Regional labor federations merge

Labor globalization seeks support in a booth at the Easter celebrations in San Carlos. Photo by Eric Jackson

Social democratic, Christian Democratic labor organizations in, leftist unions remain apart

Regional labor federations merge
by Eric Jackson

The Cold War lives in the international labor movement, but some of its hallmarks appear to be disappearing in the era of globalization.

That's apparent in an international convention to merge two major Latin American labor regional labor alliances, the Social Democratic Organizacion Regional Interamericana de Trabajadores (ORIT) and the Christian Democratic Central Latinoamericana de Trabajadores (CLAT). The former, which has the AFL-CIO as its US affiliate, claims about twice the membership of the latter, but within Latin America and the Caribbean the two organizations have roughly comparable memberships. Not participating are the leftist labor unions that in some Latin American countries are the most active and powerful working class organizations and in Cuba are the docile fronts for the ruling Communist Party.

So why the urge to merge? The left is by and large still committed to defeat globalization on the terms presented by the United States government and the multinational corporations, as in free trade agreements on the NAFTA model. The more moderate and conservative labor unions tend to accept that framework as a reality which they may or may not like, but given that paradigm they're disposed to respond to corporate globalization by labor globalization.

None if it is that precisely clear-cut. For example, against much internal opposition the AFL-CIO brokered what it though would be a deal that would get the US-Panama free trade pact ratified by the US Congress in exchange for guarantees of labor protections and environmental guarantees by the Torrijos administration (which has since conducted murders and mass arrests of union members and promoted strip mining without environmental permits). Also supporting that proposition, again with some strong internal opposition, is Panama's government-aligned CONATO labor organization. In Panama that was no political problem, as the PRD that dominates that organization composed primarily of company unions and public sector organizations like FENASEP --- which has many members who work for minimum wage and never talks about striking for higher pay, and one of whose leaders was the architect of the privatization of the Seguro Social pension fund that has ended the hopes for a retirement pension of tens of thousands of Panamanian workers. In the United States it is an has been a big problem, with most pro-labor Democrats in Congress opposing free trade deals and those that pass doing so on the strength of near-unanimous Republican support and the backing of a minority of Democrats. (The US-Panama deal has languished because there is an outstanding US terrorism warrant out against Pedro Miguel González, the president of this country's National Assembly.)

However, the move toward true international labor unionism has been gaining strength, more than anywhere else in Europe, where both the politics and economy are increasingly merged into the European Union. In 2006 International Confederation of Free Trade Unions and the World Confederation of Labor merged to found the International Confederation of Trade Unions. One initiative linked with this movement is the Global Unions alliance, which has negotiated a series of master framework labor agreements with several multinational corporations, most of them small but also including such heavyweights as Volkswagen, Telefonica and Club Mediterannee.

Although there have been some labor actions that have straddled the US-Canadian border and European boundaries, the era of comprehensive international collective bargaining and strikes is not yet upon us but doesn't take much imagination to predict.

According to the International Labor Organization, a United Nations agency, only about 12.6 percent of the world labor force is organized into unions. Both Panama and the United States have comparable unionization rates. Company unions are illegal in the USA and are no longer the preferred corporate union-busting method. In Panama most private sector unions are controlled by the companies and the Torrijos administration has been trying to take over legitimate unions or create rival PRD-aligned organizations in a drive to crush independent working class organization.

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