Managers, workers, and industrial welfarism: Management strategies at ER&S and the sulphide corporation, 1895-1929

This article is a comparative analysis of the labour management strategies of two base metal refineries: the Electrolytic Refining and Smelting Company of Australia (ER&S), Port Kembla, and the Sulphide Corporation, Cockle Creek. During the period 1895-1930 both companies adopted aspects of an industrial welfarist strategy but at different times and in different forms. ER&S developed a broad-ranging industrial welfarism that included workplace and community-based initiatives such as cooperative stores and benefit funds. Long-term financial security, inaccessibility to outside labour, and interest in North American developments propelled ER&S's interest in welfarism. The Sulphide Corporation was less interested in such long-term strategies. The smelter at Cockle Creek was more marginal to the Corporation's business and had less secure markets. The British-owned company was also influenced by a dominant British tradition of management that was less interventionist and less experimental. However, following major economic and political reorganization of the industry brought about by the onset of war in 1914 the Corporation slowly came around to 'on the job' welfarism by 1919. A comparison of these two firms can isolate the specific and general factors that account for this management diversity. Furthermore, it highlights how particular management styles such as industrial welfarism had implications beyond the workplace to the towns and communities where workers lived.