Caught in Neutral: Labour, global production networks and the green transition in South Africa’s auto industry

This book examines South Africa’s automotive industry and shows how inconsistent industrial policy has undermined a worker-centred just transition. Alex M. Mashilo explores the relationship between global geopolitics, industrial policy, economic upgrading and the contested transition to sustainable production. He analyses global production networks controlled by multinational corporations, where technological innovation and market expansion increase profits without automatically improving workers’ wages, conditions or lives. The book argues that without strategic action, economic gains remain captured by capital while workers and communities bear the costs of restructuring and decarbonisation. It also identifies transport as a strategic space where organised labour and the climate movement can build a common transformative agenda around the transition to low- and zero-emission vehicles. ISBN: 9781997461142. DOI: 10.18772/12026101142.