ABSTRACT
This chapter describes that how democratic participation was given shape in a number of African countries under post-independence mobilising regimes, and how privatisation had affected the position of workers and their trade unions. In many countries workplace democracy was exercised as part of trade union structures, combining bargaining and grievance handling with participation in decision making. Sometimes it happened in more or less casual forms of participation, like management-initiated participative management, government-induced health and safety committees, frameworks of consultation agreed to by management and unions. In the chapter, the practice of informal and more or less unstructured worker participation and of trade union participation explores by means of case studies in Togo, Burkina Faso, Mali, Guinea, Ghana and South Africa. The Societ Malienne des Piles Electriques (SOMAPIL) was publicly believed to be a successful enterprise, and one of the research objectives was to assess to what extent success was due to the nature of the labour relations in the company.
