It takes but a superficial analysis of Canadian history to
show that our politicians have repeatedly drained off discontent by flowery
words, promises and propaganda designed to raise hopes.... It would seem, then,
that one major latent function of our anti-poverty campaigns and propaganda is
to refine the practice of fending off potential discontent by raising hopes of
a new deal just around the corner.12
Manpower
With specific regard to the Manpower program, including ABE and
Job training, there is evidence that it too was heavily oriented to social
control, in spite of its avowed objectives of stimulating greater equality and
economic growth. As unemployment levels rose in the early 1970's, the program
increasingly became, in Morrison's words, a means of reducing
"unemployment (and discontent) seasonally and cyclically among working
class people".13
That is, the objective of achieving economic and political stabilization
through absorbing the unemployed during periods of peak unemployment (thereby
reducing discontent and lowering official unemployment figures) came to be the
dominant one, a conclusion corroborated by the Economic Council of Canada in
its 1971 report.14 In
this connection, Dandurand identifies the "overriding function" of
Manpower programs:
The admitted double objective, economics (growth and
stability) and equality (of educational opportunity) of a program of technical
and vocational training shows up the contradicting interests that the State
attempts to reconcile. In this program, the government proposes to contribute
from its own resources to increase productivity of the work force and, as a
consequence, to ensure increased profit for the owning classes. The objective
of equality appears to favour the interests of the workers (and even of the
least favored workers) in the labour market. For some people, profitability and
economic growth, for others, equality of opportunity; everybody seems to find
an advantage. But the overriding function which is not spoken about is neither
economic nor a question of fairness: it is a political issue. The principal
interest for the employer class is not so much to increase productivity, but at
one and the same time to maintain the purchasing power of the unemployed and
maintain a social control over that relatively important portion of the labour
force (which could potentially be a fertile ground for questioning the economic
and political system).15
Likewise, Dunn observes:
A major element of adult education in the past has been to
depoliticize situations which would potentially be threatening for the power
elite.... Manpower training and restraining programs, of which ABE is but one,
themselves serve a depoliticizing function. One of the objectives traditionally
ascribed to manpower policy is short-term economic stabilization, or the
offsetting of cyclical and seasonal employment fluctuations. Training programs
provided, among other things, a focus of activities for the unemployed during
times of recession and a method of by-passing them in formulating the
"official" unemployment rate. The political function of such programs
is obvious. 16
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