Teamsters’ union members vs. police, Minnesota, 1934 (credit: Wikimedia Commons) 

Let’s briefly consider an example that shows how values in real life must reach dynamic equilibrium in order for us simply to function. This particular example of how values shape human relations is relevant because it can be seen as a paradigm of how humans today really do use their beliefs and values to relate with each other in all areas of their lives, professional and personal.

A captain of industry in the West today has times when he despises unions, but he has come to accept that if workers are not paid a fair percentage of the company’s earnings, they will work less and less efficiently. He may find ways of retaliating through punitive measures, but he knows those will simply cause the cycle to deepen and worsen. If the obstinacy on both sides becomes hardened enough, violence is inevitable. If those who own the means of production—farms, dams, mines, factories, etc.—become even more incorrigible in their attitudes, the whole society will eventually break down into revolution and chaos. To prevent such chaos and to preserve his way of life, the smart CEO must have ambition/drive (courage), but also wisdom. A smart owner or CEO works with, not against, his workers.

Thus, we have learned, by trial and painful error, to aim for balance. For example, workers in Western democracies have rights to safe working conditions and free collective bargaining via their unions. Smart business people negotiate with unions, and contracts are arrived at by debate and compromise. In fact, the most successful business people in the West today are those specifically trained in labour-management negotiations.

   

        union leaders with Ford executives (contract signing 2007) (credit: Wikimedia Commons)

For their part, most union leaders today know they have to respect a company’s ability to pay. They ask for reasonable wages and benefits for their members, but most of them don’t try to push the owners to the brink of insolvency. To do so would simply be irrational. Union leaders must have drive and wisdom in balance as well. Furthermore, most business leaders in the West have accepted that as long as prices go up, workers will expect wages to go up accordingly. 

Making their business or factory more efficient by smarter management and ongoing research and development rather than by union-busting is what the ethical, deserving business people do. Thus, attempts at strike-breaking today are generally viewed as being rooted in managerial incompetence. Finding balance between the parties trying to interact and relate with each other is the key to making the whole corporate/economic system work. 

And clearly, the system is not random. It does not find a working balance by lucky chance, nor by one individual's choice. Many parties, guided by their concepts and values, interact, give a bit, demand a bit in return, and reach agreements that are viable in the real world. Values drive human behavior which, in turn, must interact with reality. The values that reflect the forces driving the empirical world are the ones that will produce the best working compromises of all. Companies whose workers and management strive to balance enthusiasm with judgement and innovation with respect produce useful, top-quality goods and thrive. Those that don't don't.   

There are also some even more nuanced ways of seeing balance in this labour-management subsystem within our society. One truth is that while most smart business leaders secretly hope they can achieve a modest settlement with their workers, they also hope the rest of their society’s workers will get generous new contracts. That will mean more disposable income in the economy, money that workers, who are just consumers during their time off, can spend on the smarter business leader’s goods and services.

The corollary is that while any one group of workers wants generous rates of pay in their new contracts, they don’t want to see too generous pay packets being handed out in all the contracts signed in other sectors of their society. If settlements in general are modest, workers know that goods will be cheaper, relative to their wages, than those goods were just a few months ago. If they are honest, most workers will admit to wanting their own company to succeed above others. Their jobs depend on it. Some of the leaders of their company may seem unsympathetic and unyielding at times, but smart workers know that managers who watch the bottom line, as long as they also know how to adapt to innovations and to market their goods in creative ways, are the ones the company needs if it is to stay in business and keep workers employed.

In short, in the modern business world, smart business people don’t espouse Social Darwinism and smart workers don’t espouse Marxism. Democracy in all its sectors runs by interactions and tensions between complex, balanced systems of concepts and values, or, to put the matter more exactly, between groups of people who carry those concepts and values in their heads and then think, talk, and live by them.