Last of the Labour Aristocrats: Restructuring of the Philippine Sugar Industry and the Exportist Labour Market

Abstract

This article uses the local labour market to examine the development and restructuring of exportist dynamics within the Philippine sugar industry and its effects on industrial labour. In contrast to Fordism, exportism argues that stable development occurs in regions that rely on the production of exports for foreign markets. The approach illustrates how specific production sectors in Asia were integral to Fordist growth. With its processes constituted on the ground, I focus on the struggle over workplace changes that occurred from 1995–2010 at the Victorias sugar mill located in the province of Negros Occidental. In particular, I discuss the 2003 worker walkout as a key institutional moment that marked the end of a labour market form that helped define the industry during its exportist period under American neocolonialism. At the same time, the disintegration of the labour market during the 1990s–2000s further signalled major shifts in power within the sugar society as Chinese-Filipino traders and industrialists continued to consolidate key areas of the industry. Examining Victorias’ restructuring sheds light on the broader linkages between exportist and Fordist forms of growth, and how these processes were constituted, regulated and reorganised through the workings of an “exportist labour market” at the local level.

Key Words:

• Labour markets
• exportism
• Fordism
• industrial restructuring
• Philippines
• sugar industry

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank Jim Glassman, Michael S. Billig and anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments on earlier versions of this article.

Notes

¹ Sugar mills in the Philippines are also referred to as sugar centrals.

² The structural forms of the enterprise, money and international regimes are the other three features used to examine a mode of regulation.

³ Given that Negros still produces almost 60% of the nation’s sugar (PSMA 2013), the evolution and restructuring of the industry can still largely be told through the experiences of this region. I do acknowledge that other sugar producing areas in the country play an important role in the industry’s development.

⁴ This claim is based on the observations of these officials. One conducted a recent survey of compensation and benefits schemes among four mills: the Lopez Sugar Central, the Hawaiian-Philippine Co., BISCOM Inc. and the Central Azucarera de la Carlota. These officials noted the reluctance of many centrals to share their information with the government and their industry association.

⁵ Following Billig, I realise that ethnic terms like “Chinese” and “taipan” are highly complex and loaded categories. I use these terms simply to denote newer players in the industry whose traditional interests are not historically linked to sugar.