ITUC is organizing its 5th congress in Melbourne, from 17 to 22 November. This happens in a globalising world with huge challenges for the international trade union movement. The newly elected leadership of ITUC will have to deliver to keep the workers on the winning side of history.
Not only is globalisation as we knew it changing, but this is coming in a context of deep international crisis.
The covid pandemic is gradually slowing down, leaving behind significant harm to the working class. A lot of workers lost their job, others had to stay at work in extremely dangerous circumstances and a significant amount of them became ill or even died. We are very proud of what unions did to face this crisis but undoubtedly many of them have been impacted.
Covid also showed us how our economies and political systems are interconnected to each other and how what happens in one part of the world can affect severely workers on the other side of the globe
While we are still recovering from this pandemic, climate change is progressing at a pace that goes beyond what was forecasted. Only right-wing Trumpers still deny that the world is warming up, and the awareness that we will have to take action grows ever stronger. However, who will pay the price for this fight against climate change? Are the workers or the industry at the origin of this situation?
On top of that, we face the challenge of social dumping which is escalating in a “race to the bottom”. It causes job loss, salary decreases and competition between workers. In short, the quality of work is going down, pressure and stress for workers is going up. This is causing a huge shortage of good jobs: people simply do not want to do some jobs anymore because working conditions are appalling. This is a unique occasion for the international labour movement, giving trade unions an extraordinary negotiating power with employers, governments and international organisations.
And last but not least, wars are raging all over the planet and growing tensions between “old” and “new” superpowers create instability. The war in Ukraine is causing victims all over the world. It has led to a massive increase of energy prices and instability in the food industry, striking the poorest first.
They are global!
Multinational corporations and ‘big data’ companies do have a global strategy. The days when a company’s decisions were made on a national level are long gone. Big corporations like Amazon, Meta, Uber, Lufthansa, Maersk … are active all over the world and often have a lot of political influence.
This is why the importance of international trade unions cannot be overstated. If ‘they’ have a global strategy, so should ‘we’. Those trade unions should be organized on a company, sectoral and national level to optimally defend workers’ rights. But if we are unable to develop common approaches and shared strategies, if we do not exchange experiences, share information and work together on an international level we are doomed to be on the losing side. Warren Buffet, stock exchange guru, once said: ‘Yes, there is a class struggle, and we are winning.’ Our answer should be: no way, we fight back!
The new leadership that will be elected at the ITUC congress has to build an international organisation ready to attack the global challenges unions are facing. This organization and its leadership should be dynamic, flexible, relevant, visionary and unifying.
Tripartism to be revised
ITUC has to be the workers’ voice in international institutions such as the ILO. But they should also represent the voice of the workers in WTO, G20, …
The relevance of the work that is done for the affiliates must be the main focus of the new leadership. If partaking in tripartite cenacles does not yield any benefits, it is a waste of time. Negotiating agreements and bringing those back to the unions is of the utmost importance to improve the lives of our members. We cannot afford standing at the sidelines and saying no.
So yes, we have to spend time, money and resources to revise tripartism and make it work. Too many attacks on social dialogue and tripartite negotiating have stayed unanswered by our side. It is high time to find allies in the economic and political world, to redevelop collective negotiation and agreements so that we can share the profits of capitalism. Billions of dollars of profits find their way to the wallets of the happy few. The richest percentage of the world owns more than half of the wealth.
Negotiating as long as we can, taking action when we must
Without power we cannot hope to achieve positive results at the bargaining table. The ‘partners’ at the other side of the table must be aware that the union is not a lobby machine. They need to know that we have the numbers, that we have the power, …
Merely talking and being smart will not lead us to major victories. Unions have never obtained results by asking nicely or being clever. Throughout history we have changed the world by organizing, mobilizing, campaigning, … Action is the motor of social progress.
ITUC must become louder and more present in the frontline of the global confrontation with deregulation, liberalization, … We can do this by believing in the power we represent, using that power to create awareness and influence decision makers and by putting pressure on governments and politicians.
Affiliates really engaging in ITUC
Participating in the Melbourne congress cannot be national unions’ only contribution to the ITUC. The biggest mistake the national unions can make today is to retreat on national level. Sadly, many times that is exactly what they do, thinking they can ‘fix it’ in their own country.
A terrible mistake in a global world. Unfair competition, tax havens, delocalization, just transition … are only a few examples of the problems we face on a global scale.
Unions have to take ownership of what is to be done in ITUC. The ITUC team is David facing Goliath if they do not have the strong support of the unions behind them. The affiliated unions must be ready to engage by relaying campaigns on a
national level, participating in ILO meetings, …
All of this has to be organized by the ITUC leadership. We need campaigns on a global level where every affiliate can join in. I myself am engaged in a national transport union, a national confederation and I am very active in the European an international Transport Workers’ Federation. Yet I have to admit that I have insufficient knowledge of ITUC’s campaigns at the moment. This is first and foremost my own responsibility, but ITUC should ask itself why people don’t know and how they can spread that knowledge more easily. I’m sure the rank-and-file unionists that are aware of the ITUC campaigns are few and far between. If our own people do not know what we do, how could we expect the other stakeholders to know?
A leadership much closer to the affiliates
A capitalist company is led based on
authority, a trade union on democracy. While this difference makes us what we are, it also means that worldwide unionism is a complicated venture. We all want the same thing, but union traditions, cultures and priorities are very different around the globe.
We expect the new leadership of the ITUC to make trade unions’ engagement a priority and to build the future jointly with ITUC members.
ITUC leadership has to deal with this diversity and work patiently to develop a common strategy. A democratic organization where all unions have a voice must stay the priority of our global union. This is no easy task, but it will make unions worldwide stronger against their political and economic counterparts.
The ITUC congress as a new start
The congress in Melbourne should be the start of a reimagining of the organization. We need to build on the strong foundations we have, while reshuffling the cards with which we build our house. Structures and practices that have worked for decades are no longer enough to face the modern challenges.
Progress is impossible without change. This means that after the congress the new leadership should devise fresh and innovative proposals to introduce new life into the organization by giving hope to workers and mobilize them to join the organization.
