Union Busting and Precarious Work Is not the Answer to Sustainable Development

By Eva Seidelman, ILRF Program Assistant

As large investment banks and finance corporations in the US receive billions of dollars in bailout money, workers around the world are getting murdered while their employment situations are becoming increasingly precarious. 

The International Trade Union Federation (ITUC) issued its 2008 survey of trade union rights violations around the world.  The survey found that a worldwide total of 91 trade unionists were murdered for defending workers' rights, with Colombia, where 39 lost their lives, by far the worst offender yet
again.  It also noted a disturbing upsurge in trade union violence in Guatemala with four unionists (a liberal estimate) murdered and a worsening climate of threats and harassment.

The report shows the trend of national and multinational employers, often facilitated by legislative provisions, to replace full-time and permanent jobs with precarious jobs, by forcing workers into temporary, casual and part-time employment situations, reducing their incomes, removing job security and making it harder for them to plan for the futures.  Many companies have moved in this direction by replacing regular workers with "contract labor", thus avoiding duties and responsibilities which they would otherwise have to meet.

"Global patterns such as casualisation and contracting-out are emerging, which pose a major threat to working men and women right across the globe.  As the global economic situation worsens, this threat can be expected to spread wider and deeper, and governments need to act responsibly to ensure secure, decent jobs at a time when working people, and the revitalization of the world economy, most need it," said General Secretary of the ITUC, Guy Ryder.

Even with a democratic administration in Congress and Barack Obama as president, the international labor movement will continue to face an uphill battle.  Corporations continue to take the low road when cutting costs buy replacing regular workers with temporary or contract workers. They use this tactic to bust unions in addition to resorting to violence to scare workers out of unionizing. Companies will likely use the excuse of the international recession to further erode labor rights and reduce regular, decently paid jobs with social benefits. The jobs are the key to building new  wealth and a middle class around the world. 

Here's an idea: since the free-market model has clearly failed us, why don't companies try something new. Take the high road to building sustainable economies by increasing the numbers of good, stable jobs. Workers with stable jobs are more likely to pay for their kids' education. Kids who are educated now are our only hope for sustainability in the future. Governments around the world should realize that they need to start building self-sufficient economies dependent on their own citizens, not foreign investors who will cut and run with the fluctuations of the market. Time and time again, governments weaken their labor law enforcement or legislation tp favor of corporate interests. Then these multinational corporations create unstable jobs, close their factories or destroy local economies at their whim. Busting unions by killing union leaders and creating precarious jobs will not lead to sustainable economies in the long run.

Comments

[Daniel Cardozo]

Thanks for the link to the ITUC report. I had no idea that so many federal and state workers were denied bargaining rights in the United States!

There's an awful lot of work to do in the next eight years...