ABSTRACT
The 1970s saw the opening of an important debate on the so-called “marginal” sector of society, which began to be called “informal”, based on an ILO study on Kenya. At the same time, an international debate about the peasants redefined them and their role in the society. I did participate in those debates and in the early 1980s I proposed the category “Direct Social Factory Workers” (TRADIFAS, in Spanish: Trabajadores directos de la fábrica social). Peasants, Indigenous people, “informal” workers, and other groups were included in the category. I examined their social and political conditions, their relation with capital, and their continual struggle against the dominant system exploiting and marginalizing them. The proposal was basically ignored, inside and outside academia. But the question takes on new life in the current crises. Perhaps the category could at last fulfill its function and contribute to dismantling current prejudices.
