The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Politics (295 page)

Seat of the Lord Chancellor in the House of Lords, from where the Lord Chancellor, or his or her deputy, presides over debate. The Woolsack is a large square cushion, covered in red cloth.

 
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This term covers a variety of schemes which have sought to give workers full democratic control over the enterprises and organizations in which they are employed. It suggests something more than rights of consultation and participation, and points to a more fundamental achievement by workers (in their particular industry or occupational sphere) of the real power to take key decisions. It has permeated much of the socialist tradition of thought, including some strands of revolutionary
Marxism
, and which has been one of the doctrinal foundations of
syndicalism
. Workers' control within a capitalist society—in the sense of significant measures of trade union and ‘shop-floor’ influence over managerial decision-making, known in German as
Mitbestimmung
—must be distinguished from complete self-management of industry by workers under conditions of socialized rather than private ownership of capital (as exemplified by the Yugoslav system of workers' councils in the 1950s and 1960s).
KT 

 
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The class of people who are employed for wages, especially as manual workers. Narrower than Marx's
proletariat
, comprising those who have nothing to sell except their labour power, because that describes almost everybody in a modern industrial society. In ordinary use the term denotes a Weberian status-group rather than a Marxian class. To be working-class is to have some badge(s) of status such as wearing heavy protective clothes at work, being subject to tight discipline on attendance such as having to clock in and out of work at fixed times, and working in a heavily unionized occupation. The criteria are vague and it is not clear how they are to be fitted to those not actually in work; nevertheless almost everybody uses and has subjective understanding of the term.

 
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The Washington-based World Bank group of institutions comprises the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD, established 1945) and its affiliates—the International Development Association (IDA, established 1960), the International Finance Corporation (1956), and the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (1988). Their common objective is to help raise living standards in developing countries by channelling financial resources to them from developed countries.
The IBRD is owned by the governments of over 155 countries, and it funds loans to governments, or where there are government guarantees, chiefly from borrowings in the world capital markets. The IDA depends heavily on subscriptions and replenishments by governments, and advances interest-free credits to around forty of the poorest countries. The World Bank has evolved from financing mainly large capital infrastructure projects, through addressing basic needs, especially in rural areas, to conditional lending in support of sectoral and
structural adjustment
programmes. The Bank's most recent presentations have given renewed emphasis to reducing poverty and now pay increased attention to environmental considerations.
PB1 

 
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A historical and sociological approach to political economy with a belief in the importance of interdependency and the global systemic structure and connected processes. There are two strains to world system analysis. First, the strain that focuses on aspects of international capitalism and is associated most strongly with Immanuel Wallerstein (
see his Geopolitics and Geoculture: Essays on the Changing World System
, 1991). This uses a large-scale and long-term framework analysing structures, cycles, and trends. Three central processes are stressed: the rise and fall of hegemonic powers; the gradual expansion, with short-term shifts; and the core-periphery division of labour. The second strain emphasizes rather the global political system, and is associated most closely with George Modelski ( see his Long Cycles in World Politics, 1987). Phases and cycles are identified in the hegemonic global structure, with processes associated with order, territorial rights, security and trade stability.
PI 

 
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