World Social Forum 2007 - Nairobi

January 2, 2007

Following the World Social Forum, Porto Alegre, 2002, I wrote a piece on ‘The Still Unconsummated Marriage of International Unionism and the Global Justice Movement’. If the preparations for the Nairobi WSF, 2007, are anything to go by, it looks as if we might be able to talk at least about an engagement. There are two striking features about these preparations.

The first is that the newly-merged International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) is coming in forcefully, under the banner of ‘Decent Work’. The second is the at least marginal presence of autonomous labour groups with an orientation toward what might just be conceived as the ‘Emancipation of Labour’.

The ITUC, firmly rooted in Western Europe, is joined in its campaign by a number of other NGOs, mostly of West European origin and with a similar social-democratic or social-reformist background. However, both unions and labour-oriented NGOs from the Third World can be expected to endorse Decent Work (DW). DW seems to mean the working conditions and rights that existed for many under the Welfare Capitalism of Western Europe before neo-liberal globalisation. The policy was actually invented within the International Labour Organisation (ILO). This is the UN’s inter-state organisation for labour, one in which the unions have a 25 percent representation alongside their ‘social partners’, capital (25 percent) and state (50 percent).

The other tendency, that I am calling the Emancipation of Labour (EoL) consists initially of a couple of autonomous initiatives, one rooted in South Africa, the other in Italy. The first initiative, inspired by the Thirdworldist socialist thinker, Samir Amin, is supported by the Swedish Agora/Agenda NGO, is entitled ‘Towards Transnational Solidarity? The Reorganisation of the Global Working Class’. Reversing the title, it would seem to be suggesting that the current restructuring of work and workers raises new challenges for global labour solidarity. The second project, sponsored by independent socialists and left unionists in Italy, is entitled ‘Labour in Movement – Facing the Challenge of Globalisation’. It seems to be similarly reflecting on the consequences of globalisation for a labour movement going beyond the bounds of formal trade unionism.

These two tendencies are not necessarily in conflict with one another. They are likely to overlap in both concerns and in labour spaces at the WSF. The ITUC, for example, is encouraging unions to seek out other civil society bodies during the forum. And both other initiatives have multiple union links. Moreover, there will be dozens of other labour or pro-labour organisations, networks and NGOs, leaning toward one, the other, both, or some third position.

Meanwhile, of course, we must remember that the unions are not equivalent to labour (they represent under 20% of the world’s labour force), and that the WSF is not equivalent to the global justice and solidarity movement (which includes a myriad of social protests, movements, developments in civil society and culture that do not turn up at the forums).

One significant labour development, quite separate and distinct from the WSF, is the current wave of union mergers. The most important is that which gave rise to the ITUC itself, November 2006. This excludes only the (formerly Communist) World Federation of Trade Unions. Another is the recently announced alliance of several major mines/metals/engineering/etc unions in the UK, Germany and the US. This process is also occurring within countries, such as the UK. Such mergers or alliances suggest that the unions may be passing a phase in which a major response of unions to capitalist globalisation and outsourcing, and state neo-liberalism was ‘concession bargaining’ (negotiating how much worker income or how many union rights were to be given away). However, most of this activity takes place within the isolated sphere of ‘industrial relations’ and involves union officers rather than worker action. Most of it seems to be centred in the North. And the relevance to either the South, the East (ex-Communist) or that majority of the world’s working people outside unions has yet to be demonstrated.

Another such process, largely independent of any WSF or trade union connection, is that of the new working classes or categories, either created by neo-liberal globalisation or finding themselves in this period. The most dramatic such action has to be that of the (largely Latin American, mostly Thirdworld) migrant workers in the USA, who on Mayday 2006 created the largest worker demonstration in the history of that country. Earlier than this we have seen Mayday demonstrations of the West European ‘precariat’, the increasing number of precarious workers. Finally we have to remember the literal millions of Chinese labourers, urban and rural, regular or casual, who have succeeded in imposing themselves against this highly authoritarian state - and its official trade union.

Such varied processes may to the consummation of a marriage between labour and the global justice movement. Nairobi should provide an indication of how far this process is going and what shape it might take.

Peter Waterman (London, 1936) is a lifelong union member, one-time international union officer, who studied, has taught on and written about unionism in the Third World and internationally. He has been recently concentrating on unions and the WSF.

See also:

Peter Waterman's articles and analysis
Compilation of articles and analysis on the World Social Forum phenomenon by Peter Waterman. Among his books are "Globalisation, Social Movements and the New Internationalisms", and (co-editor) of "World Social Forum: Challenging Empires" published online by Choike.