are “private” attempts at eviction or intimidation, through verbal threats or physical violenceby security personnel or armed thugs who try to expel or intimidate workers, presumably paid bythe owners or possible beneficiaries of the auction of the goods of the business. The increase inthese situations, sometimes combined, which we had already noted in previous surveys, raises the

alarm about what recovery processes face due to the lack of protection for workers.Here, we come to possibly the most relevant and unusual data point: the considerable increase inthe duration of conflicts. That is, the average number of days that conflicts last, generally countedfrom their outbreak, due to lockout or occupation, to the beginning of worker self-management.This was in decline compared to the bitter conflicts of the ’90s or the outbreak of the crisis, and hadstabilized around four or five months, but has now increased considerably, eventually doubling theprevious period. We can see it clearly in this graphic:

Given the noticeable increase in the duration of conflicts recently, it is reasonable to wonder whatthe reason is, which means determining the changes in the situation that make that the closure ofthe conflict period so difficult and force workers to maintain occupations or protests for so long.

This extreme duration makes the maintenance of the worker collective even more difficult: notonly does the workplace remain closed (or partly closed, since, on occasion, they manage to havesome kind of informal activity), drawing out the time they do not have regular income, but it alsomakes it harder to sustain the framework necessary to continue with the process of getting resources,

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Figure 4.1: Average days of occupation/conflict. Synthesis of four surveys.

mobilizing support and, especially, dealing with the greatly reduced possibilities of reactivating theplant or establishment. It is well-known that in the case of industrial production, the longer themachinery is stopped, the greater the damage it suffers if adequate maintenance cannot be done onit, and similar things happen with facilities of other kinds of businesses as well.

And, of course, it is even harder to rebuild value chains, regain customers and providers, or rein-tegrate competitively into the market. The excessive duration of conflicts – rather than a heroicstruggle, as seen from a point of view focused on the organization or militancy of worker strug-gles – is a serious inconvenience to the successful recovery of an economic unit, that adds to thewell-known difficulties that recovered businesses already bring with them. An average of elevenmonths of conflict is no small detail, but rather a strong determinant for future worker management.

If we connect this data point with others related to legal issues, we can see several clues as to whythis situation happens. Also, to the extent that this harms workers, it can indicate who it may benefitin exchange.

The Reform of the Bankruptcy Law and its Consequences

At the close of the 2010 report, one of the issues that gave the most hope was the potential approvalof a reform of the Bankruptcy Law, one of the first demands of the National Movement of RecoveredBusinesses from its beginning in 2002.

The bankruptcy law in effect until 2011 dated back to 1995, and was built on the foundations ofthe prior law 22,917, approved in 1983 by the military dictatorship prior to leaving power. So, law24,552 maintained a marked neoliberal imprint, facilitating the disposal of bankruptcy assets. Thelaw sought the quick disposal of the goods to pay creditors, especially banks (harming the State and

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workers), facilitated successive bankruptcies (reducing the time in which the same enterprise couldagain declare bankruptcy to a year), and eliminated asset stripping as an economic crime.

It was a law to liquidate businesses and, for exactly that reason, the primary pretext for the business

asset stripping that preceded (and precedes) the large majority of the cases of recovered businesses.The mission of judges and trustees intervening in the bankruptcies was the quick liquidation of thegoods, without taking into account the loss of either jobs or the productive capacity of establish-ments that, in many cases, were in operational condition.

Become of this, the workers quickly identified that law as an enemy of their most basic interests.In 2002, in the context of the economic crisis lashing the country, law 25,563 was passed, introduc-ing new changes in the procedural aspects of bankruptcy and prolonging the period of negotiationbetween debtors and creditors in a bankruptcy before reaching a resolution. In one of its articles,this reform includes the extraordinary recourse of giving productive continuity to the worker coop-erative as a guardian of the goods.

In June of 2011, after being approved almost unanimously in both houses of the National Congress,

law 26,684 was passed, introducing important changes to the bankruptcy process, especially for thecases of businesses in process of recovery by their workers.

The driver of this reform was the inclusion of prioritizing productive continuity over the liquidationof goods, no longer as an extraordinary recourse, but as a possibility that the judge has to take intoconsideration if certain requirements are met, giving standing to workers organized into coopera-tives to be able to carry on the operationof the business both in preventive cases and in bankruptcies,through the mechanism of compensation through wage claims under worker control.

This way, the debts of the bankrupt business owner owed to the workers can serve as capital forthe worker cooperative to purchase the business. So, it was established that when the debts in labormatters (salaries, severance, etc.) are equivalent to the capital of the business, the bankruptcy judge

can proceed to direct adjudication in favor of the workers. There were several objections presentedalong the way to the possible use of this tool for cases of recovered businesses. First, the delegationof fundamental decisions to judges and trustees, with a large margin for ideological discretion onthe technical basis of viability, without making clear the criteria for evaluation of viability and whowould be in charge of judging it. Or rather, without consultating with specialized public bodies thatcould give an alternative vision based on the prior experience of BRWs or cooperatives in general.

Second, the requirement that cooperatives must be formed by two thirds of the former workersmeans that in many cases, with the departure of administrative personnel or those who don’t agreeor have gotten another job, that number is not reached and possibilities are blocked. And, finally, inmore than one enterprise, workers’ claims are far from compensating for the value of bankruptcy,which means the workers either cannot take over the factory or would end up with part of the former

owners’ debt.

All these problems can be seen in concrete cases, where judges use these same reasons to denylabor continuity to workers, as in the case of the MOM printing cooperative, formerly Lanci Impre-

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sores. In this case, it was objected that the workers in the cooperative (in practice, everyone whoremained when the firm closed its doors and was occupied) were not two thirds of the labor roster.Attorneys for the bosses filed a criminal complaint for encroachment which ended with the evictionof the workers from the plant by the Metropolitan Police in March of 2013, and since that time, the

workers have maintained an encampment at the entrance. Curiously, the judge objects that thereis no “productive continuity” because the printing press hasn’t worked since the eviction. Beyondthe ridiculous and even insulting nature of the argument, what it shows is the lack of willingnessto value the option for the workers that the bankruptcy law makes possible, confirming what wemaintain about how the reform continues to depend on judges’ discretion to make it effective.

Contrasting the concrete situation of the surveyed BRWs from 2010-2013, of which two thirds arerecoveries begun after the new law came into effect, some of these assumptions take shape. In thefirst place, we can see that there is a notable decline in the passage of expropriation laws. By 2010,63% of surveyed BRWs had gotten expropriation, of which 19% had “definitive” expropriationlaws, and the rest, temporary. To clarify, the “definitive” laws generally corresponded to cooper-atives in the City of Buenos Aires affected by law 1529/04, the large majority of which were notapplied, and whose extension is systematically vetoed by the head of government, Mauricio Macri.The percentage was significant, resulting in ad hoc ways to resolve, or start to resolve, the legalsituation of the BRWs this way. The situation showed a broad diversity, since the rest were dividedinto laws in process, continuities granted by the court, several (very few) purchases at auction orswaps of severance for machinery, and other isolated forms of resolution, but predominantly, ex-propriation.

This panorama changed radically in the period studied in this survey. The situations with respectto ownership of the BRWs in the sample are extremely diverse and scarcely 16% were able toobtain an expropriation law in their favor. A similar number is under occupation without any legalprogress, and an even smaller percentage (which means, because of the size of the sample, very few

cases, and if we project it out to the total BRWs in the period, which is to say twice as many, thereare still only a few) is situations that can be framed in the process of the new bankruptcy law. Ifwe combine authorizations to operate given by judges with the mechanisms explicitly mentionedas corresponding to the law, they only add up to 19.4%. Parallel to that, we find a wide varietyof situations that, listed as “others,” include concessions and agreements with bosses, rentals ofproperties or expropriation laws in process.

This disparity allows us to contrast the desired or imagined effects of the reform of the bankruptcylaw with the situation so far in the cases where it could have been applied, and also with the variousobjections or observations that have been made about the law based on legal doctrine, or even onexamples of isolated cases.

Examining this situation, the first thing that we can see is that the effective result expected from

this law, which is to say, that all or the large majority of recoveries could be channeled through thisreform, has not been verified in concrete practice. On the contrary, only 10% have been able to useits mechanisms to move ahead in the recovery of the business by the workers (even admitting that

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Figure 4.2: The legal situation of the BRWs 2010-2013 concerning ownership.

a similar percentage that appear in our survey as “authorized to work by the bankruptcy judge” canalso invoke this law), and there remains a very large majority of cases after its enactment where,for different reasons, it could not be used. In that large majority, which is 80-90%, the diversityof situations is aggravated by an effect that we could describe as negative, in which expectationscreated by the reform seem to have blocked the previously usual path of an expropriation law.Considering this, we see that not only are the laws passed few in number, with a somewhat highernumber of bills in process, but there is a similar number that hasn’t even has opted to try to get one.In this sense, it may not be at all correct to attribute the decline in the approval of expropriationlaws to the reform of the bankruptcy law, since the tendency towards the decrease was alreadyobserved in the last survey. What it did do was consolidate it, giving legislators and also workersthe impression that with this reform, the problem of the recovered businesses was being resolved

and that it was no longer necessary to pass expropriation laws. Reality shows that, on the contrary,legal precariousness has increased.

It is at this point that another data point begins to make sense – one that is even more worrisomethan the scarcity of strong measures on property conflicts, which is why we chose to gather dataabout conflict with that about the legal framework into a single chapter. We refer to the already-mentioned increase in the duration of conflicts and occupations. The judicialization of conflictswithout appealing to the passage of expropriation laws that reduce the length of bankruptcy casesputs workers in a situation of vulnerability and dependence on the whims and apathy of judges andtrustees. Because they don’t depend on the popular vote, they do not have the pressure that thelegislators can feel (and that, in fact, felt in the moments of highest institutional crisis and politicaldeligitimation in the years after December 2001). The result is that permits to produce, the provision

of labor and productive continuity, plus the settlement of the mechanisms of compensation in backpay, travel the slow and ponderous corridors of justice, while the workers occupy their plants inprecarious conditions or await authorizations to go back to work. The four or five-month average

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that we saw only four years ago has become more than eleven.

In synthesis, we can say on the basis of this data that the reform of the bankruptcy law is not oper-ating as a facilitator of recovery processes, but drawing out conflictive processes by judicializing

all the processes and lengthening conflicts, usually without resolving them in favor of the workers.Additionally, it seems to have had the effect of blocking the path of legislative (political) resolutionof conflicts by creating the false idea that the problem of the recovered businesses was “solved”with the reform of the bankruptcy law.

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Chapter 5

Production

While analyzing the BRWs in this report that started their processes in the last three and a half years,it is worthwhile to clarify again that we are not considering information about the sample (31 cases)in relation to all recovered businesses in the country (as in the previous surveys), but rather, onlythose within this temporal framework. This clarification is even more important to keep in mind inthis chapter, which is dedicated to the recovered businesses as productive units, because of the short

production time that the cases considered had at the time of the survey. Extrapolating the resultsto the whole set would give information far removed from the reality of the entire group, which iswhy we still consider the conclusions of the 2010 survey valid.

In the results of the first survey, finalized at the beginning of 2003, the panorama was even moretenative, because the majority of the BRWs surveyed were very recently formed or had only beenproducting for a short time. The macroeconomic context in which they found themselves was verydifferent from the current one: a country in the middle of a crisis, perhaps the deepest that Argentinahas gone through in the last century. The levels of production reached by the recovered businessesat the time clearly mark this situation. Today, there is not the same urgency and, even though thereis a global crisis that obviously affects our country, the context for a recovered business to restartactivity is (or tends to be) much more favorable. In spite of those considerations, we can make

a comparison of the levels of production at that time to be able to perceive this difference and itscauses.

In the following graphic, we can see the lines of estimated percentage of use of installed capacity in2002 and 2013. The comparison clearly shows that ten years ago, the recovered businesses (in part,occupied businesses that were still unable to restart activity) had enormous difficulties producingcompared with the panorama of current recoveries.

In the current survey, four cases were found that were still not able restart economic activity, allof them because they are still in conflict. We have already shown, in the previous chapter, theextension of the periods of conflict and its causes. Among those that are active, we can confirm animprovement in conditions by looking at the intervals of production capacity utilization in detail:in the first range, from 1 to 20% utilization of installed capacity, in the current survey, we see 13%,much less than in 2002-2003, in which – including those that were not producing yet – it was 46%.Between 21% and 40%, thelevels coincide on a percentage of 26%. In contrast, in the higher ranges,we clearly note a high level of productive activity in the recovered businesses in the fourth survey,

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Figure 5.1: Percentages of utilization of installed capacity 2002-2013. (Total cases in the sample 2002

N: 59 and 2013 N: 31)

compared to the sustained drop in the first survey as we advanced towards the higher percentages,

even reaching 13% in the highest range (80-100%), of which we found no examples at all in thesurveys in the years between.

In spite of this difference in production by the businesses after beginning post-recovery economicactivity, the problems indicated by the workers are similar in both periods, and also to the secondsurvey in 2004. The major cause that explains low performance or the inability to recover greaterlevels of productivity is the lack of working capital and raw material (which is really another wayof expressing the same problem). This scenario is logical in the BRWs that began recently, giventheir legally precarious conditions and, therefore, their lack of access to credit that would allowthem to assume the costs of beginning production. In contrast, in the third survey in 2010, with apredominant set of BRWs that had already been in recovery for several years, the problem of thelack of working capital had been displaced by the difficulties of entering the market, a problemthat corresponds to a different developmental stage of self-managed businesses. Market problemsare also named (29.4%), together with other circumstances that, as a whole, constitute the range ofdifficulties and issues in which self-managed businesses are in worse conditions than private-capitalbusinesses, due not only to their conflictive origins, but principally to the legal abyss and publicpolicies that separate one from another.

Examining the characteristics of production at BRWs during this time, it is striking how low thepercentage of work for third parties, called a façon, is compared to the 2010 survey. This mode ofproducing for a so-called “client” (a businessperson who provides the supplies and pays an amountfor productive work on goods, which s/he then markets) is used fairly commonly in businesses thatare not in a condition to capitalize enough to undertake production on their own, or to fill holes anddowntime created by insufficient utilization of productive capacity. However, just as we showedin the report of the third survey how the usual hypotheses with respect to why and how much thismode was applied did not correspond directly to reality, we see here a very low level of work forthird parties, in spite of looking at BRWs with little time working. Twenty-nine percent of the

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BRWs interviewed responded that they do a façon work, a number clearly less than the 49% foundin 2010.

These issues around the state of production in recovered businesses between 2010 and 2013 are

part of the broader profile of the BRWs in the country. In this regard, it is interesting to observe thedifferences and similiarities between these cases and the general profile that we saw in the surveyreport in 2010. From the current sample, it emerged that 60% of businesses had been around sincethe ’70s. In the survey done in 2010, that same percentage corresponded to older businesses (frombefore 1950 until the ’70s). The profile of the recovered businesses of the current period shows asignificant number: 35% of businesses started their activity since the beginning of the ’90s, and16% in the last decade, which is to say, in the setting dominated by the current post-convertibilityeconomic policy.

The data in this report reflect a similar configuration to previous surveys on the destination ofproduction. End consumption is the greatest percentage (48.4%), though in comparison, it is lessthan the 60% seen in 2010. Intermediate consumption (45.2%) and production of raw materials

(3.2%) remain in similar proportions (around 4% in 2010). There is a greater percentage of serviceBRWs, 22.6%, compared to 15% in 2010. Workers’ perceptions of factory facilities is positive,with similar findings to the answers given in 2010. For example, 66.7% consider the facilities oftheir recently recovered businesses to be in good condition, while 28% find them obsolete. Fourteenpercent feels machinery is lacking, and 9.5% reports a lack of physical space in the facilities foradequate functioning. Other answers we found less frequently were the lack of maintenance ofmachinery and the lack of parts to keep it running. Likewise, 48% uses all their machinery, makingfull use of their productive circuit.

Figure 5.2: State of the facilities/machinery. Base: Sample of BRWs, excluding the service sector. N: 21.

Note: Multiple responses, total is more than 100%.

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As for adding machinery at new BRWs, keeping in mind that are we talking about workplacesrecently reactivated as recovered businesses, only 29% answer that they have added machinery,which is quite different from the 59% of BRWs that our third survey showed. Among those thatwere able to add machinery, 50% responded that they had done so with their own funds, 25%

through their own funds plus subsidies, and another 25% exclusively through subsidies. Again, aswe showed in the previous report, the idea of the BRWs being dependent on State help to survivedoes not seem to be verified, even when looking at things subsidies are usually granted for, such asthe purchase, repair, and updating of technology.

To finish, the productive profile of businesses that produce or sell services cannot be thought ofwithout investigating their entry in the market. We have already seen that workers in the mostrecent BRWs largely attribute their productive difficulties to the lack of working capital primarilyand, to a lesser extent, to difficulties in dealing with the market, while in the older cases in theprevious report, these proportions were reversed. Having asked about marketing problems directlyin this fourth survey, we see more who say they do not have difficulties with marketing than thosewho do, though the latter still comes to 45%.

Along the same lines, we can examine the network of economic relationships the recently formedBRWs are in, investigating how they positionthemselves with customers and suppliers, and whetherthis approach has been modified from the original business. Of the BRWs interviewed, 67% answerthat they retain the same suppliers as the original business, and the majority of those that do not aresuffering the consequences of the debts left by the former owners to suppliers and customers (andto the workers, of course), even though only a third has had to assume any of those debts to be ableto rebuild the relationship with their former suppliers.

Concerning connections with clients, 55% say they do not have a predominant client and, withinthe 41% that does, 54% clarifies that this client represents between 30 and 40% of production.

A significant percentage of sales to the general public is made by service businesses and those thatproduce for end consumption. The next biggest clients are big businesses and SMEs, which repre-sent sales in the traditional market. Only a very few BRWs trade with other recovered businesses,like two print shops (22 de Mayo – formerly Lacabril – and Gráfica Suárez). Social businesses andmicro enterprises add up to 11%, and the State is also is a client of the BRWs with 11% of sales(for two construction businesses and a print shop), which is up from 8.64% in 2010. There is nopresence of NGOs in the trade relationships of the BRWs created in this period.

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Chapter 6

The Workers

We saw in the first chapter of this report that the number of recovered businesses in the countryshowed large growth in the years studied. If we add up the total workers in these 63 new BRWs, jobs that have been preserved by the recovered businesses, they come to 2,644. If we take intoaccount that the third survey indicated a total of 9,400 workers, which we can raise to approximately10,000 by adding the cases that, as we indicated previously, we had not detected by the time that

report closed, [we can extrapolate that, with currently unknown BRWs,] the total of recovered jobsreaches about 3,000. (Between the second survey, in 2004, and the next, in 2010, the number of jobs preserved and created by BRWs was 2,400, which is to say, around 5,400 jobs were createdin the period following the crisis). Once again, we confirm that the recovery of businesses by theworkers not only serves to avoid the closure of workplaces, but also to create employment, even ifnot on a massive scale.

Analyzing the profile of the BRWs from the point of view of their ability to create jobs, in recentcases, we find the same phenomenon of contraction from the period of greatest expansion of theoriginal business to a notable reduction in the number of workers at the time of conflict. This re-duction is usually of large proportions through the employer stage, and is due to different factors, ofwhich technological renovation is not the least, especially in the industrial sector. While identifying

the causes of the reduction in the labor force in each case would require a detailed study that we arenot in a condition to do, nor is it among the objectives of this work, we can see from informationin the different surveys how this situation is verified in almost all cases.

The majority of the businesses had their greatest activity and number of workers in the ’80s – although in this work we can find an equal proportion of cases where this happened in ’90s – and an enormous drop in the number of employees by the time the moment of conflict arrived (inthis survey, between the years 2010 and 2013). This clearly shows that the deterioration of thebusiness, either because of a decline in its competitive conditions or because of a conscious actof asset stripping and business fraud, does not happen during the conflict, much less during thebeginning of worker management, but is the responsibility the former owners.

It is indicative of this phenomenon and the current dimensions of the recovered businesses that, atthe point defined as the greatest expansion of the businesses under a boss, 58% had more than 50workers and, of these, 26% occupied more than 200. These percentages had already been reducedto little more than 40%, and only 3% with more than 200, when the periods of conflict began.

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Figure 6.1: Number of workers at different stages of the business, added up. (N:31, BRWs from the sample)

With respect to the information recorded in previous reports, we do not see significant differencesin this descending curve in the number of workers from the beginning of the conflict and evenafter the business is recovered. In the previous survey, in contrast, a small upturn was noted in thelatter, which is to say, there was job recovery in the BRWs, but this must be contextualized, giventhat the calculation applies to the sample including both recent recoveries and those of greater age,while here, we only include the BRWs recovered in the last three years, with a majority havingbeen recovered between one and two years. In this regard, only 11% of the BRWs in this periodhave over 50 workers and only one has more than 200 workers (Indiel). The process of reductionremains clear enough, and the profile we showed of the BRWs in previous reports, as largely SMEs,most of which were previously larger businesses in numbers of workers, remains unchanged in theprofile of the current BRWs. In this analysis, we can see that the average workers per enterprise issimilar to what was recorded in 2010 (43 in 2013, 45 in 2010).

It is interesting to observe, in that regard, several variations by region and sector (applied to thetotal of existing BRWs as of December of 2013) as the following tables show us:

Sector

Number of

BRWs

Total workers per

BRW Average

Metallurgy 61 2937 48.15

Printing 31 879 28.35

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Textiles 26 1070 41.15

Restaurants 16 328 20.50

Glass 7 327 46.71

Chemicals 8 197 24.63

Plastic 5 95 19.00

Meat 22 2041 92.77

Shipbuilders 2 62 31.00

Food 40 1036 25.90

Construction 17 938 55.18

Leather 6 380 63.33

Health 11 517 47.00

Education 7 215 30.71

Hotels 5 233 46.60

Woodworking/milling

8 146 18.25

Fuel 4 77 19.25

Papermaking 2 71 35.50

Shoemaking 5 601 120.20

Transportation 7 720 102.86

Logistics andmaintenance

6 154 25.66

Media 6 244 40.66

Rubber 1 13 13.00

Trade 3 109 36.66

Mining 1 13 13.00

Others 3 59 19.67

Total 311 13,462 43.42

Table 6.1: Distribution of cases, number of workers and average of workers per BRW, by sector. N: 311.

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In this distribution, the difference can clearly be seen between the average sizes of BRWs by sector,in which some stand out with a greater concentration of labor (like the meat industry, shoemakingand transportation), while others that are noticeable for the number of cases, like print shops andfood industries (except, of course, meat), are characterized by a lower average number of workers.

In geographical distribution, by province, we also observe variation. This generally has to do withthe kind of BRW concentrated in each province. It is noteworthy that in some regions with smallnumbers of recoveredbusinesses but which, because of their characteristics, occupy a lot of workers,the average is very high (for example, Neuquén), while in those with a higher number of recoveredbusinesses, the average approaches the national average (as in the City of Buenos Aires, the provinceof Buenos Aires, both in the case of Greater Buenos Aires and in the interior, and Santa Fe).

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Region2013Total

% byprovince

Totalworkers % workers

Averageworkers

CABA 58 19 1902 14.14 33.00

GBA 97 31 4406 32.76 45.42

BA (interior) 46 14.79 1726 12.83 37.52

Chaco 9 2.89 343 2.55 38.11

Corrientes 5 1.61 454 3.38 90.80

Entre Rios 5 1.61 328 2.44 65.60

Santa Fe 26 8.36 1189 8.85 45.81

Chubut 3 0.96 45 0.33 15.00

Córdoba 14 4.5 1003 7.46 71.64

La Pampa 5 1.61 157 1.18 31.40

La Rioja 4 1.29 133 0.99 33.25

Mendoza 7 2.25 173 1.29 24.71

Neuquén 6 1.93 837 6.22 139.50

Rio Negro 8 2.57 244 1.81 30.50

San Juan 2 0.64 39 0.29 19.50

Tierra del

Fuego

1 0.32 30 0.22 30.00

Catamarca 1 0.32 27 0.2 27.00

Jujuy 2 0.64 80 0.6 40.00

Misiones 4 1.29 93 0.69 23.25

San Luis 5 1.61 232 1.72 46.40

Tucumán 1 0.32 7 0.05 7.00

Table 6.2: Distribution of cases, number of workers and average of workers per BRW, by province. N: 311.

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The Workers After Recovery

With the qualification of the little time transpired in most cases studied, 58% of the cases sawa decline in the number of workers between the beginning of the process and the moment when

each BRW was interviewed. The reasons workers to leave the incipient BRW vary, but just as inthe previous reports (in which the number was higher, because of having more time under self-management, but that in general was compensated for by additions), we find that the main explana-tion was the difficulties in the first times of self-management, expressed both through the discontentwith the difficulties in returning to earlier incomes, or disagreements with the new form of man-agement. The remainder of the reasons given also have to do with these same difficulties in theinitial period, like internal conflicts, the ability of the most qualified workers and youth to get an-other job and, in some cases, also retirements and deaths. By a large majority, the workers whodecided leave the BRW are from heirarchical and administrative areas, which we had also verifiedin previous surveys.

In contrast, fewer than 40% of the BRWs surveyed were able to add new workers. In the casesthat have not done so, again, the short time of management, the fact of still not having recoveredsufficient activity to bring in new workers since the end of the conflict, and the fact that some caseshad not yet been able to return to activity at the time of the survey, explain this situation.

The composition of these workers again shows predominantly men (approximately 75%), of which58% are more than 35 years old, with approximately 12% over 55. This proportion shows, already,that the lack of answers from the State on social security, especially retirement, for self-managedworkers will also affect a large proportion of workers in the most recent BRWs in the near future.Those hired without becoming members are rare, not more than 2% of the total, and are mostlydescribed as aspiring to membership and, in a few cases, as staff hired for possible tasks. As wealready indicated in the previous survey report, in non-cooperative businesses (and in the Stateitself) the majority of these cases would not count as “workers” of the business, but as contractingof services. However, for the members of the recovered businesses, they are others workers whocannot join cooperatives because they work temporarily, and on occasion, on their own.

The criteria for new hiring, especially for aspiring members or new members, are established witha certain degree of variability in those BRWs that have added workers. The majority are formerworkers at the same enterprise who were fired or quit before the recovery process, family andacquaintances and, to a lesser degree, totally new staff without previous links with the collective.These totally new workers have been added through references or, in some case, making inquiriesin the community around the BRW.

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Chapter 7

Management Structure

As we have already pointed outon other occasions, management structure is the most striking aspectof the recovered businesses (other than the conflict), and it generates different kinds of expectations,because it is around these issues that the difference with other kindsof businesses, both privately andpublicly managed, appears most clearly. This is where self-management is put in play, and therefore,is the point that is hardest to analyze in a statistical report. The variables that may be useful to us

to evaluate the depth or the even existence of self-management processes are difficult to reflect in asurvey, which sharply limits analysis if we don’t combine them with qualitative information whichalso cannot be reduced to a given moment, but rather, should be created over a rather prolongedperiod of time. Because of this, most of the observations our team can make here are possiblebecause of the continuity of work since 2002, and its characteristics give us the means to interpretthese data and combine them with other qualitative data. Along with this caveat, we should alsopoint out that the difficulty in generally evaluating the structure of self-management of the BRWsas a whole is far from having been overcome.

In this sense, we can classify the data created by the survey with respect to the management structurein three sets. In the first, we’re going to see the most obvious signs of labor democratization, andthose described as such by the workers, such as equality of hours and pay among the members

of a BRW. Since the time the movement was formed, the existence of this equality for the wholemembership of a BRW was the most visible and verifiable data point to identify the standards ofinternal democracy and egalitarianism. The second data group is on the question of the politicalorganizationof management, such as the existence and frequency of assemblies and the compositionand election of the administrative council. The third is the presence or absence of alterations ofwork processes in the BRW, which we could identify as the depth of the transformations that self-management can make in the economic aspect. The survey data gave us an approximation of theseissues that can only be taken as indications of what really happens in the most profound parts ofsocial and economic relationships existing within each self-managed business.

EqualityAs we just said, we refer to equality in pay and hours as an indicator of egalitarianism in the laborrelations between the members of the BRWs. That idea, as we have explained in previous reports,

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has a close relationship with the circumstances of the conflict of origin where the dissolution of allforms of business and even union organization prior to the conflict operates as a powerful reorga-nizer of the collective, including an egalitarian division of the first income and also of the hoursworked, which is quite logical in the difficult context of most recoveries.

This egalitarianism not necessarily, as is deduced from the analysis of the circumstances that createit, an ideological choice, but one borne of sheer necessity. From the beginning, the “intensity ofthe conflict” as an engine of transformations in these matters has been a hypothesis of various re-searchers in analyzing this relationship of equality adopted by the workers. The later trajectory ofthe majority of surveyed BRWs has shown that the adoption of strict equality in these aspects hasprovoked more than a few discussions in the heart of the cooperatives themselves about the relation-ship between this absolute equality and criteria of responsibility, recognition of efforts, capacities,responsibilities and training of the workers, which has led to more than a little internal tension. Itis also is rather subjective to set criteria to evaluate or measure the relationship between the “inten-sity of the conflict” and the “depth of self-management” based on variables that do not necessarilyconstitute significant transformations in the organization of work and the democratization of laborrelations, as much as they may remind us of the Paris Commune.

The information created in this survey does not refer to the entire set of experiences — only thosein the period studied — so we are not in a position to evaluate the evolution of these indicators.Still, we can see that the proportion of BRWs that adopt these initial principles remains nearlyunchanged. The egalitarian work day, for example, has been adopted by 55.6% of the businessesrecovered since 2010, with an average of nine hours. In the rest, it is observed that there are workerswho have longer hours because the job they occupy demands more work.

A similar proportion is observed in the draws. In 51.9% of cases, all theworkers earn the same thing.The amounts of the salaries are difficult to measure because of the inflationary circumstances of theperiod, and surely even the most recent data may be out of date by the first months of 2014. That

said, on average, among all of the cases in which their is no differentiation, the draws of the newrecovered businesses amounts to AR$3823 [about US$450 in late 2014, but over US$600 in late2013]. The average rises to AR$4000 for those who do not use the egalitarian criterion. In thesecases, salary differentials go from less than 25% (34% of the cases) to between 25% and 50% (33%of the cases). Notwithstanding, it should be noted that the maximum draw, AR$8000, is earned ata business in which all the workers earn the same thing.

In the cases where there are differences in pay, and in spite of not adopting the “egalitarian” crite-rion, the chosen alternatives seek to preserve what the workers percieve as fair in accordance withabilities, recognition of effort made and the needs of each one. The number of hours worked isthe preponderant criterion of salary differentiation (61.5%), followed by seniority (23.1%). In oneof the cases, the criteria of differentiation have to do with the contribution that the founders made

at the beginning, as a form of compensation. In other cases, the particular family situation of thecompañeros was taken into account.

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Among those that decided to establish categories of salary differentiation, 83.3% apply those thatare described in the collective work agreement. In this case, and beyond the relationship that mayhave existed with the union, the inheritance of what was considered fair as a union demand clearlyremains an applicable criterion in the cooperative, marking them once again as still belonging to,

and still being connected to, union traditions that date back to before the adoption of cooperativerules. The widespread use of the term “salaries” in place of “draws,” as they are properly called inaccording to the norms of worker cooperatives, is not a simple whim or ignorance of cooperativism:what they receive weekly, biweekly or monthly is actually a salary — compensation for work doneand not a “draw on the utilities account,” for as much as this is what must happen to adapt work inthe recovered businesses to cooperative terminology. It is not the only difficulty of this adaptation,and is not, of course, a problem of the workers who have to adopt worker cooperativism to keeptheir jobs, but the lack of legislation for this new reality.

Assemblies and Councils

The report of the third survey, in 2010, was the first to incorporate data that made it possible to eval-uate aspects of the internal organization of BRWs (heard as claims that are often widespread but notbacked up with evidence) that would demonstrate some of the characteristics of self-managementprocesses. This basically happens with the forms that the decision-making process takes, especiallyin holding assemblies. The association between self-management and assemblies or, to put it an-other way, “making decisions horizontally,” was one of the first groundbreaking features attributedto the BRWs. However, it is clear that, just like equality of pay, whether assemblies exist or notis an important indicator, but it does not necessarily affect the core of the internal structure of abusiness.

Assemblies, on theother hand, are notstrangers to the workers’ movement. On thecontrary, they are

a tradition that is strongly rooted in union struggles and, of course, are adopted as a way to discussand make or legitimate decisions in the conflict stage. It is common sense that the managementof a business that has to operate day to day would need to deepen its organizational form to becompatible with this management, which means making small decisions constantly.

With this in mind, one of the most striking points in the previous report was — without going tothe extreme of the “permanent assembly” — the inversion of the decision-making structure of therecovered businesses compared to traditional cooperatives, between the assembly and the admin-istrative council. The frequency of assemblies was very high. While the data point suffers from alack of precision due to our inability to look deeper into each case, the recognition of the member-ship assembly as the fundamental body, and that of the council as an executive body subject to thepolicy determined by the assembly, appeared as clearly predominant.

For the BRWs that appeared in the period of 2010-2013, that proportion remains. The assembliescontinue to be the space in which the central decisions of worker management are made: 33% makeit clear that all decisions are made there, while 30% say those that are most important, and 22%,

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those of an economic nature. We should add that 93% of the surveyed BRWs state that assembliesare held periodically, and in 56% of the cases, once a week (even more than in 2010, when itwas 44%). The majority of the surveyed BRWs affirm that in the council, operational, everydaydecisions are made (27%), and practical decisions about budgets, marketing and production (23%).

As we see, then, in the real functioning of the BRWs, the assembly continues to be prioritized asthe space in which fundamental decisions are made about the business.

Another important aspect to seeing the changes in the business structure is how that new composi-tion is reflected in the members of the leadership, which is to say, the administrative council. Thisis an important point because, as much as we point out the importance of the assembly, the councilis the body elected by the workers where leadership is reflected, as well as relationships of strengthor internal balance. In that regard, it is interesting to point out that an important majority of councilmembers, 80.8%, belonged to the production area. The structure of union representation does notcarry much weight in the new arrangement, as only 26.9% were stewards. These variables demon-strate shopfloor workers’ onoging access to council positions and the lack of automatic transfer ofleadership or previous hierarchies to the new management structure, just as was seen in the surveydone in 2010.

Likewise, it should be noted that 63% of the BRWs consulted say they use other information chan-nels between workers, complementary to the assembly. Forty-one percent use of chalkboards orbulletin boards, while 35% the use the breakfast/lunchrooms.

Work Processes

With a deeper reading of the changes that have occurred in the way the BRWs are managed, lookingpast the most easily accessible indicators (like those above on egalitarianism and decision-making),

transformations appear in the organization and the work process. As in the previous report, thecurrent data also show the difficulty in making changes in such a way as to bring about not onlytechnological modifications that require capital investments, but also learning and innovation thatfar exceed the possibilities of a recovered business at its beginning (and not only then).

Going a little deeper into the matter, changes of this kind are not usually seen as necessary by theworkers except when demanded by the need to replace administrators, salespeople, and managerswith shopfloor workers, or by the need to cover more jobs between fewer workers. In this case,changes usually refer to job rotation. This job rotation is occasionally deliberate, as a way of social-izing knowledge among the collective, but in most cases, they are forced to cover functions oncedone by the heirarchy and the administrative personnel, and sometimes they also have to make upfor absences among the workers.

This situation no is different among the BRWs in the sample we analyze here. Three out of fournew recovered businesses made no changes from how the business had been under employer man-agement. In only one case was it argued that this is due to the fact that the machines impose this

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kind of organization of work. In 25% of the cases, the decision to not innovate was based on respectfor certain positions, or as a function of the knowledge acquired after long years doing the sametask in the work process. So far, the answers allude to restrictions that can arise from the machinesused in production — although, as we’ve seen, only in one case — or even of the position itself,

of know-how accumulated in each worker. Notwithstanding, there is another 25% that maintainedthe organization of the work process simply becaused they considered it comfortable, adequate forwork, or efficient.

In the few cases that said they have carried out some type of innovation, it was job rotation, or thefact that there are now workers who, besides busying themselves with production, also do admin-istrative tasks. As we said, the cases of rotation seem to be due to need, whether meeting a certaindemand for work, or taking advantage of the scarcity of work in one sector to perform tasks inanother (production workers that do sales in their free time, for example).

This job rotation was practiced in 67% of the new recovered businesses, independent of whetherthey had reorganized the productive process as such. This figure shows continuity with the survey

done in 2010, in which 70% of the BRWs surveyed reported doing job rotation.Besides this general maintenance of the organization of work in three out of four of the new recov-ered businesses, there are other aspects of employer management that persist. For example, 60%reported having section leaders, and when asked the criteria with which people were designated forthat role, 31.3% responded that “they are the same as in the previous business.” Notwithstanding,the proportion was still greater than the new recovered businesses in which ability, experience orfitness were the reasons given for the designation of these roles, covering 50% of the cases thatreported having section leaders. (These align with the notion that the position that already waspresent in the responses from those that didn’t introduce innovations in the productive process.)

In synthesis, to evaluate changes in the management structure, there are multiple aspects to takeinto account, and they cannot be reduced to a single factor, like equality of pay and hours, theorganization of decision-making, or transformations in the organization of production. Even theseareas combined still give only a partial idea of the changes, which only can be observed with amore detailed work than a general survey, since most changes that come from self-managementare in dynamics that can’t be reduced to a number, a classification, or any part of the proceduresof the collective business, even in contrast with the most prominent characteristics of the businessunder a boss. Just as business viability cannot be reduced to billing or the traditional measurementof productivity, neither can self-management be reduced to decision-making or a certain aspectsof the democratization of internal relations. As we have maintained in various publications, self-managed dynamics in a field as heterogeneous as the BRWs means a permanent practice that, onthe economic plane, includes multiple variables, of which we can only give a partial account here.

Finally, and especially in the case of the BRWs of the recent period studied in this report, thetime transpired since the beginning of worker management means that relevant data could not becollected on some of the issues that were present in the last survey.

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Chapter 8

Unions

In the third survey, we added the relationship between the BRWs and unions as an analytical vari-able, collecting information for the first time about the issue beyond case studies that did not givean account of the big picture. As with the rest of this report, what we observe here does not replacethe data from 2010, but complements and updates them concerning the BRWs that appeared in theperiod analyzed.

One of the significant issues that emerged from previous report is that the presence of labor orga-nizations in the BRWs was strikingly high prior to recovery. While we cannot establish what thegeneral rate of unionization was (Argentina has the highest rate of unionization in South America,and according to different studies, was somewhere between 24% and 39% of all wage laborers na-tionally in 2010), since there are references to the number of workers affiliated with unions, we cansee what the percentage was of establishments that would later be recovered where labor organi-zations were present. The third survey shows us that out of a total of 85 surveyed cases, a unionwas present in 87%. Even if it was confrontational, the relationship existed: the unions appearprominently in the histories of recoveries. In those in this survey, the level of unionization prior torecovery is 90%, confirming the tendency.

Union representation shows diverse characteristics in the history of the unions, the kinds of activity,

leaders, and operational policies. These variables affect the relationships that can be establishedwith the workers in the recovered businesses, defining widely varying positions: from support andassistance for workers during the recovery process to opposition to these kind of measures andbeing complicit with management, with the objective of undermining workers’ opposition to thestripping of the business.

Below, we will analyze some of characteristics of the relationship between unions and BRWs in theperiod of 2010-2013.

Unionization of the Workers in Recovered Businesses

The BRW that were analyzed, which have a different make-up of sectors than those interviewed in2010, have the following distribution of union representation:

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Figure 8.1: Presence of unions in the BRWs prior to recovery (in percentages). N:31.

In this period, we can see the continuity of the preponderance of printers’ unions (seven cases).This continues the trend analyzed in the previous survey, of the recovery of printing businesseswith strong support from their union.

In the case of the Buenos Aires Printing Federation, despite not having originally had a position

of support for the recovered businesses in its sector, it soon changed course and transformed intoone of their principal promotors, providing help in conflicts and legal aid to workers. We shouldhighlight that the majority of the recovered businesses in the sector maintain important links toeach other through the Cooperative Printers’ Network, also with the endorsement of the union.We find a similar case in the Print Workers’ Union in the province of Córdoba, which had anactive role supporting workers during occupations or encampments at businesses in conflict andalso participating in a march before the judge for the expropiations of the properties. The unionmaintained full rights for theworkers (even health insurance), even though they were in no conditionto make dues payments.

The presence of the restaurants union is also observed, due to the impact of restaurant recoveries(six cases), with the caveat of that five of the six establishments surveyed belonged to the same

business group, though currently, a separate cooperative exists for each establishment.

There is not a strong presence of metallurgical recoveries, which makes the presence of the UOMvery small in this survey (the UOM is one of the unions, in some regions, mostly Quilmes, that

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was a prominent promoter of business recoveries in earlier times). Still, it is important to note themomentum that, in 2012, the UOM (Quilmes local) gave to the development of the National Met-alurgical Cooperative Network, a second-degree association that unites cooperative businesses andthe recovered metallurgical businesses of Argentina, following the model of the Printers’ Network.

In textiles, for example, we can identify in different cases the presence of different union organi-zations that bring together the workers according to the specific tasks of their activity, which iswhy within the same textile business different unions usually coexist. Such is the case of SOIVA(Worker Union of Clothing and Related Industries), SETIA (Union of Employees of the Textile andRelated Industries) and the AOT (Textile Workers’ Association). In the cases surveyed, we wereable to observe different behavior by each union regarding support for the recovery of the sameenterprise.

Current Relationship with Unions

As for the current relationship of the BRWs with their unions, it is observed in 54% of cases, thelink is maintained, compared to 45% that we found in the 2010 survey.

The most notable change is observed in the kind of relationship. Currently, in 47% of the cases, theworkers remain affiliated with the union with full rights, and in 33%, they base their relationshipmainly on the use of health insurance. In the previous survey, the percentages were 36% and 49%respectively, meaning the principal type of relationship has basically flipped.

As for the role of the unions during the conflict, we can group the data into three categories:

The “support” category coversdifferent forms of union intervention, as described by the interviewedworkers themselves. In 11 cases, active support by the union was reported; in three cases, it wasreported that there was support only at the beginning; in two cases, it was indicated that the supportwas partial, which is to say, with the maintenance of social security, food and materials during theconflict; in another case, it was in the form of legal advice; and in the last, the workers described thesupport received as “opportunist,” indicating that the union representatives sought personal gain.Six cases were recorded in which it was indicated that there was no participation by the union,which were put in the “indifference” category. Then there were four cases in which the role of theunion was was reported to be “support for the bosses,” which were included in the “opposition”category.

In comparison with the 2010 survey, the most striking data point is the reduction of the cases of“indifference,” which went from 42% to 22%. This decline coincides with the increase of the levelof cases of “support.”

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Role of Stewards during the Recovery Process

On this point, the presence of stewards in the businesses that were later recovered remains at a highpercentage: 79% in this survey, while in the 2010 report, it was 86%. This continuing trend is

related to the continuity of the high level of unionization we indicated earlier.

In the presence of stewards in these businesses, much like the level of unionization, a strong contrastis seen between the sample and the national levels. Of the BRWs, 79% had delegates, while at thenational level, there is a presence of stewards in just 39% of private establishments. This also showscontinuity with the prior survey.

The roles of stewards during the conflict can be presented as four kinds of situations: in 12 cases(43%), stewards had an active role; in six cases (21%), there was no steward; in five cases (18%),their role was described as opposition (or betrayal); and in four cases (14%), it was reported thatthey did not play any special role.

While the active role remains at the same level as in the previous survey, there is a reduction of cases

in which the delegate does not play any prominent role (from 28% to 14%). There was a slight risein establishments where there was no presence of stewards,1 and also a rise in the percentage ofcases in which the steward or stewards opposed the recovery process.

In analyzing the relationship between unions and recovered businesses, we find ourselves with aheterogeneous and complex panorama. In slightly more than half of the cases surveyed, the workersmaintain an organic link with their old unions. In these cases, it is significant that there are 42% inwhich they are recognized as union members with full rights, while 35% maintains health insuranceand other benefits.

In a way, these experiences of self-management put traditional union practices in an awkward posi-tion. The hegemonic union model, which represents the wage laborer in a dependent relationship,

which has strong links to the State, and which includes different forms of struggling and bargainingfor salaries and working conditions with the proprieters, faces enormous difficulties in recognizingand representing workers in the recovered businesses. Several of the unions simply did not knowwhat to do in these situations.

Definitively, the experiences of the recovered businesses question the role of labor organizationswhen the workers stop having dependent relationships with their employer and decide form a co-operative to maintain employment. The boss — the figure against whom unions were historicallyorganized — disappears, but the worker-subject remains. At the beginning of the process, otherthan the exceptions already mentioned, the reaction of the union was rejection or abandonment.The proliferation of BRWs and the impact they have had even on union structures have recently ledto a notable change of attitude which, while it doesn’t imply acceptance and active support for the

new situation in all cases, shows a greater participation of unions in recovery processes. In a way,

1 The case of the restaurants is interesting, in which the bosses did not allow the workers to chose stewards.

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Figure 8.2: Role of stewards. N:31.

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the process we’ve been analyzing has had an impact within the union movement, pushing someunions that face the situation to rethink their role and how to respond to these phenomena.

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Chapter 9

Social Security

Legal Framework

As already we said while analyzing the legal framework, almost all the surveyed recovered busi-nesses organized as worker cooperatives. While this choice means certain advantages — like thepossibility of being recognized as a labor continuity of the failed business by the bankruptcy judge,

of operating legally in the market, or of being the beneficiary of an eventual expropriation by theState — due to the non-existence of a specific law on worker cooperatives or other kind of rule thatrecognizes their members as workers, certain conflicts arise that make the development of this kindof enterprise difficult, particularly with respect to access to the benefits of social security.

All cooperatives are regulated by the Law N°20337/73, and until December 2013, access to socialsecurity by workers in worker cooperatives was regulated by two resolutions: N°183/92 INAC,which established that it is the worker cooperative itself that must guarantee access to social securityto its members, and Resolution 784/92 of the ANSES, which determined that, since members ofworker cooperatives are not dependent on it, they should be considered self-employed workers.In December of last year INAES, passed a new resolution (Resolution 4664/13) that modifies andrepeals 183/92, which we will discuss later, because it wasn’t in effect at the time of surveying these

data.So, as there is no relationship of dependence between the cooperative and its members, the workersin recovered businesses that decide to organize themselves as a worker cooperatives are consideredself-employed workers and must take part in the simplified program for small taxpayers (“singletax”)1 to access the benefits of social security.

The single tax is an integrated and simplified tax structure that brings together tax obligations (VATand income tax) and previsional (medical insurance and retirements) into a single monthly payment.However, taking part in this program creates various kinds of problems for workers both in theprovisions that they get, and, above all, in the vulnerability they are exposed to.

Payment of the single tax allows the workers (not only those of the recovered businesses but every-

one in this tax structure) to have access to only two of the five components of the Single System of

1 Resolution N°619/99 AFIP

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Social Security (SUSS)2: retirement and medical insurance. The remainder of the coverages mustbe guaranteed by each cooperative, which, according to the INAES resolution, must be responsi-ble for the full access to these rights of each of their members. Payment of the single tax neithergives them access to the benefit of the Universal Allowance per Child nor the Pregnancy Allowance

for Social Protection, which can only be accessed by those workers who are included in the socialsingle tax.3

Analysis of the survey data for the period of 2010-2013 is not at all encouraging with respect tocoverages provided, and gives an account of the difficulties that this tax structure continues to bringto workers of the recovered businesses.

Pension Contributions

As for the access to the Argentine Integrated Pension System (SIPA), we see that the workers of63% of the BRWs interviewed for this survey aren’t making pension payments, because they hadnot signed up for the single tax. If we keep in mind that at the time we did the survey, the onlyway they were able make these payments was by paying the single tax, we see that a very highpercentage of the new BRW workers are not making any kind of pension payment.

However, it is necessary to clarify that within this percentage, nearly a third is in the process ofsigning up for the single tax, which is no small detail, considering that are we talking about BRWsthat have been working only a short time, and that the process takes time to complete. Within thisgroup, four are in the process of the social single tax, which means that the gross income of thesebusinesses does not exceed the lowest category of the general single tax (AR$4000 per month perworker).

Within this 63%, also, there is one case that isn’t making payments but is signed up for the single

tax, which is to say, all the workers of this BRW are not covered, but do owe back payments to theState. This is another of the difficulties this program brings: once signed up, if, for some reason,the worker stops paying, a debt is created to the State which grows month to month until the workerleaves or the system automatically removes him or her.

2 The SUSS is made up of five subsystems: the Argentine Integrated Pension System (SIPA), the systems of family

allowances, occupational hazards, unemployment provisions, and the national system of health insurance.3 The workers of the recovered businesses are demanding to be included in the receipt of these allowances. At the time

of the writing of this report, it is a topic under discussion, but the addition of single-tax-payers in the lowest categoriesto those who receive these benefits has not yet been established.

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Health Coverage

The other component of social security to which access is provided through thepayment of thesingletax is the National System of Health Insurance,4 which is to say, medical coverage. However, the

characteristics of the coverage are limited. On the one hand, payment of the single tax only providesaccess to the so-called PMO (Obligatory Medical Plan) that is limited to some minimum basicprovisions, requiring payment of an additional sum to access medical services not included in it.Additionally, in contrast to dependent workers, payment of the single tax only gives coverage to thebeneficiary, which is to say, every member of the immediate family also has to sign up “voluntarily”and pay the same amount as the beneficiary (AR$143). Also, if payment is not made on time, thereis no coverage until it is made, and if a worker misses payments for three consecutive months orfive months total, s/he is taken off the rolls of active affiliates in health insurance, which meansthat s/he must start the affiliation process over. All of which is to say, the type of health coverageobtained through the single tax is deficient and, in large measure, the coverage provided remainsrestricted to what one can pay.

While 63% of the BRWs surveyed are not yet signed up for the single tax, access to health coverageis much broader than pension coverage, because in 59% of the surveyed BRWs, the workers havesome type of medical coverage. This is explained, in large measure, by the 50% of the cases inwhich they get coverage through union health insurance, which is a significant change in these newBRWs compared to the situation observed in the 2010 survey, when only 29% had coverage throughunion health insurance (55% through the single tax, and 16% through pre-payments). As seen inthe previous chapter, among the BRWs of the period analyzed, an important increase is observedin the recovered businesses that maintain a relationship with the union, where a significant 47%continue being affiliated with full rights and 33% retains the use of health insurance.

Coverage of Occupational Hazards

Worker cooperatives are not considered in the Occupational Hazards Law, which only distinguishesbetween the workers in relationship of dependence — for whom the boss must make payments forOccupational Hazard Insurance (ART) — and self-employed workers. Self-managed workers mustuse the structure meant for the latter, which is to say, the only choice they have to access coverageagainst occupational hazards is buying some type of insurance against personal accidents. Thiskind of insurance means higher costs and fewer benefits for the productive unit than those offeredby ART.

4 The National System of Health Insurance encompasses national health insurances and other agents, such as mutuals,health insurances associations, insurance federations and agents, and is regulated by the Superintendency of HealthServices, which is part of the Ministry of Health of the Nation.

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In this context, it is not strange that 63% of the new BRWs do not have any kind of coverage foroccupational hazards. In the remaining 27%, some workers opted for some of the possibilities theinsurance market offers: 30% have workers covered by life insurance, another 30% have coverageagainst accidents, 20% have comprehensive insurance against all risks and 50% responded that they

have contracted some type of private coverage without specifying which (some have contracted twoor more of these simultaneously).

As we have seen, the single tax not only does not solve access to social security for the workers ofthe BRWs, it also adds new problems. In the first place, it means a loss of rights compared to otherwage laborers, because does not provide the same coverage. On the other hand, it is a structure thatdoes not take into account characteristics of self-organized work. The workers at the BRWs arenot independent workers that carry out their activities individually but, on the contrary, are workerswho organize their work collectively. Legislation that truly solves these problems must begin byrecognizing this new collective form of work.

New INAES Resolution

To end, we will make brief reference to Resolution 4664/13 of the INAES. This new resolutionintroduces two modifications: one with respect to pension coverage and the other with respect tocoverage for occupational hazards. The first expands workers’ options when making retirementpayments, because it establishes that, besides the single tax, the workers in worker cooperativeswill be able to choose, in assembly, to make pension payments as dependent workers.5 The secondspecifies that ART must issue policies in favor of worker cooperatives.

The first modification would seem improve the situation of the workers in recovered businessesbecause they would avoid losing their accumulated payments,6 as happens when they pay through

the single tax, and because it would allow the workers to access full coverage at the SUSS. Thecosts of this option, however, are much greater than those of the single tax or the social single tax,and at no time is it established what would happen if the workers opt for this kind of payment butare not able to find the resources every month to be able to pay it, again leaving BRW workersin a disadvantaged situation with respect to access to social security compared the workers in adependent relationship. This makes it prohibitive for the large majority of worker cooperatives,and especially the BRWs, to pay costs that correspond to both the employer and the employee,

5 This does not mean that labor dependence is established between the member and the cooperative but, simply, that forpension purposes, the workers in the worker cooperative can participate in the dependent worker program.

6 One of the main problems of workers in BRWs that have to pay through the single tax is the loss of their accumulatedpension payments. This is due to the fact that the payment that dependent workers make is a percentage of their salary(the greater the salary, the greater the payment), while the payment made through the single tax is a fixed amount thatcorresponds to the minimum payment.

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with their history of difficulties that have been widely explained in this and previous reports andpublications. Hence, the scope of this new resolution is practically null.

Shortly after the publication of this resolution, which tries to resolve the problem of payments and

labor rights in recovered businesses, the national government sent Parliament a bill to facilitatesmall businesses legalizing un-registered workers through, among others tools, the State paying asignificant part or all of the pension payment the employers owe. The State anticipates providingthese resources to business owners who, for various reasons, did not register their workers, evadingall the costs of social security mentioned here, while it proposes the BRWs pay those same costs torecognize the same rights that these businesses have denied to their workers.

Finally, with respect to coverage for ART, if the Superintendency of Occupational Hazards does notduplicate this modification and implement the mechanisms necessary to incorporate the workers inworker cooperatives to the Occupational Hazards Law, it is very probable that this modificationwill become a dead letter.

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Chapter 10

The State and the Organizations

When we talk about the State, we usually think of the government — the Executive Power — and more specifically, of the policies it advances or its shortcomings, usually in reference to thenational government, as opposed to provincial or local. This general affirmation about the common-sense concept of the State also applies to setting of the recovered businesses and, as we can seein the answers to this and previous surveys or interviews, is in extensive use among the workers

themselves.But, as previous chapters showed, to restrict the role of the State to the actions of one of its pow-ers is to see only a part of the issue. As was made clear in analyzing the legal framework, thefirst meeting that the workers have with the State is through the judicial power, which carries outbankruptcy proceedings or the meeting of creditors of businesses in conflict, and the bulk of re-pressive episodes are due to court orders. The legislative power, especially at the provincial level,debates expropriation laws and other matters related to specific laws that concern the BRWs. Atthe same time, numerous decisions about economic or social policies made by the nation-State — which is to say, certain public policies not specifically intended for the sector, except as generalpolicies, or even meant for other settings — have an enormous influence on the development of therecovered businesses, specifically the progress of general economic processes, as well as numerous

regulations that affect the specific activities of the businesses. Social security legislation for workercooperatives, as was made clear in the previous chapter, is one of the spheres where this is mostnotable.

But if we look at government policy, and analyze it from the perspective of the cases analyzed inthis report, in the period of 2010-13, we will find ourselves reaffirming what was said before onthe occasion of analyzing the results of the previous surveys: the nation-State still does not havean integrated policy towards the recovered businesses that recognizes them as a specific sector thatneeds measures specially meant for its problems. The lack of this policy is what makes what wassaid earlier about the impact of general political decisions on the particular situation of the BRWsmost notable.

In the period that concerns us, the 2011 reform of the bankruptcy law was intended to somehowtake the place of public policy or of legislation that would solve the problem of regularizing thetransition from private management to worker cooperative in this kind of process. The problem, aswe already showed, is that the results do not verify this, but rather, just the opposite, and instead of

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unifying legislation for the bulk of the situations, we have still greater dispersion and diversity inthe processes.

Within that general consideration, and according to the data, the BRWs that began in the period

show a consolidation of government support for the recovery of businesses in the same way that wasalready visible, and which we showed clearly, in the 2010 report. Sixty-one percent of BRWs havereceived some type of state support, which is a relatively high percentage if we keep in mind thatnot all the surveyed cases have reached a degree of legal consolidation sufficient to allow access tomany of the available tools of State sustenance, which, in most cases, require the finalization of theincorporation of the cooperative and legal permission to work. Of this percentage that report theyhave received support, a majority (73%) was through subsidies granted by the nation-State, withsmaller percentages from provincial or municipal funds (though not exclusively — the same BRWcan receive or apply for subsidies at different ministries at the national, provincial, or municipallevel, etc.). By a large majority, these subsidies have been granted by the Ministry of Labor of theNation, through its Self-Managed Labor Program. Others have been received from the INAES,and a small number of this sample reports having been supported by municipalities, like those ofRosario and Avellaneda, and by provincial ministries.

Figure 10.1: Support received from the State. N: 19 BRWs that responded that they have received support.

Multiple responses.

Comparing this situation to the prior period (always remembering that those data refer to the total

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of the existing BRWs as of 2010), the level of State support is lower (85% indicated they hadbeen supported in some way by State institutions or bodies), and within this total, the activity ofthe Nation-state has risen from 55% to more than 70%. The type of support in 2010 was stillconcentrated in subsidies. In spite of these differences, the panorama has not changed much on

State action in support for the BRWs.

Figure 10.2: Types of support received from the State. N: 19 BRWs that responded that they have received

support. Multiple responses.

Nor has the observation we make about this State policy changed. In spite of recognizing theimportance and quality of some programs, public policy on the BRWs remains scattered across dif-ferent bodies, and continues to be considered not economic or productive policy, but social or laborpolicy. Actions taken in other sectors that could have some type of effect are marginal or com-pletely absent. Even the scarce funds directed at training workers continue to ignore the particularsof self-organized work and especially of the recovered businesses, focusing on topics directed atclassic cooperativism, at the so-called “social economy,” and, within this, at the promotion of “en-trepreneurship” and microenterprise, which, it goes without saying at this point, are totally differentfrom the recovery of businesses by workers.

Certainly, is clear that if the attitude of the State was one of of hostility towards the experiences ofself-management (which would do no more than reflect the historical constant), the situation wouldbe radically different and worse. This obvious fact highlights the deficit provoked by the dispersion

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of efforts and financing, and leaves the BRWs in a state of vulnerability to eventual changes in thepolitical context of the country.

Support, Organization and Solidarity

From the beginning, the enormous importance of the support received from outside of the collectiveitself to sustain, strengthen, and expand the resistance of the workers in times of conflict, and alsoin the later stage of development of self-management, has been highlighted. Whereas, in 2002and 2004, we saw that the bulk of that support came from social movements that were boomingat the time, like the piquetero movement and the neighborhood assemblies, by 2010, we saw aprogressive increase in sustenance from the organizations of the working class, both unions and themembers of the movements of recovered businesses and worker cooperativism. At the same time,the importance of State support was growing, with characteristics detailed previously.

This aspect of social mobilization and solidarity with the workers in the struggle for the recovery of

their jobs and the formation of self-managed businesses cannot be underestimated. Solidarity net-works play a fundamental role. But their actors have changed over time, as a result of the changingdynamic of social struggle, the economic recovery of the country, the increasing prominence of therole of State policies and the recovery of a certain strength on the part of unions, which, to a certainextent, as we said in the corresponding chapter, led to a change in their perception of the BRWs.What is noteworthy is a great diversification of actors, and the cases in the period studied show thistendency, as is seen in the following graphic.

Which we can observe is that, first, worker organizations are the majority, as we already noted.Neighborhood organizations, as such, have nearly disappeared from the spectrum of support, thoughnot so the neighborhood community, as embodied by neighbors and (while not necessarily from thesame place) the families of the workers themselves. Support and advice from other cooperatives, oreven from the Credicoop bank, shows a certain relevance, which could not be seen as significant,or differentiated, in previous years. The presence of the State, at least during the conflict, is veryinconsistent and at this stage, does not reflect the preponderance that it takes on later, when thecooperative is incorporated and has a certain regularization of its legal situation, and is in a conditionto offer subsidies and other support that require paperwork for the fulfillment of several regulatoryconditions, which the BRWs in conflict necessarily lack.

The relationship between the BRWs themselves is decisive not only at the conflict stage but later,both as transmitters of direct experience and of contact networks and political support, even thoughtheir capacity to orient or create replicable models of management continues to be minimal. Eventhe possibility of putting together networks of economic exchange between the recoveredbusinessescontinues to be limited, for numerous reasons beyond the power of the workers, like the still-not-very-extensive network of self-managed businesses capable of becoming suppliers or consumers ofsimilar businesses, due to scale on which they operate and the very small portion of the market ineach area they manage to capture. However, “networks” that bring together recovered businesses

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Figure 10.3: Sources of support received in the recovery process. N:31. Multiple responses.

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and worker cooperatives in the same sector have proliferated in recent years, following the modelof the Cooperative Printers’ Network. Thus, the Metallurgy Network, the Textile Network, the Fed-eration of Food Producers Organizations (FOPAL), among others, have emerged. But beyond theorganic bonds created, the possibility of economic cooperation between the new BRWs continues

to be limited. Between the BRWs of the period studied, which had only been working a short time,only 26% were able to establish this kind of relationship. While it was not part of this survey, itis reasonable to suppose that this proportion has increased for BRWs in general from 2010 to thepresent.

While more and more organizational links have emerged among the BRWs, both between them andwith the rest of the cooperative sphere and even with other organizations, one of the data points thatwas most striking in this survey is the limited ability of the organizations and movements of therecovered businesses themselves to integrate the new BRWs. While in 2010 and in previous works,the level of participation in second-tier organizations (even if, in many cases, the relationship withthe movements was defined as sporadic or occasional) was 78%, in the period studied, that numberonly comes to 48%. While the rest do not necessarily reject participation in such organizations,they may have disagreements with certain positions, or question the way in which the organizationsthat approached them tried include them in their ranks. They may see a need for another kind ofmovement or, in the case of several BRWs interviewed in Rosario, may have the idea of forming alocal federation or organization.

That is, even though the formal incorporation of the organizations and movements that unite recov-ered businesses has not been predominant among the new BRWs, this does not imply a stance ofisolation or a rejection of the need to work together, but in most cases, is a criticism of the practicesof several organizations or leaders and, principally, of the lack of unity of the sector.

Within those that are part of these organizations and movements, a great dispersion also is observed,far removed from the times the the MNER and the MNFRT (National Movement of Recovered

Businesses and of Recovered Factories, respectively) divided up the adherents.Among these organizations, the MNFRT and FACTA (Argentine Federation of Cooperatives ofSelf-Managed Workers) make up half of the adherents among the cases in this period, and the restis distributed among the Cooperative Printers’ Network, the Producers’ Union of Self-ManagedWorkers (UPEA), the Federation of Worker Cooperatives (FECOOTRA), and the MNER. Of thosewho participate, a large percentage (67%) say they do so “intensely.” Beyond these statistics, whatis clear is that there is organizational dispersion and diversity, which, more than anything, weakensthe movement as a whole.

It is possible that this organizational weakness also has to do with the decline in one of the moststriking and socially and politically distinctive characteristics of the recovered businesses, which

is organizing and holding of solidarity, educational, and cultural activities in their facilities. Whilein 2010, 57% reported hosting some type of activity of this kind, among those interviewed in thissurvey, that percentage fell to 29%.

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Also, above all, these activities are collaborations in solidarity with other collectives and workers.The economic contribution to other recovered businesses and collaboration with schools and localorganizations appear to be the most important, followed by donating space to other cooperativesand technical or political contributions to other BRWs. Also, as their nature indicates, the large

majority of these practices are carried out by the workers themselves, with little contribution fromother groups, as was characteristic of previous years (especially in the cases of schools and culturalcenters). Perhaps we can also find out why the militant social and territorial groups, which inmost cases held (and largely continue doing so) these activities with the consent of the workers,have stopped approaching and even ignore the new businesses recovered by the workers, in thefact that in some of the best-known (the chain of restaurants, for example), the infrastructure isin no condition to hold them (remember that the majority of the cultural centers and schools wereorganized in factories that were underusing their facilities).

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Chapter 11

Final Words

As can be deduced from the data on this report, the recovered businesses in Argentina are goingthrough a contradictory time, which can be synthesized as a double movement: on the one hand,expansion and consolidation and, on the other hand, an increase of the difficulties in the recognitionand regularization of the experiences of self-managed work. Expansion is seen clearly in the grow-ing number of cases, which exceed 310 in total and, in particular, the more than 60 in the period

specifically studied in this survey. The consolidation is shown, in spite of the difficulties mentioned,in the tiny degree of “business mortality” that the BRWs that arose since the end of the ’90s show,and the clearly demonstrated fact that for Argentine workers, the path of self-management as a wayto preserve jobs and, simultaneously, develop a new way of doing business from the perspective oflabor, not capital, is an ever-more viable and possible alternative.

At the same time, we see a rise in the difficulties that prevent this expansion from gaining legalrecognition that would finally give a legal framework to this kind of collective work and allow theproblems pointed out throughout this report to be solved in a satisfactory and enduring way — nottemporary or provisional — and to guarantee minimum working conditions. This step is fundamen-tal because the problems that many BRWs face regarding market entry, their capacity for associationand for recreating another logic of production and exchange and, in synthesis, their ability to use (at

least) the same facilities of financing and legislation that the current legal framework (together withState action itself) gives to capitalist businesses, are due largely to this lack of legal consolidation.With these problems overcome, workers could see the way cleared for an integrated developmentof self-management, with all its problems and potential. At the same time, and for the same reason,the criticism from some sectors — which do not understand these difficulties, or have an interestin ignoring them — about the economic and productive performance of the BRWs could to start tohave a constructive meaning.

The case of the BAUEN cooperative clearly shows these kind of difficulties. The lack of a solu-tion, no longer legal but political, is a clear indicator of all these matters. Eleven years of self-management have not been enough for the (three) powers of the State to take the bull by the hornsand, as the workers say, make what’s legitimate legal. While the BAUEN is possibly the case on

which the least has been achieved legally, since both the legislative power of the City and the policeat all levels have made pronouncements in favor of the bosses that defrauded the State using theiralliance with corrupt and genocidal admirals in the days of the dictatorship (one of the clear cases

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of complicity between economic power and dictatorial power), that very precariousness illustratesthe ability of the workers of the recovered businesses, in spite of swimming against the current innumerous aspects, to go much farther than was expected of them over a decade ago.

The new BRWs, all in all, would appear to have a more favorable context than those that came out ofthe crisis of 2001 had to face: a macroeconomic period that is favorable (or at least more favorable)to production, a limited but certainly existing policy of government support, the prior experiencesof workers that can be transmitted and taken advantage of, and an unquestionable social legitimacy.However, the struggle of the workers still needs to be known and valued, to be able suport it withall the strength neccesary for its definitive consolidation.

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Appendices

List of Surveyed Recovered Businesses

Autonomous City of Buenos Aires

• Ale Ale• Don Bataglia• Encuadernación Varela• Ex Trabajadores de Dulce Carola

• Fuegos and Vinos• Gráfica MOM• Gráfica Suárez• La Soleada• Lacar• Los Chanchitos• Mangiata• San Salvador

Greater Buenos Aires

• 22 of May (formerly Lacabril)• Acetatos Argentines• Alcoyana• Master Cheese• Nuevo Perpetuo Socorro

Province of Buenos Aires (except GBA)

• Cerámica La Unión (formerly Vandenfil)• Frigorífico Recupera

• Nuevo Amanecer

Córdoba

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• Flexointegral• Gráfica Integral• Gráficos Unidos

Misiones

• El Caiman• Force and Willingness• Super

Neuquén

• CER.SIN.PAT (formerly Cerámica Stefani)

Santa Fe

• Districoop• Naranpol• Nueva Terraza

List of Recovered Businesses - 2013

Recovered Business / Sector

• 1 de Mayo / Woodworking• 10 de Noviembre / Textile• 10 de Septiembre / Metallurgy• 11 de Junio / Glass• 11 de Noviembre / Metallurgy• 14 Hermanos / Leather• 15 de Febrero / Textile• 15 de noviembre / Food• 18 de Diciembre (formerly Brukman) / Textile• 19 de diciembre / Metallurgy• 2 de Diciembre / Metallurgy

• 22 de Mayo / Printing• 23 de Febrero / Laundry services• 25 de Mayo / Metallurgy

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• 3 de Julio / Transportation• 7 de Febrero / Services of logistics and maintenance• 7 de Septiembre / Metallurgy• 8 de Marzo - Hilandería Villa Ángela / Textile• Acetatos Argentinos / Textile• Adabor / Metallurgy• Ados / Health• Alcoyana / Textile• Ale Ale / Restaurant• Alimentaria San Pedro / Food• Ameghino / Food• Amanecer (formerly MVH) / Woodworking• Arcucci / Metallurgy• Argentina Nueva Era / Metallurgy

• Argypaz / Construction• Arrufat / Food• Astillero Navales Unidos / Shipbuilders• Astral / Restaurant• Avícola Moreno / Meat• Azul / Food• BAUEN / Hotel• Blaquier / Food• Bolsas de Tucumán / Printing• Bolsas Olavarría / Printing• C.E.F.A. / Metallurgy• C.I.T.A. / Textile• Cacique Pismanta / Hotel• Cadenas Ancla / Metallurgy• Cafla / Plastic• Campichuelo / Printing• Campos / Metallurgy• Cefomar / Printing• CER.SIN.PAT / Construction• Cerámica Blanca / Construction• Cerámica Cuyo / Construction

• Cerámica del Sur / Construction• Cerámica La Unión / Construction• Cerámicos Marabó / Construction

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• Ceres / Textile• Chamical / Shoemaking• Chilavert / Printing• CIAM Julian Moreno / Metallurgy• CIDEC / Leather• Cintoplom / Chemicals• Citrus Argentinos / Food• City Hotel Mar del Plata / Hotel• Clínica Junín / Health• Clínica La Merced / Health• Clínica Mosconi / Health• Coceramic / Construction• Coembotá / Services of logistics and maintenance• COGTAL / Printing

• Complejo Capdeville / Hotel• Comunicar / Media• Concordia / Transportation• Confecciones Gaiman / Textile• CONOCER / Construction• Coopecon / Food• Cooperar 7 de Mayo / Metallurgy• Coopergas Las Armas / Fuels• Cooperpel / Printing• Cooptem / Glass• Cootragas San Miguel / Fuels• Cootravel / Chemicals• Copacinox / Metallurgy• Costeños Unidos / Textile• COTRACER / Construction• COTRAVESA / Metallurgy• Creciendo Juntas / Textile• Cristal Avellaneda / Glass• Cristal San Justo / Glass• Crometal / Metallurgy• CUC - Unidos por el Calzado / Shoemaking

• CUPS / Textile• Curtidores de Mendoza / Leather• Curtidores Unidos / Leather

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• DECOSUR / Fuels• Diógenes Taborda / Metallurgy• DISTRICOOP / Commerce• Don Alberto / Rubber• Don Bataglia / Restaurant• Ecoopgas Arrecifes / Fuels• EFA - Establecimientos Fabriles Argentinos / Food• El Aguante / Food• El Amanecer / Food• El Caiman / Meat• El Gauchito / Food• El General / Restaurant• El Nuevo Gourmet / Restaurant• El Parrillero / Restaurant

• El Petróleo / Transportation• El Salvador / Transportation• El Tiburon / Meat• Elastax / Plastic• Electromecánica Barrancas / Metallurgy• Electrounión / Metallurgy• Emisora Pampeana / Media• Encata / Printing• Encuadernación Varela / Printing• Engraucoop / Food• Entre Ríos / Food• Entre- Confec / Textile• Envases Flexibles Mataderos / Printing• Esperanza del Plata / Plastic• Evaquil / Metallurgy• Ex Empleados Frigorífico Minguillón / Meat• Ex Empleados Supermercado San Cayetano / Commerce• Ex Korlamp / Glass• Ex Rench / Metallurgy• Ex Textil San Remo / Textile• Ex Trabajadores de Dulce Carola / Textile

• Ex Vandenfil / Textile• Fabricaciones Rosario / Metallurgy• Fadecop / Food

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• Fader / Metallurgy• Fadip / Metallurgy• Famel / Metallurgy• FaSinPat / Construction• Felipe Vallese / Metallurgy• Fénix / Construction• Fénix Café / Restaurant• Fénix Salud / Health• Ferrox Seven / Chemicals• Filplus / Metallurgy• Fishbach / Education• Flexointegral / Printing• Forja San Martín / Metallurgy• Frigocarne Máximo Paz / Meat

• Frigorífico Matadero Victoria / Meat• Frigorífico Recupera / Meat• Frigorífico Resistencia / Meat• Frigorífico Tatra / Meat• Frigorífico Uriburu / Meat• Frigorífico y Matadero Bragado / Meat• Fuegos y Vinos / Restaurant• Fuerza y Voluntad / Construction• Fundición LB / Metallurgy• Fundifer / Metallurgy• Galaxia / Metallurgy• Gráfica El Sol / Printing• Gráfica Grupos & Proyectos / Printing• Gráfica Integral / Printing• Gráfica Loria / Printing• Gráfica Mom / Printing• Gráfica Patricios / Printing• Gráfica San Luis / Printing• Gráfica Suarez / Printing• Grafico / Printing• Gráficos Asociados / Printing

• Gráficos del Oeste / Printing• Gráfico Unidos / Printing• Grupo Alfa / Construction

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• Guido Spano / Education• Hacia Nuevos Rumbos / Education• Herramientas Unión / Metallurgy• Hospital Israelita / Health• Huesitos Wilde / Leather• Idelgraff / Printing• IMPA - Cooperativa 22 de Mayo / Metallurgy• IMPOPAR / Metallurgy• Impresora Barracas / Printing• INCOB / Meat• Indiel / Metallurgy• Industrias RB / Metallurgy• Inimbo / Textile• Instituto Comunicaciones / Education

• J. J. Gómez / Meat• Jabonera Cañada Rosquín / Chemicals• Jardín de Palermo / Education• La Argentina / Food• La Cabaña / Food• La Constructora / Construction• La Disco de oro / Food• La Dorrego / Metallurgy• La Foresta / Meat• La Gráfica / Printing• La Histórica / Metallurgy• La Lagunita / Meat• La Lechera / Food• La Matanza / Metallurgy• La Mocita / Food• La Negra / Food• La Nueva Avan / Metallurgy• La Nueva Esperanza (Global) / Chemicals• La Nueva Esperanza (Grissinópoli) / Food• La Nueva Unión / Printing• La Paz / Commerce

• La Peña del Colorado / Restaurant• La Prensa / Media• La Prensa - Comercio y Justicia / Media

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• La Recuperada / Food• La Soleada / Restaurant• La Unión / Metallurgy• Lacar / Textile• Lácteos La Ciudad / Food• Laguna Paiva / Metallurgy• Las Flores Salud / Health• Pauny / Metalúrgica Lavalán / Laundry services• Libra / Health• Llampicó / Food• Lo Mejor del Centro / Restaurant• Lonas Elías Bedrán / Textile• Los Chanchitos / Restaurant• Los Constituyentes / Metallurgy

• Los Manzanares / Food• Los Tilos / Health• LU3 Ondas del Sur / Media• Maderera Cinco Saltos / Woodworking• Maderera Córdoba/ Woodworking• Maderera Santiago / Woodworking• Malvinas Argentinas / Construction• Malvinas / Food• Mangiata / Restaurant• Marsur / Hotel• Masily / Food• Master Cheese / Food• Mecber / Metallurgy• Metal Varela / Metallurgy• Metalmecánica / Metallurgy• Arrecifes / Metallurgy• Metalúrgica de Quilmes / Metallurgy• Metalúrgica del Sur / Metallurgy• Mil Hojas / Food• Molinera de Saladillo / Food• Muebles San José / Woodworking

• MVH / Metallurgy• Naranpol / Food• Nehuen / Textile

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• Norte / Printing• Nubacoop / Restaurant• Nueva Industria Ganadera – INGA / Meat• Nueva Terraza / Restaurant• Nuevo Amanecer / Food• Nuevo Perpetuo Socorro / Health• Obrera de Tolosa / Meat• Obrera de Transporte La Calera / Transportation• Obreros Unidos del Cuero / Leather• Oeste Argentino / Food• Olavarría / Papermaking• Pachi Lara / Papermaking• Palmar / Construction• Peluqueros y Estética Buenos Aires / Cosmetology

• Pinturas Continente / Chemicals• Porcelana Sanitaria Malvinas Argentinas / Construction• Posadas / Transportation• Proyecto 1 / Services of logistics and maintenance• Puerto Vilelas / Meat• Punta Arenas / Laundry services• Punto Gráfico / Printing• Quilino / Glass• Química del Sur / Chemicals• Rabbione Su transporte / Transportation• Rectificaciones San José / Metallurgy• Recuperando lo Nuestro / Food• Renacer / Metallurgy• Reno / Metallurgy• Resurgir / Food• Rich / Restaurant• RobyCoop / Chemicals• Ronicevi / Metallurgy• Ruedas Rosario / Metallurgy• San Carlos / Rubber• San Francisco Javier / Food

• San Salvador / Metallurgy• Santa Isabel / Meat• Sigas / Metallurgy

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• Simar Aserradero Godoy / Woodworking• Standard Motor Argentina / Shipbuilders• Super / Shoemaking• Sur Coop / Woodworking• Talleres Universal / Metallurgy• Textil Arribeños / Textile• Textil Pampeana / Textile• Textil Quilmes / Textile Textiles Pigüé / Shoemaking• Tomás Espora / Education• Torgelon / Meat• Trabajadores en Lucha (formerly Supermercado Tigre) / Retail• Trabajadores de LV2 / Media• Trabajadores de Mac Body / Textile• Unión Marítima San José / Meat

• Unión Papelera Platense / Papermaking• Unión Saladeña / Food• Unión y Fuerza / Metallurgy• Unión y Trabajo / Health• UST - Unión Solidaria de Trabajadores / Logistics and maintenance• UTRSA - Unión de Trabajadores Sanluiseños / Shoemaking• Viejo Café / Restaurant• Vieytes (former Ghelco) / Food• Villa Elisa / Metallurgy• Viniplast / Plastics• Vitrofin / Glass• Vuelta de Página / Printing• Yaguané / Meat• Yimemn / Education

Documents

Report of the Fourth Survey of Recovered Businesses - US Letter