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LABOUR IN THE GLOBAL SOUTH

CHALLENGES AND ALTERNATIVES FOR WORKERS

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LABOUR IN THE GLOBAL SOUTH

CHALLENGES AND ALTERNATIVES FOR WORKERS

edited by Sarah Mosoetsa and Michelle Williams

INTERNATIONAL LABOUR OFFICE • GENEVA

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Copyright © International Labour Organization 2012

First published 2012
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Mosoetsa, Sarah; Williams, Michelle

Labour in the global South: Challenges and alternatives for workers / edited by Sarah Mosoetsa and
Michelle Williams; International Labour Office – Geneva: ILO, 2012
232 p.
ISBN 978-92-2-126238-1 (print)
ISBN 978-92-2-126239-8 (web pdf)

International Labour Office

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PREFACE

In the decades following the Second World War, the mature industrial relations
systems of the advanced economies served as an example and even as a model for labour
movements in the South. Informal employment in the South was largely seen as a
problem of insufficiently regulated markets and high labour surpluses in developing
countries, one which would disappear through the process of industrialization.
Trade unions in industrialized countries, with their long and proud history, were
in many cases regarded and often saw themselves as representatives of a trade union
practice that could also inspire and guide the labour movements of the industrializ-
ing South. Their potential to serve as role models has proved to be an illusion on several
counts. In the age of globalization and financialization, the traditional industrial
relations system has been undermined, and trade unions in the North are losing ground.
Social dialogue, corporatism and collective bargaining are, in a growing number of
instances, changing from institutions that ensure fair sharing of productivity gains to
instruments that accommodate the demands of capital and governments to lower
wages and erode working conditions in the name of competitiveness. Labour market
reform, the downsizing of welfare state provisions and the return of mass unemploy-
ment created precarious employment for millions of workers, and the wage share in
nearly all industrialized countries has been declining for decades. The current crisis has
reinforced and intensified the pressures on the traditional models of trade unionism,
social dialogue and collective bargaining, particularly in Europe.
In sum, instead of “good” labour market systems of the North acting as models
for development in the South, features of unregulated and informal labour markets
associated with the South have increasingly been adopted in industrialized countries.
At the same time, it is increasingly evident in the developing and industrializing
countries that informality is not merely a transitional phenomenon. A relatively small
formal sector is linked through outsourcing and sophisticated supply chains with large

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Labour in the global South

numbers of workers in different forms of precarious and informal employment. Trade

union movements face the harsh reality that this is not some backward model of
industrial production, but rather cutting-edge twenty-first-century capitalism used by
the most advanced multinational companies to maximize their profits.
Given these structural changes and new challenges, trade unions in all countries
are discussing and exploring new forms of organizing and mobilizing, new means of
international cooperation, and new alliances with other civil society organizations.
Trade unions in the South have been pioneering many of these new strategies. SEWA
in India shows that even the most vulnerable workers – women in the informal
economy – can organize successfully. The Brazilian trade unions were an important
partner in the launch of the World Social Forum, and the political achievement of the
Lula Government would be unimaginable without the role of organized labour.
COSATU is running one of the strongest campaigns against labour brokers and is a
crucial pillar of democracy in South Africa. In Uruguay, the trade unions were instru-
mental in achieving nearly universal collective bargaining coverage and extending
social protection to many vulnerable informal workers. And significantly, the new
International Domestic Workers’ Network has many of its key affiliates and leaders in
countries of the South.
Industrial workplaces have also shifted to new destinations, which has had the
inevitable effect of reshaping the international labour movement. The Global Labour
University (GLU) itself is part of this shift in international trade union and labour
research cooperation. GLU works as a global knowledge and research network to
overcome the traditional concept of the North−South knowledge transfer. Working
in close cooperation with the national and international trade union movements,
GLU offers masters’ programmes at universities in Brazil, Germany, India and South
Africa, through which it provides the opportunity to look at the world and the labour
movement from different perspectives, and it creates a forum in which to debate
responses to the changing world of industrial relations.
Labour in the global South is an example of these debates. In their introductory
chapter, editors Sarah Mosoetsa and Michelle Williams put today’s challenges for
organized labour in the context of the seismic changes in the global distribution and
organization of work. Globalization has largely extended the possibilities for multi-
national companies to evade national regulations. However, the editors point out that
this new world of corporate globalization is not so new for the global South, precisely
because Keynesian capitalism, including the powerful institutional role for organized
labour and a comprehensive welfare state, never made it to the South.
In a competitive race to provide ever more generous investment climates, even
governments historically close to labour have shifted the balance of power further in
favour of capital through a whole range of deregulatory policies. The current volume
discusses the very different experiences of trade unions with governments they had
mobilized to vote for. It shows that winning elections is not enough, and that real

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Preface

change also requires a movement that has the strength and public authority to keep those
elected accountable to their voters as well as to help them to withstand the lobbying
pressure of the countervailing forces. This, as some of the authors highlight, will not
be possible without trade unions that reach out and mobilize beyond their tradition-
al strongholds. Facing a crisis that is not only economic and social but also ecological
rules out the possibility of another century of global economic growth during which
the South is supposed to catch up to the North by growing even faster than the
North does. Labour needs new strategies to mobilize and organize and to build new
alliances, but it also needs development concepts that question capitalism’s insatiable
appetite for growth, without denying the necessity of income growth for the billions
of people living in abject poverty.
By selecting diverging and potentially controversial views on these issues, this
book contributes the much-needed southern perspective to this essential debate, as
well as to the global discourse.

Bheki Ntshalintshali
Deputy Secretary-General
Congress of South African Trade Unions

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CONTENTS

Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . v
Notes on contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi
Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiv
List of abbreviations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xv

1 Challenges and alternatives for workers in the global South

Sarah Mosoetsa and Michelle Williams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

PART I COUNTERING EXPLOITATION AND MARGINALIZATION . . 17

2 South African labour’s response to climate change: The threat
of green neoliberal capitalism
Jacklyn Cock . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
3 Women, gender and power in trade unions
Akua Britwum, Karen Douglas and Sue Ledwith . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
4 Local government call centres: Challenge or opportunity
for South African labour?
Babalwa Magoqwana and Sandra Matatu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
5 Why labour unions have failed Bangladesh’s garment workers
Zia Rahman and Tom Langford . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87

PART II POLITICAL MOVEMENTS AND TRADE UNIONS . . . . . . . . 107

6 Brazilian labour relations in Lula’s era: Telemarketing operators
and their unions
Ruy Braga . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109

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7 Labour relations in Uruguay under the Frente Amplio Government,

2005–09: From neoliberalism to neocorporativism?
Jana Silverman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
8 Can a labour-friendly government be friendly to labour? A hegemonic
analysis of Brazilian, German and South African experiences
Christoph Scherrer and Luciana Hachmann . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141

PART III WORKER ALTERNATIVES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159

9 The recovered factories and the Argentine labour movement:
A grey zone in a “new” social movement
Bruno Dobrusin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
10 Organizing informal women workers for green livelihoods:
The Self Employed Women’s Association in Gujarat
Sarbeswara Sahoo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181

Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201

LIST OF TABLES
3.1 Percentages of women on trade union decision-making bodies, 2009 . . . 50
3.2 Senior office-holders in selected trade unions and confederations,
by gender, with percentages for women . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
3.3 Women and trade union equality structures, 2009 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
3.4 Successes and barriers for women in their unions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
4.1 Characteristics of call centre operations focused on, respectively,
quantity of calls handled and quality of service provided . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
5.1 The garment industry in Bangladesh: Numbers of factories
and employees, 1983/84 to 2010/11 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
6.1 Percentage growth in numbers of telemarketing operators in Brazil,
by region, 2004–09 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
6.2 Numbers of telemarketing operators in Brazil, by region, 2003–09 . . . . 111
10.1 Sources of green livelihood, by sector . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183
10.2 SEWA membership across India, by state, 2010 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184
10.3 Rural–urban distribution of SEWA membership in Gujarat, 2009 . . . . 185

LIST OF FIGURES
6.1 Numbers of telemarketing operators in Brazil, 2003–09 . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
10.1 Outline of study coverage showing types of location,
activities and workers examined . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188

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NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS

Ruy Braga is a professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of São

Paulo, Brazil (USP). He was Director of USP’s Center for the Study of Citizenship
Rights (Cenedic) from 2006 to 2010 and is the Correspondence Secretary of the
magazine Outubro (periodical of the Brazilian Institute of Socialist Studies) and
Deputy Editor of the magazine Societies Without Borders (organ of the association
Sociologists Without Borders). He was Vice-Chair of USP’s Department of Sociology
from 2005 to 2009 and is President of the Human Resources General Commission of
USP’s Faculty of Philosophy, Literature and Human Sciences.

Akua Britwum is Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Development Studies,
University of Cape Coast, Ghana, where she has been teaching and carrying out
research in gender and labour studies since 1996.

Jacklyn Cock is a professor emeritus in the Department of Sociology, and an honorary

research associate of the Society, Work and Development Institute, at the University
of the Witwatersrand, South Africa.

Bruno Dobrusin is an adviser to the International Relations Secretariat of the

Argentine Workers’ Confederation and a PhD candidate at the University of Buenos
Aires. He has an MA in Globalization and Labour from the Tata Institute of Social
Sciences, Mumbai, a member institution of the Global Labour University.

Karen Douglas is a Senior Industrial Officer of the Health and Community Services
Union, Victoria, Australia, and a graduate of the Masters in Labour Policies and
Globalization programme of the Global Labour University.

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Labour in the global South

Luciana Hachmann is undertaking her PhD at the International Center for

Development and Decent Work at Kassel University, Germany. She is a graduate of
the Masters in Labour Policies and Globalization programme of the Global Labour
University.

Tom Langford is a professor in the Sociology Department at the University of

Calgary, Canada. He can be reached at [email protected]. His collaborative work
with Zia Rahman includes “The limitations of global social movement unionism as
an emancipatory labour strategy in majority world countries”, which was published in
the Canadian journal Socialist Studies in 2010.

Sue Ledwith is Leverhulme Emeritus Scholar in International Labour and Trade

Union Studies at Ruskin College, United Kingdom, www.ruskin.ac.uk, and can be
contacted by email at [email protected].

Babalwa Magoqwana is a PhD candidate in sociology at Rhodes University, South

Africa. Her thesis focuses on call centre labour processes within local government in
South Africa.

Sandra Matatu is a PhD candidate in sociology at Rhodes University, South Africa.

Her thesis focuses on e-government and workplace restructuring in South African
municipalities.

Sarah Mosoetsa is Senior Lecturer in Sociology at the University of Witwatersrand,

South Africa, where she is a member of the Global Labour University executive
committee. Her publications include Eating from one pot: The dynamics of survival in
poor South African households (Wits University Press, 2011).

Zia Rahman is an Associate Professor in Sociology at the University of Dhaka,

Bangladesh. He can be reached at [email protected]. His collaborative work with
Tom Langford includes “The limitations of global social movement unionism as an
emancipatory labour strategy in majority world countries”, which was published in the
Canadian journal Socialist Studies in 2010.

Sarbeswara Sahoo is an Assistant Professor in Economics at Mahatma Gandhi Labour

Institute, Gujarat, India, and can be reached by email at [email protected].

Christoph Scherrer is Professor for Globalization and Politics and Executive Director
of the International Center for Development and Decent Work at the University of
Kassel, Germany.

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Notes on contributors

Jana Silverman is the Programme Director of the AFL-CIO Solidarity Center for
Brazil and Paraguay. In addition, she is a PhD candidate in labour and social
economics at the State University of Campinas in Brazil and holds a Master’s degree
in international affairs, specializing in human rights, from Columbia University. She
has published and presented extensively in academic forums in English, Spanish and
Portuguese on union strategies and labour relations in the Southern Cone countries
in the post-authoritarian period.

Michelle Williams is Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of

Witwatersrand, South Africa, where she is chairperson of the Global Labour University
programme. Her publications include The roots of participatory democracy: Democratic
communists in South Africa and Kerala, India (Palgrave, 2008) and South Africa and
India: Shaping the global South (co-edited with Isabel Hofmeyr; Wits University Press,
2011).

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Books are always collective projects; edited volumes especially so. We would like
to thank the following organizations: the International Labour Organization,
the Friedrich-Ebert Stiftung and the Department of Sociology, University of the
Witwatersrand. Many people have contributed to this volume either directly or
indirectly, and while we cannot thank them all individually, a few deserve special
mention: Pulane Ditlhake, Frank Hoffer, Claire Hobden, Musa Malabela, Vishwas
Satgar, Edward Webster, Jacklyn Cock, Devan Pillay, Chris Edgar, Alison Irvine, our
copy editor Gillian Somerscales and three reviewers who reviewed the manuscript in
a “double blind” process. We would also like to thank all the contributors, who
worked to very strict deadlines in order to keep up with an extremely stringent
publication schedule.

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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

AAFLI Asian American Free Labor Institute

ACD automatic call distributor
ADOS Asociación de Obras Sociales (Argentina)
AFL-CIO American Federation of Labor–Congress of Industrial
Organizations
AITUC All India Trade Union Congress
ANC African National Congress
ANTA Self-administered Workers’ Association (Argentina)
AO automatic operator
APCOL All Pakistan Confederation of Labour
ATE State Workers Association (Argentina)
BAG Bargaining Agenda for Gender
BEE Black Economic Empowerment
BGMEA Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association
BGWUC Bangladesh Garment Workers Unity Council
BIGU Bangladesh Independent Garment-Workers Union
BNCL Bengal National Chamber of Labour
BNDES Brazilian Development Bank
BNP Bangladesh Nationalist Party
CAN Climate Justice Network
CDES Economic and Social Development Council (Brazil)
CDM Clean Development Mechanism
CGT General Labour Confederation (Argentina)
CIFE Chief Inspector of Factories and Establishment (Bangladesh)
CJN Climate Justice Now
CJNSA Climate Justice Now South Africa

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Labour in the global South

CLC Canadian Labour Congress

COB customer-oriented bureaucracies
COP Conference of the Parties
COSATU Congress of South African Trade Unions
CS consejos de salarios (Uruguay)
CTA Workers’ Confederation of Argentina
CTAs tele-activity centres (Brazil)
CUT Central Única dos Trabalhadores (Brazil)
CWU Communication Workers Union (South Africa)
DGB Deutscher Gewerkschaftsbund
DIEESE Inter-Union Department of Statistics and Socioeconomic
Studies (Brazil)
DL Directorate of Labour (Bangladesh)
EPFL East Pakistan Federation of Labour
EPZ export processing zone
ETUC European Trade Union Confederation
FA Frente Amplio (Uruguay)
FASINPAT Fábrica sin patrones (Argentina)
FDI foreign direct investment
FEDUSA Federation of Unions of South Africa
FORU Uruguayan Regional Workers’ Federation
GATS General Agreement on Trade in Services
GDP gross domestic product
GEAR Growth, Employment and Redistribution
GHG(s) greenhouse gas(es)
GLU Global Labour University
HR human resources
ICFTU International Confederation of Free Trade Unions
IFL Indian Federation of Labour
ILO International Labour Organization
IMF International Monetary Fund
INTUC Indian National Trade Union Congress
IRP Integrated Resource Plan (South Africa)
ITUC International Trade Union Confederation
IUF International Union of Food, Agricultural, Hotel, Restaurant,
Catering, Tobacco and Allied Workers’ Associations
IVR interactive voice response
LGBT Lesbians, gays, bisexuals, transvestites, transsexuals
and transgendered people
LRK Little Rann of Kutch
MEF Ministry of Economy and Finances (Uruguay)

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List of abbreviations

MPN Movimiento Popular Neuquino (Argentina)

MTSS Ministry of Labour and Social Security (Uruguay)
NACTU National Council of Trade Unions (South Africa)
NGO non-governmental organization
NGP New Growth Path (South Africa)
NLC Nigerian Labour Congress
NMM Nelson Mandela Bay Metropolitan Municipality
NPM New Public Management
NUM National Union of Mineworkers (South Africa)
NUMSA National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa
OECD Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
PIT-CNT Uruguayan labour confederation
PSDB Partido da Social Democracia Brasiliera (Social Democratic Party
of Brazil)
PT Partido dos Trabalhadores (Workers’ Party, Brazil)
RDP Reconstruction and Development Programme
REDD Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation
RG research group
RMG ready-made garments
SACP South African Communist Party
SALGA South African Local Government Association
SAMWU South African Municipal Workers Union
SATAWU South African Transport and Allied Workers Unions
SC Solidarity Center (Bangladesh)
SEWA Self Employed Women’s Association (India)
SKOP Sramik Karmachari Okkyo Parishad (Bangladesh)
SOECN Sindicato de Obreros y Empleados Ceramistas de Neuquén
(Argentina)
SPD Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands
SUTRASPRIN Sindicato de Salud Privada del Neuquén (Argentina)
TRIPS Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights
UACs utilities, agencies and corporatized entities
UCR Unión Cívica Radical
UNEP United Nations Environment Programme
UNFCCC United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change
WFTU World Federation of Trade Unions
WTO World Trade Organization
WWF World Wildlife Fund

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CHALLENGES AND ALTERNATIVES

FOR WORKERS IN THE GLOBAL SOUTH
1

Sarah Mosoetsa and Michelle Williams

In recent years, news broadcasts across the world have been awash with stories of
governments in advanced capitalist countries such as Britain, France, Germany and
the United States, saving corporations and banks in a desperate attempt to rescue the
global economic system. These events signal the emergence of a new global crisis of
capitalism triggered by the actions of an unscrupulous financial sector. This new crisis
is global in character, originating in and most directly affecting the global North, and
is compounded by the widespread crisis of the State. At the root of the economic crisis
is a greedy financial sector, motivated by the ideals of the free market and self-
regulation, whose disregard for its own fiscal and credit rules led to a credit collapse.
Despite their culpability in creating the crisis, banks, transnational corporations
and domestic firms have been bailed out by governments in coordinated efforts to
save local and global economies from ruin, proving anew that states and capital can
work together to save each other, especially in times of instability. Our question is:
at whose expense?
The recent crisis must be seen within the context of the past 30 years of neolib-
eral globalization, with its increasingly pernicious effects on growing numbers of
people: “The number of people unemployed and the number of unstable, insecure
jobs has actually increased – from 141 million to 190 million (1993 to 2007) and
from 1,338 million to 1,485 million (1997 to 2007) respectively” (War on Want,
2009, p. 4). This crisis has exacerbated trends that have been under way for some
time, with effects felt across the globe. While responses to the crisis in the global
North have focused inward on national economies and companies, they also affect
the global South. Promises to support development in the global South have been
forgotten, with foreign development aid declining at an alarming rate. Corporate
bailouts are accompanied by “austerity” measures that are being forced on

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populations, threatening such meagre safety nets as are still in place to protect
the poor and the working class. The focus in mainstream debate has been on
simultaneous intervention of the State in saving negligent corporations and in
disciplining populations, purportedly in pursuit of the public good. As Bowles
(2011) reminds us, neoliberal globalization is a political project aimed at increasing
the power of capital in relation to the State and labour.
While the importance of state action in regulating and facilitating markets has
gained a new salience across the globe, less attention has been given in the popular
media to the effects of the crisis on organized and unorganized workers. For example,
the loss of over one million jobs in 2010–11 in South Africa alone hardly registered
on the news radar of even local broadcasters. And yet the repercussions of this crisis
in global capitalism for the developing and post-colonial world are immediate,
albeit indirect.
For these countries of the global South, crisis has been a familiar state of affairs
for at least three decades. In the 1980s and 1990s it came in the wake of the Structural
Adjustment Programmes orchestrated by the world financial institutions, the
International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank and the World Trade
Organization (WTO), which took over from the General Agreement on Tariffs and
Trade in 1995. Structural adjustment really meant financial and trade liberalization,
and its imposition ushered in crisis after crisis across countries in the developing world.
The effects were retrenchments, unemployment, poverty and rising inequalities.
These events have come as no surprise for many who have noted rising inequal-
ities between and within states, over-consumption and high levels of household debt,
and over-extraction in the natural environment. Neoliberal globalization has created
growing insecurity and deteriorating conditions for workers across the globe, often
pitting workers against each other (Bieler and Lindberg, 2011). Yet the warning signs
have been ignored. The world chose to focus on giant US technology and IT
companies such as Apple as examples of the success of global capitalism, paying little
attention to labour conditions in these companies. As soaring profits were registered
by transnational corporations, increasingly precarious conditions for labour were
seen as the necessary price to be paid for such spectacular “success” in profits and
growth. We thus see alongside extraordinary wealth an increase in informalization
of production through, for example, outsourced workers, export processing zones
(EPZs) and the growth in the informal economy. The effects have been global, with
“global inequality [rising] steadily from .43 in 1980 to .67 in 2005” (Bieler and
Lindberg, 2011, p. 3).
As predicted by scholars such as Karl Polanyi in The great transformation, such times
require a return from the market to society to resolve the crisis brought about by the
contradictions of marketization and the commodification of labour, land and money.
Polanyi argued that capitalism came at a high cost for industrial workers and democratic
political institutions: “[T]he idea of a self-adjusting market implied a stark utopia. Such

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an institution could not exist for any length of time without annihilating the human
and natural substance of society; it would have physically destroyed man and trans-
formed his surrounding into a wilderness” (Polanyi, 1944, p. 3). A counter-movement,
he argued, would rise against such forces of marketization and commodification. Since
the 1990s we have seen increasing numbers of global protests, starting with Seattle
in 1999 and continuing through Genoa (2001) and the emergence in the latter year of
the World Social Forum to the recent Occupy Wall Street movement and the Arab
Spring. Indeed, recent world events could be described as further examples of such
movements in the demands for political and economic democracy witnessed in
Argentina, Bolivia, Egypt, Greece, South Africa and the Syrian Arab Republic. The
question arises: what is the role of labour in the counter-movements for change?
Within this context, it is evident that global economic and political insecurity pose
enormous challenges, both new and old, for labour in the global South. It is therefore
not surprising that there has been renewed academic interest in exactly these questions
and many projects focusing on the challenges faced by labour (see e.g. Harrod and
O’Brian, 2002; Munck, 2002; Clawson, 2003; Phelan, 2006; Bronfenbrenner, 2007;
Bieler, Lindberg and Pillay, 2008; Chun, 2009; Taylor, 2009). Across the disciplinary
spectrum from economics to sociology, politics, history and development, and reaching
beyond the academy to include labour activists, researchers and practitioners, there has
been a turn towards seeking new ways of understanding labour’s challenges, identifying
creative responses, and suggesting possible future implications of these new realities
(Webster, Lambert and Bezuidenhout, 2008; Bieler and Lindberg, 2011). We have seen
different types of labour responses to the political challenges faced today: initiatives such
as corporate codes of conduct, international framework agreements, global unions and
international labour standards have all been proposed in an attempt to reclaim labour’s
lost power (Webster, 2011). In some countries, such as Argentina and Bolivia, social
movements have become rivals to traditional labour movements, while in others, such
as Brazil, India, the Republic of Korea and South Africa, labour has forged alliances with
political movements both in and out of government. Sometimes the alliances emerge
after political parties come to power, but more often they are formed before that point.
In yet other instances, such as Bangladesh and India’s Self Employed Women’s
Association (SEWA), labour movements have remained non-aligned and independent.
It is against this backdrop that the Global Labour University (GLU) hosted the
interdisciplinary conference on “The Politics of Labour and Development”, which
brought together over 150 labour scholars and activists from over 25 countries.1
The conference was held at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg,
South Africa, in September 2011. Themes highlighted included challenges faced by
labour, workplace issues, new forms of power and leverage, policy engagements, labour
alliances with political parties and social movements, and alternative forms of produc-
tion, consumption and distribution. The location in South Africa gave the proceedings
a natural bias towards South Africa, but one of the notable features of the conference

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Labour in the global South

was the overwhelming number of labour scholars and activists from countries in the
global South.
The essays brought together in this volume arise out of this conference. Like the
conference itself, the volume has a natural bias towards South Africa, with three
chapters dealing with issues of labour in that country; but it also explores more widely
labour’s attempts to shift the balance of power away from capital and unelected
bureaucracies and in favour of labour and broader society. In other words, we look at
the ways in which labour has tried to reconfigure the multiple relations of power and
oppression, including their economic, political and cultural aspects, that reproduce
and sustain subordinate classes. One of the strengths of this volume is that it includes
chapters by both labour scholars and practitioners, and thus contributes important
case studies from the global South to the field of global labour studies. The focus on
the global South may prompt reservations in some readers. We chose this focus quite
deliberately as the sister volume, Trade unions and the global crisis: Labour’s visions,
strategies and responses (Serrano, Xhafa and Fichter, 2011), largely focused on OECD
countries. This volume, therefore, presents an opportunity to examine research on the
global South and largely by scholars from the global South.
The term “global South” might itself be unfamiliar to some readers as, while
commonly used among scholars, it is less commonly understood outside academia. Its
genealogy is rooted in the vocabulary of the Brandt Commission in the 1980s, which
used the term “South” to refer to a North–South, rich–poor duality. With the collapse
of the Soviet Union, the old terminology of Eastern bloc and Western bloc, and the
concomitant idea of three worlds – First World, Second World and Third World –
lost meaning as the Second World, the countries of the former Eastern bloc, were now
being absorbed into the categories of First and Third Worlds, developed and
developing countries. As Hofmeyr and Williams explain: “In this context, the term
‘Global South’ came to stand in as a proxy for the term ‘Third World’” (Hofmeyr and
Williams, 2011, p. 17). But the concept denotes more than the residual hierarchical
category of the “Third World”. The idea of the global South is meant to identify
countries in similar economic and geopolitical positions in the global capitalist system
and to highlight their shared strategic objectives and interests. Reference to the “global
South” rather than simply the “South” highlights the political, rather than merely
geographical, coordinates that unite the countries. Thus, countries in the global South
may be located in the geographical north, south, west or east, but they share basic
geopolitical and strategic interests. In the next section of this introduction we
summarize the challenges for and responses by labour, both of which are covered in
the chapters that follow. We then outline the structure of the volume. The first set of
chapters, Part I, look specifically at different challenges faced by labour in the global
South. The second set of chapters (Part II) explore the various linkages between
politics and labour. The chapters in Part III focus more specifically on responses that
labour has initiated.

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Challenges for and responses by labour in the

twenty-first century
We begin by discussing the challenges for labour arising from the dual crises of the
economy and ecology. Neoliberal globalization, which includes the financial crisis that
erupted in 2008 and evolved into a full-blown economic crisis by 2010, has had far-
reaching effects on economies around the world and has a variety of dimensions that
must all be understood in order to appreciate its effects on labour. One of these is the
change in ownership patterns over the past 30 years as international capital investors –
who are not directly involved in running companies – have come to dominate corporate
life (Bieler and Lindberg, 2011, pp. 3–5). Thus, states and companies are increasingly
influenced by the global economy rather than by local and national conditions. This new
international ownership structure weakens local and national trade unions as decisions
about the company are often made in distant places (Hyman, 2011). One of the out-
comes of this new ownership pattern is to give transnational corporations a great deal
more structural power than labour, as unions’ regulatory capacity has been system-
atically undermined. Alongside this new ownership structure, outsourcing has led
to decentralization of production and fragmented industrial systems, with smaller
companies often unwilling to recognize collective bargaining structures (Hyman, 2011,
p. 17). As a result, unions are struggling to secure increases in wages and social benefits,
leading in turn to the loss of membership and status (Hyman, 2011, p. 16). Moreover,
with the penetration of the market has come not a retreat of the State, but rather a shift
in the State’s priorities. States no longer prioritize being responsive and accountable to
their populations, but rather increasingly look to protect and advance the interests of
corporations and economies at the expense of society. Thus their involvement has often
come at the expense of labour. For example, the Republic of Korea recently passed a
draconian law effectively making labour responsible to the company for profits lost
during a strike.
Neoliberal globalization has, moreover, not only intensified exploitation at the
workplace and extended exploitation to the sphere of social reproduction, in such
matters as health care and education; it has extended its own reach to the furthest
corners of the global South. The conditions for labour in the global South differ from
those prevailing in the global North, as labour in the global South was never
incorporated into the Keynesian welfare state system in which trade unions had
influence over decision-making (Bieler and Lindberg, 2011, p. 7). Instead of fostering
welfare state conditions, neoliberal globalization forced the global South to open up
to imports and foreign direct investment (FDI), which undermined national develop-
ment (Saad-Filho, 2005). By the late 1990s, developing countries were being battered
by draconian accords such as the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights
(TRIPS) Agreement and the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), and
forced to dismantle tariff barriers. As a result of trade liberalization during the 1980s

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and 1990s, Africa and Latin America experienced “large-scale job losses, increasing
unemployment and declining wages” (Bieler and Lindberg, 2011, p. 8). One of the
most important outcomes of neoliberal globalization has been job losses across many
sectors and the concomitant loss of economic leverage by trade unions. Put simply, job
losses translate into fewer union members, which weaken unions’ positions with regard
to capital. Ultimately, for workers in the global South, the continuous drive to lower
costs and intensify exploitation has led to a crisis of legitimacy (Silver, 2003, p. 81).
There have also been long-term structural changes that have posed serious
challenges to labour. In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, manufacturing was
responsible for the lion’s share of labour-absorbing economic growth. By the late
twentieth century, however, manufacturing was shrinking both in terms of its share
in the economy and in its capacity to sustain the working class and create increases in
well-being (Amsden, 2001; Evans, 2008, pp. 8–10). Manufacturing’s leading role in
job creation has diminished as advanced technology has increasingly replaced labour,
causing the sector to shed jobs at an alarming rate. As manufacturing has lost its
centrality, the strategic significance of the service sector has mushroomed. To take
one example, in South Africa services have taken a leading role in the economy: the
service sector grew from 51.1 per cent of GDP in 1983 to 63.7 per cent by 2002, while
the high labour absorbing sectors of mining and manufacturing dropped from
44.5 per cent of GDP in 1983 to 32.2 per cent of GDP in 2002 (World Bank, 2004).
Thus, services have become the engine of growth and the sector creating most jobs.
The service sector is especially conducive to the use of informal labour and the
employment of casual workers, a situation that capital has exploited to its advantage.
As Standing (2011) has shown, the process of neoliberal globalization has changed the
nature of work and ultimately weakened the standard employment relationship.
Employment is no longer characterized by full-time, secure contracts that maintain
social reproduction. With these changes, trade unions’ traditional forms of power –
workplace bargaining and regulatory capacity – have also been eroded.
These changes in the structure of the economy have had profound implications
for labour. Labour in the traditional manufacturing sectors has had to find new forms
of power and leverage in an effort to combat job losses and the diminishing signif-
icance of the sector in the economy and in response to the changing nature of work.
At the same time, the new importance of the service sector, in which trade unions
were formerly less interested in organizing, has forced labour to think about new
approaches to organizing and new tactics for mobilizing. Perhaps one of the most
serious challenges facing labour is how to organize the so-called “precariat”, from the
unemployed to casual workers, domestic workers, migrant workers and informal
workers. According to Standing (2011), this new precariat is part of a new global class
structure. Clearly, the various forms of labour have a crucial role to play in countering
the destructive logic of capitalism and championing Polanyi’s movement of society in
response to the perils of the market.

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Compounding the economic crisis is an ecological crisis that many analysts say
is quickly reaching the point of no return. Global temperatures are rising; storms are
becoming more violent and more frequent; some regions are suffering from extreme
flooding while others are subject to record-breaking droughts; clean water is becoming
a scarce resource in many areas (see Chapter 2 by Cock in this volume; Bellamy-
Foster, 2011).
Together, the economic and ecological crises have seen the dispossession of
the commons (including local resources as well as public goods such as health and
education), the informalization of labour, and increases in unemployment and social
inequality at the national and global levels. As well as damaging impacts on the human
environment, with the rapid spread of urban areas without adequate access to housing,
water or electricity, and increases in pollutants that threaten livelihoods and endanger
public health, they have exacerbated processes in the natural environment that threaten
the very earth itself, including declining biodiversity and climate change. At the same
time, the extension of state and market control over daily life is narrowing electoral
choices and increasing restrictions on protest. These two intertwined crises of the
economy and nature are having profound impacts on subordinate classes around the
world, especially in the global South. The challenge for labour is how to forge new
solidarities in response to these trends.
Solidarity is always constructed. Trade union solidarity has traditionally been
based on the mutual interests of workers. In today’s conditions, however, there is a need
for broader forms of solidarity, requiring unions to look beyond their narrow
interests to issues of neoliberal development (Hyman, 2011). Perhaps what is required
is a return to the solidarities of social movement unionism prevalent in many places in
the global South in the 1980s and 1990s. Certainly, to face today’s challenges, new
solidarities need to be constructed that prioritize universal rather than particular interests.
Hyman suggests (2011, p. 26) that trade unions have to move beyond common
interests to solidarity built on interdependence (that is, mutuality despite difference).
Linked to the need for new forms of solidarity is the need to explore new forms of
power. Historically, trade unions primarily used their structural and associational forms
of power in pursuing workers’ interests. In social welfare states, unions also had political
power within their repertoire. In today’s conditions, however, these forms of power are
proving less efficacious than they once were, requiring labour to look for new sources
of power. Chun (2009) has shown the importance of symbolic power in struggles by
marginalized labour. Symbolic power builds legitimacy around the workers’ demands
by invoking moral and discursive stories that frame the struggles in such a way as to
resonate with the public (Chun, 2009, pp. 13–15). Thus symbolic power is forged
through classification struggles over legitimacy (p. 18). While labour laws can facilitate
this process, tapping into moral legitimacy is of paramount importance.
It is clear from this summary that labour faces many challenges arising from both
economic and ecological crises, but also that there are hopeful openings for resistance

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in forging broader forms of solidarity and exploring new forms of power. The chapters
that follow, outlined in the next sections of this introduction, all deal with these issues
to varying degrees.

Countering exploitation and marginalization

The first set of chapters (Part I) deal with the challenges posed by the intensification
of exploitation and marginalization. Jacklyn Cock; Akua Britwum, Karen Douglas and
Sue Ledwith; Babalwa Magoqwana and Sandra Matatu; and Zia Rahman and Tom
Langford all address various forms of intensified exploitation and marginalization.
Cock explicitly looks at new areas of exploitation emerging out of “green capitalism”,
in which the “efficiency of the market [is brought] to bear on nature” (p. 20), and the
concomitant creation of “green jobs”. Cock shows that the idea of “green jobs” has
been formulated erroneously, pitting jobs against nature, with little attention to the
job losses that would result in the transition to a low-carbon economy. As a result,
organized labour has been ambivalent about measures to mitigate climate change.
Moreover, Cock argues, green jobs play into the capitalist growth paradigm and will
continue to exploit nature. Using South Africa as her case study, Cock argues that
there is an alternative that benefits both labour and nature, epitomized in the climate
justice movement, which brings together workers and their organizations into
transnational solidarity networks. Cock argues that the labour movement’s successful
insertion of the concept of “just transition” into the United Nations Framework
Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in 2010 marked an important shift
from the “green economy” discourse that “emphasizes growth, competitiveness and
efficiency” to a discourse that places some form of justice at its centre (pp. 30–31).
However, Cock also explains that the concept of “just transition” continues to be
attended by great ambiguity within and among global labour movements. Labour’s
efforts to address issues of ecology suggest an important step forward from the old
“green versus red” debate in which labour and ecology were pitted against each other
in a zero-sum game.
Another important challenge facing labour in the global South has to do with
the inadequacy of traditional forms of organizing in reaching women and
marginalized workers. Labour in the global South is strongly characterized by casual
labour contracts, informal work and marginalized workers, toiling away on the
fringes of the global economy. For example, women and girls carry out two-thirds of
the world’s labour; yet they receive only one-tenth of the income generated
(Mohanty, 2003), and trade unions have not dealt adequately with gender issues.
Akua Britwum, Karen Douglas and Sue Ledwith show that the increase in women
trade union members around the world has not translated into representation in
leadership structures. They suggest that marginalized workers such as women,
migrants and other disadvantaged groups are increasingly challenging unions to

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become agents of social change. They argue that “to be effective agents of change it
is vital that unions themselves disrupt their own traditional male hegemony” and
“that women continue to use their agency” (p. 41). Britwum, Douglas and Ledwith
draw on bargaining agendas for gender from Canada, the Philippines and Turkey to
show that many challenges continue to exist, but also that there is a great deal of
variation between countries.
Addressing more explicit and traditional understandings of exploitation,
Magoqwana and Matatu argue that new forms of structuring work come with the
intensification of exploitation and increased vulnerability. Looking at South African
local Government’s recourse to call centres, Magoqwana and Matatu explore the way
in which the labour process has changed through the outsourcing of work formerly
done by government employees to call centres. Now employing over 80,000 workers,
call centres have grown 8 per cent per year since 2006, yet the labour movement has
not made serious inroads into this growing workforce as it is a difficult sector to
organize. Magoqwana and Matatu show how the work environment has become more
routinized and individualized, and is characterized by extreme forms of surveillance
and management oversight. For example, workers face tough performance targets and
computer-based monitoring that further depersonalize the job. Despite the perilous
conditions of work, South African unions have not organized this sector adequately,
and as a result of their “disregard of this new customer-centred workplace” (p. 78) only
25 per cent of South African call centres are unionized compared to the international
average of 40 per cent (p. 65).
Taking the issue of union neglect of marginalized workers across the Indian
Ocean, Zia Rahman and Tom Langford explore the difficult relationship between
marginalized workers and trade unions in the context of Bangladesh’s garment workers.
Rahman and Langford show that the 3.6 million Bangladeshi garment workers have been
largely ignored by trade unions since the 1980s. Despite the importance to the national
economy of the manufacture of ready-made garments (RMG) – Bangladesh is the fourth
largest producer of RMG in the world after China, the European Union and Turkey –
its workers continue to operate under precarious conditions. Unionization “remained
stagnant into the 2000s, despite the fact that employment in the industry grew by an
astounding 500 per cent between 1990–91 and 2006–07” (p. 90). Rahman and
Langford argue that the failure of unions to organize garment workers stems partly from
the fact that the “major labour unions ... represent the interests of political parties rather
than those of workers” (p. 97). However, they argue that the massive protests in the sector
in 2006 not only won partial victories, but also began to raise both the status and the
capacity of labour unions in the garment sector.
The intensified exploitation of both nature and marginalized workers has created
serious challenges for labour, but has also provided opportunities to develop new forms
of solidarity and symbolic power. The chapters in this section demonstrate that while
global economic forces are crucial in determining the conditions for labour, these forces

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are still mediated through local and national processes, offering labour important avenues
for organizing resistance.

Political movements and trade unions

Trade unions have a long history of political engagement. In the years after the Second
World War, labour in the global North was incorporated into welfare state systems,
providing labour with important avenues through which to shape industrial relations
and social benefits (Bieler and Lindberg, 2011, p. 7). In the global South, however,
the relations between trade unions and political movements have often been mediated
through struggles for independence from colonial rule (in, for example, India, Kenya,
Mexico and South Africa) or against authoritarian governments (as in Brazil, the
Republic of Korea and Uruguay). Thus, unions in the global South have often helped
to build political movements that later won places in government. Sadly, the story all
too often took the same form: once in government, political movements tended to
sideline their union partners as the demands of the global economy limited their
capacities to act.
The chapters in this section of the volume look at the various relationships
between unions and political movements in government in Brazil, Germany, South
Africa and Uruguay. Exploring the challenges emerging from States’ ambivalent
attitudes towards unions, Ruy Braga, Jana Silverman, and Christoph Scherrer and
Luciana Hachmann highlight the difficult conditions labour faces even when labour-
friendly governments take power.
Braga focuses our gaze on telemarketers in Brazil, a sector which grew by 20 per
cent per year between 2003 and 2009 to employ an estimated 1.4 million workers by
2011 – most of them young, Afro-Brazilian women and lesbians, gays, bisexuals,
transvestites, transsexuals and transgendered people (LGBTs). Like their counterparts
in South African call centres, the Brazilian telemarketers’ conditions of work are
characterized by precarious employment, extreme automated surveillance, physical
fatigue, psychological harassment and numerous forms of sickness. Rather than just
focusing on the conditions of labour that Magoqwana and Matatu highlight, Braga
shows how this highly exploited “sub-proletarian” class has both looked to “Lulaism”
and the State for ways to reduce social inequality and also slowly found its own voice
in organizing against conditions of work. Braga argues that the extraordinary
popularity of President Lula, as well as the very real connections between the State and
unions that the Lula Government created, translated into shifts in the way workers saw
the State and the ways in which they conducted their own struggle. In addition, he
notes, telemarketers were largely apolitical and unfamiliar with trade union traditions,
making it even more difficult for unions to organize them. This context, together with
Lula’s election victory in 2002, Braga argues, led unions to shift to “‘citizen unionism’,
by which the union offers its associates a variety of services formerly provided by the

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State, such as health-care plans and vocational training, in addition to supporting

employment agencies funded by the Workers Relief Fund” (p. 116). However, in
2006 the situation began to change, with workers going on strike, developing a class
consciousness and becoming more politicized. Braga suggests that the future is open
to many new forms of organizing and building solidarity, largely created by the
extreme forms of exploitation and increasingly fragmented workforce that have come
to characterize the working environment in this sector.
Silverman offers a historical analysis of the Uruguayan labour movement,
showing that the redemocratization of the country after 1985 “did not lead to a full
restoration of the political and organizational capacity of the unions” (p. 125) because
the adoption of neoliberal policies curtailed the role of the State in promoting labour-
friendly policies and collective bargaining. Instead, the State created a “voluntary”
system of bilateral labour relations that “did not take into account the inherent
power inequalities between workers and employers” (pp. 125–26). Despite widespread
expectations that the return to democracy would usher in an era of decent jobs,
increased purchasing power and democratic unions, the era was marked by state
control of labour through, for example, new restrictions on the right to strike and the
introduction of neoliberal economic policies. Silverman shows that as a result real
salaries declined between 1998 and 2003, massive job losses were experienced in the
industrial sector and private sector unions haemorrhaged members. The situation
changed in 2004 with the Frente Amplio party’s election victory, which won it the
majority position in government and allowed it to regulate labour relations, pass laws
protecting workers and implement labour-friendly policies. As a result, social dialogue
and labour rights were strengthened and the role of the state has slowly been redefined
as “neocorporativist”.
The next chapter shifts the focus to other forms of linkage between trade unions
and parties. Brazil, Germany and South Africa raise interesting questions about rela-
tionships between trade unions and labour-friendly parties. The nature of political
alliances and forms of mobilizing are vital issues, and experiments in these areas are
under way in various regions of the world (for example, in many parts of Latin
America). Christoph Scherrer and Luciana Hachmann investigate whether labour-
friendly governments actually represent the interests of labour. They posit a degree of
similarity between the cases of Brazil, Germany and South Africa, in all three of which
political power passed to labour-friendly parties with long-standing relationships with
progressive and relatively strong labour movements. However, while Brazil and South
Africa share the experience of overcoming authoritarian regimes through popular
struggles in recent times, they differ in respect of the relationship between the left-of-
centre political party and the trade unions. In Brazil the trade union federation (CUT)
actually provided the top leadership of the Workers’ Party (PT), while in South Africa
the trade union federation (COSATU) is a formal ally of the African National
Congress (ANC). Germany is different again: here, the current leadership of the Social

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Democrats and the trade unions do not share such decisive experiences, being
separated by a generation from the common opposition to Nazism. Scherrer and
Hachmann show that despite the linkages between parties and trade unions, in
all three cases the left-leaning parties in government disappointed their labour
constituencies in terms of macroeconomic policies in the early years of the twenty-first
century. They further show that the reasons for this lie partly in economic constraints,
but also, and very importantly, in issues of politics and power.

Finding alternatives: New forms of power

While the chapters in the first two parts of the volume highlight various challenges
faced by workers – exploitation, informalization, marginalization, state power – they
also indicate opportunities for renewal in labour organizing emerging out of these
challenges. The next set of chapters, in Part III, turn more explicitly to emerging
responses by labour in the global South. Growth in precarious work, including
informalization, often undermines the strength and interests of organized labour; but
it also holds the potential of reviving labour strategies and challenging the broader
economic and political balance of power (Munck, 2002; Tait, 2005). To what extent,
then, has labour in the global South embraced this possibility? While labour move-
ments always attempt to extract as much as possible of the social surplus created
through mobilization for higher wages and better working conditions, as can be seen
in the recent waves of strikes around the world, many other responses are becoming
evident. These are especially important in conditions of rising inequality and its
devastating effects on society, with more and more people being pushed into the
margins of production and consumption patterns. In these circumstances, workers
both within and outside trade unions have responded in a range of creative and
unexpected ways.
Among the most interesting responses are attempts by labour to find new forms
of power and leverage. With rising unemployment and increasing numbers of workers
pushed into precarious forms of work, new forms of power are being explored, often
by the most marginalized workers and those in sectors traditionally ignored by labour
movements. Labour’s links to other social forces are crucial here. The quest for new
forms of power also raises questions about who constitutes the working class, with
wider understandings of labour increasingly finding salience in innovative movements
around the world. Trade unions have a contribution to make to both debate and
action in this area (e.g. innovative organizing methods, reaching out to marginalized
workers, etc.), given their history as catalysts for social change and their continued role
in the economic and political landscape throughout the world. It is plausible to argue
that trade unionism will not “decline to the point of insignificance any time soon”
(Phelan, 2006, p. 33), but it will have to build and sustain new local and global
strategies.

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The development of transnational linkages and networks is an important

dimension of the search for new forms of power and leverage to “empower workers”
(Stevis and Boswell, 2008). This endeavour includes building a sustainable global
union movement and network, forging new transnational union alliances, and organiz-
ing transnational and cross-border campaigns (Harrod and O’Brien, 2002;
Bronfenbrenner, 2007; Webster, Lambert and Bezuidenhout, 2008). Perhaps one of
the most exciting responses to the new conditions has been the replacement of
industrial production and consumption by alternative forms of production and
consumption. For example, there has been an upsurge in worker cooperatives,
microcredit/microfinance projects (though these pose their own challenges for
informal sector workers), and local agricultural production around the world.
Bruno Dobrusin and Sarbeswara Sahoo examine examples of creative responses
by workers in Argentina and India respectively. Dobrusin explores the recovered
factories movement in Argentina and the links to Peronism that permeate the broader
Argentine political culture. He argues that changes in labour politics, trade unions and
the Peronist movement help to explain the historical roots and current characteristics
of the recovered factories movement that emerged in the first decade of the new
millennium. To understand the factory takeovers, he says, we must also understand
their relation to the union movement: “In some cases the CTA played a substantial role
in promoting and consolidating the struggle of the newly created cooperatives, while
the CGT was a dominant player on the opposite side, its bureaucratized union leaders
participating actively in boycotting the processes of retaking the factories” (p. 169). As
Dobrusin demonstrates, the unions’ role in these processes is complex and historically
rooted, and important to understanding these creative responses by workers.
Turning from Argentina to India, and from recovered factories to new forms of
“green livelihood”, Sahoo looks at the attempts of the Self Employed Women’s
Association (SEWA) to fight climate change while also creating livelihoods. Whereas
Cock in Chapter 2 of this volume challenged the “green economy”, Sahoo takes a less
critical stance, showing how SEWA has taken on the dual task of providing livelihoods
for informal women workers and protecting the environment in both rural and urban
areas. Sahoo explores four of SEWA’s projects – smokeless cooking stoves and solar
pumps; waste-pickers’ cooperatives; eco-tourism; and saltpan workers’ cooperatives –
in arguing that informal workers have responded creatively to opportunities created by
climate change. Both the Argentine recovered factories movement and SEWA’s
experiences suggest that workers are confronting real and multiple challenges with
imagination and experimentation, responding in creative and unexpected ways.

Conclusion
The twenty-first century has brought serious structural challenges to workers and the
poor, but it has also brought renewed vitality in response, with creative and innovative

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responses from labour evident around the world. While we have focused in this volume
on struggles in the global South, many similar issues and responses are to be seen in the
global North. For example, the Occupy Movement’s stark framing of the 1 per cent
elites versus the 99 per cent have-nots, the Arab Spring’s demands for democratic
transformation, and the Greek and Spanish protests against EU austerity measures all
emphasize the same points. States and corporations have become disconnected from
society and from the vast populations of working people around the world. The struggles
we see are a response to this. Labour, which forms a significant part of the 99 per cent,
is a fundamental part of the solution. In all these struggles there is an ideational
component: a vision of an alternative future, one centred not on profits and exploitation,
but on the well-being of humans and the natural world.

Note
1The GLU offers an international masters programme for trade unionists at the University of Kassel and Berlin School of
Economics in Germany, the University of Witwatersrand in South Africa, the University of Campinas in Brazil and the Tata
Institute in India. The GLU programme is itself part of the growing field of global labour studies and attempts to bridge the
divide between academia and trade union activism.

References

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(New York, Oxford University Press).

Bellamy-Foster, J. 2011. The ecological rift: Capitalism’s war on earth (London, Monthly Review Press).

Bieler, A.; Lindberg, I. 2011. “Globalization and the new challenges for transnational solidarity: An
introduction”, in A. Bieler and I. Lindberg (eds): Global restructuring, labour, and the challenges for
transnational solidarity (London, Routledge), pp. 3–15.

—; —; Pillay, D. (eds). 2008. Labour and the challenges of globalization: What prospects for transnational
solidarity? (London, Pluto Press).

Bowles, P. 2011. “Globalization’s problematic for labour: Three paradigms”, Global Labour Journal,
Vol. 1, No. 1, pp. 12–31.

Bronfenbrenner, K. (ed.). 2007. Global unions: Challenging transnational capital through cross-border
campaigns (Ithaca, NY, and London, Cornell University Press).

Chun, J. 2009. Organizing at the margins: The symbolic politics of labor in South Korea and the United
States (Ithaca, NY, Cornell University Press).

Clawson, D. 2003. The next upsurge: Labour and the new social movements (London, Cornell University
Press).

Evans, P. 2008. In search of the 21st century developmental state, Working Paper No. 4, Centre for Global
Political Economy, University of Sussex, Brighton.

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Harrod, J.; O’Brian. R. (eds). 2002. Global unions: Theory and strategies of organised labour in the global
political economy (London and New York, Routledge).
Hofmeyr, I.; Williams, M. 2011. “South Africa–India: Historical connections, cultural circulations and
socio-political comparisons”, in Isabel Hofmeyr and Michelle Williams (eds): South Africa and
India: Shaping the global South (Johannesburg, Wits University Press), pp. 2–19.
Hyman, R. 2011. “Trade unions, global competition and options for solidarity”, in A. Bieler and
I. Lindberg (eds): Global restructuring, labour, and the challenges for transnational solidarity (London,
Routledge), pp. 16–30.
Mohanty, C.T. 2003. Feminism without borders: Decolonizing theory, practicing solidarity (Durham, NC,
and London, Duke University Press).
Munck, R. 2002. Globalization and labour: The new “Great Transformation” (London, Zed Books).
Phelan, C. (ed.). 2006. The future of organised labour: Global perspectives (Oxford, Peter Lang).
Polanyi, K. 1944. The great transformation: The political and economic origins of our time (Boston, Beacon
Press).
Saad-Filho, A. 2005. “From Washington to post-Washington consensus: Neoliberal agendas for
economic development”, in A. Saad-Filho and D. Johnson (eds): Neoliberalism: A critical reader
(London, Pluto Press), pp. 113–19.
Serrano, M.; Xhafa, E.; Fichter, M. (eds). 2011. Trade unions and the global crisis: Labour’s visions,
strategies and responses (Geneva, International Labour Office).
Silver, B. 2003. Forces of labor: Workers’ movements and globalization since 1870 (Cambridge, Cambridge
University Press).
Standing, G. 2011. The precariat: The new dangerous class (London, Bloomsbury Press).
Stevis, D.; Boswell, T. 2008. Globalization and labor: Democratizing global governance (London:
Rowman & Littlefield).
Tait, V. 2005. Poor workers’ unions: Rebuilding labor from below (Cambridge, MA, South End Press).
Taylor, M. 2009. “Who works for globalization? The challenges and possibilities for international
labour studies”, in Third World Quarterly, Vol. 30, No. 3, pp. 435–52.
War on Want. 2009. Trading away our jobs: How free trade threatens employment around the world.
Available at: http://www.waronwant.org/attachments/Trading%20Away%20Our%20Jobs.pdf
[27 June 2012].
Webster, E. 2011. “The politics of labour and development: Competing paradigms in the age of
globalization”, keynote address presented at the Seventh Global Labour University Conference,
University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa, 28 Sep.
—; Lambert, R.; Bezuidenhout, A. 2008. Grounding globalization: Labour in the age of insecurity
(Oxford, Blackwell).
World Bank. 2004. South Africa at a glance. Country Profiles. Development Economics Central
Database, 15 Sep.

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PART I

COUNTERING EXPLOITATION
AND MARGINALIZATION
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SOUTH AFRICAN LABOUR’S RESPONSE

TO CLIMATE CHANGE: THE THREAT OF
2
GREEN NEOLIBERAL CAPITALISM

Jacklyn Cock

Introduction
The ecological crisis is deepening. Despite 17 years of multinational negotiations, there
is no binding global agreement on the reduction of carbon emissions. In fact, carbon
emissions are rising, which means climate change will intensify and have devastating
impacts – particularly on the working class – in the form of rising food prices, water
shortages, crop failures and so on. Southern Africa will be the worst affected region in
the world. Shifting towards a low-carbon or “green” economy will be particularly
challenging for South Africa given the carbon-intensive nature of its current economy.
Very recently the South African labour movement has expressed its commitment
to a “just transition”. However, the phrase is contentious, used with very different
understandings of the scale and nature of the changes involved. A just transition to a
low-carbon economy could be defensive, involving demands for shallow change focused
on protecting vulnerable workers; alternatively, it could require deep, transformative
change to dramatically different forms of production and consumption. In this sense
the ecological crisis represents an opportunity to demand the redistribution of power
and resources; to challenge the conventional understanding of economic growth; and
to create an alternative development path.
The crisis could also generate a new kind of transnational solidarity, wider,
deeper and more powerful than anything yet seen. Moving beyond solidarities based
on interests or identities, Hyman advocates a solidarity involving “mutuality despite
difference”, based on a sense of interdependence (Hyman, 2011, p. 26). He concludes
that “the challenge is to reconceptualise solidarity in ways which encompass the local,
the national … and the global. For unions to survive and thrive, the principle of
solidarity must not only be redefined and reinvented: workers on the ground must be
active participants in this redefinition and reinvention” (Hyman, 2011, p. 27).

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This chapter suggests that the discourse of climate change – most clearly in its
warnings of the threat to human survival – could be contributing to such a process.
But it also cautions that the transition to a low-carbon or “green” economy could
mean shallow change and incorporation into “green capitalism”.

Green neoliberal capitalism

Capital’s response to the ecological crisis generally and climate change specifically is
that the system can continue to expand by creating a new “green capitalism”, bringing
the efficiency of the market to bear on nature and its reproduction. In effect, the
climate crisis has been appropriated by capitalism as another site of accumulation:
what Bond calls “climate-crisis capitalism”, namely “turning a medium/long-term,
system-threatening prospect into a short-term source of commodification, specu-
lation and profit” (Bond, 2011, p. 2). Underlying all capital’s strategies is the broad
process of commodification: the transformation of nature and all social relations into
economic relations, subordinated to the logic of the market and the imperatives
of profit.
Green capitalism rests on the twin pillars of technological innovation and
expanding markets, while seeking to keep the existing institutions of capitalism intact.
More specifically, green capitalism involves:
• the carbon trading regime enshrined in the Kyoto Protocol to the United Nations
Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which involves
measures such as the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and Reducing
Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD) that allow developed
countries to profit from the climate crisis while avoiding the reduction of their own
carbon emissions;
• appeals to nature (and even the ecological crisis) as a marketing tool;
• developing new, largely untested technologies such as “climate-smart agriculture”
and “clean coal” technology in the form of carbon capture and storage, which
involves installing equipment that captures carbon dioxide and other greenhouse
gases (GHGs) and then pumping the gas underground;
• the development of new sources of energy such as solar, nuclear and wind,
thereby creating new markets;
• the massive development of biofuels, which diverts land from food production;
• manipulative advertising in the form of “greenwash”; and
• triumphalist accounts of the potential of “green jobs” which are unsupported by
empirical evidence and fail to pay sufficient attention to working conditions.

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“Green jobs”
Historically, the labour movement in South Africa has neglected environmental issues.
This is largely because of a widespread belief that environmental protection threatened
jobs (Cock, 2007). Conversely, what is now driving trade unions into an engagement
with climate change is the indirect threat posed to existing energy-intensive jobs and
the possibility of new “green” jobs.
The emphasis on the creation of “green” jobs challenges the false dichotomy which
portrays the relationship between labour and environment as a trade-off between jobs
and environmental protection. Green jobs are at the centre of global debates on the
transition to what is variously termed a “low-carbon” or “green” economy. The common
element is the need for a transition to a new energy regime. However, there is ambiguity
on the meaning of these terms.
The simplest definition of green jobs is those in existing and new sectors
which “contribute substantially to preserving or restoring environmental quality”
(UNEP/ILO/IOE/ITUC, 2008, p. 3). However, there are several problems in the
current formulations of green jobs. First, many aspirational claims are made which seem
inflated and are not supported by empirical evidence. As Annabella Rosenberg of the
International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) has pointed out, “the impacts of
climate change on employment remain mostly unexplored by research” (Rosenberg,
2011). Insufficient attention has been paid to job losses. Some employment will be
substituted, as in shifting waste handling from landfill and incineration to recycling.
Certain jobs will be eliminated, as in the production of elaborate packaging materials,
and many workers in existing jobs, for example electricians, or metal and construction
workers, will have to be retrained. A transition to clean energy could create far more jobs
than it would eliminate. However, the fact that some people could get new jobs is little
comfort for the people and communities who could lose theirs – jobs in coal-fired power
plants, for example.
Second, in the debate on creating a green economy, insufficient attention has
been paid to the quality of green jobs (in terms of labour standards and wage levels).
“Decent work” means jobs that pay at least a living wage, and offer training opportu-
nities and some measure of economic and social security. At present, the creation of
green jobs is driven more by the interests of the market than by social needs: and, as
the President of the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA) has
pointed out in relation to the renewable energy sector, “green jobs can be as indecent
as blue or brown jobs … [They] can use cheap labour, exploit women and children,
use labour brokers and be dangerous in terms of occupational health and safety”
(Gina, 2011).
Green jobs are at the centre of the South African Government’s conception of
the transition to a low-carbon or green economy.

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The South African Government’s response to climate

change
The dominant government policy strategy is termed the New Growth Path (NGP).
The document enshrining this strategy, which was released in October 2010, promised
a move away from the stranglehold of the carbon-intensive minerals–energy complex
towards a “green economy” marked by renewable energy and green jobs. It set targets
of 300,000 additional direct jobs by 2020, with 80,000 in manufacturing and the
rest in construction, operation and maintenance of new environmentally friendly
infrastructure. “The potential for job creation,” it asserts, “rises to well over 400,000
by 2030” (EDD, 2010, p. 13). While the NGP Framework identifies the “green
economy” as important, it does not define it or specify what constitutes it.
In November 2011 the labour movement, in the form of the South African
trade union federation, indicated its support for this policy thrust by signing NGP
Accord 4, the “Green Economy Accord”, which launched a “green partnership” and
binds Government, business and labour to creating thousands of jobs by building a
green industrial base. On the launch of the Accord, COSATU affirmed: “We have
made a commitment through the NGP to create 5 million jobs in the next ten years.
And this agreement on green jobs will make a very critical contribution to the
realization of that target” (Zwelinzima Vavi, General Secretary of COSATU, cited in
EDD, 2011, p. 5). While the labour movement emphasized job creation, Government
ministers have emphasized the transition to a green or low-carbon economy as both a
challenge and an opportunity. For example, in an interview the Economic
Development minister, Ebrahim Patel, said that South Africa had to move towards a
green economy as quickly as possible: “As a considerable emitter of greenhouse gases,
South Africa faces the challenge of transitioning to a less carbon-intensive growth
trajectory without delay.”1
Several questions must be confronted. Are green jobs one component of a new
green capitalism which is trying to avoid fundamental change through an emphasis on
expanding markets and new technologies? Is the notion of a “green economy” another
“false solution” which is using climate change as a new site for capital accumulation?
Or are green jobs part of a “green economy” which – “based on rights, sustainability
principles and decent work – can meet the challenge of a just transition”
(Sustainlabour, 2011, p. 2)?
Overall, the South African Government’s climate change policy is rooted in
green neoliberal capitalism. This is evident in the priority it accords to profit
generation, its reliance on market mechanisms (especially the promotion of carbon
trading through measures such as the CDM) and its emphasis on technological
innovation in expensive, high-risk schemes such as carbon capture and storage and
nuclear energy. The latter is low carbon only at the point of generation: the rest of the
production chain is both energy and carbon intensive, costs are excessive, safety cannot

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be guaranteed and nowhere has a safe storage option for high-level nuclear waste
been identified.
Official policy documents lack coherence, with aspirations to reduce carbon
emissions contradicted by existing government practices which involve massively
expanded provision of coal-fired and nuclear energy. These practices reflect the
continuing power of the minerals–energy complex, the alliance of the mining and
energy sectors which have dominated South Africa’s industrial development. For
example, the parastatal Eskom is committed to building more coal-fired power
stations, Medupi and Kusile. The World Bank’s US$3.75 billion loan to Eskom to
enable it to do this will increase the price of electricity for domestic consumers, worsen
the country’s contribution to carbon emissions and climate change, and allow
continued subsidized supply of the world’s cheapest electricity to large corporations,
such as BHP Billiton, and the export of their profits abroad.
While another government policy document, the second Integrated Resource
Plan (IRP2, 2010), introduced some energy from renewable sources into the supply
mix, beyond Medupi and Kusile the IRP plans on two or three major new coal-fired
plants between 2014 and 2030, and a “fleet” of six new nuclear power plants to be
built by 2030. Trollop and Tyler conclude that “the IRP does not support the
transition to a low energy intensive economy as is required by mitigation policy”
(Trollop and Tyler, 2011, p. 18).
At the same time, South Africa has as yet no legislation requiring a reduction in
carbon emissions, though the Government seems aware of the seriousness of the threat
of climate change. For example, the 2011 National Climate Change Response White
Paper warns that if international action does not limit the average global temperature
increase to a maximum of 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, “the potential
impacts on South Africa in the medium to long-term are significant and potentially
catastrophic”. It goes on to warn that “after 2050 warming is projected to reach around
3–4 degrees C along the coast, and 6–7 degrees C in the interior. With these kinds of
temperature increases, life as we know it will change completely” (Government of the
Republic of South Africa, 2011, p. 9).
In 2010 South Africa’s carbon emissions were about 400 million tonnes, which
amounts to about 1.5 per cent of the global total. In 2009 at the multinational
negotiations at the Conference of the Parties to the UNFCCC (COP-15) in
Copenhagen, the Pretoria Government made voluntary commitments to a “peak,
plateau and decline” trajectory. The “decline” means that “South Africa … will take
nationally appropriate mitigation action to enable a 34 per cent deviation below
the ‘Business as Usual’ emissions growth trajectory by 2020 and a 42 per cent devi-
ation below … by 2025” (DEA, 2010, p. 2). Much publicity has been given to this
commitment, but less attention to how these reductions will be made, or to the
condition stipulated: that an international agreement is reached and that the financing
and technology necessary to achieve this reduction are provided by the international

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community. Two economists have concluded that “the post 2025 plateau and decline
is at least economically infeasible if not impossible within the current economic
structure” (Trollop and Tyler, 2011, p. 28). Furthermore, the policy document, the
NGP, does not mention the Copenhagen pledge, focusing instead on the new “green
economy”.
Many triumphalist claims are made about the green economy as a “major new
thrust for the South African economy which presents multiple opportunities to create
jobs and value-adding industries” (DTI, 2011, p. 17). It is also acknowledged that
“increasing energy costs pose a major threat to manufacturing, rendering our histor-
ical, resource-intensive, processing-based industrial path unviable in the future” (DTI,
2011, p. 97). However, these claims are weakened by the compartmentalization of
the green economy as distinct from the “real economy”; as “something separate and
therefore different or additional to a mainstream future South African economy”
(Trollop and Tyler, 2011, p. 12).
The “real economy” remains carbon intensive and environmentally destructive.
As Kumi Naidoo points out, “while the NGP’s (and the broader state’s) commitment
to ‘greening the economy’ focuses on the potential of environmental concerns to
meet the needs of the market (through job creation and more efficient production
processes), the existing deleterious effects of capitalist development on the environ-
ment continue largely unaddressed” (K. Naidoo, 2011, p. 10).
Overall, South Africa’s commitments to reducing carbon emissions are vague
and insubstantial. The real commitment is to economic growth. The Government’s
strategy perpetuates market-led economic growth models which benefit large corpo-
rations at the expense of job creation and the social needs of the majority. It will not
solve the problem of climate change which threatens us all. Neither will “green
capitalism”. As David Hallowes comments,
government cannot face up to what it sees coming because it remains wedded to the
dominant interests of the mineral–energy complex. It remains locked in a view of
the world in which economic growth constitutes the central organizing principle of
development. This is not because growth is needed to alleviate poverty but because
it is needed to reproduce capital … Changing the system is necessary because
capitalism is not compatible with addressing climate change. (Hallowes, 2011, p. 18)

This is one of the key themes of the emerging climate justice movement in South
Africa, which includes labour.

The civil society response to climate change:

The climate justice movement
The civil society conference convened by COSATU in October 2010 included over
300 civil society organizations and resulted in a declaration which included a

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recognition of the ecological crisis. For example, “we need to move towards sustainable
energy, to migrate the economy from one based on a coal to a low carbon or possibly
carbon free economy. The renewable energy sector will grow, needing different skills
and different locations. We have to make sure that we are in charge of this process
and do not become the objects of it.” There are also references to “eco-agriculture”,
a rejection of nuclear power, “zero-waste” and “green jobs” (COSATU, 2010, p. 6).
The notion of “climate justice” was prominent in these deliberations and has
become the foundational concept in a widespread global civil society movement launched
in 2007 at the Bali climate change negotiations. The movement has been steadily
growing since the network Climate Justice Now (CJN) was formed that year from
different strands in the women’s, environmental and democratic popular movements
from the global South, such as Via Campesina and Jubilee South. It is an alternative to
the well-funded environmental foundations and NGOs that often lack democratic
accountability and tend to ventriloquize on behalf of grass-roots communities.
The stress is on climate justice in both global and local terms. Globally, justice is
a strong theme among activists who claim that a wide range of activities contribute to
an ecological debt owed to countries in the global South: the extraction of natural
resources, unequal terms of trade, degradation of land and soil for export crops, loss of
biodiversity and so on. Locally, it is demonstrated that it is the poor and the powerless
who are most negatively affected by pollution and resource depletion and will bear the
brunt of climate change.
In South Africa this emphasis translates into a campaigning focus on issues such
as jobs and food prices which resonate with working-class people. The consequence is
that the movement has a different social base from that of past environmental
struggles. Dominated by white, middle-class supporters, these were largely focused on
the conservation of threatened plants, animals and wilderness areas to the neglect of
social needs (Cock, 2006). The social base of the climate justice movement includes
organized labour and unemployed people and, according to Standing, has a special
appeal to what he terms the “precariat”. This “is naturally the green class in arguing
for a more egalitarian society in which sharing and reproductive, resource-conserving
activities are prioritized” (Standing, 2011, p. 179).2
Several commentators have gone beyond this analysis to stress the unifying
potential of the emerging climate justice movement in South Africa. According to
Patrick Bond, “the CJ organisations and networks offer great potential to fuse issue-
specific progressive environmental and social activists, many of which have strong roots
in oppressed communities” (Bond, 2010, p. 3). Tristan Taylor of Earthlife Africa,
Johannesburg, believes that there is potential for unity if there is tolerance for political
differences and the campaign focuses on one simple idea: “‘Stop climate change now.’
Then the different organisations can take the idea in different political directions”
(Taylor, 2011). The director of Greenpeace has also emphasized the importance of
speaking with a united voice on the climate crisis. According to Kumi Naidoo (2011),

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“as the host of COP 17 the government of South Africa has a great opportunity to
represent Africa who will be hardest hit by climate change. We must come together
and speak with one voice … Having different marches at the World Summit on
Sustainable Development meant we let South Africa down.”
To generate this unity, representatives from 80 different organizations across
a broad spectrum of civil society, including several individual trade unions as well
as COSATU, came together in Durban in January 2011 to form a coordinating
committee. In the aftermath of the meeting, which has been described by a participant
as “fraught” with competing claims and interests, the committee focused on a logistical
unity which involved public education, providing an alternative space in Durban
for civil society organizations during COP-17, and organizing the mass march on the
global day of action on 3 December 2011.
This march of 12,000 people from all over the world to the site of the COP-17
negotiations in Durban was a very colourful event, with different movements –
including COSATU affiliates and the COSATU General Secretary – marching in
their battalions, singing and chanting slogans such as “A people united will never be
defeated”. However, the unity was geographical rather than ideological. Early in the
march violence was initiated by some 200 people in green, labelled “Host City
Monitors”, who turned out to be paid members of the ANC Youth League, claiming
to have been provoked by “these anti-Zuma people behind us”. In response to
this alleged provocation – despite an exceptionally heavy police presence – they
threw stones and water bottles, tore up banners and posters, made physical threats,
sang ANC songs and flourished placards such as “Zuma until Jesus comes”. On
another occasion in the Durban City Hall the same contingent attacked silent protes-
tors holding placards appealing for President Zuma to “listen to the people of Africa”.
The organizations participating in this march and the COP-17 process –
whether inside or outside the formal negotiations – encompassed a variety of shades
of “green” (meaning minimally some level of commitment to more sustainable rela-
tions between human society and nature). Overall, the main fault-line runs along the
ideological division between those organizations with a “green” reform agenda (many
of which belong to the Climate Action Network3) and those with a “red–green” anti-
capitalist transformative agenda (often linked to CJN). The anti-capitalist orientation
of labour, particularly within COSATU, brings it closer to the CJN position. All these
organizations are working on the mobilization of civil society, and most appeal to the
notion of climate justice to do so. All emphasize the need for change towards the goal
of a low-carbon economy, but they differ on the means of reaching it and the scale of
change involved. Nor is there agreement on what a low-carbon economy would look
like. Overall there are sharp divisions on five “wedge” issues:
• the role of technology;
• the value of the UNFCCC process;

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• market mechanisms, particularly carbon trading;

• the expansionist logic of neoliberal capitalism as the cause of the climate crisis;
and
• how our relationship to nature should change.

The main issue of contention is the reliance on market mechanisms enshrined

in the Kyoto Protocol, which is viewed with a level of scepticism among CJN
activists although it is the only legally binding agreement to date.4 Generally, those
organizations with a reform agenda accept market-based solutions such as carbon
trading, place a heavy reliance on technologies such as carbon capture and storage,
and view the UNFCCC process and the South African Government’s negotiat-
ing position in positive terms. This stance is the object of intense criticism from
those organizations with a transformative agenda, which stress that market-based
solutions such as carbon trading are one way in which capital is attempting to
appropriate the crisis and make climate change a site of capital accumulation. They
are particularly critical of CDM and REDD as “unsustainable”, and “unjust”
REDD is particularly controversial: while some environmental groups maintain it
contributes to forest preservation, others claim it involves the further commod-
ification of nature and will benefit corporate investors while damaging the
livelihoods and cultures of forest-dependent communities.5 They are sceptical about
the claims made for expensive and untested technologies, such as the “climate-
smart agriculture” promoted by the World Bank and the Food and Agriculture
Organization, and carbon capture and storage. There is a strong emphasis on the
expansionist logic of the capitalist system as the cause of the climate crisis. Some
organizations prioritize a class analysis, while many of the Northern NGOs are
“class blind”, for example, following the influential Mary Robinson Foundation for
Climate Justice in framing climate change in the liberal discourse of human
rights.6 Others understand the issue as a stark choice between “green capitalism”
and “eco-socialism”.
Provisional mapping of the climate change activism terrain indicates a loose
grouping around a few key nodes such as the organizations Groundwork and
Earthlife Africa. The latter is now the lead organization in South Africa of the
international alliance Climate Justice Now and supports a transformative agenda.
The alliance Climate Justice Now South Africa (CJNSA) explicitly rejects “the false
solutions based on market mechanisms such as the CDM, and REDD” (CJNSA,
2011a).7 The CJNSA submission on the Integrated Resource Plan 2011 stated:
“The IRP displays the continued power of the corporations at the centre of the
minerals–energy complex to shape development to their own interests. For the people
of South Africa and the environment, it is catastrophic.” Another CJN position
paper states:

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Capitalism is not compatible with addressing climate change. It requires never ending
economic growth for its survival. Growth has brought unprecedented wealth to the
owners of capital, prosperity to the world’s middle classes and untold misery to the
majority of people particularly in the global South. Capitalism plunders the resources
of the earth and of the people. It is the driving force behind ecological disruption on
all scales from the local to the global. Climate change is the ultimate symptom of
this renting of the earth system. (CJNSA, 2011b, p. 2)

A central node in an alternative approach is the World Wildlife Fund

(WWF), an international NGO which espouses a reform agenda, supporting carbon
trading, the role of the World Bank in mitigation funding, and the South African
Government’s negotiating position in a reform agenda. Among those adopting this
approach there is an optimism that environmentally destructive capitalist activities can
be corrected through political action within the system, using means such as carbon
trading, taxes, technological innovation, energy efficiency and incentives to capital.
The trust is on reforming or greening the present form of “suicide capitalism”.

Labour’s response to climate change

Clearly, workers and their organizations are an indispensable force for a transition to
a low-carbon economy. As Jakopovich writes, “Environmentalists are workers and
obviously potential allies in their efforts to advance workplace health and safety, and also
to tackle environmental concerns of working-class communities: for workers bear the
brunt of environmental degradation and destruction, both in terms of health and quality
of life issues” (Jakopovich, 2009, p. 75).
For this reason, this chapter argues for building transnational solidarity networks
involving labour and environmental activists. The implication is that labour needs to
move away from the traditional, national-level organizational form, as well as broad-
ening the conventional focus on jobs and workplace issues to embrace environmental
issues. In South Africa this shift could build on the tradition of “social movement
unionism” which involved an active engagement in community struggles. Similarly,
environmentalists need to extend their traditional focus on threatened plants, animals
and wilderness areas to address social needs.
A global alliance of labour and environmental activists could become a signif-
icant source of countervailing power. For example, in 2009 in South Africa two
environmental justice organizations, Earthlife Africa (Johannesburg) and Groundwork,
mobilized international opposition to the World Bank’s US$3.75 billion loan to Eskom
to build more coal-fired power stations, making connections between organizations and
grass-roots communities in the global North and South. Within three months more than
200 organizations around the world (including some trade unions) had endorsed a
rejection of the loan. Earthlife argued that “this loan is not about poor people or jobs
or even the climate, but is benefitting vested interests” (Adam, Taylor and Peek, 2010,

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p. 12), pointing out that the new power stations would increase both the price of elec-
tricity for poor people and South Africa’s contribution to carbon emissions and climate
change. While opposition to the loan was not ultimately successful, Earthlife officer
Tristan Taylor maintains that “future World Bank funding for coal is far less likely”.
To link labour and environmental activists, and to address the fear that “green
jobs” are market driven, progressive forces are organizing around the notion of
“climate jobs”. A “million climate jobs” campaign, modelled on a British trade union
campaign, is taking hold in the South African labour movement. It is based on the
argument that if we are to move in a “just transition” to a low-carbon economy using
renewable energy instead of coal, it will be workers who will have to build wind, wave,
tidal and solar power infrastructure, and workers who will have to renovate and
insulate our homes and buildings and build new forms of public transport. It is stressed
that the lives of working people could improve in the process. Research findings
launched at COP-17 demonstrated that 3.7 million climate jobs (jobs which reduce
carbon emissions) could be created to address both the unemployment crisis and the
climate crisis in South Africa. It is also stressed that climate jobs must be “decent”,
largely public sector jobs which promote equality and justice.
In June 2011 the central committee of COSATU – a trade union federation
with 2 million members and 20 affiliate unions – endorsed the million climate jobs
campaign and resolved that, “going forward, we should strengthen our participation
and be more effective in the COP17 Co-ordinating Committee … and mobilize
our members for the Global Day of Action on Saturday 3 December” (quoted in
COSATU, 2011).
This recognition of climate change as a developmental and social issue goes back
several years. COSATU decided at its 2009 congress to increase its research capacity
on climate change and at the next congress that “climate change is one of the greatest
threats to our planet and our people”. It noted that “it is the working class, the poor
and developing countries that will be adversely affected by climate change”. The
congress also noted that “unless the working class and its organizations take up the
issue of climate change seriously, all the talk about ‘green jobs’ will amount to nothing
except being another site of accumulation for capitalists” (quoted in COSATU, 2011).
COSATU is influenced in its stance on climate change by the international
trade union movement and organizations such as the International Labour Organization
(ILO) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). Trade unions have
participated in the UNFCCC since its inception, under the umbrella of the International
Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), which represents 170 million workers through
its affiliated organizations in 157 countries. The UNFCCC process has included
rising numbers of trade unionists, albeit mostly from the developed countries.
Representatives from these organizations were present in April 2011 at the Madrid
Dialogue, a gathering of trade union leaders from around the world to discuss a new low-
carbon development paradigm. At this meeting the Spanish minister of the environment

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stressed that “the social and environmental agenda should be indissolubly joined in order
for a just transition to be produced towards a new model of growth” (quoted in CJNSA,
2011b). Zwelinzima Vavi, the General Secretary of COSATU, said:

The current economic model is heading us towards more crises, unemployment and
environmental degradation … If we are serious about addressing the vulnerability
of poor workers and communities, Rio+20 needs to shift from piecemeal
commitments and deliver a universal social protection floor, which will ensure
dignified livelihoods for all. The climate negotiations in Durban must support this
effort through the protection of the poorest from a climate perspective: with ambition
in terms of emission reductions and climate finance. (Quoted in CJNSA, 2011b)

In a statement which clearly prioritizes social over environmental considerations,

he also said: “We will not support any form of capital accumulation that breeds
inequalities – even if those forms of capital accumulation are green” (quoted in
CJNSA, 2011b).
Others at this gathering expressed support for a green economy and green jobs.
For example, Ambet Yuson, the General Secretary of Building and Woodworkers
International (BWI), said: “A green economy based on rights, sustainability principles
and decent work can meet the challenge of our societies … A just transition, such as the
one unions are calling for, needs to be based on the transformation of all jobs into
sustainable ones” (quoted in CJNSA, 2011b).
While capital’s discourse of a low-carbon economy emphasizes growth, compet-
itiveness and efficiency, the labour movement agrees on this notion of a “just transition”.
However, there is less agreement on the substantive content of the notion of a
“just transition”.

Different understandings of a just transition to a

low-carbon economy: Paradigm shift or regime change?
Two broad approaches to this notion of a “just transition” may be identified within
the global labour movement.
• The minimalist position emphasizes shallow, reformist change with green jobs,
social protection, retraining and consultation. The emphasis is defensive and
shows a preoccupation with protecting the interests of vulnerable workers.

• An alternative notion of a just transition involves transformative change: an

alternative growth path, and new ways of producing and consuming.

In addressing climate change, the International Metalworkers Federation and the

ITUC have advocated a “just transition”. Their argument is that workers and affected
communities need adequate social protection and access to new opportunities. This

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implies new labour market policies, income protection, retraining, awareness and
capacity building. At the 2010 UNFCCC meeting held in Cancún, Mexico, organized
labour successfully lobbied for the inclusion of the concept of a “just transition”
into the UNFCCC negotiations.
The ILO defines a just transition as “the conceptual framework in which the
labour movement captures the complexities of the transition towards a low-carbon and
climate-resilient economy, highlighting public policy needs and aiming to maximize
benefits and minimize hardships for workers and their communities in this
transformation” (Rosenberg, 2010, p. 141).
However, while the concept of a “just transition” is central to ITUC policy, there
are many outstanding questions. Its report Equity, justice and solidarity in the fight against
climate change (2009) stresses the need “to create green and decent jobs, transform and
improve traditional ones and include democracy and social justice in environmental
decision-making processes” (ITUC, 2009, p. 10). A just transition is described as “a tool
the trade union movement shares with the international community, aimed at smoothing
the shift towards a more sustainable society and providing hope for the capacity of a
‘green economy’ to sustain decent jobs and livelihoods for all” (ITUC, 2009, p. 14).
According to Sustainlabour and UNEP, in a very influential and widely circu-
lated document entitled Climate change: Its consequences on employment and trade
union action. A training manual for workers and trade unions, “the appropriate measures
to guarantee a fair transition for potentially affected workers” should include:
• social protection systems which “must run in parallel to adaptation efforts as they
can diminish vulnerability to climate change and strengthen the social security
systems, especially in developing countries”;
• economic diversification policies, able to identify potential job opportunities;
and
• “training and requalification programmes”. (Sustainlabour and UNEP, 2008, p. 66)
The emphasis is on “the need to involve workers in climate change decision
making, to establish fair transitions and to protect the most vulnerable from necessary
changes to be undertaken in the world of work” (Sustainlabour and UNEP, 2008,
p. 101).
The same document states: “While trade unions need to accept that changes in
some sectors are necessary, they need to propose measures that prevent workers from
bearing the burden of these transitions” (Sustainlabour and UNEP, 2008, p. 77). This
protective discourse contrasts strongly with a transformative notion of workers
carrying society forward into a completely new energy regime.
A similarly weak notion is evident in the ILO background note to the UNEP
report of 2011, Towards a green economy: Pathways to sustainable development and
poverty eradication, which states: “The structural transformation … may also cause the

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contraction of sectors and enterprises which are incompatible with long term
sustainable development. The management of this change needs to be fair and must
ensure sufficient protection and access to alternatives for those negatively affected”
(ILO, 2011, p. 5).
The majority of global trade union federations, led by the ITUC, are committed
to a social dialogue model of social change. Their definition of a just transition
explicitly contains the phrase “social dialogue”. This contrasts with the minority
World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU) – to which some COSATU affiliates,
including the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA), are aligned
– whose proposals around climate change frame the issue in terms of class struggle and
a critique of capitalism.
In South Africa, many trade unionists emphasize the links between the climate
crisis and neoliberal capitalism. A document entitled Labour’s initial response to the
National Climate Change Response Green Paper 2010, dated 28 February 2011 and
endorsed by COSATU, the National Council of Trade Unions (NACTU) and the
Federation of Unions of South Africa (FEDUSA), states:

We are convinced that any effort to address the problems of Climate Change that
does not fundamentally challenge the system of global capitalism is bound not only
to fail, but to generate new, larger and more dangerous threats to human beings and
our planet. Climate Change … is caused by the global private profit system of
capitalism. Tackling greenhouse gas emissions is not just a technical or technological
problem. It requires a fundamental economic and social transformation to
substantially change current patterns of production and consumption. (COSATU,
NACTU and FEDUSA, 2011, p. 3)

Following discussion at a workshop on climate change convened by COSATU

in Durban in July 2011 that was attended by national officeholders, representatives of
the 20 affiliated unions and nine provincial structures, a Climate Change Policy
Framework was adopted. Fourteen principles were agreed, on which the most
controversial were:
• Capitalist accumulation has been the underlying cause of excessive greenhouse gas
emissions, and therefore global warming and climate change.
• A new low-carbon development path is needed which addresses the need for
decent jobs and the elimination of unemployment.
• Market mechanisms are rejected as a means of reducing carbon emissions.
• Developed countries must pay their climate debt and the Green Climate Fund
must be accountable.8
• A just transition towards a low-carbon and climate-resilient society is required.

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In the COSATU policy framework on climate change endorsed by the Central

Executive Committee in August 2011, the explanation of “just transition” reads:
The evidence suggests that the transition to a low carbon economy will potentially
create more jobs than it will lose. But we have to campaign for protection and
support for workers whose jobs or livelihoods might be threatened by the
transition. If we do not do that, then these workers will resist the transition. We
also have to ensure that the development of new, green industries does not become
an excuse for lowering wages and social benefits. New environmentally-friendly
jobs provide an opportunity to redress many of the gender imbalances in
employment and skills. The combination of these interventions is what we mean
by a just transition. (COSATU, 2011, p. 13)

It goes on to say:
The Just Transition is a concept that COSATU has supported in the global
engagements on climate change that have been led by the ITUC. The basic demands
of a Just Transition are:
• Investment in environmentally friendly activities that create decent jobs that
are paid at living wages, that meet standards of health and safety, that promote
gender equity and that are secure;
• The putting in place of comprehensive social protections (pensions,
unemployment insurance etc) in order to protect the most vulnerable;
• The conducting of research into the impacts of climate change on employment
and livelihoods in order to better inform social policies;
• Skills development and retraining for workers to ensure that they can be part of
the new low-carbon development model. (COSATU, 2011, p. 14)

The question is: are these not only necessary but also sufficient conditions for
a just transition? To some, just transition involves shallow change focused on
protecting the sectors of the workforce most vulnerable to mitigation strategies, while
to others it requires deep, transformative change to ensure both sustainability and
justice in the move to a low-carbon economy. For example, whereas the ITUC speaks
of a “paradigm shift”, some activists in one COSATU affiliate, the South African
Municipal Workers Union (SAMWU), speak of “regime change”. The unions’
response to the National Climate Change Response Green Paper of February 2011,
noted above, included the assertion: “Tackling greenhouse gas emissions is not
just a technical or technological problem. It requires a fundamental economic
and social transformation to substantially change current patterns of production and
consumption.” Another COSATU affiliate, NUMSA, argues that the shift to a low-
carbon economy, and particularly the development of renewable energy, is being
dominated by green capitalism (Sikwebu, 2012).

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The President of COSATU, Sdumo Dlamini, has stressed that “we need a just
transition which will not lead to job losses. We need a transition that will create jobs”
(Dlamini, 2011). Fundi Nzimande, a researcher for the COSATU-aligned research
organization NALEDI, says COSATU wants “just transition strategies to a green
economy in which there are as few job losses as possible”. She has referred to building
“alliances with civil society” and emphasizes a class analysis: “We want to view climate
change from a working class perspective. We want to counter the big business point
of view” (Nzimande, 2011).
Overall, there are differences within the labour movement in responses to
five issues:
• the substantive content of a “just” transition;
• the use of market mechanisms to reduce carbon emissions;
• the efficacy of technologies such as clean coal and carbon capture and storage;
• whether it is possible to delink economic growth from carbon emissions; and
• the scale of change necessary to address the climate crisis.

The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM), representing some 500,000

mineworkers in South Africa, is obviously particularly sensitive to job losses, and
some shop stewards have expressed faith in new technology to reduce carbon
emissions. By contrast, NUMSA – one of the biggest unions, representing almost
300,000 workers in energy-intensive industries – is sceptical towards the “just
transition” approach. According to the NUMSA President, “the language of ‘just
transition’ needs a class analysis. We believe that a ‘just transition’ can become a
disarming term for the working class if we are not careful. It must always be clear that
capitalism has caused the crisis of climate change that we see today. There is an urgent
need to situate the question of climate change in a class struggle perspective” (Gina,
2011). NUMSA believes that a “just transition must be based in worker controlled
democratic social ownership of key means of production and means of subsistence …
Without this struggle over ownership and the struggle for a socially owned renewable
energy sector, just transition will become a capitalist concept, building up a capitalist
green economy” (NUMSA, 2011). In 2011 NUMSA established two worker-led
research and development groups, one on energy efficiency and the other on renewable
energy (Sikwebu, 2012). These research groups will investigate the carbon emissions
of various products and then work with groups in the community that use them. The
aim is to build an evaluation of these products in relation to carbon emissions into the
union’s negotiating strategy.
Clearly, different affiliates will react differently to climate change policies,
with marked responses especially from those directly threatened with job losses.
Understanding of the issue is uneven. A recent small-scale survey of shop stewards

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in COSATU affiliates revealed that at least 10 per cent of the respondents were
unclear about the nature of climate change, and almost a quarter (23 per cent) did
not know what a “just transition” meant. Furthermore, it is unclear how much
priority will be given to climate change in the context of the many other issues and
planned campaigns currently being addressed by the labour movement in South
Africa – issues such as labour brokers, corruption and the living wage campaign,
among others.

Conclusion: An alternative developmental path

An adequate response to the climate crisis involves formulating an alternative growth
path. In South Africa, given the flawed government policy and weaknesses in civil
society, labour needs to take the lead in doing so. Clearly much work needs to be
done, especially to build stronger alliances between the labour and environmental
movements, if labour is to give priority to the climate crisis, avoid being absorbed
into a green capitalism and promote a transformative understanding of a “just
transition to a low-carbon economy”. Such an understanding involves thinking
about options which go beyond both “green” and “suicide” capitalism. According to
Sean Sweeney:
In recent years global labor has worked on the premise that the “real world” historical
options are essentially two-fold. Either humanity will transition to some form of
“green capitalism” where economic growth is de-linked from emissions and
environmental destruction generally, or we face a “suicide capitalism” scenario where
fossil-fuel corporations and major industry, agriculture, transport and retail interests
are successful in maintaining business as usual. (Sweeney, 2011, p. 9)

But the notion of “green” or “sustainable” capitalism is being subjected to

growing criticism (see Kovel, 2002; Harris-White and Harriss, 2006; Foster, 2009).
These critiques are rooted in the understanding that capital’s logic of accumulation is
destroying the ecological conditions which sustain life. “No serious observer now
denies the severity of the environmental crisis, but it is still not widely recognised as
a capitalist crisis, that is a crisis arising from and perpetuated by the rule of capital,
and hence incapable of resolution within the capitalist framework” (Wallis, 2010,
p. 32).
At the same time there is a growing view that the notion of the “green economy”
has become – like the United Nations climate negotiations – a site of “corporate
capture” (Fernandes and Girard, 2011). The notion has become a key phrase in the
lexicon of corporate and political elites, used to demonstrate their commitment to
sustainable development, while allowing them to extend the process of
commodification, the transformation of nature and all social relations into economic
relations, subordinated to the logic of the market and the drive for profit.

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However, a transformative understanding of a “just transition to a low-carbon

economy” could be a precursor to an alternative social order. For example, it could
involve:
• the collective, democratic control of production;
• the mass roll-out of socially owned renewable energy, providing decentralized
energy supply with much greater potential for community control;
• the localization of food production in a shift from carbon-intensive industrial
agriculture to agro-ecology, promoting not only food security, cooperatives and
more communal living, but also a more direct sense of connection to nature;
• the reduction of consumption, simplifying middle-class lifestyles by reducing
waste, extravagance and ostentation;
• a shift to public transport, with a concomitant reduction in the reliance on
private motor cars as symbols of power and freedom;
• more sharing of resources in more collective social forms, eroding the individ-
ualism which is a mark of neoliberal capitalism;
• a shift towards a more appreciative use of natural resources, reducing the
alienation from nature of many urban inhabitants; and
• the spreading of values of sharing, simplicity, solidarity and more mindful living.

This alternative social order could contain the embryo of a new kind of socialism
which is democratic, ethical and ecological.
To debate genuine alternatives requires trade unions to look beyond the nation
and beyond the workplace. A first and pressing task is to re-emphasize and redefine the
core value of the labour movement – solidarity – which involves struggling against
individualism and what has been called “the infection of self-interest” promoted by
marketized social relations (Leibowitz, 2010, p. 144). It is also necessary to challenge
the notion that trade unions have become largely obsolete in a globalizing world.
This argument surfaces in various debilitating forms, such as the cynicism of Standing
(2011), who sees a class fragmentation (involving a new elite and a growing “precariat”)
displacing organized labour.
Second, we need to develop a vision of an alternative social order; to be clear about
the kind of future society we want to see. As Leibowitz writes, “if we don’t know where
we want to go, no path will take us there” (Leibowitz, 2010, p. 7). At this moment, “the
deepest shadow that hangs over us is neither terror, nor environmental collapse, nor
global recession. It is the internalized fatalism that holds there is no possible alternative
to capital’s world order” (Kelly and Malone, 2006, p. 116). Giving substantive content
to the notion of a “just transition to a low-carbon economy” could be a step towards
formulating such an alternative.

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Notes
1 Cited in Sunday Times, 4 Dec. 2011.
2The “precariat” is a large and growing social category characterized by insecure or no employment, minimal labour protection,
no sense of secure occupational identity and few state entitlements (Standing, 2011). Standing cites no empirical evidence to
support his claim that a “natural green class” is emerging. Nor does he consider how the ecological crisis is deepening insecurities
among all classes and creating a “risk society” (Beck, 2001).
3The Climate Action Network (CAN), which includes many of the large conservation organizations, does not see capitalism as
the main threat and is uncritical of carbon trading.
4 The Kyoto Protocol promotes carbon trading, which has been described as “a cloak for the disastrous lack of action by developed
countries to cut their greenhouse gas emissions and provide adequate climate finance as repayment for their climate debt to the
developing world” (Friends of the Earth International, 2011). It involves the buying and selling of an artificial commodity, the
right to emit GHGs, and comes in two main forms, “cap and trade” and “offsetting”. The largest offset scheme is the CDM,
established under the framework of the Kyoto Protocol, which allows rich countries “flexibility” in their emissions reductions by
allowing them to buy those reductions from developing countries instead. What the “flexibility mechanisms” mean is that
corporations are able to buy the right to pollute.
Carbon trading has failed to reduce carbon emissions but has proved to be extremely profitable for many multinational
corporations. It is another manifestation of “green capitalism”, which is aimed at making profits from climate change, not solving it.
5 In response to the failure of COP-15 at Copenhagen, the Bolivian Government organized the People’s Conference on Climate
Change and the Rights of Mother Earth, held in Cochabamba, Plurinational State of Bolivia, in April 2010 and attended by some
30,000 participants from around the world. Participants report that there was general agreement that the cause of climate change
is the expansionist logic of the capitalist system, which should be replaced by “living well” and respecting “the rights of nature”.
6Mary Robinson, of the Mary Robinson Foundation for Climate Justice, asserts that “climate change represents … the greatest
threat to human rights that we will ever face” (meeting on climate change convened by Jayendra Naidoo, Johannesburg,
24 Mar. 2011).
7 CJNSA is a group of individual organizations which is itself affiliated to the international alliance CJN.
8 This fund emerged from UNFCCC negotiations to assist developing nations with adaptation and mitigation measures.
Controversy centres on the role of the World Bank in its administration. The explanatory note in the COSATU policy framework
on this point states: “the Fund should not be administered or dominated in any way by the World Bank. The World Bank has
historically been part of the problem of climate change, not part of the solution. It continues to fund massive fossil fuel projects
in at least seven different countries” (COSATU, 2011, p. 5).

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Friends of the Earth International. 2011. Our climate is not for sale: Say no to carbon trading at
COP 17, http://www.foei.org/en/resources/publications/pdfs/2011/our-climate-is-not-for-sale-say-
no-to-carbon-trading-expansion-at-cop-17 [27 June 2012].
Gina, C. 2011. Opening Address to NUMSA International Seminar on Climate Change and Class
Struggle, Durban, 4 Dec.
Government of the Republic of South Africa. 2011. National Climate Change Response White Paper
(Pretoria).
Hallowes, D. 2011. Feeling the heat in Durban: People’s struggles and climate change (Durban: Oxfam
for South Durban Community Environmental Alliance).
Harris-White, B.; Harriss, E. 2006. “Unsustainable capitalism: The politics of renewable energy in the
UK”, in L. Panitch and C. Leyes (eds): Coming to terms with nature (Toronto, Palgrave for Socialist
Register), pp. 72–101.
Hyman, R. 2011. “Trade unions, global competition and options for solidarity”, in A. Bieler and
I. Lindberg (eds): Global restructuring, labour and the challenges for transnational solidarity (London,
Routledge), pp. 16–27.
International Labour Organization. 2011. Promoting decent work in a green economy, ILO background
note to Towards a green economy: Pathways to sustainable development and poverty eradication,
UNEP, 2011 (Geneva).
International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC). 2009. Equity, justice and solidarity in the fight against
climate change (Brussels, 2009).

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Jakopovich, D. 2009. “Uniting to win: Labour environmental alliances”, in Capitalism, Nature,

Socialism, Vol. 20, No. 2, June, pp. 74–96.

Kelly, J.; Malone, S. 2006. Ecosocialism or barberism (London, Socialist Resistance).

Kovel, J. 2002. The enemy of nature: The end of capitalism or the end of the world? (London, Zed Books).

Leibowitz, M. 2010. The socialist alternative (New York, Monthly Review Press).

Naidoo, K. 2011. Interview, Uppsala, Sweden, 13 Apr. 2011.

Naidoo, P. 2011. “New paths, old (com)promises?”, in J. Daniel, P. Naidoo, D. Pillay and R. Southall
(eds): New South African Review (Johannesburg: Wits University Press), pp. 1–17.

National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA). 2011. Statement from NUMSA Central
Committee, 14 Dec.

Nzimande, F. 2011. Interview, Durban, 15 July.

Rosenberg, A. 2010. “Building a just transition: The linkages between climate change and employment”,
in International Journal of Labour Research, Vol. 2, No. 2, p. 141.

—. 2011. Interview, Durban, 27 July.

Sikwebu, D. 2012. Interview, Johannesburg, 7 Feb.

Standing, G. 2011. The precariat: The new dangerous class (London, Bloomsbury).

Sustainlabour. 2011. “The Madrid Dialogue took off”, http://www.sustainlabour.org/noticia.php?lang

=EN&idnoticia=132 [27 June 2012].

—; UNEP. 2008. Climate change, its consequences on employment and trade union action:
A training manual for workers and trade unions (Madrid and Nairobi, Sustainlabour and UNEP).

Sweeney, S. 2011. “How unions can help secure a binding global climate agreement in 2011”,
http://www.labor4sustainability.org/post/the-durban-challenge/ [27 June 2012].

Taylor, T. 2011. Interview, Johannesburg, 7 Oct.

Trollop, H.; Tyler, E. 2011. Is South Africa’s economic policy aligned with our national mitigation policy
direction and a low carbon future?, paper presented to the National Planning Commission Second
Low Carbon Economy Workshop, Johannesburg, July.

United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). 2011. Towards a green economy: Pathways to
sustainable development and poverty eradication (Nairobi).

—; International Labour Organization (ILO); International Organisation of Employers (IOE);

International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC). 2008. Green jobs: Towards decent work in a
sustainable, low-carbon world (Washington, DC, New York and Nairobi, Worldwatch Institute and
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Wallis, V. 2010. “Beyond green capitalism”, in Monthly Review, Feb., pp. 32–47.

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WOMEN, GENDER AND POWER

IN TRADE UNIONS
3

Akua Britwum, Karen Douglas and Sue Ledwith

Introduction
Increasingly, women around the world are joining trade unions. However, this rise in
female union membership is consistently at odds with women’s representation in
leadership. This lack of representation, voice and power in trade unions is significant
for a number of reasons. Workers remain the focus of attack from employers and are
forced to carry the burden of failures of private capital. Women carry this burden
disproportionately, owing to their gendered positioning in societal and organizational
cultures and structures. Thus women are placed precariously and insecurely in labour
markets, dominating informal sectors especially. This positioning is also partly
responsible for women’s difficulties in joining trade unions, while unions themselves
also use this as an excuse for their low levels of organizing activity among women and
other marginalized groups. Nevertheless, newly diverse labour forces, including
women, migrant workers and other previously marginalized groups, are becoming
more and more vocal in their demands for recognition and representation in labour
movements, and in a period of sustained ideological attack, trade unions cannot
credibly maintain their important place in the global community as agents of social
change if their own internal decision-making bodies do not reflect the full range of
their constituencies.
To be effective agents of change it is vital that unions themselves disrupt their
own traditional male hegemony, and of equal importance that women continue to use
their agency in this project. Women trade unionists (mainly) have been discussing
these issues and increasingly mounting challenges and developing strategies for change.
In this they are supported by scholars and researchers providing data, analysis and
ideas. Unions, too, are putting gender equality measures in place and formally out-
lawing discriminatory practice, often in line with legal and rights frameworks. Such

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work challenges long-held assumptions that women are averse to union membership
and lack a capacity for power, including capabilities in leading their unions. In this
chapter we examine the “women and power” question in unions, addressing both
women’s power deficit and their prospects for holding power. First, we briefly survey
the relationship between gender relations in society and in labour markets, and how
the gender order is replicated in trade unions. Then we move to focus on women
within their trade unions, exploring factors that account for their continued subor-
dinate roles in unions, the role of power and gender, and ways in which gender may
be central in agendas for change.
We pursue these themes through an unusual study which draws its strength from
two aspects. First, the researchers are an international team of trade union colleagues
from 11 countries across six continents: Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe, Latin America,
and North America.1 Most are graduates of or teach on Global Labour University
(GLU) masters programmes. Second, the researchers are both “insiders” and “outsiders”.
All are directly or indirectly linked to trade unions or trade union inclined research
institutes and/or university departments in their respective countries, and are actively
engaged in labour movements; yet the demands of our positioning as researchers
calls for a certain distancing that also makes us outsiders. This unique combination of
seemingly contradictory positions provides us with a vantage standpoint as participant
observers. Our research has been taking place since 2009, and is continuing.

Gendered labour markets

Women’s participation in the labour market is influenced by their historical treatment
in both paid and unpaid work. Theoretical developments around gender and class, as
well as race and sexuality, have stressed the fragmentary and fluid nature of
subjectivities, insisting that identities are constructed by, and embedded in, the
different places, spaces and times of particular lives.
For women workers these identities have been shaped through the standard
employment relationship, a gendered contract based on the idea of a male bread-
winner and female caregiver and characterized by one job, one place, one working
career. This “unencumbered” worker was the favoured type of employee, protected
in the labour market and by the professional and managerial classes of both genders
(see Cass,1995; Broomhill and Sharp, 2005; Chapman, 2005; Young, 2005; Vosko,
2010). Thus at a personal level women and men have very different material and
temporal experiences of paid work. Generally, male labour force participation rates
tend to be around 75–90 per cent and are fairly steady, whereas women’s vary over
their life cycle as they move in and out of the labour market, working part time and
then full time, and/or holding several short-term and part-time jobs as family life
allows. This locates women in a narrow range of jobs which mirror and reproduce
their ascribed family role of caring and servicing. Everywhere women dominate the

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“five Cs” of caring, cashiering, catering, clerical and cleaning, mainly in service and
public sectors in formal labour markets, and in precarious work in both formal and
informal sectors. Gender relations permeate all aspects of economic, social and political
life, constructing economies and societies as gendered cultures and structures (Çağatay
and Erturk, 2004, p. 5).
Now, as globalization fragments work and workforces, restructuring and the
demands of flexibility have seen women’s labour force participation rates continuing
to rise, in most of the countries in our study reaching 50 per cent of the workforce,
with high proportions of women dominating informal sectors and precarious work.
Often, women are not replacing male workers but are increasingly competing with
them, pushing down already meagre earning levels. In addition, the negative fallout
from earlier Structural Adjustment Programmes imposed by the international financial
institutions continues to affect labour forces adversely. In these shifts we see the rise of
the “precariat” (Standing, 2011), a hybrid of the proletariat and the precarious worker,
toiling in insecure, casual jobs – often several simultaneously – and usually without
rights: conditions long familiar to women, migrant workers and other minority
groups, especially those in informal sectors and in the global South. This growth of
precarious employment has come to be referred to as the “feminization of work”
(Fudge and Owens, 2006, p. 11). Women also comprise a significant group working
in agriculture, domestic work and export processing zones (EPZs), where exclusion
from state rights, including health care and occupational safety, and from trade union
protection, is routine.
These are all forms of work that challenge the very notion of traditional trade union
organization, historically strongest in primary and extractive sectors such as mining, iron
and steel, and in big factories and workplaces with large, stable workforces, mainly male.
Indeed, the International Union of Food, Agricultural, Hotel, Restaurant, Catering,
Tobacco and Allied Workers’ Associations (IUF) sees the development of precarious
work as a deliberate strategy to restrict workers’ ability to organize and challenge issues
such as poverty, insecurity and unsafe working conditions through collective bargaining
(IUF, n.d.).
We move now to unpack these issues, starting with women’s positions and roles
in labour movements.

Women in trade unions

Even though recent research informs us that women’s membership of trade unions is
increasing at higher rates than men’s (Yates, 2006, 2010; Pillinger, 2010;), this has not
yet resulted in a corresponding increase in the numbers of women in union leadership
roles, demonstrating that a male hegemony in trade union leadership persists. This is
not surprising. Since trade unions are integral to labour markets, it follows that occupa-
tional and industrial gender patterns and gender relations are all reproduced in unions.

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The trend in trade union membership overall is one of decline, but within that
there is also evidence of considerable change within the membership demographic,
with increases in women, migrant workers and those from minority ethnic groupings
– the previously marginalized (see e.g. Moore, 2011). In Europe women are making
up an increasing proportion of trade union members in most union centres and
countries for which data are available, suggesting that their membership is tending to
hold up better than men’s in union organizations that are shrinking, and that they are
making up a greater proportion of growth in organizations that are expanding (Carley,
2009). But outside Europe and the English-speaking countries it is difficult to find
statistical data on membership generally, let alone by gender.
Nevertheless, we do know that women are still not represented proportionally
in leadership positions and authority roles in their unions. This gender leadership
deficit is also a democratic deficit, and is of major concern. Worldwide, women
account for less than a third of those in the highest decision-making bodies (ILO and
ICFTU, 1999). The European Trade Union Confederation’s 8 March 2011 survey
reports that only a few confederations, most of them in the Nordic countries, have
women delegates to national general committees or councils in proportion to their
membership (ETUC, 2011). Briskin (2012) writes that although there is limited
systematic documentation in Canada and the United States, recent US scholarship
speaks to the low numbers, and the Canadian Labour Congress (CLC) comments:
“People are worried that we’re starting to slide backwards.” In New Zealand, the rise
in women holding elected positions in union leadership is so slow as to have been
described as “glacial” (Parker and Douglas, 2010, p. 444).
So, as re-emphasized recently by the ETUC, “improving the gender balance in
union leadership and decision-making structures remains a fundamental challenge for
the trade union movement” (Pillinger, 2010, p. 7). Central here are the issues of
gender power relations and sexual politics in unions.

Gender and power in unions

Franzway (2001) asserts that the politics of gender represent the greatest barrier
to women in their unions, and she and colleague Mary Margaret Fonow identify
how the dynamic and changing circumstances of sexual politics, in which gender
relations contest and shape political opportunities and social identities, produce
the resources and capacities for political action (Franzway and Fonow, 2009, p. 2).
Unpacking these power relations, Harriet Bradley (2007, pp. 188–89)
addresses two key questions which go to the heart of gender politics in trade unions:
“Who holds power and in whose interests is it exercised?” Bradley discusses power
in terms of resources which can be employed by groups and individuals to achieve
their ends. In particular, she examines how men as a group are able to access
and control some of the most crucial power resources: physical, positional/status,

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economic and symbolic. We are interested in how men do this and how women
fare in the process.
Bradley sees power as multidimensional, which can allow for complexities and
variations, while also incorporating agency. She develops a model of different types of
power resource. Men as a group control the most crucial of these – physical power,
positional power, economic power and symbolic power – though there are some, such
as sexual power and domestic power, which women can also use to their advantage
(Bradley, 2007, p. 189). Altogether, the command of such resources represents a
formidable armoury in the struggle for control, where gendered power is seen as the
capacity of one sex to control the behaviour of the other.
These struggles also tap into discussions of women challenging union oligarchies
(see e.g. Healy and Kirton, 2000), whereby lay leaders (mainly male), once elected, tend
to retain their positions by using their expertise and the union’s resources to stave off
challenges to their power (Kelly and Heery, 1994). We can recognize some of these
outcomes of gendered power dynamics in the “patriarchal dividend” (Connell, 1996,
p. 162): the benefits that have accrued to men from unequal shares of the products of
social labour, such as being on the right side of the gender pay gap (Williams, 2007,
p. 294). These are outcomes of Lukes’s (1974) conceptualization of “power over”, a
traditional model of dominance and control whereby one party (in gender politics,
usually heterosexual men) seeks to influence another party regardless of the latter’s
agency or interest. More useful for us is the concept of a “power to” approach of
resistance, which seeks to place power with the individual – and also, in our union
project, with the collective – to exercise their own agency; what Bradley refers to as
women’s ability to control certain types of resources and use them as countervailing bases
of resistance and challenge. We are especially keen to explore the dialectics involved
here; as Foucault observed, “where there is power there is resistance” (1979, p. 95).
Levesque and Murray (2010) propose shifting from a “power to” to a “capacity
to” approach, while a cooperative approach is described by Berger (2005) as “power
with”, reflecting an empowerment model where dialogue, inclusion, negotiation and
shared power guide decision-making. On the one hand, we can see gender relations in
unions as being about a frontier of control. On the other, asks Burrell (1992,
pp. 74–75), even if patriarchy and power are present in cross-gender interactions, does
this mean that it is impossible for the sexes to cooperate in the face of common
problems, since both women and men are oppressed and impoverished?

Challenge and strategies

Feminist scholarship has argued for a more inclusive, equity-based trade union
agenda to transform unions and thus influence social agendas (Kirton and Healy,
1999; Kainer, 2006). A significant element necessary to orchestrate such a shift is a
reconsideration of the role of gender power relations in decision-making processes

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within unions and its impact on internal gender democracy. Discussions about union
gender democracy usually focus on the persistence of male dominance and conclude
that unions are embedded in a system of power relations that supports the status quo
by ordering union structures and operations to serve male interests (Creese, 1999;
Curtin, 1999; Deslippe, 2000; all in Britwum, 2010, p. 7). Strategies to unsettle and
disturb these are discussed now.
Unions’ own moves towards closing the gender democracy deficit have been
invested in equality strategies approached from two interrelated directions, which
together represent an ongoing dialectic of gender power relations. Excluded groups,
mainly women, organizing autonomously and also in coalitions with progressive men,
have made demands on their unions for strategic change. Strategies generally involve
three main approaches for addressing both structural and cultural gender and equality
democratic deficits in unions: organizing women into membership and encouraging
them into activism; affirmative action such as electoral systems to encourage women,
including reserved seats and gender quotas; and gender mainstreaming, the inclusion
and integration of those from oppressed groups into mainstream structures and processes.
Structural measures have mainly focused on the numbers, for example gender
quotas and proportional representation. Culture remains the place where informal
power relations grip most strongly, but they are slippery and cannot be easily dealt
with through the “normal” or “formal” channels of union rules and procedures.
Measures here overlap to some extent with the structural measures and involve women
and other diversity groups having their own committees, conferences, dedicated
officers and support systems. They also entail autonomous organizing, for example in
women’s groups and education programmes, which can be risky and are frequently
contested (Briskin, 1993). Unions have been equivocal about putting in place such
measures, which raise complex feelings among and between the genders, and are
continuously resisted on the grounds of being separatist and divisive of traditional
(read “masculine”) solidaristic union values.
Such contestation involves the use of power, especially status and authority,
sexual power and collective homosocial organizing. There is much at stake when
women resist, muster their collective agency and develop a capacity to challenge gender
politics, thereby upsetting and interfering with the existing order. Here women’s
groups have a central role in raising awareness and developing consciousness and skills,
as well as generating collective strategies for carrying gender agendas for change into
the union mainstream (Colgan and Ledwith, 2000; Parker, 2003, 2006; Kirton
and Healy, 2004). We agree with the contention of Cornfield (1993, p. 345) that
“insurgency” inside unions is most likely to be successful where women are organized
into caucuses, networks or structures which allow women as a social group to harness
the union’s resources to attain and exercise power.
While much of the concern about the absence of women from leadership roles
is focused on senior positions, leadership in active grass-roots and community

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unionism is also important, although less readily visible: local unions that are
embedded in external and community networks are more likely to play a strong role
in the workplace (Yates, 2006). Perhaps the best known of these is SEWA, the Indian
Self Employed Women’s Association, organizing in the informal sector, “the unpro-
tected labour force of our country”, over 94 per cent of whom are women (SEWA,
n.d.). SEWA’s strategy is one of “struggle and development”, and in SEWA, leadership
is done cooperatively.
Forming horizontal and local alliances, including with social movements,
organizing the traditionally unorganized, and adopting direct action as a means of
raising the profile of worker action in the public milieu while simultaneously
disrupting entrenched vertical leadership regimes (Voss and Sherman, 2000; Voss,
2010) are all important strategies. This “power with” approach to democratic deter-
mination provides the space for an inclusive politics of difference, opening up
opportunities for diverse groups of workers to be included in unions’ decision-making
processes, to pursue social and economic justice for workers and to reframe union
legitimacy (Fraser, 2000; Young, 2002; Kainer, 2006; Dufour and Adelheid, 2010).
We find the analysis of institutional decision-making processes by Iris
Marion Young (1990, 2002) useful in disrupting historical approaches to decision-
making. Young challenges the notion of “representation”, arguing that discharging
this responsibility adequately rests on understanding difference. Suppression of differ-
ence obscures diversity, thus constructing political engagements on the basis of the
dominant culture, imposing a discipline centred on “sameness” and thus “deny[ing]
recognition” (Fraser, 2000, p. 109) of the other. To be effective in practice, differences
have to be respected; but at the same time a system of transversal politics (Yuval-Davis,
1997) can be implemented, whereby women and members of other groups from
different constituencies may remain rooted in their own membership and identity,
while at the same time being prepared to shift into a position of exchange with those
from different groups with different interests in pursuit of a common agenda.
Fung and Wright (2001) suggest that these sorts of alternative, cooper-
ative community decision-making deepen democratic processes – they use the term
“Empowered Deliberative Democracy” – by engaging people with a myriad of
technical skills, community commitment and access to resources in a consensus-based
decision-making process. There are similarities here with the autonomous organizing
discussed above and a Freirean dialogical pedagogy of gender conscientization; an
essential ingredient of the gender challenge to traditional trade unionism on the road
towards a gender politics of inclusion and equity.

Women’s agency: Individual and collective strategies

Meanwhile, however, although gender conscientization of women moving into activist
and leader positions is essential, on its own it is not sufficient. Building a “capacity to”

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element into our model, we draw on a proposal by Sue Ledwith (2009) about the
development of a feminist/gender counter-hegemony which seeks to challenge and then
shift the axis of masculine hegemonic control in trade unions. Taking a Gramscian
approach, this involves two groups of intellectuals/thinkers: “movement activists”,
including feminist and sister-traveller activists in trade unions, communities, social
movements, NGOs and civil society; and “movement thinkers”, including gender and
feminist researchers and activists engaging with and working with trade unionists in
gender and labour movements locally, nationally and internationally, and in a range of
ways, such as joint research projects, round tables and international e-networking. Our
GLU gender and trade unions research group encompasses both, and thus is an active
contributor to this gender and trade unions counter-hegemonic project.

Research methods and issues

Our methods triangulate, involving a range of quantitative and qualitative data
collection tools. For the quantitative data we developed a series of templates to be
completed by colleagues in their own countries, as far as possible. These covered labour
markets broken down by gender, between full- and part-time workers, and between
private and public sectors. The resulting data are inconsistent but sufficient to give us
a broad picture at this stage, as well as identifying gaps.
Others also have such problems – as the European Industrial Relations
Observatory comments, such a process “is also sometimes contentious and sensitive for
unions themselves, and features numerous methodological and conceptual problems”
(Carley, 2009, p. 2) – for instance, how trade unions and union membership are
defined and how the data are gathered. Such issues make the examination of national
trade union membership figures problematic; the difficulties are magnified when an
international comparison is attempted, and again when we ask for gender breakdowns.
To try to overcome these problems we developed a second series of templates to
collect data about gender and trade unionism: these addressed gender proportions in
membership and in a range of leadership positions, and attendance as delegates at
conferences. In addition, we collected information about trade union equality
structures and positions. Since the numbers alone do not tell the full story about the
social and political struggles confronting women in unions, we also carried out
individual and group interviews that enabled us to interact directly with women
activists, especially those in union leadership positions. In a smaller but more detailed
study in three countries, colleagues examined the Bargaining Agenda for Gender
(BAG): we are aware of the potential for change here that can flow from having
women in leadership roles.
Using these methods, we found that even just asking the questions in our own
unions can be a powerful move in challenging the inertia of the status quo. In Nigeria,
for example, GLU colleague Joel Odigie reported that no gender data had been

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collected, but in future the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) will be collecting data
by gender – because he asked the question.
Further, as a response to the unreliability of gender data, our GLU gender and
trade unions research group (RG) has set up its own database. This will collect gender
information from our RG members across six continents and 11 or more countries, with
the intention of providing regular reliable data over time. We intend to publish this
annually, initially on the GLU website,2 and see its potential as a powerful tool to mark
out gendered space in international labour movements. It is a tangible example of,
initially, “capacity to”, with the potential of moving to a position of “power to”, changing
the debates about gender and visibility in trade unions. It is also a mark of the unique
capacity of the GLU RG members who, as union insiders, are able to access union
information through a range of channels and methods. Likewise, by publishing this initial
account of power and gender in our unions, we can see the RG members as both
“movement activists” and “movement thinkers”, actively challenging traditional union
oligarchy and hegemony. Group members, in addition to their varied positions within
the trade union research nexus, operate within the feminist position that insists on
connecting theory to practice. Our participation in this research group has affirmed our
political commitment to a gendered and feminist agenda for change.

Findings
Notwithstanding the gaps in our data, in all the countries in our study increasing
proportions of women can be seen to be moving into work and into trade union
membership. Even when overall unemployment increases women’s work, often
shifting it to part-time work, their labour force participation tends to hold up, along
with their union membership. Within this general pattern, union membership
is generally more robust in public sectors and service work in both formal and
informal sectors, largely as a result of the predominance of women working in the
“five Cs” noted above.
In almost all the countries covered by our research, female union densities were
lower than male, ranging from a low of 8 per cent in the Republic of Korea to a high
of 46 per cent in Australia, where the female presence in the public sector is high and
growing. There were also sectoral differences: as colleagues Boniface Phiri and Crispen
Chinguno report respectively from Zambia and Zimbabwe, women teachers make up
just over half their unions’ membership, although they do not reach proportionality
in senior positions. Nevertheless, among women in Zambia, participation in the union
is increasing, largely due to growing awareness of women’s rights. Generally there
was higher density of union membership among women in the industrialized
countries of the global North. This is not surprising, since women are highly concen-
trated in precarious work and informal sectors, especially in the global South, where
trade union organization is weak.

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Table 3.1 Percentages of women on trade union decision-making

bodies, 2009
Country Union Percentage of women in:

Membership National National National Conference

executive council conference delegations

Brazil CONTRAF/ 53 0 50 29 36
CUT
Canada CUPE 67 – 13 51 51
Ghana GTUC 30 20 33 – –
Republic KCTU 27 10 28 28 –
of Korea
Zambia ZaCTU – 0 0 – –
ZNUT 52 – – – –
Zimbabwe ZiCTU 20 33 17 – –
ZIMTA 52 33 27 27 27
Key: CONTRAF/CUT: Bank workers’ union confederation, Rio de Janeiro; CUPE: Canadian Union of Public Employees;
GTUC: Ghana Trades Union Congress; KCTU: Korea Confederation of Trade Unions; ZCTU: ZaCTU: Zambia Congress
of Trade Unions; ZNUT: Zambia National Union of Teachers; ZiCTU: Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions;
ZIMTA: Zimbabwe Teachers Union.

Data from our countries clearly show women’s lack of proportional repre-
sentation in positions of power in trade unions, in spite of the policies of gender
equality formally espoused by their unions. Women are generally missing from top
trade union leadership positions irrespective of the proportion of membership they
constitute. Thus, trade unions with a majority of women members are just as likely as
trade unions with a minority of women members to have few women in leadership
positions. Table 3.1 shows, for example, that the Canadian public sector union CUPE
and teachers’ unions in Zambia and Zimbabwe all had predominantly female
memberships and yet had only a minority of women in decision-making roles.
Of all the unions covered in our study, CUPE had the highest proportion of female
membership (67 per cent); yet women constituted only 51 per cent of conference
delegates and filled just 13 per cent of union leadership roles. In the Zimbabwean
teachers’ union ZIMTA women made up just 33 per cent of the national executive and
27 per cent of conference delegates.
There were instances where the proportion of women in leadership positions
was slightly higher than the proportion of women in the membership. This was the
case in Ghana and the Republic of Korea, where success had been achieved through
affirmative action provisions. Women were, however, in the minority in conference
delegations in all the unions studied except CUPE.
In respect of the particular positions occupied (see table 3.2), the Republic of
Korea and Zimbabwe were exceptional in having women holding high union office at

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 Table 3.2 Senior office-holders in selected trade unions and confederations, by gender, with percentages for women
Country Union Union position
President Vice- Treasurer/ General Assistant/ Lead Education Provincial/ Local/ Other Union
President Trustee Secretary Deputy Organizer regional branch officers staff
Secretary leaders representatives

Brazil CONTRA/ M M M M – M – – – 2W, 40% –

CUT
CONTRAF/ M M W M M M M – – 2W, 25% –
CUT
Canada CUPE – – – – – – – 1W, 10% 48% W – –
Ghana GTUC M M – M M – M – – – –
Korea,
Rep. of KCTU M 2W, 50% 3W, 50% M M 4W, 22% 2W, 50% – – 15W, 32% –
South COSATU M M W M M2 – 10% W 11% W – Organizers: –
Africa1 19% leaders 22% W
women
Turkey3 – – – – – – – – 13W, 7.6% – 70W, 10.8% –

United TUC M – – M W – W – – – 55% W

Kingdom4
Zambia ZaCTU M M 2W, 50% M – – – – – – –
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ZNUT M M 1W, 25% M 1W, 50% – – – – – –

Zimbabwe ZiCTU M 2W, 33% M M M M W – – 3W, 30% 24W,5 49%
ZIMTA M W M M M M [CEO] – 1W, 11% – 2W,5 22% 15W,6 27%
Key: CONTRA/CUT: National Confederation Financial Sector Workers; CONTRAF/CUT: Bank workers’ union confederation, Rio de Janeiro; CUPE: Canadian Union of Public Employees;
GTUC: Ghana Trades Union Congress; KCTU: Korea Confederation ofTrade Unions; COSATU: Confederation of South African Trade Unions; TUC: Trades Union Congress; ZaCTU: Zambia
Congress of Trade Unions; ZNUT: Zambia National Union of Teachers; ZiCTU: Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions; ZIMTA: Zimbabwe Teachers Union.
Notes:
M = male; F = female.
1 Gender Report to the COSATU National Conference March 2012; Tsomondo 2011. 2 First deputy president is M. Second deputy president is W. 3 National data compiled from 2009 statistics of the

Ministry of Labour and Social Security of Turkey. 4 See TUC 2011 Equality Audit. 5 Women employed by ZiCTU are mainly support staff. Of 11 heads of departments, seven are men and four women.
6 One woman is the AIDS coordinator.
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confederation level as vice-presidents. Women in leadership positions were, however,

more likely to be in subordinate roles such as treasurer or organizer (CONTRAF/
CUT, KCTU and ZiCTU). It was notable that in some unions/confederations seats
were reserved for women, but only as secondary office-holder: in Ghana, for example,
Akua Britwum reported that the second vice-chairperson must be a woman, a provi-
sion that generates the assumption that this is as high as a woman can aspire.
In South Africa, too, Constance Tsomondo (2011) confirms that union gender
representation reproduces women’s labour market position, with women mainly
found in education, health, and commercial and catering services. Women are scarce
in union leaderships, occupying only 19 per cent of leadership positions by 2004;
even in unions where the majority of members are women, those in influential
positions are still mostly male. Women are mainly found as administrators, positions
that lack influence and are not involved in policy-making, whereas men are the
organizers and office-bearers.

Union equality structures

As can be seen in table 3.3, all the unions covered had in place some form of equality
structures: in all cases there were national women’s committees, and in five regional
or local women’s committees as well. Most also had national women’s conferences.
In Brazil the banking unions also had structures for other forms of inequality, relating
to race, ethnicity and disability. In three countries (Brazil, Ghana, Nigeria) there were
30 per cent women’s quotas.
The existence of women’s equality structures, however, does not guarantee an
automatic promotion of women’s interests in their trade unions, or their resourcing.
When we asked about the effectiveness of these measures, only in Brazil and the Republic
of Korea were they found to be effective. In the case of the Brazilian bank workers’ union
CONTRAF/CUT, Jo Portilho reports that the women’s structures had been able to exert
pressure for the inclusion of equality provisions in all collective agreements of the union,
while Kim Mijeoung writes that in the Republic of Korea the promotion of women’s
structures at confederation level has filtered down to all the affiliate industrial unions.
The position of women’s structures in the remaining unions, however, is best captured
in the pronouncements of interviewees who described them as “moribund” and unable
to challenge the male hegemony in the union. “Most do not function nationally – no
meetings are held.” The ineffectiveness in two African cases was attributed to the fact
that the “women’s structures have no budget”.3
Table 3.4 shows the main barriers impeding women in their unions, and the
successes that have been achieved. The barriers can be summarized as emerging mainly
from what the report from Zambia described as the “hardwired” masculine and
patriarchal union culture which encouraged sexual harassment, male hostility towards
women, resistance and men’s unwillingness to share power, while also contributing to

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Table 3.3 Women and trade union equality structures, 2009

Country Union National National National Targets for Regional/local Gender policy
women’s women’s women’s women’s women’s
officer committee conference representation committees

Brazil CONTRA/ N Y1 – Y2 – –
CUT
CONTRAF/ N Y3 – Y4 – –
CUT
Canada CUPE – Y5 Y N – –

Ghana GTUC Y Y Y Y6 Y Y

Korea, KCTU Y Y Y Y – –
Rep. of
Nigeria NLC Y Y Y Y7 Y Y

South COSATU Y9 Y Y – – Y
Africa8
United TUC Y Y Y Y – Y
Kingdom10
Zambia ZaCTU Y11 Y – – – Y
ZNUT – Y Y – Y Y
Zimbabwe ZiCTU Y Y Y Y Y –
ZIMTA Y Y Y Y – –

Key: CONTRA/CUT: National Confederation Financial Sector Workers; CONTRAF/CUT: Bank workers’ union confederation,
Rio de Janeiro; CUPE: Canadian Union of Public Employees; GTUC: Ghana Trades Union Congress; KCTU: Korea Confederation
of Trade Unions; NLC: Nigerian Labour Congress; COSATU: Confederation of South African Trade Unions; TUC: Trades Union
Congress; ZaCTU: Zambia Congress of Trade Unions; ZNUT: Zambia National Union of Teachers; ZiCTU: Zimbabwe Congress
of Trade Unions; ZIMTA: Zimbabwe Teachers Union.
Notes: 1 Made up of national commission of gender, race, sexuality and disability. 2 30 per cent quota for women for affiliates and
confederation. 3 Made up of national commission of gender, race, sexuality and disability. 4 Target available for membership on
the National Executive Council. 5 National Equality Committee. 6 30 per cent quota in all union events and reserved seat; second
vice-chairperson. 7 30 per cent quota and special seat. 8 Source: Tsomondo, 2011. 9 Titles are “gender” throughout. 10 Source: TUC,
2011. Affiliates vary, e.g. quite often the national structures and officers encompass other diversity groups, defined by e.g.
race/ethnicity. All the largest unions have structures for ethnicity/race, disability and sexuality as well as women. 11 Gender desk.

women’s perception that union leadership positions were really only for men. Females
were deemed not to be real union leaders. The most frequently recurring barrier
identified was the belief that union leadership was a male preserve. From this culture
flowed problems for women such as the lack of union education programmes and the
practice of holding union meetings outside working hours, which then impinged on
women’s “domestic burden”. This was a particular problem in the case of the Zambian
teachers’ union, where, although women formed a majority of the membership, they
were not yet in a position to gain access to power. The responsibilities of the home
were raised several times as a major barrier to women’s participation, hammered home
by the absence of support for women in this role.

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Table 3.4 Successes and barriers for women in their unions

Country Union Barriers Successes

Canada CUPE Data on gender, race, ethnicity and

disability
Ghana GTUC Male hostility and resistance Gender quotas and special seats
Sexual harassment Gender desk
Women’s domestic burden Gender policy
Apathy Women’s committees
Women’s value of usefulness of
unions
Distance between women and
their union
Republic of KCTU Patriarchal culture TU gender quota system
Korea Men unwilling to share power Monitoring and review
No trade union course for Women’s committees in all
women affiliates; quotas for education and
No support for women as training
caregivers
Nigeria NLC Lack of political will Special seats
Male resistance Quotas for education and training
Women’s committees
Philippines Survey across Time Assuring women’s representation
several unions Women’s domestic in union decision-making
responsibilities Women’s committees
Quotas for women in leadership
positions
Appointment of gender equality
officers
Turkey Interviews and Anti-women legislation Increase in the number of
discussions Male-dominant union unionized women in some sectors,
with women structures e.g. health services
outside the Greater media coverage of women
workplace Women’s low labour market
participation in unions
Sexual division of labour at
home
Zambia ZNUT Union constitutional Women’s committees
provisions Gender policy
Dominant perception that
union positions are male
Zimbabwe ZiCTU Holding union meetings
ZIMTA outside work hours

Key: CUPE: Canadian Union of Public Employees; GTUC: Ghana Trades Union Congress; KCTU: Korea Confederation of
Trade Unions; NLC: Nigerian Labour Congress; ZNUT: Zambia National Union of Teachers; ZiCTU: Zimbabwe Congress
of Trade Unions; ZIMTA: Zimbabwe Teachers Union.

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It is perhaps striking that these barriers can be interpreted as emerging from

collective masculine power resources, including economic power (lack of support
systems for women), positional and symbolic power (which maintains men in senior
roles), and sexual resources (especially sexual harassment and sexual bribery: what is
often described by African women as ‘pull her down’ sexual politics). Conversely, it is
women as individuals who have to cope with what is often experienced as powerless-
ness. However, when we look at the successes achieved – affirmative action provisions
such as quotas and special seats for women in union decision-making structures,
women’s committees backed by gender policies and units – these have all been the
result of women acting collectively to push their unions to put these in place, some-
times in alliances with powerful men. Even so, as our male colleague reports from
Zambia, the Women’s Committee has been in existence for over a decade, which
brings its effectiveness into question. In addition, not all national unions have created
gender desks to support and provide technical expertise to the women’s committees,
except at the federation (ZaCTU).
There is a general view that women’s committees remain isolated and sometimes
parallel to the main union structures they are intended to integrate with. They are still
perceived as typical “women’s structures”, largely used for campaigns and appeasement
rather than for integrating women into the mainstream. The women’s committees are
run by women and all their activities exclusively target women, which further works
to isolate them. In some cases, the committees have no specific budgetary allocations
and are funded on an ad hoc basis.

Unions and the Bargaining Agenda for Gender (BAG)

Since we are interested in making the links between gender and unions and the impact
of union activity on the material working lives of the female membership, we also
examined collective bargaining agendas – what we call the Bargaining Agenda for
Gender or “BAG”. We wanted to see what was in that BAG beyond women’s pay and
conditions of work. In discussing the BAG we need to differentiate between what was
on the bargaining agenda, what actually reached the bargaining table, and what did or
did not end up in agreements about women’s pay and conditions at work.
The BAG reports cover only three countries: Canada, the Philippines and
Turkey. Nevertheless, the detailed research undertaken, particularly in the Philippines
and in Turkey, provides some revealing insights.

Canada
The Canadian research by Patricia Chong concerned CUPE, the country’s biggest
public sector union. CUPE’s efforts at bringing women’s issues on to the union
bargaining agenda were the result of a two-year membership consultation by its

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National Women’s Task Force. Over 7,000 members were asked about the “status of
women in our workplaces, society and within the union” through surveys and face-to-
face discussions. The report produced as a result of the consultation was presented at
the 2007 CUPE national convention.4 There were 54 recommendations, grouped into
the following six categories:
• bargaining to support women;
• applying equality throughout the union;
• education and training for women;
• leadership development for women;
• more effective union meetings and ways to involve members;
• creating a more representative union structure.

This survey was followed two years later with a Women’s Equality Conference
with the twin goals of building “bargaining strength to advance women’s equality”
and setting “achievable goals on bargaining issues for women” (CUPE, 2008). The
conference report, “Recipes for setting the table: Getting what you want in bargaining”,
highlighted areas considered “critical for women’s equality”, which covered minimum
pay, job retention, pensions, work–life balance, and elimination of violence and harass-
ment in the workplace (CUPE, 2009, p. 1).
In addition, CUPE creatively provides a recipe for achieving equality in these
areas through an ingredients list of information and “a bowl of facts”, about workplace
issues, and concludes with recommendations as to how to build collective strength. It
also offers “Recipes for setting the table: Collective agreement language”, a collection
of terminology actually used in union contracts, gathered from various localities, on
issues affecting women such as “child rearing”, “pensionable service”, “violence in the
workplace”, “employment equity” and “flexible hours”. There is also a collection of
materials for members presented under the title “Bargaining equality: A workplace
for all”, covering issues such as disability, harassment and violence that are of particular
concern to groups of marginalized women like Aboriginal and LGBT workers.5
The CUPE research, then, gave us information on who decided what was to go
in the BAG, and how it could be negotiated. We have to move to the Philippines to
find out more about what happens at the negotiating table, and afterwards.

Philippines
Our research colleagues in the Philippines, Ramon Certeza and Melisa Serrano, carried
out a large questionnaire survey, and interviewed seven officers of national federations
and 12 local union leaders. Their findings identified how advances in the promotion
and protection of women’s rights have resulted from several interacting factors:

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a strong women’s movement; legislation promoting gender equality and rights of

women (e.g. law on anti-sexual harassment); and a strong ILO gender and women’s
rights programme. These have combined to impact on women’s involvement in
collective bargaining. Their BAG study found that the top three items on women’s list
of demands were maternity leave, pay equality and menstrual leave. The downside was
that these three priorities were also among the top six items which were most likely to
be traded off for other bargaining proposals. The survey showed that women were a
minority in union bargaining teams, comprising only 20 per cent of team member-
ship. About 70 per cent of the unions responding to the study had no provisions to
ensure that women were represented on their bargaining teams. As a result, unions
with bargaining teams led by men tended to focus more on wage increases and
other direct economic measures in the collective agreement and were less likely to see
gender-/women-related proposals as important.
In the absence of a strong BAG presence, employers were highly likely to resist
agreeing to provisions that they saw as costs, such as menstrual leave, special leave for
women, day-care services and facilities, pay equality, breastfeeding facilities and
maternity leave beyond what is stipulated by law. It will therefore be in management’s
interests to resist, or at least not encourage, the incorporation of women in bargaining
teams. Except for reproductive health and protection against sexual harassment, all
other gender-/women-related proposals in collective bargaining were always traded off
by the union against other bargaining proposals. Protection against sexual harassment,
and, to a lesser extent, reproductive health and equality of opportunities for training
and education, are likely to be less costly and to offer opportunities for direct payback.
However, women’s absence from direct BAG negotiations did not deprive them
of the chance to influence the content of issues covered in union bargaining. Their
active participation in organizing drives increased the likelihood of their demands
being featured in union bargaining agendas: there are many Philippine unions that
have strong gender equality programmes at the workplace, and reproductive health is
one of the issues that some unions are pursuing through their national agendas.

Turkey
In Turkey the difficulties involved in accessing women in their unions or at the
workplace, in part owing to anti-union legislation, led our researcher, Gaye Yilmaz, to
organize small tea parties in cafes where the women could freely discuss their concerns.
Her report concerns women leaders in the health sector, where women predominate.
Although in Turkey there is a framework of legal rights which includes protection for
pregnant women, maternity leave for female workers, paid time off for nursing/breast-
feeding, and mandatory provision in workplaces with over 100 women employees for
babies and children up to the age of six, in practice these are not always implemented.
Among Turkish unions interest in pressing for these rights varies. KESK, the only one

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of the three main confederations which is seen as gender sensitive, and also as a
militant union, has scored notable success: for example, it has doubled the time off for
mothers nursing babies for up to four months, and increased the time off for caring
for infants to six months. Women have a weak presence in Turkish union negotiating
teams: all but five of the women reported that there were no women represented on
negotiating teams, and they strongly supported change.

Discussion and conclusions

While the data reported here are partial and concern a range of not always compar-
able material, nevertheless we think there is sufficient evidence to provide a basis for
examining gender power relations in the unions covered in our study.
These relations are complex and comprise a fluid set of interactions involving
labour market positions of women and men, union structures, culture and ideologies,
individual and collective agency, and the ability to access and use power resources.
These relations ebb and flow as forces for women come up against powerful male
hegemonic resistance.
We can see the influence of differing labour market positions in the global South
and North, whereby higher union density in countries like Australia, Canada and the
United Kingdom reflect a greater female presence in formal labour markets. Although
women’s relative position in their own labour markets may be circumscribed and
increasingly precarious, nevertheless there is in these countries a longer history of
industrialization, unionization and feminization, facilitating the construction of
sophisticated gender and equality structures and bargaining frameworks. In countries
of the global South, where a strong presence in the informal labour market and the
absence of rights are the norm for women, their task is harder and the road longer.
Nevertheless, in some of the more precarious places the combination of women’s
agency and the resources of external donors from the global North supporting women’s
projects – as in Ghana – offers a model of how such coalitions can muster sufficient power
resources to counter the inertia of homosocial masculinity. In Ghanaian unions such
alliances have been able to put in place comprehensive gender structures and support
mechanisms such as women’s education programmes, both developing a gender
consciousness among women and enabling them to move into leadership positions. In
the Philippines such external influences were also significant. There, advances for women
are the result of several interacting forces, including a strong women’s movement,
legislative rights and a strong external ILO gender programme. Development of such
measures has provided space, visibility and voice for women, which, together with a
growing awareness of women’s rights, represent significant accumulations of and strategic
use of women’s power resources to address the democratic gender deficit.
Structural gains are also evident in a number of cases where collective agency is
at play internally. In Brazil and the Republic of Korea affirmative action programmes

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such as gender leadership quotas have been established. In addition, radical union
ideologies have been important both in motivating the establishment of gender
structures and in achieving material outcomes – as in Brazil, and in Turkey where the
militant union KESK is seen as gender sensitive and has made gains for mothers in
provision for the care of their babies and infants.
There is another important issue that needs raising, even though our research was
not specifically aiming to discuss it: namely, when women do reach senior roles, are
those women buying into the gender agenda? Other research shows that this is not
necessarily the case, for although women are elected into reserved positions, it is
not realistic to see women as a single interest group always supporting feminist or
gender agendas (Colgan and Ledwith, 2000). Also, they are not usually elected only
by women, and are likely in their positions to represent a broader constituency of both
women and men. Research has shown that if oppressed social groups are to gain real
power, there is an additional need for gender political consciousness among women
office-holders and new radical democratic frameworks (McBride, 2001). Political
knowledge and skills can be developed at women’s courses – although our research
found that these were often not available – and within women’s groups, as discussed
above, which may also provide the springboard for radical strategies.
Action research is in itself a powerful method of consciousness raising and indeed
organizing. Several of the research team found that by setting up meetings and asking
questions they were able to pass on information, for example about bargaining rights.
This form of empowerment is also an important way of developing gender democracy
from below, among grass-roots and community groupings. As we saw, women inter-
viewees in the Philippines discovered for the first time, from the researchers, what their
union gender policy was in relation to collective bargaining. In Turkey the women had
not previously thought about the possible impact of having women in negotiating
teams, nor were they aware that such teams might by right be gender balanced. The
women told our colleagues how helpful the research had been: the questions posed had
helped them to think about gender issues more than they had ever done previously. In
Canada, CUPE is vocalizing the importance of the gender discourse and claiming the
language of gendered workplace demands.
Against such gains, however, must be weighed the power of masculinized resist-
ance. In some countries, economic power has been used to block budget allocations for
women’s education. In others, women’s advances in union structures have been limited
to certain secondary positions, reinforcing beliefs among both women and men that real
leadership is a male preserve, and women’s is the domestic sphere. A further significant
inhibitor that circumscribes women’s position and role is that based on the discourse
that women’s self-organizing prevents their integration into the union mainstream, as
so forcefully expressed in the Zambian case, for example. It includes “hardwired”
masculine and patriarchal union cultures which encourage the “pull her down” syndrome
when women reach positions of power. In collective bargaining, too, where a third party,

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the (usually male-dominated) employer, is present, there is a pincer movement, even

collusion, between the accumulated power of the masculinized union and the employer.
In such circumstances the malestream power in sexual politics is stronger than the forces
of collective women’s agency.
These power resources are fluid and unstable, and our study has shown how
gender resistance and challenges both open up and limit the spaces for women. While
some gender gaps may have been closing, male hegemony has managed to hold on to
power in both structure and culture in unions. Yet there is evidence from the study that,
where radical union ideology combines with women’s collective agency in a counter-
hegemonic journey, an inclusive “power with” approach can recognize difference and
can address the democratic gender deficit. It is this dialectic that could open up further
space both to women’s capacity for power and to the ability of unions to develop gender
solidarity in the face of global neoliberalism, which increasingly oppresses and
impoverishes both women and men. While this may sound overly optimistic, we see it
as the greatest challenge for twenty-first-century labour movements.

Acknowledgements
As the writers of this chapter, we wish to acknowledge the continuing input, as well
as the formal reports already compiled, from the whole research team, with special
thanks to Patricia Chong who got the team going and coordinated so much of
the work:
Australia Karen Douglas
Brazil Jo Portilho
Canada Patricia Chong
Ghana Akua Britwum
Republic of Korea Kim Mijeoung
Nigeria Joel Odigie
Philippines Ramon Certeza, Melisa Serrano
South Africa Janet Munakamwe
Turkey Gaye Yilmaz
United Kingdom Sue Ledwith
Zambia Boniface Phiri
Zimbabwe Crispen Chinguno

We also thank all our union colleagues who so readily completed questionnaires,
answered questions and took part in discussions. We hope they will be able to use our
findings to further the gender project in their unions.

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Notes
1 See the list of contributors at the end of this chapter.
2 http://www.global-labour-university.org [accessed 4 June 2012].
3 Reports from Crispen Chinguno, Zimbabwe, and Boniface Phiri, Zambia.
4 http://cupe.ca/nwtf [accessed 2 June 2012].
5 http://cupe.ca/bargeq [accessed 2 June 2012].

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LOCAL GOVERNMENT CALL CENTRES:

CHALLENGE OR OPPORTUNITY
4
FOR SOUTH AFRICAN LABOUR?

Babalwa Magoqwana and Sandra Matatu

Introduction
The South African call centre industry has been steadily growing over the years.
Fostered as a means of curbing escalating unemployment, the industry was predicted
to contribute more than 100,000 jobs (directly and indirectly) to the national
economy by 2009 (TradeInvestSA, 2007). A 2007 report by the Global Call-centre
Industry Project at the University of the Witwatersrand revealed that South Africa’s
call centres are concentrated in Johannesburg (51.8 per cent), followed by Cape Town
(38 per cent), Durban (7.9 per cent) and then the Eastern Cape Province (1.6 per cent)
(Benner, Lewis and Omar, 2007). It also reported that only 25 per cent of these
call centres surveyed were unionized, a lower figure than the international average
of 40 per cent unionization of call centres. These unionized call centres offered better
working conditions and higher wages (Benner, Lewis and Omar, 2007). Public service
call centres tend to be unionized and small and to handle inbound calls, leading to
better working conditions than in their outsourced counterparts. Arguably, the
outsourced centres tend to pose more threats to unionization in this industry owing
to the flexible nature of their employment practices (Shire, Holtgrewe and Kerst, 2002;
Benner, Lewis and Omar, 2007).
From the industrial relations perspective, the biggest challenge for the unions in
this industry has arguably been the individualistic nature of call centre work and its
reward system (Bain and Taylor, 2000, 2002, 2004), both of which inhibit collective
action. In view of this challenge, the routine, controlling, intense nature of call centre
work should be taken into account in the bargaining process. The service manage-
ment school (Frenkel et al., 1999; Korczynski et al., 2000; Korczynski, 2003) argues
that unions need to adapt to the new capitalist consumption model and be part of the
solution at the front line by extending their involvement beyond the bread-and-butter

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issues of pay and conditions to include the delivery of customer services, which seems
to be the primary cause of stress among the call centre operators.
This chapter contributes to the sparse literature on employment conditions at
local government call centres. It highlights the concerns arising from working condi-
tions associated with call centre work and outlines the challenges and opportunities
for public sector trade union strategies illustrated by the case of the South African
Municipal Workers Union (SAMWU). The chapter is based on research conducted
at the front line in the City of Johannesburg Metropolitan Municipality call centre,
supplemented by data from the Nelson Mandela Bay Metropolitan Municipality
(NMM). SAMWU forms the majority union in both municipalities. The study is
exploratory in nature, owing to the paucity of prior research in this area: very little
South African literature is available on the study of trade unions and call centres,
especially in the local government sector. This chapter will shed some light on this
issue, using material from the two metropolitan municipalities, and will thereby
contribute to extending our understanding of the labour process at local government
call centres. Initial findings confirm concerns that the call handling section of South
African local government is beset by serious problems such as high levels of stress, high
turnover of staff, understaffing, lack of training, unequal wages among employees
and lack of communication at all levels of the organization.

Methodology
This chapter draws on qualitative data obtained from Joburg Connect (the City of
Johannesburg metropolitan call centre) in 2010 and 2011. Qualitative data were
collected through semi-structured in-depth interviews with over 30 participants,
including call centre operators, trade union officials, shop stewards, managers and
municipal officials.1 Different interview questions were designed for managers, super-
visors and operators respectively. The overarching aim of these interviews was to
collect detailed data on the history, objectives, development and outcomes of the
local government call centres. The interviews lasted between 45 and 90 minutes and
focused on each individual’s perceptions and experiences of the call centre workplace.
Non-participant observation was also undertaken in call centres for over six weeks, during
which researchers talked to operators, supervisors, shop stewards and managers. The aim
of the observation was to capture the dynamic and interactive nature of the call centre
labour process in action, to explore participants’ responses to it, and thereby to establish
a detailed picture of the process. Detailed field notes were taken during and after the
observation, and were transcribed as soon as possible. Focus group discussions were
also used to explore participants’ responses in greater depth by stimulating group inter-
action and to tease out some of the less clear responses from the individual interviews.
The City of Johannesburg forms the epicentre of South Africa’s financial,
business and information services. It is the biggest metropolitan municipality in terms

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of both population and contribution (13 per cent) to gross domestic product (GDP).
Johannesburg was the first city to be restructured along neoliberal lines immediately
after the democratic elections of 1994. In order to expand services to cover areas
previously racially segregated and lacking basic provision, while at the same time
addressing the City’s severe financial crisis, the City Council introduced the iGoli
2002 transformation plan. The main objectives of this plan were to decentralize
operations, stabilize the City’s finances and promote administrative efficiency. This
involved, among other things, the creation of utilities, agencies and corporatized
entities (UACs). Among South African city authorities, Johannesburg Council has
completely separated its utilities functions from the City Government bureaucracy.
Though they remain wholly owned by the City, they have their own chief executive
officers just like private companies. Johannesburg’s commanding position as the hub
of economic and political power in the country makes it a role model in municipal
business operations, which in turn means that this model is likely to be exported not
only around the country but possibly into the southern African region more widely.
The City of Johannesburg was chosen as the focus for this study because of
its socio-historical and political position in the country. The metropolitan popu-
lation consists of approximately 3.2 million people, of whom 72 per cent are Black,
17 per cent White, 6.5 per cent Coloured (mixed race) and 3.7 per cent Asian (mainly
Indians). The City, whose racialized inequality reflects the greater South African social
problem, has some of the biggest low-income formal townships in the country, for
example Soweto, Alexandria, Diepsloot, Ivory Park and Orange Farm. The northern
suburbs are mainly occupied by white and affluent communities who benefited from
services provided by the apartheid Government. The inner city is characterized by
slums where service delivery is poor or absent (Smith, 2006). Data gathered through
the municipality’s regular customer service surveys helps in assessing the population’s
perceptions about the city and satisfaction with service delivery.
In 2001 the then Mayor, Amos Masondo, launched the “One Number, One
City, One Vision” campaign and opened up Joburg Connect at Proton House in
Roodepoort. Joburg Connect is the single biggest council call centre in the country,
with more than 120 workstations.
The Johannesburg data are supplemented by data collected between 2007 and
2009 in NMM, which are used for purposes of confirmation or comparison. Though
smaller than Joburg Connect, the NMM call centre showed many similarities with
the larger institution in terms of working organization and labour process.

Public call centres: A product of the New Public

Management
The first call centres came into being over 35 years ago when the travel and hospitality
industries decided to centralize their reservation operations to cope with growing

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consumer demand. Today, they are the norm in the retailing, telecommunications,
entertainment and travel industries, and in public sector service delivery. Call centres
are not uniform. Differences exist in relation to several variables: size, industrial sector,
market, call complexity and cycle time, the nature of operations (inbound, outbound
or combined), management style and priorities, the configuration of technological
integration of telephones and computers, and the effectiveness of representative
institutions – including trade unions (Bain and Taylor, 2001). The most significant
differences are in work organization and call complexity, especially the distinctions
that arise from an emphasis on, respectively, quantity or quality. Table 4.1 presents
the contrasting characteristics of call centre operations focused respectively on quantity
and quality. These elements are not necessarily exclusive and both may exist in an
operation.
Call centres in the public sector have been inspired by the neoliberal concept of
the sovereign customer. They reflect the influence of the New Public Management
(NPM), which introduced private sector managerial styles of business operation, with
emphasis on flexibility, performance management systems and privatization, into the
public sector. The introduction of call centres in the public service was intended to close
the digital divide and encourage active citizenship: arguably, they play a role in improving
social inclusion by redressing citizen exclusion from information and services, and foster
participatory democracy by encouraging citizens to exercise influence on the provision
of services. According to these ideas, the citizen as “customer” should not just be a
recipient of service but should be able to participate in policy formulation. However,
the concept of customer in the public sector inherently excludes the masses of those who
are deemed unable to pay for services, especially in the developing world (Hague, 2001,
p. 69). Parkin’s (1979) notion of “a shift from collective to individual exclusion” relates
to the physical distance placed between service and citizen by the introduction of public
call centres. Public call centres are arguably the “masks” of political leaderships that
seek to remove the masses from face-to-face interaction in dealing with basic services.
This raises questions about the purported ability of the call centres to open up access to
participatory democracy for the masses.
According to the international literature, the ostensible focus of public call centres
is less on the reduction of costs and more on customer satisfaction. Owing to the nature
of the target market in size and orientation, they are inclined to emphasize the quality
rather than the quantity of service delivery outputs, a contradiction noted by Korczynski
(2001). They are part of the interconnected network linking different departments
and citizens and, as Glucksman (2002, p. 796) observed, they are not “self autonomous
workspaces” but part of the whole production-to-consumption system. They handle
enquiries with regard to various basic needs, including water and electricity accounts,
refuse collection, health and emergency services. Their advantages are that they deal with
large volumes of enquiries, relieve citizens of the need to spend time and money
travelling, do away with physical queuing, and reduce the time spent in face-to-face

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Table 4.1 Characteristics of call centre operations focused on, respectively,

quantity of calls handled and quality of service provided
Focus on quantity Focus on quality

Simple customer interaction Complex customer interaction

Routinization Individualization/customization
Targets hard Targets soft
Strict adherence to scripts Flexible or no scripts
Tight call handling times Relaxed call handling times
Tight “wrap-up times” Customer satisfaction a priority
High percentage of time on-phone/ready Possibility of task completion off-phone
Statistics-driven Statistics modified by quality criteria
Volume Value
Source: Bain and Taylor, 2001, p. 118.

customer interaction. However, they have also been labelled the “new sweatshops
of the service economy” or “white-collar factories”, driven by standardization and
rationalization (Fernie and Metcalf, 1998; Knights and McCabe, 2003). They are staffed
mainly by experienced public servants who have been moved into the new environment
(Bain, Taylor and Dutton, 2005; Huws, 2009; Pupo and Noack, 2009).
The literature on call centres can broadly be divided into the pessimistic and the
optimistic. The pessimistic strand has been largely influenced by Fernie and Metcalf
(1998), who saw this sort of work through a Foucauldian perspective. On the basis of
their study in the private sector, they saw call centres as the epitome of assembly line
production, with management using electronic surveillance to exercise total control
over the labour process. Silent surveillance through call recording makes it hard for
operators to know whether any conversation is being recorded or listened to or not,
and so makes direct supervision redundant as the operators are constantly under
surveillance. Poynter (2000) endorses this view, arguing that new forms of service work
embody practices once the preserve of assembly line and manual employees, routiniz-
ing and deskilling professional work. The form of organization once characteristic of
manual labour has rapidly diffused within industries previously associated with white-
collar workers and “mental” labour (Poynter, 2000, p. 151). This new deskilled pool
of labour does not need either qualifications or extensive training.
The optimists, most of whom are to be found in the new service manage-
ment literature, argue that the call centres are producing more empowered, semi-
professional, highly skilled and committed employees, delivering customized service
(Schneider and Bowen, 1999). Most of these optimistic accounts are endorsed by the
business practitioners who seek to spread call centre services. Taylor and Bain (1999)
emphasize the variation of the call centres in size, market orientation and so forth. In
observing the labour process of call centre work, many authors have described it as

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“deskilling” what was “a complex set of tasks”; however, Taylor et al. (2005) argue that
not all call centres are monotonous and deskilling, and that some are based on a quality
of service principle which stresses employee discretion in decision-making. Service
quality varies across the industry, depending on many factors such as size, sector and
the nature of the functions performed.
Many commentators associate aspects of call centre work with bad customer
service (Blunden, 2003). Some note that workers are increasingly treated as “human
robots” in these “McJobs” (Korczynski, 2001, p. 79), and portray contemporary
service work as fake, invasive, demeaning and highly routinized (Korczynski, 2001,
p. 80). Front-line workers experience “emotional alienation”, being required to hide
their unpleasant emotions and always put the customer first (Taylor, 1997). Prevalent
physical problems associated with call centre work include repetitive strain injury,
sleeplessness, voice loss and hearing problems. In working conditions, low pay, close
supervision, surveillance, monotonous work, boredom and unsociable hours are
common (Richardson, Belt and Marshal, 2000, p. 363). Some scholars have noted
high turnover and employee absenteeism in call centres as coping or resistance
strategies against these “dehumanising” working conditions (Mulholland, 2004).

Unionization at call centres

Non-standard employment arrangements are characteristic of call centres in many
parts of the world. These forms of employment are commonly categorized as
precarious work because they are insecure, unprotected and poorly paid. Generally,
where employment is precarious, union representation is non-existent, very low or
discouraged by the employer (Tucker, 2002). Shire, Holtgrewe and Kerst (2002)
noted that increased flexibility in working arrangements within the service sector
reflects an attempt to challenge the traditional collective restraints through a “liberal
employment model” which seeks to avoid the unions. Little knowledge has been
gathered about the role of trade unions in call centres, with research dominated
by an almost exclusive focus on work organization and management control. The
unionization of call centres has been seen as inhibited by the nature of the job, which
is based on individualistic work organization and reward systems. Call centre operators
are tied to their desks, deal with numerous calls and are mostly under heavy
supervision, which makes them hard to organize. The individualizing nature of call
centre working conditions, epitomized by individual contracts, results in workers
feeling discouraged about unions and union membership (Webster and Omar, 2003;
Stewart, 2005). Performance rewards are strongly determined by individual call
monitoring: the more calls the operator handles, the better. Bain and Taylor (2000)
have contested the “myth” of the decline of collective resistance within call centres.
They argue that call centre workers use their oppositional attitude and subversion to
resist in these individualized workplaces.

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Gorz (1982) suggests that individualism could be the starting point in rejecting
the current working order: “This rupture can only come from the individuals
themselves. The realm of freedom can never arise out of material processes; it can
only be established by a constitutive act which, aware of its free subjectivity, asserts
itself as an absolute end in itself within each individual” (Gorz, 1982, p. 74). Gorz’s
idea of individual agency has arguably been prevalent in the call centre industry,
noticeable through high turnover throughout the industry. This exit option has been
seen as the main resistance strategy applied at the individual level. According to
Gorz’s description of the neo-proletariat (Gorz, 1982, p. 69), call centre workers are
part of the non-class that can only resist the capitalist production system by breaking
away to liberate themselves from work. In a later publication Gorz (1999) suggested
that if trade unions see their only task as that of defending the interests of those
with stable jobs, they run the risk of deteriorating into a “neo-corporatist, conser-
vative force, as has occurred in many Latin American countries”. Instead, they should
engage with societal issues affecting the whole working class.
The youthful profile of call centre operators and empathy with their
customers seem to pose additional challenges for union organization in this
industry. Wray-Bliss argues that in “privileging customer relations over industrial
relations, frontline staff may be interpreted as contributing to the declining political
visibility and viability of unions” (2001, p. 46). Korczynski (2003) expands this
view with the notion of “communities of coping”, where capitalist consumptions
supersede the collective class solidarity propounded by Marx. According to this neo-
Weberian perspective, the presence of abusive and irate customers prompts the
emergence of informal “communities of coping” among workers to assist them to
cope in this contradictory environment in which they sometimes empathize with
customer complaints. These “communities of coping”, which are embedded in the
“collective emotional labour” shared by these front-line workers, then create a
potential solidarity from which trade unions can emerge (Korczynski, 2003, p. 71).
Korczynski posits that trade unionism at the front line should not be concerned
solely with bread-and-butter issues of pay and conditions but should also “acknowl-
edge the enmeshing of consumption and production that occurs in the service
work. A potentially potent sustaining ideology for trade unionism in the service
economy becomes the aim of simultaneously civilising production and consump-
tion – seeking to create not only decent jobs, but also decent services to deliver to
customers” (2007, p. 579). This means that trade unionism at the front line can
grow out of customer service issues, easing the strain both on front-line workers and
also on customers. The concept of “customer-oriented bureaucracies” (COB)
supports the notion that, in service work, the presence of the customer has socio -
logical significance. Worker satisfaction and customer satisfaction are interrelated.
Therefore, trade unions can usefully expand their scope beyond the basic issues of
pay and conditions.

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Local government call centres

Within South African municipalities, call centres are a recent phenomenon. Their
introduction was motivated by the Government’s quest for a more customer-centred
service delivery plan in compliance with the Batho Pele (“People first”) framework
outlined in the 1998 White Paper on Local Government (see Batho Pele, 2000). Since
the introduction of Batho Pele, government philosophy in public administration has
shifted, giving centre stage to the recipients of services as customers. NPM reforms
have been adopted, entailing the introduction of private sector business principles into
the management and delivery of public services. Performance management systems,
for example, have become mandatory for municipalities, under arrangements set out
in various pieces of legislation.2 These systems are viewed as a means through which
municipalities can improve organizational and individual performance to enhance
service delivery, and also as a means of promoting a responsive and performance-
based culture.
The Municipal Systems Act (2000) stipulates that local municipalities should
treat their residents as consumers. Chapter 6 of the Act states that the “municipality
must facilitate a culture of public service and accountability amongst staff … [and]
give members of the local municipality full and accurate information about the level
and standard of the municipal services they are entitled to receive”. Call centres are a
means by which the Batho Pele principle of access to information and services for
“customers” is being realized. It is worth noting that call centres serve a different
purpose from that of customer care centres. The call centre allows residents from
anywhere to call in with their queries and complaints, whereas the customer care
centres are walk-in centres located in different parts of the municipality to offer services
that cannot be resolved over the phone, for example rectifying incorrect bills.
Within most municipalities, call centres are designed to answer queries from
citizens about utilities accounts, water bills, emergency services, natural disasters,
service cut-offs and so forth, using an automatic call distributor (ACD) and interactive
voice response (IVR). At Johannesburg Metropolitan Municipality, for example,
organizational and structural transformation has transformed a network of helpdesks
into a fully fledged call centre. This shift has been accompanied by expectations that
these public call centres should have better working conditions and be less “alienating”
than if outsourced private operating call centres were used.

Call centre organization: The case of Joburg Connect

Joburg Connect is the largest call centre in South African local government and a role
model for other metropolitan municipalities. It has 120 workstations, most of which
(70 per cent) are occupied by black women between the ages of 20 and 38. It operates
around the clock, seven days a week and 365 days a year. Its main purpose is to

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centralize service access for customers, deal with queries by telephone, and handle
complaints in a standard and speedy fashion. The call centre is divided into two
sections: Emergency Connect and Care Connect. Emergency Connect operators
receive calls relating to life-threatening emergencies and dispatch ambulances, police,
fire engines and rescue vehicles in response. Care Connect is a customer relations call
centre used to assist the public with queries about municipal services, for example
billing issues, meter reading and traffic fines.
Findings revealed that in 2010–11 each Joburg Connect operator dealt with up
to 200 calls per shift, which means that one operator spent less than three minutes on
each call. During the day shift there are 96 workers (80 per cent capacity), whereas
on the night shift there are fewer than 20 (17 per cent capacity). However, these
statistics have been changing as a result of inaccuracies in water statements and bills
issued to customers. This topic will be discussed later in the chapter, under the causes
of stress in the call centre. Call centre operators are employed under full contract by
the City, which is a different arrangement from that typical of contracts in the separate
utilities call centre, which is run on commercial lines. However, the higher incentives
and pay in the utilities call centre are envied by those working in the City call centre.
Customer service centres such as Joburg Water, City Power and Joburg Metro
Police Department run in parallel with the City call centre. These call centres are not
linked, which has posed a challenge from the outset; nor are they situated under the
same roof, though they use the same IVR number in connecting all calls.3

Working conditions
Stress
It is well known that the call centre industry the world over is beset by high levels of
stress and high staff turnover, exacerbated within the local government context by the
experience of poor service delivery at the local level. Both Joburg Connect and NMM
call centre workers noted that they experienced considerable stress. A primary cause of
this was the continuing shortage of staff in both call centres. Joburg Connect has been
experiencing high turnover, and some of the terminated contracts were not immedi-
ately replaced by new ones owing to financial difficulties. “The whole municipality is a
mess; we are currently operating on less than 60 per cent capacity … because the
municipality refuses to replace those budgeted vacancies” (JC, SM 1). This comment
was echoed by other managers and agents within the Joburg Connect call centre, and
the lack of capacity was visible during the researchers’ visits to the call centre. The NMM
call centre was operating at almost full capacity, with usually 20 call centre operators
in the electricity section and a few open spaces waiting to be filled. A supervisor
here explained: “We usually call on our casuals during the peak periods … as the call
centre gets busy around pay days and during natural disasters” (NMM, Supervisor 1).

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On top of understaffing, another major challenge within the call centres was
absenteeism owing to high levels of sick leave. In both municipal call centres studied,
this proved to be a tactic operators used to relieve pressure and stress. Most admitted
that they take sick leave not because they are physically ill, but because the work is too
stressful. “People who take leave outnumber the ones at work. Some maybe are lazy,
but most are bored; it’s not nice to come to work and call centre work is stressful”
(JC, CCO 2).
The levels of stress that lead to absenteeism on this scale are partly the result of
poor communication within the organization. Working conditions have worsened as
expectations of service delivery on the part of the councils have risen. Local government
call centres, though (relatively) small and unionized, are stressful places to work because
the operators are seen not as call handlers, but rather as the “face of inefficient service
delivery”. The abuse they receive from irate customers is not based only on “bad customer
service” but is also about service delivery itself. Because of the lack of communication
between the back office and the call centre, operators have to answer for things about
which they are not informed, and so they sound “inefficient” to members of the public.
Having to deal with irritated customers and protect the council’s decisions makes this
job stressful for workers. Moreover, call centre workers become identified not only with
the municipality but with the public sector as a whole. One worker at Joburg Connect
seemed to have accepted these relations with customers, saying: “Threats and angry
customers are part of our job” (JC, CCO 1). However, some workers in the NMM call
centre who were accused of inefficiency and blamed for the national Government’s faults
regarded the insults and abuse from the public as racist. One agent quoted a customer
as saying: “All of you Thabo Mbeki government people, you don’t know what you are
doing there … You are so incompetent” (NMM, CCO 2).
It is clear from the research that call centre workers are not just “answering the
phone”: they have become “fire extinguishers” or “shock absorbers” who have to
smooth the relationship between the customer and the council. As customers call the
municipality, irritated about services and angrily searching for answers, they are met
with a voice that has to assure them that all is going to be well. “When the council
makes a decision that is very unpopular, we get more frustrated callers … which we
understand, but it’s not our fault” (JC, CCO 2).
This was evident when the energy supply company Eskom increased tariffs by
30 per cent in 2009, a move exacerbated by an inefficient billing system and power
supply problems. Call centre workers bore the brunt of customer dissatisfaction and
had to be spokespersons not only for the municipality but also for Eskom, which ended
up not answering calls to its own office. The burden on call centre operators was
worsened by the lack of communication between the back office and front-line workers.
Workers’ voices and accents were among the key factors contributing to the stress
they experienced. Operators identified their accents as the source of attack and abuse
by customers who immediately accused them of incompetence. “When they listen to

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your name and accent, then you get it” (NMM, CCO 3). The same point was
emphasized by an NMM customer care manager, who argued for training in voice and
telephone etiquette for workers. One of the operators explained that when she
complained about the lack of training: “You know us, hey … from disadvantaged
education background; when you get here and deal with English and Afrikaans
speaking customers you tend to be intimidated and not want to answer the calls”
(NMM, CCO 2).

Lack of training
There are no fixed criteria for recruitment, as long as candidates have knowledge of the
job and some basic customer service experience. Most of the managers seemed to think
that age was a big problem with call centre operators who had worked in the “old
culture of the organization”, which posed a challenge to the current “customer-
oriented” municipality. A top manager in the NMM stated: “The biggest challenge is
changing the attitudes of the employees towards this new customer-oriented approach
… It is easy to deal with new recruits, but the old staff has to be retrained and it is hard
to retrain those people” (NMM, SM 2).
One of the most common and effective ways of changing attitudes and culture in
an organization is through extensive training and development. In the local government
call centres, most of the managers were trained in the new customer care approach; but
they are not the ones who sit at the desk dealing with customers every day. Joburg
Connect operators complained that their training was not sufficient to deal with the
current water and electricity billing software crisis, which had become a source of
grievance to both customers and operators. “The impact of billing … basically call
volumes have skyrocketed because of incorrect bills. This has frustrated the staff
members, which results from a frustrated customer; this saw a backlog in our calls and
increased abandonment rate. Response times have tended to be longer” (JC, SM 2).
It is acknowledged by the managers that the inaccurate statements given to
customers have worsened working conditions in the call centre and further increased
the turnover of staff. This problem is not restricted to Johannesburg, as the billing
system in most municipalities is linked directly to the call centre’s function. Customers
anywhere, infuriated by the inaccuracy of their statements or by having their electricity
cut off, turn angrily to the first person they face representing the municipality and
insult them.

Poor communication between the front and back offices

Though managers seek to control workers, there is always space for resistance by
employees. Dropping the call of an irate customer, putting it on loudspeaker and
letting the customer talk unattended, or “working to rule”, thus restricting both the

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information and the courtesy given to the customer, are the most common forms of
resistance. This kind of behaviour by call centre operators has been provoked by poor
communication between different departments of the municipalities and/or between
the departments and the call centre. According to one NMM manager, “Front-line
office should work well with back-office but there is lack of communication between
the two which makes call centre work very difficult … People work in silos here”
(NMM, SM 3).
One instance of this failure to communicate concerned an appearance by the
director of the NMM electricity department on a radio programme the night before
the researchers visited the call centre. Answering questions about electricity supply on
a Port Elizabeth based radio station, he apparently gave the call centre number for
more enquiries. The issue he was questioned about on the radio was not about
electricity faults, but about the poor quality of service delivery. The call centre then
received a high volume of calls from people about their lack of access to electricity.
After answering one of these calls, a supervisor, looking lost and shocked at the same
time, was very embarrassed that she had not known about the radio appearance:
“When did Mr Sompete4 go to this station? How come he never told us about this
[shaking her head]?” (NMM, Supervisor 2).
Joburg Connect workers have gone as far as saying: “Customers teach us lots of
things that are not communicated to us by the management” (JC, CCO 2). Poor
communication forms one of the sources of frustration and pressure in the call centre
environment as the primary task of staff members is the dispersal of information.
“You know what is happening in the call centre, the customer teaches you lots of
things. You then pretend as if you know because you are trying to cover up for the
municipality, and then you run to the supervisor who knows nothing as well because
there is no communication between the supervisors and the managers” (JC, CCO 3).
Communication should be a priority in a call centre in order to avoid customers
becoming angry and embarrassing or abusing operators. As things stand, the operators
are insulted for their lack of knowledge and for being purely message-takers, who
cannot actually help at all. The most interesting observation on this topic was that
poor communication was not only evident within the organization, but was also
reported to apply to the union representatives who were supposed to inform and
protect the call centre operators. Some of the operators felt isolated from and even on
occasion compromised by their union.

Union collective action and limitations on worker

participation
According to Omar (2008), it is very difficult for call centre workers to strike owing
to the “individualized” nature of their jobs. Collective action is constrained by
individualized employment contracts and the nature of the work carried out (Benner,

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Lewis and Omar, 2007). Although workers at one of the call centres operated by the
private communications company Telkom did attempt a strike, the calls were simply
redirected to another call centre within Telkom. Thus workers in the call centre
industry are at a disadvantage, for employers can easily avoid the impact of a strike
(Omar, 2008). Some limited action has been taken. In Joburg Connect, workers
participated in a strike organized by SAMWU in October 2007, leaving the call centre
operating with 50 per cent of the staff; and an operator in the NMM said: “We do
strike, but only during lunchtime, and picket, but we cannot leave our workstation as
this is considered as the emergency services” (NMM, CCO 3).
Most of the workers interviewed identified loyalty and job protection as the
major reasons for joining the union. Despite these reasons, the union was deemed
invisible in the call centres. Although many operators wanted to participate in union
activities, their opportunities to do so were limited by the nature of their jobs and time
constraints. One of them even suggested that “if meetings were during the time where
all of us can make it, I’m sure we will be able to participate ... but in our job it is
impossible for all of us to attend [or] even to picket when there is a strike because we
are more like essential service ... If we go picketing, we’ll have to go during lunchtime
and get back to work” (NMM, CCO 3).
Unions will need to deal with call centres differently from other working
environments because of the unique working conditions. They should address issues
relating to gender, shift work, transport home after late night shifts, the stress asso-
ciated with management’s time control and training to deal with stress. Greater
SAMWU visibility in call centres could also assist in building trust among union
members, some of whom termed their shop stewards “shop stupid” because of their
perceived ineffectiveness.
When asked about the role of call centres in the municipality with regard to
service delivery, one SAMWU organizer said: “In South Africa, people cannot afford
R10.00 prepaid electricity. How do you expect these people to call a call centre and
wait for a long time without money? Call centres are a convenience for the rich and a
nightmare for the poor … How can you become a customer still struggling for the
basic needs? Water is not a luxury; it’s a necessity” (SAMWU, EC 1).
A representative of the SAMWU Gauteng Provincial structure went further:
“Call centres are just message-takers who cannot help you or provide any feedback.
They are just glorified PAs of other departments; there is no link between call centres
and the other municipal entities” (SAMWU, GP Rep. 1). Both these respondents
pointed to the “uselessness” of call centres – not only to the public, but also to the
workers themselves, who lack any capacity to assist the public.
SAMWU officials appeared to lack knowledge of how much local government
is now being conducted through call centres. It is, moreover, a matter of urgency that
they conduct their own research about the number of call centre workers within their
union. Hitherto, this category of workers has been largely ignored, because they are

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not present in every municipality. They are treated as front desk or reception staff,
differing only that they are specialized in dealing with telephone enquiries (SAMWU,
GP Rep. 2).
This deficiency was recognized by another union official who acknowledged that
this group of workers has never been explicitly covered by the union, which historically
has focused on organizing blue-collar workers within the municipality. “Maybe this is
the start of the conversation about this section of workers. We need to set up a national
approach and put it in our agenda, even in the bargaining council. They are [a] unique
section of workers within SAMWU. Maybe they have been overlooked; nothing much
has been done by the union” (SAMWU, JHB 1).
The union is facing a number of challenges with regard to the reforms in local
government entailed by programmes such as iGoli 2002. Poor relations between the
union and the managers of the utilities were mentioned by several speakers. This
tension was observed by Barchiesi (2007, p. 64), who noted that utility managers
tended to be ambivalent towards collective bargaining and unions in general. This
attitude might also lead to inter-union conflicts and competition as the utilities attract
unions from outside local government boundaries. For example, the South African
Transport and Allied Workers Union (SATAWU) recruits bus drivers in local
government, who may also be members of SAMWU. “SATAWU and SAMWU ...
though we are under COSATU [Congress of South African Trade Unions], these
unclear jurisdictions affect the strength of union organizations as we now fight for
members ourselves ... We have a court case tomorrow directly linked to this issue”
(SAMWU, JHB 2).
Similarly, while the Communication Workers Union (CWU) organizes workers
in the communication industry, since the call centres are part of local government they
fall under SAMWU. One of the senior SAMWU officials was very confident that
SAMWU would remain pre-eminent in local government, dismissing the threat from
other unions:

SATAWU and CWU can never take over from our jurisdiction because each
union has its own constitution stipulating exactly where it will start in terms of the
jurisdiction ... For example, there are police in local government, but that is
POPCRU’s [the Police and Prisons Civil Rights Union’s] territory. We can’t go just
because they are on local government ... The scope for each union is defined – whether
public or private – call centre is the function of local government, so they will need
to prove a demarcation dispute at the CCMA [Commission for Conciliation,
Mediation and Arbitration] to prove that it is their jurisdiction. (SAMWU, JHB 1)

The new customer-centred workplace within local government seems to present both
new challenges to and opportunities for mobilization. One SAMWU representative
recognized the impact of the new customer-driven ethos on both working conditions
and citizens in general in pointing out:

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Customerization worsens the working conditions of municipal workers because they

now seek to maximize profit with less workers to increase revenue and impressive
fiscal policies. For example, we’ve got this case now here [showing me a document
about the working hours and conditions in the local government]. Library workers
are now required to work on Saturdays as well and given that day during the week
without pay. This was done without consultation with the union, but we oppose that.
Workers are supposed to be given a choice whether to work on a weekend or not
and paid for the overtime they worked. This business rule of more [work] with fewer
workers is wrong. (SAMWU, EC 1)

Echoing this point, one worker complained: “We work Monday to Monday and
sometimes get the day off during the week. When you start questioning this, they just
say read the contract” (NMM, CCO 1).
Given this noticeable deterioration in employment conditions offered by the
formerly “secure and fair” employer, SAMWU needs to move beyond its traditional
concerns and probe the growing number of socio-political questions which have
strengthened its course in history. Von Holdt (2002) and Barchiesi (2007), however,
seemed pessimistic about the prospects for social movement unionism within the
democratic dispensation buttressed by labour’s alliance with the ruling party. The
radicalism and militancy of SAMWU that were apparent in its opposition to
privatization (see Barchiesi, 2007) seem to have diminished. Nevertheless, through
engaging with service delivery SAMWU can provide support and relief to the call
centre workers who have been abused by angry citizens. Shortcomings in service
delivery, moreover, do not only affect call centre operators at work, for they too are
service users. For this reason they sometimes express sympathy with customers.
A case in point was the billing crisis of 2010/11, when Johannesburg City
Council came under media attack after issuing inflated water and electricity bills.
Workers were then blamed by the senior managers who denied the existence of a crisis
in the municipality, arguing: “It is not really accurate to say we have a billing crisis,
but rather to say we have a customer-service challenge … If you say billing crisis, you
get the impression we have cash-flow problems, and that was never so … until we re-
establish our credibility with customers, that will remain a problem.”5
The silence of SAMWU throughout this crisis was heavily criticized by both
shop stewards and operators, who pointed to the close relations between SAMWU
and municipal officials as the source of compromise on issues relating to the workers.
Close political ties with the ruling party were then cited by senior SAMWU officials
themselves as the diluting force in their struggle for the workers. For example, before
and during the introduction of Project Phakama in the City of Johannesburg,6
SAMWU at first resisted but later accepted the decision by the council to implement
the project. This generated great disappointment with the union among call centre
operators, who argued that union self-interest had separated the leadership from the
rank and file: “The workers were seriously compromised in this whole period …

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SAMWU never tried enough to stop the implementation of the Phakama Project”
(JC, CCO 1).
Barchiesi (2007) rightly observed the weakening of the union through its
alliance with the ruling party, casualisation and fragmented collective bargaining due to
municipal restructuring. Though the wages of call centre workers in Johannesburg munic-
ipality are regulated at the national level under the South African Local Government
Association bargaining council, inequalities have been noted, with the utilities call
centre paying more and offering better working conditions and benefits. After the imple-
mentation of Phakama, this meant call centre workers performing the same tasks in the
same building were paid differently because some were working for utilities and some
were not. This affected morale among the call centre workers and collective solidarity
among SAMWU members within the workplace: “The major challenge, as I have
mentioned, it’s salaries. The city pays less than these utilities, and the terms of employ-
ment and conditions of work are completely different. For example, they enjoy a
13th cheque and paid maternity leave, but the union can’t do anything at this level;
such things need to be addressed at the national bargaining council” (SAMWU, JHB 2).
This finding was confirmed by Joburg Connect operators, who argued that
utilities offered career opportunities not available to those in the City call centre as well
as better pay and benefits: “The [utilities] employees get paid more than the City
employees. There is growth there; not more than two years in call centre. Here, there
are people who have been here since it started and they will say the old staff does not
want to work ... Managers of those entities open up doors for them and recommend
their staff members” (JC, CCO 3).

Recommendations for union organization and

representation
SAMWU’s apparent lack of knowledge of the number of workers working in call
centres and the issues affecting them reflect the union’s disregard of this new customer-
centred workplace. As a majority union, with the politicized nature of workplaces in
South Africa working to its advantage, SAMWU nevertheless cannot be complacent.
It needs to conduct its own research about the number of local government call
centres, which appears to be growing as metropolitan municipalities across the country
convert their helpdesks into fully fledged call centres.
SAMWU did seem to be aware of the lack of training and development among
this group of workers. These matters should be included among collective bargaining
issues, for training and development can boost workers’ confidence and lower their
stress levels. Also lacking are counselling services, which are vital for psychologically
abused workers and could improve both attendance and morale among the demor-
alized workforce. SAMWU could further engage the municipality to secure better
working conditions for call centre workers, who appear to be particularly vulnerable

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to health and safety problems (Taylor et al., 2003). All these issues could be raised
with the employer by SAMWU, along with the matter of clear job descriptions to
improve workers’ performance.
SAMWU’s initiative in putting pressure on the municipality to bring contract
workers into permanent employment in 2007 should be acknowledged. This is a
significant step towards increasing the number of union members. The atypical
contracts governing call centre workers make them vulnerable to poor wages. When
wage issues are pursued by the union, the needs of this category of workers should be
addressed. In the Johannesburg municipality, call centre operators working for the
utilities refused to be treated as part of the Joburg Connect call centre, because they
enjoyed better working conditions and wages. This discrepancy needs to be abolished,
as all these operators belong to the same union; doing so will increase a sense of unity
among SAMWU members in the same or similar jobs.
Call centre workers are not easily accessible to the union. The strict working
hours make it difficult for workers to attend union meetings. SAMWU should
improve and extend its communication channels between these workers and union
representatives. These should include routine union inspections of the workplace and
visibility in worker canteens during break times. Call centre workers’ low expectations
of the union may change if the union makes itself accessible and provides information
on workers’ rights and benefits.
The union should work on its image, conveying a message relevant to the needs
of call centre workers. It also needs to address recent allegations of corruption and
mismanagement of funds, said to have influenced the Johannesburg branch against
participating in the 2011 strike. SAMWU’s challenge in “representing the changing
municipal workforce” has been noted by Barchiesi (2007, p. 71), and many observers
have confirmed the growing representation of managers within the union, which may
challenge the union’s capacities and loyalties: “SAMWU has neglected its duties;
unions want to retain members and not to expose them … nepotism, bedroom
promotions are all part of the frustration here” (JC, CCO 4). The feeling of being
compromised for the sake of the union’s political gains further spreads these negative
sentiments among the rank and file.
Call centre workers are situated at the intersection of customer, council, citizen
and service delivery. This means that the union’s campaigns have to encompass all
elements of this nexus. While some of the issues highlighted above relate to technical
matters, most of the discontent among this group of workers seems to relate to socio-
political questions. This brings us back to the question of community unionism or
social movement unionism. SAMWU’s militancy, though neutralized by the political
alliance with the ruling party, may prove to be a key in addressing the current stresses
on call centre workers. The union’s strategy should include confronting citizen service
delivery issues (community-based concerns) as well as worker grievances about their
experiences of working in call centres (workplace struggles). The negative effects of

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socio-political problems experienced by the citizen translate into the call centre
worker’s experience of work. Therefore a deliberate widening of the union’s scope of
action would yield broader results.

Conclusion
As government elevates the customer as sovereign, trade unions should be responsive
to the experience of call centre workers. The precarious nature of public call centre
work limits unionization and demands new union strategies to organize and represent
the growing numbers of call centre workers. The issues of high stress levels, high
turnover, understaffing, unequal wages and lack of communication from all levels of
the organization require a comprehensive trade union strategy. Call centre work is
individualizing not only labour but also the citizen by removing direct contact with
the politicians accountable for service delivery. This is why we argue that, in
responding to the issues raised by call centres, trade unions will need to revise their
community unionism approach and deal with service provision problems in order to
improve the well-being of call centre workers. Given the rising number of public sector
call centres, more research needs to be conducted within this sector. Little literature
exists on public call centres in South Africa, and so this chapter is explorative and
descriptive. In the light of the global trend towards the increasing use of call centres,
the working conditions of call centre workers are likely to continue to be a cause for
concern. More work needs to be done in studying public call centres as a unique
workplace attached to the bureaucracy, distinct from those in the commercial sector
and requiring different tools of analysis to capture the labour process.

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Appendix 4.1 List of interviewees (with pseudonyms used)

Municipality/union Position Number Name Date of interview

NMM SM 1 Thamsanqa 02/10/08

NMM SM 2 Andile 02/10/08
NMM SM 3 Ondela 08/09/08
NMM Supervisor 1 Jessica 11/09/08
NMM Supervisor 2 Ngwanya 04/08/08
SAMWU SAMWU EC 1 Chumile 05/08/08
SAMWU SAMWU NMM 2 Mphumzi 06/08/08
NMM CCO 1 Kago 04/08/08
NMM CCO 2 Carol 04/08/08
NMM CCO 3 Rhonda 04/08/08
JC SM 1 Felicia 04/08/10
JC SM 2 Amandla 06/08/10
JC CCO 1 Kromotso 09/08/10
JC CCO 2 Kholiswa 09/08/10
JC CCO 3 Thuli 04/07/11
JC CCO 4 Sqhamo 05/07/11
SAMWU SAMWU JHB 1 Denson 11/08/10
SAMWU SAMWU JHB 2 Vusumzi 11/08/10
SAMWU SAMWU GP Rep. 1 Mahlubi 04/07/11
SAMWU SAMWU GP Rep. 2 Petros 05/07/11
SAMWU Shop Steward JC 1 Mandla 06/07/11
Key: NMM = Nelson Mandela Bay Metropolitan Municipality; SAMWU = South African Municipal Workers Union;
JC = Joburg Connect; SM = Senior Manager; EC = Eastern Cape; CCO = Call Centre Operator; JHB = Johannesburg;
GP = Gauteng Province; Rep. = Representative.

Notes
1 A list of the interviewees quoted in the text, with explanations of abbreviations used, is provided in appendix 4.1.
2Municipal Systems Act 32 of 2000, Municipal Planning and Performance Management Regulations 2000, Municipal Finance
Act 53 of 2003 and Municipal Performance Regulations for Municipal Managers and Managers Directly Accountable to
Municipal Managers of 2006.
3 At the time of writing, the call centres from different utilities were being integrated under Programme Phakama, which seeks

to unify the revenue services and billing system under one database.
4 Not his real name.
5Roland Hunter, Executive Director, Finance and Economic Development, City of Johannesburg, quoted in Mail and Guardian,
3 Feb. 2011.
6 This collection of initiatives uses a comprehensive software program to streamline operations across the metropolis.

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WHY LABOUR UNIONS HAVE FAILED

BANGLADESH’S GARMENT WORKERS
5

Zia Rahman and Tom Langford

Introduction
The manufacture of ready-made garments (RMG) for global markets took hold in
Bangladesh in the 1980s because the country had wage levels among the lowest in the
world and a huge reserve army of labour available for exploitation, and its policy-
makers were averse to introducing labour standards and allowing unionization of this
sector because of a fear of losing foreign currency earnings. The Bangladeshi public’s
perception of the existing union movement as corrupt was used to justify the resistance
to further unionization. Consequently Bangladesh soon became a preferred manufac-
turing location for many outsourcing transnational apparel companies (Dannecker,
2002; Kabeer, 2004; Rock, 2001a; Siddiqi, 2004). Here we see an illustration of the
race-to-the-bottom thesis of globalization. The ruling elites in Bangladesh were able
to pursue such policies effectively because of their control of an overdeveloped State,
a product of colonialism (Alavi, 1979).
By 2010/11 there were 5,150 garment factories in Bangladesh employing
3.6 million people (see table 5.1). Yet labour unions in Bangladesh largely ignored the
RMG sector in the 1980s and efforts at unionization since 1990 have had very limited
success. This chapter explains why labour unions have failed Bangladesh’s garment
workers over the past 30 years. It is based upon a review of the historical literature,
extensive documentary research, and in-depth interviews with labour union officials,
industrial relations experts and garment workers conducted by the first author in
Dhaka in 2007.
Over the past three decades the RMG sector has become crucial to Bangladesh’s
economy. In 2007 Bangladesh became the fourth largest RMG-producing country in
the world after China, the EU-27 and Turkey (Mirdah, 2010). In the same year,
Bangladesh ranked fifth in the list of RMG exporters to the United States. The RMG

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Table 5.1 The garment industry in Bangladesh: Numbers of factories

and employees, 1983/84 to 2010/11

Year No. of No. of Year No. of No. of

garment factories employees (000) garment factories employees (000)

1983/84 134 40 1997/98 2 726 1 500

1984/85 384 115 1998/99 2 963 1 500
1985/86 594 198 1999/2000 3 200 1 600
1986/87 629 283 2000/01 3 480 1 800
1987/88 685 306 2001/02 3 618 1 800
1988/89 725 317 2002/03 3 760 2 000
1989/90 759 335 2003/04 3 957 2 000
1990/91 834 402 2004/05 4 107 2 000
1991/92 1 163 582 2005/06 4 220 2 200
1992/93 1 537 804 2006/07 4 490 2 400
1993/94 1 839 827 2007/08 4 743 2 800
1994/95 2 182 1 200 2008/09 4 925 3 500
1995/96 2 353 1 290 2009/10 5 063 3 600
1996/97 2 503 1 300 2010/11 5 150 3 600

Source: Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA), http://www.bgmea.com.bd [accessed
21 June 2012].

sector contributes a staggering 78 per cent of Bangladesh’s foreign exchange earnings,

keeps many associated service businesses going and provides employment to millions
of workers, approximately 80 per cent of them women, who otherwise would be hard
pressed to find waged labour (BGMEA, 2012; Khan, 2008).
When transnational apparel companies first contracted production in
Bangladesh, the country’s textile sector did not meet international standards and did
not produce related accessories such as zippers, buttons, threads and labelling, so that
Bangladeshi entrepreneurs had to import fabrics and related accessories from other
countries. Therefore, for a long time the RMG industry in Bangladesh depended
upon its one and only so-called comparative advantage: cheap and abundant female
labour (Kabeer, 2004). Every year since the 1980s, thousands upon thousands of
young rural women have migrated to major Bangladeshi cities and been absorbed
into the burgeoning RMG factories (Ahmed, 2004; Kabeer, 1991, 2004; McCarthy
and Feldman, 1983). These rural-to-urban migrants have tended to be illiterate and
deferential towards male authority figures, and have continued to think of the rural
areas they come from as their permanent homes. Gender is therefore an integral
dimension of the story of labour unions in the RMG industry in Bangladesh, even
though it is not an analytical focus of this chapter.

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The remainder of this introduction summarizes our argument, which is then

presented in more detail in the following three sections of the chapter. Those three
sections, respectively:
• establish an understanding of the various historical forces that shaped labour
unions in Bangladesh up to the 1980s;
• identify the causes for the failure of labour unions to organize and represent the
interests of the RMG proletariat over the past three decades; and
• assess the implications of the massive wave of protest by Bangladeshi garment
workers in 2006 for the current status and capacity of labour unions in the sector.
Labour unions first developed in Bangladesh in the jute and cotton textile
industries during the British colonial period.1 These unions provided stability for the
colonial enterprises. However, they soon became part of the broader anti-colonial
movement dominated by left and nationalist political parties. This process represented
a particular type of politicization of labour unions: factory-based trade unionism was
virtually absent and unions were key organizations on the national political stage.
Political unionism, dominated by the left political parties, and the labour unions’
prominence in the jute and textile industries continued even after the end of colonial rule.
However, the tradition of left political unionism was challenged in the 1960s by the
military dictator General Ayub Khan. He introduced factory-level unionism as part of an
anti-communist campaign and with the aim of extending the military regime’s hegemony
over the working class (Ahmad, 1969; Siddique and Akkas, 2003; Umar, 2006). After
Bangladesh gained independence from Pakistan in 1971, all its industries were national-
ized (Akash, 1998; Sobhan and Ahmad, 1980). This led to the politicization of labour
unions by the ruling party (Hossain, 2005; Umar and Kabir, 1978), a pattern that
persisted during the two major military regimes that existed between 1975 and 1990
(Ahmed, 1995). Whereas the leftist parties prior to the 1960s had used politicized unions
to promote their oppositional political agendas, the ruling parties of recent decades have
used politicized unions to support their hold on power.
During the first military regime after independence (1975–81), the country’s
economic policy based on nationalization was abandoned in favour of a neoliberalism
that flourished during the second military regime (1981–90), led by General Ershad
(Ahmed, 1995; Akash, 1998). It was during this latter period that garment manufac-
turing began to shift to Bangladesh. At this point the labour movement was incapable
of mounting organizing drives. During the period of military dictatorship, many of
Bangladesh’s radical political unions were replaced by unions attached to the ruling party,
which were characterized by corruption, nepotism and the development of a self-
interested labour aristocracy (Ahmed, 1995). This situation created a very negative image
of labour unionism among urban, educated citizens and civil society groups, and as a
result the conscience constituency for progressive labour union activism has been very

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small since the 1970s. At the same time, because of the neoliberal economic policy
introduced by the military regimes, the private sector became the engine of growth and
private entrepreneurs did everything in their power to prohibit union activities.
Furthermore, the mass media propagated both the ruling elites’ views and the sentiments
of the urban, educated middle class in favour of union-free development of the RMG
industry. In addition, the State indirectly supported private sector employers by not
enforcing regulations on labour standards.
Unionization of RMG workers remained stagnant into the 2000s, despite the
fact that employment in the industry grew by an astounding 500 per cent between
1990/91 and 2006/07. However, it seemed likely to receive a big boost after a massive
and chaotic protest by thousands of RMG workers in Dhaka in May 2006. This mass
action occurred in sympathy with worker actions at two factories. At F.S. Sweater,
workers had gone on strike on 10 May 2006 because of the non-payment of wages.
Two of the strike leaders were arrested on 18 May and the next day a worker was shot
and killed by the police. Meanwhile, workers at a second factory, Universal Knitting
Garments Ltd, had been locked out on 18 May after management suddenly refused
to engage in negotiations with their union representatives. On 22 May over 5,000
workers protested outside the Universal Knitting gates, joined by many other garment
workers on their lunch breaks. Together the two independent, leftist unions involved
in the F.S. Sweater and Universal Knitting disputes organized nine separate protest
rallies on 23 May 2006 in order to mobilize as many sympathizers as possible. These
protest rallies were repressed by management security forces throughout Dhaka, thus
provoking militant counter-action by numerous groups of workers. The entirety of
Dhaka City and its adjacent areas became a battlefield because the workers were
extremely militant and enraged, and as a result normal life ground to a standstill.
On 23 May approximately 16 factories were burnt, 50 factories were vandalized,
200 vehicles were ransacked and a worker was killed (Cheng, 2006). Such militant
mass action had never previously been seen in the Bangladesh RMG industry.
The Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA)
initially called this movement a conspiracy against the booming industry. However,
the gravity of events soon prompted them to meet with the Sramik Karmachari
Okkyo Parishad (SKOP), the umbrella organization of the country’s national labour
federations, and the Government. After three meetings of a tripartite committee, an
historic memorandum of understanding was signed on 12 June 2006 whereby the
BGMEA accepted all the unions’ demands, including an increase in wages, an appoint-
ment letter for all workers, a weekly day off, female maternity leave, withdrawal of all
disciplinary cases against workers, and the right of trade unions to represent garment
workers. On 22 June another agreement was signed between the BGMEA and 16
garment workers’ unions highlighting the same concessions.
In the end, however, the May 2006 movement was only partially successful. Its
greatest success was in challenging the previously unquestioned ownership rights of

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Why labour unions have failed Bangladesh’s garment workers

the RMG factory proprietors. This was first seen when the frightened owners took to
the streets on 23 May to defend their property. It also represented the first time that the
Government had become a party to an agreement between employers and unions.
A third success of the movement was the formation of a minimum wage board that raised
the minimum wage for garment workers by over 75 per cent. Nevertheless, much of the
promise of the May 2006 labour movement remains unrealized to this date (August
2012). Some RMG factories, particularly those in the export processing zones (EPZs),
have implemented the terms of the tripartite agreement, but the majority of factories
have not. Although the State was for the first time a signatory of an agreement between
the BGMEA and garment workers’ labour unions, it has not taken steps to ensure the
full implementation of the agreement. The two leftist unions that helped to organize the
strikes at F.S. Sweater and Universal Knitting continue to be marginalized by the State,
employers and other unions. Finally, the collaborationist unions affiliated with the
BGMEA acted to undercut the workers’ initial demand in 2006 for a minimum wage
of 3,000 taka (BDT) (much higher than the BDT1,662.50 that was eventually
implemented in October 2006).2 The final section of this chapter considers what it would
take for labour unions to break this impasse and begin making significant and continuing
contributions to the welfare of Bangladesh’s RMG proletariat.

Labour unions as shaped by colonialism, the

anti-colonial struggle and military dictatorships
Labour movements and labour unions in Bangladesh were shaped and strongly influ enced
by the two centuries of British colonial rule in the Indian subcontinent, lasting from 1757
until 1947. In colonial India, the expanding cotton industry in Bombay and jute indus-
try in Bengal were the early sites for labour movements (Ahmad, 1969; Basu, 1993; Read,
1931; Saha, 1978; Sharma, 1963). The labour organi zations that formed in colonial India
had five distinctive characteristics. First, they were largely organized as the arms of leftist
or nationalist political parties engaged in anti-colonial politics. As a consequence, the early
labour unions in India were unable to develop a distinctive labour philosophy like
Revisionism in Germany or Fabianism in England (Basu, 1993; Saha, 1978; Sharma,
1963). Second, most of the membership did not strongly identify with labour organiza-
tions because the new industrial working class maintained an unbroken link with its rural
origins and thus was slow to develop the urban industrial proletarian culture that is cru-
cial for any working-class organization. As Read noted:
The effect of the Industrial Revolution [in Europe] was to create very rapidly a perma-
nent urban population, completely cut off from the countryside, dependent for their work,
homes, health and recreation on the cities. In India, even after eighty years and more
of industrial organization in the chief centers, the factory population still continues to
ebb and flow from village to city, and from city to village, preferring with the wisdom of
the east the fields and open skies to the city alleys and the street lamps. (1931, p. 4)

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Third, caste, ethnic and religious stratifications were superimposed on the newly develop-
ing capitalist relations, making it difficult to create united labour organizations. For
instance, during the heyday of industrialization in colonial India there were many riots
between Hindus and Muslims even when workers of the two religious groups shared a
similar class situation.3 Fourth, the workers lacked previous experience of organizing
(that is, there were few rural popular movements at the time), and most of them lacked
formal education (Das, 1923); indeed, the 1931 Royal Commission of Labour noted
that the almost universal illiteracy of the industrial proletariat posed significant barriers
to labour organization (Read, 1931, p. 52). Finally, the ethos of the feudal period was
reproduced when powerful elites acted as the saviours of the poor masses in the absence
of legal rules and regulations to ensure justice and rights (Etienne, 1979). Extreme
allegiance of the worker towards the proprietor created a paternalistic ma–bap relation-
ship.4 Overall, these five factors during the colonial period tended to create a transient,
divided and dependent working class, and labour organizations that neglected the
day-to-day exploitation and oppression of workers.
The politicization of labour was particularly prevalent in the decade just prior to
the independence of India. During this period, three new labour federations were
established as alternatives to the All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC). Hussain
Shahid Suhrawardy formed the Bengal National Chamber of Labour (BNCL) in
1937, when he was labour minister in the Muslim League Government in Bengal, as
a pro-Government labour organization acting as an arm of the incumbent regime.
Similarly, and also in 1937, when in power in the seven Hindu majority provinces,
the Indian National Congress formed the Indian National Trade Union Congress
(INTUC) (Ahmad, 1969; Sharma, 1963). Finally, in 1941 M.N. Roy formed the
Indian Federation of Labour (IFL) in order to promote India’s involvement on the side
of the Allies in the Second World War.5 It is noteworthy that each one of these three
newly formed umbrella labour organizations was organized under the aegis of a ruling
party, and in all three cases their main purpose was to help sustain the political line
and power of the respective ruling party rather than to concentrate on the well-being
of the working class. This legacy of a multiplicity of politicized labour unions, as well
as recurring conflicts among competing labour elites, is one of the key historical
consequences of the colonial period.
The formation of Pakistan as a nation in 1947 was very peculiar, since histor-
ically West and East Pakistan were divided by distinctly different patterns of language,
ethnicity and culture. On the whole, while the political leadership in West Pakistan
was conservative and absolutely served the interests of the feudal elites, the leader-
ship of East Pakistan was relatively liberal and connected to the rising middle class.
While the majority of the West Pakistani people followed a relatively orthodox Islamic
ideology, East Pakistani people were relatively secular; while the mother tongue of
West Pakistan was Urdu, East Pakistani people spoke Bengali; and while historically
West Pakistan had a conservative and relatively homogeneous cultural ethos, East

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Pakistan had a diverse and humanitarian cultural heritage (Ahmad, 1975; Umar,
2004). After independence, West Pakistan became the power locus of Pakistan;
conservative and feudal values dominated every sphere of society, and East Pakistan
became in effect an internal colony of West Pakistan (Ahmad, 1975; Hossain, 2005;
Mamoon and Ray, 1998; Sobhan, 2003; Umar, 2004). The period immediately
following the creation of Pakistan was also marked by the emergence of US hegemony
and the Cold War between the United States and Soviet Union, throwing the
world into turmoil. The ideology of the ruling elites in Pakistan was in line with US
economic and political policies, and these elites started suppressing the communists
and other radical politicians in Bengal (East Pakistan) where progressive politics were
relatively strong (Ahmad, 1969; Umar, 2004).
From 1947 the main labour leadership in Pakistan was in the hands of so-called
liberals who were directly or indirectly associated with the ruling Muslim League.
Hence the nature and actions of labour unions and labour movements during the
early years of independent Pakistan were influenced by state patronage. The number
of labour movements grew significantly in these years: about 250 unions were formed
in which 200,000 workers registered with the Registrar of Trade Unions (Ahmad,
1969, p. 42). However, during these years labour unions were permeated by politi-
cization, nepotism, corruption, splits and the cult of leadership. Furthermore, the
labour leadership was dominated by conservatives; indeed, the main labour federation,
the All Pakistan Confederation of Labour (APCOL), was guided and directed by the
then labour minister, Dr Abdul Motaleb Malik. It is interesting that within three
years of independence many labour federations, claiming to represent the workers of
East Pakistan, were formed because of personal and political conflicts among leaders.
This was the period when the main labour unions were preoccupied with state
patronage and labour leaders were mainly concerned with personal gain rather than the
interests of the workers. Another significant feature is that the major labour unions
were led by people belonging to middle-class and professional groups who took
unionism as a career; no leadership was developed from among the workers themselves
(Ahmad, 1969; Umar, 2004).
During the late 1950s, labour organizations were directed and organized by the
major political parties and hence labour movements became even more politicized. For
example, in 1956 when the Bangladesh Awami League (or Awami League for short)
came to the fore in East Pakistan, many labour leaders and workers joined this new
party since it seemed to be a labour party (Ahmad, 1969). In 1958, after martial law
was declared by General Ayub Khan, all kinds of trade union politics were banned and
a large number of labour leaders and workers were arrested (Ahmad, 1969; Hossain,
2005; Umar, 2006). Even so, leftist labour leaders tried to reorganize various unions
during the martial law period. The Awami League, as the emerging popular party at
that time, also initiated various political movements against the military dictator and
the continuing oppression of East Pakistan by West Pakistan; many of those political

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movements were organized and launched by labour leaders and workers (Ahmad,
1969; Mamoon and Ray, 1998; Ziring, 1992).
Between 1966 and 1969, Pakistan was in a serious political crisis. On the
one hand, the military dictator tried to consolidate his regime by repressing political
leaders, students, labour leaders and workers; on the other hand, oppositional groups
launched a series of concerted street protests that eventually forced the military dictator
to hand over power to another general, Yahiya Khan. In November 1968, the charis-
matic political leader Maulana Bhashani urged the rural poor to gherao (surround
or blockade) various corrupt government officials in the rural areas, and since then
gherao movements have become popular tools of protest in Bangladesh. During the
anti-Ayub movement in 1969, the urban industrial workers applied this gherao strategy
to intimidate and coerce the employers, with the support of other social forces,
especially students (Ahmad, 1969; Mamoon and Ray, 1998; Umar, 2006). It is
therefore understandable that the nationalist political struggle, headed by the Awami
League’s charismatic leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, dominated labour struggles
between 1969 and 16 December 1971, when Bangladesh secured its independence.
There were three additional important features of labour politics in East Pakistan
between 1947 and 1971. First, both the International Confederation of Free Trade
Unions (ICFTU) and the American Federation of Labor–Congress of Industrial
Organizations (AFL-CIO) were very active in Bangladesh. As a result, the East Pakistan
Federation of Labour (EPFL) became affiliated to the ICFTU. When the EPFL
acrimoniously split into three factions in 1960, “each one of them declared that the
others had taken thousands from employers, from the ICFTU funds and from the AFL-
CIO” (Ahmad, 1969, p. 50). Hence both trade union bureaucracy and trade union
imperialism were important elements of labour politics. Second, as political movements
and labour movements converged, the development of independent labour unions was
seriously hampered. Third, despite repressive measures against labour unions including
a ban on strikes, workers continually launched strikes (Umar, 2006).
At the point of Bangladesh’s independence in 1971, both the nationalist Awami
League and its leftist competitor, the National Awami Party, had their own strong
labour unions that supported the paths taken by their respective political parties. In a
broad sense, the multiplicity of labour unions, the power of the labour aristocracy,
trade union imperialism, the politicization of labour unions, the close connections
between the State and labour unions, and the cult of labour leaders all emerged under
the Pakistani regime with numerous historical antecedents in the colonial period. Yet
in spite of all the negative elements that developed during the Pakistani regime, leftist
labour organizations such as the Chatkal Sramik Federation and Purba Pakistan
Sramik Federation played significant roles in organizing various militant labour
movements and achieving numerous labour rights after 1961.
Taking power in 1972 after the successful war of independence, the Awami
League Government introduced a socialist economic policy, leading to the nation-

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alization of more than 90 per cent of the country’s enterprises (Akash, 1998; Sobhan
and Ahmad, 1980). A progressive labour policy was announced in which workers’
participation in management was initiated and a Workers’ Management Council was
formed in all nationalized industries (Siddique and Akkas, 2003; Sobhan and Ahmad,
1980). However, the authoritarian state bureaucracy and the right-wing members
of the ruling party obstructed the implementation of this “Yugoslavian style”
self-management policy. In 1975 the Government squeezed workers’ rights by incor-
porating all the labour unions within a single organization, treated as an integral
part of the socialist Government. Some commentators have argued that government
leaders moved to politicize and incorporate labour unions for their own political
interests in this period (Bhuiyan, 1991; Hossain, 2005; Umar and Kabir, 1978). As
a result, corruption, nepotism and inter-union rivalry continued. Later that year
the Awami League Government was ousted in a brutal military coup, in which the
founder of the country, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, and 18 of his 20 family members
were assassinated.
After the coup, in 1975, General Ziaur Rahman (also known as General Zia or Zia)
assumed the de facto authority of the State. Trade union politics were banned under
martial law. Since Zia wanted to do politics, he formed a political front and later a
political party, namely the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP). In 1977, he lifted the
ban on trade union politics and introduced a mandatory registration system for all labour
unions. Henceforth the registration of 30 per cent of the employees in a workplace was
required to form a union (Akkas, 1999; Hossain, 2005). Furthermore, registration could
only be obtained by the labour front of a political party (Taher, 1998, p. 69). In 1979,
General Zia formed his own labour front which directly served the interests of the
BNP. General Zia created an environment in which inter-union rivalry became the
norm; corruption and nepotism became permanent features in Bangladesh labour
politics. Furthermore, he bought the allegiance of many political and labour leaders,
mostly those of the right and pro-Beijing left (Ahmed, 1995; Akkas, 1999; Hossain,
2005; Siddique and Akkas, 2003).6 He also introduced a privatization policy prescribed
by the World Bank and IMF and sold many nationalized enterprises to supporters
of the ruling party at undervalued prices (Ahmed, 2004; Akash, 1998). Labour move -
ments during the Zia regime ground to a standstill.
This was the political context in which transnational corporations began to
outsource the manufacture of RMG to Bangladesh in the early 1980s.

Labour unions’ failures in the RMG sector since 1980

General Ziaur Rahman’s time in power ended in 1981, when he was assassinated
during an unsuccessful military coup. In 1982 another general, H.M. Ershad, captured
power from the BNP and ruled the country until 1990, when a mass student move -
ment toppled his regime. Like his predecessor, General Ershad formed a new political

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party, Jatiyo Party. Ershad followed the neoliberal policies of his predecessor, and as a
consequence several more state-owned organizations were sold to private owners at
very cheap prices, following the Structural Adjustment Programme prescribed by the
IMF (Akash, 1998). In order to consolidate his power, General Ershad spent large
sums of state money on the formation of labour, student and youth fronts. In fact, a
number of the leaders of General Ziaur Rahman’s BNP simply transferred to the
newly formed political party of General Ershad. These political leaders threw off any
semblance of political principle and immersed themselves in the politics of money,
power and corruption (Ahmed, 1995; Hossain, 2005; Mamoon and Ray, 1998).
Throughout the Ershad regime, progressive labour leaders initiating various anti-
military movements were repressed by harsh measures while the ruling party labour
front grew in stature by incorporating veteran opposition leaders. Labour unions were
used as one of the main arms of the military dictatorship. Inter-union rivalries,
corruption and nepotism spread throughout public enterprises while competition over
lucrative trade union positions and offices, even to the extent of opponents being
killed, became a permanent feature of the labour unions in nationalized enterprises in
Bangladesh (Akkas, 1999; Siddique and Akkas, 2003; Talukder, 1997). Nonetheless,
an oppositional labour movement eventually emerged, protesting against various
anti-labour acts by the Ershad regime. A significant step occurred in 1984 when major
labour unions in the country formed SKOP and initiated a range of actions against
anti-labour measures (Hossain, 2005; Rock, 2001b). Nevertheless, the focus of oppo-
sitional unions was on action at the political level, and the nascent RMG sector was
largely ignored. Furthermore, the unity of the oppositional labour movement was soon
thereafter shattered when two of its central leaders joined the Ershad Government as
Cabinet members and the labour unions sponsored by the Awami League stopped
participating in SKOP. Later in the 1980s all labour unions once again worked
through SKOP. It should be noted, however, that between 1984 and 1990 SKOP did
not realize even one of its demands: the military regime would sign agreements but
would never enact them (Hossain, 2005).
Since the autocratic Ershad regime was forced from power in 1990 by powerful
student movements, democratic means have been used to select governments in
Bangladesh. From 1991 to 1996, and from 2001 to 2006, the BNP ruled the country;
the Awami League held power from 1996 to 2001, and returned to power once more
in 2009 after a brief period of caretaker government. It is interesting that although
both the Awami League and BNP claim allegiance to democratic norms and practices,
neither of the parties has made any remarkable contributions towards the welfare of
the workers. When either party was in power, many agreements were signed with
labour union federations but most of them remained unrealized. Since both parties
support an open market economy, their policies towards workers and unions are very
similar. In fact, during each of the parties’ period in office, the respective ruling party’s
labour front became very powerful and everything was carried out in accordance with

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Why labour unions have failed Bangladesh’s garment workers

the party line. As a result, during the period of democratic governance over the past
20 years, the major labour unions in Bangladesh have continued to represent the
interests of political parties rather than those of workers. It is disturbing to note here
that the major labour unions in Bangladesh had become so myopic and obsolete by
2002 that when the Government closed a 50-year-old nationalized jute mill and
snatched away the employment of 30,000 workers, no fruitful resistance was mounted
(Rahman and Langford, 2010, p. 55).
Garment manufacturing in Bangladesh is governed by two separate regulatory
regimes. The majority of the RMG factories exist outside the EPZs, have Bangladeshi
owners and are covered by the regulations of the Bangladesh Labour Law of 2006.
Two main state agencies are responsible for enforcing these regulations: the
Directorate of Labour (DL) and the Office of the Chief Inspector of Factories and
Establishment (CIFE). Both of these agencies are widely regarded as being financially
corrupt and under the influence of factory owners. Union leader Lovely Yesmin
recounted an example of such corruption. As a child and a young adult she worked for
Sparrow Apparels in Mirpur. In response to a repressive work environment that
included physical harassment and forced overtime, Lovely Yesmin and her supervisor,
Ms Jaheda Begum, decided to organize a union in the late 1980s. They were success-
ful in registering the union with the DL. However, when the newly formed union
submitted an eight-point set of demands to Sparrow Apparels just two days after
getting their union registration, they faced ruthless obstruction from the owner and
management. According to Ms Yesmin, the owner employed a number of repressive
measures, including hiring local thugs. The unionists learned that the owner was able
to organize these repressive measures quickly because he had been given information
about the union from someone at the DL office. Lovely Yesmin explained the nexus
between the corrupt state officials and factory owners: “What happens in our country
is that the Joint Director of Labour or the Office of the Factory Inspector actually do
not work in favour of the workers; they maintain a liaison with the owners. … Initially
they [DL officials] wanted our organization to be formed or the union to be registered
but they supplied all the information to the owner later on.”7
A second major problem with the enforcement of the Bangladesh Labour Law
in the RMG sector is that the Office of the CIFE lacks the resources to carry out its
mission. In 2007 this office was responsible for inspecting 22,000 factories, including
those in the RMG sector, all over Bangladesh. However, at that time it employed
only 48 factory inspectors. In an interview the Chief Inspector indicated he had urged
the Government to provide funds to hire an additional 315 people. After a struggle
that lasted three years, the Ministry of Establishment approved the hiring of only
146 personnel and subsequently the Ministry of Finance cut the number to 59 – and
this number included all positions, not just factory inspectors.
The second regulatory regime covers the small minority of RMG factories that
are located in one of the eight EPZs in Bangladesh. Much of the investment in the

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EPZs has been made by foreign investors, and the EPZs were established with a legal
prohibition on trade unionism (Fair Labor Association, 2005; ILO, 1998). In contrast,
in the RMG factories outside the EPZs trade unionism was allowed in principle
(as Lovely Yesmin’s account of registering a union at Sparrow Apparels in the late
1980s revealed) but nevertheless strongly opposed and repressed when it took practical
form (Khan, 2001; Rock, 2001b; Zaman, Arefin and Ahmed, 2002). Indeed, there
was only one political party/labour union that was active in organizing garment
workers during the 1980s – a pro-China leftist party, the Bangladesh Workers’ Party,
which was more interested in recruiting workers for its own political purposes than in
trying to build a solid basis for the mass unionization of the sector. Furthermore,
throughout the 1980s, no NGOs, philanthropic organizations or international groups
were active on the questions of labour rights and the exploitation of garment workers.
Within this closed opportunity structure, there were occasional worker protests
at particular factories but no organized protest movements aided by established labour
unions. The occasional protests were spontaneous and often quite militant: common
actions included factory blockades, destruction of the means of production, sit-in
protests, processions and mass meetings in front of the factories. Such spontaneous
protests occurred because the workers in the industry generally suffered from
oppressive and often unsafe working conditions, poor wages and poor benefits.
Towards the end of the 1980s, some union registration drives were launched
after local working-class leaders communicated with the leaders of union federations.
In addition, international organizations, especially the Asian American Free Labor
Institute (AAFLI) – now called Solidarity Center (SC) – aided various individual
factory leaders and developed the Bangladesh Independent Garment-Workers Union
(BIGU). Despite the infusion of such outside resources, however, most of the union
drives were ruthlessly suppressed by local musclemen employed by the factory owners
or by the state police, both of whom often used physical torture against union activists.
In addition, union drives were undercut by various deceitful strategies, including
short-term increases in wages, bonuses or overtime rates, and buying off union leaders
by awarding them a promotion or even a straightforward bribe.
The fire at the Saraka Garments factory in December 1990, which killed
27 people, blew the lid off this bleak, repressive situation. Thousands of workers came
out into the streets and an opportunity arose to unite the disconnected local leaders
working in the RMG industry. Therefore, even though the main pattern in the
industry throughout the 1980s and into the 1990s was a lack of working-class
resistance and protest, the 1990s saw an increasing number of localized protest
movements under the banners of various unrecognized factory-based unions. The
main organizing tactic of the unions was to organize street protests outside garment
factories. In addition, some unions placed demands directly before the BGMEA on
issues such as the length of the working week and overtime pay. However, these
attempts at negotiation failed. A prime example of the unions’ inadequacy is the

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repetitive sequence of agreements that the Bangladesh Garment Workers Unity

Council (BGWUC) has made with the BGMEA regarding the same issues time and
again. The typical pattern of negotiation follows this course: the BGWUC announces
a tough set of demands, and the BGMEA is reluctant even to negotiate; the workers’
organization then follows up with a contentious action like a strike, upon which
the BGMEA is eager to make an agreement; and then after things settle down, the
BGMEA shows no interest in implementing the agreement. This pattern has been
repeated with monotonous regularity since 1997. It is noteworthy that the BGWUC’s
demands have never amounted to anything more than the implementation of
Bangladesh’s labour laws. The failure of the unions to get the BGMEA to implement
agreements is, therefore, an indication not only of labour’s impotence but also of the
State’s complicity in the suppression of workers’ rights. Our contention is that labour
leaders in the RMG industry often launch negotiations with the BGMEA not because
they expect to improve the lot of workers but to justify their own existence.
The persistent general weakness of the mainstream union movement in
Bangladesh is a key reason why unions have failed the nascent garment proletariat.
The contemporary characteristics of the mainstream labour unions – their political
subservience, corruption, nepotism, lack of a democratic union culture and domi-
nation by a trade union bureaucracy – are the product of historical forces that are
ultimately connected to the overall underdevelopment of Bangladesh in the capitalist
world-system. In tandem with the weakness of mainstream unions has gone the
relegation of progressive trade unionism to the margins of Bangladeshi society between
the 1960s and 1980s when the RMG industry was becoming established; as a
consequence, progressive unions were in no position to organize anything but small
pockets of the huge RMG workforce.
The unfavourable political opportunity structure for labour unions and the
State’s shameless subservience to the interests of capital are two other general factors
that help explain unions’ failure in this sector from 1980. The State’s anti-worker
actions in the RMG sector have included the routine suppression of spontaneous
workers’ protests by the police; the failure to hire enough factory inspectors to enforce
employment and occupational standards; and the prevalence of state officials who are
willing to accept bribes from owners.
As noted above, beginning in the 1990s a number of labour unions became
active among the garment proletariat, although union attempts to negotiate with
owners on behalf of workers were uniformly unsuccessful right up to the May 2006
uprising. During these years industrial relations in the sector were marked by the
refusal of RMG owners and the Government to respect the collective bargaining
process, and by the timid responses of labour unions to the prevarications of the
owners. It is important to note, however, that the ever-increasing mass of workers was
accumulating valuable experience of capitalist relations of production in the 1980s and
1990s and right up to the eve of the 2006 uprising. What this meant is that even

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though the majority of the female labour force presented themselves as uninformed
about their basic rights and intimidated by authority figures,8 they were developing a
practical (as opposed to a discursive) class consciousness that could readily be
mobilized in a strike wave; indeed, this is exactly what occurred in May 2006.
The lack of outside support and internal divisions in the labour movement itself
are two further reasons why labour unions have failed the garment proletariat in
Bangladesh. Historically, civil society in Bangladesh has meant the sophisticated,
urban, educated middle class that has been the main participant group in broad
political movements. However, up until recently there have been no prominent
organizations that link this urban middle class to the RMG proletariat. The labour
fronts of the major political parties could have taken on this role, but never did. As a
consequence, during the course of the spontaneous protests that marked the early years
of the industry, workers had to rely upon contributions from passers-by on the street
to sustain their collective actions. It is little wonder that worker resistance was fleeting
rather than sustained.
In recent years some support for workers has flowed into the RMG sector from
international labour organizations and from both international and Bangladeshi
NGOs. This has not been a uniformly positive process. For instance, the support
provided by the SC, itself backed by the AFL-CIO, may well be tainted since it appears
to promote the protectionist interests of US manufacturers and labour unions. The SC
directly funds BIGU and indirectly funds the Bangladesh Garment and Industrial
Workers Federation. Two local NGOs, Karmojibi Nari and the Awaj Foundation, also
sponsor their own labour unions (Bangladesh Garment Sramik Jote and the United
Garment Workers Federation, respectively). Furthermore, some NGOs have undercut
labour unions by taking on union-like roles and others unintentionally undermine the
willingness of workers to volunteer freely for union activity by paying those same
workers for participation in NGO seminars. On the other hand, however, domestic
NGOs such as the Bangladesh Institute of Labour Studies and Bangladesh Legal Aid
and Service Trust, and international NGOs such as Oxfam, have provided significant
boosts to the efforts of resource-starved Bangladesh unions.
Finally, internal weaknesses and divisions have limited the effectiveness of
Bangladesh labour unions in the RMG sector. First, it is indeed peculiar that there
are so many separate unions and alliances of unions,9 given the generally accepted
motto of the labour movement that “in unity there is strength”. This multiplicity of
organizations is not, in our view, a by-product of differences in political ideology and
strategy; rather, each alliance is based on the personal interests of its leader in terms of
fame, career advancement and resources. This point is supported by the extraordinary
fact that the federations are identified in Bangladeshi society by the leaders’ names
rather than the official names of the organizations. Another reason for the proliferation
of federations is that there exists a variety of international organizations, local NGOs
and employers’ organizations, all of which prefer to sponsor their own respective

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labour union allies rather than face the uncertainty of dealing with an independent
union federation.
The existence of so many alliances leads to many conflicts among union leaders
in Bangladesh. Indeed, we believe that the reason labour unions were unable to
consolidate gains after the May 2006 garment worker uprising lay in inter-union
rivalry, mistrust and lack of respect. Another negative consequence of this situation is
that unions have to expend a much higher proportion of their limited resources on
basic organizational survival than they would if there were a smaller number of larger
unions in the sector.
Second, the diverse backgrounds of the labour leaders are a compounding
source of division. Some of the leaders have almost no education, coming directly from
the factory, while a number have higher degrees and lack any direct working-class
experience; this second category includes many of the country’s prominent national
labour leaders. In interviews in 2007, the first author of this chapter observed that
many of the labour leaders who lacked formal education seemed to be jealous of their
counterparts who had higher degrees, social status and prominence. At the same time,
veteran labour leaders with advanced education tended to ignore and dismiss those
new leaders who had come from the shop floor because of the latters’ perceived lack
of knowledge and sophistication.
Third, although internal divisions are an important factor, the lack of finance is
the number one problem for labour unions. It means that they do not have the means
to run independently and are forced to form alliances with organizations that can offer
material help (either local NGOs or international organizations of some type). This
situation creates additional rivalry among the unions, since they are in competition for
outside help. The only exceptions to this pattern are the unions based on left ideology
that depend on well-wishers’ donations. It must be noted that even unions with a sizeable
number of members cannot avoid the problem of a lack of funds. This is because
most garment workers are so poor that they cannot afford to pay any union dues.

Implications of the May 2006 mass uprising by

garment workers
The broad details of the May 2006 uprising were sketched in the introduction to this
chapter. This concluding section provides additional details and analysis, and identifies
the strategic actions that hold out the most hope for advancing the interests of
Bangladesh’s garment workers in the coming years.
The May 2006 movement of garment workers was so powerful and widespread
that it eventually had an impact on the Dhaka EPZ area; indeed, strikes and other
forms of unrest occurred in various EPZ factories in early June, during the second
week after the main uprising. The owners responded by closing their EPZ factories
from 4 June for an indefinite period of time. However, on the initiative of the

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Government, the Bangladesh Export Processing Zone Authority, owners and workers
met and agreed to a number of concessions, including the historic provision of trade
union rights for workers in an EPZ; as a result, production resumed about a week
later (Cheng, 2006).
The workers’ movement of May 2006 received widespread public sympathy and
attention. The representative of the ILO in Bangladesh, various international and local
NGOs, and many prominent Bangladeshi civil society leaders supported the demands
of the unions (Rashid, 2006), especially an increase in a minimum wage that had been
frozen since 1994 (Cheng, 2006).
Contemporary social movement theory can be used to help explain how this
movement emerged and flourished. Within such an adverse political opportunity
structure, where plant-level dispute mechanisms were completely absent and repres-
sion levels were high, the initial factory movements could not have developed in the
way they did without help from external organizations (in this case, two unions with
ties to leftist political organizations).10 For the same reasons, extreme militancy was the
only hope for successful labour action. In terms of the mobilization of resources, the
initial factory movements depended upon the limited resources of rank-and-file
workers supplemented by the relatively limited resources of the radical unions. One
important political resource of the two unions was their close working relationship,
which allowed them to coordinate the protests on 23 May 2006 in order to obtain
maximum effect. The explosion of consciousness and mass action on that day,
however, cannot be explained using resource mobilization concepts – it better fits the
model of working-class mobilization theorized by Rosa Luxemburg and the later
industrial relations scholar John Kelly (1988).
In conclusion, while we recognize that recommending an emancipatory model
for Bangladesh’s RMG workers is not easy, we think three complementary strategies
are well worth pursuing. First, contemporary garment workers and their union leaders
require enormous institutional support and resources to build their organizations and
capacities for political action. Our suggestion is that capacity training and awareness
education should be the number one priority during quiet periods of class struggle.
What is needed is a network of proletarian schools that teach literacy while
simultaneously helping workers to better understand the character of class relations in
the garment industry and to build rank-and-file networks. For this sort of project,
resources from domestic and international NGOs and genuine internationalist
working-class organizations would be essential.
Second, when it comes to achieving gains for garment workers it is evident that
soft, non-confrontational approaches are totally ineffective in Bangladesh; unless the
State and the owners receive a severe and alarming blow from mobilized workers, they
ignore even the most basic and reasonable demands. The power of mass, contentious
protest by the working class was demonstrated by the movement that burst out after
the tragic Saraka Garments fire in 1990 and by the upsurge in protest in May 2006.

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Third, although militant mass protests have yielded dramatic concessions

from factory owners and the Government, such concessions have been difficult to
consolidate after labour relations have returned to “normal”. This indicates that the
Bangladesh Government must be pressured to reform the labour relations system such
that (1) independent unions are no longer ignored and repressed, and (2) employers
are required to engage in meaningful collective bargaining. Although domestic
organizations need to take the lead in promoting such demands, international
organizations can make significant contributions to such a pressure campaign.
It is true that there is always a risk in attempting to build militant movements
because the dominant elites and their supporters (a large section of the educated
middle class, some NGOs and think-tanks, and even some labour organizations)
continuously argue in favour of peaceful movements and against any militancy. The
position of the NGOs on this strategic matter is understandable, given that these
organizations are very dependent upon Western organizations for financial support.
Nonetheless, it is our argument that until the State changes its elite-centred policy,
until the owners change their feudal mindset and unhesitatingly abide by the labour
laws and ILO Conventions, and until international labour organizations are free from
any hidden protectionist agendas, militant movements are essential to the successful
pursuit of workers’ demands. If the militant kind of labour movement can be roughly
classified as the Marx–Polanyi type of movement, then the only remedy for the
exploitation and repression that ails the RMG proletariat in Bangladesh at this point
is just such a militant movement.

Notes
1Bangladesh (then known as Bengal) was part of the British colony of India until 1947. In 1947, after 200 years of British rule,
India gained independence and was divided into two different states: India and Pakistan, the latter divided into East and West
Pakistan. Until 1971, Bangladesh was named East Pakistan. In 1971, after a nine-month armed struggle for independence from
West Pakistan, Bangladesh appeared on the world map as an independent State.
2 The minimum wage was raised on 27 July 2010 from BDT1,662.50 to BDT3,000; this is the only significant improvement
achieved by RMG workers since the 2006 protests. It is not surprising, then, that factory-level protest movements are currently
a common feature in the RMG industry in Bangladesh.
3 Hindu–Muslim riots were very common in colonial India, and were exploited by the colonial rulers to “divide and rule” the
people whenever needed. After the British invaded India, defeating the Muslim ruling class, Muslims tended to be very hostile
towards the British, while Hindus were more likely to cooperate and take the resulting benefits. The conflicts spread not only
among the elites but also among the masses and industrial workers. This inter-communal antagonism was fomented by the British
rulers and as a result became one of the main barriers to working-class solidarity in India. A lower-caste Hindu assassinated
Gandhi, a pioneer in defending working-class interests, because he did not subscribe to this communalism and consequently
opposed Hindu–Muslim conflict.
4 Sharma (1963, p. 27) quoted a very revealing exchange concerning this feudal ma–bap (mother–father) relationship: “The
personnel officer of one firm asked a worker representative who was demanding a long list of free amenities, including free shoes,
‘But why free shoes?’ The worker replied, ‘Shahib, the company is our father and our mother.’”
5The AITUC did not support Indian participation in the Second World War because of its official opposition to British colonial
rule. For supporting the colonial Government’s war role, the IFL received INR13,000 per month (Sharma, 1963).
6For instance, Kazi Jafar Ahmed, once famous as a pro-Beijing leftist student and trade union leader, became the country’s
education minister during the Zia regime. In the 1980s, under General Ershad’s regime, Mr Ahmed became Prime Minister
(Ahmed, 1995; Hossain, 2005; Mamoon and Ray, 1998).

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7 First author’s interview, 2007.

8 These tendencies were strongly apparent in four focus group discussions with garment workers conducted by the first author
in 2007.
9In 2007 there were four major alliances of unions active in the RMG industry, each with between eight and 16 affiliated unions.
Independent unions active in the industry sometimes form temporary alliances with one another.
10The two radical unions were the Bangladesh Garment Workers Union Federation (active at F.S. Sweater) and the Bangladesh
Garment Workers Trade Union Centre (active at Universal Knitting). The latter is the labour front of the Communist Party of
Bangladesh.

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McCarthy, F.; Feldman, S. 1983. “Rural women discovered: New sources of capital and labour in
Bangladesh”, in Development and Change, Vol. 14, No. 2, pp. 211–36.

Mamoon, M.; Ray, J.K. 1998. Civil society in Bangladesh: Resilience and retreat (Dhaka, Subarna).

Mirdah, R. 2010. “Bangladesh ranks fourth in global apparel exports says WTO report”, in Daily Star,
25 July. Available at http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=148118
[30 May 2012].

Rahman, Z.; Langford, T. 2010. “The limitations of global social movement unionism as an
emancipatory labour strategy in majority world countries”, in Socialist Studies, Vol. 6, No. 1,
pp. 45–64.

Rashid, M. 2006. “RMG in Bangladesh: Wakeup call and the ground realities”, in Daily Star, 6 June.
Available at http://www.thedailystar.net/2006/06/06/d60606050356.htm [1 July 2012].

Read, M. 1931. The Indian peasant uprooted (London, Longmans, Green & Co.).

Rock, M. 2001a. “Globalisation and Bangladesh: The case of export-oriented garment manufacture”,
in Journal of South Asian Studies, Vol. 24, No. 1, pp. 201–26.

—. 2001b. “The rise of the Bangladesh independent garment workers’ union (BIGU)”, in J. Hatchison
and A. Brown (eds): Organising labour in globalising Asia (London, Routledge), pp. 27–47.

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Saha, P. 1978. History of the working-class movement in Bengal (New Delhi, People’s Publishing House).
Sharma, G.K. 1963. Labour movement in India (its past and present) (Jullundur, University Publishers).
Siddiqi, H.G.A. 2004. The ready-made garment industry of Bangladesh (Dhaka, University Press Ltd).
Siddique, S.A.; Akkas, A.M. 2003. “The role of the state in the industrial system in Bangladesh”, in
Dhaka University Journal of Business Studies, Vol. 24, No. 1, pp. 1–15.
Sobhan, R. 2003. Bourgeoise rasto babosther sankat [Crisis of the bourgeois state system] (Dhaka,
Shahitika).
—; Ahmad, M. 1980. Public enterprise in an intermediate regime (Dhaka, Bangladesh Institute of
Development Studies).
Taher, M.A. 1998. “Politicization of trade unions: Issues and challenges in Bangladesh perspective”,
in Journal of Asiatic Society of Bangladesh (Hum.), Vol. 34, No. 2, pp. 68–79.
Talukder, M.A.S. 1997. Labour and industry (Dhaka, Nasa Prokashony).
Umar, B. 2004. The emergence of Bangladesh, Vol. 1: Class struggles in East Pakistan (1947–1958)
(Oxford, Oxford University Press).
—. 2006. The emergence of Bangladesh, Vol. 2: The rise of Bengali nationalism (1958–1971) (Oxford,
Oxford University Press).
—; Kabir, S. 1978. Bangladesh marxbad o sramik andoloner samasya [Bangladesh Marxism and the
problems of labour movements] (Dhaka, Jubo Prakashani).
Zaman, F.; Arefin, K.; Ahmed, M. 2002. “Comparison of trade unions in developed and developing
countries: Bangladesh perspectives”, in Journal of Business Administration, Vol. 2, Nos. 3–4,
pp. 21–33.
Ziring, L. 1992. Bangladesh from Mujib to Ershad: An interpretative study (Dhaka, University Press Ltd).

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PART II

POLITICAL MOVEMENTS AND TRADE UNIONS

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BRAZILIAN LABOUR RELATIONS IN

LULA’S ERA: TELEMARKETING
6
OPERATORS AND THEIR UNIONS

Ruy Braga

The uncommonly high approval ratings of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s Government,
which guaranteed Dilma Roussef’s victory as his successor in the 2010 presidential
election, clearly stimulated the Brazilian sociological imagination, prompting the
question: what are the bases of the current Lulist hegemony? Undoubtedly, one of the
most important contributions to the debate over so-called “Lulism” has been André
Singer’s famous article of 2009. According to Singer’s now well-known argument,
beginning in May 2005, during the scandalous “Mensalão” (monthly backhander)
period, when members of Parliament bought votes, Lula’s Workers’ Party (PT)
Government would have lost to the opposition Social Democratic Party (PSDB) a
significant number of the supporters it had won over in 2002 from the urban middle
class. However, low-income Brazilian voters, though traditionally not in favour of
Lula, would have been attracted by government-promoted public policies; during the
2006 presidential campaign they would have warmed to the PT programme and, in a
movement known in political science as electoral realignment, decided solidly to side
with the incumbent candidate, thereby guaranteeing his victory (Singer, 2009).
Comparing electoral research for 2002 and 2006, Singer offered a vast body of
evidence for this realignment, and demonstrated that a vote for Lula in 2006 was
largely a “popular” vote, whereas the opposing candidate, Geraldo Alckmin, would
have been preferred by the middle and upper classes. This identification with Lula and
the PT on the part of the unqualified, underpaid, low-status workers known as the
“sub-proletarian” class led Singer to identify in Brazil the revival of a phenomenon
genealogically associated with the rich history of Latin American populism. Singer
understands the “sub-proletariat” to consist of those who receive up to the minimum
wage plus half of those paid up to twice the minimum wage. According to this
criterion, 63 per cent of the Brazilian proletariat consisted of sub-proletarians. Singer’s

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hypothesis runs as follows: Lulism is the ideological expression of a class fraction incapable
of constructing autonomous forms of organization that looks instead to the State for the
optimal path to reducing social inequality. Our aim here will be to test this hypothesis
through an analysis of one of the sub-proletarian groups which has grown most
strongly over the past decade: telemarketing operators, or tele-operators.

Characteristics of the Brazilian call centre industry

In Brazil, this sector was formed only very recently. In fact, 96 per cent of the Brazilian
tele-activity centres (CTAs) were created after 1990, and 76 per cent after 1998, the
year Telebrás was privatized and at the height of neoliberal policies in the country.
Between 1998 and 2002, the number of jobs in the sector grew at an annual rate of
15 per cent: figures from the Ministry of Labour indicate that during Lula’s time in
government this accelerated to 20 per cent per year, representing total growth of
282 per cent between 2003 and 2009 (see figure 6.1).
In fact, the total numbers are even greater, for the Ministry of Labour figures
take into account only outsourced tele-operators. When in-house CTAs are included,
the Brazilian Association of Teleservices, which represents call centre businesses,

Figure 6.1 Numbers of telemarketing operators in Brazil, 2003–09

400 000

351 012 353 304

350 000

304 996
300 000
266 369

250 000 241 801

200 000 196 266

150 000
125 154

100 000
2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009

Note: Telemarketing operators defined according to Brazilian occupational classification 4223.

Source: Brazilian Ministry of Labour and Employment/Rais.

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Table 6.1 Percentage growth in numbers of telemarketing operators in

Brazil, by region, 2004–09
Region Growth over previous year (%) Growth 2004–09
2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009
North 1.20 13.04 36.46 –7.37 –1.66 10.42 57.02
North-east 101.68 21.98 4.02 13.85 19.73 8.11 277.12
South-east 62.22 22.79 11.86 16.61 15.48 –0.02 199.96
South 20.16 29.33 11.89 7.91 4.93 –0.92 95.08
East-central 40.12 21.42 –2.21 6.61 22.01 –0.73 114.83
All Brazil 56.82 23.20 10.16 14.50 15.09 0.65 182.30
Note: Telemarketing operators defined according to Brazilian occupational classification 4223.

Source: Brazilian Ministry of Labour and Employment/Rais.

estimates that in 2010 more than 1.2 million workers were employed in the sector.
This increase transformed the call centre sector into the main gateway for young
people into the country’s formal labour market, in addition to creating the second and
third biggest private employers in the country, Contax (78,200 employees) and Atento
(76,400 employees). Furthermore, this increase, despite still being concentrated in
the south-east of the country (where total employment in the sector, according to the
Ministry of Labour, reached 259,108 in 2009), is now extending to the north-east.
During Lula’s time in government, it was the north-east that showed the greatest
growth (277.12 per cent) in the number of tele-operators in the Brazilian call centre
industry (see tables 6.1 and 6.2).
It is worth remembering that nearly all these jobs constitute formal employment:
that is, they are governed by labour legislation and subject to collective bargaining.
Consequently, the recognized trend towards informal employment in the north-east
region has transformed telemarketing into an appealing activity for young workers

Table 6.2 Numbers of telemarketing operators in Brazil, by region, 2003–09

Region 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009

North 1 417 1 434 1 621 2 212 2 049 2 015 2 225

North-east 9 253 18 661 22 763 23 678 26 958 32 278 34 895
South-east 86 381 140 125 172 063 192 470 224 431 259 162 259 108
South 16 692 20 057 25 940 29 024 31 319 32 863 32 562
East-central 11 411 15 989 19 414 18 985 20 239 24 694 24 514
All Brazil 125 154 196 266 241 801 266 369 304 996 351 012 353 304
Note: Telemarketing operators defined according to Brazilian occupational classification 4223.

Source: Brazilian Ministry of Labour and Employment/Rais.

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with no previous work experience. When, as a result of the development of a new

regime of post-Fordist accumulation, supported by entrepreneurial outsourcing,
neoliberal privatization and labour financialization, Brazilian call centres spread to the
north-east under Lula’s Government, they could draw on a vast pool of young, largely
female and black, workers in search of their first opportunity in the formal labour
market. In encapsulating part of the recent evolution of work relations in the country,
the call centre industry has proved to be a privileged place to observe current
modifications in the Brazilian post-Fordist sub-proletarian class. To sum up:
• This is a group of young workers.
• The workers are unskilled or semi-skilled.
• The workers are in precarious conditions of employment.
• The workers earn between once and twice the minimum wage.
• The workers are employed in labour relations that inhibit collective organization.
• The call centre industry gathers thousands of workers from the informal sector,
without prior experience of unionization.
• The sector provides access to labour rights.
• The sector provides access to some sort of professional qualification.
• The sector condenses salient features of the current peripheral post-Fordist
regime of accumulation: business outsourcing, privatization and neoliberal
financialization of work.
In following the trajectory of tele-operators, our research emphasizes four
key variables: model of labour organization; level of skills; rates of pay; and forms of
collective mobilization.1
In respect of the general characteristics of tele-operators’ work process, our field
research in two of the largest Brazilian call centre businesses, one in domestic and the
other in international ownership, found that with the automatization of tele-operator
work, productivity gains come at the cost of a sharp increase in physical fatigue, fixed
posture, part-time work contracts, dizziness from the multiplicity of calls, and illness
at work. In fact, throughout our field research, from the questionnaires administered
to the selected sample in both businesses and from our contact with tele-operators
through in-depth interviews, we came across a reality marked by repetitive strain
injury, tendonitis, Ménière’s disease (bouts of severe dizziness with ringing in the ears
and progressive hearing loss), acute depression, urinary tract infections (because of the
limits on bathroom breaks), obesity, uncontrolled hypertension and vocal cord
nodules. The answers to our questionnaire revealed a clear link between working hours
and the declining health of operators (see Braga and Antunes, 2009).

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To a great extent, it seems reasonable to us to assume that workplace illness

in the telemarketing sector, as recorded both by academic researchers and in
investigations conducted by the Department of Labour Relations, derives from a
combination of factors, among which are inadequate training, stress arising from
pressure to meet targets, negligence with respect to ergonomics and the ambient
temperature of the workplace, insufficient breaks during the day, lack of days off, the
strict monitoring of tele-operators and the increased hours of work which accompany
the process of technological innovation (see Freire, 2002; also Assunção et al., 2006;
Marx, 2000; Pimentel, 2009).
Another salient characteristic of the Brazilian call centre industry is its oligo-
polistic nature. In 2011 the total number of workers in the two largest companies
(154,600) corresponded to 86 per cent of the total number of workers of the 18 next
largest companies (180,479). This is a feature that clearly differentiates the Brazilian
call centre industry from its counterparts in, for example, France and the United
States. This oligopolistic characteristic, in addition to the low-skilled workforce and
the relative weakness of the unions acting in this sector, helps us to understand why –
even though the large majority of Brazilian tele-operators (70 per cent) are covered by
collective bargaining – Brazilian salaries in this sector (averaging US$3,415 a year
where covered by collective bargaining, and US$4,484 a year where not covered by
collective bargaining) are among the lowest in the world in this sector, surpassing only
those of Indian workers. For the sake of comparison, a US tele-operator earns a yearly
salary of US$35,000 and a tele-operator in South Africa US$11,200: ten and three
times, respectively, the salary of a Brazilian tele-operator. The low wages correspond
to the low skill level of the workforce: among the 17 countries sampled by David
Holman, Rosemary Batt and Ursula Holtgrewe, Brazilian tele-operators had the lowest
level of education (see Holman, Batt and Holtgrewe, 2007).
With the rate of female participation in the workforce approaching 70 per cent,
and a high proportion of Afro-Brazilians, it is possible to say that Brazilian tele-operators
are mainly black women – in other words, they belong to precisely that sub-proletarian
group that has historically occupied the worst positions in the labour market, as well
as heading 80 per cent of the single-parent families in the country. In addition, as we
will see, our field research, both in the businesses and in the unions, showed that, as
well as large majorities of women and black people, there are among the Brazilian tele-
operators countless workers with special needs, in addition to a significant proportion
of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transvestite, transsexual and transgendered people (LGBTs).
Again, we find ourselves among the groups most discriminated against in the Brazilian
labour market.
It was no surprise, therefore, that we identified in our field research the presence
of a significant minority of tele-operators who were prepared to adapt to the working
hours demanded and who felt, to some extent, satisfied with this type of work. As revealed
in the interviews, this was a group formed mainly of black women around 20 years old

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and dealing with urgent family responsibilities. We noted that it was often those
female workers who stated that their husbands were unemployed who were inclined to
adapt to the work flow and to associate the work with positive values. On the basis of
the interviews, we realized, as was to be expected, that being the breadwinner produced
a very strong disciplinary effect, particularly in cases where – a well-known and frequently
adopted business recruitment strategy to keep wages low – the worker declared herself
to be a single mother. This same tendency towards adaptation was found in interviews
with gay tele-operators. During the research, we realized that the call centre industry
had become a type of “refuge” for those sub-proletarian groups in the Brazilian labour
market suffering the highest levels of discrimination.

Infotaylorism: Dissatisfaction and difficulties for

collective organization
Notwithstanding these factors conducive to accommodation with the demands of the
work, many tele-operators did become critical of the working conditions and of
the businesses that employ them, provoked by their encounter with infotaylorism and
the constant turnover of workers on short-term contracts.2 We frequently encountered
acute dissatisfaction with pay and with the ever-increasing pressure from the business
to meet targets. On the one hand, according to our interviewees, the operations
coordinators and human resources (HR) managers are constantly trying to impress on
the tele-operators that they are involved in a cut-throat economic competition, thereby
attempting to dissuade them from any collective action of a trade union or political-
organizational nature. On the other hand, workers are selected on the basis of
behavioural qualities such as availability, flexibility and readiness to accept new rules,
all of which tend to go with a certain inclination to subordinate oneself to the system.
It should also be borne in mind that tele-operators are recruited on temporary, short-
term contracts, which are renewed or not on the basis of one’s behaviour in the job,
notably one’s availability and loyalty towards the business.
Obviously, these characteristics, associated with the high rate of staff turnover,
impose structural difficulties for collective organization (Rosenfield, 2009). And
indeed, when we began our field research during the second quarter of 2004, reports
of collective mobilizations or strikes were extremely rare among the tele-operators
spoken to. The only exception was the mention of a defensive strike that took place
in the Quatro A company on 4 February 2000, regarding the quality of the food
provided in the works canteen. The interviews with trade union directors and trade
unionists inevitably began highlighting the huge obstacles that unionism confronted
in this industry: as soon as a tele-operator approached a union and began to develop
some sort of organizational activity, he or she was harassed by the company or simply
dismissed at the end of the fixed-term contract, forcing the union to restart the work
all over again, without being able to consolidate and expand.

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Another frequent observation linked to the trade-union diagnosis of the

organizational challenges posed by the telemarketing sector referred to the lack of
political experience among the tele-operators. Because most were young people new
to the labour market, we often heard opinions from trade unionists such as “They’re
very depoliticized”, “They don’t understand the importance of unions” and “It’s
difficult to communicate with them”. In the case of one union, the Professionals in
Telecommunication Union in the State of São Paulo (Sintetel-SP), for example, which
until 1998 was associated with Telesp, a state-run Fordist company in the São Paulo
telecommunications sector, the age gap between trade unionists and tele-operators
seemed to impede collective action (Rombaldi, 2007).3
Immediately following the privatization cycle, which was marked by the
outsourcing of jobs and firing of many workers, the sector’s unions ended up focusing
primarily on maintaining and creating jobs. In the case of the former Telesp, for
example, the Sintetel union substituted long-term demands for short-term, and
adopted a more defensive stance. This happened during a period in which many of the
benefits won through previous collective bargaining agreements (such as extra pay for
extra hours, fines for dismissal without cause, and aid in cases of illness or injury) were
steadily reduced by the companies to the minimum levels allowed by law. In addition,
the diversification of businesses and activities stemming from the privatization of
Telesp in 1998 gave rise to intense disputes between trade unionists over the repre-
sentation of their rank-and-file members. Sintetel’s right to represent tele-operators in
the city and metropolitan region of São Paulo was challenged by another union,
launched in 1992: Sintratel (Professionals in Telecommunication Union of São Paulo)
– a dispute eventually won by Sintetel.4

Call centre unions and their demands

In the period prior to the privatization of Telesp, the main union demands concerned
wage adjustments and length-of-service bonuses. After privatization, because of the rise
in unemployment and job insecurity, the priorities shifted from higher wages to
safeguarding jobs, and from length-of-service bonuses to the negotiation of wage
subsidies, with (largely unsuccessful) attempts to include profit-sharing and some
social benefits, such as health plans and arrangements with private universities.
Furthermore, in the period prior to privatization, the very low staff turnover and the
relative homogeneity within the Fordist business environment allowed relatively stable
ties of solidarity to form among workers, which facilitated trade union action. In other
words, a certain symbolic structure that focused on validating the identity of the
“Telesp worker” promoted collective mobilization.
Maintaining this symbolic structure for a long period allowed workers and trade
union leaders to share a reference system, even though the latter, as part of union
management, maintained a distance from the daily practices of the workers they

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represented. Owing in large part to the rise in unemployment that followed priva-
tization, Sintetel’s defensive approach led to the reinforcement of a model of trade
union action characterized by pragmatism and refinement of strategies for making
demands: bargaining with companies completely replaced any open confrontation
whatsoever.
As a response to Sintetel’s model, Sintratel charted a new course. Through
greater integration in the non-union social movements, in particular the black and
LGBT movements, the Sintratel leadership sought to strengthen alternative forms of
class solidarity by encouraging collectives geared towards the discussion of questions
of race, gender and sexual orientation, thus bringing tele-operators closer to the
everyday life of the union. In addition, the union has been acting with the LGBT Pride
Parade Association of São Paulo, establishing itself as one of the few trade unions or
professional associations of São Paulo to organize, year after year, a separate float
during the parade. This link between Sintratel and LGBT Pride has encouraged
transvestites and transsexuals to participate in the trade union movement as rank-
and-file delegates, which is unusual in the history of the Brazilian labour movement
(Braga et al., 2011).
Nonetheless, despite these differences, it is also possible to observe some important
convergences between Sintetel and Sintratel’s lines of action. Both, for example, have
been investing in the organization of professional courses through partnerships with
businesses in the sector, in addition to taking part in the “Brazilian Programme of
Self-Regulation of the Customer Relations Sector” created by employers running
call centres. Similarly, both Sintetel and Sintratel have been following a model known
as “citizen unionism”, by which the union offers its associates a variety of services
formerly provided by the State, such as health-care plans and vocational training, in
addition to supporting employment agencies funded by the Workers Relief Fund.5
Lula’s election as President in 2002 represented a genuine watershed in the
relationship between Brazilian trade unionism and the state apparatus. In the first
place, Lula’s Government filled nearly half of its key steering and advising positions –
about 1,305 in all – with trade unionists, who were thereby placed in control of an
annual budget of over 200 billion real (BRL). Furthermore, some trade union leaders
took up highly prestigious roles in state-run businesses such as Petrobrás and Furnas
Centrais Elétricas, including positions relating to their pension funds, while others
joined the administrative board of the Brazilian Development Bank (BNDES). Lula’s
Government also promoted reform of trade union law, legalizing Brazilian trade union
federations, raising union dues and transferring nearly BRL100 million annually to
these federations. All in all, Brazilian trade unionism rose to the role of a strategic actor
with regard to capitalist investment in the country.
This new reality, as was to be expected, modified the relationship between the
call centre industry’s trade union and the state apparatus in the country. Throughout
our interviews with trade union leaders and rank-and-file activists of both unions, a

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favourable opinion of Lula’s Government clearly predominated. In order to justify

their adherence to the PT programme, trade unionists made repeated comparisons
with the “FHC era” of Fernando Henrique Cardoso, Lula’s predecessor. Moreover,
professional development projects – not to mention agreements with private univer-
sities – implemented by trade unions, depend on resources from the Workers Relief
Fund and the support of federal initiatives such as the University for All Programme,
which distributes full or partial study grants to low-income students to finance private
university education. It is not surprising, therefore, that the main initiative taken by
Lula’s Government in relation to the telemarketing sector, the Telemarketing Law
passed on 1 December 2008, provoked nothing more than routine protest from trade
unionists, despite its being limited exclusively to the rights of consumers and doing
nothing to improve the working conditions of the tele-operators (Peres et al., 2006).6

The cycle of strikes and the experience of trade

unionism in the city of São Paulo
In the absence of direct union pressure on government, with regard to strike action
Sintratel has shown itself to be more active than Sintetel. At this point it is worth
noting that, despite the structural obstacles to collective mobilization in the sector,
there have been a fair number of strikes in the call centre industry in São Paulo. As
noted above, when we began our research we noted very few references to strikes in
telemarketing. This scenario, however, changed after the famous strike of August 2005
in the Atento unit in São Bernardo. This was a crucial episode in Sintratel’s history,
because the strike broke out in the same city that, 30 years earlier, had seen the
eruption of the great cycle of strikes which, under the leadership of Lula, gave rise to
the “new unionism”.
The workers’ dissatisfaction stemmed from the absence of any wage increases for
the two previous years, shortfalls in meal vouchers, the “banking” of overtime working
hours, precarious working conditions and psychological harassment. When lower
transportation allowances were introduced various demonstrations were organized,
with the backing of Sintratel (and the opposition of Sintetel), culminating in a day-
long work stoppage of approximately 150 tele-operators – enough to provoke the
police to imprison trade unionists and the company to fire about 30 tele-operators
who went on strike. Then about half of the 900 tele-operators in the unit decided to
join the movement, which went on for nine days and demanded, in addition to a
17.74 per cent pay rise, an increase in the value of meal vouchers from BRL2.74 to
BRL6, wage equality across all tele-operators in the unit and profit-sharing. Although
the dismissals were not reversed, the strike was considered a victory by both the union
and the tele-operators, almost all of whose demands were met. Thereafter shorter
strikes began to happen every year, with the same list of demands: profit-sharing, child
care, wage increases, shorter working hours, higher-value meal vouchers and so on.

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During our interviews with tele-operators and rank-and-file trade unionists in

early 2006, we recorded references to the Atento strike. However, having been
overly influenced by the prevailing defensive trend in the unions at the beginning of
2005 we incorrectly interpreted this movement as part of the struggles more or less
related to the recognition of an individual’s dignity – against psychological harass-
ment and for the right to bathroom breaks, longer rest breaks, an improvement in the
snacks provided and so on. In reality, however, more offensive shutdown movements
began emerging at that time.7 Since we were not focused on the close analysis of trade
union movements, we did not grasp the importance of certain key factors relating
to the work process in the CTAs in the formation of class solidarity among the
tele-operators.8
In the first place, while it is true that the characteristics of a first job in
telemarketing, along with the high turnover of employees in call centres, tend to
impede class-based political action, and while it is also true that in a labour market
where for every three jobs created in non-agricultural private enterprise, two are in
companies with up to ten workers who earn on average BRL633.03 per month, the
call centre industry came to be regarded by many as a more or less inescapable
occupational horizon. Despite the intense job turnover in this sector (42 per cent
per year) (DIEESE, 2010), we managed to interview tele-operators with as much
as ten years’ experience in telemarketing. This means that the union bonds are not
simply lost, but frequently taken from one company to another. Second, the
progressive monopolization of the Brazilian call centre industry led to ever tougher
working conditions, feeding a diffuse dissatisfaction among the rank-and-file workers.
Finally, it is worth pointing out two aspects of the working process that foster
solidarity: the emphasis on the need to reach goals through cooperative teamwork,
which tends to nurture ties between tele-operators who demonstrate during occasions
of conflict with the company; and the shared experience of discrimination on the basis
of gender, sexual orientation and race, which often further reinforces these ties of
solidarity, thereby creating a certain inclination towards collective mobilization.
This is not to imply a simplistic conclusion that tele-operators form a group
mobilized by unions. Rather, what we have are workers who, despite the difficulties
placed by the industry in the way of collective mobilization, have started to form an
embryo of collective consciousness strong enough to guarantee some important steps on the
path to union self-organization. In fact, the rapid and concentrated growth in the call
centre industry in Brazil, added to the accumulation of experience in the sector on the
part of the tele-operators, has tended to favour the emergence of certain more assertive
demands. This may not seem much, in the historical context of the Brazilian union
movement; but if we take into account the model of labour organization predominant
in the industry, as well as the very recent formation of this group of workers, it
becomes apparent that any image that associates tele-operators with the absence of the basic
conditions for participation in the class struggle must be immediately rejected.

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In fact, observing this post-Fordist sub-proletarian group has allowed us to test

the “passive Brazilian revolution” hypothesis outlined by the present author with
Alvaro Bianchi after Lula’s first election (Braga and Bianchi, 2005). At that time, we
posited two scenarios. First, we argued that Lula’s Government would not simply
be another example of neoliberalism, along the lines of those headed by Fernando
Collor or Fernando Henrique Cardoso, precisely because, in order to achieve the
necessary margin of popular consent, he would have to respond to certain demands
pent up in the social movements. We used the – admittedly rather weak – notion of
“social liberalism” in an attempt to address the emphasis on income distribution
policies, even if they are shaped by the reproduction of the rentier orthodoxy. Second,
we argued that the “transformist” direct relationship of the high-level union bureau-
cracy with its pension funds might not be sufficient to generate a “new class”, as
Oliveira (2003) contended, but would certainly pave the one-way street of the “new
trade-unionism” towards the globalized financial system of concentrated economic
power/accumulation. We argued that this path would completely destroy any
possibility of this bureaucracy once again defending the historical interests of Brazilian
subaltern classes. We called this process the “financialization of the trade union
bureaucracy”.
The experience of the city of São Paulo’s trade unions within the telemarketing
sector allowed us to test this hypothesis. In fact, we found both tendencies in action.
On the one hand, we noted, in particular, a resolute initiative on Sintratel’s part
to narrow the gap between the union’s demands and those formulated by the social
movements in the country throughout the 1980s and 1990s: struggles for equality
across differences of gender, race and sexual orientation, access to university education,
social protection and so on. Furthermore, Sintratel sought not only to associate
with other unions in countries where Atento maintains operations, but also to coor-
dinate with the Human Rights Secretary of the President of the Republic in order to
develop projects to combat psychological harassment and discrimination based on
sexual orientation. Thus the union, in its own way, helped to increase the margin of
popular consent among the tele-operators, bringing them closer to certain historical
demands of the country’s social movements.
On the other hand, Sintratel supported the reform of union legislation under-
taken by Lula’s Government, in an attempt to take advantage of the situation: during
our research, we were able to follow the outbreak of a series of conflicts within the
union – with reports of physical aggression between leaders – motivated in large part
by the process of disaffiliation from the CUT federation and the building of a new
federation (the CTB), created by the Communist Party of Brazil exclusively to receive
a larger portion of the tax revenue destined for the trade union associations. In one way
or another, the result of the encounter between the demands pent up in the social
movements and “trade union transformism” undoubtedly represented an increase in
the control of the trade union movement by the state apparatus.

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Conclusion
Our research into these post-Fordist sub-proletarians and their unions certainly does
not generate an image of a class fraction incapable of constructing autonomous forms
of organization that would turn to the State for the optimal path to reducing social
inequality. In fact, the tele-operators constitute a remarkably ambiguous phenomenon
in ideological terms. While it is true that they possess very little political experience,
they have already started organizing their own strikes; although they are not interested
in parties, they do know how to manifest their dissatisfaction within and outside the
companies where they work; they associate the rise in popular consumption with the
continuity of Lulism, but do not delude themselves with the “miracle” of credit
subsidized by the Government.
With regard to the cycle of economic growth and the distribution of wealth among
those who make a living wage, this group drew lessons that foster not an attitude
dependent on the State so much as a more or less permanent state of social unrest. They
momentarily adhered to Lulism, but let us not fool ourselves: this indication of passivity
does not adequately characterize them. On the contrary, it is more likely a type of diffuse
popular pressure, all too familiar to the trade unionists who work in the sector, that
criticizes the present and looks beyond it into the future. This project might spill over
the boundaries of the trade union movement and further reduce popular support for
the Government, if the standard of living of those who make a living wage were to be
undermined. If we consider the historical characteristics of semi-peripheral capitalism,
it should come as no surprise that Dilma Roussef’s Government has already announced
substantial cuts to the federal budget and forced Congress to approve a rise in the
minimum wage far lower than the trade unions had expected.
Returning to the history of Brazilian populism, we should remember that exag-
geration of the virtues of non-manual jobs by newcomers in the workforce was a
phenomenon widely documented in the ethnographies that dealt with the formation
of the new Brazilian working class between 1930 and 1960. Unfamiliar with this type
of work amid their initial contacts with factory despotism in semi-peripheral
conditions, the workers envied desk jobs and wished that their daughters could study,
abandon their housekeeping jobs and occupy such positions in the future. The rising
sociology of Brazilian professional labour interpreted this as a clear indication of
the individualism that, supposedly characteristic of this social group, dissolved the
workers’ identification with their social environment; the aspiration to find freedom
from the furious work pace of the assembly line and take refuge in office work was
mistaken for a feeling of helplessness in the face of the large Fordist company.
The history of the emergence of a new trade unionism, with Lula at its head, at
the end of the 1970s showed that the sociological imagination simply was not capable
of correctly capturing the aspirations of Brazilian workers. On the contrary, what arose
from the strikes of the late 1970s was the trade union leadership. Currently, the

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daughters – and grand-daughters – of those workers attend a private night college,

abandon their housekeeping jobs and settle into desk jobs. As we have seen, there is
no shortage of positions in the post-Fordist call centre industry, especially in the north-
east of the country. Whether or not they will keep quiet faced with low wages, high
turnover, long and pressurized working hours, racial discrimination, psychological
harassment and illness, all of which are prevalent in the sector, remains to be seen.
Perhaps they will decide to follow in the footsteps of their fathers and grandfathers
some 30 years ago.

Acknowledgements
The author thanks Mariana Riscali, Fábio Pimentel, David Flores and Vitor Vaneti for
their comments and contributions. Any remaining errors are the author’s responsibility.

Appendix: Methodological note

The field research that led to this chapter was guided by the extended case method. To
this end, we combined over a period of approximately five years research techniques
based on a questionnaire with qualitative methods of ethnographic observation.
Concerning the pre-tests, sample definition and systematization of data collected through
the directive questionnaire, I received invaluable help from Natália Padovani and
Gabriel Casoni. Mariana Riscali helped me with the research at the database of the
Ministério do Trabalho e Emprego (Ministry of Labour and Employment). Regarding
the in-depth interviews, I benefited from a formidable trio of students: David Flores,
Fábio Pimentel and Vitor Vaneti. In addition, the work made use of interviews
conducted by another student, Maurício Rombaldi, in his dissertation on Sintetel.
After an exploratory phase that lasted about three months and covered the first
group of non-directive interviews with tele-operators, the classification of responses and
the elaboration of a structured questionnaire, the field research itself began in the first
half of 2004, lasting until the first half of 2006 and including the in-depth interviews.
The programme of research was as follows. (1) Visits to two companies were
undertaken in order to observe the organization of work and the industrial production
process of the service relationship. (2) Interviews were conducted with the main agents
(managers, coordinators, quality monitors, supervisors, union leaders and tele-operators)
involved in the process and in the organization of work. (3) A questionnaire was
distributed among tele-operators aiming to collect information about the pace of work,
career prospects, duration of operations, cooperation, supervising activities, corporate
goals policy and duration of rest breaks. (4) In-depth interviews were conducted
with tele-operators.
We chose to conduct our research in the two most important companies of the
Brazilian call centre market, here called “Company A” and “Company B”. Between

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them they have cornered the Brazilian market. To illustrate, in 2005 these two
companies employed a total of 75,926 people (Company A: 38,000; Company B:
37,926). Company A had 14,500 available operators (AOs), and Company B 17,507.
All other thirteen largest companies together had a total of 59,721 employees and
35,353 AOs. This means that Companies A and B together represented 56 per cent
of the sector in terms of total number of employees and 47.5 per cent of the market
in terms of the number of AOs. As expected, both companies operate with the latest
technology in the sector, as well as having a diverse array of institutional clients from
different economic sectors – especially telecommunications, banks, internet businesses,
government, public administration, medical services, energy companies and industry.
The services offered to clients were mostly focused on research, scheduling, billing and
sales (active telemarketing); phone banking, customer service, scheduling, helpdesks,
research and sales (receptive telemarketing); and services connected to the internet,
such as email, chat, co-browsing and video conferencing. Database, consulting and
subscription services were also offered to a smaller extent.
We understand that because these two companies even today define the para-
meters in the sector, all other Brazilian call centres are guided in their competitive
initiatives by the two leading companies. This tends to equalize the working condi-
tions and, to a large extent, the remuneration of tele-operators. Thus, these companies
offer a privileged field for the study of the behaviour of workers in this sector.
Moreover, it is noteworthy that our field observations were made in what were
considered “reference” sites by the companies themselves. This is to say that, either
because of their size – about 2,400 tele-operators each – or because of the diversity of
operations, they offered at that time a representative sample of the reality of the
working processes of both companies.
The visits occurred during the months of March, April and May 2004
(Company B) and May 2004 (Company A). Interviews were conducted with an
HR manager (Company B), with operation coordinators (Companies A and B) and
with supervisors (Companies A and B), in addition, of course, to informal – untaped
– conversations with tele-operators during snack breaks. In all, there were five visits to
Company B and three to Company A.
Unfortunately, the interviews with tele-operators could not be conducted in
reserved spaces – well away from the supervision of managers – on the grounds that
this was contrary to “company policy” and would constitute “work interference”.
Given these limitations, access to tele-operators was made possible by the trade unions
active in the sector, Sintetel and Sintratel. The contact with tele-operators was made
through two main instruments: a questionnaire with eleven closed questions and in-
depth structured interviews with open questions based on preliminary interpretation
of data from the questionnaires. The questionnaire was administered over three
different weekends in April and May 2004, during the presentation of union (Sintetel)
activities to tele-operators from Companies A and B, on a farm beside Rodovia dos

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Imigrantes in the city of Santo André. The in-depth interviews were conducted in July
2004, June–July 2005, and January and June 2006 in the course of activities organized
by Sintetel and Sintratel and held in the offices of the unions in the city of São Paulo.
The second stage of our field research, conducted with unionists from Sintetel and
Sintratel, two of the major unions that operate in the city of São Paulo, was undertaken
over three months of participant observation in 2009. Eighteen in-depth interviews
were conducted with union officers and grass-roots activists. In addition, we conducted
24 interviews with tele-operators during their work breaks and during their approaches
to the unions in order to submit labour demands. In this stage we sought, through
systematic observation, to distinguish the external forces (the relationships between local
unions and central unions, as well as with the state apparatus) from the internal processes
(the relationships between unionists and tele-operators, unionization campaigns and
mobilization of workers) that shape collective action in the sector. By this means it was
possible to reflexively understand the scope and limits of union activity in relation to
the expectations, especially wage expectations, of tele-operators. Moreover, the interviews
offered key information for our analysis of the intimate connection between the despotic
factory regime – high employee turnover rate, lack of domestic markets, strong job
placement rate, autocratic management model, and so on – and the strike mobilization
observed after 2006 in the São Paulo call centre industry.

Notes
1 For details of the research personnel and process, see the appendix to this chapter.
2“Infotaylorism” is a mechanism for controlling the workforce based on the use of information technologies to consolidate the
power of management and eliminate any autonomous initiative of the employee during the workday.
3 Sintetel is a union affiliated to the Union Force federation, the chief representative of Brazilian business unionism.
4Sintratel was originally affiliated to the CUT federation, but during the union reform negotiations of the Lula Government it
decided to join the new federation created by the Communists, the CTB federation.
5Despite the strong competition for the right to represent the same rank and file, both Sintratel and Sintetel support Lula’s
Government. Naturally, the main reason for this lies in the great financial and material advantages provided by the federal
Government to those unions that support their policies.
6The Telemarketing Law was an attempt by Lula’s Government to regulate the telemarketing sector by the formation of a
national registry of those who did not accept phone calls from companies.
7 The demands of these more aggressive movements include salary increases above inflation, the right to share in company profits

and the establishment of crèches for the children of workers.

8At that time, we were trying to identify the importance of labour process organization for the achievement of workers’ consent
to the rules of the two companies in which the research was conducted.

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[A social construction: The attachment of the Brazilian standard of ergonomics at the work of
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Rombaldi, M. 2007. Os sindicalistas nas entrelinhas: O caso do Sintetel pós-privatizações [The unionists
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LABOUR RELATIONS IN URUGUAY

UNDER THE FRENTE AMPLIO
7
GOVERNMENT, 2005–09:
FROM NEOLIBERALISM TO
NEOCORPORATIVISM?
Jana Silverman

Introduction
The small Latin American country of Uruguay has long been considered a bastion
of progressive labour policy in the region, owing in large part to the early political
incorporation of the working class led from above by the reformist President José
Batlle y Ordoñez during the first decade of the twentieth century. During the eight
years he served in office, Batlle y Ordoñez established fundamental labour rights such
as the eight-hour day, union freedoms, unemployment insurance and social security
coverage for workers, as well as expanding suffrage and creating a public education
system. On the other hand, the Uruguayan union movement never became a funda-
mental part of the electoral base of Batlle y Ordoñez’s political vehicle, the Colorado
Party, and subsequent governments never attempted to limit union actions either
through the imposition of corporatist structures or through the introduction of a
detailed judicial code to regulate labour. These factors, combined with a stable demo-
cratic system and relative economic prosperity which lasted until the last quarter of the
century, allowed the union movement in Uruguay to develop in favourable socio-
economic conditions while preserving its autonomy in relation to the State and the
traditional political parties.
After an intensification of social conflict and the installation of an authoritarian
regime in 1973, the labour movement and its nascent political ally, the centre-left
Frente Amplio (FA) party, were viciously repressed and forced to act clandestinely.
When redemocratization of the country began in 1985, this did not lead to a full
restoration of the political and organizational capacity of the unions, this time owing
to the implementation of neoliberal policies which, in addition to liberalizing trade
policies and opening capital markets, truncated the role of the State in promoting
union freedoms and collective bargaining in favour of a “voluntary”, bilateral system

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of labour relations that did not take into account the inherent power inequalities
between workers and employers.
This type of labour relations system prevailed in Uruguay for over a decade
until the historic landslide victory in the October 2004 presidential and congres-
sional elections by the FA, which continued to share ideological, organizational and
personal ties with the labour movement. Beginning in 2005, the FA Government
led by President Tabaré Vázquez legislated a wide-ranging set of changes to the
Uruguayan labour relations framework, through the convening of mandatory sector-
wide tripartite wage negotiations known as the consejos de salarios, the granting of
further guarantees for union leaders and activists through the Ley del Fuero Sindical
(Law of Special Union Protections), and the expansion and institutionalization of
collective bargaining processes to previously excluded categories of workers, such as
teachers, domestic workers and rural labourers. This chapter will attempt to analyse
these transformations, investigating how this new activist role of the State in the
promotion of union freedoms and collective bargaining has affected unions and
their strategies to defend workers’ rights, as well as examining the impact of this
neocorporativist approach to labour relations in the context of a country still in the
process of economic development on the labour market and the political arena as
a whole.
In order to understand the political incorporation process of Uruguayan workers
during the first part of the twentieth century, we turn to the conceptual framework
offered by Collier and Collier (2002), who analyse the changes produced by the
entrance of the working class into the national polis – changes that depend upon the
initial configuration of classes, the crystallization of the relationship between the union
movement and the political party or parties that represent it, and the establishment
of institutional mechanisms to regulate conflicts between labour and capital. These
changes do not occur in a linear fashion, but only at certain defined moments
denominated as “critical junctures”, when variations in factors such as the economic
and productive structure, geopolitical dynamics and the organizational strength of the
union movement combine to generate a radical rearrangement of the links between
the working class and the political system, which in turn has an impact on all the
players operating within that system. Adopting the concept of path dependency,
Collier and Collier (2002, pp. 27–29) argue that the institutionalization of the config-
uration of power structures in the period following a critical juncture delimits the
future strategic choices available to the actors in the national polis, until a new critical
juncture arises out of another situation of political uncertainty and transforms the
political arena once again. For this reason, in order to understand how the reconfig-
uration of political opportunities under the FA Government led to changes in the
political insertion of Uruguayan workers during the first decade of the twenty-first
century, it is necessary to analyse past trajectories that shaped the relationships between
unions, employers and the State.

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A historical framework of the political insertion of the

Uruguayan working class: From premature political
incorporation to neoliberal exclusion
Using this theoretical frame of reference, we can characterize the process which
integrated the Uruguayan working class into the political arena as one of “premature
political incorporation”, as it occurred when industrial capitalism was just beginning
to be installed and before the union movement was able to establish a truly national
presence. The origins of Uruguayan unionism lie in the late nineteenth century, when
a wave of immigrants from Italy and Spain brought their anarcho-syndicalist political
tradition to the country. Unions with a fixed organizational structure began to appear
in 1895, and in the wake of the historic strike of Montevideo municipal workers, the
first national labour confederation (the Uruguayan Regional Workers’ Federation,
known by its Spanish acronym FORU) was formed by anarchist labour activists in
1905. In these early years, the workers’ movement was principally characterized by its
concentration in urban areas, its organizational fragmentation and its political out-
look, dubbed “oppositional unionism” by Supervielle and Pucci (2008, p. 78), which
favoured direct action instead of collective bargaining as the preferred strategy to
mitigate labour exploitation. Owing to these factors, the initial political incorporation
process which began during this period was led not by the relatively weak anarcho-
syndicalist forces that rejected the use of state instruments to promote labour rights,
but by a traditional “catch-all” political party – the Colorado Party, under the leader-
ship of Batlle y Ordoñez. With the goal of releasing Uruguay from the grips of
endemic partisan violence, Batlle y Ordoñez conceived of a far-reaching set of social
reforms aimed at creating a democratic, secular and economically stable nation free
from foreign intervention. To do this, he saw the need to modernize working
conditions and expand democratic institutions, leading to the codification of the
country’s first set of labour laws, as well as the extension of the right to vote and the
creation of public education and social security systems with broad coverage. In the
opinion of Cavarozzi (2001), these social reforms, combined with the existence of a
strong bipartisan system, allowed Uruguay to gain the distinction of being the most
stable democratic regime in all of Latin America during the first half of the twentieth
century. However, because of the nascent stage of trade union organization, its anti-
partisan political bent, and the large numbers of unionized workers without voting
rights (because of their status as migrants), the Uruguayan union movement never
integrated itself into the political and electoral base of the Colorado Party, thus
opening up the opportunity for it to later become one of the principal social allies
of the FA.
The next critical juncture that redefined the historical relationship between the
Uruguayan political system and the union movement corresponds to the phase of
union consolidation and radicalization, political polarization and economic stagnation

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which characterized the period 1966–73 and which terminated tragically in the coup
d’état of 1973 and the ensuing installation of an authoritarian regime. In the decades
that preceded this moment, governments inspired by Batlle y Ordoñez introduced
further reformist labour legislation, such as that which created the minimum wage,
prohibited child labour and installed obligatory tripartite national wage bargaining
processes, known as the consejos de salarios (CS). However, in order to combat the
economic crisis which began to affect the country in the 1960s, owing to failures in
the import-substitution model of industrial development and stagnation in the
agricultural sector, subsequent governments began to repeal some of these pro-worker
measures, as well as to devalue the currency and freeze prices and salaries (Collier
and Collier, 2002, pp. 657–58). This caused a growing tension between the union
movement, the recently formed FA party and the Guevarist Tupamaro guerrilla
movement on one side, and the Uruguayan Government and armed forces on
the other, leading eventually to a rupture in the democratic system. In June 1973,
President Juan María Bordaberry declared the suspension of the Congress, prohibited
the functioning of all political parties and unions, and curtailed the freedom of the
press, thus installing a military–civilian dictatorship which lasted until 1985.
Upon entering the period of redemocratization in the 1980s, there were wide-
spread expectations among the population not only that the dismantled democratic
institutions (including unions) would be rebuilt, but also that lost purchasing power
would be recovered and decent jobs be created. These hopes were not to be realized:
although the first newly democratic government of Julio María Sanguinetti made an
effort to reconvene the CS, the arrival of the neoconservative leader of the National
Party, Luis Alberto Lacalle, in the presidency in 1989 marked an abandonment of
policies to stimulate social dialogue and revalue salaries. Following the predominant
ideological current in Latin America at the time, Lacalle decided to apply neoliberal
economic policies, including fiscal adjustment, the deregulation of the banking and
insurance sectors, the elimination of barriers to international trade and investment, the
flexibilization of labour contracts and the imposition of new restrictions on the right to
strike. The effects of these policies on Uruguayan workers included an average decline
in real salaries of 24 per cent between 1998 and 2003 (Olesker, 2009, p. 13), the loss
of jobs in the industrial sector (whose contribution to national GDP dropped from
25 per cent to 16 per cent during the period 1990–94) and an increase in the levels of
unemployment and underemployment. The Uruguayan labour confederation PIT-
CNT adopted a position of resistance to Lacalle’s reforms, but although it was able to
block the proposed privatization of several important public utilities companies, it could
not stop the haemorrhaging of individual affiliated members that it experienced during
this period, especially in the private sector. According to Méndez, Senatore and Traversa
(2009, p. 13), the unionization rate fell from 35 per cent of the economically active
population in 1987 to only 15 per cent in 2000, with less than 8 per cent of private sector
workers registered as unionized that year.

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These labour market and macroeconomic tendencies worsened after the 2002
banking crisis, which affected over half of Uruguay’s banking establishments and was
provoked by a run on deposits by Argentine account holders who were trying anxiously
to preserve their own patrimony after the collapse of the financial system in their country
one year earlier. In the first quarter of 2002, Uruguayan banks lost over 40 per cent
of their reserves and deposits. This in turn led to an increase in the country’s sovereign
debt and fiscal deficit owing to the massive bailout efforts that were undertaken as well
as the rapid devaluation of the currency. The country’s real economy was also gravely
affected: in 2002 GDP plummeted by 11 per cent, unemployment surged to the record
level of 19.8 per cent, and over 58,000 workers left the country in search of jobs overseas
(Ladra, 2008).
Thus the social and labour panorama in Uruguay before the arrival of the FA
Government in 2005 can be characterized as very precarious, marked by the flexi-
bilization of the labour market, the absence of social dialogue processes, and the
persistence of high levels of unemployment, underemployment and informal work.
Although the Uruguayan union movement was able to preserve its unitary structure,
with a single confederation, the abovementioned PIT-CNT, its rolls were reduced to
a mere 115,000 affiliates, of which 68 per cent were employed in the public sector
(Zurbriggen, Doglio and Senatore, 2003). In the private sector, the violation of norms
that protected union leaders against arbitrary dismissal, and the failure to convene the
CS, made the practice of collective bargaining processes extremely difficult. Bargaining
was possible only in those economic sectors with a historically strong union presence,
such as banking and transportation; and even in these cases, sector-wide agreements
could not be reached. In addition, according to Pucci et al. (2010, pp. 41–42), the
issues being negotiated were transformed, as unions began to make more defensive
claims related to topics such as job stability, productivity and the role of the union in
industrial restructuring processes, with less emphasis on wage demands.
The framework of Uruguayan labour law during this period preceding the
formation of the FA Government was described by the ILO (1995) as “non-systematic
and non-detailed”. Unlike countries such as Brazil and France, with highly complex
labour codes, Uruguay had not codified its labour laws, which led to a plethora of
divergent interpretations and contradictory judicial rulings. Before 2005, little legis-
lation existed regarding labour relations. For example, the only guarantees of union
freedoms in Uruguayan law were enshrined in the constitution of 1967 and in three
relevant ILO Conventions ratified by the Uruguayan State.1 Regarding collective
bargaining, Law 13.556 of 1966 regulated the negotiation process and stipulated the
requirements for the registration of agreements, but in many cases this law was ignored
in practice by both employers and unions, leaving the agreements themselves as the
only legal framework respected by all actors. As a result, two distinct labour relations
regimes existed in Uruguay: one which corresponded to the era when the CS were
convened on a regular basis and unions effectively participated in the processes that

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defined work conditions and salary levels, and one in which the CS were not convened
and social dialogue practices and union activity as a whole were hindered. Thus the
conversion of the CS into obligatory mechanisms for sector-wide wage negotiation was
essential in order for the Uruguayan union movement to overcome the organizational
weakness that plagued it after the implementation of neoliberal economic policies in
the 1990s and the blowback from the financial crisis of 2002.

Cambia, todo cambia: The transformation

of the Uruguayan labour policy agenda under
the Frente Amplio Government
The possibility of restructuring the Uruguayan labour relations system became reality
in October 2004, when Tabaré Vázquez, the former Mayor of Montevideo standing
as presidential candidate for the Frente Amplio/Encuentro Progresista/Nueva Mayoria
coalition, obtained 50.5 per cent of the total vote, thus securing a historic victory for
the united forces of the left in a single round of balloting (Natanson, 2008, p. 66). In
addition to this triumph, the FA also won an absolute majority in both houses of
the national Congress, with the election of 16 senators and 53 members of Congress.
This allowed the FA to create a “government of the party”, excluding all other political
groupings from leadership posts in both the executive and legislative branches, giving
it greater freedom to construct new public policies in accordance with its political
platform, with minimal interference from the opposition.
It is important to note that the triumph of the FA in 2004 was not unexpected,
as the vote count for the party’s presidential candidates had jumped from only
21 per cent in 1989 to 30.6 per cent in 1994, increasing further to 40.1 per cent in 1999
– victory in this last case being lost in the second round of balloting owing to a pact that
consolidated the support of both traditional political parties for the Colorado Party
candidate, Jorge Batlle. According to Chavez (2008, p. 104), the key factors that explain
the growth and consolidation of the left as the predominant political force in the urban
areas of Uruguay include the demographic changes that gave more importance to the
youth vote, the widespread popular dissatisfaction with social and economic policy after
the banking crisis of 2002, and the innovative and efficient management of the city of
Montevideo by the FA since its capture of the mayoralty in 1990. Owing to these factors,
in 2004 the FA was able to capture a substantial number of votes from social sectors
beyond its traditional electoral base of unionized workers, students and intellectuals.
The electoral platform of the FA, which later formed the base for its policy
proposals regarding labour issues, contained the following points:
• the reactivation of the CS;
• the restoration of the purchasing power lost by workers during the Batlle
Government of 2000–04;

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• an even greater upwards revaluation of the minimum wage and of the salaries of
teachers and public health-care sector workers;
• a reduction in the levels of structural unemployment, especially for groups of
workers with more precarious positions in the Uruguayan labour market (such
as youth, women, minorities and unskilled workers);
• a reduction in informal work.

In order to construct the final version of its labour policy agenda, Vázquez and
other leaders of the FA entered into dialogue with business and union leaders, in order
to ensure that their interests were reflected. Employers’ organizations, such as the
Uruguayan Chamber of Commerce and Services, doubted the FA’s intentions at
first but then signalled their relief when Danilo Astori, a centrist leader of the party
committed to maintaining economically orthodox policies founded on open markets
and inflation targeting, was named as Finance Minister. Under Astori’s watch, the
Ministry of Economy and Finances (MEF) repeatedly vetoed certain wage and social
spending policies proposed by other governmental and legislative actors that contra-
dicted its priority of maintaining price stability and a primary fiscal surplus. In
addition, Astori ensured that capital gains were protected from higher levels of taxation
in the fiscal reform bill passed by the FA Government in 2006 (Reygadas and
Filgueira, 2010, p. 181).
With regard to the union movement represented by the PIT-CNT, the FA’s
programme incorporated the great majority of its aspirations, owing to the historical
and ideological links that the two organizations have shared since the founding of
the FA in 1971. For that reason, it has been argued that the PIT-CNT places more
endogenous constraints on the ruling leftist party than any other workers’ movement
operating within the context of the “new left” that has surged to the fore in Latin
America during the past decade (Luna, 2010, p. 37). Thus the key issues advocated
by the PIT-CNT, such as the reactivation of the CS and the reduction of informal
work, were highlighted in the FA’s platform, and other policies of interest to the
unions, such as greater protections for union negotiators in the CS and a widening
of the right to strike, were also included in the FA’s policy agenda.
It is important to mention that the capacity of the FA Government to transform
the Uruguayan labour relations system after coming to power in 2005 was linked not
only to its auspicious position as majority party, but also to the decidedly favourable
economic context arising from high international prices for its export commodities,
such as beef, soy, rice and forestry products, and from the reactivation of demand
for services such as tourism and computer programming in both the national and
the regional market. These factors, combined with a boom in FDI estimated at
US$6.6 billion during the years 2005–09, help to explain the dramatic growth in GDP
during this period, calculated at 35.4 per cent (Olesker, 2009, p. 94). Although most

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FDI was concentrated in sectors with low levels of incorporation of technology, such
as food and beverages, cellulose and paper pulp, and cattle raising (Red de Economistas
de Izquierda del Uruguay, 2010), industrial production was favoured by the increase
in internal consumer demand for perishable goods and by the first government
industrial promotion policies put into place since the 1950s. The reduction in unem-
ployment since 2005 is consequently due principally to the creation of new jobs
responding to this amplified demand and not to the exit of workers from the labour
market (ILO, 2012, p. 24).

The social and economic impacts of the reregulation

of labour relations in Uruguay
As noted above, one of the highest priorities of the FA after Tabaré Vázquez’s inau-
guration in March 2005 was the reactivation of the CS, a move that did not require
new legislation as the regulatory framework created by Law 10449 of 1943 was still
technically in force. However, in order to ensure the success of the new round of
negotiations in the CS, several new structures were created. The Consejo Superior
Tripartito and Consejo Superior Rural were formed to classify all economic sectors and
subsectors into groups to facilitate the bargaining process, and to propose provisions
to modernize Law 10449. The Consejo Bipartito was also created as a space for social
dialogue with public employees. With this new institutional structure in place, the first
round of tripartite bargaining processes were convened in 2005, divided into three
levels of negotiations. The “macro” level, represented by the Consejo Superior
Tripartito, brought national leaders of the PIT-CNT and employers’ organizations
together with representatives of the Ministry of Labour and Social Security (MTSS):
this body defined general parameters for all negotiations and also determined the level
of the national minimum wage. The “meso” level involved negotiations between
union leaders and employers of individual economic sectors, accompanied by repre-
sentatives of the MTSS, divided into 20 groups and approximately 190 subgroups
defined by the Consejo Superior Tripartito. At the “micro” level negotiations took
place at the level of individual companies in order to address issues not covered at the
“meso” level. It should be mentioned that the role of the State (embodied by
the representatives of the MTSS) is not that of a mere observer whose principal role is
to guarantee that the labour legislation is respected, but is actually quite proactive,
especially in the negotiations at the “meso” level, where it presents its own proposals
for clauses to be negotiated in cases when employers’ and workers’ representatives
cannot arrive at a consensus.
This process, defined as “amplified social dialogue” by Méndez, Senatore and
Traversa (2009), in order to differentiate it from the more restricted negotiations
which were held during the Sanguinetti Government in the 1980s, culminated in
the conclusion of 181, 213, 226 and 205 agreements in 2005, 2006, 2008 and 2010

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respectively, incorporating topics related not only to salaries but also to gender
equality in the workplace, vocational training, occupational health and safety, and
working hours (MTSS, 2011). Out of the total number of collective bargaining
agreements signed in these years, 96 per cent (2005), 86 per cent (2006), 84 per cent
(2008) and 84 per cent (2010) were resolved by consensus, thus confirming the
capacity of this mechanism to mediate and pacifically resolve labour conflicts. These
agreements covered a total of 440,000 private sector workers, 150,000 public sector
workers, 80,000 rural workers and 95,000 domestic workers (this last category
only beginning in 2008), encompassing over 50 per cent of the economically active
population of Uruguay. It is also accepted that the agreements reached in the
CS helped revalue workers’ salaries, which lost an average of 16 per cent of their
real purchasing power after the banking crisis of 2002. Furthermore, the fact that
over 200,000 new jobs were produced during the period 2005–08 is clear
evidence that the improved levels of remuneration for workers agreed upon in the
CS did not “crowd out” the creation of new employment opportunities (Olesker,
2009, p. 39).
In addition to the reactivation of the CS, new legislation to strengthen labour rights
and social dialogue processes was also approved during the Government of Tabaré
Vázquez. In order to protect the activity of union leaders involved in the negotiations
taking place in the CS, the Law of Special Union Protections (Ley del Fuero Sindical)
was passed in 2005. In accordance with the ILO Freedom of Association and Protection
of the Right to Organise Convention, 1948 (No. 87), already ratified by Uruguay, this
law explicitly stipulates that the creation of new unions and the activities of existing
organizations must take place in a context free of employer influence, and that any
worker fired from their job as a result of their union activity must be promptly and
automatically reinstated (Ermida, 2006, p. 6). The law also guarantees that union leaders
be given paid leave to exercise their functions. It is important to note that this law initially
met with stiff resistance from the Uruguayan Chamber of Commerce and Services, but
the active support of the PIT-CNT and strict party discipline observed by the members
of the FA in the Congress permitted its approval with only minor amendments.
In 2009, towards the end of Tabaré Vázquez’s period in office, the Congress
worked to pass two new legislative proposals in order to keep up the momentum
towards the institutionalization of a new labour relations system based on social
dialogue processes, in both the public and the private sector. Law 18508 addresses
collective bargaining in the public sector, extending this right to all public employees;
previously it was denied to important segments of this workforce, such as certain
functionaries in the executive branch and public school teachers, despite the previous
ratification of the ILO’s Collective Bargaining Convention, 1981 (No. 154), which
allows the exclusion only of members of the police and armed forces from collective
bargaining processes (Bajac, 2010, p. 8). Specifically, this law states that all workers in
the legislative, executive and judicial branches of government, state-owned enterprises,

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autonomous state entities and local governments are allowed to conclude collective
bargaining agreements covering the following issues:
• working conditions and occupational health and safety;
• the design and implementation of vocational training programmes;
• the structure of civil service careers;
• proposals for reform of the public sector;
• relations between employers and employees. (Méndez, Senatore and Traversa,
2009, p. 31)

The general framework of the negotiations between the State and its employees
is set by the Consejo Superior de Negociación Publica del Sector Publico, while
individual agreements in each state entity are negotiated directly in bipartite pro-
cesses involving equal numbers of union and state representatives (in their capacity
as employers). The responsibility to guarantee compliance with the agreements rests
with the MTSS.
In September 2009, after two years of debate, the controversial collective
bargaining law for the private sector was passed by the Uruguayan Congress, owing
in large part to the partisan discipline of the FA members of Congress and to the
intense pressure campaign launched in 2009 by the PIT-CNT. This law enshrines
tripartite social dialogue as one of the pillars of the Uruguayan labour relations
system, through the regulation of the functions and structure of the Consejo Superior
Tripartito. This institution, composed of nine representatives of the MTSS, six repre-
sentatives of employers’ organizations and six representatives of the PIT-CNT, has
the authority to establish and modify the legal minimum wage, classify groups of
economic activities in order to facilitate the tripartite wage bargaining processes
that take place in the CS, indicate the labour and employers’ organizations that will
participate in the CS, deliberate on questions pertaining to labour and employer
issues to be resolved bilaterally and trilaterally, and develop initiatives to advance
labour relations in the country.
It should be noted that this law allows any of the three parties represented in
the Consejo Superior Tripartito to convene the CS, thus effectively eliminating the
ability of the executive branch of the Government to unilaterally block the realization
of these sector-wide social dialogue processes, as it did during the reinstallation of a
“voluntarist” labour relations system during the years 1990–2004. In addition, the law
stipulates that the agreements reached in the CS are legally binding and that
compliance for all the actors involved is mandatory, even if the employers refuse
to participate in the negotiations. This occurred, for example, in 2008, in the nego-
tiations in the CS for domestic workers, when no representative of an employers’
organization took part in the talks. Likewise, according to this new law, all wage

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agreements remain in force until new agreements are signed, thus giving a greater level
of stability and continuity to the labour relations system.
Owing to pressure from employers’ groups, a “peace clause” was introduced in
the days before the signing of the law, which stipulates that the actors involved in the
negotiations in the CS shall not take actions in detriment to the spirit of the agreements.
Despite the last-minute inclusion of this clause, the business sector maintained its
opposition to the implementation of this law, even taking it to the point where the
Uruguayan Chamber of Commerce and Services sent a complaint regarding its contents
to the Committee on Freedom of Association of the ILO, and was vindicated when in
2010 this committee recommended to the Uruguayan Government that modifications
be made in order to further demarcate the role of the MTSS representatives in the
collective bargaining processes that take place in the CS (ILO, 2010). To comply with
this recommendation, the Government established a new tripartite commission in
October 2011 to formulate the suggested modifications; its work is still in progress.
Besides these laws regarding collective bargaining and protections for union
leaders, over 35 other legislative proposals regarding labour issues were made by the
FA Government and approved by the Uruguayan Congress during the years 2005–10,
giving this period the distinction of having produced more labour legislation than any
other in the history of the country. Although a detailed description of these other laws
is beyond the scope of this chapter, we may briefly note here some of the issues dealt
with in this legislation: they include the limitation of the working day for domestic and
rural workers, the inclusion of domestic workers in the national social security system,
the establishment of a new public institute for vocational training, and the prohibition
of outsourcing labour in cases where this practice is principally used to reduce costs
and disguise a de facto employer–employee relationship. In the light of this prolif-
eration of legislative activity, it is reasonable to conclude that the Uruguayan labour
relations system has been transformed from one in which negotiated norms prevail,
such as in the United Kingdom and the United States, into one in which labour norms
are explicitly codified through national law rather than bilateral agreements, following
the French and German tradition.
The implementation of these new norms has had significant impacts on the
Uruguayan labour market, especially in relation to the creation and formalization
of employment and to the strengthening of union actors in the labour relations
system. Olesker (2009, p. 31) shows that the unemployment rate declined from
over 13 per cent to 7 per cent, the real value of the minimum wage increased by
135 per cent and wages in all economic sectors were revalued during the period
2005–08. Olesker also estimates that informal employment was reduced by 3 per cent;
however, further action in this sphere is still necessary, as the Instituto Cuesta Duarte
(2009) estimates that approximately 33 per cent of all employment in the country can
still be classified as informal. With regard to the strengthening of the social actors in
the labour market, it is evident that the union movement (traditionally the weakest

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actor) has taken advantage of this new labour relations framework: over 200,000 new
members joined unions affiliated to the PIT-CNT during the years 2005–10, thus
raising the unionization rate in this period from 14.4 per cent to over 25 per cent
(Confederación Sindical de Trabajadores de las Américas, 2010). During the Tabaré
Vázquez Government, the representativeness of the union movement also increased
qualitatively, as new unions were created in formerly under-represented sectors such
as domestic work, retail sales and private security services.

Latin American neocorporativism:

The reconfiguration of interest representation
in post-neoliberal Uruguay
Taking into consideration factors such as the increased promotion of tripartite
social dialogue, the united action of unions and employers’ organizations, and the
redefinition of the role of the State in the new labour relations system installed by
the FA Government, it is possible to pose the question whether the type of political
representation of Uruguayan social actors now prevailing can be classified as “neocor-
porativist” or “societal corporatist”. Utilizing the concept proposed by Schmitter,
corporatism can be defined as a
system of interest representation in which the constituent units are organized into a
limited number of singular, compulsory, noncompetitive, hierarchically ordered and
functionally differentiated categories, recognized … by the state and granted a
deliberate representational monopoly within their respective categories in exchange
for observing certain controls on their selection of leaders and articulation of demands
and supports. (Schmitter, 1974, pp. 93–94)

“Social corporatism” refers to a political system with open and competitive

electoral processes and coalition-based executive powers, which also exhibits
processes of rationalization of state policy-making that serve to incorporate
subordinate social groups more closely within the political process, in this way
corresponding to social democratic systems such as that which operate in the north
European countries.
On the basis of these definitions it can be deduced that there is an approximation
between the neocorporativist or social corporatist model and the current system of
interest representation in Uruguay. This can be confirmed in structural terms. The
representation of workers’ interests is carried out by the unitary labour confederation
PIT-CNT, which has a hierarchical framework (being composed of federations, which
in turn are made up of individual unions), is recognized by the State as the sole
legitimate actor representing labour interests in the CS, and – even if its selection of
leaders is completely autonomous of the State – accepts the rules of the game implicit
in its participation in the CS, including the “peace clause” mentioned above. Although

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Uruguayan employers’ interests are represented by a plurality of organizations without

a defined hierarchy, it is important to note that these groups do not dispute the spheres
of participation in which they operate and strictly coordinate their actions within
the CS. The identification can also be affirmed in historical terms. Schmitter (1974,
p. 126) states that the transition to social corporatism depends on past liberalism,
involving a history of autonomous organizational development, distinctive class self-
images and loyalties, the presence of a competitive electoral arena in which wider
appeals can be launched, and a gradual expansion of the role of the State occurring
in response to the needs and pressures of organized private interest groups. The
autonomy and distinct cultural identity of the Uruguayan union movement, the
country’s traditional egalitarian values stemming from the social welfare regime
constructed by Batlle y Ordoñez, the strong levels of party identification, and the
historic role of the unions in stimulating state involvement in labour relations through
the use of their influence on FA leaders all concur with this definition. Finally, the
Uruguayan labour relations system follows the neocorporativist model on a procedural
level. The tripartite social dialogue that takes place in the CS is now convened on a
permanent basis, leading to comprehensive, legally binding agreements. Also, tripartite
dialogue processes are now being developed in other institutions related to the
world of work, such as the national social security institute (Banco de Previsión Social)
and the national vocational training institute (Instituto Nacional de Empleo y
Formación Profesional).
Despite these indications, the installation of neocorporativism on an
institutional, political and cultural level in Uruguay is not yet complete. According to
Offe (1985), the development and stability of corporatist political structures depend
on the traditions and specific national configurations that labour movements assume,
the suppression of other forms of interest expression, and continuous economic
prosperity. In the case of Uruguay, the unitary structure of the union movement and
its strategic decision to prioritize tripartite collective bargaining over other types of
conflict resolution favour a deepening of corporatist practices. However, it is possible
that alternative interest groupings could emerge, as the process of incorporation in the
leadership of the PIT-CNT and in the bargaining committees of the CS of workers
representing non-traditional union constituencies, such as women, youth and informal
sector workers, has been quite slow. In addition, the premise of continued economic
growth is also in doubt: despite the fact that Uruguay registered an impressive increase
in GDP in 2010 (8.5 per cent), aftershocks from the 2008 world financial crisis still
threaten to reduce demand for its principal exports to European and North American
markets and thus weaken the national economy. Another worry stems from recent
protectionist measures being implemented by Argentina, which threaten to restrict
Uruguay’s capacity to export products from important industrial sectors, such as
textiles, auto parts and paper, to its larger southern neighbour (Cámara Nacional de
Comercio y Servicios del Uruguay, 2012).

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Offe also cautions that social corporatist structures could be threatened by the
internalization and sharpening of class conflict, which would damage the capacity of
the State to direct the institutional mechanisms put into place to ameliorate the
tensions between labour and capital. Taking this into account, in the Uruguayan
context, Senatore and Méndez (2010, p. 28) warn of the possibility of a regression in
the consolidation of a neocorporativist labour relations system, if conflict between
employers, unions and the State begins to escalate, particularly in relation to the
distribution of public resources, macroeconomic policy-making and the redefinition
of the new collective bargaining law for the private sector. On the other hand, the
maintenance of the political hegemony of the FA in the executive and legislative
branches of the national Government, the sustained quantitative and qualitative
growth of the Uruguayan union movement, continued macroeconomic stability, and
the widening of policy space on a regional level with the consolidation of centre-left
political tendencies in the Southern Cone all contribute positively to the deepening of
a social democratic political system based on social dialogue and a more equitable
distribution of resources in this Latin American nation. Only with the passage of more
time will it be possible to discern with greater clarity if this moment truly marks a new
critical juncture in the history of the political development of the Uruguayan labour
movement and a clear shift towards a neocorporativist system of interest repre-
sentation; nevertheless, so far short-term indicators do show that the structural changes
implemented to date by the FA Government have been able to benefit both
Uruguayan workers and their organizations in a way that has not been seen since the
introduction of Batlle y Ordoñez’s labour reforms over a century ago.

Note
1 These were the Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organise Convention, 1948 (No. 87); the Right to Organise

and Collective Bargaining Convention, 1949 (No. 98); and the Labour Relations (Public Service) Convention, 1978 (No. 151).

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Méndez, G.; Senatore, L.; Traversa, F. 2009. La política laboral de un proyecto socialdemócrata periférico:
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Foundation in Uruguay (FESUR)).
Ministry of Labour and Social Security (MTSS). 2011. Negociación Colectiva: Junio 2011
(Montevideo).
Natanson, J. 2008. La nueva izquierda (Buenos Aires, Editorial Sudamericana).
Offe, C. 1985. Capitalismo desorganizado (São Paulo, Editora Brasiliense).
Olesker, D. 2009. Crecimiento e inclusión: Logros del gobierno frenteamplista (Montevideo, Ediciones
Trilce).
Pucci, F.; Nion, S.; Ciapessoni, F.; Rojido, E. 2010. “Viejos y nuevos temas en la negociación colectiva
uruguaya”, in F. Pucci (ed.): El Uruguay desde la Sociología VIII (Montevideo, Faculty of Social
Sciences, University of the Republic).
Red de Economistas de Izquierda del Uruguay. 2010. La torta y las migajas: El gobierno progresista
2005–2010 (Montevideo, Ediciones Trilce).
Reygadas, L.; Filgueira, F. 2010. “Inequality and the incorporation crisis: The left’s social policy toolkit”,
in M. Cameron and F. Hershberg (eds): Latin America’s left turns (London, Lynne Rienner).
Schmitter, P. 1974. “Still the century of corporatism?”, Review of Politics, Vol. 36, No. 1, pp. 85–131.

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Senatore, L.A.; Méndez, G. 2010. Las relaciones laborales en el Uruguay: Entre el neocorporativismo y la
concertación salarial (Montevideo, FESUR).
Supervielle, M.; Pucci, F. 2008. “El trabajo y las relaciones laborales en el siglo XX”, in B. Nahum (ed.):
El Uruguay del SIGLO XX: La sociedad (Montevideo, Ediciones de la Banda Oriental).
Zurbriggen, C.; Doglio, N.; Senatore, L. 2003. Notas a propósito de los desafíos del movimiento sindical
uruguayo (Montevideo, FESUR).

Interviews

Peloche, Jorge, Secretary of Education, Federación de Empleados de Comercio y Servicios (FUECYS),

Montevideo, Uruguay, 3 June 2011.
Pereyra, Martin, Director of Youth Department, PIT-CNT, Montevideo, Uruguay, 2 June 2011.
Picco, Alejandra, Research Director, Instituto Cuesta Duarte, Montevideo, Uruguay, 3 June 2011.

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CAN A LABOUR-FRIENDLY
GOVERNMENT BE FRIENDLY TO
8
LABOUR? A HEGEMONIC ANALYSIS
OF BRAZILIAN, GERMAN AND
SOUTH AFRICAN EXPERIENCES
Christoph Scherrer and Luciana Hachmann

Introduction
A labour movement is bound to become involved in politics, because so many aspects
of its own conditions of action as well as of its members’ lives are shaped by the
prevailing laws and balance of forces in the political arena. In many countries,
therefore, organized labour operates with two “arms”: one a trade union, the other a
political party. However, the relationship between the two arms is seldom without
tension, especially once the party rises to power (Howell, 2001; Webster, 2007).
The common explanation for the inevitability of the disappointment of trade
unions in these circumstances refers to economic constraints. It is argued that external
and domestic economic pressures limit governments’ room for manoeuvre (Hunter,
2007). However, this explanation assumes that economic constraints are indisputably
fixed, and not open to contestation. It also rests on the idea that trade unions always
and inevitably reject the economic constraints – which is not always the case, as certain
limitations on government action may be acknowledged by trade unions. Thus,
economic conditions cannot be held solely responsible for the tensions between a left-
leaning government and trade unions.
Another common interpretation of the move of a leftist party to the political
middle ground refers to the median voter model. It states that competing politicians
will adopt policies which reflect the preferences of the median voters, because their
vote is decisive (Congleton, 2002). This focus on elections, which take place only once
in a while, seems to be too narrow to fully capture the dynamics of the political process.
Our theoretical approach takes into account societal power relations. It is
inspired by Antonio Gramsci’s conception of hegemony, which includes both coercive
and consensual elements. We argue that the extent of neoliberal hegemony has had a
decisive influence on the relationship between trade unions and left-leaning parties in

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government in the past two decades. In an attempt to explore the explanatory powers
of the various theoretical approaches by way of comparison, we have selected three
cases which are similar only in respect of the fact that parties came to power which have
traditionally enjoyed good relations with the respective countries’ main trade unions:
Brazil 2003–10, Germany 1998–2005 and South Africa 1999–2008. Such a compar-
ison of countries which differ along many dimensions is expected to yield a good
assessment of the various factors influencing the relationship between trade unions and
a labour-friendly party in government.
In Brazil and South Africa, the trade union federations – Central Única dos
Trabalhadores (CUT) and the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) –
provided the top leadership for the Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT) and the African
National Congress (ANC), respectively. In Germany, by contrast, the leadership of
the Deutscher Gewerkschaftsbund (DGB) emerged distinct from that of the Sozial-
demokratische Partei Deutschlands (SPD) in Germany and did not share such decisive
experiences, being a generation apart from the common opposition to Nazism.
Despite these differences in originary relationships, all three left-leaning parties
in government disappointed their labour constituencies in terms of macroeconomic
policies in the early part of the twenty-first century. The alienation of labour was
greater in Germany and South Africa than in Brazil, as in the former two countries it
extended beyond macroeconomics into labour market and social policies. In Germany
it led to a switch of loyalty among a significant part of organized labour from the Social
Democrats to the newly formed party Die Linke (The Left) and to the eventual
electoral defeat of the Social Democrats under Chancellor Schröder in 2005. In South
Africa, President Mbeki’s centralized style of ruling marginalized COSATU in the
triple alliance between the ANC, COSATU and the South African Communist Party
(SACP). When it became obvious that his neoliberal macroeconomic policies had not
delivered employment growth, COSATU members rallied together with left-leaning
ANC members against Mbeki, who had to step down from the party leadership and
the presidency in 2008. In Brazil, while the trade unions were disappointed on macro-
economic policies, the relationship between the PT and CUT remained generally
cordial, most visibly during President Lula’s second term.
These broadly similar, yet in detail distinct, experiences in the relationship between
party and trade unions provide the basis for deeper insights into the factors that influence
the relationship of a labour-friendly party in government to trade unions.
Our analysis begins with a brief description of the three governments’
macroeconomic and labour market policies. Then we explore to what degree economic
and electoral constraints explain the experience of the trade union–government
relationship in each of the three countries. Since economic and electoral constraints
cannot explain these experiences sufficiently, we introduce the Gramscian concepts of
hegemony and transformismo and apply them to the three cases. We conclude with a
summary of our main findings.

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The trade union–government relationship

Chancellor Schröder (1998–2005)

While the predominant German trade union confederation, the DGB, and its member
organizations are not explicitly aligned with any party, they always had a social demo-
cratic identity.1 Many trade unionists were also active in the SPD. They contributed
substantially to the electoral victory of the coalition of the Green Party and the SPD in
September 1998, which ended 16 years of a conservative–liberal government under
Chancellor Helmut Kohl (the Greens obtained 6.7 per cent and the Social Democrats
40.9 per cent of the electoral vote). The DGB unions’ relationship with the new
Government under the Social Democrat Gerhard Schröder started out as a “honey-
moon”, but ended in a “war of roses”. We have identified three phases of the Red–Green
reform agenda. (The phases have been named after their leading policy entrepreneurs:
see in more detail Beck and Scherrer, 2005.)
The “Lafontaine phase”, from September 1998 to March 1999 (Lafontaine, 1999),
saw repeals of previous cuts in the social security safety net, the promulgation of
neo-Keynesian macroeconomic policies and the initiation of an “Alliance for Jobs” on the
suggestion of the metalworkers’ union IG Metall. Oskar Lafontaine’s progressive economic
policies were met with particularly stiff resistance from industry, which threatened to move
jobs and operations out of Germany. His resignation from the Treasury came unex-
pectedly and is still clouded in mystery. With it, the progressive phase came to an end.
The “Eichel–Riester phase”, from April 1999 to February 2002, brought a
cautious reversal of the previous policy stance, with more restrictive macroeconomic
policies, substantial tax relief for corporate Germany (under Hans Eichel, the new
Secretary of the Treasury) and the introduction of a supplementary private pension
system (the so-called Riester Rente, named after the Minister of Labour, Walter Riester,
a former trade unionist). All in all, despite some improvements for labour, for example,
in the case of co-determination through the reform of the Works Constitution Act
(Betriebsverfassungsgesetz), this phase was marked by a clear redirection of economic
policies towards improving supply-side conditions and competitiveness.
In preparing for the general election of September 2002, a third policy phase was
inaugurated in March 2002 with the appointment of Peter Hartz, Volkswagen’s
personnel manager, to chair a commission on labour market reforms. After its very
narrow re-election in September 2002, the Red–Green Government hastened to imple -
ment the Hartz reforms under the slogan “Agenda 2010”. For this purpose, Chancellor
Schröder replaced Riester with Wolfgang Clement, the most neoliberal of the Social
Democratic heads of state governments, and united the ministries of economics and
labour under Clement’s leadership.
The “Hartz–Clement phase”, from March 2002 to March 2004, opened the
door to temporary work agencies, tightened the eligibility criteria for unemployment

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benefits, gave tax incentives for low-wage employment and massively reduced long-
term unemployment benefits. Popular discontent with these policies, including within
the SPD, proved to be enduring, even increasing as one reform after another was
enacted. Schröder was forced to quit as party leader, and in a desperate move to regain
momentum called for early elections, which his Red–Green coalition narrowly lost in
September 2005 (Seeleib-Kaiser and Fleckenstein, 2007).

President Mbeki (1999–2008)

Even before Thabo Mbeki had assumed the presidency of South Africa, tensions
between him and COSATU had arisen. In his capacity as Deputy President, Mbeki
had initiated the Growth, Employment and Redistribution (GEAR) programme in
1996. In pursuing macroeconomic austerity, external liberalization and domestic
privatizations, GEAR broke with the social democratic goals of the Reconstruction
and Development Programme (RDP), the ANC’s election manifesto of 1994. While
the RDP (“the anti-apartheid alliance’s consensus”: UNDP, 2003, p. 60) called for
bottom-up consultations, GEAR represented a non-negotiable macroeconomic policy
imposed from the top down (Gevisser, 2007, p. 666). Mbeki had launched GEAR
without regard for either the ANC’s political allies, above all COSATU, or public
opinion (Gumede, 2007, p. 76).
Mbeki’s tenure as President increased the strain between COSATU and his ANC
Government. His term came to be characterized as “elitist” (Mathekga, 2008, p. 132).
Indeed, Mbeki had long believed that the ANC would have to end the alliance with the
SACP in post-apartheid South Africa. He had envisioned the ANC as a centre-left party,
loosely connected to trade unions and the SACP (Gumede, 2007, p. 43).
This belief translated into a top-down approach to government which undermined
the ANC’s internal democracy and marginalized grass-roots members and activists
(Gumede, 2009, pp. 35–45). Similarly, institutional forms of social dialogue such as
the National Economic Development and Labour Council lost their significance for the
Government. At the same time, key financial and mining conglomerates gained influence
in the Government and among the ANC elite (Butler, 2007, p. 41).
Mbeki’s “modernization agenda” gave priority to “capital reform”, that is, to
the deracialization of economic power. Thus an “implicit bargain” took shape. On the
one hand, the ANC pledged to foster macroeconomic stability and international
openness; on the other hand, business agreed to the principles behind “black economic
empowerment”, that is, increasing the ownership of assets by black South Africans
(Gelb, 2005, p. 369).
Since GEAR did not deliver in terms of employment (official unemployment
rates for 1997 and 2009 were 22.7 per cent and 24 per cent, respectively: Statistics
South Africa, 1998, 2009), COSATU remained committed to the RDP. Despite its
increasing frustration with Mbeki’s neglect of working-class interests, however,

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COSATU recognized (as it continues to do) that the ANC remains the only political
party capable of representing those interests. Therefore, COSATU tried to advance
working-class interests within the ANC (COSATU, 2006).
In 2008 COSATU, together with the left wing of the ANC, forced Mbeki
to resign. With the support of COSATU he was replaced by Jacob Zuma, a former
Deputy President under Mbeki, first as the leader of the ANC, and in 2009 also as
President of South Africa.

President Lula (2003–10)

The historical ties between the PT and CUT in Brazil are well documented (Sluyter-
Beltrão, 2010; Secco, 2011). Indeed, the PT owes its foundation in 1980 to the desire
of the trade union movement for an autonomous political party. Many leaders in this
process were responsible for founding the CUT later in 1983.
The relationship between the CUT and PT has remained cordial during Lula’s
five presidential campaigns. Once in government, Lula broke with the leadership style
of his predecessor and became very accessible for trade unionists and civil society
groups. He also established an institutional channel, the Economic and Social
Development Council (CDES) – a plural consultative body which for the first time in
Brazil put the trade unions on an equal footing with employers in the field of economic
policy formulation (Costa, 2010a). Initially, the media and the opposition parties in
Parliament accused the President of trying to use the CDES to bypass the democratic
processes of Parliament itself (Costa, 2010b); however, the benefits of the new arrange-
ments were later widely recognized across the different sectors of society. The CUT
considered the CDES particularly important for elaborating a common agenda to face
the consequences of the 2008 global crisis (CDES, 2010).
In addition, the Lula Government passed a law which finally recognized trade
union confederations de jure (and not only de facto, as it was the case until 2007) as
representative bodies of workers. This act provided the CUT and other federations
with legal guarantees of their participation in forums and councils. It also had financial
repercussions, stipulating an increase in the federations’ share of the compulsory
tax equivalent to one day’s work a year for all formal employees. In 2007, the CUT
received approximately US$9.5 million from this tax (Portal Vermelho, 2008).
On the macroeconomic front, however, Lula maintained his predecessor’s
market-oriented policies. This was considered unacceptable by a significant number
of PT and CUT members who wanted to see a more radical leftist approach. As a
result, they left both organizations to build new trade union federations and new left-
wing political parties (Costa, 2010b).
However, the Government’s social policies (in respect of, for example, the
minimum wage and efforts to reduce poverty) were in line with the expectations of
the trade unions in Brazil and acted to neutralize its controversial orthodox

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macroeconomic policies. For example, the minimum wage increased by 53.67 per cent
in real terms between 2003 and 2010, and the booming economy brought down
unemployment from 12.4 per cent in 2003 to 6.7 per cent in 2010, creating
15.3 million formal jobs and reducing the poverty rate by 50.6 per cent (Zimmerman
and Spitz, 2005; DIEESE, 2012; FGV, 2011; MTE, 2011). In the light of these
positive economic developments, especially in the labour market, the majority of
CUT members welcomed the CUT’s support of the Lula Government.

Comparison of the three administrations

In all three countries, the trade union federations had supported the electoral campaigns
of their allied political parties. Nevertheless, the relationship between labour and party
varied, characterized in each case by differing degrees of dissatisfaction. Lula was most
active in pursuing a pro-worker policy, while at the same time placating conservative
forces with a restrictive macroeconomic policy. While Mbeki pushed forward a neoliberal
economic agenda in technocratic fashion, he neither cut social security provisions nor
reduced protection for workers in the formal labour market. It was Schröder who not
only pursued restrictive macroeconomic policies but also made cuts in the welfare state
and promoted the flexibilization of labour.
The three heads of state also differed in their leadership styles. While Lula
adopted an inclusive style of governance and conducted an open dialogue with civil
society, Mbeki opted for a technocratic style with little dialogue with social groups or
even with the ANC itself. Schröder became famous for his Basta-Politik – the term
used to indicate his brusque way of ending policy debates.
One of the surprising observations arising from the comparison is that the PT
met some of the demands of trade unions despite being in coalition with conservative
parties, while the ANC, which did not have to fear any electoral challenge and thus
theoretically was under less pressure to compromise with conservative forces, made
fewer concessions to the unions.

The explanatory power of economic and electoral

constraints
As noted in the introduction to this chapter, trade unions’ disappointment with allied
parties in government is commonly explained with reference to economic constraints
and the median voter model. In the countries examined, we find that the labour-friendly
government of the country facing the least external economic constraints, the export
champion Germany, alienated organized labour the most. Under pressure to fulfil his
campaign promise of 1998 to lower unemployment significantly, Chancellor Schröder
could have attempted to reflate the economy instead of opting for labour market reforms
to the detriment of workers. Brazil and South Africa faced much more severe domestic

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and external economic constraints. In spite of such constraints, Brazil was able to
implement some social policies with significant reach which were well received by labour;
Mbeki, however, did not test the limits of progressive economic policies. Therefore, while
economic constraints should not be underestimated, they are not sufficient to explain
the governments’ macroeconomic, social and labour market policies.
Might the behaviour of the three governments be better understood with
recourse to the median voter model? While this model has been developed for majori-
tarian electoral systems, it has been adapted to systems of proportional representation
where coalition governments are the rule. Here coalitions fight for the middle ground
of the political spectrum and the coalition partner closest to the middle may become
decisive for the simple reason that the party in the middle can easily switch sides and
join the other coalition (Mayer and Meier-Walser, 2002). Applying this analysis to the
trade union question, it would explain labour’s disappointment with the need of
the left-leaning party to accommodate a more centrist coalition partner and to appeal
to voters to the right of the trade unions. Even so, plausible as this argument sounds,
it does not quite capture the three cases at hand.
First, the policies of these three governments which disappointed or even alienated
labour were neither the manifestation of an election-day mandate nor the realization of
long-held beliefs of the parties in government (Samuels, 2004; Gumede, 2007). In fact,
the SPD would not have had majority support for these laws before coming to power
(Heinrich, Lübker and Biehl, 2002, p. 39).
Second, the coalition dynamics were not in line with the model’s predictions.
Unlike the social democratic Schmidt Government of the 1970s, which had to reach
compromises with an economically liberal coalition partner (the Free Democrats),
Schröder was not forced to the right by the Green Party. The same is true for Mbeki’s
ANC alliance, which held a comfortable lead in the elections, but not for Lula, who
headed a coalition with conservative parties and without a clear majority of parlia-
mentary seats in the first term – and yet the Lula Government implemented policies
supported by trade unions.
While the electoral dynamics should not be ignored, politics cannot be reduced
to elections, which take place only every so often. Politics are made every day. The
victory at the election booth allows the winning coalition to occupy the top govern-
ment positions, but it does not guarantee the implementation of its policies (if it has
any). The case of Lafontaine, who attempted a progressive macroeconomic policy shift,
is very instructive.
Lafontaine’s agenda depended on the cooperation of the central bank, the
Bundesbank, in lowering interest rates, and on the finance ministries of other
OECD countries in coordinating their fiscal policies as well as preventing tax evasion.
However, the cooperation of these partners was not forthcoming: indeed, the US
Treasury did not hide its dislike for Lafontaine’s neo-Keynesianism and the German
business community railed relentlessly against him (Hippler, 1999).

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Learning from the defeat of Lula in the previous presidential election, the PT
leadership had recognized the need to placate business interests even before Lula came to
power in 2003. This recognition is reflected in the change of campaign rhetoric from 1989
to 2002 in a shift which opened the way to a coalition with conservative parties. Once in
power, Lula accommodated the right-wing party, the PSDB, by appointing individ-
uals close to it to head the Ministry of Agriculture, the Ministry of Development,
Industry and Foreign Trade and the Central Bank (Borges Neto, 2003, p. 10).
By itself, pressure from the business community and the conservative media was
not so much to be feared if it did not affect electoral competition. However, this was a
real threat for both Schröder and Lula. While the activation of the SPD core constituency
contributed to Schröder’s initial victory, the bulk of the party’s new supporters in that
election had previously voted for the centre-right party, the Christian Democrats
(Infratest dimap, 1998). These voters were more receptive to the arguments of the
conservative opposition. This latter point was fully confirmed in the first state elections
following the federal elections that brought the Red–Green coalition to power. Running
on a platform against the Greens’ pet project of dual citizenship for immigrants, the
Christian Democrats under Roland Koch pushed the Red–Green coalition out of office
in the state of Hessia (Hofrichter and Westle, 2000). Hence there are good reasons for
a left-of-centre government in a competitive electoral system to listen to the voters to
their right and to those who might have influence over them.
The alternative would be to mobilize one’s own forces, to exhaust the reservoir
of support within one’s own camp. Left-of-centre governments have seldom resorted
to such a strategy (Burnham, 1980). Why have they hesitated to pursue this
alternative? They might have wanted to avoid risking a profound alienation of the
powers that be and a right-wing populist counter-mobilization.
Instead of turning to the party, could not the trade unions mobilize their
members and other workers in support of a progressive agenda? All three trade union
movements had a good record in mobilizing against the conservative governments that
had previously held office, but the coming to power of “their” parties confronted
them with a strategic dilemma: namely, the risk that their mobilization would alienate
those non-core voters for the left-leaning parties and thus contribute to these parties’
failure in government. In Germany, the SPD leadership was not shy about pointing
out this risk. So the unions were caught in a dilemma: the Red–Green Government
was moving against them on important issues, but opposing these moves would make
it even more likely that these detrimental laws would be enacted by the next conser -
vative government (Zeuner, 2000).
The CUT faced a similar quandary. As the media in Brazil are largely conser-
vative, open dispute is always a concern for left-of-centre forces. In 2005, the PT faced
one of its major crises when a corruption scandal took over the political agenda in the
country. This episode was widely covered by the conservative media and opened up a
prospective challenge to Lula’s re-election in 2006.

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In contrast, the ANC did not face serious electoral competition. COSATU did
not have to fear that its opposition to GEAR would topple the Government. However,
COSATU, in alliance with the SACP, continued for a long time to try to uphold the
ideal of the unity of the alliance. By 2008 the situation had changed and COSATU
campaigned for a change in the presidency.
To sum up, there are plenty of incentives for a left-of-centre coalition to listen
to the centre and the powerful players in society. In addition, the trade unions did not
want to be blamed for bringing down a former friend and ending up with a current
enemy in government. Yet, in the light of variations in the three governments’ policy
stances, the economic and political constraints do not quite explain the dynamic of the
relationship between trade unions and left-of-centre parties. In the German case the
adoption of the unpopular “Agenda 2010” remains particularly puzzling, especially in
hindsight. Why would a government turn against its core constituency at the risk of
getting voted out of office? A Gramscian perspective might shed some more light on
the trade union–party relationship by contextualizing it in a broader frame of power
relations in capitalist societies.

A Gramscian perspective on the hegemony of capital

The point of departure of Antonio Gramsci’s analysis of power relations is that
capitalist society cannot ensure its own reproduction. The “dull compulsion of the
production relations”, based on the separation of producers from their means of
production, is insufficient to keep the working class in its dependent position for ever.
But even the use of coercion is not adequate for this purpose; other, “non-coercive”
strategies are required. To analyse these strategies, which aim at creating active consent
among the subordinate classes, Gramsci developed several concepts, of which we will
use here those of hegemony and transformism. Hegemony refers to an entrenched form
of rule that resorts to coercion only in exceptional cases. A ruling class is hegemonic
and not just dominant if it succeeds in winning approval for its authority among the
members of other societal classes. The more this authority is not merely passively
tolerated but actively supported, the more secure the hegemony is. Whenever
hegemony essentially relies on cunning and coercion, as Gramsci believed the ruling
middle class did after successfully removing the yoke of feudal power, it lacks ethical
legitimacy. One particularly effective form of hegemony by deception, Gramsci
argued, is the co-option of the leadership of subordinate classes: this is what he
called transformism. The ethical side of hegemony – leading other groups to the
pinnacle of knowledge, technology and culture – pertains only to allied classes, not to
rival, “ruled” classes (Gramsci, 1991–96, Notebook 7 §19, Notebook 8 §§173 and
179, Notebook 10 §44).
The task at hand here is first to analyse the impact of the then prevailing
neoliberal hegemony on the behaviour of the left-leaning parties and the trade unions

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in the three countries. The next step explores the extent of co-optation of the left-
leaning party leadership in favour of existing property relations.

The extent of neoliberal hegemony

The electoral victories of Lula, Mbeki and Schröder came at a time when in many
other countries progressive leaders like New Democrat Bill Clinton in the United
States and New Labour’s Tony Blair in Britain had embraced markets as solutions for
social and economic problems. Hence their emphasis on the epithet “new” in relation
to their parties’ traditional role as stalwart defenders of the welfare state.
The embracing of markets, and thus of private capital, by left-of-centre parties
reflected not only the reassertion of private business interests in Western societies but
also the intellectual hegemony of market proponents. The appeal of markets, that is,
private property holders in competition against each other, went far beyond the
economic profession, especially in Germany. It extended to public policy advisers and
the media. The impressive job performance of the “New Economy” in the United States
seemed to provide the empirical evidence for the theoretical assertion of neoclassical
economists: namely, that deregulated markets were superior to the (allegedly) oversized
welfare state (cf. Sturm, 2003, p. 90). Despite many well-founded alternative perspectives
on the factors driving job growth in both countries (cf. Palley, 1998), the public debate
focused almost solely on labour market flexibility (Beck, 2005).
At the same time, proponents of corporatist, statist solutions to globalization in
general and unemployment in particular remained on the defensive. Although most
of them had not supported Soviet policies, the collapse of the Soviet Union severely
discredited state intervention in the economy and took away a point of reference for
arguing in favour of state planning. In addition, the West’s answer to the communist
challenge, Keynesian policies, had been discredited by the inflation of the 1970s
and their unsuccessful revival under the early Mitterrand Government in France.
It all added up to a lack of a unifying vision beyond the defence of the status quo
(Zeuner, 1998).
Brazil had already gone through a period of explicit neoliberalism by the time
Lula came to power, while the 16 years of the conservative Chancellor Kohl had
brought only a small dose of neoliberalism to Germany. Therefore, the PT was much
more conscious of the negative aspects of neoliberalism. Together with a mixed group
of political and economic experts, especially at Instituto Cidadania, the PT had
developed a body of alternative economic expertise (Instituto Cidadania, 2012).
Nevertheless, the PT faced a broad elite consensus inside and outside Brazil on the
need to pursue conservative monetary and fiscal policies, with pressure from, for
example, the Instituto Liberal, Liberty Fund and Cato Foundation. (See in more detail
Gros, 2004.) The leadership, therefore, had decided not to challenge this elite policy
stance. By Lula’s second term, criticism of conservative macroeconomics had lost

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strength within the PT. One reason for this was that, despite restrictive policies, the
Brazilian economy had been growing; the other reason was that PT members and
voters also opted for moderation (Samuels, 2008).
The economic legacy of the apartheid regime in South Africa does not fit the
Keynesian/developmental versus neoliberal categorization. The apartheid governments
pursued import substitution first by choice and later by necessity because of economic
sanctions. The primary characteristic of the apartheid economy, however, was the
exclusion of the black majority from holding property or gaining access to well-paid jobs.
Therefore, the main issue confronting the post-apartheid regime was opening up
opportunities for black citizens. The original idea of the ANC was to achieve this
objective by a mixture of socialist and Keynesian policies. As noted above, this approach
was quickly superseded by the neoliberal GEAR programme favoured by Mbeki and the
white power elite. While COSATU remained in opposition to GEAR, much of the
impetus towards building a convincing and strong alternative strategy evaporated as
many key leaders and experienced researchers left the trade unions to work for the
Government or in business.

Transformism: Co-optation of leadership

The SPD had already made peace with capitalism in the late 1950s. By the 1990s, its
leadership at the lower and middle ranks consisted mainly of government employees;
few representatives had been workers. The top leadership consisted of professional
politicians, in some areas with close ties to the energy sector (Clement was a case in
point). In a break with the past, by the 1990s many party officials expected to land jobs
in the private sector after leaving public office. Chancellor Schröder himself became
chairman of the supervisory board of Nord Stream AG, a subsidiary of the Russian
energy behemoth Gazprom, immediately after he left office (Lütgert, 2011).
The Brazilian press frequently reports on illicit strategies for enrichment adopted
by the PT leadership. It is not illegal for parliamentarians to run private consulting
firms while in office;2 some of them make use of this option (Istoé Dinheiro, 2011).
A problem of legality does arise, however, when political influence is used to expand
personal wealth.
The opposition has also criticized the Lula Government for filling government
positions not on merit but to serve political considerations. Praça, Freitas and Hoepers
(2011) suggest, however, that such political appointments were necessary to maintain
the government coalition. Moreover, political appointments are not used exclusively
for patronage ends as many positions are held by career civil servants.
In South Africa, political engagement is a major avenue of upward mobility. Salary
levels for government employees are a legacy of the apartheid era, when these jobs
were reserved for whites. Political connections also help to break into the white business
world. It is very important, however, to note Mbeki’s non-partisan commitment in

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relation to appointing his administration. The appointment of some individuals as public

officials without prior consultation with the ANC has widened the gap between the
party’s leaders and the Government (Mathekga, 2008).
Career expectations similar to those of Social Democratic politicians can also be
found among high-ranking German trade unionists, many of whom move on to
positions in government (as noted above), or on the boards of public enterprises, or as
heads of personnel departments of co-determined companies.3 This may in part
explain the lack of resistance initially mounted by German trade unions to “Agenda
2010”. Only when core organizational interests were threatened and many lower-
ranking officials voiced their dissatisfaction did they distance themselves from
Chancellor Schröder openly (Weßels, 2007).
During Lula’s term in office, many CUT leaders began to work for the
Government. Among the political appointees were many leaders of trade unions for
public employees, which had gained many members in the 1990s and most of which
were affiliated to the CUT (D’Araújo, 2009).
The issue of “brain drain” also affected the trade unions in South Africa as some
important COSATU leaders took political office with the ANC or important positions
in the corporate sector (Buhlungu, 1999). COSATU’s loss of key leading personnel
seriously diminished its pool of skilled and experienced leaders. This “brain drain” led
to a decline in the quality both of services provided to members and of democratic
processes (Webster, 2001, pp. 267–68). The union activists who became part of the
corporate sector through the policy of black economic empowerment were, according
to a study by Prevost (2006, p. 175), often less sympathetic to union demands than
the previous board members.
The extent of intellectual co-optation is also related to the question of inde-
pendent expertise. While German trade unions own many training institutions for
their members, invest much in the training of work council members and fund
research through their foundations, they found themselves on the intellectual defensive
in the field of macro and labour market economics. They commanded little in-house
expertise on these issues and their network of friendly economists at universities had
become a severely marginalized group. In fact, Chancellor Schröder had installed a
neoclassical economist as president of the only trade union-friendly government-
sponsored economic think-tank (Lieb, 2005).
Similarly, the intellectual base for progressive economic policies was rather
small in South Africa (Webster and Adler, 1999, p. 370). In contrast, the CUT could
draw on economic expertise from its own Inter-Union Department of Statistics and
Socioeconomic Studies (DIEESE) and from institutions such as the University of
UNICAMP. The trade unions’ own training schools, the escola sindical, also provide
assistance for trade unionists.
The three political leaders’ treatment of trade unions reflects their respective
political backgrounds. Lula, as a former trade unionist, had the closest ties; Schröder,

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as a trained lawyer and professional politician, and Mbeki, as the representative of the
ANC in exile, had both made their careers at a distance from the trade unions.
The three parties also differ in terms of their identity. While the PT has a
pronounced working-class identity, not only in name (Secco, 2011), the German SPD
sees itself as a people’s party (Lösche, 1992) and the ANC’s self-image is still that of
a liberation movement (ANC, 2007). These different identities mirror the parties’
relationships with the trade unions: the ties are closest in Brazil and loosest in
Germany. In the case of South Africa, the formal tripartite alliance between the ANC,
COSATU and SACP did not translate into much influence for labour on key
economic policy decisions during Mbeki’s term. The ANC did not pick up on
working-class demands in a “consistent” and “strong” form (Williams, 2008, p. 132),
despite the fact that the black working class predominantly supported the ANC
(García-Rivero, 2006).

Conclusion
Disappointment of trade unions with a labour-friendly party in government is a quite
common phenomenon. To different degrees we found this disappointment among
trade unions in three major countries, Brazil, Germany and South Africa, in recent
years. The experiences of these countries under government by representatives of
left-of-centre parties, respectively the PT, SPD and ANC, only partially fit the
standard explanations for the estrangement of trade unions and labour-friendly parties
in government. The Government subject to fewest economic constraints moved most
strongly against trade union interests (Schröder’s in Germany). The Government with
the most complex coalition, including conservative parties, and therefore most
vulnerable to coalitional defection, was most friendly to labour (Lula’s in Brazil). The
Government with the lowest threat of electoral defeat was least willing to engage with
labour (Mbeki’s in South Africa). While these standard explanations should not be
discarded, the different experiences of the three countries call for a complementary
look at overall societal power relations.
The extent to which market-friendly policy ideas became hegemonic explains
the behaviour of the German SPD and the Brazilian PT fairly well. The societal
penetration of neoliberalism went deeper in Germany than in Brazil, which had
already gone through a period of explicit neoliberalism, so that the PT was much more
aware of its negative aspects. In line with these differences on neoliberalism, the PT
and SPD differed with respect to the level of co-optation and the identity of the party
in relation to workers. The SPD has for many decades called itself a people’s party,
while the PT is still explicit about its working-class heritage.
The behaviour of the ANC under Mbeki represents a departure from this
pattern. Despite the fact that a large number of party activists opposed neoliberalism
and most ANC voters were living a life far removed from neoliberal conceptions of

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individual entrepreneurship, a neoliberal agenda was pursued in the macroeconomic

realm and in relation to civil society representation. This theoretically unexpected
behaviour can be explained by Mbeki’s exclusive leadership style, even towards the
ANC, and the use of public office to co-opt many activists into a lifestyle formerly
reserved for the white population.
Finally, the lower level of acceptance of neoliberalism in Brazil was accompanied
by a broader base of alternative policy expertise than existed in either Germany or
South Africa. The same holds true for the mobilization capacities of the trade unions
in the comparison between Brazil and Germany. Here again, South Africa stands
apart. There, mobilization capacity is high, but was long hampered by the belief in
“unity”. COSATU’s outstanding ability to mobilize its members, however, explains
the downfall of Mbeki in 2008, brought about through a revolt within the ANC and
not through general elections as in the case of Schröder.
To sum up, a labour-friendly party faces a difficult task in the attempt to stay
friendly towards labour when it attains power. However, it does not inevitably have
to become unfriendly towards labour. If, on the one hand, the party and labour can
develop their own vision of society and buttress this vision with policy expertise and
the capacity to mobilize their constituency in the face of the business agenda and
power, and if, on the other hand, the trade unions recognize the policy constraints on
a party in government and do not evaluate the Government’s performance against the
background of unrealistic expectations, party and unions can stay on friendly terms,
although they might disagree from time to time.

Notes
1Christian Democrats were usually represented on the executive board of the DGB trade unions, but always in a minority
position; Communists were present in some of the trade unions at lower ranks.
2 These consulting firms may be in various sectors, including engineering, construction or taxation.
3 Authors’ observation.

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PART III

WORKER ALTERNATIVES
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THE RECOVERED FACTORIES AND

THE ARGENTINE LABOUR MOVEMENT:
9
A GREY ZONE IN A “NEW” SOCIAL
MOVEMENT
Bruno Dobrusin

Introduction
This chapter attempts to connect the recovered factories movement in Argentina both
with historical Peronism and with current Peronism in its different forms, centred on
the Peronist trade unions. The recovered factories movement is considered one of the
most relevant contemporary political phenomena in Argentina, a by-product of
the socio-economic crisis of 2001, when workers began occupying and taking control
of factories and companies throughout the country. These recovered factories became
a symbol of Argentina’s crisis and social responses to it. The main connection between
the recovered factories movement and Peronism in its functional and structural aspects
is made through an analysis of the Peronist Government of Carlos Menem in the
1990s. The analysis covers the reconfiguration of traditional Peronist ideas and
the reshaping of policies towards a neoliberal model. Analysis of the effects of these
changes on labour politics, workers’ unions and the Peronist movement itself will
contribute to an understanding of the recovered factories movement in relation to
historic workers’ movements as opposed to the perspective that looks at the factories
movement as a process alienated from historical roots (Heller, 2004; Rebón, 2004;
Fernández, 2006; Rebón and Saavedra, 2006).
The sociologist Javier Auyero identifies a “grey zone” in the context of the
lootings that occurred in Argentina during the popular protests of December 2001. He
argues that the activities of the looters were not independent of party politics and
the police, and specifically that they were connected with informal Peronist party
networks. In this framework, the “grey zone” is a zone in which “activities of those
perpetrating the violence and those who presumably seek to control them coalesce”
(Auyero, 2007, p. 32). It is therefore a “murky area where normative boundaries
dissolve, where state actors and political elites promote and/or actively tolerate and/or

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participate in damage-making” (Auyero, 2007, p. 32). In this chapter, this idea is

reinterpreted and adapted in the context of the relationship between the recovered
factories movement and Peronist culture and ideology as represented in the form of
the union movement. Analyses of the formation of “new” social movements in
Argentina tend to apply a rigid dichotomy in defining the new movements as either
Peronist or non-Peronist. This dichotomy is based on both an interpretation and a
simplification of Peronism, which at this period (between 1999 and 2004) is strictly
associated with Menemist Peronism. The argument presented in this chapter is that
in the case of Peronism and new social movements, particularly the recovered factories
movement, there is a “grey zone” in which a blurred combination of different aspects
of Peronism affected and influenced the movement.
The formation of the “grey zone” surrounding Peronism and the recovered
factories movement is explained by analysing the dynamics within Peronism during
the Menem years. This analysis includes the divisions and confrontations within the
Peronist movement, mainly concerning conflicting understandings of the Peronist
doctrine and the reinterpretation attempted, and finally applied, by the Menem
Government. These divisions sparked a debate between “traditional/true” Peronism
and “new/Menemist” Peronism (Galasso, 1990; Levitsky, 2003; Levitsky and Murillo,
2005), which is essential in explaining the diverse forms by which Peronism is
connected to the recovered factories movement. Taking into consideration the
influence of labour policies and the positioning of unions on the recovered factories
movement, this chapter carefully addresses the effects of Menem’s policies in creating
the split inside the General Labour Confederation (CGT). The confrontations within
the union confederation over whether or not to support the liberalization process led
to the creation of the Workers’ Confederation of Argentina (CTA), challenging the
monopoly on workers’ organization and also defying the CGT’s claim to be the sole
representative of Peronist ideals. The CTA erupted onto the labour scene with banners
based on Peronist conceptions of social justice and the role of the working class in the
Argentine political and economic sphere. This splitting apart of the union movement
confirmed lasting divisions inside Peronism between those who defended a leftist
tendency – represented by figures like John William Cook and the Resistencia in
the 1970s – and those who preferred to negotiate in order to maintain relative
positions of power. Both the CGT and the CTA played a critical role in the develop-
ment of the recovered factories movement, and are accordingly central to the thesis
of this chapter.
Although the recovered factories movement is a recent phenomenon, beginning
in 2001, with the greatest numbers of companies being recovered in 2002 and 2003
(Lavaca Collective, 2007), it has already received attention from several scholars in
Argentina and in North America. These studies tend to focus directly on the process
of recovery, on the forms of organization of the workers inside the factories, and on
the various challenges that the movements faced at the outset, as well as those that

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confront them now and are likely to do so in the future (Magnani, 2003; Almeyra,
2004; Heller, 2004; Rebón, 2004; Fernández, 2006; Rebón and Saavedra, 2006). This
approach to the movement contributes to an understanding largely on a practical level,
deriving from a problem-solving orientation. The explanation provided focuses on the
movement as a consequence mainly of the application of neoliberal policies under
the Menem Government (Rebón, 2004; Fernández, 2006). Some might go even
further to include the “deperonization” of Peronism under Menem as part of the
liberalization package (Rebón and Saavedra, 2006, p. 25). In spite of this connection,
the analyses generally emphasize the working-class nature of the movement (Heller,
2004), but do not connect it to historical working-class movements in Argentina,
among which Peronism is the most influential. The analyses narrow down the Peronist
movement to Menem’s Government and the CGT (Rebón and Saavedra, 2006,
p. 27), misunderstanding the differences within the movement as well as the fluidity
and hybridization that characterize the movement, allowing it to adapt into different
forms and structures. It is through these informal structures, as well as the formal “true
Peronist” ones mentioned above, that most of the historical connections can be made.
The prevalent isolation of the recovered factories movement from informal and formal
connections to wider political movements creates a superficial understanding of the
conditions from which it arises and in which it persists. In an attempt to reshape
the understanding of the nature of the recovered factories movement, this chapter
analyses these intrinsic connections to the Peronist movement. The movement is
presented as a reflection of a grey zone of politics (Auyero, 2007), incorporating tradi-
tional union politics along with traditional Peronist cultural norms and ideologies.
As Auyero (2007) points out, in every socio-political process there is a grey zone,
in which factors not obvious at first sight appear (p. 32). The analysis of this zone
provides a “conceptual tool that warns us against too rigid – and misleading –
dichotomies” (p. 32). It is in this zone that exchanges take place between actors that
do not normally feature in standard accounts, but that nevertheless represent a key
element in the process. This concept of the “grey zone” is essential in arguing for the
connection between Peronism and the recovered factories movement. In this instance,
this grey zone links the recovered factories movement to the Peronist movement
through the roles played by the CGT and the CTA. The role of both unions is relevant
in understanding that the process initiated in 2001 took place not in a vacuum, but
in a politicized context in which unions – and especially the union leadership – were
influential in either supporting or confronting the process of recovery. The two cases
analysed later in this chapter illustrate this context.
This chapter links the internal transitions within Peronism, both ideological and
institutional, with their effects on Argentine politics and particularly with the
recovered factories movement that began in 2001. By concentrating the analysis on the
union movement, the intention is to focus on one of the most influential elements of
the broad movement that is Peronism – labour – and view the transition through that

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lens. Coincidentally, the labour movement is the sector of mainstream politics most
actively involved with the recovered factories phenomenon.

Peronism in brief
Peronism began under the figure of General Juan Domingo Perón in the early 1940s.
Initially appointed Minister of Labour in a military government, Perón increasingly
gained decision-making power within the group that had staged the coup d’état of
1943, leading to his appointment in 1945 as Minister of War and Vice President.
Perón achieved his greatest success at the Ministry of Labour, where he managed to
build working-class support and unify the largest sector of the union movement
under the CGT leadership (Levitsky and Murillo, 2005, p. 25). From 1945 onwards,
with Perón elected as President the following year, Peronism established itself as
the leading movement in Argentine politics and went on to promote some of the
most profound socio-economic reforms the country had witnessed.
During the Peronist decade (1945–55) hundreds of schools were built at both
elementary and secondary levels. The Government built more schools and classrooms
in these first two terms of Peronist rule than in all the previous periods of Argentine
history added together (Galasso, 2005, p. 514). The numbers of students increased
dramatically, principally in the first Peronist government, rising from 143,000 in 1940
to 446,000 in 1954 (Galasso, 2005, p. 516). The schools and classrooms became a
useful channel for expanding the ideology and culture being created by Peronism, but
also for promoting various government measures through propaganda in school texts.
The universities in particular became a main source of new cadres and militants for
the Peronist movement, and tertiary education became an important sector during
the years of “Peronist Resistance” after 1955. The immersion of the State in both the
economy, through nationalization and regulation, and in the field of social benefits,
through education, health care and housing, contributed largely to the concept of the
“organized community” in which the State was the main organizer. Perón asserted
that “we seek to surpass the class struggle, replacing it by a just agreement between
the workers and the employers, based on a justice that springs from the state” (James,
1988, p. 34).
Peronism was predominantly a working-class movement and a working-class
culture. This identity is rooted in the prominent position that organized workers
gained in Perón’s Government. To them, he was the leading figure in their struggle;
the workers became the main pillar of the “organized community”, and the workforce
was, in Perón’s own words, “one of the main determinant powers, as long as it was
organized under a strong union movement” (Eloy Martínez, 1996, p. 60). This strong
organization was provided by the CGT, which was given priority over other national
unions and became the leading organization influencing both governments and
workers’ claims throughout the years of Peronist rule and also the opposition to

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military juntas and non-Peronist regimes. To this day, the CGT is still the organ-
ization that most clearly identifies itself with traditional Peronist values. In many
aspects this consideration of Peronism as a working-class movement is still present
today, and the appropriation of working-class identity has spread to other social and
political movements that are not directly identified with Peronism, such as the
recovered factories movement.
The fall of Perón’s Government through a military coup in September 1955
signified the beginning of a period known as la Resistencia Peronista – the Peronist
Resistance (James, 1988; Horowitz, 1990; Brennan, 1998). With Perón himself in
exile, and therefore directing events from a distance rather than being present as a
unique and charismatic leader, this period saw the reconfiguration of the mass-based
movements. The power vacuum in the movement left by Perón’s absence led to
disputes between prominent rank-and-file delegates, union leaders and some figures
of the Peronist business sector. The predominance of rank-and-file delegates with
strong allegiance to the leftist ideals of Peronism led to a shift in parts of the Peronist
cultural identity towards a more revolutionary and confrontational tone.
The revolutionary identification of many Peronist rank-and-file delegates,
combined with the co-optation and inertia of the main CGT leaders, reconfigured
Peronism towards a leftist revolutionary movement and ideology. The Peronist
command coordinated the various actions of the Resistance in several places, two of
the main locations being the factories and the prisons. However, this command did
not have full control over the remaining resources of the movement, nor did it have
the explicit confirmation of Perón himself that it was supposed to lead the Resistance.
Nevertheless, despite the lack of formal organization, the Resistance had support in
the barrios, in the factories and wherever the cultural identity of Peronism was still
alive (Galasso, 2005, p. 797). Old rank-and-file cadres did the organizing work in
the factories, since the main union leaders were not completely supportive of the
Resistance. The primary reason for the Resistance in the factories was the defence of
the gains workers had achieved throughout the Perón years, which were now being
challenged by the military regime. However, the Resistance was divided even among
the workers’ organizations. One sector was radically opposed to the military regime
and to any negotiations with the generals in power. This was the sector in which the
nature of Peronism was most strongly reshaped into a revolutionary movement, away
from an “organized community”, but still strongly associated with the ideals of social
justice propagated under Perón’s Government.
The other main sector of the Peronist Resistance was led by some new union
leaders who had not abandoned the movement, but had taken up a different and less
extreme position with regard to the military Government. Many of its members were
still officially recognized union leaders, and therefore still had the legal power vested
in the union to deal with the Government over policy. The main institutional
manifestations of this group were the Intersindical and the 62 Organizations (James,

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1988, p. 74; Horowitz, 1990, p. 219). They engaged in legal activities such as strikes
and mobilizations, focusing on regaining workers’ benefits rather than on the return
of Perón.
On Perón’s death in 1974 power of the presidency passed to his wife, Isabel Perón,
but in reality the Government was in the hands of right-wing Peronists led by José López
Rega. The transitional Government of Isabel Perón then led to the 1976 coup that began
one of the bloodiest episodes of Argentine history. The years that followed the ending
of dictatorship in 1983 were a challenge for Peronism – as for every other political
movement in Argentina – since many cadres had been lost and the divisions initiated
in the period of the Resistance had deepened. This disunity was aggravated by the
election of Menem in 1989 and the ensuing application of some of the most radical
neoliberal reforms ever witnessed by a single administration. As the following section
shows, Menem’s Government exacerbated the existing confrontations within Peronism
and led to the break-up of one of its most fundamental elements: the union movement.

Menem’s candidacy and Government

Carlos Menem represented a new face for Peronism in the transition and trans-
formation through which the movement passed between electoral defeat in 1983 and
the selection of the Peronist candidate for the presidential election in 1989. Menem
was one of the first main critics of organized union leadership inside Peronism.
However, a surprising shift in Menem’s political ideas came about in the primary
elections to select the party’s presidential candidate in July 1988 (Levitsky, 2003,
p. 121). Here Menem based his opposition to the other candidate, Antonio Cafiero,
on the proposition of a populist platform drawing its main organized support from
the union movement (Galasso, 1990; Levitsky, 2003; Levitsky and Murillo, 2005).
Accordingly, the CGT and a newly formed labour coalition supported Menem
and provided the main financial resources for his campaign (Levitsky, 2003, p. 121).
In contrast, Cafiero represented the party apparatus and the old-style leadership
that favoured negotiations rather than confrontation. In this particular contest,
Menem used traditional ideas regarding the leader, social justice and the “organized
community”, expressed in terms of Peronist cultural identity and ideology, to gain
substantial support from the lower classes and from the union movement. Menem’s
campaign was based on recreating these values of social justice and the “organized
community” in the particular context of Argentina at that time. The country was in
the middle of a serious economic crisis, with massive unemployment, and the Peronist
movement needed to put forward a populist figure who could bring back the
memories of Perón’s first two governments, and also bring back people’s ideas of
Perón himself. Menem reinvigorated the “organized community” by asserting the
importance of the organized union movement, as well as the need to bring the State
back into decision-making. Moreover, Menem portrayed himself as the leader who

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could take the country out of economic crisis by restoring some of the old values
embodied in Perón.
Menem won the presidential primaries against Antonio Cafiero, and in the national
presidential poll of 1989 took close to a majority of the popular vote, 47.3 per cent,
which provided him with control of the Congress. From that point onwards, Menem’s
Government was to commit one of the most controversial betrayals by any Argentine
leader of the majority that had elected him into government (Levitsky, 2003; Galasso,
2005). The Menem Government proposed a strictly neoliberal economic policy,
contrary to his electoral promises, and made space in the ruling elite for the right-wing
elements in Peronist cadres. Nevertheless, Menem gained the support of some sectors
of the union movement, despite the reforms opposing traditional claims made by labour
organizations. The period of economic liberalization and state retrenchment ushered
in by the Menem Government was made possible not only through political nego -
tiations, but also, and primarily, through a reconfiguration of the Peronist movement,
its ideologies and its cultural identities, within the working class as well as in the
leadership of the movement at the time.
The “organized community” underwent its greatest changes in Menem’s
period, opposing the ideas presented in the Peronist governments between 1945 and
1955. Peronism was reoriented towards a neoliberal programme. Moreover, at this
time Peronism incorporated the massive informal framework of territorial-clientelistic
power (Auyero, 2001, 2007).
Under Menem, the State was redirected towards “regulating” the liberalization
and privatization of the economy. If under Perón’s Government the State acted as
main regulator through the use of state-led enterprises, under Menem most of those
enterprises were privatized at low prices, justified by the assertion that they were
inefficient in providing services. The privatizations included almost every national-
level organization, from the most deficit-ridden sectors (e.g. the railways) to the
most profitable (e.g. the energy concern YPF), and from those most closely linked
to national security (e.g. a few nuclear power plants) to the most inconsequential in
national security terms (e.g. sanitation services) (Corrales, 1998). In addition to the
privatizations, the State eliminated a variety of regulations, price controls, industrial
subsidies and restrictions on foreign investment, and lowered tariff barriers.
Another main player in this period was the business class, which during the
Menem years presented itself as one of the closest allies and benefactors of the reforms
that the Government was undertaking. The promotion of Structural Adjustment
Programmes, beginning during the presidency of Raúl Alfonsín and reinforced under
Menem, led to the consolidation of large (private) companies and so-called grupos
economicos (economic groups) (Teubal, 2004, p. 174). One of the main policies that
led to the strengthening of economic groups was the Convertibility Plan of 1991,
which managed to bring down inflation and the inflationary expectations that
characterized the period of hyperinflation at the end of Alfonsín’s Government

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(Teubal, 2004, p. 181). This plan was implemented alongside the liberalization of
markets and the reform of labour laws, which made it easier for companies to hire and
lay off workers. These measures benefited many transnational economic groups
(Teubal, 2004, p. 183), but also many members of the national bourgeoisie, which was
now supporting Menem as in the past it had supported Perón.

The role of the CGT under Menem and the formation of the CTA
During the 1990s, unions preserved a large share of the power gained during Perón’s
governments and through the Resistance period. The most striking aspect of the
workers’ union activities at this time, especially those of the CGT, was their backing
of Menem’s structural reforms. The support given by the dominant Peronist union
leadership to the reforms led to a split in the union movement and the formation of
the CTA. This group became a key player in challenging official and corrupt union
politics. In addition, the CTA reshaped the ideas around Peronism and Peronist
identity. The so-called “betrayal of Menem”, in abandoning both his campaign
promises and Peronist historical claims (Galasso, 1990, p. 128), led to a division
generally characterized as that between Peronist–Menemist, often considered
non-Peronist, and Peronist of Perón, identified as true Peronist (Auyero, 2001). As
Galasso expresses it, the opposition of “true” Peronists to the Menem Government
and its supporters “attempted to continue the same old struggle for workers’ rights,
by ratifying the ‘best’ Peronist history and excluding the current leadership of the
movement as part of that history” (Galasso, 1990, pp. 136–37).
The dominant union movement, the CGT, seemed to have a clear goal in the
process of liberalization: to preserve a non-competitive corporatist institutional
order (Etchemendy, 2005, p. 64). Peronist union support for government initiatives
was secured by benefiting certain unions and their leaders through the following
mechanisms: maintaining a corporatist labour structure; preserving the role of unions
in administering the health-care system; granting unions a privileged position in
the private pension funds market; and granting unions a share of the proceeds of
privatization (Etchemendy, 2005, p. 74). These measures ensured compliance in
supporting the reforms on the part of the union leadership and also some rank-and-
file delegates. The administration of the benefits provided by the Government, such
as the pension plans and the health-care system, was in the hands of the union leaders,
who enjoyed increasing bargaining power with regard to the Government, within the
union and in the workplace. Decisions taken at top level in the unions were hardly ever
challenged by shop-floor workers owing to the leaders’ increasing control over
resources (Etchemendy, 2005, p. 79).
The split in the union movement occurred on the same lines as that which had
divided the unions at the time of the Resistance, based on conflicting conceptions of
Peronism held by activists (Martucelli and Svampa, 1997, p. 163). While some argued

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in favour of a welfare-oriented state, others were inclined towards a pragmatic

understanding, and therefore supported Menem’s changes. Among the latter was the
faction that dominated the CGT and enjoyed the benefits proffered by Menem. The
former constituted the core of the CTA. Based on the leadership of the State Workers
Association (ATE), the CTA was created in 1991 not solely to confront the policies
undertaken by the Government, but also to lead a new way of “political construction”
(Martucelli and Svampa, 1997, p. 282). The CTA modelled itself on the experience
of Solidarity in Poland and the CUT in Brazil, these being examples of workers’
confederations that integrated unions with other sectors of society such as the Church
and the unemployed.
The CTA can still be considered within the framework of a Peronist movement.
The majority of its leadership is drawn from the Peronist Resistance and integrated in
the Peronist Party (Martucelli and Svampa, 1997, p. 295). Peronism in this alternative
to the CGT is less explicit, limited to the private sphere, but is present nonetheless.
The CTA and the CGT represent different strands of Peronism, the former more
strongly linked to the Resistance and figures from that period, the latter associated with
an institutional tendency, inclining towards negotiation rather than confrontation.
Despite its growing presence, CTA does not have the mobilization capacity that the
CGT enjoys: in negotiating with governments and business, the CGT is still the more
powerful of the two, being able to paralyse strategic industries by strike action. The CTA,
committed to a genuine model of community trade unionism, was determined to expand
its sphere of influence by incorporating social movements of the unemployed and other
sectors of civil society. However, while this imperative was strongly felt at the outset, over
time the CTA has also become a large and influential union, recognized as such in
practice albeit not officially by the Government. The CTA is present alongside the
Government at the negotiating table when the minimum wage is discussed, and has an
increased potential for mobilization and the application of pressure.
When economic crisis hit Argentina in 2001 as a result of Menem’s neoliberal
reforms, the CTA was involved in sectors of the newly created social movements,
providing mainly institutional support and legal defence. This grey zone of politics
that ran through the union movement also affected the recovered factories movement.
In some cases the CTA played a substantial role in promoting and consolidating the
struggle of the newly created cooperatives, while the CGT was a dominant player on
the opposite side, its bureaucratized union leaders participating actively in boycotting
the processes of retaking the factories. These connections will be explained in the next
section of the chapter.

The factories are running again

The period of Menem’s Government led to one of the most significant crises in
Argentine history. By 1998, the country’s economy was stagnating, with no increase

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in gross national product, leading to a situation of protest and crisis. Mass unem-
ployment, high poverty levels and the lack of state intervention created a swelling
discontent with the policies of the Government (Teubal, 2004, p. 185). The 1999
elections offered an opportunity for change in the country, as represented by the
popularity of a coalition of former members of the Peronist Party, “true” Peronist, left-
wing parties, and the historical opposition to Peronism, the Radical Civic Union
(Unión Cívica Radical; UCR). The coalition won the elections, defeating the
Peronist–Menemist candidate Eduardo Duhalde. The hopes for change initially
created with the change in government and the victory of a centre-left coalition were
nearly dashed immediately by the growing economic crisis the new Government faced.
The economics minister appointed by De la Rúa (the new President) attempted to get
the country out of stagnation by taking loans from foreign banks and financial
institutions, called the blindaje financiero (financial bailout), while also pursuing even
deeper structural adjustment programmes and cuts in state expenditure (Teubal, 2004,
p. 185). The overall situation of macroeconomic instability, together with the increas-
ing numbers of poor and unemployed, led to a national collapse in December 2001.
In this context, Argentina’s shantytowns and neighbourhoods were immersed in
“political hyperactivity” (Magnani, 2003, p. 38). This enabled the new social move-
ments that had been taking shape in the country since the beginning of the structural
crisis in 1998 to gain relevance and support among the wider Argentine population.
The case of the recovered factories movement was one example of how a new actor
came to participate in the political and social life of the country. At its centre were the
factories that had been locked up in the crisis at the end of Menem’s mandate, when
many companies declared bankruptcy and laid off their workers. Most of these
factories were left abandoned, with most of the machinery inside. Slowly, laid-off
workers began organizing and reoccupying – “recovering” – the factories, both as a
solution to their current unemployment and as a claim on the former ownership that
had fired them (Magnani, 2003; Almeyra, 2004; Heller, 2004; Fernández, 2006;
Lavaca Collective, 2007). The workers’ main motivation was to become the new
owners of the factories, therefore being their own bosses in the production process
(Heller, 2004, p. 43).
The moment at which the recovered factories movement began has not been
exactly pinpointed, but most studies place it in the mid- to late 1990s, at the end
of the Menem mandate (Magnani, 2003, p. 43). However, it is clear that it did not
become relevant as a social movement until the 2001 crisis (Magnani, 2003, p. 46;
Heller, 2004, p. 11; Lavaca Collective, 2007). The actions undertaken by the move-
ment are based on two national laws: the Ley de Expropiación (Expropriation Law)
and the Ley de Quiebras (Law of Bankruptcies) (Heller, 2004, p. 145). These laws
established that the workers were not the owners of the factories or companies, but
rather that they were “momentarily occupying” the sites (Heller, 2004, pp. 145–46).
This meant that the workers could organize the production and functioning of a

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factory, as long as the judge in charge of the bankruptcy of the company had not made
a final decision with regard to its assets. Basing themselves on the combination of these
two laws, workers began retaking their old sources of employment, and founded
several new operations and companies in a wide range of sectors. No precise number
of recovered factories has been established, but an estimate provided by one of
the main leaders of the movement, Eduardo Murúa, is around 170 by mid-August
2003 (Magnani, 2003, p. 43), when the process was at its peak. The sectors in
which factories and companies have been recovered by the workers include food,
construction, cosmetics, leather, education, electrical products, restaurants, graphic
arts, gasoline, hotels, lumber, automobiles, manufacturing, communications, plastics,
chemicals, health, textiles and transport (Lavaca Collective, 2007, pp. 229–36).
In order to illustrate the situation of the recovered factories and their relations
with the unions, the cases of two companies are considered below: Cerámica Zanón
and the ADOS medical clinic, both situated in the province of Neuquén.

Zanón and FASINPAT

Cerámica Zanón has been the subject of many studies (see Ranis, 2005; Aiziczon,
2009). It is symbolically the most significant example of the recovered factories move-
ment, both economically (accounting for just over 10 per cent of overall countrywide
ceramics production) and also politically (since the workers’ initiative was pursued
against opposition from both the owner and the provincial administration).
Long before it gained notoriety as the site of conflict between the workers and
the bosses after 2001, Cerámica Zanón was a quality workplace. As Aiziczon has
explained (2009, pp. 118–19), working for Cerámica Zanón was seen as “a dream” for
most workers in the area, since the salaries were high and the benefits and working
atmosphere were good. The changes began in the 1990s, with the restructuring of
Argentine industries and labour laws under the Menem Government. Zanón grew in
size, which meant also a restructuring of workers’ relations, especially those between
the managers and the floor workers. Managerial pressure for higher productivity and
greater efficiency altered the existing patterns of relationships, leading to increasing
competition among the workers themselves (Aiziczon, 2009, p. 123). Moreover, in
this period, Zanón opened a third sector of production, in porcellanato. The opening
of this highly sophisticated new operation involved several different dynamics in the
factory, which were later to influence the progress of the conflict. Through a process
that is unclear, the provincial and national Governments (Menem himself even visited
the factory in 1994 for the opening of the new sector) credited Zanón with a sum of
just over US$19 million (Aiziczon, 2009, p. 122) as part of a Provincial Development
Fund programme. This connection between the owner and the factory and the
provincial and national political class played a critical role in the process of recovery
and conflict with the workers.

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The second key factor in the evolution of the conflict over recovery was the
union. The Sindicato de Obreros y Empleados Ceramistas de Neuquén (SOECN), a
member of the CGT at national and provincial level, was a key ally of the owner in
promoting the changes. The union made no attempt to defend the workers in their
struggle against the changes in the labour laws or in the restructuring of the factory
itself (Aiziczon, 2009, p. 127). Inside the union, traditional Peronist cadres took over
the leadership in the mid-1980s and were to remain in place until 2000, when the
majority of the workers voted for a change in leadership and their removal from
the union. These leaders represented the most institutionalized and bureaucratized
sector of the union movement in Argentina at the time, closely linked to the main
heads of the CGT and supporters of the Menem Government’s reform process.
The conflict in Zanón began around 1997, as the country entered an increas-
ingly difficult economic situation. As noted above, the process of change in the factory
had two key components: the owner’s initiative, with the support of provincial and
national Government; and the support given by the CGT-dominated union to this
process. It should therefore come as no surprise that the main conflicts were on these
two fronts: against the owner and Government, but also against the union. The first
conflict, which arose before the process of recovery even began, came inside the union
itself, when floor workers (headed by Sergio Godoy) declared their opposition to the
main union leaders, the Montes brothers (Aiziczon, 2009, p. 139). The assemblies
inside the union saw increasingly heated debates regarding compliance with the owner
by the existing leadership of the union. After years of discussions and confrontations
(for a detailed description, see Aiziczon, 2009, pp. 139–80), the workers headed by
Godoy finally won control of the union in December 2000 (Aiziczon, 2009, p. 168).
In order to win such a dispute, the floor workers had to mobilize all their efforts in
getting people to support them in the assembly. This victory, and the “recovery” (as
they call it) of the union by the workers, stayed in the workers’ consciousness for years
to come, and was one of the pillars in the later move to recover the factory itself.
The second conflict was economic. Towards the end of the Menem period
Argentina entered a period of economic downturn, and Zanón was no exception to
its effects. Zanón began to suspend workers’ duties and to cut back on production;
slowly the workers witnessed a process of “emptying” (vaciamiento) of the factory.
Owing to poor administration, Zanón ceased to pay its dues to either its workers or
its creditors (Aiziczon, 2009, p. 173). The economic downturn extended beyond the
factory to all sectors of society, creating an atmosphere of protest across the country
expressed in constant demonstrations and strikes. The workers of Zanón, and
especially the SOECN, now under their control, became a representative and
combative element in the collective actions taken by a broad sector of society,
including unions, social movements and political parties.
The crucial clash came when Zanón decided to close the doors of the factory and
send telegrams of dismissal to all its workers. The company justified this action by

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claiming that it owed over US$75 million in debts to public and private creditors and
that the running of the factory was unsustainable. At this point, the workers decided
to camp in the factory, arguing that it could still operate productively (Aiziczon, 2009,
p. 186). In October, the workers proved that the factory still had enough material to
work with, and that two days of production would generate enough to pay the salaries
of all the workers. In addition to paying salaries, the workers occupied the factory to
prevent the owner from emptying it completely. The owner did not stand idly by as
this was happening but went to the courts in order to get back what he claimed was
his. There were a few attempts by the police to expel the workers from the factory, but
these failed in the face of the workers’ organization and resistance, and also the strong
support given by large segments of Neuquén society, which came out in defence
of Zanón’s workers (Aiziczon, 2009, p. 197). In addition to resisting this pressure
from the owner and police, the Zanón workers had to resist campaigns in the media
against them, mainly organized by the Montes brothers and their followers (Aiziczon,
2009, p. 197).
By March 2002 the available stock of materials had run out, and at this point
the workers decided to start up production without bosses, with the entire process
under worker control. The factory was up and running again; however, the organi-
zation went on for four years without any legal standing whatsoever. It was not until
October 2005, after several petitions to provincial and national authorities, that the
workers were allowed to form a cooperative with the right to run the factory for one
year. This cooperative was, and still is today, named FASINPAT, fábrica sin patrones
(“factory without bosses”). In the first year following this decision, FASINPAT won
a hard battle in the courts to gain permission to run the factory for three more years,
when the decision would come up for review. The main claim by the workers, now
organized in FASINPAT, throughout these years has been that the State should
expropriate the factory, pay off the old debts (acquired in the times of Luiggi Zanón)
and declare the factory “under workers’ control”, bajo control obrero. In August 2009,
in a historic decision made by Neuquén’s provincial legislature, the provincial
Government expropriated Zanón and committed itself to cancelling those of its debts
held by public institutions. The other issue that will come up for debate is whether
the workers are to keep functioning under the banner of the cooperative FASINPAT,
or whether they manage to get the provincial Government to agree with their proposal
of a “state-led company under workers’ management”, a model with no precedent
in Argentina.

ADOS
The case of the medical clinic ADOS has not received much attention in the main
studies on the recovered factories movement, possibly because it is not a “factory” but
rather a clinic that has been retaken and run by the workers. For the purpose of this

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chapter, however, ADOS represents a key example of the recovered factories

movement and its links with Peronism. In order to understand the process by which
the clinic was retaken, it is useful to see it in connection with the process of
liberalization undertaken in the early years of the Menem Government. As explained
above, crucial support for Menem’s neoliberal reforms was provided by the main
branch of the CGT, which in exchange for this support was given control over areas
of the health-care system and also benefits in the private pension plan market.
Moreover, these reforms included the move towards self-financed and administered
hospitals, of which ADOS (Asociación de Obras Sociales: Association of Health Care
Organizations) would be the most common form.
ADOS in Neuquén was created in 1958, and for the following 30 years its
administration fell under the aegis of the Superintendencia de Servicios de Salud
(Health Services Secretariat), an agency belonging to the Ministry of Health (Favoro
and Iuorno, 2008, pp. 13–14). This secretariat has been historically administered by
the CGT, both at the national and at the provincial level. In Neuquén, throughout
the years of Menem’s Government, ADOS was administered by representatives of the
most pragmatic sector of the CGT in the province, drawn mainly from the Healthcare
Union and the Union of Commercial Employees (Favoro and Iuorno, 2008, p. 16).
Together with all other government-controlled institutions, as government
funding diminished, ADOS witnessed a downward spiral in its capacity to provide
coverage and plunged into serious financial and fiscal crisis. This in turn led to a
political crisis and criticism of the administration, which was accused of corruption
and maladministration. Towards the end of the 1990s a combination of factors led to
the recovery of the clinic under workers’ control. The administration of the clinic
called an assembly of creditors and declared the organization bankrupt, unable to pay
salaries to its workers and with high debts to the national pension plans and to
the national tax agency (Favoro and Iuorno, 2008, p. 15). In the process leading to
bankruptcy, many of the clinic’s workers ended up unemployed and with unpaid
salaries. In the initial years of this episode, the role of the CTA was critical in
organizing the workers and providing institutional support for the creation of a
cooperative that could administer the clinic once it was recovered. This role will be
discussed below, in conjunction with the other cases covered in this chapter.
Towards the end of 2000 the workers at the clinic organized themselves into a
new union, called the Sindicato de Salud Privada del Neuquén (SUTRASPRIN). This
union included all the workers in the clinic, irrespective of their professions, with the
exception of the administrators, who were blamed for the crisis into which the clinic
had fallen. Through this unionized move, the workers put pressure on the Government
to finally declare ADOS bankrupt and give its administration to a newly created cooper-
ative, under workers’ control. The process of dispute continued for two years, during
which the clinic kept functioning at a minimal level under the administration of a
tripartite (triunvirato) body consisting of representatives of the CTA, the Doctors’

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Association of Neuquén and the workers (Favoro and Iuorno, 2008, p. 16). The judge
in charge of the case investigated the situation, and at the end of 2003 decided to
approve the bankruptcy and give the administration of the clinic to the newly created
Cooperativa de Trabajo ADOS Ltda. This cooperative is still in charge of the admin-
istration of the clinic today, and has amply proved its capacity to administer the clinic,
increase its coverage and improve the livelihoods of its workers.

Union engagement in Zanón and ADOS

The interaction between the CTA and the CGT in the conflicts surrounding Zanón
and ADOS was rather similar, although manifested at different times. The CGT repre-
sented the opposing side in both the conflicts. In the words of Godoy, the leading
figure in the Zanón recovery process, victory over the union was a major blow against
the “bureaucracy of the UOCRA [Construction Workers’ Union]” (Aiziczon, 2009,
p. 78). The CGT, embodied in the persons of the Montes brothers, was a living
illustration of the changes that the mainstream Peronist leaders had undergone in
supporting Menem’s policies. The Montes stood firmly side by side with the owner
and the status quo of the factory as this was more convenient for the strength of their
own political position, even though this led to the rebellion of several other workers.
The CGT leadership in the city and the province of Neuquén aligned itself with
Menem and the local Peronist Government, run by the neo-Peronist MPN. This
alliance was a direct reflection of the alliance arrived at nationally between the CGT
and Menem. In Neuquén, the Ceramist Union was among the leading provincial
unions controlled by the CGT.
In the case of ADOS, too, the CGT represented the enemy, the face of the
former fraudulent administration that had presided over the ruin of the clinic. Being
identified with the target of the outrage, the CGT had lost any legitimacy to represent
the workers. Furthermore, not only was the CGT directly responsible for the adminis-
tration of ADOS prior to the recovery, it was backed up by the provincial authorities.
In contrast with Zanón, where the bosses of the CGT were excluded from any inter-
vention in the working of the cooperative, in ADOS the CGT is trying to strike back
and regain control of the clinic, because there is potential for economic gains.
However, the rejection of the CGT by the leadership of the cooperative shows that
the image of the former administration and the struggle they had to go through
to recover the clinic is still very fresh in the mind. In addition, the provincial
Government, still in the hands of the MPN, has also shown an interest in promoting
a rapprochement between the cooperative and the former administration. This only
further tarnishes the image of the CGT in the eyes of the workers.
The CTA had a different impact in both these processes of recovery. The
Neuquén affiliate of the CTA is led mainly by ATE, which includes among its leading
cadres an important proportion of former Peronist youth associated with the Peronist

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Resistance of the 1960s and 1970s. Neuquén has a history of migration into the
province of many leftist Peronist cadres, who arrived there in a form of internal exile
during the military dictatorship (Aiziczon, 2009, p. 69). Many of these cadres became
integrated in, and still belong to, the ranks of ATE, since the state bureaucracy was a
leading sector in the economic and social life of the province. Since the CTA was
created and established throughout the country in the mid-1990s, it has gained an
importance in the provincial sphere, possibly even in excess of its importance at
national level. Neuquén was one province in which it had particular relevance, leading
the struggle against Menem’s neoliberalization programme and its application in the
province. This confrontation, added to the high levels of social discontent towards
the end of the 1990s, placed the CTA at the centre of the struggles under way and as
a key player within the politics of the province. The CTA also played a part in the
specific processes of recovery at Zanón and ADOS, to a greater extent at ADOS
than at Zanón.
The CTA in Neuquén has been engaged in the most important political
moments of the last decade in the province. Its capacity to mobilize and to confront
the MPN governing elite make it a pillar of Neuquén’s political and social movements.
As emphasized earlier in this chapter, the CTA has a traditional Peronist identity
linked to a national–popular model of political participation, with the State as an
active player in providing social justice. This identity is also present in Neuquén, where
the CTA, mainly through ATE, progressively attained a leading role in confronting
the reforms of MPN governments throughout the 1990s (Aiziczon, 2009, p. 71). The
challenge to liberalization came from the belief in the need for a government presence
in the economy, but also in the need for a fairer distribution of the province’s immense
resources – especially oil.
Despite the progressive role of the CTA in Neuquén, it is debatable whether
it represents a new style of unionism. Zanón has managed to maintain a certain
autonomy from larger political movements; however, this autonomy has been more
rhetorical than real. The main influence, at least in its leadership, comes from leftist
tendencies similar to those characteristic of the Peronist youth and the Peronist
Resistance in the 1970s. This influence leads to a firm belief in the process of
consensus and assemblies, which is not shared by the more vertical unionism espoused
by the CTA, based on delegates participating in daily debates rather than incorpo-
rating the entire membership in the decision process. The modes of decision-making
are crucial for Zanón: the assembly as a decision-making body is defended at all times.
Nevertheless, this difference over the definitive form of determining the outcome of
debate has not impeded the collaboration between the CTA and the cooperative in
Zanón. And the CTA was one of the most important groups in defending the recovery
of the factory.
In the case of ADOS, the CTA played a major role in the process of recovery of
the clinic (Favoro and Iuorno, 2008, p. 21), heading up the initial struggle and

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providing the legal defence for the workers and the institutional support needed to
undertake the recovery. This leading role was recognized later by granting the CTA a
presence on the governing tripartite council. However, ADOS has different dynamics
from Zanón, arising from the different composition of the cooperative. In ADOS
there are doctors, nurses, administrators and cleaning staff: the class composition is
therefore more complex, which leads to the cooperative being less politically active.
The general line of decisions is maintained throughout the different mandates, but
political activity varies according to whether the director of the cooperative is a
doctor, a nurse or an administrator. The CTA’s greatest influence is definitely
exercised through the nursing and administrative groups in the cooperative.
In spite of these internal differences in ADOS, the cooperative is one of the
cornerstones of ANTA (the Self-administered Workers’ Association). ANTA is an
autonomous group, but operates inside the CTA and has gained support from
its leadership, at both national and provincial levels. ANTA is a conglomeration
of different workers’ cooperatives, recovered companies and cooperatives originally
formed as such. It operates under the umbrella of the CTA and since 2004 it has
broken through the antagonism between the two main national union groups that
dominated the recovered factories movement. ANTA gained relevance in the context
of the CTA through its great symbolic significance for workers’ organization. None of
the cooperatives is particularly significant in terms of economic importance or in
numbers of members. However, the recovered factories everywhere, including the
ones in ANTA, have had a profound impact on other movements as examples of
successful working-class struggle against hegemonic movements (including the CGT
and Peronism) and the business sector.

Conclusion
The focus throughout this chapter has been on the structural connection between the
recovered factories movement and the union movement in Argentina. Following an
analysis of Peronism’s historical roots, and its transformations and development into
different political forms, an outline of Menem’s period in government was presented,
with an especial focus on the split in the union movement. It was in this sector that a
“grey zone” was identified. The argument is that despite the confrontation between the
CGT and the CTA, at the core of both unions there is an undeniable Peronist identity
and mode of action. The participation of these unions, whether through opposition
or support, was critical in the process of retaking factories in the period after 2001. The
roles played by the unions were not only institutional, but also influenced issues of
identity of the newly created movement.
Analysis of the cases of Zanón (FASINPAT) and ADOS in Neuquén offers
important evidence in understanding the struggles in the recovered factories
movement and its relationship with older forms of political participation, mainly the

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unions. Zanón and ADOS were in the midst of a fight not only between the workers
and the bosses, but also between the CGT and the CTA. In both these cases, the
CGT represented the opposing side of the struggle, and also the main face of the
enemy. Its role represented that of the union at the national level during Menem’s
years, siding with the patronal (bosses), supported by the governing authorities and
becoming instrumental in delegitimizing the struggle of the workers. On the other
side, the CTA took the part of the workers trying to retake their sources of labour. In
their claim to strive for social justice and for broader participation of the working class
in the economic and political spheres, the CTA represented a strand of Peronism that
identifies with leftist politics, following a line established by Cook in the 1950s and
1960s. This was reflected in its involvement with the cases of both Zanón and
ADOS, where the CTA has maintained firm support of the workers. This combined
influence of the CGT and the CTA creates a “grey zone” in the factories movement,
in which the old forms of political participation and political identity mix with more
recent forms.
The recovered factories movement has elsewhere been presented as a novel social,
economic and political movement that confronts old forms of organization and partic-
ipation. This chapter has addressed and refuted that claim. It has shown that there is a
zone in which old and new forms are intertwined with each other, and that there is not
a clear separation between the one and the other. Peronism has played a leading role in
the history of Argentina throughout the second half of the twentieth century and
continues to do so in the present. This is not to say that all new movements are Peronist;
it is, rather, to assert a link with historical roots and with other pre-existing organizations
that can in turn help in understanding current phenomena. The recovered factories
movement has also to face this dilemma, caught as it is between old and new identities,
between autonomy and the need to articulate its struggle with other existing institutions,
notably the unions.
The development of the recovered factories movement is a clear representation
of the need for labour to relate to other social movements, and to integrate historic
political currents. The majority of the factories recovered in 2001–02 are today
(mid-2012) still running under workers’ control, among them Zanón and ADOS.
However, one relevant aspect of the environment has changed, and that is the intran-
sigence towards collaborating with the Government. The arrival of the Kirchner
administrations (beginning in 2003 and continuing at the time of writing) not only
heralded the economic recovery of Argentina, but also opened the doors for a pro-
worker administration. The factories have benefited from this change, especially in
terms of receiving financial support and subsidies for maintaining their production.
Raymond Williams, in his book Marxism and literature (1977), discussed the
different interpretations of the idea of “culture”, its uses and development. He asserted:
“The complexity of a culture is to be found not only in its variable processes and their
social definitions – traditions, institutions, and formations – but also in the dynamic

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interrelations, at every point in the process, of historically varied and variable

elements” (Williams, 1977, p. 121). Peronism as a culture and political formation has
profoundly influenced the Argentine working class. As Williams illustrates, culture
and politics have a dynamic interrelationship, constantly being reinterpreted according
to contextual situations. Peronism is no exception to this principle. Having played
a considerable role throughout the last 50 years, it is also a contested movement. Under-
standing Peronism, interpreting Peronism, requires an exploration of Argentina’s history
from the early 1940s to the present day. Connecting this history with current struggles
such as the recovered factories movement is therefore critical in understanding these novel
formations. The “grey zone” idea is a useful tool not only in approaching “new” social
movements, but also in understanding present expressions of political mobilization.

References

Aiziczon, F. 2009. Zanón, una experiencia de lucha obrera (Buenos Aires, Herramienta).
Almeyra, G. 2004. La protesta social en la Argentina (1990–2004) (Buenos Aires, Ediciones
Continentes).
Auyero, J. 2001. Poor people’s politics: Peronist survival networks and the legacy of Evita (Durham, NC,
and London, Duke University Press).
—. 2007. Routine politics and violence in Argentina: The gray zone of state power (New York, Cambridge
University Press).
Brennan, J. (ed.). 1998. Peronism and Argentina (Wilmington, SR Books).
Corrales, J. 1998. “Do economic crises contribute to economic reform? Argentina and Venezuela
in the 1990s”, in Political Science Quarterly, Vol. 112, No. 4, Winter, pp. 617–44.
Eloy Martínez, T. 1996. Las memorias del general (Buenos Aires, Editorial Planeta).
Etchemendy, S. 2005. “Old actors in new markets: Transforming populist/industrial coalition in
Argentina, 1989/2001”, in S. Levitsky and V. Murillo (eds), 2005, pp. 62–87.
Favoro, O.; Iuorno, G. 2008. “Nuevas formas organizativas en la Argentina de los últimos años.
El caso de las cooperativas Ados y Fricader (Neuquén y Río Negro), 1990–2006”, in L. Pasquiali
and O. Videla (eds): Historia social e historia oral. Experiencias en la historia reciente de Argentina y
América Latina (Rosario, Homo Sapiens Ediciones).
Fernández, A. 2006. Política y subjectividad. Asambleas barriales y fábricas ocupadas (Buenos Aires,
Tintalimon Ediciones).
Galasso, N. 1990. De Perón a Menem: el Peronismo en la encrucijada (Buenos Aires, Ediciones Colihue).
—. 2005. Perón: formación, ascenso y caida (1893–1955) (Buenos Aires, Ediciones Colihue).
Heller, P. 2004. Fábricas ocupadas, Argentina 2000–2004 (Buenos Aires, Ediciones Rumbo).
Horowitz, A. 1990. Los cuatro Peronismos (Buenos Aires, Editorial Planeta).

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James, D. 1988. Resistance and integration: Peronism and the Argentine working class, 1946–1976
(New York, Cambridge University Press).
Lavaca Collective. 2007. Sin patrón: Stories from Argentina’s worker-run factories (Chicago, Haymarket
Books).
Levitsky, S. 2003. Transforming labor-based parties in Latin America: Argentine Peronism in comparative
perspective (New York, Cambridge University Press).
—; Murillo, V. (eds). 2005. Argentine democracy: The politics of institutional weakness (University Park,
PA, Pennsylvania State University Press).
Magnani, E. 2003. El cambio silencioso. Empresas y fabricas recuperadas por los trabajadores en la Argentina
(Buenos Aires, Prometeo).
Martucelli, D.; Svampa, M. 1997. La plaza vacía. Las transformaciones del peronismo (Buenos Aires,
Editorial Losada).
Ranis, P. 2005. “Argentina’s worker-occupied factories and enterprises”, in Socialism and Democracy,
Vol. 19, No. 3, pp. 1–23.
Rebón, J. 2004. Desobedeciendo al desempleo. La experiencia de las fábricas recuperadas (Buenos Aires,
Ediciones PICASO).
—; Saavedra, I. 2006. Empresas recuperadas la autogestión de los trabajadores (Buenos Aires, Capital
Intelectual).
Teubal, M. 2004. “The rise and collapse of neoliberalism in Argentina: The role of economic groups”,
in Journal of Developing Societies, Vol. 20, Nos. 3–4, pp. 173–88.
Williams, R. 1977. Marxism and literature (Oxford, Oxford University Press).

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ORGANIZING INFORMAL WOMEN

WORKERS FOR GREEN LIVELIHOODS:
10
THE SELF EMPLOYED WOMEN’S
ASSOCIATION IN GUJARAT
Sarbeswara Sahoo

Climate change, and the threat it poses to human civilization, are among the
most widely and urgently discussed subjects in these early years of the twenty-first
century. Evidence of its impact is widely reported by both developed and developing
economies around the world. It has been calculated that over a period of 140 years the
temperature of the earth has increased by 0.6°C. Fighting climate change without
compromising the present and future economic needs of the 7 billion or more people
of the globe will be a daunting task, requiring joint effort from all the stakeholders
likely to be affected, and the issue has already attracted sustained attention from
governments, researchers, trade unions and other civil society organizations.
Many economies around the world, seeking to avoid the industrial use of
fossil fuels, have devised strategies to supply goods and services with help of “green
technology”. In this endeavour, trade unions working in both the formal and the
informal employment sectors have worked cooperatively with governments and
NGOs. For instance, in India the Self Employed Women’s Association (SEWA),
a trade union of informal workers, has realized that it is poor women workers who are
most likely to bear the brunt of climate change. In order to protect the livelihoods of
these women, SEWA has developed an innovative concept of “green livelihood”,
whereby members can earn a sustainable livelihood and in the process contribute
positively towards adapting to and mitigating climate change.
This chapter documents the “green livelihood” initiatives of SEWA with
reference to a few case studies in both rural and urban areas of Gujarat. In doing so, it
sets out to explain the meaning and importance of green livelihoods in the context of
climate change; to describe the structure, profile and functions of SEWA and its role
in improving the livelihoods and social security of informal women workers; and to
outline SEWA’s green livelihood initiatives in urban and rural areas. In the urban
context, the chapter focuses on a cooperative of waste-pickers; in the rural context, it

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examines SEWA’s initiatives relating to smokeless cooking stoves (nirdhum chula),

solar lamps, eco-tourism, watershed management and organic farming.

Green livelihood: Its meaning and importance

Scientific studies support the contention that excess emissions from the burning of
fossil fuels for industrial and domestic energy production and consumption and trans-
portation are largely responsible for global warming and other manifestations of climate
change. This process can be best fought by the adoption of eco-friendly practices
using clean and green technology. According to the United Nations Environment
Programme, “greening the economy refers to the process of reconfiguring businesses
and infrastructure to deliver better returns on natural, human and economic capital
investments, while at the same time reducing greenhouse gas emissions, extracting and
using less natural resources, creating less waste and reducing social disparities”.1 “Green
livelihood” refers to a process whereby the individual earns a livelihood while contribut-
ing positively towards this process of greening the economy. This concept echoes the
UNEP definition of “green jobs” as work in agriculture, industry, services and adminis-
tration that contributes to preserving or restoring the quality of the environment (UNEP,
ILO, IOE, ITUC, 2008, pp. 35–36), ultimately reducing the environmental impact of
enterprises and economic sectors to sustainable levels. Thus green jobs achieve the dual
objective of sustainable economic development without compromising the interests of
future generation. A summary of the various sources of green jobs is set out in table 10.1.
The sectors that generate green jobs may be formal or informal in nature. For
example, much work in recycling, or in agriculture, is informal. SEWA’s green liveli-
hoods initiative aims to focus on developing eco-friendly skills, technologies and tools,
renewable energy and green rural infrastructure, involving women working in the
informal sector across India (SEWA, 2011).

The Self Employed Women’s Association

Location and scope
SEWA is a membership-based organization made up of informal women workers. Its
head office is located in the Ahmedabad district of Gujarat State. Gujarat, located in
western India, is administratively divided into 26 districts and 226 talukas (blocks).
SEWA is one of the largest trade unions not only in India but across the world in the
informal sector, with a membership of more than 1.3 million in 2010.2 At present it
is active in 14 districts of Gujarat, covering 50 per cent of the State’s area. SEWA also
works in seven other Indian states, and has extended its operations into a few countries
outside India, including South Africa, Turkey and Yemen. In the coming decade it
aims to increase its membership to 2.5 million.

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Table 10.1 Sources of green livelihood, by sector

Economic sector Activity/source of green jobs

Energy supply Integrated gasification/carbon sequestration

Co-generation (combined heat and power)
Renewables (wind, solar, biofuels, geothermal, small-scale hydro);
fuel cells
Transport More fuel-efficient vehicles
Hybrid electric, electric and fuel-cell vehicles
Car sharing
Public transport
Non-motorized transport (cycling, walking), and changes in land-use
policies and settlement patterns (reducing distances travelled and
dependence on motorized transport)
Manufacturing Pollution control (scrubbers and other tailpipe technologies)
Energy and materials efficiency
Clean production techniques (avoiding toxic substances)
Cradle-to-cradle (closed-loop systems)
Buildings Lighting, energy-efficient appliances and office equipment
Solar heating and cooling, solar panels
Green buildings (energy-efficient windows, insulation, building materials,
heating, ventilation and air-conditioning)
Passive-solar houses, zero-emissions buildings
Materials management Recycling
Extended producer responsibility, product take-back
and remanufacturing
Durability and reparability of products
Retail Promotion of efficient products and use of eco-labels
Store locations closer to residential areas
Minimization of shipping distances (from origin of products
to store location)
New service economy (selling services, not products)
Agriculture Soil conservation
Water efficiency
Organic growing methods
Reducing farm-to-market distance
Forestry Reforestation and afforestation projects
Agro-forestry
Sustainable forestry management and certification schemes
Halting deforestation
Source: adapted from UNEP, ILO, IOE, ITUC, 2008.

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Membership profile

Since the enrolment in 1972 of its first member, Rudiben – without whose contri-
bution the organization would not have reached the position it occupies today –
SEWA has expanded continuously, growing from just 1,070 in that first year to
1.3 million in 2010. The distribution of the membership across India is set out in table
10.2. In Gujarat, the State with the highest membership (735,617), around two-thirds
of these women live and work in rural areas (see table 10.3).
The members of SEWA represent more than 125 different trades; there are about
3,500 local producer groups and nine economic federations.
The members are broadly divided into four categories, as follows:
• home-based workers;
• vendors or hawkers;
• manual labourers;
• service providers and producers.

Goals, approach and structure

SEWA’s main goal is to organize women workers for full employment and self-reliance.
Full employment means employment whereby workers obtain work security, income
security, food security and social security (at a minimum, health care, childcare and
shelter). Self-reliance means that women should be autonomous and self-reliant,
individually and collectively, both economically and in terms of their decision-making
ability. To promote its goals SEWA pursues a combination of what it calls “struggle”
and “development”: that is, unionizing activities to address constraints and demand

Table 10.2 SEWA membership across India, by state, 2010

State No. of members

Gujarat 735 617

Madhya Pradesh 401 080
Uttar Pradesh 82 500
Delhi 37 183
Bihar 35 640
Rajasthan 24 501
West Bengal (Murshidabad) 3 500
Kerala 2 000
Uttarakhand 3 357
Total 1 325 378
Source: http://www.sewa.org/Thirty_third_issue.asp [accessed 25 June 2012].

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Table 10.3 Rural–urban distribution of SEWA membership in Gujarat, 2009

Main categories of workers No. of women Percentage of total membership

Urban 230 184 36.46

Rural 401 161 63.54
Total 631 345 100.0
Source: http://www.sewa.org/Twenty_Fifth_Issue.asp [accessed 25 June 2012].

change, and development interventions to promote alternative economic opportunities

(Chen, Khurana and Nidhi, 2004).
In pursuit of these goals, SEWA has drawn up a list of questions on 11 key
themes that together form an eleven-point strategy for assessing progress:
• Employment: have the members obtained more employment?
• Income: has their income increased?
• Ownership: do they have more assets in their name?
• Nutrition: are they and their families better nourished?
• Health care: do they and their families have access to better health care?
• Housing: do they have improved or more secure housing?
• Childcare: do they have access to childcare, if needed?
• Organized strength: has their collective organizational strength increased?
• Leadership: have more and stronger leaders emerged from the membership?
• Self-reliance: have members become more self-reliant, both individually and
collectively?
• Education: has their education (and that of their children) improved?

SEWA’s approach is demand driven: through discussions with members it

identifies their needs and the problems they face, and then suggests programmes to
improve their livelihoods and social security that are practicable within existing budget
constraints and appropriate to members’ skill levels. To quote Reema Nanavati,

SEWA’s approach to organizing is a need based and demand driven approach. It

identifies the needs and issues of the communities and links them up with
government programmes and schemes rather than creating parallel programmes. This
helps in leveraging government resources and also policy action. In addition to this,
provision of need based and demand driven services like banking, insurance and
health care led to expansion and growth of the organization and new membership.
(Nanavati, 2008, p. 3)

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To support and direct its work, SEWA has devised a two-tier structure to
represent its grass-roots members. This consists of:
• The Trade Council, which is elected by the members of each of the trades (for
example, saltpan workers, handicraft workers, garment workers, vegetable vendors,
dairy workers, and so on) in a ratio of one representative per 100 members.
In addition, and in parallel to the general Trade Council, each trade has its own
trade committee with between 15 and 50 members, which meets monthly to
discuss specific trade-related problems and solutions. All Trade Council members
are also members of their respective trade committees.

• The Executive Committee, which consists of 25 members elected every three years
by the Trade Council. Representation on the Executive Committee is proportional
to the membership. The office-holders of the Trade Council are elected from
among the members of the Executive Committee. (Verhagen, 2004)

Over a period of four decades SEWA’s activities have expanded significantly

and it is still working hard to increase its membership base. As a result of globalization,
all over the world formal sector employment has been in decline and more and
more workers are joining the informal sector. Obtaining a sustainable livelihood and
even a minimal level of social security will continue to be a substantial challenge for
informal sector workers and their families. In India, as in many other countries,
women members traditionally worked in the household; but now, largely as a result
of initiatives taken by SEWA, it has been realized that women can contribute signif-
icantly towards both improving their own family’s quality of life and the country’s
national production by pursuing their own livelihoods. For 40 years SEWA has
struggled hard to assert the rights of poor women workers, and has had some success
in persuading state governments as well as central Government to introduce legislation
in this area. Among the important achievements of SEWA in this regard are:
• an act that protects the rights of construction workers;
• an act that protects the rights of street vendors;
• an act that protects the rights of beedi (cigarette) rolling workers;
• a social security act guaranteeing minimum social security to informal workers
across the country;
• the setting up of the unorganized sector welfare board by the Government of
Gujarat.
As well as fighting for the rights of informal workers, over the years it has also
sought to improve their financial and social security. SEWA found that the main cause
of poverty among these workers is dependence on moneylenders for credit, for which

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they are charged excessive rates of interest. If credit could be provided with little or no
transaction cost, most of the workers’ financial problems would be solved. SEWA
therefore started the Swashrayi Mahila SEWA Sahakari Bank to meet the credit needs
of the workers, and from time to time trains members on the importance of financial
literacy and management. It also offers members training in the latest innovations in
their respective sectors or trades, including how to use the new technologies to improve
their productivity and livelihoods. SEWA also helps members to market their products
so that they can get appropriate prices for their work. In addition, SEWA offers its own
social security provision through its VimoSEWA scheme, providing members with
protection in times of ill health or other misfortune.
To summarize, then, the four pillars supporting all SEWA’s work for its
members are:
• organization;
• capacity building;
• credit linkage;
• market linkage.
Strong leadership with a vision, inclusiveness, hard work, dedication and
teamwork are among the factors that have enabled SEWA to build solid and mutually
trusting relationships with state and central governments, funding agencies, other trade
unions and civil society organizations. In addition, by mobilizing its members, it can
also help them to respond through their work to the challenge posed by climate
change. The next section of the chapter will turn to SEWA’s recent initiatives on green
livelihoods, illustrated through a few case studies.

Reviewing SEWA’s initiatives on green livelihoods:

A note on methodology
The study of SEWA’s green livelihood initiatives presented here drew on both primary
and secondary data, including video material produced by SEWA. In addition, group
discussions were organized with the informal women workers involved in both urban
and rural contexts, and in four different areas of work, in order to arrive at a deeper
understanding of the initiatives and to assess progress to date. The different areas and
types of work covered are shown diagrammatically in figure 10.1.
Among the green livelihood initiatives studied here is that promoting the use of
solar lamps and clean cooking stoves by rural saltpan workers, who were specifically chosen
for this study because they need the solar lamps and clean cooking stoves most urgently
for their daily chores. However, it has been decided that these two items should be
distributed not just among saltpan workers but among all the members of SEWA living
in rural areas. The clean stoves are now being tested experimentally in a pilot project.

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Figure 10.1 Outline of study coverage showing types of location, activities

and workers examined

Rural area Urban area

Enjara village (Surendranagar)
(Rajpur, Ahmedabad)
Ganeshpura village (Mehsana)

Smokeless Solid waste

Solar lamps Eco-tourism
cookstoves management
Salt workers (rural)
Salt workers
Waste-pickers
(rural) (rural)
(urban)

To address other green livelihood initiatives appropriate to rural areas, including

tree plantation and horticulture, organic farming, composting using worms, water
conservation and eco-tourism, a group discussion was conducted at Ganeshpura village
in Mehsana district.
In the urban context, the study focused on waste-pickers organized by SEWA.
Studies show that municipal waste contributes significantly to GHG formation; the
informal waste-pickers, working on the principle of the “three Rs” (reduce, reuse and
recycle), are contributing through their work to combat this process. To understand
the work of this group, a focused group discussion was held with women working as
informal waste-pickers in Ahmedabad.
In addition, discussions were held with a few SEWA management executives
regarding the concept of green livelihood in general: an account of these is given in
the next section of the chapter.

Group discussion 1: SEWA Gram Haat, Ahmedabad

In this discussion, at SEWA Gram Haat, Navarangpura, Ahmedabad, a group of
SEWA executives recalled how the concept of green livelihood evolved from SEWA’s
livelihood initiatives spread across a number of trades that are basically eco-friendly,
contributing positively to the health of the environment by reducing GHG emissions.

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SEWA began campaigning long ago on the issues of “women, water, and forest”,
believing that gender has a large role to play in the move towards sustainable
development. It is poor women who are the first victims of climate change: for
example, if there is drought, they have to travel long distances in rural areas to collect
water. Water shortages not only deny SEWA members’ basic right to safe drinking
water, but also hinder their efforts to achieve full employment and economic self-
reliance, the central goals of all SEWA’s activities (Verhagen, 2004). Similarly, if there
is deforestation, women also have to walk long distances to collect fuelwood. Two-
thirds of SEWA members live in rural areas and around 150,000 members depend on
occupations related to water, forestry, agriculture and energy.
One of SEWA’s major aims is to provide members with a professional identity
and hence self-respect and dignity, creating an owner and manager in each worker. In
order to do this, it provides education and training for members on technical, managerial
and financial issues through collaboration with reputable technical and management
institutions, thereby helping the workers to improve their skills in a variety of areas.
SEWA began its “green livelihoods” (hariyali rojgar) campaign in 2005, under
the dual rubric of employment generation and protecting the environment. The issue
of green livelihoods became even more important in 2007–08 and the following years
because of the global economic recession. In these circumstances, over-production
generates excess goods and services for which there is no market, while also damaging
the environment. Through the green livelihoods initiative, which now occupies a
central place in all SEWA trade committees, poor informal workers can both make a
living and help to protect the environment. SEWA works to inform behenes3 about the
issues of climate change, especially global warming, and how they are going to affect
the life of the poor in general and women in particular. Around 300 members from
nine districts of Gujarat came together after the Copenhagen climate summit in 2009
to discuss the effects of climate change, their experience of it and how to tackle it,
focusing on the central question: What are the alternatives available to generate income
at the same time as protecting the environment? In 2010 SEWA organized a national
seminar on green livelihoods at Ahmedabad Management Association to draw policy-
makers’ attention to the concept.
It was clear from the group discussion that members understood that climate
change is happening, and that the effects will bear heavily on poor informal workers
– but also that efforts to adapt to climate change can create employment opportunities
and also improve the health of workers.

SEWA initiatives
SEWA found that each rural household spends 30 per cent of its income on fuelwood
and kerosene oil. In order to supply fuelwood, forests are being cut down. The
collection of fuelwood and the cooking of food are tasks done by the female members

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in Indian society, and both have negative effects not only on the environment but on
their health. To collect the wood they have to walk long distances, cut the wood and
then carry it back on their heads. The wood is then used in traditional cooking stoves
known as chulas, which emit smoke. The women keep the stoves alight and hot by
pumping air into them, using iron or bamboo pipes; this puts a lot of pressure on their
lungs, especially in the rainy season when the wood is wet. Together, then, the
collection, carrying and use of fuelwood has an enormous impact on women’s health.
Studies show that smoke from indoor biomass cooking is associated with a number of
diseases, including acute respiratory illnesses and even cancer, with women and young
children affected disproportionately. It is estimated that smoke from cooking fuels
accounted for nearly 2 million deaths in 2009 (World Bank, 2011).
The use of traditional biomass stoves for household cooking, which is widespread
in developing countries such as India, is linked to local environmental problems. Open
fires and primitive stoves are inefficient at converting energy into heat for cooking; the
amount of biomass cooking fuel required each year can reach up to 2 tonnes per family
(World Bank, 2011). There is mounting evidence that biomass burned inefficiently
contributes to climate change at both regional and global levels. In developing
countries, about 730 million tonnes of biomass are burned each year, generating more
than 1 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions and other products of incomplete
combustion that further exacerbate the problem.
SEWA’s experiment with clean, smokeless cooking stoves known as nirdhum
chulas goes back to 1986. Realizing the dangers associated with traditional cooking
stoves, SEWA took up the challenge of finding clean alternatives for its members that
would also help them to earn a livelihood, marketing the new cooking stoves among
their fellow members. By this means they can contribute to a cleaner environment
and better health for themselves and their fellow members as well as earning a few
rupees in this process. SEWA aims to sell 200,000 stoves among its membership, all
assembled, installed and repaired by the members.
Other SEWA initiatives covered in this discussion with SEWA executives
relate to forestry, vermiculture (composting with worms), water harvesting, and the
operation and maintenance of rural infrastructure. SEWA has invited experts in these
fields to train women workers in skills including water testing technology, forestry,
nursery, grafting of plants and seed production. Training in forestry and plant
management enables members to contribute towards afforestation as well as to earn
money from selling plants. Members can also earn good incomes from supplying
vermicompost for organic farming to the 265,000 small and marginal farmers
associated with SEWA. Water conservation through watershed development yields
positive ecological and environmental benefits. SEWA has constructed 4,000 small
water harvesting structures in the state of Gujarat which help members to save time in
collecting drinking water. It has also launched a bio-gas project to stop the burning
of cow-dung cakes, which is responsible for lung disease. SEWA’s construction of

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145 bio-gas plants in the Kutch district of Gujarat has reduced these damaging
smoke emissions and brought down carbon dioxide emissions by nearly 3,000 tonnes
every year.
In all, the green energy and green livelihood campaign has generated annual
incomes amounting to 1,175 million rupees (INR) for 139,685 members in 2011/12.
By 2015 SEWA aims to have launched 25,000 young green entrepreneurs who, it is
estimated, could help to create 200,000 green jobs (SEWA, 2010).
In urban areas there is great scope for green employment in the waste-picking
sector. SEWA has a long tradition of organizing the informal waste-collectors and has
organized around 45,000 women waste-pickers in Gujarat alone. The World Bank has
estimated that around 1 per cent of urban populations in the developing economies
are engaged in waste collection (Medina, 2008). In India, waste collectors earn their
livelihood by collecting paper, plastic, metal and glass scrap for sale to the recycling
industry. In doing so, they not only supply recycling plants with their raw material but
also keep the city clean, protecting the environment and reducing municipal costs.
SEWA has started training the workers to reuse and recycle the collected waste
themselves to produce stationery and other products that generate a livelihood.

Group discussion 2: Waste-pickers’ cooperative,

Rajpur, Gomtipur, Ahmedabad
In order to explore SEWA’s green livelihood initiatives in urban areas, a group
discussion was organized with the members of Geetanjali Mahila SEWA Audyogik
Stationery Sahakari Mandali, Rajpur, Gomtipur. The objective of the discussion was
to study the contribution of the waste-pickers towards reducing GHG emissions and
generating employment out of waste.
It emerged from this discussion that even in cities such as Ahmedabad there is
evidence of climate change. The intensity of rainfall has increased, and in 2009 and
2010 there were floods due to water logging. Also, temperatures are rising, reaching
unbearable levels in summer.
There are around 50,000 workers in Ahmedabad who earn their living collecting
waste, most of them living in the eastern part of the city. Most of the waste-pickers are
poor and walk long distances, carrying the waste bags on their backs for at least five or
six hours every day, starting early in the morning to go out and collect the various types
of wastes, then coming back home to sort them out according to their usability and
value, and finally taking the sorted waste to a scrap dealer (pitha) to sell them. On
average, a waste-picker can earn around INR60–80 per day.
Members agreed that if waste were not collected regularly from the various
parts of the city then the resulting pollution and stench would lead to environmental
and health hazards. Piling up of solid waste would lead to the formation of GHGs,
thus contributing further to the increase in temperature within the city already noticed

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by the workers. The participants in the discussion pointed out that mechanization of
waste collection would not be helpful in reducing GHG emissions, because it would
not necessarily separate the dry waste from the wet wastes that lead to GHG
formation. The waste-pickers, however, do segregate the dry waste from the wet wastes
and recycle the dry waste, thereby helping to reduce GHG emissions.
The owner of Jivraj Bidi (a local cigarette manufacturer) has provided a large hall
at Gomtipur to accommodate the SEWA waste-pickers’ activities. Members collect
different types of waste such as mill broke, wood-free unprinted waste, wood-free
printed waste, and mechanical and unsorted wastes from various offices,4 and then
clean and sort them. Out of the waste they produce notepads, office stationery, pens
and pencils, jewellery and recyclable paper bags. SEWA has made arrangements with
companies including Staples, Weconnect, Gift Link and Exchanger to train members
in better techniques for recycling the waste. The Geetanjali Waste Collectors’
Cooperative was founded in the year 1995; now it has 150 active members involved
in recycling wastes. The cooperative faces many challenges in its work to bring more
members into this area of green livelihood, notable among them:
• the need to change workers’ attitudes to attract more into waste recycling;
• the need to improve the finished products in order to compete effectively in the
market;
• the need to gain access to finance and markets.

Group discussion 3: Vanalaxmi tree growers’

cooperative, Ganeshpura village, Mehsana district
The third discussion was organized with the executive members of Shree Vanalaxmi
Ganeshpura Mahila SEWA Vruksh Utpadak Sahakari Mandali, a tree growers’ coop-
erative. The objective of the discussion was to find out about the cooperative’s
initiatives in wasteland reclamation, watershed development and management,
water conservation, planting and nursery work, organic farming, horticulture and
eco-tourism.
Ganeshpura village is located 51 kilometres from Ahmedabad on the way to
Mehsana, adjacent to Kadi and Kalol taluka, which is home to a large number of small
and medium-sized enterprises. The participants in the discussion agreed that climate
change as a result of industrialization has brought about an increase in the local
temperature. As a result of the heat, even poor people are now drinking bottled water,
which was never used 20 years ago. The village has 150 households, most of which
belong to dalits (lower castes) and other less educated classes (senema). There is a
substantial number of women workers in the village struggling in poor socio-economic
conditions. When SEWA first arrived in the village, they saw women facing many
problems, including:

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• lack of sufficient and regular employment, leading to dependence on the

landlords for survival and migration from the village in search of livelihood;
• long distances to be covered to collect fuelwood and fodder, and a decline in the
numbers of livestock owing to lack of fodder, leading in turn to poor health and
loss of employment;
• long distances to be covered in order to collect drinking water.

Realizing their plight, in 1981 SEWA approached the women, inviting them
to become members, with the aim of introducing the smokeless cooking stove into
the village. With the agreement of the village panchayat (local self-government), the
SEWA leaders launched their project, and around 25 poor women agreed to use
the new stove.

The land reclamation project

This success encouraged the SEWA leaders to make further efforts to improve the
livelihoods of these poor women. They found out that there were 10 acres of waste
land lying unused at the end of the village. The land was barren, growing natural grass
only in the rainy season, when it was used by the shepherds of the village. There were
no trees except the Israeli ganda babool (acacia totilis), used by most households
for fuelwood.
In 1986 SEWA asked the panchayat for permission to take a 30-year lease on
the waste land in an attempt to address the problems facing the women of the village.
The idea was to use it in ways that would both conserve nature and benefit the
women. By establishing a tree plantation, growing nursery plants, introducing water
conservation and pursuing horticulture culture and organic farming, they would
relieve the women of the need to spend their time collecting drinking water, fuelwood
and fodder and would provide them with employment in the process. Furthermore,
the project has taken advantage of the growing interest among the urban population
in eco-tourism, attracting visitors to the reclaimed site and thereby generating
additional income and employment.5
Participants in the discussion shared their experience of addressing the problems
they have faced and the impacts of this project on their social and economic condition.
When SEWA proposed the land reclamation scheme, both the sarpanch (village head)
and officials of the district forestry department were sceptical about the capabilities of
these women, most of whom were either illiterate or educated only at primary level.
Nevertheless, in 1987, 55 women became the first members of the cooperative and it
was registered as Shree Vanalaxmi Tree Growers Cooperative under the Cooperatives
Act at the office of the registrar of cooperatives in Ahmedabad. At that time, each
member engaged in the land reclamation work received INR13 per day from SEWA’s
own fund. Now the members are earning INR4,500 per month.

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First the entire area was fenced using barbed wire by the women members
themselves. The problem of water supply was first dealt with by constructing ponds
on the cooperative’s land to collect water for drinking and irrigation purposes;
however, owing to the sandy soil, water could not be stored in these for long periods.
To overcome this problem, members went to Indian Petrochemicals in Baroda for
training in the construction of plastic ponds to prevent water loss; these have now been
constructed at the Vanalaxmi Cooperative complex, which can now store up to
202,000 litres of water.6 In addition, members have also learned to harvest rainwater
in troughs for plantation and domestic use, and have been trained in tapak sinchai
(sprinkler irrigation), which saves precious water. In 1989/90 the cooperative
introduced the first bore well inside the complex. By these various means, the water
requirements of the cooperative have been met, and members no longer need to travel
long distances collecting household water.
After initial work on landscaping and water supply, the members started plotting
the land and making decisions on what kinds of plants were to be planted. At the
outset it was decided that non-fruit-bearing trees beneficial to the environment would
be grown along with fruit-bearing trees in a ratio of 70:30. Seasonable vegetables
would be grown inside the cooperative.
As work progressed, the cooperative received support for further development
from various agencies and institutions. For example, some members undertook a training
programme on topics including seed technology, greenhouse use and vermicompost
with help from the faculty of Anand Agricultural University. At the outset, the members
bought in seeds from outside suppliers, which cost them money. Later they decided to
grow seeds on their own, and gained certification from the Department of Agriculture
of the Government of Gujarat. In the first year they produced 20 kilograms of seed and
are now supplying all the seed the cooperative requires. The members also successfully
developed a cotton seed of their own.
Another eco-friendly project pursued by this cooperative is vermiculture. Members
were trained in producing organic manures by Anand Agricultural University, and are
now using the organic vermicompost instead of chemical fertilizer both inside the
cooperative and on their own private land. Sales of this compost are also expected to be
a good source of livelihood for the members.
On the fruit and vegetable plots the cooperative grows amla (phyllanthus emblica),
mangoes, lemons, chikoo (achrus sapodilla), guava and other vegetables. The cultivation
and proceeds are shared among the members through a system of drawing lots. Those
who draw the winning lots each will “own” a plot and take care of its cultivation; they
will then sell the products at the market, after which they will keep one-third of the total
proceeds while two-thirds goes to the account of the cooperative. Any production surplus
is processed, packed and sold through SEWA’s own brand, Rudi.
In addition to these activities on the cooperative’s reclaimed land, the members
also use solar lamps and clean cooking stoves both within the cooperative and in

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their own homes, again contributing positively both to their livelihoods and to
the environment.
It emerged from the discussion that the cooperative’s members had been
pursuing all these activities for years without knowing that what they were doing
amounted to a green livelihood. However, over the past three years, owing to the large
number of campaigns on green livelihood that have been conducted, they have come
to realize that they are making a contribution to the environment as well as to
employment generation, and have started to consider how the cooperative can
promote more livelihood opportunities.
The area reclaimed and cultivated by the cooperative is now covered with a thick
green canopy of mature trees that is home to many species of birds rarely or never seen
in urban areas. Realizing the potential of this rich and peaceful environment, SEWA
initiated an eco-tourism project. Facilities have been created allowing urban visitors to
spend a relaxing day at the cooperative, with breakfast, lunch and tea provided, for a
minimum price of INR150, including meals. During the three years since this
initiative was launched, many visitors have come to Vanalaxmi to take advantage of
these facilities, including bank officials, lawyers, schoolchildren, senior citizens,
forestry officers and foreign tourists.

The impact of the project on the environment and on members’

livelihoods
Participants in the discussion reported that in the past most of the cooperative’s
members lived in subordination to the male-dominated culture, wearing the veil and
prohibited from talking to men. They were also victims of caste-based discrimination
and exclusion. Since the cooperative was set up, they have gained in collective strength
and are no longer subject to these severe social constraints. Migration has also been
reduced, and as a result school dropout rates are lower and enrolment rates higher.
Increased income has empowered the women, and 30 families now live on the
proceeds of this cooperative. Through their association with the project, some
members have had the opportunity to travel abroad to share their experience, visiting
China, Italy, Sri Lanka, Thailand and the United States (New York), and receiving
widespread acclamation.
In discussing their future plans for the cooperative, members spoke of expanding
the range of plants grown and moving into floriculture. One idea is to grow the gerbera
flower, for which there is a high market demand. At present there are 3,000 trees inside
the cooperative, most of the babool trees having been replaced by amla plants. There
are now plans to adopt a suraksha chakra (security cycle) cultivating cereals, vegetables
and lentils in cycles, and also to start producing herbal medicines. In order to
increase the visibility of the cooperative, members want to install a billboard on the
Mehsana–Ahmedabad highway.

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Group discussion 4: Saltpan workers’ cooperative,

Enjara village
The fourth group discussion, held with the members of Mahadev Mitha Mandali (a
saltpan workers’ cooperative) at Enjara village in Halvad taluka of Surendranagar
district, focused on promoting green livelihoods through the use of solar lanterns and
smokeless cooking stoves.
Enjara is 23 kilometres from Dhrangadhra, in a part of Gujarat famous for its
production of salt and its traditional saltpan workers. Enjara and other villages lie on
the edge of the desert area known as the Little Rann of Kutch (LRK), which spreads over
an area of 5,000 square kilometres that crosses the borders of six districts of the state.
There are 181 cooperatives of salt workers working within the LRK, which is famous
for supplying 70 per cent of all the salt used in the Indian economy. Most of the saltpan
workers are found in Halvad, Dhrangadhra and Patdi talukas of Surendranagar district,
where around 30,000 women rural workers are organized by SEWA.
The salt workers draw water from underground with the help of diesel pumps
that contain a chemical known as bromine necessary for salt production. These pumps
run constantly in order to produce a good quality of bromine. Sizeable sums of money
are spent on procuring diesel to operate the pumps; also, burning the diesel generates
carbon dioxide, adding to the total output of GHGs. Salt is still produced here by
traditional manual methods, and the salt workers and their families have to spend eight
months of the year in the LRK to generate the final product. In recent years the
workers have reported erratic rainfall in this region, including episodes of heavy rainfall
that washed large amounts of salt away. Saltpan workers are particularly vulnerable
to climate change and are likely to be affected if there is either an excess or a shortage
of rainfall.
As well as diesel to run the pumps, salt workers need kerosene oil to light lamps
after dark. This is because they work out in the desert, far from their original homes
and without any facilities including electricity, and salt farming is a continuous process
that requires bright light in the working area 24 hours a day. The wells where water is
pumped from the ground are a long way from the huts where they live, and light is
also needed to protect these isolated workers against threats from wild animals and
storms. Another requirement is fuelwood for cooking food. The women here still use
the traditional smoky chulas that cause health and environmental problems.
SEWA has calculated that the salt workers spend significant proportions of their
hard-earned money on kerosene and fuelwood. Each family of salt workers needs
between 10 and 60 kilograms of fuelwood every day for cooking food, and on top of
the cost of this the women lose working time in collecting it. If they do have an
electricity connection then they have to pay INR350 a month in electricity charges.
In addition, each family consumes on average 8 litres of kerosene oil per month at
INR14 per litre.

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SEWA discussed these problems with the salt workers and decided to try
introducing alternatives to the traditional lamps and cooking stoves. It made arrange-
ments with 17 companies, including Philips and Environfits, to manufacture clean
smokeless cooking stoves that consume less fuelwood and emit less smoke, and with
Gautam Polymer to make solar lanterns, which have already been distributed among
6,000 members at a price of INR1,800 or 3,000, depending on the type of lantern.
Godiben, an active SEWA member in Enjara village, has now been using the lamp for
six years and reports that it is working with no problem.
The smokeless cooking stove is currently at the experimental stage; once its
development is considered complete and successful, stoves will be distributed among
the members. The following points were made about the smokeless stove:
• As well as emitting less smoke than the traditional stove, the smoke it does emit
is grey rather than black, containing less carbon.
• The stove is small and easily portable; it is sufficiently large for a small family of
four, but may not be appropriate for a larger household.
• There is a problem in using it to prepare bajra no rotlo (bread made of pearl
millet), an important food item for people in rural Gujarat.

In discussions on the solar lantern, members made the following points:

• The lantern is light in weight and attractive in appearance, and can easily be
carried and hung anywhere.
• No fuel is required, no smoke is emitted, and there is no threat of fire.
• Since the lantern uses an LED bulb, the lights are good for the eye.
• The lantern has a mobile charging port, so that workers out in the LRK can
recharge the mobile battery without having to travel the 30 kilometres to a village
with electricity.
• It can easily be assembled and repaired by the members themselves with a little
training. This helps them to earn some income.

Conclusions and recommendations

In developing countries very high proportions of the population work in the informal
sector: in India the proportion is over 93 per cent of the total workforce, and as
economic reforms continue their numbers are likely to increase. Women’s partic-
ipation in the informal sector is likely to increase because more family members need
to work to supplement the household income. Also, as noted above, climate change is
likely to bear especially heavily on the poor, among them most informal workers
and most women. Under such circumstances, SEWA’s green livelihood strategy is

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definitely proving beneficial to informal workers, and should be more widely adopted
and financially supported in its contribution to both employment and environmental
protection.
This chapter has examined some of SEWA’s initiatives with regard to green
livelihoods. The following recommendations emerge from this exercise:
• The price of solar lamps and smokeless stoves should be reduced. The prices
of solar lamps are currently rather high, putting them out of reach of most poor
women. Efforts should be made to produce a lamp that would be affordable to
large numbers of women. The same applies in the case of smokeless cooking
stoves. Further innovations are needed to produce a stove that can cook food for
more than four people.
• The use of solar pumps should be promoted. Pumps are used extensively by
farmers as well as salt workers. It is estimated that, on average, each pump burns
1,500 litres of diesel over the course of a season, giving rise to substantial carbon
dioxide emissions. The LRK receives very bright sunshine, with summer temper-
atures exceeding 50°C, making it highly appropriate for producing solar energy.
The incorporation of solar pumps into the green livelihood model would improve
the informal workers’ livelihood considerably.
• Small cooling systems should be developed. Not only lighting and heating but
cooling systems can simultaneously provide livelihoods and contribute positively
to the environment and food security. Small and affordable refrigerators could
help the workers to preserve food for longer times and so reduce the necessity of
cooking that in turn requires fuelwood to be burnt.
• Eco-tourism projects could be developed in the areas bordering the Little Rann
of Kutch. The Gujarat Government is encouraging tourism, including eco-
tourism, in the state. Since SEWA has experience of eco-tourism at the Ganeshpura
village, it could apply this near Dhrangadhra, Halvad and Patdi. Already some
entrepreneurs have started eco-tourism projects adjacent to the LRK. This area
has great scope for eco-tourism, which could provide livelihoods for many of the
informal workers.
• Carbon credits should be measured and compensated. Policy-makers should
develop a proper methodology to estimate the contribution of the informal
workers to the reduction of GHG emissions, whether by the use of solar lighting,
clean stoves, tree-planting or waste recycling, and should compensate them
accordingly, either through financial means or some other form of recognition.

With the global population rising very fast, serious attention must be given to
how all these people are to be provided with adequate employment and livelihood. It
seems unlikely that such a huge workforce could all be accommodated in the formal

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sector, and even if this were done it may not be sustainable. Hence we must ensure that
the mass of informal workers obtain employment that simultaneously protects the
environment. To this end, more and more innovative forms of green livelihood
must be explored in order to tackle the twin challenges of population growth and
climate change.

Notes
1 http://www.unep.org/roap/Home/tabid/roap/Activities/ResourceEfficiency/GreenEconomyInitiative/tabid/6825/Default.aspx
[accessed 2 July 2012].
2 http://www.sewa.org/Thirty_third_issue.asp [accessed 2 July 2012].
3 Behenes is a Gujarati word meaning “sister”, widely used among poor informal workers.
4 On the ABCD analysis of waste, see http://rps.gn.apc.org/info3.htm#abcd [accessed 2 June 2012].
5 For details, see http://www.sewaecotourism.org/index.htm [accessed 2 June 2012].
6 Indian Petrochemicals also donated agricultural equipment, including a power tiller.

References

Chen, M.A.; Khurana, R.; Nidhi, M. 2004. Towards economic freedom: The impact of SEWA
(Ahmedabad, Self Employed Women’s Association (SEWA)).
Medina, M. 2008. “The informal recycling sector in developing countries: Organizing waste pickers to
enhance their impact”, Gridlines (Public–Private Infrastructure Advisory Facility), Note No. 44, Oct.
Nanavati, R. 2008. Empowerment through mobilization of poor women on a large scale: A case study on
Self Employed Women’s Association (SEWA), India (Ahmedabad, SEWA).
Self Employed Women’s Association (SEWA). 2010. “SEWA and green livelihoods”, in We the
self-employed, SEWA electronic newsletter, Jan. Available at: http://www.sewa.org/Twenty_Fifth_
Issue.asp [2 June 2012].
—. 2011. “SEWA unveils green livelihoods initiative”, DNA Ahmedabad, 16 Jan.
United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP); International Labour Organization (ILO);
International Organisation of Employers (IOE); International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC).
2008. Green jobs: Towards decent work in a sustainable, low-carbon world (Washington, DC, New
York and Nairobi, Worldwatch Institute and Cornell University Global Labor Institute for UNEP).
Verhagen, J. 2004. SEWA’s water campaign, paper presented to conference on “Attaining the
MDGs in India: The role of public policy and service delivery”, Delhi, 17–18 June. Available at:
http://siteresources.worldbank.org/INTINDIA/Resources/swc.pdf [31 May 2012].
World Bank. 2011. Household cookstoves, environment, health, and climate change: A new look at an old
problem (Washington, DC). Available at: http://climatechange.worldbank.org/sites/default/
files/documents/Household%20Cookstoves-web.pdf [24 August 2012].

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INDEX

Note: Page numbers in bold indicate references to tables; those in italics indicate figures. Because
the entire work is about “labour” and “the global South” the use of these terms as entry points has
been restricted.

accumulation 20, 29, 35, 58, 112, 118–19 Argentina 3, 13, 129, 161–3, 166, 172–3,
activists 3–4, 25, 33, 47–8, 126, 144, 154 177–9
environmental 28–9 ADOS medical clinic 171, 173–8
labour 3, 127 union engagement 175–7
movement 48–9 FASINPAT 171, 173, 177
union 98, 152 history 164, 166, 169
ADOS medical clinic 171, 173–8 labour movement and recovered factories
union engagement 175–7 161–79
African National Congress (ANC) 11, 142, Menem Government 161–3, 166–72,
144–6, 149, 151–4 174–5, 177–8
age 57, 72, 75 Montes brothers 172–3, 175
agriculture 35, 43, 148, 182, 189, 194 Neuquén 171–7
climate-smart 20, 27 Peronism see Peronism
Ahmedabad 188, 191–3, 199 Peronist identity 168, 176–7
AITUC see All India Trade Union Congress Peronist Resistance 164–5, 169, 176
Aiziczon, F. 171–3, 175–6 politics 163–4
alliances 3, 23, 35, 55, 100–1, 149, 175 role of CGT under Menem and formation of
of unions 100, 104 CTA 168–9
All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC) 92, Worker’s Confederation of Argentina (CTA)
103 13, 162–3, 168–9, 174–8
All Pakistan Confederation of Labour (APCOL) Zanón 171–3, 175–8
93 union engagement 175–7
alternative developmental path 35–6 Australia 42, 49, 58
alternative growth path 30, 35 autonomy 125, 137, 176, 178
ANC see African National Congress Awami League 93–6

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back offices 74–5 Brazil 10–11, 52–3, 58–9, 109–11, 142, 145,
BAG see Bargaining Agenda for Gender 153–4
Bangladesh 3, 9 call centre industry 111–13, 118, 122
garment factories 87–8, 91, 97–8 characteristics 110–14
numbers 88 call centre unions and their demands
garment workers 9, 87–104 115–17
implications of May 2006 uprising 101–3 cycle of strikes and experience of trade
numbers 88 unionism in São Paulo 117–19
labour unions infotaylorism 114–15
failures in RMG sector since 1980 labour market 113–14
95–101 labour relations in Lula’s era 109–23
as shaped by colonialism 91–5 Lula da Silva, President Luiz Inácio 109–23,
Rahman, General Ziaur 95–6 145–53
Rahman, Sheikh Mujibur 95 São Paulo 115–17, 119, 123
Sramik Karmachari Okkyo Parishad (SKOP) Sintetel 115–17, 121–3
90, 96 Sintratel 115–17, 119, 122–3
Universal Knitting 90–1, 104 telemarketing operators and their unions 10,
Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and 109–23
Exporters Association (BGMEA) 88, growth in number of operators 111
90–1, 98–9 numbers of operators 2003-09 110
Bangladesh Garment Workers Unity Council numbers of operators by region 111
(BGWUC) 99 union-government relationship 145–6
Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) 95–6 unions
banking 1, 117, 122, 128–9, 147, 185 proportion of women on decision-making
crisis 129–30, 133 bodies 50
bankruptcy 170–1, 174–5 senior office-holders 51
bank workers 50–3 women and union equality structures 53
Barchiesi, F. 78–81 bribes 98–9
bargaining 56, 116, 129 Briskin, L. 44, 46
collective see collective bargaining
Bargaining Agenda for Gender (BAG) 48, 55–8 Cafiero, Antonio 166–7
Batho Pele 72 call centres 9, 65–6, 68–78, 80–2, 112, 114,
Batlle y Ordoñez, President Jose 125, 127–8, 138 117–18
benefits 8, 24, 27, 45, 80–1, 144–5, 168–9 Brazil 110–13, 118, 122
social 5, 10, 33, 115, 164 characteristics of operations 69
Bengal 91–3, 103 NMM 67, 73–4
BGMEA see Bangladesh Garment public 67–8, 72, 82
Manufacturers and Exporters Association work 65–6, 69–70, 74, 76, 82
BGWUC see Bangladesh Garment Workers workers 71, 74, 76–7, 79–82
Unity Council Canada 9, 44, 53–5, 58–9
biofuels 20, 183 successes and barriers in unions for women 54
black economic empowerment 144, 152 unions
BNP (Bangladesh Nationalist Party) 95–6 and Bargaining Agenda for Gender (BAG)
Bradley, H. 44–5 55–6

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proportion of women on decision-making response of South African labour 19–37

bodies 50 climate crisis 20, 25, 27, 29, 32, 34–5
senior office-holders 51 climate justice 25–7, 37
women and union equality structures 53 movement 8, 24–5
Canadian Labour Congress (CLC) 44 Climate Justice Now (CJN) 25–7
Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Climate Justice Now South Africa (CJNSA)
50–1, 53–6, 59 27–8, 30, 37
capacity 6, 10, 31, 44–6, 73, 133–4, 174–6 climate-smart agriculture 20, 27
building 31, 187 coal 25, 29
organizational 11, 125 clean 20, 34
regulatory 5–6 coal-fired power stations 21, 23, 28
capital 1–2, 4, 6, 24, 27–8, 35, 99 collective bargaining 11, 43, 57, 59, 78, 113,
capitalism 1–2, 6, 20, 24, 28, 32, 34 125–7
green see green capitalism fragmented 80
suicide 28, 35 processes 99, 126, 129, 133, 135
carbon capture and storage 20, 22, 27, 34 collective emotional labour 71
carbon emissions 19–20, 23, 29, 34, 37, collective mobilization 112, 114–15, 117–18
190–1, 198 Collier, R.B. & D. 126, 128
carbon trading 22, 27–8, 37 colonial India 91–2, 103
CDM see Clean Development Mechanism Colorado Party 125, 127, 130
CGT (General Labour Confederation) 13, commodification 2–3, 20, 27, 35
162–6, 168–9, 172, 174–5, 177–8 communication 66, 74, 76, 82, 171
leadership 164, 175 poor 74–6
childcare 184–5 conditions of work 10, 55, 80
citizen unionism 10, 116 conflicts 101, 103, 118–19, 126, 138, 171–2, 175
civil society 26, 35, 48, 100, 146, 169 Congress of South African Trade Unions
conference 24 (COSATU) 24–6, 29, 32–4, 53, 142,
groups 89, 145 144–5, 149
organizations 24, 26, 181, 187 affiliates 32–3, 35
CJN see Climate Justice Now policy framework 33, 37
CJNSA see Climate Justice Now South Africa consensus 132–3, 176
class analysis 27, 34 consumption 3, 13, 19, 32–3, 36, 71, 182
classes 37, 42, 126 contracts 6, 70, 73, 79
subordinate 4, 7, 149 short-term 114
working see working class cooking stoves
class solidarity 71, 103, 116, 118 clean 187, 194, 197
class struggle 32, 102, 118, 164 smokeless 13, 182, 190, 193, 196–8
CLC (Canadian Labour Congress) 44 traditional 190
clean coal technology 20, 34 cooperatives 13, 36, 169, 177, 193, 195–6
clean cooking stoves 187, 194, 197 corporatism, social 136–7
Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) 20, COSATU see Congress of South African Trade
22, 27, 37 Unions
climate change 7, 13, 181–2, 187, 189–92, credit 1, 120, 186–7
196–7, 199 creditors 172, 174

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cross-border campaigns 13 education 5, 7, 51–2, 54, 56–7, 101, 185

CTA see Worker’s Confederation of Argentina formal 92, 101
cultural identity 137, 165–7 public 26, 125, 127
culture 27, 46, 53, 58, 60, 72, 178–9 women’s 58–9
patriarchal 52, 54, 59 elections 67, 130, 141, 143, 147–8, 154, 170
CUPE see Canadian Union of Public electoral competition 148–9
Employees electoral constraints 142, 146
customer-centred workplaces 9, 78, 80 electricity 7, 23, 29, 75–7, 197
customer service 66, 75, 122 elites 35, 92–3, 103, 161, 176
bad 70, 74 emergency services 68, 72, 77
employees 42, 66, 75, 80, 111, 122–3, 134
databases 49, 121–2 public 9, 51, 54, 132–3, 151–2
daughters 120–1 employers 11, 60, 91, 94, 126, 131–2, 134–6
decent work 11, 21–2, 30–3, 71, 128, 199 employment 6, 21, 33, 70, 184–5, 193, 198–9
democracy 11, 31 agencies 11, 116
gender 46, 58–60 formal 111, 186
participatory 68 informal 111, 135, 181
deskilling 69–70 precarious 10, 43
development 3, 13, 20, 24, 33, 80, 177–8 empowerment 59, 144, 152, 199
industrial 23, 128 energy 20, 22–3, 167, 183, 189
sustainable 26, 31–2, 35, 182, 189 nuclear 22–3
watershed 190, 192 renewable 21–2, 25, 29, 33–4, 36, 182
Dhaka 87, 90, 101 Enjara village 188, 196–7
dialectics 45–6, 60 environment 13, 21, 24, 27, 188–91, 194–5,
dictatorship 198–9
military 89, 91, 93–4, 96, 176 environmental activists 28–9
military-civilian 128 environmental degradation 28, 30
disability 52–4, 56 environmental protection 21, 198
discrimination 114, 118–19, 121, 195 EPZs see export processing zones
diversity 47, 122 equality 29, 56–7, 119
groups 46, 53 gender 41, 50, 54, 56–7, 133
drinking water 189–90, 192–4 Ershad, H.M. 89, 95–6, 103
Durban 26, 30, 32, 65 ethnicity 52, 54, 92
ETUC (European Trade Union Confederation)
Earthlife Africa 25, 27–8 44
East Pakistan 92–4, 103 see also Bangladesh explicit neoliberalism 150, 153
ecological crises 7, 19–20, 25, 37 exploitation 6, 8–9, 11–12, 14, 17, 87, 92
economic crises 1, 5, 7, 128, 166–7, 169 intensification of 5, 8–9
economic growth 19, 24, 28, 34–5, 120, 137 export processing zones (EPZs) 2, 43, 91,
economic policies 11, 89–90, 94, 128, 130, 97–8, 102
143, 167 external economic constraints 146–7
progressive 143, 147, 152
economic power 45, 55, 59, 119, 144 FA (Frente Amplio) 11, 125–7, 130–3, 138
eco-tourism 13, 182, 188, 192–3, 195, 198 Government 125–7, 129–31, 133, 135–8

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factories 90–1, 97–8, 161–2, 165, 169–73, General Labour Confederation see CGT
175–6, 178 Germany 1, 10–11, 14, 91, 142–3, 150, 153–4
garment 87–8, 91, 97–8 DGB unions 143, 154
movement 161, 178 SPD (Sozialdemokratische Partei
recovered see recovered factories Deutschlands) 142–4, 147, 151, 153
families 185–6, 190, 195–7 union-government relationship 143–4
single-parent 113 Ghana 50, 52–4, 58
family members 95, 197 successes and barriers in unions for women 54
FASINPAT 171, 173, 177 Trades Union Congress 50–1, 53–4
FDI (foreign direct investment) 5, 131–2 unions, senior office-holders 51
FEDUSA (Federation of Unions of South women and union equality structures 53
Africa) 32 globalization 87, 150, 186
field research 112–14, 121, 123 neoliberal 1–2, 5–6
finance 97, 101, 117, 192 Global Labour University see GLU
financial crises 5, 67, 130, 137, 199 GLU (Global Labour University) 3, 14, 42, 48
fiscal policies 79, 147, 150 Gorz, A. 71
flexibilization 128–9, 146 Gramsci, A. 149
foreign direct investment (FDI) 5, 131–2 green capitalism 8, 20, 22, 24, 27, 33, 35
forestry 183, 189–90 neoliberal 19–20, 22
formal education 92, 101 green economy 13, 19–22, 24, 30–1, 34–5
formal employment 111, 186 greenhouse gases 20, 22, 32–3, 37 see also
formal labour markets 43, 58, 111–12, 146 carbon emissions
fossil fuels 181–2 see also coal green jobs 8, 20–2, 25, 29–30, 182–3, 191, 199
Frente Amplio see FA green livelihoods 13, 181–99
fuelwood 189–90, 193, 196, 198 initiative 181, 187–9, 191, 199
meaning and importance 182
Ganeshpura village 188, 192, 198 sources by sector 183
garment factories 87–8, 91, 97–8 green neoliberal capitalism, threat of 19–37
numbers 88 green technology 181–2
garment workers greenwash 20
Bangladesh 9, 87–104 grey zone 161–3, 169, 177–9
numbers 88 growth 2, 8, 12, 30, 43–4, 111, 130–1
GEAR (Growth, Employment and alternative path 30, 35
Redistribution) 144, 149, 151 Growth, Employment and Redistribution
gender 9, 77, 88, 116, 118–19, 189 see GEAR
democracy 46, 58–60 Gujarat 181–99
equality 41, 50, 54, 56–7, 133 rural-urban distribution of SEWA
policies 53–5 membership 185
politics 44–7
and power 41–61 harassment 56
power relations 44–6, 58 psychological 10, 117–19, 121
quotas 46, 54 sexual 52, 54–5, 57
relations 42–3, 45 health 7, 28, 33, 52, 68, 81, 188–90
gendered labour markets 42–3 care 5, 164, 168, 174, 184–5

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occupational 21, 133–4 Indian Federation of Labour (IFL) 92, 103

reproductive 57 individualism 36, 71, 120
hegemony 48–9, 141–2 industrialization 58, 92, 192
of capital 149–51 industrial production 13, 121, 132
male 9, 41, 43, 52, 60 infants 58–9
neoliberal 141, 149–50 informal employment 111, 135, 181
Hofmeyr, I. 4 informal sectors 41, 43, 47, 49, 112, 182, 197
homes 29, 53–4, 91, 191–2, 195–6 informal women workers 13, 181–99
housekeeping jobs 120–1 infotaylorism 114–15, 123
Hyman, R. 5, 7, 19 innovation, technological 20, 22, 28, 113
interest representation 136, 138
ICFTU (International Confederation of Free International Confederation of Free Trade
Trade Unions) 44, 94 Unions see ICFTU
identity 19, 42, 47, 115, 153, 164, 176–7 International Labour Organization see ILO
cultural 137, 165–7 International Monetary Fund (IMF) 2, 96
working-class 153, 165 International Organisation of Employers
ideologies 58, 93, 162–7 see IOE
radical union 59–60 international organizations 98, 100–1, 103
IFL (Indian Federation of Labour) 92, 103 international ownership 5, 112
ILO (International Labour Organization) 29, International Trade Union Confederation
31–2, 102–3, 132–3, 135, 182–3, 199 see ITUC
incomes 8, 185, 189, 193, 197 IOE (International Organisation of Employers)
independence 10, 89, 92–4, 103 182–3, 199
India 13, 91–2, 103, 181–2, 184, 190–1, 199 ITUC (International Trade Union
colonial 91–2, 103 Confederation) 21, 29–33, 182–3, 199
Enjara village 188, 196–7
Ganeshpura village 188, 192, 198 Jakopovich, D. 28
Gujarat 181–99 job losses 6, 8, 11, 21, 34
rural-urban distribution of SEWA Joburg Connect 66–7, 72–7, 80–1, 83
membership 185 Johannesburg 3, 25, 28, 37, 65, 67, 83
IFL (Indian Federation of Labour) 92, 103 justice 8, 25, 29, 31, 33, 92, 164
Little Rann of Kutch (LRK) 196–8 social 31, 162, 165–6, 176, 178
SEWA (Self Employed Women’s just transition 8, 19, 29–31, 33–5
Association) 3, 13, 47, 181–99
goals, approach and structure 184–7 KCTU (Korea Confederation of Trade Unions)
green livelihood initiatives 189–91 50–4
land reclamation project 193–5 kerosene oil 189, 196
location and scope 182 Keynesian policies 150–1
membership by state 184 Korczynski, M. 65, 68, 70–1
membership profile 184 Korea Confederation of Trade Unions see
methodology of review of green livelihood KCTU
initiatives 187–9 Korea, Republic of 5, 10, 49–54, 58
rural-urban distribution of membership in KCTU (Korea Confederation of Trade
Gujarat 185 Unions) 50–4

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successes and barriers in unions for women 54 legitimacy 6–7, 47, 149, 175
unions liberalization 167–8, 174, 176
proportion of women on decision-making trade 6
bodies 50 Little Rann of Kutch (LRK) 196–8
senior office-holders 51 livelihoods 13, 33, 181–2, 185–7, 190–1,
women and union equality structures 53 193–5, 198
research 4, 21, 29, 33, 42–3, 59, 119–23 green see green livelihoods
field 112–14, 121, 123 sustainable 181, 186
groups 34, 48–9 loans 23, 28–9, 170
Kyoto Protocol 20, 27, 37 local government call centres see South Africa,
local government call centres
labour activists 3, 127 low-carbon economy 8, 19, 22, 26, 28–30, 33,
labour-friendly governments 10–11, 141–54 35–6
comparison between Brazil, Germany and low wages 81, 98, 113, 121
South Africa 146 LRK see Little Rann of Kutch
explanatory power of economic and electoral Lula da Silva, President Luiz Inácio 109–23,
constraints 146–9 145–53
Gramscian perspective on hegemony of Lulism 109–10, 120
capital 149–51
and transformism 151–3 macroeconomic policies 12, 142–3, 146
labour laws 7, 99, 103, 111, 127, 129, 171–2 neo-Keynesian 143
labour markets 41–3, 58, 113, 115, 118, 126, neoliberal 142
129 macroeconomic stability 138, 144
formal 43, 58, 111–12, 146 male hegemony 9, 41, 43, 52, 60
policies 31, 142, 147 management 32, 69, 72, 76, 90, 95, 97
reforms 143, 146 managers 66, 73, 75–6, 78, 80–1, 83, 121–2
labour movements 8–9, 12, 21–2, 34–6, 41–3, marginalization 8–9, 12, 17, 41, 152
91, 93–5 marketization 2–3
labour organizations 91–3, 103, 167 market mechanisms 22, 27, 32, 34
labour politics 3, 13, 94–5, 161 martial law 93, 95
labour relations 11, 103, 112–13, 125–6, 129, Mary Robinson Foundation for Climate Justice
132, 137–8 27, 37
systems 103, 126, 130–1, 133–7 Mbeki, President Thabo 74, 142, 144–7,
labour rights 11, 94, 98, 112, 125, 127, 133 150–1, 153–4
labour unions see unions media 90, 145, 148, 150, 173
land reclamation 193–5 conservative 148
leadership 11, 46–7, 92–3, 149–51, 167–9, median voter model 141, 146–7
172, 175–7 Mehsana 188, 192
co-optation 151–3 Méndez, G. 128, 132, 134, 138
positions 44, 48, 50, 52, 54, 58 Menem, Carlos 161–3, 166–71, 175, 178
styles 145–6 Menem Government 161–3, 166–72, 174–5,
union 43–4, 48, 50, 52–3, 120, 163, 168 177–8
leftist unions 90–1 metropolitan municipalities 66, 72, 80
left-leaning parties 12, 141–2, 147–9 microcredit/micro-finance projects 13

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middle class local government call centres as product of

educated 90, 100, 103 67–70
urban 100, 109 NGOs 25, 48, 98, 100, 103, 181
migrant workers 6, 41, 43–4 international 28, 100, 102
military-civilian dictatorship 128 local 100–2
military dictatorship 89, 91, 93–4, 96, 176 NGP (New Growth Path) 22, 24
military regimes 89–90, 96, 165 Nigeria 48, 52–4
minerals-energy complex 22–3, 27 successes and barriers in unions for women
minimum wage 91, 102–3, 109, 112, 120, 54
131–2, 134–5 women and union equality structures 53
mobilization NLC (Nigerian Labour Congress) 49, 53–4
capacities 154, 169 NMM (Nelson Mandela Bay Metropolitan
collective 112, 114–15, 117–18 Municipality) 66–7, 73–7, 79, 83
Montes brothers 172–3, 175 call centre 67, 73–4
Montevideo 127, 130 NPM (New Public Management) 67–8, 72
movement activists 48–9 nuclear energy 22–3
movement thinkers 48–9 nuclear power 23, 25, 167
municipalities 66–7, 72–81 NUMSA (National Union of Metalworkers of
municipal services 72–3 South Africa) 21, 32–4

Naidoo, K. 24 occupational classification 110–11

National Climate Change Response Green occupational health 21, 133–4
Paper 32–3 oil, kerosene 189, 196
National Union of Metalworkers of South Olesker, D. 128, 131, 133, 135
Africa see NUMSA Omar, R. 65, 70, 76–7
natural resources 25, 36 oppression 4, 92–3
negotiations 35, 45, 90, 98–9, 115, 132–5, organic farming 182, 188, 190, 192–3
165 organizational capacity 11, 125
Nelson Mandela Bay Metropolitan organized labour 8, 12, 25, 31, 36, 141–2, 146
Municipality see NMM outsourcing 5, 9, 112, 115
neocorporativism 11, 125, 136–8 ownership 34, 144, 185
neo-Keynesian macroeconomic policies 143 international 5, 112
neoliberal capitalism 27, 32, 36 social 34
green 19–20, 22
neoliberal globalization 1–2, 5–6 Pakistan 89, 92–4, 103
neoliberal hegemony 141, 149–50 East 92–4, 103
neoliberalism 89, 119, 125, 150, 153–4 Ershad, H.M. 89, 95–6, 103
explicit 150, 153 West 92–3, 103
neoliberal macroeconomic policies 142 participation, political 176–8
neoliberal policies 11, 96, 110, 125, 163 participation rates 42–3
nepotism 81, 89, 93, 95–6, 99 patriarchal culture 52, 54, 59
Neuquén 171–7 Peronism 13, 161–70, 174–5, 177–9
New Growth Path (NGP) 22, 24 in brief 164–6
New Public Management (NPM) 72 Peronist culture 162

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Peronist identity 168, 176–7 Poynter, G. 69

Peronist Party 169–70 precariat/precarious work 6, 12, 25, 36–7, 43,
Peronist Resistance 164–5, 169, 176 49, 70
Philippines 9, 54–6, 58–9 pressure 52, 76, 81, 113, 135, 137, 173–4
successes and barriers in unions for women 54 private sector 68–9, 90, 128–9, 133–4, 138,
unions and Bargaining Agenda for Gender 151
(BAG) 56–7 privatization 68, 79, 112, 115, 128, 167–8
PIT-CNT 129, 131–4, 136–7 production 2, 5, 12, 19, 32–4, 98–9, 170–3
Polanyi, K. 2–3, 6, 103 alternative forms of 3, 13
police 73, 78, 90, 98–9, 117, 133, 173 industrial 13, 121, 132
policies 11, 50, 87, 96, 128, 146–7, 169–70 productivity 129, 171, 187
fiscal 79, 147, 150 profits 2, 5, 14, 20, 23, 35, 37
gender 53–5 progressive economic policies 143, 147, 152
labour market 31, 142, 147 progressive labour policy 95, 125
macroeconomic see macroeconomic policies protests 7, 89, 94, 98–9, 102–3, 170, 172
progressive labour 95, 125 street 94, 98
social 33, 142, 145, 147 psychological harassment 10, 117–19, 121
political arena 126–7, 141 public call centres 67–8, 72, 82
political movements 3, 10, 94, 100, 107, 163, public education 26, 125, 127
165–6 public employees 9, 51, 54, 132–3, 151–2
political participation 176–8 Pucci, F. 127, 129
political parties 3, 9, 11, 89, 95, 97–8, 126–8
traditional 125, 130 quotas 52–5, 59
political power 7, 11, 67
political system 126–7, 136, 138 race 42, 52–4, 116, 118–19
politicization 89, 92–4 Rahman, General Ziaur 95–6
politics 3–4, 12, 95–6, 141, 147, 163, 169 Rahman, Sheikh Mujibur 95
gender 44–7 ready-made garments see garment workers
sexual 44, 55, 60 real economy 24, 129
trade union 93, 95 recovered factories 13, 161, 161–79
poor women 181, 186, 189, 193, 198–9 movement 13, 161–3, 165, 169–71, 173–4,
poverty 2, 24, 31, 43, 145, 186 177–9
power 2–4, 6–7, 10–12, 89–90, 92, 94–6, recovery 162–3, 171–2, 174–8
147–8 recycling 188, 191–2
economic 45, 55, 59, 119, 144 REDD (Reducing Emissions from
and gender 41–61 Deforestation and Degradation) 20, 27
gendered 45 reforms 78, 103, 119, 134, 143–4, 167–8, 174
new forms of 3, 6–8, 12–13 labour market 143, 146
nuclear 23, 25, 167 renewable energy 21–2, 25, 29, 33–4, 36, 182
political 7, 11, 67 representation 8, 41, 47, 53–4, 80, 115, 136
relations 44, 46, 141, 149, 153 interest 136, 138
resources 44–5, 58, 60 women 41, 53–4
sexual 45–6 repressive measures 94, 97
symbolic 7, 9, 45, 55 reproductive health 57

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resistance 7, 45, 52, 54, 75–6, 165–6, 168–9 methodology of review of green livelihood
resources 19, 28, 36, 44–7, 58, 97–8, 102 initiatives 187–9
limited 101–2 rural-urban distribution of membership in
retraining 30–1, 33 Gujarat 185
rights 22, 30, 43, 57–8, 81, 92, 186 sexual harassment 52, 54–5, 57
women’s 49, 56–8 sexual orientation 116, 118–19
Rio de Janeiro 50–1, 53 sexual politics 44, 55, 60
risk 71, 103, 148–9 sexual power 45–6
society 37 Sharma, G.K. 91–2, 103
RMG (ready-made garments) see garment shop stewards 34, 66, 77, 79
workers single-parent families 113
ruling parties 79–81, 89, 92, 95 Sintetel 115–17, 121–3
Sintratel 115–17, 119, 122–3
SACP see South African Communist Party skills 25, 33, 46, 59, 112, 182, 189–90
safety 21–2, 28, 33, 133–4 smokeless cooking stoves 13, 182, 190, 193,
salaries 80, 113, 123, 128, 131, 133, 173–4 196–8
smokeless stoves 197–8
salt workers 13, 186–8, 196–8
social benefits 5, 10, 33, 115, 164
SAMWU (South African Municipal Workers
social corporatism 136–7
Union) 33, 66, 77–81, 83
social dialogue 11, 32, 128, 132, 134, 136–8,
members 78, 80–1
144
senior officials 78–9
processes 129, 133–4
São Paulo 115–17, 119, 123
social justice 31, 162, 165–6, 176, 178
cycle of strikes and experience of trade
social movements 3, 47–8, 116, 119, 161–2,
unionism 117–19
169–70, 178–9
Schmitter, P. 136–7
social movement unionism 7, 28, 79, 81
Schröder, Chancellor Gerhard 142–4, 146–8,
social ownership 34
150–4
social policies 33, 142, 145, 147
self-reliance 184–5, 189 social reproduction 5–6
Senatore, L. 128–9, 132, 134, 138 social security 21, 30, 119, 132, 181, 184–6
service delivery 67–8, 72–4, 76–7, 79, 81–2, social transformation 32–3
199 solar lamps/lanterns 182, 187–8, 196–8
services 6, 10, 67–9, 72, 122, 131, 181–2 solar pumps 13, 198
emergency 68, 72, 77 solidarity 7–8, 19, 31, 36, 115, 118, 169
municipal 72–3 class 71, 103, 116, 118
public 68, 72, 138 new forms of 7, 9
SEWA (Self Employed Women’s Association) Solidarity Center (SC) 98, 100
3, 13, 47, 181–99 South Africa 2–4, 8–11, 21–9, 31–5, 65–7,
goals, approach and structure 184–7 141–2, 151–4
green livelihood initiatives 189–91 Batho Pele 72
land reclamation project 193–5 civil society response to climate change 24–8
location and scope 182 Congress of South African Trade Unions see
membership by state 184 Congress of South African Trade Unions
membership profile 184 Durban 26, 30, 32, 65

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FEDUSA (Federation of Unions of South stress 73–5

Africa) 32 Structural Adjustment Programmes 2, 43, 96,
government response to climate change 22–4 167, 170
Joburg Connect 66–7, 72–7, 80–1, 83 subordinate classes 4, 7, 149
Johannesburg 3, 25, 28, 37, 65, 67, 83 subordinate roles 42, 52
labour’s response to climate change 19–37 sub-proletarian groups 10, 109–10, 113–14
local government call centres 65–83 suicide capitalism 28, 35
Joburg Connect 72–3 Supervielle, M. 127
lack of training 75 supervisors 66, 73, 76, 97, 121–2
methodology 66–7 Surendranagar 188
poor communication between front and surveillance 9–10, 69–70
back offices 75–6 sustainability principles 22, 30
as product of New Public Management sustainable capitalism see green capitalism
67–70 sustainable development 26, 31–2, 35, 182,
recommendations for union organization 189
and representation 80–2 sustainable livelihoods 181, 186
stress 73–5 symbolic power 7, 9, 45, 55
union collective action and limitations on
worker participation 76–80 teachers 50–1, 54, 126, 131, 133
unionization 70–1 technological innovation 20, 22, 28, 113
working conditions 73–6 technologies 23, 26–7, 34, 122, 132, 149, 182
Mbeki, President Thabo 74, 142, 144–7, new 22, 34, 187
150–1, 153–4 untested 20, 27
National Climate Change Response Green telemarketing 10, 109–23
Paper 32–3 tele-operators 110–23
union-government relationship 144–5 tourism 131, 198
unions, senior office-holders 51 trade liberalization 6
women and union equality structures 53 trade unions see unions
South African Communist Party (SACP) 142, traditions 10, 28, 89, 137, 178
144, 149, 153 training
Sparrow Apparels 97–8 lack of 75
SPD (Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands) vocational 11, 116, 133, 135
142–4, 147, 151, 153 transformative change 19, 30, 33
Sramik Karmachari Okkyo Parishad (SKOP) transformism 119, 149, 151–3
90, 96 transition 8, 19–23, 30–6, 137, 163, 166
stability 89, 135, 137 just 8, 19, 29–31, 33–5
macroeconomic 138, 144 transnational corporations 1–2, 5, 95
staff turnover 73, 75, 114–15 transport 35, 129, 171, 182–3
state apparatus 116, 119, 123 public 29, 36, 183
status quo 46, 48, 150, 175 transsexuals 10, 113, 116
stoves 190, 197–8 transvestites 10, 113
clean 187, 197–8 Traversa, F. 128, 132, 134
smokeless 197–8 tripartite bargaining processes 132, 134
street protests 94, 98 tripartite social dialogue 134, 136–7

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Trollop, H. 23–4 proportion of women on decision-making

Turkey 9, 51, 54–5, 59, 87, 182 bodies 50
successes and barriers in unions for women 54 registration 97–8
unions senior office-holders 51
and Bargaining Agenda for Gender (BAG) union-government relationship 142
57–8 Brazil 145–6
senior office-holders 51 Germany 143–4
turnover, staff 73, 75, 114–15 South Africa 144–5
Tyler, E. 23–4 unionists 14, 29, 32, 48, 114–17, 120, 143
United Kingdom 53, 58, 135
underemployment 128–9 unions, senior office-holders 51
understaffing 66, 74, 82 women and union equality structures 53
unemployment 2, 7, 12, 30, 32, 115–16, 128–9 United Nations Environment Programme
insurance 33, 125 see UNEP
UNEP (United Nations Environment United Nations Framework Convention on
Programme) 29, 31, 182–3, 199 Climate Change see UNFCCC
UNFCCC (United Nations Framework United States 1, 44, 87, 135, 150, 195
unity 25–6, 81, 96, 100, 149, 154
Convention on Climate Change) 8, 20,
Universal Knitting 90–1, 104
23, 29, 31, 37
unsafe working conditions 43, 98
union activists 98, 152
urban middle class 100, 109
unionism 47, 93, 114, 176
Uruguay
new 117
Chamber of Commerce and Services 131,
social movement 7, 28, 79, 81
133, 135
unionization 9, 58, 65, 82, 87, 112
Colorado Party 125, 127, 130
rate 128, 136
Consejo Superior Tripartite 132, 134
South African local government call centres
FA (Frente Amplio) 11, 125–7, 130–3, 138
70–1
Government 125–7, 129–31, 133, 135–8
unions 4–13, 41–58, 76–82, 87–91, 93–103, labour market 131, 135
113–20, 151–4 labour relations system 130–1, 134–5, 137
alliances of 100, 104 labour relations under Frente Amplio
bureaucracy 94, 99, 119 Government 2005-09 125–38
confederations/federations 22, 32, 50–1, 53, Montevideo 127, 130
98, 162 neocorporativism 11, 125, 136–8
equality structures 52–5 PIT-CNT 129, 131–4, 136–7
gender and power 41–61 political insertion of working class 127–30
imperialism 94 President José Batlle y Ordoñez 125, 127–8,
leaders 29, 98, 101–3, 115–16, 121, 126, 131–3 138
bureaucratized 13, 169 social and economic impacts of reregulation
leadership 43–4, 48, 50, 52–3, 120, 163, 168 of labour relations 132–6
leftist 90–1 transformation of labour policy agenda under
membership 42–4, 48–9, 70 Frente Amplio Government 130–2
movement(s) 13, 118–20, 125–8, 135–7, union movement 125, 127, 129–30, 137–8
162–4, 166–9, 177 utilities 67, 78, 80–1
Uruguay 125, 127, 129–30, 137–8 call centres 73, 80

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Vavi, Zwelinzima 22, 30 working class 2, 6, 12, 29, 91–2, 125–7, 178–9
vermiculture 190, 194 identity 153, 165
vocational training 11, 116, 133, 135 interests 103, 144–5
voters 109, 141, 147–8, 151, 153 movement 164–5
political insertion 127–30
wages 5, 12, 80–1, 90, 114–15, 117, 134–5 working conditions 20, 66, 70, 78–9, 82, 114,
living 21, 33, 120 117–18
low 81, 98, 113, 121 better 12, 65, 72, 80–1
waste 191–2, 199 South African local government call centres
waste-pickers 13, 181, 188, 191–2 73–6
water 7, 68, 75, 77, 189–90, 194, 196 unsafe 43, 98
conservation 188, 190, 192–3 working hours 53, 79, 81, 112–13, 117, 121,
drinking 189–90, 192–4 133
shortages 19, 189 workplaces 5, 36, 43, 47, 54, 56–7, 80–1
watershed development 190, 192 customer-centred 9, 78, 80
welfare state 5, 146, 150 World Bank 2, 6, 23, 27–8, 37, 190–1, 199
West Pakistan 92–3, 103
World Trade Organization (WTO) 2
Williams, M. 1, 4, 45, 153, 179
World Wildlife Fund (WWF) 28
wind 20, 29, 183
women 8–9, 25, 181–2, 184–6, 188–90,
Zambia 49–50, 52–5, 61
192–3, 195–6
National Union of Teachers see ZNUT
agency, individual and collective strategies
successes and barriers in unions for women 54
47–8
unions
black 72, 113
proportion of women on decision-making
education 58–9
bodies 50
poor 181, 186, 189, 193, 198–9
senior office-holders 51
representation 41, 53–4
women and union equality structures 53
rights 49, 56–8
successes and barriers in unions 54 Zambia Congress of Trade Unions 50–1, 54
in unions 41–61 Zanón 171–3, 175–8
challenge and strategies 45–7 union engagement 175–7
on decision-making bodies 50 Zimbabwe 49–50, 53–4, 61
equality structures 52–5 Congress of Trade Unions 50–1, 53–4
findings 49–52 successes and barriers in unions for women 54
individual and collective strategies 47–8 Teachers Union see ZIMTA
research methods and issues 48–9 unions
workers 42, 184, 192 proportion of women on decision-making
informal 13, 181–3, 185, 187, 189, 191, bodies 50
193 senior office-holders 51
poor 181, 186 women and union equality structures 53
Worker’s Confederation of Argentina (CTA) ZIMTA (Zimbabwe Teachers Union) 50–1,
13, 162–3, 168–9, 174–8 53–4
Workers Relief Fund 11, 116–17 ZNUT (Zambia National Union of Teachers)
workforce 33, 43, 113, 120, 123, 133, 164 50–1, 53–4

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