I have finally begin to "ink" some ideas that I have for a large writing project this summer.
These preliminary ideas have a long way to go and I would happily receive comments thoughts from my readers.
My work will be threefold.
1. I will need
to write a summary of the coinciding economic histories of the city of
Detroit (housing patterns, taxes, etc.) and the corporations that
dominate the auto industry (mostly GM, but also Ford and Chrysler) as
they relate to Wayne county Michigan. Numbers such as populations,
employment numbers, etc. This is essentially to establish statistical
correlation between these corporations and the county that houses them.
This will be an important aspect as it will (hopefully) numerically
demonstrate how the people involved and the enterprises symbiotically
both built and destroyed a major urban area. Included will be analysis
of both the corporations, but also public services etc. offered by local
governments to their employees.
2. I plan to update the Marxian conception of the corporation.
The generation of surplus labor takes place not only within the
settings of the corporate environment, but also within a certain
geographic area. I hope to contribute to the Marxist corporate
literature from this perspective. Topics such as type of labor
available, as well as surplus generating policies of the enterprise need
to be updated to discuss the relationship with the communities in which
the enterprises are contained. Surplus is generated by real people and
they have to exist within a geographic area, this dynamic is not
adequately discussed in Marxian economics or geography. This section
will also include an analysis of labor relations, relative bargaining
power of the workers of these companies over time, union actions, etc.
Basically wage/labor relations history stuff, but in the context of
these things affecting both the enterprise and the community (something
new as far as I know>)
3. Finally, and this is vague still...I want to be able
to say something meaningful about municipal policy, certainly as it
relates to "fallen" cities like Detroit, Pittsburgh, Holyoke, etc. and
how they should attempt to use the resources/factories that they have to
stimulate recovery (with or without the gentrification pattern that is
being followed in many American cities), but also, the future of other
American urban areas that rely upon manufacturing today, as well as
possibly some contributions on positives/negatives to the broader idea
of the moving away from "real" production into the service sector that
the American macro economy as a whole has experienced.
Comments very welcome!
