The number of companies taken over and run by workers in Argentina continues to rise. The total is now over 250 factories run by over 16,000 workers. Since 2008, over 30 factories have been reopened and cooperatively run by workers.
When Hotel Bauen in Buenos Aires went bankrupt, the cooks and housekeepers took over the hotel. Each worker has one vote in the running of the successful hotel and earns the same amount of money.
The Cooperativa Cristal Avellaneda, a workers cooperative that used to be named Cristalux Glassworks, continues to produce despite the fact that the former owner has shut off the electricity. Government forces claim the workers are in the glass factory buildings illegally, but they have been unable to overturn the takeover.
Workers have seized their factories and work places in response to a series of economic crises caused by imperialist policies of the IMF and World Bank and now by the worldwide capitalist crisis. The takeovers in Argentina are a clear example that workers are more than capable of organizing production on their own terms.
