Workshop – Mechanisms for Increasing Women’s Participation in Unions: Education, Policies, Quotas and Budgets

Workshop – Mechanisms for Increasing Women’s Participation in Unions: Education, Policies, Quotas and Budgets

Workshop
Mechanisms for Increasing Women’s Participation in Unions: Education, Policies, Quotas and Budgets

Panelists
• Sally Choi, Project Coordinator, Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions (HKCTU), Hong Kong
• Khamati Mugalla, Executive Secretary, East Africa Trade Union Confederation, (EATUC), Kenya
• Rosana Sousa de Deus, Executive Committee, Central Única dos Trabalhadores (CUT), Brazil

Moderator
Kate Doherty, Solidarity Center Deputy Executive Director

Kate Doherty opened the workshop by noting it will include participant and panelist discussion of successful and not so successful strategies for increasing women’s participation in unions.

Sally Choi began with a quick overview of the HKTCU, which represents an equal number of women and men. Fifteen percent of HKTCU’s 29-member Executive Committee is women, indicating low involvement of women in union leadership.

Looking at ways to increase women’s participation in leadership, HKTCU devoted a year to discussing whether it should establish a quota system. Some expressed concern that quotas would be unfair to male members and some women believed quota positions (seats set aside for women) were inferior. The union ultimately adopted a quota system for its Executive Committee, including a mandate that a maximum of four seats be reserved for women candidates.

However, the quota system proved unpopular among members because the quotas were underutilized—there was no large increase of female nominations from affiliates, or significant change in affiliate leadership. Structural problems also worked against the quota system—low leadership turnover prohibited new candidates from running for office and no additional resources were allocated to the women’s committee for leadership building and gender training.

Further, class differences emerged among female unionists. Women from white-collar professional unions (university, teachers, flight attendants) believe the women’s committee and quotas are not relevant to them.  The women’s committee is dominated by blue-collar workers—domestic workers and those in the cleaning, textile and clothing industries who support the quota.

See her full presentation.

Khamati Mugalla centered her discussion around the metaphor of a tree to convey how women learn their roles in trade unions. The roots, she said, supply nourishment, that is, socialization. A union must examine the customs of behavior by understanding that they are:

• Passed from generation to generation (older members)
• Storytelling—stories about great trade unionists. (if no women leaders, heroines, then no model)
• Traditional songs and dances: Do we know the background of “Solidarity Forever”?
• Traditional ceremonies

The tree trunk enables transmission: institutional structures, laws, and policies.

• Policies
• Legislation
• Affirmative action
• Protocols
• Rules and regulations

The tree’s leaves are the symptoms:

• Discrimination
• Stereotyping
• Gender Gaps
• Gender-based violence
• Harmful cultures
• Honor crimes, e.g., punishing “immoral” behavior of women
• Female genital mutilation
• Gender selection (preference for boys)
• Mortality differentials

It’s essential for unions to understand how an organization functions before drafting policies and budgets. The East Africa Trade Union Confederation recently conducted a needs analysis before developing a gender strategy. From it, they learned that if a union’s constitution does not allow for women in leadership, the first step is to amend the constitution.

Gender dimensions should be looked at in every phase and aspect of program planning.

Affiliate unions spend a lot of time dealing with symptoms. Rather than focusing solely on the numbers of women in top leadership positions, she said, unions should also quantify women’s involvement in the union.

Rosana Sousa de Deus opened by saying the capitalist system depends on exclusions: homophobia, racism, discrimination against women. If women are absent from the collective bargaining process, their interests are not represented because men often value economic objectives more than social objectives when negotiating union contracts.

Her union, CUT, takes a special interest in training women around issues of equality, communication, patriarchy and capitalism. Through the training process, women learn that their presence is important. They learn they need to intervene in leadership spaces like men.

In 1993, CUT approved a 30 percent quota for women in leadership. Some women believed quota positions are inferior, as Sally mentioned. Her union tried to help everyone understand that taking on leadership roles has been historically difficult for women, because of lack of child care, lack of sharing responsibilities in the home and lack of flexibility in work schedules. Now, women understand the need for quotas. But it took 10 years for women to take advantage of the quotas.

In 2008, the union made quotas part of its statutes and affiliate unions were required to adhere to them. By 2015, women must comprise 50 percent of union leadership. Unions are also required to provide child care during union activities; offer flexible meeting times and mainstream gender issues into all secretariats.

Kate Doherty summed up the presentations, pinpointing three themes:

1. Change is hard and long term.
2. Constitutional change is not enough, change also must be political.
3. The root causes of gender inequality include socialization and culture.

It’s not enough to say all we need to do is change the numbers of women in leadership positions, Doherty said. We need to change the way we do things to allow women to participate.  Three different environments, with mixed experiences.

Workshop – Mechanisms for Increasing Women’s Participation in Unions: Education, Policies, Quotas and Budgets

Workshop Building Women’s Power in Times of Political Change: Examples from MENA

Zeinab Hashem Mahmoud Ahmed (left) described the role of Egyptian union women in strikes leading up to the 2011 uprising. Credit: Tula Connell

Zeinab Hashem Mahmoud Ahmed (left) described the role of Egyptian union women in strikes leading up to the 2011 uprising. Credit: Tula Connell

Workshop

Building Women’s Power in Times of Political Change: Examples from MENA

Participants
• Zeinab Hashem Mahmoud Ahmed, Treasurer, Union of the Workers of the Egyptian Company for Iron Alloy, Egyptian Democratic Labor Congress (EDLC), Egypt
• Alyaa Hussein Mahood Al-Rubaye, Executive Board Member/Secretary of Women’s Department, General Federation of Iraqi Workers (GFIW), Iraq
• Ilham Abdulmaabood Majeed Al-Jasim, President, Telecommunications Workers Union in Basra/General Federation of Workers and Unions in Iraq (GFWUI), Iraq
• Touriya Lahrech, Executive Office/Coordinator of Women Department, Confédération Démocratique du Travail, Morocco

Moderator
Francesca Ricciardone, Solidarity Center Program Officer, MENA

Francesca Ricciardone said one goal of the workshop is to avoid “exceptionalizing” the Middle East/North Africa (MENA) experience for women seeking to achieve power in times of political upheaval. The question we ask today, said Ricciardone, is “what role can unions play in creating more just societies and more equality in society?”

Zeinab Hashem Mahmoud Ahmed opened by noting the role of women and unions leading up to Egypt’s January 2011 uprising. Women played a major role in the 3,000 strikes by workers in the four years prior to the uprising, even though unions are made up of mostly men. There is no quota system to help women advance in Egyptian unions. Further, there are no child care facilities in workplaces and women don’t know their rights—they don’t know what the law says, so the only way they get those rights is through union membership. The January 2011 uprising called for equal job opportunities for men and women, and workers were pushing a law in the legislature that would permit creation of unions without the permission of the government.

She said “the Morsi regime was excluding women from political life,” even though “Islam itself calls for equality between men and women. But no one implements these laws.” Further, under Morsi, 151 workers were illegally fired in one year, she said. The year he was in office “was a tragic year for the working class. Many more suffered harassment” and much of the harassment was directed at unions, she said. Workers held rallies to demand work, and protests rose from 160 a month to more than 1,000 in six months. The 300 unions in eight regional federations of the EDLC “try to defend the rights of workers, especially workers who see their salaries are being slashed,” Ahmed said.

Alyaa Hussein Mahood Al-Rubaye began by noting that Iraqis “lived through very difficult times after the fall of Saddam Hussein—double jeopardy for rural women who were completely isolated.” Further, “We live in a tribal culture that’s totally misogynist,” she said, one based on “inherited customs.”

However, windows of opportunity began opening for women when the need to economically support their families grew. As a result, “work helped open the way for women to gain freedom. The whole issue of women started to became important after so many years of being invisible.” Still, society overall does not recognize women, even though after Saddam Hussein fell, the government and other entities began reaching out to women.

Ilham Abdulmaabood Majeed Al-Jasim continued Mahood’s discussion about the issues women face in Iraq by stating that “women can’t even go out in the streets without being harassed.” She cited the need for capacity building to increase women’s role in politics and the need for data to understand what women and men face in their daily lives. In short, “the advancement of women’s social status can only happen through training,” she said.

Touriya Lahrech built on Ricciardone’s call to expand the breadth of discussion by stating that “we in the Arab Spring call it a movement. In fact, it’s not even Arab because the area is multi-cultural and multi-lingual. We can’t call it purely Arab from a cultural perspective.”

Morocco has traditionally lacked independent trade unions, she said. Further, society traditionally has focused on “cultural values, male pride, rejecting what the woman has to say.” She described common caricatures of women as deceitful, and said to counter such stereotypes, women workers are looking to develop movies and other popular media to change the culture.

Achieving gender equality in unions means women must change union bylaws to include gender quotas for leadership positions because “there is a large gap between men and women in leadership.”

Lahrech, who is the coordinator of the CDT’s Women Department, said that the confederation has mandated that any local council that did not include a certain number of women could not vote as a member of the federation’s national council.

Francesca Ricciardone asked panelists to discuss how we can raise the issue of women’s rights.

Majeed Al-Jasim, who is president of the Telecommunications Workers Union in Iraq, said whatever the union undertakes “we always try to include women’s participation.” Yet, “the old mindset is not favorable to women’s participation.” Because women are shamed for going out in the street, women have very little visibility in mass protest rallies, she said.

Mahood Al-Rubaye discussed efforts by unions, with assistance from the Solidarity Center, to meet with government officials as they drafted new labor laws to ensure they comply with international labor standards. A “diversity of unions” have joined forces in this ongoing effort because of the Solidarity Center, she said.

Lahrech said it should not only be women’s responsibility to increase their role in unions. “It should be part of the structure of unions, it should be part of the core of policies of unions.” To achieve this goal, “union leaders have to be convinced of the need to include more women. There have to be empowerment policies to integrate them fully.”

In the audience, Chidi King from the ITUC’s Equality Department, described her experience while in Tunisia for International Women’s Day in March this year, and remarked on “their drive, their commitment, their activism.” Yet, “they are not getting the support they need from union structures.” Women need the space to self-organize. “If we are truly going to build a movement that is fully inclusive, women need to be able to organize among themselves,” she said.

Ahmed asked that the international community apply pressure on the government for example, by urging it to follow a law on union freedom that will allow women to organize. “So many people are outside any union structure,” she said. “The Muslim Brotherhood refused to enforce the law that would give back the rights to workers that have been stolen from them.”

Ricciardone asked panelists how they are regarded by society for doing this work.

Majeed Al-Jasim stated that “the lack of opportunity for women is one of the things that pushed women into union work.”

Ahmed said Egyptian “society is all about men. Tribal problems also exist, she said. “One tribe won’t be represented by another.” Women won’t run for political office because they face smear campaigns. “Most women are totally oblivious to their rights as workers,” she said, and her union is pushing for the government to educate women about their rights.

Lahrech said there is a “relationship between unions and women’s committees.” Her confederation held popular protests and rallies and joined with 650 organizations to take to the streets to protest religious extremists’ efforts to take away women’s rights.

Mahood pointed out that women in Kurdistan have a lot of rights. But because Baghdad is not safe, “we feel a lot of insecurity.” Despite the external challenges, Mahood said unions have had some successes, such as wage raises.

Ahmed remarked that after the revolution in Egypt, unions established women’s committees and unions provide much assistance around such issues as sexual harassment.

(Amnah Mafarjah, president of the Palestine General Federation of Trade Unions  was unable to attend the conference. Read her presentation, “Toward Promoting Equality and Social Protection for Working Women in the Agriculture and Public Services Sectors in Palestine.”)

Workshop – Mechanisms for Increasing Women’s Participation in Unions: Education, Policies, Quotas and Budgets

Workshop Decisions in Union Organizing: Applying a Gender Analysis to Organizing Campaigns

Workshop
Decisions in Union Organizing: Applying a Gender Analysis to Organizing Campaigns

Facilitator
Tom Egan, Solidarity Center Senior Program Officer, Trade Union Strengthening

Tom Egan: Conducting a gender analysis before an organizing campaign can boost its effectiveness. Photo: Matt Hersey

Tom Egan, who has been designing and running organizing campaigns for more than 20 years, facilitated this breakout session for those interested in the link between gender analysis and organizing. Egan said he sought to demonstrate that conducting a gender analysis prior to an organizing campaign can strengthen organizers’ strategic preparation,  improve the campaign’s effectiveness and increase its inclusivity—all of which ultimately will lead to a more inclusive, cohesive and sustainable trade union.  For instance, a  bargaining committee created after an organizing campaign that keeps gender in focus will be more inclusive of women workers and the collective bargaining agreement less gender-biased toward men’s concerns.

The 16 participants, who came from around the world, spoke about their experiences with organizing—some had extensive trade union background while others had engaged in community organizing.

In discussions on the elements of an organizing campaign, the majority agreed that the most important outcome is to get people to act, to change agendas and shift the previously existing balance of power. Participants discussed the steps of an organizing campaign, including:

• Preparing a campaign
• Identifying potential leaders among employees
• Recruiting the potential leaders to join the organizing campaign
• Training the leaders and empowering them to run meetings with their co-workers
• Identifying common issues among the employees
• Encouraging the group to undertake small, winnable activities
• Preparing the group to eventually establish the union with concrete and common demands and proposals so as to be ready to engage in collective bargaining

Egan gave the group an organizing exercise that highlighted how a gender analysis could influence the decisions made when running a campaign. He divided participants into three groups and asked each to develop a campaign for a separate bargaining unit of a fictional workplace. Employees in each area experienced different problems, some between the management and employees and others among employees. These problems included accusations of sexual harassment of women employees by male employees’ accusations that management favored men over women when it came to which employees were offered better shifts; wage equity; health and safety; and cafeteria food scheduling.

Each group was asked to select four candidates to run the organizing campaign in their department and each was given the same bio sheet listing of eight candidates from which to choose. Each group was tasked with reporting to the full workshop the process behind their choices of the four organizing team members. The groups also were asked to determine how they would create unity among the workers based on the workers’ diverse concerns. Finally, participants were asked to list the information the organizers would need to know about each worker.

In the report back session, the groups reported selecting different workers to lead the organizing committees. It became clear to all that gender influences decision making at all levels of an organizing campaign and keeping gender issues in the forefront will not necessarily make the decision-making process easier.

The exercise also confirmed the universality of organizing concepts across the globe. The group also came to another important conclusion: It is vitally important to try to include a worker’s family in the organizing campaign for the union to be sustainable. Unless the worker’s family members clearly understand the benefits of a trade union, they will not understand the worker’s motives and so may not support the decision to join a union or become active in one, and instead may resent the worker’s absence from the family.

Workshop – Mechanisms for Increasing Women’s Participation in Unions: Education, Policies, Quotas and Budgets

Workshop Strategic Alliances for Working Women’s Rights: Unions and NGOs

Workshop

Strategic Alliances for Working Women’s Rights: Unions and NGOs

Panelists

• Evangelina Argûeta Chinchilla, Coordinator, General Workers Confederation (CGT), and FESITRATEMASH, Honduras
• Julia Quiñonez Amparan, Coordinator, Comitè Fronterizo de Obreros/as (Border Committee of Workers), Mexico
• Gisela Dütting, Coordinator of the Living Wage Campaign at the Clean Clothes Campaign, Netherlands

Facilitator
Lorraine Clewer, Solidarity Center Country Program Director, Mexico

Lorraine Clewer discussed the question of why NGOs and unions would want to work together on issues affecting working women to advance a common agenda on women’s rights.

Julia Quiñonez began by describing the work of Comité Fronterizo de Obreros/as (Border Committee of Workers), a grassroots organization that supports union democracy and worker rights in six cities along the Mexico-U.S. border. With support from the Comité, maquiladora workers have won significant victories, even though organizing maquila workers and engaging in other union activities in border areas has been difficult since the 1980s because organizing activities and independent unions have been prohibited from operating in the area.

Union leaders then developed new strategies to overcome these obstacles, including empowering women to speak out against violations of women’s rights and worker rights. Women enthusiastically embraced empowerment on production lines and in factories, and joined forces in new groups. The groups were registered as NGOs, not unions. Despite the limitations of NGOs, they successfully organized several unions and conducted representation elections.  Unfortunately, these fledgling unions did not last because the companies did not allow them to survive.

The Comité is working in a strategic alliance with the mostly male Miners’ Union, Los Mineros, which is permitted to work with factories along the border. The alliance has strengthened over the past year, with mutual organizing assistance and training workshops with workers in factories. There are more than 500 factories with 100,000 workers in the maquiladora region, and in 2012, unions centered their organizing efforts here among several thousand workers. The Comité has worked with the AFL-CIO and the United Steelworkers (USW), as well as the Solidarity Center Office in Mexico, which has provided support for worker rights activities for more than 12 years.

Although border factories are highly profitable, mineworkers generally live in poverty, Quiñonez said, showing slides that depicted life along the Mexico side of the border. Numerous multinationals have factories in the area, including General Electric and Alcoa. At Alcoa, which produces components for Ford, workers earn about $50 a week for a 40-hour week.

A Finnish-owned company, PKC, bought an Alcoa factory which now makes components for several major car companies. In March 2012, the Comité arranged for reporters from Finland to visit the area and produce stories and documentaries about the conditions at the Finnish-owned PKC plant. A Finnish television program, “45 Minutes,” devoted an entire episode to the poor working conditions at the PKC plant, where many workers stepped forward to talk about their working conditions, despite the risk of employer retaliation. The campaign took a big step forward when a major pension fund threatened to withdraw all of its investments in the plant if working conditions did not improve.

PKC recently signed an agreement with the Comité, which is now seeking to the right to represent workers at the factory. Comité organizers are reaching out to workers through small labor education workshops and home visits especially aimed at women workers to try and empower them.

Evangelina Argûeta is working to build strategic alliances with two human and labor rights organizations in Honduras that develop women’s leadership skills at the workplace through training in labor rights and labor law. Partnering with these two organizations has been useful, she said, because developing women trade union leaders is not a priority for some unions.

In another example of strategic partnerships, Argûeta described the unity of unions and NGOs during the country’s 2002 economic crisis when many jobs were lost as factories closed. Their ability to mutually confront the crisis led to greater cooperation between unions and NGOs, she said.

However, there are obstacles to building alliances with NGOs and grassroots organizations, and the Central General de Trabajadores de Honduras (CGT) has worked to overcome them. For instance, many unions believe that NGOs are competitors and conduct campaigns against unions—and unfortunately, some do, she said. However, the CGT believes in working together with NGOs when there is a common interest and when an NGO’s work complements that of a union. For instance, many unions do not conduct programs on gender or gender equality as effectively as some NGOs do. Also, NGOs do effective research on issues such as salary levels, research that unions often do not have the capacity to perform.

Argûeta also discussed the CGT’s alliance with the Center for Women’s Rights in which they hold joint training programs in the Honduran manufacturing sector on human, labor, and women’s rights issues. The center also conducts trainings on sexual harassment and domestic violence, because it does a better job in this type of training than the unions do, Argûeta said. The CGT’s cooperative relationship with the center and with another NGO has strengthened union membership and assisted unions in collective bargaining and in safety and health work, which in turn has improved job safety and overall working conditions.

Gisela Dütting of the Clean Clothes Campaign (CCC) said her organization has worked closely with trade unions and NGOs around the world since 1989. Unions differ from country to country, as do NGOs. Some are more hierarchal, she said, and some have greater interest in organizing and in strengthening women’s rights.

The CCC works a lot in Asia with garment workers, unions and NGOs and has tried to add value on gender issues as well. The CCC seeks to expand outreach beyond union leadership to be more inclusive, a strategy that works better in some situations than in others. The CCC is also focusing on activities with migrants and migrant women workers.

Dütting discussed a 2010 study on alliances between trade union and NGOs that sought to determine the factors that lead to effective alliance. The study arrived at four conclusions:

1. Personal trust is important for success. Alliance building is a multi-year process that involves maintaining regular personal contact. Personal rapport is essential for advancing strategic alliances and there must be trust between high level leaders.

2. Local and national dynamics impact partnerships. Alliances work best in situations which are threatening to both groups, because organizations are seeking alliance partners to broaden the scope of their efforts.

3. It is important to forge common ways of talking about positions on issues of mutual interest.

4. There should be an incentive for each organization to collaborate with each other.

The CCC developed two important principles for its work in alliances:

1. The art of framing an issue is important. For instance, when working as part of an alliance, it is helpful to be able to show that it is not only a women’s issue but is also a broader workers’ issue of importance to many people. This opens space to reach out to other groups, such as young people. It is important to project a common approach which will help persuade a larger audience.

2. It is important to consider people’s multiple identities and affinities in organizing. For example, individuals identify not only as women or men, but also as workers or church-goers, and are open on many levels to different ways of approaching a common issue. Engaging these various identities overcomes tensions and differences in organizational imperatives and strengthens cooperation.

Dütting then turned to discussing how strategic alliances are essential to campaigns involving the global value chain, specifically that of the garment industry. She noted it is impossible to effectively work nationally or locally without addressing the entire supply chain. Clothes are no longer produced only in Asia with the biggest buyers in Europe and the United States—consumers and brands are spread across the globe and it’s important to link up and get all of these folks working together because the combined forces of producers, consumers and concerned citizens make the most impact in effecting change. For instance, campaigns in Europe around retail outlets reach out to customers, with unions engaging in a variety of activities in different countries.

Dütting also cited the example of Cambodia, a major apparel producer, where there have been mass faintings of women garment workers—some believe the women are too poor to afford enough food. The Community Legal Education Center, a Cambodian NGO, linked up with groups in different countries to organize mass faint-ins at major stores in Europe. The CCC website has photos of the mass faint-ins.

General Discussion
Question:  What are the deeper and convergent interests between NGOs and unions? What are the difficulties involved?

Quiñonez:  It is a big challenge for unions to work cooperatively with NGOs and to find common interests in working together, but we have had some success in doing this. One big difference is in how the work is conducted by each type of organization. Unions tend to engage in direct actions such as picket lines, demonstrations, and similar types of activities. The CFO NGO has a more horizontal way of operating while unions tend to be more vertical. The different capacity and interests of these groups can complement each other, although it has been challenging to work together and develop a methodology that benefits both types of organizations. Conducting activities to empower women and workers through awareness training, conducting workshops, and one-on-one discussion have helped encourage greater cooperation. While there are sometimes tensions and disagreements, they have continued efforts to make it work because these mutual efforts have had results and there have been a number of success stories that have helped workers.

Last October, government and company-controlled unions beat the independent union in a very close representation election. Because past union elections have been marred by irregularities, an oversight group observing this election ordered that a new election be held. This demonstrated the need for NGOs and unions to keep working together despite their differences and tensions within their alliance so that workers can get fair representation.

Argûeta: In Honduras, unions have common interests with NGOs and there are a number of women in leadership positions. While there are tensions between unions and NGOs, the two groups have worked together to confront injustices that workers face. Some unions in labor federations have criticized her union for reaching out to NGOs.

Some men in unions have been critical and made derogatory remarks such as women involved in these education programs are learning to be lesbians. There has also been bullying by leaders and members in some unions who are opposed to working with women’s rights and feminist groups.  The women activists try to demonstrate that women have the capacity to be union leaders. Some employers have asked why unions are working with NGOs, while some union leaders fear that the NGOs are trying to replace some union leaders. The women explain to them that the NGOs are doing work that the unions have not been doing and should be doing; and that they need to work together to promote gender equality along with unionization.

There are also problems with the way unions are structured. Obtaining legal registration is difficult and time-consuming. On the other hand, some NGOs don’t recognize the right for workers to belong to unions. In response, efforts have been made to work with unions and NGOs to define how workers should be represented and to promote mutual respect and understanding.

They are trying to resolve their differences and to work together. The issue of violence against women has also provided common ground to bring together NGOs and unions. Whenever there is a demonstration on the issue of violence against women, unions should participate along with NGOs on this important issue.

Question: Are these organizations changing because of their relationships and common activities?

Quiñonez: The fundamental mission has not changed, but methods have. It’s an ongoing process with increased contact between NGOs and unions which should continue to progress in future years.

Argûeta: There have been behavior changes rather than a change in mission because the leadership of her union now recognizes the value of working with NGOs. One concern is that NGOs depend on obtaining financial support for projects and if a group loses funding for these activities, it could cause major problems.

Workshop – Mechanisms for Increasing Women’s Participation in Unions: Education, Policies, Quotas and Budgets

Workshop – Brazil’s Integrated Education and Solidarity Economy: Opening Pathways to Income and Citizenship

Workshop

Brazil’s Integrated Education and Solidarity Economy: Opening Pathways to Income and Citizenship

Participants
• Ruth Needleman, Professor Emerita, Labor Studies Program, Indiana University, USA
• Eunice Maria Dias Wolf, Secretary of Social Development, City of Canoas, Brazil
• Mardeli de Quadros Rosa, General Coordinator, Associação de Mulheres do Multiplicar, Brazil
• Maria Regina dos Santos Braga, President, Cooperativa Vida Saudável, Brazil

Facilitators
David Welsh, Solidarity Center Country Program Director, Cambodia
Alex Feltham, Solidarity Center Senior Program Officer, Asia

Mardeli de Quadros Rosa (left) and Ruth Needleman described Brazilian unions’ successful popular education campaign. Photo: Tula Connell 

Ruth Needleman opened the workshop, which focused on a labor-run popular education project in Brazil, by stating that “the role of the union is to go beyond membership, to go into the community.” At the center of that goal is understanding the importance of education.

Needleman then overviewed the program, in which the Central Unitario de Trabajadores (CUT) engaged in a far-reaching outreach project based on the concept of “integrated education,” which combines traditional disciplines with experience-based learning. CUT centered its program in Quilombo, a primarily Afro-Brazilian state far from urban centers, initially training 3,000 local residents to lead the community-based program. The project, which ran from 2003 to 2006, was unique in targeting all nonunion members, and was especially successful in empowering women, many of whom were illiterate and suffered from domestic abuse.

Needleman gave an example of how the program empowered women by describing the experience of Anna, who had worked from age 12 at a shoe factory. She couldn’t help her son with homework and he didn’t respect her because of her lack of knowledge. So she jumped at the opportunity to get an elementary school education through the unions’ integrated learning process. She went to school five nights a week for three months after working 10 hours day. Education changed everything, she said. “Now, I am somebody. Before, I was nobody and treated as a nobody.”

After the initial year, the union trained 2,000 new teachers a year. Classroom activity involved computer training, investigation and analysis. Students learned traditional subjects through practical examples. For instance, they learned math by examining the price of bread as it goes up and down, or absorbed science through identifying pollution in their communities.

The process creates a community of support, and members of this community then go on to meet with government officials and other decision-makers, to push them to implement the changes identified by the community.

The project also involved training workers to market their products. In Quilombo, the union trainers found that the Afro-Brazilians planted a unique genus of rice. They tested it and found it is much more nutritious than Asian rice. In previous centuries, black slaves tucked rice grains in their hair so they would have some to plant in case they were uprooted, thus keeping that specific genus viable. When they learned how to market their rice, they went from “being people with no self worth” to people selling goods, Needleman said.

The National Metalworkers Union (SNM) took the concept of integrated education even further and re-structured elementary school education, creating an intensive, four-night a week program. Many of the participants were low-wage workers, like domestic workers.

The trade unions involved in the popular education project “made an enormous commitment to people outside the union,” Needleman said. “This is very important, because most workers, including women, are outside unions.”

Needleman believes CUT ended the project because it returned to a focus on membership, “and so became isolated from society.” Further, the Lula government’s “solidarity economy has been a tremendously important means for transforming the economy.”

Eunice Maria Dias Wolf spoke briefly, describing the SNM, where she has worked for 28 years, and overseen the creation and mission of Associação de Mulheres do Multiplicar, showing images of the women involved in the association. She also noted the SNM offers a training program for women in such areas as collective bargaining and leadership training because the union wanted to ensure all local unions in the metalworkers’ federation had women on board.

She ended with a quote from Simone de Beauvoir: “Only work can ensure concrete independence.”

See her full presentation.

Mardeli de Quadros Rosa noted that before becoming general coordinator of Associação de Mulheres do Multiplicar, she was the former treasurer (2003-2006) of the BMBC—Biscuits, Pasta and Homemade Biscuits, a micro enterprise.

She overviewed Associação de Mulheres do Multiplicar, founded in 1997, which was created with the support of the Metalworkers. Its mission is to promote social inclusion of women to fight all forms of oppression and violence. The organization holds courses on citizenship, women’s rights, women’s health and has added a new course, one focused on domestic violence. It’s the only organization in the state (Rio Grande do Sol) that looks after victims of domestic violence.

Maria Regina dos Santos Braga is a former student of the union education program, and now president of a cooperative that employs women seamstresses. “When I started doing this work, housework was all I knew,” she said. “I am very proud to have taken the long walk these women have taken. So imagine the multiplier effect—we hope to grow and grow.”

The Cooperativa Vida Saudável, a cooperative of seamstresses, recycles donated clothes and the workers customize, renovate and fix them, then sell them at subway stops. For instance, the seamstresses transform towels and turn them into handkerchiefs. Many families benefit from this income the seamstresses earn.

Santos Braga works in the Healthy Life Cooperative, which has four sections, including one where women produce cakes and bread for sale and another where they make jelly and cookies. They also cater parties and weddings. The Associação de Mulheres do Multiplicar was key for the formation of this cooperative. The association offers courses for women, and when they first start, “they have very low self-esteem,” she said, and sometimes are victims of domestic violence. “We have to rescue women.”

Eunice Maria Dias Wolf closed the workshop by paying tribute to an association member, Patricia Esber, who was murdered at age 32 by her husband, the victim of domestic violence.

“Cooperative sharing is intrinsic to our tradition. People engaged in popular education must have this vision,” she said. “We believe it’s in our capacity for teamwork, against individualism.”

See the presentation of Quadros Rosa, Santos Braga and Wolf. (Portuguese)

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