LABOUR: Unions Call on UN to Regulate Globalisation

By Gustavo Capdevila Reprint | | Print |

Gustavo Capdevila

BUCHAREST, Oct 26 2001 (IPS) - The United Nations should create an economic and social security council entrusted with protecting social rights, says the World Confederation of Labour (WCL), one of the leading international union organisations.

This UN council, with the participation of labour and civil society representatives, would oversee the socio-economic regulation of the globalisation process, said the WCL Friday.

Other functions of the proposed UN body would include monitoring global summits, co-ordinating international policies, and serving as a dispute settlement body for non-governmental organisations (NGOs), according to the document approved at the close of the WCL’s congress in Bucharest.

Willy Thys, the Belgian-born WCL secretary-general, said the initiative now needs to be promoted by those who share the objectives of democratising the governance of the globalisation process and building a new global social charter, one that is based on solidarity and social justice.

In that sense, the WCL – which represents “autonomous and democratic trade unions” in 113 countries – supports a broad- based dynamic movement with the greatest trade union participation possible, but also including civil society forces representing the developing South as well as the industrialised North.

Such a movement could be launched at the World Social Forum, an international arena of debate created last January in the southern Brazilian city of Porto Alegre, which is slated to meet there again in early 2002.

The WCL is so far the only international labour confederation to take part in the Porto Alegre Forum.

The WCL congress, which is held every four years, wrapped up its week-long sessions Friday with a commitment to establishing basic social, labour, and environmental standards to guide economic globalisation.

On that point, the unionists gathered in the Romanian capital agreed with most governments of industrialised countries, which are attempting to incorporate basic standards on workers’ rights and environmental protection into the accords reached under the auspices of the World Trade Organisation (WTO).

Their efforts have continually run up against opposition from representatives of developing countries at the WTO, who fear that the inclusion of labour and environment standards are a smokescreen for protectionist measures favouring the industrialised world.

The new president of the WCL, Basile Mahan Gahe of Cote d’Ivoire, stated Friday that the congress, the confederation’s primary governing body, had taken an important step towards joining forces with other social actors.

The leaders of the Brussels-based union organisation are encouraging a workers’ movement in the broadest sense, including people who have limited ties with organised labour, as is the case of most workers in the informal sector of the economy.

Mahan Gahe made an appeal to establish cooperative efforts with other social movements that are also interested in improving the dignity and standard of living for the world’s individuals and groups who are marginalised most.

Among these forces of change, he mentioned other global workers’ organisations, primarily the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU), the world’s largest labour association.

The alliance proposed by the WCL also extends to movements and NGOs that are engaged in “the fight against neo-liberalism.”

The documents drawn up by the WCL for this week’s congress repeatedly make reference to a social-labour movement, because the confederation has sought a broader term “than mere unionism,” according to the delegates involved.

In his opening speech at the congress, secretary-general Thys issued an invitation to the participants to reflect on other ways of restructuring the WCL, of taking action and of building alliances.

The new approach is related to the international panorama the union movement faces, as labour organisations have lost political power and are suffering a decline in membership, which its leaders attribute to the impacts of globalisation’s neo-liberal bias.

The WCL congress expressed concern about a perceived tendency of the International Labour Organisation (ILO), a specialised agency of the UN, to look favourably upon reducing the binding nature of international labour regulations.

In particular, the WCL disagrees with the ILO authorities who support the voluntary codes of conduct drawn up by the private sector, particularly those of the big transnational corporations.

These codes, say WCL leaders, lack any sort of mechanism for independent monitoring of compliance and undermine the authority of the ILO’s own regulatory system.