State wartime intervention fused economic and political labor struggles.

Evidence

What had previously registered as strictly economic demands, such as hours and wage increases, were now considered as part of more systematic demands that directly involved the state (which had become the de facto employer). Th e direct intervention of the state in production meant that industrial struggles against the employers immediately developed into political struggles against the state— and thus to demands that state power be used to bring social production under democratic control (Clarke 1988, 199). — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order, 374

Categorization

• DEFINE: Crisply defines how ‘economic democracy’ as a demand emerged: the state’s wartime role as employer made industrial conflicts into political ones.
• XREF: connects to: State intervention during wartime made capitalist exploitation overtly political and vulnerable to resistance — Clara E. Mattei, Escape from Capitalism, 173; War-induced labor scarcity forced state intervention to discipline workers — Clara E. Mattei, Escape from Capitalism, 171; Government wartime economic policy revealed state as instrument of class domination — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order: How Economists…, 204 (+15 more)

Broader Connections

• State wartime intervention exposed the natural order of capitalism as a political choice #corroborates (0.92) — Clara E. Mattei, Escape from Capitalism, 169
• Wartime state intervention exposed market arrangements as political choices, not natural facts #expands (0.90) — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order, 34
• State control of labor made capitalist surplus extraction explicitly political during the war #corroborates (0.90) — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order, 186
• Wartime state mobilization proved production relations were changeable, emboldening workers #expands (0.90) — Clara E. Mattei, Escape from Capitalism, 174
• Wartime state control proved economies are politically moldable #expands (0.90) — Gary Mongiovi, Austerity Is an Antidemocratic Strategy…, 29
• State intervention made capitalist exploitation political and thereby threatened capitalism itself #expands (0.88) — Clara E. Mattei, Escape from Capitalism, 173
• World War I’s state interventions emboldened workers to reject a return to capitalism #expands (0.85) — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order, 455
• Postwar labor unrest aimed at revolution, not just wages. #expands (0.85) — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order, 375
• Workers’ wartime indispensability empowered postwar demands to transform the economic system #expands (0.80) — Clara E. Mattei, Escape from Capitalism, 174
• State discipline, not wages, resolved wartime labor scarcity for capital #exemplifies (0.80) — Clara E. Mattei, Escape from Capitalism, 171
• Fascism reimposed the economic-political divide that workers had breached #qualifies (0.75) — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order, 583