France, Alternative Libertaire AL #230 - Agone, capitalist firm or editorial collective and militant in crisis? (fr)

In his column "Letters" Alternative libertarian published in July 2013, a testimony from 
two former employees of Agnone, G and R , which speak methods "employer", "managerial" and 
"outsourcing strategies " . It's never nice to see old friends away with bitterness. And 
it's worse to see them publicly that the project in which they have invested so much in 
their eyes became the opposite of what it was a few months earlier. Respect for the work 
done, this answer does not want to give a different perspective on what happened in 2012 
in Agnone. ---- Issue 50 of the magazine Agony which serves as a starting point to letters 
to the editor discusses employer strategies of companies such as Peugeot, EDF and 
Carrefour, where trade unionists are subject to repressive practices and domestication 
constituting violent versions or mild sprains labor law and shattering lives.

The group of publishers Rl himself described as fun if it was suddenly transformed into a 
capitalist firm [ 1 ]? The personality of its editorial director, Thierry Discepolo, 
well-known part of the activist world, she is suddenly transformed? We do not see things 
this way.

It is a fact, five employees have left editions Agnone between October 2012 and January 
2013. Each of them chose the conditions of his departure, and consequent bonuses were 
awarded. The president of the Association Agony merely to endorse. All these departures 
follow a major crisis. Nobody denies that. This situation needs to be analyzed as 
political crisis a committed editorial project, amid upheaval worlds book.

These departures are not a thunderbolt from a clear sky. They are the result of several 
months of disagreement, after which the editorial director offers, in June 2012, to 
withdraw in favor of editorial collegium composed of other employees. This proposal is 
rejected and causes the first two starts. A general meeting of employees and directors of 
collection is convened in September, during which the editorial director reiterates its 
proposal to withdraw the benefit of employees dissatisfied. She is refused again. The 
Editorial Director will propose a reduction of logistical tasks and redesign of the 
website. This project is approved by a majority - and supported by the office of the 
association, including a wage increase of 20%. A week later, three other employees, 
including G and R, announce their departure.

General Assembly in September 2012, no single solution to disagreements had been emerging. 
Differences related to the collective organization of work and response to contemporary or 
old issues Issue: What book uses digital formats of the book? To what extent developing 
online sales? How these practices coexist with the library?

These differences also focused on relations with the intellectual or academic. For Agony 
is not only a producer of material goods. Its raw material is text, which, unfortunately, 
often predictable social backgrounds: small and large intellectual bourgeoisie, activist 
circles, academic circles, rarely worlds workers. This finding should be taken until the 
end: the publishing business requires a connection with these groups to access the raw 
material are made of books.

To satisfy the ideal of an editorial collective committed this work collection (collection 
management), but also on the same texts (preface, translation, machine notes, appendices, 
etc..) Should be shared as much as possible among all employees of a publishing house.

Ignoring these issues, most of the houses have adopted a hierarchical organization of 
tasks which reproduces the intellectual cut / manual "great thinker" / "little hands". 
This produces a division between those who "find books" (revolving in intellectual 
circles, especially in Paris) and "those who have become objects", between those who work 
on the texts and "agencent books together" to form an editorial line and those who give 
form and movement. This is not a problem for Fayard or Flammarion arise, however, a real 
problem when a publishing how-to books is as important as their home contents.

Agony in the collective organization of work based on the principle of equal pay. In 
addition, a large part of the work of collecting and working on the texts is distributed 
among employees performing the different jobs that brings a publishing house. But this is 
not enough. It was and is very difficult to establish a division of labor totally 
egalitarian. This is one of the points of the crisis we went through. Can we settle the 
long term, an editorial director who provides most of the relationship between the 
publisher and its external stakeholders (authors, translators, colleagues, librarians, 
distributor and marketer, government)? How to manage information asymmetry, social 
visibility and the impact of customization that this inevitably occurs within a group?

The political lesson there to be learned from this situation does not seem to have to be 
found in a parallel move with managerial logic. (Thus the "outsourcing" is it mentioned 
only the delegation to the library Read Want to Ivry-sur-Seine, online ordering site 
Agone.org, and it has never been discussed " . reducing payroll ") If we take a lesson 
from this crisis is the need to reflect on the shortness of the vocational model, which is 
at the center of Agnone project meet difficulties for Member a group to agree on a 
long-term self-management project, which is more with the current upheaval in the worlds 
of publishing. The question remains to successfully articulate the requirements of 
diffusion of symbolic goods with material realities which inevitably pass by a project 
that wants to keep these ambitions.

Denis Becquet, Thierry Discepolo, GUENOCHE Alain Sylvain Laurens, Jo?lle Metzger, Julian 
Mischi Philippe Olivera Penissat Etienne, Jean-Jacques Rosat, Jacques Vialle - officers or 
employee of Agony editions in 2012 and 2013.

[ 1 ] R (Agnone editions): "It is better to take your time," Article XI, July 2010 .