POLITICAL ACTION OF THE INTERNAL BOURGEOISIE IN THE 2017 LABOR COUNTERREFORM APPROVAL

Abstract

This article aims to analyze the political actions of the Brazilian internal bourgeoisie, driven by the goal of expanding workforce overexploitation, in approving changes to labor legislation in 2017. The alterations encompass the unrestricted outsourcing, established by Law No. 13,429/2017, and the labor reform established by Law No. 13,467/2017, both of which will be referred to as “labor counterreform”. The methodologies  employed in this study comprise bibliographical research, with a theoretical-methodological framework derived from the Marxist Theory of Dependency, and documentary research focused on employers’ organizations publications. We identified 152 documents, from 18 employers' organizations, related to the labor reform. This demonstrates that the internal bourgeoisie played a decisive political role in approving the counter-reform. Thus, merely pointing out that the labor counter-reform increases workforce overexploitation does not fully capture its significance, nor does it suffice to generically state that it is a capitalist action, even though that is accurate. By recognizing that the counter-reform not only maintained but also intensified the overexploitation of the workforce due to the decisive involvement of the internal bourgeois fraction, we can deepen the analysis and better understand the fundamental reasons behind its implementation.