Labour and Globalisation : Results and Prospects [1 ed.] 9781781386996, 9780853238171

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Labour and Globalisation Results and Prospects

Labour and Globalisation Results and Prospects Edited by Ronaldo Munck

First published 2004 by First published 2004 by Liverpool University Press University 4Liverpool Cambridge Street Press 4 Cambridge Liverpool L69Street 7ZU Liverpool L69 7ZU Copyright © 2004 Liverpool University Press Copyright © 2004 Liverpool University Press The right of Ronaldo Munck to be identified as the editor of this work has been The rightbyofhim Ronaldo Munck towith be identified as theDesigns editor ofand thisPatents work has asserted in accordance the Copyright, Act,been 1988 asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval All rights No part of form this book reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, orreserved. transmitted, in any or bymay anybe means, electronic, mechanical, system, or transmitted, in or anyotherwise, form or by any means, electronic, photocopying, recording, without the prior writtenmechanical, permission of photocopying, the publisher. recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication data British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication A British Library CIP record is available data A British Library CIP record is available ISBN 0-85323-817-0 hardback ISBN 0-85323-817-0 hardback 0-85323-827-8 paperback 0-85323-827-8 Web PDF eISBN paperback 978-1-78138-699-6 Typeset by Servis Filmsetting Ltd, Manchester Typeset and by Servis Filmsetting Ltd, Manchester Printed bound in the European Union by Antony Rowe Ltd, Chippenham, Printed and bound in the European Union by Antony Rowe Ltd, Chippenham, Wiltshire Wiltshire

Contents

Acknowledgements Foreword: Denis MacShane MP Notes on the Contributors List of Abbreviations Introduction: Globalisation and Labour Transnationalism Ronaldo Munck

vii viii xii xv 1

Part I: Global Dimensions 1. An Emerging Agenda for Trade Unions?Richard Hyman

19

2. The ICFTU and the World Economy: A Historical Perspective Rebecca Gumbrell-McCormick

34

3. Globalisation, Imperialism and the Labour Standards Debate Robert O’Brien

52

4. Towards Global Networked Unions Eric Lee

71

Part II: Spatial Dimensions 5. Re-Scaling Trade Union Organisation: Lessons from the European Front Line Jane Wills

85

6. Australia and Beyond: Targeting Rio Tinto James Goodman

105

7. International Solidarity and Labour in South Africa Roger Southall and Andries Bezuidenhout

128

8. Labour and NAFTA: Nationalist Reflexes and Transnational Imperatives in North America, 1991–1995 John D. French

149

v

vi Labour and Globalisation Part III: Social Dimensions 9. Beyond Unions: Labour and Codes of Conduct Linda Shaw

169

10. Globalisation and Child Labour: Protection, Liberation or Anti-Capitalism? Michael Lavalette and Steve Cunningham

181

11. Globalisation, Trade Unionism and Solidarity: Further Reflections on the Liverpool Dock Lockout Jane Kennedy and Michael Lavalette

206

12. Globalisation and Trade Union Strategy: Evidence from the International Civil Aviation Industry Paul Blyton, Miguel Martínez Lucio, John McGurk and Peter Turnbull Index

227

245

Acknowledgements

The editor wishes to acknowledge the kind permission of the International Institute for Labour Studies to reprint Richard Hyman’s ‘An Emerging Agenda for Trade Unions?’, and the generous support of the ESRC (Economic and Social Research Council) for the Labour Studies Seminar Series (1999–2000) from which much of the impetus for this volume came.

vii

Foreword

This book is being published at a key moment in trade union history. For the first time there are serious questions being raised about the long-term survival of trade unionism. As capital has gone global, the inability of trade unions to follow suit is now a major challenge for those who believe that democratic trade unionism represents a key building block in any decent society. Will history record trade unions as a form of social organisation that arrived with the twentieth century and faded in the twenty-first? The rhetoric of internationalism has always been part of the trade union narrative but the actual trade union form has remained profoundly national. The long and costly cul-de-sac of Sovietism and the split in international labour insisted upon by Lenin after 1920 was exacerbated by the logic of the Cold War after 1947. Yet the end of the Cold War has seen little evidence of a rebirth of trade unionism internationalism. The different trade union supra-national organisations such as the ICFTU (International Confederation of Free Trade Unions) and the international trade union secretariats or the ETUC (European Trade Union Confederation) continue to do excellent coordinating work but their national affiliates refuse to provide the money, the staff resources or the transfer of authority and power to match the demands and requirements for effective international union organisation. For the first time since the 1960s there is talk of full employment in Europe. But if an increasing number of workers have work, why are fewer and fewer of them joining trade unions? The figures are startling. In the United States, despite more than a decade of full employment since 1990, only one in fifteen workers in the private sector belongs to a trade union. In Germany, the once-mighty DGB (Deutschegewerkschaftbund) has lost one third of its members since 1990. In Britain, Tony Blair’s Labour government has passed more laws to support trade unions than any government in British history. The TUC (Trades Union Congress) has identified 26 new laws or decrees that help workers and trade unions in Britain since Blair became prime minister. Despite this, the TUC’s eight million members represent a drop of 40 per cent from its membership in 1980. The long years of socialist rule under Felipe Gonzalez did not help increase trade union membership in Spain, and Italian trade union numbers are also on the decline. In France, the figures are particularly opaque. How many French workers pay dues regularly and faithfully to a union? One million? Two million? Without viii

Foreword ix the financial support of employers in allowing employees to be seconded as fulltime union officials could French unions survive? Many of the nominal trade union members in Europe or the US are actually retired although they remain active in trade union life and pay reduced dues. The age profile of trade unions means that the demands of the retired have higher priority than those of young workers. For the left, whose politics and values in the twentieth century have been identified with the struggle of workers and their trade unions, this dramatic decline in trade union presence leaves the new governing parties of the centre-left without an effective partner. What is worse is that trade unionism is no longer a struggle with capital but a trench war against the tax-payer. The majority of trade union members in Europe and the US are public sector workers, teachers, and other employees who are paid by the taxpayer. The public sector is easier terrain for trade union recruitment. The influence of the industrial trade unions trying to survive in the capitalist sector or the unions exposed to globalisation has been reduced. In the 1980s, the trade union model in the form of Solidarnosc in Poland or the black unions in South Africa was central to the struggle to establish democracy in East Europe or overthrow apartheid. Trade union leaders such as Lula in Brazil also helped undermine Latin American dictators. But today in Poland, South Africa and Latin America, trade unions are weak, divided, and reduced to confrontational politics instead of accepting responsibility for shaping the economy and society. Why has this come about? Why, despite the growth of employment, are so few workers joining trade unions? The construction of the European Union has a strong social element to it. But with the new rules and regulations declared in Brussels, are union leaders seeking to make up for their own failure to organise workers by substituting a formal statist regulation regime at the Europe-wide level for the mass organisation of workers? The new economy is not union-friendly. Trade unionism in the twentieth century was mainly a man’s business. Today, women demand an equal presence in the labour market but have different priorities from male workers. Trade union leadership and militancy is controlled by white men, yet the new proletariat is largely immigrant. Where are the trade union leaders coming from the ethnic minority communities in Europe? Twentieth-century trade unionism was ideologically divided. With the end of communism and with an increasingly secular society why do so many trade unions still reflect the rivalries of the Cold War or the historic desire of the church to control the working class? Unions have always asserted their internationalism but have great difficulty coming to terms with globalisation. Yet it is workers, with their legitimate demand for the cheapest possible food, cars and holidays, who are the driving force of globalisation. In Britain, workers are seeing companies in the car, steel, plastic and tyre industries shut down production to transfer jobs to other parts of the world. This is good news for workers outside the UK, but what, short

x Labour and Globalisation of national protectionism, can British trade unions do to keep companies operating in the UK? As capital has gone post-national, trade unions become increasingly differentiated in national terms. Why are German trade unions so completely different from French trade unions, and why are Belgian trade unions completely different from their British equivalents, despite the growing similarity of their economies? In the 1950s, militant trade unionists in France and Britain opposed productivity. Today, unions oppose flexibility. In Sweden and other countries where trade unions have remained mass membership organisations, unions have sought to manage rather than resist the necessary changes in forms of work organisation demanded by the market. Unions have always focused on increases in salaries. Why have they ignored the need to allow workers to participate in ownership? Now that state ownership of industry is a thing of the past when will unions start to argue that workers should be rewarded with shares in companies – a permanent stake that will grow irrespective of salary? Instead of demanding an ever-increasing list of paper rights from Brussels, which is leading to the creation of trade unionism without trade unionists, when will union leaders break with twentieth-century models of organisation and politics and reinvent themselves as mass organisations able to attract and retain millions of workers? In a world where poverty and inequality grow hand in hand with ever-increasing wealth, the social need for trade unionism is increasing rather than declining. But twenty-first-century trade unionism will have to be based on new forms of thought and practice if unions are again to respond to the need of the working class. How can unions in richer countries handle their relationship with workers in poor nations? The president of the United Steelworkers of America, put it well recently as he looked upon the haemorrhaging of steel jobs in North America: ‘How can my guys on $30 an hour compete with Chinese steelworkers on 13 cents an hour?’ For pure free-traders there is no problem. The workers of rich countries should roll over, accept their fate and retire on what benefits they have accrued. Yet instead of a levelling-down policy, a race to the bottom in terms of wages and conditions, what can labour do to increase the purchasing power and bargaining strength of workers in poorer nations? The assumption that formal political democratic rights would do the trick has not been proven. India has half a century of democracy and vibrant trade unions but poverty, illiteracy and economic despair are the lot of hundreds of millions of Indian workers, especially women. The culture of disdain against trade unions that has become so prevalent and fashionable in the North has now infected many of the NGOs who fight on issues relating to developing countries. The strongest critique of enforceable global labour rights has not come from the multinational companies or repressive governments but from NGOs, who proclaim that a campaign against multinationals exploiting child labour is simply northern protectionism. Much the same argument was unrolled in the nineteenth century to defend slavery – freeing the slaves would mean they would lose their jobs – and the moral bankruptcy of much left

Foreword xi discourse on worker rights means that the twenty-first century opens with little vision of how the workers of the world will ever obtain a share of the value their labour produces, let alone construct the good society of adequate health, education, housing and other collective public goods which trade unions and socialist politicians have always existed to promote. The chapters in this book address many of these key issues. They explore possibility and are frank about failure. The tensions between the organisational structures of trade unionism and the demands for unqualified solidarity support are explored. Can the ICFTU and the other supra-national labour organisations be in the van of social movement and progress or will their lack of resources and their need to operate at the lowest common denominator political level of holding a ring for conflicting national visions of trade unionism always mean they trail behind events? Ronnie Munck is excellently placed to discuss these issues. His pioneering work on trade unionism in Latin America – also a region where the hopes and ambitions of the 1970s and 1980s have faded in the new century – opened my eyes to a rich complexity of political differentiation in Latin American trade unions. As David Montgomery, doyen of US labour historians and a former metalworker and union activist liked to remark, in the middle of the twentieth century there were lots of socialist workers and rather few socialist intellectuals. By the century’s end it seemed to be the other way round. This book is a major intellectual contribution to the question of how, indeed whether, trade unions can survive in a post-national economy. I hope it will be read by trade union activists themselves as well as by academics and researchers. There still remains a world to win for the world of workers. Denis MacShane February 2001

Notes on the Contributors

Andries Bezuidenhout is a researcher at the Sociology of Work Unit at the University of the Witwatersrand. His research interests include issues such as the impact of globalisation and regionalisation on labour movements, the casualisation of work and debates on market flexibility, as well as industrial restructuring and industrial policy. His recent publications include Towards global social movement unionism? Trade Union responses to globalisation in South Africa for the International Institute for Labour Studies. Paul Blyton is Professor of Industrial Relations and Industrial Sociology at Cardiff University, co-author (with Peter Turnbull) of The Dynamics of Employee Relations (Palgrave, 1998) and co-editor (with Peter Turnbull) of Reassessing Human Resource Management (Sage, 1992). Steve Cunningham is a Lecturer in Social Policy at the University of Central Lancashire. He has recently completed his PhD on child labour in Britain between 1920 and 1970. His publications include ‘The problem that doesn’t exist? Child labour in Britain between 1920 and 1970’, in M. Lavalette (ed.), A Thing of the Past? Child Labour in Britain in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries (Liverpool University Press, 1999) and ‘Children, the state and social policy’, in M. Lavalette and A. Pratt (eds), Social Policy: A Conceptual and Theoretical Introduction (Sage, 2001). John French is Associate Professor of Latin American History at Duke University. He has written on Brazilian and Latin American labour movements and his most recent work is Globalizing Protest: The Fight for Workers’ Rights in World Trade (Duke University Press, forthcoming). James Goodman lectures on globalisation at the University of Technology in Sydney, Australia. His latest publication is Protest and Globalisation: Prospects for Transnational Society (Pluto Press, Australia, 2002). He is actively involved in several campaigns including AidWatch and the Minvals Policy Institute. Rebecca Gumbrell-McCormick is a Lecturer in Management in the School of Management and Organisational Psychology, Birkbeck, University of London. She is co-author of The International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (Peter Lang, 2000) and has worked as a senior researcher for the trade union movement. xii

Notes on the Contributors xiii Richard Hyman is Professor of Industrial Relations at the London School of Economics and is editor of the European Journal of Industrial Relations. He has written extensively on British and European trade unions, most recently in Understanding European Trade Unionism: Between Market, Class and Society (Sage, 2001). Jane Kennedy is a Lecturer in Social Work at the University of Liverpool and Chairperson of the Liverpool Association of University Teachers. Her research interests include popular struggle and social exclusion. Among her publications are Solidarity on the Waterfront: The Liverpool Lockout, 1995/6 (with Michael Lavalette) (Liver Press, 1996) and Social Exclusion, the Poor and the World of Work: New Times, Old Times (Contemporaray Politics, Vol. 6, No. 4, 2000). Michael Lavalette is a Senior Lecturer in Social Policy at the University of Liverpool. He writes on issues of child labour, social movement activity and Marxist theory in the welfare field. His most recent publications include A Thing of the Past? Child Labour in Britain in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries (ed.) (Liverpool University Press, 1999), Class Struggle and Social Welfare (with G. Mooney) (Routledge, 2000), Leadership and Social Movements (with C. Barker and A. Johnson) (Manchester University Press, 2001) and Rethinking Welfare: A Critical Perspective (with I. Ferguson and G. Mooney) (Sage, 2001). Eric Lee is author of The Labour Movement and the Internet: The New Labour Internationalism (Pluto Press, 1997) and is founder of the LabourStart website, widely regarded as a leading international labour resource. Miguel Martínez Lucio is Senior Lecturer in Human Resource Management at Leeds University. John McGurk is Head of Research and Legal Services at BALPA (British Air Line Pilots’ Association). Ronaldo Munck is Professor of Political Sociology and Director of the Globalisation and Social Exclusion Unit at the University of Liverpool. His recent publications include Marx@2000 (Zed Books, 2001) and Globalisation and Labour: The New ‘Great Transformation’ (Zed Books, 2002). He is currently researching the impact of globalisation on social exclusion worldwide, to appear as Globalisation and Social Exclusion: A Transformationalist Perspective, launching a series Transforming Globalisation for Kumarian Press. Robert O’Brien is the LIUNA / Mancinelli Professor of Global Labour Issues and Associate Director of the Institute on Globalisation and the Human Condition at McMaster University in Canada. He is co-author (with Marc Williams) of Global Political Economy: Evolution and Dynamics (Palgrave, 2003) and co-editor (with Jeffrey Harrod) of Global Unions? Theory and Strategies of Organized Labour in the Global Political Economy (Routledge, 2002). Linda Shaw is at the Centre of Continuing Education at the University of Manchester where she organises adult education courses and works with local

xiv Labour and Globalisation community groups. She is also a member of Women Working Worldwide, which supports women’s rights internationally. Roger Southall is Executive Director of the Democracy and Governance research programme at the Human Sciences Research Council in South Africa, and was previously Professor of Political Studies at Rhodes University, South Africa. He is editor of Trade Unions and the New Industrialisation of the Third World (Zed Books, 1988) and author of Imperialism or Solidarity? International Labour and South African Trade Unions (University of Cape Town Press, 1995). His present interests lie primarily in the politics of democratisation in Africa. Peter Turnbull is Professor of Human Resource Management and Labour Relations at Cardiff University, co-author (with Paul Blyton) of The Dynamics of Employee Relations (Palgrave, 1998) and co-editor (with Paul Blyton) of Reassessing Human Resource Management (Sage, 1992). Jane Wills is a Lecturer in Geography at Queen Mary, University of London. She recently co-edited Place, Space and New Labour Internationalisms (Blackwell, 2001) and is co-editor of the radical geography journal Antipode. She is currently researching the future of trade unions in the UK.

List of Abbreviations

AFL–CIO BALPA CAW COSATU ETUC GATT ICEM

American Federation of Labor–Congress of Industrial Organizations British Air Line Pilots’ Association Canadian Auto-Workers’ Union Congress of South African Trade Unions European Trade Union Confederation General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers’ Unions ICFTU International Federation of Free Trade Unions ILO International Labour Organisation ITF International Transport Workers’ Federation ITO International Trade Organisation ITS International Trade Secretariat MNCs multinational corporations NAFTA North American Free Trade Agreement OATUU Organisation of African Trade Union Unity OECD Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development TNCs transnational corporations TUAC Trade Union Advisory Committee to the OECD TUC Trades Union Congress UNCTAD United Nations Conference on Trade and Development WTO World Trade Organisation

xv

Introduction: Globalisation and Labour Transnationalism Ronaldo Munck

Globalisation is transforming the world in ways that we are only just beginning to understand. It is often assumed that social movements, such as that of labour, will simply be overwhelmed by these changes. Thus, in his influential threevolume study of the new globalised ‘information capitalism’, Manuel Castells, more or less in passing, notes that ‘the labour movement seems to be historically superseded’ (Castells, 1997: 360). The contributions to this volume point to this conclusion as at best premature and possibly also misguided. This introductory chapter sets the scene by critically examining and deconstructing the globalisation discourse(s). It then goes on to examine, in broad brush fashion, the responses of the labour movement to the challenges posed by globalisation (for more detail see Munck, 2002). Before turning to introducing the contributors to this volume, I examine some of the main theoretical and policy issues and controversies that have emerged in recent years around labour transnationalism in the era of globalisation. Globalisation blues? Rarely has a term suffered from such severe conceptual inflation as ‘globalisation’, which in less than a decade has come to dominate whole areas of research. Yet even as the texts proliferate (for a ‘state of the art’ report circa 1998 see Held et al., 1999), clarity and agreement seem even further away. For my part, I find persuasive the (presumably) slightly tongue-in-cheek but acute observation by Daniel Drache that ‘The simple truth is that one-third of the globalisation narrative is over-sold; one-third we do not understand because it is a process unfolding; and one-third is radically new’ (Drache, 1999: 7). If the term ‘discourse’ (as applied to globalisation) implies social construction, fluidity, and contested political terrain, the term ‘(meta)-narrative’, as deployed by Drache, points towards a grand endof-century mobilising myth, nonetheless real despite a component part (a nominal one-third sounding about right) being over-sold. My second starting point is that globalisation opens as many doors as it closes – perhaps just an article of faith at present, but one which I believe is borne out by a (re)reading of labour history and a sharper examination of current trends in labour–capital relations worldwide. 1

2 Labour and Globalisation It is now much more common to stress the ‘limits’ of globalisation (Boyer and Drache [eds] 1995) and to seek out previous historical periods in which widespread internationalisation took place. This relativist mood is well captured in the phrase that globalisation ‘ain’t unprecedented; ain’t new; and ain’t unique’ (Drache, 1999). While this may well be true, it is a perspective that may also close us off to transformations of the world system, captured, for example, in the notion of time-space compression. As Ash Amin puts it, ‘the resulting interconnectedness, multiplexity and hybridisation of social life at every level – spatial and organisational’ (Amin, 1997: 129) is perhaps the most distinctive feature of contemporary globalisation. The economic, political, social and cultural interpenetration and interdependence of the global level has a profound impact, of course, on the world of work and workers. It is leading to an accelerating transformation of all social relations and relations of production. It is posing grave challenges for the traditional labour movement if it remains locked in national, industrial and modernist modes of organising, thinking and acting. Conversely, it could also be a spur to a regeneration of the labour movement. There are many perceived failures of the globalisation approach. Barry Gills provides us with a litany of these: ‘its economism; its economic reductionism; its technological determinism; its political cynicism, defeatism and immobilism . . . its teleological subtext of inexorable global “logic” driven exclusively by capital accumulation and the market’ (Gills, 1997: 12). Indeed, all these characteristics can be detected, especially in popular/conservative renderings of the globalisation story. Yet they might not be enough to make us simply turn our backs on globalisation as an arena for critical discerning debate. Perhaps the main thing to recognise is that there is no one globalisation strategy, unified, integrated and consistent. There are various strategies deployed by firms, nation states, international organisations and, indeed, by transnational social movements. There are globalising processes at work in the world today – at all sorts of levels and in all sorts of spheres – but there is no such thing as ‘globalisation’ out there and obviously recognisable. We need not accept the binary, mirror-image opposition between globalisation as panacea, dear to the heart of its liberalising popularisers, and globalisation as demonic myth of a reinvigorated twenty-first century capitalism. I believe that we really need to radically deconstruct the globalisation narrative if we are to gain a better understanding of globalisation. No better place to start, perhaps, than the poststructuralist feminist perspective of Gibson-Graham (1996) who draws out an unusual, but ultimately convincing, analysis through comparison with the rape script. The multinational corporations are also seen to ‘penetrate’ developing countries and capitalist globalisation portrays itself as master narrative as it ‘violates’ all non-globalised spaces. The voracious appetite of globalisation presents us with an all-encompassing narrative bereft of alternatives. Yet globalisation can (or should) be seen as more fluid, penetrated as well as penetrating, as the notion of hybridity, already alluded to, points us towards. As Gibson-Graham puts it, capitalist globalisation may not be (just) ‘hard, thrusting and powerful’ but may show ‘leakage, unboundedness and invasion’ (Gibson-Graham, 1996: 138-39). In queer-

Introduction 3 ing/querying the globalisation script we open it up to alternative scriptings, a proliferation of differences and a refusal to simply counterpose a dynamic global and a static, traditional local. The identity of globalisation simply cannot be seen as fixed. From a perspective concerned primarily with labour the main problem with dominant globalisation discourses is that they are strangely workerless. It is only recently that some researchers have begun to reinsert workers, as social and political actors, into the globalisation script (see Herod, 1997). Workers have always shaped the spatial and social relations of capitalism, whether in a positive sense or through capital’s reaction to workers’ strength in a given region or sector. The politics of resistance to globalisation takes many different forms, of course, from the ‘nativist’, localist reaction, to the posing of alternative transnational solidarity scenarios. Labour is not just ‘done to’ by globalisation processes but is itself an active agent within these processes. If we go beyond a conception of workers as victims then we need to reconsider the history of the international workers’ organisations, the various networks set up to counter the multinational corporations and the broader solidarity campaigns involving other sectors of civil society. Thus a more inclusive, open-ended and nuanced understanding of the processes of globalisation might be possible. Having set the broader parameters of the globalisation debate it is time to examine its impact on workers across the world. The way the World Bank saw it in 1995 was that, whereas a decade previously over one third of the world’s workers lived in countries insulated from international markets, by the time of writing less than 10 per cent ‘are likely to be cut off from the economic mainstream’ (World Bank, 1995: 50). The great global neo-liberal offensive since the 1980s has indeed transformed capital–labour relations. There are strong forces driving a new global integration based on free trade and a retreat of the state. Development strategies no longer rest on the nation state but on unilateral liberalisation. Although since the mid-1990s there has been something of a reaction towards this offensive, with the role of the state rediscovered even by the World Bank, it is still the dominant strand. There is thus a tendency towards the creation of a global labour market. At the very least, as the World Bank states, ‘The lives of workers around the world are increasingly connected through international trade, capital flows, and migration’ (World Bank, 1995: 49). There is a long way from this interconnectedness, however, to the optimistic platitudes of the World Bank (1995), such as: ‘Economic growth is good for workers’ (1995: 3); ‘Fears that increased international trade and investment and less state intervention will hurt employment are mainly without basis’ (1995: 2); ‘Despite unprecedented increases in labour supply, the world’s median worker is better off today than thirty years ago’ (1995: 4). Even the World Bank recognises that a scenario of growing global divergence of incomes is as likely as one of growing convergence in which the wages gap within and between countries narrows. There is, in fact, a growing body of evidence pointing towards a rapidly increasing international disparity of per capita incomes (see Rowthorn and KozulWright, 1998). Furthermore, for all participants in the world economy, ‘The risks are high and are exacerbated by globalisation’ (World Bank, 1995: 123). Even if

4 Labour and Globalisation protectionism may be a self-defeating project, as the World Bank says, it is hard to see how all nation states can succeed in the globalisation race by attracting capital flows through the ‘right’ market-friendly policies. This would appear to be as much a ‘beggar-my-neighbour’ policy as traditional protectionism ever was. The fear in labour circles, among others, is that globalisation will lead to a ‘race to the bottom’ rather than to a levelling up of wages and conditions. For the author of the International Labour Organisation’s World Employment Report, while anxiety on this score is indeed justified, ‘given the current state of knowledge it remains unclear what the precise explanations are of the rising wage inequality in several developing countries’ (Lee, 1996: 490). Certainly it is a moot point whether it was General Pinochet’s trade liberalisation policies or his so-called labour policy that drove down Chilean wages after 1973. There have also been cases in East Asia where liberalisation, economic growth and comparatively small wage inequalities have gone hand in hand. Nor do economic forces affect institutions and markets in an unmediated fashion, abstracted from the social and political setting in which they are embedded. Indeed, uneven development of globalisation is to be expected and whether there is levelling up or down in specific regional integration exercises, for example, will depend on the balance of social and political forces involved. We cannot simply conceive of globalisation as a one-way, inexorable path towards economic integration and a global labour market. Already, from deep within the corridors of economic power, warnings are emerging about the risks entailed by globalisation. Thus, Klaus Schwab, founder and president of the World Economic Forum at Davos, warns that present trends are ‘multiplying the human and social costs of the globalisation process to a level that tests the social fabric of its democracies in an unprecedented way’ (cited by Martin and Schumann, 1997: 231). Concern with the ‘disruptive backlash’ inherent in globalisation does at least show awareness of its limits. In a sustained and detailed argument, Ethan Kapstein writes in the influential US journal Foreign Affairs about the ways in which ‘[the] global economy is leaving millions of disaffected workers in its train’ (Kapstein, 1996: 14). Kapstein recognises the ways in which global neo-liberalism rides roughshod over the social contracts established by labour, capital and the state in some countries. Its blind capitalist logic leads the agents of globalisation to ignore social and political logic. In a quite apocalyptic vein Kapstein warns the international capitalist leadership and its economic advisors that: ‘Like the German elite in Weimar, they dismiss mounting worker dissatisfaction . . . and the plight of the unemployed and working poor as marginal concerns compared with the unquestioned importance of a sound currency and balanced budget’ (Kapstein, 1996: 37). Even as globalisation proceeds, it provides new opportunities for interventions by labour and other social forces. For instance, the ongoing debate around trade liberalisation with core international labour standards provides one such example. The international trade union movement has been at the centre of efforts to bring social regulation into the emerging international trade regimes. Albeit with reservations from some trade unions in developing countries that this represents a protectionist move, the labour standards issue has shown the undoubted potential for

Introduction 5 social eruptions in the supposed calm sea of globalisation. Although not a new issue – going back as it does even further than the foundation of the International Labour Organisation in 1919 – its linking of trade and labour issues would seem to have considerable potential today. Indeed the debate has now shifted beyond whether transnational economic actors should respect the right of association and collective bargaining and the refusal of discrimination and forced labour, to how the observance of such minimal, bottom-line labour rights can be monitored and enforced. Labour’s responses We have already established that labour has not just been a silent spectator to the onslaught of capitalist globalisation. This was signalled symbolically by the 1996 World Congress of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) recognising that globalisation is the greatest challenge currently facing labour across the globe. In the post-Cold War setting, the ICFTU was free to, but also obliged to, confront the reality of actually existing capitalism and not the communist bogey. The ICFTU not only recognised clearly that ‘[the] position of workers has changed as a result of the globalisation of the economy and changes in the organisation of production’ but went on to declare resoundingly that ‘one of the main purposes of the international trade union movement is the international solidarity of workers’ (ICFTU, 1996: 2). Certainly there is a gap between the rhetoric of conference declarations and the practice of the international trade union leadership. However, campaigns such as that around the abolition of child labour, in which international trade unionism played a prominent role, point towards a recognition of the crucial importance of the new world order and a willingness to engage in more democratic ways than in the past. Well before the ICFTU came to confront capitalist globalisation, the International Trade Secretariats (ITSs), bringing together unions in the same sectors across borders, had in practice sought to challenge the multinational corporations. While an earlier wave of organisations and resistance had not come to fruition, in part due to the end of the Cold War, the climate is now ripe to renew transnational organising. The union response to global capital is outlined rather more clearly than in the pragmatic statement of the ICFTU by the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers’ Unions (ICEM). Following a review of the transformations of the world economy up to the mid-1990s – dubbed the ‘globalisation of social injustice’ – the ICEM argues that ‘the problem for the trade union movement is how to upgrade its response to match the power structures of the late-twentieth century’ (ICEM, 1996: 52). There is a clear understanding that global organisation is not the same thing as international organisation, and a salutary recognition of the pitfalls of ‘trade union imperialism’ which once bedevilled international trade union politics. There is a clear priority given to trade union organising (understandable given the decline in trade union membership in many countries) and a recovery of ‘old’ trade union principles such as ‘an injury to one is an injury to all’. But what is most striking in the ICEM manifesto is the recognition that in the past the trade union interna-

6 Labour and Globalisation tionals had been brought in as ‘fire-fighters’ when local action had failed, but that under globalised capitalism, ‘[a]ction has to be planned on an international basis right from the start. This entails a change in thinking – both within national unions and the ITSs themselves’ (ICEM, 1996: 15). It is too early to evaluate this turn and the implications of the recent ITS transmogrification into Global Union Federations. From the seemingly unlikely quarter of the Danish General Workers’ Union (SID) we have recently had one of the most far-reaching union attempts to set out a new global agenda. Unusually for radical labour programmatic statements, the SID argues that ‘[the time] has come for the trade unions to use the positive sides of globalisation to the advantage of poor people all over the world’ (SID, 1997: 5). They rightly detect a swing in the 1990s away from global neo-liberal recipes, and the glimmers of new voices calling for a new global social development. Not only is this global agenda much more attuned to the needs of the developing countries than most European Union discourses, but it also maintains a positive stance towards development and activist non-governmental organisations (NGOs), often derided by ‘official’ trade unions as ‘unrepresentative’. That means that the SID have a far less ‘productivist’ bias than most trade union worldviews, recognising, for example, that the multinational corporations are today, as never before, vulnerable to consumer pressures and can be influenced from that side. The Danish union also understands that while the ICFTU and the ITSs have ‘put globalisation and its implications for workers’ rights on the agenda’, this is not enough, and that there is a need to ‘bring this debate out of the closed circles of decision-makers in these organisations’ (SID, 1997: 6). So not only is this pragmatic statement much broader than any previous one in terms of the social and political alliances which it advocates for labour, but it is also part of the broad trend towards radical democracy within the ‘new’ social movements. It is now widely recognised that regionalism is an integral part of, as well as a response to, globalisation (see Gamble and Payne, 1996). In the last decade or so this process has profoundly disrupted nationalist or chauvinist trade union reflexes and prejudices. Symptomatic perhaps has been the evolution of British trade unions from sceptical observers of all things European, to pragmatic engagers to escape the rigours of Thatcherism, to enthusiastic supporters of a pro-European trade union movement. Superseded notions of ‘national sovereignty’ were finally discarded in favour of at least a minimal transnational level of organisation. Whether it is the 1994 EU Directive on European Works Councils or the 1995 parental leave agreement achieved through collective bargaining, trade unions in Europe are beginning to give real meaning to notions such as ‘social partners’ or ‘social cohesion’. Andreas Breitenfellner of the Austrian Federation of Trade Unions may be forgiven a degree of hyperbole when he argues that ‘Europe promises to become the chief laboratory for experiments in global unionism’ (Breitenfellner, 1997: 545). A more global perspective would be more attuned to earlier advances in the so-called developing world, but it is significant to see such changes occurring in the countries where trade unionism had its origins.

Introduction 7 The North American Free Trade Association (NAFTA), on the ‘borderland’ between developed and developing social systems of production, is a most rewarding case study for a critical understanding of the new labour transnationalism. The conflictual, but ultimately productive, interaction between the US, Mexican and Canadian trade unions over and within NAFTA may yet prove to be a watershed in labour repertoires in the era of globalisation. Chauvinist responses à la Ross Perot had deep resonance in US labour but in the end veteran AFL–CIO president Lane Kirkland declared that ‘You can’t be a trade unionist unless you are an internationalist’ (cited in French et al., 1994: 1). Certainly his logic was that ‘substandard conditions and poverty’ elsewhere would be a threat to ‘good conditions and comparatively good standards’ at home. The fact remains that even President Clinton was forced to pay lip service to ‘upward harmonisation’ of wages and conditions, which flew in the face of the ‘race to the bottom’ implicit in the dominant discourse of globalisation. A community of interests between all the workers of North America will not be easy to achieve but some of the excesses of chauvinism and trade union imperialism do seem to have been overcome. At national level too, the trade union movements are going through a period of rethinking, readjustment and political rearmament. This process is, of course, uneven, and many national trade union movements have experienced severe contraction under the neo-liberal hegemony of the 1980s. In 1995, only 14 countries had union membership of over 50 per cent (as a percentage of the non-agricultural workforce) and for half the sample, the unionised workforce was less than 20 per cent. Where compulsory union membership existed, as in Eastern Europe, union membership had declined by around half in the 1990s, but there were also dramatic declines in Israel (
75%), New Zealand (
47%), Portugal (
44%), Venezuela (
32%), France (
3%) and the UK (
25%). On the other hand, trade union membership increased in terms of absolute numbers in a number of countries, from South Africa (127%), to Chile (90%), the Philippines (69%) and South Korea (61%). These figures, however, only tell part of the story. The International Labour Organisation (ILO) argued in 1998 that trade unions were ‘[b]attered, but rising to the challenges [of globalisation]’ (ILO, 1998: 2). The overall decline in membership masked the fact that ‘trade unions are adopting innovative strategies to rise to the challenge [of globalisation]’ (ILO, 1998: 2). While many commentators still argue that workers’ organisations are hangovers from the past, the ILO, with its detailed cross-national studies to support its views, argues that things are not so bleak and that trade unions are adjusting to the new realities. Certainly that may take the form of a ‘new realism’ which embraces human resource management and the whole ethos of managerialism. But, as the ILO finds, a new social dynamic is developing within the union movement in many countries, with ‘the most active trade unions . . . looking beyond the working population and opening their doors to those who have no stable employment, or no job at all. Both in word and in deed, they are looking more and more like genuine social movements with a clear vision of how to defend the interests, however varied, of the world of those in work’ (ILO, 1998: 2). I shall return in the next section to the prospects of a

8 Labour and Globalisation new social movement unionism; the point here is to signal ‘official’ recognition of its possible emergence as an alternative in the era of globalisation. Perhaps the most dramatic reassessment of past international policies has been seen in the United States, where trade union imperialism once prevailed undisturbed. Barbara Shailor, the new director of the AFL–CIO (American Federation of Labor–Congress of Industrial Organizations) International Affairs Department, now argues that ‘[g]lobalisation is here to stay, but the neo-liberal model of globalisation is not pre-ordained . . . Labour has no choice but to . . . demand regulation of the global capital market, and organise the global labour market’ (Shailor and Kourpias, 1998: 279). In words that would astonish many workers in Latin America, for example, who had been recipients of AFL–CIO ‘assistance’ in the past, Shailor now declares resoundingly that ‘[no] worker in the world should be exploited by any multinational within the reach of a USA based union’ (Shailor and Kourpias, 1998: 282). There is now a clear-sighted recognition of the devastation caused during the Cold War to US labour practices at home and abroad. Paternalism and dependency in international labour links are seen to be the ‘bad deal’ they were for all concerned. It is too early to tell whether the potentially powerful US labour movement will become a genuine force for labour transnationalism, but its worst practices do seem to have been left behind. It would seem safe to conclude that labour responses to globalisation have developed unevenly across countries and in terms of the depth of rethinking involved. Increasingly, economic integration has set up a tendency towards a levelling down of wages and social conditions. The new information technologies are leading to greater flexibility and a network-based mode of organisation. Only to a limited extent have workers’ organisations begun to adapt positively to the emerging new capitalist dispensation. Workplace bargaining is already clearly providing diminishing returns, but the new unionism has not yet been forged. Manuel Castells, in a more positive journalistic note on the role of trade unions in the new global economy than that provided in his book, calls for nothing less than a ‘reinvention’ of the labour movement if it is to be adequate to the tasks posed. For trade unions to simply carry on bargaining within enterprises being overwhelmed by globalisation and the information economy can only lead to their demise. For Castells, ‘[the] trade unions can only survive, and with them the defence of the right of workers, if they pose a broad social and political debate . . . at factory and neighbourhood level . . . to reinvent the labour movement to correspond with the reinvention of itself which capitalism has operated’ (Castells, 1998: 3). This is, indeed, the challenge posed. Matters arising An influential argument has been made by Charles Tilly that, quite simply, ‘[g]lobalisation threatens labor’s rights’ (Tilly, 1995: 1). It is worth following in some detail the reasoning that led to such a truism. The bottom line for Tilly is that ‘globalisation threatens established rights of labor through its undermining of state

Introduction 9 capacity to guarantee those rights’ (Tilly, 1995: 4). Citizenship, democracy and workers’ rights came about, at least in Western Europe, under the aegis of the state. Today, not only the internationalisation of much economic activity but also the creation of supranational political bodies has undermined the capacity of that state to act as guarantor of any social pact. The agents of capitalism have adapted far more quickly and effectively to the new order than workers’ organisations: ‘Almost everywhere, organised labor is in retreat’ (Tilly, 1995: 21). In the long run, not only workers’ rights but the very survival of democracy is threatened by these developments. For Charles Tilly the implications in terms of labour strategies are clear: ‘only collective action at an international scale has much prospect of providing gains for labor, or even of stemming labor’s losses’ (Tilly, 1995: 21). The seamless web apparently running through Tilly’s case may not, however, be so persuasive on closer inspection. In the first place, Tilly’s argument is based on the assumption that globalisation undermines, weakens or even supersedes the nation state. Second-wave globalisation studies (e.g., Holton, 1998) have questioned that whole assumption and demonstrated the continuing (if transformed) role of the state in today’s capitalism and the enduring significance of the nation as main arena of class and other social conflicts. It is, furthermore, an admittedly Eurocentric perspective which does not particularly have resonance for Third World workers, who have always had to operate in the context of colonialism, neo-colonialism and imperialism. But my main concern with Tilly’s argument is that there are no mediations, no real history, no variation, in a case which goes from state-guaranteed workers’ rights once upon a time, to the state now undermined by globalisation, hence workers’ organisations must become international. There is a monochromatic negative view of globalisation here and a complete absence of real workers’ organisations, which have always had an international dimension. There is nothing in this abstract model, other than exhortation against an apocalyptic authoritarian future, to persuade us that transnational labour activity is actually possible and realistic. If we take as a given that ‘[as] states decline, so do workers’ rights’ (Tilly, 1995: 21) then we should simply be advocating a strengthening of the state and not a reinvention of labour’s repertoire. From more activist quarters come equally simplified links between globalisation and labour responses. Thus Bradley Nash quite unselfconsciously begins his analysis of ‘Problems and Prospects for a Global Labor Movement’ with the sentence: ‘Rapidly globalising capital obviously calls forth the need for a global labour movement’ (Nash, 1990: 3). The word ‘obviously’ begs many questions. At best this argument poses that the ‘objective conditions’ for international labour solidarity exist, while it is only the ‘subjective will’ that is missing. If we go back to an earlier debate on ‘new’ labour internationalism in the late 1970s–early 1980s we can observe similar fallacies. It was then that trade union activists began to articulate the need of transnational worker links to produce a countervailing power to that of the multinational corporations. Not only were these propositions inherently economistic (simply transferring from the national to the international level ‘ordinary’ trade union practices), but they ignored the fundamental asymmetry between

10 Labour and Globalisation capital and labour, given that the latter was simply not mobile to the same degree (see Haworth and Ramsay, 1984). That first round of labour transnationalism was also hampered by the inter-union rivalry typical of the Cold War period, but the sceptics were proven right in practice. One of the few explicit attempts to theorise and set a research agenda on labour transnationalism in the current period is that by Daniel Cornfield (1997). In an introduction to a collection on labour in the Americas he argues for an extension of labour segmentation theory to the international level. Capital and labour markets are fragmented or segmented across regions and industries and even firms, so workers are not ‘naturally’ unified but segmented. What Cornfield puts forward is the suggestion that ‘[it] is the international unevenness of the capital accumulation process which effectively links geographically separate workers of the same labour segment into a single labor market, thereby, and ironically, motivating workers to standardise employment conditions and shaping the sectoral boundaries and possibilities of transnational trade and tourism’ (Cornfield, 1997: 282). This is certainly a plausible argument underlying the ongoing attempts by workers employed by the same multinational corporation in different countries to forge links. Maybe it is indeed these ‘labour segments’ who are most prone to take transnational actions. However, the stronger case falls if we think about how workers in Volkswagen (Germany) and workers in Volkswagen (Brazil) do not share a ‘single labour market’ but are embedded in German and Brazilian labour markets of vastly different social, economic, political and cultural characteristics. While globalisation does not ‘call forth’ or spontaneously generate transnationalist labour practices, it has created new conditions for labour organising, nowhere more so than in relation to international labour organisations such as the ICFTU, the ITSs and regional labour bodies. In recent years it has been a focus of the ICFTU in particular to have a ‘social clause’ inserted into the World Trade Organisation statutes. The strategy is premised on the globalisation of social policy because no nation state is insulated from the global arena. It assumes a certain porousness of the new world order and not a seamless, non-contradictory project of a mythical ‘global capitalism’. Couched in pro-free trade language, the ‘social clause’ may yet have a significant effect on labour worldwide. It certainly is not exempt from its own contradictions between, for example, workers’ organisations in the old industrialised countries and those in the so-called developing countries. Nevertheless, I believe that it is somewhat premature and dogmatic for Sam Gindin of the Canadian Auto Workers’ Union (CAW) to declare that ‘[a]ny focus on lobbying international institutions like the International Monetary Fund or the World Bank or creating comparable alternatives will get us absolutely nowhere’ (Gindin, 1995: 156). It is common in assessing the limits of official trade union internationalism to counterpose it to ‘rank-and-file’ internationalism. Thus, Kim Moody, while accepting that ‘official’ labour internationalism may be ‘in transition’, deems it ‘inadequate’ at all levels to the changes taking place in its global economy (Moody, 1997: 247). Moody points to a range of rank-and-file transnational labour activities across the globe since the late 1970s. The Liverpool dockers’ dispute of 1996–97,

Introduction 11 with its significant international solidarity actions, is pointed to and, along with a recent history of this dispute (Lavalette and Kennedy, 1996), Moody highlights the importance of rank-and-file transnationalism compared to the indifference of the powerful International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF), the ITS that should nominally have been organising the international solidarity action for the Liverpool dockers. Likewise, Lavalette and Kennedy criticise the dockers for only nominally adopting rank-and-file transnationalism, when in fact they carried out much work through sympathetic trade union officials who are seen to have the same ‘social position’ as ‘right wing bureaucrats’ (Lavalette and Kennedy, 1996: 129). If we examine more closely what is meant by rank-and-file transnationalism it is unclear as to whether it can, or should, be counterposed to ‘official’ labour international work. I do not intend to downplay the contribution of the Europeanbased Transnational Information Exchange (TIE), but it is odd and revealing that Moody chooses it as the exemplar and main case study in this chapter on rank-andfile internationalism (Moody, 1997: 249-68). A mainly activist group, primarily dedicated to research and information, albeit with significant reverberations in pockets of the international labour movement, cannot be counterposed to the ICFTU, nor can it offer an alternative to it. Nor would it be a particular virtue to the Liverpool dockers’ dispute to bypass middle-ranking union officials to concentrate on some magically pure ‘rank-and-file’. Of course, ‘rank-and-filism’ is tied in with a longstanding socialist critique of trade union ‘bureaucracy’ (the classic statement is still Michels, 1962), and is seen as a good in its own right. Certainly initiatives taken by trade union leaderships (particularly at an international level) can be meaningless if they do not translate into understanding and action at all levels of the trade union movement. But an emphasis on a somewhat mythical rank-and-file which ignores, for example, the key mediating role of trade union ‘middle management’ smacks more of political gesture than of a serious engagement with the complex tasks of the labour movement today. I think that one of the problems running through much analysis of labour transnationalism is a certain counterposition between ‘levels’ of action. Thus the Monthly Review ‘school’ has recently launched a polemic against globalisation and, at least implicitly, sought to return labour politics to the national level against a ‘completely abstract internationalism’ (Wood, 1997: 15). On the other hand, the advocates of transnationalism (e.g. Waterman, 1998) tend towards a hierarchy of labour activities with internationalism highest on the list. Other opponents of globalisation advocate a turn towards local politics as the only salvation. Binary oppositions (such as national/international, local/global, rank-and-file/bureaucratic) can only be poor in theory or in practice. I believe we are better off starting, with Ash Amin, from an understanding of globalisation ‘in relational terms as the interdependence and intermingling of global, distant and local logics resulting in the greater hybridisation and perforation of social, economic and political life’ (Amin, 1997: 133). Globalisation is part and parcel of an old capitalist story of uneven but also combined development, so labour politics must necessarily reflect this hybrid world in a politics which is multi-level and fluid.

12 Labour and Globalisation Finally, we need to consider the prospects for an international social movement unionism first advocated in the 1980s (Munck, 1998; Waterman, 1993) and now advocated programmatically by Kim Moody in a broad overview of unions in the international economy (Moody, 1997). Somewhat simplistically we can distinguish between an ‘economic’ unionism (focused on wage bargaining), ‘political’ unionism (focused on political bargaining with the state) and a ‘social’ unionism which considers trade unionism as a social movement. As part of a social movement, workers are producers and consumers, they work somewhere but also live somewhere, and they will also have a social identity shaped by gender, ethnicity, age and geography. A social (or social movement) unionism is thus holistic in its approach and does not artificially separate levels or spheres of workers’ existence, consciousness and action. In practice, one of the most common manifestations of social unionism has been a growing emphasis on community involvement in labour struggles, the use of consumer boycotts as well as producer strikes, and an openness to other bodies within civil society, such as women’s organisations and other campaigning groups. It is not possible to draw up a categorical balance-sheet of social movement unionism. Certainly, in Brazil and South Africa there were significant examples of this trend during the 1980s, and more recently in South Korea we have seen it reemerging. Also, as we saw above, it is becoming, at least rhetorically, part of the repertoire of the official international trade union movement. Certainly, to ignore the concept and retreat to the old industrial relations approach and the ‘new’ human resource management, as one collection on globalisation and Third World trade unions (Thomas [ed.] 1991) does, would seem to be anachronistic. Kim Moody’s advocacy of a worldwide social movement union currently reflects some of the new thinking but, ultimately, seems based on a very orthodox Marxist understanding of ‘class politics’ which its originators were precisely criticising. On the other hand, with Peter Waterman, for example, social unionism seems to reflect a wish list of all that would be progressive, radical and transformatory if only the trade union movement were something else. It may well again be a case of uneven and combined development because trade unions are, indeed, part of capitalist society, reflecting wage relations as they are, even if they occasionally soar to social movement status in moments of crisis or social and political transformations. Social unionism will certainly have some role to play in the new century, even if it may not turn out to be a panacea. Contributions The contributions to this volume are varied in tone, coverage and ‘line’ but I believe that the whole adds up to more than the sum of the parts. Part I, dedicated to the global dimensions of labour’s activity, starts with an ambitious agenda-setting exercise by Richard Hyman. Written originally for an Internet-based debate hosted by the ILO, this chapter surveys all the main issues facing workers across the globe. Increased ‘flexibility’ for labour is seen to go hand-in-hand with diminished security for

Introduction 13 workers and their families. The challenge for the trade unions is also, however, a ‘moral’one, to regain their role as fighters for justice. Rebecca Gumbrell-McCormick in Chapter 2 takes up the history of the concrete agent who might fulfil that role, namely the ICFTU. Providing a much-needed historical perspective, GumbrellMcCormick helps ground current debates, which are often unaware of both the possibilities and the limitations of the ICFTU interventions in relation to establishing social control over globalisation. Having set the agenda for international trade unionism and dissected its possible vehicle, the ICFTU, we move in Chapter 3 by Robert O’Brien to a consideration of one of the key issues facing labour worldwide, namely the international labour standards debate. Relating back to the practically forgotten concept of imperialism, O’Brien shows how the North–South divide has major implications for how international trade unionism faces up to the challenges of globalisation. We are offered a vision that is more complex than simply advocacy of equity but which offers opportunity for new strategies of resistance. In Chapter 4, Eric Lee carries out a sober but ultimately optimistic analysis of the prospects for globally networked trade unions. Based on his experience as a pioneering labour website organiser, Lee shows how recent developments such as web rings, banner exchanges and news wire services may potentially revolutionise international labour communications. While the Liverpool dockers in their 1995–96 dispute might have preferred to have the official backing of the TGWU (Transport and General Workers’ Union) we cannot underestimate the importance of their (at least in part) electronically generated international activity. Part II deals with various spatial dimensions of labour’s confrontation with what has become known as globalisation. Jane Wills, in Chapter 5, discusses the ‘rescaling’ of trade union organisation from a European perspective. It would seem that capital and labour are often not playing on the same field. Yet European unification does at least seem to offer the possibility that they are playing the same game. The European Works Councils are carefully dissected to examine their potential and pitfalls in terms of a possible new Europe-wide labour internationalism. Across the Atlantic, workers are also being brought together in the North American Free Trade Association (NAFTA). In Chapter 6, John French provides a lively activist-oriented account of some of the debates generated within the US, Mexican and Canadian trade unions around NAFTA and its implications for workers. No easy path to a transnational strategy is put forward and full account is given of the nationalist ‘reflexes’ of different groups of workers. In the history of international labour solidarity few cases have been as important and dramatic as the labour-based anti-apartheid movement in South Africa. In Chapter 7 Roger Southall and Andries Bezuidenhout carry out a meticulous reconstruction of this story. Particular attention is paid to the politics of the various trade union internationals and how South Africa’s emerging independent unions related to these organisations. The current dilemmas faced by South Africa’s trade unions in the era of neo-liberal globalisation are also confronted. In Chapter 8, James Goodman examines the nature of cross-national social movement unionism in

14 Labour and Globalisation Australia (and beyond) in relation to the energetic campaign against the mining transnational Rio Tinto. This campaign shows both the severe constraints and the real possibilities which campaigning groups face when challenging the large transnational corporations. The lessons of this chapter, as of those above, obviously go beyond the geographical regions where they originated. Finally, in Part III various authors tackle some of the key social dimensions of labour’s global repertoire of action. Linda Shaw, in Chapter 9, starts from the exemplary history of Women Working Worldwide in taking up the issue of ‘codes of conduct’ and pioneering a labour strategy ‘beyond unions’. In this insider’s account we see how, since the mid-1980s, international labour issues have been increasingly taken up by activist issue-oriented groups outside (but also inside) the trade unions. Another crucial campaign which broadened the struggle over labour issues was in relation to child labour, an issue taken up by Michael Lavalette and Steve Cunningham in Chapter 10, where they outline the extent to which child labour has become a major social issue at the turn of the century. Lavalette and Cunningham analyse the significance of child labour and the campaigns based on the three major interpretations of the trade unions, NGOs focused on the issue, and the new global ‘anti-capitalist’ alliance respectively. We find that certain trades or professions seem to lend themselves more easily to transnational action. Chapter 11 by Jane Kennedy and Michael Lavalette takes up recent struggles by dockers in Liverpool, in particular following the lockout by employers in 1995. Contrasting interpretations of the dockers’ struggles – ‘dinosaurs’ of the labour movement going down to another glorious defeat or harbingers of the new labour internationalism – are detailed in a tightly packed and well-informed narrative of events. Chapter 12, by Paul Blyton, Miguel Martínez Lucio, John McGurk and Peter Turnbull, addresses emerging trade union strategies within the international civil aviation industry. What this chapter shows among other things is that globalisation is not just an unfolding of capitalist logic but is mediated socially through the activities of labour and trade unions, among others. Based on a study commissioned by the International Transport Workers’ Union, this chapter is a fitting strategy-oriented finale to the volume as a whole. In different ways, from different angles and taking up different positions, all the above chapters can be seen as contributions to the development of a labour-based challenge to the ravages of globalisation. They are all grounded in different spatial and social realities and thus help take us beyond declamatory statements of ‘what is to be done’. They are, on the whole, neither optimistic nor pessimistic but do seek out possibilities as well as establishing limits to labour transnationalism in the era of globalisation. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, unlike the early 1990s, we can more confidently envisage a world ‘beyond competition’. In establishing a democratic and social control over globalisation, labour, as a social movement, has a crucial role to play economically, politically and culturally. It may well be that one of the oldest of the social movements will re-emerge as a ‘new’ social movement in the decade and century now opening up.

Introduction 15 References Amin, A. (1997), ‘Placing Globalisation’, Theory, Culture and Society, 14(2). Boyer, R., and Drache, D. (eds) (1995), States Against Markets: The Limits of Globalisation, London: Routledge. Breitenfellner, A. (1997), ‘Global Unionism: A Potential Player’, International Labour Review, 136(4). Castells, M. (1997), The Information Age Vol. 2: The Power of Identity, Oxford: Blackwell. –– (1998), ‘Empleo, trabajo y sindicatos en la nueva economía global’, La factoría, 1 (October). Cornfield, D. (1997), ‘An Editorial Introduction to “Labor in the Americas”’, Work and Occupations, 24(3). Drache, D. (1999), ‘Globalisation: Is There Anything to Fear?’, University of Warwick, Centre for the Study of Globalisation and Regionalisation, Working Paper No. 3199. Fernandez Jilberto, A. E., and Mommen, A. (eds) (1998), Regionalisation and Globalisation in the Modern World Economy: Perspectives on the Third World and Transitional Economies, London: Routledge. French, J., Cowie, J., and Littleman, S. (1994), Labor and NAFTA: A Briefing Book, Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Gamble, A. and Payne, A. (1996), ‘Conclusion’, in A. Gamble and A. Payne (eds), Regionalism and World Order, London: Palgrave. Gibson-Graham, J. K. (1996), The End of Capitalism (As We Knew It), Oxford: Blackwell. Gills, B. (1997), Editorial: ‘Globalisation and the Politics of Resistance’, New Political Economy, 2(1). Gindin, S. (1995), The Canadian Autoworkers: The Birth and Transformation of a Union, Toronto: James Lorrimer. Haworth, N., and Ramsay, N. (1984), ‘Grasping the Nettle: Problems with the Theory of International Trade Union Solidarity’, in P. Waterman (ed.), For a New Labour Internationalism, The Hague: ILERI. Held, D. et al. (1999), Global Transformations, Politics, Economics and Culture, Cambridge: Polity Press. Herod, A. (1997), ‘Labor as an Agent of Globalisation and as a Global Agent’, in K. Cox (ed.), Spaces of Globalisation: Reasserting the Power of the Local, London: The Guildford Press. Hollingsworth, R. J., and Boyer, R. (eds) (1997), Contemporary Capitalism: The Imbeddedness of Institutions, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Holton, B. (1998), Globalisation and the Nation-State, London: Macmillan. ICEM (International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers’ Unions) (1996), Power and Counterpower: The Union Response to Global Capital, London: Pluto Press.

16 Labour and Globalisation ICFTU (International Confederation of Free Trade Unions) (1996), The Global Market: Trade Unionism’s Greatest Challenge, Brussels: ICFTU. ILO (International Labour Organisation) (1998), World Labor Report 1997–8: Industrial Relations, Democracy and Social Stability, Geneva: ILO. Kapstein, E. (1996), ‘Workers and the World Economy’, Foreign Affairs (May/June). Lavalette, M., and Kennedy, J. (1996), Solidarity on the Waterfront: The Liverpool Lock Out of 1995–6, Liverpool: Liver Press. Lee, E. (1996), ‘Globalisation and Employment: Is Anxiety Justified?’, International Labour Review, 135(5). Martin, H. P., and Schumann, H. (1997), The Global Trap: Globalisation and the Assault on Democracy and Prosperity, London: Zed Books. Moody, K. (1997), Workers in a Lean World: Unions in International Economy, London: Verso. Michels, R. (1962), Political Parties: A Sociological Study of the Oligarchical Tendencies of Modern Democracy, New York: Free Press. Munck, R. (1998), The New International Labour Studies, London: Zed Books. — (2002), Globalisation and Labour: The New ‘Great Transformation’, London: Zed Books. Nash, B. (1990), ‘Forum: Problems and Prospects for a Global Labor Movement’, Journal of World-Systems Research, 4(1). Rowthorn, R., and Kozul-Wright, R. (1998), ‘Globalization and Economic Convergence: An Assessment’, United Nations Conference on Trade and Development Discussion Papers, No. 131, Geneva: UNCTAD. Shailor, B., and Kourpias, G. (1998), ‘Developing and Enforcing International Labour Standards’, in G. Mantsios (ed.), A New Labour Movement for the New Century, New York: Monthly Review Press. SID (General Workers’ Union, Denmark) (1997), A New Global Agenda: Visions and Strategies for the 21st Century, SID Global Labour Summit, Copenhagen (website now defunct). Thomas, H. (ed.) (1991), Globalisation and Third World Trade Unions: The Challenge of Rapid Economic Change, London: Zed Books. Tilly, C. (1995), ‘Globalisation Threatens Labor’s Rights’, International Labor and Working Class History, 47. Waterman, P. (1993), ‘Social Movement Unionism: A New Model for a New World Order’, Review, 16(3): 245–78. — (1998), Globalisation, Social Movements and the New Internationalism, London: Mansell. Wood, E. M. (1997), ‘Labor, the State and Class Struggle’, in E. M. Wood (ed.), Rising from the Ashes? Labour in the Age of ‘Global’ Capitalism, Monthly Review, 49(3). World Bank (1995), Workers in an Integrating World: World Development Report 1995, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Part I: Global Dimensions

1. An Emerging Agenda for Trade Unions? Richard Hyman

‘Trade unions have always had two faces, sword of justice and vested interest’ (Flanders, 1970: 15). The balance between these two features can change over time, however. It seems clear that in many countries, unions have lately come to be widely perceived as conservative institutions, primarily concerned to defend the relative advantages of a minority of the working population. One of the challenges which confront trade unionism in the twenty-first century is therefore to revive, and to redefine, the role as sword of justice. Many union leaders and activists around the world are indeed well aware of this challenge, and in a variety of countries there are examples of creative and imaginative responses. The aim of this chapter is to review some of the challenges and discuss some of the potential for response. An important task for our project will be to survey the latter in more detail. The battle of ideas It is common to emphasise the material challenges faced by trade unions, and with good reason. There have been increasing difficulties both in the external environment of union organisation and action, and in the nature of the constituencies which unions seek to mobilise. Externally, the economic environment has become far harsher. Global competition has intensified, putting new pressures on national industrial relations regimes. Industrialised market economies which had enjoyed several decades of relatively full employment have since experienced a return to mass unemployment. Massive job losses have been one of the elements of the ‘shock therapy’ inflicted on the new market economies. Newly industrialised economies, in many cases previously cushioned from external shocks, have become subject to the fluctuations of global markets. Secondly, as governments grapple with the problems of adaptation to the new disorder in the world economy, the political environment in many countries – particularly those where labour movements are longest established – has become far more unfavourable. In some cases this is linked to the erosion of unions’ representative status as ‘social partners’, in part in consequence of loss of membership. The third external challenge comes from employers. In some countries there has been a growing unwillingness to accept trade unions as collective representatives 19

20 Labour and Globalisation of employees; in others, while collective bargaining has survived its scope has been reduced, and managements have established new forms of direct communication with employees as individuals. The fashion for teamworking has introduced new mechanisms of collective decision-making which in many countries are detached both from trade union structures and from statutory institutions of workplace representation. In addition, the expansion of multinational companies has meant that leading employers are often able to escape the regulatory force of national industrial relations systems. What may be termed the internal challenge stems from changes in the constituencies which unions seek to recruit and represent. Traditionally trade unions, particularly but not only in highly industrialised societies, were shaped by the existence (real, but often exaggerated) of a ‘normal’ employment relationship. This involved a full-time job with a specific employer and usually a degree of long-term stability. The classic example was the ‘mass’ worker in mining, manufacturing and transport, with limited individual resources in the external labour market but significant potential to exert collective pressure on the employer. Though early trade unionism in many countries was indeed based on a highly skilled ‘labour aristocracy’, ‘modern’ labour movements found their core constituency (at least in the private sector, which was dominant numerically and in shaping labour movement policy) among those who lacked substantial capacity for individual career advancement but were not so vulnerable as to be incapable of sustained collective cohesion. The ‘normal’ worker, and hence the ‘normal’ potential trade union member, was thus a full-time employee whose employment status was not merely casual. By extension, the ‘normal’ employee was a man who was presumed to be the ‘breadwinner’ for his family. (Of course there were exceptions, notably in the textile industries; but Marx’s prediction that the predominance of female employment in cotton-weaving would be the prototype for capitalist ‘modern industry’ proved strikingly wrong.) This in turn shaped the typical trade union agenda: predominantly concerned with terms and conditions of employment, and in particular with three aspects: achieving the payment of a ‘family wage’, defining and reducing the standard working week, and constraining the employer’s ability to hire and fire at will. While the realities were always more complex than this stylised account, and certainly varied between countries, this model of the traditional ‘normal’ agenda is far from a caricature. In many countries there have indeed been serious efforts, sometimes dating back several decades, to transform this agenda in order to appeal to a broader constituency. Achieving this transformation has become increasingly urgent, the key reason being that ‘atypical’ employment situations have become increasingly typical. Part-time work, short-term and casual employment, agency work, self-employment (both genuine and spurious), special government makework schemes and of course unemployment have all become more common; in total, in some countries, they affect the majority of the economically active population. At the same time there have been numerous structural shifts in the sectoral and occupational distribution of employment: the decline of most of the tradi-

An Emerging Agenda for Trade Unions? 21 tional staple manufacturing and associated industries and the growth of a wide variety of service industries, particularly in the private sector; the eclipse or transformation, partly under the impact of microelectronic technologies, of many traditional manual occupations and the growth of ‘white-collar’ work (now in many countries the majority); the reversal of the process of employment concentration with ‘downsizing’ in former core industries and the expansion of small and medium-sized enterprises. There has thus developed a diversity of forms of linkage to the labour market, and structural change has brought both winners and losers (though in most countries, losers far outnumber winners). Instead of presuming the existence of a ‘normal’ worker it is necessary to differentiate. Reich (1991), focusing on skills and functions, distinguishes ‘routine producers’, ‘in-person servers’ and ‘symbolic analysts’; the first two categories consisting primarily of dead-end and often precarious jobs, only (some of) the latter enjoying significant scope for advancement. Standing (1997) has described contemporary labour markets as stratified into seven groups, which he terms the elite, the salariat, ‘proficians’ (those without stable employment but with valuable marketable skills), traditional core workers, low-skilled ‘flexiworkers’ who depend on casualised job opportunities, the unemployed, and those detached altogether from regular (or legal) work. Whatever classification is adopted, it is evident that the traditional core constituency of trade union membership has dwindled, while there has been expansion at two extremes: those with professional or technical skills who may feel confident of their individual capacity to survive in the labour market; and those with no such resources but whose very vulnerability makes effective collective organisation and action difficult to achieve or perhaps even to contemplate. These developments are evidently connected to the increasing feminisation of the labour force. To a substantial degree, ‘atypical’ employment is female employment (Briskin and McDermott [eds], 1993; Cook et al., 1992). The growing proportion of women in the formal labour market negates the traditional model of husband as wage-worker and wife as domestic worker, but in most countries domestic work remains primarily or exclusively female. The management of the relationship between time spent at home and in employment is thus a distinctive concern of an increasing – female – section of the workforce. There has also been a different kind of transformation in the relationship between home and work. There is a stereotype of the traditional proletarian status which emphasises a common work situation, an integrated and homogeneous local community, and a limited repertoire of shared cultural and social pursuits. Though exaggerated, this stereotype does identify a core of historical reality, particularly in the single-industry manual working-class milieux in which ‘modern’ mass trade unionism had its strongest roots. By contrast, in contemporary society the spatial location and social organisation of work, residence, consumption and sociability have become highly differentiated. Today the typical employee may live a considerable distance from fellow-workers, possess a largely ‘privatised’ domestic life or a circle of friends unconnected with work, and pursue cultural or recreational interests quite

22 Labour and Globalisation different from those of other employees in the same workplace. This disjuncture between work and community (or indeed the destruction of community in much of its traditional meaning) entails the loss of many of the localised networks which strengthened the supports of union membership (and in some cases made the local union almost a ‘total institution’). Many writers have seen these structural shifts as linked to a cultural and ideological decline of collectivism and a rise of individualism. In its unsophisticated form this argument involves a gross oversimplification (Kelly, 1998). Nevertheless the eclipse of the ‘mass worker’ whose institutionalised solidarities were reinforced by the broader networks of everyday life does mean that the possibility and character of collectivism are very different today when work and everyday life are increasingly differentiated (Zoll, 1993). Pérez-Díaz (1987: 122–23) has outlined the implications with great clarity. Traditionally, he argues, workers’ collective orientations were externally defined: either they ‘acquired a class ethos or habit’ because they were immersed in a social milieu where such values were unquestioned, or they were inspired by commitment to the ideal of ‘a new world or a different future’. By contrast, today the traditional identities have been displaced and the transformatory ideals have lost their grip; workers adopt ‘a rational, instrumental or experimental attitude towards the unions (or parties)’. To win their support, unions now have to pass a direct and pragmatic test. This more calculative orientation, which certainly creates possibilities of far greater individualism, makes practicable the new managerial efforts to capture workers’ loyalties and displace identification with trade unionism, and may in turn be reinforced by such efforts. But it also reflects the degree to which unions have experienced ‘a serious moral and intellectual crisis [and] their reserves of moral indignation seem to be depleted’ (Pérez-Díaz, 1987: 114–15). Hence the evident material problems facing trade unions cannot be separated from less tangible problems of ideology. To resist the hostile forces ranged against them, unions must mobilise countervailing power resources; but such resources consist in the ability to attract members, to inspire members and sympathisers to engage in action, and to win the support (or at least neutrality) of the broader public. The struggle for trade union organisation is thus a struggle for the hearts and minds of people; in other words, a battle of ideas. In the remainder of this chapter I consider some of the ideas which can contribute to this battle. The representation of workers’ interests – and their definition, which is necessarily a prior process – has never been straightforward. Building collective solidarity is in part a question of organisational capacity, but more fundamentally it is part of this battle of ideas. The crisis of traditional trade unionism is reflected not only in the more obvious indicators of loss of strength and efficacy, but also in the exhaustion of a traditional discourse and a failure to respond to new ideological challenges. It is those whose projects are hostile to what unions stand for who have set the agenda of the past decades. Unions have to recapture the ideological initiative. As a starting point, the labour market perspectives of the ‘mass worker’ with a stan-

An Emerging Agenda for Trade Unions? 23 dard model of full-time employment, firm-specific job security and limited scope for occupational advancement can no longer dictate the central content of bargaining policy. To construct trade union programmes with which vertically and horizontally differentiated groups of workers can identify requires a sensitive redefinition of what interests are represented. If on the one hand unions must be alert and receptive to (possibly altered) expectations and aspirations on the part of actual and potential members, on the other hand a priority must be to construct an agenda which can unite rather than divide. To do so, unions must scrutinise the concepts which have inspired the offensive of employers and the political right and attempt to reclaim these for different purposes. I shall consider a number of examples. Flexibility Flexibility emerged, notoriously, as a rallying cry directed against forms of social regulation – by law or by collective agreement – which have tempered the arbitrary and unequal workings of the labour market. The ideological bias of the term is obvious: presenting as ‘rigidities’ those labour market protections which neoliberals wish to weaken and restrict, making workers more disposable and more adaptable to the changing requirements of the employer. This ‘negative flexibility’ (TUAC, 1995: 5) has naturally been opposed by most trade unions. Yet flexibility can have alternative meanings. The 1970s objective of ‘humanisation of work’ was in essence a claim for flexibility in the interests of workers through the human-centred application of technologies, the adaptation of task cycles and work speeds to fit workers’ own rhythms, the introduction of new types of individual and collective autonomy in the control of the labour process. This agenda has in large measure been hi-jacked as part of the new managerialism of the 1980s and 1990s (with its mendacious rhetoric of ‘empowerment’ and ‘human resource development’). Can unions recapture the initiative? A rigid division of labour and narrow standardisation of tasks were impositions of a particular model of capitalist work organisation, a form of subordination which involved a degradation of status for many workers. To the extent that some of the features of Taylorist-Fordist systems have lost their attractions to many employers, space exists for unions to mobilise support for radical alternatives which transcend some of the divisions within the labour force. For example, one widespread trend in manufacturing over the past decade or more has been the introduction of teamworking, with team members performing a variety of tasks and exercising a degree of discretion over operational decisions. In many countries, unions viewed such initiatives with considerable suspicion; understandably, since teamwork was typically one element in a move towards Japanese-style ‘lean production’ and hence a recipe for job-cutting and ‘management by stress’ (Parker and Slaughter, 1988). However, simple resistance often proved ineffectual, since union members themselves were frequently attracted by the rhetoric of autonomy and job enlargement. More viable in the longer run have been strategies of ‘critical engagement’, in which unions have

24 Labour and Globalisation responded by mobilising support for their own demands in the process of negotiating change. For example, a comparative study of work restructuring in the motor industry (Kochan et al. [eds], 1997) shows clearly that unions in some countries have been able to exert significant influence on the change process by such means. Another key issue in the contemporary world of work is that of time-flexibility. Again, this has often involved making workers more available and disposable to suit the changing requirements of employers. On the one hand this can mean the extension of working time to ‘unsocial’ hours and days: evening and night-work, weekend working; on the other hand, it can mean payment only for those hours when the employee can actually be set to work (Alaluf et al., 1995). The latter can entail, for example, the use of split shifts or even – notoriously in Britain – ‘zerohours’ contracts where the employee must be available but is paid only if called to work. There is, however, a worker-oriented meaning of flexible working time which can directly confront that of the employers – and which offers potential for moving from the defensive to the offensive and integrating very different types of employee interest (Mückenberger, 1995). This centres on the idea of time-sovereignty: the ability to influence the patterns of the working day, week, year and lifetime to optimise the temporal linkages between employment, leisure, career development and domestic life. ‘Traditional rigid conceptions of working time do not suit the diversity of employee interests’ (Lapeyre and Hoffmann, 1995: 8–9). Most notably, women workers (unless and until there is a radical redistribution of domestic responsibilities) have a particular interest in ensuring that there is genuine flexibility of choice between full-time and part-time employment, and that the contractual position and career potential associated with the latter are not inferior to those in full-time jobs (Cunnison and Stageman, 1995: 202). More generally, opening new areas of choice in the organisation of individual working time could be seen as an important trade union principle (Matthies et al., 1994). The operation of ‘flexitime’, originally devised to suit managerial requirements, certainly provides scope for a ‘personalisation’ of the working day (Leccese, 1997: 169) attractive to many workers. Similarly, the development of ‘annualised hours’ systems has reflected employers’ interest in flexibility but can also be adapted to suit workers’ own choices. But the negotiation of individual working time will allow the employer the upper hand, and hence create new possibilities for exploitative relations, unless undertaken within a collectively regulated framework. Moves towards greater flexibility thus create both the need and the potential for new forms of trade union regulation (Raasch, 1995). Just as unions have increasingly been involved in negotiating flexitime, so there has been considerable union involvement in phased retirement agreements. Again, such deals have often been initiated by employers as a form of partial redundancy; but a flexible rather than abrupt transition from ‘normal’ employment to retirement suits the wishes of many older workers themselves. Much more generally, unions could appeal to many workers by pressing for increased choice of both the

An Emerging Agenda for Trade Unions? 25 quantity and the distribution of working time to match individual circumstances and preferences, and by establishing the ground-rules to ensure that such flexibility is not used to employees’ disadvantage. Security The most dramatic feature of labour market trends in the past two decades has been a massive growth of insecurity. Survey evidence from a range of countries shows that the fear of job loss – either through collective redundancy or through victimisation by the employer – is the overwhelming work-related concern of employees today. Part of the function of trade unionism is to resist this insecurity; but to the extent that such resistance is company- or sector-specific, its consequences may well prove divisive. The fight for company-level security, if successful, by stabilising the position of ‘insiders’ may make the labour market situation of ‘outsiders’ even more precarious. Where public employees struggle to retain protections which in the private sector were lost a decade ago, their unions may be seen as defenders of sectional privilege. (It may have been only because of very distinctive political circumstances that the public-sector strikes in France in 1995 and 1996 evoked considerable popular support.) Yet it is surely essential that, in order to address workers’ current consciousness of extreme job insecurity, trade unions develop programmes which offer hope of real employment opportunity yet do so in a non-divisive manner. In constructing an agenda which links the interests of the precariously employed, the unemployed and the relatively secure, it is again possible to seek a distinctive trade union application of current rhetoric which is often used mendaciously. One concept which has become increasingly popular among policy-makers is ‘employability’: the argument is that individuals can no longer anticipate unbroken employment within a single organisation but can avoid labour market vulnerability by acquiring valued competences, including adaptability itself. This is the basis on which the European Commission (1997) envisages a ‘balance’ between flexibility and security: a balance which in Dutch labour market debate has been given the name ‘flexicurity’ (Wilthagen, 1998). Commonly this rhetoric is no more than a means of individualising the problem of unemployment and deficient job opportunities and scapegoating the unemployed for their own marginalisation; as Lowe (1998: 248) puts it, ‘the concept of “life-long learning” is shifting the onus of human resource development onto the individual’. A purely supply-side labour market policy aimed at increasing individual ‘employability’ is likely to result primarily in a better qualified cohort of unemployed; a frustrating mismatch between enhanced skills and the limited skill content of available jobs (particularly in the expanding service sector); and perhaps also in a demographic shift in the structure of employment and unemployment. However, the concept of employability is in principle one which can be made central to trade union policy. This would imply the coordination and integration of demands which unions have indeed often embraced: first, for enhanced individual entitlements to

26 Labour and Globalisation education and training, and for flexible opportunities to benefit from these throughout the working life; second, for more effective (and worker-oriented) provision both by employers and by education and training institutions; third, for demand-side policies to encourage employment growth and, no less importantly, to provide appropriate employment opportunities for ‘upskilled’ workers. As Lowe argues (1998: 249), ‘job quality could be a basis for collective action, especially among well-educated young workers whose expectations are still high’. There is significant scope for action at company and sectoral level to influence the process of work restructuring and technological innovation in the direction of upskilling rather than deskilling. The comparative study of the transformation of work in telecommunications edited by Katz (1997), for example, shows that the contrasting strategies adopted by unions in different countries have been a significant factor in explaining the very different ways in which jobs have been reconfigured. But some of the issues involved require economy-wide intervention to match supply and demand of skills – including, perhaps, action to ensure that foreign inward investment does not merely take the form of low-skilled and disposable jobs but enhances the scope for ‘employability’ policies. Part of the difficulty is that these demands address different interlocutors and involve different levels of initiative, and hence may fail through lack of coordination. To take a concrete example: the imaginative and innovative proposals developed by IG Metall a decade ago (‘Tarifreform 2000’) were overwhelmed by the macroeconomic problems affecting the German labour market after unification. Conversely, one of the difficulties confronting the attempt to construct an ‘alliance for jobs’ in Germany, and an important reason for the failure of the initiative, was the lack of mechanisms for translating any central agreement into action at the level of individual companies (Streeck, 1998: 537). Unions themselves could become central actors in building linkages between these different levels of decision-making so that citizens are enabled ‘to define together supply and demand’ within the labour market (Lipietz, 1996: 271). Opportunity This connects to a third theme: opportunity. Again, this is a concept which has been appropriated by the right but should be reclaimed for the labour movement. For most of the twentieth century, the core workforce which formed the main basis of trade unionism achieved their employment status through the dull compulsion of circumstance. Career advancement and self-directed occupational mobility are aspirations increasingly salient for unions’ actual and potential constituencies. As Waddington and Whitston (1996: 163) note in their study of white-collar workers’ attitudes, ‘new union members . . . look to unions to negotiate a fair and equitable framework within which individualised aspects of the employment relationship – which are often career related – may be worked out’. The weakening of the ties to the existing occupation and employer is, however, emancipating only to the extent that real and preferable alternatives are open. As

An Emerging Agenda for Trade Unions? 27 with the themes of flexibility and employability, so more generally: it is evident that while the choice among alternative options is an individual project, its reality is deceptive and even threatening unless a genuine and favourable structure of opportunities exists. This creates important openings for unions to address what Leisink (1996) calls ‘occupational interests’. To enhance the opportunity structure is necessarily a collective project, one which challenges both employers’ discretion and the anarchy of market forces. In many ways a redefinition of the traditional function of trade unionism, this is another key dimension of a union agenda which can appeal to diverse constituencies in solidaristic fashion (Kochan and Wever, 1991: 373). In essence, then, the challenge for trade unions is to win the argument that individual choice is liberating only when the options available are those that workers wish to choose. In the past, many unions have favoured inflexible regulation out of fear that this provides the only safeguard against manipulation and exploitation by employers; in the current situation this protection must be guaranteed primarily by procedural rules which enhance individual discretion and by active labour market policies which provide an advantageous framework for career decisions. In both respects, unions have a vital role to perform. Democracy Changes in the organisation of production and the employment relationship (such as teamworking, quality circles, performance-related pay, personalised contracts) are often accompanied by a managerial propaganda offensive in which ‘empowerment’ is a central rhetorical device. Such mendacious discourse typically provides a ‘democratic’ gloss to employer efforts to intensify production pressures, cut staffing numbers and undermine traditional forms of collective regulation. The ‘new workplace’ is one in which employees often have increased responsibilities but reduced power and resources. As labour costs are reduced through the imposition of ‘lean’ organisation, employees are simultaneously pressed to take increasing concern for ‘quality’ and ‘customer care’. The effects may be profoundly alienating; yet the ideological argument that more stressful work is more worthy and that intensified external pressure means greater autonomy has proved strangely effective. The big lie seems to work: as Dejours (1998) insists, evil is rendered banal and the intolerable becomes tolerated. The paradoxical consequence, suggests Coutrot (1988), is a form of ‘forced cooperation’ whereby employees embrace their newly (re)defined roles for want of any visible alternative. Yet this acceptance is only partial: for example the annual British Social Attitudes surveys reveal a large and increasing proportion of workers (approaching two-thirds) believing that management ‘try to get the better of employees’ and that ‘big business benefits owners at the expense of workers’. The detailed case studies undertaken by Scott (1994) reveal a similar picture. In its most recent report on world labour, the ILO (International Labour Organisation) (1997: 27) referred to the ‘democratic function’ performed by trade

28 Labour and Globalisation unions. This can be understood in a double sense: by virtue of their capacity for collective representation, unions can give employees a ‘voice’ within the workplace and limit unilateral and arbitrary management action; but in addition, unions can challenge the authoritarian and hierarchical structures of contemporary employing organisations and can press for an extension of citizenship rights to employment. In many of the developed economies, such demands gathered pace in the era of stability and growth; in a period of stagnation and recession the emphasis has been on more immediate material issues. In developing economies with a substantial labour surplus, questions of industrial democracy have more often than not been regarded as a diversionary luxury (Ramaswamy, 1988: 239). Nevertheless, trade unions’ democratic function could speak to real grievances and concerns in a way which strengthens unions’ legitimacy and appeal. Unquestionably there is considerable scope to exercise this function by challenging the widespread current abuse of concepts of democracy at work and exposing the anti-democratic character of much that passes for ‘human resource management’. By focusing their own demands and activities on the contradiction between management rhetoric and everyday reality in the workplace, trade unions have the potential to address current worker discontents in ways which generalise fragmented experiences and permit new forms of solidarity in the pursuit of genuine empowerment. Needless to say, unions’ capacity to mount a credible campaign for greater democracy in employment will be severely weakened unless they can demonstrate their own democratic credentials. This poses evident challenges for unions to scrutinise and if necessary reconstruct their own representative capacity and internal processes of agenda-building and decision-making. Community The traditional ‘normal’ employment relationship involved a sharp dichotomy between life at work and life outside. Where trade unions were longest established and collective bargaining most strongly developed, unionism itself tended to reflect and reinforce this dichotomy. This has not been universally the case, however: unions in some countries, particularly where capitalist wage-labour has not long been the dominant basis of production, have typically embraced broader community concerns. More established unions could well learn from the experience of newer union movements. One reason is the erosion of the ‘normal’ employment relationship. Another is the extent to which ‘community’ has become an ideological device in contemporary political argument. Arguments around the idea of ‘community’ have two aspects. One is negative: a legitimation of the withdrawal of elements of state provision, intervention and regulation in social welfare and labour market policy. ‘Communitarianism’ can thus provide an alibi for deregulation. Another strand of argument is more positive: the thesis that the organisations of ‘civil society’ can mobilise pressure, and perhaps generate resources, which can counteract the destructive impact of global competition and global corporations. Unions obviously have a strong interest in engag-

An Emerging Agenda for Trade Unions? 29 ing in this debate and in influencing conceptions of community in accordance with their own objectives. The links between work and community can be seen in two dimensions. First, as well as producers, workers are also consumers and citizens; unions which can relate to (potential) members in all these roles can build a deeper relationship than if they merely focus on employment-related issues. Secondly, workers produce goods or services for diverse groups of consumers, customers or clients. Employers (and other manipulators of opinion) often attempt to counterpose the interests of one against the other. Unions are in a better position to represent their members’ interests if they can build alliances with those at the receiving end of their productive activity. This is particularly the case perhaps in the public sector: Johnston (1994: 9–10) explores how public service unions in the United States – which have provided the driving force for union renewal in the 1990s – have had to adopt a ‘public interest’ logic and construct coalitions with NGOs and with representatives of user groups. Conversely, in the case of workers with a vulnerable labour market position in the private service sector, effective organisation may be possible only through seeking such alliances: constructing the basis for regulating ‘a [local] labour market with help from community groups that share an interest in raising wages and labour standards’ (Wever, 1997: 465). In the case of such initiatives, concludes Lipsig-Mummé (1998: 20), ‘their dual anchorage – in the community and in the union – allows them the potential for creativity’. It is often argued that the increase in the number of women trade unionists has in itself led to a broadening of the unions’ agenda. ‘Because [women’s] lives are grounded in the community as well as in paid work, in caring for others as well as in working on their own account, their trade union agenda has always been wider than men’s . . . Important new issues have been brought onto the movement’s agenda, such as health and the quality of community life, childcare and the responsibilities of a multicultural society’ (Cunnison and Stageman, 1995: 242). But building ‘social unionism’ (COSATU, 1997; Waterman, 1998) is not simply a gender issue. All workers have an interest in the quality of life in the broader social milieux which they inhabit, and unions which can ‘mediate between the economic and social structure’ (Piore, 1994: 537) may increase their attraction and legitimacy. One example is the tempi della città campaign in Modena in the mid-1990s, when the local unions joined with community groups, business organisations and the local authority to agree changes in the timetables of transport services and communal facilities to match the varying requirements of workers-as-citizens. Much more generally, current emphasis on ‘lifestyles’ – which some critics perceive as a source of individualism – provides ‘a focal point alternative to work-based identities’ which in one respect threatens unions but in another offers opportunities for a new basis of recruitment and representation (Piore, 1991: 403–04). Establishing a ‘social unionism’ has implications for unions’ organisational structures. In many countries, the primary unit has been the company or workplace branch; indeed in Japan and many other Asian countries, unions as such are enterprise-specific. Such a structure has an obvious collective bargaining logic, but

30 Labour and Globalisation can reinforce divisions between ‘insiders’ and ‘outsiders’. Moreover, even in terms of traditional ‘business union’ objectives a company-based structure may no longer be as effective in the past. Many workplaces are no longer social units: ‘lean production’ has reduced the scope for socialising on the job, diversification of work schedules means increasingly that only a fraction of the workforce is present at any one time, subcontracting entails that workers on a single site may be employees of different companies, and individuals often live a considerable distance from their work. This creates a need for alternative organisational mechanisms. For example, Richter et al. (1996) recount the experience of one of the regions of the German metalworkers’ union in building activity around the localities where members (and potential members) live rather than where they work. This also offered the basis for creating links between employed and unemployed, and between working and retired members. (It should be noted that while unions in some countries – notably in Italy – retain substantial numbers of pensioners in membership, it is difficult to integrate them in the life of the union where workplace-based structures predominate.) To appeal to younger workers – in most countries seriously underrepresented in union membership – unions will almost certainly have to develop alternative, locally based structures. Moving away from the bureaucratic formalities of traditional meetings to alternative, more participatory types of collective activity is also a necessary part of organisational innovation if unions are to appeal to a more diverse constituency with cultural backgrounds very different from those of the traditional trade unionist. One may perhaps note here the success of the British TUC in developing anti-racist campaigns in a style totally different from its traditional approach to organisation. Conclusions The logic of all these themes is the mobilisation of values and language in support of union objectives. To survive and thrive, unions have to reassert the rights of labour in ways which allow them to recapture the advantage in the battle of ideas. ‘Organisational strength without ideology is form without content’, said the great strategist of Swedish trade unionism Rudolf Meidner (quoted in Evatt Foundation, 1995); when so many union movements are suffering organisational weakness, motivating ideology is all the more essential. Across the world, trade unionists and supportive analysts of trade unionism have developed similar arguments: that the material difficulties confronting unions are compounded by a ‘loss of [their] ideological justification’ (Piore, 1994: 514). The task is to demonstrate that as well as influencing the material economy their mission is to establish a ‘moral economy’ (Swenson, 1989). In the words of the general secretary of the European TUC, ‘what we need are creative utopias that set new developments in motion’ (Gabaglio, 1995: 111). ‘Unions need to reformulate their goals to ensure that their activities are more closely identified with values like freedom and fairness that are both widely-held and fundamental’, concluded

An Emerging Agenda for Trade Unions? 31 the (union-linked) Evatt Foundation in Australia (1995: 128). The key challenge for South African trade unionism, concludes COSATU (1997: 43), is to offer ‘moral leadership’. For American unions to recover their fortunes, insists Rogers (1995: 368), they must win acceptance as ‘carriers of the “general interest”’. ‘Solidarity forever’ is one of the most fundamental trade union slogans. Solidarity has a double meaning: support by union members’ for each other’s struggles, but also support by the stronger for the weaker within society (or indeed between nations). The broader moral underpinnings of collective action have in many countries become eroded; if solidarity is to survive, it must be reinvented. The diversity of work and labour market situations in the contemporary world means that a traditional, standardised trade union agenda can be neither practically effective nor ideologically resonant. The task is to move from an old model of mechanical solidarity to a new model of organic solidarity – or as Heckscher (1988: 177) puts it, ‘a kind of unionism that replaces organisational conformity with coordinated diversity’. Any project aiming to create such a model must recognise and respect differentiations of circumstances and interests: within the constituencies of individual trade unions, between unions within national labour movements, between workers in different countries. The alignment and integration of diverse interests is a complex and difficult task which requires continuous processes of negotiation; real solidarity cannot be imposed by administrative fiat, or even by majority vote. Its achievement is possible to the extent that unions rediscover the conviction, and persuade both their own members and members of civil society more generally, that they have a mission as a ‘sword of justice’. References Alaluf, M., Boulin, J.-Y., and Plasman, R. (1995), ‘Dauer und Organisation der Arbeitszeit im Spannungsfeld zwischen Kollektivvereinbarungen und individueller Wahlfreiheit’, in Hoffman and Lapeyre (eds). Briskin, L., and McDermott, P. (eds) (1993), Women Challenging Unions, Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Cook, A. H., Lorwin, V. R., and Kaplan Daniels, A. (1992), The Most Difficult Revolution: Women and Trade Unions, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. COSATU (Congress of South African Trade Unions) (1997), September Commission Report, Johannesburg: COSATU. Coutrot, T. (1998), L’entreprise néo-liberale: nouvelle utopie capitaliste?, Paris: La Découverte. Cunnison, S., and Stageman, J. (1995), Feminising the Unions, Aldershot: Avebury. Dejours, C. (1998), Souffrance en France, Paris: Seuil. European Commission (1997), Partnership for a New Organisation of Work, Luxembourg: Office of Official Publications of the European Communities. Evatt Foundation (1995), Unions 2001, Sydney: Evatt Foundation. Flanders, A. (1970), Management and Unions, London: Faber & Faber.

32 Labour and Globalisation Gabaglio, E. (1995), ‘Perspektiven einer europäischen Arbeitszeitpolitik’, in Hoffman and Lapeyre (eds). Heckscher, C. C. (1988), The New Unionism, New York: Basic Books. Hoffman, R., and Lapeyre, J. (eds) (1995), Arbeitszeit – Lebenszeit, Münster: Westfälisches Dampfboot. ILO (International Labour Organisation) (1997), World Labour Report 1997–98, Geneva: ILO. Johnston, P. (1994), Success While Others Fail, Ithaca, NY: ILR Press. Katz, H. (1997), Telecommunications, Ithaca, NY: ILR Press. Kelly, J. (1998), Rethinking Industrial Relations, London: Routledge. Kochan, T. A., Landsbury, R. D., and MacDuffie, J. P. (eds) (1997), After Lean Production, Ithaca, NY: ILR Press. Kochan, T. A., and Wever, K. R. (1991), ‘American Unions and the Future of Worker Representation’, in G. Strauss, D. G. Gallagher and J. Fiorito (eds), The State of the Unions, Madison, WI: IIRA. Lapeyre, J., and Hoffman, R. (1995), ‘Einleitung’, in Hoffman and Lapeyre (eds). Leccese, V. (1997), ‘L’orario di lavoro’, in L. Bellardi and L. Bordogna (eds), Relazioni industriali e contrattazione aziendale, Milan: FrancoAngeli. Leisink, P. (1996), ‘The Wavering Innovation of Trade Union Policy’, in P. Leisink, J. Van Leemput and J. Vilrokx (eds), The Challenges to Trade Unions in Europe, Cheltenham: Edward Elgar. Lipietz, A. (1996), La société en sablier, Paris: La Découverte. Lipsig-Mummé, C. (1998), The Language of Organising: Trade Union Strategy in International Perspective, York University: Centre for Research on Work and Society. Lowe, G. (1998), ‘The Future of Work: Implications for Unions’, Relations industrielles, 53(2): 235–57. Matthies, H., Mückenberger, U., Offe, C., Peter, E., and Raasch, S. (1994), Arbeit 2000, Reinbek: Rowohlt. Mückenberger, U. (1995), ‘Arbeitszeit im Kontext einer modernisierten Gewerkschaftspolitik’, in Hoffman and Lapeyre (eds). Parker, M., and Slaughter, J. (1988), Choosing Sides: Unions and the Team Concept, Boston: South End Press. Pérez-Díaz, V. (1987), ‘Unions’ Uncertainties and Ambivalences’, International Journal of Political Economy, Fall: 108–38. Piore, M. J. (1991), ‘The Future of Unions’, in G. Strauss, D. G. Gallagher and J. Fiorito (eds), The State of the Unions, Madison, WI: IIRA. –– (1994), ‘Unions: A Reorientation to Survive’, in C. Kerr and P. D. Staudohar (eds), Labour Economics and Industrial Relations, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Raasch, S. (1995), ‘Optionale Arbeitszeiten statt Normalarbeitszeit’, in Hoffman and Lapeyre (eds). Ramaswamy, E. A. (1988), Worker Consciousness and Trade Union Response, Delhi: Oxford University Press.

An Emerging Agenda for Trade Unions? 33 Reich, R. B. (1991), The Work of Nations, New York: Knopf. Richter, G., Wittenberg, H., and Hielscher, V. (1996), Gewerkschaftsarbeit im Wohnbereich, Münster: Westfälisches Dampfboot. Rogers, J. (1995), ‘A Strategy for Labour’, Industrial Relations, 34(3): 367–81. Scott, A. (1994), Willing Slaves? British Workers under Human Resource Management, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Standing, G. (1997), ‘Globalisation, Labour Flexibility and Insecurity’, European Journal of Industrial Relations, 3(1): 7–37. Streeck, W. (1998), ‘Bündnis für Arbeit: Bedingungen und Ziele’, Gewerkschaftsmonatshefte, 8/98. Swenson, P. (1989), Fair Shares, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. TUAC (Trade Union Advisory Committee) (1995), Adaptability versus Flexibility, Paris: TUAC. Waddington, J., and Whitston, C. (1996), ‘Collectivism in a Changing Context’, in P. Leisink, J. Van Leemput and J. Vilrokx (eds), The Challenges to Trade Unions in Europe, Cheltenham: Edward Elgar. Waterman, P. (1998), Globalisation, Social Movements and the New Internationalisms, London: Mansell. Wever, K. (1997), ‘Unions Adding Value’, International Labour Review, 136(4): 449–68. Wilthagen, T. (1998), Flexicurity: A New Paradigm for Labour Market Policy Reform?, WZB Discussion Paper FS I 98-202, Berlin. Zoll, R. (1993), Alltagssolidarität und Individualismus, Frankfurt: Suhrkamp.

2. The ICFTU and the World Economy: A Historical Perspective Rebecca Gumbrell-McCormick

Since the world is like it is, it will not, for a long time, be possible to have global solutions to the problems of employment, basic needs production and multinationals. The international organisations will only be able to follow the smallest common denominator. Parallel to the lobbying work in international organisations, the international trade union movement should therefore use its contacts across borders to work on creating a development in the co-operation between political forces and governments that are prepared to create an expansionist economic policy with production and employment for the poor and weak, that are prepared to control multinational companies and that are prepared to create and use economic and organisational resources to make legislative controls of multinationals effective. (Lennart Nyström, LO Sweden, in 1976)1

Just as globalisation, as it is now called, is a far from recent phenomenon, so the international trade union movement, which began to organise in the last decades of the nineteenth century, has always been concerned about the growth of the international economy and its effect on workers and their organisations around the world. The past of the international labour movement is only now being recorded as more materials become available, so the continuity as well as the changes in the labour movement’s approach to the problems of the international economy are only now becoming familiar to the trade unionists and scholars who are seeking to make sense of globalisation and develop a coherent response to it. The international trade union movement has not always been successful in its search for ways to act effectively on the basis of differing economic, political and social objectives, including national and regional interests. Beyond this, the ICFTU (International Confederation of Free Trade Unions) and its forerunners are clearly far removed from the concerns of everyday workers, making international trade unionism an easy target for those opposed to trade union bureaucracy and officialdom in general. But the questions raised by international union organisation are far from easy to resolve in practice: how can the international trade union movement organise in such a way as to take account of and give voice to the concerns of ordinary workers, and how can it persuade them to act internationally? 1 Paper for the ICFTU workshop on the legislative control of international investment, Ottowa, 18–20 October 1976 (ICFTU archives, file 1631, economic and social policy).

34

The ICFTU and the World Economy 35 The international labour movement’s strategy in relation to the international economy has largely focused on the growing power of multinational corporations (MNCs), both around the early years of the twentieth century and in the great revival of interest in the subject in the 1970s, and again in the 1990s. The resulting unevenness of development, and the exploitation of workers in colonial and nonindustrialised countries through the internationalisation of the economy, were more specialised concerns, often linked to the radical socialist and anti-colonialist left rather than the mainstream of the labour movement.2 After the Second World War, the drive to support trade unionism in countries emerging from colonialism led to greater attention being paid to regional economic inequalities and exploitation. At the same time, the development of a specifically regional voice in international trade union affairs created problems for the world movement in its search for unity of approach and action. In the most recent period of the ICFTU’s history, a strong focus on the MNCs and the countervailing power of the trade unions in the 1970s gave way to a concentration on development and a new world economic order in the 1980s, before the two concerns merged in a renewed campaign around the adoption of core labour standards in the 1990s. This paper will draw on my research on the history of the ICFTU from 1972 to the present in order to shed some light on the development of policy and action by the ICFTU and, to some extent, its forerunners, around the international economy and labour’s response.3 Early approaches of the international labour movement to the world economy The labour movement organised its first meetings on the theme of the regulation of international trade and the economy towards the end of the nineteenth century (Kyloh, 1998), at a time of great expansion of international trade and attention to international issues within both the left and other progressive movements. The first international trade secretariats (ITSs) were set up around the turn of the century (Dreyfus, 2000), alongside the confusingly named International Trade Union Secretariat (ITUS), a federation of national centres. Much of the attention to the world economy was linked to fears that economic rivalries would lead to armed conflict, which indeed eventually happened. As has often been noted, the internationalist ideals of the early labour movement did not succeed in preventing the outbreak of the First World War, but the creation of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) in 1919 was in many ways the realisation of the internationalist project of trade unions and other progressive social movements in its immediate aftermath (Van Goethem, 2000). 2 An important exception was Edo Fimmen, general secretary of the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) from 1919 to 1942 (Koch-Baumgarten, 1997; Reinalda, 1997). 3 I was part of an international research project sponsored by the International Institute for Social History (IISG), Amsterdam, and the International Association of Labour History Institutions (IALHI) on the history of the ICFTU and its forerunners, which resulted in the publication Carew et al., 2000. This chapter is loosely based on material in my chapter of this book (2000c), along wth GumbrellMcCormick 2000a, 2000b and 2000d.

36 Labour and Globalisation The International Federation of Trade Unions (IFTU), which succeeded the ITUS as the voice of the social-democratic and reformist trade unions, undertook the first efforts to organise outside Europe and began to push for the regulation of the international economy and the adoption of international labour standards. Its style of trade union internationalism – based on formal representation within the ILO and other inter-governmental or international institutions led by the top officials of national centres – was challenged by the Red International of Labour Unions (RILU), but also by one of the leaders of the ‘Amsterdam International’ itself: Edo Fimmen, general secretary first of the IFTU, then, after 1919, of the International Transport Workers Federation (ITF). His brand of internationalism, based on direct action with the leading role being taken by the ITSs, resulted in the most successful international actions in support of industrial and political objectives that the international trade union movement has ever seen, and had an impact in the struggle against fascism, in which the ITF organised boycotts and gave vital assistance to anti-fascists and refugees, but it remained a minority voice in the ‘free’ trade unionism of his time (Etty, 1976; Fimmen, 1924; Reinalda, 1997). Fimmen was also among the first to launch proposals for labour internationalism as the free association of regional organisations, with workers from the colonialised and underdeveloped countries on equal footing with those of the Western industrialised countries (Fimmen, 1924; Reinalda, 1997). His vision of the federation of autonomous regional organisations was impractical in his day, but it was taken up by the ICFTU with its foundation of the first full regional organisations within the free trade union movement in the early 1950s. After the Second World War, the foundation of the United Nations recalled the idealistic vision around the creation of the ILO. Indeed, the ILO was incorporated into the UN system while maintaining its tripartite structure. It was in the 1950s that the trade union movement undertook its first serious attempt to build a countervailing force against the growing weight of the MNCs, which was already beginning to threaten the balance of power between employers and unions. The earliest major advocates of a trade union approach to the multinationals were trade unions representing car workers, who had a strong potential for concerted international action. All main producers were transnational and unions faced the risk that these companies might transfer production from countries with strong employment regulation to those with weaker standards. The metalworkers’ federation IMF was the first ITS to take up the issue, from the mid-1950s onward, under the responsibility of then assistant general secretary Charles Levinson and his successor, Karl Casserini (previously secretary of the Trade Union Advisory Committee to the OECD [TUAC]), who first coined the term ‘social clause’. The IMF set up the first world company councils (WCCs) at Ford and General Electric in 1966 (Etty, 1978: 70–71; Etty and Tudyka, 1974: 10; Piehl, 1974a: 239–42). The early efforts of the IMF, followed by the International Chemical Workers’ Federation (ICF) and others, to create a ‘counter-power’ to the multinationals were naturally concentrated in the unions of the most developed countries – the displacement of production towards less developed countries was not yet much in evidence

The ICFTU and the World Economy 37 as either a threat or a reality. There was still little attention paid to the economic interests of the developing countries at this time – most attention was given to the struggle against colonialism. At the same time, the ICFTU’s regional organisations were not yet the truly autonomous bodies envisaged by Fimmen. Their purpose was largely to act as a ‘conduit’ to feed information and policy proposals from the regions to the secretariat and back again. Indeed, the marked variations both within and between the regions in terms of economic and social development, alongside the weakness of trade union membership and financial and organisational resources more generally, impeded the development and effective expression of the concerns of the developing countries, just as it hindered the development of a common policy for the world body that took into account the views of all its constituents. The development of the ICFTU’s strategy around the international economy The ICFTU had long shown concern with the issue of the multinationals, but the question assumed a far higher profile from the late 1960s, with pressure from a number of affiliates, notably the TUC (Trades Union Congress). This was one of the main themes of the World Economic Conference of Free Trade Unions in Geneva in June 1971 and the ICFTU London congress in July 1972. The most important theme in the debate was the need for cooperation between the ICFTU and the ITSs in undertaking research into MNCs and developing common action. In consequence the Executive Board (hereafter EB) agreed to invite all ITSs to participate in a joint working party. Leaders of many of the ITSs – in particular Charles Levinson, general secretary of the ICF – believed that action around individual corporations was more likely to bear fruit than lobbying within intergovernmental institutions like the ILO, but took part in at least some of the meetings of the working party. A division of labour was worked out by participants in the first meeting: relations between MNCs and unions would be the primary responsibility of the ITSs, while relations between these corporations and governments and intergovernmental organisations would be the responsibility of the ICFTU.4 The working party held five meetings between February 1973 and the November 1975 congress: the first were chaired by the general secretary himself. Subsequently, Clas-Erik Odhner of LO Sweden and Charles Ford of the ITGLWF presided. While it was intended to include representatives from the host countries of the MNCs, and Asian representatives attended the meeting held in Tokyo, all other meetings were in Europe and in practice most regular participants were from the industrialised countries, with those from the Nordic countries, Germany and the Netherlands playing a leading role.5 Representatives of the developing countries on 4 Report of Tenth World Congress; 52EB/6; 58EB/7a; 59EB/2, 6, 7, 9(a); ESC/2; interview notes: Etty, Ford, Nedzynski, Thorpe, Vanderveken; Etty and Tudyka, 1974: 18, 27; Piehl, 1974a: 235-39. Piehl rightly stresses the potential problems for the working party posed by the ‘distant’ attitude of the three most active ITSs, but is incorrect in his assertion that the IMF and IUF refused to participate. 5 59EB/15; 60EB/7 (b); 61EB/20; 66EB/3, 9; 88EB/12, ESC8; 98EB/10; interview notes: Ford, Tapiola, Vanderveken.

38 Labour and Globalisation the ICFTU’s governing bodies voiced criticisms of economic policy documents based on the work of the OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) or TUAC with their bias towards the industrialised countries of the North. Advocates of the concerns of the developing countries, such as C. V. Devan Nair, general secretary of the Singapore TUC, and P. P. Narayanan, president of the Malayan TUC and chair of the ICFTU Economic and Social Committee, insisted that the confederation’s documents on economic and social policy should give greater attention to the extreme poverty, unemployment and underdevelopment of their countries. Their concerns were eventually reflected in the work of the working party and the Economic and Social Committee. The approach agreed within the working party reflected the division of labour between the ICFTU and the ITSs noted above. While offering support to the activities of national unions and ITSs in actions around individual companies, the confederation concentrated its efforts on work within the international institutions. Since MNCs could avoid the control of national laws and industrial relations systems by transfers of capital and production, using their power to impose antiunion practices in host countries and home countries alike, the aim was to push for the adoption of a ‘firm international legal framework’ based on ‘binding rules’. The debate around MNCs coincided with the end of post-war economic expansion and prosperity in the industrialised countries; many important affiliates now felt on the defensive and, perhaps for the first time, needed the help of the ICFTU. Through the development of a common, carefully worked out alternative economic strategy and a series of specific proposals for legally binding rules, the international trade union movement believed that it could exert an influence on policy-makers and could avoid the danger of being split into competing blocks by the manoeuvres of the MNCs. The basis of this alternative economic policy was a form of neoKeynesianism, although it was not always clearly stated in these words. Politically, the strategy was based on the view that it was in the interests of national governments to regulate the activities of the MNCs in order to protect national sovereignty and avoid a global ‘race to the bottom’, and that friendly governments could be persuaded to form a coalition with the labour movement to regulate the MNCs.6 While the defence of workers’ interests, jobs and standards of living in the industrialised countries was important, the link between world economic prosperity and the needs of the developing countries was always seen as significant, along with the negative impact of the MNCs on economic and social development in developing countries through an unequal world trading system. The issue of ‘protectionism’ was raised within the EB at an early stage, notably by Devan Nair, but supporters of regulation argued that control of the worst excesses of the MNCs would in fact help prevent it. The ICFTU leaders called for the regulation of the MNCs to be closely linked to development and full employment.7 The defence of human and 6

Report on Activities, 1972–1974: 38; 60EB/2, 9; 61EB/14; 62EB/11; 63EB/5(b) (iii); interview notes: Ford, Nedzynski, Pursey, Tapiola, Vanderveken, Nyström, Paper for ICFTU workshop. 7 52/EB/6; 60EB/2, 9; 69EB/2; interview notes: Ford, Murray, Pursey, Vanderveken.

The ICFTU and the World Economy 39 trade union rights around the world was another important consideration.8 Governments in some developing countries were willing to restrict rights of trade union organisation in order to attract investment by MNCs; conversely in some industrialised countries the same firms were adopting anti-union practices. Furthermore, labour legislation in many countries made it difficult for unions to carry out solidarity actions with workers with the same employer in other countries. As one Italian representative on the EB, Francesca Baduel Glorioso, put it, the MNCs brought together many other issues of importance to the ICFTU and therefore necessitated a truly ‘global approach’ by the confederation.9 In the view of the ICFTU, ‘the climate of international opinion is ripe for a purposeful attempt to introduce the rule of law into the largely unregulated jungle of multinational company activities’. How was this to be achieved? The evolving strategy was profoundly marked by the political currents within many left parties and unions in the 1960s and 1970s, which called for the transformation of the economy and society through the development of workers’ control and an equitable world economic system. Advocates of this argument within the ICFTU emphasised the need to challenge managerial control and to extend industrial democracy within the MNCs and national economies, on the basis of coordinated international pressure for full employment and an expansionist economic policy in cooperation with like-minded political forces. The arguments for workers’ control put forward by national centres such as the Belgian ABVV/FGTB and the French CFDT (not yet an ICFTU affiliate) captured the attention of workers at a time of great activism within labour movements and helped shape the arguments within the ICFTU. In this respect, perhaps the most important role was played by the Nordic unionists, notably LO Sweden’s head of research, Clas-Erik Odhner, who chaired the working party in 1976 and also the working group which prepared the document on MNCs for the 1975 congress.10 The outcome was a draft Charter of Trade Union Demands for the Legislative Control of Multinational Companies. It called for action by governments to establish guidelines and machinery for intergovernmental cooperation; to promote coordinated national legislation and prevent competitive undercutting of standards in order to attract investment; to adopt international conventions with ‘enforceable standards’; and to keep MNC activities under review. It formed the centrepiece of debate at the 1975 congress, with fourteen speakers, for the most part highly enthusiastic, and was adopted without opposition. In the mid-1970s, the ICFTU and its affiliates played a major role in the adoption of the only international instruments that have so far been agreed along the 8

Interview notes: Dehareng, Etty, Friso, Nedzynski, Vanderveken. 59EB/2, 7; 60EB/2, 9; 62EB/9; 63EB/2, 8; Kyloh, 1998: 18–19; Piehl, 1974a: 230–31; interview notes: Ford, Jones, Lewis, Pursey, Vanderveken. 10 Report on Activities, 1972–1974: 190; Report of the Tenth Congress: 426; 63EB/2, 6; 64EB/5 (b) (ii); 66EB/3, 9; interview notes: Vanderveken. For Belgium, see Coates (ed.), 1971; for France, see Groux and Mouriaux, 1989. For a good overview of the attitudes of European unions to workers’ control and industrial democracy, see Sorge, 1976. 9

40 Labour and Globalisation lines suggested by the international labour movement for the regulation of the multinationals. The foundation of the UN Centre and Commission on Transnational Corporations in 1974 provided an opportunity for the international labour movement to take part in consultations and also served as a significant source of information. While pursuing its action within the UN, the ICFTU was deeply engaged in action within other intergovernmental bodies, most notably the ILO. Through its control of the majority of the Workers’ Group, the confederation was able to push for the first tripartite meetings to discuss the multinationals in the autumn of 1972, leading to the adoption of a programme of activities on the MNCs. Despite the strong opposition of employers and many governments, the Governing Body in November 1997 adopted a ‘Tripartite Declaration of Principles Concerning Multinational Enterprises and Social Policy’ (ILO, 1977). The declaration was based on the report of a working group of which Casserini was workers’ vice-chair, and whose members included Paul Barton (AFL–CIO), Charles Ford, general secretary of the ITGLWF, and Stephen Pursey of the TUC, who subsequently became head of the ICFTU’s Economic and Social Policy Department. The ICFTU and ITSs were also pressing hard for the adoption of regulations of the MNCs in the OECD, where TUAC played a significant role in the development of the ICFTU’s own economic policy and sought to influence the policies and actions of the OECD. In June 1976 the OECD developed a series of guidelines for the conduct of the MNCs, as part of its Declaration on International Investment and Multinational Enterprises. This was the first international instrument for regulating the MNCs, and was welcomed by the ICFTU and TUAC as the first step towards a code of conduct. There were serious drawbacks, however: the guidelines were applicable only to the multinationals’ operations within OECD member states – and therefore did not apply to the developing countries where they were most needed – and were wholly voluntary in nature (Riddell, 1976). Nor was there a formal complaints procedure. Yet the international trade union movement found that it was possible to use the guidelines to ask for ‘clarifications’ about the practices of individual companies. The most significant of these was probably the Badger case, in which the Belgian subsidiary of a US-based multinational shut down its operations but did not provide the redundancy pay required under Belgian law (Blanpain, 1977).11 The guidelines never became a popular means of resolving disputes, nor did national centres and ITSs make full use of them after the first few years, yet the precedent had been established that the MNCs were vulnerable in the eyes of public opinion.12 The steady work of the ICFTU and the ITSs in the 1970s had some impact on public opinion and government policies, for example the use of trade policies to promote human and trade union rights, as well as in some national legislation, as in Sweden. The success of the international trade union movement in promoting its arguments on the multinationals could also be seen in the publication of the influential report of the international commission headed by the former German 11 12

Interview notes: Etty, Ford. The OECD guidelines were revised in June 2000.

The ICFTU and the World Economy 41 chancellor, Willy Brandt, North–South: A Programme for Survival. Joe Morris, president of the Canadian Labour Congress, became a member of the commission – one of the first trade unionists to serve on a high-level international body of this kind. The report examined in detail the policies and practices of the MNCs, pointing out that their investments tended to be concentrated in ‘only a few middleincome developing countries’ and ‘may conflict with the development objectives and national interests of host countries’. It supported ‘codes of conduct’ for the MNCs, to lead to ‘agreements between governments which should include . . . coordinated legislation in home and host countries’.13 Workers’ rights in the global economy During the 1970s, the ICFTU response to globalisation was primarily addressed to the power and practices of MNCs, but the outcome of this effort was disappointing: there is little evidence that codes of conduct had a significant impact on corporate behaviour, except perhaps in the case of MNC activities in South Africa (MacShane et al., 1984). In the 1980s, the confederation began to highlight issues which were already on its agenda in the 1970s but had previously received less emphasis: the dire effects on developing economies of the debt burden, particularly in a climate of high interest rates; the dynamics of financial and trade liberalisation; the policies of the international economic institutions. The demand for a social clause in trade agreements, long included among ICFTU objectives, became a central campaigning issue.14 These concerns were addressed in the 1978 ICFTU development charter ‘Towards a New Economic and Social Order’ and in the conclusions of the world conference on the trade union role in development, held in New Delhi in March 1981. Inspired by the ideas of the Brandt Report, the development charter and the ‘New Delhi Declaration’ called for a new international economic order based on full employment, balanced development and growth, and greater equality within and among nations. With social-democratic or centre-left governments in office in much of Western Europe and the Carter administration in the USA, the realisation of the Brandt agenda appeared to be within reach. But with the election of Thatcher, Reagan and Kohl, the political balance shifted disastrously: increasingly the leaders of the dominant industrialised economies were committed to fiscal restraint and deflationary macro-economic policies at home, often linked to diminished labour market protections and anti-union legislation; and externally to trade liberalisation, deregulation of financial markets and intensified competition. The ICFTU affiliates in the industrialised countries could no longer influence governments to orient their policy in favour of the developing countries. At the Cancún summit of key world leaders in October 1981, the ICFTU submitted a 13 70EB/10, Appendix I; 75EB/8 (c), (e); 76EB/12 (b); 80EB/17; Dewil, personal communication; Independent Commission on International Development Issues (1980); interview notes: Ford, Pursey. 14 Personal communication: Pursey; interview notes: Etty, Friso, Vanderveken.

42 Labour and Globalisation detailed economic policy, but in vain. Soon the issue became not so much achieving coordinated advance as resisting a ‘global race for the bottom’.15 In responding to these adverse circumstances, the ICFTU needed to develop a sophisticated approach with an articulation between different levels of engagement. On the one hand, it intensified its regional activities, developing a dialogue with union leaders and activists who were in the front line of the effects of globalisation; and it adopted a more assertive campaigning approach, seeking to make an impact by highlighting abusive labour practices and the damaging consequences of unregulated competitive forces. On the other hand, it stepped up its work within the world financial institutions, holding regular meetings with the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and intervening in the trade liberalisation negotiations within the framework of GATT and the World Trade Organisation (WTO) which followed from it. The confederation’s work on the international economy was designed to provide a world labour response to what was now increasingly termed ‘globalisation’. While there was significant continuity with the approach of the 1970s, there were also interesting contrasts. The close link in the 1970s between the demands for regulation of MNCs and industrial democracy was all but forgotten in the changed political climate of the 1980s. The analysis of the global economy in the 1980s also appeared less radical and more defensive than that in the 1970s: there was near-universal acceptance that there was no alternative to free trade within a market system, and that the main task was to reform its worst excesses. Governments were still key players, but social regulation would need to be imposed from outside, rather than by the internal pressure of workers and citizens.16 The dramatic worldwide rise in interest rates in the 1970s and 1980s entailed a crippling increase in the burden of repayments for Third World debtor countries. If they maintained repayments this was inevitably at the expense of essential social programmes; if they defaulted on any wide scale, this would threaten the collapse of an already precarious international financial system. The risk of default itself helped drive rates upwards in a vicious spiral. The deflationary conditions attached to IMF rescue packages also had damaging social consequences and made the attainment of long-term self-sufficiency the more elusive. A major outcome of the ICFTU’s work on international trade and economic questions was the statement ‘The World Economy: Reform or Ruin’ submitted in 1974 to the UN General Assembly and the annual meeting of the IMF and World Bank. The ICFTU backed the call of the General Assembly for a new international economic order. At this time, the economic problems of the Third World were attributed mainly to adverse moments in terms of trade and the instability of prices for primary products. Within a few years the confederation embraced the view that ‘the traditional concept of “indebtedness” should be abandoned in favour of a new approach 15

Personal communication: Pursey; Report on Activities 1979–1982: 53, 199–202; 90EB/12; Shailor, 1998: 28–29. 16 Levinson, at the Shell WCC in June 1974, quoted in Etty and Tudyka, 1974: 27; interview notes: Jordan, Thorpe.

The ICFTU and the World Economy 43 which views the matter as one of international resource management’; and in a resolution at the 1979 congress attacked ‘the unequal policies of the IMF in putting pressure on so-called deficit countries to deflate while failing to insist on expansion in surplus countries and the excessively severe conditions on loan repayment imposed by the IMF which can lead to serious internal political instability in countries where there is unemployment and poverty’.17 The issue assumed new urgency with the disruptive effects of the second oil crisis at the end of the 1970s. A number of regional conferences on the world economic crisis were organised, notably in Cuernavaca in August 1984 on the theme ‘New Approaches to the Economic Crisis in Latin America and the Caribbean’ and in September 1986 in Buenos Aires on ‘Debt and Development’. The latter approved a statement entitled ‘First the People and then the Debt’; this was adopted by the EB and formed the basis for pressure on the international institutions. The confederation outlined detailed proposals for the general alleviation of the debt burden and for a coordinated policy of equitable international economic relations and balanced growth. While the impact was limited, the ICFTU claimed in 1988 that ‘the IMF has shown some flexibility in the design of its recovery programmes . . . Some steps have also been made towards the construction of a framework for closer coordination of the economic policies of the major industrial countries. The ICFTU may fairly claim to have contributed to these shifts’ – which it nevertheless insisted were far from adequate.18 This sober assessment was fully justified. The debt crisis continued into the 1990s, intensified by the Asian financial crisis. Far from adopting a more sympathetic regime, the ‘structural adjustment programmes’ imposed by the IMF and the World Bank intensified the problems of the development countries; as ever, the workers were the main victims, and women most of all. The ICFTU continued to hold regional conferences on the problem, and ensured that the situation of women was integrated into policy documents on the world economy to a far greater extent than ever before. At the same time it maintained its pressure on the international institutions, complaining that the IMF and World Bank had come to ‘assume a position of unparalleled importance . . . They used their new-found power to promote a series of structural adjustment programmes designed to increase the role of the market through opening up to imports, reducing subsidies, privatising publicly-owned companies, and liberalising prices. These programmes resulted in high levels of poverty with little economic benefit.’ In 1994 the ICFTU, together with several ITSs, opened a Washington office to facilitate pressure on the two institutions. It also showed increased willingness to cooperate with NGOs seeking to achieve a more humane international economic regime. At the end of 17

Report on Activities 1972–1974: 179–83; 1975–1978: 50; Report of the Twelfth World Congress: 649. Personal communication: Pursey; Report on Activities 1979–1982: 56–57; Report of the Thirteenth World Congress: A/49–51; Report on Activities 1983–1986: 46–51, 224–29. There was some debate in the EB in 1986 as to whether there was any point in pursing dialogue with institutions that ‘were identified with policies of economic repression in the developing world and seemed impermeable to change’ (90EB/12). 18

44 Labour and Globalisation the century there were signs, however ambiguous, that the climate of world opinion was beginning to change.19 The idea of the social clause The GATT negotiations on trade liberalisation began in 1973. The ICFTU issued a statement which welcomed the initiative but insisted that ‘the fundamental objectives of the negotiations should be to improve living standards, to expand employment, and to contribute to a fairer distribution of income and wealth throughout the world’. Its proposals included an outline social clause (prepared jointly with the International Metalworkers’ Federation), and a tripartite Commission on Trade and Employment linking GATT and the ILO. This was discussed with the GATT director general in 1977 and elaborated in the following year. The idea of a social clause, and in particular the principle of linking trade to fair labour standards, assumed new prominence in subsequent decades.20 The confederation endorsed the decision to commence a new set of GATT negotiations (the ‘Uruguay round’) in 1986, and again insisted on the inclusion of a commitment to ensure ‘minimum labour standards’, adding that ‘without a social clause the pressures for increased protection will be much harder to resist’. Two years later the EB declared that ‘the level of awareness of the case for a social clause among industrialised and development country governments [was] far greater than ever before’. In formulating its objectives, the ICFTU had to confront the issues, first of defining minimum standards, second of countering arguments that such standards would themselves be protectionist in outcome even if not in intent. The two questions were closely interconnected. Affiliates from the developing countries reported that in discussions with their own governments they ‘encountered fears that any social clause might be turned to protectionist ends’. But while earlier proposals for the social clause might have been thought to imply measures such as the harmonisation of wages and working conditions, which could indeed have worked against less developed countries, the proposal was now explicitly limited to core labour standards. These had been specified in the 1986 GATT submission as freedom of association, the right to collective bargaining, non-discrimination, abolition of forced labour, a minimum age for employment, occupational health and safety, and labour inspection.21 The content of the social clause was formalised when the UN World Summit for Social Development in Copenhagen in March 1995 identified seven ILO ‘core conventions’ that provided the minimum acceptable standard for workers’ rights.22 19

Report on Activities 1987–1990: 43–48; 1991–1994: 58– 68; David, 1996. Report on Activities 1972–1974: 174–79. 21 Report on Activities 1983–1986: 232–34; 94EB/10; 98EB/12(a); interview notes: Etty, Ford, Friso, Jordan, Pursey. 22 They were Conventions 29 and 105 on the abolition of forced labour; 87 and 98 on freedom of association and collective bargaining; 111 and 100 on discrimination in employment and equal pay for work of equal value; and 138 on the minimum age for employment (Kyloh, 1998: 39). 20

The ICFTU and the World Economy 45 These core labour standards could, at least in principle, be met by any country without undue cost, and they could retain any competitive advantage based, for example, on lower wage levels. Supporters of the social clause argued that it would be ‘a means of reducing pressure for protectionism by creating a fairer basis for international trade’. The protectionist issue was a real one, however, and could not be resolved easily. It continued to divide opinion among ICFTU affiliates, and led to a situation where the unions did not always ‘speak with the same voice’, as, for example, in the International Labour Conference, where some affiliates backed the stance of their own governments against a link between workers’ rights and trade.23 This was to constitute a major problem. Particularly in the Asian-Pacific Regional Organisation (APRO) there was widespread apprehension at the whole campaign: ‘some members emphasised that they wished to obtain more assurances that a social clause would not become a protectionist device’. Even if they did not finally oppose ICFTU policy within its own decision-making processes, some unions undermined it in other bodies. Though the confederation continued to press its demand, ‘despite wide support for the proposal among industrialised and some developing countries, it was blocked by opposition from certain other developing country governments. Since GATT operates by consensus, this was sufficient to stop the proposal.’ Regular submissions were made within GATT, and to the WTO which succeeded it in 1994; and efforts were made to coordinate pressure by national unions on their governments. Attempts were also made to achieve the objective within the ILO, but here too ‘opposition from the same governments as in the GATT blocked discussions’.24 In the course of the 1990s, as the prospects of a social clause seemed as distant as ever, the confederation’s approach to trade liberalisation became somewhat less enthusiastic. It argued that ‘multilateral rules governing the behaviour of the TNCs are the most effective way of maximising the potential benefits of foreign direct investment and minimising the potential costs’, and began to make progress with governments and employers’ organisations. For Bill Jordan, general secretary from December 1996, this had to be the major function of the ICFTU in an increasingly integrated global economy. This approach continued with the negotiations initiated by the OECD for a Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI), which the ICFTU neither supported nor opposed in principle.25 This detachment can be seen as a reflection of a growing disenchantment, within the ranks of the world’s trade unions and public opinion more generally, with the whole dynamic of globalisation. For many critics, globalisation stemmed from a deliberate series of actions by the multinationals and conservative government policy-makers, a logical consequence of the neo-liberal ideas that had taken hold in the 1980s. It was a phenomenon that the labour movement must combat, not adapt to. Some national centres, most notably the CLC, but also many within the 23

Interview notes: Briesch, Delhomenie, Etty, Vanderveken. Report on Activities 1987–1990: 48–49; 1991–1994: 54–58, 244. India was a leading opponent of the social clause. 25 90EB/12; interview notes: Jordan, Pursey, Vanderveken; Jordan, 1997. 24

46 Labour and Globalisation American, Australian and New Zealand unions, saw world trade agreements as so irredeemably hostile to the interests of trade unionists that they opposed the ICFTU granting such agreements any legitimacy by tacking on what appeared a largely ineffectual social clause.26 The cautious lobbying within the international institutions which was central to ICFTU action in the 1990s contrasted with the uncompromising opposition to trade liberalisation by many NGOs, which inspired the opposition of the French government to the MAI and resulted in its collapse; and seemed also to contribute to the débâcle of the Seattle summit. Yet did this mean merely leaving the world economy an open field for the MNCs? What was the alternative? One response, reflecting the more critical attitude to globalisation which began to take hold in the 1990s, was provided by some ITSs such as the ICEM (formed through the merger of the ICEF and the Miners’ International Federation), which criticised the continued efforts to seek regulation through the international institutions – the ILO, UN, WTO and OECD – as an unrealistic approach, requiring enormous resources but unlikely to yield significant results because of the poor record of implementation of even the most uncontroversial and widely accepted core labour standards. A more aggressive response to the MNCs, with greater coordination among the ITSs and between them and the ICFTU, and appealing directly to public (and consumer) opinion, was seen as potentially a better option.27 Challenging the multinationals The previous efforts to regulate MNCs through international codes of conduct had achieved little success; the multinationals had demonstrated that economic power could buy political influence at both national and supranational level. Yet in some respects multinationals were vulnerable. The Bhopal disaster in 1984, caused by the cost-cutting practices of the US multinational Union Carbide, caused an immense public outcry. It provoked active concern within the ICFTU with environmental issues – much reinforced by Chernobyl two years later – and helped encourage cooperation with environmental NGOs. Companies producing directly for the consumer market could not afford such opprobrium. This was demonstrated in the case of Nestlé, which suffered from a consumer boycott following exposure of its damaging efforts to sell infant formula milk in Third World countries. Many ITSs, and the ICFTU itself, were able to learn from such examples. In the mid-1980s the International Union of Food and Allied Workers (IUF) proposed to the ITS general conference that cooperation among the ITSs be increased, perhaps leading to the 26

Interview notes: Benedict, Matheson, Riche. Addressing the TUC, Nancy Riche CLC, and ICFTU vice-president, insisted that ‘the new world order was no accident’. It was not simply a ‘trend’, as a senator in Canada had suggested to her. ‘I said, “no hoola hoop was a trend”’ (Report of Congress, 1998: 63). In this context see Haworth and Hughes, 1997; and the statement by a major affiliate of LO Denmark, SID (1997), prepared for an international conference in Copenhagen that involved many ICFTU affiliates. 27 Interview notes: Etty, Thorpe; Gallin, 1994: 126–30.

The ICFTU and the World Economy 47 creation of an ITS liaison office and newsletter. In the late 1980s and 1990s it worked closely with ICEF and other like-minded ITSs, jointly organising the Global Conference on Labour Solidarity for action against the multinationals in Washington in 1989 and continuing their common work around MNCs such as Unilever. The ITSs and ICFTU worked together on a number of international solidarity actions, including the US-based Pittson dispute in 1989 and the Rio Tinto dispute in Australia and South Africa in 1997–98. To achieve closer collaboration, the ICFTU and ITSs discussed changing the policy on formal representation of ITSs in the ICFTU’s governing bodies and decided that from 1990 all ITSs would be invited to meetings instead of the previous four official representatives.28 The ICFTU/ITS working party and the Economic and Social Committee began to devote much greater attention to the negative social effects of the MNCs in the Third World from the 1980s onwards, under the leadership of Narayanan, who had become president of the confederation as well as chair of the committee. Major issues included the exploitation of women workers in the Free Trade Zones and the use of child labour. The EB ordered a study of child labour in November 1982 and called for a major campaign by the confederation and its affiliates a year later. Several affiliates initiated small-scale practical projects aimed at assisting the families of child workers to escape the ‘cycle of poverty’ that lay at the root of child labour; one of the most successful was the programme organised by INTUC in Bombay with the assistance of the ICFTU. The involvement of the MNCs was naturally an important part of the research and publicity on the problem of child labour, and affiliates in the host countries were urged to address the issue in collective bargaining and in representations to management.29 Within the secretariat, the ICFTU began pursuing more active campaigns around specific issues, and lent support to organising campaigns by individual affiliates. In the 1990s, the campaign on child labour became more prominent as it adopted such tactics as the ‘toycott’ (boycott of toys produced by child labour), which received considerable support from NGOs. The confederation carried out extensive publicity on the subject, for example, with the worldwide tour of a Pakistani child worker, Iqbal Masih, who was subsequently murdered on his return to his native country. This more aggressive ‘campaigning’ style owed much to the revival of social movement unionism as well as to the tactics of NGOs. In the absence of a major breakthrough in the adoption of a social clause by WTO or UN system, direct campaigning by the ICFTU and ITSs provided a way for the international labour movement to sustain the initiative on the multinationals.30 The renewed interest in the issue of MNCs was marked by the ICFTU/ITS conference on trade unions and the transnationals in 1990. The preparatory document 28

Report on Activities 1983–1986: 58–59; 96EB/6 (c) (v); 97EB/11; 99EB/12; 25 MNC-WP/8, 1990; interview notes: Etty, Ford, Nedzynski, Pursey, Royer, Thorpe. 29 84EB/8. 30 Report on Activities 1991–1994: 269–70; TUC, General Council Report 1996: 113–15; interview notes: Jordan, Matheson, Pursey, Royer. On social movement unionism see Johnston, 1994 and Waterman, 1999.

48 Labour and Globalisation concluded with a call for new tactics in response to the lack of progress within the international institutions. It recognised the ‘pivotal role’ played by the ITSs in international solidarity actions, and pointed to the success of recent campaigns where unions in the MNC home countries had exerted pressure on top management to resolve disputes involving unions in host countries. It recommended the adoption at the international level of the sort of ‘comprehensive corporate campaigns’ then being carried out with some success in North America, where unions undertook extensive research on the investments and activities of target companies, and sought links with investors, consumers and others affected by the company in union recognition campaigns or disputes. The conclusions of the conference called for a more central role for the working party, which had lost some of its impact because of the lack of progress in implementing the international instruments. Pointing out the changing nature of companies, which were less confined to individual industrial sectors, and the increased importance of publicity and solidarity campaigns that required the involvement of entire labour movements, the conference called for the working party, and the ICFTU itself, to strengthen the coordination of the work of the ITSs and national centres.31 In the late 1990s, hopes were raised for a renewed dynamism within the UN system, or at least the ILO, with the appointment of Juan Somavia (who had chaired the Copenhagen summit), as the new director general; this created hopes for a greater role for the organisation in setting the world economic and social policy agenda. This appeared to justify the long-running work of the ICFTU within the ILO, and made its displacement in favour of the Bretton Woods institutions or the WTO appear premature. The ILO remained the only tripartite institution, and the trade unions also enjoyed a consultative role within the UN that they lacked in the WTO or the financial institutions. At the same time, changes in the governments of leading industrial countries indicated a possible end to the paralysis of policy-making which had marked the 1980s. These developments encouraged renewed efforts by national affiliates to push their own governments to adopt a coordinated policy for control of the international economy, with the goal of restoring democratic accountability. As Georges Debunne, former president of the ABVV–FGTB, put it, there was ‘a need for political power to regain its role, and for trade unions to renew their struggle, in order to restore political, economic and social democracy’. This same process had been anticipated at European level, where the internationalisation of the economy had already led to fresh approaches by the ETUC and its affiliates for greater economic democracy and transparency. Conclusion From the 1970s through to the 1990s, the ICFTU devoted significant resources to the problems of the global economy, on the basis of its own perceived role as the ‘spokesman’ for world labour in relation to national governments, international 31

Report on Activities 1987–1990: 51–57; 24 MNC-WP/8, 1989; 24 MNC-WP/8, 1990.

The ICFTU and the World Economy 49 institutions and public opinion. Its concentration on work within the ILO and UN system as a whole, and later on influencing the international financial institutions and the WTO, showed great continuity with the earliest days of the international labour movement, but was bound to appear bureaucratic and far from the grassroots. It was the ‘mobilisation coalition’ of the ITSs, especially the IMF, ICF (ICEM) and IUF, that carried out the practical organising work on the ground, and reaped most of the publicity. Over time, this division of labour between the two arms of the international trade union movement led to friction and misunderstanding, especially as in the 1990s the ICFTU sought to adopt a more ‘campaigning’ stance itself when faced with the paucity of results from its work within the institutions. Yet the lobbying of the confederation within these same institutions, and the international instruments that were adopted, provided essential tools for the ITSs and national affiliates to carry out their own campaigns. While the basic approach of the ICFTU remained fairly constant, its priorities changed with time, in response to changes in the global economy and society and changing perspectives of leaders and activists within the labour movement. Attention to the MNCs from the 1950s through to the 1970s focused almost entirely on the industrialised countries and their interests. By the late 1970s, however, the pernicious role of the multinationals in countries such as Chile and South Africa came to the fore. At the same time, the rising influence of trade unionists from the developing countries within the confederation’s governing bodies led to a greater concentration on the effect of MNCs on the Third World economies. The problems of poverty and development were the main preoccupations of the confederation in the 1980s, just as action within the international institutions over the MNCs came to a standstill. In the 1990s, the labour movement’s concerns over the power of the multinationals in the industrialised countries and their effects on the economies of the developing countries came together in efforts to regulate the world economy and control the effects of globalisation. It remained for the ICFTU to build on its past work and to integrate the issue of the governance of the world economy into all aspects of its policies and programmes, in the pursuit of the truly ‘global approach’ already called for in the 1970s.32 References This chapter is based primarily on unpublished materials at the ICFTU archive at the Internationaal Instituut voor Sociale Geschiedenis, Amsterdam, and the archives of the CLC at the National Archives of Canada, Ottowa. It also makes extensive use of interviews, including the following: Jim Baker (ICFTU), Steve Benedict (CLC), Roger Briesch (CFDT), Jim Catterson (ICEM), Georges Debunne (formerly ABVV–FGTB), Marcelle Dehareng (formerly ICFTU), Jean-Pierre Delhomenie (CFDT), Tom Etty (FNV), Charles Ford (formerly ITGLWF/TUAC), Enzo Friso (former general secretary, ICFTU), Tim Harcourt 32

60EB/2, 9; interview notes: Debunne, Pursey.

50 Labour and Globalisation (ACTU), Bill Jordan (general secretary, ICFTU), Dwight Justice (ICFTU), Harold Lewis (former general secretary, ITF), Alan Matheson (ACTU), Lord Murray (former general secretary, TUC), Stefan Nedzynski (former general secretary, PTTI), Stephen Pursey (ILO/ICFTU), Elsa Ramos (ICFTU), Nancy Riche (vice-president, CLC and ICFTU), Kari Tapiola (deputy director general, ILO, formerly SAK/TUAC), Vic Thorpe (former general secretary, ICEM), John Vanderveken (former general secretary, ICFTU), Michael Walsh (TUC). Blanpain, R. (1977), The Badger Case and the OECD: Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises, Deventer: Kluwer. Carew, A., Dreyfus, M., van Goethem, G., Gumbrell, R., and van der Linden, M. (2000), The International Confederation of Free Trade Unions: A History of the Organisation and its Precursors, Bern: Peter Lang. Coates, K. (ed.) (1971), A Trade Union Strategy in the Common Market: The Programme of the Belgian Trade Unions, Nottingham: Spokesman. David, N. (1996), Worlds Apart: Women and the Global Economy, Brussels: ICFTU. Dreyfus, M. (2000), ‘The Emergence of an International Trade Union Organisation (1902–1919)’, in Carew et al. Etty, T. (1976), Labour’s Forgotten Alternative, unpublished ms, University of Nijmegen. –– (1978), ‘Gewerkschaftliche Weltkonzernaussschüsse: Ein Überblick’, in W. Olle (ed.), Einführung in die internationale Gewerkschaftspolitik, I, Berlin: Olle and Wolter. Etty, T., and Tudyka, K. (1974), ‘Wereldkoncernraden: Vakbonden en hun “kapitaalgerichte” strategie tegen multinationale ondernemingen’, in T. Etty, K. Tudyka and P. Reckman (eds), Naar een multinationale vakbeweging, Kosmodok, 7(2): 3–39. Fimmen, E. (1924), Labour’s Alternative: The United States of Europe or Europe Limited, London: Labour Publishing Company. Friso, E. (1998), Sindacalista in un Mondo Ingiusto, unpublished ms. Gallin, D. (1994), ‘Inside the New World Order: Drawing the Battle Lines’, New Politics, 5(1). Groux, G., and Mouriaux, R. (1989), La CFDT, Paris: Economica. Gumbrell-McCormick, R. (2000a), ‘Globalisme et régionalisme’ in A. Fouquet, U. Rehfeldt and S. Le Roux (eds), Le syndicalisme dans la mondialisation, Paris: Editions de l’Atelier, 43-53. –– (2000b), ‘Quel internationalisme syndical? Passé, présent, avenir’, Les Temps Modernes, Jan.–Feb. 178-206. –– (2000c), ‘Facing New Challenges: The International Confederation of Free Trade Unions 1972–1990s’, in Carew et al. –– (2000d), ‘Globalisation and the Dilemmas of International Trade Unionism’, Transfer, 1/2000: 29-42. Haworth, N., and Hughes, S. (1997), ‘Global Regulation and Labour Strategy: The Case of International Labour Standards’, in P. Morrison (ed.), Labour,

The ICFTU and the World Economy 51 Employment and Work, Wellington: Victoria University. Independent Commission on International Development Issues (1980), North–South: A Programme for Survival, London: Pan. ILO (International Labour Organisation) (1977), Tripartite Declaration of Principles Concerning Multinational Enterprises and Social Policy, Geneva: ILO. Johnston, P. (1994), Success While Others Fail, Ithaca, NY: ILR Press. Jordan, B. (1997), Unions, Markets and Democracy, Geneva: ILO. Koch-Baumgarten, S. (1997), ‘Edo Fimmen: Iron Fist in a Velvet Glove’, in Reinalda (ed.). Kyloh, R. (1998), ‘The Governance of Globalisation: The ILO’s Contribution’, in R. Kyloh (ed.), Mastering the Challenge of Globalisation: Towards a Trade Union Agenda, Geneva: ILO. MacShane, D., Plaut, M., and Ward, D. (1984), Power! Black Workers, their Unions and the Struggle for Freedom in South Africa, Nottingham: Spokesman. Piehl, E. (1974a), ‘Multinationale Konzerne und die Zersplitterung der internationalen Gwerkschaftsbewegung’, Argument-Sonderbände, AS2: 230–55. –– (1974b), ‘Gewerkschaftliche Basismobilisierung kontra multinationale Kapitalstrategie: am Beispiel Ford’, in O. Jacobie, W. Müller-Jentsch and E. Schmidt (eds), Gewerkschaften und Klassenkampf: Kritisches Jahrbuch 1974, Frankfurt: Fisher. Reinalda, B. (1997), ‘The ITF and the Non-European World’, in Reinalda (ed.). Reinalda, B. (ed.) (1997), The International Transportworkers Federation 1914–1945, Amsterdam: Stichting Beheer IISG. Riddell, J. (1976), ‘Multinational Guidelines’, Free Labour World, July–August. Shailor, B. (1998), ‘Reinforcing TUAC’s Policy Agenda at National Level’, in TUAC–OECD, TUAC 1948–1998, Paris: TUAC. SID (Specialarbej der forbundet i Danmark) (1997), A New Global Agenda: Visions and Strategies for the 21st Century, Copenhagen: SID. Sorge, A. (1976), ‘The Evolution of Industrial Democracy in the Countries of the European Community’, British Journal of Industrial Relations, 14(3): 274–94. Van Goethem, G. (2000), ‘Conflicting Interests: The International Federation of Free Trade Unions (1919–1945)’, in Carew et al. Waterman, P. (1999), ‘The New Social Unionism: A New Union Model for a New World Order’, in R. Munck and P. Waterman (eds), Labour Worldwide in the Era of Globalisation, London: Macmillan.

3. Globalisation, Imperialism and the Labour Standards Debate1 Robert O’Brien

The issue of international labour standards poses a dilemma for groups working nationally and internationally for increased equality and fairness in the workplace. Many groups agree that improved working conditions should be a goal, but disagree about what can or should be done on the international stage. Recent debate has centred around whether core labour standards should be linked to trade under the World Trade Organization (WTO). However, there has also been concern about the unilateral action of developed states to enforce labour standards and the activity of consumer and other NGOs around codes of conduct and publicity campaigns. This division between equity advocates makes their already difficult task more formidable. Rather than arguing the case for or against particular labour standards proposals this study examines the multiple and interlocking sources of power and domination that characterise relations around global labour issues. It argues that the difficulty equity advocates have in agreeing upon a labour issues strategy can be attributed to the complex nature of modern imperialism and its historical legacy. Nevertheless, transformation in the nature of global domination provides the opportunity for new strategies of resistance and cooperation on labour standards issues. The argument evolves in three sections. The first section discusses the concept of imperialism and how it is used in this paper. It outlines how the configuration of the trade regime and the activity of Western unions in the Cold War contributed to imperial expansion and left a historical legacy. It is this legacy that throws a shadow over present-day equity advocates. In addition, this section argues that the social basis of imperialism has changed in the post-war period by detaching organised labour from the ruling coalition. This has provided the opportunity for Western labour to redefine its interests and engage in coalition-building with equity-focused groups in other countries. However, labour’s own imperial legacy poses an obstacle to potential cooperation and colours its views of policy options. This will be illustrated by reference to two cases in the second section of the paper. The case of the controversy of incorporating core labour standards into the oper1

Versions of this chapter were presented to the British International Studies Association meeting at the University of Sussex in December 1998 and the ESRC Labour and Globalisation Seminar at the University of Liverpool, January 1999. My thanks to the participants for helpful comments. Randall Germain, in particular, offered useful criticism. Research was facilitated by ESRC Grant L120251027.

52

Globalisation, Imperialism and the Labour Standards Debate 53 ation of the WTO and the issue of child labour in export industries will be considered. The WTO debate highlights the clash within and between groups confronting international institutions which are already perceived to be favouring Northern interests.2 The attempt to end the use of child labour in export industries of South Asia demonstrates the danger and the possibilities of Northern campaigns for reforming economic practices in developing countries. The final section of the paper considers how a multifaceted strategy aware of the imperialist legacy can go some way to addressing labour issue concerns. The legacy of imperialism Imperialism is a contested concept which can often obscure more than it clarifies. However, it does capture a central dynamic of the international system better than terms such as ‘balance of power’ or ‘hegemony’. Because of this problem, I shall outline how the term is used in this paper before illustrating its impact on the labour standards debate and its transformation in the post-war period. ‘Imperialism’ has been used in three broadly different senses. It has been used to refer to a particular historical epoch and stage of capitalism (1870s–1914), which saw the rapid expansion of European and US economic, military and political power on the back of the industrial revolution (Lenin, 1939). The dominant feature of this era was the ‘scramble for Africa’ and the contest between European powers for land in parts of the world that had not yet been claimed by their rivals. In the 1960s and 1970s the concept of imperialism was revived to capture the continued inequality between developed and developing states despite (or because of) decolonisation (Galtung, 1971). Other authors spoke in terms of dependency theory to capture similar structural inequalities (Dos Santos, 1970; Cardoso and Faletto, 1979). Finally, it has been projected backward in time to encompass premodern empires and reinterpreted to mean ‘the process or policy of establishing or maintaining an empire’ (Doyle, 1986: 45). By ‘imperialism’ I am referring to a process of capitalist expansion and dominance emanating from the advanced industrial states, economies and societies of Western Europe and North America beginning in the mid-nineteenth century and continuing until today. It involves the dominance of these state, market and social actors over the state, market and society of other areas of the globe based upon the superior productive power of the first (steam and steel), second (electricity and chemicals) and third (information and biotechnology) industrial revolutions (Barraclough, 1979: 43–64). This chapter is concerned with the transformation of imperialism in the post-1945 period and how that feeds into the issue of promoting and protecting labour standards and working conditions. The concept of imperialism is used in preference to international domination or unequal power relations because it captures the link to a dynamic capitalist process 2 This chapter uses the terms ‘Northern’ and ‘Western’ interchangeably to refer to states or societies located in Western Europe, the United States and Canada.

54 Labour and Globalisation that involves state and non-state actors. Unequal power relations spring from the advantages derived from more productive economic systems in advanced industrialised states. Although located in particular states, the production is organised by corporations. As a group, firms increasingly exercise their own forms of authority and rival the power of many states (Cutler et al. [eds], 1999; Stopford and Strange, 1991). Unequal influence is also exercised by civil society groups based in leading states. Religious groups, political parties, charitable foundations, social activists and unions can draw upon their relative prosperity to influence counterparts in target states. Thus, although imperialism is rooted in the expansion of a particular economic system, its expression can be seen in the unequal power relations between states (through treaties or war), firms (the activity of multinationals) and social actors (religions, educators, social activists). Although the understanding of imperialism as Northern or Western domination has virtually disappeared from academic analysis in advanced industrialised states, the process of globalisation is often interpreted as a new phase of imperialism. For example, a statement from a South African trade union declares, ‘It is clear that globalisation as it is currently unfolding is imperialism gone mad’.3 Keeping these views in mind, one can see how the post-war environment facilitated the expansion of Northern-based economic interests. Following the end of the Second World War the international system was structured to facilitate renewed Western capitalist expansion through the activity of interstate organisations, multinational corporations and society-based actors. In the field of international organisations, NATO and a series of regional alliances provided the security shield for capitalist states. International economic organisations such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (World Bank) were created to facilitate the rebuilding of a liberal transatlantic economy. These institutions played a crucial role with regard to developing countries in the 1970s and particularly the 1980s. The attempt to create a trade organisation stalled when the International Trade Organisation (ITO) did not appeal to the US Congress. In its place the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) facilitated the reduction of tariffs through a series of negotiating rounds. Along with bilateral actions of the US government, these organisations created an environment conducive to the expansion of multinational corporations across Western frontiers and into select countries in the developing world. Even though imperialist expansion into the South was not the primary concern of advanced industrialised states, firms and societies, it did have a disproportionately large influence on the weaker states, firms and societies it encountered. Because of their dependence on advanced industrialised countries, relatively minor shocks emanating from the core could have disproportionate effects on developing countries. Even though the bulk of trade and foreign direct investment remained within the confines of advanced industrialised states, the degree to which 3

Statement by NEHAWU, printed on the back of ‘South Africa Confronts Globalisation Calendar 2000’, distributed by the International Labour and Resource Information Group.

Globalisation, Imperialism and the Labour Standards Debate 55 it travelled between Northern or Southern countries was of crucial importance to developing states. Decisions taken in the context of domestic Western interests had devastating impacts upon other areas. For example, the US decision to fight inflation in the late 1970s contributed greatly to the Third World debt crisis of the 1980s (Hartland-Thurnberg, 1986: 4). In the following two sections we will see how the structure of the trade regime and activity of Northern-based unions contributed to the sense of imperialist domination. The imperial legacy of the trade regime The post-1945 trade regime, like the monetary regime, was created to serve the interests of the major Western powers. It was negotiated primarily between the United States and the United Kingdom, with some input from other Western states. Following the failure of the ITO, trade rules were overseen by the GATT. Developing countries had three major concerns about the GATT trade regime (Williams, 1994: 141–78). Firstly, it was limited in scope to lowering tariffs and did not consider the imperative of development or the need for a commodity regime for developing countries. Secondly, many developing states disagreed with the liberal premises of GATT because they were pursuing policies of import substitution. Thirdly, GATT was unable to enforce its decisions on developed states. Rather than mitigating the power of developed states, GATT was seen to reinforce their power. An example of this abuse of power can be seen in the coverage of GATT disciplines. While developed states pressured developing countries to reduce tariffs on a wide range of goods, products in which developing states had particular interests were not subject to disciplines. The primary area of contention was textiles. Beginning in the early 1960s, a series of agreements which culminated in the 1974 Multi-Fibre Agreement restricted the export of textile products to developed states. These agreements violated the GATT principles and posed a serious problem for many developing countries which were using the textile industry as the first step on the road to industrialisation (Tussie, 1987: 64–103). An indication of this dissatisfaction with the operation of GATT, the IMF and the World Bank can be seen in the creation of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) in 1964 (Gosovic, 1972). Unlike the Bretton Woods institutions, UNCTAD was an international organisation founded by developing countries and its prime purpose was to facilitate Southern development strategies. It was part of a broader push by developing countries to create a New International Economic Order (NIEO) based upon rules that would redress the balance between developing and developed states (Cox, 1979). UNCTAD served as a useful pressure group in international economic relations, but was undermined by the opposition of Western states and eventually succumbed to the general shift towards more liberal policies in the 1980s (Williams, 1994: 179–210). In the 1970s developing countries and some developed states became concerned with the rise of ‘New Protectionism’. This referred to a series of strategies designed to discriminate against imports by means other than tariff barriers. Voluntary

56 Labour and Globalisation export restraints were forced upon developing countries and US trade law was used (especially anti-dumping duties) to slow the flow of cheaper products into developed state markets. This activity was beyond the reach of GATT discipline. It tended to be the tool of stronger economies protecting their domestic market at the expense of weaker exporting states. As such, it worked greatly to the disadvantage of developing states, which had no recourse against the new protectionism. In the latest round of GATT trade negotiations, the Uruguay Round (1986–1993), developing countries also saw elements of unfairness in the negotiating agenda and the final agreements (Das, 1998). Developed states were most interested in expanding the trade regimes to cover areas in which they were exploiting new comparative advantages such as services, intellectual property and investment. In return for concessions in these areas some much delayed action was taken to bring agriculture and textiles under GATT disciplines (Nicolaides, 1994; McDowell, 1994). At the first ministerial meetings of the World Trade Organisation in Singapore in 1996 developed states again pushed for new initiatives on investment, competition policy and labour standards. Many developing states were concerned that the Uruguay Round had only been partially implemented and that little assistance had been offered to the least developed states, which were net losers from the latest round of liberalisation.4 Advanced industrialised countries were pushing a new agenda while most developing states were struggling to catch up with the old agenda. During the 1999 WTO ministerial meeting in Seattle developing countries once again expressed their desire that old issues be addressed before new issues were examined. The failure of the Seattle meeting is partially attributable to developing country resistance against discussing trade issues linked to environmental or labour standards. Although the Seattle breakdown can be attributed to many factors, US attempts to bring labour standards into the WTO upset the leaders of numerous developing states and made negotiations much more difficult (ICTSD, 1999). For many states and social actors in the developing world the experience of the international trade regime has been one of submission to an unequal and biased set of rules. Although the debt crisis and structural constraints of the 1980s converted many developing states to increased liberal economic practice (Biersteker, 1992), resentment at the organisation of world trade and trade regulation remains. The theory of a rule-based system which would restrain dominant states did not live up to expectations. Leaving aside intentions, the effects of the international trade regime were to protect the interests of developed states and to offer minimal support to developing economies. Developing states continued to participate in GATT because an unequal arrangement was preferable to none at all.5 However, the legacy of this trade regime is that many in the developing world are sceptical about the developed world’s (state, firm or society) motivation in pushing for new and expanded multilateral regulation. 4

‘Declaration of the Ministerial Meeting of the Least-Developed Countries’, 18 October 1996, WT/MIN (96)/1. 5 Keohane (1984) has shown how even those disadvantaged by a particular regime may continue to be members because the cost of having no regime is greater than that of having an unequal regime.

Globalisation, Imperialism and the Labour Standards Debate 57 The imperial legacy of Western trade union activity Worker internationalism has had a troubled history in the twentieth century. More often than not unions have supported state foreign policies, whether they be those of the former Soviet Union or the US. A frequent critique of the international activity of Western unions during the Cold War was that they engaged in a process of trade union imperialism. Western unions were accused of being in league with state elites, transnational corporations and local authoritarians intent upon undermining unions which challenged widespread inequality or the policies of Western states (Thomson and Larson, 1978). There is some evidence to support this harsh critique. Up until the 1980s, unions were a crucial element in laying the groundwork for the expansion of US and European capital. In the early post-war reconstruction of Western Europe, US unions became heavily involved in undermining communist unions in France and Italy so that these countries would implement policies more friendly to US interests (Radosh, 1969: 304–47). In later years Western unions took a leading role in shifting the nature of social systems in developing countries. Companies and unions that were rivals at home joined forces to facilitate the reorientation of radical labour movements in developing countries. For example, British and US unions worked to provide a stable industrial relations climate in Jamaica which facilitated the exploitation of bauxite resources by Western multinationals (Harrod, 1972). The United States established a series of international labour institutes in Asia, Africa and Central America to accompany its European organisation. While providing useful resources to labour groups in developing countries, programmes were aimed at deradicalising indigenous unions in favour of groups that would advocate business unionism and cooperation with US corporate interests (Sims, 1992; Welch, 1995). In deadly struggles for social justice in numerous developing countries, US unions sided with the conservative ruling elite against those working for more equality. This is not to say that all Western international union activity was imperialistic or had the effect of dominating other societies. The attempt to assist South African trade unions in their struggle against apartheid is a complex but significant example of positive solidarity activity (Southall, 1994). Similarly, the international campaign from 1975 to 1985 to protect Coca-Cola workers in Guatemala was central in combating the threats of violence from the state and forcing Coca-Cola to transfer its franchise to more union-friendly operators (Levenson-Estrada and Frundt, 1995). In both cases solidarity was based upon listening to local demands and concerns rather than trying to export a particular model of union structure and development. The legacy from some Western unions’ Cold War activity was to leave some groups in the developing world asking whether their Northern counterparts were partners or predators (Spooner, 1989). The historical legacy of Western activity in the developing world was complicated because positive intentions sometimes

58 Labour and Globalisation resulted in unintended consequences. It may be the intention of a particular strategy to support free and independent unions in other countries, but the consequences may be to undermine independent unions and bolster undemocratic unions. It may be a union confederation’s intention to protect its workers against mobile capital, but the effects of its action could be to strengthen the system in which mobile capital works. This disagreement between intentions and outcomes was an interesting feature of a debate about the role of the American Federation of Labor–Congress of Industrial Organisations (AFL–CIO) and the International Labour Organisation (ILO) in supporting US hegemony in the 1970s (Cox, 1977; 1980; Douglas and Godson, 1980). Its implications are that well-meaning people can have negative effects on others if they fail to be sufficiently self-critical of their actions. This is especially important in relationships characterised by an imbalance of power between the parties. Perhaps an example far from today’s contentious issue will illustrate the point. In the nineteenth century many Western missionaries, men of conscience, worked in sub-Saharan Africa. Horrified at the destruction wrought by the slave trade, they pushed into Africa, converting natives in the hope that this would prevent their enslavement. When the lives of the missionaries were threatened Western states intervened and confiscated the land of the people the missionaries had originally sought to defend. The good intentions of protecting Africans from European and Arab slavers had the unintended consequence of removing their rightful ownership of land (Pakenham, 1997: 372–92). The changing nature of imperialism An interesting thing happened to the nature of imperialism itself in the 1970s and the 1980s. As international organisations continued to restructure in corporatefriendly ways and MNCs continued their global expansion, labour was ejected from its junior position of power in the imperialist core. Through the process of globalisation, imperialism is increasingly becoming denationalised and in less need of its former partner. By denationalised I mean that the mechanisms of domination are not as dependent upon national coalitions. Changes in state regulation have facilitated capital mobility, and a general offensive against labour unions in developed states has weakened the power of unions. Business organisations now feel powerful enough to attack labour directly in developed and developing countries simultaneously. The social basis for imperialist expansion has changed. Labour is out and in its place are a number of elite networks and groups such as TNC executives, globalising bureaucrats, politicians and professionals and consumerist elites (Sklair, 1997). In the developed world, this transformation of the imperial alliance can be seen as a revolt of the elites.6 Economic liberalisation has allowed elites to cut their ties from other members of society. The corporatist contract with labour has been 6

The phrase is taken from Lasch, 1995.

Globalisation, Imperialism and the Labour Standards Debate 59 abandoned as state policy shifted to the right. In response some Western unions have joined environmentalists and women’s groups in a new internationalism or a new multilateralism (Cox [ed.], 1997), engaging other social groups, states, corporations and international organisations to rebuild social regulation. They are attempting to pursue corporations that have escaped state regulation or states that have weakened regulation in response to corporate desires. An alternative response has seen some unions and workers clinging to alliances with corporations through business unionism. In summary, there are two sets of power relations that need to be considered. The first is within the core areas of capitalism where business had the upper hand over labour groups, but participated in a cooperative arrangement sharing the fruits of economic growth and expansion through state policies (Maier, 1977). Labour has been ejected from this arrangement and has increasingly turned to international partners for assistance. The second set of relations is between the state, firms and society of this core and similar actors in other countries. Here we can see a general pattern of the dominance, to varying degrees, of Western states, firms and society over non-Western states, firms and societies. This section has concentrated on the manner in which the trade regime and the activity of Western unions complied with such activity. The stage is now set for us to consider how these historical arrangements influence the debate about labour standards in a global economy. Labour standards issues The 1980s and 1990s have witnessed a number of attempts at liberal economic regulation designed to facilitate the free flow of investment and goods across state boundaries. Prominent among these initiatives have been the revitalisation of European integration through the Single Market project and monetary union, the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the creation of the WTO and the attempt to negotiate a Multilateral Agreement on Investment at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). In each of these cases nonbusiness social interests have attempted to influence the content of these agreements. Unions have been at the forefront of attempting to build social regulation into the emerging governance structure (Leary, 1996). In attempting to move from regional to multilateral regulation Western labour groups have encountered social interests in developing countries also trying to restructure the economic environment. However, many groups from developing countries have a far-reaching critique of the interstate organisations and multinational corporations, and of the activity of Western social activists themselves. Because of the legacy of imperialism they are sensitive to issues of coercion by Northern states and social groups. This leads to a divergence of strategy. We will explore this tension by examining the issue of core labour standards at the WTO and child labour in the textile industry.

60 Labour and Globalisation The WTO debate In December 1996 the WTO held its first ministerial meeting in Singapore. It was a significant inaugural event which would set the tone for the operation of the new international organisation. Most of the week’s activities centred upon the negotiation of a Ministerial Declaration which would set out the future agenda of the organisation. The United States and the Europeans were eager to expand the WTO’s competencies into new areas such as investment, competition policy and, to a lesser extent, labour standards. Many developing countries wanted the WTO to focus upon the implementation of the Uruguay Round agreements and address the problem of least developing states. They were generally against the opening of new issues at the institution. On the issue of core labour standards there was a clash of views between and among states and civil society actors (O’Brien et al., 2000: 67–108). Western European social democratic states and the United States pushed for the WTO to address labour issues. A coalition of neo-liberal (UK, Australia, New Zealand), authoritarian (Indonesia) and anti-imperialist states (India) actively opposed a trade and labour standards link. Northern employer organisations such as the International Chamber of Commerce, Eurocommerce and the Union of Industrial and Employers’ Confederations of Europe (UNICE) also opposed any linkage between trade and labour issues. On the union side the major international union confederations such as the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) and the World Confederation of Labour (WCL) strongly supported the link. Some of the ICFTU’s affiliates such as the Malaysian Trade Union Congress were under strong state pressure to oppose core labour standards, but they continued to support them. A significant exception to this support can be found in the position of Indian trade unions. For example, the linkage between labour standards and the WTO was rejected in two national conferences of independent Indian unions in March and October 1995. Delegates expressed fears that the social clause initiative was driven by protectionist desires in Northern countries. The Indian unions suggested that rather than working through the WTO workers should push for a United Nations Labour Rights Convention and the establishment of National Labour Rights Commissions. The issue was not whether all workers should be entitled to basic rights, but whether the WTO was the appropriate institution for such a task. The conclusion among many Indian activists was that the WTO, along with the IMF and World Bank, was irrevocably tied to exploitative Northern interests. In their view everything possible should be done to stop the expansion of its powers to new areas, including labour standards (Asian Labour Update, 1995). The opposition of Indian trade unions mirrored the stance of the Indian state and other elements of Indian civil society that maintained a strong anti-imperialist position. Crucially, however, this commitment to combating the influence of Western states was less rigid in areas such as intellectual property rights, investment and services. In these commercial areas the Indian state gave way to Northern MNCs (McDowell, 1994).

Globalisation, Imperialism and the Labour Standards Debate 61 An important supporter of the core labour standards drive among Southern unions was the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU).7 Fresh from a victory over apartheid, imbued with democratic and anti-racist/anti-imperialist credentials, South African support disproved the claim that desire for international enforcement of labour standards was a Northern-only project. Similarly, the South African state played a brokering role between pro- and anti-labour standards states, which eventually allowed India and Pakistan to agree to the final declaration. To clarify the issues at stake between equity-based members of civil society we will focus upon the difference of opinion between the major union confederations and a representative of Southern development groups. Both claimed to be pursuing increased equality and justice, but disagreed as to the proper strategy for reaching such a goal. When the major international trade union confederations arrived at the Singapore conference there was some surprise when they discovered that a coalition of NGOs coordinated by the Third World Network (TWN) had issued a public statement opposing the extension of the WTO’s mandate to new issues, including core labour standards.8 Their primary argument was that the WTO was an inappropriate institution to defend workers’ rights and advance the concerns of the peoples of the developing world. They viewed the WTO, as well as the World Bank and the IMF, as institutions of Northern domination. The TWN and a number of development NGOs argued that ‘Countervailing measures imposed unilaterally by powerful countries on weaker nations (and hardly conceivable the other way around) would lack legality, moral authority and effectiveness to lead to any effective improvement in workers’ conditions or human rights situations in poor or rich countries’ (TWN, 1996). The debate between the ICFTU and the TWN illuminates the divide in strategy for furthering labour rights.9 The TWN claimed that the structure of the WTO was biased to such an extent that the incorporation of core labour standards would only be used as a weapon by developed countries against developing countries. While sympathetic to protecting labour rights, they felt that the appropriate institution was the ILO, not the WTO. The ICFTU argument was that the ILO’s monitoring activity needed to be supplemented by the WTO’s enforcement capability. The WTO was not the ideal institution, but it would be far worse to have no link between labour standards and trade. The ICFTU advocated achieving gains within the existing structures while the TWN was seeking a new international architecture to give developing states more equality. Whereas the ICFTU saw the prime international cleavage as being between workers and employers, the TWN saw the divide as being North/South. The ICFTU was in favour of international organisations forcing governments to live up to minimum standards; the TWN, because of 7

See their analysis in Shopsteward, Vol. 5 (December 1996–January 1997). This can be found at the COSATU website http://www.cosatu.org.za. 8 TWN is a coalition of intellectuals from Southern-based research institutes which pursues an active research and publication programme. See its website at http://www.twnside.org.sg. 9 The following account is based upon the author’s notes, December 1996, Singapore.

62 Labour and Globalisation its view of international organisations, preferred greater state autonomy. In the end, the ICFTU could not answer the TWN’s criticism of the structural inequality of international economic institutions and the TWN could not advocate a concrete policy proposal to improve workers’ rights. Around the fringes of the debate, but never openly articulated, was not just a dispute about tactics to be adopted to further progressive change, but a contest over legitimacy and representativeness. From the perspective of some TWN members, the ICFTU was a naïve Northern-dominated institution acting on the behalf of Northern workers to the detriment of Southern workers. It had few links to the poorest of the poor, namely to the millions of peasants in developing countries and the informal sector. Its backing of a strengthened WTO smacked of the strategy of a labour aristocracy trying to protect its own. From the perspective of the ICFTU, the TWN was a collection of intellectuals with dubious links to the people they claimed to speak for. They had no mass membership base and no mechanisms of accountability. Their wholesale rejection of working within the WTO offered no hope for improving workers’ living conditions. The debate continued after Singapore. In a seminar organised by the Organisation of African Trade Union Unity (OATUU) in Tunisia in September 1997 on the issue of labour standards, TWN members joined OATUU and WFTU10 officials in arguing against a social clause at the WTO, while ICFTU representatives, including confederations that were part of OATUU, argued in favour. A similar exchange took place between labour activists and development groups and local activists at a seminar organised by the Canadian Labour Congress at the 1997 APEC People’s Summit in Vancouver.11 Again, those subject to the punishing forces of the existing trade regime were opposed to giving the WTO more power. Child labour In Western countries in recent years there has been increased consumer awareness and concern about the methods used in the production of manufactured goods. This has spawned a series of campaigns against particular corporations by consumer and union groups. Such activity is part of a civil society campaign to ‘Think Globally and Punish Locally’ (Rodman, 1998). It has also put the question of ethics and the possibility of profiting from an ethical policy on the agenda of many corporations and in business publications. The issue of child labour in the export sector of developing countries has been particularly prominent because it is seen to violate important norms of Western society. Many people do not wish to be complicit in an economic process that uses children to increase profits. Northern trade unions, consumer and development groups have targeted this problem as 10

The WFTU is the labour confederation that used to represent labour organisation in Communist states. During the Cold War it was the primary rival of the ICFTU. Following the Cold War it has been trying to re-establish itself in the face of loss of support from state machinery. 11 Author’s notes, November 1997, Vancouver.

Globalisation, Imperialism and the Labour Standards Debate 63 one requiring action. Attention has focused upon child labour in South Asia in industries producing textiles, carpets and footballs. Action is being taken to combat child labour on two levels – the state and the market. Pressure has been put upon states to ban imports of products made with child labour, while civic action groups have mobilised to boycott particular products or approve the purchase of other products based upon a labelling system. However, like the WTO issue, this activity also raises questions about unequal power relations and the impact of unintended consequences. There has been the objection that consumer action and state pressure in Western countries is hurting the people it is meant to protect. A key case is the fate of Bangladeshi children in the textile industry. In 1992 US Senator Tom Harkin sponsored a piece of legislation in the US Congress that would put sanctions on countries where child labour was rampant. The threat of sanctions caused numerous textile exporters to fire their child labourers. Many of these children entered lower paying and more dangerous work such as prostitution and brick-making (Leipziger and Sabharwal, 1995). In this case, state sanctions had a negative effect on the people they sought to help. On the other hand, a review of the carpet labelling scheme ‘Ragmark’ indicates that Indian manufacturers’ desire to take measures limiting child labour mirrored the relative success or failure of the Harkin legislation through Congress (ILRF, 1996). It is clear that manufacturers require either a financial incentive or the threat of economic loss before they consider child labour an issue worth addressing. It is also clear that sanctions against developing countries or industries based in developing countries run the risk of hurting the people they are meant to help. Consumer and union pressure in the West is unlikely to stop as more people become aware of the problem and a wider section of citizens become engaged in the issue. A prominent example of this increased activity has been the international anti-child labour crusade of the teenage Canadian child activist Craig Keilburger (1998). The question then becomes: how can this activity be channelled in a positive manner? Increasingly, people concerned about the child labour issue have acknowledged that it must be tackled in a multi-pronged manner. The threat of sanctions will influence behaviour, but steps must be taken to ensure the welfare of children abandoned by employers. An example of this is evident in an initiative by the ILO, the Pakistan Carpet Manufacturers’ and Exporters’ Association (PCMEA) and the US Department of Labor. The ILO will provide education opportunities for children transferred from the carpet industry and assist in training other family members in income-earning skills. The goal is to remove children from the carpetweaving industry over a period of several years. The US Department of Labor is providing most of the required $300,000 with other funds being contributed by the PCMEA (Financial Times, 1998). While this initiative shows a developing awareness of the need to transfer resources from Northern to Southern countries to confront basic abuses of workers’ rights, it is hardly conceivable that the US Department of Labor is capable of funding the educational needs of millions of children in the developing world.

64 Labour and Globalisation Indeed, it faces major hurdles in accomplishing its domestic agenda (Reich, 1997). At most, a stop-gap measure has been created to change the division of labour in highly visible export industries. A more systemic solution is required if the issue of child labour in domestic as well as export industries is to be addressed. A broad agenda tackling issues such as terms of trade and debt burdens is required. Reconciling multiple strategies The two previous case studies indicate some of the difficulties encountered by groups seeking more equity in the global political economy on the issue of labour standards. These difficulties arise from overlapping patterns of domination. Within the advanced industrialised countries, state and corporate elites are forcing their citizens and workers into an increasingly competitive environment as regulation is liberalised or internationalised (O’Brien, 1998). In an attempt to fight back, Western-based citizen groups have tried to transnationalise their reform strategies. They then encounter citizen groups from the South which have been suffering domination from local as well as Western state, firm and social actors. Some Southern activists see the actions of Northern activists as contributing to their difficulties. This is not a problem unique to the labour movement. A wide range of social actors from women’s groups to development groups are struggling with the issue of how to cooperate across existing inequalities. Western NGOs are often accused of supporting existing power structures and undermining Southern attempts to institute social justice (Bendana, 1998). For equity groups involved in the issue of labour standards the problem comes down to two questions. The first question is ‘how do you regulate transnational capital?’ The second question is ‘what is the appropriate relationship between equity groups located in different areas of the world?’ On the issue of regulating capital, the previous section suggests that there are three possibilities. Firms can be regulated by states, by pressure in the market or by a combination of the two. With regard to state regulation, this can take place through the extraterritorial regulation of powerful states or the application of rules in multilateral institutions. The difficulty with extraterritorial regulation is that it sets the preferences of a particular state as the benchmark for behaviour in other countries. In practice this means the desires of social forces in advanced industrialised states. Numerous states have objected to such activity in measures such as the US Helms-Burton legislation forbidding trade with Cuba. The difficulty for equity-based extraterritorial enforcement is that the power structures within states make it difficult for this issue to reach a prominent place in the agenda; or if it does, this happens in an unsatisfactory manner. It is because of the negative implications in unilateral extraterritorial regulation that multilateral arrangements involving a negotiated standard between numerous states are often viewed as preferable. However, the critique against multilateral regulation is similar in that it alleges bias towards the interests of the strongest states. Critics point out that GATT/WTO rules are less likely to apply to developed states

Globalisation, Imperialism and the Labour Standards Debate 65 than to developing countries. Indeed, the challenge of the WTO is to be able to bind the strongest states to mutually agreed rules. This issue is not yet decided, but it does appear that the WTO is increasingly being used by developed and some developing states to hold the stronger nations accountable to their obligations. Although many in the developing world would discount such a possibility, it is conceivable that the United States could be challenged on a labour standards case by the European Union, should they ever be incorporated into the WTO. For example, the ICFTU has used the WTO’s trade policy review mechanism to attack Canada’s labour practices (ICFTU, 1998). Market-based solutions have recently been favoured by groups which have difficulty convincing state elites to act. Although one can point to achievements of such activity, the fact is that it is a second best strategy. It occurs because state regulation has failed (Kearney, 1999). Market activity is not seen as sufficient in national societies because of the inefficiency of effort required to launch continuing citizen campaigns. There are problems with collecting and distributing information, mobilising citizens and the need for constant vigilance. A legal process and institution is needed to regularise activity and enforce general rules. If marketbased activity is seen as inadequate for domestic purposes, why would it prove sufficient on a global scale? In practice, there are a multitude of strategies from market to state-based initiatives seeking to address the labour standards issue. Some civil society actors have been successful in raising awareness, while the threat of state action (either unilaterally or multilaterally) has been useful to focus the minds of corporate and state elites. The challenge is to work out a suitable combination of these strategies. On the subject of relations between equity groups, Western unions carry a burden of history requiring proof that their new internationalism is in fact new. Is it an internationalism of partnership that listens to the concerns of people in other parts of the world? Is it an internationalism of convenience that refuses to bear any costs and demands that Western strategies be pursued? Western unions under severe attack at home may find it strange that they may be contributing to other people’s problems in developing countries. It is difficult to accept that the unintended consequences of one’s best intentions may have disastrous effects. Labour groups in developing countries that have been on the receiving end of trade union imperialism are justified in demanding proof that Western unions have changed. There is some evidence of change. With the end of the Cold War, those favouring an anti-Communist union policy no longer have powerful arguments to deploy. The AFL–CIO trumpets its new credentials by pointing to changes in its leadership and policies (Mort, 1998). A new wave of literature describes how many grassroots labour activists are becoming more internationalist, cooperating with other social movements and challenging old trade union international policies (Waterman, 1998; Moody, 1997). Certainly, the growth of information technology has facilitated links between local union branches and creates the possibility of a more informed and active union membership (Lee, 1997). In North America, the creation of the NAFTA has prodded US and

66 Labour and Globalisation Canadian unions to move from rhetorical to practical solidarity with unions in Mexico (Moody, 1995; Alexander and Gilmore, 1994). Yet signs of the old business unionism remain. A good example was the response of the US union movement to the Kyoto negotiations for a climate change treaty. In negotiations aimed at setting emission levels for countries, developing states argued that since most of the world’s pollution emanated from the developed world, the developed world should curb emission before asking poor countries to do so. Developing countries felt it was unjust that they restrict their development possibilities before the major polluters had undertaken steps to curb pollution. The AFL–CIO echoed US corporate concerns that developing countries would not be covered by initial emission curbs (AFL–CIO, 1998). There was no acknowledgement that climate change was created primarily by Northern-based industrialisation and that Northerners would have to take the lead in attacking the problem. As with the issue of labour standards, the debate on the environment shows that some Western union leaders seem unaware of or unconcerned with the legacy of imperialism. Their view of the content and limits of internationalism is restricted because they concentrate on a narrow definition of their members’ interests. Focusing solely on the imbalance in power between Northern workers and Northern corporations blinds them to the consequences of the historical imbalances between Western and non-Western states and societies. If labour groups in advanced industrialised countries are to modify their strategies, anti-imperialist groups in developing countries will also need to develop a more nuanced understanding of global power struggles. They will have to reconsider, and perhaps reject, a theme developed in 1970s Third World theories of imperialism, when it was thought that there was an irreconcilable antagonism ‘between the interests of the advanced, Western, and predominantly “white”, colonising societies and the interests of the proletarian, non-Western and predominantly “non-white” colonial, semicolonial [or post-colonial societies]’ (Hodgkin, 1972: 111). Just as there are power struggles and debates within their own communities, so there are conflicts within developed countries. If the mechanisms of domination are becoming increasingly detached from workers in the developed world, blanket condemnation of the agenda of Northern workers is unsustainable. It is more fruitful to consider practical ways of cooperating that square concerns about coercion in developing states with the desire of social groups in developed states for social protection. One of the ways in which internationalism can be invigorated is for it to take place at the level of local organisations in addition to international confederations. By building up transnational local contacts two things are achieved. Firstly, local groups in different places begin to learn about each other’s problems, concerns and strategies for improvement. This is especially important for groups in Western countries because they can be directly exposed to the views of colleagues in poorer states. Secondly, local groups will become more interested in, and demanding of, their national union’s international policies and activities. Union foreign policy will no longer be the preserve of union elites. It is a step in the direction of building

Globalisation, Imperialism and the Labour Standards Debate 67 accountability into international union policy. Rather than seeing grassroots activism and existing international union structures as in competition, they can operate complementarily. Local activism can inform and guide bureaucratic activity while the internationals will have considerably more support when undertaking global campaigns. Another possibility for change arises from the participation of developing country dynamic social unionism in the old international trade union structure. The entry of unions with different histories and enhanced legitimacy from historical struggles (such as South Africa’s COSATU and Brazil’s CUT) into the Cold War structures opens the floor to greater debate about the role of trade unions in the global economy and the meaning of internationalism. For example, COSATU and CUT have been trying to push the ICFTU to engage the WTO in a wide range of issues of concern to developing countries rather than just the labour standards issue.12 This would provide the basis for greater cooperation with other civil society actors and help to dispel the doubts about ICFTU motivations. Similarly, one can imagine a different dynamic in the labour standards debate if the General Secretary of the ICFTU was from the developing world or developing world trade unions had a more prominent role in trade union internationals. This chapter has not provided an answer to the labour standards issue. Rather, it has tried to clarify the power relationship underlining the contest over core labour standards. It is not clear that there is a simple correct answer accessible to the academic analyst. The answer most likely requires a process of negotiation between the groups concerned about labour standards in the global economy. Groups pressing for increased equity face a long and difficult task of reforming internationalism between themselves on a more equitable basis. There will be conflicts and differences of opinion on the way, but there is little other option if one’s goal is a more equitable world. References Alexander, R., and Gilmore, P. (1994), ‘The Emergence of Cross-Border Labor Solidarity’, NACLA Report on the Americas, 28 (July/August): 42–48. AFL–CIO (American Federation of Labor–Congress of Industrial Organizations) (1998), ‘The Kyoto Protocol’, Executive Council Statement, 30 January. Asian Labour Update (1995), ‘Towards a UN Labour Rights Convention’ and ‘Conclusions of the National Consultation Concerning the Social Clause in World Trade Agreements’, Asian Labour Update, 20 (November 1995–March 1996): 11–12, 17. Barraclough, G. (1979), An Introduction to Contemporary History, New York: Penguin Books. Bendana, A. (1998), ‘Which Way for NGOs? A Perspective from the South’, 12 Author’s notes from an ICFTU pre-ministerial meeting 15–17 May 1998. On changes in the ICFTU see O’Brien, 2000.

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Globalisation, Imperialism and the Labour Standards Debate 69 Aftermath of Seattle: A Summary of Competing Claims’, ICTSD Bridges Weekly News Digest (15 December). ILRF (International Labor Rights Fund) (1996), Ragmark After One Year: Appraisal of a New Effort at Social Marketing in the Interest of Children, Washington, DC: International Labor Rights Fund. Kearney, N. (1999), ‘Corporate Codes of Conduct: The Privatised Application of Labour Standards’, in R. Mayne and S. Picciotto (eds), Regulating International Business – Beyond Liberalisation, Basingstoke: Macmillan/Oxfam. Keohane, R. (1984), After Hegemony: Co-operation and Discord in the World Political Economy, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Keilburger, C., with Major, K. (1998), Save the Children, Toronto: McClelland and Stewart. Lasch, C. (1995), The Revolt of the Elites and the Betrayal of Democracy, New York: W. W. Norton. Leary, V. (1996), ‘Workers’ Rights and International Trade: The Social Clause (GATT, ILO, NAFTA, US Laws)’, in J. Bhagwati and R. Hudec (eds), Fair Trade and Harmonisation, Vol. 2: Legal Analysis, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Lee, E. (1997), The Labour Movement and the Internet: The New Internationalism, London: Pluto Press. Lenin, V. I. (1939), Imperialism: The Highest Stage of Capitalism, New York: International. Levenson-Estrada, D., and Frundt, H. (1995), ‘Towards a New Internationalism: Lessons from the Guatemalan Labour Movement’, NACLA Report on the Americas, 27(5) (March/April): 16–21. Leipziger, D., and Sabharwal, P. (1995), Child Labour: The Cutting Edge of Human Rights, Council on Economic Priorities, November 1995 Research Report. Maier, C. (1977), ‘The Politics of Productivity: Foundations of American International Economic Policy after World War II’, International Organisation, 31: 607–33. McDowell, S. D. (1994), ‘India, the LDCs and GATT Negotiations on Trade and Investment in Services’, in R. Stubbs and G. Underhill (eds), Political Economy and the Changing Global Order, Toronto: McClelland and Stewart. Moody, K. (1995), ‘NAFTA and the Corporate Redesign of North America’, Latin American Perspectives, 84(22.1) (Winter): 95–116. –– (1997) Workers in a Lean World: Unions in the International Economy, London: Verso. Mort, J. (1998), Not Your Father’s Union Movement: Inside the AFL–CIO, New York: Verso. Nicolaides, P. (1994), ‘The Changing GATT System and the Uruguay Round Negotiations’, in R. Stubbs and G. Underhill (eds), Political Economy and the Changing Global Order, Toronto: McClelland and Stewart. O’Brien, R. (1998), ‘Shallow Foundations: Labour and the Selective Regulation of Free Trade’, in G. Cook (ed.), The Economics and Politics of International Trade, London: Routledge.

70 Labour and Globalisation –– (2000), ‘Workers and World Order: The Tentative Transformation of the International Union Movement’, Review of International Studies (October). O’Brien, R., Goetz, A. M., Scholte, J. A., and Williams, M. (2000), Contesting Global Governance: Multilateral Economic Institutions and Global Social Movements, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Pakenham, T. (1997),The Scramble for Africa, London: Abacus. Radosh, R. (1969), American Labor and United States Foreign Policy, New York: Random House. Reich, R. (1997), Locked in the Closet, New York: Knopf. Rodman, K. A. (1998), ‘Think Globally, Punish Locally: Nonstate Actors, Multinational Corporations and Human Rights Sanctions’, Ethics and International Affairs, 12: 19–41. Sims, B. (1992) Workers of the World Undermined: American Labor’s Role in US Foreign Policy, Boston: South End Press. Sklair, L. (1997), ‘Social Movements for Global Capitalism: The Transnationalist Capitalist Class in Action’, Review of International Political Economy, 4(3) (Autumn): 514–38. Southall, R. (1994), ‘The Development and Delivery of “Northern” Worker Solidarity to South African Trade Unions in the 1970s and 1980s’, Journal of Commonwealth and Comparative Politics, 32(2): 166–99. Spooner, D. (1989), Partners or Predators: International Trade Unionism and Asia, Hong Kong: Asia Monitor Resource Centre. Stopford, J., and Strange, S. (1991), Rival States, Rival Firms, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Thomson, D., and Larson, R. (1978), Where Were You, Brother? An Account of Trade Union Imperialism, London: War on Want. Tussie, D. (1987), The Less Developed Countries and the World Trading System: A Challenge to GATT, New York: St Martin’s Press. TWN (Third World Network) (1996), ‘Joint NGO Statement on Issues and Proposals for the WTO Ministerial Conference’ (8 December). Waterman, P. (1998), Globalisation, Social Movements and the New Internationalisms, London: Mansell. Welch, C. (1995), ‘Building Transnational Co-ordinative Unionism’, in H. Juarez Nunez and S. Babson (eds), Confronting Change: Auto Labor and Lean Production in North America, Detroit: Wayne State University Press. Williams, M. (1994), International Economic Organisations and the Third World, New York: Harvester Wheatsheaf.

4. Towards Global Networked Unions Eric Lee

Back in 1847, in The Communist Manifesto, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels proposed the novel idea that the actual victories that workers were occasionally winning in their struggles with employers were unimportant when compared to the main thing. And the main thing was building up contacts between workers, ending their isolation one from the other, creating something larger and more enduring than the small local trade unions then coming into being. The key, wrote Marx, was the new communications technology then being deployed by capitalism. This idea has persisted largely unchallenged on the left and in labour movements ever since. Progress in general, and in particular the development of new communications technologies, was helping not only capitalism but also its gravediggers, the international proletariat. The logical extension of Marx’s arguments was made a century and a half later by writers such as Peter Waterman and myself: the new communications technologies becoming available in the last decade of the twentieth century would allow the creation not of a fifth International (as some were calling it) but of a first – the first true global organisation of workers. Those new communications technologies included electronic mail (email), the world wide web, instant messaging systems, fax, mobile telephony, videoconferencing, machine translation, digital photography and video, and so on. Just as railways, steamships and the telegraph transformed – and perhaps created – the first labour movements, so these technologies could be expected to transform today’s labour movement into something different. In this chapter, I shall aim first to develop this hypothesis and then to test it against reality. I shall be looking at both the failures and the successes, trying to come up with a balanced view of whether the new technologies have lived up to their promise. Networked trade unions: the reality I want to begin by making clear that no one (or at least, no one I knew) was proposing that the popularisation of the world wide web, which began in the early 1990s, would somehow lead inevitably and automatically to the creation of a new workers’ International. That would have been ridiculous. Such a new International, were it ever to be created, would require much more than a personal computer and 71

72 Labour and Globalisation a few websites – just as trade unions are more than the office equipment one finds in their headquarters or the magazines they produce. To create a new and more powerful international labour movement requires above all the will to do so on the part of very large numbers of worker-activists. The presence of new, enabling technology does not in any way guarantee that it will be used, and a new internationalism based on the new technologies is only a possibility, no more than that. What proponents of the new labour internationalism (as it came to be known) were suggesting, rather, was that a number of factors were combining to produce the conditions for the creation of a new kind of trade union internationalism. Chief among those factors is capitalism itself – the process which we have all come to call ‘globalisation’. Globalisation has made life much more difficult for trade unionists and has made it much easier for corporations who wish to deal with weakened unions or none at all. It has made essential the creation of what Charles Levinson was calling a generation ago a ‘countervailing power’ to the unchallenged authority of multinational corporations. But the existence of the new communications technologies has not prevented a continuing decline of effective trade union internationalism. There are many examples that spring to mind of cases where in spite of all the fine new technologies, unions continue to behave as if they were living in a nineteenth-century world, and as a result, continue to lose battles. For example, the recent threatened closure of Rover auto factories in Britain should have provoked a display of solidarity between British and German unions. A German company, BMW, had purchased Rover and after several years of multimillion-pound losses, decided to dump it. One would have thought that using all the communications technologies at our disposal today, British and German unions would have coordinated a campaign to pressure BMW to save Rover jobs, maybe even something on the model of Volkswagen’s job-sharing scheme. Certainly many of the trade unionists involved on both sides have been connected to the web and email for some time now. Germany and Britain have among the highest rates of Internet connectivity in the world; German and British trade unionists have easy access to satellite and cable television; among the Germans, at least, many understand English. The barriers between national groups of workers should have begun to crumble and a new internationalist outlook appear. But nothing of the sort took place. German unions basically defended BMW’s decision on business grounds, and a German trade union representative sitting on BMW’s board did little to help his colleagues in Britain. German trade unionists were reported to have said that had British workers been more productive, there would have been no crisis. Meanwhile, British workers were encouraged by the right-wing tabloids to see the whole affair as just another example of why the Germans are never to be trusted. In a world without borders, as the Internet has promised us, such a scenario seems impossible – and yet that is precisely what happened, just as in the nineteenth century, bosses were able crudely to pit worker against worker, safeguarding their own profits with no fear of a coordinated trade union response. When ABC television in the USA, a subdivision of Disney, locked out hundreds

Towards Global Networked Unions 73 of broadcasting technicians in late 1998, the unions rushed to use the web, often quite effectively, in support of the strike. Digital photos of strike-breakers were published. Union activists intervened in ABC’s website, in one case disrupting a live chat which was supposed to be an exchange of Thanksgiving recipes, and turned the company’s own website into a new weapon in the union’s arsenal. But the new technology did little to help build international support. ABC, using the new technology, was able to shift broadcasting of its nightly news shows to its London studio, thereby avoiding the picket lines in New York. (I shall not comment on the fact that the capital of Labour Britain was seen as a good place to locate a strike-breaking operation.) The union sent over a few activists for a couple of days, and they were able to rally a few dozen British trade union officials for a picket line at the local ABC offices. The new communications technology was indeed used – email to set up the contacts, mobile phones to reach union officials and quickly pull together the picket, faxes and the web to get information to the visiting trade unionists. Digital photos of the solidarity picket were posted within hours on the union’s website. The picketers retired to a local pub convinced that an effective demonstration of international labour solidarity had been made. But when the Americans went home, the London picket line came to an end, and ABC continued broadcasting from the British capital. In the end, the union was soundly defeated, and the digital photos on its website proved to be absolutely useless. The strikers at Canada’s Calgary Herald also made excellent use of the net, creating an online newspaper to tell their side of the story in a battle with right-wing media magnate Conrad Black. The struggle had an international dimension from the beginning, as Black was also involved in a bitter dispute with journalists at another of his many papers, the Jerusalem Post. (They also set up a website, the somewhat less ambitious but cleverly named ‘Jerusalem Ghost’.) A guestbook at the Calgary website invited expressions of solidarity and by the end of 1999 there were dozens of messages from around the world. The strikers also made effective use of email, sending out regular announcements, and posted news updates as they came out directly to the LabourStart website. Meanwhile, the Jerusalem Post journalists admitted defeat, and, by the summer of 2000, with no sign of victory in sight, the Calgary journalists called off the struggle, as some drifted back to work and others sought employment elsewhere. A few dozen messages of support on a website are of limited value when up against an employer like Black. Despite their use of a tool pioneered in the early days of the web by the San Francisco newspaper strikers in 1995 – a daily online strike paper – the workers lost. I have given these three examples from Rover, ABC and the Calgary Herald to try to create a balanced picture. There are many more examples, sometimes widely publicised, of the effective use of the net by unions today. A sense of balance is important because in no way has the new technology levelled the playing field or made unions somehow the equals of employers. No website has yet proven itself a substitute for a picket line, no web forum has replaced the need for union meetings, and no one has been recruited to a trade union by clever marketing through

74 Labour and Globalisation the web. Unions are gaining strength or declining due to numerous other factors and the Internet remains insignificant compared to those. If I were asked what has done more to revitalise the labour movement in the USA, the election of the reformist Sweeney team in the mid-1990s or the world wide web, the answer would be obvious – and it’s not the web. Similarly, the small growth in unions in the UK in recent years is clearly attributable to a somewhat improved industrial relations climate thanks to a Labour government being in power and cannot in any way be credited to British unions’ use of the Internet (which is unimpressive in any case). Victories Nevertheless, the first few victories which have been won in part because of intelligent and creative use of the new communications technologies do point the way forward. I should begin by pointing out that when I wrote my book, The Labour Movement and the Internet: The New Internationalism (Pluto Press, 1996), there were already a few examples of the potent use of the new technology in the field of industrial relations. Way back in the early 1980s, the British Columbia Teachers’ Federation, which had adopted mobile computers with modems and thermal printers (but no screens) used computer networks to organise effectively and meet the challenge of a hostile provincial government. Later that decade, the adoption of email and online research tools by the International Trade Secretariats also played a role in reinvigorating those bodies, making them more efficient, and allowing global campaigning to take place. I recounted a story in my book of how during Boris Yeltsin’s 1993 attack on the Russian White House, imprisoned leftists were freed due to a worldwide email campaign which prompted phone calls directly to the police station in which they were held. At the time it was considered a pretty amazing thing. Since then we have moved on a bit and we have the two examples of the Liverpool dockers and the Australian wharfies, which have much to teach us about how the Internet can be used in global campaigning by unions under siege. The story of the 500 Liverpool dock workers who were sacked because they refused to cross a picket line has often been told and is sometimes used as an example of an early, effective campaign on the net. To me, it showed both the strength and weakness of the new technology. The dockers were able to get worldwide attention, despite the fact that their own union, the Transport and General Workers’ Union (TGWU), was unable (some say unwilling) to help. Independent activists, in particular Chris Bailey of LabourNet, were able to get the dockers’ message out. Two international days of solidarity were held, organised largely on the net and through email. In the end, the dockers were defeated, proving that having a great website will not lead to victory when your own union cannot give you its full support. Given a choice of having a website or the support of the TGWU, I think the dockers would have picked the latter. But they had no choice.

Towards Global Networked Unions 75 The subsequent struggle of the Australian dock workers, known as ‘wharfies’, had a happier ending. Official union support was never in doubt – the wharfies’ own union, the Maritime Union of Australia (MUA), was under attack. It was able to mobilise the full support of the Australian labour movement behind it. The MUA launched a snazzy website on the eve of the struggle, but this was rarely updated during the heady days of the spring of 1998. A number of activists from different unions with some experience on the web set up a site under the auspices of the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU), but even this could not keep pace with breaking developments. For a time, the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF), based in London, was unable to mount a solidarity campaign because of a restraining order issued by a British judge. The ITF had been criticised for its failure to do enough on behalf of the Liverpool dockers – it would have replied that it did what it could, considering the position of the dockers’ own union – and wanted to play a more prominent role in the Australian struggle. Ultimately, the one website in Australia that was able to tell the story of the wharfies’ struggle on a daily, and sometimes hourly, basis was run by an individual, who went by the name of ‘Takver’. His site, ‘Takver’s Soapbox’, became the source for news about the struggle. In addition, highly effective use was made of email lists, and the Victoria-based LeftLink mailing list, sponsored by a local leftwing bookshop, provided daily eyewitness accounts of life on the picket line. At one of the most dramatic moments in the struggle, when court orders were being published by the hour and the fate of the wharfies hung in the balance, Takver’s site was not updated (he may have been on a picket line). Letters began to reach me in Israel where we had just launched the LabourStart website, asking for the latest news. What was odd about this was that the letters were coming from Australian activists, who saw nothing strange in writing to someone on the other side of the world asking for news about what was happening in their country. The Australian wharfies won their battle in part because of the threat of an international boycott of Australian shipping. Unlike the Liverpool dockers, they won because in addition to having excellent high-tech tools (like Takver’s Soapbox and LeftLink) they also had the full support of their unions, including the national centre and the ITF. There have been one or two cases of trade unions winning extraordinary victories thanks to the new communications technologies – victories which might have been impossible otherwise. The best example that springs to mind comes from South Korea. The Korean unions had long been users of computer networks and their 1996–97 general strike was partly coordinated through a series of ‘closed-user groups’ (CUGs). During that struggle they also launched frequently updated websites in English and Korean which focused the attention of the world on their battle with a repressive regime which was (and is) committed to democracy only in name. I discovered these sites because some of the most popular websites in the world, such as CNN’s site, were linking to them as sources of information about the general strikes in Korea. Several months after the general strike, the Korean unions and labour support groups held an international conference in Seoul which

76 Labour and Globalisation brought together for the first time some of the leading activists from different countries using the new media. The election of the reformer Kim Dae Jung to the presidency in 1998 did little to change matters and in December 1999, the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU) was once again caught up in a protest campaign against government policies. The KCTU leadership was engaged in a non-violent sit-in protest when Kim ordered in riot police to break up the demonstration. Seventeen leaders of the Korean unions were beaten up and jailed. Indeed, it seemed as if the whole leadership of the KCTU had been arrested – the whole leadership, that is, except for the union’s intrepid International Secretary, who fired off an urgent email message to his contacts around the globe. The message began by giving out President Kim’s email address in order to send urgent messages of protest, and this was repeated several times throughout the message. LabourStart ran the KCTU statement as its top news story and sent it out to its own global mailing list, which consisted at that time of around 1,400 names. Other labour websites and unions themselves took swift action and within two days – aptly on 10 December, International Human Rights Day – the KCTU announced success. All the jailed trade unionists had been released. The KCTU message thanked LabourStart, the Canadian Labour Congress, the South African Municipal Workers’ Union and others for their prompt response to the appeal for help. It went on to say that the leaders were freed because of this trade union response – and not because of pressure from the US State Department, Amnesty International or even protests in Korea itself. More than that, the KCTU singled out the Internet as a new source of power for the unions, something which had been confirmed by the success of the campaign. There are other, possibly better, examples of global networking, such as the role played by the net in organising the new anti-capitalist protests at WTO, World Bank and IMF meetings, but I wanted to focus on examples I knew well and had personal experience with. Online, global networking goes on all the time and sometimes one forgets just how powerful a tool this can be. New models of global cooperation and solidarity So far, the examples I have given of success and failure have tended to be online variants on somewhat traditional means of building international labour solidarity. The use of guestbooks to publish messages of solidarity is just a digital version of speakers getting up at rallies and reading out messages of support. The use of email to send protest messages demanding that trade unionists be freed from jail is a modern version of petition campaigns and protest telegrams. I am not trying to belittle such efforts: I think that we dare not forget how important such solidarity messages can be to the men and women walking the picket line. But there are also interesting ways of doing global solidarity work that were impossible before the net. Indeed, even describing these and how they work is difficult unless one is somewhat web-savvy. But I shall try.

Towards Global Networked Unions 77 An example is the Union Ring, launched several years ago by Eugene Plawiuk, a school custodian in Edmonton, Canada, whose ever-growing empire of websites began with ‘Plawiuk Pontificates’ and continues with LabourNet Canada and many others. Plawiuk was an early adopter of the web ring concept, which basically works like this: you register a web ring at the central web ring website (http://www.webring.org), which was recently purchased by Yahoo! You are given a bit of code (in HTML) which people who choose to affiliate to your website can use on their sites. This code gives visitors to those sites the option to go on to the next site in the web ring, or the previous one, or a random one, or even a list of all sites which have affiliated to the ring. It also gives a link to those webmasters who want to know more about the ring and how to join it. Web rings are useful for surfers, for people with time on their hands who wish to travel from site to site within a particular subject area. They are immensely popular and there are now over 80,000 such rings. Union Ring took off quickly and has today reached the extraordinary number of over 600 affiliated labour websites. What is remarkable to me about the project is that many large unions, often quite wary about what they will link to on their sites, have not hesitated to put Union Ring code on their front pages. It has become a kind of identifying badge, a ‘union label’, as it were, for hundreds of trade union websites. Plawiuk has actually done little to promote the ring. What seems to drive trade union webmasters to sign up is its ubiquitous appearance all over the net. And because of its truly global character, displaying a Union Ring logo on one’s website is the twenty-first-century equivalent of hoisting a red flag over a trade union building in the nineteenth or twentieth centuries. It has become a globally recognised icon of the labour movement, a unifying trademark made possible only by the net. A much less successful effort – but still an interesting one – has been the attempt to create a banner exchange network linking trade union websites across borders. An early effort, begun in 1997, used the Link Exchange system, now owned by Microsoft. Link Exchanges work in a similar way to web rings, but require more work on the part of webmasters, who must design banner advertisements which are pooled and shown across the network. They usually work on a 2:1 ratio, meaning that for every two times a Link Exchange banner ad is shown on your site, one of your ads is shown on another site in the network. Link Exchange accepted LabourStart as a partner in the affiliate programme (which was later dropped) and at my suggestion created a special category for trade union websites which had joined the programme. This was promoted through LabourStart under the name ‘Labour Link Exchange’, but after more than two years, only about 50 sites had signed up. Furthermore, though a site could choose to target its banner advertisement at other trade union websites, it had little control over whose ads appeared on its own site. In the Union Ring, the only sites one was linking to were other labour sites – but not in Link Exchange. A more promising effort currently under way is the new International Labour Banner Exchange (ILBE), launched in January 2000. Unlike the original Link

78 Labour and Globalisation Exchange, the ILBE rotates advertisements only among those websites which join it – making it a kind of mini-Link Exchange open only to trade unions. Web rings and banner exchanges have opened up new possibilities for trade unions in different countries to assist one another by driving traffic to each other’s websites. In addition to that, and like the highly successful Union Ring, they provide labour websites with a way of proudly declaring their affiliation with a global network. Another new means of cooperating is the Labour NewsWire (LNW), launched in March 2000 by LabourStart. LNW is basically a small computer program written in the Perl scripting language, which resides on LabourStart’s web server in the UK. What the script does is allow any website in the world to include labour news headlines from LabourStart – which are updated 24 hours a day, seven days a week. An early version of the LNW required users to install and configure a complex CGI script on their web servers, and this proved to be an insurmountable obstacle for many. The new version required only that webmasters copy and paste a single line of code from the LabourStart website to their pages. LNW was immediately adopted by the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) which integrated lists of both global and South African labour news stories in their site. COSATU was swiftly followed by the main website of the Russian trade unions, trud.org, which neatly incorporated the latest worldwide labour news headlines in a box on its front page. (The news headlines are in English, as are the news stories they link to, but the rest of the trud.org front page is entirely in Russian.) Within a few weeks, LNW was adopted by several dozen more websites, including such high traffic sites as the New South Wales Teachers’ Federation in Australia, the Communication Workers’ Union in the UK, and Labournet Canada. The closest parallel to a pre-Internet version of Labour NewsWire would have been a wire service, such as Associated Press or Reuters, but one owned by and serving the labour movement. Theoretically, such a service could have been created decades ago, possibly at the instigation of (or with the approval of) the ICFTU. It could have been providing a continuous news feed from unions around the world to the labour press. But it took the Internet for such a service to be launched. For trade union webmasters, the incorporation of Labour NewsWire in their sites is a way to always and automatically have current information on the site. For the international labour movement, it is potentially a consciousness-raising tool that will teach trade unionists everywhere to think globally. Another example of new forms of cooperation is the rise of teams or networks to put together the better labour websites. In the beginning, such sites were built and maintained by single individuals – Marc Belanger setting up SoliNet by himself in the mid-1980s, Chris Bailey’s LabourNet a decade later, Takver’s Soapbox in Australia, Plawiuk’s various sites culminating in LabourNet Canada, and even this author’s first efforts to create LabourStart. Today such sites have been supplanted by team efforts as it became clear that individuals could not cope with the growing amount of work involved in maintaining labour news sites. The best example of this is the new network of LabourStart

Towards Global Networked Unions 79 correspondents. Until April 1999, the daily news links were added to the site by hand – coded in HTML by this writer. Already, a number of activists were routinely sending in links by email which were incorporated into the day’s page. But when I was unable to update the site due to holiday or sickness, the site was not updated. In April 1999, a new database-driven version of LabourStart was unveiled. It allowed remote access to the news links database via a web-based form – meaning that user IDs and passwords could be assigned to trusted ‘correspondents’ who could then add news from their union or region in real time, directly to the LabourStart front page. That was actually not the intention: the change-over to a database was driven by a need to simplify the entry of new links and the archiving of old ones, which was proving time-consuming. The ability to update remotely was simply a by-product of this. Within a year, 80 correspondents were signed up. The most active of them have been contributing between five and ten news stories per day. Nearly 10,000 news links were added to the database in the first twelve months online. A number of these correspondents are professional labour journalists, such as Gretchen Donart in Seattle, Juhanni Artto in Helsinki and Andrew Casey in Sydney. Others are rank-and-file trade unionists who just like to use the net, such as postal worker Stuart Elliott in Wichita or teacher Angie Croft in New Zealand. Trade union staffers from national unions and national centres (including COSATU and the Australian Council of Trade Unions) ensure that there is comprehensive coverage of their unions and regions. Most recently, officials of several international trade secretariats (ITSs) and the ICFTU have become active correspondents, and LabourStart’s coverage of global developments has expanded. The creation of a network of LabourStart correspondents was unplanned and is beginning to produce unexpected results. Thanks to the creation of a web forum allowing the correspondents to exchange ideas and information, a page listing them – with their email addresses – on the website, and the constant exchange of email messages among them, a network of labour correspondents now exists which had no precedent in the pre-Internet world. Finally, there has recently been a proposal to create a ‘.unions’ global Top Level Domain (gTLD) on the Internet – a kind of global union label. There was some discussion of this during the spring and early summer of 2000, but when the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) met to consider the addition of new gTLDs, it decided that it would have to charge $50,000 just to consider the possibility of creating such a domain. Even though the ICFTU and all the ITSs had submitted a proposal to ICANN, it now appears likely that because of the cost, the idea will be dropped. These examples I have given – web rings, banner exchanges, news wire services, a correspondents’ network, and a ‘.union’ gTLD on the net – are all new and really have no parallel in the pre-Internet world. Collectively they are creating the basis for a new, networked, global trade unionism. But that new unionism will not have an easy birth. Even as technical obstacles fall aside and imaginative new ways are found to link up unions in different countries, the language problem looms

80 Labour and Globalisation larger as the Internet expands far beyond its original core of English-speaking users and countries. The language question If one were to single out the biggest obstacle to creating a truly global labour network today, it would have to be language. There are other important obstacles, but language is the biggest. So long as automatic translation software produces laughable results – and this is certainly the case with the software currently available on the web – unions will have to spend huge amounts of money on translation. Recently, unions have taken an interest in the possibilities of machine translation. In a proposed project to be funded by the European Commission, the German postal and telecom workers’ union DPG aims to create a self-learning automatic translation system which will allow real-time dialogue between Englishand German-speaking trade unionists. They will be working with specialists who are already involved in a long-term United Nations University project to develop machine translation from all recognised UN languages to all others. This would be an impossible job ordinarily, but the project visualises an intermediary language into which everything would be translated, known as an interlingua. The ITSs have also taken an interest in machine translation and apparently have begun using it in some cases. In addition, LabourStart offers live, online translation of its news headlines into 24 languages. I enjoy showing this off to people, and will often ask an audience if anyone there knows, for example, Welsh. If no one does, I show off the Welsh version. The very best you can get out of this software today is the gist of the text – which is often better than nothing at all. Meanwhile, what most trade unions can afford is translation into one language – English – of a part of their site. The news pages tend to be translated only during a sharp struggle, such as a strike, and particularly where international support would be helpful. The struggle of Quebec’s nurses to secure a decent contract in the summer of 1999 illustrated how a trade union website can be transformed in the heat of battle. As the strike began the nurses’ union (FIIQ) had what one might call a ‘first generation’ website, basically an online brochure. It had some static information about the union, a photo of the president, and not much more. The site was entirely in French, making it inaccessible not only for the vast majority of trade unionists around the world, but also for other nurses’ unions in Canada. These unions, and in particular the Saskatchewan nurses, were themselves facing similar challenges and difficulties as cost-conscious provincial governments (often with social democratic parties at their head) were cracking down on militant public sector unionism. But several days into the Quebec nurses’ strike, some strange things began to happen on their website. First of all, it was transformed from an online brochure to a source of daily news. And secondly, it added a continuously updated list of organisations in Canada and abroad which had sent messages of support – and a news page in English.

Towards Global Networked Unions 81 The addition of English-language pages is becoming an important element of trade union sites, particularly in cases of industrial action. The Korean unions paved the way with their extensive English-language material on the web during the 1996–97 general strike. The Russian labour website, trud.org, has featured a large English-language section from the beginning. The Finnish unions support Juhanni Artto’s ‘Trade Union News from Finland’ website, which provides regular coverage of that country’s labour movement in English. And the German national trade union centre DGB launched its Forum Arbeit website with extensive English language content, including translations of online discussion taking place within the German part of the site. In an ideal world, we would all know a second, universal language and there would be no need for translations. We would all use Esperanto. Unfortunately, we don’t live in that world, and the global language has turned out to be English. Trade unions that need (or that will at some point in the future need) international support or at least understanding need to produce versions of their sites in a language that can be understood across borders. Towards global, networked unions If the solution to the language problem is a technical one (and I fully expect machine translation to be adequate within a few years), this is not the only barrier unions face. Probably the final obstacle to a new global unionism will be the conservatism of the unions themselves. There are few institutions in civil society as conservative as the trade unions. And I am not rushing to condemn conservatism – sometimes institutions should not rush to make unnecessary and ill-thought-out changes. But let me illustrate this problem with a true story. In one of the British unions I work with, we discussed how we can use the Internet to organise. Right now, a potential recruit stumbling across the union’s site can request that a membership pack be mailed to him or her. He or she cannot join online. The union says that joining online is out of the question because of insurmountable technical issues. I asked if we could, at least, put the membership application form online so that a potential member could print it out. That would save the step of requesting that such a form be mailed. (It would also allow local activists to have union membership application forms handy when they needed them, rather than always have to request such forms from the central office.) The officer in charge of membership said that we absolutely could not put a version of the membership application form online. And why not? Because if we did, potential members would print it out and fill it in and it would reach our office and – it would be on white paper. And membership application forms in this union must be on yellow paper. So long as unions think this way, there is little hope that they are going to maximise the potential of the net. Union officials who say that we do thing a certain way because ‘this is the way we have always done it’ – and I’ve actually heard this said – are themselves endangering the future of the very unions which employ them.

82 Labour and Globalisation Fortunately, there is a way around some of the conservatism – and it is to tap the very strong spirit of innovation which we sometimes find at other levels of unions. In another British union one of the local branches decided not to wait for permission from anyone, and put up a version of the membership application form on their website. About a dozen unorganised workers in their high-tech workplace joined the union using the downloaded form. In that same union, even though the Communications Director (now gone) had said openly that the union did not want local branches to have websites of their own, 43 local branches set up websites. I find among trade unionists at every level of their unions, from rank-and-file right up to the top executive officers, a hunger for their organisations to use the new technology. This is increasingly taking the form of local initiatives, with thousands of trade union websites and mailing lists springing up around the world. It also takes the form of honest discussion and debate in the unions’ democratic forums, as they grope for ways to use the new media. In time unions will overcome their conservatism and will exploit the new communications technologies to the maximum – or they will die. Either a new, networked global trade unionism comes into being, or the 150-year history of trade unionism is nearing its end. The choice is ours.

Part II: Spatial Dimensions

5. Re-Scaling Trade Union Organisation: Lessons from the European Front Line Jane Wills

My own favourite image of labour confronted by globalisation is a sporting one: the unions trot out on the field all kitted-up for football, and find themselves sliding about on the ice-hockey field of a Globalised Network Capitalism – or even confronted by the kind of electronic game incomprehensible to most over the age of 25. To their complaints that there had been no Collective Bargaining Agreement concerning the new game, the globalised and networked cyborgs they confront (‘half-beings, half-flows’), bleep back at them: ‘This-is-a-game. These-are-the-rules. If-you-don’t-like-them-youcan-go-play-with-yourselves. Exterminate-exterminate-ate’. (Waterman, 1998: 366)

The dynamism of capitalism has always brought new challenges to working people and it is now clear that economic globalisation (among other things) is undermining existing forms of trade union organisation. As Waterman suggests, the structures, objectives and methods of twentieth-century trade union organisation are inadequate to protect workers’ interests today. In what Bauman (1998) calls ‘The Great War of Independence from Space’, some sections of capital have been liberated by geographical mobility, leaving workers weakened and stranded in place. Indeed, it is suggested that the mobility of capital has also accentuated the political divisions between workers, fragmenting solidarity between workers in different locations: ‘For the liberty of movement and for their unconstrained freedom to pursue their ends, global finance, trade and the information industry depend on the political fragmentation – the morcellement of the world scene’ (Bauman, 1998: 67–68; for similar arguments see Bukharin, 1972; Harvey, 1989). In such circumstances, workers are urged to re-scale and refocus their organisations by establishing new forms of international trade unionism. Internationalism was, of course, common currency in the labour movement long before contemporary experiences of globalisation. Efforts to foster connections between workers in different countries stretch back over more than 150 years, as demonstrated by the history of the International Working Men’s Association (the First International), established in 1864 (see Braunthal, 1980; Lorwin, 1929; Milner, 1990; Wills, 1998a). Yet this impulse to forge international solidarity between workers has waxed and waned over time depending largely upon national-level political opportunities, the reach of class struggle, geopolitical circumstances (most notably the Cold War), and economic change (see Cox, 1996; Herod, 1997; Logue, 85

86 Labour and Globalisation 1980; Thomson and Larson, 1978). Moreover, nationalism has historically brought greater returns to the labour movement than the lofty ideals of internationalism. After the Second World War, the provision of welfare and employment rights by ‘Western’ governments tied trade unions to the nation state (see Nairn, 1980; Volger, 1985). When this is coupled with political, cultural and linguistic factors, it is easy to see why unions have tended to focus their efforts on the national arena. Contemporary trade union organisations still reflect this historical legacy. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, unions still prioritise the processes of bargaining and representation in the workplace above all other forms of organisation; they are still governed by cumbersome bureaucracies that act through a notional democratic mandate rather than through local autonomy and direct action; they remain national organisations with links to separate political parties that are expected to deliver political gains (such as the Labour Party in Britain); and their international work still usually involves official delegations meeting each other and passive affiliations to international union federations. This ‘twentieth-century’ model still has deep roots in the contemporary labour movement despite the fact that it is clearly inadequate to meet the needs of workers today. The labour market has turned decisively in favour of employers, as reflected in the hours and intensity of work, the use of temporary and sub-contracted labour, and often in the level of pay. Disillusionment with unions is widespread, and as a result, membership has continued to fall across the advanced capitalist world. Trade unions are in crisis and it is now widely acknowledged that unless they change they may well disappear altogether. If unions are to garner power to act in the interests of workers, they need to devise new methods to fight in new territories and on a larger spatial scale, drawing upon reconfigured institutional structures which are driven by updated ideas about unions and their place in the world. In this context a number of commentators, trade unionists and academics have proposed alternative models for union organisation and practice at the transnational scale. These models reflect ongoing debates in the history of labour internationalism (see Ramsay, 1997), and although some of them complement rather than contradict one another, each is advocated as a way out of the current impasse: 1. Strengthening the Global Union Federations (GUFs). This would involve giving the GUFs (formerly called International Trade Secretariats) a mandate, backed with more resources, to tackle union issues on a global scale. As the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers’ Unions (ICEM, 1996: 52; see also Gallin, 1994), suggests: ‘Global organisation is not the same thing as international organisation. Global organisation takes the total picture of world interactions into account and is not led by power relations between individual nations.’ Such a strategy would mean national trade unions ceding power to the GUFs, allowing them to forge global strategies to respond to multinational corporations (MNCs) at the appropriate level: linking local union members across national divides in order to defend workers’ rights and secure positive change. Indeed, in the longer term, the GUFs may become global unions actively organis-

Re-Scaling Trade Union Organisation 87 ing workers across national divides. As Ron Oswald from the International Union of Food and Allied Workers (IUF) put it to me during interview: ‘Each year the IUF has become more like a trade union body . . . we are asked to do a lot of things that a national union would otherwise do’. 2. Building global tripartism. The union voice would be strengthened at a global level by fostering tripartism between the International Labour Organisation (ILO), the World Trade Organisation (WTO), the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank. This perspective suggests that, using all the organisational resources at their disposal, unions should make the regulation of global relations, trade and investment their priority. As Breitenfellner (1997: 552; see also Mehmet et al., 1999) suggests: The ultimate goal of global unionism would be to institutionalize a system of tripartite social partnership for the purpose of regulating the global economy in the interest of greater equality, prosperity and stability. All this would no doubt entail a radical change in the attitudes of conservative and inward-looking labour organisations.

This strategy has been central to policy-making at the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) in recent years and it depends upon the strength of the organisation at all levels of the trade union movement. 3. Reinforcing national union organisation. Strengthening existing union organisation is argued to be key to pressurising national governments, which remain key institutions in determining the progress and impact of globalisation. Ellen Meiksins-Wood (1998: 15) argues that strong, radical, local and national organisation can give workers the power to challenge international capital through their influence over democratically elected national governments: This internationalism would be founded not on some unrealistic and abstract notion of an international civil society or global citizenship, nor on the illusion that we can make things better by increasing the left’s representation in transnational organizations of capital like the IMF, but rather on mutual support among various local and national movements in their struggles against their own domestic capitalists and states . . . Workers of all countries unite . . . but unity begins at home.

Rather than focus on the international scale, this perspective suggests that more can be done by revitalised local and national organisation (see also Herod, 2001). 4. Building social movement unionism. This would involve fostering an organising culture in the trade union movement at every level from the local to the global. By organising around issues in the workplace, the community, the nation and beyond, unions can foster democratic social movements that link the struggle for workers’ rights with wider concerns about poverty, the environment, transport and services (the Bus Riders’ Union in Los Angeles being a case in point: see Mann, 1998; see also Bronfenbrenner et al. [eds], 1998; Tillman and Cummings [eds], 1999). Empowered union members can then take the lead in forging links across space by using new

88 Labour and Globalisation technology to foster solidarity between workers and their communities in different locations (MacShane, 1996; Moody, 1997). As Dan Gallin from the Global Labour Institute put it to me during interview: ‘The paradox is that this is the first time in history when it is possible to create a genuine international labour movement in the true sense of the term. The same technology which has enabled companies to globalise, the electronics, transport, etc., also helps labour.’ Waterman (1998b) argues that this new form of labour internationalism would prioritise face-to-face relations among labouring people at shopfloor, community and grassroots level; stimulate an international network based on self-empowered democratic relations; replace an ‘aid model’ of internationalism with a ‘solidarity model’ in which ideas and support flow in more than one direction; refocus activities on the grassroots, away from verbal declarations, conferences and appeals; allow workers to forge links with other democratic internationalists; and link solidarity abroad with action at home to combat racism, nationalism and discrimination. Although each of these strategies appears to be separate, in practice, they tend to merge into each other. To realise successfully the goals of each strategy, unions need to refigure the balance of power between labour and capital. As long as unions are weak on the ground, there is little chance of building strong international federations, of negotiating with the World Trade Organisation, putting pressure on national governments or facilitating rank-and-file contact. In practice, each of these depends on a radical overhaul of the trade union movement in the direction outlined by those advocating social movement unionism. To reinvigorate their organisations, unions are called upon to shed the bureaucratic and hierarchical structures that have been designed to service members in order to adopt a more radical, activist, organising culture in which members take power and control over their organisations. Yet turning unions into social movements is very difficult to achieve. Shifting the entrenched cultures of long-established union organisation is a very slow, painful process. As witnessed in the USA, where this change is furthest advanced, the obstacles to change are enormous and activists encounter resistance from members, officers and managers as they seek to organise in new ways (Bronfenbrenner et al. [eds], 1998; Voss and Sherman, 2000). In this chapter I explore the experiences of workers involved in European Works Councils (EWCs) to try to shed some light on these debates about labour internationalism and social movementism. The process of European economic and political unification has been accompanied by new social legislation that has brought new opportunities for workers to forge international links, most particularly through EWCs. Indeed, Breitenfellner (1997: 545) suggests that ‘Europe promises to become the chief laboratory for experiments in global unionism’. Union experiences in EWCs can illustrate the possibilities and pitfalls of labour organisation at transnational dimensions. The following section briefly introduces EWCs before going on to look at one EWC in some depth. The final part of the chapter then looks back to consider the implications of EWCs for devising successful strategies for labour internationalism in the twenty-first century.

Re-Scaling Trade Union Organisation 89 European Works Councils European economic unification, centred on the implementation of a single currency and the elimination of national barriers to trade, investment or the movement of people, has been accompanied by limited social reform. Social partnership has been enshrined as a guiding principle for policy, allowing trade unions, employers and government institutions to reach agreement through negotiation and debate. Thus far, the social protocol of the Maastricht Treaty has facilitated new directives on information sharing and consultation in MNCs (in the form of European Works Councils), parental leave, part-time working and fixed-term contracts. In addition, European unions and employers have reached various sectoral agreements through a process of negotiation. Such developments have been positive for workers, bringing new rights to workers in countries such as Britain. However, such social legislation is proving rather meagre in the face of accelerating economic integration which is tending to erode labour regulation standards at a national scale (Amin and Tomaney [eds], 1995; Peck, 1996; Streeck, 1993, 1997a). As expenditures become more transparent with the introduction of the single currency, there is added pressure to reduce costs in every location – but particularly those where standards of pay and conditions are high. While the European trade unions have sought to create a European system of industrial relations to counter such pressures on workers, it is clear that there is still a very long way to go (Lecher and Platzer [eds], 1998; Marginson and Sisson, 1996). In this context, the European trade union movement has attached considerable importance to the development of EWCs. Devised to overcome the ‘representation gap’ in large MNCs, the EWC Directive, ratified in September 1994, requires that all companies which employ more than 1,000 workers, of whom at least 150 are employed in each of two member states, are legally obliged to establish a forum or procedure for informing and consulting their employees across Europe (for more information on the background to this development, see Hall, 1992; Hall et al., 1994; Gold and Hall, 1994; Marginson et al., 1998; Rivest, 1996). In effect, at least 15 million workers, in approximately 2,000 MNCs, now have rights to a new level of representative information sharing and consultation that will bring them into contact with their colleagues from other countries in Europe. Since the ratification of the EWC Directive, more than 500 international networks of employee representatives and senior managers have been established in firms across Europe (European Works Councils Bulletin, 1999: 10). Each of these new networks meets at least once a year to discuss the changing firm, its business environment, employment issues and future plans. Senior managers present information to employee representatives who are asked to respond, and (in theory at least) consultation takes place over corporate decisions that affect workers in more than one country. Most EWCs allow employee representatives to hold their own meetings, with translation services, before and/or after the main session, and some are developing new forms of communication between annual events.

90 Labour and Globalisation For the most part, trade unions have welcomed the development of EWCs. Indeed, in many ways they represent the prime achievement of years of campaigning to foster the transnational participation and representation of workers (Knutsen, 1997; Levinson, 1972; Streeck, 1997a). Speaking at a European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) conference in Brussels in 1996, president Emilio Gabaglio suggested that the EWC Directive ‘is a cornerstone for social life in Europe, one of the few achievements to reconcile European working people with the European integration process’. In addition the ETUC has argued that EWCs represent ‘a major step forward, a step towards the democratisation of the economy’ (ETUC, undated: 3), while the British Trades Union Congress (TUC) posits that EWCs allow trade unionists to strengthen ‘the foundations of international co-operation which is becoming increasingly important in a global economy’ (Monks, in TUC, 1997: inside front cover). There can be no doubt that trade unions see EWCs as a powerful mechanism to cement relationships between workers across national divides. Such international relationships would allow the exchange of independent information between EWC representatives outside formal events. These networks could then allow workers to validate management information, to anticipate managerial change and to plan in advance for change (see Weston and Martínez Lucio, 1997, 1998). In addition, such active networks could be essential if unions are to use EWCs to formulate Europe-wide strategy within a company, planning bargaining agendas and long-term goals (see Marginson, 1998). The networks around EWCs could also form the basis of active international solidarity – as was seen in the case of Renault’s decision to close their Belgian plant at Vilvoorde in 1997 (Labour Research, 1997; European Works Councils Bulletin, 1997a). As Lecher (1998: 247–48), explains, such active networks are key to making the EWCs a success for workers and trade unions in Europe: ‘The creation of such a living “organic” network is the precondition for reducing formal EWC meetings to their properly secondary function compared with the maintenance of permanent information contacts – analogous to the functioning of German central works councils or French works committees.’ Moreover, such networks would help to counter the ‘top-down’ convergence currently dominating European economic and political unification (Turner, 1996; Wills, 1999). Seizing these opportunities is less than straightforward, however, as EWCs do not automatically create a networking culture or active solidarity between employee representatives. Strictly speaking, an EWC merely allows employee representatives to meet each other once a year in circumstances when, with the assistance of simultaneous translation services, they can exchange experiences, developments and ideas. There is no automatic resource provision to stimulate contact outside these meetings, and any such activity largely depends upon the representatives taking the initiative, or doing so in conjunction with their trade union organisations. To date, research evidence reports a rather mixed picture in terms of employee-led communication and networking outside the formal EWC meetings. While there are positive examples of independent networks emerging from EWCs (see Müller, 1998; Weston and Martínez Lucio, 1997, 1998; Lecher et al., 1999; Lecher and Rüb, 1999),

Re-Scaling Trade Union Organisation 91 it is clear that there are also many cases in which workers have not been able to make the EWC work in their favour (Wills, 2000). Moreover, although the picture is varied and some EWCs are more active than others (Fitzgerald et al., 1999; Marginson et al., 1998; Pedersini, 1998), most trade unionists do not attach great importance to these new institutions. It is now widely recognised that EWCs are not forums for consultation, and senior managers use the EWC to inform staff of decisions that have already been made. In this context it is not surprising that locally focused trade unionists concentrate their organisational efforts on those areas where they do have limited power – leaving the EWC to one side. Without the power to change anything in corporate life, even those trade unionists who are active at other levels of the organisational hierarchy have been slow to take up the opportunities of EWCs. As an illustration of this impasse, a survey of 26 firms with EWCs conducted in the UK during 1998 revealed ‘considerable scepticism about the value of these councils. Scepticism on the part of management was expected. What was not expected was the degree of doubt on the part of union delegates about how much of value they felt was being achieved in the EWC meeting’ (IPA, 1998: 11). In the following section I use research material collected through interviews and participant observation at the EWC of a UK-owned manufacturing company1 to elaborate upon the dilemmas facing the international trade union movement in these new institutions. The experiences of UK representatives at a European Works Council The company selected for study was one of the first UK-owned firms to set up an EWC in 1995. The firm is very well established, employing in excess of 25,000 employees in the EEA (although the number is falling very quickly) and approximately 60,000 worldwide. Having disposed of its non-core interests, the company is a specialist manufacturer, supplying industry with materials for production and retail companies with finished products. The EWC agreement was negotiated with the national and international trade unions involved in the group, and opens with some general statements about the importance of employee communication in the contemporary business environment. Unusually, the agreement then allows for a number of different divisional EWCs to be established in addition to a group EWC that meets once a year. In the early days, there were four such divisional EWCs, but with the sale of parts of the group only one remains. The text of the EWC agreement makes it clear that the company sees its EWC as a body for information exchange, rather than for any real consultation. Moreover, non-union members are to be included in the employee-side representation at the EWC. The company aims to promote constructive dialogue on issues such as ‘economics, financial performance, commercial issues, investment, HRM, health and 1 This case study is part of a wider project exploring the development and implications of EWCs in the UK which has included surveying managers in UK-owned firms, in-depth case study research at a number of firms and interviews with representatives from the international trade union movement (see Wills, 1998a, 1999, 2000). Research access to this EWC was agreed on the basis of anonymity, and the firm has not been named for this reason.

92 Labour and Globalisation safety and environmental matters’ and makes special reference to ‘investment and employment decisions with cross-border implications’. The numbers of representatives and the selection methods to be used are not specified in the group agreement, and these matters are dealt with at a divisional level by the managers and the recognised trade unions involved. The research material presented below relates to the experiences of the UK representatives in one of the divisional EWCs, which subsequently became the sole EWC. There is no provision for employee-side ‘experts’ in this particular divisional agreement, although a full-time trade union official from the UK plays a leading role in coordinating and chairing the employee side of this EWC. The distribution of employment of employees in this division, and their representation at the EWC during the late 1990s, is detailed in Table 1 below. As can be seen, the geography of employment has changed considerably during the lifetime of the EWC. Germany, Spain, Portugal, Italy and France have all lost considerable numbers of workers. Moreover, employment in Eastern Europe has grown (although I do not have any figures that predate Eastern European members’ arrival at the EWC in 1998) and the numbers in smaller specialist and sales offices have increased. As these data suggest, the UK representatives had not suffered heavy job losses before 1998, although this situation changed dramatically during 1999. Due to a factory closure announced in 1999 one of the Scottish representatives has lost her job, and she is not likely to be replaced since employee numbers have fallen. The UK representatives who attended the meeting in 1999 were all trade unionists employed in factory or warehouse production in this division, coming from Scotland, Ireland, the North East and Leicester. For the first three years of the EWC a non-union representative attended on behalf of an employee consultative body based at the warehouse and sales office in Leicester, but this individual has since been replaced by a union member on site. Only one of the other representatives has changed over the lifetime of the EWC, due to a process of reelection between shop stewards at a factory in Northern Ireland, although a deputy representative from the North East has also attended at least once. There were four annual meetings of this divisional EWC between 1995 and 1999 and the places and agendas of these meetings are summarised in Table 2. These meetings were led by senior managers of the company delivering detailed presentations to the assembled delegates, outlining the progress of the company, strategic planning and management matters. On each occasion, senior managers reported poor economic results, falling profits, concerns about the share price, job losses and major reorganisation. Not surprisingly perhaps, management of the company has reflected this instability, changing the European management structures and profiles of this division twice since the EWC came into existence. In 1997 the board decided to implement a process-based system across Europe, only to return to geographical formation in 1999. Such upheaval has rather overshadowed the EWC and most of the meetings have been taken up in explaining these new managerial structures and systems. Contrary to expectations, the fact that the workforce and their representatives

Re-Scaling Trade Union Organisation 93 Table 1. The geography of employment and employee representation at the divisional EWC, 1995 and 1998 Country

Austria Belgium Denmark Finland France Germany Holland Hungary Italy Ireland Norway Poland Portugal Spain Sweden UK All Europe*

No. of employees 1995

No. of delegates 1995 (1998)

No. of employees 1998 (no. of sites)

Employee change 1995–1998 (%)

22 13 10 97 118 1,844 65 n/a 1,047 10 n/a n/a 1,068 565 n/a 1,988 6,847

1 1 1 1 1 6 1 (1) 4 1 – (1) 4 2 – 6 29

22 (1)1 23 (2)1 17 (2)1 106 (1)1 104 (2)1 1,381 (8)1 60 (3)1 1,178 (3)1 865 (7)1 12 (2)1 17 (1)1 204 (2)1 859 (5)1 428 (3)1 23 (1)1 1,795 (10) 7,094 (53)

+10 +77 +70 1+9 –12 –25 1–8 1– –17 +20 1– 1– –19.5 –24 1– –10

* including a trade union official from the UK and excluding Eastern European members, who started attending in 1998, and Swedish and Norwegian members, who do not appear to have taken up their rights to representation at the EWC. n/adata not available

faced ongoing job losses and instability during this time did not prompt them to develop a strong interest in the EWC. Despite the passage of four annual meetings, there was very little sign of growing understanding across national borders and, in practice, delegates tend to simply report their local and national concerns to the EWC. The representatives remained focused on their own needs, and appeared to have little understanding of the plight of those in other locations. Comments from one of the UK employee representatives, interviewed in 1997 (when he did not have any major problems) and 1999 (when he was facing redundancies and concerns about future investment) illustrate this very clearly: When things are going well for you, you don’t ask too many questions, you listen to other people’s problems. I’ve had the luxury of doing that during the three years I’ve been involved. (1997) People with problems come forward. It’s quite obvious that until a year ago the Germans dominated the meetings because they had a lot of problems. And if I’m honest, I sat back because everything was hunky-dory at my plant. Now it’s coming round for me. We’re in trouble, but there’s no solidarity at all. (1999)

This individual has experienced the pain and anxieties of local redundancies and reorganisation in recent times, but the EWC gave him no means to foster

94 Labour and Globalisation Table 2. EWC Meetings 1995–1999 Date

Place and Purpose

Duration

Content

August 1995

Brussels Sign document

24–25 September 1996

Kenzingen, Germany Annual Meeting

2 days

(i) Factory visit (ii) Employee-side meeting (iii) CEO and senior staff present overview of the company and the division (iv) Senior managers outline new European-wide process management systems and new computer system (v) HR Director presents employment information (vi) Open forum

24 September 1997

Slough, UK Annual Meeting

1 day

(i) Employee-side meeting (ii) CEO presents overview of the company and the division (iii) CEO of division leads presentations on the European-wide process management system and computer systems (iv) Final questions and answers

17 September 1998

Barcelona, Spain Annual Meeting

1 day

(i) Employee-side meeting (ii) CEO presents overview of the company and the division (iii) Senior managers give overview of their area of European production system (iv) Final questions and answers

10 September 1999

Heathrow, UK Annual Meeting

1 day

(i) Employee-side meeting (ii) Executive director of Europe presents information about the new functional/geographical management structure and systems in context of poor economic performance (iii) UK and German managing directors make presentations (iv) CEO provides overview of the whole global company (v) Short employee-side meeting to prepare responses (vi) Final questions and answers

Re-Scaling Trade Union Organisation 95 solidarity between his members and the other parts of the group. Indeed, there was no sign of active solidarity between the national groups represented at the EWC. As another UK representative put it more bluntly: ‘Personally, I can never see European solidarity. Never, because at the minute it’s everybody looking after themselves.’ Although there was little sign of solidarity, a number of the continental European representatives did try to use the EWC to highlight the need to protect the wider European industry from low-cost competition. The Italian representatives in particular tried to reinforce the call for European-wide intervention to save their industry, suggesting that political action was needed to protect European jobs from the threat of cheap labour in North Africa, Eastern Europe and further afield. At their initiative, the employee side at the 1998 EWC meeting issued a press release to highlight their concerns: Press Release: EUROPEAN WORKS COUNCIL MEMBERS CALL FOR INDUSTRY SUPPORT

At its meeting held in Barcelona on Thursday 17 September, the workers’ side of the [named] EWC expressed their deep concern at the decline of the European [x] and [y] industries and the lack of support and understanding from the European Commission and member state governments. The EWC members called upon all public authorities including those in Central and Eastern Europe to work together along with the European Commission and Parliament to bring about policies which would achieve a more stable economic and social situation for the over 3 million workers employed in the industry throughout Europe. The EWC members remain committed to the constructive redevelopment of the industry but feel that the present unregulated ‘free for all’ will lead to thousands more job losses involving factory closures, failed businesses and whole communities deprived of employment. [X], Chairman of the workers’ side of the [named] EWC and national secretary for the [named] union in the UK said: ‘this is a unique statement from members of a EWC and the first from the [x] industry in Europe. It is indicative of the serious situation in the industry across Europe and the shared concern that workers in all countries feel. There is a strong view that member state governments and, in particular, the European Commission, are prepared to see the industry decline, which would lead to serious unemployment levels in the [x] regions of Europe.’

As far as they were aware, this statement was only picked up in one newspaper, and the delegates decided to concentrate more on specific company matters during the 1999 EWC. In the event, however, they had little time to ask questions of management and their contributions, beyond short questions, were restricted to an open forum at the end of the day. This formal arrangement meant that there was very little opportunity for employees to contribute to discussion during the day. Senior managers took the lead in presenting information to delegates, who were then invited to save any

96 Labour and Globalisation general questions and contributions until the end of the day. As a result, a UK employee representative explained: You go to a big session where you get blasted with facts and figures and business strategy. When they’ve told you everything there’s not a lot of interest in what’s coming from our side. What we think doesn’t really matter. I just sit through the process at the moment. There’s not much time for us to say very much.

As the management presentations were often pitched at a very general level, covering financial returns, markets, strategy and new developments, it was often difficult for locally based employee representatives to respond. In countries that do not have works councils, such as the UK, employee representatives are not used to discussing issues of management or financial strategy. Although trade unionists will be used to considering employment conditions at their own place of work, they will not be invited to discuss company policy with senior staff. The EWC thus puts new issues onto the agenda for many European trade unionists, and representatives need more assistance in making sense of company decision-making at the EWC (see also Miller and Stirling, 1998). In addition, senior managers did not use the EWC as a forum for genuine consultation that might increase employee involvement. They just informed the employee representatives of decisions that had already been made, and then invited questions and comments on those decisions. As such, there was very little scope for employee representatives to change corporate life. As the UK trade union officer who attended the EWC explained, genuine consultation could turn the EWC into a more meaningful body for trade unionists in the company: The EWC should be about genuine dialogue and genuine discussion to stop closures and redundancies, then there’s a real benefit to them. Rather than the unions and the workforce finding out when redundancies are planned, when it’s too late to do anything, we would like to discuss it beforehand, to see if we can do something about it.

In this regard, the German representatives at the 1997 EWC meeting were particularly concerned about the financial losses associated with factory closures and the relocation of production work from Germany to Portugal. Rather than using the EWC as a forum for opposing such closures, they wanted to use the meeting as an opportunity to tell senior managers from the ‘home country’ (the UK) about the ways in which they might manage the closure and relocation more successfully. After closures in 1996 they realised that the company was losing customers because the new production site could not secure work of sufficient quality. During the employee-side pre-meeting, the German representatives suggested that they could help staff at the Portuguese factory to run production in parallel and get the production process right before factory closure in Germany. As one of the German delegates explained: ‘If closures cannot be prevented, we can still make sure the change is more successful for the company’. In the event, these representatives had no opportunity to put such ideas to the key decision-makers in the company. The

Re-Scaling Trade Union Organisation 97 employee side had no power to influence management practice or shape much of the debate at the EWC. The absence of real consultation, in conjunction with the local/national consciousness of employee representatives and the real language barriers that exist, conspired against this EWC. Employee representatives had not taken up the option of strengthening independent communication links through the EWC. Moreover, as it was constituted, the employee representatives at this EWC were led by a fulltime official from one of the two largest trade unions representing staff in the UK. This individual dealt with all corporate correspondence about the EWC and he chaired the employee-side meetings at each event. Inevitably perhaps, he also dominated the employee side of the EWC. In 1997 he was responsible for 47 per cent of all employee-side questions and contributions at the formal EWC event. In 1998 this figure was 44 per cent and in 1999 it reached 50 per cent. In the main, the employee representatives looked to this official to ‘lead’ them, but as a result, they tended to say very little themselves. This model of ‘leadership’ left a vacuum after each annual EWC because this trade union official had no time to facilitate additional communication and independent exchange between annual events. Although broadly happy with the meetings, in an interview he did make the following remark: I’m aware that in some areas the EWC is not as active as it should be because quite honestly, I haven’t got the time. I’m still keen on having full-time officers involved but we do need local trade unionists to take more of a role. I think eventually the senior co-ordinator will come from within the company.

This EWC thus highlighted the problems faced by employees at EWCs. Representatives remain locally focused, there is no sense of solidarity between them, and the EWC had probably reinforced their resignation to continued redundancy and reorganisation. In addition, the company gave the employee representatives very little opportunity to use the EWC to serve their agenda, and there was no employee-side contribution at the EWC. Perhaps more seriously, however, the trade union leadership of the employee side at this EWC had, unintentionally, militated against greater employee involvement in the EWC. While delegates waited for the full-time trade union official to chair their discussions and take the lead in asking questions of management, they remained passive at the EWC. Moreover, they had not taken any steps towards building an independent network for information exchange between EWC meetings, and coordination was left to the union official involved. Employee representatives (even from within the UK) saw each other for one day a year and they listened to information from the management of the division. Despite expectations, it is clear that this EWC was not fostering European-wide solidarity and strategy between workers. The case demonstrates that the European trade union movement could do much more to support these institutions and ‘manage them’ to their best advantage (for further elaboration, see Wills, 2001).

98 Labour and Globalisation What is to be done? The lessons from the European front-line of labour internationalism are sobering. EWCs provide ready-made networks of trade unionists in at least 500 companies across Europe, meeting at corporate expense. These networks are recognised by the senior management of key MNCs in Europe, and they provide a forum for information to be extracted and shared. Yet the case study detailed in this chapter suggests that the trade union movement has not yet grasped the opportunities of these new institutions. Although it is widely recognised that the EWC can form a basis from which to build international information exchange, solidarity and active strategy between workers, there does not yet appear to be any means for delivering such desires. Moreover, if the long-established unions in Europe cannot seize the opportunities of these institutions, we might ask what hope there is for others under the lash of more ruthless models of capitalism There are those who suggest that any such attempts to foster labour internationalism will always be torn by conflicts of interest between local and non-local concerns. As Terry (1985) found in his research into company combine committees within the UK, successful action depends on unity between trade unionists in different parts of a company, but in practice, well-organised trade union bodies have less need for solidarity with their brothers and sisters in other parts of the group. As he explains: ‘It may be that we are left with a paradox: strong plant-level organisation is both a precondition for, and an inhibitor of, effective combine organisation in the UK context’ (Terry, 1985: 376). Such arguments have also been made in the context of international trade unionism and campaigns around closure (Baldry et al., 1983; Haworth and Ramsay, 1986; Milner, 1990; Logue, 1980). Yet it seems too early to dismiss EWCs on these lines. They represent an important new development, on a scale unimagined in the dreams of international labour organisers all over the world, and EWCs have the potential to realise much more (see also Lecher et al., 1999; Wills, 2001). There is more that could be done to support employee representatives at EWCs with training, active guidance and regular information bulletins about company developments. Moreover, national trade unions could usefully cede responsibility and resources for much of this work to the European offices of the GUFs (the Global Union Federations). Extra energy could then be devoted to building international networks around EWCs, fostering employee-side strategy for the meetings. In the early days of the EWC Directive, the European Union Federations (EUFs) did an enormous amount of this type of work, using commission money to bring trade unionists together to formulate an agenda for negotiating EWCs. The European Federation of Building and Wood Workers (EFBWW), for example, established precursory networks to EWCs in about 70 to 80 companies during the early/mid-1990s, using resources from the European Commission (for details of the European Metal Workers’ activity see European Works Councils Bulletin, 1997b). These programmes allowed workers to share ideas and information, to get a better understanding of industrial relations practices in different countries and .

Re-Scaling Trade Union Organisation 99 to develop a trade union agenda in each company. Such developments were very beneficial to the unions involved, and they strengthened trade union organisation at local, national and European levels, as this representative from the EFBWW explained in interview: EWCs have brought us much more inside information about what is going on in our industry. They have given us much better information and analysis of industrial relations and industrial policy, the problems we have to face and so on . . . The EWCs have also created, for the first time in history, a European mandate for the European federation. The national unions have given a negotiating mandate to the European industry federations for the first time in history. It is completely new for us to sign agreements like this. This makes us much stronger in debates with the Commission and the employers about concrete issues.

In the light of such positive experiences, extra resources could be given to the EUFs to allow them to continue this work and service the EWCs that have already been established. Of course, the experiences of other international labour organisations suggest that it will be difficult to secure such transnational mandates and resources from national trade unions. Although organisations such the GUFs are successfully devising strategies to take on the power of the TNCs in the interests of the world working class, they still need to win an internal argument about the importance of securing adequate resources and power at the transnational scale. Ron Oswald, the General Secretary of the IUF, put this very well during interview when he argued: We are in a period of transition when we are caught between two phenomena. One is the huge increase in our workload as the unions in industrialised countries expect us to continue our old role of solidarity work alongside more direct assistance in dealing with transnational firms. Our work has become much more practical, much more demanding – which is good – we are much more of a trade union organisation. But unfortunately, there is a hell of a time lag between that reaction to employers . . . and any increase in resources. The second phenomenon is that globalisation is causing financial problems for all IUF affiliates at the present time and recruitment is more and more of an issue for them.

Without winning extra resources and new mandates to act at the international level, the emerging global labour movement will be unable to make an adequate response to the challenges posed by EWCs and the global economy. An internal argument needs to be won within the labour movement, about the scale at which resources and power are best mobilised. Just as local trade unions slowly responded to the nation state in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, by amalgamating and pooling resources at the scale of the state, the challenge of the millennium will be to build genuinely global trade union actors. EWCs might still play a part in this re-scaling of trade unionism, by giving transnational labour organisations more of a role. However, in addition, EWCs could

100 Labour and Globalisation be used to foster social movement-type trade unionism within companies and communities. The American Federation of Labor–Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL–CIO) has made corporate campaigning a key weapon in its attempt to build a social movement around labour, raising environmental and human rights issues to mobilise consumers and community members alongside trade union members. The EWC networks could facilitate such organisation across Europe, highlighting questions of plant closures, child labour, good labour standards and so on. In this way, the EWC network could be an active part of a social movement within and beyond any particular company – mobilising people to achieve change through the EWC. Such networks would have to be active on an ongoing basis, drawing EWC members into active relationships with each other. Such speculation is, of course, very far from the reality of most EWCs today. Indeed, the case study presented in this chapter illustrates the scale of the shift that is needed if unions really are to turn themselves into social movements, or activist organisations. Moreover, if unions do refigure themselves in the ways suggested by activist/scholars such as Kate Bronfenbrenner, Kim Moody, Dan Gallin and Peter Waterman, and EWCs do become part of a wider agenda for fostering an active, campaigning union movement, solidarity will never be easily achieved. The very nature of global capitalism means that international solidarity will always be a messy business, in which arguments need to be won. Solidarity at a local or national level has always involved political arguments and conscious intervention to break down sectional and geographical divisions, and the transnational level is the same (see Hyman, 1975; Wills, 1998b). The experiences of employee representatives at the EWC outlined in this chapter would suggest that, as yet, these new European structures of international trade unionism have not facilitated widespread collective action, mass protest, or even an embryonic collective consciousness at this spatial scale. The lessons from the European front line of labour internationalism are hard-hitting. There is a desperate need to refigure the organisational energies of the European and international trade union movement to make EWCs living networks of rank-and-file trade unionists that can breathe life into the labour movement of the future at all spatial scales. Acknowledgements I am extremely grateful to the management at the case study company outlined in this paper for granting me access to the EWC, and to the representatives who took part. It has been a great pleasure to meet everyone involved and I have benefited enormously from such close scrutiny of one organisation. This research work has been funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) (Grant No. R000221873). I presented this paper at an ESRC labour studies seminar in Liverpool, January 2000, and benefited from constructive discussions with Noel Castree, Tony Elger, Angela Hale, Stuart Howard, Mike Lavalette, Steve Munby, Ronaldo Munck, Sarah Penny, Michael Samers, and Vic Thorpe.

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6. Australia and Beyond: Targeting Rio Tinto James Goodman

Corporate globalism creates new imperatives for labour and other movements. The strengthening of transnational sources of corporate power, hand in glove with strengthened inter-state regulations to promote corporate interests, intensifies rates of accumulation across all sectors. Corporations have exploited the relative mobility of capital to put progressive governments and nationally organised labour movements onto the defensive. The emergence of new ‘exit options’, as more than one third of private capital goes transnational, greatly enhances corporate power (ILO, 1997; UNCTAD, 1993). There is an intensified search for ‘greenfield’ sites of accumulation, especially in the mining industry (Otto, 1998), threatening noncommodified practices on the far peripheries of capitalist accumulation, and undermining the very survival of peoples. Corporations have very successfully exercised their structural power ‘as a weapon in the domestic space of class conflict’: national class compromises in the ‘global North’ have been overwhelmed by the new drive for ‘global competitiveness’, pitting workers against workers in the ‘global market’ for capital (Moran, 1998: 68; Gill and Law, 1989). At the same time, increased rates of exploitation and a global diffusion of industrialism have accelerated the rate of exhaustion of societies and environments, leading to crises of reproduction. Reflecting these pressures there has been a growing debate about the need for labour movements to reground themselves as cross-national social movements (ILO, 1997: 228; Moody, 1997; Munck, 2000; Waterman, 1998, 1999). The mobility gap that so disempowers labour movements can only be bridged by concerted resistance across sites of domination. This means bridging very different logics of struggle in the common cause of contesting global accumulation. Struggles against exploitation, often vested in labour movements, need to be intertwined with struggles against exhaustion and also with struggles for survival. There is also a need to shift across national borders, and in this respect, labour and other movements can become consciously transnational, matching the mobility and reach of the agents of corporate globalism. There is an urgent need to move away from an industrial focus for the labour movement, where labour is forced onto the defensive, caught in the constraints of ‘historic compromises’ that no longer deliver. The alternatives require the formation of new alliances for the labour movement in other social movement sectors, 105

106 Labour and Globalisation and the construction of stronger cross-national linkages, to mirror the scope of transnational capital. As Kim Moody argues, ‘Social movement unionism, by whatever name, can be the democratic vision and practice . . . [and can] reach out across the many lines capitalism draws between people’ (Moody, 1997: 292). This can entail a return to the internationalist social and ideological roots of the labour movement: as Waterman points out, labour movements were in many cases initially established as ‘internationals’ rather than as national movements.1 It can also involve a process of reimagining the process of emancipation, as Hyman notes: ‘Effective union action requires material resources and strategic intelligence, but success has typically depended on the capacity to mobilise identification and support by inspiring hearts and minds. In other words, unions have needed to colonise, and to reshape civil society’ (Hyman, 1999: 108). Workplace struggles cannot be dissociated from the communities and environments in which they are embedded and labour movements cannot rely on nationally focused systems of class compromise (Standing, 1997). There is a need to reinvigorate labour internationalism as a global transformative agenda, guided by the new global commons of survival and sustainability. This explicitly normative agenda has the potential to reach beyond the industrial context to capture the required ‘moral credibility’ (Gill and Law, 1989: 495). As Stevis and Boswell argue: Articulating transnational interests requires a political discourse that will appeal to a critical mass of workers, labour activists and activists from other issue areas . . . A key step is to promulgate a shared global agenda . . . Unions will benefit from strategic coordination with other progressive movements and social groups, such as human rights, women’s and environmental organisations, retirees and churches. (Stevis and Boswell, 1997: 96)

This chapter debates these issues from an Australian perspective, focusing on a campaign to challenge the world’s largest transnational mining corporation, Rio Tinto. This unprecedented international campaign is coordinated by the Australian-based mineworkers’ union, the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU), on behalf of the Brussels-based International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers’ Unions (ICEM). Launched in South Africa in 1996, the campaign has been seen as the first global trade union campaign to focus on a transnational corporation. From its inception, the campaign coalition reached beyond trade unions to draw in environmental campaigns, indigenous peoples’ organisations and human rights groups, in a concerted effort to target and highlight the abuses of Rio Tinto. It could, then, be seen as offering a model for cross-national social movement unionism. There are strong ‘local’ reasons for the CFMEU to take on such a central role 1

Waterman, 1998. Despite recent moves to revitalise cross-national labour movements, the strength of early internationalism is still unprecedented. One example, quoted by Waterman, is the £30,000 that was collected in Australia for 20,000 striking dockers in London in 1889, more than a pound each for the strikers, equivalent to several days’ pay (solidarity was reciprocated on a similar scale a year later, during an Australian docks strike).

Targeting Rio Tinto 107 in the campaign: Rio Tinto has been engaged in union-busting operations in Australia, from 1996 actively encouraged by the neo-liberal Howard government. In 1995 the company had been forced to abandon its first attempt at deunionisation, after the Industrial Relations Commission ruled that it had been discriminating against unionists at Weipa in Queensland by offering inducements for workers to move to non-union individual contracts. The tactic then shifted to obstructing union representation by refusing to sign collective agreements, unilaterally imposing changed working conditions, using courts against increasingly frustrated unionists, and finally simply laying off active union members. This pattern has emerged at Rio Tinto’s operations across Australia, but is most evident at Rio Tinto operations in the Hunter Valley in New South Wales, a union stronghold that, against all company assertions, is among the most ‘productive’ in Australia.2 Here, as elsewhere, the company has failed to intimidate significant numbers of workers into leaving the union. Furthermore, the union has repeatedly won cases at the Industrial Relations Commission. But, under new legislation, the Commission is increasingly ineffectual, to the extent that the original 1995 anti-discrimination ruling in the Weipa case has been repeatedly and persistently flouted. In this context there is a clear need for the union to step beyond increasingly constrained workplace struggles, to outflank both the national government and the transnational corporation. There are not only sound motives, there are also opportunities, as Rio Tinto has for many years been targeted by a wide range of social movements. Rio Tinto’s global attack on the labour movement is paralleled by world-wide attacks on living environments, on cultural and social survival and on development rights. Human rights organisations, indigenous peoples’ organisations and environmental movements have all been active in challenging Rio Tinto’s corporate practices. As the national secretary of the CFMEU stated in 1998: Whilst an ability to recruit and organise is central to the effectiveness of any trade union, it is no longer sufficient to ensure reasonable bargaining power in dealing with multinational corporations and, by extension, the competitive pressures they bring to bear . . . So the CFMEU has ‘gone global’ against Rio Tinto’s attacks on workers’ rights. In one sense it has been hard because it involves campaigning and communicating in ways we are not used to. In another sense it has been easy as we have discovered that Rio Tinto faces opposition from scores of trade unions, environment groups and human rights and aid organisations internationally. (Maitland, 1998)

There may be motive and opportunity, but is there the political will? Does the campaign against Rio Tinto offer a foundation for long-lasting transformation, as 2 The company offered unionists their entitlements if they signed individual contracts. When that failed, non-union collective agreements were offered, while the company threatened to cut redundancy payments if the workforce failed to sign up. Again this was rejected, and management shifted to the end game, making workers redundant on the basis of ‘performance’ criteria such as ‘attitude towards the company’. As a result, in 2000, the CFMEU took up over 230 unfair dismissal cases (CFMEU, Summary of disputes at Rio Tinto Australian operations, March 2000, Sydney).

108 Labour and Globalisation opposed to a short-lived tactical manoeuvre? If Rio Tinto abandons its anti-union stance in Australia, or an Australian government proceeded to defend union rights, would the ‘social movement unionism’ and the cross-national linkages be downgraded? Alliance-building needs to have an instrumental component – there have to be clear benefits for the union, and ultimately for the union membership. But if the hoped-for strategic leverage of cross-national social movement unionism is to be realised, the realignment cannot be simply a tactical one. To some extent the logic of alliance-building forces a degree of reorientation – dialogue, of itself, generates change. Whether this automatically creates the required political culture is much less certain. These issues are discussed in the following section from a broad perspective, drawing on the work of Kees Van Der Pijl. Contrasts are drawn between the logic of resisting exploitation, that of challenging exhaustion, and that of asserting survival. Each dimension of resistance is seen as a product of a particular mode of accumulation. While capitalist industrialism centres on the exploitation of workers, more intensive forms of late capitalism also exhaust the ‘substratum’ of society. Both the logic of exploitation and that of exhaustion contrast with a third form of accumulation, ‘original’ accumulation, which threatens the survival of whole societies. Corporate globalism intensifies all three of these, posing the question of how struggles can be brought together. This question is explored in the third section through a brief analysis of the ICEM’s Rio Tinto campaign. Here, the emphasis is on the degree to which the campaign solidifies the trade union challenge to heightened exploitation with environmentalist challenges to exhaustion and indigenous peoples’ campaigns for survival. In the concluding section an attempt is made at assessing the outcomes and prospects of the campaign, returning to the broader problematic of contesting corporate globalism. Exploitation, exhaustion, survival Industrial unionism is often founded on productivist assumptions – that production can and should be maintained, and where possible expanded. Environmental risk may be acknowledged, but rarely as a constraint on expanded production: in the case of the CFMEU, for instance, the honourable exception is uranium mining, which is categorically opposed. This should come as no surprise: with ‘industrial’ accumulation it is the process of imposing the disciplines of capital over labour that is resisted, with resistance primarily expressed in struggles over the distribution of the economic surplus, manifested in industrial militancy and state welfarism. Conflicts are channelled into trade union ‘cadres’ and into a process of ‘corporatisation’, of striking class compromises, mainly through the state (Van Der Pijl, 1998). In the process, labour movements become implicit partners with corporations in negotiating disciplinary trade-offs, in collective bargaining contexts, or perhaps with state authorities in tripartite structures. Reflecting this logic of resistance, and the distributional deals that result, labour movements have become primarily national rather than cross-national entities.

Targeting Rio Tinto 109 Their story is very much the story of domestication. With the formation of nationally focused social democratic parties labour solidarity lapsed into forms of institutionalised internationalism, centred on international structures. Waterman argues that this reflects a fatal flaw in the Marxian assumption that capital would create a relatively homogeneous proletariat, with ‘world historical’ rather than local or national consciousness. In practice, as Meiksins-Wood argues, ‘capitalism tends to fragment class struggle and to domesticate it’ – a multiplicity of localisms and nationalisms have been maintained, constructed, and constantly reproduced (Meiksins-Wood, 1998: 10). Waterman argues that this requires the ‘abandonment of any assumption that [proletarian] internationalism is structurally determined and/or exemplary’ (Waterman, 1998: 33). Arguments about revolutionary agency, for instance whether industrialised proletariats or imperialised peasantries should shoulder the burden of social transformation, thus need to be redefined as arguments about how to build solidarity. This series of assumptions and problems dramatically contrasts with the logic of exhaustion-centred struggles. Here, under the more intensive modes of accumulation that have become associated with late capitalism, the discipline of capital begins to exhaust the social and environmental ‘substratum’ on which accumulation depends. With the strengthened discipline of capital beyond the workplace, everyday lives become more commodified and the effort of work is intensified, for instance to incorporate leisure time. In the process, the wider substratum of ‘reproduction’, whether delivered through the ‘household’ or through the state, is threatened. As Van Der Pijl argues, ‘the atomisation inherent in commodification in this way is no longer compensated by socialisation, and the state itself is losing credence as a source of social regeneration’ (Van Der Pijl, 1998: 47). These pressures dovetail with the advancing exhaustion of the biosphere, as the discipline of capital intrudes further into the natural world, rendering it unsustainable. In this respect, capital begins to destroy the very foundations of its existence – access to use value is disrupted, social reproduction is undermined, and the state’s role in promoting social consensus is severely shaken. As the substratum of livelihood is whittled away, a range of conflicts centred on ‘exhaustion’ begin to emerge. These are struggles over the means of reproduction, whether planetary, cultural or social, and are defined against productivism: they respond to a fundamental crisis in capitalist accumulation and often assert ecocentric rather than ethnocentric values as the necessary starting point for an alternative. These forms of resistance are also, unavoidably, defined against the national container. They are often driven by global crises and necessarily assert universal norms. Here, identification with global concerns and action, on the basis of a global environmental consciousness, contrasts with the more limited international solidarity of the labour movement, as expressed in the confederal structures of the international trade union movement. This comes close to the ‘global solidarity’ advocated by Waterman, who describes it as distinct both from internationalism and from more universalistic forms of cosmopolitanism. This ‘democratic and humanistic linkage’ is diverse in its orientation and founded more on interaction

110 Labour and Globalisation and dialogue across movements than on vertically arranged hierarchies of representation (Waterman, 1998). It is, by necessity, less institutionalised and less predictable, but with this comes much democratic appeal, even inspiration, and much tactical leverage. Both these modes of accumulation and resistance contrast with a third model, ‘original’ accumulation. Here the logic of accumulation breaks apart pre-existing social structures, in an often violent process of establishing the priority of commodity exchange over non-commodified practice. In this case it is the ‘discipline’ of capital over use values that is resisted: as Van Der Pijl argues, the ‘very fact of being disinherited from one’s more or less independent means of subsistence and the destruction of the entire life-world with which they are entwined, with its natural or traditional time-scales and rhythms, drives people to resistance’ (Van Der Pijl, 1998:38). The law of capital is thus confronted by ancestral law. The alternative order that is asserted is an ancestral order, and whether this is pre-existing, prior to ‘contact’, or is ongoing, it bears continuing rights to sovereignty and selfdetermination. The resulting logic of resistance contrasts dramatically with a trade unionist’s aspiration to social redistribution or an environmentalist’s desire for sustainable reproduction. Yet, like them, struggles for survival are also struggles against capitalist accumulation, as production for subsistence rather than exchange is asserted against the logic of commodification. In the current era, with crises of reproduction in the capitalist heartlands invigorating the search for ‘greenfield’ accumulation, this mode of resistance is most clearly expressed in intensified indigenous claims for sovereignty over ancestral lands. These are centred on a variety of forms of confrontational localism (in effect, local demands for the right to refuse corporate intrusions) and, for some, these are seen as primary sources of contestation under ‘postmodern’ corporate globalism. Rejection of a stageist interpretation of resistance to capitalist development entails recognition that all of these three modes of accumulation can exist concurrently. The solidarity required under corporate globalism necessarily entails a rejection not only of national chauvinism, but also of developmental chauvinism. On this understanding, for instance, Waterman argues for a cross-national learning process, between labour and other movements, to develop a global solidarity that rejects stageist notions of developmentalism or vanguardism. If this is accepted, then the challenge is to analyse how the different logics of resistance can be brought together to mount a sustained assault on capitalist accumulation. There is clearly a potential for tension between various types of movements, not least between workplace-centred and survival-centred approaches, with one locked into a productivist logic, and the other defined against it. The three forms of resistance diverge in their prescriptions – where the first promotes redistribution of the spoils of capitalism, the second promotes transformation of the structures of capitalist reproduction, while the third promotes the right to exist autonomously from capitalism. Despite these divergences, a common class dynamic may offer underlying foundations for strategy and action. As economic

Targeting Rio Tinto 111 power becomes increasingly concentrated in the global corporation, struggles for redistribution, struggles for the means of reproduction, and struggles for survival may flow into the same mould. Transnational corporations impose higher rates of exploitation, increased rates of exhaustion and multiple threats to survival, and, as such, enmesh these in their day-to-day practices. The corporate institution crystallises the several facets of domination and, as a result, can be vulnerable to an attack that consciously binds together the forms of resistance. A common thread, the consciousness of ‘a united oppressing force’, may enable forms of collective action that range across the three types of movement and across spatial scales (Waterman, 1998: 52). This raises the crucial question of how the three modes of resistance can be correlated or concerted. The ICEM-led Rio Tinto campaign offers a particularly useful insight into these possibilities. Global mining corporations combine the three forms of accumulation – industrial, intensive and original – and in this way embody the logic of global capitalism. In the 1990s mining companies gained ‘unprecedented access to a larger proportion of the earth’s surface than ever before . . . shaped by a world market place where countries must compete for private sector investment’ (Otto, 1998: 85). They exploit the sharp divisions in global income levels, drive a ‘race to the bottom’ in environmental standards, and displace local indigenous cultures. To some extent the campaign has linked these challenges as the company has seen trade unionists, part of a productivist movement for redistribution, work with environmentalists, whose primary concern is to sustain reproductive capacity, and indigenous peoples, whose main objective is to halt the advance of capitalist incursions into ancestral terrain. The following discusses the extent to which the ICEM–Rio Tinto campaign has been balanced across these movements. The Rio Tinto campaign Rio Tinto has traditionally sought to maintain a low profile. In River of Tears: The Rise of the Rio Tinto–Zinc Mining Corporation, written in 1972, Richard West outlined how the company had kept itself out of the limelight, aware that it was highly vulnerable to public scrutiny. The company was named after the Rio Tinto region of Spain where, from 1873, it operated a large-scale copper mine. From its earliest days the company was beset with accusations of malpractice, and produced its first promotional text in 1904: Rio Tinto Mine: Its History and Romance. The company prospered under Franco, and funds from the mine’s partial sale in 1954 were used to create a mining conglomerate that shadowed the British empire. In the post-war era of anti-colonial nationalism Rio Tinto focused on the British settler colonies such as Northern Rhodesia, South Africa, Canada and Australia: it ‘preferred to work in countries with white, stable, conservative governments’ (West, 1972: 23). The company grew by acquisition and merger, in Australia creating a majorityowned Conzinc Rio Tinto Australia (CRA) in 1962, which was to become fully owned in 1995.

112 Labour and Globalisation By the mid-1990s Rio Tinto had 200 subsidiaries in 40 countries.3 Its success hinged on diversification but also, as Roger Moody notes, on a ‘worldwide political infrastructure’ (Moody, 1996: 47). In an increasingly oligopolised industry, there is clear evidence of collusion with its main ‘rival’ mining corporation, AngloAmerican, in manipulating markets and exerting political influence.4 A key strategy has been to embed operations in national contexts in order to render regulation unnecessary; the company ‘defended itself against economic nationalism by offering shares to the host country’ (West, 1972: 23). The company had a ‘huge influence . . . on Australian economic life’, with the conservative prime minister, Robert Menzies, retaining an office in the Melbourne CRA building (West, 1972: 85). The role that Rio Tinto has played in the Australian mining industry – both through the CRA and now more directly – helps to explain why the Australiabased CFMEU has been such a key player in the ICEM global campaign mounted against the company. In 1995, at the ICEM’s founding conference, it was declared that ‘the struggle against RTZ-CRA is of fundamental importance to international miners’ trade unions’.5 The conference resolved to create a ‘coordinated plan of action’ among ICEM affiliates to target the company. The ICEM is an International Trade Secretariat (ITS), drawing together national trade unions from the mining, chemical and energy sectors. Unlike nationally centred federations and international confederations of trade unions, ITSs such as the ICEM provide a sectoral base that can be focused on an industry association or on a corporation, and thus are particularly well suited to the emerging systems of transnational corporate power (Thorpe, 1999; Moody, 1997; Diller, 1999; Miyoshi, 1995). Nationally based federations can be played off against each other by transnational companies threatening relocation. Cross-national ITSs have the potential to respond to this by mounting cross-national campaigns, linking together nationally based affiliates. As Vic Thorpe, an ICEM official, argues, ‘Since the power increasingly rests with the companies rather than the governments, it is primarily with the companies that the trade unions have to establish a negotiating relationship’ (Thorpe, 1999: 227). Several ITSs were involved in strategising for company councils in the 1960s and 1970s; these approaches were revived in the early 1990s, especially in the context of regional agreements, such as the European Works Councils under the European 3 In 1989 Anglo-American was the largest global mining company; since then, Rio Tinto has grown, through mergers and takeovers, to take its place. In 1997 the company had assets of US$13 billion, a turnover of US$9.2 billion and profits of US$1.2 billion. It operated 60 mines in 40 countries. Since its merger with the Australian Mining Corporation (CRA) in 1996 (previously Rio Tinto had a 49 per cent stake in CRA), Rio Tinto has been listed as a public company in both the UK and Australia, although its headquarters remain in London (UNCTAD, 1994). 4 In 1994 the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) highlighted the growing concentration of ownership in the global minerals industry, describing the sector as oligopolised by the 1970s. In 1989 three companies controlled 47 per cent of nickel production, 35 per cent of gold, 38 per cent of bauxite, 32 per cent of copper and iron ore; of these, nickel, iron ore and copper had become significantly more concentrated since 1975 (UNCTAD, 1994). 5 1995 launch conference of ICEM.

Targeting Rio Tinto 113 Union, and the North American Agreement on Labour Co-operation under the North American Free Trade Agreement. The recent initiatives by ITSs are typically less top-down and less centred on organised labour than their antecedents; as a result they have the potential to gain greater leverage (Stevis and Boswell, 1997). The ICEM–Rio Tinto campaign was launched in Brussels in October 1996 at a meeting between senior ICEM and CFMEU officials and the Norwegian miners’ union. The Norwegian union was then in dispute with Rio Tinto, and had drawn inspiration from the successful CFMEU dispute at Weipa, Australia, earlier that year.6 Later in 1996 the ICEM formally established an ICEM–Rio Tinto network. From the start the objective was to pressurise the company not only to respect trade union rights, but also to adhere to minimum social standards, health and safety and environmental standards and to respect the rights of local communities. The network would be focused on information-gathering, and on the promotion and monitoring of standards, and would become a tool for organising solidarity campaigns.7 The ICEM was aiming to politicise Rio Tinto, defining it as a global pariah. The campaign timetable aimed to attack the company through its Annual General Meetings, targeting its investors, following a relatively established and increasingly popular model of corporate campaigning by environmental and indigenous groups. In Rio Tinto’s case the model had been in place since at least 1981, when Aboriginal landowners from Weipa came to the London AGM to demand compensation for the loss of their lands (Moody, 1996). The objective of these campaigns was generally to undermine reputational capital in the corporation’s ‘home’ territory, and thereby undermine investor confidence and exploit the volatility of investment flows, to force changes in corporate practice. Vulnerability to investor perceptions has become a key issue for large transnational corporations. Many are forced to respond to issues of environmental justice, labour and human rights, indigenous sovereignty and self-determination, issues that in an earlier era could simply be defined as the responsibility of ‘host’ governments (Cowell et al., 1999; Clark and Clark, 1999; Diller, 1999). Confidence in mining operations cannot be sustained without some consent for operations from local peoples, as well as from national governments, and at least the passive acquiescence of NGOs and wider public opinion in the countries where shareholders are based (Labonne, 1999; Azinger, 1998). If corporations fail to secure and maintain these preconditions, corporate legitimacy, the informal ‘licence to operate’, is threatened. Their operations become increasingly uncertain, the expectation of future surplus is undermined and the leverage of opposition NGOs is greatly enhanced. In February 1998 a meeting of ICEM affiliates participating in the campaign was convened in Johannesburg, South Africa, with 40 delegates from 15 unions. At the meeting the president of the South African National Union of Mineworkers 6 7

Media release, ‘Unions set up global network on RTZ–CRA’, October 1996, ICEM, Brussels. Letter to affiliates, ‘ICEM creation of an ICEM RTZ–CRA network’, Brussels, 3 December 1996.

114 Labour and Globalisation underlined the significance of the campaign structures as a ‘new departure for international trade union action’. The CFMEU national secretary added a further dimension, stressing the necessity for ‘a broad and long-lasting alliance with human rights groups, environmental organisations, indigenous peoples and churches. If based on mutual respect such an alliance could only increase the pressure on the company’; such organisations had been campaigning against Rio Tinto for many years and had ‘the knowledge and resources which we need’; they would, in turn, benefit from the ‘solidarity of organised labour’.8 This position was reflected in the meeting’s final resolutions. The first of these established the trade union network, the second dealt with the creation of a public information database on Rio Tinto, and the third adopted ‘a concerted strategy to ensure that Rio Tinto respects basic human and trade union rights’. As part of this, an action programme would be implemented, ‘with community groups, environmentalists, churches and other organisations which recognise the damaging impact of Rio Tinto’s operations’. The meeting ended with discussions with President Mandela, who condemned ‘in the strongest terms any . . . multinational company that does not allow collective bargaining’.9 In 1998 campaigners mounted a cyber-campaign against Rio Tinto on the model of other ICEM campaigns; this was aimed at demonstrating the transnational scope of protests against the company, and centred on the theme of ‘Nowhere to Hide’. Protestors were encouraged to visit the ICEM website and send an email to the company, as well as signing up to on-line petitions. Campaigners also produced a film, Naked into the Jungle: Rio Tinto, Workers and Communities, an account of the company’s abuses of corporate power, which was launched in March 1998. The film centred on the company’s anti-union policies in Australia, but also ranged across other human rights and environmental issues. At the same time, the ICEM assembled a report on Rio Tinto, to be aimed at shareholders, which also became the foundation for the cyber-campaign. This was not simply to be a trade union document, with shareholders and web-visitors presented with the labour perspective on Rio Tinto’s global operations. Rather, it was to be a broadbased analysis, which embedded labour concerns in a series of wider challenges to the company. Campaigners deliberately sought to prevent the company from characterising their intervention as that of a self-interested labour confederation. To succeed in this, the intervention had to be more broadly based and had to appeal to shareholder concerns about the viability of their investment in Rio Tinto. The ICEM, and especially coordinators of the campaign based in Sydney, deliberately set out to collect information from the existing networks of mining 8

1998 meeting – Maitland Statement. Media release, ‘Report of ICEM Rio Tinto Network Meeting’, Johannesburg, February 1998, ICEM, Brussels. Rio Tinto later claimed that President Mandela had retracted this statement, and took the trouble of writing to participating organisations such as the Mineral Policy Institute, copying a letter from Mandela stating that he had been commenting on labour relations in general rather than voicing an opinion on the issue of union membership in Australia. Letter from Rio Tinto to the president of the MPI, 21 May 1998.

9

Targeting Rio Tinto 115 advocacy NGOs as well as from ICEM trade union affiliates. Large sections of the report were commissioned from organisations such as ‘Peoples Against RTZ and its Subsidiaries’ (Partizans), a long-time critic of Rio Tinto, and MineWatch, both based in the UK; also involved were the US-based Project Underground and Australia-based Mineral Policy Institute (MPI), the Philippine Mining Communities Development Centre, Down to Earth in Indonesia, Community Aid Abroad in Australia, and the World Development Movement, Friends of the Earth and Amnesty International in the UK.10 Many of these groups had been campaigning on Rio Tinto-related issues for many years. Partizans, in particular, was created in 1978 when North Queensland Aborigines contacted London-based activists to put pressure on the company to compensate for dispossession of their lands at Weipa (Moody, 1996). It had organised many actions focused on the London AGM, mounting a disinvestment campaign with the support of the Greater London Council in the early 1980s. More recently, several of the mining advocacy groups, and others, had been involved in a 1997 protest at the London Rio Tinto AGM, focusing on a range of environmental and human rights abuses. MPI and Partizans became key participants in the ICEM report, mainly because they were already committed to producing a joint report on Rio Tinto. This was to be an update of the 1991 Partizans report on Rio Tinto, Plunder!, widely recognised as a key text for campaigners on mining issues (Moody, 1991). Work undertaken for this report was used for the ICEM report, particularly its detailed sections on specific mines, and much of the material on human rights and environmental rights. This helps to account for the form the report finally took. In the report the ICEM integrated labour concerns with the concerns of environmental and human rights campaigners, defining these as threats to the company’s financial viability, rather than simply threats to its moral credibility. Corporate abuses had to become risks for the company – risks that could translate into financial uncertainty, for instance in the form of compensation claims, enforceable in either the UK or Australia. Campaigners sought to avoid generating a knee-jerk reaction from the shareholders against a trade union class perspective. A report that attacked the company for accumulating capital at the expense of its workers could not be expected to find much resonance among shareholders. Instead, the ICEM sought to construct a partnership with investors, in a joint endeavour of holding the corporation to account. Communities whose livelihoods had been undermined by Rio Tinto operations, peoples who had been forced off their lands, or subdued by local security forces acting for Rio Tinto, workers who were being denied the right to join a trade union, or who were enduring substandard working conditions, were all defined as ‘stakeholders’ of the company. The company depended on all stakeholders for its success, and this translated into a series of duties that the company owed to all of them. Shareholders had a financial stake and, by virtue of that, were entitled to expect Rio Tinto to be 10

Contact details for all of these were listed at the end of the 1998 report.

116 Labour and Globalisation accountable and behave responsibly towards them. Likewise, company operations had a direct impact on other stakeholders, and these also had a justified expectation that the company be accountable for its impacts. The report, ‘Rio Tinto: The Tainted Titan’, was presented to shareholders in 1998. It was subtitled ‘The Stakeholders’ Report’ and was structured to mirror the company’s annual report, in A4 format with glossy paper, numerous tables and photographs and a well-designed layout. Shareholders were discouraged from recognising it as a campaign report; in a foreword they were invited to see themselves as playing a central role in pressuring Rio Tinto to become a more responsible ‘corporate citizen’. The foreword states: This report is part of an appeal to shareholders, investor corporations and any other body which may have influence on Rio Tinto to make the company act on its obligations as a corporate citizen. Rio Tinto must fulfil not only its fiduciary duty, but also its wider duty to all those stakeholders who have contributed and continue to contribute to the survival and success of the company. (ICEM, 1998: 1)

This is not the language of class struggle, in which the labour movement takes centre stage; rather it is a language of rights and duties, in which there are diverse and equally legitimate claims that the company is required to address. Not least among these is its duty to its financial stakeholders – the shareholders. These were foregrounded in the report, in the first of its three chapters, with ‘operational and financial analysis’ of the company’s 1997 performance. This stressed financial uncertainty, operational and management problems, and exposure to environmental and legal risks, and raised concerns about executive salaries, contrasting these with minimal contributions to communities affected by Rio Tinto operations. All of these issues were framed as issues for investors, and provided a lead into the second chapter focused on human rights, and the third on environmental health and safety. Indigenous peoples’ rights were addressed in the same chapter as workers’ rights, combining cases of indigenous peoples’ opposition to Rio Tinto operations in Australia, the Philippines and Indonesia with campaigns against deunionisation at existing mines in Australia, Indonesia, Namibia and Norway. The common theme was the abuse of human rights and the impact of this on corporate profile: International human rights are poorly protected by national laws and in most countries where Rio Tinto operates, the risk of exposure or liability for these breaches cannot be expressed in financial terms of criminal sanctions. However, as the company’s international reputation suffers, so do its future opportunities for growth and profit. (ICEM, 1998: 20)

A similar framing of workers’ issues occurs in the third chapter, where questions of health and safety are addressed hand-in-hand with issues of environmental degradation, community health and socio-cultural displacement. Here there were case studies from Freeport, a mine part-owned by Rio Tinto in Indonesia; the Rossing mine in Namibia; Kelian, again an Indonesian mine; Lihir in Papua New Guinea;

Targeting Rio Tinto 117 Capper Pass in the UK; and planned operations in Madagascar. In all cases the interaction between working conditions and impacts on local livelihoods and environments was highlighted. It was argued that the company could be held legally liable under UK law for abuses in its offshore operations (following cases brought by former employees at the Rossing uranium mine), and hence that many of these issues were likely to rebound on the company in years to come. The ICEM report was thus an attempt at concerted alliance-building. The company attempted to pre-empt the ICEM critique with a set of commitments outlined in a sixteen-page pamphlet, ‘The Way We Work: Our Statement of Business Practice’, published in March 1998 (Rio Tinto, 1998a). The ICEM report directly addressed this statement, stating that ‘it would be an abuse of trust of those who have praised . . . [it] were it proven to be a cynical marketing exercise’ (ICEM, 1998: 5). Returning the ball into the company’s court, the ICEM gave Rio Tinto a year to ‘prove that it is a willing and constructive corporate citizen’. The 1998 statement was not Rio Tinto’s first attempt at improving its public image; these efforts, as noted, began in the 1900s. In the 1990s the company was involved in a plethora of foundations and community development projects, invariably directed at peoples affected by Rio Tinto operations, or at indigenous and environmental NGOs that might otherwise be critical of the company.11 The 1998 statement was probably the most comprehensive to date, addressing issues such as political involvements, human rights and health, safety and the environment; and in effect constituted a quasi-code of conduct. Such mechanisms for self-regulation have become the norm for relatively exposed transnational corporations (UNCTAD, 1995; Diller, 1999). Reflecting this political dynamic, the codes have no built-in legal implications and are invariably designed to outflank demands for more thorough-going national and international regulation, for instance through the United Nations. As such they typically lack any concept of binding duty and any distinction between lawful and unlawful actions and are ‘little more than public relations exercises’ (Muchlinski, 1997). Nonetheless such codes can have political effects, especially as the gap widens between corporate claims and corporate practice. This is certainly the case with Rio Tinto. The company statement is a piece of empty rhetoric, but it does offer avenues for sharpened politicisation of corporate practices. In interesting ways the Rio Tinto statement shares the ICEM report’s emphasis on linking corporate responsibility and profitability: In order to deliver superior returns to our shareholders over many years, we take a long term and responsible approach . . . We believe that our competitiveness and future success depend not only on our employees and the quality and diversity of our assets but also on our record as good neighbours and partners around the world. (Rio Tinto, 1998a: 1) 11

One of the more transparent examples was the A$1.2 million the company donated to the World Wildlife Fund in January 2000 for a frog conservation programme. This was condemned by ICEM campaigners as a blatant attempt at window-dressing. Press release, ‘WWF and Rio Tinto partner for frogs’, 4 January 2000, WWF, Sydney.

118 Labour and Globalisation The similarity ends there, as the statement focuses on establishing and promoting a good ‘record’, not on changing corporate practices. The commitments embodied in the statement are very limited, primarily announcements of corporate intention rather than practice. Phrases such as ‘aims to ensure’, ‘strives to understand’, ‘aims to develop’ are widespread. There is much commitment to frameworks of ‘partnership’, ‘trust’, ‘integrity and fairness’, ‘full consultation’, ‘mutual respect’, and ‘practical common effort’. There is no commitment to existing international standards, beyond the Human Rights Declaration, and even this is heavily hedged.12 Likewise, there is no commitment to independent verification or monitoring beyond existing forms of ‘corporate governance’, including the presence of ‘non-executive directors who bring independent judgement and wide knowledge and experience’ to the company (Rio Tinto, 1998a: 3). The Rio Tinto statement implicitly acknowledged the ICEM campaign; this was made explicit later in 1998 with the publication of Rio Tinto’s direct rebuttal of the ICEM report, ‘Rio Tinto The Facts: “Tainted Titan” or Responsible Company?’ (1998b). This was produced in Australia and sent out to shareholders to debunk ICEM claims. ‘The Facts’ covered ‘Aboriginal Relations in Australia’, ‘Policy on Union Representation’ and ‘Human Rights’. On human rights the company stated that it was ‘pleased to be associated with Amnesty International’s efforts to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the [Human Rights] Declaration this year’. Sponsorships aside, the language was remarkably defensive, stating that company policies were based on ‘mutual respect, active partnership and long term commitment’, and adding that ‘our operations are expected to look for opportunities to support positive efforts to promote a broader understanding of the values of human rights, particularly where those efforts assist our local communities’ (Rio Tinto, 1998b: 15). There was a strong emphasis on ‘community partnerships’, foundations and development projects that the company had established. In the Freeport case a glowing tribute from the International Committee of the Red Cross is quoted, in Kelian involvement with the World Health Organisation and relief NGOs is emphasised, in Lihir ongoing consultation and compensation is outlined, and in Rossing the support of SWAPO (the South West African People’s Organisation) and, later, the Namibian government is claimed. In the Philippine case the company outlines how its sensitivity to (by implication misguided and manipulated) local opinion led it to abandon proposals to mine in the country. In general, there is a strong emphasis on partnership and compromise in relation to issues of human rights and environmental and community impacts. In contrast, however, ‘The Facts’ is unequivocal in attacking labour unions, and in particular the CFMEU, for preventing the company from achieving higher productivity in its Australia-based operations. The section on Australian coal defends the company’s policy of introducing individual contracts in its Australia-based operations, 12

The ICFTU produced a detailed critique of the statement, stressing the failure to mention most of the relevant international standards, including OECD and ILO agreements on the conduct of multinational enterprises, on labour standards, indigenous rights and health and safety standards; ICFTU, Brussels, April 1998.

Targeting Rio Tinto 119 quoting extensively from the Australian government’s Industry Commission Report on productivity in the coal industry. At the same time, the company restates its ‘policy on union representation’, under the human rights section of the report, claiming that it respects an employee’s ‘right to choose whether or not they wish to be represented collectively’ (Rio Tinto, 1998b: 15). The main objective of ‘The Facts’ was to separate ‘industrial’ concerns from wider social, cultural and environmental issues. Thus there was much effort put into answering the criticisms levelled against the company by indigenous peoples, environmentalists, human rights organisations and others, emphasising structures of negotiation and consultation. These are, of course, mechanisms of legitimation and co-optation, now common practice for mining companies seeking consent for their operations. The company characterises the ICEM report as an attempt at misleading shareholders, in which these wider concerns are cynically manipulated by the CFMEU in pursuit of its narrow industrial interests. This position is made clear in a covering letter addressed to shareholders from the Rio Tinto chairman, stating that the ICEM report is part of a campaign against Rio Tinto being orchestrated by ICEM and an Australian trade union, the CFMEU. The latter is attempting to internationalise their dispute at the Hunter Valley No.1 mine in New South Wales since they are failing to achieve their objective directly in Australia. The ICEM document includes unsubstantiated allegations and misrepresentations; many dredged up from the past. I very much regret the attempt to mislead you in this way . . . We believe that is it important that people are not misled by sweeping and inaccurate propaganda . . . (Rio Tinto, 1998b: 3)

The exaggerated language employed by the chairman, surprising in a formal letter to institutional and individual shareholders, underlines the effectiveness of the ICEM strategy. The company was seeking to persuade its shareholders that the ICEM campaign was an industrial campaign, driven by the selfish interests of relatively privileged trade unionists in Australia. It was attempting to divide campaigners, confining them to their separate national and issue-based arenas. The ICEM’s concerted challenge, targeted at shareholders, had to be disaggregated, and the best way of doing this was to accuse the CFMEU of manipulating non-labour and non-Australian issues purely for tactical gain. Following the company’s response, trade unionists stepped up the pressure. The CFMEU defended itself against company accusations, arguing that the 1998 report was not primarily concerned with trade union issues; in June 1998 the general secretary of the CFMEU replied to accusations from Rio Tinto’s managing director, stating that only seven pages of the report related to the issue of unionism in Australia, and, furthermore that ‘in undertaking our own campaign to stop unionbusting . . . we have been surprised to find that there are so many groups and communities around the world who have long-standing grievances against the company’.13 The campaign had revealed the full range of potential challenges to 13

Letters page, Australian Financial Review, 15 June 1998.

120 Labour and Globalisation the company, and the ICEM was now in a position to capitalise on the relationships that had been established, to further strengthen its position. In February 1999 a second meeting was convened for trade union participants, this time in London and with involvement from British and European parliamentarians.14 The result was a second report, ‘Rio Tinto: Behind the Façade’, which sought to debunk the company’s claims to have become a good ‘corporate citizen’ (ICEM, 1999). This smaller report focused on a number of key cases to reiterate the campaign position. It was launched by the CFMEU and the Minerals Policy Institute, the Sydney-based mining advocacy group, to coincide with the May 1999 Rio Tinto AGM. In 1999 campaigners also set about deepening the shareholder focus. This resulted in the launch of a shareholder campaign, the ‘Coalition of Rio Tinto Shareholders’, in March 2000. This was led by a former Australian federal cabinet minister, Susan Ryan (soon to become president of the Australian Institute of Superannuation Trustees), and was backed by Northern union federations, notably the US-based AFL–CIO, the British TUC and the Australian CTU, as well as the ICEM and the CFMEU. The initiative followed a model developed by many non-labour NGOs, and also by some trade unions, for example the anti-sweatshop shareholders campaign mounted by US garment unions in the 1990s. The shareholder coalition promoted two resolutions for the May 2000 Rio Tinto AGMs. The first exploited shareholder concerns at ‘corporate governance’ in Rio Tinto, and specifically required the company to appoint an independent deputy chair who could act as advocate for shareholder interests. The second resolution required the company to comply with international human rights standards in the workplace as expressed in ILO conventions, and exploited shareholder concern at the company’s failures in risk management. The overall package was described as ‘restor[ing] shareholder value at Rio Tinto’.15 Some major investors, such as the British-based Co-operative Bank and several industry superannuation fund holders, signalled support for both resolutions, while investment advisers, such as the Australian Shareholders’ Association and Independent Shareholder Services, backed only the first. At the 2000 Rio Tinto AGM the first resolution attracted 20.3 per cent of Rio Tinto shares voted, while the second attracted 17.3 per cent. The national secretary of the CFMEU explained the success of this strategy, stating: ‘Trade unions have demonstrated that they can work with shareholders for the mutual benefit of both in moving a big company to improved board and workplace practice’.16 The two resolutions had offered a quid pro quo, offering shareholders increased influence in exchange for some commitments on minimum labour standards. Generally, AGM resolutions on social issues receive no more than 15 per cent of shares voted, and 14

Notably Richard Howitt, who had initiated the European Parliament’s call for a binding EU code of conduct for EU-based companies operating in non-OECD states. 15 Coalition of Rio Tinto Shareholders, letter to 200 Australian shareholders of Rio Tinto, May 2000, Sydney. 16 CFMEU briefing notes, ‘The international shareholder campaign within Rio Tinto’, May 2000, CFMEU, Sydney.

Targeting Rio Tinto 121 normally well below 10 per cent, so this was an impressive, perhaps unprecedented result. It was certainly the first significant cross-continental shareholder action conducted by trade unions targeted at a major transnational corporation. Such resolutions, even if attracting only modest support, ‘can assist proponents in discussions with management since [they] demonstrate a measure of shareholder support for the spirit of the resolution (Diller, 1999: 121). In the Rio Tinto case, the company began to display some limited flexibility in its dispute with the CFMEU, with its chief executive now talking the language of peace and reconciliation.17 By 2000, then, the focus of the campaign had shifted from an emphasis on coalition-building with non-labour critics of Rio Tinto, to a primarily shareholder focus. Here the strategy was focused on exploiting shareholder concerns, generated in part by the 1998 and 1999 campaign reports, to win the argument for minimum labour standards. The wider environmental, human rights and indigenous rights agenda was still pursued; for instance, the CFMEU and the MPI funded a visit to the 2000 AGM by Muhammed Ramli from communities affected by the Rio Tinto Kelian mine, in Kalimantan, Indonesia.18 Nonetheless it was the shareholder campaign that took centre stage. CFMEU campaigners were concerned that the company had simply been responding with a PR boost, and some community funding. It was hoped that the shareholder campaign would force the board of directors to justify their position directly, preventing them from brushing off the campaign. This shift was combined with a direct appeal to Rio Tinto. In 1999 the ICEM had offered to help to facilitate a solution to the CFMEU–Rio Tinto dispute; this was preceded by pressure from the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) for Rio Tinto to accept the ICEM as a ‘social partner’ in ‘negotiating standards covering the most important areas of your social responsibilities’.19 In 2000 the ICEM declared itself willing to negotiate a code of labour practice with Rio Tinto. This involved, in February 2000, an offer of ‘co-operation with Rio Tinto in return for [a] global agreement on labour rights’, explicitly stating that, in exchange for the right to collective bargaining, the ICEM would be willing to ‘work co-operatively with the company and ensure it is an efficient and competitive producer of minerals and minerals products’.20 Here the ICEM was signalling a willingness to become a partner with Rio Tinto in promoting corporate competitiveness. There are clear tensions between this proposed partnership approach and the conviction that, as the national secretary 17

CFMEU media release, ‘Stunning shareholder support for union’s resolutions at Rio Tinto AGM’, May 2000, CFMEU, Sydney. 18 An Indonesian landowner from Rio Tinto’s Kelian mine attended the 1999 AGM, but was hosted by the MPI rather than by the ICEM campaign out of concern that the Kelian issue could steal the limelight from the shareholder campaign. Press release, ‘Rio Tinto’s shame file: Indonesian landowner’s discontent represented at Rio Tinto AGM’, Mineral Policy Institute, Sydney, 23 May 2000. 19 The ICFTU was responding to the company’s ‘The Way We Work’ statement, and added ‘Working with the ICEM is the best way to ensure that the right words are put on paper and that they are put into practice’. Letter from the ICFTU general secretary to the chair of Rio Tinto, 14 April 1998. 20 This comes from the title of a CFMEU media release, ‘International unions offer co-operation with Rio Tinto in return for global agreement on labour rights’, February 2000, CFMEU, Canberra.

122 Labour and Globalisation of the CFMEU put it in 1998, ‘[we] must get together to reduce the threat of cutthroat competition that leaves all workers worse off’ (Maitland, 1998). Kim Moody highlights precisely this problem in his discussion of the potential role of International Trade Secretariats: If union leaders, who accept more and more of the TNC’s ‘competitiveness’ agenda and are locked into various ‘joint’ schemes with top management, play a major and even growing role in an ITS, it is hard to imagine the performance of that federation improving as the challenges of globalisation continue to grow more difficult. (Moody, 1997: 236)

There is clearly a need to establish what Thorpe calls a ‘negotiating relationship’ with the corporation, but this directly raises the question of what sort of relationship it should be (Thorpe, 1999: 227). If it is a relationship between a highly resourced corporation and a relatively poorly staffed, Northern-based and Northern-led ITS, relatively distanced from rank-and-file union members, then the relationship is likely to be relatively accommodating (Moody, 1997). In this case, the offer of accommodation reflected tactical considerations rather than a fundamental shift. In the first instance the ICEM, and through it the CFMEU, was acting out a concern to find some solution for striking and redundant workers in Australia. Despite the accommodating rhetoric, the ICEM insisted that it would remain involved in the campaign, even if collective bargaining was introduced. If, as was likely, the company rejected the offer, the union would be cast in a positive light, so adding fuel to the shareholder campaign. More broadly, while the offer appeared to overturn the ICEM’s earlier commitment to working with non-labour social movements, it expressed an inevitable difference in immediate priorities, rather than an irreconcilable clash. The ICEM had never seen the campaign as a unified coalition, but rather as a loose network, in which common ground could be developed while maintaining separate priorities. This position was shared by other NGOs, notably the Minerals Policy Institute (MPI), which was anxious not to lose its commitment to addressing environmental and indigenous concerns through its involvement in the Rio Tinto campaign. Indeed, throughout the campaign there was – and still is – a strong emphasis on the involvement of non-labour NGOs. Although key campaign meetings, in 1996, 1998 and 2000, were never held jointly with non-labour movement organisations, they were involved in the campaign. In Sydney the CFMEU established a network of these groups, including environmental, indigenous, human rights and development rights organisations, to coordinate responses. During the campaign there were exchanges and seminars between regional representatives of unions. As noted, the two campaign reports were compiled with the direct assistance of mining advocacy groups, and in fact would have been very different reports without them. Furthermore, the CFMEU was very committed to ensuring that the campaign gave a voice to all ‘stakeholders’ in Rio Tinto operations. When in 1998 Rio Tinto offered behind-closed-doors consultations with the ICEM, the national secretary of the CFMEU countered by insisting that Rio Tinto establish ‘round-

Targeting Rio Tinto 123 table discussions with stakeholders’ in an ‘open meeting’. These forums, which could see groups actively engaging in monitoring the corporation, could enable the company to become ‘more responsive to stakeholder concerns’ (Maitland, 1998). This position had been put to the company chair at the 1998 Melbourne AGM in May and had received a flat refusal, tempered by a very revealing statement that the company would, however, agree to behind-closed-doors meetings with individual stakeholders, clearly attempting to sow division among the various groups. Significantly, it was the CFMEU – rather than the ICEM – that was the key factor in constructing these wider alliances. It was the CFMEU national president who constantly stressed the need for such alliances, and it was the CFMEU that appointed a full-time campaign officer, in early 1998, who had experience in working across environmental, anti-nuclear and trade union issues. In early February 1998 (before the ICEM meeting in South Africa) a number of Londonbased mining advocacy groups met with the CFMEU and it was made very clear that the Australian union was a key sponsor of the campaign and would insist that non-trade union groups were closely involved. The CFMEU position was nonnegotiable, and ensured that the non-labour movement campaigners became active participants at this relatively early stage. While labour organisations were concerned to prioritise the interests of their members, so were non-labour NGOs. Perhaps some underestimated the significance and potential of the ICEM campaign; perhaps others were concerned about their existing partnerships with corporations, or about alienating a relatively conservative or middle-class support base. This latter point was certainly true of Amnesty International, which was associated with the campaign in its early stages, but after being challenged by Rio Tinto quickly distanced itself. This was made clear to participating NGOs in May 1998 when Rio Tinto copied a letter to them from Amnesty International Australia in which its director stated: We regret that Amnesty International may have been used as a supporter of the campaign . . . we have . . . asked that our name not be used on any further campaign materials or public statements that imply Amnesty International supports a campaign against Rio Tinto . . . we look forward to a productive and useful discussion with Rio Tinto on possible ways we can further the protections of international human rights principles.21

There is also an issues of priorities. Where NGOs have worked with trade unions to campaign for codes of conduct, for instance in the Apparel Industry Partnership in the US, there have been disagreements about whether certain labour rights – specifically the requirement for a living wage – should be taken up. Only a small proportion of shareholder resolutions mounted by corporate campaigns address labour issues (50 out of 650 in the US in 1996 for instance; Diller, 1999: 117). In these cases, there was much more concern with issues of forced labour, child labour, 21 Letter from the director of Amnesty International Australia to the managing director of Rio Tinto Australia, 23 April 1998.

124 Labour and Globalisation and health and safety than with freedom of association or rights to collective bargaining. There are also problems of accountability and coherence in the negotiation process – in contrast with trade unionists NGO representatives may be relatively free from public scrutiny. In general terms, the danger is that coolness towards the campaign coming from some mainstream NGOs, combined with the trade union’s anxiousness to be seen to deliver for its members, could drive the campaign back into an industrial relations framework, and from there, into nationally separated bargaining contexts. This would deprive the campaign of its main sources of leverage. As a CFMEU coordinator noted, the company was concerned when it was presented with a transnational trade union alliance; this quickly intensified when it became clear that the alliance was making common cause with the company’s many other environmentalist and indigenous critics. As the campaign broadened it became progressively harder for the company to characterise its critics as self-interested ideologues. Campaigners began to gain some influence over shareholder opinion as the fear of environmental risk and of risk incurred by human rights violations, as well as by the company’s abuse of health and safety and labour rights, drew a significant proportion of shareholders away from the company position. The cross-national social movement strategy was already reaping some rewards; as an experiment, it was working, and needed to be strengthened. Conclusions The current globalising waves of corporate and state restructuring are generating popular responses: just as classical imperialism was challenged and superseded by anti-colonialism, so corporate globalism may be facing transnational challenges. A key challenge comes from campaigns focused on the exercise of corporate power. Here, trade unions and their International Trade Secretariats, in alliance with other social movement organisations, clearly have a major role to play in contesting corporations. In 1997 Moody noted that no ITS had at that stage attempted to ‘coordinate strike action across borders’, adding ‘nor is that likely to happen until bigger changes in the national leadership and membership’s consciousness occur’ (Moody, 1997: 237). It could be argued that in the Rio Tinto campaign, the ICEM has realised at least at some of the potential of cross-national social movement unionism, albeit stopping short of coordinated strike action – as yet. If it is accepted that the strategy has gained some significant leverage over Rio Tinto, to what extent should this been seen as an isolated example? Corporate campaigns are focused on individual sectors and often on an individual company – but they have implications well beyond these immediate targets. The pressure of campaigns, and the inadequate corporate responses, can legitimate existing regulatory agreements – for instance ILO agreements – and can offer justification for more interventionist approaches from other international agencies. Examples from 1999–2000 include the United Nations’ ‘Global Compact’ on the implementation of business obligations, the review by the Organization for

Targeting Rio Tinto 125 Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) of its code for multinational enterprises, and the European Parliament’s promotion of a code of conduct for EU companies operating outside the OECD. By focusing on the immediate urgent needs of workers, communities and activists, corporate campaigns engage with the everyday logic of corporate globalisation, and at the same time necessarily raise the question of how to regulate corporate power. A key issue here is how to deal with corporate responses. Strategic scepticism is perhaps most important. Roger Moody, a long-time activist from Partizans, has argued for campaigns targeting transnational corporations that can strike a balance between ‘naive over-optimism about corporate willingness to change’ and ‘profound pessimism that any re-direction is possible’ (Moody, 1996: 51). Such a balance requires constant watchfulness and solidarity, avoiding a focus on individual corporate abuses and retaining a critique of the overarching structures, both of the corporation and of the institutions through which it exercises influence. Politicising corporate power requires a long view of the process of reclaiming the levers of power across all realms of social life. A focus on short-term gains in one location or sector can become a Pyrrhic victory, as the corporate agenda is simply shifted elsewhere. In 2000 this point was clearly demonstrated as the world’s nine largest mining companies, including Rio Tinto, began working on a ‘Global Mining Initiative’. The initiative was coordinated through the World Business Council on Sustainable Development, with the objective being to establish a ‘sustainable’ future for global mining. The intervention finessed and extended the already established model of corporate agenda-setting on climate change issues, first applied in 1992 (Levy and Egan, 1998). The initiative was explicitly geared at influencing the agenda of the 2002 ‘Rio plus Ten’ meeting of the UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), and was aimed at recruiting a wide range of NGOs – including the labour movement – to the corporate agenda (Global Mining Initiative, 2000; UN Economic and Social Council, 2000). Reflecting the long years of careful watchfulness, many mining advocacy groups, such as the MPI and Partizans, refused to join the corporate bandwagon. Instead, they began organising their own ‘initiative’, to put over their interpretation of the facts, and their prescriptions for the future. The labour movement has a central role to play in developing this alternative agenda, and the Rio Tinto campaign now provides a central foundation from which to do this. References Azinger, K. (1998), ‘Methodology for Developing a Stakeholder-Based External Affairs Strategy’, Geology Bulletin, Melbourne (April): 5–7. Clark, A., and Clark, J. (1999), ‘The New Reality of Mineral Development: Social and Cultural Issues in Asia and Pacific Nations’, Resources Policy, 25. Cowell, S., et al. (1999), ‘Sustainability and the Primary Extractive Industries: Theories and Practice’, Resources Policy, 25: 227–86.

126 Labour and Globalisation Diller, J. (1999), ‘A Social Conscience in the Global Marketplace? Labour Dimensions of Codes of Conduct, Social Labelling and Investor Initiatives’, International Labour Review, 138(2): 99–130. Gill, S., and Law, D. (1989), ‘Global Hegemony and the Structural Power of Capital’, International Studies Quarterly, 33: 475–99. Gindin, S. (1998), ‘Notes on Labor at the End of the Century: Starting Over?’, Monthly Review (July–August): 141–57. Global Mining Initiative (2000), Mining, Minerals and Sustainable Development: Project Strategy, London: International Institute for Environmental and Development. Gorz, A. (1999), ‘A New Task for the Unions: The Liberation of Time from Work’, in Munck and Waterman (eds). Hyman, R. (1999), ‘National Industrial Relations Systems and Transnational Challenges: An Essay in Review’, European Journal of Industrial Relations, 5(1): 89–110. ICEM (International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers’ Unions) (1998), ‘Rio Tinto: The Tainted Titan’, Sydney: ICEM. –– (1999), ‘Rio Tinto: Behind the Façade’, Sydney: ICEM. ILO (International Labour Organisation) (1997), World Labour Report 1997–98: Industrial Relations, Democracy and Social Stability, Geneva: ILO. Labonne, B. (1999), ‘The Mining Industry and the Community: Joining Forces for Sustainable Social Development’, Natural Resources Forum, 23: 315–22. Levy, D., and Egan, D. (1998), ‘Capital Contests: National and Transnational Channels of Corporate Influence on the Climate Change Negotiations’, Politics and Society, 26(3): 335–59. Maitland, J. (1998), ‘Core Labour Standards and Beyond: Reining in the Multinationals’, paper delivered at a conference, Globalisation: Restructuring Capital–Labour Relations, Melbourne (June). Meiksins-Wood, E. (1998), ‘Labor, Class and State in Global Capitalism’, in E. Meiksins-Wood, P. Meiksins and M. Yates (eds), Rising from the Ashes: Labor in the Age of ‘Global Capitalism’, New York: Monthly Review Press. Miyoshi, M. (1995), ‘Sites of Resistance in the Global Economy’, Boundary 2, 22(1): 61–93. Moody, K. (1997), Workers in a Lean World, London: Verso. Moody, R. (1991), Plunder!, London: Partizans/CAFCA. –– (1996), ‘Mining the World: The Global Reach of Rio Tinto’, The Ecologist, 26(2): 46–52. Moran, J. (1998), ‘The Dynamics of Class Politics and National Economies in Globalisation: The Marginalisation of the Unacceptable’, Capital and Class, 66: 53–83. Muchlinski, P. (1997), ‘“Global Bukowina” Examined: Viewing the Multinational Enterprise as a Transnational Law-Making Community’, in G. Teubner (ed.), Global Law without a State, Aldershot: Dartmouth.

Targeting Rio Tinto 127 Munck, R. (2000), ‘ Labour in the Global: Challenges and Prospects’, in R. Cohen and S. Rai (eds), Global Social Movements, London: The Athlone Press. Munck, R., and Waterman, P. (eds) (1999), Labour Worldwide in the Era of Globalisation, London: Macmillan. Otto, J. (1998), ‘Global Changes in Mining Laws, Agreements and Tax Systems’, Resources Policy, 24(2): 79–86. Partizans (1981), RTZ Uncovered, London: Partizans. Rio Tinto (1998a), ‘The Way We Work: Our Statement of Business Practice’, London: Westerham Press. –– (1998b), ‘Rio Tinto The Facts: “Tainted Titan” or Responsible Company?’, Melbourne: Rio Tinto. Standing, G. (1997), ‘Globalisation, Labour Flexibility and Insecurity: The Era of Market Regulation’, European Journal of Industrial Relations, 3(1): 21–57. Stevis, D., and Boswell, T. (1997), ‘Labour: From National Resistance to International Politics’, New Political Economy, 2(1): 93–104. Thorpe, V. (1999), ‘Global Unionism: The Challenge’, in Munck and Waterman (eds). UN Economic and Social Council (2000), ‘Preliminary Views and Suggestions on the Preparations for the 10-Year Review of the Implementation of the Outcome of the UNCED’, report of the Secretary General, Commission on Sustainable Development (March), New York: UN. UNCTAD (United Nations Conference on Trade and Development) (1993), World Investment Report: Transnational Corporations and Integrated Production, New York: UN. –– (1994), Structural Changes in the World Minerals Industry during the 1980s, Report by the UNCTAD Secretariat, Geneva: UNCTAD. –– (1995), World Investment Report, Geneva: UNCTAD Van Der Pijl, K. (1998), Transnational Classes and International Relations, London Routledge. Waterman, P. (1998), Social Movements and the New Internationalisms, London: Cassell. –– (1999), ‘The New Social Unionism: A New Union Model for a New World Order’, in Munck and Waterman (eds). West, R. (1972), River of Tears: The Rise of the Rio Tinto–Zinc Mining Corporation, London: Earth Island.

7. International Solidarity and Labour in South Africa1 Roger Southall and Andries Bezuidenhout

Globalisation is associated with the increased reliance on the regulation of economic relations by markets. National governments turn to neo-liberal approaches to macro-economic management, implying privatisation, monetary liberalisation, a reduction in import tariffs, labour market flexibilisation and fiscal discipline. Countries are also becoming more interconnected as trade barriers between them are dismantled. India reduced its average import tariffs from 82 per cent in 1990 to 30 per cent in 1997, Brazil from 25 per cent in 1991 to 12 per cent in 1997, and China from 43 per cent in 1992 to 18 per cent in 1997 (UNDP, 1999: 29). Likewise, South Africa reduced its average import tariffs on manufactured goods from 14 per cent in 1994 to 5.6 per cent in 1998 (ILO, 1997: 76). This puts workers in different countries in competition with each other, which opens up the prospect of a ‘levelling downwards’ in wages and working conditions. The flow of money between countries has also increased. Foreign direct investment grew to US$400 billion in 1997, seven times what it was in real terms in the 1970s. Goods exported now average a value of US$7 trillion. Also, transnational corporations (TNCs) have been growing at a rapid pace. In 1990, there were 11,300 mergers and acquisitions. In 1997, this number more than doubled to 24,600. In 1997 alone, US$236 billion was spent in cross-border mergers and acquisitions. Many TNCs now have annual sales totalling more than the gross domestic product of many countries, including South Africa (UNDP, 1999: 31–32). As workers across the globe are becoming increasingly interconnected, either through common employers, or through the threat of factories relocating to areas where labour is docile and cheap, trade unions have increasingly become aware of the need for a different approach to campaigns. Certain recent events, such as the involvement of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) in the controversial social clause campaigns during the 1999 Seattle talks of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), have all indicated that there is an increased realisation among organised labour that merely national responses to globalisation are not adequate (Taylor, 1998). 1 Sections on the more recent history of the South African labour movement and international structures are based on research commissioned by the International Institute for Labour Studies, Geneva (see Bezuidenhout, 2000). Of course, the authors of this chapter take responsibility for the arguments put forward.

128

International Solidarity and Labour in South Africa 129 In the early 1970s, Charles Levinson (1972) argued that the spread of TNCs around the globe was providing the economic basis for a new level of trade union internationalism. Arguing that the phenomenal thrust of TNCs was subjecting more workers in more countries to shared exploitation by common employers, Levinson (1972: 14) proposed that at the global level, the international labour movement would need a comprehensive programme of industrial action in order to advance towards full collective – and centralised – bargaining with TNCs. Helping a union or unions in one country would be a first phase; coordinating such action among unions in several countries would be another; and the signing of a truly international agreement (between international union bodies and TNCs) would be a third. However, matters do not seem quite so simple. Rob Lambert (1998: 73) argues that many unions have been responding to globalisation through a form of business unionism. This approach is ‘characterised by a narrow workplace focus’ and a ‘failure to engage with community organisations’. Business unionism becomes global business unionism when unions ‘accept the logic of globalisation as a reason for their engagement’. This form of unionism is by definition nationalist, and not internationalist in nature. But it is bound to be unsuccessful, since it takes a narrow national focus on economies that are in practice not just national, but globalised. Richard Hyman argues: ‘Rather than a crisis of trade unionism, what has occurred is a crisis of a specifically narrow based type of trade unionism’ (in Munck, 1999: 12). Lambert argues that an alternative form of unionism has been emerging, that of global social movement unionism: ‘Global social movement unionism arises when unions are conscious of the linkage between workplace, civil society, the state and global forces and develop a strategy to resist the damaging pressures of globalisation through creating a movement linking these spheres’ (1998: 73). He draws on South African experience to illustrate: ‘Union leaders in South Africa who were active in the 1970s and 1980s are likely to have a deep understanding of this approach. They became conscious that the apartheid state could not be brought to its knees by a narrow workplace focus, no matter how militant that focus might have been’ (1998: 73–74). Indeed, Munck (1999: 7–8) points out that the ‘workers of the “world-market factories” are more than just a passive component of a global reserve army of labour. Like women, the once excluded and peripheralised Third World workers are now playing a key role in revitalising the strategies of the traditional model of trade unionism.’ But the South African form of social movement unionism was tied to a very specific local campaign – the anti-apartheid struggle. In that sense, although drawing on global resources, it was not a global social movement unionism. Consequently, not least because the new South African state has embraced neo-liberalism, the South African trade union movement is now having to confront the challenge of how to respond to globalisation. All three of the major trade union federations – the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), the Federation of Unions of South Africa (FEDUSA), and the National Council of Trade Unions (NACTU) – are affiliated to the ICFTU, and individual trade unions are affiliated to the ICFTU’s International Trade

130 Labour and Globalisation Secretariats (ITSs). In addition, COSATU and NACTU are involved in the continent, through the Organisation for African Trade Union Unity (OATUU) and the Southern Africa Trade Union Co-ordinating Council (SATUCC). South African union international linkages were highlighted when the ICFTU held its seventeenth world congress in Durban in April 2000. The theme of the gathering was ‘Globalising Social Justice: Trade Unionism in the 21st Century’. Speaker upon speaker, after commenting on the significance of the ICFTU holding its congress in South Africa, where the labour movement was instrumental in ridding the society of its apartheid regime, debated issues such as social clauses to trade agreements and reforming global institutions such as the WTO, the ILO, and IMF and the World Bank. A document proposing a ‘Millennium Review’ argued that Unions are increasingly looking to their international structures for effective, coherent and co-ordinated action to transform the institutions that govern the global economy, to achieve sustainable development, to counter-balance the power of multi-national enterprises, and to channel practical and effective solidarity among national trade union organisations. (ICFTU, 2000: 2)

As indicated, transnational trade union involvement is not something new to South African labour. The nature of campaigns may be changing, but South African unionism has always been tied to international dynamics. However, the union movement’s engagement with organised workers and bodies set up by or ‘for’ them has certainly not been unproblematic. At times, it has been characterised by very high levels of solidarity, but also by suspicion and animosity. Significantly, the relationship between South African unions and global players, such as the ICFTU and the World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU), was shaped both by the internal struggle against apartheid and by Cold War politics (Southall, 1995). However, now that COSATU has achieved many of the campaign goals of the 1980s, its position as a recipient of assistance is changing to one in which it is forced to become more outward-looking and to contribute to the struggles of other social movement unions, notably in the South African and Asian context. International labour and South African trade unions: the background2 Circa 1890–1940 International labour connections with the South African working class stretch back to the late nineteenth century, when British immigrant workers established trade unions on the model of those they left behind. The majority of these, with the exception of the Mine Workers’ Union, were craft unions, which easily lent themselves to the elaboration of the racial division of labour which entrenched wide wage disparities between white and black workers. Hence it was that the slogan 2

For reasons of brevity, referencing for the historical sections of this chapter is omitted. Purists should consult Southall, 1995.

International Solidarity and Labour in South Africa 131 ‘Equal Pay for Equal Work’ become the union’s rallying cry, for its practical effect was to secure the exclusion of the overwhelming body of black workers (who lacked formal skills) from the trade union movement. Similarly, although the Labour Party (LP), formed in 1910, was nominally socialist and early affiliated to the Second International, its commitment was overwhelmingly to the white working class and its socialism for white labour only. This was never seriously disputed by the British labour movement, which despatched a number of early visitors, not least because the issue of striking up solidarity with black workers was hardly an issue when they were as yet as industrially unorganised because politically ‘unfree’. The schisms which divided the Second International were replicated in South Africa, when following the outbreak of war a minority of radicals and pacifists left the LP to form the International Socialist League. This subsequently affiliated to the Comintern in 1920 and became the core of the Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA), formed the following year. In contrast, the right wing of the labour movement was centred upon a South African Trade Union Congress (SATUC), which affiliated to the International Federation of Trade Unions (IFTU), and of course upon the LP, which similarly affiliated to the Labour and Socialist International. In South African conditions, the left and right wings of the labour movement were as divided by racial issues as they were by ideology. In short, although the established trade union movement formally endorsed racially open unions from 1929, and thereafter recruited Coloured workers, it remained white-dominated and ultimately white-protectionist. In contrast, the CPSA argued that workers should be organised on the basis of class rather than race, and from its earliest days, various of its leading figures were heavily involved in the recruitment of black workers into trade unions (these latter included Clements Kadalie’s sprawling Industrial and Commercial Industrial Workers’ Union [ICU] until communists were expelled from that organisation in 1926). Yet even this was controversial, for other early communists simply did not view the mobilisation of black labour as then a realistic alternative to the political organisation of the white proletariat, which they regarded as the most advanced segment of the working class. In the event, despite its active early profile among the emerging black working class, the CPSA was to be neutralised by the intervention of the Comintern. The story is highly complicated, but in essence, in 1927 the Comintern decided that the immediate task of revolutionaries in South Africa was to establish a (bourgeois) Black Republic as a stage towards the final overthrow of capitalism. This was at that time a minority position within the South African party, for the majority argued that as yet the white working class was, by virtue of its more advanced political consciousness, potentially much more revolutionary than either the still tiny African bourgeoisie or African workers (who as yet scarcely constituted a class). In contrast, the minority proposed the paramount importance of black unity against white domination, stressed that white workers were playing an ever less revolutionary role, and initially commended the ANC as expressing the national aspirations of Africans.

132 Labour and Globalisation Historians of the party now largely accept that the CPSA was right to prioritise the national rather than the class struggle at the time that it did, yet few fail to condemn the purges that followed, as under Comintern influence the local party leadership now expelled most of those activists (white and black) who, in pursuit of class mobilisation, had been energetically involved in organising black workers into trade unions. Further damage was inflicted when from 1930, in pursuit of a newly adopted Comintern line which ascribed the primary nationalist/antiimperialist revolutionary role to the African proletariat, the CPSA dismissed the ANC as bourgeois and reformist, and directed its own trade union activity towards militant political struggle. The result was that the party lost most of its members, and isolated itself from both the principal vehicle of African nationalism and the most effective African trade unions (primarily concerned with working for better wages and conditions), for the best part of a decade. It only recovered when from 1938, following the Comintern’s new line of now working closely with nationalist and other popular forces against fascism and imperialism, it again began to work closely with the ANC and the non-communist-led African trade unions. Nonetheless, for all that its record was mixed, communist internationalism had played a significant role in stimulating African trade unionism and in proposing its organic connection with the broader struggle for national liberation and democracy. In contrast, Western labour interventions in this era (which the IFTU left largely to the British TUC) were essentially futile. Some attempts were made in the late 1920s to assist the ICU, yet these were essentially premised upon its ridding itself of communist influence and adopting a rigorously ‘non-political’ and bureaucratic trade unionism which was entirely inappropriate to the mass nature of that union, and to the political repression which it encountered. Such assistance is deemed by some historians to be in considerable measure to blame for the rapid decline of the ICU in the early 1930s (see e.g. Simons and Simons, 1983: 360–62). Imbued with liberal paternalism and identified with colonial labour policies, the TUC failed completely to grapple with the connection between African trade unionism and emergent nationalist aspirations. Meanwhile, drawn towards the white labour movement (which supposedly represented all South African workers in international fora such as the IFTU, the ILO and Commonwealth Labour Conferences), it proved unable – or unwilling – to confront the fact that, whatever internationalist leanings the established unions might once have had, these had long been buried under the weight of their racial protectionism. 1940–1970 The decision by communists to work with trade unions they had previously dismissed as reformist facilitated the eventual formation in 1941 of the Congress of Non-European Trade Unions (CNETU), which provided the framework for an upsurge of militant labour activity by black workers during the Second World War. This culminated in the major African mineworkers’ strike of 1946, which was brutally crushed by the state and served as a prelude to a vicious post-war clampdown

International Solidarity and Labour in South Africa 133 on African trade union activity which smashed CNETU as an effective organisation. This pre-dated the arrival of the National Party in power in 1948, but was thereafter supplemented by the Suppression of Communism Act of 1950, which was used to deprive many African unions of their remaining leaders. By the mid-1950s, under pressure to operate on an apartheid basis, the South African labour movement had divided into three parts. First, there were the proNationalist trade unions, which operated on an unambiguously racially exclusive basis, and which therefore enjoyed no international connections. Second, there were the remaining bulk of the established trade unions. By 1954 these were largely grouped within the Trade Union Council of South Africa (TUCSA), which included both white and racially mixed affiliates, although these latter excluded African workers, who were organised only in ‘parallel’ (subordinate and separate) unions. Claiming that such segregation was forced upon its unions, TUCSA maintained working relations with the ICFTU, even though the latter disallowed its affiliation on the grounds of the racial basis of its organisation. Meanwhile, the third branch of the trade union movement was constituted by the South African Congress of Trade Unions (SACTU), which was formed in 1956 by remnants of CNETU and some fourteen African and mixed unions which had broken with those that had formed TUCSA over the latter’s acceding to the government’s segregationist demands (Webster [ed.], 1978; Luckhardt and Wall, 1980). Internationally, SACTU identified with (but did not formally affiliate to) the WFTU. This stemmed from its ideological affinity. SACTU was far from being a communist organisation, not least because of the inhibiting effects of the Suppression of Communism Act. More important was the impact of apartheid labour legislation. This so narrowed the legal space in which black unions were able to operate that SACTU moved easily to an ideology which argued that black workers’ struggle against economic exploitation was inextricably tied up with the struggle for the political emancipation of the people as a whole. This ‘political unionism’ inevitably brought SACTU into close association with the Congress Alliance (composed of the ANC, the Coloured Peoples’ Congress, the Indian Congresses and the small, white Congress of Democrats), which was committed to the struggle for national liberation on a non-racial and fully democratic basis (Lambert, 1985). Yet SACTU’s preference for the WTU was also a recognition of South African communists’ historical commitment to non-racial trade unionism, which sat uneasily with the ICFTU’s anti-communist priorities and the informal links it retained (principally via the TUC) with the racially ordered unions grouped in TUCSA. The TUC had always deplored the racial basis upon which TUCSA had been founded, yet in practice it supported the latter’s formation of parallel unions for Africans on the grounds that otherwise the established unions were too weak and divided to resist further attacks upon trade unionism by the government. In contrast, although SACTU was founded upon the universal principles of trade unionism (which forbid discrimination against any workers on grounds of race, colour or creed), the TUC was alarmed by its political orientation. This it viewed as inspired by communism, sustained by African nationalism (with which it had

134 Labour and Globalisation little sympathy) and as much too distant from the economistic brand of unionism it endorsed. This antipathy to SACTU rubbed off onto the ICFTU, which, although much less concerned about anti-colonialism than the TUC, was obsessed by its Cold War struggle against communism and the WFTU. Convinced that the Congress Alliance was effectively directed by communists, the ICFTU therefore inspired the formation, mainly from TUCSA parallel unions, of the Federation of Free African Trade Unions of South Africa (FOFATUSA) as a rival to SACTU in 1959. Once established, FOFATUSA received funding from the ICFTU, to which it became affiliated. Yet unlike SACTU, whose unions established a firm base in the factories, FOFATUSA had limited support on the ground, and it never made much impact except to import the rivalries of the Cold War. The banning of the ANC and PAC after the Sharpeville Massacre in 1961 meant that the major responsibility for the continuing mobilisation of the masses now fell upon SACTU. Its capacity to call upon worker support was therefore central to the subsequent holding of quite widely supported stay-aways which mourned the Sharpeville dead and protested against the NP’s declaration of South Africa as a republic. Its repression inevitably followed, propelling many of its key activists either towards the armed struggle or into exile. However, for all that its organisation within South Africa was now totally destroyed, the support which it enjoyed internationally meant that it was never officially proscribed. WFTU’s support for SACTU was expressed only from outside South Africa, not least because visits by SACTU delegates to meetings outside the country had been systematically barred. Nonetheless, WFTU’s access to international platforms proved crucial to SACTU’s survival as a movement in exile. This proved particularly costly for the apartheid regime at the annual meetings of the ILO, where from 1959 onwards, the WFTU linked up with especially African delegations to lobby for the replacement of TUCSA by SACTU delegates as being most representative of South African workers. When taken up by the newly formed Organisation of African Unity, this then led to the expulsion of South Africa from the ILO in 1963. SACTU subsequently built upon this major triumph to wage an international campaign against FOFASATU and the ICFTU as having divided the black working class. In this it enjoyed early success. Indeed, by 1966, FOFATUSA was dead, dissolved by the decisions of various of its own affiliates to join TUCSA, which had opened doors to African unions precisely to ward off accusations at the ILO that it was a racially organised body. Meanwhile, SACTU’s complaints about the ICFTU fell upon receptive ears in Africa, where, ironically, many newly independent governments now wished to be able to impose controls upon their own trade union movements without external interference. Accusations that the ICFTU had played a divisive role in South Africa therefore melded with widespread accusations that it had become, via the affiliation of the AFL–CIO (the American Federation of Labor–Congress of Industrial Organizations), a front for the American Central Intelligence Agency. The upshot was that by the late 1960s, the ICFTU had lost the large majority of its affiliates in Africa.

International Solidarity and Labour in South Africa 135 SACTU had successfully harnessed the wind of African decolonisation: FOFATUSA was dead, the ICFTU had been widely dismissed as divisive, and SACTU had established itself in international fora as the principal representative of South Africa’s black working class. Yet all this proved a Pyrrhic victory. International trade union action had been seen as a vital component of a much wider effort to reverse the tide of apartheid, yet by the late 1960s it had become clear that SACTU had overestimated the likely impact of external action. Soon SACTU was lamenting the inexperience of its officials in exile, its lack of financial resources, and its lack of substantive support from other African national union federations. Importantly, too, it had alienated itself from the ICFTU, which, for all its faults, remained the focal point for Western trade union international activity. International labour and South Africa in the 1970s and the 1980s The patterns of international linkages and rivalries established in the 1950s and 1960s came to define a relationship of distrust between SACTU and the ICFTU during the 1970s and 1980s, even though during these years both organisations declared their total support for the struggle of black South African workers for industrial and political rights. However, a relationship which had been largely dictated by the Cold War subsequently became redefined by, on the one hand, a political liberation of the ICFTU following the resignation from its ranks of the AFL–CIO in 1969, and on the other hand, the intellectual and political capture of SACTU by the South African Communist Party (SACP) following its forced retreat into exile. The AFL–CIO withdrew from the ICFTU for two major reasons. First, it resented being accountable to the ICFTU for its expenditure in Asia, Africa and Latin America; and second, it perceived its mainly social-democratically inclined fellow affiliates as dangerously soft on communism. Although its departure left many cold warriors within the ICFTU’s bureaucracy, it nonetheless greatly increased the relative weight within the organisation of the Dutch and Scandinavian national centres, all of which had become strongly supportive of the struggle for national liberation in South Africa. For the moment, however, because there was no trade union body unquestionably representative of black workers within South Africa, the ICFTU was mainly restricted to anti-apartheid activity at the UN and ILO. Here, in fact, it found itself playing second fiddle to SACTU, which – with the WFTU’s support – was the key force in organising an International Trade Union Conference against Apartheid in 1973. But in this same year the international as well as the South African landscape was to be transformed by the Durban strike wave. The ICFTU’s programme of action The strike wave of 1973 registered a massive demand by black workers for industrial rights. It also rendered visible a number of small, yet potentially effective

136 Labour and Globalisation proto-unions which were beginning to cater for black workers. However, while SACTU queried the strategy, capacity and representativeness of these bodies, the ICFTU immediately recognised them as worthy of its support. The outcome was its formation in 1974 of a Co-ordinating Committee for South Africa (COCOSA), principally composed of representatives from its major European affiliates, whose role was to promote trade union assistance to South Africa. The Programme of Action which soon emerged had four major elements. These were: 1. The imposition of trade union sanctions against apartheid by the exertion of pressures upon governments to discourage emigration to, and to break all cultural, commercial and diplomatic contacts with, South Africa. Such pressure involved calls for mandatory sanctions, observance of the UN arms embargo, campaigns for withdrawal of investment, industrial action by ICFTU affiliates to boycott South African goods, and so on. 2. The monitoring of, and active protest against, violations by the apartheid regime of trade union and human rights, and the channelling of substantial financial aid to victims of such abuse, and to their families. This involved assistance to cover the legal costs incurred by the emergent unions, many of which became deeply engaged in legal process. Between 1976 and 1981, for instance, the ICFTU forwarded US$588,419 in legal and relief aid to emergent unions. 3. The imposition of trade union pressures upon TNCs in South Africa to recognise representative trade unions and to improve wages and conditions for their black workers. This involved the ICFTU in backing Codes of Conduct as guidelines for corporate behaviour in South Africa, despite much criticism which argued that these served only to camouflage corporate exploitation. For the ICFTU, however, support for the Codes was only one plank of a strategy which otherwise involved pressure upon parent companies to correct the employment practices of their South African subsidiaries, the concentration of campaign efforts by ICFTU affiliates upon designated ‘target’ companies, and solidarity support by home unions and ITSs for black unions engaged in disputes with foreign firms. 4. The coordination and channelling of financial assistance from ICFTU affiliates to the emergent unions and federations, to enable them to meet costs of salaries, rent, transport, education and organisation. Such funding amounted to well in excess of US$6.6 million between 1976 and 1984, and further substantial amounts in the later 1980s. Most of this money originated from the foreign aid budgets of Western governments, and inevitably aroused fears of dependence and imperialistic intentions among recipients. However, the donor affiliates on COCOSA clearly recognised the importance of their funding only genuinely representative unions, as well as their maintaining a careful balance of resources between bodies such as the Trade Union Advisory Co-ordinating Committee (formed in 1973), the successor Federation of South African Trade Unions (FOSATU) (formed in 1979), the Council of Unions of South Africa (CUSA) (established in 1980) and various independent unions. Indeed, ICFTU donor affiliates’ determination not to favour inappropriately any federations or unions

International Solidarity and Labour in South Africa 137 enabled them to rein in definite imperialist tendencies evinced by the AFL–CIO when the latter, which rejoined the ICFTU in 1980, attempted to launch its own independent and uncoordinated programme of financial support. That the ICFTU programme was beset by various problems is undeniable. COCOSA provided for competition as well as cooperation among donor affiliates; CUSA affiliated to the ICFTU while FOSATU did not; COSATU subsequently declined to accept monies from the ICFTU, insisting that these should come directly from its affiliates; and the ICFTU bureaucracy was widely viewed as inefficient and, especially by FOSATU and COSATU trade unionists, as having its own cold warrior agenda. Furthermore, the ICFTU, and the international departments of its major affiliates, notably of the TUC, the Canadian Labour Congress (CLC) and the AFL–CIO, were viewed as politically regressive by activist elements of the domestic labour movements they supposedly represented. Nonetheless, overall, the programme made a substantial impact in legitimating and sustaining the post-1973 democratic trade union movement in South Africa, as well as contributing significantly to the level of anti-apartheid pressures exerted upon Pretoria, Western governments and TNCs. For SACTU, however, the ICFTU’s solidarity was designed to subvert as much as sustain the course of South African liberation. SACTU’s exile role Many of those activists who were critical of the ICFTU were guided politically by SACTU, which in exile moved into a close ideological association with the SACP. The fundamental problem for SACTU was that it could not bring itself to recognise the emergent union movement as a progressive and legitimate successor to itself until, in the early 1980s, the longevity and popularity of the new unions could no longer be denied. Prior to this, SACTU’s strategic orientation had become paralysed by an inflexible analysis of South Africa as fascist. This argued from SACTU’s own experience that the weight of governmental repression under apartheid was such that the operation of genuinely representative non-racial trade unions was impossible. Only the African working class could determine its struggle for liberation by mobilising the masses in a vast organised movement of solidarity. However, precisely because their movement was suppressed internally, South African workers, through the ANC, SACP and SACTU, had long concluded that armed struggle, carried on in parallel with mass political action domestically and the isolation of South Africa internationally, was the only means for the people to achieve power (Gaetsewe, 1977). This inevitably led SACTU into all sorts of confusion. The resurgence of black working-class resistance, as exemplified by the Durban strike wave, could scarcely be denied. However, given the characterisation of the state as fascist, such activity was portrayed as essentially heroic and futile, requiring an input of external political organisation to transform it into sustained struggle. Open forms of organisation,

138 Labour and Globalisation such as the new unions, would rapidly be crushed, and the only way forward was on the basis of underground organisation. It was this perspective which led to FOSATU, in particular, being viewed with suspicion, for although it subscribed to SACTU’s own principles of non-racial, industrial trade unionism, it rejected the latter’s stress on political unionism for an insistence that political engagement would divert its energies from factory organisation and endanger its independence. It was only towards the mid-1980s, following reverses for unions such as the South African Allied Workers’ Union (which ran closer to SACTU’s principles by linking factory to community struggles), that SACTU began to offer FOSATU grudging support, especially to the extent that it began to appreciate the centrality of the latter to the trade union unity process, which subsequently culminated in the formation of COSATU in 1985 on a basis of industrial unionism. However, having eventually conceded the legitimacy of the internal unions, SACTU now came to insist in anti-apartheid circles and in international fora that it should be the sole channel of external assistance to the South African working class. SACTU’s commitment to trade union unity may at last have drawn it closer to FOSATU, yet it was its belated and reluctant recognition of the emergent unions which had proved too much for a small group of Marxist intellectuals, who, in the late 1970s, had begun to criticise the exile movement from within for standing aside from the latest waves of worker self-organisation. Arguing the need for direct international working-class support for South African labour struggles, these dissidents opposed SACTU’s undifferentiated stress on boycotts against South Africa with the slogan ‘sanctions against capital, solidarity with labour’. After bitter internal feuding, these dissidents – who developed a Trotskyist critique of SACTU, the ANC and the SACP – were suspended by SACTU in 1980 and were eventually expelled from the ANC (within which they had organised a Marxist Workers’ Tendency) in 1985. What they had done was frontally to challenge SACTU’s insistence that it possessed the sole right to determine the nature of connections with the internal labour movement. However, it was precisely because SACTU premised its critique of other Western labour contacts with South Africa upon this claim that it reacted so vigorously against the dissidents. Hence it was that in April 1982 a virulent article in Workers’ Unity, SACTU’s newspaper, proclaimed ‘Direct Links Stinks’, and attacked direct contacts as jeopardising internal unions and deliberately attempting to bypass the liberation movement. Had this dispute remained entirely internal to SACTU, its impact might have remained overwhelmingly doctrinal. In practice, however, it made a major impact upon the international labour scene, for SACTU’s exile strength lay in its capacity to mobilise support among rank-and-file trade unionists, and to blend this with popularly based anti-apartheid activism. This was to bring it into perennial conflict with the ICFTU and its affiliates, whose greatest weakness lay in a lack of connection between their leaderships and their grassroots activist membership.

International Solidarity and Labour in South Africa 139 The ICFTU and SACTU: competitive internationalisms By 1970 much of the heat had gone out of ICFTU/SACTU antipathy. With the AFL–CIO having gone, the ICFTU could be less easily decried as an arm of the CIA; the decision by TUCSA (having effectively absorbed FOFATUSA in 1966) to expel African unions in 1969 left the ICFTU with no conceivably credible, non-racist trade union centre within South Africa to relate to; and joint participation by the ICFTU with SACTU/WFTU in initiatives at the UN and ILO (notably the 1973 Conference) provided a framework for some considerable agreement concerning external trade union action against apartheid. However, the re-emergence of trade union activity among black workers within South Africa from 1973 was to revive the scope for competitive labour internationalism. SACTU suspected that the objective of ICFTU financial aid was more to boost a non-communist alternative to itself than to promote a black trade union movement which would seriously threaten the apartheid regime. In any case, SACTU felt threatened, because while strong on rhetorical support, WFTU never provided it with anything like the (modest) financial resources which ICFTU came to deploy among the emergent unions. Indeed, much of the solidarity money which SACTU raised for assisting South African trade unionists was probably devoted to paying its own way, and rather little was directly channelled to underground organisational work actually within South Africa. For their part, while the emergent unions felt relatively safe to accept financial support from the ICFTU, they were extremely wary of exposing themselves to attack by the regime for engaging in any connection to SACTU. Furthermore, just as the ICFTU declined to acknowledge SACTU’s claim to be the major historical representative of the black working class, so it denied primacy to the ANC and accorded equality of status to the Pan-Africanist Congress as a liberation movement. Indeed, during the early to mid-1970s, strong backing by the ICFTU for the Black Allied Workers’ Union indicated a preference by its bureaucracy (although not by its affiliates) for the Black Consciousness Movement. Hence it was that although SACTU publicly endorsed any activity by the ICFTU which was compatible with its own isolationist objectives, it simultaneously worked hard to discredit Western labour’s direct connections to the emergent unions. It was enabled to do this by its creation, notably in Britain and Canada, of widespread support among trade union activists at grassroots and shop steward level. In Britain (where SACTU was based), this then interlocked with the extensive organisational base provided by the Anti-Apartheid Movement (AAM), which in turn was closely aligned to the ANC (and less openly to the SACP). In Canada, meanwhile, where no single organisation linked anti-apartheid activists, a SACTU Solidarity Committee was created in 1980, whose purpose was to mobilise backing for SACTU among Canadian trade unionists. The International Departments of both the TUC and the CLC made efforts to promote support for South Africa’s black trade unions among their own memberships by the conventional means of trade union education: the distribution of antiapartheid material, the use of union newspapers, the holding of weekend

140 Labour and Globalisation workshops, and of course support for specific solidarity campaigns by particular workers. But in so doing they proved rather less successful than SACTU, for three major reasons. The first was that as national centres, they were confederal organisations, where the channel of communication ran indirectly from top to bottom via individual affiliated national union hierarchies. There was, in other words, a considerable vertical gap between senior Congress and union officials and ordinary workers, often compounded by mutual suspicion of motives and activities. In contrast, SACTU was able to approach trade unionists, at different levels in the different union hierarchies, horizontally, unencumbered by the baggage of other issues which often complicate connections between union officials and shopfloor activists. Secondly, whereas the relatively small International Departments of both the TUC and the CLC were concerned with international solidarity issues globally and could only devote so much time to South Africa, SACTU’s was a single-issue campaign which allowed for a much more concentrated and single-minded effort. Thirdly, whereas SACTU proclaimed the stark message that black workers would best be assisted by direct support for itself, the ANC and the struggle for liberation, the TUC and CLC followed the ICFTU in declaring a much more complicated strategy concerning the need for non-South African neutrality between liberation movements externally, and between the various democratic trade union blocs within South Africa. There were good, non-imperialistic reasons for this, yet it was a complex story to sell to ordinary workers in the West who, however committed in principle to supporting ‘black South African trade unions’, rarely had any detailed knowledge about the South African labour movement. As noted above, because it contested initially their legitimacy and viability, and subsequently their strategies, SACTU objected to direct connections between the emergent democratic unions and the Western labour movement. However, following the formation of COSATU in 1985, SACTU quietly buried its objection to ‘direct links’ and moved into a much closer, cooperative relationship with (especially) the British TUC and other Western national union leaderships, as these latter committed themselves to a crescendo of anti-apartheid popular activity. Nonetheless, after SACTU’s return to South Africa after 1990 (following the unbanning of the ANC), and its subsequent decision to merge itself into COSATU, the residue of its continuing hostility towards the Western internationals was one of the factors which contributed to COSATU’s initial wariness about affiliating to the ICFTU. Global and local realignment in the 1990s The collapse of the Soviet Union and the unbanning of the ANC, the SACP, the PAC, and other liberation organisations in 1990 transformed the political landscape in South Africa. Internally, COSATU played an important role, now in formal alliance with the ANC and the SACP. Externally, COSATU put international relationships on its agenda in order to address what Jay Naidoo, then its general secretary, deemed

International Solidarity and Labour in South Africa 141 the issues raised by ‘the world restructuring of the economy, and the loosening of the political climate internationally’. In this context, Naidoo felt that workers were going to begin sharing common problems as an unbridled move to free-market systems placed their lives and jobs in increasing jeopardy (Naidoo, 1991: 18). Prior to this, in October 1990, COSATU had sent its first formal political delegation to the Soviet Union, even though, by then, it was already clear that it was leaning towards a more engaging approach with the ICFTU (Mather, 1991; Naidoo, 1991). Indeed, in December 1990, COSATU had its first meeting with the Executive Council of the ICFTU in Tokyo. COSATU likewise attempted to ‘normalise’ its relationship with the AFL–CIO. Having already established strong links with affiliates of the AFL–CIO, such as the ACTWU and the UAW, Naidoo pointed out: [T]here is more that unites than divide us. We should not pretend that there are not differences – there will always be differences – but we should co-operate around the issues common to us. Whether you are an American worker, or a worker in the Soviet Union, Europe, Asia or Africa, the world restructuring of the economy is going to undermine your rights in the interests of increased profits for the capitalists. (Naidoo, 1991: 18)

COSATU also increased its activities in Africa. In 1990, COSATU attended the congress of the OATUU for the first time. As Naidoo (1991: 17) pointed out: ‘None of us really knew what OATUU stood for, but it was a symbolic thing of wanting to identify with Africa’. Meanwhile, COSATU had also been building links with unions in the Southern African region, through the Southern African Trade Union Co-ordinating Committee (SATUCC), most notably by involving itself in a process of forging a social charter for workers’ rights. Naidoo (1991: 18) noted that ‘Our common interests with Southern African workers will be shared, particularly as borders open up, with industry relocating, or manufacturing industry in the Frontline States being wiped out by South Africa’. NACTU had already affiliated to OATUU and was also actively involved in SATUCC. Concerning the latter, Cunningham Ngcukana, general secretary of NACTU, pointed out: The Southern African region is economically integrated. We have a lot of migrant labour from neighbouring countries and we should develop a social charter to protect their rights. Most South African employers in industries including construction, mining, and forestry, are taking people from outside because they do not have to make social security payments . . . Also, once the political question is resolved in South Africa, there are possibilities that South African companies will move into neighbouring states and exploit workers there . . . Co-operation amongst Southern African trade unions is very important to tackle employers in the whole region. (Ngcukana, 1991: 26)

Meanwhile, just as it was re-evaluating its regional linkages, COSATU began to involve itself in other international connections, mainly through conferences with labour movements from elsewhere. For instance, one such engagement was the Indian Ocean Regional Initiative, which held its first meeting in Perth, Western Australia in May 1991, attended by unions from the Philippines, Pakistan, Sri

142 Labour and Globalisation Lanka, Malaysia, Indonesia and Papua New Guinea as well as from Australia (Lambert, 1992). COSATU also attended a second meeting in December 1992 at which the various federations agreed to implement an exchange programme and to work collectively towards a Social Code of Conduct, which set out basic trade union rights. The Code called for targeted boycott campaigns against companies which did not comply with the labour standards set out (Von Holdt, 1993a). Similarly, a second engagement was COSATU’s holding of joint conferences with the Italian General Confederation of Labour (CGIL) and the Workers’ Centre of Brazil (CUT) to discuss the challenges posed by globalisation (Von Holdt, 1993b). In February 1993, in the context of an increase in violence in South Africa, specifically in the KwaZulu-Natal province, COSATU and NACTU hosted a delegation from the ICFTU which included the federation’s general secretary, Enzo Friso, the chair of the ICFTU’s human rights committee and unionists from the Scandinavian countries, the Netherlands, Britain, the US, Italy, Japan and Zambia and a number of ITSs. The Co-ordinating Committee on South Africa (COCOSA) met in Johannesburg, the first time in South Africa since it was founded in 1976. Subsequently, Friso made three points which prepared the ground for closer relations. First, he insisted that the ICFTU would welcome a progressive input from COSATU; second, he acknowledged that funds from the ICFTU had in the past gone ‘into the pockets’ of certain African and South East Asian dictators, and that this would come to an end; and, third, he was also critical of structural adjustment programmes, saying that these programmes had ‘no principles’. He also stated that it was possible to put pressure on the IMF and the World Bank to ‘listen and not only impose’ (Von Holdt and Zikalala, 1993; see also Waterman, 1993). These statements were made in the context of a considerable critique of the ICFTU’s role in Asia. Through the Indian Ocean Regional Initiative, COSATU had become involved with many of the ‘independent’ unions in Asia which were very critical of the ICFTU’s membership base in the so-called ‘yellow’ unions (established by governments to pre-empt autonomous worker action). Consequently, COSATU’s potential affiliation to the ICFTU became a hotly debated topic, because although unionists from Asia expressed their satisfaction with the above statements from the ICFTU when in South Africa, they were concerned whether they would be translated into practical policy. According to them, ‘such a change would necessitate a dramatic transformation of the ICFTU’s role in Asia, its affiliation base and its organisational structures’. Hence they argued that ‘[if] COSATU affiliates to the ICFTU without bargaining and negotiating the issue of the character of the ICFTU in Asia, an historic opportunity will have been lost . . . because the ICFTU will be able to gain enormous credibility from COSATU’s affiliation, without having to transform its Asian operations’ (Meecham et al., 1993). Indeed, the Philippines’ Kilusang Mayo Uno wrote an open letter calling on COSATU not to affiliate, since the ICFTU was ‘tainted with blood and bribe money’ (KMU, 1993). However, although cognisant of such views, COSATU argued the need for greater global cooperation between trade unions, and opted to affiliate to the ICFTU in 1997, as did NACTU. Their lead was then followed by FEDUSA, which affiliated in 1998.

International Solidarity and Labour in South Africa 143 Meanwhile, COSATU’s involvement in OATUU and SATUCC led to more active campaigns in Africa. One example was its campaign in support of the Swaziland Congress of Trade Unions (SCTU). In 1997, the SCTU went on a two-day strike to support its demands for democracy and the recognition of labour rights by the Swazi government. On the first day of the strike, 31 January 1997, the Swaziland government imprisoned 23 members of the pro-democracy movement, including the SCTU general secretary, Jan Sithole. In response, COSATU threatened to block delivery of goods to Swaziland at the border. When, twelve days later, the union leaders had not been released, a delegation from SATUCC, including representatives from COSATU and NACTU, met with the Swazi government to negotiate for the release of the detained leaders (a request which was subsequently met). Then, in March, COSATU, in consultation with SATUCC and the SCTU, organised a blockade of the border posts, bringing the transport of goods between the two countries to a temporary standstill. Although the campaign failed to result in major reforms in Swaziland, it indicated the potential for regional trade unions to become involved with SATUCC in coordinating struggles for labour rights and democratisation. Individual unions have also become involved in transnational campaigns, especially in the clothing and textile industries. For instance, in 1997, while South Africa was negotiating a bilateral trade agreement with Zimbabwe, the Southern African Clothing and Textile Workers’ Union wrote a letter to the Southern African Customs Union, demanding that it prevent Zimbabwe from exporting textiles into South Africa until workers who had been dismissed as a result of a strike were reinstated. The Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions strategically used the letter in its public campaigns for labour rights. Similarly, the Transport and General Workers’ Union (TGWU) has signed a statement of intent with the Maritime Union of Australia whereby they have committed themselves to advancing the process of linking organisationally the ports of Fremantle in Western Australia and Durban in South Africa. This follows the refusal of TGWU members to offload Australian ships during the dockworker dispute in Australia in 1998. Another campaign resulted in the Maputo Declaration on the Textiles, Clothing and Leather Industries, signed on 9 May 1999. Several unions organising workers in these related industries, including unions in South Africa, Lesotho, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Zambia, Tanzania and Zimbabwe, met in Maputo to discuss the state of the industry in the region. The participants identified common problems, such as the erosion of labour standards by export processing zones, the deleterious impacts of structural adjustment programmes and tariff reductions on the industry, as well as the difficulties caused by large-scale smuggling and the trading of second-hand clothing intended as donations. In the declaration, the unions jointly called for more appropriate macro-economic policies, the promotion of workers’ rights, linking trade and labour rights, a more careful consideration of the reduction of import tariffs on specific industries, and the integration of export processing zones into the national economies of countries. Furthermore, the unions committed themselves to developing ‘strong, financially independent organisations, controlled by members and run in a democratic manner’ and to

144 Labour and Globalisation sharing information and building ‘a comprehensive database on every company in the region, and on wages and working conditions applicable in every country and every workplace’. They also agreed to meet as a regional structure at least twice a year, to build the structures of the International Textile, Garment and Leather Workers’ Federation (ITGLWF) in Africa, and to ‘convene meetings of shop stewards in the region from the same companies, and undertake campaigns to be run across national frontiers’. All in all, the approach of the Maputo Declaration reflects COSATU’s model of unions controlled by workers and strong shop stewards’ committees, now linked up to broader campaigns for democratisation. COSATU’s commitment to the ‘new internationalism’ has also been indicated by its having hosted several high-profile conferences and congresses. The first was the Seventh Ordinary Congress of OATUU, which was held in Johannesburg in September 1999. The second took place a month later, when COSATU hosted the Southern Initiative on Globalisation and Trade Union Rights (SIGTUR). This was attended by delegates from South Korea, Australia, Pakistan, India, Indonesia and the Philippines, who addressed topics which included workplace restructuring through ‘lean production’, resulting from economic liberalisation, privatisation, downsizing, outsourcing and casualisation; forms of union resistance, including Korean workers’ campaigns against casualisation and the conflict on the Australian waterfront; and sector-level strategies on recruiting workers, building strong unions, and new approaches to casualisation. The third congress, that of the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers’ Unions (ICEM), was held in Durban from 3 to 5 November 1999, at which the National Union of Mineworkers lobbied support from unions in Canada and Australia to put pressure on the multinational mining company Placer Dome to reinstate 3,000 workers retrenched from the Western Areas gold mine. Conclusion As pointed out in the introduction, Levinson has proposed that the increasing reach of TNCs has provided new opportunities for international trade unionism. We have also seen that, in practice, South African trade unions have sought to confront TNCs by mobilising support from overseas via the international labour network. Nonetheless, for all the relative success they may be said to have at times enjoyed, there are those who argue that the globalisation of the world economy does not provide the conditions for a new phase of labour internationalism in the way that Levinson insists. An important argument has been pursued by Olle and Schoeller (1977), who propose that unions in industrially advanced countries have normally protected their members from lower wage competition of less well-paid workers elsewhere. From this perspective, the most likely response of trade unions in the North to a shift of jobs to the South will probably be nationalistic rather than internationalistic. In this regard, many governments and some trade unions from the South are suspicious about arguments to link social clauses to trade agreements.

International Solidarity and Labour in South Africa 145 Haworth and Ramsay (1988) similarly dispute that employees of the same TNCs but in different countries will easily combine. Their argument is that the identity of workers is concrete in that it revolves around the workplace. It may then extend outward to the community and nation but it will increasingly tend to dissipate the further it goes. Identification by workers with workers’ struggles in other countries will therefore be the exception rather than the rule. In contrast, however, TNCs think globally. They view workers as abstract labour, subject to global financial calculations whose concern is to achieve an optimal international workforce in terms of considerations such as cost, skills and flexibility. The prospects are therefore that in terms of international actions, TNCs are normally likely to be more than one jump ahead of international union action seeking to counteract them. There are two major, complementary responses that South African (and, for that matter, non-South African) trade unionists need to give to such gloomy prognoses. The first is quite simply that if contemporary international trade union structures and modes of operation are inadequate to protecting workers globally, then they must be improved. As has been indicated above, there is much about the international labour movement which is problematic: international trade unionism has often been driven by non-union agendas, it has been funded by state rather than worker monies, it has been riven by ideological divisions, it has been excessively bureaucratic, it has been distant from the shop floor, and so on. Nonetheless, critics must also acknowledge that its achievements have been considerable: for all their limitations, the structures of international trade unionism have provided the principal framework for international labour action, which, as indicated by South African experience, extends well beyond the contours of Levinsonian international bargaining. Even if there is much that is wrong with existing international relations departments of national trade union centres, ITSs and the ICFTU, they have accumulated a mass of experience which workers acting internationally cannot do without. Any suggestion of trade unions abandoning these structures and starting again is therefore simply absurd. The objective must rather be to open them up, especially to workers from the East and South, and to render them more transparent, democratic and effective. In this regard, the decision by all three major trade union federations in South Africa to affiliate to the ICFTU represents a progressive attempt to shape the direction of the Confederation, as also to represent the interests of unions in developing countries globally. Meanwhile, COSATU is also strengthening ties with unions in the South on both sides of the ocean – in Asia, in Australia through SIGTUR, and in Brazil, links which now include a working relationship through the ICFTU’s ITSs. The second answer to the argument that the transnationalisation of the global economy is now erecting insuperable obstacles to labour internationalism follows directly from national trade union histories almost everywhere. Indeed, as SACTU argued so vociferously, trade unions may only disconnect economic from political struggles at their peril. As Haworth and Ramsay (1988) go on to argue, unless workers have a non-economistic vision which spans their differences (of colour, culture, relative poverty or wealth as well as of nation), unions of the more

146 Labour and Globalisation advantaged workers in industrialised countries will probably reflexively resist the equalisation of international wages and conditions. What is required, therefore, is the fostering of a shared political consciousness – centred around commonalities extending beyond workplace issues (such as health and safety and minimum labour standards for all) to concerns about human rights, racial equality, the arms trade and the environment, and so on. Such a consciousness is now more than ever enabled to span the transnational workforce because of the revolution in the technology of communications: the arrival of computers, the Internet and fax machines means that repressive governments and exploitative employers are today unable to monopolise information, and even poverty-stricken trade unions in the South can gain instant access to networks of international solidarity. Such developments offer the prospect of a new labour internationalism, which will short-circuit the bureaucratic and hierarchical procedures of the established Internationals whilst forging organic connections between trade unions and the new social movements (peace campaigners, women’s groups, human rights activists, environmental organisations, etc.) whose various struggles – in both the North and the South – are becoming increasingly difficult to disentangle. In the post-Cold War world, the debate between the established Internationals and their critics has become much less abstract and far more practical: with the collapse of the WFTU, can the ICFTU be transformed into an effective and democratic body genuinely representative of the global worker? It is this question, above all, which has shaped discussion about internationalism within the South African labour movement, both in the run up to and after the attainment of (formal) political democracy in 1994. However, for all the new dilemmas that the South African labour movement has to face (including the embrace of neo-liberalism by the ANC government), the affiliation of the three major trade union federations to the ICFTU reflects a new era of global labour alignment. There seems to be general support for the involvement of South African trade unions in global campaigns for a social clause, to motivate countries to sign ILO conventions and to challenge the roles currently played by the World Bank, the WTO and the IMF. COSATU’s position, in particular, has changed from that of a social movement union federation campaigning nationally for democracy and labour rights to that of a labour movement that is also now supporting the struggles of other social movement unions in the context of regional integration and global economic liberalisation. To be sure, many of these campaigns have attained only partial success, and many campaigns remain overwhelmingly rhetorical. Opportunities are many, but capacity is lacking. Nonetheless, precisely because of their long-established tradition of linking economic to political concerns, and national to international, South African trade unions seem set to make a major contribution to the development of more effective international labour action and the emergence of a genuinely global social movement unionism.

International Solidarity and Labour in South Africa 147 References Allen, M. (1991), ‘New Internationalism . . . or Old Rhetoric?’, South African Labour Bulletin, 16(2): 61–68. Bezuidenhout, A. (2000), Towards Global Social Movement Unionism? Trade Union Responses to Globalisation in South Africa, discussion paper published by the International Institute for Labour Studies, Geneva: ILO. Gaetsewe, J. (1977), ‘South Africa: There is Only One Working Class’, World Trade Union Movement, 6: 18–20. Haworth, N., and Ramsay, H. (1988), ‘Workers of the World Untied: International Capital and Some Dilemmas in Industrial Democracy’, in Southall (ed.). ICFTU (International Confederation of Free Trade Unions) (2000), The Millennium Review, document presented to the 17th Congress of the ICFTU, Durban, South Africa: ICFTU. ILO (International Labour Organisation) (1999), Studies on the Social Dimensions of Globalisation: South Africa, Geneva: ILO. KMU (Kilusang Mayo Uno) (1993), ‘The ICFTU: Tainted with Blood and Bribery’, South African Labour Bulletin, 17(5): 60–65. Lambert, R. (1985), ‘Political Unionism and Working Class Hegemony: Perspectives on the South African Congress of Trade Unions, 1955–1965’, Labour, Capital and Society, 18(2): 244–79. –– (1992), ‘Constructing the New Internationalism: Australian Trade Unions and the Indian Ocean Regional Initiative’, South African Labour Bulletin, 16(5): 66–73. — (1998), ‘Globalisation: Can Unions Resist?’, South African Labour Bulletin, 22(6): 72–77. Levinson, C. (1972), International Trade Unionism, London: George Allen & Unwin. Levinson, R. (1998), ‘Globalisation: Can Unions Resist?’, South African Labour Bulletin, 22(6): 72–77. Luckhardt, K., and Wall, B. (1980), Organise . . . or Starve! The History of the South African Congress of Trade Unions, London: Lawrence and Wishart. Mather, C. (1991), ‘Solidarity in a Changing World’, South African Labour Bulletin, 15(7): 13–15. Meecham, R., Lambert, R., Pekham, K., Dass, A., Latiff, A., Veeriah, A., Aahammed, Y., and Clancy, J. (1993), ‘COSATU, the ICFTU, and Dictatorships in Asia’, South African Labour Bulletin, 17(3): 76–81. Munck, R. (1999), ‘Labour Dilemmas and Labour Futures’, in R. Munck and P. Waterman (eds), Labour Worldwide in the Era of Globalisation: Alternative Union Models in the New World Order, London: Macmillan. Naidoo, J. (1991), ‘More that Unites than Divides’, South African Labour Bulletin, 15(7): 16–21. Ngcukana, C. (1991), ‘Rooting out Dependency’, South African Labour Bulletin, 15(7): 22–26. Olle, W., and Schoeller, W. (1977), ‘World Market Competition and Restrictions upon International Trade Union Policies’, Capital and Class, 2: 36–58.

148 Labour and Globalisation Simons, J., and Simons, R. (1983), Class and Colour in South Africa 1850–1950, London: International Defence and Aid Fund for Southern Africa. South African Labour Bulletin (1991), ‘Towards Worker Controlled Internationalism?’, South African Labour Bulletin, 15(7): 32–39. Southall, R. (1995), Imperialism or Solidarity: International Labour and South African Trade Unions, Cape Town: University of Cape Town Press. — (ed.) (1988), Trade Unions and the New Industrialization of the Third World, London: Zed Books. Taylor, R. (1998), Trade Unions and Transnational Industrial Relations, Geneva: International Institute for Labour Studies. UNDP (United Nations Development Programme) (1999), Globalisation with a Human Face: Human Development Report, Geneva: UNDP. Von Holdt, K. (1991), ‘Towards Worker Controlled Internationalism?’, South African Labour Bulletin, 15(7): 32–39. — (1993a), ‘A New Labour Internationalism?’, South African Labour Bulletin, 17(2): 76–79. –– (1993b), ‘The New World Economy – Challenge by Labour’, South African Labour Bulletin, 17(5): 72–79. Von Holdt, K., and Zikalala, S. (1993), ‘The ICFTU in South Africa’, South African Labour Bulletin, 17(1): 67–71. Waterman, P. (1991), ‘A New Labour Internationalism: What Content and What Form?’, South African Labour Bulletin, 16(2): 69–75. –– (1993), ‘The ICFTU in South Africa: Admissions, Revelations, Silences’, South African Labour Bulletin, 17(3): 82–84. Webster, E. (ed.) (1978), Essays in Southern African Labour History, Johannesburg: Ravan Press.

8. Labour and NAFTA: Nationalist Reflexes and Transnational Imperatives in North America, 1991–1995 John D. French1

The fight against the North American Free Trade Agreement helped to open up a belated public debate, especially among trade unionists, regarding the advantages and disadvantages of the current model of international trade and investment contained in ‘free trade’ agreements such as the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, NAFTA, and Mercosur. Although such supranational phenomena seem distant, alien, or alienating to most non-specialists, the common people of today’s world cannot afford to ignore the accelerating and largely negative impact that such developments have had on their lives, living standards, and collective and individual rights. In the early 1990s, the backers of NAFTA hailed this model of market-driven development subordinated to the United States as the path forward for the world’s peoples. Having ignored NAFTA’s severe limitations, they were taken by surprise when the December 1994 peso meltdown revealed the brutal truth that NAFTA had nothing to do with creating jobs in the US, Canada and Mexico, nor did it improve the living standards of the people of any of the three countries. Instead, the speculative bubble underlying the drive to pass NAFTA was revealed as an elaborate hoax; the predictable outcome has been a devastating assault on the well-being of Mexican citizens and, to a lesser extent, those of the US and Canada. Like all great public controversies, the NAFTA debate had its defining phrases and images that synthesised collective fears and embodied them in concise form. Most US citizens no doubt remember Ross Perot’s famous ‘sucking sound to the South’ as jobs left the US for Mexico. Far fewer, however, are likely to recall its equally pithy Mexican counterpart: the ‘giant gulping sound to the North’ as the US gobbles up Mexico. It is useful to deconstruct these two very different ‘sound1 This chapter originated in a 1991–1995 research project co-directed with labour economist Russell E. Smith. Entitled ‘Labor, Free Trade, and Economic Integration in the Americas: National Labor Union Responses to a Transnational World’, the project was hemispheric in scope and covered both the trinational NAFTA and Mercosur, which brings together Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay. Placing the trade union movement at the centre of analysis, it examined both the obstacles to and the prospects for labour transnationalism in today’s world. See the 1995 special issue of Latin American Labor News (12–13) for a report on the conference’s deliberations, and abstracts and excerpts from the papers and briefing books.

149

150 Labour and Globalisation bites’ because these representations of self and other, when read against each other, do in fact reveal a great deal about both societies (Kingsolver, 2001). Perot’s graphic ‘sucking’ image is about jobs as the lifeblood of the nation and their loss, it is suggested, is a slow process that gradually weakens the victim. The image also suggests that there is a perpetrator, such as a vampire or a blood-sucking leech – a sneaky opponent who is both dishonest and indirect. The Mexican image of ‘gulping’ is equally vivid and negative, of course, but suggests a quite different threat: that of being swallowed whole by something or someone larger than oneself. The image of being swallowed is more immediate than the sucking image: it happens in an instant (1 January 1994 perhaps) and then you find yourself inside someone or something else, still largely whole, but now subject to disaggregating, dissolving assault by digestive juices. ‘Gulping’ also suggests a gross slob who swallows meat and potatoes whole – probably without even noticing what he has eaten, oblivious to what is happening. It is significant that these very different images of victimhood clearly work in tandem with each other, and that they so aptly capture aspects of the national psychology of the two societies. Unfortunately, the real-world problems captured in these soundbites are not merely discursive constructions. Both images of threat and bodily harm have come true over the decade since the meltdown of the Mexican economy. Not only has it produced job losses in Mexico but it has accelerated job losses in the US, in addition to hastening the further denationalisation of the Mexican economy and loss of national sovereignty on the Mexican side of the border. So in the end, NAFTA has proven to be far from the ‘win–win’ cooperative agreement suggested by its US, Mexican and Canadian proponents. Instead, we find that a ‘sucking gulping’ sound best captures the negative effects that are in store for the common people of all three societies. Let us end this deconstructive exercise with one final observation: the power of these images is testimony to the reality of national identity and difference. At the same time, the people of these very different societies are not going to arrive at freedom until they clearly understand that the ‘sucking gulping’ sounds are two sides of a single threat, one that does not originate with the ‘other’ people or nation. Rather, the blood-sucker and the gross gulper represent the worst elements of both societies: the beneficiaries of a system that is making real today the worst fears of the common people of both NAFTA North (the US and Canada) and NAFTA South (Mexico). This paper is divided into three parts. It begins with a discussion of NAFTA and the process of ‘silent integration’ in North America before turning to NAFTA and the prospects for labour transnationalism, primarily in North America. It ends with some broader global reflections on the path ahead and mastering the transnational challenge. NAFTA and the ‘silent integration’ of peoples and economies in North America NAFTA, which came into effect on 1 January 1994, represents a high point in a century-long trend towards increasing economic integration between Mexico,

Labour and NAFTA 151 Canada and the US. Although NAFTA itself was new, the agreement can only be understood in the light of an ongoing process of ‘silent integration’ involving longterm flows of trade, investment and population within North America. In all three countries, the dynamic expansion of US capitalism since the late nineteenth century gave rise to democratic and class struggles in which the working class and its trade unions played a major role – with Mexico taking pride of place as the site of the twentieth century’s first great popular revolution in 1910. Yet the parallel struggles between the workers of Canada, Mexico and the US and their common, as well as conflicting, interests have long been neglected. To the north, one can point to a history of bi-national trade union structures which brought together Canadian and US citizens, though by no means without tension. In the US, Mexicans and Mexican–Americans have made important contributions to, and have benefited from, the success of labour organisation since the 1930s despite an earlier history of discrimination and racist abuse in many unions. Moreover, the US trade union movement has provided support at key points for trade union movements and progressive causes: in Canada during the 1930s, and in Mexico before and during the revolution, and again, in solidarity with the government of Mexican president Lázaro Cárdenas in the 1930s. Yet the acceleration of capital mobility within North America, and the further integration of its economies (but not peoples) through NAFTA, represents a fundamental challenge to the working- and middle-class people, both organised and unorganised, of all three countries. As we contemplate the ties that increasingly bind peoples together, we should keep in mind the following advice – equally relevant to Canada as to Mexico – offered in 1916 by Samuel Gompers, then president of the American Federation of Labor: Those who know and understand the force of the industrial ties that unite Mexico and the United States know that there is no boundary line between the industrial problems of the workers of the two countries. This is not only because of the overlapping of the interests of the employers of the two countries but because of the intermingling and blending of the workers of the two countries. . . There must be understanding and cooperation between the workers of Mexico and the United States, in order that neither may permit themselves to be used for the undoing of all.2

Unfortunately, the history of solidarity between the working peoples of North America, with its high and low points, has to date proven shallow and intermittent when compared to secular trends in investment and trade. Most of all, it is inadequate to the challenges facing all three peoples at the beginning of the third millennium. My four central propositions are that NAFTA was not inevitable in origin; that it was not the only path to integration; that it represents a flawed and dangerous form of integration; and that it points inevitably towards social and political conflict in the future within and between the three societies. 2 Gompers made this point in a 1916 discussion of an up-coming Mexican–US labour conference (Levenstein, 1971: 36–37).

152 Labour and Globalisation NAFTA was not inevitable but conjunctural in origin As we look at a post-NAFTA North America, it is important to emphasise that the creation of a common ‘economic constitution for North America’ was not the inevitable result of the creation of a shared North American economic space. Despite the overwhelming dependence of Canada and Mexico upon the US, many earlier governments, social movements, and political actors – especially labour – had long struggled to win greater national autonomy vis-à-vis their more powerful neighbour. This struggle took an especially dramatic turn in Mexico. Facing a US-backed dictatorial regime at the turn of the century, the country’s fight for sovereignty and independence was marked by tragic episodes during the Mexican Revolution as well as by fundamental turning points of national affirmation, such as Mexico’s 1938 expropriation of US and British oil companies. In the case of Canada, the push for national autonomy and the drive to limit US economic control were especially marked from the late 1950s through the 1970s. Given such nationalist aspirations, why did the leaders of both countries come to accept forms of economic integration with the US in the late 1980s that they would have rejected five years earlier? First, we must review the immediate precursors to NAFTA in the mid-1980s. Devastated by the debt crisis and ravaged by the debt-fuelled austerity, Mexico’s weakened rulers opted for a process of structural adjustment and economic opening that led Mexico to join the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) in 1986 – although the country had refused to join six years earlier. Because of their countries’ uniquely trade-dependent economies, Canadian and Mexican business people and politicians had come to view closer ties to the US, in the second half of the 1980s, as a defensive move in the face of protectionist tendencies within the United States and Europe. This led Canada’s conservative Tory party, in late 1987, to enter into discussions with the US for a proposed Canadian–US Free Trade Agreement (FTA), which was finally enacted by the minority Tory government that emerged from the 1988 elections. With both the Mexican entry into GATT and the Canada–US FTA, one saw the effects of a brutal reordering of international power relations during the 1980s as weaker powers lost the manoeuvrability they had gained during the depth of the crisis of US hegemony in the 1960s and 1970s. In addition, the conservative crusade symbolised by Reagan and Thatcher brought into play political and ideological factors with broad transnational appeal to the upper classes while their opponents were reeling and in disarray. By June 1990, when Presidents George Bush and Carlos Salinas first proposed a Mexican–US free trade agreement, later joined by Canada in February 1991, the international situation had shifted radically with the attenuation and eventual elimination of the Soviet bloc. With the fall of the Berlin Wall, the international order lost its structuring principle, and divisions within the West gained greater salience, with a new, more open expression of rivalry and conflict over trade and investment.

Labour and NAFTA 153 Indeed, it seemed in early 1990 as if the new post-Cold War international order was moving in the direction of regional power blocs. The announcement of the Mexican–US FTA in early June 1990 was followed later that month by President Bush’s proposal for a Western-hemisphere FTA – the Enterprise for the Americas Initiative, or EAI, as it was called. Within this context, Mexico’s new president Carlos Salinas believed that advantages for Mexico could be gained by formalising the country’s dependence upon the US in a manner analogous to Canada. In both countries, and especially in Canada, the turn towards de jure and not just de facto integration with the US economy produced misgivings and at times controversy. The response of Prime Minister Mulroney and President Salinas was that if Canada and Mexico were to defend their national interests effectively, they needed a less rigid and more ‘modern’ vision of sovereignty based on the allegedly more solid economic foundation offered by closer ties with the United States. NAFTA also reflected a departure for the US which now sought, with renewed energy, to tighten further its links with its immediate neighbours and eventually the Western hemisphere. Both NAFTA and the EAI reflected the US desire to marshal its forces in the face of increasing international competition for influence and power. Responding to a fear of its own relative decline in world power, US leaders saw NAFTA as both a partial defence against the consolidation of rival Western European and Japanese trade blocs and a useful bargaining strategy designed to gain leverage in the then stalled Uruguay round of negotiations in the GATT. Through the Canada–US FTA and NAFTA, US government and business officials successfully drew Mexico and Canada into a new stage of deeper and more formal subordination as all too junior partners under US hegemony. NAFTA was not the only path to continental integration There were multiple ways in which North American economic and social relationships could have been formalised. Although NAFTA was portrayed by its proponents as the sole method of continental integration, the existing trade agreement represented but one of several possible paths facing the people of North America. Indeed, even the term ‘free trade agreement’ was a misnomer for the 2,000-page treaty, since trade barriers had already been largely dropped – by Mexico unilaterally and by Canada through the Canada–US FTA of 1989. As a legally binding international agreement, NAFTA aimed for far more ambitious objectives than mere free trade, namely to establish a common regime for investment, trade and finance in line with the US market-driven model of economic, social and political development. More an investment than a trading agreement, NAFTA codified a set of rules, especially in Mexico and Canada, that liberalised access for foreign financial, service, agricultural and industrial investors and producers – primarily to the benefit of US-based capital (even prior to the US takeover of Mexico’s economic management in the aftermath of the peso crisis).

154 Labour and Globalisation In particular, NAFTA established firm guarantees of the inviolability of foreign investments and served to ‘lock in’ concessions made by weak governments in Canada and Mexico. In doing so, NAFTA offered a type of investors’ ‘insurance policy’ that raised the price to be paid by any future Canadian or Mexican government that departs from the conservative economic policy-making model of the Reagan–Bush era. In return, producers in Mexico and Canada received improved – but by no means absolute – access to the US market through the neutralisation of various US trade barriers and instruments. NAFTA is a flawed and dangerous agreement that integrates capital but not peoples Unlike the European Union, NAFTA does not in fact integrate markets per se since it makes no provision for freer mobility of labour within North America. From the very outset, the US government resisted all efforts to bring the reality of labour market integration between Mexico and the US into the negotiations. Moreover, the agreement’s supporters worsened the situation by selling NAFTA dishonestly as a solution to the ‘evil’ of Mexican immigration to the United States: ‘create jobs there so they won’t come here’. The poisonous fruits of this pernicious aspect of the NAFTA campaign in the United States could be seen in the 1994 passage of the anti-immigrant Proposition 187 in California. This anti-foreign hysteria and bigotry, now intensified by the events of 9/11, have led to further charges in the US that Mexicans are ‘stealing our jobs’ as the flow of Mexican-based MNC production, and of Mexican workers, has increased. Again, in contrast to the EU vision of creating ‘Europeans’, NAFTA provides for the creation of no common institutions, whether governmental or civic. Instead, NAFTA limits itself to establishing a unified set of rules favourable to powerful economic actors such as banks and transnational corporations – hardly a broad or inclusive basis upon which to build a future for the peoples of the three countries. In this regard, the agreement’s long-term consequence is to restrict the ability of all three governments to regulate and direct investment in the future, thus limiting their ability to use active government intervention to contain or limit the damaging effects of current trends. By eliminating restrictions on capital, NAFTA fulfils the classical objectives of nineteenth-century English liberalism. ‘By free trade,’ Karl Marx wrote in 1852, ‘they mean the unfettered movement of capital: freed from all political, national, and religious shackles . . . There are, in short, not to be tolerated any political or social restrictions, regulations, or monopolies, unless they proceed from “the eternal laws of political economy”, that is, from the conditions under which capital produces and distributes’ (Marx, 1852).

Labour and NAFTA 155 NAFTA’s socio-political underpinnings point inevitably towards social and political conflict in the future within and between the three societies Beyond the historical quest for lessened restraints on the investment of capital, the immediate domestic political context for the negotiation of NAFTA was the crisis period of the late 1970s and early 1980s. During those years, the ‘golden age’ of post-World War II capitalist development came to a close in each of the three countries and with it came a crisis in the social and political alliances between labour, the state and capital. In all three countries, the structural weakening of organised labour and the mass impact of deteriorating economic conditions, especially in the 1980s, made feasible a more aggressive drive to use a supranational discipline – ‘free trade’ and ‘global competitiveness’ – to reshape the internal alignment of class, sectoral and regional forces. For Canada and Mexico, this meant a shift away from a weak, but nonetheless real, emphasis on enhancing autonomy vis-à-vis the United States. In each of the three societies there were popular explosions and protests in response to this deepening process of ‘silent integration’ and its accompanying domestic crises: the Cuáhtemoc Cárdenas ‘surprise’ in the 1988 Mexican presidential elections; the Canadian–US FTA ‘surprise’ that dominated the bitterly fought national parliamentary elections in Canada in 1988; and the NAFTA ‘surprise’ in the US from the Fast Track debate in 1991 to the final vote in late 1993. In each country, new coalitional forms were pioneered that succeeded in connecting to mass sentiments in ways that surprised political pundits and analysts. In all three cases, organised labour and the working classes played fundamental roles. These popular mobilisations, it should be emphasised, took place in response to the cumulative impact of similar processes: downward economic pressure, deteriorating living and working conditions, and increased anxiety and uncertainty – all of which occurred within the context of a shared crisis in inherited socio-political assumptions and institutions. Unfortunately, the three insurgencies occurred in a staggered manner restricted to each national space and its respective political arena. Although a byproduct of broader North American and global trends, these popular struggles did not yet coincide in time or focus (Ayres, 1998). The inability of these popular insurgencies to unite and act together on a tri-national basis stands in marked contrast to those forces at the top of the three societies who were enacting their common agenda for the region. The challenge is clear: for working- and middle-class people to win upcoming battles it is essential that a true tri-national dialogue be established that can unify the peoples of the three countries. The objective must be a common platform for the continental integration of peoples rather than just capital: one that is social and not anti-social in nature, one that unites rather than divides, and one that improves people’s lives rather than making them worse.

156 Labour and Globalisation NAFTA and the prospects for labour transnationalism NAFTA hit the US labour movement at the end of a decade and a half marked by massive assaults on its membership, power and even legitimacy within the US. The NAFTA issue also dates from the end of the Cold War, which at one stroke weakened the ideological imperatives of anti-communism and anti-radicalism that had so long informed the international policies of the American Federation of Labor–Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL–CIO). The recent past has also brought home to US trade unionists that the international arena has a direct connection with the welfare and well-being of its members. The result of these two trends has been a period of transition for US labour, which is slowly shedding its previous hidebound conservatism in international affairs. As part of this process, a new internationalism has come to characterise the trade union movement in the US, a country where such a transnational emphasis has been weak in the past. As then AFL–CIO president Lane Kirkland admonished convention delegates, ‘You can’t be a [real] trade unionist unless you are an internationalist’.3 Kirkland has even joined his Latin American counterparts in denouncing current proposals for Western-hemisphere economic integration as an initiative by ‘the capitalists of North America’ that makes it ‘all the more evident that the wage earners of these countries must also unite for their common protection and betterment’.4 Kirkland’s point was echoed by the Venezuelan president of the InterAmerican Trade Secretariat for textile workers, who toured the US in March 1992. The increasing ‘union of capital,’ he argued, ‘demanded an ever stronger opposing organisation of Inter-American labor to protect the working people of the western hemisphere’.5 Yet it was NAFTA that challenged the North American labour movement in the clearest and most direct manner. The realisation that a ‘go-it-alone’ strategy can never succeed has prompted an encouraging increase in solidarity activities and contacts between North American and Mexican labour activists since the mid1980s. As border visits have become increasingly common, US trade unionists have realised that efforts ‘to bring about a better understanding between the workers of the US and Mexico’ require the establishment of ‘a more reciprocal and cooperative intercourse’ than has been true in the past. Avowing a goal of unionism without borders, one group has even proposed mutual acceptance of union cards 3 To illustrate the continuities in the place and discourse of labour within North America long before as well as after NAFTA, I have placed quotations from earlier decades in the mouths of contemporary labour leaders in characterising their response to NAFTA. The quotation attributed here to Lane Kirkland was originally from a speech by his immediate predecessor George Meaney at the 1961 AFL–CIO national convention (Levenstein, 1971: 230). 4 The quotation attributed here to Lane Kirkland is paraphrased from the 1917 Conference Committee Manifesto of the Pan American Federation of Labor (Snow, 1964: 29). 5 The quotation attributed here to the Venezuelan trade unionist José Ramírez is paraphrased from a 1915 statement by Puerto Rican labour leader Santiago Iglesias (Snow, 1964: 29).

Labour and NAFTA 157 as well as cross-border sympathy strikes in order to secure ‘economic, political, and social improvements’ for workers in the two countries.6 At the same time, there have also been efforts – spearheaded by the Teamsters union under its reformist president at the time, Ron Carey – to give an action-oriented grassroots character to such initiatives. Some Ford locals in the US, for example, joined their Mexican counterparts in Cuatitlán to commemorate the anniversary of the 1990 murder of a dissident Ford worker killed by thugs acting on behalf of the government, its favoured union and the enterprise. ‘That US businessmen are deeply involved in this latest attack on the rights of Mexican workers is not seriously questioned,’ commented one UAW official, who went on to argue that attacks on ‘the rights and liberties and hopes of Mexican wage-earners’ were a direct threat to the interests of Ford workers in the United States.7 As one top Teamsters’ official puts it, North American workers must realise that they have a direct stake in saying ‘No to NAFTA’ and its backers, whatever their nationality. ‘American capitalists support Salinas,’ he argued, precisely because ‘they are looking to Mexican cheap labour to help them break the back of organised labour in the United States and Canada, by transporting a part of their capital to Mexico’.8 Or as another US labour leader argued, ‘Deny Mexicans the right to strike and . . . the opportunity of a fair and just wage, [and] . . . the mines, mills, and oil wells of America can well be closed while Mexican products of cheap labour may be freely dumped into the markets of the United States’.9 US labour has even begun to discuss possible alternative formulas for socially responsible free trade regimes. Speaking on behalf of the AFL–CIO, the former secretary treasurer Tom Donahue advanced proposals designed to defend US jobs while helping the peoples of Latin America. He proposed government credits for the purchase of US-manufactured goods in the region, combined with a practical social programme designed ‘to raise the standard of living in Latin America’. Increasing Latin American purchasing power, he went on, would also help make up, in part, for the markets that the US has lost in the last two decades to rivals such as Japan and Germany.10 Indeed, Donahue’s proposal – which included debt relief – in many ways paralleled the logic of the proposed ‘Continental Development and Trade Initiative’ put forward by Mexican opposition leader Cuáhtemoc Cárdenas 6 The quotation attributed here to a US labour fact-finding mission is from the official statement issued by an AFL commission dispatched to Mexico in 1918 (Snow, 1964: 37). 7 The quotation attributed here to a leader of the United Auto Workers is paraphrased from Gomper’s 1919 response to an anti-labour threat by the Mexican President Venustiano Carranza (Levenstein, 1971: 100). 8 The quotation attributed here to a Teamster official is paraphrased from a famous 1911 book, Barbarous Mexico, by US socialist John Kenneth Turner, which attacked Mexican dictator Porfírio Díaz (Foner, 1989: 105). 9 The quotation attributed here to a US labour leader is another paraphrase from Gomper’s 1919 response to Carranza (Levenstein, 1971: 100). 10 The quotation attributed here to AFL–CIO secretary treasurer Tom Donahue is from a speech by CIO president John L. Lewis to the 1939 convention of the Congress of Industrial Organizations (Levenstein, 1971: 169).

158 Labour and Globalisation in early 1991 – a proposal that was all but formally endorsed when the AFL–CIO’s Industrial Union Department hosted Cárdenas in September 1991. At this point, I would like to turn, however briefly, to Mexican labour responses to NAFTA. Not surprisingly, opposition to NAFTA was strongest among leftist labour leaders who saw NAFTA as a scheme to despoil both US and Mexican workers to the benefit of multinational capital. In the words of Berta Luján of the Frente Autentico de Trabajo (FAT), ‘the great corporations voraciously exploiting the workers of the world constitute the common adversaries’ of the workers of both the Mexico and the US.11 Unlike his dissident Mexican counterparts, Fidel Velásquez, the then 94-yearold president of the dominant pro-government Confederación de Trabajadores de México, supported NAFTA not only as a source of needed jobs for Mexicans, but as part of labour’s duty to the nation. Foreign affairs, however interesting, he explained, are necessarily secondary for the union movement, whose role in this area is to maintain itself united behind President Carlos Salinas de Gortari.12 Having once spoken with warmth of a special relationship with the AFL–CIO, Velásquez and his fellow CTM leaders now denounced what they saw as the patronising and arrogant attitudes of their North American counterparts who, along with their Latin American ‘satellites’, had criticised the CTM’s stance on NAFTA.13 A quite distinct pro-NAFTA line was sounded by Francisco Hernández Juarez, president of the Mexican Telephone Workers’ Union. A self-styled labour moderniser, Hernández Juarez was close to President Salinas and made no secret of his desire to head the Mexican labour movement in the future. Unlike Velásquez, however, he justified the country’s economic opening as a necessary consequence of the failure of Mexico’s previous development model based on Import Substitution Industrialisation (ISI).14 As he repeatedly emphasised, today’s world demonstrates that there is, in fact, ‘a direct correlation between domestic prosperity and foreign trade’. At the same time, Hernández Juarez emphasised that ‘the basic problem of Mexico is not that of the distribution of wealth . . . but rather of low productivity’, and that economic growth can only be ‘achieved by 11 The quotation attributed here to Berta Luján of the FAT is from a 1939 speech by CIO president John L. Lewis when he addressed the founding meeting of the Confederación de Trabajadores de América Latina in Mexico City (Levenstein, 1971: 158). 12 The quotation attributed here to the CTM’s eternal leader Fidel Velásquez is actually from one of his speeches in the early 1960s (Levenstein, 1971: 223–24). 13 The sentiments attributed here to Fidel Velásquez are from two of his speeches in the 1950s. The first is from the late 1950s, after he had reconciled with the US-dominated Organización Regional Interamericana de Trabajo (ORIT). The latter hostile comment is from 1951 when he angrily denounced ORIT and the North Americans for excluding the Peronist Argentine Confederación General de Trabajo from a hemispheric trade union conference, despite the promises they had made to him to the contrary (Levenstein, 1971: 197, 221). 14 The quotation attributed here to Francisco Hernández Juarez, leader of the Mexican telephone workers, is from the late 1940s by the anti-communist CIO leader James Carey of the International Union of Electrical Workers (Kofas, 1992: 293).

Labour and NAFTA 159 an intelligent coordination of the three factors that produce wealth: state, capital, and labour’.15 Having completed this all too brief and condensed bi-national survey, I must now admit to having played a trick on you, albeit one with a higher purpose. At the outset of this research project in 1992, I began by reading the preliminary materials that I had accumulated on contemporary labour responses to NAFTA in Mexico and the United States. Having grounded myself in contemporary reality, I then plunged into the half dozen books that have explored the relationship between the labour movements of the United States, Mexico, and Latin America during the twentieth century. The experience was eerie because I found that, at the level of discourse and actions, every dimension of the current Mexican/US problematic had been played out before – at least once and very often more than once. Thus the quotations that I used above to summarise the labour discussion of NAFTA were all drawn from the statements made by US and Mexican trade union leaders between 1915 and 1963. This striking parallelism between past and present leads to a series of nine interrelated observations and conclusions. 1. The issues that working- and middle-class people are facing today in North America and the world as a whole are by no means new or unprecedented. 2. There is a rich but neglected history of transnational labour contact that has much to offer us in terms of both positive and negative examples. 3. We should avoid a rigid juxtaposition between the national and the international. Indeed, I believe that greater analytical clarity would be achieved by replacing the term ‘labour internationalism’ with the concept of ‘labour transnationalism’. In doing so, we can avoid the oversimplification that stems from the use of dichotomous categories – nationalist or internationalist – when examining a labour movement’s supranational practice. Moreover, the proposed terminology better captures the reality that a given national labour movement’s policies have always been marked by an uneasy coexistence of nationalist and transnationalist responses to a capitalist system that long ago pierced borders and created a global economy. 4. We must avoid the romantic illusion that a pristine labour transnationalism can be found or created that is free of conflict and frank differences of interest and perspective. If we do not do so, we will be left to conclude, at the end of each episode or invocation of the concept, that labour transnationalism is merely a vain illusion, an impossibility. In this regard, the author of a fine 1971 history of relations between US and Mexican labour unions has spoken quite rightly about ‘the myth of international labor solidarity’. ‘The necessity for international labor cooperation,’ Harvey Levenstein argued, was long accepted on both sides of the border ‘as a given, and therefore not even mentioned, or [else was] relegated to the realm 15

The quotation attributed here to Hernández Juarez is from US trade union leader H. W. Fraser, the chairman of the Railway Labor Executive’s Association of the United States, speaking in 1948 (Kofas, 1992: 323).

160 Labour and Globalisation of platitudinous oratory. This is understandable,’ he went on, ‘for the ideal itself, separated from specific interests, becomes almost inoperative’ (emphasis added). When no interests are at stake, he concludes, ‘the demands of the [internationalist] ideal are easily satisfied by ritual exchanges of greetings and by membership in powerless international labor organisations’ (Levenstein, 1971: 5–6). 5. To lay the groundwork for future struggles on the transnational plane, we must also recognise the limitations of labour’s current approaches to international mobilisation, which leave even many of its practitioners doubtful and frustrated. We cannot progress until we recognise, in the words of Mike Press in 1989, that the world’s national labour movements have long pursued a ‘narrow sectional approach to trade union internationalism’ that is even less adequate during the era of unchallenged capitalist power that has followed the collapse of the communist world between 1989 and 1991.16 In this regard, we should listen to individuals such as Burton Bendiner, who served as an official of the International Metalworkers’ Federation, the most active of all of the international trade union secretariats. ‘While international trade union conferences to discuss world economic problems are taking place with increasing regularity,’ he observed in 1989, ‘there is generally a wide gap between the convening of these meetings and meaningful international action taken as a result.’ While Bendiner notes an ‘impressive increase in cooperation’ among unions ‘on a world-wide scale’, he observes with sober realism that ‘it is an inescapable conclusion that little or no progress has been made’ towards achieving some of labour’s more ambitious international objectives (Bendiner, 1987: 182, 179, 151). 6. Differences in national interests among workers must be acknowledged if they are to be conciliated in common pursuit of agreed-upon objectives. As part of the larger briefing book from which this chapter is drawn, I examined, with the assistance of my collaborators Jeff Cowie and Scott Littlehale, how workers’ interests differ in the three countries while working to identify those elements that could provide the basis for a common transnational platform of struggle. Indeed, we spent a great deal of time examining such tri-national initiatives, even though they were largely unsuccessful and usually marginal in relation to the mainstream of labour and politics in the three countries.17 We called for the recognition of differences in interests between workers because, if divergences are never admitted, the result is that one party, always the strongest, simply imperially asserts its ‘own interests’ as the ‘common interests’ of all. Such power-plays by the strong, in which so-called ‘universal’ interests are imposed by fiat, reproduce patterns of great power domination that are by no means alien to the transnational relations 16 Press, 1989: 43. For an assessment of the trajectory of the ideological crisis of labour and the left in both a regional and global context, see French, 2000; 2002. 17 French, Cowie and Littlehale, 1995. See also the project’s related publications about a South/South integration scheme: Smith and Healey, 1994a; 1994b. Available for purchase from http://www.duke. edu/web/las/papers.html. 18 For a fine example of clashing national interests within the transnational labour sphere, see Perosa, 1995.

Labour and NAFTA 161 between unions.18 Such unilateralism constitutes a major obstacle to transnational solidarity and serves to alienate trade unionists from the weaker countries, who are often sensitive to national slights. This danger is all the more significant in the case of Mexico and the US, given a history of violent conflict, racial hostility, discrimination and insensitivity between the strong and the weak – practices to which the US labour movement has not been immune. 7. NAFTA is a North–South economic integration agreement and, as such, poses especially difficult and thorny issues for the creation of tri-national labour solidarity – especially when the issue is defined as a conflict over jobs. Too little attention has been paid to what makes NAFTA unique in comparison with other free trade and integration schemes. On the one hand, there are North–North integration pacts such as the Canada–US FTA or the European Union prior to its expansion to Eastern Europe; on the other hand, there are South–South agreements, of which the most notable is Mercosur. NAFTA is unprecedented precisely because this North–South free trade zone is marked by disparities of wealth and power far larger than those to be found in other cases. Returning to Bendiner, we find a very frank discussion of precisely those issues – ‘stealing jobs’ and ‘defending jobs’ – that came to define the controversy over the North American Free Trade Agreement between NAFTA North (the United States and Canada) and NAFTA South (Mexico). Labour attitudes towards capital mobility in the developing world, Bendiner observes, necessarily differ from the position held by unions in the developed world. Indeed, Bendiner admits that this ‘conflict of interest among trade unions in different countries, [even] within the same industry’, is ‘not the least’ of the roadblocks to concerted world labour action (Bendiner, 1987: 179, 151). As Bendiner observes, trade unions in the Western industrialised nations have commonly reacted to capital mobility through a ‘campaign for protectionism through tariffs on imports and products manufactured abroad’. Secondarily, and with ‘very limited success’, they have campaigned to ‘convert the labour organisations in some low-wage areas into a more efficient force for the raising of standards in pay and working conditions, which might at the same time eventually discourage the MNCs’ flight to these very countries’. As for the developing world, Bendiner notes that their trade unions ‘necessarily have different priorities . . . [and may] make concessions . . . in order to entice multinational corporations away from high-cost production areas . . . [because] their top priority [is] to reduce . . . massive unemployment by importing jobs’. Yet Bendiner is careful, even here, to draw a nuanced picture that avoids automatically picturing such labour organisations as governments’ or employers’ stooges (Bendiner, 1987: 187, 168). 8. On an issue such as NAFTA, a labour movement’s discourse should be framed with an eye to the larger transnational context. Although a US trade unionist’s ‘domestic’ message will never play as well in Mexico City as it does in Peoria, Illinois, he or she should at least take care that the message does not bomb in Mexico City, producing detrimental effects that undermine prospects for cross-border solidarity in the future (Cowie, 1997). This warning is aimed especially at the United States, where the public debate on NAFTA was characterised by an obsession with numbers

162 Labour and Globalisation of hypothetical ‘jobs to be lost’ versus ‘jobs to be gained’ in the event of NAFTA’s passage. The US labour movement’s overwhelming reliance on such ‘NAFTA math’, as we came to call it, may have been understandable and even relatively successful as a tactic in domestic politics. However, my collaborators and I concluded that the ‘jobs body count’ approach, which we deemed diversionary, was far too easily read by the mass US audience as ‘Mexicans are stealing our jobs’ – the charge that was the mainstay of the right-wing anti-NAFTA opposition led by Ross Perot and Pat Buchanan. While fear of job loss had to be central to the fight against NAFTA, most US trade unionists embraced it as a strategy, not merely a tactic. Reflecting deeply ingrained nationalist reflexes and ‘big power’ self-centredness, the zero-sum jobs discourse of the anti-NAFTA campaign worked against prospects for establishing transnational labour unity with NAFTA South in the future.19 The perverse logic of basing strategy on the ‘jobs gambit’ can be seen when we look from the other side of the border. On what grounds could a US trade unionist criticise his or her Mexican trade union counterparts who overwhelmingly supported NAFTA? Given that the Mexicans follow the same nationalist logic of ‘jobs’ as their US counterparts, it is only right and proper that they hail an agreement that brings jobs to the far poorer and more desperate Mexican workers. In truth, the majority of the US and Mexican labour movements operated solely on the national terrain that was most comfortable and familiar to them, and decided their courses of action exclusively in relationship to a domestic calculus of gains and losses. They were, in truth, unable to conceptualise their actions in any consistent way on a transnational basis. 9. To meet the challenges of the future, we must realise that, first, there can be no purely national answers to the problems of working people today in any country, North or South, and second, that there are likewise no purely international solutions. The challenge lies in adding a stronger transnational dimension to labour’s national strategies. The path ahead: mastering the transnational challenge However clear the lines of class may be within a given national society, such domestic conflicts operate within a hierarchical and profoundly unequal global world order, to which most workers and many trade unionists, especially in the OECD countries, are oblivious and which unionists in the South feel powerless to affect. This division reproduces, in part, the classic debate within the world labour movement in the first half of the twentieth century: what should the relationship be between working-class movements in the metropolis and the workers and peoples of the colonised and dependent countries? The eventual liquidation of the formal colonial system, in the aftermath of World War II, suggests that progress can be 19

See ‘The Politics of Jobs in the United States: The Limits of NAFTA Math’, by Scott Littlehale as well as Chapter 3’s examination of the strategy adopted by the US labour movement and its allies of convenience such as Pat Buchanan (French, Cowie and Littlehale, 1995: 28–54, 55–119).

Labour and NAFTA 163 made – as in today’s world – but only with a maximum of honesty and toughminded thinking on the part of labour and its allies. It is a truism today that the international economy is no longer neatly segregated from the domestic affairs of workers in their respective nation states – even in the developed world. The irony is well captured in a 1975 article on MNCs by Nat Weinberg of the US United Auto Workers’ Union. He begins with a quotation from a British trade union leader in 1970 who recalls, with considerable irony, the simpler world of the mid-1950s. I remember about 15 years ago one of our local officials negotiating with Phillips demanding higher wages for the technicians inside the British company. The management replied by saying, ‘You [already have] higher wages than those paid in Holland’, and the reply our official gave was, ‘Well, it is a bloody good job your Head Office is not in Hong Kong or you would be offering bowls of rice.’ (Weinberg, 1975: 91)

Fifty years later, the story has acquired additional layers of meaning, even for the workers in Hong Kong who now lose jobs to still poorer Asian countries. The point, as Weinberg notes, is clear: The aim of employers everywhere, nationally or internationally, is to minimise labor costs and to extract the maximum possible in productivity and profit from the workers they employ. Despite frequently heard lip-service to the contrary, workers are treated not as human beings who are ends in themselves, but as mere instruments to be bought as cheaply as possible, to be used with ruthless efficiency and to be discarded when no longer needed. (Weinberg, 1975: 91)

The history of labour in all countries is the story of the workers’ resistance to such treatment and the lessons to be learned from that struggle. The same drive that undercuts workers in England to the ‘benefit’ of workers in Hong Kong brings with it, as surely as night follows day, the certainty that tomorrow the loser will be in Hong Kong. Uncurbed, this drive imperils the future of all in a world of violent inequalities in wages and living standards. A future – of a sort – is gained in Mexico today because a worker in the electronics industry there must work 416 hours in order to purchase a refrigerator, unlike his or her more highly paid US neighbour for whom 28 hours suffice. Yet how secure is that future when, looming behind both, lies the reality that 1,069 hours are required in still poorer India (Bendiner, 1987: 184–85)? The immensity of this gap within today’s world can be seen with graphic, even frightening clarity in the extraordinary 1993 book by Brazilian photographer Sebastião Salgado, Workers: An Archaeology of the Industrial Age, published in a luxurious edition by the Aperture Foundation in New York, which brings together beautiful and moving photographs of manual labour throughout the entire world (Salgado, 1993). Organised not by country but by product, the book covers everything from the most modern automated factory production in France to the breathtakingly primitive, purely manual production in the shipbreaking industry in Bangladesh. When you see Indian women building canals

164 Labour and Globalisation entirely by hand, basket by basket, you cannot see even Latin American poverty in the same light. Yet Salgado’s book is to be hailed for something else as well, something that is vital if we are to overcome current defeatist intellectual trends which have made a fetish of ‘difference’, whether originating in nationality, race, religion or gender. Salgado’s book is a manifesto that reveals, even revels, in difference, but it does so without absolutising or reifying it. Instead, Salgado sketches out a vision of the common humanity of all working people across boundaries of gender, race, nationality, culture, religion and politics. Sebastião Salgado’s book is a welcome call to arms. The challenge before us is to link the fight for a decent life for South Dakota slaughterhouse workers with that of autoworkers in Kazakhstan or gold-diggers in Serra Pelada in Brazil. The direction, I believe, is clear and new only in its urgency in today’s world: the struggle for a more just domestic social order in all countries is inseparable from the fight for a new international economic order based on egalitarian principles, consciously applied through the cooperation of humankind everywhere. Such an objective will not come without titanic struggles. As we face the task, we should recall the words of the nineteenth-century African-American leader Frederick Douglass, born a slave, who helped abolish a barbarous system that had prevailed for thousands of years, not just a few centuries, as in the case of capitalism. As Douglass declared, The whole history of the progress of human liberty shows that all concessions yet made to her august claims have been born of earnest struggle. . . If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground, they want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters. The struggle may be a moral one, or it may be a physical one, and it may be both moral and physical, but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.20

References Ayres, J. M. (1998), Defying Conventional Wisdom: Political Movements and Popular Contention against North American Free Trade, Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Bendiner, B. (1987), International Labor Affairs: The World Trade Unions and the Multinational Companies, Oxford: Clarendon Press. Blassingame, J. W. (ed.) (1985), The Frederick Douglass Papers. Series One: Speeches, Debates, and Interviews, Vol. III: 1855–1863, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. 20

Frederick Douglass, ‘The Significance of Emancipation in the West Indies’, a speech given at Canandaigua, New York, 3 August 1857. Reprinted in Blassingame (ed.), 1985: 204.

Labour and NAFTA 165 Cowie, J. R. (1997), ‘National Struggles in a Transnational Economy: A Critical Analysis of US Labor’s Campaign against NAFTA’, Labor Studies Journal 21(4): 3–32. Foner, P. (1989), US Labor Movement and Latin America: A History of Workers’ Response to Intervention, 1846–1919, Vol. I, Amherst: Bergin and Garvey. French, J. D. (2000), ‘The Latin American Labor Studies Boom’, International Review of Social History [Amsterdam] 45: 279–310. — (2002), ‘From the Suites to the Streets of Seattle: The Unexpected Re-emergence of the “Labor Question” 1994–1999’, Labor History 43(3): 285–304. French, J. D., Cowie, J. R., and Littlehale, S. (1995), Labor and NAFTA: A Briefing Book, Durham, NC: The Duke–UNC Program in Latin American Studies. Kingsolver, A. (2001), NAFTA Stories: Fears and Hopes in Mexico and the United States, Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner. Kofas, J. V. (1992), The Struggle for Legitimacy: Latin American Labor and the United States, 1930–1960, Tempe, AZ: Center for Latin American Studies, Arizona State University. Levenstein, H. (1971), Labor Organizations in the United States and Mexico: A History of their Relations, Westport, CT: Greenwood. Marx, Karl (1852), ‘Free Trade and the Chartists’, New York Daily Tribune, 2 August. http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1852/08/25.htm Perosa, H. R. (1995), Respuestas Sindicales a la Desregulación y Privatización de las Lineas Áreas: La Experiencia Latinoamericana, Latin American Labor Occasional Paper 12, Miami: Center for Labor Research and Studies of Florida University. Press, M. (1989), ‘The People’s Movement’, in M. Press and D. Thomson (eds), Solidarity for Survival: The Don Thomson Reader on Trade Union Internationalism, Nottingham: Russell Press. Salgado, S. (1993), Workers: An Archaeology of the Industrial Age, New York: Aperture. Smith, R. E., and Healey, M. (1994a), Labor and Mercosur: A Briefing Book, Durham, NC: The Duke–UNC Program in Latin American Studies. — (1994b), Labor and Mercosur: A Documentary Collection, Durham, NC: The Duke–UNC Program in Latin American Studies. Snow, S. (1964), The Pan-American Federation of Labor, Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Weinberg, N. (1975), ‘The Multinational Corporation and Labor’, in L. R. Simmons and A. A. Said (eds), The New Sovereigns: Multinational Corporations as World Powers, Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.

Part III: Social Dimensions

9. Beyond Unions: Labour and Codes of Conduct Linda Shaw

In the early 1990s international labour issues were considered to be the concern primarily of trade unions. On occasion, solidarity actions in support of workers in specific disputes drew on a wider constituency of support. It was in this context, for example, that the small Manchester-based labour rights group, Women Working Worldwide (WWW), worked with unions and other groups in support of Filipino garments workers locked out by the subsidiary of a UK-based garments multinational (Shaw, 1997). The increasingly footloose nature of many companies increasingly undermined the success of solidarity action, as garments production was easily switched to a site not troubled by organised labour and demands for better working conditions. Unorganised workers, the vast majority in sectors such as the garments industry, have no recourse at all to international support and solidarity actions. Companies simply refused to accept responsibility for working conditions in factories they did not directly own. Campaigns Ten years later, the problems of footloose companies, exploitative working conditions and unorganised workers clearly have not diminished – the impact of globalisation has made matters worse. What has changed is the wider context of the work that WWW continues to do in support of women workers internationally. Beyond unions, several international networks of organisations and groups are concerned with international labour issues and workers’ rights and conditions internationally. There are now literally hundreds of groups and many more individuals working in a variety of ways on issues that ten years ago were considered to be the specific province of trade unions. Organised into national and international networks, these groups are based in both Europe and the US. The networks involve a wide range of organisations including consumer groups, women’s groups, development agencies and NGOs such as Oxfam, church-based organisations, fair trade shops and organisations and labour rights groups (Ross [ed.], 1997). Originating outside traditional trade union-based international structures, these groups and networks nonetheless have an agenda that is firmly concerned with improving labour conditions internationally. The Europe-wide Clean Clothes Campaign is a typical example and introduces itself as follows: 169

170 Labour and Globalisation We are an international network with the goal of improving the working conditions in the garment industry worldwide. The network comprises a wide variety of organisations, such as trade unions, consumer groups, researchers, solidarity groups, women’s organisations, church groups, youth movements and worldshops. (http://www. cleanclothes.org/campaign.htm)

In support of the aim of improving working conditions there have been a growing number of what have been termed ‘campaigns of embarrassment’ (Kearney, 1999) in Europe and the US. Groups and networks have organised consumer campaigns designed to cause maximum embarrassment to companies by publicising the exploitative labour conditions under which company products are made. Media attention has been drawn to low wages, excessive working hours, dangerous conditions, harassment and the use of child labour. Many groups have focused on the huge difference between the labour cost of the product and the ultimate retail price. This approach has been used extensively with sports shoes such as the widely used example of Indonesian workers making sports shoes which (in 1998) retailed at £60.00 in the UK; the workers were earning 0.4 per cent of the price paid by consumers (Labour Behind the Label, 1999). These campaigns have generated extensive publicity about the prevalence of exploitative labour conditions involved in the production of goods for everyday use such as clothes. In the US, campaigning over labour issues and protesting over sweatshop conditions in the garment industry have been responsible for what the New York Times described as ‘the biggest surge in campus activism in two decades’ (23 March 1999). In July 1998 a national coalition, United Students Against Sweatshops, was formed, followed by the formation of a Canadian counterpart a year later. In Europe, a series of high-profile actions against Nike’s labour practices have been in progress for several years (Van de Stichele and Pennartz, 1996) and a worldwide network of campaigns over sports shoes was set up in 1995. By the end of 1999, across Europe there were fifteen national Clean Clothes campaigns concerned with labour conditions in the international garments industry. In each country, there is a national platform coordinating the activities of a diverse and growing number of organisations. An international campaign targeting sportswear companies took place during the Euro 2000 soccer championships. Campaigners have adopted a variety of tactics. Often, fairly combative actions are used against companies to generate as much negative publicity as possible; for example, direct action, street theatre, extensive postcard and letter campaigns, interventions at company AGMs, and education work, as well as legal actions against companies – the latter strategy being particularly common in the US. Many groups have gained widespread national publicity for their attempts to ‘name and shame’ companies. At the European level, the Clean Clothes Campaign organised a ‘People’s Tribunal’ in Brussels in 1998 which heard evidence on exploitative working conditions and labour rights abuses in seven famous ‘brand name’ companies. Hitherto largely the preserve of unions and a limited number of NGOs, often linked to socialist or social democratic parties,

Labour and Codes of Conduct 171 working on labour issues has now become a concern of a large number of organisations, many with little or no prior involvement with labour. In the UK, large NGOs such as Oxfam, Christian Aid and CAFOD, who had previously focused on a range of ‘development issues’ largely distinct from labour, have moved into projects directly addressing the world of work. Thus all of these agencies have run extensive campaigns to improve working conditions in the garment, shoe and food industries. Asking for consumer support and actions in support of a specific campaign is clearly not a new phenomenon. There have been long-running campaigns calling for consumer support for a boycott of South African produce during the apartheid regime and for a boycott of Nestlé products by the Babymilk campaign. There have been and continue to be many calls for boycotts in relation to specific labour disputes. In the years following the First World War, Seattle workers organised not only at the point of production but via politicised consumption, employing tactics such as boycotts, cooperatives and union labels (Frank, 1994). Contemporary labour-related consumer campaigns have moved beyond simple calls for an immediate boycott of the relevant company product or resolution of a specific dispute. As in Seattle, there is a wider agenda of politicised consumption being developed. Given that the concerns are related to ongoing exploitative labour conditions, there have been attempts to develop longer-term strategies. This has involved demands that labour issues should be added to the agenda of corporate responsibility. Companies are to be held accountable for what is often termed ‘the triple bottom line’, i.e. social, environmental and economic performance. The pressure is to ensure that the ‘social’ bottom line is redefined to include labour conditions and labour rights internationally. Strategies One of the main strategies developed to achieve this is to press for the inclusion of clauses detailing labour standards within corporate codes of conduct. Defined simply as a statement of corporate intent and commitment to a specific enterprise policy, codes have a long history (Murray, 1998). Most deal generally with business ethics but, due to this external pressure, an increasing number of codes have begun to include labour issues – so much so that they have become a ‘key element in the debate over improving the conditions of workers worldwide’ (ILO, 1998b). A recent study (Diller, 1999) looked at 215 such codes with labour-related provisions and reported that they could be found in most industrial and service sectors, although they were most likely to be found in the area of textiles, clothing and footwear production and also in the food, beverage, chemical and toy industries. The actual numbers of codes are not yet known, especially at the regional level, and more are being agreed all the time. In the US, however, a Department of Labor Survey reported that 33 out of the top 42 apparel

172 Labour and Globalisation retailers had labour-related codes of conduct publicly available (US Department of Labor, 1996). It is commonly accepted that Levi Strauss were one of the first companies to issue such a code of conduct in 1992, though the UK company Littlewoods actually included reference to labour standards in a code in 1990 (Shaw, 1997). Research into UK companies known to have publicly available codes of conduct covering labour issues revealed 18 such codes by 1998, although the report stressed that the number was growing (Ferguson, 1998). A report published in the following year pointed out that all the main UK supermarkets were in the process of introducing codes to their suppliers (Barrientos et al., 1999b). Another survey in 1999 of 12 companies (either having or in the process of producing a labour-related code) stated that their sales value of £57 billion in 1998 represented around 25 per cent of the UK retail market (ETI, 1999). There appears to be no overall mapping of code development at the regional European level. The development of labour-related codes has generated extensive debate within trade unions at the international level and among the many NGOs and organisations involved. Even in the mid-1990s they were dismissed by many as simply public relations exercises by the companies concerned. Now any discussion of international strategies to protect labour rights has to consider the role of corporate codes. A full review of the issues and debates is beyond the scope of this article but key trends and developments will be outlined in the following section. Initially, debates and research were concerned with the actual content of codes. There were, and still are, considerable variations as to the content of codes and which aspects of labour conditions were included. The most common issues cited were child labour and health and safety and there was often no apparent coherence to the choice of other labour concerns (Diller, 1999). Understandably, many responses from trade unionists were strongly critical of codes for not using labour standards based on the relevant ILO conventions, especially Freedom of Association. Unsurprisingly, US codes seem to have been particularly negligent in this respect (ILO, 1998b). Typically, these codes were developed unilaterally by companies. Codes In response to such criticism, several model codes were developed by different organisations including the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU). The model codes developed in Europe are largely based on the relevant ILO conventions and examples include the ICFTU Model Code, the Clean Clothes Campaign and the Base Code for the UK Ethical Trading Initiative. They include clauses concerning forced labour, anti-discrimination, freedom of association and collective bargaining, and health and safety. More controversial are references to child labour and wage levels. Thus there has been a growing consensus among unions and NGOs in Europe at least that codes should be based on the relevant ILO conventions (Justice, 1999).

Labour and Codes of Conduct 173 At the same time there has been a general trend towards developing multi-sectoral and/or an industry-wide approach. At this level, associations in the toy, tea, sports shoes and food industries have developed sector-wide codes with labour provisions in response to external pressure (Diller, 1999). Most recently, debates have been concerned not so much with the content of labour-related codes as with how to ensure their implementation. There are currently lively and extensive debates occurring on the merits or otherwise of the different strategies being adopted to ensure adequate monitoring and implementation take place. This is a huge and, some would say, impossible challenge given the highly complex and fragmented nature of many of the supply chains. The example of the US garments industry is often cited: a single US retailer can typically source from as many as 13,000 different suppliers who then have an average five subcontractors each (Kearney, 1999). The complexities and extent of global supply and subcontracting chains have been well documented. The industries characteristically associated with labour-related codes have tended to be those in which the retailer holds a dominant position, such as the garment, footwear and toy industries, which can be characterised as ‘buyer-driven commodity networks’ (Gereffi, 1997). Such industries tend to have an emphasis on high-profile ‘brand-name’ products; they can also be characterised by having largely female-dominated workforces, though little work has been done on this aspect of supply chains except in the case of the fruit export sector (Barrientos et al., 1999a). Debates over how to ensure that the implementation strategies for codes are effective have focused on a number of issues. A major one is proving to be the development of effective monitoring and verification procedures. At the time of writing, several different approaches to implementation are being developed, though the examples I will discuss further are ones of particular interest to labour. They consist of some of the major initiatives which provide a new institutional framework, bringing together unions and NGOs as well as companies in what is sometimes called the multi-stakeholder approach. In the UK this approach is being developed following the establishment of the Ethical Trade Initiative (ETI) in 1998. The ETI brings together NGOs, companies and international trade unions with the aim of identifying and promoting good practice in the implementation of codes. Companies joining the ETI also agree to adopt the Base Code (see above) and to work towards its implementation throughout their supply chains. They have also committed themselves to participation in pilot studies. These have been undertaken in three different sectors: the wine industry in South Africa, horticultural products in South Africa and garments and knitwear production in southern China (ETI, 1999). As yet no final conclusions are available as to the outcomes of the pilot studies. In a related approach the Ethical Trading Action Group in Canada is working on the development of a similar multi-stakeholder approach with a Base Code of Labour Practice and working groups to look at possible mechanisms for implementation. The Clean Clothes Campaign in the Netherlands has worked towards

174 Labour and Globalisation the establishment of a stichting or social foundation (the Fair Wear Charter Foundation/Stichting Eerlijk Handels Handwest). The Foundation has a board, an expert panel and a secretariat; like the ETI in the UK it is composed of unions, NGOs and retailers, but intends to play a more direct role in monitoring than the ETI. In the US the Apparel Industry Initiative (AIP) also brought together unions, companies and NGOs, but it proved to be short-lived when the unions withdrew in 1998 because of concerns over strategies for ensuring implementation (Blowfield, 1999). The bringing together of a wide range of organisations working on labour conditions, not just unions, clearly raises a number of critical issues. The new institutional frameworks also vary from country to country. Whereas in the US it is the Department of Labor that has been primarily concerned with codes, in the UK there has been a strong ‘development’ flavour to these changes, with the Department for International Development (DfID) providing key funding for the ETI. As part of a growing commitment to development based increasingly on a human rights agenda, and a core priority of poverty reduction, DfID now sees the improvement of labour standards as an important element in its work. In the past, DfID contact with unions has been limited (Gibbons and Ladbury, 2000), though it has long experience of working with development NGOs such as Oxfam. Trade unions and NGOs are not only working together at national levels in the new institutions such as the ETI but also more informally at different local and regional levels in different campaigns – though the extent and nature of involvement varies considerably. Within Europe, for example, Dutch unions have been working within the Clean Clothes framework since 1995 at least, whereas in the UK, it is only since the beginning of 1999 that unions have begun to contribute substantially to the work of the UK division of the Clean Clothes Campaign, the Labour Behind the Label network. Thus unions and NGOs are now finding themselves working together as social partners within a new framework. Predictably, there are many unresolved issues and tensions on both sides, coupled with an acknowledgement that it would be useful to begin to develop a common agenda. This is not an easy task. Many NGOs are working on labour issues for the first time, have little experience of this work and are often not fully trusted by trade unionists (Gibbons and Ladbury, 2000). Historically, unions have been used to claiming a legitimacy as the best, if not sole, representatives of labour interests – indeed, in many accounts the term ‘labour movement’ has been synonymous with trade unions. Perhaps understandably, the more recent claims of NGOs to be acting on behalf of workers’ interests have been met with a repeated emphasis that the best protection for working conditions lies in the establishment of free trade unions. Debates continue as to the potential of codes to displace union organising (Kearney, 1999). In Central America, many unions are suspicious of codes, seeing them as undermining the legitimate role of unions, especially when local NGOs can be involved in monitoring a factory where unions are trying to organise. Conversely, NGOs can

Labour and Codes of Conduct 175 point to the fact that codes have enabled the unions to survive in these factories (Yanz et al., 1999). Agency In these debates a crucial fact is often overlooked when looking at the question of the agency behind the changes during the past decade. It is undoubtedly true that one of the major drivers of change has been the campaigning work of the NGOs and other grassroots coalitions. Arguably the most significant shift occurred when companies began to accept that they were responsible for labour conditions involved in goods being produced along their subcontracting chain. Prior to this the growing prevalence of placing orders with (nominally) independent subcontractors had enabled retailers to shrug off responsibility for labour conditions, especially on an international basis. It is difficult to pinpoint an exact moment for this change, but by 1995–96 it was well established in Europe that companies accepted an international responsibility (Ascoly and Zeldenrust, 1999; Shaw, 1997). Although glossed over in several accounts, it is also clear that this was the work not of trade unions but of NGOs and campaigners. The prevalence of labourrelated codes in certain sectors – garments and food especially – largely reflects the presence of consumer-led campaigns (Diller, 1999). This is hardly surprising given the difficulties that face established union structures in organising internationally in new ways. In this context, there has been a growth in more informal ‘cross-border activities’ during the past twenty years, often bringing in non-union groups such as the international NGO Transnationals Information Exchange (Moody, 1997). Others have looked at the growth of what have been called ‘transnational workers’ networks’ in the context of NAFTA, which have involved coalitions that go beyond unions (Kidder and McGinn, 1995). The growth of complex global supply chains presents enormous challenges for unions and many NGOs point to the fact that codes are needed precisely because union presence in most of the sectors covered by the codes is minimal (Justice, 1999). Although a considerable amount of research needs to be done on specific sectors, early indications are that in the production chains covered by the UK ETI and by the Clean Clothes campaigns, only a very small proportion of the workers are effectively unionised. In addition, it is no accident that the industries targeted in the above-mentioned campaigns consist of a largely female workforce. The overall lower rates of unionisation among women workers have been well documented (Lim, 1996; ILO, 1999b). For the millions of women workers in Export Processing Zones, rights to organise in free trade unions are severely restricted (ILO, 1998a). This would appear to be especially true for the international textiles and garments industry. Rates of union membership have always been low and for a variety of reasons are hardly likely to improve much in the near future. Indeed, in a recent contribution to an ILO report, the International Textile, Garments and Leather Workers’ Federation stated that it considered that ‘the key to alleviating

176 Labour and Globalisation the problems affecting workers in the textile, clothing and leather sectors is to be found at the international level rather than the national or local level’ (ILO, 1998a: S3.2.5). In addition, of course, the deregulation of labour markets by governments has exacerbated the situation. For governments, the voluntary and non-governmental nature of codes has proved a very attractive aspect. For many critics, voluntary codes fit all too comfortably with the neo-liberal consensus and can be regarded as a form of ‘soft law’ (ILO, 1998a) or indeed as involving the privatisation of labour standards (Kearney, 1999). Nonetheless there is a general consensus among unions and NGOs that self-verification by companies is not acceptable and that a system of independent third-party monitoring and verification is the way forward. Several third-party models are being developed concurrently by different agencies and institutions but there is no consensus as to an appropriate model or even agreed international standards of measurement. Many are concerned at the arrival on the scene of external auditors operating on a purely commercial basis (examples include multinational accounting firms such as PriceWaterhouseCoopers and Ernst & Young), who have been used by several major companies to audit labour standards in their factories and suppliers. Most of them lack any experience in detecting workplace violations of codes or of working on labour issues generally (Diller, 1999). There are a growing number of calls for the ILO to take on this role, especially among trade unionists (Kearney, 1999; ILO, 1998a). There are several other recent initiatives in this field. In the US the Council for Economic Priorities Accreditation Agency (CEPAA) developed in 1997 a set of international labour rights standards (based on ILO Conventions), known as South Africa 8000. CEPAA is offering accreditation training to independent auditors and organisations. It is likely that it is the professional auditing firms that will become accredited under this scheme, though theoretically NGOs could also undergo training. Critics have pointed to the lack of a clear role for unions and NGOs under this scheme (Yanz et al., 1999). In a similar vein the US-based Apparel Industry Initiative (AIP), sponsored by the Department of Labor, has also devised a scheme that assigns the role of independent monitor to commercial firms. Both unions and NGOs are divided on this issue and as a result several members (union and NGO) have left the AIP. There is no overall consensus as to the way forward within the US unions, with some leaders sympathetic to monitoring schemes directly involving NGOs, some supportive of commercial auditors, and others suspicious of monitoring in general, seeing it as undermining union presence (Benjamin, 1999). In Europe there is undoubtedly a similar range of perspectives and opinions over monitoring and verification issues. So far unions and NGOs have remained working together, for example in the different initiatives in the UK and the Netherlands. There are ongoing debates as to who should be involved at the local level in monitoring procedures. The issues of whether local NGOs or unions should be involved in third-party monitoring schemes at the local and national

Labour and Codes of Conduct 177 levels remain very controversial. Crucially, there are a growing number of voices from the South rightly pointing out that much of the work done with codes by both unions and NGOs has not involved genuine consultation or input from the South (Asia Monitor Resource Centre, 1998). In two consultative workshops on codes held in Asia and Central America with workers and unions, much emphasis was placed on the fact that there was a need for more initiatives and proposals to come from the South (Women Working Worldwide, 1998, 1999). Ensuring active Southern participation in work on codes by both unions and NGOs clearly presents a major challenge. Moreover, the impact of codes on informal-sector workers has remained largely unconsidered and represents a further key challenge. Largely unorganised by trade unions and unaffected by national legislation, many home-based and informal-sector workers are nevertheless still linked into global and national production chains. In an encouraging development, however, a code of conduct for home-based workers has been developed in Australia. The magnitude of the problem should not be underestimated. Recent research by the Australian Fairwear Campaign has shown that for every factory-based garment worker in Australia there are 15 home-based workers (TCFUA, 1995). In a unique example, the Textile, Clothing and Footwear Union of Australia (TCFUA) has not only been organising home-based workers since 1986 but launched the Fairwear Campaign in 1997. This campaign promoted consumer action in support of better conditions for workers and was based in part on the strategies used by some of the European campaigns. The TCFUA also became a member of HomeNet, the international network of home-based worker organisations. As a result of these actions, the TCFUA has negotiated a Homeworkers’ Code of Practice. Retailers and manufacturers have a responsibility for labour conditions in their supply chains, including conditions for homeworkers. Minimum wages and standard benefits and conditions are required and, significantly, the union is mandated to monitor working conditions (HomeNet, 1999). This is a unique example of a union-led clothing campaign targeting consumers which has led to a code not only designed for home-based workers but monitored by the union itself – in a sector where the majority of unions have found it difficult to gain a foothold. A further example of work on codes in a similarly unorganised sector comes from Nicaragua. Since 1993 women workers in Export Processing Zones, in the absence of trade union organisation, have been part of a regional women’s network, the Central American Network in Solidarity with Women Workers in the Maquila. In 1997 the network initiated a systematic campaign involving work on codes, and encouraged the women workers to devise their own code of conduct, backed by extensive campaigning. The provisions of the codes were adopted by the minister of labour and zone employers in 1998. They include clauses specific to the situation of women workers and include reproductive rights, freedom from sexual harassment and freedom from excessive overtime. Initially, the code did not include trade union rights as the women workers did not feel that unions had much

178 Labour and Globalisation relevance for them. However, clauses on freedom of association have since been added (Jeffcott and Yanz, 1999). To date, evidence on the levels of enforcement of the code in Nicaragua is lacking. Conclusion Concerning the broader issues of women workers and codes, work on the development of gender-sensitive codes has as yet been very limited in scope. Research into gender and codes of conduct using a South African case study of horticultural production has highlighted a number of key issues in this context (Barrientos et al., 1999b). There are low levels of unionisation among farm workers, especially seasonal, temporary and contract workers, who are often women. However, codes work with existing structures and are not designed to address directly the gendered division of labour. The study points out that in relation to monitoring and verification, methods need to be developed to enable the needs of all workers to be represented in the process – otherwise the risk is that codes will only strengthen the employment conditions of the small minority of permanent and mainly male workers. Currently the vast majority of both male and female workers employed by companies who have labour-related codes are unaware of their existence. The challenge of the next ten years will be to ensure that codes begin to have a real impact at grassroots level. Codes are only one of several strategies being pursued to protect international labour rights and conditions – but they are important. Not only have they broadened support for labour internationally, they have also begun to address the issue of developing strategies for global supply chains. Whether codes persist as a key strategy remains an open question, but they have highlighted the potential effectiveness of labour and NGO coalitions within the international context. References Ascoly, N., and Zeldenrust, I. (1999), The Code Debate in Context: A Decade of Campaigning for Clean Clothes, Amsterdam: Clean Clothes Campaign. Asia Monitor Resource Centre (1998), ‘Editorial’, Asian Labour Update, 26 (January). Barrientos, S., McClenaghan, S., and Orton, L. (1999a), Women and Agribusiness, London: Macmillan. –– (1999b), Gender and Codes of Conduct: A Case Study from Horticulture in South Africa, London: Christian Aid. Benjamin, M. (1999), ‘The Anti-Sweatshop Movement: An Assessment and a Call for Unity’, Verite Monitor, 3: 12–13. Blowfield, M. (1999), ‘Ethical Trade: A Review of Developments and Issues’, Third World Quarterly, 20(4): 753–70. Diller, J. (1999), ‘A Social Conscience in the Global Marketplace? Labour

Labour and Codes of Conduct 179 Dimensions of Codes of Conduct, Social Labelling and Investor Initiatives’, International Labour Review, 138(2): 99–129. ETI (Ethical Trade Initiative) (1999), Learning from Doing: A Report on Company Progress in Implementing Ethical Sourcing Policies and Practice, London: ETI. Ferguson, C. (1998), A Review of UK Company Codes of Conduct, London: Department for International Development. Frank, D. (1994), Purchasing Power: Consumer Organising, Gender and the Seattle Labor Movement 1919–1929, Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press. Gereffi, G. (1997), ‘The Reorganisation of Production on a World Scale: States, Markets and Networks in the Apparel, Electronics and Commodity Chains’, in D. Campbell et al. (eds), Regionalisation and Labour Market Interdependence in East and South East Asia, London: Macmillan. Gibbons, S., and Ladbury, S. (2000), Core Labour Standards: Key Issues and Proposals for a Strategy, London: Department for International Development. HomeNet (1999), New Ways of Organising in the Informal Sector, Leeds: HomeNet. ILO (International Labour Organisation) (1998a), Labour and Social Issues Relating to Export Processing Zones, Geneva: ILO. –– (1998b), Overview of Global Developments and Office Activities Concerning Codes of Conduct and Other Private Sector Initiatives Addressing Labour Issues, Geneva: ILO. –– (1999a), Trade Unions and the Informal Sector: Towards a Comprehensive Strategy, Geneva: ILO. –– (1999b), The Role of Trade Unions in Promoting Gender Equality and Protecting Vulnerable Women Workers, Geneva: ILO. Jeffcott, B., and Yanz, L. (1999), Voluntary Codes of Conduct: Do They Strengthen or Undermine Government Regulation and Worker Organising?, Toronto: Maquila Solidarity Network. Justice, D. (1999), The New Codes of Conduct and the Social Partners, Brussels: ICFTU. Kearney, N. (1999), ‘Corporate Codes of Conduct: The Privatised Application of Labour Standards’, in S. Picciotto and R. Mayne (eds), Regulating International Business: Beyond Liberalisation, Basingstoke: Macmillan. Kidder, T., and McGinn, M. (1995), ‘In the Wake of NAFTA: Transnational Workers Networks’, Social Policy, 14: 14–21. Labour Behind the Label (1999), Threadbare: A Report on Wages in the Fashion Industry, Norwich: Labour Behind the Label. Lim, L. (1996), More and Better Jobs for Women, Geneva: ILO. Moody, K. (1997), Workers in a Lean World, London: Verso. Murray, J. (1998), ‘Corporate Codes of Conduct and Labour Standards’, in R. Kyloh (ed.), Mastering the Challenge of Globalisation: Towards a Trade Union Agenda, ACTRAV Working Paper, Geneva: ILO. Ross, A. (ed.) (1997), No Sweat, New York: Verso.

180 Labour and Globalisation Shaw, L. (1997), ‘The Labour behind the Label: Clean Clothes Campaigns in Europe’, in Ross (ed.). Stichele, M. van der, and Pennartz, P. (1996), Making It Our Business: European NGO Campaigns on Transnational Corporations, London: Catholic Institute for International Relations. TCFUA (Textile, Clothing and Footwear Union of Australia) (1995), The Hidden Cost of Fashion, Carlton, Victoria: TCFUA. US Department of Labor (1996), The Apparel Industry and Codes of Conduct: A Solution to the International Child Labour Problem, Washington, DC: US Department of Labor. Women Working Worldwide (1998), Women Workers and Codes of Conduct: Asia Workshop Report, Manchester: Women Working Worldwide. –– (1999), Women Workers and Codes of Conduct: Central America Report, Manchester: Women Working Worldwide. Yanz, L., and Jeffcott, B. (1999), Codes of Conduct: From Corporate Responsibility to Social Accountability, Toronto: Maquila Solidarity Network. Yanz, L., Jeffcott, B., Ladd, D., and Atlin, J. (1999), Policy Options to Improve Standards for Garment Workers in Canada and Internationally, Ottowa: Status of Women Canada.

10. Globalisation and Child Labour: Protection, Liberation or Anti-Capitalism? Michael Lavalette and Steve Cunningham

Do you charge us with wanting to stop the exploitation of children? . . . To this crime we plead guilty. (Marx and Engels, 1848: 487) Unorganized, with few dependents, no rights, a need for income, and vulnerable by their very nature, children are the most readily exploited of all labour groups. (Fyfe, 1989: 5) [T]he issue of child labour cannot be addressed without . . . addressing the increasingly obvious inequalities of the global economy, but also questioning western assumptions about the value systems and lifestyles of other societies. (Newbery, 2000: 14) The reasons I stitch footballs is because my parents cannot afford the cost of my education . . . If there were a ban on child labour, most of the people in my village would go hungry. (Khalid Hussain, aged 15, quoted on the Save the Children Fund homepage: www.oneworld.org) Child labour . . . drives down wages and replaces adults . . . The practice perpetuates poverty . . . the ‘right to work’ may mean accepting inhuman conditions in order to survive. (George, 1999: 176)

At the start of the twenty-first century, child labour has once again become a significant social problem motivating trade unions, NGOs and social movement activists to demand improved living conditions for children across the world. Campaigning has become more visible over the last twenty years. Trade unions have argued for various ‘social clauses’ to be included in trade agreements to guarantee various worker rights and a ‘zero tolerance’ of child labour. NGOs have increasingly argued for a child’s right to work in combination with improved educational options for young people in developing economies. More recently child labour control has become a central demand of the American student ‘No Sweats’ campaign, described as part of the most significant social protests to rock America since the anti-war movement of the late 1960s and early 1970s (‘No Sweat?’, Panorama, BBC Television, 15 October 2000). However, there is little agreement among this disparate group of organisations and individuals over what precise measures should be taken to prevent children from working. For trade unions it is prevention by passing restricting legislation and enacting social clauses, but for NGOs this is to impose a ‘Western’ conception 181

182 Labour and Globalisation of childhood onto ‘Third World’ children. Finally, for students on US campuses involved in the No Sweats campaigns child labour is merely one concern, albeit an important one, of the growing ‘anti-capitalist critique’ of modern global capitalism and its social and environmental consequences. The aim of this chapter is to outline the key differences in the strategies advocated by the various actors involved in the campaign against child exploitation. Campaigning histories Trade unionists have been involved in the struggle against child labour since the early nineteenth century. E. P. Thompson argues that, in Britain, the 1830s were ‘aflame with agitations which turned on issues in which wages were of secondary importance . . . [for example] the great strike in the north-east coalfield in 1831 turned on security of employment, “tommy shops”, child labour’ (1968: 222). In 1866 the International Workers’ Conference called for an international campaign against child labour and from the 1860s there was a gradual increase in the number of International Trade Secretariats that contained the abolition of child labour among their core demands (Myrstad, 1999). At the end of the nineteenth century the British Trades Union Congress (TUC) passed a resolution condemning child labour as ‘a crime against the human race’. Children were being ‘torn from the school and hurled into the factory’ and the time had come ‘for Great Britain . . . to give up coining its wealth out of children’s wasted lives’. The resolution instructed the TUC’s Parliamentary Committee ‘to demand as a temporary minimum from the Government the abolition of child labour until the age of 15, and of night labour until the age of 18’ (TUC, 1896: 62). The TUC’s commitment to the total abolition of all child employment in Britain remained a clear policy goal for much of the twentieth century (Cunningham, 2000), and in 1997 the TUC reaffirmed its commitment to combating the exploitation of children by publishing a damning indictment of the extent and nature of child labour in the UK (TUC, 1997). Trade unions in the US also have a long history of opposition to child labour, and they too continue to draw attention to the plight of children employed both at home and abroad. The AFL–CIO (American Federation of Labor–Congress of Industrial Organizations), for example, has recently highlighted the plight of children employed on US farms, noting that ‘hundreds of thousands of young children work long, hard hours in the nation’s agriculture industry . . . under conditions that threaten their health, safety and well-being’ (AFL–CIO, 1998). Representatives of the trade union movement have been formally included in the ILO’s ‘tripartite’ organisational structure since it was set up in 1919, and their representatives have maintained the stance that the labour movement’s ultimate goal is the abolition of all forms of child labour. Various philanthropists, charitable organisations and what are now termed nongovernmental organisations have also been involved in the campaign against child labour from the early nineteenth century onwards. Prominent individuals such as Michael Sadler, Richard Oastler and Lord Shaftesbury (in Britain), Owen R.

Globalisation and Child Labour 183 Lovejoy, Reverend Charles Bruce, Grace Abbott and Edgar C. Murphy (in the US) and Samuel Van Houten (in the Netherlands) gained their reputations, in part, through their campaigning work on behalf of child workers. Organisations such as Anti-Slavery International and Save the Children Fund (SCF) have worked in this area for decades – conducting research, supporting local campaigns in various parts of the globe and pressurising governments to enact restricting regulations to abolish child labour. For most of the twentieth century, both these types of organisation, NGOs and trade unions, followed similar strategies, their goal the implementation of international statute and agreement to gradually abolish child labour. Yet this ‘slow-paced’ campaigning work no longer seems appropriate. For most writers, researchers and activists the problem has become more severe as a consequence of the expansion of global capitalism. GATT and WTO agreements, IMF- and World Bank-initiated structural adjustment programmes and ‘developments in the world capitalist system have increased the economic motivation of Third World countries to use the cheapest sources of labour . . . [in the unorganised and informal sector] . . . [T]he informal sector is not a relic from a pre-capitalist past. In fact it is an integral part of the world capitalist system’s process of surplus extraction; it is superexploitation, especially of child labour’ (Gulrajani, 2000: 51). Such concerns have had a dramatic effect on child labour activists. There is now in process a significant reappraisal of the child labour problem with divisions emerging over the question ‘what is to be done?’ For some writers child labour remains essentially a problem of pre-capitalist social relations, of underdevelopment (see, for example, Mehta et al., 1985). As Fyfe argues, ‘The transition to industrial capitalism has been associated . . . with a longterm decline in child employment’ (1989: 4). On this scenario, the eradication of child labour in the ‘advanced’ countries offers the model for newly industrialising countries to follow. It is suggested that the democratising process and development of modern society controlled child labour and thus, in the newly developing world the further expansion and development of capitalism will control it. Although coming from a different starting point, this is essentially the line of argument presented by free-market liberals within the WTO, the IMF and the World Bank: the spread of an integrated capitalism will increase wealth which will trickle down to improve the lives of the poor (and gradually eradicate child labour). For many unions, social clauses and state regulation of the labour market (and possibly also reform of the WTO) remain fundamental to the campaign to control unscrupulous businesses and corporations and protect child workers. Stressing traditional ‘child protection’ perspectives, they argue that pressure must be brought to bear on governments and international financial and trade organisations to regulate labour markets and protect vulnerable workers. Large international union confederations (possibly in conjunction with their local affiliates) and unions in the advanced economies have a key role to play in forcing their agenda onto the table of organisations such as the WTO. The AFL–CIO, for example, has thrown its weight behind international action against child labour. Its president,

184 Labour and Globalisation John Sweeney, has demanded an end to global practices that ensure that children are ‘cheated out of their childhoods, denied even the most basic education, and sent out, often at an early age, to difficult and dangerous work at pitifully low wages’ (AFL–CIO, 1996). Although these are a continuation of long-held reform strategies – which have failed to control child labour in the recent past – there is, nevertheless, a discernible belief that the need for reform has become more urgent as labour market deregulators and free-market liberals enforce their agendas on economies across the globe (ICFTU, 1996, ‘States of Disarray’). In other words, the unfettered development of capitalism will not eradicate child labour, as developmentalists argue, indeed it may well make the problem worse. However, controlled or managed development, with appropriate legal regulation of working conditions and labour markets and full recognition for workers’ organisations, can start to solve the problem. However, a radically different argument is presented by a number of researchers and writers influenced by what is termed the ‘children’s rights agenda’. Developing a critique of an ‘imposed Western childhood’, these advocates argue that notions of a long, sheltered childhood undermine local cultural traditions and operate to exclude young people from participation in their societies and (in this context) from the world of work. Espousing these themes, a number of writers and NGOs suggest that ‘Western’ concerns with child labour ignore local cultural practices and concerns (Newbery, 2000). This is a broadly ‘child liberationist’ position. It has led some NGOs to raise the demand for children’s right to work. Further, they argue that banning child labour actually makes the problem worse in one of two ways: either by forcing child labour underground, where conditions are more brutal, or by forcing children out of work, making their (and their families’) poverty more severe. In short, their position is that the conditions of labour should be improved, rather than the work activity stopped. These last two positions push in opposite directions – one opposing child labour, the other defending it, or even advocating it. Yet the ‘protectionists’ and the ‘liberationists’ have more in common than may at first seem apparent: both treat child labour as a problem that can be dealt with in isolation from the wider social totality. Recently, however, there has developed a broader ‘anti-capitalist’ critique that has drawn together activists and researchers from a range of campaigns: activists concerned with debt, poverty, global trade, environmental destruction, structural adjustment programmes, labour rights and the operation of a range of MNCs (see, e.g., Klein, 2000; Danaher and Burbach [eds], 2000; Harman, 2000). In the aftermath of the Seattle demonstrations against the World Trade Organisation’s Third Ministerial (30 November–3 December 1999), the anti-capitalist movement has developed a sharper perspective, arguing that all of these problems have a common root: there are many social problems, one overarching cause – global capitalism. Within the anti-capitalist movement child labour is identified as one of the major problems of a globalised world – and the solutions to this problem are intimately linked to the interrelated issues of debt, poverty and global inequality. It is this approach, we suggest, that offers a way out of the theoretical and practical cul-

Globalisation and Child Labour 185 de-sac in which the two dominant campaigns against child labour find themselves. Before proceeding, however, it is necessary to offer some indication of the scale of the child labour problem we are discussing. The extent of child labour Estimating the exact number of children employed worldwide is difficult. As the International Labour Organisation (ILO, 1996) points out, many countries do not keep figures, and the statistics of those that do are, at best, partial. For example, most surveys only include children aged 10 and above, despite the fact that millions below this age can be found in employment. In addition, they often only include children for whom work is their principal activity, ignoring those who combine employment with school. Yet part-time work and ‘out of school’ work is a significant source of employment for children across the globe. Global estimates of child labour are, therefore, likely to underestimate its overall level, and the statistical analyses provided by international bodies and NGOs need to be interpreted with care. For instance, in 1995, the ILO estimated that some 73 million children aged between 10 and 14 were working worldwide. However, these figures were based on a limited survey of 100 nations, and China (with a substantial child labour problem) and other industrialised countries were not included. Paid work by children under the age of 10 was not considered, nor were those engaged in various forms of homeworking. UNICEF (1997) estimated that if these last two groups alone were taken into account the figure could have been as high as 400 million. According to Boyd (1994) in a review of data, in the ‘Third World’ at least one in four children between the ages of 10 and 14 works. She suggests that Children constitute about 18 per cent of Brazil’s workforce. An estimated 12 million children work in Nigeria. But the highest number of child workers is to be found in the countries of Asia. India has an estimated 44 million working children; Pakistan’s estimates range from 7.5 million to 10 million child labourers. In Indonesia conservative estimates claim that almost 3 million children work. (1994: 155).

New Internationalist (1997) addressed the problem from a slightly different starting point. It looked at the number of school-age children across the globe who were not attending school – assuming that the vast majority of non-attenders were working. This led it to estimate that there were 500 million working children in the world. The ILO has since accepted that its 1995 survey provided a ‘gross underestimation’ of the problem and has revised its figures upwards. It now suggests that there are in the region of 120 million child workers working full-time in the ‘developing’ world and a further 130 million working part-time (ILO, 1998a). The estimates of child workers, therefore, provide testimony to the scale of the problem: the difference between 250 million (ILO) and 500 million (New Internationalist) may be substantial but even the ‘conservative’ILO figures represent a frightening level of child labour exploitation (see McKechnie and Hobbs, 2002, for further discussion).

186 Labour and Globalisation Yet these figures, however horrific, hide the reality of the work children are expected to perform. They mask the story of millions of children working in terrible conditions – workers such as ‘Alfredo’, a 13-year-old boy from Northern Portugal, who works every day from 8 a.m. to 7.30 p.m. breaking stones; or 8-yearold ‘Fatima’, who lives on the Nile Delta and works at night (starting at 1 a.m.) picking jasmine; or ‘Sanji’, the 8-year-old carpet worker from North-East India who was forced to work 16 hours a day by an unscrupulous local employer; or the young Taiwanese girls who work in a canning factory in two 12-hour shifts and sleep above the factory in conditions akin to the ‘prentice houses’ of nineteenthcentury Britain (Hobbs and McKechnie, 1997; Prachankhadee et al., 1979). But child labour is not just a problem in the developing world. Across the developed economies children can be found working in a wide range of full-time and part-time jobs (workers, it should be remember, who were almost certainly excluded from the ILO revised figures of 1998). For example, investigations conducted in the United States show that, despite federal and state laws, millions of children are engaged in exploitative and dangerous child labour (Brooks et al., 1993; McKechnie, 1999; Barling and Kelloway, 1999). In the agricultural industry alone it is estimated that 800,000 children are employed under conditions that have been described as ‘inhumanely cruel’ (Walsh, 2000). These are not children working for their parents on small family farms but are the children ‘in California, Arizona, Washington state and Texas . . . employed as cheap labour in the billiondollar agricultural industry’ (Walsh, 2000: 24). There is sometimes a romantic image attached to farm work. It may be hard, but it is seen as healthy, conducted in the open and in the sun – it is ‘good honest toil’. But Walsh’s description reveals the reality of child farm work. He describes ‘Juan’s’ experience: As the sun heats the fields, the dew evaporates, to be replaced by clouds of dust. By 7 a.m., his eyes will be weeping and raw from the sulphurous pesticides in the soil. As the sulphur finds its way into his lungs, he will become dizzy and nauseated. Even for an adult, it would be an inhumanely cruel ordeal. But Juan is nine years old. (2000: 24).

In Britain it is estimated that 2 million children under the age of 16 are working (Pond and Searle, 1991; Leonard 1999). Children work in a range of jobs, such as newspaper and milk delivery, serving in shops and cafés, and employment in garages, warehouses and factories. For instance, a survey conducted in Lancashire found that 27 per cent of working children in Year 11 (predominantly 14- or 15year-olds) were employed in shop work; 20 per cent were employed in ‘waiting’ work in restaurants and cafés; 5 per cent were employed in the hotel and catering industry, and 16 per cent were working in ‘other’ occupations such as cleaning, gardening, modelling, factory and building work (Lavalette et al., 1995). What the children have in common in each of these sectors of employment is that they are cheap and relatively docile; what the jobs have in common is that they are often illegal and carried out in poor working conditions (Lavalette, 1994; Lavalette [ed.], 1999; Hobbs and McKechnie, 1997; TUC, 1997). Nevertheless, government policy in Britain continues to be shaped by the notion that child work is restricted to a

Globalisation and Child Labour 187 few types of appropriate ‘children’s jobs’, that they are ‘light’ jobs, and they are carried out in safe conditions which are subject to appropriate regulation. All the research evidence suggests otherwise (Lavalette [ed.], 1999). For example, milk and newspaper delivery are often thought to be particularly suitable for children, yet both are likely to require children to start work early in the morning (before the legal start-time of 7 a.m.), with some milk-rounds starting as early as 3 a.m. The work is often arduous. In 1988 The Observer suggested that newspaper delivery workers carried anything ‘from 21.5 lbs to 68.5lbs – nearly five stones’ in their shoulder bags (see Lavalette et al., 1991). Nor should we be complacent and imagine that among the advanced economies child labour is a peculiarly British and US problem, the legacy of twenty years of market liberalisation. Meillassouix (2000), in an otherwise interesting paper, comes close to this position when he suggests that ‘child labour is resurfacing . . . [in] Great Britain’ because of ‘Conservative Party policy, which created deep inequalities in income, [and] in many respects brought British social structures closer to those of the underdeveloped world’ (2000: 42, 50). The evidence is that wherever research has been undertaken children have been found at work and this includes children from across Europe (Cecchetti, 1998; McKechnie and Hobbs, 2002). Children have been found working in Germany (Weinold, 1991), France (Garet, 2000), Denmark (Hansen, 1991), the Netherlands (Hertmeijer, 1991), Italy (Valcarenghi, 1981), Spain (Searight, 1980), Portugal (Williams, 1992), Romania (IWGCL, 1998), Russia (IWGCL, 1998), and Canada (IWGCL, 1998). All the evidence emphasises that child labour is a truly global social problem. Given this picture, how can we start to solve the problem of child labour? The international community designated 1979 as the Year of the Child. Child labour research was instigated and the belief was that by extending the adoption of ILO Convention 138 the problem could be eradicated. Since then this confidence has been dented – child labour is a particularly stubborn problem. As noted above, there is considerable debate between activists and researchers over the strategies to follow, with many proposing diametrically opposed solutions. Some continue to press for national governments to toughen their child labour laws, although they should take ‘First Things First’, in the words of the ILO campaign, and regulate work ‘detrimental to children’. Others press governments in advanced economies to instigate ‘social clauses’, banning the importation of goods made with exploitative child labour (ICFTU, 1996), while a number of NGOs now explicitly reject banning child labour, arguing that children have a ‘right to work’, and campaigning for the improvement of children’s working conditions. To help plot our way through this minefield, it is necessary to look at the logic behind the various positions, strategies and goals of the child labour activists.

188 Labour and Globalisation The developmentalists’ case ‘Gradualism’ We may say that child labour persists in inverse relation to the degree of economic advancement of a society, country or region. (Mendelievich, 1979: 4)

The most commonly held explanation for the continuing exploitation of child labour is that it is a feature of economic and social backwardness, a remnant of precapitalist social relations that will gradually be eradicated by the further expansion of capitalism. There is a long tradition of child labour research based on these premises, producing a broadly Whiggish history of child labour eradication (Hutchins and Harrison, 1966) that reflects a gradualist approach to social reform from above (Draper, 1966). Key examples are drawn from a particular reading of the history of child labour exploitation and its ‘demise’ in the advanced economies. In Britain, for example, it is argued that child labour exploitation was at its most extreme during the ‘protoindustrial’ period and that the worst exploiters of children’s labour were their parents. The argument continues by suggesting that in the early phase of the Industrial Revolution the ‘old’ labour practices continued, but as children were drawn out of the home and into the factory they became more noticeable and gradually philanthropists and reformers were able to bring pressure on the polity to control children’s labouring activities and protect them from the worst forms of abuse. Hence, the development of modern capitalism – and with it a democratising polity – was part of the process of protecting children and stopping child labour. As Lavalette (1998) argues elsewhere, however, there are a number of serious problems with this argument. Although there was a decline in the level of child labour exploitation in Britain in the second half of the nineteenth century, this was the consequence of a number of specific features. Among the most important were changing economic technologies, the development of a more organised form of capitalism, the need for an educated workforce, the development of state social policy to control and shape family life, concern over the future of the ‘British race’ and the ‘problem of order’ in the expanding urban areas. The combination of these factors, at a particular historical juncture, reshaped children’s labour market activities, pushing them into part-time jobs that could be combined with schooling. But the part-time jobs did not stop being exploitative – they simply stopped being an object of concern for social commentators, and the ‘child labour problem’ disappeared from view (Cunningham, 1999). For those wedded to the notion that ‘enlightened politicians’ and the bourgeoisie more generally were central to controlling child labour in Britain, the case of child chimney sweepers is particularly revealing. Chimney sweeping was a peculiarly British job. Young children (normally boys) were sent up flues to clean chimneys and to fight fires. Very often they were sent up naked to help them squeeze into the tiny cavities. Chimney sweepers were not ‘hidden’ in outlying areas, but worked in towns and cities, in the homes of the rich and powerful. Agitation to

Globalisation and Child Labour 189 control and regulate the conditions of chimney sweepers began in 1760, and the first Bill which attempted to deal with the issue was introduced to Parliament in 1788, yet this and successive Bills were defeated until the Chimney Sweepers Act of 1875 introduced some basic controls on chimney climbing (Keeling, 1914). Finally, the claims made by ‘developmentalists’ are further weakened by evidence showing that child labour in advanced capitalist nations is far from being eradicated (see McKechnie, 1999). As Goddard and White (1982) argue, the tendency, prevalent among Western commentators and politicians, to assume that child labour will inevitably be superseded with the further ‘capitalisation’ of underdeveloped nations is fundamentally flawed. The continuing widespread use and exploitation of child labour in both Britain and the United States shows that the practice is not destined to disappear in the transition from a more ‘savage’ to a more ‘advanced’ form of capitalist accumulation. The neo-liberal twist Recently, developmentalist arguments have been given a neo-liberal twist by advocates of structural adjustment programmes, labour market deregulation and market liberalisation – in essence what the poor need is more unregulated capitalism, not less. Economic ‘liberals’ opposed to the imposition of international labour regulations claim that child labour is an unfortunate, yet inevitable and necessary part of the development process. From this perspective, demand for child labour is a consequence of the ‘undercapitalised’ state of Third World economies and the only effective way of eliminating it is through economic growth. Economic progress, it is argued, will generate real improvements in working conditions and material living standards, and dependence on child labour will diminish as a result. This approach shaped the 1992–1997 British Conservative government’s response to calls for the rules governing world trade to be linked to core social rights, including restrictions on child labour. It argued that any attempt to restrict child labour would have effects opposite to those intended. In the absence of any alternative means of supplementing meagre incomes, families that were already very poor would be further impoverished, and children stopped from working would be forced into ‘less desirable’ activities such as prostitution (Hansard, House of Lords, C 684, 19 February 1997). In the words of Ian Lang, the then British Conservative President of the Board of Trade, such controls would ‘serve to slow down trade liberalisation’ and ‘make social problems in these countries even worse’ (Evins, 1996). However, this form of developmentalism is undermined by evidence emphasising that levels of child labour appear to be growing rather than decreasing. As the ICFTU (1996) argues, not only does child labour continue to exist in many forms, it ‘shows signs of increase in an alarming number of industrialised and developing countries’. Moreover, it is in those nations which have been most exposed to structural adjustment programmes, attacks on organised labour and trade liberalisation policies of the sort advocated by neo-liberal developmentalists that the situation appears to have deteriorated the most. For example, household surveys in Brazil

190 Labour and Globalisation show that the percentage of urban male children working increased from 10 per cent to 15 per cent between 1976 and 1995 (the respective increase for females was from 4 per cent to 8 per cent). This was despite the fact that the country witnessed an average GNP annual growth rate of 3.5 per cent between 1975 and 1995 (UN, 1999: 182). According to Green (1999), a similar trend is apparent in Latin America, where UN figures show that child labour among 13 to 17-year-olds rose in five out of seven countries studied. Again, this increase occurred at a time when the region as a whole enjoyed sustained economic growth (an average of 2.8 per cent of GNP per year between 1975 and 1995) (UN, 1999: 183). In short, the ‘developmentalist’ claim that low levels of labour market regulation will ultimately promote economic growth in ‘Third World’ countries, and hence deliver lower levels of child labour, has proven to be false. As Green (1999) notes, such strategies appear to have led to more, not fewer, children in the workplace. In other words, structural adjustment programmes and market liberalisation and deregulation increase inequality and the vulnerability of the very poorest. Perhaps not surprisingly, under such conditions child labour grows and becomes more extreme. Neoliberalism apparently brings with it a charter to exploit child workers. A child’s right to work? The ‘new sociology’ of childhood As we have noted, recent years have witnessed an increase in child labour exploitation. But rather than this coinciding with increasing efforts to control and regulate child labour, it has occurred at a time when increasing numbers of academics, NGO activists and politicians have adopted elements of the ‘children’s rights agenda’. This has led some activists to argue for children’s right to work. Central to this change within the NGOs was the promotion of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, which was formally adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1989. The Convention asserts some basic values regarding the treatment, participation and protection of children within society. It contains a number of contradictions (Lavalette [ed.], 1999), but it has been described by some advocates as ‘akin to a manifesto for the children’s rights movement’ (Franklin and Franklin, 1996: 2). It has led some advocates to argue that ‘protectionist paradigms’ are inappropriate. Protectionism, it is suggested, reflects peculiarly Western values that have little relevance to the lives of children in the developing world; further, it denies children’s agency and locks them into a restricting life-stage, ‘childhood’, in which their lives are devalued and their rights restricted or denied. These developments have coincided with a wider theorisation of children, their social roles and their abilities formulated under the self-proclaimed title of the ‘new sociology of childhood’ (James et al., 1998). The ‘new sociology’ has developed broadly postmodern themes. It is suggested that childhood is a relatively recent ‘Western’ invention and that different cultures have different traditions and views on the appropriate roles and activities of children. Therefore ‘cultural rela-

Globalisation and Child Labour 191 tivism’ is the appropriate approach to understanding the social world. Further, it is argued that the life-stage ‘childhood’ is oppressive for all children and that children are in a unique position to know and understand their oppression (and thus their ‘voices’ must be prioritised in any policy or research agendas). Finally, it is asserted that children should have full participation rights within society; they should have rights normally accorded to adults, and this includes the right to work (see Lavalette [ed.], 1999). There is no necessary link between theory and practice but the ‘rights agenda’ and the emphasis on cultural autonomy have figured centrally within recent NGO work on child labour. The consequence is that NGOs are now much more focused on ‘child liberation’ perspectives and reject international attempts to stop child labour. What are the consequences of these ideas for NGO practice? NGOs and child labour In recent years NGOs have emerged as major actors on the world stage in terms of both their size and their impact. The UN estimates that the NGO sector in the US alone employs nearly 9 million people and possesses some $566 billion in revenues. They have, it is argued, ‘become important pressure groups, protecting people’s rights and watching over other actors’ (UN, 1999: 95). With regard to working children, UNICEF suggests that NGOs have played ‘a primary role in discovering and denouncing child labour abuses, lobbying and advocating policy reform and proposing or providing direct services for working children’. In fact, in 1992–93 NGOs were involved in the implementation of 60 per cent of the ILO’s International Programmes on the Elimination of Child Labour (IPECs) (Tabusa, 1997). As it is currently constituted, the ILO’s tripartite policy-making structure does not guarantee NGOs formal rights to influence policy directly. However, recent discussions which have taken place at the ILO show that Western governments (including those of the US and the UK) would like to see an even greater role for NGOs in the formulation and implementation of international conventions on child labour (ILO, 1998a). Given the part such ‘third sector’ organisations play in implementing programmes, and the fact that their views and assistance are increasingly being sought, it is important to assess their proposals for dealing with child labour. Most of the NGOs that have taken an interest in child labour are not opposed to children being employed per se but now prefer to make a distinction between what they see as ‘acceptable’ and ‘unacceptable’ work. ‘Unacceptable’ forms of child labour include those jobs which are deemed to be particularly pernicious, such as military service, bonded or slave labour, prostitution or other forms of commercial sexual exploitation. NGOs acknowledge that the employment of children in work of this kind is intolerable and that immediate action is needed to eliminate it. Hence, the NGO Group for the Convention on the Rights of the Child (1999), a coalition of more than 40 international non-governmental organisations, welcomed the new ILO Convention on the Immediate Abolition of the Worst Forms of Child Labour (1999).

192 Labour and Globalisation However, most NGOs strenuously oppose calls for the immediate prohibition of all forms of child labour and few are prepared to accept that work is necessarily prejudicial. For example, Save the Children Fund International argues that what counts as ‘exploitation’ needs to be located within the cultural context within which it is undertaken. So there are universal standards of treatment which can be used as a ‘yardstick measurement’ but then culture and context must be considered (though how universal principles can be combined with cultural relativism is never fully explained). SCF warns against the imposition of a Western, culturally specific experience of childhood socialisation onto societies whose structures and traditional support networks have evolved entirely differently (SCF, 1998). Hence, although NGOs acknowledge that the labour performed by ‘Third World’ children might be considered ‘harmful’ by standards prevalent in contemporary Western societies, they argue that when placed in a Third World setting it becomes much more understandable. In the first place, the economic contribution children’s earnings make towards their own and their family’s survival is often absolutely necessary. However, through their work, children also learn the skills that are needed to live in their localities. In the words of Norberg-Hodge, director of the International Society for Ecology and Culture, ‘working with the family and community helps to shape their identity, gives them a vital role in life and a feeling of responsibility and belonging’ (cited in Newbery, 2000). Not surprisingly, then, NGOs have persistently refused to support proposals which they believe will, in the absence of alternative forms of income, harm the immediate welfare of those effected. In this respect, their response to the public outcry that accompanied the discovery of the employment of thousands of young Pakistani children in the production of World Cup footballs was illustrative. At the time (1998), the revelations led to calls from politicians and trade unionists in Europe and elsewhere for basic employment rights to be written into world trade agreements (McSmith, 1999). SCF, though, counselled against any such moves, arguing that the money children earned from stitching footballs may have been used to ‘help children to eat better, or wear shoes, or better clothes’. It went on: The thought of children in a poor part of the world labouring to produce leisure goods for children in Europe is disturbing. But Save the Children is convinced that quick-fix solutions such as bans or boycotts aren’t the answer . . . Save the Children is cautioning campaigners against rushing in and taking ill-thought-out action. While children are very vulnerable to employer exploitation, work can be a way of children gaining skills and increasing their choices. Emotive responses in the past have caused more harm than good. (SCF, 1998)

In justifying their opposition to ‘bans and boycotts’ NGOs draw specific attention to instances where such strategies appear to have had a negative impact on children’s lives. Perhaps the most frequently cited example is that of the Bangladeshi garment industry’s response to the introduction of the ‘Harkin Bill’ in the United States, which, if enacted, would have prohibited the import of minerals and goods produced with child labour. Both SCF and CAFOD point out that

Globalisation and Child Labour 193 the mere threat of sanctions led to the dismissal of thousands of children (mainly girls), who, in the absence of any other means of earning a living, were forced to take up even worse jobs as brick-breakers, domestic servants or even sex workers. A similar example is the ‘Meknes Affair’. In 1995 a British television documentary revealed that child workers were being employed in a textile factory in Meknes, Morocco. The young workers were employed making dresses that eventually appeared for sale in high street stores in Britain. The discovery sparked international interest in the case and child employment in Morocco came under scrutiny. However, the International Working Group on Child Labour, in a follow-up study, found that the international storm had left many of the child workers in a perilous state. The Working Group found that many of the young workers had been sacked as a direct consequence of the publicity the factory received, that many of those who had been dismissed were significantly poorer, that the children’s families were poorer without their children’s income and that a number of the children had been forced into underground employment, prostitution or had simply ‘disappeared’ from view (IWGCL, 1998). NGOs, therefore, argue that certain basic principles need to be followed if such ‘spectacular examples of misguided action’ are to be avoided in future (CAFOD, 1997). For example, they insist that working children and their families need to be consulted when governments draw up policies – they, it is argued, know their situations best, and only they are in a position to assess the concrete impact of proposals designed to improve their lot (SCF, 1999). Just as importantly, governments need to understand the complexity of child labour and acknowledge the fact that ‘simplistic solutions can have disastrous consequences for children’. As Malaysia’s Third World Network argue, they must begin by recognising that Euro-American Western-style models of childhood are ‘totally devoid of relevance to day-to-day life’ in underdeveloped countries. Most of all, argues Norberg-Hodge, the ‘blanket assumption that wherever children work, it is abuse’ needs to be tackled (cited in Newbery, 2000). To sum up, the position of NGOs is that it is better to work towards improving the conditions of children’s employment (where possible combining it with education) rather than campaigning for the abolition of child labour. In this respect, SCF’s ‘child porter project’ in Mongolia provides an excellent example of the sort of concrete strategy favoured by NGOs working in this field: In Mongolia SCF has been working with boys who work as porters in urban markets. Many of them are from very poor families. This work was both hazardous because they had to wield very heavy trolleys and exploitative because they had to rent the trolleys at a high daily rate. In collaboration with local government authorities SCF has developed a project which enables the children to rent trolleys at a much lower rate. Our partner organisation purchased some lighter weight trolleys in bulk. The children can now buy them on hire purchase. The lower cost trolley hire means that the children can work for fewer hours per day. This project has reduced the hazard and exploitation that the children face whilst not removing their livelihoods. (SCF, 1998)

194 Labour and Globalisation The NGOs’ position, and the child liberationist position more generally, has some (superficial) appeal. It talks in terms of rejecting ‘Western’ values and this can seem attractive in societies ravaged by the operation of Western multinationals and by the historical legacy of imperialism. Its emphasis on the right to work – and hence on the active role of children as agents in the social process – sounds radical and seems to avoid the pitfall of leaving young workers and their families in desperate poverty by banning their employment and detrimentally affecting their earning potential. And the emphasis NGOs place on ‘listening to children’s voices’ means that they report the concerns of children in the developing world, who view work as the only solution to their desperate fight against poverty. But such sentiments are, as we suggested, superficial. Rejecting and fighting against the role of multinationals in developing countries, or intervention from imperialist powers, does not necessarily entail unconditional defence of indigenous cultural practices – many of which may involve reinforcing oppression and exploitation. Many of the direct exploiters of child labour, for example, will be representatives of local capital, while the power and wealth of the national ruling class is tied in with the interests of the global capitalist system which is at the heart of the child labour problem. Secondly, as Susan George (1999) points out, child labour undermines adult wages, thereby exacerbating the problem of poverty. It has also been used to undermine the collective (trade union) rights of adult workers within developing countries by acting as a wedge of casualisation. As Bequele and Boyden (1988) note, child workers are far more likely to be employed in the informal sector, in casual conditions of employment, and where trade unions do not have (or no longer have) a significant presence. Thirdly, of course many children in developing countries want to work because the alternative is starvation. But what if the question were posed differently? Would children still want to work if poverty were taken out of the equation? If they and their families’ health and welfare needs were met? If schooling were free and relevant? In posing these questions we suggest that the NGOs’ general perspective is built upon a deep pessimism about our ability to solve the major social problems facing the world. It assumes that global inequality and poverty are inevitable, that it is not possible to provide full and adequate health, welfare and educational facilities for all people across the globe and, therefore, that children have to work to help provide a meagre standard of living for their families. The ‘bigger picture’, of dealing with poverty in what is now a world of enormous plenty, is lost. Instead the focus is on the pressing problem and the practical and the partial solution – solutions which deal with the immediate but can also end up reinforcing the exploitation, the oppression and the inequalities child workers face. As an example, let us mention the case of young charcoal workers in Brazil, highlighted in a UK Channel 4 television programme ‘Slavery’ (broadcast on Thursday 28 September 2000). In the recent past the young workers had been enslaved by the charcoal producers, forced to work long hours, in atrocious conditions, producing charcoal for the US steel industry. They were literally slaves: they received no pay and were not free to leave their employment. A long campaign

Globalisation and Child Labour 195 by NGOs and various agencies eventually succeeded in stopping the practice of slavery in this industry – a significant and important victory against child slave labour. The young workers are now ‘free’ and earn the equivalent of £2.50 a day. Many of the NGOs now defend the children’s right to work, because they need the money. But today the young workers work in the same atrocious conditions. They get paid, but have to support themselves fully on their meagre incomes. And while they are ‘free’, they have no alternative but to sell their labour power to the charcoal bosses – with their freedom has come a very brutal ‘economic compulsion’ which has left them in a similar predicament as wage slaves. But this situation does not receive the same negative publicity – these are free workers, not slaves. Perhaps not surprisingly, the ‘pragmatic’ opposition of NGOs to blanket bans on child labour, and their refusal to support proposals to link trade to labour standards, have also been welcomed by employer delegates to the ILO. In the face of increasing global condemnation of child labour, and the growing threat of direct action and boycotts against companies that utilise it in the production of their goods, the more prudent, conservative strategies recommended by NGOs have provided employers with a welcome respite. What is clear is that NGO support for ‘non-exploitative’ forms of child labour has provided legitimacy to employer demands that reform be pursued at a slow, ‘realistic’ pace. For example, when calling for the scope of the proposed convention on the immediate abolition of the worst forms of child labour to be limited, the Employers’ Confederation of Service Industries in Finland was keen to reiterate the point made by many NGOs that children’s participation in working life had ‘a long history and deep cultural roots in many countries’. Such participation, it argued, had ‘implications for the economic development of these countries’ and it would ‘therefore be a mistake to seek to ban all forms of work by children’. The Federation of Jordanian Chambers of Commerce also utilised the language of NGOs in its calls for the aims of the convention to be narrowly defined. Noting that ‘any income earned by a child or any member of a family, especially in most developing countries, is a source of livelihood for the whole family’, it argued that the complete abolition of child labour should not be included as one of the stated objectives of the new convention. And, in an address which echoed the calls made by NGOs for a distinction to be made between ‘acceptable’ and ‘unacceptable’ work, the Confederation of Portuguese Industry insisted that ‘child labour in itself should not be confused with the “extreme” forms, the “worst” forms or the “most intolerable” forms of such work’ (ILO, 1999). Trade unions and child labour The notion that child labour should be tolerated because it is part of the ‘traditional’ way of life in certain societies, or because its curtailment will arrest the economic development of ‘Third World’ countries, has been rejected by trade union organisations. As AFL–CIO president John Sweeney argues, trade unions must be determined to fight global practices which mean children are ‘cheated out of their

196 Labour and Globalisation childhoods, denied even the most basic education, and sent out, often at an early age, to difficult and dangerous work at pitifully low wages’ (AFL–CIO, 1996): There are still those who assert that child labor must be tolerated . . . that it can only be overcome after economic development occurs in poor countries. We reject these arguments – just as we reject the arguments that the natural course of economic growth in developing countries bars the assertion of workers’ rights or human rights. We believe that economic development and education go hand in hand – that school is the best place for all children, regardless of their social standing or their nation’s economic vitality. Indeed, basic education is essential to lifting families, communities and countries out of poverty. (AFL–CIO, 2000)

Some trade unions have therefore expressed concern about the recent emphasis which governments and NGOs have placed on the need to focus more specifically on the most exploitative types of child work. At its conference in 1999, the ILO adopted Convention 182 calling on states to ‘take immediate and effective measures to secure the prohibition and elimination of the worst forms of child labour as a matter of urgency’ (ILO, 1999b). Although this convention was passed unanimously, trade union delegates were concerned that it represented a wateringdown of Convention 138, passed in 1973, which demands the implementation of measures to ‘ensure the effective abolition of child labour’ (ILO, 1973). For example, the Kenyan Central Organization of Trade Unions (COTU) argued that the wording of the new convention provided ‘room for flexibility by setting a lower standard than that laid down in Convention No. 138’ (ILO, 1999b). The General Confederation of Portuguese Workers (CGTP-IN) was also sceptical about the aims of the convention, noting that it ‘[did] not contain any references to the fact that all forms of child labour are intrinsically reprehensible’ (ILO, 1999b). Distinguishing between ‘acceptable’ and ‘unacceptable’ forms of child work in international law, it argued, drew attention away from ‘the final objective which continues to be the ultimate abolition of all child labour’: The expression chosen to delimit the scope of the instruments – ‘the worst forms of child labour’ – is not the most ideal one, in that it involves an implicit value judgement: if there are worse forms, there are also better forms of child labour which are therefore more acceptable – a particularly disturbing idea in the context of the fight against child labour . . . The main shortcoming in the proposed instruments is their scope, which is too restricted and, moreover, liable to give the idea that the other forms of child labour not mentioned could, in some way, be acceptable. (ILO, 1999a)

There can, in fact, be little doubt that the promoters of the new convention saw it as a means of ‘diluting’ the ILO’s long-standing commitment to the abolition of all forms of child labour. Indeed, in a speech to the NGO Sub-Group on Child Labour (1996), A. Bequele, director of the ILO’s Working Conditions and Environment Department, admitted that it was motivated by the belief that the objectives laid out in Convention 138 were ‘too comprehensive and too detailed’ and the standards it set ‘too stringent’. However, he confessed that the convention

Globalisation and Child Labour 197 also represented an attempt to ‘take the subject of child labour out of the social clause debate, and handle the problem through voluntary action rather than economic pressure’. In short, it was hoped that perceived progress on combating the worst forms of child labour would help contain the ‘difficulties’ recent debates over the inclusion of ‘social clauses’ in international trade agreements had caused certain ‘Third World’ governments. As discussed above, ‘developmentalists’ and NGOs have always opposed ‘social clauses’, claiming that they harm economic progress and thereby perpetuate the conditions which lead to child labour in the first place. The international trade union movement, though, concerned about the impact of globalisation on workers’ rights, has lobbied hard for governments and international bodies to link trade agreements with ‘Third World’ countries to guarantees about labour standards, including child employment. Indeed, the pressure applied by trade unions has contributed to the development of a number of initiatives linking, or seeking to link, trade to the observance of certain minimum standards. The United States Generalized System of Preferences (USGSP), which exempts products imported from certain ‘Third World’ countries from customs duties, is one such initiative. Since 1984, those nations wishing to benefit from these exemptions have had to prove that they are taking steps to adhere to certain internationally recognised workers’ rights, including the fixing of a minimum age for admission to employment. Opponents of the USGSP have accused its supporters, including the labour movement in the US, of seeking to destroy the comparative advantage of ‘Third World’ countries via a form of disguised protectionism. However, the AFL–CIO argues that initiatives such as the USGSP are crucial in order to prevent international economic competition degenerating into ‘a race to the bottom where we sacrifice the standards under which most people live and labor on the altar of private profit for a privileged few’ (AFL–CIO, 1996). The union insists that today’s unregulated and imbalanced global economy ‘is not working well for working people’, because it encourages an environment in which companies ‘compete by exploitation – playing nations against one another – lowering wages, scrapping regulations, loosening environmental restrictions’. Moreover, the global economy has spawned a system in which ‘children are valued not for who they are, or for who they will become, but because they are cheap, docile and expendable’. Trade accords, argues the AFL–CIO, ‘must protect people and not just property’, and it is for this reason that it fights ‘to secure rules for the global economy that enforce workers’ rights and environmental protections, not subvert them’ (AFL–CIO, 2000). The European Union’s System of Generalised Tariff Preferences (EUSGTP), like the USGSP, grants reductions in tariff duties to certain products imported from a number of ‘Third World’ countries. As in the US, the EU has come under sustained pressure from unions to link trade preferences to labour standards, and, partly as a result of this, working conditions in the nations seeking to benefit from its scheme are expected to comply with certain core social rights. The EU scheme is more specific than its US counterpart in defining what is clearly unacceptable and it allows for the complete withdrawal of preferences if countries are found to

198 Labour and Globalisation permit any form of forced labour (as defined in ILO Conventions 29 and 105). In addition, since 1998, it has given further preferences to countries which can prove that they have adopted and applied in their national legislation the substance of the standards elaborated in a number of other ILO conventions, including Convention 138 (ILO, 1997; UNCTAD, 1999). The European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) believes that the EU should build upon its System of Generalised Tariff Preferences and create a ‘benchmark social model’ for other regional groupings seeking to ‘develop a framework of rules and policies to shape the globalisation process in the interests of the mass of the population’. It responds thus to criticisms of its ‘social clause’ campaign: The ‘needs’ of the global economy are constantly used as an alibi by those who wish to roll back workers’ rights and downgrade social and labour standards. This cannot continue. If globalisation is pursued on the present basis of greater freedom for the owners of capital, with no countervailing rules, then the result will be ever greater inequalities within and between countries, challenges to democratic government, exploitation of environmental resources taking no account of future generations, and the undermining of labour standards – and ultimately the forces of economic development – in a competitive race to the bottom. In this case the victims will not only be those directly exploited – such as child-labourers . . . but all those who must work for their living. (ETUC, 1999)

The trade union-led ‘social clause’ campaigns in Europe and the US are therefore driven by a fear that increasingly fierce competition between nations created by the globalisation of economic forces has had, and in the absence of appropriate safeguards will continue to have, harmful repercussions for social progress. In recent years the international trade union movement has taken this campaign a stage further and called for ‘social clauses’ to be integrated into World Trade Organisation (WTO) treaties and agreements governing global integration. Under proposals put forward by the ICFTU, the WTO, together with the ILO, would create and administer a multilateral framework for core labour standards in the international trading system. The WTO would, in effect, be vested with powers, currently lacking within the ILO, to penalise persistently irresponsible behaviour by companies and governments by denying them the right to access global markets. In short, the WTO would ensure that nations engaging in international trade would be obliged to respect certain workers’ rights and trade sanctions would be imposed on them if they failed to do so (ICFTU, 1998b). Naturally, the ICFTU has faced charges of ‘cultural imperialism’ from NGOs, governments and others opposed to social clauses. However, it responds to these by arguing that ‘the real threat to culture comes not from a universally agreed system of rules, but from transnationals, which answer to no one, with their uncontrolled commercialism, and their imposition of wage levels, patterns of work and working conditions regardless of national mores or local sensitivities’ (ICFTU, 1998a). Its sole aim, it claims, is to ‘stop is governments trying to gain competitive advantage through the repression, discrimination, and exploitation of workers’ (ICFTU, 1998a).

Globalisation and Child Labour 199 For the international trade union movement, therefore, the solution to the problem of child labour lies, ultimately, in the reform of the WTO and the adoption of an internationally recognised and enforceable code of workers’ rights. There are, however, a number of problems with such an approach. First, it assumes that a social clause, if adopted by the WTO, would be effective, fully implemented and enforced. In fact, as the trade union movement in the US has found, the precedents in this regard are not very encouraging. For instance, the social clauses in the USGSP merely oblige governments to ‘take steps’ with a view to ensuring the application of certain core rights. Moreover, even when petitions have been filed against recalcitrant countries, little effort is made to ensure compliance. Thus, complaints have frequently been suspended solely on the basis of a pledge received from the governments concerned that remedial measures will be taken in the future. US administrations have, therefore, shown themselves extremely reluctant to withdraw trade preferences, and petitions are often only taken seriously when there is conclusive evidence of extreme violations of freedom of association. As the ILO notes, charges relating to child labour are rare and as late as November 1995 Pakistan was the only nation to have been deprived of certain advantages of the system for abuses relating to it. Even then, the child labour charge was merely one of a number of grounds for the petition against Pakistan (ILO, 1997). The simple fact is that US governments have been more concerned to promote global economic interests than they have international labour standards. One question the trade union movement must, therefore, ask itself is whether there is any reason to assume that the WTO would do otherwise. Certainly, the ICFTU’s belief in the potential of the WTO to act as a guarantor of core labour standards does suggest an uncritical and unproblematic conception of what its role and functions are – it is after all there to protect and promote the interests of free-market capitalism (see Danaher and Burbach [eds], 2000; Harman, 2000). The approach of the international trade union organisations is one that has stressed the possibility of treating child labour as an ‘isolated’ social problem. It has emphasised the role of international agreement and social clauses in curtailing child labour exploitation, yet it is an approach that has failed to stop child labour and has instead actually witnessed its increase. Child labour has increased because marketisation, structural adjustment programmes, labour market deregulation, increased poverty and inequality have all become much more common and severe at the start of the twenty-first century. But such a realisation also poses a fundamental question for the international trade union organisations: can we treat child labour as an isolated problem or does solving the problem involve addressing wider issues of social inequality? Seattle, anti-capitalism and the rebirth of the child labour debate The two dominant approaches to the issue of child labour exploitation apparently pull in different directions. For liberationists and those who adhere to the ‘rights agenda’, the poverty faced by children and their families, the rejection of the

200 Labour and Globalisation ‘Western concept of childhood’ and a perspective which stresses ‘listening to children’s voices’ lead to a position in which many NGOs defend children’s right to work. For the international trade union organisations and those who can broadly be termed ‘protectionists’, international agreements need to be invoked to stop children from working. Yet these positions have more in common than may at first appear. Both primarily involve a focus on child labour, isolated from other aspects of poverty and inequality that blight children’s lives. Both isolate child labour from the wider social totality and produce partial solutions that have failed to control or stop the problem of child labour – after all, the evidence suggests that child labour is increasing despite the years of active campaigning to control it. In this context, we suggest, the wider perspective developing out of the broad ‘anti-capitalist movement’ (Klein, 2000; Harman, 2000; Danaher and Burbach [eds], 2000) offers a potential way out of the theoretical and practical impasse. The movement centrally focuses on the global nature of modern capitalism and the social, environmental and political costs it imposes on humanity. It emphasises that there is a relationship between the rich and the poor – or, to put it another way, that the problems of the poor and the exploited cannot be separated from the problem of the rich and their continuing efforts to enrich themselves still further. The anti-capitalist demonstrations in Seattle, Washington, Millau, Melbourne and Prague in 1999 and 2000 emphasised that the new movement represents a merging of various, previously single-issue, campaigns into a movement that identifies a common source for their problems. Campaigns around GM foods, environmental concerns, labour rights, world poverty, debt and inequality came together, influenced each other and in the process transformed the political terrain. Within the movement the pressure has been to locate the specific issues within the totality of capitalist social relations and from this perspective, we suggest, the anticapitalist movement creates a new space for the further development of the child labour debate. Child labour exploitation is firmly located as a central topic within the anticapitalist movement. Activists within the movement have targeted multinationals such as Nike and Gap because their out-sourcing practices mean that, despite their claimed commitment to ‘ethical production’, they are involved in the exploitation of child workers in developing countries (‘No Sweats?’, Panorama, BBC TV, 15 October 2000). The No Sweats campaigns have focused on what Klein terms the ‘celebrity face of global capitalism’, but, she continues: ‘When they [the high-profile mulitnationals] come under public scrutiny, the entire system is hauled under the microscope as well’ (2000: 421). Focusing on Nike should not let Adidas or Reebok off the hook, and simply concentrating on the ‘brands’ will leave children working in various other locations. The logic of the campaign pushes ever outward until it is firmly established that child labour is a problem of competitive, market-driven, global capitalism, and that partial solutions which avoid the ‘big picture’ can end up reinforcing inequalities and oppressions. The anti-capitalist movement offers a new impulse, a new constituency of activists and a focus on the global that can stimulate and possibly redirect debate over the child labour problem.

Globalisation and Child Labour 201 This is not to suggest that there are ready-made answers. The anti-capitalist movement does not present uniform solutions to global problems. It is a movement in the throes of debate over a whole number of issues, such as strategy, leadership and organisation; debt, poverty and inequality; the possibility of reforming the WTO and the World Bank; and the uses of social clauses, fair trade and a Tobin tax. This is a debate child labour activists and researchers should welcome and join. There are some encouraging signs. Save the Children has recently argued that multinationals caught employing children should be required to pay the children’s wages while they attend school, keeping the jobs open for them until they reach school-leaving age (‘No Sweats?’, Panorama, BBC TV, 15 October 2000). This is an interesting idea – but should we not go further? The multinationals and the local employers who work with them should be taxed to pay for a decent health, welfare and education system for all the children of the developing countries. Indeed as The Observer (28 November 1999) noted, if the richest 200 people in the world gave up a mere 1 per cent of their annual income, every child across the globe could have a fully funded primary education. In a sense, the logic of the anti-capitalist critique is to focus on the totality and hence pose bigger questions, rather than offering one-sided answers. Conclusion In this chapter we have argued that recent debate over child labour has become polarised between broadly ‘protectionist’ and ‘liberationist’ positions. It has been our case that both these approaches are partial and hence solve one issue only to reinforce or create new problems. We have suggested that this is an opportune time to reopen and recast the child labour debate, locating it firmly in the developing anti-capitalist movement. Across the globe, child labour cannot be separated from the problems of poverty and inequality understood in their widest sense. Solving the problem of child labour is intimately tied to a project of increasing democracy and accountability. It involves reversing the growing inequalities across the globe, increasing the taxes on the fabulously rich (in both local and global terms) to provide appropriate health, welfare and educational provision for children across the globe. By locating themselves within the developing anti-capitalist critique, we suggest that child labour activists and researchers can overcome some of the hurdles that have led protectionists and liberationists into their respective theoretical dead-ends. By asking the larger questions, by linking the single issue (here child labour) to other campaigns, the commonality of inequality and oppression under global capitalism is clearly revealed. In this light, the increasingly sterile liberation/protection debate can be developed in new and fruitful directions. References AFL–CIO (American Federation of Labor–Congress of Industrial Organizations) (1996), Speech by John J. Sweeney to the Ministerial Conference at the ILO on

202 Labour and Globalisation 12 June 1996, AFL–CIO, http://www.aflcio.org/publ/speech1996/sp0612.htm (accessed 28 September 2000). –– (1998) Adopted Policy Statements: Child Labor in US Agriculture (Monterey, CA, 14 October 1998), AFL–CIO, http://www.aflcio.org/publ/estatements/ oct1998/child.htm (accessed 28 September 2000). –– (2000) Speech by John J. Sweeney to the ILO Child Labor Conference on 17 May 2000, AFL–CIO, http://www.aflcio.org/publ/speech2000/sp0517.htm (accessed 28 September 2000). Ashagrie, K. (1998), Statistics on Working Children and Hazardous Labour in Brief, Geneva: ILO, http://www.ilo.org/public/english/comp/child/stat/stats.htm (accessed 28 September 2000). Barling, J., and Kelloway, E. K. (1999), Young Workers: Varieties of Experience, Washington, DC: American Psychological Association. Bequele, A., and Boyden, J. (1988), Combating Child Labour, Geneva: ILO. Boyd, R. (1994), ‘Child Labour Within the Globalising Economy’, Labour, Capital and Society, 27(2). Brooks, D. R., Davies, L. K., and Gallagher, S. S. (1993), ‘Work-Related Injuries Among Massachusetts Children: A Study Based on Emergency Department Data’, American Journal of Industrial Medicine, 24(3): 313–24. CAFOD (Catholic Fund for Overseas Development) (1997), Statement on Child Labour, London: CAFOD. –– (1998), The Asian Garment Industry and Globalisation, London: CAFOD. Cecchetti, R. (1998), Children Who Work in Europe, Brussels: European Forum for Child Welfare. Cunningham, S. (1999), ‘The Problem That Doesn’t Exist? Child Labour in Britain, 1920–1970’, in Lavalette (ed.). –– (2000), ‘Child Labour in Britain, 1900–1970’, unpublished PhD thesis, University of Central Lancashire. Danaher, K., and Burbach, R. (eds) (2000), Globalize This! The Battle Against the World Trade Organisation and Corporate Rule, Monroe, MA: Common Courage Press. Draper, H. (1966), The Two Souls of Socialism, London: Bookmarks. ETUC (European Trade Union Confederation) (1999), Resolution Adopted by the European Trade Union Confederation at the IXth Annual Congress, 29th June–2nd July 1999, Brussels: ETUC. Evins, A. (1996), ‘Government to Resist Call for Child Labour Sanctions’, The Independent (30 October). Franklin, A., and Franklin, B. (1996), ‘The Developing Children’s Rights Movement in the UK’ in J. Pilcher and S. Wagg (eds), Thatcher’s Children?, Bristol: Falmer Press. Fyfe, A. (1989), Child Labour, Cambridge: Polity Press. Garet, B. (2000), ‘Apprenticeship in France: A Parallel Case in an Industrialized Society’, in Schlemmer (ed.). George, S. (1999), The Lugano Report, London: Pluto Press.

Globalisation and Child Labour 203 Goddard, V., and White, B. (1982), ‘Child Workers and Capitalist Development’, Development and Change, 13. Green, D. (1999), ‘Child Workers of the Americas’, North American Congress on Latin America, 32(4). Gulrajani, M. (2000), ‘Child Labour and Exports Sector in the Indian Carpet Industry’, in Schlemmer (ed.). Hansen, O. N. (1991), ‘Children at Work: A Study of Health Risks in a Danish School Population’, conference paper presented at Child Labour in Europe, Tecklenburg, Germany (October). Harman, C. (2000), ‘Anti-capitalism: Theory and Practice’, International Socialism. Hertmeijer, H. (1991), ‘Child Labour in the Netherlands’, conference paper presented at Child Labour in Europe, Tecklenburg, Germany (October). Hobbs, S., and McKechnie, J. (1997), Child Employment in Britain, Edinburgh: HMSO. Hutchins, B. L., and Harrison, A. (1996), A History of Factory Legislation, London: Frank Cass. ICFTU (International Confederation of Free Trade Unions) (1996), 16th World Congress of the ICFTU: Congress Resolutions, Brussels: ICFTU. –– (1998a), Press Release: ‘Defending Workers’ Human Rights at the World Trade Organisation – The Next Steps’ (6 April), Brussels: ICFTU. –– (1998b), Labour Standards and Trade: What is the Social Clause?, Brussels: ICFTU. –– (2000), Internationally Recognised Core Labour Standards in the 15 Member States of the European Union, Report for the WTO General Council Review of the Trade Policies of the European Union, Geneva (12 and 14 July), Brussels: ICFTU. ILO (International Labour Organisation) (1973), Convention 138 Concerning the Minimum Age for Admission to Employment, Geneva: ILO. –– (1996), Child Labour: What is to be Done?, document for discussion at the Informal Tripartite Meeting at the Ministerial Level, Geneva: ILO. –– (1997), Globalization, Liberalization and Child Labour, Geneva: ILO. –– (1998a), Child Labour: Targeting the Intolerable, Report VI (1), 86th Session, Geneva: ILO. –– (1998b), Report of the Committee on Child Labour, 86th Session, Geneva: ILO. –– (1999a), Child Labour: Report IV 2 (b), 87th Session, Geneva: ILO. –– (1999b), Convention (182) Concerning the Prohibition and Immediate Action for the Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labour, Geneva: ILO. –– (2000) About the ILO: Who We Are, Geneva: ILO. IWGCL (International Working Group on Child Labour) (1998), Working Children: Reconsidering the Debates, Report of the International Working Group on Child Labour (ed. J. McKechnie and S. Hobbs), Amsterdam: IWGCL. James, A., Jenks, C., and Prout, A. (1998), Theorizing Childhood, Cambridge: Polity Press. Keeling, F. (1914), Child Labour in the United Kingdom, London: P. S. King.

204 Labour and Globalisation Klein, N. (2000), No Logo, London: Flamingo. Kyloh, R. (1998), Mastering the Challenge of Globalization: Towards a Trade Union Agenda, Geneva: ILO Bureau for Workers’ Activities. Lavalette, M. (1994), Child Employment in the Capitalist Labour Market, Aldershot: Avebury. –– (1998), ‘Child Labour: Historical, Legislative and Policy Context’, in B. Pettitt (ed.), Children and Work in the UK/Refocusing the Debate, London: Save the Children Fund/CPAG. Lavalette, M. (ed.) (1999), A Thing of the Past? Child Labour in Britain in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Liverpool: Liverpool University Press. Lavalette, M., Hobbs, S., and McKechnie, J. (1991), The Forgotten Workforce: Scottish Children at Work, Glasgow: Scottish Low Pay Unit. Lavalette, M., Hobbs, S., McKechnie, J., and Lyndsay, S. (1995), ‘Child Employment in Britain: Policy, Myth and Reality’, Youth and Policy. Leonard, M. (1999), ‘Child Work in the UK, 1970–1998’, in Lavalette (ed.). Marx, K., and Engels, F. (1848), The Communist Manifesto, in Robert C. Tucker (ed.), The Marx–Engels Reader, 2nd edn, New York: Norton Press. McKechnie, J. (1999), ‘A Peculiarly British Phenomenon? Child Labour in the USA’, in Lavalette (ed.). McKechnie, J., and Hobbs, S. (2002), ‘Work by the Young: The Economic Activity of School Aged Children’, in M. Tienda and W.J. Wilson (eds), Youth in Cities, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. McSmith, A. (1999), ‘UK Launches Bid to End Child Labour’, The Observer (7 November). Mehta, M. N., Prabhu, S. V., and Mistry, H. N. (1985), ‘Child Labour in Bombay’, Child Abuse and Neglect, 9. Meillassoux, C. (2000), ‘The Economy and Child Labour: An Overview’, in Schlemmer (ed.). Mendelievich, E. (ed.) (1979), Children at Work, Geneva: ILO. Myrstad, G. (1999), ‘What Can Trade Unions Do to Combat Child Labour’, Childhood, 6(1): 75–88. Newbery, B. (2000), ‘Labouring Under Illusions’, The Ecologist (July–August). New Internationalist (1997), Child Labour, special issue, 292 (July). NGO Group for the Convention on the Rights of the Child (1999), Position Paper on the Proposed Convention and Recommendation Concerning the Prohibition and Immediate Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labour, NGO Group for the Convention on the Rights of the Child, Geneva: ILO. NGO Sub-Group on Child Labour (1996), Notes on the Presentation by Mr A. Bequele, Director of the Working Conditions and Environment Department, ILO, at the NGO Sub-Group on Child Labour meeting (29 October), NGO SubGroup on Child Labour, Geneva: ILO. Pond, C., and Searle, A. (1991), The Hidden Army, London: LPU. Prachankhadee, B., Nelayothin, A., Intrasukporn, N., and Montawan, V. (1979), ‘Children at Work: Thailand’, in Mendelievich (ed.).

Globalisation and Child Labour 205 SCF (Save the Children Fund) (1998), ‘Briefing Paper: Eliminating the Worst Forms of Child Labour – What Needs to be Done?’, London: Save the Children. –– (1999), Press Release: ‘Save the Children Calls on ILO to Give Working Children a Voice’, London: Save the Children (28 April). Schlemmer, B. (ed.) (2000), The Exploited Child, London: Zed Books. Searight, S. (1980), Child Labour in Spain, London: Anti-Slavery International. Tabusa, S. (1997), ‘IPEC and Trade Unions’, in G. Querenghi (ed.), Protecting Children in the World of Work, Geneva: ILO Bureau for Workers’ Activities. Thompson, E. P. (1968), The Making of the English Working Class, Harmondsworth: Penguin. TUC (Trades Union Congress) (1896), Annual Conference Report, London: TUC. –– (1997), A TUC Report on School Age Labour in England and Wales, London: TUC. UN (United Nations) (1999), Human Development Report 1999, Oxford: Oxford University Press. UNCTAD (United Nations Conference on Trade and Development) (1999), Handbook of the GSP Scheme of the European Community, New York: UN Conference on Trade and Development. UNICEF (United Nations Children’s Fund) (1997), Ending Child Labour: The Next Steps, New York: UNICEF. Valcarenghi, M. (1981), Child Labour in Italy, London: Anti-Slavery International. Walsh, N. (2000), ‘Victims of America’s Harvest of Shame’, The Observer (25 June). Weinold, H. (1991), ‘Sociological Aspects of Child Labour in Germany’, conference paper presented at Child Labour in Europe, Tecklenburg, Germany (October). Williams, S. (1992), Child Labour in Portugal, London: Anti-Slavery International.

11. Globalisation, Trade Unionism and Solidarity: Further Reflections on the Liverpool Dock Lockout Jane Kennedy and Michael Lavalette

On 25 September 1995, 20 workers employed by the Torside stevedoring company in Liverpool were instructed to work overtime under conditions which broke existing contractual arrangements held between Torside Ltd, the Mersey Docks and Harbour Company (MDHC) and the Transport and General Workers’ Union (TGWU). In response the men decided, at the end of their normal shift, to return to the canteen and attempt to contact their shop steward. The first five men to reach the canteen were met by the managing director of Torside, who sacked them for leaving the ship. When the others arrived they were told to return to the ship without their colleagues or face dismissal. They refused to return without their workmates and were sacked. On the following morning the shop stewards arranged a meeting to review the situation. The managing director of Torside appeared at the meeting and sacked the entire Torside workforce. Over the next few days the conflict spread through the port as the Torsiders picketed out the dock workforce. First, men from Nelson Freight were picketed out – and then sacked for joining the strike. Then, on 28 September, a picket was placed on the gates of Seaforth docks – the main entry point for 325 MDHC-employed dockers. The Seaforth workforce refused to cross the line, which meant that dockers across the whole complex were out on strike.1 Instead of entering into negotiations MDHC chose to sack the entire workforce and recruit a casual, non-union labour force via Drake International, a London-based employment agency. In the space of four days, 500 workers had lost their jobs. When the TGWU tried to negotiate a return to work, MDHC informed them that there would be jobs for a small minority, on new casual contracts and no union recognition, but the majority would never work at the complex again. The dispute had turned into a fully fledged union-busting lockout. These dramatic events started the Liverpool docks lockout that was to continue for the next 28 months, eventually ending in defeat for the dockers in January 1998. The story of the lockout has been told elsewhere and it is not our intention to repeat much of that history here (see Lavalette and Kennedy, 1996; 1997; 1998; Kennedy and Lavalette, 1997; Castree, 1999; Barker and Lavalette, 2001). But the Liverpool lockout and the dockers’ response remains important because a number of academics have used the episode to suggest that it was emblematic of some wider 1

With the exception of 30 who crossed the line and continued to work throughout the dispute.

206

The Liverpool Dock Lockout 207 and more profound social changes. One argument (see Munby, cited in Castree, 2000) suggests that the dockers were doomed from the start, because ‘old-style’ industrial conflict inevitably leads to defeat. A second argument (see Waterman, 1998) suggests that the dockers’ struggle contained within it ‘the birth of the new’ – a rank-and-file internationalism that should become the dominant strategy of workers in the future given the global nature of modern capitalism. In contrast, our argument, developed in earlier works (Lavalette and Kennedy 1996; 1998), is that, while the ‘international turn’ was important, it was pursued at the expense of a ‘local strategy’ – of mobilising the organised working class in Liverpool to shut down the dock operations – and this local strategy had much greater potential as a strategy to achieve victory. In this chapter we return to these debates to look at how and why the dockers’ international strategy developed and to offer a contrast with the Australian dock dispute that developed just after the Liverpool lockout had come to its tragic end. Early in 1998 dock employers on the Australian waterfront launched an assault on the Australian wharfies organised in the Maritime Union of Australia (MUA). In Liverpool there was much talk of the dockers passing the ‘baton of resistance’ and the ‘new rank-and-file international strategy’ to their comrades in Australia (see the dockers’ web-page at www.labournet.co.uk). The expectation was that the forms of struggle and organisational networks and committees established during the Liverpool lockout would now function in defence of the wharfies, and that the forms of protest undertaken in support of Liverpool would be taken up by the MUA. Yet while some international support was forthcoming, the remarkable feature of the Australian conflict was the level of physical solidarity from the local working class. In Australia militant mass pickets (involving on occasion up to 6,000 people) were the key to the wharfies’ victory – local solidarity rather than global solidarity was the preferred strategy. In this chapter, then, we look at the international strategy of the Liverpool dockers and contrast it with the strategies of the Australian wharfies in order to test some of the claims and arguments that developed around the Liverpool dock dispute. The Liverpool dockers – dinosaurs or innovators? As we noted above, there have been two types of argument presented over the Liverpool lockout which suggest that it was emblematic of wider changes: arguments that depict the dockers as the last of a ‘dying breed’ clinging to old forms of labour struggle, and those that view them as innovators of strategies and tactics within the context of ‘global’ class struggle. The first of these suggests that modern, global capitalism is too strong and too powerful for workers to resist and, hence, that negotiation and compromise are the only realistic strategies to follow (see the debate between Michael Lavalette and Steve Munby held at http://www.globdem.org.uk). Such arguments developed and gained credence in Britain during the 1980s when the left went into decline and the union movement faced assaults from government

208 Labour and Globalisation and employers that usually (though not always) ended in union retreat. The defeats suffered by the miners in 1984–85, the printers in 1985–86 and the dockers in 1989 were particularly significant: the crushing of three traditionally strong unions had an impact throughout the labour and trade union movement in Britain. Psychologically these (and other) defeats had a significant influence on the subjective element involved in the class struggle – workers’ confidence in their ability to take successful action. Yet in Munby’s analysis these defeats represented more than this: they signalled the fundamental weakening of the objective position of workers vis-à-vis capital. Such claims, if nothing else, attempted to engage with the changes that affected British society from the late 1970s onwards: the development of an increasingly vicious global capitalist system, the restructuring of the labour market, and the role of the state as an advocate of neo-liberal policies, anti-unionism and repression. Yet identifying potential changes to the social structure, or developments within capitalism, does not guarantee the validity of one’s conclusions. We suggest that the problem with the type of analysis exemplified by Munby is that it illegitimately extrapolates from concerns with these structural developments to derive unwarranted conclusions that dismiss the potential of the working class as an agent of social change. There are three significant problems with the approach. First, while restructuring of the labour market is important, it is hardly new – it is a process as old as capitalism itself. The decline of the manufacturing or industrial working class in Britain is important but it should not be exaggerated, nor should it be confused with the decline of the ‘working class’ itself. Within Britain, manufacturing still remains significant, many other jobs have been proletarianised (teaching, social work, etc.), while the ‘new’ service jobs that have developed over the last twenty years often utilise cheap labour in highly controlled environments, creating a particularly exploited section of the working class (for example, those working in call centres). In Britain today the working class may look different from the way it looked twenty or thirty years ago, but it is still the numerically dominant social class, is still relatively well organised (with trade unionism back on the increase), and still has the collective power to withdraw its labour and bring the system to a halt. Finally, of course, if we look beyond Western Europe, we see that internationally the ‘traditional’ working class is larger than ever – living, working and fighting in cities and towns right across the globe, including, for example, the miners in the Kolubara region of Serbia (described by Misha Glenny [2000] as the ‘Gdansk of Yugoslavia’), who were key to the events that toppled Milosevic from power in October 2000. All this suggests that notions of the demise of the working class are exaggerated. Secondly, it is not the case that organised workers cannot fight and do not win. Kim Moody in Labor Notes regularly plots the number of economic and political mass strikes to affect different parts of the globe. Surveying the period 1994–1997, he notes that there were mass or general political strikes in ‘France and Canada in 1995 . . . [and] in Nigeria (1994), Indonesia (1994), Paraguay (1994), Taiwan (1994), Bolivia (1995), South Africa (1996), Brazil (1996), Greece (1996, 1997), Spain

The Liverpool Dock Lockout 209 (1994, 1996), Argentina (twice in 1996), Venezuela (1996), Italy (1996), South Korea (1996–97), Canada (1995–1997), Haiti (1997), Columbia (1997), Ecuador (1997) and Belgium (1997)’ (Moody 1997: 21). The World Development Movement (Woodroffe and Ellis-Jones, 2000) reports various countries within which strikes and demonstrations against neo-liberal policies took place in the first 6 months of 2000. The list includes Argentina, Bolivia, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Honduras, Paraguay, Kenya, Malawi, Nigeria and Zambia. The significant ‘rebirth’ of the union movement in the US and the continuing conflicts in France emphasise that these developments are not merely ‘Second World’ or ‘Third World’ events. Further, it is not the case that throughout the 1980s and 1990s all industrial conflicts in Britain ended in defeat for the organised working-class movement. The 1980s in general was a period of defeat punctuated by a few significant victories and in the 1990s there were far fewer catastrophic defeats (see German, 1990; Darlington 199?; Barker and Lavalette, 2001; Lavalette and Flanagan, 2000; 2001). Finally, there is substantial scholarship that emphasises that social protest tends to appear in ‘waves’ (Barker and Dale, 1999; Tarrow, 1994; Tarrow, Tilly and McAdam, forthcoming). There are periods in history when little seems to be happening and the hope of significant change seems a distant dream; there are periods when employers and state go on the offensive and try to increase the level and rate of exploitation and undermine workers’ organisations; and, finally, there are the periods of great social explosions, international waves of protest when everything seems possible and reform – and even revolution – are on the agenda. History warns us that during the periods of retreat or stalemate it is not sensible to generalise and dismiss the long-term potential of the working class to shape history. But the notion of ‘waves of protest’ should not be interpreted as suggesting that in the troughs we inevitably lose and at the peaks we must win. Social conflicts are dynamic events that take place within particular contexts. This means that the structural and historical context matters, but so too do the actions and activities of people within the conflict (and of course social conflicts involve at least two sides, each trying to win and acting in ways that they think will outwit their opponents) (see Lavalette and Flanagan, 2000). This suggests that within social conflicts there are ‘strategic hinges’ (Kimmeldorf, 1988), when the decisions and actions of one side or the other in the conflict dramatically alter what is happening, perhaps bringing victory closer, or taking the conflict in an unexpected direction. All this suggests that strike activity is much more ‘open-ended’ and less certain than the Munby analysis allows. The Munby case against the dockers is one of pessimistic miserablism – there is nothing we can do, the class struggle has been lost. Luckily, this was not a perspective shared by the Liverpool dockers themselves. If the dockers had accepted MDHC’s right to manage as they saw fit, if they had accepted the decision to sack them after 28 September, then they certainly would have lost, but by fighting they gave themselves a chance to win, a chance to get their jobs back and re-establish unionism in the port of Liverpool. We suggest that the evidence offers little support to Munby’s thesis and we will not return to it again in this chapter.

210 Labour and Globalisation A second, far more important, argument surrounding the Liverpool lockout focuses on the claimed innovation and novelty associated with the dockers’ ‘international turn’. For Waterman (2001) this represented the embryonic form of a new method of working-class struggle, one appropriate to the new global era. Once again the starting point for this perspective is developments within modern capitalism – the development of globalisation. There are at least three versions of the ‘globalisation thesis’. The first is put forward by neo-liberal advocates of global free markets. The second is put forward by social-democrat pessimists, such as Munby, who suggest that the nation state can no longer control the powerful TNCs and MNCs and must satisfy itself with merely creating the conditions (flexible labour markets, low wages, limited social spending) that will attract inward investment (see, for example, Leonard, 1998, who argues that these two versions give us two types of modern government, either ‘enthusiastic’ or ‘reluctant’ welfare dismantlers). Finally, there are those, such as Waterman, who note changes to the modern world, the intensification of capitalism and huge social and environmental crises it creates, but who also stress the potential for resistance within the world. Of course, none of these three positions is homogeneous. We would, for example, locate ourselves in this last group, but have many areas of disagreement with Waterman over some of his perspectives on globalisation and the conclusions he draws. Nevertheless, his conclusions are radically different from those of Munby. Rather than being a globalisation pessimist, he is a globalisation optimist, his optimism stemming, in part, from the potential he saw in the Liverpool dockers’ international strategy. This was a strategy, he claims, based on a democratic, rank-and-file internationalism that drew global solidarity from workers across the world who saw their common interests with Liverpool workers in the face of common problems (free-marketism, labour market deregulation, privatisation, attacks on trade unionism, and so on). It is certainly true that the Liverpool dockers’ international strategy produced some stunning results. Dockers were dispatched to all corners of the globe raising financial support for the locked out men, setting up organisational networks of activists and, on three occasions, organising international, coordinated strike activity in support of the dockers. But as Castree (2000) notes, many of the claims made about the international strategy are based on second-hand (and often inaccurate) accounts of what happened and why. An accurate narrative is necessary to judge the claims being made. The Liverpool lockout Competing strategies The Liverpool dock dispute lasted over two years and the dockers’campaign involved a number of strategies relating to how the campaign should be run, its priorities and the demands it placed on sacked dockers, their supporters and the officials within the TGWU. At different points particular strategies came to dominate the work of

The Liverpool Dock Lockout 211 the campaign. Broadly, for analytical purposes, we can say that the campaign developed in response to the interaction of four influences. The first was the relative successes and failures of the campaign. Strategies were evaluated throughout the dispute with the result that some were dropped, others modified and others given greater prominence. However, the evaluation – what counted as a success, or what was thought possible – was made in the light of the ideas dominant within the dispute. Thus the second influence was the expectations and the political ideologies of the dispute’s leadership. Leadership of the campaign rested with the powerful shop stewards’strike committee, which contained a number of individuals who were experienced political and union activists. These activists had a long affinity with militant unionism of a broadly syndicalist type, but they had also lived through the 1980s and witnessed the defeats of the miners and (other) dockers at first hand. These experiences shaped their beliefs, which took the form of a militant selfreliance, a strong affinity to the TGWU and a conception that the working-class movement had been seriously weakened in Britain. Within the dispute these ideas were expressed in a number of linked themes, publicly expressed at mass meetings: that industrial relations law had effectively shackled the trade unions in Britain, that the TGWU leadership were doing everything within their means to support the dockers, that after 18 years of Conservative governments, the British working class had been significantly weakened and was unable to deliver industrial solidarity, that it was impossible to ask workers in other industries for support without first going through their own union machinery, and that, given the legal situation and the weakness of trade unionism in Britain, it was essential to look to other sources of support in order to win the dispute. Whether, or to what extent, any of these beliefs was accurate is less important than the fact that they represent the political perspectives of the dockers’ leadership and had a real effect in shaping the conduct of the dispute. Of course, it was not the case that all the stewards accepted all of these positions. There were clear differences between the stewards, but their adherence to a policy of ‘collective responsibility’ meant that each steward was tied to the dominant, majority opinion within the leadership. The third influence came from support groups outside the workforce. In the early months of the campaign, for example, regular Saturday meetings were held with shop stewards from across the city (Dockers’ Charter, No. 2, December 1995); after the first couple of months support groups sprang up across the country, raising money, taking dockers on delegation visits to local offices and factories and arranging meetings for dockers to raise their profile. These examples raised the potential of winning substantial local solidarity and particularly had an impact on those dockers involved in this type of liaison work. The final factor affecting the campaign was the influence the official trade union movement, especially the TGWU, had on the stewards. The relationship between the dockers, their stewards and the TGWU officials was often fraught. As we noted, during the dispute defence of the TGWU’s position was a key element shaping the stewards’ thinking, so, on the one hand, dockers were informed at mass meetings that the national officials were a great help and had been doing everything behind

212 Labour and Globalisation the scenes to promote the dockers’ cause (see, for example, mass meetings on 1 March 1996; 3 April 1996; 19 April 1996; 19 July 1996). The stewards, although running an unofficial dispute, operated out of Transport House. The TGWU National Docks Officer, Jack Adams, was in regular contact with the stewards and was involved in negotiations with MDHC (on occasions without any dock stewards being present). The dockers’ acceptance, towards the end of the dispute, of a plan to establish a ‘Labour Supply Company’ (i.e. a labour co-op) was developed by the TGWU leadership as a way of ‘solving’ the conflict. Unusually for an unofficial dispute, the TGWU national officials offered the dockers verbal support and the use of the union premises and machinery for negotiations. All these elements emphasis the link between the stewards and the union officials that continued throughout the dispute. On the other hand, the lack of practical and substantial financial support from the TGWU was heavily criticised by dockworkers in the open sessions in a number of mass meetings (see, for example, mass meetings on 26 April 1996; 10 May 1996; 6 September 1996). The failure of TGWU port officials to deliver physical support during the dispute was attacked by stewards (mass meeting 26 July 1996) and dockers at the open session (see, for example, mass meetings, 26 April 1996; 10 May 1996; 6 September 1996). The stewards also expressed frustration at being denied access to the TGWU hardship funds to which they and their members had contributed over a number of years (mass meetings, 19 July 1996; 26 July 1996; 6 September 1996). These factors created a degree of tension within the dispute and helped to shape its eventual outcome. From the beginning, the dispute was organised through a strike committee, made up of the members of the former shop stewards’ committee and other (nonelected) union activists. This group met on a daily basis and discussed strategy and tactics. Mass meetings were held at least once a week; reports were presented to the workforce and debate and questions could be raised in this forum. The strike committee had near unanimous support for the way in which they conducted the dispute. Initially the strategy followed by the strike committee was composed of two elements. First, as far as possible, the dockers should keep the dispute within the legal parameters established by industrial relations law. This was difficult in so far as the dockers had formally broken the law on 28 September when they refused to cross the Torside workforce’s picket lines, but by the afternoon of Thursday 28 September, senior TGWU officials had met directors from MDHC who informed them that they would not be taking any legal action against the union. The second element of their strategy was to try to mobilise public opinion and the support of recognised community leaders, such as MPs, councillors and the clergy (see, for example, Liverpool Echo, 11 October 1997; 17 October 1997; 2 November 1995). The high point of this campaign was the first community march and rally held on 21 October 1995, which assembled and started at Liverpool’s Roman Catholic cathedral. An advertisement taken out in the Liverpool Echo (20 October 1995) lists the breadth of community support the dockers had obtained. The march was led by church leaders and local MPs and obtained substantial

The Liverpool Dock Lockout 213 support from community and labour and trade union organisation across Merseyside. In this atmosphere, the Liverpool Echo, not noted for its radicalism, came out in support of reinstatement in its leader column. It argued that ‘MDHC must heed growing opinion on Merseyside urging the reinstatement of the dockers’ (11 October 1995). The build-up of community pressure may have been partially responsible for the first ‘final offer’ of settlement issued by MDHC on 18 October 1995. It applied only to former employees of MDHC and Coastal Containers Ltd, but offered nothing to employees of Nelson Freight or Torside; the offer was rejected by the workforce. However, the local press and some community leaders saw the offer as acceptable, or at least as a basis for further negotiations and this seemed to indicate that there were certain limits to the public opinion/community-focused campaign the dockers were undertaking: put bluntly, within the ‘community’ there were many who were opposed to the reinstatement campaign or whose objective was to obtain some form of negotiated settlement between the dockers and MDHC which fell short of reinstatement. As the dispute moved into its third month, sections of the workforce grew impatient and demands for a more active strategy began to be raised. In particular, two strike bulletins written by dockers who were supporters of the Socialist Worker movement argued for a strategy composed of, first, mass picketing to close the docks and obtain support from other workers in Liverpool and, secondly, greater emphasis on delegation visits to factories and offices throughout the country to raise solidarity and force the dispute on to the national agenda. Picketing was an integral part of the dockers’ campaign from the start. But mass picketing, with the aim of closing the docks, was not initially part of the dockers’ strategy. It may seem strange that such a traditional method of organising and winning disputes had not been considered before, but as Tony, the shop steward with responsibility for this activity, argued: ‘We’d never had to do it before, strikes had always been solid’. Further, of course, organising mass pickets meant breaking the law and initially the stewards, after seeking advice from the TGWU, wanted to avoid such a confrontation. The participants in the dispute did not immediately accept the arguments presented within the bulletins, but they did start a debate over tactics. Eventually delegation work became much more systematically organised and mass pickets by dockers were organised by mid-November (Liverpool Echo, 6 November 1995). Finally, by late November the dockers were calling for workers throughout Britain to support them on mass pickets of the dock gates. Notification of the times and place of pickets were set in advance and posted to supporters throughout the country. As a result a number of very significant 6 a.m. pickets of the Seaforth Container Terminal took place and these led to the dock gates being shut, something that had not happened before. However, the tactic of calling mass pickets was used sparingly during the dispute. The stewards argued that it had two weaknesses. First, it allowed MDHC and the shipping lines to make alternative arrangements for the days and times of the pickets. Secondly, it gave the police the opportunity to prepare, thus increasing

214 Labour and Globalisation the chances of violent confrontation between dockers, their supporters and the police. Given the size and the age profile of the dock workforce this was thought to be counter-productive (although by July 1996 the police had become more aggressive in their methods and regularly picked up those they considered ‘ringleaders’ on marches and pickets). It also reflected the notion that winning ‘public opinion’ to the dockers’ cause was key: the stewards believed that scenes of violence from the picket line could damage their public support. As a result the stewards developed a ‘hit-and-run’ picketing tactic. Dockers were given a list, at each week’s mass meeting, of the following week’s picket roster, informing dockers when there would be ‘normal’ pickets and when there would be dockers’ mass pickets. This allowed the dockers and the women’s support group to take MDHC and the police by surprise and led to the dock gates being closed, with resultant delays on ships using the port. But the tactic hindered other groups of workers from joining the dockers at the port gates. Even with the dockers’ mass pickets the aim was to shut the dock gates for a limited period only. As the police, and in particular the Special Operations Division, gathered, the stewards would lead the women and men away from the gates. However, this form of picketing meant that while ships were delayed (not an insignificant feature in an industry geared to meeting tight sailing and tide times), they were not stopped from loading and unloading their cargoes and hence the port could still operate. The picketing, therefore, became part of a long war of attrition between the dockers and their supporters on the one hand and MDHC and the shipping and cargo lines on the other. The self-imposed limit on the local strategy was further shown on May Day 1996. In the run up to May Day a number of dockers proposed calling a Merseyside Day of Action, but the dock stewards were reticent about issuing such a call. Eventually the demand was taken up by trade unionists outside the docks: UNISON members throughout Merseyside voted and agreed on a 24hour stoppage; firefighters, who were in dispute with the local Labour council, intended to strike that day and local civil servants voted for strike action. There was clearly the potential for a significant show of solidarity. However, there was some confusion among dockers over what they were hoping to achieve. Some dockers and stewards believed that they could not demand solidarity strike action (despite the building momentum) because it would mean workers breaking the law and this was thought to be something other workers would not do (despite the evidence that some workers were clearly willing to follow this strategy). As a result, the wording of dockers’ leaflets was softened to ask workers across Merseyside to join the early morning picket and the lunchtime demonstration and rally. Despite this, the May Day march and rally was one of the best supported throughout the campaign and witnessed a number of workplaces taking solidarity strike action. The possibility of further local solidarity was emphasised on 18 January 1997 when a North West region joint shop stewards’ meeting passed a number of resolutions supporting the dockers and calling for a boycott of containers going through the port (two large local employers, Ford’s

The Liverpool Dock Lockout 215 and Heinz, regularly transported goods through the port, and stewards from both these factories were present at the meeting). These activities emphasised the possibility of developing a militant ‘locally based’ strategy to win the dispute by building solidarity with other workers in the Merseyside region and, more generally, across the country. But any such strategy would have involved the stewards breaking with the TGWU and actively arguing for solidarity from local, organised workers. This, however, would have required a change of political perspective – or a challenge to the dominant perspective from a group of dockworkers. Such a challenge was not forthcoming, at least not in any sustained manner; the leadership had earned too much respect and authority as a result of their history and work within the union. At the same time, the conflicts that might have been generated by a faltering local strategy were ‘solved’ by the international turn. The dockers could rely on other port workers and their traditions of militant action, they could avoid British industrial relations law, they could avoid direct conflict with the TGWU and they could run a militant trade union campaign against MDHC, one stage removed from long-term conflict at the Liverpool dock gates. The international strategy provided a way for the dockers to maintain their campaign, to organise some spectacular international events, and yet to maintain their relationship with the TGWU and operate (generally) within the confines of industrial relations law. Global warfare Initially the international tactic was promoted by five of the senior stewards: Jimmy Nolan and Jimmy Davies (both ex-CP members and both former full-time convenors on the docks), Mike Carden and Bobby Morton (both TGWU National Council members), and Terry Teague, who became the steward with primary responsibility for coordination of the international days of action. The politics of the five could best be classified, for simplicity, as various forms of union ‘broad leftism’.2 This perspective also determined whom the international campaign tried to influence and obtain support from – it was left officials (Bjorn Borg, Jack Heyman from the ILWU on the US west coast, and Jim Donovan from the MUA in Australia) who were courted as the key men to deliver victory for the Liverpool workforce. The decision to take the ‘international turn’ occurred around the fifth week of the dispute. According to the stewards, it occurred because of the inactivity of the early weeks of the dispute. Terry Teague commented: 2 ‘Broad leftism’ can be summarised as a commitment to securing positions for left activists within the union machinery, allied to a political perspective that the main division within the union movement is a simple one between left and right – that there is no necessary conflict between union officials or bureaucracy and the rank-and-file. This contrasts with rank-and-file strategies whose position was probably best summed up in the statement of the Clyde Workers’ Committee: ‘We will support the officials just so long as they rightly represent the workers, but we will act independently immediately that they misrepresent them . . . we claim to represent the true feelings of the workers. We can act immediately according to the merits of the case and the desire of the rank-and-file’ (in Callinicos, 1995: 33).

216 Labour and Globalisation The move onto the international scene was taken in some respects out of sheer frustration against unfair and one-sided [UK] labour laws. With no secondary or solidarity action forthcoming from our normal allies, such as other waterways workers both nationally and locally, as well as the other big industrial workers like Fords, Vauxhall and other transport workers.

The viability and credibility of these arguments was further enhanced in the early months of the dispute by the success of the first international delegations. Initially the dockers sent people to ‘friendly ports’ where previous contacts had been made. The link between dockworkers in different countries was not a wholly new phenomenon. During the 1970s and 1980s conferences of European dockers had been held in Birmingham, Barcelona, Tenerife and Antwerp. The British delegates to these conferences were organised by the National Port Shop Stewards’ Committee, which was an unofficial rank-and-file body with strong support from all UK ports. The Communist Parties in various countries were central to promoting this tactic and saw this as part of their attempts to build broad lefts in national and international union organisations. Jimmy Nolan, the respected chair of the Liverpool stewards, who had been on the Liverpool docks since 1960 and a leading Communist Party member, was heavily involved in many of these early international campaigns. The aim of the CP was to involve both port-level shop stewards (and their European equivalents) and progressive sections of the trade union bureaucracies in the various countries. So although the development of the international strategy was innovative, it built on earlier links. The first delegation was to Bilbao in Spain, where Liverpool had a container trade through Ellerman’s Andrew Weir shipping lines. It was also important to make contact with ports which had significant direct trade links with Liverpool, and so delegations were sent to ports in Canada where the shipping lines CAST, CANMAR and BALTIC were based, to Sydney in Australia where ABC Lines operated, and to the east coast of America where the biggest shipping line using Liverpool, American Container Line (ACL), operated. These initial delegations brought some success. Financial and moral support was obtained at all the ports visited and boycotts started in Sweden and New Zealand. In Canada delegations were sent to Montreal, Toronto and Quebec, with the result that ships loaded in Liverpool were boycotted. In Australia delegates went to 21 meetings including 10 mass meetings of working dockers. The result of these was a series of go-slows and 24-hour delays on the ABC shipping line, who normally shipped between 600 and 700 containers per trip through Liverpool, and who, partly as a result of this action, were soon to cease trading. Finally, there was the visit to the east coast of the USA, when three of the dockers (Bobby Morton, Tony Nelson and Kevin Bilsborough) went in pursuit of an ACL vessel. They attempted to set a picket line at the ports the ship visited, but with mixed results. In Baltimore the dockers listened to what they had to say, but did not stop work. The police threw them out of Norfolk, Virginia and threatened them with imprisonment. Demoralised, they arranged to come home, only to find that Kevin had lost his passport. While a new

The Liverpool Dock Lockout 217 passport was organised they decided to try one more picket in New Jersey. Bobby tells the story: We were ready to return home . . . and felt very low. However, Kevin’s passport was stolen and while we were waiting for this to be sorted out it was suggested that we should picket Newark, New Jersey, where the ship had just docked. We set up the picket-line, at 6am on a December morning in the fiercest blizzard for 70 years, we didn’t know what to expect. When the first longshoreman came to the gate, we approached his car and explained our situation. He turned back and that happened with every longshoreman we approached. The feeling that we had when this happened was one of elation – we were dancing on the picket line . . . We maintained that picket for [nearly] a week and subsequently ACL put pressure on MDHC which forced them into negotiation.

This was the most substantial victory achieved from the initial international visits and gave the whole dispute a massive boost at a crucial moment, Christmas 1995. As a consequence of these initial successes the dockers were able to organise an international conference that was held in Liverpool from 18–23 February 1996. The purpose of the conference was to establish a network of activists able to organise solidarity for any members of the international dock community facing a threat to their jobs or working conditions. There were over 50 delegates at the conference from 17 countries. Twenty-four resolutions were discussed and passed, including a resolution promising international disruption of ships using the Liverpool port. For the stewards the conference was important for three reasons. First, it emphasised the level of international support that the dockers had and held out the possibility that this could be used to disrupt ships using the Liverpool port. Secondly, it boosted the dockers’ confidence, adding weight to the argument that concerted efforts by the international dock community could win the dispute for Liverpool workers. Finally, if the dockers won, it could herald the start of a significant rankand-file movement that could be used to support workers in other ports. The success of the conference gave a further boost to the international strategy, confirming its place as the dominant strategy within the dockers’ campaign. The aim was to increase the pressure on MDHC by obstructing vessels using the Liverpool port. In particular the focus was turned to the ACL shipping company, which was one of MDHC’s major customers. The Liverpool stewards looked to John Bowers, president of the east coast of America’s International Longshoremen’s Union (ILU), who promised to exert pressure on ACL to pull out of Liverpool. This promise was made several times over the next few months and when ACL eventually left the port on 26 June 1996 this was seen as a major victory for the dispute and a vindication of the international strategy. By contrast, the return of ACL to Liverpool less than a month later, on 23 July, was clearly a blow to morale. Nevertheless, it was argued that the pressure that had forced ACL out of Liverpool could be repeated and that the international strategy was the way forward. Planning for the next part of the campaign was undertaken at the second international conference, held in Liverpool over the weekend of 31 August 1996.

218 Labour and Globalisation The aim of the August conference was to produce a plan of action to win the dispute. The conference was well attended by delegates from various countries. However it was dominated by union officials and leaders rather than rank-and-file dockers. Further, there were some key absences of officials who had promised to attend: John Bowers – despite his centrality to the ACL campaign – failed to appear or to send a representative from his union, and both German officials and Bob Baete (president of the Belgian Dockworkers) were expected but failed to attend (widely believed to be the result of pressure applied by the International Transport Workers’ Federation). However, the conference was deemed very successful and a number of resolutions were adopted, including a call for the ITF to support the dispute, and a resolution to form a steering committee to oversee and coordinate international action against the Liverpool port. The first formal meeting of the steering committee took place in Paris on 28 October 1996. On 30 September 1996, to mark the first anniversary of the dispute, a range of actions were undertaken across the world. These included workplace meetings in several ports in Spain, limited strikes in Le Havre, go-slows in Montreal and 24hour walk-outs in a number of Danish ports. In Liverpool there was a mass picket, a large march and a rally. In its own terms the day was a success and was viewed as providing a platform from which to extend the international strategy further. The most significant day of action took place on 20 January 1997. Coordinated by the steering committee and Terry Teague in Liverpool, this produced a wide variety of actions in support of the Liverpool workforce. The range of activities varied significantly. In Brazil the dockers’ union wrote to Brazilian and foreign shipping lines asking them to persuade MDHC to reinstate the Liverpool dockers, and called a national delegates’ conference to discuss effective boycott activity against Liverpool cargo. In Japan the National Council of Dockworkers’ Unions held workplace rallies and ‘limited time strikes’ at 50 ports. In New Zealand seafarers put up pickets, which the waterfront and harbour workers refused to cross, at the three main container ports of Auckland, Wellington and Lyttleton. The pickets stayed in place for one hour, causing significant delays to many shipping lines. In Sweden all containers belonging to ACL and the Canadian CAST company were immobilised by a 24-hour boycott. In Aarhus the port was shut for 24 hours. In Holland and Belgium there were work-to-rules on vessels and shipping lines with Liverpool connections. In Quebec the offices of CAST and CANMAR were occupied while the union, working to ‘health and safety norms’, disrupted ships. Finally, on the west coast of America all ports stopped work for at least 8 hours. As the Los Angeles Times reported: Pacific Rim Trade spluttered to a halt and dozens of mammoth cargo ships sat idle in their ports on Monday as union dock workers from Los Angles to Seattle stayed off the job in a one day show down of support for striking longshoremen in Liverpool . . . At the Los Angeles–Long Beach harbour complex, the nation’s busiest, 33 ships were either stuck in berths with no one to handle their cargo or were anchored in the San Pedro Bay with nowhere to go. (21 January 1997)

The Liverpool Dock Lockout 219 The various activities in support of the Liverpool dockers brought significant delays and costs to international shipping lines. A report in the American Tribune business news (21 January 1997) emphasised the costs involved. Quoting captain Karsten Lemke, vice-president of the Zim-American Israeli Shipping Co., the paper claimed that the delays in America on 20 January were ‘going to cost . . . millions of dollars’, while Mike Johnson, president of the Port Intermodal Operators’ Association, was quoted in the same article as estimating that the effect on American business would be ‘half a billion dollars in commerce . . . shot . . . down the drain’. The solidarity the Liverpool dockers received during the international day of action on 20 January was remarkable. It generated publicity, cost ports and shipping companies substantial sums and put pressure on MDHC. In the aftermath of the action there was great excitement and expectation from the dockers – many wanted to know when the next day of action would be. But it was at exactly this point that the weakness of the international strategy was most sharply revealed. Terry Teague, responding to questions at the mass meeting on 20 June 1997, stated that the events of 20 January were the culmination of months of delegation visits, phone calls, faxed messages and meetings and, hence, that it would take months to achieve such coordinated action again. Indeed, despite their best efforts it took eight months to organise the next set of actions in September 1997. The September solidarity action took the form of a week of action (beginning on 8 September) against shipping companies with Liverpool connections. The breadth of support for the dockers was once again reflected in the range of countries that took part. Actions included a one-hour strike by the All Japan Dockworkers’ Union, and work stoppages in Australia, on the west coast of America, and in Sweden and Denmark. The most notable occurred when ILWU dockers refused to work on the Neptune Jade. This ship was targeted in Oakland because it had links with Thamesport, England (which the dockers believed to have a connection with MDHC). They refused to unload the ship, which then transferred to Vancouver, where dockers again refused to unload it. Eventually, the ship had to go to Yokohama to be unloaded, but the Japanese dockworkers refused to handle the cargo from Thamesport. There was some discussion before September that this week would be the beginning of a series of rolling actions across the globe, but once again the immense difficulties involved in coordinating such action proved simply too great. However, the dockers’ international strategy did produce, overall, a number of remarkable events in support of the Liverpool workforce, and the extent of this support is summarised in Table 1. How do we offer an assessment of the international strategy? Let us make six brief points. First, dockers across the globe, facing similar problems in terms of employer offensives, re-casualisation and attacks on their organisations, provided absolutely magnificent support for the Liverpool dockers. The internationalism of the dock community was immense. Secondly, the international strategy brought costs – it took an enormous amount of energy and effort to enact, and this was at the cost of the local campaign. For the Liverpool dockers, the international strategy enabled them to avoid confronting some very difficult strategic questions about their rela-

220 Labour and Globalisation Table 1. International support for the Liverpool dockers Country

International days of action

International conferences attended

30 September 1996

20 January 1997

8–12 September 1997

February 1996

August 1996

Australia

Work to rule

Strikes and demos

12-hour stoppages

Yes

Yes

Belgium

–

Work to rule

–

Yes

No

Canada

Work to rule

Occupations and work to rule

Strike action and Yes go-slows

Yes

Denmark

Strike action

Strikes and boycotts

Go-slows and strike action

Yes

Yes

France

Boycotts

Go-slows

8-hour go-slow

Yes

Yes

Germany

Workplace meetings

Workplace meetings

–

Yes

Ireland

–

–

Overtime ban and stoppages

Yes

Yes

Italy

–

Mass meetings

–

Yes

Yes

Japan

–

Strike action and workplace rallies

Strikes, boycotts including Neptune Jade

No

No

New Zealand –

Respected picket lines

Workplace meetings

Yes

No

Portugal

–

Workplace meeting

Demonstrations, Yes workplace meetings

No

Spain

Workplace meetings

Workplace meetings

Workplace meetings

Yes

Yes

Sweden

ACL boycotts

ACL and CAST boycotts

ACL and CAST boycotts

Yes

Yes

USA (west coast)

Meetings

Strike action

Go-slows

Yes

Yes

USA (east coast)

–

–

–

Yes

No

tionship with the TGWU, over the question of mass pickets, and over operationalising local solidarity. The international turn meant that they could put self-imposed limits on the local strategy, avoid having to question their wider political perspectives, and at the same time carry out a militant campaign for reinstatement. Thirdly, the international campaign was claimed as a ‘rank-and-file’ campaign. Yet the cam-

The Liverpool Dock Lockout 221 paign tried to put pressure on trade union leaders (sometimes, as in the case of Bowers, not even left-wing leaders) to deliver solidarity. The conferences involved few actual working dockers – indeed at the second conference the majority were full-time trade union officials. These officials were tied to their own union bureaucracies and to the International Transport Workers’ Federation – which of course had links to the TGWU (the largest affiliate to the ITF). With one or two notable exceptions, most of these national leaders and officials proved to be unreliable allies. Fourthly, despite the energy and effort that went into the international campaign, the returns were limited, if spectacular: there were seven days of action (one in September 1996, one in January 1997 and a five-day period of much more limited action in September 1997) carried out over a 28-month period. Despite more demands for international action from the mass meetings, Terry Teague was clear that such activities were immensely difficult to organise and coordinate and took months to produce the results that they did. In these circumstances they could be a useful way of highlighting the dockers’ plight and galvanising the international dock community into action, but were they ever going to force MDHC to negotiate, never mind concede? Was such internationalism really an alternative to a militant campaign waged at the dock gates, mobilising local support? To see what such a campaign could look like, we turn to the Australian wharfies. Battle on the Australian waterfront Passing the baton? In the same week that the Liverpool dispute ended, the opening moves were made in what was to become one of the most important industrial conflicts in recent Australian history – the conflict between the Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) and several dock employers backed by the Australian state. On 28 January 1998 Patrick Stevedores leased part of their facilities on the Webb Dock in Melbourne to non-union employer P. & C. Stevedores, which was being backed by the National Farmers’ Federation. It was suggested at the time that Liverpool was ‘passing the baton’ to Australia in the sense that the fight against casualisation and the development of an international rank-and-file strategy were being handed over to the Australian wharfies. There were clear similarities to be found between the two disputes. Each country had witnessed a substantial reduction in the number of dockworkers employed on the waterfront in preceding years: in Britain 80 per cent of dockworkers left the industry between 1989 and 1992 (Wass and Turnbull, 1994), while in Australia during the same period, the Waterfront Industry Reform Authority (WIRA) oversaw a 57 per cent reduction in the numbers of dockers (ACTU, 1998). Against this background, in each case local employers created conflict that enabled them to sack a unionised workforce and replace it with a non-union one. In Britain in 1989 re-casualisation went ahead with the full support of the Thatcher government, while in Australia in 1998 the Howard government offered full support to

222 Labour and Globalisation businesses determined to destroy the union. As Robert Milliken commented in the Independent at the time: ‘The federal Conservative coalition, headed by John Howard, has supported Patrick’s showdown with the union. It has treated the docks war as the decisive battleground to break Australia’s biggest and last union monopoly’ (Milliken, 1998). The extent of the Australian government’s support was exposed as the dispute unfolded. The most dramatic revelation came in June 1998 when the Labour opposition released a leaked submission to the cabinet by the minister for workplace relations, Peter Reith, and the former transport minister, John Sharp. This paper detailed a government strategy to destroy the position of the MUA on the waterfront. It laid out quite clearly the role that the government would take in this strategy: The Government’s role will be to ‘set the scene’, to facilitate changes that the stevedore(s) [i.e. the stevedoring companies] and others wish to make and to give them the political and regulatory tools to get their business working again as quickly as possible in the event of industrial action. (South News, 7 June 1998).

Further, the leaked paper argued that the government would need to play a significant role preparing for the dispute. Preparations were to include smoothing the way for the use of overseas labour to replace the dockers: ‘This will involve immigration, professional certification, certification of foreign tugs, accommodation and many other details’ (South News, 7 June 1998). Finally the paper argued that the government would need to provide public funds to support the employers: ‘Some elements of the strategy may involve significant public expenditure. The capacity to authorise such expenditure needs to be sorted out before the dispute, enabling the necessary action to be taken quickly and decisively’ (South News, 7 June 1998 [original emphasis]). The dispute was at the heart of the Howard government’s industrial strategy. The Reith Plan was a carefully conceived strategy to reduce the power of the unions and their ability to undertake forms of collective action. Chris Corrigan, the chairman of Patrick Stevedores, was clear that this was a battle ‘between capital and labour’ (Bramble, 1998: 7), and Stan Wallis, the head of the Business Council of Australia, declared that big business was ‘prepared to wear any amount of costs’ (Svenson, 1998). As Bramble notes, ‘The Financial Review spelled out what this meant when it revealed that several large companies had contributed close to $100 million to the National Farmers’ Federation in its bid to destroy the MUA’ (Bramble, 1998: 3). The MUA clearly faced an organised opponent, utilising the might of the state and local capital in an all-out confrontation. In these circumstances the importance of the dispute was recognised by the Australian Confederation of Trade Unions (ACTU). As Bramble suggests, the leadership knew that ‘to abandon the MUA would leave the field clear for the decimation of the union movement’ (Bramble, 1998: 4). The willingness of the ACTU to support the wharfies is in stark contrast to the lack of support offered to the Liverpool dockers by the TGWU and the TUC. But the wharfies did not simply rely on the ACTU, nor indeed on the officials in

The Liverpool Dock Lockout 223 the MUA. Support groups were established and direct links made with workers in other industries. The level of support the wharfies obtained from rank-and-file workers suggests that they also understood the importance of the attack on the MUA and the need for a collective response. The dispute became a focus for resistance against the Howard government for thousands of workers who wanted not only to protest against industrial relations policies but also against welfare cuts and the mass privatisation programmes that had been the hallmark of the coalition government (Bramble, 1998). Patrick Stevedores began the dispute by locking out its own workforce on the Webb dock the day after leasing part of the dock to the non-unionised P. & C. Stevedores. This sparked the union protests that were to form the first part of the dispute. In these first few weeks, before the mass sackings, we can already identify the three key elements that formed the backbone of the MUA and ACTU strategy. These elements were the use of mass pickets by the MUA throughout Australian ports, large-scale solidarity action (on 20 March, 12,000 construction workers took part in a one-day strike in support the Melbourne workers), and finally use of the courts (the MUA sought orders from the courts to prevent Patrick dismissing its workforce). On 6 April the federal courts failed to grant these orders but the court did advise Patrick to abide by its awards and agreements. However, the company had other plans. Late in the evening of 7 April security guards went onto the Webb dock and forcibly removed workers from their cranes and expelled them from the waterfront. Patrick sacked its entire workforce of 1400 permanent and 300 part-time workers and announced that it would be outsourcing a range of services previously performed by its own labour force to nine outside contractors, including P. & C. Stevedores. The response to the sackings was swift. The following morning thousands of workers took to the streets and picket lines in support of the sacked wharfies: mass pickets, solidarity action and mass demonstrations were a daily event. When the sackings took place on 8 April, thousands of workers walked off their jobs to join the picket lines set up by the MUA outside the key ports, notably Fremantle, Melbourne and Sydney. Throughout April warehouse workers from the big supermarket chains, building and construction workers, truck drivers, metal workers and coal miners all took action and turned up in large contingents to lend support to the wharfies’ cause (Bramble, 1998: 6). Arguably the most significant of these mass pickets took place on the night of Friday 17 April on the East Swanson dock in Melbourne in response to a tip-off that 1,000 police officers were due to arrive to break up the picket line. Workers, students, pensioners, community groups and left activists descended upon the dock to meet the imminent police assault. By 3 a.m. 4,000 pickets were assembled behind barricades. At 8 a. m. nearly 2,000 construction workers arrived and encircled the police. After assessing the situation the police decided to abandon their action and had to ask the pickets to let them out of the dock (Bramble, 1998: 6; South News, 19 April 1998). The MUA did receive solidarity support, both financial and physical, from

224 Labour and Globalisation overseas dockers’ unions in Japan and America. However, while this was a useful addition to the local strategy enacted by the dockers, it was not central to their reinstatement campaign. The scale of the local support the wharfies received was the crucial factor in the eventual victory of the MUA in the courts on 4 May. On that day the High Court upheld an earlier order made in the federal court on 21 April that the Patrick workforce must be reinstated. The depth and breadth of the support that the wharfies received was perhaps most clearly demonstrated in the numbers of people who attended May Day rallies throughout Australia just a few days after the court victory. In Sydney there were 4,000 people, in Brisbane 10,000, but by far the largest rally was in Melbourne. This massive demonstration saw between 80,000 and 120,000 people at the Victorian Trade Hall council rally (Bramble, 1998; South News, 6 May 1998). The Australian dispute was won3 by strategies that some commentators depict as ‘outmoded’ or ‘outdated’ – militant trade unionism, mass collective action, local solidarity and conflict with the local state acting as an agent of capital. The Australian dispute was not a development of the ‘international strategy’ of the Liverpool dockers but an example of the continuing relevance and power of working-class direct action. Conclusion: ‘think globally, act locally’ Internationalism is at the heart of the socialist project. Concepts of brotherhood and sisterhood have a powerful resonance within the trade union movement. The immense appeal – if not romanticism – of an international campaign is that it reflects these values of a common brotherhood/sisterhood and makes us feel part of a gigantic international army – the world working class. Yet such strategies can also misdirect and disarm. If we are feeling weak or isolated at home, the notion that the international working class is on our side can comfort us and make us feel powerful. For the Liverpool dockers, their years of struggle had left them isolated as the only organised dock workforce in Britain. Their traditions and commitment to trade unionism had stood the test of time – yet now the official trade union machinery stood by as they were sacked and locked out. In this context the dockers took up the gauntlet laid down by MDHC and entered into a heroic battle. Over the 28 months of the lockout the dockers developed many strategies to try to win their jobs back. By December 1995 they had reached an important fork in the road – a strategic hinge, as Kimmeldorf (1988) would put it. Down one road was an active local strategy. This would involve sending out delegates to argue with workers at the office and factory gates, and with shop stewards in their union com3 The nature of the final agreement between the MUA and Patrick has been heavily criticised by many activists. They felt that it was a ‘sell-out’ and that a significantly greater victory could have been achieved. They argue that the deal actually saw a large number of wharfies lose their jobs, and that the leadership of the MUA and the ACTU failed to capitalise on the massive support that the dispute received to force changes to or abolition of the Workplace Relations Act, a failure which has left all workers (not just wharfies) vulnerable to attack.

The Liverpool Dock Lockout 225 mittees, that local involvement in a more militant dock-gate strategy was needed: daily mass pickets, turning lorries away from the docks, almost certainly some confrontation with the police, local solidarity strikes – in short the strategy followed by the Australian wharfies. No one suggests that this would have been easy, nor that it would have guaranteed victory, but the early mass pickets that shut the dock gates in November 1995, and the strikes across Merseyside on May Day 1996, emphasise that it was a potentially powerful and realisable strategy. Down the other road was internationalism – support and solidarity from the international dock community with the international dock unions forcing MDHC to retreat. For the next two years, the main emphasis within the reinstatement campaign was on the dockers’ global warfare against MDHC. It brought some spectacular days of coordinated international action, but it failed to seriously affect MDHC’s long-term profits or their daily operations. Within the developing anti-capitalist movement, there is an excellent slogan: ‘Think globally, act locally’. Thinking globally means recognising that the spread and intensification of global capitalism, combined with the ascendancy of neo-liberalism as the dominant paradigm within governments and the international financial institutions, results in workers across the globe facing similar attacks from a common enemy. Free-marketism, labour market restructuring, ‘flexploitation’, cuts in public spending, vast increases in inequality, attacks on trade unionism – these are all problems confronting workers across the world. In a very real sense, these are global problems created by an increasingly brutal capitalist system. The international nature of modern capitalism cannot, and should not, be lost sight of – it is a global system of profit maximisation, a system geared to further increasing the wealth of a tiny minority at the expense of the vast majority. In their ruthless pursuit of profit, big business, multinationals and both large and small ‘local’ employers are willing to sacrifice the lives of millions and, indeed, to threaten the sustainability of the planet itself. In the face of this enemy we should think globally. Yet locating the problems faced by workers (and other social movements) in a global context does not mean that we have to act globally. Capital requires profits. Profits require workers working and being exploited at the point of production. When workers stop working, when they strike, go-slow or occupy, they reveal their immense collective power – a power that can force capital and governments to retreat. We should think globally, but act locally, by stopping capital realising the profits that it desperately needs to keep the system going. The Australian wharfies emphasised the continuing relevance of ‘acting locally’. References ACTU (Australian Confederation of Trade Unions) (1998), Factsheet (21 April) Barker, C., and Lavalette, M. (2002), ‘Strategizing and the Sense of Context: Reflections on the First Two Weeks of the Liverpool Docks Lockout, September–October 1995’, in N. Whittier, D. Meyer and B. Robnett (eds), Social Movements: Identity, Culture and the State, New York, Oxford University Press.

226 Labour and Globalisation Castree, N. (2000), ‘Geographic Scale and Grass-Roots Internationalism: The Liverpool Dock Dispute 1995–98’, Economic Geography, 76(3): 272–92. Dockers Charter, various issues. German, L. (1990), ‘The Last Days of Thatcher?’, International Socialism, 48. Glenny, M. (2000), ‘Police and Priests Join Workers’ Revolt’, The Times (6 October). Harvey, P. (1995a), ‘Churches Plea to Docks Chief ’, Liverpool Echo (11 October). –– (1995b), ‘MP’s Fury at Bosses’, Liverpool Echo (17 October). Hunt, A. (1995), ‘Dock Bosses Hit Back at Labour’, Liverpool Echo (2 November). Kennedy, J., and Lavalette, M. (1997), ‘Women of the Waterfront: Class and Gender Relations in the Liverpool Docks Dispute’, conference paper, British Sociological Association (York, April). Kimmeldorf, H. (1988), Reds or Rackets, Chicago: Chicago University Press. Lavalette, M., and Flanagan, N. (2000), ‘In Defence of the “Agitator” – The Role of Leaders and Activists in Industrial Disputes: The Case of Sefton Unison’, North West Labour History Journal. –– (2001), ‘Defending the Sefton 2: Contested Leadership in a Trade Union Dispute’, in C. Barker, A. Johnson and M. Lavalette (eds), Leadership in Social Movements, Manchester: Manchester University Press. Lavalette, M., and Kennedy, J. (1996), Solidarity on the Waterfront: The Liverpool Lock-out 1995/96, Liverpool: Liver Press. –– (1997), ‘Global Warfare: The Liverpool Dockers’ International Campaign for Re-instatement’, in C. Barker and M. Tyldesley (eds), Proceedings of the Third International Conference on Alternative Futures and Popular Protest, Manchester: Manchester University Press. –– (1998), ‘Losarbejdets tilbagevenden: Havnearbejdere, fagbevægelse og lock-out en på havenfronten i Liverpool 1995–1998’, Arbejderhistorie. Tidsskrift for historie, Kultur og politik, 3. Leonard, P. (1998), Postmodern Welfare, London: Sage. Liverpool Echo, various issues. Milliken, R. (1998), ‘Australian Dockers Claim Victory’, The Independent (5 May). Moody, K. (1997), Workers in A Lean World, London: Verso. Socialist Worker, various issues, http://www.socialistworker.co.uk South News, various issues. Waterman, P. (2001), Globalisation, Social Movements and the New Internationalism, London: Continuum. Woodroffe, J., and Ellis-Jones, M. (2000), States of Unrest: Resistance to IMF Policies in Poor Countries, World Development Movement.

12 Globalisation and Trade Union Strategy: Evidence from the International Civil Aviation Industry Paul Blyton, Miguel Martínez Lucio, John McGurk and Peter Turnbull

For trade unions, the central problematic of globalisation is widely seen to be a growing disparity between the mobility of capital and that of labour. The ability of capital to operate on a transnational basis is judged to provide employers with a lever by which they can extract industrial relations concessions from labour (Graham, 1995; Mueller, 1996; Mueller and Purcell, 1992) and thereby pursue a ‘race to the bottom’ in relation to employees’ terms and conditions as international companies seek to cut labour costs (Brecher and Costello, 1994). This greater mobility of capital is seen to contrast with the relatively more fixed and nationally based characteristics of labour. Schmitter and Grote have summarised this approach thus: Of course the real culprit – everyone’s favorite deus ex machina – was (and still is) globalisation. Sharpened international competition . . . [and] the overt threat to move to another site put great pressures on workers to make concessions . . . The upshot of these trends seemed quite clear to many analysts in the 1980s. At best ‘national corporatism’ had to shift from the macro to the meso level of aggregation. (Schmitter and Grote, 1997: 28–29)

The problem with such approaches, however, is that they assume that management acquires a set of power resources in its relation with labour which it translates into changes in work organisation and reductions in labour costs, without acknowledging the more dynamic features of labour responses in both global and national contexts. Further, systematic empirical evidence on the impact of globalisation is hard to find, as is any assessment of the differential impact of globalisation on different occupational groups or within different industrial sectors. Moreover, the studies that are available commonly involve manufacturing, and the automotive sector in particular, which may not adequately represent the overall dynamics of globalisation and management strategy. Focusing on the international civil aviation industry, this chapter examines the effects of globalisation on employees and the national and international strategies developed by organised labour in response. Although the evidence points to some deterioration in terms and conditions of employment, trade unions have been able to retard the pace of change and defend effectively the interests of some occupational groups. Moreover, the future course of globalisation in this sector, as in others, will be contested through new international strategies and repertoires of collective action being developed by the trade union movement. 227

228 Labour and Globalisation The recent experience of the civil aviation industry illustrates quite clearly that the effects of globalisation on labour cannot simply be ‘read off’ from developments within capital. Rather, globalisation is mediated by the activities of labour and trade unions, organised at various levels from the workplace to the international labour confederation and pursued in a variety of ways from cooperative partnerships and negotiated accommodation to militant resistance (Blyton et al., 1999b; see also Ruigrok and van Tulder, 1995). To assess the impact of this mediation, it is necessary to analyse specific industries and embrace the different levels of organisation and interaction. To this end, the next section reviews the process of globalisation in the international civil aviation industry, highlighting the impact of market liberalisation on competitive strategies and labour relations. The third section presents evidence on the adverse impact of globalisation on workers’ terms and conditions of employment. The consequent opportunities for national and international trade union action to protect employment in the globalising airline industry are evaluated in the fourth section. As part of this, we examine the necessary conditions for effective international trade union action, utilising the framework elaborated by Ramsay (1997). The prevalence of industrial conflict and the resolve of union organisation in the civil aviation industry are often noted (see e.g. Blyton and Turnbull, 1995; Gall, 1996; Kassim, 1997: 220), but it is argued that new forms of organisation, and new repertoires of industrial and political action, will be required if labour is to retain the comparatively high levels of pay and conditions of employment traditionally prevailing in the civil aviation industry. Globalisation in the civil aviation industry In 1998, British Airways (BA) formed a global alliance with American Airlines (AA), Canadian International, Qantas and Cathay Pacific under the nomenclature of ‘oneworld’, an apposite title in an industry that is being transformed by product market liberalisation, labour market deregulation, and the commercialisation and privatisation of state-owned airlines. By 1999 there were over 500 international alliances in the civil aviation industry involving more than 170 airlines, but four major alliances now account for over 51 per cent of the world market (Airline Business, 1999). The Star Alliance, for example, has revenues in excess of US$48 billion, serving over 720 destinations in 110 countries with almost 1,500 aircraft and more than 230,000 employees (Feldman, 1998; Airline Business, 1999).1 In many respects, the civil aviation industry epitomises the globalisation scenario as major airlines consolidate their economic resources and increasingly source labour on an international basis. 1 The founding members of the Star Alliance in 1997 were Lufthansa, SAS, United Airlines, Air Canada, Varig and Thai Airways International. Newer members include Ansett Australia, Air New Zealand, Austrian Airlines, Mexicana Airlines and Singapore Airlines. The Star Alliance accounts for around 20 per cent of total employment in the Airline Business top 100 airlines ‘league table’.

Trade Union Strategy in Civil Aviation 229 A workable definition of economic globalisation is ‘the integration of spatially separate locations into a single international market’. There are both economic and political dimensions to such integration. The principal economic dimension is simply a reduction in the cost of conducting business on an international basis. This includes, in particular, transport and transaction costs, such as travel time, freight rates, and the cost and ease of communication. The key political factors in the process of globalisation include free trade agreements, privatisation programmes, and the relaxation or abolition of capital controls in order to facilitate foreign direct investment. Like virtually all other industries, transport services have been fundamentally affected by these developments in recent years, but transport is also fundamental to the process of integrating spatially separate locations into a single international market. Put differently, transport services are both a cause and an object of globalisation (Turnbull, 2000). There are two further dimensions to our definition of globalisation. First, an important characteristic of many transnational corporations (TNCs) is the sourcing of labour on an international basis. Transport services have always been at the forefront of such developments, most notably the employment of ‘crews of convenience’ on ‘flag of convenience’ shipping. Thus, the ‘integration of markets’ must embrace both product and labour markets. Secondly, the process of globalisation in any specific industry must be analysed as an endogenous management strategy rather than as an exogenous context in which TNCs and other organisations now operate. Globalisation strategies are exerting a profound effect in the civil aviation industry, with privatisation programmes and deregulation (‘open skies’) policies introduced by national governments and international agencies in response to, and also to facilitate, companies’ spatial integration of product and labour markets. Traditionally, the market for air transport services has been highly regulated. For example, market entry was restricted through bilateral control of traffic rights, capacity was controlled and prices were set through multilateral negotiations within the International Air Transport Association (IATA) (see Kassim, 1997: 206–10; Lyth, 1997). In addition, state ownership (outside the United States) was the prevalent model for the majority of the world’s major airlines. These carriers enjoyed ‘national flag’ status and preferential access to their country’s main airports, ‘sovereignty’ over their domestic market and preferential access to international markets through bilateral agreements between national governments. As a result, fewer than one in ten routes into and out of the UK were contested by more than two airlines in the mid-1980s (MMC, 1987) and elsewhere around the world the proportion was even lower (see Doganis, 1991; Hanlon, 1996). One outcome of this high degree of state regulation was an industry whose product market was generally stable and predictable. In particular, in a ‘closed’ market, especially one that was generally expanding, there was often little incentive for management to pursue major change or innovation. The monopoly position of many carriers effectively meant that any increases in costs could be passed on to consumers in the form of higher prices (see Doganis, 1991; Taneja, 1976). Widespread state ownership – and thus the absence of private shareholders – acted

230 Labour and Globalisation further to reduce pressure on airlines to cut costs or seek productivity improvements that might boost profits or surpluses. Under these conditions, therefore, there was often an absence of concerted efficiency strategies. The stability of route networks, pricing structures and many other aspects of the airline business facilitated a high level of job security for most employees. Job security was coupled with generally good terms and conditions of employment, backed by extensive collective bargaining machinery and secure trade union recognition throughout much of the industry (see, e.g., Windle, 1991). Though grievances and conflict were by no means absent from civil aviation, industrial relations took place in a relatively ordered environment, often supported by the state. During this time, therefore, the predominant organisational philosophy was to provide an integrated, centrally regulated service, which was mirrored by comprehensive industrial relations arrangements. This pattern has been undergoing radical change in recent years, however, with the advent of globalisation. With progressive relaxation of state regulation creating much more volatility in the industry, there is now much greater emphasis on profitability and a sharper focus on reducing labour costs and intensifying labour use. Pressure for a relaxation in state regulation in recent years has come from a variety of sources, such as growing political support for ‘free-market’ capitalism within a more liberalised and privatised economic regime. But globalisation has been driven predominantly from within the industry itself. Airlines have developed a more commercial orientation to their business and in many countries have pressed for privatisation and a more open market. Following the deregulation of the United States industry in the late 1970s, more liberal bilaterals were negotiated between the US government (representing private carriers) and several European countries in the 1980s. In addition, more liberal intra-European bilaterals became more common from the mid-1980s onwards. Since then there has been a further liberalisation of domestic and inter-country airline markets around the world (see, e.g., Oum and Yu, 1998: 28–30). This is most advanced in Europe, where a single market for aviation came into being on 1 April 1997, with any EU-registered carrier gaining the right to operate services within and between any of the EU’s then fifteen member countries, together with Norway and Iceland. This was the culmination of three liberalisation ‘packages’ (introduced in 1988, 1990 and 1993), the third of which was the most far-reaching in terms of removing national restrictions on intra-EU air services, including entry of new carriers, operations, pricing and capacity. By 1997 the EU regulatory framework was similar to that prevailing in the US domestic air transport industry (see Button et al., 1998; European Commission, 1997) and the hegemony of (national) state control has arguably been superseded through the creation of an alternative source of (pan-European) authority for civil aviation within the EU (see Armstrong and Bulmer, 1998; Kassim, 1997: 220–21; O’Reilly and Stone Sweet, 1998). In this respect at least, the ‘regionalisation’ of the industry’s regulatory structure is clearly part of a much wider process of globalisation. The relaxation of state regulation of airline markets had certain immediate

Trade Union Strategy in Civil Aviation 231 effects, and other more gradual ones. Probably the most visible has been the entry into the industry of a variety of independent lower-cost carriers, such as EasyJet and Ryanair, which in turn have given rise to many of the major carriers establishing low-cost domestic or regional operations (such as KLM Buzz and British Airways Go). The new entrants have typically been able to operate a lower-cost service due to lower overheads (for example, by leasing rather than purchasing aircraft), operating from second-tier and regional airports (whose charges are much lower than first-tier airports and turnaround times faster due to lower levels of congestion), engaging in direct selling (thereby avoiding travel agents’ fees), offering a very basic service (for example, no tickets or seat reservations, no baggage check-in and no catering), and requiring employees to be highly flexible by performing multiple tasks (thereby operating with lower staffing levels overall). As low-cost carriers enter the market, they quickly become the ‘cost target’ or benchmark for other carriers to aim at. This particular benchmark, however, applies mainly to short-haul operations. In a global industry, the benchmarks for employee performance and acceptable costs on long-haul operations are more likely to be the higher labour productivity of US carriers and the lower labour costs of Asian carriers (see Oum and Yu, 1998: 201). The emergence of new global alliances, which allow alliance partners to secure access to a more comprehensive route network with far less risk, securing economies of scale and scope that would otherwise be beyond their reach, exposes carriers to the superior performance of their partners and obviously facilitates the process of benchmarking. In any industry, companies can compete on the basis of lower costs, higher quality, or product innovation (see Porter, 1990). In civil aviation, the ‘choice’ has typically been presented as one between either low costs or high quality/service innovation (see, e.g., Kochan and Dyer, 1993: 576). Increasingly, however, airlines seek to compete on all three criteria, for in an age of globalisation the process of emulation becomes more rapid, such that it is difficult for individual carriers to maintain competitive advantage solely on the basis of service quality or product innovation. On many routes, for example, service quality is almost identical, catering is supplied by the same (transnational) corporations such as GateGourmet and Skychefs, and virtually all airlines now have ‘frequent flier programmes’ or other marketing innovations. What differentiates airlines is increasingly the delivery of service and the cost of travel. On both counts, the airline’s workforce is central. At the points of service interaction with customers, for example, what Carlzon (1987) calls the ‘moments of truth’, airline staff are implored to be polite and courteous as well as efficient and resourceful. As for labour costs, not only are such costs an important element in the cost structure of any airline, they are also one of the few variable costs under the direct control of management (unlike fuel costs, landing charges and aircraft costs). The result is that the industry’s workforce has become the focus of both cost reduction and productivity/service improvement programmes. The strategies adopted by management will obviously differ according to the scale of their operations, route networks, competitive environment, industrial relations arrangements and a host of other variables. In particular, important differences can

232 Labour and Globalisation be expected to emerge between ‘global’ and ‘non-global’ carriers, and some occupational groups (such as cabin crew) are more likely to be subject to quality improvement programmes while others (such as maintenance or ground handling) are more likely to face cost-reduction pressures such as the threat of out-sourcing. Before the response of organised labour to these and other developments is examined, the following section explores the impact of industrial restructuring and different management strategies on work and employment in the civil aviation industry. Globalisation and the changing experience of work in civil aviation The effects of globalisation on jobs and workers’ terms and conditions of employment were explored by the authors in a recently completed two-year investigation (Blyton et al., 1999a), part of which involved an international survey of civil aviation unions affiliated to the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF). Fifty-two unions responded to the survey (a response rate of 36 per cent), together representing half a million airline workers in 29 countries. In addition, detailed case studies of four national airlines (BA, Lufthansa, Iberia and Aer Lingus) were conducted, along with a separate survey of 13 national pilot unions affiliated to the European Cockpit Association (ECA). Both the survey and case evidence point to the conclusion that globalisation has precipitated a downward push on the terms and conditions of many airline workers, driven by increasingly assertive airline management with the aim of intensifying labour use and reducing labour costs. Moreover, in a global operating environment where airlines have greater incentive to pursue higher profits as well as competitive advantage, managers are beginning to display a greater willingness to break with established negotiating arrangements, assert their prerogative over new operating and working procedures, and increasingly impose change on the workforce. First and foremost, globalisation has been accompanied by a decline in employment in recent years, although the impact on different occupational groups has been markedly different (see IATA, 1997). Table 1, based on data from our survey of ITF-affiliated unions, illustrates this variation. Unions representing general support services such as cleaning and catering were far more likely to report declining employment levels between 1992 and 1997, as were unions with members in refuelling and servicing areas, baggage handling, and ticketing and sales. At the same time, while many of these jobs have been out-sourced in recent years, airlines have simultaneously sought to improve the quality of ‘customer service’ at key points of customer contact. The latter, combined with the growth of industry passenger traffic, accounts for the increase in cabin crew employment. Put differently, airlines can cut labour costs in some areas by out-sourcing, but in others they must intensify labour use or even recruit more staff. Evidence of airlines’ quest to intensify labour use was apparent when unions were asked to evaluate the impact of restructuring on their members’ substantive terms and conditions of employment, together with their experience of work, including relationships with management. As Table 2 shows, more than three

Trade Union Strategy in Civil Aviation 233 Table 1. Employment change by occupational group, 1992–97 (percentage* of unions reporting change)

General support Refuelling and servicing Ticketing and sales Baggage handling Maintenance Management Flight deck Cabin crew

Decreased

Stable

Increased

45 40 36 39 32 32 20 14

29 47 32 22 26 36 40 25

26 13 32 39 42 32 40 61

* Not all respondent unions represented workers in each occupational category.

Table 2. The impact of global restructuring on the experience of work (percentages)

Work intensity Job security Job satisfaction Management–labour relations Earnings Hours of work Careers Health and safety Pensions

Negative impact

No impact

Positive impact

78 70 69 68 56 54 44 37 24

20 21 26 22 31 39 44 43 62

2 9 5 10 13 7 12 20 14

quarters of all respondents noted the negative impact of global restructuring on work intensity. Other dimensions of employment in the industry were also seen to have deteriorated, most notably levels of job security, job satisfaction, and the quality of union–management relations.2 Unions with members working for global airlines were somewhat more likely to report adverse effects from restructuring on all the various dimensions of work identified in Table 2. Likewise, cabin crew were more likely to have experienced an intensification of work, declining job security and job satisfaction, and a deterioration in management–labour relations, earnings and hours of work. The more important issue raised by the data in Table 2 is the longer-term ability of many airlines to deliver high-quality services from committed and motivated staff: work 2

The data reported in Table 2 were corroborated by a series of telephone interviews with airline staff in each of the main occupational groups, semi-structured interviews with cabin crew, ground handling and maintenance staff, and in-depth interviews with employee representatives (shop stewards) and union officials (see Blyton et al., 1999a).

234 Labour and Globalisation intensity and job-related stress can have a damaging effect on both quality and safety standards, while job insecurity and declining job satisfaction lie at the heart of poor morale, a lack of commitment and low productivity in many organisations (see Hartley et al., 1991). The experience of BA in the latter years of the 1990s illustrates these problems. Data from BA’s own employee satisfaction and customer satisfaction surveys reveal that a 1 percentage point decline in the former translates into a 0.24 per cent decline in the latter (Lebrecht, 1999). Job satisfaction fell steadily following the company’s announcement of its cost-cutting Business Efficiency Programme and the subsequent cabin crew strike of 1997, and it is widely perceived both inside and outside the company that poor employee morale lay at the heart of BA’s recent decline in profitability (Blyton et al., 1998c; Harper, 2000; Lebrecht, 1999). For many airline workers, the deterioration in their pay in recent years has stemmed directly from nominal wage reductions or pay freezes (reported in the survey by 42 per cent of all unions), the withdrawal of cost of living agreements or allowances (COLAs) (experienced by 30 per cent of the sample), or the introduction of two-tier wage rates with a lower second-tier rate (typically for new recruits) and much slower salary progression. Global carriers, who benchmark against other global carriers as well as against low-cost new entrants, were far more likely to have introduced a wage reduction/freeze or to have withdrawn COLAs, and it was the global carriers who were most likely to have introduced two-tier wage rates. The negative effects of restructuring on working hours reported in Table 2 were the result of longer shift duration (reported by a third of all unions), more frequent shifts and an overall increase in total working hours (both cited by 40 per cent of the respondents). Temporal flexibility has assumed greater importance in the industry in recent years as management seeks to obtain greater utilisation of staff. Initiatives at regional and global levels have been pursued to enable employers to obtain these efficiencies. First, airlines have pressed for a relaxation of regulations on flight and cabin crew duty limitations at the regional and wider supra-national level. Secondly, carriers have increased productivity as a function of technology. Newer aircraft types allow longer stage lengths that have often necessitated longer shift periods. Thirdly, airlines have sought to introduce greater variation and frequency into shift patterns in response to both peaks and troughs in demand. These developments appear to have had a particularly adverse effect on cabin crew, whose unions were far more likely than those representing other groups to report longer shifts and, as a result, an overall increase in working hours. Increases in working hours were reported by the vast majority (over four in five) of the unions representing cabin crew, compared to fewer than one in five among ground handling and maintenance. Civil aviation unions, like their counterparts in many other contexts, find it particularly difficult to protect their members’ terms and conditions of employment when faced with the threat that work will be contracted out. Subcontracting of work had been introduced in three quarters of the airlines covered by the survey. Most commonly, in seven out of every ten cases, this involved subcontracting of

Trade Union Strategy in Civil Aviation 235 support services (cleaning, catering, security and computing, for example), but in almost two fifths of cases there had also been subcontracting in more central services, such as engineering, ground handling and check-in. In addition, 50 per cent of the unions reported that the airline management they dealt with used the possibility that work could be contracted out as a threat to secure reduced costs and/or improved efficiency. Also prominent was the emergence of global outsourcing where services are subcontracted on an international basis (reported by more than half the sample). Cross-border employment is also becoming increasingly commonplace (reported by 28 per cent of respondents), especially among flight and cabin crew working for global airlines. For many commentators this development is indicative of the emergence of ‘crews of convenience’ in the airways, similar to crews of convenience in the shipping industry (ITF, 1992; 1997; Lillie, 1999). In order to determine how different areas of the business should be operated, airlines routinely benchmark their operations against competitors or other potential service providers. Thus, flight and cabin crew might be benchmarked against other airlines, as might ground and maintenance grades, but the latter might also be benchmarked against specialist service providers such as catering, cleaning, and security companies, cargo-handling and logistics specialists, and dedicated equipment maintenance companies. More than half (56 per cent) of the sample reported the use of benchmarking by managers in order to establish ‘market rates’. Even if work is retained ‘in-house’, decentralisation strategies lead to the creation of strategic business units (profit centres), and unions’ experience of such developments is that they tend to be associated with a deterioration in terms and conditions. In many areas of civil aviation, however, out-sourcing is simply impossible because of industry regulations, the skills required to perform particular tasks, the safety-critical nature of the operations, and the absence of reliable or cost-effective external service providers. It is in these areas that civil aviation unions have been far more successful in defending their members’ terms and conditions of employment. Nonetheless, staff in these occupational groups are reported to be working harder and longer and the majority are now subject to quality control programmes designed not only to improve customer service but also to regulate more closely the work of airline staff. More than half the sample (55 per cent) reported quality control programmes to be in place in the major airlines where the union had members, and a further 13 per cent reported airlines with plans to implement such policies in the very near future. The majority of these programmes have been focused on external ‘customer care’, targeting cabin crew and check-in staff to go beyond ‘service with a smile’. Over half (54 per cent) of the sample reported that the airlines they dealt with now had customer care programmes in place, compared to just 20 per cent five years previously. Increasingly, however, airlines also utilise quality as a means of internal control, such that employees treat fellow workers as customers or suppliers rather than colleagues (reported by 53 per cent of the sample). A further 28 per cent reported the use of specific internal quality targets. The notion of an ‘internal customer’ can create competitive relationships between

236 Labour and Globalisation employee groups and individuals and is often part and parcel of an attempt by airlines to create loyalties around managerially defined teams rather than around the broader occupational groups that traditionally have constituted the basis of trade union organisation. Such practices are often reinforced by new forms of ‘performance management’ based on customer surveys, peer appraisal, and even reports from managers posing as passengers (see Blyton and Turnbull, 1998: 69–79). For many airline employees, therefore, quality initiatives simply add to the pressures of the job. The apparent inability of airline unions to prevent restructuring having deleterious effects, both on their members’ terms and conditions of employment and on their broader experience of work, appears to be related to the growing trend towards the imposition rather than the negotiation of change. In many countries in the past, aviation unions were closely involved in significant developments affecting major airlines, especially the national flag carriers, via national collective bargaining. In the 1990s, most changes were still negotiated by civil aviation unions, but there is some disconcerting evidence from the ITF survey that airlines are now introducing far-reaching changes unilaterally via the assertion of ‘managerial prerogatives’, even in the face of trade union opposition, and are seeking to bypass previously established channels of communication, consultation and negotiation. In fact, as airlines ‘go global’, collective bargaining and other forms of employee representation ‘go local’.3 These developments raise serious questions about the ability of trade unions to protect their members’ future terms and conditions of employment in an age of globalisation. It is to the strategies being pursued by trade unions that we now turn. Globalisation and trade union strategies In order to protect airline workers’ pay and conditions, civil aviation unions have traditionally relied primarily on national collective bargaining and standard forms of industrial action (e.g. strikes, picketing, demonstrations and public protests). These traditional repertoires are still widely used and regarded as effective by most trade unions. Over two thirds of the unions responding to the survey indicated that they had been involved in strike action during the previous five years, almost the same proportion had organised demonstrations and public protests, and over half had organised action short of a strike such as a work-to-rule or overtime ban. Over four fifths of unions cited industrial action as an ‘effective’ strategy and more than half believed that demonstration and political campaigns were still effective, even though state regulation of the industry has been eroded 3

Overall, 80 per cent of respondent trade unions indicated that they negotiated principally with individual carriers on a company basis, and a further 10 per cent negotiated primarily at the local level (that is, the airport or location in which members were employed). Just 10 per cent of trade unions were involved in national-level, multi-company bargaining, and the trend is towards further decentralisation, as reported by 22 per cent of respondents (69 per cent reported no change over the previous 5 years and just 6 per cent reported greater centralisation of collective bargaining arrangements).

Trade Union Strategy in Civil Aviation 237 Table 3. The effectiveness of trade union strategies, as perceived by the unions (percentages)

Industrial action Education of members Cross-border trade union cooperation Union cooperation across alliance partners Inter-union cooperation at national level Political campaigns Management–union cooperation Concession bargaining

Effective

Ineffective

Neither

82 81 75 74 70 57 46 37

11 11 10 15 14 22 28 41

7 8 15 11 16 21 26 22

in recent years. Moderation, as opposed to union militancy, elicited a less favourable response: less than half the unions regarded ‘management–union cooperation’ as effective while just over a third cited ‘concession bargaining’ as an effective strategy (see Table 3). However, examples of more effective forms of partnership emerged from our case study research, including the recent agreements negotiated by the principal Spanish civil aviation unions and Iberia, which refocused the restructuring of the airline towards productivity and quality enhancement (including quality of working life) instead of simply job reduction (Martínez Lucio et al., 2001), and the acceptance of radical change by unions recognised by Aer Lingus in return for assurances on job security and a greater role in decision-making (Blyton et al., 1999a; 1999b). In contrast, the greater hostility of trade unions to concession bargaining seems to reflect a growing realisation that in a global industry where privatised airlines seek to maximise the returns on capital demanded by shareholders, it is profitability rather than competitiveness or efficiency that lies at the heart of company demands for wage concessions or calls for cooperation in major restructuring exercises. The extensive resort to, and continued effectiveness of, traditional forms of union activity evidenced in the global survey and directed towards national airlines, institutions and states is hardly surprising. Even global carriers have a ‘home base’ and all airlines are vulnerable to strike action.4 Moreover, even in a deregulated product market, global airlines are still dependent on the regulatory support of national governments (for example, to protect established ‘rights’ to airport slots). Not surprisingly, civil aviation unions continue to favour national regulatory policies such as union recognition and collective bargaining, national 4

Given the technical and safety-critical nature of many airline jobs it is extremely difficult to hire replacement labour during a strike. In addition, the service offered – airline seats – is highly perishable, which makes strikes costly in the short term (revenue losses) and potentially costly in the longer term (the airline’s reputation for reliability and customer loyalty may be severely damaged). The 1997 BA cabin crew dispute, for example, was estimated to have cost the airline £125 million in lost revenue (see Blyton et al., 1998c).

238 Labour and Globalisation Table 4. State and regulatory policies in the labour market (percentage of respondent unions)

Support

Oppose

Neither/ No opinion

Uphold union recognition and collective bargaining

98

0

2

Harmonise minimum terms and conditions

94

2

4

Support harmonised limits on flight and duty times

90

0

10

Enforce existing social protection (e.g. Social Chapter and ILO conventions)

88

2

10

Provide for statutory worker representation on airline boards

67

9

24

Allow workers and management to negotiate their own solutions

57

18

25

Support workers’ right to obtain a stake in their airline

41

22

37

Regulators should . . .

minimum terms and conditions5 of employment, statutory worker representation on airline boards and state financial support for national airlines (Table 4). Increasingly, however, civil aviation unions recognise the need to develop international strategies to combat the effects of globalisation on their members’ terms and conditions of employment. Three quarters of the ITF sample, for example, regarded cross-border trade union cooperation and/or inter-union cooperation across members of the new global airline alliances as an effective strategy, 90 per cent supported the international harmonisation of flight and duty times and the enforcement of international social conventions (e.g. the Social Chapter of the Maastricht Treaty and ILO conventions), and more than half favoured market regulation of global alliances. The basis for effective international trade union action, according to Ramsay (1997: 526–27), is organisational comprehensiveness (i.e. extensive affiliation to the international organisation), inclusiveness (i.e. high union membership density among the affiliates), internal authority within the international federation, exter5

The enforcement of minimum terms and conditions, for example, not only limits cost competition from new entrants and specialist service providers but also constitutes an important counter against the dis-integration strategies of the major carriers. In Germany, for example, the main airline trade unions (Ver. di and DAG) have been able to retain under the main Lufthansa collective agreement the subsidiary companies that have been created for handling the company’s short-haul routes, tourist traffic, cargo, maintenance and catering. Thus, even though Lufthansa is unusual in Germany in negotiating a company agreement with its trade unions, rather than being part of a broader sectoral agreement, the ability of the unions to preserve these activities under the main collective agreement has restricted management’s ability to pursue a ‘core/periphery’ strategy with inferior terms and conditions in the company’s subsidiaries.

Trade Union Strategy in Civil Aviation 239 nal recognition by employers, governments and international agencies, and of course sufficient resources. The ITF is widely regarded as one of the best examples of international trade unionism (see e.g. Breitenfellner, 1997: 545), and the civil aviation section of the ITF certainly meets the criteria for an effective international trade secretariat. First, there are no significant ‘gaps’, or at least no insurmountable gaps, in the comprehensiveness of the ITF’s civil aviation section.6 Indeed, affiliation is now being extended to many of the world’s ‘second-tier’ airlines, especially in Eastern Europe. Secondly, membership tends to be very high among civil aviation unions across virtually all occupational groups, but especially among workers who occupy a strategic position in the work process (e.g. pilots, cabin crew, ground handling staff, and technical/maintenance staff). Thirdly, the ITF has demonstrated its ability to coordinate effective international campaigns and solidarity action in several key disputes, demonstrating the internal authority of the Federation. Fourthly, the ITF is widely recognised by employers, state governments and important international agencies such as the ICAO (International Civil Aviation Organization), JAA/FAA (Joint Aviation Authority [Europe]/Federal Aviation Administration [US]), the ILO, UNCTAD and the OECD. Finally, resource constraints have not unduly impeded the effectiveness of the ITF’s civil aviation section. In fact, one of the most important resource constraints faced by all international trade union organisations, namely the financial costs of translation and interpretation, is minimised in civil aviation because English constitutes the ‘industry language’. All ITF cabin crew meetings, for example, are conducted in English. Based on these solid organisational foundations, civil aviation unions have been able to develop novel, and in many instances effective, international repertoires. The 1997 BA cabin crew dispute is a case in point (Blyton et al., 1998c), with action organised against BA services around the globe (see ITF, 1997). In fact, the transnational structure of the civil aviation industry, combined with the homogeneity of work and conditions of employment, and more importantly the increasing tendency of (global) airlines to ‘benchmark’ and export conditions from one carrier to the next, has created both an awareness and an incentive for labour to combine across borders. Further, important new networks have been formed within the ITF’s civil aviation section to mirror, and counter, the main global alliances formed by national airlines. Member unions of these networks have signed a formal International Trade Union Co-operation Agreement that commits the unions to solidarity action. All these activities reinforce the point that globalisation continues to be mediated by the activities of labour and trade unions organised at various levels and executed through traditional and new repertoires of collective mobilisation and political action. Yet, regardless of such novel developments, there remain major challenges facing organised labour in the international context. Ramsay’s model enables a detailing of the issues that confront labour within the new global environment. In 6 The only gaps in North America are Delta (which is non-union) and American Airline’s cabin crew union (although the union does attend ITF meetings). AA ground staff are affiliated to the ITF. In Europe all the major flag carriers are affiliated, with the exception of Finair cabin crew. Where unions are recognised in Asia they are usually affiliated to the ITF (Singapore Airlines is a notable exception).

240 Labour and Globalisation terms of ‘organisational comprehensiveness’ (extensive affiliation to the international organisation) and ‘inclusiveness’, while post-Cold War international relations have facilitated the construction of less hostile inter-labour relations, there are still threats. The main one is the possibility of alternative splinter organisations developing and new sets of competitive relations between international organisations being established. Within the docks sector, for example, the ITF has been challenged by new forms of international relationships that espouse distinct ideologies and positions. Similar developments may occur in civil aviation, reflecting tensions that may emerge within the international hierarchy of airlines. Another major challenge is that while internationally there may be a new dialogue that develops across a range of sectoral and political issues, no one can judge what the long-term organisational impact of occupational and employment fragmentation will be. The tendency towards subcontracting and organisational disintegration continues, meaning that the actual authority of the member unions may be undermined by the possibility of greater union fragmentation at the national level. Occupationally, the significance of sectoral identification (which has been a key issue within the industry and can form the basis of international relations) may similarly be undermined by new forms of worker identity that are more functional and fragmented. Further, convergence internationally may not necessarily be supported by convergence at the national level, given the emergence in countries such as Spain and the UK of splinter unions and strained relations between occupations (Martínez Lucio et al., 2001). So, while there is a thematic convergence in terms of changes in the airline industry, there may not be organisational congruity at the national level. In terms of the issue of internal authority within the international federations, here we can note two possible tensions. International trade union collaboration is based not just on formal international bodies but also on loose networks of trade unionists and other worker representatives. These networks facilitate dialogue across frontiers but also set up alternative forms of organisation. How such bodies will relate to broader international collaboration is yet to be seen. In cases where national disputes are not sanctioned by national union leaderships, the ITF has its hands tied when dealing with the alternative networks. Further, there is a second potential challenge to a systematic and strategic transnational trade unionism and its internal authority, which stems from the nature of the airline sector’s globalisation. The growth of global alliances presents a challenge both to the ITF and to international trade union relations. While such alliances may encourage those unions within participating companies to exchange information and frame solidarity principles (as seen with oneworld), there are alternative challenges also. The relationships and power struggles between the trade union networks of different alliances may lead to new fault-lines in the international relations of the ITF. Stronger interest groupings may develop to challenge the internal authority of the ITF, which had previously been based on coordinating less organised clusters of national unions. Within these interest groups there may be dominant players, such as the German trade unions, whose resources and institutional role may be much

Trade Union Strategy in Civil Aviation 241 more extensive than those of other member unions. Within oneworld the dominance of BA and AA labour unions is seen to configure the nature of the internal discussions, according to trade unionists from less central airlines that we interviewed. The upshot is that rather than globalisation being a zero-sum process whereby power is taken, or not, from the national and local unions, in practice the process will be more complex due to the new sectoral and competing bodies that may emerge at the global level itself, and the way these are internally structured around new hierarchies. Finally, there is the issue of external recognition of international trade union bodies by employers, governments and international agencies. While bodies such as the ITF continue to strengthen in terms of their credibility and recognition, there remains a paucity of global regulatory structures that provide the union movement with an effective regulatory role. While the airline industry is known for its international regulatory bodies, the international labour movement finds greater support and a range of roles from general international agencies such as the ILO. In fact, the nature of globalisation, structured around the emergence of global regions, may in turn contribute to a global labour movement within this sector that is skewed in terms of its regulatory capacity. For example, the role of Western European airline unions within the European Union provides it with a greater set of transnational initiatives and roles than those of unions in other global regions. In this respect, as with the issue of global airline alliances discussed above, there may be a variety of fault-lines and tensions within the new, positive union developments that we have outlined in this chapter. Conclusion The age-old problems faced by trade unions on an international stage (Haworth and Ramsay, 1986; Ulman, 1975) clearly remain in evidence in the civil aviation industry. Fundamentally, capital has always found it easier to combine than labour because for capital ‘solidarity’ (e.g. the formation of a global alliance) is determined by market transactions (the ‘willingness to pay’), whereas labour must also define a collective identity and ensure a ‘willingness to act’ as well as a ‘willingness to pay’ (see Offe and Wiesenthal, 1980). Moreover, labour is generally slow to develop new repertoires of industrial and political action necessary to counter the restructuring of capital. This is reflected in the evident failure, to date, of civil aviation unions to halt the erosion in employees’ terms and conditions, as evidenced in the responses of the industry’s trade unions. Yet it would be wrong to suggest that labour organisations have not influenced the speed or the course of industrial restructuring, which is still in progress and is increasingly global in character. As also noted above, the restructuring of national carriers in countries such as Spain and Ireland attests to the ability of trade unions to influence management strategy, particularly in regard to industrial relations and human resource management policies. Indeed, with high levels of union membership in the industry and a highly perishable product, civil aviation unions still possess considerable power

242 Labour and Globalisation resources that have been exercised to significant effect. Furthermore, as disputes at BA, UPS, and elsewhere have demonstrated (ITF, 1997), labour is showing signs of more effective international organisation and action. Civil aviation unions have also targeted international regulatory agencies in an attempt to protect established conditions of employment, especially in relation to safety, where alliances can be forged with passenger groups to ensure the enforcement of rigorous international standards. The changing nature of the sector and the patterns of restructuring are providing unions with opportunities to forge a new international discourse of solidarity that draws from the way that workers are being asked for greater commitment within less supportive environments. Throughout our survey findings one sees an emergence of issues and themes within restructuring that have contributed to a greater dialogue within the international airline labour movement regarding safety, restructuring, work intensification, and new management practices. The success, or otherwise, of these new repertoires, and the ability of organised labour to mobilise its membership and coordinate activity, will be important factors in shaping the future course of globalisation in the civil aviation industry. Acknowledgements The financial support of the Leverhulme Trust is gratefully acknowledged. This chapter is a revised version of a paper presented by the authors at the 1999 Employment Relations Unit Conference, Cardiff Business School and an article published in the International Journal of Human Resource Management. References Airline Business (1999), ‘Circling the Globe’, Airline Business (July): 34–37. Armstrong, K. A., and Bulmer, S. J. (1998), The Governance of the Single European Market, Manchester: Manchester University Press. Blyton, P., and Turnbull, P. (1995), ‘Growing Turbulence in the European Airline Industry’, European Industrial Relations Review, 255: 14–16. –– (1998), The Dynamics of Employee Relations, 2nd edn, Basingstoke: Macmillan. Blyton, P., Martínez Lucio, M., McGurk, J., and Turnbull, P. (1998a), Contesting Globalisation: Airline Restructuring, Labour Flexibility and Trade Union Strategies, London: ITF. –– (1998b), ‘Globalisation, Deregulation and Flexibility on the Flight Deck’, report prepared for the European Cockpit Association, Cardiff Business School, Cardiff University. –– (1998c), ‘Strategic Calculation? Innovative Cost Reduction and Employment Relations in British Airways’, mimeo, Cardiff Business School, Cardiff University. –– (1999a), Employment Relations Under Deregulation: A Study of European Airlines, End of Award Report, London: Leverhulme Trust. –– (1999b), ‘European Airline Deregulation: A Comparative Study of Four

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244 Labour and Globalisation International Air Transport Industry 1930–1990’, in J. McConville (ed.), Transport Regulation Matters, London: Pinter, 154–74. Martínez Lucio, M., Turnbull, P., Blyton, P., and McGurk, J. (2001), ‘Using Regulation: An International Comparative Study of the Civil Aviation Industry in Britain and Spain’, European Journal of Industrial Relations (forthcoming). MMC (Monopolies and Mergers Commission) (1987), British Airways plc and British Caledonian Group plc: A Report on the Proposed Merger, Cm 247, London: HMSO. Mueller, F. (1996), ‘National Stakeholders in the Global Contest for Corporate Investment’, European Journal of Industrial Relations, 2(3): 345–68. Mueller, F., and Purcell, J. (1992), ‘The Europeanization of Manufacturing and the Decentralization of Bargaining: Multinational Management Strategies in the European Automotive Industry’, International Journal of Human Resource Management, 3(1): 15–34. Offe, C., and Wiesenthal, H. (1980), ‘Two Logics of Collective Action: Theoretical Notes on Social Class and Organizational Forum’, Political Power and Social Theory, 1: 67–115. O’Reilly, D., and Stone Sweet, A. (1998), ‘The Liberalization and European Reregulation of Air Transport’, in W. Sandholtz and A. Stone Sweet (eds), European Integration and Supranational Governance, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 164–87. Oum, T., and Yu, C. (1998), Winning Airlines: Productivity and Cost Competitiveness of the World’s Major Airlines, Boston: Kluwer. Porter, M. E. (1990), The Competitive Advantage of Nations, New York: Free Press. Ramsay, H. (1997), ‘Solidarity at Last? International Trade Unionism Approaching the Millennium’, Economic and Industrial Democracy, 18(4): 503–37. Ruigrok, W., and van Tulder, R. (1995), The Logic of International Restructuring, London: Routledge. Schmitter, P. C., and Grote, J. R. (1997), ‘The Corporatist Sisyphus: Past, Present and Future’, paper presented at conference on Plotting our Future: Technology, Environment, Economy and Society, Florence: European University Institute. Taneja, N. K. (1976), The Commercial Airline Industry, Lexington, MA: Lexington Books. Turnbull, P. (2000), ‘Contesting Globalization on the Waterfront’, Politics and Society, 28(3): 367–91. Ulman, L. (1975), ‘Multinational Unionism: Incentives, Barriers and Alternatives’, Industrial Relations, 14(1): 1–31. Windle, R. J. (1991), ‘The World’s Airlines: A Cost and Productivity Comparison’, Journal of Transport Economics, 25(1): 31–49.

Index

ABC Lines 72–3, 216 aborigines, land 113, 115 ABVV/FGTB 39, 48 ACTWU 141 Adams, Jack 212 Adidas 200 AFL–CIO 8, 40, 58, 65, 66, 100, 120, 134, 135, 137, 139, 141, 156, 157–8, 183–4, 195–6, 197 All Japan Dockworkers’ Union 219 American Airlines 228, 241 American Container Line 216–17 Amin, Ash 2, 11 Amnesty International 115, 123 ANC 131, 132, 133, 137, 138, 139, 140 banning 134 anti-apartheid movement 13, 129, 139 anti-capitalist alliance 14, 184, 199–201, 224 Anti-Slavery International 183 apartheid 13, 57, 130, 133, 134 trade union sanctions 136 Apparel Industry Partnership 123, 176 Artto, Juhanni 79, 81 Asia, trade unions 142 Asian financial crisis 43 Asian-Pacific Regional Organisation 45 Australia 144, 145, 216, 219 dock workers 75, 143, 207, 215–21, 221–4 Rio Tinto campaign 106–8 trade unionism 13–14, 75 Australian Confederation of Trade Unions 6, 75, 79, 222–3 Australian Fairwear Campaign 177 Australian Shareholders’ Independent Shareholder Services 120 Babymilk campaign 171 Badger case 40

Bailey, Chris 78 BALTIC 216 Bangladesh, child labour 63, 192–3 banner exchanges 77–8 Base Code of Labour Practice, Canada 173 Belanger, Marc 78 Belgium x, 218 Bendiner, Burton 160, 161 Bezuidenhout, Andries 13, 128 Bhopal disaster 46 Bilsborough, Kevin 216 Black Allied Workers’ Union 139 Black, Conrad 73 Black Consciousness Movement 139 black workers, South Africa 130–7, 138, 139 Blyton, Paul 14, 227 BMW 72 Borg, Bjorn 215 boycotts 171 Liverpool docks dispute 216 Brandt, Willi 41 Brazil 10, 128, 145, 189–90, 194, 218 trade unions ix, 67 Breitenfeller, Andreas 6 Britain 7, 139 child labour 186–7, 188–9 codes of conduct, labour issues 172 EWC representatives 91–7 location of industry overseas ix–x trade unions 72, 81–2, 207–8, 240 British Airways 228, 232, 234, 241 British Airways Go 231 British Columbia Teachers’ Federation 74 broad leftism 215 Buchanan, Pat 162 Bus Riders’ Union 87 Bush, President George 152–3 Business Council of Australia 222

245

246 Labour and Globalisation cabin crews airlines 232, 233–4 working hours 234 Cafod 171, 192–3 Calgary Herald, strike 73 Canada 65, 139, 144, 216 effects of NAFTA 149–50 NAFTA and 152–4 trade unions 7, 13, 66, 80 Canadian International 228 Canadian Labour Congress 41, 45, 76, 137 Canadian–US FTA 152, 153, 155, 161 CANMAR 216, 218 capital integration, NAFTA 154 mobility 85, 161 regulation 64–5 capitalist development, forms of resistance 108–11 capitalist expansion, imperialism and 53–5 Carden, Mike 215 Cárdenas, Cuáhtemoc 157–8 Cárdenas, President Lázaro 151 carriers, low-cost, civil aviation 231 Casserini, Karl 36, 40 CAST 216, 218 Castells, Manuel 8 Cathay Pacific 228 Central American Network in Solidarity with Women Workers in the Maquila 177 CEPAA 176 CFDT 39 CFMEU 106–7, 113, 114, 118, 119, 120, 121–3, 124 CGIL 142 CGTP-IN 196 charcoal industry, child labour 194–5 Chernobyl disaster 46 child labour x, 5, 47, 53, 62–4, 181–2 acceptable and unacceptable 191–2, 196–7 anti-capitalism and 199–201 campaigns 182–5 developmentalist case 188–90 extent 185–7 trade unions and 195–9 child liberationist position 184, 191, 200 child porter project 193 childhood new sociology 190–1 Western models 190, 192, 193, 200

children exploitation 186–7 right to work 190–5 Chile 7, 49 chimney sweeping, child labour 188–9 China 128, 173, 185 Christian Aid 171 civil aviation deregulation 230–1 global alliances 228–9 globalisation 228–32 state regulation 229–30 trade unions 14, 228, 229, 230, 232–42 work experience 232–6 CLC 139–40 Clean Clothes Campaign 169–70, 172, 173–4 climate change treaty, Kyoto 66 Clinton, President Bill 7 closed-user groups 75 CNETU 132–3 CNN 75 Co-operative Bank 120 Coalition of Rio Tinto Shareholders 120 Coastal Containers Ltd 213 Coca Cola 57 COCOSA 136–7, 142 codes of conduct corporate behaviour, South Africa 136 implementation 173–4, 176–8 labour standards 171–8 MNCs 117 Cold War 8, 130, 134 trade union activity 57 collective bargaining airlines 236–7 weakening of 20 collectivism, workers 22 Coloured Peoples’ Congress 133 Comintern 131, 132 Communist Party 216 communitarianism 28 community, work and 28–30 Community Aid Abroad 115 community support, Liverpool dock dispute 212–13 competition, civil aviation 231 concession bargaining 237 Confederación de Trabajadores de México 158 Confederation of Portuguese Industry 195 Congress Alliance 133, 134

Index 247 Congress of Democrats 133 Conzinc Rio Tinto Australia 111–12 Cornfield, Daniel 10 corporations, legitimacy 113 Corrigan, Chris 222 COSATU 31, 61, 67, 78, 79, 129–30, 138, 140–4, 145 cost of living agreements 234 COTU 196 CPSA 131–2 critical engagement, negotiation of change 23–4 Croft, Angie 79 CTU 120 Cunningham, Steve 14, 181 CUSA 136–7 customer care, airlines 235–6 CUT 67, 142 Danish General Workers’ Union (SID) 6 Davies, Jimmy 215 debt Mexico 152 Third World 42–3, 55 Debunne, Georges 48 democracy, trade unions and 27–8 Denmark 219 Department for International Development 174 deregulation, civil aviation 230–1 Devan Nair, C.V. 38 developing countries x, 36–7 critique of ICTFU 37–8 GATT and 55–6 labour groups 66 labour movements 57–8 labour standards 177 DGB viii, 81 discourse, globalisation 1 dock workers Australia 75, 143, 207, 221–4 decline in numbers 221 international strategy 210, 215–21 Liverpool 10–11, 13, 14, 74, 206–7, 208 Donahue, Tom 157 Donart, Gretchen 79 Donovan, Jim 215 Douglass, Frederick 164 Down to Earth 115 DPG 80 Drache, David 1, 2

EasyJet 231 economic environment, trade unions 19 economic integration, North America 150–5 economic policy, alternative 38 education, workers 26 EFBWW 98–9 Ellerman’s Andrew Weir 216 Elliott, Stewart 79 email, trade union use 74, 75 emissions, curbing 66 employability 25–6 employee representatives, EWCs 89, 90, 91–5, 96–100 employers changing attitudes to trade unions 19–20 child labour and 195 Employers’ Confederation of Service Industries, Finland 195 employment, democracy in 27–8 empowerment 23, 26 Engels, Friedrich 71 Enterprise for the Americas Initiative 153 environment 66 conflict over 109 health and safety 116–17 trade union alliance 114, 115 Ethical Trading Action Group 173 Ethical Trading Initiative 172, 173, 174, 175 ETUC viii, 198 European Cockpit Association 232 European integration 59 European Union ix, 112, 161, 230 Directive on European Works Councils 6 European Union Federations 99 European Works Councils 13, 89–91, 112 EU Directive 6, 98 lessons for labour 98–100 EUSGTP 197–8 export processing zones 143, 175 Fair Wear Charter Foundation 173 Federation of Jordanian Chambers of Commerce 195 FEDUSA 129, 142 FIIQ 80 Fimmen, Edo 36–7 Finland 195 trade unions 81 flags of convenience 229

248 Labour and Globalisation flexibility labour market x, 12, 23–5 time 24–5 flexicurity 25 flight crews, working hours 234 FOFATUSA 134, 139 forced labour 198 Ford, Charles 37, 40 foreign direct investment 128 foreign investment, access to, NAFTA 153–4 Fortum Arbeit 81 FOSATU 136–7, 138 France 7, 57, 209 union membership viii–ix Free Trade Zones 47 French, John 13, 149 Frente Autentico de Trabajo 158 Friends of the Earth 115 Friso, Enzo 142 Gabaglio, Emilio 90 Gallin, Dan 88 Gap 200 garment industry 169–71, 173 child labour 192–3 GateGroumet 231 GATT 44, 45, 54, 55–6, 64, 149, 152, 153, 183 general strike, Korea 75–6 Germany 10 relocation of production 96–7 trade unions viii, x, 72 Gibson-Graham, J.K. 2–3 Gills, Barry 2 Gindin, Sam 10 global competitions 19 Global Union Federations 6, 86–7, 98, 99 globalisation 42, 105, 227–8 characteristics 1–5 civil aviation 228–32 critique 45–6 impact on workforce 232–6 labour response 5–12, 159, 208–10 race to the bottom 4, 7, 42 trade unions and ix–x, 72–6, 85 Gompers, Samuel 151 Goodman, James 13–14, 105 government, role in dockworkers’ dispute 221–2 Group for the Convention of the Rights of the Child 191

gTLD 79 Guatemala 57 Gumbrell-McCormick, Rebecca 13, 34, 57 Harkin Bill 192 Harkin, Tom 63 health and safety 116–17 Hernández Juarez, Francisco 158–9 Heymen, Jack 215 home, relationship with work 21–2 HomeNet 177 homeworkers 177, 185 Homeworkers’ Code of Practice 177 Hong Kong 163 Howard, John 221–2 human rights 38, 114, 115–16, 120, 136 Hyman, Richard 12, 19 IATA 229 Iberia 232, 236–7 ICANN 79 ICAO 239 ICEF 46 ICEM 49, 86, 106 campaign against RTZ 106, 108, 112–24, 125 response to globalisation 5–6, 46 ICF 36, 37, 49 ICFTU viii, xi, 6, 11, 13, 34, 35, 65, 67, 78, 79, 121, 129–30, 133, 145, 146 development charter 41 global economy 41–4 on globalisation 5, 48–9, 87 labour standards 60, 61–2 Model Code 172 multinationals and 37–41 relations with COSATU 141 SACTU and 139–40 social clause 10, 36, 41, 44–6, 128 South African Unions and 129–30, 133, 134–7, 142 working party on MNCs 37–9 ICU 131, 132 IG Metall 26 ILWU 215, 219 immigration, Mexico–US 154 imperialism 13, 53–9 denationalised 58–9 import substitution 55 import tariffs 128 imports, discrimination against 55–6 incomes, international disparity 3

Index 249 India x, 60, 128, 163 Indian Congresses 133 Indian Ocean Regional Initiative 141–2 Indonesia 121, 170 industrial democracy 42 industrial relations civil aviation 228, 230 national regimes 19, 20 industrialised countries, economic policy 41–2 industry European, low-cost competition 95 relocation ix–x, 96–7 informal sector 62, 177, 183, 194 interest rates 42 internal customers 235–6 International Bank for Reconstruction and Development see World Bank International Chamber of Commerce 60 International Federation of Trade Unions 36, 132 International Labour Banner exchange 77–8 International Labour Organisation 4, 5, 7, 27–8, 35–6, 40, 44–5, 46, 48, 58, 61, 87, 124, 130, 132, 134, 146, 172, 176, 185–6, 187, 191, 196, 198, 238 International Longshoremen’s Union 217 International Metalworkers’ Federation 36, 44, 49, 160 International Monetary Fund (IMF) 42, 43, 54, 60, 61, 87, 130, 142, 146, 183 international order, post-Cold War 152–3 International Socialist League 131 International Textile, Garments and Leather Workers’ Federation 175–6 International Trade Organisation (ITO) 54, 55 International Trade Secretariats 5, 6, 10, 11, 35, 36, 43, 46, 74, 79, 80, 112–13, 122, 124, 129–30, 145, 182 MNCs and 37–9, 46–8, 49 International Trade Union Secretariat 35, 36 International Union of Food and Allied Workers 46–7, 87 International Working Group on Child Labour 193 internationalism, rank-and-file 10–11 internet, trade union use 73–6, 81 IPECS 191 Israel 7

Italian General Confederation of Labour 142 Italy viii, 57 ITF 11, 36, 75, 218, 232, 236, 238, 239, 240–1 ITGLWF 37, 40, 144 JAA/FAA 239 Jamaica 57 Japan 29, 218 Jerusalem Post 73 job losses 25, 149–50, 157, 161–2 airlines 232 job protection 95 Johnson, Mike 219 Jordan, Bill 45 Kadalie, Clemens 131 Kapstein, Ethan 4 KCTU 76 Kennedy, Jane 11, 14, 206 Kilusang Mayo Uno 142 Kim Dae Jung 76 Kirkland, Lane 156 KLM Buzz 231 Korea, trade unions 75–6, 81 Kyoto, climate change treaty 66 labour cheap 95, 157 end of alliance with capital 58–9 flexibility x, 12, 23–5 international sourcing 228, 229 internationalism 13, 98–100, 156–62 response to globalisation 5–8, 12, 105–6 segmentation 10 strategy beyond unions 14 Labour Behind the Label 174 labour conditions, international campaigns 169–71 labour costs, civil aviation 231, 232 labour force changing 20–1 feminisation 21 Labour Link Exchange 77 labour market deregulation 176 Germany 26 global 3, 4 restructuring 208 security 12–13, 25–6

250 Labour and Globalisation labour movement developed and developing countries 161 implications of NAFTA 156–62 national 108–9 transnational 8–12 see also trade unions Labour NewsWire 78 Labour Party, South Africa 131 labour standards 4–5, 13, 35, 44–5, 52–3, 59–64, 121, 142, 143 auditing 176 codes of conduct 171–8 strategies 64–5 trade agreements and 197–8 LabourNet 74, 78 LabourNet Canada 77 LabourStart 73, 75, 76, 77, 80 network of correspondents 78–9 language problem, global labour network 80–1 Latin America ix Lavalette, Michael 11, 14, 181, 206, 207 Lee, Eric 13, 71 LeftLink 75 Lemke, Karsten 219 Levenstein, Harvey 159–60 Levi Strauss 172 Levinson, Charles 36 life-long learning 25 Link Exchange 77–8 Littlewoods 172 Liverpool, dockers’ dispute 10–11, 13, 14, 74, 206–7, 208 living standards 163–4 LO Sweden 37, 39 lockouts 169 ABC 72–3 dockers’ dispute, Liverpool 14, 206–7, 210–21 Melbourne dockers’ dispute 223 Lufthansa 232 Luján, Barta 158 Lula ix Maastricht Treaty 89, 238 McGurk, John 14, 227 machine translation 80, 81 Malaysia 193 Malaysian Trade Union Congress 36, 60 managerialism 23, 26 managers, EWCs and 95–7

manufacturing industry 201 Britain 208 Maputo declaration 143–4 Maritime Union of Australia 75, 207, 215, 221–4 market-based regulation, capital 65 Martínez Lucio, Miguel 14, 227 Marx, Karl 71 Masih, Iqbal 47 mass workers 22–3 May Day march and rally, dockers’ dispute 214–15 Meknes Affair 193 Melbourne, dockers’ dispute 221–4 Menzies, Robert 112 Mercosur 149, 161 Mersey Docks and Harbour Company 206, 209, 212, 213, 214, 215, 217, 218, 219, 221, 224–5 Mexican Revolution 152 Mexico 163 effects of NAFTA 149–50 NAFTA and 153–4 national autonomy 152 trade unions 7, 13, 66, 156–9 Milliken, Robert 222 Minerals Policy Institute 115, 120, 122, 125 miners 208 Miners’ International Federation 46 MineWatch 115 mineworkers’ strike, South Africa 132 MNCs 2, 8, 9, 14, 20, 42, 54, 86, 98, 105, 125, 129, 144–5, 163, 229 call for regulation 38–40 child labour 200 corporate legitimacy 113 countervailing approach 36–7 growing power 35, 36–7 growth 128 ICFTU concern with 37–41 OECD code 124–5 regulation 64–5 in Third World 47 worker links 10, 46–8, 89 Mongolia 193 Montgomery, David xi Moody, Kim 10–11, 12, 106, 122, 124, 208–9 Moody, Roger 125 Morocco 193 Morris, Joe 41 Morton, Bobby 215, 216

Index 251 Mulroney, Brian 153 Multi-Fibre Agreement 55 Multilateral Agreement on Investment 45, 46, 59 multilateral agreements, trade 64–5 Munby, Steve 207–9, 210 Munck, Ronaldo xi, 1 NACTU 129–30, 142, 143 NAFTA 7, 59, 65–6, 113, 149–50, 175 implications for labour transnationalism 156–62 ‘silent integration’ 150–5 unions and 7, 13 Naidoo, Jay 140–1 Narayanan, P.P. 38, 47 narrative, globalisation 1 Nash, Bradley 9–10 nation state as agent of social rights 8–9 effect of globalisation 9 trade unions and 86 National Council of Dockworkers’ Unions, Japan 218 National Farmers’ Federation 221, 222 National Party, South Africa 133 National Port Shop Stewards’ Committee 216 NATO 54 Nelson Freight 206, 213 Nelson, Tony 216 neo-liberalism 4, 8, 45, 128, 129, 208, 209 child labour 189–90 Neptune Jade 219 Nestlé 46, 171 Netherlands 173–4, 218 New Delhi Declaration 41 new international economic order 41, 42, 55 New Internationalist 185 new labour internationalism 72 New Protectionism 55–6 new sociology of childhood 190–1 New Zealand 7, 216, 218 news wire services 78–9 NGOs x, 6, 29, 43, 113, 122, 123–4 child labour 14, 181–3, 187, 191–5 development 61 labour issues 169, 170–8 Nicaragua, women workers 177–8 Nike 170, 200 No Sweats campaign 181, 182

Nolan, Jimmy 215, 216 non-governmental organisations see NGOs North American Agreement on Labour Co-operation 113 North–South divide 13 nurses, Quebec 80 OATUU 62, 130, 141, 143, 144 O’Brien, Robert 13, 52 occupational mobility 26–7 Odhner, Clas-Erik 37, 39 OECD 239 code for MNCs 124–5 Multilateral Agreement on Investment 45, 46, 59 Trade Union Advisory Committee 36, 38, 40 oil crisis, second 43 oneworld 228 opportunity 26–7 Organisation of African Unity 134 Oswald, Ron 87, 99 outsourcing, civil aviation 234–5 Oxfam 169, 171 P. & C. Stevedores 221, 223 PAC 140 Pakistan 192 Pakistan Carpet Manufacturers’ and Exporters’ Association (PCMEA) 63 parental leave agreement 6 Partizans 115, 125 Patrick Stevedores 221, 222, 223, 224 peasants 62 Perot, Ross 149, 150, 162 Philippine Mining Communities Development Centre 115 Philippines 7, 142, 169 pickets 73, 206, 207, 212 mass 213–14, 218, 220, 223 Pittson dispute 47 Placer Dome 144 Plawiuk, Eugene 77, 78 police, picketing and 213–14 pollution 66 Port Intermodal Operators’ Association 219 Portugal 7, 96 power relations, unequal 54 printers 208 private sector, trade unions 25 production, relocation 96–7

252 Labour and Globalisation Project Underground 115 protectionism 45, 161 new 55–6 public sector, trade unions ix, 25, 29 public service unions, USA 29 Pursey, Stephen 40 Qantas 228 Quebec 80 Ramli, Muhammad 121 Red International of Labour Unions 36 Reebok 200 Reith, Peter 222 Renault, Vilvoorde plant 90 Rio Tinto 14, 47, 111–12 campaign against unions 106–7, 118–19 ICEM campaign 106, 108, 112–24 response to ICEM critique 117–19 Rover, closure 72 Russia, trade unions 78, 81 Ryan, Susan 120 Ryanair 231 SACTU 133–5 in exile 137–8 ICFTU and 139–40 Salgado, Sebastiao 163–4 Salinas, President Carlos 152–3, 158 Saskatchewan 80 SATUCC 130, 141, 143 Save the Children Fund 183, 192–3, 193, 201 Schwab, Klaus 4 Second International 131 security, workers 12–13, 25–6 self-regulation, MNCs 117 service sector 21, 201, 208 Shailor, Barbara 8 shareholders perceptions of Rio Tinto 113, 115–16 Rio Tinto 120–1 Sharp, John 222 Sharpeville Massacre 134 Shaw, Linda 14, 169 shop stewards’ strike committee, dockers 211, 212, 215–16 Singapore TUC 38 Single European Market 59, 89 Sithole, Jan 143 SITUR 145 skills 25

Skychefs 231 slavery x, 194–5 social clause 10, 36, 41, 44–6, 144, 198–9 Social Code of Conduct 142 social conflict, waves 209 social movements, trade unions 6, 8, 12, 13–14, 29, 87–8, 100, 105–6, 124, 129 solidarity 31 Solidarnosc ix SoliNet 78 Somavia, Juan 48 South Africa 7, 49, 173 boycotts 171 trade unions ix, 13, 31, 57, 61, 67, 129, 130–44 South African Clothing and Textile Workers’ Union 143 South African Communist Party 135, 137, 138, 140 South African Municipal Workers’ Union 76 South African National Union of Mineworkers 113–14, 130 South Korea 7 Southall, Roger 13, 128 Southern African Customs Union 143 Spain 216 trade unions viii, 237, 240 sport shoes 170 stakeholders, RTZ 115–16, 122–3 Star Alliance 228 state regulation, civil aviation 229–30 strikes African mineworkers, South Africa 132 dock dispute 218 Durban 135, 137 worldwide 208–9 structural adjustment programmes 43, 152, 183, 189 subcontracting 173, 175 civil aviation 234–5 supply chains, complexity 173 Suppression of Communism Act 1950, South Africa 133 Swaziland Congress of Trade Unons (SCTU) 143 sweatshops 170 Sweden 216, 218, 219 trade unions x Sweeney, John 184, 195–6

Index 253 Takver’s Soapbox 75, 78 tariffs 54, 55, 161 import 128 Third World countries 197–8 Teague, Terry 215–16, 218, 219, 221 Teamsters’ Union 157 teamworking 23 Textile, Clothing and Footwear Union of Australia 177 textile industry 143–4 child labour 63 developing countries 5 TGWU 13, 74, 143, 206, 210, 211–12, 215, 220, 222 think globally, act locally 224–5 Third World Network 61–2, 193 Tilly, Charles 8–9 time, flexibility 24–5 Torside Ltd 206, 212, 213 trade, labour standards and 60–2 trade agreements, Third World 197–8 trade liberalisation 45 child labour and 189–90 trade regime, international 52, 55–6 trade unions 11, 13, 39 black workers, South Africa 136–7 changing constituencies 20–1 child labour 181, 182–4, 195–9 civil aviation 14, 228, 229, 230, 232–42 codes of practice 172–8 community and 28–30 company-based 29–30 decline in membership viii–ix, 7, 86 democratic function 27–8 external and internal challenges 19–23 global networking 13, 76–82 global solidarity 109–10 global tripartism 87 globalisation and ix–x, 72–6, 85, 129 imperialism 5, 7, 52, 57–8, 65 international 5–7, 34–41, 65–7, 85–8, 128–9, 144–6, 156–8, 238–41 labour flexibility 23–5 MNCs and 37, 38 NAFTA and 7, 13, 156–62 national x, 87 nationalism 6–7 networking 71–6, 113–15 old forms of labour struggle 207–9 organisation and practice 85–8 regional organisations 36–7

social movements 6, 8, 12, 13–14, 29, 87–8, 105–6, 124, 129 strategies 236–41 views on labour standards 60–2 white workers, South Africa 130–1 see also labour movement training, workers 26 transnational corporations see MNCs Transnationals Information Exchange 11, 175 trud.org 78, 81 TUC viii, 30, 37, 90, 120, 132, 133–4, 139–40, 182, 222 TUCSA 133, 134, 139 Turnbull, Peter 14, 227 UAW 141 UNCED 125 UNCTAD 55, 239 unemployment 19, 25 UNICE 60 UNICEF 191 Union Carbide 46 UNISON 214 United Kingdom see Britain United Nations, Centre and Commission on Transnational Corporations 40 United States child labour 186–7 civil aviation 230 codes of conduct, labour issues 171–2 effects of NAFTA 149–50 labour standards 199 relations with NAFTA partners 153–4 relocation of production abroad x, 149–50 trade unions 7, 57–8, 73, 156–8, 209 United Steelworkers of America x United Students Against Sweatshops 170 Uruguay Round 44, 56, 60, 153 US Department of Labor 63–4 USGSP 197 Van Der Pijl, Kees 108, 109 Velásquez, Fidel 158 Venezuela 7, 156 wages inequality 163–4 levelling down 8, 144 reduction 234 Wallis, Stan 222

254 Labour and Globalisation Waterfront Industry Reform Authority 221 Waterman, Peter 71, 85, 106, 109–10, 210 web rings 77, 78 websites ICEM 114 trade union use 73–6 Weinberg, Nat 163 Weipa 113, 115 WFTU 62, 130, 133, 134, 135, 139, 146 wharfies, Australia 75, 207, 221–4 white workers, South Africa 130–1 Wills, Jane 13, 85 women, trade unionists 29 women workers 21 exploitation 47 labour codes 177–8 union membership 175 Women Working Worldwide 14, 169 work changing experience, civil aviation 232–6 humanisation 23 intensification 232–4 relationship with home 21–2 work-to-rules 218 workers as agents in globalisation 3 differing interests 160–1 international solidarity 5

North America 151 security 12–13, 25–6 workers’ control 39 workers’rights x–xi, 8–9, 121, 169–71, 198–9 working class 208 working hours, increase 234 working time, flexibility 24–5 works councils see European Works Councils World Bank 3–4, 42, 43, 54, 60, 61, 87, 130, 142, 146, 183 world company council 36 World Confederation of Export processing zones 177 World Development Movement 115, 209 world economy, international trade union approaches 35–7, 39 World Trade Organisation 44, 45, 46, 52–3, 53, 56, 59, 67, 87, 130, 146, 184 labour standards 60–2, 183 social clause 10, 128, 198–9 trade policy mechanism 64–5 Year of the Child 187 Zim-American Israeli Shipping Co. 219 Zimbabwe 143 Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions 143