ABSTRACT
In his criticism of the theoretical model of ‘pluralistic industrialism’, John Goldthorpe has pointed out that, despite their pluralist structure of political interest representation, liberal-democratic industrial societies of the West continue to operate on the basis of an economic system organized in the interests of private capital (Goldthorpe, 1984a, 1984b). He argues further that:
In their advanced form, such societies in various ways promote the extensive and effective organization of economic interests—with labour gaining in particular in its capacity to engage in distributional conflict. But all such organization is essentially organization against market forces, on the operation of which the efficiency of capitalist economies, even when ‘mixed’ and ‘managed’, must still ultimately depend. (1984a: 12)
