In an environment filled with partisan hectoring, the wish to retreat to some sort of halfway point and to define that as a sensible middle is becoming very tempting.

This phenomenon has given rise to a political landscape which is dominated by a centre that is large and diverse but unified by frustrations with the policies of the major political parties. The dominant political belief is that however polarized the political divide may appear to be, it is this political centre that highly influences the outcome of an election.

Like all other human beings the constituents forming part of this middle class are on the lookout for something better, bigger and tastier. This is what makes a major part of the electorate whimsical in their attitudes, beliefs and expectations.

This frenzied set of expectations, lurking in the stream of consciousness, tends to get higher in degrees when the economy is registering growth.

Indeed it makes a number of workers believe that affluence can be within their reach if they can tune their skills and knowledge to the imperatives of the booming economic market. 

The quest to reach or satisfy these high expectations may indeed fit with the political belief in the invisible hand of the market which is considered to be the keystone of the neo-liberal political view espoused, albeit in different political tones, by the major political parties in Europe, including Malta. 

The prime mover of this process has been the process of globalization which has given free rein to capital to travel freely and in the process respond to the vagaries and fluctuations of the market.

In order to ensure the sustainability and resilience of their economy policy makers, even those leaning to the left spectrum of the political divide, have been forced to take market-oriented actions and decisions in order to cope adequately with the demands of this globalization process.

This submissive attitude to the exigencies of the global market has brought a wave of protests that have landed policy makers, such as Emmanuel Macron in France, in trouble with the electorate.  

Social partners, in spite of their bickering, have by and large, become aware of the need of a consensual ethic of industrial relations

What the protests of the Yellow Vests in France demonstrate is that when a government in its endeavour to assert its business approach and beliefs becomes too submissive to the whims of the global market, it risks alienating a great section of the populace.

The EU Commission in spite of its neo-liberal approach desists in falling into this trap. Indeed the EU directives about labour law are meant to make the governments of EU member states intervene when and where it is needed to make the labour market more humane.

The market might indeed have an invisible hand to make demand and supply reach a balance of equilibrium. However, if left to operate to its own devices it can generate an endless accumulation of capital which results in merciless competition and commodification of nearly everything.

The highly worldwide forces of competition characteristic of this new spirit of industry have given a new impetus to capitalists to aggressively move and strive for ever more and to endlessly accumulate so as to ensure that they would not fall back. Definitely, this is not the world we want to get to.

The ideal scenario is one where the hand of the market is made to be more visible so as to ensure a win-win situation rather than the ruthless dog-eat-dog approach.

For wealth to be produced needs the synergy of capital and labour. One cannot do without the other.

A government very often has to act as the intermediary between the demands of the two which very often can, or inevitably, be in conflict with each other. As the events in Paris have shown, pandering too much to the forces of the globalised market may risk alienating the workers who form a wide base of the electorate.

On the other hand, government has to ensure that the side effects of the regulations related to the labour market do not stifle or jeopardize the viability of the firms operating in the labour market. In their task to reconcile what is socially desirable with what is financially possible, policymakers have to contend with the volatility of the economic activities.

A global slowdown would have adverse effects on the economy of a small sovereign state, such as Malta, heavily dependent on sectors such as tourism, electronics, I-gaming and financial services. The social partners, in spite of their bickering, have by and large, become aware of the need of a consensual ethic of industrial relations so as to ensure a higher level of economic viability.

A consensual approach in industrial relations implies that the social partners, aware of their common and divergent interests, strive to reinforce their common interests and at the same time reconcile their divergences. The consolidation of the tripartite social dialogue at national level under the umbrella of the Malta Council for Economic and Social Development could, or maybe should, generate a commitment to such a relationship.

Saviour Rizzo is a former director of the Centre for Labour Studies at the University of Malta.

This is a Times of Malta print opinion piece